Focus Plus: Detect Learner's Distraction by Web Camera in Distance Teaching

Distance teaching has become popular these years because of the COVID-19 epidemic. However, both students and teachers face several challenges in distance teaching, like being easy to distract. We proposed Focus+, a system designed to detect learners' status with the latest AI technology from their web camera to solve such challenges. By doing so, teachers can know students' status, and students can regulate their learning experience. In this research, we will discuss the expected model's design for training and evaluating the AI detection model of Focus+.Comment: 5 Pages, 4 Figures, 2021 National Chair Professorship Academic Series: Teaching and Learning in Pandemic Er

T Oligo-Primed Polymerase Chain Reaction (TOP-PCR): A Robust Method for the Amplification of Minute DNA Fragments in Body Fluids.

Body fluid DNA sequencing is a powerful noninvasive approach for the diagnosis of genetic defects, infectious agents and diseases. The success relies on the quantity and quality of the DNA samples. However, numerous clinical samples are either at low quantity or of poor quality due to various reasons. To overcome these problems, we have developed T oligo-primed polymerase chain reaction (TOP-PCR) for full-length nonselective amplification of minute quantity of DNA fragments. TOP-PCR adopts homogeneous "half adaptor" (HA), generated by annealing P oligo (carrying a phosphate group at the 5' end) and T oligo (carrying a T-tail at the 3' end), for efficient ligation to target DNA and subsequent PCR amplification primed by the T oligo alone. Using DNA samples from body fluids, we demonstrate that TOP-PCR recovers minute DNA fragments and maintains the DNA size profile, while enhancing the major molecular populations. Our results also showed that TOP-PCR is a superior method for detecting apoptosis and outperforms the method adopted by Illumina for DNA amplification

Recovery from Anorexia Nervosa in contemporary Taiwan: A multiple-case qualitative investigation from a cultural-contextual perspective

Grounded in a cultural and contextual perspective, the current study examined the lived experiences and the recovery pathways of three Taiwanese women diagnosed with various subtypes of anorexia nervosa, at varying stages of their recovery. Specifically, using a multiple-case qualitative method, this study explored the complex, dynamic interactions of sociocultural factors and forces (i.e., cultural, familial, and societal influences) that impinge upon the three Taiwanese female participants in relation to living with anorexia nervosa in contemporary Taiwan. Data were collected based on in-depth, semi-structured interviews with the participants and relevant written materials and journal entries provided by these participants. The data were first analyzed within each case and then again across all cases. Accordingly, we present the results of the study by illustrating each participant’s story and narrative of struggling with and recovering from anorexia. We then describe three main culturally-related themes that emerged from the cross-case analysis, which pertain specifically to the recovery process of the participants under the East-West ‘biculturalism’ in Taiwan: 1) anorexia as a function of the conflictual bicultural self; 2) recovery as a pathway towards an integrated bicultural self; and 3) the paradoxical roles of Chinese cultural heritage in anorexia and recovery. Findings of the study highlight the role of local cultural factors/forces, including Chinese familism, Confucianism, filial piety, face-saving, gender role prescriptions, biculturalism, Westernization, and self-relation-coordination, in affecting and shaping Taiwanese women’s struggling with anorexia. Implications and recommendations for future research and clinical interventions are discussed

Development of a revised taxonomic approach for improving supply chain integration and collaboration

Although integration and collaboration are considered critical factors in supply chain practice, improving integration and collaboration still encounters a dilemma that is ascribable to three problems, i.e., partners’ opportunistic behaviours, the complicated resource distribution and heavy workloads, and large time costs. To solve these problems and effectively improve integration and collaboration, a revised taxonomic approach will be developed in this research. Based on the case of East Asia, the revised taxonomic approach can produce guidelines to help manufacturers well know how to effectively improve integration and collaboration in a sequential manner and avoid encountering the three problems noted above. There are multiple implications of this study; the research results not only develop a new approach by revising theory but also provide convenient tools to help manufacturers effectively improve integration and collaboration when entering different markets. Thus, this study makes great contributions to the field

Functional decline and mortality in long-term care settings: Static and dynamic approach

AbstractBackground/PurposeFunctional impairment is known to be associated with higher mortality risk and adverse health outcomes. However, little is known about whether functional decline could predict mortality among the elderly in the long-term care setting.MethodsThis is a prospective cohort study in two veteran homes in northern Taiwan with active use of the minimum data set (MDS). Evaluation tools retrieved from the MDS, including MDS Resource Utilization Group-III for Activities of Daily Living (RUG-III ADL), MDS Cognitive Scale, MDS Social engagement, triggers for resident assessment protocol (RAP) and Pain scale, were utilized for the analysis.ResultsA total of 1125 male participants were included in this study. The mean age of the participants was 83.1 ± 5.1 years, and 65 (5.8%) developed physical functional decline within a 6-month period. Participants with functional decline [odds ratio (OR) 2.305, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.002–5.303], poor baseline functional status (OR 1.116, 95% CI 1.002–1.242), positive RAP triggers for dehydration (OR 13.857, 95% CI 3.07–62.543), and underlying chronic lung diseases (OR 2.279, 95% CI 1.149–4.522), depression (OR 2.994, 95% CI 1.161–7.721), and cancer (OR 3.23, 95% CI 1.078–9.682) were more likely to have an additional 12-month mortality. By contrast, Parkinsonism (OR 3.875, 95% CI 1.169–12.841), increase in sum of RAP triggers (OR 6.096, 95% CI 2.741–13.562), and positive RAP triggers for cognitive loss (OR 3.164, 95% CI 1.612–6.212) and mood (OR 2.894, 95% CI 1.466–5.71) are strong predictors for functional decline within 6 months.ConclusionPhysical function decline within 6 months predicted the subsequent 1-year mortality, whereas increased sum of RAP triggers and positive trigger for cognitive loss and mood were associated with functional decline

