Drivers for Inter-city Innovation Networks Across Chinese Cities:Modelling Physical Versus Intangible Effects

Cross-region innovation is widely recognized as an important source of the long-term regional innovation capacity.In the recent past,a growing number of studies has investigated the network structure and mechanisms of cross-region innovation collaboration in various contexts.However,existing research mainly focuses on physical effects,such as geographical distance and high-speed railway connections.These studies ignore the intangible drivers in a changing environment,the more digitalized economy and the increasingly solidified innovation network structure.Thus,the focus of this study is on estimating determinants of innovation networks,especially on intangible drivers,which have been largely neglected so far.Using city-level data of Chinese patents(excluding Hong Kong,Macao,and Taiwan Province of China),we trace innovation networks across Chinese cities over a long period of time.By integrating a measure on Information and Communications Technology(ICT)development gap and network structural effects into the general proximity framework,this paper explores the changing mechanisms of Chinese innovation networks from a new perspective.The results show that the structure of cross-region innovation networks has changed in China.As mechanisms behind this development,the results confirm the increasingly important role of intangible drivers in Chinese inter-city innovation collaboration when controlling for effects of physical proximity,such as geographical distance.Since digitalization and coordinated development are the mainstream trends in China and other developing countries,these countries'inter-city innovation collaboration patterns will witness dramatic changes under the influence of intangible drivers.

Evaluation of Technical Education by Using a Modern Structured MOODLE Laboratory Course, in Relation to Recent Data

E-learning platforms support education systems worldwide, transferring theoretical knowledge as well as soft skills. In the present study high-school pupils’, and adult students’ opinions were evaluated through a modern structured MOODLE interactive course, designed for the needs of the laboratory course “Automotive Systems”. The study concerns Greek secondary vocational education pupils aged 18 and vocational training adult students aged 20 to 50 years. The multistage, equal size simple random cluster sample was used as a sampling method. Pupils and adult students of each cluster completed structured 10-question questionnaires both before and after attending the course. A total of 120 questionnaires were collected. In general, our findings disclosed that the majority of pupils and adult students had significantly improved their knowledge and skills from using MOODLE. They reported strengthening conventional teaching, using the new MOODLE technology. The satisfaction indices improved quite, with the differences in their mean values being statistically significant.

Spatio-temporal Fragmentation of Leisure Activities in Information Era： Empirical Evidence from Nanjing, China

Activity fragmentation provides a new approach for understanding the transformation of urban space and function in the information era. Numerous theoretical and empirical studies have been conducted on activity fragmentation, but few studies have focused on the fragmentation of leisure activities. This study was intended to extend the extant literature by: 1) analysing the spatio-temporal fragmentation of physical and virtual leisure activities by using a dataset collected in Nanjing, China, and 2) evaluating the reasons of leisure activity fragmentation, as well as the potential spatial effect of activity fragmentation. The results indicated that virtual leisure activities are more fragmented than physical leisure activities, but the fragmentation of physical and virtual leisure activities varies on weekday and weekend, as well as in various locations and urban districts. In addition, the results suggested that sociodemographic factors and information and communication technology(ICT) variables distinctly affect the fragmentation of leisure activities. Meanwhile, the fragmentation of virtual leisure activities may enhance the transformation of traditional urban space by reallocating leisure activity times and locations.

Telecentres in Mountain Regions-A Peruvian Case Study of the Impact of Information and Communication Technologies on Remoteness and Exclusion

Communities in developing country mountain areas,in part due to their remoteness,find themselves excluded from social,political and economic systems; and excluded from access to resources. This paper aims to study the impact of information and communication technologies (ICTs) on remoteness and exclusion. It utilises two models - the resource movement framework,and the "information chain" - to analyse a telecentre in one district of mountainous Huancavelica,Peru's poorest region,set in the high Andes. It finds ICTs enabling new and positive resource flows for the two key user groups:teenaged school students and young farmers. These help to maintain social networks. They also support information searches that have improved agricultural practice where other information chain resources have been available. But non-use and ineffective use of the telecentre are found where information chain resources are lacking. ICTs have some impacts on intangible elements of remoteness. In this particular example,they also offer access to some previously-excluded resources. But they have not really addressed the systematic exclusions faced by mountain communities. And they so far appear to be a technology of inequality; favouring those residents who begin with better resource endowments.The paper concludes by offering some recommendations for mountain ICT project practice.

