Performance Feedback A Common Thread in the Process to Provide Optimal Heart Failure Care⁎⁎Editorials published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology reflect the views of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of JACC or the American College of Cardiology.

Current software community players like academy and industry have been changing the traditional paradigms of software engineering towards context-awareness and distributed computing. Nowadays, service-oriented computing and context-aware computing are two emerging paradigms that are changing the way of designing, developing, providing and consuming software services. Whilst service-oriented computing is based on service-oriented architectures and it is focused on modelling functionality and providing flexible software services, context-aware computing is based on the context life cycle and it allows processing and changing the behaviour of such services given certain context information. The synergy between both paradigms is a core research topic in ubiquitous and pervasive computing widely applied to the Internet of Things and Smart Cities.In the present PhD thesis, we exploit this synergy by focusing on context-aware computing from the perspective of service-oriented computing, which is also known as context-aware service-oriented computing. Such research topic involves the management of context within different essential phases of the context life cycle that show how the context data moves from phase to phase in software services within the paradigm of the service-oriented computing. Hence, the work done in this thesis involves different components and processes that have the aim to accomplish the context life cycle, namely the acquisition, modelling, reasoning and dissemination of the context in service-oriented computing. Particularly, we make an effort to provide both a context ontology for context modelling, context reasoning and high-level context dissemination, and a context-aware monitoring architecture for context acquisition and low-level context dissemination.Such work of the thesis has been motivated for contributing in the solution of different issues mainly identified in the phases of context modelling and context acquisition that are a strong basis of the context life cycle. Firstly, in the context modelling we mainly identified the proliferation of several context models presenting some problems about: reusability, extensibility and adaptation. Secondly, in the context acquisition we mainly identified that existing monitoring infrastructures are not prepared to support the constant changes in their context and the context of other entities, including the services that they are supervising which provoke the provisioning of context data that is not reliable. In summary, this thesis explores three big research questions: 1) What context data to acquire and to model? This involves the study of the current state of the art of context models, specifically: which are these proposals and how are they related, what are their structural characteristics, what context information is the most addressed, and what are their most consolidated definitions. 2) How to model context data? This involves the development of a three-level context ontology with the aim of improving the reusability, extensibility and adaptation capabilities of existing context models. 3) How to acquire context data? This involves the development of a context-aware monitoring architecture that can be easily configured, adapted or evolved according to the constant changes of the context.The context model and the architecture proposed in this PhD thesis are validated through different scenarios and use cases, highlighting their integration in SUPERSEDE (www.supersede.eu), a European project in the H2020 program for fulfilling some requirements of data acquisition and management demonstrating that the context life cycle is supported.Els actors actuals de la comunitat de software, com l'acadèmia o la indústria, han anat canviant els paradigmes tradicionals de l'enginyeria de software cap a la sensibilitat al context i la computació distribuïda. Avui dia, la computació orientada a serveis i la computació conscient del context són dos paradigmes emergents que estan canviant la forma de dissenyar, desenvolupar, proporcionar i consumir serveis de software. Mentre que la computació orientada a serveis es basa en arquitectures orientades a serveis i se centra en el modelatge de la funcionalitat i la prestació de serveis de software flexibles, la computació sensible al context es basa en el cicle de vida del context i permet el processament i canviar el comportament d'aquest tipus de serveis donada una determinada informació del context. La sinergia entre els dos paradigmes és un tema central de recerca a la computació ubiqua i omnipresent, àmpliament aplicada a la Internet de les coses i les ciutats intel·ligents. En la present tesi doctoral explotem aquesta sinèrgia, centrant-se en la computació sensible al context des de la perspectiva de la computació orientada a serveis, que també es coneix com computació orientada a serveis sensibles al context. Tal tema de recerca implica la gestió de contexts en diferents fases essencials del cicle de vida del context que mostren com les dades de context es mouen d'una fase a l’altra en serveis de software dins del paradigma de la computació orientada a serveis. Per tant, el treball realitzat en aquesta tesi consisteix en diferents components i processos que tenen l'objectiu d'aconseguir el cicle de vida del context, és a dir, l'adquisició, el modelatge, el raonament i la difusió del context en computació orientada a serveis. En particular, fem un esforç per proporcionar tant una ontologia de context per a la modelització, raonament i difusió del context d'alt nivell, i una arquitectura de monitorització sensible al context per a l'adquisició i difusió del context de baix nivell. Aquest treball de tesi ha estat motivat per contribuir a la solució dels diferents problemes identificats principalment en les fases de modelatge de context i adquisició de context que són una base sòlida del cicle de vida del context. En primer lloc, en el modelatge de context es van identificar principalment la proliferació de diversos models de context que presenten alguns problemes sobre: reutilització, l'extensibilitat i l'adaptació. En segon lloc, en l'adquisició del context identifiquem principalment que les infraestructures de monitorització existents no estan preparats per suportar els canvis constants en el seu context i el context d'altres entitats, incloent-hi els serveis que s'estan supervisant, que provoquen un aprovisionament de dades de context que no és fiable. En resum, aquesta tesi explora tres grans preguntes de recerca: 1) Quines dades de context cal adquirir i modelar? Això implica l'estudi de l'estat actual de la tècnica dels models de context, en concret: ¿quines són aquestes propostes i com es relacionen, quines són les seves característiques estructurals, quina informació de context és la més adreçada, i quines són les seves definicions més consolidades. 2) Com modelar les dades de context? Això implica el desenvolupament d'una ontologia de context de tres nivells amb l'objectiu de millorar les capacitats de reutilització, extensibilitat i adaptació dels models de context existents. 3) Com adquirir dades de context? Això implica el desenvolupament d'una arquitectura de monitorització sensible al context que pot ser fàcilment configurat o adaptat d'acord amb els canvis del context. El model de context i l'arquitectura proposada en aquesta tesi doctoral es validen a través de diferents escenaris i casos d'ús, destacant la seva integració en SUPERSEDE, un projecte europeu en el programa H2020 per al compliment d'alguns requisits d'adquisició i gestió de dades que demostra que es dóna suport al cicle de vida del context

