6,765 research outputs found

    UMSL Bulletin 2023-2024

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    The 2023-2024 Bulletin and Course Catalog for the University of Missouri St. Louis.https://irl.umsl.edu/bulletin/1088/thumbnail.jp

    Graduate Catalog of Studies, 2023-2024

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    An empirical investigation of the relationship between integration, dynamic capabilities and performance in supply chains

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    This research aimed to develop an empirical understanding of the relationships between integration, dynamic capabilities and performance in the supply chain domain, based on which, two conceptual frameworks were constructed to advance the field. The core motivation for the research was that, at the stage of writing the thesis, the combined relationship between the three concepts had not yet been examined, although their interrelationships have been studied individually. To achieve this aim, deductive and inductive reasoning logics were utilised to guide the qualitative study, which was undertaken via multiple case studies to investigate lines of enquiry that would address the research questions formulated. This is consistent with the author’s philosophical adoption of the ontology of relativism and the epistemology of constructionism, which was considered appropriate to address the research questions. Empirical data and evidence were collected, and various triangulation techniques were employed to ensure their credibility. Some key features of grounded theory coding techniques were drawn upon for data coding and analysis, generating two levels of findings. These revealed that whilst integration and dynamic capabilities were crucial in improving performance, the performance also informed the former. This reflects a cyclical and iterative approach rather than one purely based on linearity. Adopting a holistic approach towards the relationship was key in producing complementary strategies that can deliver sustainable supply chain performance. The research makes theoretical, methodological and practical contributions to the field of supply chain management. The theoretical contribution includes the development of two emerging conceptual frameworks at the micro and macro levels. The former provides greater specificity, as it allows meta-analytic evaluation of the three concepts and their dimensions, providing a detailed insight into their correlations. The latter gives a holistic view of their relationships and how they are connected, reflecting a middle-range theory that bridges theory and practice. The methodological contribution lies in presenting models that address gaps associated with the inconsistent use of terminologies in philosophical assumptions, and lack of rigor in deploying case study research methods. In terms of its practical contribution, this research offers insights that practitioners could adopt to enhance their performance. They can do so without necessarily having to forgo certain desired outcomes using targeted integrative strategies and drawing on their dynamic capabilities

    Modeling and Simulation in Engineering

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    The Special Issue Modeling and Simulation in Engineering, belonging to the section Engineering Mathematics of the Journal Mathematics, publishes original research papers dealing with advanced simulation and modeling techniques. The present book, “Modeling and Simulation in Engineering I, 2022”, contains 14 papers accepted after peer review by recognized specialists in the field. The papers address different topics occurring in engineering, such as ferrofluid transport in magnetic fields, non-fractal signal analysis, fractional derivatives, applications of swarm algorithms and evolutionary algorithms (genetic algorithms), inverse methods for inverse problems, numerical analysis of heat and mass transfer, numerical solutions for fractional differential equations, Kriging modelling, theory of the modelling methodology, and artificial neural networks for fault diagnosis in electric circuits. It is hoped that the papers selected for this issue will attract a significant audience in the scientific community and will further stimulate research involving modelling and simulation in mathematical physics and in engineering

    International Academic Symposium of Social Science 2022

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    This conference proceedings gathers work and research presented at the International Academic Symposium of Social Science 2022 (IASSC2022) held on July 3, 2022, in Kota Bharu, Kelantan, Malaysia. The conference was jointly organized by the Faculty of Information Management of Universiti Teknologi MARA Kelantan Branch, Malaysia; University of Malaya, Malaysia; Universitas Pembangunan Nasional Veteran Jakarta, Indonesia; Universitas Ngudi Waluyo, Indonesia; Camarines Sur Polytechnic Colleges, Philippines; and UCSI University, Malaysia. Featuring experienced keynote speakers from Malaysia, Australia, and England, this proceeding provides an opportunity for researchers, postgraduate students, and industry practitioners to gain knowledge and understanding of advanced topics concerning digital transformations in the perspective of the social sciences and information systems, focusing on issues, challenges, impacts, and theoretical foundations. This conference proceedings will assist in shaping the future of the academy and industry by compiling state-of-the-art works and future trends in the digital transformation of the social sciences and the field of information systems. It is also considered an interactive platform that enables academicians, practitioners and students from various institutions and industries to collaborate

