The value of knowledge sharing: impact of tacit and explicit knowledge sharing on team performance of scientists

Knowledge sharing that takes place among team members is a process of great relevance that builds ties and relationships which in turn results in positive organizational and team outcomes. However, as it is not usually formally included in the job descriptions and is not a formal part of organizations’ and team activities, it is considered to be an organization citizenship behavior. Our paper emphasizes significance of tacit and explicit knowledge sharing to team performance in the context of scientific cooperation. A positive relationship between tacit knowledge sharing and explicit knowledge sharing with team performance was found using linear regression. Furthermore, high levels of knowledge sharing and team performance were identified among scientists. Keywords: Team performance, Knowledge sharing, Tacit knowledge, Explicit knowledge, Scientific cooperatio

Vascularisation du cou et de la tête révélée par imagerie médicale et par dissection: élaboration d'un nouvel outil didactique pour l'enseignement

L'anatomie du cou et de la tête est particulièrement complexe, ce qui rend son enseignement diffici- le. Dans le présent travail, une attention particulière est donnée à la vascularisation artérielle du cou et de la tête, avec pour but d'aider l'étudiant de deuxième année en médecine à étudier et connaître des structures primordiales comme les artères carotides ou les artères cérébrales, ceci grâce à la réalisation d'un nouvel outil didactique venant compléter l'enseignement pratique. Afin d'appréhender des pathologies bien connues comme l'AVC (accident vasculaire cérébral), ou des entités plus rares comme la fistule artério-veineuse, une connaissance approfondie du réseau artériel parcourant le cou et la tête est indispensable pour tout médecin généraliste, ou dans de nombreuses disciplines comme la neurologie, la radiologie, la chirurgie ou l'angiologie. En effet, afin de pouvoir localiser la région cérébrale d'une atteinte ischémique à partir des symptô- mes ou du status neurologique, et donc de pouvoir déterminer quelle artère est concernée et ainsi d'orienter le diagnostic, une connaissance bien établie du réseau artériel intracrânien est requise. De même, afin de pouvoir pratiquer une manoeuvre basique comme le massage du sinus carotidien (dans le but de freiner une tachycardie supra-ventriculaire notamment), une représentation claire de la topographie des artères carotides est un savoir fondamental. Il est donc essentiel d'avoir des préparations de référence à introduire dans l'enseignement pratique pour compléter le travail de dissection des étudiants. L'usage de l'imagerie dans ce contexte est judicieux, puisqu'elle permet de visualiser des détails d'anatomie qui ne sont pas visibles dans les livres d'anatomie populaires comme le Netter ou le Plat- zer, et donne un meilleur reflet de la réalité que dans les images de ces livres qui se doivent souvent d'être très schématiques. De plus, l'imagerie permet une sensibilisation précoce à l'étude des images radiographiques plus tard dans le cursus, un as- pect qui prend tout son sens lorsque l'on sait que l'imagerie est bien souvent le seul moyen de vi- sualiser l'anatomie particulière de chaque patient. Enfin, il n'y a pas de meilleure méthode que l'ima- gerie pour faire l'étude d'éventuelles variations anatomiques artérielles chez un patient, des in- formations qui deviennent essentielles avant une intervention neurochirurgicale par exemple1,2. Le présent travail a donc pour but d'offrir aux étudiants de deuxième année de médecine un complément pour l'étude de la vascularisation du cou et de la tête. Ils auront accès, lors des travaux pratiques, à deux pièces disséquées dans le cadre de ce projet. Ils pourront ensuite retrouver des photos légendées de ces mêmes pièces sur une plateforme moodle dédiée à l'anatomie, sur laquelle seront aussi intégrées des images radiographiques, dont notamment des reconstructions artérielles acquises par CT-scanner avec possibilité de les comparer directement aux images des pièces dissé- quées, ainsi que des exercices interactifs dérivés de ce travail. Enfin, un support d'apprentissage écrit intégrant des aspects de pathologie sera aussi mis à la dispo- sition de ces étudiants en début de cursus, ce qui permettra de donner une perspective médicale, et donc stimulante, à leur apprentissage de l'anatomie

Niosomes as a delivery system for DNA vaccines.

DNA vaccines have become the spotlight in vaccinology in the past ten years as an alternative to conventional vaccines. In our study we characterized newly formulated non-ionic surfactant vesicles (niosomes) and assessed their potential as a delivery vehicle for DNA vaccines. Plasmid DNA was successfully entrapped into cationic niosomes using the dehydration-rehydration method. The DRV niosomes entrapping or complexing the plasmid DNA were shown to protect the latter from deoxyribonuclease attack as well as damage from probe sonication. Although niosome stability was composition dependent, overall all formulations were more stable in skeletal muscle extract than in plasma at 37°C. Niosomes were shown to offer significant protection to the incorporated plasmid DNA in the presence of plasma and skeletal muscle extract at 37°C. Tissue distribution with 125I-labelled DNA studies indicated that the plasmid DNA is recovered in the injection site as well as the local lymph nodes. Also expression of a plasmid DNA (pEGFP encoding the enhanced green fluorescent protein) after intramuscular injection occurred in the thigh muscle and local lymph nodes to a greater extent compared to the naked DNA. After immunization with cationic DRV niosomes entrapping the plasmid DNA results indicated significantly greater IgG antibody responses against the encoded antigen compared to naked plasmid DNA. The presence of DOPE was shown to be vital for better immune response. Furthermore, production of endogenous IL-4 and IFN-γ cytokines was also detected in the spleen. The cytokine levels were mainly significantly higher in animals injected with niosomal-DNA compared to those injected with naked DNA. It appears that niosome mediated DNA immunization is effective in inducing both humoral and/or cell-mediated immune response and, therefore, niosomes are promising vehicles for the delivery of DNA vaccines

