Experiences on the specification of algorithms for fire and smoke control in road tunnels

The main objective of ventilation systems in case of fire is the reduction of the possible consequences by achieving the best possible conditions for the evacuation of the users and the intervention of the emergency services. The required immediate transition, from normal to emergency functioning of the ventilation equipments, is being strengthened by the use of automatic and semi-automatic control systems, what reduces the response times through the help to the operators, and the use of pre-defined strategies. A further step consists on the use of closed-loop algorithms, which takes into account not only the initial conditions but their development (air velocity, traffic situation, etc.), optimizing smoke control capacity.

Ontology Requirements Specification

The goal of the ontology requirements specification activity is to state why the ontology is being built, what its intended uses are, who the end users are, and which requirements the ontology should fulfill. This chapter presents detailed methodological guidelines for specifying ontology requirements efficiently. These guidelines will help ontology engineers to capture ontology requirements and produce the ontology requirements specification document (ORSD). The ORSD will play a key role during the ontology development process because it facilitates, among other activities, (1) the search and reuse of existing knowledge resources with the aim of reengineering them into ontologies, (2) the search and reuse of ontological resources (ontologies, ontology modules, ontology statements as well as ontology design patterns), and (3) the verification of the ontology along the ontology development.

LED bulb lamps technical specification and testing procedure for solar home systems.

With the consolidation of the new solid state lighting LEOs devices, te5t1n9 the compliance 01 lamps based on this technology lor Solar Home Systems (SHS) have been analyzed. The definition of the laboratory procedures to be used with final products 15 a necessary step in arder to be able to assure the quality of the lamps prior to be installed [1]. As well as with CFL technology. particular attention has been given to simplicity and technical affordability in arder to facilitate the implementation of the test with basie and simple laboratory too15 even on the same SHS electrification program locations. The block of test procedures has been applied to a set of 14 low-cost lamps. They apply to lamp resistance, reliability and performance under normal, extreme and abnormal operating conditions as a simple but complete quality meter tool 01 any LEO bulb.

An ITS architecture specification - The FOTsis project experience

The recent continuous development of Cooperative ITS has resulted in several initiatives which focus on different parts of the Cooperative environment landscape. The FOTsis project focuses on the infrastructure side of the Cooperative environment and will deploy and test 7 services designed to maximise the benefits of the integration of the road operator and infrastructure-based information providers into the ITS environment. This integration can take place in any of the stages of data collection, processing and actuations of the services, but also support and trigger external tasks such as operations of the emergency response entities, etc. This paper describes the current status of the project and focuses on the specification of the supporting architecture to the services tested: references, a brief outline of the requirements’ definition, and the FOTsis architecture proposal, with some conclusions about the architecture tests conducted. The outlook on the project’s next steps is given in the last section of the paper.

LED bulbs technical specification and testing procedure for solar home systems

The definition of technical specifications and the corresponding laboratory procedures are necessary steps in order to assure the quality of the devices prior to be installed in Solar Home Systems (SHS). To clarify and unify criteria a European project supported the development of the Universal Technical Standard for Solar Home Systems (UTSfSHS). Its principles were to generate simple and affordable technical requirements to be optimized in order to facilitate the implementation of tests with basic and simple laboratory tools even on the same SHS electrification program countries. These requirements cover the main aspects of this type of installations and its lighting chapter was developed based on the most used technology at that time: fluorescent tubes and CFLs. However, with the consolidation of the new LED solid state lighting devices, particular attention is being given to this matter and new procedures are required. In this work we develop a complete set of technical specifications and test procedures that have been designed within the frame of the UTSfSHS, based on an intense review of the scientific and technical publications related to LED lighting and their practical application. They apply to lamp reliability, performance and safety under normal, extreme and abnormal operating conditions as a simple but complete quality meter tool for any LED bulb.

An ITS architecture specification - The FOTsis project experience

The recent continuous development of Cooperative ITS has resulted in several initiatives which focus on different parts of the Cooperative environment landscape. The FOTsis project focuses on the infrastructure side of the Cooperative environment and will deploy and test 7 services designed to maximise the benefits of the integration of the road operator and infrastructure-based information providers into the ITS environment. This paper describes the current status of the project and focuses on the road safety approach within the project: safety services and safety impact assessment. The outlook on the project's next steps is given in the last section of the paper.

Cross-lineage expression of Ig-β (B29) in thymocytes: Positive and negative gene regulation to establish T cell identity

