A Service Component-based Accounting and Charging Architecture to Support Interim Mechanisms across Multiple Domains

Today, telematics services are often compositions of different chargeable service components offered by different service providers. To enhance component-based accounting and charging, the service composition information is used to match with the corresponding charging structure of a service session. This enables the sharing of revenues among the service providers, and calculation of the total cost for the end-user. When multiple independent service providers are involved, it is a great challenge to apply interim accounting and charging during a service session in order to minimize financial risks between business partners. Another interesting development is the trend towards outsourcing accounting and charging processes to specialized business partners. This requires a decoupling between provisioning and accounting and charging processes. In this paper, we propose a comprehensive component-based accounting and charging architecture to support service session provisioning across multiple domains. The architecture, modeled in UML, incorporates an interim accounting and charging mechanism to enable the processing and exchange of accounting information needed to update intermediate charges for separate service components and the user's credit, even during the service provisioning phase

Nuclear processes associated with plant immunity and pathogen susceptibility

Plants are sessile organisms that have evolved exquisite and sophisticated mechanisms to adapt to their biotic and abiotic environment. Plants deploy receptors and vast signalling networks to detect, transmit and respond to a given biotic threat by inducing properly dosed defence responses. Genetic analyses and, more recently, next-generation -omics approaches have allowed unprecedented insights into the mechanisms that drive immunity. Similarly, functional genomics and the emergence of pathogen genomes have allowed reciprocal studies on the mechanisms governing pathogen virulence and host susceptibility, collectively allowing more comprehensive views on the processes that govern disease and resistance. Among others, the identification of secreted pathogen molecules (effectors) that modify immunity-associated processes has changed the plant–microbe interactions conceptual landscape. Effectors are now considered both important factors facilitating disease and novel probes, suited to study immunity in plants. In this review, we will describe the various mechanisms and processes that take place in the nucleus and help regulate immune responses in plants. Based on the premise that any process required for immunity could be targeted by pathogen effectors, we highlight and describe a number of functional assays that should help determine effector functions and their impact on immune-related processes. The identification of new effector functions that modify nuclear processes will help dissect nuclear signalling further and assist us in our bid to bolster immunity in crop plants

Neo-Atlantis: Dutch Responses to Five Meter Sea Level Rise

What would happen to the Netherlands if, in 2030, the sea level starts to rise and eventually, after 100 years, a sea level of five meters above current level would be reached? Two socio-economic scenarios are developed from a literature review and by interviews with researchers and practicionersin the domains of social sciences, economics, civil engineering, and land use planning. One scenario describes what would happen in a future characterised by a trend towards further globalisation, marketisation and high economic growth, while the other scenario happens in a future under opposite trends. Under both scenarios, the Southwest and Northwest of the Netherlands – already now below seal level - would be abandoned because of sea level rise. Although most experts believe that geomorphology and current engineering skills allow to largely maintain the territorial integrity of the Netherlands, there are some reasons to assume that this is not likely to happen. Social processes that precede important political decisions – such as the growth of the belief in the reality of SLR and the framing of such decision in a proper political context (policy window) – evolve slowly. Although a flood disaster would speed up decision-making, the general expectation is that decisions would come too late in view of the rate of SLR and the possible pace of construction of works.Extreme sea level rise, The Netherlands, flood defences

Nucleation and crystallization process of silicon using Stillinger-Weber potential

We study the homogeneous nucleation process in Stillinger-Weber silicon in the NVT ensemble. A clear first-order transition from the liquid to crystal phase is observed thermodynamically with kinetic and structural evidence of the transformation. At 0.75 T_m, the critical cluster size is about 175 atoms. The lifetime distribution of clusters as a function of the maximum size their reach follows an inverse gaussian distribution as was predicted recently from the classical theory of nucleation (CNT). However, while there is a qualitative agreement with the CNT, the free energy curve obtained from the simulations differs significantly from the theoretical predictions, suggesting that the low-density liquid phase found recently could play a role in the nucleation process.Comment: 21 page

