Key Crowdsourcing Technologies for Product Design and Development

Traditionally, small and medium enterprises(SMEs) in manufacturing rely heavily on a skilled, technical and professional workforce to increase productivity and remain globally competitive. Crowdsourcing offers an opportunity for SMEs to get access to online communities who may provide requested services such as generating design ideas or problem solutions. However, there are some barriers preventing them from adopting crowdsourcing into their product design and development(PDD) practice. In this paper, we provide a literature review of key crowdsourcing technologies including crowdsourcing platforms and tools, crowdsourcing frameworks,and techniques in terms of open call generation, rewarding, crowd qualification for working, organization structure of crowds, solution evaluation, workflow and quality control and indicate the challenges of integrating crowdsourcing with a PDD process. We also explore the necessary techniques and tools to support the crowdsourcing PDD process. Finally, we propose some key guidelines for coping with the aforementioned challenges in the crowdsourcing PDD process.

Role of c-Jun NH_(2)-terminal kinase-mediated mitogen-activated protein kinase pathway in response to pesticides in Apis cerana cerana

The mitogen-activated protein kinase(MAPK)cascade pathway plays an important role in regulating stress responses.The function of the c-Jun NH_(2)-terminal kinase(JNK),a component of the MAPK cascade pathway,in Apis cerana cerana(Acc)remains unclear.Here,JNK was isolated and identified from Acc.Bioinformatics analyses revealed there is a typical serine/threonine protein kinase catalytic domain in the AccJNK protein.An expression profile analysis showed that AccJNK was significantly induced by pesticide treatments.To further explore the functional mechanisms of AccJNK,a yeast 2-hybrid screen was performed,activator protein-1(AP-1)was screened as the interaction partner of AccJNK,and the interaction relationship was further verified by pull-down assay.Quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction showed the expression pattern of AccAP-I was similar to that of AccJNK.After a knockdown of AccJNK or AccAP-I by RNA interference,the survival rate of Acc after pesticide treatments increased.Additionally,the expression levels of antioxidant-related genes and the activities of antioxidant enzymes increased,suggesting that the knockdown of AccJNK or AccAP-I increased the antioxidant capacity of bees.Our study revealed that the JNK-mediated MAPK pathway responds to pesticide stress by altering the antioxidant capacity of Acc.

Experimental study of non-uniform bubbles in a plume

The bubble plume is an important flow phenomenon, ubiquitous in many fields. The non-uniform bubbles in a plume are often simply considered as uniform and moving with a same slip velocity in an integral model. This study aims to have a better understanding of the behavior of the non-uniform bubbles in a plume. A set of experiments are conducted in a transparent water tank, in which the air plumes are generated through different injectors to vary the spectrum of the bubble size. The shadow images of the bubbles are simultaneously recorded with the illumination of a plane backlight. The algorithm used in the image analysis for tracing the bubbles is a newly developed multi-frame method based on the predictor-corrector method, with a good accuracy in estimating the size and the velocity of the overlapped bubbles based on the bubble shadow images. The bubbles are divided into several groups by their equivalent diameters with an interval of 0.5 mm. The spectrums of the bubble size and the void fraction are measured. It is found that the bubbles of different sizes show different dynamics features, resulting in a difference in the radial distribution. It is shown that the large bubbles gather in the center of the plume, while the medium bubbles spread the widest and even wider than the small bubbles. The difference can be explained by the effects of the transverse lift force and the amplitude of the bubble oscillation.

Double-plume Lagrangian particle tracking model and its application in deep water oil spill

Due to the density stratification of sea water,the dispersed oil droplets and gas bubbles with small diameters,as well as the dissolved components,may remain in some specific depths.The double-plume Lagrangian particle tracking model for bubbly plumes in vertical density stratified environments is improved and applied to predict the underwater pollutants in a blowout.This model considers the different properties and dissolution processes of components in crude oil and focuses on their behavior and stratification differences in the plume.The crude oil components are divided into several groups and the dissolution of oil and gas is also considered.The model is applied to simulate the“Deepwater Horizon”oil spill accident in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.The results show several enrichment layers of oil and gas at different depth and the differences in concentration between components,which corresponds to the distribution of petroleum pollutants in the in-situ observation.