Linear force and moment equations for an annular smooth shaft seal perturbed both angularly and laterally

Coefficients are derived for equations expressing the lateral force and pitching moments associated with both planar translation and angular perturbations from a nominally centered rotating shaft with respect to a stationary seal. The coefficients for the lowest order and first derivative terms emerge as being significant and are of approximately the same order of magnitude as the fundamental coefficients derived by means of Black's equations. Second derivative, shear perturbation, and entrance coefficient variation effects are adjudged to be small

Diagnostic Prediction Using Discomfort Drawings with IBTM

In this paper, we explore the possibility to apply machine learning to make diagnostic predictions using discomfort drawings. A discomfort drawing is an intuitive way for patients to express discomfort and pain related symptoms. These drawings have proven to be an effective method to collect patient data and make diagnostic decisions in real-life practice. A dataset from real-world patient cases is collected for which medical experts provide diagnostic labels. Next, we use a factorized multimodal topic model, Inter-Battery Topic Model (IBTM), to train a system that can make diagnostic predictions given an unseen discomfort drawing. The number of output diagnostic labels is determined by using mean-shift clustering on the discomfort drawing. Experimental results show reasonable predictions of diagnostic labels given an unseen discomfort drawing. Additionally, we generate synthetic discomfort drawings with IBTM given a diagnostic label, which results in typical cases of symptoms. The positive result indicates a significant potential of machine learning to be used for parts of the pain diagnostic process and to be a decision support system for physicians and other health care personnel.Comment: Presented at 2016 Machine Learning and Healthcare Conference (MLHC 2016), Los Angeles, C

Business processes in the agile organisation: a socio-technical perspective

© 2015, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg. This paper takes a cross-disciplinary view of the ontology of “business process”: how the concept is treated in the IS research literature and how related concepts (with stronger human behavioural orientation) from organisation and management sciences can potentially inform this IS perspective. In particular, is there room for socio-technical concepts such as technology affordance, derived from the constructivist tradition, in improving our understanding of operational business processes, particularly human-centric business processes? The paper presents a theoretical framework for understanding the role of business processes in organisational agility that distinguishes between the process-as-designed and the process-as-practiced. How this practice aspect of business processes also leads to the improvisation of various information technology enablers, is explored using a socio-technical lens. The posited theoretical framework is illustrated and validated with data drawn from an interpretive empirical case study of a large IT services company. The research suggests that processes within the organisation evolve both by top-down design and by the bottom-up routinisation of practice and that the tension between these is driven by the need for flexibility

Introducing a socio-technical perspective on business processes into enterprise interoperability frameworks

© IFIP International Federation for Information Processing 2015. This paper looks at enterprise interoperability (EI), specifically process-level interoperability, and suggests that the inherent non-determinacy of human-centred business processes introduces another ingredient into the EI puzzle that has thus far been understated in EIF ontologies. A conceptualisation of business process based on socio-technical concepts is presented. It is argued that this provides a better way to accommodate human agency factors, and under the influence of these factors, how business processes inevitably evolve over time, potentially affecting their interoperability. We suggest the extant body of knowledge on the theory of dynamic capabilities is relevant to understanding how organisations can control this potentially undirected process evolution and thereby sustain interoperability. Some initial observations are made concerning how this new ontological element could be accommodated into existing EIFs. The paper aims to stimulate discussion in this area and make a contribution to the EI body of knowledge

Neutrino oscillations: Quantum mechanics vs. quantum field theory

A consistent description of neutrino oscillations requires either the quantum-mechanical (QM) wave packet approach or a quantum field theoretic (QFT) treatment. We compare these two approaches to neutrino oscillations and discuss the correspondence between them. In particular, we derive expressions for the QM neutrino wave packets from QFT and relate the free parameters of the QM framework, in particular the effective momentum uncertainty of the neutrino state, to the more fundamental parameters of the QFT approach. We include in our discussion the possibilities that some of the neutrino's interaction partners are not detected, that the neutrino is produced in the decay of an unstable parent particle, and that the overlap of the wave packets of the particles involved in the neutrino production (or detection) process is not maximal. Finally, we demonstrate how the properly normalized oscillation probabilities can be obtained in the QFT framework without an ad hoc normalization procedure employed in the QM approach.Comment: LaTeX, 42 pages, 1 figure; v2: minor clarifications, matches published version; v3: Corrected the discussion of the conditions under which an oscillation probability can be sensibly defined in the QFT approach (sec. 5.2.4

Iterative maximum-likelihood reconstruction in quantum homodyne tomography

I propose an iterative expectation maximization algorithm for reconstructing a quantum optical ensemble from a set of balanced homodyne measurements performed on an optical state. The algorithm applies directly to the acquired data, bypassing the intermediate step of calculating marginal distributions. The advantages of the new method are made manifest by comparing it with the traditional inverse Radon transformation technique

Correlation of microclimatic factors with species distribution in Shenk\u27s woods, Howard county, Indiana

In furtherance of the plan of the Botany Department of Butler University to place on record as rapidly as possible analysis of as many of the remnants of the forest primeval as can be studied before the woodsman\u27s saw and axe make it too late..

An action principle for the quantization of parametric theories and nonlinear quantum cosmology

By parametrizing the action integral for the standard Schrodinger equation we present a derivation of the recently proposed method for quantizing a parametrized theory. The reformulation suggests a natural extension from conventional to nonlinear quantum mechanics. This generalization enables a unitary description of the quantum evolution for a broad class of constrained Hamiltonian systems with a nonlinear kinematic structure. In particular, the new theory is applicable to the quantization of cosmological models where a chosen gravitational degree of freedom acts as geometric time. This is demonstrated explicitly using three cosmological models: the Friedmann universe with a massless scalar field and Bianchi type I and IX models. Based on these investigations, the prospect of further developing the proposed quantization scheme in the context of quantum gravity is discussed.Comment: 14 page

Preventing Advanced Persistent Threats in Complex Control Networks

An Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) is an emerging attack against Industrial Control and Automation Systems, that is executed over a long period of time and is difficult to detect. In this context, graph theory can be applied to model the interaction among nodes and the complex attacks affecting them, as well as to design recovery techniques that ensure the survivability of the network. Accordingly, we leverage a decision model to study how a set of hierarchically selected nodes can collaborate to detect an APT within the network, concerning the presence of changes in its topology. Moreover, we implement a response service based on redundant links that dynamically uses a secret sharing scheme and applies a flexible routing protocol depending on the severity of the attack. The ultimate goal is twofold: ensuring the reachability between nodes despite the changes and preventing the path followed by messages from being discovered.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech