A hybrid Tabu search-simulated annealing method to solve quadratic assignment problem

Quadratic assignment problem (QAP) has been considered as one of the most complicated problems. The problem is NP-Hard and the optimal solutions are not available for large-scale problems. This paper presents a hybrid method using tabu search and simulated annealing technique to solve QAP called TABUSA. Using some well-known problems from QAPLIB generated by Burkard et al. (1997) [Burkard, R. E., Karisch, S. E., & Rendl, F. (1997). QAPLIB–a quadratic assignment problem library. Journal of Global Optimization, 10(4), 391-403.], two methods of TABUSA and TS are both coded on MATLAB and they are compared in terms of relative percentage deviation (RPD) for all instances. The performance of the proposed method is examined against Tabu search and the preliminary results indicate that the hybrid method is capable of solving real-world problems, efficiently

Analyzing The Perceived Service Quality Factor On Customer Loyalty In Banking Industry

Customer loyalty concept has received much attention from both academics and practitioners in different industry. Banking industry is also not excluded and because it has a highly interaction with the customers, getting familiar with this concept would be very important and helpful for managers in defining strategies. According to the previous researches, there are many factors, which influence the customer loyalty. This article tries to define the service quality factor and its influence on the customer loyalty. In order to do this a survey was conducted among bank customers and after analyzing the answers, the results shows that service quality factor can be divided in to two separate factors which are named tangible quality and intangible quality, and both have direct influence on custome

Infinitely many weak solutions for a fourth-order equation on the whole space

The existence of infinitely many weak solutions for a fourth-order equation on the whole space with a perturbed nonlinear term is investigated. Our approach is based on variational methods and critical point theory

Studying Effects of Different Levels of Organic and Phosphorus Fertilizer on Yield and Yield Components of Lentil (Lens culinaris) under Dry Farming Conditions and Amount of Plant Phosphor in Kohgiluye-IRAN

In order to study the effects of different levels of organic and phosphorus fertilizer on Lentil dry farming performance and amount of plant's phosphor, an experiment on Factorial, random block-complete plan in 9 treatments was carried with 3 levels been repeated in kohgiluye & boyer ahmad-Iran during 2013- 2014. Treatments included three levels of animal fertilizer (0, 10, 20, ton per hectare) and different levels of super triple phosphate (0, 100, 200 kg per hectare). The results showed that the maximum amount of plant height in treatment D0P1 (nonuse of organic fertilizer with use of 100kg per hectare the triple super phosphate) attained the amount of 37.5cm, pod number in plant in treatment D0P1 (nonuse organic fertilizer with use of 100kg per hectare of triple super phosphate) attained the amount of 195.3, grain yield in treatment D0P1 (nonuse organic fertilizer with use of 100kg per hectare of triple super phosphate) attained the amount of 1404kg per hectare and the highest amount of harvest index in the treatment D1P2 (taking 10 tons per acre of livestock manure by consuming 200 kg of triple superphosphate per ha) was seen at a rate of 36.16%, grain protein was seen at a rate of 30.93% in the treatment D1 P1 (taking 20 tons of livestock manure per acre with the consumption of 100 kg triple superphosphate per ha) and the maximum amount of plant phosphorus was seen at a rate of 0.42% in the treatment P2 (with the consumption of 200 kg per ha of triple superphosphate)

Effect of Different Levels of Irrigation and Potassium on Qualitative and Quantitative Characteristics of the Beans in Yasooj, Iran

