Offline Emergence Engineering For Agent Societies

Many examples for emergent behaviors may be observed in self-organizing physical and biological systems which prove to be robust, stable, and adaptable. Such behaviors are often based on very simple mechanisms and rules, but artificially creating them is a challenging task which does not comply with traditional software engineering. In this article, we propose a hybrid approach by combining strategies from Genetic Programming and agent software engineering, and demonstrate that this approach effectively yields an emergent design for given problems.

Vorausschau und Planung neuer Technologiepfade in Unternehmen

Unternehmen konkurrieren in einem globalen Wettbewerb um den Transfer neuer Technologien in erfolgreiche Geschäftsmodelle. Aus diesem Grund stehen sie zunehmend der Herausforderung gegenüber, technologische Potenziale frühzeitig zu identifizieren, zu bewerten und Strategien für das Erschließen dieser Potenziale zu entwickeln. Dies ist zentraler Gegenstand der Vorausschau und Planung neuer Technologiepfade. In der vorliegenden Arbeit wird gemeinsam mit vier Unternehmen ein Leitfaden für die Strategiefindung, Entwicklung und Kommerzialisierung neu aufkommender Technologien entwickelt und angewendet. Den Ausgangspunkt der Arbeit bildet eine systematische Aufarbeitung des Forschungsstandes der Vorausschau und Planung neuer Technologien. Anschließend wird ein Beschreibungsmodell der Entstehung neuer Technologiepfade in technologiebasierten Innovationssystemen entwickelt. Auf Basis dieses Modells werden unterschiedliche Kategorien von Einflussfaktoren definiert, die als Analyserahmen für die neu entstehende Technologie dienen. Auf Basis der in der Literatur dokumentierten Abläufe, Teamstrukturen und Methoden (z.B. Roadmaps, Szenarien, Datenbankanalysen) wird ein sechsstufiger Ansatz für die Durchführung der Vorausschau und Planung neuer Technologiepfade konzipiert. Dieser Ansatz wird in vier Firmen für die Vorausschau und Planung neuer Technologien angewendet. Die untersuchten Technologien lassen sich den Feldern Biotechnologie, Nanotechnologie, Umwelttechnologie und Sensorik zuordnen. Zentrales Ergebnis der Arbeit ist ein entsprechend der Erfahrungen in den Unternehmen angepasster Ansatz für die Vorausschau und Planung neuer Technologiepfade. Dieser Ansatz ist in Abhängigkeit von Unternehmens- und Technologiecharakteristika für die weitere Anwendung konkretisiert. Dabei finden die zu beteiligenden Organisationseinheiten, zu betrachtende Einflussfaktoren sowie anwendbare Methoden besondere Berücksichtigung. Die Arbeit richtet sich an Personen in Führungspositionen im Bereich des strategischen Technologiemanagements sowie der Forschung und Entwicklung in Unternehmen, die Strategien für neu aufkommende Technologien entwickeln. Weiterhin sind die Ergebnisse der Arbeit für Wissenschaftler auf dem Gebiet der Methoden zur Vorausschau und Strategieentwicklung für neue Technologien von Interesse.

Applicability of Emergence Engineering to Distributed Systems Scenarios

Genetic Programming can be effectively used to create emergent behavior for a group of autonomous agents. In the process we call Offline Emergence Engineering, the behavior is at first bred in a Genetic Programming environment and then deployed to the agents in the real environment. In this article we shortly describe our approach, introduce an extended behavioral rule syntax, and discuss the impact of the expressiveness of the behavioral description to the generation success, using two scenarios in comparison: the election problem and the distributed critical section problem. We evaluate the results, formulating criteria for the applicability of our approach.

INFO1010: Organisational Perspectives

lecture in professional issues which looks at organisations likely to employ our students and suggests how students might work towards identifying and achieving their employment objectives

WAIS Seminar:Let's SoFWIReD!

Title: Let’s SoFWIReD! Time: Wed, 21 May 2014 11:00-11:50 Location: Building 32, Room 3077 Speaker: Dr Sepi Chakaveh Abstract The information age as we know it has its roots in several enabling technologies – most of all the World Wide Web – for the provision of truly global connectivity. The emergence of a Web of Big Data in terms of the publication and analysis of Open Data provides new insights about the impact of the Web in our society. The second most important technology in this regard has been the emergence of streaming processes based on new and innovative compression methods such as MP3 so that audio and video content becomes accessible to everyone on the Web. The SoFWIReD team is developing comprehensive, interoperable platforms for data and knowledge driven processing of Open Data and will investigate aspects of collective intelligence. Insights generated in the project will form the basis for supporting companies through consulting, organisational development, and software solutions so that they can master the collective intelligence transition. The seminar will present how the project addresses the research topics of web observatory, dynamic media objects, crowd-sourced open data and Internet services. At the end of a talk a number of demos will be shown in the context of SoFWIReD’s Dynamic Media Object.

