Organizational factors and total quality management - an empirical study

The level of awareness of Total Quality Management (TQM) has increased considerably over the last few years. Different sets of organizational requirements are prescribed by quality management gurus and practitioners for the effective practice of TQM. These requirements do not seem to have been formulated on the basis of systematic empirical research. Many researchers point out that tacit factors, e.g. employee empowerment, open culture and executive commitment, and not TQM tools and techniques alone, could drive TQM success, and that organizations would need to acquire these factors to stay successful. Many TQM advocates have also suggested that a conducive organizational environment would be essential for an effective practice of TQM. However, they did not offer any empirical evidence. There appears to be no empirical study reported in the literature that could establish a relation between TQM and organizational factors. The objective of this paper is to describe an empirical research on TQM conducted in Indian business units carried out recently by considering some organizational factors, e.g. quality of work life, organizational climate and communication. The methodology and findings are discussed in detail

Tools and pipelines for BioNano data: molecule assembly pipeline and FASTA super scaffolding tool

Citation: Shelton, J. M., Coleman, M. C., Hemdon, N., Lu, N. Y., Lam, E. T., Anantharaman, T., . . . Brown, S. J. (2015). Tools and pipelines for BioNano data: molecule assembly pipeline and FASTA super scaffolding tool. Bmc Genomics, 16, 16. doi:10.1186/s12864-015-1911-8Background: Genome assembly remains an unsolved problem. Assembly projects face a range of hurdles that confound assembly. Thus a variety of tools and approaches are needed to improve draft genomes. Results: We used a custom assembly workflow to optimize consensus genome map assembly, resulting in an assembly equal to the estimated length of the Tribolium castaneum genome and with an N50 of more than 1 Mb. We used this map for super scaffolding the T. castaneum sequence assembly, more than tripling its N50 with the program Stitch. Conclusions: In this article we present software that leverages consensus genome maps assembled from extremely long single molecule maps to increase the contiguity of sequence assemblies. We report the results of applying these tools to validate and improve a 7x Sanger draft of the T. castaneum genome

Egorov's theorem for transversally elliptic operators on foliated manifolds and noncommutative geodesic flow

The main result of the paper is Egorov's theorem for transversally elliptic operators on compact foliated manifolds. This theorem is applied to describe the noncommutative geodesic flow in noncommutative geometry of Riemannian foliations.Comment: 23 pages, no figures. Completely revised and improved version of dg-ga/970301

The Iron Pillar at Delhi

The massive Iron Pillar located in South Delhi has been an object of considerable interest to modern scientists and technologists for two main reasons viz., the amazing technology by which a metallic object weighing nearly seven tons could be fabricated over fifteen centuries ago and the phenomenal corrosion resistance displayed by this ancient monument despite exposure to sun, rain, wind and dust for so long. In this paper all available material on this metallurgical marvel is examined scientifically and systematically and an attempt made to answer such questions as are likely to arise in the minds of discern-ing visitors to this impressive monument. The following important conclusions are arrived at: (1) Date of Erec-tion : 370-375 A.D., (2) Date of the Inscription : 380-385 A.D., (3) Mode of Fabrication.: Hammer forging and welding ball of hot pasty iron in many steps, and (4) Reasons for Restlessness : Il4any viz., unusual chemical composition, protective oxide film, favourable Delhi climate and slag particles at grain boundaries

Hypersensitivity and chaos signatures in the quantum baker's maps

Classical chaotic systems are distinguished by their sensitive dependence on initial conditions. The absence of this property in quantum systems has lead to a number of proposals for perturbation-based characterizations of quantum chaos, including linear growth of entropy, exponential decay of fidelity, and hypersensitivity to perturbation. All of these accurately predict chaos in the classical limit, but it is not clear that they behave the same far from the classical realm. We investigate the dynamics of a family of quantizations of the baker's map, which range from a highly entangling unitary transformation to an essentially trivial shift map. Linear entropy growth and fidelity decay are exhibited by this entire family of maps, but hypersensitivity distinguishes between the simple dynamics of the trivial shift map and the more complicated dynamics of the other quantizations. This conclusion is supported by an analytical argument for short times and numerical evidence at later times.Comment: 32 pages, 6 figure

Annual variation in the levels of transcripts of sex-specific genes in the mantle of the common mussel, Mytilus edulis

Mytilus species are used as sentinels for the assessment of environmental health but sex or stage in the reproduction cycle is rarely considered even though both parameters are likely to influence responses to pollution. We have validated the use of a qPCR assay for sex identification and related the levels of transcripts to the reproductive cycle. A temporal study of mantle of Mytilus edulis found transcripts of male-specific vitelline coat lysin (VCL) and female-specific vitelline envelope receptor for lysin (VERL) could identify sex over a complete year. The levels of VCL/VERL were proportional to the numbers of sperm/ova and are indicative of the stage of the reproductive cycle. Maximal levels of VCL and VERL were found in February 2009 declining to minima between July - August before increasing and re-attaining a peak in February 2010. Water temperature may influence these transitions since they coincide with minimal water temperature in February and maximal temperature in August. An identical pattern of variation was found for a cryptic female-specific transcript (H5) but a very different pattern was observed for oestrogen receptor 2 (ER2). ER2 varied in a sex-specific way with male > female for most of the cycle, with a female maxima in July and a male maxima in December. Using artificially spawned animals, the transcripts for VCL, VERL and H5 were shown to be present in gametes and thus their disappearance from mantle is indicative of spawning. VCL and VERL are present at equivalent levels in February and July-August but during gametogenesis (August to January) and spawning (March to June) VCL is present at lower relative amounts than VERL. This may indicate sex-specific control mechanisms for these processes and highlight a potential pressure point leading to reduced reproductive output if environmental factors cause asynchrony to gamete maturation or release

Genomic Expansion of Magnetotactic Bacteria Reveals an Early Common Origin of Magnetotaxis with Lineage-specific Evolution

The origin and evolution of magnetoreception, which in diverse prokaryotes and protozoa is known as magnetotaxis and enables these microorganisms to detect Earth’s magnetic field for orientation and navigation, is not well understood in evolutionary biology. The only known prokaryotes capable of sensing the geomagnetic field are magnetotactic bacteria (MTB), motile microorganisms that biomineralize intracellular, membrane-bounded magnetic single-domain crystals of either magnetite (Fe3O4) or greigite (Fe3S4) called magnetosomes. Magnetosomes are responsible for magnetotaxis in MTB. Here we report the first large-scale metagenomic survey of MTB from both northern and southern hemispheres combined with 28 genomes from uncultivated MTB. These genomes expand greatly the coverage of MTB in the Proteobacteria, Nitrospirae, and Omnitrophica phyla, and provide the first genomic evidence of MTB belonging to the Zetaproteobacteria and “Candidatus Lambdaproteobacteria” classes. The gene content and organization of magnetosome gene clusters, which are physically grouped genes that encode proteins for magnetosome biosynthesis and organization, are more conserved within phylogenetically similar groups than between different taxonomic lineages. Moreover, the phylogenies of core magnetosome proteins form monophyletic clades. Together, these results suggest a common ancient origin of iron-based (Fe3O4 and Fe3S4) magnetotaxis in the domain Bacteria that underwent lineage-specific evolution, shedding new light on the origin and evolution of biomineralization and magnetotaxis, and expanding significantly the phylogenomic representation of MTB

Predictors of oropharyngeal cancer survival in Europe

Objectives: HPV16-positive oropharyngeal cancer (OPC) patients experience better outcomes compared to HPV16-negative patients. Currently, strategies for treatment de-escalation are based on HPV status, smoking history and disease stage. However, the appropriate cut-point for smoking and the role of other non-clinical factors in OPC survival remains uncertain. Materials and Methods: We examined factors associated with OPC outcome in 321 patients recruited in a large European multi-center study. Seropositivity for HPV16 E6 was used as a marker of HPV16 positive cancer. Hazard ratios (HR) and confidence intervals (CI) were estimated using Cox proportional models adjusted for potential confounders. Results: Overall 5-year survival following OPC diagnosis was 50%. HPV16-positive OPC cases were at significantly lower risk of death (aHR = 0.51, 95% CI: 0.32–0.80). A significant effect on OPC survival was apparent for female sex (aHR 0.50: 95% CI: 0.29–0.85) and being underweight at diagnosis (aHR: 2.41, 95% CI: 1.38–4.21). A 10 pack year smoking history was not associated with overall survival. Higher stage at diagnosis appeared as the only factor significantly associated with OPC recurrence (aHR: 4.88, 95% CI: 2.12–11.21). Conclusion: This study confirms that HPV16 status is an independent prognostic factor for OPC survival while female sex lowers risk of death and being underweight at diagnosis increases the risk of death. Smoking was not an independent predictor of OPC survival.</p

Genomic resolution of a cold subsurface aquifer community provides metabolic insights for novel microbes adapted to high CO2 concentrations.

As in many deep underground environments, the microbial communities in subsurface high-CO2 ecosystems remain relatively unexplored. Recent investigations based on single-gene assays revealed a remarkable variety of organisms from little studied phyla in Crystal Geyser (Utah, USA), a site where deeply sourced CO2 -saturated fluids are erupted at the surface. To provide genomic resolution of the metabolisms of these organisms, we used a novel metagenomic approach to recover 227 high-quality genomes from 150 microbial species affiliated with 46 different phylum-level lineages. Bacteria from two novel phylum-level lineages have the capacity for CO2 fixation. Analyses of carbon fixation pathways in all studied organisms revealed that the Wood-Ljungdahl pathway and the Calvin-Benson-Bassham Cycle occurred with the highest frequency, whereas the reverse TCA cycle was little used. We infer that this, and selection for form II RuBisCOs, are adaptions to high CO2 -concentrations. However, many autotrophs can also grow mixotrophically, a strategy that confers metabolic versatility. The assignment of 156 hydrogenases to 90 different organisms suggests that H2 is an important inter-species energy currency even under gaseous CO2 -saturation. Overall, metabolic analyses at the organism level provided insight into the biochemical cycles that support subsurface life under the extreme condition of CO2 saturation