An investigation into appraisal methods for industrial projects

A wide variety of tools exists for appraisal in general. There are, however, very few widely accepted guidelines governing their specific application in industrial projects. It would be useful to a practicing project appraiser to be able to discern which appraisal methods are most applicable to a particular situation. This research has therefore undertaken to investigate the relationship between the appraisal methods available and their application to industrial projects. As such, a number of specific objectives have been discerned. The first of these was to analyse the literature in order to determine the general views held. The second was to corroborate the views of literature with actual industrial trends. The final objective was to compare theory and practice in order to develop broad guidelines for future project appraisers. The procedure adopted to meet these objectives firstly involved conducting a survey of the literature. This yielded a number of conclusions which suggest a preferred approach to appraisal. To evaluate this approach an appropriate questionnaire was compiled. This questionnaire was then circulated to a representative target area, namely the industrial sector of the South Western Cape. The response to this survey provided a database of actual industrial projects. From this database trends were extracted using a number of statistical techniques, such as Analysis of Variance, Contingency Analysis and Log-linear Modelling. The results of this analysis were then used to complement the conclusions of literature and to confirm the preferred approach to project appraisal. The conclusions from the literature where consensus was found to exist involve the following issues: The chronological position of appraisal in the project life-cycle. The types of study that should be included in project appraisal. The chronological order of these studies. The extent to which formal techniques should be used. The background that the appraisers should have. The extent to which project characteristics influence the appraisal approach. The database provided by the industrial survey consisted of 173 projects conducted in 33 different organisations. Analysis conducted on this database yielded a number of simple one-to-one relationships between project success, appraisal method used and project characteristics. From these relationships a picture of the reality experienced in the South Western Cape could be formed. Such a picture was compared with literature in order to form an overall set of guidelines for use by the practising project appraiser. As a result of the analysis and the subsequent comparison between literature and practice, conclusions were drawn concerning a number of aspects in the research. Such aspects include the success of the research method, uncertainties of the industrial survey, consensus between literature and practice on appraisal procedures and the existence of a preferred approach to project appraisal. A number of recommendations could also be made with regard to two areas of interest. The first concerns recommendations for further research in the field of project appraisal. These include extending the database so as to accommodate multi-variate analysis, researching the formal techniques available for operational suitability and technical feasibility studies and adopting a different mode of survey to that of a posted questionnaire. The second area of interest recommends a set of broad guidelines to the practising project appraiser. These guidelines rationalise such issues as the influence of project characteristics on the use of appraisal methods, the chronological position of appraisal within the project life-cycle, the type and chronological order of studies that should be conducted in the appraisal procedure and the techniques and expertise that should be utilised within each study

Environmental Innovations: Institutional Impacts on Co-operations for Sustainable Development

A suitable strategy for achieving sustainable development is to foster environmental innovations. Environmental innovations, however, suffer from so-called "double externalities", because apart from innovation spillovers they also improve the quality of public environmental goods, which can be used without cost by free riders. Those innovation spillovers can be avoided through co-operation. Furthermore co-operations can be considered as advantageous because environmental innovations often depend on interaction in research and development, production, selling and disposal. This paper analyzes as to what extent institutional factors impact co-operative arrangements of innovative organizations in the development of new environmental technologies. It applies a multi-dimensional institutional analysis focusing not only on institutional arrangements which exist among organizations but also on opportunities and constraints provided by the institutional environment in which these organizations are embedded. Expanding the existing research we will conclude what kind of policy measure may support the success within networks of environmental oriented innovators.Environmental innovation, Co-operation, Sustainability, Institutional analysis, Policy measures

The learners' electronic portfolio system (E-Portfolio) as an element of the information enviroment for managing the educational process

This article is devoted to the methodological and practical approaches to developing and implementing the electronic portfolios for learners as part of the electronic educational environment for managing the learning process. Based on the modern model of education in the pedagogical university, as well as on the federal state standard, the main sections of the system of the students' electronic portfolio have been formulated, which describe the main educational, scientific and other achievements of the students. In addition, the functional capabilities of the software implementation of an example of the electronic portfolio, software architecture and the methodological approaches to working with the system have been substantiated. The application of the students' electronic portfolios allows us to quickly obtain the information about the status of the main parameters of student activities and to stimulate them in different areas of the activities

