Higher education strategy in digital transformation.

Digital transformation in the global higher education industry determines the future roadmap to a sustainable education management strategy. This research paper aims to develop a qualitative model that advocates how digital transformation as a propelling force could be used to build competitive advantages for universities. Building competitive advantage is a relative, evolving, and important concept in strategy formulation. In recent years, specifically in the education industry, the notion of building competitive advantage is challenged by global phenomena such as digital transformation globalization, information exchange, digitization and social media in most of the global industries. These phenomena have collectively made the process of building competitive advantage rapidly changing, short-term and contextual. These findings aid the evolution of strategic management practices in universities by providing empirical insights in determining the impactful changes and their connection to evolutionary learning. It also stresses the importance of using the developed model as a decision support system to generate, regulate and retain student experience and expectations. This research paper provides first-hand insight into the impactful changes affecting universities' vision and how they can turn these changes to their advantages and set a road map to design-develop models to integrate and regulate these essential changes in their strategies using evolution learning mechanism and digital transformation strategy.

A sustainable University: Digital Transformation and Beyond.

Universities focus on digital transformation strategy to stay competitive in global education, staying competitive is taking on quite a different meaning in the 21st century - it includes the long-term implications of Covid-19 - the interaction of politics and economics, the emergence of China as a superpower, the end of neoliberalism, the emergence of distributed autonomous organisations particularly in the area of research and education. The impact of sustainable digital transformation in universities could be perceived as system and systematic. When the intangible but impactful influence is identified/recognized as a system, an applicable conceptual model could become designable and implementable. Conceptual models of digital transformation are vital to universities and business schools to gain sustainability amid rapid technological changes. However, there is paucity of practical, implementable and simple digital transformational models combining technologies, system and educational phenomena. This theoretical gap is sizeable, impactful and non-ignorable. To fulfil this gap, this paper critically examines the need and the association between sustainable digital transformation and its impact in the universities, using an innovative qualitative grounded theory approach which uses three distinct coding procedures namely open, axial and selective followed by transcribing qualitative data. The researchers have proposed a conceptual model for sustainable digital transformation, new propositions by critically reviewing the latest but multiple cases on (a) sustainability (b) digital transformation (c) green technologies and (d) implementable approaches in the education industry/universities. How fast universities could develop dependable business models to cater for the rapid changes amid globalization of education has become an important issue. If the universities can explore a scientific approach to the design-developing conceptual model, then it becomes straightforward for the academic leaders to implement digital transformation process effectively without resource burnouts. The adoption sustainability in digital transformation/information technology is remaining an underdeveloped area. There is a need to develop an innovative architectural design (blueprint) to stimulate sustainable practice, reporting mechanism and its leadership implication. Once universities recognize the digital transformational capabilities, then they could transform into operational effectiveness, which is vital to their business sustainability. This research study points to the effectiveness of using a sustainable blueprint while designing, developing and implementing digital transformation projects in universities. Also, this paper developed numerous value propositions for green implementation of digital transformation as new research studies/potential studies.

Climate change and drinking water from Scottish peatlands: Where increasing DOC is an issue?

Increasing levels of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) have been detected in the last decades in water bodies of the Northern hemisphere, and climate change might fuel this rise. For drinking water reservoirs located in peatland catchments, already subjected to elevated amounts of DOC that needs to be removed, this might pose a further problem. Scotland is predicted to face warmer temperatures and a change in rainfall patterns, which will result in more frequent and severe summer droughts and in heavier winter precipitation. These conditions are not ideal for peatlands, which may undergo a drastic reduction in area. Using two bioclimatic envelope models (Blanket bog Tree model and Lindsay Modified model) that project blanket bog distribution in Scotland in the 2050s, we extracted the area of blanket bog that is at risk of loss. Assuming that part of the carbon stored in this area is likely to be lost, we calculated how much of it could be added to DOC in catchments that contain public drinking water reservoirs each year. This analysis is a first estimate of the risk for the provision of drinking water from peatlands in Scotland due to climate change. The aim is to identify the catchments that may face the highest consequences of future climates in terms of the concentration of DOC ([DOC]), where more sophisticated water treatments might be needed. Our results show a great variability among the catchments, with only a few being unaffected by this problem, whereas others could experience substantial seasonal increase in [DOC]. This highlights the necessity to frequently monitor DOC levels in the reservoirs located in catchments where the major problems could arise, and to take the necessary measures to reduce it. Given that peatland condition and vegetation cover play a fundamental role in influencing DOC losses, this study also offers an indication of where peatland restoration might be useful to counteract the projected DOC increase and bring the highest benefits in terms of safe drinking water provision.

Conversion of lowland tropical forests to tree cash crop plantations loses up to one-half of stored soil organic carbon.

