Combination of web usage, content and structure information for diverse web mining applications in the tourism context and the context of users with disabilities

188 p.

Usage of substances and their dosage regimes in pharmacological animal models of schizophrenia

Background: Contrary to what is generally thought schizophrenia is a very common mental health issue. For this, several animal models are used to assess the illness in order to develop a definitive. The most widely spread paradigm is the use of pharmacological models. Aim: The aim of this review is to display which are the most used insults for the assessment of social behaviour related negative symptoms in animal models as well as to ascertain which is the most adequate regime. Design: Literature review. Methods: PubMed database was used for this article by the search of the indexed “schizophrenia”, “animal models”, “social behaviour” and “negative symptoms” descriptors. With the exception of a single article due to it value this review is based on articles from 10 years onwards. Besides, only clinical trials and reviews written in English or Spanish and that had laboratory rodents as target population were accepted. Results: The studies assessed agree that pharmacological models (specially those regarding the NMDA receptor antagonists) are a valuable means for the experimental investigation of negative symptoms in schizophrenia with the necessity to emphasise that only some negative symptoms (anhedonia and social interaction, mainly) can be experimentally assessed. Conclusions: There is not enough evidence regarding the fours aspects of this review. PCP, Ketamine or MK-801 in sub-acute dosage regimes are currently the most indicated insults to mimic schizophrenic symptoms in rodents, although further research in needed, albeit other substances are valuable as well. (In English language exclusively)

A study of capacitance-voltage characteristics of lead zirconate titanate ferroelectric thin films and their usage to investigate polarization and coercive field.

Capacitance-voltage (C-V) characteristics of lead zirconate titanate (PZT) thin films with a thickness of 130 nm were measured between 300 and 533 K. The transition between ferroelectric and paraelectric phases was revealed to be of second order in our case, with a Curie temperature at around 450 K. A linear relationship was found between the measured capacitance and the inverse square root of the applied voltage. It was shown that such a relationship could be fitted well by a universal expression of C/A = k(V+V(0))(-1/2) and that this expression could be derived by expanding the Landau-Devonshire free energy at an effective equilibrium position of the Ti/Zr ion in a PZT unit cell. By using the derived equations in this work, the free energy parameters for an individual material can be obtained solely from the corresponding C-V data, and the temperature dependences of both remnant polarization and coercive voltage are shown to be in quantitative agreement with the experimental data.

Optimisation of fuel usage and steam availability in the power and steam plant of a paper mill

This paper presents the results of a project aimed at minimising fuel usage while maximising steam availability in the power and steam plant of a large newsprint mill. The approach taken was to utilise the better regulation and plant wide optimisation capabilities of Advanced Process Control, especially Model Predictive Control (MPC) techniques. These have recently made their appearance in the pulp and paper industry but are better known in the oil and petrochemical industry where they have been used for nearly 30 years. The issue in the power and steam plant is to ensure that sufficient steam is available when the paper machines require it and yet not to have to waste too much steam when one or more of the machines suffers an outage. This is a problem for which MPC is well suited. It allows variables to be kept within declared constraint ranges, a feature which has been used, effectively, to increase the steam storage capacity of the existing plant. This has resulted in less steam being condensed when it is not required and in significant reductions in the need for supplementary firing. The incidence of steam being dump-condensed while also supplementary firing the Combined Heat & Power (CHP) plant has been reduced by 95% and the overall use of supplementary firing is less than 30% of what it was. In addition the plant runs more smoothly and requires less operator time. The yearly benefit provided by the control system is greater than £200,000, measured in terms of 2005 gas prices.

Which diagrams and when? Health workers' choice and usage of different diagram types for service improvement

Diagrammatic representations, such as process mapping and care pathways, have been often used for service evaluation and improvement in healthcare. While a broad range of diagrammatic representations exist, their application in healthcare has been very limited. There is a lack of understanding about how and which diagrams could be usable and useful to health workers. In this study, ten mental health workers were asked to discuss positive and negative issues around their service delivery using one or two diagrams of their choice out of seven different diagrams representing their service: care pathway diagram; organisation diagram; communication diagram; service blueprint; patient state transition diagram; free form diagram; geographic map. Their interactions with diagrams were video-taped for analysis. The patient state transition diagram was the most popular choice in spite of relatively low previous familiarity. The overall findings provided insight into a better use of diagrams in healthcare. © 2012 Springer-Verlag.

JUSTEIS: JISC Usage Surveys: Trends in Electronic Information Services Final report 2003/2004 Cycle Five

Urquhart, C., Spink, S., Thomas, R., Yeoman, A., Durbin, J., Turner, J., Fenton, R. & Armstrong, C. (2004). JUSTEIS: JISC Usage Surveys: Trends in Electronic Information Services Final report 2003/2004 Cycle Five. Aberystwyth: Department of Information Studies, University of Wales Aberystwyth. Sponsorship: JISC

JUSTEIS (JISC Usage Surveys: Trends in Electronic Information Services) Strand A: survey of end users of all electronic information services (HE and FE), with Action research report. Final report 2002/2003 Cycle Four.

Urquhart, C. (editor for JUSTEIS team), Spink, S., Thomas, R., Yeoman, A., Durbin, J., Turner, J., Armstrong, A., Lonsdale, R. & Fenton, R. (2003). JUSTEIS (JISC Usage Surveys: Trends in Electronic Information Services) Strand A: survey of end users of all electronic information services (HE and FE), with Action research report. Final report 2002/2003 Cycle Four. Aberystwyth: Department of Information Studies, University of Wales Aberystwyth with Information Automation Ltd (CIQM). Sponsorship: JISC