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Aim: Public health lifestyle databases at local authority level are currently poorly aligned across the UK. The integration of lifestyle databases at a regional level could provide a rich resource to support research and help inform public health leads and service commissioners in improving service delivery, facilitating decision-making and developing key public health policies. Prior to its implementation, the acceptability of an integrated lifestyle database should be explored. The aim of this study was to consult with public health stakeholders to explore the acceptability of developing and implementing a regional integrated lifestyle database across four key areas of public health: smoking cessation, diet, physical activity and alcohol consumption. Method: Qualitative interviews were conducted with public health stakeholders recruited from across the East Midlands region of England. All interviews were conducted using video conferencing software and recorded, transcribed, and analysed using the Framework approach. Sixteen public health stakeholders were purposively identified and invited to participate in interviews. Results: Stakeholders viewed the integrated database as having potential to support research, service development and commissioning decisions. Barriers such as providers' reluctance to reveal their business strategies to rival organisations, cost of setting up and running the proposed database, complex information-sharing and governance were identified. Conclusion: An integrated lifestyle database has the potential to support research and service commissioning regionally. However, several barriers were identified that must be addressed prior to the development and implementation of an integrated database. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract The integrated computational materials engineering (ICME) has achieved great success in accelerating the rational design and deployment of new materials. It is a new route of designing new materials and processes and highlighted by Materials Genome Initiative/Engineering that stresses the high‐throughput computation in addition to high‐throughput experimentation and materials informatics. This article presents a brief review on the basic theories and multi‐scale computational tools of ICME to design advanced steel grades, including the first‐principles calculations, the CALPHAD method (i.e., computational thermodynamics) fueled by dedicated databases, diffusion and phase‐field simulations, as well as finite analysis methods and machine learning. In the ICME scheme to deal with steels, the CALPHAD method is considered as the core to readily consider multi‐component systems and integrated to link the microscopic simulations (such as diffusion and phase field method to predict microstructure evolutions in response to external conditions) and macroscopic finite analysis method to deal with mechanical properties. Two applications are also presented to address the new routes to carry out materials design, especially for advanced steels.

Background: In clinical oncology, it is widely recognized that data sharing and the integration of completed clinical trials can promote research and development (R&D). The Foundation Aide et Recherche en Cancérologie Digestive (ARCAD) database project was initiated in Europe and the United States in 2006. Approximately 40 000 individual patient data (IPD) for metastatic colorectal cancer were collected and constructed as an integrated database. Materials and methods: ARCAD-Asia was launched in 2021 and has been actively collecting Asian clinical trials. In addition, ARCAD-Asian data were periodically transferred to the Mayo Clinic, and IPD was integrated into the ARCAD database. Finally, all data were shared with three data centers, ARCAD-Asia and ARCAD, located in Europe, the United States, and Japan. We have developed a reproducible and reliable data conversion procedure based on the methodology established by ARCAD. Results: From September 2021 to April 2023, 2318 IPD from four first-line, two second-line, and three third-line trials for metastatic colorectal cancer were integrated and stored in ARCAD-Asia. By autumn 2023, three more trials (1565 IPD) will be included, resulting in 12 trials (3883 IPD) in the Asia database. These are transferred and shared with ARCAD. After integrating Asian data, the ARCAD database contained 70 trials with ∼50 000 IPD. Conclusions: Based on our active collaboration, ARCAD-Asia was established, and a global integrated database was constructed. As a next step, we will continue to collect Asian IPD and expand the cancer types, leading to a more comprehensive and available global database.

Objective: Tuberculosis (TB) poses a huge socioeconomic burden and remains listed among the top ten causes of deaths across the globe, despite enormous efforts of health agencies and researchers. The primary concern in a relatively slower pace of curbing TB is the emergence of multi-drug resistance and difficulty in tracking antibiotic consumption. Methods: We propose here a biometric-linked digital means of antibiotic prescription data collection and its utility for various epidemiological assessments. Results: In this short communication, we propose here, a visionary workflow to explore the use of biometric identification system to gather the antibiotic prescription information for tuberculosis cases and real-time monitoring over a global scale. Our proposal is mainly aimed at collection of antibiotic prescription data at clinician level and point of sales level using a simple fingerprint-based biometric approach and its linkage to unique biometric IDs such as Aadhar in India and related systems in other countries. Conclusion: The online server and web-interface are aimed at facilitating the health organizations and medical councils to monitor the antibiotic prescription and their consumption in real time. This will not only augment the existing policy-making regarding drug-resistance programs but also promote the collection and downstream exploratory analysis of huge amount of data to get a deeper insight into the epidemiology of tuberculosis and related diseases.

The paper presents the conceptual design of a database for the European Portal of Logistics Services (EPLOS) and its application. The database contains the data on logistics companies, the infrastructure for road, railway, inland, and air transport, as well as the data on the nodal elements of logistics infrastructure (warehouse facilities, seaports, transhipment terminals). Complete and verified information is the fundamental condition for rational decisions about the realization of logistics processes on a meso- and macroeconomic scale. Authors present the relations in the making of the EPLOS database, its assumed scope, and the potential benefits for the TSL market from accessing the EPLOS database.

Abstract Background Recently, there has been an increasing tendency to go back to nature in search of new medicines. To facilitate this, a great deal of effort has been made to compile information on natural products worldwide, and as a result, many ethnic-based traditional medicine databases have been developed. In Ethiopia, there are more than 80 ethnic groups, each having their indigenous knowledge on the use of traditional medicine. About 80% of the population uses traditional medicine for primary health care. Despite this, there is no structured online database for Ethiopian traditional medicine, which limits natural products based drug discovery researches using natural products from this country. Description To develop ETM-DB, online research articles, theses, books, and public databases containing Ethiopian herbal medicine and phytochemicals information were searched. These resources were thoroughly inspected and the necessary data were extracted. Then, we developed a comprehensive online relational database which contains information on 1054 Ethiopian medicinal herbs with 1465 traditional therapeutic uses, 573 multi-herb prescriptions, 4285 compounds, 11,621 human target gene/proteins, covering 5779 herb-phenotype, 1879 prescription-herb, 16,426 herb-compound, 105,202 compound-phenotype, 162,632 compound-gene/protein, and 16,584 phenotype-gene/protein relationships. Using various cheminformatics tools, we obtained predicted physicochemical and absorption, distribution, metabolism, excretion, and toxicity (ADMET) properties of ETM-DB compounds. We also evaluated drug-likeness properties of these compounds using FAF-Drugs4 webserver. From the 4285 compounds, 4080 of them passed the FAF-Drugs4 input data curation stage, of which 876 were found to have acceptable drug-likeness properties. Conclusion ETM-DB is the largest, freely accessible, web-based integrated resource on Ethiopian traditional medicine. It provides traditional herbal medicine entities and their relationships in well-structured forms including reference to the sources. The ETM-DB website interface allows users to search the entities using various options provided by the search menu. We hope that our database will expedite drug discovery and development researches from Ethiopian natural products as it contains information on the chemical composition and related human target gene/proteins. The current version of ETM-DB is openly accessible at http://biosoft.kaist.ac.kr/etm.

Various approaches have been attempted by the Government of Indonesia to eradicate poverty throughout the country, one of which is equitable distribution of social assistance for target households according to their classification of social welfare status. This research aims to re-evaluate the prior evaluation of five well-known machine learning techniques; Naïve Bayes, Random Forest, Support Vector Machines, K-Nearest Neighbor, and C4.5 Algorithm; on how well they predict the classifications of social welfare statuses. Afterwards, the best-performing one is implemented into an executable machine learning application that may predict the user’s social welfare status. Other objectives are to analyze the reliability of the chosen algorithm in predicting new data set, and generate a simple classification-prediction application. This research uses Python Programming Language, Scikit-Learn Library, Jupyter Notebook, and PyInstaller to perform all the methodology processes. The results shows that Random Forest Algorithm is the best machine learning technique for predicting household’s social welfare status with classification accuracy of 74.20% and the resulted application based on it could correctly predict 60.00% of user’s social welfare status out of 40 entries.

