The early (2-4 d) effects of slowly imposed soil water deficit on Lupinus albus photosynthetic performance, carbon metabolism, and hormonal balance in different organs (leaf blade, stem stele, stem cortex, and root) were evaluated on 23-d-old plants (growth chamber assay). Our work shows that several metabolic adjustments occurred prior to alteration of the plant water status, implying that water deficit is perceived before the change in plant water status. The slow, progressive decline in soil water content started to be visible 3 d after withholding water (3 DAW). The earliest plant changes were associated with organ-specific metabolic responses (particularly in the leaves) and with leaf conductance and only later with plant water status and photosynthetic rate (4 DAW) or photosynthetic capacity (according to the Farquhar model; 6 DAW). Principal component analysis (PCA) of the physiological parameters, the carbohydrate and the hormone levels and their relative values, as well as leaf water-soluble metabolites full scan data (LC-MS/MS), showed separation of the different sampling dates. At 6 DAW classically described stress responses are observed, with plant water status, ABA level, and root hormonal balance contributing to the separation of these samples. Discrimination of earlier stress stages (3 and 4 DAW) is only achieved when the relative levels of indole-3-acetic acid (IAA), cytokinins (Cks), and carbon metabolism (glucose, sucrose, raffinose, and starch levels) are taken into account. Our working hypothesis is that, in addition to single responses (e.g. ABA increase), the combined alterations in hormone and carbohydrate levels play an important role in the stress response mechanism. Response to more advanced stress appears to be associated with a combination of cumulative changes, occurring in several plant organs. The carbohydrate and hormonal balance in the leaf (IAA to bioactive-Cks; soluble sugars to IAA and starch to IAA; relative abundances of the different soluble sugars) flag the initial responses to the slight decrease in soil water availability (10-15% decrease). Further alterations in sucrose to ABA and in raffinose to ABA relative values (in all organs) indicate that soil water availability continues to decrease. Such alterations when associated with changes in the root hormone balance indicate that the stress response is initiated. It is concluded that metabolic balance (e.g. IAA/bioactive Cks, carbohydrates/IAA, sucrose/ABA, raffinose/ABA, ABA/IAA) is relevant in triggering adjustment mechanisms.

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The proposed regulation strategy consists in obtaining at the right time the correct information about the energy contained in the resonant tank. This information allows a stable operation of the switches and a higher efficiency of any Series Loaded Series Resonant (SLSR) power converter, especially when contactless energy transfer is concerned. The strategy is based on guaranteeing the correct portion of energy transported by the resonant tank to the load. The portion has to vary corresponding to the error signal taken from the output voltage and remains unchanged if the error signal is at its minimum. In a certain way this method is similar to the Current Mode Control of the classical power converters. The viability of the idea is demonstrated by simulation of a realistic analogue circuit (on preparation for a digital implementation in the near future).

Recent issues of global heating and energy shortages are imposing a need to change our paradigm around transportation. Somehow, electric vehicles are progressively standing as a strong and necessary alternative for the society. Technically and technologically the acceptance of the EV is easier now than ever but the psychology of the consumers and the running business of internal combustion vehicles, the whole existing infrastructure are too much conservative to be changed easily. The changes in technology require changes in the engineering society and its human resources. The objective of this paper is to give a contribution to the discussion and reflection of potential future scenarios where EV?HEV?s are spread across the society. It gives an overview of the range of knowledge and competences necessary for a sustainable and streamlined development of those. In fact, it is expected that a new kind of professional profiles need to be created or developed to supply the work market with the right human resources. The paper provides some discussion on the creation of new profiles or adaption of existing ones. Among different possible scenarios the creation of post-graduation courses for students holding undergraduate profiles in the fields referred to earlier would be an interesting and viable solution for fast response. The post graduation would be focused in specific key areas of the EV?HEV. Several factors are pointed out to endorse this scenario

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Models, with different levels of detail, share similar abstractions that can be reused by means of model-driven techniques such as transformations. For example, scenarios are a well-known technique in requirements engineering to represent behavioral flows in a software system. When using UML, scenarios are typically represented with activity models in the early stages of software development, while sequence models are used to describe more detailed object interactions as modeling progresses. This paper defines transformation rules to automate the migration from activity to sequence models. We present a case study illustrating the application of our transformation rules. Our preliminary assessment of the impact of the benefits of using these transformations points to: (i) a reduction of around 50% in the effort building sequence models, (ii) increased trace ability among models, and (iii) error prevention when migrating from different scenario notations.

