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Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -Developing and ¿transition¿ economies face myriad challenges in their attempts to achieve and maintain political stability and foster the economic growth essential for national security, the social well-being of current citizens and sustainable environments for future generations. Governments in the Western Balkans have striven to achieve all of the above, and this volume assesses the nature of their experiences as well as the level of their success in doing so. Featuring detailed case studies of public policy reforms in the region as well as comparative analysis on a range of indicators, the book analyzes the role of key players in setting the political agenda as well as implementing policy reforms. It also distils the lessons that can be learned from the Western Balkan experience, recommending strategies for enhancing the policy making process. In addition, it examines the developmental role played by the full spectrum of policy actors, including the private sector, NGOs, specialinterest groupings, international financial institutions, donor nations and the EU.Each case study has been prepared by academics with deep knowledge and experience of the western Balkans and addresses a core set of questions: identifying the policy issue and its broader context, defining the roles of specific individuals in formulating policy and reform and assessing the influence of networks and coalitions in the policy making process. With so little detailed literature on public policy making in a group of nations strategically positioned between Europe, Russia and the near East, the detailed insights provided by this volume will be widely welcomed.Our book provides case studies of specific public policy reform episodes in selected Western Balkan post-conflict and transition countries. The focus of these case studies extends beyond the technical aspects and entails substantive examination of the policy actors, constituencies and politics that ultimately shape the policy that emerges from the policy making process. This analysis draws lessons for strengthening the quality of policies, the transparency, consistency, and governance of the policy making process and ultimately for contributing to economic and social development of the region.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 264 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This book introduces transplantation in rodents as useful tools used in studying transplant immunobiology. Several solid organs (kidney, heart, liver) transplant models in rodents are described in this book. It can help surgical quality and save surgical time. The first part of the book provides a review of rodent transplant tolerance induction, the role of gender and body-weight in rodent transplantation, surgical instruments and organ preservation solutions. In the second part of the book, various organ-transplantation techniques in rodents are discussed in individual chapters. This book presents uniform surgical procedures in mouse and rats, which produce comparable data, efficiently enhancing the translational research from bench to non-human primates and beyond. It will be of great value to transplant researchers, research fellows and clinicians in many surgical specialties.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 184 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -The present work investigates global politics and political implications of social science and management with the aid of the latest complexity and chaos theories. Until now, deterministic chaos and nonlinear analysis have not been a focal point in this area of research. This book remedies this deficiency by utilizing these methods in the analysis of the subject matter. The authors provide the reader a detailed analysis on politics and its associated applications with the help of chaos theory, in a single edited volume.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 212 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -New biotechnologies have propelled the question of what it means to be human ¿ or posthuman ¿ to the forefront of societal and scientific consideration. This volume provides an accessible, critical overview of the main approaches in the debate on posthumanism, and argues that they do not adequately address the question of what it means to be human in an age of biotechnology. Not because they belong to rival political camps, but because they are grounded in a humanist ontology that presupposes a radical separation between human subjects and technological objects.The volume offers a comprehensive mapping of posthumanist discourse divided into four broad approaches¿two humanist-based approaches: dystopic and liberal posthumanism, and two non-humanist approaches: radical and methodological posthumanism. The author compares and contrasts these models via an exploration of key issues, from human enhancement, to eugenics, to new configurations of biopower, questioning what role technology plays in defining the boundaries of the human, the subject and nature for each.Building on the contributions and limitations of radical and methodological posthumanism, the author develops a novel perspective, mediated posthumanism, that brings together insights in the philosophy of technology, the sociology of biomedicine, and Michel Foucault¿s work on ethical subject constitution. In this framework, technology is neither a neutral tool nor a force that alienates humanity from itself, but something that is always already part of the experience of being human, and subjectivity is viewed as an emergent property that is constantly being shaped and transformed by its engagements with biotechnologies. Mediated posthumanism becomes a tool for identifying novel ethical modes of human experience that are richer and more multifaceted than current posthumanist perspectives allow for.The book will be essential reading for students and scholars working onethics and technology, philosophy of technology, poststructuralism, technology and the body, and medical ethics.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 252 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -The book¿s main contribution is its interdisciplinary approach to the issue of sedation at the end-of-life. Because it occurs at the end of life, palliative sedation raises a number of important ethical and legal questions, including whether it is a covert form of euthanasia and for what purposes it may legally be used. Many of the book chapters address the first question and almost all deal with a specific form of the second: whether palliative sedation should be used for those experiencing ¿existential suffering¿ This raises the question of what existential suffering is, a topic that is also discussed in the book. The different chapters address these issues from the perspectives of the relevant disciplines: Palliative Medicine, Bioethics, Law and Theology. Hence, helpful accounts of the clinical and historical background for this issue are provided and the importance of drawing accurate ethical and legal distinctions is stressed throughout the whole book. So the volume represents avaluable contribution to the emerging literature on this topic and should be helpful across a broad spectrum of readers: philosophers, theologians and physicians.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 196 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This book disentangles the complex meanings of responsibility in nanotechnology development by focusing on its theoretical and empirical dimensions. The notion of responsibility is extremely diversified in the public discourse of nanoscale technologies. Addressed are major disciplinary perspectives working on nanotechnology, e.g. philosophy, sociology, and political science, as well as the major multidisciplinary areas relevant to the innovation process, e.g. technology assessment and ethics. Furthermore, the interplay between such expertises, disciplines, and research programmes in providing a multidisciplinary understanding of responsibility is emphasized.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 220 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -The focus of the book is on different ways of knowing: the western scientific way (reductionist, dualistic and materialist) versus the indigenous approach (holistic, non-dualistic, and spiritual). It discusses both science and medicine in the context of the challenges experienced in introducing science and medicine into Africa through imperialism, colonization, and globalization. It looks at selected indigenous African paradigms, the dominant western paradigms, and the practitioners that represent these practices. The book deals with questions concerning compatibility and incompatibility of different ways of knowing and delves into epistemological stances, and the assumptions underlying these epistemologies. The volume investigates whether, and how a person can accommodate different epistemologies, and the nature of such accommodations.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 172 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -Descriptions of new varieties of European languages in postcolonial contexts have focused exceedingly on system-based indigenisation and variation. This volume¿while further illustrating processes and instantiations of indigenisation at this level¿incorporates investigations of sociolinguistic and pragmatic phenomena in daily social interaction¿e.g. politeness, respect, compliment response, naming and address forms, and gender¿through innovative analytic frameworks that view indigenisation from emic perspectives. Focusing on postcolonial Cameroon and using natural and questionnaire data, the book assesses the salience of linguistic and sociocultural hybridisation triggered by colonialism and, recently, globalisation in interaction in and across languages and cultures. The authors illustrate how the multilingual nature of the society and individuals¿ multilingual repertoires shape patterns in the indigenisation and evolution of the ex-colonial languages, English and French, and Pidgin English.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 232 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -The liberal enlightenment as well as the more radical left have both traditionally opposed religion as a reactionary force in politics, a view culminating in an identification of the politics of religion as fundamentalist theocracy. But recently a number of thinkers¿Agamben, Badiou, Tabues and in particular Simon Critchley¿have begun to explore a more productive engagement of the religious and the political in which religion features as a possible or even necessary form of human emancipation. The papers in this collection, deriving from a workshop held on and with Simon Critchley at the University of Texas at San Antonio in February 2010, take up the ways in which religion¿s encounter with politics transforms not only politics but also religion itself, molding it into various religions of politics, including not just heretical religious metaphysics, but also what Critchley describes as non-metaphysical religion, the faith of the faithless. Starting from Critchley¿s own genealogy ofPauline faith, the articles in this collection explore and defend some of the religions of politics and their implications. Costica Bradatan teases out the implications of Critchley¿s substitution of humor for tragedy as the vehicle for the minimal self-distancing required for any politics. Jill Stauffer compares Critchley¿s non-metaphysical religiosity with Charles Taylor¿s account of Christianity. Alistair Welchman unpacks the political theology of the border in terms of god¿s timeless act of creation. Anne O¿Byrne explores the subtle dialectic between mores and morality in Rousseaüs political ethics. Roland Champagne sees a kind non-metaphysical religion in Arendt¿s category of the political pariah. Davide Panagia presents Critchley¿s ethics of exposure as the basis for a non-metaphysical political bond. Philip Quadrio wonders about the political ramifications of Critchley¿s own ¿mystical anarchism¿ and Tina Chanter re-reads the primal site in the Western tradition at which the political and the religious intersect, the Antigone story, side-stepping philosophical interpretations of the story (dominated by Hegel¿s reading) by means of a series of post-colonial re-imaginings of the play. The collection concludes with an interview with Simon Critchley taking up the themes of the workshop in the light of more recent political events: the Arab Spring and the rise and fall of the Occupy movement.