Intelligent combinatorial auctions of decentralized task assignment for AGV with multiple loading capacity

The need to have an efficient transportation system has attracted worldwide attention. Although there is increasing demand to implement distributed control system for industrial applications, there is still an unexplored potential of deploying distributed transportation system. This paper focuses on dynamic assignment of transportation requests to a fleet of vehicles in real time. We introduce an improved combinatorial auction methodology to accommodate the distributed task assignment procedure. Based on a multiagent architecture, each vehicle is represented by an intelligent agent that bids for task and plans its own schedule. On the other hand, the auctioneer has the objective of minimizing transportation tardiness. An automated guided vehicle (AGV) has been selected as the case study, and numerical experiments have been carried out. The result obtained shows that the improved task assignment approach is able to produce performance competitive to a conventional task assignment. © 2013 Institute of Electrical Engineers of Japan. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Influence of water content in sub-flooring materials using adhesive on chemical compounds emission

Indoor air pollution is caused predominantly by emission of primary pollutants from building materials or finishing materials. Recently, there has been increasing interest in the new secondary pollutants caused by chemical reaction of the primary pollutants. In this study, the pollutants emitted from poly(vinyl chloride) (PVC) flooring material were measured, and 2-ethyl-1-hexanol (2E1H) and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) emitted from composite building materials made of PVC flooring material used as a self-leveling flooring were measured to identify the mechanism of emission of 2E1H. The moisture sorption isotherm was measured with a Magnetic Suspension Balance to examine the moisture content of the self-leveling flooring material and its effect on emission of 2E1H. 2E1H was emitted from the PVC flooring material through hydrolysis or oxidation of di-2-ethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP). The composite building material including the self-leveling flooring material emitted more 2E1H through hydrolysis over time. It was determined that liquid prevails in the self-leveling flooring material when the water content is higher than 4% and vapor prevails when the water content is lower than 4%. The prevailing liquid in the flooring material contributes to the increased emission of 2E1H and the prevailing vapor in the material did not cause increase in emission of 2E1H. It is considered that control of water in the self-leveling flooring material or concrete slab is very important in order to inhibit emission of 2E1H through hydrolysis of DEHP on the floor.     

Properties of reactively sputtered IrOx for PZT electrode applications

Abstract

The use of IrO_x for electrodes in PbZr_xTi_1?xO₃ (PZT) capacitors for ferroelectric memory applications has proven to be advantageous in several respects. In comparison with Pt, IrO_x often exhibits improved fatigue and provides resistance to hydrogen induced degradation at elevated temperatures. Since IrO_x is often produced by sputtering in an oxygen containing environment, several forms of IrO_x can be produced depending on the process conditions. This work concentrates on an analysis of the DC reactive sputtering of IrO_x from an Ir metal target. As with other oxidizable metals, Ir exhibits a transition between metal and oxide mode sputtering when sputtered in oxygen containing atmospheres. Variations in the Ar/O₂ gas flow ratio were used to produce Ir and IrO_xfilms on both sides of the metal-to-oxide mode reactive sputtering transition. Changes in the IrO_x film properties were quantified by using a combination of metrics including X-ray diffraction, sheet resistance, and stress. It was found that the, IrO_x crystalline structure and other IrO_x properties could be directly related to the ferroelectric switching performance of PZT capacitors with IrO_xtop electrodes. A relationship between IrO_x deposition processes and resistance to etch induced damage of the ferroelectric properties was also observed.     

Decision-making in electrical appliance use in the home

This paper presents the results of a survey as well as an argument from the viewpoint of behavioral economics with the aim of clarifying how consumers make decisions about electrical appliance use in the home. A survey of consumers showed that most have little awareness of the energy efficiency of appliances, the price of the services produced by electrical appliances, or electricity rates. These findings indicate that price does not function as a signal in electricity consumption through electrical appliance use. Rather, we found that consumer decision-making in electricity consumption is dependent on the characteristics of the particular electrical appliances they use. Additionally, we argue that the payment system for home electricity consumption plays an important role in decision-making, causing biases due to aspects of human psychology discussed here in terms of satisficing and heuristics, payment decoupling, and budgeting. We conclude that decision-making about electrical appliance use and electricity consumption in the home is not always rational and is affected both by the particular characteristics of appliances and the payment system for electricity consumption along with human psychology.     

