Economic Cost of Air Pollution in Cubatao - SP Based on Health Expenses Related to Diseases of the Respiratory and Circulatory Systems

The aim of this research was to evaluate economic costs of respiratory and circulatory diseases in the municipality of Cubatao, in the state of Sao Paulo, Brazil. Data on hospital admissions and on missed working days due to hospitalization (for age group 14 to 70 years old) from the database of Sistema Unico de Sa de (SUS - Brazilian National Health System) were used. Results: Based on these data, it was calculated that R$ 22.1 million were spent in the period 2000 to 2009 due to diseases of the respiratory and circulatory systems. Part of these expenses can be directly related to the emission of atmospheric pollutants in the city. In order to estimate the costs related to air pollution, data on Cubatao were compared to data from two other municipalities that are also located at the coast side (Guaruja and Peru be), but which have little industrial activity in comparison to Cubatao. It was verified that, in both, average per capita costs were lower when compared to Cubatao, but that this difference has been decreasing in recent years.

Rural governance and livelihoods systems diversification in the Western Balkans: comparative case studies of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and Serbia

Agriculture is still important for socio-economic development in rural areas of Bosnia, Montenegro and Serbia (BMS). However, for sustainable rural development rural economies should be diversified so attention should be paid also to off-farm and non-farm income-generating activities. Agricultural and rural development (ARD) processes and farm activity diversification initiatives should be well governed. The ultimate objective of this work is to explore linkages between ARD governance and rural livelihoods diversification in BMS. The thesis is based on an extended secondary data analysis and surveys. Questionnaires for ARD governance and coordination were sent via email to public, civil society and international organizations. Concerning rural livelihood diversification, the field questionnaire surveys were carried out in three rural regions of BMS. Results show that local rural livelihoods are increasingly diversified but a significant share of households are still engaged in agriculture. Diversification strategies have a chance to succeed taking into consideration the three rural regions’ assets. However, rural households have to tackle many problems for developing new income-generating activities such as the lack of financial resources. Weak business skills are also a limiting factor. Fully exploiting rural economy diversification potential in BMS requires many interventions including improving rural governance, enhancing service delivery in rural areas, upgrading rural people’s human capital, strengthening rural social capital and improving physical capital, access of the rural population to finance as well as creating a favourable and enabling legal and legislative environment fostering diversification. Governance and coordination of ARD policy design, implementation and evaluation is still challenging in the three Balkan countries and this has repercussions also on the pace of rural livelihoods diversification. Therefore, there is a strong and urgent need for mobilization of all rural stakeholders and actors through appropriate governance arrangements in order to foster rural livelihoods diversification and quality of life improvement.

Novel investigation methods in Computational Social Dynamics and Complex Systems

In this thesis the evolution of the techno-social systems analysis methods will be reported, through the explanation of the various research experience directly faced. The first case presented is a research based on data mining of a dataset of words association named Human Brain Cloud: validation will be faced and, also through a non-trivial modeling, a better understanding of language properties will be presented. Then, a real complex system experiment will be introduced: the WideNoise experiment in the context of the EveryAware european project. The project and the experiment course will be illustrated and data analysis will be displayed. Then the Experimental Tribe platform for social computation will be introduced . It has been conceived to help researchers in the implementation of web experiments, and aims also to catalyze the cumulative growth of experimental methodologies and the standardization of tools cited above. In the last part, three other research experience which already took place on the Experimental Tribe platform will be discussed in detail, from the design of the experiment to the analysis of the results and, eventually, to the modeling of the systems involved. The experiments are: CityRace, about the measurement of human traffic-facing strategies; laPENSOcosì, aiming to unveil the political opinion structure; AirProbe, implemented again in the EveryAware project framework, which consisted in monitoring air quality opinion shift of a community informed about local air pollution. At the end, the evolution of the technosocial systems investigation methods shall emerge together with the opportunities and the threats offered by this new scientific path.

Generalizability and Applicability of Model-Based Business Process Compliance-Checking Approaches – A State-of-the-Art Analysis and Research Roadmap

With a steady increase of regulatory requirements for business processes, automation support of compliance management is a field garnering increasing attention in Information Systems research. Several approaches have been developed to support compliance checking of process models. One major challenge for such approaches is their ability to handle different modeling techniques and compliance rules in order to enable widespread adoption and application. Applying a structured literature search strategy, we reflect and discuss compliance-checking approaches in order to provide an insight into their generalizability and evaluation. The results imply that current approaches mainly focus on special modeling techniques and/or a restricted set of types of compliance rules. Most approaches abstain from real-world evaluation which raises the question of their practical applicability. Referring to the search results, we propose a roadmap for further research in model-based business process compliance checking.

