Refine
Year of publication
- 2015 (106) (remove)
Document Type
- Part of Periodical (34)
- Doctoral Thesis (33)
- Bachelor Thesis (19)
- Master's Thesis (18)
- Conference Proceedings (1)
- Lecture (1)
Has Fulltext
- yes (106) (remove)
Keywords
- Vorlesungsverzeichnis (4)
- OpenGL (3)
- Android (2)
- Compute Shader (2)
- Crowdsourcing (2)
- Eyetracking (2)
- Führung (2)
- Grafikkarte (2)
- Serviceorientierte Architektur (2)
- 360 Grad (1)
Institute
- Zentrale Einrichtungen (31)
- Institut für Computervisualistik (18)
- Fachbereich 7 (14)
- Institut für Informatik (9)
- Institut für Management (8)
- Fachbereich 8 (6)
- Institut für Softwaretechnik (4)
- Institut für Wirtschafts- und Verwaltungsinformatik (4)
- Fachbereich 4 (2)
- Fachbereich 5 (2)
- Institut für Erziehungswissenschaft (2)
- Institut für Integrierte Naturwissenschaften, Abt. Biologie (2)
- Mathematisches Institut (2)
- Arbeitsbereich Allgemeine und Pädagogische Psychologie (1)
- Arbeitsbereich Biopsychologie, Klinische Psychologie und Psychotherapie (1)
- Institut für Integrierte Naturwissenschaften, Abt. Geographie (1)
- Institut für Psychologie (1)
- Institute for Web Science and Technologies (1)
Today, augmented reality is becoming more and more important in several areas like industrial sectors, medicine, or tourism. This gain of importance can easily be explained by its powerful extension of real world content. Therefore, augmented realty became a way to explain and enhance the real world information. Yet, to create a system which can enhance a scene with additional information, the relation between the system and the real world must be known. In order to establish this relationship a commonly used method is optical tracking. The system calculates its relation to the real world from camera images. To do so, a reference which is known is needed in the scene to serve as an orientation. Today, this is mostly a 2D-marker or a 2D-texture. These are placed in the real world scenery to serve as a reference. But, this is an intrusion in the scene. That is why it is desirable that the system works without such an additional aid. An strategy without manipulating the scene is object-tracking. In this approach, any object from the scene can be used as a reference for the system. As an object is far more complex than a marker, it is harder for the system to establish its relationship with the real world. That is why most methods for 3D-object-tracking reduce the object by not using the whole object as reference. The focus of this thesis is to research how a whole object can be used as a reference in a way that either the system or the camera can be moved in any 360 degree angle around the object without loosing the relation to the real world. As a basis the augmented reality framework, the so called VisionLib, is used. Extensions to this system for 360 degree tracking are implemented in different ways and analyzed in the scope of this work. Also, the different extensions are compared. The best results were achieved by improving the reinitialization process. With this extension, current camera images of the scene are given to the system. With the hek of these images, the system can calculate the relation to the real world faster in case the relation went missing.
Web application testing is an active research area. Garousi et al. did a systematic mapping study and classified 79 papers published between 2000-2011. However, there seems to be a lack of information exchange between the scientific community and tool developers.
This thesis systematically analyzes the field of functional, system level web application testing tools. 194 candidate tools were collected in the tool search and screened, with 23 tools being selected as foundation of this thesis. These 23 tools were systematically used to generate a feature model of the domain. The methodology to support this is an additional contribution of this thesis. It processes end user documentation of tools belonging to an examined domain and creates a feature model. The feature model gives an overview over the existing features, their alternatives and their distribution. It can be used to identify trends and problems, extraordinary features, help decision making of tool purchase or guide scientists how to focus research.
Global crop production increased substantially in recent decades due to agricultural intensification and expansion and today agricultural areas occupy about 38% of Earth’s terrestrial surface - the largest use of land on the planet. However, current high-intensity agricultural practices fostered in the context of the Green Revolution led to serious consequences for the global environment. Pesticides, in particular, are highly biologically active substances that can threaten the ecological integrity of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. Although the global pesticide use increases steadily, our field-data based knowledge regarding exposure of non-target ecosystems such as surface waters is very restricted. Available studies have by now been limited to spatially restricted geographical areas or had rather specific objectives rendering the extrapolation to larger spatial scales questionable.
Consequently, this thesis evaluated based on four scientific publications the exposure, effects, and regulatory implications of particularly toxic insecticides` concentrations detected in global agricultural surface waters. FOCUS exposure modelling was used to characterise the highly specific insecticide exposure patterns and to analyse the resulting implications for both monitoring and risk assessment (publication I). Based on more than 200,000 scientific database entries, 838 peer-reviewed studies finally included, and more than 2,500 sites in 73 countries, the risks of agricultural insecticides to global surface waters were analysed by means of a comprehensive meta-analysis (publication II). This meta-analysis evaluated whether insecticide field concentrations exceed legally accepted regulatory threshold levels (RTLs) derived from official EU and US pesticide registration documents and, amongst others, how risks depend on insecticide development over time and stringency of environmental regulation. In addition, an in-depth analysis of the current EU pesticide regulations provided insights into the level of protection and field relevance of highly elaborated environmental regulatory risk assessment schemes (publications III and IV).
The results of this thesis show that insecticide surface water exposure is characterized by infrequent and highly transient concentration peaks of high ecotoxicological relevance. We thus argue in publication I that sampling based on regular intervals is inadequate for the detection of insecticide surface water concentrations and that traditional risk assessment concepts based on all insecticide concentrations including non-detects lead to severely biased results and critical underestimations of risks. Based on these considerations, publication II demonstrates that out of 11,300 measured insecticide concentrations (MICs; i.e., those actually detected and quantified), 52.4% (5,915 cases; 68.5%) exceeded the RTL for either water (RTLSW) or sediments. This indicates a substantial risk for the biological integrity of global water resources as additional analyses on pesticide effects in the field clearly evidence that the regional aquatic biodiversity is reduced by approximately 30% at pesticide concentrations equalling the RTLs. In addition, publication II shows that there is a complete lack of scientific monitoring data for ~90% of global cropland and that both the actual insecticide contamination of surface waters and the resulting ecological risks are most likely even greater due to, for example, inadequate sampling methods employed in the studies and the common occurrence of pesticide mixtures. A linear model analysis identified that RTLSW exceedances depend on the catchment size, sampling regime, sampling date, insecticide substance class, and stringency of countries` environmental regulations, as well as on the interactions of these factors. Importantly, the risks are significantly higher for newer-generation insecticides (i.e., pyrethroids) and are high even in countries with stringent environmental regulations. Regarding the latter, an analysis of the EU pesticide regulations revealed critical deficiencies and the lack of protectiveness and field-relevance for current presumed highly elaborated FOCUS exposure assessment (publication IV) and overall risk assessment schemes (publication III). Based on these findings, essential risk assessment amendments are proposed.
In essence, this thesis analyses the agriculture–environment linkages for pesticides at the global scale and it thereby contributes to a new research frontier in global ecotoxicology. The overall findings substantiate that agricultural insecticides are potential key drivers for the global freshwater biodiversity crisis and that the current regulatory risk assessment approaches for highly toxic anthropogenic chemicals fail to protect the global environment. This thesis provides an integrated view on the environmental side effects of global high-intensity agriculture and alerts that beside worldwide improvements to current pesticide regulations and agricultural pesticide application practices, the fundamental reformation of conventional agricultural systems is urgently needed to meet the twin challenges of providing sufficient food for a growing human population without destroying the ecological integrity of global ecosystems essential to human existence.
The formulation of the decoding problem for linear block codes as an integer program (IP) with a rather tight linear programming (LP) relaxation has made a central part of channel coding accessible for the theory and methods of mathematical optimization, especially integer programming, polyhedral combinatorics and also algorithmic graph theory, since the important class of turbo codes exhibits an inherent graphical structure. We present several novel models, algorithms and theoretical results for error-correction decoding based on mathematical optimization. Our contribution includes a partly combinatorial LP decoder for turbo codes, a fast branch-and-cut algorithm for maximum-likelihood (ML) decoding of arbitrary binary linear codes, a theoretical analysis of the LP decoder's performance for 3-dimensional turbo codes, compact IP models for various heuristic algorithms as well as ML decoding in combination with higher-order modulation, and, finally, first steps towards an implementation of the LP decoder in specialized hardware. The scientific contributions are presented in the form of seven revised reprints of papers that appeared in peer-reviewed international journals or conference proceedings. They are accompanied by an extensive introductory part that reviews the basics of mathematical optimization, coding theory, and the previous results on LP decoding that we rely on afterwards.
Traditional Driver Assistance Systems (DAS) like for example Lane Departure Warning Systems or the well-known Electronic Stability Program have in common that their system and software architecture is static. This means that neither the number and topology of Electronic Control Units (ECUs) nor the presence and functionality of software modules changes after the vehicles leave the factory.
However, some future DAS do face changes at runtime. This is true for example for truck and trailer DAS as their hardware components and software entities are spread over both parts of the combination. These new requirements cannot be faced by state-of-the-art approaches of automotive software systems. Instead, a different technique of designing such Distributed Driver Assistance Systems (DDAS) needs to be developed. The main contribution of this thesis is the development of a novel software and system architecture for dynamically changing DAS using the example of driving assistance for truck and trailer. This architecture has to be able to autonomously detect and handle changes within the topology. In order to do so, the system decides which degree of assistance and which types of HMI can be offered every time a trailer is connected or disconnected. Therefore an analysis of the available software and hardware components as well as a determination of possible assistance functionality and a re-configuration of the system take place. Such adaptation can be granted by the principles of Service-oriented Architecture (SOA). In this architectural style all functionality is encapsulated in self-contained units, so-called Services. These Services offer the functionality through well-defined interfaces whose behavior is described in contracts. Using these Services, large-scale applications can be built and adapted at runtime. This thesis describes the research conducted in achieving the goals described by introducing Service-oriented Architectures into the automotive domain. SOA deals with the high degree of distribution, the demand for re-usability and the heterogeneity of the needed components.
It also applies automatic re-configuration in the event of a system change. Instead of adapting one of the frameworks available to this scenario, the main principles of Service-orientation are picked up and tailored. This leads to the development of the Service-oriented Driver Assistance (SODA) framework, which implements the benefits of Service-orientation while ensuring compatibility and compliance to automotive requirements, best-practices and standards. Within this thesis several state-of-the-art Service-oriented frameworks are analyzed and compared. Furthermore, the SODA framework as well as all its different aspects regarding the automotive software domain are described in detail. These aspects include a well-defined reference model that introduces and relates terms and concepts and defines an architectural blueprint. Furthermore, some of the modules of this blueprint such as the re-configuration module and the Communication Model are presented in full detail. In order to prove the compliance of the framework regarding state-of-the-art automotive software systems, a development process respecting today's best practices in automotive design procedures as well as the integration of SODA into the AUTOSAR standard are discussed. Finally, the SODA framework is used to build a full-scale demonstrator in order to evaluate its performance and efficiency.
Software systems are often developed as a set of variants to meet diverse requirements. Two common approaches to this are "clone-and-owning" and software product lines. Both approaches have advantages and disadvantages. In previous work we and collaborators proposed an idea which combines both approaches to manage variants, similarities, and cloning by using a virtual platform and cloning-related operators.
In this thesis, we present an approach for aggregating essential metadata to enable a propagate operator, which implements a form of change propagation. For this we have developed a system to annotate code similarities which were extracted throughout the history of a software repository. The annotations express similarity maintenance tasks, which can then either be executed automatically by propagate or have to be performed manually by the user. In this work we outline the automated metadata extraction process and the system for annotating similarities; we explain how the implemented system can be integrated into the workflow of an existing version control system (Git); and, finally, we present a case study using the 101haskell corpus of variants.
A fundamental understanding of attachment of engineered nanoparticles to environmentalrnsurfaces is essential for the prediction of nanoparticle fate and transport in the environment.
The present work investigates the attachment of non-coated silver nanoparticles and citraterncoated silver nanoparticles to different model surfaces and environmental surfaces in thernpresence and absence of humic acid. Batch sorption experiments were used for this investigation.
The objective of this thesis was to investigate how silver nanoparticles interactrnwith surfaces having different chemical functional groups. The effect of presence of HA, on the particle-surface interactions was also investigated. In the absence of humic acid, nanoparticle-surface interactions or attachment was influencedrnby the chemical nature of the interacting surfaces. On the other hand, in the presence ofrnhumic acid, nanoparticle-surface attachment was influenced by the specific surface area of the sorbent surfaces. The sorption of non-coated silver nanoparticles and citrate coatedrnnanoparticles to all the surfaces was nonlinear and best described by Langmuir isotherm, indicating monolayer sorption of nanoparticles on to the surfaces. This can be explained as due to the blocking effect generated by the particle-particle repulsion. In the presence of humic acid, sorption of nanoparticles to the surfaces was linear. When the humic acid was present in the interacting medium, both the nanoparticles and surfaces were getting coated with humic acid and this masks the chemical functionalities of the surfaces. This leads to the change in particle-surface interactions, in the presence of humic acid. For the silver nanoparticle sorption from an unstable suspension, the sorption isotherms did not follow any classical sorption models, suggesting interplay between aggregation and sorption. Citrate coated silver nanoparticles and humic acid coated silver nanoparticles showed arndepression in sorption compared to the sorption of non-coated silver nanoparticles. In therncase of citrate coated silver nanoparticles the decrease in sorption can be explained by thernmore negative zeta potential of citrate coated nanoparticles compared to non-coated ones. For humic acid coated nanoparticles the sorption depression can be due to the steric hindrance caused by the free humic acid molecules which may coat the sorbent surface or due to the competition for sorption sites between the nanoparticle and free humic acid molecules present in the suspension. Thus nanoparticle surface chemistry is an important factor that determines the attachment of nanoparticles towards surfaces and it makes the characterization of nanoparticle surface an essential step in the study of their fate in the environment.
Another aim of this study was to introduce the potential of chemical force microscopy for nanoparticle surface characterization. With the use of this technique, it was possible to distinguish between bare silver nanoparticles, citrate coated silver nanoparticles, and humic acid coated silver nanoparticles. This was possible by measuring the adhesion forces between the nanoparticles and five different AFM probes having different chemical functionalization.
