Prototyping Environment Research Articles

Sigma Factor-Mediated Tuning of Bacterial Cell-Free Synthetic Genetic Oscillators.

Cell-free transcription–translation provides a simplified prototyping environment to rapidly design and study synthetic networks. Despite the presence of a well characterized toolbox of genetic elements, examples of genetic networks that exhibit complex temporal behavior are scarce. Here, we present a genetic oscillator implemented in an E. coli-based cell-free system under steady-state conditions using microfluidic flow reactors. The oscillator has an activator–repressor motif that utilizes the native transcriptional machinery of E. coli: the RNAP and its associated sigma factors. We optimized a kinetic model with experimental data using an evolutionary algorithm to quantify the key regulatory model parameters. The functional modulation of the RNAP was investigated by coupling two oscillators driven by competing sigma factors, allowing the modification of network properties by means of passive transcriptional regulation.

Modeling the performance of TRISO-based fully ceramic matrix (FCM) fuel in an LWR environment using BISON

Fully ceramic microencapsulated (FCM) fuel is a proposed fuel type for improved accident performance in LWRs (Light Water Reactors) that involves TRISO (TRistructural-ISOtropic) particles embedded in a nano-powder sintered silicon carbide (SiC) matrix. The TRISO particles contain a spherical fuel kernel ranging from 500 to 800 µm in diameter. The kernel and buffer layer are then coated with three layers, each of which is 30–40 µm thick, composed of dense inner pyrolytic carbon (IPyC), chemically vapor deposited silicon carbide (SiC) layer, and an outer pyrolytic carbon (OPyC) layer. These TRISO particles are then embedded in a fully dense sintered SiC matrix with an expected particle packing fraction of about 35–40% by volume. As is the case for gas reactor applications, the release of radioactivity into the coolant is dependent on the integrity of the silicon carbide layer of the TRISO particles, in addition to the SiC matrix. In this work, we report on fuel performance modeling of TRISO-bearing FCM fuel using the BISON code to simulate the thermo-mechanical behavior of this fuel in a prototypic LWR environment. This paper considers the effects of embedding a TRISO particle in the SiC pellet matrix and includes a discussion of the irradiation-induced dimensional change in the pyrolytic carbon (PyC) layers of the TRISO particle. Additionally, methods were developed to simulate a FCM pellet containing a large number of discrete and independent particles. Future work will report on developing an interface debonding model, a fracture model, and a radionuclide transport model.

Virtual Reality for Prototyping Service Journeys

The use of virtual elements for developing new service prototyping environments and more realistic simulations has been suggested as a way to optimise the service prototyping process. This work examines the application of virtual reality (VR) in prototyping service journeys and it hypothesises that VR can recreate service journeys in a highly immersive, agile, and inexpensive manner, thus allowing users to have a representative service experience and enabling service designers to extract high-quality user feedback. To that end, a new service prototyping method, called VR service walkthrough, is presented and evaluated through an empirical comparative study. A VR service walkthrough is a virtual simulation of a service journey, representing how the service unfolds over space and time. A comparative study between the VR service walkthrough method and an adapted service walkthrough method evaluates the application of both methods using a location-based audio tour guide service as a case study. Two user groups (each with 21 users) were used to evaluate both methods based on two factors: the user experience they offered and the subjective meaningfulness and quality of feedback they produced. Results show that the VR service walkthrough method gave a performance similar to that of the service walkthrough method. It was also able to communicate the service concept in an immersive way and foster constructive feedback.

Optimizing the mechanical device of a mono-axial sun tracking mechanism

The paper deals with the dynamic optimization of the mechanical device for a mono-axial sun tracking system, with application for photovoltaic and solar-thermal systems, which convert the solar radiation in electrical or respectively thermal energy. The actuating of the mono-axial tracking mechanism is carried out by using a linear actuator, the optimization study intending to determine the optimal configuration of the mechanism with the aim to minimize the motor force developed by actuator in order to perform the imposed step-by-step tracking algorithm (motion law). The design variables in the optimal design process are represented by the global coordinates of the connection points of the linear actuator to the adjacent parts (the solar panel and the fixed support). The optimization study is conducted in virtual prototyping environment.

CREATE: Acceptance and Adoption of Virtual Prototyping across the Defense R&D and Acquisition Communities

With an annual budget of nearly US600 billion, the US Department of Defense (DoD) is tasked with protecting the US and its allies and interests abroad against potential adversaries. It must accomplish these tasks in a globalized and highly interconnected world where the pace of technology is moving faster than the current time-consuming DoD acquisition systems can keep up with. Moving forward, the DoD must change these time-consuming paradigms and accelerate the pace of innovation. One way to do this is to shift to a virtual prototyping environment where the benefits of high-performance supercomputing and complex physics-based engineering software can expand the decision space and enable the DoD to field better systems faster, cheaper, and at less risk than previous methods. This is the goal of the Computational Research and Engineering Acquisition Tools and Environments (CREATE) program. This issue of CiSE provides the third installment of articles relating to the history, formation, and ongoing work of the High Performance Computing Modernization Program (HPCMP) CREATE program.

