This dissertation expands on the economic geography literature on how and why innovation clusters spatially by taking a closer look at two correlated phenomena: regional specialization and firm clustering. While existing studies note that innovative regions are often highly specialized and highly clustered, further research is needed on the relative contributions of specialization and clustering to regional innovation. I examine these contributions by focusing on one key element of any regional innovation project: the labor market for scientific and technical professionals. The foundation for this study is a typology of regions based on regional specialization and firm clustering. I use this typology to answer one key research question: how specialization and clustering affect wages and recruitment methods in science-based industries. I create my typology using firm location data from the Photonics Buyers’ Guide, a leading trade publication in the photonics industry; I use the standardized location quotient and the average nearest neighbor distance as metrics of regional specialization and firm clustering, respectively. I investigate small firms’ labor market strategies using job search and wage data from the 2011 and 2012 SPIE salary surveys of employees in the photonics industry. I also examine how people-based and place-based policies for strengthening scientific and technical labor markets change when viewed through the lens of specialization and clustering. I selected the photonics industry as an example of a science-based industry for three reasons: its diversity of applications, its policy importance, and its unique colocation of design and manufacturing. Regional specialization and firm clustering, while correlated, do not always go hand in hand. By disentangling the effects of specialization versus clustering, this dissertation contributes to the literature on the spatial analysis of innovation. It also offers policymakers a heuristic for deciding on the importance of being known for a particular industry (regional specialization) and creating dense innovation districts (firm clusters) through preferential zoning or other mechanisms.

Η παρούσα διπλωματική εργασία αφορά τη σχεδίαση και υλοποίηση μίας εφαρμογής smartphone σε περιβάλλον iOS, η οποία έχει ως σκοπό την προβολή των δραστηριοτήτων του Μουσείου Επιστημών και Τεχνολογίας (Μ.Ε.Τ) που βρίσκεται στον χώρο του Πανεπιστημίου Πατρών. Πιο συγκεκριμένα, παρέχει γενικές και χρήσιμες πληροφορίες σχετικά με το Μ.Ε.Τ, σύντομη εικονική ξενάγηση στους εκθεσιακούς του χώρους, διευκόλυνση πρόσβασης σε αυτό αλλά και δυνατότητα ενημέρωσης περί των εκδηλώσεων που φιλοξενεί. / This diploma dissertation concerns the development of a smartphone application on the iOS platform, aiming to introduce the user to the activities of the Museum of Science and Technology which is located in the University of Patras district. In particular, it provides general and useful information about the Museum, short virtual tour at its showrooms, easy access to it and the ability to stay informed of the various events it hosts.

In an attempt to further our understanding of the relationship between the calpain system and postmortem tenderization, three muscles [biceps femoris (BF), infraspinatus (IS), and longissimus (LD)] from normal (N = 6) and callipyge (N = 6) sheep were studied. Callipyge is a genetic phenomenon where carriers of the callipyge gene present a hypertrophy of pelvic and torso muscles, such that BF and LD are affected while IS is not. It has been observed characteristically that calpastatin and m-calpain activities are increased in muscles of animals affected by the callipyge phenotype. Soluble calpain and calpastatin, and myofibril-bound μ-calpain activities, and myofibrillar fragmentation index (MFI) were determined at death, 1d, 3d and 10d postmortem. Sarcomere length was determined at 1d and 10d postmortem. Shear force of the longissimus muscle was determined at 1d, 3d and 10d postmortem. Western blots for calpastatin, μ-calpain, desmin, nebulin, titin, troponin-T and α-actinin were performed to follow the degradation pattern of those proteins. The calpastatin and m-calpain activities were more than two-fold greater in BF and LD muscles from callipyge than in the same muscles from normal animals. Calpastatin activities in infraspinatus muscle from normal animals were higher than in the other two muscles of this phenotype. Soluble μ-calpain activities were higher at death for normal phenotype in BF and IS muscles and it decreased rapidly during postmortem storage. However, the rate of this decrease in that activity was faster in normal than in callipyge phenotype. Myofibrils contained calcium dependent protease activity and this activity was inhibited by cysteine proteases inhibitors and by calpastatin to some degree. There was no difference in the myofibril-calcium dependent protease activity between phenotypes at any time postmortem, presenting lower activity at death. The magnitude of protein degradation and tenderization were assessed by MFI and shear force, respectively. Neither the MFI nor shear force changed appreciably during storage of the callipyge affected muscles. Calpastatin level seems to determine the rate of postmortem tenderization.