Tropical deforestation for the establishment of tree cash crop plantations causes significant alterations to soil organic carbon (SOC) dynamics. Despite this recognition, the current Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) tier 1 method has a SOC change factor of 1 (no SOC loss) for conversion of forests to perennial tree crops, because of scarcity of SOC data. In this pantropic study, conducted in active deforestation regions of Indonesia, Cameroon, and Peru, we quantified the impact of forest conversion to oil palm (Elaeis guineensis), rubber (Hevea brasiliensis), and cacao (Theobroma cacao) agroforestry plantations on SOC stocks within 3-m depth in deeply weathered mineral soils. We also investigated the underlying biophysical controls regulating SOC stock changes. Using a space-for-time substitution approach, we compared SOC stocks from paired forests (n = 32) and adjacent plantations (n = 54). Our study showed that deforestation for tree plantations decreased SOC stocks by up to 50%. The key variable that predicted SOC changes across plantations was the amount of SOC present in the forest before conversion--the higher the initial SOC, the higher the loss. Decreases in SOC stocks were most pronounced in the topsoil, although older plantations showed considerable SOC losses below 1-m depth. Our results suggest that (i) the IPCC tier 1 method should be revised from its current SOC change factor of 1 to 0.6 ± 0.1 for oil palm and cacao agroforestry plantations and 0.8 ± 0.3 for rubber plantations in the humid tropics; and (ii) land use management policies should protect natural forests on carbon-rich mineral soils to minimize SOC losses.

Woronichinia naegeliana: A common nontoxigenic component of temperate freshwater cyanobacterial blooms with 30% of its genome in transposons.

Monitoring in the U.S. state of Washington across the period 2007-2019 showed that Woronichinia has been present in many lakes state-wide. This cyanobacterium was commonly dominant or sub-dominant in cyanobacterial blooms in the wet temperate region west of the Cascade Mountains. In these lakes, Woronichinia often co-existed with Microcystis, Dolichospermum and Aphanizomenon flos-aquae and the cyanotoxin microcystin has often been present in those blooms, although it has not been known whether Woronichinia is a toxin producer. We report the first complete genome of Woronichinia naegeliana WA131, assembled from the metagenome of a sample collected from Wiser Lake, Washington, in 2018. The genome contains no genes for cyanotoxin biosynthesis or taste-and-odor compounds, but there are biosynthetic gene clusters for other bioactive peptides, including anabaenopeptins, cyanopeptolins, microginins and ribosomally produced, post-translationally modified peptides. Genes for photosynthesis, nutrient acquisition, vitamin synthesis and buoyancy that are typical of bloom-forming cyanobacteria are present, although nitrate and nitrite reductase genes are conspicuously absent. However, the 7.9 Mbp genome is 3-4 Mbp larger than those of the above-mentioned frequently co-existing cyanobacteria. The increased genome size is largely due to an extraordinary number of insertion sequence elements (transposons), which account for 30.3% of the genome and many of which are present in multiple copies. The genome contains a relatively large number of pseudogenes, 97% of which are transposase genes. W. naegeliana WA131 thus seems to be able to limit the potentially deleterious effects of high rates of recombination and transposition to the mobilome fraction of its genome.

Cost-effectiveness analysis of policy instruments for greenhouse gas emission mitigation in the agricultural sector.

Market-based policy instruments to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are generally considered more appropriate than command and control tools. However, the omission of transaction costs from policy evaluations and decision-making processes may result in inefficiency in public resource allocation and sub-optimal policy choices and outcomes. This paper aims to assess the relative cost-effectiveness of market-based GHG mitigation policy instruments in the agricultural sector by incorporating transaction costs. Assuming that farmers' responses to mitigation policies are economically rationale, an individual-based model is developed to study the relative performances of an emission tax, a nitrogen fertilizer tax, and a carbon trading scheme using farm data from the Scottish farm account survey (FAS) and emissions and transaction cost data from literature metadata survey. Model simulations show that none of the three schemes could be considered the most cost effective in all circumstances. The cost effectiveness depends both on the tax rate and the amount of free permits allocated to farmers. However, the emissions trading scheme appears to outperform both other policies in realistic scenarios.

Global cropland and greenhouse gas impacts of UK food supply are increasingly located overseas.

Producing sufficient, healthy food for a growing world population amid a changing climate is a major challenge for the twenty-first century. Agricultural trade could help alleviate this challenge by using comparative productivity advantages between countries. However, agricultural trade has implications for national food security and could displace environmental impacts from developed to developing countries. This study illustrates the global effects resulting from the agricultural trade of a single country, by analysing the global cropland and greenhouse gas impacts of the UK's food and feed supply. The global cropland footprint associated with the UK food and feed supply increased by 2022 kha (+23%) from 1986 to 2009. Greenhouse gas emissions (GHGE) associated with fertilizer and manure application, and rice cultivation remained relatively constant at 7.9 Mt CO2e between 1987 and 2008. Including GHGE from land-use change, however, leads to an increase from 19.1 in 1987 to 21.9 Mt CO2e in 2008. The UK is currently importing over 50% of its food and feed, whereas 70% and 64% of the associated cropland and GHGE impacts, respectively, are located abroad. These results imply that the UK is increasingly reliant on external resources and that the environmental impact of its food supply is increasingly displaced overseas.