Scaling mechanisms of energy communities:A comparison of 28 initiatives

Energy communities have mushroomed over the past decades. These initiatives have scaled, that is replicated their experiences, expanded membership, and diversified involved actors and technologies. The picture existing literature paints is hopeful that the scaling of local-scale action may translate into global-scale impact and thus effectively contribute to combating climate change. However, important gaps remain in understanding the (combinations of) conditions which are necessary for scaling with this goal in mind. This article pushes the boundaries of knowledge further by examining and comparing 28 energy communities through a fuzzy set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) and by identifying the necessary conditions of actionable scaling mechanisms. Our analysis identifies a high number (8) of necessary (combinations of) conditions for scaling. Addressing a strong need amongst policy makers to facilitate broader scaling of community initiatives, this article offers concrete insights on mechanisms that need to be in place to scale energy communities. Insights are developed on – for example – the type of capacity support needed, support structures and the tools needed for connecting communities with each other. These insights help corroborate empirically, for the first time the crucial leverage points that will support strategies for upscaling the impact of energy communities, and will enable them to flourish as an essential element of the global climate governance system.</p

Comparing birch core plywood with traditional softwood plywood

Plywood made with birch cores is an important product in the European Union, and has potential to become an important product in North America. White birch in Ontario is currently an underutilized species. This paper explores the mechanical properties of a new plywood product being produced in Ontario that is very similar to European birch plywood, but uses white birch (Betula papyrifera) grown in North America. Tests were done to measure the modulus of elasticity, compressive strength parallel to the grain and hardness of the new plywood and traditional softwood plywood. These values were tested using the ASTM D1037- 12 testing standard. Compared to softwood plywood, the birch plywood had 94.83% of the compressive strength of softwood plywood, 82% of the MOE and 181.95% of the hardness

High exposures to bioactivated cyclophosphamide are related to the occurrence of veno-occlusive disease of the liver following high-dose chemotherapy

We investigated whether the occurrence of veno-occlusive disease of the liver (VOD) may be associated with individual variations in the pharmacokinetics of high-dose cyclophosphamide. Patients received single or multiple courses of cyclophosphamide (1000 or 1500 mg m−2 day−1), thiotepa (80 or 120 mg m−2 day−1) and carboplatin (265–400 mg m−2 day−1) (CTC) for 4 consecutive days. The area under the plasma concentration–time curves (AUCs) were calculated for cyclophosphamide and its activated metabolites 4-hydroxycyclophosphamide and phosphoramide mustard based on multiple blood samples. Possible relationships between the AUCs and the occurrence of VOD were studied. A total of 59 patients (115 courses) were included. Four patients experienced VOD after a second CTC course. The first-course AUC of 4-hydroxycyclophosphamide (P=0.003) but not of phosphoramide mustard (P=0.101) appeared to be predictive of the occurrence of VOD after multiple courses. High exposures to bioactivated cyclophosphamide may lead to increased organ toxicity

Efficient routing on complex networks

In this letter, we propose a new routing strategy to improve the transportation efficiency on complex networks. Instead of using the routing strategy for shortest path, we give a generalized routing algorithm to find the so-called {\it efficient path}, which considers the possible congestion in the nodes along actual paths. Since the nodes with largest degree are very susceptible to traffic congestion, an effective way to improve traffic and control congestion, as our new strategy, can be as redistributing traffic load in central nodes to other non-central nodes. Simulation results indicate that the network capability in processing traffic is improved more than 10 times by optimizing the efficient path, which is in good agreement with the analysis.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

Altered expression of immune-associated genes in first-trimester human decidua of pregnancies later complicated with hypertension or foetal growth restriction

During pregnancy the maternal immune system has to coordinate uterine spiral-artery remodelling, trophoblast invasion, and acceptance of the semi-allogenic fetus simultaneously. As dysregulation of the immune system is associated with adverse pregnancy outcomes, we analysed first-trimester deciduas of pregnancies for immune parameters in later complicated pregnancies. Higher IL6 and macrophage mRNA expression, and lower ratios of regulatory macrophages were found in first-trimester deciduas of pregnancies later complicated with pregnancy-induced hypertension. Lower Gata3 (Th2) mRNA expression was found in deciduas of pregnancies with later foetal growth restriction. Our results suggest that adverse pregnancy outcomes are associated with immunological disturbances in first-trimester deciduas. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved