634 research outputs found
Reading the news through its structure: new hybrid connectivity based approaches
In this thesis a solution for the problem of identifying the structure of news published
by online newspapers is presented. This problem requires new approaches and algorithms
that are capable of dealing with the massive number of online publications in existence
(and that will grow in the future). The fact that news documents present a high degree of
interconnection makes this an interesting and hard problem to solve. The identification
of the structure of the news is accomplished both by descriptive methods that expose the
dimensionality of the relations between different news, and by clustering the news into
topic groups. To achieve this analysis this integrated whole was studied using different
perspectives and approaches.
In the identification of news clusters and structure, and after a preparatory data collection
phase, where several online newspapers from different parts of the globe were
collected, two newspapers were chosen in particular: the Portuguese daily newspaper
Público and the British newspaper The Guardian.
In the first case, it was shown how information theory (namely variation of information)
combined with adaptive networks was able to identify topic clusters in the news published
by the Portuguese online newspaper Público.
In the second case, the structure of news published by the British newspaper The
Guardian is revealed through the construction of time series of news clustered by a kmeans
process. After this approach an unsupervised algorithm, that filters out irrelevant
news published online by taking into consideration the connectivity of the news labels
entered by the journalists, was developed. This novel hybrid technique is based on Qanalysis
for the construction of the filtered network followed by a clustering technique to
identify the topical clusters. Presently this work uses a modularity optimisation clustering technique but this step is general enough that other hybrid approaches can be used without
losing generality.
A novel second order swarm intelligence algorithm based on Ant Colony Systems
was developed for the travelling salesman problem that is consistently better than the
traditional benchmarks. This algorithm is used to construct Hamiltonian paths over the
news published using the eccentricity of the different documents as a measure of distance.
This approach allows for an easy navigation between published stories that is dependent
on the connectivity of the underlying structure.
The results presented in this work show the importance of taking topic detection in
large corpora as a multitude of relations and connectivities that are not in a static state.
They also influence the way of looking at multi-dimensional ensembles, by showing that
the inclusion of the high dimension connectivities gives better results to solving a particular
problem as was the case in the clustering problem of the news published online.Neste trabalho resolvemos o problema da identificação da estrutura das notícias publicadas
em linha por jornais e agências noticiosas. Este problema requer novas abordagens e
algoritmos que sejam capazes de lidar com o número crescente de publicações em linha
(e que se espera continuam a crescer no futuro). Este facto, juntamente com o elevado
grau de interconexão que as notícias apresentam tornam este problema num problema
interessante e de difícil resolução. A identificação da estrutura do sistema de notícias foi
conseguido quer através da utilização de métodos descritivos que expõem a dimensão das
relações existentes entre as diferentes notícias, quer através de algoritmos de agrupamento
das mesmas em tópicos. Para atingir este objetivo foi necessário proceder a ao estudo deste
sistema complexo sob diferentes perspectivas e abordagens.
Após uma fase preparatória do corpo de dados, onde foram recolhidos diversos jornais
publicados online optou-se por dois jornais em particular: O Público e o The Guardian.
A escolha de jornais em línguas diferentes deve-se à vontade de encontrar estratégias de
análise que sejam independentes do conhecimento prévio que se tem sobre estes sistemas.
Numa primeira análise é empregada uma abordagem baseada em redes adaptativas
e teoria de informação (nomeadamente variação de informação) para identificar tópicos
noticiosos que são publicados no jornal português Público.
Numa segunda abordagem analisamos a estrutura das notícias publicadas pelo jornal
Britânico The Guardian através da construção de séries temporais de notícias. Estas foram
seguidamente agrupadas através de um processo de k-means. Para além disso desenvolveuse
um algoritmo que permite filtrar de forma não supervisionada notícias irrelevantes que
apresentam baixa conectividade às restantes notícias através da utilização de Q-analysis
seguida de um processo de clustering. Presentemente este método utiliza otimização de modularidade, mas a técnica é suficientemente geral para que outras abordagens híbridas
possam ser utilizadas sem perda de generalidade do método.
Desenvolveu-se ainda um novo algoritmo baseado em sistemas de colónias de formigas
para solução do problema do caixeiro viajante que consistentemente apresenta resultados
melhores que os tradicionais bancos de testes. Este algoritmo foi aplicado na construção
de caminhos Hamiltonianos das notícias publicadas utilizando a excentricidade obtida a
partir da conectividade do sistema estudado como medida da distância entre notícias. Esta
abordagem permitiu construir um sistema de navegação entre as notícias publicadas que é
dependente da conectividade observada na estrutura de notícias encontrada.
Os resultados apresentados neste trabalho mostram a importância de analisar sistemas
complexos na sua multitude de relações e conectividades que não são estáticas e que
influenciam a forma como tradicionalmente se olha para sistema multi-dimensionais.
