Self-organization, embodiment, and biologically inspired robotics.

Robotics researchers increasingly agree that ideas from biology and self-organization can strongly benefit the design of autonomous robots. Biological organisms have evolved to perform and survive in a world characterized by rapid changes, high uncertainty, indefinite richness, and limited availability of information. Industrial robots, in contrast, operate in highly controlled environments with no or very little uncertainty. Although many challenges remain, concepts from biologically inspired (bio-inspired) robotics will eventually enable researchers to engineer machines for the real world that possess at least some of the desirable properties of biological organisms, such as adaptivity, robustness, versatility, and agility.

支持可扩展性的设计模式协作研究

在软件设计中,设计模式已被大量采用,以提高系统的可扩展性、可重用性和可维护性。从使用设计模式应用的实际例子出发,研究设计模式在实际的应用中会遇到的协作方面的问题。从系统的可扩展性角度讨论了设计模式协作的度量准则,从中提出了设计模式协作的友好性分类,并通过设计模式的应用的实例来分析设计模式协作的友好性分类准则的使用方式,对设计模式的协作使用提出了指导性的意见和建议。

Effect of the compatibilization of linear low-density polyethylene-g-acrylic acid on the morphology and mechanical properties of poly(butylene terephthalate)/linear low-density polyethylene blends

A poly(butylene terephthalate) (PBT)/linear low-density polyethylene (LLDPE) alloy was prepared with a reactive extrusion method, For improved compatibility of the blending system, LLDPE grafted with acrylic acid (LLDPE-g-AA) by radiation was adopted in place of plain LLDPE. The toughness and extensibility of the PBT/LLDPE-g-AA blends, as characterized by the impact strengths and elongations at break, were much improved in comparison with the toughness and extensibility of the PBT/LLDPE blends at the same compositions. However, there was not much difference in their tensile (or flexural) strengths and moduli. Scanning electron microscopy photographs showed that the domains of PBT/LLDPE-g-AA were much smaller and their dispersions were more homogeneous than the domains and dispersions of the PBT/ T,T PE blends. Compared with the related values of the PBT/LLDPE blends, the contents and melting temperatures of the usual spherulites of PBT in PBT/LLDPE-g-AA decreased.

基于B/S模式的机器人监控平台的研究

针对目前移动机器人本体研究平台存在局限性的问题,设计出一种基于B/S模式的机器人软件控制系统。系统的实现采用了Java和Vc相结合的方式,在利用Java语言的JNI技术解决接口问题的同时,为了充分利用现有软件模块,提出了一种新型的控制架构,使得整个系统更加完善。通过实验验证了此方法的有效性,有效的提高了系统的可维护性,可扩展性以及可复用性,最终很好实现了控制机器人的目的。

空值环境下含不确定及可能信息关系数据库的更新

本文在［１］扩展关系模型中引入属性级的不完全信息空值。为适应此环境下更新操作的需要，本文对［１］中的扩展关系模型进行了进一步的扩展，并以此模型为基础讨论了空值环境下含不确定及可能信息关系数据库的更新操作的策略，给出了相应的处理算法。

关系模型中不确定信息与可能信息的引入与处理

In this paper,the traditional relational model is extended in order to express indefinite and maybe information. On the basis of the extended relational model.,the foundamental operations in relational algebra are defined again,and the policy and algorithm for updating relational database are given.

空值环境下含不确定及可能信息关系数据库的查询

本文以［１］中的扩展关系模型为基础在两种元组级的不完全信息──不确定及可能信息中引入属性级的不完全信息空值，使两种不同性质的不完全信息同时出现在同一关系中。为了能够查询到不同种类及不同确定程度的信息，文中制定了这种扩展关系模型上关系的查询策略，定义了能够体现这种策略的最小关系代数运算。

