Communication about scientific uncertainty in environmental nanoparticle research - a comparison of scientific literature and mass media

Science.gov (United States)

Heidmann, Ilona; Milde, Jutta

2014-05-01

The research about the fate and behavior of engineered nanoparticles in the environment is despite its wide applications still in the early stages. 'There is a high level of scientific uncertainty in nanoparticle research' is often stated in the scientific community. Knowledge about these uncertainties might be of interest to other scientists, experts and laymen. But how could these uncertainties be characterized and are they communicated within the scientific literature and the mass media? To answer these questions, the current state of scientific knowledge about scientific uncertainty through the example of environmental nanoparticle research was characterized and the communication of these uncertainties within the scientific literature is compared with its media coverage in the field of nanotechnologies. The scientific uncertainty within the field of environmental fate of nanoparticles is by method uncertainties and a general lack of data concerning the fate and effects of nanoparticles and their mechanisms in the environment, and by the uncertain transferability of results to the environmental system. In the scientific literature, scientific uncertainties, their sources, and consequences are mentioned with different foci and to a different extent. As expected, the authors in research papers focus on the certainty of specific results within their specific research question, whereas in review papers, the uncertainties due to a general lack of data are emphasized and the sources and consequences are discussed in a broader environmental context. In the mass media, nanotechnology is often framed as rather certain and positive aspects and benefits are emphasized. Although reporting about a new technology, only in one-third of the reports scientific uncertainties are mentioned. Scientific uncertainties are most often mentioned together with risk and they arise primarily from unknown harmful effects to human health. Environmental issues itself are seldom mentioned

Semantic representation of scientific literature: bringing claims, contributions and named entities onto the Linked Open Data cloud

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Bahar Sateli

2015-12-01

Full Text Available Motivation. Finding relevant scientific literature is one of the essential tasks researchers are facing on a daily basis. Digital libraries and web information retrieval techniques provide rapid access to a vast amount of scientific literature. However, no further automated support is available that would enable fine-grained access to the knowledge ‘stored’ in these documents. The emerging domain of Semantic Publishing aims at making scientific knowledge accessible to both humans and machines, by adding semantic annotations to content, such as a publication’s contributions, methods, or application domains. However, despite the promises of better knowledge access, the manual annotation of existing research literature is prohibitively expensive for wide-spread adoption. We argue that a novel combination of three distinct methods can significantly advance this vision in a fully-automated way: (i Natural Language Processing (NLP for Rhetorical Entity (RE detection; (ii Named Entity (NE recognition based on the Linked Open Data (LOD cloud; and (iii automatic knowledge base construction for both NEs and REs using semantic web ontologies that interconnect entities in documents with the machine-readable LOD cloud.Results. We present a complete workflow to transform scientific literature into a semantic knowledge base, based on the W3C standards RDF and RDFS. A text mining pipeline, implemented based on the GATE framework, automatically extracts rhetorical entities of type Claims and Contributions from full-text scientific literature. These REs are further enriched with named entities, represented as URIs to the linked open data cloud, by integrating the DBpedia Spotlight tool into our workflow. Text mining results are stored in a knowledge base through a flexible export process that provides for a dynamic mapping of semantic annotations to LOD vocabularies through rules stored in the knowledge base. We created a gold standard corpus from computer

An annotated bibliography of scientific literature on managing forests for carbon benefits

Science.gov (United States)

Sarah J. Hines; Linda S. Heath; Richard A. Birdsey

2010-01-01

Managing forests for carbon benefits is a consideration for climate change, bioenergy, sustainability, and ecosystem services. A rapidly growing body of scientific literature on forest carbon management includes experimental, modeling, and synthesis approaches, at the stand- to landscape- to continental-level. We conducted a search of the scientific literature on the...

Searching the scientific literature: implications for quantitative and qualitative reviews.

Science.gov (United States)

Wu, Yelena P; Aylward, Brandon S; Roberts, Michael C; Evans, Spencer C

2012-08-01

Literature reviews are an essential step in the research process and are included in all empirical and review articles. Electronic databases are commonly used to gather this literature. However, several factors can affect the extent to which relevant articles are retrieved, influencing future research and conclusions drawn. The current project examined articles obtained by comparable search strategies in two electronic archives using an exemplar search to illustrate factors that authors should consider when designing their own search strategies. Specifically, literature searches were conducted in PsycINFO and PubMed targeting review articles on two exemplar disorders (bipolar disorder and attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder) and issues of classification and/or differential diagnosis. Articles were coded for relevance and characteristics of article content. The two search engines yielded significantly different proportions of relevant articles overall and by disorder. Keywords differed across search engines for the relevant articles identified. Based on these results, it is recommended that when gathering literature for review papers, multiple search engines should be used, and search syntax and strategies be tailored to the unique capabilities of particular engines. For meta-analyses and systematic reviews, authors may consider reporting the extent to which different archives or sources yielded relevant articles for their particular review. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

76 FR 59407 - Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research Report of Scientific and Medical Literature and...

Science.gov (United States)

2011-09-26

...] Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research Report of Scientific and Medical Literature and Information... Administration (FDA) is announcing the availability of its report of scientific and medical literature and... Research Report of Scientific and Medical Literature and Information on Non-Standardized Allergenic...

76 FR 71045 - Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research Report of Scientific and Medical Literature and...

Science.gov (United States)

2011-11-16

...] Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research Report of Scientific and Medical Literature and Information... period for the notice on its report of scientific and medical literature and information concerning the... ``Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research Report of Scientific and Medical Literature and Information...

Categorization of psychoactive substances into "hard drugs" and "soft drugs": a critical review of terminology used in current scientific literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Janik, Peter; Kosticova, Michaela; Pecenak, Jan; Turcek, Michal

2017-11-01

Precise terminology and definitions are important components of scientific language. Although the terms "hard drugs" and "soft drugs" are used widely by professionals, neither the International Classification of Diseases nor the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual classify psychoactive substances into the categories "hard" and "soft." To analyze the occurrence of the terms "hard drugs" and "soft drugs" in recent scientific literature and to establish the degree of consensus in labeling psychoactive substances as "hard" or "soft." A critical review of scientific papers listed in PubMed and Scopus between 2011 and 2015. Three hundred thirty-four articles were initially identified as potentially relevant for review, 132 of which were included in the final analysis. One hundred twenty-four articles used the term "hard drugs" and 84.7% provided examples of substances considered "hard." Forty-four articles used the term "soft drugs" and 90.9% provided examples of substances considered "soft." Citations of relevant articles supporting categorization as "hard" or "soft" were not given in 90% of the articles. The authors often provided no or only very sparse information on their reasons for considering specific drugs as "hard" or "soft." Although it initially appeared that there is substantial agreement as to which psychoactive substances should be regarded as "hard" and "soft," closer inspection shows that the dividing line is blurred without clear criteria for categorization. At this time, it remains uncertain whether these terms should persist in the scientific literature. We therefore recommend these terms should be avoided or, if used, be clearly and precisely defined.

MSL: Facilitating automatic and physical analysis of published scientific literature in PDF format.

Science.gov (United States)

Ahmed, Zeeshan; Dandekar, Thomas

2015-01-01

Published scientific literature contains millions of figures, including information about the results obtained from different scientific experiments e.g. PCR-ELISA data, microarray analysis, gel electrophoresis, mass spectrometry data, DNA/RNA sequencing, diagnostic imaging (CT/MRI and ultrasound scans), and medicinal imaging like electroencephalography (EEG), magnetoencephalography (MEG), echocardiography  (ECG), positron-emission tomography (PET) images. The importance of biomedical figures has been widely recognized in scientific and medicine communities, as they play a vital role in providing major original data, experimental and computational results in concise form. One major challenge for implementing a system for scientific literature analysis is extracting and analyzing text and figures from published PDF files by physical and logical document analysis. Here we present a product line architecture based bioinformatics tool 'Mining Scientific Literature (MSL)', which supports the extraction of text and images by interpreting all kinds of published PDF files using advanced data mining and image processing techniques. It provides modules for the marginalization of extracted text based on different coordinates and keywords, visualization of extracted figures and extraction of embedded text from all kinds of biological and biomedical figures using applied Optimal Character Recognition (OCR). Moreover, for further analysis and usage, it generates the system's output in different formats including text, PDF, XML and images files. Hence, MSL is an easy to install and use analysis tool to interpret published scientific literature in PDF format.

Access to the scientific literature

Science.gov (United States)

Albarède, Francis

The Public Library of Science Open Letter (http://www.publiclibraryofscience.org) is a very generous initiative, but, as most similar initiatives since the advent of electronic publishing, it misses the critical aspects of electronic publishing.Ten years ago, a Publisher would be in charge of running a system called a “scientific journal.” In such a system, the presence of an Editor and peer Reviewers secures the strength of the science and the rigor of writing; the Publisher guarantees the professional quality of printing, efficient dissemination, and long-term archiving. Publishing used to be in everyone's best interest, or nearly everyone. The Publisher, because he/she is financially motivated, ensures widespread dissemination of the journal amongst libraries and individual subscribers. The interest of the Author is that the system guarantees a broad potential readership. The interest of the Reader is that a line is drawn between professionally edited literature, presumably of better quality, and gray literature or home publishing, so that he/she does not waste time going through ‘low yield’ ungraded information. The Publisher could either be a private company, an academic institution, or a scholarly society. My experience is that, when page charges and subscription rates are compounded, journals published by scholarly societies are not necessarily cheaper. The difference between these cases is not the cost of running an office with rents, wages, printing, postage, advertisement, and archiving, but that a private Publisher pays shareholders. Shareholders have the bad habit of minding their own business and, therefore, they may interfere negatively with scientific publishing. Nevertheless, while the stranglehold imposed by private Publishers on our libraries over the last 10 years by increasing subscription rates may in part be due to shareholders' greed, this is true only in part. The increases are also a consequence of the booming number of pages being

A review of scientific topics and literature in abdominal radiology in Germany. Pt. 2. Abdominal parenchymal organs

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Grenacher, L. [Diagnostik Muenchen-Diagnostic Imaging Centre (Germany); Juchems, M.S. [Konstanz Hospital (Germany). Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology; Holzapfel, K. [Technische Univ. Muenchen (Germany). Dept. of Radiology; Kinner, S.; Lauenstein, T.C. [University Hospital Essen (Germany). Dept. of Radiology; Wessling, J. [Clemens Hospital Muenchen (Germany). Dept. of Radiology; Schreyer, A.G. [University Hospital Regenburg (Germany). Dept. of Radiology

2016-03-15

The working group for abdominal and gastrointestinal diagnosis is a group of the German Radiological Society (DRG) focusing clinically and scientifically on the diagnosis and treatment of the gastrointestinal tract as well as the parenchymal abdominal organs. In this article we give an up-to-date literature review of scientific radiological topics especially covered by German radiologists. The working group experts cover the most recent relevant studies concerning liver-specific contrast media with an emphasis on a new classification system for liver adenomas. Additionally studies regarding selective internal radiotherapy (SIRT) are reviewed. For the pancreas the most important tumors are described followed by an introduction to the most recently introduced functional imaging techniques. The manuscript concludes with some remarks on recent studies and concerning chronic pancreatitis as well as autoimmune pancreatitis.

Acquisition of Scientific Literature in Developing Countries. 2: Malaysia.

Science.gov (United States)

Taib, Rosna

1989-01-01

Describes the acquisition of scientific literature by academic libraries in Malaysia. The discussion covers the impact of government policies, library acquisition policies, the selection process, acquisition of special materials, the role of gifts and exchanges, and problems with customs clearance and censorship. Progress in cooperative…

CREATE Cornerstone: Introduction to Scientific Thinking, a New Course for STEM-Interested Freshmen, Demystifies Scientific Thinking through Analysis of Scientific Literature

Science.gov (United States)

Gottesman, Alan J.; Hoskins, Sally G.

2013-01-01

The Consider, Read, Elucidate hypotheses, Analyze and interpret data, Think of the next Experiment (CREATE) strategy for teaching and learning uses intensive analysis of primary literature to improve students’ critical-thinking and content integration abilities, as well as their self-rated science attitudes, understanding, and confidence. CREATE also supports maturation of undergraduates’ epistemological beliefs about science. This approach, originally tested with upper-level students, has been adapted in Introduction to Scientific Thinking, a new course for freshmen. Results from this course's initial semesters indicate that freshmen in a one-semester introductory course that uses a narrowly focused set of readings to promote development of analytical skills made significant gains in critical-thinking and experimental design abilities. Students also reported significant gains in their ability to think scientifically and understand primary literature. Their perceptions and understanding of science improved, and multiple aspects of their epistemological beliefs about science gained sophistication. The course has no laboratory component, is relatively inexpensive to run, and could be adapted to any area of scientific study. PMID:23463229

Scholarly literature and the press: scientific impact and social perception of physics computing

CERN Document Server

Pia, Maria Grazia; Bell, Zane W; Dressendorfer, Paul V

2014-01-01

The broad coverage of the search for the Higgs boson in the mainstream media is a relative novelty for high energy physics (HEP) research, whose achievements have traditionally been limited to scholarly literature. This paper illustrates the results of a scientometric analysis of HEP computing in scientific literature, institutional media and the press, and a comparative overview of similar metrics concerning representative particle physics measurements. The picture emerging from these scientometric data documents the scientific impact and social perception of HEP computing. The results of this analysis suggest that improved communication of the scientific and social role of HEP computing would be beneficial to the high energy physics community.

Electronic Scientific Data & Literature Aggregation: A Review for Librarians

Science.gov (United States)

Losoff, Barbara

2009-01-01

The advent of large-scale digital repositories, along with the need for sharing useful data world-wide, demands change to the current information structure. The merging of digital scientific data with scholarly literature has the potential to fulfill the Semantic Web design principles. This paper will identify factors leading to integration of…

Scientific Issues Relevant to Setting Regulatory Criteria to Identify Endocrine-Disrupting Substances in the European Union.

Science.gov (United States)

Slama, Rémy; Bourguignon, Jean-Pierre; Demeneix, Barbara; Ivell, Richard; Panzica, Giancarlo; Kortenkamp, Andreas; Zoeller, R Thomas

2016-10-01

Endocrine disruptors (EDs) are defined by the World Health Organization (WHO) as exogenous compounds or mixtures that alter function(s) of the endocrine system and consequently cause adverse effects in an intact organism, or its progeny, or (sub)populations. European regulations on pesticides, biocides, cosmetics, and industrial chemicals require the European Commission to establish scientific criteria to define EDs. We address the scientific relevance of four options for the identification of EDs proposed by the European Commission. Option 1, which does not define EDs and leads to using interim criteria unrelated to the WHO definition of EDs, is not relevant. Options 2 and 3 rely on the WHO definition of EDs, which is widely accepted by the scientific community, with option 3 introducing additional categories based on the strength of evidence (suspected EDs and endocrine-active substances). Option 4 adds potency to the WHO definition, as a decision criterion. We argue that potency is dependent on the adverse effect considered and is scientifically ambiguous, and note that potency is not used as a criterion to define other particularly hazardous substances such as carcinogens and reproductive toxicants. The use of potency requires a context that goes beyond hazard identification and corresponds to risk characterization, in which potency (or, more relevantly, the dose-response function) is combined with exposure levels. There is scientific agreement regarding the adequacy of the WHO definition of EDs. The potency concept is not relevant to the identification of particularly serious hazards such as EDs. As is common practice for carcinogens, mutagens, and reproductive toxicants, a multi-level classification of ED based on the WHO definition, and not considering potency, would be relevant (corresponding to option 3 proposed by the European Commission). Slama R, Bourguignon JP, Demeneix B, Ivell R, Panzica G, Kortenkamp A, Zoeller RT. 2016. Scientific issues relevant

Nanotoxicology: characterizing the scientific literature, 2000-2007

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ostrowski, Alexis D.; Martin, Tyronne; Conti, Joseph; Hurt, Indy; Harthorn, Barbara Herr

2009-01-01

Understanding the toxicity of nanomaterials and nano-enabled products is important for human and environmental health and safety as well as public acceptance. Assessing the state of knowledge about nanotoxicology is an important step in promoting comprehensive understanding of the health and environmental implications of these new materials. To this end, we employed bibliometric techniques to characterize the prevalence and distribution of the current scientific literature. We found that the nano-toxicological literature is dispersed across a range of disciplines and sub-fields; focused on in vitro testing; often does not specify an exposure pathway; and tends to emphasize acute toxicity and mortality rather than chronic exposure and morbidity. Finally, there is very little research on consumer products, particularly on their environmental fate, and most research is on the toxicity of basic nanomaterials. The implications for toxicologists, regulators and social scientists studying nanotechnology and society are discussed.

Scholarly literature and the press: scientific impact and social perception of physics computing

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Pia, M G; Basaglia, T; Bell, Z W; Dressendorfer, P V

2014-01-01

The broad coverage of the search for the Higgs boson in the mainstream media is a relative novelty for high energy physics (HEP) research, whose achievements have traditionally been limited to scholarly literature. This paper illustrates the results of a scientometric analysis of HEP computing in scientific literature, institutional media and the press, and a comparative overview of similar metrics concerning representative particle physics measurements. The picture emerging from these scientometric data documents the relationship between the scientific impact and the social perception of HEP physics research versus that of HEP computing. The results of this analysis suggest that improved communication of the scientific and social role of HEP computing via press releases from the major HEP laboratories would be beneficial to the high energy physics community.

Bibliometric analysis of scientific literature on intestinal parasites in Argentina during the period 1985-2014.

Science.gov (United States)

Basualdo, Juan A; Grenóvero, María S; Bertucci, Evangelina; Molina, Nora B

2016-01-01

The study of scientific production is a good indicator of the progress in research and knowledge generation. Bibliometrics is a scientific discipline that uses a set of indicators to quantitatively express the bibliographic characteristics of scientific publications. The scientific literature on the epidemiology of intestinal parasites in Argentina is scattered in numerous sources, hindering access and visibility to the scientific community. Our purpose was to perform a quantitative, bibliometric study of the scientific literature on intestinal parasites in humans in Argentina published in the period 1985-2014. This bibliometric analysis showed an increase in the number of articles on intestinal parasites in humans in Argentina published over the past 30 years. Those articles showed a collaboration index similar to that of the literature, with a high index of institutionality for national institutions and a very low one for international collaboration. The original articles were published in scientific journals in the American Continent, Europe and Asia. The use of bibliometric indicators can provide a solid tool for the diagnosis and survey of the research on epidemiology of intestinal parasites and contributes to the dissemination and visibility of information on the scientific production developed in Argentina. Copyright © 2016 Asociación Argentina de Microbiología. Publicado por Elsevier España, S.L.U. All rights reserved.

Positioning of a CNRS department in the scientific literature

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Remy, D.; Ring, B.; Vergnes, G.

1996-01-01

The evaluation of scientific production has been the topic of several reports. There is a multiplication of indicators concerning institutions and their insertion inside their domain of specialty. Also criteria are becoming more refined and modeling is developing. One principal source of information is the questioning of database and in particular of the Science Citation Index. This paper reports on the results of a positioning study for the CNRS (French National Scientific Research Center) PNC (Corpuscular Nuclear Physics) department in the scientific literature context: methods employed, sources used, reliability limits and bias encountered. One advantage of the PNC department is its own ''Democrites'' database supplied by documentalists from the different laboratories. Even not perfect, this database allows to start with a significant documentation corpus. Results from external databases are thus verified and the uncertainty factor linked to the informations could be partially corrected. (J.S.). 9 refs., 9 tabs

PFOA and possible health effects : A review of scientific literature

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Rijs KJ; Bogers RP; M&G; M&V

2017-01-01

Associations were found between blood concentrations of PFOA in humans and possible health effects and functioning of the body. This is the result of a review of previously performed reviews of the scientific literature on studies conducted among humans by the National Institute for Public Health

Scientific Support of Terrorist Actions by Commercial Grey Area Literature

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Katzung, W.

2007-01-01

The publication of the Al-Quaida handbook and time and time again notes of the possibility for getting special scientific knowledge from the internet have decreased the attention for an other important source of scientific support for terrorist education and/or actions. This is the commercial available and distributed grey area literature provided by a huge amount of (book) sellers and publishing houses. Most of this literature (hard copies and CDs) with dangerous subject matter is published in the US and may be ordered fast and with low costs using the internet. This kind of support for real and potential terrorists stands strongly in contradiction to the official policy and the 'unconditional' war against terrorism. With the presented poster the above described problem should be a little bit put in the focus of the CBMTS community and so to the authorities, too. By means of selected examples from different branches, such as Narcotics, Explosives, unusual Killing Methods, special Poisons / Toxins and, last not least, CW agents inclusive application methods and devices the highly charged situation is tried to shown. (author)

A retrospective of the GREGOR solar telescope in scientific literature

Science.gov (United States)

Denker, C.; von der Lühe, O.; Feller, A.; Arlt, K.; Balthasar, H.; Bauer, S.-M.; Bello González, N.; Berkefeld, Th.; Caligari, P.; Collados, M.; Fischer, A.; Granzer, T.; Hahn, T.; Halbgewachs, C.; Heidecke, F.; Hofmann, A.; Kentischer, T.; Klva{ňa, M.; Kneer, F.; Lagg, A.; Nicklas, H.; Popow, E.; Puschmann, K. G.; Rendtel, J.; Schmidt, D.; Schmidt, W.; Sobotka, M.; Solanki, S. K.; Soltau, D.; Staude, J.; Strassmeier, K. G.; Volkmer, R.; Waldmann, T.; Wiehr, E.; Wittmann, A. D.; Woche, M.

2012-11-01

In this review, we look back upon the literature, which had the GREGOR solar telescope project as its subject including science cases, telescope subsystems, and post-focus instruments. The articles date back to the year 2000, when the initial concepts for a new solar telescope on Tenerife were first presented at scientific meetings. This comprehensive bibliography contains literature until the year 2012, i.e., the final stages of commissioning and science verification. Taking stock of the various publications in peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings also provides the ``historical'' context for the reference articles in this special issue of Astronomische Nachrichten/Astronomical Notes.

Perceptions of scientific research literature and strategies for reading papers depend on academic career stage.

Science.gov (United States)

Hubbard, Katharine E; Dunbar, Sonja D

2017-01-01

Reading primary research literature is an essential skill for all scientists and students on science degree programmes, however little is known about how researchers at different career stages interact with and interpret scientific papers. To explore this, we conducted a survey of 260 undergraduate students and researchers in Biological Sciences at a research intensive UK university. Responses to Likert scale questions demonstrated increases in confidence and skill with reading the literature between individuals at each career stage, including between postdoctoral researchers and faculty academics. The survey indicated that individuals at different career stages valued different sections of scientific papers, and skill in reading the results section develops slowly over the course of an academic career. Inexperienced readers found the methods and results sections of research papers the most difficult to read, and undervalued the importance of the results section and critical interpretation of data. These data highlight a need for structured support with reading scientific literature at multiple career stages, and for senior academics to be aware that junior colleagues may prioritise their reading differently. We propose a model for the development of literature processing skills, and consider the need for training strategies to help inexperienced readers engage with primary literature, and therefore develop important skills that underpin scientific careers. We also encourage researchers to be mindful of language used when writing papers, and to be more inclusive of diverse audiences when disseminating their work.

A Computing Environment to Support Repeatable Scientific Big Data Experimentation of World-Wide Scientific Literature

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Schlicher, Bob G [ORNL; Kulesz, James J [ORNL; Abercrombie, Robert K [ORNL; Kruse, Kara L [ORNL

2015-01-01

A principal tenant of the scientific method is that experiments must be repeatable and relies on ceteris paribus (i.e., all other things being equal). As a scientific community, involved in data sciences, we must investigate ways to establish an environment where experiments can be repeated. We can no longer allude to where the data comes from, we must add rigor to the data collection and management process from which our analysis is conducted. This paper describes a computing environment to support repeatable scientific big data experimentation of world-wide scientific literature, and recommends a system that is housed at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in order to provide value to investigators from government agencies, academic institutions, and industry entities. The described computing environment also adheres to the recently instituted digital data management plan mandated by multiple US government agencies, which involves all stages of the digital data life cycle including capture, analysis, sharing, and preservation. It particularly focuses on the sharing and preservation of digital research data. The details of this computing environment are explained within the context of cloud services by the three layer classification of Software as a Service , Platform as a Service , and Infrastructure as a Service .

Literature information in PubChem: associations between PubChem records and scientific articles.

Science.gov (United States)

Kim, Sunghwan; Thiessen, Paul A; Cheng, Tiejun; Yu, Bo; Shoemaker, Benjamin A; Wang, Jiyao; Bolton, Evan E; Wang, Yanli; Bryant, Stephen H

2016-01-01

PubChem is an open archive consisting of a set of three primary public databases (BioAssay, Compound, and Substance). It contains information on a broad range of chemical entities, including small molecules, lipids, carbohydrates, and (chemically modified) amino acid and nucleic acid sequences (including siRNA and miRNA). Currently (as of Nov. 2015), PubChem contains more than 150 million depositor-provided chemical substance descriptions, 60 million unique chemical structures, and 225 million biological activity test results provided from over 1 million biological assay records. Many PubChem records (substances, compounds, and assays) include depositor-provided cross-references to scientific articles in PubMed. Some PubChem contributors provide bioactivity data extracted from scientific articles. Literature-derived bioactivity data complement high-throughput screening (HTS) data from the concluded NIH Molecular Libraries Program and other HTS projects. Some journals provide PubChem with information on chemicals that appear in their newly published articles, enabling concurrent publication of scientific articles in journals and associated data in public databases. In addition, PubChem links records to PubMed articles indexed with the Medical Subject Heading (MeSH) controlled vocabulary thesaurus. Literature information, both provided by depositors and derived from MeSH annotations, can be accessed using PubChem's web interfaces, enabling users to explore information available in literature related to PubChem records beyond typical web search results. Graphical abstractLiterature information for PubChem records is derived from various sources.

Using HeLa cell stress response to introduce first year students to the scientific method, laboratory techniques, primary literature, and scientific writing.

Science.gov (United States)

Resendes, Karen K

2015-01-01

Incorporating scientific literacy into inquiry driven research is one of the most effective mechanisms for developing an undergraduate student's strength in writing. Additionally, discovery-based laboratories help develop students who approach science as critical thinkers. Thus, a three-week laboratory module for an introductory cell and molecular biology course that couples inquiry-based experimental design with extensive scientific writing was designed at Westminster College to expose first year students to these concepts early in their undergraduate career. In the module students used scientific literature to design and then implement an experiment on the effect of cellular stress on protein expression in HeLa cells. In parallel the students developed a research paper in the style of the undergraduate journal BIOS to report their results. HeLa cells were used to integrate the research experience with the Westminster College "Next Chapter" first year program, in which the students explored the historical relevance of HeLa cells from a sociological perspective through reading The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. In this report I detail the design, delivery, student learning outcomes, and assessment of this module, and while this exercise was designed for an introductory course at a small primarily undergraduate institution, suggestions for modifications at larger universities or for upper division courses are included. Finally, based on student outcomes suggestions are provided for improving the module to enhance the link between teaching students skills in experimental design and execution with developing student skills in information literacy and writing. © 2015 The International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.

Restrictions of comparative analysis of investing in scientific research and scientific outcomes of the countries in nanotechnology

OpenAIRE

Milanović, Vesna; Bučalina-Matić, Andrea; Golubović, Marina

2016-01-01

The aim of this paper is to provide an insight into restrictions of comparative analysis of investing in scientific research and scientific outcomes of the countries in nanotechnology, having in mind that it is a developing technology which is expected to give significant contribution to science, economy and society in the future. Using the methods of content analysis, comparative methods and relevant literature, certain restrictions of this comparative analysis have been established. They ar...

Scientific Utopia: An agenda for improving scientific communication (Invited)

Science.gov (United States)

Nosek, B.

2013-12-01

The scientist's primary incentive is publication. In the present culture, open practices do not increase chances of publication, and they often require additional work. Practicing the abstract scientific values of openness and reproducibility thus requires behaviors in addition to those relevant for the primary, concrete rewards. When in conflict, concrete rewards are likely to dominate over abstract ones. As a consequence, the reward structure for scientists does not encourage openness and reproducibility. This can be changed by nudging incentives to align scientific practices with scientific values. Science will benefit by creating and connecting technologies that nudge incentives while supporting and improving the scientific workflow. For example, it should be as easy to search the research literature for my topic as it is to search the Internet to find hilarious videos of cats falling off of furniture. I will introduce the Center for Open Science (http://centerforopenscience.org/) and efforts to improve openness and reproducibility such as http://openscienceframework.org/. There will be no cats.

Fostering Scientific Literacy: Establishing Social Relevance via the Grand Challenges

Science.gov (United States)

Lyford, M. E.; Myers, J. D.; Buss, A.

2010-12-01

Numerous studies and polls suggest the general public’s understanding of science and scientific literacy remain woefully inadequate despite repeated calls for improvement over the last 150 years. This inability to improve scientific literacy significantly is a complex problem likely driven by a number of factors. However, we argue that past calls and efforts for improving scientific literacy have failed to: 1) articulate a truly meaningful justification for society to foster a scientifically literate public; 2) provide a rationale that motivates individuals of diverse backgrounds to become scientifically literate; 3) consider the impact of personal perspective, e.g. values, beliefs, attitudes, etc., on learning; and 4) offer a relevant and manageable framework in which to define scientific literacy. For instance, past calls for improving scientific literacy, e.g. the U.S. is behind the Soviets in the space race, U.S students rank below country X in math and science, etc., have lacked justification, personal motivation and a comprehensive framework for defining scientific literacy. In these cases, the primary justification for improving science education and scientific literacy was to regain international dominance in the space race or to advance global standing according to test results. These types of calls also articulate short-term goals that are rendered moot once they have been achieved. At the same time, teaching practices have commonly failed to consider the perspectives students bring to the classroom. Many STEM faculty do not address issues of personal perspective through ignorance or the desire to avoid controversial subjects, e g. evolution, climate change. We propose that the ‘grand challenges’ (e.g., energy, climate change, antibacterial resistance, water, etc.) humankind currently faces provides a compelling framework for developing courses and curricula well-suited for improving scientific literacy. A grand challenge paradigm offers four

A review of scientific topics and literature in abdominal radiology in Germany. Pt. 1. Gastrointestinal tract

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Schreyer, A.G.

2016-01-01

The working group for abdominal and gastrointestinal diagnosis is a group of the German Radiological Society (DRG) focusing clinically and scientifically on the diagnosis and treatment of the gastrointestinal tract with all parenchymatous abdominal organs. In addition to the clinical and scientific further development of abdominal radiology, the education of radiologists within this core discipline of radiology is one of the major aims. In this article we give an up-to-date literature review of scientific radiological topics especially covered by German radiologists. This manuscript focuses on the most recent literature on the diagnosis of the stomach, small bowel, colon and rectum. The review with a focus on the most recent studies published by German radiologists concludes with a synopsis of mesenterial bleeding and ischemia followed by a critical appraisal of the current literature on conventional abdominal radiography.

Relevant climate response tests for stratospheric aerosol injection: A combined ethical and scientific analysis

Science.gov (United States)

Lenferna, Georges Alexandre; Russotto, Rick D.; Tan, Amanda; Gardiner, Stephen M.; Ackerman, Thomas P.

2017-06-01

In this paper, we focus on stratospheric sulfate injection as a geoengineering scheme, and provide a combined scientific and ethical analysis of climate response tests, which are a subset of outdoor tests that would seek to impose detectable and attributable changes to climate variables on global or regional scales. We assess the current state of scientific understanding on the plausibility and scalability of climate response tests. Then, we delineate a minimal baseline against which to consider whether certain climate response tests would be relevant for a deployment scenario. Our analysis shows that some climate response tests, such as those attempting to detect changes in regional climate impacts, may not be deployable in time periods relevant to realistic geoengineering scenarios. This might pose significant challenges for justifying stratospheric sulfate aerosol injection deployment overall. We then survey some of the major ethical challenges that proposed climate response tests face. We consider what levels of confidence would be required to ethically justify approving a proposed test; whether the consequences of tests are subject to similar questions of justice, compensation, and informed consent as full-scale deployment; and whether questions of intent and hubris are morally relevant for climate response tests. We suggest further research into laboratory-based work and modeling may help to narrow the scientific uncertainties related to climate response tests, and help inform future ethical debate. However, even if such work is pursued, the ethical issues raised by proposed climate response tests are significant and manifold.

Falls from Height in the Construction Industry: A Critical Review of the Scientific Literature

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Evan A. Nadhim

2016-06-01

Full Text Available Globally, falls from height (FFH are a substantial public health jeopardy and are among the important leading causes of serious and fatal injuries for construction workers. A comprehensive understanding of the causal factors in FFH incidents is urgently required; however, the literature appears to lack a scientific review of FFH. In this study, 297 articles that contribute to the topic of fall incidents were reviewed. Seventy-five (75 articles met the criteria for relevance and were aggregated in a database to support a critical review. A synthesis of macro-variables approach was adopted rather than a structured meta-analysis. Such a method of analysis provides the flexibility to combine previous studies' findings. The most common factors associated with FFH are risky activities, individual characteristics, site conditions, organizational characteristics, agents (scaffolds/ladders and weather conditions. The outcomes contributed to identifying the most significant research area for safety enhancement by improving engineering facilities, behaviour investigations and FFH prevention methods.

Increasing the Discovery and Use of Non-Patent Literature (NPL): Scientific Publications in Patent Examination

OpenAIRE

F. Loizides; B. Diallo; A. Pollard; A. Mavri

2017-01-01

In this work we present findings on non-patent literature use, and specifically scientific publications such as academic articles. We interview patent examiners and observe their prior art searching in order to provide insights into the perceived usage of non-patent literature and produce high level requirements for advancing non-patent literature search tools.

Searching for a Common Ground--A Literature Review of Empirical Research on Scientific Inquiry Activities

Science.gov (United States)

Rönnebeck, Silke; Bernholt, Sascha; Ropohl, Mathias

2016-01-01

Despite the importance of scientific inquiry in science education, researchers and educators disagree considerably regarding what features define this instructional approach. While a large body of literature addresses theoretical considerations, numerous empirical studies investigate scientific inquiry on quite different levels of detail and also…

British Literature: Increasing Relevancy for High School Seniors through Multicultural Augmentation.

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Kirkland, Nancy C.

A practicum aimed to increase the relevancy (to the ethnically diverse students of contemporary classrooms) of the regular high school senior English course in British literature and composition by expanding the curriculum to include selections from countries (other than the United States) influenced by the British Colonial Empire. Using a…

Scaffolding scientific discussion using socially relevant representations in networked multimedia

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Hoadley, Christopher M.

1999-11-01

How do students make use of social cues when learning on the computer? This work examines how students in a middle-school science course learned through on-line peer discussion. Cognitive accounts of collaboration stress interacting with ideas, while socially situated accounts stress the interpersonal context. The design of electronic environments allows investigation into the interrelation of cognitive and social dimensions. I use on-line peer discussion to investigate how socially relevant representations in interfaces can aid learning. First, I identify some of the variables that affect individual participation in on-line discussion, including interface features. Individual participation is predicted by student attitudes towards learning from peers. Second, I describe the range of group outcomes for these on-line discussions. There is a large effect of discussion group on learning outcomes which is not reducible to group composition or gross measures of group process. Third, I characterize how students (individually) construct understanding from these group discussions. Learning in the on-line discussions is shown to be a result of sustained interaction over time, not merely encountering or expressing ideas. Experimental manipulations in the types of social cues available to students suggest that many students do use socially relevant representations to support their understanding of multiple viewpoints and science reasoning. Personalizing scientific disputes can afford reflection on the nature of scientific discovery and advance. While there are many individual differences in how social representations are used by students in learning, overall learning benefits for certain social representations can be shown. This work has profound implications for design of collaborative instructional methods, equitable access to science learning, design of instructional technology, and understanding of learning and cognition in social settings.

Annual review of selected scientific literature: Report of the committee on scientific investigation of the American Academy of Restorative Dentistry.

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Donovan, Terence E; Marzola, Riccardo; Murphy, Kevin R; Cagna, David R; Eichmiller, Frederick; McKee, James R; Metz, James E; Albouy, Jean-Pierre

2016-11-01

It is clear the contemporary dentist is confronted with a blizzard of information regarding materials and techniques from journal articles, advertisements, newsletters, the internet, and continuing education events. While some of that information is sound and helpful, much of it is misleading at best. This review identifies and discusses the most important scientific findings regarding outcomes of dental treatment to assist the practitioner in making evidence-based choices. This review was conducted to assist the busy dentist in keeping abreast of the latest scientific information regarding the clinical practice of dentistry. Each of the authors, who are considered experts in their disciplines, was asked to peruse the scientific literature published in 2015 in their discipline and review the articles for important information that may have an impact on treatment decisions. Comments on experimental methodology, statistical evaluation, and overall validity of the conclusions are included in many of the reviews. The reviews are not meant to stand alone but are intended to inform the interested reader about what has been discovered in the past year. The readers are then invited to go to the source if they wish more detail. Analysis of the scientific literature published in 2015 is divided into 7 sections, dental materials, periodontics, prosthodontics, occlusion and temporomandibular disorders, sleep-disordered breathing, cariology, and implant dentistry. Copyright © 2016 Editorial Council for the Journal of Prosthetic Dentistry. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Word add-in for ontology recognition: semantic enrichment of scientific literature

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Naim Oscar

2010-02-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background In the current era of scientific research, efficient communication of information is paramount. As such, the nature of scholarly and scientific communication is changing; cyberinfrastructure is now absolutely necessary and new media are allowing information and knowledge to be more interactive and immediate. One approach to making knowledge more accessible is the addition of machine-readable semantic data to scholarly articles. Results The Word add-in presented here will assist authors in this effort by automatically recognizing and highlighting words or phrases that are likely information-rich, allowing authors to associate semantic data with those words or phrases, and to embed that data in the document as XML. The add-in and source code are publicly available at http://www.codeplex.com/UCSDBioLit. Conclusions The Word add-in for ontology term recognition makes it possible for an author to add semantic data to a document as it is being written and it encodes these data using XML tags that are effectively a standard in life sciences literature. Allowing authors to mark-up their own work will help increase the amount and quality of machine-readable literature metadata.

Word add-in for ontology recognition: semantic enrichment of scientific literature.

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Fink, J Lynn; Fernicola, Pablo; Chandran, Rahul; Parastatidis, Savas; Wade, Alex; Naim, Oscar; Quinn, Gregory B; Bourne, Philip E

2010-02-24

In the current era of scientific research, efficient communication of information is paramount. As such, the nature of scholarly and scientific communication is changing; cyberinfrastructure is now absolutely necessary and new media are allowing information and knowledge to be more interactive and immediate. One approach to making knowledge more accessible is the addition of machine-readable semantic data to scholarly articles. The Word add-in presented here will assist authors in this effort by automatically recognizing and highlighting words or phrases that are likely information-rich, allowing authors to associate semantic data with those words or phrases, and to embed that data in the document as XML. The add-in and source code are publicly available at http://www.codeplex.com/UCSDBioLit. The Word add-in for ontology term recognition makes it possible for an author to add semantic data to a document as it is being written and it encodes these data using XML tags that are effectively a standard in life sciences literature. Allowing authors to mark-up their own work will help increase the amount and quality of machine-readable literature metadata.

Principles and Ethics in Scientific Communication in Biomedicine

OpenAIRE

Donev, Doncho

2013-01-01

Introduction and aim: To present the basic principles and standards of scientific communication and writing a paper, to indicate the importance of honesty and ethical approach to research and publication of results in scientific journals, as well as the need for continuing education in the principles and ethics in science and publication in biomedicine. Methods: An analysis of relevant materials and documents, sources from the internet and published literature and personal experience and obse...

Academic Writing in Reflexive Professional Writing: Citations of Scientific Literature in Supervised Pre-Service Training Reports

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Lívia Chaves de Melo

2013-06-01

Full Text Available In this paper we investigate citation practices of scientific literature in reflexive writing from the genre of supervised pre-service training report produced by pre-service teachers enrolled in the mandatory pre-service training subject of English Language Teaching, at an undergraduate language teaching course. The aim of this research is to analyze how these pre-services teacher represent themselves based on citation practices of scientific literature, and characterize some of the functions deployed by the citations in the reflexive writing emerging in the academic sphere. We use the dialogic approach to language from Bakhtinian studies as a theoretical base, as well as theoretical and methodological contributions regarding types of sequences and of discourse proposed by Adam and Bronckart. The results of this research show that the practice of citation of scientific literature is an invocation of authority as a form of erudition, amplification and ornamentation of the discourse produced. This practice can also guide pedagogical action developed by pre-service teachers in their supervised training.

[New bibliometric indicators for the scientific literature: an evolving panorama].

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La Torre, G; Sciarra, I; Chiappetta, M; Monteduro, A

2017-01-01

Bibliometrics is a science which evaluates the impact of the scientific work of a journal or of an author, using mathematical and statistical tools. Impact Factor (IF) is the first bibliometric parameter created, and after it many others have been progressively conceived in order to go beyond its limits. Currently bibliometric indexes are used for academic purposes, among them to evaluate the eligibility of a researcher to compete for the National Scientific Qualification, in order to access to competitive exams to become professor. Aim of this study is to identify the most relevant bibliometric indexes and to summarized their characteristics. A revision of bibliometric indexes as been conducted, starting from the classic ones and completing with the most recent ones. The two most used bibliometric indexes are the IF, which measures the scientific impact of a periodical and bases on Web of Science citation database, and the h-index, which measures the impact of the scientific work of a researcher, basing on Scopus database. Besides them other indexes have been created more recently, such as the SCImago Journal Rank Indicator (SJR), the Source Normalised Impact per Paper (SNIP) and the CiteScore index. They are all based on Scopus database and evaluate, in different ways, the citational impact of a periodic. The i10-index instead is provided from Google Scholar database and allows to evaluate the impact of the scientific production of a researcher. Recently two softwares have been introduced: the first one, Publish or Perish, allows to evaluate the scientific work of a researcher, through the assessment of many indexes; the second one, Altmetric, measure the use in the Web of the academic papers, instead of measuring citations, by means of alternative metrics respect to the traditional ones. Each analized index shows advantages but also criticalities. Therefore the combined use of more than one indexes, citational and not, should be preferred, in order to correctly

How can the English-language scientific literature be made more accessible to non-native speakers? Journals should allow greater use of referenced direct quotations in 'component-oriented' scientific writing.

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Charlton, Bruce G

2007-01-01

In scientific writing, although clarity and precision of language are vital to effective communication, it seems undeniable that content is more important than form. Potentially valuable knowledge should not be excluded from the scientific literature merely because the researchers lack advanced language skills. Given that global scientific literature is overwhelmingly in the English-language, this presents a problem for non-native speakers. My proposal is that scientists should be permitted to construct papers using a substantial number of direct quotations from the already-published scientific literature. Quotations would need to be explicitly referenced so that the original author and publication should be given full credit for creating such a useful and valid description. At the extreme, this might result in a paper consisting mainly of a 'mosaic' of quotations from the already existing scientific literature, which are linked and extended by relatively few sentences comprising new data or ideas. This model bears some conceptual relationship to the recent trend in computing science for component-based or component-oriented software engineering - in which new programs are constructed by reusing programme components, which may be available in libraries. A new functionality is constructed by linking-together many pre-existing chunks of software. I suggest that journal editors should, in their instructions to authors, explicitly allow this 'component-oriented' method of constructing scientific articles; and carefully describe how it can be accomplished in such a way that proper referencing is enforced, and full credit is allocated to the authors of the reused linguistic components.

Harnessing the wealth of Chinese scientific literature: schistosomiasis research and control in China

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Mak Tippi K

2008-09-01

Full Text Available Abstract The economy of China continues to boom and so have its biomedical research and related publishing activities. Several so-called neglected tropical diseases that are most common in the developing world are still rampant or even emerging in some parts of China. The purpose of this article is to document the significant research potential from the Chinese biomedical bibliographic databases. The research contributions from China in the epidemiology and control of schistosomiasis provide an excellent illustration. We searched two widely used databases, namely China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI and VIP Information (VIP. Employing the keyword "Schistosoma" ( and covering the period 1990–2006, we obtained 10,244 hits in the CNKI database and 5,975 in VIP. We examined 10 Chinese biomedical journals that published the highest number of original research articles on schistosomiasis for issues including languages and open access. Although most of the journals are published in Chinese, English abstracts are usually available. Open access to full articles was available in China Tropical Medicine in 2005/2006 and is granted by the Chinese Journal of Parasitology and Parasitic Diseases since 2003; none of the other journals examined offered open access. We reviewed (i the discovery and development of antischistosomal drugs, (ii the progress made with molluscicides and (iii environmental management for schistosomiasis control in China over the past 20 years. In conclusion, significant research is published in the Chinese literature, which is relevant for local control measures and global scientific knowledge. Open access should be encouraged and language barriers removed so the wealth of Chinese research can be more fully appreciated by the scientific community.

A review of scientific topics and literature in abdominal radiology in Germany. Pt. 1. Gastrointestinal tract; Aktuelle Schwerpunkte und Literatur der Abdominalradiologie im deutschsprachigen Raum. T. 1. Gastrointestinaltrakt

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Schreyer, A.G. [University Hospital Regensburg (Germany). Dept. of Radiology; Wessling, J. [Clemens Hospital, Muenster (Germany). Clinic for Radiology; Kinner, S.; Lauenstein, T.C. [University Hospital Essen (Germany). Dept. of Radiology; Juchems, M.S. [Konstanz Hospital (Germany). Dept. of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology; Holzapfel, K. [Technical University Munich (Germany). Inst. of Radiology; Konietzke, P. [University Hospital Heidelberg (Germany). Dept. of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology; Grenacher, L. [Diagnostic Muenchen - Diagnostic Imaging Center, Munich (Germany)

2016-02-15

The working group for abdominal and gastrointestinal diagnosis is a group of the German Radiological Society (DRG) focusing clinically and scientifically on the diagnosis and treatment of the gastrointestinal tract with all parenchymatous abdominal organs. In addition to the clinical and scientific further development of abdominal radiology, the education of radiologists within this core discipline of radiology is one of the major aims. In this article we give an up-to-date literature review of scientific radiological topics especially covered by German radiologists. This manuscript focuses on the most recent literature on the diagnosis of the stomach, small bowel, colon and rectum. The review with a focus on the most recent studies published by German radiologists concludes with a synopsis of mesenterial bleeding and ischemia followed by a critical appraisal of the current literature on conventional abdominal radiography.

Open Access to the Scientific Journal Literature: Situation 2009

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Björk, Bo-Christer; Welling, Patrik; Laakso, Mikael; Majlender, Peter; Hedlund, Turid; Guðnason, Guðni

2010-01-01

Background The Internet has recently made possible the free global availability of scientific journal articles. Open Access (OA) can occur either via OA scientific journals, or via authors posting manuscripts of articles published in subscription journals in open web repositories. So far there have been few systematic studies showing how big the extent of OA is, in particular studies covering all fields of science. Methodology/Principal Findings The proportion of peer reviewed scholarly journal articles, which are available openly in full text on the web, was studied using a random sample of 1837 titles and a web search engine. Of articles published in 2008, 8,5% were freely available at the publishers' sites. For an additional 11,9% free manuscript versions could be found using search engines, making the overall OA percentage 20,4%. Chemistry (13%) had the lowest overall share of OA, Earth Sciences (33%) the highest. In medicine, biochemistry and chemistry publishing in OA journals was more common. In all other fields author-posted manuscript copies dominated the picture. Conclusions/Significance The results show that OA already has a significant positive impact on the availability of the scientific journal literature and that there are big differences between scientific disciplines in the uptake. Due to the lack of awareness of OA-publishing among scientists in most fields outside physics, the results should be of general interest to all scholars. The results should also interest academic publishers, who need to take into account OA in their business strategies and copyright policies, as well as research funders, who like the NIH are starting to require OA availability of results from research projects they fund. The method and search tools developed also offer a good basis for more in-depth studies as well as longitudinal studies. PMID:20585653

Open access to the scientific journal literature: situation 2009.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Bo-Christer Björk

Full Text Available BACKGROUND: The Internet has recently made possible the free global availability of scientific journal articles. Open Access (OA can occur either via OA scientific journals, or via authors posting manuscripts of articles published in subscription journals in open web repositories. So far there have been few systematic studies showing how big the extent of OA is, in particular studies covering all fields of science. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: The proportion of peer reviewed scholarly journal articles, which are available openly in full text on the web, was studied using a random sample of 1837 titles and a web search engine. Of articles published in 2008, 8.5% were freely available at the publishers' sites. For an additional 11.9% free manuscript versions could be found using search engines, making the overall OA percentage 20.4%. Chemistry (13% had the lowest overall share of OA, Earth Sciences (33% the highest. In medicine, biochemistry and chemistry publishing in OA journals was more common. In all other fields author-posted manuscript copies dominated the picture. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: The results show that OA already has a significant positive impact on the availability of the scientific journal literature and that there are big differences between scientific disciplines in the uptake. Due to the lack of awareness of OA-publishing among scientists in most fields outside physics, the results should be of general interest to all scholars. The results should also interest academic publishers, who need to take into account OA in their business strategies and copyright policies, as well as research funders, who like the NIH are starting to require OA availability of results from research projects they fund. The method and search tools developed also offer a good basis for more in-depth studies as well as longitudinal studies.

Rape in Armed Conflicts in the Democratic Republic of Congo: A Systematic Review of the Scientific Literature.

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Kabengele Mpinga, Emmanuel; Koya, Mapendo; Hasselgard-Rowe, Jennifer; Jeannot, Emilien; Rehani, Sylvie B; Chastonay, Philippe

2017-12-01

We conducted a systematic review of the scientific literature between 1996 and 2013 on rape in war-ridden Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in order to better understand the interest of the scientific community in describing the magnitude and characteristics of the problem. The literature search was conducted in French and English using several databases (Pubmed, PsycInfo, Sapphire, BDSP, Embase, Rero, and Web of Science) with the key words "rape and DRC" combined with several Medical Subject Headings concepts. Our systematic review yielded 2,087 references, among which only 27 are original studies, that is 20 are based on population surveys and the remaining 7 are original data based on case studies and reviews. Ten studies provided prevalence rates of rape victims, 18 provided specific information on the profile of the victims, 10 reported that most of the perpetrators of rape were military personnel, 14 referred to the negligence of the government in protecting victims, and 10 reported a lack of competent health-care facilities. The awareness of rape in conflict-ridden DRC is still limited as reported in the scientific literature: Published scientific papers are scarce. Yet more research would probably help mobilize local authorities and the international community against this basic human rights violation.

THE CURRENT STATE OF KNOWLEDGE IN THE VALUE RELEVANCE RESEARCH FIELD

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Carmen- Alexandra BALTARIU

2015-04-01

Full Text Available The purpose of this paper is to assess the scientific literature referring to the value relevance of reported accounting information over a twelve year period starting from 2002. The approach of the paper is a theoretical (conceptual one. In order to complete the purpose of the paper we selected as research method the longitudinal qualitative analysis. The qualitative analysis carried out presents a deductive character. Our conclusions regarding the general characteristics of the research field pertaining to the value relevance of reported accounting information are drawn based on the main results and scientific contributions identified in the research field of interest.

Scientific Literacy Matters: Using Literature to Meet Next Generation Science Standards and 21st Century Skills

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Cynthia Tomovic

2017-04-01

Full Text Available Scientific literacy matters. It matters because it is vitally important to the education and development of America’s children, tomorrow's workforce, and the keepers of our future. If the future of American individual decision making, engagement in civic and cultural affairs, and valuable contributions to economic development is to be protected, it is critical that American students become more scientifically literate than they are today. Today, most Americans, including students, are considered scientifically illiterate. Recognizing the need to develop and enhance scientific literacy (also known as science literacy, science educators have worked diligently at developing new science standards, new approaches to science teaching, and new techniques aimed at engaging students in the practice of science. In this article, the use of literature is discussed as one method to augment or supplement the teaching of science. In the context of making a literature selection, a new conceptual approach is proposed that includes attention to meeting the Next Generation Science Standards while being responsive to the importance of 21st Century Skills. Additionally, a Literary Assessment Tool is shared that demonstrates how science educators can evaluate a literary selection in terms of how well it will help them to enhance scientific literacy.

