The marketing firm and co‐creation: The case of co‐creation by LEGO

This article discusses the marketer and customer co‐creation process within the context of bilateral contingencies. Bilateral contingencies occur when the marketers' behavior is reinforced (and/or punished) by the customers' behavior, whereas the behavior of the customers is reinforced (and/or punished) by the marketers' actions. Using the example of the LEGO community, we discuss how the marketers in the organization can respond to behaviors resulting from co‐creational customer– customer exchanges. This paper fills the knowledge gap by presenting a behavior analysis framework (theory of the marketing firm) for the empirical measurement of the co‐creation process.The marketing firm and co‐creation: The case of co‐creation by LEGOacceptedVersio

Factors influencing online flight ticket purchasing

In spite of the rapid growth in Internet purchasing of products and services in Korea, the buying rate of online flight ticketing remains low. This research investigates the factors that influence online ticket purchasing through a survey of Internet consumers to determine the relationships between convenience, willingness to purchase and trust. From these, the present satisfaction levels can be assessed and future upgrades and requirements can be planned. It is also necessary to determine the background factors that influence Internet-using consumers who visit websites, with a view to simplifying procedures and encouraging repeat visits to the sites

Force-matched embedded-atom method potential for niobium

Large-scale simulations of plastic deformation and phase transformations in alloys require reliable classical interatomic potentials. We construct an embedded-atom method potential for niobium as the first step in alloy potential development. Optimization of the potential parameters to a well-converged set of density-functional theory (DFT) forces, energies, and stresses produces a reliable and transferable potential for molecular dynamics simulations. The potential accurately describes properties related to the fitting data, and also produces excellent results for quantities outside the fitting range. Structural and elastic properties, defect energetics, and thermal behavior compare well with DFT results and experimental data, e.g., DFT surface energies are reproduced with less than 4% error, generalized stacking-fault energies differ from DFT values by less than 15%, and the melting temperature is within 2% of the experimental value.Comment: 17 pages, 13 figures, 7 table

The marketing firm and co‐creation: An empirical study of marketer and customer's co‐creation process

This study empirically investigates the marketer and customer's co‐creation process within the context of the marketing firm. Based on principles from bilateral contingencies, findings from a conjoint study (n = 98) indicate that utilitarian and informational reinforcing consequences from the marketer have a stronger impact on customers' co‐creation behavior relative to informational reinforcing consequences from other customers. Consequently, analyzing the impact of important reinforcing contingencies through the lens of bilateral contingencies expands our understanding of how and why co‐creation outcomes might occur. Also, a good co‐creation process may increase the business companies' research and intelligence and, as a consequence, strengthen their competitiveness.The marketing firm and co‐creation: An empirical study of marketer and customer's co‐creation processacceptedVersio

A Novel Electrical Sensor for Combined Online Measurement of Partial Discharge (OLPD) and Power Quality (PQ)

A novel inductive sensor has been developed that can be used for both for online partial discharge (OLPD) monitoring and power quality (PQ) monitoring. The sensor has been designed for attachment onto power cables with 50/60 Hz currents up to 800 A. The sensor comprises a high frequency (HF) winding to detect partial discharge (PD) pulses between 200 kHz and 30 MHz with a flat frequency response within this range. A low frequency (LF) winding is aimed at monitoring the power frequency (50/60 Hz) and its harmonics up to the 63rd order; it can also be used for current signature analysis (CSA) in rotating machines. A passive low-pass filter is integrated inside the sensor casing to suppress the higher frequencies not relevant to power quality monitoring. The sensor has a split-core design, making it easy to install and allows for retrofit installations. The combined sensor is well suited to places where space is limited such as compact cable boxes where it would be difficult to install two separate sensors. The sensor is primarily used for high voltage (HV) rotating machines (direct or VSD fed) and can be used in a variety of other applications such as monitoring of onshore and offshore wind farms. The paper begins by reviewing the main types of sensors used for partial discharge monitoring followed by the development of the novel sensor. Finally, two case studies where the sensor has been successfully installed are presented

Final Report: Detection and Characterization of Underground Facilities by Stochastic Inversion and Modeling of Data from the New Generation of Synthetic Aperture Satellites

