The Texas Economy: The Prospects for Natural Gas Substitution

The Texas Economy: The Prospects for Natural Gas SubstitutionBureau of Business Researc

Investigation of Sox9 Ablation on Neural Stem Cell Behaviour after Spinal Cord Injury

After spinal cord injury neural stem cells are activated to proliferate and differentiate primarily into astrocytes, but are unable to replace lost neurons or aid in neurological recovery. Recent research shows that the transcription factor Sox9 promotes gliogenesis while inhibiting neurogenesis, and that Sox9 ablation causes improved recovery after spinal cord injury. The purpose of this study was to determine how Sox9 ablation alters neural stem cell behaviour after spinal cord injury and whether it leads to neurological improvements. We used BrdU and YFP to label and track neural stem cells and a neural stem cell-specific Sox9 knockout mouse model to isolate their role in improving recovery. We found that although Sox9 ablation reduced neural stem cell proliferation and gliogenesis while increasing neurogenesis, the effects were too small to have a significant impact on neurological recovery. Thus, additional factors must be altered in addition to Sox9 ablation for significant results

Providing decision support for the condition-based maintenance of circuit breakers through data mining of trip coil current signatures

The focus of this paper centers on the condition assessment of 11kV-33kV distribution circuit breakers from the analysis of their trip coil current signatures captured using an innovative condition monitoring technology developed by others. Using available expert knowledge in conjunction with a structured process of data mining, thresholds associated with features representing each stage of a circuit breaker's operation may be defined and used to characterize varying states of circuit breaker condition. Knowledge and understanding of satisfactory and unsatisfactory breaker condition can be gained and made explicit from the analysis of captured trip signature data and subsequently used to form the basis of condition assessment and diagnostic rules implemented in a decision support system, used to inform condition-based decisions affecting circuit breaker maintenance. This paper proposes a data mining method for the analysis of condition monitoring data, and demonstrates this method in its discovery of useful knowledge from trip coil data captured from a population of SP Power System's in-service circuit breakers. This knowledge then forms the basis of a decision support system for the condition assessment of these circuit breakers during routine trip testing

Optimal Charging Strategy for EVs with Batteries at Different States of Health

The electric vehicle (EV) is targeted as an efficient method of decreasing CO2 emission and reducing dependence on fossil fuel. Compared with filling up the internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicle, the EV power charging time is usually long. However,to the best of our knowledge, the current charging strategy does not consider the battery state of health (SOH). It is noted that a high charging current rate may damage the battery life. Motivated by this, an optimal charging strategy is proposed in the present paper, providing several optimal charging options taking into account the EV battery health, trying to prevent ‘abused battery utilization’ happening