The Shanghai News (1950-1952) : external propaganda and New Democracy in early 1950s Shanghai

The Shanghai News was the first English-language newspaper produced in the People’s Republic of China. This idiosyncratic publication was a product of “New Democracy”: the defining political paradigm in the PRC between the communist revolution of 1949 and 1953. New Democracy entailed uniting a cross-class coalition in the name of national reconstruction. Historians normally focus on the ways New Democracy was undermined or dismiss it as a “bogus” façade for Communist authoritarianism. In this article the history of The Shanghai News is used to reappraise the real-world impacts of New Democratic ideals, divorced from teleological narratives. The News was set up on New Democratic principles, deploying a commercial business model and employing experienced personnel who had worked for the Guomindang regime. The News’s short history has much to teach us too about how the promise of New Democracy was compromised by economic malaise, mass movements and China’s international isolation

Evolutionary relationships between Rhynchosporium lolii sp. nov. and other Rhynchosporium species on grass.

Copyright: 2013 King et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are creditedThe fungal genus Rhynchosporium (causative agent of leaf blotch) contains several host-specialised species, including R. commune (colonising barley and brome-grass), R. agropyri (couch-grass), R. secalis (rye and triticale) and the more distantly related R. orthosporum (cocksfoot). This study used molecular fingerprinting, multilocus DNA sequence data, conidial morphology, host range tests and scanning electron microscopy to investigate the relationship between Rhynchosporium species on ryegrasses, both economically important forage grasses and common wild grasses in many cereal growing areas, and other plant species. Two different types of Rhynchosporium were found on ryegrasses in the UK. Firstly, there were isolates of R. commune that were pathogenic to both barley and Italian ryegrass. Secondly, there were isolates of a new species, here named R. lolii, that were pathogenic only to ryegrass species. R. lolii was most closely related to R. orthosporum, but exhibited clear molecular, morphological and host range differences. The species was estimated to have diverged from R. orthosporum ca. 5735 years before the present. The colonisation strategy of all of the different Rhynchosporium species involved extensive hyphal growth in the sub-cuticular regions of the leaves. Finally, new species-specific PCR diagnostic tests were developed that could distinguish between these five closely related Rhynchosporium species.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio

Detection of Aβ plaque-associated astrogliosis in Alzheimer’s disease brain by spectroscopic imaging and immunohistochemistry

