CA Research Tools

We conclude this chapter with a few illustrative color plates. Simple B W graphics are sufficient for viewing CA only in the special case when sites take on one of two values. In all other cases, color is indispensable for visualizing the behavior of the system. The plates were produced using the freely available CA software packages MCell, Cellab and WinCA. See Appendix A CA Research Tools for a description of these programs and links to web sites from which they can be HnwnlnnHpH... 

Appendix A provides a brief description of several existing hardware and software tools designed for CA research. Appendix B contains a useful list of CA and more general c omplcxity-related information sources availabk on the World Wide Web (WWW), subject-sorted into a total of 91 WWW Universal Resource Loc a-tor (URL) links in 16 categories. The book is indexed and includes an extensive bibliography. 

SciFinder at http //www.cas.org/SCIFINDER/scicover2.html is an easy-to-use desktop research tool that allows the user to explore research topics, browse scientific journals, and access information on the most recent scientific developments. SciFinder Scholar is a desktop research tool designed especially for use by students and faculty to easily access the information in the CAS databases. With either tool, one can search Chemical Abstracts and the CA Registry by author name, research topic, substance identifier, chemical structure, or chemical reaction. 

Accdg to Hammersley Handscomb (Addnl Ref N, p 8), S. Ulam, J. von Neumann and E. Fermi independently rediscovered Monte Carlo methods ca 1944 and started its systematic development. They also ensured that their scientific colleagues should become aware of the possibilities, potentialities and physical applications. The real use of Monte Carlo methods as research tools is attributed to von Neumann Ulam who applied them to random neutron diffusion in fissile material... 

SPM is widely used as research tool and industrial measuring instrument, and has drawn attraction as nanoscale processing tool at nanometer order from the initial stage of development. The atomic operation became possible by SPM [54], and scanning probe nanolithography (SPNL) was developed at ca. 10 nm level [55]. There are three major categories for SPNL as follows ... 

Warehoused Plastics, Inc., 13 Blackburn St., Toronto, Ont., Canada M4M 2B3 Wateree Chemical Co., P.O. Box 1045, Camden, SC 29020 Whitey Research Tool Co., 5679 Landregan St., Emeryville, CA 94608 Zeus Industrial Products, Inc., Thompson St., Raritan, NJ 08869... 

In clinical chemistry, the most fiequently assessed matrices for calcium status are blood (particularly plasma or serum) and urine. Fecal calcium levels are rarely measured. The intracellular calcium concentration is much lower than extracellular (nmol vs. mmol levels) and, although physiologically as important as the extracellular ionized fraction, is not usually measured in the routine clinical chemistry laboratory. However, the measurement of intracellular Ca ", both total and free, is an important research tool and will be discussed briefly at the end of this section. 

Chapter 5 provides some examples of purely analyti( al tools useful for describing CA. It discusses methods of inferring cycle-state structure from global eigenvalue spectra, the enumeration of limit cycles, the use of shift transformations, local structure theory, and Lyapunov functions. Some preliminary research on linking CA behavior with the topological characteristics of the underlying lattice is also described. 

CAM-PC is a general purpose CA software simulation environment based on CAM-6, Designed by members of the GENOME Project at Eotvos University in Hungary, the first version of CAM-PC extends the possibilities of CAM-6 but is not yet fully compatible with it. The primary addition is support for 8 bit planes, increasing the size of CAM-6 s ccdl-statc alphabet to 256, The laudable purpose behind the project is to provide inexpensive but otherwise fully functional simulation tools for amateur researchers unable to afford faster dedicatcxl hardware. 

We should not minimize the effects that electronic searching of patents has had on the business of research. In 1990, CAS introduced MARPAT, which is a database of Markush (generic) structures found in patent documents [1]. This database provided a valuable tool for patent searching in a more comprehensive way than had been available previously. In 1995, CAS launched SciFinder, which provided access to the patent literature for chemists on their desktops. Using the SciFinder interface, one may search for research topics, authors, companies, or structures/reactions. From a practical viewpoint, SciFinder did more to enhance the searching capabilities of the medicinal chemist than any other tool. Even today, SciFinder continues to provide a first pass through the patent literature when chemists want to include patents in their searching. Indeed, when a search is performed, patent references are included in the answer set. Only very recently have there been additional tools to search the patent literature that have found widespread use. 

Ulrich H, Trujillo CA, Nery AA, Alves JM, Majumder P, Resende RR, Martins AH (2006) DNA and RNA aptamers from tools for basic research towards therapeutic applications. Comb Chem Fligh Throughput Screen 9 619-632... 

However, it is not just the presence or absence of an element that is useful (as most elements will be present at some concentration), but it is the relative variation in the trace element profile that is the parameter that provides the major discriminatory power. McHard et al. [16] were possibly some of the first researchers to apply a normalization procedure to multielement data in order to maximize the differences between two sets of samples. Their approach, which is now accepted as being a standard tool for use in chemometric investigations, was to identify an element whose concentration was constant, irrespective of the geographical origin of the samples, and then to normalize all other elemental data against it. In McHard s study on fruit juice, they used Zn. The authors of this chapter used Ca in an egg authenticity study, where eggshells were used as the sample matrix (unpublished data) and Mg was used in a study of Welsh onions [14]. 

---