Realistic Framework Research Articles

Portrayal of Russian Foreign Policy towards Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine in 2014 in the Western and Russian Academia

This study examines how the Russo-Georgian War in 2008 and the Ukraine Crisis in 2014 were discussed in Western and Russian academic circles. The findings show that historical accounts as well as various theoretical frameworks were used to explain the Russian foreign policy (RFP) regarding these conflicts. In comparison, although mono-theoretical models were utilized in both cases, they are more dominant in the works of Western scholars. On the other hand, inductive historical explanations were used more in the works of Russian scholars. Another important point is that in the latter studies, alternative accounts to the Western unilateralism are more popular. These accounts reveal themselves with concepts such as “multipolar world” or “Eurasianism”. As for the mono theoretical accounts, realist approaches seem to be the dominant framework in both cases. Realist frameworks emphasize the improved material capabilities of Russia and external pressures in its sphere of influence. The later component of the realist approach is stressed more by scholars from both academic circles. Moreover, even the studies that utilize different approaches, such as ideational explanations, domestic political factors, decision-maker related approaches, or the ones that highlight the regional competition, emphasize the role of the strategic or geopolitical imperatives as a factor that cannot be ignored regarding how RFP is formed and implemented.

A Realistic Framework to Assess the Barriers to SCM 4.0 in the Foundry Industry

This study focuses on the barriers to implementing supply chain management (SCM) 4.0 in the foundry industry and provides insights into its practical implementation in foundry units. Our study identifies barriers such as data privacy, legal issues, SCM complexity, and barriers related to implementing Industry 4.0 (I4.0)-enabled SCM in the foundry industry. It also provides insights into the role of digital infrastructure in building effective I4.0-enabled SCM. This study provides insights into how SCM 4.0 can be implemented in the foundry industry. The findings will be helpful to policymakers and foundry consultants in designing appropriate strategies for foundry units.

Optimizing some parameters of air-filled ion pulse ionization chambers for effective radon detection

Air-filled ionization chambers in pulse ion mode can provide precise low-level detection of indoor/outdoor radon. However, it suffers from relatively high collection duration of positive and negative charges as well as environmental changes. In order to overcome these shortcomings, the Garfield++ software which is a powerful toolkit to develop a realistic simulation framework for radiation detectors was applied. Also, Garfield++ interface to Magboltz was used to calculate the gas parameters for air at various humidity conditions for a wide range of electric field strengths in order to compare the results with other available data in the literature. The Garfield++ software was also used to calculate maximum charge collection duration for a wide range of tube radii, wire radii, and electric potentials which are the main parameters affecting the charge collection duration. Furthermore, the influence of environmental conditions including air pressure, temperature, and humidity on the charge collection duration was investigated. The results show that for an air-filled radon ionization chamber with a moderate size (e.g. 1 L) with a bias voltage of hundreds of volts, the time constant of the external circuit can be chosen to be less than 100 ms, which is much lower than the values used in other studies. Therefore, with a proper design of an ionization chamber and its electronic system, it is possible to determine radon activity concentrations of up to a few tens of kBq.m−3 in pulse mode. In conclusion, the data obtained in this study assists in developing radon air-filled ionization chambers in order to determine chamber dimensions and bias voltage as well as designing the readout electronics according to the characteristics required in an intended application.

Dynamics of excitable cells: spike-adding phenomena in action

We study the dynamics of action potentials of some electrically excitable cells: neurons and cardiac muscle cells. Bursting, following a fast–slow dynamics, is the most characteristic behavior of these dynamical systems, and the number of spikes may change due to spike-adding phenomenon. Using analytical and numerical methods we give, by focusing on the paradigmatic 3D Hindmarsh–Rose neuron model, a review of recent results on the global organization of the parameter space of neuron models with bursting regions occurring between saddle-node and homoclinic bifurcations (fold/hom bursting). We provide a generic overview of the different bursting regimes that appear in the parametric phase space of the model and the bifurcations among them. These techniques are applied in two realistic frameworks: insect movement gait changes and the appearance of Early Afterdepolarizations in cardiac dynamics.

