Semantic-Based Storage QoS Management Methodology -- Case Study for Distributed Environments

The distributed computing environments, e.g. clouds, often deal with huge amounts of data, which constantly increase. The global growth of data is caused by ubiquitous personal devices, enterprise and scientific applications, etc. As the size of data grows new challenges are emerging in the context of storage management. Modern data and storage resource management systems need to face wide range of problems -- minimizing energy consumption (green data centers), optimizing resource usage, throughput and capacity, data availability, security and legal issues, scalability. In addition users or their applications can have QoS (Quality of Service) requirements concerning the storage access, which further complicates the management. To cope with this problem a common mass storage system model taking into account the performance aspects of a storage system becomes a necessity. The model described with semantic technologies brings a semantic interoperability between the system components. In this paper we describe our approach at data management with QoS based on the developed models as a case study for distributed environments

Storage QoS provisioning for execution programming of data-intensive applications

Abstract. In this paper a method for execution programming of data-intensive applications is presented. The method is based on storage Quality of Service (SQoS) provisioning. SQoS provisioning uses the semantic based storage monitoring based on a storage resources model and a storage performance management. Test results show the gain for the execution time when using the QStorMan toolkit which implements the presented method. Taking into account the SQoS provisioning opportunity on the one hand, and the increasingly growing user demands on the other hand, we believe that the execution programming of data-intensive applications can bring a new quality into the application execution

Between a rock and a hard place : site selection for Brush-tailed Rock-wallaby (Petrogale penicillata) translocations using an explicit decision-making process

Translocation programs are used in species conservation, but their success rates, particularly in Australia, are low. The poor outcomes for translocation programs are commonly attributed to a lack of information about habitat requirements, especially for rare and endangered species. To address this, the identification of suitable release sites using analytical methods such as Habitat Suitability Models (HSM), has become common. Since biodiversity losses are predicted to increase in the future, effective strategies to reduce species decline are required. Evidence-based decisions and scientific data to support conservation decision-making is paramount in conservation efforts. Once widely distributed across the mountainous country of south-eastern Australia, the distribution of the Brush-tailed Rock-wallaby (BTRW) has contracted particularly within the southern extent of their range. Considered critically endangered in Victoria and extinct in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT), it is more important than ever that the habitat requirements of the BTRW are understood to inform future translocations and the protection of this species in the wild. In this study, an explicit decision-making process was combined with Habitat Suitability Modelling (HSM) and ground-truthing methods to inform potential Brush-tailed Rock-wallaby (BTRW) translocations sites within Victoria and the ACT. Although this study is not the first of its kind to use HSM to predict BTRW habitat suitability, it is the first of its kind to apply an explicit decision-making process at two key stages: 1. to inform the selection of key physical and management attributes to be used in a HSM; and 2. to prioritise sites, within experts’ local knowledge areas, for ground-truthing By combining HSM and an explicit decision-making process, this study has been able to identify six suitable and two highly suitable habitat for BTRW across Victoria and the ACT. The use of an explicit decision-making process and ground-truthing methods to validate the model outputs and prioritise sites for ground-truthing has ensured that the final ranking of potential candidate sites can be reliably used by the Southern Brush-tailed Rock-wallaby Recovery Team to inform future translocations.Masters by Researc

A GIS Suitability Model Evaluating Habitat Characteristics Influencing Beaver (Castor Canadensis) Lodge Site Selection and Lodge Occupancy in Central Adirondacks, New York

The North American beaver (Castor canadensis) represents a quintessential example of an ecosystem engineer. Yet the species\u27 landscape-scale impacts on hydrology, geomorphology, and ecosystem ecology are not uniformly distributed through landscapes or time. Understanding beaver lodge site selection and lodge fidelity through time can help to predict where the greatest effects of beaver activity may occur. In this research project, I seek to understand the relationships between beaver habitat suitability, the habitat variables that currently define suitable areas, and lodge occupancy over time. Using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to model habitat suitability, I use hydrologic, vegetative, and physiographic variables to determine the relationship between traditionally conceived suitable factors and their influence on both lodge site suitability and lodge occupancy at my study site in the Huntington Wildlife Forest (HWF) in the Central Adirondacks of New York state. The results confirm beaver habitat preferences for stable water sources, herbaceous wetland vegetation, and shallow topographic slopes. These habitat variables, however, did not influence occupancy at the lodge-scale over time. Furthermore, three different habitat suitability models showed no relationship between site suitability and lodge occupancy, thereby revealing that long-term occupancy is not a significant consideration when beaver select lodge sites. Together, this project demonstrates that factors promoting suitability for beaver settlement do not correspond to suitability for long-term lodge occupancy

