The purpose of this session is to examine the vestibular consequences of mild traumatic brain injury (TBI) and blast exposure. Preliminary data will be presented showing characteristics of vestibular dysfunction and postural instability related to mild TBI and blast exposure. Also reviewed will be the latest findings including recent data collected at the War Related Illness & injury Center showing vestibular impairments in those with mTBI. The target audience is audiologists, physical therapists, neurologists, otolaryngologists. This session will cover intermediate level of content.

The purpose of this thesis is to study the effect of lower milk support prices trigger ed by chronic surplus production problems and to offer alter native management strategies for dairymen caught in the cash flow squeeze precipitated by resulting cuts in the producer price of milk. Historical dairy policy is reviewed and recommendations are offered for consideration in developing dairy policy over the next decade. FLIPSIM V, a powerful, firm-level computerized simulation model is employed to predict the probable outcome of employing alternative management strategies designed to improve profitability for individual dairymen. The study focuses on a typical farm devised from survey data to be representative of Utah's dairy industry. A five-year planning horizon is simulated.

<div>This thesis proposes an Adaptive Rule-Based Energy Management Strategy (ARBS EMS) for a parallel hybrid electric vehicle (P-HEV). The strategy can effciently be deployed online without the need for complete knowledge of the entire duty cycle in order to optimize fuel consumption. ARBS improves upon the established Preliminary Rule-Based Strategy (PRBS) which has been adopted in commercial vehicles. When compared to PRBS, the aim of ARBS is to maintain the battery State of Charge (SOC) which ensures the availability of the battery over extended distances. The proposed strategy prevents the engine from operating in highly ineffcient regions and reduces the total equivalent fuel consumption of the vehicle. Using an HEV model developed in Simulink, both the proposed ARBS and the established PRBS strategies are compared across eight short duty cycles and one long duty cycle with urban and highway characteristics. Compared to PRBS, the results show that, on average, a 1.19% improvement in the miles per gallon equivalent (MPGe) is obtained with ARBS when the battery initial SOC is 63% for short duty cycles. However, as opposed to PRBS, ARBS has the advantage of not requiring any prior knowledge of the engine efficiency maps in order to achieve optimal performance. This characteristics can help in the systematic aftermarket hybridization of heavy duty vehicles.</div>

Historically Black colleges and university managers lack sufficient understanding of customer-relationship management strategies to create high enrollment rates leading to increased financial stability. The focus of this qualitative single case study was to explore customer-relationship management strategies managers use to improve financial performance from historically Black colleges and universities located within the state of Georgia with a student enrollment that exceeds 2,000 students. The conceptual framework for this study was the general system theory. Data were collected using semistructured interviews and employee handbooks. The data analysis consisted of compiling the data, disassembling the data into common codes, reassembling the data into themes, interpreting the meaning, and reporting the themes. The use of member checking and methodological triangulation increased the trustworthiness of the study. Themes that emerged were efficiencies with technology, student retention, and financial performance. Using up to date and effective technology including customer relationship management, and creating strategies to focus on student retention can help educational organizations improve their financial performance. The potential for social change includes the opportunity to increase the graduation and student retention rates to provide more opportunities for local business leaders and enhance the economic sustainability of local communities.

