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Nowadays, scientific research deals with alternative solutions for creating non-traditional computing systems, such as neural network architectures where the stochastic nature and live dynamics of memristive models play a key role. The features of memristors make it possible to direct processing and analysis of both biosystems and systems driven by artificial intelligence, as well as develop plausible physical models of spiking neural networks with self-organization. This book deals with advanced applications illustrating these concepts, and delivers an important contribution for the achievement of the next generation of intelligent hybrid biostructures. Different modeling and simulation tools can deliver an alternative to funding the theoretical approach as well as practical implementation of memristive systems.

Like management of disease, management of pain is as old as the human race. When patients come to us with their pain, they present us with a wonderful opportunity: the chance to understand them, to understand how their pain is affecting their lives, the challenge of discovering what is causing their pain, and finally the opportunity to prescribe medications and lifestyle changes to help them gain relief from their pain. It is hoped that this book will provide the latest evidence-based updates on pain management in special circumstances and will serve as a ready reference for those embarking on pain management. Its intent is not to be a heavy book that can only be stored on a bookshelf, but a pocket-sized reference that can be carried, be easily navigated, and be available whenever a conceptual gap compromises pain physicians and their ability to treat their patients.

One of the most challenging scientific steps of the modern era has been the ability to replace, functionally or anatomically, the failing heart, and in December 2017 we celebrated the 50th anniversary of the world's first human heart transplant. Despite a long and troubled hystory, heart transplantation has dramatically expanded over time, and is currently the "gold standard" solution in terms of treatment of refractory end-stage heart failure. Thanks to the contributions by well-known experts in the field, the goal of this book is to provide a framework for successful transplant program development and management. The text reflects the global collective efforts of those who have dedicated countless energy to achieving a better understanding of the details that will ultimately yield better outcomes in terms of teamwork.

Structural health monitoring (SHM) has attracted more attention during the last few decades in many engineering fields with the main aim of avoiding structural disastrous events. This aim is achieved by using advanced sensing techniques and further data processing. SHM has experienced booming advancements during recent years due to the developments in sensing techniques. The reliable operation of current, sophisticated, man-made structures drives the development of incipient reliable damage diagnosis and assessment. This book aims to illustrate the background and applications of SHM from both sensing and processing approaches. Its main objective is to summarize the advantages and disadvantages of SHM methodologies and their applications, which may provide a new perspective in understanding SHM for readers from diverse engineering fields.

This book is intended for systems analysts, designers, developers, users, experts, as well as those involved in quality, risk, safety and security management, and, of course, scientists and students. The various sets of original and traditional probabilistic models and interesting results of their applications to the research of different systems are presented. The models are understandable and applicable for solving system engineering problems: to optimize system requirements, compare different processes, rationale technical decisions, carry out tests, adjust technological parameters, and predict and analyze quality and risks. The engineering decisions, scientifically proven by the proposed models and software tools, can provide purposeful, essential improvement of quality and mitigation of risks, and reduce the expense of operating systems. Models, methods, and software tools can also be used in education for system analysis and mathematical modeling on specializations, for example "systems engineering," "operations research," "enterprise management," "project management," "risk management," "quality of systems," "safety and security," "smart systems," "system of systems," etc.

The need for fresh water is increasing with the rapid growth of the world's population. In countries and regions with available water resources, it is necessary to ensure the health and safety of the water supply. However, in countries and regions with limited freshwater resources, priority is given to water supply plans and projects, among which the desalination strategy stands out. In the desalination process, membrane and thermal processes are used to obtain fresh water from salty water that is in abundant amounts in the sea. This book will outline valuable scientific contributions to the new desalination and water treatment technologies to obtain high quality water with low negative environmental impacts and cost. The editors would like to record their sincere thanks to the authors for their contributions.