Emerging trends in information and communication technology in mine safety and disaster management

There is tremendous growth in the use of Geographic Information Systems(GIS), Global Positioning Systems (GPS), Remote Sensing, Satellite Communication, andModeling & Simulation techniques.These tools and techniques helps significantly in characterizinginfrastructure, risk area and disaster zones, planning and implementation ofhazards reduction measures etc.Communication satellites becomes vital for providingemergency communication and timely relief measures.Integration of space technologyinputs into natural disaster monitoring and mitigation mechanisms is critical for hazard reduction.This paper mainly focused on all the issues described above.Major emphasis hadbeen given to the recent developments in information & communication technology enabledtools and their applications in mining industries for safe mining operations with increasedproductivity.

Improving Low Bitrate Video Coding via Computation Incorporating A Priori Information

The growing number of mobile users, as well as the diversification in types of services have resulted in increasing demands for wireless network bandwidth in recent years. Although evolving transmission techniques are able to enlarge the network capacity to some degree, they still cannot satisfy the requirements of mobile users. Meanwhile, following Moore's Law, the data processing capabilities of mobile user terminals are continuously improving. In this paper, we explore possible methods of trading strong computational power at wireless terminals for transmission efficiency of communications. Taking the specific scenario of wireless video conversation, we propose a model-based video coding scheme by learning the structures in multimedia contents. Benefiting from both strong computing capability and pre-learned model priors, only low-dimensional parameters need to be transmitted; and the intact multimedia contents can also be reconstructed at the receivers in real-time. Experiment results indicate that, compared to conventional video codecs, the proposed scheme significantly reduces the data rate with the aid of computational capability at wireless terminals.

Construction of Agricultural Information Service System in China——under the Eyeshot of Communication Science

The paper aims to study the current communication condition,configuration,characteristic and regulation of Chinese agricultural information in terms of the eyeshot of communication studies,and provide reference to build Chinese agricultural information service system based on the analysis of their advantages and disadvantages.

GIS as an Information Infrastructure for Recovery and Reconstruction after the Great East Japan Earthquake

This study considers the regional characteristics of the Tohoku region and the extent of the damage caused by the Great East Japan Earthquake and makes proposals for recovery and reconstruction of the areas affected by this disaster as well as for a reduction of the impact of natural disasters that may occur in the future with GIS （geographic information systems） as a social infrastructure positioned at the heart of the information infrastructure. Due to the fact that social media that used ICT （information and communication technology） was useful in the days directly after the disaster, it can be said that it is necessary to investigate the provision of an information infrastructure that uses ICT to reduce the impact of disasters. Therefore, this study proposes the construction of a geographical information database using GIS and the provision and sharing of information using social media GIS after discussion of the relationship between the development of the computerization of Japan and GIS as a valid example of using information systems for recovery and reconstruction after the Great East Japan Earthquake.

Forecasting promising technology using analysis of patent information:Focused on next generation mobile communications

In order to forecast promising technologies in the field of next generation mobile communication, various patent indicators were analyzed such as citation per patent, patent family information, patent share, increase rate, and patent activity. These indicators were quantified into several indexes and then integrated into an evaluation score to provide promising technologies. As a result of the suggested patent analysis, four technologies out of twenty two in details classification were selected, which showed outstanding technology competitiveness, high patent share and increasing rates as well as high recent-patent-ratios and triad-patent-family-ratios. Each of the selected technologies scored more than 10 points in total, and the following four technologies were suggested as promising ones in the field of next generation mobile communication: 1) 3GPP based mobile communication, 2) beyond 4G mobile communication, 3) IEEE 802.16 based mobile communication, which are in medium classification of broadband mobile communication system, and 4) testing/certification system of mobile communication, which is in medium classification of mobile communication testing/certification system.

Magnetized Micropillar-Enabled Wearable Sensors for Touchless and Intelligent Information Communication

The wearable sensors have recently attracted considerable attentions as communication interfaces through the information perception,decoding,and conveying process.However,it is still challenging to obtain a sensor that can convert detectable signals into multiple outputs for convenient,e cient,cryptic,and high-capacity information transmission.Herein,we present a capacitive sensor of magnetic field based on a tilted flexible micromagnet array(t-FMA)as the proposed interaction interface.With the bidirectional bending capability of t-FMA actuated by magnetic torque,the sensor can recognize both the magnitude and orientation of magnetic field in real time with non-overlapping capacitance signals.The optimized sensor exhibits the high sensitivity of over 1.3 T-1 and detection limit down to 1 mT with excellent durability.As a proof of concept,the sensor has been successfully demonstrated for convenient,e cient,and programmable interaction systems,e.g.,touchless Morse code and Braille communication.The distinguishable recognition of the magnetic field orientation and magnitude further enables the sensor unit as a high-capacity transmitter for cryptic information interaction(e.g.,encoded ID recognition)and multi-control instruction outputting.We believe that the proposed magnetic field sensor can open up a potential avenue for future applications including information communication,virtual reality device,and interactive robotics.