Understanding the concept of individual level knowledge sharing: A review of critical success factors

This paper identifies key factors enabling individual knowledge sharing in organizations and on projects. A literature review on the topic of knowledge sharing has been conducted with an aim of recognizing relevant factors that influence individual knowledge sharing. We take a holistic approach in examining knowledge sharing by factors pertaining to Theory of planned behaviour, Social capital theory, Social influence theory, Social exchange theory, Social-cognitive theory, and motivational theories augmented with additional aspects. Factors belonging to organizational, team and individual contexts interact and, in turn affect knowledge sharing behaviour of individuals working in organizations and on projects. Relationships between various success factors were found relevant in influencing knowledge sharing and integration of theories in order to develop knowledge sharing model is recommended. Keywords: Knowledge sharing, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge management, Tacit knowledg

End-User Service Computing: Spreadsheets as a Service Composition Tool

In this paper, we show how spreadsheets, an end-user development paradigm proven to be highly productive and simple to learn and use, can be used for complex service compositions. We identify the requirements for spreadsheet-based service composition, and present our framework that implements these requirements. Our framework enables spreadsheets to send requests and retrieve results from various local and remote services. We show how our tools support different composition patterns, and how the style of declarative dependencies of spreadsheets can facilitate service composition. We also discuss novel issues identified by using the framework in several projects and education

Open Source Software: All You Do Is Put It Together

The authors propose an infrastructure for rapidly prototyping applications from open source software components. The Adaptable Multi-Interface Communicator infrastructure (AMICO) is based on ideas of middleware platforms for component integration, but it focuses on pragmatic aspects of OSS integration, often absent from many existing integration platforms. The authors also identify the key requirements of middleware for rapid prototyping with OSS components and illustrate their approach through two examples in complex scenarios

Universal Accessibility as a Multimodal Design Issue

In recent years, many research activities have focused on design that aims to produce universally accessible systems, taking into account special needs of various user groups. These special needs are associated with many user factors, such as impairments of speech, hearing or vision, cognitive limitations, aging, as well as with various environmental factors. Fields that address this problem, such as Usability, Universal Accessibility, Universal Design, or Inclusive Design have been developed as relatively independent domains, but they share many aspects with other human-computer interaction (HCI) disciplines. However, researchers and practitioners are often not aware of interconnections among concepts of universal accessibility and "ordinary" HCI. In view of this situation, in this article we show there is a fundamental connection between multimodal interface design and universal accessibility, and that awareness of these links can help both disciplines. Researchers from these areas may use different terminology, but the concepts they use often have essentially the same meaning. We propose a unified conceptual framework where these areas can be joined

Integrating heterogeneous open-source software into web browsers using AMICO:WEB

A web browser provides a uniform user interface to different types of information. Making this interface universally accessible and more interactive is a long term goal still far from being achieved. Universally accessible browsers require novel interaction modalities and additional functionalities, for which existing browsers tend to provide only partial solutions. Although functionality for web accessibility can be found as open-source and free software components, their reuse and integration is complex because they were developed in diverse implementation environments, following standards and conventions incompatible with the web. To enable the integration of existing partial solutions within a mainstream web browser environment, we have developed a middleware infrastructure, AMICO:WEB. This enables browser access to a wide variety of open source and free software components. The main contribution of AMICO:WEB is in enabling the syntactic interoperability between web extension mechanisms and a variety of integration mechanisms used by open-source and free software components. It also bridges the semantic differences between the high-level world of web XML-based APIs and the low-level APIs of the device-oriented world. We discuss the design decisions made during the development of AMICO:WEB in the context of web accessibility, using two typical usage scenarios: one describing a disabled user using a mainstream web browser with additional interaction modalities; another describing a non-disabled user browsing in a suboptimal interaction situation

Web browser accessibility using open source software

A Web browser provides a uniform user interface to different types of information. Making this interface universally accessible and more interactive is a long term goal still far from being achieved. Universally accessible browsers require novel interaction modalities and additional functionalities, for which existing browsers tend to provide only partial solutions. Although functionality for Web accessibility can be found as open source and free software components, their reuse and integration is complex because they were developed in diverse implementation environments, following standards and conventions incompatible with the Web. To enable the integration of existing partial solutions within a mainstream Web browser environment, we have developed a middleware infrastructure, AMICO:WEB. This enables browser access to a wide variety of open source and free software components. The main contribution of AMICO:WEB is in enabling the syntactic interoperability between Web extension mechanisms and a variety of integration mechanisms used by open source and free software components. It als