Importance-Performance Analysis of Guest Entertainment Technology Amenities in the Lodging Industry

An assessment of how hotel guests view in-room entertainment-technology amenities was conducted to compare the importance of these technologies to how they performed. In-room entertainment technology continues to evolve in the hotel industry. However, given the multitude of entertainment products available in the marketplace today, hoteliers have little understanding of guests’ expectations and of which in-room entertainment-technology amenities will drive guest satisfaction and increase loyalty to the hotel brand. Given that technology is integral to a hotel stay, this study seeks to evaluate the importance and performance of in-room entertainment-technology amenities. Findings indicate that free-to-guest television (FTG TV) and high-speed Internet access were the two most important inroom entertainment-technology amenities when it comes to the selection of a hotel for both leisure and business travelers. The Importance/Satisfaction Matrix presented in the current study showed that many of the in-room entertainment-technology amenities are currently a low priority for guests. Keywords: importance-performance analysis, hotel, in-room entertainment technologie

Grey matter involvement by focal cervical spinal cord lesions is associated with progressive multiple sclerosis

BACKGROUND: The in vivo relationship of spinal cord lesion features with clinical course and function in multiple sclerosis (MS) is poorly defined. OBJECTIVE: The objective of this paper is to investigate the associations of spinal cord lesion features on MRI with MS subgroup and disability. METHODS: We recruited 120 people: 25 clinically isolated syndrome, 35 relapsing-remitting (RR), 30 secondary progressive (SP), and 30 primary progressive (PP) MS. Disability was measured using the Expanded Disability Status Scale. We performed 3T axial cervical cord MRI, using 3D-fast-field-echo and phase-sensitive-inversion-recovery sequences. Both focal lesions and diffuse abnormalities were recorded. Focal lesions were classified according to the number of white matter (WM) columns involved and whether they extended to grey matter (GM). RESULTS: The proportion of patients with focal lesions involving at least two WM columns and extending to GM was higher in SPMS than in RRMS (p = 0.03) and PPMS (p = 0.015). Diffuse abnormalities were more common in both PPMS and SPMS, compared with RRMS (OR 6.1 (p = 0.002) and 5.7 (p = 0.003), respectively). The number of lesions per patient involving both the lateral column and extending to GM was independently associated with disability (p < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: More extensive focal cord lesions, extension of lesions to GM, and diffuse abnormalities are associated with progressive MS and disability

Selective Metal Cation Capture by Soft Anionic Metal-Organic Frameworks via Drastic Single-Crystal-to-Single-Crystal Transformations

In this paper we describe a novel framework for the discovery of the topical content of a data corpus, and the tracking of its complex structural changes across the temporal dimension. In contrast to previous work our model does not impose a prior on the rate at which documents are added to the corpus nor does it adopt the Markovian assumption which overly restricts the type of changes that the model can capture. Our key technical contribution is a framework based on (i) discretization of time into epochs, (ii) epoch-wise topic discovery using a hierarchical Dirichlet process-based model, and (iii) a temporal similarity graph which allows for the modelling of complex topic changes: emergence and disappearance, evolution, and splitting and merging. The power of the proposed framework is demonstrated on the medical literature corpus concerned with the autism spectrum disorder (ASD) - an increasingly important research subject of significant social and healthcare importance. In addition to the collected ASD literature corpus which we will make freely available, our contributions also include two free online tools we built as aids to ASD researchers. These can be used for semantically meaningful navigation and searching, as well as knowledge discovery from this large and rapidly growing corpus of literature.Comment: In Proc. Pacific-Asia Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining (PAKDD), 201

Spatial variability and changes of metabolite concentrations in the cortico-spinal tract in multiple sclerosis using coronal CSI

We characterized metabolic changes along the cortico-spinal tract (CST) in multiple sclerosis (MS) patients using a novel application of chemical shift imaging (CSI) and considering the spatial variation of metabolite levels. Thirteen relapsing-remitting (RR) and 13 primary-progressive (PP) MS patients and 16 controls underwent (1)H-MR CSI, which was applied to coronal-oblique scans to sample the entire CST. The concentrations of the main metabolites, i.e., N-acetyl-aspartate, myo-Inositol (Ins), choline containing compounds (Cho) and creatine and phosphocreatine (Cr), were calculated within voxels placed in regions where the CST is located, from cerebral peduncle to corona radiata. Differences in metabolite concentrations between groups and associations between metabolite concentrations and disability were investigated, allowing for the spatial variability of metabolite concentrations in the statistical model. RRMS patients showed higher CST Cho concentration than controls, and higher CST Ins concentration than PPMS, suggesting greater inflammation and glial proliferation in the RR than in the PP course. In RRMS, a significant, albeit modest, association between greater Ins concentration and greater disability suggested that gliosis may be relevant to disability. In PPMS, lower CST Cho and Cr concentrations correlated with greater disability, suggesting that in the progressive stage of the disease, inflammation declines and energy metabolism reduces. Attention to the spatial variation of metabolite concentrations made it possible to detect in patients a greater increase in Cr concentration towards the superior voxels as compared to controls and a stronger association between Cho and disability, suggesting that this step improves our ability to identify clinically relevant metabolic changes

The influence of ocean acidification on nitrogen regeneration and nitrous oxide production in the North-West European shelf sea