Software environment for rapid prototyping of graph and network algorithms

The article presents an innovative software environment for rapid prototyping of graph and network algorithms. The environment consists of two main components: an editor of graphs & networks and an editor of algorithms’ code. The presented environment enables interactive visualization of algorithms implemented therein, which in turn allows quick verification of algorithms results as well as its correctness. The aim of the environment construction was to provide a solution for rapid prototyping of novel algorithms. The developed tool can also be successfully used for educational purposes.

Prototyping a query compiler using Coq (experience report)

Designing and prototyping new features is important in many industrial projects. Functional programming and formal verification tools can prove valuable for that purpose, but lead to challenges when integrating with existing product code or when planning technology transfer. This article reports on our experience using the Coq proof assistant as a prototyping environment for building a query compiler intended for use in IBM's ODM Insights product. We discuss the pros and cons of using Coq for this purpose and describe our methodology for porting the compiler to Java, as required for product integration.

Conceptualizing Business Opportunities: Prototype Theory, Personality, and Environment

In this exploratory study, we utilize a prototype theory perspective to examine how personality (Big Five, Dark Triad) and environmental factors (environmental uncertainty) contribute to the concep...

Clinical manifestations and treatment outcomes of scrub typhus in a rural health care facility on the Thailand-Myanmar border.

Scrub typhus is endemic in rural Southeast Asia. The district of Umphang in northwestern Thailand is a prototype environment for this disease. We report the clinical manifestations and outcomes of patients diagnosed with scrub typhus in this area. Patients diagnosed with scrub typhus between 2011 and 2014 were analyzed. Diagnosis was based on clinical symptoms in conjunction with a positive rapid test or a pathognomonic eschar lesion. A total of 857 patients were included, of which 488 were adults and 369 were children. Most patients (728; 84.9%) were included via a positive serology on rapid test, 86 patients (10.0%) had eschar only, and 43 patients (5.0%) had both sero-confirmation and presence of eschar. The most common symptom was fever (93.8%), followed by headache (48.1%) and cough (33.1%). Eschars were reported in 129 patients, with a significantly higher percentage in children (p < 0.001), and a different anatomical distribution was found when adults and children were compared. Common complications were elevated transaminases, acute kidney injury, and pneumonia. Most patients recovered from the disease. Scrub typhus in Umphang district is common. Patients can present with a variety of clinical symptoms, regardless of the presence of fever. Standard treatment led to a favorable outcome in most patients.

Implementation and Evaluation of FPGA-based Annealing Processor for Ising Model by use of Resource Sharing

The non-von Neumann computer architecture has been widely studied to prepare us for the post-Moore era. The authors implemented this kind of architecture, which finds the lower energy state of the Ising model using circuit operations inspired by simulated annealing in SRAM-based integrated circuits. Our previous prototype was suited for the Ising model because of its simple and typical structure such as its three-dimensional lattice topology, but it could not be used in real world applications. A reconfigurable prototyping environment is needed to develop the architecture and to make it suitable for applications. Here, we describe an FPGA-based prototyping environment to develop the annealing processor's architecture for the Ising model. We implemented the new architecture using a prototyping environment. The new architecture performs approximated simulated annealing for the Ising model, and it supports a highly complex topology. It consists of units having fully-connected multiple spins. Multiple units are placed in a two-dimensional lattice topology, and neighboring units are connected to perform interactions between spins. The number of logic elements was reduced by sharing the operator among multiple spins within the unit. Furthermore, a pseudo-random number generator, which produces random pulse sequences for annealing, is also shared among all the units. As a result, the number of logic elements was reduced to less than 1/10, and the solution accuracy became comparable to that of a conventional computer's simulated annealing.

Prototype Environment for integrating and sharing Farm Things and associated data

Farm equipment, including sensors and mobile machinery, create increasing amounts of data, and data can also be gained from third-party services. In order to be able to fully take advantage of this a farmer needs to be able to gather, store, process, and share the data as needed. In this work we describe a prototype for open environment that can gather, combine, store, select, and share data from arbitrary sources and with external partners, as well as use the data in decision making and provide it as input for various services. The environment is built using the Service Oriented Architecture paradigm and is therefore not tied to any specific operating system or software framework. We have tested the environment on the farm scale in Finland. The system was found suitable to improve the work in all tested tasks.

