Middlesex University

The current momentum of digitization in administration, the welfare state, and public services is often framed as a necessity for modernization. At the same time, there are growing indications that so-called “digital by default” strategies, automated decision-making systems, and mandatory online authentication are creating new axes of exclusion. Against this backdrop, this paper reconstructs the “digital underclass” as a renewed figure of social inequality: not primarily as a deficit of individual subjects, but as the result of institutional implementation logics, normative settings, and infrastructural prerequisites that selectively enable or even deny access. However, the research subject focuses on three analytical complexes: (1) accessibility standards and their scope, (2) enforced digitalization as a mode of governance and organization, and (3) the justifiability of a human right to analog participation as a counter-principle to the de facto lack of alternatives to digital access. In this context, methodologically, the contribution is based on an internationally oriented research overview that synthesizes empirical studies on digital exclusion, political science work on digital governance, and legal and standards-related contributions on accessibility. Moreover, the evaluation focuses on the tensions between formal norm validity and practical effectiveness, between promises of efficiency and participation risks, and between inclusion as a target formula and the real burdens arising from digital access obligations. Firstly, the results show that accessibility laws and standards—in particular WCAG 2.2, BITV 2.0, the European Accessibility Act (EAA), and EN 301 549, which serves as an operational ICT testing and procurement framework—formalize accessibility requirements but are often undermined in institutional implementation practice by fragmented responsibilities, weak enforcement, inadequate procurement and quality assurance routines, and the externalization of adaptation efforts to users. Thus, accessibility is asserted as a norm but is only realized to a limited extent as a reliable participation infrastructure. Secondly, it is clear that enforced digitization, particularly in welfare state contexts such as benefit administration, health, and counseling, increases administrative hurdles, creates dependencies on end devices and identity infrastructures, and promotes “self-optimization” practices; this means there is no effective reduction of complexity in line with DIN EN ISO 9241-110 regarding human-computer interaction principles, which results in the stabilization of social inequalities in a praxeological sense. Thirdly, also from a human rights and democratic theory perspective, it can be argued that analog access should not be treated as residual goodwill but as an independent condition for effective participation that also applies where digital systems are formally designed to be barrier-free. In practical terms, this study leads to a conclusion that is not only normatively necessary but also practically operationalizable in terms of institutional controllability: participatory digitization is not an add-on to the modernization of administrative or private-sector services but rather an infrastructure decision subject to legal, design, and governance requirements, whose legitimacy is measured by the criterion of real participation. It follows that digital transformation, insofar as it takes place in areas critical to participation, must be linked to binding multi-channel access: digital procedures must not act as exclusive gatekeepers but must be flanked by enforceable analog alternatives and low-threshold support paths to transform autonomy into a guaranteed opportunity rather than a condition of competence. Operationally, this paper is only feasible if organizations do not moralize about exclusion risks retrospectively but rather test them prospectively and in a consequence-oriented manner, namely, through standardized accessibility and exclusion tests that do not stop at formal conformity but rather capture usage interruptions, error risks, cognitive overload, and assisted third-party use as indicators of structural exclusion. The DIN EN ISO 9241 series of standards provides a consistent testing and justification framework for precisely this purpose: DIN EN ISO 9241-11 links the assessment to effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction in the real context of use; DIN EN ISO 9241-110 specifies the minimum interaction-logical requirements of controllability, self-descriptiveness, conformity with expectations, and error tolerance; and DIN EN ISO 9241-210 commits institutions to a human-centered, iterative development and evaluation practice throughout the entire life cycle of interactive systems. From this perspective, participation should not be treated as a rhetorical value but as a governance mechanism: digital innovations must be translated into procedures that involve those affected as epistemically relevant actors and continuously align systems with non-discrimination, task appropriateness, social permeability, and democratically accountable accessibility in everyday practice. Otherwise, digitalization remains structurally vulnerable to transforming participation into a selective achievement of those who are already connected—and thus stabilizing precisely those patterns of exclusion that it purports to overcome programmatically.

