Guideline Policy for Snow and Ice Control

These Guidelines are a compilation of information given by several agencies, such as the National Cooperative Highway Research Program, the Salt Institute, American Public Works Association, AASHTO, and many others. Our goal was to was to gather all the information that could be useful for the Indiana Counties and Cities, add our own experience and expertise, and place it in one report. These Guidelines are Divided into three sections. The first section is the Guidelines. It gives information and suggestions on all aspects of snow and ice control. The second section is a template for a snow and ice control policy. The intent of this section is to give you a policy that is almost complete. You just need to fill in the blanks and check a few boxes that pertain to your county or city. We encourage you to add any information that is missing from this policy that would make it more specific for your county or city. The third section is a sample Snow and Ice Control Policy for Parke County, Indiana. We worked closely with their Highway Superintendent on this policy. He supplied us with information and maps, and we compiled a policy to give you an example

Understanding Game-based Approaches for Improving Sustainable Water Governance : The Potential of Serious Games to Solve Water Problems

The sustainable governance of water resources relies on processes of multi-stakeholder collaborations and interactions that facilitate knowledge co-creation and social learning. Governance systems are often fragmented, forming a barrier to adequately addressing the myriad of challenges affecting water resources, including climate change, increased urbanized populations, and pollution. Transitions towards sustainable water governance will likely require innovative learning partnerships between public, private, and civil society stakeholders. It is essential that such partnerships involve vertical and horizontal communication of ideas and knowledge, and an enabling and democratic environment characterized by informal and open discourse. There is increasing interest in learning-based transitions. Thus far, much scholarly thinking and, to a lesser degree, empirical research has gone into understanding the potential impact of social learning on multi-stakeholder settings. The question of whether such learning can be supported by forms of serious gaming has hardly been asked. This Special Issue critically explores the potential of serious games to support multi-stakeholder social learning and collaborations in the context of water governance. Serious games may involve simulations of real-world events and processes and are challenge players to solve contemporary societal problems; they, therefore, have a purpose beyond entertainment. They offer a largely untapped potential to support social learning and collaboration by facilitating access to and the exchange of knowledge and information, enhancing stakeholder interactions, empowering a wider audience to participate in decision making, and providing opportunities to test and analyze the outcomes of policies and management solutions. Little is known about how game-based approaches can be used in the context of collaborative water governance to maximize their potential for social learning. While several studies have reported examples of serious games, there is comparably less research about how to assess the impacts of serious games on social learning and transformative change

MultiMetEval: comparative and multi-objective analysis of genome-scale metabolic models

Comparative metabolic modelling is emerging as a novel field, supported by the development of reliable and standardized approaches for constructing genome-scale metabolic models in high throughput. New software solutions are needed to allow efficient comparative analysis of multiple models in the context of multiple cellular objectives. Here, we present the user-friendly software framework Multi-Metabolic Evaluator (MultiMetEval), built upon SurreyFBA, which allows the user to compose collections of metabolic models that together can be subjected to flux balance analysis. Additionally, MultiMetEval implements functionalities for multi-objective analysis by calculating the Pareto front between two cellular objectives. Using a previously generated dataset of 38 actinobacterial genome-scale metabolic models, we show how these approaches can lead to exciting novel insights. Firstly, after incorporating several pathways for the biosynthesis of natural products into each of these models, comparative flux balance analysis predicted that species like Streptomyces that harbour the highest diversity of secondary metabolite biosynthetic gene clusters in their genomes do not necessarily have the metabolic network topology most suitable for compound overproduction. Secondly, multi-objective analysis of biomass production and natural product biosynthesis in these actinobacteria shows that the well-studied occurrence of discrete metabolic switches during the change of cellular objectives is inherent to their metabolic network architecture. Comparative and multi-objective modelling can lead to insights that could not be obtained by normal flux balance analyses. MultiMetEval provides a powerful platform that makes these analyses straightforward for biologists. Sources and binaries of MultiMetEval are freely available from https://github.com/PiotrZakrzewski/MetEv​al/downloads

Betulin Is a Potent Anti-Tumor Agent that Is Enhanced by Cholesterol

Abstract Betulinic Acid (BetA) and its derivatives have been extensively studied in the past for their anti-tumor effects, but relatively little is known about its precursor Betulin (BE). We found that BE induces apoptosis utilizing a similar mechanism as BetA and is prevented by cyclosporin A (CsA). BE induces cell death more rapidly as compared to BetA, but to achieve similar amounts of cell death a considerably higher concentration of BE is needed. Interestingly, we observed that cholesterol sensitized cells to BE-induced apoptosis, while there was no effect of cholesterol when combined with BetA. Despite the significantly enhanced cytotoxicity, the mode of cell death was not changed as CsA completely abrogated cell death. These results indicate that BE has potent anti-tumor activity especially in combination with cholesterol

Online Monitoring Technical Basis and Analysis Framework for Large Power Transformers; Interim Report for FY 2012

The Light Water Reactor Sustainability program at Idaho National Laboratory (INL) is actively conducting research to develop and demonstrate online monitoring (OLM) capabilities for active components in existing Nuclear Power Plants. A pilot project is currently underway to apply OLM to Generator Step-Up Transformers (GSUs) and Emergency Diesel Generators (EDGs). INL and the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) are working jointly to implement the pilot project. The EPRI Fleet-Wide Prognostic and Health Management (FW-PHM) Software Suite will be used to implement monitoring in conjunction with utility partners: the Shearon Harris Nuclear Generating Station (owned by Duke Energy for GSUs, and Braidwood Generating Station (owned by Exelon Corporation) for EDGs. This report presents monitoring techniques, fault signatures, and diagnostic and prognostic models for GSUs. GSUs are main transformers that are directly connected to generators, stepping up the voltage from the generator output voltage to the highest transmission voltages for supplying electricity to the transmission grid. Technical experts from Shearon Harris are assisting INL and EPRI in identifying critical faults and defining fault signatures associated with each fault. The resulting diagnostic models will be implemented in the FW-PHM Software Suite and tested using data from Shearon-Harris. Parallel research on EDGs is being conducted, and will be reported in an interim report during the first quarter of fiscal year 2013

