Digital Commons Network^™

An Investigation Into Computer And Network Curricula, David Veal

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This thesis consists of a series of internationally published, peer reviewed, journal and conference research papers that analyse the educational and training needs of undergraduate Information Technology (IT) students within the area of Computer and Network Technology (CNT) Education. Research by Maj et al has found that accredited computing science curricula can fail to meet the expectations of employers in the field of CNT: “It was found that none of these students could perform first line maintenance on a Personal Computer (PC) to a professional standard with due regard to safety, both to themselves and the equipment. Neither could they …

Delayed Discharges From An Adult Intensive Care Unit (Icu), Teresa Williams

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Introduction - Maximising efficient and effective use of resources without compromising quality of care is essential in the current healthcare climate. Intensive care unit services are one of the most resource intensive and therefore expensive services within a hospital. Because intensive care unit services comprise a significant portion of hospital costs and resources, appropriate utilisation of intensive care units is imperative. The occurrence of delayed discharges and the reason for the delays is important as they impact on the efficiency and effectiveness of intensive care unit services. Patients who no longer need intensive care unit care block beds for impending …

Life After Diagnosis : The Social Experience Of Adolescents Diagnosed With Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder And How They Manage Their Lives, Georgia L. Carragher

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder is the most frequently diagnosed developmental disorder in school-age children in Western Australia today. It concerns and frustrates the children and adolescents who are diagnosed with the disorder, their parents, teachers and the general community. In spite of the plethora of research associated with AD/HD, dissension abounds in the community, literature and the media over its diagnosis and the best treatment and response to the disorder. Notwithstanding the body of research very little is known about adolescents' experiences, opinions, needs and problems associated with the disorder as research and treatment regimes are currently determined by adults. The research …

Use Of Multi-Scale Phase-Based Methods To Determine Optical Flow In Dynamic Scene Analysis, Robert Hastings

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Estimates of optical flow in images can be made by applying a complex periodic transform to the images and tracking the movement of points of constant phase in the complex output. This approach however suffers from the problem that filters of large width give information only about broad scale image features, whilst those of small spatial extent (high resolution) cannot track fast motion, which causes a feature to move a distance that is large compared to the filter-size. A method is presented in which the flow is measured at different scales, using a series of complex filters of decreasing width. …

Determinants Of Internet Banking Adoption In Thailand, Bussakorn Jaruwachirathanakul

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Increasingly competition in the financial services sector is forcing service providers to develop and utilise alternative delivery channels (Daniel, 1999). Within the sector, banking has always been a highly service intensive activity that relies heavily on technology to acquire, process, and deliver services and information to consumers (Tan & Teo, 2000). The emergence of the Internet has provided a way for banks to improve the efficiency of their service delivery and to gain a competitive advantage by reducing the number of brick-and-mortar branches. The study investigated the adoption of lnternet banking services in Thailand and is based on the premise …

Exploring The Antecedents Of Successful E-Business Implementations Through Erp : A Longitudinal Study Of Sap-Based Organisations 1999-2003, Colin Ash

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This research was carried out between 1999 and 2003 on the use of e-business applications in ERP-based organisations. A composite research method based on structured case studies was developed for this study. It combined the application of case methods by Carroll et al. (1998], Klein and Myer (1998), and Eisenhardt (1989). This was used to provide a focused, yet flexible structure, as a dynamic approach to case study interpretive research. The research method used three distinct models at three progressive stages of the study, to provide a multi-faceted view of each case. This composite case-based method was developed to maintain …

Alcohol Restraint Television Advertisements Targeted At Adolescents : A Three-Way Comparison Of Reinforcement Styles On Attitude To The Advertisement, Attitude To The Cause And Attitude To The Act, Neil Robinson

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Adolescent binge-drinking is an area of great concern in Australia as it is with many other developed countries around the world. Every year in Australia, Commonwealth and State health authorities invest considerable resources into trying to address this issue and the results have been described as being at best, mixed. Health promotion initiatives such as school programmes, media promotion and health programmes coupled w1th restrictions on supply of alcohol are all used to try and curb the incidence of adolescent binge drinking. In recent years television advertising has specifically been used to try and curb the incidence of adolescent binge-drinking …

The Role Of Stereotypes In Age Discrimination In Hiring: Evaluation And Intervention, Eyal Gringart