Mukandi, I. Influence of competitive match play on countermovement jump performance, lower-limb isometric strength, and self-reported subjective measures 40 hours postmatch in professional soccer. J Strength Cond Res 40(2): 206-217, 2026-This study investigated the impact of competitive match play on countermovement jump (CMJ) performance, hamstrings and adductor isometric strength, and subjective self-reported measures 40 hours postcompetitive match play in professional soccer players. Twenty-eight professional players completed baseline assessments during preseason. Assessment 40 hours postmatch was limited to players who played ≥60 minutes, with players grouped into 2 categories based on minutes played: 60-89 minutes or 90-110 minutes. Baseline measures for subjective self-reported measures were collected 24 hours before each match. Across both groups, significant reductions ( p < 0.05) were observed in all outcome, ratio, and driver metrics except for eccentric mean force. All strategy metrics significantly increased ( p < 0.05). Minutes played and match demands were not significantly associated with CMJ performance (τ b = -0.07 to 0.16 and τ b = -0.28 to 0.00, respectively). Prone isometric 0° showed nonsignificant reductions ( p > 0.05) in both conditions with trivial to small effects. Significant reductions ( p < 0.05) were observed for both conditions for the supine 90° hamstring test, however minutes played, and match demands were not significantly associated with a reduction in performance (τ b = -0.04 to -0.01 and τ b = -0.27 to 0.21). Short lever hip adduction results showed nonsignificant reductions ( p > 0.05) in the 60-89 minutes group, but significant decreases ( p < 0.001) were observed for the dominant limb, nondominant limb, and total score in the 90-110 minutes condition. However, minutes played and match demands were not significantly associated with reduction in adductor isometric strength (τ b = 0.18-0.22 and τ b = -0.15 to 0.11). Subjective measures revealed significant reductions in sleep quality ( p < 0.05) and composite scores ( p < 0.001), and significant increases in muscle soreness ( p < 0.001) across both conditions. Mood was only significantly reduced ( p < 0.05) in the 90-110 minutes condition. No significant associations were found between minutes played, match demand, and self-reported subjective scores (τ b = -0.07 to 0.05 and τ b = -0.09 to 0.00).

ABSTRACT What shapes employees' intention to become intrapreneurs? Drawing on the entrepreneurial ecosystem approach and social cognitive theory (SCT), this research examines the relationships among national ecosystems, entrepreneurial cognition and intrapreneurship. Using multilevel structural equation modelling (MSEM), the model is tested on a unique sample of 84,653 employees across 48 countries. The results reveal that entrepreneurial ecosystems influence intrapreneurship both directly and indirectly by shaping employees' entrepreneurial cognition. This research contributes to the literature by demonstrating that the impact of ecosystems extends beyond initial venture creation to intrapreneurial opportunity exploitation. Moreover, it highlights the important role of employees' cognition in shaping their intrapreneurial engagement. The findings have significant theoretical and practical implications for academics and practitioners.

Abstract Systems of Fredholm integral equations are essential in engineering fields for modeling complex systems involving dynamic behavior, material properties, and interactions between different forces or fluids. In this research, the Taylor expansion approach is utilized to solve the systems of linear Fredholm integral equations (SLFIEs) of the second kind in a novel manner. By combining the m th-order Taylor polynomial of unknown functions at an arbitrary point and employing the repeated integration method; the given system of linear Fredholm integral equations is transformed into a new system of linear equations of unknown functions and their derivatives. Eventually, this new system is solved to obtain demanded m th-order approximate solutions. An error analysis is given as well as several numerical examples to demonstrate the efficiency, accuracy, and ability of the proposed method. Furthermore, this method leads always to the exact solution if the exact solution is a polynomial of degree less than or equal to m .

Ethnicity recognition has become increasingly important for a wide range of applications, highlighting the need for accurate and robust predictive models. Despite advances in machine learning, ethnicity classification remains a challenging research problem due to variations in facial features, class imbalance, and generalization issues. This study provides a concise synthesis of prior work to motivate the problem and then introduces a novel experimental framework for ethnicity recognition rather than a survey review. It proposes an improved approach that leverages transfer learning to enhance classification performance. The inclusion of various imaging sensors in the proposed methodology allows for an examination of how these imaging sensors impact the performance of facial recognition systems when a variety of images are captured under a number of real-world conditions, using professional and consumer-grade devices to create a range of conditions; from this dataset, the UTKFace dataset will be used to train and validate our method; an additional balanced dataset of Test Celebrities Faces was also created, representing five different ethnic groups (Black, Asian, White, Indian, and Other); the “Other” classification was specifically excluded for final evaluations to eliminate ambiguity and enhance stability. Rigorous preprocessing of both datasets was performed for optimal extraction of features from the sensors’ acquired images; the performance of several pre-trained CNN (Convolutional Neural Network) models (VGG16, DenseNet169, VGG19, ResNet50, MobileNetV2, InceptionV3 and EfficientNetB4) was used to identify an Ideal Hyperparameter Configuration for Optimal Performance. The resulting experimental results indicate that the VGG19 model achieved an 87% validation accuracy and a Maximum test accuracy of 75% on the Primary Dataset of Celebrity Faces; subsequently, the VGG19 model demonstrated a Range of Per-Class Accuracies, in addition to an overall accuracy of 87% across all five ethnic groups (51–90%+). This work demonstrates that leveraging transfer learning on imaging-sensor-captured images enables robust ethnicity classification with high accuracy and improved training efficiency relative to full model retraining. Furthermore, systematic hyperparameter optimization enhances model generalization and mitigates overfitting. Comparative experiments with recent state-of-the-art methods (2023–2025) further confirm that our optimized VGG19 model achieves competitive performance, reinforcing the effectiveness of the proposed reproducible and fairness-aware evaluation framework.

