Effects of rhFSH regimen and time interval on ovarian responses to repeated stimulation cycles in rhesus monkeys during a physiologic breeding season

We studied the effects of repeated stimulation by recombinant human FSH (rhFSH) at various time intervals during a physiologic breeding season in rhesus monkeys. Ovarian recovery and responses were assessed by ultrasonography, serum steroid concentrations

BarraCUDA – a Fast Sequence Mapping Software using Graphics Processing Units

High-throughput DNA sequencing (HTS) instruments today are capable of generating millions of sequencing reads in a short period of time, and this represents a serious challenge to current bioinformatics pipeline in processing such an enormous amount of data in a fast and economical fashion. Modern graphics cards are powerful processing units that consist of hundreds of scalar processors in parallel in order to handle the rendering of high-definition graphics in real-time. It is this computational capability that we propose to harness in order to accelerate some of the time-consuming steps in analyzing data generated by the HTS instruments. We have developed BarraCUDA, a novel sequence mapping software that utilizes the parallelism of NVIDIA CUDA graphics cards to map sequencing reads to a particular location on a reference genome. While delivering a similar mapping fidelity as other mainstream programs , BarraCUDA is a magnitude faster in mapping throughput compared to its CPU counterparts. The software is also capable of supporting multiple CUDA devices in parallel to further accelerate the mapping throughput. BarraCUDA is designed to take advantage of the parallelism of GPU to accelerate the mapping of millions of sequencing reads generated by HTS instruments. By doing this, we could, at least in part streamline the current bioinformatics pipeline such that the wider scientific community could benefit from the sequencing technology. BarraCUDA is currently available at http://seqbarracuda.sf.net

Customizing the technology roadmapping technique for software companies

Software importance keeps growing fast and consistently for many organizations. The growth of software functionality in manufactured products and the emergence of digital media, convergent spaces including digital content, software, and multi-channels to the market, are recent examples of organizational changes where software assumed a central position for the corporate strategy. This paper analyzes the alignment between strategic objectives and software development processes at software companies and proposes a methodology to ensure that development processes are aligned with the corporate capabilities required to exploit future market opportunities. The methodology includes the categorization of different software companies according to their core capabilities and the customization of the technology roadmapping technique for software companies. The research process included the realization of case studies and a survey. (c) 2006 PICMET.

Birth seasonality and interbirth interval of captive Rhinopithecus bieti

This study, which is based on 10 years of birth records, shows that black-and-white snub-nosed monkeys (Rhinopithecus bieti) in captivity display marked birth seasonality. The birth season starts in December and ends in June, with a peak from March to May

Everywhere and nowhere: nearshore software development in the context of globalisation

Offshore software development has been identified as one of the most striking manifestations of contemporary globalisation and as evidence of placelessness, the idea that information and communication technologies have rendered location irrelevant. Research in the International Business and Information Systems fields, in contrast, has suggested that all locations are not equal and has identified a number of characteristics that may influence the attractiveness of a location for multinational investment and offshoring, respectively. These literatures, however, focus almost exclusively on quantitative, economic characteristics that are seen as fixed and applying uniformly throughout a whole country. They therefore offer little guidance on the suitability of particular locations as offshoring destinations, especially in countries without a track record in offshore software development. Drawing on two cases of nearshore software development centres set up by offshore service providers in the Caribbean, this paper illustrates that, while the initial decision to establish the ventures reflected a logic of placelessness, characteristics of these particular locations affected their subsequent success. Through the findings, we therefore develop a typology of espoused, unanticipated and remediable locational characteristics, which illustrates that locational attractiveness may vary significantly within countries and that offshore service providers and government agencies can modify locational characteristics to their advantage.

Experimentally validated three dimensional GCT wafer level simulations

In this paper we present a wafer level three-dimensional simulation model of the Gate Commutated Thyristor (GCT) under inductive switching conditions. The simulations are validated by extensive experimental measurements. To the authors' knowledge such a complex simulation domain has not been used so far. This method allows the in depth study of large area devices such as GCTs, Gate Turn Off Thyristors (GTOs) and Phase Control Thyristors (PCTs). The model captures complex phenomena, such as current filamentation including subsequent failure, which allow us to predict the Maximum Controllable turn-off Current (MCC) and the Safe Operating Area (SOA) previously impossible using 2D distributed models. © 2012 IEEE.

GYGAX: Multi-Sensor Software Platform API

CLI .NET 4.0 research prototype platform coded in C# and Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF)