Drivers of member advocacy and detraction in credit unions: key contributors to net promoter scores

Credit unions today face an uncertain future, with their very survival in question. This study sought to understand where credit union leaders should focus to foster growth and create lasting organizational success. Treacy and Wiersema (1995) proffer that the key to growth rests in customer intimacy and as others suggest, the creation of an exceptional customer experience (McConnell & Huba, 2003; Pine & Gilmore, 1999). As customers for credit unions are called members, an exceptional member experience is thus necessary. Customer (or member) satisfaction levels indicate the member experience. Member loyalty levels also reflect the member experience. This study sought to uncover the drivers of credit union member advocacy and detraction, and explored the existence of age, income, or gender differences. The study used the seminal SERVQUAL model (Zeithaml, Parasuraman, & Berry, 1990) of customer satisfaction as a framework for understanding the drivers of high member loyalty. Specifically, responses to the Net Promoter Score\u27s likelihood to recommend question (Reichheld, 2006a) were coded, first independently, and then to the five distinct dimensions of service quality: Tangibles, Reliability, Responsiveness, Assurance and Empathy (Zeithaml et. al, 1990). In so doing, this study led to greater understanding of what contributes to high and low NPS scores, and thus what credit union leaders can do to create an excellent member experience, and high loyalty, among current members. The study also led to a new, more complete banking-specific account holder experience assessment model, SQ+ , and five additional dimensions: Convenience, Rates, Fees, Products/Services and Relationship. Two key research tools were also developed: A new SQ+ questionnaire for use in assessing the member/customer experience, and a codebook to use in interpreting and utilizing NPS likelihood to recommend comments

Paired Storage Distributed Energy System Design for a Local Community Farm

This project considers the design of a renewable energy microgrid for a 19-acre community farm in San Luis Obispo, CA as the farm seeks to increase the magnitude of its electrical loads, and gain back-up electrical capability. The microgrid design will enable lower carbon emissions, reduce demand on the utility grid while saving on energy costs, and provide improved reliability and resiliency to the operator of the community farm. The eventual implementation of the design by a professional engineering entity will allow the community farm to expand its education program to include renewable energy as well as gain notoriety in the sustainability conscience community that City Farm relies on for donations. The design process will consist of 1) analysis of the farm’s existing electrical system and its loads, 2) a dive into State, local, and utility rules defining under what circumstances microgrids can be built interconnected to the grid, 3) analysis to estimate optimal component and resource sizing, and 4) recommending locations, components, protection and component settings for the smart distributed energy generation facility 5) analysis on safety, back up capacity, and financial feasibility of the design

Domain specific software architectures: Command and control

GTE is the Command and Control contractor for the Domain Specific Software Architectures program. The objective of this program is to develop and demonstrate an architecture-driven, component-based capability for the automated generation of command and control (C2) applications. Such a capability will significantly reduce the cost of C2 applications development and will lead to improved system quality and reliability through the use of proven architectures and components. A major focus of GTE's approach is the automated generation of application components in particular subdomains. Our initial work in this area has concentrated in the message handling subdomain; we have defined and prototyped an approach that can automate one of the most software-intensive parts of C2 systems development. This paper provides an overview of the GTE team's DSSA approach and then presents our work on automated support for message processing

Photovoltaic decision analysis

This paper is a product of the Photovoltaics Project Decision Analysis task of the Planning and Analysis for Development of Photovoltaic Energy Conversion System project, supported at the MIT Energy Laboratory, under subcontract to the MIT Lincoln Laboratory, by the U.S. Energy Research and Development AdministrationThis paper is concerned with the development and implementation of a methodology that analyzes information relating to the choice between flat plate and concentrator technologies for photovoltaic development. A Decision Analysis approach is used to compare and systematically evaluate the two photovoltaic energy conversion systems. This methodology provides a convenient framework for structuring the decision process in an orderly sequential fashion via decision trees, incorporating information on subjective probabilities of future outcomes, and focusing attention on critical options and uncertainties. A significant tenet of the analysis is that any set of energy technologies must be compared on the basis of the cost of generated energy rather than simply on the basis of the cost of hardware production. As a result, the cost analyses presented focus on a comparison of energy generated by the photovoltaic systems in units of $/kWh, rather than on a comparison based on units of$/peak kW. The criterion for choice between the alternative technologies is chosen to be minimization of expected cost per unit of energy generated. After presenting the decision tree framework used to structure the problem, including a classification of the components of the competing technologies, a detailed procedure for calculating the system cost per kilowatt-hour for each path through the decision tree is described for each technology and methods for assessing subjective probability distributions are discussed

Modeling meiotic chromosomes indicates a size dependent contribution of telomere clustering and chromosome rigidity to homologue juxtaposition.

