Integrated billing mechanisms in the Internet of Things to support information sharing and enable new business opportunities

The Internet of Things (IOT) concept and enabling technologies such as RFID offer the prospect of linking the real world of physical objects with the virtual world of information technology to improve visibility and traceability information within supply chains and across the entire lifecycles of products, as well as enabling more intuitive interactions and greater automation possibilities. There is a huge potential for savings through process optimization and profit generation within the IOT, but the sharing of financial benefits across companies remains an unsolved issue. Existing approaches towards sharing of costs and benefits have failed to scale so far. The integration of payment solutions into the IOT architecture could solve this problem. We have reviewed different possible levels of integration. Multiple payment solutions have been researched. Finally we have developed a model that meets the requirements of the IOT in relation to openness and scalability. It supports both hardware-centric and software-centric approaches to integration of payment solutions with the IOT. Different requirements concerning payment solutions within the IOT have been defined and considered in the proposed model. Possible solution providers include telcos, e-payment service providers and new players such as banks and standardization bodies. The proposed model of integrating the Internet of Things with payment solutions will lower the barrier to invoicing for the more granular visibility information generated using the IOT. Thus, it has the potential to enable recovery of the necessary investments in IOT infrastructure and accelerate adoption of the IOT, especially for projects that are only viable when multiple benefits throughout the supply chain need to be accumulated in order to achieve a Return on Investment (ROI). In a long-term perspective, it may enable IT-departments to become profit centres instead of cost centres. © 2010 - IOS Press and the authors. All rights reserved.

Report on science communication training and Wayamba International Conference (WINC) on Sustainable Development through Equitable Sharing

This report presents presentations from representatives of 12 countries, key outcomes and recommendations for the future.

Molecular modeling on some human interleukins sharing gamma c of interleukin-2 receptor, and structure-function relationships

Five models for human interleukin-7 (HIL-7), HIL-9, HIL-13, HIL-15 and HIL-17 have been generated by SYBYL software package. The primary models were optimized using molecular dynamics and molecular mechanics methods. The final models were optimized using a steepest descent algorithm and a subsequent conjugate gradient method. The complexes with these interleukins and the common gamma chain of interleukin-2 receptor (IL-2R) were constructed and subjected to energy minimization. We found residues, such as Gln127 and Tyr103, of the common gamma chain of IL-2R are very important. Other residues, e.g. Lys70, Asn128 and Glu162, are also significant. Four hydrophobic grooves and two hydrophilic sites converge at the active site triad of the gamma chain. The binding sites of these interleukins interaction with the common gamma chain exist in the first helical and/or the fourth helical domains. Therefore, we conclude that these interleukins binds to the common gamma chain of IL-2R by the first and the fourth helix domain. Especially at the binding sites of some residues (lysine, arginine, asparagine, glutamic acid and aspartic acid), with a discontinuous region of the common gamma chain of IL-2R, termed the interleukins binding sites (103-210). The study of these sites can be important for the development of new drugs. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

西藏高原护士工作倦怠特点及组织干预

Studies on job burnout have drawn more and more attentions for clinical nurses, however, investigations on specific nurse sample, those working in the Tibet Plateau, are few. In this study, we evaluated the job burnout of the nurses working in the Tibet Plateau and investigated the influence of organization intervention on the job burnout of nurses. The questionnaires applied in this study included MBI-General Survey and Distributive，Procedural and interactive Justice . The results were as follows, First, certain degree of job burnout undoubtedly exists in the nurse sample working in the Tibet Plateau, although it was not serious in general. The factors, such as age, being soldier or not , weekly working hours and the professional titles, had significant influence on the levels of job burnout in the nurse sample of this study; Secondly, emotional exhaustion was at a higher level for the nurses working in the Tibet Plateau,a high altitude area than in those working in the low altitude area, while it was easier for nurses in the low altitude area to achieve personal accomplishment; Thirdly, a correlation was observed in the organizational justice and job burnout. Organization intervention can alleviate or prevent from the feelings of job burnout by improving the organization justice; Finally, taken together, we thus suggest that prevention is the most effective measure to prevent the onset of job burnout, and an improvement in the social organization and personal skills and attitudes simultaneously are much appreciated.

军队医学科技人员身心健康与影响因素的研究

To study the relationship between mental-physical health and coping behavior,job stress and job motivation in medical laboratory scientists and technicians. A cross-section survey was conducted,using the anxiety rating scale(SAS), depression rating scale(SDS), coping behavior rating scale,self-rating subhealth scale,self-rating stress scale,and self-rating job motivation scale among 289 medical laboratory scientists and technicians with analysis of ANOVA and Regression. The study was carried out in three steps:step1 is to analyze the general situation of the mental-physical health.Step 2 is to analyze the features of the main influencial facotors.Step 3 is to study the influence of the relative factors on mental-physical health.The following are the results: 1.The anxiety and depression scores of the medical researchers and technicians were 30±6 and 37±8 respectively,both significantly lower than those of the national norm（34±6 and 42±11 respectively,both P<0.01）,which are of significant difference. The depression score of the associate chief technician was 42±7, significantly higher than those of the medical researchers and technicians with any other professional titles (all P<0.05）, and the anxiety score of the associate chief technicians was 32±7, significantly higher than that of the research fellows（28±4, P<0.05），with no significant difference to the score of the medical researchers and technicians with other professional titles. The depression score,anxiety score and the subhealth score of the age group of 36～49 were 39±9,31±7 and 32±9 respectively, both higher than that of the age group of 20～35 （36±8,29±6 and 29±7 respectively,both P<0.05）,while there is much diference among other age groups. And the subhealth status has nothing to do with marital status,education background and professional titles. 2.The coping behaviors,job stress and motivation of the military medical laboratory scientists and technicians. 1）Coping behaviors:The seeking help score of the associate chief technicians was 2.8±0.5,not significantly different from that of the associate research fellows（2.8±0.5）,but significantly lower than those of the medical researchers and technicians with other professional titles(all P<0.01),and whose self-blame score was higher than that of the research fellows,which is of significant difference.The self-blame score and the imagination score of the associate research fellows were 2.0±0.5 and 2.4±0.5 respectively, significantly higher than that of the research fellows(1.6±0.4, 2.1±0.4,both P<0.01). The seeking help score of the females was 3.1±0.5, significantly higher than that of the males(2.9±0.5, both P<0.01),and the solving problem score was 3.4±0.6,significantly lower than the male(3.6±0.7, both P<0.01).There is no any significant difference in coping behaviors among researchers and technicians of different marital status,education background and age groups. 2)Job stress: The score of job stress of the age group of 35~49 and 50~60 were 23±8 and 25±6 respectively,significantly higher than that of the 20~35(21±7,both P<0.05). There is no any significant difference in job stress among researchers and technicians of different marital status,gender,professional titles and education background. 3)The score of meeting personal desire for reputation and interests of the males was 19.6±5.4，significantly higher than that of the females(18.4±5.0, both P<0.05), while there is no significant difference in job motivation among researchers and technicians of different titles,education,age and marital status. 3.The relationship of the mental-physical health of the military medical laboratory scientists and technicians with their coping behaviors,job stress and motivations 1) Coping behaviors:Regression analysis showed that, the best predictors of subhealth were anxiety,depression and escaping (β=-0.40,β=0.23, β=0.14, both P<0.01).the best predictors of anxiety and depression were active coping behaviors and negative coping behaviors (β=-0.40,β=0.40, both P<0.01).The moderate(rational) coping behaviors is the best predictor only of anxiety and of significant difference. 2)job stress : Regression analysis demonstrated that anxiety,depression,job stress 2 and job stress 4 are the best predictor for subhealth;job stress 12 is the best retro-predictor for depression; job stress 3 and 8 are the best predictor for depression;and job stress 2 and 9 are the best predictor for anxiety ,which are of significant difference. 3)Motivation:Regression analysis demonstrated that depression is the best predictor for subhealth while motivation itself doesn't predict subhealth;with respect to the specific contents of motivation,"probing unknown rules and making contributions to the human society "is the best retro-predictor for depression and has nothing to do with anxiety prediction. 4) The combined influences of coping behaviors,job stress and motivations: Regression analysis showed that, the best predictors for subhealth were anxiety,depression and job stress(β=0.41,β=0.24, β=0.19, both P<0.01).the best predictors for anxiety and depression were active coping behaviors and negative coping behaviors (β=-0.40,β=0.40, both P<0.01).The moderate(rational) coping behaviors is the best predictor only for anxiety and of significant difference. CONCLUSIONS: Regression analysis showed that the best predictors for anxiety and depression were active coping behaviors and negative coping behaviors, the best predictors for subhealth were anxiety,depression and job stress.Coping behaviors, job stress and motivations have significant influences on the mental-physical health of the military medical researchers and and technicians. Among them,coping behavior is the most important factor while job stress and motivation follow. Seeking help more often,less self-blame ,imagination and job stress could help release the anxiety, depression and improve the subhealth of the medical researchers and technicians. The findings of this study indicate we should address the physical and mental health of the military laboratory researchers and technicians.