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 208 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This book is based on the assumption that ¿organic has lost its way¿. Paradoxically, it comes at a time when we witness the continuing of growth in organic food production and markets around the world. Yet, the book claims that organic has lost sight of its first or fundamental philosophical principles and ontological assumptions. The collection offers empirically grounded discussions that address the principles and fundamental assumptions of organic farming and marketing practices. The book draws attention to the core principles of organic and offers different clearly articulated and well-defined conceptual frameworks that offer new insights into organic practices. Divided into five parts, the book presents new perspectives on enduring issues, examines standards and certification, gives insights into much-discussed and additional market and consumer issues, and reviews the interplay of organic and conventional farming. The book concludes with a framework for rethinking ethics in the organic movement and reflections on the positioning of organic ethics.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 352 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This book offers innovative insights on South¿South human mobility. It features a collection of papers that highlight often overlooked mobility patterns among and within regions in the global South as well as address critical realities faced by South-South migrants.This publication thoroughly investigates key issues of the migration debate, spanning from the terminological and contextual meaning of migration and development. It also critically examines some of the key features that human mobility in the global South is characterized by, including the prevalence of intra-regional and labor mobility, the role of diasporas communities in developing countries, South-South remittances patterns, the influence of environmental factors on the decision to migrate and the rising number of child migrants.By carefully moving the lens from the frequently examined South¿North and North¿North movements to human mobility within the Southern regions of the world, this book questions the traditional conception of the migration paradigm. It offers knowledge and insights that will help to expand the debate as well as stimulate further research on this important topic and, hopefully, promote future activities aimed at the protection of migrants and their families living in the South. As a result, it is an ideal resource for migration scholars, policy-makers and development practitioners.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 188 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This book offers a systematic view of social analysis that will advance the communication of results between different academic disciplines. It overcomes misunderstandings that are due to the use of an unstructured variety of methodological traditions in the analysis of complex socioeconomic and political processes. The book focuses on the special features of human society: humans as subjects, non-repetitiveness and irreversibility of social actions and the peculiar relations between necessity and possibility in human action. It defines methodological criteria, procedures and rules that enable researchers to select and classify realistic hypotheses to derive general principles and basic organizational features. It then applies these criteria in critical reviews of major theories and interpretations of society and history, offering clarifications and alternative proposals with regard to crucial aspects of anthropological, political, juridical, sociological and religious thought.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 340 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This book provides new insights into the significant gap that currently exists between desired and actual fertility in Europe. It examines how people make decisions about having children and demonstrates how the macro-level environment affects micro-level decision-making.Written by an international team of leading demographers and psychologists, the book presents the theoretical and methodological developments of a three-year, European Commission-funded project named REPRO (Reproductive Decision-Making in a Macro-Micro Perspective). It also provides an overview of the research conducted by REPRO researchers both during and after the project.The book examines fertility intentions from quantitative and qualitative perspectives, demonstrates how the macro-level environment affects micro-level decision-making, and offers a multi-level analysis of fertility-related norms across Europe.Overall, this book offers insight into how people make decisions to have children,when they are most likely to act on their decisions, and how different social and policy settings affect their decisions and actions. It will appeal to researchers, graduate students, and policy advisors with an interest in fertility, demography, and life-course decision making.