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This book illustrates the agile transformation journey of a consulting organization. It consists of nine main chapters, each focusing on specific aspects of transformation. These include establishing value in business, holistic recruitment and retention, innovating performance appraisals, rethinking organizational structure, redesigning leadership roles, streamlining measurement and reward systems, and improving career paths. Some specific processes, such as corporate decision making, SMILE (budget for business improvement at employee discretion), project selection, holiday leave, and career coaching are also described. All of the transformations described build up on Management 3.0, a collection of management principles and practices that fit perfectly in an agile world.The book is of practical relevance for managers and agile coaches who want to learn how to approach agile transformation.

This book focuses on the emerging research in the field of treatment of solid tumors or cancer with new drug delivery systems using nanotechnology. Nanotechnology has given us a good scope for development of new innovative drug delivery strategies to increase the therapeutic efficacy of anticancer drugs with reduced off-target side effects. Cancer is one of the main causes of death worldwide due to the limitations of classical therapies such as low solubility of active drugs, toxic side effects on healthy cells and resistance of tumor cells. These issues are partly solved by the recent development of polymeric nanoparticles, which improve drug absorption and the therapeutic index, while reducing side effects. Drug carriers must be biocompatible, biodegradable and non-immunogenic. Coupled to a ligand that has affinity for that particular cell, polymeric nanoparticles are used to target specifically malignant cells or tissues and, in turn, improve drug stability. This book presents the latest advances in the application of polymeric particles for cancer treatment, with focus on the tumor microenvironment, synthesis, active and passive targeting, patents, targeting over-expressed receptors, tumor-targeting ligands, theranostics, glioblastoma tumors, lung cancer, breast cancer, prostate cancer and pH-responsive nanoparticles

Nutrition is an important environmental factor for the maturation of the human immune system and essential for maintaining immunological homeostasis. Based on this, a variety of food applications with medical claims are being generated by food manufacturers worldwide in order to expand the market potential of products creating interesting linkages with other market segments, such as cosmetics and pharmaceuticals. However, in addition to the health benefits, active principles of such components often remain unexplored.This book focusses on the specific interactions between food ingredients and the immune system along the entire immune defense response. Starting from the immune barrier, through the innate and adaptive immune response, to active limitation and termination, all major mechanisms of the immune response are addressed and different biochemical, cellular and genetic interactions of components of our diet are discussed. The book presents a wealth of disease patterns for which nutritional factors are relevant and thereby provides indications for potential intervention strategies. In addition, associated food-technological aspects are discussed.  Being the first of its kind, this book provides an overview of the variety of functional food components and their influence on immunological responses. Written in an accessible style, it addresses researchers, health professionals and students with different scientific backgrounds.

The number of solid organ transplant recipients is increasing worldwide every year, which has meant a significant improvement of recipient's survival and quality of life. To prevent graft rejection, patients require long-term immunosuppression, which is responsible for their increased risk of neoplastic and infectious diseases. This practical and concise atlas presents the most important dermatoses in solid organ transplant recipients. Providing a guide to diagnosis and appropriate therapy, it helps dermatologists, general practitioners and physicians manage the dermatoses found in organ transplant recipients. The first three chapters discuss immunosuppressive regimens and the prevalence of dermatoses, while the other chapters approach the main diseases didactically, providing a large number of illustrations.

The year 2022 is the 50th anniversary of Alfred Crosby's celebrated book - The Columbian Exchange: Biological and Cultural Consequences of 1492. In the book, Crosby was the first to discuss the impact that the Spanish and Portuguese colonial period had on world agriculture and human culture. How the crops of the world became homogenized, and how an indigenous culture was destroyed by disease after Columbus landed. His landmark study broke new ground in its broad conceptualization of the Atlantic exchange.Building on what Crosby so succinctly and brilliantly presented, the main goal of this new work is to present the depth of information that has emerged since "e;The Columbian Exchange"e; and to discuss more fully the development of crops and agriculture before and after the Iberian contact. It follows the journey of crops and livestock in the Old and New Worlds and end's with their distribution in today's world.

Agatha Christie and the Guilty Pleasure of Poison examines Christie's female poisoners in the context of Christie's own experience in pharmacy and of detective fiction. In doing so, it uncovers an overlooked dynamic in which female poisoners deliver well-deserved comeuppance for gendered and classed wrongdoing ordinarily accepted in everyday life. While critics have long recognized male outlaws, like Robin Hood, who use crime to oppose a corrupt system, this book contends that female outlaws - witches and poisoners - offer a similar heritage of empowered femininity. Far from cozy and formulaic, Agatha Christie's outlaw poisoners offer readers the surprising pleasures of comeuppance, and they set the stage for contemporary detective fiction writers, more recent films depicting poisoning as empowering, and even poison gardens, which are tourist destinations that offer visitors the guilty pleasure of poison.

