Evaluating the impact of smart technologies on harbor’s logistics via BPMN modeling and simulation

A smart Information and Communication Technology (ICT) enables a synchronized interplay of different key factors, aligning infrastructures, consumers, and governmental policy-making needs. In the harbor’s logistics context, smart ICT has been driving a multi-year wave of growth. Although there is a standalone value in the technological innovation of a task, the impact of a new smart technology is unknown without quantitative analysis methods on the end-to-end process. In this paper, we first present a review of the smart ICT for marine container terminals, and then we propose to evaluate the impact of such smart ICT via business process model and notation (BPMN) modeling and simulation. The proposed approach is discussed in a real-world modeling and simulation analysis, made on a pilot terminal of the Port of Leghorn (Italy).     

Abstract reduction in directed model checking CCS processes

Model checking tools face a combinatorial blow up of the state-space (commonly known as the state explosion problem) that must be addressed to formally verify concurrent systems. We propose an approach combining abstraction techniques and heuristic search to overcome the problem above. In particular, heuristic search can avoid the bottleneck of the exhaustive exploration of the global state graph of a system, while retaining the advantages of abstraction techniques.     

Conjugation of amino-bioactive glasses with 5-aminofluorescein as probe molecule for the development of pH sensitive stimuli-responsive biomaterials

Bioceramics, such as silica-based glasses, are widely used in bone and teeth restoration. Nowadays, the association between nanotechnology and pharmacology is one of the most promising research fields in cancer therapy. The advanced processing methods and new chemical strategies allow the incorporation of drugs within them or on their functionalized surfaces. Bioceramics can act as local drug delivery systems to treat bone and teeth diseases. The present paper reports data related to the development of a pH-stimuli responsive bioactive glass. The glass conjugation with 5-aminofluorescein (5-AF), through a pH-sensitive organic spacer, allows to produce a pH-responsive bioactive biomaterial: when it is exposed to specific pH changes, it can favour the release of 5-AF directly at the target site. 5-AF has been chosen as a simple, low cost, non toxic model to simulate doxorubicin, an anticancer drug. As doxorubicin, 5-AF contains an amino group in its structure in order to form an amide bond with the carboxylic functionalities of the glass. Raman spectroscopy and thermal analysis confirm the glass conjugation of 5-AF by means of an amide bond; the amount of 5-AF loaded was very high (≈65 and 44 wt%). The release tests at two different pH (4.2 and 7.4) show that the amount of released 5-AF is higher at acid pH with respect to physiological one. This preliminary datum evidenced that a pH-sensitive drug delivery system has been developed. The low amount of 5-AF released (<1 wt% of the total 5-AF) is due to the very low solubility of 5-AF in aqueous medium. This disadvantage, may be overcome in a dynamic environment (physiological conditions), where it is possible to obtain a drug release system ensuring an effective therapeutic dose for long times and, at the same time, avoiding the drug toxicity.     

Reduced Models for Efficient CCS Verification

Verification of a concurrent system can be accomplished by model checking the properties on a structure representing the system; this structure is, in general, a transition system which contains a prohibitive number of states. In this paper, we apply a method to reduce the state explosion problem by pointing out the events of the system to be ignored on the basis of the property to be verified. We evaluate the method by means of a real application used as a case study: the system is specified by a CCS program, then the program is reduced by means of syntactic rules; afterwards, the corresponding transition system is built by means of a non-standard operational semantics, which performs further reductions during the construction. Prototype tools perform both kinds of reductions; finally the required properties are checked by means of the model checkers of the CWB-NC.     

A methodology for the quantitative risk assessment of major accidents triggered by seismic events

A procedure for the quantitative risk assessment of accidents triggered by seismic events in industrial facilities was developed. The starting point of the procedure was the use of available historical data to assess the expected frequencies and the severity of seismic events. Available equipment-dependant failure probability models (vulnerability or fragility curves) were used to assess the damage probability of equipment items due to a seismic event. An analytic procedure was subsequently developed to identify, evaluate the credibility and finally assess the expected consequences of all the possible scenarios that may follow the seismic events. The procedure was implemented in a GIS-based software tool in order to manage the high number of event sequences that are likely to be generated in large industrial facilities. The developed methodology requires a limited amount of additional data with respect to those used in a conventional QRA, and yields with a limited effort a preliminary quantitative assessment of the contribution of the scenarios triggered by earthquakes to the individual and societal risk indexes. The application of the methodology to several case-studies evidenced that the scenarios initiated by seismic events may have a relevant influence on industrial risk, both raising the overall expected frequency of single scenarios and causing specific severe scenarios simultaneously involving several plant units.     

