Interactive Tools for Collaborative Architectural Design

Today's rapidly changing society is continuously developing towards an increased demand for multistakeholder knowledge and influence in the architectural planning and design process. Accordingly, we are working with developing and setting up a partner engaged collaborative design process. It includes active collaboration between users, external partners and designers, and visualizations in conceptual design and scenario building. My research is focusing on integrating visualization technology in theseprocesses by application of digital tools. We have developed a working prototype for an interactive design tool. The prototype is an extremely “easy to use” digital modelling tool called “ForeSite Designer.” With this tool one builds oneis own spatial environment with elements on a 2D surface.With one command the 2D layout is exported to a lit-up 3D/Virtual Reality world in the computer game “Half-Life”. ForeSite Designer has lately been used in a series of workshops together with external users. In these processes ForeSite Designer has played a crucial role as an arena of building spatially arranged concepts of future environments. The results show that it works, and, importantly, promotes a collaborative engagement among the users

A Real Time 3D Environment for Collaborative Design

By setting up collaborative design processes in architecture it is possible to considerably improve the integration of customer needs and ideas into the programming phase of a building project. Our design process includes active collaboration between customers, users and other stakeholders as well as the use of virtual environments in conceptual design. The output from the process is treated as visualised input to the architectural programming. The work presented focuses on developing digital tools to support this collaborative design dialogue. We have developed an extremely “easy to use” digital modelling tool called “ForeSite Designer”. The tool enables the users to build layouts of prefabricated components on a building site in 2D. This 2D layout can then instantly be exported to a lit-up real time 3D environment in the computer game “Half-Life.” ForeSite Designer has been used in a several design events with different settings. This paper presents the tool and one project where it was utilized. The results show that ForeSite Designer can promote dialogue and collaborative design work among the participants. We have also found that it is important how the virtual environment and its components are visually designed in order to support the dialogue and collaborative design work

Exploration of P-type Ca2+ channels as drug targets for the treatment of epilepsy or ischemic stroke.

We investigated the neuroprotective efficacy of the P-type Ca2+ channel antagonist daurisoline against electroshock-induced convulsions in rats and mice, hypoxic/hypoglycemic-induced damage in rat hippocampal slices and brain damage induced by occlusion of the middle cerebral artery (MCA) in rats. Daurisoline applied intravenously (i.v.) (bolus of 1-60 mg/kg) reduced the spontaneous activity of rat cerebellar Purkinje cells in a dose-dependent manner, a result demonstrating activity in the brain with systemic administration of the compound. While this effect reversed rapidly in about 10-20 min following bolus-application of the drug at doses of up to 30 mg/kg, a dose of 60 mg/kg consistently induced a depression of respiration followed by death of the animals. Daurisoline administered at 10-30 mg/kg did not prevent electroshock-induced convulsions in mice or rats, nor did it reduce the neuronal damage in hippocampal slices induced by a hypoxic/hypoglycemic insult in vitro by MCA occlusion in vivo. These observations do not support the hypothesis that P-type Ca2+ channels are promising drug targets for the acute treatment of epileptic convulsions and/or ischemic stroke

Unstable B-chromosomes in Ranunculus bulbosus

A B-chromosome system has been found in Ranunculus bulbosus. 87 plants from Monte Croce della Serra in Umbria (Italy) have been examined and 12 of these have shown Bs. Bs in R. bulbosus are unstable (in roots, leaves and male meiocytes), very small (less than 1 mu m), can reach relatively high numbers (up to 19B) and are heterochromatic (visible in interphase nuclei after Feulgen or Giemsa staining procedures). In spite of the wide intra tissue range of B number the mitotic behaviour of B is very often regular. Also microsporogenesis observations have shown that Bs can pair and segregate regularly in the A chromosome fashion, especially when the B-number in meiocytes is low. Irregularities (clumps, laggards, micronuclei) ate much more frequent when Bs are more than six