The paper presents the conceptual design of a database for the European Portal of Logistics Services (EPLOS) and its application. The database contains the data on logistics companies, the infrastructure for road, railway, inland, and air transport, as well as the data on the nodal elements of logistics infrastructure (warehouse facilities, seaports, transhipment terminals). Complete and verified information is the fundamental condition for rational decisions about the realization of logistics processes on a meso-and macroeconomic scale. Authors present the relations in the making of the EPLOS database, its assumed scope, and the potential benefits for the TSL market from accessing the EPLOS database. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Patient-level data are available for 11 randomized, controlled, Phase III/Phase IV solifenacin clinical trials. Methods: Meta-analyses were conducted to interrogate the data, to broaden knowledge about solifenacin and overactive bladder (OAB) in general. Before integrating data, datasets from individual studies were mapped to a single format using methodology developed by the Clinical Data Interchange Standards Consortium (CDISC). Initially, the data structure was harmonized, to ensure identical categorization, using the CDISC Study Data Tabulation Model (SDTM). To allow for patient level meta-analysis, data were integrated and mapped to analysis datasets. Mapping included adding derived and categorical variables and followed standards described as the Analysis Data Model (ADaM). Mapping to both SDTM and ADaM was performed twice by two independent programming teams, results compared, and inconsistencies corrected in the final output. ADaM analysis sets included assignments of patients to the Safety Analysis Set and the Full Analysis Set. Results: There were three analysis groupings: Analysis group 1 (placebo-controlled, monotherapy, fixed-dose studies, n = 3011); Analysis group 2 (placebo-controlled, monotherapy, pooled, fixed- and flexible-dose, n = 5379); Analysis group 3 (all solifenacin monotherapy-treated patients, n = 6539). Treatment groups were: solifenacin 5 mg fixed dose, solifenacin 5/10 mg flexible dose, solifenacin 10 mg fixed dose and overall solifenacin. Patient were similar enough for data pooling to be acceptable. Conclusions: Creating ADaM datasets provided significant information about individual studies and the derivation decisions made in each study; validated ADaM datasets now exist for medical history, efficacy and AEs. Results from these meta-analyses were similar over time.

For this study, we performed a variety of analyses using the Institute for Traffic Accident Research and Data Analysis' Integrated Driver Database with traffic accident and violation records. The database integrates driver management data and road traffic accident statistics data, making it possible to explore the relationships among driver attributes and road traffic accident characteristics in considerable detail. By controlling our compilation conditions and refining our sets of driver attributes, our analysis showed that drivers who experience accidents drive more carefully immediately after an accident, revealed high accident rates among drivers who have experienced certain violations, and produced other findings that could constitute a foundation for developing individual driver-targeted measures. Our analysis of large age groups, meanwhile, showed that drivers with a history of numerous accidents or apprehensions/violations are more likely to cause accidents. The Integrated Driver Database with traffic accident and violation records boasts an expansive scope, covering all of the 81 million licensed drivers in Japan, and features 200 variables pertaining to driver attributes, accidents, and violations. In addition to letting users refine their focuses by driver age, sex, and place of residence, the database also enables analyses that account for lifestyle-related variables like when drivers received their licenses and whether drivers have moved to new addresses. The sheer diversity of driver attributes in the database makes it a promising resource for formulating driver-targeted measures.

Abstract Risk assessment has been used to prevent health problems associated with eating habits in response to increased interest in a balanced diet. For nutritional risk assessment (NRA), it is important to 1) consider personal nutrition status based on year-round dietary intake, 2) organize core datasets such as food composition, intake, and health based guidance value (HBGV) datasets with public confidence, and 3) assess and predict the effects by using the computerized NRA tool. Our research staff constructed an integrated database system by compiling and organizing core datasets produced sporadically by different organizations and with different formats and developed a nutritional exposure and risk assessment system called Nutri-Risk (NUTRItional RISK assessment platform), which contained the database. Nutri-Risk is not only capable of NRA, but also contains additional data service functions. Here, the compilations and organization of an integrated database are outlined. In addition, the overall architectures of Nutri-Risk and dietary modeling are described and predictive simulation functions to support the regulatory decisions related to nutritional fortification or reduction policy were demonstrated. Highlights • An integrated database with standardized codesets and a platform were developed. • A platform was implemented for risk assessment with dietary modeling and simulation. • The simulation can minimize the risk for nutritional fortification and reduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the procedures leading to the construction of an integrated dataset for business firms. By merging information from sources such as business registries, financial statements and intellectual property offices, we show how to assemble a panel data that is suited to investigate issues ranging from firm demographics to industrial dynamics, also encompassing the analysis of innovation activities taking place within business firms. We test the validity of the proposed procedures resorting to the virtual universe of Italian limited liability companies, hence covering more than 1 million firms operating in both manufacturing and service sectors. The main purpose of the paper is to provide a unified set of procedures to help researchers dealing with the vast amount of information available on corporate firms and of ever increasing size. Our work also contributes to ease the replicability of empirical analyses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Amid growing concern over the changing climate, environment, and health care, the interconnectivity between cardiovascular diseases, coupled with rapid industrialization, and a variety of environmental factors, has been the focus of recent research. It is necessary to research risk factor extraction techniques that consider individual external factors and predict diseases and conditions. Therefore, we designed a framework to collect and store various domains of data on the causes of cardiovascular disease, and constructed a big data integrated database. A variety of open source databases were integrated and migrated onto distributed storage devices. The integrated database was composed of clinical data on cardiovascular diseases, national health and nutrition examination surveys, statistical geographic information, population and housing censuses, meteorological administration data, and Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service data. The framework was composed of data, speed, analysis, and service layers, all stored on distributed storage devices. Finally, we proposed a framework for a cardiovascular disease prediction system based on lambda architecture to solve the problems associated with the real-time analyses of big data. This system can be used to help predict and diagnose illnesses, such as cardiovascular diseases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During designing of warehouse facilities it is necessary to adopt series of input data. Each of the elements has a number of characteristics and parameters. In order to complex designing of warehouse facilities, it is necessary to develop an integrated database. The article discusses the concept of an integrated database, which will be prepared as part of the project SIMMAG 3D - System for modelling and visualization in the 3D warehouse facilities. Database allows for filtering of objects, depending on the function of the warehouse and the industry. It will contain also data connected with significant elements of the logistics network. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction and Hypothesis: Pooled data from seven randomized placebo-controlled trials were analysed to evaluate relationships between baseline body mass index (BMI), gender or age and the efficacy/tolerability of solifenacin (5 - 10 mg daily) in patients with overactive bladder (OAB). Methods: Changes in efficacy variables from baseline to 12 weeks were compared in patients with symptoms at baseline between solifenacin-treated and placebo-treated groups. Normalization rates were calculated (no more than eight micturitions in 24 h, no more than one episode of nocturia per night, zero values for other variables over 24 h). Treatment-emergent adverse events (TEAEs) were recorded. Results: The baseline incidence of incontinence and urgency incontinence increased with increasing BMI and age; relatively more women than men were incontinent. The baseline incidence of urgency was similar between genders and among age groups, but tended to increase with increasing BMI. The baseline frequencies of micturition and nocturia were similar in all BMI categories, between genders and in all age groups. The results from this meta-analysis of an integrated database of data from trials investigating solifenacin showed that solifenacin was more efficacious than placebo for all OAB symptoms across all BMI and age categories, and between genders. Normalization rates for micturition frequency, incontinence and urgency were greater in patients receiving solifenacin than in those receiving placebo across all categories. The overall incidence of TEAEs was higher in patients receiving solifenacin than in those receiving placebo; solifenacin was generally well tolerated in both groups. The overall frequency of TEAEs for solifenacin and placebo was slightly higher in women than in men and in older than in younger patients. The most commonly reported TEAEs were dry mouth and constipation. Conclusions: Regardless of BMI, gender or age, all patients with OAB can be considered candidates for solifenacin treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pleurochrysis is a coccolithophorid genus, which belongs to the Coccolithales in the Haptophyta. The genus has been used extensively for biological research, together with Emiliania in the Isochrysidales, to understand distinctive features between the two coccolithophorid-including orders. However, molecular biological research on Pleurochrysis such as elucidation of the molecular mechanism behind coccolith formation has not made great progress at least in part because of lack of comprehensive gene information. To provide such information to the research community, we built an open web database, the Pleurochrysome (http://bioinf.mind.meiji.ac.jp/phapt/), which currently stores 9,023 unique gene sequences (designated as UNIGENEs) assembled from expressed sequence tag sequences of P. haptonemofera as core information. The UNIGENEs were annotated with gene sequences sharing significant homology, conserved domains, Gene Ontology, KEGG Orthology, predicted subcellular localization, open reading frames and orthologous relationship with genes of 10 other algal species, a cyanobacterium and the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. This sequence and annotation information can be easily accessed via several search functions. Besides fundamental functions such as BLAST and keyword searches, this database also offers search functions to explore orthologous genes in the 12 organisms and to seek novel genes. The Pleurochrysome will promote molecular biological and phylogenetic research on coccolithophorids and other haptophytes by helping scientists mine data from the primary transcriptome of P. haptonemofera. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although there are considerable site-based data for individual or groups of ecosystems, these datasets are widely scattered, have different data formats and conventions, and often have limited accessibility. At the broader scale, national datasets exist for a large number of geospatial features of land, water, and air that are needed to fully understand variation among these ecosystems. However, such datasets originate from different sources and have different spatial and temporal resolutions. By taking an open-science perspective and by combining site-based ecosystem datasets and national geospatial datasets, science gains the ability to ask important research questions related to grand environmental challenges that operate at broad scales. Documentation of such complicated database integration efforts, through peer-reviewed papers, is recommended to foster reproducibility and future use of the integrated database. Here, we describe the major steps, challenges, and considerations in building an integrated database of lake ecosystems, called LAGOS (LAke multi-scaled GeOSpatial and temporal database), that was developed at the sub-continental study extent of 17 US states (1,800,000 km2). LAGOS includes two modules: LAGOSGEO, with geospatial data on every lake with surface area larger than 4 ha in the study extent (∼50,000 lakes), including climate, atmospheric deposition, land use/cover, hydrology, geology, and topography measured across a range of spatial and temporal extents; and LAGOSLIMNO, with lake water quality data compiled from ∼100 individual datasets for a subset of lakes in the study extent (∼10,000 lakes). Procedures for the integration of datasets included: creating a flexible database design; authoring and integrating metadata; documenting data provenance; quantifying spatial measures of geographic data; quality-controlling integrated and derived data; and extensively documenting the database. Our procedures make a large, complex, and integrated database reproducible and extensible, allowing users to ask new research questions with the existing database or through the addition of new data. The largest challenge of this task was the heterogeneity of the data, formats, and metadata. Many steps of data integration need manual input from experts in diverse fields, requiring close collaboration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although there are considerable site-based data for individual or groups of ecosystems, these datasets are widely scattered, have different data formats and conventions, and often have limited accessibility. At the broader scale, national datasets exist for a large number of geospatial features of land, water, and air that are needed to fully understand variation among these ecosystems. However, such datasets originate from different sources and have different spatial and temporal resolutions. By taking an open-science perspective and by combining site-based ecosystem datasets and national geospatial datasets, science gains the ability to ask important research questions related to grand environmental challenges that operate at broad scales. Documentation of such complicated database integration efforts, through peer-reviewed papers, is recommended to foster reproducibility and future use of the integrated database. Here, we describe the major steps, challenges, and considerations in building an integrated database of lake ecosystems, called LAGOS (LAke multi-scaled GeOSpatial and temporal database), that was developed at the sub-continental study extent of 17 US states (1,800,000 km²). LAGOS includes two modules: LAGOSGEO, with geospatial data on every lake with surface area larger than 4 ha in the study extent (~50,000 lakes), including climate, atmospheric deposition, land use/cover, hydrology, geology, and topography measured across a range of spatial and temporal extents; and LAGOSLIMNO, with lake water quality data compiled from ~100 individual datasets for a subset of lakes in the study extent (~10,000 lakes). Procedures for the integration of datasets included: creating a flexible database design; authoring and integrating metadata; documenting data provenance; quantifying spatial measures of geographic data; quality-controlling integrated and derived data; and extensively documenting the database. Our procedures make a large, complex, and integrated database reproducible and extensible, allowing users to ask new research questions with the existing database or through the addition of new data. The largest challenge of this task was the heterogeneity of the data, formats, and metadata. Many steps of data integration need manual input from experts in diverse fields, requiring close collaboration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Although utilities have access to land use and demographic data, often little is known of water users, except for their billing class. The present study integrated this data with water billing records of three Canadian municipalities, using it to define benchmarks and targets for conservation. Integrated databases were created for easy storage and updating. Results were presented in a summary tool. Access to an organized and condensed version of the extensive water, land use, and demographic data facilitates system assessments. The integrated database and the summary tool provide actionable information for utilities seeking to increase the sustainability of their systems. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This work describes the process of building Micro.3, an integrated database containing firm level information for Italian enterprises. Micro.3 covers the period 1989-2004 and represents the development of a previous database, Micro.1 which covered a much narrower set of variables and spanned only from 1989 to 1997. This works explains the motives that drove the development of Micro.3 and it details the decisions taken during the process of construction to ensure the continuity of the existing variables as they are retrieved from different sources. Finally, we presents some statistical evidence that enables the reader to assess the quality of Micro.3. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article describes an integrated databases on European macobenthic fauna, developed within the framework of the European Network of Excellence Marine Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning (MarBEF), and the data and data integration exercise that provided its content. It states that a total of 44 datasets including 465,354 distribution records from soft-bottom macrobenthic species were uploaded into the relational MacroBen database, corresponding to 22,897 sampled station from all European seas, and 7,203 valid tax. Moreover, an interface which allows the user to explore, subselect, export and analyse the data by calculating different indices was created.

