scholarly journals The silver lining of COVID-19 – improving operational processes

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sabina Cerimagic ◽  
Dewa Wardak
Keyword(s):  
Scale Up ◽  
Holistic Approach ◽  
Soft Systems ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Design Based Research ◽  
The Past ◽  
Soft Systems Thinking ◽  
Systems Thinking Approach ◽  
Operational Processes ◽  
Silver Lining

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the need for improvement in our operational processes. In our Business Co-Design (BCD) team we have successfully utilised a design-based research (DBR) approach for the past two years - and it has worked well. However, we have noticed that from an operational perspective, the DBR approach methodology we have been using can struggle to scale up, as designing is bespoke and offers tailor made solutions for our individual projects. We will pilot incorporating elements of a soft systems thinking approach together with actornetwork theory (ANT) to enable us in applying a more holistic approach to the design and development of units of study which will provide opportunities for input from the larger team, instead of working in silos. Additionally, we are hopeful that this new approach will also assist us in making our design and projects scalable and sustainable – and to support us in increasing efficiency.

scholarly journals A Human Perspective of Contractor Prequalification

2011 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 60-70
Author(s):  
Bassam Michael Baroudi ◽  
Mike Metcalfe
Keyword(s):  
Construction Projects ◽  
Contextual Analysis ◽  
Alternative View ◽  
Soft Systems ◽  
Holistic View ◽  
The Past ◽  
Soft Systems Thinking ◽  
Human Aspects ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
Selection Of

The contractor prequalification topic has had much written on it over the last two decades. In the past it has been primarily viewed in terms of the appropriate selection of contractors for construction projects. There has been extensive research interest into the functional and process driven aspects of contractor prequalification. However, there has been little research taking a more holistic view of contractor prequalification in terms of the human aspects that surround it. Hence, gaining a wider appreciation on how prequalification systems affect the major stakeholders seems warranted. The use of soft systems thinking allowed for an in-depth and contextual analysis of prequalification issues. This necessitated unstructured in-depth interviews to be carried out with senior industry practitioners. Sifting through their respective experiences allowed for an alternative view of contractor prequalification systems. It allowed a very human perspective of prequalification to emerge. The research suggests that viewing prequalification systems from a human perspective provides a fuller picture of their true benefits and limitations.

TEM study of a biofilm on copper corrosion

1996 ◽  
Vol 54 ◽  
pp. 220-221
Author(s):  
W. A. Chiou ◽  
N. Kohyama ◽  
B. Little ◽  
P. Wagner ◽  
M. Meshii
Keyword(s):  
Marine Bacterium ◽  
Culture Medium ◽  
Copper Alloys ◽  
Pure Copper ◽  
Localized Corrosion ◽  
Natural Seawater ◽  
Copper Corrosion ◽  
New Approach ◽  
The Past ◽  
Copper Tolerant

The corrosion of copper and copper alloys in a marine environment is of great concern because of their widespread use in heat exchangers and steam condensers in which natural seawater is the coolant. It has become increasingly evident that microorganisms play an important role in the corrosion of a number of metals and alloys under a variety of environments. For the past 15 years the use of SEM has proven to be useful in studying biofilms and spatial relationships between bacteria and localized corrosion of metals. Little information, however, has been obtained using TEM capitalizing on its higher spacial resolution and the transmission observation of interfaces. The research presented herein is the first step of this new approach in studying the corrosion with biological influence in pure copper.Commercially produced copper (Cu, 99%) foils of approximately 120 μm thick exposed to a copper-tolerant marine bacterium, Oceanospirillum, and an abiotic culture medium were subsampled (1 cm × 1 cm) for this study along with unexposed control samples.

On-Surface Radical Oligomerisation: A New Approach to STM Tip-Induced Reactions

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gaolei Zhan ◽  
Younes Makoudi ◽  
Judicael Jeannoutot ◽  
Simon Lamare ◽  
Michel Féron ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sample Surface ◽  
Scanning Tunnelling Microscope ◽  
Transfer Event ◽  
New Approach ◽  
The Past ◽  
Organic Nanostructures ◽  
Scanning Tunnelling ◽  
New Strategy ◽  
Surface Fabrication ◽  
And Control

Over the past decade, on-surface fabrication of organic nanostructures has been widely investigated for the development of molecular electronic devices, nanomachines, and new materials. Here, we introduce a new strategy to obtain alkyl oligomers in a controlled manner using on-surface radical oligomerisations that are triggered by the electrons/holes between the sample surface and the tip of a scanning tunnelling microscope. The resulting radical-mediated mechanism is substantiated by a detailed theoretical study. This electron transfer event only occurs when <i>V</i><sub>s</sub> < -3 V or <i>V</i><sub>s</sub> > + 3 V and allows access to reactive radical species under exceptionally mild conditions. This transfer can effectively ‘switch on’ a sequence leading to formation of oligomers of defined size distribution due to the on-surface confinement of reactive species. Our approach enables new ways to initiate and control radical oligomerisations with tunnelling electrons, leading to molecularly precise nanofabrication.