Die vorliegende Forschungsarbeit beschäftigt sich mit der Positionierung und anbieterinternen Kommunikation der innovativen IT-Architektur SOA. Die zentralen Ziele der vorliegenden explorativen und empirischen Forschungsarbeit, die im Kontext der Innovations-Erfolgsfaktorenforschung angesiedelt ist, bestehen in der Beantwor-tung der beiden folgenden forschungsleitenden Fragestellungen:
Forschungsfrage 1: Welche Bedingungen tragen zu einer erfolgreichen Positionierung von SOA bei? Forschungsfrage 2: Welche Bedingungen tragen zu einer erfolgreichen anbieterinternen Kommunikation bezüglich SOA bei? Zur Überprüfung dieser beiden Forschungsfragen wurde ein zweistufiges Delphi-Verfahren durchgeführt. Hierbei wurde zunächst eine qualitative Befragungswelle (N=53) zur Identifizierung der SOA-Positionierungsbedingungen und anbieterinternen SOA-Kommunikations-bedingungen durchgeführt. Insgesamt wurden in der ersten Befragungswelle 122 SOA-Positionierungsbedingungen identifiziert, die sich in 65 Bedingungen auf Anbieterseite, 35 Bedingungen auf Kundenseite, 19 Bedingungen auf SOA-Seite und 3 Bedingungen aufseiten des weiteren Umfeldes aufteilen. Im Rahmen der anbieterinternen SOA-Kommunikation konnten 31 Bedingungen identifiziert werden. Die in der ersten Welle identifizierten SOA-Positionie-rungsbedingungen und anbieterinternen SOA-Kommunikationsbedingungen wurden mittels der zweiten Befragungswelle (N=83) einer quantitativen Analyse unterzogen. Somit liefert die vorliegende Studie Bedingungen, die sowohl zu einer erfolgreichen SOA-Positionierung als auch zu einer erfolgreichen anbieterinternen SOA-Kommunikation beitragen.
Die Resultate dieser Arbeit werden zusammengefasst und theoretisch eingeordnet. Ebenfalls wird die methodische Vorgehensweise kritisch diskutiert und die Güte der Daten beurteilt. Schließlich wird ein Ausblick auf zukünftige Forschungsfelder gegeben.
Zentrale Aufgaben der Hochschule sind die Bewertung, die Ursachenklärung und die Förderung von Studienleistungen (Heublein & Wolter, 2011, S. 215). In diesem Kontext gilt neben intellektuellen Fähigkeiten die Leistungsmotivation als bedeutsamer Prädiktor für den akademischen Erfolg (z. B. Schmidt-Atzert, 2005, S. 132; Steinmayr & Spinath, 2009, S. 80). Im Fokus der vorliegenden Studie stehen deshalb Überlegungen zu Motivationsprozessen von 332 Studienanfängern der Hochschule der Bundesagentur für Arbeit und zu den Faktoren, die sich förderlich auf ihre Lernresultate auswirken. Mit einer Ausschöpfungsquote von 89 % sind die gewonnenen Daten für die Grundgesamtheit repräsentativ. Anhand einer Ex-post-facto-Versuchsanordnung in Form eines quantitativen Prädiktor-Kriteriums-Ansatzes (spezielle Variante eines Längsschnittdesigns) mit unterschiedlichen Erhebungsmethoden, wie standardisiertem Selbstbeurteilungsfragebogen, Leistungstests und offiziellen Dokumenten/Aktenmaterial, wurden folgende Forschungshypothesen zugrunde gelegt: Die Stärke der Leistungsmotivation ist sowohl von Erwartungskomponenten (Fähigkeitsselbstkonzept, Selbstwert, subjektive Notenerwartung, Erfolgszuversicht und Misserfolgsfurcht) als auch von Anreizkomponenten (Gegenstands-, Tätigkeits-, Folgenanreizen) abhängig, welche wiederum vermittelt über das leistungsmotivierte Verhalten einen Einfluss auf die Studienleistung besitzt. Dabei wurde postuliert, dass motivationale Variablen auch dann noch einen bedeutsamen Effekt auf die Studienleistung ausüben, wenn weitere Leistungsprädiktoren, wie die Schulabschlussnote, die Intelligenz, die emotionale Stabilität und die Gewissenhaftigkeit kontrolliert werden.
Heat exchangers are used for thickening of various products or desalination of saltwater. Nevertheless, they are used as cooling unit in industries. Thereby, the stainless steel heat transferring elements get in contact with microorganism containing media, such as river water or saltwater, and corrode. After at least two years of utilization the material is covered with bacterial slime called biofilm. This process is called biofouling and causes loss in efficiency and creates huge costs depending on cleaning technique and efficiency. Cleaning a heat exchanger is very expensive and time consuming. It only can be done while the device is out of business.
Changing the surface properties of materials is the best and easiest way to lengthen the initial phase of biofilm formation. This leads to less biofouling (Mogha et al. 2014).
Thin polymer films as novel materials have less costs in production than stainless steel and are easy to handle. Furthermore, they can be functionalzed easily and can be bougth in different sizes all over the world. Because of this, they can reduce the costs of cleaning techniques and lead to a longer high efficiency state of the heat exchanger. If the efficiency of the heat exchanger decreases, the thin polymer films can be replaced.
For a successful investigation of the microbial and the process engineering challenges a cooperation of Technical University of Kaiserslautern (chair of seperation science and technology) and University of Koblenz-Landau (working goup microbiology) was established.
The aim of this work was design engineering and production of a reactor for investigation of biofouling taking place on thin polymeric films and stainless steel. Furthermore, an experimental design has to be established. Several requirements have to be applied for these tasks. Therefore, a real heat exchanger is downscaled, so the process parameters are at least comparable. There are many commercial flow cell kits available. Reducing the costs by selfassembling increased the number of samples, so there is a basis for statistic analysis. In addition, fast and minimal invasive online-in-situ microscopy and Raman spectroscopy can be performed. By creating laminary flow and using a weir we implemented homogenous inflow to the reactors. Reproduceable data on biomass and cell number were created.
The assessment of biomass and cell number is well established for drinking water analysis. Epifluorescense microscopy and gravimetric determination are the basic techniques for this work, too. Differences in cell number and biomass between surface modifications and materials are quantified and statistically analysed.
The wildtype strain Escherichia coli K12 and an inoculum of 500 ml fresh water were used to describe the biofouling of the films. Thereby, we generated data with natural bacterial community in unknown media properties and data with well known media properties, so the technical relevance of the data is given.
Free surface energy and surface roughness are the first attachment hurdles for bacteria. These parameters were measured according to DIN 55660 and DIN EN ISO 4287. The materials science data were correlated with the number of cells and the biomass. This correlation acts as basal link of biofouling as biological induced parameter to the material properties. Material properties for reducing the biofouling can be prospected.
By using Raman spectroscopy as a cutting edge method future investigations could be shortened. If biomass or cell number can be linked with the spectra, new functional materials can be investigated in a short time.
Change of ecosystems and the associated loss of biodiversity is among the most important environmental issues. Climate change, pollution, and impoundments are considered as major drivers of biodiversity loss. Organism traits are an appealing tool for the assessment of these three stressors, due to their ability to provide mechanistic links between organism responses and stressors, and consistency over wide geographical areas.
Additionally, traits such as feeding habits influence organismal performance and ecosystem processes. Although the response of traits of specific taxonomic groups to stressors is known, little is known about the response of traits of different taxonomic groups to stressors. Additionally, little is known about the effects of small impoundments on stream ecosystem processes, such as leaf litter decomposition, and food webs.
After briefly introducing the theoretical background and objectives of the studies, this thesis begins by synthesizing the responses of traits of different taxonomic groups to climate change and pollution. Based on 558 peer-reviewed studies, the uniformity (i.e., convergence) in trait response across taxonomic groups was evaluated through meta-analysis (Chapter 2). Convergence was primarily limited to traits related to tolerance.
In Chapter 3, the hypothesis that small impoundments would modify leaf litter decomposition rates at the sites located within the vicinity of impoundments, by altering habitat variables and invertebrate functional feeding groups (FFGs) (i.e., shredders), was tested. Leaf litter decomposition rates were significantly reduced at the study sites located immediately upstream (IU) of impoundments, and were significantly related to the abundance of invertebrate shredders.
In Chapter 4, the invertebrate FFGs were used to evaluate the effect of small impoundments on stream ecosystem attributes. The results showed that heterotrophic production was significantly reduced at the sites IU. With regard to food webs, the contribution of methane gas derived carbon to the biomass of chironomid larvae was evaluated through correlation of stable carbon isotope values of chironomid larvae and methane gas concentrations.