A molecular-based approach for examining responses of eukaryotes in microcosms to contaminant-spiked estuarine sediments.

Ecotoxicological information for most contaminants is limited to a small number of taxa, and these are generally restricted to comparatively hardy organisms that are readily extractable from test media and easily identifiable. Advances in DNA sequencing can now provide a comprehensive view of benthic invertebrate diversity. The authors applied 454 pyrosequencing to examine the responses of benthic communities in microcosms exposed to sediments with elevated concentrations of triclosan, the endpoint being eukaryl communities that have successfully vertically migrated through the manipulated sediments. The biological communities associated with the 3 treatments (control triclosan, low triclosan [14 mg/kg], and high triclosan [180 mg/kg]) clustered into 3 groups: control/low (n = 6 controls and 4 low), moderate (n = 2 low), and high (n = 5 high). One sample was discarded as an outlier. The most pronounced change as a response to triclosan was the loss of number of metazoan operational taxonomic units (OTUs), indicative of the control/low and moderate groups, with this being most evident in the range of taxa associated with the classes Chromadorea and Bivalvia and the phylum Kinorhyncha. The authors also describe a range of other taxa that aided discrimination between the groups; compare findings with traditionally obtained meio- and macrofaunal communities obtained from the same experiment; and illustrate some of the advantages and limitations associated with both the molecular and traditional approaches. The described approach illustrates the capacity for amplicon sequencing to provide ecologically relevant information that can be used to strengthen an understanding of how sedimentary communities respond to a range of environmental stressors.

Is there an ideal REDD+ program? An analysis of policy trade-offs at the local level.

We use economy-wide simulation methods to analyze the outcome of a simple REDD+ program in a mixed subsistence/commercial-agriculture economy. Alternative scenarios help trace REDD+'s causal chain, revealing how trade-offs between the program's public and private costs and benefits determine its effectiveness, efficiency and equity (the 3Es). Scenarios reveal a complex relationship between the 3Es not evident in more aggregate analyses. Setting aside land as a carbon sink always influences the productivity of agriculture and its supply of non-market goods and services; but the overall returns to land and labor-which ultimately determine the opportunity cost of enrollment, the price of carbon and the distribution of gains and losses-depend on local conditions. In the study area, market-oriented landowners could enroll 30% of local land into a cost-effective program, but local subsistence demands would raise their opportunity costs as REDD+ unfurls, increasing the marginal cost of carbon. A combination of rent and wage changes would create net costs for most private stakeholders, including program participants. Increasing carbon prices undermines the program's efficiency without solving its inequities; expanding the program reduces inefficiencies but increases private costs with only minor improvements in equity. A program that prevents job losses could be the best option, but its efficiency compared to direct compensation could depend on program scale. Overall, neither the cost nor the 3Es of alternative REDD+ programs can be assessed without accounting for local demand for subsistence goods and services. In the context of Mexico's tropical highlands, a moderate-sized REDD+ program could at best have no net impact on rural households. REDD+ mechanisms should avoid general formulas by giving local authorities the necessary flexibility to address the trade-offs involved. National programs themselves should remain flexible enough to adjust for spatially and temporally changing contexts.

5.1 The demography of oral diseases, future challenges and the implications for dental education.

This Section considered the immense challenges presented by the changing demography of populations (in particular, cross-boundary flow), changing oral and dental disease trends. It also considered the difficulties of gathering data on such information. It then considered how these challenges may affect the education of the dental team in the future. The Section considered the concept of the 'global village' as a representation of the changing world demography. We were at pains to recognize that our role was in considering both emerging and established market economies. In fact, a major part of the Section's activities concentrated on the development of the professional ethic of social responsibility - represented at the local, regional, national and international levels. We considered a finite group of oral and dental diseases, namely dental caries, periodontal diseases, oral cancer and cranio-facial disorders. In addition, we chose to comment on systemic diseases influenced by oral diseases, oral diseases influenced by systemic diseases and iatrogenic diseases (including prion disorders and cross-infection control issues). The Section recognized the profound difference between needs and demands in the provision of oral and dental health care. We considered the concept of best practices within our working remit and named these as: * the gathering of valid data on health trends; * uniformity in the measurement of disease and diagnostic parameters; * the identification of a core curriculum which best addresses an increased awareness of changing demography; and * a multidisciplinary approach to education and research in the context of global collaboration. The Section recognized the enormous potential for global networking with the explosion of information and communication technology. We investigated the requirements in converging towards higher global standards, while accepting and appreciating important regional and continental differences. To this end, the Section has put forward a number of important recommendations and realistic goals.