Developmental commitment involves activation of lineage-specific genes, stabilization of a lineage-specific gene expression program, and permanent inhibition of inappropriate characteristics. To determine how these processes are coordinated in early T cell development, the expression of T and B lineage-specific genes was assessed in staged subsets of immature thymocytes. T lineage characteristics are acquired sequentially, with germ-line T cell antigen receptor-β transcripts detected very early, followed by CD3ɛ and terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase, then pTα, and finally RAG1. Only RAG1 expression coincides with commitment. Thus, much T lineage gene expression precedes commitment and does not depend on it. Early in the course of commitment to the T lineage, thymocytes lose the ability to develop into B cells. To understand how this occurs, we also examined expression of well defined B lineage-specific genes. Although λ5 and Ig-α are not expressed, the μ0 and Iμ transcripts from the unrearranged IgH locus are expressed early, in distinct patterns, then repressed just before RAG1 expression. By contrast, RNA encoding the B cell receptor component Ig-β was found to be transcribed in all immature thymocyte subpopulations and throughout most thymocyte differentiation. Ig-β expression is down-regulated only during positive selection of CD4+CD8– cells. Thus several key participants in the B cell developmental program are expressed in non-B lineage-committed cells, and one is maintained even through commitment to an alternative lineage, and repressed only after extensive T lineage differentiation. The results show that transcriptional activation of “lymphocyte-specific” genes can occur in uncommitted precursors, and that T lineage commitment is a composite of distinct positive and negative regulatory events.

Anteroposterior neural tissue specification by activin-induced mesoderm

The transforming growth factor β superfamily member, activin, is able to induce mesodermal tissues in animal cap explants from Xenopus laevis blastula stage embryos. Activin can act like a morphogen of the dorsoventral axis in that lower doses induce more ventral, and higher doses more dorsal, tissue types. Activin has also previously been reported to induce neural tissues in animal caps. From cell mixing experiments it was inferred that this might be an indirect effect of induced mesoderm signaling to uninduced ectoderm. Here we demonstrate directly that neural tissues do indeed arise by the action of induced mesoderm on uninduced ectoderm. Dorsal mesoderm is itself subdivided into posterior and anterior domains in vivo, but this had not been demonstrated for induced mesoderm. We therefore tested whether different concentrations of activin recreate these different anteroposterior properties as well. We show that the anteroposterior positional value of induced mesoderm, including its neuroinductive properties, depends on the dose of activin applied to the mesoderm, with lower doses inducing more posterior and higher doses giving more anterior markers. We discuss the implications of these results for patterning signals and the relationship between anteroposterior and dorsoventral axes.

Structural Characterization of the Loop at the Alpha-Subunit C-Terminus of the Mixed Lineage Leukemia Protein Activating Protease Taspase1.

Funding: The authors acknowledge the Fonds of Chemical Industry for funding JvdB by their Chemiefonds grant and the DFG for funding PB and CB (CRC 1093).

Evolution of plastid gene rps2 in a lineage of hemiparasitic and holoparasitic plants: Many losses of photosynthesis and complex patterns of rate variation

The plastid genomes of some nonphotosynthetic parasitic plants have experienced an extreme reduction in gene content and an increase in evolutionary rate of remaining genes. Nothing is known of the dynamics of these events or whether either is a direct outcome of the loss of photosynthesis. The parasitic Scrophulariaceae and Orobanchaceae, representing a continuum of heterotrophic ability ranging from photosynthetic hemiparasites to nonphotosynthetic holoparasites, are used to investigate these issues. We present a phylogenetic hypothesis for parasitic Scrophulariaceae and Orobanchaceae based on sequences of the plastid gene rps2, encoding the S2 subunit of the plastid ribosome. Parasitic Scrophulariaceae and Orobanchaceae form a monophyletic group in which parasitism can be inferred to have evolved once. Holoparasitism has evolved independently at least five times, with certain holoparasitic lineages representing single species, genera, and collections of nonphotosynthetic genera. Evolutionary loss of the photosynthetic gene rbcL is limited to a subset of holoparasitic lineages, with several holoparasites retaining a full length rbcL sequence. In contrast, the translational gene rps2 is retained in all plants investigated but has experienced rate accelerations in several hemi- as well as holoparasitic lineages, suggesting that there may be substantial molecular evolutionary changes to the plastid genome of parasites before the loss of photosynthesis. Independent patterns of synonymous and nonsynonymous rate acceleration in rps2 point to distinct mechanisms underlying rate variation in different lineages. Parasitic Scrophulariaceae (including the traditional Orobanchaceae) provide a rich platform for the investigation of molecular evolutionary process, gene function, and the evolution of parasitism.

CD68+ cells of monocyte/macrophage lineage in the environment of AIDS-associated and classic-sporadic Kaposi sarcoma are singly or doubly infected with human herpesviruses 7 and 6B

Earlier studies have shown that Kaposi sarcomas contain cells infected with human herpesvirus (HHV) 6B, and in current studies we report that both AIDS-associated and classic-sporadic Kaposi sarcoma contain HHV-7 genome sequences detectable by PCR. To determine the distribution of HHV-7-infected cells relative to those infected with HHV-6, sections from paraffin-embedded tissues were allowed to react with antibodies to HHV-7 virion tegument phosphoprotein pp85 and to HHV-6B protein p101. The antibodies are specific for HHV-7 and HHV-6B, respectively, and they retained reactivity for antigens contained in formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tissue samples. We report that (i) HHV-7 pp85 was present in 9 of 32 AIDS-associated Kaposi sarcomas, and in 1 of 7 classical-sporadic HIV-negative Kaposi sarcomas; (ii) HHV-7 pp85 was detected primarily in cells bearing the CD68 marker characteristic of the monocyte/macrophage lineage present in or surrounding the Kaposi sarcoma lesions; and (iii) in a number of Kaposi sarcoma specimens, tumor-associated CD68+ monocytes/macrophages expressed simultaneously antigens from both HHV-7 and HHV-6B, and therefore appeared to be doubly infected with the two viruses. CD68+ monocytes/macrophages infected with HHV-7 were readily detectable in Kaposi sarcoma, but virtually absent from other normal or pathological tissues that harbor macrophages. Because all of the available data indicate that HHV-7 infects CD4+ T lymphocytes, these results suggest that the environment of the Kaposi sarcoma (i) attracts circulating peripheral lymphocytes and monocytes, triggers the replication of latent viruses, and thereby increases the local concentration of viruses, (ii) renders CD68+ monocytes/macrophages susceptible to infection with HHV-7, and (iii) the combination of both events enables double infections of cells with both HHV-6B and HHV-7.

