Boston Children's Hospital Construction Management Plan

The Major Qualifying Project was completed for Stantec. The project analyzed the construction plans for the Boston Children's Hospital Addition in Brookline, Massachusetts and designed possible alternatives for these plans. Cut-and-fill calculations were completed that considered the contaminated soils on site. Three alternative plans were developed that altered duration, costs, soil reuse, and phasing start dates. These plans were then evaluated using a weighted decision matrix. The provided recommendation focused on maximizing efficiency of project cost and time

Understanding Barriers and Incentives for Sustainability in Moreland, Australia

The Moreland Energy Foundation in Melbourne, Australia, sought to broaden the acceptance of sustainable practices within the Moreland community. Using our analysis of responses to a large telephone survey of residents and through targeted interviews, we developed a community engagement strategy to more effectively deliver MEFL’s message to residents in historically difficult-to-reach demographic groups and least sustainable group. Our pilot programs showed that two of our proposed communication strategies were effective among residents age 18-34 (using social media) and within culturally and linguistically diverse communities (using trusted community leaders), while the third had limited success reaching residents age 65 or older

Expanded encyclopaedias of DNA elements in the human and mouse genomes

AbstractThe human and mouse genomes contain instructions that specify RNAs and proteins and govern the timing, magnitude, and cellular context of their production. To better delineate these elements, phase III of the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) Project has expanded analysis of the cell and tissue repertoires of RNA transcription, chromatin structure and modification, DNA methylation, chromatin looping, and occupancy by transcription factors and RNA-binding proteins. Here we summarize these efforts, which have produced 5,992 new experimental datasets, including systematic determinations across mouse fetal development. All data are available through the ENCODE data portal (https://www.encodeproject.org), including phase II ENCODE1 and Roadmap Epigenomics2 data. We have developed a registry of 926,535 human and 339,815 mouse candidate cis-regulatory elements, covering 7.9 and 3.4% of their respective genomes, by integrating selected datatypes associated with gene regulation, and constructed a web-based server (SCREEN; http://screen.encodeproject.org) to provide flexible, user-defined access to this resource. Collectively, the ENCODE data and registry provide an expansive resource for the scientific community to build a better understanding of the organization and function of the human and mouse genomes.11Nsciescopu

Perspectives on ENCODE

The Encylopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) Project launched in 2003 with the long-term goal of developing a comprehensive map of functional elements in the human genome. These included genes, biochemical regions associated with gene regulation (for example, transcription factor binding sites, open chromatin, and histone marks) and transcript isoforms. The marks serve as sites for candidate cis-regulatory elements (cCREs) that may serve functional roles in regulating gene expression1. The project has been extended to model organisms, particularly the mouse. In the third phase of ENCODE, nearly a million and more than 300,000 cCRE annotations have been generated for human and mouse, respectively, and these have provided a valuable resource for the scientific community.11Nsciescopu