The results indicated that the contribution of methane gas derived carbon into stream benthic food web is low. In conclusion, traits are a useful tool in detecting ecological responses to stressors across taxonomic groups, and the effects of small impoundments on stream ecological integrity and food web are limited.
Campuszeitung Ausg. 1/2012
(2015)
Themen: Schwerpunkte der Forschungsinitiative Forschungsinitiative des Landes fördert vier Schwerpunkte
Student der Universität in Koblenz gewinnt Sonderpreis
Studieren bewegt
Wanderer zwischen den Kulturen
Alphajump erleichtert Berufseinstieg für Studierende
Apps für Deutschland
QR-Codes auf dem Campus und weitere
Campuszeitung Ausg. 1/2013
(2015)
Campuszeitung Ausg. 1/2014
(2015)
Campuszeitung Ausg. 1/2015
(2015)
Campuszeitung Ausg. 2/2011
(2015)
Themen: Methodenzentrum am Campus Koblenz
"Macbeth" mal ganz anders
Gründungsbüro eröffnet
KOpEE-Kongress
20 Jahre ZFUW
10 Jahre Semantic Web Forschung
Lahnsteiner Schüler auf dem Campus
Westpoint meets Universität in Koblenz MINT-Aktionstag 2011 auf dem Campus
Auftakt Women Career Center
Absolventenfeiern
PTHV und Uni stärken Kooperation
Campuszeitung Ausg. 2/2014
(2015)
The increasing application of titanium dioxide nanoparticles (nTiO2) entails an increased risk regarding their release to surface water bodies, where they likely co-occur with other anthropogenic stressors, such as heavy metals. Their co-occurrence may lead to an adsorption of the metal ions onto the particles. These nanoparticles often sediment, due to their agglomeration, and thus pose a risk for pelagic or benthic species. The combined toxicity of nTiO2 and heavy metals is likely influenced by the properties of both stressors (since they may alter their interaction) and by environmental parameters (e.g., organic matter, pH, ionic strength) affecting their fate.
These issues were not yet systematically examined by the recent literature. Therefore, this thesis investigated the influence of nTiO2-products with differing crystalline phase composition on the toxicity of copper (as representative for heavy metals) in presence of different organic matters using the pelagic test organism Daphnia magna.
Moreover, the duration of the stressors` interaction (=aging) likely modulates the combined toxicity. Hence, the influence of nTiO2 on copper toxicity after aging as a function of environmental parameters (i.e., organic matter, pH, ionic strength) was additionally investigated.
Finally, the transferability of the major findings to benthic species was examined using Gammarus fossarum. The present thesis discovered a reduction of the copper toxicity facilitated by nTiO2 for all assessed scenarios, while its magnitude was determined by the surface area and structure of nTiO2, the quantity and quality of organic matter as well as the aging of both stressors. The general copper toxicity reduction by nTiO2 was also transferable to benthic species, despite their potentially increased exposure due to the sedimentation of nTiO2 with adsorbed copper. These observations suggest the application of nTiO2 as remediation agent, but potential side effects (e.g., chronic toxicity, reactive oxygen species formation) require further investigations. Moreover, questions regarding the transferability to other stressors (e.g., different heavy metals, organic chemicals) and the fate of stressors adsorbed to nTiO2 in aquatic ecosystems remain open.
Durch eine systematische Literaturanalyse sollen die wichtigsten Aspekte des Phänomens Crowdsourcing abgedeckt werden. Da die Summe an Forschungsfragen relativ breit gefächert ist, soll der Fokus der Arbeit auf die im Folgenden aufgelisteten Fragen gelegt werden: Was ist unter dem Begriff Crowdsourcing gezielt zu verstehen? Wie lässt sich das Phänomen Crowdsourcing von anderen angrenzenden Konzepten trennen? Wo liegen die Gemeinsamkeiten und wesentlichen Unterschiede zwischen den einzelnen Konzepten? Welche Ausprägungsformen von Crowdsourcing sind in Theorie und Praxis vorzufinden? In welchen Bereichen kommt Crowdsourcing zum Einsatz? Welche Unternehmen setzen Crowdsourcing erfolgreich um? Welche Plattformen zur Unterstützung von Crowdsourcing sind vorhanden? Welche Ziele bzw. Ergebnisse sollen mit dem Einsatz von Crowdsourcing erreicht bzw. erzielt werden? Wie läuft der Crowdsourcing-Prozess ab und in welche Phasen lässt sich dieser unterteilen? Wie sieht die Wertschöpfung durch Crowdsourcing (a) allgemein und (b) speziell für Unternehmen aus? Welche Chancen und Potenziale sowie Risiken und Grenzen entstehen dabei den Unternehmen? Was lässt sich in Zukunft im Bereich des Crowdsourcing noch verbessern, das heißt in welchen Bereichen besteht noch Forschungsbedarf?
Information systems research has started to use crowdsourcing platforms such as Amazon Mechanical Turks (MTurk) for scientific research, recently. In particular, MTurk provides a scalable, cheap work-force that can also be used as a pool of potential respondents for online survey research. In light of the increasing use of crowdsourcing platforms for survey research, the authors aim to contribute to the understanding of its appropriate usage. Therefore, they assess if samples drawn from MTurk deviate from those drawn via conventional online surveys (COS) in terms of answers in relation to relevant e-commerce variables and test the data in a nomological network for assessing differences in effects.
The authors compare responses from 138 MTurk workers with those of 150 German shoppers recruited via COS. The findings indicate, inter alia, that MTurk workers tend to exhibit more positive word-of mouth, perceived risk, customer orientation and commitment to the focal company. The authors discuss the study- results, point to limitations, and provide avenues for further research.
Code package managers like Cabal track dependencies between packages. But packages rarely use the functionality that their dependencies provide. This leads to unnecessary compilation of unused parts and to speculative conflicts between package versions where there are no conflicts. In two case studies we show how relevant these two problems are. We then describe how we could avoid them by tracking dependencies not between packages but between individual code fragments.
Animationen können in instruktionalen Kontexten genutzt werden, um Wissen über Sachverhalte zu vermitteln, die Prozesse oder Abläufe beinhalten. So können dynamische Sachverhalte explizit dargestellt werden und müssen nicht vom Lerner selbst in Gedanken hergestellt, sondern nur anhand der Animation nachvollzogen werden. Dies sollte sich positiv auf den Wissenserwerb auswirken. Dabei stellen Animationen mit ihrer besonderen Eigenschaft der Darstellung zeitlicher Abläufe besondere Herausforderungen an den Lerner. Das menschliche Informationsverarbeitungssystem unterliegt bestimmten Begrenzungen im Hinblick auf die Wahrnehmung von Geschwindigkeiten. Zu schnelle und zu langsame Geschwindigkeiten können beispielsweise nur schwer wahrgenommen und dementsprechend auch nicht kognitiv verarbeitet werden. Die Zielsetzung der Arbeit, die sich daraus ergibt, war eine systematische Untersuchung der Wirkung unterschiedlicher Präsentationsgeschwindigkeiten auf das Wahrnehmen und Verstehen eines dynamischen Sachverhaltes anhand einer Animation.
Um die Fragestellungen der Arbeit beantworten zu können, wurden vier experimentelle Studien durchgeführt. Die Pilotstudie hatte das Ziel, sowohl das Lernmaterial als auch den entwickelten Wissenstest zu evaluieren. In Studie 1 wurde der Frage nach dem Einfluss der Präsentationsgeschwindigkeit auf den Wissenserwerb beim Lernen mit einer interaktiven Animation nachgegangen.