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 188 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -Beginning with an overview of data and concepts developed in theEU-project HABIT-CHANGE, this book addresses the need for sharing knowledge and experience in the field of biodiversity conservation and climate change. There is an urgent need to build capacity in protected areas to monitor, assess, manage and report the effects of climate change and their interaction with other pressures. The contributors identify barriers to the adaptation of conservation management, such as the mismatch between planning reality and the decision context at site level. Short and vivid descriptions of case studies, drawn from investigation areas all over Central and Eastern Europe, illustrate both the local impacts of climate change and their consequences for future management. These focus on ecosystems most vulnerable to changes in climatic conditions, including alpine areas, wetlands, forests, lowland grasslands and coastal areas. The case studies demonstrate the application of adaptation strategies inprotected areas like National Parks, Biosphere Reserves and Natural Parks, and reflect the potential benefits as well as existing obstacles. A general section provides the necessary background information on climate trends and their effects on abiotic and biotic components. Often, the parties to policy change and conservation management, including managers, land users and stakeholders, lack both expertise and incentives to undertake adaptation activities. The authors recognise that achieving the needed changes in behavior ¿ habit ¿ is as much a social learning process as a matter of science-based procedure. They describe the implementation of modeling, impact assessment and monitoring of climate conditions, and show how the results can support efforts to increase stakeholder involvement in local adaptation strategies. The book concludes by pointing out the need for more work to communicate the cross-sectoral nature of biodiversity protection, the value of well-informed planning in thelong-term process of adaptation, the definition of acceptable change, and the motivational value of exchanging experience and examples of good practice.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 336 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -Color perception plays an important role in object recognition and scene understanding both for humans and intelligent vision systems. Recent advances in digital color imaging and computer hardware technology have led to an explosion in the use of color images in a variety of applications including medical imaging, content-based image retrieval, biometrics, watermarking, digital inpainting, remote sensing, visual quality inspection, among many others. As a result, automated processing and analysis of color images has become an active area of research, to which the large number of publications of the past two decades bears witness. The multivariate nature of color image data presents new challenges for researchers and practitioners as the numerous methods developed for single channel images are often not directly applicable to multichannel ones. The goal of this volume is to summarize the state-of-the-art in the early stages of the color image processing pipeline.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 444 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -Crystals are everywhere, from natural crystals (minerals) through the semiconductors and magnetic materials in electronic devices and computers or piezoelectric resonators at the heart of our quartz watches to electro-optical devices. Understanding them in depth is essential both for pure research and for their applications.This book provides a clear, thorough presentation of their symmetry, both at the microscopic space-group level and the macroscopic point-group level. The implications of the symmetry of crystals for their physical properties are then presented, together with their mathematical description in terms of tensors. The conditions on the symmetry of a crystal for a given property to exist then become clear, as does the symmetry of the property. The geometrical representation of tensor quantities or properties is presented, and its use in determining important relationships emphasized.An original feature of this book is that most chapters include exerciseswith complete solutions. This allows readers to test and improve their understanding of the material.The intended readership includes undergraduate and graduate students in materials science and materials-related aspects of electrical and optical engineering; researchers involved in the investigation of the physical properties of crystals and the design of applications based on crystal properties such as piezoelectricity, electro-optics, optical activity and all those involved in the characterization of the structural properties of materials.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 548 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -Gastrointestinal (GI) physiology is a fundamental subject that is indispensable not only for undergraduate but also for graduate courses. The audience include, but are not limited to, medical, pharmacy, nursing, human biology, Chinese medicine, and science students, as well as other health-related subject students. The overall objectives of this textbook are to present basic concepts and principles of GI physiology and, more importantly, to convey an understanding of how to apply this knowledge to abnormal GI physiology in the clinical context. As such, the basic knowledge of GI physiology and its application in the form of clinical case studies should be grasped, which are critical for professional examinations and bedside, as well as for general practice in the future. In this handbook, we aim to achieve these elements by covering the breadth of GI, pancreatic, hepatobiliary, and nutritional physiology. Moreover, we include relevant scenario-based clinical case in each chapter so as to evaluate whether the students can apply the basic GI they learn to the clinical setting.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 380 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -Few books currently exist that cover such a wide spectrum of topics. The chapters dealing with air pollution from mobile sources, air pollution and health effects and air quality modelling fall into the air pollution category while the ones related to microalgae for carbon dioxide sequestration/biofuels production, fuel cells, and solar energy technology, respectively, can be ascribed to the energy topic. Several technologies to handle a wide spectrum of environmental pollutants are taken into account in numerous chapters. The chapter on biodiversity is clearly related to the conservation issue, while the water pollution subject is tackled by the chapter on water quality monitoring. Finally, a general analysis on green business, as well as a chapter on grid/cloud computing technology for collaborative problem solving and shared resources management conclude the work. Because of its breadth of coverage, this book is particularly useful as a graduate text.