An optimal time to sleep for an auto-sleep system considering multi-usage states

An auto-sleep system is defined by the following two properties:

• 1.(i) a call for the system occurs randomly and intermittently
• 2.(ii) the system automatically goes to sleep if there occurs no call during a prespecified time T.

It considers four states:

• 1.(a) sleep
• 2.(b) warm-up
• 3.(c) nonusage
• 4.(d) usage.

For such a system, the time to sleep has been discussed based on suitable criteria. This study extends the model for an auto-sleep system so that the model can deal with multi-usage states. With a view to determining an optimal time to sleep under the extended model, the expected energy consumed per unit time is formulated as a criterion to be minimized. The existence of an optimal time to sleep is examined under a general call distribution. Numerical examples are also provided for a Weibull as well as a log-normal call distribution.     

Analysis of performance of an iron-bath reactor using computational fluid dynamics

The performance of an iron-bath reactor has been studied using a comprehensive numerical model that combines a computational fluid dynamics approach for the gas phase and a heat and mass balance model for the bath. The model calculates:

• •coal, ore, flux and oxygen consumption;
• •post-combustion ratio (PCR);
• •heat-transfer efficiency (HTE);
• •off-gas temperature and composition;
• •heat transfer and chemical reactions between gas and iron and slag droplets; and
• •heat transfer between gas and bath, refractories and lance.

The model was validated with data reported by the Nippon Steel Corporation for a 100 t pilot plant, and the calculated and measured data are in good agreement. Modelling results showed that the dominant mechanisms of heat transfer from the gas to the bath are radiation to the slag surface and convection heat transfer to droplets.     

Common knowledge revisited

We consider the common-knowledge paradox raised by Halpern and Moses: common knowledge is necessary for agreement and coordination, but common knowledge is unattainable in the real world because of temporal imprecision. We discuss two solutions to this paradox:

• 1.(1) modeling the world with a coarser granularity, and
• 2.(2) relaxing the requirements for coordination.

     

System dynamics and feedback control problem formulations for real time dynamic traffic routing

This paper formulates the Dynamic Traffic Routing (DTR) problem as a real-time feedback control problem. Three different forms of the formulation are presented:

• 1.(1) distributed parameter system form derived from the conservation law;
• 2.(2) space discretized continuous lumped parameter form;
• 3.(3) space and time discretized lumped parameter form.

These formulations can be considered as the starting points for development of feedback control laws for the different control problems stated in this paper. This paper presents the feedback control problems, and does not discuss in detail the methodology of solution techniques which could be used to solve these problems. However, for the sake of completeness a brief treatment of the three forms are included in this paper to show possible ways to design the controllers.     

Probabilistic inequalities and remarks

The authors use their recently proved integral inequality to obtain bounds for the covariance of two random variables

• 1.in a general setup and
• 2.for a class of special joint distributions.

The same inequality is also used to estimate the difference of the expectations of two random variables. Finally, the authors study the attainability of a related inequality.     

A model of the effects of nonuniform soil-water distribution on the subsurface migration of bacteria: Implications for land disposal of sewage

Australia produces one of the highest volumes of agricultural, industrial, and municipal wastes per capita in the world. Increasingly, the public is demanding statutory authorities investigate environmentally sound methods of land application. However, a real danger associated with land disposal of wastes, in particular sewage, is the possible contamination of groundwater and threats to public health resulting from transport of pathogenic micro-organisms through the vadose zone. The study of the transport and fate of micro-organisms in soils is also of vital importance in the fields of oil recovery, biological control of plant root diseases, and in-situ bioremediation of contaminated soils and aquifers from industrial accidents. The objectives of this paper are

• 1.(a) to explore the extent of spatial and temporal heterogeneity found in the soil-water patterns in Australian soils, and
• 2.(b) to establish the framework for a mathematical model of the population dynamics and mobility of soil bacterial transport through the unsaturated zone of soils.

The model explicitly incorporates spatial and temporal heterogeneity in describing these dynamics.     

Warranty cost analysis for second-hand products

For second-hand products sold with warranty, the expected warranty cost for an item to the manufacturer, depends on

• 1.(i) the age and/or usage as well as the maintenance history for the item
• 2.(ii) the terms of the warranty policy.

The paper develops probabilistic models to compute the expected warranty cost to the manufacturer when the items are sold with free replacement or pro rata warranties.     

Mathematical modelling of the flotation deinking process

The overall flotation deinking process can be divided into four basic microprocesses:

• 1.(1) collision or capture of an (ink) particle by an air bubble
• 2.(2) adhesion of an (ink) particle to the air bubble by sliding
• 3.(3) development of a three-phase contact at the air bubble/water/particle interface, and
• 4.(4) bubble/particle stability or instability after an aggregate is formed each of these microprocesses have an associated probability that they will occur successfully in a flotation cell.

