This report describes a method of incorporating decision analysis principles to enhance a simulation being created by The University of Texas at Austin’s Institute for Advanced Technology (IAT). The simulation is called Virtual Simulation Learning Platform (VSLP) and the scenario created to test the platform is called Virtual Platoon Leader (VPL). Recommendations include a method of implementing value-focused decision making, the implementation of decision tools to build a scenario within the simulation, a dialogue process between the developer and the subject matter expert, a design for the implementation of graphical user interfaces for the decision tools used to build a scenario and a user scoring methodology. / text

Artificial membranes composed of natural lipids are not stable when exposed to air/vacuum, surfactant, organic solvent, etc. Polymerizable lipids provide an opportunity to broaden the use of lipid membranes to study ligand-receptor pairs under harsh experimental conditions. This dissertation presents the utilization of polymerizable lipids in matrix assisted laser desorption and ionization-mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS) for analysis of ligands bound to membrane receptors. This platform may be applied to rapid drug-screening for membrane receptors including transmembrane proteins. Bacterial toxins and their membrane receptors were used as model ligand-receptor pairs to demonstrate the feasibility of using polymerizable lipids to detect and identify ligands by MALDI-TOF MS. Cholera toxin B (CTB) was successfully detected bound to polymerized lipid membranes with incorporation of its membrane receptor, GM1, while no CTB was detected in non-polymerizable lipid membranes. This affinity capture platform based on poly(lipid) showed a high resistance to interferences. On-plate digestion of bound CTB was performed and 57% amino acid sequence coverage was achieved. Total internal reflection fluorescence microscopy (TIRF-M) was applied to compare CTB-GM1 binding affinity in polymerized and unpolymerized membranes. Under a static flow system, the binding between CTB and GM1 was found to be stronger in polymerized membranes than other membranes. However, the ligand concentration under a static flow system is not in excess and the apparent binding affinity is likely to be significantly different than the true value. The true binding affinity can be approached under a continuous flow system, however equilibration time was found to be too long to address experimentally. Membrane fluidity, which may be required to maintain the membrane receptor activity, is suppressed in poly(lipid) membranes compared to unpolymerized membranes. In order to maintain fluidity, a non-polymerizable lipid was mixed into a polymerized lipid. Fluorescence recovery after photobleaching (FRAP) data showed that fluidity of membrane composed of the mixed lipid was maintained compared to pure poly(lipid). Phase segregation of polymerized lipid and non-polymerizable lipid was detected by atomic force microscopy (AFM). CTB bound to GM1 in mixed lipid membranes was detected by MALDI-MS, indicating the mixed lipid membranes retain stability under MALDI-MS analysis conditions.

Artificial membranes composed of natural lipids are not stable when exposed to air/vacuum, surfactant, organic solvent, etc. Polymerizable lipids provide an opportunity to broaden the use of lipid membranes to study ligand-receptor pairs under harsh experimental conditions. This dissertation presents the utilization of polymerizable lipids in matrix assisted laser desorption and ionization-mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS) for analysis of ligands bound to membrane receptors. This platform may be applied to rapid drug-screening for membrane receptors including transmembrane proteins. Bacterial toxins and their membrane receptors were used as model ligand-receptor pairs to demonstrate the feasibility of using polymerizable lipids to detect and identify ligands by MALDI-TOF MS. Cholera toxin B (CTB) was successfully detected bound to polymerized lipid membranes with incorporation of its membrane receptor, GM1, while no CTB was detected in non-polymerizable lipid membranes. This affinity capture platform based on poly(lipid) showed a high resistance to interferences. On-plate digestion of bound CTB was performed and 57% amino acid sequence coverage was achieved. Total internal reflection fluorescence microscopy (TIRF-M) was applied to compare CTB-GM1 binding affinity in polymerized and unpolymerized membranes. Under a static flow system, the binding between CTB and GM1 was found to be stronger in polymerized membranes than other membranes. However, the ligand concentration under a static flow system is not in excess and the apparent binding affinity is likely to be significantly different than the true value. The true binding affinity can be approached under a continuous flow system, however equilibration time was found to be too long to address experimentally. Membrane fluidity, which may be required to maintain the membrane receptor activity, is suppressed in poly(lipid) membranes compared to unpolymerized membranes. In order to maintain fluidity, a non-polymerizable lipid was mixed into a polymerized lipid. Fluorescence recovery after photobleaching (FRAP) data showed that fluidity of membrane composed of the mixed lipid was maintained compared to pure poly(lipid). Phase segregation of polymerized lipid and non-polymerizable lipid was detected by atomic force microscopy (AFM). CTB bound to GM1 in mixed lipid membranes was detected by MALDI-MS, indicating the mixed lipid membranes retain stability under MALDI-MS analysis conditions.

With the rapid growth of servers and applications spurred by the Internet economy, power consumption in today's data centers is reaching unsustainable limits. This has led to an imminent financial, technical and environmental crisis that is impacting the society at large. Hence, it has become critically important that power consumption be efficiently managed in these computing power-houses of today. In this work, we revisit the issue of adaptive power and performance management of data center server platforms. Traditional data center servers are statically configured and always over-provisioned to be able to handle peak load. We transform these statically configured data center servers to clairvoyant entities that can sense changes in the workload and dynamically scale in capacity to adapt to the requirements of the workload. The over-provisioned server capacity is transitioned to low-power states and they remain in those states for as long as the performance remains within given acceptable thresholds. The platform power expenditure is minimized subject to performance constraints. This is formulated as a performance-per-watt optimization problem and solved using analytical power and performance models. Coarse-grained optimizations at the platform-level are refined by local optimizations at the devices-level namely - the processor & memory subsystems. Our adaptive interleaving technique for memory power management yielded about 48.8% (26.7 kJ) energy savings compared to traditional techniques measured at 4.5%. Our adaptive platform power and performance management technique demonstrated 56.25% energy savings for memory-intensive workload, 63.75% savings for processor-intensive workload and 47.5% savings for a mixed workload while maintaining platform performance within given acceptable thresholds.

The recent trend of mass customization has redefined the way companies do business. Each individual customer is now their own market, requiring products specific to their wants and needs at mass production prices. This need for ever-increasing variety is a significant challenge for industry that many times leads to ballooning manufacturing costs and lower product performance. One approach that has received widespread attention and implementation is to develop families of products from standardized product platforms. While, many methods have been developed to address different challenges within product platform design, they are not without their limitations/tradeoffs and therefore leave much room for development and improvement. The Product Platform Constructal Theory Method (PPCTM), developed by Dr. Gabriel Hernandez, is a novel approach for developing product platforms that enable customizable products. Rooted in the tenants of hierarchic systems theory and constructal theory, the PPCTM solves for the product platform as a problem of optimization of access in a geometric space. The result is a hierarchical organization of the modes for managing variety and the specification of their commonality across the product platform. Overall, the PPCTM offers an extremely comprehensive product platform design method, with the ability to accommodate multi-platform design, multiple design specifications, non-uniform demand modeling, and multi-objective decision-making. One limitation of this method is that the selection of platform variables and the modes for managing product variety must be pre-specified or determined ad hoc by the designer. This thesis seeks to address this limitation through the integration of a sensitivity-based analysis method to determine the effect of platform variable variation on the family performance. The result of this work is a Sensitivity-based PPCTM that facilitates the selection of common platform variables, such that modes for managing variety can be ranked and applied to the space element hierarchy. The proposed method is illustrated with three examples: the design of a line of customizable pressure vessels, universal electric motors, and finger pumps.