Exact Solutions to the Symmetric and Asymmetric Vehicle Routing Problem with Simultaneous Delivery and Pick-Up

In reverse logistics networks, products (e.g., bottles or containers) have to be transported from a depot to customer locations and, after use, from customer locations back to the depot. In order to operate economically beneficial, companies prefer a simultaneous delivery and pick-up service. The resulting Vehicle Routing Problem with Simultaneous Delivery and Pick-up (VRPSDP) is an operational problem, which has to be solved daily by many companies. We present two mixed-integer linear model formulations for the VRPSDP, namely a vehicle-flow and a commodity-flow model. In order to strengthen the models, domain-reducing preprocessing techniques, and effective cutting planes are outlined. Symmetric benchmark instances known from the literature as well as new asymmetric instances derived from real-world problems are solved to optimality using CPLEX 12.1.

The surface temperatures of Earth: steps towards integrated understanding of variability and change

Surface temperature is a key aspect of weather and climate, but the term may refer to different quantities that play interconnected roles and are observed by different means. In a community-based activity in June 2012, the EarthTemp Network brought together 55 researchers from five continents to improve the interaction between scientific communities who focus on surface temperature in particular domains, to exploit the strengths of different observing systems and to better meet the needs of different communities. The workshop identified key needs for progress towards meeting scientific and societal requirements for surface temperature understanding and information, which are presented in this community paper. A "whole-Earth" perspective is required with more integrated, collaborative approaches to observing and understanding Earth's various surface temperatures. It is necessary to build understanding of the relationships between different surface temperatures, where presently inadequate, and undertake large-scale systematic intercomparisons. Datasets need to be easier to obtain and exploit for a wide constituency of users, with the differences and complementarities communicated in readily understood terms, and realistic and consistent uncertainty information provided. Steps were also recommended to curate and make available data that are presently inaccessible, develop new observing systems and build capacities to accelerate progress in the accuracy and usability of surface temperature datasets.

Search for satellites near comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko using Rosetta/OSIRIS images

Context. The European Space Agency Rosetta mission reached and started escorting its main target, the Jupiter-family comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, at the beginning of August 2014. Within the context of solar system small bodies, satellite searches from approaching spacecraft were extensively used in the past to study the nature of the visited bodies and their collisional environment. Aims. During the approaching phase to the comet in July 2014, the OSIRIS instrument onboard Rosetta performed a campaign aimed at detecting objects in the vicinity of the comet nucleus and at measuring these objects' possible bound orbits. In addition to the scientific purpose, the search also focused on spacecraft security to avoid hazardous material in the comet's environment. Methods. Images in the red spectral domain were acquired with the OSIRIS Narrow Angle Camera, when the spacecraft was at a distance between 5785 km and 5463 km to the comet, following an observational strategy tailored to maximize the scientific outcome. From the acquired images, sources were extracted and displayed to search for plausible displacements of all sources from image to image. After stars were identified, the remaining sources were thoroughly analyzed. To place constraints on the expected displacements of a potential satellite, we performed Monte Carlo simulations on the apparent motion of potential satellites within the Hill sphere. Results. We found no unambiguous detections of objects larger than similar to 6 m within similar to 20 km and larger than similar to 1 m between similar to 20 km and similar to 110 km from the nucleus, using images with an exposure time of 0.14 s and 1.36 s, respectively. Our conclusions are consistent with independent works on dust grains in the comet coma and on boulders counting on the nucleus surface. Moreover, our analysis shows that the comet outburst detected at the end of April 2014 was not strong enough to eject large objects and to place them into a stable orbit around the nucleus. Our findings underline that it is highly unlikely that large objects survive for a long time around cometary nuclei.

