642 research outputs found
Why would anyone come to Corfu to have a Heineken?
This paper examines brand naming decisions, along with other management decisions that affect tourist experiences, such as visitor tours, and souvenir appropriation, in the context of a microbrewery located on a Greek island that remains heavily dependent upon tourism. Data were gathered from in-depth interviews with the microbrewery’s owner and senior management team to offer rich insights into the issues under investigation. Findings stress the importance of the meanings that can be conveyed through brand names, including those that indicate authenticity of the brand’s origin, filling previously identified gaps in the literature on Country Of Origin with regard to fast consuming goods, and low involvement products such as beer, and exploring the issue of experiential consumption of beer as part of the tourists’ vacation experience. Data were gathered from only a single company, and although highlighting important managerial decisions regarding brand naming, further research could be widened to other companies and other industries, and could explore these issues from the tourists own perspective rather than solely from a managerial perspective. Results may offer insights for local producers, particularly SMEs, whose markets serve both domestic and tourist consumers. This research furthers knowledge into gaps on a range of issues arising in the literature that have hitherto not been previously linked, specifically: product Country Of Origin / brand origin; cultural consumption of beverages and sense of place; issues of authenticity; souvenirs; and experiential consumption
Defining and delimiting the scope of the Corporate Identity construct
This paper defines and delimits the scope of the Corporate Identity (CI) construct by exploring its applicability outside its usual research focus on large corporate entities. We also provide an important bridge between the management literature where the concept of Organisational Identity (OI) is better researched and understood, and the marketing literature where it is more common to find research defined in terms of CI. The conceptual underpinning of this paper favours a view of CI as a construct that is ‘multi-modal and multi-sensory’, therefore we use an all-encompassing definition of CI as the presentation of an organisation to every stakeholder. Moreover, research into CI and smaller entrepreneurial family-owned organisations is relatively underdeveloped, thus we based our findings on a conceptualisation of the seven broad dimensions of CI namely: Corporate Communication; Corporate Design; Corporate Culture; Behaviour; Corporate Structure; Industry Identity; and Corporate Strategy, as they relate to small family firms
Territorial brand management: Beer, authenticity, and sense of place
This paper explores brand management decisions concerning the terroir product of an authentic beer brand. Findings are based on a single case study of a Greek microbrewery informed by in-depth interviews with the company owner and senior management team. Additional customer insights into the issues were gathered from 191 questionnaire responses. Results identify the way this company has approached territorial brand management based on a clear understanding of potential consumer perceptions and reactions to clues about place brand origin in its brand names when targeting its main groups of domestic, export, and tourist consumers. This research offers practical insights into territorial brand management decisions, especially those concerning brand names that offer clues to a product's place of origin. These insights may offer practical strategies for SMEs operating in markets serving both local and tourist consumers, and who wish to defend the terroir claims of their products against large multi-nationals
An enigmatic hypoplastic defect of the maxillary lateral incisor in recent and fossil orangutans from Sumatra (Pongo abelii) and Borneo (Pongo pygmaeus)
Developmental dental pathologies provide insight into health of primates during ontogeny, and are particularly useful for elucidating the environment in which extant and extinct primates matured. Our aim is to evaluate whether the prevalence of an unusual dental defect on the mesiolabial enamel of the upper lateral incisor, thought to reflect dental crowding during maturation, is lesser in female orangutans, with their smaller teeth, than in males; and in Sumatran orangutans, from more optimal developmental habitats, than in those from Borneo. Our sample includes 49 Pongo pygmaeus (87 teeth), 21 P. abelii (38 teeth), Late Pleistocene paleo-orangutans from Sumatra and Vietnam (67 teeth), Late Miocene catarrhines Lufengpithecus lufengensis (2 teeth), and Anapithecus hernyaki (7 teeth). Methods include micro-CT scans, radiography, and dental metrics of anterior teeth. We observed fenestration between incisor crypts and marked crowding of unerupted crowns, which could allow tooth-to-tooth contact. Tooth size does not differ significantly in animals with or without the defect, implicating undergrowth of the jaw as the proximate cause of dental crowding and defect presence. Male orangutans from both islands show more defects than do females. The defect is significantly more common in Bornean orangutans (71 %) compared to Sumatran (29 %). Prevalence among fossil forms falls between these extremes, except that all five individual Anapithecus show one or both incisors with the defect. We conclude that maxillary lateral incisor defect is a common developmental pathology of apes that is minimized in optimal habitats and that such evidence can be used to infer habitat quality in extant and fossil apes
GIVE: portable genome browsers for personal websites.
