OT Modeling: The Enterprise Beyond IT

Enterprises are composed of an enormous number of elements (e.g., organizational units, human resources, production processes, and IT systems) typically classified in the business or the IT domain. However, some crucial elements do not belong in either group: they are directly responsible for producing and delivering the company’s goods and services and include all the elements that support day to day operations. Collectively, these elements have been called operational technologies (OT) and have been conspicuously excluded from enterprise modeling (EM) approaches which traditionally have focused on the business and IT dimensions. Evidence of this is the absence of OT elements in languages and metamodels for EM. This is in line with the historical division between IT and OT in organizations that has led to information silos, independent teams, and disparate tech- nologies that only recently have started to be reconciled. Considering that OT is critical to most productive organi- zations, and the benefits that EM brings to its understand- ing and improvement, it makes sense to expand EM to include OT. For that purpose, this paper proposes an extension to ArchiMate 3.0 which includes crucial OT elements. On top of that, this paper also proposes an approach to further expand ArchiMate to address specific industries where more specific OT elements are required. This is illustrated in the paper with an extension for the Oil and Gas case that was validated with experts belonging to five companies in the sector

No influence of oxygen levels on pathogenesis and virus shedding in Salmonid alphavirus (SAV)-challenged Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar L.)

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>For more than three decades, diseases caused by salmonid alphaviruses (SAV) have become a major problem of increasing economic importance in the European fish-farming industry. However, experimental infection trials with SAV result in low or no mortality i.e very different from most field outbreaks of pancreas disease (PD). This probably reflects the difficulties in reproducing complex biotic and abiotic field conditions in the laboratory. In this study we looked at the relationship between SAV-infection in salmon and sub-lethal environmental hypoxia as a result of reduced flow-through in tank systems.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The experiment demonstrated that constant reduced oxygen levels (60-65% oxygen saturation: 6.5-7.0 mg/L) did not significantly increase the severity or the progress of pancreas disease (PD). These conclusions are based upon assessments of a semi-quantitative histopathological lesion score system, morbidities/mortalities, and levels of SAV RNA in tissues and water (measured by 1 MDS electropositive virus filters and downstream real-time RT-PCR). Furthermore, we demonstrate that the fish population shed detectable levels of the virus into the surrounding water during viraemia; 4-13 days after i.p. infection, and prior to appearance of severe lesions in heart (21-35 dpi). After this period, viral RNA from SAV could not be detected in water samples although still present in tissues (gills and hearts) at lasting low levels. Lesions could be seen in exocrine pancreas at 7-21 days post infection, but no muscle lesions were seen.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>In our study, experimentally induced hypoxia failed to explain the discrepancy between the severities reported from field outbreaks of SAV-disease and experimental infections. Reduction of oxygen levels to constant suboptimal levels had no effect on the severity of lesions caused by SAV-infection or the progress of the disease. Furthermore, we present a modified VIRADEL method which can be used to detect virus in water and to supplement experimental infection trials with information related to viral shedding. By using this method, we were able to demonstrate for the first time that shedding of SAV from the fish population into the surrounding water coincides with viraemia.</p

Towards the production of genetically modified strawberries which are acceptable to consumers

-This manuscript discusses different aspects that are relevant to genetically modified strawberry plants with improved characteristics and ‘acceptable’ to consumers and growers of strawberry. It starts with a consumer acceptance survey, held in Norway, Denmark and the UK, studying public perception of genetic modification in general and specifically of genetically modified strawberries with altered properties. This study revealed that genetically modified plants are better accepted by consumers if only genes from the species itself are used for the genetic modification. Subsequently, the results of a functional analysis of the strawberry polygalacturonase inhibiting protein gene (FaPGIP) are described. This indicates that this gene is a possible candidate to induce resistance to Botrytis cinerea when upregulated in strawberry fruits. For this analysis, the FaPGIP gene was overexpressed in transgenic strawberry plants using the cauliflower mosaic virus 35S (CaMV35S) promoter. This showed that FaPGIP overexpression led to resistance to Botrytis in transgenic leaves. For the generation of intragenic (i.e. genetically modification using native genetic elements only) strawberry plants, a transformation vector was constructed in which FaPGIP was combined with a strawberry fruit-specific promoter and terminator that were isolated from a strawberry expansin gene (FaExp2). This vector also included elements that allow the elimination of (foreign) selectable marker genes after genetically modified plant lines have been established. Using this vector, genetically modified strawberry plants were produced that contained only genes from the species itself, and therefore these plants were called intragenic, rather than transgenic. Unfortunately, further evaluations of the intragenic strawberry plants could not demonstrate any enhanced level of resistance to Botrytis in fruits