A Language for Teaching Discrete-event Simulation

Courses which teach discrete-event simulation are based on many different simulation languages. The requirements for a language to support teaching simulation are discussed. In particular, it is recommended that such languages separate into distinct modules those aspects of simulation which are taught as separate topics. Implementation of the separation is discussed. The SEESIM language, developed as a teaching aid, is described, and examples of its use are given. Straightforward use of SEESIM can be learned quickly, yet the language provides facilities for a staged introduction to advanced concepts of simulation.     

Structures and stability of Al<Subscript><Emphasis Type="Bold">7</Emphasis></Subscript>C and Al<Subscript><Emphasis Type="Bold">7</Emphasis></Subscript>N clusters

We report results of the atomic and electronic structures of Al₇C cluster using ab initio molecular dynamics with ultrasoft pseudopotentials and generalized gradient approximation. The lowest energy structure is found to be the one in which carbon atom occupies an interstitial position in Al₇ cluster. The electronic structure shows that the recent observation [Chem. Phys. Lett. 316, 31 (2000)] of magic behavior of Al₇C^- cluster is due to a large highest occupied and lowest unoccupied molecular orbital (HOMO-LUMO) gap which makes Al₇C^- chemically inert. These results have further led us to the finding of a new neutral magic cluster Al₇N which has the same number of valence electrons as in Al₇C^- and a large HOMO-LUMO gap of 1.99 eV. Further, calculations have been carried out on (Al₇N)₂ to study interaction between magic clusters. Received 28 July 2001     

Complete ideals and singularities of space curves

We consider complete ideals supported on finite sequences of infinitely near points, in regular local rings with dimensions greater than two. We study properties of factorizations in Lipman special *-simple complete ideals. We relate it to a type of proximity, linear proximity, of the points, and give conditions in order to have unique factorization. Several examples are presented. Received: 2 February 2000 / in final form: 14 March 2001 / Published online: 18 January 2002     

CMS physics overview

The principal physics goals of the Compact Muon Solenoid experiment under construction at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN in Geneva are reviewed. Procedures to search for the Standard Model Higgs boson, supersymmetric Higgses and other supersymmetric particles are described.     

Two modifications of the least cost per period heuristic for dynamic lot-sizing

This paper proposes two constructive heuristics for the well-known single-level uncapacitated dynamic lot-sizing problem. The proposed heuristics, called net least period cost (nLPC) and nLPC(i), are developed by modifying the average period cost concept from Silver and Meal's heuristic, commonly known as least period cost (LPC). An improved tie-breaking stopping rule and a locally optimal decision rule are proposed in the second heuristic to enhance performance. We test the effectiveness of the proposed heuristics by using 20 benchmarking test problems frequently used in the literature. Furthermore, we perform a large-scale simulation study involving three factors, 50 experimental conditions, and 100?000 randomly generated problems to evaluate the proposed heuristics against LPC and six other well-known constructive heuristics in the literature. The simulation results show that both nLPC and nLPC(i) produce average holding and setup costs lower than or equal to those of LPC in every one of the 50 experimental conditions. The proposed heuristics also outperform each of the six other heuristics evaluated in all experimental conditions, without an increase in computational requirements. Lastly, considering that both nLPC and nLPC(i) are fairly simple for practitioners to understand and that lot-sizing heuristics have been commonly used in practice, there should be a very good chance for practical applications of the proposed heuristics.     

The application of a vehicle routing model to a waste-collection problem: two case studies

In this paper we suggest a unique model for estimating the operating cost of each of three waste-collection systems. Under the traditional system, which is widely used, waste is typically collected in plastic bags and a three-man crew is needed on each vehicle. The other two systems require a one-man crew for vehicle collecting street containers. The side-loader system with fixed body automatically empties street containers into the vehicle body and empties the load at the disposal site. The side-loader system with demountable body allows the separation of the waste collection phase from transport to the disposal site, since the vehicle body can be demounted. We also present two case studies and show how the estimation of operating costs is a critical issue in decisions regarding the type of system to be used for waste collection.     

The study and applications of photochemical-dynamical gravity wave model II

A nonlinear, compressible, non-isothermal gravity wave model that involves photochemistry is used to study the effects of gravity wave on atmospheric chemical species distributions in this paper. The changes in the distributions of oxygen compound and hydrogen compound density induced by gravity wave propagation are simulated. The results indicate that when a gravity wave propagates through a mesopause region, even if it does not break, it can influence the background distributions of chemical species. The effect of gravity wave on chemical species at night is larger than in daytime.     

Polyhedral <Emphasis Type="Italic">K</Emphasis><Subscript><Emphasis Type="Italic">2</Emphasis></Subscript>

 Using elementary graded automorphisms of polytopal algebras (essentially the coordinate rings of projective toric varieties) polyhedral versions of the group of elementary matrices and the Steinberg and Milnor groups are defined. They coincide with the usual K-theoretic groups in the special case when the polytope is a unit simplex and can be thought of as compact/polytopal substitutes for the tame automorphism groups of polynomial algebras. Relative to the classical case, many new aspects have to be taken into account. We describe these groups explicitly when the underlying polytope is 2-dimensional. Already this low-dimensional case provides interesting classes of groups. Received: 13 December 2001 / Revised version: 24 June 2002 The second author was supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, INTAS grant 99-00817 and TMR grant ERB FMRX CT-97-0107 Mathematics Subject Classification (2000): 14L27, 14M25, 19C09, 52B20