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 288 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This book gives practical advice and ready to use tips on the design and construction of subsurface reservoir models. The design elements cover rock architecture, petrophysical property modelling, multi-scale data integration, upscaling and uncertainty analysis. Philip Ringrose and Mark Bentley share their experience, gained from over a hundred reservoir modelling studies in 25 countries covering clastic, carbonate and fractured reservoir types. The intimate relationship between geology and fluid flow is explored throughout, showing how the impact of fluid type, production mechanism and the subtleties of single- and multi-phase flow combine to influence reservoir model design.Audience:The main audience for this book is the community of applied geoscientists and engineers involved in the development and use of subsurface fluid resources. The book is suitable for a range of Master¿s level courses in reservoir characterisation, modelling and engineering. Provides practical advice and guidelines for users of 3D reservoir modelling packages Gives advice on reservoir model design for the growing world-wide activity in subsurface reservoir modelling Covers rock modelling, property modelling, upscaling and uncertainty handling Encompasses clastic, carbonate and fractured reservoirsSpringer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 268 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This notable collection provides an interdisciplinary platform for prominent thinkers who have all made significant recent contributions to exploring the nexus of philosophy and narrative. It includes the latest assessments of several key positions in the current philosophical debate. These perspectives underpin a range of thematic strands exploring the influence of narrative on notions of selfhood, identity, temporal experience, and the emotions, among others. Drawing from the humanities, literature, history and religious studies, as well as philosophy, the volume opens with papers on narrative intelligence and the relationship between narrative and agency. It features special sections of in-depth commentary on a range of topics. How, for example, do narrative and philosophical biography interact Do celebrated biographical and autobiographical accounts of the lives of philosophers contribute to our understanding of their work This new volume has a substantive remit that incorporatesthe intercultural religious view of philosophy¿s links to narrative together with its many secular aspects. A valuable new resource for more advanced scholars in all its constituent disciplines, it represents a significant addition to the literature of this richly productive area of research.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 220 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This anthology of essays presents a sample of studies from recent philosophy of medicine addressing issues which attempt to answer very general (interdependent) questions: (a) what is a disease and what is health (b) How do we (causally) explain diseases (c) And how do we distinguish diseases, i.e. define classes of diseases and recognize that an instance X of disease belongs to a given class B (d) How do we assess and choose cure/ therapy The book is divided into three sections: classification, disease and evidence. In general, attention is focused on statistics in medicine and epidemiology, issues in psychiatry and connecting medicine with evolutionary biology and genetics. Many authors position the theories that they address within their historical contexts.The nature of health and disease will be addressed in several essays that also touch upon very general questions about the definition of medicine and its status.Several chapters scrutinize classification because of its centrality within philosophical problems raised by medicine and its core position in the philosophical questioning of psychiatry. Specificities of medical explanation have recently come under a new light, particularly because of the rise of statistical methods and several chapters investigate these methods in specific contexts such as epidemiology or meta-analysis of random testing. Taken together this collection addresses the question of how we gather, use and assess evidence for various medical theories.The rich assortment of disciplines featured also includes epidemiology, parasitology and public health, while technical aspects such as the application of game theory to medical research and the misuse of the DSM in forensic psychiatry are also given an airing. The book addresses more than the construction of medical knowledge, however, adding cogent appraisal of the processes of decision making in medicine and the protocols used to justify therapeutic choices.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 232 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This bookeducates whilst also challenging the contemporary schools of thought within philosophical and religious ethics. In addition, it underlines the fact that the substance of ethics in general and bioethics/healthcare ethics specifically, is much more expansive and inclusive than is usually thought. Bioethics is a relatively new academic discipline. However, ethics has existed informally since before the time of Hippocrates. The indigenous culture of African peoples has an ethical worldview which predates the western discourse. This indigenous ethical worldview has been orally transmitted over centuries. The earliest known written African text containing some concepts and content of ethics is the ¿Declaration of Innocence¿ written in 1500 B.C., found inan Egyptian text. Ubuntu is an example of African culture that presents an ethical worldview. Thiswork interprets the culture of Ubuntu to explain the contribution of a representative indigenous African ethics to global bioethics. Many modern scholars have written about the meaning of Ubuntu for African societies over centuries. Some scholars have viewed Ubuntu as the greatest contribution of African cultures to other world cultures. None of the scholars, however has explored the culture of Ubuntu as providing a representative indigenous ethics that can contribute to global bioethics as discussed in this book.¿Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 272 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This book identifies key elements of an international framework to develop systems-level change to promote access to education, including higher education, for socio-economically marginalized groups. It is based on interviews with senior government officials and senior management in universities, non formal education and prisons across 12 countries in Europe. The book identifies systemic obstacles to and opportunities for promotion of access to education for socio-economically excluded groups that are issues transferable to other countries¿ contexts. It adopts a systemic focus on access across a range of domains of education, both formal higher education and non-formal education, as well as prison education. Through a focus on a more dynamic structuralist systems framework it develops an innovative post-Bronfenbrennerian view of system levels in lifespan developmental and educational psychology. It also develops an international agenda for reform in relation to these various system levels for access to education for socio-economically marginalized groups, through extraction of key structural indicators to evaluate reform progress in a transparent, culturally sensitive manner. The book identifies current gaps and strengths in policy, practice and structures that impact upon access to education, including higher education, across a range of countries. These gaps and strengths are illustrative and are to inform a strategic approach to system level change and development for the promotion of access to education for socio-economically marginalized groups in Europe and beyond.¿Too many educational practices entrench social exclusion: it is an urgent priority across Europe that social justice policies are implemented for the inclusion of marginalised groups. Paul Downes' analysis of these issues is timely. His conclusions are considered and practical: this book is a valuable and constructive resource for practitioners, academics and the policycommunity.¿ Professor Alistair Ross, Jean Monnet ad Personam Professor of Citizenship Education in Europe, Emeritus Professor of Education, Institute for Policy Studies in Education, London Metropolitan UniversitySpringer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 288 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This book provides an introduction to noncommutative geometry and presents a number of its recent applications to particle physics. It is intended for graduate students in mathematics/theoretical physics who are new to the field of noncommutative geometry, as well as for researchers in mathematics/theoretical physics with an interest in the physical applications of noncommutative geometry. In the first part, we introduce the main concepts and techniques by studying finite noncommutative spaces, providing a ¿light¿ approach to noncommutative geometry. We then proceed with the general framework by defining and analyzing noncommutative spin manifolds and deriving some main results on them, such as the local index formula. In the second part, we show how noncommutative spin manifolds naturally give rise to gauge theories, applying this principle to specific examples. We subsequently geometrically derive abelian and non-abelian Yang-Mills gauge theories, and eventually the full Standard Model of particle physics, and conclude by explaining how noncommutative geometry might indicate how to proceed beyond the Standard Model.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 256 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -Few faculty members in academic medical centers are formally prepared for their roles as teachers. This work is an introductory text designed to provide medical teachers with the core concepts of effective teaching practice and information about innovations for curriculum design, delivery and assessment. It offers brief, focused chapters with content that is assimilated easily by the reader. The topics are relevant to basic science and clinical teachers and the work does not presume readers possess prerequisite knowledge of education theory or instructional design. The authors emphasize the application of concepts to teaching practice. Topics include: Facilitating Student Learning; Teaching Large Groups; Teaching in Small Groups; Flipping the Classroom; Problem-Based Learning; Team-Based Learning; Teaching Clinical Skills; Teaching with Simulation; Teaching with Practicals and Labs; Teaching with Technological Tools; Teaching to Develop Scientific Engagement in Medical Students; Designing a Course; Establishing and Teaching Elective Courses; Designing Global Health Experiences; Assessing Student Performance; Documenting the Trajectory of Your Teaching and Teaching as Scholarship. This is a complete revision of the first edition of this work with new chapters and up to date information. Similar to the first edition, chapters were written by leaders in medical education and research who draw upon extensive professional experience and the literature on best practices in education. Although designed for teachers, the work reflects a learner-centered perspective and emphasizes outcomes for student learning. The book is accessible and visually interesting and the work contains information that is current, but not time-sensitive. Each chapter concludes with references, many include recommendations for additional reading, and the work includes an appendix with resources for medical education.