Clinical evaluation of inter-implant distance influence on the wear characteristics of low-profile stud attachments used in mandibular implant?retained overdentures

This study was aimed to evaluate the influence of inter-implant distance on the wear characteristics of low-profile stud attachments used in mandibular implant retained overdentures. Forty Completely edentulous participants aged between 50 ? 70 years were enrolled in this study. Each patient received 2-implants by 2-stage submerged surgical protocol. Participants categorized into 4-groups. Group I: 19 mm inter-implant distance with Locator retained overdentures; Group II: 19 mm inter-implant distance with OT Equator retained overdentures; Group III: 25 mm inter-implant distance with Locator retained overdentures; Group IV: 25 mm inter-implant distance with OT Equator retained overdentures. The female housings of each attachment were picked up to the mandibular overdenture. 12 month later the male inserts were replaced by new one. The used retentive male inserts were examined by Stereomicroscopic. Stereomicroscopic examination revealed wear were detected on both inner surface and, the core of male inserts. Comparison between the unused and the used Locator and OT equator retentive male inserts at various inter-implant distance revealed highly significant wear changes between them at either 19 mm, or 25 mm inter-implant distance P1= .000, P2=.000 respectively. After one year of implant overdenture clinical use; both locator and OT equator retentive male inserts revealed significant surface deformities and wear. Wear were more notable on both locator and OT equator retentive male inserts with 25 mm interimplant distance than with 19 mm interimplant distance

THE IMPACT OF BUSINESS-IT ALIGNMENT ON ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE

Organizational culture continues to be cited as one of the most important factors for organizations’ success in an increasingly competitive and IT-driven global environment. Given the fact that organizational culture has an influence all over the organization, the complexity of its nature is increased when considering the relationship between business and IT. As a result, different factors that have influence on changing organizational culture were highlighted in literature. These factors are found in the research literature distributed in three main group; micro-environment factors, macro-environment factors and leader’s impact. One of the factors that have not been yet well investigated in researches is concerning business-IT alignment (BITA. Therefore the purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of BITA maturity on organizational culture. The research process that we have followed is a literature survey followed by an in-depth case study. The result of this research shows a clear interrelation in theories of both BITA and organizational culture, and clear indications of BITA impact on organizational culture and its change. The findings may support both practitioners and researchers in order to understand the insights of the relationships between BITA and organizational culture components and provide a roadmap for improvements or desired changes in organizational culture with highlighted target business area

A Framework to Support Practitioners in Evaluating Business-IT Alignment Models

Many business-IT alignment (BITA) models have been designed to support organizations in achieving, assessing and maintaining alignment between business and IT. These models focus on different components and emphasize different perspectives. This makes it difficult for practitioners to choose appropriate BITA models given organization at-hand. In this paper, an evaluation framework supporting practitioners to choose appropriate BITA models is presented. The framework was designed following design science as main research approach. The design process was based on literature and empirical studies. The literature study contributed in constructing a tentative version of the framework which was refined through an empirical study in 6 organizations. The final framework consists of 25 criteria categorized into four groups, and was demonstrated on six major BITA models showing its feasibility. Finally, the framework was evaluated by interviewing two business consultants and three CIOs from large-sized Swedish companies. The evaluation shows the framework having a complete set of criteria, but its usability and efficiency could be increased

Ultrasensitive in-vitro monitoring of monoamine neurotransmitters from dopaminergic cells

The design of biosensing assay of monoamine neurotransmitters (MANTs) such as epinephrine (Ep), norepinephrine (NE), and dopamine (DA), as well as the monitoring of these MANTs released from dopaminergic cells, are of particular interest. Electrochemical sensors based on the novel construction of nickel oxides (NiO) were fabricated and employed for electrochemical screening of MANTs. A novel NiO-lacy flower-like (NLF) geometrical structure with semi-spherical head surfaces connected with a trunk as an arm was achieved. The designed semi-spherical head associated with abundant and the well-dispersed tubular branches with needle-like open ends might lead to the creation of vascular vessels for facile diffusion and suitable accommodation of the released MANTs throughout active and wide-surface-area coverage, multi-diffusive pores, and caves with connective open macro-/meso-windows along the entire top-view nanoneedles of lacy flower head and trunk. These electrode surfaces possess high-index catalytic site facets associated with the formation of ridges/defects on {110}-top-cover surface dominants for strong binding, fast response, and signaling of MANTs. The NLF- modified electrode enabled high sensitivity for MANTs and a low limit of detection of 6 nM. Ultrasensitive in-vitro monitoring of DA released from dopaminergic cells (such as PC12) was realized. The NLF electrode was used to detect MANTs from its sources (PC12), and it could be used for clinical diagnosis

