System for robot control inspired by the functionality and organisation of the human nervous system

This paper presents a model of a control system for robot systems inspired by the functionality and organisation of human neuroregulatory system. Our model was specified using software agents within a formal framework and implemented through Web Services. This approach allows the implementation of the control logic of a robot system with relative ease, in an incremental way, using the addition of new control centres to the system as its behaviour is observed or needs to be detailed with greater precision, without the need to modify existing functionality. The tests performed verify that the proposed model has the general characteristics of biological systems together with the desirable features of software, such as robustness, flexibility, reuse and decoupling.

Parallel Computational Intelligence-Based Multi-Camera Surveillance System

In this work, we present a multi-camera surveillance system based on the use of self-organizing neural networks to represent events on video. The system processes several tasks in parallel using GPUs (graphic processor units). It addresses multiple vision tasks at various levels, such as segmentation, representation or characterization, analysis and monitoring of the movement. These features allow the construction of a robust representation of the environment and interpret the behavior of mobile agents in the scene. It is also necessary to integrate the vision module into a global system that operates in a complex environment by receiving images from multiple acquisition devices at video frequency. Offering relevant information to higher level systems, monitoring and making decisions in real time, it must accomplish a set of requirements, such as: time constraints, high availability, robustness, high processing speed and re-configurability. We have built a system able to represent and analyze the motion in video acquired by a multi-camera network and to process multi-source data in parallel on a multi-GPU architecture.

A formal framework for modelling complex network management systems

Society today is completely dependent on computer networks, the Internet and distributed systems, which place at our disposal the necessary services to perform our daily tasks. Subconsciously, we rely increasingly on network management systems. These systems allow us to, in general, maintain, manage, configure, scale, adapt, modify, edit, protect, and enhance the main distributed systems. Their role is secondary and is unknown and transparent to the users. They provide the necessary support to maintain the distributed systems whose services we use every day. If we do not consider network management systems during the development stage of distributed systems, then there could be serious consequences or even total failures in the development of the distributed system. It is necessary, therefore, to consider the management of the systems within the design of the distributed systems and to systematise their design to minimise the impact of network management in distributed systems projects. In this paper, we present a framework that allows the design of network management systems systematically. To accomplish this goal, formal modelling tools are used for modelling different views sequentially proposed of the same problem. These views cover all the aspects that are involved in the system; based on process definitions for identifying responsible and defining the involved agents to propose the deployment in a distributed architecture that is both feasible and appropriate.

On Modeling an Innovative Monitoring Network for Protecting and Managing Cultural Heritage from Risk Events

In this paper the model of an Innovative Monitoring Network involving properly connected nodes to develop an Information and Communication Technology (ICT) solution for preventive maintenance of historical centres from early warnings is proposed. It is well known that the protection of historical centres generally goes from a large-scale monitoring to a local one and it could be supported by a unique ICT solution. More in detail, the models of a virtually organized monitoring system could enable the implementation of automated analyses by presenting various alert levels. An adequate ICT solution tool would allow to define a monitoring network for a shared processing of data and results. Thus, a possible retrofit solution could be planned for pilot cases shared among the nodes of the network on the basis of a suitable procedure utilizing a retrofit catalogue. The final objective would consist in providing a model of an innovative tool to identify hazards, damages and possible retrofit solutions for historical centres, assuring an easy early warning support for stakeholders. The action could proactively target the needs and requirements of users, such as decision makers responsible for damage mitigation and safeguarding of cultural heritage assets.

Optimal Design of a Hybrid Membrane System Combining Reverse and Forward Osmosis for Seawater Desalination

In this work we study Forward Osmosis (FO) as an emerging desalination technology, and its capability to replace totally or partially Reverse Osmosis (RO) in order to reduce the great amount of energy required in the current desalination plants. For this purpose, we propose a superstructure that includes both membrane based desalination technologies, allowing the selection of only one of the technologies or a combination of both of them seeking for the optimal configuration of the network. The optimization problem is solved for a seawater desalination plant with a given fresh water production. The results obtained show that the optimal solution combines both desalination technologies to reduce not only the energy consumption but also the total cost of the desalination process in comparison with the same plant but operating only with RO.

Conceptual Modelling of Complex Network Management Systems

Society, as we know it today, is completely dependent on computer networks, Internet and distributed systems, which place at our disposal the necessary services to perform our daily tasks. Moreover, and unconsciously, all services and distributed systems require network management systems. These systems allow us to, in general, maintain, manage, configure, scale, adapt, modify, edit, protect or improve the main distributed systems. Their role is secondary and is unknown and transparent to the users. They provide the necessary support to maintain the distributed systems whose services we use every day. If we don’t consider network management systems during the development stage of main distributed systems, then there could be serious consequences or even total failures in the development of the distributed systems. It is necessary, therefore, to consider the management of the systems within the design of distributed systems and systematize their conception to minimize the impact of the management of networks within the project of distributed systems. In this paper, we present a formalization method of the conceptual modelling for design of a network management system through the use of formal modelling tools, thus allowing from the definition of processes to identify those responsible for these. Finally we will propose a use case to design a conceptual model intrusion detection system in network.