    Adaptation of the human nervous system for self-aware secure mobile and IoT systems

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    IT systems have been deployed across several domains, such as hospitals and industries, for the management of information and operations. These systems will soon be ubiquitous in every field due to the transition towards the Internet of Things (IoT). The IoT brings devices with sensory functions into IT systems through the process of internetworking. The sensory functions of IoT enable them to generate and process information automatically, either without human contribution or having the least human interaction possible aside from the information and operations management tasks. Security is crucial as it prevents system exploitation. Security has been employed after system implementation, and has rarely been considered as a part of the system. In this dissertation, a novel solution based on a biological approach is presented to embed security as an inalienable part of the system. The proposed solution, in the form of a prototype of the system, is based on the functions of the human nervous system (HNS) in protecting its host from the impacts caused by external or internal changes. The contributions of this work are the derivation of a new system architecture from HNS functionalities and experiments that prove the implementation feasibility and efficiency of the proposed HNS-based architecture through prototype development and evaluation. The first contribution of this work is the adaptation of human nervous system functions to propose a new architecture for IT systems security. The major organs and functions of the HNS are investigated and critical areas are identified for the adaptation process. Several individual system components with similar functions to the HNS are created and grouped to form individual subsystems. The relationship between these components is established in a similar way as in the HNS, resulting in a new system architecture that includes security as a core component. The adapted HNS-based system architecture is employed in two the experiments prove its implementation capability, enhancement of security, and overall system operations. The second contribution is the implementation of the proposed HNS-based security solution in the IoT test-bed. A temperature-monitoring application with an intrusion detection system (IDS) based on the proposed HNS architecture is implemented as part of the test-bed experiment. Contiki OS is used for implementation, and the 6LoWPAN stack is modified during the development process. The application, together with the IDS, has a brain subsystem (BrSS), a spinal cord subsystem (SCSS), and other functions similar to the HNS whose names are changed. The HNS functions are shared between an edge router and resource-constrained devices (RCDs) during implementation. The experiment is evaluated in both test-bed and simulation environments. Zolertia Z1 nodes are used to form a 6LoWPAN network, and an edge router is created by combining Pandaboard and Z1 node for a test-bed setup. Two networks with different numbers of sensor nodes are used as simulation environments in the Cooja simulator. The third contribution of this dissertation is the implementation of the proposed HNS-based architecture in the mobile platform. In this phase, the Android operating system (OS) is selected for experimentation, and the proposed HNS-based architecture is specifically tailored for Android. A context-based dynamically reconfigurable access control system (CoDRA) is developed based on the principles of the refined HNS architecture. CoDRA is implemented through customization of Android OS and evaluated under real-time usage conditions in test-bed environments. During the evaluation, the implemented prototype mimicked the nature of the HNS in securing the application under threat with negligible resource requirements and solved the problems in existing approaches by embedding security within the system. Furthermore, the results of the experiments highlighted the retention of HNS functions after refinement for different IT application areas, especially the IoT, due to its resource-constrained nature, and the implementable capability of our proposed HNS architecture.