Despite the tremendous achievement in economic development over the past four decades since independence, Malaysia is facing a problem of environmental degradation at a rapid pace. In searching for Malaysian approach to alter this trend, this thesis is written against a background of concern for a balanced development in economy and social wellbeing and simultaneously preserving the environment. The aim of the study is to identify an alternative approach in managing the local environment for health, starting from a value position of regard for local knowledge and abilities, and for scientists and administrators working together with local knowledge and abilities, and for scientists and administrators working together with local communities in their natural settings. Findings from this study offer a range of lessons for those who wish to integrate local and scientific knowledge. The research approach proved capable of documenting the separate realities of the place-based and the knowledge-based communities within a common interpretative framework. The place-based communities held realistic interpretations of their capacity to contribute to local sustainable development, distinct from one another and also distinct from the same events as perceived by the scientific community. The conclusion is drawn that each needs the other for any effective local application of scientific findings or government support. Finally, this has not been a study of top-down or bottom up but from the 'inside-out' with a small study of the 'outside-in.' It offers another perspective and an extra set of tools or strategies for the professionals' community to work with local communities in their environmental management for health. The desired outcome would be for the local communities to contribute as a full partner to the dominant scientific studies in designing local management strategies. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Soil microorganisms play important roles in maintaining soil quality and ecosystem health. Development of effective methods for studying the composition, diversity, and behavior of microorganisms in soil habitats is essential for a broader understanding of soil quality. Forest management strategies and practices are of vital significance for sustainable forest production. How the different forest management measures will influence soil microbial communities is a widespread concern of forest industry and scientific communities. Only a small proportion (~0.1%) of the bacteria from natural habitats can be cultured on laboratory growth media. Direct extraction of whole-community DNA from soil, followed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and other analysis circumvents the problems of the culture-dependent methods and may shed light on a broader range of microbial communities in the soil. DNA-based molecular methods rely on high quality soil microbial DNA as template, and thus extraction of good quality DNA from soil samples has been a challenge because of the complex and heterogeneous nature of the soil matrix. The objectives of this research were to establish a set of DNA-based molecular methods and to apply them to investigate forest soil microbial composition and diversity. Soil samples were collected from different forest ecosystems, i.e., the natural forest (YNF) and the first rotation (~ 50 years) (Y1R) and the second rotation (~ 1 year) (Y2R) of hoop pine plantations at Yarraman, and from different forest residue management practices (the experiments had established 6.4 years before the samples were collected) at Gympie, two long-term experimental sites of the Queensland Department of Primary Industry-Forestry in subtropical Queensland, Australia. Some DNA-based molecular techniques, including DNA extraction and purification, PCR amplification, DNA screening, cloning, sequencing and phylogenetic analyses, were explored using Yarraman soil samples, which were high in organic matter, clay and iron oxide contents. A set of methods was assembled based on the recommendations of the method development experiments and applied to the investigations of the microbial composition and diversity of the Yarraman and Gympie soil samples. Four soil DNA extraction methods, including the Zhou method (Zhou et al., 1996), the Holben method (Holben, 1994), the UltraClean (Mo Bio) and FastDNA (Bio 101) soil DNA extraction kits, were explored. It was necessary to modify these methods for Yarraman soil. I designed and introduced a pre-lysis buffer washing step, to partially remove soil humic substances and promote soil dispersion. This modification greatly improved the quality of the extracted DNA, decreasing co-extracted humic substances by 31% and increasing DNA yield by 24%. The improved Holben method was recommended for fungal community studies, and the improved Zhou method for bacterial community studies. The extracted DNA was good in quality, with a consistent size of ~20 kb and a yield of 48-87 g g-1 soil, and could be successfully used for 16S (Zhou method) and 18S (Holben method) rDNA amplifications. For less difficult environmental samples, UltraClean kits could be a good option, because they are simple and fast and the extracted DNA are also of good quality. Screening of the DNA PCR products using TGGE, Heteroduplex-TGGE and SSCP was also explored. These methods were not so effective for the screening of the soil DNA PCR products, owing to the difficulty in interpretation of the results. Cloning was a necessary step to obtain a single sequence at species level in soil microbial community studies. The screening of the clone library by TGGE, Heteroduplex-TGGE and SSCP could only separate the clones into several major bands, although SSCP