Mostra-se que a inclusão desta dimensões extra produzem melhores resultados na resolução
do problema de identificar a estrutura subjacente a este problema da publicação de notícias em linha
The multiple pheromone Ant clustering algorithm
Ant Colony Optimisation algorithms mimic the way ants use pheromones for marking paths to important locations. Pheromone traces are followed and reinforced by other ants, but also evaporate over time. As a consequence, optimal paths attract more pheromone, whilst the less useful paths fade away. In the Multiple Pheromone Ant Clustering Algorithm (MPACA), ants detect features of objects represented as nodes within graph space. Each node has one or more ants assigned to each feature. Ants attempt to locate nodes with matching feature values, depositing pheromone traces on the way. This use of multiple pheromone values is a key innovation. Ants record other ant encounters, keeping a record of the features and colony membership of ants. The recorded values determine when ants should combine their features to look for conjunctions and whether they should merge into colonies. This ability to detect and deposit pheromone representative of feature combinations, and the resulting colony formation, renders the algorithm a powerful clustering tool. The MPACA operates as follows: (i) initially each node has ants assigned to each feature; (ii) ants roam the graph space searching for nodes with matching features; (iii) when departing matching nodes, ants deposit pheromones to inform other ants that the path goes to a node with the associated feature values; (iv) ant feature encounters are counted each time an ant arrives at a node; (v) if the feature encounters exceed a threshold value, feature combination occurs; (vi) a similar mechanism is used for colony merging. The model varies from traditional ACO in that: (i) a modified pheromone-driven movement mechanism is used; (ii) ants learn feature combinations and deposit multiple pheromone scents accordingly; (iii) ants merge into colonies, the basis of cluster formation. The MPACA is evaluated over synthetic and real-world datasets and its performance compares favourably with alternative approaches
Optimisation of Mobile Communication Networks - OMCO NET
The mini conference “Optimisation of Mobile Communication Networks” focuses on advanced methods for search and optimisation applied to wireless communication networks. It is sponsored by Research & Enterprise Fund Southampton Solent University.
The conference strives to widen knowledge on advanced search methods capable of optimisation of wireless communications networks. The aim is to provide a forum for exchange of recent knowledge, new ideas and trends in this progressive and challenging area. The conference will popularise new successful approaches on resolving hard tasks such as minimisation of transmit power, cooperative and optimal routing
Ant Colony Optimization
Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) is the best example of how studies aimed at understanding and modeling the behavior of ants and other social insects can provide inspiration for the development of computational algorithms for the solution of difficult mathematical problems. Introduced by Marco Dorigo in his PhD thesis (1992) and initially applied to the travelling salesman problem, the ACO field has experienced a tremendous growth, standing today as an important nature-inspired stochastic metaheuristic for hard optimization problems. This book presents state-of-the-art ACO methods and is divided into two parts: (I) Techniques, which includes parallel implementations, and (II) Applications, where recent contributions of ACO to diverse fields, such as traffic congestion and control, structural optimization, manufacturing, and genomics are presented
Partitioning Method for Emergent Behavior Systems Modeled by Agent-Based Simulations
Used to describe some interesting and usually unanticipated pattern or behavior, the term emergence is often associated with time-evolutionary systems comprised of relatively large numbers of interacting yet simple entities. A significant amount of previous research has recognized the emergence phenomena in many real-world applications such as collaborative robotics, supply chain analysis, social science, economics and ecology. As improvements in computational technologies combined with new modeling paradigms allow the simulation of ever more dynamic and complex systems, the generation of data from simulations of these systems can provide data to explore the phenomena of emergence.
To explore some of the modeling implications of systems where emergent phenomena tend to dominate, this research examines three simulations based on familiar natural systems where each is readily recognized as exhibiting emergent phenomena. To facilitate this exploration, a taxonomy of Emergent Behavior Systems (EBS) is developed and a modeling formalism consisting of an EBS lexicon and a formal specification for models of EBS is synthesized from the long history of theories and observations concerning emergence. This modeling formalism is applied to each of the systems and then each is simulated using an agent-based modeling framework.
To develop quantifiable measures, associations are asserted: 1) between agent-based models of EBS and graph-theoretical methods, 2) with respect to the formation of relationships between entities comprising a system and 3) concerning the change in uncertainty of organization as the system evolves.
These associations form the basis for three measurements related to the information flow, entity complexity, and spatial entropy of the simulated systems. These measurements are used to: 1) detect the existence of emergence and 2) differentiate amongst the three systems.
