springer berlin heidelberg okt 2016 (801 risultati)

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book contains the most important formulas and more than 190 completely solved problems from Kinetics and Hydrodynamics. It provides engineering students material to improve their skills and helps to gain experience in solving engineering problems. Particular emphasis is placed on finding the solution path and formulating the basic equations. Topics include: Kinematics of a Point Kinetics of a Point Mass Dynamics of a System of Point Masses Kinematics of Rigid Bodies Kinetics of Rigid Bodies Impact Vibrations Non-Inertial Reference Frames HydrodynamicsSpringer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 256 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 288 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -As a business concept ¿storytelling¿ has had a significant impact on how companies can build strong corporate cultures and credible brands. Yet many corporations are still confused as to how exactly storytelling can make a difference: Why should we tell stories at all What makes a good story And how do we tell it in a way that advances our company both culturally and fiscally while strengthening our brand The second edition of this successful book presents ten new case studies. Written by practitioners for practitioners and students and filled with simple tools for putting corporate storytelling into practice, it provides knowledge and inspiration for using storytelling as a strategic tool for releasing your company¿s potential.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 260 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book presents a comparative historical analysis of state-led nationalist movements in Chinese history, which counters current claims that popular nationalism in present-day China is strong enough to sustain costly expansionist wars. Popular nationalism in China has been on the rise since the early 1990s to the concern of many observers. Some have even asked whether China will become another Germany. A comparative historical analysis of pre-war and wartime nationalist mobilization helps us better understand how individuals formulate their opinions under extreme conditions. It concludes that the public's weak perception of foreign threats, taken together with pro-minority domestic institutions, may significantly undermine the state¿s efforts at nationalist mobilization and thus limit its capability to pursue external expansion or other strategic goals.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 176 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book investigates the functioning and ecosystems of biorefineries and assesses the potential of the industrial bioeconomy. The authors present a case study of the biorefinery at Bazancourt Pomacle, near Reims, France, as an outstanding illustration of the creation, work processes, financing, provision of environmental services, competitive benefits and future prospects of a bioeconomy. Analysing the case of Bazancourt Pomacle, the authors show the wide range of products produced by integrated biorefineries such as food, bioenergy, molecules for cosmetics and nutrients for agricultural use. They also analyse Bazancourt Pomacle as an open innovation platform, which encompasses several layers of R&D, including three department chairs from leading engineering and business schools in France. Illustrating a number of global success stories that started in Bazancourt Pomacle, the authors also investigate the provision of pilot- and demonstration plants as inescapable steps in the scaling-up process from the lab to industrial scale. The book provides a systematic overview of the lessons learned, as well as data on an industrial bioeconomy. Investors, decision- makers, public-policy shapers, analysts and scholars will learn about the history, actors, economics, industrial symbiosis, role of cooperatives, R&D and future prospects of a world-class biorefinery and bio-based cluster in Europe.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 156 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book introduces the new China (Shanghai) Free-Trade Zone one year after its launch. It examines in depth the economic, strategic and political effects of Chinese economic and financial reform. The results of the analysis are further clarified by comparing Shanghai with analogous counterparts in Singapore and Hong Kong. China has developed a number of special and free-trade zones but the new Pilot Shanghai FTZ includes all previous privileges promoting the area as perfect hub for the Asia-Pacific region. This work represents a valuable business guide for appraising new opportunities in the most promising sectors for business enterprises in China.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 244 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book aims to identify, understand and qualify barriers to the patient-centred knowledge sharing (KS) in interprofessional practice of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and Western Medicine (WM) healthcare professionals in Chinese hospitals. This collaboration is particularly crucial and unique to China since, contrary to Western practice, these two types of professionals actually work together complimentary in the same hospital.This study adopted a Grounded Theory approach as the overarching methodology to guide the analysis of the data collected in a single case-study design. A public hospital in central China was selected as the case-study site, at which 49 informants were interviewed by using semi-structured and evolving interview scripts. The research findings point to five categories of KS barriers: contextual influences, hospital management, philosophical divergence, Chinese healthcare education and interprofessional training. Further conceptualising the research findings, it is identified that KS is mostly prevented by philosophical and professional tensions between the two medical communities. Therefore, to improve KS and reduce the effects of the identified barriers, efforts should be made targeted at resolving both types of tensions.The conclusion advocates the establishment of national policies and hospital management strategies aimed at maintaining equality of the two medical communities and putting in place an interprofessional common ground to encourage and facilitate communication and KS.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 236 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book outlines Chinäs current overseas investment promotion system, analyzing the general situation and the main problems arising during its development. Based on investigations of both the historical and present-day contexts of outbound investment, the book suggests improvements to overseas investment promotion to protect Chinäs enterprises from various aspects of the system including legal, regulatory, fiscal, intellectual property rights and standardization, risk prevention, foreign trade and economic cooperation zones to promote overseas securities investment promotion and social services.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 252 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This monograph is the first academic work to apply a neo-Marxist approach to 20th-century Canadian social realist novels, pursuing a refreshingly (neo-)Marxist approach to such issues as Bakhtinian notions of the novelistic form and dialogism as applied to Canadian socio-political novels influenced by various socialisms, socialist-feminist concerns, economic and sexual politics, and the genre of social realism. In so doing, it demonstrates that Marxist socialism is as relevant today as it was in the 1930s, just as social realist novels continue to thrive as a critique of capitalism. Readers will find valuable insights into the social significance, formal innovations, moral sensitivity, aesthetic enrichment, and ideological complexity of Canadian social realist novels.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 324 pp. Englisch.