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

As the number of older adults grows, governments find it increasingly harder to support them through social and health care services. One solution to this problem is for older adults to remain in paid employment longer. However, older workers are discriminated against due to negative stereotyping by employers. Previous research has found that older females experienced greater discrimination than did older males. In order to address the issue of hiring discrimination against older adults a progressive two-stage research project was conducted. Using a questionnaire that was developed especially for this project, Study One explored the stereotypes held about older workers …

Database Development And Intranet Based Image Included Database Management System For Ballistic Firearm Identification System, Toni C. Jiao

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The process of imaging, collecting and searching a cartridge case to identifying its suspected firearm is a time consuming procedure. Within this study, a cartridge case identification database management system in an Intranet environment is designed and implemented, thus enabling firearm examiners from different forensic laboratories to engage firearm identification without the constraints of time and location. Specifically, the study investigates appropriate database management system for image involved and Intranet secured ballistics firearm identification database. The results demonstrated that a computerized firearm identification system could be implemented in Intranet with a secure, scalable, performable Intranet database management system.

Gender, Human Rights, And Peace Agreements, Christine M. Chinkin

Articles

I would first like to thank the organizers for the very great honor of being asked to present the annual Schwartz Lecture in 2002. It is especially apposite to discuss issues of international peace agreements in Ohio, not far from Dayton which is famous as the location of the process that brought an end to the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina. However this lecture is going to examine issues that were not explored at Dayton, that is, some relationships between gender, peace agreements, and international human rights. In addition, because the function of peace agreements in today's world has become the broader …

Unregulable Defenses And The Perils Of Shareholder Choice, Jennifer Arlen, Eric L. Talley

Faculty Scholarship

A significant debate rages within corporate law scholarship as to whether shareholders or managers should be granted authority over the tender offer process once a bid is imminent. Both sides generally agree that the issue depends on whether shareholders are capable of exercising informed choice over takeover bids. Supporters of managerial veto power contend that the arguments favoring professional management of publicly held firms carry over into the tender offer context. Proponents of shareholder choice, on the other hand, argue that shareholders can act on their own behalf in the special circumstances surrounding contests for corporate control.

This Article challenges …

Managing A Correctional Marketplace: Prison Privatization In The United States And The United Kingdom, David Pozen

Faculty Scholarship

This article traces the recent history and development of privately operated prisons in the United States and the United Kingdom, and it compares their current role in the countries' correctional systems. The privatization movements of the U.S. and the U.K. were driven by similar factors, but the relative weight of these factors varied between the two. In the U.S., legal pressures to alleviate prison overcrowding and fiscal incentives to contract out prison construction were stronger, while in the U.K. the ideological and political aims of the governing party exerted more influence in stimulating privatization. America's experience with private prisons in …

Current Treatments Of Vitiligo, Azam J. Samdani

Department of Medicine

No abstract provided.

Institutionalization: What Do Empirical Studies Tell Us About Court Mediation?, Bobbi Mcadoo, Nancy A. Welsh, Roselle L. Wissler

Faculty Scholarship

In the 25 years since the Pound Conference, federal and state courts throughout the country have adopted mediation programs to resolve civil disputes. This increased use of mediation has been accompanied by a small but growing body of research examining the effects of certain choices in designing and implementing court-connected mediation programs.

This article focuses on the lessons that seem to be emerging from the available empirical data regarding best practices for programs that mediate non-family civil matters. Throughout the article, we consider the answers provided by research to three questions: (1) How does program design affect the success of …

Foreword: Nafta As A Lesson For Globalization, Elizabeth Trujillo

Faculty Scholarship

Since its enactment, NAFTA has impacted international business among its members and it has awakened concerns of the environmental and labor challenges that the participating countries face as they move toward economic integration. Among the many challenges, coping with the economic, legal, and cultural differences that exist among the partners has been difficult. The nations must continue to work together to harmonize their laws in such a way that allows for easier integration without impeding their sovereign power to enact laws that address local needs. At the conference entitled “NAFTA at Ten: Harmonization and Legal Transformation,” held on June 14-15, …

Market Principles For Pesticides, Andrew P. Morriss, Roger E. Meiners

Faculty Scholarship

Overall, pesticide use is growing in developing countries. United States' pesticide use changed in content, but remains substantial in volume. Critics of pesticide policy, including many of the speakers at this symposium, are concerned that pesticide problems are worsening. Surprisingly, thirty years after the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act ("FIFRA") reforms and the victory over DDT, the critics are not yet prepared to declare victory. Even worse from the perspective of environmental pressure groups is the change in attitude toward DDT, a substance whose name invokes extraordinary invective, where the current picture is not quite what the advocacy groups …