The use of geospatial technologies, including radio telemetry, GPS collars, and mapping software, has proliferated in wildlife conservation. In addition to being tools for research, though, tracking devices are increasingly used to control animals that have been reintroduced to natural areas. Animals with radio or GPS collars can be tracked, and when considered necessary, trapped and relocated or removed to captivity, a common practice in projects to reintroduce and conserve endangered carnivores. The assumption is that such actions will help to defuse conflicts over wildlife between wildlife managers and land users. Conservation has come to mean surveillance and control, a situation recently made possible by technology. This dissertation examines the role of geospatial technology in conservation through an examination of the Mexican Wolf Reintroduction Project taking place in Arizona and New Mexico. Major findings include: 1. Policies to monitor and control Mexican wolves represent a deferral of the struggle over priority uses of public lands; 2. State and local government agencies seized on the discourse of adaptive management to gain control over the reintroduction project and expand their institutional authority. Rather than a practice of "learning by doing" and collaboration, however, the adaptive management program that was implemented only operated smoothly when it held together a prior political consensus and fell apart when external factors worked to dissolve that consensus; 3. The policies of controlling "problem wolves" rest on a series of assumptions about human and wolf behavior that are unsubstantiated and likely false; 4. The embodied production of geospatial data about Mexican wolves is erased in project-authored maps, which privilege a partial perspective on Mexican wolf distribution and territory; and 5. The practices of Mexican wolf monitoring and control are best understood as political technologies of governance that constitute Mexican wolves as individualized, domesticated and, I argue, racialized subjects. The policies and practices governing the Mexican wolf reintroduction project, this dissertation shows, have relied on technological surveillance and control, with complex and contradictory results for people-wolf relations and the politics of conservation.

In the mid to late 1990s, many states developed eGovernment programs that included the use of consultation technologies. More recently, the social characteristics of the web have emerged as offering an alternative means for citizen participation, promising more openness and inclusion. In this dissertation I draw upon studies of the policy-making process and media design, to examine the implications of citizen-led production of infrastructures for public participation in policy-making through the social web and within the context of open government discourse. My research methods for this research project were ethnographically informed. I participated in the design and use of social web infrastructures for participation in policy-making as a contributor to open government communities in Ontario, Canada. I also analyzed Hansard records as well as the popular press, and interviewed 15 citizen designers who created social web based infrastructures for public participation in the policy-making of four bills in Ontario. In my research, I develop and use the term citizen designer drawing on the more common phrase of citizen journalist. Both terms suggest that citizens can engage in creative practices to encourage institutions such as government or the mass media to become more participatory. The citizen designers in my project were found to act as policy entrepreneurs, sometimes for particular bills, but more generally for the broader ideal of open government that includes citizen participation. The major finding of this work is that citizens are using an integrated mix of social web tools across multiple policy windows to promote openness and participation. This work contributes to the policy, information and the internet studies literatures on the roles and experiences of internet-savvy policy entrepreneurs who are situated in civil society networks, which are not always tied to formal organizations. This work also expands our understandings of citizenship to include the design and use of the social web in everyday political life.

In recent years, there have been several proposals for large-scale human genotyping projects in the developing world. The dissertation presented here explores the motivations, opportunities and challenges of initiating locally led, large-scale genotyping projects documenting human genomic variation in the developing world. I analyze two case studies: the Indian Genome Variation Consortium in India and the University of Cape Town, Department of Human Genetics and the African Genomics Education Initiative in South Africa. These case studies, together with similar projects in Mexico and Thailand provide compelling reasons for pursuing these projects: the potential to address local health needs and reduce health care costs; the opportunity to stimulate economic development through investments in genomic sciences, and the availability of unique population resources. In an effort to capture the value of these investments and promote an equal stake in international collaborations, Mexico and India have developed guidelines and laws to protect local human genetic material as a sovereign resource, referred to here as ‘genomic sovereignty’. Critics have suggested that it can impede international collaborations and reduce access to external funding. I provide an in depth analysis of genomic sovereignty and how it may contribute to each country’s aim of achieving health equity through investments in genomics, its relation to heritage and patrimony, and its potential limitations. The debate is critical, as the knowledge generated from large-scale human genomic research will need to be interpreted in larger international collaborative efforts before it can lead to health benefits. Qualitative case study methodology is employed and the primary data source consists of interviews conducted with key informants. The research described here provides a source of empirical description and analysis that is informing the framing of policies, principles and practices on how research infrastructure and capacity are being established for human genomic sciences in developing countries.

In the mid to late 1990s, many states developed eGovernment programs that included the use of consultation technologies. More recently, the social characteristics of the web have emerged as offering an alternative means for citizen participation, promising more openness and inclusion. In this dissertation I draw upon studies of the policy-making process and media design, to examine the implications of citizen-led production of infrastructures for public participation in policy-making through the social web and within the context of open government discourse. My research methods for this research project were ethnographically informed. I participated in the design and use of social web infrastructures for participation in policy-making as a contributor to open government communities in Ontario, Canada. I also analyzed Hansard records as well as the popular press, and interviewed 15 citizen designers who created social web based infrastructures for public participation in the policy-making of four bills in Ontario. In my research, I develop and use the term citizen designer drawing on the more common phrase of citizen journalist. Both terms suggest that citizens can engage in creative practices to encourage institutions such as government or the mass media to become more participatory. The citizen designers in my project were found to act as policy entrepreneurs, sometimes for particular bills, but more generally for the broader ideal of open government that includes citizen participation. The major finding of this work is that citizens are using an integrated mix of social web tools across multiple policy windows to promote openness and participation. This work contributes to the policy, information and the internet studies literatures on the roles and experiences of internet-savvy policy entrepreneurs who are situated in civil society networks, which are not always tied to formal organizations. This work also expands our understandings of citizenship to include the design and use of the social web in everyday political life.