Consumer Loyalty and Loyalty Programs: a topographic examination of the scientific literature using bibliometrics, spatial statistics and network analyses

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Viviane Moura Rocha

2015-04-01

Full Text Available This paper presents a topographic analysis of the fields of consumer loyalty and loyalty programs, vastly studied in the last decades and still relevant in the marketing literature. After the identification of 250 scientific papers that were published in the last ten years in indexed journals, a subset of 76 were chosen and their 3223 references were extracted. The journals in which these papers were published, their key words, abstracts, authors, institutions of origin and citation patterns were identified and analyzed using bibliometrics, spatial statistics techniques and network analyses. The results allow the identification of the central components of the field, as well as its main authors, journals, institutions and countries that intermediate the diffusion of knowledge, which contributes to the understanding of the constitution of the field by researchers and students.

Workplace Interventions to Prevent Disability from Both the Scientific and Practice Perspectives: A Comparison of Scientific Literature, Grey Literature and Stakeholder Observations.

Science.gov (United States)

Williams-Whitt, Kelly; Bültmann, Ute; Amick, Benjamin; Munir, Fehmidah; Tveito, Torill H; Anema, Johannes R

2016-12-01

Purpose The significant individual and societal burden of work disability could be reduced if supportive workplace strategies could be added to evidence-based clinical treatment and rehabilitation to improve return-to-work (RTW) and other disability outcomes. The goal of this article is to summarize existing research on workplace interventions to prevent disability, relate these to employer disability management practices, and recommend future research priorities. Methods The authors participated in a year-long collaboration that ultimately led to an invited 3-day conference, Improving Research of Employer Practices to Prevent Disability, held October 14-16, 2015, in Hopkinton, Massachusetts, USA. The collaboration included a topical review of the literature, group conference calls to identify key areas and challenges, drafting of initial documents, review of industry publications, and a conference presentation that included feedback from peer researchers and a question/answer session with an expert panel with direct employer experience. Results Evidence from randomized trials and other research designs has shown general support for job modification, RTW coordination, and organizational support, but evidence is still lacking for interventions at a more granular level. Grey literature reports focused mainly on job re-design and work organization. Panel feedback focused on organizational readiness and the beliefs and values of senior managers as critical factors in facilitating changes to disability management practices. While the scientific literature is focused on facilitating improved coping and reducing discomforts for individual workers, the employer-directed grey literature is focused on making group-level changes to policies and procedures. Conclusions Future research might better target employer practices by tying interventions to positive workplace influences and determinants, by developing more participatory interventions and research designs, and by

When the Periphery Becomes the Center. Forensic Anthropology in Argentina, a Case of Socially Relevant Scientific Knowledge Production

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Luciano G. Levin

2015-12-01

Full Text Available Forensic anthropology has had extraordinary scientific success in Argentina. On the one hand, this discipline has developed very well in only 25 years generating scientifically relevant knowledge both locally and internationally. On the other hand, and unlike a large part of scientific knowledge generated in peripheral contexts, it has major social applications. This work describes the different dimensions of the origin and development of this discipline in Argentina, the cognitive condition of the field in 1983 and, briefly, its development until today, its institutional dimension, the existence of other research traditions and certain social dimensions which, we believe, are the basis for the success of this scientific discipline.

Systematic literature reviews and meta-analyses: part 6 of a series on evaluation of scientific publications.

Science.gov (United States)

Ressing, Meike; Blettner, Maria; Klug, Stefanie J

2009-07-01

Because of the rising number of scientific publications, it is important to have a means of jointly summarizing and assessing different studies on a single topic. Systematic literature reviews, meta-analyses of published data, and meta-analyses of individual data (pooled reanalyses) are now being published with increasing frequency. We here describe the essential features of these methods and discuss their strengths and weaknesses. This article is based on a selective literature search. The different types of review and meta-analysis are described, the methods used in each are outlined so that they can be evaluated, and a checklist is given for the assessment of reviews and meta-analyses of scientific articles. Systematic literature reviews provide an overview of the state of research on a given topic and enable an assessment of the quality of individual studies. They also allow the results of different studies to be evaluated together when these are inconsistent. Meta-analyses additionally allow calculation of pooled estimates of an effect. The different types of review and meta-analysis are discussed with examples from the literature on one particular topic. Systematic literature reviews and meta-analyses enable the research findings and treatment effects obtained in different individual studies to be summed up and evaluated.

Anaerobic oxidation of carbon steel in granitic groundwaters: A review of the relevant literature

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Platts, N.; Blackwood, D.J.; Naish, C.C.

1994-02-01

This report reviews the published literature on the anaerobic oxidation of iron in aqueous solutions which are of particular relevance to Swedish granitic groundwaters. The thermodynamics of iron corrosion in water are briefly considered. Following this the experimental data found in the literature are presented and discussed. Results were found for corrosion of iron in both pure water and solutions containing mineral salts. The literature work in the nature of the films formed on iron surfaces under anaerobic conditions is reviewed and the possible mechanisms of film formation are discussed. Conclusions are drawn on the factors most likely to influence and control film growth. 32 refs

Nordic interdisciplinary reviews of the scientific literature concerning the relationsiip between indoor environmental factors and health, Nordworks

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sundell, Jan; Bornehag, C.-G.

1999-01-01

The relationship between indoor air environments and health is, however, a truly interdisciplinary area involving numerous disciplines. Scientific work is primarily "within disciplinary", often resulting in conclusions that would not stand in an interdisciplinary context. Results are mostly...... today, a number of interdisciplinary scientific groups have been created within the Nordic countries with the aim at reviewing the scientific literature within specific areas, and creating an interdisciplinary consensus on the present state of the art. Results from four so-called NORD-groups (NORDVOC...

Private Science and Public Knowledge: The Committee for the Scientific Investigation of the Claims of the Paranormal and its Use of the Literature.

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Pinch, T. J.; Collins, H. M.

1984-01-01

Shows the part played by formal/informal literatures in the social construction of scientific knowledge, analyzing the work of the "Committee for the Scientific Investigation of the Claims of the Paranormal" (which critically investigates fringe-sciences). Indicates that popular literature can deconstruct facts while scientific…

The philosophy of scientific experimentation: a review

Science.gov (United States)

2009-01-01

Practicing and studying automated experimentation may benefit from philosophical reflection on experimental science in general. This paper reviews the relevant literature and discusses central issues in the philosophy of scientific experimentation. The first two sections present brief accounts of the rise of experimental science and of its philosophical study. The next sections discuss three central issues of scientific experimentation: the scientific and philosophical significance of intervention and production, the relationship between experimental science and technology, and the interactions between experimental and theoretical work. The concluding section identifies three issues for further research: the role of computing and, more specifically, automating, in experimental research, the nature of experimentation in the social and human sciences, and the significance of normative, including ethical, problems in experimental science. PMID:20098589

Meditation, Health and Scientific Investigations: Review of the Literature.

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Sampaio, Cynthia Vieira Sanches; Lima, Manuela Garcia; Ladeia, Ana Marice

2017-04-01

A growing number of people are seeking health recovery treatments with a holistic approach to the human being. Meditation is a mental training capable of producing connection between the mind, body and spirit. Its practice helps people to achieve balance, relaxation and self-control, in addition to the development of consciousness. At present, meditation is classified as a complementary and integrative technique in the area of health. The purpose of this review of the literature was to describe what meditation is, its practices and effects on health, demonstrated by consistent scientific investigations. Recently, the advances in researches with meditation, the discovery of its potential as an instrument of self-regulation of the human body and its benefits to health have shown that it is a consistent alternative therapy when associated with conventional medical treatments.

Military Influence Operations: Review of Relevant Scientific Literature

Science.gov (United States)

2007-11-01

give their attitudes about voluntary euthanasia . Participants read a newspaper vignette that indicated the attitudes of 3 groups (small majority...university students gave their attitudes about voluntary euthanasia after reading a newspaper vignette about the small or large minority’s (or...computer screen. The topics concerned euthanasia and school integration. They received both of these messages containing the same content in one of

Novel keyword co-occurrence network-based methods to foster systematic reviews of scientific literature.

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Radhakrishnan, Srinivasan; Erbis, Serkan; Isaacs, Jacqueline A; Kamarthi, Sagar

2017-01-01

Systematic reviews of scientific literature are important for mapping the existing state of research and highlighting further growth channels in a field of study, but systematic reviews are inherently tedious, time consuming, and manual in nature. In recent years, keyword co-occurrence networks (KCNs) are exploited for knowledge mapping. In a KCN, each keyword is represented as a node and each co-occurrence of a pair of words is represented as a link. The number of times that a pair of words co-occurs in multiple articles constitutes the weight of the link connecting the pair. The network constructed in this manner represents cumulative knowledge of a domain and helps to uncover meaningful knowledge components and insights based on the patterns and strength of links between keywords that appear in the literature. In this work, we propose a KCN-based approach that can be implemented prior to undertaking a systematic review to guide and accelerate the review process. The novelty of this method lies in the new metrics used for statistical analysis of a KCN that differ from those typically used for KCN analysis. The approach is demonstrated through its application to nano-related Environmental, Health, and Safety (EHS) risk literature. The KCN approach identified the knowledge components, knowledge structure, and research trends that match with those discovered through a traditional systematic review of the nanoEHS field. Because KCN-based analyses can be conducted more quickly to explore a vast amount of literature, this method can provide a knowledge map and insights prior to undertaking a rigorous traditional systematic review. This two-step approach can significantly reduce the effort and time required for a traditional systematic literature review. The proposed KCN-based pre-systematic review method is universal. It can be applied to any scientific field of study to prepare a knowledge map.

Relevance and reliability of experimental data in human health risk assessment of pesticides.

Science.gov (United States)

Kaltenhäuser, Johanna; Kneuer, Carsten; Marx-Stoelting, Philip; Niemann, Lars; Schubert, Jens; Stein, Bernd; Solecki, Roland

2017-08-01

Evaluation of data relevance, reliability and contribution to uncertainty is crucial in regulatory health risk assessment if robust conclusions are to be drawn. Whether a specific study is used as key study, as additional information or not accepted depends in part on the criteria according to which its relevance and reliability are judged. In addition to GLP-compliant regulatory studies following OECD Test Guidelines, data from peer-reviewed scientific literature have to be evaluated in regulatory risk assessment of pesticide active substances. Publications should be taken into account if they are of acceptable relevance and reliability. Their contribution to the overall weight of evidence is influenced by factors including test organism, study design and statistical methods, as well as test item identification, documentation and reporting of results. Various reports make recommendations for improving the quality of risk assessments and different criteria catalogues have been published to support evaluation of data relevance and reliability. Their intention was to guide transparent decision making on the integration of the respective information into the regulatory process. This article describes an approach to assess the relevance and reliability of experimental data from guideline-compliant studies as well as from non-guideline studies published in the scientific literature in the specific context of uncertainty and risk assessment of pesticides. Copyright © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Spaceflight and Neurosurgery: A Comprehensive Review of the Relevant Literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Swinney, Christian C; Allison, Zain

2018-01-01

Spaceflight and the associated gravitational fluctuations may impact various components of the central nervous system. These include changes in intracranial pressure, the spine, and neurocognitive performance. The implications of altered astronaut performance on critical spaceflight missions are potentially significant. The current body of research on this important topic is extremely limited, and a comprehensive review has not been published. Herein, the authors address this notable gap, as well as the role of the neurosurgeon in optimizing potential diagnostic and therapeutic modalities. A literature search was conducted using the PubMed, EMBASE, and Google Scholar databases, with no time constraints. Significant manuscripts on physiologic changes associated with spaceflight and microgravity were identified and reviewed. Manifestations were separated into 1 of 3 general categories, including changes in intracranial pressure, the spine, and neurocognitive performance. A comprehensive literature review yielded 27 studies with direct relevance to the impact of microgravity and spaceflight on nervous system physiology. This included 7 studies related to intracranial pressure fluctuations, 17 related to changes in the spinal column, and 3 related to neurocognitive change. The microgravity environment encountered during spaceflight impacts intracranial physiology. This includes changes in intracranial pressure, the spinal column, and neurocognitive performance. Herein, we present a systematic review of the published literature on this issue. Neurosurgeons should have a key role in the continued study of this important topic, contributing to both diagnostic and therapeutic understanding. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Active learning-based information structure analysis of full scientific articles and two applications for biomedical literature review.

Science.gov (United States)

Guo, Yufan; Silins, Ilona; Stenius, Ulla; Korhonen, Anna

2013-06-01

Techniques that are capable of automatically analyzing the information structure of scientific articles could be highly useful for improving information access to biomedical literature. However, most existing approaches rely on supervised machine learning (ML) and substantial labeled data that are expensive to develop and apply to different sub-fields of biomedicine. Recent research shows that minimal supervision is sufficient for fairly accurate information structure analysis of biomedical abstracts. However, is it realistic for full articles given their high linguistic and informational complexity? We introduce and release a novel corpus of 50 biomedical articles annotated according to the Argumentative Zoning (AZ) scheme, and investigate active learning with one of the most widely used ML models-Support Vector Machines (SVM)-on this corpus. Additionally, we introduce two novel applications that use AZ to support real-life literature review in biomedicine via question answering and summarization. We show that active learning with SVM trained on 500 labeled sentences (6% of the corpus) performs surprisingly well with the accuracy of 82%, just 2% lower than fully supervised learning. In our question answering task, biomedical researchers find relevant information significantly faster from AZ-annotated than unannotated articles. In the summarization task, sentences extracted from particular zones are significantly more similar to gold standard summaries than those extracted from particular sections of full articles. These results demonstrate that active learning of full articles' information structure is indeed realistic and the accuracy is high enough to support real-life literature review in biomedicine. The annotated corpus, our AZ classifier and the two novel applications are available at http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/yg244/12bioinfo.html

Quantifying the consensus on anthropogenic global warming in the scientific literature

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Cook, John; Nuccitelli, Dana; Winkler, Bärbel; Painting, Rob; Skuce, Andrew; Green, Sarah A; Richardson, Mark; Way, Robert; Jacobs, Peter

2013-01-01

We analyze the evolution of the scientific consensus on anthropogenic global warming (AGW) in the peer-reviewed scientific literature, examining 11 944 climate abstracts from 1991–2011 matching the topics ‘global climate change’ or ‘global warming’. We find that 66.4% of abstracts expressed no position on AGW, 32.6% endorsed AGW, 0.7% rejected AGW and 0.3% were uncertain about the cause of global warming. Among abstracts expressing a position on AGW, 97.1% endorsed the consensus position that humans are causing global warming. In a second phase of this study, we invited authors to rate their own papers. Compared to abstract ratings, a smaller percentage of self-rated papers expressed no position on AGW (35.5%). Among self-rated papers expressing a position on AGW, 97.2% endorsed the consensus. For both abstract ratings and authors’ self-ratings, the percentage of endorsements among papers expressing a position on AGW marginally increased over time. Our analysis indicates that the number of papers rejecting the consensus on AGW is a vanishingly small proportion of the published research. (letter)

Gene annotation from scientific literature using mappings between keyword systems.

Science.gov (United States)

Pérez, Antonio J; Perez-Iratxeta, Carolina; Bork, Peer; Thode, Guillermo; Andrade, Miguel A

2004-09-01

The description of genes in databases by keywords helps the non-specialist to quickly grasp the properties of a gene and increases the efficiency of computational tools that are applied to gene data (e.g. searching a gene database for sequences related to a particular biological process). However, the association of keywords to genes or protein sequences is a difficult process that ultimately implies examination of the literature related to a gene. To support this task, we present a procedure to derive keywords from the set of scientific abstracts related to a gene. Our system is based on the automated extraction of mappings between related terms from different databases using a model of fuzzy associations that can be applied with all generality to any pair of linked databases. We tested the system by annotating genes of the SWISS-PROT database with keywords derived from the abstracts linked to their entries (stored in the MEDLINE database of scientific references). The performance of the annotation procedure was much better for SWISS-PROT keywords (recall of 47%, precision of 68%) than for Gene Ontology terms (recall of 8%, precision of 67%). The algorithm can be publicly accessed and used for the annotation of sequences through a web server at http://www.bork.embl.de/kat

Dialogue concerning the survival of the one great world system: a study of the post-war scientific and theological perception of time scales as a relevant moral category in analyzing the dilemmas of the nuclear age

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Cummins, D.J.F.

1985-01-01

This thesis seeks to extend the search for the moral implications inherent in the development, possession, and the threatened use of physical/astrophysical processes and in current understandings of the evolution of the physical universe. The nature of normal/theological discussion will not be a primary concern although clearly some residual position that such discussion is meaningful is presupposed. Neither is the nature of science or the scientific method at issue. It is assumed that both theology and science have long since negotiated the confidence crises of adolescence, and have mustered the requisite self-esteem regarding their respective disciplines. The aim of this work is to present the concept of time scales as a relevant moral category. It investigates the use of this concept and its relationship to the other categories developed in the relevant scientific literature. The question is raised as to the validity of and the future of the concept of time scales as a common moral ground.

Dialogue concerning the survival of the one great world system: a study of the post-war scientific and theological perception of time scales as a relevant moral category in analyzing the dilemmas of the nuclear age

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Cummins, D.J.F.

1985-01-01

This thesis seeks to extend the search for the moral implications inherent in the development, possession, and the threatened use of physical/astrophysical processes and in current understandings of the evolution of the physical universe. The nature of normal/theological discussion will not be a primary concern although clearly some residual position that such discussion is meaningful is presupposed. Neither is the nature of science or the scientific method at issue. It is assumed that both theology and science have long since negotiated the confidence crises of adolescence, and have mustered the requisite self-esteem regarding their respective disciplines. The aim of this work is to present the concept of time scales as a relevant moral category. It investigates the use of this concept and its relationship to the other categories developed in the relevant scientific literature. The question is raised as to the validity of and the future of the concept of time scales as a common moral ground

West Nile Virus: Using Adapted Primary Literature in Mathematical Biology to Teach Scientific and Mathematical Reasoning in High School

Science.gov (United States)

Norris, Stephen P.; Macnab, John S.; Wonham, Marjorie; de Vries, Gerda

2009-01-01

This paper promotes the use of adapted primary literature as a curriculum and instruction innovation for use in high school. Adapted primary literature is useful for promoting an understanding of scientific and mathematical reasoning and argument and for introducing modern science into the schools. We describe a prototype adapted from a published…

Using Crowdsourcing to Evaluate Published Scientific Literature: Methods and Example

Science.gov (United States)

Brown, Andrew W.; Allison, David B.

2014-01-01

Systematically evaluating scientific literature is a time consuming endeavor that requires hours of coding and rating. Here, we describe a method to distribute these tasks across a large group through online crowdsourcing. Using Amazon's Mechanical Turk, crowdsourced workers (microworkers) completed four groups of tasks to evaluate the question, “Do nutrition-obesity studies with conclusions concordant with popular opinion receive more attention in the scientific community than do those that are discordant?” 1) Microworkers who passed a qualification test (19% passed) evaluated abstracts to determine if they were about human studies investigating nutrition and obesity. Agreement between the first two raters' conclusions was moderate (κ = 0.586), with consensus being reached in 96% of abstracts. 2) Microworkers iteratively synthesized free-text answers describing the studied foods into one coherent term. Approximately 84% of foods were agreed upon, with only 4 and 8% of ratings failing manual review in different steps. 3) Microworkers were asked to rate the perceived obesogenicity of the synthesized food terms. Over 99% of responses were complete and usable, and opinions of the microworkers qualitatively matched the authors' expert expectations (e.g., sugar-sweetened beverages were thought to cause obesity and fruits and vegetables were thought to prevent obesity). 4) Microworkers extracted citation counts for each paper through Google Scholar. Microworkers reached consensus or unanimous agreement for all successful searches. To answer the example question, data were aggregated and analyzed, and showed no significant association between popular opinion and attention the paper received as measured by Scimago Journal Rank and citation counts. Direct microworker costs totaled $221.75, (estimated cost at minimum wage: $312.61). We discuss important points to consider to ensure good quality control and appropriate pay for microworkers. With good reliability and

Using crowdsourcing to evaluate published scientific literature: methods and example.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Andrew W Brown

Full Text Available Systematically evaluating scientific literature is a time consuming endeavor that requires hours of coding and rating. Here, we describe a method to distribute these tasks across a large group through online crowdsourcing. Using Amazon's Mechanical Turk, crowdsourced workers (microworkers completed four groups of tasks to evaluate the question, "Do nutrition-obesity studies with conclusions concordant with popular opinion receive more attention in the scientific community than do those that are discordant?" 1 Microworkers who passed a qualification test (19% passed evaluated abstracts to determine if they were about human studies investigating nutrition and obesity. Agreement between the first two raters' conclusions was moderate (κ = 0.586, with consensus being reached in 96% of abstracts. 2 Microworkers iteratively synthesized free-text answers describing the studied foods into one coherent term. Approximately 84% of foods were agreed upon, with only 4 and 8% of ratings failing manual review in different steps. 3 Microworkers were asked to rate the perceived obesogenicity of the synthesized food terms. Over 99% of responses were complete and usable, and opinions of the microworkers qualitatively matched the authors' expert expectations (e.g., sugar-sweetened beverages were thought to cause obesity and fruits and vegetables were thought to prevent obesity. 4 Microworkers extracted citation counts for each paper through Google Scholar. Microworkers reached consensus or unanimous agreement for all successful searches. To answer the example question, data were aggregated and analyzed, and showed no significant association between popular opinion and attention the paper received as measured by Scimago Journal Rank and citation counts. Direct microworker costs totaled $221.75, (estimated cost at minimum wage: $312.61. We discuss important points to consider to ensure good quality control and appropriate pay for microworkers. With good

[The Open Access Initiative (OAI) in the scientific literature].

Science.gov (United States)

Sánchez-Martín, Francisco M; Millán Rodríguez, Félix; Villavicencio Mavrich, Humberto

2009-01-01

According to the declaration of the Budapest Open Access Initiative (OAI) is defined as a editorial model in which access to scientific journal literature and his use are free. Free flow of information allowed by Internet has been the basis of this initiative. The Bethesda and the Berlin declarations, supported by some international agencies, proposes to require researchers to deposit copies of all articles published in a self-archive or an Open Access repository, and encourage researchers to publish their research papers in journals Open Access. This paper reviews the keys of the OAI, with their strengths and controversial aspects; and it discusses the position of databases, search engines and repositories of biomedical information, as well as the attitude of the scientists, publishers and journals. So far the journal Actas Urológicas Españolas (Act Urol Esp) offer their contents on Open Access as On Line in Spanish and English.

The effect of scientific evidence on conservation practitioners' management decisions.

Science.gov (United States)

Walsh, Jessica C; Dicks, Lynn V; Sutherland, William J

2015-02-01

A major justification of environmental management research is that it helps practitioners, yet previous studies show it is rarely used to inform their decisions. We tested whether conservation practitioners focusing on bird management were willing to use a synopsis of relevant scientific literature to inform their management decisions. This allowed us to examine whether the limited use of scientific information in management is due to a lack of access to the scientific literature or whether it is because practitioners are either not interested or unable to incorporate the research into their decisions. In on-line surveys, we asked 92 conservation managers, predominantly from Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom, to provide opinions on 28 management techniques that could be applied to reduce predation on birds. We asked their opinions before and after giving them a summary of the literature about the interventions' effectiveness. We scored the overall effectiveness and certainty of evidence for each intervention through an expert elicitation process-the Delphi method. We used the effectiveness scores to assess the practitioners' level of understanding and awareness of the literature. On average, each survey participant changed their likelihood of using 45.7% of the interventions after reading the synopsis of the evidence. They were more likely to implement effective interventions and avoid ineffective actions, suggesting that their intended future management strategies may be more successful than current practice. More experienced practitioners were less likely to change their management practices than those with less experience, even though they were not more aware of the existing scientific information than less experienced practitioners. The practitioners' willingness to change their management choices when provided with summarized scientific evidence suggests that improved accessibility to scientific information would benefit conservation management

Trends in scientific literature on addiction to the internet, video games, and cell phones from 2006 to 2010

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Xavier Carbonell

2016-01-01

Conclusions: The number of publications on technological addictions reached a peak in 2008. The scientific contributions of China, Taiwan, and Korea are overrepresented compared to other scientific fields such as drug addiction. The inclusion of Internet Gaming Disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5 th Edition could change the publication trends in the technological addiction area and underline the relevance of this upcoming disorder in dissatisfaction with life in general.

Research governance and scientific knowledge production in The Gambia

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Frederick U. Ozor

2014-09-01

Full Text Available Public research institutions and scientists are principal actors in the production and transfer of scientific knowledge, technologies and innovations for application in industry as well for social and economic development. Based on the relevance of science and technology actors, the aim of this study was to identify and explain factors in research governance that influence scientific knowledge production and to contribute to empirical discussions on the impact levels of different governance models and structures. These discussions appear limited and mixed in the literature, although still are ongoing. No previous study has examined the possible contribution of the scientific committee model of research governance to scientific performance at the individual level of the scientist. In this context, this study contributes to these discussions, firstly, by suggesting that scientific committee structures with significant research steering autonomy could contribute not only directly to scientific output but also indirectly through moderating effects on research practices. Secondly, it is argued that autonomous scientific committee structures tend to play a better steering role than do management-centric models and structures of research governance.

A step-by-step guide to systematically identify all relevant animal studies

Science.gov (United States)

Leenaars, Marlies; Hooijmans, Carlijn R; van Veggel, Nieky; ter Riet, Gerben; Leeflang, Mariska; Hooft, Lotty; van der Wilt, Gert Jan; Tillema, Alice; Ritskes-Hoitinga, Merel

2012-01-01

Before starting a new animal experiment, thorough analysis of previously performed experiments is essential from a scientific as well as from an ethical point of view. The method that is most suitable to carry out such a thorough analysis of the literature is a systematic review (SR). An essential first step in an SR is to search and find all potentially relevant studies. It is important to include all available evidence in an SR to minimize bias and reduce hampered interpretation of experimental outcomes. Despite the recent development of search filters to find animal studies in PubMed and EMBASE, searching for all available animal studies remains a challenge. Available guidelines from the clinical field cannot be copied directly to the situation within animal research, and although there are plenty of books and courses on searching the literature, there is no compact guide available to search and find relevant animal studies. Therefore, in order to facilitate a structured, thorough and transparent search for animal studies (in both preclinical and fundamental science), an easy-to-use, step-by-step guide was prepared and optimized using feedback from scientists in the field of animal experimentation. The step-by-step guide will assist scientists in performing a comprehensive literature search and, consequently, improve the scientific quality of the resulting review and prevent unnecessary animal use in the future. PMID:22037056

A review of literature relevant to gas production in radioactive waste

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Norris, G.H.

1987-11-01

A review of relevant recent papers on gas generation in low-level wastes and intermediate-level wastes is presented. Chemical, microbiological, radiolytic and thermal reactions are considered for both unconditioned wastes and wastes conditioned in cement, or bitumen, or polymer. Possible reaction mechanisms are identified and the effects of temperature and pressure are evaluated. Estimations of the production of combustible gases (which also have the potential to form explosive mixtures) have been taken from the literature. The implications of gas production for pressurisation (and possible rupture) of waste drums and of a repository are assessed. Waste-treatment schemes for the reduction of gas-generation capacity of several waste-types are highlighted. Recommendations for further work are summarised. (author)

TVOC and health in non-industrial indoor environments. Reports from a Nordic scientific consensus meeting at Långholmen in Stockholm, 1996

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

K., Andersson; Bakke, J.V.; Bjørseth, O.

1997-01-01

and interpretations of TVOC. This means that simple addition of the quantities of individual VOCs may not be relevant from a health point of view. Twelve researchers from the Nordic countries have reviewed the literature on VOC/TVOC and health. A search of the literature resulted in the identification of about 1100...... in indoor environments in non-industrial buildings. However, the scientific literature is inconclusive with respect to TVOC as a risk index for health and comfort effects in buildings. Consequently, there is at present an inadequate scientific basis on which to establish limit values/guidelines for TVOC...

A global scientific literature of research on water quality indices: trends, biases and future directions

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Maria Tereza Ribeiro Alves

2014-09-01

Full Text Available AIM: Water quality has been the subject of many recent studies, moreover, the physical, chemical and biological parameters of water are used to investigate water quality and can be combined into a single index, the Water Quality Index (WQI, for use by water resource managers and the general public. The aim of this study was to use scientometrics to evaluate how water quality has been addressed in the international scientific literature. METHOD: For the quantitative analysis of the publications on WQI, we used the search database SCOPUS (http://www.scopus.com. The search was performed using the words "QUALIT* WATER* INDEX*" in papers published in all databases (through 2011. RESULTS: We found 554 articles that dealt with the use of WQI the number of publications has increased significantly over the last 20 years. India had the most studies, with 177 articles, followed by China, Brazil and the United States. These four countries together published 57% of studies on WQI. We generated 15 linear models to explain the number of publication by study sit (country. According to the Akaike Information Criterion (AIC, the best model to explain the number of publications by country was the model that combined Sanitation and Public Supply. CONCLUSION: Finally, this paper presents the state of scientific literature on WQI and demonstrates the growing interest of the scientific community in this issue, which is certainly due to the importance of the quantity and quality of water for human supply, economics, health and the conservation of water resources.

Tire Crumb Research Study Literature Review / Gap ...

Science.gov (United States)

In order to more fully understand data gaps in human exposure and toxicity to tire crumb materials, ATSDR, CPSC and EPA undertook a collaborative effort in the form of a scientific literature review and subsequent gaps analysis. The first objective of the Literature Review and Gap Analysis (LRGA) collaboration was to identify the existing body of literature related specifically to human exposure to tire crumb materials through the use of synthetic turf athletic fields and playgrounds. The second objective was to characterize and summarize the relevant data from the scientific literature. The final objective was to review the summary information and identify data gaps to build on the current understanding of the state-of-the-science and inform the development of specific research efforts that would be most impactful in the near-term. Because of the need for additional information, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention/Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR), and the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) launched a multi-agency action plan to study key environmental human health questions. The Federal Research Action Plan includes numerous activities, including research studies (U.S. EPA, 2016). A key objective of the Action Plan is to identify key knowledge gaps.

The Strategic Environment Assessment bibliographic network: A quantitative literature review analysis

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Caschili, Simone, E-mail: s.caschili@ucl.ac.uk [UCL QASER Lab, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT (United Kingdom); De Montis, Andrea; Ganciu, Amedeo; Ledda, Antonio; Barra, Mario [Dipartimento di Agraria, University of Sassari, viale Italia, 39, 07100 Sassari (Italy)

2014-07-01

Academic literature has been continuously growing at such a pace that it can be difficult to follow the progression of scientific achievements; hence, the need to dispose of quantitative knowledge support systems to analyze the literature of a subject. In this article we utilize network analysis tools to build a literature review of scientific documents published in the multidisciplinary field of Strategic Environment Assessment (SEA). The proposed approach helps researchers to build unbiased and comprehensive literature reviews. We collect information on 7662 SEA publications and build the SEA Bibliographic Network (SEABN) employing the basic idea that two publications are interconnected if one cites the other. We apply network analysis at macroscopic (network architecture), mesoscopic (sub graph) and microscopic levels (node) in order to i) verify what network structure characterizes the SEA literature, ii) identify the authors, disciplines and journals that are contributing to the international discussion on SEA, and iii) scrutinize the most cited and important publications in the field. Results show that the SEA is a multidisciplinary subject; the SEABN belongs to the class of real small world networks with a dominance of publications in Environmental studies over a total of 12 scientific sectors. Christopher Wood, Olivia Bina, Matthew Cashmore, and Andrew Jordan are found to be the leading authors while Environmental Impact Assessment Review is by far the scientific journal with the highest number of publications in SEA studies. - Highlights: • We utilize network analysis to analyze scientific documents in the SEA field. • We build the SEA Bibliographic Network (SEABN) of 7662 publications. • We apply network analysis at macroscopic, mesoscopic and microscopic network levels. • We identify SEABN architecture, relevant publications, authors, subjects and journals.

The Strategic Environment Assessment bibliographic network: A quantitative literature review analysis

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Caschili, Simone; De Montis, Andrea; Ganciu, Amedeo; Ledda, Antonio; Barra, Mario

2014-01-01

Academic literature has been continuously growing at such a pace that it can be difficult to follow the progression of scientific achievements; hence, the need to dispose of quantitative knowledge support systems to analyze the literature of a subject. In this article we utilize network analysis tools to build a literature review of scientific documents published in the multidisciplinary field of Strategic Environment Assessment (SEA). The proposed approach helps researchers to build unbiased and comprehensive literature reviews. We collect information on 7662 SEA publications and build the SEA Bibliographic Network (SEABN) employing the basic idea that two publications are interconnected if one cites the other. We apply network analysis at macroscopic (network architecture), mesoscopic (sub graph) and microscopic levels (node) in order to i) verify what network structure characterizes the SEA literature, ii) identify the authors, disciplines and journals that are contributing to the international discussion on SEA, and iii) scrutinize the most cited and important publications in the field. Results show that the SEA is a multidisciplinary subject; the SEABN belongs to the class of real small world networks with a dominance of publications in Environmental studies over a total of 12 scientific sectors. Christopher Wood, Olivia Bina, Matthew Cashmore, and Andrew Jordan are found to be the leading authors while Environmental Impact Assessment Review is by far the scientific journal with the highest number of publications in SEA studies. - Highlights: • We utilize network analysis to analyze scientific documents in the SEA field. • We build the SEA Bibliographic Network (SEABN) of 7662 publications. • We apply network analysis at macroscopic, mesoscopic and microscopic network levels. • We identify SEABN architecture, relevant publications, authors, subjects and journals

PARENTAL ALIENATION IN BRAZIL: A REVIEW OF SCIENTIFIC PUBLICATIONS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sheila Maria Prado Soma

2016-11-01

Full Text Available Parental Alienation (PA and Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS are of great relevance to the common area shared by Psychology and Law, and have gained emphasis in Brazil since the approval of Law 12.318/2010. Such law provides punishment for alienating practices and determines the role of Forensic Psychologists in the investigation of alleged cases. Nevertheless, the topic is controversial from a scientific point of view and the literature is scarce, particularly in Brazil.The present study reviewed the Brazilian scientific literature regarding PA and PAS up to July 2015. As a result, 13 articles were selected and analyzed. Nine of them were theoretical papers, and only four presented results from empirical research. Unfortunately most publications, including the empirical studies, did not seem to offer important contributions to the area. The lack of empirical research on this topic affects the area’s conceptual development and professional conduct while working with families in litigation.

THE CURRENT STATE OF KNOWLEDGE IN THE VALUE RELEVANCE RESEARCH FIELD

OpenAIRE

Carmen- Alexandra BALTARIU

2015-01-01

The purpose of this paper is to assess the scientific literature referring to the value relevance of reported accounting information over a twelve year period starting from 2002. The approach of the paper is a theoretical (conceptual) one. In order to complete the purpose of the paper we selected as research method the longitudinal qualitative analysis. The qualitative analysis carried out presents a deductive character. Our conclusions regarding the general characteristics of the research fi...

[Abortion and stigma: an analysis of the scientific literature on the theme].

Science.gov (United States)

Adesse, Leila; Jannotti, Claudia Bonan; Silva, Katia Silveira da; Fonseca, Vania Matos

2016-12-01

This article analyzes the scientific output on abortion and social stigma and the potential of the stigma category for abortion care in Brazil. An integrative review of publications on scientific databases without a time limit was conducted. Sixty-five publications with the social representations of women who had an abortion and the professionals who attended them were analyzed. The obstacles to the implementation of abortion laws and the protocols and norms that facilitate access to quality services care was explored. The conceptual relevance of Erving Goffman was a key element for the understanding of the gender transgression stereotypes, the imperative of motherhood, sexual purity, which tarnishes women who have abortions as inferior, damaged, promiscuous, sinful and murderous. Groups most affected by stigmatization were identified, namely women having an abortion and health professionals. Female conflicts due to the duality of concealing/revealing their abortions, the professional's conscientious objection and the obstacles facing the implementation of public policies emerged from the study. Reflecting on the role of stigma may interfere in the cycle of clandestine abortion and contribute to the (re)design of interventions that help to reduce damage to the sexual and reproductive health of women.

Brazilian academic search filter: application to the scientific literature on physical activity.

Science.gov (United States)

Sanz-Valero, Javier; Ferreira, Marcos Santos; Castiel, Luis David; Wanden-Berghe, Carmina; Guilam, Maria Cristina Rodrigues

2010-10-01

To develop a search filter in order to retrieve scientific publications on physical activity from Brazilian academic institutions. The academic search filter consisted of the descriptor "exercise" associated through the term AND, to the names of the respective academic institutions, which were connected by the term OR. The MEDLINE search was performed with PubMed on 11/16/2008. The institutions were selected according to the classification from the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) for interuniversity agreements. A total of 407 references were retrieved, corresponding to about 0.9% of all articles about physical activity and 0.5% of the Brazilian academic publications indexed in MEDLINE on the search date. When compared with the manual search undertaken, the search filter (descriptor + institutional filter) showed a sensitivity of 99% and a specificity of 100%. The institutional search filter showed high sensitivity and specificity, and is applicable to other areas of knowledge in health sciences. It is desirable that every Brazilian academic institution establish its "standard name/brand" in order to efficiently retrieve their scientific literature.

The "sequence of prevention" for musculoskeletal injuries among adult recreational footballers: A systematic review of the scientific literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Kilic, Ozgur; Kemler, Ellen; Gouttebarge, Vincent

2018-02-02

To gather epidemiological information related to all steps of Van Mechelen's "sequence of prevention" for musculoskeletal injuries among adult recreational football players. A systematic review of the scientific literature was conducted in Medline via Pubmed. Therefore, two highly sensitive search strategies based on three groups of keywords (and related search terms) were used. In total, 33 relevant original studies were included in our systematic review. The results of our systematic review showed that the incidence of musculoskeletal injuries among recreational adult football players ranged from 9.6 to 15.8 injuries per 1000 exposure hours. These injuries are especially located in the ankle, knee, groin and hamstring, being associated with previous injury and match exposure. The FIFA11 + injury prevention programme and the Nordic Hamstring Exercise (NHE) were found to be effective for the reduction or prevention of musculoskeletal injuries among adult recreational football players. Our systematic review showed that musculoskeletal injuries are common among recreational adult football players, while effective preventive programmes are available. Further studies should focus on the identification and understanding of the key factors responsible for the optimal adoption, implementation and maintenance of these measures. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Quantitative analysis and relevant features of the scientific literature related to SAXS and SANS

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Craievich, Aldo F; Fischer, Hannes

2010-01-01

We present and discuss here numerical information derived from a systematic searching of scientific papers related to SAXS and SANS published in indexed journals - from 1945 until nowadays - recorded by the Web of Science Data Bank (WoS). We have detected interesting features regarding the time dependence of the number of papers/year, N(t), indicating the existence of three well-defined periods of historical evolution with rather well-defined boundaries. All three periods exhibit a positive and approximately linear variation of N(t) but, at the two transitions between periods, the rate of growth exhibits clear and strong increases. Differences of the historical evolutions in the numbers of papers/year related to SAXS and to SANS were established. The different behaviours regarding the numbers of papers/year related to SAXS and to SANS and the existence of three different and well defined periods for N(t) can be qualitatively understood as a consequence of the progressive and increasing availability along the last three decades of very brilliant synchrotrons, last generation commercial X-ray sources, new neutron facilities, powerful computers and novel theoretical approaches for SAS data analysis. The rates of growth in the number of papers/year published by authors from a set of different countries are approximately constant along the last two decades. For other countries we have detected a slowing down effect in the number of papers/year while a clear acceleration could be noticed for the production of SAS papers by authors from several emerging countries. These opposite trends compensate in such a way that the number of SAS (SAXS+SAXS) articles published per year all around the world maintained a vigorous linear growth - during more than 20 years - at a constant rate of 60 papers/year, without any indication of eventual saturation. The observed distribution of articles among different journals indicates that a very high fraction of the volume of SAS research is

What is lost when searching only one literature database for articles relevant to injury prevention and safety promotion?

Science.gov (United States)

Lawrence, D W

2008-12-01

To assess what is lost if only one literature database is searched for articles relevant to injury prevention and safety promotion (IPSP) topics. Serial textword (keyword, free-text) searches using multiple synonym terms for five key IPSP topics (bicycle-related brain injuries, ethanol-impaired driving, house fires, road rage, and suicidal behaviors among adolescents) were conducted in four of the bibliographic databases that are most used by IPSP professionals: EMBASE, MEDLINE, PsycINFO, and Web of Science. Through a systematic procedure, an inventory of articles on each topic in each database was conducted to identify the total unduplicated count of all articles on each topic, the number of articles unique to each database, and the articles available if only one database is searched. No single database included all of the relevant articles on any topic, and the database with the broadest coverage differed by topic. A search of only one literature database will return 16.7-81.5% (median 43.4%) of the available articles on any of five key IPSP topics. Each database contributed unique articles to the total bibliography for each topic. A literature search performed in only one database will, on average, lead to a loss of more than half of the available literature on a topic.

Integration of Information and Scientific Literacy: Promoting Literacy in Undergraduates

Science.gov (United States)

Wolbach, Kevin C.; Purzycki, Catherine B.; Bowman, Leslie A.; Agbada, Eva; Mostrom, Alison M.

2010-01-01

The Association of College and Research Libraries recommends incorporating information literacy (IL) skills across university and college curricula, for the goal of developing information literate graduates. Congruent with this goal, the Departments of Biological Sciences and Information Science developed an integrated IL and scientific literacy (SL) exercise for use in a first-year biology course. Students were provided the opportunity to access, retrieve, analyze, and evaluate primary scientific literature. By the completion of this project, student responses improved concerning knowledge and relevance of IL and SL skills. This project exposes students to IL and SL early in their undergraduate experience, preparing them for future academic advancement. PMID:21123700

Literature overview for greenhouse effect part VI

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Orthofer, R.; Nevyjel, A.

1997-10-01

On behalf of the Austrian Federal Ministry of Environment, Youth and Family Affairs the current scientific and technical literature in the subject area of greenhouse effect and global climatic change is investigated by performing quarterly on-line retrieval searches in the databases Compendex, Enviroline, NTIS and ULIT. This report contains the research results of the period of September to December 1996. From the observed 199 citations the most significant 50 citations were selected, evaluated and summarised in a literature review. Relevant topics are (1) research on causes, effects and modelling, (2) possible agricultural, technical, economic and political control measures, (3) strategies and actions taken in various countries, and (4) international co-ordination. The review is based on the abstracts from the databases and for the most interesting publications - from the original literature. Five similar reports have been published previously which cover the literature since January 1994. (author)

Benefits and harms of general health checks- lifelong learning in general practice: how to read and use scientific literature

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Arreskov, Anne Beiter; Graungaard, Anette Hauskov; Nielsen, Kirsten Lykke

the paper using the method of critical appraisal. Session content The didactic method used in the workshop is mostly small group activities with eight participants and two tutors in each group. The participants will receive two scientific papers: the BMJ-version of the Cochrane review about general health......Abstract title: Benefits and harms of general health checks - lifelong learning in general practice: how to read and use scientific literature Objectives After this workshop the participants will know the basics of how to read a systematic literature review and interpret a meta-analysis and be able......, assesses, and implements methods of diagnosis and treatment on the basis of the best available current research, clinical expertise, and combines this with the needs and preferences of the patient, is termed evidence-based medicine. By learning and practising the principles of evidence-based medicine, GPs...

Our House Is Burning: Discrepancy in Climate Change vs. Biodiversity Coverage in the Media as Compared to Scientific Literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Pierre Legagneux

2018-01-01

Full Text Available Scientists, policy makers, and journalists are three key, interconnected players involved in prioritizing and implementing solutions to mitigate the consequences of anthropogenic pressures on the environment. The way in which information is framed and expertise is communicated by the media is crucial for political decisions and for the integrated management of environmental issues. Here we present a comparative study of scientific literature and press articles addressing climate change and biodiversity. We extensively scrutinized the scientific literature, research funding, and press articles from the USA, Canada, and United Kingdom addressing climate change and biodiversity issues between 1991 and 2016. We found that media coverage of climate change was up to eight times higher compared to biodiversity. This discrepancy could not be explained by different scientific output between the two issues. Moreover, climate change media coverage was often related to specific events whereas no such indication of a connection was found in the case of biodiversity. An international communication strategy is urgently required to raise public awareness on biodiversity issues. We discussed several initiatives that scientists could undertake to better communicate major discoveries to the public and policy makers.

Occupational Exposure to Solar Radiation at Different Latitudes and Pterygium: A Systematic Review of the Last 10 Years of Scientific Literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Alberto Modenese

2017-12-01

Full Text Available Pterygium is a chronic eye disease: among its recognized risk factors there is long-term exposure to ultraviolet (UV radiation. The Sun is the main source of UV exposure: according to the World Health Organization, the Population Attributable Fraction of pterygium due to solar radiation (SR is 42–74%. Outdoor work can deeply influence the eye exposure to solar UV rays, but, despite this, pterygium is currently not adequately considered as a possible occupational disease in this working category, at least in Europe. For this reason, we performed a systematic review of the scientific literature published in the last ten years (2008–2017 considering the role of outdoor work as a risk factor for pterygium, in order to give new support for the prevention of this UV related disease in workers. We identified 29 relevant papers. Our results show that pterygium prevalence highly increased with latitude and mean annual UV index, and outdoor work is one of the most relevant risk factors, as well as age and male sex, both in high risk and in moderate risk World areas considering the environmental UV levels. Accordingly, pterygium occurring in outdoor workers should be considered an occupational disease. Moreover, our findings clearly support the need of further research on more effective prevention of the occupational risk related to long-term solar radiation exposure of the eye.

The Scientific Attitude (The Scientific Temper in Eastern and Western societies

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

SN Arseculeratne

2014-03-01

Full Text Available The Scientific Attitude, different from the attitude to science, is discussed in relation to Eastern and Western modes of thinking; it is also differentiated from Scientism. The literature from western as well as Indian authors, and the comments of Joseph Needham on China, are included. The topics considered are the history of science, the importance of science, its methodologies, determinants of the growth of modern science, internal and external factors in the growth of science, education in science, documentation of science and technology, and determinants of the modes of thinking about science and its practice: these determinants include religion, tradition, utilitarianism, and administration in science. The major point of contrast between the attitudes of East versus West is argued to be religious versus secular. A relevant bibliography is provided.

Are there ways to improve the citations of a scientific paper?

Science.gov (United States)

Bartoli, E

2018-04-01

The expansion of scientific publications makes more difficult the mining of relevant information necessary for a productive appraisal of authors' work, scientific interaction and exchange. Papers over-citation is unproductive, under-citation of innovative research generates delay and inefficiency. The extraction of information from the literature is mostly based on keywords (KWs). I computed the chances of citation of one paper as 1/number of papers retrieved by the KWs published in that paper, and compared them with the chances obtained by selecting different KWs. Using generic KWs the chances are smaller, at times practically nil, as compared to those calculated with more specific KWs and their association. Selecting scientifically-analyzed KWs, specific for the message conveyed by a paper and computing beforehand the theoretical chances of citation, might increase the citations obtained, the retrieval of important scientific and innovative information, optimize scientific exchange and qualitative productivity. LEARNING POINTS. Copyright © 2018 European Federation of Internal Medicine. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Recency or Relevance: A Quest for Pedagogical Framework in Teaching Philippine and World Literature in Senior High School

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Richard M. Bañez

2016-11-01

Full Text Available Pedagogical questions on whether recency or relevance of literary texts, and the importance of generic academic over discipline-based learning objectives as the core of literature instruction are increasingly becoming the interest of debates in senior high school education. Hence, this study determined the degree of importance of literary instruction in preparation for college education and workplace challenges as assessed by 38 Grade 11 students at Malvar Senior High School, Philippines during the school year 2016-2017. By employing the survey type of descriptive research with a self-made questionnaire, it was found out that the respondents assessed both recency and relevance as important consideration in selecting literary texts. They also perceived that discipline-based/work-oriented learning objectives, especially those that focus on honing their human relation skills, were relevant in preparing themselves for college education and workplace responsibilities. Moreover, the respondents preferred language-based activities that tend to provide the former opportunities and develop other complex skills which are important in tertiary education and workplace challenges. With these, revitalizing the literature instruction in the senior high school is highly recommended in this study.

Safety assessment of GM plants: An updated review of the scientific literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Domingo, José L

2016-09-01

In a wide revision of the literature conducted in 2000, I noted that the information in scientific journals on the safety of genetically modified (GM) foods in general, and GM plants in particular, was scarce. Of course, it was not sufficient to guarantee that the consumption of these products should not mean risks for the health of the consumers. Because of the scientific interest in GM organisms (GMOs), as well as the great concern that the consumption of GM foods/plants has raised in a number of countries, I conducted two subsequent revisions (2007 and 2011) on the adverse/toxic effects of GM plants. In the present review, I have updated the information on the potential adverse health effects of GM plants consumed as food and/or feed. With only a few exceptions, the reported studies in the last six years show rather similar conclusions; that is to say, the assessed GM soybeans, rice, corn/maize and wheat would be as safe as the parental species of these plants. However, in spite of the notable increase in the available information, studies on the long-term health effects of GM plants, including tests of mutagenicity, teratogenicity and carcinogenicity seem to be still clearly necessary. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Dimensions of Ideology. A Review of Social-Psychological Literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Bojan Todosijević

2014-01-01

Full Text Available In social psychological literature, ideology is typically conceived as a relatively stable and organized set of general orientations that include interrelated attitudes grouped according to various sources of constraint, such as psychological disposition, general values, or ideological traditions. The paper reviews social-psychological literature on the organization of social attitudes. Research on this topic started nearly eight decades ago, inspired by the research on the structure of intellectual abilities. Since then, a large body of literature has been generated, which has not been systematically reviewed. Despite the long tradition, this literature has not resulted in proportional cumulative scientific development. The review should help improving this situation by listing the relevant studies, examining the research methodology and the main findings. The review ends with the critical summary of the man findings and methodological problems, and recommendations for the future research.

FAO's role in facilitating access to the scientific and technical literature in Agriculture in developing countries

OpenAIRE

Katz, Stephen

2007-01-01

Research generated in developing and emerging countries is currently “missing” from the international knowledge bases because of financial consequences affecting its publication and distribution. Much of the scientific research output from Africa for example, is in form of grey literature and hardly accessible. FAO is the specialized United Nation agency that leads international efforts to defeat hunger and emphasizes on knowledge management for food and agriculture. FAO more than an extensiv...

eHealth effectiveness : does scientific literature provide evidence of the effectiveness of eHealth and what does that mean?

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Schurer, Margreet; Velthuijsen, Hugo

Although the scientific literature consists of over 10,000 papers on eHealth, remarkably few applications are consistently being used in the healthcare domain. Numerous reasons for this lack of progression have been noted, one of these being the objection of medical professionals to the introduction

Other relevant numerical modelling papers

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chartier, M.

1989-01-01

The ocean modelling is a rapidly evolving science and a large number of results have been published. Several categories of papers are of particular interest for this review: the papers published by the international atomic institutions, such as the NEA (for the CRESP or Subseabed Programs), the IAEA (for example the Safety Series, the Technical Report Series or the TECDOC), and the ICRP, and the papers concerned by more fundamental research, which are published in specific scientific literature. This paper aims to list some of the most relevant publications for the CRESP purposes. It means by no way to be exhaustive, but informative on the incontestable progress recently achieved in that field. One should note that some of these papers are so recent that their final version has not yet been published

Using an Ishikawa diagram as a tool to assist memory and retrieval of relevant medical cases from the medical literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Wong, Kam Cheong

2011-03-29

Studying medical cases is an effective way to enhance clinical reasoning skills and reinforce clinical knowledge. An Ishikawa diagram, also known as a cause-and-effect diagram or fishbone diagram, is often used in quality management in manufacturing industries.In this report, an Ishikawa diagram is used to demonstrate how to relate potential causes of a major presenting problem in a clinical setting. This tool can be used by teams in problem-based learning or in self-directed learning settings.An Ishikawa diagram annotated with references to relevant medical cases and literature can be continually updated and can assist memory and retrieval of relevant medical cases and literature. It could also be used to cultivate a lifelong learning habit in medical professionals.

Using an Ishikawa diagram as a tool to assist memory and retrieval of relevant medical cases from the medical literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Wong Kam Cheong

2011-03-01

Full Text Available Abstract Studying medical cases is an effective way to enhance clinical reasoning skills and reinforce clinical knowledge. An Ishikawa diagram, also known as a cause-and-effect diagram or fishbone diagram, is often used in quality management in manufacturing industries. In this report, an Ishikawa diagram is used to demonstrate how to relate potential causes of a major presenting problem in a clinical setting. This tool can be used by teams in problem-based learning or in self-directed learning settings. An Ishikawa diagram annotated with references to relevant medical cases and literature can be continually updated and can assist memory and retrieval of relevant medical cases and literature. It could also be used to cultivate a lifelong learning habit in medical professionals.

National scientific literature on nursing ethics: a systematic Review

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ilka Nicéia D’Aquino Oliveira Teixeira

2010-03-01

Full Text Available Objective: To identify the most prevalent nursing ethical issues published in scientific Brazilian journals. Methods: A systematic literature review with the following inclusion criteria: (1 articles on Nursing Ethics written in Portuguese, English, French, and Spanish; (2 published in Brazilian journals; (3 in the period from January 1997 to February 2009. The search was carried out in four databases BDENF, LILACS, MEDLINE, and SCIELO. The key-words were ethics AND nursing. The selected studies were classified into categories. The content of the articles were analyzed using the Collective Subject Discourse. The categories generated discourses by organizing the main excerpts from the abstracts of the selected studies, which are the “key expressions”. Results: A hundred and thirty three articles that met the inclusion criteria were classified into eight categories: 1. Nursing Care; 2. Dilemmas and Controversies; 3. Education; 4. Legal Aspects; 5. Research; 6. Management; 7. Values and Beliefs; 8. Perspectives and Health Policies. The category “Nursing Care” prevailed in 36% of the selected articles, and it was classified into six subcategories. “Dilemmas and Controversies” was the second most prevalent category (15%. Conclusion: The number of theoretical papers on ethical issues is high, but there is little research on the ethical experiences in nursing practice.

Raising students’ awareness with respect to choice of literature

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Bagger, Bettan; Taylor Kelly, Hélène; Hørdam, Britta

is a pedagogical tool which raises students’ awareness with respect to the necessity of employing scientific and researched based material. The tool is not only used in the theoretical setting but also in clinical practice. Students and clinical advisors evaluate the relevance of the pedagogical tool via...... questionnaires. The data will be analyzed and form the basis for further innovative teaching developments promoting the theory-clinical connection in the learning environment. Keywords: literature, education, pedagogical tool, theory-practice connection....

Literature in Indigenous Language: Its Relevance to Human ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

The paper therefore argues that since human development have to do with human mind, literature (as genre) in indigenous language such as Igbo as a school subject at all levels of education and as well as reading it for leisure will obviously play important role in achieving good human development index. Igbo literature in ...

Information literacy in science writing: how students find, identify, and use scientific literature

Science.gov (United States)

Klucevsek, Kristin M.; Brungard, Allison B.

2016-11-01

For undergraduate students to achieve science literacy, they must first develop information literacy skils. These skills align with Information Literacy Standards and include determining appropriate databases, distinguishing among resource types, and citing resources ethically. To effectively improve information literacy and science literacy, we must identify how students interact with authentic scientific texts. In this case study, we addressed this aim by embedding a science librarian into a science writing course, where students wrote a literature review on a research topic of their choice. Library instruction was further integrated through the use of an online guide and outside assistance. To evaluate the evolution of information literacy in our students and provide evidence of student practices, we used task-scaffolded writing assessments, a reflection, and surveys. We found that students improved their ability and confidence in finding research articles using discipline-specific databases as well as their ability to distinguish primary from secondary research articles. We also identified ways students improperly used and cited resources in their writing assignments. While our results reveal a better understanding of how students find and approach scientific research articles, additional research is needed to develop effective strategies to improve long-term information literacy in the sciences.

Writing software or writing scientific articles?

CERN Document Server

Basaglia, Tullio; Dressendorfer, P V; Larkin, A; Pia, M G

2008-01-01

An analysis of publications related to high energy physics computing in refereed journals is presented. The distribution of papers associated to various fields of computing relevant to high energy physics is critically analyzed. The relative publication rate of software papers is evaluated in comparison to other closely related physics disciplines, such as nuclear physics, radiation protection and medical physics, and to hardware publications. The results hint to the fact that, in spite of the significant effort invested in high energy physics computing and its fundamental role in the experiments, this research area is underrepresented in scientific literature; nevertheless the analysis of citations highlights the significant impact of software publications in experimental research.

Geant4 in Scientific Literature

CERN Document Server

Pia, M G; Bell, Z W; Dressendorfer, P V

2009-01-01

The Geant4 reference paper published in Nuclear Instruments and Methods A in 2003 has become the most cited publication in the whole Nuclear Science and Technology category of Thomson-Reuter's Journal Citation Reports. It is currently the second most cited article among the publications authored by two major research institutes, CERN and INFN. An overview of Geant4 presence (and absence) in scholarly literature is presented; the patterns of Geant4 citations are quantitatively examined and discussed.

Analyzing Data Citations to Assess the Scientific and Societal Value of Scientific Data

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, R. S.; Downs, R. R.

2012-12-01

Stakeholders in the creation, distribution, support, funding, and use of scientific data can benefit by understanding the value that the data have for society and science. For decades, the scientific community has been using citations of articles in the published scientific literature as one of the primary measures used for evaluating the performance of scientists, departments, institutions, and scientific disciplines. Similarly, citations in the published literature of scientific data may be useful for measuring and assessing the value of the scientific data and the performance of the individuals, projects, programs, and organizations that have contributed to the data and their use. The results of citation analysis and other assessments of the value of data also can contribute to planning for future data collection, development, distribution, and preservation efforts. The planned release of new data citation indexes and the more widespread adoption of unique data identifiers and automated attribution mechanisms have the potential to improve significantly the capabilities for analyzing citations of scientific data. In addition, rapid developments in the systems and capabilities for disseminating data, along with education and workforce development on the importance of data attribution and on techniques for data citation, can improve practices for citing scientific data. Such practices need to lead not only to better aggregate statistics about data citation, but also to improved characterization and understanding of the impact of data use in terms of the benefits for science and society. Analyses of citations in the scientific literature were conducted for data that were distributed by an interdisciplinary scientific data center during a five-year period (1997 - 2011), to identify the scientific fields represented by the journals and books in which the data were cited. Secondary citation analysis also was conducted for a sample of scientific publications that used

Ventilation and health in non-industrial indoor environments: report from a European Multidisciplinary Scientific Consensus Meeting (EUROVEN)

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Wargocki, Pawel; Sundell, Jan; Bischof, W.

2002-01-01

Scientific literature on the effects of ventilation on health, comfort, and productivity in non-industrial indoor environments (offices, schools, homes, etc.) has been reviewed by a multidisciplinary group of European scientists, called EUROVEN, with expertise in medicine, epidemiology, toxicology......, and engineering. The group reviewed 105 papers published in peer-reviewed scientific journals and judged 30 as conclusive, providing sufficient information on ventilation, health effects, data processing, and reporting, 14 as providing relevant background information on the issue, 43 as relevant but non......-informative or inconclusive, and 18 as irrelevant for the issue discussed. Based on the data in papers judged conclusive, the group agreed that ventilation is strongly associated with comfort (perceived air quality) and health (Sick Building Syndrome (SBS) symptoms, inflammation, infections, asthma, allergy, short-term sick...

Rediscovering the scientific ethos

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Djørup, Stine

The doctoral dissertation discusses some of the moral standards of good scientific practice that areunderexposed in the literature. In particular, attempts are made to correct the conceptual confusionsurrounding the norm of 'disinterestedness' in science (‘uhildethed’), and the norm of scientific...

Harnessing scientific literature reports for pharmacovigilance. Prototype software analytical tool development and usability testing.

Science.gov (United States)

Sorbello, Alfred; Ripple, Anna; Tonning, Joseph; Munoz, Monica; Hasan, Rashedul; Ly, Thomas; Francis, Henry; Bodenreider, Olivier

2017-03-22

We seek to develop a prototype software analytical tool to augment FDA regulatory reviewers' capacity to harness scientific literature reports in PubMed/MEDLINE for pharmacovigilance and adverse drug event (ADE) safety signal detection. We also aim to gather feedback through usability testing to assess design, performance, and user satisfaction with the tool. A prototype, open source, web-based, software analytical tool generated statistical disproportionality data mining signal scores and dynamic visual analytics for ADE safety signal detection and management. We leveraged Medical Subject Heading (MeSH) indexing terms assigned to published citations in PubMed/MEDLINE to generate candidate drug-adverse event pairs for quantitative data mining. Six FDA regulatory reviewers participated in usability testing by employing the tool as part of their ongoing real-life pharmacovigilance activities to provide subjective feedback on its practical impact, added value, and fitness for use. All usability test participants cited the tool's ease of learning, ease of use, and generation of quantitative ADE safety signals, some of which corresponded to known established adverse drug reactions. Potential concerns included the comparability of the tool's automated literature search relative to a manual 'all fields' PubMed search, missing drugs and adverse event terms, interpretation of signal scores, and integration with existing computer-based analytical tools. Usability testing demonstrated that this novel tool can automate the detection of ADE safety signals from published literature reports. Various mitigation strategies are described to foster improvements in design, productivity, and end user satisfaction.

Clinical relevance of metronidazole and peripheral neuropathy: a systematic review of the literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Goolsby, Tiffany A; Jakeman, Bernadette; Gaynes, Robert P

2018-03-01

The objective of this paper was to review and evaluate the literature on metronidazole-associated peripheral neuropathy and determine the relevance in clinical practice. MEDLINE/PubMed, EBSCO, and Google Scholar were searched through February 2017 using the search terms metronidazole and peripheral neuropathy, or polyneuropathy, or paresthesia, or neurotoxicity. Relevant case reports, retrospective studies, surveys, and review articles were included. Bibliographies of all relevant articles were reviewed for additional sources. Overall, metronidazole is generally well tolerated, but serious neurotoxicity, including peripheral neuropathy, has been reported. The overall incidence of peripheral neuropathy associated with metronidazole is unknown. Our review found 36 case reports (40 unique patients) of metronidazole-associated peripheral neuropathy, with most cases (31/40) receiving a >42 g total (>4 weeks) of therapy. In addition, we reviewed 13 clinical studies and found varying rates of peripheral neuropathy from 0 to 50%. Within these clinical studies, we found a higher incidence of peripheral neuropathy in patients receiving >42 g total (>4 weeks) of metronidazole compared with those patients receiving ≤42 g total (17.9% vs. 1.7%). Nearly all patients had complete resolution of symptoms. In conclusion, peripheral neuropathy is rare in patients who receive ≤42 g total of metronidazole. Patients who receive higher total doses may be at higher risk of peripheral neuropathy, but symptoms resolve after discontinuation of therapy in most patients. Antimicrobial stewardship programs may consider use of antibiotic combinations that include metronidazole over broad-spectrum alternatives when treating with ≤42 g total of the drug (≤4 weeks). Published by Elsevier B.V.

Lean and the working environment: a review of the literature

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hasle, Peter; Bojesen, Anders; Jensen, Per Langaa

2012-01-01

for the negative impact of lean on both the working environment and employee health and well-being in cases of manual work with low complexity. However, since examples of positive effects were also found in the literature, it is important to move from a simple cause-and-effect model to a more comprehensive model...... of manufacturing industry. The literature reflects, only to a limited extent, on the significance of implementation strategy and production context. Practical implications - Organizations working with lean should make efforts to avoid an impaired working environment for manual employees. Involvement of employees......Purpose - The effects of lean on employees have been debated ever since the concept was introduced. The purpose of this paper is to review the scientific literature on the effects of lean on the working environment and employee health and well-being. Design/methodology/approach - Relevant databases...

Introducing Scientific Literature to Honors General Chemistry Students: Teaching Information Literacy and the Nature of Research to First-Year Chemistry Students

Science.gov (United States)

Ferrer-Vinent, Ignacio J.; Bruehl, Margaret; Pan, Denise; Jones, Galin L.

2015-01-01

This paper describes the methodology and implementation of a case study introducing the scientific literature and creative experiment design to honors general chemistry laboratory students. The purpose of this study is to determine whether first-year chemistry students can develop information literacy skills while they engage with the primary…

Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation in Substance Use Disorders: A Systematic Review of Scientific Literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Lupi, Matteo; Martinotti, Giovanni; Santacroce, Rita; Cinosi, Eduardo; Carlucci, Maria; Marini, Stefano; Acciavatti, Tiziano; di Giannantonio, Massimo

2017-09-01

New treatment options such as noninvasive brain stimulation have been recently explored in the field of substance use disorders (SUDs), including transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS). In light of this, we have performed a review of the scientific literature to assess efficacy and technical and methodological issues resulting from applying tDCS to the field of SUDs. Our analysis highlighted the following selection criteria: clinical studies on tDCS and SUDs (alcohol, caffeine, cannabis, cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, and nicotine). Study selection, data analysis, and reporting were conducted according to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines. Exclusion criteria were as follows: clinical studies about tDCS among behavioral addiction; review and didactic articles; physiopathological studies; and case reports. Eighteen scientific papers were selected out of 48 articles. Among these, 16 studied the efficacy of tDCS applied to the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, and 8 suggested the efficacy of tDCS in reducing substance craving. In light of these data, it is premature to conclude that tDCS over the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex is a very efficient technique in reducing craving. Small sample size, different stimulation protocols, and study duration were the main limitations. However, the efficacy of tDCS in treating SUDs requires further investigation.

Prostate cancer, treatment modalities and complications: an evaluation of the scientific literature

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Santos-Filho, Sebastiao David; Fonseca, Adenilson de Souza da; Bernardo-Filho, Mario; Missailids, Sotiris

2008-01-01

Prostate (PR) cancer (CA) is one of the most common malignant neoplasms in men all over the world. In general, if prostate cancer (PC) is detected early, treatment usually involves either surgical removal of the prostate or radiotherapy (RT). Hormone Therapy (HT) or chemotherapy (CH) is the preferred treatment for more advanced cases of PC or if CA spreads beyond the PT. A number of complications, such as urinary incontinence (IU) or erectile dysfunction (ED), can be associated with some modalities of treatment of the PC. The aim of this work is to evaluate, in PubMed, the number of publications related with prostate cancer and the main modalities of treatment, as well as some clinical complications. The searches were performed in PubMed (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi) in the period 1950 to 2008 using the words: CA, CA and PR or penis or testis, CA and PR and RT, CA and PR and surgery (SU), CA and PR and CH and, CA and PR and HT and CA and PR and RT and IU or ED, CA and PR and SU and IU or ED, CA and PR and CH and IU or ED and, CA and PR and HT and CH and IU or ED, and (V) PC and the same modalities of treatment. The data was obtained on July 20th, 2008. PC, as expected has been cited extensively and surgery has been identified as the most widely referenced modality of treatment. Furthermore, urinary incontinence and erectile dysfunction are important complications that have attracted significant scientific interest. In conclusion, these findings have shown the relevance of the PubMed to analyze quantitatively the publications in cancer and this information could be worthwhile in aiding the comprehension of some clinical aspects related with PC, as well as the development of preventative actions. The analysis of the scientific interest, considering the number of publications in the PubMed, reveals research trends in the field and demonstrates the importance of the surgical procedures in the treatment of the prostate cancer. Moreover, this finding is

Prostate cancer, treatment modalities and complications: an evaluation of the scientific literature

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Santos-Filho, Sebastiao David; Fonseca, Adenilson de Souza da; Bernardo-Filho, Mario [Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (UERJ), RJ (Brazil). Inst. de Biologia Roberto Alcantara Gomes. Dept. de Biofisica e Biometria]. E-mail: santos-filho@uer.br; Missailids, Sotiris [The Open University, Milton Keynes (United Kingdom). Dept. of Chemistry and Analytical Sciences

2008-12-15

Prostate (PR) cancer (CA) is one of the most common malignant neoplasms in men all over the world. In general, if prostate cancer (PC) is detected early, treatment usually involves either surgical removal of the prostate or radiotherapy (RT). Hormone Therapy (HT) or chemotherapy (CH) is the preferred treatment for more advanced cases of PC or if CA spreads beyond the PT. A number of complications, such as urinary incontinence (IU) or erectile dysfunction (ED), can be associated with some modalities of treatment of the PC. The aim of this work is to evaluate, in PubMed, the number of publications related with prostate cancer and the main modalities of treatment, as well as some clinical complications. The searches were performed in PubMed (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi) in the period 1950 to 2008 using the words: CA, CA and PR or penis or testis, CA and PR and RT, CA and PR and surgery (SU), CA and PR and CH and, CA and PR and HT and CA and PR and RT and IU or ED, CA and PR and SU and IU or ED, CA and PR and CH and IU or ED and, CA and PR and HT and CH and IU or ED, and (V) PC and the same modalities of treatment. The data was obtained on July 20th, 2008. PC, as expected has been cited extensively and surgery has been identified as the most widely referenced modality of treatment. Furthermore, urinary incontinence and erectile dysfunction are important complications that have attracted significant scientific interest. In conclusion, these findings have shown the relevance of the PubMed to analyze quantitatively the publications in cancer and this information could be worthwhile in aiding the comprehension of some clinical aspects related with PC, as well as the development of preventative actions. The analysis of the scientific interest, considering the number of publications in the PubMed, reveals research trends in the field and demonstrates the importance of the surgical procedures in the treatment of the prostate cancer. Moreover, this finding is

A bibliometric study of scientific literature on the dietary therapies for epilepsy in Scopus.

Science.gov (United States)

Morandi, Gabriella; Guido, Davide; Tagliabue, Anna

2015-07-01

The aim of this study was to provide a descriptive overview of the impact and production of literature on dietary therapies for epilepsy and perform a citation analysis of the related research articles. We searched for 'ketogenic OR low-glycemic OR medium chain OR modified Atkins in TITLE AND epilep*' in Title/Abstract/Keyword in Scopus database. A total of 661 references were retrieved, 80% had been published after 2000s, 87% were published in English, and 39% of the publications were published in nine journals. The majority (76.3%) of research articles describe the clinical application of the dietary therapies regarding the classical ketogenic diet (80%), followed by the modified Atkins diet (11.5%), medium chain triglyceride diet (6.4%), and low glycemic index treatment (2.0%); the remaining are basic science studies on the mechanisms of action. The citation analysis revealed that the latter have the highest percentage variation in citation per publication across the years. Concerning the article cohorts, the greatest number of citations per publication was in 1998. The overview of the literature on the dietary therapy of epilepsy evidences a growing interest in the field with a striking prevalence of clinical over basic science studies. The most cited clinical studies have validated the efficacy of the dietary therapies; the few studies on the mechanisms of action received a great number of citations. Bibliometric analysis measuring the trends and the impact of the scientific literature would help researchers to a best knowledge of this specific topic.

Critical appraisal of scientific articles: part 1 of a series on evaluation of scientific publications.

Science.gov (United States)

du Prel, Jean-Baptist; Röhrig, Bernd; Blettner, Maria

2009-02-01

In the era of evidence-based medicine, one of the most important skills a physician needs is the ability to analyze scientific literature critically. This is necessary to keep medical knowledge up to date and to ensure optimal patient care. The aim of this paper is to present an accessible introduction into critical appraisal of scientific articles. Using a selection of international literature, the reader is introduced to the principles of critical reading of scientific articles in medicine. For the sake of conciseness, detailed description of statistical methods is omitted. Widely accepted principles for critically appraising scientific articles are outlined. Basic knowledge of study design, structuring of an article, the role of different sections, of statistical presentations as well as sources of error and limitation are presented. The reader does not require extensive methodological knowledge. As far as necessary for critical appraisal of scientific articles, differences in research areas like epidemiology, clinical, and basic research are outlined. Further useful references are presented. Basic methodological knowledge is required to select and interpret scientific articles correctly.

Text mining for literature review and knowledge discovery in cancer risk assessment and research.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Anna Korhonen

Full Text Available Research in biomedical text mining is starting to produce technology which can make information in biomedical literature more accessible for bio-scientists. One of the current challenges is to integrate and refine this technology to support real-life scientific tasks in biomedicine, and to evaluate its usefulness in the context of such tasks. We describe CRAB - a fully integrated text mining tool designed to support chemical health risk assessment. This task is complex and time-consuming, requiring a thorough review of existing scientific data on a particular chemical. Covering human, animal, cellular and other mechanistic data from various fields of biomedicine, this is highly varied and therefore difficult to harvest from literature databases via manual means. Our tool automates the process by extracting relevant scientific data in published literature and classifying it according to multiple qualitative dimensions. Developed in close collaboration with risk assessors, the tool allows navigating the classified dataset in various ways and sharing the data with other users. We present a direct and user-based evaluation which shows that the technology integrated in the tool is highly accurate, and report a number of case studies which demonstrate how the tool can be used to support scientific discovery in cancer risk assessment and research. Our work demonstrates the usefulness of a text mining pipeline in facilitating complex research tasks in biomedicine. We discuss further development and application of our technology to other types of chemical risk assessment in the future.

Availability, quality and relevance of toxicogenomics data for human health risk assessment: A scoping review of the literature on trihalomethanes.

Science.gov (United States)

Vachon, Julien; Pagé-Larivière, Florence; Sirard, Marc-André; Rodriguez, Manuel J; Levallois, Patrick; Campagna, Céline

2018-03-05

Human health risk assessment (HHRA) must be adapted to the challenges of the 21st century, and the use of toxicogenomics data in HHRA is among the changes that regulatory agencies worldwide are trying to implement. However, the use of toxicogenomics data in HHRA is still limited. The purpose of this study was to explore the availability, quality and relevance to HHRA of toxicogenomics publications as potential barriers to their use in HHRA. We conducted a scoping review of available toxicogenomics literature, using trihalomethanes as a case study. Four bibliographic databases (including the Comparative Toxicogenomics Database) were assessed. An evaluation table was developed to characterise quality and relevance of studies included on the basis of criteria proposed in the literature. Studies were selected and analysed by two independent reviewers. Only nine studies, published between 1997 and 2015, were included in the analysis. Based on the selected criteria, critical methodological details were often missing; in fact, only three out of nine studies were considered to be of adequate quality for HHRA. No studies met more than three (out of seven) criteria of relevance to HHRA (e.g. adequate number of doses and sample size, etc.). This first scoping review of toxicogenomics publications on trihalomethanes shows that low availability, quality and relevance to HHRA of toxicogenomics publications presents potential barriers to their use in HHRA. Improved reporting of methodological details and study design is needed in the future so that toxicogenomics studies can be appropriately assessed regarding their quality and value for HHRA.

Nutritional support for chronic myelogenous and other leukemias: a review of the scientific literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Steriti, Ronald

2002-10-01

Chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) is a slowly progressive disease characterized by the overproduction of granulocytes (neutrophils, eosinophils, and basophils). A blood smear shows moderate elevations in white blood cell counts that may persist for years and be benign. Platelets are increased in number, although their function is impaired, resulting in symptoms of easy bleeding (purpura, swollen gums). Conventional medical treatment is a marrow transplant and alkylating agents, which are usually prescribed only during crisis. Several nutrients and botanicals have been studied for use in CML, including vitamin A and all-trans retinoic acid (Retin-A), vitamin D3, vitamin E, vitamin B12, indirubin (found in herbs including Indigofera tinctoria and Isatis tinctoria), and Curcuma longa. This article briefly reviews the scientific literature on the therapeutic use of these nutrients for CML.

Tooth preparations for complete crowns: an art form based on scientific principles.

Science.gov (United States)

Goodacre, C J; Campagni, W V; Aquilino, S A

2001-04-01

No recent literature has reviewed the current scientific knowledge on complete coverage tooth preparations. This article traces the historic evolution of complete coverage tooth preparations and identifies guidelines for scientific tooth preparations. Literature covering 250 years of clinical practice was reviewed with emphasis on scientific data acquired during the last 50 years. Both a MEDLINE search and an extensive manual search were used to locate relevant articles written in English in the last 50 years. Teeth should be prepared so that they exhibit the following characteristics: 10 to 20 degrees of total occlusal convergence, a minimal occlusocervical dimension of 4 mm for molars and 3 mm for other teeth, and an occlusocervical-to-faciolingual dimension ratio of 0.4 or greater. Facioproximal and linguoproximal line angles should be preserved whenever possible. When the above features are missing, the teeth should be modified with auxiliary resistance features such as axial grooves or boxes, preferably on proximal surfaces. Finish line selection should be based on the type of crown/retainer, esthetic requirements, ease of formation, and personal experience. Expectations of enhanced marginal fit with certain finish lines could not be validated by recent research. Esthetic requirements and tooth conditions determine finish line locations relative to the gingiva, with a supragingival location being more acceptable. Line angles should be rounded, and a reasonable degree of surface smoothness is desired. Nine scientific principles have been developed that ensure mechanical, biologic, and esthetic success for tooth preparation of complete coverage restorations.

Making Deferred Taxes Relevant

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Brouwer, Arjan; Naarding, Ewout

2018-01-01

We analyse the conceptual problems in current accounting for deferred taxes and provide solutions derived from the literature in order to make International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) deferred tax numbers value-relevant. In our view, the empirical results concerning the value relevance of

A Guideline for Game Development-Based Learning: A Literature Review

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Bian Wu

2012-01-01

Full Text Available This study aims at reviewing the published scientific literature on the topics of a game development-based learning (GDBL method using game development frameworks (GDFs with the perspective of (a summarizing a guideline for using GDBL in a curriculum, (b identifying relevant features of GDFs, and (c presenting a synthesis of impact factors with empirical evidence on the educational effectiveness of the GDBL method. After systematically going through the available literature on the topic, 34 relevant articles were selected for the final study. We analyzed the articles from three perspectives: (1 pedagogical context and teaching process, (2 selection of GDFs, and (3 evaluation of the GDBL method. The findings from the 34 articles suggest that GDFs have many potential benefits as an aid to teach computer science, software engineering, art design, and other fields and that such GDFs combined with the motivation from games can improve the students’ knowledge, skills, attitudes, and behaviors in contrast to the traditional classroom teaching. Furthermore, based on the results of the literature review, we extract a guideline of how to apply the GDBL method in education. The empirical evidence of current findings gives a positive overall picture and can provide a useful reference to educators, practitioners, and researchers in the area of game-based learning.

Medical and scientific writing: Time to go lean and mean

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Payal Bhardwaj

2017-01-01

Full Text Available The Lean Six Sigma methodology for process improvements and driving efficiency is old, but lean writing was adopted late by the pharmaceutical world in terms of size of the documents. The documents were lean earlier, and then became voluminous, and now we are about to complete a full circle in this regard, i.e., coming back to the lean documents again using e-formats and hyperlinking. Furthermore, writing has become more and more precise over time. The need for this lean and mean medical and scientific writing arose from voluminous research globally, both industry and academia which are abuzz with skyrocketing regulatory and scientific submission volumes. The quantum of literature is so much that reviewers or information seekers firmly believe that going through even selected and relevant literature has become highly challenging. Considering this, there has been much insistence on downsizing the medical writing documents, which could be tempting enough to be leveraged for scientific publications as well. Here, we present the need for lean and mean medical writing, discuss this concept in relation to the pharmaceutical industry, and how to apply this to key documents. Furthermore, presented is the proposed algorithm for lean and mean clinical study reports and manuscripts. These thoughts are aligned to the recently established concept of data transparency, and can be easily achieved by web links between the protocols and clinical trial results disclosed publicly, and the corresponding manuscripts.

What would a 'scientifically engaged Australia' look like?

Science.gov (United States)

Donald, Tegan N.

In 2010 the Australian Federal Government released the landmark report Inspiring Australia which described the first national strategy for engagement with the sciences, and aimed to create a ‘scientifically engaged Australia’. This study investigates what might be meant by a ‘scientifically engaged Australia’ by creating a snapshot picture of the current Australian science communication landscape: its priorities, its limitations and its key players’ envisioned recommendations for future activity. It draws on several sources of data to create this picture: academic and practitioner literature regarding the emerging concept of ‘public engagement’; literature and case studies that discuss the appropriate place for deficit model and one-way approaches to science communication; the Inspiring Australia report itself and other government policy documents; and a series of interviews with top level public figures in Australian science policy and advocacy. A central finding of this study is the absence of a universal and unambiguous definition of public engagement. In addition, in contrast to trends within much of the scholarly literature, the study highlights the persistence of one-way methods and to a lesser degree the deficit model in practice. The ongoing use and relevance of one-way communication is evident; it remains a popular, albeit often default, choice in practice and is seen as ideal for the communication of fixed messages. Science communication in Australia remains, for the foreseeable future, dominated by one-way methods, in particular in the use of traditional and social media. In this respect, a scientifically engaged Australia would seem to be one in which a great deal of one-way communication takes place, supplemented by small moves towards dialogical or participatory communication. Finally, this study highlights two dominant motivations behind the call for a ‘scientifically engaged Australia’. Much high level discourse on this topic is

Role of ghrelin in drug abuse and reward-relevant behaviors: a burgeoning field and gaps in the literature.

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Revitsky, A R; Klein, L C

2013-09-01

Ghrelin is a gut-brain hormone that regulates energy balance through food consumption. While ghrelin is well known for its role in hypothalamic activation and homeostatic feeding, more recent evidence suggests that ghrelin also is involved in hedonic feeding through the dopaminergic reward pathway. This paper investigated how ghrelin administration (intraperitoneal, intracerebroventricular, or directly into dopaminergic reward-relevant brain regions) activates the dopaminergic reward pathway and associated reward-relevant behavioral responses in rodents. A total of 19 empirical publications that examined one or more of these variables were included in this review. Overall, ghrelin administration increases dopamine levels in the nucleus accumbens, as well as reward-relevant behaviors such as food (both standard chow and palatable foods) and alcohol consumption. Ghrelin administration also increases operant responding for sucrose, and conditioned place preference. Following a review of the small body of literature examining the effects of ghrelin administration on the dopamine reward pathway, we present a model of the relationship between ghrelin and dopaminergic reward activation. Specifically, ghrelin acts on ghrelin receptors (GHS-R1A) in the ventral tegmental area (VTA) and lateral dorsal tegmental nucleus (LDTg) to stimulate the mesolimbic dopamine reward pathway, which results in increased rewarding behaviors in rodents. Results from this review suggest that selective antagonism of the ghrelin system may serve as potential treatment for addictive drug use. This review highlights gaps in the literature, including a lack of examination of sex- or age-related differences in the effects of ghrelin on dopamine reward processes. In light of vulnerability to drug abuse among female and adolescent populations, future studies should target these individual difference factors.

A survey and critical review of the literature on indoor air quality, ventilation and health symptoms in schools

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Daisey, J.M. [Lawrence Berkeley National Lab., CA (United States). Energy and Environment Div.; Angell, W.J. [Univ. of Minnesota, St. Paul, MN (United States)

1998-03-01

A survey and critical review were undertaken of existing published literature and reports on indoor air quality (IAQ), ventilation, and IAQ- and building-related health problems in schools, including California schools. Over 450 relevant publications were obtained and reviewed, including papers published in the archival peer-reviewed scientific literature, proceedings of scientific meetings, government reports, 77 NIOSH Health Hazard Evaluation Reports (HHER) and 70 reports on investigations of problem schools in California. Most of the reviewed literature was for complaint or problem schools. The types of health symptoms reported in schools were very similar to those defined as sick building syndrome (SBS) symptoms, although this may be due, at least in part, to the type of health symptom questionnaires used. Some of the symptoms, e.g., wheezing, are indicative of asthma. In the studies in which complaint and noncomplaint buildings or areas were compared, complaint buildings generally had higher rates of health symptoms.

What's New in the Medicine Cabinet?: A Panoramic Review of Clinically Relevant Information for the Busy Dermatologist.

Science.gov (United States)

Del Rosso, James Q; Zeichner, Joshua

2014-01-01

This article is the first in a periodic series of therapeutic topics with short reviews gleaned from major dermatology meetings, especially Scientific Poster Sessions, and is designed to provide information that may assist the readers in adapting information from the literature to their clinical practice. The topics covered in this issue are discussions of the clinical relevance of newer information about acne pathophysiology, acne in adult women, and topical corticosteroid spray formulations for chronic plaque psoriasis.

Scientific Progress in Strategic Management

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Foss, Nicolai Juul

Does the RBV represent a case of scientific progress? And has it emerged as the dominant approach to the analysis of competitive advantage for this reason? Conventional criteria for scientific progress, notably those of the growth of knowledge literature, are not particularly helpful for understa...

A practical application of text mining to literature on cognitive rehabilitation and enhancement through neurostimulation.

Science.gov (United States)

Balan, Puiu F; Gerits, Annelies; Vanduffel, Wim

2014-01-01

The exponential growth in publications represents a major challenge for researchers. Many scientific domains, including neuroscience, are not yet fully engaged in exploiting large bodies of publications. In this paper, we promote the idea to partially automate the processing of scientific documents, specifically using text mining (TM), to efficiently review big corpora of publications. The "cognitive advantage" given by TM is mainly related to the automatic extraction of relevant trends from corpora of literature, otherwise impossible to analyze in short periods of time. Specifically, the benefits of TM are increased speed, quality and reproducibility of text processing, boosted by rapid updates of the results. First, we selected a set of TM-tools that allow user-friendly approaches of the scientific literature, and which could serve as a guide for researchers willing to incorporate TM in their work. Second, we used these TM-tools to obtain basic insights into the relevant literature on cognitive rehabilitation (CR) and cognitive enhancement (CE) using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS). TM readily extracted the diversity of TMS applications in CR and CE from vast corpora of publications, automatically retrieving trends already described in published reviews. TMS emerged as one of the important non-invasive tools that can both improve cognitive and motor functions in numerous neurological diseases and induce modulations/enhancements of many fundamental brain functions. TM also revealed trends in big corpora of publications by extracting occurrence frequency and relationships of particular subtopics. Moreover, we showed that CR and CE share research topics, both aiming to increase the brain's capacity to process information, thus supporting their integration in a larger perspective. Methodologically, despite limitations of a simple user-friendly approach, TM served well the reviewing process.

A practical application of text mining to literature on cognitive rehabilitation and enhancement through neurostimulation

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Puiu F Balan

2014-09-01

Full Text Available The exponential growth in publications represents a major challenge for researchers. Many scientific domains, including neuroscience, are not yet fully engaged in exploiting large bodies of publications. In this paper, we promote the idea to partially automate the processing of scientific documents, specifically using text mining (TM, to efficiently review big corpora of publications. The cognitive advantage given by TM is mainly related to the automatic extraction of relevant trends from corpora of literature, otherwise impossible to analyze in short periods of time. Specifically, the benefits of TM are increased speed, quality and reproducibility of text processing, boosted by rapid updates of the results. First, we selected a set of TM-tools that allow user-friendly approaches of the scientific literature, and which could serve as a guide for researchers willing to incorporate TM in their work. Second, we used these TM-tools to obtain basic insights into the relevant literature on cognitive rehabilitation (CR and cognitive enhancement (CE using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS. TM readily extracted the diversity of TMS applications in CR and CE from vast corpora of publications, automatically retrieving trends already described in published reviews. TMS emerged as one of the important non-invasive tools that can both improve cognitive and motor functions in numerous neurological diseases and induce modulations/enhancements of many fundamental brain functions. TM also revealed trends in big corpora of publications by extracting occurrence frequency and relationships of particular subtopics. Moreover, we showed that CR and CE share research topics, both aiming to increase the brain’s capacity to process information, thus supporting their integration in a larger perspective. Methodologically, despite limitations of a simple user-friendly approach, TM served well the reviewing process.

EDUCATION FOR LEAN & LEAN FOR EDUCATION: A LITERATURE REVIEW

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Saveta Vukadinovic

2017-03-01

Full Text Available The purpose of this paper is to investigate and understand how tools and principles of Lean philosophy can be adopted to improve the effectiveness of engineering education by providing services beyond the competition and costs below the competition, and how engineering education can provide better prepared engineering professionals capable to work in dynamic Lean environments by developing multidisciplinary knowledge and skills. Paper will be based on analysis of relevant scientific and professional literature sources, including certain elements of description, classification, explanation and prediction. The authors will use detailed literature review to explain complex relationship and interdependence between Lean philosophy and engineering education and answer the question what benefits modern Lean enterprises may expect from properly educated and qualified engineers and how application of Lean tools and principles can improve the system of engineering education.

pGenN, a Gene Normalization Tool for Plant Genes and Proteins in Scientific Literature

Science.gov (United States)

Ding, Ruoyao; Arighi, Cecilia N.; Lee, Jung-Youn; Wu, Cathy H.; Vijay-Shanker, K.

2015-01-01

Background Automatically detecting gene/protein names in the literature and connecting them to databases records, also known as gene normalization, provides a means to structure the information buried in free-text literature. Gene normalization is critical for improving the coverage of annotation in the databases, and is an essential component of many text mining systems and database curation pipelines. Methods In this manuscript, we describe a gene normalization system specifically tailored for plant species, called pGenN (pivot-based Gene Normalization). The system consists of three steps: dictionary-based gene mention detection, species assignment, and intra species normalization. We have developed new heuristics to improve each of these phases. Results We evaluated the performance of pGenN on an in-house expertly annotated corpus consisting of 104 plant relevant abstracts. Our system achieved an F-value of 88.9% (Precision 90.9% and Recall 87.2%) on this corpus, outperforming state-of-art systems presented in BioCreative III. We have processed over 440,000 plant-related Medline abstracts using pGenN. The gene normalization results are stored in a local database for direct query from the pGenN web interface (proteininformationresource.org/pgenn/). The annotated literature corpus is also publicly available through the PIR text mining portal (proteininformationresource.org/iprolink/). PMID:26258475

A study on literature obsolescence and core journals' cost-benefit in citations of the 'Scientific Medical Journal of Ahwaz'.

Science.gov (United States)

Zare-Farashbandi, Firoozeh; Mohammadi, Parastoo Parsaei

2014-01-01

One of the methods of identifying core and popular resources is by citation evaluation. Using citation evaluation, the librarians of the Acquisition Department can use quantitative methods to indentify core and popular resources among numerous information resources and make serious savings in the library's budget, by acquiring these core resources and eliminating useless ones. The aim of this study is assessing literature obsolescence and core journals' cost-benefit in citations of the 'Scientific Medical Journal of Ahwaz'. This study is a descriptive and cross-sectional survey that uses citation analysis. Sampling is objective sampling from all documents from years 1364 (1985) to 1385 (2006), and the population comprises of 6342 citations of the articles published in 'Scientific Medical Journal of Ahwaz'. Data collection is done through referring to the original documents and the data is analyzed using the Excel software, and for descriptive and analytical statistics the cost-benefit formula and Bradford law formula are used. Findings showed that the average citation for each document in the 'Scientific Medical Journal of Ahwaz' was 15.81. The average citation to international sources was 14.37, and the average citation to national sources was 1.44. The literature obsolescence of Farsi documents in this study was 15 years, while it was equal to 20 years for English documents. The highly cited Farsi journals were (sorted based on citation in descending order): 'Scientific Medical Journal of Ahwaz', 'Daroudarman', 'Nabz,' and 'Journal of Medical School, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences'. The highly cited English journals were (sorted based on citation in descending order): 'Pediatrics', 'The New England Journal of Medicine', 'Gastroenterology' and 'Medicine'. All of these four journals are part of the ISI database and have good impact factors in the Journal Citation Reports (JCR). Also their cost-benefit was reasonable based on the frequency of their

Text-based plagiarism in scientific publishing: issues, developments and education.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Yongyan

2013-09-01

Text-based plagiarism, or copying language from sources, has recently become an issue of growing concern in scientific publishing. Use of CrossCheck (a computational text-matching tool) by journals has sometimes exposed an unexpected amount of textual similarity between submissions and databases of scholarly literature. In this paper I provide an overview of the relevant literature, to examine how journal gatekeepers perceive textual appropriation, and how automated plagiarism-screening tools have been developed to detect text matching, with the technique now available for self-check of manuscripts before submission; I also discuss issues around English as an additional language (EAL) authors and in particular EAL novices being the typical offenders of textual borrowing. The final section of the paper proposes a few educational directions to take in tackling text-based plagiarism, highlighting the roles of the publishing industry, senior authors and English for academic purposes professionals.

The Uncertain of Scientific Process

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jovina dÁvila Bordoni

2016-10-01

Full Text Available The study assesses the existence of certainty in the scientific process, it seeks the truth, however, faced with the unknown, causes uncertainties and doubts. We used the bibliographical research, in which it systematized the scientific literature on epistemology and knowledge related to the scientific process and the uncertainties that surround him. The scientific process, though continuously seeks the truth, will not attain perfection, because the researcher deals with the unknown. The science seeks constantly new knowledge and progress with the criticism of the mistakes, seeks the truth, however these are provisional. It is concluded that all scientific knowledge is uncertain.

Critical appraisal of published literature

Science.gov (United States)

Umesh, Goneppanavar; Karippacheril, John George; Magazine, Rahul

2016-01-01

With a large output of medical literature coming out every year, it is impossible for readers to read every article. Critical appraisal of scientific literature is an important skill to be mastered not only by academic medical professionals but also by those involved in clinical practice. Before incorporating changes into the management of their patients, a thorough evaluation of the current or published literature is an important step in clinical practice. It is necessary for assessing the published literature for its scientific validity and generalizability to the specific patient community and reader's work environment. Simple steps have been provided by Consolidated Standard for Reporting Trial statements, Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network and several other resources which if implemented may help the reader to avoid reading flawed literature and prevent the incorporation of biased or untrustworthy information into our practice. PMID:27729695

Critical appraisal of published literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Goneppanavar Umesh

2016-01-01

Full Text Available With a large output of medical literature coming out every year, it is impossible for readers to read every article. Critical appraisal of scientific literature is an important skill to be mastered not only by academic medical professionals but also by those involved in clinical practice. Before incorporating changes into the management of their patients, a thorough evaluation of the current or published literature is an important step in clinical practice. It is necessary for assessing the published literature for its scientific validity and generalizability to the specific patient community and reader′s work environment. Simple steps have been provided by Consolidated Standard for Reporting Trial statements, Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network and several other resources which if implemented may help the reader to avoid reading flawed literature and prevent the incorporation of biased or untrustworthy information into our practice.

Preventing statistical errors in scientific journals.

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Nuijten, M.B.

2016-01-01

There is evidence for a high prevalence of statistical reporting errors in psychology and other scientific fields. These errors display a systematic preference for statistically significant results, distorting the scientific literature. There are several possible causes for this systematic error

Trends in Scientific Literature on Addiction to the Internet, Video Games, and Cell Phones from 2006 to 2010.

Science.gov (United States)

Carbonell, Xavier; Guardiola, Elena; Fuster, Héctor; Gil, Frederic; Panova, Tayana

2016-01-01

The goals of the present work were to retrieve the scientific articles published on addiction to the Internet, video games, and cell phones and to analyze the pattern of publications in this area (who is doing the research, when and where it is taking place, and in which journals it is being published), to determine the research being conducted as well as to document geographical trends in publication over time in three types of technological addictions: Internet, cell phones, and video games. Articles indexed in PubMed and PsycINFO between 2006 and 2010 related to the pathological use of Internet, cell phones, and video games were retrieved. Search results were reviewed to eliminate articles that were not relevant or were duplicates. Three hundred and thirty valid articles were retrieved from PubMed and PsycINFO from 2006 to 2010. Results were compared with those of 1996-2005. The year with the highest number of articles published was 2008 (n = 96). The most productive countries, in terms of number of articles published, were China (n = 67), the United States (n = 56), the United Kingdom (n = 47), and Taiwan (n = 33). The most commonly used language was English (70.3%), followed by Chinese (15.4%). Articles were published in 153 different journals. The journal that published the most articles was Cyberpsychology and Behavior (n = 73), followed by Chinese Journal of Clinical Psychology (n = 27) and International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction (n = 16). Internet was the area most frequently studied, with an increasing interest in other areas such as online video games and cell phones. The number of publications on technological addictions reached a peak in 2008. The scientific contributions of China, Taiwan, and Korea are overrepresented compared to other scientific fields such as drug addiction. The inclusion of Internet Gaming Disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5(th) Edition could change the publication trends in the

Keywords Review of IT Security Literature in Recent 20 Years

OpenAIRE

WANG Lidong; LIN Yan; QIAN Liping

2012-01-01

The volume of published scientific literature available on Internet has been increasing exponentially. Some of them reflect the latest achievement of the specific research domain. In recent years, many projects have been funded aiming to online scientific literature mining, especially in biomedical research. Scientific literature covers most of the hot topics in the research field and has a very large domain-specific vocabulary. The exploitation of domain knowledge and specialized vocabulary ...

[Bibliometric analysis of scientific articles on evidence-based nursing of burn in the mainland of China].

Science.gov (United States)

Yue, L Q; Pi, X Q; Fan, X G

2016-07-20

To analyze the current research status of evidence-based nursing of burn in the mainland of China, in order to provide basis for the improvement of scientificity of burn nursing practice. Chinese scientific articles on evidence-based nursing of burn in the mainland of China published from January 1997 to December 2015 were retrieved from Chinese Biology Medicine disc, Chinese Journals Full-text Database, Wanfang Database, and VIP Database. From the results retrieved, date with regard to publication year, region of affiliation of the first author, journal distribution, literature type, literature quality assessment, topic of evidence-based research, fund program support, implementation of evidence-based practice steps, and language and quantity of reference. Data were processed with Microsoft Excel software. A total of 50 articles conforming to the criteria were retrieved. (1) Articles about evidence-based nursing of burn arose in 2004. Compared with that in the previous year, there was no obvious increase in the number of relevant articles in each year from 2004 to 2011. The number of literature in 2012 was obviously increased than that in each year from 2004 to 2011, while the number of literature in each year from 2012 to 2015 was not obviously increased compared with that in the previous year. (2) The regions of affiliation of the first author were distributed in 13 provinces, 3 minority autonomous regions, and 3 municipalities, with the largest distribution in East China, and Northwest China and Southwest China in the follow. (3) The articles were published in 32 domestic journals, with 9 (28.12%) nursing journals, 5 (15.62%) burn medical related journals, and 18 (56.25%) other journals. Twenty (40%) articles were published in Source Journal for Chinese Scientific and Technical Papers. (4) Regarding the literature type, 31 (62%) articles dealt with clinical experiences, 17 (34%) articles dealt with scientific research, and 2 (4%) articles dealt with case report

Incidence and etiology of lumbar spondylolysis: review of the literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Sakai, Toshinori; Sairyo, Koichi; Suzue, Naoto; Kosaka, Hirofumi; Yasui, Natsuo

2010-05-01

Lumbar spondylolysis is a defect of the pars interarticularis known to occur as a stress fracture. Its incidence varies considerably depending on ethnicity, sex, and sports activity. However, there are few literature reviews describing its incidence in different ethnic groups or in people who engage in different sports. We reviewed the most relevant articles on spondylolysis published in scientific journals. First, we focused on its incidence in various ethnic groups distributed by sex, the familial occurrence, and in patients with relevant diseases. Second, we focused on the incidence of spondylolysis in relation to the sports practiced by the patients. Although placing special emphasis on the incidence of lumbar spondylolysis in the general population in Japan, we also reviewed the Japanese and English literature to investigate its incidence among those who engage in different sports. The incidence of lumbar spondylolysis in the general Japanese population was 5.9%. Most studies report that the incidence in higher in male subjects than in female subjects. We found that Japanese rugby and judo players were prone to suffer lumbar spondylolysis, at an incidence of about 20%. However, the incidence for Japanese professional soccer and baseball players was much higher, at 30%, which was more than five times the incidence in the general Japanese population. The incidence of lumbar spondylolysis varies depending on ethnicity, sex, family history, relevant disease, and sports activity.

Knowledge as Public Property : The Societal Relevance of Scientific Research

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Bouter, Lex M

2008-01-01

Universities are funded by public means to a large extend. It’s reasonable to expect that society benefits from the results. For scientific research this means that it should at least have a potential societal impact. Universities and individual investigators must explicitly consider the societal

Evaluation of forestry strategies for climate change mitigation in continental France. Scientific literature and main actors' positioning review

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Buitrago Esquinas, Miriam

2012-01-01

This work contributes to the current scientific debate regarding the optimization of the forest sector's contribution to mitigating climate change. A scientific literature review has pointed out some uncertainties on the contribution to emission reduction objectives in the short to medium-term of an increasing harvest of forest resources for wood construction and energy generation. Timing of mitigation benefits for a managed forest depends on forestry upstream characteristics(forest and soil type and silviculture method) and downstream characteristics (transport distance, use of wood, efficiency of wood based energy production, fossil-fuel based reference system that is substituted,etc). A survey conducted among national forest experts points out debates concerning optimal silviculture practices to mitigating climate change. These discussions are due to the trades-off between sequestering carbon in forest ecosystems and climatic benefits obtained by sustainable forest harvesting and use of wood products to displace fossil emissions. (author) [fr

Literature database aid

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Wanderer, J.A.

1991-01-01

The booklet is to help with the acquisition of original literature either after a conventional literature search or in particular after a database search. It bridges the gap between abbreviated (short) and original (long) titel. This, together with information on the holdings of technical/scientific libraries, facilitates document delivery. 1500 short titles are listed alphabetically. (orig.) [de

Ways of Presenting Love in Ancient Sanskrit Literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Fabrizia Baldissera

2017-05-01

Full Text Available This study traces the appearance and relevance of love motifs in Sanskrit texts. It deals with preclassical, classical and medieval literature, with excerpts from the Vedic scriptures, the epics, the normative texts and the courtly formalized Kāvya. Attention is paid to the change in the status of women, whose position becomes gradually more subordinate over time. Several conventional topoi of Sanskrit erotic literature are examined, such as love enjoyed in the union of the lovers, or suffered in their separation; divine love; the traditional belief that women are more passionate than men; the different religious/philosophical schools' outlook towards love; love in the dramatic theory of aesthetic experience; the importance of marriage, and marital love as opposed or complementary to illicit love. Finally there is a brief survey of a few scientific disciplines that have something to say about the experience of love, like Āyurveda, astronomy/astrology, and the treatises on Dharma and those on the science of government.

Fostering Scientific and Numerate Practices in Journalism to Support Rapid Public Learning

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Louise Yarnall

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Journalism has the potential––and arguably the mandate––to expand public understanding of societally important phenomena. However, some methods for more effectively educating the public have been persistently underutilized: in particular, embedding informative numerical rates and efficient scientific explanations in news reports. In the current era of disrupting and downsizing the news business, the challenges to using such methods have only increased. To address this problem, this article seeks to (a raise awareness about the psychological reasons that help explain why it is crucial to use such elements in news reports, and (b exhibit some methods for doing so that require modest effort. Building on a review of relevant psychological literatures, principles, and existing reporting methods, we describe findings from a series of cognitive-scientific studies that demonstrate how using key––and relatively minimal––scientific and numerical elements can enhance public learning from news reports. We conclude by also describing curricula and resources designed to help journalists and bloggers use these methods.

Motivating Scientific Research and Development: | Ononogbu | Bio ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Scientific research is an important aspect of the function of a university lecturer. It is how he/she carries out this function that determines his/her relevance in the university system and indeed in the scientific community as a whole. Scientific research or investigation may be divided into four sections: mental exercise, ...

Hearing difficulties, ear-related diagnoses and sickness absence or disability pension--a systematic literature review.

Science.gov (United States)

Friberg, Emilie; Gustafsson, Klas; Alexanderson, Kristina

2012-09-12

Hearing difficulties is a large public health problem, prognosticated to be the ninth leading burden of disease in 2030, and may also involve large consequences for work capacity. However, research regarding sickness absence and disability pension in relation to hearing difficulties is scarce. The aim was to gain knowledge about hearing difficulties or other ear-related diagnoses and sickness absence and disability pension through conducting a systematic literature review of published studies. Studies presenting empirical data on hearing difficulties or ear-related diagnoses and sick leave or disability pension, published in scientific peer-reviewed journals, were included. Studies were sought for in three ways: in literature databases (Pub-Med, Embase, PsycInfo, SSCI, and Cochrane) through March 2011, through scrutinising lists of references, and through contacts. Identified publications were assessed for relevance and data was extracted from the studies deemed relevant. A total of 18 studies were assessed as relevant and included in this review, regardless of scientific quality. Fourteen studies presented empirical data on hearing difficulties/ear diagnoses and sick leave and six on these conditions and disability pension. Only two studies presented rate ratios or odds ratios regarding associations between hearing difficulties and sick leave, and only two on hearing difficulties and risk of disability pension. Both measures of hearing difficulties and of sick leave varied considerable between the studies. Remarkably few studies on hearing difficulties in relation to sickness absence or disability pension were identified. The results presented in them cannot provide evidence for direction or magnitude of potential associations.