A network of interacting transcriptional regulators involved in Drosophila neural fate specification revealed by the yeast two-hybrid system

Neural fate specification in Drosophila is promoted by the products of the proneural genes, such as those of the achaete–scute complex, and antagonized by the products of the Enhancer of split [E(spl)] complex, hairy, and extramacrochaetae. As all these proteins bear a helix-loop-helix (HLH) dimerization domain, we investigated their potential pairwise interactions using the yeast two-hybrid system. The fidelity of the system was established by its ability to closely reproduce the already documented interactions among Da, Ac, Sc, and Extramacrochaetae. We show that the seven E(spl) basic HLH proteins can form homo- and heterodimers inter-se with distinct preferences. We further show that a subset of E(spl) proteins can heterodimerize with Da, another subset can heterodimerize with proneural proteins, and yet another with both, indicating specialization within the E(spl) family. Hairy displays no interactions with any of the HLH proteins tested. It does interact with the non-HLH protein Groucho, which itself interacts with all E(spl) basic HLH proteins, but with none of the proneural proteins or Da. We investigated the structural requirements for some of these interactions by site-specific and deletion mutagenesis.

Mitogen-activated protein kinase and neural specification in Xenopus

We have investigated the activity and function of mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) during neural specification in Xenopus. Ectodermal MAPK activity increased between late blastula and midgastrula stages. At midgastrula, MAPK activity in both newly induced neural ectoderm and ectoderm overexpressing the anterior neural inducer noggin was 5-fold higher than in uninduced ectoderm. Overexpression of MAPK phosphatase-1 (MKP-1) in ectoderm inhibited MAPK activity and prevented neurectoderm-specific gene expression when the ectoderm was recombined with dorsal mesoderm or treated with fibroblast growth factor (FGF). Neurectoderm-specific gene expression was observed, however, in ectoderm overexpressing both noggin and MKP-1. To evaluate the role of MAPK in posterior regionalization, ectodermal isolates were treated with increasing concentrations of FGF and assayed for MAPK activity and neurectoderm-specific gene expression. Although induction of posterior neural ectoderm by FGF was accompanied by an elevation of MAPK activity, relative MAPK activity associated with posterior neural fate was no higher than that of ectoderm specified to adopt an anterior neural fate. Thus, increasingly posterior neural fates are not correlated with quantitative increases in MAPK activity. Because MAPK has been shown to down-regulate Smad1, MAPK may disrupt bone morphogenetic protein 4 (BMP-4) signaling during neural specification. Our results suggest that MAPK plays an essential role in the establishment of neural fate in vivo.

A model for spontaneous B-lineage lymphomas in IgHμ-HOX11 transgenic mice

HOX11, a divergent homeodomain-containing transcription factor, was isolated from the breakpoint of the nonrandom t(10;14)(q24;q11) chromosome translocation found in human T cell acute lymphoblastic leukemias. The translocation places the HOX11 coding sequence under the transcriptional control of TCR α/δ regulatory elements, resulting in ectopic expression of a normal HOX11 protein in thymocytes. To investigate the oncogenic potential of HOX11, we targeted its expression in lymphocytes of transgenic mice by placing the human cellular DNA under the transcriptional control of Ig heavy chain or LCK regulatory sequences. Only IgHμ-HOX11 mice expressing low levels of HOX11 were viable. During their second year of life, all HOX11 transgenic mice became terminally ill with more than 75% developing large cell lymphomas in the spleen, which frequently disseminated to thymus, lymph nodes, and other nonhematopoietic tissues. Lymphoma cells were predominantly clonal IgM+IgD+ mature B cells. Repopulation of severe combined immunodeficient mice with cells from hyperplastic spleens indicated that the HOX11 tumor phenotype was transplantable. Before tumor development, expression of the transgene did not result in perturbations in lymphopoiesis; however, lymphoid hyperplasia involving the splenic marginal zones was present in 20% of spleens. Our studies provide direct evidence that expression of HOX11 in lymphocytes leads to malignant transformation. These mice are a useful model system to study mechanisms involved in transformation from B-lineage hyperplasia to malignant lymphoma and for testing novel approaches to therapy. They represent a novel animal model for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma of peripheral mature B cell origin.