Recent applications of description logics (DLs) strongly suggest the integration of non-monotonic features into DLs, with particular attention to defeasible inheritance. However, the existing non-monotonic extensions of DLs are usually based on default logic or autoepistemic logic, and have to be seriously restricted in expressive power to preserve the decidability of reasoning. In particular, such DLs allow the modelling of defeasible inheritance only in a very restricted form, where non-monotonic reasoning is limited to individuals that are explicitly identified by constants in the knowledge base. In this paper, we consider non-monotonic extensions of expressive DLs based on circumscription. We prove that reasoning in such DLs is decidable even without the usual, strong restrictions in expressive power. We pinpoint the exact computational complexity of reasoning as complete for NPNEXP and NEXPNP, depending on whether or not the number of minimized and fixed predicates is assumed to be bounded by a constant. These results assume that only concept names (and no role names) can be minimized and fixed during minimization. On the other hand, we show that fixing role names during minimization makes reasoning undecidable.

El trabajo realizado en esta tesis pertenece al área de argumentación en inteligencia artificial. La representación de conocimiento en un formalismo basado en argumentación se realiza a través de la especificación de argumentos, cada uno en favor de una conclusión a partir de ciertas premisas. Dado que estas conclusiones pueden estar en contradicción, se producen ataques entre los argumentos. Luego, la evaluación de toda la información presente podría dar preponderancia a algunos argumentos por sobre aquellos que los contradicen, produciendo un conjunto de conclusiones que se considera ran garantizadas. El objetivo principal de esta tesis es la definición de un nuevo marco argumentativo capaz de manejar dinámica de conocimiento. En este sentido, se da una representación no sólo a los argumentos, sino que también se introduce la noción de evidencia como entidades especiales dentro del sistema. En cada instante, el conjunto de evidencia se corresponde con la situación actual, dándole contexto al marco argumentativo. La plausibilidad de los argumentos en un instante dado depende exclusivamente de la evidencia disponible. Cuando la evidencia es suficiente para dar soporte a un argumento, éste se denominará activo. También se considera la posibilidad de que algunos argumentos se encuentren activos aun sin encontrar soporte directamente desde la evidencia, ya que podrían hacerlo a través de las conclusiones de otros argumentos activos. Estas conexiones entre argumentos dan lugar a lo que en esta tesis se denomina estructura argumental, proveyendo una visión un tanto más compleja que la usual en cuanto a la representación de conocimiento argumentativo. Los resultados obtenidos en esta tesis permitirán estudiar la dinámica de conocimiento en sistemas argumentativos. En la actualidad, ya se han publicado artáculos que presentan un formalismo que combina argumentación y la teoría clásica de revisión de creencias. En esta línea de investigación se denen operadores de cambio que se aplican sobre el marco argumentativo abstracto dinámico y tienen como objetivo alcanzar cierto estado del sistema; por ejemplo, garantizar un argumento determinado. Por otra parte, este marco también permitirá estudiar métodos para acelerar el computo de garantía a partir del proceso de razonamiento realizado en estados anteriores.

This doctoral thesis considers the automatic verification of parameterized systems, i.e. systems with an arbitrary number of communicating components, such as mutual exclusion protocols, cache coherence protocols or heap manipulating programs. The components may be organized in various topologies such as words, multisets, rings, or trees. The task is to show correctness regardless of the size of the system and we consider two methods to prove safety:(i) a backward reachability analysis, using the well-quasi ordered framework and monotonic abstraction, and (ii) a forward analysis which only needs to inspect a small number of components in order to show correctness of the whole system. The latter relies on an abstraction function that views the system from the perspective of a fixed number of components. The abstraction is used during the verification procedure in order to dynamically detect cut-off points beyond which the search of the state-space need not continue. Our experimentation on a variety of benchmarks demonstrate that the method is highly efficient and that it works well even for classes of systems with undecidable property. It has been, for example, successfully applied to verify a fine-grained model of Szymanski's mutual exclusion protocol. Finally, we applied the methods to solve the complex problem of verifying highly concurrent data-structures, in a challenging setting: We do not a priori bound the number of threads, the size of the data-structure, the domain of the data to store nor do we require the presence of a garbage collector. We successfully verified the concurrent Treiber's stack and Michael & Scott's queue, in the aforementioned setting. To the best of our knowledge, these verification problems have been considered challenging in the parameterized verification community and could not be carried out automatically by other existing methods.

Este trabalho descreve o comportamento da aderência do concreto armado sob ações monotônicas e repetidas através de uma revisão bibliográfica e de ensaios de arrancamento padronizados. A influência de alguns parâmetros foi analisada, como diâmetro da armadura, tipo e amplitude de carregamento. Os resultados dos ensaios monotônicos foram comparados com as recomendações do CEB-FIP MC 1990, EUROCODE 2 e NB-1/78. Também foi realizada a análise numérica da aderência monotônica por meio de elementos finitos. Considerou-se a barra lisa, elementos de contato entre o aço e concreto e comportamento elástico-linear dos materiais; pois a ruína experimental da ligação ocorreu pelo corte do concreto entre as nervuras. A resistência monotônica da ligação ficou compreendida entre condições boas e ruins de aderência. Os resultados calculados de acordo com as normas foram muito diferentes em relação aos valores experimentais, e apresentaram uma dispersão muito grande. A força repetida ocasionou a perda de aderência pelo crescimento progressivo dos deslizamentos. Os modelos numéricos não representaram o comportamento experimental, devido à resposta força-deslizamento não-linear. / This research describes the bond behaviour in reinforced concrete under monotonic and repeated loading through a state-of-art and standard pull-out tests. The influence of some parameters was analysed as deformed bar diameter, type and amplitude of loading. The monotonic test results were compared with recommendations of CEB-FIP MC 1990, EUROCODE 2 and NB-1/78. The numerical analysis of monotonic bond was realized through finite elements. It was considered smooth bar, contact elements between the steel and concrete, and materials as of linear-elastic behaviour, because the experimental degradation of bond was caused by concrete between the ribs sheared off. The monotonic bond resistance resulted between good and bad bond conditions. The results calculated according to the codes were very different from the experimental values and very disperse. The repeated loading causes bond degradation by progressive increase of slip. The numerical specimens did not represent the experimental behaviour because of the non-linear load-slip response.

Une Fonction Latticielle Polynômiale (FLP) sur un treillis L est une fonction p : Ln → L, qui peut être exprimée à partir de variables, de constantes et des opérateurs de treillis ∧ et ∨ . Dans les cas où L est distributif et borné, les FLP incluent les intégrales de Sugeno. Celles-ci sont des fonctions d'agrégation qui permettent de fusionner des valeurs sur des échelles ordinales non numériques, et qui sont utilisées notamment dans l'approche qualitative de l'Aide à la Décision Multi Critères en tant qu'alternatives ordinales aux intégrales de Choquet. Dans une première partie, nous traitons la tâche d'interpolation par des FLP, c'est à dire : pour un treillis L, un sous-ensemble fini D de Ln et une fonction f : D → L, retourner une FLP p : Ln → L telle que p(x) = f(x) pour tout x ∊ D (si une telle FLP existe). Nous traitons successivement le cas où L est un treillis fini et le cas où L est une treillis distributif borné. Dans les deux cas, nous donnons des algorithmes qui résolvent ce problème en temps polynomial. Dans une seconde partie, nous abordons les généralisations des intégrales de Sugeno appelées Fonctions d'Utilité de Sugeno (FUS), qui permettent la fusion de valeurs appartenant à des échelles ordinales différentes, ainsi que leur application à la tâche de classification monotone. Nous introduisons un modèle composé de plusieurs FUS, ainsi qu'un algorithme d'apprentissage d'un tel modèle. Nous comparons ce modèle aux ensembles de règles de décision appris par VC-DomLEM, et étudions le nombre de FUS nécessaires afin de modéliser des données empiriques / A Lattice Polynomial Function (LPF) over a lattice L is a map p : Ln → L that can be defined by an expression involving variables, constants and the lattice operators ∧ and ∨. If L is a distributive lattice, these maps include the so-called Sugeno integrals that are aggregation functions capable of merging ordinal values, not necessarily numerical. They are widely used in the qualitative approach to Multiple Criteria Decision Aiding (MCDA), and they can be thought of as the ordinal counterparts of Choquet integrals. In the first part of this thesis, we tackle the task of interpolating a partial function by an LPF, stated as follows: for a lattice L, a finite