Graphical Programming of Simulation Models in an Object-Oriented Environment

Graphical programming has been used in conjunction with conventional simulation languages via block diagrams or activity networks. Its beneficial effects on programming and modeling in simulation have been accepted by everyone involved in these languages. However, none of these conventional techniques is truely interactive. Given the level of the current hardware and software technology, it is possible to design a very good graphical programming system which supports an interactive incremental programming style in specifications of simulation models. The benefit of such a visual system would go beyond the modeling phase of a simulation study and it might as well be realized in understanding the behavior of complex problems, in being a communication and training medium for the user and developers, and finally in presenting the simulation results. In this study, the graphical programming methodology has been investigated from the perspective of object-oriented simulation. The truely interactive and graphical orientation of some of the object-oriented languages (e.g., Smalltalk-80) has opened up new avenues of research in this very important topic. Today, the nature of this type of research will be not whether it can be done but how the known techniques should be combined to yield the highest benefit

A Probabilistic Solution Generator of Good Enough Designs for Simulation

We build a probabilistic solution generator using the learning automata theory, which can generate a small set of "good enough" designs with a predetermined high probability. The main goal of our work is to reduce a large design population to a much smaller subset of good designs that can be analyzed thoroughly in a subsequent simulation study to identify the best design among them. In the process of building the solution generator, a rough-cut design evaluation method with a high noise error is employed in order to screen designs very rapidly _ may it be an approximate method, a heuristic approach, or short simulation runs. The solution generator has been applied successfully to several serious test problems with noisy objectives

A Dynamic Planning Technique for Continuous Activities Under Multiple Resource Constraints

The solution technique developed in this paper integrates the simplex search algorithm into the recursive calculations of dynamic programming in order to mitigate the "curse-of-dimensionality." Since differentiation is not required as a means of optimization procedure, it is expected that this technique will have an important impact on planning problems, such as the multiple resource allocation problems which involve nondifferentiable and/or highly nonlinear performance functions. Applications of the technique to very complex problems seem to confirm the anticipated polynomial average performance.dynamic programming, simplex search

A Turkish Gynecologic Oncology Group study of fertility-sparing treatment for early-stage endometrial cancer

Objective: To analyze the results of fertility-sparing treatment of early-stage endometrial cancer (EC) in patients treated at Turkish gynecologic oncology centers, and to present a review of the literature. Methods: Thirteen healthcare centers in Turkey were contacted to determine if they were eligible to participate in the study. Centers that were eligible and agreed to participate were sent a database form to record the demographic characteristics, clinicopathologic findings, and follow-up results for their EC patients. Results: Eleven Turkish healthcare centers provided data on 43 EC patients. Mean duration of treatment was 5 months and mean follow-up was 49 months. In total, 35 (81.4%) patients were tumor free following primary progesterone therapy. Mean time from the end of progesterone therapy to pregnancy was 10.6 +/- 4.3 months (range, 3-18 months). Two patients had tumor recurrence during follow-up. The pregnancy rate among the 31 women who actively sought pregnancy was 41.9% (n = 13). Conclusion: Conservative management of early-stage EC in women of reproductive age using oral progestins was effective and did not compromise oncological outcome. Pregnancy in the study patients was achieved spontaneously and artificially. (C) 2012 International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved