DRACULA Microscopic Traffic Simulator

The DRACULA traffic simulator is a microscopic model in that the vehicles are individually represented. The movement of vehicles in the network are represented continuously and updated every one second. The network is modelled as a set of nodes and links which represent junctions and streets respectively. Vehicles are generated at their origins with a random headway distribution and are assigned a set of driver/vehicle characteristics (according to user-specified probabilities) and a fixed route. The movement of the vehicles on a network is governed by a car-following law, the gap acceptance rules and the traffic regulations at intersections. They can join a queue, change lane, discharge to another link or exit from the system. The traffic regulation at an intersection is actuated by traffic lights or right-of-way rules. The inputs to the simulation are network data, trip matrix, fixed-time signal plans, gap-acceptance and car-following parameters. Outputs are in forms of animated graphics and statistical measures of network performance. The program is written in C-language. All types of vehicle attributes are represented as one entity using the structure data type which provides a flexibility in storing and modifying various types of data. Attributes of nodes, links and lanes are also represented as structures. The large number of variables associated with vehicles and the network imply that the performance of the simulation depends on the size of the network and the total number of vehicles within the network at one time. The simulator can be applied in many areas of urban traffic control and management, such as detailed evaluation of traffic signal control strategies, environmental issues such as air pollution due to emission from vehicles in idling, accelerating, decelerating or cruising, and analyses of the effects of variable demand and supply upon the performance of a network

An advanced meshless method for time fractional diffusion equation

Recently, because of the new developments in sustainable engineering and renewable energy, which are usually governed by a series of fractional partial differential equations (FPDEs), the numerical modelling and simulation for fractional calculus are attracting more and more attention from researchers. The current dominant numerical method for modeling FPDE is Finite Difference Method (FDM), which is based on a pre-defined grid leading to inherited issues or shortcomings including difficulty in simulation of problems with the complex problem domain and in using irregularly distributed nodes. Because of its distinguished advantages, the meshless method has good potential in simulation of FPDEs. This paper aims to develop an implicit meshless collocation technique for FPDE. The discrete system of FPDEs is obtained by using the meshless shape functions and the meshless collocation formulation. The stability and convergence of this meshless approach are investigated theoretically and numerically. The numerical examples with regular and irregular nodal distributions are used to validate and investigate accuracy and efficiency of the newly developed meshless formulation. It is concluded that the present meshless formulation is very effective for the modeling and simulation of fractional partial differential equations

Network effects of intelligent speed adaptation systems

Intelligent Speed Adaptation (ISA) systems use in-vehicle electronic devices to enable the speed of vehicles to be regulated externally. They are increasingly appreciated as a flexible method for speed management and control, particularly in urban areas. On-road trials using a small numbers of ISA equipped vehicles have been carried out in Sweden, the Netherlands, Spain and the UK. This paper describes the developments made to enhance a traffic microsimulation model in order to represent ISA implemented across a network and their impact on the networks. The simulation modelling of the control system is carried out on a real-world urban network, and the impacts on traffic congestion, speed distribution and the environment assessed. The results show that ISA systems are more effective in less congested traffic conditions. Momentary high speeds in traffic are effectively suppressed, resulting in a reduction in speed variation which is likely to have a positive impact on safety. Whilst ISA reduces excessive traffic speeds in the network, it does not affect average journey times. In particular, the total vehicle-hours travelling at speeds below 10 km/hr have not changed, indicating that the speed control had not induced more slow-moving queues to the network. A significant, eight percent, reduction in fuel consumption was found with full ISA penetration. These results are in accordance with those from field trials and they provide the basis for cost-benefit analyses on introducing ISA into the vehicle fleet. Contrary to earlier findings from the Swedish ISA road trials, these network simulations showed that ISA had no significant effect on emission of gaseous pollutants CO, NOx and HC. Further research is planned to investigate the impact on emission with a more comprehensive and up to date modal emission factor database

Joint Symbol-Level Precoding and Reflecting Designs for IRS-Enhanced MU-MISO Systems

Intelligent reflecting surfaces (IRSs) have emerged as a revolutionary solution to enhance wireless communications by changing propagation environment in a cost-effective and hardware-efficient fashion. In addition, symbol-level precoding (SLP) has attracted considerable attention recently due to its advantages in converting multiuser interference (MUI) into useful signal energy. Therefore, it is of interest to investigate the employment of IRS in symbol-level precoding systems to exploit MUI in a more effective way by manipulating the multiuser channels. In this article, we focus on joint symbol-level precoding and reflecting designs in IRS-enhanced multiuser multiple-input single-output (MU-MISO) systems. Both power minimization and quality-of-service (QoS) balancing problems are considered. In order to solve the joint optimization problems, we develop an efficient iterative algorithm to decompose them into separate symbol-level precoding and block-level reflecting design problems. An efficient gradient-projection-based algorithm is utilized to design the symbol-level precoding and a Riemannian conjugate gradient (RCG)-based algorithm is employed to solve the reflecting design problem. Simulation results demonstrate the significant performance improvement introduced by the IRS and illustrate the effectiveness of our proposed algorithms

Dilations for Systems of Imprimitivity acting on Banach Spaces

Motivated by a general dilation theory for operator-valued measures, framings and bounded linear maps on operator algebras, we consider the dilation theory of the above objects with special structures. We show that every operator-valued system of imprimitivity has a dilation to a probability spectral system of imprimitivity acting on a Banach space. This completely generalizes a well-kown result which states that every frame representation of a countable group on a Hilbert space is unitarily equivalent to a subrepresentation of the left regular representation of the group. The dilated space in general can not be taken as a Hilbert space. However, it can be taken as a Hilbert space for positive operator valued systems of imprimitivity. We also prove that isometric group representation induced framings on a Banach space can be dilated to unconditional bases with the same structure for a larger Banach space This extends several known results on the dilations of frames induced by unitary group representations on Hilbert spaces.Comment: 21 page

A node-based smoothed conforming point interpolation method (NS-CPIM) for elasticity problems

This paper formulates a node-based smoothed conforming point interpolation method (NS-CPIM) for solid mechanics. In the proposed NS-CPIM, the higher order conforming PIM shape functions (CPIM) have been constructed to produce a continuous and piecewise quadratic displacement field over the whole problem domain, whereby the smoothed strain field was obtained through smoothing operation over each smoothing domain associated with domain nodes. The smoothed Galerkin weak form was then developed to create the discretized system equations. Numerical studies have demonstrated the following good properties: NS-CPIM (1) can pass both standard and quadratic patch test; (2) provides an upper bound of strain energy; (3) avoid the volumetric locking; (4) provides the higher accuracy than those in the node-based smoothed schemes of the original PIMs

Dilations of frames, operator valued measures and bounded linear maps

We will give an outline of the main results in our recent AMS Memoir, and include some new results, exposition and open problems. In that memoir we developed a general dilation theory for operator valued measures acting on Banach spaces where operator-valued measures (or maps) are not necessarily completely bounded. The main results state that any operator-valued measure, not necessarily completely bounded, always has a dilation to a projection-valued measure acting on a Banach space, and every bounded linear map, again not necessarily completely bounded, on a Banach algebra has a bounded homomorphism dilation acting on a Banach space. Here the dilation space often needs to be a Banach space even if the underlying space is a Hilbert space, and the projections are idempotents that are not necessarily self-adjoint. These results lead to some new connections between frame theory and operator algebras, and some of them can be considered as part of the investigation about "noncommutative" frame theory.Comment: Contemporary Mathematics, 21 pages. arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1110.583