Quantifying the higher-order influence of scientific publications

Scientometrics - Citation impact is commonly assessed using direct, first-order citation relations. We consider here instead the indirect influence of publications on new publications via...     

Quantifying the role of risk-taking behaviour in causation of serious road crash-related injury

This study was designed to quantify the increased risk of road crash-related injury, which can be attributed to risk-taking behaviour. A case-control study was conducted to compare motor vehicle drivers (car and bike) who had been hospitalised for injuries following crashes with population-based controls. Cases were recruited prospectively over 12 months and controls were randomly selected from license holders (car and bike) living in the same geographical location as cases. A self-administered questionnaire was used to ascertain participants' driving behaviour, general risk-taking behaviour and selected demographic characteristics. After adjusting for demographic variables, number of years of driving and total distance driven per week, logistic regression analysis showed that a high risk acceptance was associated with an eight-fold increased risk of having a crash that resulted in serious injury (OR 7.8, 95% CI 4.2-15.8). The findings of this study support the suggestion that certain host factors increase the risk of crash-related serious injury. There would appear to be a reasonable argument for persisting with injury prevention programmes, which concentrate on host as well as environment risk factor reduction.     

Linking networks and plant roles: the impact of changing a plant role

Many manufacturing firms are expanding their global footprint to explore new opportunities for efficient and effective production. The strategic perspective on international manufacturing networks involves both the network level and the plant level. A key aspect is the relationship between the network and the role of plants. In this research, we investigate the relationship between the network and plant perspectives in international manufacturing networks. We use an embedded case study that includes five plants in two product networks over a period of three years. We analyse how changing the role of one plant affects the network as well as the roles of the other plants in the networks. We find that decisions on plant roles are, to a very high degree, network decisions and not decisions for individual plants. Based on the insights into the case study, we also develop a framework for mapping manufacturing networks, including market coverage, plant location and site competence.     

A note on the role of system engineering in the industry of a changing society

In order to analyze and solve the problems arising nowadays especially associated with production activities and services in a “changing society”, the most appropriate methodology is System Science and Engineering, of which a more incisive contribution is desirable in an age where a political approach prevails in such problems. One of the most important problems concerns the electricity sector, of which the peculiar characteristics are underlined, as it represents at the same time an asset and a service not assimilable to “goods”, and as regards the limits that are set for competition and the characteristics that make a “natural monopoly” of it regardless of its, private or public, nature.     

Extension of the strategic renewal journey framework: The changing role of middle management

This paper presents the findings of a longitudinal study of a large corporation's journey towards becoming an ambidextrous organisation in the face of emerging technology. By investigating the interplay between the top and middle management, the results show that business intelligence systems allowed the firm to pursue a controlled renewal journey that was data-driven, automated, and supported fast organisational learning. This substituted for active frontline and middle managers. The change in organisational direction was driven by a small and powerful strategic top management group, even though this was a multi-unit firm with more than 100,000 employees. The main advantage of this type of journey is that the organisation can fully realize the advantage of highly centralised formal planning and control while becoming resilient and ambidextrous. A well-functioning decision support system, organisational policies and communication strategy can substitute for collective sense-making and shared strategic schemas. The results also suggest that management control systems can have a profound impact on developing organisational ambidexterity. The article also provides further details on the nature and implications of the rhetorical tactics used by the top management team to focus on organisational attention and action.     

Quantifying the ease of scientific discovery

It has long been known that scientific output proceeds on an exponential increase, or more properly, a logistic growth curve. The interplay between effort and discovery is clear, and the nature of the functional form has been thought to be due to many changes in the scientific process over time. Here I show a quantitative method for examining the ease of scientific progress, another necessary component in understanding scientific discovery. Using examples from three different scientific disciplines - mammalian species, chemical elements, and minor planets - I find the ease of discovery to conform to an exponential decay. In addition, I show how the pace of scientific discovery can be best understood as the outcome of both scientific output and ease of discovery. A quantitative study of the ease of scientific discovery in the aggregate, such as done here, has the potential to provide a great deal of insight into both the nature of future discoveries and the technical processes behind discoveries in science.     

Analysis of driver roles: modelling the changing role of the driver in automated driving systems using EAST

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the role of the driver within automated driving systems using the Event Analysis of Systemic Teamwork (EAST) method. We already know that as the level of automation increases within the driving task, the role of the driver shifts from that of an active operator (i.e. a driver driving) to more of a passive monitor (i.e. a driver monitoring). Task, social and information networks were constructed using the Hierarchical Task Analysis of Driving and evidence from driver verbalisations collected during a previous study to further explore the changing role of the driver using network analysis. A ‘broken links’ approach was conducted to show that momentary engagement in non-driving-related secondary tasks within an automated driving system can dramatically change the structure of driving system.     

Mining the past

Whenever we hear of an accident elsewhere we are eager to learn what happened and what recommendations have been made to prevent it happening again. However, we can learn as much from past accidents that have been forgotten or were never widely reported. Some such accidents are described, including entry to confined spaces, the collapse of a gasholder and the collapse of a tank for an unusual reason.     