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 288 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This book discusses the impact and effects of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) on quality of working life of employees. It describes the changes and the acceleration of processes caused by the widespread use of ICT in a broad range of working areas and in different national contexts. It explores the important role ICT has come to play in nearly all work places in developed societies and the impact it is starting to have on work places in developing countries. The book brings together experts from the fields of ICT and quality of working life and from a variety of backgrounds and disciplines, including sociology, psychology, industrial engineering and macro ergonomics. It discusses the range of current positive and negatives effects as well as the possible increase of both kinds of effects in the future. The final chapter of the book integrates the diverse perspectives of the authors and gives recommendations on how to increase the possible positive outcomes and to diminish negative effects of ICT in an accelerated society. 244 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -The second volume in the collected works of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi covers about thirty years of Csikszentmihalyi¿s work on three main and interconnected areas of study: attention, flow and positive psychology. Describing attention as psychic energy and in the footsteps of William James, Csikszentmihalyi explores the allocation of attention, the when and where and the amount of attention humans pay to tasks and the role of attention in creating ¿experiences¿, or ordered patterns of information. Taking into account information processing theories and attempts at quantifying people¿s investment, the chapters deal with such topics as time budgets and the development and use of the Experience Sampling Method of collecting data on attention in everyday life.Following the chapters on attention and reflecting Csikszentmihalyi¿s branching out into sociology and anthropology, there are chapters on the topic of adult play and leisure and connected to that, on flow, a concept formulated and developed by Csikszentmihalyi. Flow has become a popular concept in business and management around the world and research on the concept continues to flourish. Finally, this volume contains articles that stem from Csikszentmihalyi¿s connection with Martin Seligman; they deal with concepts and theories, as well as with the development and short history, of the field and the ¿movement¿ of positive psychology.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 324 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This book about lightning summarizes the essence of physics and effects of lightning in a non-technical manner and provides an up-to-date description of the phenomenon of lightning in simple language. Starting with the myths related to lightning, the reader is introduced to the mechanism of lightning flashes and their interactions with humans, human-made systems and Earth¿s environment. Most of the available books on lightning are written for the experts in the field and there is a need for a book that introduces the undergraduate and beginning post graduate students to the subject of lightning and prepares them for more advanced books meant for the experts. This introductory book, which is based on a series of lectures given to undergraduate and postgraduate students in electrical engineering, is intended to fill this need. Tailored to the needs of university students who plan to study electrical engineering, meteorology, environmental or basic physics, it is also a valuable reference resource for laymen who are interested in knowing more on this phenomenon.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 404 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -The book takes a holistic approach to sustainability. Acknowledging the Brundtland definition, that sustainable development meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs, the book is specifically concerned with the ethics of contemporary social and environmental sustainability activity and thinking. It is concerned with the role of institutions¿both local and global in achieving sustainability initiatives. All twelve chapters extend sustainability¿conceptually, empirically and theoretically, and in doing so provide insights into linking local and global sustainability. The book refocuses sustainability as a series of interwoven and dynamic relationships, backed by just ethical decision-making, which begin locally, and reach out to impact the global level.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 244 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware -This book is the first compilation of its kind that brings together discussions of the evolution of scholarship in different branches of the Social Sciences. It presents a comprehensive multi-disciplinary text exploring the changing dynamics of the Social Sciences in Ghana, offering a broader perspective from which to view the evolution, theory, methods, substance and relevance of each of the Social Science disciplines and their multiple interfaces. The introduction and the conclusion are devoted to the theoretical, comparative and empirical debate over the Social Sciences from historical and analytical perspectives. Written by acknowledged experts, the 15 chapters span the following disciplines: Archaeology and Heritage Studies; History; Geography; Psychology; Sociology and Anthropology; Social Work; Economics; Political Science; International Affairs; Information Studies; Communication Studies; African Studies; Development Studies; Women¿s and Gender Studies and Adult and Continuing Education.Changing Perspectives on the Social Sciences in Ghana offers sophisticated perspectives for comparing and appreciating the synergies, differences, trends and nuances among and between the Social Science disciplines in Ghana, in a holistic and scholarly manner.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 360 pp. Englisch.