Weed/Plant Classification Using Evolutionary Optimised Ensemble Based On Local Binary Patterns

This thesis presents a novel pixel-level weed classification through rotation-invariant uniform local binary pattern (LBP) features for precision weed control. Based on two-level optimisation structure; First, Genetic Algorithm (GA) optimisation to select the best rotation-invariant uniform LBP configurations; Second, Covariance Matrix Adaptation Evolution Strategy (CMA-ES) in the Neural Network (NN) ensemble to select the best combinations of voting weights of the predicted outcome for each classifier. The model obtained 87.9% accuracy in CWFID public benchmark

Change Readiness Influences on Knowledge Management Processes: A Case of Three Professional Service Firms

Introduction: The current dynamic market is characterised by stiff competition and ever-changing clients’ demand for better and innovative products and services. In this challenging environment, the need for developing and managing knowledge transcends the importance of accumulating physical capital. With an increasing awareness of the potential of knowledge as a competitive source for firms’ survival, there is an increased knowledge management initiatives and investments by firms. Nevertheless, literature highlights increasing failures of knowledge management initiatives, with reasons for the failure yet to be established conclusively. On the basis of the premise that implementation of the knowledge management process could induce changes in firms’ practices and culture, and employees’ beliefs and cognitive structure, the current thesis addresses the issue from the change management perspective. The main idea that drives the research evolves from the understanding that failure in knowledge management initiatives could be rooted in the lack of readiness to change. Objective: The primary objective of this thesis is to understand how the change readiness construct shapes the various processes for managing knowledge in professional service firms. Change readiness in this thesis was conceptualised as a multidimensional and multilevel construct. This thesis contributes to the body of knowledge by explicating the way these change readiness elements shape knowledge management processes. The study setting within the professional service industry offers unique insights, which is less explored in the extant KM literature. Method: The study was conducted within the professional service firms’ context, on the basis that knowledge represents the main source for survival and competitiveness in this knowledge-intensive industry. This research is grounded in the interpretive paradigm and is studied from the constructivist epistemological lens. This qualitative research employed multiple case study design in three New Zealand professional service firms. Two firms are accounting establishments and one represents an engineering maintenance firm. Sixteen semi-structured interviews, conducted over the period of two months, involved the managerial and operational professionals in these participating firms. Data were analysed following the grounded theory analysis and findings presented using cross-cases analysis. Results: This thesis contributes to the body of knowledge in the field of knowledge management (KM) by revealing the distinctive influences of multidimensional elements of the change readiness construct on the knowledge acquisition, knowledge application and knowledge sharing processes in the firms studied. The thesis proposes three dimensions of the change readiness construct, which are categorised as KM change understanding, KM change context and individual differences. The dimension of KM change understanding consists of change goal, change benefit, need for knowledge, perceived management support and collective commitment. The KM change context is comprised of learning, participation, communication and management support. Individual expertise and adaptability represent the individual differences dimension of the change readiness construct. Specifically, findings show that: 1) Readiness for the knowledge acquisition process is largely shaped by the individual’s change readiness elements, including the understanding of the need for knowledge and perceived management support, and the individual’s capability of expertise and adaptability. Learning and communication provides the essential contexts that shape the firm’s readiness for the knowledge acquisition process. 2) Readiness for the knowledge application process is largely shaped by the individual’s change readiness elements, including the understanding of change goal, change benefit and perceived management support, and the individual’s capability of expertise and adaptability. Collective commitment shapes professionals’ understanding of knowledge application at the firm level. Learning and management support provides the essential contexts that shape the firm’s readiness for the knowledge application process. 3) Readiness for the knowledge sharing process is largely shaped by the firm’s change readiness elements, consisting of professionals’ understanding of collective commitment, and the essential contexts of communication, participation and learning. Understanding of the need for knowledge and change benefit, as well as the professional’s expertise, shapes the individual’s readiness for the knowledge sharing process. 4) The way these change readiness elements shapes the distinctive KM processes in the professional service firms studied vary due to the effects of firm archetypes, inter-profession differences, change nature, knowledge nature and the demographic characteristic. These factors moderates the interrelationships described in in 1), 2), and 3)

Peasants, Markets and Austerity: State retrenchment and rural livelihoods in Amazonas and São Paulo in the aftermath of constitutional austerity (Brazil Post-2015)

This thesis examines the politics and impacts of mediated markets for rural development in light of the austerity regime recently established in Brazil. Theory and praxis tend to overlook relational complexities between rural people and the state and their interplay with livelihood opportunities and self-reported wellbeing. Focused on Brazil’s Fome Zero Food Acquisition Programme, we analyse the political economy surrounding its establishment and subsequent retrenchment and the impacts of this rise and fall on rural people in two contrasting study areas. Paying attention to geographical, economic and demographic differences, we adapt political ecology and livelihood frameworks to investigate how peasants in São Paulo and Amazonas have coped with austerity. The research uncovers an underlying tension in nested markets for rural development, in which principles of equity and social justice are to some extent subsumed as policy principles by a modernisation project represented by a ‘pedagogy of marketisation’. Under this project, rural people are encouraged to move away from community self-provisioning to a market economy - which would transform them from being people belonging to the country (peasants or camponeses) into workers or controllers of the land (family farmers or rural entrepreneurs). This tension threatens to absorb peasants into the corporate food regime and undermine ecological and cultural diversity. Our findings suggest a complex set of impacts such as income-poverty alleviation, progress towards gender equality but limited effects on structural inequality or market integration. The significance of this thesis is that it informs our theoretical understanding of rural development through nested markets by introducing a political economy/ecology focus hitherto lacking – and informs our empirical understanding of wellbeing, public procurement, food, agrarian, environmental and social policy.Open Acces

Sustainable development for the logistics industry in the UK

At a time when environmental mitigation is firmly at the centre of the agenda for sustainable development, there is no shortage of research in the field of green logistics. However, little has been done in an attempt to provide integrated solutions for industry, based on a practical assessment of the interrelationships between specific measures. This research investigates the current status of the British logistics industry in terms of its environmental sustainability, by examining 14 sustainable measures that feature strongly in contemporary logistics practice and policies, and determines the interrelationships among them. The primary data was collected using a combined approach involving a postal questionnaire survey and in-depth company interviews. The survey covered both logistics services providers (LSPs) and logistics service users (LSUs), together with the targeted inclusion of more specific actors within the logistics industry. Through analysis of the sustainable practice and implementation process as seen in the experiences and judgments of key actors in the logistics industry, it is shown that the role of the actors as either logistics providers or users has a certain impact on their perceptions of, and behaviours in, sustainable logistics. Particular characteristics of the company and the sector it belongs to also exert influence, to various extents, on its response to sustainability. The findings also highlight cost-effectiveness as another critical factor determining companies’ sustainability policies. On the basis of the assessment of the measures, in particular their effectiveness and cost efficiency, the thesis concludes with proposals for sustainable packages constructed from different perspectives, along with suggestions for their implementation. This evidence-based research thus informs policy-makers of appropriate and viable sustainable strategies with the right incentives in various circumstances, and the potential to bring about tangible improvements in environmental performance

Sustainable development for the logistics industry in the UK

At a time when environmental mitigation is firmly at the centre of the agenda for sustainable development, there is no shortage of research in the field of green logistics. However, little has been done in an attempt to provide integrated solutions for industry, based on a practical assessment of the interrelationships between specific measures. This research investigates the current status of the British logistics industry in terms of its environmental sustainability, by examining 14 sustainable measures that feature strongly in contemporary logistics practice and policies, and determines the interrelationships among them. The primary data was collected using a combined approach involving a postal questionnaire survey and in-depth company interviews. The survey covered both logistics services providers (LSPs) and logistics service users (LSUs), together with the targeted inclusion of more specific actors within the logistics industry. Through analysis of the sustainable practice and implementation process as seen in the experiences and judgments of key actors in the logistics industry, it is shown that the role of the actors as either logistics providers or users has a certain impact on their perceptions of, and behaviours in, sustainable logistics. Particular characteristics of the company and the sector it belongs to also exert influence, to various extents, on its response to sustainability. The findings also highlight cost-effectiveness as another critical factor determining companies’ sustainability policies. On the basis of the assessment of the measures, in particular their effectiveness and cost efficiency, the thesis concludes with proposals for sustainable packages constructed from different perspectives, along with suggestions for their implementation. This evidence-based research thus informs policy-makers of appropriate and viable sustainable strategies with the right incentives in various circumstances, and the potential to bring about tangible improvements in environmental performance

WiFi-Based Human Activity Recognition Using Attention-Based BiLSTM

Recently, significant efforts have been made to explore human activity recognition (HAR) techniques that use information gathered by existing indoor wireless infrastructures through WiFi signals without demanding the monitored subject to carry a dedicated device. The key intuition is that different activities introduce different multi-paths in WiFi signals and generate different patterns in the time series of channel state information (CSI). In this paper, we propose and evaluate a full pipeline for a CSI-based human activity recognition framework for 12 activities in three different spatial environments using two deep learning models: ABiLSTM and CNN-ABiLSTM. Evaluation experiments have demonstrated that the proposed models outperform state-of-the-art models. Also, the experiments show that the proposed models can be applied to other environments with different configurations, albeit with some caveats. The proposed ABiLSTM model achieves an overall accuracy of 94.03%, 91.96%, and 92.59% across the 3 target environments. While the proposed CNN-ABiLSTM model reaches an accuracy of 98.54%, 94.25% and 95.09% across those same environments