Effects of selective laser melting parameters on relative density of AlSi10Mg

Selective Laser Melting (SLM) is an advance Additive Manufacturing (AM) technique in which a component is manufacturing in a layer by layer manner by melting the top surface of a powder bed with a high intensity laser according to sliced 3D CAD data. AlSi10Mg alloy is a traditional cast alloy that is often used for die-casting. Because of its good mechanical and other properties, this alloy has been widely used in the automotive industry. In this work, the effects on the relative density is investigated for SLM-produced AlSi10Mg parts on one factor at a time (OFAT) basis by keeping constant various parameters such as laser power, scanning speed and hatching distance. It is shown that AlSi10Mg parts produced by SLM having best relative density values are at 350 watt laser power, 1650 mm/s of scanning speed and hatching distance of 0.13mm

Development of a System Architecture for Unmanned Systems Across Multiple Domains

In the unmanned systems industry, there is no common standard for systems components, connections and relations. Such a standard is never likely to exist. Needless to say, a system needs to have the components that are required for the application, however, it is possible to abstract the common functionality out of an individual implementation. This thesis presents a universal unmanned systems architecture that collects all of the common features of an unmanned system and presents them as a set of packages and libraries that can be used in any domain of unmanned system operation. The research and design of the universal architecture results in a well-defined architecture that can be used and implemented on any unmanned system. The AUVSI student competitions are specifically analyzed and it is shown how this universal architecture can be applied to the challenges posed by the competitions in different domains

The preparation and characterization of multi-component systems in drug pre-formulation

The supramolecular derivatisation, via co-crystallization and cyclodextrin (CD) inclusion of three active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs), was attempted with the aim of generating new solid forms with potential pharmaceutical application. The APIs under investigation included allopurinol (used for the treatment of gout and kidney stones), 6-thioguanine (used to treat acute myelogenous leukaemia) and valproic acid (for treatment of epilepsy and bipolar disorders). Allopurinol and 6-thioguanine were fairly intractable, yielding very limited results following co-crystallization trials with a series of co-formers. However, a new polymorph of one of the co-formers, namely isonicotinamide, was discovered serendipitously and thoroughly characterized using thermal analysis and single crystal X-ray diffraction. Phase solubility studies with a variety of CDs showed that the poor aqueous solubility of allopurinol and 6-thioguanine was not significantly modified in the presence of CD solutions. However, a more accurate aqueous solubility value for 6-thioguanine was achieved, namely 0.078 ± 0.003 mg.cm-3 at 25 o C. Six new CD complexes of valproic acid (VAL) were isolated by kneading and/or coprecipitation methods and characterized by thermal analysis, powder X-ray diffraction and spectroscopic (1H NMR and FT-IR) techniques. The six CD complexes (with host-guest stoichiometries in parentheses) included -CD·VAL (2:1), -CD·VAL (1:1), -CD·VAL (4:3), DMB·VAL (1:1), TMB·VAL (1:1) and TMA·VAL (1:1). The -CD·VAL, -CD·VAL, and -CD·VAL complexes were assessed for their ability to alter the aqueous solubility of the drug at 23 o C. The SCD/So ratios for these CD complexes (SCD being the solubility of VAL in the form of the CD complex and So the solubility of pure VAL) were 0.39, 0.42 and 0.41 respectively and thus CD complexation reduced the aqueous solubility of valproic acid. Single crystal X-ray structures of four of the CD-valproic acid complexes were determined, those with native CDs featuring fully disordered guest molecules, while those with permethylated -CD and dimethylated -CD revealed the modes of inclusion of the drug unequivocally

Status Report of the DPHEP Study Group: Towards a Global Effort for Sustainable Data Preservation in High Energy Physics

Data from high-energy physics (HEP) experiments are collected with significant financial and human effort and are mostly unique. An inter-experimental study group on HEP data preservation and long-term analysis was convened as a panel of the International Committee for Future Accelerators (ICFA). The group was formed by large collider-based experiments and investigated the technical and organisational aspects of HEP data preservation. An intermediate report was released in November 2009 addressing the general issues of data preservation in HEP. This paper includes and extends the intermediate report. It provides an analysis of the research case for data preservation and a detailed description of the various projects at experiment, laboratory and international levels. In addition, the paper provides a concrete proposal for an international organisation in charge of the data management and policies in high-energy physics