A DEA-inspired approach to selecting parking areas for dangerous-goods trucks

The transport of dangerous goods by trucks requires special conditions for rest areas. By considering the set of existing service areas, the present work develops a procedure for selecting the subgroup of the most suitable service areas for modification in order to provide a service to dangerous-goods transporters. Under multiple criteria, a new DEA-inspired model is developed that uses the main characteristics of the problem under study with the goal of selecting the best locations. Through the application of this model to Spanish territory with the help of Geographical Information Systems, various solutions are suggested. The final decision on the number of areas to be located depends on corresponding authorities, whose main priority is to satisfy economic criteria

Master of Science

thesisOut-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OOHCA) is prevalent in the United States. Each year several hundred thousand people die due to cardiac arrest. The automated external defibrillator (AED) has greatly enhanced survival rates for OOHCA. However, one of the most important factors in successful resuscitation is emergency medical services (EMS) response time. Unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones as they are more commonly called, have routinely been used for remote sensing but there are new opportunities to use drones for medical emergencies due to their high speeds and ease of navigation. While a drone with an on-board AED could potentially reduce response times to OOHCAs, it remains unclear how effective it is compared to ground EMS. It also remains uncertain how a network of AED-enabled drones should be implemented so that it can best serve cardiac arrest patients. This study examines historical out-of-hospital cardiac arrests and develops a new location model, referred to as the backup coverage location problem with complementary coverage (BCLP-CC), to aid in the deployment of a network of AED-enabled medical drones. By explicitly considering overlapping and partial coverage, the BCLP-CC optimally places drones and the corresponding launch sites while significantly improving backup coverage. Results show that 90.4 percent of historical out-of-hospital cardiac arrests in Salt Lake County can be responded to within one minute by using seventy-one drones and sixty-eight launch sites. In addition, 58.9 percent of incidents are covered two or more times, a significant improvement over existing models. The BCLP-CC was then extended to the backup coverage location problem with complementary coverage and capital improvement (BCLP-CCCI) to minimize implementation costs. Analyses results of the BCLP-CCCI show that by upgrading forty-four existing EMS facilities, by building twenty-six new launch sites, and by using seventy-six drones, 90 percent of the historical incidents could be reached by at least one AED-enabled drone within one minute, 65 percent of the demand could be reached by a secondary drone within one minute, and implementation costs could be reduced by 17 percent as compared to the results of the BCLP-CC. Although there are many concerns and limitations associated with medical drones, this study shows that an optimized network of drones has the potential to significantly reduce live-saving equipment travel times

Coverage reduction: a mathematical model

This paper deals with a mathematical model for reduction of the lack of coverage (LC) involving multiple coverage in presence of partial covering. The model proposes a new structure of assignment of facilities in a facility location system to cover in greater proportion of the demand territory, avoiding assignment of several facilities in the same space of the territory. A comparison between the engendered solution and its representation is carried out through known indicators to measure the improvement of the solution. The results of our proposed model are contrast and better compared to defined referred models in order to evaluate the reduction of LC

A abordagem POESIA para a integração de dados e serviços na Web semantica

Orientador: Claudia Bauzer MedeirosTese (doutorado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de ComputaçãoResumo: POESIA (Processes for Open-Ended Systems for lnformation Analysis), a abordagem proposta neste trabalho, visa a construção de processos complexos envolvendo integração e análise de dados de diversas fontes, particularmente em aplicações científicas. A abordagem é centrada em dois tipos de mecanismos da Web semântica: workflows científicos, para especificar e compor serviços Web; e ontologias de domínio, para viabilizar a interoperabilidade e o gerenciamento semânticos dos dados e processos. As principais contribuições desta tese são: (i) um arcabouço teórico para a descrição, localização e composição de dados e serviços na Web, com regras para verificar a consistência semântica de composições desses recursos; (ii) métodos baseados em ontologias de domínio para auxiliar a integração de dados e estimar a proveniência de dados em processos cooperativos na Web; (iii) implementação e validação parcial das propostas, em urna aplicação real no domínio de planejamento agrícola, analisando os benefícios e as limitações de eficiência e escalabilidade da tecnologia atual da Web semântica, face a grandes volumes de dadosAbstract: POESIA (Processes for Open-Ended Systems for Information Analysis), the approach proposed in this work, supports the construction of complex processes that involve the integration and analysis of data from several sources, particularly in scientific applications. This approach is centered in two types of semantic Web mechanisms: scientific workflows, to specify and compose Web services; and domain ontologies, to enable semantic interoperability and management of data and processes. The main contributions of this thesis are: (i) a theoretical framework to describe, discover and compose data and services on the Web, inc1uding mIes to check the semantic consistency of resource compositions; (ii) ontology-based methods to help data integration and estimate data provenance in cooperative processes on the Web; (iii) partial implementation and validation of the proposal, in a real application for the domain of agricultural planning, analyzing the benefits and scalability problems of the current semantic Web technology, when faced with large volumes of dataDoutoradoCiência da ComputaçãoDoutor em Ciência da Computaçã

Dimensioning Microgrids for Productive Use of Energy in the Global South—Considering Demand Side Flexibility to Reduce the Cost of Energy

Microgrids using renewable energy sources play an important role in providing universal electricity access in rural areas in the Global South. Current methods of system dimensioning rely on stochastic load profile modeling, which has limitations in microgrids with industrial consumers due to high demand side uncertainties. In this paper, we propose an alternative approach considering demand side management during system design which we implemented using a genetic scheduling algorithm. The developed method is applied to a test case system on Idjwi Island, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which is to be powered by a micro hydropower plant (MHP) in combination with a photovoltaic (PV) system and a battery energy storage system (BESS). The results show that the increased flexibility of industrial consumers can significantly reduce the cost of electricity. Most importantly, the presented method quantifies the trade-off between electricity cost and consumer flexibility. This gives local stakeholders the ability to make an informed compromise and design an off-grid system that covers their electricity needs in the most cost-efficient way

Human Machine Interaction

In this book, the reader will find a set of papers divided into two sections. The first section presents different proposals focused on the human-machine interaction development process. The second section is devoted to different aspects of interaction, with a special emphasis on the physical interaction