Integrating BIM and GIS for 3D City Modelling : The Case of IFC and CityGML

3D geoinformation has become a base for an increasing number of today’s applications. Examples of these applications are: city and urban planning, real estate management, environmental simulation, crisis and disaster management, telecommunication, facility management and others. 3D city models are presently scattered over different public and private sectors in different systems, different conceptual models, different data formats, different data schemas, different levels of detail and different quality. In addition, the potential of 3D models goes beyond visualisation of 3D objects of virtual scenes to real 3D city models. In such an environment, integration of different sources of data for building real 3D city models becomes more difficult.   3D city models are of two types, design and real world models. Design models are usually used for building industry purposes and to fulfil the requirements of maximum level of detail in the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) industry. Real world models are geospatial information systems that represent spatial objects around us and are largely represented in GIS applications. Research efforts in the AEC industry resulted in Building Information Modelling (BIM), a process that supports information management throughout buildings’ lifecycle and is increasingly widely used in the AEC industry. Results of different integration efforts of BIM and geospatial models show that only 3D geometric information does not fulfil the integration purpose and may lead to geometrical inconsistency. Further complex semantic information is required. Therefore, this thesis focuses on the integration of the two most prominent semantic models for the representation of BIM and geospatial objects, Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) and City Geography Markup Language (CityGML), respectively.   In the integration of IFC and CityGML building models, substantial difficulties may arise in translating information from one to the other. Professionals from both domains have made significant attempts to integrate CityGML and IFC models to produce useful common applications. Most of these attempts, however, use a unidirectional method (mostly from IFC to CityGML) for the conversion process. A bidirectional method can lead to development of unified applications in the areas of urban planning, building construction analysis, homeland security, etc. The benefits of these unified applications clearly appear at the operational level (e.g. cost reduction, unified data-view), and at the strategic level (e.g. crisis management and increased analysis capabilities).   For a bidirectional method, a formal mapping between both domains is required. Researchers have suggested that harmonising semantics is currently the best approach for integration of IFC and CityGML. In this thesis, the focus is therefore on semantic integration of IFC and CityGML building models for bidirectional conversion. IFC and CityGML use different terminologies to describe the same domain and there is a great heterogeneity in their semantics. Following a design research method, the thesis proposes a more expressive reference ontology between IFC and CityGML semantic models. Furthermore, an intermediate unified building model (UBM) is proposed between IFC and CityGML that facilitates the transfer of spatial information from IFC to CityGML and vice versa. A unified model in the current study is defined as a superset model that is extended to contain all the features and objects from both IFC and CityGML building models. The conversion is a two-steps process in which a model is first converted to the unified model and then to the target model.   The result of the thesis contributes, through the reference ontology, towards a formal mapping between IFC and CityGML ontologies that allows bidirectional conversion between them. Future development of the reference ontology may be seen as the design of a meta-standard for 3D city modelling that can support applications in both domains. Furthermore, the thesis also provides an approach towards a complete integration of CityGML and IFC through the development of the UBM. The latter contribution demonstrates how different classes, attributes and relations have been considered from IFC and CityGML in the building of the UBM.   To illustrate the applicability of the proposed approach, a hospital building located in Norrtälje City, north of Stockholm, Sweden, is used as a case study. The purpose of the case study is to show how different building elements at different levels of detail can be constructed. Considering future research possibilities, the integration approach in the thesis is seen as a starting-point for developing a common database that formulates a UBM’s platform. With such a platform, data from IFC and CityGML can be automatically integrated and processed in different analyses. Other formats can also be included in further steps. Finally, the proposed approach is believed to need future research beyond the building models alone and on an implementation process for testing and verification.QC 2011012

