This book analyzes how sound choices can be made in Dutch health care policies, and shows why they are necessary, urgent, and even inevitable. Analyzing the current functioning and funding of the Dutch health care system, this book shows how three dimensions of sustainability – financial, staffing and societal – are under increasing pressure. This study explores priority setting in health care and calls for well-informed, clear and sometimes uncompromising choices in the allocation of means and personnel. This is necessary in order to maintain accessible and high-quality care for all, and to improve public health. Making balanced choices in health care is of particular importance to vulnerable groups whose voices may not be heard as readily or effectively in the public debate, and whose interests are more easily crowded out. Prioritizing in the domain of public health care is first and foremost a political responsibility, but also one for health care providers across the system and ultimately also for citizens. While this work focuses on the Netherlands, similar processes are at play across the developed economies, making it broadly relevant to policy makers, health care professionals and health care (policy) researchers grappling with the questions surrounding the sustainability of public health care.

Every cell, tissue, organ and organism is competent to use signs to exchange information reaching common coordinations and organisations of both single cell and group behavior. These sign-mediated interactions we term biological communication. The regulatory system that works in development, morphology, cell fate and identity, physiology, genetic instructions, immunity, memory/learning, physical and mental disease depends on epigenetic marks. The communication of cells, persistent viruses and their defectives such as mobile genetic elements and RNA networks ensures both the transport of regulatory instructions and the reprogramming of these instructions. But how are the different states of the epigenome orchestrated? The epigenetic pathways respond to various signaling cues such as DNA methylation, histone variants, histone modifications, chromatin structure, nucleosome remodeling, and epigenetic interactions. Epigenetic signals are responsible for the establishment, maintenance and reversal of transcriptional states that are fundamental for the cell's ability to memorize past events, such as changes in the external environment, socio-sphere or developmental cues.

This book is the second edition of the one originally published in 2017. The original publication features the discovery of numerous novel applications for the use of smartphones and portable media devices for the quantification of gait, reflex response, and an assortment of other concepts that constitute first-in-the-world applications for these devices. Since the first edition, numerous evolutions involving the domain of wearable and wireless systems for healthcare have transpired warranting the publication of the second edition.

This book provides essential information on the morphology, biology, phytochemistry, pharmaceutical prospects, evolution, phylogeny, biogeography, and taxonomy of Paris (Melanthiaceae), a morphologically distinctive plant genus with great economic importance. Since the establishment of this genus, 70 species and 24 subspecific taxa have been described, resulting in considerable confusion in species delimitation.

The ten-volume set LNCS 12949 – 12958 constitutes the proceedings of the 21st International Conference on Computational Science and Its Applications, ICCSA 2021, which was held in Cagliari, Italy, during September 13 – 16, 2021. The event was organized in a hybrid mode due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The three-volume set LNCS 10918, 10919, and 10290 constitutes the proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Design, User Experience, and Usability, DUXU 2018, held as part of the 20th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction, HCII 2018, in Las Vegas, NV, USA in July 2018. The total of 1171 papers presented at the HCII 2018 conferences were carefully reviewed and selected from 4346 submissions. The papers cover the entire field of human-computer interaction, addressing major advances in knowledge and effective use of computers in a variety of applications areas.

This book constitutes the first part of refereed proceedings of the 5th Computational Methods in Systems and Software 2021 (CoMeSySo 2021). The CoMeSySo 2021 Conference is breaking the barriers, being held online. CoMeSySo 2021 intends to provide an international forum for the discussion of the latest high-quality research results.
The software engineering, computer science, and artificial intelligence are crucial topics for the research within an intelligent systems problem domain.

This book comprises the selected proceedings of the 3rd International Workshop on Natural Hazards (NATHAZ’22), Angra do Heroísmo, Terceira Island, Azores, 2022. The book interests all researchers and practitioners in Earth Sciences, Volcanic Risks, Natural Hazards, Geoethics, Environmental Sciences and Engineering.

This book highlights various designs for urban green spaces and their functions. It provides an interesting meeting point between Asian, European and North America specialists (researchers, planners, landscape architects) studying urban biodiversity; urban biodiversity and green space; relations between people and biodiversity. The most important feature of this book is the unique point of view from each contributor towards “the relationship between nature and people in urban areas”, in the context of the ecosystem and biodiversity in urban areas and how to manage them.

This comprehensive book presents an alternative fresh look at date palm byproducts as a springboard for the future circular bio economy. The book shows and exemplifies how these sustainable biomaterials can be the base for a wide spectrum of products and uses. Examples of these numerous products and uses are demonstrated and categorized into five principal uses: i) pharmaceutical, cosmetics and natural wax ,ii) textiles and composites, cellulose and cellulose derivatives, iii)timber and wood substitutes, architecture insulation and building materials, iv) organic fertilizer, compost and soil amendment and water treatment purposes, v) natural fodder and silage , green fuels and bioenergy.

Bidong Island is a small island located in the South China Sea, and is about 14 km from mainland Peninsular Malaysia. The island and the Bidong archipelago boast of its richness in diversity of both terrestrial and marine organisms and its undeniably pristine and thriving ecosystem. In 1975–1990, Bidong Island was formerly a UNHCR refugee camp for a quarter of a million Vietnamese "Boat people" escaping the Vietnam War, and still holds great significance to many of its descendants. Due to its historical significance, the Terengganu State government plans to develop Bidong Island as a heritage tourism site and a new scuba diving destination.

The coalbed methane (CBM) reserve in China ranks third in the world with a total resource of 36.8×1012 m3. Exploitation of CBM has an important practical significance to ensure the long-term rapid development of China natural gas industry. Therefore, in 2002, the Ministry of Science and Technology of China set up a national 973 program to study CBM system and resolve problems of CBM exploration and exploitation in China. All the main research results and new insights from the program are presented in this book.

This book introduces MIN, a novel networking architecture to implement the sovereign equality of all countries in the cyberspace. Combining legal theory and network technology, it first discusses the historical development of sovereignty and expounds the legal basis of cyberspace sovereignty. Then, based on the high-performance blockchain, it describes a new network architecture designed to implement co-governance at the technical level.

This proceedings book emphasizes adopting artificial intelligence-based and sustainable energy efficiency integrated with clear objectives, to involve researchers, students, and specialists in their development and implementation adequately in achieving objectives.

This book consists of papers presented at Automation 2018, an international conference held in Warsaw from March 21 to 23, 2018. It discusses the radical technological changes occurring due to the INDUSTRY 4.0, with a focus on offering a better understanding of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.