Die Studien 2 und 3 untersuchten den Einfluss verschiedener Reihenfolgen von Geschwindigkeiten auf den Wissenserwerb. Hier ging es um eine systematische Erfassung der perzeptuellen und kognitiven Verarbeitung dynamischer Informationen in zwei verschiedenen Geschwindigkeiten mittels Blickbewegungsmessung (Studie 2) und wiederholten Testungen des Wissenserwerbs zwischen den einzelnen Lernphasen (Studie 3).
Die Ergebnisse der Studien deuten darauf hin, dass bei langsamer Geschwindigkeit Wissen über Ereignisse auf untergeordneter zeitlicher Ebene erworben wurde und dass je schneller eine Animation gesehen wurde, umso mehr anteiliges Wissen auf einer übergeordneten zeitlichen Ebene erworben wurde (Studie 1), aber eindeutige Aussagen über den Einfluss der Geschwindigkeit auf den Wissenserwerb auf verschiedenen zeitlichen Hierarchieebenen lassen sich aufgrund der Ergebnisse der Studien nicht machen. Im Hinblick auf die Lernförderlichkeit verschiedener Arten der Sequenzierung von Geschwindigkeiten zeigten sich auch keine eindeutigen Ergebnisse. Aufgrund der Analyse der Blickbewegungsdaten deutet sich jedoch an, dass die Reihenfolge "langsam - schnell" den Bedingungen auf Seiten der Lerner eher entgegen kommt als die Reihenfolge "schnell - langsam".
The identification of experts for a specific technology or framework produces a large benefit for collaborative software projects. Hence it reduces the communication overhead that is required to identify an expert on the fly. Therefore this thesis describes a tool and approach that can be used to identify an expert that has a specific skill-set. It will mainly focus on the skills and expertise of developers that use the Django framework. By adding more rules to our framework that approach could easily be extended for different technologies or frameworks. The paper will close with a case study on an open source project.
Demographic change forces companies in the social sector, which already face more difficulties recruiting from the primary labor market and keep qualified workers committed then other enterprises, to deal with the increase of employees satisfaction. This research paper analyses the context of dialogic management in the relation between the manager and her staff and satisfaction of employees. It measures the personal preferences of leaders and staff from the employee perception.
The following personal preferences are distinguished: Harmony-seeking relation preference versus dominant autonomy preferencern Thrill-seeking stimulant preference versus controlling balance preference according to Riemann, 1999 und Pashen Dihsmaier 2011. The empiric research was done with help of a survey at the Samaritan institution Fürstenwalde with a 364 out of 560 employees´ participation. It finds significant correlation between the satisfaction of the employees with their managers and their dialogic expertise as well as with their skill to create confidence and spread appreciation. It determines differences in job satisfication of employees between the perceived psychological preferences of the staff and the perceived preference of their managers. It can be proved that relationship-oriented leaders show a higher degree of willingness for dialogue then autonomy-oriented managers. The satisfaction of employees with these leaders is clearly higher then with managers who are perceived as autonomy- oriented. A higher degree of correlation between the contentment and dialogic behavior of management could be determined with stimulant- and relationship-oriented employee against employees with a preference for autonomy or balance. The highest value of contentment could be reached by relationship- oriented workers, who perceive their management also relationship-oriented. The foundation of dialogic thought and behavior based on trust and appreciation must be developed upon managers and employees, first, before dialogic management can be introduced to a company.
In this context the relationship-oriented management approaches should be taken into consideration when recruiting managers and should also have a high priority in the human resources development.
The publication of freely available and machine-readable information has increased significantly in the last years. Especially the Linked Data initiative has been receiving a lot of attention. Linked Data is based on the Resource Description Framework (RDF) and anybody can simply publish their data in RDF and link it to other datasets. The structure is similar to the World Wide Web where individual HTML documents are connected with links. Linked Data entities are identified by URIs which are dereferenceable to retrieve information describing the entity. Additionally, so called SPARQL endpoints can be used to access the data with an algebraic query language (SPARQL) similar to SQL. By integrating multiple SPARQL endpoints it is possible to create a federation of distributed RDF data sources which acts like one big data store.
In contrast to the federation of classical relational database systems there are some differences for federated RDF data. RDF stores are accessed either via SPARQL endpoints or by resolving URIs. There is no coordination between RDF data sources and machine-readable meta data about a source- data is commonly limited or not available at all. Moreover, there is no common directory which can be used to discover RDF data sources or ask for sources which offer specific data. The federation of distributed and linked RDF data sources has to deal with various challenges. In order to distribute queries automatically, suitable data sources have to be selected based on query details and information that is available about the data sources. Furthermore, the minimization of query execution time requires optimization techniques that take into account the execution cost for query operators and the network communication overhead for contacting individual data sources. In this thesis, solutions for these problems are discussed. Moreover, SPLENDID is presented, a new federation infrastructure for distributed RDF data sources which uses optimization techniques based on statistical information.
While the 1960s and 1970s still knew permanent education (Council of Europe), recurrent education (OECD) and lifelong education (UNESCO), over the past 20 years, lifelong learning has become the single emblem for reforms in (pre-) primary, higher and adult education systems and international debates on education. Both highly industrialized and less industrialized countries embrace the concept as a response to the most diverse economic, social and demographic challenges - in many cases motivated by international organizations (IOs).
Yet, literature on the nature of this influence, the diffusion of the concept among IOs and their understanding of it is scant and usually focuses on a small set of actors. Based on longitudinal data and a large set of education documents, the work identifies rapid diffusion of the concept across a heterogeneous, expansive and dynamic international field of 88 IOs in the period 1990-2013, which is difficult to explain with functionalist accounts.
Based on the premises of world polity theory, this paper argues that what diffuses resembles less the bundle of systemic reforms usually associated with the concept in the literature and more a surprisingly detailed model of a new actor " the lifelong learner.
The intention of this thesis was to characterise the effect of naturally occurring multivalent cations like Calcium and Aluminium on the structure of Soil Organic Matter (SOM) as well as on the sorption behaviour of SOM for heavy metals such as lead.
The first part of this thesis describes the results of experiments in which the Al and Ca cation content was changed for various samples originated from soils and peats of different regions in Germany. The second part focusses on SOM-metal cation precipitates to study rigidity in dependence of the cation content. In the third part the effects of various cation contents in SOM on the binding strength of Pb cations were characterised by using a cation exchange resin as desorption method.
It was found for soil and peat samples as well as precipitates that matrix rigidity was affected by both type and content of cation. The influence of Ca on rigidity was less pronounced than the influence of Al and of Pb used in the precipitation experiments. For each sample one cation content was identified where matrix rigidity was most pronounced. This specific cation content is below the cation saturation as expected by cation exchange capacity. These findings resulted in a model describing the relation between cation type, content and the degree of networking in SOM. For all treated soil and precipitate samples a step transition like glass transition was observed, determined by the step transition temperature T*. It is known from literature that this type of step transition is due to bridges between water molecules and organic functional groups in SOM. In contrast to the glass transition temperature this thermal event is slowly reversing after days or weeks depending on the re-conformation of the water molecules. Therefore, changes of T* with different cation compositions in the samples are explained by the formation of water-molecule-cation bridges between SOM-functional groups. No influence on desorption kinetics of lead for different cation compositions in soil samples was observed. Therefore it can be assumed that the observed changes of matrix rigidity are highly reversible by changing the water status, pH or putting agitation energy by shaking in there.
The subject of this thesis was to analyse the involvement of classical creativity techniques and IT tools in different phases of the innovation process. In addition, the present work deals with the integration of Design Thinking and TRIZ into the innovation process. The aim was to define a specific innovation process based on diverse existing Innovation process models from the literature. This specific innovation process should serve as a basis for the analysis of integration of creativity techniques, IT tools, Design Thinking and TRIZ. Summarizing it can be said that the application of creativity techniques and IT Tools is admissible and useful in every phase of the innovation process. In this work it was shown that the design thinking method can be integrated in the early stages of the innovation process. Also, the process model of TRIZ, which differs from traditional innovation processes, can be combined with classical innovation processes.