Šiomis dienomis labai greitai tobulėja mobilios technologijos. Į išmaniuosius įrenginius montuojamų procesorių taktinis dažnis jau pasiekė 1Ghz, ekranai tapo labai didelės raiškos, jautrūs lietimui bei pasižymintys labai kokybišku spalvų atkūrimu. Dėl daugybės į išmaniuosius telefonus montuojamų papildomų įtaisų, jų panaudojimo sritis vis plečiasi, jų populiarumas auga. Kartu su aparatūros tobulėjimu, tobulėja ir jiems skirta programinė įranga. Per paskutinius kelis metus pasirodė net trys naujos išmaniesiems telefonams skirtos operacinės sistemos. Visos šios naujovės ir greitas jų tobulėjimas labai apsunkina programuotojų darbą. Labai sunku suspėti su visomis naujomis technologijomis. Kiekviena atsiradusi platforma atsineša ir savo programavimo principus. Norint, kad sukurta programinė įranga pasiektų kuo didesnę vartotojų auditoriją, būtina ją pateikti kelioms skirtingoms ir dažnai nesuderinamoms platformoms. Tai pareikalauja didesnių laiko sąnaudų, daugiau žmogiškųjų resursų kas sąlygoja ir didesnius programinės įrangos kūrimo kaštus. Taip pat, labai trūksta profesionalių specialistų gerai išmanančių šias visai neseniai rinkoje pasirodžiusias technologijas. Tyrimo objektas – nuo platformos nepriklausomos programinės įrangos išmaniesiems telefonams kūrimo galimybės. Tyrimo tikslas – realizuoti ir ištirti nuo platformos nepriklausomą programinės įrangos karkasą, palengvinantį programinės įrangos išmaniesiems telefonams kūrimą. Tyrimo uždaviniai: 1. išanalizuoti nuo... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / With the introduction and popularity of wireless devices, the diversity of the platforms has also been increased. There are different platforms and tools from different vendors such as Microsoft, Sun, Nokia, SonyEricsson and many more. Because of the relatively low-level programming interface, software development for wireless devices platforms, such as Symbian, is a tiresome and error prone task. This paper introduces the problem of the software development for incompatible mobile platforms, moreover, it provides a solution based on easy to use web technologies – JavaScript and XML. In the presented approach, the platform-independence lies in JavaScript interpretation and XML structures based user interface. The subject of research, object and subject relevance were detectable through literature analysis and through existing approaches are presented in the first part. The platform independent mobile application framework was implemented to demonstrate the proposed solution. System components design and programming process are presented in the second part. The implemented system static view is provided by using class diagrams and dynamic view - by sequences and activities diagrams. In the third part are provided assessment of the platform independent mobile software framework capabilities and quality. Program developed by using this framework was compared to program developed by using standard Symbian OS native means.

