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University of Technology Sydney. Faculty of Science. Inflammation of the brain is increasingly recognised as important in encephalitis. The high mortality and morbidity rates of acute neuroinflammatory diseases has directed significant interest in the investigation of biomarkers to define neuroinflammation and explore mechanisms involved in the regulation of central nervous system immune responses. Metabolomics is a rapidly emerging research field increasingly recognised as a powerful approach for addressing the gaps in knowledge underlying the pathophysiologic mechanisms involved in neuroinflammation and accurate diagnostic biomarkers. The advancements in analytical platforms followed by subsequent chemometrics tools have revolutionised untargeted metabolomics analyses. With liquid chromatography coupled to high resolution mass spectrometry moving to the forefront, an untargeted metabolomics analysis method was developed and optimised to identify multi-class metabolites in human cerebrospinal fluids. The detection of cerebrospinal fluid metabolites were determined based on a simple and rapid methanol precipitation sample preparation method. The chromatographic separation was achieved within a twenty minute gradient elution using hydrophilic interaction chromatography. The method exhibited good reproducibility, high efficiency chromatographic separation and strong mass resolving mass spectrometry analysis. The practicality and robustness of the developed method on a pilot study further demonstrated the potential of the untargeted metabolomics strategy to identify biomarkers and understand the biochemical pathways involved in neuroinflammation. With metabolites as the downstream products of cellular function, the application of metabolomics data is to understand the pathogenesis of neuroinflammatory mechanisms involved in encephalitis. Preliminary evidence showed statistically discriminative metabolites in the tryptophan-kynurenine pathway, nitric oxide pathway and elevation of neopterin. The use of the adjacent ratios such as kynurenine/tryptophan, anthranilic acid/3-hydroxyanthranilic acid and ADMA/arginine in combination with neopterin can serve as a potential cerebrospinal fluid biomarker panel to predict neuroinflammation, particularly when routine tests and neuroimaging return a negative result in encephalitis patients. The emergence of cerebrospinal metabolomics holds significant promise incorporating omics research into a clinical diagnostic service.

To optimise the use of limited available land, land-scarce cities such as Singapore are increasingly looking towards the underground in search of more space. A good understanding of what already exists underground is essential for the planning of underground spaces. In particular, utility services make up a significant part of what exists underground. To meet planning needs, the Singapore government has initiated efforts towards bringing records of existing utility networks together in a single database and share its contents to support planning, design, and construction of underground developments. However, these records can not be relied on to support these critical processes: They are not guaranteed to represent today’s state of the underground, are not accurate or of unknown accuracy, are inconsistently modelled, and may indicate as-design information instead of as-built information. This lack of reliability leads to an increase in cost and a loss in efficiency caused by the need to repeatedly survey to locate existing utility services on-site, and can have potentially disastrous outcomes when an excavation would damage existing services. Technological advances in utility surveying and mapping devices such as Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) and gyroscopic pipeline mapping devices offer the potential of accurately mapping utilities in three dimensions (3D) at a large scale and high speed. However, a better understanding of the benefits and limitations of these technologies in a practical context is needed, as well as their suitability for mapping to support applications such as urban planning and land administration. The Digital Underground project is a collaboration between Singapore-ETH Centre, Singapore Land Authority and the City of Zürich that aims to develop a roadmap towards a reliable 3D utility map of Singapore. To enable the development of utility mapping standards and guidelines, the 3D mapping workflow for underground utilities is studied extensively based on market research, literature study, and case studies. This work presents the beginnings of a framework for 3D mapping of underground utilities as one of the initial results of the Digital Underground project as it is in progress. From these experiences, it can be concluded that, together with existing data, data captured using various surveying methods can indeed contribute to the establishment and maintenance of a consolidated and reliable utility map. To this end, a multi-sensor, multi-data 3D mapping workflow is proposed to integrate data captured using different surveying techniques during different moments in the development lifecycle of utilities. Based on this framework, this work also identifies areas for improvement and critical gaps to be bridged that will ultimately form part of the roadmap., International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences, 42 (4/W10), ISSN:1682-1750, ISSN:2194-9034, ISSN:1682-1777