--- IT-järjestelmiä hyödynnetään tiedon ja toimintojen hallinnassa useilla aloilla, kuten sairaaloissa ja teollisuudessa. Siirtyminen kohti esineiden Internetiä (Internet of Things, IoT) tuo tällaiset laitteet yhä kiinteämmäksi osaksi jokapäiväistä elämää. IT-järjestelmiin liitettyjen IoT-laitteiden sensoritoiminnot mahdollistavat tiedon automaattisen havainnoinnin ja käsittelyn osana suurempaa järjestelmää jopa täysin ilman ihmisen myötävaikutusta, poislukien mahdolliset ylläpito- ja hallintatoimenpiteet. Turvallisuus on ratkaisevan tärkeää IT-järjestelmien luvattoman käytön estämiseksi. Valitettavan usein järjestelmäsuunnittelussa turvallisuus ei ole osana ydinsuunnitteluprosessia, vaan otetaan huomioon vasta käyttöönoton jälkeen. Tässä väitöskirjassa esitellään uudenlainen biologiseen lähestymistapaan perustuva ratkaisu, jolla turvallisuus voidaan sisällyttää erottamattomaksi osaksi järjestelmää. Ehdotettu prototyyppiratkaisu perustuu ihmisen hermoston toimintaan tilanteessa, jossa se suojelee isäntäänsä ulkoisten tai sisäisten muutosten vaikutuksilta. Tämän työn keskeiset tulokset ovat uuden järjestelmäarkkitehtuurin johtaminen ihmisen hermoston toimintaperiaatteesta sekä tällaisen järjestelmän toteutettavuuden ja tehokkuuden arviointi kokeellisen prototyypin kehittämisen ja toiminnan arvioinnin avulla. Tämän väitöskirjan ensimmäinen kontribuutio on ihmisen hermoston toimintoihin perustuva IT-järjestelmäarkkitehtuuri. Tutkimuksessa arvioidaan ihmisen hermoston toimintaa ja tunnistetaan keskeiset toiminnot ja toiminnallisuudet, jotka mall-innetaan osaksi kehitettävää järjestelmää luomalla näitä vastaavat järjestelmäkomponentit. Nä-istä kootaan toiminnallisuudeltaan hermostoa vastaavat osajärjestelmät, joiden keskinäinen toiminta mallintaa ihmisen hermoston toimintaa. Näin luodaan arkkitehtuuri, jonka keskeisenä komponenttina on turvallisuus. Tämän pohjalta toteutetaan kaksi prototyyppijärjestelmää, joiden avulla arvioidaan arkkitehtuurin toteutuskelpoisuutta, turvallisuutta sekä toimintakykyä. Toinen kontribuutio on esitetyn hermostopohjaisen turvallisuusratkaisun toteuttaminen IoT-testialustalla. Kehitettyyn arkkitehtuuriin perustuva ja tunkeutumisen estojärjestelmän (intrusion detection system, IDS) sisältävä lämpötilan seurantasovellus toteutetaan käyttäen Contiki OS -käytöjärjestelmää. 6LoWPAN protokollapinoa muokataan tarpeen mukaan kehitysprosessin aikana. IDS:n lisäksi sovellukseen kuuluu aivo-osajärjestelmä (Brain subsystem, BrSS), selkäydinosajärjestelmä (Spinal cord subsystem, SCSS), sekä muita hermoston kaltaisia toimintoja. Nämä toiminnot jaetaan reunareitittimen ja resurssirajoitteisten laitteiden kesken. Tuloksia arvioidaan sekä simulaatioiden että testialustan tulosten perusteella. Testialustaa varten 6LoWPAN verkon toteutukseen valittiin Zolertia Z1 ja reunareititin on toteutettu Pandaboardin ja Z1:n yhdistelmällä. Cooja-simulaattorissa käytettiin mallinnukseen ymp-äristönä kahta erillistä ja erikokoisuta sensoriverkkoa. Kolmas tämän väitöskirjan kontribuutio on kehitetyn hermostopohjaisen arkkitehtuurin toteuttaminen mobiilialustassa. Toteutuksen alustaksi valitaan Android-käyttöjärjestelmä, ja kehitetty arkkitehtuuri räätälöidään Androidille. Tuloksena on kontekstipohjainen dynaamisesti uudelleen konfiguroitava pääsynvalvontajärjestelmä (context-based dynamically reconfigurable access control system, CoDRA). CoDRA toteutetaan mukauttamalla Androidin käyttöjärjestelmää ja toteutuksen toimivuutta arvioidaan reaaliaikaisissa käyttöolosuhteissa testialustaympäristöissä. Toteutusta arvioitaessa havaittiin, että kehitetty prototyyppi jäljitteli ihmishermoston toimintaa kohdesovelluksen suojaamisessa, suoriutui tehtävästään vähäisillä resurssivaatimuksilla ja onnistui sisällyttämään turvallisuuden järjestelmän ydintoimintoihin. Tulokset osoittivat, että tämän tyyppinen järjestelmä on toteutettavissa sekä sen, että järjestelmän hermostonkaltainen toiminnallisuus säilyy siirryttäessä sovellusalueelta toiselle, erityisesti resursseiltaan rajoittuneissa IoT-järjestelmissä