Dynamics of Medical Screening: A Simulation Model of PSA Screening for Early Detection of Prostate Cancer

In this study, we present a novel simulation model and case study to explore the long-term dynamics of early detection of disease, also known as routine population screening. We introduce a realistic and portable modeling framework that can be used for most cases of cancer, including a natural disease history and a realistic yet generic structure that allows keeping track of critical stocks that have been generally overlooked in previous modeling studies. Our model is specific to prostate-specific antigen (PSA) screening for prostate cancer (PCa), including the natural progression of the disease, respective changes in population size and composition, clinical detection, adoption of the PSA screening test by medical professionals, and the dissemination of the screening test. The key outcome measures for the model are selected to show the fundamental tradeoff between the main harms and benefits of screening, with the main harms including (i) overdiagnosis, (ii) unnecessary biopsies, and (iii) false positives. The focus of this study is on building the most reliable and flexible model structure for medical screening and keeping track of its main harms and benefits. We show the importance of some metrics which are not readily measured or considered by existing medical literature and modeling studies. While the model is not primarily designed for making inferences about optimal screening policies or scenarios, we aim to inform modelers and policymakers about potential levers in the system and provide a reliable model structure for medical screening that may complement other modeling studies designed for cancer interventions. Our simulation model can offer a formal means to improve the development and implementation of evidence-based screening, and its future iterations can be employed to design policy recommendations to address important policy areas, such as the increasing pool of cancer survivors or healthcare spending in the U.S.

Eye for an AI: More-than-seeing, fauxtomation, and the enactment of uncertain data in digital pathology.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools are being developed to assist with increasingly complex diagnostic tasks in medicine. This produces epistemic disruption in diagnostic processes, even in the absence of AI itself, through the datafication and digitalization encouraged by the promissory discourses around AI. In this study of the digitization of an academic pathology department, we mobilize Barad's agential realist framework to examine these epistemic disruptions. Narratives and expectations around AI-assisted diagnostics-which are inextricable from material changes-enact specific types of organizational change, and produce epistemic objects that facilitate to the emergence of some epistemic practices and subjects, but hinder others. Agential realism allows us to simultaneously study epistemic, ethical, and ontological changes enacted through digitization efforts, while keeping a close eye on the attendant organizational changes. Based on ethnographic analysis of pathologists' changing work processes, we identify three different types of uncertainty produced by digitization: sensorial, intra-active, and fauxtomated uncertainty. Sensorial and intra-active uncertainty stem from the ontological otherness of digital objects, materialized in their affordances, and result in digital slides' partial illegibility. Fauxtomated uncertainty stems from the quasi-automated digital slide-making, which complicates the question of responsibility for epistemic objects and related knowledge by marginalizing the human.

Asymptotic extinction and persistence of a perturbed epidemic model with different intervention measures and standard Lévy jumps

Controlling an outbreak through response measures is critical to saving lives and protecting vulnerable populations. This article proposes an epidemic model with three intervention measures: media coverage, isolation, and medical therapy. Since randomness plays an important role in biology, from the molecular level to the organismal level, we extend our system to a more realistic framework, which then takes into account the effect of standard jumps due to some sudden environmental changes. After providing the associated framework, the sharp criteria for asymptotic extinction and persistence of illness are derived. To check the accuracy of our results, we perform two numerical examples.

The different facets of 'experiential knowledge' in Swedish women's claims about systemic side effects of the copper intrauterine device.

'Experiential knowledge' has been identified as a key epistemic resource used by lay people to contest medical authorities and build new knowledge related to health. The Internet has created unprecedented opportunities for such experience-based epistemic projects. This article contributes to understandings of the as yet under-theorised concept of experiential knowledge by analysing accounts of a group of Swedish women who claim that their use of contraceptive copper IUDs has led to systemic side effects not recognised by health care providers. Based on digital group interviews and written essays, we distinguish between three components or stages of experiential knowledge at work in the women's use of experience as an epistemic resource: somatic knowing, collective validation and self-experimentation. Drawing on a critical realist framework, we defend a notion of experiential knowledge as crucially, while only partially, based on a bodily and practical access to aspects of reality organised by extra-discursive principles. By providing theoretical complexity to the notion of experiential knowledge, we contribute resources for discriminating between and evaluating various experience-based claims, something that is particularly needed in the current 'post-truth' era where experience-based knowledge claims pointing in divergent directions flourish.