Relación entre cultura corporativa y desempeño: Una caracterización desde las ciencias de la complejidad

La siguiente monografía busca dar una mirada descriptiva a la cultura corporativa y a su relación con el desempeño organizacional desde la perspectiva de las ciencias de la complejidad. Inicialmente presenta una mirada general de la definición de cultura y caracteriza los sistemas complejos para luego proceder a examinar como algunos fenómenos de la complejidad se ven reflejados en la cultura, revisando la propuesta de Dolan et al, que proponen los valores como atractores en el desempeño. Adicionalmente se examinan distintas formas y definiciones de desempeño organizacional y se identifican algunos estudios que apuntan a la correlación entre culturas fuertes y desempeño. Sin embargo Gordon & DiTomaso concluyen que no se comprende muy bien cómo funciona la relación más allá de la correlación. Finalmente se concluye que la complejidad presenta una opción para explicar cómo puede funcionar la relación entre cultura y desempeño a través de los valores como un elemento cultural que lleva a la emergencia. Sin embargo queda la incógnita sobre la aplicabilidad de estrategias para implementar lo estudiado en organizaciones y en el uso de herramientas de simulación para profundizar en la investigación

Desarrollo de un estado de la cuestión acerca de las interacciones entre el control de gestión y el aprendizaje organizacional.

Las organizaciones en la actualidad deben encontrar diferentes maneras de sobrevivir en un tiempo de rápida transformación. Uno de los mecanismos usados por las empresas para adaptarse a los cambios organizacionales son los sistemas de control de gestión, que a su vez permiten a las organizaciones hacer un seguimiento a sus procesos, para que la adaptabilidad sea efectiva. Otra variable importante para la adaptación es el aprendizaje organizacional siendo el proceso mediante el cual las organizaciones se adaptan a los cambios del entorno, tanto interno como externo de la compañía. Dado lo anterior, este proyecto se basa en la extracción de documentación soporte valido, que permita explorar las interacciones entre estos dos campos, los sistemas de control de gestión y el aprendizaje organizacional, además, analizar el impacto de estas interacciones en la perdurabilidad organizacional. ​

The language used in early mother-child interaction by very-low-birth-weight children, with a focus on the emergence of grammar. 'El lenguaje utilizado por niños con muy bajo peso al nacer en la interacción temprana entre madre e hijo, con atención especial a la aparición de la gramática'.

Resumen basado en el de la publicación. Resumen en español

Supporting multi-organisational collaborative groups in the public sector

In this paper, the issues that arise in multi-organisational collaborative groups (MOCGs) in the public sector are discussed and how a technology-based group support system (GSS) could assist individuals within these groups. MOCGs are commonly used in the public sector to find solutions to multifaceted social problems. Finding solutions for such problems is difficult because their scope is outside the boundary of a single government agency. The standard approach to solving such problems is collaborative involving a diverse range of stakeholders. Collaborative working can be advantageous but it also introduces its own pressures. Conflicts can arise due to the multiple contexts and goals of group members and the organisations that they represent. Trust, communication and a shared interface are crucial to making any significant progress. A GSS could support these elements.

Emergence of Chenopodium album and Stellaria media of different origins under different climatic conditions

The emergence behaviour of weed species in relation to cultural and meteorological events was studied. Dissimilarities between populations in dormancy and germination ecology, between-year maturation conditions and seed quality and burial site climate all contribute to potentially unpredictable variability. Therefore, a weed emergence data set was produced for weed seeds of Stellaria media and Chenopodium album matured and collected from three populations (Italy, Sweden and UK). The seeds were collected in two consecutive seasons (1999 and 2000) and subsequently buried in the autumn of the same year of maturation in eight contrasting climatic locations throughout Europe and the USA. The experiment sought to explore and explain differences between the three populations in their emergence behaviour. Evidence was demonstrated of synchrony in the timing of the emergence of different populations of a species at a given burial site. The relative magnitudes of emergence from the three populations at a given burial site in a given year were generally similar across all the burial sites in the study. The resulting data set was also used to construct a simple weed emergence model, which was tested for its application to the range of different burial environments and populations. The study demonstrated the possibility of using a simple thermal time-based model to describe part of the emergence behaviour across different burial sites, seed populations and seasons, and a simple winter chilling relationship to adjust for the magnitude of the flush of emergence at a given burial site. This study demonstrates the possibility of developing robust generic models for simple predictions of emergence timing across populations.

Duration from vine emergence to flowering suggests a long-day or rate of change of photoperiod response in white yam (Dioscorea rotundata Poir.)

The objective of this study was to quantify the effect of photoperiod on the duration from vine (shoot) emergence to flowering in white or Guinea yam (Dioscorea rotundata). The duration from vine emergence to flowering in two clonal varieties of yam (TDr 131 and TDr 99-9) was recorded at 10 different sowing dates/locations in Nigeria. Durations to flowering varied from 40 to > 88 days. Mean daily temperature and photoperiod between vine emergence and flowering varied from 25 to 27 degrees C and 13.1 to 13.4 h day(-1), respectively. Both clones had similar responses to temperature, with base and optimum temperatures of 12 and 25-27 degrees C, respectively. Thermal durations to flowering were strongly related (r(2) > 0.75-0.83) to absolute photoperiod (h) at vine emergence as well as to rate of change of photoperiod (s day(-1)) at vine emergence. The response to absolute photoperiod suggests that white yams are quantitative LDPs, flowering sooner in long than short days. Yams also flowered earlier when the rate of change of photoperiod was positive but small, or was negative. It is suggested that yams may use a combination of photoperiod and rate of change in order to fine tune flowering time. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.