Direct Measurements of the Volume Flow Rate and Emissions in a Large Naturally Ventilated Building.

The direct measurement of emissions from naturally ventilated dairy barns is challenging due to their large openings and the turbulent and unsteady airflow at the inlets and outlets. The aim of this study was to quantify the impacts of the number and positions of sensors on the estimation of volume flow rate and emissions. High resolution measurements of a naturally ventilated scaled building model in an atmospheric boundary layer wind tunnel were done. Tracer gas was released inside the model and measured at the outlet area, using a fast flame ionization detector (FFID). Additionally, the normal velocity on the area was measured using laser Doppler anemometry (LDA). In total, for a matrix of 65 × 4 sensor positions, the mean normal velocities and the mean concentrations were measured and used to calculate the volume flow rate and the emissions. This dataset was used as a reference to assess the accuracy while systematically reducing the number of sensors and varying the positions of them. The results showed systematic errors in the emission estimation up to +97%, when measurements of concentration and velocity were done at one constant height. This error could be lowered under 5%, when the concentrations were measured as a vertical composite sample.

Discovery of novel NAMPT inhibitors based on pharmacophore modeling and virtual screening techniques.

Nicotinamide phosphoribosyltransferase (NAMPT), an enzyme taking part in main NAD biosynthetic pathway, is an attractive target for anticancer therapy. The purpose of our study is to find novel NAMPT inhibitors based on in silico drug discovery means including the generation of 3D-QSAR models, and virtual screening techniques. Firstly, ten pharmacophore models were generated by Catalyst/HypoGen algorithm. Hypo1 with high correl value (0.96), large cost (77.77), and low root mean square deviation (0.81), featured by four chemical features was selected as the best one. Subsequently, Hypo1 was validated through test set prediction and Fischer's randomization methodologies. Then we screened some public compound libraries (Asinex, Ibscreen and Natural products database) using Hypo1 for a 3D query. The screened hits were further refined by Lipinski's rule of five, ADMET properties as well as molecular docking studies. Finally, six molecules with diverse scaffolds exhibited the right pharmacophore features and good binding modes between the receptor and ligands, and were selected as possible candidates against NAMPT for further study.