UNCERTAINTY QUANTIFICATION IN ENGINEERING OPTIMIZATION APPLICATIONS

Ph.DDOCTOR OF PHILOSOPH

Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks

Being infrastructure-less and without central administration control, wireless ad-hoc networking is playing a more and more important role in extending the coverage of traditional wireless infrastructure (cellular networks, wireless LAN, etc). This book includes state-of the-art techniques and solutions for wireless ad-hoc networks. It focuses on the following topics in ad-hoc networks: vehicular ad-hoc networks, security and caching, TCP in ad-hoc networks and emerging applications. It is targeted to provide network engineers and researchers with design guidelines for large scale wireless ad hoc networks

Feasible, Robust and Reliable Automation and Control for Autonomous Systems

The Special Issue book focuses on highlighting current research and developments in the automation and control field for autonomous systems as well as showcasing state-of-the-art control strategy approaches for autonomous platforms. The book is co-edited by distinguished international control system experts currently based in Sweden, the United States of America, and the United Kingdom, with contributions from reputable researchers from China, Austria, France, the United States of America, Poland, and Hungary, among many others. The editors believe the ten articles published within this Special Issue will be highly appealing to control-systems-related researchers in applications typified in the fields of ground, aerial, maritime vehicles, and robotics as well as industrial audiences

Algunas aportaciones sobre representación de preferencias

En la mayoría de los problemas de decisión multicriterio se supone un conocimiento a priori de los criterios. Sin embargo, esta hipótesis no parece ser la más adecuada en diversas situaciones. En esta línea de búsqueda de los criterios subyacentes del decisor, surge el concepto de dimensión inicialmente propuesto por Dushnik y Miller. Sin embargo, este concepto solamente es aplicado a órdenes parciales. En esta memoria se define un nuevo concepto de dimensión que permitirá la representación de cualquier relación de preferencia no reflexiva, se analizaran propiedades asociadas a este concepto así como algoritmos para su cálculo. Este nuevo concepto de dimensión permite su extensión al contexto difuso permitiendo una representación de cualquier relación de preferencia difusa, sin más que analizar la secuencia de alfa-cortes de dicha relación. El análisis de las relaciones de preferencia permitirá el desarrollo de diversos algoritmos interactivos de clasificación difusa de imágenes digitales obtenidas vía satélite. Se desarrollan algoritmos no supervisados de clasificación desde dos perspectivas diferentes, el conceptó de variacional de un píxel y la coloración de grafos difusos que modelizan la imagen digital

Safety and Reliability - Safe Societies in a Changing World

The contributions cover a wide range of methodologies and application areas for safety and reliability that contribute to safe societies in a changing world. These methodologies and applications include: - foundations of risk and reliability assessment and management - mathematical methods in reliability and safety - risk assessment - risk management - system reliability - uncertainty analysis - digitalization and big data - prognostics and system health management - occupational safety - accident and incident modeling - maintenance modeling and applications - simulation for safety and reliability analysis - dynamic risk and barrier management - organizational factors and safety culture - human factors and human reliability - resilience engineering - structural reliability - natural hazards - security - economic analysis in risk managemen

Location aware data aggregation for efficient message dissemination in Vehicular Ad Hoc Networks

The main contribution of this thesis is the LA mechanism - an intelligent, locationaware data aggregation mechanism for real-time observation, estimation and efficient dissemination of messages in VANETs. The proposed mechanism is based on a generic modelling approach which makes it applicable to any type of VANET applications. The data aggregation mechanism proposed in this thesis introduces location awareness technique which provides dynamic segmentation of the roads enabling efficient spatiotemporal database indexing. It further provides the location context to the messages without the use of advanced positioning systems like satellite navigation and digital maps. The mechanism ensures that the network load is significantly reduced by using the passive clustering and adaptive broadcasting to minimise the number of exchanged messages. The incoming messages are fused by Kalman filter providing the optimal estimation particularly useful in urban environment where incoming measurements are very frequent and can cause the vehicle to interpret them as noisy measurements. The scheme allows the comparison of aggregates and single observations which enables their merging and better overall accuracy. Old information in aggregates is removed by realtime database refreshing leaving only newer relevant information for a driver to make real-time decisions in traffic. The LA mechanism is evaluated by extensive simulations to show efficiency and accuracy