Impact of user influence on information multi-step communication in a micro-blog

User influence is generally considered as one of the most critical factors that affect information cascading spreading. Based on this common assumption, this paper proposes a theoretical model to examine user influence on the information multi-step communication in a micro-biog. The multi-steps of information communication are divided into first-step and non-first-step, and user influence is classified into five dimensions. Actual data from the Sina micro-blog is collected to construct the model by means of an approach based on structural equations that uses the Partial Least Squares （PLS） technique. Our experimental results indicate that the dimensions of the number of fans and their authority significantly impact the information of first-step conxrnunication. Leader rank has a positive impact on both first-step and non-first-step communication. Moreover, global centrality and weight of friends are positively related to the information non-first-step communication, but authority is found to have much less relation to it.

Mental Health Impacts of Information and Communication Technology Usage in South Africa

This study examined mental health issues affecting the group of individuals who are in the social media contact list of the researchers.This was done by administering a closed structured questionnaire,covering information from participants’demographic characteristics,duration of time spent on ICT usage,to their perceived health effects thereof.Male respondents,largely unemployed are active ICT users,addicted to the Internet,and also suf-fer from unspecified ailments.Aged 31–35 and above,half of men and all women participants spend more than 5 h per day.High-intensive ICT use is associated,in general,with concurrent symptoms of information overload,depression and Internet addiction.It is insignificantly associated with composite stress.Medium intensive ICT use is correlated with fatigue and depression in equal measure but in opposite direction.There are significant differ-ences in demographic attributes as they explain intensity of ICT Usage.The older the employed survey partici-pants are,the less they suffer from composite stress.However,black South Africans suffer significantly from composite stress,fatigue and depression,though negatively from internet addiction.The results also indicate that South African men have negative experiences of composite stress,depression and internet addiction.Educated South Africans have negative experiences of fatigue,but positive experiences of composite stress,depression and internet addiction.Low intensive use of ICT has no impact on composite stress,fatigue and depressive moods of survey participants.It impacts negatively on internet addiction.Medium intensive use of ICT impacts posi-tively on survey participants’experiences of fatigue,but negatively on composite stress,depression and internet addiction.High-intensive use of ICT impacts positively on survey participants’experiences of composite stress and depression.

A Culturally-Sensitive Model for CME Distance Learning Demonstratesa Way Forward： Kenya＇s Experience with ACME-IT （Advancing Continuing Medical Education Through Information Technology）

A distance learning Continuing Medical Education （CME） project based on live interactive presentations and a group participatory model demonstrated that important strides can be made in the quality of CME available to health care professionals in African rural settings. Implementers choose a communication model consistent with the fundamental orality of Kenyan and other sub-Saharan African countries. The project involved four hospitals and one training institution in rural Kenya. The testing of learners and focus group discussions with learners, facilitators and presenters indicated that the project＇s methodologies, that strove to be culturally and work place friendly, contributed to gains in knowledge, competencies including case management, the continuity of patient care, team work, staff morale and other issues of expressed importance to the hospital healthcare work force and hospital administrators. The learning system, known as Advancing Continuing Medical Education through Information Technology （ACME-IT）, was implemented by the Kenyan Ministry of Medical Services, EC Associates and the US-funded Aphia2 Western initiative implemented by PATH. The findings of this pilot suggests that the ACME-IT methodology that set up learning centers at the participating institutions is a promising viable alternative to the traditional and relatively expensive workshop training that characterizes much of CME in lower and middle income countries.

New Information and Communication Technologies and University Education Renovation in Vietnam

The introduction of new information and communication technologies in Vietnam has had significant impacts on every sector, and changed the face of the whole Vietnamese society. New cultures, customs, and norms have been introduced to compete with the country＇s traditional values. In the context of Vietnamese sustained economic growth and social development, university education in Vietnam falls behind those from regional countries, partly because the influences of＇ information and communication technologies to the society as well as the education system at the paradigm levels have not been properly understood. In order to reverse this trend, a comprehensive renovation in university education must be carried out, and one of the first issues to be addressed is to reach a national consensus on the traditional and emerging social and educational values in Vietnam.