A nautical chart is a kind of map used to describe the seafloor morphology and the shoreline of adjacent lands. One of its main purposes is to guaranty safety of maritime navigation. As a consequence, construction of a nautical chart follows very specific rules. The cartographer has to select and highlight undersea features according to their relevance to navigation. In an automated process, the system must be able to identify and classify these features from the terrain model.An undersea feature is a subjective individuation of a part of the seafloor. Landform recognition is a difficult task because its definition usually relies on a qualitative and fuzzy description. Achieving automatic recognition of landforms requires a formal definition of the landforms properties and their modelling. In the maritime domain, the International Hydrographic Organisation published a standard terminology of undersea feature names which formalises a set of definitions mainly for naming features and communication purpose. This terminology is here used as a starting point for the automatic classification of the features from a terrain model.In order to integrate knowledge about the submarine relief and its representation on the chart, this research aims to define ontologies of the submarine relief and nautical chart. Then, the ontologies are applied to generalisation of nautical chart. It includes two main parts. In the first part of the research, an ontology is defined to organize geographical and cartographic knowledge for undersea feature representation and nautical chart generalisation. First, a domain ontology of the submarine relief introduces the different concepts of undersea features with their geometric and topological properties. This ontology is required for the classification of features. Second, a representation ontology is presented, which describes how bathymetric entities are portrayed on the map. Third, a generalisation process ontology defines constraints and operations in nautical chart generalisation. In the second part, a generalisation process based on the ontology is designed relying on a multi-agent system. Four kinds of agents (isobath, sounding, feature and group of features) are defined to manage cartographic objects on the chart. A database model was generated from the ontology. The bathymetric data and the ontology are stored in a triplestore database, and are connected to an interface in Java and C++ to automatically classify the undersea features extracted from the bathymetry, and evaluate the cartographic constraints. At first, geometrical properties describing the feature shape are computed from soundings and isobaths and are used for feature classification. Then, conflicts are evaluated in a MAS and generalisation plans are provided.; Une carte marine est un type de carte utilisé pour décrire la morphologie du fond marin et du littoral adjacent. Un de ses principaux objectifs est de garantir la sécurité de la navigation maritime. En conséquence, la construction d'une carte marine est contrainte par des règles très précises. Le cartographe doit choisir et mettre en évidence les formes du relief sous-marin en fonction de leur intérêt pour la navigation. Au sein d'un processus automatisé, le système doit être en mesure d'identifier et de classifier ces formes de relief à partir d’un modèle de terrain.Un relief sous-marin est une individuation subjective d'une partie du fond océanique. La reconnaissance de la morphologie du fond sous-marin est une tâche difficile, car les définitions des formes de relief reposent généralement sur une description qualitative et floue. Obtenir la reconnaissance automatique des formes de relief nécessite donc une définition formelle des propriétés des reliefs et de leur modélisation. Dans le domaine maritime, l'Organisation Hydrographique Internationale a publié une terminologie standard des noms des formes de relief sous-marines qui formalise un ensemble de définitions principalement pour des objectifs de communication. Cette terminologie a été utilisée ici comme point de départ pour la classification automatique des formes de relief sous-marines d'un modèle numérique de terrain.Afin d'intégrer les connaissances sur le relief sous-marin et sa représentation sur une carte nautique, cette recherche vise à définir des ontologies du relief sous-marin et des cartes marines. Les ontologies sont ensuite utilisées à des fins de généralisation de carte marine. Nos travaux de recherche sont structurés en deux parties principales. Dans la première partie de la recherche, une ontologie est définie afin d'organiser la connaissance géographique et cartographique pour la représentation du relief sous-marin et la généralisation des cartes marines. Tout d'abord, une ontologie de domaine du relief sous-marin présente les différents concepts de formes de relief sous-marines avec leurs propriétés géométriques et topologiques. Cette ontologie est requise pour la classification des formes de relief. Deuxièmement, une ontologie de représentation est présentée, qui décrit la façon dont les entités bathymétriques sont représentées sur la carte.Troisièmement, une ontologie du processus de généralisation définit les contraintes et les opérations usitées pour la généralisation de carte marine. Dans la deuxième partie de la recherche, un processus de généralisation fondé sur l'ontologie est conçu en s'appuyant sur un système multi-agents (SMA). Quatre types d'agents (isobathe, sonde, forme de relief et groupe de formes de relief) sont définis pour gérer les objets cartographiques sur la carte. Un modèle de base de données a été généré à partir de l'ontologie. Les données bathymétriques et l'ontologie sont stockées dans une base de données de type ``triple store'', et sont connectées à un système d'information implémenté en Java et C++. Le système proposé classe automatiquement les formes de relief sous-marines extraites à partir de la bathymétrie, et évalue les contraintes cartographiques. Dans un premier temps, les propriétés géométriques décrivant une forme de relief sont calculées à partir des sondes et des isobathes et sont utilisées pour la classification des formes de relief. Ensuite, les conflits de distance et de superficie sont évalués dans le SMA et des plans de généralisation sont proposés au cartographe. Des tests ont été réalisés avec des données bathymétriques du monde réel montrant ainsi l'intérêt de la recherche dans le domaine de la cartographie nautique.

