This volume examines selected aspects of the foreign language learning process from an ecological perspective, adopting a holistic view on complex interrelations among and within organisms (L2 language learners) and their milieus (family, school and society). First of all, the personal ecosystem of the learner is taken into consideration, whereby two powerful influences are intertwined: cogniti…
This book, written by an international team of experienced researchers, investigates unique and dynamic approaches to key issues in policy transformation, curriculum reforms and teacher training in three cultures? China, Japan and the United States? in a globalized world. By examining their respective policy choices and evidence-based practices, the authors show how best to provide for young ch…
This open access book explores the global challenges and experiences related to digital entrepreneurial activities, using carefully selected examples from leading companies and economies that shape world business today and tomorrow. Digital entrepreneurship and the companies steering it have an enormous global impact; they promise to transform the business world and change the way we communicat…
This open access book focuses on investigating predicting precursor information and key points of rockburst in mining engineering through laboratory experiment, theoretical analysis, numerical simulation and case studies. Understanding the evolution patterns for the microstructure instability of rock is a prerequisite for rockburst prediction. The book provides a guide for readers seeking to un…
The purpose of this Special Issue, “Nutrition and Allergic Diseases”, is to provide an overview of the role of nutrition in allergy. The prevalence of asthma, rhinitis, and food allergy has increased tremendously over the last few decades. Is there a role for nutrition to help managing this global challenge? This Special Issue touches upon the many aspects that relate to nutrition and aller…
This book seeks to unravel the mysteries of wolfberry, and systematically introduces its mechanisms in preventing aging-associated diseases, such as cardiovascular diseases, inflammation, liver and neurodegenerative diseases. Wolfberry, the dried fruit of Lycium barbarum, is an anti-aging herbal medicine. There have been numerous reports investigating the underlying mechanisms of its anti-aging…
Concept Development Studies in Chemistry is an on-line textbook for an Introductory General Chemistry course. Each module develops a central concept in Chemistry from experimental observations and inductive reasoning. This approach complements an interactive or active learning teaching approach.
This book collects the refereed proceedings of the 6th Indian Conference on Logic and Its Applications, ICLA 2015, held in Mumbai, India, in January 2015. The volume contains 13 full revised papers along with 3 invited talks presented at the conference. The papers were selected after rigorous review, from 23 submissions. They cover topics related to pure and applied formal logic, foundations an…
This book covers a wide range of local image descriptors, from the classical ones to the state of the art, as well as the burgeoning research topics on this area. The goal of this effort is to let readers know what are the most popular and useful methods in the current, what are the advantages and the disadvantages of these methods, which kind of methods is best suitable for their problems or a…
This monograph provides a detailed analysis on fair queueing rules from a normative, a strategic, and a non-cooperative viewpoint. The queueing problem is concerned with the following situation: There is a group of agents who must be served in a facility. The facility can handle only one agent at a time and agents incur waiting costs. The problem is to find the order in which to serve agents an…