Growing popularity and diversity of genomic data demand portable and versatile genome browsers. Here, we present an open source programming library called GIVE that facilitates the creation of personalized genome browsers without requiring a system administrator. By inserting HTML tags, one can add to a personal webpage interactive visualization of multiple types of genomics data, including genome annotation, "linear" quantitative data, and genome interaction data. GIVE includes a graphical interface called HUG (HTML Universal Generator) that automatically generates HTML code for displaying user chosen data, which can be copy-pasted into user's personal website or saved and shared with collaborators. GIVE is available at: https://www.givengine.org/
Punica granatum (Pomegranate) juice provides an HIV-1 entry inhibitor and candidate topical microbicide
BACKGROUND: For ≈ 24 years the AIDS pandemic has claimed ≈ 30 million lives, causing ≈ 14,000 new HIV-1 infections daily worldwide in 2003. About 80% of infections occur by heterosexual transmission. In the absence of vaccines, topical microbicides, expected to block virus transmission, offer hope for controlling the pandemic. Antiretroviral chemotherapeutics have decreased AIDS mortality in industrialized countries, but only minimally in developing countries. To prevent an analogous dichotomy, microbicides should be: acceptable; accessible; affordable; and accelerative in transition from development to marketing. Already marketed pharmaceutical excipients or foods, with established safety records and adequate anti-HIV-1 activity, may provide this option. METHODS: Fruit juices were screened for inhibitory activity against HIV-1 IIIB using CD4 and CXCR4 as cell receptors. The best juice was tested for inhibition of: (1) infection by HIV-1 BaL, utilizing CCR5 as the cellular coreceptor; and (2) binding of gp120 IIIB and gp120 BaL, respectively, to CXCR4 and CCR5. To remove most colored juice components, the adsorption of the effective ingredient(s) to dispersible excipients and other foods was investigated. A selected complex was assayed for inhibition of infection by primary HIV-1 isolates. RESULTS: HIV-1 entry inhibitors from pomegranate juice adsorb onto corn starch. The resulting complex blocks virus binding to CD4 and CXCR4/CCR5 and inhibits infection by primary virus clades A to G and group O. CONCLUSION: These results suggest the possibility of producing an anti-HIV-1 microbicide from inexpensive, widely available sources, whose safety has been established throughout centuries, provided that its quality is adequately standardized and monitored
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A mobile telehealth intervention for adults with insulin-requiring diabetes: early results of a mixed-methods randomized controlled trial
BACKGROUND: The role of technology in health care delivery has grown rapidly in the last decade. The potential of mobile telehealth (MTH) to support patient self-management is a key area of research. Providing patients with technological tools that allow for the recording and transmission of health parameters to health care professionals (HCPs) may promote behavior changes that result in improved health outcomes. Although for some conditions the evidence of the effectiveness of MTH is clear, to date the findings on the effects of MTH on diabetes management remain inconsistent.
OBJECTIVE: This study aims to evaluate an MTH intervention among insulin-requiring adults with diabetes to establish whether supplementing standard care with MTH results in improved health outcomes-glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c), blood pressure (BP), health-related quality of life (HRQoL), diabetes self-management behaviors, diabetes health care utilization, and diabetes self-efficacy and illness beliefs. An additional objective was to explore the acceptability of MTH and patients' perceptions of, and experience, using it.
METHODS: A mixed-method design consisting of a 9-month, two-arm, parallel randomized controlled trial (RCT) was used in combination with exit qualitative interviews. Quantitative data was collected at baseline, 3 months, and 9 months. Additional intervention fidelity data, such as participants' MTH transmissions and contacts with the MTH nurse during the study, were also recorded. RESULTS: Data collection for both the quantitative and qualitative components of this study has ended and data analysis is ongoing. A total of 86 participants were enrolled into the study. Out of 86 participants, 45 (52%) were randomized to the intervention group and 36 (42%) to the control group. Preliminary data on MTH training sessions and MTH usage by intervention participants are presented in this paper. We expect to publish complete study results in 2015.
CONCLUSIONS: The range of data collected in this study will allow for a comprehensive evaluation of processes and outcomes. The early results presented suggest that MTH usage decreases over time and that MTH participants would benefit from attending more than one training session.
TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT00922376; http://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT00922376 (Archived by WebCite at http://www.webcitation.org/6Vu4nhLI6)
Nitrogen transfer from forage legumes to nine neighbouring plants in a multi-species grassland
Legumes play a crucial role in nitrogen supply to grass-legume mixtures for ruminant fodder. To quantify N transfer from legumes to neighbouring plants in multi-species grasslands we established a grass-legume-herb mixture on a loamy-sandy site in Denmark. White clover (Trifolium repens L.), red clover (Trifolium pratense L.) and lucerne (Medicago sativa L.) were leaf-labelled with 15N enriched urea during one growing season. N transfer to grasses
(Lolium perenne L. and xfestulolium), white clover, red clover, lucerne, birdsfoot trefoil (Lotus corniculatus
L.), chicory (Cichorium intybus L.), plantain (Plantago
lanceolata L.), salad burnet (Sanguisorba minor L.)and caraway (Carum carvi L.) was assessed. Neighbouring plants contained greater amounts of N derived from white clover (4.8 gm-2) compared with red clover (2.2 gm-2) and lucerne (1.1 gm-2). Grasses having fibrous roots received greater amounts of N from legumes than dicotyledonous plants which generally have taproots. Slurry application mainly increased N transfer from legumes to grasses. During the growing season the three legumes transferred approximately 40 kg N ha-1 to neighbouring plants. Below-ground N transfer from legumes to neighbouring plants differed among nitrogen donors and nitrogen receivers and may depend on root characteristics and regrowth strategies of plant species in the multi-species grassland
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