大地电磁测深反演方法对比与可视化及应用研究

At first, the article has an introduction of the basic theory of magnetotelluric and the essential methods of data acquisition and preprocessing. After that, the article introduces the methods together with their predominance of computing transfering function such as the Least-square method, the Remote-Reference method and the Robust method. The article also describe the cause and influence of static shift, and has a summarize of how to correct the static shift efficiently, then emphasizes on the theories of the popular impedance tensor decomposition methods as Phase-sensitivity method, Groom and Bailey method, General tensor-analyzed method and Mohr circle-analyzed method. The kernal step of magnetotelluric data-processing is inversion, which is also an important content of the article. Firstly, the article introduces the basic theories of both the popular one-dimensional inversion methods as Automod, Occam, Rhoplus, Bostick and Ipi2win and the two-dimensional inversion methods as Occam, Rebocc, Abie and Nlcg. Then, the article is focused on parallel-analysis of the applying advantage of each inversion method with practical models, and obtains meaningful conclusion. Visual program design of magnetotelluric data-processing is another kernal part of the article. The bypast visual program design of magnetotelluric data-processing is not satisfied and systemic, for example, the data-processing method is single, the data-management is not systemic, the data format is not uniform. The article bases the visual program design of magnetotelluric data-processing upon practicability, structurality, variety and extensibility, and adopts database technology and mixed language program design method; finally, a magnetotelluric data management and processing system that integrates database saving and fetching system, data-processing system and graphical displaying system. Finally, the article comes onto the magnetotelluric application.takeing the Tulargen Cu-Ni mining area in Xingjiang as the practical example, using the data-processing methods introduced before, the article has a detailed introduction of magnetotelluric data interpretation procedure.

Symbolic Integration

SIN and SOLDIER are heuristic programs in LISP which solve symbolic integration problems. SIN (Symbolic INtegrator) solves indefinite integration problems at the difficulty approaching those in the larger integral tables. SIN contains several more methods than are used in the previous symbolic integration program SAINT, and solves most of the problems attempted by SAINT in less than one second. SOLDIER (SOLution of Ordinary Differential Equations Routine) solves first order, first degree ordinary differential equations at the level of a good college sophomore and at an average of about five seconds per problem attempted. The differences in philosophy and operation between SAINT and SIN are described, and suggestions for extending the work presented are made.

An integrated firewall policy validation tool.

Security policies are increasingly being implemented by organisations. Policies are mapped to device configurations to enforce the policies. This is typically performed manually by network administrators. The development and management of these enforcement policies is a difficult and error prone task. This thesis describes the development and evaluation of an off-line firewall policy parser and validation tool. This provides the system administrator with a textual interface and the vendor specific low level languages they trust and are familiar with, but the support of an off-line compiler tool. The tool was created using the Microsoft C#.NET language, and the Microsoft Visual Studio Integrated Development Environment (IDE). This provided an object environment to create a flexible and extensible system, as well as simple Web and Windows prototyping facilities to create GUI front-end applications for testing and evaluation. A CLI was provided with the tool, for more experienced users, but it was also designed to be easily integrated into GUI based applications for non-expert users. The evaluation of the system was performed from a custom built GUI application, which can create test firewall rule sets containing synthetic rules, to supply a variety of experimental conditions, as well as record various performance metrics. The validation tool was created, based around a pragmatic outlook, with regard to the needs of the network administrator. The modularity of the design was important, due to the fast changing nature of the network device languages being processed. An object oriented approach was taken, for maximum changeability and extensibility, and a flexible tool was developed, due to the possible needs of different types users. System administrators desire, low level, CLI-based tools that they can trust, and use easily from scripting languages. Inexperienced users may prefer a more abstract, high level, GUI or Wizard that has an easier to learn process. Built around these ideas, the tool was implemented, and proved to be a usable, and complimentary addition to the many network policy-based systems currently available. The tool has a flexible design and contains comprehensive functionality. As opposed to some of the other tools which perform across multiple vendor languages, but do not implement a deep range of options for any of the languages. It compliments existing systems, such as policy compliance tools, and abstract policy analysis systems. Its validation algorithms were evaluated for both completeness, and performance. The tool was found to correctly process large firewall policies in just a few seconds. A framework for a policy-based management system, with which the tool would integrate, is also proposed. This is based around a vendor independent XML-based repository of device configurations, which could be used to bring together existing policy management and analysis systems.