Since the dawn of civilization, humans were selected, allocated and organized based on their skills and job criteria. Today, the role of Human Resources (HR) professionals goes beyond recruitment and management of human capital. Human Resource Planning for the 21st Century tackles the current trends of human resource management (HRM) and human resource planning while highlighting certain roles that HR professionals are involved in. Human Resource Planning for the 21st Century explores HRM systems and their roles within a corporate setting, elaborates on HR plans for crises, uncovers the effects of downsizing on company brand and looks at the possible impact of globalization on corporate social responsibility and HRM.

Changes in seabird populations are good indicators of large-scale and long-term change in marine ecosystems, and are important because of their global impacts on the marine environment. This book has six chapters that present a wide variety of global seabird-related issues, from India to Svalbard, Norway. It also gives a comprehensive history of the use and chemical content of guano and certification schemes in fisheries for seabird conservation in Argentina. With the knowledge available in this book we should know how best to protect seabirds, which need all our support to survive in changing environments and climates. We can all do our best to recycle plastic waste to reduce global plastic pollution, which has affected seabirds' physical state, food sources, and nesting areas.

Nanocrystals and nanostructures attract a special attention in the recent years due to their various properties and a wide range of applications such as in electrical, optical, optoelectronic, catalytic, medicine, chemo- and biosensing, and environmental protection fields. Although extensive research has been done in the field of nanocrystals, it is considered one growing research field. The main goal of this book is to present the current research activities in the field of nanocrystals and nanostructures covering issues regarding new synthesis methods, self-assembly strategies, characterization techniques, properties, and applications. Interesting reports regarding biomimetic modeling of the biomineralization processes and theoretical models to describe mechanisms of deformation twinning in nanocrystalline and ultrafine-grained materials have been presented. By structuring, approaching, and content, the work may be useful for specialist in the field of nano-/materials science, PhD students, students, and all those interested in this topic of high relevance.

DNA damage response (DDR) and lesion repair are vital processes ensuring genome integrity through various pathways depending mainly on the nature of DNA injury and cell cycle stage. DDR is finely regulated at many levels in co-ordination with other ongoing processes as is genome replication and cell cycle progression. Posttranslational modifications (PTMs), affecting both protein-protein and protein-DNA interactions, play a crucial role in finely tuning all processes involved in the restoration of genome lesions. Regarding damaged chromatin, PTMs serve in many cases as recruitment platforms for DNA repair mechanisms by facilitating binding sites or regulating interactions between involved proteins. Ubiquitination, the addition of ubiquitin moieties on a target protein, apart from controlling protein availability through degradation, is also involved, together with partner small ubiquitin-like modifier (SUMO), in controlling many pathways involved in DDR by modifying the structure-function relationship and thus interacting with partner molecules. The aim of this book is to cover a broad spectrum of current topics in ubiquitination and to a lesser extent SUMOylation involvement in regulation of DDR and repair in health and disease. This book is intended for pre- and postgraduate students and young scientists in this field. Members of both academic and research institutions, actively involved in the field, have described their current understanding of major mechanisms involved, highlighted key events, described ongoing applications in both developmental diseases and cancer and provided hints for future potential applications.

In a plural, complex, and diverse society, the school faces many challenges. Teachers must prepare their students for future professions, unthinkable nowadays, and the digital competences of teachers and students are one of the axes of an advanced school. This book presents a set of works rigorously elaborated by authors of different disciplines, on the role of information and communication technologies (ICT) in educational centers and on the use of digital resources in the initial and continuing teacher training to improve them, as well as in the teaching of different subjects to achieve a better academic and social performance of students. Besides, the reader will find some innovative experiences in physical education to achieve a better physical, emotional, and social performance of students.

