The Peptidyl Prolyl Isomerase Rrd1 Regulates the Elongation of RNA Polymerase II during Transcriptional Stresses

Rapamycin is an anticancer agent and immunosuppressant that acts by inhibiting the TOR signaling pathway. In yeast, rapamycin mediates a profound transcriptional response for which the RRD1 gene is required. To further investigate this connection, we performed genome-wide location analysis of RNA polymerase II (RNAPII) and Rrd1 in response to rapamycin and found that Rrd1 colocalizes with RNAPII on actively transcribed genes and that both are recruited to rapamycin responsive genes. Strikingly, when Rrd1 is lacking, RNAPII remains inappropriately associated to ribosomal genes and fails to be recruited to rapamycin responsive genes. This occurs independently of TATA box binding protein recruitment but involves the modulation of the phosphorylation status of RNAPII CTD by Rrd1. Further, we demonstrate that Rrd1 is also involved in various other transcriptional stress responses besides rapamycin. We propose that Rrd1 is a novel transcription elongation factor that fine-tunes the transcriptional stress response of RNAPII

Evaluating computer aided design tools for building performance: Trusting and defining the predetermined automated inputs

BIM use is on the rise in New Zealand with popular software packages, including Revit and ARCHICAD, adopting a semi-automated simulation platform. This allows architects and designers to calculate the thermal and energy performance of their designs. This paper identifies the strengths and weaknesses of these semi-automated simulation platforms. The objective is to investigate how accurate their assumptions are in determining a reliable output for use in achieving compliance with Clause H1 of the New Zealand Building Code. To achieve this, this paper reports a comparative study that examines the program’s ability to calculate construction R-values, interpret thermal properties and simulate energy performance. The results from this study show that if used as delivered there is a significant difference between the simulation results of the two software packages, due to the assumptions built into the default settings. It also identifies the disadvantages of the inbuilt construction R-value calculators and explores a potential path to resolving this through redefining the inputs of thermal properties

Semi-automated simulations: Know your schedules

This study tests semi-automated simulation measures such as schedules and occupancy profiles in B I M software packages to establish energy performance predictions for the purposes of providing evidence of compliance. These predictions are tested against an archetypal range of household operation figures that are based on the data collected of approximately 400 households monitored for 11 months each. This study identifies that standardising the simulations by using the archetypal range of dwelling occupation predictions produces a more consistent outcome in energy evaluation across both software packages. However, both of the B I M software packages tested in this study are unable to establish energy performance predictions that align with the real-world measured data. This suggests that in-built semi-automated simulation measures, beyond the optimised schedules and occupancy profiles, investigated in this study, need to be examined in greater detail

Reconciling folksonomic tagging with taxa for bioacoustic annotations

Acoustic sensors are increasingly used to monitor biodiversity. They can remain deployed in the environment for extended periods to passively and objectively record the sounds of the environment. The collected acoustic data must be analyzed to identify the presence of the sounds made by fauna in order to understand biodiversity. Citizen scientists play an important role in analyzing this data by annotating calls and identifying species. This paper presents our research into bioacoustic annotation techniques. It describes our work in defining a process for managing, creating, and using tags that are applied to our annotations. This paper includes a detailed description of our methodology for correcting and then linking our folksonomic tags to taxonomic data sources. Providing tools and processes for maintaining species naming consistency is critical to the success of a project designed to generate scientific data. We demonstrate that cleaning the folksonomic data and providing links to external taxonomic authorities enhances the scientific utility of the tagging efforts of citizen scientists

Can we design buildings within planetary boundaries? An exploration into using a top-down benchmarking approach for embodied carbon

The way we build, occupy, and dismantle architecture contributes heavily to the global problem of climate change. Accounting for the embodied emissions from buildings is just as important as measuring operational emissions. It’s widely recognised that including Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) during design can inform decisions to reduce emissions. However, it is difficult to complete a LCA during the early stages and to define appropriate targets for achieving a project that is within the planetary boundaries (a concept involving earth system processes). Therefore, there is a need for benchmarks that respond to the scale of design decisions and allocate carbon emission targets for different building elements. To support designers in early decision making, this paper explores how a top-down benchmarking approach can be applied to both the building and elemental levels of LCA results. Functional units are applied using fulltime employee to create a cap. The approach is applied to typical and non-typical building typologies from the same case study, a koala rehabilitation centre in Queensland, Australia. The case study was selected to form a discussion around the application of top-down building and elemental benchmarks in commercial architecture practice and test limitations. The paper asks the question: how can top-down benchmarks best support early design decisions to reduce the environmental impact of a building? The results show that whilst top-down benchmarks are good at connecting building scale benchmarks with a global carbon budget, the sharing principles used to achieve the benchmark limit their application on nontypical building typologies