Product selection plan for a case company

The thesis recorded a process of a product selection project for a case company. It start-ed with the background information of the upcoming potential business and the estab-lishment of the new shop for the case company in downtown Helsinki. Accordingly with the information of the case company, the objective and scope of the project were clearly mentioned. The first chapter listed main theories that are being used in the following chap-ter and a brief plan to accomplish the project objective step by step. The project was divided into three tasks, which included: locating the case company’s position in the industry, applying theory into practice, finding target customers’ needs and popular products in Chinese market, comparing prices with local nutrition stores, and checking details for the final plan and present the solution to the case company. The theory part started with industry analysis - to analyse the big environment for the case company, Porter’s five forces -analysis and SWOT analysis. These were used to position the case company in the nutrition supplements industry. Competitor analysis to check the case company’s strategy, as a result, the case company is market nicher. In the end of the theory part, I included a brief introduction about nutrition supplements in-dustry, to familiarize readers with the special industry the company is in. In Chapter 3, the thesis mainly included how I have researched Chinese market. In this chapter, I have used survey to detect Chinese customers’ need for nutrition supplements, and what are the trends in China for the nutrition market. A rough product selection in a table form was listed after I have searched on line about the net stores in China, what are their price strategies, what products are purchased the most etc. The next chapter then polished the product selection with on field research in Finnish nu-trition stores. I have gone to Finnish stores to check their price strategy and more popular products, and listed in the product selection plan for the case company. The final step before handing the product selection plan to the case company, was that I have inter-viewed an experienced tour guide in Nordic countries, he has given me useful tips for checking the details of the product selection plan. The thesis gave an analysis of the results and a suggestion for the case company on how to follow up after the project is accomplished. This was located in chapter 5. This chapter concluded the project from the perspective from both the thesis writer and the case com-pany, and it also cleared out what both the case company and I are going to do in the future after the project is completed

EQUIVALENT POLYGONS AND POLYHEDRA

Bachelor'sBACHELOR OF SCIENCE (HONOURS

Study on land use conflict identification and territorial spatial zoning control in Rao River Basin, Jiangxi Province, China

The coordinated development of territorial space is a necessary condition for sustainable regional development. In the context of rapid socio-economic development, how to construct a spatial control model to coordinate land use conflicts between agriculture, construction, and ecology has become an urgent problem to be resolved. By taking the Rao River Basin, a typical region with land use conflict issues, as an example, this study developed various land use suitability evaluation systems to identify and evaluate the land use conflict status in 2020 under the three major land use objectives: agricultural production, urban construction, and ecological protection. Then, based on the consideration of ecological priority, the remote sensing ecological index was applied to characterize the ecological quality of the watershed. Afterwards, a framework for spatial control zoning was developed to guide the land use approach within the context of territorial spatial planning by integrating regional ecological quality and land use conflict status. The results found that the spatial distribution of the suitability of agricultural land, construction land, and ecological land in the Rao River Basin exhibited overlap and intersection, causing significant land use conflicts. According to statistics, 36.55 % of the basin was affected by conflict, with medium conflict as the main grade and agriculture-construction conflict being the most significant with an area of up to 1,397.01 km2. Therefore, it is necessary to develop differentiated management strategies and divide spatial control zones to mitigate land use conflicts according to the basin's current development status. Integrated land use conflicts and ecological quality, the watershed was split into six spatial control zones: eco-dominated zones, agricultural production zones, urban construction zones, priority treatment zones, controlled development zones, and development potential zones. The study results can provide a basis for decision-making on the spatial development of the Rao River Basin and a methodological reference for identifying and mitigating land use conflicts

Multi-Task Offloading Based on Optimal Stopping Theory in Edge Computing Empowered Internet of Vehicles

Vehicular edge computing is a new computing paradigm. By introducing edge computing into the Internet of Vehicles (IoV), service providers are able to serve users with low-latency services, as edge computing deploys resources (e.g., computation, storage, and bandwidth) at the side close to the IoV users. When mobile nodes are moving and generating structured tasks, they can connect with the roadside units (RSUs) and then choose a proper time and several suitable Mobile Edge Computing (MEC) servers to offload the tasks. However, how to offload tasks in sequence efficiently is challenging. In response to this problem, in this paper, we propose a time-optimized, multi-task-offloading model adopting the principles of Optimal Stopping Theory (OST) with the objective of maximizing the probability of offloading to the optimal servers. When the server utilization is close to uniformly distributed, we propose another OST-based model with the objective of minimizing the total offloading delay. The proposed models are experimentally compared and evaluated with related OST models using simulated data sets and real data sets, and sensitivity analysis is performed. The results show that the proposed offloading models can be efficiently implemented in the mobile nodes and significantly reduce the total expected processing time of the tasks

