HPV Screening in Nicaragua

Cervical cancer is the leading cause of mortality due to a malignant neoplasm for young women in Latin America and the leading cause of cancer among women of any age in Nicaragua. Additionally, cervical cancer is the third most common cause of cancer death in females worldwide. This paper will focus on just the screening aspect of prevention. There are also vaccines now available for preventing certain oncologic strains of HPV which ultimately leads to prevention of cervical cancer. There is not yet an organized program offering HPV vaccination in Nicaragua due to the high cost of the vaccine. The aim of this paper is to look for the most efficient and effective way to prevent HPV and cervical cancer in Nicaragua. While HPV DNA testing with cryotherapy was the best practice found in the research, in reality this was not proven to be an effective strategy for cervical cancer prevention in Nicaragua. Due to cost and the resources available, Pap testing and VIA are the preferred methods for screening for cervical cancer over HPV DNA testing

Cigarette Smoke Exposure-Associated Alterations to Non-Coding RNA

Environmental exposures vary by timing, severity, and frequency and may have a number of deleterious effects throughout the life course. The period of in utero development, for example, is one of the most crucial stages of development during which adverse environmental exposures can both alter the growth and development of the fetus as well as lead to aberrant fetal programming, increasing disease risk. During fetal development and beyond, the plethora of exposures, including nutrients, drugs, stress, and trauma, influence health, development, and survival. Recent research in environmental epigenetics has investigated the roles of environmental exposures in influencing epigenetic modes of gene regulation during pregnancy and at various stages of life. Many relatively common environmental exposures, such as cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption, and drug use, may have consequences for the expression and function of non-coding RNA (ncRNA), important post-transcriptional regulators of gene expression. A number of ncRNA have been discovered, including microRNA (miRNA), Piwi-interacting RNA (piRNA), and long non-coding RNA (long ncRNA). The best-characterized species of ncRNA are miRNA, the mature forms of which are ∼22 nucleotides in length and capable of post-transcriptionally regulating target mRNA utilizing mechanisms based largely on the degree of complementarity between miRNA and target mRNA. Because miRNA can still negatively regulate gene expression when imperfectly base-paired with a target mRNA, a single miRNA can have a large number of potential mRNA targets and can regulate many different biological processes critical for health and development. The following review analyzes the current literature detailing links between cigarette smoke exposure and aberrant expression and function of ncRNA, assesses how such alterations may have consequences throughout the life course, and proposes future directions for this intriguing field of research

Adoption of Open Government Data for Commercial Service Innovation: an Inductive Case Study on Parking Open Data Services

City councils produce large amounts of data. As this data becomes available, and as information and communication technology capabilities are in place to manage and exploit this data, open government data is seen as becoming more and more valuable as a catalyst for service innovation and economic growth. Notwithstanding this, evidence of open data adoption is currently largely scattered and anecdotal. This is reflected in the lack of literature focusing on users of open data for commercial purposes. This research aims to address this gap and contributes to the IS open data services debate by proposing a model of factors perceived by an open data services business as the most relevant in explaining adoption of open government data for commercial service innovation in cities. Adopting an inductive reasoning approach through qualitative methods was critical to capture the complexity of the open data services ecosystem perceived by those reusing this data

Action design research: a comparison with canonical action research and design science

This research in progress paper addresses the IS issue in relation to conducting relevant research while keeping academic rigor. In particular, it contributes to the ongoing academic conversation around the investigation on how to incor-porate action in design science research. In this document the philosophical underpinnings of the recently proposed methodology called Action Design Re-search [1] are derived, outlined and integrated into Burrel and Morgan’s Par-adigmatic Framework (1979)[6]. The results so far show how Action Design Research can be considered as a particular case of Design Science Research (rather than a methodology closely related to Action Research) although they can assume two different epistemological positions. From these philosophical perspectives, future works will involve the inclusion of actual research projects using the three different methodologies. The final goal is to outline and structure the divergences and similarities of Action Design Research with Design Science Research and Canonical Action Research

SYSTEMATIC PROBLEM FORMULATION IN ACTION DESIGN RESEARCH: THE CASE OF SMART CITIES

The research project presented in this paper is being conducted in collaboration with Dublin City Council and Intel Corporation, and is focused on the development of a Smart City maturity model. This paper focuses on the research methodology that is being used for this study, i.e. Action Design Research (Sein et al. 2011). Particularly, we will describe why this recently proposed methodology is suitable for our research, in comparison with Design Science Research (March and Smith, 1995; Hevner et al. 2004) and Action Research (Baburoglu and Ravn, 1992). Furthermore, we will focus on the problem formulation stage to systematically investigate the topic. A systematic literature review based on the 8-steps method proposed in (Okoli et al. 2010) is presented to explore the factors required to evaluate the environmental and socioeconomic sustainability impact of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) solutions at a city level. Furthermore, Grounded Theory principles were adopted to structure the Smart City ecosystem, and identify the areas in which ICT-enabled services have an impact on the city´s social, environmental, and economical performances. \ Keywords: Action Design Research, Smart Cities, Systematic Literature Review, Grounded Theory

