Practical Applications as a Source of Credibility: A Comparison of Three Fields of Dutch Academic Chemistry

In many Western science systems, funding structures increasingly stimulate academic research to contribute to practical applications, but at the same time the rise of bibliometric performance assessments have strengthened the pressure on academics to conduct excellent basic research that can be published in scholarly literature. We analyze the interplay between these two developments in a set of three case studies of fields of chemistry in the Netherlands. First, we describe how the conditions under which academic chemists work have changed since 1975. Second, we investigate whether practical applications have become a source of credibility for individual researchers. Indeed, this turns out to be the case in catalysis, where connecting with industrial applications helps in many steps of the credibility cycle. Practical applications yield much less credibility in environmental chemistry, where application-oriented research agendas help to acquire funding, but not to publish prestigious papers or to earn peer recognition. In biochemistry practical applications hardly help in gaining credibility, as this field is still strongly oriented at fundamental questions. The differences between the fields can be explained by the presence or absence of powerful upstream end-users, who can afford to invest in academic research with promising long term benefits.     

A prospective examination of the impact of high levels of exercise training on sedentary behaviour

The aim of this study is to determine changes in sedentary behaviour in response to extensive aerobic exercise training. Participants included adults who self-selected to run a marathon. Sedentary behaviour, total activity counts and physical activity (PA) intensity were assessed (Actigraph GT3X) for seven consecutive days during seven assessment periods (?3, ?2, and ?1 month prior to the marathon, within 2 weeks of the marathon, and +1, +2, and +3 months after the marathon). Models were fitted with multiple imputation data using the STATA mi module. Random intercept generalized least squares (GLS) regression models were used to determine change in sedentary behaviour with seven waves of repeated measures. Results: Twenty-three individuals (mean?±?S_x: 34.4?±?2.1y, 23.0?±?1.9% fat, 15 women, 8 men) completed the study. Marathon finishing times ranged from 185 to 344 minutes (253.2?±?9.6 minutes). Total counts in the vertical axis were 1,729,414 lower one month after the race, compared with two months prior to the race (peak training). Furthermore, counts per minute decreased by 252.7 counts·minute^?1 during that same time period. Daily sedentary behaviour did not change over the seven assessment periods, after accounting for age, gender, per cent body fat, wear time, marathon finishing time, and previous marathon experience. This prospective study supports the notion that PA and sedentary behaviours are distinct, showing that sedentary behaviour was not impacted by high levels of aerobic training.     

The structure of the South Korean developmental regime and its transformation – statist mobilization and authoritarian integration in the anticommunist regimentation

Through the lens of consumption at Chinese Starbucks, this paper examines the lifestyle and attitudes of parts of the mainland Chinese urban middle class, especially of the so-called xiaozi. Based on interviews with and guestbook entries by customers I analyze how the foreign brand and the multitude of meanings associated with it are consumed. I argue that consumption may be viewed as a particular search for authenticity that enables consumers to construct their self-images in the context of the vast changes occurring in contemporary China. A foreign brand promises to be especially valuable as it promises the authenticity of an ‘other’ on which one's own desires may be projected.     

‘Second death’, or revival of the ‘third world’ in the context of neo‐liberal globalization

Abstract

This paper tries to analyze the historical change in the Third World in its emergent stage, in the authoritarian stage and in the current democratic stage and, thereafter, find a way to revive the Bandung spirit in the current globalization context. I define the Bandung spirit as one of a ‘non‐aligned self‐helped “organization against” the dominant powerful countries’; that is, spirit of ‘anti‐predominance’. This spirit has emerged on the base of such domestic orientation and realities as economic self‐reliance, nationally integrated political regime, convergence of the state and civil society around anti‐colonialism. However, according to intensification of the Cold War confrontation on the international level and its centrifugal influence, the early Third World changed to a ‘new’ authoritarian Third World. The Third World in this stage could be characterized by an exclusive authoritarian political regime, dependent‐developmentalist economic orientation and coercively repressed and mobilized, in the top‐down way, civil society. This authoritarian Third World began to be confronted with a strong struggle from the bottom for democratization. In order for democratization of the Third World to become its true revival in the context of globalization, the following tasks should be considered. First, the democratic Third World should be a great driving force for the institutionalization of the transnational public regulatory mechanism. Second, the democratic Third World countries try to go over a kind of ‘transformed’ dependent development strategy. Third, democratization should go along with recovery of political inclusiveness and openness of the state to civil society’s demands. Thereafter, I tried to construct globalist re‐interpretation of the Bandung, by way of conceptualizing the current globalization as imperial globalization, unlike the imperialist globalization which the historical Bandung wanted to confront. I argue that the Bandung spirit of collective self‐help organizations against the newly emerging dominant order should be revived in this worse imperial globalization context. In addition, I argue that a nationalist resistance is also one component of the multiple resistances in the current imperial globalization.     

Integrierte Entwicklung von Automotive-Software mit AutoFocus

Zur Beherrschung der komplexen vernetzten und verteilten Funktionen von Automotive-Software ist eine Beschreibung des zu erstellenden Systems auf verschiedenen Abstraktionsebenen und schrittweise überg?nge zwischen diesen Ebenen notwendig. Neben der Definition geeigneter Ebenen werden zur Unterstützung echtzeitkritischer Systemanteile ein einheitliches Berechnungsmodell, ebenenspezifische Beschreibungstechniken, sowie methodische Regeln für diese Abstraktionsebenen eingeführt und in den Werkzeugprototypen AutoFocus integriert.     

Dimensions of variability in embedded operating systems

Design, implementation, and re-engineering of operating systems are still an ambitious undertaking. Despite, or even because, of the long history of theory and practice in this field, adapting existing systems to environments of different conditions and requirements as originally specified or assumed, in terms of functional and/or non-functional respects, is anything but simple. Especially this is true for the embedded systems domain which, on the one hand, calls for highly specialized and application-aware system abstractions and, on the other hand, cares a great deal for easily reusable implementations of these abstractions. The latter aspect becomes more and more important as embedded systems technology is faced with an innovation cycle decreasing in length. Software for embedded systems needs to be designed for variability, and this is in particular true for the operating systems of this domain. The paper discusses dimensions of variability that need to be considered in the development of embedded operating systems and presents approaches that aid construction and maintenance of evolutionary operating systems. CR subject classification  C.3; D.2.11; D.2.13; D.4.7