Biogeography-based combinatorial strategy for efficient autonomous underwater vehicle motion planning and task-time management

Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs) are capable of spending long periods of time for carrying out various underwater missions and marine tasks. In this paper, a novel conflict-free motion planning framework is introduced to enhance underwater vehicle’s mission performance by completing maximum number of highest priority tasks in a limited time through a large scale waypoint cluttered operating field, and ensuring safe deployment during the mission. The proposed combinatorial route-path planner model takes the advantages of the Biogeography-Based Optimization (BBO) algorithm toward satisfying objectives of both higher-lower level motion planners and guarantees maximization of the mission productivity for a single vehicle operation. The performance of the model is investigated under different scenarios including the particular cost constraints in time-varying operating fields. To show the reliability of the proposed model, performance of each motion planner assessed separately and then statistical analysis is undertaken to evaluate the total performance of the entire model. The simulation results indicate the stability of the contributed model and its feasible application for real experiments.     

Establishment of Community Managed Fisheries’ Closures in Kenya: Early Evolution of the Tengefu Movement

Community-based management (CBM) could be an essential tool to prevent the depletion of marine resources in the Western Indian Ocean region. In Kenya, political pressure to strengthen local governance, has led to adoption of CBM as a way of reducing over-exploitation and managing the competing uses and impacts on the marine environment. Several communities in Kenya have embraced CBM and have set aside or closed previously fished areas to enhance recovery of fisheries and biodiversity. These community fisheries closures (locally called tengefu), despite being degraded, may recover to finfish abundances and biodiversity levels similar to established MPAs or above thresholds for maintaining some ecological services. Communities see their direct involvement and control of these tengefu as more likely to result in benefits flowing directly to them. Community closures are also important for articulating and resolving community values and strengthening their management capacity. Here, we describe the evolution of the tengefu movement in Kenya and combine information from focus group discussions, interviews, underwater surveys and boundary marking to evaluate the current status, opportunities and challenges facing these tengefu. We show that in some cases community closures suffer from slow and incomplete national and local legislative processes, challenges to compliance, and weak management.     

Novel Electrically Stimulated Catalytic Converter Prototype for Replacement of Conventional Auto Exhaust Emission Converters

High voltage electrostatics and corona discharge are utilized for various applications in pollution and environmental control. The traditional applications have many flaws due to improper construction of electrode design and assembly that cause system failure, in particular when electrically stimulated devices are exposed to high humidity. A new innovative-patented design by Hamade, electrically stimulated catalytic converter(ESCC),eliminates such flaws and shows the wide practical applications of the new design. The new design utilized previous patented designs and work of the same inventor but retrofitted for catalytic auto exhaust emission control. The current and previous patents include: employing electrically stimulated filtration(ESF) to replace high efficiency particulate air(HEPA) filters, treatment of biological and infectious diseases, electret fabrication, and, most notably, the invention of a new electrically stimulated catalytic converter(ESCC). The electrically stimulated catalytic converter invention includes an exhaust conduit fed from the engine exhaust port with a housed corona charger apparatus. The opposite end is opened to the atmosphere outside of the vehicle or connected to a reduced-size catalytic converter. The corona charger is intrusively or non-intrusively associated with a main flow path defined by the exhaust conduit. The corona charger includes at least one electrode, which may be recessed away from, the main flow path. A plurality of corona chargers may be used in various combinations, optimally a two dimensional grid. The electrically stimulated catalytic converter is adapted to treat and eliminate auto exhaust pollution emission to air.     

Enabling a viable technique for the optimization of LNG carrier cargo operations

In this study, we optimize the loading and discharging operations of the Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) carrier. First, we identify the required precautions for LNG carrier cargo operations. Next, we prioritize these precautions using the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and experts’ judgments, in order to optimize the operational loading and discharging exercises of the LNG carrier, prevent system failure and human error, and reduce the risk of marine accidents. Thus, the objective of our study is to increase the level of safety during cargo operations.     

Investigating the influence of assigning a higher priority to scheduling work and school activities in the activity-based models on the simulated travel/activity patterns

Transportation - Two dynamic, gap-based activity scheduling models are tested by applying a short-run microsimulation approach to replicate workers’ travel/activity patterns over a 1-week...     

Using multiple hybrid spatial design network analysis to predict longitudinal effect of a major city centre redevelopment on pedestrian flows

Transportation - Predicting how changes to the urban environment layout will affect the spatial distribution of pedestrian flows is important for environmental, social and economic sustainability....     

Step-tolling with price-sensitive demand: Why more steps in the toll make the consumer better off

Most dynamic models of congestion pricing use fully time-variant tolls. However, in practice, tolls are uniform over the day, or at most have just a few steps. Such uniform and step tolls have received surprisingly little attention from the literature. Moreover, most models that do study them assume that demand is insensitive to the price. This seems an empirically questionable assumption that, as this paper finds, strongly affects the implications of step tolling for the consumer. In the bottleneck model, first-best tolling has no effect on the generalised price, and thus consumer surplus remains the same as without tolling. Conversely, under price-sensitive demand, step tolling increases the price, making the consumer worse off. The more steps the toll has, the closer it approximates the first-best toll, thereby increasing the welfare gain and making consumers better off. This indicates the importance for real-world tolls to have as many steps as possible: this not only raises welfare, but may also increase the political acceptability of the scheme by making consumers better off.     

A hedonic test of the effects of the Alternative Motor Fuels Act

Under the Alternative Motor Fuels Act (AMFA), vehicles that run on ethanol, methanol, or natural gas get extra credits in the calculation of Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE). This paper uses hedonic techniques to examine the effect of production of alternative-fuel vehicles (AFVs) on the implicit price of fuel economy. This study finds that, after AFVs came to market, the marginal value of fuel economy from companies producing them decreased. This finding suggests that manufacturers who produced AFVs were willing to offer a lower price for fuel economy, because automakers had an additional way to achieve fuel economy standards beyond improving the fuel efficiency of conventional cars. These findings bolster the argument that a major role of the AMFA credit for AFVs is to allow automakers to increase their production of fuel-inefficient vehicles.     

Key technologies of ship remote control system in inland waterways under ship-shore cooperation conditions北大核心CSCD

［Objective ］ To meet the requirements of remotely controlling ship in curved, narrow and crowded inland waterways, this paper proposes an approach that consists of CNN-based algorithms and knowledge based models under ship-shore cooperation conditions. ［Method］On the basis of analyzing the characteristics of ship-shore cooperation, the proposed approach realizes autonomous perception of the environment with visual simulation at the core and navigation decision-making control based on deep reinforcement learning, and finally constructs an artificial intelligence system composed of image deep learning processing, navigation situation cognition, route steady-state control and other functions. Remote control and short-time autonomous navigation of operating ships are realized under inland waterway conditions, and remote control of container ships and ferries is carried out. ［Results］The proposed approach is capable of replacing manual work by remote orders or independent decision-making, as well as realizing independent obstacle avoidance, with a consistent deviation of less than 20 meters. ［Conclusions］The developed prototype system carries out the remote control operation demonstration of the above ship types in such waterways as the Changhu Canal Shenzhou line and the Yangtze River, proving that a complete set of algorithms with a CNN and reinforcement learning at the core can independently extract key navigation information, construct obstacle avoidance and control awareness, and lay the foundation for inland river intelligent navigation systems. © 2022 Journal of Clinical Hepatology. All rights reserved.     

Correlates of bicycling trip flows in Hamilton,Ontario: fastest,quietest, or balanced routes?

Transportation - Bicycling is an increasingly popular mode of travel in Canadian urban areas, like the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA). While trip origins and destinations can be inferred...