Screening Versus Plea Bargaining: Exactly What Are We Trading Off?, Gerard E. Lynch

Faculty Scholarship

I was delighted to be invited to comment on Ronald Wright and Marc Miller's important and instructive article, The Screening/Bargaining Tradeoff. Those familiar with the authors' work, including their original and fascinating criminal procedure casebook, will be unsurprised by many of the article's virtues, including a focus on empirical examination of real-world practice and (perhaps a special case of that more general virtue) attention to practices at the state and local level, where most criminal law enforcement actually occurs. Wright and Miller develop some interesting insights into the potential for changes in plea bargaining practices that have frequently been …

Revising The Model Penal Code: Keeping It Real, Gerard E. Lynch

Faculty Scholarship

The thesis of this talk can be simply stated: In any serious discussion of revising the Model Penal Code (MPC), the object of the game cannot be revising the MPC itself. Rather, the object of any revision of the Code is to promote the reform of the nation's actual criminal codes, as adopted by the state legislatures and Congress.

Local Institutions, Foreign Investment And Alternative Strategies Of Development: Some Views From Practice, Tamara Lothian, Katharina Pistor

Faculty Scholarship

This Essay summarizes the major insights gained from a panel discussion with legal practitioners about the relevance of local institutions to foreign direct investors. The Essay offers a critique of policy conclusions drawn from empirical studies that suggest a positive correlation between legal institutions and foreign investment flows. It points out that the data used in these studies are far too general to allow policy conclusions and that neither the data nor the policy conclusions are sufficiently attuned to the challenges or opportunities that foreign direct investment projects face on the ground. According to the results of the panel discussion, …

The Byrd Amendment Is Wto-Illegal: But We Must Kill The Byrd With The Right Stone, Jagdish N. Bhagwati, Petros C. Mavroidis

Faculty Scholarship

On 16 January 2003, the WTO Appellate Body issued its report on United States – Continued Dumping And Subsidy Offset Act Of 2000 (WTO Doc. WT/DS217 and 234/AB/R). In this report, the Appellate Body condemned the so-called US Byrd Amendment by finding that it was inconsistent with the US obligations under the WTO Agreements on Antidumping (AD) and Subsidies and Countervailing Measures (SCM).

Mechanisms Of Volatile Anesthetic-Induced Myocardial Protection, Lynda M. Ludwig, Judy R. Kersten, Katsuya Tanaka, Weidong Gu, John F. Ladisa, David C. Warltier, Paul S. Pagel

Biomedical Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

Volatile anesthetics protect myocardium against reversible and irreversible ischemic injury. Experimental evidence from several in vitro and in vivo animal models demonstrates that volatile agents enhance the recovery of stunned myocardium and reduce the size of myocardial infarction after brief or prolonged coronary artery occlusion and reperfusion, respectively. This protective effect persists after the anesthetic has been discontinued, a phenomenon known as anesthetic-induced preconditioning (APC). Recent clinical data also demonstrates evidence of APC in patients during cardiac surgery. Thus, administration of volatile anesthetics may represent a novel therapeutic approach that reduces morbidity and mortality associated with perioperative myocardial ischemia and …

Mitigating The Negative Effects Of Stress In Space Flight: A Transactional Approach, Haydee Maria Cuevas

Publications

The primary goal of this theoretical paper is to highlight how a transactional approach to investigating stressor effects during space flight can lead to a greater understanding of the complex processes by which humans adapt psychologically and physically to the adverse conditions encountered in this extreme environment.Transactional approaches conceptualize stress as occurring in the nature of the "transaction" (Le., interaction) between the individual and the stimulus environment, emphasizing the role of cognitive appraisal (Le., perceived ability to cope with the situation). Interventions that positively influence this cognitive appraisal process may, therefore, lessen the experience of stress and optimize human performance …

Measurement Of The Stochasticity Of Low-Latitude Geomagnetic Temporal Variations, Mark Anthony Reynolds, James A. Wanliss

Publications

Ground magnetometer measurements of total magnetic field strength from 6 stations at low latitudes were analyzed using power spectrum and Hurst range scaling techniques. The Hurst exponents for most of these time-series were near 0.5, which indicates stochasticity, with the highest latitude stations exhibiting some persistence with Hurst exponents greater than 0.6. Although no definite correlations are evident, the relative increase of the Hurst exponent with latitude suggests the possibility that the underlying dynamics of the magnetosphere change with latitude. This result may help quantify the dynamics of the inner magnetosphere itself without the direct presence of the solar wind …

