Cross-disciplinary Information Research Articles

Supporting ethical and cultural competency development in cross-disciplinary information education in Germany

This paper discusses development, teaching, and learning of a graduate level course on information ethics in a German academic setting. It provides an overview of student and course learning objectives, course design, approach to student engagement, assessment, and educational activities. The educational environment was cross-disciplinary between library and information science informed information ethics and computer science concepts and applications. Learning and teaching were contextualized to AI in medical domains, to support focus of educational environment. Ethical and cultural competencies were incorporated into course design to support application of information ethics in design choices, alongside European and United States guidelines on ethical AI. This paper also discusses experienced challenges to balancing disciplinary perspectives and European and North American pedagogical approaches. Specific, identifiable opportunities for future course expansion to support interdisciplinary, ethically, and culturally informed professional education are discussed.

Knowledge map and forecast of digital twin in the construction industry: State-of-the-art review using scientometric analysis

With the advancement of Industry 4.0 and the development of science and technology, industries have seen the advantages of digital twin (DT) implementations and concepts. Although the construction industry is still in the early stage of DT development and implementation, it is urgent for the industry to have a DT agenda. This paper identifies 1158 related bibliographic records from the Web of Science and 745 records from the Derwent Patent Database and quantitatively analyzed them to describe patterns of publications. Two knowledge mapping tools were selected to visualize and analyze the literature in the relevant scientific domain. Then, we integrated clustering, knowledge mapping, and network analysis methods to show the current foci and future directions of DT-MT derived from the data of time distribution, journal areas, and subject distribution. The results indicate that DT is a cross-disciplinary information technology with great development potential, and its development in the construction industry is scattered with the leading advancement in the manufacturing of construction materials and components. The derived knowledge map shows three stages of construction DT, including (1) data collection and creation of DT framework and database; (2) implementation of planning and design modules in detail and control of construction sites; and (3) carrying out asset management and fault prediction in the operation and maintenance phase of projects. The novelty of this paper is the specific analysis of DT in the construction industry. This study adds value to the architecture, engineering, and construction industries by shedding light on the focus of DT practical applications and the formation of a development path of construction DT.

Companion Diagnostics: Lessons Learned and the Path Forward From the Programmed Death Ligand-1 Rollout.

Programmed death ligand-1 (PD-L1) immunohistochemistry companion diagnostic assays play a crucial role as predictive markers in patients being considered for immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy. However, because of a convergence of several factors, including recognition of increased types of cancers susceptible to immunotherapy, increasing numbers of immune checkpoint inhibitors, and release of multiple PD-L1 immunohistochemistry antibodies with differing reporting systems, this complex testing environment has led to significant levels of confusion for pathologists and medical oncologists. To identify which processes and procedures have contributed to the current challenges surrounding programmed death receptor-1 (PD-1)/PD-L1 companion diagnostics and to propose potential remedies to this issue. This is based upon input from key industrial stakeholders in conjunction with the College of American Pathologists Personalized Health Care Committee. A meeting of representatives of pharmaceutical and in vitro diagnostic companies along with the Personalized Health Care Committee reviewed the process of release of the PD-L1 companion diagnostic assays using a modified root cause analysis format. The modified root cause analysis envisioned an ideal circumstance of development and implementation of a companion diagnostic to identify shortcomings in the rollout of the PD-L1 assay and to suggest actions to improve future companion diagnostic assay releases. The group recommended improvements to key principles in companion diagnostics implementation related to multi-stakeholder communication, increased regulatory flexibility to incorporate postapproval medical knowledge, improved cross-disciplinary information exchange between medical oncology and pathology societies, and enhanced postmarket training programs. The rapidly changing nature of and increasing complexity associated with companion diagnostics require a fundamental review of processes related to their design, implementation, and oversight.

FloraGuard: Tackling the Online Illegal Trade in Endangered Plants Through a Cross-Disciplinary ICT-Enabled Methodology

This article presents a part of the ongoing Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)-funded project “FloraGuard: Tackling the illegal trade in endangered plants” that relies on cross-disciplinary approaches to analyze online marketplaces for the illegal trade in endangered plants, and explores strategies to develop digital resources to assist law enforcement in countering and disrupting this criminal market. This contribution focuses on how the project brought together computer science, criminology, conservation science, and law enforcement expertise to create a tool for the automatic gathering of relevant online information to be used for research, intelligence, and investigative purposes. The article also discusses the ethical standards applied and proposes the concept of “artificial intelligence (AI) review” to provide a sociotechnical solution that builds trustworthiness in the AI approaches used for this type of cross-disciplinary information and communications technology (ICT)-enabled methodology.

Modeling of cross-disciplinary collaboration for potential field discovery and recommendation based on scholarly big data

The promise of cross-disciplinary scientific collaboration has recently been proven by both technological innovation and scientific research. Much effort has been spent on research collaboration recommendation. A remaining challenge is to make valuable recommendation to specific researchers in specific fields in order to obtain more fruitful cross-disciplinary collaboration. Cross-disciplinary information hides in big data and the relationships between different fields are complicated, complex, and subtle. This paper proposes a method for cross-disciplinary collaboration recommendation (CDCR) to analyze cross-disciplinary collaboration patterns in scholarly big data, and recommend valuable research fields for possible cross-disciplinary collaboration. A cross-disciplinary discovery algorithm based on topic modeling is designed to extract potential research fields. Collaboration patterns are examined by analyzing the research field correlations. A recommendation algorithm is developed to provide a specific recommendation list of potential research fields according to the discovered cross-disciplinary collaboration patterns with researchers’ profiles. Evaluations conducted based on a real scholarly dataset demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method in recommending potentially valuable collaborations.

The Role of Dietitians in Providing Guidance: On the Use of Natural Health Products

Dietitians are experts on nutrition, and yet much uncertainty remains about their readiness and capacity to address a rapidly evolving marketplace of novel foods, nutrients, and nutrient-like substances (i.e., natural health products [NHPs]), which are available to consumers. In 2011, we conducted a qualitative examination of current thinking on the scope of practice, as well as barriers to and facilitators of dietitians' role as experts in providing guidance on NHP use. We sought rich descriptions of existing and future dietetic competencies with NHPs. We therefore conducted six focus groups. Participants were 18 dietitians practising in rural settings and 21 practising in urban settings of Atlantic Canada. Themes identified included people, products, and information; future education and training underlay these themes. The "food first" philosophy of dietetics practice was a primary convergent theme, the consensus being that NHPs can be used for select populations, lifestyles, and health conditions. The less food-related the NHP, the more divergent opinions were on specific competencies and scope of practice; focus group participants often referred to the importance of "doing no harm" and evidence-based practice. Dietitians' achievement of competency in providing guidance on NHPs will require core, consistent, and cross-disciplinary information and competencies, as well as enhanced integrative practice models.

Enabling More Human-Oriented Exploration of Complex Building Information Models

Building-related information is captured and has to be reused throughout the entire building life cycle. Therefore, an intuitively understandable and easy-to-handle access to a building life cycle wide archive is essential. Cross-disciplinary information seeking should be possible based on a three-dimensional representation of the building. In information seeking the planner must not be restricted to a single searching strategy. This paper initially focuses on all supporting explorative searching strategies. A “raw” building information model schema has been enhanced by user-oriented associations between particular data objects, referred to in this paper as “navigation links.” Each link is defined as a new property of a particular concept of the building model schema. Such a link points to a query recipe that can retrieve information about each instance of the concept. If the link is activated by a user, the query recipe is instantiated and processed by the system. The navigation links are formally represented using the Web Ontology Language. This paper describes the structure of the links as well as the structure of the system, which stores and processes the links throughout an information-seeking session.

The GEOSS Interoperability Process Pilot Project (IP3)

There is an ever-increasing need to integrate knowledge from the diverse disciplines engaged in studying the constituent parts of the complex Earth system. With the emergence of the Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS), which is bringing together thousands of previously isolated Earth observing systems, the necessity of establishing methods that will help in the integration of varied discipline information systems becomes even more urgent. The Group on Earth Observations (GEO) was established to oversee the creation of GEOSS which seeks to advance the convergence of Earth observing systems based on interoperability arrangements agreed to by consensus. We describe the specific approaches that GEO has proposed for achieving interoperability among its component systems and give an overview of the GEOSS Interoperability Process Pilot Project (IP3). The IP3 is helping to develop an advanced information infrastructure that supports the formation and operation of Earth System Science communities based on cross-disciplinary information exchange. This means moving from discipline-specific monolithic data-centric systems toward modular service-oriented information systems. GEOSS seeks to provide scientists, researchers, and decision makers with a persistent set of independent but interoperable information services that can be applied to address many pressing societal issues. The IP3 is furthering this cause by piloting a framework for multidisciplinary knowledge integration.

