843,120 research outputs found

    Henry Ford vs. assembly line balancing

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    Ford’s Assembly Line at Highland Park is one of the most influential conceptualizations of a production system. New data reveal Ford’s operations were adaptable to strongly increasing and highly variable demand. These analyses show Ford’s assembly line was used differently than modern ones and their production systems were more flexible than previously recognized. Assembly line balancing theory largely ignores earlier practice. It will be shown that Ford used multiple lines flexibly to cope with large monthly variations in sales. Although a line may be optimized to yield lowest cost production, systems composed of several parallel lines may yield low cost production along with output and product flexibility. Recent research on multiple parallel lines has focussed on cost effectiveness without appreciating the flexibility such systems may allow. Given the current strategic importance of flexibility it should be included in such analyses as an explicit objective

    STV-based Video Feature Processing for Action Recognition

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    In comparison to still image-based processes, video features can provide rich and intuitive information about dynamic events occurred over a period of time, such as human actions, crowd behaviours, and other subject pattern changes. Although substantial progresses have been made in the last decade on image processing and seen its successful applications in face matching and object recognition, video-based event detection still remains one of the most difficult challenges in computer vision research due to its complex continuous or discrete input signals, arbitrary dynamic feature definitions, and the often ambiguous analytical methods. In this paper, a Spatio-Temporal Volume (STV) and region intersection (RI) based 3D shape-matching method has been proposed to facilitate the definition and recognition of human actions recorded in videos. The distinctive characteristics and the performance gain of the devised approach stemmed from a coefficient factor-boosted 3D region intersection and matching mechanism developed in this research. This paper also reported the investigation into techniques for efficient STV data filtering to reduce the amount of voxels (volumetric-pixels) that need to be processed in each operational cycle in the implemented system. The encouraging features and improvements on the operational performance registered in the experiments have been discussed at the end

    Value Relevance of Financial and Non-Financial Information: Evidence from the Gaming Industry

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    Using financial and non-financial data from casino gaming firms listed in the United States from 1999–2017, we explore two research questions: (1) Is financial information value relevant to financial markets in the casino gaming industry? (2) Does non-financial information have incremental explanatory power over financial information? In general, we find that accounting numbers can explain a firm’s market value and stock returns in the casino gaming industry, except for accounting accruals, which may behave differently compared to other industries. We also find that non-financial information, such as the number of table games, number of slot machines, and their relative proportion, have significant value relevance in explaining market valuation. Our findings contribute to a better understanding of the value relevance of financial and non-financial information in the casino gaming industry. We also provide analysis of firms characterized by these non-financial attributes. Keywords: hospitality, casino, gaming, value relevance, table games, slot machines JEL Code: L83, M19, M4

    Air Treatment Techniques for Abatement of Emissions from Intensive Livestock Production

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    Intensive livestock production is connected with a number of environmental effects, including emissions of ammonia (NH3), greenhouse gases (CH4 and N2O), odour, and particulate matter (PM10 and PM2.5). Possible strategies for emission reduction include feed management, adaptation of housing design, and, in case of mechanically ventilated animal houses, the application of end-of-pipe air treatment, viz acid scrubbers and bioscrubbers. Air treatment techniques can achieve very high emission reductions (up to 100% ammonia removal for acid scrubbers). Furthermore, air treatment offers the possibility to achieve removal of not just one compound but of a combined removal of a variety of pollutants (ammonia, odour and particulate matter) at the same time. The successful application of scrubbers is of increasing importance as intensive livestock operations have to comply with ever stricter regulations and emission limits. Research is needed to address topics such as reduction of costs (both investment and operational costs), improvement of process control to guarantee stable removal efficiencies, decrease of N2O production in bioscrubbers, and increase of odour removal efficienc

    Un modelo integrado para el enrutamiento de aeronaves y la programación de la tripulación: Relajación lagrangiana y algoritmo metaheurístico

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    [EN] Airline optimization is a significant problem in recent researches and airline industryl as it can determine the level of service, profit and competition status of the airline. Aircraft and crew are expensive resources that need efficient utilization. This paper focuses simultaneously on two major issues including aircraft maintenance routing and crew scheduling. Several key issues such as aircraft replacement, fairly night flights assignment and long-life aircrafts are considered in this model. We used the flight hours as a new framework to control aircraft maintenance. At first, an integrated mathematical model for aircraft routing and crew scheduling problems is developed with the aim of cost minimization. Then, Lagrangian relaxation and Particle Swarm Optimization algorithm (PSO) are used as the solution techniques. To evaluate the efficiency of solution approaches, model is solved with different numerical examples in small, medium and large sizes and compared with GAMS output. The results show that Lagrangian relaxation method provides better solutions comparing to PSO and also has a very small gap to optimum solution.[ES] La optimización de aerolíneas es un problema importante en investigaciones recientes e industria de aerolíneas, ya que puede determinar el nivel de servicio, el beneficio y el estado de competencia de la aerolínea. Las aeronaves y la tripulación son recursos costosos que necesitan una utilización eficiente. Este artículo se centra simultáneamente en dos cuestiones principales, incluyendo el enrutamiento de mantenimiento de aeronaves y la programación de la tripulación. En este modelo se consideran varios temas clave, como el reemplazo de aeronaves, la asignación de vuelos nocturnos y los aviones envejecidos. Usamos las horas de vuelo como un nuevo marco para controlar el mantenimiento de las aeronaves. Al principio, se desarrolla un modelo matemático integrado para el enrutamiento de aeronaves y los problemas de programación de la tripulación con el objetivo de la minimización de costos. A continuación, se utilizan como técnicas de solución la relajación lagran-giana y el algoritmo “Particle Swarm Optimization” (PSO). Para evaluar la eficiencia de los en-foques de la solución, el modelo se resuelve con diferentes ejemplos numéricos en tamaños pequeños, medianos y grandes y se compara con la salida GAMS. Los resultados muestran que el método de relajación lagrangiana proporciona mejores soluciones en comparación con PSO y también tiene una pequeña diferencia para una solución óptimaMirjafari, M.; Rashidi Komijan, A.; Shoja, A. (2020). An integrated model for aircraft routing and crew scheduling: Lagrangian Relaxation and metaheuristic algorithm. WPOM-Working Papers on Operations Management. 11(1):25-38. https://doi.org/10.4995/wpom.v11i1.12891OJS2538111Al-Thani, Nayla Ahmad, Ben Ahmed, Mohamed and Haouari, Mohamed (2016). A model and optimization-based heuristic for the operational aircraft maintenance routing problem, Transportation Research Part C: Emerging Technologies, Volume 72, Pages 29-44. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trc.2016.09.004Azadeh, A., HosseinabadiFarahani, M., Eivazy, H., Nazari-Shirkouhi, S., &Asadipour, G. (2013). A hybrid meta-heuristic algorithm for optimization of crew scheduling, Applied Soft Computing, Volume 13, Pages 158-164. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.asoc.2012.08.012Barnhart C. and Cohn, A. (2004). Airline schedule planning: Accomplishments and opportunities, Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, 6(1):3-22, 47, 69, 141, 144. https://doi.org/10.1287/msom.1030.0018Basdere, Mehmet and Bilge, Umit (2014). Operational aircraft maintenance routing problem with remaining time consideration, European Journal of Operational Research, Volume 235, Pages 315-328. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejor.2013.10.066Bazargan, Massoud (2010). Airline Operations and scheduling second edition, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, USA, Ashgate publishing limite.Belien, Jeroen, Demeulemeester, Eric and Brecht (2010). Integrated staffing and scheduling for an aircraft line maintenance problem, HUB RESEARCH PAPER Economics & Management.Ben Ahmed, M., Zeghal Mansour, Farah and Haouari, Mohamed (2018). Robust integrated maintenance aircraft routing and crew pairing, Journal of Air Transport Management, Volume 73, Pages 15-31. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jairtraman.2018.07.007Ben Ahmed, M., Zeghal Mansour, F., Haouari, M. (2017). A two-level optimization approach for robust aircraft routing and retiming, Computers and Industrial Engineering, Volume 112, Pages 586-594. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cie.2016.09.021Borndorfer, R., Schelten, U., Schlechte, T., Weider, S. (2006). A column generation approach to airline crew scheduling, Springer Berlin Heidelberg, Pages 343-348. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-32539-5_54Clarke, L., E. Johnson, G. Nemhauser, Z. Zhu. (1997). The Aircraft Rotation Problem. Annals of Operations Research, 69, Pages 33-46. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1018945415148Deveci, Muhammet and ÇetinDemirel, Nihan (2018). Evolutionary algorithms for solving the airline crew pairing problem, Computers & Industrial Engineering, Volume 115, Pages 389-406. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cie.2017.11.022Dozic, S., Kalic, M. (2015). Three-stage airline fleet planning model, J. Air Transport. Manag, 43, Pages 30-39. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jairtraman.2015.03.011Eltoukhy, A.E., Chan, F.T., Chung, S. (2017). Airline schedule planning: a review and future directions, Ind. Manag. Data Syst, 117(6), Pages 1201-1243. https://doi.org/10.1108/IMDS-09-2016-0358Feo, T. A., J. F. Bard. (1989). Flight Scheduling and Maintenance Base Planning. Management Science, 35(12), Pages 1415-1432. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.35.12.1415Goffin, J. L. (1977). On the convergence rates of subgradient optimization methods. Math. Programming, 13, Pages 329-347. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01584346Gopalakrishnan, B., Johnson, E. L (2005). Airline crew scheduling, State-of-the-art. Ann. Oper. Res, 140(1), Pages 305-337. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10479-005-3975-3Held, M. and Karp, R.M. (1970). The Traveling-Salesman Problem and Minimum SpanningTrees. Operations Research, 18, 1138-1162. https://doi.org/10.1287/opre.18.6.1138Held, M. Wolfe, P., Crowder, H. D. (1974). Validation of subgradient optimization, Math. Programming, 6, 62-88. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01580223Jamili, Amin (2017). A robust mathematical model and heuristic algorithms for integrated aircraft routing and scheduling, with consideration of fleet assignment problem, Journal of Air Transport Management, Volume 58, Pages 21-30. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jairtraman.2016.08.008Jiang, H., Barnhart, C. (2009) Dynamic airline scheduling, Transport. Sci, 43(3), Pages 336-354. https://doi.org/10.1287/trsc.1090.0269Kasirzadeh, A., Saddoune, M., Soumis, F. (2015). Airline crew scheduling: models, algorhitms and data sets, Euro Journal on Transportation and Logistics, 6(2), Pages 111-137. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13676-015-0080-xLacasse-Guay, E., Desaulniers, G., Soumis, F. (2010). Aircraft routing under different business processes, J. Air Transport. Manag, 16(5), Pages 258-263. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jairtraman.2010.02.001Muter, İbrahim, Birbil, Ş. İlker, Bülbül, Kerem, Şahin, Güvenç,Yenigün, Hüsnü, Taş,Duygu andTüzün, Dilek (2013). Solving a robust airline crew pairing problem with column generation, Computers & Operations Research, Volume 40, Issue 3, Pages 815-830. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cor.2010.11.005Saddoune, Mohammed, Desaulniers, Guy, Elhallaoui, Issmail and François Soumis (2011). Integrated airline crew scheduling: A bi-dynamic constraint aggregation method using neighborhoods, European Journal of Operational Research, Volume 212, Pages 445-454. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejor.2011.02.009Safaei, Nima and K.S.Jardine, Andrew (2018). Aircraft routing with generalized maintenance constraints, Omega, Volume 80, Pages 111-122. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.omega.2017.08.013Shao Shengzhi (2012). Integrated Aircraft Fleeting, Routing, and Crew Pairing Models and Algorithms for the Airline Industry, Faculty of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Industrial and Systems Engineering.Shao, S., Sherali, H.D., Haouari, M. (2017). A novel model and decomposition approach for the integrated airline fleet assignment, aircraft routing, crew pairing problem, Transport. Sci, 51(1), Pages 233-249. https://doi.org/10.1287/trsc.2015.0623Sherali, H.D., Bish, E.K., Zhu, X. (2006). Airline fleet assignment concepts, models and algorithms, Eur. J. Oper. Res, 172(1), Pages 1-30. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejor.2005.01.056Warburg, V., Hansen, T.G., Larsen, A., Norman, H., Andersson, E. (2008). Dynamic airline scheduling: an analysis of potentials of refleeting and retiming, J. Air Transport. Manag. 14(4), Pages 163-167. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jairtraman.2008.03.004Yan, C. and Kung, J. (2018). Robust aircraft routing, Transport. Sci, 52(1), Pages 118-133. https://doi.org/10.1287/trsc.2015.0657Yen, J.W., Birge, J.R., (2006). A stochastic programming approach to the airline crew scheduling problem. Transportation Science, Volume 40, Pages 3-14. https://doi.org/10.1287/trsc.1050.0138Yu, G. (1998). Operation Research in the Airline Industry. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-5501-8Zeren, Bahadir and Ozkol, Ibrahim (2016). A novel column generation strategy foe large scale airline crew pairing problems, Expert system with applications, Volume 55, Pages 133-144. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eswa.2016.01.045Zhang, Dong, Lau, H.Y.K. Henry and Yu, Chuhang (2015). A two stage heuristic algorithm for the integrated aircraft and crew schedule recovery problems, Computers and Industrial Engineering, Volume 87, Pages 436-453. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cie.2015.05.03