Energy payback time of grid connected pv systems: comparison between tracking and fixed systems

A review of existing studies about LCA of PV systems has been carried out. The data from this review have been completed with our own figures in order to calculate the Energy Payback Time of double and horizontal axis tracking and fixed systems. The results of this metric span from 2 to 5 years for the latitude and global irradiation ranges of the geographical area comprised between −10◦ to 10◦ of longitude, and 30◦ to 45◦ of latitude. With the caution due to the uncertainty of the sources of information, these results mean that a GCPVS is able to produce back the energy required for its existence from 6 to 15 times during a life cycle of 30 years. When comparing tracking and fixed systems, the great importance of the PV generator makes advisable to dedicate more energy to some components of the system in order to increase the productivity and to obtain a higher performance of the component with the highest energy requirement. Both double axis and horizontal axis trackers follow this way, requiring more energy in metallic structure, foundations and wiring, but this higher contribution is widely compensated by the improved productivity of the system.

solaR: Solar Radiation and Photovoltaic Systems with R

The solaR package allows for reproducible research both for photovoltaics (PV) systems performance and solar radiation. It includes a set of classes, methods and functions to calculate the sun geometry and the solar radiation incident on a photovoltaic generator and to simulate the performance of several applications of the photovoltaic energy. This package performs the whole calculation procedure from both daily and intradaily global horizontal irradiation to the final productivity of grid-connected PV systems and water pumping PV systems. It is designed using a set of S4 classes whose core is a group of slots with multivariate time series. The classes share a variety of methods to access the information and several visualization methods. In addition, the package provides a tool for the visual statistical analysis of the performance of a large PV plant composed of several systems. Although solaR is primarily designed for time series associated to a location defined by its latitude/longitude values and the temperature and irradiation conditions, it can be easily combined with spatial packages for space-time analysis.

Evaluating alternative industrial network organizations and information systems

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present a simulation‐based evaluation method for the comparison of different organizational forms and software support levels in the field of supply chain management (SCM). Design/methodology/approach – Apart from widely known logistic performance indicators, the discrete event simulation model considers explicitly coordination cost as stemming from iterative administration procedures. Findings - The method is applied to an exemplary supply chain configuration considering various parameter settings. Curiously, additional coordination cost does not always result in improved logistic performance. Influence factor variations lead to different organizational recommendations. The results confirm the high importance of (up to now) disregarded dimensions when evaluating SCM concepts and IT tools. Research limitations/implications – The model is based on simplified product and network structures. Future research shall include more complex, real world configurations. Practical implications – The developed method is designed for the identification of improvement potential when SCM software is employed. Coordination schemes based only on ERP systems are valid alternatives in industrial practice because significant investment IT can be avoided. Therefore, the evaluation of these coordination procedures, in particular the cost due to iterations, is of high managerial interest and the method provides a comprehensive tool for strategic IT decision making. Originality/value – Reviewed literature is mostly focused on the benefits of SCM software implementations. However, ERP system based supply chain coordination is still widespread industrial practice but associated coordination cost has not been addressed by researchers.

Lagrangian descriptors: a method for revealing phase space structures of general time dependent dynamical systems

Lagrangian descriptors are a recent technique which reveals geometrical structures in phase space and which are valid for aperiodically time dependent dynamical systems. We discuss a general methodology for constructing them and we discuss a "heuristic argument" that explains why this method is successful. We support this argument by explicit calculations on a benchmark problem. Several other benchmark examples are considered that allow us to assess the performance of Lagrangian descriptors with both finite time Lyapunov exponents (FTLEs) and finite time averages of certain components of the vector field ("time averages"). In all cases Lagrangian descriptors are shown to be both more accurate and computationally efficient than these methods.

Trust-ware: A Methodology to Analyze, Design, and Secure Trust and Reputation Systems