Buch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book coins the term ¿Networked Public¿ to describe the active social actors in new media ecology. The author argues that, in today¿s network society, Networked Public Communication is different than, yet has similarities with, mass communication and interpersonal communication. As such it is the emergent paradigm for research. The book reviews the historical, technological and social context for the rising of Networked Public, analyzes its constituents and characteristics, and discusses the categories and features of social media in China. By analyzing abundant cases from recent years, the book provides answers to the key questions at micro, meso and macro-levels, including how information flows under regulation in the process of Networked Public Communication; what its features and models are; what collective action strategies and¿resistance culture¿have been developed as a result of Internet regulate; the nature of power games among Networked Public, mass media, political forces and capital, and the links with the development of Chinese civil society.Springer-Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 320 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This unique book presents the discretization of continuous systems and implicit mapping dynamics of periodic motions to chaos in continuous nonlinear systems. The stability and bifurcation theory of fixed points in discrete nonlinear dynamical systems is reviewed, and the explicit and implicit maps of continuous dynamical systems are developed through the single-step and multi-step discretizations. The implicit dynamics of period-m solutions in discrete nonlinear systems are discussed. The book also offers a generalizedapproach to findinganalytical and numerical solutions of stable and unstable periodic flows to chaos in nonlinear systems with/without time-delay. The bifurcation trees of periodic motions to chaos in the Duffing oscillator are shown as a sample problem, while the discrete Fourier series of periodic motions and chaos are also presented. The book offers a valuable resource for university students, professors, researchers and engineers in the fields of applied mathematics, physics, mechanics, control systems, and engineering.Springer-Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 320 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This concise, well-illustrated monograph explains the true pathogenesis, hitherto unsolved, of five key pain syndromes of the arm and describes diagnosis, indications for surgery, surgical techniques and results. The syndromes in question are tennis elbow, golf elbow, proximal radial nerve compression syndrome, so-called coracoiditis and Sudeck¿s dystrophy. In each case, the neurogenic pathogenesis is identified and deficiencies of other interpretations, for example that these conditions are the result of degenerative processes, are discussed. Appropriate surgical techniques in resistant cases are described in the context of pathogenesis and treatment outcomes are documented. The fact that these outcomes are excellent in the large majority of cases may be taken as support for the author¿s interpretation of pathogenesis. This book will be informative and instructive for all hand, orthopedic, trauma, plastic, general and neurosurgeons as well as neurologists and hand therapists.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 168 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This concise textbook for students preferably of a postgraduate level, but also for engineers in practice, contains the basic kinematical and kinetic structures of dynamics together with carefully selected applications. The book is a condensed introduction to the fundamental laws of kinematics and kinetics, on the most important principles of mechanics and presents the equations of motion in the form of Lagrange and Newton-Euler. Selected problems of linear and nonlinear dynamics are treated, as well as problems of vibration formation. The presented selection of topics gives a useful basis for stepping into more advanced problems of dynamics. The contents of this book represent the result of a regularly revised course, which has been and still is given for masters students at the Technische Universität München.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 228 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -The book introduces tourism earth-science as a new scientific discipline by applying the principles of earth-science in the study of natural and human tourism resources. It involves studying the geo-scientific characteristics of these tourism resources through surveys, evaluation and aesthetic value assessment. It also discusses about the principles behind geopark establishment and management. It is an important publication providing direction for geopark and tourism developments in China. The book is a tool for geological heritage survey, assessment and research. It can also be used to assist planning of geopark, national parks, heritage protection and scientific interpretation. It is a valuable teaching material for teachers and students of geoscience and tourism as well as providing useful guidance for geopark managers and tour guides in their operation. In addition, the book also offers scientific knowledge of the surrounding natural and cultural landscapes to the public and thegeneral visitors.