IT-based networking trends such as the rise of social media, crowd sourcing, open innovation, and cloud computing enable a profoundly different way of working and collaborating that challenges significantly traditional approaches of companies towards governance, i.e. the mechanisms a company employs …

A few years ago the Maritime Pilots Institute Netherlands (MPIN) was asked to carry out practical research aimed at developing a simple method to predict wind loads on huge constructions. For practical reasons the method should not be time consuming. Some reasons for the initiative were the following. …

During the last twenty years, a remarkable new type of service has been developed in the world of sports, which can be described as the indoorisation of outdoor sports. Typical outdoor sports like climbing, skiing, surfing, rowing, and skydiving, which used to be exclusively practiced in a natural environment …

The green trend has taken a big interest in society. The need to live and act 'green' is becoming more popular and is not only followed by consumers but also in countries, companies and other institutions. The green phenomenon is more often seen in different aspects of life, such as food, clothes, parties …

The professional development of teacher educators is increasingly being recognised as a topic of paramount importance. This is partly caused by the stronger emphasis on improving the quality of teacher education programs and as a consequence on attention for the lifelong learning of those responsible …

The network economy typically signifies a notion from the information society where new products and services are developed by collaborating individuals and/or businesses organised in virtual networks. The network economy has important characteristics in common with Northern European governance models, …

In many fields within management and organizational literature there is considerable debate and controversy about key theoretical concepts and their definitions and meanings. Systematic metaphor analysis can be a useful approach to study the underlying conceptualizations that give rise to these controversies …

This paper focuses on the concept climate refugees in the 21st Century and mainly concerns environmentally displaced persons from developing countries. It seeks to answer the following question: 'Should the concept of climate refugees best be approached from a juridical or an environmental point of view?' …

Ghrelin, a peptide predominantly produced by the stomach [1], appears to play an important role in the regulation of food intake. Intravenous infusion of ghrelin stimulates food intake and enhances appetite in humans [2]. In addition, plasma ghrelin concentrations rise gradually before a meal and decrease …

In 1949 the People's Republic of China emerged from a civil war with communist Mao Zedong as its victor. During the peak of Mao's rule China was completely isolated from the world. In the 1960's China lost the support of the Soviet Union due to failed policies such as the Great Leap Forward and various …