In this paper, the associated probabilities of each microprocess are employed in the development of a kinetic- or population balance-type model of the overall flotation process. The overall model contains two kinetic constants: the first, k₁ governs the overall probability of a free ink particle successfully intercepting and adhering to an air bubble; the second, k₂ is a measure of the probability that a bubble/particle aggregate pair will become unstable and split to yield a “new” free ink particle.The solution to the kinetic model is presented in terms of k₁ and k₂, which are themselves functions of system parameters such as bubble and particle physical properties (e.g., diameter, density), fluid properties (e.g., viscosity, surface tension), etc. From this solution, a definition of a theoretical flotation efficiency, as well as other system performance parameters are presented.     

The dynamic programming method in the generalized traveling salesman problem

A procedure of the dynamic programming (DP) for the discrete-continuous problem of a route optimization is considered. It is possible to consider this procedure as a dynamic method of optimization of the towns choice in the well-known traveling salesman problem. In the considered version of DP, elements of a dynamic optimization are used. Two variants of the function of the aggregations of losses are investigated:

• 1.(1) the additive functions;
• 2.(2) the function characterizing the aggregation of losses in the bottle-neck problem.

     

Oxygen dynamics in coastal and lagoon ecosystems

Aquatic systems with a high trophic level (for example some coastal lagoons connected with sea, estuaries, and the neighbourhood) can be affected by some dystrophic phenomena. The instability of these ecosystems greatly depends on the nutrients availability and on the meteorological and climatic conditions. The variation of these factors can produce fast evolution of dystrophic phenomena into anoxis crises: that is the depletion of oxygen in the water column that, starting from localized areas, can interest all the basin. Due to these modifications, great changes can be observed in the composition of the biotic community. These processes may be described by a reaction-diffusion system based on the following biological hypotheses:

• 1.(i) the primary production is assumed to be constant (in particular of macrophytes),
• 2.(ii) the model consists of the balance equations of some chemical species, in the water column and in the sediment at the bottom of the water,
• 3.(iii) a simplified formalization of reaction kinetics.

The model presented can be used to evaluate the influence of environmental factors, such as temperature, wind, and lighting on the level of oxygen, and it is described by a system of semilinear partial differential equations of parabolic type.A numerical study, based on the semidiscrete Galerkin Method with finite elements, is proposed. The present approach uses an iterative process of successive approximations which splits the system in three independent systems of linear equations. Finally, some results of numerical simulation of oxygen consumption, with reference to the lagoon of Orbetello (Tuscany, Italy), are presented and discussed.     

Maximizing profit of a food retailing chain by targeting and promoting valuable customers using Loyalty Card and Scanner Data

In this paper, we set up a House of Profit Model, an approach of maximizing profit of a food retailing chain by targeting and promoting valuable customers. Our model combines

• •segmentation analysis of households using Loyalty Card and Scanner Data,
• •price and promotion elasticity analysis,
• •simulation of effects of pricing and promotion,
• •price and promotion optimization to maximize profit.

These components are well-known in the literature and each of them has received considerable independent study. However, in this study we combine each of these components into one consistent, application-orientated model. We then demonstrate using panel data that the combination has a synergic effect on the efficiency of estimation and the maximization of profit (e.g., price and promotion elasticity estimation is improved by conducting it within market segments rather than across an entire hetereogeneous population). These estimates are further improved by incorporating “pass through”—a functional relationship between a retailer’s unit prices and unit costs.     

Dynamic graph models

Research in graph theory has focused on studying the structure of graphs with the assumption that they are static. However, in many applications, the graphs that arise change with time, i.e., they are dynamic in nature. This is especially true of applications involving graph models in computer science. We present an expository study of dynamic graphs with the main driving force being practical applications. We first develop a formal classification of dynamic graphs. This taxonomy in the form of generalizations and extensions will in turn suggest new areas of application. Next, we discuss areas where dynamic graphs arise in computer science such as compilers, databases, fault-tolerance, artificial intelligence, and computer networks. Finally, we propose approaches that can be used for studying dynamic graphs. The main objective in any study of dynamic graphs should be to

• 1.(i) extend results developed for static graph theory to dynamic graphs,
• 2.(ii) study the properties that describe how a dynamic graph changes,
• 3.(iii) investigate problems and issues in dynamic graph theory that are raised by practical applications of dynamic graphs in computer science.