Computational Methods for Medical and Cyber Security

Over the past decade, computational methods, including machine learning (ML) and deep learning (DL), have been exponentially growing in their development of solutions in various domains, especially medicine, cybersecurity, finance, and education. While these applications of machine learning algorithms have been proven beneficial in various fields, many shortcomings have also been highlighted, such as the lack of benchmark datasets, the inability to learn from small datasets, the cost of architecture, adversarial attacks, and imbalanced datasets. On the other hand, new and emerging algorithms, such as deep learning, one-shot learning, continuous learning, and generative adversarial networks, have successfully solved various tasks in these fields. Therefore, applying these new methods to life-critical missions is crucial, as is measuring these less-traditional algorithms' success when used in these fields

The critical success factors for landscape management of operations on sustainable urban drainage system (SuDS) projects

Population explosion and urbanization are the most significant reasons for increasing pressure on the earth's natural resources, particularly water. Historically, water services have been supplied and discharged through a network of piped infrastructure and hardened surfaces with the main objectives of efficiency and risk management. Separation in service provision of water resources has proven operationally unsustainable, with increasing negative impacts on the environment. New approaches have been sought to mitigate these impacts through a new paradigm in urban stormwater management, referred to as Sustainable Urban Drainage Systems (SuDS), which describes a strategic sustainable approach to the management of stormwater quality and quantity. Various typologies are used individually or in configurations to form a treatment train with engineered and landscape infrastructure components that are mutually supportive. Much research has been done on the design and implementation phases of this infrastructure, but the literature reveals a less detailed understanding of the intricate management and operational aspects of SuDS. This case study considers the Critical Success Factors in the management and maintenance of SuDS on landscape projects during the operational phase, that contribute to optimal functioning of these complex ecological systems for the benefits of ecosystem goods and services and quality of life for all. This research design has been couched in the pragmatic paradigm which considers the problem at the heart of the research, approaching research from a qualitative perspective. To fulfill the research objectives, a critical literature review was conducted, and a single case study research methodology used to investigate this phenomenon, located at Intaka Island, Century City, Cape Town that has been operationally successful for over two decades. Qualitative thematic analysis was carried out through empirical inquiry on the management and maintenance approaches followed. The research design included data collection of from a variety of sources. These were then expressed through rich descriptive text which was, analysed, and interpreted through a process of triangulation, leading to the establishment of emergent themes and the assertions of four prominent Critical Success Factors, namely: strategic vision, culture of learning, clearly defined management objectives and adaptive management. From this, conclusions are drawn, and recommendations made

An integrated model for the measurement of online customer experience. An empirical international study.

With the emergence of the internet as a new business channel and its impact on the overall role of today¿s customers, existing models for the measurement of perceived quality, satisfaction and loyalty are worth revisiting. This is specifically important in light of the prominent progress of some of the new business concepts, particularly customer experience management, and the rising emphasis on customers¿ hedonic and emotional needs. This study attempts to bridge the gap in existing literature by examining the online customer experience in its entirety, attending within the study to both the utilitarian and hedonic needs of online customers and giving special attention to emerging aspects in the online environment, such as customer engagement in self-driven experiences. Therefore, the study includes a comprehensive review of a large body of knowledge, both in consumer behaviour and marketing literature as well as quality management literature, in addition to a scrutiny of 50 studies for different evaluation models in the online environment. This is in order to identify a list of attributes and factors that impact customer evaluations of online experiences. Upon the synthesis of the list of attributes and factors that impact customer evaluations of online experiences, an online blog was created as an environment for asynchronous focus groups. The online blog was beneficial in creating a deeper understanding of what online customers want and what impacts their experiences. Following, an online questionnaire was administered in two stages, once for measure purification purposes which received 90 pilot responses and once for mass data collection purposes which received 366 responses. As a result of this study, an integrated model for the measurement of online customer experience that emphasises the significance of the emotional component was proposed. The model consists of three components, each serve a specific measurement purpose. The XQual construct which consists of 7 attributes and 30 factors, is a performance measure of the experience in relation to specific aspects that address customers¿ utilitarian and hedonic needs. The satisfaction continuum consists of four factors and is an output measure for each experience or transaction with the online firm. The loyalty continuum consists of four factors and is an outcome measure that indicates customers¿ attitudinal commitment towards the online firm