Evasion policies for a vessel being chased by pirate skiffs

Piracy attack is a serious safety problem for maritime transport worldwide. Whilst various strategic actions can be taken, such as rerouting vessels and strengthening navy patrols, this still cannot completely eliminate the possibility of a piracy attack. It is therefore important for a commercial vessel to be equipped with operational solutions in case of piracy attacks. In particular, the choice of a direction for rapidly fleeing is a critical decision for the vessel. In this article, we formulate such a problem as a nonlinear optimal control problem. We consider various policies, such as maintaining a straight direction or making turns, develop algorithms to optimize the policies, and derive conditions under which these policies are effective and safe. Our work can be used as a real‐time decision making tool that enables a vessel master to evaluate different scenarios and quickly make decisions.     

Comparison of rank aggregation methods based on inherent ability

Ranking is a common task for selecting and evaluating alternatives. In the past few decades, combining rankings results from various sources into a consensus ranking has become an increasingly active research topic. In this study, we focus on the evaluation of rank aggregation methods. We first develop an experimental data generation method, which can provide ground truth ranking for alternatives based on their “inherent ability.” This experimental data generation method can generate the required individual synthetic rankings with adjustable accuracy and length. We propose characterizing the effectiveness of rank aggregation methods by calculating the Kendall tau distance between the aggregated ranking and the ground truth ranking. We then compare four classical rank aggregation methods and present some useful findings on the relative performances of the four methods. The results reveal that both the accuracy and length of individual rankings have a remarkable effect on the comparison results between rank aggregation methods. Our methods and results may be helpful to both researchers and decision‐makers.     

大型复杂装备研制项目群风险管理研究

为有效避免研制项目出现"拖、降、涨"等恶性现象,大型复杂装备研制多采用项目群管理模式,由于同时开放了风险环境,增强了子项目间的复杂交互,使得研制项目群风险管理成为制约项目研制成功率的关键因素。目前装备研制风险管理研究以及项目群风险管理研究多是从静态或局部的角度来展开,虽然也有数值仿真方面的研究,但是对不同风险因素间的动态交互行为,及其进而造成的风险动态演化机制缺乏系统的分析,于是项目群风险演化动力学问题成为下一步的重要研究方向。     

作战效能评估方法研究

作战效能评估是指挥决策的基础。随着战争形态由机械化向信息化的转变,作战信息爆炸式增长,战争系统呈现出前所未有的复杂特征,给作战效能评估工作提出了挑战。文章根据效能评估模型建立机理的不同,将效能评估方法分为数学模型驱动、作战模拟驱动、经验驱动和数据驱动,并从每类方法中选取一种或多种典型方法进行介绍,对各类方法的优缺点和适用范围进行比较,分析得出效能评估发展趋势。     

Capacity games for partially complementary products under multivariate random demands

In this study, we consider n firms, each of which produces and sells a different product. The n firms face a common demand stream which requests all their products as a complete set. In addition to the common demand stream, each firm also faces a dedicated demand stream which requires only its own product. The common and dedicated demands are uncertain and follow a general, joint, continuous distribution. Before the demands are realized, each firm needs to determine its capacity or production quantity to maximize its own expected profit. We formulate the problem as a noncooperative game. The sales price per unit for the common demand could be higher or lower than the unit price for the dedicated demand, which affects the firm's inventory rationing policy. Hence, the outcome of the game varies. All of the prices are first assumed to be exogenous. We characterize Nash equilibrium(s) of the game. At the end of the article, we also provide some results for the endogenous pricing. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 59: 146–159, 2012     

Balancing perfectly periodic service schedules: An application from recycling and waste management

A national recycling and waste management company provides periodic services to its customers from over 160 service centers. The services are performed periodically in units of weeks over a planning horizon. The number of truck‐hours allocated to this effort is determined by the maximum weekly workload during the planning horizon. Therefore, minimizing the maximum weekly workload results in minimum operating expenses. The perfectly periodic service scheduling (PPSS) problem is defined based on the practices of the company. It is shown that the PPSS problem is strongly NP‐hard. Attempts to solve large instances by using an integer programming formulation are unsuccessful. Therefore, greedy BestFit heuristics with three different sorting schemes are designed and tested for six real‐world PPSS instances and 80 randomly generated data files. The heuristics provide effective solutions that are within 2% of optimality on average. When the best found BestFit schedules are compared with the existing schedules, it is shown that operational costs are reduced by 18% on average. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 59: 160–171, 2012     

Coordinated pricing and inventory control problems with capacity constraints and fixed ordering cost

This article addresses a single‐item, finite‐horizon, periodic‐review coordinated decision model on pricing and inventory control with capacity constraints and fixed ordering cost. Demands in different periods are random and independent of each other, and their distributions depend on the price in the current period. Each period's stochastic demand function is the additive demand model. Pricing and ordering decisions are made at the beginning of each period, and all shortages are backlogged. The objective is to find an optimal policy that maximizes the total expected discounted profit. We show that the profit‐to‐go function is strongly CK‐concave, and the optimal policy has an (s,S,P) ‐like structure. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2012     

一种面向复杂地理空间栅格数据处理算法并行化的任务调度方法

随着并行计算技术的成熟,地理空间栅格数据处理算法的并行化研究成为新的热点。聚焦于处理流程包含多个计算步骤的复杂地理空间栅格数据处理算法,基于空间计算域理论,提出了一个随着算法处理流程而动态变化的任务调度方法。实验证明,该方法在算法流程的每一个计算步都会调整任务分组方案,因此相比于传统任务调度方法,任务调度的负载均衡效果更好,并行算法程序的运行时间更短。     

公众聚集场所消防监督管理存在问题及对策

近年来 ,我国公众聚集场所群死群伤恶性火灾时有发生 ,原因固然是多方面的 ,但是 ,公众聚集场所在监督和管理两个层面上存在的突出问题和薄弱环节 ,不能不引起我们的高度重视。结合多年来开展消防监督工作的实践 ,从消防法律法规、消防安全管理体制、技术标准等方面分析了公众聚集场所消防安全监督管理存在的问题 ,并提出了相应对策措施。     

从波黑维和看我国维和警察的培训与管理

结合在波黑任务区国际警察部队执行任务的工作实践,IPTF的工作分类及对维和人员的相关要求做了介绍,并对我国维和警察的培训及管理工作提出了建议。