gave better separation. Sequencing of selected clones directly from the clone library obtained ultimate results of microbial taxonomic composition and diversity through well-established sequence analysis software packages and the databases. It was recommended that, in this project with the target of microbial community composition and diversity, soil DNA PCR products were directly cloned to construct clone libraries and a sample of clones were sequenced to achieve an estimate of the taxonomic composition of the soil. Fungal communities of the Yarraman soil samples under the natural forest (YNF) and the hoop pine plantations (YHP) were investigated using 18S rDNA based cloning and sequencing approaches. Twenty-eight clone sequences were obtained and analysed. Three fungal orders, i.e., Zygomycota, Ascomycota and Basidiomycota were detected from the YNF and YHP samples. By contrast, culture-based analyses of fungi in the literature were mostly Ascomycetes. YNF appeared to have more Ascomycota but less Zygomycota than YHP, and within the Zygomycota order, YHP had more unidentified species than YNF. Bacterial communities of Yarraman soil samples of YNF, Y1R and Y2R were investigated using 16S rDNA-based cloning and sequencing approaches. 305 16S rDNA clone sequences were analysed and showed an overall bacterial community composition of Unclassified bacteria (34.4%), Proteobacteria (22.0%), Verrucomicrobia (15.7%), Acidobacteria (10.2%), Chloroflexi (6.9%), Gemmatimonadetes (5.6%), and Actinobacteria (5.2%). There was a significant difference among YNF, Y1R and Y2R in the taxonomic group composition. YNF had a greater proportion of Acidobacteria (18.0%), Verrucomicrobia (23.0%) and Chloroflexi (9.0%) than Y1R and Y2R (corresponding to 6.3%, 12.1% and 5.9%, respectively), while Y1R and Y2R had a higher percentage of the Unclassified group (38.5% for Y1R and 46.5% for Y2R) than YNF (18.0%). For the Proteobacteria group, YNF had more Alpha-subdivision but Y1R and Y2R had more Delta-subdivision. From YNF to Y1R to Y2R, the clone sequence variable site ratios, 5% and 10% OTU numbers and Shannon's diversity index H' values tended to decrease, indicating the soil bacterial diversity decreased from the natural forest to the first and the second rotation hoop pine plantations. The large amount of unclassified clone sequences could imply a novel group of bacteria in the soil, particularly in the hoop pine soil samples. Alternatively they may result from artefacts during the PCR process. Bacterial communities of the Gympie soil under different residue management practices, i.e., residue (litter plus logging residue) removed (G0R), residue retained (G1R), and residue doubled (G2R), were also investigated using the 16S rDNA-based cloning and sequencing approaches. Acidobacteria (37.6%) and Proteobacteria (35.6%, including Alpha-subdivision of 29.9% and Gamma-subdivision of 5.7%) were dominant components of the communities, followed by Actinobacteria (14.7%), Verrucomicrobia (7.3%) and Unclassified bacteria. There was no significant difference among G0R, G1R and G2R in the bacterial community compositions and diversity. These findings provided an in-depth vision of the soil microbial communities under different forest management practices. Their combination with other soil analysis results, such as physical and chemical properties, and forest production data, could provide an improved understanding of sustainable forest management strategies.

Knowledge management is considered a necessary precursor to organizational success. This view is increasingly prevalent in the case of the health care sector. Two main knowledge management strategies are recognized: codification and personalization strategies. An organizations choice of knowledge management strategy depends on its objectives and the dominant form of knowledge informing its decision-making processes.<p>Health care decision-makers have access to a wealth of knowledge with which to inform their decisions. Little is known, however, about how the various types of knowledge are managed to optimize their use in decision-making. This study examines the knowledge management strategies of health care decision-makers working in the context of a regionalized health care system. The potential of communities of practice as a conceptual means for understanding health care knowledge management is also explored.<p>Members of Regional health authorities (RHAs) in the province of Saskatchewan constitute the unit of analysis for the study, which is guided by a qualitative research design. Interviews were used as the main data collection technique. For data analysis, open and axial coding methods based on the inductive and deductive approaches were adopted.<p>The study concludes that regional health authority (RHA) members utilize more fully explicit rather than tacit forms of knowledge. One of the main knowledge management practices adopted by the RHA members is the use of professional reports. This indicates that RHA members pursue a codification strategy more strongly than a personalization strategy. Moreover, it was found that the practices and strategies associated with managing knowledge were in place, despite the absence of a stated knowledge management policy. Finally, RHAs cannot be regarded as communities of practice, even though they exhibit many of their features.<p>Recommendations include the following: (1) the need for RHAs to institutionalize a knowledge management policy to guide their knowledge management processes and strategies, and (2) the cultivation of online communities of practice to marshal the tacit knowledge of RHA members, and that of the public, as an intervention to complement the use of explicit knowledge.

