1,132 research outputs found
Application of artificial intelligence to overload control a
Papers presented virtually at the 41st International Southern African Transport Conference on 10-13 July 2023.High quality road infrastructure is essential to support economic growth for any landlocked
region, confirmed by the fact that 79% of South African goods use road transport.
Protection of the road infrastructure is implemented by means of overload control
monitoring at Traffic Control Centres (TCCs) on freight corridors linking ports with
economic hubs. As these systems lack the available information to support intelligent
decision-making, 75% to 85% of statically weighed vehicles are legally loaded, resulting in
unnecessary wastage of time and fuel. This paper proposes an intelligent weigh-in-motion
(IWIM) algorithm aiming to decrease unnecessary static weighing of vehicles through data
sharing between TCCs combined with intelligent data interpretation. Several Artificial
Intelligence (AI) models were evaluated for their ability to decrease static weighing of
vehicles while not increasing the number of overloaded vehicles allowed to proceed on the
corridor. We found that a Random Forest Tree model produced the best performance to
differentiate between overloaded and legal vehicles, achieving an average improvement of
65.83% in terms of vehicles to be statically weighed when compared to the current rulebased system. Implementation of the IWIM concept can therefore have a significant
positive impact for all stakeholders involved in the freight movement process
Proposed alternative to assist current overload operations in South Africa
Efficient overload control is of utmost importance to protect the road infrastructure in any region. An investigation into the status quo of overload control in South Africa provided evidence of low efficiencies and many instances of systematic evasion of overload control regulations without effective enforcement. In this article, we analyse data to obtain empirical evidence of the level of inefficiencies and to identify the primary factors that affect overload behaviour and the efficiency of current enforcement measures. The data used consist of traffic flow, weigh-in-motion and static scale data over the period 2012 to 2015. We propose an improved overload control system based on more accurate monitoring of road user behaviour using a combination of technologies and the more intelligent use of available data, and discuss the legal implications of the proposed application and steps needed for a pilot deployment of the proposed system.Paper presented at the 35th Annual Southern African Transport Conference 4-7 July 2016 "Transport ? a catalyst for socio-economic
growth and development opportunities to improve quality of life", CSIR International Convention Centre, Pretoria, South Africa.The Minister of Transport, South AfricaTransportation Research Board of the US
Understanding Terrorist Organizations with a Dynamic Model
Terrorist organizations change over time because of processes such as
recruitment and training as well as counter-terrorism (CT) measures, but the
effects of these processes are typically studied qualitatively and in
separation from each other. Seeking a more quantitative and integrated
understanding, we constructed a simple dynamic model where equations describe
how these processes change an organization's membership. Analysis of the model
yields a number of intuitive as well as novel findings. Most importantly it
becomes possible to predict whether counter-terrorism measures would be
sufficient to defeat the organization. Furthermore, we can prove in general
that an organization would collapse if its strength and its pool of foot
soldiers decline simultaneously. In contrast, a simultaneous decline in its
strength and its pool of leaders is often insufficient and short-termed. These
results and other like them demonstrate the great potential of dynamic models
for informing terrorism scholarship and counter-terrorism policy making.Comment: To appear as Springer Lecture Notes in Computer Science v2:
vectorized 4 figures, fixed two typos, more detailed bibliograph
Economic crisis and the construction of a neo-liberal regulatory regime in Korea
A consistent theme of the literature on the ontology of the 1997 South Korean crisis is the key role played by regulatory failures and the growing weakness of the state. This paper seeks to briefly highlight both the insights and the limitations of this approach to understanding the crisis. Having done so, we shall set out the argument that the crisis created an opportunity for reformist Korean élites to advance their longstanding, but previously frustrated, project to create a comprehensive unambiguously neo-liberal regulatory regime. This paper will also seek to highlight the implications of our reading of the development of the Korean political economy for broader debates on economic liberalisation, crisis and the future of the developmental state
Parameterized Verification of Safety Properties in Ad Hoc Network Protocols
We summarize the main results proved in recent work on the parameterized
verification of safety properties for ad hoc network protocols. We consider a
model in which the communication topology of a network is represented as a
graph. Nodes represent states of individual processes. Adjacent nodes represent
single-hop neighbors. Processes are finite state automata that communicate via
selective broadcast messages. Reception of a broadcast is restricted to
single-hop neighbors. For this model we consider a decision problem that can be
expressed as the verification of the existence of an initial topology in which
the execution of the protocol can lead to a configuration with at least one
node in a certain state. The decision problem is parametric both on the size
and on the form of the communication topology of the initial configurations. We
draw a complete picture of the decidability and complexity boundaries of this
problem according to various assumptions on the possible topologies.Comment: In Proceedings PACO 2011, arXiv:1108.145
Milagrito: a TeV air-shower array
Milagrito, a large, covered water-Cherenkov detector, was the world's first
air-shower-particle detector sensitive to cosmic gamma rays below 1 TeV. It
served as a prototype for the Milagro detector and operated from February 1997
to May 1998. This paper gives a description of Milagrito, a summary of the
operating experience, and early results that demonstrate the capabilities of
this technique.Comment: 38 pages including 24 figure
Mapping the contribution of single muscles to facial movements in the rhesus macaque
The rhesus macaque (Macaca mulatta) is the most utilized primate model in the biomedical and psychological sciences. Expressive behavior is of interest to scientists studying these animals, both as a direct variable (modeling neuropsychiatric disease, where expressivity is a primary deficit), as an indirect measure of health and welfare, and also in order to understand the evolution of communication. Here, intramuscular electrical stimulation of facial muscles was conducted in the rhesus macaque in order to document the relative contribution of each muscle to the range of facial movements and to compare the expressive function of homologous muscles in humans, chimpanzees and macaques. Despite published accounts that monkeys possess less differentiated and less complex facial musculature, the majority of muscles previously identified in humans and chimpanzees were stimulated successfully in the rhesus macaque and caused similar appearance changes. These observations suggest that the facial muscular apparatus of the monkey has extensive homology to the human face. The muscles of the human face, therefore, do not represent a significant evolutionary departure from those of a monkey species. Thus, facial expressions can be compared between humans and rhesus macaques at the level of the facial musculature, facilitating the systematic investigation of comparative facial communication
Larval gryporhynchid tapeworms (Cestoda: Cyclophyllidea) of British freshwater fish, with a description of the pathology caused by Paradilepis scolecina
Larvae of the cyclophyllidean tapeworms Paradilepis scolecina (Rudolphi, 1819), Neogryporhynchus cheilancristrotus (Wedl, 1855) and Valipora campylancristrota (Wedl, 1855), are described from British freshwater fish. The morphometrics of the rostellar hooks, infection characteristics and host ranges of these parasites from fisheries in England and Wales are presented. Difficulties in the detection, handling and identification of these tapeworms are highlighted, and may in part explain the paucity of records from Britain. Tissue digestion was shown to be a useful technique for the examination of these parasites, providing clear and consistent preparations of the rostellar hooks for measurement. The pathological changes caused by P. scolecina to the liver of wild tench, Tinca tinca, are detailed for the first time. Tapeworms located in the hepatic parenchyma and pancreatic tissues caused little pathological damage and invoked only mild inflammatory responses. The small size of these tapeworms and their encapsulation within host tissues appear to limit the severity of pathology, compared with parasites that insert their rostellum during attachment
Optimisation of composite bone plates for ulnar transverse fractures
Metallic bone plates are commonly used for arm bone fractures where conservative treatment (casts) cannot provide adequate support and compression at the fracture site. These plates, made of stainless steel or titanium alloys, tend to shield stress transfer at the fracture site and delay the bone healing rate. This study investigates the feasibility of adopting advanced composite materials to overcome stress shielding effects by optimising the geometry and mechanical properties of the plate to match more closely to the bone.
An ulnar transverse fracture is characterised and finite element techniques are employed to investigate the feasibility of a composite-plated fractured bone construct over a stainless steel equivalent. Numerical models of intact and fractured bones are analysed and the mechanical behaviour is found to agree with experimental data. The mechanical properties are tailored to produce an optimised composite plate, offering a 25% reduction in length and a 70% reduction in mass. The optimised design may help to reduce stress shielding and increase bone healing rates
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