To address the problem of visual content description, two Description Schemes (DSs) developed within the context of a European ACTS project known as DICEMAN, are presented. The DSs, designed based on an analogy with well-known tools for document description, describe both the structure and semantics of still images and video sequences. The overall structure of both DSs including the various sub...

In this new millennium, entirely new markets, products, and services are emerging from digital technologies such as Internet based businesses or e-commerce. Strategic planning of e-commerce website development is one of the critical activities of an organization within the context of its ecommerce investment and success. The unstructured nature of this problem-solving activity makes it an appro...

The microbiologically influenced corrosion (MIC) resistance of a novel Cu-bearing 2205 duplex stainless steel (2205 Cu-DSS) against an aerobic marine Pseudomonas aeruginosa biofilm was investigated. The electrochemical test results showed that Rp increased and icorr decreased sharply after long-term immersion in the inoculation medium, suggesting that 2205 Cu-DSS possessed excellent MIC resista...

A decision support system (DSS) was developed to support tactical decision making in demanding, ambiguous situations. An applied experiment was conducted to evaluate the extent to which the DSS contributed to greater situational awareness. Eight highly experienced CO-TAO teams participated in four realistic scenarios, two with and two without the DSS. Decision performance and team communication...

The Direct Simple Shear (DSS) test is one of the laboratory element testing devices that has been widely used to assess soil behavior. Although the DSS test is considered to simulate the cyclic shear loading mode from the earthquakes in an effective manner, the most commonly used versions of the test device (such as the NGI-type DSS device) do not provide means of measuring the lateral stresses...

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a chronic disorder of the gastrointestinal tract. Although the etiology and pathogenesis of IBD remain unknown, pro-inflammatory cytokines including IFN-gamma play an important role in the development of IBD. Suppressor of cytokine signaling-1 (SOCS-1) is a crucial inhibitor of cytokine signaling, particularly of IFN-gamma. In this study, we investigated the ...

Tumor necrosis factor (TNF) receptor-associated factor 5 (TRAF5) is a key mediator of TNF receptor superfamily members and is important in both T helper (Th) cell immunity and the regulation of multiple signaling pathways. To clarify TRAF5's influence on inflammatory bowel diseases (IBDs), we investigated TRAF5 deficiency's effect on dextran sulfate sodium- (DSS-) induced colitis. Colitis was i...

IS academics are under increasing pressure to apply for national competitive grants, internal university grants, and industry funding to support their research programs. This paper presents an investigation of the nature of DSS research funding through the analysis of 1,020 papers published in 14 high quality journals from 1990 to 2003. In the sample, 23.6% of DSS papers acknowledged grant supp...

In the last few years, ontologies have been successfully exploited by Decision Support Systems (DSSs) to support some phases of the decisionmaking process. In this paper, we propose to employ an ontological representation for all the content both processed and produced by a DSS in answering requests. This semantic representation supports the DSS in the whole decisionmaking process, and it is ca...

Previous studies showed that Danggui-Shaoyao-San (DSS), a traditional Chinese medicinal prescription, could alleviate cognitive dysfunction of Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients. However, the mechanisms remain unclear; we have now examined the effect of DSS on SAMP8 and elucidated the possible mechanism. Animals were treated with DSS for 2 months, and step-down test and Morris water maze (MWM) t...