To study the effects of different levels of irrigation and potassium on Bean components practice, this study was carried out in Yasooj-Iran region in 2012-2013 cultivation year. Factorial experiment with two factors was carried out where the first factor of potassium sulfate fertilizer levels (zero, 100 and 200 kg per hectare) and the second factor of Irrigation (4 days, 8 days and 12 days) in a randomized complete block design were performed in triplicate. Developmental characteristics such as plant height, number of branches, stem diameter, number of pods per plant, seeds per pod, number of seeds per plant, seed weight, seed yield, biological yield and harvest index were measured. Results showed that treatment with potassium sulphate on stem height, number of branches, stem diameter, number of pods, number of seeds per pod, number of seeds per plant, seed weight, seed yield, biological yield and harvest index had a significant effect. The maximum amount of 1000 grains weight and harvest index was observed in the treatment of 100 kg per hectare of potassium sulfate. Irrigation factors on traits such as plant height, shoot fresh weight and seed yield showed a significant effect, the maximum amount of plant height, shoot fresh weight and seed yield was obtained from 4-day irrigation. Applying 100 KG per hectare of potassium sulfate is recommended to increasing of beans grown in

Effect of Different Levels of Irrigation and Potassium on Qualitative and Quantitative Characteristics of the Beans in Yasooj, Iran

To study the effects of different levels of irrigation and potassium on Bean components practice, this study was carried out in Yasooj-Iran region in 2012-2013 cultivation year. Factorial experiment with two factors was carried out where the first factor of potassium sulfate fertilizer levels (zero, 100 and 200 kg per hectare) and the second factor of Irrigation (4 days, 8 days and 12 days) in a randomized complete block design were performed in triplicate. Developmental characteristics such as plant height, number of branches, stem diameter, number of pods per plant, seeds per pod, number of seeds per plant, seed weight, seed yield, biological yield and harvest index were measured. Results showed that treatment with potassium sulphate on stem height, number of branches, stem diameter, number of pods, number of seeds per pod, number of seeds per plant, seed weight, seed yield, biological yield and harvest index had a significant effect. The maximum amount of 1000 grains weight and harvest index was observed in the treatment of 100 kg per hectare of potassium sulfate. Irrigation factors on traits such as plant height, shoot fresh weight and seed yield showed a significant effect, the maximum amount of plant height, shoot fresh weight and seed yield was obtained from 4-day irrigation. Applying 100 KG per hectare of potassium sulfate is recommended to increasing of beans grown in

Trust and Reputation Management: a Probabilistic Approach

Software architectures of large-scale systems are perceptibly shifting towards employing open and distributed computing. Web services emerged as autonomous and self-contained business applications that are published, found, and used over the web. These web services thus exist in an environment in which they interact among each other to achieve their goals. Two challenging tasks that govern the agents interactions have gained the attention of a large research community; web service selection and composition. The explosion of the number of published web services contributed to the growth of large pools of similarly functional services. While this is vital for a competitive and healthy marketplace, it complicates the aforementioned tasks. Service consumers resort to non-functional characteristics of available service providers to decide which service to interact with. Therefore, to optimize both tasks and maximize the gain of all involved agents, it is essential to build the capability of modeling and predicting the quality of these agents. In this thesis, we propose various trust and reputation models based on probabilistic approaches to address the web service selection and composition problems. These approaches consider the trustworthiness of a web service to be strongly tied to the outcomes of various quality of service metrics such as response time, throughput, and reliability. We represent these outcomes by a multinomial distribution whose parameters are learned using Bayesian inference which, given a likelihood function and a prior probability, derives the posterior probability. Since the likelihood, in this case, is a multinomial, a commonly used prior is the Dirichlet distribution. We propose, to overcome several limitations of the Dirichlet, by applying two alternative priors such as the generalized Dirichlet, and Beta-Liouville. Using these distributions, the learned parameters represent the probabilities of a web service to belong to each of the considered quality classes. These probabilities are consequently used to compute the trustworthiness of the evaluated web services and thus assisting consumers in the service selection process. Furthermore, after exploring the correlations among various quality metrics using real data sets, we introduce a hybrid trust model that captures these correlations using both Dirichlet and generalized Dirichlet distributions. Given their covariance structures, the former performs better when modeling negative correlations while the latter yields better modeling of positive correlations. To handle composite services, we propose various trust approaches using Bayesian networks and mixture models of three different distributions; the multinomial Dirichlet, the multinomial generalized Dirichlet, and the multinomial Beta-Liouville. Specifically, we employ a Bayesian network classifier with a Beta- Liouville prior to enable the classification of the QoS of composite services given the QoS of its constituents. In addition, we extend the previous models to function in online settings. Therefore, we present a generalized-Dirichlet power steady model that predicts compositional time series. We similarly extend the Bayesian networks model by using the Voting EM algorithm. This extension enables the estimation of the networks parameters after each interaction with a composite web service. Furthermore, we propose an algorithm to estimate the reputation of web services. We extend this algorithm by leveraging the capabilities of various clustering and outlier detection techniques to deal with malicious feedback and various strategic behavior commonly performed by web services. Alternatively, we suggest two data fusion methods for reputation feedback aggregation, namely, the covariance intersection and ellipsoidal intersection. These methods handle the dependency between the information that propagates through networks of interacting agents. They also avoid over confident estimates caused by redundant information. Finally, we present a reputation model for agent-based web services grouped into communities of homogeneous functionalities. We exploit various clustering and anomaly detection techniques to analyze and identify the quality trends provided by each service. This model enables the master of each community to allocate the requests it receives to the web service that best fulfill the quality requirements of the service consumers. We evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed approaches using both simulated and real data

In Vitro Effect of Hydroalcoholic Extract of Aloe Vera and 0.2% Chlorhexidine Mouthwash on Streptococcus Sanguinis, Streptococcus Salivarius and Streptococcus Mutans

Objectives This study aimed to assess the antimicrobial effects of aloe vera hydroalcoholic extract and 0.2% chlorhexidine (CHX) mouthwash on Streptococcus sanguinis (S. sanguinis), Streptococcus salivarius (S. salivarius) and Streptococcus mutans (S. mutans) in vitro.Methods Four concentrations (25%, 50%, 75% and 100%) of hydroalcoholic extract of aloe vera were prepared. S. sanguinis, S. salivarius and S. mutans were cultured on tryptic soy agar, and a single colony was removed from each microorganism and the opacity of pure microbial suspension was set at 0.5 McFarland standard concentration. Brain heart infusion broth culture medium, different concentrations of aloe vera extract, 0.2% CHX mouthwash, negative (distilled water) and positive (penicillin) controls and 0.5 McFarland bacterial suspension were added to the tubes and incubated at 37°C for 5, 10, and 15 minutes. Then, the samples were cultured on tryptic soy agar and incubated at 37°C for 48 hours. Number of colony forming units (CFUs) in the groups was compared with two-way repeated measures ANOVA. For paired comparisons, Tukey's multiple comparisons test was used (P˂0.05).Results The results showed significant effect of hydroalcoholic extract of aloe vera (25, 50, 75, and 100%) on the tested microorganisms but the mean CFUs following the use of 0.2% CHX was significantly less than that after using different concentrations aloe vera extract (P<0.001). Regardless of the type of the material, the number of CFUs decreased with increased exposure time.Conclusion Aloe vera can be used alone or with CHX mouthwash to eliminate cariogenic bacteria

Molecular mechanism of insulin-enhancing and -mimetic action of Vanadium compounds

Thèse numérisée par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal

Barriers to Implementing Performance-Based Budgeting at Iranian Universities of Medical Sciences: A Qualitative Study

Introduction: A performance-based budgeting system provides the link between performance indicators and resource allocation. This study aimed to identify the barriers to implementing performance-based budgeting at Iranian universities of medical sciences. Method: In this qualitative study with the framework analysis approach, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 14 university professors and directors of the Iranian Ministry of Health and Medical Education using purposive sampling and snowball model. MAXQDA-10 software was used to apply the codes and manage the data. The codes were extracted using deductive and inductive methods. Results: Barriers of performance-based budgeting were classified in three main areas including elements of environmental, human, and organizational management, and 14 themes. Conclusion: Having a deep understanding of the barriers to implementing evidence-based budgeting can help managers and policymakers to reach careful planning and successful implementation of budgeting. Paying attention to the environmental, human, and organizational infrastructure is essential for the successful deployment of performance-based budgeting at Iranian universities of medical sciences. Keywords: Budget, Budgeting, Universities, Ira