Understanding customers’ purchase behaviour from online group buying websites: a transaction cost approach

This study examined customers’ purchase behaviour from online group buying (OGB) websites. Based on transaction cost approach, a research model was developed from OGB context. Overall, data from 208 OGB customers support the model and the developed relationships. Although price discount has been considered as the strongest driver for customers to purchase from OGB websites, for the first time, this study empirically established it. Moreover, it is found that information asymmetry negatively impacts purchase behaviour; however, the effect of information asymmetry can be reduced by proper signalling method such as disseminating prior customers’ reviews. This study also argued that customization, rather than personalization, is more relevant to transaction costs and OGB. Interestingly, while making a purchase, customers pay less importance to reputation of OGB vendor. The results have been discussed with implications

Open data adoption in Australian government agencies: an exploratory study

Australia is among the leading countries that envisaged releasing unclassified public data under open license and reusable format with no further restriction on re/use. But, according to the Australian Information Commissioner John McMillan, Australia’s progress on open data is ‘patchy’ and ‘transitional’. He also evidenced that although a few agencies are proactive and have embraced the movements quite seriously, still there are “many obstacles that worked against effort to make government information and data discoverable and usable” (Hilvert 2013). Despondently, there is little empirical evidence that could explain what makes public departments not to release public data. Driven by the nature of the research, this study conducted an exploratory field study in Australia by interviewing eleven employees from six different government agencies. Applying content analysis technique, this study identifies six important antecedents to adoption of open data in public organisations, and proposes future research to test their relationships. As the main theoretical contribution, this study extends organisational behaviour toward technology diffusion. The findings of this study incite policymakers and managers to think about and prepare future strategies on open data developments

Hard Combination Data Fusion for Cooperative Spectrum Sensing in Cognitive Radio

This paper presents a study of hard combination data fusion for cooperative spectrum sensing in Cognitive Radio (CR). We evaluated the performance of cooperative spectrum sensing with the hard combination OR, AND and MAJORITY rules. Energy detection technique is used to sense the presence of primary user (PU) signal. Simulation result shows that cooperative spectrum sensing with OR rule is the best among hard combination data fusion in Cognitive Radio and gives the better performance than AND and MAJORITY rules.DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.11591/ijece.v2i6.181

Highly selective and sensitive macrocycle-based dinuclear foldamer for fluorometric and colorimetric sensing of citrate in water.

The selective detection of citrate anions is essential for various biological functions in living systems. A quantitative assessment of citrate is required for the diagnosis of various diseases in the human body; however, it is extremely challenging to develop efficient fluorescence and color-detecting molecular probes for sensing citrate in water. Herein, we report a macrocycle-based dinuclear foldamer (1) assembled with eosin Y (EY) that has been studied for anion binding by fluorescence and colorimetric techniques in water at neutral pH. Results from the fluorescence titrations reveal that the 1·EY ensemble strongly binds citrate anions, showing remarkable selectivity over a wide range of inorganic and carboxylate anions. The addition of citrate anions to the 1·EY adduct led to a large fluorescence enhancement, displaying a detectable color change under both visible and UV light in water up to 2 μmol. The biocompatibility of 1·EY as an intracellular carrier in a biological system was evaluated on primary human foreskin fibroblast (HF) cells, showing an excellent cell viability. The strong binding properties of the ensemble allow it to be used as a highly sensitive, detective probe for biologically relevant citrate anions in various applications

What improves citizens' privacy perceptions toward RFID technology? A cross-country investigation using mixed method approach

ABSTRACT Privacy is a serious concern to Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology. Several companies worldwide scrapped RFID projects because of high resistance from the consumers and their advocacy groups -which actually demand RFID-specific privacy policies. This concern is even more acute when RFID is used in public applications; because, in general case, citizens cannot refuse to provide data, and the data collected by a government agency would offer a serious threat if are shared among third parties. Limited research has been performed in this specific issue; they all agree that perceived privacy increased RFID acceptance. But, what drives privacy perceptions are yet to be researchedthis study closes this research gap. In order to conduct the current research, the mixed method of research approach has been adopted. In the qualitative research stage, the authors conducted two focused-group discussions and eight in-depth interviews in two different countries: Australia and Bangladesh; arguing that the status, and the perceptions and tolerance of the citizens on privacy are different in these two regions. The explored factors have been examined with empirical data obtained from these two countries. It is found that, there are distinct differences in perceptions in developed and developing countries. The detail findings offer practical suggestions to the agency managers so that they can ensure better privacy of the citizens. As a significant theoretical contribution, this 1 study enhances the existing literature identifying the antecedents of privacy which play even different roles in different cultural backgrounds

