<p> The goal of this study is to characterize spatial variability of snow water equivalent (SWE) at the meter scale. The study includes measurement of SWE with a new pressure sensor and use of meteorological sensor data to investigate physical properties within the snowpack that can affect sensor measurement. The new sensor, which can continuously measure a load equivalent to up to 5.5 meters of snow, is designed to be smaller and less expensive (&lt; $1,500) than traditional pressure sensors (> $10,000). Manual snow cores and detailed snow pit analyses were performed to assess accuracy of the sensors and identify physical properties that may be related to sensor measurement error. SWE sensor response and accuracy were assessed between sensors and through comparison with bulk precipitation gage, manual SWE measurements, and snow pillows. SWE sensor readings compared favorably to other measurement methods, particularly in early and peak season. Spatial variability of SWE during the melt season of the two low-snow years during the study period confounded our ability to compare multiple sensor readings for validation. Spatial variability of SWE at study sites was calculated from sets of manual SWE measurements. The correlation length of 80 cm, determined using semi-variograms, highlights the small scale variability in SWE. Statistical resampling of manual measurements suggests that a minimum of ten manual measurements are needed to get within 10% of the spatial average of SWE. Although SWE can remain relatively stable during the melt period, this can be a result of increased density with decreasing snow depth, suggesting that simple inferences about SWE from depth measurements are not appropriate.</p>

E-commerce creates opportunities for companies to implement internal and external connections. This establishes new capabilities to meet market needs and changes the way business can be conducted through the redefinition of rules and roles in the extended enterprise. The literature suggests that the emergence of Internet / Web based communities of common interest accelerates this shift towards the concept of the extended enterprise by enabling enterprises to align within a series of 'value networks' against other groups of enterprises. A collaborative approach and shared benefits are among the crucial factors which bind these value networks of closely integrated business communities. This study investigates the cultural and organisational context of implementing e-commerce to support business to business collaborative relationships. Using primarily qualitative and exploratory methods, various interrelationships are explored through two in depth case studies. The research approach is structured by underpinning theories, predominantly transaction cost economics, and informed by key findings from the literature search of the topic domain. The research itself is based on the assumption that collaborative e-commerce cannot be considered in a vacuum and that a holistic perspective is required, particularly in considering the socio-political and relational aspects of such inter-organisational systems. The work undertaken therefore seeks to identify the interrelationships between the IT, organisational and business aspects of collaborative business to business relationships. The research concludes that a number of interdependent factors are key in implementing e-commerce to support collaborative relationships. Foremost among these are the redesign of processes and practices, common information interchange standards and support, a consultative approach based on mutual trust, the sharing of benefits and a willingness to learn and to adopt a 'network' perspective. The findings are encapsulated into an e-commerce/collaborative relationship framework developed by incorporating key findings from the case studies, as well as themes from the literature. This framework may be a useful tool for analysis in other case studies and could be refined and enhanced by further such research.

<p> What explains variation over time in how states treat &ldquo;non-core groups&rdquo;? What are the reasons for co-opting, accommodating, or politically excluding them? Drawing on insights in ethnic politics and international relations, a recent body of literature claims that interstate relations and foreign policy ought to drive state decision making toward externally linked groups. Yet, I observe outcomes that suggest that when regimes perceive a higher threat to internal regime security than they do to their territorial borders, domestic politics is more important in driving regime decision making toward such groups. In such situations, even if non-core groups are supported by unfriendly external powers, I argue that regimes decide to accommodate, accommodate and co-opt, or politically exclude such groups based on their location in the architecture of the opposition&mdash;the numerical strength and diversity of identities in the opposition that threaten the regime in power. The causal mechanism for this relationship is the perception of proximate threats to regime security from political opposition, with larger, crosscutting oppositional configurations posing a bigger threat than smaller, homogenous opposition. I also argue that regimes prefer non-core groups to &ldquo;stay in their lane&rdquo;, that is, that they remain narrowly political in regards to pursuing goods from the state related to their identity.</p><p> This dissertation employs an in-depth, single case study of one group in the same country over time, testing the finding in a secondary country using a most similar systems approach. The case of Kuwait&rsquo;s treatment of its Shi&lsquo;a from 1963 through 2011 serves as the in-depth case study, and uses data gathered from seventy interviews during half a year of fieldwork in Kuwait City in 2013, in addition to documents from the British National Archives and Arabic media. I also briefly compare outcomes in policies toward the Shi&lsquo;a to policies toward the stateless residents and expatriates. Insights from the Kuwaiti case are tested on the secondary case of Bahrain to explain regime treatment of the Shi&lsquo;a from 1973 through 2011. I also suggest that the theory may be extrapolated to explain the variation in recent relations between the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the non-core Kurds in Turkey. The findings crack open the black box of ethnic politics in semi-authoritarian regimes, helping to explain variation&mdash;and some counter-intuitive co-optation&mdash;in cases in which we might expect more exclusion in general.</p>

