on the market is expected to create great value added and increase productivity. On the other hand, automatic management of supply chain opens new challenges: first, web services should locate other services that provide a solution to their problems, second, services should interoperate to compose complex

Contrary to theoretical expectations, measures of willingness to accept greatly exceed measures of willingness to pay. This paper reports several experiments that demonstrate that this "endowment effect" persists even in market settings with opportunities to learn. Consumption objects (e

transformation to represent a signal in its own best basis, but since the transformation is orthogonal once the basis is chosen, compression via the best-basis method is not drastically affected by noise: the noise energy in the transform values cannot exceed the noise energy in the original signal. Furthermore

for this state of affairs is that existing theories of work The authors express great appreciation to members of the consulting firm that helped us gain access to the organizations where this research was conducted; to Kenneth Brousseau, Daniel Feldman, and Linda Frank for assistance in data collection

properties that make applying them in straightforward ways difficult. Most traditional pedagogical technologies are characterized by specificity (a pencil is for writing, while a microscope is for viewing small objects); stability (pencils, pendulums, and chalkboards have not changed a great deal over time

traditional operational models are of great value – and at the same time fundamentally limited – in their ability to characterize system performance. We review the state of research on telephone call centers. We begin with a tutorial on how call centers function and proceed to survey academic research devoted

Searching on the Internet today can be compared to dragging a net across the surfgace of the ocean. While a great deal may be caught in the net, there is still a wealth of information that is deep, and therefore, missed. The reason is simple. Most of the Web's information is buried far down

. This can be a powerful tool in locating the source of trouble in a misbehaving experiment. To the user of the data, a statement (by the experimenter) of the range within which the results of the present experiment might have fallen by chance alone is of great help in deciding whether the present data agree

, are required to undergo an experience, such as being exposed to loud noises or watching a film clip. They are asked to provide a continuous indication of the hedonic quality of their experience in real time by manipulating a lever that controls a marker on a scale, which is usually defined by extreme values

Follicular variant of papillary thyroid carcinoma (FVPTC), particularly the encapsulated subtype, often causes a diagnostic dilemma. We reconfirmed the molecular profiles in a large number of FVPTCs and investigated the efficacy of the preoperative mutational analysis in indeterminate thyroid nodules. BRAF V600E/K601E and RAS mutational analysis was performed on 187 FVPTCs. Of these, 132 (70.6%) had a point mutation in one of the BRAF V600E ( = 57), BRAF K601E ( = 11), or RAS ( = 64) genes. All mutations were mutually exclusive. The most common RAS mutations were at NRAS codon 61. FNA aspirates from 564 indeterminate nodules were prospectively tested for BRAF and RAS mutation and the surgical outcome was correlated with the mutational status. Fifty-seven and 47 cases were positive for BRAF and RAS mutation, respectively. Twenty-seven RAS-positive patients underwent surgery and all except one patient had FVPTC. The PPV and accuracy of RAS mutational analysis for predicting FVPTC were 96% and 84%, respectively. BRAF or RAS mutations were present in more than two-thirds of FVPTCs and these were mutually exclusive. BRAF mutational analysis followed by N, H, and KRAS codon 61 mutational analysis in indeterminate thyroid nodules would streamline the management of patients with malignancies, mostly FVPTC.