Solid Lipid Nanoparticles: A Promising Drug Delivery Technology

2009 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 509-516
Author(s):  
S. Pragati ◽  
S. Kuldeep ◽  
S. Ashok ◽  
M. Satheesh
Keyword(s):  
Drug Delivery ◽  
Solid Lipid Nanoparticles ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Colloidal Particles ◽  
Scale Up ◽  
Lipid Nanoparticles ◽  
Scale Production ◽  
Research Activity ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Solid Lipid

One of the situations in the treatment of disease is the delivery of efficacious medication of appropriate concentration to the site of action in a controlled and continual manner. Nanoparticle represents an important particulate carrier system, developed accordingly. Nanoparticles are solid colloidal particles ranging in size from 1 to 1000 nm and composed of macromolecular material. Nanoparticles could be polymeric or lipidic (SLNs). Industry estimates suggest that approximately 40% of lipophilic drug candidates fail due to solubility and formulation stability issues, prompting significant research activity in advanced lipophile delivery technologies. Solid lipid nanoparticle technology represents a promising new approach to lipophile drug delivery. Solid lipid nanoparticles (SLNs) are important advancement in this area. The bioacceptable and biodegradable nature of SLNs makes them less toxic as compared to polymeric nanoparticles. Supplemented with small size which prolongs the circulation time in blood, feasible scale up for large scale production and absence of burst effect makes them interesting candidates for study. In this present review this new approach is discussed in terms of their preparation, advantages, characterization and special features.

Click Reactions in Chemistry of Triterpenes - Advances Towards Development of Potential Therapeutics

2018 ◽  
Vol 25 (5) ◽  
pp. 636-658 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan Pokorny ◽  
Lucie Borkova ◽  
Milan Urban
Keyword(s):  
Biological Activities ◽  
Synthetic Approach ◽  
Clinical Use ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Click Reactions ◽  
Drug Candidates ◽  
The Past ◽  
Low Toxicity ◽  
New Compounds ◽  
Potential Therapeutics

Triterpenoids are natural compounds with a large variety of biological activities such as anticancer, antiviral, antibacterial, antifungal, antiparazitic, antiinflammatory and others. Despite their low toxicity and simple availability from the natural resources, their clinical use is still severely limited by their higher IC50 and worse pharmacological properties than in the currently used therapeutics. This fact encouraged a number of researchers to develop new terpenic derivatives more suitable for the potential clinical use. This review summarizes a new approach to improve both, the activity and ADME-Tox properties by connecting active terpenes to another modifying molecules using click reactions. Within the past few years, this synthetic approach was well explored yielding a lot of great improvements of the parent compounds along with some less successful attempts. A large quantity of the new compounds presented here are superior in both activity and ADME-Tox properties to their parents. This review should serve the researchers who need to promote their hit triterpenic structures towards their clinical use and it is intended as a guide for the chemical synthesis of better drug candidates.

Transient Thermal Analysis for the Automotive Underhood and Underbody Components

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yu Hsien Wu ◽  
Kumar Srinivasan ◽  
Steven Patterson ◽  
Emmanuel Bot
Keyword(s):  
Thermal Analysis ◽  
Thermal Management ◽  
Dissimilar Materials ◽  
Thermal Mass ◽  
New Approach ◽  
The Past ◽  
Full Vehicle ◽  
Development Cycle ◽  
Transient Thermal ◽  
Steady State Solutions

The transient thermal simulation is an important part of thermal management development for new vehicle architectures. Different techniques have been studied in the past to address this coupled conduction/convection/radiation problem. In order to fully capture the transient thermal behavior of various underhood and underbody components, it is also necessary to accurately model the thermal mass of each part and the thermal links between dissimilar materials. The paper will outline a new, efficient methodology for this type of thermal analysis that shows acceptable results for complex full vehicle thermal analysis without sacrificing accuracy. The methodology is based on approximating the transient convective field with intermittent steady state solutions. The paper will present results from this new approach and compare them with fully transient simulation results as well as experimental data. The new methodology can be optimized to significantly reduce simulation run times without sacrificing accuracy and to be more practical for application in the vehicle development cycle.

A solution-focussed approach to time-limited counselling

1998 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. 105-112
Author(s):  
John Barletta
Keyword(s):  
Training Programs ◽  
Counsellor Training ◽  
New Approach ◽  
The Past ◽  
Helping Others ◽  
Daily Interactions ◽  
Interpersonal Helping ◽  
Major Emphasis

Counsellors routinely work in situations with students, parents and colleagues, where they need to use interpersonal helping and counselling skills. This function has been recently compounded by the emergence of multiple demands which place a new set of challenges on counsellors. Given that many counsellor training programs do not include time-limited counselling techniques, counsellors have traditionally drawn on more problem-focussed, longer-term theories when helping others. This has not always been appropriate or successful. Traditional counselling theories suggest that only highly trained counsellors should be involved in interpersonal helping, simultaneously placing a major emphasis on the clinical nature of problems. This paper presents a relatively new approach to counselling that does not delve intrusively into the past, and is not restricted to professional counsellors. Solution-focussed brief counselling techniques lend themselves well to the education context, and with appropriate attention, can be utilised by counsellors who will become more intentional and f acilitative in their daily interactions.

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