Reactive Control Improvisation

Reactive synthesis is a paradigm for automatically building correct-by-construction systems that interact with an unknown or adversarial environment. We study how to do reactive synthesis when part of the specification of the system is that its behavior should be random. Randomness can be useful, for example, in a network protocol fuzz tester whose output should be varied, or a planner for a surveillance robot whose route should be unpredictable. However, existing reactive synthesis techniques do not provide a way to ensure random behavior while maintaining functional correctness. Towards this end, we generalize the recently-proposed framework of control improvisation (CI) to add reactivity. The resulting framework of reactive control improvisation provides a natural way to integrate a randomness requirement with the usual functional specifications of reactive synthesis over a finite window. We theoretically characterize when such problems are realizable, and give a general method for solving them. For specifications given by reachability or safety games or by deterministic finite automata, our method yields a polynomial-time synthesis algorithm. For various other types of specifications including temporal logic formulas, we obtain a polynomial-space algorithm and prove matching PSPACE-hardness results. We show that all of these randomized variants of reactive synthesis are no harder in a complexity-theoretic sense than their non-randomized counterparts.Comment: 25 pages. Full version of a CAV 2018 pape

The SH3 and cysteine-rich domain 3 (Stac3) gene is important to growth, fiber composition, and calcium release from the sarcoplasmic reticulum in postnatal skeletal muscle

The SH3 and cysteine-rich domain 3 (Stac3) gene is specifically expressed in the skeletal muscle. Stac3 knockout mice die perinatally. In this study, we determined the potential role of Stac3 in postnatal skeletal muscle growth, fiber composition, and contraction by generating conditional Stac3 knockout mice. We disrupted the Stac3 gene in 4-week-old male mice using the Flp-FRT and tamoxifen-inducible Cre-loxP systems. RT-qPCR and western blotting analyses of the limb muscles of target mice indicated that nearly all Stac3 mRNA and more than 70 % of STAC3 protein were deleted 4 weeks after tamoxifen injection. Postnatal Stac3 deletion inhibited body and limb muscle mass gains. Histological staining and gene expression analyses revealed that postnatal Stac3 deletion decreased the size of myofibers and increased the percentage of myofibers containing centralized nuclei, with no effect on the total myofiber number. Grip strength and grip time tests indicated that postnatal Stac3 deletion decreased limb muscle strength in mice. Muscle contractile tests revealed that postnatal Stac3 deletion reduced electrostimulation-induced but not the ryanodine receptor agonist caffeine-induced maximal force output in the limb muscles. Calcium imaging analysis of single flexor digitorum brevis myofibers indicated that postnatal Stac3 deletion reduced electrostimulation- but not caffeine-induced calcium release from the sarcoplasmic reticulum. This study demonstrates that STAC3 is important to myofiber hypertrophy, myofiber-type composition, contraction, and excitation-induced calcium release from the sarcoplasmic reticulum in the postnatal skeletal muscle.https://doi.org/10.1186/s13395-016-0088-

Análise de imagens na caracterização de genótipos de sorgo.

O objetivo deste trabalho foi avaliar a divergência genética de 25 genótipos de sorgo sacarino de acordo com o desenvolvimento de plântulas e germinação das sementes, utilizando técnicas descritas nas Regras de Análise de Sementes e correlacionando com análise de imagens das plântulas pelo Software ImageJ.Evento online

Costs and Cost-Effectiveness of Training Traditional Birth Attendants to Reduce Neonatal Mortality in the Lufwanyama Neonatal Survival Study (LUNESP)

The Lufwanyama Neonatal Survival Project (“LUNESP”) was a cluster randomized, controlled trial that showed that training traditional birth attendants (TBAs) to perform interventions targeting birth asphyxia, hypothermia, and neonatal sepsis reduced all-cause neonatal mortality by 45%. This companion analysis was undertaken to analyze intervention costs and cost-effectiveness, and factors that might improve cost-effectiveness.We calculated LUNESP's financial and economic costs and the economic cost of implementation for a forecasted ten-year program (2011–2020). In each case, we calculated the incremental cost per death avoided and disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) averted in real 2011 US dollars. The forecasted 10-year program analysis included a base case as well as ‘conservative’ and ‘optimistic’ scenarios. Uncertainty was characterized using one-way sensitivity analyses and a multivariate probabilistic sensitivity analysis. The estimated financial and economic costs of LUNESP were $118,574 and$127,756, respectively, or $49,469 and$53,550 per year. Fixed costs accounted for nearly 90% of total costs. For the 10-year program, discounted total and annual program costs were $256,455 and$26,834 respectively; for the base case, optimistic, and conservative scenarios, the estimated cost per death avoided was $1,866,$591, and $3,024, and cost per DALY averted was$74, $24, and$120, respectively. Outcomes were robust to variations in local costs, but sensitive to variations in intervention effect size, number of births attended by TBAs, and the extent of foreign consultants' participation.Based on established guidelines, the strategy of using trained TBAs to reduce neonatal mortality was ‘highly cost effective’. We strongly recommend consideration of this approach for other remote rural populations with limited access to health care

On the Synthesis of Mobile Robots Algorithms: the Case of Ring Gathering

International audienceRecent advances in Distributed Computing highlight models and algorithms for autonomous swarms of mobile robots that self-organize and cooperate to solve global objectives. The overwhelming majority of works so far considers handmade algorithms and correctness proofs.This paper is the first to propose a formal framework to automatically design distributed algorithms that are dedicated to autonomous mobile robots evolving in a discrete space. As a case study, we consider the problem of gathering all robots at a particular location, not known beforehand. Our contribution is threefold. First, we propose an encoding of the gathering problem as a reachability game. Then, we automatically generate an optimal distributed algorithm for three robots evolving on a fixed size uniform ring. Finally, we prove by induction that the generated algorithm is also correct for any ring size except when an impossibility result holds (that is, when the number of robots divides the ring size)

How to Win First-Order Safety Games

First-order (FO) transition systems have recently attracted attention for the verification of parametric systems such as network protocols, software-defined networks or multi-agent workflows like conference management systems. Functional correctness or noninterference of these systems have conveniently been formulated as safety or hypersafety properties, respectively. In this article, we take the step from verification to synthesis---tackling the question whether it is possible to automatically synthesize predicates to enforce safety or hypersafety properties like noninterference. For that, we generalize FO transition systems to FO safety games. For FO games with monadic predicates only, we provide a complete classification into decidable and undecidable cases. For games with non-monadic predicates, we concentrate on universal first-order invariants, since these are sufficient to express a large class of properties---for example noninterference. We identify a non-trivial sub-class where invariants can be proven inductive and FO winning strategies be effectively constructed. We also show how the extraction of weakest FO winning strategies can be reduced to SO quantifier elimination itself. We demonstrate the usefulness of our approach by automatically synthesizing nontrivial FO specifications of messages in a leader election protocol as well as for paper assignment in a conference management system to exclude unappreciated disclosure of reports

Vorwort Die Theorietage

Automaten und Formale Sprachen " haben bereits eine lange Tradition

CD1-010

Swadesh Indo-Aryan word listNagar Valley, Gilgit-Baltistan Province, Pakista