Spacewire Interface Simulation

Spacewire [1] is an interface standard for high rate peer-to-peer intercommunication between several nodes and routers for example between payloads and a spacecraft on-board computer. The functionalities of Spacewire continue to increase, mainly due to the increase of on-board software complexity. New facilities have to be provided to support the development and testing of Spacewire and on-board software applications. This paper provides an overview of a generic “request - action list” concept for real-time interface simulation physically implemented as a Spacewire Interface Simulator (SWIS). The SWIS concept provides a means of generic peer-to-peer interface simulations of the packet, protocol and application layer with free user- defined functionality for several simultaneous Spacewire links. A payload simulation can be established by “drag and drop” in a much shorter time than usually needed for project specific software development. Using the SWIS test and system engineers as well as managers can prepare simulations without any need for real-time software development. The effort (i.e. cost and time) for development of the test facility is reduced and the quality may increase significantly

A Custom Panel for Profiling Microglia Gene Expression

Potru P, Vidovic N, Wiemann S, Ruß T, Trautmann M, Spittau B. A Custom Panel for Profiling Microglia Gene Expression. Cells. 2024;13(7): 630.Despite being immune cells of the central nervous system (CNS), microglia contribute to CNS development, maturation, and homeostasis, and microglia dysfunction has been implicated in several neurological disorders. Recent advancements in single-cell studies have uncovered unique microglia-specific gene expression. However, there is a need for a simple yet elegant multiplexed approach to quantifying microglia gene expression. To address this, we have designed a NanoString nCounter technology-based murine microglia-specific custom codeset comprising 178 genes. We analyzed RNA extracted from ex vivo adult mouse microglia, primary mouse microglia, the BV2 microglia cell line, and mouse bone marrow monocytes using our custom panel. Our findings reveal a pattern where homeostatic genes exhibit heightened expression in adult microglia, followed by primary cells, and are absent in BV2 cells, while reactive markers are elevated in primary microglia and BV2 cells. Analysis of publicly available data sets for the genes present in the panel revealed that the panel could reliably reflect the changes in microglia gene expression in response to various factors. These findings highlight that the microglia panel used offers a swift and cost-effective means to assess microglial cells and can be used to study them in varying contexts, ranging from normal homeostasis to disease models