Towards an Operational Model for Prevention and Treatment of Asthma Attacks

Asthma is one of the major chronic diseases in many countries. At present there is no cure for asthma, but medical advances can help to reduce the chances of attacks of the condition. Efficient care for asthma involves complexity, uncertainty, variability and the use of scarce resources, and these are the same conditions that indicate a possible use for the modelling approach of operational research. This paper is concerned with a pilot model that was developed through joint work by medical professionals and operational researchers. The development of the model is explained and illustrative results indicate the potential value of the modelling approach for the care of asthma in the community.     

A Note on an Input Control Model of a Predictive Regression Interval

A well-known problem of prediction in linear regression models is to find a confidence interval for the random value of the dependent variable when the values of the independent variables are given. Such a situation may arise in economic quality control models when the independent variables are costly inputs and the dependent variable is some measure of quality or production. In such a circumstance, an important control objective may be to find values for the inputs that will maximize the lower limit of the prediction confidence interval for a fixed budget, or alternatively, to minimize the cost of the inputs for a fixed lower limit of the confidence interval. In this paper, we shall show that global optima can be found using known algorithms. The special case of simple linear regression is discussed and an illustrative example is provided.     

Quantitative evaluation of two-dimensional dynamic deformations using digital holography

An optical system for the parallel evaluation of in- and out-of-plane dynamical deformations will be described. A double pulse laser with pulse separation in the microsecond range is used for the investigations. Two separate interferograms of an object under test, in its undeformed and deformed state, are recorded in a few microseconds. The object is illuminated from two different directions and imaged onto a CCD sensor. This produces two sensitivity vectors. The reference beams have different directions in order to produce two directional spatial carriers. The Fourier method is used for quantitative evaluation, and the measurements along different sensitivity vectors are separated in the Fourier domain. The phases of the two interferograms are obtained from the complex amplitudes and the two dimensional deformation is calculated from the phases. Experimental results are presented.     

The colloid-structure of semicrystalline low-density polyethylene

The length-distribution of stereoregular sequences in low-density polyethylene (LDPE) is determined by a computer-aided analysis of cp-melting curves within the framework of thermodynamics of eutectoid copolymers. Small-angle x-ray scattering patterns are then described by using the structure data derived. One of the results is that fluctuations of the mean electron-density are increasingly reduced with an increasing degree of crystallinity.Dedicated to Prof. Dr. W. Pechhold on the occasion of his 60th birthday     

Special features of the radiative capture of ultracold neutrons by thin and thick layers of matter

The radiative capture of ultracold neutrons traversing thin and thick homogeneous layers of matter is analyzed. The applicability range of the formulas for the probabilities of reflection, transmission, and capture in thick layers (under certain conditions, they admit a simple interpretation—it is often quoted in the literature—that is based on the effective capture cross section, which is in inverse proportion to the velocity of a neutron in matter) is investigated, along with the conditions under which there arises the effective capture cross section.     

Trefftz,collocation, and other boundary methods—A comparison

In this article we survey the Trefftz method (TM), the collocation method (CM), and the collocation Trefftz method (CTM). We also review the coupling techniques for the interzonal conditions, which include the indirect Trefftz method, the original Trefftz method, the penalty plus hybrid Trefftz method, and the direct Trefftz method. Other boundary methods are also briefly described. Key issues in these algorithms, including the error analysis, are addressed. New numerical results are reported. Comparisons among TMs and other numerical methods are made. It is concluded that the CTM is the simplest algorithm and provides the most accurate solution with the best numerical stability. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Numer Methods Partial Differential Eq, 2007     

Stability of translating solutions to mean curvature flow

We prove stability of rotationally symmetric translating solutions to mean curvature flow. For initial data that converge spatially at infinity to such a soliton, we obtain convergence for large times to that soliton without imposing any decay rates. The authors are members of SFB 647/B3 “Raum – Zeit – Materie: Singularity Structure, Long-time Behaviour and Dynamics of Solutions of Non-linear Evolution Equations”.     

Problems, Models and Complexity. Part II: Application to the DLSP

In Part I of this study, we suggest to identify an operations research (OR) problem with the equivalence class of models describing the problem and enhance the standard computer-science theory of computational complexity to be applicable to this situation of an often model-based OR context. The Discrete Lot-sizing and Scheduling Problem (DLSP) is analysed here in detail to demonstrate the difficulties which can arise if these aspects are neglected and to illustrate the new theoretical concept. In addition, a new minimal model is introduced for the DLSP which makes this problem eventually amenable to a rigorous analysis of its computational complexity.