This thesis conducts a text and network analysis of criminological files. The specific focus during the research is the field money laundering. The analysis showed the most important concepts present in the text which were classified in eleven different classes. The relationships of those concepts were analysed using ego networks, key entity identification and clustering. Some of the statements given about money laundering could be validated by the findings of this analysis and their interpretation. Specific concepts like banks and organizations as well as foreign subsidiaries were identified. Aggregating these concepts with the statements in chapter 1.4.3 on the circular process of money laundering it can be stated that different organizations and individuals, present in the criminological files, were placing money through different banks, organizations and investments in the legal financial market. At last this thesis tries to validate the benefits of the used tools for the kind of conducted research process. An estimation on ORA's and Automap's applicability for this kind of research is given in the end.
Einfluss eines Ausrichtungswerkzeugs auf die Bedienbarkeit in unbeaufsichtigten Eyetrackingsystemen
(2015)
Eye gaze trackers are devices that can estimate the direction of gaze of a person. Among usability testing eye tracking also allows persons with decreased limb mobility to control or to interact with the computer. The quality and availability of eye tracking equipment has been increasing while costs have been decreasing. This development leads to entering new markets by using eye tracking as an additional input dimension for a variety of applications. Up to now eye tracking has been supervised by qualified experts, who assured that the important conditions like position in front of the eye tracking device, calibration and light conditions has been kept, while using.
This thesis examines an adjustment tool, which is helping the user to adjust in front of the eye tracker and helping to keep this position during the experiment. Furthermore the accuracy while moving the head has been analysed. In this experiment an remote eye gaze tracker has been used to control a game character in the video game called 'Schau Genau!'. The goal was to determine whether the game is playable without the barrier of adjusting and calibration. The results show that adjusting in front of an eye tracker is not a problem, keeping this position is. Small changes of the head position after the calibration process leads to a lack of accuracy. Giving up the calibration and using someone else calibration shows way bigger deviation. Additional head movement increases error rate and makes controlling more difficult.
Immersion into narrative worlds - theoretical and empirical approaches to audience experience
(2015)
Die vorliegende Dissertation widmet sich dem Phänomen des Erlebens der Rezeption von audiovisuellen narrativen unterhaltenden Medieninhalten. Dieses wird zunächst in die Rezeptions- und Wirkungsforschung eingeordnet und für das weitere Vorgehen konkretisiert: Transportation und Narrative Engagement stellen aktuell die beiden wichtigsten Konzepte der Medienpsychologie bezüglich der Nutzung und Wirkung von Geschichten dar.
Anschließend werden drei Fragestellungen bearbeitet. Bisher standen Forscher und Forscherinnen vor dem Problem der Manipulation des Rezeptionserlebens. Daher wurden in der vorliegenden Arbeit zwei Verfahren vorgeschlagen und in vier experimentellen Studien geprüft. Der Einsatz von Rezensionen erwies sich als geeignet, um bei allen narrativen unterhaltenden Texten das Rezeptionserleben ökonomisch zu manipulieren. Weiterhin gibt es bislang kein etabliertes Verfahren zur rezeptionsbegleitenden Messung des Rezeptionserlebens.
In dieser Arbeit wurde ein Verfahren aus einer Kombination von Real Time Response Measurement (RTR), Secondary Task Reaction Times (STRT) und der Erhebung der Lidschlagfrequenz entwickelt. Vor allem RTR war in der Lage, die im Zusammenhang mit dem Rezeptionserleben auftretenden emotionalen Prozesse zu erfassen. Die Befürchtung, die rezeptionsbegleitenden Messmethoden könnten das Rezeptionserleben verhindern, wurde in einer weiteren experimentellen Studie größtenteils entkräftet. Zuletzt wurde der Prozess des Zusammenfassens des Rezeptionserlebens in ein postrezeptives Urteil thematisiert. Nach der Entwicklung eines Rahmenmodells der Beantwortung postrezeptiver Skalen wurde in einer weiteren Studie die Bedeutung verschiedener Verlaufsparameter für das postrezeptive Urteil untersucht. Vier ausgesuchte Parameter zusammen können das postrezeptive Urteil besser erklären als der Verlaufs-Mittelwert. Die Arbeit schließt mit einer Diskussion, in der unter anderem die dynamische und die postrezeptive Messung des Rezeptionserlebens aufeinanderrnbezogen werden und hinsichtlich ihrer Bedeutung kritische Würdigung erfahren.
Emotion regulation – an empirical investigation in female adolescents with nonsuicidal self- injury
(2015)
Nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) was included as a condition for further study in the DSM-5. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate the suggested diagnostic criteria and the clinical and psychological correlates. In order to provide an optimal treatment best tailored to the patients need, a clear differentiation between Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) and NSSI is needed. The investigation of personality traits specific to patients with NSSI might be helpful for this differentiation. Furthermore, social difficulties can often be a trigger for NSSI. However, little is known about how adolescents with NSSI perceive social situations. Therefore, we examined how adolescents with NSSI process emotional expressions. A new emotion recognition paradigm (ERP) using colored and morphed facial expressions of happiness, anger, sadness, disgust and fear was developed and evaluated in a student sample, selected for being high (HSA) or low socially anxious (LSA). HSA showed a tendency towards impaired emotion recognition, and the paradigm demonstrated good construct validity.
For the main study, we investigated characteristics of NSSI, clinical and psychological correlates, personality traits and emotion recognition. We examined 57 adolescents with NSSI diagnosis, 12 adolescents with NSSI without impairment/distress and 14 adolescents with BPD, 32 clinical controls without NSSI, and 64 nonclinical controls. Participants were interviewed regarding mental disorders, filled out self-report questionnaires and participated in the ERP.
Results indicate that adolescents with NSSI experienced a higher level of impairment than clinical controls. There were similarities between adolescents with NSSI and adolescents with BPD, but also important differences. Adolescents with NSSI were characterized by specific personality traits such as high harm avoidance and novelty seeking compared to clinical controls. In adolescents with BPD, these personality traits were even more pronounced. No group differences in the recognition of facial expressions were found. Nonetheless compared to the control group, adolescents with NSSI rated the stimuli as significantly more unpleasant and arousing.
In conclusion, NSSI is a highly impairing disorder characterized by high comorbidity with various disorders and by specific personality traits, providing further evidence that NSSI should be handled as a distinct diagnostic entity. Consequently, the proposed DSM-5 diagnostic criteria for NSSI are useful and necessary.
Das Thema dieser Arbeit ist die Entwicklung einer hardwarebeschleunigten Einzelbildkompression zur Videoübertragung. Verfahren zur Einzelbildkompressionrn existieren bereits seit längerer Zeit. Jedoch genügen die gängigen Verfahren nicht den Anforderungen der Echtzeit und Performanz, um während einer Videoübertragung ohne spürbare Latenz zum Einsatz zu kommen. In dieser Arbeit soll einer der geläufigsten Algorithmen zur Bildkompression auf Parallelisierbarkeit, unter zu Hilfenahme der Grafikkarte, untersucht werden, um Echtzeitfähigkeit während der Kompression und Dekompression von computergenerierten Bildern zu erreichen. Die Ergebnisse werden evaluiert und in den Rahmen aktueller Verfahren parallelisierter Kompressionstechniken eingeordnet.
In this thesis, an interactive application is developed for Android OS. The application is about a virtual-reality game. The game is settled in the genre of first-person shooters and takes place in a space scenario. By using a stereo renderer, it is possible to play the game combined with virtual-reality glasses.