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<p> Every year a plethora of students come to pursue their careers at California State University, Long Beach (CSULB). The university supports an arena of web portals for enrollment, courses, department, student recreation and wellness amongst others.</p><p> Although there are enrollment services available, they involve mandatory check-ins and paperwork. GoSchoolPro portal eases the process of enrollment for the students by providing convenient services. This portal will not only help in facilitating the process for the incoming students but will also give voice to the past experiences of the alumni. It will be a student democrat: For the students and by the students.</p><p> The current project presents GoSchoolPro as a web application, which leverages the Model-View-Controller (MVC) architecture as its foundation and implements the Active Server Pages using Dot NET (ASP.NET) framework. GoSchoolPro uses the backbone of the Object-Oriented Analysis and Design (OOAD) methodology and other Software Engineering (SE) best practices.</p>

No description available.

<p> Collaborative helping via social networking conversation threads can pose serious challenges in emergency situations. Interfaces that support complex group interaction and sense-making can help. This research applies human-computer interaction (HCI), computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW), and collaboration engineering in developing an interactive design, the Mega-Collaboration Tool (MCT). The goal is to reduce the cognitive load of a group&rsquo;s growing mental model, thus increasing the general public&rsquo;s ability to organize spontaneous collaborative helping. </p><p> The specific aims of this research include understanding the dynamics of mental model negotiation and determining whether MCT can assist the group&rsquo;s sense-making ability without increasing net cognitive load. </p><p> The proposed HCI theory is that interfaces supporting collaborative cognition motivate contribution and reduce information bias, thus increasing the information shared. These research questions are addressed: 1. Does MCT support better collaborative cognition? 2. Does increasing the size of the shared data repository increase the amount of information shared? 3. Does this happen because group members experience 1) a greater sense of strategic commitment to the knowledge structure, 2) increased intrinsic motivation to contribute, and 3) reduced resistance to sharing information? </p><p> These questions were affirmed to varying degrees, giving insight into the collaborative process. Greater content did not motive group members directly; instead, half of their motivation came from awareness of their contribution&rsquo;s relevance. Greater content and organization improved this awareness, and also encouraged sharing through increased enthusiasm and reduced bias. Increased commitment was a result of this process, rather than a cause. Also, MCT increased collaborative cognition but was significantly hampered by Internet performance. This challenge indicates MCT&rsquo;s system components should be redesigned to allow asynchronous interaction. These results should contribute to the development of MCT, other collaboration engineering applications, and HCI and information science theory.</p>