Vanadium oxide monolayer catalysts. 3. A Raman spectroscopic and temperature-programmed reduction study of monolayer and crystal-type vanadia on various supports

Vanadium(V) oxide supported on 7-A1203, GO2, Cr2O3, Si02, Ti02, and Zr02 was studied by X-ray fluorescence, by X-ray diffraction, and especially by the combination of Raman spectroscopy and temperature-programmed reduction (TPR) for qualitative and quantitative structural analysis, respectively. Catalysts were prepared via ion-exchange and wet-impregnation methods. The V contents ranged from - 1 to 40 wt % V. At low surface concentrations only surface vanadate phases of two-dimensional character are observed for all carriers. According to Raman and TPR data the structure of these surface vanadate species is independent of the preparation technique. At medium and high surface concentrations, the webimpregnated samples already contain crystalline V20b At equal surface concentrations the ion-exchanged catalysts contain no V205 crystallites. An exception is Si02 on which also crystalline V206 is formed in both preparation techniques. Monolayer stability toward thermal treatment decreases in the order AZO>3 Ti02> Ce02,w hereas on heating ion-exchanged V/Si02 the crystalline V206 spreads out over the silica surface. The reducibilities of the ion-exchanged catalyats, as measured by TPR, can be used as a measure for the contact interaction between vanadia and the carrier oxides. At temperatures of 500-800 K, this interaction ranges from strong with titania to weak with silica as a carrier

A predicted physicochemically distinct sub-proteome associated with the intracellular organelle of the anammox bacterium Kuenenia stuttgartiensis

Background: Anaerobic ammonium-oxidizing (anammox) bacteria perform a key step in global nitrogen cycling. These bacteria make use of an organelle to oxidize ammonia anaerobically to nitrogen (N2) and so contribute approximately 50% of the nitrogen in the atmosphere. It is currently unknown which proteins constitute the organellar proteome and how anammox bacteria are able to specifically target organellar and cell-envelope proteins to their correct final destinations. Experimental approaches are complicated by the absence of pure cultures and genetic accessibility. However, the genome of the anammox bacterium Candidatus "Kuenenia stuttgartiensis" has recently been sequenced. Here, we make use of these genome data to predict the organellar sub-proteome and address the molecular basis of protein sorting in anammox bacteria. Results: Two training sets representing organellar (30 proteins) and cell envelope (59 proteins) proteins were constructed based on previous experimental evidence and comparative genomics. Random forest (RF) classifiers trained on these two sets could differentiate between organellar and cell envelope proteins with ~89% accuracy using 400 features consisting of frequencies of two adjacent amino acid combinations. A physicochemically distinct organellar sub-proteome containing 562 proteins was predicted with the best RF classifier. This set included almost all catabolic and respiratory factors encoded in the genome. Apparently, the cytoplasmic membrane performs no catabolic functions. We predict that the Tat-translocation system is located exclusively in the organellar membrane, whereas the Sec-translocation system is located on both the organellar and cytoplasmic membranes. Canonical signal peptides were predicted and validated experimentally, but a specific (N- or C-terminal) signal that could be used for protein targeting to the organelle remained elusive. Conclusions: A physicochemically distinct organellar sub-proteome was predicted from the genome of the anammox bacterium K. stuttgartiensis. This result provides strong in silico support for the existing experimental evidence for the existence of an organelle in this bacterium, and is an important step forward in unravelling a geochemically relevant case of cytoplasmic differentiation in bacteria. The predicted dual location of the Sec-translocation system and the apparent absence of a specific N- or C-terminal signal in the organellar proteins suggests that additional chaperones may be necessary that act on an as-yet unknown property of the targeted proteins

Linking genomics and metabolomics to chart specialized metabolic diversity

Microbial and plant specialized metabolites constitute an immense chemical diversity, and play key roles in mediating ecological interactions between organisms. Also referred to as natural products, they have been widely applied in medicine, agriculture, cosmetic and food industries. Traditionally, the main discovery strategies have centered around the use of activity-guided fractionation of metabolite extracts. Increasingly, omics data is being used to complement this, as it has the potential to reduce rediscovery rates, guide experimental work towards the most promising metabolites, and identify enzymatic pathways that enable their biosynthetic production. In recent years, genomic and metabolomic analyses of specialized metabolic diversity have been scaled up to study thousands of samples simultaneously. Here, we survey data analysis technologies that facilitate the effective exploration of large genomic and metabolomic datasets, and discuss various emerging strategies to integrate these two types of omics data in order to further accelerate discovery

Minimum Information about a Biosynthetic Gene cluster

A wide variety of enzymatic pathways that produce specialized metabolites in bacteria, fungi and plants are known to be encoded in biosynthetic gene clusters. Information about these clusters, pathways and metabolites is currently dispersed throughout the literature, making it difficult to exploit. To facilitate consistent and systematic deposition and retrieval of data on biosynthetic gene clusters, we propose the Minimum Information about a Biosynthetic Gene cluster (MIBiG) data standard.Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO)/Rubicon/825.13.001EU/FP7/Joint Call OCEANBiotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)Natural Environment Research Council (UK)National Institute for Energy Ethics and Society (NIEeS; UK)Gordon and Betty Moore FoundationNational Science Foundation (NSF; US)US Department of EnergyEngineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC