Creative Discovery in Architectural Design Processes: An empirical study of procedural and contextual components

This research aims to collect empirical evidence on the nature of design by investigating the question: What role do procedural activities (where each design step reflects a unit in a linear process) and contextual activities (an action based on the situation, environment and affordances) play in the generation of creative insights, critical moves, and the formation of design concepts in the reasoning process? The thesis shows how these activities can be identified through the structure of a linkograph, for better understanding the conditions under which creativity and innovation take place. Adopting a mixed methodology, a deductive approach evaluates the existing models that aim to capture the series of design events, while an inductive approach collects data and ethnographic observations for an empirical study of architectural design experiments based on structured and unstructured briefs. A joint approach of quantitative and qualitative analyses is developed to detect the role of evolving actions and structural units of reasoning, particularly the occurrence of creative insights (‘eureka’ and ‘aha!’ moments) in the formation of concepts by judging the gradual transformation of mental imagery and external representations in the sketching process. The findings of this research are: (1) For any design process procedural components are subsets in solving the design problem for synchronic concept development or implementation of the predefined conceptual idea, whereas contextual components relate to a comprehensive view to solve the design problem through concept synthesis of back- and forelinking between the diachronic stages of the design process. (2) This study introduces a new method of looking at evolving design moves and critical actions by considering the time of emergence in the structure of the reasoning process. Directed linkography compares two different situations: the first is synchronous, looking at relations back to preceding events, and the second is diachronic, looking at the design state after completion. Accordingly, creative insights can be categorised into those emerging in incremental reasoning to reframe the solution, and sudden mental insights emerging in non-incremental reasoning to restructure the design problem and reformulate the entire design configuration. (3) Two architectural designing styles are identified: some architects define the design concept early, set goals and persevere in framing and reframing this until the end, whereas others initiate the concept by designing independent conceptual elements and then proceed to form syntheses for the design configuration. Sudden mental insights are most likely to emerge from the unexpected combination of synthesis, particularly in the latter style. In its contribution to design research and creative cognition this dissertation paves the way for a better understanding of the role of reflective practices in design creativity and cognitive processes and presents new insights into what it means to think and design as an architect

Directed Linkography and Syntactic Analysis: Comparing Synchronous and Diachronic Effects of Sudden Emergence of Creative Insights on the Structure of the Design Process

This paper reports on a study of the emergence of creative insights in the architectural design process. Using detailed ethnographic observations of designers working on an architectural design task, and coding these using linkographs, we identify two poles of design creativity: incremental improvement and the sudden creative insight. We show how these can be identified in the structure of the linkograph, giving rise to the possibility of better understanding the conditions under which creativity and innovation take place. Linkography is directed in relation to the time of emergence of design utterances. It is characterised as a pivotal structure of a multi-level hierarchical network. A quantitative model is proposed to capture the structure of events and sudden changes occurring in the design process using syntactic measures of space syntax and urban graphs. Two situations are compared: synchronous designing using ‘directed linkography’ looking at the backlink relations and the completed state of the linkograph. Local, global measurements and directed j-graphs are correlated with design contents and descriptions for the concept development. Our interest lies in capturing events of drastic changes and investigating the transformation of the associated interim products. Such events are hypothesised, reflecting significant transformation in concept reasoning and the configuration of the linkograph. Through this model, we aim to answer the question: why would sudden insights divert the network to a different structure state

Empirical Analysis of Value at Risk Models: SIAS Equity Portfolio Risk Model Selection and Formulation

This paper is to determine an appropriate Value-at-Risk model that can improve the overall management of the SIAS fund, particular for the two equity portfolios. We consider the four candidate models: Historical Simulation, Dynamic Conditional Correlation Generalized AutoRegressive Conditional Heteroskedastic , Filtered Historical Simulation, and Hybrid Approach. Using historical information from 2003, all the models are implemented, and their specifications and performances are discussed in detail and examined with four backtesting procedures, including Unconditional Coverage, Independence, Conditional Coverage, and Quantile Regression tests. Our findings confirm that the Historical Simulation model performs poorly in capturing the volatility dynamics, and we also have a comprehensive discussion about the factors that are used in the Hybrid Approach model. Those two are highly rejected from all the test procedures. On the other hand, Filtered Historical Simulation is the only model that passes the likelihood ratio tests. However, the likelihood ratio test may be flawed and biased; therefore, we employ Quantile Regression test that is believed to be a more powerful backtesting procedure. The results turn out that DCC GACRH is the best model among others. In addition, its other properties allow the risk management process to be more in depth. Therefore, DCC GACRH is strongly recommended