Abstract: CCAP, the largest European protistan culture collection, is based at the Scottish Association for Marine Science near Oban, Scotland (http://www.ccap.ac.uk). The Collection comprises more than 2700 strains in the public domain, of which 1050 are marine algae, 1300 freshwater algae, and 350 protozoa. The primary mission of CCAP is to maintain and distribute defined cultures and their associated information to its customers. It also has a support and advisory function on all aspects of protistan science. In addition, it is involved in the training of students and researchers in algal identification and culture techniques. In light of the increasing number of fully sequenced protists, the CCAP is striving to provide targeted services and support to workers involved in all aspects of genomic research. At present, the Collection holds several hundred strains of genomic model taxa including: Acanthamoeba, Cafeteria, Cercomonas, Chlamydomonas, Chlorella, Cyanophora, Dictyostelium, Dunaliella, Ectocarpus, Emiliania, Euglena, Micromonas, Naegleria, Nephroselmis, Paramecium, Pavlova, Phaeodactylum, Porphyra, Pseudendoclonium, Pylaiella, Rhodomonas, Scenedesmus, Staurastrum, Tetrahymena, Thalassiosira, Volvox and Zygnema. These strains provide a defined representation of natural variation within model organisms, an increasingly useful resource for post-genomics approaches. Our aim over the next 2–5 years is to add value to the Collection by increasing the number of genome model species, and by offering an integrated, up-to-date, easy-to-use resource that would provide curated information on our strain holdings. In collaboration with other major Biological Resource Centres worldwide, we intend to build a hub providing access to both protistan cultures and their associated bioinformatics data. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: In this paper, internet-based ship technical information management system has been developed as a means to accumulate, manage, share and utilize various distributed applications and information used for ship design and building. The information managed in the system is documents from the whole life cycle including concept design, basic design, detailed design, construction, operation and maintenance. In addition, using the developed system, integrated system framework is also proposed to integrate applications and database in concurrent engineering environment. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The Riken mouse genome encyclopedia a comprehensive full-length cDNA collection and sequence database. High-level functional annotation is based on sequence homology search, expression profiling, mapping and protein–protein interactions. More than 1 000 000 clones prepared from 163 tissues were end-sequenced and classified into 128 000 clusters, and 60 000 representative clones were fully sequenced representing 24 000 clear protein-encoding genes. The application of the mouse genome database for positional cloning and gene network regulation analysis is reported. To cite this article: Y. Hayashizaki, C. R. Biologies 326 (2003). [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

We developed an Integrated Medical Image Database and Retrieval System (INIS) for easy access by medical staff. The INIS mainly consisted of four parts: specific servers to save medical images from multi-vendor modalities of CT, MRI, CR, ECG and endoscopy; an integrated image database (DB) server to save various kinds of images in a DICOM format; a Web application server to connect clients to the integrated image DB and the Web browser terminals connected to an HIS system. The INIS provided a common screen design to retrieve CT, MRI, CR, endoscopic and ECG images, and radiological reports, which would allow doctors to retrieve radiological images and corresponding reports, or ECG images of a patient simultaneously on a screen. Doctors working in internal medicine on average accessed information 492 times a month. Doctors working in cardiological and gastroenterological accessed information 308 times a month. Using the INIS, medical staff could browse all or parts of a patient''s medical images and reports. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The objective of this paper is to report on the development of an integrated database to act as an information resource base for 4D/VR construction process simulation.A comprehensive database was designed, implemented and populated with the School of Health Construction Project (a £8 million, three-story development at the University of Teesside campus). The database is composed of a core database of building components which is in turn, integrated with a CAD package (AUTOCAD 2000), a Project Management Package (MS Project) and Graphical User Interfaces.The core database was designed using Standard Classification Methods (Uniclass). One of the benefits of using the Uniclass method, a part from providing standards for structuring building information, is that it provides a media for integrating Product Breakdown Structure (PBS) with Work Breakdown Structure (WBS). This is an important aspect for delivering a meaningful 4D model.Integrated interfaces between MS Access Database, AutoCAD Drawings and MS Project Schedules were developed and implemented. Furthermore, the British Standards of layering convention (BS 1192-5) was adapted and implemented and justification for this is given in the part 2 of this document.The database was populated with detailed 2D drawings (whole building and M&E), schedules of work and resources of the School of Health Project. This paper is also addressing object definition, structuring the data, and establishing the relationships and dependencies within the data set, the WBS and building objects as well as modelling the building in 3D in order to capture the essential space- and time-critical attributes of tasks. Practical application of database throughout the construction process has been highlighted and discussed. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]