This book examines queer activism and queer social movements (QSMs) in Indonesia and Malaysia, broadly engaging with these topics on three different levels: macro (global and national discourses), meso (organizational level - activities), and micro (individual - the activist). The micro level perspective allows for moving beyond the "e;traditional"e; political movement paradigm by understanding activism in Foucauldian terms as the ethics of the self (Foucault, 1984). In other words, the queer subject is seen as an active agent in taking care of the self by queering/resisting gender norms as well as heteronormative practices and regimes in their social environment through embodiment and actions. This kind of ethical being has the potential to build support and community between and amongst individuals.

This is the first book to focus on the scope of social work practice within military settings from an international perspective, and therefore addresses what has been a significant gap in the literature. Given the critical support needs of military personnel and their families worldwide, and the expanding role of social work in responding to these needs, this book offers a comprehensive global understanding of the common military social work (MilSW) practices with active duty military service members and their families, as well as the forms of practice and approaches that are unique, or potentially transferable across nations.Based on a systematic inquiry conducted by the Editors, there are at least 25 countries that have social workers working directly within their country's military in either a civilian or uniformed capacity, or both. This book includes contributions from experts in Australia, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Israel, the Netherlands, New Zealand, South Africa, the UK, and the USA, who describe various aspects of the MilSW role within their country and the research that informs what military social workers do. The MilSW similarities and differences among these countries are highlighted, including developmental milestones, practice settings, practice orientation and approach, ethical dilemmas, military to veteran transition support, and past and current challenges. Experts from countries that do not yet have MilSW but are interested in developing it (Japan, Ukraine) or are in the process of establishing this area of practice (Slovakia), also contribute chapters about these developments and the evidence base that supports this direction.Military Social Work Around the Globe is a valuable resource for social work programs and essential reading for instructors and students in MilSW electives and specializations. It is also pertinent reading for occupational social work and international social work courses. In addition, this book is an important source of information for military social workers who would like to gain insights into existing programs and the possibilities for international collaboration, and for countries interested in developing MilSW.

This book comprehensively discusses the role that non-state actors play in the Arctic and assesses the normative role of these actors. Beyond any organised forum, there are actors that have a significant impact on the way the Arctic is developed, adjudicated, managed, perceived, presented and represented. This book complements the literature on non-state actors in international law and international security, world politics and international relations and provides a geographical account of their role for the Arctic. The book content is not limited to a specific discipline, but takes into account different approaches to the topic. This means that it contains three types of contributions: research articles, shorter research notes and commentaries. While the research articles constitute the main body of the work, it is also the research notes which provide an insight into issues related to the topic of the book.

Drawing on field-based data and experiences from the practice of democratic decentralization and local governance over the last three decades in Ghana, this book examines whether and how democratic decentralization and local governance reforms in developing countries have produced the anticipated development outcomes.In seventeen related contributions, the authors present four relevant focal themes, including conceptual and historical trajectories of decentralization and local governance; institutional choice, democratic representation, and poverty reduction; local governance, resource capacity, and service delivery; and non-state actors, local governance and sustainable development. The book blends perspectives of scholars, practitioners, and policy-makers to provide a holistic analysis of linkages between decentralization, local governance, and sustainable development efforts, presenting a novel and useful guide for science, policy, and practice of bottom-up governance and development. It provides relevant lessons and experiences for scholars, policy-makers, and development practitioners in Africa in particular and developing countries in general.

This book presents paraproteinemia and the highly complex scientific information behind it to clinicians in a way they can understand and, ultimately, apply to their diagnostic and treatment practices. Paraproteinemia or dysproteinemia is characterized by the overproduction of an immunoglobulin by clonal expansion of cells from the B cells lineage which includes the plasma cells. The resultant monoclonal protein can be composed of the entire immunoglobulin or of its components. The identification and categorization of the different representatives of this group of disorders have traveled a long distance, but despite its high prevalence there is surprisingly limited evidence, in some areas, to guide the best clinical practice both at the time of diagnosis and during follow up. This book seeks to fill that gap.  The book is divided into three sections, introductory chapters, disease entities and experimental therapies. The text guides clinicians through these diseases and disorders. The group of renal diseases attributed to deposition of monoclonal immunoglobulins or their components are arranged as one disease category in order to simplify the understanding of these complicated diseases in plasma cell dysplasia. In emulation of this practical approach, at a larger scale, the volume editors and chapter authors attempt to encompass the whole spectrum of the paraproteinemias in this text. This will have the dual benefit of offering the audience a panoramic view of this group of disorders and simultaneously keeping them focused on its individual representatives. There have been many recent advances in diagnosis, risk stratifications, and management of many members of this group of diseases and they are explored in depth here.  This is an ideal guide for rheumatologists, hematologists, nephrologists, immunologists, oncologists, and relevant trainees caring for patients with paraproteinemia and related disorders.

This book addresses research challenges in the rapidly developing area of nonequilibrium thermodynamics and fluctuation kinetics. This cross-disciplinary field comprises various topics, ranging from fundamental problems of nonequilibrium statistical mechanics and thermodynamics to multiple applications in plasma, fluid mechanics, nonlinear science, systems of dissipative particles, and high-Q resonators. The purpose of this book is to bring together world-leading experts in the above fields to initiate a cross-fertilization among these active research areas. The book is dedicated to and honours the memory of Professor Slava Belyi who passed away unexpectedly on May 20, 2020. He was pioneering the theory of nonequilibrium fluctuations, in particular the application of the Callen-Welton fluctuation-dissipation theorem to nonequilibrium systems and its generalization. This and related problems also feature in the book.

Constance of France: Womanhood and Agency in Twelfth-Century Europe is a biography of Constance of France, sister of King Louis VII of France. Myra Bom recovers Constance's life story and puts it in its medieval context by examining the historical evidence of chronicles, charters, seal imprints and letters. The countess's long and interesting life makes for women's history with a large geographical scope, including France, England, Toulouse and the Latin East. It touches on many aspects of life during the Middle Ages such as birth, marriage and divorce, gender roles, experience of time, and expectation for the afterlife. Bom demonstrates how and to what extent medieval women could, and did, take control of their own lives. This book is an account of the interplay of historical context and agency. 

This book presents the updated results of an investigation carried out in 2019. The National Autonomous University of Mexico's (UNAM) Climate Change Research Program (PINCC), funded the research coordinated by Armelle Gouritin. The research aims to answer the following questions: Does the Mexican legal framework and public policies address forced internal climate mobility? If not, what could be the elements of a legal framework and public policies to address the phenomenon? As the phenomenon was approached it was clear that it was extremely complex and consisted of numerous tensions that would lead to other questions throughout the research process.Climate forced internal displacement is projected as a huge-scale phenomenon in Mexico. Against this background, the book provides the first critical diagnosis of the current politico-legal Mexican framework and finds it to be lagging behind in terms of prevention and attention. The book analyses the three-level Mexican governance (federal, state and local levels), and identifies serious loopholes according to a rights-based approach that particularly focuses on women, indigenous peoples, and persons and communities with scarce economic resources. The results provide information on up-coming legislative and political processes and provide benchmarks that can be applied in other case-studies, including other national frameworks' critical analysis.

This book focuses on biomedical applications of polarized light, covering instrumentation and modeling specific to the field. This will be the first book, written by leading researchers in the field, to tackle this important topic. Readers will learn the fundamentals of polarized light transport and how to develop instrumentation for clinical and preclinical studies. They will also become familiar with the latest advancement in data analysis and image processing for a variety of medical applications. The book is dedicated specifically to the biomedical community, including scientists, engineers, and physicians working on the development of instrumentation for clinical and preclinical use.Emphasizes biomedical imaging and sensing;Describes new computational approaches with examples;Provides detailed descriptions of novel instrumentation.

This book deals with the advantages of using artificial intelligence (AI) in the fight against the COVID-19 and against future pandemics that could threat humanity and our environment. This book is a practical, scientific and clinically relevant example of how medicine and mathematics will fuse in the 2020s, out of external pandemic pressure and out of scientific evolutionary necessity. This book contains a unique blend of the world's leading researchers, both in medicine, mathematics, computer science, clinical and preclinical medicine, and presents the research front of the usage of AI against pandemics.Equipped with this book the reader will learn about the latest AI advances against COVID-19, and how mathematics and algorithms can aid in preventing its spreading course, treatments, diagnostics, vaccines, clinical management and future evolution.