Entendemos por inteligencia colectiva una forma de inteligencia que surge de la colaboración y la participación de varios individuos o, siendo más estrictos, varias entidades. En base a esta sencilla definición podemos observar que este concepto es campo de estudio de las más diversas disciplinas como pueden ser la sociología, las tecnologías de la información o la biología, atendiendo cada una de ellas a un tipo de entidades diferentes: seres humanos, elementos de computación o animales. Como elemento común podríamos indicar que la inteligencia colectiva ha tenido como objetivo el ser capaz de fomentar una inteligencia de grupo que supere a la inteligencia individual de las entidades que lo forman a través de mecanismos de coordinación, cooperación, competencia, integración, diferenciación, etc. Sin embargo, aunque históricamente la inteligencia colectiva se ha podido desarrollar de forma paralela e independiente en las distintas disciplinas que la tratan, en la actualidad, los avances en las tecnologías de la información han provocado que esto ya no sea suficiente. Hoy en día seres humanos y máquinas a través de todo tipo de redes de comunicación e interfaces, conviven en un entorno en el que la inteligencia colectiva ha cobrado una nueva dimensión: ya no sólo puede intentar obtener un comportamiento superior al de sus entidades constituyentes sino que ahora, además, estas inteligencias individuales son completamente diferentes unas de otras y aparece por lo tanto el doble reto de ser capaces de gestionar esta gran heterogeneidad y al mismo tiempo ser capaces de obtener comportamientos aún más inteligentes gracias a las sinergias que los distintos tipos de inteligencias pueden generar. Dentro de las áreas de trabajo de la inteligencia colectiva existen varios campos abiertos en los que siempre se intenta obtener unas prestaciones superiores a las de los individuos. Por ejemplo: consciencia colectiva, memoria colectiva o sabiduría colectiva. Entre todos estos campos nosotros nos centraremos en uno que tiene presencia en la práctica totalidad de posibles comportamientos inteligentes: la toma de decisiones. El campo de estudio de la toma de decisiones es realmente amplio y dentro del mismo la evolución ha sido completamente paralela a la que citábamos anteriormente en referencia a la inteligencia colectiva. En primer lugar se centró en el individuo como entidad decisoria para posteriormente desarrollarse desde un punto de vista social, institucional, etc. La primera fase dentro del estudio de la toma de decisiones se basó en la utilización de paradigmas muy sencillos: análisis de ventajas e inconvenientes, priorización basada en la maximización de algún parámetro del resultado, capacidad para satisfacer los requisitos de forma mínima por parte de las alternativas, consultas a expertos o entidades autorizadas o incluso el azar. Sin embargo, al igual que el paso del estudio del individuo al grupo supone una nueva dimensión dentro la inteligencia colectiva la toma de decisiones colectiva supone un nuevo reto en todas las disciplinas relacionadas. Además, dentro de la decisión colectiva aparecen dos nuevos frentes: los sistemas de decisión centralizados y descentralizados. En el presente proyecto de tesis nos centraremos en este segundo, que es el que supone una mayor atractivo tanto por las posibilidades de generar nuevo conocimiento y trabajar con problemas abiertos actualmente así como en lo que respecta a la aplicabilidad de los resultados que puedan obtenerse. Ya por último, dentro del campo de los sistemas de decisión descentralizados existen varios mecanismos fundamentales que dan lugar a distintas aproximaciones a la problemática propia de este campo. Por ejemplo el liderazgo, la imitación, la prescripción o el miedo. Nosotros nos centraremos en uno de los más multidisciplinares y con mayor capacidad de aplicación en todo tipo de disciplinas y que, históricamente, ha demostrado que puede dar lugar a prestaciones muy superiores a otros tipos de mecanismos de decisión descentralizados: la confianza y la reputación. Resumidamente podríamos indicar que confianza es la creencia por parte de una entidad que otra va a realizar una determinada actividad de una forma concreta. En principio es algo subjetivo, ya que la confianza de dos entidades diferentes sobre una tercera no tiene porqué ser la misma. Por otro lado, la reputación es la idea colectiva (o evaluación social) que distintas entidades de un sistema tiene sobre otra entidad del mismo en lo que respecta a un determinado criterio. Es por tanto una información de carácter colectivo pero única dentro de un sistema, no asociada a cada una de las entidades del sistema sino por igual a todas ellas. En estas dos sencillas definiciones se basan la inmensa mayoría de sistemas colectivos. De hecho muchas disertaciones indican que ningún tipo de organización podría ser viable de no ser por la existencia y la utilización de los conceptos de confianza y reputación. A partir de ahora, a todo sistema que utilice de una u otra forma estos conceptos lo denominaremos como sistema de confianza y reputación (o TRS, Trust and Reputation System). Sin embargo, aunque los TRS son uno de los aspectos de nuestras vidas más cotidianos y con un mayor campo de aplicación, el conocimiento que existe actualmente sobre ellos no podría ser más disperso. Existen un gran número de trabajos científicos en todo tipo de áreas de conocimiento: filosofía, psicología, sociología, economía, política, tecnologías de la información, etc. Pero el principal problema es que no existe una visión completa de la confianza y reputación en su sentido más amplio. Cada disciplina focaliza sus estudios en unos aspectos u otros