Native and Biotechnologically Engineered Plant Proteases with Industrial Applications

Proteases occupy the most relevant position among industrial enzymes. Plant proteases have been used in medicine, detergent manufacturing, and food science for many years, but their production is diminishing in favor of those of microbial origin because lower production costs. Papain, bromelain, and ficin are the most frequently employed plant proteases, although new proteases with new and more appealing physicochemical properties for industry are still emerging. DNA technology and genetic engineering shall play, without a doubt, an important role for the production of these proteases at the industrial level. The present review focuses on the applications of traditional plant proteases as well as new proteases discovered during the last 20 years, some of which have already been genetically engineered either to increase production or to strengthen some of their physicochemical properties. The review also refers to the protease classification, action pattern, and main characteristics.     

A risk management approach to safety assessment of trenchless technologies for culvert rehabilitation

Proper functioning of culverts is not only critical to protecting the transportation system from flooding but also critical to maintaining the expected service life of the overall transportation system. During the service life of culverts, they deteriorate due to many reasons such as corrosion caused by road salt, blockage by debris and sediment, poor construction techniques, etc. Trenchless technologies have been used by several State Departments of Transportation (DOTs) to rehabilitate deteriorated drainage structures without disrupting the traffic and within a relatively short span of time. These technologies provide many benefits in terms of cost, time, quality, and expected service life. However, the safety aspects of these techniques have not been discussed and documented in detail probably due to the complexity and the lack of safety standards and specifications directly associated with the techniques. This paper discusses the application of a risk assessment framework to assess potential safety issues of currently available trenchless technologies for culvert rehabilitation. The findings of the study will provide additional information to improve the decision making process in selecting and planning culvert rehabilitation projects.     

Simulation Techniques for the Manufacturing Test of MCMs

Simulation techniques used in the Manufacturing Test SIMulator(MTSIM) are described. MTSIM is a Concurrent Engineering tool used tosimulate the manufacturing test andrepair aspects of boards and MCMs from design concept through manufacturing release. MTSIM helps designers select assemblyprocess, specify Design For Test (DFT) features, select board testcoverage, specify ASIC defect level goals, establish productfeasibility, and predict manufacturing quality and cost goals. A newyield model for boards and MCMs which accounts for theclustering of solder defects is introduced and used topredict the yield at each test step. In addition, MTSIMestimates the average number of defects per board detected at eachtest step, and estimates costs incurred in test execution, faultisolation and repair. MTSIM models were validated withhigh performance assemblies at Hewlett-Packard (HP).     

Comparative Assessment of Adaptive Body-Bias SOI Pass-Transistor Logic

A very low voltage transconductor for video frequency range applications and compatible with standard CMOS technology is described. In the proposed transconductor, except the DC level shifter circuit (DCLS), the whole transconductor uses the main supply voltage [which can be as low as 1.5 V in a standard 0.6 μm CMOS technology] while the DCLS uses a simple charge-pump circuit as its supply voltage and has a very low current consumption. In addition, proper common-mode sense and charge-pump circuits are developed for this low-voltage application. Meanwhile, some techniques to improve the frequency response, linearity, and noise performance of the proposed transconductor are described. In a standard 0.6 μm CMOS technology and single 1.5 V supply, simulations show that the proposed transconductor futures a THD of −50 dB for 1.4 V_pp and 10 MHz input signal and −60 dB for 1.4 V_pp and 1 MHz signal where the threshold voltage of MOS transistors could be as high as 1 V. Based on the proposed transconductor, a lowpass filter with 700 kHz to 8 MHz programmable cutoff frequency and a bandpass 10.7 MHz second order filter were implemented. Armin Tajalli received the B.Sc. from Sharif University of Technology (SUT), Tehran, Iran, in 1997, and M.Sc. from Tehran Polytechnic University, Tehran, Iran, in 1999. From 1998 he has joint Emad Co. as a senior design engineer were he has worked on several industrial and R&D projects on analog and mixed-mode ICs. He received the award of the Best Design Engineer from Emad Co., 2001, the Kharazmi Award of Industrial Research and Development, Iran, 2002, and Presidential Award of the Best Iranian Researchers, in 2003. He is now working toward his PhD degree at SUT. His current interests are design of high speed circuits for telecommunication systems. Mojtaba Atarodi received the B.S.E.E. from Amir Kabir University of Technology (Tehran Polytechnic) in 1985, and M.Sc. degree in electrical engineering from the University of California, Irvine, in 1987. He received the Ph.D. degree from the University of Southern California (USC) on the subject of analog IC design in 1993. From 1993 to 1996 he worked with Linear Technology Corporation as a senior analog design engineer. Since then, he has been consulting with different IC companies. He is currently a visiting professor at Sharif University of Technology. He has published more than 30 technical papers in the area of analog and mixed-signal integrated circuit design as well as analog CAD tools.     

Deposition of Carotenoids in Eggs from Hens Fed Diets Containing Saponified and Unsaponified Oleoresin Paprika

Deposition of carotenoids in saponified paprika (SP) and unsaponified oleoresin paprika (OP) in egg yolks as well as the dietary level for desired pigmentation were evaluated. Sixty-four hens on a carotenoid-depletion diet were divided into two replicated groups of each of eight dietary treatments containing from 0 to 16 mg paprika carotenoids per kg feed. Colour and the carotenoid content of egg yolk increased linearly ( P< 0·01) with the amounts of paprika carotenoids in the diets. The colours of egg yolks from hens fed similar concentra-tions of OP or SP were not significantly different ( P< 0·01). A low dose (4 mg kg⁻¹) of OP or SP provided yolk colour equivalent to the colour of eggs in supermarkets. High-performance liquid chromatographic analyses showed that carotenoids deposited in the yolk are in the free alcohol form, regardless of the form of carotenoids in the diet. Capsanthin, the predominant carotenoid in paprika, was deposited in egg yolk less efficiently than zeaxanthin and lutein.     

计算光刻驱动DFM的拥有成本

45和32nm节点的可制造性需要新的策略。计算光刻提供了为设计流程定义解决方案的方法。随着晶体管数目的增加、芯片功能和性能的日益提高,集成电路的几何尺寸变得越来越小,这需要以一种史无前例的方法来改造设计和制造流程。当关键技术、工具和接口开始出现并且展示它们的实际价值     

直接调制应用中的混合分数N阶合成器

对减少元器件数量、提高性能的需求不断促使无线系统结构的革新，其中之一就是直接调制结构。直接调制适于采用调频方式的GSM、蓝牙和802.11b系统。系统发射部分的直接调制，直接将数据送入DS合成器的DS调制器部分。目前，对高速数据系统采用这项调制技术尚有困难，这是因为DS合成器环路带宽窄，不足以减少DS调制器在高频段产生的量化噪声。这种带宽较窄的锁相环滤波器一方面衰减量化噪音，另一方面，由于数据也被滤掉，会引起符号间干扰(ISI)。所以，为了在高速数据速率标准中使用直接调制结构，必须降低量化噪声。本文分析几种类型…     

利用视频套件加速FPGA上的视频开发

处理器友好型视频开发的新方法,无须VHDL或Verilog知识即可生成高度优化的结果 随着下一代视频压缩标准问世,行业从基本视频处理向更复杂的集成处理解决方案转移,达使得系统的要求超越了独立DSP力所能及的视频性能.FPGA以不到30美元的价格提供20GMACs以上的DSP性能,从而为成本敏感型军事、汽车、医疗、消费、工业和安全应用填补了这一空白.只有FPGA能够为整套端对端视频解决方案提供逻辑、嵌入式处理、OS支持和驱动器.     

Tracking monotonically advancing boundaries in image sequences using graph cuts and recursive kernel shape priors

We introduce a probabilistic computer vision technique to track monotonically advancing boundaries of objects within image sequences. Our method incorporates a novel technique for including statistical prior shape information into graph-cut based segmentation, with the aid of a majorization-minimization algorithm. Extension of segmentation from single images to image sequences then follows naturally using sequential Bayesian estimation. Our methodology is applied to two unrelated sets of real biomedical imaging data, and a set of synthetic images. Our results are shown to be superior to manual segmentation.     

Behavioural models for distributed Fractal components

This paper presents a formal behavioural specification framework for specifying and verifying the correct behaviour of distributed Fractal components. The first contribution is a parameterised and hierarchical behavioural model called pNets that serves as a low-level semantic framework for expressing the behaviour of various classes of distributed languages and as a common internal format for our tools. Then, we use this model to define the generation of behavioural models for applications ranging from sequential Fractal components, to distributed objects, and finally to distributed components. Our models are able to characterise both functional and non-functional behaviours and the interaction between the two concerns. Finally, this work has resulted in the development of tools allowing the non-expert programmer to specify the behaviour of his components and (semi)automatically verify properties of his application.