subset D of Ln, and a function f : D → L, return an LPF p : Ln → L such that p(x) = f(x) for all x ∊ D (if such an LPF exists). We treat the cases where L is a finite lattice, and then the cases where L is a bounded distributive lattice. In both cases, we provide algorithms that solve this problem in polynomial time. In the second part, we consider generalizations of Sugeno integrals in the multi-attribute setting, in particular, the Sugeno Utility Functions (SUFs), that are able to merge values coming from different ordinal scales. We consider the their use in monotonic classification tasks. We present a model based on a set of SUFs and an algorithm for learning such model from data. We compare this model to the sets of monotonic decision rules learned by VC-DomLEM, and study the number of SUFs that are required in order to model empirical data

Para o correto dimensionamento da maioria dos componentes estruturais é necessário informações sobre a resposta do material quando submetido à fadiga de alto e baixo ciclo, bem como conhecer as propriedades monotônicas (não-cíclicas) e cíclicas dos materiais. Na literatura são encontradas amplas divulgações de dados sobre diversos materiais de engenharia (Ex. SAE J1099 Technical Report on Fatigue Properties). Porém, quando se trata de ferro fundido nodular estas informações são limitadas, sendo assim, visa-se neste trabalho caracterizar as propriedades monotônicas e cíclicas destes materiais em complemento aos trabalhos já publicados na literatura e propor métodos para a estimativa destas propriedades a partir da dureza. Faz-se necessário a proposição de métodos estimativos das propriedades mecânicas destes materiais baseados na dureza devido às suas grandes variações que são inerentes ao processo de fundição. Em um mesmo componente podem existir diferentes classes de ferro fundido, que apesar de possuir a mesma composição química, podem apresentar variações nas propriedades mecânicas devido à formação de diferentes estruturas metalúrgicas que são sensíveis às taxas de resfriamento do material que variam de acordo com as características geométricas da peça que está sendo fundida, principalmente a variação da espessura. Neste estudo a determinação das relações entre as propriedades monotônicas e cíclicas dos ferros fundidos nodulares foram obtidas a partir do tratamento dos dados publicados na literatura levando-se em consideração o índice de qualidade. Foi proposto um modelo contínuo com relação à dureza para a estimativa das propriedades monotônicas, do coeficiente de resistência cíclico e do expoente de encruamento cíclico e para a estimativa das propriedades cíclicas que experimentalmente demonstraram não ter correlação com a dureza foi proposto uma forma discreta, que consistiu na recomendação de valores típicos definidas por faixas de dureza. / For the correct design of the most part of structural components is necessary to have information about the material response under both high cycle and low cycle fatigue, as well as the knowledge of monotonic and cyclic materials properties. In literature a major publication of several engineering material data can be found (e.g, SAE J1099 - Technical Report on Fatigue Properties), but regarding to ductile iron this information is quite limited. Therefore, this work aims to characterize the monotonic and cyclic properties of this material in complementing to the available data in the literature and also make a proposition of methods to estimate this properties from hardness. The mechanical properties estimation model from hardness is relevant to take into account the inherent variations of casting process, which for the same chemical composition can be found different grades in a same part. This fact occurs due to the formation of different metallurgical structures that is influenced by cooling ratio which changes accordingly to geometrical characteristic of the part, especially the thickness variation. In this study the determination of the relation between monotonic and cyclic properties from hardness has been determined from literature data processing taking into account the Quality Index. For monotonic properties, the cyclic strength coefficient and the cyclic strain hardening exponent estimation has been proposed a continuous method based on hardness and for the cyclic properties that experimentally showed to remain independent of hardness has been recommended one set of properties for specific hardness ranges.

