Design Guidelines for Agent Based Model Visualization

In the field of agent-based modeling (ABM), visualizations play an important role in identifying, communicating and understanding important behavior of the modeled phenomenon. However, many modelers tend to create ineffective visualizations of Agent Based Models (ABM) due to lack of experience with visual design. This paper provides ABM visualization design guidelines in order to improve visual design with ABM toolkits. These guidelines will assist the modeler in creating clear and understandable ABM visualizations. We begin by introducing a non-hierarchical categorization of ABM visualizations. This categorization serves as a starting point in the creation of an ABM visualization. We go on to present well-known design techniques in the context of ABM visualization. These techniques are based on Gestalt psychology, semiology of graphics, and scientific visualization. They improve the visualization design by facilitating specific tasks, and providing a common language to critique visualizations through the use of visual variables. Subsequently, we discuss the application of these design techniques to simplify, emphasize and explain an ABM visualization. Finally, we illustrate these guidelines using a simple redesign of a NetLogo ABM visualization. These guidelines can be used to inform the development of design tools that assist users in the creation of ABM visualizations.Visualization, Design, Graphics, Guidelines, Communication, Agent-Based Modeling

Designing a craft computing environment for non-industrial settings

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2002.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 83-84).This thesis studies the design and introduction of relevant computer-based design tools for non-industrial locations in developing settings. To this end, a programmable environment for combining motifs into patterns was developed named Estampa (Environment for Stamping Patterns). Estampa was developed for the community of Santa Clara del Cobre, a copper craft artisan town located Mexico, where they already used Computer Aided Design (CAD) tools for their craftwork. Estampa is a visual programming language environment for applying transformations to primitive motifs to create ornamental patterns. Estampa seeks to recreate the motifs and patterns in the Best Maugard drawing method, a drawing technique for creating authentic Mexican drawings. The design and implementation of Estampa seeks to fulfill the economic, cultural and artisanal requirements of this specific location. The evaluation of Estampa, through initial user trials in the community, presents other possible approaches for introducing programming in a relevant way to non-industrial locations in developing countries. Drawing from this example, a series of guidelines are presented for designing and introducing relevant computer-based applications for these communities.by Daniel Kornhauser.S.M

Ernst Freund as Precursor of the Rational Study of Corporate Law

Gindis, David, Ernst Freund as Precursor of the Rational Study of Corporate Law (October 27, 2017). Journal of Institutional Economics, Forthcoming. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2905547, doi: https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2905547The rise of large business corporations in the late 19th century compelled many American observers to admit that the nature of the corporation had yet to be understood. Published in this context, Ernst Freund's little-known The Legal Nature of Corporations (1897) was an original attempt to come to terms with a new legal and economic reality. But it can also be described, to paraphrase Oliver Wendell Holmes, as the earliest example of the rational study of corporate law. The paper shows that Freund had the intuitions of an institutional economist, and engaged in what today would be called comparative institutional analysis. Remarkably, his argument that the corporate form secures property against insider defection and against outsiders anticipated recent work on entity shielding and capital lock-in, and can be read as an early contribution to what today would be called the theory of the firm.Peer reviewe

Circadian Integration of Glutamatergic Signals by Little SAAS in Novel Suprachiasmatic Circuits

Neuropeptides are critical integrative elements within the central circadian clock in the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN), where they mediate both cell-to-cell synchronization and phase adjustments that cause light entrainment. Forward peptidomics identified little SAAS, derived from the proSAAS prohormone, among novel SCN peptides, but its role in the SCN is poorly understood.Little SAAS localization and co-expression with established SCN neuropeptides were evaluated by immunohistochemistry using highly specific antisera and stereological analysis. Functional context was assessed relative to c-FOS induction in light-stimulated animals and on neuronal circadian rhythms in glutamate-stimulated brain slices. We found that little SAAS-expressing neurons comprise the third most abundant neuropeptidergic class (16.4%) with unusual functional circuit contexts. Little SAAS is localized within the densely retinorecipient central SCN of both rat and mouse, but not the retinohypothalamic tract (RHT). Some little SAAS colocalizes with vasoactive intestinal polypeptide (VIP) or gastrin-releasing peptide (GRP), known mediators of light signals, but not arginine vasopressin (AVP). Nearly 50% of little SAAS neurons express c-FOS in response to light exposure in early night. Blockade of signals that relay light information, via NMDA receptors or VIP- and GRP-cognate receptors, has no effect on phase delays of circadian rhythms induced by little SAAS.Little SAAS relays signals downstream of light/glutamatergic signaling from eye to SCN, and independent of VIP and GRP action. These findings suggest that little SAAS forms a third SCN neuropeptidergic system, processing light information and activating phase-shifts within novel circuits of the central circadian clock

Populist Mobilization: A New Theoretical Approach to Populism*

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/112280/1/j.1467-9558.2011.01388.x.pd

Bounds for the smallest integer solution of general quadratic equations.

The goal of Hilbert's tenth problem is to find an algorithm for deciding whether an arbitrary multivariate polynomial equation with integer coefficients has an integral solution. Although Matijasevic showed in 1970 that no such general algorithm is possible, in 1972 Siegel provided an algorithm for all equations of degree two. Siegel's algorithm consists of a search bound depending on the maximum of the magnitudes of the coefficients (called the height), which guarantees that if there are no integer solutions below the bound then the quadratic equation has no integer solutions at all. However, the bound is astronomical when made explicit. Independently of Siegel, a number of authors have provided good search bounds for special classes of quadratic equations. The goal of this thesis is to provide search bounds for quadratic equations, which improve on results of previous authors by being sharper, more explicit, or of more general applicability. The dissertation consists of two chapters. The first chapter treats the general binary quadratic equation, and obtains the following results. First, a search bound is established which grows roughly as a factorial function of the height. Then it is shown that any search bound must infinitely often exceed a certain exponential function of the height. These two results are significant improvements over work of previous authors, and taken together they are seen to be nearly best possible. The second chapter handles the general quadratic equation in five or more unknowns for which the quadratic part is a nonsingular form; this work generalizes and makes quantitative some research by Watson. The main result is a search bound which grows as a polynomial in the height, when the number of unknowns is held fixed. This bound significantly improves on previous results, is nearly optimal, and contrasts sharply with the exponential bounds mentioned above for equations in two variables. The proofs, which are elementary, do not apply to equations in three or four unknowns.Ph.D.MathematicsPure SciencesUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/128326/2/8920568.pd