How has Japan become a major economic power, a world leader in the automotive and electronics industries? What is the secret of their success? The consensus has been that, though the Japanese are not particularly innovative, they are exceptionally skilful at imitation, at improving products that already exist. But now two leading Japanese business experts, Ikujiro Nonaka and Hiro Takeuchi, turn this conventional wisdom on its head: Japanese firms are successful, they contend, precisely because they are innovative, because they create new knowledge and use it to produce successful products and technologies. Examining case studies drawn from such firms as Honda, Canon, Matsushita, NEC, 3M, GE, and the U.S. Marines, this book reveals how Japanese companies translate tacit to explicit knowledge and use it to produce new processes, products, and services.

The knowledge-creating company : how Japanese companies create the dynamics of innovation

This report incorporates the views expressed at the workshop of leading experts from government, academia, and private sector, and detailed in contributions submitted thereafter by members of the U.S. science and engineering community. Acknowledgements The contribution of all participants in this study in developing a coherent vision for Converging Technologies for Improving Human Performance is acknowledged. The initial group that began planning this study in Spring 2001 is composed W. About the cover: The arrow suggests the combined role of nanotechnology, biotechnology, information technology in accelerating advancement of mental, physical, and overall human performance. This report was prepared under the guidance of NSET. Any opinions, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the United States Government.

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Converging technologies for improving human performance

Coming of Age in Second Life: An Anthropologist Explores the Virtually Human

This study represents two critical steps forward in the area of smart city research and practice The first is in the form of the development of a comprehensive conceptualization of smart city as a resource for researchers and government practition- ers; the second is in the form of the creation of a bridge between smart cities research and practice expertise City governments increasingly need innovative arrangements to solve a variety of technical, physical, and social problems "Smart city" could be used to represent efforts that in many ways describe a vision of a city, but there is little clarity about this new concept This paper proposes a comprehensive conceptualization of smart city, including its main components and several specific elements Academic literature is used to create a robust framework, while a review of practical tools is used to identify specific elements or aspects not treated in the academic studies, but essential to create an integrative and comprehensive conceptualization of smart city The paper also provides policy implications and suggests areas for future research in this topic

What makes a city smart? Identifying core components and proposing an integrative and comprehensive conceptualization

Many of the problems being addressed by Immersive Analytics require groups of people to solve. This chapter introduces the concept of Collaborative Immersive Analytics (CIA) and reviews how immersive technologies can be combined with Visual Analytics to facilitate co-located and remote collaboration. We provide a definition of Collaborative Immersive Analytics and then an overview of the different types of possible collaboration. The chapter also discusses the various roles in collaborative systems, and how to support shared interaction with the data being presented. Finally, we summarize the opportunities for future research in this domain. The aim of the chapter is to provide enough of an introduction to CIA and key directions for future research, so that practitioners will be able to begin working in the field.

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Collaborative immersive analytics

Virtual labs and simulation is a powerful tool to engage students in active learning. This paper presents virtual chemistry laboratory for school education developed at Multimedia System Laboratory MarSTU. Virtual Lab includes a lot of experiments which are accomplished through the use of the real-time 3D graphics and pre-rendered animation. Interactive laboratory activities are able to enhance student's understanding of chemical processes and practical skills. In order to make human-computer interaction more enjoyable and productive, an animated pedagogical agent was added to the interface of the laboratory. The cost-effective approaches for the development of virtual learning environment are described.

Virtual chemistry laboratory for school education

In this paper, we present a new approach to educational activities in 3D virtual worlds. This approach is based on a new vision of content and learning process in virtual worlds and related to a new platform called vAcademia. This virtual world is designed and developed specially for educational purposes, and it has an integrated set of tools for a number of learning activities. The main original feature of vAcademia is 3D recording, which allows capturing dynamically everything in a given location in the virtual world. A 3D recording looks like a live virtual class providing students with a collaboration space and giving a sense of presence. In such a manner, vAcademia supports a new type of digital content -- 3D recording or virtcast, which is created based on synchronous activities and opens new possibilities to explore. In this paper, we present the functionality, scenarios of use, and challenges of the educational virtual world vAcademia.

vAcademia -- Educational Virtual World with 3D Recording

vAcademia is a 3D virtual world designed for collaborative learning It enables a new approach to educational activities in virtual worlds, which is based on a new vision of content and learning process The most distinct feature of vAcademia is 3D recording which allows capturing everything in a given virtual world location in dynamics The resultant recordings can be not only watched later, but also visited, providing students with a collaboration space and giving a sense of presence 3D recording is conceptually different from video recording or screen capturing In such a manner, vAcademia supports a new type of digital content – 3D recording or virtcast which is created based on synchronous activities In addition, this platform has an integrated set of tools for collaborative learning which substitute those commonly used in physical classrooms, but also allows implementing new learning scenarios that are not possible or costly in reality In this paper, we present the functionality, scenarios of use, and the initial evaluation results of the vAcademia virtual world

Asynchronous Immersive Classes in a 3D Virtual World: Extended Description of vAcademia

In recent years, the usage of virtual worlds for educational purposes has increased. In this paper, we focus specifically on virtual campuses, i.e. virtual worlds representing real educational institutions that use the metaphor of a university and provide users with a range of different tools for learning. Based on the results of a case study that we have performed, this paper provides a set of requirements for a virtual campus. Following the requirements, we present the design of a virtual campus representing our university. Among the associated tools and resources we introduce an innovative educational recourse ‘Collaborative Virtual Workshop’, based on the principles of social software.

Virtual Campus as a Framework for Educational and Social Activities

In this paper, we review the use of virtual and augmented reality technologies for capture and externalization of tacit knowledge from complex activity in knowledge-intensive professions. We focus on technologies for converting experience hidden in activity with the aim to boost industry competitiveness, innovation, and facilitate learning on the job. As such types of knowledge and experience are difficult to capture and represent in traditional media, we explore emerging technology along two lines of investigation. First, we look at applications of virtual reality to then, second, focus on using sensors, augmented reality, and wearable technologies. We discuss existing and future applications of experience capturing with virtual and augmented reality technologies. This review provides a comprehensive overview for those interested in recording virtual, real, and augmented activities, methods for delivering the recorded data, and extracting knowledge.

Mikhail Morozov

Papers

Virtual chemistry laboratory for school education

vAcademia -- Educational Virtual World with 3D Recording

Asynchronous Immersive Classes in a 3D Virtual World: Extended Description of vAcademia

Virtual Campus as a Framework for Educational and Social Activities

An Overview of Capturing Live Experience with Virtual and Augmented Reality.