Selected abstracts of standards under review, 2006‐2007: Notes from the ASIS&T Standards Committee (ASIS&T‐SC)

Selected abstracts of standards under review, 2006‐2007: Notes from the ASIS&T Standards Committee (ASIS&T‐SC)

Building Society Up and Tearing it Down: Paired Reviews of Jared Diamond’s “Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies” and “Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed”

There is a growing interest in the scientific community in cross-disciplinary research to address the complex world in which we live. Cross-disciplinary research generates novel insights by bringing together information and analytical approaches from different fields, enriching our understanding of the interactions and factors involved in events. Jared Diamond’s career demonstrates the value of a crossdisciplinary approach. Diamond earned his Ph.D. in physiology, but his research interests have taken him into the fields of evolution and geography. He is currently a professor of geography at the University of California, Los Angeles. Not only has he mastered various fields himself, he is also able to distill and communicate cross-disciplinary information to nonexperts. His most recent and potentially most important contributions to the popular scientific literature are the books “Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies,” which explores the development and distribution of civilization, and “Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed,” which addresses the dynamics of maintaining a society over the long term.

Tracking Cross-Disciplinary Information Use by Author Affiliation: Demonstration of a Method

In this paper, we report the results of a bibliometric study in which we track cross-disciplinary citation behavior in the sciences. We hypothesize that cross-disciplinary citation in the sciences increased over the time period 1985–2000. Unlike most previous studies in this area, we assign discipline to a paper by its first author’s affiliation, and we hypothesize that assigning papers to disciplines based on first-author affiliation would yield results consistent with previous findings on cross-disciplinary citation rates in the sciences. Using the output of scientists in Biological Sciences, Chemistry, and Physics departments at 12 large research universities in 1985, 1990, 1995, and 2000 as our data set, we measure the cross-disciplinary citation rates of each discipline and compare our results to the findings of previous studies in this area.

Diagnostic pathology of lymphoproliferative disorders

The last 20 years have seen a dramatic change in the way we classify, and therefore diagnose, lymphoma. Two decades ago, the International Working Formulation enabled diagnosis and management on the basis of H&E sections alone, with no mandatory requirement for immunophenotyping, molecular studies or any other ancillary investigations. The concept of categorisation by 'clinicopathological entities' defined by clinical features, morphology, immunophenotype and more recently, genotype, began with the Kiel, and Lukes and Collins classifications in the late 1970s, becoming fully expressed in the REAL and subsequently WHO classifications. The current, multidisciplinary approach to categorisation adds significantly to the task facing the anatomical pathologist, since it requires distribution of biopsy material to all the appropriate specialised laboratories, the gathering of a range of cross-disciplinary information, the correlation of all diagnostic findings, deduction of a definitive diagnosis and, finally, integration of all the above into a single multiparameter report. In this review, we summarise the contemporary approach to the biopsy, diagnosis and reporting of lymphoproliferative disorders.

Status and trends on the integration of non-timber forest resources in forest inventorying: a brief overview

A brief assessment is presented highlighting the recent experiences, as well as identifying constraints and prospects, on the integration of non-timber forest resources (NTFR) into larger forest inventories (mostly for timber), with emphasis from tropical regions, and from regional to local levels. Although several experiences have been implemented, further documentation is needed on the degree of compatibility of timber management with respect to the extraction of NTFR. One of the main constraints to integration involves the actual costs of undertaking assessments for specific NTFR and the lack of trained personnel who usually have a focus on timber inventories. To overcome this barrier, cross-disciplinary information exchange may be needed in order to make assessments cost-effective and stimulate further work on developing assessment methods for particular NTFR within the framework of larger forest inventories.

The Business of Science: Cross-Disciplinary Information Literacy in the Applied Sciences and Business

Collaboration between academia and industry is resulting in new programs in applied science and engineering across many campuses. The information needs of students in these programs present a unique opportunity for science librarians and business librarians to collaborate in the development of information literacy course components. This paper describes one such collaborative effort at the University of Arizona Library to provide library instruction for the course Materials Engineering and Design. Students in this engineering class are required not only to design and engineer a new product but also to address fundamental business considerations such as cost analyses and market research.

“In-Determinacy” in Science and Discourse: A Rhetoric of Disciplinary Levels

Research and writing often begin with a play of determinacy and indeterminacy, or “in-determinacy” Do. Other disciplinary levels include invention and presuppositions D1, formal findings D2, and technical and media products D3. This rhetorical approach leads, here, to identifying levels and relationships; tracing cross-disciplinary information and dominant influences; applying the results to specific cases in science, literary criticism, ethics, and technical writing; thus, suggesting a typology for furthering such dialogue.

Value-added processing of representational and speculative information using cognitive skills

Representational information is given on the terms "Cognition," "Cognitive Processes," and "Information Pro cessing," through a review of value-added definitions of these terms that lexicographic information processors have written for publication in dictionaries, encyclopedia, or thesauri. Speculative representational information for the terms "Infor mation Processing" and "Cognitive Skills" is then presented to and in stimulating creativity among researchers within li brary and information science Cross-disciplinary information from cognitive, cultural, and folk psychology is also used to stimulate such creativity. The information processing under consideration is primarily manual and mental for meaning making, rather than machine and computational for file mak ing.