Embedded Reference: Translocating Gestures in Video-Mediated Interaction

ABSTRACTAudiovisual technologies can enable informal communication akin to face-to-face interaction. However, they prove less successful when deployed to support work and organizational activities. This is, in part, due to the limited ways such technologies provide access to the materials, objects, documents, and the like that are critical for supporting work activities as they emerge and unfold. What is often neglected in these new technologies is a consideration of how objects are referred to, manipulated, and transformed within and through interactions between colleagues. In this article, we consider an advanced prototype system called t-Room that seeks to provide geographically dispersed participants with rich and varied access to physical and digital documents. This technology has been designed to support flexible collaborative activities with and around objects, as if remote participants and materials in their local environment were copresent within a common space. By undertaking quasi-naturalistic experiments in this prototype environment, we reveal that at times participants could unproblematically refer to detailed features of the environments and when there were difficulties, resolve them. We notice, however, that at other times participants had great difficulties in assessing the relationships among themselves, their remote colleagues, and objects in the environment, the very flexibility of the technology introducing instabilities into the sequential accomplishment of referential activities. By considering examples of this technology in use, we suggest that these limitations may reflect wider issues concerned with our understanding of how interactional activities are embedded within the local environment. Data in this paper are in English.

Similar task features shape judgment and categorization processes.

The distinction between similarity-based and rule-based strategies has instigated a large body of research in categorization and judgment. Within both domains, the task characteristics guiding strategy shifts are increasingly well documented. Across domains, past research has observed shifts from rule-based strategies in judgment to similarity-based strategies in categorization, but limited these comparisons to 1 prototypical environment, a linear task structure, and a restricted set of strategies. To systematically compare the 2 domains, we considered several instantiations of rule-based and similarity-based strategies and examined strategy choice across different types of judgment and categorization tasks. Between participants, we varied task characteristics from a 1-dimensional linear to a multidimensional linear and to 2 multidimensional nonlinear tasks. Irrespective of domain, strategies considered, or model comparison technique used, we find that more participants relied on similarity-based strategies when the functional relationship between the cues and the criterion was nonlinear. Shifts from rule-based strategies in judgment to similarity-based strategies in categorization, however, were rare and most pronounced in 1-dimensional environments. These results support the hypothesis that the cognitive strategies people select to solve a judgment or categorization task depend less on the domain but more on the complexity of the task. (PsycINFO Database Record

Parametric optimization in virtual prototyping environment of the control device for a robotic system used in thin layers deposition

The paper deals with the optimal design of the control system for a 6-DOF robot used in thin layers deposition. The optimization is based on parametric technique, by modelling the design objective as a numerical function, and then establishing the optimal values of the design variables so that to minimize the objective function. The robotic system is a mechatronic product, which integrates the mechanical device and the controlled operating device.The mechanical device of the robot was designed in the CAD (Computer Aided Design) software CATIA, the 3D-model being then transferred to the MBS (Multi-Body Systems) environment ADAMS/View. The control system was developed in the concurrent engineering concept, through the integration with the MBS mechanical model, by using the DFC (Design for Control) software solution EASY5. The necessary angular motions in the six joints of the robot, in order to obtain the imposed trajectory of the end-effector, have been established by performing the inverse kinematic analysis. The positioning error in each joint of the robot is used as design objective, the optimization goal being to minimize the root mean square during simulation, which is a measure of the magnitude of the positioning error varying quantity.

PetIGA: A framework for high-performance isogeometric analysis

We present PetIGA, a code framework to approximate the solution of partial differential equations using isogeometric analysis. PetIGA can be used to assemble matrices and vectors which come from a Galerkin weak form, discretized with Non-Uniform Rational B-spline basis functions. We base our framework on PETSc, a high-performance library for the scalable solution of partial differential equations, which simplifies the development of large-scale scientific codes, provides a rich environment for prototyping, and separates parallelism from algorithm choice. We describe the implementation of PetIGA, and exemplify its use by solving a model nonlinear problem. To illustrate the robustness and flexibility of PetIGA, we solve some challenging nonlinear partial differential equations that include problems in both solid and fluid mechanics. We show strong scaling results on up to 4096 cores, which confirm the suitability of PetIGA for large scale simulations.

Connecting performance to social structure and pedagogy as a pathway to scaling learning analytics in MOOCs: an exploratory study

AbstractThis exploratory study focuses on the design and evaluation of teaching analytics that relate social learning structure with performance measures in a massive open online course (MOOC) prototype environment. Using reflexive analysis of online learning trace data and qualitative performance measures we present an exploratory empirical study that: (a) rigorously evaluates a novel, multi‐dimensional performance construct; (b) describes differences in small group dynamics and structure; and (c) draws a connection between learning performance and group structure. Performance is operationalized using a combination of knowledge construction measurement from discussion boards, rigorous analysis of student work products and several indicators of small group identity in the course examined. Interview and observational data are used to develop an approach for deriving and validating a model of the social structure of students in the course using traces of interaction data. The connection between performance and structure is developed at the small group unit of analysis. Implications for MOOC design, scaling MOOC analytics and a vision for developing social sensors in MOOC environments are presented in the discussion and conclusion.

