The Effect of Cross-functional Integration on Organizational Performance: A Look at Collaboration, Coordination, and Communication

Cross-functional integration (CFI) in organizations involves a sequence of integrated tasks and activities across multiple departments and units. Modern organizations are hierarchical and have separated functional departments. This may lead to limited reciprocal communication and poor coordination. Work is often divided, categorized, and poses a challenge for CFI personnel to be practical. This challenge continues as technology and organizational structures change. This study is to investigate the effect of CFI on organization performance. The study also looked at CFI from a triadic level of analysis, a broader perspective involving several functional units and processes within the organization. Specifically, this study examines how collaboration, coordination, and communication as the three core processes of CFI impact organization performance and develops a research model based on Tushman & Nadler’s (1978) information processing framework. The study also incorporates the organizational structure (OS) by testing the moderated effect between CFI and performance. We tested the model via a survey that included 325 completed survey responses from online participants. The results showed a strong positive impact of collaboration, coordination, and communication on performance. Also, the study revealed that organizational structure partially moderates the relationships between CFI and performance. There was a strong interaction effect on the relationship between coordination and performance, and communication and performance. No relationship was found between collaboration and performance when the organizational structure is included. Implications of these findings are discussed, along with suggestions for future research

Visualizing the genome: techniques for presenting human genome data and annotations

BACKGROUND: In order to take full advantage of the newly available public human genome sequence data and associated annotations, biologists require visualization tools ("genome browsers") that can accommodate the high frequency of alternative splicing in human genes and other complexities. RESULTS: In this article, we describe visualization techniques for presenting human genomic sequence data and annotations in an interactive, graphical format. These techniques include: one-dimensional, semantic zooming to show sequence data alongside gene structures; color-coding exons to indicate frame of translation; adjustable, moveable tiers to permit easier inspection of a genomic scene; and display of protein annotations alongside gene structures to show how alternative splicing impacts protein structure and function. These techniques are illustrated using examples from two genome browser applications: the Neomorphic GeneViewer annotation tool and ProtAnnot, a prototype viewer which shows protein annotations in the context of genomic sequence. CONCLUSION: By presenting techniques for visualizing genomic data, we hope to provide interested software developers with a guide to what features are most likely to meet the needs of biologists as they seek to make sense of the rapidly expanding body of public genomic data and annotations

Neuroblastoma occurring in a 38-year old Nigerian man: a rare finding

Neuroblastoma (NB) is a common malignancy in children, but rarely occurs in adults. Accepted unfavorable prognostic factors include age over one year, low histological grade and advanced stage, MYCN amplification, chromosomal aberrations, elevations of neuron specific enolase and lactate dehydrogenase, and increased catecholamine metabolites in urine or serum. In adults, abdomen/retroperitoneum are the primary sites and in children the adrenal gland. We report a 38-year old civil servant who presented at our urology clinic on the 21st of December 2007 with a six month history of right flank dull pain which was worse on walking and relieved by rest, hypertension and a large right retroperitoneal mass. Tumor resection revealed a grade III NB. Chemotherapy using a combination of vincristine, adriamycin and cyclophosphamide was started. Follow-up showed regression of the mass initially with a relapse after patient absconded for three months. He resurfaced with new masses and he had a repeat chemotherapy with disappearance of the masses and is currently undergoing further treatment. To our knowledge this is the only report of NB in an adult registered so far in Nigeria and perhaps the whole of Africa. Currently, there are no standard treatment guidelines for patients with NB in adulthood. This study emphasizes the need for a standard treatment regime for adult onset neuroblastoma and its recognition as a possible differential in intra-abdominal mass in adults

Global Aerosol Optical Models and Lookup Tables for the New MODIS Aerosol Retrieval over Land

Since 2000, MODIS has been deriving aerosol properties over land from MODIS observed spectral reflectance, by matching the observed reflectance with that simulated for selected aerosol optical models, aerosol loadings, wavelengths and geometrical conditions (that are contained in a lookup table or 'LUT'). Validation exercises have showed that MODIS tends to under-predict aerosol optical depth (tau) in cases of large tau (tau greater than 1.0), signaling errors in the assumed aerosol optical properties. Using the climatology of almucantur retrievals from the hundreds of global AERONET sunphotometer sites, we found that three spherical-derived models (describing fine-sized dominated aerosol), and one spheroid-derived model (describing coarse-sized dominated aerosol, presumably dust) generally described the range of observed global aerosol properties. The fine dominated models were separated mainly by their single scattering albedo (omega(sub 0)), ranging from non-absorbing aerosol (omega(sub 0) approx. 0.95) in developed urban/industrial regions, to neutrally absorbing aerosol (omega(sub 0) approx.90) in forest fire burning and developing industrial regions, to absorbing aerosol (omega(sub 0) approx. 0.85) in regions of savanna/grassland burning. We determined the dominant model type in each region and season, to create a 1 deg. x 1 deg. grid of assumed aerosol type. We used vector radiative transfer code to create a new LUT, simulating the four aerosol models, in four MODIS channels. Independent AERONET observations of spectral tau agree with the new models, indicating that the new models are suitable for use by the MODIS aerosol retrieval

Geminate recombination of hydroxyl radicals generated in 200 nm photodissociation of aqueous hydrogen peroxide

The picosecond dynamics of hydroxyl radicals generated in 200 nm photoinduced dissociation of aqueous hydrogen peroxide have been observed through their transient absorbance at 266 nm. It is shown that these kinetics are nearly exponential, with a decay time of ca. 30 ps. The prompt quantum yield for the decomposition of H2O2 is 0.56, and the fraction of hydroxyl radicals escaping from the solvent cage to the water bulk is 64-68%. These recombination kinetics suggest strong caging of the geminate hydroxyl radicals by water. Phenomenologically, these kinetics may be rationalized in terms of the diffusion of hydroxide radicals out of a shallow potential well (a solvent cage) with an Onsager radius of 0.24 nm.Comment: 14 pages, 1 figur

Hinode Calibration for Precise Image Co-alignment between SOT and XRT (November 2006 -- April 2007)

To understand the physical mechanisms for activity and heating in the solar atmosphere, the magnetic coupling from the photosphere to the corona is an important piece of information from the Hinode observations, and therefore precise positional alignment is required among the data acquired by different telescopes. The Hinode spacecraft and its onboard telescopes were developed to allow us to investigate magnetic coupling with co-alignment accuracy better than 1 arcsec. Using the Mercury transit observed on 8 November 2006 and co-alignment measurements regularly performed on a weekly basis, we have determined the information necessary for precise image co-alignment and have confirmed that co-alignment better than 1 arcsec can be realized between Solar Optical Telescope (SOT) and X-Ray Telescope (XRT) with our baseline co-alignment method. This paper presents results from the calibration for precise co-alignment of CCD images from SOT and XRT.Comment: 8 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in PASJ (Hinode Special issue