In western countries at least one third of the population develops cancer. The main cause of death in cancer patients is metastasis and there is no effective treatment for this complication. The situation can be improved by a better understanding of the cancer invasion process. In order to re­ veal new aspects of this dynamic process, a novel image-processing-based direct viewing cancer-cell invasion assay was developed and used with inverted wide-field microscopy. The combination of high-resolution 3D image-processing approaches with a custom-made flow chamber system enabled the quantification of the sarcoma-cell invasion process through a monolayer of endothelial cells in vitro. The image processing entailed the separation of positive cell signal from background noise and blur, which are inherent in 3D wide-field microscopy. The preparation and cell signal segmentation of wide-field images prior to quantification featured stochastic as well as deterministic techniques. The stochastic approach was based on a Gaussian Mixture Model to separate noise and background signal characteristics from positive cell signal which performed well in conditions with high signal-to-noise ratios. The. deterministic segmentation approach was based- on linear diffusion and performed well despite low signal-to-noise ratios as it assessed the diffusion rates of cell signal over multiple convolutions. The image-processing-based assay included the definition of two new parameters to quantify the invasion: Relative Invasion (RI) and Opening Rate of the Endothelial Monolayer (O REM). The first parameter RI measured the invasion as the percentage of sarcoma cell signal below the reconstructed monolayer surface. The second parameter O RE M evaluated the speed at which the sarcoma cells disassemble the monolayer in their strive to exit the flow channel. This assay was applied to metastatic rat sarcoma cells where the cells invaded monolayers of rat endothelial cells. After adhesion, the sarcoma cells initially invaded significantly faster under flow conditions compared to situations without shear stress. Later, however, the rate of invasion underflow decreased and the sarcoma cells without shear stress achieved significantly higher levels of invasion. These observations thus revealed the non-linear modulation of a tumour-cell invasion process by shear flow, demonstrating that tumour cells can respond to flow by enhancement of invasiveness in a similar way to white blood cells. In summary, the newly developed direct viewing assay provides a quantitative image-processing-based approach to assessing cancer invasion dynamics, which should lead to a better understanding of the mechanisms involved in cancer invasion and metastasis.

Understanding knowledge management is critical for organisations because the persons concerned are not trained adequately to access, use and benefit from this knowledge effectively. The main problem is that the workers themselves do not understand how to organize and manage a huge amount of knowledge capital has, and the importance of this to improve organizational performance. This research is based on understanding the importance of knowledge management practices and policies within an organisation. This is based on research to understand the importance of knowledge management practices and policies within the organization. This research focuses on building a framework based on the knowledge of social issues within the organization and its impact on business. This research will explore strategies that can be used for organizations in order to integrate this knowledge into their business social benefit from social ontology. To enable this framework, a business organization knowledge management integrated social ontology framework (BOKMISOf) was built with a focus on telecommunications industry in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states. In order to understand the social aspects of an organisation, a social ontology was developed which was incorporated into the knowledge management framework. The BOKMISO framework was evaluated with case studies, within telecommunication companies, in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states. The employees of these companies contributed in data collection activity via questionnaire, whereas the managers of these companies contributed via semi-structured interview. Results that were gathered from data collection showed that BOKMISO framework was valid, appropriate, useful and added value to an organisation. Further work can be done to apply the BOKMISOf within other telecommunications companies in Saudi Arabia.

<p> This dissertation investigates emotional contagion in social movements within social media platforms, such as Twitter. The main research question is: How does a protest behavior spread in social networks? The following sub-questions are: (a) What is the dynamic behind the anger contagion in online social networks? (b) What are the key variables for ensuring emotional spread? We gained access to Twitter data sets on protests in Charlotte, NC (2016) and Charlottesville, VA (2017). Although these two protests differ in their triggering points, they have similarities in their macro behaviors during the peak protest times. To understand the influence of anger spread among users, we extracted user mention networks from the data sets. Most of the mentioned users are influential ones, who have a significant number of followers. This shows that influential users occur as the highest in-degree nodes in the core of the networks, and a change in these nodes affects all connected public users/nodes. Then, we examined modularity measures quite high within users&rsquo; own communities. After implementing the networks, we ran experiments on the anger spread according to various theories with two main assumptions: (1) Anger is the triggering emotion for protests and (2) Twitter mentions affect distribution of influence in social networks. We found that user connections with directed links are essential for the spread of influence and anger; i.e., the angriest users are the most isolated ones with less number of followers, which signifies their low impact level in the network.</p><p>