Production of Hydrogen Storage Alloy of Mg2NiH4 by Hydriding Combustion Synthesis in Laboratory Scale

A laboratory scale production method for hydrogen storage alloy of Mg₂NiH₄ by hydriding combustion synthesis was investigated. In this study, cylinders of magnesium and nickel mixture powder, compressed at different pressures, and a powder mixture of metals, without the compressive treatment, were used as a raw material. The products were examined by X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning-electron microscopy (SEM). The XRD results indicated that pure Mg₂NiH₄ was simply obtained not only from the compressed cylinders, but also from the powder. There was no significant effect of the compressive pressure of the cylinder on the composition of the final products. However, SEM observations showed that the compressed sample and the powder are clearly different, in spite of the same product composition. The results also revealed a possibility of new production system of Mg₂NiH₄ using hydriding combustion synthesis, with many benefits of simple pretreatment, including: simple equipment, short operating time, high-quality product, and energy savings.     

Exergetic life cycle assessment of new waste aluminium treatment system with co-production of pressurized hydrogen and aluminium hydroxide

A new system is proposed for the treatment of waste aluminium. The total exergy loss (EXL) in the system for the co-production of 1 kg of hydrogen at 30 MPa and 26 kg of aluminium hydroxide is evaluated from the viewpoint of life cycle assessment (LCA) by comparison with the EXLs in conventional systems. The exergy flow diagram reveals that the exergy of waste aluminium, which contains only 15 mass% metal, is still large, while that of pure aluminium hydroxide is relatively small. Therefore, the EXL in the proposed system (150.9 MJ) is 55% less than that in the conventional system (337.7 MJ) in which the gas compressor and production of aluminium hydroxide consume significantly more exergy. The results also indicate that exergy analysis should be applied to the LCA as a critical measure for practical use, in addition to the conventional LCA of carbon dioxide emission.     

MC180295 Inhibited Epstein–Barr Virus-Associated Gastric Carcinoma Cell Growth by Suppressing DNA Repair and the Cell Cycle

DNA methylation of both viral and host DNA is one of the major mechanisms involved in the development of Epstein–Barr virus-associated gastric carcinoma (EBVaGC); thus, epigenetic treatment using demethylating agents would seem to be promising. We have verified the effect of {"type":"entrez-nucleotide","attrs":{"text":"MC180295","term_id":"1885105835","term_text":"MC180295"}}MC180295, which was discovered by screening for demethylating agents. {"type":"entrez-nucleotide","attrs":{"text":"MC180295","term_id":"1885105835","term_text":"MC180295"}}MC180295 inhibited cell growth of the EBVaGC cell lines YCCEL1 and SNU719 in a dose-dependent manner. In a cell cycle analysis, growth arrest and apoptosis were observed in both YCCEL1 and SNU719 cells treated with {"type":"entrez-nucleotide","attrs":{"text":"MC180295","term_id":"1885105835","term_text":"MC180295"}}MC180295. MKN28 cells infected with EBV were sensitive to {"type":"entrez-nucleotide","attrs":{"text":"MC180295","term_id":"1885105835","term_text":"MC180295"}}MC180295 and showed more significant inhibition of cell growth compared to controls without EBV infection. Serial analysis of gene expression analysis showed the expression of genes belonging to the role of BRCA1 in DNA damage response and cell cycle control chromosomal replication to be significantly reduced after {"type":"entrez-nucleotide","attrs":{"text":"MC180295","term_id":"1885105835","term_text":"MC180295"}}MC180295 treatment. We confirmed with quantitative PCR that the expression levels of BRCA2, FANCM, RAD51, TOP2A, and CDC45 were significantly decreased by {"type":"entrez-nucleotide","attrs":{"text":"MC180295","term_id":"1885105835","term_text":"MC180295"}}MC180295. LMP1 and BZLF1 are EBV genes with expression that is epigenetically regulated, and {"type":"entrez-nucleotide","attrs":{"text":"MC180295","term_id":"1885105835","term_text":"MC180295"}}MC180295 could up-regulate their expression. In conclusion, {"type":"entrez-nucleotide","attrs":{"text":"MC180295","term_id":"1885105835","term_text":"MC180295"}}MC180295 inhibited the growth of EBVaGC cells by suppressing DNA repair and the cell cycle.     

A development of an equilibrium analysis model between electricity retailers under competitive environment

This paper provides a novel equilibrium model for analyzing behaviors of the electric retailers under competitive environment. In the deregulated electricity retail market, the retailers purchase the electricity power and sell it to consumers at the competitive prices. According to their risk attitudes, the retailers optimize the selling prices and the purchase allocation between a day‐ahead market and forward contracts. Without the regulation, an equilibrium by those selfish decision‐making processes of multiple retailers would cause an adverse impact on the electricity market and also the power system. From stable and economical viewpoints, it is important to analyze the unfavorable equilibrium. The selfish behaviors of retailers are modeled as an equilibrium problem with equilibrium constraints in this paper and formulated as a mixed integer linear programming problem to obtain a generalized Nash equilibrium by commercial solvers efficiently. Through computational examples, the proposed model and formulation are validated.