Towards Malaria Elimination - A Leap Forward was started to mark the occasion for renewed commitment to end malaria transmission for good (the WHO's call for "Malaria Free World" by 2030). This book is dedicated for the benefit of researchers, scientists, program and policy managers, students and anyone interested in malaria and other mosquito-borne diseases with the goal of sharing recent information on success stories, innovative control approaches and challenges in different regions of the world. Some main issues that emerged included multidrug-resistant malaria and pandemic risk, vaccines, cross-border malaria, asymptomatic parasite reservoir, the threat of Plasmodium vivax and Plasmodium knowlesi, insecticide resistance in Anopheles vectors and outdoor malaria transmission. This book is one little step forward to bring together in 17 chapters the experiences of malaria-expert researchers from five continents to present updated information on disease epidemiology and control at the national/regional level, highlighting the constraints, challenges, accomplishments and prospects of malaria elimination.

Sea level rise and coastal erosion had drawn an increasing awareness recently as the repercussion of increase of sea level and coastal erosion would reshape the earth's system and induce a tremendous loss in ecological or economics cost. Governments are dedicated to meliorate the occurrence of these phenomena, or else all creations on the earth will suffer from the catastrophe. Global warming is one of the crucial factors resulting in the increase of sea level and coastal erosion. Remote sensing and geographic information systems (GIS) technologies are thoroughly adopted and applied to monitor the dynamic change of the nature system, such as coastal land use and land cover, sea level rise, and coastal infrastructure.

Clustering has emerged as one of the more fertile fields within data analytics, widely adopted by companies, research institutions, and educational entities as a tool to describe similar/different groups. The book Recent Applications in Data Clustering aims to provide an outlook of recent contributions to the vast clustering literature that offers useful insights within the context of modern applications for professionals, academics, and students. The book spans the domains of clustering in image analysis, lexical analysis of texts, replacement of missing values in data, temporal clustering in smart cities, comparison of artificial neural network variations, graph theoretical approaches, spectral clustering, multiview clustering, and model-based clustering in an R package. Applications of image, text, face recognition, speech (synthetic and simulated), and smart city datasets are presented.

Optical amplifiers are indispensable in long-haul communication systems operating in a relatively broad range of electromagnetic spectra. Various forms of optical amplifiers and their advancements have been extensively discussed in the literature emphasizing the relative merits and demerits of different types of configurations and/or designs and also usefulness in specific applications. The book - Optical Amplifiers: A Few Different Dimensions - aims at reporting developments in these devices in the recent years. The contributed chapters in this book encompass both theoretical and experimental results covering various aspects in the relevant research directions. This somehow makes the volume useful to both experts and novice researchers. Finally, the expectation remains of the contents to be of some merit for the R

Temperature is the most often-measured environmental quantity and scientists are continuously improving ways of sensing it. To present their work in the field of temperature sensing, researchers from distant parts of the world have joined their efforts and contributed their ideas according to their interest and engagement. Their articles will give you the opportunity to understand concepts and uses of fiber-optic sensing technology. The optical fiber Mach-Zehnder interferometer for temperature sensing is presented, as well as the optical fiber-distributed temperature sensor and fiber Bragg grating-based sensor. You can learn about tunable diode laser absorption spectroscopy and its various industrial applications. Last but not least, cutting temperature measurements during the machining of aluminum alloys provides us with an insight into the correlation between cutting conditions, mechanical strength of the aluminum alloy, and the cutting temperature measured using the tool-workpiece thermocouple system. The editors hope that the presented contributions will allow both professionals and readers not involved in the immediate field to understand and enjoy the topic.

The rock matrix and the fluids contained therein define the aquifer as a whole, the custodian of continuity of life on this planet Earth. Its sustainable development, equitable utilization, quality maintenance, and balanced discharge and recharge are the essential elements to ensure that the next generation receives the resource baton passed on by the current generation. Spanning across the political and regional frontiers, transboundary aquifers have the potential to provide a uniting platform to the participatory nations. The common good of water can be enhanced by synergized research, data and knowledge sharing, joint development ventures, and hazard mitigation. Covering the multifarious facets of aquifers, this book will form an essential and interesting reading for all stakeholders?researchers, engineers, academia, intelligentsia, and the common consumer.

