The purpose of this thesis is to investigate if vacuum insulation panels are a competitive alternative to traditional insulation. Vacuum insulation has been used as insulation in buildings in Germany and Switzerland for a few years. In Sweden the high-performance insulation material is mainly used in refrigerators, freezers and vacuum thermoses. The development is proceeding well and vacuum insulation is becoming more common in the construction industry. Since it is a relatively unexplored material on the market there are many flaws and problems with the material. The questions we have chosen to answer in this report include an increased knowledge of vacuum insulation, various problems that may arise when handling/installation and the pros and cons of vacuum insulation compared to standard traditional insulation. The methods we have chosen to use in this report is a literature study, interviews with various suppliers and manufactures and calculations to show the differences between traditional and vacuum insulation. Vacuum insulation is 5-10 times better insulation than standard traditional mineral wool insulation, mainly at the beginning of its lifetime. Vacuum insulation panels (VIP) have a service life of approximately 50 years, whereas traditional insulation has a service life of approximately 100 years. In limited and confined spaces, the vacuum insulation is used as additional insulation. The insulation is also used to construct the "slim" and well insulated walls that are more aesthetically pleasing than half a meter thick wall of energy efficient buildings. There are several advantages of the vacuum insulation. Efficiency and energy savings due to its low U-value are the most important. The disadvantages are the expensive investment, the fragile metal case that is highly sensitive to mechanical damage and a shorter service life compared to traditional insulation. / Syftet med rapporten är att undersöka om vakuumisolering är ett konkurrenskraftigt alternativ till traditionellt isoleringsmaterial så som mineralull. Vakuumisolering har funnits i Tyskland och i Schweiz i många år men i Sverige har det högpresterande isoleringsmaterialet främst använts i kyl- och frysskåp och i termosflaskor. Utvecklingen går framåt och vakuumisolering blir mer vanligt inom byggbranschen. Eftersom det är relativt outforskat material på marknaden finns det många brister och problem med materialet och dess hantering. De frågeställningar vi valt att besvara genom denna rapport omfattar ökad kännedom om vakuumisolering, olika problem som kan uppkomma vid hantering/montering samt för- och nackdelar med vakuumisolering jämfört med vanlig traditionell mineralullsisolering. Metodvalen som rapporten bygger på är litteraturstudier, intervjuer via telefon och mailkontakt med olika leverantörer och återförsäljare samt beräkningar som styrker det som skiljer mineralull och vakuumisolering åt. Vakuumisolering har 5-10 gånger bättre isoleringsförmåga än vanlig traditionell mineralullsisolering främst i början av dess livstid. Vakuumisolering har en beräknad livslängd på cirka 50 år medan traditionell isolering har en på cirka 100 år. Vid begränsade och trånga utrymmen kan vakuumisolering användas som tilläggsisolering. Isoleringen används även för att konstruera ”slanka” och välisolerade väggar som är mer estetiskt tilltalande än halvmeter tjocka konstruktioner vid projektering av exempelvis passivhus. Det finns ett antal fördelar och nackdelar med vakuumisolering jämfört med mineralull. Effektivitet och energisparande på grund av dess låga U-värde är några exempel. Exempel på nackdelar är känsligheten för mekanisk åverkan, den dyra investeringskostnaden och en kortare livslängd än traditionell isolering.

No description available.

No description available.

Abstract Climate and environmental issues are of paramount importance. Researchers agree that we must all contribute to a reduction of gases that contribute to climate change. Energy consumption must decrease within all sectors and the promotion of renewable sources of energy must be introduced. Each sector should aspire to decrease its energy consumption. Energy consumption is strongly linked to waste gases that contribute to climate change. Passive houses are a part of the construction industry's methods to attain energy conservation. Passive houses are derived from low energy houses and super insulated houses. A passive house is intended to obtain heat from the inhabitants and through their activities. The house is built so that heat losses through the climate shell (doors, windows, walls, floors and ceilings) and the ventilation system are decreased. In order to get a good indoor environment it is important that the ventilation and heat recycling system working together, hold the energy consumption down. This is how faculty people usually present a passive house to someone who has not considered the concept before. I would like to turn the focus from heating to cooling. Houses with large glass facades facing south and a closed climate shell risk too high an indoor temperature. How do we plan houses so that they don’t need a cooling system? Is protection from the sun enough? During the planning of a passive house, efforts are made in order to let the house be dependent on a small heat battery during the coldest parts of the year. My approach to passive houses became an effort to see how solar radiation influences closed and highly insulated units. The heating of houses in my calculations was not influenced to any extent by the rotation of the building. When heating buildings the sun’s radiation only plays a small part. When the sun’s radiation is most concentrated no active heating is required. It is important to note that solar radiation cannot be depended upon at all times especially in winter. Of course, with sun protection, energy needed for heating will increase but energy for cooling will decrease. Sun radiation influences active cooling as shown in my software program. Increased sun radiation requires increased active cooling for alternatives in my study without sun protection. The alternatives with sun protection are not influenced as much by solar radiation as those without. Alternatives with strong sun protections are not as sensetive how the house is placed among the point of the compass. Solar radiation does not become equally considerable and impact to be decreased therefore.