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 292 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book covers the latest advances in processing techniques for producing metallic biomaterial implants. It also discusses recent developments in surface modifications using bioactive ceramics and blood-compatible polymers, as well as the adhesive strength of bioactive surface layers, before introducing the practical applications of metallic biomaterials in the fields of surgery and dentistry. As such, the book provides an essential reference guide for researchers, graduate students and clinicians working in the fields of materials, surgery, dentistry, and mechanics.Mitsuo Niinomi, PhD, D.D.Sc., is a Professor at the Institute for Materials Research, Tohoku University, JapanTakayuki Narushima, PhD, is a Professor at the Department of Materials Processing, Tohoku University, JapanMasaaki Nakai, PhD, is an Associate Professor at the Institute for Materials Research, Tohoku University, JapanSpringer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 292 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book focuses on analysis and design problems for high-order linear time-invariant (LTI) swarm systems (multi-agent systems) to achieve consensus, formation, containment and formation-containment. As a first step, the concepts of practical consensus and formation-containment are introduced. Unlike previous research, the formation in this book can be time-varying. A general framework for consensus, consensus tracking, formation, containment and state formation-containment is presented for the first time.Sufficient/necessary and sufficient conditions, and approaches to designing the protocols for swarm systems to achieve these control objectives, are respectively proposed. Autonomous time-varying formation experiments using five quadrotor unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are conducted in an outdoor setting to demonstrate the theoretical results.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 192 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This fifteenth volume in the EUROPEAN INSTRUCTIONAL LECTURES series continues the format of educational chapters from across Orthopaedics and Traumatology contributed by distinguished Orthopaedic Educators in Europe. It provides current material and major advances covering a range of topics including General Orthopaedics, Basic Science and Technology, Musculoskeletal Tumours, Infections, Paediatric Orthopaedics, Trauma, Spine, Upper Limb, Hip, Knee and Lower Leg. All the chapters are based on lectures presented at the 16th EFORT Congress in Prague, Czech Republic. The lectures are an authoritative source of information illustrated by radiographs, MRI, CT and PET Scans, operative photographs, tables and line drawings as appropriate. They are an invaluable source of instruction for Surgeons and Trainees alike. This book was edited by Professor George Bentley, Chairman, Scientific Publications Committee of EFORT.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 244 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book offers a systematic introduction to recent achievements and development in research on the structure of finite non-simple groups, the theory of classes of groups and their applications. In particular, the related systematic theories are considered and some new approaches and research methods are described ¿ e.g., the F-hypercenter of groups, X-permutable subgroups, subgroup functors, generalized supplementary subgroups, quasi-F-group, and F-cohypercenter for Fitting classes. At the end of each chapter, we provide relevant supplementary information and introduce readers to selected open problems.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 376 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This comprehensive work thoroughly introduces and reviews the set ofresults from Belle and BaBar - aftermore than two decades of independent and complementarywork - all theway from the detectors and theanalysis tools used, up to the physicsresults, and the interpretationof these results.The world¿s two giant B Factorycollaborations, Belle at KEK and BaBar at SLAC, have successfullycompleted theirmain mission to discover and quantify CP violation in the decays of B mesons. CP violation is a necessary requirement to distinguish unambiguously between matterand antimatter. The shared primary objective of the two B Factory experiments was to determine the shape of the so-calledunitarity triangle, an abstract triangle representing interactionsof quarks, the elementary constituents ofmatter. The areaof the triangle is a measure of the amount of CPviolation associated with the weakforce.Many other measurements have been performed by the B Factories and are also discussed in this work.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 932 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -Motivated by a variational model concerning the depth of the objects in a picture and the problem of hidden and illusory contours, this book investigates one of the central problems of computer vision: thetopological and algorithmic reconstruction of a smooth three dimensional scene starting from the visible part of an apparent contour.The authors focus their attention on the manipulation of apparent contours using a finite set of elementary moves, which correspond to diffeomorphic deformations of three dimensional scenes.A large part of the book is devoted to thealgorithmic part, with implementations, experiments, and computed examples. The book is intended also as a user's guide to the software code appcontour, writtenfor the manipulation of apparent contours and their invariants. This book is addressed to theoretical and applied scientists working in the field of mathematical models of image segmentation.