On the relationship of funding and research publications

The impact of 17 year period of funding in schistosomiasis research on publication outcome was examined. Two productivity and three quality indicators were used to compare the output from the entire population of schistosomiasis in this period with those associated with 351 funded researchers. A substantially higher productivity and citation impact were found. This consistency of direction points to the positive effect of a period of sustained funding commitment.Dedicated to the memory of Michael J. MoravcsikThis publication is supported in part by a NIH grant RO1-LM-04680 from the National Library of Medicine.     

Scientific publications released in the Baltic States

The article focuses on evolution of scientific publications released in the Baltic States (Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia) and refers to international databases that contain scientific papers produced over the last 20 years of independence. The countries share the same history of restoration of independence after 40 years of occupation. The article shall specifically focus on the period of post EU accession in 2004. It will discuss the contribution of Kaunas University of Technology, Vilnius Gediminas Technical University, Riga Technical University and Tallinn University of Technology to the total number of publications in these countries. The investigation was based on databases of Thomson Reuters Web of Science, Essential Science Indicators and Journal Citation Report. Additionally, it employed the Scimago ranking system based on Scopus database. Data analysis also involved similar indices that provide the number of papers and their citation results as well as the average number of citations per paper.     

Using the h-index for assessing single publications

It is shown that a Hirsch-type index can be used for assessing single highly cited publications by calculating the h-index of the set of papers citing the work in question. This index measures not only the direct impact of a publication but also its indirect influence through the citing papers.     

Quantifying the complexity of the delayed logistic map

Statistical complexity measures are used to quantify the degree of complexity of the delayed logistic map, with linear and nonlinear feedback. We employ two methods for calculating the complexity measures, one with the 'histogram-based' probability distribution function and the other one with ordinal patterns. We show that these methods provide complementary information about the complexity of the delay-induced dynamics: there are parameter regions where the histogram-based complexity is zero while the ordinal pattern complexity is not, and vice versa. We also show that the time series generated from the nonlinear delayed logistic map can present zero missing or forbidden patterns, i.e. all possible ordinal patterns are realized into orbits.     

The role of publications in the new programme oriented funding of the Hermann von Helmholtz Association of National Research Centres (HGF)

Summary The year 2002 brought a successive funding change-over from until now institutional to programme oriented funding (POF) in the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres (HGF). This way the 15 German research centres now have to generate their means successively from programmes of the research fields of the HGF (see: www.helmholtz.de) by competing with each other. This nucleus of the reform of the Association is being implemented based upon the opinion of international experts. In this context the evaluation of publications of individual research centres, resp. research groups will be playing an ever increasing part. This lecture will inform about the reformed, partially formalized system and first experiences therewith at the time of the first evaluations.     

Searchlights from the past

"Modern man", wrote the historian, E.H. Carr, "peers eagerly back into the twilight from which he has come, in the hope that its faint beams will illuminate the obscurity into which he is going ...". Carr is wrong. For those who are willing to look, searchlights, not faint beams, shine out from the past and show us the pits into which we will fall if we do not look where we are going. Some of these searchlights illuminate specific technical risks while others remind us of general principles. In an age of rapid change people are particularly prone to ignore the past, but while technology changes, people do not.     

Quantifying the 3D macrostructure of tissue scaffolds

The need to shift from tissue replacement to tissue regeneration has led to the development of tissue engineering and in situ tissue regeneration. Both of these strategies often employ the use of scaffolds--templates that allow cells to attach and then guide the new tissue growth. There are many design criteria for an ideal scaffold. These criteria vary depending on the tissue type and location in the body. In any application of a scaffold it is vital to be able to characterise the scaffold before it goes into in vitro testing. In vitro testing allows the cell response to be investigated before its in vivo performance is assessed. A full characterisation of events in vitro and in vivo, in three dimensions (3D), is necessary if a scaffold's performance and effectiveness is to be fully quantified. This paper focuses on porous scaffolds for bone regeneration, suggests appropriate design criteria for a bone regenerating scaffold and then reviews techniques for obtaining the vitally important quantification of its pore structure. The techniques discussed will include newly developed methods of quantifying X-ray microtomography (microCT) images in 3D and for predicting the scaffolds mechanical properties and the likely paths of fluid flow (and hence potential cell migration). The complications in investigating scaffold performance in vitro are then discussed. Finally, the use of microCT for imaging scaffolds for in vivo tests is reviewed.     

Ranking scientific publications considering the aging characteristics of citations

Ranking the significance of scientific publications has been a challenging topic for a long time. So far, many ranking methods have been proposed, one of which is the well-known PageRank algorithm. In this paper, we introduce aging characteristics to the PageRank algorithm via considering only the first 10 year citations when aggregating resource from different nodes. The validation of our new method is performed on the data of American Physical Society journals. The results indicate that taking into account aging characteristics improves the performance of the PageRank algorithm in terms of ranking accuracy for both papers and authors. Though our method is only applied to citation networks in this paper, it can be naturally used in many other real systems and similar improvements are expected.