dentro de los TRS, pero ninguna de ellas trata de explotar el conocimiento generado en el resto para mejorar sus prestaciones en su campo de aplicación concreto. Aspectos muy detallados en algunas áreas de conocimiento son completamente obviados por otras, o incluso aspectos tratados por distintas disciplinas, al ser estudiados desde distintos puntos de vista arrojan resultados complementarios que, sin embargo, no son aprovechados fuera de dichas áreas de conocimiento. Esto nos lleva a una dispersión de conocimiento muy elevada y a una falta de reutilización de metodologías, políticas de actuación y técnicas de una disciplina a otra. Debido su vital importancia, esta alta dispersión de conocimiento se trata de uno de los principales problemas que se pretenden resolver con el presente trabajo de tesis. Por otro lado, cuando se trabaja con TRS, todos los aspectos relacionados con la seguridad están muy presentes ya que muy este es un tema vital dentro del campo de la toma de decisiones. Además también es habitual que los TRS se utilicen para desempeñar responsabilidades que aportan algún tipo de funcionalidad relacionada con el mundo de la seguridad. Por último no podemos olvidar que el acto de confiar está indefectiblemente unido al de delegar una determinada responsabilidad, y que al tratar estos conceptos siempre aparece la idea de riesgo, riesgo de que las expectativas generadas por el acto de la delegación no se cumplan o se cumplan de forma diferente. Podemos ver por lo tanto que cualquier sistema que utiliza la confianza para mejorar o posibilitar su funcionamiento, por su propia naturaleza, es especialmente vulnerable si las premisas en las que se basa son atacadas. En este sentido podemos comprobar (tal y como analizaremos en más detalle a lo largo del presente documento) que las aproximaciones que realizan las distintas disciplinas que tratan la violación de los sistemas de confianza es de lo más variado. únicamente dentro del área de las tecnologías de la información se ha intentado utilizar alguno de los enfoques de otras disciplinas de cara a afrontar problemas relacionados con la seguridad de TRS. Sin embargo se trata de una aproximación incompleta y, normalmente, realizada para cumplir requisitos de aplicaciones concretas y no con la idea de afianzar una base de conocimiento más general y reutilizable en otros entornos. Con todo esto en cuenta, podemos resumir contribuciones del presente trabajo de tesis en las siguientes. • La realización de un completo análisis del estado del arte dentro del mundo de la confianza y la reputación que nos permite comparar las ventajas e inconvenientes de las diferentes aproximación que se realizan a estos conceptos en distintas áreas de conocimiento. • La definición de una arquitectura de referencia para TRS que contempla todas las entidades y procesos que intervienen en este tipo de sistemas. • La definición de un marco de referencia para analizar la seguridad de TRS. Esto implica tanto identificar los principales activos de un TRS en lo que respecta a la seguridad, así como el crear una tipología de posibles ataques y contramedidas en base a dichos activos. • La propuesta de una metodología para el análisis, el diseño, el aseguramiento y el despliegue de un TRS en entornos reales. Adicionalmente se exponen los principales tipos de aplicaciones que pueden obtenerse de los TRS y los medios para maximizar sus prestaciones en cada una de ellas. • La generación de un software que permite simular cualquier tipo de TRS en base a la arquitectura propuesta previamente. Esto permite evaluar las prestaciones de un TRS bajo una determinada configuración en un entorno controlado previamente a su despliegue en un entorno real. Igualmente es de gran utilidad para evaluar la resistencia a distintos tipos de ataques o mal-funcionamientos del sistema. Además de las contribuciones realizadas directamente en el campo de los TRS, hemos realizado aportaciones originales a distintas áreas de conocimiento gracias a la aplicación de las metodologías de análisis y diseño citadas con anterioridad. • Detección de anomalías térmicas en Data Centers. Hemos implementado con éxito un sistema de deteción de anomalías térmicas basado en un TRS. Comparamos la detección de prestaciones de algoritmos de tipo Self-Organized Maps (SOM) y Growing Neural Gas (GNG). Mostramos como SOM ofrece mejores resultados para anomalías en los sistemas de refrigeración de la sala mientras que GNG es una opción más adecuada debido a sus tasas de detección y aislamiento para casos de anomalías provocadas por una carga de trabajo excesiva. • Mejora de las prestaciones de recolección de un sistema basado en swarm computing y odometría social. Gracias a la implementación de un TRS conseguimos mejorar las capacidades de coordinación de una red de robots autónomos distribuidos. La principal contribución reside en el análisis y la validación de las mejoras increméntales que pueden conseguirse con la utilización apropiada de la información existente en el sistema y que puede ser relevante desde el punto de vista de un TRS, y con la implementación de algoritmos de cálculo de confianza basados en dicha información. • Mejora de la seguridad de Wireless Mesh Networks contra ataques contra la integridad, la confidencialidad o la disponibilidad de los datos y / o comunicaciones soportadas por dichas redes. • Mejora de la seguridad de Wireless Sensor Networks contra ataques avanzamos, como insider attacks, ataques desconocidos, etc. Gracias a las metodologías presentadas implementamos contramedidas contra este tipo de ataques en entornos complejos. En base a los experimentos realizados, hemos demostrado que nuestra aproximación es capaz de detectar