publications

2020

Estimating Tie Strength in Follower Networks to Measure Brand Perceptions

Tung Nguyen, Li Zhang, and Aron Culotta

In Proceedings of the 2019 IEEE/ACM International Conference on Advances in Social Networks Analysis and Mining, 2020

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As public entities like brands and politicians increasingly rely on social media to engage their constituents, analyzing who follows them can reveal information about how they are perceived. Whereas most prior work considers following networks as unweighted directed graphs, in this paper we use a tie strength model to place weights on follow links to estimate the strength of relationship between users. We use conversational signals (retweets, mentions) as a proxy class label for a binary classification problem, using social and linguistic features to estimate tie strength. We then apply this approach to a case study estimating how brands are perceived with respect to certain issues (e.g., how environmentally friendly is Patagonia perceived to be?). We compute weighted follower overlap scores to measure the similarity between brands and exemplar accounts (e.g., environmental non-profits), finding that the tie strength scores can provide more nuanced estimates of consumer perception.

2014

Utilizing Starch and Clay Mineral to Make Affordable Controlled-Release Fertilizer

Tung Nguyen, Trung Le, Huy Nguyen, and 4 more authors

In Journal of Science & Technology Issue 52 - Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, 2014

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Show-release fertilizers based on bentonite and modified-starch have been prepared and studied. Tapioca Starch was modified by Javen solution at diffirent time conditions, in neutral medium. The degree oxidization of Starch was determined by carboxyl index and molecular weight. After that, modified-starch was mixtured with ure fertilizer, bentonite before pelleting. The release rate and nutrient content of the products were characterized. The results showed that modified-starch samples after 7 hours for the best adhesive ability, optimum starch content of slow release fertilizer composition is 30 percent by weight compared with bentonite.