Joint Spatio-Temporal Precoding for Practical Non-Stationary Wireless Channels

The high mobility, density and multi-path evident in modern wireless systems makes the channel highly non-stationary. This causes temporal variation in the channel distribution that leads to the existence of time-varying joint interference across multiple degrees of freedom (DoF, <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">e.g</i> ., users, antennas, frequency and symbols), which renders conventional precoding sub-optimal in practice. In this work, we derive a High-Order Generalization of Mercer’s Theorem (HOGMT), which decomposes the multi-user non-stationary channel into two (dual) sets of jointly orthogonal subchannels (eigenfunctions), that result in the other set when one set is transmitted through the channel. This duality and joint orthogonality of eigenfuntions ensure transmission over independently flat-fading subchannels. Consequently, transmitting these eigenfunctions with optimally derived coefficients eventually mitigates any interference across its degrees of freedoms and forms the foundation of the proposed joint spatio-temporal precoding. The transferred dual eigenfuntions and coefficients directly reconstruct the data symbols at the receiver upon demodulation, thereby significantly reducing its computational burden, by alleviating the need for any complementary post-coding. Additionally, the eigenfunctions decomposed from the time-frequency delay-Doppler channel kernel are paramount to extracting the second-order channel statistics, and therefore completely characterize the underlying channel. We evaluate this using a realistic non-stationary channel framework built in Matlab and show that our precoding achieves ⩾4 orders of reduction in BER at SNR⩾15dB in OFDM systems for higher-order modulations and less complexity compared to the state-of-the-art precoding.

Modeling genetic benefits and financial costs of integrating biobanking into the conservation breeding of managed marsupials.

Managed breeding programs are an important tool in marsupial conservation efforts but may be costly and have adverse genetic effects in unavoidably small captive colonies. Biobanking and assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs) could help overcome these challenges, but further demonstration of their potential is required to improve uptake. We used genetic and economic models to examine whether supplementing hypothetical captive populations of dibblers (Parantechinus apicalis) and numbats (Myrmecobius fasciatus) with biobanked founder sperm through ARTs could reduce inbreeding, lower required colony sizes, and reduce program costs. We also asked practitioners of the black-footed ferret (Mustela nigripes) captive recovery program to complete a questionnaire to examine the resources and model species research pathways required to develop an optimized biobanking protocol in the black-footed ferret. We used data from this questionnaire to devise similar costed research pathways for Australian marsupials. With biobanking and assisted reproduction, inbreeding was reduced on average by between 80% and 98%, colony sizes were on average 99% smaller, and program costs were 69- to 83-fold lower. Integrating biobanking made long-standing captive genetic retention targets possible in marsupials (90% source population heterozygosity for a minimum of 100 years) within realistic cost frameworks. Lessons from the use of biobanking technology that contributed to the recovery of the black-footed ferret include the importance of adequate research funding (US$4.2 million), extensive partnerships that provide access to facilities and equipment, colony animals, appropriate research model species, and professional and technical staff required to address knowledge gaps to deliver an optimized biobanking protocol. Applied research investment of A$133 million across marsupial research pathways could deliver biobanking protocols for 15 of Australia's most at-risk marsupial species and 7 model species. The technical expertise and ex situ facilities exist to emulate the success of the black-footed ferret recovery program in threatened marsupials using these research pathways. All that is needed now for significant and cost-effective conservation gains is greater investment by policy makers in marsupial ARTs.

Examining an Altruism-Eliciting Video Intervention to Increase COVID-19 Vaccine Intentions in Younger Adults: A Qualitative Assessment Using the Realistic Evaluation Framework.

COVID-19 vaccine-induced immunity wanes over time, and with the emergence of new variants, additional "booster" doses have been recommended in Canada. However, booster vaccination uptake has remained low, particularly amongst younger adults aged 18-39. A previous study by our research team found that an altruism-eliciting video increased COVID-19 vaccination intentions. Using qualitative methods, the present study aims to: (1) identify the factors that influence vaccine decision-making in Canadian younger adults; (2) understand younger adults' perceptions of an altruism-eliciting video designed to increase COVID-19 vaccine intentions; and (3) explore how the video can be improved and adapted to the current pandemic context. We conducted three focus groups online with participants who: (1) received at least one booster vaccine, (2) received the primary series without any boosters, or (3) were unvaccinated. We used deductive and inductive approaches to analyze data. Deductively, informed by the realist evaluation framework, we synthesized data around three main themes: context, mechanism, and intervention-specific suggestions. Within each main theme, we deductively created subthemes based on the health belief model (HBM). For quotes that could not be captured by these subthemes, additional themes were created inductively. We found multiple factors that could be important considerations in future messaging to increase vaccine acceptance, such as feeling empowered, fostering confidence in government and institutions, providing diverse (such as both altruism and individualism) messaging, and including concrete data (such as the prevalence of vulnerable individuals). These findings suggest targeted messaging tailored to these themes would be helpful to increase COVID-19 booster vaccination amongst younger adults.