Meiosis is the cell division that halves the genetic component of diploid cells to form gametes or spores. To achieve this, meiotic cells undergo a radical spatial reorganisation of chromosomes. This reorganisation is a prerequisite for the pairing of parental homologous chromosomes and the reductional division, which halves the number of chromosomes in daughter cells. Of particular note is the change from a centromere clustered layout (Rabl configuration) to a telomere clustered conformation (bouquet stage). The contribution of the bouquet structure to homologous chromosome pairing is uncertain. We have developed a new in silico model to represent the chromosomes of Saccharomyces cerevisiae in space, based on a worm-like chain model constrained by attachment to the nuclear envelope and clustering forces. We have asked how these constraints could influence chromosome layout, with particular regard to the juxtaposition of homologous chromosomes and potential nonallelic, ectopic, interactions. The data support the view that the bouquet may be sufficient to bring short chromosomes together, but the contribution to long chromosomes is less. We also find that persistence length is critical to how much influence the bouquet structure could have, both on pairing of homologues and avoiding contacts with heterologues. This work represents an important development in computer modeling of chromosomes, and suggests new explanations for why elucidating the functional significance of the bouquet by genetics has been so difficult

Nutrient sensing and acquisition in fungi: Mechanisms promoting pathogenesis in plant and human hosts

Fungal pathogens destroy our crops and cause hazardous human infections, therefore threatening our health and food security. The ability of fungal pathogens to sense and respond to dynamic host microenvironments enables the establishment and progression of disease. Sensing nutritional cues is vital throughout fungal infection of either plants or mammals: enabling the pathogen to invade, adapt and survive in the face of host immunity. Acquiring nutrients from their host for energy, growth and repair is also essential to a fungal pathogen's success. Cell-surface proteins embedded in the fungal plasma membrane sense and transport host macro- and micronutrients, including carbon and nitrogen sources and minerals such as iron and zinc. Using examples from model crop (Fusarium graminearum, Magnaporthe oryzae and Ustilago maydis) and human (Aspergillus fumigatus, Candida albicans, Cryptococcus neoformans) pathogens we review the nutrient sensing and transporting roles of fungal cell-surface receptor, transporter and transceptor proteins, and their importance to plant and human fungal disease. We discuss how their cellular localisation, central role in cell signalling and importance to disease makes these fungal cell-surface proteins candidates in the search for new strategies to control fungal diseases, while highlighting the areas where further research is needed to make this possible.</p

Nutrient sensing and acquisition in fungi: Mechanisms promoting pathogenesis in plant and human hosts

Fungal pathogens destroy our crops and cause hazardous human infections, therefore threatening our health and food security. The ability of fungal pathogens to sense and respond to dynamic host microenvironments enables the establishment and progression of disease. Sensing nutritional cues is vital throughout fungal infection of either plants or mammals: enabling the pathogen to invade, adapt and survive in the face of host immunity. Acquiring nutrients from their host for energy, growth and repair is also essential to a fungal pathogen's success. Cell-surface proteins embedded in the fungal plasma membrane sense and transport host macro- and micronutrients, including carbon and nitrogen sources and minerals such as iron and zinc. Using examples from model crop (Fusarium graminearum, Magnaporthe oryzae and Ustilago maydis) and human (Aspergillus fumigatus, Candida albicans, Cryptococcus neoformans) pathogens we review the nutrient sensing and transporting roles of fungal cell-surface receptor, transporter and transceptor proteins, and their importance to plant and human fungal disease. We discuss how their cellular localisation, central role in cell signalling and importance to disease makes these fungal cell-surface proteins candidates in the search for new strategies to control fungal diseases, while highlighting the areas where further research is needed to make this possible.</p

RNAseq reveals hydrophobins that are involved in the adaptation of aspergillus nidulans to lignocellulose

Background Sugarcane is one of the world’s most profitable crops. Waste steam-exploded sugarcane bagasse (SEB) is a cheap, abundant, and renewable lignocellulosic feedstock for the next-generation biofuels. In nature, fungi seldom exist as planktonic cells, similar to those found in the nutrient-rich environment created within an industrial fermenter. Instead, fungi predominantly form biofilms that allow them to thrive in hostile environments. Results In turn, we adopted an RNA-sequencing approach to interrogate how the model fungus, Aspergillus nidulans, adapts to SEB, revealing the induction of carbon starvation responses and the lignocellulolytic machinery, in addition to morphological adaptations. Genetic analyses showed the importance of hydrophobins for growth on SEB. The major hydrophobin, RodA, was retained within the fungal biofilm on SEB fibres. The StuA transcription factor that regulates fungal morphology was up-regulated during growth on SEB and controlled hydrophobin gene induction. The absence of the RodA or DewC hydrophobins reduced biofilm formation. The loss of a RodA or a functional StuA reduced the retention of the hydrolytic enzymes within the vicinity of the fungus. Hence, hydrophobins promote biofilm formation on SEB, and may enhance lignocellulose utilisation via promoting a compact substrate-enzyme-fungus structure. Conclusion This novel study highlights the importance of hydrophobins to the formation of biofilms and the efficient deconstruction of lignocellulose

Self-Adaptive Systems for Information Survivability: PMOP and AWDRAT

Information systems form the backbones of the critical infrastructures of modern societies. Unfortunately, these systems are highly vulnerable to attacks that can result in enormous damage. Furthermore, traditional approaches to information security have not provided all the protections necessary to defeat and recover from a concerted attack; in particular, they are largely irrelevant to the problem of defending against attacks launched by insiders.This paper describes two related systems PMOP and AWDRAT that were developed during the DARPA Self Regenerative Systems program. PMOP defends against insider attacks while AWDRAT is intended to detect compromises to software systems. Both rely on self-monitoring, diagnosis and self-adaptation. We describe both systems and show the results of experiments with each