FROM SOCIETAL TO ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE : THE IMPACT ON BUSINESS-IT ALIGNMENT

Business-IT alignment (BITA) has clearly become more important over the last decade. However, considerable difficulties remain when attempting to achieve a mature level of BITA. Therefore, research efforts which have resulted in a number of theoretical models have been able to help in devising and applying supportive tools for assessing different components of BITA. However, most of these efforts have either been produced in Anglo-Saxon countries or have been based on specific experiences in those countries. Consequently, they have tended to ignore a number of factors which differ in nature due to variations in cultural contexts. However, organisational culture has been given little consideration. Societal and organisational cultural aspects of BITA are particularly important because the majority of BITA models tend to focus more on the efficiency and effectiveness of BITA components rather than on trying to create ways in which how BITA can be achieved or maintained in different contexts. Therefore, the purpose of this thesis is to investigate the impact of societal and organisational culture on achieving BITA and influencing its maturity. The main result is an extended BITA model developed originally by Luftman, known as; Luftman’s Strategic Alignment Maturity Model (SAM), which is influenced by the organisational culture perspective. The research method and process advocated by Peffers et al. (2007) is used in the thesis to design the extended-SAM, consisting of six activities. The first of these activities involves identifying specific problems. This is achieved by an extensive literature survey of theories related to BITA, an explorative study of the impact of organisational culture on BITA and a classification of the general limitations of BITA. The second activity concerns the requirement for definitions of the designed artifact. The third activity is then specified in terms of designing the artifact; i.e. an extended-SAM. The design is based on constructed hypotheses of the potential impact of organisational culture elements (based on Smit et al.’s model (2008) on BITA attributes (based on SAM), and followed by an empirical study of 6 multinational organisations, for testing the hypotheses. Following that, in the fourth activity, various processes for extending SAM are demonstrated in different seminars within the IT management group at DSV, in conference papers and in different seminars of the Swedish research School of Management and Information Technology (MIT) (Forskarskolan Management och IT. In the fifth activity, the extended-SAM model is evaluated in 5 multinational organisations to test its practicality and utility. In the last activity, a journal paper (Paper III in the thesis) is presented to summarise all the processes. The communication is also carried out through pre-licentiate and the licentiate seminars. The extended-SAM shows in the result of the thesis that organisational culture is a clear factor that should be considered while assessing and studying BITA maturity. In addition, by considering organisational culture, assessing BITA is clearly shown as being more accurate and as reflecting a more detailed picture of the organisation’s BITA

From Theory to Practice of Business-IT Alignment : Barriers, an Evaluation Framework and Relationships with Organisational Culture

Business-IT alignment (BITA) continues to be a top management concern. It generally refers to a preferred condition in which the relationship between business and IT is optimised to maximise the business value of IT. Early approaches in both research and practice have focused on the role of IT in supporting business strategies. Today, a more extended approach of BITA has been embraced that recognises soft factors that are related to people and culture issues at both tactical and operational levels of organisations. ‘Why alignment is important’ is not the crucial question today. In fact ‘how it can be achieved and matured’ is the real concern of business executives. There exists a number of theoretical models for conceptualising BITA, however, they have different focuses and contain different BITA components. Therefore, there is a need for a means of supporting practitioners for selecting an appropriate model. Furthermore, there is a need for a more practice-oriented research that target higher maturity of BITA by understanding the organisational context, including barriers that hinders BITA and the mutual relationships between organisational culture and BITA. Thus, the overall problem addressed in the thesis is the following: In spite of extensive literature on business-IT alignment, there is still limited maturity of business-IT alignment in practice due to the limited knowledge on barriers that hinder BITA achievement from practitioners’ perspective, on the means for supporting the selection of an appropriate model for assessing BITA, and on mutual relationships between BITA and organisational culture. Based on this research problem, five research objectives were developed. The first two objectives corresponded to barriers to achieving BITA and supporting the selection of BITA model respectively. The remaining three objectives corresponded to the two unidirectional influences between BITA and organisational culture (OC) and to the mutual relationships between them respectively. Different research methodologies and strategies were applied to achieve the research objectives, including qualitative and quantitative studies as well as design science. The results presented in the thesis, each corresponding to an objective, are the following:  A list of barriers that practitioners can use as a basis for better achievement of BITA, a better focus on strategic vs. tactical barriers, and their relationships to BITA components. An evaluation framework that supports practitioners in selecting appropriate BITA models for assessing and modelling BITA. An extended version of the strategic alignment model (SAM) of Luftman (2000), which considers organisational culture. An analysis of the impact of BITA components on organisational culture profiles. A BITA-organisational culture integrated view that supports decision-makers in facilitating decisions regarding both BITA and organisational culture. The results of the research provide both theoretical and empirical contributions to the business-IT alignment research and practice.MI

METHOD FOR INTEGRATING BUILDING MODELS IN IFC AND CITYGML

Abstract. One of the main problems facing 3D city modelling applications is lack of interoperability among various Building Information Models (BIM) and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) models. CityGML (representing a wide range of 3D urban objects) and IFC (representing a very detailed semantic model for buildings) are considered the most prominent semantic models in GIS and BIM, respectively, today. When integrating the two models, substantial difficulties may arise in transforming information from one to the other. Professionals from both domains have made significant efforts to integrate CityGML and IFC models for seeking useful common applications. However, most of these efforts use a unidirectional method (mostly from IFC to CityGML) for a conversion process. As a formal mapping between both domains is required, researchers have suggested that harmonising semantics is the best approach for such integration. In this paper, we focus on semantic integration of IFC and CityGML building models for bidirectional conversion. Both IFC and CityGML use different terminologies to describe the same domain. Additionally, there is a great heterogeneity in their semantics. This paper, therefore, propose more expressive reference ontology between IFC and CityGML semantic models and an intermediate Unified Building Modelled (UBM) is built. The result of the paper contributes, through the reference ontology, towards a formal mapping between IFC and CityGML ontologies that allows bidirectional conversion between them. It also contributes towards a design of meta-standard for 3D city modelling that can support applications on both domains