Novel mechanism for evaluating feedback in the grid environment on resource allocation

The primary concern in proffering an infrastructure for general purpose computational grids formation is security. Grid implementations have been devised to deal with the security concerns. The chief factors that can be problematic in the secured selection of grid resources are the wide range of selection and the high degree of strangeness. Moreover, the lack of a higher degree of confidence relationship is likely to prevent efficient resource allocation and utilization. In this paper, we propose an efficient approach for the secured selection of grid resources, so as to achieve secure execution of the jobs. The presented approach utilizes trust and reputation for securely selecting the grid resources by also evaluation user’s feedback on the basis of the feedback already available about the entities. The proposed approach is scalable for an increased number of resources.

Retrodicting patch use by foraging swans in a heterogeneous environment using a set of functional responses

Effective conservation of important bird areas requires insight in the number of birds an area can support, and how this carrying capacity changes with habitat modifications. When food depletion is the dominant mechanism of competition, it should in principle be possible to calculate the total time foragers can spend per patch from their functional response (intake rate as a function of food density). However, in the field there are likely to be factors modulating the functional response. In this study previously published results of experiments on captive Bewick's swans were used to obtain functional responses of swans digging for tubers of Fennel pondweed on different foraging substrates: sandy and clayey sediment, and in shallow and deep water. In a field study, four 250×250 m sections belonging to different types (sandy–shallow, clayey–shallow, sandy–deep and clayey–deep) were delineated. Here tubers were sampled with sediment corers in three years, both before and after swan exploitation in autumn, and swans were observed and mapped from a hide in two of these years. Giving-up tuber biomass densities varied among sections. Substitution of these giving-up densities in the derived patch-type-specific functional responses yielded the quitting net energy intake rates in the four sections. As expected from the marginal value theorem, the quitting net energy intake rates did not vary among sections. Moreover, the observed foraging pressure (total foraging time per area) per patch type was in quantitative agreement with the integrated functional responses. These results suggest that in spatially heterogeneous environments, patch exploitation by foragers can be predicted from their functional responses after accounting for foraging substrate.

Intelligent clothing for automated recognition of human physical activities in free-living environment

This paper presents an intelligent clothing framework for human daily activity recognition using a single waist-worn tri-axial accelerometer sensor coupled with a robust pattern recognition system. The activity recognition algorithm is realized to distinguish six different physical activities through three major steps: acceleration signal collection/pre-processing, wavelet-based principle component analysis, and a support vector machine classifier. The proposed activity recognition method has been experimentally validated through two batches of trials with an overall mean classification accuracy of 95.25 and 94.87%, respectively. These results suggest that the intelligent clothing is not only able to learn the activity patterns but also capable of generalizing new data from both known and unknown subjects. This enables the proposed intelligent clothing to be applied in a comfortable and in situ assessment of human physical activities, which would open up new market segments to the textile industry.

Field evaluation of a suite of biomarkers in an Australian Tropical Reef Species, Stripey Seaperch (Lutjanus carponotatus) : Assessment of Produced Formation water from the Harriet A Platform