A progression of the employee-organization concept : an exploratory study on the employee-employee relationships at workplace

This research paper explores a whole new concept, the Employee to Employee Relationship (EER) which is a further development from the Employee to Organization Relationship (EOR) concept. In this paper, we seek to identify specifically, the parties to the EERs, their expectations and their reactions to unmet expectations through a qualitative approach. The data from this study was collected from 7 participants from a focus group discussion and 25 individual interviewees from 3 different industries; namely Shipping, Banking and Defence. Our interview findings suggested that there are various organizational representatives in the minds of the employees, providing a perspective different to the conventional assumption of managers being the sole representative of the organization. Through our qualitative research, we also identified implicit, unwritten expectations of employees in the EERs, providing evidence that runs contrary to previous literature studies conducted on the psychological contract and the EOR. Our results suggest that by understanding the informal expectations of employees, organizations are able to better manage the EERs within, achieving meaningful organizational outcomes as a result. Lastly, the limitations of our study and suggestions for future research will also be discussed.BUSINES

Classification and Prognosis Analysis of Pancreatic Cancer Based on DNA Methylation Profile and Clinical Information

Pancreatic adenocarcinoma (PAAD) has a poor prognosis with high individual variation in the treatment response among patients; however, there is no standard molecular typing method for PAAD prognosis in clinical practice. We analyzed DNA methylation data from The Cancer Genome Atlas database, which identified 1235 differentially methylated DNA genes between PAAD and adjacent tissue samples. Among these, 78 methylation markers independently affecting PAAD prognosis were identified after adjusting for significant clinical factors. Based on these genes, two subtypes of PAAD were identified through consistent clustering. Fourteen specifically methylated genes were further identified to be associated with survival. Further analyses of the transcriptome data identified 301 differentially expressed cancer driver genes between the two PAAD subtypes and the degree of immune cell infiltration differed significantly between the subtypes. The 14 specific genes characterizing the unique methylation patterns of the subtypes were used to construct a Bayesian network-based prognostic prediction model for typing that showed good predictive value (area under the curve value of 0.937). This study provides new insight into the heterogeneity of pancreatic tumors from an epigenetic perspective, offering new strategies and targets for personalized treatment plan evaluation and precision medicine for patients with PAAD

Formation of Peptide Bound Pyrraline in the Maillard Model Systems with Different Lys-Containing Dipeptides and Tripeptides

Peptide-bound advanced glycation end-products (peptide-bound AGEs) can be formed when peptides are heated with reducing saccharides. Pyrraline is the one of most commonly studied AGEs in foods, but the relative importance of the precursor peptide structure is uncertain. In the present study, model systems were prepared by heating peptides with glucose from 60 °C to 220 °C for up to 65 min, and the amounts of peptide-bound pyrraline formed were monitored to evaluate the effect of the neighboring amino acids on the peptide-bound pyrraline formation. The physico-chemical properties were introduced to explore the quantitative structure-reactivity relationships between physicochemical properties and peptide bound formation. 3-DG content in dipeptide-glucose model system was higher than that in the corresponding tripeptide-glucose model systems. Dipeptides produced higher amounts of peptide-bound pyrraline than the corresponding tripeptides. The peptide-bound pyrraline and 3-DG production were influenced by the physico-chemical properties of the side chain of amino acids adjacent to Lys in the following order: Lys-Leu/glucose > Lys-Ile/glucose > Lys-Val/ glucose > Lys-Thr/glucose > Lys-Ser/glucose > Lys-Ala/ glucose > Lys-Gly/glucose; Lys-Leu-Gly/glucose > Lys-Ile-Gly/glucose > Lys-Val-Gly/glucose > Lys-Thr-Gly/glucose > Lys-Ser-Gly/glucose > Lys-Ala-Gly/glucose > Lys-Gly-Gly/glucose. For the side chain of amino acids adjacent to Lys in dipeptides, residue volume, polarizability, molecular volume and localized electrical effect were positively related to the yield of peptide bound pyrraline, while hydrophobicity and pKb were negatively related to the yield of peptide bound pyrraline. In terms of side chain of amino acid adjacent to Lys in tripeptides, a similar result was observed, except hydrophobicity was positively related to the yield of peptide bound pyrraline