The Local-Time Variation Of The Quiet Plasmasphere: Geosynchronous Observations And Kinetic Theory, Mark Anthony Reynolds, G. Ganguli, Y-J Su, M.F. Thomsen

Publications

The quiet-time structure of the plasmaspheric density was investigated using observations of the Los Alamos geosynchronous satellites, and these observations were compared with theoretical predictions of the quasi-static localtime variation by a kinetic model. It was found that the coupling to the ionosphere (via the local-time variation of the exobase) played a key role in determining the density structure at 6.6 RE. The kinetic model predicts that most of the local-time variation at geosynchronous orbit is due to the variation of the exobase parameters. During quiet times, when the convection electric field is dominated by the corotation field, the effects …

Three-Dimensional Reconstruction Algorithm For A Reverse-Geometry Volumetric Ct System With A Large-Array Scanned Source, Taly Gilat Schmidt, Rebecca Fahrig, Norbert J. Pelc

Biomedical Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

We have proposed a CT system design to rapidly produce volumetric images with negligible cone beam artifacts. The investigated system uses a large array scanned source with a smaller array of fast detectors. The x-ray source is electronically steered across a 2D target every few milliseconds as the system rotates. The proposed reconstruction algorithm for this system is a modified 3D filtered backprojection method. The data are rebinned into 2D parallel ray projections, most of which are tilted with respect to the axis of rotation. Each projection is filtered with a 2D kernel and backprojected onto the desired image matrix. …

Sensitivity To Hand Path Curvature During Reaching, Kyle P. Lillis, Robert A. Scheidt

Biomedical Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

People optimize reaching to make straight and smooth movements. We performed experiments characterizing human sensitivity to hand path deviations from a straight reach. Vision of the arm was blocked. Subjects either moved the hand along paths of constrained curvature, or a robot moved the relaxed limb along similar trajectories (active and passive conditions, respectively). Subjects responded after each trial whether or not they thought the movement curved convex right. In a series of three experiments, we tested the effects of modifying visual feedback of hand position to suppress curvature, isotonic muscle activation, and a distracter task on subjects ability to …

War: Rhetoric And Norm-Creation In Response To Terror, Tawia Baidoe Ansah

Faculty Publications

Everything is very simple in war," said Carl von Clausewitz, "but the simplest thing is difficult." This essay will suggest that the resort to the language of war, as "natural" and "starkly simple" as it is, nevertheless has a profound impact on how the law's intervention is shaped, or how the laws governing the transnational use of force are interpreted to accommodate a "war" on terrorism. I argue that although "war" is absent from the principal international legal instruments by which states are guided (and obligated) in their relations with other states, the concepts suppressed by this elision have an …

Agora: Future Implications Of The Iraq Conflict: Editors' Introduction, Lori Fisler Damrosch, Bernard H. Oxman

Faculty Scholarship

The military action against Iraq in spring 2003 is one of the few events of the UN Charter period holding the potential for fundamental transformation, or possibly even destruction, of the system of law governing the use of force that had evolved during the twentieth century. As with the great debates surrounding U.S. involvement in the two world wars, the establishment of the United Nations, and the challenges to UN Charter norms during the Cold War, this Journal seeks to provide a forum for reasoned and respectful treatment of legal issues that have aroused fierce passions.

The New Technology Transfer Block Exemption: Will The New Block Exemption Balance The Goals Of Innovation And Competition?, Maurits Dolmans, Anu Bradford

Faculty Scholarship

Licensors and licensees have long enjoyed the benefit of block exemption regulations for technology licensing. Block exemption regulations were adopted in the mid-80s for patent licensing and know-how licenses. These were combined and replaced in 1996 by a unified Technology Transfer Block Exemption Regulation (TTBE). This block exemption is currently under review.

DG Competition is writing a draft for a new T'BE. It is expected to be ready for review by the member states in September, and to be published for comments in October. The Commission hopes to have the new block exemption adopted and published in the first quarter …

Private Lawyers And Environmental Justice, Michael B. Gerrard

Faculty Scholarship

A private lawyer representing a private client is seldom a crusader. When environmental justice is relevant to a particular matter – the client proposes to build a facility and engages the lawyer to help secure necessary governmental approvals, for example-the lawyer's primary duty must be to the client.

The client in such a case faces two primary types of questions: substantive, such as where and how to build the facility; and procedural, deciding what processes to follow and how much to involve the community in the planning. Typically, by the time the lawyer is brought in, the client already has …