Evaluation of an open-source collaborative web-GIS prototype in risk management with students

Over the past decades, advancements in web services and web-based geospatial technologies have led to increasing delivery, access and analysis of rich spatial information over the web. With the use of open access data and open-source technology, it has become possible for policy and decision makers to make more transparent and informed decisions. Under the framework of the CHANGES project, a prototype web-based collaborative decision support platform was developed for the evaluation and selection of risk management measures, mainly targeting flood and landslide hazards. The design of the conceptual framework was based on the initial observations obtained from field visits and stakeholders’ meetings at the case study areas of the project. A three-tier client–server architecture backed up by Boundless (OpenGeo) was applied with its client side development environment for rapid prototyping. This developed prototype was tested with university students to obtain feedback on the conceptual and technical aspects of the platform as well as to analyse how the application of interactive tools during an exercise could assist students in studying and understanding risk management. During the exercise, different roles (authorities, technicians, community) were assigned to each group of students for identification and selection of risk mitigation measures in a study area: Cucco village located in Malborghetto-Valbruna municipality of North-Eastern Italy. Data were collected by means of written feedback forms on specific aspects of the platform and the exercise. The subsequent analysis of the feedback reveals that students with previous experience in Geographical Information Systems (GIS) responded positively and showed interests in performing exercises with such kinds of interactive tools for learning, compared to the ones with fewer or no GIS experience. These results also show that the prototype is useful and supportive as a decision support tool in risk management while user-friendliness, interactivity and practical aspects of the platform could be further improved.

Building blocks in creative computing: modularity increases the probability of prototyping novel ideas

Design is a cyclical journey from creative ideas to concrete realizations of those ideas though prototyping. Designers today have increasing access to low-cost technology toolkits within the electronic and computational domain. However, for technical novices, including electronic components in prototypes can hamper the ability to create novel ideas by introducing technical obstacles. Electronic modules can increase the probability of prototyping success, at the cost of reduced design flexibility. This research (1) presents the results of a pilot usability evaluation of (N = 68) participants making physical light emitting diode (LED) light creations with non-modular electronics components, and (2) uses this evaluation to motivate a creative prototyping study (N = 86) exploring the question: ‘How does prototyping tool modularity influence the creative result?’ Using a browser-based crowd platform (Amazon’s Mechanical Turk), participants created electric ‘creature circuits’ with LEDs in a virtual prototyping environment. We found that increasing the modularity of LED components (i) increased the novelty rating of prototypes as rated by a condition-blind panel, (ii) increased the quantity of prototypes created and the quantity of LEDs used by study participants, (iii) increased participants’ degree of perceived self-efficacy and cognitive flow, and (iv) reduced the number of errors due to LED polarity. The results highlight that novice prototyping with electronics is difficult due to the number of possible ways to fail. The findings show that modularity can reduce the chance of errors and improve the likelihood of creating novel prototypes.

Proposal of an Innovative Environment for Supporting Production Scale-up, Including Design, Prototyping, Manufacturing, Assembly, Testing, and Certification of Products that Require Special Conditions

A considerable bottleneck in Brazil is the lack of technology centers aimed at industrial R&D. On one side, universities conduct basic research that is usually does not go beyond bench testing. On the other side, companies have their structure focused on large-scale production. Pilot plants, which are fundamental environments for the innovation process, are rarely found within Brazilian companies. This paper proposes a model for an innovative infrastructure, focused on meeting industrial demands that require special conditions of operation and control. Its scope is limited to supporting innovation mainly in the pre-competitive stage of product and process development. To this effect, the proposed model consists of a technology service center, embedded in an industrial environment, which focuses on production scale-up, large scale testing, manufacturing/assembly of pilot plants, and development of real size prototypes. Through these activities, this center is expected to give full support to technological development and to industrial innovation processes. In order to validate this proposal, an environment was modeled for the development of renewable energy solutions, which encompasses scale-up, testing and certification.

Communicative intentions of child-directed speech in three different learning environments: Observations from the Netherlands, and rural and urban Mozambique

This article compares the communicative intentions observed in the speech addressed to children of 1;1 and 1;6 years old from three cultural communities: the Netherlands, rural Mozambique, and urban Mozambique. These communities represent two prototypical learning environments and a third hybrid: Western, urban, middle-class families; non-Western, rural, subsistence-farming families; and non-Western, urban learning environment. The results show that the Dutch CDS contains relatively more utterances with a cognitive intention than the Mozambican CDS. In Mozambique, CDS contains more imperatives, particularly in the rural environment. The CDS from urban Mozambique contains more socioemotional intentions. The findings suggest that these differences can be explained in terms of the different responsibilities and levels of autonomy expected from children of the three learning environments.