This book reviews current research, including applications of matrices, spaces, and other characteristics. It discusses the application of matrices, which has become an area of great importance in many scientific fields. The theory of row/column determinants of a partial solution to the system of two-sided quaternion matrix equations is analyzed. It introduces a matrix that has the exponential function as one of its eigenvectors and realizes that this matrix represents finite difference derivation of vectors on a partition. Mixing problems and the corresponding associated matrices have different structures that deserve to be studied in depth. Special compound magic squares will be considered. Finally, a new type of regular matrix generated by Fibonacci numbers is introduced and we shall investigate its various topological properties.

This book has been written to represent the efficient applications of sustainability upon building designs. The book intends to illustrate various techniques of action of sustainability on building conceptions. The book is divided into four parts and eight chapters. Part I "Introduction into Target Theme" includes a chapter with title "Introductory Chapter." It makes an overview of the meaning and the target of sustainable building and sustainable building material. Part II "Sustainable Building Design, Process, and Management" discusses many forms and concepts of sustainable building and includes three chapters. Part III "Sustainable Building by Using Energy Efficiency in Building Design" includes one chapter. Part IV "Sustainability in Building Materials: Study Cases" includes three chapters.

Ozone has an important and irreplaceable function in nature and human society. It preserves life on the Earth by stratospheric ozone layer. On the other hand, the formation of ground-level ozone by reactions of hydrocarbons with nitrogen dioxide in the presence of sunlight has adverse effects on humans and animals as well as on various materials. This book concentrates on the protection of stratospheric ozone and prevention of ground-level ozone formation; applications of its strong oxidizing properties in the treatment of water, wastewater and sludge; odor and color removal; uses in medicine as a disinfectant; and various other ozone therapies. It also deals with catalytic ozonation in water treatment, control methods for ozone applications on biological systems, various areas of ozone use in dental care, follow-up therapy and prevention.

This book is about the novel aspects and future trends of the hyperspectral imaging in agriculture, food, and environment. The topics covered by this book are hyperspectral imaging and their applications in the nondestructive quality assessment of fruits and vegetables, hyperspectral imaging for assessing quality and safety of meat, multimode hyperspectral imaging for food quality and safety, models fitting to pattern recognition in hyperspectral images, sequential classification of hyperspectral images, graph construction for hyperspectral data unmixing, target visualization method to process hyperspectral image, and soil contamination mapping with hyperspectral imagery. This book is a general reference work for students, professional engineers, and readers with interest in the subject.

Tissue regeneration is a vast subject, with many different important aspects to consider. Regenerative medicine is a new branch of medicine that tries to change the course of chronic diseases and, in many cases, regenerates the organ systems that fail due to age, disease, damage, or genetic defects. The main purpose of this book is to point out the interest of some important topics of tissue regeneration and the progress in this field as well as the variety of different surgical fields and operations. This book includes 7 sections and 11 chapters that provide an overview of the essentials in tissue regeneration science and their potential applications in surgery. The authors of each chapter have given consolidated information on ground realities and attempted to provide a comprehensive knowledge of tissue engineering and regeneration. This book will be useful to researchers and students of biological and biomedical sciences (medical and veterinarian researchers).

The main scope of this study is to emphasize exergy efficiency in all fields of industry. The chapters collected in the book are contributed by invited researchers with a long-standing experience in different research areas. I hope that the material presented here is understandable to a wide audience, not only energy engineers but also scientists from various disciplines. The book contains seven chapters in three sections: (1) "General Information about Exergy," (2) "Exergy Applications," and (3) "Thermoeconomic Analysis." This book provides detailed and up-to-date evaluations in different areas written by academics with experience in their fields. It is anticipated that this book will make a scientific contribution to exergy workers, researchers, academics, PhD students, and other scientists in both the present and the future.