Callable products for an implicit time model with dependent demands

Capacity providers such as airlines and hotels have traditionally increased revenues by practicing market segmentation and revenue management, enabling them to sell the same capacity pool to different consumers at different prices. Callable products can enhance profits and improve consumers' welfare by allowing the firm to broker capacity between consumers with different willingness to pay. A consumer who buys a callable product gives the capacity provider the right to recall capacity at a prespecified recall price. This article studies callable products in the context of the model most commonly used in industry, which handles time implicitly imposing fewer restrictions on the nature of randomness compared to the Poisson arrival process favored in academia. In the implicit time model, capacity providers set booking limits to protect capacity for future high-fare demand. Our numerical study identifies conditions where callable products result in significant gains in profits.     

Fire truck relocation during major incidents

The effectiveness of a fire department is largely determined by its ability to respond to incidents in a timely manner. To do so, fire departments typically have fire stations spread evenly across the region, and dispatch the closest truck(s) whenever a new incident occurs. However, large gaps in coverage may arise in the case of a major incident that requires many nearby fire trucks over a long period of time, substantially increasing response times for emergencies that occur subsequently. We propose a heuristic for relocating idle trucks during a major incident in order to retain good coverage. This is done by solving a mathematical program that takes into account the location of the available fire trucks and the historic spatial distribution of incidents. This heuristic allows the user to balance the coverage and the number of truck movements. Using extensive simulation experiments we test the heuristic for the operations of the Fire Department of Amsterdam‐Amstelland, and compare it against three other benchmark strategies in a simulation fitted using 10 years of historical data. We demonstrate substantial improvement over the current relocation policy, and show that not relocating during major incidents may lead to a significant decrease in performance.     

Interdiction models for delaying adversarial attacks against critical information technology infrastructure

Information technology (IT) infrastructure relies on a globalized supply chain that is vulnerable to numerous risks from adversarial attacks. It is important to protect IT infrastructure from these dynamic, persistent risks by delaying adversarial exploits. In this paper, we propose max‐min interdiction models for critical infrastructure protection that prioritizes cost‐effective security mitigations to maximally delay adversarial attacks. We consider attacks originating from multiple adversaries, each of which aims to find a “critical path” through the attack surface to complete the corresponding attack as soon as possible. Decision‐makers can deploy mitigations to delay attack exploits, however, mitigation effectiveness is sometimes uncertain. We propose a stochastic model variant to address this uncertainty by incorporating random delay times. The proposed models can be reformulated as a nested max‐max problem using dualization. We propose a Lagrangian heuristic approach that decomposes the max‐max problem into a number of smaller subproblems, and updates upper and lower bounds to the original problem via subgradient optimization. We evaluate the perfect information solution value as an alternative method for updating the upper bound. Computational results demonstrate that the Lagrangian heuristic identifies near‐optimal solutions efficiently, which outperforms a general purpose mixed‐integer programming solver on medium and large instances.     

基于G-AHP的非致命性武器驱散效能评估

定义了非致命性武器驱散效能的概念;根据非致命性武器的研发目的和应用实际,对影响其驱散效能的各相关因素进行逐层递阶划分,建立了较为全面的指标评估体系;提出非致命性武器效能G-AHP评估方法,借鉴专家经验,实现了非致命性武器装备驱散效能的量化评估;案例计算结果符合实际,验证了灰色层次分析法的可行性,为下一步有针对性地使用非致命性武器,提供了有力的科学依据。     

National security,military spending and the business cycle

This paper develops a Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium model where national security is an argument in the agent’s utility function and the government chooses optimally the level of military spending to maximize social welfare. National defense depends on military expenditure and on the strategic environment reflecting a potential hostile external threat. We use aggregate data on consumption, investment, and military spending for the US economy to estimate the parameters of the model. Estimation results suggest that consumption and national defense are complements and that military spending variability is mainly explained by external threat shocks although it also depends on the macroeconomic conditions. We compute impulse response functions of the main macroeconomic variables to several shocks: a total factor productivity shock, a defense technology shock, and a strategic environment shock. Surprisingly, we find that the optimal response to an increase in the external threat (a worsening in the strategic environment) will rise output by reducing consumption and increasing investment.     

A partial characterization of the optimal ordering/rationing policy for a periodic review system with two demand classes and backordering

We consider a finite horizon periodic review, single product inventory system with a fixed setup cost and two stochastic demand classes that differ in their backordering costs. In each period, one must decide whether and how much to order, and how much demand of the lower class should be satisfied. We show that the optimal ordering policy can be characterized as a state dependent (s,S) policy, and the rationing structure is partially obtained based on the subconvexity of the cost function. We then propose a simple heuristic rationing policy, which is easy to implement and close to optimal for intensive numerical examples. We further study the case when the first demand class is deterministic and must be satisfied immediately. We show the optimality of the state dependent (s,S) ordering policy, and obtain additional rationing structural properties. Based on these properties, the optimal ordering and rationing policy for any state can be generated by finding the optimal policy of only a finite set of states, and for each state in this set, the optimal policy is obtained simply by choosing a policy from at most two alternatives. An efficient algorithm is then proposed. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2010     

激波诱导惰性堆积粉尘运动的建模及数值模拟

基于空间平均的双流体模型 ,引入描述颗粒脉动速度的粒化温度 ,建立颗粒相的本构方程 ,将粒化温度模型推广到解决高速流动问题。采用AUSM+ 有限差分法 ,数值模拟激波在一定厚度的惰性粉尘床中传播及诱导粉尘颗粒运动的过程。结果表明 ,粒化温度模型较好地描述了这一过程 ,证实了此模型在处理稠密颗粒高速流动和流场存在强间断中的可行性     

泥沙传输方程广义初边值问题的解析解与差分解比较

Cheng提出了泥沙传输问题的广义底边界条件并导出了具有复杂形式的解析解 ,解析解的求解过程中还需求解两个超越方程。本文一方面分析了解析解的复杂性 ,简化了超越方程根的搜索区间 ,另一方面 ,通过数值试验 ,得到了一类稳定的差分格式 ,格式参数为 0 .48≤Θ ≤ 1 ,数值例子表明 :对于稳定的差分格式 ,差分数值解具有很好的逼近效果。     

Performance analysis of queue length monitoring of M/G/1 systems

This study investigates the statistical process control application for monitoring queue length data in M/G/1 systems. Specifically, we studied the average run length (ARL) characteristics of two different control charts for detecting changes in system utilization. First, the nL chart monitors the sums of successive queue length samples by subgrouping individual observations with sample size n. Next is the individual chart with a warning zone whose control scheme is specified by two pairs of parameters, (upper control limit, d_u) and (lower control limit, d_l), as proposed by Bhat and Rao (Oper Res 20 (1972) 955–966). We will present approaches to calculate ARL for the two types of control charts using the Markov chain formulation and also investigate the effects of parameters of the control charts to provide useful design guidelines for better performance. Extensive numerical results are included for illustration. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2011     

基于属性的舰载机航材备件品种确定方法

航材备件品种确定是舰载机供应保障工作的重要内容。基于属性对舰载机航材备件品种确定进行研究。基于粗糙集理论对属性集进行属性约简,确定航材备件品种确定的主要影响属性,然后基于属性约简进行航材备件品种确定。给出了单属性、顺次属性和多属性的品种决策方法。最后结合实例进行了应用分析。