    Blockchain Technology: Disruptor or Enhnancer to the Accounting and Auditing Profession

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    The unique features of blockchain technology (BCT) - peer-to-peer network, distribution ledger, consensus decision-making, transparency, immutability, auditability, and cryptographic security - coupled with the success enjoyed by Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have encouraged many to assume that the technology would revolutionise virtually all aspects of business. A growing body of scholarship suggests that BCT would disrupt the accounting and auditing fields by changing accounting practices, disintermediating auditors, and eliminating financial fraud. BCT disrupts audits (Lombard et al.,2021), reduces the role of audit firms (Yermack 2017), undermines accountants' roles with software developers and miners (Fortin & Pimentel 2022); eliminates many management functions, transforms businesses (Tapscott & Tapscott, 2017), facilitates a triple-entry accounting system (Cai, 2021), and prevents fraudulent transactions (Dai, et al., 2017; Rakshit et al., 2022). Despite these speculations, scholars have acknowledged that the application of BCT in the accounting and assurance industry is underexplored and many existing studies are said to lack engagement with practitioners (Dai & Vasarhelyi, 2017; Lombardi et al., 2021; Schmitz & Leoni, 2019). This study empirically explored whether BCT disrupts or enhances accounting and auditing fields. It also explored the relevance of audit in a BCT environment and the effectiveness of the BCT mechanism for fraud prevention and detection. The study further examined which technical skillsets accountants and auditors require in a BCT environment, and explored the incentives, barriers, and unintended consequences of the adoption of BCT in the accounting and auditing professions. The current COVID-19 environment was also investigated in terms of whether the pandemic has improved BCT adoption or not. A qualitative exploratory study used semi-structured interviews to engage practitioners from blockchain start-ups, IT experts, financial analysts, accountants, auditors, academics, organisational leaders, consultants, and editors who understood the technology. With the aid of NVIVO qualitative analysis software, the views of 44 participants from 13 countries: New Zealand, Australia, United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, Italy, Ireland, Hong Kong, India, Pakistan, United Arab Emirates, and South Africa were analysed. The Technological, Organisational, and Environmental (TOE) framework with consequences of innovation context was adopted for this study. This expanded TOE framework was used as the theoretical lens to understand the disruption of BCT and its adoption in the accounting and auditing fields. Four clear patterns emerged. First, BCT is an emerging tool that accountants and auditors use mainly to analyse financial records because technology cannot disintermediate auditors from the financial system. Second, the technology can detect anomalies but cannot prevent financial fraud. Third, BCT has not been adopted by any organisation for financial reporting and accounting purposes, and accountants and auditors do not require new skillsets or an understanding of the BCT programming language to be able to operate in a BCT domain. Fourth, the advent of COVID-19 has not substantially enhanced the adoption of BCT. Additionally, this study highlights the incentives, barriers, and unintended consequences of adopting BCT as financial technology (FinTech). These findings shed light on important questions about BCT disrupting and disintermediating auditors, the extent of adoption in the accounting industry, preventing fraud and anomalies, and underscores the notion that blockchain, as an emerging technology, currently does not appear to be substantially disrupting the accounting and auditing profession. This study makes methodological, theoretical, and practical contributions. At the methodological level, the study adopted the social constructivist-interpretivism paradigm with an exploratory qualitative method to engage and understand BCT as a disruptive innovation in the accounting industry. The engagement with practitioners from diverse fields, professions, and different countries provides a distinctive and innovative contribution to methodological and practical knowledge. At the theoretical level, the findings contribute to the literature by offering an integrated conceptual TOE framework. The framework offers a reference for practitioners, academics and policymakers seeking to appraise comprehensive factors influencing BCT adoption and its likely unintended consequences. The findings suggest that, at present, no organisations are using BCT for financial reporting and accounting systems. This study contributes to practice by highlighting the differences between initial expectations and practical applications of what BCT can do in the accounting and auditing fields. The study could not find any empirical evidence that BCT will disrupt audits, eliminate the roles of auditors in a financial system, and prevent and detect financial fraud. Also, there was no significant evidence that accountants and auditors required higher-level skillsets and an understanding of BCT programming language to be able to use the technology. Future research should consider the implications of an external audit firm as a node in a BCT network on the internal audit functions. It is equally important to critically examine the relevance of including programming languages or codes in the curriculum of undergraduate accounting students. Future research could also empirically evaluate if a BCT-enabled triple-entry system could prevent financial statements and management fraud

