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This book provides an engaging introduction to economics through a literary lens. Drawing on writers such as James Joyce, George Eliot, Edith Wharton, Jane Austen, Charlotte Bronte, and Elizabeth Gaskell, each chapter is framed around a quote from a classic text of English literature that helps tease out a key economic concept and demonstrate its broader relevance. While rigorous, the book is virtually free of technical language and aims to give a concise overview of all the main topics in contemporary economics ¿ from supply and demand, pricing, labour markets, externalities, and game theory, to environmental and behavioural economics, fiscal policy and business cycles, modern approaches to macroeconomics and economic growth.Interweaving literary examples with easy-to-follow explanations and reflective tasks, the book takes an interdisciplinary approach to economics and literature that requires no prior knowledge in either camp, but which illuminates patterns of real-world behaviour observed by novelists and economists alike. This concise and accessible book will be a valuable tool for students embarking on introductory economics courses, economics modules in business studies, and interdisciplinary courses more broadly, as well as the general reader interested in building their knowledge of economics.

This volume constitutes the proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Variable Neighborhood Search, ICVNS 2023, held in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, in October 2022.The 11 full papers presented in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 29 submissions. The papers describe recent advances in methods and applications of variable neighborhood search.

This book discusses the cultural importance of spirits, what spirits want, and how humans interact with them, using examples from around the world and through time. Examples range from the vengeful spirits of the Zulu that cast lightning bolts from clear skies to punish wrongdoers, to the benevolent Puebloan Kachina that encourage prosperity, safety, and rain in the arid American Southwest. The case studies illustrate how humans seek to cooperate (or counteract) spirits to heal the physical and spiritual ailments of their people, to divine the truth, or to gain resources. Building from their cross-cultural analyses, the authors further discuss how our physiology and psychology impact our interaction with the spirits. Readers will come away with an appreciation of the beauty and power of the spirits that continue to shape the lives of people around the world.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 28th Argentine Congress on Computer Science, CACIC 2022, held in La Rioja, Argentina, during October 3¿6, 2022. The 20 full papers included in this book were carefully reviewed and selected from 184 submissions. They were organized in topical sections as follows: Agents and Systems; Technology Applied to Education; Graphic Computation, Images and Visualization; Software Engineering; Databases and Data Mining; Hardware Architectures, Networks, and Operating Systems; Innovation in Software Systems; Signal Processing and Real-Time Systems; Innovation in Computer Science Education; and Digital Goverance and Smart Cities.

This book constitutes the proceedings of the 44th International Conference on Application and Theory of Petri Nets and Concurrency, PETRI NETS 2023, which took place in Lisbon, Portugal, in June 2023. The 21 full papers included in this book were carefully reviewed and selected from 47 submissions. They were organized in topical sections as follows: Process mining; semantics; tools; verification; timed models; model transformation. The book also includes two invited talks in full paper length.

The book contains a selection of peer-reviewed papers from the 2022 conferences, which took place at the Universiti Kuala Lumpur, Malaysian Spanish Institute (UniKL MSI), Kedah, Malaysia. This book contains twenty-two papers written by researchers participating in the conferences. Topics covered in this book include composite materials, thermodynamics, vibration, dynamics of structures, manufacturing processes, computer-aided manufacturing, CFD analysis, design and optimization of devices, and procedures. The topics are commonly encountered in industries and become an interest in the academic world. The learning of engineering technology¿s curricular across universities is now an essential topic covered in various higher learning institutions. Therefore, it is hoped that this book serves as an excellent reference for researchers and graduate students working with/on multidisciplinary engineering technology.

This book presents a collection of chapters on Covid-19 topics, with focus on the metabolomics and diagnosis. The chapters report on diagnostic tests for detection of SARC-CoV-2 virus and related proteins as well as post-Covid omics. This book covers Fourier-Transform Infrared spectroscopy and spectromicroscopy applied to Covid-19 studies and Carbon Nanomaterials as Covid-19 Electrochemical sensors. Moreover, the reader will find content on 3D printing for virus diagnosis, as well as organ-on-a-chip models for viral infection proteomics interaction.