y confinar varios tipos de ataques que afectan a los protocoles esenciales de la red. La propuesta ofrece unas velocidades de detección muy altas así como demuestra que la inclusión de estos mecanismos de actuación temprana incrementa significativamente el esfuerzo que un atacante tiene que introducir para comprometer la red. Finalmente podríamos concluir que el presente trabajo de tesis supone la generación de un conocimiento útil y aplicable a entornos reales, que nos permite la maximización de las prestaciones resultantes de la utilización de TRS en cualquier tipo de campo de aplicación. De esta forma cubrimos la principal carencia existente actualmente en este campo, que es la falta de una base de conocimiento común y agregada y la inexistencia de una metodología para el desarrollo de TRS que nos permita analizar, diseñar, asegurar y desplegar TRS de una forma sistemática y no artesanal y ad-hoc como se hace en la actualidad. ABSTRACT By collective intelligence we understand a form of intelligence that emerges from the collaboration and competition of many individuals, or strictly speaking, many entities. Based on this simple definition, we can see how this concept is the field of study of a wide range of disciplines, such as sociology, information science or biology, each of them focused in different kinds of entities: human beings, computational resources, or animals. As a common factor, we can point that collective intelligence has always had the goal of being able of promoting a group intelligence that overcomes the individual intelligence of the basic entities that constitute it. This can be accomplished through different mechanisms such as coordination, cooperation, competence, integration, differentiation, etc. Collective intelligence has historically been developed in a parallel and independent way among the different disciplines that deal with it. However, this is not enough anymore due to the advances in information technologies. Nowadays, human beings and machines coexist in environments where collective intelligence has taken a new dimension: we yet have to achieve a better collective behavior than the individual one, but now we also have to deal with completely different kinds of individual intelligences. Therefore, we have a double goal: being able to deal with this heterogeneity and being able to get even more intelligent behaviors thanks to the synergies that the different kinds of intelligence can generate. Within the areas of collective intelligence there are several open topics where they always try to get better performances from groups than from the individuals. For example: collective consciousness, collective memory, or collective wisdom. Among all these topics we will focus on collective decision making, that has influence in most of the collective intelligent behaviors. The field of study of decision making is really wide, and its evolution has been completely parallel to the aforementioned collective intelligence. Firstly, it was focused on the individual as the main decision-making entity, but later it became involved in studying social and institutional groups as basic decision-making entities. The first studies within the decision-making discipline were based on simple paradigms, such as pros and cons analysis, criteria prioritization, fulfillment, following orders, or even chance. However, in the same way that studying the community instead of the individual meant a paradigm shift within collective intelligence, collective decision-making means a new challenge for all the related disciplines. Besides, two new main topics come up when dealing with collective decision-making: centralized and decentralized decision-making systems. In this thesis project we focus in the second one, because it is the most interesting based on the opportunities to generate new knowledge and deal with open issues in this area, as well as these results can be put into practice in a wider set of real-life environments. Finally, within the decentralized collective decision-making systems discipline, there are several basic mechanisms that lead to different approaches to the specific problems of this field, for example: leadership, imitation, prescription, or fear. We will focus on trust and reputation. They are one of the most multidisciplinary concepts and with more potential for applying them in every kind of environments. Besides, they have historically shown that they can generate better performance than other decentralized decision-making mechanisms. Shortly, we say trust is the belief of one entity that the outcome of other entities’ actions is going to be in a specific way. It is a subjective concept because the trust of two different entities in another one does not have to be the same. Reputation is the collective idea (or social evaluation) that a group of entities within a system have about another entity based on a specific criterion. Thus, it is a collective concept in its origin. It is important to say that the behavior of most of the collective systems are based on these two simple definitions. In fact, a lot of articles and essays describe how any organization would not be viable if the ideas of trust and reputation did not exist. From now on, we call Trust an Reputation System (TRS) to any kind of system that uses these concepts. Even though TRSs are one of the most common everyday aspects in our lives, the existing knowledge about them could not be more dispersed. There are thousands of scientific works in every field of study related to trust and reputation: philosophy, psychology, sociology, economics, politics, information sciences, etc. But the main issue is that a comprehensive vision of trust and