Networks, such as the Internet, are comprised of dense information flows with expansive, multi-directional reach that continuously change—and this changeability is what keeps the network active, relative, and vital. I call the form of network exhibiting those dynamic features the vital network. This form of network is not simply the outcome of connectivity and communication between affiliative objects and actors such as cell phones and humans that together convey a sense or feeling of ‘aliveness,’ it is the outcome of software programming goals for communication systems inspired by nonhuman, self-organizing biological life. The biological turn in computation produces an organizing logic for the vital network that self-propagates connections and disconnections, services, collectives, and structures proximal to forms that feel vital and dynamic. The vital network can do things, it has capacities to act, and different material consequences emerge out of the organization and coordination of communication with particular implications for human privacy, autonomy, and network transparency. I examine the biological turn in computing as a feature within a development program for the design of digital network control systems that rely on self-regulation and autonomous communication processes intentionally constructed to be non-transparent. I explore nonhuman models of control as a response to this requirement considered through three objects: microbe, simulation, and control, each understood in process terms that disclose what these things do and how they act. It is appropriate to the concerns of this dissertation to think of these as object-processes occurring within three moments or transverse becomings: first, in terms of Gilles Deleuze’s notion of differentiation from the one to the many; secondly, from organism to simulation through the use of models to describe microbial processes in informatic terms; and finally, from description to control through the progression in computing from an emphasis on structure and descriptive procedures, to processes of control. Given that so much of contemporary life is structured by communication technology, my study points to the need for an ethics of control to imagine how much and how deep control should go when considering the organization appropriate to our shared, technically enabled, sphere of communication. / Thesis (Ph.D, Sociology) -- Queen's University, 2014-01-27 14:57:29.139

In recent years, there have been several proposals for large-scale human genotyping projects in the developing world. The dissertation presented here explores the motivations, opportunities and challenges of initiating locally led, large-scale genotyping projects documenting human genomic variation in the developing world. I analyze two case studies: the Indian Genome Variation Consortium in India and the University of Cape Town, Department of Human Genetics and the African Genomics Education Initiative in South Africa. These case studies, together with similar projects in Mexico and Thailand provide compelling reasons for pursuing these projects: the potential to address local health needs and reduce health care costs; the opportunity to stimulate economic development through investments in genomic sciences, and the availability of unique population resources. In an effort to capture the value of these investments and promote an equal stake in international collaborations, Mexico and India have developed guidelines and laws to protect local human genetic material as a sovereign resource, referred to here as ‘genomic sovereignty’. Critics have suggested that it can impede international collaborations and reduce access to external funding. I provide an in depth analysis of genomic sovereignty and how it may contribute to each country’s aim of achieving health equity through investments in genomics, its relation to heritage and patrimony, and its potential limitations. The debate is critical, as the knowledge generated from large-scale human genomic research will need to be interpreted in larger international collaborative efforts before it can lead to health benefits. Qualitative case study methodology is employed and the primary data source consists of interviews conducted with key informants. The research described here provides a source of empirical description and analysis that is informing the framing of policies, principles and practices on how research infrastructure and capacity are being established for human genomic sciences in developing countries.

My research examines the extent to which features of ‘openness’ might usefully contribute to mechanisms of governance of human stem cell lines, with a view to the production of therapeutic stem cell treatments for the provision of health benefits. The impetus for the project is the UK Stem Cell Bank, a national repository for stem cell lines and the focal point of a unique set of publicly supported, non-statutory arrangements for the informal (but mandatory) oversight of human embryonic stem cell lines (hESCs) in the UK. The sharing of stem cells through this mechanism promotes public confidence in embryo and stem cell research, and supports research by making (ethically-sourced and quality-controlled) human stem cell lines widely available to researchers, but the structure and functions of the Bank also impose constraints on the imminent commercial development and manufacture of stem cell therapies for human application. My thesis examines the role of ‘openness’ in systems of governance designed to facilitate not just research but the whole trajectory of stem cell technology, from research to production and delivery of clinical treatments. What is openness and what function does it have in purposive attempts to design mechanisms that will advance stem cell technology? The bulk of my thesis maps out the conceptual foundations upon which systems of governance for the production of stem cell therapies may be grounded. It does not address the ethical and social debate surrounding embryo research and the embryonic derivation of stem cell lines, which are legally permissible in the UK. In Part I, I frame the problem of governance of ongoing use of stem cell lines as part of a larger policy endeavour related to the provision of public goods. Secondly, I propose a conception of reflexive governance that is capable of facilitation of technology in a multi-faceted heterogeneous environment. Part II explores traditional narratives of openness in science and technology, and how they might be reconceived in the context of modern scientific technology. In Part III, I apply my conception of facilitative governance to collective strategies or ‘commons’ approaches to facilitative governance. I then identify its applicability for the present UK system governing stem cell lines, and for the proposition of alternative structures and processes that might be better able to achieve the policy goal of provision of health benefits through delivery of therapeutic stem cell treatments.