The results suggest that the taxonomy and formal specification developed provide a workable, simulation-centric definition of emergent behavior systems consistent with both historical concepts concerning the emergence phenomena and modern ideas in complexity science. Furthermore, the results support a structured approach to modeling these systems using agent-based methods and offers quantitative measures useful for characterizing the emergence phenomena in the simulations
Self-organizing Network Optimization via Placement of Additional Nodes
Das Hauptforschungsgebiet des Graduiertenkollegs "International Graduate
School on Mobile Communication" (GS Mobicom) der Technischen Universität
Ilmenau ist die Kommunikation in Katastrophenszenarien. Wegen eines
Desasters oder einer Katastrophe können die terrestrischen Elementen der
Infrastruktur eines Kommunikationsnetzwerks beschädigt oder komplett
zerstört werden. Dennoch spielen verfügbare Kommunikationsnetze eine sehr
wichtige Rolle während der Rettungsmaßnahmen, besonders für die
Koordinierung der Rettungstruppen und für die Kommunikation zwischen ihren
Mitgliedern. Ein solcher Service kann durch ein mobiles Ad-Hoc-Netzwerk
(MANET) zur Verfügung gestellt werden. Ein typisches Problem der MANETs
ist Netzwerkpartitionierung, welche zur Isolation von verschiedenen
Knotengruppen führt. Eine mögliche Lösung dieses Problems ist die
Positionierung von zusätzlichen Knoten, welche die Verbindung zwischen den
isolierten Partitionen wiederherstellen können. Hauptziele dieser Arbeit
sind die Recherche und die Entwicklung von Algorithmen und Methoden zur
Positionierung der zusätzlichen Knoten. Der Fokus der Recherche liegt auf
Untersuchung der verteilten Algorithmen zur Bestimmung der Positionen für
die zusätzlichen Knoten. Die verteilten Algorithmen benutzen nur die
Information, welche in einer lokalen Umgebung eines Knotens verfügbar ist,
und dadurch entsteht ein selbstorganisierendes System. Jedoch wird das
gesamte Netzwerk hier vor allem innerhalb eines ganz speziellen Szenarios -
Katastrophenszenario - betrachtet. In einer solchen Situation kann die
Information über die Topologie des zu reparierenden Netzwerks im Voraus
erfasst werden und soll, natürlich, für die Wiederherstellung mitbenutzt
werden. Dank der eventuell verfügbaren zusätzlichen Information können
die Positionen für die zusätzlichen Knoten genauer ermittelt werden. Die
Arbeit umfasst eine Beschreibung, Implementierungsdetails und eine
Evaluierung eines selbstorganisierendes Systems, welche die
Netzwerkwiederherstellung in beiden Szenarien ermöglicht.The main research area of the International Graduate School on Mobile
Communication (GS Mobicom) at Ilmenau University of Technology is
communication in disaster scenarios. Due to a disaster or an accident, the
network infrastructure can be damaged or even completely destroyed.
However, available communication networks play a vital role during the
rescue activities especially for the coordination of the rescue teams and
for the communication between their members. Such a communication service
can be provided by a Mobile Ad-Hoc Network (MANET). One of the typical
problems of a MANET is network partitioning, when separate groups of nodes
become isolated from each other. One possible solution for this problem is
the placement of additional nodes in order to reconstruct the communication
links between isolated network partitions. The primary goal of this work is
the research and development of algorithms and methods for the placement of
additional nodes. The focus of this research lies on the investigation of
distributed algorithms for the placement of additional nodes, which use
only the information from the nodes’ local environment and thus form a
self-organizing system. However, during the usage specifics of the system
in a disaster scenario, global information about the topology of the
network to be recovered can be known or collected in advance. In this case,
it is of course reasonable to use this information in order to calculate
the placement positions more precisely. The work provides the description,
the implementation details and the evaluation of a self-organizing system
which is able to recover from network partitioning in both situations
Solving the extended vehicle scheduling problem with metaheuristics
Mestrado Integrado. Engenharia Informática e Computação. Faculdade de Engenharia. Universidade do Porto. 201
Optimisation for Optical Data Centre Switching and Networking with Artificial Intelligence
Cloud and cluster computing platforms have become standard across almost every domain of business, and their scale quickly approaches servers in a single warehouse. However, the tier-based opto-electronically packet switched network infrastructure that is standard across these systems gives way to several scalability bottlenecks including resource fragmentation and high energy requirements. Experimental results show that optical circuit switched networks pose a promising alternative that could avoid these.
However, optimality challenges are encountered at realistic commercial scales. Where exhaustive optimisation techniques are not applicable for problems at the scale of Cloud-scale computer networks, and expert-designed heuristics are performance-limited and typically biased in their design, artificial intelligence can discover more scalable and better performing optimisation strategies.
This thesis demonstrates these benefits through experimental and theoretical work spanning all of component, system and commercial optimisation problems which stand in the way of practical Cloud-scale computer network systems. Firstly, optical components are optimised to gate in and are demonstrated in a proof-of-concept switching architecture for optical data centres with better wavelength and component scalability than previous demonstrations. Secondly, network-aware resource allocation schemes for optically composable data centres are learnt end-to-end with deep reinforcement learning and graph neural networks, where less networking resources are required to achieve the same resource efficiency compared to conventional methods. Finally, a deep reinforcement learning based method for optimising PID-control parameters is presented which generates tailored parameters for unseen devices in . This method is demonstrated on a market leading optical switching product based on piezoelectric actuation, where switching speed is improved with no compromise to optical loss and the manufacturing yield of actuators is improved. This method was licensed to and integrated within the manufacturing pipeline of this company. As such, crucial public and private infrastructure utilising these products will benefit from this work
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