The Vasoactive Intestinal Peptide (VIP) is an agonist of the CFTR chloride channel in the human airways. In the genetic disease Cystic Fibrosis, where CFTR is defective or absent from the apical membrane of epithelial cells, VIP innervations are lost. Our group has demonstrated that VIP increases CFTR membrane stability through PKCε. However, the mechanism remained to be determined. Here we found that VIP stimulation increases the interaction of NHERF1 and P-ERMs with CFTR through PKCε phosphorylation. Moreover a reduction of the interaction between intracellular CFTR and the Golgi associated protein, CAL was observed following VIP stimulation. Silencing either ERMs or NHERF1 with siRNA prevented the VIP ability to increase CFTR surface expression and function, confirming that NHERF1 and P-ERMs are necessary for VIP regulation of the sustained activity of membrane CFTR. This study shows the cellular mechanism by which prolonged VIP stimulation of airway epithelial cells regulates CFTR-dependent secretions.

Endogenous peptides modulate a wide range of physiological conditions in the central and peripheral nervous systems, but have not been harnessed to perform similar functions in pharmaceutical roles due to their ease of degradation and difficulty in introducing into the neurovascular unit. We report herein advances that evidence the wide applicability that glycosylation provides as a pathway for improving the drug-like properties of peptides. This is demonstrated by utilizing novel sugar-amino acids to modify the potent mu opioid receptor agonist DAMGO to provide antinociception, and serine glycosides to modify secretin family peptides for neuroprotection and angiotensin-(1-7) to both reduce cognitive impedance following myocardial infarction and as a treatment for peripheral neuropathy. Evidence is presented via a series of in vitro and in vivo models and assays, and demonstrates the advantageous effects of glycosylation through increased persistence in serum, greatly improved blood-brain barrier penetration, and the tolerance of receptor interactions to the addition of a carbohydrate.

La forme la plus agressive des gliomes, tumeurs cérébrales primitives, est l'astrocytome de grade IV appelé aussi glioblastome (GBM). Le pronostic des patients atteints d'un GBM est très sombre du fait de la nature infiltrante de ces cancers et de la présence de cellules souches cancéreuses (CSC) peu sensibles aux thérapies actuelles. Il est donc primordial d'étudier ces deux caractéristiques des GBM. Mes travaux de thèse ont porté sur ces deux aspects.La connaissance de l'implication de la voie de signalisation Hedgehog (Hh) dans le maintien du pool de CSC permet d'envisager de nouvelles stratégies thérapeutiques visant à les éliminer. La voie Hh joue un rôle important dans le développement embryonnaire. L'activation de cette voie a été mise en évidence dans de nombreux cancers dont les GBM. La cyclopamine est une substance alcaloïde inhibitrice de la voie Hh. L'inconvénient de l'utilisation de la cyclopamine pour une thérapie anticancéreuse est que cette voie est aussi active dans les cellules souches somatiques adultes. Pour cibler la tumeur, une prodrogue glucuronylée de la cyclopamine a été synthétisée. La partie glucuronide peut être hydrolysée par la β-glucuronidase, une enzyme présente dans la zone nécrotique des GBM, conduisant à la libération de la cyclopamine active de façon ciblée, dans le microenvironnement tumoral. Des tests de viabilité indiquent que cette prodrogue ne présente pas latoxicité de la cyclopamine envers les cellules C6 de GBM de rat, leur population de cellule souches (C6-GSC) ainsi que dans des coupes de cerveau de rat adulte. En revanche, l'hydrolyse par la β-glucuronidase de cette prodrogue permet de restaurer la toxicité de la cyclopamine sur les cellules de GBM. L'analyse par RT-qPCR de l'expression d'un gène cible de la voie Hh, le facteur de transcription GLI1, permet de vérifier l'inhibition spécifique de la voie Hh par la cyclopamine dans les cellules C6 et les C6-GSC. Ainsi, la prodrogue en libérant la cyclopamine dans l'environnement tumoral devrait permettre de limiter l'étendue des effets de la drogue sur les cellules saines du cerveau.La voie Hh joue un rôle dans la régulation de la migration et de l'invasion des cellules de GBM. Mon équipe d'accueil a montré que le vasoactive intestinal peptide (VIP) régule la migration et l'invasion de deux lignées cellulaires M059K et M059J. Dans ce travail de thèse, les effets du VIP et de son analogue le pituitary adenylate cyclase-activating peptide(PACAP) sur la migration et l'invasion des cellules C6 de rat et U87 humaines ont été étudiés. Les résultats obtenus indiquent que les agonistes VIP, PACAP-38 et l'antagoniste synthétique VIP10-28 des récepteurs de ces peptides contrôlent la migration et l'invasion dans les deux lignées de GBM. Le VIP et le PACAP-38 inhibent l'invasion ex vivodes cellules C6 dans des coupes de cerveau. De plus, le VIP10-28 augmente la migration et l'invasion de ces cellules de façon PKA-, Akt- et Hh-dépendante. L'étude des voies detransduction impliquées dans l'action des neuropeptides sur la migration et l'invasion des GBM a ensuite été approfondie. Les données obtenues indiquent que le VIP et le PACAP diminuent le taux de la forme active nucléaire de la protéine GLI1 dans les cellules C6 et U87 de façon PKA-dépendante. Inversement, le VIP10-28 augmente l'expression de GLI1 dans les cellules C6 de façon Akt-dépendante. Enfin, nous avons constaté que le PACAP diminue la phosphorylation d'Akt dans les cellules C6 etaugmente celle de la protéine PTEN, en accord avec le rôle de ces kinases dans la régulation de la migration cellulaire et de l'activité GLI1. L'ensemble de ces résultats indique que le système VIP-récepteurs régule la migration et l'invasion par des interactions entre les voies PKA, Hh et Akt/PTEN dans les cellules de GBM. / The most aggressive form of glioma, primary brain tumors, is grade IV astrocytoma also called glioblastoma (GBM)...