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 392 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -The present publication contains a special collection of research and review articles on deformations of surface singularities, that put together serve as an introductory survey of results and methods of the theory, as well as open problems and examples. The aim is to collect material that will help mathematicians already working or wishing to work in this area to deepen their insight and eliminate the technical barriers in this learning process. Additionally, we introduce some material which emphasizes the newly found relationship with the theory of Stein fillings and symplectic geometry. This links two main theories of mathematics: low dimensional topology and algebraic geometry.¿The theory of normal surface singularities is a distinguished part of analytic or algebraic geometry with several important results, its own technical machinery, and several open problems. Recently several connections were established with low dimensional topology, symplectic geometry and theory of Stein fillings. This created an intense mathematical activity with spectacular bridges between the two areas. The theory of deformation of singularities is the key object in these connections.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 288 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book reports on the latest advances in the study of Networked Control Systems (NCSs). It highlights novel research concepts on NCSs; the analysis and synthesis of NCSs with special attention to their networked character; self- and event-triggered communication schemes for conserving limited network resources; and communication and control co-design for improving the efficiency of NCSs. The book will be of interest to university researchers, control and network engineers, and graduate students in the control engineering, communication and network sciences interested in learning the core principles, methods, algorithms and applications of NCSs.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 184 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book represents an attempt to fully review the phenomenon of the blogosphere. The intention is to provide a reliable guide to understanding and analyzing the world of the unimaginable number of diverse blogs, each consisting of innumerable posts, which in their entirety form the blogosphere. We go on to answer the questions of how to grasp the complexity of the blogosphere and extract useful knowledge from it. In setting out to write this book, our central aim was to increase the reader¿s awareness and understanding of the blogosphere phenomenon, including its structure and characteristics. This can be achieved through a better understanding of individual blogs and their particular technical characteristics, as well as a deeper knowledge of how a single blog is embedded and interconnected within the entire blogosphere. The shape and form of the blogosphere can be described using the analogy of different continents. In our description the defining features and characteristics of the continents are illustrated by paradigmatic example blogs. Following on from the structural analysis we provide details of the available methods and describe the complex challenge of automatically retrieving information from the abundance of data contained in the blogosphere. Finally, we present our blog search platform, called BLOGINTELLIGENCE and describe all the tools and features we have developed during the last couple of years to explore the blogosphere.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 284 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -The two-volume set LNCS 9985 and LNCS 9986 constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Theory of Cryptography, TCC 2016-B, held in Beijing, China, in November 2016.The total of 45 revised full papers presented in the proceedings were carefully reviewed and selected from 113 submissions. The papers were organized in topical sections named: TCC test-of-time award; foundations; unconditional security; foundations of multi-party protocols; round complexity and efficiency of multi-party computation; differential privacy; delegation and IP; public-key encryption; obfuscation and multilinear maps; attribute-based encryption; functional encryption; secret sharing; new models.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 596 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -The two-volume set LNCS 9985 and LNCS 9986 constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Theory of Cryptography, TCC 2016-B, held in Beijing, China, in November 2016.The total of 45 revised full papers presented in the proceedings were carefully reviewed and selected from 113 submissions. The papers were organized in topical sections named: TCC test-of-time award; foundations; unconditional security; foundations of multi-party protocols; round complexity and efficiency of multi-party computation; differential privacy; delegation and IP; public-key encryption; obfuscation and multilinear maps; attribute-based encryption; functional encryption; secret sharing; new models.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 708 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -Web Dynpro ABAP, a NetWeaver web application user interface tool from SAP, enables web programming connected to SAP Systems. The authors¿ main focus was to create a book based on their own practical experience. Each chapter includes examples which lead through the content step-by-step and enable the reader to gradually explore and grasp the Web Dynpro ABAP process. The authors explain in particular how to design Web Dynpro components, the data binding and interface methods, and the view controller methods. They also describe the other SAP NetWeaver Elements (ABAP Dictionary, Authorization) and the integration of the Web Dynpro Application into the SAP NetWeaver Portal.The new edition has been expanded to include chapters on subjects such as POWER Lists; creating the Modal Windows and External Windows; using Web Dynpro application parameters and Shared Objects to communicate between the Web Dynpro ABAP Application and Business Server Pages; and creating multi-language mails using Web Dynpro ABAP.