On the application and extension of system signatures in engineering reliability

Following a review of the basic ideas in structural reliability, including signature‐based representation and preservation theorems for systems whose components have independent and identically distributed (i.i.d.) lifetimes, extensions that apply to the comparison of coherent systems of different sizes, and stochastic mixtures of them, are obtained. It is then shown that these results may be extended to vectors of exchangeable random lifetimes. In particular, for arbitrary systems of sizes m < n with exchangeable component lifetimes, it is shown that the distribution of an m‐component system's lifetime can be written as a mixture of the distributions of k‐out‐of‐n systems. When the system has n components, the vector of coefficients in this mixture representation is precisely the signature of the system defined in Samaniego, IEEE Trans Reliabil R–34 (1985) 69–72. These mixture representations are then used to obtain new stochastic ordering properties for coherent or mixed systems of different sizes. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2008     

Discriminating between the Weibull and log‐normal distributions

Log‐normal and Weibull distributions are the most popular distributions for modeling skewed data. In this paper, we consider the ratio of the maximized likelihood in choosing between the two distributions. The asymptotic distribution of the logarithm of the maximized likelihood ratio has been obtained. It is observed that the asymptotic distribution is independent of the unknown parameters. The asymptotic distribution has been used to determine the minimum sample size required to discriminate between two families of distributions for a user specified probability of correct selection. We perform some numerical experiments to observe how the asymptotic methods work for different sample sizes. It is observed that the asymptotic results work quite well even for small samples also. Two real data sets have been analyzed. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2004     

Estimating component characteristics from system failure‐time data

Suppose that failure times are available from a random sample of N systems of a given, fixed design with components which have i.i.d. lifetimes distributed according to a common distribution F. The inverse problem of estimating F from data on observed system lifetimes is considered. Using the known relationship between the system and component lifetime distributions via signature and domination theory, the nonparametric maximum likelihood estimator _N(t) of the component survival function (t) is identified and shown to be accessible numerically in any application of interest. The asymptotic distribution of _N(t) is also identified, facilitating the construction of approximate confidence intervals for (t) for N sufficiently large. Simulation results for samples of size N = 50 and N = 100 for a collection of five parametric lifetime models demonstrate the utility of the recommended estimator. Possible extensions beyond the i.i.d. framework are discussed in the concluding section. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2010     

Changing civilian support for the Maoist conflict in India

Prolonged domestic political conflicts change over time. The Maoist conflict in India which began in the late 1960s is one such conflict. Over time, the ‘old’ Maoist conflict has become a ‘new’ Maoist conflict. Important changes have occurred both in the macro and micro processes of the conflict. Some of these changes include the strategic relocation of the Maoist bases, a shift in the class character of the conflict, the nature of civilian support, and the rebels' methods of operation. While in the 1960s, the conflict was involved in land redistribution with the aim of annihilating class enemies, the recent conflict focuses on caste identities. In addition, it is intrinsically linked with territorial control and local political competition. This has automatically led the Maoists to become involved with local criminal networks and also local business networks based. This involvement has led to financial resources for the conflict. Furthermore, it has forced the local population to become linked with the conflict. Studying these changes is important, especially for counterinsurgency policies.     

Log‐concave and concave distributions in reliability

Nonparametric classes of life distributions are usually based on the pattern of aging in some sense. The common parametric families of life distributions also feature monotone aging. In this paper we consider the class of log‐concave distributions and the subclass of concave distributions. The work is motivated by the fact that most of the common parametric models of life distributions (including Weibull, Gamma, log‐normal, Pareto, and Gompertz distributions) are log‐concave, while the remaining life of maintained and old units tend to have a concave distribution. The classes of concave and log‐concave distributions do not feature monotone aging. Nevertheless, these two classes are shown to have several interesting and useful properties. We examine the closure of these classes under a number of reliability operations, and provide sharp reliability bounds for nonmaintained and maintained units having life distribution belonging to these classes. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 46: 419–433, 1999     

Statistical analysis of exponential lifetimes under an adaptive Type‐II progressive censoring scheme

In this article, a mixture of Type‐I censoring and Type‐II progressive censoring schemes, called an adaptive Type‐II progressive censoring scheme, is introduced for life testing or reliability experiments. For this censoring scheme, the effective sample size m is fixed in advance, and the progressive censoring scheme is provided but the number of items progressively removed from the experiment upon failure may change during the experiment. If the experimental time exceeds a prefixed time T but the number of observed failures does not reach m, we terminate the experiment as soon as possible by adjusting the number of items progressively removed from the experiment upon failure. Computational formulae for the expected total test time are provided. Point and interval estimation of the failure rate for exponentially distributed failure times are discussed for this censoring scheme. The various methods are compared using Monte Carlo simulation. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2009