Cortical lamina-dependent blood volume changes in human brain at 7T

Cortical layer-dependent high (sub-millimeter) resolution functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in human or animal brain can be used to address questions regarding the functioning of cortical circuits, such as the effect of different afferent and efferent connectivities on activity in specific cortical layers. The sensitivity of gradient echo (GE) blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) responses to large draining veins reduces its local specificity and can render the interpretation of the underlying laminar neural activity impossible. The application of the more spatially specific cerebral blood volume (CBV)-based fMRI in humans has been hindered by the low sensitivity of the noninvasive modalities available. Here, a vascular space occupancy (VASO) variant, adapted for use at high field, is further optimized to capture layer-dependent activity changes in human motor cortex at sub-millimeter resolution. Acquired activation maps and cortical profiles show that the VASO signal peaks in gray matter at 0.8–1.6 mm depth, and deeper compared to the superficial and vein-dominated GE-BOLD responses. Validation of the VASO signal change versus well-established iron-oxide contrast agent based fMRI methods in animals showed the same cortical profiles of CBV change, after normalization for lamina-dependent baseline CBV. In order to evaluate its potential of revealing small lamina-dependent signal differences due to modulations of the input-output characteristics, layer-dependent VASO responses were investigated in the ipsilateral hemisphere during unilateral finger tapping. Positive activation in ipsilateral primary motor cortex and negative activation in ipsilateral primary sensory cortex were observed. This feature is only visible in high-resolution fMRI where opposing sides of a sulcus can be investigated independently because of a lack of partial volume effects. Based on the results presented here, we conclude that VASO offers good reproducibility, high sensitivity and lower sensitivity than GE-BOLD to changes in larger vessels, making it a valuable tool for layer-dependent fMRI studies in humans

The time course of ineffective sham blinding during low-intensity (1mA) transcranial direct current stimulation

Studies using transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) typically compare an active protocol relative to a shorter sham (placebo) protocol. Both protocols are presumed to be perceptually identical on the scalp, and thus represent an effective method of delivering double‐blinded experimental designs. However, participants often show above‐chance accuracy when asked which condition involved active/sham retrospectively. We assessed the time course of sham‐blinding during active and sham tDCS. We predicted that participants would be aware that the current is switched on for longer in the active versus sham protocol. 32 adults were tested in a pre‐registered, double‐blinded, within‐subjects design. A forced‐choice reaction time task was undertaken before, during and after active (10min 1mA) and sham (20s 1mA) tDCS. The anode was placed over the left primary motor cortex (C3) to target the right hand, and the cathode on the right forehead. Two probe questions were asked every 30s: “Is the stimulation on? “and “How sure are you?”. Distinct periods of non‐overlapping confidence intervals were identified between conditions, totalling 5min (57.1% of the total difference in stimulation time). These began immediately after sham ramp‐down and lasted until the active protocol had ended. We therefore show a failure of placebo control during 1mA tDCS. These results highlight the need to develop more effective methods of sham‐blinding during transcranial electrical stimulation protocols, even when delivered at low‐intensity current strengths

T lymphocytes from patients with primary biliary cirrhosis produce reduced amounts of lymphotoxin, tumor necrosis factor and interferon-gamma upon mitogen stimulation

Primary biliary cirrhosis (PBC) is considered an autoimmune disease characterized by destruction of small intrahepatic bile ducts by lymphocytes. Altered functions of these lymphocytes might reflect an abnormal immune response leading to tissue damage. We investigated lymphokine secretion by mitogen-stimulated T lymphocytes from the liver biopsies of patients with PBC and for comparison also peripheral blood. In PBC, diminished synthesis of lymphotoxin (TNFP), tumor necrosis factor (TNFa) and interferon-y (IFIVy) was found both in T-cell lines from liver tissue and in peripheral blood. The reduction was most prominent for TNFP in early histological stages of PBC, and appeared to be a stable phenomenon when T cells were tested after long-term tissue culture. Analysis of mRNA levels indicates a possible link between reduced TNFP production and a defect in interleukin-2 transcription. The data suggest that diminished lymphokine production in patients with PBC may play ;In important role in the immanopathogenesis of this disease

Exploring covalently bonded diamondoid particles with valence photoelectron spectroscopy

We investigated the valence electronic structure of diamondoid particles in the gas phase, utilizing valence photoelectron spectroscopy. The samples were singly or doubly covalently bonded dimers or trimers of the lower diamondoids. Both the bond type and the combination of bonding partners are shown to affect the overall electronic structure. For singly bonded particles, we observe a small impact of the bond on the electronic structure, whereas for doubly bonded particles, the connecting bond determines the electronic structure of the highest occupied orbitals. In the singly bonded particles a superposition of the bonding partner orbitals determines the overall electronic structure. The experimental findings are supported by density functional theory computations at the M06-2X/cc-pVDZ level of theory.Comment: 7 pages, 7 figure