Fire safe,sustainable loose furnishing

The aim of this exploratory study has been to investigate the fire properties and environmental aspects of different upholstery material combinations, mainly for domestic applications. An analysis of the sustainability and circularity of selected textiles, along with lifecycle assessment, is used to qualitatively evaluate materials from an environmental perspective. The cone calorimeter was the primary tool used to screen 20 different material combinations from a fire performance perspective. It was found that textile covers of conventional fibres such as wool, cotton and polyester, can be improved by blending them with fire resistant speciality fibres. A new three‐dimensional web structure has been examined as an alternative padding material, showing preliminary promising fire properties with regard to ignition time, heat release rates and smoke production.     

The Critical Role of Passive Permeability in Designing Successful Drugs

Passive permeability is a key property in drug disposition and delivery. It is critical for gastrointestinal absorption, brain penetration, renal reabsorption, defining clearance mechanisms and drug-drug interactions. Passive diffusion rate is translatable across tissues and animal species, while the extent of absorption is dependent on drug properties, as well as in vivo physiology/pathophysiology. Design principles have been developed to guide medicinal chemistry to enhance absorption, which combine the balance of aqueous solubility, permeability and the sometimes unfavorable compound characteristic demanded by the target. Permeability assays have been implemented that enable rapid development of structure-permeability relationships for absorption improvement. Future advances in assay development to reduce nonspecific binding and improve mass balance will enable more accurately measurement of passive permeability. Design principles that integrate potency, selectivity, passive permeability and other ADMET properties facilitate rapid advancement of successful drug candidates to patients.     

Autolysis and the endogenous proteinases characterised in beardless barb (Anematichthys apogon) muscle

Beardless barb is a common fish species used in fermentation of fish paste Ka-pi-plaa. Autolytic profile of beardless barb muscle showed the maximum autolysis was at 50 °C, at both acidic and alkaline pH values. With augmentation concentration of NaCl, autolytic activity slightly decreased. Endogenous proteinases isolated from fish muscle in crude extract forms were also characterised. The acidic proteinases had optimum activity at pH 3.0 and 50°C, and they showed higher proteolytic activity than the alkaline proteinases which were optimally active at pH 9.0 and 50 °C. Proteinases in peak at pH 3.0 were inhibited by pepstatin A, but those in peak at pH 9.0 were highly inhibited by PMSF, TLCK and soybean trypsin inhibitor, suggesting that both aspartic and serine proteinases were existed in beardless barb muscle. The proteinases were stable in pH range of 2.0-5.0 but unstable at the temperatures higher than 40 °C. NaCl suppressed the proteolytic activity, ATP activated the proteinase activity, while CaCl₂, MgCl₂ and CoCl₂ exhibited no influence on the activity. The results implied that cathepsin D is the predominant proteinase responsible for autolysis in beardless barb. The findings were useful to improve the processing and qualities of Ka-pi-plaa product using beardless barb as raw material.     

The apolipoprotein E allele epsilon 4 is overrepresented in patients with the Lewy body variant of Alzheimer's disease

We determined apolipoprotein E (ApoE) genotypes in 122 autopsied demented patients. The frequency of the ApoE epsilon 4 allele was 39.6% in Alzheimer's disease (AD), 29.0% in the Lewy body variant of AD (LBV), and 6.25% in diffuse Lewy body disease. For AD and LBV patients, the epsilon 4 frequency was significantly higher than that reported in nondemented controls (10 to 15%). Therefore, LBV and AD share ApoE epsilon 4 as a genetic risk factor, providing further evidence that these conditions overlap.     

Parallel path consistency

Filtering algorithms are well accepted as a means of speeding up the solution of the consistent labeling problem (CLP). Despite the fact that path consistency does a better job of filtering than arc consistency, AC is still the preferred technique because it has a much lower time complexity. We are implementing parallel path consistency algorithms on multiprocessors and comparing their performance to the best sequential and parallel arc consistency algorithms.^(1,2) (See also work by Kerethoet al. ⁽³⁾ and Kasif⁽⁴⁾) Preliminary work has shown linear performance increases for parallelized path consistency and also shown that in many cases performance is significantly better than the theoretical worst case. These two results lead us to believe that parallel path consistency may be a superior filtering technique. Finally, we have implemented path consistency as an outer product computation and have obtained good results (e.g., linear speedup on a 64K-node Connection Machine 2).     

Fast internal dynamics in polyelectrolyte gels measured by dynamic light scattering

Summary Dynamic light scattering was used to investigate the dynamics of sodium poly(styrene sulfonate) and fully neutralized poly(acrylic acid) gels as a function of the degree of swelling and weight ratio of cross-linking agent. It was shown that the collective diffusion coefficient increases with increasing degree of swelling and that the diffusion coefficient shows stronger concentration dependence than predicted by scaling arguments. For gel samples measured at the swelling equilibrium, the diffusion coefficient increases with increasing gel concentration for both gel systems.     

Manufacturing method for monolithic dye-sensitised solar cells permitting long-term stable low-power modules

A manufacturing technique for monolithic dye-sensitised solar cells is presented. Encapsulated modules designed for indoor low-power applications have been prepared using industrial methods and equipment. Under certain conditions (light intensity <5000 lx, temperature between –10°C and 50°C, and relative humidity of appr. 50%), the modules have performed well and shown excellent long-term stability. Moreover, modules withstand illumination in combination with storage at 100% relative humidity. However, a certain degradation of the module performance takes place at illuminations exceeding 5000 lx and temperatures exceeding 50°C.     

The Region 1 & 3 Broadcasting‐Satellite Service Plan after WRC‐03

The 1977 Broadcasting‐Satellite Service (BSS) Plan for Region 1 & 3 had been widely acknowledged to be out‐of‐date by the late 1980s. Development of digital modulation in the early 1990s provided an opportunity to update the technical provisions of the Plan to make it more economically viable. After a decade of work and three World Radiocommunication Conferences (WRCs), the revision of Region 1 & 3 BSS Plan was finally completed in 2003. The new Plan increased channel assignments from 5 to 10 analog‐equivalent channels for each country in Region 1, and from 4 to 12 channels for each country in Region 3. Yet, despite the increase in capacity, the new Plan is surprisingly similar to the original one in terms of the technical parameters. It is still based on national coverage, and the channel plan, orbital location, orbital spacing, and polarization are also the same. As a result, the new Plan is no more economically viable to implement than the old. To create economically viable BSS systems would most likely require modifications to the assignment in the Plan. Yet, modification procedures were made more difficult to apply after replanning. Less future implementation of BSS networks than would otherwise have occurred can be expected, and an inefficient usage of these frequency bands will likely result. On the other hand, less implemented systems will mean more capacity set aside for future use. This is important for countries that currently do not have satellite operations. In the end, BSS replanning reflects the eternal conflict between efficient usage and guaranteed future access. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

重馏分油加氢脱氮反应动力学模型的研究

简要地介绍了一些典型的模型氮化物的ＨＤＮ反应规律。根据胜利ＶＧＯ在３７２２Ｂ催化剂上的大量ＨＤＮ实验数据，提出了如下的ＨＤＮ基本反应动力学方程：ｄＣＮｄｔ＝－ｋ１＋Ｋ＊ＣＮＣＮＰＨ２为了扩大上式的应用范围，详细分析了各种因素（如原料油种类和馏程及Ｈ２Ｓ等）对ＨＤＮ的影响，并开发了相应的经验关联式，从而得到了一个较完整的馏分油ＨＤＮ反应动力学模型。验证实验表明，该模型是成功的。