Full interference cancellation for two-path relay cooperative networks

This paper proposes the full interference cancellation (FIC) algorithm to cancel the inter-relay interference (IRI) in the two-path cooperative system. Arising from simultaneous data transmission from the source and relay nodes, IRI may significantly decrease the performance if it is not carefully handled. Compared to the existing partial interference cancellation (PIC) scheme, the FIC approach is more robust yet with less complexity. Numerical results are also given to verify the proposed scheme.

Modelling the likely impact of healthy eating guidelines on agricultural production and land use in England and Wales

Quadratic programming techniques were applied to household food consumption data in England and Wales to estimate likely changes in diet under healthy eating guidelines, and the consequences this would have on agriculture and land use in England and Wales. The first step entailed imposing nutrient restrictions on food consumption following dietary recommendations suggested by the UK Department of Health. The resulting diet was used, in a second step as a proxy for demand in agricultural commodities, to test the impact of such a scenario on food production and land use in England and Wales and the impacts of this on agricultural landscapes. Results of the diet optimisation indicated a large drop in consumption of foods rich in saturated fats and sugar, essentially cheese and sugar-based products, along with lesser cuts of fat and meat products. Conversely, consumption of fruit and vegetables, cereals, and flour would increase to meet dietary fibre recommendations. Such a shift in demand would dramatically affect production patterns: the financial net margin of England and Wales agriculture would rise, due to increased production of high market value and high economic margin crops. Some regions would, however, be negatively affected, mostly those dependent on beef cattle and sheep production that could not benefit from an increased demand for cereals and horticultural crops. The effects of these changes would also be felt in upstream industries, such as animal feed suppliers. While arable dominated landscapes would be little affected, pastoral landscapes would suffer through loss of grazing management and, possibly, land abandonment, especially in upland areas.

Explaining the 'health check' of the Common Agricultural Policy: budgetary politics, globalisation and paradigm change revisited

Three potential explanations of past reforms of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) can be identified in the literature: a budget constraint, pressure from General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade/World Trade Organization (GATT/WTO) negotiations or commitments and a paradigm shift emphasising agriculture’s provision of public goods. This discussion on the driving forces of CAP reform links to broader theoretical questions on the role of budgetary politics, globalisation of public policy and paradigm shift in explaining policy change. In this article, the Health Check reforms of 2007/2008 are assessed. They were probably more ambitious than first supposed, although it was a watered-down package agreed by ministers in November 2008. We conclude that the Health Check was not primarily driven by budget concerns or by the supposed switch from the state-assisted to the multifunctional policy paradigm. The European Commission’s wish to adopt an offensive negotiating stance in the closing phases of the Doha Round was a more likely explanatory factor. The shape and purpose of the CAP post-2013 is contested with divergent views among the Member States.

Human-computer cooperative teleoperation with time delay

Presents a method for model based bilateral control of master-slave arm with time delay between master and slave arms, where the system supports cooperative action between manual and automatic modes. The method realises efficiencies in master-slave arm control with the simplicities of a computer and the flexibility of a skilled human operator.

Cooperative task support for the control room

The National Grid Company plc. owns and operates the electricity transmission network in England and Wales, the day to day running of the network being carried out by teams of engineers within the national control room. The task of monitoring and operating the transmission network involves the transfer of large amounts of data and a high degree of cooperation between these engineers. The purpose of the research detailed in this paper is to investigate the use of interfacing techniques within the control room scenario, in particular, the development of an agent based architecture for the support of cooperative tasks. The proposed architecture revolves around the use of interface and user supervisor agents. Primarily, these agents are responsible for the flow of information to and from individual users and user groups. The agents are also responsible for tackling the synchronisation and control issues arising during the completion of cooperative tasks. In this paper a novel approach to human computer interaction (HCI) for power systems incorporating an embedded agent infrastructure is presented. The agent architectures used to form the base of the cooperative task support system are discussed, as is the nature of the support system and tasks it is intended to support.

The Finance Acts 1998 and 2000: can the owners of agricultural land continue to gain from their capital disposals?

This paper seeks to analyse and discuss, from the perspective of the owners of agricultural land, the main changes to the Capital Gains Tax regime introduced in the Finance Act 1998 and subsequently amended in the Finance Act 2000. The replacement of indexation with a new Taper relief is examined, along with the phasing out of Retirement relief, and the interaction of Taper relief with Rollover relief. The opportunity for tax mitigation by the owners of agricultural land is critically examined.