Many clandestine development and production activities can be conducted underground to evade surveillance. The purpose of the study reported here was to develop a technique to detect underground facilities by broad-area search and then to characterize the facilities by inversion of the collected data. This would enable constraints to be placed on the types of activities that would be feasible at each underground site, providing a basis the design of targeted surveillance and analysis for more complete characterization. Excavation of underground cavities causes deformation in the host material and overburden that produces displacements at the ground surface. Such displacements are often measurable by a variety of surveying or geodetic techniques. One measurement technique, Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR), uses data from satellite-borne (or airborne) synthetic aperture radars (SARs) and so is ideal for detecting and measuring surface displacements in denied access regions. Depending on the radar frequency and the acquisition mode and the surface conditions, displacement maps derived from SAR interferograms can provide millimeter- to centimeter-level measurement accuracy on regional and local scales at spatial resolution of {approx}1-10 m. Relatively low-resolution ({approx}20 m, say) maps covering large regions can be used for broad-area detection, while finer resolutions ({approx}1 m) can be used to image details of displacement fields over targeted small areas. Surface displacements are generally expected to be largest during or a relatively short time after active excavation, but, depending on the material properties, measurable displacement may continue at a decreasing rate for a considerable time after completion. For a given excavated volume in a given geological setting, the amplitude of the surface displacements decreases as the depth of excavation increases, while the area of the discernable displacement pattern increases. Therefore, the ability to detect evidence for an underground facility using InSAR depends on the displacement sensitivity and spatial resolution of the interferogram, as well as on the size and depth of the facility and the time since its completion. The methodology development described in this report focuses on the exploitation of synthetic aperture radar data that are available commercially from a number of satellite missions. Development of the method involves three components: (1) Evaluation of the capability of InSAR to detect and characterize underground facilities ; (2) inversion of InSAR data to infer the location, depth, shape and volume of a subsurface facility; and (3) evaluation and selection of suitable geomechanical forward models to use in the inversion. We adapted LLNL's general-purpose Bayesian Markov Chain-Monte Carlo procedure, the 'Stochastic Engine' (SE), to carry out inversions to characterize subsurface void geometries. The SE performs forward simulations for a large number of trial source models to identify the set of models that are consistent with the observations and prior constraints. The inverse solution produced by this kind of stochastic method is a posterior probability density function (pdf) over alternative models, which forms an appropriate input to risk-based decision analyses to evaluate subsequent response strategies. One major advantage of a stochastic inversion approach is its ability to deal with complex, non-linear forward models employing empirical, analytical or numerical methods. However, while a geomechanical model must incorporate adequate physics to enable sufficiently accurate prediction of surface displacements, it must also be computationally fast enough to render the large number of forward realizations needed in stochastic inversion feasible. This latter requirement prompted us first to investigate computationally efficient empirical relations and closed-form analytical solutions. However, our evaluation revealed severe limitations in the ability of existing empirical and analytical forms to predict deformations from underground cavities with an accuracy consistent with the potential resolution and precision of InSAR data. We followed two approaches to overcoming these limitations. The first was to develop a new analytical solution for a 3D cavity excavated in an elastic half-space. The second was to adapt a fast parallelized finite element method to the SE and evaluate the feasibility of using in the stochastic inversion. To date we have demonstrated the ability of InSAR to detect underground facilities and measure the associated surface displacements by mapping surface deformations that track the excavation of the Los Angeles Metro system. The Stochastic Engine implementation has been completed and undergone functional testing

Cases, Regulations, and Statutes

With the exception of ApoE4, genome-wide association studies have failed to identify strong genetic risk factors for late-onset Alzheimer's disease, despite strong evidence of heritability, suggesting that many low penetrance genes may be involved. Additionally, the nature of the identified genetic risk factors and their relation to disease pathology is also largely obscure. Previous studies have found that a cancer-associated variant of the cell cycle inhibitor gene p21cip1 is associated with increased risk of Alzheimer's disease. The aim of this study was to confirm this association and to elucidate the effects of the variant on protein function and Alzheimer-type pathology. We examined the association of the p21cip1 variant with Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease with dementia. The genotyping studies were performed on 719 participants of the Oxford Project to Investigate Memory and Ageing, 225 participants of a Parkinson's disease DNA bank, and 477 participants of the Human Random Control collection available from the European Collection of Cell Cultures. The post mortem studies were carried out on 190 participants. In the in-vitro study, human embryonic kidney cells were transfected with either the common or rare p21cip1 variant; and cytometry was used to assess cell cycle kinetics, p21cip1 protein expression and sub-cellular localisation. The variant was associated with an increased risk of Alzheimer's disease, and Parkinson's disease with dementia, relative to age matched controls. Furthermore, the variant was associated with an earlier age of onset of Alzheimer's disease, and a more severe phenotype, with a primary influence on the accumulation of tangle pathology. In the in-vitro study, we found that the SNPs reduced the cell cycle inhibitory and anti-apoptotic activity of p21cip1. The results suggest that the cancer-associated variant of p21cip1 may contribute to the loss of cell cycle control in neurons that may lead to Alzheimer-type neurodegeneration