This book features the second volume of the proceedings of the 9th International Conference of the International Association of Cultural and Digital Tourism (IACuDiT). Held at the Syros Island in Greece in September 2022, the conference's lead theme was ¿Tourism, Travel, and Hospitality in a Smart and Sustainable World¿.With a full appreciation of the contributions made by numerous writers toward the progress in tourism research, this book presents a critical academic discourse on sustainable practices in a smart tourism context, stimulating future debates and advancing knowledge and understanding in this critical area of knowledge. It also puts emphasis on the knowledge economy and smart destinations notion. It enacts new modes of tourism management and development and presents chapters on cultural heritage tourism, emerging technologies and tourism consumer behaviour, such as tourism education, location-based services, Internet of Things, smart cities, mobile services, gamification, digital collections and the virtual visitor, social media, social networking, and augmented reality.

This book introduces impact-driven research paths in computer science, information systems and cybersecurity with practical insights, effective instructions, and examples. The book takes the students through the full cycle of research until the point of submission and evaluation. The book begins by providing postgraduate research students with the foundational concepts and techniques to simplify the complexities associated with choosing topics in the computer science (CS), information systems (IS) and cybersecurity (CY) research domains. The authors furnish readers with fundamentals that facilitate active quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods research enquiries. The content offers important perspectives on how to think about deepening research in CS, IS and CY, noting that these subjects can be studied from computational sciences, engineering sciences, health sciences, social sciences, or interdisciplinary perspectives. This unique and contemporary book aims to benefit researchers, graduate students and engineers in the fields of computer science, information systems and cybersecurity in particular, in addition to other engineering and technology disciplines.

This book offers a history of the instrumentation used to materialize the early thought experiments devised in the Einstein-Bohr disputes over the foundations of quantum mechanics. It shows how the second world war and cold war fostered the development of materials, instruments, and systems that made it possible to create, manipulate, and detect single quantum systems, thus creating the material conditions for experiments in foundations of quantum mechanics and for a broad spectrum of experimental inquiries on the structure and properties of matter which underlay the creation of new research fields such as quantum optics, quantum information, and atomic, molecular, and optical physics. Discussing research and development performed in diverse contexts, this book reveals how physicists carried instruments, and the knowledge they embodied, through disciplinary and geographic frontiers to probe entanglement, a most intriguing feature of the quantum world.

This book highlights the recent research on hybrid intelligent systems and their various practical applications. It presents 97 selected papers from the 22nd International Conference on Hybrid Intelligent Systems (HIS 2022) and 26 papers from the 18th International Conference on Information Assurance and Security, which was held online, from 13 to 15 December 2022. A premier conference in the field of artificial intelligence and machine learning applications, HIS¿IAS 2022, brought together researchers, engineers and practitioners whose work involves intelligent systems, network security and their applications in industry. Including contributions by authors from over 35 countries, the book offers a valuable reference guide for all researchers, students and practitioners in the fields of Computer Science and Engineering.

This book analyzes China's transformative political power in today's world while simultaneously addressing global issues and the reformation of world institutions. China has become known as the world's first factory and trading power, but more knowledge on China's rise is necessary to understand the world of today and the future. The main question is where China's rise is headed and how this affects the increasingly connected world that faces problems that no state can effectively address on its own. This book analyzes both sides of the coin, that is, the problems of a world scale and the change of the world political order. China is among the major actors for global issues such as mitigating climate warming, controlling weapons of mass destruction, combating economic inequality and underdevelopment, and improving health for all. In the current setting of the new world order, all countries and especially world powers develop a general blueprint for the future, as cultural andmaterial conditions of the present world are very different from the past. Under such conditions, China faces a review of its bilateral and regional strategies, as well as its position and actions in world institutions that have the mission of forming policy responses to issues of a global scale.This book, therefore, provides insight into China's view of world problems and the future world order. It is a must-read for everybody interested in a better understanding of China's role in today's world and the global power shift.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the Third EAI International Conference on IoT and Big Data Technologies for Health Care, IotCARE 2022, which took place virtually during December 12-13, 2022.The 23 papers included in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 67 submissions. The papers are present newest results in big data technologies for e-health and for e-care. The papers are organized in the following topical sections: big data technologies for e-health; and big data technologies for e-care.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 16th International Conference on Artificial General Intelligence, AGI 2023, held in Stockholm, Sweden in June 2023. The 35 full papers and one short paper presented in this book were carefully reviewed and selected from 72 submissions. The papers cover topics from foundations of AGI, to AGI approaches and AGI ethics, to the roles of systems biology, goal generation, and learning systems, and so much more.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the International Conference on Computers and Games, CG 2022, held virtually, during November 22¿24, 2022.The 15 full papers included in this book were carefully reviewed and selected from 23 submissions. They were organized in topical sections as follows: ¿classic games, multi-player and multi-action games, solving games, measuring games, decision making in games and puzzles.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 12th Enterprise Engineering Working Conference on Advances in Enterprise Engineering XVI, EEWC 2022, held in Leusden, The Netherlands, November 2¿3, 2022.EEWC aims at addressing the challenges that modern and complex enterprises are facing in a rapidly changing world. The participants of the working conference share a belief that dealing with these challenges requires rigorous and scientific solutions, focusing on the design and engineering of enterprises. The goal of EEWC is to stimulate interaction between the different stakeholders, scientists as well as practitioners, interested in making Enterprise Engineering a reality.The 4 full papers and 2 short papers included in this book were carefully reviewed and selected from 13 submissions. In addition, there are 2 invited papers from keynote presentations. They were organized in topical sections as follows: Invited Papers from Keynote Presentations and Presented Papers.

This book constitutes the proceedings of the 17th International Conference on Research Challenges in Information Sciences, RCIS 2023, which took place in Corfu, Greece, during May 23¿26, 2023. It focused on the special theme "Information Science and the Connected World".The scope of RCIS is summarized by the thematic areas of information systems and their engineering; user-oriented approaches; data and information management; business process management; domain-specific information systems engineering; data science; information infrastructures, and reflective research and practice.The 28 full papers presented in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from a total of 87 submissions. The book also includes 15 Forum papers and 6 Doctoral Consortium papers. The contributions were organized in topical sections named: Requirements; conceptual modeling and ontologies; machine learning and analytics; conceptual modeling and semantic networks; business process design and computing in the continuum; requirements and evaluation; monitoring and recommending; business process analysis and improvement; user interface and experience; forum papers; doctoral consortium papers. Two-page abstracts of the tutorials can be found in the back matter of the volume.

This book constitutes the refereed conference proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Mobile Wireless Middleware, Operating Systems and Applications, MOBILWARE 2022, via Virtual Event on 28-29, 2022 Due to COVID-19 pandemic the conference was held virtually. The 23 revised full papers were reviewed and selected from 59 submissions and are organized in tracks on Middleware, Wireless, and Future Networks; Integrated Satellite-Terrestrial Information Network; and Integrated Satellite-Terrestrial Intelligent Information Processing, Decision and Planning.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Optimization and Learning, OLA 2023, held in Malaga, Spain, during May 3¿5, 2023. The 32 full papers included in this book were carefully reviewed and selected from 78 submissions. They were organized in topical sections as follows: advanced optimization; learning; learning methods to enhance optimization tools; optimization applied to learning methods; and real-world applications.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 23rd International Conference on Group Decision and Negotiation, GDN 2023, which took place in Tokyo, Japan during June 11¿15, 2023.The field of Group Decision and Negotiation focuses on decision processes with at least two participants and a common goal but conflicting individual goals. Research areas of Group Decision and Negotiation include electronic negotiations, experiments, the role of emotions in group decision and negotiations, preference elicitation and decision support for group decisions and negotiations, and conflict resolution principles. This year¿s conference focusses on multimodal interactions.The 11 full papers presented in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 102 submissions. They were organized in the following topical sections: Taking a step back: Critically re-examining technology interactions with group decision and negotiation; preference modeling and multi-criteria decision-making;and conflict modeling and distributive mechanisms.

This book gathers the high-quality papers presented at the 19th International Conference on Computing and Information Technology (IC2IT2023), held on May 18¿19, 2023, in Bangkok, Thailand. The book presents an original research work for both academic and industry domains, which is aiming to show valuable knowledge, skills and experiences in the field of computing and information technology. The topics covered in the book include natural language processing, image processing, intelligent systems and algorithms, as well as machine learning. These lead to the major research directions for innovating computational methods and applications of information technology.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Smart Grid and Innovative Frontiers in Telecommunications, SmartGIFT 2022, held in Changsha, China, in December 10-12, 2022The 44 full papers were selected from 116 submissions and focus on new challenges and opportunities of intelligent technologies in new energy systems.The papers are the papers are divided into the following areas: Simulation and analysis of the integrated energy system, disaster prevention & reduction for power grid, industry 4.0 applications, flexible planning and regulation techniques in smart grids, smart control and diagnose of distributed power system, and control and operation of UAV. These sessions aimed to address the new dimension that can gain insights into key challenges, understanding, and criteria of new technologies to develop and implement future industry-related services and applications.

