Exploring Terms and Taxonomies Relating to the Cyber International Relations Research Field: or are "Cyberspace" and "Cyber Space" the same?

This project has at least two facets to it: (1) advancing the algorithms in the sub-field of bibliometrics often referred to as "text mining" whereby hundreds of thousands of documents (such as journal articles) are scanned and relationships amongst words and phrases are established and (2) applying these tools in support of the Explorations in Cyber International Relations (ECIR) research effort. In international relations, it is important that all the parties understand each other. Although dictionaries, glossaries, and other sources tell you what words/phrases are supposed to mean (somewhat complicated by the fact that they often contradict each other), they do not tell you how people are actually using them. As an example, when we started, we assumed that "cyberspace" and "cyber space" were essentially the same word with just a minor variation in punctuation (i.e., the space, or lack thereof, between "cyber" and "space") and that the choice of the punctuation was a rather random occurrence. With that assumption in mind, we would expect that the taxonomies that would be constructed by our algorithms using "cyberspace" and "cyber space" as seed terms would be basically the same. As it turned out, they were quite different, both in overall shape and groupings within the taxonomy. Since the overall field of cyber international relations is so new, understanding the field and how people think about (as evidenced by their actual usage of terminology, and how usage changes over time) is an important goal as part of the overall ECIR project

An assessment of land cover changes using GIS and remote sensing : a case study of the uMhlathuze Municipality, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.

Thesis (M.Env.Dev.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2005.Rapid growth of cities is a global phenomenon exerting much pressure on land resources and causing associated environmental and social problems. Sustainability of land resources has become a central issue since the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. A better understanding of the processes and patterns of land cover change will aid urban planners and decision makers in guiding more environmentally conscious development. The objective of this study was firstly, to determine the location and extent of land use and land cover changes in the uMhlathuze municipality, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa between 1992 and 2002, and secondly, to predict the likely expansion of urban areas for the year 2012. The uMhlathuze municipality has experienced rapid urban growth since 1976 when the South African Ports and Railways Administration built a deep water harbour at Richards Bay, a town within the municipality. Three Landsat satellite images were obtained for the years, 1992, 1997 and 2002. These images were classified into six classes representing the dominant land covers in the area. A post classification change detection technique was used to determine the extent and location of the changes taking place during the study period. Following this, a GIS-based land cover change suitability model, GEOMOD2, was used to determine the likely distribution of urban land cover in the year 2012. The model was validated using the 2002 image. Sugarcane was found to expand by 129% between 1992 and 1997. Urban land covers increased by an average of 24%, while forestry and woodlands decreased by 29% between 1992 and 1997. Variation in rainfall on the study years and diversity in sugarcane growth states had an impact on the classification accuracy. Overall accuracy in the study was 74% and the techniques gave a good indication of the location and extent of changes taking place in the study site, and show much promise in becoming a useful tool for regional planners and policy makers

Cellular Automata

Modelling and simulation are disciplines of major importance for science and engineering. There is no science without models, and simulation has nowadays become a very useful tool, sometimes unavoidable, for development of both science and engineering. The main attractive feature of cellular automata is that, in spite of their conceptual simplicity which allows an easiness of implementation for computer simulation, as a detailed and complete mathematical analysis in principle, they are able to exhibit a wide variety of amazingly complex behaviour. This feature of cellular automata has attracted the researchers' attention from a wide variety of divergent fields of the exact disciplines of science and engineering, but also of the social sciences, and sometimes beyond. The collective complex behaviour of numerous systems, which emerge from the interaction of a multitude of simple individuals, is being conveniently modelled and simulated with cellular automata for very different purposes. In this book, a number of innovative applications of cellular automata models in the fields of Quantum Computing, Materials Science, Cryptography and Coding, and Robotics and Image Processing are presented

A review of the effects of chemical and phase segregation on the mechanical behaviour of multi-phase steels

In the drive towards higher strength alloys, a diverse range of alloying elements is employed to enhance their strength and ductility. Limited solid solubility of these elements in steel leads to segregation during casting which affects the entire down-stream processing and eventually the mechanical properties of the finished product. Although it is thought that the presence of continuous bands lead to premature failure, it has not been possible to verify this link. This poses as increasingly greater risk for higher alloyed, higher strength steels which are prone to centre-line segregation: it is thus vital to be able to predict the mechanical behaviour of multi-phase (MP) steels under loading. This review covers the microstructure and properties of galvanised advanced high strength steels with particular emphasis to their use in automotive applications. In order to understand the origins of banding, the origins of segregation of alloying elements during casting and partitioning in the solid state will be discussed along with the effects on the mechanical behaviour and damage evolution under (tensile) loading. Attention will also be paid to the application of microstructural models in tailoring the production process to enable suppression of the effects of segregation upon banding. Finally, the theory and application of the experimental techniques used in this work to elucidate the structure and properties will be examined.Comment: 53pages, 34 figures, 4 table

Land-Cover and Land-Use Study Using Genetic Algorithms, Petri Nets, and Cellular Automata

Recent research techniques, such as genetic algorithm (GA), Petri net (PN), and cellular automata (CA) have been applied in a number of studies. However, their capability and performance in land-cover land-use (LCLU) classification, change detection, and predictive modeling have not been well understood. This study seeks to address the following questions: 1) How do genetic parameters impact the accuracy of GA-based LCLU classification; 2) How do image parameters impact the accuracy of GA-based LCLU classification; 3) Is GA-based LCLU classification more accurate than the maximum likelihood classifier (MLC), iterative self-organizing data analysis technique (ISODATA), and the hybrid approach; 4) How do genetic parameters impact Petri Net-based LCLU change detection; and 5) How do cellular automata components impact the accuracy of LCLU predictive modeling. The study area, namely the Tickfaw River watershed (711mi²), is located in southeast Louisiana and southwest Mississippi. The major datasets include time-series Landsat TM / ETM images and Digital Orthophoto Quarter Quadrangles (DOQQ’s). LCLU classification was conducted by using the GA, MLC, ISODATA, and Hybrid approach. The LCLU change was modeled by using genetic PN-based process mining technique. The process models were interpreted and input to a CA for predicting future LCLU. The major findings include: 1) GA-based LCLU classification is more accurate than the traditional approaches; 2) When genetic parameters, image parameters, or CA components are configured improperly, the accuracy of LCLU classification, the coverage of LCLU change process model, and/or the accuracy of LCLU predictive modeling will be low; 3) For GA-based LCLU classification, the recommended configuration of genetic / image parameters is generation 2000-5000, population 1000, crossover rate 69%-99%, mutation rate 0.1%-0.5%, generation gap 25%-50%, data layers 16-20, training / testing data size 10000-20000 / 5000-10000, and spatial resolution 30m-60m; 4) For genetic Petri nets-based LCLU change detection, the recommended configuration of genetic parameters is generation 500, population 300, crossover rate 59%, mutation rate 5%, and elitism rate 4%; and 5) For CA-based LCLU predictive modeling, the recommended configuration of CA components is space 6025 * 12993, state 2, von Neumann neighborhood 3 * 3, time step 2-3 years, and optimized transition rules

Report from the MPP Working Group to the NASA Associate Administrator for Space Science and Applications

NASA's Office of Space Science and Applications (OSSA) gave a select group of scientists the opportunity to test and implement their computational algorithms on the Massively Parallel Processor (MPP) located at Goddard Space Flight Center, beginning in late 1985. One year later, the Working Group presented its report, which addressed the following: algorithms, programming languages, architecture, programming environments, the way theory relates, and performance measured. The findings point to a number of demonstrated computational techniques for which the MPP architecture is ideally suited. For example, besides executing much faster on the MPP than on conventional computers, systolic VLSI simulation (where distances are short), lattice simulation, neural network simulation, and image problems were found to be easier to program on the MPP's architecture than on a CYBER 205 or even a VAX. The report also makes technical recommendations covering all aspects of MPP use, and recommendations concerning the future of the MPP and machines based on similar architectures, expansion of the Working Group, and study of the role of future parallel processors for space station, EOS, and the Great Observatories era