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Some of the most important work in the development of economic theory is associated with the study of market structure. In essence, most markets are two-sided. For example, product markets connect tens of thousands of product brands to tens of millions of consumers; marriage markets couple the single men and women who would otherwise suffer from a lonely heart; and labour markets link the job candidates to their preferred employers and positions. Apart from the two-sidedness, we have explored another important common aspect of these market structures, i.e. interconnection/competition of the segments within one side of the market. Under this common thread, the three essays in this thesis are freshly formulated in a loosely related manner, covering topics in three different areas. Chapter 2 is motivated by strategic transitions of many marketplaces (e.g. Amazon.com). From the perspective of a platform owner, when it owns part of the business on one side of the market, there is no straightforward answer as to whether having the rest of business owned by others is advantageous or not. The argument is that, on the one hand, the platform welcomes more third-party business as it boosts revenue in terms of membership fees; on the other hand the business owned by the platform dislikes the incoming competitors whose participation drives down pro t margins. We propose a novel framework in this chapter to explore the trade-off between the two. Here, the intermediary can decide to be either a "merchant" or a "two-sided platform", or a hybrid one in between. Our analysis shows that in hybrid mode the platform extracts all the surplus from the producers of the merchandised brands, and the merchandised brands always charge a price premium compared to the directly retailed ones. We also show that as the platform absorbs an existing directly retailed brand into the self-brand portfolio, the equilibrium prices of both brand types are increased. We find that only the directly retailed brands dominate the market when the platform s capacity is relatively small; and both brand types coexist in the marketplace when the capacity is relatively large. Furthermore, we find a backward bending proportion plus a vertical proportion of the "contract curve" in comparative statics. That is, the self-brand portfolio always expands while the third-party-brand portfolio shrinks until it reaches a certain level, when the platform increases its capacity. It helps us to gain some ideas on the dynamics of brand portfolio management for the platform. Lastly, taking into account of indirect network effect which is the common feature in the two-sided market, it is shown that the platform is better o¤ when consumers have positive expected surplus. Chapter 3 is much motivated by the Chinese experience. China has witnessed the largest rural to urban labour ow (among which the majority are male) in the world s history over the last three decades. We propose an idea that the grand migration can also be attributed to the unbalanced sex ratio between rural and urban areas. This chapter develops a two-sided matching model of two linked marriage markets with homogeneous agents, non-transferable utility and search friction. We extend the one-market model of the previous literature into a two-market one, allowing the agents to migrate between the markets at a fixed cost. The analysis focuses on the unmatched as well as the migrating population, which is induced by the different sex ratios in the two geographically isolated marriage markets. We find that imperfections in the matching technology leads to the enlarged gap of sex ratio of the unmatched population compared to that of the unbalanced inflows. We are interested in the question of how the migrating costs affect the migration between rural and urban areas, and under what conditions a subsidy covering migrating costs might benefit a party in the marriage markets. We characterise the equilibrium set in the parameter space of migrating costs, and find that a full subsidy of migrating costs does not necessarily benefit those who receive it but always benefits the opposite sex, if they are the short sides of both markets. Chapter 4 explains the migration of labour force from a different angle. Here, the migration is of workers to jobs. Motivated by the distinction of public and private sector, we consider a spatial oligopsony model in which forms (two co-locating small firms with recruiting capacity constraints and a large firm without such limit) are competing for workers along a "strip" market. The capacity issue that is extensively discussed in the Chapter 2 again plays an important role in this model, though in a very different context. It is shown that the recruiting capacity affects the intra-group competition and hence the inter-group competition in wage- posting strategies. Additionally, we show that, as recruiting limits expand, the expected wages offered by the small firms increase while the wage offered by the big firm decreases, which helps to explain the recent trend of the wage disparity between public and private jobs. We also characterise the equilibrium wages and the size (direction) of the migration in the three-stage game (i.e. the workers decide whether to relocate in the first stage, then the big firm decides its wage offer, and lastly, the two co-locating firms simultaneous set wages), which helps us to understand better the inter-sector mobility in a changing environment of economy. We investigate the issues of interconnection and competition in three different markets. It is always of interest for a researcher of economics to have some ideas on the same issue from different perspectives. Remember that whilst this is a collection of essays on economic theory, it is nonetheless compared to empirical observation. And it will surely serve as a starting point for the author to further the research on market structure.

Data stored in third party storage systems like the cloud might not be secure since confidentiality and integrity of data are not guaranteed. Though cloud computing provides cost-effective storage services, it is a third party service and so, a client cannot trust the cloud service provider to store its data securely within the cloud. Hence, many organizations and users may not be willing to use the cloud services to store their data in the cloud until certain security guarantees are made. In this thesis, a solution to the problem of securely storing the client’s data by maintaining the confidentiality and integrity of the data within the cloud is developed. Five protocols are developed which ensure that the client’s data is stored only on trusted storage servers, replicated only on trusted storage servers, and guarantee that the data owners and other privileged users of that data access the data securely. The system is based on trusted computing platform technology [11]. It uses a Trusted Platform Module, specified by the Trusted Computing Group [11]. An encrypted file system is used to encrypt the user’s data. The system provides data security against a system administrator in the cloud.

This thesis investigates the design of a CubeLab Module frame to facilitate biological research aboard the International Space Station (ISS). With the National Laboratory designation of the ISS by the United States Congress the barriers for use of the facility have been lowered for commercial and academic entities, allowing greater volume and diversity in the research that can be done. Researchers in biology and other areas could benefit from development and adoption of a plug-and-play payload containment system for use in the microgravity/space environment of the ISS. This research includes design and analysis of such a system. It also includes production and testing of a prototype. The relevant NASA requirements are documented, and they were considered during the design phase. Results from finite element analyses to predict performance of a proposed design under expected service conditions are reported. Results from functional testing of the prototype are also provided. A discussion of future work needed before the structure outlined in this thesis can become commercially viable is also presented.