EFSA Panel on Biological Hazards (BIOHAZ); Scientific Opinion on Scientific Opinion on risk based control of biogenic amine formation in fermented foods

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hald, Tine

A qualitative risk assessment of biogenic amines (BA) in fermented foods was conducted, using data from the scientific literature, as well as from European Union-related surveys, reports and consumption data. Histamine and tyramine are considered as the most toxic and food safety relevant...... chromatography (HPLC)-based methods enable simultaneous and high sensitivity quantification of all BA in foods, hence are best suited for monitoring and control purposes. Monitoring of BA concentrations in fermented foods during the production process and along the food chain would be beneficial for controls...... and further knowledge. Further research on BA in fermented foods is needed; particularly on toxicity and associated concentrations, production process-based control measures, further process hygiene and/or food safety criteria development, and validation of analysis methods....

Analysis of the production of scientific literature in clinical research areas in Physiotherapy between 2005 and 2009

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Torres-Narváez Martha

2012-04-01

Full Text Available Objective: characterize the behavior of clinical research in Physiotherapy, through the analysis of theproduction of scientific literature in a period of five years in order to identify areas of concentrationand dispersion, collaborative research and types of clinical studies have conducted. Methods andmaterials: descriptive study on the papers in Medline/PubMed from 2005-2009. Were considereda total 404 publications, clinical trials and epidemiological studies side, analyzed according to thepercentage distribution of articles by clinical area, year of publication, and institutional affiliation ofresearchers. Results: It found a greater number of trials (93% systematic reviews represented thegreatest number of epidemiological studies side. The clinical areas pulmonary and cardiovascularaccount for 65% of scientific publications in the studies analyzed. The year with highest numberof publications was 2008. Half of the clinical research produced in this five-year have affiliationwith academic institutions, and secondly, studies conducted in hospitals. Conclusions: the clinicalresearch publications in Physiotherapy in Medline/PubMed registered show sustained activity ofscientific production in the pulmonary and cardiovascular areas, consistent with the major healthconcerns in the world. The findings suggest that the ability of physiotherapists to develop qualityresearch, use and transfer of results into clinical practice should achieve greater development.

Applying a text mining framework to the extraction of numerical parameters from scientific literature in the biotechnology domain

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

André SANTOS

2012-07-01

Full Text Available Scientific publications are the main vehicle to disseminate information in the field of biotechnology for wastewater treatment. Indeed, the new research paradigms and the application of high-throughput technologies have increased the rate of publication considerably. The problem is that manual curation becomes harder, prone-to-errors and time-consuming, leading to a probable loss of information and inefficient knowledge acquisition. As a result, research outputs are hardly reaching engineers, hampering the calibration of mathematical models used to optimize the stability and performance of biotechnological systems. In this context, we have developed a data curation workflow, based on text mining techniques, to extract numerical parameters from scientific literature, and applied it to the biotechnology domain. A workflow was built to process wastewater-related articles with the main goal of identifying physico-chemical parameters mentioned in the text. This work describes the implementation of the workflow, identifies achievements and current limitations in the overall process, and presents the results obtained for a corpus of 50 full-text documents.

Applying a text mining framework to the extraction of numerical parameters from scientific literature in the biotechnology domain

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Anália LOURENÇO

2013-07-01

Full Text Available Scientific publications are the main vehicle to disseminate information in the field of biotechnology for wastewater treatment. Indeed, the new research paradigms and the application of high-throughput technologies have increased the rate of publication considerably. The problem is that manual curation becomes harder, prone-to-errors and time-consuming, leading to a probable loss of information and inefficient knowledge acquisition. As a result, research outputs are hardly reaching engineers, hampering the calibration of mathematical models used to optimize the stability and performance of biotechnological systems. In this context, we have developed a data curation workflow, based on text mining techniques, to extract numerical parameters from scientific literature, and applied it to the biotechnology domain. A workflow was built to process wastewater-related articles with the main goal of identifying physico-chemical parameters mentioned in the text. This work describes the implementation of the workflow, identifies achievements and current limitations in the overall process, and presents the results obtained for a corpus of 50 full-text documents.

Assessing Hospital Physicians' Acceptance of Clinical Information Systems: A Review of the Relevant Literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Bram Pynoo

2013-06-01

Full Text Available In view of the tremendous potential benefits of clinical information systems (CIS for the quality of patient care; it is hard to understand why not every CIS is embraced by its targeted users, the physicians. The aim of this study is to propose a framework for assessing hospital physicians' CIS-acceptance that can serve as a guidance for future research into this area. Hereto, a review of the relevant literature was performed in the ISI Web-of-Science database. Eleven studies were withheld from an initial dataset of 797 articles. Results show that just as in business settings, there are four core groups of variables that influence physicians' acceptance of a CIS: its usefulness and ease of use, social norms, and factors in the working environment that facilitate use of the CIS (such as providing computers/workstations, compatibility between the new and existing system.... We also identified some additional variables as predictors of CIS-acceptance.

The Limits to Relevance

Science.gov (United States)

Averill, M.; Briggle, A.

2006-12-01

Science policy and knowledge production lately have taken a pragmatic turn. Funding agencies increasingly are requiring scientists to explain the relevance of their work to society. This stems in part from mounting critiques of the "linear model" of knowledge production in which scientists operating according to their own interests or disciplinary standards are presumed to automatically produce knowledge that is of relevance outside of their narrow communities. Many contend that funded scientific research should be linked more directly to societal goals, which implies a shift in the kind of research that will be funded. While both authors support the concept of useful science, we question the exact meaning of "relevance" and the wisdom of allowing it to control research agendas. We hope to contribute to the conversation by thinking more critically about the meaning and limits of the term "relevance" and the trade-offs implicit in a narrow utilitarian approach. The paper will consider which interests tend to be privileged by an emphasis on relevance and address issues such as whose goals ought to be pursued and why, and who gets to decide. We will consider how relevance, narrowly construed, may actually limit the ultimate utility of scientific research. The paper also will reflect on the worthiness of research goals themselves and their relationship to a broader view of what it means to be human and to live in society. Just as there is more to being human than the pragmatic demands of daily life, there is more at issue with knowledge production than finding the most efficient ways to satisfy consumer preferences or fix near-term policy problems. We will conclude by calling for a balanced approach to funding research that addresses society's most pressing needs but also supports innovative research with less immediately apparent application.

[Reading behavior and preferences regarding subscriptions to scientific journals : Results of a survey of members of the German Society for General and Visceral Surgery].

Science.gov (United States)

Ronellenfitsch, U; Klinger, C; Buhr, H J; Post, S

2015-11-01

The purpose of surgical literature is to publish the latest study results and to provide continuing medical education to readers. For optimal allocation of resources, institutional subscribers, professional societies and scientific publishers require structured data on reading and subscription preferences of potential readers of surgical literature. To obtain representative data on the preferences of German general and visceral surgeons regarding reading of and subscription to scientific journals. All members of the German Society for General and Visceral Surgery (DGAV) were invited to participate in a web-based survey. Questions were asked on the affiliation and position of the member, individual journal subscriptions, institutional access to scientific journals, preferences regarding electronic or print articles and special subscriptions for society members. Answers were descriptively analyzed. A total of 630 out of 4091 (15 %) members participated in the survey and 73 % of the respondents had at least 1 individual subscription to a scientific journal. The most frequently subscribed journal was Der Chirurg (47 % of respondents). The institutional access to journals was deemed insufficient by 48 % of respondents, predominantly in primary care hospitals and outpatient clinics. Almost half of the respondents gave sufficient importance to reading printed versions of articles for which they would pay extra fees. A group subscription for society members was perceived as advantageous as long as no relevant extra costs were incurred. This structured survey among members of the DGAV provides data on preferences regarding reading of and subscription to scientific journals. Individual subscriptions to journals are still common, possibly due to suboptimal institutional access particularly at smaller non-academic institutions. In an age of online publications it seems surprising that many respondents place a high value on printed versions. The results are relevant for

Constructing Scientific Explanations: a System of Analysis for Students' Explanations

Science.gov (United States)

de Andrade, Vanessa; Freire, Sofia; Baptista, Mónica

2017-08-01

This article describes a system of analysis aimed at characterizing students' scientific explanations. Science education literature and reform documents have been highlighting the importance of scientific explanations for students' conceptual understanding and for their understanding of the nature of scientific knowledge. Nevertheless, and despite general agreement regarding the potential of having students construct their own explanations, a consensual notion of scientific explanation has still not been reached. As a result, within science education literature, there are several frameworks defining scientific explanations, with different foci as well as different notions of what accounts as a good explanation. Considering this, and based on a more ample project, we developed a system of analysis to characterize students' explanations. It was conceptualized and developed based on theories and models of scientific explanations, science education literature, and from examples of students' explanations collected by an open-ended questionnaire. With this paper, it is our goal to present the system of analysis, illustrating it with specific examples of students' collected explanations. In addition, we expect to point out its adequacy and utility for analyzing and characterizing students' scientific explanations as well as for tracing their progression.

Media and mental illness: Relevance to India

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

S K Padhy

2014-01-01

Full Text Available Media has a complex interrelationship with mental illnesses. This narrative review takes a look at the various ways in which media and mental illnesses interact. Relevant scientific literature and electronic databases were searched, including Pubmed and GoogleScholar, to identify studies, viewpoints and recommendations using keywords related to media and mental illnesses. This review discusses both the positive and the negative portrayals of mental illnesses through the media. The portrayal of mental health professionals and psychiatric treatment is also discussed. The theories explaining the relationship of how media influences the attitudes and behavior are discussed. Media has also been suggested to be a risk factor for the genesis or exacerbation of mental illnesses like eating disorders and substance use disorders. The potential use of media to understand the psychopathology and plight of those with psychiatric disorders is referred to. The manner in which media can be used as a tool for change to reduce the stigma surrounding mental illnesses is explored.

A Survey on Visual Approaches for Analyzing Scientific Literature and Patents.

Science.gov (United States)

Federico, Paolo; Heimerl, Florian; Koch, Steffen; Miksch, Silvia

2017-09-01

The increasingly large number of available writings describing technical and scientific progress, calls for advanced analytic tools for their efficient analysis. This is true for many application scenarios in science and industry and for different types of writings, comprising patents and scientific articles. Despite important differences between patents and scientific articles, both have a variety of common characteristics that lead to similar search and analysis tasks. However, the analysis and visualization of these documents is not a trivial task due to the complexity of the documents as well as the large number of possible relations between their multivariate attributes. In this survey, we review interactive analysis and visualization approaches of patents and scientific articles, ranging from exploration tools to sophisticated mining methods. In a bottom-up approach, we categorize them according to two aspects: (a) data type (text, citations, authors, metadata, and combinations thereof), and (b) task (finding and comparing single entities, seeking elementary relations, finding complex patterns, and in particular temporal patterns, and investigating connections between multiple behaviours). Finally, we identify challenges and research directions in this area that ask for future investigations.

Scientific culture in Colombia. A proposal of an indicator system for science technology and innovation

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Pardo Martinez, C.I.; Alfonso, W.H

2016-07-01

In last decades, scientific culture has become a key element of Governance of Science, Technology and Innovation in the countries where it is important to determine measurement to analysis trends on scientific culture. Research questions that guide this paper are the following: i. What are information needs on scientific culture in Colombia?; ii. How can be measured scientific culture?; iii. What is the adequate structure for indicators of scientific culture?. In order to answer these questions, a mix of methodologies is used. First, we review the literature on scientific culture and indicators related to this topic. Second, we made a series of interviews with staff members of Colciencias to determine requirements of measurement on scientific culture. Third, with this information, we built an information matrix to prioritise information and determine indicators with respective metrics, and sources according to relevance and cost-effectiveness of estimation. Fourth, from indicators formulated and an indicator system is proposed determining for every dimension of scientific culture indicators related to inputs, process, and outputs designed indicator sheets that includes definition, objective, sources aggregation levels, time series, and calculation methods for indicators proposed. This study achieves formulate an indicator system from the definition of scientific culture a and its dimension proposing around 60 indicators through a multidimensional model that integrates different elements of scientific culture such as the individual and society establishing indicators to measure inputs, process and outputs in general form and specific initiatives for Colciencias. (Author)

[The fate of scientific articles when errors and scientific misconduct are detected].

Science.gov (United States)

Vinther, Siri; Rosenberg, Jacob

2014-01-20

When a minor error is noted in a scientific article, the publishing journal should issue a correction. Issuing an expression of concern is relevant when scientific misconduct is suspected. If the suspicion proves to be well founded, the journal should retract the article. The number of retractions is increasing, and this emphasizes the need for unequivocal concepts and guidelines. The reason a given article is corrected or retracted should be unambiguous and articles as well as notices should be indexed properly.

THE IMPACT OF AUDITOR AFFILIATION ON FINANCIAL STATEMENT RELEVANCE

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Radu-Daniel LOGHIN

2017-12-01

Full Text Available The role of the audit report is to provide a level of trust to the professional judgment behind the financial statements of a company. The market for audit services is not a homogenous one, and large audit partners known as the Big 4 dominate with their partner networks in both developed and emerging markets. The scientific literature provides a rich background of studies linking auditor affiliation and auditor independence. The current exploratory paper tries to approach the issue of auditor independence and affiliation by drawing on the Ohlson model for a sample of 552 firm-year observations from the Borsa Istanbul, covering the 2014 and 2015 financial periods. The results reveal a strong correlation for the year 2015 between the Big 4 affiliation and the value of the equities, possibly suggesting a correlation between auditor independence and financial statement relevance.

How Individual Scholars Can Reduce the Rigor-Relevance Gap in Management Research

OpenAIRE

Wolf, Joachim; Rosenberg, Timo

2012-01-01

This paper discusses a number of avenues management scholars could follow to reduce the existing gap between scientific rigor and practical relevance without relativizing the importance of the first goal dimension. Such changes are necessary because many management studies do not fully exploit the possibilities to increase their practical relevance while maintaining scientific rigor. We argue that this rigor-relevance gap is not only the consequence of the currently prevailing institutional c...

Scientific evidence-based effects of hydrotherapy on various systems of the body.

Science.gov (United States)

Mooventhan, A; Nivethitha, L

2014-05-01

The use of water for various treatments (hydrotherapy) is probably as old as mankind. Hydrotherapy is one of the basic methods of treatment widely used in the system of natural medicine, which is also called as water therapy, aquatic therapy, pool therapy, and balneotherapy. Use of water in various forms and in various temperatures can produce different effects on different system of the body. Many studies/reviews reported the effects of hydrotherapy only on very few systems and there is lack of studies/reviews in reporting the evidence-based effects of hydrotherapy on various systems. We performed PubMed and PubMed central search to review relevant articles in English literature based on "effects of hydrotherapy/balneotherapy" on various systems of the body. Based on the available literature this review suggests that the hydrotherapy has a scientific evidence-based effect on various systems of the body.

Analysis According to Certain Variables of Scientific Literacy among Gifted Students That Participate in Scientific Activities at Science and Art Centers

Science.gov (United States)

Kömek, Emre; Yagiz, Dursun; Kurt, Murat

2015-01-01

The purpose of this study is to analyze scientific literacy levels relevant to science and technology classes among gifted students that participate in scientific activities at science and art centers. This study investigated whether there was a significant difference in scientific literacy levels among gifted students according to the areas of…

International Scientific and Technical Organisations

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Nunez-Lagos Rogla, R.

2003-01-01

The nuclear scientific and technical world is well aware of the EURATOM and IAEA activities but usually other international scientific and technical organisations relevant for their ordinary work are unknown. In this article three international organisations are described briefly, the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP). International Union of Pure and Applied chemistry (IUPAC) and the international council of Science (ICSU). (Author)

[Workplace violence in Latin America: A review of the scientific evidence].

Science.gov (United States)

Ansoleaga, Elisa; Gómez-Rubio, Constanza; Mauro, Amalia

2015-01-01

Workplace Violence has acquired social relevance given the evidence regarding there its health consequences. Has identified various effects such as mood disorders and sleep disorders, hostility, isolation, insecurity, among others. To describe and analyze scientific evidence published on workplace violence in studies in Latin American countries between 2009 and 2014. A descriptive and quantitative study. A search was made on the basis of Academic Search Complete (EBSCOhost) Academic Source Premier, PSICODOC, Scielo.org, JSTOR and SCOPUS. And indexed empirical studies were considered. We worked with 46 selected articles. The studies showed a higher amount of psychological violence at work, with a potential risk in women and health professionals. Also, the analysis categories were the most reported behaviors that express violence, health implications and facilitators. The literature on the study of workplace violence in Latin America is recent. Items are descriptive, interpretative studies with insufficient or analytical nature. Health personnel, particularly women, have conditions of vulnerability, with relevance with regard to sexual harassment, wage inequality and bullying.

The "Mendel syndrome" in science: durability of scientific literature and its effects on bibliometric analysis of individual scientists.

Science.gov (United States)

Costas, Rodrigo; van Leeuwen, Thed N; van Raan, Anthony F J

2011-10-01

The obsolescence and "durability" of scientific literature have been important elements of debate during many years, especially regarding the proper calculation of bibliometric indicators. The effects of "delayed recognition" on impact indicators have importance and are of interest not only to bibliometricians but also among research managers and scientists themselves. It has been suggested that the "Mendel syndrome" is a potential drawback when assessing individual researchers through impact measures. If publications from particular researchers need more time than "normal" to be properly acknowledged by their colleagues, the impact of these researchers may be underestimated with common citation windows. In this paper, we answer the question whether the bibliometric indicators for scientists can be significantly affected by the Mendel syndrome. Applying a methodology developed previously for the classification of papers according to their durability (Costas et al., J Am Soc Inf Sci Technol 61(8):1564-1581, 2010a; J Am Soc Inf Sci Technol 61(2):329-339, 2010b), the scientific production of 1,064 researchers working at the Spanish Council for Scientific Research (CSIC) in three different research areas has been analyzed. Cases of potential "Mendel syndrome" are rarely found among researchers and these cases do not significantly outperform the impact of researchers with a standard pattern of reception in their citations. The analysis of durability could be included as a parameter for the consideration of the citation windows used in the bibliometric analysis of individuals.

How to write scientific paper

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kim, Si Jung

1977-03-01

This book introduces the essence of scientific paper, contents of paper, writing of manuscript, as well as research and analysis and arrangement of reference. It shows conditions of paper, kinds of paper, division and arrangement of content, title, author name, table of contents, abstracts, introduction, experimental materials and methods, results, consideration, conclusion, summary, acknowledgements, references. It also covers draft, quotation, footnotes and references, graphs and pictures, importance of literature research, how to find special literature, and analysis and arrangement of literature.

A systematic review of the literature on self-management interventions and discussion of their potential relevance for people living with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Aantjes, C.J.; Rameran, L; Bunders-Aelen, J.G.F.

2014-01-01

Objective: This study systematically reviews the literature on self-management interventions provided by health care teams, community partners, patients and families and discusses the potential relevance of these interventions for people living with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa. Methods: We searched

Risk factors and control of hospital acquired infections: a comparison between Wikipedia and scientific literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Elisa Maggi

2013-03-01

Full Text Available Background: nowadays Wikipedia is one of the main on-line sources of general information. It contains several items about nosocomial infections and their prevention, together of items on virtually every scientific topic.This study aims to assess whether Wikipedia can be considered a reliable source for professional updating, concerning Healthcare-associated Infections (HAI.Methods: Wikipedia has been searched in order to gather items on HAI. 387 items were found with a search string. The field of research was reduced at those articles (27 items containing exhaustive information in relation to prevention of HAI. The messages contained in those articles were than compared with the recommendations of a selected guideline (NICE 2003, completed by a literature search, with the aim of testing their reliability and exhaustivity.Results: 15 Wiki items were found and 51 messages selected. NICE guidelines contained 119 recommendations and 52 more recommendations has been found in a further literature search. 45.1% of Wikipedia’s messages were even found in the guidelines. On this percentage, 21.6% completely agreed with the messages of the guidelines, 15.7% partially agreed, 3.9% disagreed and 3.9% showed different level of evidence in different articles. Moreover, 54.9% of Wikipedia’s messages were not included in the guidelines and 84.2% of the recommendations contained in the guidelines were not present in Wikipedia.Conclusions: Wikipedia should not be considered as a reliable source for professional updating on HAI.

Electronic Cigarettes and Vaping: A New Challenge in Clinical Medicine and Public Health. A Literature Review

Science.gov (United States)

Palazzolo, Dominic L.

2013-01-01

Electronic cigarette (e-cigarette) use, or vaping, in the United States and worldwide is increasing. Their use is highly controversial from scientific, political, financial, psychological, and sociological ideologies. Given the controversial nature of e-cigarettes and vaping, how should medical care providers advise their patients? To effectively face this new challenge, health care professionals need to become more familiar with the existing literature concerning e-cigarettes and vaping, especially the scientific literature. Thus, the aim of this article is to present a review of the scientific evidence-based primary literature concerning electronic cigarettes and vaping. A search of the most current literature using the pubmed database dating back to 2008, and using electronic cigarette(s) or e-cigarette(s) as key words, yielded a total of 66 highly relevant articles. These articles primarily deal with (1) consumer-based surveys regarding personal views on vaping, (2) chemical analysis of e-cigarette cartridges, solutions, and mist, (3) nicotine content, delivery, and pharmacokinetics, and (4) clinical and physiological studies investigating the effects of acute vaping. When compared to the effects of smoking, the scant available literature suggests that vaping could be a “harm reduction” alternative to smoking and a possible means for smoking cessation, at least to the same degree as other Food and Drug Administration-approved nicotine replacement therapies. However, it is unclear if vaping e-cigarettes will reduce or increase nicotine addiction. It is obvious that more rigorous investigations of the acute and long-term health effects of vaping are required to establish the safety and efficacy of these devices; especially parallel experiments comparing the cardiopulmonary effects of vaping to smoking. Only then will the medical community be able to adequately meet the new challenge e-cigarettes and vaping present to clinical medicine and public health. PMID

Electronic cigarettes and vaping: a new challenge in clinical medicine and public health. A literature review.

Science.gov (United States)

Palazzolo, Dominic L

2013-11-18

Electronic cigarette (e-cigarette) use, or vaping, in the United States and worldwide is increasing. Their use is highly controversial from scientific, political, financial, psychological, and sociological ideologies. Given the controversial nature of e-cigarettes and vaping, how should medical care providers advise their patients? To effectively face this new challenge, health care professionals need to become more familiar with the existing literature concerning e-cigarettes and vaping, especially the scientific literature. Thus, the aim of this article is to present a review of the scientific evidence-based primary literature concerning electronic cigarettes and vaping. A search of the most current literature using the pubmed database dating back to 2008, and using electronic cigarette(s) or e-cigarette(s) as key words, yielded a total of 66 highly relevant articles. These articles primarily deal with (1) consumer-based surveys regarding personal views on vaping, (2) chemical analysis of e-cigarette cartridges, solutions, and mist, (3) nicotine content, delivery, and pharmacokinetics, and (4) clinical and physiological studies investigating the effects of acute vaping. When compared to the effects of smoking, the scant available literature suggests that vaping could be a "harm reduction" alternative to smoking and a possible means for smoking cessation, at least to the same degree as other Food and Drug Administration-approved nicotine replacement therapies. However, it is unclear if vaping e-cigarettes will reduce or increase nicotine addiction. It is obvious that more rigorous investigations of the acute and long-term health effects of vaping are required to establish the safety and efficacy of these devices; especially parallel experiments comparing the cardiopulmonary effects of vaping to smoking. Only then will the medical community be able to adequately meet the new challenge e-cigarettes and vaping present to clinical medicine and public health.

Deciphering Primary and Popular Literature: An Interactive Approach for Promoting Students’ Development of Scientific, Digital, and Information Literacy in Post-Secondary Contexts

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Lacy M. Cleveland

2015-08-01

Full Text Available In an era of unprecedented scientific and technological advancement, it is imperative that individuals possess the ability to interpret and make meaning of current scientific phenomena, including those of both national and global importance.  Despite this necessity, research suggests that less than 30% of Americans are able to understand the science section of the New York Times or other popular media resources.  In this paper, we present an interactive approach utilizing primary and popular literature that is designed to: a enhance students’ understanding of science content; b promote students’ ability to make use of evidence to support or reject claims regarding controversial science topics; and c improve students’ oral and written communication skills.  Applications for use in post-secondary classrooms are discussed.

On the development of standardization methods for measuring the degree of graphitization of industrial materials, correlation of scientific characterization with the industrially relevant secondary properties of graphitic material

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Fitzer, E.; Koechling, K.H.

1984-01-01

The completed research roject comprised the development of standardization methods for measuring the degree of graphitization of industrial materials, the testing of characterization methods with regard to significance, the correlation of scientific characterization with industrially relevant material properties and the resultant modification of industrial processes for the manufacture of coke raw materials and graphitic materials. Also targeted within the scope of this project were the grouping of comparable characterization methods and the drawing up of unequivocal terminology for scientific and industrial-commercial usage, with both aims based on intensified national and international teamwork. (orig./WL) [de

Utility of radiotracer methodology in scientific research of industrial relevancy

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kolar, Z.I.

1990-01-01

Utilization of radiotracer methodology in industrial research provides substantial scientific rather than directly demonstrable economic benefits. These benefits include better understanding of industrial processes and subsequently the development of new ones. Examples are given of the use of radiotracers in technological studies and the significance of the obtained results is put down. Creative application of radiotracer methodology may contribute to the economic development and technological advancement of all countries including the developing ones. (orig.) [de

Scientific and technical information as a source for IAEA safeguards state evaluation

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Barletta, M.; Feldman, Y.; Ferguson, M. [International Atomic Energy Agency, Vienna (Austria)

2014-07-01

The IAEA Department of Safeguards is continually working to refine its methodologies and procedures for the analysis of information relevant to the evaluation of the nuclear fuel cycle in States that have safeguards agreements with the IAEA. This analysis is required to achieve an understanding of States' nuclear-related activities against which a State's declarations are evaluated for correctness as well as completeness, and to provide credible assurances on the peaceful uses of nuclear material in the State. To achieve this end, diversification of sources and comparison for consistency among available information is essential to ensure an accurate assessment of a State's nuclear activities. Open sources of information on scientific and technical (S&T) developments and research provide the Department of Safeguards with an enhanced basis to evaluate the technical capabilities of States. These information sources are regularly and systematically assessed to provide information about industrial capabilities, patenting activities and research and development activities in States as reflected through published scientific and technical literature. Using such sources, in addition to other, long-established safeguards information sources, helps the IAEA to draw soundly-based safeguards conclusions. The utility of this category of information in terms of the State evaluation process lies primarily in the comparison with other sources of information, especially State-declared information, and in the assessment of consistency of all safeguards-relevant information regarding nuclear fuel cycle technologies and activities in a State. The current paper aims to describe the use of S&T literature, how information from different sources is consolidated, how it is analysed and how it contributes in the overall process of State evaluation in the IAEA Department of Safeguards. (author)

Potential disease transmission from wild geese and swans to livestock, poultry and humans: a review of the scientific literature from a One Health perspective.

Science.gov (United States)

Elmberg, Johan; Berg, Charlotte; Lerner, Henrik; Waldenström, Jonas; Hessel, Rebecca

2017-01-01

There are more herbivorous waterfowl (swans and geese) close to humans, livestock and poultry than ever before. This creates widespread conflict with agriculture and other human interests, but also debate about the role of swans and geese as potential vectors of disease of relevance for human and animal health. Using a One Health perspective, we provide the first comprehensive review of the scientific literature about the most relevant viral, bacterial, and unicellular pathogens occurring in wild geese and swans. Research thus far suggests that these birds may play a role in transmission of avian influenza virus, Salmonella, Campylobacter , and antibiotic resistance. On the other hand, at present there is no evidence that geese and swans play a role in transmission of Newcastle disease, duck plague, West Nile virus, Vibrio, Yersinia, Clostridium, Chlamydophila , and Borrelia . Finally, based on present knowledge it is not possible to say if geese and swans play a role in transmission of Escherichia coli, Pasteurella, Helicobacter, Brachyspira, Cryptosporidium, Giardia , and Microsporidia. This is largely due to changes in classification and taxonomy, rapid development of identification methods and lack of knowledge about host specificity. Previous research tends to overrate the role of geese and swans as disease vectors; we do not find any evidence that they are significant transmitters to humans or livestock of any of the pathogens considered in this review. Nevertheless, it is wise to keep poultry and livestock separated from small volume waters used by many wild waterfowl, but there is no need to discourage livestock grazing in nature reserves or pastures where geese and swans are present. Under some circumstances it is warranted to discourage swans and geese from using wastewater ponds, drinking water reservoirs, and public beaches. Intensified screening of swans and geese for AIV, West Nile virus and anatid herpesvirus is warranted.

Relevant cost information for order acceptance decisions

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Wouters, M.J.F.

1997-01-01

Some economic considerations for order acceptance decisions are discussed. The relevant economic considerations for order acceptance are widely discussed in the literature: only those costs are relevant which would be avoidable by not accepting the order incremental costs plus opportunity costs .

Cholesterol lowering effect of a commercial margarine in hypercholesterolemic adults: a review of the scientific literature.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Raquel Bernácer

2013-03-01

Full Text Available Introduction: the hypercholesterolemia is a growing problem, responsible of one fifth of coronary events in Spain. It is considered that plant sterols (PS could play an important role in their treatment.Objective: we review the role of a range of functional foods with added PS (including specific studies using Flora pro•activ in adults with hypercholesterolemia.Methods: we performed a review of the literature in the PubMed database to locate human studies that have evaluated the role of Flora pro•activ or PS fortified foods with a similar composition. We also have been consulted the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA database.Results: Flora pro•activ demonstrated in rigorous scientific studies to lower cholesterol in adults with hypercholesterolemia. Two servings of Flora pro•activ (1.5 g PS are needed to observe this effect. Lowering cholesterol with Flora pro•activ (2 servings / day oscillate as EFSA notes, between 7 and 10%. This effect is observed after 2-3 weeks. Its composition allows to make health claims about lowering cholesterol as is described for the European Union. The cholesterol-lowering efficacy of PS enriched foods that are not margarine, mayonnaise, salad dressings or dairy products is under-researched. With few exceptions, the use of fortified foods with PS is safe.Conclusions: the current scientific evidence justify the promotion of the use of PS to lower LDL cholesterol in adults with hypercholesterolemia.

297 Literature in Indigenous Language: Its Relevance to Human ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

need to carry out a re-orientation of the people's general ... aim is to persuade an audience to think and feel or act in a ... power can create impact on the lives of people in the society. ... in their literature as it teaches the cultural values of the ...

A Literature Review of Homelessness and Aging: Suggestions for a Policy and Practice-Relevant Research Agenda.

Science.gov (United States)

Grenier, Amanda; Barken, Rachel; Sussman, Tamara; Rothwell, David; Bourgeois-Guérin, Valérie; Lavoie, Jean-Pierre

2016-03-01

Homelessness among older people is a growing concern across Canada and is expected to rise with demographic change (Crane & Warnes, 2010; Culhane, Metraux, Byrne, Stino, & Bainbridge, 2013). Yet current knowledge, policies, and practices on homelessness largely focus on younger populations. Likewise, research and policies on aging typically overlook homelessness. Responses to homelessness among older people must address complex needs related to health, income security, and housing. Based on a comprehensive literature review, this article outlines the existing and needed research with regards to homelessness among older people. We clarify the intersections of aging and homelessness; review the relevant statistics, including estimated prevalence; discuss pathways and variations in experience; and identify gaps in knowledge. We conclude with a call for an inclusive research agenda that will help build policies and practices to reduce and ultimately to eliminate homelessness among older people in Canada.

Passage relevance models for genomics search

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Frieder Ophir

2009-03-01

Full Text Available Abstract We present a passage relevance model for integrating syntactic and semantic evidence of biomedical concepts and topics using a probabilistic graphical model. Component models of topics, concepts, terms, and document are represented as potential functions within a Markov Random Field. The probability of a passage being relevant to a biologist's information need is represented as the joint distribution across all potential functions. Relevance model feedback of top ranked passages is used to improve distributional estimates of query concepts and topics in context, and a dimensional indexing strategy is used for efficient aggregation of concept and term statistics. By integrating multiple sources of evidence including dependencies between topics, concepts, and terms, we seek to improve genomics literature passage retrieval precision. Using this model, we are able to demonstrate statistically significant improvements in retrieval precision using a large genomics literature corpus.

Analysis of Protein Phosphorylation and Its Functional Impact on Protein-Protein Interactions via Text Mining of the Scientific Literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Qinghua; Ross, Karen E; Huang, Hongzhan; Ren, Jia; Li, Gang; Vijay-Shanker, K; Wu, Cathy H; Arighi, Cecilia N

2017-01-01

Post-translational modifications (PTMs) are one of the main contributors to the diversity of proteoforms in the proteomic landscape. In particular, protein phosphorylation represents an essential regulatory mechanism that plays a role in many biological processes. Protein kinases, the enzymes catalyzing this reaction, are key participants in metabolic and signaling pathways. Their activation or inactivation dictate downstream events: what substrates are modified and their subsequent impact (e.g., activation state, localization, protein-protein interactions (PPIs)). The biomedical literature continues to be the main source of evidence for experimental information about protein phosphorylation. Automatic methods to bring together phosphorylation events and phosphorylation-dependent PPIs can help to summarize the current knowledge and to expose hidden connections. In this chapter, we demonstrate two text mining tools, RLIMS-P and eFIP, for the retrieval and extraction of kinase-substrate-site data and phosphorylation-dependent PPIs from the literature. These tools offer several advantages over a literature search in PubMed as their results are specific for phosphorylation. RLIMS-P and eFIP results can be sorted, organized, and viewed in multiple ways to answer relevant biological questions, and the protein mentions are linked to UniProt identifiers.

CDAPubMed: a browser extension to retrieve EHR-based biomedical literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Perez-Rey David

2012-04-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Over the last few decades, the ever-increasing output of scientific publications has led to new challenges to keep up to date with the literature. In the biomedical area, this growth has introduced new requirements for professionals, e.g., physicians, who have to locate the exact papers that they need for their clinical and research work amongst a huge number of publications. Against this backdrop, novel information retrieval methods are even more necessary. While web search engines are widespread in many areas, facilitating access to all kinds of information, additional tools are required to automatically link information retrieved from these engines to specific biomedical applications. In the case of clinical environments, this also means considering aspects such as patient data security and confidentiality or structured contents, e.g., electronic health records (EHRs. In this scenario, we have developed a new tool to facilitate query building to retrieve scientific literature related to EHRs. Results We have developed CDAPubMed, an open-source web browser extension to integrate EHR features in biomedical literature retrieval approaches. Clinical users can use CDAPubMed to: (i load patient clinical documents, i.e., EHRs based on the Health Level 7-Clinical Document Architecture Standard (HL7-CDA, (ii identify relevant terms for scientific literature search in these documents, i.e., Medical Subject Headings (MeSH, automatically driven by the CDAPubMed configuration, which advanced users can optimize to adapt to each specific situation, and (iii generate and launch literature search queries to a major search engine, i.e., PubMed, to retrieve citations related to the EHR under examination. Conclusions CDAPubMed is a platform-independent tool designed to facilitate literature searching using keywords contained in specific EHRs. CDAPubMed is visually integrated, as an extension of a widespread web browser, within the standard

A literature review of idea management

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jensen, Anna Rose Vagn

2012-01-01

The objective of the paper is primarily to conduct a state-of-the-art literature review of Idea Management and secondary to point out unanswered questions which are left behind in the reviewed literature. Scientific knowledge is primarily represented in innovation management literature but also...... considerably in literature on software and IT. On the background of the literature review, there are some weaknesses in the literature to be considered. These weaknesses concern the understanding of how people interact with idea management in their daily work practices and how different types of ideas...

How to write a surgical clinical research protocol: literature review and practical guide.

Science.gov (United States)

Rosenthal, Rachel; Schäfer, Juliane; Briel, Matthias; Bucher, Heiner C; Oertli, Daniel; Dell-Kuster, Salome

2014-02-01

The study protocol is the core document of every clinical research project. Clinical research in studies involving surgical interventions presents some specific challenges, which need to be accounted for and described in the study protocol. The aim of this review is to provide a practical guide for developing a clinical study protocol for surgical interventions with a focus on methodologic issues. On the basis of an in-depth literature search of methodologic literature and on some cardinal published surgical trials and observational studies, the authors provides a 10-step guide for developing a clinical study protocol in surgery. This practical guide outlines key methodologic issues important when planning an ethically and scientifically sound research project involving surgical interventions, with the ultimate goal of providing high-level evidence relevant for health care decision making in surgery. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Injuries of Repetitive Efforts in Workers from the Poultry Meat Industry: A Bibliometric Analysis of Literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Alexandre Crespo Coelho S. Pinto

2018-01-01

Full Text Available Injuries of repetitive efforts constitute one of the prime causes of absenteeism in the workplace, bear a considerable cost for the public health system and can cast doubt on the sustainability of a company. The objective of this paper is to build, in the researchers, the needed knowledge to choose a set of relevant scientific articles about repetitive strain injuries in the poultry meat industry, aiming to identify characteristics in those scientific publications that have the potential to contribute to the topic of this paper. The research is characterized as exploratory-descriptive, and draws on primary and secondary data sources. The study involves the application of a method for the selection and analysis of the selected articles. To this end, the method utilized was the knowledge development process—constructivist (Proknow-C, as the theoretical intervention instrument. Within the process development, a portfolio of 16 articles aligned to the research and scientifically recognized with the main periodicals, papers, authors and keywords was obtained. The ProKnow-C process allowed us to identify opportunities in the literature about injuries in the poultry meat industry and showed opportunities for future research. This paper, under the constructivist perspective, presents a structured process to build, in the researcher, the necessary knowledge for the identification, selection and analysis of relevant scientific articles relating to research context and, for these articles, find prominences and opportunities for a research theme without similar publications.

Making academic research more relevant: A few suggestions

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Abinash Panda

2014-09-01

Full Text Available Academic research in the domain of management scholarship, though steeped in scientific and methodological rigour, is generally found to be of little relevance to practice. The authors of this paper have revisited the rigour-relevance debate in light of recent developments and with special reference to the management research scenario in India. The central thesis of the argument is that the gulf between rigour and relevance needs to be bridged to make academic research more relevant to business organizations and practitioners. They have offered some suggestions to enhance the relevance of academic research to practice.

Literature classification for semi-automated updating of biological knowledgebases

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Olsen, Lars Rønn; Kudahl, Ulrich Johan; Winther, Ole

2013-01-01

abstracts yielded classification accuracy of 0.95, thus showing significant value in support of data extraction from the literature. Conclusion: We here propose a conceptual framework for semi-automated extraction of epitope data embedded in scientific literature using principles from text mining...... types of biological data, such as sequence data, are extensively stored in biological databases, functional annotations, such as immunological epitopes, are found primarily in semi-structured formats or free text embedded in primary scientific literature. Results: We defined and applied a machine...

Role of Scientific Societies in International Collaboration

Science.gov (United States)

Fucugauchi, J. U.

2007-12-01

Geophysical research increasingly requires global multidisciplinary approaches. Understanding how deeply interrelated are Earth components and processes, population growth, increased needs of mineral and energy resources, global impact of human activities, and view of our planet as an interconnected system emphasizes the need of international cooperation. International research collaboration has an immense potential and is needed for further development of Earth science research and education. The Union Session is planned to provide a forum for analysis and discussion of the status of research and education of geosciences in developing countries, international collaboration programs and new initiatives for promoting and strengthening scientific cooperation. A theme of particular relevance in the analyses and discussions is the role of scientific societies in international collaboration. Societies organize meetings, publish journals and books and promote cooperation through academic exchange activities. They may further assist communities in developing countries in providing and facilitating access to scientific literature, attendance to international meetings, short and long-term stays and student and young researcher mobility. What else can be done? This is a complex subject and scientific societies may not be seen independently from the many factors involved in research and education. Developing countries present additional challenges resulting from limited economic resources and social and political problems, while urgently requiring improved educational and research programs. Needed are in-depth analyses of infrastructure and human resources, and identification of major problems and needs. What are the major limitations and needs in research and postgraduate education in developing countries? What and how should international collaboration do? What are the roles of individuals, academic institutions, funding agencies, scientific societies? Here we attempt to

Literature searches on Ayurveda: An update.

Science.gov (United States)

Aggithaya, Madhur G; Narahari, Saravu R

2015-01-01

The journals that publish on Ayurveda are increasingly indexed by popular medical databases in recent years. However, many Eastern journals are not indexed biomedical journal databases such as PubMed. Literature searches for Ayurveda continue to be challenging due to the nonavailability of active, unbiased dedicated databases for Ayurvedic literature. In 2010, authors identified 46 databases that can be used for systematic search of Ayurvedic papers and theses. This update reviewed our previous recommendation and identified current and relevant databases. To update on Ayurveda literature search and strategy to retrieve maximum publications. Author used psoriasis as an example to search previously listed databases and identify new. The population, intervention, control, and outcome table included keywords related to psoriasis and Ayurvedic terminologies for skin diseases. Current citation update status, search results, and search options of previous databases were assessed. Eight search strategies were developed. Hundred and five journals, both biomedical and Ayurveda, which publish on Ayurveda, were identified. Variability in databases was explored to identify bias in journal citation. Five among 46 databases are now relevant - AYUSH research portal, Annotated Bibliography of Indian Medicine, Digital Helpline for Ayurveda Research Articles (DHARA), PubMed, and Directory of Open Access Journals. Search options in these databases are not uniform, and only PubMed allows complex search strategy. "The Researches in Ayurveda" and "Ayurvedic Research Database" (ARD) are important grey resources for hand searching. About 44/105 (41.5%) journals publishing Ayurvedic studies are not indexed in any database. Only 11/105 (10.4%) exclusive Ayurveda journals are indexed in PubMed. AYUSH research portal and DHARA are two major portals after 2010. It is mandatory to search PubMed and four other databases because all five carry citations from different groups of journals. The hand

The relevance of folkloric usage of plant galls as medicines: Finding the scientific rationale.

Science.gov (United States)

Patel, Seema; Rauf, Abdur; Khan, Haroon

2018-01-01

Galls, the abnormal growths in plants, induced by virus, bacteria, fungi, nematodes, arthropods, or even other plants, are akin to cancers in fauna. The galls which occur in a myriad of forms are phytochemically-distinct from the normal plant tissues, for these are the sites of tug-of-war, just like the granuloma in animals. To counter the stressors, in the form of the effector proteins of the invaders, the host plants elaborate a large repertoire of metabolites, which they normally will not produce. Perturbation of the jasmonic acid pathway, and the overexpression of auxin, and cytokinin, promote the tissue proliferation and the resultant galls. Though the plant family characteristics and the attackers determine the gall biochemistry, most of the galls are rich in bioactive phytochemicals such as phenolic acids, anthocyanins, purpurogallin, flavonoids, tannins, steroids, triterpenes, alkaloids, lipophilic components (tanshinone) etc. Throughout the long trajectory of evolution, humans have learned to use the galls as therapeutics, much like other plant parts. In diverse cultures, the evidence of folkloric usage of galls abound. Among others, galls from the plant genus like Rhus, Pistacia, Quercus, Terminalia etc. are popular as ethnomedicine. This review mines the literature on galling agents, and the medicinal relevance of galls. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

The logical foundations of scientific theories languages, structures, and models

CERN Document Server

Krause, Decio

2016-01-01

This book addresses the logical aspects of the foundations of scientific theories. Even though the relevance of formal methods in the study of scientific theories is now widely recognized and regaining prominence, the issues covered here are still not generally discussed in philosophy of science. The authors focus mainly on the role played by the underlying formal apparatuses employed in the construction of the models of scientific theories, relating the discussion with the so-called semantic approach to scientific theories. The book describes the role played by this metamathematical framework in three main aspects: considerations of formal languages employed to axiomatize scientific theories, the role of the axiomatic method itself, and the way set-theoretical structures, which play the role of the models of theories, are developed. The authors also discuss the differences and philosophical relevance of the two basic ways of aximoatizing a scientific theory, namely Patrick Suppes’ set theoretical predicate...

Teaching Mathematical Biology in High School Using Adapted Primary Literature

Science.gov (United States)

Norris, Stephen P.; Stelnicki, Nathan; de Vries, Gerda

2012-01-01

The study compared the effect of two adaptations of a scientific article on students' comprehension and use of scientific inquiry skills. One adaptation preserved as much as possible the canonical form of the original article (APL, Adapted Primary Literature) and the other was written in a more narrative mode typical of secondary literature (SL).…

Can commonly-used fan-driven air cleaning technologies improve indoor air quality? A literature review

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Zhang, Yinping; Mo, Jinhan; Li, Yuguo

2011-01-01

America, and Asia with expertise in air cleaning, aerosol science, medicine, chemistry and ventilation. The effects on health were not examined. Over 26,000 articles were identified in major literature databases; 400 were selected as being relevant based on their titles and abstracts by the first two......Air cleaning techniques have been applied worldwide with the goal of improving indoor air quality. The effectiveness of applying these techniques varies widely, and pollutant removal efficiency is usually determined in controlled laboratory environments which may not be realized in practice. Some...... air cleaners are largely ineffective, and some produce harmful by-products. To summarize what is known regarding the effectiveness of fan-driven air cleaning technologies, a state-of-the-art review of the scientific literature was undertaken by a multidisciplinary panel of experts from Europe, North...

The Early Scientific Contributions of J. Robert Oppenheimer: Why Did the Scientific Community Miss the Black Hole Opportunity?

Science.gov (United States)

Ortega-Rodríguez, M.; Solís-Sánchez, H.; Boza-Oviedo, E.; Chaves-Cruz, K.; Guevara-Bertsch, M.; Quirós-Rojas, M.; Vargas-Hernández, S.; Venegas-Li, A.

2017-04-01

We assess the scientific value of Oppenheimer's research on black holes in order to explain its neglect by the scientific community, and even by Oppenheimer himself. Looking closely at the scientific culture and conceptual belief system of the 1930s, the present article seeks to supplement the existing literature by enriching the explanations and complicating the guiding questions. We suggest a rereading of Oppenheimer as a figure both more intriguing for the history of astrophysics and further ahead of his time than is commonly supposed.

Physical activity of pregnant women in the light of scientific research - a review of the literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Anna Sass

2017-08-01

Full Text Available Introduction: Physical activity during pregnancy is very important due to health benefits for women and fetus. Undoubtedly, physical activity should be adapted to the current psychophysical abilities of pregnant women. During that time, the physical effort should be taken by appropriate intensity, also the forms of physical activity should be general aimed in current pregnancy state. Undoubtedly the simplest form of physical activity for pregnant women is walk, as well as swimming, gymnastics, yoga and pilates. Exercises should have wide impact on her body and muscles. The aim of the study is to identify the physical activity of pregnant women in available scientific publications. Further goal is the assessment of the knowledge about the physical activity of pregnant women based on the current review of the literature. Research Methods: The following databases and scientific browsers were used and tracked for the purpose of the research objective: Pub Med, Retina Medical Search, Medline Plus, Europe PMC, POPLINE, Google Scholar. During searching for a results the keywords phrases were written in English: physical activity in pregnancy, pregnancy exercises, fitness, yoga, pilates, swimming and pelvic floor exercises during pregnancy. Conclusions: The current researches among the population of pregnant women are methodologically differentiated and not coherent in the subject. The implication of unexplored issues about pregnant women is the differentiation in directions of researches about the physical activity of pregnant women. It seems that is important to design and program an prospective research by using objective techniques to explore the pregnant women’s behavior, lifestyle and physical activity.

A scoping review of competencies for scientific editors of biomedical journals.

Science.gov (United States)

Galipeau, James; Barbour, Virginia; Baskin, Patricia; Bell-Syer, Sally; Cobey, Kelly; Cumpston, Miranda; Deeks, Jon; Garner, Paul; MacLehose, Harriet; Shamseer, Larissa; Straus, Sharon; Tugwell, Peter; Wager, Elizabeth; Winker, Margaret; Moher, David

2016-02-02

Biomedical journals are the main route for disseminating the results of health-related research. Despite this, their editors operate largely without formal training or certification. To our knowledge, no body of literature systematically identifying core competencies for scientific editors of biomedical journals exists. Therefore, we aimed to conduct a scoping review to determine what is known on the competency requirements for scientific editors of biomedical journals. We searched the MEDLINE®, Cochrane Library, Embase®, CINAHL, PsycINFO, and ERIC databases (from inception to November 2014) and conducted a grey literature search for research and non-research articles with competency-related statements (i.e. competencies, knowledge, skills, behaviors, and tasks) pertaining to the role of scientific editors of peer-reviewed health-related journals. We also conducted an environmental scan, searched the results of a previous environmental scan, and searched the websites of existing networks, major biomedical journal publishers, and organizations that offer resources for editors. A total of 225 full-text publications were included, 25 of which were research articles. We extracted a total of 1,566 statements possibly related to core competencies for scientific editors of biomedical journals from these publications. We then collated overlapping or duplicate statements which produced a list of 203 unique statements. Finally, we grouped these statements into seven emergent themes: (1) dealing with authors, (2) dealing with peer reviewers, (3) journal publishing, (4) journal promotion, (5) editing, (6) ethics and integrity, and (7) qualities and characteristics of editors. To our knowledge, this scoping review is the first attempt to systematically identify possible competencies of editors. Limitations are that (1) we may not have captured all aspects of a biomedical editor's work in our searches, (2) removing redundant and overlapping items may have led to the

Using the Primary Literature in an Allied Health Microbiology Course

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Donald P. Breakwell

2009-12-01

Full Text Available A strategy was adapted for using the primary literature to foster active learning in an allied health microbiology course. Recent journal articles were selected that underscored the fundamental microbiological principles to be learned in each course unit. At the beginning of the semester, students were taught the relationship between the layout of scientific articles and the scientific method. During the rest of the semester, students were oriented to the topic of each paper by viewing videos from Unseen Life on Earth: an Introduction to Microbiology, reading assigned pages from the text, and participating in mini-lectures and discussions. After all preparatory material was completed, a paper was read and discussed in small groups and as a class. Students were assessed using daily reading quizzes and end-of-unit concept quizzes. While reading quizzes averaged approximately 93%, concept quiz grades averaged approximately 82%. Student recognition of the terms used in each unit’s scientific article was assessed with pre-read and post-read wordlists. For the self-assessment, the percent change between pre-read and post-read word cognition was, as expected, highly significant. Approximately 80% of students agreed that reading the scientific articles was a valuable part of the class and that it provided meaning to their study of microbiology. Using the primary scientific literature facilitated active learning in and out of the classroom. This study showed that introducing the scientific literature in an allied health microbiology class can be an effective way of teaching microbiology by providing meaning through the current literature and understanding of the scientific method.

Presenting Fake Figures: A Tool to Teach Effective Scientific Figure Design

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Veronica A. Segarra

2013-08-01

Full Text Available As trained scientists, we become adept not only at analyzing and understanding figures in the scientific literature, but also at designing figures to effectively represent our own data and findings. As educators, we strive to pass on these skills to our students, some of whom will ultimately become scientists themselves. Conveying the principles of effective figure design can be challenging, particularly when students have had little exposure to the process of reading scientific literature, much less writing a piece of scientific literature. Improvisational activities in the classroom reinforce teaching goals such as spontaneity, risk-taking, creativity, communication skills, team-building, and critical thinking (2. Indeed, improv training for scientists is becoming more common, helping scientists to communicate more spontaneously about their work and connect with their audience (1. In this article, we present an improvisational game that can aid in the teaching of effective scientific figure design. This “Present-a-Fake-Figure Exercise” is applicable to both the classroom and laboratory settings. In this learning activity, students improvise presenting fake scientific figures to an audience of their peers. These fake figures are prepared beforehand by the instructor and exemplify the do’s and don’ts of scientific figure design. Some of the learning outcomes of the activity include (1 identifying what makes a scientific figure cohesive, easy to analyze, and reader-friendly, and (2 identifying strategies that are useful in the design of a multi-panel figure to convey a scientific story.

Scientific Digital Libraries, Interoperability, and Ontologies

Science.gov (United States)

Hughes, J. Steven; Crichton, Daniel J.; Mattmann, Chris A.

2009-01-01

Scientific digital libraries serve complex and evolving research communities. Justifications for the development of scientific digital libraries include the desire to preserve science data and the promises of information interconnectedness, correlative science, and system interoperability. Shared ontologies are fundamental to fulfilling these promises. We present a tool framework, some informal principles, and several case studies where shared ontologies are used to guide the implementation of scientific digital libraries. The tool framework, based on an ontology modeling tool, was configured to develop, manage, and keep shared ontologies relevant within changing domains and to promote the interoperability, interconnectedness, and correlation desired by scientists.

How to write and read a scientific evaluation paper

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Wieringa, Roelf J.; Heerkens, Johannes M.G.; Regnell, Björn

Scientific evaluation papers investigate existing problem situations or validate proposed solutions with scientific means, such as by experiment or case study. There is a growing amount of literature about how to report about empirical research in software engineering, but there is still some

The art of scientific writing

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Wopereis, Iwan

2018-01-01

This three-part workshop introduces strategies, tools, and techniques for sound scientific output. It discusses success and failure factors relevant to the publication process (writing included). The first part aims to understand the entire publication process. It presents an overview of standard

A student's guide to searching the literature using online databases

Science.gov (United States)

Miller, Casey W.; Belyea, Dustin; Chabot, Michelle; Messina, Troy

2012-02-01

A method is described to empower students to efficiently perform general and specific literature searches using online resources [Miller et al., Am. J. Phys. 77, 1112 (2009)]. The method was tested on multiple groups, including undergraduate and graduate students with varying backgrounds in scientific literature searches. Students involved in this study showed marked improvement in their awareness of how and where to find scientific information. Repeated exposure to literature searching methods appears worthwhile, starting early in the undergraduate career, and even in graduate school orientation.

Mathematical and Scientific Foundations for an Integrative Engineering Curriculum.

Science.gov (United States)

Carr, Robin; And Others

1995-01-01

Describes the Mathematical and Scientific Foundations of Engineering curriculum which emphasizes the mathematical and scientific concepts common to all engineering fields. Scientists and engineers together devised topics and experiments that emphasize the relevance of theory to real-world applications. Presents material efficiently while building…

Mapping the evolution of scientific fields.

Science.gov (United States)

Herrera, Mark; Roberts, David C; Gulbahce, Natali

2010-05-04

Despite the apparent cross-disciplinary interactions among scientific fields, a formal description of their evolution is lacking. Here we describe a novel approach to study the dynamics and evolution of scientific fields using a network-based analysis. We build an idea network consisting of American Physical Society Physics and Astronomy Classification Scheme (PACS) numbers as nodes representing scientific concepts. Two PACS numbers are linked if there exist publications that reference them simultaneously. We locate scientific fields using a community finding algorithm, and describe the time evolution of these fields over the course of 1985-2006. The communities we identify map to known scientific fields, and their age depends on their size and activity. We expect our approach to quantifying the evolution of ideas to be relevant for making predictions about the future of science and thus help to guide its development.

77 FR 15382 - Outer Continental Shelf Scientific Committee; Notice of Renewal

Science.gov (United States)

2012-03-15

... Committee provides advice on the feasibility, appropriateness, and scientific value of the OCS Environmental... relevance of the research and data being produced to meet BOEM's scientific information needs for decision...

The emergence of scientific management in America

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sorin-George Toma

2014-05-01

Full Text Available A scientific approach to management was initiated for the first time in America in the late 19th century. Scientific management arose mainly from the need to increase efficiency in America, but other key factors were the spread of big businesses and the expanding application of science in industry. The aims of our paper are to present the emergence of scientific management in America and to emphasize the contribution of some of the most representatives American authors to its development. The methodological approach is literature review. Our paper shows that scientific management was essentially an American achievement that provided useful lessons for the whole human society.

Representations of Science and Technology in Cordel Literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Carla Almeida

2016-09-01

Full Text Available In Brazilian cultural manifestations, science is not usually pictured prominently. Still, one can find references to it in some of the most popular forms of communication. Cordel literature is one of them. In this article, we try to understand how the scientific world is inserted and represented in this literary genre. We did a discourse analysis based on a corpus of 50 Cordel booklets on topics related to science. We note that the booklets present, as a whole, an ambivalent image of science, extolling the scientific achievements and their authors in some cases, whereas, in others, showing a critical view of technological development. Our study suggests that the mixing of science and Cordel literature has the potential to bring together scientific and popular cultures. This could also promote a critical thinking in the public about the relationship between science and society. Therefore, Cordel literature may be an interesting tool for education and popularization of science.

Fostering and Measuring General Scientific Reasoning Expertise at the Second Year Level

Science.gov (United States)

Jones, F. M.; Jellinek, M.; Bostock, M. G.

2010-12-01

Geoscience faculty members often debate about the definition and development of scientific expertise. Some will argue it emerges at the graduate level, others that novice students can develop relevant skills. The debate hinges on definitions of “expertise”, “scientific skills” and how these abilities are assessed. We present data from a second year geoscience course specifically designed to help research scientists foster generic skills associated with critical scientific thinking, presentation, and framing of scientific arguments and questions. To develop the course, key characteristics that professional scientists exhibit were identified from the literature and our experience. These are the abilities to: a) read critically; b) succinctly summarize and communicate; c) pose insightful questions; d) use and discuss models, data and their relationships; and e) work effectively as part of a team. To help with learning and assessment of these skills in students who do not yet have significant discipline-specific background, classroom practices were chosen so that students must think and act more like professional scientists. These include use of some team-based learning strategies, replacing exams with quizzes and projects, mixing team-teaching with solo-teaching, discursive rather than didactic instruction, and use of diverse topics representative of research in our Department. Specific strategies employed which enable “master geoscientists” to actively guide and assess novices as they practice desired skills are: homework involving reading, writing abstracts and posing questions for one or two articles each week, pre-post testing of model based reasoning abilities, interaction with guest scientists, and oral and poster presentations on topics chosen by students. Results of collecting data over two terms of using these general and specific strategies include: 1. Abstract writing skills improved during the first two thirds of the course, then leveled off in

INSPIRE: a new scientific information system for HEP

CERN Document Server

Ivanov, R; CERN. Geneva. IT Department

2010-01-01

The status of high-energy physics (HEP) information systems has been jointly analyzed by the libraries of CERN, DESY, Fermilab and SLAC. As a result, the four laboratories have started the INSPIRE project – a new platform built by moving the successful SPIRES features and content, curated at DESY, Fermilab and SLAC, into the open-source CDS Invenio digital library software that was developed at CERN. INSPIRE will integrate current acquisition workflows and databases to host the entire body of the HEP literature (about one million records), aiming to become the reference HEP scientific information platform worldwide. It will provide users with fast access to full text journal articles and preprints, but also material such as conference slides and multimedia. INSPIRE will empower scientists with new tools to discover and access the results most relevant to their research, enable novel text- and data-mining applications, and deploy new metrics to assess the impact of articles and authors. In addition, it will ...

INSPIRE: a new scientific information system for HEP

CERN Multimedia

Ivanov, R

2009-01-01

The status of high-energy physics (HEP) information systems has been jointly analyzed by the libraries of CERN, DESY, Fermilab and SLAC. As a result, the four laboratories have started the INSPIRE project – a new platform built by moving the successful SPIRES features and content, curated at DESY, Fermilab and SLAC, into the open-source CDS Invenio digital library software that was developed at CERN. INSPIRE will integrate present acquisition workflows and databases to host the entire body of the HEP literature (about one million records), aiming to become the reference HEP scientific information platform worldwide. It will provide users with fast access to full-text journal articles and preprints, but also material such as conference slides and multimedia. INSPIRE will empower scientists with new tools to discover and access the results most relevant to their research, enable novel text- and data-mining applications, and deploy new metrics to assess the impact of articles and authors. In addition, it will ...

Atmospheric Deposition: Sampling Procedures, Analytical Methods, and Main Recent Findings from the Scientific Literature

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M. Amodio

2014-01-01

Full Text Available The atmosphere is a carrier on which some natural and anthropogenic organic and inorganic chemicals are transported, and the wet and dry deposition events are the most important processes that remove those chemicals, depositing it on soil and water. A wide variety of different collectors were tested to evaluate site-specificity, seasonality and daily variability of settleable particle concentrations. Deposition fluxes of POPs showed spatial and seasonal variations, diagnostic ratios of PAHs on deposited particles, allowed the discrimination between pyrolytic or petrogenic sources. Congener pattern analysis and bulk deposition fluxes in rural sites confirmed long-range atmospheric transport of PCDDs/Fs. More and more sophisticated and newly designed deposition samplers have being used for characterization of deposited mercury, demonstrating the importance of rain scavenging and the relatively higher magnitude of Hg deposition from Chinese anthropogenic sources. Recently biological monitors demonstrated that PAH concentrations in lichens were comparable with concentrations measured in a conventional active sampler in an outdoor environment. In this review the authors explore the methodological approaches used for the assessment of atmospheric deposition, from the analysis of the sampling methods, the analytical procedures for chemical characterization of pollutants and the main results from the scientific literature.

Literature Reviews and the Hermeneutic Circle

Science.gov (United States)

Boell, Sebastian K.; Cecez-Kecmanovic, Dubravka

2010-01-01

Conducting a literature review is a vital part of any research. Library and information science (LIS) professionals often play a central role in supporting academics in their efforts to locate relevant publications and in teaching novice researchers skills associated with literature reviews. This paper examines literature review processes with the…

Health issues of female foreign domestic workers: a systematic review of the scientific and gray literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Malhotra, Rahul; Arambepola, Chandima; Tarun, Samiksha; de Silva, Vijitha; Kishore, Jugal; Østbye, Truls

2013-01-01

Although the number of female foreign domestic workers (FDWs) is increasing worldwide, little is known about their health issues. To systematically review the literature on health issues of female FDWs to ascertain the problems studied, identify limitations, and suggest future research and policy implications. A systematic database (PubMed, EBSCO Host, and Google Scholar) and bibliographic search identified the English-language scientific and gray literature published during 1990-2012 addressing health issues of female FDWs living with the family of the employer, using qualitative and/or quantitative research methods. Studies in which female FDWs constituted less than half of the participants were excluded. The health issues studied and identified were adverse work conditions and associated health problems (such as physical, verbal, and sexual abuse at the workplace, caregiving tasks associated with musculoskeletal strain, and chemical exposure associated with respiratory difficulty), mental health (psychotic, neurotic, and mood disorders), infectious diseases (most of the studies were on intestinal parasitic infections), and health knowledge/attitudes/practices (most of the studies were in context of sexual and reproductive health). Most of the studies were medical record reviews or questionnaire-based surveys utilizing convenience sampling or qualitative interviews/focus group discussions. Female FDWs face numerous health problems. Studies on representative, possibly longitudinal, samples of female FDWs focusing on specific health conditions are needed to better understand the epidemiology of such conditions. Concerted efforts through the governments of both labor-sending and host countries are required to improve the health, work conditions, and safety of this vulnerable group of women.

Does transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS have a clinically relevant analgesic effect on different pain conditions? A literature review

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Asami Naka

2013-07-01

Full Text Available Transcutaneous electric nerve stimulation (TENS is a standard therapy used in different painful conditions such as low back pain, diabetic polyneuropathy or arthrosis. However, literature reviews focusing on the effects and the clinical implication of this method in various painful conditions are yet scarce. The purpose of this literature research was to determine, whether TENS provides an analgesic effect on common painful conditions in clinical practice. Literature research was performed using three data bases (Pubmed, Embase, Cochrane Database, focusing on papers published in the space of time from 2007 to 2012. Papers were evaluated from two reviewers independently concerning the clinical outcome, taking account for the level of external evidence according to the German Cochrane levels of evidence (Ia – IV. 133 papers of varying methodological quality dealing with different painful conditions were selected in total. A clinically relevant analgesic effect was described in 90 painful conditions (67%. In 30 painful states (22%, the outcome was inconclusive due to the study design. No significant analgesic effect of TENS was observed in 15 painful conditions (11%. The vast majority of the papers were classified as Cochrane evidence level Ib (n = 64; 48%, followed by level Ia (n = 23; 17%, level III (n = 18; 14%, level IV (n = 15; 11%, level IIb (n = 10; 8% and level IIa (n = 3; 2%. Most of the studies revealed an analgesic effect in various painful conditions, confirming the usefulness of TENS in clinical practice.

Authorship for scientific papers: the new challenges.

Science.gov (United States)

Garcia, Carla Costa; Martrucelli, Cristina Ribeiro Nabuco; Rossilho, Marilisa de Melo Freire; Denardin, Odilon Victor Porto

2010-01-01

The dissemination of the practice of collaborative authorship (coauthorship) in Brazil and in the international scientific community has been accompanied by an increasing occurrence of frauds, manipulations and other deviations in the assignment of responsibility for a scientific paper. This article discusses the criteria for authorship attribution, the reasons for the growing indices of coauthorship and the challenges to determine authorship in electronic journals. Through literature review and case study (bibliographic search in scientific database), it shows ways to avoid that "misbehaviors" related to the authorship attribution affect the credibility of science.

Methodological individualism as opposed to methodological holism. History, relevancy and the implications of the (insoluble? debate on the explanatory capacity and scientific status of sociocultural anthropology

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Nina Kulenović

2016-02-01

Full Text Available The paper is part of wider research into the status of explanation in the debate on the scientific status of anthropology – wherein one of the key assumptions is that there is a strong correlation between theoretical and methodological structures which would make them inseparable, and that explanation or explanatory potential, is the point of convergence which can be used to test for the possibility of separating theoretical and methodological structures in the first place. To test this idea, a line of debate between methodological holism and methodological individualism – one of the longest running and most complex debates in the social sciences and humanities – was considered. The historical background of the debate has been highlighted, and its relevancy and implications in the controversy about the explanatory capacity and scientific status of sociocultural anthropology.

[Facebook in oncology. Review of the literature].

Science.gov (United States)

Veneroni, Laura; Ferrari, Andrea; Massimino, Maura; Clerici, Carlo Alfredo

2015-01-01

Internet and particularly the so-called Web 2.0 are powerful tools of communication characterized by high user participation in the creation of content through various sites, such as those of social networking, where Facebook is the best known and most widely used. The aim of the present paper is to review the literature on the use of Facebook in health care. The international scientific literature of the past 10 years has been collected by major databases online. From the research were identified 262 articles of which 57 are considered relevant. The articles are schematically divided into three categories according to the topic: use of Facebook for psychosocial support for communication, for doctor-patient relationship, for institutional communication. The authors have identified the critical aspects and the possibility of using this tool in the communication and relationship between patients and health professionals. Despite the presence of critical issues, the use of social media is to be considered with interest and is worthy of study and research in the clinical setting. It should at the same time that health professionals are aware of the risks associated with the use of social networking but also trained in the use of the potential of these virtual tools that cannot replace real interactions but can support them.

Social marketing and breastfeeding: a literature review.

Science.gov (United States)

Schmidt, Manuela

2013-02-08

Through the review of relevant literature this study illuminates the concepts of social marketing and breastfeeding. It specifically discusses the positioning of the link between social marketing and breastfeeding within different fields of study and develops a theoretical framework that tries to bridge the gap between those disciplines. Various electronic databases were used and through systematic selection 11 scientific articles were identified that this literature review is based on. The review indicates that the relationship between social marketing and breastfeeding is complex. There are indications that this relationship is being investigated within three distinct fields of research: psychology/education, public health and marketing. Depending on the research field the emphasis is put on either breastfeeding or social marketing as well as on the other concepts that were discovered to be of importance within this relationship. Namely, group and individual demography as well as behaviour were revealed to be important elements of the link between social marketing and breastfeeding. Based on the results this study concludes that a more multidimensional view on the relationship between the concepts under study is needed since the focus of previous studies is very one-sided and limited to just one element when all elements should be integrated equally.

Electroconvulsive Therapy in Anti-N-Methyl-D-Aspartate Receptor Encephalitis: A Case Report and Review of the Literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Coffey, M Justin; Cooper, Joseph J

2016-12-01

There is a growing scientific literature describing the neuropsychiatric symptoms of anti-N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor encephalitis, including the use of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) to treat those symptoms. We sought to consolidate this literature into a review that highlights its relevance to ECT practitioners. We performed a PubMed search using the terms electroconvulsive therapy and encephalitis, autoimmune encephalitis, or anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis. We reviewed all relevant studies in detail, cross-referenced all bibliographies, and collected key clinical information related to the practice of ECT. We identified 6 studies offering patient-level descriptions of the use of ECT in patients with anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis. In all cases ECT was used to target symptoms of catatonia. Electroconvulsive therapy was delivered safely and effectively irrespective of the timing of diagnosis, tumor removal, or immunotherapy. There are no controlled data on the use of ECT in anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis. Further investigation is needed to determine whether ECT has a disease-modifying effect on this form of autoimmune encephalitis.

Socioscientific issues: topics and importance to the scientific education

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Díaz Moreno, Naira;

2012-01-01

Full Text Available Socioscientific debates arise and become widespread concerning the most popular and innovative issues in our society: transgenics, homeopathy, the impact of mobile phone network and so on. For this reason we believe it is important to analyse the meaning of these debates and the relationship between information processing in newspapers and teaching literature and to determine their possible use in a school context. The common image of scientific news that tends to appear in the media hampers its use in the classroom. On analysing didactic literature, we have selected activities that can be used as a model to plan debates in the science classroom with the objective of developing a series of capacities in students related to scientific literacy, critical thinking and the promotion of a scientific culture.

Assessors' Search Result Satisfaction Associated with Relevance in a Scientific Domain

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ingwersen, Peter; Lykke, Marianne; Bogers, Toine

2010-01-01

genuine information tasks. Ease of assessment and search satisfaction are cross tabulated with retrieval performance measured by Normalized Discounted Cumulated Gain. Results show that when assessors find small numbers of relevant documents they tend to regard the search results with dissatisfaction and...

INSPIRE: A new scientific information system for HEP

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ivanov, R; Raae, L

2010-01-01

The status of high-energy physics (HEP) information systems has been jointly analyzed by the libraries of CERN, DESY, Fermilab and SLAC. As a result, the four laboratories have started the INSPIRE project - a new platform built by moving the successful SPIRES features and content, curated at DESY, Fermilab and SLAC, into the open-source CDS Invenio digital library software that was developed at CERN. INSPIRE will integrate current acquisition workflows and databases to host the entire body of the HEP literature (about one million records), aiming to become the reference HEP scientific information platform worldwide. It will provide users with fast access to full text journal articles and preprints, but also material such as conference slides and multimedia. INSPIRE will empower scientists with new tools to discover and access the results most relevant to their research, enable novel text- and data-mining applications, and deploy new metrics to assess the impact of articles and authors. In addition, it will introduce the 'Web 2.0' paradigm of user-enriched content in the domain of sciences, with community-based approaches to scientific publishing. INSPIRE represents a natural evolution of scholarly communication built on successful community-based information systems, and it provides a vision for information management in other fields of science. Inspired by the needs of HEP, we hope that the INSPIRE project will be inspiring for other communities.

The 'Sequence of Prevention' for musculoskeletal injuries among recreational basketballers: a systematic review of the scientific literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Kilic, Özgür; Van Os, Vivian; Kemler, Ellen; Barendrecht, Maarten; Gouttebarge, Vincent

2018-01-16

Currently, there is no overview of the incidence and (basketball-specific) risk factors of musculoskeletal injuries among recreational basketball players, nor any insight into the effect of preventive measures on the incidence of basketball injuries. This study aimed to gather systematically the scientific evidence on the incidence, prevalence, aetiology and preventive measures for musculoskeletal injuries among recreational basketball players. Highly sensitive search strategies were built based on three groups of keywords (and related search terms). Two electronic databases were searched, namely Medline (biomedical literature) via Pubmed, and SPORTDiscus (sports and sports medicine literature) via EBSCOhost. The incidence of musculoskeletal injuries among recreational basketball players ranged from 0.0047 injuries per 1,000 athlete-exposures (AE) for dental injuries to 10.1 injuries per 1000 AE for overall injuries during match play. Significant risk factors for injuries were defending, postural sway, high vertical ground reaction force during jumping and weight >75 kg. All prevention studies have shown to have a significant effect on reducing the risk of injury ranging from an odds ratio (95% confidence interval (CI)) of 0.175 (0.049-0.626) for training injuries and a relative risk (95% CI) of 0.83 (0.57-1.19) achieved with FIFA 11+ prevention exercises and sport-specific balance training, relatively. In order to gain insight in the aetiology of basketball-specific injuries and consequently facilitate the development of preventive strategies, more high quality basketball-specific and injury-specific studies among recreational basketball players are needed.

[Scientific journals of medical students in Latin-America].

Science.gov (United States)

Cabrera-Samith, Ignacio; Oróstegui-Pinilla, Diana; Angulo-Bazán, Yolanda; Mayta-Tristán, Percy; Rodríguez-Morales, Alfonso J

2010-11-01

This article deals with the history and evolution of student's scientific journals in Latin-America, their beginnings, how many still exist and which is their future projection. Relevant events show the growth of student's scientific journals in Latin-America and how are they working together to improve their quality. This article is addressed not only for Latin American readers but also to worldwide readers. Latin American medical students are consistently working together to publish scientific research, whose quality is constantly improving.

Concentration of the most-cited papers in the scientific literature: analysis of journal ecosystems.

Science.gov (United States)

Ioannidis, John P A

2006-12-20

A minority of scientific journals publishes the majority of scientific papers and receives the majority of citations. The extent of concentration of the most influential articles is less well known. The 100 most-cited papers in the last decade in each of 21 scientific fields were analyzed; fields were considered as ecosystems and their "species" (journal) diversity was evaluated. Only 9% of journals in Journal Citation Reports had published at least one such paper. Among this 9%, half of them had published only one such paper. The number of journals that had published a larger number of most-cited papers decreased exponentially according to a Lotka law. Except for three scientific fields, six journals accounted for 53 to 94 of the 100 most-cited papers in their field. With increasing average number of citations per paper (citation density) in a scientific field, concentration of the most-cited papers in a few journals became even more prominent (ppapers published or number of journals available in a scientific field. Multidisciplinary journals accounted for 24% of all most-cited papers, with large variability across fields. The concentration of most-cited papers in multidisciplinary journals was most prominent in fields with high citation density (correlation coefficient 0.70, ppapers in eight scientific fields (none in two fields). Journals concentrating most-cited original articles often differed from those concentrating most-cited reviews. The concentration of the most-influential papers was stronger than the already prominent concentration of papers published and citations received. Despite a plethora of available journals, the most influential papers are extremely concentrated in few journals, especially in fields with high citation density. Existing multidisciplinary journals publish selectively most-cited papers from fields with high citation density.

Concentration of the Most-Cited Papers in the Scientific Literature: Analysis of Journal Ecosystems

Science.gov (United States)

Ioannidis, John P. A.

2006-01-01

Background A minority of scientific journals publishes the majority of scientific papers and receives the majority of citations. The extent of concentration of the most influential articles is less well known. Methods/Principal Findings The 100 most-cited papers in the last decade in each of 21 scientific fields were analyzed; fields were considered as ecosystems and their “species” (journal) diversity was evaluated. Only 9% of journals in Journal Citation Reports had published at least one such paper. Among this 9%, half of them had published only one such paper. The number of journals that had published a larger number of most-cited papers decreased exponentially according to a Lotka law. Except for three scientific fields, six journals accounted for 53 to 94 of the 100 most-cited papers in their field. With increasing average number of citations per paper (citation density) in a scientific field, concentration of the most-cited papers in a few journals became even more prominent (pjournals available in a scientific field. Multidisciplinary journals accounted for 24% of all most-cited papers, with large variability across fields. The concentration of most-cited papers in multidisciplinary journals was most prominent in fields with high citation density (correlation coefficient 0.70, pjournals had published fewer than eight of the 100 most-cited papers in eight scientific fields (none in two fields). Journals concentrating most-cited original articles often differed from those concentrating most-cited reviews. The concentration of the most-influential papers was stronger than the already prominent concentration of papers published and citations received. Conclusions Despite a plethora of available journals, the most influential papers are extremely concentrated in few journals, especially in fields with high citation density. Existing multidisciplinary journals publish selectively most-cited papers from fields with high citation density. PMID:17183679

Influence of radiation treatment on pharmaceuticals. A study of the relevant literature

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Dahlhelm, H.; Boess, C.

2002-01-01

The present communication provides a quick overview of the behaviour of individual substances when treated with ionizing radiation while making reference to the respective original literature. The choosen form of an encyclopaedia enables the user to find information at a glance. It is based on parts I - XII of our review of literature on the influence of radiation treatment on pharmaceutical products and adjuvants/excipients we started in 1978. (orig.)

Performance Testing of Cutting Fluids. A review of relevant literature

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Belluco, Walter

the extended abstracts in the data-base, each displayed on one page which is also bearing all relevant information for the retrieval of the published material. A full copy of the publications can be obtained in most cases by DTV-Technical Knowledge Center & Library of Denmark, Ankels Engelunds Vej 1, 2800...

Home care in Europe: a systematic literature review

Science.gov (United States)

2011-01-01

Background Health and social services provided at home are becoming increasingly important. Hence, there is a need for information on home care in Europe. The objective of this literature review was to respond to this need by systematically describing what has been reported on home care in Europe in the scientific literature over the past decade. Methods A systematic literature search was performed for papers on home care published in English, using the following data bases: Cinahl, the Cochrane Library, Embase, Medline, PsycINFO, Sociological Abstracts, Social Services Abstracts, and Social Care Online. Studies were only included if they complied with the definition of home care, were published between January 1998 and October 2009, and dealt with at least one of the 31 specified countries. Clinical interventions, instrument developments, local projects and reviews were excluded. The data extracted included: the characteristics of the study and aspects of home care 'policy & regulation', 'financing', 'organisation & service delivery', and 'clients & informal carers'. Results Seventy-four out of 5,133 potentially relevant studies met the inclusion criteria, providing information on 18 countries. Many focused on the characteristics of home care recipients and on the organisation of home care. Geographical inequalities, market forces, quality and integration of services were also among the issues frequently discussed. Conclusions Home care systems appeared to differ both between and within countries. The papers included, however, provided only a limited picture of home care. Many studies only focused on one aspect of the home care system and international comparative studies were rare. Furthermore, little information emerged on home care financing and on home care in general in Eastern Europe. This review clearly shows the need for more scientific publications on home care, especially studies comparing countries. A comprehensive and more complete insight into the

Avaliação da relevância de artigos científicos sobre obesidade e sobrepeso em Feira de Santana de 2003 a 2010

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Fábio Thomaz Melo

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Considerando-se que o sobrepeso e obesidade representam uma realidade no contexto mundial e, inclusive, local, o que tem propiciado um crescimento das produções científicas sobre o referido tema, esta pesquisa procedeu à investigação acerca da importância dos artigos publicados sobre obesidade e sobrepeso em Feira de Santana de 2003 a 2010. Para tanto, foi realizada uma pesquisa bibliográfica para análise da importância das produções, levando-se em consideração a relevância do órgão publicador e a sua classificação junto ao WebQualis, sistema utilizado pela Coordenadoria de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal do Ensino Superior (CAPES para avaliar a importância das produções científicas. Após levantamento de artigos existentes na Biblioteca Virtual de Saúde (LILACS e BDENF se utilizando dos termos obesidade, sobrepeso, Feira, Santana, foi possível verificar que, dos quatro artigos encontrados, dois (50% se enquadram em conceitos considerados de menor relevância para a comunidade científica, enquanto os outros dois (50% são classificados como de maior relevância. ABSTRACT Evaluation of the relevance of scientific articles on obesity and overweight in Feira de Santana 2003 and 2010 Considering that overweight and obesity represent a reality in the global context, including location, which has fostered growth of scientific production on the said topic, this research undertook research on the importance of published articles on obesity and overweight in Feira de Santana 2003 to 2010. to this end, a literature search was performed to analyze the importance of production, taking into account the importance of organ and his publisher by the Web Qualis classification system used by the Coordination for Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (CAPES to assess the importance of scientific production. After removal of articles on the Virtual Health Library (Rev and BDENf using the terms obesity, overweight, Fair, Santana, we found

Bibliometric analysis of worldwide scientific literature in mobile - health: 2006-2016.

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Sweileh, Waleed M; Al-Jabi, Samah W; AbuTaha, Adham S; Zyoud, Sa'ed H; Anayah, Fathi M A; Sawalha, Ansam F

2017-05-30

The advancement of mobile technology had positively influenced healthcare services. An emerging subfield of mobile technology is mobile health (m-Health) in which mobile applications are used for health purposes. The aim of this study was to analyze and assess literature published in the field of m-Health. SciVerse Scopus was used to retrieve literature in m-Health. The study period was set from 2006 to 2016. ArcGIS 10.1 was used to present geographical distribution of publications while VOSviewer was used for data visualization. Growth of publications, citation analysis, and research productivity were presented using standard bibliometric indicators. During the study period, a total of 5465 documents were published, giving an average of 496.8 documents per year. The h-index of retrieved documents was 81. Core keywords used in literature pertaining to m-Health included diabetes mellitus, adherence, and obesity among others. Relative growth rate and doubling time of retrieved literature were stable from 2009 to 2015 indicating exponential growth of literature in this field. A total of 4638 (84.9%) documents were multi-authored with a mean collaboration index of 4.1 authors per article. The United States of America ranked first in productivity with 1926 (35.2%) published documents. India ranked sixth with 183 (3.3%) documents while China ranked seventh with 155(2.8%) documents. VA Medical Center was the most prolific organization/institution while Journal of Medical Internet Research was the preferred journal for publications in the field of m-Health. Top cited articles in the field of m-Health included the use of mobile technology in improving adherence in HIV patients, weight loss, and improving glycemic control in diabetic patients. The size of literature in m-Health showed a noticeable increase in the past decade. Given the large volume of citations received in this field, it is expected that applications of m-Health will be seen into various health aspects and

Retracted publications in the drug literature.

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Samp, Jennifer C; Schumock, Glen T; Pickard, A Simon

2012-07-01

Recent studies have suggested an increase in the number of retracted scientific publications. It is unclear how broadly the issue of misleading and fraudulent publications pertains to retractions of drug therapy studies. Therefore, we sought to determine the trends and factors associated with retracted publications in drug therapy literature. A PubMed search was conducted to identify retracted drug therapy articles published from 2000-2011. Articles were grouped according to reason for retraction, which was classified as scientific misconduct or error. Scientific misconduct was further divided into data fabrication, data falsification, questions of data veracity, unethical author conduct, and plagiarism. Error was defined as duplicate publication, scientific mistake, journal error, or unstated reasons. Additional data were extracted from the retracted articles, including type of article, funding source, author information, therapeutic area, and retraction issue. A total of 742 retractions were identified from 2000-2011 in the general biomedical literature, and 102 drug studies met our inclusion criteria. Of these, 73 articles (72%) were retracted for a reason classified as scientific misconduct, whereas 29 articles (28%) were retracted for error. Among the 73 articles classified as scientific misconduct, those classified as unethical author conduct (32 articles [44%]) and data fabrication (24 articles [33%]) constituted the majority. The median time from publication of the original article to retraction was 31 months (range 1-130). Fifty percent of retracted articles did not state a funding source, whereas pharmaceutical manufacturer funding accounted for only 13 articles (13%) analyzed. Many retractions were due to repeat offenses by a small number of authors, with nearly 40% of the retracted studies associated with two individuals. We found that a greater proportion of drug therapy articles were retracted for reasons of misconduct and fraud compared with other

Bringing Relevance to Elearning--A Gender Perspective

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Wallace, Ann; Panteli, Niki

2018-01-01

In this paper, we discuss the importance of relevance in the provision of eLearning for the pursuit of higher education (HE). In particular, we argue how the extant literature focuses on quality and security in the design of eLearning platforms, but pays scant attention to how relevant the platform and the programme contents are to the needs of…

Scientific papers for health informatics.

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Pereira, Samáris Ramiro; Duarte, Jacy Marcondes; Bandiera-Paiva, Paulo

2013-01-01

From the hypothesis that the development of scientific papers, mainly in interdisciplinary areas such as Health Informatics, may bring difficulties to the author, as had its communicative efficacy decreased or compromising their approval for publication; we aim to make considerations on the main items to good players making this kind of text. The scientific writing has peculiarities that must be taken into consideration when it writes: general characteristics, such as simplicity and objectivity, and characteristics of each area of knowledge, such as terminology, formatting and standardization. The research methodology adopted is bibliographical. The information was based on literature review and the authors' experience, teachers and assessors of scientific methodology in peer review publications in the area. As a result, we designed a checklist of items to be checked before submission of a paper to a scientific publication vehicle in order to contribute to the promotion of research, facilitating the publication and increase its capacity in this important area of knowledge.

Neurology and literature 2.

Science.gov (United States)

Iniesta, I

2014-05-01

Good literary fiction has the potential to move us, extend our sense of life, transform our prospective views and help us in the face of adversity. A neurological disorder is likely to be the most challenging experience a human being may have to confront in a lifetime. As such, literary recreations of illnesses have a doubly powerful effect. Study the synergies between neurology and fictional literature with particular reference to narrative based medicine (NBM). Doctors establish boundaries between the normal and the abnormal. Taking a clinical history is an act of interpretation in which the doctor integrates the science of objective signs and measurable quantities with the art of subjective clinical judgment. The more discrepancy there is between the patient's experience with the illness and the doctor's interpretation of that disease, the less likely the doctor-patient interaction is to succeed. NBM contributes to a better discernment of the meanings, thus considering disease as a biographical event rather than just a natural fact. Drawing from their own experience with disease, writers of fiction provide universal insights through their narratives, whilst neuroscientists, like Cajal, have occasionally devoted their scientific knowledge to literary narratives. Furthermore, neurologists from Alzheimer to Oliver Sacks remind us of the essential value of NBM in the clinic. Integrating NBM (the narrative of patients) and the classic holistic approach to patients with our current paradigm of evidence based medicine represents a challenge as relevant to neurologists as keeping up with technological and scientific advances. Copyright © 2011 Sociedad Española de Neurología. Published by Elsevier Espana. All rights reserved.

ANALYSIS OF THE SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE ON SUSTAINABILITY IN ADMINISTRATION RESEARCH

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Márcia Martins Mendes De Luca

2014-09-01

Full Text Available Sustainability has become an increasingly popular topic in administration research projects, with a great number of researchers trying to understand and apply it to the corporate world. The general objective of the present study consists of investigating the theoretical perspectives of scientific production on sustainability in administration present in the annals of the Anpad Meeting and in the “Revista de Gestão Social e Ambiental”, over an eight-year period. The research encompasses the characteristics of authorship, methodological procedures and theoretical groundwork, as well as the qualitative characteristics of the selected articles. It is a qualitative study, characterized as descriptive research, with the application of bibliometrics and content analysis. 103 articles, published in the Anpad Meeting (annual editions, from 2003 to 2010 and in the “Revista de Gestão Social e Ambiental” (published three times a year, from 2007 to 2010, were analyzed. The results revealed an increase in scientific production on sustainability, demonstrating this topic’s growing maturity. In a more punctual way, researchers identified a tendency towards co-authorship; methodological diversity, not limited to theories or pre-defined models; and a high incidence of proposals of models related to sustainability.

Referencing Science: Teaching Undergraduates to Identify, Validate, and Utilize Peer-Reviewed Online Literature

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Berzonsky, William A.; Richardson, Katherine D.

2008-01-01

Accessibility of online scientific literature continues to expand due to the advent of scholarly databases and search engines. Studies have shown that undergraduates favor using online scientific literature to address research questions, but they often do not have the skills to assess the validity of research articles. Undergraduates generally are…

Mining skeletal phenotype descriptions from scientific literature.

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Tudor Groza

Full Text Available Phenotype descriptions are important for our understanding of genetics, as they enable the computation and analysis of a varied range of issues related to the genetic and developmental bases of correlated characters. The literature contains a wealth of such phenotype descriptions, usually reported as free-text entries, similar to typical clinical summaries. In this paper, we focus on creating and making available an annotated corpus of skeletal phenotype descriptions. In addition, we present and evaluate a hybrid Machine Learning approach for mining phenotype descriptions from free text. Our hybrid approach uses an ensemble of four classifiers and experiments with several aggregation techniques. The best scoring technique achieves an F-1 score of 71.52%, which is close to the state-of-the-art in other domains, where training data exists in abundance. Finally, we discuss the influence of the features chosen for the model on the overall performance of the method.

Understanding mineral trioxide aggregate/Portland-cement: a review of literature and background factors.

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Steffen, R; van Waes, H

2009-06-01

This was to carry out a review of the literature concerning mineral trioxide aggregate (MTA) and Portland cement with regards to clinical, biological and mechanical findings and a possible substitution of MTA through Portland cement for endodontic use. Electronic literature search of scientific papers from January 1993 to January 2009 was carried out on the MEDLINE and Scopus databases using specific key words. In total, 57 papers were identified that dealt with MTA and Portland cement in a relevant way. The review of 50 papers conforming to the applied criteria showed that MTA and Portland cements have the same clinical, biological and mechanical properties. In animal experiments and technical characterisations both materials seemed to have very similar properties. The only difference is bismuth oxide in MTA added for better radio opacity. It seems likely that MTA materials are based on industrial Portland cements mixed with bismuth oxide. More studies, especially some long-term studies comparing MTA and Portland cement, are necessary. The existing literature gives a solid base for clinical studies with Portland cement in order to replace MTA as an endodontic material. Portland cement could be a substitute for most endodontic materials used in primary teeth.

Pre-Operative Lugol's Iodine Treatment in the Management of Patients Undergoing Thyroidectomy for Graves' Disease: A Review of the Literature.

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Hope, Nicholas; Kelly, Andrew

2017-02-01

To undertake a review of the relevant English literature published on the pre-operative use of Lugol's iodine in the management of patients undergoing thyroidectomy for Graves' disease. We reviewed all relevant papers found through Ovid Medline, PubMed, EMBASE and the American Thyroid Association website. Searches were limited to the English language only. The critical appraisal tool CASP was used to help analyse the papers. Following this, the evidence was ranked using the Harbour and Miller classification of hierarchy. Four papers were deemed appropriate for analysis. The evidence contained within the review is considered weak. The literature available in the public domain regarding the use of iodinated solutions in the pre-operative period for those patients about to undergo thyroidectomy for Graves' disease is scant. Having undertaken an extensive literature review, we are of the opinion that the evidence on which the American Thyroid Association's guidance on the use of preoperative Lugol's iodine is based is tenuous. There appears to be little in the way of sound clinical evidence that post-operative outcomes are any different following a course of Lugol's iodine. Given the lack of robust clinical evidence regarding the clinical need for iodine solution in the pre-operative period, it appears clear that a larger, prospective, randomised controlled trial of all relevant outcomes - clinical and scientific - is required to answer whether or not patient preparation with Lugol's iodine is in fact necessary prior to operative intervention for Graves' disease.

[Macroscopical estimation of the post mortem interval (PMI) and exclusion of the forensically relevant resting period--a comparison of data presented in the literature with recent osteological findings].

Science.gov (United States)

Holley, Stephanie; Fiedler, Sabine; Graw, Matthias

2008-01-01

The aim of the present study was to determine to what extent macroscopical parameters mentioned in the literature are suitable for the estimation of the post mortem interval (PMI) and particularly for the exclusion of the forensically relevant resting period for recent bone material. The macroscopical examination of recent bone material with a known PMI showed that only one published parameter (relics of adipocere in the cross section of the compacta) was consistent with our findings for this particular resting period (27-28 years). Other macroscopical parameters presented in the literature were contradictory to the results observed in this study. Among those are the rigidity of bones, the adhesion of soft tissue, the filling of the marrow cavity, and the permeation of the epiphyses with adipocere. Concerning the exclusion of the forensically relevant resting period, a similar result was observed. This study identified some diagnostic findings in bones with a resting period of less than 50 years which according to the literature should only be present after a resting period of more than 50 years. These features included the lack of macroscopical traces of adipocere, degradation of the compacta surface, detachment of the cortical substance, the ability of bone to be broken with bare hands, and superficial usures. Moreover, in one-third of our cases we identified some intra-individual differences not previously described in the literature. In addition to the other results, those intra-individual differences make an estimation of the PMI more difficult. However it should be noted that those published parameters were collected from bone material which was stored in a "relatively arid sand-grit-clay soil of the broken stone layer of Munich". The bones in the present study were stored in acidic and clayey-loamy soil, partly with lateral water flow. In conclusion, the present study demonstrates that one should use caution estimating the post mortem interval and excluding

The paradox of imaging technology: A review of the literature

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Murphy, F.J.

2006-01-01

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to review the social scientific literature associated with medical imaging technology. Methods: An extensive search of published studies in nursing, psychology and anthropology was undertaken to support the radiography specific literature. Results: Following a broad definition of technology and its profound influence on society, an analysis of imaging literature revealed a complex relationship between technology and human interactions. Examples are cited for CT, MRI and ultrasound. Conclusion: It is suggested that any attempt to understand imaging technology must place at its centre the perspectives of patients and radiographers. Scientific descriptors must be balanced with equal deliberation given to 'soft technology'

[Scientific output on transsexuality in the Spanish biomedical literature: bibliometric and content analyses (1973-2011)].

Science.gov (United States)

Navarro-Pérez, Patricia; Ortiz-Gómez, Teresa; Gil-García, Eugenia

2015-01-01

To explore the scientific output on transsexuality in the Spanish biomedical literature between 1973 and 2011, through bibliometric and content analyses. We carried out a descriptive, cross-sectional study of Spanish biomedical articles on transsexuality published between 1973 and 2011. The data sources consisted of Índice Médico Español and ISOC-Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades. Bibliometric and content analyses were performed. A total of 65 papers were analyzed. Knowledge on transsexuality in Spain began to appear in medical journals between 1973 and 1984. A decade of intense productivity began in 1996 and the number of journals publishing articles on transsexuality multiplied in the following years. Until 2006, the year with the most biomedical productivity, biomedical discourses reproduced representations of transsexuality anchored in biological determinism. From 2008-2011, professionals writing on the topic incorporated feminist theories and social perspectives in their discourses. In the last quarter of the twentieth century, the dominant medical discourse considered manifestations of transsexual people from a biologist perspective that conceives transsexuality as a configuration mismatch between sex and gender. The emergence of new identity categories and medical reflection from non-essentialist and non-normative gender perspectives has improved the clinical management of transsexuality. Copyright © 2014 SESPAS. Published by Elsevier Espana. All rights reserved.

What's in a Name: Is “Evolutionary Psychology” Eclipsing “Sociobiology” in the Scientific Literature?

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Gregory D. Webster

2007-10-01

Full Text Available Is the term “evolutionary psychology” supplanting “sociobiology” in the scientific literature? How influential was E. O. Wilson's (1975 book, Sociobiology, in establishing the discipline of the same name? Similarly, how influential were the two Tooby-Cosmides chapters appearing in The Adapted Mind (Cosmides and Tooby, 1992; Tooby and Cosmides, 1992 in establishing evolutionary psychology as a viable outgrowth of sociobiology? The purpose of the present research was to answer these questions using quantitative analyses of publication trends. The Internet search engine Google Scholar was used to count the number of hits (i.e., the number of scholarly works, citations, etc. for “sociobiology” and “evolutionary psychology” separately per year from 1960 to 2003. Interrupted time-series analyses revealed significant increases (intercept shifts for sociobiology hits between 1974 and 1975, and for evolutionary psychology hits between 1991 and 1992. Evolutionary psychology hits also experienced a significant increase in change-over-time (a slope shift between 1991 and 1992. Growth curve analyses revealed that the rate of growth for evolutionary psychology, which was accelerating over time, was significantly greater than that for sociobiology, which was decelerating. The implications of these findings for understanding the histories of sociobiology and evolutionary psychology are discussed.

Result of some valuable scientific searches

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sergiu VLĂDICĂ

2017-06-01

Full Text Available Annually, the Editorial Activity division of the Academy of Public Administration edits the proceedings of the scientific-practical conferences with international participation „Theory and Practice of Public Administration”, in a separate volume. This year collection contains 120 articles signed by the researchers of the Academy, of other national higher education institutions and from the similar institutions abroad, of central and local public authorities. The most relevant scientific researches presented in the plenary session of the Conference as well as within six workshops are emphasized in the article.

Advanced Excel for scientific data analysis

CERN Document Server

De Levie, Robert

2004-01-01

Excel is by far the most widely distributed data analysis software but few users are aware of its full powers. Advanced Excel For Scientific Data Analysis takes off from where most books dealing with scientific applications of Excel end. It focuses on three areas-least squares, Fourier transformation, and digital simulation-and illustrates these with extensive examples, often taken from the literature. It also includes and describes a number of sample macros and functions to facilitate common data analysis tasks. These macros and functions are provided in uncompiled, computer-readable, easily

Transcription factor HIF1A: downstream targets, associated pathways, polymorphic hypoxia response element (HRE) sites, and initiative for standardization of reporting in scientific literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Slemc, Lucija; Kunej, Tanja

2016-11-01

Hypoxia-inducible factor-1α (HIF-1α) has crucial role in adapting cells to hypoxia through expression regulation of many genes. Identification of HIF-1α target genes (HIF-1α-TGs) is important for understanding the adapting mechanism. The aim of the present study was to collect known HIF-1α-TGs and identify their associated pathways. Targets and associated genomics data were retrieved using PubMed, WoS ( http://apps.webofknowledge.com/ ), HGNC ( http://www.genenames.org/ ), NCBI ( http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ ), Ensemblv.84 ( http://www.ensembl.org/index.html ), DAVID Bioinformatics Resources ( https://david.ncifcrf.gov /), and Disease Ontology database ( http://disease-ontology.org/ ). From 51 papers, we collected 98 HIF-1α TGs found to be associated with 20 pathways, including metabolism of carbohydrates and pathways in cancer. Reanalysis of genomic coordinates of published HREs (hypoxia response elements) revealed six polymorphisms within HRE sites (HRE-SNPs): ABCG2, ACE, CA9, and CP. Due to large heterogeneity of results presentation in scientific literature, we also propose a first step towards reporting standardization of HIF-1α-target interactions consisting of ten relevant data types. Suggested minimal checklist for reporting will enable faster development of a complete catalog of HIF-1α-TGs, data sharing, bioinformatics analyses, and setting novel more targeted hypotheses. The proposed format for data standardization is not yet complete but presents a baseline for further optimization of the protocol with additional details, for example, regarding the experimental validation.

The policy relevance of global environmental change research

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yarnal, Brent

1996-01-01

Many scientists are striving to identify and promote the policy implications of their global change research. Much basic research on global environmental change cannot advance policy directly, but new projects can determine the relevance of their research to decision makers and build policy-relevant products into the work. Similarly, many ongoing projects can alter or add to the present science design to make the research policy relevant. Thus, this paper shows scientists working on global change how to make their research policy relevant. It demonstrates how research on physical global change relates to human dimensions studies and integrated assessments. It also presents an example of how policy relevance can be fit retroactively into a global change project (in this case, SRBEX-the Susquehanna River Basin Experiment) and how that addition can enhance the project's status and science. The paper concludes that policy relevance is desirable from social and scientific perspectives

The relevance of ligament balancing in total knee arthroplasty: how important is it? A systematic review of the literature

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Sina Babazadeh

2009-11-01

Full Text Available Ligament balancing affects many of the postoperative criteria for a successful knee replacement. A balanced knee contributes to improved alignment and stability. Ligament balancing helps reduce wear and loosening of the joint. A patient with a balanced knee is more likely to have increased range of motion and proprioception, and decreased pain. All these factors help minimize the need for revision surgery. Complications associated with ligament balancing can include instability caused by over-balancing and the possibility of neurovascular damage during or as a result of ligament balancing. This article attempts to summarize the literature, to define a balanced knee, and outline the benefits and possible complications of ligament balancing. Different techniques, sequences, and tools used in ligament balancing, and their relevance in correcting various deformities are reviewed.

Scientific research in the Soviet Union

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Mtingwa, S.K.

1990-01-01

I report on the scientific aspects of my US/USSR Interacademy Exchange Visit to the Soviet Union. My research was conducted at three different institutes: the Lebedev Physical Institute in Moscow, the Leningrad Nuclear Physics Institute in Gatchina, and the Yerevan Physics Institute in Soviet Armenia. I included relevant information about the Soviet educational system, salaries of Soviet physicists, work habits and research activities at the three institutes, and the relevance of that research to work going on in the United States. 18 refs

Fast-fashion: systematic literature review and research agenda

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Lívia Juliana Silva Solino

2015-09-01

Full Text Available The fast-fashion (FF is considered an approach and phenomenon of global influence that suit the requirements of a constantly changing and demanding market, since it is a business model resulting of a mixture of fast manufacturing, flexibility, low cost and agile retail approaches. Within this context, this research by a systematic literature review seeks to answer how the FF has been addressed in scientific studies published until the year 2013. Through the review, a total of 82 texts was analysed, among them articles, dissertations and theses. The research method employed is characterized as descriptive, regarding the objectives, and as qualitative and quantitative, on the approach. After conducting the classification of the material, it was possible to understand the state-of-the-art, and thus set a holistic concept and the appropriate term for the FF. As well as propose a research agenda with new approaches for future studies within the relevant topic.

Information Discovery from Complementary Literatures: Categorizing Viruses as Potential Weapons.

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Swanson, Don R.; Smalheiser, Neil R.; Bookstein, A.

2001-01-01

This project demonstrates how techniques of analyzing complementary literatures might be applied to problems of defense against biological weapons. The article is based solely on the open-source scientific literature, and is oriented on informatics techniques. Findings are intended as a guide to the virus literature to support further studies that…

Writing the review of literature: rasgulla as metaphor

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Nandita Chattopadhyay, DCH, DNB (Ped, FAIMER Fellow

2014-12-01

Full Text Available The author uses the metaphor of the Indian sweet, rasgulla, to unravel the details of how to conduct a literature search, and demonstrates thereby, how to structure a review of literature. The process also illustrates that a scientific temperament can be beneficial in any walk of life.

Introduction - NCS Dietary Assessment Literature Review

Science.gov (United States)

To assist in the planning of the National Children's Study, investigators at the NIH Office of Dietary Supplements, NCI and Johns Hopkins University contracted with Westat to conduct a comprehensive review of the scientific literature.

Non-surgical spinal decompression therapy: does the scientific literature support efficacy claims made in the advertising media?

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Daniel Dwain M

2007-05-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Traction therapy has been utilized in the treatment of low back pain for decades. The most recent incarnation of traction therapy is non-surgical spinal decompression therapy which can cost over $100,000. This form of therapy has been heavily marketed to manual therapy professions and subsequently to the consumer. The purpose of this paper is to initiate a debate pertaining to the relationship between marketing claims and the scientific literature on non-surgical spinal decompression. Discussion Only one small randomized controlled trial and several lower level efficacy studies have been performed on spinal decompression therapy. In general the quality of these studies is questionable. Many of the studies were performed using the VAX-D® unit which places the patient in a prone position. Often companies utilize this research for their marketing although their units place the patient in the supine position. Summary Only limited evidence is available to warrant the routine use of non-surgical spinal decompression, particularly when many other well investigated, less expensive alternatives are available.

INF Code related matters. Joint IAEA/IMO literature survey on potential consequences of severe maritime accidents involving the transport of radioactive material. 2 volumes. Vol. I - Report and publication titles. Vol. II - Relevant abstracts

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

2000-07-10

This literature survey was undertaken jointly by the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) as a step in addressing the subject of environmental impact of accidents involving materials subject to the IMO's Code for the Safe Carriage of Irradiated Nuclear Fuel, Plutonium and High-Level Radioactive Wastes in Flasks on Board Ships, also known as the INF Code. The results of the survey are provided in two volumes: the first one containing the description of the search and search results with the list of generated publication titles, and the second volume containing the abstracts of those publications deemed relevant for the purposes of the literature survey. Literature published between 1980 and mid-1999 was reviewed by two independent consultants who generated publication titles by performing searches of appropriate databases, and selected the abstracts of relevant publications for inclusion in this survey. The IAEA operates INIS, the world's leading computerised bibliographical information system on the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. The acronym INIS stands for International Nuclear Information System. INIS Members are responsible for determining the relevant nuclear literature produced within their borders or organizational confines, and then preparing the associated input in accordance with INIS rules. INIS records are included in other major databases such as the Energy, Science and Technology database of the DIALOG service. Because it is the INIS Members, rather than the IAEA Secretariat, who are responsible for its contents, it was considered appropriate that INIS be the primary source of information for this literature review. Selected unpublished reports were also reviewed, e.g. Draft Proceedings of the Special Consultative Meeting of Entities involved in the maritime transport of materials covered by the INF Code (SCM 5), March 1996. Many of the formal papers at SCM 5 were included in the literature

INF Code related matters. Joint IAEA/IMO literature survey on potential consequences of severe maritime accidents involving the transport of radioactive material. 2 volumes. Vol. I - Report and publication titles. Vol. II - Relevant abstracts

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2000-01-01

This literature survey was undertaken jointly by the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) as a step in addressing the subject of environmental impact of accidents involving materials subject to the IMO's Code for the Safe Carriage of Irradiated Nuclear Fuel, Plutonium and High-Level Radioactive Wastes in Flasks on Board Ships, also known as the INF Code. The results of the survey are provided in two volumes: the first one containing the description of the search and search results with the list of generated publication titles, and the second volume containing the abstracts of those publications deemed relevant for the purposes of the literature survey. Literature published between 1980 and mid-1999 was reviewed by two independent consultants who generated publication titles by performing searches of appropriate databases, and selected the abstracts of relevant publications for inclusion in this survey. The IAEA operates INIS, the world's leading computerised bibliographical information system on the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. The acronym INIS stands for International Nuclear Information System. INIS Members are responsible for determining the relevant nuclear literature produced within their borders or organizational confines, and then preparing the associated input in accordance with INIS rules. INIS records are included in other major databases such as the Energy, Science and Technology database of the DIALOG service. Because it is the INIS Members, rather than the IAEA Secretariat, who are responsible for its contents, it was considered appropriate that INIS be the primary source of information for this literature review. Selected unpublished reports were also reviewed, e.g. Draft Proceedings of the Special Consultative Meeting of Entities involved in the maritime transport of materials covered by the INF Code (SCM 5), March 1996. Many of the formal papers at SCM 5 were included in the literature

A Qualitative Study Examining the Exclusive Use of Primary Literature in a Special Topics Biology Course: Improving Conceptions about the Nature of Science and Boosting Confidence in Approaching Original Scientific Research

Science.gov (United States)

Carter, B. Elijah; Wiles, Jason R.

