Designing Software Architectures As a Composition of Specializations of Knowledge Domains

This paper summarizes our experimental research and software development activities in designing robust, adaptable and reusable software architectures. Several years ago, based on our previous experiences in object-oriented software development, we made the following assumption: ‘A software architecture should be a composition of specializations of knowledge domains’. To verify this assumption we carried out three pilot projects. In addition to the application of some popular domain analysis techniques such as use cases, we identified the invariant compositional structures of the software architectures and the related knowledge domains. Knowledge domains define the boundaries of the adaptability and reusability capabilities of software systems. Next, knowledge domains were mapped to object-oriented concepts. We experienced that some aspects of knowledge could not be directly modeled in terms of object-oriented concepts. In this paper we describe our approach, the pilot projects, the experienced problems and the adopted solutions for realizing the software architectures. We conclude the paper with the lessons that we learned from this experience

An Analysis of Service Ontologies

Services are increasingly shaping the world’s economic activity. Service provision and consumption have been profiting from advances in ICT, but the decentralization and heterogeneity of the involved service entities still pose engineering challenges. One of these challenges is to achieve semantic interoperability among these autonomous entities. Semantic web technology aims at addressing this challenge on a large scale, and has matured over the last years. This is evident from the various efforts reported in the literature in which service knowledge is represented in terms of ontologies developed either in individual research projects or in standardization bodies. This paper aims at analyzing the most relevant service ontologies available today for their suitability to cope with the service semantic interoperability challenge. We take the vision of the Internet of Services (IoS) as our motivation to identify the requirements for service ontologies. We adopt a formal approach to ontology design and evaluation in our analysis. We start by defining informal competency questions derived from a motivating scenario, and we identify relevant concepts and properties in service ontologies that match the formal ontological representation of these questions. We analyze the service ontologies with our concepts and questions, so that each ontology is positioned and evaluated according to its utility. The gaps we identify as the result of our analysis provide an indication of open challenges and future work

On the Origin of the Early Solar System Radioactivities. Problems with the AGB and Massive Star Scenarios

Recent improvements in stellar models for intermediate-mass and massive stars are recalled, together with their expectations for the synthesis of radioactive nuclei of lifetime $\tau \lesssim 25$ Myr, in order to re-examine the origins of now extinct radioactivities, which were alive in the solar nebula. The Galactic inheritance broadly explains most of them, especially if $r$-process nuclei are produced by neutron star merging according to recent models. Instead, $^{26}$Al, $^{41}$Ca, $^{135}$Cs and possibly $^{60}$Fe require nucleosynthesis events close to the solar formation. We outline the persisting difficulties to account for these nuclei by Intermediate Mass Stars (2 $\lesssim$ M/M$_\odot \lesssim 7 - 8$). Models of their final stages now predict the ubiquitous formation of a $^{13}$C reservoir as a neutron capture source; hence, even in presence of $^{26}$Al production from Deep Mixing or Hot Bottom Burning, the ratio $^{26}$Al/$^{107}$Pd remains incompatible with measured data, with a large excess in $^{107}$Pd. This is shown for two recent approaches to Deep Mixing. Even a late contamination by a Massive Star meets problems. In fact, inhomogeneous addition of Supernova debris predicts non-measured excesses on stable isotopes. Revisions invoking specific low-mass supernovae and/or the sequential contamination of the pre-solar molecular cloud might be affected by similar problems, although our conclusions here are weakened by our schematic approach to the addition of SN ejecta. The limited parameter space remaining to be explored for solving this puzzle is discussed.Comment: Accepted for publication on Ap

Workshop on Pristine Highlands Rocks and the early History of the Moon

Oxide composition of the Moon, evidence for an initially totally molten Moon, geophysical contraints on lunar composition, random sampling of a layered intrusion, lunar highland rocks, early evolution of the Moon, mineralogy and petrology of the pristine rocks, relationship of the pristine nonmore rocks to the highlands soils and breccias, ferroan anorthositic norite, early lunar igneous history, compositional variation in ferroan anosthosites, a lunar magma ocean, deposits of lunar pristine rocks, lunar and planetary compositions and early fractionation in the solar nebula, Moon composition models, petrogenesis in a Moon with a chondritic refractory lithophile pattern, a terrestrial analog of lunar ilmenite bearing camulates, and the lunar magma ocean are summarized

