Improving access to and reuse of research results, publications and data for scientific purposes – Study to evaluate the effects of the EU copyright framework on research and the effects of potential interventions and to identify and present relevant provisions for research in EU data and digital legislation, with a focus on rights and obligations (Publications Office of the European Union)

This report supports ERA Policy Agenda 2022-2024, aiming at an EU framework for copyright and data fit for research. It analyses barriers to accessing and reusing publicly funded research, evaluating EU copyright and data legislation, along with regulatory frameworks. Presented measures aim to enhance the current framework, aligning it with scientific research and open data principles. It offers a comprehensive overview of the EU's research and innovation legal landscape, providing insights for policymakers, researchers, and research organisations

Creating change in government to address the social determinants of health: how can efforts be improved?

Background - The evidence base for the impact of social determinants of health has been strengthened considerably in the last decade. Increasingly, the public health field is using this as a foundation for arguments and actions to change government policies. The Health in All Policies (HiAP) approach, alongside recommendations from the 2010 Marmot Review into health inequalities in the UK (which we refer to as the ‘Fairness Agenda’), go beyond advocating for the redesign of individual policies, to shaping the government structures and processes that facilitate the implementation of these policies. In doing so, public health is drawing on recent trends in public policy towards ‘joined up government’, where greater integration is sought between government departments, agencies and actors outside of government. Methods - In this paper we provide a meta-synthesis of the empirical public policy research into joined up government, drawing out characteristics associated with successful joined up initiatives. - We use this thematic synthesis as a basis for comparing and contrasting emerging public health interventions concerned with joined-up action across government. Results - We find that HiAP and the Fairness Agenda exhibit some of the characteristics associated with successful joined up initiatives, however they also utilise ‘change instruments’ that have been found to be ineffective. Moreover, we find that – like many joined up initiatives – there is room for improvement in the alignment between the goals of the interventions and their design. Conclusion - Drawing on public policy studies, we recommend a number of strategies to increase the efficacy of current interventions. More broadly, we argue that up-stream interventions need to be ‘fit-for-purpose’, and cannot be easily replicated from one context to the next

Scientific visualisation and the exploratory analysis of area data

Area data are commonly used in many social science disciplines, but have a number of characteristics which have necessitated the development of specialist tools for analysis and display. In this paper we discuss the application to area data of exploratory analysis methods and visualisation techniques, and in particular the growing number of software packages which provide visualisation methods to support exploratory spatial data analysis (ESDA). In the exploratory analysis of nonspatial data, the data are often considered to consist of rough and smooth elements. If this idea is extended to spatial data, it can be argued that a software system for ESDA should have facilities for exploring the rough and smooth elements of both the spatial and nonspatial elements of the data. Visualisation techniques can assist with this by providing a wide range of graphical displays, in a highly interactive environment. Conceptual frameworks are developed for both ESDA and scientific visualisation, and four software packages that link graphical and cartographical views of the data are reviewed against these requirements. The packages fall into two broad groups. In one, the emphasis is on highly interactive graphics, but with few numerical methods or tools for exploring the spatial properties of the data. In the other, specialist spatial tools are provided, but the graphical tools are less flexible. It is argued that a combination of both approaches would provide a package which more fully satisfied the requirements of ESDA. The need to assess the effectiveness of different visualisation techniques in supporting and encouraging the exploratory analysis of spatial data is noted.

DIELECTRIC-BREAKDOWN AND RELIABILITY OF MOS MICROSTRUCTURES - TRADITIONAL CHARACTERIZATION AND LOW-FREQUENCY NOISE MEASUREMENTS

Four different types of ultra-thin oxide MOS structures have been analyzed to investigate the dielectric breakdown, by using a combination of techniques: time-zero breakdown, time-dependent breakdown and low-frequency noise measurements. The experiments have shown that different devices presenting lifetime values depending on the fabrication technology are all affected, before breakdown, by sharp fluctuations of the current tunnelling through the oxide in both its components: the main and the substrate current. These new results confirm those previously obtained with a set of homogeneous devices, and show that the presence of current fluctuations is a general experimental evidence in the occurrence of dielectric breakdown. The main physical models proposed in the past to explain the origin of substrate current and breakdown are then briefly reviewed. Thereafter, a comparative analysis showing how these mechanisms could justify the experimental data coming from the noise measurements is presented. The results of this analysis seem to rule out the band-to-band impact ionization mechanism as responsible for the substrate current and breakdown

Copyright flexibilities: mapping and comparative assessment of EU and national sources

This report illustrates and analyses the results of the research activities conducted in the framework of reCreating Europe’s Task 2.1. From January 2020 to June 2022, the task performed an unprecedented, two-layer, comparative, EU and cross-national mapping and assessment of sources impacting on copyright flexibilities and access to culture, focusing on (a) statutes, court decisions, governmental policies, practices and schemes in the field of copyright law, DSM, and broader cultural policies, and (b) private ordering sources, such as standardized license agreements (EULAs) and terms of use from online platforms, selected to represent a wide array of cultural and creative goods and services. The study built on a rich state of the art, and particularly on previous partial attempts to systematize the matter. The research relied both on in-house desk mapping of available sources, and on a wide network of national experts from academia and private practice, who contributed to the study by answering to two rounds of questionnaires and participating at a mid-term workshop which discussed interim results. The mapping produced a wealth of data and findings, which have been systematized and structured in an internal dataset and will be made available to the public on the user-friendly website www.copyrightflexibilities.eu by the end of the project. This report provides an overview and commentary on the datasets, drawing descriptive conclusions that constitutes the backbone of the policy recommendations issued in September 2022. The report is structured in 6 parts. The introductory sections (1 and 2) sketch the state of the art underlying this study, summarize its research questions, objectives and expected outcomes, and outline the general structure and workflow of the research, illustrating its general and sector-specific methodology and selection of sources. Section 3 offers a detailed overview of the mapping of public regulatory sources, focusing first on the EU and then on each of the 27 Member States. Section 4 provides a comparative analysis and assessment of the results, articulated around twelve categories of uses/flexibilities. Section 5 reports on the study of the state of copyright flexibilities in online platforms’ EULAs, assessing their compliance with the CDSM Directive. Section 6 concludes, commenting on the descriptive findings of the research and sketching the road ahead

The demographic characteristics of foster carers in the UK: motivations, barriers and messages for recruitment and retention

This review examines existing research on what motivates individuals and families to become foster carers and the barriers they identify

Polyp measurement and size categorisation by CT colonography: effect of observer experience in a multi-centre setting

The extent measurement error on CT colonography influences polyp categorisation according to established management guidelines is studied using twenty-eight observers of varying experience to classify polyps seen at CT colonography as either 'medium' maximal diameter 6-9 mm) or 'large' (maximal diameter 10 mm or larger). Comparison was then made with the reference diameter obtained in each patient via colonoscopy. The Bland-Altman method was used to assess agreement between observer measurements and colonoscopy, and differences in measurement and categorisation was assessed using Kruskal-Wallis and Chi-squared test statistics respectively. Observer measurements on average underestimated the diameter of polyps when compared to the reference value, by approximately 2- 3 mm, irrespective of observer experience. Ninety-five percent limits of agreement were relatively wide for all observer groups, and had sufficient span to encompass different size categories for polyps. There were 167 polyp observations and 135 (81%) were correctly categorised. Of the 32 observations that were miscategorised, 5 (16%) were overestimations and 27 (84%) were underestimations (i.e. large polyps misclassified as medium). Caution should be exercised for polyps whose colonographic diameter is below but close to the 1-cm boundary threshold in order to avoid potential miscategorisation of advanced adenomas