Grand Cayman, Little Cayman, and Cayman Brac are, in reality, the summits of independent fault blocks that rise from the depths of the Caribbean Sea. This book traces the geological evolution of these islands over the last 30 to 35 million years. The balance between deposition of carbonate sediments and karst development of the exposed land was dictated by the interaction between ever-changing sea levels and vertical tectonic movement of the fault blocks. Today, drinking water needed for the ever-increasing populations of the islands is supplied largely by desalinization plants that are located in accord with a detailed knowledge of the bedrock.This book is based on an extensive data base that has been assembled over the last 40 years of field work and laboratory analyses. Noteworthy aspects of this database include:Approximately 60 visits to the islands over last 40 years - sampling and documentation of virtually every accessible outcrop on the islands (including some that no longer exist). Most samples have been fully documented petrographically and geochemically.Data from 120 wells that have been drilled to depths up to 245 m (most less than 125 m). Wells have been cored and/or chip sampled. Full documentation of drilling histories, XRD analyses of samples, extensive geochemical analyses for major and minor elements, stable isotopes, 87Sr/86Sr ratios, and Rare Earth Elements from numerous samples.Mapping and sampling of modern sediments, including sediment cores, from most of the lagoons around Grand Cayman.Extensive thin section petrography, scanning electron microscope, and electron microprobe analyses of the dolostones and limestones that form the bedrock of the islands.Samples and data collected from numerous caves on Grand Cayman and Cayman Brac have been used to track their developmental history.Detailed analyses of phosphates collected from Little Cayman.Detailed analyses of terra rossa collected from each of the islands.

In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, thousands of pupils attended boarding schools in various places across the globe. Their experiences were vastly different, yet they all had in common that they were separated from their families and childhood friends for a period of time in order to sleep, eat, learn and move within the limited spatial sites of the boarding school. This book frames these ¿boarding schools¿ as a global and transcultural phenomenon that is part of larger political and social developments of European imperialism, the Cold War, and independence movements. Drawing together case studies from colonial South Africa, colonial India, Dutch Indonesia, early twentieth-century Nigeria, Fascist Spain, Ghana, Nazi Germany, nineteenth-century Ireland, North America and the Soviet Union, this edited collection examines the ways in which boarding schools extracted pupils from their original social background in order to train, mold and shape them so that they could fit intothe perceived position in broader society. The book makes the broader argument that framing boarding schools as a global phenomenon is imperative for a deepened understanding of the global and transnational networks that linked people as well as ideas and practices of education and childhood in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

This textbook aimed at upper-level undergraduate and graduate engineering students who need to describe the large deformation of elastic materials like soft plastics, rubber, and biological materials.  The classical approaches to finite deformations of elastic materials describe a dozen or more measures of stress and strain.  These classical approaches require an in-depth knowledge of tensor analysis and provide little instruction as to how to relate the derived equations to the materials to be described.  This text, by contrast, introduces only one strain measure and one stress measure.  No tensor analysis is required.  The theory is applied by showing how to measure material properties and to perform computer simulations for both isotropic and anisotropic materials.  The theory can be covered in one chapter for students familiar with Euler-Lagrange techniques, but is also introduced more slowly in several chapters for students not familiar with these techniques.  The connection to linear elasticity is provided along with a comparison of this approach to classical elasticity.

This contributed volume book aims at discussing transdisciplinary approaches to address common problems. By working transdisciplinarily, researchers coming from different disciplines can work jointly using a shared conceptual framework bringing together disciplinary-specific theories and concepts. There are numerous barriers that can obstruct effective communication between different cultures, communities, religions and geographies. This book shows that through bringing together different disciplines, researchers not only can surpass these barriers but can effectively produce new venues of thought that can positively affect the development and evolution of research and education. The book discusses new and emerging applications of knowledge produced by transdisciplinary efforts and covers the interplay of many disciplines, including agriculture, economics, mathematics, engineering, industry, information technology, marketing, nanoscience, neuroscience, space exploration, human-animal relationships, among others. Consequently, it also covers the relationship between art and science, as one of the most remarkable transdisciplinary approaches that paves the way for new methods in engineering, design, architecture and many other fields.

This textbook comprehensively covers the latest state-of-the-art methods and applications of artificial intelligence (AI) in medicine, placing these developments into a historical context. Factors that assist or hinder a particular technique to improve patient care from a cognitive informatics perspective are identified and relevant methods and clinical applications in areas including translational bioinformatics and precision medicine are discussed. This approach enables the reader to attain an accurate understanding of the strengths and limitations of these emerging technologies and how they relate to the approaches and systems that preceded them.With topics covered including knowledge-based systems, clinical cognition, machine learning and natural language processing, Intelligent Systems in Medicine and Health: The Role of AI details a range of the latest AI tools and technologies within medicine. Suggested additional readings and review questions reinforce the key points covered and ensure readers can further develop their knowledge. This makes it an indispensable resource for all those seeking up-to-date information on the topic of AI in medicine, and one that provides a sound basis for the development of graduate and undergraduate course materials.