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 496 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -With their intuitive graphical approach and expressive analysis techniques, Petri nets are suitable for a wide range of applications and teaching scenarios, and they have gained wide acceptance as a modeling technique in areas such as software design and control engineering. The core theoretical principles have been studied for many decades and there is now a comprehensive research literature that complements the extensive implementation experience.In this book the author presents a clear, thorough introduction to the essentials of Petri nets. He explains the core modeling techniques and analysis methods and he illustrates their usefulness with examples and case studies. Part I describes how to use Petri nets for modeling; all concepts are explained with the help of examples, starting with a generic, powerful model which is also intuitive and realistic. Part II covers the essential analysis methods that are specific to Petri nets, introducing techniques used to formulate keyproperties of system nets and algorithms for proving their validity. Part III presents case studies, each introducing new concepts, properties and analysis techniques required for very different modeling tasks. The author offers different paths among the chapters and sections: the elementary strand for readers who wish to study only elementary nets; the modeling strand for those who wish to study the modeling but not the analysis of systems; and finally the elementary models of the modeling strand for those interested in technically simple, but challenging examples and case studies.The author achieves an excellent balance between consistency, comprehensibility and correctness in a book of distinctive design. Among its characteristics, formal arguments are reduced to a minimum in the main text with many of the theoretical formalisms moved to an appendix, the explanations are supported throughout with fully integrated graphical illustrations, and each chapter ends with exercises and recommendations for further reading.The book is suitable for students of computer science and related subjects such as engineering, and for a broad range of researchers and practitioners.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 260 pp. Englisch.

Buch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book explains the theory and application of evolutionary computer vision, a new paradigm where challenging vision problems can be approached using the techniques of evolutionary computing. This methodology achieves excellent results for defining fitness functions and representations for problems by merging evolutionary computation with mathematical optimization to produce automatic creation of emerging visual behaviors.In the first part of the book the author surveys the literature in concise form, defines the relevant terminology, and offers historical and philosophical motivations for the key research problems in the field. For researchers from the computer vision community, he offers a simple introduction to the evolutionary computing paradigm. The second part of the book focuses on implementing evolutionary algorithms that solve given problems using working programs in the major fields of low-, intermediate- and high-level computer vision.This book will be ofvalue to researchers, engineers, and students in the fields of computer vision, evolutionary computing, robotics, biologically inspired mechatronics, electronics engineering, control, and artificial intelligence.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 436 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -¿This book addresses the subject of emotional speech, especially its encoding and decoding process during interactive communication, based on an improved version of Brunswik¿s Lens Model. The process is shown to be influenced by the speaker¿s and the listener¿s linguistic and cultural backgrounds, as well as by the transmission channels used. Through both psycholinguistic and phonetic analysis of emotional multimodality data for two typologically different languages, i.e., Chinese and Japanese, the book demonstrates and elucidates the mutual and differing decoding and encoding schemes of emotional speech in Chinese and Japanese.Springer-Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 256 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -Contemporary China, in an era of globalization and in the midst of transition, now faces both great opportunities and unprecedented challenges. People are more and more becoming ¿economic man,¿ ¿technological man¿ and ¿one-dimensional man,¿ and are increasingly losing the virtue, dignity and beauty of human nature. When humanity¿s habitat grows smaller and smaller as economic, technological, informational and social interaction become more and more intense, while conflicts of interest and clashing values are growing increasingly heated, how should different religions, national groups and states deal with each other As environmental pollution worsens, our ecosystem becomes increasingly unstable and population growth becomes an unbearable burden, where shall we look for a homeland where we can rest our weary minds ¿ To answer these daunting questions and address their attendant challenges, all human activities, including institutional arrangements, economic constructions, and science and the arts, must all start from the change of humankind, re-think the true nature of humankind and its needs, and consider the prospect of humankind evolving into a ¿better humankind.¿ This book is an exploration of such inquires.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 240 pp. Englisch.