The Effects of Information and Communication Technology on Health Service Delivery at Tafo Government Hospital

This study sought to find out the effects of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) on health service delivery at Tafo Government Hospital. A descriptive survey design was used. Data were collected through the use of semi-structured questionnaire and administered to 50 respondents where stratified random sampling technique was used by ranking position as strata. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics. From the findings, 56% of the respondents overwhelmingly agreed to the fact that the applications of ICT provide quicker medical diagnoses, reduced workload among users, improvement in patients’ waiting time and information accessibility. Nonetheless, 72% bemoaned lack of ICT infrastructure, poor ICT network concerns coupled with that insufficient knowledge on the use of ICT could impede the impact of ICT in quality service delivery. This could be deduced from the findings that ICT improves collaboration and clinical decision support in facilitating clinical work flow integration among nurses and other medical professionals. Moreover, the findings above affirm the fact that without electricity, ICT infrastructure, insufficient skills and technical knowledge in dealing with ICT innovations, it is impossible to successfully adopt ICT resources in health care delivery. The above findings show that the majority of healthcare professional generally had a positive attitude towards ICT prospects as they rated their skill as fairly well. The study recommends that the Ministry of Health plays a supporting role by investing in health care ICT.

Organizational Learning （OL） and Organizational Innovation （OI）： The Case of Information and Communication Technology （ICT） Industry in Malaysia

The progression through which a person acquires ,;kills, understanding, and opinions regarding a particular organization or company is called organizational learning （OL）. In this study, the connection between organizational innovation （OI） and OL within the inf3rmation and communication technology （ICT） industry in Malaysia is surveyed. These relationships are examined, because various previous inquiries have shown that an imperative precursor to firm performance is OL. Two hundred and seventy-eight surveys were completed by small and medium organizations across Malaysia. The connections existing between the causes of OL and the causes of OI were ascertained by using structural equation modeling （SEM）. Amongst the Malaysian small- and medium-sized enterprises （SMEs） that participated in fire study, OI and OL are considerably linked.

Cloud Computing Applications in Global Logistics Information System Infrastructure

Information and communication technology （ICT） and systems are essential for every business. They can be used in retail, manufacturing and other industries. Nevertheless, new and innovative ideas and solutions are constantly emerging and introducing new possibilities for the reorganization of traditional logistics processes. Particularly, attention is given to basic concept of CC （cloud computing） service models and opportunities in logistics. This paper provides comprehensive review and comparison of different ICT solutions and CC applications. As a new and cutting-edge technology, CC is changing the form and function of information technology infrastructures making supply chain information collaboration easy and feasible. It can also be an enabler of fully electronic logistics management systems. Adoption of CC concept involves strong hardware support, good internet connectivity and implied reorganization of traditional business activities.

An Efficient CSI Feedback Scheme for Dual-Polarized MIMO Systems Using Layered Multi-Paths Information

Massive MIMO is one of tile enabling technologies tbr beyond 4G and 5G systems due to its ability to provide beamforming gain and reduce interference Dual-polarized antenna is widely adopted to accommodate a large number of antenna elements in limited space. However, current CSI（channel state information） feedback schemes developed in LTE for conventional MIMO systems are not efficient enough for massive MIMO systems since the overhead increases almost linearly with the number of antenna. Moreover, the codebook for massive MIMO will be huge and difficult to design with the LTE methodology. This paper proposes a novel CSI feedback scheme named layered Multi-paths Information based CSI Feedback （LMPIF）, which can achieve higher spectrum efficiency for dual-polarized antenna system with low feedback overhead. The MIMO channel is decomposed into long term components （multipath directions and amplitudes） and short term components （multipath phases）. The relationship between the two components and the optimal precoder is derived in closed form. To reduce the overhead, different granularities in feedback time have been applied for the long term components and short term components Link and system level simulation results prove that LMPIF can improve performance considerably with low CSI feedback overhead.

Impact of Enforcement of Right of Communication through Information Network

On 27 October 2001, the Standing Committee of the People's Congress reviewed and passed the Amendment to the Copyright Law of the People's Republic of China. In Article 10 of the amended Copyright Law as of 2001 has been incorporated a new subject matter under the copyright protection: the right of communication through information network, that is, the right to make a work available to the public by wire or by wireless means, so that people may have access to the work from a place and at a time individu...

Information Communication Technology(ICT信息传播技术)Rules

ICT,including the Internet and e-mail,is provided for students as part of their learning.Parents'permission is required.Remember that access(准入)is a privilege(特别待遇),not a right,and thataccess requires responsibility.