Order, Structure and Disorder in Space Syntax and Linkography: Intelligibility, Entropy, and Complexity Measures

There has been great interest in the use of linkographies to describe the events that take place in design processes with the aim of understanding when creativity takes place and the conditions under which creative moments emerge in the design. Linkography is a directed graph network and because of this it gives resemblance to the types of large complex graphs that are used in the space syntax community to describe urban systems. In this paper, we investigate the applications of certain measures that come from space syntax analyses of urban graphs to look at linkography systems. One hypothesis is that complexity is created in different scales in the graph system from the local sub-graph to the whole system. The method of analysis illustrates the underlying state of any system. Integration, complexity and entropy values are measured at each individual node in the system to arrive at a better understanding on the rules that frame the relationships between the parts and the whole

Thermoresponsive and Reducible Hyperbranched Polymers Synthesized by RAFT Polymerisation

Here, we report the synthesis of new thermoresponsive hyperbranched polymers (HBPs) via one-pot reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) copolymerisation of poly(ethylene glycol)methyl ether methacrylate (PEGMEMA, Mn = 475 g/mol), poly(propylene glycol)methacrylate (PPGMA, Mn = 375 g/mol), and disulfide diacrylate (DSDA) using 2-cyanoprop-2-yl dithiobenzoate as a RAFT agent. DSDA was used as the branching agent and to afford the HBPs with reducible disulfide groups. The resulting HBPs were characterised by Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy (NMR) and Gel Permeation Chromatography (GPC). Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC) was used to determine lower critical solution temperatures (LCSTs) of these copolymers, which are in the range of 17–57 °C. Moreover, the studies on the reducibility of HBPs and swelling behaviours of hydrogels synthesized from these HBPs were conducted. The results demonstrated that we have successfully synthesized hyperbranched polymers with desired dual responsive (thermal and reducible) and crosslinkable (via thiol-ene click chemistry) properties. In addition, these new HBPs carry the multiplicity of reactive functionalities, such as RAFT agent moieties and multivinyl functional groups, which can afford them with the capacity for further bioconjugation and structure modifications

Effects of green manure crops and mulching technology on reduction in herbicide and fertilizer use during rice cultivation in Korea

Green manure crops are primarily used in environmentally friendly agricultural practices to reduce the application of chemical fertilizer and herbicide. In this study, a two-year field experiment was conducted to evaluate the effects of paper and plastic mulching with hairy vetch alone or in combination with barley on weed control and rice yield. In addition, treatment effects on soil redox potential (Eh) and the concentration of ammonium (NH4+) in rice paddy were investigated. The results showed that plastic film (10 or 20 μm) and paper mulching with hairy vetch alone had no significant effects on weed density and rice yield when compared with conventional practice (herbicide and fertilizer application) during the first year. However, during the second year, plastic film (20 μm) with partial tillage of hairy vetch alone increased rice yield and decreased weed occurence; but barley and hairy vetch mixture showed opposite trends. Plastic film mulching led to a decrease in soil redox potential, mainly due to the decomposition of soil organic matter. In addition, plastic film mulching increased NH4+-N contents in rice paddy soil. These results suggest that the combination of plastic film with hairy vetch and barley mixture can be used in rice fields to reduce the use of chemical fertilizer and herbicide.Keywords: Green manure, hairy vetch, mulching, rice, weed co

Planning target volume margins for prostate radiotherapy using daily electronic portal imaging and implanted fiducial markers