Living Labs: A Bibliometric Analysis

The objective of this study is to understand how Living Lab(s) (LL) as a concept and research approach has developed, proliferated and influenced scholarly research to date. The goal is in assisting both the LL and Action Design Research (ADR) communities in advancing both fields by establishing understanding, commonalities and challenges in advancing both research agendas. We adopt a bibliometric methodology to understand the scholarly impact, contribution and intellectual structure of LL as a new approach to innovation. We conclude with recommendations on advancing both ADR and LL fields of research, highlighting that increased cross-collaboration going forward offers clear opportunities to both fields

TURKEY BEYOND CAP: AGRO-FOOD COMMERCIAL RELATIONS WITH EMILIA-ROMAGNA

The objective of this paper is to analyse the role that European countries’ institutional relations and economic policies have in improving the competitiveness, sustainable development and structural adjustments of farms and agro-food economy in Turkey by supporting sustainable and long-lasting foreign agricultural commercial relations. In particular, the paper analyses the case study of Turkey and Emilia-Romagna region agro-food economic trade and the institutional relations developed within a political and institutional framework of actions over the last decade showing how these initiatives have contributed to enhance the role of Turkey as an increasingly important trade partner country. The paper concludes that future CAP budget constraints should lead to a forward looking European enlargement policy towards candidate countries with agriculture oriented economies aiming at supporting agro-food economic relations and eventually a diminishing role of direct CAP support.Agro-Food Policy, Turkey, International Trade, Cap, Enlargement, Agricultural and Food Policy, Political Economy, Q10, Q18,

Open Data Diffusion for Service Innovation: An Inductive Case Study on Cultural Open Data Services

Information Systems research on Open Data has been primarily focused on its contribution to e-government inquiries, government transparency, and open government. Recently, Open Data has been explored as a catalyser for service innovation as a consequence of big claims around the potential of such initiatives in terms of additional value that can be injected into the worldwide economy. Subsequently, the Open Data Services academic conversation was structured (Lindman et al. 2013a). The research project presented in this paper is an interpretive case study that was carried out to explore the factors that influence the diffusion of Open Data for new service development. This paper contributes to this debate by providing an interpretive inductive case study (Walsham 1995) of a tourism company that successfully turned several city authorities’ raw open datasets into a set of valuable services. Results demonstrate that 16 factors and 68 related variables are the most relevant in the process of diffusion of open data for new service development. Furthermore, this paper demonstrates the suitability of Social Constructionism and interpretive case study research to inductively generate knowledge in this field

David Kramer – an unauthorised biography and creative nonfiction : writing an unauthorised biography of David Kramer

This study is comprised of two parts: an unauthorised biography of the South African musician David Kramer, as well as a reflective look at the process of writing this biography. In this regard the following aspects were looked at closely: finding an appropriate style, biography versus propaganda, conjecturing, the bilingual nature of the text, problems of research, ethics, influences, make-believe, approach to the subject, intertextuality, and fictionalisation. The central question of the biography is to highlight the success of a fellow Worcester (the author’s hometown) boy. The central research questions of the thesis are the fictionalisation of the nonfiction text, intertextuality, and the question of a text written in both English and Afrikaans. With regard to the aforementioned fictionalisation, a biographical text is classified as “nonfiction”, because it deals with a real person and real events. However, a text such as David Kramer – an unauthorised biography presents an alternative perspective, in that the narrative often moves into fiction, or “creative nonfiction”. Written texts are traditionally divided into two fields: fiction or nonfiction. Nonfiction is deemed to be fact, truth, whereas fiction is the fruit of an author’s imagination. But perhaps the notion of truth versus untruth is too limited, and one should include the words “objectivity” and “subjectivity”. Some texts incorporate both elements, be they newspaper editorials which are mostly opinion, advertisements which are highly subjective, or biographies such as Taraborrelli’s Madonna – An Intimate Biography, which often reads as a novel. This doctoral thesis looks at David Kramer – an unauthorised biography, which is at times “faction”, to illuminate the sections where the text fell somewhere between fiction or nonfiction. In attempting this exercise, intertextuality was useful in two ways. Firstly, to ground the text in a reality the reader could believe, as it brought “real” things to the text, such as song lyrics, photographs, et cetera, all things which brought some credibility to the truth of the text, and secondly to place the events being described in a certain timeframe. The use of English and Afrikaans in the biography was to reflect that Kramer uses both languages in his songs, and furthermore, to give an idea of the South Africa at the time of Kramer’s early success: the divides of English/Afrikaans, white/black, liberal/conservative.Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2011.Unit for Creative WritingUnrestricte

Boeddhistiese simboliek en metaforiek, en die beskouing van sonde, skuld en straf in Die boeddha op bladsy 13

This dissertation consists of a novel, The Buddha on Page 13 and a dissertation of limited extent, "Buddhist symbolism and metaphoric, and the perception of sin, guilt and punishment in The Buddha on Page 13." In the dissertation of limited extent the role that guilt plays in the motivation of an individual's actions is investigated. The Christian and Buddhist views of sin are compared, and the conclusion is made that neither Christianity nor Buddhism can explain why mankind experiences the feeling of guilt. The central character, Toit Brink, finally accepts this "so-ness" of things: "thathatha". The dissertation explains how the style of the text wishes to be neutral, and how this neutrality is harnessed for Buddhist reasons. The Buddhist element in the novel's symbolism and metaphoric is illuminated, as well as the apparent contradiction of some of the metaphors.Afrikaans and Theory of LiteratureM.A. (Afrikaans