The assimilation and regeneration of dissolved inorganic nitrogen, and the concentration of N2O, was investigated at stations located in the NW European shelf sea during June/July 2011. These observational measurements within the photic zone demonstrated the simultaneous regeneration and assimilation of NH4+, NO2− and NO3−. NH4+ was assimilated at 1.82–49.12 nmol N L−1 h−1 and regenerated at 3.46–14.60 nmol N L−1 h−1; NO2− was assimilated at 0–2.08 nmol N L−1 h−1 and regenerated at 0.01–1.85 nmol N L−1 h−1; NO3− was assimilated at 0.67–18.75 nmol N L−1 h−1 and regenerated at 0.05–28.97 nmol N L−1 h−1. Observations implied that these processes were closely coupled at the regional scale and nitrogen recycling played an important role in sustaining phytoplankton growth during the summer. The [N2O], measured in water column profiles, was 10.13 ± 1.11 nmol L−1 and did not strongly diverge from atmospheric equilibrium indicating that sampled marine regions where neither a strong source nor sink of N2O to the atmosphere. Multivariate analysis of data describing water column biogeochemistry and its links to N-cycling activity failed to explain the observed variance in rates of N-regeneration and N-assimilation, possibly due to the limited number of process rate observations. In the surface waters of 5 further stations, Ocean Acidification (OA) bioassay experiments were conducted to investigate the response of NH4+ oxidising and regenerating organisms to simulated OA conditions, including the implications for [N2O]. Multivariate analysis was undertaken which considered the complete bioassay dataset of measured variables describing changes in N-regeneration rate, [N2O] and the biogeochemical composition of seawater. While anticipating biogeochemical differences between locations, we aimed to test the hypothesis that the underlying mechanism through which pelagic N-regeneration responded to simulated OA conditions was independent of location and that a mechanistic understanding of how NH4+ oxidation, NH4+ regeneration and N2O production responded to OA could be developed. Results indicated that N-regeneration process responses to OA treatments were location specific; no mechanistic understanding of how N-regeneration processes respond to OA in the surface ocean of the NW European shelf sea could be developed

Microclustering: When the Cluster Sizes Grow Sublinearly with the Size of the Data Set

Most generative models for clustering implicitly assume that the number of data points in each cluster grows linearly with the total number of data points. Finite mixture models, Dirichlet process mixture models, and Pitman--Yor process mixture models make this assumption, as do all other infinitely exchangeable clustering models. However, for some tasks, this assumption is undesirable. For example, when performing entity resolution, the size of each cluster is often unrelated to the size of the data set. Consequently, each cluster contains a negligible fraction of the total number of data points. Such tasks therefore require models that yield clusters whose sizes grow sublinearly with the size of the data set. We address this requirement by defining the \emph{microclustering property} and introducing a new model that exhibits this property. We compare this model to several commonly used clustering models by checking model fit using real and simulated data sets

ADvanced IMage Algebra (ADIMA): a novel method for depicting multiple sclerosis lesion heterogeneity, as demonstrated by quantitative MRI.

There are modest correlations between multiple sclerosis (MS) disability and white matter lesion (WML) volumes, as measured by T2-weighted (T2w) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans (T2-WML). This may partly reflect pathological heterogeneity in WMLs, which is not apparent on T2w scans

Polarization of coalitions in an agent-based model of political discourse

Political discourse is the verbal interaction between political actors in a policy domain. This article explains the formation of polarized advocacy or discourse coalitions in this complex phenomenon by presenting a dynamic, stochastic, and discrete agent-based model based on graph theory and local optimization. In a series of thought experiments, actors compute their utility of contributing a specific statement to the discourse by following ideological criteria, preferential attachment, agenda-setting strategies, governmental coherence, or other mechanisms. The evolving macro-level discourse is represented as a dynamic network and evaluated against arguments from the literature on the policy process. A simple combination of four theoretical mechanisms is already able to produce artificial policy debates with theoretically plausible properties. Any sufficiently realistic configuration must entail innovative and path-dependent elements as well as a blend of exogenous preferences and endogenous opinion formation mechanisms

Mathematical modelling long-term effects of replacing Prevnar7 with Prevnar13 on invasive pneumococcal diseases in England and Wales

England and Wales recently replaced the 7-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV7) with its 13-valent equivalent (PCV13), partly based on projections from mathematical models of the long-term impact of such a switch compared to ceasing pneumococcal conjugate vaccination altogether. A compartmental deterministic model was used to estimate parameters governing transmission of infection and competition between different groups of pneumococcal serotypes prior to the introduction of PCV13. The best-fitting parameters were used in an individual based model to describe pneumococcal transmission dynamics and effects of various options for the vaccination programme change in England and Wales. A number of scenarios were conducted using (i) different assumptions about the number of invasive pneumococcal disease cases adjusted for the increasing trend in disease incidence prior to PCV7 introduction in England and Wales, and (ii) a range of values representing serotype replacement induced by vaccination of the additional six serotypes in PCV13. Most of the scenarios considered suggest that ceasing pneumococcal conjugate vaccine use would cause an increase in invasive pneumococcal disease incidence, while replacing PCV7 with PCV13 would cause an overall decrease. However, the size of this reduction largely depends on the level of competition induced by the additional serotypes in PCV13. The model estimates that over 20 years of PCV13 vaccination, around 5000–62000 IPD cases could be prevented compared to stopping pneumococcal conjugate vaccination altogether. Despite inevitable uncertainty around serotype replacement effects following introduction of PCV13, the model suggests a reduction in overall invasive pneumococcal disease incidence in all cases. Our results provide useful evidence on the benefits of PCV13 to countries replacing or considering replacing PCV7 with PCV13, as well as data that can be used to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of such a switch