Critical Thinking Skills Profile of High School Students In Learning Science-Physics

This study aims to describe Critical Thinking Skills high school students in the city of Makassar. To achieve this goal, the researchers conducted an analysis of student test results of 200 people scattered in six schools in the city of Makassar. The results of the quantitative descriptive analysis of the data found that the average value of students doing the interpretation, analysis, and inference in a row by 1.53, 1.15, and 1.52. This value is still very low when compared with the maximum value that may be obtained by students, that is equal to 10.00. This shows that the critical thinking skills of high school students are still very low. One fact Competency Standards science subjects-Physics is demonstrating the ability to think logically, critically, and creatively with the guidance of teachers and demonstrate the ability to solve simple problems in daily life. In fact, according to Michael Scriven stated that the main task of education is to train students and or students to think critically because of the demands of work in the global economy, the survival of a democratic and personal decisions and decisions in an increasingly complex society needs people who can think well and make judgments good. Therefore, the need for teachers in the learning device scenario such as: driving question or problem, authentic Investigation: Science Processes

Optimising financial performance measures in a supply chain network redesign

Financial issues play a critical role in the strategic design of supply chain networks (SCNs). They have a strong impact on the structure of supply chains (SCs). Investigation of the literature evidences that many aspects of financial issues in SCN designing are still far from being fully integrated in the existing models. Most of the studies have ignored that the SCs' financial performance stems from its accounting information system (AIS). This study reviews the development of SCN designing models that integrate financial and operational issues in a holistic optimising approach. Considering main characteristics of the models in a redesigning approach, our models deliberate the previous configuration of the SCN to recommend controlled, minimal changes when new products are launched to the SCN's new and existing markets. The main uncertainties of a real market are reflected as demand and price uncertainties as well as their correlation in markets. In the first proposed model, a basic multi-period, multi-tier, multi-product SCN redesign model is introduced to consider launching new products in markets. When new products are introduced into a supply chain, the existing logistics may no longer optimally meet the objectives of the enterprise. The basic model provides an analytical approach to redesigning a supply chain network (SCN), considering its current infrastructure. While aiming to maximise total profit, we take into consideration the demand and price uncertainty and their correlation as two important risk factors, and formulate them using associated Brownian motions employed in a real options pricing approach. Our model captures multiple periods and cash flow aspects through a nonlinear structure. In the solution approach, we apply a novel piecewise linear conversion. Our theoretical model is complemented by a realistic case study from the Australian cement industry. We demonstrate significant improvements in the financial position of the company after redesigning its SCN. For instance, the SCN redesign increases total profit by 49%, while the profit from the existing product increases by 23%. The results also indicate that ignoring the effect of the correlation leads to profit overestimation. Incorporation of financial and operational risk management is the key contribution of the second model, which contemplates maximisation of the financial performance indicators (FPIs) rather than profit. The second model (called the FPI model) proposes a novel organisation that uses essential accounts existing in the basic financial statements of an SCN company to delineate how the strategic financial considerations can influence the network structure and its operational flows. The proposed model takes the existing SCN structure into account, and redesigns the optimal supply network when new products are introduced to markets. It ascertains the future financial position of the company, as well as the optimal levels of loans and the proportion of available cash required for financing the new design. As a company's measure of profitability is related to the uncertain demand and price of new products, we consider stochastic continuous and correlated processes to characterise these uncertainties. The final nonlinear model is solved by employing a piecewise linearisation method. We examine the applicability of the model by designing a realistic case study of an Australian SCN company and comparing the results with a profit maximisation model. Furthermore, we evaluate the resulting financial ratios with real ratios aimed at representing the reliability of the model and introducing future target values for the ratios. This study offers several managerial insights regarding the FPI model. For instance, considering inventory values as a current asset in designing an SCN leads to a realistic design that is aligned with financial statements and is also reportable to creditors and investors