On the role of stigmergy in cognition

Cognition in animals is produced by the self- organized activity of mutually entrained body and brain. Given that stigmergy plays a major role in self-organization of societies, we identify stigmergic behavior in cognitive systems, as a common mechanism ranging from brain activity to social systems. We analyze natural societies and artificial systems exploiting stigmergy to produce cognition. Several authors have identified the importance of stigmergy in the behavior and cognition of social systems. However, the perspective of stigmergy playing a central role in brain activity is novel, to the best of our knowledge. We present several evidences of such processes in the brain and discuss their importance in the formation of cognition. With this we try to motivate further research on stigmergy as a relevant component for intelligent systems.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

SURE 2021 Undergraduate Science Conference Booklet

The SURE 2021 Conference was the fourth series of Science Undergraduate Research Experience (SURE) Conferences and second online conference, following earlier face to face series in 2018 (with three conferences in Dublin, Athlone and Waterford) and in 2019 (with three conferences in Dublin, Sligo and Carlow). The 2021 virtual online conference was hosted by Waterford Institute of Technology (WIT), TUS:MM (Athlone Institute of Technology) and Dundalk Institute of Technology (Dundalk IT) and featured 23 oral presentations and 48 poster presentations across three thematic streams/break out rooms on zoom. An interactive virtual poster session took place using the online gamified poster sharing platform Gathertown. The 2021 poster archive is still accessible in Gathertown here. SURE Virtual 2021 was attended by approx 400 students, academic staff, professional body and industry representatives. Last year’s SURE Virtual 2020 conference, hosted by GMIT, Cork IT and TU Dublin (city campus) was the first SURE Network conference to go online, featuring 24 oral presentations, 35 poster presentations and a 450 plus audience. The aims of the SURE conference are to: Provide current students with an opportunity to gain an understanding of the work which has been undertaken by recent graduates, and the career opportunities that exist for graduates in Scientific disciplines. Provide recent graduates with an opportunity to gain a reviewed publication based on the scientific research undertaken by them during their undergraduate studies. Celebrate the academic achievements of recent graduates in the scientific disciplines. Provide a multi-disciplinary scientific forum through which undergraduate research outputs can be disseminated to students, researchers, academic professionals and industry

Towards Interoperable Research Infrastructures for Environmental and Earth Sciences

This open access book summarises the latest developments on data management in the EU H2020 ENVRIplus project, which brought together more than 20 environmental and Earth science research infrastructures into a single community. It provides readers with a systematic overview of the common challenges faced by research infrastructures and how a ‘reference model guided’ engineering approach can be used to achieve greater interoperability among such infrastructures in the environmental and earth sciences. The 20 contributions in this book are structured in 5 parts on the design, development, deployment, operation and use of research infrastructures. Part one provides an overview of the state of the art of research infrastructure and relevant e-Infrastructure technologies, part two discusses the reference model guided engineering approach, the third part presents the software and tools developed for common data management challenges, the fourth part demonstrates the software via several use cases, and the last part discusses the sustainability and future directions

Time for a Nappy Change: beliefs and attitudes towards modern cloth nappies.

The United Nations Environment Programme highlights how the use of disposable nappies has become unsustainable, yet the practice of using modern cloth nappies (MCN) is niche. This study uses mixed methods of survey, story completion and focus group methods to explore how behaviour beliefs and attitudes to behaviour contribute to families’ decision making regarding the nappy system they use for their children. 1588 responded to the survey; 38 completed story completion activity; 24 participated in groups. This study finds that beliefs about the performance as a nappy, environmental credentials, financial considerations, laundry, effort, and hygiene differ according to the level of personal experience of using MCN. While beliefs about the environmentalcredentials of MCN create powerful drivers for the intention to use MCN, other beliefs about the upfront costs, laundry and effort contribute a negative attitude to MCN overall if their support network of other MCN users is not established. Current MCN users found using cloth nappy retailer websites, nappy libraries, and social media groups, including pre-loved and-sell groups, to be beneficial in improving attitude to MCN. This study concludes that interventions that simultaneously reduce or remove perceived barriers such as upfront costs, financial risks and too much effort, paired with campaigns which increase the likelihood of finding support, are more likely, than individual interventions, to be effective in increasing the number of families using MCN.Further study is needed to investigate the potential of interventions which reduce the financial risks such as, easy to access hire kits, spread the cost of MCN and pre-natal and newborn public services such as midwives and health visitors being well informed and encouraging of the use of MCN.<br/