Load balancing for constraint solving with GPUs

Solving a complex Constraint Satisfaction Problem (CSP) is a computationally hard task which may require a considerable amount of time. Parallelism has been applied successfully to the job and there are already many applications capable of harnessing the parallel power of modern CPUs to speed up the solving process. Current Graphics Processing Units (GPUs), containing from a few hundred to a few thousand cores, possess a level of parallelism that surpasses that of CPUs and there are much less applications capable of solving CSPs on GPUs, leaving space for further improvement. This paper describes work in progress in the solving of CSPs on GPUs, CPUs and other devices, such as Intel Many Integrated Cores (MICs), in parallel. It presents the gains obtained when applying more devices to solve some problems and the main challenges that must be faced when using devices with as different architectures as CPUs and GPUs, with a greater focus on how to effectively achieve good load balancing between such heterogeneous devices

Convenio de Colaboración entre la Universidad de Almería (España) y la Universidad de Cuenca (Ecuador)

Españo

Redução de consumos na iluminação pública

A iluminação pública (IP) é um serviço essencial para o bem-estar das populações. Quer seja em espaço urbano ou rural ela desempenha papéis fulcrais em áreas como a segurança rodoviária, a segurança pessoal dos cidadãos ou mesmo o embelezamento de espaços. Em Portugal, a Iluminação Pública é responsável por 3% do consumo energético. A tendência desta parcela é para aumentar (cerca de 4 a 5% por ano), o que representa custos muito elevados para os Municípios [1]. Portanto, torna-se fundamental definir um conjunto de medidas direcionadas para o aumento da eficiência energética no parque de IP, sem que isso afete a qualidade de vida nos espaços públicos. Esta iniciativa terá um dos seus pilares na aplicação de tecnologias mais eficientes em detrimento de tecnologia corrente, permitindo assim reduzir o consumo de energia elétrica, mantendo o mesmo nível de serviço. Algumas intervenções demonstram que a Eficiência Energética ao nível da IP são já uma realidade: • Instalação de reguladores do fluxo luminoso; • Substituição de luminárias e balastros ineficientes ou obsoletos; • Substituição de lâmpadas de vapor de mercúrio por fontes de luz mais eficientes; • Instalação de tecnologias de controlo, gestão e monitorização da IP; • Substituição das fontes luminosas nos sistemas de controlo de tráfego e peões por tecnologia LED. Para garantir ganhos de eficiência energética ao nível da IP será futuramente criado um Regulamento que permitirá uma análise, controlo e monitorização rigorosa deste tipo de sistemas, contribuindo assim para uma melhoraria da sustentabilidade económica e ambiental dos municípios

Esports – Video Game Data Analysis

Tese de Mestrado, Engenharia Informática, 2023, Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de CiênciasThe phenomenon of Esports has been growing and, with it, the interest in online video games by players and spectators. With technological evolution, it has become increasingly easier to use data collection techniques about the events that take place during a match, generating large volumes of data that can be used to analyze the performance of players and teams. This analysis is of great importance in both personal and professional contexts. Casual players look for methods to understand what mistakes they are making and the optimal way to play certain characters, while in a professional context, the focus is mostly on understanding what strategies are used by other teams and how to counter them. For the analysis of this volume of data to be effective, it is fundamental to explore data analysis mechanisms combined with visualization techniques (visual analytics) applied to spatio-temporal data and the various types of events during a match that are of interest to players, coaches, and analysts. These events can range from a player’s position (space) at a given instant (time) to more game-specific events, such as where the player died. The goal of this project is to explore and apply machine learning algorithms to spatio-temporal data to discover patterns in player behaviors while continuing the work on visual analytics of video game data. The investigation extends to exploring datasets from new games, ultimately leading to the selection of League of Legends (LoL) as the focal point for in-depth analysis. One significant challenge in this pursuit is the scarcity of readily available datasets featuring spatio-temporal data. To overcome this obstacle, the research project involves the creation of spatio-temporal datasets from the selected game, LoL, through data collection facilitated by the Riot API. In summary, this research project not only builds on previous work but also introduces new data analysis techniques, notably the clustering of spatio-temporal data, to uncover possibly hidden patterns of player behaviors in the world of League of Legends. The results obtained provide valuable insights on the players, particularly focusing on the jungler role. They provide information regarding potential death patterns and the most frequently visited locations on the map as the game progresses. Additionally, these results make it possible to observe differences in spatio-temporal data across various game patches. The culmination of these efforts promises valuable insights into the gaming ecosystem, with potential applications in game design, player engagement, and beyond

Fountaine pajot valuation

Fountaine Pajot is the second biggest player in the Catamaran market, a market that has been recovering from the European crisis recently. However, even with the large growth that the firm has experienced in the last years and the exceptional fundamentals it has, the stock market price seems not to fully reflect fundamentals. The purpose of the project was to find out why the market price does not follow the solid financial performance of the company in the last years, as well as expectations that it continues to grow. This project was addressed using the DCF method and relative valuatio

A meta-analysis on the Bank of Japan quantitative easing policy: the Bank of Japan's effectiveness to promote economic growth

