A State-of-the-art Integrated Transportation Simulation Platform

Nowadays, universities and companies have a huge need for simulation and modelling methodologies. In the particular case of traffic and transportation, making physical modifications to the real traffic networks could be highly expensive, dependent on political decisions and could be highly disruptive to the environment. However, while studying a specific domain or problem, analysing a problem through simulation may not be trivial and may need several simulation tools, hence raising interoperability issues. To overcome these problems, we propose an agent-directed transportation simulation platform, through the cloud, by means of services. We intend to use the IEEE standard HLA (High Level Architecture) for simulators interoperability and agents for controlling and coordination. Our motivations are to allow multiresolution analysis of complex domains, to allow experts to collaborate on the analysis of a common problem and to allow co-simulation and synergy of different application domains. This paper will start by presenting some preliminary background concepts to help better understand the scope of this work. After that, the results of a literature review is shown. Finally, the general architecture of a transportation simulation platform is proposed

Densifying the sparse cloud SimSaaS: The need of a synergy among agent-directed simulation, SimSaaS and HLA

Modelling & Simulation (M&S) is broadly used in real scenarios where making physical modifications could be highly expensive. With the so-called Simulation Software-as-a-Service (SimSaaS), researchers could take advantage of the huge amount of resource that cloud computing provides. Even so, studying and analysing a problem through simulation may need several simulation tools, hence raising interoperability issues. Having this in mind, IEEE developed a standard for interoperability among simulators named High Level Architecture (HLA). Moreover, the multi-agent system approach has become recognised as a convenient approach for modelling and simulating complex systems. Despite all the recent works and acceptance of these technologies, there is still a great lack of work regarding synergies among them. This paper shows by means of a literature review this lack of work or, in other words, the sparse Cloud SimSaaS. The literature review and the resulting taxonomy are the main contributions of this paper, as they provide a research agenda illustrating future research opportunities and trends

Dynamics of localized spins coupled to the conduction electrons with charge/spin currents

The effects of the charge/spin currents of conduction electrons on the dynamics of the localized spins are studied in terms of the perturbation in the exchange coupling $J_{K}$ between them. The equations of motion for the localized spins are derived exactly up to $O(J_{K}^2)$, and the equations for the two-spin system is solved numerically. It is found that the dynamics depends sensitively upon the relative magnitude of the charge and spin currents, i.e., it shows steady state, periodic motion, and even chaotic behavior. Extension to the multi-spin system and its implications including possible ``spin current detector'' are also discussed.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, REVTe

Magic sets with full sharing

In this paper we study the relationship between tabulation and goal-oriented bottom-up evaluation of logic programs. Differences emerge when one tries to identify features of one evaluation method in the other. We show that to obtain the same effect as tabulation in top-down evaluation, one has to perform a careful {\em adornment} in programs to be evaluated bottom-up. Furthermore we propose an efficient algorithm to perform forward subsumption che cking over adorned {\em magic facts}

Rules for contrast sets

In this paper we present a technique to derive rules describing contrast sets. Contrast sets are a formalism to represent groups diferences. We propose a novel approach to describe directional contrasts using rules where the contrasting efect is partitioned into pairs of groups. Our approach makes use of a directional Fisher Exact Test to and significant diferences across groups. We used a Bonferroni within search adjustment to control type I errors and a pruning technique to prevent derivation of non significant contrast set specializations.Thanks to Prof. M. Pazzani for kindly providing the code for the STUCCO algorithm. This work was Supported by Fundacao Ciencia e Tecnologia, Project PFound, Project ProtUnf, FEDER and Programa de Financiamento Plurianual de Unidades de I & D

O programa nacional de fortalecimento da agricultura familiar no Brasil: uma análise sobre a distribuição regional e setorial dos recursos.

No Brasil, as políticas públicas para o espaço rural sempre tenderam a priorizar a agricultura patronal, em detrimento dos agricultores familiares. Todavia, os estudos realizados pelos órgãos FAO - INCRA deram subsídio para a criação do Programa Nacional de Fortalecimento da Agricultura Familiar (PRONAF), resultando em um novo direcionamento dos investimentos públicos, os quais passaram a contemplar o segmento dos agricultores familiares. Entende-se o PRONAF como uma política não-compensatória, que, apesar de seus problemas, tem contribuído de fato para mudanças e melhorias no espaço agrário brasileiro. Desde sua criação no final da década de 1990, o PRONAF passou por várias mudanças em sua estrutura administrativa e operacional, a fim de alcançar seus objetivos e adequar-se face a complexa realidade social agrária brasileira. Sendo assim, o presente estudo visa discutir as ações do Estado por meio desse Programa, a partir de suas linhas de atuação, bem como analisar a distribuição de suas concessões de crédito regional e setorialmente. Assim, os procedimentos metodológicos utilizados para a realização deste trabalho compreendem pesquisa bibliográfica e documental, além de pesquisa em fontes secundárias, no intuito de obter dados e informações relevantes para a análise das relações sociais estabelecidas em meio a esse processo de concretização e espacialização desse Programa. Dentre as implicações do PRONAF pode-se notar em âmbito nacional, uma diminuição da disparidade regional brasileira, bem como a preocupação que o Programa tem demonstrado com os aspectos socioculturais locais e regionais, como forma de garantir que seus investimentos perpassem a dimensão econômica, mas valorize outras dimensões, a exemplo dos elementos culturais