Recent work using micro-Fourier transform infrared (μFTIR) imaging has revealed that a lipid-rich layer surrounds many plaques in post-mortem Alzheimer’s brain. However, the origin of this lipid layer is not known, nor is its role in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Here, we studied the biochemistry of plaques in situ using a model of AD. We combined FTIR, Raman and immunofluorescence images, showing that astrocyte processes co-localise with the lipid-ring surrounding many plaques. We used μFTIR imaging to rapidly measure chemical signatures of plaques over large fields of view, and selected plaques for higher resolution analysis with Raman. Raman maps showed similar lipid-rings and dense protein cores as in FTIR images, but also revealed cell bodies. We confirmed the presence of plaques using amylo-glo staining, and measured astrocytes using immunohistochemistry, revealing astrocyte colocalisation with lipid-rings. This work is important because it correlates biochemically changes surrounding the plaque with the biological process of astrogliosis

Ordering the City : Revolution, Modernity and Road Renaming in Shanghai, 1949–1966

Between 1949 and 1966, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)-led municipal government of Shanghai renamed more than one in seven of the city’s roads. Renaming was an important marker of revolutionary change in China’s largest and most foreign-influenced city. Road renaming in socialist China has been commonly understood to have been extensive. This article argues, however, that the nature and extent of renaming in socialist Shanghai was less dramatic than has been assumed. It demonstrates that renaming was not simply an iconoclastic process, but rather involved the pragmatic weighing of symbolic change against potential disruption. Further, it contends that renaming was driven by a desire to order the city, in line with the CCP’s modernist worldview

‘Decolonisation’ in China, 1949-1959

In this chapter Jonathan Howlett adopts perspectives and models from wider literatures on decolonisation to explore the Chinese Communist Party’s elimination of the British semi-colonial presence from China after the revolution of 1949 and to place it within its global context. He focuses in particular on the CCP’s attempts to address the economic, cultural and human legacies of semi-colonialism within a comparative context. In so doing, the author seeks to complicate our understanding of the Sino-British relationship by exploring one of its most dramatic phases and to further illuminate this neglected period in Chinese history

Creating a new Shanghai : the end of the British presence in China (1949-57)

This thesis provides a fundamental reassessment of the limits of the power of the Chinese Communist Party in the years following its takeover of China in 1949 through an examination of its policies towards eliminating British businesses from Shanghai. In the early years of the People's Republic of China, the Party sought to eliminate all foreign influence. It wanted to reset completely China's foreign relations following what was portrayed as a century of 'national humiliation'. It has previously been assumed that the CCP went about this task in a pre-planned and thoroughly ruthless manner, and that their policy making was primarily motivated by their anti-imperialist sentiments. This thesis argues that the CCP decided to take a long-term and pragmatic approach in order to prevent economic instability. Revolutionary transformative goals were compromised in order to preserve short-term stability. Rather than having a grand plan for the elimination of British businesses, the CCP's policy was often contingent and provisional. Policies directed at Chinese businesses were often adapted to pressure British businesses. The CCP lacked skills, knowledge, resources and manpower. This thesis contributes to a growing literature on China in the early 1950s by suggesting that the CCP was not strong, it was in fact weak, but that its great strength lay in its awareness of its own weaknesses and in its ability to work around them. 1.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Subsystem Structures, Shifting Mandates and Policy Capacity: Assessing Canada’s Ability to Adapt to Climate Change

Adapting to climate change requires governments to design and implement policies capable of dealing with long-term problems. This poses significant policy design and implementation challenges since policies must also be multilevel and multi-sectoral in nature given the cross-sectoral and international character of climate change issues. Responsive policy-making on climate change issues thus requires both sophisticated policy analysis as well as an institutional structure which allows problems to be dealt with in a way which corresponds with changing organizational mandates, resources and network structures. Designing such policies requires matching policy analytical resources in relevant government departments and agencies with new and expanded mandates, a process which is not always necessarily successful. This introductory article presents the framework utilized in a collaborative study of climate change adaptation capacity in four Canadian policy sectors (agriculture, finance, infrastructure, and transportation) and one US case (the energy sector in Colorado). The study framework and subsequent analysis examine policy from a three-level perspective including (1) the macro nature of the subsystem involved, (2) the meso level of the organization or leadagency in charge of the issue and (3) the micro level nature of policy work being undertaken in each sector

Re-visiting Meltsner: Policy Advice Systems and the Multi-Dimensional Nature of Professional Policy Analysis

10.2139/ssrn.15462511-2