The Effect of Customization Service on Flow Experience and Behavior Intensions in Customer Co-Design Process

Computer Mediated Environments (CMEs) prepared a satisfactory opportunity for providing customization service on line. This characteristics of synchronous and interactive allow designers or enterprises enhance to discover customer s’ demands. Interface design plays a core role and influence customers’ decisions. Yet, the research of this field also has varied investigation about “flow experience”, which considerable attention has been paid in the past to research issues related to motionless state of customization product process in CMEs (e.g. system, technology, and communication tool et al.), a literature on issues of dynamic state has emerged only very slowly and in a more scattered way. It excited the curiosity of this study In this study, we attempt evaluate customization improvements of customer value by content customization and context customization. Further to investigate the relationships between content and context customization, flow experience and behavioral intentions when provide customer co-design service. According the findings, content customization service and context customization service provided enhanced the flow experience occur. Yet, the flow experience was significantly associated with behavior intension

Time‐Dependent Cryospheric Longwave Surface Emissivity Feedback in the Community Earth System Model

Frozen and unfrozen surfaces exhibit different longwave surface emissivities with different spectral characteristics, and outgoing longwave radiation and cooling rates are reduced for unfrozen scenes relative to frozen ones. Here physically realistic modeling of spectrally resolved surface emissivity throughout the coupled model components of the Community Earth System Model (CESM) is advanced, and implications for model high‐latitude biases and feedbacks are evaluated. It is shown that despite a surface emissivity feedback amplitude that is, at most, a few percent of the surface albedo feedback amplitude, the inclusion of realistic, harmonized longwave, spectrally resolved emissivity information in CESM1.2.2 reduces wintertime Arctic surface temperature biases from −7.2 ± 0.9 K to −1.1 ± 1.2 K, relative to observations. The bias reduction is most pronounced in the Arctic Ocean, a region for which Coupled Model Intercomparison Project version 5 (CMIP5) models exhibit the largest mean wintertime cold bias, suggesting that persistent polar temperature biases can be lessened by including this physically based process across model components. The ice emissivity feedback of CESM1.2.2 is evaluated under a warming scenario with a kernel‐based approach, and it is found that emissivity radiative kernels exhibit water vapor and cloud cover dependence, thereby varying spatially and decreasing in magnitude over the course of the scenario from secular changes in atmospheric thermodynamics and cloud patterns. Accounting for the temporally varying radiative responses can yield diagnosed feedbacks that differ in sign from those obtained from conventional climatological feedback analysis methods.Plain Language SummaryClimate models have exhibited a persistent cold‐pole bias, whereby they systematically underestimate the average temperature and the amplification of climate change at high latitudes. A number of different explanations have been advanced for cold‐pole biases, which can be broadly divided into radiative and dynamic explanations. Here we explore in detail a relatively novel radiative explanation for the cold‐pole bias: the ice emissivity feedback. Similar to the difference in shortwave reflectivity of unfrozen and frozen surfaces, recent literature has shown that unfrozen surfaces are less emissive than frozen surfaces, which can induce a positive radiative feedback. We first present the highly nontrivial implementation of this feedback in a global circulation model (GCM) and show how to harmonize the disjointed representation of surface emissivity within the radiative transfer calculated by atmospheric and land components of a GCM. With this modified model, we show how this ice emissivity feedback depends on atmospheric water vapor and thus varies on time scales ranging from seasonal to centennial. We also show that the ice emissivity feedback is seasonally complementary to the well‐known ice‐albedo feedback, where the former is most influential during polar night. Finally, we show that including this feedback essentially eliminates the cold‐pole bias on the model we used.Key PointsLW spectral surface emissivity improves CESM Arctic surface temperature bias by 6.1 ± 1.9 degrees KelvinSpectral emissivity kernels computed for 200+ period are nonlinear in timeTemporally and spatially localized atmospheric dynamics show decreased climatological seasonal sea ice emissivity radiative response in ArcticPeer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/142486/1/jgrd54377_am.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/142486/2/jgrd54377.pd

The sustainable cycle between lean production and auditing practices and its efficiency in improving supplier relationships and green supply chains

This study explores why a sustainable cycle is induced when manufacturers implement auditing in combination with lean production. Furthermore, it verifies whether this sustainable cycle enhances process integration and risk resilience, thereby allowing the manufacturer to build strong cooperation with suppliers, which further produces a positive effect on the green supply chain. Sociotechnical systems theory is our theoretical basis, and calculating Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient and estimating PLS regressions are the main methods used. The results show that the implementation of auditing induces two driving forces: internal responsibility and the ability to respond to emergencies. These two forces drive suppliers to actively and positively cooperate with lean practices to ensure that the effect of those practices is strengthened. Moreover, stronger lean practices also produce two feedback forces – expanded tolerance for auditing and expanded acceptance of auditing interventions – that strengthen auditing practices. As a result, the mutually continuous strengthening of lean production and auditing practices is produced, which further becomes a sustainable cycle. This cycle can continue to enhance process integration and increase risk resilience, build strong cooperation with suppliers, and improve the green supply chain