Everett’s Interpretation and Convivial Solipsism

I show how the quantum paradoxes occurring when we adopt a standard realist framework (or a framework in which the collapse implies a physical change of the state of the system) vanish if we abandon the idea that a measurement is related (directly or indirectly) to a physical change of state. In Convivial Solipsism, similarly to Everett’s interpretation, there is no collapse of the wave function. However, contrary to Everett’s interpretation, there is only one world. This also allows us to get rid of any non-locality and to provide a solution to the Wigner’s friend problem and its more recent versions.

AC transmission expansion planning based on self‐organized criticality to mitigate the risk of cascading blackouts

AbstractThe secular increase of load causes the evolving power system to operate near the critical margins. In such attitudes, the probability of cascading line outages, as the major reason for recent blackouts, is much more than expected. As a result, an innovative approach for optimal AC transmission expansion planning (TEP) to minimize the risk of cascading blackouts is presented in this paper. The proposed multi‐objective AC‐TEP problem minimizes the expected energy not supplied due to the total load shedding imposed on the system to mitigate the risk of cascading line outages along with the total investment and operational costs of the new transmission lines planned to be optimally added to the system. This probabilistic procedure is based on self‐organized criticality and considers the actual aspects of the power system such as reactive power and voltage concerns in the planning stage. The obtained Pareto front set provides the opportunity for the planners to choose the most preferred solution. The proposed method is implemented and verified in the IEEE 118‐bus test system and compared with two types of TEP approaches. The first one is a previously reported version of this work which was a simplified DC model of the problem and the second one is the conventional AC‐TEP model. The obtained results show the benefits of the proposed AC model on the mitigation of cascading line outages in a more realistic framework, considering the impact of reactive power and voltage stability concerns.

Disordered ferromagnetic systems with stochastic driving

We study the effects of a newly proposed type of driving conducted by the stochastic increments of the external magnetic field applied to the disordered three-dimensional ferromagnetic systems. The influence of randomness is analyzed in the representative regimes of stochastic driving covering a wide range of driving rates (slow, intermediate and fast). Obtained results are consistent with the experimental ones for the systems exhibiting similar intermittent avalanche dynamics. Stochastic driving opens a more realistic general experimental and theoretical framework for the studies of not (easily) feasible real-world phenomena, with the prospect of becoming a broadly applicable platform going beyond the scope of the nonequilibrium zero-temperature variant of the random field Ising model used here as its exemplification.

Implementation and scalability of shared care models for chronic eye disease: a realist assessment informed by health system stakeholders in Finland, the United Kingdom, and Australia

Background/ObjectivesSeveral health systems have implemented innovative models of care which share the management of patients with chronic eye diseases between ophthalmologists and optometrists. These models have demonstrated positive outcomes for health systems including increased access for patients, service efficiency and cost-savings. This study aims to understand factors which support successful implementation and scalability of these models of care.Subjects/MethodsSemi-structured interviews were conducted with 21 key health system stakeholders (clinicians, managers, administrators, policy-makers) in Finland, United Kingdom and Australia between October 2018 and February 2020. Data were analyzed using a realist framework to identify the contexts, mechanisms of action, and outcomes of sustained and emerging shared care schemes.ResultsFive key themes relating to successful implementation of shared care were identified as (1) clinician-led solutions, (2) redistributing teams, (3) building inter-disciplinary trust, (4) using evidence for buy-in, and (5) standardized care protocols. Scalability was found to be supported by (6) financial incentives, (7) integrated information systems, (8) local governance, and (9) a need for evidence of longer-term health and economic benefits.ConclusionsThe themes and program theories presented in this paper should be considered when testing and scaling shared eye care schemes to optimize benefits and promote sustainability.

An operative framework to model mucus clearance in silico by coupling cilia motion with the liquid environment.

Mucociliary clearance is the first defense mechanism of the respiratory tract against inhaled particles. This mechanism is based on the collective beating motion of cilia at the surface of epithelial cells. Impaired clearance, either caused by malfunctioning or absent cilia, or mucus defects, is a symptom of many respiratory diseases. Here, by exploiting the lattice Boltzmann particle dynamics technique, we develop a model to simulate the dynamics of multiciliated cells in a two-layer fluid. First, we tuned our model to reproduce the characteristic length- and time-scales of the cilia beating. We then check for the emergence of the metachronal wave as a consequence of hydrodynamic mediated correlations between beating cilia. Finally, we tune the viscosity of the top fluid layer to simulate the mucus flow upon cilia beating, and evaluate the pushing efficiency of a carpet of cilia. With this work, we build a realistic framework that can be used to explore several important physiological aspects of mucociliary clearance.