There is paucity of data regarding hydrocarbon exposure of tropical fish species inhabiting the waters near oil and gas platforms on the Northwest Shelf of Australia. A comprehensive field study assessed the exposure and potential effects associated with the produced water (PW) plume from the Harriet A production platform on the northwest shelf in a local reef species, Stripey seaperch (Lutjanus carponotatus). This field study was a continuation of an earlier pilot study which concluded that there were “warning signs” of potential biological effects on fish populations exposed to PW. A 10-day field caging study was conducted deploying 15 individual fish into 6 separate steel cages set 1-m subsurface at 3 stations in a concentration gradient moving away from the platform. A battery of biomarkers were evaluated including hepatosomatic index (HSI), total cytochrome P450, bile metabolites, CYP1A-, CYP2K- and CYP2M-like proteins, cholinesterase (ChE) activity, and histopathology of liver and gill tissues. Water column and PW effluent samples was also collected. Results confirmed that PAH metabolites in bile, CYP1A-, CYP2K-, and CYP2M-like proteins and liver histopathology provided evidence of significant exposure and effects after 10 days at the near-field site (~200 m off the Harriet A platform). Hepatosomatic index, total cytochrome P450, and ChE did not provide site-specific differences by day 10 of exposure to PW. CYP proteins were shown by principal component analysis (PCA) to be the best diagnostic tool for determining exposure and associated biological effects of PW on L. carponotatus. Using a suite of biomarkers has been widely advocated as a vital component in environmental risk assessments worldwide. This study demonstrates the usefulness of biomarkers for assessing the Harriet A PW discharge into Australian waters with broader applications for other PW discharges. This approach has merit as a valuable addition to environmental management strategies for protecting Australia’s tropical environment and its rich biodiversity.

By design : negotiating flexible learning in the built environment discipline

The term ‘flexible education’ is now firmly entrenched within Australian higher education discourse, yet the term is a contested one imbued with a multiplicity of meanings. This paper describes a process designed to elucidate how the idea of flexible education can be translated into teaching models that are informed by the specific demands of disciplinary contexts. The process uses a flexible learning ‘matching’ tool to articulate the understandings and preferences of students and academics of the Built Environment to bridge the gap between student expectations of flexibility and their teacher’s willingness and ability to provide that flexibility within the limits of the pedagogical context and teaching resources. The findings suggest an informed starting point for educators in the Built Environment and other creative disciplines from which to traverse the complexities inherent in negotiating flexibility in an increasingly digital world.

Upgrading arc median shortest path problem for an urban transportation network

In this paper, we propose an algorithm for an upgrading arc median shortest path problem for a transportation network. The problem is to identify a set of nondominated paths that minimizes both upgrading cost and overall travel time of the entire network. These two objectives are realistic for transportation network problems, but of a conflicting and noncompensatory nature. In addition, unlike upgrading cost which is the sum of the arc costs on the path, overall travel time of the entire network cannot be expressed as a sum of arc travel times on the path. The proposed solution approach to the problem is based on heuristic labeling and exhaustive search techniques, in criteria space and solution space, respectively. The first approach labels each node in terms of upgrading cost, and deletes cyclic and infeasible paths in criteria space. The latter calculates the overall travel time of the entire network for each feasible path, deletes dominated paths on the basis of the objective vector and identifies a set of Pareto optimal paths in the solution space. The computational study, using two small-scale transportation networks, has demonstrated that the algorithm proposed herein is able to efficiently identify a set of nondominated median shortest paths, based on two conflicting and noncompensatory objectives.

The maternity journey in an organisational context : a case study

The transition to motherhood is a significant life event impacting on all spheres of a woman's life. In an organisational context, changes to women's relationships with their employer and to their social identity occur as they adjust to their new role. A case study was undertaken to describe and compare the workplace experiences of three female employees from one health organisation who were either preparing to commence, currently on or recently returned to work from maternity leave. At all stages of the maternity journey, women expected flexibility from their employer in negotiating their return to work and managing parenting responsibilities. Women's obligations to their employer included being open about their capacity to work and parenting situations which may interfere with their work, as well as maintaining their work performance. Within a supportive work environment that included a shared identity with managers who were also mothers, women's social identity as a worker was not significantly threatened and did not change. Social identity change may be most apparent during the transition to first-time motherhood.

