A Summary of the Collaborative IS Curriculum Specification of the Joint DPMA, ACM, AIS Task Force

Information Systems \u2795 (IS \u2795), a model curriculum for a bachelor\u27s degree in Information Systems (IS), is the resulting development of collaborative work of a Joint Task Force of the Data Processing Management Association (DPMA), the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), and Academy for Information Systems (AIS). Representation on the task force includes both academic and industrial members. This paper summarizes the full report (Figure 1). A definition of the IS discipline and its relevance within the business and university community is discussed. Resources needed to support a viable program are identified, including faculty, and information technology. Courses are identified and the characteristics of graduates defined. A paradigm is provided which couples a definition of the IS discipline and its underlying principles to the of characteristics of the IS graduate. An updated IS body of knowledge is presented. It is based on previous efforts of DPMA and ACM (Longenecker and Feinstein 1991a,b,c; Ashenhurst 1972; Couger 1972; ACM 1983 and ACM 1990; DPMA 1981, 1986). The current body of knowledge contains the Computer Science and Engineering body of knowledge (Turner and Tucker 1991). A cognitive behavioral metric is presented for specifying and evaluating depth of knowledge. The specification includes a numeric depth indicator and appropriate language to describe presentation goals and resultant behavior expected of students completing study of specific aspects of the curriculum. A modular concept of learning units is defined and utilized in specifying proposed courses. Methods for mapping the learning units to alternate course plans are discussed. Elements from the body of knowledge are combined in a logical top-down manner to form Learning Units (LU). Each LU contains a goal statement, behavioral objectives and associated elements from the body of knowledge. Five curriculum areas with 20 sub-areas form clusters of these learning units. A complete set of 128 learning units form meta-presentation units which can be organized in different schemes to meet individual institutional missions. One possible organization of these units into ten courses is presented. This paper provides curriculum guidelines for implementing undergraduate programs in information systems. The full report, IS\u2795, provides the detail necessary for design and implementation of courses. Dissemination of the curriculum and plans for review and updating the curriculum are presented

A SURVEY FOR ODONTOCETE CETACEANS OFF KAUA‘I AND NI‘IHAU, HAWAI‘I, DURING OCTOBER AND NOVEMBER 2005: EVIDENCE FOR POPULATION STRUCTURE AND SITE FIDELITY

Considerable uncertainty exists regarding population structure and population sizes of most species of odontocetes in the Hawaiian Islands. A small-boat based survey for odontocetes was undertaken off the islands of Kaua‘i and Ni‘ihau in October and November 2005 to photoidentify individuals and collect genetic samples for examining stock structure. Field effort on 24 days covered 2,194 km of trackline. Survey coverage was from shallow coastal waters out to over 3,000 m depth, though almost half (47%) was in waters less than 500 m in depth. There were 56 sightings of five species of odontocetes: spinner dolphins (30 sightings); bottlenose dolphins (14 sightings); short-finned pilot whales (6 sightings); rough-toothed dolphins (5 sightings); and pantropical spotted dolphins (1 sighting). One hundred and five biopsy samples were collected and 14,960 photographs were taken to document morphology and for individual photo-identification. Photographs of distinctive individuals of three species (bottlenose dolphins, 76 identifications; rough-toothed dolphins, 157 identifications; short-finned pilot whales, 68 identifications) were compared to catalogs of these species from a survey off Kaua‘i and Ni‘ihau in 2003, as well as from efforts off O‘ahu, Maui/Lana‘i and the island of Hawai‘i. Within- and between-year matches were found for all three species with individuals previously identified off Kaua‘i and Ni‘ihau, though no matches were found with individuals off any of the other islands. This suggests site fidelity to specific island areas, and population structure among island areas for all three species. Movements of photographically identified bottlenose dolphins were documented between deep water areas off the islands of Kaua‘i and Ni‘ihau, as well as between shallow (\u3c350 m) and deep (\u3e350 m) waters. A lack of sightings or reports of false killer whales off Kaua‘i or Ni‘ihau during our study, combined with documented movements among the other main Hawaiian Islands, suggest that there is no “resident” population of false killer whales that inhabits waters only off Kaua‘i or Ni‘iha

Swedish Undergraduate Information Systems Curricula: A Comparative Study

The authors do a comprehensive comparison of the Swedish Information Systems undergraduate programs in order to on the one hand get a better understanding of how the Swedish curriculum compares to the Australian and US counter parts and on the other hand also get an understanding of where the IS field has changed over time. This change is debated to get a clearer view of what courses should be core in a post 2020 curriculum. The study points to some significant overlaps where Foundations of Information Systems, Data and Information Management, and Systems Analysis and Design are important for both Swedish, Australian, and US undergraduate IS programs. The study also shows differences in focus in the different countries curriculum, where the Swedish programs have a clear focus towards enterprise architecture and application development in comparison to both the Australian and US counterparts

Range and primary habitats of Hawaiian insular false killer whales: informing determination of critical habitat