This thesis deals with the development of an interactive Android card game. As an example, the Hebrew game Yaniv was implemented. Focus is the elaboration of required background components and the corresponding implementation in that application. Required game processes will be screened and a possible solution will be identified.
In current research of the autonomous mobile robots, path planning is still a very important issue.
This master's thesis deals with various path planning algorithms for the navigation of such mobile systems. This is not only to determine a collision-free trajectory from one point to another. The path should still be optimal and comply with all vehicle-given constraints. Especially the autonomous driving in an unknown and dynamic environment poses a major challenge, because a closed-loop control is necessary and thus a certain dynamic of the planner is demanded.
In this paper, two types of algorithms are presented. First, the path planner, based on A*, which is a common graph search algorithm: A*, Anytime Repairing A*, Lifelong Planning A*, D* Lite, Field D*, hybrid A*. Second, the algorithms which are based on the probabilistic planning algorithm Rapidly-exploring Random Tree (Rapidly-exploring Random Tree, RRT*, Lifelong Planning RRT*), as well as some extensions and heuristics. In addition, methods for collision avoidance and path smoothing are presented. Finally, these different algorithms are evaluated and compared with each other.
Ray Tracing enables a close to reality rendering implementation of a modelled scene. Because of its functioning, it is able to display optical phenomena and complex lighting. Though, numerous computations per pixel have to be done. In practice implementations can not achieve computer graphics" aim of real-time rendering close to 60 frames per second. Current Graphics Processing Units (GPU) allows high execution parallelism of general-purpose computations. By using the graphics-API OpenGL this parallelism can be achieved and it is possible to design and realize a Ray-Tracer, which operates entirely on the GPU. The developed approach will be extended by an Uniform Grid - a Ray-Tracing acceleration structure. Hence, a speed-up is expected.
This thesis` purpose is the implementation of Ray-Tracer, which operates completely on the GPU, and its expansion by integrating an Uniform Grid. Afterwards, the evaluation of maximum achievable performance takes place. Possible problems regarding GPU-programming will be identified and analysed.
“Mittelstand” businesses are the backbone of the German economy. To operate effectively, these businesses require sufficient financing provided through adequate financing instruments. Yet, which characteristics do capital seekers value in adequate financing instruments? Despite the macroeconomic relevance of the topic, only few empirical studies exist to this date, which examine the financing behaviour of “Mittelstand”. For the paper at hand, all PREPS financed German businesses were asked to fill out an online survey. PREPS is a standardized mezzanine financing instrument, which was offered to “Mittelstand” businesses with a high degree of credit worthiness - primarily to finance business growth. PREPS financed businesses are of particular interest for this research as they can choose from the greatest variety of financing options amongst their peers due to their size and credit worthiness. Financing instruments differ in terms of rights and obligations associated with them. Depending on their design, financing contracts can fulfil a variety of functions beyond the obvious supply of liquidity, such as financial transformation, influencing of behaviours, and signalling private information. The paper at hand suggests that the businesses in question selected the same financing instrument, however, for different reasons. Furthermore, the degree of appreciation for certain characteristics of the financing instrument varies with business and situation specific context. When exploring individual hypotheses on how individual factors influence this degree of appreciation for certain financing characteristics, this paper builds on core capital structure theories as well as recent empirical insights in regards to financing behaviour. In addition, the paper examines several explorative hypotheses.
Im Rahmen dieser Arbeit wird untersucht, wie sich Modellfehler auf die Positionsgenauigkeit und Handhabbarkeit beim Rangieren mit einem Fahrerassistenzsystem auswirken. Besonderer Wert wird dabei auf die Bestimmung von Fehlergrenzen gelegt. Es wird der Frage nachgegangen, wie groß der Eingangsfehler sein darf, damit die Assistenz noch hinreichende Qualitätseigenschaften hinsichtlich ihrer Präzision und Robustheit aufweist. Dazu erfolgt zunächst eine quantitative Betrachtung der Fehler anhand des kinematischen Modells. Danach wird eine qualitative Betrachtung anhand von systematischen Experimenten durchgeführt. Es wird zunächst ein Controller entwickelt, mit dem sich ein Manöver mithilfe der visuellen Informationen der Assistenz simulieren lässt.
Dann wird eine Methode vorgestellt, mit deren Hilfe man das Manöver anhand definierter Fehlergrenzen bewerten kann. Um einen großen Raum möglicher Fehlerkombinationen effizient zu durchsuchen, wird das probabilistische Verfahren des Annealed Particle Filters benutzt. Mithilfe einer Testumgebung werden schließlich systematische Experimente durchgeführt. Zur weiteren Evaluation des Assistenzsystems in einer kontrollierten Umgebung erfolgte in Zusammenarbeit mit dem Fraunhofer ITWM in Kaiserslautern die Portierung des Assistenzsystems auf die dortige Simulationsumgebung RODOS.
In this thesis we present an approach to track a RGB-D camera in 6DOF andconstruct 3D maps. We first acquire, register and synchronize RGB and depth images. After preprocessing we extract FAST features and match them between two consecutive frames. By depth projection we regain the z-value for the inlier correspondences. Afterwards we estimate the camera motion by 3D point set alignment between the correspondence set using least-squares. This local motion estimate is incrementally applied to a global transformation. Additionally wernpresent methods to build maps based on point cloud data acquired by a RGB-D camera. For map creation we use the OctoMap framework and optionally create a colored point cloud map. The system is evaluated with the widespread RGB-D benchmark.
In der vorliegenden Arbeit sollen weltweit herrschende inhaltliche Ausprägungen und Schwerpunkte des Themengebiets "BMI" bzw. "GMI" mit Hilfe des Literatur-Reviews akademischer Artikel herausgearbeitet werden. Die festgestellten Beziehungen und Zusammenhänge sollen visualisiert und lokalisiert werden, um eine globale Sicht über das Thema herzustellen. Unter anderem sollen die in das finale Set aufgenommenen Artikel auf eine Korrelation zwischen BMI und Controlling bzw. Management hin überprüft werden. Als letzter Schritt soll eine Ableitung möglicher Forschungslücken unternommen werden.
One task of executives and project managers in IT companies or departments is to hire suitable developers and to assign them to suitable problems. In this paper, we propose a new technique that directly leverages previous work experience of developers in a systematic manner. Existing evidence for developer expertise based on the version history of existing projects is analyzed. More specifically, we analyze the commits to a repository in terms of affected API usage. On these grounds, we associate APIs with developers and thus we assess API experience of developers. In transitive closure, we also assess programming domain experience.
Factors triggering the ecotoxicity of metal-based nanoparticles towards aquatic invertebrates
(2015)
Nanoparticles are produced and used in huge amounts increasing their probability to end up in surface waters. There, they are subject to environmentally driven modification processes. Consequently, aquatic life may be exposed to different nanoparticle agglomerate sizes, while after sedimentation benthic organisms are more likely to be affected.
However, most ecotoxicity studies with nanoparticles exclusively investigated implications of their characteristics (e.g. size) on pelagic organisms, ignoring environmentally modified nanoparticles. Therefore, a systematic assessment of factors triggering the fate and toxicity of nanoparticles under environmentally relevant conditions is needed. The present thesis, therefore, investigates the implications of nanoparticle related factors (i.e., inherent material-properties and nanoparticle characteristics) as well as environmental conditions towards the pelagic living organism Daphnia magna and the benthic species Gammarus fossarum. In detail, inert titanium dioxide (nTiO2) and ion-releasing silver nanoparticles (nAg), both of varying particle characteristics (e.g. initial size), were tested for their toxicity under different environmental conditions (e.g. ultraviolet-light (UV-light)).