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Fiducial markers and daily electronic portal imaging (EPI) can reduce the risk of geographic miss in prostate cancer radiotherapy. The purpose of this study was to estimate CTV to PTV margin requirements, without and with the use of this image guidance strategy.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>46 patients underwent placement of 3 radio-opaque fiducial markers prior to prostate RT. Daily pre-treatment EPIs were taken, and isocenter placement errors were corrected if they were ≥ 3 mm along the left-right or superior-inferior axes, and/or ≥ 2 mm along the anterior-posterior axis. During-treatment EPIs were then obtained to estimate intra-fraction motion.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Without image guidance, margins of 0.57 cm, 0.79 cm and 0.77 cm, along the left-right, superior-inferior and anterior-posterior axes respectively, are required to give 95% probability of complete CTV coverage each day. With the above image guidance strategy, these margins can be reduced to 0.36 cm, 0.37 cm and 0.37 cm respectively. Correction of all isocenter placement errors, regardless of size, would permit minimal additional reduction in margins.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Image guidance, using implanted fiducial markers and daily EPI, permits the use of narrower PTV margins without compromising coverage of the target, in the radiotherapy of prostate cancer.</p

Establishing an EU-China consortium on traditional Chinese medicine research.

Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is widely used in the European Union (EU) and attracts intense research interests from European scientists. As an emerging area in Europe, TCM research requires collaboration and coordination of actions. Good Practice in Traditional Chinese Medicine Research in the Post-genomic Era, also known as GP-TCM, is the first ever EU-funded 7th Framework Programme (FP7) coordination action, aiming to inform the best practice and harmonise research on the safety and efficacy of TCM through interdisciplinary exchange of experience and expertise among clinicians and scientists. With its increasingly large pool of expertise across 19 countries including 13 EU member states, Australia, Canada, China, Norway, Thailand and the USA, the consortium provides forums and collaboration platforms on quality control, extraction technology, component analysis, toxicology, pharmacology and regulatory issues of Chinese herbal medicine (CHM), as well as on acupuncture studies, with a particular emphasis on the application of a functional genomics approach. The project officially started in May 2009 and by the time of its conclusion in April 2012 a Europe-based academic society dedicated to TCM research will be founded to carry on the mission of GP-TCM.RIGHTS : This article is licensed under the BioMed Central licence at http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/license which is similar to the 'Creative Commons Attribution Licence'. In brief you may : copy, distribute, and display the work; make derivative works; or make commercial use of the work - under the following conditions: the original author must be given credit; for any reuse or distribution, it must be made clear to others what the license terms of this work are

ROX Index to Guide Management of COVID-19 Pneumonia

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by novel severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) emerged from China in December 2019 leading to a global pandemic (1). Approximately 17% of patients admitted to hospital require critical care, the majority of whom undergo mechanical ventilation (MV) for pneumonia complicated by hypoxaemia (2)

Long-term survival rates of laryngeal cancer patients treated by radiation and surgery, radiation alone, and surgery alone : studied by lognormal and Kaplan-Meier survival methods

BACKGROUND: Validation of the use of the lognormal model for predicting long-term survival rates using short-term follow-up data. METHODS: 907 cases of laryngeal cancer were treated from 1973–1977 by radiation and surgery (248), radiation alone (345), and surgery alone (314), in registries of Connecticut and Metropolitan Detroit of the SEER database, with known survival status up to 1999. Phase 1 of this study used the minimum chi-square test to assess the goodness of fit of the survival times of those who died with disease to a lognormal distribution. Phase 2 used the maximum likelihood method to estimate long-term survival rates using short-term follow-up data. In order to validate the lognormal model, the estimated long-term cancer-specific survival rates (CSSR) were compared with the values calculated by the Kaplan-Meier (KM) method using long-term data. RESULTS: The 25-year CSSR were predicted to be 72%, 68% and 65% for treatments by radiation and surgery, by radiation alone, and by surgery alone respectively, using short-term follow-up data by the lognormal model. Corresponding results calculated by the KM method were: 72+/-3%, 68+/-3% and 66+/-4% respectively. CONCLUSIONS: The lognormal model was validated for the prediction of the long-term survival rates of laryngeal cancer patients treated by these different methods. The lognormal model may become a useful tool in research on outcomes