reputation for all these disciplines does not exist. Every discipline focuses its studies on a specific set of topics but none of them tries to take advantage of the knowledge generated in the other disciplines to improve its behavior or performance. Detailed topics in some fields are completely obviated in others, and even though the study of some topics within several disciplines produces complementary results, these results are not used outside the discipline where they were generated. This leads us to a very high knowledge dispersion and to a lack in the reuse of methodologies, policies and techniques among disciplines. Due to its great importance, this high dispersion of trust and reputation knowledge is one of the main problems this thesis contributes to solve. When we work with TRSs, all the aspects related to security are a constant since it is a vital aspect within the decision-making systems. Besides, TRS are often used to perform some responsibilities related to security. Finally, we cannot forget that the act of trusting is invariably attached to the act of delegating a specific responsibility and, when we deal with these concepts, the idea of risk is always present. This refers to the risk of generated expectations not being accomplished or being accomplished in a different way we anticipated. Thus, we can see that any system using trust to improve or enable its behavior, because of its own nature, is especially vulnerable if the premises it is based on are attacked. Related to this topic, we can see that the approaches of the different disciplines that study attacks of trust and reputation are very diverse. Some attempts of using approaches of other disciplines have been made within the information science area of knowledge, but these approaches are usually incomplete, not systematic and oriented to achieve specific requirements of specific applications. They never try to consolidate a common base of knowledge that could be reusable in other context. Based on all these ideas, this work makes the following direct contributions to the field of TRS: • The compilation of the most relevant existing knowledge related to trust and reputation management systems focusing on their advantages and disadvantages. • We define a generic architecture for TRS, identifying the main entities and processes involved. • We define a generic security framework for TRS. We identify the main security assets and propose a complete taxonomy of attacks for TRS. • We propose and validate a methodology to analyze, design, secure and deploy TRS in real-life environments. Additionally we identify the principal kind of applications we can implement with TRS and how TRS can provide a specific functionality. • We develop a software component to validate and optimize the behavior of a TRS in order to achieve a specific functionality or performance. In addition to the contributions made directly to the field of the TRS, we have made original contributions to different areas of knowledge thanks to the application of the analysis, design and security methodologies previously presented: • Detection of thermal anomalies in Data Centers. Thanks to the application of the TRS analysis and design methodologies, we successfully implemented a thermal anomaly detection system based on a TRS.We compare the detection performance of Self-Organized- Maps and Growing Neural Gas algorithms. We show how SOM provides better results for Computer Room Air Conditioning anomaly detection, yielding detection rates of 100%, in training data with malfunctioning sensors. We also show that GNG yields better detection and isolation rates for workload anomaly detection, reducing the false positive rate when compared to SOM. • Improving the performance of a harvesting system based on swarm computing and social odometry. Through the implementation of a TRS, we achieved to improve the ability of coordinating a distributed network of autonomous robots. The main contribution lies in the analysis and validation of the incremental improvements that can be achieved with proper use information that exist in the system and that are relevant for the TRS, and the implementation of the appropriated trust algorithms based on such information. • Improving Wireless Mesh Networks security against attacks against the integrity, confidentiality or availability of data and communications supported by these networks. Thanks to the implementation of a TRS we improved the detection time rate against these kind of attacks and we limited their potential impact over the system. • We improved the security of Wireless Sensor Networks against advanced attacks, such as insider attacks, unknown attacks, etc. Thanks to the TRS analysis and design methodologies previously described, we implemented countermeasures against such attacks in a complex environment. In our experiments we have demonstrated that our system is capable of detecting and confining various attacks that affect the core network protocols. We have also demonstrated that our approach is capable of rapid attack detection. Also, it has been proven that the inclusion of the proposed detection mechanisms significantly increases the effort the attacker has to introduce in order to compromise the network. Finally we can conclude that, to all intents and purposes, this thesis offers a useful and applicable knowledge in real-life environments that allows us to maximize the performance of any system based on a TRS. Thus, we deal with the main deficiency of this discipline: the lack of a common and complete base of knowledge and the lack of a methodology for the development of TRS that allow us to analyze, design, secure and deploy TRS in a systematic way.

