A High Reliability Asymptotic Approach for Packet Inter-Delivery Time Optimization in Cyber-Physical Systems

In cyber-physical systems such as automobiles, measurement data from sensor nodes should be delivered to other consumer nodes such as actuators in a regular fashion. But, in practical systems over unreliable media such as wireless, it is a significant challenge to guarantee small enough inter-delivery times for different clients with heterogeneous channel conditions and inter-delivery requirements. In this paper, we design scheduling policies aiming at satisfying the inter-delivery requirements of such clients. We formulate the problem as a risk-sensitive Markov Decision Process (MDP). Although the resulting problem involves an infinite state space, we first prove that there is an equivalent MDP involving only a finite number of states. Then we prove the existence of a stationary optimal policy and establish an algorithm to compute it in a finite number of steps. However, the bane of this and many similar problems is the resulting complexity, and, in an attempt to make fundamental progress, we further propose a new high reliability asymptotic approach. In essence, this approach considers the scenario when the channel failure probabilities for different clients are of the same order, and asymptotically approach zero. We thus proceed to determine the asymptotically optimal policy: in a two-client scenario, we show that the asymptotically optimal policy is a "modified least time-to-go" policy, which is intuitively appealing and easily implementable; in the general multi-client scenario, we are led to an SN policy, and we develop an algorithm of low computational complexity to obtain it. Simulation results show that the resulting policies perform well even in the pre-asymptotic regime with moderate failure probabilities

Biological Warfare: An Emerging Threat of the Future

We are living in a geo-politically transforming world, forcing nations to persistently engage in cooperation, competition, cooperation, and even conflict. While the potential global threat and disastrous consequences of biological warfare were known to the domain and few security experts, this threat has come to the forefront and greater scrutiny ever since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. The mind-boggling numbers of human fatalities and casualties, it's spiraling and continuing destructive potential (evolving mutations), along with consequences to the global economy and way of life has clearly illustrated that the biological threat can be even moredevastating than nuclear, because they can persist, propagate, and spread through a population globally. Unfortunately, the existing agreements/conventions specially the Biological Warfare Convention (BWC), signedand ratified almost universally (183 nations), is widely acknowledged, butlacks compliance monitoring and verification mechanisms- making it farfrom effective in controlling biological weapons (BW). In this perspective,the paper examines the emerging threat of biological warfare and theimplications it holds for the world at large and India in particular

Yield improvement using configurable analogue transistors (CATs)

Continued process scaling has led to significant yield and reliability challenges for today’s designers. Analogue circuits are particularly susceptible to poor variation, driving the need for new yield resilient techniques in this area. This paper describes a new configurable analogue transistor structure and supporting methodology that facilitates variation compensation at the post-manufacture stage. The approach has demonstrated significant yield improvements and can be applied to any analogue circui

Transnational Approaches on Money Laundering as an Organized Crime: Resolving Jurisdictional Conflicts and the Indian State Practice

Money laundering refers to the conversion or laundering of money which is illegally obtained so as to make it appear to originate from a legitimate source Money laundering is being employed by launderer s worldwide to conceal criminal activity associated with it such as drugs arms trafficking terrorism extortion and reason for various other heinous crimes But in simple term it is the conversion of black money into white money The research inevitably to explain the paper to context that any instance of money laundering would have an angle of international degree as money laundering typically involves transferring money through several countries in order to obscure its origin Further the research has divided into four parts first part deals with the jurisdictional issue arise during transnational money laundering Second part deals with the intention of Parliament of India meant to target proceeds of criminal conduct then and now in the money laundering and its related offenses Third part elaborates international development through different instruments and controlling mechanisms to deal with this problem and analyse the position of India in controlling money laundering Fourth part discusses various problems and loopholes in implementation of anti-money laundering laws Finally the research concludes with few suggestions to have better anti-money laundering regim

Potential analysis of sunspot parameters and behaviour of random noise

Changes in solar magnetic field are responsible for initialisation and maintenance of different solar processes. Sunspots are clear manifestations of field variations and are good indicators of solar activity. Nature of activity can be well understood by analyzing the underlying sunspot dynamics. Techniques of potential analysis are used in this paper to investigate sunspot numbers and sunspot area, during the period 1875-2012, for finding out their stochastic behaviour. The presence of instabilities in the time series of sunspot numbers and sunspot area are examined in detail. The level of instability in sunspot numbers was observed to be maximum in the years 1953-1955, while that in sunspot area was maximum during 1887-1889. This study also concludes that random noise has a greater effect on dynamics of sunspot area than that on dynamics of sunspot numbers. Presence of high level of noise is noticed in both parameters during 1923-1925. Effect of random noise on the dynamics of sunspot number and area was shown to be very high during the years close to sunspot minima. Results reported can be helpful in predicting evolution of solar activity, which would be crucial in understanding solar-terrestrial phenomena

Discounting in Games across Time Scales

We introduce two-level discounted games played by two players on a perfect-information stochastic game graph. The upper level game is a discounted game and the lower level game is an undiscounted reachability game. Two-level games model hierarchical and sequential decision making under uncertainty across different time scales. We show the existence of pure memoryless optimal strategies for both players and an ordered field property for such games. We show that if there is only one player (Markov decision processes), then the values can be computed in polynomial time. It follows that whether the value of a player is equal to a given rational constant in two-level discounted games can be decided in NP intersected coNP. We also give an alternate strategy improvement algorithm to compute the value