Modular formal verification of specifications of concurrent systems

In this paper, we propose a bottom‐up approach for the verification of systems with modular structure: we prove that when the modules are composed in specific ways, the complete software system verifies a composition of the properties each component does. We focus on the process of upgrading systems with new functionalities, where the validity of old requirements needs to be ensured, but also an understanding of the new properties the upgraded system would enjoy is useful. In this work, we assume each component to be specified by a CCS process, and the properties to be expressed by selective mu‐calculus formulae. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Immunohistochemical Analysis of DNA Repair- and Drug-Efflux-Associated Molecules in Tumor and Peritumor Areas of Glioblastoma

Glioblastoma (GBM), the most commonly occurring primary tumor arising within the central nervous system, is characterized by high invasiveness and poor prognosis. In spite of the improvement in surgical techniques, along with the administration of chemo- and radiation therapy and the incessant investigation in search of prospective therapeutic targets, the local recurrence that frequently occurs within the peritumoral brain tissue makes GBM the most malignant and terminal type of astrocytoma. In the current study, we investigated both GBM and peritumoral tissues obtained from 55 hospitalized patients and the expression of three molecules involved in the onset of resistance/unresponsiveness to chemotherapy: O6-methylguanine methyltransferase (MGMT), breast cancer resistance protein (BCRP1), and A2B5. We propose that the expression of these molecules in the peritumoral tissue might be crucial to promoting the development of early tumorigenic events in the tissue surrounding GBM as well as responsible for the recurrence originating in this apparently normal area and, accordingly, for the resistance to treatment with the standard chemotherapeutic regimen. Notably, the inverse correlation found between MGMT expression in peritumoral tissue and patients’ survival suggests a prognostic role for this protein.     

A Petri nets semantics for data flow networks

This work presents a truly concurrent operational semantics for nondeterministic data flow networks. We introduce a model, the df-process, which is a notion similar to that of non-sequential process for a Petri net: a df-process is defined as a mapping from an occurrence net K to a data flow net N, such that the places and the transitions of K are mapped onto the channels and the nodes of N. A df-process contains, by means of some labelling of the places, information on the value and the order in which data flow through the channels during a computation. Df-processes for a data flow network are characterized in an abstract way by a set of properties and in general a df-process corresponds to a set of computations of the network. We give a way to build the df-process corresponding to a computation incrementally at each event occurrence: a main result of the paper is that the incremental construction yields exactly the same set of df-processes as abstractly defined. We also show that df-processes are compositional. The model is intended to be used by distributed systems designers: it contains enough information to be a guideline for the designer and to be a base to develop dynamic checking tools. We outline how df-processes can be used in the design phase of a system.Research supported in part by Progetto Coordinato CNR ANATRA     

The iterative solution of large systems of linear equations: some new empirical criteria and tests

Research into the numerical solution of large systems by substitution strategies is presented, with particular reference to the Jacobi and Gauss-Seidel methods. Special attention is paid to the prediction of the convergence behavior of these iterative processes. The use of computers now allows one to obtain statistical information about these processes, where deterministic mathematical devices are insufficient or where their application is too complex or prohibitive.Using some rigorous mathematical properties and experience, effective statistical criteria are proposed for the prediction of convergence or divergence of an iterative scheme for a given set of linear equations. The total number of the system dealt with here, in the course of the analysis performed, has been over 6500; the maximum system order was 1000. In addition to the general results, the adopted and derived criteria are described. These suggest a methodology which enables one to obtain further information in particular cases.     

Optimal joint routing and link scheduling for real-time traffic in TDMA Wireless Mesh Networks

We investigate the problem of joint routing and link scheduling in Time-Division Multiple Access (TDMA) Wireless Mesh Networks (WMNs) carrying real-time traffic. We propose a framework that always computes a feasible solution (i.e. a set of paths and link activations) if there exists one, by optimally solving a mixed integer-nonlinear problem. Such solution can be computed in minutes or tens thereof for e.g. grids of up to 4 × 4 nodes. We also propose heuristics based on Lagrangian decomposition to compute suboptimal solutions considerably faster and/or for larger WMNs, up to about 50 nodes. We show that the heuristic solutions are near-optimal, and we exploit them to gain insight on the schedulability in WMN, i.e. to investigate the optimal placement of one or more gateways from a delay bound perspective, and to investigate how the schedulability is affected by the transmission range.