企业组织领导参与决策行为研究

In the processes of Chinese economic and political reforms, making decision democratically and scientifically is one of the most important problems for the managers. Through the investigations of 319 managers from 13 companies in 3 cities of China, the participation or the behavior of influence and power sharing in managerial decision-making was systematically analyzed. The research was concerned with three aspects: (1) the descriptive study of managerial decision-making; (2) the relationship between managerial decision-making and a set of specified contingent situational factors; (3) the relationship between managerial decision-making and various outcome variables, such as job satisfaction and organizational effectiveness. The principal results of the research showed. 1. The managers used different methods of decision-making in different situations. The wildly used method by the managers was "prior consultation with subordinate". 2. Compared with the developed countries, Chinese managers tended to use more centralized methods of decision-making. In the comparisons among the different districts of China, the managers in the districts of the higher level economic and cultural development tended to use more participative methods in the processes of decision-making. 3. The behavior of managerial decision-making was influenced by the various contingent factors, such as the uncertainties of the environments, the job constraints, and the variables related to persons, etc. 4. The behavior of the managerial decision-making correlated significantly with the job satisfaction and organizational effectiveness. The more influence and power managers owned in the processes of decision-making, the more positive they evaluated their job satisfaction and organizational effectiveness.

Sharing visual features for multiclass and multiview object detection

We consider the problem of detecting a large number of different classes of objects in cluttered scenes. Traditional approaches require applying a battery of different classifiers to the image, at multiple locations and scales. This can be slow and can require a lot of training data, since each classifier requires the computation of many different image features. In particular, for independently trained detectors, the (run-time) computational complexity, and the (training-time) sample complexity, scales linearly with the number of classes to be detected. It seems unlikely that such an approach will scale up to allow recognition of hundreds or thousands of objects. We present a multi-class boosting procedure (joint boosting) that reduces the computational and sample complexity, by finding common features that can be shared across the classes (and/or views). The detectors for each class are trained jointly, rather than independently. For a given performance level, the total number of features required, and therefore the computational cost, is observed to scale approximately logarithmically with the number of classes. The features selected jointly are closer to edges and generic features typical of many natural structures instead of finding specific object parts. Those generic features generalize better and reduce considerably the computational cost of an algorithm for multi-class object detection.

Heuristics for Job-Shop Scheduling

Two methods of obtaining approximate solutions to the classic General Job-shop Scheduling Program are investigated. The first method is iterative. A sampling of the solution space is used to decide which of a collection of space pruning constraints are consistent with "good" schedules. The selected space pruning constraints are then used to reduce the search space and the sampling is repeated. This approach can be used either to verify whether some set of space pruning constraints can prune with discrimination or to generate solutions directly. Schedules can be represented as trajectories through a Cartesian space. Under the objective criteria of Minimum maximum Lateness family of "good" schedules (trajectories) are geometric neighbors (reside with some "tube") in this space. This second method of generating solutions takes advantage of this adjacency by pruning the space from the outside in thus converging gradually upon this "tube." One the average this methods significantly outperforms an array of the Priority Dispatch rules when the object criteria is that of Minimum Maximum Lateness. It also compares favorably with a recent relaxation procedure.

Job change and workplace learning in the public sector: the significance of new technology for unskilled work.

Focussing here on local authorities and health services, this paper examines the significance of new technology to unskilled work in the public sector as it is developing and the implications for workplace learning. An argument is developed that new technology is central to a minority of examples of job change, although, significantly, it is more important to staff–initiated change and to workers’ ability to fully participate in life beyond the workplace.

Novel information sharing syntax for data sharing between police and community partners, using role-based security.

The exchange of information between the police and community partners forms a central aspect of effective community service provision. In the context of policing, a robust and timely communications mechanism is required between police agencies and community partner domains, including: Primary healthcare (such as a Family Physician or a General Practitioner); Secondary healthcare (such as hospitals); Social Services; Education; and Fire and Rescue services. Investigations into high-profile cases such as the Victoria Climbié murder in 2000, the murders of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman in 2002, and, more recently, the death of baby Peter Connelly through child abuse in 2007, highlight the requirement for a robust information-sharing framework. This paper presents a novel syntax that supports information-sharing requests, within strict data-sharing policy definitions. Such requests may form the basis for any information-sharing agreement that can exist between the police and their community partners. It defines a role-based architecture, with partner domains, with a syntax for the effective and efficient information sharing, using SPoC (Single Point-of-Contact) agents to control in-formation exchange. The application of policy definitions using rules within these SPoCs is inspired by network firewall rules and thus define information exchange permissions. These rules can be imple-mented by software filtering agents that act as information gateways between partner domains. Roles are exposed from each domain to give the rights to exchange information as defined within the policy definition. This work involves collaboration with the Scottish Police, as part of the Scottish Institute for Policing Research (SIPR), and aims to improve the safety of individuals by reducing risks to the community using enhanced information-sharing mechanisms.