2017-01-01

This qualitative study explores the experiences of six students enrolled in a special topics biology class that exclusively used primary literature as course material. Nature of science (NOS) conceptions have been linked to students' attitudes toward scientific subjects, but there has been little research specifically exploring the effects of…

Mapping the evolution of scientific ideas

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Roberts, David C [Los Alamos National Laboratory; Herrera, Mark [UNIV OF MARYLAND; Gulbahce, Natali [NORTHEASTERN UNIV

2008-01-01

The importance of interdisciplinary research is ever increasing as challenging world problems require expertise across diverse fields. Despite the apparent conceptual boundaries of scientific fields, a formal description for their evolution is lacking. Here we describe a novel approach to study the dynamics and evolution of scientific ideas and fields using a network-based analysis. We build a idea network consisting of American Physical Society Pacs numbers as nodes representing scientific concepts. Two Pacs numbers are linked in the network if there exist publications that reference them simultaneously. We locate scientific fields using an overlapping community finding algorithm and describe the time evolution of these fields using a community evolution method over the course of 1985-2006. We find that the communities we find map to scientific fields, the lifetime of these fields strongly depends on their size, impact and activity, and longest living communities are least volatile. The described approach to quantify the evolution of ideas is expected to be relevant in making predictions about the future of science and how to guide its development.

Ten tips for authors of scientific articles.

Science.gov (United States)

Hong, Sung-Tae

2014-08-01

Writing a good quality scientific article takes experience and skill. I propose 'Ten Tips' that may help to improve the quality of manuscripts for scholarly journals. It is advisable to draft first version of manuscript and revise it repeatedly for consistency and accuracy of the writing. During the drafting and revising the following tips can be considered: 1) focus on design to have proper content, conclusion, points compliant with scope of the target journal, appropriate authors and contributors list, and relevant references from widely visible sources; 2) format the manuscript in accordance with instructions to authors of the target journal; 3) ensure consistency and logical flow of ideas and scientific facts; 4) provide scientific confidence; 5) make your story interesting for your readers; 6) write up short, simple and attractive sentences; 7) bear in mind that properly composed and reflective titles increase chances of attracting more readers; 8) do not forget that well-structured and readable abstracts improve citability of your publications; 9) when revising adhere to the rule of 'First and Last' - open your text with topic paragraph and close it with resolution paragraph; 10) use connecting words linking sentences within a paragraph by repeating relevant keywords.

Building scientific institution’s brand with online instruments

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Barbara Mróz-Gorgoń

2016-03-01

Full Text Available The brand image is fundamental for the scientific institution. In the high- competitive market the brand may have a significant impact on students decisions but also the decisions made by other stakeholders. The usage of online tools in creating brands and the brand awareness is standard nowdays and is present in many business strategies. The aim of the article is to present the problem on the example of scientific institutions. Based on literature review and empirical study the authors described the usage of most popular online tools in creating the scientific institutions’ brands.

Scientific method, adversarial system, and technology assessment

Science.gov (United States)

Mayo, L. H.

1975-01-01

A basic framework is provided for the consideration of the purposes and techniques of scientific method and adversarial systems. Similarities and differences in these two techniques of inquiry are considered with reference to their relevance in the performance of assessments.

Passive prosthetic hands and tools: A literature review.

Science.gov (United States)

Maat, Bartjan; Smit, Gerwin; Plettenburg, Dick; Breedveld, Paul

2018-02-01

The group of passive prostheses consists of prosthetic hands and prosthetic tools. These can either be static or adjustable. Limited research and development on passive prostheses has been performed although many people use these prosthesis types. Although some publications describe passive prostheses, no recent review of the peer-reviewed literature on passive prostheses is available. Review the peer-reviewed literature on passive prostheses for replacement of the hand. Literature review. Four electronic databases were searched using a Boolean combination of relevant keywords. English-language articles relevant to the objective were selected. In all, 38 papers were included in the review. Publications on passive prosthetic hands describe their users, usage, functionality, and problems in activities of daily living. Publications on prosthetic tools mostly focus on sport, recreation, and vehicle driving. Passive hand prostheses receive little attention in prosthetic research and literature. Yet one out of three people with a limb deficiency uses this type of prosthesis. Literature indicates that passive prostheses can be improved on pulling and grasping functions. In the literature, ambiguous names are used for different types of passive prostheses. This causes confusion. We present a new and clear classification of passive prostheses. Clinical relevance This review provides information on the users of passive prosthetic hands and tools, their usage and the functionality. Passive prostheses receive very little attention and low appreciation in literature. Passive prosthetic hands and tools show to be useful to many unilateral amputees and should receive more attention and higher acceptance.

Consideration of social scientific issues in a safety case. Final report

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sailer, Michael; Kallenbach-Herbert, Beate; Brohmann, Bettina; Spieth-Achtnich, Angelika

2010-01-01

The research outcome presented here - a model for identifying and describing safety-relevant social scientific issues - provides a scientific basis for addressing these issues in a safety case. In order for them to be implemented in a repository process, it would be necessary to elaborate in greater detail the initial conceptual foundations that have been laid in this research project in line with the project's terms of reference. The requisite elaboration relates to binding rules for designing the repository process, particularly with regard to the stages in which the safety case is to be developed during planning, approval, construction and operation through to repository closure. Such detailed elaboration also needs to involve specifying the extent to which each social scientific issue and sub-issue is to be addressed in the different stages. Consideration would need to be given not only to the relevance of the issue for a given stage but also to the various options and methods for providing proof of safety. It would be possible to draw on experiences with handling safety management in nuclear power plants - a sphere in which over the last ten years efforts have been ongoing to develop methods for presentation by the operator and review by the authorities. Furthermore, it is likely that the social scientific issues relevant to a safety case cannot be defined once and for all in a single process, but that the need for continual revision and adaptation will arise due to both the increasing knowledge acquired during the course of the repository process and the experiences and expectations of stakeholders (similarly to experiences in the sphere of scientific-technological requirements). Appropriate conditions need to be defined for such a process. This process could be supported by implementing the option mentioned above whereby a regulatory definition of safety management for geological disposal is formulated which encompasses all safety-relevant social scientific

Scientific relevance of Swiss property insurance data on flood risks and losses

Science.gov (United States)

Röthlisberger, Veronika; Bernet, Daniel; Keiler, Margreth

2015-04-01

The databases of Swiss flood insurance companies build a valuable but to date rarely used source of information for flood risk research. Detailed insights into the Swiss flood insurance system are crucial to evaluate the potential of the different databases for scientific analysis. Even though the flood insurance system modalities are mainly regulated on cantonal level there are some common principles that apply throughout Switzerland. First of all coverage against floods (and other particular natural hazards) is an integral part of every fire insurance policy for buildings or contents in Switzerland. This coupling of insurance as well as the statutory obligation to insure buildings in most of the cantons and movables in some of the cantons lead to a very high penetration. Second, in case of damage, the reinstatement costs (value as new) are compensated and third there are no (or little) deductible and co-pay. Thus the different datasets of the flood insurance companies would allow a very comprehensive data analysis. Moreover, insurance companies not only store electronically data about losses (typically date, amount of claims payment, cause of damage, identity of the insured object or policyholder) but also about insured objects. For insured objects the (insured) value and the details on the policy and its holder are the main feature to record. On buildings the insurance companies usually computerize additional information such as location, volume, year of construction or purpose of use. For the 19 (of total 26) cantons with a cantonal monopoly insurer the data of these insurance establishments have the additional value to represent (almost) the entire building stock of the respective canton. However, scientists face a wide range of the opportunities and challenges when using insurance data for flood research. The origin of flood insurance data implies that they are not generated for research but for business management. The presentation will highlighted pro and

Understanding the role of waste prevention in local waste management: A literature review.

Science.gov (United States)

Zacho, Kristina O; Mosgaard, Mette A

2016-10-01

Local waste management has so far been characterised by end-of-pipe solutions, landfilling, incineration, and recycling. End-of-pipe solutions build on a different mind-set than life cycle-based approaches, and for this reason, local waste managers are reluctant to consider strategies for waste prevention. To accelerate the transition of waste and resource management towards a more integrated management, waste prevention needs to play a larger role in the local waste management. In this review article, we collect knowledge from the scientific community on waste prevention of relevance to local waste management. We analyse the trends in the waste prevention literature by organising the literature into four categories. The results indicate an increasing interest in waste prevention, but not much literature specifically concerns the integration of prevention into the local waste management. However, evidence from the literature can inform local waste management on the prevention potential; the environmental and social effects of prevention; how individuals in households can be motivated to reduce waste; and how the effects of prevention measures can be monitored. Nevertheless, knowledge is still lacking on local waste prevention, especially regarding the methods for monitoring and how local waste management systems can be designed to encourage waste reduction in the households. We end the article with recommendations for future research. The literature review can be useful for both practitioners in the waste sector and for academics seeking an overview of previous research on waste prevention. © The Author(s) 2016.

Using Primary Literature to Teach Science Literacy to Introductory Biology Students

OpenAIRE

Johanna Krontiris-Litowitz

2013-01-01

Undergraduate students struggle to read the scientific literature and educators have suggested that this may reflect deficiencies in their science literacy skills. In this two-year study we develop and test a strategy for using the scientific literature to teach science literacy skills to novice life science majors. The first year of the project served as a preliminary investigation in which we evaluated student science literacy skills, created a set of science literacy learning objectives al...

The Importance of Scientific Research on Happiness and Its Relevance to Higher Education

Science.gov (United States)

Bourner, Tom; Rospigliosi, Asher

2014-01-01

There has been much interest in happiness over the last decade fueled by developments in neuroscience and the measurement of happiness. Positive psychology has emerged as a recognised discipline within academia to provide a home for the findings of the new scientific study of happiness. In 2011, positive psychology was the most popular course at…

When stereotypes become 'scientific' statements: dealing with gender issues.

Science.gov (United States)

Madureira, Ana Flávia do Amaral

2009-06-01

The theoretical analysis by Watzlawik (Integrative Psychological & Behavioral Science 2009) demonstrates the scientific fragility of the constructs of masculinity and femininity based on the oversimplification and overlapping between three levels of analysis: group differences, inter-individual differences and intra-individual differences. Watzlawik presents fresh and relevant contributions in terms of methodological issues, especially about the construction of scientific generalizations. Here I focus on issues related to the transformation of stereotypes in statements about gender differences that claim to be 'scientific'--outlining the socio-political agendas of such statements.

A guide of scientific writing in English

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Han, Bang Geun

1987-10-01

This book introduces reference while writing English paper, how to use letters, punctuation, how to use articles, similar word phrases and verbs used in scientific writings, auxiliary verbs, nouns deeply related to scientific writings, expressions about experiment tools and equipment, expressions of chemicals, how to mark numbers, adjectives and pronouns relevant to numbers, how to make plural form, expressions about multiple, surface area, depth, width, time, period, temperature, humidity. It also adds expressions about sensible assessment, statistics, deviation, signs, abbreviations, and how to write letters in English.

Annotated black walnut literature

Science.gov (United States)

J. W. Van Sambeek

2006-01-01

Many of our publications on the establishment, management, and utilization of black walnut, butternut, and associated high-value hardwoods are printed in conference proceedings or scientific journals that are not readily available at most public libraries or on the internet. As Chair of the Education Committee, I have tried to summarize for you the relevant findings of...

Fostering Scientific Reasoning in Education--Meta-Analytic Evidence from Intervention Studies

Science.gov (United States)

Engelmann, Katharina; Neuhaus, Birgit J.; Fischer, Frank

2016-01-01

Scientific reasoning skills are not just for researchers, they are also increasingly relevant for making informed decisions in our everyday lives. How can these skills be facilitated? The current state of research on supporting scientific reasoning includes intervention studies but lacks an integrated analysis of the approaches to foster…

On the Influence of Naturalism on American Literature

Science.gov (United States)

Zhang, Xiaofen

2010-01-01

Naturalism was first proposed and formulated by French novelist Emile Zola, and it was introduced to America by American novelist Frank Norris. It is a new and harsher realism. It is a theory in literature emphasizing scientific observation of life without idealism or avoidance of the ugly. American literature naturalists dismissed the validity of…

Social behavioural epistemology and the scientific community.

Science.gov (United States)

Watve, Milind

2017-07-01

The progress of science is influenced substantially by social behaviour of and social interactions within the scientific community. Similar to innovations in primate groups, the social acceptance of an innovation depends not only upon the relevance of the innovation but also on the social dominance and connectedness of the innovator. There are a number of parallels between many well-known phenomena in behavioural evolution and various behavioural traits observed in the scientific community. It would be useful, therefore, to use principles of behavioural evolution as hypotheses to study the social behaviour of the scientific community. I argue in this paper that a systematic study of social behavioural epistemology is likely to boost the progress of science by addressing several prevalent biases and other problems in scientific communication and by facilitating appropriate acceptance/rejection of novel concepts.

Accessing the scientific literature. The reality of virtual scholarship.

Science.gov (United States)

Birrer, R B; Doherty, M

1997-01-01

The age-honored practice of plowing through the Index Medicus in a good medical library to meander through citations for treasured finds is an anachronism. Today, clinicians have the astonishing capacity to bring to bear existing knowledge almost effortlessly. Virtual scholarship makes available up-to-date medical citations and their abstracts. There can be access around the clock on any topic in the office, at the bedside, or from home. Computerized searches of the medical literature promote directed continuing education and may enhance clinical care of patients.

Geomicrobiology and its relevance to nuclear waste disposal - a further annotated bibliography

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

West, J.M.; Arme, S.C.

1984-07-01

Scientific investigations into the disposal of high/intermediate level radioactive waste into deep geological formations includes work in the field of geomicrobiology. It has been shown that microbes exist in deep and shallow geological formations and that they could alter the geochemical environment of a waste repository and influence radionuclide migration. A preliminary literature survey indicated a lack of annotated material and an initial report (West, McKinley and Christofi, 1982) provided the first bibliography. This report is an updated annotated bibliography of relevant geomicrobiological research published since 1982 and should be used in conjunction with the previous report. Those without specific biological experience may find the glossary of common terms in the initial report of use. A major area of work which has not been referenced widely here is near surface disposal of both radioactive and conventional industrial waste. This vast topic can be accessed via some of the general reviews in this report. (author)

Evaluation of the scientific impact of the Ebola epidemic: a systematic review.

Science.gov (United States)

Mutters, N T; Malek, V; Agnandji, S T; Günther, F; Tacconelli, E

2017-09-04

The Ebola outbreak prompted an extensive number of scientific publications, but little attention has been paid to the involvement of local scientists, distribution of research funding and related publications. We sought to systematically review publicly available information on the scientific impact of the Ebola epidemic. A systematic review of literature on the Ebola outbreak was performed. Extracted information included origins of the authors, type and distribution of funding, and impact factors (IF) of related publications between 6 December 2013, and 22 December 2015. We identified 460 relevant articles out of 3281 references, which were mostly authored by American (46.6%) and European (28.4%) institutions; only 13.4% of authors were affiliated with African institutions. Most IF can be attributed to the Americas and Europe, with 43% (25 030.8 IF) and 34.5% (20 074.2 IF), respectively, compared with 17.9% (10 436.5 IF) in Africa. Funds were provided mainly by the Americas (31.8% of all funded studies) and Europe (17%). American and European funds were also distributed back, mainly to American (77.8%) and European (85.2%) institutions, respectively. The Ebola outbreak had a significant scientific impact and resulted in numerous publications in high IF journals. The main impact could be measured in the Americas and Europe, and was directly related to funding. African researchers were only marginally involved in the scientific processing (86.6% of all researchers were not African), probably because major research centres are located in America and Europe. Our results suggest the importance of promoting closer cooperation between regions. Copyright © 2017 European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Scientific white paper on concentration-QTc modeling.

Science.gov (United States)

Garnett, Christine; Bonate, Peter L; Dang, Qianyu; Ferber, Georg; Huang, Dalong; Liu, Jiang; Mehrotra, Devan; Riley, Steve; Sager, Philip; Tornoe, Christoffer; Wang, Yaning

2018-06-01

The International Council for Harmonisation revised the E14 guideline through the questions and answers process to allow concentration-QTc (C-QTc) modeling to be used as the primary analysis for assessing the QTc interval prolongation risk of new drugs. A well-designed and conducted QTc assessment based on C-QTc modeling in early phase 1 studies can be an alternative approach to a thorough QT study for some drugs to reliably exclude clinically relevant QTc effects. This white paper provides recommendations on how to plan and conduct a definitive QTc assessment of a drug using C-QTc modeling in early phase clinical pharmacology and thorough QT studies. Topics included are: important study design features in a phase 1 study; modeling objectives and approach; exploratory plots; the pre-specified linear mixed effects model; general principles for model development and evaluation; and expectations for modeling analysis plans and reports. The recommendations are based on current best modeling practices, scientific literature and personal experiences of the authors. These recommendations are expected to evolve as their implementation during drug development provides additional data and with advances in analytical methodology.

Culturally Relevant Literature: What Matters Most to Primary-Age Urban Learners

Science.gov (United States)

Cartledge, Gwendolyn; Keesey, Susan; Bennett, Jessica G.; Ramnath, Rajiv; Council, Morris R., III.

2016-01-01

The ratings and rationales primary-age urban learners gave culturally relevant reading passages was the focus of this descriptive study. First- and second-grade students each read 30 researcher-developed passages reflecting the students' immediate and historical backgrounds. The students rated the passages and gave a reason for their ratings. A…

Prader-willi syndrome: A case report and a Chinese literature review.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhu, Junzhen; Cao, Qinying; Zhang, Ning; Zhao, Lijuan

2013-11-01

Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS) is a genetic disorder, resulting from lack of gene expression on the paternally inherited chromosome 15. It is important to determine diagnostic methods for PWS for early treatment. In this study, we report a newborn with Prader-willi syndrome. We further summarized the genetic testing results in the Chinese literature and the relevance of high resolution chromosome and genome-wide copy number variation analysis. There is a heterozygosis deletion of a 5 Mb region in the paternal chromosome 15q11.3-q13.3 by genome-wide copy number variation analysis. However, there is no abnormality in high resolution chromosome karyotype analysis. In conclusion, genome-wide copy number variation analysis is an effective and specific diagnosis method, which will provide scientific evidence for the clinical diagnosis and early treatment of PWS.

Clinically relevant incidental cardiovascular findings in CT examinations

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Voigt, P.; Fahnert, J.; Kahn, T.; Surov, A.; Schramm, D.; Bach, A.G.

2017-01-01

Incidental cardiovascular findings are a frequent phenomenon in computed tomography (CT) examinations. As the result of a dedicated PubMed search this article gives a systemic overview of the current literature on the most important incidental cardiovascular findings, their prevalence and clinical relevance. The majority of incidental cardiovascular findings are of only low clinical relevance; however, highly relevant incidental findings, such as aortic aneurysms, thromboses and thromboembolic events can also occasionally be found, especially in oncology patients. The scans from every CT examination should also be investigated for incidental findings as they can be of decisive importance for the further clinical management of patients, depending on their clinical relevance. (orig.) [de

[The functional sport shoe parameter "torsion" within running shoe research--a literature review].

Science.gov (United States)

Michel, F I; Kälin, X; Metzger, A; Westphal, K; Schweizer, F; Campe, S; Segesser, B

2009-12-01

Within the sport shoe area torsion is described as the twisting and decoupling of the rear-, mid- and forefoot along the longitudinal axis of the foot. Studies have shown that running shoes restrict the torsion of the foot and thus they increase the pronation of the foot. Based on the findings, it is recommended to design running shoes, which allow the natural freedom of movement of the foot. The market introduction of the first torsion concept through adidas(R) took place in 1989. Independently of the first market introduction, only one epidemiological study was conducted in the running shoe area. The study should investigate the occurrence of Achilles tendon problems of the athletes running in the new "adidas Torsion(R) shoes". However, further studies quantifying the optimal region of torsionability concerning the reduction of injury incidence are still missing. Newer studies reveal that the criterion torsion only plays a secondary roll regarding the buying decision. Moreover, athletes are not able to perceive torsionability as a discrete functional parameter. It is to register, that several workgroups are dealing intensively with the detailed analysis of the foot movement based on kinematic multi-segment-models. However, scientific as well as popular scientific contributions display that the original idea of the torsion concept is still not completely understood. Hence, the "inverse" characteristic is postulated. The present literature review leads to the deduction that the functional characteristics of the torsion concept are not fully implemented within the running shoe area. This implies the necessity of scientific studies, which investigate the relevance of a functional torsion concept regarding injury prevention based on basic and applied research. Besides, biomechanical studies should analyse systematically the mechanism and the effects of torsion relevant technologies and systems.

Wind turbines and health: a critical review of the scientific literature.

Science.gov (United States)

McCunney, Robert J; Mundt, Kenneth A; Colby, W David; Dobie, Robert; Kaliski, Kenneth; Blais, Mark

2014-11-01

This review examines the literature related to health effects of wind turbines. We reviewed literature related to sound measurements near turbines, epidemiological and experimental studies, and factors associated with annoyance. (1) Infrasound sound near wind turbines does not exceed audibility thresholds. (2) Epidemiological studies have shown associations between living near wind turbines and annoyance. (3) Infrasound and low-frequency sound do not present unique health risks. (4) Annoyance seems more strongly related to individual characteristics than noise from turbines. Further areas of inquiry include enhanced noise characterization, analysis of predicted noise values contrasted with measured levels postinstallation, longitudinal assessments of health pre- and postinstallation, experimental studies in which subjects are "blinded" to the presence or absence of infrasound, and enhanced measurement techniques to evaluate annoyance.

Scientific computer simulation review

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kaizer, Joshua S.; Heller, A. Kevin; Oberkampf, William L.

2015-01-01

Before the results of a scientific computer simulation are used for any purpose, it should be determined if those results can be trusted. Answering that question of trust is the domain of scientific computer simulation review. There is limited literature that focuses on simulation review, and most is specific to the review of a particular type of simulation. This work is intended to provide a foundation for a common understanding of simulation review. This is accomplished through three contributions. First, scientific computer simulation review is formally defined. This definition identifies the scope of simulation review and provides the boundaries of the review process. Second, maturity assessment theory is developed. This development clarifies the concepts of maturity criteria, maturity assessment sets, and maturity assessment frameworks, which are essential for performing simulation review. Finally, simulation review is described as the application of a maturity assessment framework. This is illustrated through evaluating a simulation review performed by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. In making these contributions, this work provides a means for a more objective assessment of a simulation’s trustworthiness and takes the next step in establishing scientific computer simulation review as its own field. - Highlights: • We define scientific computer simulation review. • We develop maturity assessment theory. • We formally define a maturity assessment framework. • We describe simulation review as the application of a maturity framework. • We provide an example of a simulation review using a maturity framework

Healthy Settings in Hospital - How to Prevent Burnout Syndrome in Nurses: Literature Review.

Science.gov (United States)

Friganović, Adriano; Kovačević, Irena; Ilić, Boris; Žulec, Mirna; Krikšić, Valentina; Grgas Bile, Cecilija

2017-06-01

Healthy settings involve a holistic and multidisciplinary method that integrates actions towards risk factors. In hospital settings, a high level of stress can lead to depression, anxiety, decreased job satisfaction and lower loyalty to the organization. Burnout syndrome can be defined as physical, psychological and emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and low sense of personal accomplishment. The aim of this literature review was to make systematic literature analysis to provide scientific evidence for the consequences of constant exposure to high levels of stress and for the methods to be used to prevent burnout syndrome among health care workers. The Medline database was searched to identify relevant studies and articles published during the last 15 years. The key words used in this survey were burnout syndrome, prevention, nurses, and healthy settings. The 6 eligible studies were included in literature review. Evidence showed nurses to be exposed to stress and to have symptoms of burnout syndrome. As a result of burnout syndrome, chronic fatigue and reduced working capacity occur, thus raising the risk of adverse events. In conclusion, the occurrence of burnout syndrome is a major problem for hospitals and healthcare system. Action plan for hospital burnout syndrome prevention would greatly reduce the incidence and improve the quality of health care.

How to respond to referee comments for scientific articles?

Science.gov (United States)

Kalemci, Mustafa Serdar; Turna, Burak

2013-09-01

Currently, the increasing number of article submissions to scientific journals forces editors to be more selective in their acceptance of papers. Consequently, editors have increased the frequency of their use of scientific referee mechanisms. For many researchers, the publication of a scientific article in a high impact factor journal is a gradual and difficult process. After preparation and submission of a manuscript, one of the most important issue is responding to the comments of referees. However, there is a paucity of published reports in the literature describing how to respond to these comments. The aim of this review is to assist researchers/authors in responding to referee comments as part of the publication process for scientific articles.

Locating grey literature on communication disorders.

Science.gov (United States)

Shpilko, Inna

2005-01-01

This article provides an overview of selected Web-based resources containing grey literature in the area of communication disorders. It is geared to practitioners, researchers, students, and consumers seeking reliable, freely available scientific information. Grey (or gray) literature has been defined as "that which is produced on all levels of government, academics, business, and industry in print and electronic formats, but which is not controlled by commercial publishers."1 This paper reviews various general reference sources potentially containing grey literature on communication disorders. This review includes identification of the methods specialists in this field use to obtain this valuable, yet often overlooked, literature. Access points and search tools for identifying grey literature on communication disorders are recommended. Commercial databases containing grey literature are not included. Conclusions presented in this article are considered complementary to traditionally published information resources on communication disorders, such as scholarly journals, online databases, etc.

Mapping the evolution of scientific ideas

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Roberts, David [Los Alamos National Laboratory; Herrera, Mark [UNIV OF MARYLAND; Gulbahce, Natali [UNIV OF BOSTON

2009-01-01

Despite the apparent conceptual boundaries of scientific fields, a formal description for their evolution is lacking. Here we describe a novel approach to study the dynamics and evolution of scientific fields using a network-based analysis. We build an idea network consisting of American Physical Society PACS numbers as nodes representing scientific concepts. Two PACS numbers are linked if there exist publications that reference them simultaneously. We locate scientific fields using Cfinder, an overlapping community finding algorithm, and describe the time evolution of these fields using a community evolution method over the course of 1985-2006. The communities we identify map to known scientific fields, and their age strongly depends on t.heir size, impact and activity. Our analysis further suggests that communities that redefine themselves by merging and creating new groups of ideas tend to have more fitness as measured by the impact per paper, and hence communities with a higher fitness tend to be short-lived. The described approach to quantify the evolution of ideas may be relevant in making predictions about the future of science and how to guide its development.

Financial interest and its disclosure in scientific publications.

Science.gov (United States)

Krimsky, S; Rothenberg, L S

1998-07-15

Journal policies and requirements of funding agencies on financial disclosure of authors and grant applicants have divided editors and scientists who disagree on whether such policies can improve the integrity of science or manage conflicts of interest. Those opposed to such disclosure policies argue that financial interest is one of many interests held by scientists, is the least scientifically dangerous, and should not be singled out. Those who favor open reporting of financial interests argue that full disclosure removes the suspicion that something of relevance to objectivity is being hidden and allows readers to form their own opinions on whether a conflict of interest exists and what relevance that has to the study. The authors believe that the scientific community and the public will be best served by open publication of financial disclosures for readers and reviewers to evaluate.

Commentary paper: Scientific objectivity and postphenomenological perception

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Olesen, Finn

2011-01-01

Don Ihde’s paper “Stretching the in-between: Embodiment and beyond” appears to me as a stimulating, topical text with a number of important arguments about human embodiment as a dynamic and epistemically relevant dimension to scientific knowledge production. But, indirectly, the text also raises...

Communicating novel and conventional scientific metaphors

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Knudsen, Sanne

2005-01-01

. But we still need empirical studies of the career of metaphors in scientific discourse and of the communicative strategies identifying a given metaphor as either novel or conventional. This paper presents a case study of the discursive development of the metaphor of "the genetic code" from......Metaphors are more popular than ever in the study of scientific reasoning and culture because of their innovative and generative powers. It is assumed, that novel scientific metaphors become more clear and well-defined, as they become more established and conventional within the relevant discourses...... the introduction of the metaphor to it was established as an entire network of interrelated conventional metaphors. Not only do the strategies in communicating the metaphor change as the metaphor becomes more established within the discourse, but the genres in which the metaphor is developed and interpreted...

78 FR 12422 - Health Services Research and Development Service Scientific Merit Review Board, Notice of Meeting

Science.gov (United States)

2013-02-22

... DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS Health Services Research and Development Service Scientific Merit... nursing research. Applications are reviewed for scientific and technical merit, mission relevance, and the... Program Manager, Scientific Merit Review Board, Department of Veterans Affairs, Health Services Research...

Learning as change: Responding to socio-scientific issues through informal education

Science.gov (United States)

Allen, Lauren Brooks

Informal learning is an important venue for educating the general public about complex socio-scientific issues: intersections of scientific understanding and society. My dissertation is a multi-tiered analysis of how informal education, and particularly informal educators, can leverage learning to respond to one particular socio-scientific issue: climate change. Life-long, life-wide, and life-deep learning not only about the science of climate change, but how communities and society as a whole can respond to it in ways that are commensurate with its scale are necessary. In my three-article dissertation, I investigated the changes in practice and learning that informal educators from a natural history museum underwent in the process of implementing a new type of field trip about climate change. This study focused on inquiry-based learning principles taken on by the museum educators, albeit in different ways: learner autonomy, conversation, and deep investigation. My second article, a short literature review, makes the argument that climate change education must have goals beyond simply increasing learners' knowledge of climate science, and proposes three research-based principles for such learning: participation, relevance, and interconnectedness. These principles are argued to promote learning to respond to climate change as well as increased collective efficacy, necessary for responding. Finally, my third article is an in-depth examination of a heterogeneous network of informal educators and environmental professionals who worked together to design and implement a city-wide platform for informal climate change learning. By conceptualizing climate change learning at the level of the learning ecology, educators and learners are able to see how it can be responded to at the community level, and understand how climate change is interconnected with other scientific, natural, and social systems. I briefly discuss a different socio-scientific issue to which these

Fine crystalline powders. Analysis of scientific and technical literature

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Denisenko, Eh.T.; Kulik, O.P.; Eremina, T.V.

1983-01-01

The state of development and studies of fine crystalline powders for recent five years is reviewed in the paper. Based on data available in literature, the most significant methods for fine metal and alloy powder production are considered and physicochemical properties of ultrafine particles are discussed from the standpoint of their interrelation with promising techniques for powder production. It is stated that the most important feature of ultrafine powder production technique at the present stage is a transition from the stage of data accumulation to that of controlled production of ultrafine structures of various metals and alloys under controllable conditions

Movement activity in children with ADHD: Literature review

OpenAIRE

Mečířová, Martina

2013-01-01

Thema works: Movement activity in childern with ADHD: Literature review Goal: The goal was to make literature review about children with ADHD and learn how to involve these children in movement activities. Methods: Thesis was made as a theoretical study in the form of a literature review, focusing on the summary of current findings about movement activities in children with ADHD. Results: I studied scientific books, papers and articles dealing with children with ADHD and I thought about the p...

Ethics in writing: Learning to stay away from plagiarism and scientific misconduct

Science.gov (United States)

Sharma, Bharat Bhushan; Singh, Virendra

2011-01-01

Fraudulent data and plagiarized text may corrupt scientific medical literature and ultimately harm patients. By prescribing erroneous treatment to an individual, only single patient is affected; but by presenting incorrect data or transcripts, the whole scientific medical universe is affected. Although both scenarios are highly undesirable, one can assume the magnitude of the effect of latter. Writers of scientific medical literature have been found to be involved in plagiarism and other publication misconducts from time to time irrespective of social, economic and geographic structure. The reason of such behavior is not usually obvious. Easy availability of personal computers has led to widespread dissemination of medical literature. As a result, young scientists are now publishing their research more frequently and efficiently. At the same time, this has increased the tendency to submit hurriedly prepared, poorly drafted and even illegitimate publications. Use of some amount of copy–paste followed by modifications during preparation of a manuscript seems to be common. Therefore, the researchers, especially postgraduate students, should be educated continuously about ethical medical writing. PMID:21712931

Lessons from Literature: Blending Academic Perspective with Management Practices

Science.gov (United States)

Kapur, Surbhi; Mohanty, Pooja

2014-01-01

The present paper studies the role literature can play in management in general and in leadership, organizational behavior and communication in particular. Literature normally gets a skeptical reception in management studies. The paper discusses the relevance of literature for a better understanding of human behaviour and a judicious discernment…

Literature-based discovery of diabetes- and ROS-related targets

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Pande Manjusha

2010-10-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Reactive oxygen species (ROS are known mediators of cellular damage in multiple diseases including diabetic complications. Despite its importance, no comprehensive database is currently available for the genes associated with ROS. Methods We present ROS- and diabetes-related targets (genes/proteins collected from the biomedical literature through a text mining technology. A web-based literature mining tool, SciMiner, was applied to 1,154 biomedical papers indexed with diabetes and ROS by PubMed to identify relevant targets. Over-represented targets in the ROS-diabetes literature were obtained through comparisons against randomly selected literature. The expression levels of nine genes, selected from the top ranked ROS-diabetes set, were measured in the dorsal root ganglia (DRG of diabetic and non-diabetic DBA/2J mice in order to evaluate the biological relevance of literature-derived targets in the pathogenesis of diabetic neuropathy. Results SciMiner identified 1,026 ROS- and diabetes-related targets from the 1,154 biomedical papers (http://jdrf.neurology.med.umich.edu/ROSDiabetes/. Fifty-three targets were significantly over-represented in the ROS-diabetes literature compared to randomly selected literature. These over-represented targets included well-known members of the oxidative stress response including catalase, the NADPH oxidase family, and the superoxide dismutase family of proteins. Eight of the nine selected genes exhibited significant differential expression between diabetic and non-diabetic mice. For six genes, the direction of expression change in diabetes paralleled enhanced oxidative stress in the DRG. Conclusions Literature mining compiled ROS-diabetes related targets from the biomedical literature and led us to evaluate the biological relevance of selected targets in the pathogenesis of diabetic neuropathy.

Resource Disambiguator for the Web: Extracting Biomedical Resources and Their Citations from the Scientific Literature.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ibrahim Burak Ozyurt

Full Text Available The NIF Registry developed and maintained by the Neuroscience Information Framework is a cooperative project aimed at cataloging research resources, e.g., software tools, databases and tissue banks, funded largely by governments and available as tools to research scientists. Although originally conceived for neuroscience, the NIF Registry has over the years broadened in the scope to include research resources of general relevance to biomedical research. The current number of research resources listed by the Registry numbers over 13K. The broadening in scope to biomedical science led us to re-christen the NIF Registry platform as SciCrunch. The NIF/SciCrunch Registry has been cataloging the resource landscape since 2006; as such, it serves as a valuable dataset for tracking the breadth, fate and utilization of these resources. Our experience shows research resources like databases are dynamic objects, that can change location and scope over time. Although each record is entered manually and human-curated, the current size of the registry requires tools that can aid in curation efforts to keep content up to date, including when and where such resources are used. To address this challenge, we have developed an open source tool suite, collectively termed RDW: Resource Disambiguator for the (Web. RDW is designed to help in the upkeep and curation of the registry as well as in enhancing the content of the registry by automated extraction of resource candidates from the literature. The RDW toolkit includes a URL extractor from papers, resource candidate screen, resource URL change tracker, resource content change tracker. Curators access these tools via a web based user interface. Several strategies are used to optimize these tools, including supervised and unsupervised learning algorithms as well as statistical text analysis. The complete tool suite is used to enhance and maintain the resource registry as well as track the usage of individual

Scientific Freedom and Human Rights

Science.gov (United States)

Munoz, Elisa

2000-03-01

As part of her ongoing work monitoring issues at the intersection of science and human rights, Ms. Munoz has highlighted violations of academic freedom in Serbia and Iran, the denial of visas and travel licenses to U.S. and Cuban scientists, interference with scientific freedom in Brazil, Mexico, Russia, and the Ukraine, the use of organs from executed prisoners in China, legislation jeopardizing women's health in Iran, and the closure of centers for the treatment of torture survivors in Turkey. Such violations contravene international human rights principles listed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international human rights covenants. Ms. Munoz will describe current violations of scientific freedom and the relevant international principles on which these freedoms rest.

Research governance and scientific knowledge production in The Gambia

OpenAIRE

Frederick U. Ozor

2014-01-01

Public research institutions and scientists are principal actors in the production and transfer of scientific knowledge, technologies and innovations for application in industry as well for social and economic development. Based on the relevance of science and technology actors, the aim of this study was to identify and explain factors in research governance that influence scientific knowledge production and to contribute to empirical discussions on the impact levels of different governance m...

Systemic Absorption of Nanomaterials by Oral Exposure

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Binderup, Mona-Lise; Bredsdorff, Lea; Beltoft, Vibe Meister

This report and accompanying database systematically evaluates the reliability and relevance of the existing scientific literature regarding systemic absorption of nanomaterials by oral exposure and makes specific recommendations for future testing approaches.......This report and accompanying database systematically evaluates the reliability and relevance of the existing scientific literature regarding systemic absorption of nanomaterials by oral exposure and makes specific recommendations for future testing approaches....

Making Learning Personally Meaningful: A New Framework for Relevance Research

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Priniski, Stacy J.; Hecht, Cameron A.; Harackiewicz, Judith M.

2018-01-01

Personal relevance goes by many names in the motivation literature, stemming from a number of theoretical frameworks. Currently these lines of research are being conducted in parallel with little synthesis across them, perhaps because there is no unifying definition of the relevance construct within which this research can be situated. In this…

Deep-sea disposal: Scientific bases to control pollution

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hagen, A.

1986-01-01

The IAEA's responsibilities are to define high-level radioactive waste that is prohibited from being dumped and make recommendations for the dumping of other radioactive waste. The IAEA had set up a series of scientific meetings and also had requested the scientific group GESAMP to advise it on suitable models for calculating concentrations of radionuclides above which sea-dumping would be prohibited. The NEA/OECD had established in 1981 a Coordinated Research and Environmental Surveillance Programme CRESP relevant to sea disposal for an initial period of 4 years. This article presents improving the scientific basis, summary of major issues and CRESP review covering five subject areas: model development, physical oceanography, geochemistry, biology, and radiological surveillance

Spatial distribution of scientific activities: An exploratory analysis of Brazil, 2000–10

OpenAIRE

Tulio Chiarini; Vanessa Parreiras Oliveira; Fabio Chaves do Couto e Silva Neto

2014-01-01

The literature analyzing the spatial distribution of scientific and technological production in Brazil identifies differences in the regional distribution of scientific and technological resources. In this paper, we contribute to this discussion, by analyzing the dynamics of the production of new scientific knowledge in the states that contributed the most to national scientific production in the period 2000–10: Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Minas Gerais and Rio Grande do Sul, also known as the ...

The relation between tourism and tecnology clusters and its impacts to the local development: a bibliometric study of scientific literature

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Cristina Martins

2016-03-01

Full Text Available This paper intends to investigate the scientific literature on the relation between tourism and technology clusters (TourTech in promoting local development on the databases Business Source Complete of the Online Research Databases (EBSCO and Leisure Tourism Database (CABI until the year 2014. With a mixed approach (qualitative and quantitative, the research is classified as descriptive and bibliographic. The strategy adopted for data collection used bibliometric criteria and the data analysis applied was content analysis. The results showed that there are some possible theoretical gaps to be developed: not only about the conection between tourism clusters and technology clusters for local development, but also the relation between tourism and technology clusters and their impact to promote innovation that can improve the local development and finally, how the investments to develop a cluster individually can impact on the development of the other.

THE VITAL IMPORTANCE OF PROVIDING SOUND SCIENTIFIC ADVICE TO POLICY MAKERS IN GOVERNMENT

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G. S. Pearson

2013-08-01

Full Text Available The article gives an idea of the scope of professional activity of scientists working in the field of biosafety in terms of providing timely and effective advice for politicians and diplomats in the government. It should be acknowledged that politicians and diplomats are also involved in a varying degree with biosafety issues such as toxicological and biological weapons, formulated in the relevant Convention: Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention. However taking into account their professional interests, they mightn’t have appropriate information on relevant events in these and other activities. The value of these activities of qualified scientists knowing the latest information in the field of biosafety is difficult to overestimate, as they have the possibility to analyze any situation on the range of relevant activities and use their knowledge to make informed proposals which could be acceptable for their co-worker scientists in other areas of biological science. For highly qualified scientists such activities appeared to be effective, it is a vital aspect of their professional activity, because such scientists are able to provide scientific advice, analyze and summarize relevant scientific aspects on a specific topic of interest for politicians and diplomats. Such an analysis should include identification of key elements that are relevant to a given scientific problem and should be formulated so as the consequences of the various elements of the Convention were clearly appreciated and understood by politicians and diplomats. In other words, the rele vant scientific aspects should be analyzed, summarized and presented in the context of the Convention, together with suggestions on what steps in this direction should be taken by politicians and diplomats.

A bibliometric analysis of the scientific literature on Internet, video games, and cell phone addiction.

Science.gov (United States)

Carbonell, Xavier; Guardiola, Elena; Beranuy, Marta; Bellés, Ana

2009-04-01

The aim of this study was to locate the scientific literature dealing with addiction to the Internet, video games, and cell phones and to characterize the pattern of publications in these areas. One hundred seventy-nine valid articles were retrieved from PubMed and PsycINFO between 1996 and 2005 related to pathological Internet, cell phone, or video game use. The years with the highest numbers of articles published were 2004 (n = 42) and 2005 (n = 40). The most productive countries, in terms of number of articles published, were the United States (n = 52), China (n = 23), the United Kingdom (n = 17), Taiwan (n = 13), and South Korea (n = 9). The most commonly used language was English (65.4%), followed by Chinese (12.8%) and Spanish (4.5%). Articles were published in 96 different journals, of which 22 published 2 or more articles. The journal that published the most articles was Cyberpsychology & Behavior (n = 41). Addiction to the Internet was the most intensely studied (85.3%), followed by addiction to video games (13.6%) and cell phones (2.1%). The number of publications in this area is growing, but it is difficult to conduct precise searches due to a lack of clear terminology. To facilitate retrieval, bibliographic databases should include descriptor terms referring specifically to Internet, video games, and cell phone addiction as well as to more general addictions involving communications and information technologies and other behavioral addictions.

Understanding scientific practices: The role of robustness notions

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Boon, Mieke; Soler, Lena

2012-01-01

This article explores the role of `robustness-notions¿ in an account of the engineering sciences. The engineering sciences aim at technological production of, and intervention with phenomena relevant to the (dis-)functioning of materials and technological devices, by means of scientific

Characteristics of scientific production in Special Education in Virtual Health Library (VHL: a bibliometric study

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Luciana Pizzani

2010-12-01

Full Text Available Objective: To characterize, through bibliometric approach, the scientific literature in this Special Education in the databases of the Virtual Health Library (VHL. The VHL is coordinated by BIREME - Specialized Center of the Pan American Health Organization whose objective is to promote the dissemination and use of scientific information in health. Method: The research methodology was performed by observing the following steps: a literature review on education special and bibliometrics, data collection from the site of BIREME about the presence of special education in the databases, organization, processing and bibliometric analysis of data collected using the software MS Excel and Vantage Point. Results: indicators produced allow signal that the predominant language of scientific production was the Portuguese and the majority of records were written individually, the themes addressed were psychology and developmental psychology. Conclusion: These bibliometric indicators characterizing the state of the art of scientific literature in Special Education at the various bases Data Bireme and also showed a field of interconnections between Health Sciences and Special Education.

An evidence-based patient-centered method makes the biopsychosocial model scientific.

Science.gov (United States)

Smith, Robert C; Fortin, Auguste H; Dwamena, Francesca; Frankel, Richard M

2013-06-01

To review the scientific status of the biopsychosocial (BPS) model and to propose a way to improve it. Engel's BPS model added patients' psychological and social health concerns to the highly successful biomedical model. He proposed that the BPS model could make medicine more scientific, but its use in education, clinical care, and, especially, research remains minimal. Many aver correctly that the present model cannot be defined in a consistent way for the individual patient, making it untestable and non-scientific. This stems from not obtaining relevant BPS data systematically, where one interviewer obtains the same information another would. Recent research by two of the authors has produced similar patient-centered interviewing methods that are repeatable and elicit just the relevant patient information needed to define the model at each visit. We propose that the field adopt these evidence-based methods as the standard for identifying the BPS model. Identifying a scientific BPS model in each patient with an agreed-upon, evidence-based patient-centered interviewing method can produce a quantum leap ahead in both research and teaching. A scientific BPS model can give us more confidence in being humanistic. In research, we can conduct more rigorous studies to inform better practices. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Porencephaly and psychosis: a case report and review of the literature

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Papathanasiou Matilda

2010-03-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Malformations of the cerebral cortex are often associated with developmental delay and psychoses. Porencephaly is a rare congenital disorder of central nervous system involving a cyst or a cavity filled with cerebrospinal fluid, in brain's parenchyma. Case presentation We present a 25 years old woman with her first psychotic episode. She also suffers from porencephaly in the frontotemporal lobes region. It is emphasized that the two consistently abnormal brain regions in schizophrenia research had significant damage in this patient since birth. There is a total of only five cases of schizencephaly or porencephaly associated with psychosis in the scientific literature. Their clinical characteristics as well as the imaging results are described. Conclusion It is unclear if porencephaly and psychosis concur by chance or are causally related. The area where the porencephalic cysts appear seems to be of relevance. This case highlights the need for further research.

Public humanization policies: integrative literature review.

Science.gov (United States)

Moreira, Márcia Adriana Dias Meirelles; Lustosa, Abdon Moreira; Dutra, Fernando; Barros, Eveline de Oliveira; Batista, Jaqueline Brito Vidal; Duarte, Marcella Costa Souto

2015-10-01

The study aimed to investigate the scientific literature on Public Humanization Policies, available in online periodicals, from 2009 to 2012, in the health field. This is an integrative literature review conducted in the Virtual Health Library databases: Latin-America and Caribbean Health Sciences (Lilacs) and the Scientific Electronic Library Online (SciELO) and Portal Capes. Data were collected in July 2013. To this end, the following Health Sciences Descriptors (DeCS) were used: "Humanization of Care," "Public Policies," "National Humanization Policy". The sample consisted of 27 articles about the investigated theme. From the publications selected for the research, three categories emerged according to their respective approaches: National Human-ization Policy: history and processes involved in its implementation; National Humanization Policy: health professionals contribution; Humanization and in the care process. The study showed that the National Humanization Policy is an important benchmark in the development of health practices. For this reason, there is a pressing multiplication of related reflections on ways to promote human-ization in health services.

Finding "hard to find" literature on hard to find groups: A novel technique to search grey literature on refugees and asylum seekers.

Science.gov (United States)

Enticott, Joanne; Buck, Kimberly; Shawyer, Frances

2018-03-01

There is a lack of information on how to execute effective searches of the grey literature on refugee and asylum seeker groups for inclusion in systematic reviews. High-quality government reports and other grey literature relevant to refugees may not always be identified in conventional literature searches. During the process of conducting a recent systematic review, we developed a novel strategy for systematically searching international refugee and asylum seeker-related grey literature. The approach targets governmental health departments and statistical agencies, who have considerable access to refugee and asylum seeker populations for research purposes but typically do not publish findings in academic forums. Compared to a conventional grey literature search strategy, our novel technique yielded an eightfold increase in relevant high-quality grey sources that provided valuable content in informing our review. Incorporating a search of the grey literature into systematic reviews of refugee and asylum seeker research is essential to providing a more complete view of the evidence. Our novel strategy offers a practical and feasible method of conducting systematic grey literature searches that may be adaptable to a range of research questions, contexts, and resource constraints. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

75 FR 25239 - Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS); Announcement of Availability of Literature Searches...

Science.gov (United States)

2010-05-07

... Information System (IRIS); Announcement of Availability of Literature Searches for IRIS Assessments AGENCY: Environmental Protection Agency. ACTION: Notice; Announcement of availability of literature searches for IRIS... the availability of literature searches for four IRIS assessments and requesting scientific...

The ghosts of HeLa: How cell line misidentification contaminates the scientific literature.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Serge P J M Horbach

Full Text Available While problems with cell line misidentification have been known for decades, an unknown number of published papers remains in circulation reporting on the wrong cells without warning or correction. Here we attempt to make a conservative estimate of this 'contaminated' literature. We found 32,755 articles reporting on research with misidentified cells, in turn cited by an estimated half a million other papers. The contamination of the literature is not decreasing over time and is anything but restricted to countries in the periphery of global science. The decades-old and often contentious attempts to stop misidentification of cell lines have proven to be insufficient. The contamination of the literature calls for a fair and reasonable notification system, warning users and readers to interpret these papers with appropriate care.

Towards pervasive computing in health care - a literature review.

Science.gov (United States)

Orwat, Carsten; Graefe, Andreas; Faulwasser, Timm

2008-06-19

The evolving concepts of pervasive computing, ubiquitous computing and ambient intelligence are increasingly influencing health care and medicine. Summarizing published research, this literature review provides an overview of recent developments and implementations of pervasive computing systems in health care. It also highlights some of the experiences reported in deployment processes. There is no clear definition of pervasive computing in the current literature. Thus specific inclusion criteria for selecting articles about relevant systems were developed. Searches were conducted in four scientific databases alongside manual journal searches for the period of 2002 to 2006. Articles included present prototypes, case studies and pilot studies, clinical trials and systems that are already in routine use. The searches identified 69 articles describing 67 different systems. In a quantitative analysis, these systems were categorized into project status, health care settings, user groups, improvement aims, and systems features (i.e., component types, data gathering, data transmission, systems functions). The focus is on the types of systems implemented, their frequency of occurrence and their characteristics. Qualitative analyses were performed of deployment issues, such as organizational and personnel issues, privacy and security issues, and financial issues. This paper provides a comprehensive access to the literature of the emerging field by addressing specific topics of application settings, systems features, and deployment experiences. Both an overview and an analysis of the literature on a broad and heterogeneous range of systems are provided. Most systems are described in their prototype stages. Deployment issues, such as implications on organization or personnel, privacy concerns, or financial issues are mentioned rarely, though their solution is regarded as decisive in transferring promising systems to a stage of regular operation. There is a need for further

Bridge over troubled waters: A Synthesis Session to connect scientific and decision making sectors

Science.gov (United States)

Lack of access to relevant scientific data has limited decision makers from incorporating scientific information into their management and policy schemes. Yet, there is increasing interest among decision makers and scientists to integrate coastal and marine science into the polic...

Improve nursing in evidence-based practice: How Chinese nurses' read and comprehend scientific literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Fei-Fei Huang

2017-07-01

Conclusions: The survey of the current status of literature education among Chinese nurses suggests that providing protected time, training for critical thinking, and incentive mechanisms will help improve nurses' engagement in literature and create a culture of academic inquiry.

[Systematic literature search in PubMed : A short introduction].