The results indicate that the toxicity of nTiO2 and nAg is mainly determined by: their adsorption potential onto biota, and their fate in terms of reactive oxygen species or Ag+ ion release. Thus, inherent material-properties, nanoparticle characteristics and environmental conditions promoting or inhibiting these aspects revealed significant implications in the toxicity of nTiO2 and nAg towards daphnids.
Furthermore, the presence of ambient UV-light, for example, adversely affected gammarids at 0.20 mg nTiO2/L, while under darkness no effects occurred even at 5.00 mg nTiO2/L. Hence, the currently associated risk of nanoparticles might be underestimated if disregarding their interaction with environmental parameters
Flowering habitats to enhance biodiversity and pest control services in agricultural landscapes
(2015)
Meeting growing demands for agricultural products requires management solutions that enhance food production, whilst minimizing negative environmental impacts. Conventional agricultural intensification jeopardizes farmland biodiversity and associated ecosystem services through excessive anthropogenic inputs and landscape simplification. Agri-environment schemes (AES) are commonly implemented to mitigate the adverse effects of conventional intensification on biodiversity. However the moderate success of such schemes thus far would strongly benefit from more explicit goals regarding ecosystem service provisioning. Providing key resources to beneficial organisms may improve their abundance, fitness, diversity and the ecosystem services they provide. With targeted habitat management, AES may synergistically enhance biodiversity and agricultural production and thus contribute to ecological intensification. We demonstrate that sown perennial wildflower strips, as implemented in current AES focusing on biodiversity conservation also benefit biological pest control in nearby crops (Chapter 2).
Comparing winter wheat fields adjacent to wildflower strips with fields without wildflower strips we found strongly reduced cereal leaf beetle (Oulema sp.) density and plant damage near wildflower strips. In addition, winter wheat yield was 10 % higher when fields adjoined wildflower strips. This confirms previous assumptions that wildflower strips, known for positive effects on farmland biodiversity, can also enhance ecosystem services such as pest control and the positive correlation of yield with flower abundance and diversity suggests that floral resources are key. Refining sown flower strips for enhanced service provision requires mechanistic understanding of how organisms benefit from floral resources. In climate chamber experiments investigating the impact of single and multiple flowering plant species on fitness components of three key arthropod natural enemies of aphids, we demonstrate that different natural enemies benefit differently from the offered resources (Chapter 3).
Some flower species were hereby more valuable to natural enemies than others overall. Additionally, the mixture with all flowers generally performed better than monocultures, yet with no transgressive overyielding. By explicitly tailoring flower strips to the requirements of key natural enemies of crop pests we aimed to maximise natural enemy mediated pest control in winter wheat (Chapter 4)and potato (Chapter 5) crops.
Respecting the manifold requirements of diverse natural enemies but not pests, in terms of temporal and spatial provisioning of floral, extra floral and structural resources, we designed targeted annual flower strips that can be included in crop rotation to support key arthropods at the place and time they are needed. Indeed, field experiments revealed that cereal leaf beetle density and plant damage in winter wheat can be reduced by 40 % to 61 % and aphid densities in potatoes even by 77 %, if a targeted flower strip is sown into the field. These effects were not restricted to the vicinity of flower strips and, in contrast to fields without flower strip, often prevented action thresholds from being reached. This suggests that targeted flower strips could replace insecticides. All adult natural enemies were enhanced inside targeted flower strips when compared to control strips. Yet, spillover to the field was restricted to key natural enemies such as ground beetles (winter wheat), hoverflies (potato) and lacewings (winter wheat and potato), suggesting their dominant role in biological control. In potatoes, targeted flower strips also enhanced hoverfly species richness in strips and crop, highlighting their additional benefits for diversity.
The present results provide more insights into the mechanisms underlying conservation biological control and highlight the potential of tailored habitat management for ecological intensification.
Der Fachbereich 4 (Informatik) besteht aus fünfundzwanzig Arbeitsgruppen unter der Leitung von Professorinnen und Professoren, die für die Forschung und Lehre in sechs Instituten zusammenarbeiten.
In jedem Jahresbericht stellen sich die Arbeitsgruppen nach einem einheitlichen Muster dar, welche personelle Zusammensetzung sie haben, welche Projekte in den Berichtszeitraum fallen und welche wissenschaftlichen Leistungen erbracht wurden. In den folgenden Kapiteln werden einzelne Parameter aufgeführt, die den Fachbereich in quantitativer Hinsicht, was Drittmitteleinwerbungen, Abdeckung der Lehre, Absolventen oder Veröffentlichungen angeht, beschreiben.
Die Basis für die Untersuchung bilden die theoretischen Erkenntnisse zur Transition und zum Fremdsprachenunterricht. In der Studie wurden saarländische Grundschullehrer und Gymnasiallehrer zu für den Fremdsprachenunterricht relevanten Aspekten befragt. Aus den Ergebnissen wurden Konsequenzen für die Bildungspolitik und die Unterrichtspraxis abgeleitet.
Diese Arbeit betrachtet das Thema Führung und Gesundheit und hat hierzu verschiedene Erkenntnisse der Literatur zusammengefasst, um diese von Führungskräften aus Wirtschaft und Polizei sowie von Personal- und Organisationsentwicklern bewerten zu lassen. Das Ziel war hierbei herauszufinden, ob die Führungskräfte und die Personal- und Organisationsentwickler das Thema als wichtig erachten, welche Hauptursachen sie für Fehlzeiten sehen und wie sie verschiedene Erkenntnisse der Literatur zum Gesundheitsmanagement einschätzen. Zusätzlich sollten sie bewerten, welche Maßnahmen sie als geeignet betrachten und welche Ressourcen notwendig sind, um die Mitarbeiter bei der Gesunderhaltung zu unterstützen. Schließlich sollten die Führungskräfte und die Personal- und Organisationsentwickler beurteilen, welcher Führungsstil als gesundheitsförderlich angesehen wird. Die Wirtschafts- und Polizeiführungskräfte sowie die Personal- und Organisationsentwickler erachten das Thema Gesundheit als wichtig und sehen es nicht nur als Modetrend an. Ihre Einschätzungen zu geeigneten Maßnahmen, die die Gesundheit der Mitarbeiter verbessern können, entsprechen überwiegend den aus der Literatur abgeleiteten Vorschlägen zur gesundheitsgerechten Führung. Die weitgehende Übereinstimmung der Sichtweisen in Forschung und Praxis legt nahe, dass die Erkenntnisse der Literatur zum Gesundheitsmanagement vermutlich von Praktikern als plausibel wahrgenommen werden.
This thesis shows an interaction of primitives in a three-dimensional space which is done by gestures. Functions which are difficult to do by gestures without any absolute feeling of the position are implemented with a touchscreen. Besides the touchscreen a second input device, a Leap-Motion, is used to obtain data of the motion of the hand. To get its data the Leap-Motion uses two CCD-cameras and three infrared LEDs. The interactions that can be done without any feedback of the absolute position are the translation, rotation and scale. These three and the movement through space are implemented as gestures in this thesis. This is done in Blender with the BlenderrnGame Engine and Python. The only function which has been implemented for the touchscreen is to select an object. Later on, a comparative control of the mouse was invented to contrast it with the control of the gestures. There are two big differences between these two controls. On the one hand, the gesture controls can be done in a three-dimensional space but most people aren't used to it yet. On the other hand, there is just a two-dimensional input possibility with the mouse control. Otherwise it is familiar to most persons. The evaluation should reveal if people prefer interaction by mouse control or by gestures. The result shows that the prefered control is done by the mouse. However in some categories of the tests the gestures are quite close to the result of the mouse.