A Guide to Distributed Digital Preservation

This volume is devoted to the broad topic of distributed digital preservation, a still-emerging field of practice for the cultural memory arena. Replication and distribution hold out the promise of indefinite preservation of materials without degradation, but establishing effective organizational and technical processes to enable this form of digital preservation is daunting. Institutions need practical examples of how this task can be accomplished in manageable, low-cost ways."--P. [4] of cover

BRITE: Universal Topology Generation from a User's Perspective

Effective engineering of the Internet is predicated upon a detailed understanding of issues such as the large-scale structure of its underlying physical topology, the manner in which it evolves over time, and the way in which its constituent components contribute to its overall function. Unfortunately, developing a deep understanding of these issues has proven to be a challenging task, since it in turn involves solving difficult problems such as mapping the actual topology, characterizing it, and developing models that capture its emergent behavior. Consequently, even though there are a number of topology models, it is an open question as to how representative the topologies they generate are of the actual Internet. Our goal is to produce a topology generation framework which improves the state of the art and is based on design principles which include representativeness, inclusiveness, and interoperability. Representativeness leads to synthetic topologies that accurately reflect many aspects of the actual Internet topology (e.g. hierarchical structure, degree distribution, etc.). Inclusiveness combines the strengths of as many generation models as possible in a single generation tool. Interoperability provides interfaces to widely-used simulation and visualization applications such as ns and SSF. We call such a tool a universal topology generator. In this paper we discuss the design, implementation and usage of the BRITE universal topology generation tool that we have built. We also describe the BRITE Analysis Engine, BRIANA, which is an independent piece of software designed and built upon BRITE design goals of flexibility and extensibility. The purpose of BRIANA is to act as a repository of analysis routines along with a user–friendly interface that allows its use on different topology formats.

Effects Of Low Metal Levels On A Clonal Hydroid

We frequently require sensitive bioassay techniques with which to study the effects of marine contaminants at environmentally realistic concentrations. Unfortunately, it is difficult to achieve sensitivity and precision in an organism amenable to indefinite periods of laboratory culture. Results from different laboratories are often extremely variable: LC50 values for the same substance, using the same organism, may differ by two or even three orders of magnitude (Wilson, Cowell & Beynon, 1975). Moreover, some of the most sensitive bioassay organisms require nutrient media, which may alter the availability and toxicity of metals by complexing them (Jones, 1964; Kamp-Nielsen, 1971; Hannan & Patouillet, 1972) and often contain metal impurities at significant levels (Albert, 1968; Steeman Nielsen & Wium Anderson, 1970). The object of the work reported here has been to develop a technique by which these problems might be minimized or avoided. Hydroids were chosen as bioassay organisms for a variety of reasons. They are tolerant but sensitive to small variations in their chemical environment. Techniques for growing hydroids are simple and they can be cultured under conditions of near optimal temperature, salinity and food supply, thus minimizing the errors frequent in bioassay work arising from variations in the history of the test organisms, their size, sex or physiological state. An important source of variability in all work with organisms is that inherent in the genetic material, but with hydroids this can be avoided by the use of a single clone.

Uniaxial metallo-dielectric metamaterials with scalar positive permeability

The dispersion relation for plane waves in uniaxial metamaterials with indefinite dielectric tensors and scalar positive permeability is theoretically investigated. It is found, that the isofrequency surfaces of the plane extraordinary waves have a hyperbolic shape which allows the propagation of waves with infinitely long wave vectors. As an example a metallodielectric multilayer was considered and the dispersion relations were determined using an effective medium approximation and an analytically exact Bloch wave calculation. The extraordinary waves in this structure are identified as multilayer plasmons and the validity of the effective medium approximation is examined.

Flexible Natural Language Generation in Multiple Contexts

We present a practical approach to Natural Language Generation (NLG) for spoken dialogue systems. The approach is based on small template fragments (mini-templates). The system’s object architecture facilitates generation of phrases across pre-defined business domains and registers, as well as into different languages. The architecture simplifies NLG in well-understood application contexts, while providing the flexibility for a developer and for the system, to vary linguistic output according to dialogue context, including any intended affective impact. Mini-templates are used with a suite of domain term objects, resulting in an NLG system (MINTGEN – MINi-Template GENerator) whose extensibility and ease of maintenance is enhanced by the sparsity of information devoted to individual domains. The system also avoids the need for specialist linguistic competence on the part of the system maintainer.