This thesis, which consists of three self-contained essays, examines, both theoretically and empirically, some of the economic and identity strategies and mechanisms that federated co-operatives, in particular, and strategic alliances, in general, can use to achieve co-operation and coordination. To accomplish this objective, the thesis uses a combination of industrial organization and game theory concepts from economics, insights from social and cognitive psychology, and evidence from in-depth interviews with decision-makers in the Co-operative Retailing System (CRS) - an association of 264 independent Western Canadian retail co-operatives and their wholesaler, Federated Co-operatives Ltd. (FCL).<p> Essay One combines a case study of the CRS with an examination, in a game-theoretic framework, of the co-operation and coordination problems arising among firms in alliances and the potential solutions to these problems suggested in the economics and business strategy literatures. One of the contributions of this essay is to provide examples of the mechanisms that can be used to implement these theoretical solutions in a business setting - i.e., the essay identifies practical ways for alliances to alter partner firms' payoffs, to provide private rewards, to monitor behaviour, to establish long term goals among partners, to build high group identification within the alliance, and to focus partners' expectations on the efficient outcomes. Another contribution of this essay is to identify some of the second-order co-operation problems that arise in strategic alliances - e.g., lack of incentives by alliance partners to contribute resources that are necessary to develop alliance management mechanisms - and to offer examples of the strategies that can be used to deal with these problems.<p> Essay Two draws upon social identity theory and develops an economic model of behaviour to show how the core firm in a strategic network can promote effective co-operation among network members by inducing them to identify with the network. In addition, the essay offers empirical evidence from the CRS that identity has successfully been used, together with economic mechanisms, to foster co-operation among member retails, and provides examples of the most important mechanisms that FCL, as the core firm in the CRS, has used to manage the identity of the retails. More generally, by incorporating the psychology (and sociology) of identity into an economic model of behaviour, Essay Two contributes to an emerging view that non-economic (behavioural) factors are complementary to the economic ones in the management of strategic partnerships.<p> Essay Three considers the collective action problems that arise in co-operatives when it comes to financing growth and identifies the conditions under which retained patronage can be an effective way for co-operatives to raise growth capital. The essay develops a game-theoretic model to examine the trade-off between the share of patronage refunds a co-operative wholesaler pays to member retails in cash and the share of patronage refunds it retains and invests, so as to provide retails with enough short-run benefits to encourage them to patronize their organization, while still retaining resources to invest in long-term growth. Analytical results show that when there are increasing returns in patronizing the co-operative wholesaler, retails' decisions to patronize their organization are complementary strategies and, as a result, multiple equilibria are possible. Some of these equilibria are ones with high patronage and high investment, while others are characterized by low patronage and low investment. Retails' expectations about the actions of their counterparts are critical in determining the prevailing equilibrium. The analysis also shows that the existence of the horizon problem further constraints the ability of the wholesaler to raise growth capital. Taken together, these results suggest that the retention of patronage refunds can be an effective way for the co-operative wholesaler to raise growth capital, provided it acts to focus retails' expectations on the 'good' equilibrium and to mitigate the horizon problem.<p> By examining the strategies and mechanisms that the CRS has used to achieve co-operation and coordination, and in so doing illustrating the mechanisms that firms can use to manage partner opportunism and prevent coordination failure, the thesis contributes to the alliance management literature. Firms today are increasingly forming strategic alliances with suppliers, buyers, and even competitors in order to achieve sustainable competitive advantage. However, despite their increasing popularity and value-creation potential, alliances more often fail than succeed, with alliance failure often attributed to opportunistic (non-co-operative) behaviour by one or more of the partners and to coordination failure. As a result, it is important to identify strategies and mechanisms that alliance partners can use to achieve co-operation and coordination, and thus realize the benefits from their association.<p> The thesis also contributes to the co-operative literature by shedding light on the age-old debate on whether federated co-operatives need to be centralized to ensure efficiency. In particular, the thesis shows that federated co-operatives can be efficient, provided they address the co-operation and coordination problems that arise among their members, and provides examples of the mechanisms that federated co-operatives can use to achieve co-operation and coordination. In addition, the thesis offers the first analytical treatment of how the horizon problem influences investment decisions in co-operatives.

Knowledge management is considered a necessary precursor to organizational success. This view is increasingly prevalent in the case of the health care sector. Two main knowledge management strategies are recognized: codification and personalization strategies. An organizations choice of knowledge management strategy depends on its objectives and the dominant form of knowledge informing its decision-making processes.<p>Health care decision-makers have access to a wealth of knowledge with which to inform their decisions. Little is known, however, about how the various types of knowledge are managed to optimize their use in decision-making. This study examines the knowledge management strategies of health care decision-makers working in the context of a regionalized health care system. The potential of communities of practice as a conceptual means for understanding health care knowledge management is also explored.<p>Members of Regional health authorities (RHAs) in the province of Saskatchewan constitute the unit of analysis for the study, which is guided by a qualitative research design. Interviews were used as the main data collection technique. For data analysis, open and axial coding methods based on the inductive and deductive approaches were adopted.<p>The study concludes that regional health authority (RHA) members utilize more fully explicit rather than tacit forms of knowledge. One of the main knowledge management practices adopted by the RHA members is the use of professional reports. This indicates that RHA members pursue a codification strategy more strongly than a personalization strategy. Moreover, it was found that the practices and strategies associated with managing knowledge were in place, despite the absence of a stated knowledge management policy. Finally, RHAs cannot be regarded as communities of practice, even though they exhibit many of their features.<p>Recommendations include the following: (1) the need for RHAs to institutionalize a knowledge management policy to guide their knowledge management processes and strategies, and (2) the cultivation of online communities of practice to marshal the tacit knowledge of RHA members, and that of the public, as an intervention to complement the use of explicit knowledge.