This book provides a comprehensive overview of the implications of tax avoidance for a firm¿s capital structure, highlighting the key role played by free cash flow and agency conflicts. First, the book provides an outline of the theories and empirical evidence concerning the role of taxes in the Theory of Capital Structure. It reviews the studies investigating the relationship between agency conflicts and capital structure. The book explores the role of free cash flow and agency conflicts in the relationship between tax avoidance and capital structure. In the final section, the results of an empirical investigation conducted on a sample of U.S. public firms are also presented. The empirical research examines whether and how tax avoidance is associated with debt covenant violation across the stages of the corporate life cycle. Specifically, the research uses the concept of the corporate life cycle stage to analyse whether and how the association between tax avoidance and debt covenant violation varies in different agency settings. Consistent with the hypotheses drawn on the Agency Theory, the findings of the empirical research suggest life cycle stages moderate the association between tax avoidance and debt covenant violation. Overall, this book sheds light on the potential implications of tax avoidance activities for a firm¿s capital structure. The book will be of interest to both experienced and early-stage scholars interested in the topic. Moreover, the book will also be of interest to policymakers, investors, analysts, lenders, and other market participants.

This volume consitutes selected papers presented during the First Pan-African Conference on Artificial Intelligence, PanAfriCon AI 2022, held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in October 2022. The 16 papers were thoroughly reviewed and selected from the 49 qualified submissions. The papers are organized in the following topical sections: ¿AI in public health; agriculture; algorithmic optimization; human-machine interaction; economy and security.

This book presents a novel method for the numerical simulation of swimming animals. It includes a review of the hydrodynamics of swimming, a description of the CFD model adopted, and a description of the results obtained by applying this model to the cownose ray. This method is developed for the open-source software OpenFOAM and relies on an overset mesh. A custom library is added to the solver to include the equations of the kinematics of the animal under investigation, combining the deformation of the fish fins with the computed displacement and rotation of the animal's body. The presented method helps investigate the dynamics of any animal moving in a fluid, provided that its kinematics is known, and in this work, it is applied to investigate the hydrodynamics of a cownose ray. This book is intended for researchers and engineers who aim to deeply understand the hydrodynamics of fish swimming and to design bioinspired autonomous underwater vehicles or novel propulsion systems.

This book offers an important contribution to the field of curriculum studies and higher education by examining the impacts of colonialism and neoliberalism in the South African education system and addressing ways to decolonise curriculum and teaching. Drawing on Pinar's work in curricular theory, the authors call for integrating self-reflective curriculum development into the national curriculum process to promote indigenous education and knowledge.

Serving in the military is often a disruptive event in the lives of those who join, precipitating a reassessment of the service member¿s ethical sensibilities or, tragically, resulting in lasting moral injury and trauma. The military experience compels them to navigate multiple identities, from citizen to warrior and back. Their religious identity, sometimes rooted in a civilian religious community, can be altered by military participation. Through a series of inductive, in-depth qualitative interviews, Suitt explores how varied religious resources and potentially traumatic events affect the lives of post-9/11 veterans who once or currently identified as Christian. Adding to existing research on moral injury, it traces how military chaplains, ethics education, just war theory rhetoric, and formal religious practice supplied by the military alter the course of service members¿ moral lives. These narrative trajectories reveal how veterans use Christian faith or other systems of meaning-making to understand war and their identities as service members and veterans.

This book describes how complex systems from a variety of fields can be modeled using quantum mechanical ideas; from biology and ecology, to sociology and decision-making. Quantum mechanics is traditionally associated with microscopic systems; however, quantum concepts have also been successfully applied to a wide range of macroscopic systems both within and outside physics. The mathematical basis of these models is covered in detail, providing a self-contained and consistent approach. This book provides unique insight into the dynamics of these macroscopic systems and opens new interdisciplinary research frontiers. The authors present an essential resource for researchers in applied mathematics or theoretical physics who are interested in applying quantum mechanics to complex systems in the social, biological or ecological sciences.Describes how complex systems from a variety of fields can be modeled using quantum mechanical ideasProvides insight into the dynamics of macroscopic systems and opens new interdisciplinary research frontiersIntroduces quantum tools needed for the analysis of the dynamical behavior of macroscopic systems