Open Access Movement for Managing Intellectual Informatics

The present work focuses on various facets of open access movement for managing intellectual output that eventually becomes available and accessible in public domain. Thus, purpose of this paper is to document and share the real time experience of managing and sharing of intellectual wealth of academia of Cochin University of Science & Technology by using open source platforms. This paper is trying to explore different intellectual information resources in the current era and also aims to suggest cost effective strategy of implementing new open access tools and technology for effective managing ofintellectual informatics

More women in informatics research and education

Speaker: Lynda Hardman Organiser: Time: 04/02/2015 12:30-13:30 Location: B32/3077 Abstract The challenges of addressing gender inequalities in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine is widely acknowledged. We currently hold a bronze award and ECS is one of many academic units in the University which has gained Athena Swan Charter status. In this seminar, Professor Lynda Hardman, Chair of the Informatics Europe working group "Women in Informatics Research and Education” will be explaining the causes of issued underlying gender inequality and constructive routes to addressing this important agenda. In undertaking to commit to an action plan which is a prerequisite of gaining charter status, the University or academic department agreed to accept and incorporate the Athena Swan six principles listed below: * To address gender inequalities requires commitment and action from everyone, at all levels of the organisation * To tackle the unequal representation of women in science requires changing cultures and attitudes across the organisation * The absence of diversity at management and policy-making levels has broad implications which the organisation will examine * The high loss rate of women in science is an urgent concern which the organisation will address * The system of short-term contracts has particularly negative consequences for the retention and progression of women in science, which the organisation recognises * There are both personal and structural obstacles to women making the transition from PhD into a sustainable academic career in science, which require the active consideration of the organisation. This seminar is designed to provide an opportunity to explore these issues NOTE: Lynda will be basing here talk on some of the work she directed as chair of the "Women in Informatics Research and Education” working group. The purpose of the working group is to actively participate and promote actions that contribute to improve gender balance in Information and Communication Sciences and Technologies. The first concrete result of the working group's activities was the publication of the booklet "More Women in Informatics Research and Education" in 2013. The booklet is a compact source of clear and simple best practices to deans and heads of departments that aim to increase the participation of women as both students and employees in their institutions. Many tips included were also inspired by colleagues already in leading positions who have already implemented actions in their institutions to attract more women and ensure their continued participation in the organization at commensurate ratios with their male colleagues. The booklet is endorsed by the European Commission and features a foreword by Neelie Kroes, Vice-President of the European Commission, responsible for the Digital Agenda.

Health informatics: improving patient-centred healthcare pathway

Nowadays the use of information and communication technology is becoming prevalent in many aspects of healthcare services from patient registration, to consultation, treatment and pathology tests request. Manual interface techniques have dominated data-capture activities in primary care and secondary care settings for decades. Despites the improvements made in IT, usability issues still remain over the use of I/O devices like the computer keyboard, touch-sensitive screens, light pen and barcodes. Furthermore, clinicians have to use several computer applications when providing healthcare services to patients. One of the problems faced by medical professionals is the lack of data integrity between the different software applications which in turn can hinder the provision of healthcare services tailored to the needs of the patients. The use of digital pen and paper technology integrated with legacy medical systems hold the promise of improving healthcare quality. This paper discusses the issue of data integrity in e-health systems and proposes the modelling of "Smart Forms" via semiotics to potentially improve integrity between legacy systems, making the work of medical professionals easier and improve the quality of care in primary care practices and hospitals.

A decadal view of biodiversity informatics: challenges and priorities

Biodiversity informatics plays a central enabling role in the research community's efforts to address scientific conservation and sustainability issues. Great strides have been made in the past decade establishing a framework for sharing data, where taxonomy and systematics has been perceived as the most prominent discipline involved. To some extent this is inevitable, given the use of species names as the pivot around which information is organised. To address the urgent questions around conservation, land-use, environmental change, sustainability, food security and ecosystem services that are facing Governments worldwide, we need to understand how the ecosystem works. So, we need a systems approach to understanding biodiversity that moves significantly beyond taxonomy and species observations. Such an approach needs to look at the whole system to address species interactions, both with their environment and with other species.It is clear that some barriers to progress are sociological, basically persuading people to use the technological solutions that are already available. This is best addressed by developing more effective systems that deliver immediate benefit to the user, hiding the majority of the technology behind simple user interfaces. An infrastructure should be a space in which activities take place and, as such, should be effectively invisible.This community consultation paper positions the role of biodiversity informatics, for the next decade, presenting the actions needed to link the various biodiversity infrastructures invisibly and to facilitate understanding that can support both business and policy-makers. The community considers the goal in biodiversity informatics to be full integration of the biodiversity research community, including citizens' science, through a commonly-shared, sustainable e-infrastructure across all sub-disciplines that reliably serves science and society alike.