Science.gov (United States)

Blümle, A; Lagrèze, W A; Motschall, E

2018-03-01

In order to identify current (and relevant) evidence for a specific clinical question within the unmanageable amount of information available, solid skills in performing a systematic literature search are essential. An efficient approach is to search a biomedical database containing relevant literature citations of study reports. The best known database is MEDLINE, which is searchable for free via the PubMed interface. In this article, we explain step by step how to perform a systematic literature search via PubMed by means of an example research question in the field of ophthalmology. First, we demonstrate how to translate the clinical problem into a well-framed and searchable research question, how to identify relevant search terms and how to conduct a text word search and a search with keywords in medical subject headings (MeSH) terms. We then show how to limit the number of search results if the search yields too many irrelevant hits and how to increase the number in the case of too few citations. Finally, we summarize all essential principles that guide a literature search via PubMed.

[Appraisal of the Millennium Development Goals by means of a review of the scientific literature in 2008].

Science.gov (United States)

Gil-González, Diana; Carrasco-Portiño, Mercedes; Davó Blanes, M Carmen; Donat Castelló, Lucas; Franco-Giraldo, Alvaro; Ortiz Moncada, Rocio; Palma Solís, Marco; Ruiz-Cantero, M Teresa; Vives-Cases, Carmen; Stein, Airton; Hernández Aguado, Ildefonso; Alvarez-Dardet Díaz, Carlos

2008-01-01

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are now at the midterm of their target period, as 2015 is the date scheduled by the United Nations Organisation (UN) for their attainment. The purpose of this article is to review the current situation of the MDGs worldwide and to analyse the barriers which are preventing them from being attained in each of the MDG areas, as well as to assess a number of the indicators evaluated. In order to do so, a review has been made of the scientific literature published on the MDGs in the principal health sciences and social sciences databases, as well as the most significant reports on the issue drawn up by the United Nations. The scientific studies on the 8 MDGs and their 18 Targets make it possible to undertake a critical analysis of the situation in which each of these Goals are found at the present time, identifying the determinants that are preventing the attainment of the Goals and the actions considered necessary in order to achieve progress. Although there have been improvements in some of the goals on a world level, the research carried out to date reveals barriers to the attainment of the MDGs, as well as the insufficient weight of the developing countries in the economic and political decision-making processes, together with the incoherence between the economic policies and the social and health policies. Furthermore, Sub-Saharan Africa constitutes the most disadvantaged region, which means that it will not attain the majority of the MDGs. Spain and the developed countries, in addition to contributing resources, can also contribute to the MDGs by means of the identification and eradication of the barriers preventing attainment. This involves promoting international economic relations under conditions of social justice, by supporting a greater decision-making power for developing countries and denouncing actions that increase social inequalities and the impoverishment of the population.

Lexical Features of Scientific Discourse

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tatjana Rusko

2014-06-01

Full Text Available Currently, a lot of emphasis is placed of the ability of a person to successfully communicate in any sphere of activity, which along with upbringing and education is among the factors that determine a person’s culture. In the context of rapid scientific and technological progress, it is vital to constantly exchange relevant infor- mation. The effectiveness of this process relies not only on the proficient knowledge of the subject and the ability to make grammatically correct sentences, but to a large extent on the level of competence in scientific language. The present article attempts to consider the interaction of discourse and vocabulary, different types of cognitive phenomena responsible for the use of a language in real time and related to the language as a means of storing and organising information. Analysing and classifying some key elements of a scientific discourse lexicon contributes to the development of certain provisions of lexicology, functional stylistics, cognitive linguistics and terminology. The results of the analysis may be advantageous both to linguistics and teaching the language for specific purposes.

Systematic review of 15 years of scientific literature on public procurement

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Lange, Sandra; Telgen, Jan; Schotanus, Fredo

2014-01-01

As public procurement research is fragmented in many sub-topics, a clear synthesis is lacking, which in turn inhibits the establishment of a clear body of knowledge. To start filling this gap, this systematic review provides an overview of the most influential literature in the field of public

Necessary Conditions for Improving Civic Competence: A Scientific Perspective

OpenAIRE

Arthur Lupia

2005-01-01

Many attempts to increase civic competence are based on premises about communication and belief change that are directly contradicted by important insights from microeconomic theory and social psychology. At least two economic literatures are relevant to my effort to improve matters. One is the literature on strategic communication, which includes Spence (1974), Crawford and Sobel (1982), Banks (1991), and Lupia and McCubbins (1998). The other is the literature on mechanism design, which incl...

Linking scientific disciplines: Hydrology and social sciences

Science.gov (United States)

Seidl, R.; Barthel, R.

2017-07-01

The integration of interdisciplinary scientific and societal knowledge plays an increasing role in sustainability science and more generally, in global change research. In the field of water resources, interdisciplinarity has long been recognized as crucial. Recently, new concepts and ideas about how to approach water resources management more holistically have been discussed. The emergence of concepts such as socio-hydrology indicates the growing relevance of connections between social and hydrological disciplines. In this paper, we determine how well social sciences are integrated with hydrological research by using two approaches. First, we conducted a questionnaire survey with a sample of hydrology researchers and professionals (N = 353) to explore current opinions and developments related to interdisciplinary collaboration between hydrologists and social scientists. Second, we analyzed the disciplinary composition of author teams and the reference lists of articles pertaining to the socio-hydrology concept. We conclude that interdisciplinarity in water resources research is on a promising track but may need to mature further in terms of its aims and methods of integration. We find that current literature pays little attention to the following questions: What kind of interdisciplinarity do different scholars want? What are social scientists' preferred roles and knowledge from a hydrology perspective?

Proximity and scientific collaboration in Northern European “cross-border regional innovation systems”

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Makkonen, Teemu; Williams, Allan

2015-01-01

A novel approach, namely cross-border regional innovation system, has been recently introduced to the literature on economic geography as a framework for studying innovation and scientific collaboration in a cross-border context. However, despite the importance of the topic for cross-border regions......, there are no existing empirical accounts comprehensively validating the concept. Here an attempt to shed some light into this “black box” is made by addressing this research gap via empirical material from Northern European cross-border regions. Specifically this is done by applying data on publications, sectoral...... and cultural statistics together with measures for accessibility and institutional and organisational similarity. These measures are linked to the varying types of proximity discussed in the literature on innovation and scientific collaboration; the impacts of proximity on the volume of cross-border scientific...

Key figures for joint assessment of indoor environmental quality (IEQ) and energy consumption in modern buildings – a literature review

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Tisov, Ana; Siroky, Jan; Kolarik, Jakub

2016-01-01

’s energy management and operational diagnostics focus mostly on energy consumption. Consequently also present key figures comprise performance indicators related to energy use. The fact that modern buildings are not spared from IEQ related problems indicates that there is a need for joint assessment...... and test key figures that would directly combine performance indicators related to both energy use and IEQ....... of energy and IEQ performance. The aim of this paper was to review relevant literature to form a scientific background for development of key figures enabling the joint assessment of energy and IEQ. The review resulted in forty cited publications. Majority of them focused explicitly on energy performance...

"Navigating" through a Scientific Career: A Question of Private and Professional Configurational Supports

Science.gov (United States)

Fusulier, Bernard; Barbier, Pascal; Dubois-Shaik, Farah

2017-01-01

Men and women remain in unequal positions in coping with their scientific and academic careers. Several of the mechanisms dissuading or preventing women from pursuing scientific careers have already been described in the literature: women getting stuck with paltry, undervalued tasks, thus manufacturing a "sticky floor"; structuring the…

Scientific literature on infectious diseases affecting livestock animals, longitudinal worldwide bibliometric analysis.

Science.gov (United States)

Ducrot, Christian; Gautret, Marjolaine; Pineau, Thierry; Jestin, André

2016-03-14

The objectives of this bibliometric analysis of the scientific literature were to describe the research subjects and the international collaborations in the field of research on infectious diseases in livestock animals including fishes and honeybees. It was based on articles published worldwide from 2006 through 2013. The source of data was the Web of Science, Core collection(®) and only papers fully written in English were considered. Queries were built that combined 130 descriptors related to animal species and 1213 descriptors related to diseases and pathogens. To refine and assess the accuracy of the extracted database, supplementary filters were applied to discard non-specific terms and neighbouring topics, and numerous tests were carried out on samples. For pathogens, annotation was done using a thematic terminology established to link each disease with its corresponding pathogen, which was in turn classified according to its family. A total of 62,754 articles were published in this field during this 8-year period. The average annual growth rate of the number of papers was 5%. This represents the reference data to which we compared the average annual growth rate of articles produced in each of the sub-categories that we defined. Thirty-seven percent of the papers were dedicated to ruminant diseases. Poultry, pigs and fishes were covered by respectively 21, 13 and 14% of the total. Thirty-seven percent of papers concerned bacteria, 33% viruses, 19% parasites, 2% prions, the remaining being multi-pathogens. Research on virology, especially on pigs and poultry, is increasing faster than the average. There also is increasing interest in monogastric species, fish and bees. The average annual growth rate for Asia was 10%, which is high compared to 3% for Europe and 2% for the Americas, indicating that Asia is currently playing a leading role in this field. There is a well established network of international collaborations. For 75% of the papers, the co

Searching for Grey Literature for Systematic Reviews: Challenges and Benefits

Science.gov (United States)

Mahood, Quenby; Van Eerd, Dwayne; Irvin, Emma

2014-01-01

There is ongoing interest in including grey literature in systematic reviews. Including grey literature can broaden the scope to more relevant studies, thereby providing a more complete view of available evidence. Searching for grey literature can be challenging despite greater access through the Internet, search engines and online bibliographic…

Publication, cooperation and productivity measures in scientific research

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gauffriau, Marianne; Larsen, P.O.; Maye, I.

2007-01-01

The literature on publication counting demonstrates the use of various terminologies and methods. In many scientific publications, no information at all is given about the counting methods used. There is a lack of knowledge and agreement about the sort of information provided by the various metho...

Disclosure of Non-Financial Information: Relevant to Financial Analysts?

OpenAIRE

ORENS, Raf; LYBAERT, Nadine

2013-01-01

The decline in the relevance of financial statement information to value firms leads to calls from organizational stakeholders to convey non-financial information in order to be able to judge firms' financial performance and value. This literature review aims to report extant literature findings on the use of corporate non-financial information by sell-side financial analysts, the information intermediaries between corporate management and investors. Prior studies highlight that financial ana...

Causes and consequences of obstetric fistula in Ethiopia: A literature review

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Daniel Nigusse Tollosa, Mengistu Asnake Kibret

2013-04-01

Full Text Available ABSTRACTObstetric fistula (OF is one of the major potential complications of childbirth mostly young women in developing countries including Ethiopia. Though few scientific studies have been conducted related to its causes and consequences, it is challenging to find a comprehensive figure about obstetric fistula in Ethiopia. Therefore, this paper sought that to review the causes and consequences of obstetric fistula in Ethiopia. A number of relevant obstetrics and gynaecology websites and journals were reviewed. Google, Pubmed, and Hinari searching engines were used to find out relevant references. Year of publication, location, language and its type of publication were the inclusion criteria used for reviewing literatures. It is observed that obstetric fistula has been a major burdened mainly for women in the rural Ethiopian and its causes and consequences are very deep and diverse. The great majority of obstetric fistula causes in Ethiopia is due to Obstetric labour. Distance to the health care facility, transportation access, economic factors (poverty, poor knowledge related to the problem, poor health seeking behaviour of the affected women and age at first marriage are the other triggering factors. Stigma and discrimination of obstetric fistula patients by their husbands and families, economic dependency and psychological disorder are often mentioned as consequences for OF patients in Ethiopia.

Network effects on scientific collaborations.

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Shahadat Uddin

Full Text Available BACKGROUND: The analysis of co-authorship network aims at exploring the impact of network structure on the outcome of scientific collaborations and research publications. However, little is known about what network properties are associated with authors who have increased number of joint publications and are being cited highly. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Measures of social network analysis, for example network centrality and tie strength, have been utilized extensively in current co-authorship literature to explore different behavioural patterns of co-authorship networks. Using three SNA measures (i.e., degree centrality, closeness centrality and betweenness centrality, we explore scientific collaboration networks to understand factors influencing performance (i.e., citation count and formation (tie strength between authors of such networks. A citation count is the number of times an article is cited by other articles. We use co-authorship dataset of the research field of 'steel structure' for the year 2005 to 2009. To measure the strength of scientific collaboration between two authors, we consider the number of articles co-authored by them. In this study, we examine how citation count of a scientific publication is influenced by different centrality measures of its co-author(s in a co-authorship network. We further analyze the impact of the network positions of authors on the strength of their scientific collaborations. We use both correlation and regression methods for data analysis leading to statistical validation. We identify that citation count of a research article is positively correlated with the degree centrality and betweenness centrality values of its co-author(s. Also, we reveal that degree centrality and betweenness centrality values of authors in a co-authorship network are positively correlated with the strength of their scientific collaborations. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Authors' network positions in co

The relevance of 7-day patch test reading.

Science.gov (United States)

Higgins, Eleanor; Collins, Paul

2013-01-01

Patch test readings are usually performed on day 2 (48 hours) and day 4 (96 hours). However, reports in the literature identify delayed allergy to metals, corticosteroids, antibiotics, some preservatives, acrylic and methacrylic monomers and p-phenylenediamine. The aim of our study was to identify the benefit of performing a day 7 (168 hours) reading to identify relevant late positive reactions. Two hundred three consecutive patients were patch tested to the British Society for Cutaneous Allergy standard series with additional test series selected according to clinical history and applied at the same time. Twenty-six patients (12.8%) had new positive reactions on day 7 (168 hours), with 28 relevant positive reactions to 21 allergens. These included mercury 0.5% (2/26); cobalt chloride 1% (2/26); colophony 20% (2/26); disperse blue mix 106/124 1% (2/26); preservatives (4/26) that included Methylchloroisothiazolinone/methylisothiazolinone, sodium metabisulfite, and diazolidinyl urea; fragrances (7/26); and gentamycin sulfate 20% (1/26). These results confirm findings in the literature and support the argument for performing a day 7 reading (168 hours) to identify relevant late positive reactions.

Scientific misconducts and authorship conflicts: Indian perspective

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Mohanchandra Mandal

2015-01-01

Full Text Available This article is a narrative review about how appropriate authorship can be achieved, a brief mention about various scientific misconducts, the reason and consequences of such misconducts and finally, the policies to be adopted by the aspiring authors to avert these problems. The literature search was performed in the Google and PubMed using ′scientific misconduct′, ′honorary/ghost authorship′, ′publish-or-perish′, ′plagiarism′ and other related key words and phrases. More than 300 free full-text articles published from 1990 to 2015 were retrieved and studied. Many consensus views have been presented regarding what constitutes authorship, the authorship order and different scientific misconducts. The conflicts about authorship issues related to publication of dissertation, the area of the grey zone have been discussed. Suggestions from different authorities about improving the existing inappropriate authorship issues have been included.

The usefulness of fair value estimates for financial decision making: a literature review

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Alfreda Sapkauskiene

2017-09-01

Full Text Available The usefulness of fair value estimates for financial decision making: a literature review The objective of this discussion is to answer the fundamental question: ‘Are Fair Value estimates current-ly useful for financial decision making?’ Through a systematic review we analyse the qualitative second-ary data from dedicated scientific articles, based on the relevance and reliability of Fair Value estimates, and find out that there are still ongoing problems with reliability of information mainly because of the managerial estimation process and the ‘human factor’ in general. We identify 3 problem areas that are closely interconnected: (1 the business entity, (2 auditing, and (3 financial regulators and accounting academics. Each area has its own set of challenges and several suggestions are given to improve the reliability and relevance of Fair Value estimates, but a lot of those propositions require dedicated attention from accounting academics, financial regulators, and standard-setters. All in all, there is a clear trend that the situation with Fair Value estimates (especially those of Level 3 has been improving recently, and Level 3 estimates can indeed be used in the current financial decision process, but with some level of scepticism.

Deja vu: a database of highly similar citations in the scientific literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Errami, Mounir; Sun, Zhaohui; Long, Tara C; George, Angela C; Garner, Harold R

2009-01-01

In the scientific research community, plagiarism and covert multiple publications of the same data are considered unacceptable because they undermine the public confidence in the scientific integrity. Yet, little has been done to help authors and editors to identify highly similar citations, which sometimes may represent cases of unethical duplication. For this reason, we have made available Déjà vu, a publicly available database of highly similar Medline citations identified by the text similarity search engine eTBLAST. Following manual verification, highly similar citation pairs are classified into various categories ranging from duplicates with different authors to sanctioned duplicates. Déjà vu records also contain user-provided commentary and supporting information to substantiate each document's categorization. Déjà vu and eTBLAST are available to authors, editors, reviewers, ethicists and sociologists to study, intercept, annotate and deter questionable publication practices. These tools are part of a sustained effort to enhance the quality of Medline as 'the' biomedical corpus. The Déjà vu database is freely accessible at http://spore.swmed.edu/dejavu. The tool eTBLAST is also freely available at http://etblast.org.

Reflections on relevance: Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics in 2004.

Science.gov (United States)

Balon, Richard

2005-01-01

Relevance of an article is a highly desirable yet hardly predictable quality at the time of its publication. Article relevance is frequently measured by the impact factor of the journal where the article is published. Furthermore, impact factor, citation index and citation analysis are used as a measure of research progress and scientific wealth of a nation. The wisdom and significance of this approach to relevance is debatable and thus discussed here. In 2004, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics published a variety of articles which, in the author's view, are clinically relevant. Several selected clinically relevant issues reviewed in this article include: the conceptualization of fibromyalgia as a stress disorder; the psychosocial impact and psychosocial interventions in cancer; the impact of alexithymia on patient care; the possible relationship between depression and nutrition (namely intake of folate and pyridoxal phosphate); the significance of hypercoagulability in panic-like anxiety; the questionable value of single isomer drugs, and the relevance and adequacy of clinimetrics versus psychometrics in clinical research. The reviewed issues seem to be relevant to clinical practice, research or both, but also to our critical thinking, and the critical review of the developments in psychiatry and psychology. Copyright 2005 S. Karger AG, Basel.

Assessing College Students’ Quantitative and Scientific Reasoning: The James Madison University Story

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John D. Hathcoat

2015-01-01

Full Text Available Quantitative and scientific reasoning is a critical student learning outcome in higher education. Data are presented for large samples of undergraduate students who were assessed as entering freshmen and then again after completing 45-70 credit hours. Results are presented around four key issues that are central to educational assessment. First, entering freshmen with transfer credits for quantitative and scientific reasoning courses that fulfill general education requirements, on average, score similar to entering freshmen without such credit. About 97% of entering freshmen who had transfer credits received their credits through dual enrollment programs. As a sophomore-junior, students who had completed their general education requirements performed similar to students who had started, but not yet finished these requirements. Second, small to moderate correlations were observed between grade-point averages in relevant general education coursework and quantitative and scientific reasoning. Third, students’ quantitative and scientific reasoning, on average, increases from freshmen to sophomore/junior years. Finally, the proportion of students who meet faculty-set standards substantially increases from pre-test to post-test. Taken together, results suggest that changes in quantitative and scientific reasoning are a function of relevant courses. Additional research is needed to examine the role of lower-level versus higher-level courses in student performance. Results also indicate a need to investigate how differences in the quality of dual enrollment courses facilitate quantitative and scientific reasoning.

Definition of a process standardization framework for a scientific journal based on a literature review and its performance objectives

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José Augusto Campos Garcia

2014-12-01

Full Text Available This work presents the results of a study that aimed to establish a framework to standardize the process of a scientific journal. It has a team that performs operational routines regulated by standards (external and patterns (internal and external. The high turnover rate of the supportive team has generated information loss and increased service variability. The research started from the assumption that the process standardization (which includes the formalization could be a way to reduce this secondary effect. Standardization techniques were identified through a literature review of the main national and international databases of journals and congresses. The identified standardization techniques were analyzed considering the number of times they appeared in the papers analyzed and performance objectives proposed by Slack et al. (2009. As result of this research, a framework was obtained for the standardization of processes adapted to the needs of the journal studied. The model is feasible to be used more widely, given its structural similarity to the one proposed by Campos (2004, a Brazilian model that is a reference in the field.

Text mining effectively scores and ranks the literature for improving chemical-gene-disease curation at the comparative toxicogenomics database.

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Allan Peter Davis

Full Text Available The Comparative Toxicogenomics Database (CTD; http://ctdbase.org/ is a public resource that curates interactions between environmental chemicals and gene products, and their relationships to diseases, as a means of understanding the effects of environmental chemicals on human health. CTD provides a triad of core information in the form of chemical-gene, chemical-disease, and gene-disease interactions that are manually curated from scientific articles. To increase the efficiency, productivity, and data coverage of manual curation, we have leveraged text mining to help rank and prioritize the triaged literature. Here, we describe our text-mining process that computes and assigns each article a document relevancy score (DRS, wherein a high DRS suggests that an article is more likely to be relevant for curation at CTD. We evaluated our process by first text mining a corpus of 14,904 articles triaged for seven heavy metals (cadmium, cobalt, copper, lead, manganese, mercury, and nickel. Based upon initial analysis, a representative subset corpus of 3,583 articles was then selected from the 14,094 articles and sent to five CTD biocurators for review. The resulting curation of these 3,583 articles was analyzed for a variety of parameters, including article relevancy, novel data content, interaction yield rate, mean average precision, and biological and toxicological interpretability. We show that for all measured parameters, the DRS is an effective indicator for scoring and improving the ranking of literature for the curation of chemical-gene-disease information at CTD. Here, we demonstrate how fully incorporating text mining-based DRS scoring into our curation pipeline enhances manual curation by prioritizing more relevant articles, thereby increasing data content, productivity, and efficiency.

Text Mining Effectively Scores and Ranks the Literature for Improving Chemical-Gene-Disease Curation at the Comparative Toxicogenomics Database

Science.gov (United States)

Johnson, Robin J.; Lay, Jean M.; Lennon-Hopkins, Kelley; Saraceni-Richards, Cynthia; Sciaky, Daniela; Murphy, Cynthia Grondin; Mattingly, Carolyn J.

2013-01-01

The Comparative Toxicogenomics Database (CTD; http://ctdbase.org/) is a public resource that curates interactions between environmental chemicals and gene products, and their relationships to diseases, as a means of understanding the effects of environmental chemicals on human health. CTD provides a triad of core information in the form of chemical-gene, chemical-disease, and gene-disease interactions that are manually curated from scientific articles. To increase the efficiency, productivity, and data coverage of manual curation, we have leveraged text mining to help rank and prioritize the triaged literature. Here, we describe our text-mining process that computes and assigns each article a document relevancy score (DRS), wherein a high DRS suggests that an article is more likely to be relevant for curation at CTD. We evaluated our process by first text mining a corpus of 14,904 articles triaged for seven heavy metals (cadmium, cobalt, copper, lead, manganese, mercury, and nickel). Based upon initial analysis, a representative subset corpus of 3,583 articles was then selected from the 14,094 articles and sent to five CTD biocurators for review. The resulting curation of these 3,583 articles was analyzed for a variety of parameters, including article relevancy, novel data content, interaction yield rate, mean average precision, and biological and toxicological interpretability. We show that for all measured parameters, the DRS is an effective indicator for scoring and improving the ranking of literature for the curation of chemical-gene-disease information at CTD. Here, we demonstrate how fully incorporating text mining-based DRS scoring into our curation pipeline enhances manual curation by prioritizing more relevant articles, thereby increasing data content, productivity, and efficiency. PMID:23613709

77 FR 41784 - Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS); Announcement of Availability of Literature Searches...

Science.gov (United States)

2012-07-16

... System (IRIS); Announcement of Availability of Literature Searches for IRIS Assessments AGENCY: Environmental Protection Agency. ACTION: Notice of availability of a literature search for benzo(a)pyrene... availability of a literature search for benzo(a)pyrene (CASRN 50- 32-8). EPA is also requesting scientific...

Reviewing Literature in Bioethics Research: Increasing Rigour in Non-Systematic Reviews.

Science.gov (United States)

McDougall, Rosalind

2015-09-01

The recent interest in systematic review methods in bioethics has highlighted the need for greater transparency in all literature review processes undertaken in bioethics projects. In this article, I articulate features of a good bioethics literature review that does not aim to be systematic, but rather to capture and analyse the key ideas relevant to a research question. I call this a critical interpretive literature review. I begin by sketching and comparing three different types of literature review conducted in bioethics scholarship. Then, drawing on Dixon-Wood's concept of critical interpretive synthesis, I put forward six features of a good critical interpretive literature review in bioethics: answering a research question, capturing the key ideas relevant to the research question, analysing the literature as a whole, generating theory, not excluding papers based on rigid quality assessment criteria, and reporting the search strategy. © 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

A systematic literature search to identify performance measure outcomes used in clinical studies of racehorses.

Science.gov (United States)

Wylie, C E; Newton, J R

2018-05-01

Racing performance is often used as a measurable outcome variable in research studies investigating clinical diagnoses or interventions. However, the use of many different performance measures largely precludes conduct of meaningful comparative studies and, to date, those being used have not been collated. To systematically review the veterinary scientific literature for the use of racing performance as a measurable outcome variable in clinical studies of racehorses, collate and identify those most popular, and identify their advantages and disadvantages. Systematic literature search. The search criteria "((racing AND performance) AND (horses OR equidae))" were adapted for both MEDLINE and CAB Abstracts databases. Data were collected in standardised recording forms for binary, categorical and quantitative measures, and the use of performance indices. In total, 217 studies that described racing performance were identified, contributing 117 different performance measures. No one performance measure was used in all studies, despite 90.3% using more than one variable. Data regarding race starts and earnings were used most commonly, with 88.0% and 54.4% of studies including at least one measure of starts and earnings, respectively. Seventeen variables were used 10 times or more, with the top five comprising: 'return to racing', 'number of starts', 'days to first start', 'earnings per period of time' and 'earnings per start'. The search strategies may not have identified all relevant papers, introducing bias to the review. Performance indices have been developed to improve assessment of interventions; however, they are not widely adopted in the scientific literature. Use of the two most commonly identified measures, whether the horse returned to racing and number of starts over a defined period of time, would best facilitate future systematic reviews and meta-analyses in advance of the development of a gold-standard measure of race performance outcome. © 2017 EVJ Ltd.

The Revista Scientific

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Oscar Antonio Martínez Molina

2017-02-01

.edu; Joomag; Intellectual Property Registry Safe Creative; Published in the Gallery for the promotion of works and authors Creative People of the Government of Spain; Monografias.com; and GitHub Repository. With these assets, SCIENTIFIC Magazine can consider a new stage of consolidation and opening of new audiences and new intellectual horizons. This requires a new organizational structure, new people and new objectives, a task that we are constantly updating. A free, innovative, rigorous and cooperative academic space Revista Scientific must maintain its identity in this new stage, that is, freedom of action, openness to new ideas and contributions, rigor in the evaluation of content and its cooperative nature. These principles imply an organizational structure that not only allows, but encourages the periodic renewal of part of its members. Equally, these principles imply an entirely voluntary nature of scientific collaborations and democracy in decision-making. A relevant scientific space of these characteristics is possible. SCIENTIFIC is an electronic magazine, which is published quarterly and publishes special editions thanks to the request of other institutions and collaborators. From the month of August of the 2016 to the present day have been published three numbers and a special edition that will be released in the month of March 2017. SCIENTIFIC is designed to facilitate the dissemination of current research in the field of education at its various levels in the territory. Due to its electronic nature and its organizational structure, it aims to shorten scientific publication times, providing an updated reference system of its field of study. The journal reflects its multidisciplinary nature both in the contents and in the composition of the Editorial Academic Committee and the Academic and Scientific Committee. SCIENTIFIC through its editorial INDTEC puts in the hands of the interested public a digital magazine of quality and particular interest for the

Medical literature searches: a comparison of PubMed and Google Scholar.

Science.gov (United States)

Nourbakhsh, Eva; Nugent, Rebecca; Wang, Helen; Cevik, Cihan; Nugent, Kenneth

2012-09-01

Medical literature searches provide critical information for clinicians. However, the best strategy for identifying relevant high-quality literature is unknown. We compared search results using PubMed and Google Scholar on four clinical questions and analysed these results with respect to article relevance and quality. Abstracts from the first 20 citations for each search were classified into three relevance categories. We used the weighted kappa statistic to analyse reviewer agreement and nonparametric rank tests to compare the number of citations for each article and the corresponding journals' impact factors. Reviewers ranked 67.6% of PubMed articles and 80% of Google Scholar articles as at least possibly relevant (P = 0.116) with high agreement (all kappa P-values PubMed searches and Google Scholar searches often identify different articles. In this study, Google Scholar articles were more likely to be classified as relevant, had higher numbers of citations and were published in higher impact factor journals. The identification of frequently cited articles using Google Scholar for searches probably has value for initial literature searches. © 2012 The authors. Health Information and Libraries Journal © 2012 Health Libraries Group.

Undergraduate medical academic performance is improved by scientific training.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhang, Lili; Zhang, Wei; Wu, Chong; Liu, Zhongming; Cai, Yunfei; Cao, Xingguo; He, Yushan; Liu, Guoxiang; Miao, Hongming

2017-09-01

The effect of scientific training on course learning in undergraduates is still controversial. In this study, we investigated the academic performance of undergraduate students with and without scientific training. The results show that scientific training improves students' test scores in general medical courses, such as biochemistry and molecular biology, cell biology, physiology, and even English. We classified scientific training into four levels. We found that literature reading could significantly improve students' test scores in general courses. Students who received scientific training carried out experiments more effectively and published articles performed better than their untrained counterparts in biochemistry and molecular biology examinations. The questionnaire survey demonstrated that the trained students were more confident of their course learning, and displayed more interest, motivation and capability in course learning. In summary, undergraduate academic performance is improved by scientific training. Our findings shed light on the novel strategies in the management of undergraduate education in the medical school. © 2017 by The International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, 45(5):379-384, 2017. © 2017 The International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.

Cyber-Enabled Scientific Discovery

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chan, Tony; Jameson, Leland

2007-01-01

It is often said that numerical simulation is third in the group of three ways to explore modern science: theory, experiment and simulation. Carefully executed modern numerical simulations can, however, be considered at least as relevant as experiment and theory. In comparison to physical experimentation, with numerical simulation one has the numerically simulated values of every field variable at every grid point in space and time. In comparison to theory, with numerical simulation one can explore sets of very complex non-linear equations such as the Einstein equations that are very difficult to investigate theoretically. Cyber-enabled scientific discovery is not just about numerical simulation but about every possible issue related to scientific discovery by utilizing cyberinfrastructure such as the analysis and storage of large data sets, the creation of tools that can be used by broad classes of researchers and, above all, the education and training of a cyber-literate workforce

Strategic Reading, Ontologies, and the Future of Scientific Publishing

Science.gov (United States)

Renear, Allen H.; Palmer, Carole L.

2009-08-01

The revolution in scientific publishing that has been promised since the 1980s is about to take place. Scientists have always read strategically, working with many articles simultaneously to search, filter, scan, link, annotate, and analyze fragments of content. An observed recent increase in strategic reading in the online environment will soon be further intensified by two current trends: (i) the widespread use of digital indexing, retrieval, and navigation resources and (ii) the emergence within many scientific disciplines of interoperable ontologies. Accelerated and enhanced by reading tools that take advantage of ontologies, reading practices will become even more rapid and indirect, transforming the ways in which scientists engage the literature and shaping the evolution of scientific publishing.

Mapping patient safety : A large-scale literature review using bibliometric visualisation techniques

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Rodrigues, S.P.; Van Eck, N.J.; Waltman, L.; Jansen, F.W.

2014-01-01

Background The amount of scientific literature available is often overwhelming, making it difficult for researchers to have a good overview of the literature and to see relations between different developments. Visualisation techniques based on bibliometric data are helpful in obtaining an overview

EDC-2: The Endocrine Society's Second Scientific Statement on Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals

Science.gov (United States)

Chappell, V. A.; Fenton, S. E.; Flaws, J. A.; Nadal, A.; Prins, G. S.; Toppari, J.; Zoeller, R. T.

2015-01-01

The Endocrine Society's first Scientific Statement in 2009 provided a wake-up call to the scientific community about how environmental endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) affect health and disease. Five years later, a substantially larger body of literature has solidified our understanding of plausible mechanisms underlying EDC actions and how exposures in animals and humans—especially during development—may lay the foundations for disease later in life. At this point in history, we have much stronger knowledge about how EDCs alter gene-environment interactions via physiological, cellular, molecular, and epigenetic changes, thereby producing effects in exposed individuals as well as their descendants. Causal links between exposure and manifestation of disease are substantiated by experimental animal models and are consistent with correlative epidemiological data in humans. There are several caveats because differences in how experimental animal work is conducted can lead to difficulties in drawing broad conclusions, and we must continue to be cautious about inferring causality in humans. In this second Scientific Statement, we reviewed the literature on a subset of topics for which the translational evidence is strongest: 1) obesity and diabetes; 2) female reproduction; 3) male reproduction; 4) hormone-sensitive cancers in females; 5) prostate; 6) thyroid; and 7) neurodevelopment and neuroendocrine systems. Our inclusion criteria for studies were those conducted predominantly in the past 5 years deemed to be of high quality based on appropriate negative and positive control groups or populations, adequate sample size and experimental design, and mammalian animal studies with exposure levels in a range that was relevant to humans. We also focused on studies using the developmental origins of health and disease model. No report was excluded based on a positive or negative effect of the EDC exposure. The bulk of the results across the board strengthen the

Joining of Ukraine to the European scientific and metric systems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

O.M. Sazonets

2015-09-01

Full Text Available At the present stage of development it is necessary to form the knowledge which structures knowledge as the object of management. In conditions of technological globalism there are structural changes in the information environment of countries. Scientific metrics is sufficiently developed in other countries, especially in the EU. The article contains the description of the first index calculation system of scientific references called Science Citation Index (SCI. The main advantage of this project was searching for information not only by the author and thematic categories, but also by the list of cited literature. The authors define the scientific and metric base in the following way: scientific and metric database (SMBD is the bibliographic and abstract database with the tools for tracking citations of articles published in scientific journals. The most prominent European scientific and metric bases are examined. The authors show that the bases have the performance assessment tools which track down the impact of scientific papers and publications of individual scientists and research institutions. The state of crisis in scientific and technological activities in Ukraine as well as the economy as a whole, needs immediate organization of national scientific and metric system.

Mobile Apps for Suicide Prevention: Review of Virtual Stores and Literature.

Science.gov (United States)

de la Torre, Isabel; Castillo, Gema; Arambarri, Jon; López-Coronado, Miguel; Franco, Manuel A

2017-10-10

The best manner to prevent suicide is to recognize suicidal signs and signals, and know how to respond to them. We aim to study the existing mobile apps for suicide prevention in the literature and the most commonly used virtual stores. Two reviews were carried out. The first was done by searching the most commonly used commercial app stores, which are iTunes and Google Play. The second was a review of mobile health (mHealth) apps in published articles within the last 10 years in the following 7 scientific databases: Science Direct, Medline, PsycINFO, Embase, The Cochrane Library, IEEE Xplore, and Google Scholar. A total of 124 apps related to suicide were found in the cited virtual stores but only 20 apps were specifically designed for suicide prevention. All apps were free and most were designed for Android. Furthermore, 6 relevant papers were found in the indicated scientific databases; in these studies, some real experiences with physicians, caregivers, and families were described. The importance of these people in suicide prevention was indicated. The number of apps regarding suicide prevention is small, and there was little information available from literature searches, indicating that technology-based suicide prevention remains understudied. Many of the apps provided no interactive features. It is important to verify the accuracy of the results of different apps that are available on iOS and Android. The confidence generated by these apps can benefit end users, either by improving their health monitoring or simply to verify their body condition. ©Isabel de la Torre, Gema Castillo, Jon Arambarri, Miguel López-Coronado, Manuel A Franco. Originally published in JMIR Mhealth and Uhealth (http://mhealth.jmir.org), 10.10.2017.

Scientific Skills as Core Competences in Medical Education: What do medical students think?

Science.gov (United States)

Ribeiro, Laura; Severo, Milton; Pereira, Margarida; Amélia Ferreira, Maria

2015-08-01

Background: Scientific excellence is one of the most fundamental underpinnings of medical education and its relevance is unquestionable. To be involved in research activities enhances students' critical thinking and problem-solving capacities, which are mandatory competences for new achievements in patient care and consequently to the improvement of clinical practice. Purposes: This work aimed to study the relevance given by Portuguese medical students to a core of scientific skills, and their judgment about their own ability to execute those skills. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted on students attending the first, fourth and sixth years of medical course in the same period. An assessment istrument, exploring the importance given by Portuguese medical students to scientific skills in high school, to clinical practice and to their own ability to execute them, was designed, adapted and applied specifically to this study. Results: Students' perceptions were associated with gender, academic year, previous participation in research activities, positive and negative attitudes toward science, research integration into the curriculum and motivation to undertake research. The viewpoint of medical students about the relevance of scientific skills overall, and the ability to execute them, was independently associated with motivation to be enrolled in research. Conclusions: These findings have meaningful implications in medical education regarding the inclusion of a structural research program in the medical curriculum. Students should be aware that clinical practice would greatly benefit from the enrollment in research activities. By developing a solid scientific literacy future physicians will be able to apply new knowledge in patient care.

Brazilian scientific publications of obstetrical nurses on home delivery: systematic literature review

OpenAIRE

Feyer, Iara Simoni Silveira; Monticelli, Marisa; Volkmer, Cilene; Burigo, Renata Angeloni

2013-01-01

This review study of national journals aimed at characterizing the scientific production of Brazilian nurses regarding home delivery and identifying the results achieved. A total of 27 studies were found, of which ten studies complied with the inclusion criteria, with eight constituting the analytical corpus in accordance with the Critical Appraisal Skills Program. Data were synthesized using the meta-ethnographic approach, following the interpretation of the reciprocal translation. Three cat...

Identity theory and personality theory: mutual relevance.

Science.gov (United States)

Stryker, Sheldon

2007-12-01

Some personality psychologists have found a structural symbolic interactionist frame and identity theory relevant to their work. This frame and theory, developed in sociology, are first reviewed. Emphasized in the review are a multiple identity conception of self, identities as internalized expectations derived from roles embedded in organized networks of social interaction, and a view of social structures as facilitators in bringing people into networks or constraints in keeping them out, subsequently, attention turns to a discussion of the mutual relevance of structural symbolic interactionism/identity theory and personality theory, looking to extensions of the current literature on these topics.

Literature review on the greenhouse effect and global warming

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

English, M.; Petri, H.; Wong, R.K.W.; Kochtubajda, B.

1990-08-01

A literature review of recent (1988-1990) publications on global warming and climate change was carried out by the Alberta Research Council. The objectives of the project were to develop a listing of relevant citations, review the publications, prepare a short summary of the contents of each, and develop statistics with respect to the degree to which scientific consensus exists on the various topics of interest. The bibliography contains 1,557 citations, and a total of 501 publications were reviewed. Topics of interest include computer modelling of world climate, potential impacts of climate change, potential strategies for responding to climate change, and technological solutions. Statistical results are presented of numbers of papers reviewed addressing types of emission, time of effective doubling of greenhouse gases, global temperature increase predicted for effective doubling of greenhouse gases, temperature increase in northern lattitudes for an effective doubling of greenhouse gases, components of atmosphere that are changing, potential impacts on agriculture, forestry, and health, suggested emission limitations, and suggested technological solutions. 4 refs., 11 figs., 3 tabs

Report for the Office of Scientific and Technical Information: Population Modeling of the Emergence and Development of Scientific Fields

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Bettencourt, L. M. A. (LANL); Castillo-Chavez, C. (Arizona State University); Kaiser, D. (MIT); Wojick, D. E. (IIA)

2006-10-04

The accelerated development of digital libraries and archives, in tandem with efficient search engines and the computational ability to retrieve and parse massive amounts of information, are making it possible to quantify the time evolution of scientific literatures. These data are but one piece of the tangible recorded evidence of the processes whereby scientists create and exchange information in their journeys towards the generation of knowledge. As such, these tools provide a proxy with which to study our ability to innovate. Innovation has often been linked with prosperity and growth and, consequently, trying to understand what drives scientific innovation is of extreme interest. Identifying sets of population characteristics, factors, and mechanisms that enable scientific communities to remain at the cutting edge, accelerate their growth, or increase their ability to re-organize around new themes or research topics is therefore of special significance. Yet generating a quantitative understanding of the factors that make scientific fields arise and/or become more or less productive is still in its infancy. This is precisely the type of knowledge most needed for promoting and sustaining innovation. Ideally, the efficient and strategic allocation of resources on the part of funding agencies and corporations would be driven primarily by knowledge of this type. Early steps have been taken toward such a quantitative understanding of scientific innovation. Some have focused on characterizing the broad properties of relevant time series, such as numbers of publications and authors in a given field. Others have focused on the structure and evolution of networks of coauthorship and citation. Together these types of studies provide much needed statistical analyses of the structure and evolution of scientific communities. Despite these efforts, however, crucial elements of prediction have remained elusive. Building on many of these earlier insights, we provide here a

Using Bibliographic Knowledge for Ranking in Scientific Publication Databases

CERN Document Server

Vesely, Martin; Le Meur, Jean-Yves

2008-01-01

Document ranking for scientific publications involves a variety of specialized resources (e.g. author or citation indexes) that are usually difficult to use within standard general purpose search engines that usually operate on large-scale heterogeneous document collections for which the required specialized resources are not always available for all the documents present in the collections. Integrating such resources into specialized information retrieval engines is therefore important to cope with community-specific user expectations that strongly influence the perception of relevance within the considered community. In this perspective, this paper extends the notion of ranking with various methods exploiting different types of bibliographic knowledge that represent a crucial resource for measuring the relevance of scientific publications. In our work, we experimentally evaluated the adequacy of two such ranking methods (one based on freshness, i.e. the publication date, and the other on a novel index, the ...

The Touchstone Process: an ongoing critical evaluation of reiki in the scientific literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Baldwin, Ann L; Vitale, Anne; Brownell, Elise; Scicinski, Jan; Kearns, Mary; Rand, William

2010-01-01

Reiki is used by a growing number of people but little is known about the scientific basis for its use. The Touchstone Process was developed as an ongoing process to systematically analyze published, peer-reviewed studies of Reiki, the results being made accessible to the public online. Thirteen scientifically qualified experts in the field of Reiki were assembled into 3 teams to retrieve, evaluate, and summarize articles using standardized, piloted evaluation forms. Summaries of 26 Reiki articles, including strengths and weaknesses, were posted on a newly developed Web site (www.centerforreikiresearch.org), together with an overall summary of the status of Reiki research and guidelines for future research: The Touchstone Process determined that only 12 articles were based on a robust experimental design and utilized well-established outcome parameters. Of these articles, 2 provided no support, 5 provided some support, and 5 demonstrated strong evidence for the use of Reiki as a healing modality. There is a need for further high-quality studies in this area.

Vitamin E-drug interactions: molecular basis and clinical relevance.

Science.gov (United States)

Podszun, Maren; Frank, Jan

2014-12-01

Vitamin E (α-, β-, γ- and δ-tocopherol and -tocotrienol) is an essential factor in the human diet and regularly taken as a dietary supplement by many people, who act under the assumption that it may be good for their health and can do no harm. With the publication of meta-analyses reporting increased mortality in persons taking vitamin E supplements, the safety of the micronutrient was questioned and interactions with prescription drugs were suggested as one potentially underlying mechanism. Here, we review the evidence in the scientific literature for adverse vitamin E-drug interactions and discuss the potential of each of the eight vitamin E congeners to alter the activity of drugs. In summary, there is no evidence from animal models or randomised controlled human trials to suggest that the intake of tocopherols and tocotrienols at nutritionally relevant doses may cause adverse nutrient-drug interactions. Consumption of high-dose vitamin E supplements ( ≥  300 mg/d), however, may lead to interactions with the drugs aspirin, warfarin, tamoxifen and cyclosporine A that may alter their activities. For the majority of drugs, however, interactions with vitamin E, even at high doses, have not been observed and are thus unlikely.

Rigor, Reliability, and Scientific Relevance: Citizen Science Lessons from COASST (Invited)

Science.gov (United States)

Parrish, J. K.

2013-12-01

Citizen science promises fine grain, broad extent data collected over decadal time scales, with co-benefits including increased scientific literacy and civic engagement. But does it only deliver non-standardized, unverifiable data collected episodically by individuals with little-to-no training? How do you know which projects to trust? What are the attributes of a scientifically sound citizen science project? The Coastal Observation and Seabird Survey Team (COASST) is a 15 year old citizen science project currently involving ~800 participants from northern California north to Kotzebue, Alaska and west to the Commander Islands, Russia. After a single 5-hour training delivered in-community by an expert, volunteers have the knowledge and skill sets to accurately survey a coastal site for beached bird carcasses, which they will be able to identify to species correctly ~85% of the time. Data are collected monthly, and some volunteers remain with the program for years, contributing hundreds, even thousands, of survey hours. COASST trainings, data collection materials, and data entry web portal all reinforce 'evidence first, deduction second,' a maxim that allows volunteers to learn, and gives on-staff experts the ability to independently verify all birds found. COASST data go directly into science, as part of studies as diverse as fishery entanglement, historic native uses of seabirds as food sources, and the impacts of sudden shifts in upwelling; as well as into resource management, as part of decisions on fishing regulations, waterfowl hunting limits, and ESA-listed species management. Like professional science, COASST features a specific sampling design linked to questions of interest, verifiable data, statistical analysis, and peer-reviewed publication. In addition, COASST features before-and-after testing of volunteer knowledge, independent verification of all deductive data, and recruitment and retention strategies linked to geographic community norms. As a result

Relevance of counselling to human resource management in ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

However, literature has shown that counselling is universal and useful in all fields of human endeavours. This paper therefore brings into focus the relevance of counselling to human resource management in organizations. It defines counselling, resource management and identifies various services that counsellors perform ...

Is victim identity in genocide a question of science or law? The scientific perspective, with special reference to Darfur.

Science.gov (United States)

Komar, Debra

2008-09-01

In genocide, victims must represent an ethnic, racial, religious or national group. But is victim identity a question of science or law? Must victims be a socially recognized group or can group identity exist solely in the mind of the perpetrator? This question is relevant to the on-going crisis in Darfur. The "Arab-on-African" violence depicted in the media encompasses identities not shared by Darfurians. This study details an evaluation of victim identity in Darfur, based on field research and literature review. Darfurians are defined by subsistence strategy and economic groups are not protected under genocide law. Whether Darfur is genocide depends on whether victims must conform to scientific group classifications or need only be defined by their relationship to the perpetrators.

Invention through bricolage: epistemic engineering in scientific communities

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Alexander James Gillett

2018-03-01

Full Text Available It is widely recognised that knowledge accumulation is an important aspect of scientific communities. In this essay, drawing on a range of material from theoretical biology and behavioural science, I discuss a particular aspect of the intergenerational nature of human communities – “virtual collaboration” (Tomasello 1999 – and how it can lead to epistemic progress without any explicit intentional creativity (Henrich 2016. My aim in this paper is to make this work relevant to theorists working on the social structures of science so that these processes can be utilised and optimised in scientific communities.

Science through the looking glass of literature

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Saris, F.W.

2005-01-01

The scientific revolution brought about by Einstein, Lorentz, Bohr, Heisenberg and others has changed our society and our worldview, as is reflected also in literature, fiction as well as non-fiction. Of course we need textbooks to teach relativity, cosmology and quantum mechanics, but I think

Mercury migration into ground water, a literature study

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Carlton, W.H.; Carden, J.L.; Kury, R.; Eichholz, G.G.

1994-11-01

This report presents a broad review of the technical literature dealing with mercury migration in the soil. The approach followed was to identify relevant articles by searching bibliographic data bases, obtaining the promising articles and searching these articles for any additional relevant citations. Eight catagories were used to organize the literature, with a review and summary of each paper. Catagories used were the following: chemical states of mercury under environmental conditions; diffusion of mercury vapor through soil; solubility and stability of mercury in environmental waters; transport of mercury on colloids; models for mercury migration through the environment; analytical techniques; retention of mercury by soil components; formation of organomecurials.

Profile and scientific production of Brazilian National Council of Technological and Scientific Development researchers in Pediatrics.

Science.gov (United States)

Oliveira, Maria Christina L; Martelli, Daniella Reis B; Pinheiro, Sergio Veloso; Miranda, Debora Marques; Quirino, Isabel Gomes; Leite, Barbara Gusmão L; Colosimo, Enrico Antonio; e Silva, Ana Cristina S; Martelli-Júnior, Hercílio; Oliveira, Eduardo Araujo

2013-09-01

To evaluate the profile and the scientific production of researchers in Pediatrics with scholarship from the National Counsel of Technological and Scientific Development. The Lattes curricula of 34 researchers in Pediatrics with active scholarships, from 2006 to 2008 were included in the analysis. The variables of interest were: gender, affiliation, time since PHD, tutoring of undergraduate students, mentorship of masters and doctors, scientific production and the papers' impact. In a total of 411 researchers in Medicine, 34 (8%) belonged to Pediatrics. Males (77%) and scholars in the category 2 of productivity (62%) prevailed. Three states of Brazil were responsible for approximately 90% of the researchers: São Paulo (53%), Minas Gerais (21%), and Rio Grande do Sul (15%). During their academic career, the Pediatrics researchers have published 3,122 articles with a median of 89 articles per researcher (interquartile range - IQ=51-119). Of the total, 40 and 59% articles were indexed in the Web of Science and Scopus databases, respectively. The Pediatrics researchers have published papers in 599 journals with a median impact factor of 2.35 (IQ=1.37-3.73) for the 323 indexed journals. The Pediatrics researchers have a relevant scientific output from the quantity point of the view, but there is a need to improve quality.

The reading of scientific texts: questions on interpretation and evaluation, with special reference to the scientific writings of Ludwik Fleck.

Science.gov (United States)

Hedfors, Eva

2007-03-01

Ludwik Fleck is remembered for his monograph published in German in 1935. Reissued in 1979 as Genesis and development of a scientific fact Fleck's monograph has been claimed to expound relativistic views of science. Fleck has also been portrayed as a prominent scientist. The description of his production of a vaccine against typhus during World War II, when imprisoned in Buchenwald, is legendary in the scholarly literature. The claims about Fleck's scientific achievements have been justified by referring to his numerous publications in international scientific journals. Though frequently mentioned, these publications have scarcely been studied. The present article discusses differences in interpretation and evaluation of science in relation to the background of the interpreters. For this purpose Fleck's scientific publications have been scrutinized. In conjunction with further sources reflecting the desperate situation at the time in question, the results of the study account for a more restrained picture of Fleck's scientific accomplishments. Furthermore, based on the review of the latter, certain demands characterizing good science could be articulated. The restricted possibilities of those not trained in science or not possessing field specific knowledge, evaluating science are discussed, as are also formal aspects of scientific papers and questions related to research ethics.

Auditory Workload Assessment. Volume II: Non-Copyrighted Literature Search Results

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Rench, Michael

2000-01-01

In support of the US Army Research Laboratory, Human Research and Engineering Directorate, HSIAC, the Human Systems Information Analysis Center, conducted an extensive search of scientific literature...

Science Teachers' Use of Mass Media to Address Socio-Scientific and Sustainability Issues

Science.gov (United States)

Klosterman, Michelle L.; Sadler, Troy D.; Brown, Julie

2012-01-01

The currency, relevancy and changing nature of science makes it a natural topic of focus for mass media outlets. Science teachers and students can capitalize on this wealth of scientific information to explore socio-scientific and sustainability issues; however, without a lens on how those media are created and how representations of science are…

Funding food science and nutrition research: financial conflicts and scientific integrity.

Science.gov (United States)

Rowe, Sylvia; Alexander, Nick; Clydesdale, Fergus; Applebaum, Rhona; Atkinson, Stephanie; Black, Richard; Dwyer, Johanna; Hentges, Eric; Higley, Nancy; Lefevre, Michael; Lupton, Joanne; Miller, Sanford; Tancredi, Doris; Weaver, Connie; Woteki, Catherine; Wedral, Elaine

2009-05-01

There has been significant public debate about the susceptibility of research to biases of various kinds. The dialogue has extended to the peer-reviewed literature, scientific conferences, the mass media, government advisory bodies, and beyond. While biases can come from myriad sources, the overwhelming focus of the discussion, to date, has been on industry-funded science. Given the critical role that industry has played and will continue to play in the research process, the International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) North America Working Group on Guiding Principles has, in this paper, set out proposed conflict-of-interest guidelines, regarding industry funding, for protecting the integrity and credibility of the scientific record, particularly with respect to health, nutrition, and food-safety science. Eight principles are enumerated, specifying ground rules for industry-sponsored research. The paper, which issues a challenge to the broader scientific community to address all bias issues, is only a first step; the document is intended to be dynamic, prompting ongoing discussion and refinement. The Guiding Principles are as follows. In the conduct of public/private research relationships, all relevant parties shall: 1) conduct or sponsor research that is factual, transparent, and designed objectively; according to accepted principles of scientific inquiry, the research design will generate an appropriately phrased hypothesis and the research will answer the appropriate questions, rather than favor a particular outcome; 2) require control of both study design and research itself to remain with scientific investigators; 3) not offer or accept remuneration geared to the outcome of a research project; 4) prior to the commencement of studies, ensure that there is a written agreement that the investigative team has the freedom and obligation to attempt to publish the findings within some specified time-frame; 5) require, in publications and conference presentations

Funding food science and nutrition research: financial conflicts and scientific integrity.

