1,397 research outputs found
Architectural Research in the Use of Foam Plastics
This program of research is being sponsored by the Agency for International Development of the U. S. Department of State in the interest of exploring the possibility of using foam plastics as a basic structural material for application in underdeveloped areas of the world. The preliminary investigation included a study of the mechanical properties of cellu lar plastics, methods for producing such ma terials (alone or in combination with other materials), as well as erection techniques which could result from the use of these ma terials. On the basis of this investigation certain conclusions were reached as to the kinds of structures which would make logical use of foam plastics, utilizing their unique properties and designing around their short comings.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/67135/2/10.1177_0021955X6500100118.pd
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Resource constrained routing and scheduling: Review and research prospects
In the service industry, it is crucial to efficiently allocate scarce resources to perform tasks and meet particular service requirements. What considerably complicates matters is when these resources, for example skilled technicians, nurses, and home carers have to visit different customer locations. This paper provides a comprehensive survey on resource constrained routing and scheduling that unveils the problem characteristics with respect to resource qualifications, service requirements and problem objectives. It also identifies the most effective exact and heuristic algorithms for this class of problems. The paper closes with several research prospects
The future of the US Dollar and its competition with the Euro
Since the collapse of the Bretton Woods Global International System in
1971, the world economy has experienced significant currency volatility. The
major economies of the world have addressed such volatility differently. The EU
has chosen to follow a monetary union and introduced successfully a new
currency. The U.S. has paid less attention to the fluctuations of the dollar and
has pursued an independent monetary policy to promote national economic
stability. Japan has seen its currency appreciate significantly. This paper argues
that while trade and growth across the globe are doing well, financial
developments are intensifying the competition between the U.S. dollar and the
euro. Three possible future scenarios are developed and discussed.peer-reviewe
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A cycle-based evolutionary algorithm for the fixed-charge capacitated multi-commodity network design problem
This paper presents an evolutionary algorithm for the fixed-charge multicommodity network design problem (MCNDP), which concerns routing multiple commodities from origins to destinations by designing a network through selecting arcs, with an objective of minimizing the fixed costs of the selected arcs plus the variable costs of the flows on each arc. The proposed algorithm evolves a pool of solutions using principles of scatter search, interlinked with an iterated local search as an improvement method. New cycle-based neighborhood operators are presented which enable complete or partial re-routing of multiple commodities. An efficient perturbation strategy, inspired by ejection chains, is introduced to perform local compound cycle-based moves to explore different parts of the solution space. The algorithm also allows infeasible solutions violating arc capacities while performing the "ejection cycles", and subsequently restores feasibility by systematically applying correction moves. Computational experiments on benchmark MCNDP instances show that the proposed solution method consistently produces high-quality solutions in reasonable computational times
Asymmetrical economic and institutional changes in the Western Balkans : cooperation with the European Union
The Western Balkans have historically been a poor area of Europe. The
total population of the Western Balkans is 24.7 million. Ethnic differences of
long standing have led to conflicts and to political and economic instability.
Poverty and instability have combined to produce a vicious circle of institutional
backwardness. Recent conflicts in Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and
Kosovo have aggravated an already adverse economic situation. GDP in
1999 was substantially lower than that in 1989. The EU plans to enter into
contractual relationships with all the Western Balkans in the form of Stabilization
and Association Agreements (SAAs). The pacts are aimed at helping to
establish economic and political stability, to implement institutional reforms,
to practice regional free trade and cooperation and to privatize the economies
of Western Balkans. These are also the presumed goals of the Western
Balkans.
This study focuses on a review of the progress made by the Western Balkans
toward meeting the above stated challenges. A main conclusion is that
the attainment of these goals has been asymmetrical for economic, political
and institutional reasons.peer-reviewe
Effects of musical training and event probabilities on encoding of complex tone patterns
Background: The human auditory cortex automatically encodes acoustic input from the environment and differentiates regular sound patterns from deviant ones in order to identify important, irregular events. The Mismatch Negativity (MMN) response is a neuronal marker for the detection of sounds that are unexpected, based on the encoded regularities. It is also elicited by violations of more complex regularities and musical expertise has been shown to have an effect on the processing of complex regularities. Using magnetoencephalography (MEG), we investigated the MMN response to salient or less salient deviants by varying the standard probability (70%, 50% and 35%) of a pattern oddball paradigm. To study the effects of musical expertise in the encoding of the patterns, we compared the responses of a group of non-musicians to those of musicians. Results: We observed significant MMN in all conditions, including the least salient condition (35% standards), in response to violations of the predominant tone pattern for both groups. The amplitude of MMN from the right hemisphere was influenced by the standard probability. This effect was modulated by long-term musical training: standard probability changes influenced MMN amplitude in the group of non-musicians only. Conclusion: This study indicates that pattern violations are detected automatically, even if they are of very low salience, both in non-musicians and musicians, with salience having a stronger impact on processing in the right hemisphere of non-musicians. Long-term musical training influences this encoding, in that non-musicians benefit to a greater extent from a good signal-to-noise ratio (i.e. high probability of the standard pattern), while musicians are less dependent on the salience of an acoustic environment.<br
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An adaptive memory programming framework for the resource-constrained project scheduling problem
The Resource-Constrained Project Scheduling Problem (RCPSP) is one of the most intractable combinatorial optimisation problems that combines a set of constraints and objectives met in a vast variety of applications and industries. Its solution raises major theoretical challenges due to its complexity, yet presenting numerous practical dimensions. Adaptive memory programming (AMP) is one of the most successful frameworks for solving hard combinatorial optimisation problems (e.g. vehicle routing and scheduling). Its success stems from the use of learning mechanisms that capture favourable solution elements found in high-quality solutions. This paper challenges the efficiency of AMP for solving the RCPSP, to our knowledge, for the first time in the literature. Computational experiments on well-known benchmark RCPSP instances show that the proposed AMP consistently produces high-quality solutions in reasonable computational times
Evidences for Tsallis non-extensivity on CMR manganites
We found, from the analysis of vs. curves of some manganese oxides
(manganites), that these systems do not follow the traditional
Maxwell-Boltzmann statistics, but the Tsallis statistics, within the
\QTR{em}{normalized} formalism. Curves were calculated within the mean field
approximation, for various ferromagnetic samples and the results were compared
to measurements of our own and to various other authors published data, chosen
at random from the literature. The agreement between the experimental data and
calculated vs. curve, where is an effective
temperature, is excellent for all the compounds. The entropic parameter, ,
correlates in a simple way with the experimental value of , irrespect
the chemical composition of the compounds, heat treatment or other details on
sample preparation. Examples include (superextensivity),
(extensivity) and (subextensivity) cases.Comment: 12 pages, 3 figure
Playing and Listening to Tailor-Made Notched Music: Cortical Plasticity Induced by Unimodal and Multimodal Training in Tinnitus Patients
Background. The generation and maintenance of tinnitus are assumed to be based on maladaptive functional cortical reorganization. Listening to modified music, which contains no energy in the range of the individual tinnitus frequency, can inhibit the corresponding neuronal activity in the auditory cortex. Music making has been shown to be a powerful stimulator for brain plasticity, inducing changes in multiple sensory systems. Using magnetoencephalographic (MEG) and behavioral measurements we evaluated the cortical plasticity effects of two months of (a) active listening to (unisensory) versus (b) learning to play (multisensory) tailor-made notched music in nonmusician tinnitus patients. Taking into account the fact that uni- and multisensory trainings induce different patterns of cortical plasticity we hypothesized that these two protocols will have different affects. Results. Only the active listening (unisensory) group showed significant reduction of tinnitus related activity of the middle temporal cortex and an increase in the activity of a tinnitus-coping related posterior parietal area. Conclusions. These findings indicate that active listening to tailor-made notched music induces greater neuroplastic changes in the maladaptively reorganized cortical network of tinnitus patients while additional integration of other sensory modalities during training reduces these neuroplastic effects
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