As the Qualitative and Quantitative Easing programmes are still in place there have been signs that the Japanese economy will maintain a path of moderate economic growth, still, without glancing the desired 2% inflation. The question over whether and how the Bank of Japan successive quantitative easing programmes, which were based on an unprecedented increase on the central bank’s asset sheet, have been successful in promoting a steady growth of the Japanese Economy, has been debated by the literature that is focused on the transmission channels of monetary policy. We present a comprehensive meta-analysis that focus on the literature that have been studying the effectiveness of the Bank of Japan’s policies during the 2001 to 2016 period, that resorts to the Vector Auto-regressive methodology to analyze, through impulse response functions, how monetary policy shocks impact output. An analysis based on funnel plots - Funnel Asymmetry Test - and linear regressions - Precision Effect Test - does not provide evidence of publication bias, neither the consensus over the output growth during the quantitative years. A meta-probit analysis suggests that a study with the characteristics mentioned above, which uses certain variables to build the model – industrial output, price level, bond yield and either the money base or the money supply - as well as different specifications in the data used - increasing the number of observations used or choosing quarterly data - will affect the probability of reporting statistically significant output growth; notwithstanding, the evidence found in this last analysis varies in terms of statistical robustness.Ainda com o programa de "Qualitative" e "Quantitative Easing" em vigor, têm existido sinais de que a economia japonesa manterá um caminho de moderada recuperação económica; não obstante, sem se vislumbrar o desejado crescimento da inflação a 2%. A questão em torno de se, e como, os sucessivos programas de "quantitative easing" baseados num crescimento sem precedentes dos ativos do Banco Central do Japão, têm tido sucesso em promover o crescimento estável da economia japonesa, tem sido discutida na literatura que se foca nos mecanismos de transmissão da política monetária. Neste estudo, apresentamos uma meta-análise que se foca na literatura que estuda a eficácia das políticas do Banco do Japão durante o período de 2001 a 2016. Literatura essa que recorre a metodologia baseada em modelos "Vector Auto-regressive", para analisar através de funções de resposta a impulso, como é que os choques causados por ferramentas de política monetária afetam a produção da economia japonesa. Com base numa análise em gráficos de dispersão em funil - "Funnel Asymmetry Test" - e em regressões lineares - "Precision Effect Test" - não obtivemos provas que sugerissem "publication bias" - enviesamento dos resultados publicados em revistas - nem provas que sugerissem um consenso entre a literatura visada, relativamente ao valor do crescimento da atividade económica no Japão durante os períodos de "quantitative easing". Uma análise baseada em modelos meta-probit, sugere que a inclusão, em estudos com a estrutura atrás mencionada, de certas variáveis no modelo a estimar (relativas à economia Japonesa) – o "output" industrial, o nível dos preços, as taxas de retorno de títulos da dívida japonesa, ou tanto a base monetária como a oferta de moeda nacional - tal como outras especificações relativas ao tipo de dados utilizados - o incremento do número de observações ou a utilização de dados trimestrais - podem afetar a probabilidade das estimações virem a reportar um crescimento positivo e estatisticamente significativo na atividade económica. Os resultados encontrados nesta última análise variam em termos de robustez estatística

Secondary structure of protamine in sperm nuclei: an infrared spectroscopy study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Protamines are small basic proteins that condense the DNA in mature spermatozoa. Typical protamines are of simple composition and very arginine-rich, usually in the range of 60-80%. Arginine residues are distributed in a number of stretches separated by neutral amino acids. We have used Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) to gain access for the first time to the secondary structure of protamines in sperm nuclei. This technique is particularly well suited to the study of DNA-bound protamine in whole nuclei since it is not affected by turbidity.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We show that DNA -bound salmon (salmine) and squid protamines contain <it>α</it>-helix, <it>β</it>-turns and a proportion of other structures not stabilized by intramolecular hydrogen bonding. No <it>β</it>-sheet was observed. In salmine, the <it>α</it>-helix amounted to ~20%, while in squid protamine it reached ~40%. In contrast, the structure not stabilized by intermolecular hydrogen bonding was more abundant in salmine (~40%) than in squid protamine (~20%). Both protamines contained ~40% <it>β</it>-turns. The different helical potential of salmine and squid protamine was confirmed by structure predictions and CD in the presence of trifluoroethanol.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>DNA-bound protamine in sperm nuclei contains large amounts of defined secondary structure stabilized by intramolecular hydrogen bonding. Both salmine and squid protamine contain similar amounts of <it>β</it>-turns, but differ in the proportions of <it>α</it>-helix and non-hydrogen bonded conformations. In spite of the large differences in the proportions of secondary structure motifs between salmon and squid protamines, they appear to be equally efficient in promoting tight hexagonal packing of the DNA molecules in sperm nuclei.</p

Tectonic control and mass-wasting processes along S. Vicente Canyon (SW Iberia) : evidences from multibeam bathymetry and seismic reflection data

European Geosciences Union General Assembly 2009 (EGU 2009), Vienna, Austria, April 19-24, 200