All around our star

Wrapping Our Heads around Endocytosis

Eukaryotic cells use a process called endocytosis to take up materials from their environment and package them for use within the cell. The best-studied form of endocytosis—receptor-mediated endocytosis—has several stages. In the first step, the cell’s outer membrane dimples to form a pocket. A protein collar then assembles around this pocket, forming a thin neck leading to a bulb of membrane. ...

Our Sun: the Nearest Star

Ethylene is all around

The small and simple gaseous molecule ethylene (C2H4) is usually associated with ripening and senescence events in plants. Its effects have been known for ages (literally), and in the last century there have been some major breakthroughs in ethylene biology. These breakthroughs include the discovery that the molecule that hastened the ripening of fruits and caused growth distortions in plants w...

All Around Logic Synthesis

This dissertation is in the area of Computer-Aided Design (CAD) of digital Integrated Circuits (ICs). Today’s digital ICs, such as microprocessors, memories, digital signal processors (DSPs), etc., range from a few thousands to billions of logic gates, flip-flops, and other components, packed in a few millimeters of area. The creation of such highly complex systems would not be possible without...

Tracing All Around

Many information systems are reengineered and redeveloped in practice, since they are legacy software. Typically, no requirements and design specifications exist and, therefore, also no traceability information. While especially the long-term utility of such information is well known, an important question in reengineering is whether installing it can have immediate benefits in the course of th...