Active Technologies for Network and Service Management: Report on DSOM'99
DSOM’99, the Tenth IFIP/ IEEE International Workshop on Distributed Systems: Operations and Management followed a series of annual meetings, the latest of which took place in Delaware, (DSOM’98) [1], Sydney, Australia (DSOM’97) [2], and L’Aquila, Italy (DSOM’96) [3]. DSOM is a single-track workshop of the management research community. The workshop traditionally stresses interaction and encourages active participation. DSOM’99 was hosted by the Computer Engineering and Networks Laboratory (TIK) of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology ETH Zürich from October 11–13 in Zürich, Switzerland. Ninety participants attended the event. DSOM’99 was supported by Ascom, BT, IBM, GTE, Lucent, and Swisscom. For technical paper sessions, 55 submissions had been received, out of which 20 were selected for presentation and are published in the workshop proceedings [4]. Ten papers in the program came from Europe, eight papers from the Americas, and two papers from Asia. About half of the contributions originated from industry labs, the other half from academia. The program was structured into seven paper sessions, with a panel at the end of each day. A keynote speech opened up the program.
Report: Internet Services: Management Beyond the Element—A Report on DSOM'2001
The report from Annual International Workshop on 'Distributed Systems: Operations and Management' is presented. The theme of workshop was 'Internet services: management beyond the element' which reflected the shift within current Internet from managing isolated network elements to managing integrated end-to-end services. The topics discussed at workshop included service provisioning, application management, customer care, QoS management, policy languages and IP applications. The tutorial on 'JMX in Java & Management Environments' described status of JMX and possible ways to integrate JMX in JAVA environment.
Scaffolds Containing Spirulina sp. LEB 18 Biomass: Development, Characterization and Evaluation of In Vitro Biodegradation.
Polymer nanofibers are nanomaterials that can be used as scaffolds in tissue engineering. The objective of this study was to develop, characterize and evaluate the in vitro degradation of a biomaterial consisting of nanofibers produced from biodegradable and biocompatible polymers with potential applications as a scaffold for tissue regeneration and containing Spirulina sp. LEB 18 biomass as the bioactive compound. The polymers used were poly(hydroxybutyrate-co-hydroxyvalerate) and polycaprolactone. The polymeric solutions exhibited sufficiently high viscosity to produce uniform nanofibers with diameters between 335 and 617 nm. The applied conditions were as follows: a voltage of 25 kV, a distance from the capillary to the collector of 120 mm, a capillary diameter of 0.80 mm, and 12% polycaprolactone and a blend of 5% polycaprolactone and 10% poly(hydroxybutyrate-co-hydroxyvalerate). The biomass was incorporated into the nanofibers at a concentration of 3%, and the incorporation was confirmed using confocal microscopy. The nanofibers were characterized using differential scanning calorimetry and thermogravimetric analysis, which showed that the addition of biomass did not alter the thermal properties of the biomaterial. The addition of biomass improved the tensile strength and elongation of the scaffolds compared with those produced with polymers alone. A biodegradation assay showed enzymatic action toward the biomaterial, simulating the behavior of natural tissue. Based on the analysis, it was concluded that the scaffolds that were produced have the potential to be applied in the field of tissue regeneration as biomaterials with pharmacological properties.