Selenoprotein oxidoreductase with specificity for thioredoxin and glutathione systems

Thioredoxin (Trx) and glutathione (GSH) systems are considered to be two major redox systems in animal cells. They are reduced by NADPH via Trx reductase (TR) or oxidized GSH (GSSG) reductase and further supply electrons for deoxyribonucleotide synthesis, antioxidant defense, and redox regulation of signal transduction, transcription, cell growth, and apoptosis. We cloned and characterized a pyridine nucleotide disulfide oxidoreductase, Trx and GSSG reductase (TGR), that exhibits specificity for both redox systems. This enzyme contains a selenocysteine residue encoded by the TGA codon. TGR can reduce Trx, GSSG, and a GSH-linked disulfide in in vitro assays. This unusual substrate specificity is achieved by an evolutionary conserved fusion of the TR and glutaredoxin domains. These observations, together with the biochemical probing and molecular modeling of the TGR structure, suggest a mechanism whereby the C-terminal selenotetrapeptide serves a role of a protein-linked GSSG and shuttles electrons from the disulfide center within the TR domain to either the glutaredoxin domain or Trx.

An Empirical Comparison of Reuse in Embedded and Nonembedded Systems

High-quality software, delivered on time and budget, constitutes a critical part of most products and services in modern society. Our government has invested billions of dollars to develop software assets, often to redevelop the same capability many times. Recognizing the waste involved in redeveloping these assets, in 1992 the Department of Defense issued the Software Reuse Initiative. The vision of the Software Reuse Initiative was "To drive the DoD software community from its current "re-invent the software" cycle to a process-driven, domain-specific, architecture-centric, library-based way of constructing software.'' Twenty years after issuing this initiative, there is evidence of this vision beginning to be realized in nonembedded systems. However, virtually every large embedded system undertaken has incurred large cost and schedule overruns. Investigations into the root cause of these overruns implicates reuse. Why are we seeing improvements in the outcomes of these large scale nonembedded systems and worse outcomes in embedded systems? This question is the foundation for this research. The experiences of the Aerospace industry have led to a number of questions about reuse and how the industry is employing reuse in embedded systems. For example, does reuse in embedded systems yield the same outcomes as in nonembedded systems? Are the outcomes positive? If the outcomes are different, it may indicate that embedded systems should not use data from nonembedded systems for estimation. Are embedded systems using the same development approaches as nonembedded systems? Does the development approach make a difference? If embedded systems develop software differently from nonembedded systems, it may mean that the same processes do not apply to both types of systems. What about the reuse of different artifacts? Perhaps there are certain artifacts that, when reused, contribute more or are more difficult to use in embedded systems. Finally, what are the success factors and obstacles to reuse? Are they the same in embedded systems as in nonembedded systems? The research in this dissertation is comprised of a series of empirical studies using professionals in the aerospace and defense industry as its subjects. The main focus has been to investigate the reuse practices of embedded systems professionals and nonembedded systems professionals and compare the methods and artifacts used against the outcomes. The research has followed a combined qualitative and quantitative design approach. The qualitative data were collected by surveying software and systems engineers, interviewing senior developers, and reading numerous documents and other studies. Quantitative data were derived from converting survey and interview respondents' answers into coding that could be counted and measured. From the search of existing empirical literature, we learned that reuse in embedded systems are in fact significantly different from nonembedded systems, particularly in effort in model based development approach and quality where the development approach was not specified. The questionnaire showed differences in the development approach used in embedded projects from nonembedded projects, in particular, embedded systems were significantly more likely to use a heritage/legacy development approach. There was also a difference in the artifacts used, with embedded systems more likely to reuse hardware, test products, and test clusters. Nearly all the projects reported using code, but the questionnaire showed that the reuse of code brought mixed results. One of the differences expressed by the respondents to the questionnaire was the difficulty in reuse of code for embedded systems when the platform changed. The semistructured interviews were performed to tell us why the phenomena in the review of literature and the questionnaire were observed. We asked respected industry professionals, such as senior fellows, fellows and distinguished members of technical staff, about their experiences with reuse. We learned that many embedded systems used heritage/legacy development approaches because their systems had been around for many years, before models and modeling tools became available. We learned that reuse of code is beneficial primarily when the code does not require modification, but, especially in embedded systems, once it has to be changed, reuse of code yields few benefits. Finally, while platform independence is a goal for many in nonembedded systems, it is certainly not a goal for the embedded systems professionals and in many cases it is a detriment. However, both embedded and nonembedded systems professionals endorsed the idea of platform standardization. Finally, we conclude that while reuse in embedded systems and nonembedded systems is different today, they are converging. As heritage embedded systems are phased out, models become more robust and platforms are standardized, reuse in embedded systems will become more like nonembedded systems.

Advanced vehicle monitoring and communication systems for bus transit: benefits and economic feasibility. Final report.

Federal Transit Administration, Washington, D.C.