VIP is neurotransmitter with pleiotropic functions in mammals. It is expressed by a large number of tissues, including the CNS, PNS, innate and adaptive immune systems. VIP has two endogenous G-protein coupled receptors, termed VPAC 1 and VPAC2. VIP signaling through VPAC1 receptor has been documented to transactivate EGFR in healthy and cancerous cells leading to the activation of multiple downstream signaling pathways. EGFR signaling is a potent inducer of the master regulator EMT, called Snail1, which is a zinc-finger, transcription factor that is associated with downregulating epithelial markers like E-cadherin, while upregulating mesenchymal markers necessary for invasion and metastasis. We hypothesize that VIP upregulates Snail1expression in cancer cells. Our results showed that VIP treatment of epithelial cells increased Snail1 expression transiently at 1h and 4h then returned to basal levels at 24h. This research has implications in development of targeted therapies for cancer.

Le 1,1-dimethylphenyl1-4piperazinium (DMPP), un agoniste nicotinique, a un effet anti-inflammatoire et bronchorelaxant. Afin de comprendre ces effets, les sous-unités alpha-3, alpha-4 et alpha-7 du récepteur nicotinique ont été localisées par immunofluorescence sur des sections trachéale et pulmonaire. Ces sous-unités étaient localisées dans l'épithélium trachéal et le parenchyme pulmonaire. Les sous-unités alpha-4 et-7 étaient sur le muscle lisse trachéal. L'effet du DMPP sur la production de peptide intestinal vasoactif (VIP) et de substance P (SP), des molécules modulant l'inflammation a été étudié dans un modèle d'asthme allergique murin. Après trois jours de traitement, le DMPP n'a eu aucun effet sur la production de SP et a augmenté celle du VIP dans le LBA. L'administration de VIPhyb, un antagoniste des VPACs, n'a pas renversé l'effet du DMPP. Une diminution du nombre de cellules neuroendocrines dans le tissu pulmonaire des souris DMPP a aussi été observée par immunofluorescence. Ces données suggèrent que le VIP n'est pas impliqué dans l'effet du DMPP.

The purpose with this report is to examine how the implemented energy efficiency measures on Bokelundskolan in Växjö have had impact on the energy use. The measures which have been implemented are, new ventilation system, new heating system, optimized adjustment of the heating system, new windows with U-value 1.2 and lower window height, insulation under windows and in the crawl space. The school's energy use before and after rebuilding has been calculated with the calculation program, Vip-Energy 1.5.5. Calculations of energy use for the school with windows on U-value, 0.9 and 0.7 have also been done. The replacement of windows has been studied from a cost perspective. The conclusion is that the exchange of heat and ventilation system was the biggest contributor to reduced energy use on Bokelundskolan. The evaluation of windows with different U-value showed that windows with U-value 1.2 were the most profitable.