The article of record as published may be found at https://dx.doi.org/10.3354/esr00435For species listed under the US Endangered Species Act, federal agencies must designate 'critical habitat', areas containing features essential to conservation and/or that may require special management considerations. In November 2010, the National Marine Fisheries Service proposed listing a small demographically isolated population of false killer whales Pseudorca crassidens in Hawai'i as endangered but has not yet proposed designating critical habitat. We assessed the population's range and heavily used habitat areas using data from 27 satellite tag deployments. Assessment of independence of individuals with temporally overlapping data indicated that data were from 22 'groups'. Further analyses were restricted to 1 individual per group. Tag data were available for periods of between 13 and 105 d (median = 40.5 d), with 8513 locations (93.4% from July-January). Analyses of photo-identification data indicated that the population is divided into 3 large associations of individuals (social clusters), with tag data from 2 of these clusters. Ranges for these 2 clusters were similar, although one used significantly deeper waters, and their high-use areas differed. A minimum convex polygon range encompassing all locations was ~82800 km2, with individuals ranging from Ni'ihau to Hawai'i Island and up to 122 km offshore. Three high-use areas were identified: (1) off the north half of Hawai'i Island, (2) north of Maui and Moloka'i and (3) southwest of Lana'i. Although this analysis provides information useful for decision-making concerning designation of critical habitat, there are likely other high-use areas that have not yet been identified due to seasonal limitations and availability of data from only 2 of the 3 main social clusters.Fieldwork was primarily funded by grants and contracts to Cascadia Research Collective from the National Marine Fisheries Service Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center and the US Navy (N45) through the Southwest Fisheries Science Center, Woods Hole Oceano- graphic Institution, and the Naval Postgraduate School. The Wild Whale Research Foundation and Dolphin Quest provided additional support.Funded by Naval Postgraduate School.Office of Naval Research Grant N00014081120

Biochemical and biophysical characterization of the major outer surface protein, OSP-A from North American and European isolates of Borrelia burgdorferi

Lyme borreliosis, caused by the spirochete Borrelia burgdorferi, is the most common vector-borne disease in North America and Western Europe. As the major delayed immune response in humans, a better understanding of the major outer surface lipoproteins OspA and OspB are of much interest. These proteins have been shown to exhibit three distinct phylogenetic genotypes based on their DNA sequences. This paper describes the cloning of genomic DNA for each variant and amplification of PCR. DNA sequence data was used to derive computer driven phylogenetic analysis and deduced amino acid sequences. Overproduction of variant OspAs was carried out in E. coli using a T7-based expression system. Circular dichroism and fluorescence studies was carried out on the recombinant B31 PspA yielding evidence supporting a B31 protein containing 11% alpha-helix, 34% antiparallel beta-sheet, 12% parallel beta sheet

SGR J1550-5418 bursts detected with the Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor during its most prolific activity

We have performed detailed temporal and time-integrated spectral analysis of 286 bursts from SGR J1550-5418 detected with the Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (GBM) in January 2009, resulting in the largest uniform sample of temporal and spectral properties of SGR J1550-5418 bursts. We have used the combination of broadband and high time-resolution data provided with GBM to perform statistical studies for the source properties. We determine the durations, emission times, duty cycles and rise times for all bursts, and find that they are typical of SGR bursts. We explore various models in our spectral analysis, and conclude that the spectra of SGR J1550-5418 bursts in the 8-200 keV band are equally well described by optically thin thermal bremsstrahlung (OTTB), a power law with an exponential cutoff (Comptonized model), and two black-body functions (BB+BB). In the spectral fits with the Comptonized model we find a mean power-law index of -0.92, close to the OTTB index of -1. We show that there is an anti-correlation between the Comptonized Epeak and the burst fluence and average flux. For the BB+BB fits we find that the fluences and emission areas of the two blackbody functions are correlated. The low-temperature BB has an emission area comparable to the neutron star surface area, independent of the temperature, while the high-temperature blackbody has a much smaller area and shows an anti-correlation between emission area and temperature. We compare the properties of these bursts with bursts observed from other SGR sources during extreme activations, and discuss the implications of our results in the context of magnetar burst models.Comment: 13 pages, 10 figures, 2 tables; minor changes, ApJ in pres

BioTIME: A database of biodiversity time series for the Anthropocene.

MotivationThe BioTIME database contains raw data on species identities and abundances in ecological assemblages through time. These data enable users to calculate temporal trends in biodiversity within and amongst assemblages using a broad range of metrics. BioTIME is being developed as a community-led open-source database of biodiversity time series. Our goal is to accelerate and facilitate quantitative analysis of temporal patterns of biodiversity in the Anthropocene.Main types of variables includedThe database contains 8,777,413 species abundance records, from assemblages consistently sampled for a minimum of 2 years, which need not necessarily be consecutive. In addition, the database contains metadata relating to sampling methodology and contextual information about each record.Spatial location and grainBioTIME is a global database of 547,161 unique sampling locations spanning the marine, freshwater and terrestrial realms. Grain size varies across datasets from 0.0000000158 km2 (158 cm2) to 100 km2 (1,000,000,000,000 cm2).Time period and grainBioTIME records span from 1874 to 2016. The minimal temporal grain across all datasets in BioTIME is a year.Major taxa and level of measurementBioTIME includes data from 44,440 species across the plant and animal kingdoms, ranging from plants, plankton and terrestrial invertebrates to small and large vertebrates.Software format.csv and .SQL