Ground State Spin Logic

Designing and optimizing cost functions and energy landscapes is a problem encountered in many fields of science and engineering. These landscapes and cost functions can be embedded and annealed in experimentally controllable spin Hamiltonians. Using an approach based on group theory and symmetries, we examine the embedding of Boolean logic gates into the ground state subspace of such spin systems. We describe parameterized families of diagonal Hamiltonians and symmetry operations which preserve the ground state subspace encoding the truth tables of Boolean formulas. The ground state embeddings of adder circuits are used to illustrate how gates are combined and simplified using symmetry. Our work is relevant for experimental demonstrations of ground state embeddings found in both classical optimization as well as adiabatic quantum optimization.Comment: 6 pages + 3 pages appendix, 7 figures, 1 tabl

An integrated decision support environment for organisational decision making

Traditional decision support systems are based on the paradigm of a single decision maker working at a stand-alone computer or terminal who has a specific decision to make with a specific goal in mind. Organisational decision support systems aim to support decision makers at all levels of an organisation (from executive, middle management managers to operators), who have a variety of decisions to make, with different priorities, often in a distributed environment. Such systems are designed and developed with extra functionality to meet the challenge. This paper proposes an Integrated Decision Support Environment (IDSE) for organisational decision making. The IDSE is designed and developed based on distributed client/server networking, with a combination of tight and loose integration approaches for information exchange and communication. The prototype of the IDSE demonstrates a good balance between flexibility and reliability

Sparse experimental design : an effective an efficient way discovering better genetic algorithm structures

The focus of this paper is the demonstration that sparse experimental design is a useful strategy for developing Genetic Algorithms. It is increasingly apparent from a number of reports and papers within a variety of different problem domains that the 'best' structure for a GA may be dependent upon the application. The GA structure is defined as both the types of operators and the parameters settings used during operation. The differences observed may be linked to the nature of the problem, the type of fitness function, or the depth or breadth of the problem under investigation. This paper demonstrates that advanced experimental design may be adopted to increase the understanding of the relationships between the GA structure and the problem domain, facilitating the selection of improved structures with a minimum of effort

Knowledge re-use for decision support

Effective decision support has already been identified as a fundamental requirement for the realisation of Network Enabled Capability. Decision making itself is a knowledge-intensive process, and it is known that right decisions can only be reached based on decision maker's good judgement, which in turn is based on sufficient knowledge. It is not unusual for decision makers to make incorrect decisions because of insufficient knowledge. However, it is not always possible for decision makers to have all the knowledge needed for making decisions in complex situations without external support. The re-use of knowledge has been identified as providing an important contribution to such support, and this paper considers one, hitherto unexplored, aspect of how this may be achieved. This paper is concerned with the computational view of knowledge re-use to establish an understanding of a knowledge-based system for decision support. The paper explores knowledge re-use for decision support from two perspectives: knowledge provider's and knowledge re-user's. Key issues and challenges of knowledge re-use are identified from both perspectives. A structural model for knowledge re-use is proposed with initial evaluation through empirical study of both experienced and novice decision maker's behaviour in reusing knowledge to make decisions. The proposed structural model for knowledge re-use captures five main elements (knowledge re-uers, knowledge types, knowledge sources, environment, and integration strategies) as well as the relationships between the elements, which forms a foundation for constructing a knowledge-based decision support system. The paper suggests that further research should be investigating the relationship between knowledge re-use and learning to achieve intelligent decision support

Barracks Life in the Nineteenth Century; or, How and Why Tommy's Lot Improved

This paper examines how and why the living conditions of British army privates serving in North America changed between 1800 and 1900. The author concentrates especially on the physical manifestations of those changes — the architectural and material culture changes that occurred. Résumé Cet article traite des conditions de vie des soldats britanniques en poste en Amérique du Nord et décrit les changements qui eurent lieu entre 1800 et 1900. L'auteur insiste particulièrement sur les changements physiques dans les domaines de l'architecture et de la culture matérielle