An in silico model to demonstrate the effects of Maspin on cancer cell dynamics

Most cancer treatments efficacy depends on tumor metastasis suppression, where tumor suppressor genes play an important role. Maspin (Mammary Serine Protease Inhibitor), an non-inhibitory serpin has been reported as a potential tumor suppressor to influence cell migration, adhesion, proliferation and apoptosis in in vitro and in vivo experiments in last two decades. Lack of computational investigations hinders its ability to go through clinical trials. Previously, we reported first computational model for maspin effects on tumor growth using artificial neural network and cellular automata paradigm with in vitro data support. This paper extends the previous in silico model by encompassing how maspin influences cell migration and the cell–extracellular matrix interaction in subcellular level. A feedforward neural network was used to define each cell behavior (proliferation, quiescence, apoptosis) which followed a cell-cycle algorithm to show the microenvironment impacts over tumor growth. Furthermore, the model concentrates how the in silico experiments results can further confirm the fact that maspin reduces cell migration using specific in vitro data verification method. The data collected from in vitro and in silico experiments formulates an unsupervised learning problem which can be solved by using different clustering algorithms. A density based clustering technique was developed to measure the similarity between two datasets based on the number of links between instances. Our proposed clustering algorithm first finds the nearest neighbors of each instance, and then redefines the similarity between pairs of instances in terms of how many nearest neighbors share the two instances. The number of links between two instances is defined as the number of common neighbors they have. The results showed significant resemblances with in vitro experimental data. The results also offer a new insight into the dynamics of maspin and establish as a metastasis suppressor gene for further molecular research

Fake news on Facebook and their impact on supply chain disruption during COVID-19

Social media (SM) fake news has become a serious concern especially during COVID-19. In this study, we develop a research model to investigate to what extent SM fake news contributes to supply chain disruption (SCD), and what are the different SM affordances that contribute to SM fake news. To test the derived hypotheses with survey data, we have applied partial least square based structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) technique. Further, to identify how different configurations of SC resilience (SCR) capabilities reduce SCD, we have used fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA). The results show that SM affordances lead to fake news, which increases consumer panic buying (CPB); CPB in turn increases SCD. In addition, SM fake news directly increases SCD. The moderation test suggests that, SCR capability, as a higher-order construct, decreases the effect of CPB on SCD; however, neither of the capabilities individually moderates. Complimentarily, the fsQCA results suggest that no single capability but their three specific configurations reduce SCD. This work offers a new theoretical perspective to study SCD through SM fake news. Our research advances the knowledge of SCR from a configurational lens by adopting an equifinal means towards mitigating disruption. This research will also assist the operations and SC managers to strategize and understand which combination of resilience capabilities is the most effective in tackling disruptions during a crisis e.g., COVID-19. In addition, by identifying the relative role of different SM affordances, this study provides pragmatic insights into SM affordance measures that combat fake news on SM.publishedVersionPaid Open Acces

A Conceptual Foundation for Blockchain Development: The Contribution of Ibn Khaldun

Blockchain is a revolutionary technology that has provided the potential answers for many real-world problems in this digital era. Blockchain is a topic of immense interest in various industries and academia in terms of discovering technology and identifying challenges and innovative practical implementation for the industry. This study deliberates the challenges that are of major concern in designing a Blockchain platform. In this context, the problems such as inefficient technology design, the criminal connection, scalability, energy consumption, privacy, regulation, security, lack of adequate skill sets, energy consumption and public perception are uncovered to be significant. Due to such challenges, the blockchain technologies have emitted a negative impression due to its inabilities to be effectively implemented while, at the same time, its advantages could not be fully reaped by its stakeholders. The aim of this study, hence, is to evaluate the blockchain initiatives and development in light of the eight foundations for economic development as propounded by Ibn Khaldun. Using Ibn Khaldun’s theory, each challenge is discussed and analyzed to find the answers and solutions for addressing and overcoming the afore-mentioned challenges