This paper reports about preparatory work for future standardization that is carried out through an EU coordination and support action titled IM-SAFE. It focuses on applied digital technologies for monitoring and safety, including predictive maintenance of bridges and tunnels. Amidst the improved affordability of digitalization technologies and techniques, the biggest challenge in monitoring and maintenance of bridges and tunnels is no longer about collecting data as much as possible, but about obtaining and exploiting meaningful data throughout the lifecycle of the built assets. An effective and efficient data-driven approach is important to al-low both human experts and computers to make accurate diagnostics, predictions, and decisions. Further standardization is seen as an important part to reach that goal. The work in IM-SAFE related to ICT standardization focuses on the following topics: (1) the general requirements and preconditions for high quality and cost-effective acquisition, transmission, storage and processing of monitoring datasets to ensure the data is fully accessible and machine-interpretable; (2) the relations between the future standards in structural engineering with the open ICT standards for interoperability, especially on Internet of Things (IoT), Building Information Model (BIM), Geographical Information System (GIS), and Semantic Linked Data (LD); (3) a common design of IT platforms to manage monitoring and asset management data of transport infrastructures; (4) the ways to facilitate data analytics technologies, including AI, to be applied for monitoring and asset management of transport infrastructures, and to assess the added value of data-driven approach next to physics-based modelling. With regard to these topics, this paper reports the outcomes from the expert and stakeholder consultations that recently took place within the IM-SAFE pan-European Community of Practice.
High-tech horticulture production methods (such as vertical farming, hydroponics and other related technology possibilities), combined with evolving market side possibilities (consumer’s willingness to pay for variety, food safety and security), are opening new ways to create and deliver value. In this paper we present four emerging business models and attempt to understand the conditions under which each business model is able to create positive market value and sustained business advantage. The first of these four models is the case of a vertically integrated production to retail operation. The second model is the case of a production model with assured retail/distribution side commitment. The third model deals with a marketing/branding driven production model with differentiated market positioning. Finally, the forth is a production model with direct delivery to the end-consumer based upon the leveraging of wide spread digital technology in the consumer market. To demonstrate these four business models, we analyze practical case studies and analyze their market approach and impact. Using this analysis, we create a framework that enables entrepreneurs and businesses to adopt a business model that matches their capabilities with market opportunities.
Using the past to orientate on the present and the future can be seen as one of history’s main contributions to educating future citizens of democratic societies. Because teachers often lack useful methods for pursuing this goal, this study explores three pedagogical approaches that may help them making connections between the past, the present and the future: working with longitudinal lines (LL), with enduring human issues (EHI) and with historical analogies (HA). The efficacy of these approaches was examined in three case studies conducted in two Dutch secondary schools with eighth- to tenth-grade students (N=135) and their teachers (N=4) as participants. Explorations took place within the boundaries of the existing history curriculum and in close collaboration with the teachers who participated because they felt a need to motivate their students by means of a pedagogy to make history more useful. Findings suggest that implementing the LL- and EHI-approaches in a traditional history curriculum with chronologically ordered topics is more complicated than implementing the HA-approach. The HA-approach appears to have more potential to encourage students to use historical knowledge in present-day contexts than the other two approaches. In terms of students’ appraisals of the relevance of history, the application of the EHI-approach showed positive effects.