Conceptualising a Liquid Interculturality for Foreign Language Teaching: A Case Study of Higher Education Teachers in China

Recent researchers and educators have suggested a renewed understanding for "culture" in order to transcend the essentialist perceptions that are deeply entrenched in intercultural education. This study adopted a critical, realistic liquid framework of interculturality to investigate how a group of foreign language teachers perceive and practise the content of culture and interculturality in a Chinese university. The study was conducted in a narrative inquiry style, in which interviews and journal entries were employed to collect data, and thematic and discourse analysis were combined to examine them. The data show that teachers’ understandings of cultures can be contradictory and manipulative, oscillating between simple and complex stances; despite some shortcomings, teachers are able to build a reflexivity in intercultural education classrooms, reflecting on issues related to diversity, equality and justice and taking actions in a socially responsible way. These results affirm the value of liquid interculturality as a framework for researchers to better examine teachers’ understandings in intercultural classrooms, and offer some feasible suggestions for educators to develop a critical awareness of cultural diversity and promote reflexive practices in the future.

A Realist Evaluation of Case Management Models for People with Complex Health Conditions Using Novel Methods and Tools-What Works, for Whom, and under What Circumstances?

Case management developed from a generalist model to a person-centred model aligned with the evidence-informed evolution of best practice people-centred integrated care. Case management is a multidimensional and collaborative integrated care strategy where the case manager performs a set of interventions/actions to support the person with a complex health condition to progress in their recovery pathway and participate in life roles. It is currently unknown what case management model works in real life for whom and under what circumstances. The purpose of this study was to answer these questions. The study methods used realistic evaluation framework, examined the patterns and associations between case manager actions (mechanisms), the person's characteristics and environment (context), and recovery (outcomes) over 10 years post severe injury. There was mixed methods secondary analysis of data extracted via in-depth retrospective file reviews (n = 107). We used international frameworks and a novel approach with multi-layered analysis including machine learning and expert guidance for pattern identification. The study results confirm that when provided, a person-centred case management model contributes to and enhances the person's recovery and progress towards participation in life roles and maintaining well-being after severe injury.Furthermore, the intensity of case management for people with traumatic brain injury, and the person-centred actions of advising, emotional and motivational support, and proactive coordination contribute to the person achieving their goals. The results provide learnings for case management services on the case management models, for quality appraisal, service planning, and informs further research on case management.

"Like putting on an old pair of gloves" or "realising i am actually over it": a qualitative study exploring the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown restrictions on eating disorder recovery in the UK.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12144-023-04353-2.

Comparison between the stem and leaf photosynthetic productivity in Eucalyptus urophylla plantations with different age.

We developed a more realistic modeling framework by integrating stem photosynthesis into the canopy carbon assimilation model to compare the photosynthetic productivity between the stem and leaf of Eucalyptus urophylla plantations. Stems of Eucalyptus species with smooth outer bark have photosynthetic green tissue that can recycle internal stem CO2. However, the potential contribution of stem photosynthesis to forest productivity has not previously been adequately quantified, and we also do not know how it compares to leaf photosynthetic productivity. To assist in addressing this knowledge gap, we conducted field surveys in Eucalyptus urophylla plantations of different ages and developed a more realistic modeling framework by integrating stem photosynthesis into the existing canopy carbon assimilation model. We calculated the proportion of tree stems shaded by neighboring tree trunks based on Poisson spatial point process. Under the stand density of 2000 trees per hectare, the light absorption area of tree trunks of 2-year-old and 7-year-old E. urophylla plantations were 0.11 (± 0.15) and 0.35 (± 0.12) m2 stem m-2 land, the stem photosynthetic productivity (GPPstem) was 0.72 (± 0.45) and 1.81 (± 1.12) mol C m-2month-1, and the ratios of GPPstem to leaf photosynthetic productivity (GPPleaf) were 5.10 and 8.17% for 2- and 7-year-old plantations, respectively. Overall, this study presents the feasibility of incorporating stem photosynthesis into the productivity prediction of E. urophylla plantations by developing the stem light absorption model.