Mechanical properties of 2D and 3D braided textile composites

The purpose of this research was to determine the mechanical properties of 2D and 3D braided textile composite materials. Specifically, those designed for tension or shear loading were tested under static loading to failure to investigate the effects of braiding. The overall goal of the work was to provide a structural designer with an idea of how textile composites perform under typical loading conditions. From test results for unnotched tension, it was determined that the 2D is stronger, stiffer, and has higher elongation to failure than the 3D. It was also found that the polyetherether ketone (PEEK) resin system was stronger, stiffer, and had higher elongation at failure than the resin transfer molding (RTM) epoxy. Open hole tension tests showed that PEEK resin is more notch sensitive than RTM epoxy. Of greater significance, it was found that the 3D is less notch sensitive than the 2D. Unnotched compression tests indicated, as did the tension tests, that the 2D is stronger, stiffer, and has higher elongation at failure than the RTM epoxy. The most encouraging results were from compression after impact. The 3D braided composite showed a compression after impact failure stress equal to 92 percent of the unimpacted specimen. The 2D braided composite failed at about 67 percent of the unimpacted specimen. Higher damage tolerance is observed in textiles over conventional composite materials. This is observed in the results, especially in the 3D braided materials

Contract Formation through Preemptive Normative Conflict Resolution

Publisher PD

Semantics for Evidence-Based Argumentation

Postprin

Constructing a Virtual Training Laboratory Using Intelligent Agents

This paper reports on the results and experiences of the Trilogy project; a collaborative project concerned with the development of a virtual research laboratory using intelligence agents. This laboratory is designed to support the training of research students in telecommunications traffic engineering. Training research students involves a number of basic activities. They may seek guidance from, or exchange ideas with, more experienced colleagues. High quality academic papers, books and research reports provide a sound basis for developing and maintaining a good understanding of an area of research. Experimental tools enable new ideas to be evaluated, and hypotheses tested. These three components-collaboration, information and experimentation- are central to any research activity, and a good training environment for research should integrate them in a seamless fashion. To this end, we describe the design and implementation of an agent-based virtual laboratory

TET2 inhibits differentiation of embryonic stem cells but does not overcome methylation-induced gene silencing

TET2 is a methylcytosine dioxygenase that is frequently mutated in myeloid malignancies, notably myelodysplasia and acute myeloid leukemia. TET2 catalyses the conversion of 5′-methylcytosine to 5′-hydroxymethylcytosine within DNA and has been implicated in the process of genomic demethylation. However, the mechanism by which TET2 loss of function results in hematopoietic dysplasia and leukemogenesis is poorly understood. Here, we show that TET2 is expressed in undifferentiated embryonic stem cells and that its knockdown results in reduction of 5′-hydroxymethylcytosine in genomic DNA. We also present DNA methylation data from bone marrow samples obtained from patients with TET2-mutated myelodysplasia. Based on these findings, we sought to identify the role of TET2 in regulating pluripotency and differentiation. We show that overexpression of TET2 in a stably integrated transgene leads to increased alkaline phosphatase expression in differentiating ES cells and impaired differentiation in methylcellulose culture. We speculate that this effect is due to TET2-mediated expression of stem cell genes in ES cells via hydroxylation of 5′-methylcytosines at key promoter sequences within genomic DNA. This leads to relative hypomethylation of gene promoters as 5′-hydroxymethylcytosine is not a substrate for DNMT1-mediated maintenance methylation. We sought to test this hypothesis by cotransfecting the TET2 gene with methylated reporter genes. The results of these experiments are presented

Social Mental Shaping: Modelling the Impact of Sociality on Autonomous Agents' Mental States

This paper presents a framework that captures how the social nature of agents that are situated in a multi-agent environment impacts upon their individual mental states. Roles and relationships provide an abstraction upon which we develop the notion of social mental shaping. This allows us to extend the standard Belief-Desire-Intention model to account for how common social phenomena (e.g. cooperation, collaborative problem-solving and negotiation) can be integrated into a unified theoretical perspective that reflects a fully explicated model of the autonomous agent's mental state

Agent-based Sensor-Mission Assignment for Tasks Sharing Assets

(c) IFAAMASPeer reviewedPostprin

Reputation-based trust evaluations through diversity

Non peer reviewedPostprin

Severity-sensitive norm-governed multi-agent planning

This research was funded by Selex ES. The software developed during this research, including the norm analysis and planning algorithms, the simulator and harbour protection scenario used during evaluation is freely available from doi:10.5258/SOTON/D0139Peer reviewedPublisher PD