Abstract: An extended state machine that makes use of an inference engine as the infrastructure for adding inferential capabilities to the state machine's execution. The result is a state machine that may operate on partial or disordered information, inferring intermediate states that have yet to be formally traversed. In addition, controls such as state timeouts and transition priorities allow for finer control of the state machine's execution, particularly in unexpected circumstances.

Abstract: An extended state machine that makes use of an inference engine as the infrastructure for adding inferential capabilities to the state machine's execution. The result is a state machine that may operate on partial or disordered information, inferring intermediate states that have yet to be formally traversed. In addition, controls such as state timeouts and transition priorities allow for finer control of the state machine's execution, particularly in unexpected circumstances.

Abstract: This invention provides a bacterial system and assay for detecting and quantifying activity of bacterial growth regulator, FtsH. The bacteria include three expression cassettes. An FtsH expression cassette comprises a first promoter operatively linked to a nucleotide sequence encoding FtsH. A transcriptional regulator expression cassette comprises a second promoter operatively linked to a nucleotide sequence encoding a transcriptional regulator which regulates the activity of a third promoter, wherein the transcriptional regulator is a substrate of FtsH. A reporter expression cassette comprises the third promoter operatively linked to a reporter gene. The activity of FtsH can be read out as a positive expression of the reporter gene. The invention also provides an assay for compounds that modulate the expression of FtsH. The assay involves contacting the recombinant bacterial cell with the agent, and determining whether the agent modulates the expression of the reporter gene.