Two studies on Twitter networks and tweet content in relation to Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS): conversation, information, and ‘Diary of a Daily Life’

To date, there is no research examining how adults with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) or Motor Neurone Disease (MND) and severe communication disability use Twitter, nor the use of Twitter in relation to ALS/MND beyond its use for fundraising and raising awareness. In this paper we (a) outline a rationale for the use of Twitter as a method of communication and information exchange for adults with ALS/MND, (b) detail multiple qualitative and quantitative methods used to analyse Twitter networks and tweet content in the our studies, and (c) present the results of two studies designed to provide insights on the use of Twitter by an adult with ALS/MND and by #ALS and #MND hashtag communities in Twitter. We will also discuss findings across the studies, implications for health service providers in Twitter, and directions for future Twitter research in relation to ALS/MND.

Dynamic social networks in guppies (Poecilia reticulata)

One of the main challenges in the study of social networks in vertebrates is to close the gap between group patterns and dynamics. Usually scan samples or transect data are recorded to provide information about social patterns of animals, but these techniques themselves do not shed much light on the underlying dynamics of such groups. Here we show an approach which captures the fission-fusion dynamics of a fish population in the wild and demonstrates how the gap between pattern and dynamics may be closed. Our analysis revealed that guppies have complex association patterns that are characterised by close strong connections between individuals of similar behavioural type. Intriguingly, the preference for particular social partners is not expressed in the length of associations but in their frequency. Finally, we show that the observed association preferences could have important consequences for transmission processes in animal social networks, thus moving the emphasis of network research from descriptive mechanistic studies to functional and predictive ones.

Beyond the classroom : building new school networks

Beyond the Classroom calls for new models of schooling that recognise that the future of young people is the responsibility of the whole community. These models should form the basis of a new social alliance across school systems enabling all young people to take an active—if not leading—role in that community, beyond the school gates.Beyond the Classroom is based on the findings of research carried out by the Education Foundation (now in alliance with the Foundation for Young Australians). The message that emerges from the research is that tinkering around the edges of schooling will not provide solutions to the widening gaps in education that limit opportunities for many young Australians.

Global students for global education research?

In this chapter we discuss the importance of ‘internationalising’ the experience of education research students. First, we look at some features of the increasingly globalised landscape of education and education research and consider three main reasons for urging students to join international networks during their period of study. We then take two examples of contemporary developments in international networking, one at a European level and one at a global level, before concluding by suggesting a number of steps that supervisors and students might take to ensure that they engage effectively with the global education research community.

Protein function prediction based on protein – protein interaction networks.

This research has expanded the knowledge in Bioinformatics and Data mining. It makes an influential contribution to the future research in this area.

An adaptive elliptical anomaly detection model for wireless sensor networks

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) provide a low cost option for monitoring different environments such as farms, forests and water and electricity networks. However, the restricted energy resources of the network impede the collection of raw monitoring data from all the nodes to a single location for analysis. This has stimulated research into efficient anomaly detection techniques to extract information about unusual events such as malicious attacks or faulty sensors at each node. Many previous anomaly detection methods have relied on centralized processing of measurement data, which is highly communication intensive. In this paper, we present an efficient algorithm to detect anomalies in a decentralized manner. In particular, we propose a novel adaptive model for anomaly detection, as well as a robust method for modeling normal behavior. Our evaluation results on both real-life and simulated data sets demonstrate the accuracy of our approach compared to existing methods.

The impact of external forces on cartel network dynamics: direct research in the diamond industry

This paper describes the impact of external environmental forces on cartel networks. Using a case research approach, this report examines two leading business networks within one industry, over time. The results suggest that (a) bargaining power of intermediaries increases with the advent of new and powerful actors, (b) process activities that cartels previously controlled are being outsourced to new actors sometimes based in developing countries, (c) other actors are acquiring resources once dominated by a cartel, (d) external forces triggered by the illegal diamond trade, such as international regulatory constraints, no longer favour cartels like De Beers, and (e) over time, these and additional environment factors are forcing actors like De Beers who perform rigid process activities to become more flexible. For example, forces are moving cartels which relied previously on hand-picked intermediaries in highly controlled networks to market their products to adopt a flexible market-focused expansion of operations in retail contexts.

A game-theoretic resource allocation approach for intercell device-to-device communications in cellular networks

Device-to-Device (D2D) communication is a recently emerged disruptive technology for enhancing the performance of current cellular systems. To successfully implement D2D communications underlaying cellular networks, resource allocation to D2D links is a critical issue, which is far from trivial due to the mutual interference between D2D users and cellular users. Most of the existing resource allocation research for D2D communications has primarily focused on the intracell scenario while leaving the intercell settings not considered. In this paper, we investigate the resource allocation issue for intercell scenarios where a D2D link is located in the overlapping area of two neighboring cells. Specifically, We present three intercell D2D scenarios regarding the resource allocation problem. To address the problem, we develop a repeated game model under these scenarios. Distinct from existing works, we characterize the communication infrastructure, namely Base Stations (BSs), as players competing resource allocation quota from D2D demand, and we define the utility of each player as the payoff from both cellular and D2D communications using radio resources. We also propose a resource allocation algorithm and protocol based on the Nash equilibrium derivations. Numerical results indicate that the developed model not only significantly enhances the system performance including sum rate and sum rate gain, but also sheds lights on resource configurations for intercell D2D scenarios.