Press mud is an acidic by-product of sugarcane processing that is commonly discarded, despite containing components with potential agricultural value. This study assessed sugarcane mill press mud through physicochemical, microbiological and enzymatic analyses to evaluate its environmental implications and suitability as a soil amendment. The material was slightly acidic (pH 6.4) and rich in essential nutrients, including potassium (1061.06 ppm), magnesium (624.96 ppm), calcium (461.06 ppm) and phosphorus (513.11 ppm). However, elevated metals such as aluminium (2083.22 ppm), iron (2342.57 ppm), manganese (85.90 ppm), zinc (60.84 ppm), copper (17.70 ppm), lead (3.10 ppm) and chromium (4.18 ppm), together with the detection of the pollutant 2,4-di-tert-butylphenol (2,4-DTBP), suggest the need for proper regulated application to mitigate environmental risks. Microbial profiling across acidic (6.4), neutral (7.0) and alkaline (9.5) conditions revealed diverse bacterial taxa. Acidic conditions yielded Escherichia coli (PQ001953), Bacillus licheniformis (PQ001957) and Moraxella catarrhalis (PQ047632); neutral conditions favored Herbaspirillum seropedicae (PQ008927), Enterococcus faecium (PQ012564) and Micrococcus luteus (PQ012569); while alkaline conditions supported Bacillus subtilis (PQ012572), Listeria ivanovii (PQ060442) and Paracoccus pantotrophus (PQ012574). Notably, E. coli, H. seropedicae and M. luteus exhibited pronounced ligninolytic enzyme activity, indicating a capacity to degrade complex organic substrates. Plant growth trials using mustard (Brassica campestris) demonstrated that a 5:1 soil-to-press-mud ratio significantly enhanced plant growth relative to untreated soil. Collectively, these findings indicate that when applied in controlled quantities, press mud, represents a promising bioresource with valuable ligninolytic and plant growth-promoting microbial communities, while warranting careful oversight due to its contaminant load.

What is 'missed' by sociological literature underpinned by assumptions of presence that a missing approach can rectify? I appropriate a metaphysics of presence and an alternative focus on what is missing as ontological foci to revisit complexity studies in sociology. I review key themes therein and show that, by predominantly adopting a being-laden set of metaphysical assumptions, the complexity discourse overlooks subtler and more nuanced aspects of elucidating social settings. By attuning ourselves to what is missing, I make a case for what the possible consequences of this overlooking might be while showing the theorizing inadequacies of complexity thinking, which rests squarely on tangibility and observability of Aristotelian entities.

The present study aimed to explore the acute effects of a novel preloading strategy on squat jump (SJ) kinetics and kinematics from 0 to 50% body mass. Twenty-one male college athletes (mean ± SD: age = 23.29 ± 3.15 yrs, body mass = 75.50 ± 6.20 kg, body height = 178.07 ± 6.45 cm and body fat content = 13.71 ± 5.45%) completed three different jump tasks across two testing sessions: a SJ, a preloaded SJ (10-50% body mass) and a countermovement jump (CMJ). Applying preloading before the SJ resulted in significant, trivial to small increases in jump height (F(5,15) = 3.76 , p = 0.01, η2 = 0.16). However, there was no significant effect of preloading on peak power, peak force and peak velocity. The maximum peak power (5128.28 ± 459.38 W vs. 5047.97 ± 447.67 W, p = 0.04; g = 0.17) and maximum peak force (1810.72 ± 150.35 N vs. 1775.50 ± 155.54 N, p = 0.03; g = 0.25) were reached at the load of 20% body mass, which was significantly higher than in the SJ with no preloading applied. Jump height, peak force and peak velocity in the 10-50% body mass preloading SJ tests were not significantly different from those in the CMJ. Preloading before a SJ results in meaningful improvements in jump performance, particularly in peak power. Athletes in sports requiring high jump performance can use preloading SJ strategies to enhance lower limb explosive power and jump height.