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Ontologies and rules are usually loosely coupled in knowledge rep- resentation formalisms. In fact, ontologies use open-world reasoning while the leading semantics for rules use non-monotonic, closed-world reasoning. One ex- ception is the tightly-coupled framework of Minimal Knowledge and Negation as Failure (MKNF), which allows statements about individuals to be jointly derived via entailment from an ontology and inferences from rules. Nonetheless, the prac- tical usefulness of MKNF has not always been clear, although recent work has formalized a general resolution-based method for querying MKNF when rules are taken to have the well-founded semantics, and the ontology is modeled by a general Oracle. That work leaves open what algorithms should be used to relate the entailments of the ontology and the inferences of rules. In this paper we pro- vide such algorithms, and describe the implementation of a query-driven system, CDF-Rules, for hybrid knowledge bases combining both (non-monotonic) rules under the well-founded semantics and a (monotonic) ontology, represented by a CDF (ALCQ) theory.

Recent issues of global heating and energy shortages are imposing a need to change our paradigm around transportation. Somehow, electric vehicles are progressively standing as a strong and necessary alternative for the society. Technically and technologically the acceptance of the EV is easier now than ever but the psychology of the consumers and the running business of internal combustion vehicles, the whole existing infrastructure are too much conservative to be changed easily. The changes in technology require changes in the engineering society and its human resources. The objective of this paper is to give a contribution to the discussion and reflection of potential future scenarios where EV/HEV‘s are spread across the society. It gives an overview of the range of knowledge and competences necessary for a sustainable and streamlined development of those. In fact, it is expected that a new kind of professional profiles need to be created or developed to supply the work market with the right human resources. The paper provides some discussion on the creation of new profiles or adaption of existing ones. Among different possible scenarios the creation of post-graduation courses for students holding undergraduate profiles in the fields referred to earlier would be an interesting and viable solution for fast response. The post graduation would be focused in specific key areas of the EV/HEV. Several factors are pointed out to endorse this scenario

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Supply chain management must appeal to different and more innovative strategies that make possible a better responsiveness to customers’ requirements and needs. The supply chains must be more agile, and also improving its ability to cope with unexpected disturbances, that is, supply chains must be more resilient. The deployment of these two strategies simultaneously will contribute to enhance the supply chain performance and competitiveness. Accordingly, the main objective of this paper is to propose an innovative conceptual model to a better understanding the influence of agile and resilient strategies on supply chain performance and competitiveness. The conceptual model proposed considers a set of agile and resilient practices deployed with consideration for the upstream and downstream supply chain relationships, as well as for the firm inward. In this model a performance measurement system is also proposed which intends to monitor the influence of these practices on operational and economic performance of the supply chain.

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N-doped ZnO films were deposited on glass substrates by RF magnetron sputtering with different deposition pressures. The samples were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), atomic force morphology (AFM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), Hall measurements and optical spectrophotometer. The XRD patterns confirmed that the films are polycrystalline and the influence of deposition pressure on the structural properties. AFM microstructures also authenticated the change in the size and shape of the grains as a function of deposition pressure; the root mean square (RMS) roughness has reached a maximum (10.65 nm) at 1.5 x 10 -2 mbar. XPS spectra revealed the change in the chemical composition. The amount of adsorbed oxygen and nitrogen at oxide sites has reached the maximum at 9.0 x 10 -3 mbar, where the film showed p-type conductivity. The optical transmittance spectra have indicated that the absorption edge is shifted towards the shorter wavelength at higher deposition pressure. Correspondingly, the optical band gap is increased from 2.17 to 2.80 eV. The average visible transmittance in the wavelength ranging 500-800 nm has been increased from 49% to 82%. Copyright © 2010 American Scientific Publishers All rights reserved.