Comparative aspects of phytase and xylanase effects on performance, mineral digestibility, and ileal phytate degradation in broilers and turkeys

Two experiments were performed, using broilers or turkeys, each utilizing a 3 × 2 factorial arrangement, to compare their response to phytase and xylanase supplementation with growth performance, nutrient digestibility, and ileal phytate degradation as response criteria. For both experiments, 960 Ross 308 or 960 BUT 10 (0-day-old) birds were allocated to 6 treatments: (1) control diet, containing phytase at 500 FTU/kg; (2) the control diet with xylanase (16,000 BXU/kg); (3) the control diet supplemented on top with phytase (1,500 FTU/kg); (4) diet supplemented with 1,500 FTU/kg phytase and xylanase (16,000 BXU/kg); (5) the control diet supplemented with phytase (3,000 FTU/kg); and (6) diet supplemented with 3,000 FTU/kg phytase and xylanase (16,000 BXU/kg). Each treatment had 8 replicates of 20 birds each. Water and diets based on wheat, soybean meal, oilseed rape meal, and barley were available ad libitum. Body weight gain and feed intake were measured from 0 to 28 D, and feed conversion ratio (FCR) corrected for mortality was calculated. Ileal digestibility for dry matter and minerals on day 7 and 28 were analyzed in addition to levels of inositol phosphate esters (InsP6-3) and myo-inositol. Statistical comparisons were performed using ANOVA. Xylanase supplementation improved 28D FCR in broilers and turkeys. Increasing doses of phytase reduced FI and improved FCR only in broilers. In broilers, the age × phytase interaction for phosphorous digestibility showed that increasing phytase dose was more visible on day 7, than on day 28. Mineral digestibility was lower in 28-day-old turkey compared with 7-day-old turkey. InsP6 disappearance increased with increasing phytase levels in both species, with lower levels analyzed in turkeys. InsP6 disappearance was greater in younger turkeys (day 7 compared with day 28). In conclusion, although broilers and turkeys shared several similarities in their growth and nutrient utilization responses, the outcomes of the 2 trials also differed in many aspects. Whether this is because of difference in diets (InsP or Ca level) or differences between species needs further investigation

Health care and hospitalisation costs of cardiovascular disease (CVD) in Thailand

Background: Cardiovascular disease (CVD) has become a leading cause of death and disability in Thailand due to the unhealthy lifestyle of the populace; triggering high risk of exposure to CVD, increase in the number of hospital admissions year on year. Objectives: The concerns generated by the inflation in the health care expenditure among service providers motivated this study to examine the costs of hospitalisation of inpatients with (CVD) conditions in Thailand, 2009. Methods: Anonymised secondary data of 327,435 CVD inpatients under “Universal Coverage” (UC) health care scheme were obtained from the National Health Security Office (NHSO), Thailand. The data(51.69%- women and 48.31% - men) were classified using International Classification of Diseases, Tenth Revision (ICD-10) code, of which I20-I25 are Ischemic heart disease (IHD), I60-I69 are stroke and I00- I99areallCVD conditions. Results: Average costs of treatments for all CVD conditions, IHD and stroke were ฿21,921 (£1 = ฿50), ฿32,884 (highest) and ฿25,617.67per patient respectively. Absolute total cost increased with age and the cost of admission of male patients is higher than female. The average (three months) length of stay for stroke patients was found to be the highest. Conclusion: Providers generally spent a total of ฿7,177 million on the treatment of CVD with IHD and stroke taking ฿2,544 million and ฿1,920 million respectivel

A connectionist model for dynamic control

The application of a connectionist modeling method known as competition-based spreading activation to a camera tracking task is described. The potential is explored for automation of control and planning applications using connectionist technology. The emphasis is on applications suitable for use in the NASA Space Station and in related space activities. The results are quite general and could be applicable to control systems in general