A parallel transformations framework for cluster environments.

In recent years program transformation technology has matured into a practical solution for many software reengineering and migration tasks. FermaT, an industrial strength program transformation system, has demonstrated that legacy systems can be successfully transformed into efficient and maintainable structured C or COBOL code. Its core, a transformation engine, is based on mathematically proven program transformations and ensures that transformed programs are semantically equivalent to its original state. Its engine facilitates a Wide Spectrum Language (WSL), with low-level as well as high-level constructs, to capture as much information as possible during transformation steps. FermaT’s methodology and technique lack in provision of concurrent migration and analysis. This provision is crucial if the transformation process is to be further automated. As the constraint based program migration theory has demonstrated, it is inefficient and time consuming, trying to satisfy the enormous computation of the generated transformation sequence search-space and its constraints. With the objective to solve the above problems and to extend the operating range of the FermaT transformation system, this thesis proposes a Parallel Transformations Framework which makes parallel transformations processing within the FermaT environment not only possible but also beneficial for its migration process. During a migration process, many thousands of program transformations have to be applied. For example a 1 million line of assembler to C migration takes over 21 hours to be processed on a single PC. Various approaches of search, prediction techniques and a constraint-based approach to address the presented issues already exist but they solve them unsatisfactorily. To remedy this situation, this dissertation proposes a framework to extend transformation processing systems with parallel processing capabilities. The parallel system can analyse specified parallel transformation tasks and produce appropriate parallel transformations processing outlines. To underpin an automated objective, a formal language is introduced. This language can be utilised to describe and outline parallel transformation tasks whereas parallel processing constraints underpin the parallel objective. This thesis addresses and explains how transformation processing steps can be automatically parallelised within a reengineering domain. It presents search and prediction tactics within this field. The decomposition and parallelisation of transformation sequence search-spaces is outlined. At the end, the presented work is evaluated on practical case studies, to demonstrate different parallel transformations processing techniques and conclusions are drawn

Iron-mediated aggregation and toxicity in a novel neuronal cell culture model with inducible alpha-synuclein expression

Parkinson's disease (PD) represents an increasing problem in society. The oligomerization of alpha-synuclein (alpha Syn) is a suggested key event in its pathogenesis, yet the pathological modes of action remain to be fully elucidated. To identify potential disease-modifying therapeutics and to study alpha Syn-mediated toxic mechanisms, we established cell lines with inducible overexpression of different alpha Syn constructs: alpha Syn, alpha Syn coupled to the fluorescence protein Venus (alpha Syn-Venus), and alpha Syn coupled to the N-terminal or C-terminal part of Venus (V1S and SV2, respectively) for a bimolecular fluorescence complementation assay (BiFC). Inducibility was achieved by applying modified GAL4-UAS or Cre-loxP systems and addition of tebufenozide or 4-OH-tamoxifen, respectively. Expression constructs were stably integrated into the host genome of H4 neuroglioma cells by lentiviral transduction. We here demonstrate a detailed investigation of the expression characteristics of inducible H4 cells showing low background expression and high inducibility. We observed increased protein load and aggregation of alpha Syn upon incubation with DMSO and FeCl3 along with an increase in cytotoxicity. In summary, we present a system for the creation of inducibly alpha Syn-overexpressing cell lines holding high potential for the screening for modulators of alpha Syn aggregation and alpha Syn-mediated toxicity

Methodik

Die vegetationskundliche und strukturelle Zuordnung der Lebensraumtypen erfolgt nach der vorrangig von Braun-Blanquet entwickelten Vegetationsklassifizierung, einer hierarchischen Gliederung der Vegetationstypen (Syntaxonomie), die die Ebenen der Assoziation, des Verbandes, der Ordnung und der Klasse umfasst. Hierbei ist die Assoziation die grundlegende Einheit, in der die Pflanzengesellschaften zusammengefasst werden, die sich durch gleiche charakteristische Arten(gruppen)kombinationen auszeichnen. Der Verband vereinigt ähnliche Assoziationen. Das sind bereits umfassendere, jedoch standörtlich noch recht einheitliche Vegetationseinheiten. In Ordnungen werden ähnliche Verbände zusammengefasst. Die Klasse vereinigt ähnliche Ordnungen

A MYB gene from wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) is up-regulated during salt and drought stresses and differentially regulated between salt-tolerant and sensitive genotypes

Crop adaptation to abiotic stresses requires alterations in expression of a large number of stress protection genes and their regulators, including transcription factors. In this study, the expression levels of ten MYB transcription factor genes from wheat (Triticum aestivum) were examined in two recombinant inbred lines contrasting in their salt tolerance in response to salt or drought stress. Quantitative RT-PCR analysis revealed that four MYB genes were consistently up-regulated in the seedling roots of both genotypes under short-term salt treatment. Three MYB genes were found to be up-regulated in both genotypes under long-term salt stress. One MYB gene was up-regulated in both genotypes under both short- and long-term salt stress. Of these salt up-regulated MYB genes, one MYB gene (TaMYBsdu1) was markedly up-regulated in the leaf and root of wheat under long-term drought stress. In addition, TaMYBsdu1 showed higher expression levels in the salt-tolerant genotype than in the susceptible genotype under salt stress. These data suggest that TaMYBsdu1 is a potentially important regulator involved in wheat adaptation to both salt and drought stresses