     

A model for an age-structured population with two time scales

In the modelisation of the dynamics of a sole population, an interesting issue is the influence of daily vertical migrations of the larvae on the whole dynamical process. As a first step towards getting some insight on that issue, we propose a model that describes the dynamics of an age-structured population living in an environment divided into N different spatial patches. We distinguish two time scales: at the fast time scale, we have migration dynamics and at the slow time scale, the demographic dynamics. The demographic process is described using the classical McKendrick model for each patch, and a simple matrix model including the transfer rates between patches depicts the migration process. Assuming that the migration process is conservative with respect to the total population and some additional technical assumptions, we proved in a previous work that the semigroup associated to our problem has the property of positive asynchronous exponential growth and that the characteristic elements of that asymptotic behaviour can be approximated by those of a scalar classical McKendrick model. In the present work, we develop the study of the nature of the convergence of the solutions of our problem to the solutions of the associated scalar one when the ratio between the time scales is ε (0 < ε ⪡ 1). The main result decomposes the action of the semigroup associated to our problem into three parts:

• 1.(1) the semigroup associated to a demographic scalar problem times the vector of the equilibrium distribution of the migration process;
• 2.(2) the semigroup associated to the transitory process which leads to the first part; and
• 3.(3) an operator, bounded in norm, of order ε.

     

Chirurgies d'indice un et isotopies de sphères dans les variétés de contact tendues

We prove the following theorems:

• 1)Any surgery of index one on u tight contact manifold (of dimension three) gives rise to a manifold which carries a natural tight contact structure.
• 2)In a tight contact manifold, any two isotopic spheres which carry the same characteristic foliation are isotopic through a contact isolopy.
• 3)In a tight contact manifold, any two isotopic spheres have isomorphic complements.

     

A Note on Old Babylonian Computational Techniques

Analysis of the errors in two Old Babylonian “algebraic” problems shows

• •that the computations were performed on a device where additive contributions were no longer identifiable once they had entered the computation;
• •that this device must have been some kind of counting board or abacus where numbers were represented as collections of calculi;
• •that units and tens were represented in distinct ways, perhaps by means of different calculi.

© 2002 Elsevier Science (USA).Eine Analyse der Rechenfehler in zwei altbabylonischen “algebraischen” Aufgaben läßt mehrere Rückschlüsse auf ein Hilfsmittel zu, das zur Durchführung von Rechnungen benutzt worden sein kann:

• •Additive Beiträge waren nach ihrer Eintragung in die Rechnung nicht länger identifizierbar.
• •Das Gerät war eine Art Rechenbrett, auf welchem Zahlen als Haufen von Rechensteinen erschienen.
• •Einer und Zehner wurden in verschiedener Weise, evtl. mittels verschiedener Rechensteine repräsentiert.

© 2002 Elsevier Science (USA).MSC subject classification: 01A17.     

Free energy and solutions of the Vlasov-Poisson-Fokker-Planck system: external potential and confinement (Large time behavior and steady states)

This paper is devoted to the characterization of external electrostatic potentials for which the Vlasov-Poisson-Fokker-Planck system satisfies one of the following properties:

• (i) the system admits stationary solutions,
• (ii) any solution to the evolution problem converges to a stationary solution, or, equivalently, no mass vanishes for large times,
• (iii) the free energy is bounded from below, We give conditions under which these different notions of confinement are equivalent.

     

Formal aspects of egress complexity

Egress complexity is concerned with the summative uncertainty experienced by a naive occupant of a building when faced with a challenge to evacuate without the assistance of signage. This paper takes the present model of egress complexity and recasts its basic initiative in terms of elementary order theory. Arguments are presented to demonstrate

• &#x02022;the existence of distinct maximum and minimum exit complexities for a given number of compartments,
• &#x02022;the monotonic nature of complexity and
• &#x02022;the relationship of a given floorplan complexity to the corresponding measures of its homomorphic images

The uniqueness of the theory on which the model is developed stems from a scenario-independent nonmetric approach to egress measurement.     

Multiparametric demand transportation problem

In some applications a minimum cost transportation model arises where supplies are fixed while demands may simultaneously vary. In this paper we analyse the structure of such a model and propose several techniques to describe its behaviour. Our approach is founded on the concept of optimal region, i.e., the subset of demand vectors where a given basic tree is optimal. The proposed algorithm consists in different pivoting strategies designed to:

• 1.build up a minimal list of basic trees such that the associated optimal regions cover the set of feasible demand vectors;
• 2.analyse the effects of either opening a new supplier or closing an existing one;
• 3.suitably treat the dual degenerate case by building up a minimal representation of every maximal region where the optimal value is linear in the demand vector.

Computational complexity is discussed and numerical examples are given.