Trabecular bone is a porous composite material which consists of a mineral phase (mainly hydroxyapatite), organic phase (mostly type I collagen) and water assembled into a complex, hierarchical structure. In biomechanical modelling, its mechanical response to loads is generally assumed to be instantaneous, i.e. it is treated as a time-independent material. It is, however, recognised that the response of trabecular bone to loads is time-dependent. Study of this time-dependent behaviour is important in several contexts such as: to understand energy dissipation ability of bone; to understand the age-related non-traumatic fractures; to predict implant loosening due to cyclic loading; to understand progressive vertebral deformity; and for pre-clinical evaluation of total joint replacement. To investigate time-dependent behaviour, bovine trabecular bone samples were subjected to compressive loading, creep, unloading and recovery at multiple load levels (corresponding to apparent strain of 2,000-25,000 με). The results show that: the time-dependent behaviour of trabecular bone comprises of both recoverable and irrecoverable strains; the strain response is nonlinearly related to applied load levels; and the response is associated with bone volume fraction. It was found that bone with low porosity demonstrates elastic stiffening followed by elastic softening, while elastic softening is demonstrated by porous bone at relatively low loads. Linear, nonlinear viscoelastic and nonlinear viscoelastic-viscoplastic constitutive models were developed to predict trabecular bone's time-dependent behaviour. Nonlinear viscoelastic constitutive model was found to predict the recovery behaviour well, while nonlinear viscoelastic-viscoplastic model predicts the full creep-recovery behaviour reasonably well. Depending on the requirements all these models can be used to incorporate time-dependent behaviour in finite element models. To evaluate the contribution of the key constituents of trabecular bone and its microstructure, tests were conducted on demineralised and deproteinised samples. Reversed cyclic loading experiments (tension to compression) were conducted on demineralised trabecular bone samples. It was found that demineralised bone exhibits asymmetric mechanical response - elastic stiffening in tension and softening in compression. This tension to compression transition was found to be smooth. Tensile multiple-load-creep-unload-recovery experiments on demineralised trabecular samples show irrecoverable strain (or residual strain) even at the low stress levels. Demineralised trabecular bone samples demonstrate elastic stiffening with increasing load levels in tension, and their time-dependent behaviour is nonlinear with respect to applied loads . Nonlinear viscoelastic constitutive model was developed which can predict its recovery behaviour well. Experiments on deproteinised samples showed that their modulus and strength are reasonably well related to bone volume fraction. The study considers an application of time-dependent behaviour of trabecular bone. Time-dependent properties are assigned to trabecular bone in a bone-screw system, in which the screw is subjected to cyclic loading. It is found that separation between bone and the screw at the interface can increase with increasing number of cycles which can accentuate loosening. The relative larger deformation occurs when this system to be loaded at the higher loading frequency. The deformation at the bone-screw interface is related to trabecular bone's bone volume fraction; screws in a more porous bone are at a higher risk of loosening.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-27T16:59:06Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Jose Zucco.pdf: 7309797 bytes, checksum: e352e60fa42fc2fb548de2f8c6f4bc2f (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010-07-27 / Secretaria da Educação do Estado de São Paulo / The goal of this research is to analyze the performance of 20 high school seniors in the State Public School System in the resolution of four problems involving the concept of monotonic functions (increasing and decreasing). The selected problems were proposed in the Public School Mathematical Olympiads (OBMEP) of 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2008. The study has a qualitative approach. The theoretical reference for analyzing the performance was Raymond Duval s theory of Registers of Semiotic Representation (2003). The analyzed protocols contained both the resolution of the problems and the justifications presented by the students for their responses. The analyses indicated difficulties in interpreting the problem statement, as well as in the activities related to handling and changing the Registers of Semiotic Representation. This study also performed an analysis of the errors, which allowed the questions to be classified in groups based on the types of answers. The results revealed that most of the students were not familiar with the proposed problems, which required them to move among the different representations of a