An Interface Theory for Input/Output Automata

Building on the theory of interface automata by de Alfaro and Henzinger we design an interface language for Lynch's Input/Output Automata, a popular formalism used in the development of distributed asynchronous systems, not addressed by previous interface research. We introduce an explicit separation of assumptions from guarantees not yet seen in other behavioral interface theories. Moreover we derive the composition operator systematically and formally, guaranteeing that the resulting compositions are always the weakest in the sense of assumptions, and the strongest in the sense of guarantees. We also present a method for solving systems of relativized behavioral inequalities as used in our setup and draw a formal correspondence between our work and interface automata. Proofs are provided in an appendix

Crystal-mush reactivation by magma recharge: Evidence from the Campanian Ignimbrite activity, Campi Flegrei volcanic field, Italy

International audienceProcesses of crystal-mush remobilization by mafic magma recharges are often related to the outpouring of largevolumes of silicic melt during caldera-forming eruptions. This occurred for the Campanian Ignimbrite (CI) erup-tion (Campi Flegrei, Italy), which produced a voluminous trachy-phonolitic ignimbrite in southern-central Italyabout 40 ka ago. We focussed on the proximal-CI deposits at San Martino that are composed of a main sequenceof early-erupted, crystal-poor units and a late-erupted (post-caldera collapse) crystal-rich Upper Pumice FlowUnit (UPFU). Detailed micro-analytical geochemical data were performed on glasses and crystals of pyroclastsfrom these deposits and coupled with Sr-Nd isotopic measurements on glasses. Results show that the CI eruptionwas fed by two distinct melts for the early-erupted units and the late UPFU, respectively. The glasses of the early-erupted units have negative Eu anomalies and show more evolved compositions and higher Nd isotope ratiosthan those of the UPFU, which have positive Eu/Eu*. The magmas of the early units formed the main volume oferuptible meltof the CI reservoir, and are interpretedashaving beenextractedfrom cumulate crystal-mushwith-out a vertical geochemical gradient within the magma reservoir. The data indicate that the generation of thedistinctive UPFU melts involved the injection of a new batch of mafic magma into the base of the CI reservoir.The mafic magma allowed heating and reactivation of the CI crystal-mush by melting of low-Or sanidines(+/−low-An plagioclases), leaving high-An plagioclases and high-Mg# clinopyroxenes as residual phases anda crystal-mush melt, made of 20% of the initial mush interstitial melt (with a composition similar to the early-erupted units) and 80% of sanidine melt. When the mush crystallinity was sufficiently reduced, the maficmagma was able to penetrate into the reactivated crystal-mush, mixing with variable proportions of crystal-mush melt and generating cooler hybrid melts, which underwent further crystallization of high-Or sanidine atvariable degrees (10–25%). Finally, possibly a short time before the eruption, the UPFU magmas were able tomix and mingle with the crystal-poor eruptible melts still persisting in the CI reservoir at the time of UPFU emis-sion. We suggest that the complex mechanisms described for the magma evolution feeding the CI eruption mayoccur whenever a crystal-mush is reactivated by new mafic magma input

Conference on the Origin of the Moon

Various topics relating to lunar evolution are discussed. The Moon's ancient orbital history, geophysical and geochemical constraints favoring the capture hypothesis, the site of the lunar core, chemical and petrological constraints, dynamical constraints, and mathematical models are among the topics discussed

Fluctuation in Equilibrium Unemployment

Fluctuations in the equilibrium rate of unemployment can only be understood within a theory of the natural or equilibrium rate. It is not enough to say that unemployment is the difference between supply and demand in the labor market, though of course it always will be. In equilibrium, no participants in the market can have an unexploited opportunity to make themselves better off. At the equilibrium unemployment rate, employers cannot obtain labor at lower cost by offering work at below the market wage to the unemployed. Unemployed workers cannot raise their effective real incomes by taking lower wages in exchange for immediate employment. The task of the theory is to explain why any unemployment remains at all when these conditions are satisfied. Part of this problem has been studied in detail in the "search theory" of unemployment -- once a worker becomes unemployed, it is reasonably well understood why the worker does not become employed again immediately. The theory of why people become unemployed in the first place is less well developed and is the main concern of this paper. Most of the unemployed are looking for new work because their previous jobs ran out. Consequently, the main ingredient of a theory of the flow of workers into unemployment is a theory of the duration of employment. Such a theory is developed here, along reasonably standard lines.