Methionine Promotes Milk Protein Synthesis via the PI3K-mTOR Signaling Pathway in Human Mammary Epithelial Cells

Breast milk is widely considered to be the most natural, safe, and complete food for infants. However, current breastfeeding rates fall short of the recommendations established by the World Health Organization. Despite this, there are few studies that have focused on the promotion of human lactation through nutrient supplementation. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the effect of methionine on milk synthesis in human mammary epithelial cells (MCF-10A cells) and to explore the underlying mechanisms. To achieve this, MCF-10A cells were cultured with varying concentrations of methionine, ranging from 0 to 1.2 mM. Our results indicated that 0.6 mM of methionine significantly promoted the synthesis of milk protein. An RNA-seq analysis revealed that methionine acted through the PI3K pathway. This finding was validated through real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) and Western blotting. In addition, PI3K inhibition assays confirmed that methionine upregulated the expression of both mTOR and p-mTOR through activation of PI3K. Taken together, these findings suggest that methionine positively regulates milk protein synthesis in MCF-10A cells through the PI3K-mTOR signaling pathway

SingleScan: a comprehensive resource for single-cell sequencing data processing and mining

Abstract Single-cell sequencing has shed light on previously inaccessible biological questions from different fields of research, including organism development, immune function, and disease progression. The number of single-cell-based studies increased dramatically over the past decade. Several new methods and tools have been continuously developed, making it extremely tricky to navigate this research landscape and develop an up-to-date workflow to analyze single-cell sequencing data, particularly for researchers seeking to enter this field without computational experience. Moreover, choosing appropriate tools and optimal parameters to meet the demands of researchers represents a major challenge in processing single-cell sequencing data. However, a specific resource for easy access to detailed information on single-cell sequencing methods and data processing pipelines is still lacking. In the present study, an online resource called SingleScan was developed to curate all up-to-date single-cell transcriptome/genome analyzing tools and pipelines. All the available tools were categorized according to their main tasks, and several typical workflows for single-cell data analysis were summarized. In addition, spatial transcriptomics, which is a breakthrough molecular analysis method that enables researchers to measure all gene activity in tissue samples and map the site of activity, was included along with a portion of single-cell and spatial analysis solutions. For each processing step, the available tools and specific parameters used in published articles are provided and how these parameters affect the results is shown in the resource. All information used in the resource was manually extracted from related literature. An interactive website was designed for data retrieval, visualization, and download. By analyzing the included tools and literature, users can gain insights into the trends of single-cell studies and easily grasp the specific usage of a specific tool. SingleScan will facilitate the analysis of single-cell sequencing data and promote the development of new tools to meet the growing and diverse needs of the research community. The SingleScan database is publicly accessible via the website at http://cailab.labshare.cn/SingleScan

Neratinib for HER2-positive breast cancer with an overlooked option

Abstract Positive human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) expression is associated with an increased risk of metastases especially those to the brain in patients with advanced breast cancer (BC). Neratinib as a tyrosine kinase inhibitor can prevent the transduction of HER1, HER2 and HER4 signaling pathways thus playing an anticancer effect. Moreover, neratinib has a certain efficacy to reverse drug resistance in patients with BC with previous HER2 monoclonal antibody or targeted drug resistance. Neratinib, as monotherapy and in combination with other therapies, has been tested in the neoadjuvant, adjuvant, and metastatic settings. Neratinib with high anticancer activity is indicated for the prolonged adjuvant treatment of HER2-positive early BC, or in combination with other drugs including trastuzumab, capecitabine, and paclitaxel for the treatment of advanced HER2-positive BC especially cancers with central nervous system (CNS) metastasis to reduce the risk of BC recurrence. This article reviewed the pharmacological profiles, efficacy, safety, tolerability, and current clinical trials pertaining to neratinib, with a particular focus on the use of neratinib in patients with metastatic breast cancer (MBC) involving the CNS. We further discussed the use of neratinib for HER2-negative and HER2-mutant breast cancers, and mechanisms of resistance to neratinib. The current evidence suggests that neratinib has promising efficacy in patients with BC which is at least non-inferior compared to previous therapeutic regimens. The most common AE was diarrhea, and the incidence, severity and duration of neratinib-related grade 3 diarrhea can be reduced with loperamide. Of note, neratinib has the potential to effectively control and prevent brain metastasis in patients with advanced BC, providing a therapeutic strategy for HER2-positive BC