On nautical charts, undersea features are portrayed by sets of soundings (depth points) and isobaths (depth contours) from which map readers can interpret landforms. Different techniques were developed for automatic soundings selection and isobath generalisation from a sounding set. These methods are mainly used to generate a new chart from the bathymetric database or from a large scale chart through selection and simplification however a part of the process consists in selecting and emphasising undersea features on the chart according to their relevance to navigation. Its automation requires classification of the features from the set of isobaths and soundings and their generalisation through the selection and application of a set of operators according not only to geometrical constraints but also to semantic constraints.The objective of this paper is to define an ontology formalising undersea feature representation and the generalisation process achieving this representation on a nautical chart. The ontology is built in two parts addressing on one hand the definition of the features and on the other hand their generalisation. The central concept is the undersea feature around which other concepts are organised. The generalisation process is driven by the features where the objective is to select or emphasise information according to their meaning for a specific purpose. The ontologies were developed in Protégé and a bathymetric database server integrating the ontology wasimplemented. A generalisation platform was also developed and examples of representations obtained by the platform are presented. Finally, current results and on-going research are discussed.; International audience; On nautical charts, undersea features are portrayed by sets of soundings (depth points) and isobaths (depth contours) from which map readers can interpret landforms. Different techniques were developed for automatic soundings selection and isobath generalisation from a sounding set. These methods are mainly used to generate a new chart from the bathymetric database or from a large scale chart through selection and simplification however a part of the process consists in selecting and emphasising undersea features on the chart according to their relevance to navigation. Its automation requires classification of the features from the set of isobaths and soundings and their generalisation through the selection and application of a set of operators according not only to geometrical constraints but also to semantic constraints.The objective of this paper is to define an ontology formalising undersea feature representation and the generalisation process achieving this representation on a nautical chart. The ontology is built in two parts addressing on one hand the definition of the features and on the other hand their generalisation. The central concept is the undersea feature around which other concepts are organised. The generalisation process is driven by the features where the objective is to select or emphasise information according to their meaning for a specific purpose. The ontologies were developed in Protégé and a bathymetric database server integrating the ontology wasimplemented. A generalisation platform was also developed and examples of representations obtained by the platform are presented. Finally, current results and on-going research are discussed.

A landform is a subjective individuation of a part of a terrain. Landform recognition is a difficult task because its definition usually relies on a qualitative and fuzzy description. Achieving automatic recognition of landforms requires a formal definition of the landforms properties and their modelling. In the maritime domain, the International Hydrographic Organisation published a standard terminology of undersea feature names which formalises a set of definition mainly for naming and communication purpose. This terminology is here used as a starting point for the definition of an ontology of undersea features and their automatic classification from a terrain model. First, an ontology of undersea features is built. The ontology is composed of an application domain ontology describing the main properties and relationships between features and a representation ontology deals with representation on a chart where features are portrayed by soundings and isobaths. A database model was generated from the ontology. Geometrical properties describing the feature shape are computed from soundings and isobaths and are used for feature classification. An example of automatic classification on a nautical chart is presented and results and on-going research are discussed.