Science.gov (United States)

Rowe, Sylvia; Alexander, Nick; Clydesdale, Fergus M; Applebaum, Rhona S; Atkinson, Stephanie; Black, Richard M; Dwyer, Johanna T; Hentges, Eric; Higley, Nancy A; Lefevre, Michael; Lupton, Joanne R; Miller, Sanford A; Tancredi, Doris L; Weaver, Connie M; Woteki, Catherine E; Wedral, Elaine

2009-05-01

There has been significant public debate about the susceptibility of research to biases of various kinds. The dialogue has extended to the peer-reviewed literature, scientific conferences, the mass media, government advisory bodies, and beyond. Whereas biases can come from myriad sources, the overwhelming focus of the discussion to date has been on industry-funded science. Given the critical role that industry has played and will continue to play in the research process, the International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) North America Working Group on Guiding Principles has, in this article, proposed conflict-of-interest guidelines regarding industry funding to protect the integrity and credibility of the scientific record, particularly with respect to health, nutrition, and food-safety science. Eight principles are enumerated, which specify the ground rules for industry-sponsored research. This article, which issues a challenge to the broader scientific community to address all bias issues, is only a first step; the document is intended to be dynamic, prompting ongoing discussion and refinement. In the conduct of public/private research relationships, all relevant parties shall 1) conduct or sponsor research that is factual, transparent, and designed objectively, and, according to accepted principles of scientific inquiry, the research design will generate an appropriately phrased hypothesis and the research will answer the appropriate questions, rather than favor a particular outcome; 2) require control of both study design and research itself to remain with scientific investigators; 3) not offer or accept remuneration geared to the outcome of a research project; 4) ensure, before the commencement of studies, that there is a written agreement that the investigative team has the freedom and obligation to attempt to publish the findings within some specified time frame; 5) require, in publications and conference presentations, full signed disclosure of all financial

Hauntings, homeopathy, and the Hopkinsville Goblins: using pseudoscience to teach scientific thinking

Science.gov (United States)

Schmaltz, Rodney; Lilienfeld, Scott O.

2014-01-01

With access to information ever increasing, it is essential that students acquire the skills to distinguish fact from fiction. By incorporating examples of pseudoscience into lectures, instructors can provide students with the tools needed to understand the difference between scientific and pseudoscientific or paranormal claims. We discuss examples involving psychics, ghosts, aliens, and other phenomena in relation to scientific thinking. In light of research literature demonstrating that presenting and dispelling scientific misconceptions in the classroom is an effective means of countering non-scientific or pseudoscientific beliefs, we provide examples of pseudoscience that can be used to help students acquire healthy skepticism while avoiding cynicism. PMID:24860520

Hauntings, homeopathy, and the Hopkinsville Goblins: Using pseudoscience to teach scientific thinking

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Rodney Michael Schmaltz

2014-04-01

Full Text Available With access to information ever increasing, it is essential that students acquire the skills to distinguish fact from fiction. By incorporating examples of pseudoscience into lectures, instructors can provide students with the tools needed to understand the difference between scientific and pseudoscientific or paranormal claims. We discuss examples involving psychics, ghosts, aliens, and other phenomena in relation to scientific thinking. In light of research literature demonstrating that presenting and dispelling scientific misconceptions in the classroom is an effective means of countering non-scientific or pseudoscientific beliefs, we provide examples of pseudoscience that can be used to help students acquire healthy skepticism while avoiding cynicism.

Hauntings, homeopathy, and the Hopkinsville Goblins: using pseudoscience to teach scientific thinking.

Science.gov (United States)

Schmaltz, Rodney; Lilienfeld, Scott O

2014-01-01

With access to information ever increasing, it is essential that students acquire the skills to distinguish fact from fiction. By incorporating examples of pseudoscience into lectures, instructors can provide students with the tools needed to understand the difference between scientific and pseudoscientific or paranormal claims. We discuss examples involving psychics, ghosts, aliens, and other phenomena in relation to scientific thinking. In light of research literature demonstrating that presenting and dispelling scientific misconceptions in the classroom is an effective means of countering non-scientific or pseudoscientific beliefs, we provide examples of pseudoscience that can be used to help students acquire healthy skepticism while avoiding cynicism.

SciRide Finder: a citation-based paradigm in biomedical literature search.

Science.gov (United States)

Volanakis, Adam; Krawczyk, Konrad

2018-04-18

There are more than 26 million peer-reviewed biomedical research items according to Medline/PubMed. This breadth of information is indicative of the progress in biomedical sciences on one hand, but an overload for scientists performing literature searches on the other. A major portion of scientific literature search is to find statements, numbers and protocols that can be cited to build an evidence-based narrative for a new manuscript. Because science builds on prior knowledge, such information has likely been written out and cited in an older manuscript. Thus, Cited Statements, pieces of text from scientific literature supported by citing other peer-reviewed publications, carry significant amount of condensed information on prior art. Based on this principle, we propose a literature search service, SciRide Finder (finder.sciride.org), which constrains the search corpus to such Cited Statements only. We demonstrate that Cited Statements can carry different information to this found in titles/abstracts and full text, giving access to alternative literature search results than traditional search engines. We further show how presenting search results as a list of Cited Statements allows researchers to easily find information to build an evidence-based narrative for their own manuscripts.

DIRECTIONS OF USEING ELECTRONIC MEANS IN TEACHING SCIENTIFIC STYLE OF SPEECH

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Л Б Белоглазова

2015-12-01

Full Text Available The article notes that the modern human cognitive activity related to the implementation of information processes, by means of information and communication technologies. The author identifies three main areas of use of electronic media in teaching scientific style of speech. These include: 1 work with electronic textbooks; 2 search of the scientific literature in electronic libraries; 3 use computer software for content analysis of scientific texts. The analysis of these areas is done. It stated that the introduction in the educational process should be accompanied by electronic means creating specialized audiences and providing them with modern equipment.

Exploring Ethnohistory and Indigenous Scholarship: What Is the Relevance to Educational Historians?

Science.gov (United States)

McGregor, Heather E.

2014-01-01

For educational historians involved in the representation of Indigenous contexts and peoples, what is the relevance of ethnohistory as a discipline or methodology, and what is lost or gained in using it? This article reviews ethnohistorical literature, and brings it in conversation with literature by Indigenous scholars on research methodologies,…

EFSA Panel on Animal Health and Welfare (AHAW); Scientific Opinion on bluetongue monitoring and surveillance

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Stegeman, Arjan; Bøtner, Anette; Savini, Giovanni

Following a request from the Commission, the Panel on Animal Health and Welfare was asked to deliver a Scientific Opinion on: 1) the expected prevalence (design prevalence) under different circumstances, and, 2) an updated scientific assessment of the size of the relevant geographical area...

On the Relevance of Game Theory in Strategic Thinking ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

On the Relevance of Game Theory in Strategic Thinking. ... The author reviews some of the applicable literature and shows how game theory can be used to predict the outcome of a strategy, explain why a ... AJOL African Journals Online.

International Service Learning: Analytical Review of Published Research Literature

Science.gov (United States)

Dixon, Brett

2015-01-01

International service learning (ISL) is an emerging area of international education. This paper summarizes academic journal articles on ISL programs and organizes the relevant publications by academic disciplines, service learning project areas, and other topics. The basis for this review is relevant literature from full-text scholarly peer…

James Hutton's Geological Tours of Scotland: Romanticism, Literary Strategies, and the Scientific Quest

Science.gov (United States)

Furniss, Tom

2014-01-01

Rather than focussing on the relationship between science and literature, this article attempts to read scientific writing as literature. It explores a somewhat neglected element of the story of the emergence of geology in the late eighteenth century--James Hutton's unpublished accounts of the tours of Scotland that he undertook in the years…

Resin bond to indirect composite and new ceramic/polymer materials: a review of the literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Spitznagel, Frank A; Horvath, Sebastian D; Guess, Petra C; Blatz, Markus B

2014-01-01

Resin bonding is essential for clinical longevity of indirect restorations. Especially in light of the increasing popularity of computer-aided design/computer-aided manufacturing-fabricated indirect restorations, there is a need to assess optimal bonding protocols for new ceramic/polymer materials and indirect composites. The aim of this article was to review and assess the current scientific evidence on the resin bond to indirect composite and new ceramic/polymer materials. An electronic PubMed database search was conducted from 1966 to September 2013 for in vitro studies pertaining the resin bond to indirect composite and new ceramic/polymer materials. The search revealed 198 titles. Full-text screening was carried out for 43 studies, yielding 18 relevant articles that complied with inclusion criteria. No relevant studies could be identified regarding new ceramic/polymer materials. Most common surface treatments are aluminum-oxide air-abrasion, silane treatment, and hydrofluoric acid-etching for indirect composite restoration. Self-adhesive cements achieve lower bond strengths in comparison with etch-and-rinse systems. Thermocycling has a greater impact on bonding behavior than water storage. Air-particle abrasion and additional silane treatment should be applied to enhance the resin bond to laboratory-processed composites. However, there is an urgent need for in vitro studies that evaluate the bond strength to new ceramic/polymer materials. This article reviews the available dental literature on resin bond of laboratory composites and gives scientifically based guidance for their successful placement. Furthermore, this review demonstrated that future research for new ceramic/polymer materials is required. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Open access: the changing face of scientific publishing.

Science.gov (United States)

Chatterjee, Pranab; Biswas, Tamoghna; Mishra, Vishala

2013-04-01

The debate on open access to scientific literature that has been raging in scholarly circles for quite some time now has been fueled further by the recent developments in the realm of the open access movement. This article is a short commentary on the current scenario, challenges, and the future of the open access movement.

Teaching the Scientific Method Using Current News Articles

Science.gov (United States)

Palmer, Laura K.; Mahan, Carolyn G.

2013-01-01

We describe a short (less than 50 minutes) activity using news articles from sources such as "Science Daily" to teach students the steps of the scientific method and the difference between primary and secondary literature sources. The flexibility in choosing news articles to examine allowed us to tailor the activity to the specific interests of…

Learning scientific programming with Python

CERN Document Server

Hill, Christian

2015-01-01

Learn to master basic programming tasks from scratch with real-life scientifically relevant examples and solutions drawn from both science and engineering. Students and researchers at all levels are increasingly turning to the powerful Python programming language as an alternative to commercial packages and this fast-paced introduction moves from the basics to advanced concepts in one complete volume, enabling readers to quickly gain proficiency. Beginning with general programming concepts such as loops and functions within the core Python 3 language, and moving onto the NumPy, SciPy and Matplotlib libraries for numerical programming and data visualisation, this textbook also discusses the use of IPython notebooks to build rich-media, shareable documents for scientific analysis. Including a final chapter introducing challenging topics such as floating-point precision and algorithm stability, and with extensive online resources to support advanced study, this textbook represents a targeted package for students...

Orthorexia Nervosa: A Review of the Literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Costa, Christine B; Hardan-Khalil, Kholoud; Gibbs, Kimberly

2017-12-01

The phenomenon of orthorexia nervosa (ON) has been noted by clinicians since 1996 and described in the scientific literature, and yet there is no formal recognition of ON as a psychiatric diagnosis. Review the latest available literature regarding diagnoses similarities, presentation uniqueness, assessment/assessment tools, and suggested treatments of ON. A literature search of four databases focusing on articles published between 2000 and 2016 was conducted to evaluate the status of the literature on Orthorexia. Among the 15 articles selected for this review, similarities with other psychiatric disorders emerged, confusion about use of assessment tools existed, and the lack of evidence based treatments for ON was pronounced. More research is needed to determine the prevalence of pathologically unhealthy, obsessive, "self-defined healthy," eating behaviors, and to determine if ON is a unique eating disorder or just a subset of another disorder.

Literature survey: health effects of radiation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Tveten, U.; Garder, K.

This report was originally written as a chapter of a report entitled 'Air pollution effects of electric power generation, a literature survey', written jointly by the Norwegian Institute for Air Research (NILU) and the Institutt for Atomenergi (IFA). (INIS RN242406). A survey is presented of the health effects of radiation. It has not, however, been the intention of the authors to make a complete list of all the literature relevant to this subject. The NILU/IFA report was meant as a first step towards a method of comparing the health effects of electric power generation by fission, gas and oil. Consequently information relevant to quantification of the health effects on humans has been selected. It is pointed out that quantitative information on the health effects of low radiation and dose rates, as are relevant to routine releases, does not exist for humans. The convention of linear extrapolation from higher doses and dose rates is used worldwide, but it is felt by most that the estimates are conservative. As an example of the use of the current best estimates, a calculation of normal release radiation doses is performed. (Auth.)

[Scientific output on nutrition in the scope of Primary Health Care in Brazil: a review of the literature].

Science.gov (United States)

Canella, Daniela Silva; Silva, Ana Carolina Feldenheimer da; Jaime, Patrícia Constante

2013-02-01

Nutrition campaigns in Primary Health Care (PHC) play an important role in health promotion and the prevention and treatment of injuries. The scope of this paper is to chart and evaluate the scientific output of nutrition in Brazilian PHC. A search and review of the literature and papers was conducted on the PubMed and Lilacs databases, using key words related to PHC and nutrition. The studies were restricted to Brazil with the professionals or population assisted by PHC in the Brazilian Unified Health System and published prior to March 2011. The references in the selected articles were also consulted in order to identify additional studies. From the total of papers located, 68 were eligible and a further 49 were identified in the references lists, such that a total of 117 papers were analyzed. The studies reviewed were mostly original articles, using quantitative methodology, carried out by São Paulo University in that state and published from 2002 to 2011. The main issues were diagnosis seeking the evaluation of nutritional status involving children. The output in this field is growing, although there is a need to redirect the scope of future studies to a focus on intervention models and program evaluation.

The Success Criteria of Scientific Pedagogic Activities

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

M. V. Ovchinnikov

2013-01-01

Full Text Available The paper considers the problem of scientific pedagogic activity assessment of the higher school academic staff. The existing options of quality estimation are listed along with their deficiencies; the most acceptable in the authors’ opinion being the systematic approach. The latter allows considering almost every aspect of scientific-pedagogic activity. On that ground, the authors recommend the following success estimation criteria: gnostic, projecting, communicative, informational, and organizational. The criteria of work satisfaction and its results are taken into consideration as additional ones. The indicators of each criterion are given demonstrating that the as- sessment can be both internal (subjective and external (objective, denoted in the normative acts. The problem of complex and just quality assessment of scientific- pedagogic activity is quite relevant as it affects the academic staff motivation. The authors believe that the research findings can improve the objectivity of teachers’ work assessment and give way to differentiated approaches to their motivation and stimulation. 

Integrating scientific argumentation to improve undergraduate writing and learning in a global environmental change course

Science.gov (United States)

Kreutz, K. J.; Koffman, B. G.; Trenbath, K. L.

2013-12-01

What makes a good scientific argument? We began ERS201: Global Environmental Change by asking students to reflect on the mechanics of a strong scientific argument. At the same time, we asked them to evaluate global CO2 and sea level data from different time periods in Earth's history to answer the question, 'Is there a relationship between atmospheric CO2 and sea level, and if so, why?' This question formed the theme for the course, a mid-level, inquiry-based class of about 20 students. Each week, students target specific aspects of the climate system through problem sets, which include experimental and laboratory work, basic statistical analyses of paleoclimate datasets, and the development of simple systems models using STELLA software. Every 2-4 weeks, we challenge students to write short (1500 word) data-driven scientific arguments, which require a synthesis of information from their problem sets and from the scientific literature. Students have to develop a clear, testable hypothesis related to each writing prompt, and then make their case using figures they have generated during the weekly problem sets. We evaluate student writing using a rubric that focuses on the structure and clarity of the argument, relevance of the data included, and integration and quality of the graphics, with a lesser emphasis placed on voice and style. In 2013, student scores improved from a median value of 86 × 9% to 94 × 8% over the course of the semester. More importantly, we found that incorporation of scientific argumentation served to increase student understanding of important and sometimes abstract scientific concepts. For example, on pre- and post-course assessments we asked the question, 'What would happen if a significant portion of the sea ice floating in the Arctic Ocean were to melt?' On the pre-assessment, 80% of students said that it would lead to more coastal flooding, while only 20% correctly stated that a decrease in the reflection of solar energy would lead to

Presentation of the paper “Open access repositories as channel of publication scientific grey literature”

OpenAIRE

Ferreras Fernández, Tránsito; García-Peñalvo, Francisco José; Merlo Vega, José Antonio

2015-01-01

This is the presentation of the paper entitled “Open access repositories as channel of publication scientific grey literature” in the TEEM 2015 International Conference held in Porto (Portugal) in October 7-9, 2015. In this paper we describe how the open access repositories are valid channels for the publication of scientific grey literature. Technological development facilitates the communication of scientific knowledge, allowing expand distribution channels and significantly reducing tra...

Assessment of burn size in obese adults; a literature review

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Borhani-Khomani, Kaveh; Partoft, Søren; Holmgaard, Rikke

2017-01-01

: The current literature was reviewed using relevant electronic databases. The initial search yielded 247 results. Relevant articles were then reviewed. A total of seven publications fulfilled the inclusion criteria. Results: The palmar surface area ranged between 0.59%–1.22%, depending on BMI, gender...

PubMed and beyond: a survey of web tools for searching biomedical literature

Science.gov (United States)

Lu, Zhiyong

2011-01-01

The past decade has witnessed the modern advances of high-throughput technology and rapid growth of research capacity in producing large-scale biological data, both of which were concomitant with an exponential growth of biomedical literature. This wealth of scholarly knowledge is of significant importance for researchers in making scientific discoveries and healthcare professionals in managing health-related matters. However, the acquisition of such information is becoming increasingly difficult due to its large volume and rapid growth. In response, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) is continuously making changes to its PubMed Web service for improvement. Meanwhile, different entities have devoted themselves to developing Web tools for helping users quickly and efficiently search and retrieve relevant publications. These practices, together with maturity in the field of text mining, have led to an increase in the number and quality of various Web tools that provide comparable literature search service to PubMed. In this study, we review 28 such tools, highlight their respective innovations, compare them to the PubMed system and one another, and discuss directions for future development. Furthermore, we have built a website dedicated to tracking existing systems and future advances in the field of biomedical literature search. Taken together, our work serves information seekers in choosing tools for their needs and service providers and developers in keeping current in the field. Database URL: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/CBBresearch/Lu/search PMID:21245076

Community Capacity Building for Physical Activity Promotion among Older Adults-A Literature Review.

Science.gov (United States)

Ubert, Tobias; Forberger, Sarah; Gansefort, Dirk; Zeeb, Hajo; Brand, Tilman

2017-09-13

Community-based interventions to promote physical activity (PA) among older adults are of high interest in health promotion since they promise to be effective strategies to reach this population group. Community capacity building, that is, the local promotion of knowledge, skills, commitment, structures, and leadership, is among the recommended core strategies. However, little guidance is provided on how to achieve a high degree of community capacity. This study aims to identify practical strategies to enhance community capacities for PA promotion among older adults (50 years or older) and to evaluate their success. A literature review was conducted using scientific databases (PsycInfo and Web of Sciences) and grey literature (national and international project databases), and 14 studies (16 articles) were identified. Five groups of capacity building strategies emerged from the literature: (1) building community coalitions and networks, (2) training of professionals, (3) training of laypersons, (4) strengthening competence and awareness in the target population, and (5) allocation of financial resources. All studies used more than one strategy. Coalition building and strengthening competence and awareness were most frequently used. Feasibility and acceptability of the capacity building strategies were demonstrated. However, intervention effects on PA behavior and other relevant outcomes were inconsistent. The one study that systematically compared different capacity building approaches did not find any evidence for beneficial effects of intensified capacity building. More rigorous research evaluating the efficacy of specific strategies to enhance community capacities for PA promotion is needed.

PubMed and beyond: a survey of web tools for searching biomedical literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Lu, Zhiyong

2011-01-01

The past decade has witnessed the modern advances of high-throughput technology and rapid growth of research capacity in producing large-scale biological data, both of which were concomitant with an exponential growth of biomedical literature. This wealth of scholarly knowledge is of significant importance for researchers in making scientific discoveries and healthcare professionals in managing health-related matters. However, the acquisition of such information is becoming increasingly difficult due to its large volume and rapid growth. In response, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) is continuously making changes to its PubMed Web service for improvement. Meanwhile, different entities have devoted themselves to developing Web tools for helping users quickly and efficiently search and retrieve relevant publications. These practices, together with maturity in the field of text mining, have led to an increase in the number and quality of various Web tools that provide comparable literature search service to PubMed. In this study, we review 28 such tools, highlight their respective innovations, compare them to the PubMed system and one another, and discuss directions for future development. Furthermore, we have built a website dedicated to tracking existing systems and future advances in the field of biomedical literature search. Taken together, our work serves information seekers in choosing tools for their needs and service providers and developers in keeping current in the field. Database URL: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/CBBresearch/Lu/search.

Ethics of genetic counseling--basic concepts and relevance to Islamic communities.

Science.gov (United States)

El-Hazmi, Mohsen A F

2004-01-01

Scientific advances and technical developments in the field of laboratory diagnosis and their practical applications have raised ethical issues linked to religion, beliefs, lifestyle and traditions prevailing in different communities. Some of these are pertinent to genetic screening at various stages of life, prenatal diagnosis and the right of the genetically affected fetus to live--all aspects relevant to inbreeding marriages. Of relevance are medical and ethical principles based on professional responsibility. These ideological and social aspects encounter the challenges of science and its applications in the health field, which are linked, directly or indirectly, to scientific achievements and applications related to human genetics. Analysis of the human genome and identification of its sequence, and chemical components, and theories arising from connection of human genome components in health and disease conditions, have led to global requirements to outline legal aspects and ethical principles in relation to diagnosis, prevention and health care. This paper presents basic aspects of disseminating genetic information, guiding the individual, the couple, or the concerned family through genetically induced ill health and methods of control and prevention. The paper discusses the elements and manner and presents details of the application of genetic counseling in Islamic communities in light of scientific, religious, social and legal aspects in the Islamic arena.

Women's Sexual Issues After Myocardial Infarction: A Literature Review.

Science.gov (United States)

Emami Zeydi, Amir; Sharafkhani, Mohammad; Armat, Mohammad Reza; Gould, Kathleen Ahern; Soleimani, Aria; Hosseini, Seyed Javad

2016-01-01

Sexual activity after myocardial infarction (MI) is a concern for patients and often a challenge for health care professionals to address. It is widely recognized that most patients, of both sexes, report sexual problems or concerns after MI. However, there are reported differences between men and women. Women with sexual concerns may seek less help from health care providers and are more inclined to conceal them because of cultural barriers. The aim of the current study is to present a comprehensive review of the literature describing women's sexual issues after MI. A systematic search of the relevant literature was performed within international databases, including PubMed/Medline, Scopus, ScienceDirect, and ProQuest, as well as Google Scholar using relevant keywords. Also, Persian electronic databases such as Magiran, Scientific Information Databases, and Iran Medex were searched from the inception to October 2014. Articles focusing on the sexual issues after MI only in women, as well as articles on both sexes where women's results could be separated, were included in this review. A total of 8 articles were included in the final dataset. The main themes of women's sexual concerns after MI were "loss or decrease of sexual activity," "dissatisfaction of sexual relationship," "doubt about resumption time of sexual activity," "fear of reinfarction or sudden death during sexual activity after MI," "knowledge deficit regarding sexual activity after MI," and "poor performance of health care providers in sexual counseling." The results of this review demonstrate that women's post-MI sexual activity is affected by many concerns. The concerns may be a knowledge deficit related to not receiving necessary consultation on this topic. Nurses, as first-line care givers, can provide appropriate consultation and education for patients post-MI. As a result, breaking taboo imposed by cultural barriers, personal assumptions, or lack of confidence on giving sexual consultation may

Profile and scientific production of Brazilian National Council of Technological and Scientific Development researchers in Pediatrics

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Maria Christina L. Oliveira

2013-09-01

Full Text Available OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the profile and the scientific production of researchers in Pediatrics with scholarship from the National Counsel of Technological and Scientific Development. METHODS: The Lattes curricula of 34 researchers in Pediatrics with active scholarships, from 2006 to 2008 were included in the analysis. The variables of interest were: gender, affiliation, time since PHD, tutoring of undergraduate students, mentorship of masters and doctors, scientific production and the papers' impact. RESULTS: In a total of 411 researchers in Medicine, 34 (8% belonged to Pediatrics. Males (77% and scholars in the category 2 of productivity (62% prevailed. Three states of Brazil were responsible for approximately 90% of the researchers: São Paulo (53%, Minas Gerais (21%, and Rio Grande do Sul (15%. During their academic career, the Pediatrics researchers have published 3,122 articles with a median of 89 articles per researcher (interquartile range - IQ=51-119. Of the total, 40 and 59% articles were indexed in the Web of Science and Scopus databases, respectively. The Pediatrics researchers have published papers in 599 journals with a median impact factor of 2.35 (IQ=1.37-3.73 for the 323 indexed journals. CONCLUSIONS: The Pediatrics researchers have a relevant scientific output from the quantity point of the view, but there is a need to improve quality.

Hauntings, homeopathy, and the Hopkinsville Goblins: using pseudoscience to teach scientific thinking

OpenAIRE

Schmaltz, Rodney; Lilienfeld, Scott O.

2014-01-01

With access to information ever increasing, it is essential that students acquire the skills to distinguish fact from fiction. By incorporating examples of pseudoscience into lectures, instructors can provide students with the tools needed to understand the difference between scientific and pseudoscientific or paranormal claims. We discuss examples involving psychics, ghosts, aliens, and other phenomena in relation to scientific thinking. In light of research literature demonstrating that pre...

Gastric cancer screening, literature review

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Porras Alfaro, Erika

2014-01-01

A comprehensive literature review was made of the methods of screening (pepsinogen test, gastrin-17, anti HP, SGD and Endoscopy). The review and descriptive study of the scientific literature related to the subject was conducted in the scientific databases: Pud Med, MD Consult and Medscape, from August 2013 to March 2014. 65 articles were found related to the topic. The review has included 47 items, assigned according to the criteria of inclusion and exclusion. Available methods were defined of high cost, difficult to spread, little sensitive, little specific and invasive. Endoscopy has had limitations of cost, quality, morbidity, mortality and availability. Pepsinogen tests and helicobacter pylori have helped identify the population at risk for later sift with endoscopy; but it is a very sensitive method. Endoscopy is recommended every two years in the population at risk (patients between 50 and 70 years with a family history of gastric cancer, chronic atrophic gastritis, Helicobacter pylori infection, intestinal metaplasia and dysplasia, patients with symptomatology of dyspepsia and with positive pepsinogen test) is a higher method than SGD in cost, sensitivity and specificity similar to invasive level. The training of the endoscopists should be strengthened in early gastric cancer detection since the detection depends on the quality of endoscopy [es

Ecosystem services and economic theory: integration for policy-relevant research.

Science.gov (United States)

Fisher, Brendan; Turner, Kerry; Zylstra, Matthew; Brouwer, Roy; de Groot, Rudolf; Farber, Stephen; Ferraro, Paul; Green, Rhys; Hadley, David; Harlow, Julian; Jefferiss, Paul; Kirkby, Chris; Morling, Paul; Mowatt, Shaun; Naidoo, Robin; Paavola, Jouni; Strassburg, Bernardo; Yu, Doug; Balmford, Andrew

2008-12-01

It has become essential in policy and decision-making circles to think about the economic benefits (in addition to moral and scientific motivations) humans derive from well-functioning ecosystems. The concept of ecosystem services has been developed to address this link between ecosystems and human welfare. Since policy decisions are often evaluated through cost-benefit assessments, an economic analysis can help make ecosystem service research operational. In this paper we provide some simple economic analyses to discuss key concepts involved in formalizing ecosystem service research. These include the distinction between services and benefits, understanding the importance of marginal ecosystem changes, formalizing the idea of a safe minimum standard for ecosystem service provision, and discussing how to capture the public benefits of ecosystem services. We discuss how the integration of economic concepts and ecosystem services can provide policy and decision makers with a fuller spectrum of information for making conservation-conversion trade-offs. We include the results from a survey of the literature and a questionnaire of researchers regarding how ecosystem service research can be integrated into the policy process. We feel this discussion of economic concepts will be a practical aid for ecosystem service research to become more immediately policy relevant.

Leadership in literature.

Science.gov (United States)

2006-03-01

Business students nowadays are not, for the most part, poets. A growing proportion come to business school with a background in investment banking or management consulting and an undergraduate business major, rather than a degree in the arts and sciences. MBA students are already very familiar with business. A number of scholars and businesspeople have begun to question the scientific model that dominates business research and teaching. Formalized management tools work well enough if you're studying techniques for financial valuation, but less so when you're studying leadership and organizational behavior. Some argue that students could learn a lot more about these subjects if they took a course in literature. Examples from fiction can be as instructive as any business textbook. HBR senior editor Diane Coutu recently met with Joseph Badaracco, Jr., for a wide-ranging discussion of what leaders can learn from literature. For the past decade, Badaracco, the John Shad Professor of Business Ethics at Harvard Business School, has used classical literature to provide well-rounded, complex pictures of leaders in all walks of life-particularly leaders whose psychological and emotional challenges parallel those of senior executives. Fiction provides some of the most powerful and engaging case studies ever written. Unlike contemporary management literature, which is relentlessly upbeat, classical literature is unsparingly realist. Leaders often struggle and sometimes fail-and the stakes are high. When business leaders read about the conflicts of literary characters, they can better understand their own circumstances. We pay far too little attention to the inner lives of leaders. Business school courses seem to suggest that you can treat executives like lab animals and control their behavior through their environment. But behaviorism is not enough. Literature suggests that leaders should learn more about themselves if they want to succeed.

The ranking of scientists based on scientific publications assessment.

Science.gov (United States)

Zerem, Enver

2017-11-01

It is generally accepted that the scientific impact factor (Web of Science) and the total number of citations of the articles published in a journal, are the most relevant parameters of the journal's significance. However, the significance of scientists is much more complicated to establish and the value of their scientific production cannot be directly reflected by the importance of the journals in which their articles are published. Evaluating the significance of scientists' accomplishments involves more complicated metrics than just their publication records. Based on a long term of academic experience, the author proposes objective criteria to estimate the scientific merit of an individual's publication record. This metric can serve as a pragmatic tool and the nidus for discussion within the readership of this journal. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

EVIDENCE FROM THE GERMAN CAPITAL MARKET REGARDING THE VALUE RELEVANCE OF CONSOLIDATED VERSUS PARENT COMPANY FINANCIAL STATEMENTS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Muller Victor - Octavian

2011-07-01

Full Text Available Financial statements main objective is to give information on the financial position, performance and changes in financial position of the reporting entity, which is useful to investors and other users in making economic decisions. In order to be useful, financial information needs to be relevant to the decision-making process of users in general, and investors in particular. Hence, the following question arises logically which of the two sets best serves the information needs of investors (and other categories of users, respectively which of the two sets is more relevant for investors? Of course, the possibility of both sets at the same time best serving the information needs should not be ruled out. In our scientific endeavor we conducted an empirical association study on the problem of market value relevance of consolidated financial statements and of individual financial statements of the parent company, searching for an answer to the above question. In this sense, we analyze the absolute and relative market value relevance of consolidated accounting information of listed companies on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (one of the largest three stock markets in the European Union between 2003 and 2008. Through this empirical study we intend to contribute to the relatively limited literature on this topic with a comparative time analysis of the absolute and incremental relevance of financial information supplied by the two categories of financial statements (group and individual. The results obtained indicate a statistically significant superiority of the relevance of consolidated statements (in detriment of individual ones. However, we could not statistically prove a superior value relevance of information provided together by consolidated and parent company financial statements as opposed to consolidated information. On the one hand, these results prove the importance (usefulness of consolidated financial statements especially for investors on

An Evaluation of Text Mining Tools as Applied to Selected Scientific and Engineering Literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Trybula, Walter J.; Wyllys, Ronald E.

2000-01-01

Addresses an approach to the discovery of scientific knowledge through an examination of data mining and text mining techniques. Presents the results of experiments that investigated knowledge acquisition from a selected set of technical documents by domain experts. (Contains 15 references.) (Author/LRW)

Tire Crumb Research Study Literature Review / Gap AnalysisWhite Paper Summary of Results

Science.gov (United States)

In order to more fully understand data gaps in human exposure and toxicity to tire crumb materials, ATSDR, CPSC and EPA undertook a collaborative effort in the form of a scientific literature review and subsequent gaps analysis. The first objective of the Literature Review and Ga...

Scientific guidelines for preservation of samples collected from Mars

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gooding, J.L.

1990-04-01

The maximum scientific value of Martian geologic and atmospheric samples is retained when the samples are preserved in the conditions that applied prior to their collection. Any sample degradation equates to loss of information. Based on detailed review of pertinent scientific literature, and advice from experts in planetary sample analysis, number values are recommended for key parameters in the environmental control of collected samples with respect to material contamination, temperature, head-space gas pressure, ionizing radiation, magnetic fields, and acceleration/shock. Parametric values recommended for the most sensitive geologic samples should also be adequate to preserve any biogenic compounds or exobiological relics

Land Sparing and Land Sharing Policies in Developing Countries - Drivers and Linkages to Scientific Debates

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Mertz, Ole; Mertens, Charlotte Filt

2017-01-01

The need for developing land sparing or land sharing policies for protecting the environment has been a polarized debate in the scientific literature. Some studies show that "spared" landscapes with clearly separated intensive agriculture and pristine forest are better for biodiversity and other...... ecosystem services, whereas others demonstrate the benefits of "shared" mosaic landscapes composed of a mix of forest types, agricultural fields, grassland, and plantations. Increasingly, these scientific views have been depolarized, recognizing that both shared and spared landscapes have a role to play......, depending on the context. However, it is less clear from the literature what drives actual policy-making related to land sparing and land sharing in developing countries and what the outcomes of these policies are. We therefore reviewed the international peer-reviewed literature for evidence of policies...

Guidance for Identifying, Selecting and Evaluating Open Literature Studies

Science.gov (United States)

This guidance for Office of Pesticide Program staff will assist in their evaluation of open literature studies of pesticides. It also describes how we identify, select, and ensure that data we use in risk assessments is of sufficient scientific quality.

[Scientific concepts in clinical medicine].

Science.gov (United States)

Rogler, G

2003-11-28

The understanding of the scientific basis and the theory of knowledge are surprisingly heterogeneous in practical and clinical medicine. It is frequently influenced or based on the philosophical theory of critical rationalism founded by Sir Karl Popper. Because the theory of knowledge and the understanding of scientific truth is the central basis for cautious and good clinical practise it is necessary to discuss both points to avoid unscientific auto-immunisation against critique in a type of medicine that regards herself as science-based. Evidence-based medicine would not be possible without interpretation and explanation of existing data into the individual treatment context. Besides an inductive or deductive logic the historical and situative side-conditions of the gathering of knowledge and of experiments are of central importance for their interpretation and their relevance in clinical practice. This historical and situative context warrants reflection but must also be paid attention to in the reflections on medical ethics.

Using HeLa Cell Stress Response to Introduce First Year Students to the Scientific Method, Laboratory Techniques, Primary Literature, and Scientific Writing

Science.gov (United States)

Resendes, Karen K.

2015-01-01

Incorporating scientific literacy into inquiry driven research is one of the most effective mechanisms for developing an undergraduate student's strength in writing. Additionally, discovery-based laboratories help develop students who approach science as critical thinkers. Thus, a three-week laboratory module for an introductory cell and molecular…

Open Science: Dimensions to a new scientific practice

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Adriana Carla Silva de Oliveira

2016-08-01

Full Text Available Introduction:The practices of e-science and the use and reuse of scientific data have constituted a new scientific work that leads to the reflection on new regulatory, legal, institutional and technological frameworks for open science. Objective: This study shows the following research question: which dimensions provide sustainability for the formulation of a policy geared to open science and its practices in the Brazilian context? The aim of this study is to discuss the dimensions that support transversely the formulation of a policy for open science and its scientific practices. Methodology:Theoretically, the study is guided by the fourth scientific paradigm grounded in the e-Science. The methodology is supported by Bufrem’s studies (2013, which propose an alternative and multidimensional model for analysis and discussion of scientific research. Technically, the literature review and documentary survey were the methods used on the Data Lifecycle scientific model, laws and international agreements.For this study purpose, five dimensions were proposed, namely: epistemological, political, ethical-legal-cultural, morphological, and technological. Results: This studyunderstands that these dimensions substantiate an information policy or the development of minimum guidelines for the open science agenda in Brazil. Conclusions: The dimensions put away the reductionist perspective on survey data and they conducted the study for the multi-dimensional and multi-relational vision of open science.

Open Source Software: critical review of scientific literature and other sources

OpenAIRE

Querol del Amo, Marc

2007-01-01

This thesis presents the results of a survey of Open Source Licensing literature. It aims to assist the reader in choosing the best license for his/her business. For this reason, the content of this thesis can be divided into: (i) an open source licensing overview, (ii) the explication of the main features of the most popular open source licenses, (iii) the consequences of using one or another and (iv) the critical or controversial issues related to Open Source Licensing. Furthermore, at the ...

The Improved Relevance Voxel Machine

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ganz, Melanie; Sabuncu, Mert; Van Leemput, Koen

The concept of sparse Bayesian learning has received much attention in the machine learning literature as a means of achieving parsimonious representations of features used in regression and classification. It is an important family of algorithms for sparse signal recovery and compressed sensing....... Hence in its current form it is reminiscent of a greedy forward feature selection algorithm. In this report, we aim to solve the problems of the original RVoxM algorithm in the spirit of [7] (FastRVM).We call the new algorithm Improved Relevance Voxel Machine (IRVoxM). Our contributions...... and enables basis selection from overcomplete dictionaries. One of the trailblazers of Bayesian learning is MacKay who already worked on the topic in his PhD thesis in 1992 [1]. Later on Tipping and Bishop developed the concept of sparse Bayesian learning [2, 3] and Tipping published the Relevance Vector...

A review of Grey and academic literature of evaluation guidance relevant to public health interventions.

Science.gov (United States)

Denford, Sarah; Abraham, Charles; Callaghan, Margaret; Aighton, Peter; De Vocht, Frank; Arris, Steven

2017-09-12

Public Health evaluation is essential to understanding what does and does not work, and robust demonstration of effectiveness may be crucial to securing future funding. Despite this, programs are often implemented with poor, incomplete or no evaluation. Public health practitioners are frequently required to provide evidence for the effectiveness of their services; thus, there is a growing need for evaluation guidance on how to evaluate public health programs. The aim of this study is to identify accessible high-quality, evaluation guidance, available to researchers and practitioners and to catalogue, summarise and categorise the content of a subset of accessible, quality guides to evaluation. We systematically reviewed grey and academic literature for documents providing support for evaluation of complex health interventions. Searches were conducted January to March 2015, and included academic databases, internet search engines, and consultations with academic and practicing public health experts. Data were extracted by two authors and sent to the authors of the guidance documents for comments. Our initial search identified 402 unique documents that were screened to identify those that were (1) developed by or for a national or international organization (2) freely available to all (3) published during or after 2000 (4) specific to public health. This yielded 98 documents from 43 organisations. Of these, 48 were reviewed in detail. This generated a detailed catalogue of quality evaluation guidance. The content included in documents covers 37 facets of evaluation. A wide range of guidance on evaluation of public health initiatives is available. Time and knowledge constraints may mean that busy practitioners find it challenging to access the most, up-to-date, relevant and useful guidance. This review presents links to and reviews of 48 quality guides to evaluation as well as categorising their content. This facilitates quick and each access to multiple selected

Using Restaurant Reviews to Teach How to Write Literature Reviews

Science.gov (United States)

Smith, Kelli Jean K.; Ferris, Sharmila Pixy

2017-01-01

Courses: Any communication course requiring a literature review, including, but is not limited to, Communication Research Methods and Communication Theory. Objectives: After completing this activity, students should be able to write better literature reviews by (1) locating a range of resources; (2) identifying a variety of relevant information…

The potentials of ICT application to increased relevance and ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

The potentials of ICT application to increased relevance and sustainability of University Library Services in Nigeria. ... in Kenneth Dike library, University of Ibadan and University of Lagos Libraries and library search of recent literature on ICT application and marketing of ICT based services in Nigerian University libraries.

Incorporating Primary Literature in Undergraduate Crop Science Courses

Science.gov (United States)

Scott, Lori K.; Simmons, Steve R.

2006-01-01

Primary literature is an underutilized learning resource for undergraduate courses in crop science. Reading assignments from scientific journals were utilized in an undergraduate University of Minnesota crop physiology course at Southwest Minnesota State University from 2002 to 2004. The subjects of the articles corresponded to the lecture topics.…

EPISTEMOLOGICAL PERCEPTION AND SCIENTIFIC LITERACY IN LEVEL HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ramiro Álvarez-Valenzuela

2016-07-01

Full Text Available Research in science education has helped to find some difficulties that hinder the teaching-learning process. These problems include conceptual content of school subjects, the influence of prior knowledge of the student and the teachers have not been trained in their university education epistemologically. This research presents the epistemological conceptions of a sample of 114 high school teachers university science area, which refer the ideas about the role of observation in scientific knowledge development and the work of scientists in the process of knowledge generation. It also includes the level of scientific literacy from the literature that is used as a source of information on the teaching. The result also identifies the level of scientific literacy in students and their influence on learning.

A Semantic Web-Based Methodology for Describing Scientific Research Efforts

Science.gov (United States)

Gandara, Aida

2013-01-01

Scientists produce research resources that are useful to future research and innovative efforts. In a typical scientific scenario, the results created by a collaborative team often include numerous artifacts, observations and relationships relevant to research findings, such as programs that generate data, parameters that impact outputs, workflows…

The scientific literature on audit and quality of nursing records

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Cecília Nogueira Valença

2013-11-01

Full Text Available Objetivos: Conhecer a produção científica sobre auditoria em enfermagem e identificar a importância do registro de enfermagem no prontuário para a auditoria. Método: Revisão bibliográfica narrativa, para qual selecionou-se artigos relacionados à auditoria em enfermagem e registros de enfermagem nas bases eletrônicas Scientific Electronic Library Online, e Literatura Latinoamericana e do Caribe em Ciências da Saúde, publicados entre 2000 e 2010. Resultados: Os artigos analisados sob caráter qualitativo indicaram que há poucos estudos sobre a temática. Foi identificado que auditoria de enfermagem, atualmente, é realizada pelo método retrospectivo no prontuário e está voltada para o âmbito contábil, e que os registros de enfermagem possuem qualidade insatisfatória para servir de instrumento de coleta de dados. Conclusão: Há perspectivas que a auditoria passe a investigar a qualidade do cuidado, e possuir um caráter educativo que possibilite a qualidade da assistência.

Mass Media and Global Warming: A Public Arenas Model of the Greenhouse Effect's Scientific Roots.

Science.gov (United States)

Neuzil, Mark

1995-01-01

Uses the Public Arenas model to examine the historical roots of the greenhouse effect issue as communicated in scientific literature from the early 1800s to modern times. Utilizes a constructivist approach to discuss several possible explanations for the rise and fall of global warming as a social problem in the scientific arena. (PA)

Quality of pharmaceutical advertising and gender bias in medical journals (1998-2008): a review of the scientific literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Cambronero Saiz, Belén; Ruiz Cantero, María Teresa; Papí Gálvez, Natalia

2012-01-01

To review the scientific literature on pharmaceutical advertising aimed at health professionals in order to determine whether gender bias has decreased and the quality of information in pharmaceutical advertising has improved over time. We performed a content analysis of original articles dealing with medical drug promotion (1998-2008), according to quality criteria such as (a) the number, validity and accessibility of bibliographic references provided in pharmaceutical advertising and (b) the extent to which gender representations were consistent with the prevalence of the diseases. Databases: PUBMED, Medline, Scopus, Sociological Abstract, Eric and LILACS. We reviewed 31 articles that analyzed advertising in medical journals from 1975-2005 and were published between 1998 and 2008. We found that the number of references used to support pharmaceutical advertising claims increased from 1975 but that 50% of these references were not valid. There was a tendency to depict men in paid productive roles, while women appeared inside the home or in non-occupational social contexts. Advertisements for psychotropic and cardiovascular drugs overrepresented women and men respectively. The use of bibliographic references increased between 1998 and 2008. However, representation of traditional male-female roles was similar in 1975 and 2005. Pharmaceutical advertisements may contribute to reinforcing the perception that certain diseases are associated with the most frequently portrayed sex. Copyright © 2011 SESPAS. Published by Elsevier Espana. All rights reserved.

Branch file system for nonconventional literature from the nuclear field

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Dvorakova, K.

1982-01-01

The branch filing system collects research and study reports, translations, trip reports, literature searches and information on scientific and technical events in Czechoslovakia. The method is described of filing, processing and use of the materials. (M.D.)

EFSA Panel on Animal Health and Welfare (AHAW); Scientific Opinion on foot-and-mouth disease in Thrace

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Bøtner, Anette; Thulke, Hans-Hermann; Salman, Mo

Following a request from the Commission, the Panel on Animal Health and Welfare was asked to deliver a Scientific Opinion on: 1) the expected prevalence (design prevalence) under different circumstances, and, 2) an updated scientific assessment of the size of the relevant geographical area...

Commissioning of Temelin NPP as seen by scientific supervisory group

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Svoboda, C.

2003-01-01

Scientific Supervisory Group worked during the Temelin NPP commissioning process as an independent supervisor. The main tasks and main results of its activity are described in this contribution. The characteristic common features of commissioning process and most important events from the Scientific Supervisory Group point of view are presented. In April 1999 the Czech Power Utility with the objective to achieve maximum level of nuclear safety and quality within the NPP Temelin commissioning procedures has established a special body / Scientific Supervisory Group and requested Nuclear Research Institute Rez plc to perform the required function. The Scientific Supervisory Group proceeds in accordance with its Statute and provides an independent specialised professional and expert work focused on nuclear safety assurance, assesment of the selected documentation related to plant preparedness for the individual commissioning stages, and, of course. on assessment of the commissioning tests results. While performing its function the Scientific Supervisory Group is guided by the Atomic Act and the relevant Directives of State Office for Nuclear Safety; its activities are in compliance with the applicable IAEA recommendations (Authors)

Problems of future philologists’ training in modern scientific discourse

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Maryna Ikonnikova

2017-04-01

Full Text Available Philosophical, psychological-pedagogical and sociolinguistic projections of future philologists’ professional training have been studied in the paper. It has been defined that they provide for creating optimal conditions for learning language, literature, translation, etc.; stimulating speech and mental activity of students; developing their critical thinking skills, linguistic personality, multiple intellect, the ability to model conceptual information; widening knowledge-based space taking into account individual styles and strategies for student learning. It has been indicated that within foreign scientific discourse scholars focus on the problem of training philologists of the integrated type that is possible provided the methodology is scientifically justified, based on the significant achievements of philosophy, psychology, pedagogy, linguodidactics, sociolinguistics and culturology, oriented toward European requirements to language education, positive foreign experience and national traditions.Key words: future philologists, professional training, philological education, philology, scientific discourse.

Policy relevant results from an expert elicitation on the health risks of phthalates

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Zimmer, K.E.; Gutleb, A.C.; Ravnum, S.; Krayer von Krauss, M.; Murk, A.J.; Ropstad, E.; Skaare, J.U.; Eriksen, G.S.; Lyche, J.L.; Koppe, J.G.; Magnanti, B.; Yang, A.; Keune, H.

2012-01-01

Background: The EU 6th Framework Program (FP)-funded Health and Environment Network (HENVINET) aimed to support informed policy making by facilitating the availability of relevant knowledge on different environmental health issues. An approach was developed by which scientific agreement,

Developments in the Value Chain of Scientific Information [Powerpoint Presentation

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Roosendaal, Hans E.

The values in scientific information relevant for the individual researcher can be represented in the value chain for this process. IT is a strong engine for change, in particular as IT has the potential not only to innovate the research information system but also the educational information system

The effect of scientific evidence on conservation practitioners’ management decisions

Science.gov (United States)

Walsh, Jessica C; Dicks, Lynn V; Sutherland, William J

2015-01-01

A major justification of environmental management research is that it helps practitioners, yet previous studies show it is rarely used to inform their decisions. We tested whether conservation practitioners focusing on bird management were willing to use a synopsis of relevant scientific literature to inform their management decisions. This allowed us to examine whether the limited use of scientific information in management is due to a lack of access to the scientific literature or whether it is because practitioners are either not interested or unable to incorporate the research into their decisions. In on-line surveys, we asked 92 conservation managers, predominantly from Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom, to provide opinions on 28 management techniques that could be applied to reduce predation on birds. We asked their opinions before and after giving them a summary of the literature about the interventions’ effectiveness. We scored the overall effectiveness and certainty of evidence for each intervention through an expert elicitation process—the Delphi method. We used the effectiveness scores to assess the practitioners’ level of understanding and awareness of the literature. On average, each survey participant changed their likelihood of using 45.7% of the interventions after reading the synopsis of the evidence. They were more likely to implement effective interventions and avoid ineffective actions, suggesting that their intended future management strategies may be more successful than current practice. More experienced practitioners were less likely to change their management practices than those with less experience, even though they were not more aware of the existing scientific information than less experienced practitioners. The practitioners’ willingness to change their management choices when provided with summarized scientific evidence suggests that improved accessibility to scientific information would benefit conservation

War in Colombia testimonial literature: between memory, culture, violence and literature

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jorge Eduardo Suárez Gómez

2011-07-01

Full Text Available Colombia may be characterized as a society ruled over by “a routinization of war and oblivion”. When memories about violent events succeed in articulate themselves and transcend the private space, they are not necessarily incorporated to national memory through “memory policies” in transitional processes. These memories are “deposited” rather than discussed. Testimonial literature is one of those “deposits”. There are times when certain topics, witnesses, authors and narrative treatments attain an unexpected relevance. Such a relevance follows national factors, like the dynamics of conflict and society in Colombia and abroad, such as a “turn to past”. When making a survey across the development of the testimonial genre from mid-20th century Violence up to our times, the gravitation of several cultures of memory is made evident in a society where oblivion appears to prevail.

Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2006 and Scientific Literacy: A Perspective for Science Education Leaders

Science.gov (United States)

Bybee, Rodger W.

2009-01-01

This article describes the idea of scientific literacy as defined in PISA, discusses relevant results of PISA, and clarifies meaningful relationships between PISA data and scientific competencies of U.S. students. Finally, the author includes insights and recommendations for contemporary leadership in science education. (Contains 8 tables and 1…

Shared scientific thinking in everyday parent-child activity

Science.gov (United States)

Crowley, Kevin; Callanan, Maureen A.; Jipson, Jennifer L.; Galco, Jodi; Topping, Karen; Shrager, Jeff

2001-11-01

Current accounts of the development of scientific reasoning focus on individual children's ability to coordinate the collection and evaluation of evidence with the creation of theories to explain the evidence. This observational study of parent-child interactions in a children's museum demonstrated that parents shape and support children's scientific thinking in everyday, nonobligatory activity. When children engaged an exhibit with parents, their exploration of evidence was observed to be longer, broader, and more focused on relevant comparisons than children who engaged the exhibit without their parents. Parents were observed to talk to children about how to select and encode appropriate evidence and how to make direct comparisons between the most informative kinds of evidence. Parents also sometimes assumed the role of explainer by casting children's experience in causal terms, connecting the experience to prior knowledge, or introducing abstract principles. We discuss these findings with respect to two dimensions of children's scientific thinking: developments in evidence collection and developments in theory construction.

The Teachers' Research Self-Efficacy and Attitudes towards Scientific Research Based on Different Parameters: A Case Study of Agri Province

Science.gov (United States)

Kurt, Murat

2015-01-01

The purpose of this study is to develop competencies of teachers, the coordination of the education, learning activities; in having access to innovations, developments and scientific studies in the literature. In addition, the purpose is to determine how teachers' scientific research self-efficacy and attitude towards the scientific research…