Negotiating masculine hegemony : female physical educators in an all-boys’ school

School physical education (PE) and sport are commonly regarded as sites where dominant or hegemonic masculinities cultivate, often at the expense of individuals who embody different gendered identities. In all-boys' PE settings, curriculum content frequently orientates around competitive and traditionally masculine team sports wherein teaching pedagogies draw heavily on ‘masculine’ practices that serve to legitimate and/or reproduce hierarchical and heteronormative masculinities. Embedded in the broader tenets of gender equity, this article draws on Foucault's technologies of the self to examine the experiences of two female physical educators in an all-boys' school as they negotiate their daily work in an environment where embodied masculinities are intensified. In doing so, it looks beyond the PE department to the wider school context (discourse and practice) as integral to the contestation and struggles for the professional identities available and taken up by female PE teachers in all-boy settings. Our findings reveal strategies that these teachers employed to negotiate and reconcile the tensions associated with being ‘positioned’ outside the gendered hegemony of the school.

Role assessment of GIS analysis and its reliability while ranking urban sustainability using scenarios specific to regional climate, community and culture

Urban Sustainability expresses the level of conservation of a city while living a town or consuming its urban resources, but the measurement of urban sustainability depends on what are considered important indicators of conservation besides the permitted levels of consumption in accordance with adopted criteria. This criterion should have common factors that are shared for all the members tested or cities to be evaluated as in this particular case for Abu Dhabi, but also have specific factors that are related to the geographic place, community and culture, that is the measures of urban sustainability specific to a middle east climate, community and culture where GIS Vector and Raster analysis have a role or add a value in urban sustainability measurements or grading are considered herein. Scenarios were tested using various GIS data types to replicate urban history (ten years period), current status and expected future of Abu Dhabi City setting factors to climate, community needs and culture. The useful Vector or Raster GIS data sets that are related to every scenario where selected and analysed in the sense of how and how much it can benefit the urban sustainability ranking in quantity and quality tests, this besides assessing the suitable data nature, type and format, the important topology rules to be considered, the useful attributes to be added, the relationships which should be maintained between data types of a geo- database, and specify its usage in a specific scenario test, then setting weights to each and every data type representing some elements of a phenomenon related to urban suitability factor. The results of assessing the role of GIS analysis provided data collection specifications such as the measures of accuracy reliable to a certain type of GIS functional analysis used in an urban sustainability ranking scenario tests. This paper reflects the prior results of the research that is conducted to test the multidiscipline evaluation of urban sustainability using different indicator metrics, that implement vector GIS Analysis and Raster GIS analysis as basic tools to assist the evaluation and increase of its reliability besides assessing and decomposing it, after which a hypothetical implementation of the chosen evaluation model represented by various scenarios was implemented on the planned urban sustainability factors for a certain period of time to appraise the expected future grade of urban sustainability and come out with advises associated with scenarios for assuring gap filling and relative high urban future sustainability. The results this paper is reflecting are concentrating on the elements of vector and raster GIS analysis that assists the proper urban sustainability grading within the chosen model, the reliability of spatial data collected; analysis selected and resulted spatial information. Starting from selecting some important indicators to comprise the model which include regional culture, climate and community needs an example of what was used is Energy Demand & Consumption (Cooling systems). Thus, this factor is related to the climate and it‟s regional specific as the temperature varies around 30-45 degrees centigrade in city areas, GIS 3D Polygons of building data used to analyse the volume of buildings, attributes „building heights‟, estimate the number of floors from the equation, following energy demand was calculated and consumption for the unit volume, and compared it in scenario with possible sustainable energy supply or using different environmental friendly cooling systems this is followed by calculating the cooling system effects on an area unit selected to be 1 sq. km, combined with the level of greenery area, and open space, as represented by parks polygons, trees polygons, empty areas, pedestrian polygons and road surface area polygons. (initial measures showed that cooling system consumption can be reduced by around 15 -20 % with a well-planned building distributions, proper spaces and with using environmental friendly products and building material, temperature levels were also combined in the scenario extracted from satellite images as interpreted from thermal bands 3 times during the period of assessment. Other examples of the assessment of GIS analysis to urban sustainability took place included Waste Productivity, some effects of greenhouse gases measured by the intensity of road polygons and closeness to dwelling areas, industry areas as defined from land use land cover thematic maps produced from classified satellite images then vectors were created to take part in defining their role within the scenarios. City Noise and light intensity assessment was also investigated, as the region experiences rapid development and noise is magnified due to construction activities, closeness of the airports, and highways. The assessment investigated the measures taken by urban planners to reduce degradation or properly manage it. Finally as a conclusion tables were presented to reflect the scenario results in combination with GIS data types, analysis types, and the level of GIS data reliability to measure the sustainability level of a city related to cultural and regional demands.

