ABSTRACTION LAYER FOR DEVELOPMENT AND DEPLOYMENT OF CLOUD SERVICES

In this paper, we will present an abstraction layer for cloud computing, which intends to simplify the manipulation with virtual machines in clouds for easy and controlled development and deployment of cloud services. It also ensures interoperability between different cloud infrastructures and allows developers to create cloud appliances easily via inheritance mechanisms

A Massera-type criterion for almost periodic solutions of higher-order delay or advance abstract functional differential equations

Let u be a given bounded uniformly continuous mild solution of a higher-order abstract functional differential equation of delay or advance type. We give a so-called Massera-type criterion for the existence of a mild solution, which is a “spectral component†of u with spectrum similar to the one of the forcing term f. Various spectral criteria for the existence of almost periodic and quasiperiodic mild solutions are given

A Generic Development and Deployment Framework for Cloud Computing and Distributed Applications

Cloud computing have paved the way for advance of IT-based demand services. This technology helps decrease operation costs, solve scalability issue and many more user and provider constraints. However, development and deployment of distributed applications on cloud environment becomes a more and more complex tasks. Cloud users must spend a lot of time to prepare, install and configure their applications on clouds. In addition, after development and deployment, the applications almost cannot move from a cloud to others due to the lack of interoperability between them. To address these problems, we present in this paper a novel development and deployment framework for cloud distributed applications/services. Our approach is based on abstraction and object-oriented programming technique, allowing users to easily and rapidly develop and deploy their services into cloud environment. The approach also enables service migration and interoperability among the clouds

DRINKING, MENTAL HEALTH AND HIV OUTCOMES AMONG PEOPLE WITH HIV AND HAZARDOUS ALCOHOL USE IN VIETNAM

Background: Mental health disorders are the number one comorbidity among people with HIV (PWH). Alcohol use disorders are also very common among this group, with almost half of PWH classified as hazardous drinkers. However, research on the interrelationship between alcohol use, mental health disorders and their effects on HIV outcomes among PWH with hazardous alcohol use remains scarce. Methods: I conducted three studies using data from a randomized controlled trial in Thai Nguyen, Vietnam, which aimed to evaluate the effects of a combined intervention and a brief intervention drawing from Motivational Enhancement Therapy and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy on alcohol use and viral suppression among antiretroviral therapy (ART) clients with hazardous alcohol use. In study 1, I evaluated the longitudinal associations between mental health symptoms (depression and anxiety symptoms) and two HIV outcomes (viral suppression and complete ART adherence) among participants, and determined whether alcohol dependence modified these associations. In study 2, I described the changes in depression and anxiety symptoms of participants over time and assessed the impact of the combined and brief interventions on depression and anxiety symptoms, comparing the effects of these interventions to each other and to the standard of care (SOC) group. Finally, in study 3, I examined whether alcohol use mediated the pathway from the interventions to depression and anxiety symptoms of participants. Results: In study 1, depression and anxiety symptoms were associated with a lower probability of complete ART adherence, although they had no overall effect on viral suppression. Alcohol dependence was a significant effect modifier, such that the negative effects of anxiety symptoms on ART adherence were stronger among participants with alcohol dependence, compared to those without. In study 2, depression and anxiety symptoms were common at baseline, and decreases in depression and anxiety symptoms were observed in all three arms over time. There were no significant differences in depression and anxiety symptoms among participants receiving either intervention, relative to the SOC. In study 3, alcohol use, measured as percentage of days abstinent from alcohol in the last 30 days, was a significant mediator of the pathways from two alcohol interventions to depression symptoms, but not anxiety symptoms.Conclusions: Improving mental health should be an important target of future interventions for people living with HIV with hazardous alcohol use, and mental health components should be incorporated into alcohol reduction interventions to simultaneously target these co-morbidities among PWH.Doctor of Public Healt

Evaluation of Average Directional Effective Emissivities of Isothermal Cylindrical-inner-cone Cavitties Using Monte-Carlo Method

We have used the Monte Carlo method based on theory of successive reflections and ray tracing to calculate the average normal directional effective emissivities of isothermal cylindrical-inner-cone cavities for various geometrical parameters. A simplified specular-directional diffuse reflection model was applied in our calculations for cavities working in the infrared spectral range. Our results are in good agreement comparing with what obtained by other authors. The algorithm developed by us has an advantage in simplicity and time saving of calculations. It can be used in blackbody cavity design considerations, especially in the cylindrical-inner-cone cases

Online Load Balancing for Network Functions Virtualization

Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) aims to support service providers to deploy various services in a more agile and cost-effective way. However, the softwarization and cloudification of network functions can result in severe congestion and low network performance. In this paper, we propose a solution to address this issue. We analyze and solve the online load balancing problem using multipath routing in NFV to optimize network performance in response to the dynamic changes of user demands. In particular, we first formulate the optimization problem of load balancing as a mixed integer linear program for achieving the optimal solution. We then develop the ORBIT algorithm that solves the online load balancing problem. The performance guarantee of ORBIT is analytically proved in comparison with the optimal offline solution. The experiment results on real-world datasets show that ORBIT performs very well for distributing traffic of each service demand across multipaths without knowledge of future demands, especially under high-load conditions