    Applied scientific and systemic problems of the related ore-dressing plants interaction in the event of decommissioning the massif that separates their quarries

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    Purpose. Determining the possible and substantiating expedient alternate design and engineering decisions regarding the stage of spacial union of the adjacent quarries belonging to various owners by mining the rock pillar between the No. 3 quarry of PJSC “ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih” and the quarry of PJSC “Southern Mining Factory” with involvement into mining the reserves, extraction of which is possible within the existing mining and land allotments. Methods. It was used an integrated methodological approach, including mining and geological analysis of the rock massif between two adjacent quarries, which is subject to decommissioning; technical-economical analysis of the operational efficiency of the ore-dressing plant when decreasing the ore mine productivity as a result of cleaning-up the deposit; theoretical substabtiation of design and engineering decisions regarding the quarry objects parameters in the specified conditions and with the efficient development of a rock pillar that separates quarries. Findings. The state of the projects and plans for the development of mining operations in the No. 3 quarry of PJSC “ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih” and the quarry of PJSC “Southern Mining Factory” has been analyzed, which, in the coming years, indicates their spacial union. It has been revealed that the decommissioning of the rock pillar between the quarries is complicated both spacely and technologically, especially as a result of seismic restrictions, but the proposed solutions and measures simplify and make safe this stage as much as possible. The problem has been defined of reduce in the loading at the dressing plants proportionally to the decline in ore output. The technical-economical calculations substantiate that the corresponding sequential decommissioning the enrichment sections of the ore-dressing plants is expedient at one of the two cooperating ore mining and processing plants. Originality. An integrated approach has been improved regarding the evolution of mining and processing enterprises at the stage when their quarries approach to the maximum depths and final contours by taking into account adjacent ore mines as a single complex dynamic system. The analytical substantiation of drilling and blasting technology of the rocks destruction has been adapted to the specific conditions of decommissioning the pillar adjacent to both quarries. Practical implications. It is distinguished their high level of suitability for implementation and use in the designing of mining operations development in the quarries of PJSC “ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih” and PJSC “Southern Mining Factory”.Мета. Визначення можливих і обґрунтування доцільних варіантів проектно-технологічних рішень щодо етапу просторового з’єднання суміжних кар’єрів різних власників на прикладі розробки породного цілика між кар’єром №3 ПрАТ “АрселорМіттал Кривий Ріг” і кар’єром ПрАТ “Південний гірничо-збагачувальний комбінат” з включенням до відпрацювання запасів, виїмка яких є можливою в межах існуючих гірничого та земельного відводів. Методика. Використано комплексний методичний підхід, що включає гірничо-геологічний аналіз породного масиву між двома суміжними кар’єрами, який підлягає ліквідації; техніко-економічний аналіз ефективності експлуатації рудозбагачувальної фабрики при зниженні продуктивності рудника внаслідок доробки родовища; теоретичне обґрунтування проектних і технологічних рішень щодо параметрів об’єктів кар’єру за даних умов та продуктивної розробки розділяючого кар’єри породного цілика. Результати. Проаналізовано стан проектів і планів розвитку гірничих робіт кар’єру №3 ПрАТ “АрселорМіттал Кривий Ріг” і кар’єру ПрАТ “Південний гірничо-збагачувальний комбінат”, що свідчить про їх просторове з’єднання в найближчі роки. Виявлено, що ліквідація породного цілика між кар’єрами ускладнюється як просторово, так і технологічно, особливо внаслідок сейсмічних обмежень, але запропоновані рішення і заходи максимально спрощують й убезпечують даний етап. Встановлена проблема зниження завантаження збагачувальних фабрик пропорційна падінню видобутку руд. Техніко-економічні розрахунки доводять, що відповідне зазначеному послідовне виведення збагачувальних секцій рудозбагачувальних фабрик є доцільним на одному зі взаємодіючих ГЗК. Наукова новизна. Вдосконалено комплексний підхід щодо еволюції гірничо-збагачувальних комбінатів на стадії наближення їх кар’єрів до граничних глибин та кінцевих контурів за рахунок врахування суміжних рудників як єдиної складної динамічної системи. Адаптовано аналітичні обґрунтування технології буро-підривного руйнування скельних порід до конкретних умов ліквідації міжкар’єрного цілика. Практична значимість визначається високим рівнем придатності їх до впровадження та використання в проектуванні розвитку гірничих робіт кар’єрів ПрАТ “АрселорМіттал Кривий Ріг” і ПрАТ “Південний гірничо-збагачувальний комбінат”.Цель. Определение возможных и обоснование целесообразных вариантов проектно-технологических решений относительно этапа пространственного соединения смежных карьеров различных собственников на примере разработки породного целика между карьером №3 ЧАО “АрселорМиттал Кривой Рог” и карьером ЧАО “Южный горно-обогатительный комбинат” с включением в отработку запасов, выемка которых возможна в рамках существующих горного и земельного отводов. Методика. Использован комплексный методический подход, включающий горно-геологический анализ породного массива между двумя смежными карьерами, который подлежит ликвидации; технико-экономический анализ эффективности эксплуатации рудообогатительной фабрики при снижении производительности рудника в результате доработки месторождения; теоретическое обоснование проектных и технологических решений относительно параметров объектов карьера при данных условиях и продуктивной разработки разделяющего карьеры породного целика. Результаты. Проанализировано состояние проектов и планов развития горных работ карьера №3 ЧАО “АрселорМиттал Кривой Рог” и карьера ЧАО “Южный горно-обогатительный комбинат”, что свидетельствует об их пространственном соединении в ближайшие годы. Выявлено, что ликвидация породного целика между карьерами осложняется как пространственно, так и технологически, особенно в результате сейсмических ограничений, но предложенные решения и меры максимально упрощают и защищают данный этап. Установленная проблема снижения загрузки обогатительных фабрик пропорциональна падению добычи руд. Технико-экономические расчеты доказывают, что соответствующее указанному последовательное выведение обогатительных секций рудообогатительных фабрик является целесообразным на одном из взаимодействующих ГОК. Научная новизна. Усовершенствован комплексный подход к эволюции горно-обогатительных комбинатов на стадии приближения их карьеров до предельных глубин и конечных контуров за счет учета смежных рудников как единой сложной динамической системы. Адаптировано аналитические обоснования технологии буровзрывного разрушения скальных пород к конкретным условиям ликвидации междукарьерного целика. Практическая значимость определяется высоким уровнем пригодности их к внедрению и использованию в проектировании развития горных работ карьеров ЧАО “АрселорМиттал Кривой Рог” и ЧАО “Южный горно-обогатительный комбинат”.The authors express their deep gratitude to the Head of the Research and Development Laboratory for quality control of iron ore raw materials, Professor A.A. Azaryan, as well as the staff of the Department of Open Pit Mining at Kryvyi Rih National University for their assistance when implementing the scientific developments and their introduction into production