single mathematical object / A presente pesquisa tem por objetivo analisar o desempenho de 20 alunos do 3º ano do Ensino Médio da Rede Pública Estadual na resolução de quatro questões envolvendo o conceito de função monotônica (crescente e decrescente). As questões escolhidas foram propostas nas Olimpíadas de Matemática das Escolas Públicas (OBMEP) de 2005, 2006, 2007 e 2008. É uma pesquisa de abordagem qualitativa. A análise do desempenho teve por referência teórica a teoria dos Registros de Representação Semiótica de Raymond Duval (2003). Nos protocolos analisados constavam tanto a resolução das questões quanto as justificativas apresentadas pelos alunos para suas respostas. As análises indicaram dificuldades na interpretação dos enunciados das questões bem como nas ações relacionadas aos tratamentos e mudança de Registros de Representação Semiótica. Este estudo também efetivou análise dos erros, a qual possibilitou classificar as questões em grupos quanto aos tipos de respostas. Os resultados revelaram que a maioria dos alunos não estava familiarizada com as questões propostas as quais exigiam transitar pelas diferentes representação de um mesmo objeto matemático

<p>Istraživanja prikazana u disertaciji imala su za cilj razvoj monotonih modela deformisanja u cilju njihove primene za određivanje dijagrama granične deformabilnosti. Kombinacijom različitih geometrija uzoraka, geometrije alata i triboloških uslova razvijeni su monotoni modeli deformisanja koji su promenjeni za određivanje dijagrama granične deformabilnosti.</p> / <p>Research presented in this dissertation was conducted in order to develop monotonic forming processes suitable for determination of forming limit diagram. Combining different geometries of billets as well as tools and friction conditions monotonic models are developed and applied for determination of forming limit diagram.</p>

With multiprocessors and multicore processors becoming ubiquitous, focus has shifted from research on uniprocessors to that on multiprocessors. Results derived for the uniprocessor case unfortunately do not always directly extend to the multiprocessor case in a straightforward manner. This necessitates a paradigm shift in the approach used to design and analyse the behaviour of such processors. In the case of Real-time systems, that is, systems characterised by explicit timing constraints, analysis and performance guarantees are more important, as failure is unacceptable. Scheduling algorithms used in Real-time systems have to be carefully designed as the performance of the system depends critically on them. Efficient tests for determining if a set of tasks can be feasibly scheduled on such a computing system using a particular scheduling algorithm thus assumes importance. Traditionally, the ‘task utilization’ parameter has been used for devising such tests. Utilization based tests for Earliest Deadline First(EDF) and Rate Monotonic(RM) scheduling algorithms are known and are well understood for uniprocessor systems. In our work, we derive limits on similar bounds for the multiprocessor case. Our work diners from previous literature in that we explore the case when the individual processors constituting the multiprocessor need not be identical. Each processor in such a system is characterised by a capacity, or speed, and the time taken by a task to execute on a processor is inversely proportional to its speed. Such instances may arise during system upgradation, when faster processors may be added to the system, making it a non-identical multiprocessor, or during processor design, when the different cores on the chip may have different processing power to handle dynamic workloads. We derive results for the partitioned paradigm of multiprocessor scheduling, that is, when tasks are partitioned among the processors, and interprocessor migration after a part of execution is completed is not allowed. Results are derived for both fixed priority algorithms(RM)and dynamic priority algorithms (EDF) used on individual processors. A maximum and minimum limit on the bounds for a ‘greedy’ class of algorithms are established, since the actual value of the bound depends on the algorithm that allocates the tasks. We also derive the utilization bound of an algorithm whose bound is close to the upper limit in both cases. We find that an expression for the utilization bound can be obtained when EDF is used as the uniprocessor scheduling algorithm, but when RM is the uniprocessor scheduling algorithm,an O(mn) algorithm is required to find the utilization bound, where m is the number of tasks in the system and n is the number of processors. Knowledge of such bounds allows us to carry out very fast schedulability tests, although we have the limitation that the tests are sufficient but not necessary to ensure schedulability. We also compare the value of the bounds with those achievable in ‘equivalent’ identical multiprocessor systems and find that the performance guarantees provided by the non-identical multiprocessor system are far higher than those offered by the equivalent identical system.