Learning Search Algorithms: An Educational View

Artificial intelligence methods find their practical usage in many applications including maritime industry. The paper concentrates on the methods of uninformed and informed search, potentially usable in solving of complex problems based on the state space representation. The problem of introducing the search algorithms to newcomers has its technical and psychological dimensions. The authors show how it is possible to cope with both of them through design and use of specialized authoring systems. A typical example of searching a path through the maze is used to demonstrate how to test, observe and compare properties of various search strategies. Performance of search methods is evaluated based on the common criteria

Follicular Dendritic Cell-Specific Prion Protein (PrPc) Expression Alone Is Sufficient to Sustain Prion Infection in the Spleen

Prion diseases are characterised by the accumulation of PrPSc, an abnormally folded isoform of the cellular prion protein (PrPC), in affected tissues. Following peripheral exposure high levels of prion-specific PrPSc accumulate first upon follicular dendritic cells (FDC) in lymphoid tissues before spreading to the CNS. Expression of PrPC is mandatory for cells to sustain prion infection and FDC appear to express high levels. However, whether FDC actively replicate prions or simply acquire them from other infected cells is uncertain. In the attempts to-date to establish the role of FDC in prion pathogenesis it was not possible to dissociate the Prnp expression of FDC from that of the nervous system and all other non-haematopoietic lineages. This is important as FDC may simply acquire prions after synthesis by other infected cells. To establish the role of FDC in prion pathogenesis transgenic mice were created in which PrPC expression was specifically “switched on” or “off” only on FDC. We show that PrPC-expression only on FDC is sufficient to sustain prion replication in the spleen. Furthermore, prion replication is blocked in the spleen when PrPC-expression is specifically ablated only on FDC. These data definitively demonstrate that FDC are the essential sites of prion replication in lymphoid tissues. The demonstration that Prnp-ablation only on FDC blocked splenic prion accumulation without apparent consequences for FDC status represents a novel opportunity to prevent neuroinvasion by modulation of PrPC expression on FDC

Comparison of different approaches to predict air pollution inside the tunnel tube

This paper deals with models of air pollution inside a tunnel tube. Various gases are emitted by combustion engines. They consist largely of oxides of nitrogen, carbon monoxide, steam and particles (opacity). Since each tunnel is unique, the design of the model must be realized for the particular road tunnel. Data measured in the control center of the tunnel is used to create various models and to realize them in the program environment MATLAB. It is possible to describe this system by description of the equations of physical dependences. These physical dependencies are between the speeds, piston effect, traffic density, quantity produced pollution, etc. Next we plan to show how fuzzy sets can be used to represent a real system. Finally, we are going to describe this system by the parametric model. For the purpose of parametric identification it is interesting to describe the sought process using input-output relations. The general procedure for estimation of the process model consists of several steps: determination of the model structure, estimation of parameters and verification of the model

Learning Search Algorithms: An Educational View

Artificial intelligence methods find their practical usage in many applications including maritime industry. The paper concentrates on the methods of uninformed and informed search, potentially usable in solving of complex problems based on the state space representation. The problem of introducing the search algorithms to newcomers has its technical and psychological dimensions. The authors show how it is possible to cope with both of them through design and use of specialized authoring systems. A typical example of searching a path through the maze is used to demonstrate how to test, observe and compare properties of various search strategies. Performance of search methods is evaluated based on the common criteria