Mixed Initiative Systems for Human-Swarm Interaction: Opportunities and Challenges

Human-swarm interaction (HSI) involves a number of human factors impacting human behaviour throughout the interaction. As the technologies used within HSI advance, it is more tempting to increase the level of swarm autonomy within the interaction to reduce the workload on humans. Yet, the prospective negative effects of high levels of autonomy on human situational awareness can hinder this process. Flexible autonomy aims at trading-off these effects by changing the level of autonomy within the interaction when required; with mixed-initiatives combining human preferences and automation's recommendations to select an appropriate level of autonomy at a certain point of time. However, the effective implementation of mixed-initiative systems raises fundamental questions on how to combine human preferences and automation recommendations, how to realise the selected level of autonomy, and what the future impacts on the cognitive states of a human are. We explore open challenges that hamper the process of developing effective flexible autonomy. We then highlight the potential benefits of using system modelling techniques in HSI by illustrating how they provide HSI designers with an opportunity to evaluate different strategies for assessing the state of the mission and for adapting the level of autonomy within the interaction to maximise mission success metrics.Comment: Author version, accepted at the 2018 IEEE Annual Systems Modelling Conference, Canberra, Australi

Validation of an automated assay for measurement of bovine plasma ceruloplasmin

Ceruloplasmin (Cp) plays an important role in copper transport and iron metabolism, as well as Cp is also an indicator for the health status of dairy cows. The present study reports the validation of an automated assay to assess the plasma Cp in dairy cows. Plasma Cp levels were determined in 40 Holstein cows and intra- and inter-assay precision, accuracy, detection limit, and clinical validation of the assay were determined. Intra- and inter-assay coefficients of variation were < 2% and < 7%, respectively. The results were linear when serial sample dilutions were tested (r = 0.999, P < 0.001). The detection limit was lower than what could be measured in plasma from healthy cows. Increased plasma Cp levels were found in cows with inflammatory diseases. The method validated in this study is precise, simple, and fast and can be easily adapted to biochemical automated analysers. Furthermore, the promising results obtained with this protein will contribute to a wider use of Cp determination in bovine practice

Theory of Complex Scattering Lengths

We derive a generalized Low equation for the T-matrix appropriate for complex atom-molecule interaction. The properties of this new equation at very low energies are studied and the complex scattering length and effective range are derived.Comment: 9 page

Improving the use of confidential enquiries into maternal deaths in developing countries

This study is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Department for International Development, the European Commission and United States Agency for International Development

Sign-indefinite second order differential operators on finite metric graphs

The question of self-adjoint realizations of sign-indefinite second order differential operators is discussed in terms of a model problem. Operators of the type -\frac{d}{dx} \sgn (x) \frac{d}{dx} are generalized to finite, not necessarily compact, metric graphs. All self-adjoint realizations are parametrized using methods from extension theory. The spectral and scattering theory of the self-adjoint realizations are studied in detail.Comment: 43 pages, 2 figure

Bounds on the negative eigenvalues of Laplacians on finite metric graphs

For a self--adjoint Laplace operator on a finite, not necessarily compact, metric graph lower and upper bounds on each of the negative eigenvalues are derived. For compact finite metric graphs Poincar\'{e} type inequalities are given.Comment: 17 page