This thesis, which consists of three self-contained essays, examines, both theoretically and empirically, some of the economic and identity strategies and mechanisms that federated co-operatives, in particular, and strategic alliances, in general, can use to achieve co-operation and coordination. To accomplish this objective, the thesis uses a combination of industrial organization and game theory concepts from economics, insights from social and cognitive psychology, and evidence from in-depth interviews with decision-makers in the Co-operative Retailing System (CRS) - an association of 264 independent Western Canadian retail co-operatives and their wholesaler, Federated Co-operatives Ltd. (FCL).<p> Essay One combines a case study of the CRS with an examination, in a game-theoretic framework, of the co-operation and coordination problems arising among firms in alliances and the potential solutions to these problems suggested in the economics and business strategy literatures. One of the contributions of this essay is to provide examples of the mechanisms that can be used to implement these theoretical solutions in a business setting - i.e., the essay identifies practical ways for alliances to alter partner firms' payoffs, to provide private rewards, to monitor behaviour, to establish long term goals among partners, to build high group identification within the alliance, and to focus partners' expectations on the efficient outcomes. Another contribution of this essay is to identify some of the second-order co-operation problems that arise in strategic alliances - e.g., lack of incentives by alliance partners to contribute resources that are necessary to develop alliance management mechanisms - and to offer examples of the strategies that can be used to deal with these problems.<p> Essay Two draws upon social identity theory and develops an economic model of behaviour to show how the core firm in a strategic network can promote effective co-operation among network members by inducing them to identify with the network. In addition, the essay offers empirical evidence from the CRS that identity has successfully been used, together with economic mechanisms, to foster co-operation among member retails, and provides examples of the most important mechanisms that FCL, as the core firm in the CRS, has used to manage the identity of the retails. More generally, by incorporating the psychology (and sociology) of identity into an economic model of behaviour, Essay Two contributes to an emerging view that non-economic (behavioural) factors are complementary to the economic ones in the management of strategic partnerships.<p> Essay Three considers the collective action problems that arise in co-operatives when it comes to financing growth and identifies the conditions under which retained patronage can be an effective way for co-operatives to raise growth capital. The essay develops a game-theoretic model to examine the trade-off between the share of patronage refunds a co-operative wholesaler pays to member retails in cash and the share of patronage refunds it retains and invests, so as to provide retails with enough short-run benefits to encourage them to patronize their organization, while still retaining resources to invest in long-term growth. Analytical results show that when there are increasing returns in patronizing the co-operative wholesaler, retails' decisions to patronize their organization are complementary strategies and, as a result, multiple equilibria are possible. Some of these equilibria are ones with high patronage and high investment, while others are characterized by low patronage and low investment. Retails' expectations about the actions of their counterparts are critical in determining the prevailing equilibrium. The analysis also shows that the existence of the horizon problem further constraints the ability of the wholesaler to raise growth capital. Taken together, these results suggest that the retention of patronage refunds can be an effective way for the co-operative wholesaler to raise growth capital, provided it acts to focus retails' expectations on the 'good' equilibrium and to mitigate the horizon problem.<p> By examining the strategies and mechanisms that the CRS has used to achieve co-operation and coordination, and in so doing illustrating the mechanisms that firms can use to manage partner opportunism and prevent coordination failure, the thesis contributes to the alliance management literature. Firms today are increasingly forming strategic alliances with suppliers, buyers, and even competitors in order to achieve sustainable competitive advantage. However, despite their increasing popularity and value-creation potential, alliances more often fail than succeed, with alliance failure often attributed to opportunistic (non-co-operative) behaviour by one or more of the partners and to coordination failure. As a result, it is important to identify strategies and mechanisms that alliance partners can use to achieve co-operation and coordination, and thus realize the benefits from their association.<p> The thesis also contributes to the co-operative literature by shedding light on the age-old debate on whether federated co-operatives need to be centralized to ensure efficiency. In particular, the thesis shows that federated co-operatives can be efficient, provided they address the co-operation and coordination problems that arise among their members, and provides examples of the mechanisms that federated co-operatives can use to achieve co-operation and coordination. In addition, the thesis offers the first analytical treatment of how the horizon problem influences investment decisions in co-operatives.