    Post-Growth Geographies: Spatial Relations of Diverse and Alternative Economies

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    Post-Growth Geographies examines the spatial relations of diverse and alternative economies between growth-oriented institutions and multiple socio-ecological crises. The book brings together conceptual and empirical contributions from geography and its neighbouring disciplines and offers different perspectives on the possibilities, demands and critiques of post-growth transformation. Through case studies and interviews, the contributions combine voices from activism, civil society, planning and politics with current theoretical debates on socio-ecological transformation

    Brain Computations and Connectivity [2nd edition]

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    This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read on the Oxford Academic platform and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Brain Computations and Connectivity is about how the brain works. In order to understand this, it is essential to know what is computed by different brain systems; and how the computations are performed. The aim of this book is to elucidate what is computed in different brain systems; and to describe current biologically plausible computational approaches and models of how each of these brain systems computes. Understanding the brain in this way has enormous potential for understanding ourselves better in health and in disease. Potential applications of this understanding are to the treatment of the brain in disease; and to artificial intelligence which will benefit from knowledge of how the brain performs many of its extraordinarily impressive functions. This book is pioneering in taking this approach to brain function: to consider what is computed by many of our brain systems; and how it is computed, and updates by much new evidence including the connectivity of the human brain the earlier book: Rolls (2021) Brain Computations: What and How, Oxford University Press. Brain Computations and Connectivity will be of interest to all scientists interested in brain function and how the brain works, whether they are from neuroscience, or from medical sciences including neurology and psychiatry, or from the area of computational science including machine learning and artificial intelligence, or from areas such as theoretical physics

    A Secure and Privacy-Preserving E-Government Framework using Blockchain and Artificial Immunity

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    Electronic Government (e-Government) systems constantly provide greater services to people, businesses, organisations, and societies by offering more information, opportunities, and platforms with the support of advances in information and communications technologies. This usually results in increased system complexity and sensitivity, necessitating stricter security and privacy-protection measures. The majority of the existing e-Government systems are centralised, making them vulnerable to privacy and security threats, in addition to suffering from a single point of failure. This study proposes a decentralised e-Government framework with integrated threat detection features to address the aforementioned challenges. In particular, the privacy and security of the proposed e-Government system are realised by the encryption, validation, and immutable mechanisms provided by Blockchain. The insider and external threats associated with blockchain transactions are minimised by the employment of an artificial immune system, which effectively protects the integrity of the Blockchain. The proposed e-Government system was validated and evaluated by using the framework of Ethereum Visualisations of Interactive, Blockchain, Extended Simulations (i.e. eVIBES simulator) with two publicly available datasets. The experimental results show the efficacy of the proposed framework in that it can mitigate insider and external threats in e-Government systems whilst simultaneously preserving the privacy of information
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