Physical activity for children in special school environment

 Key Messages

How long should we ignore imperfect detection of species in the marine environment when modelling their distribution?

The application of the 'ecosystem approach' to marine conservation management demands knowledge of the distribution patterns of the target species or communities. This information is commonly obtained from species distribution models (SDMs). This article explores an important but rarely acknowledged assumption in these models: almost all species may be present, but simply not detected by the particular survey method. However, nearly all of these SDM approaches neglect this important characteristic. This leads to the violation of a fundamental assumption of these models, which presuppose the detection of a species is equal to one (i.e. at each survey locality, a species is perfectly detected). In this article, the concept of imperfect detection is discussed, how it potentially influences the prediction of species' distributions is examined, and some statistical methods that could be used to incorporate the detection probability of species in estimates of their distribution are suggested. The approaches discussed here could improve the collection and interpretation of marine biological survey data and provide a coherent way to incorporate detection probability estimates in the modelling of species distributions. This will ultimately lead to an unbiased and more rigorous understanding of the distribution of species in the marine environment.

Can a motivational intervention overcome an unsupportive environment for walking : findings from the step-by-step study

Background : Interventions to promote walking have rarely examined how their effects varied by the attributes of the physical environment.

Purpose : The purpose of this study is to examine whether perceptions of environmental walkability predicted change in walking behavior following an individual-based intervention to promote walking and whether the intervention buffered the effects of unsupportive environment for walking.

Methods : Inactive adults (aged 30–65 years, 85% women) who completed a 3-month randomized control trial comparing the effect of a single mail-out of a theoretically based self-help walking program (WP, n = 102); the same program plus a pedometer (WPP, n = 105); and a “no-treatment” control group (C, n = 107). Measures included change in self-reported walking time for all purposes and in the proportion of people reporting regular walking (i.e., ≥150 min/week and ≥5 sessions/wk). Perceptions of environmental esthetics, safety from crime, proximity to destinations, access to walking facilities, traffic, streetlights, connectivity, and hilliness were assessed at baseline and dichotomized into “low” or “high” by the median score. Covariates were social support, self-efficacy, intention to change behavior, and sociodemographic characteristics.

Results : Adjusting for baseline walking, significant covariates, and study groups, walking time at follow-up was lower if streetlights or esthetics were perceived to be “low” (&minus;24% and &minus;22%, respectively) compared with “high” (p&thinsp;<&thinsp;0.05). In “low” esthetic conditions, those in the WPP were significantly more likely than controls to increase total walking time (Exp (b)&thinsp;=&thinsp;2.53, p&thinsp;<&thinsp;0.01) and to undertake regular walking (OR&thinsp;=&thinsp;5.85, 95% CI 2.60–12.2), whereas in esthetically pleasing environments, the between-group differences were nonsignificant.

Conclusions : Walkability attributes can influence individual-based walking programs. Some environmental barriers for walking can be overcome by motivational aids.

Prospective memory in a virtual environment: beneficial effects of cue saliency

Prospective Memory (PM) research focuses on how the cognitive system successfully encodes and retains an intention, before retrieving it at a particular future time or in response to a particular future event. Previous work using 2D text stimuli has shown that increasing the saliency of the retrieval cue can improve performance. In this work, we investigated the effect of increased cue saliency in a more ecologically valid 3D virtual environment. The findings indicate that increased perceptual saliency of the cue does benefit PM in a dynamic and visually rich environment but that the impact of cue saliency does not interact with attentional load.