    Using Operations Data for Planning the the Delaware Valley: First Steps

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    Real-time traffic operations data has been gathered for several years on an increasing number of roads throughout the Delaware Valley. The archives of this data are a tremendous potential resource for transportation planning. Use of the data, however, has posed significant technical challenges. This report summarizes how the data can be used, the state of operations data for planning in the Delaware Valley, and the results of two case studies. The first case study used data from the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation's Dynac system about speed and travel time on a section of I-76. The second case study used data provided by the I-95 Corridor Coalition Vehicle Probe Project (VPP) from INRIX, a private-sector traffic data company. The second case study analyzed duration of congestion on weekdays in 2009 for freeways in the Delaware Valley. This analysis was used in the region's 2011 Congestion Management Process

    KM Maturity Factors Affecting High Performance in Universities

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    This paper aims to measure Knowledge Management Maturity (KMM) in the universities to determine the impact of knowledge management on high performance. This study was applied on Al-Quds Open University in Gaza strip, Palestine. Asian productivity organization model was applied to measure KMM. Second dimension which assess high performance was developed by the authors. The controlled sample was (306). Several statistical tools were used for data analysis and hypotheses testing, including reliability Correlation using Cronbach’s alpha, “ANOVA”, Simple Linear Regression and Step Wise Regression.The overall findings of the current study suggest that KMM is suitable for measuring high performance. KMM assessment shows that maturity level is in level three. Findings also support the main hypothesis and it is sub- hypotheses. The most important factors effecting high performance are: Processes, KM leadership, People, KM Outcomes and Learning and Innovation. Furthermore the current study is unique by the virtue of its nature, scope and way of implied investigation, as it is the first comparative study in the universities of Palestine explores the status of KMM using the Asian productivity Model
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