This book focuses on new and emerging data mining solutions that offer a greater level of transparency than existing solutions. Transparent data mining solutions with desirable properties (e.g. effective, fully automatic, scalable) are covered in the book. Experimental findings of transparent solutions are tailored to different domain experts, and experimental metrics for evaluating algorithmic transparency are presented. The book also discusses societal effects of black box vs. transparent approaches to data mining, as well as real-world use cases for these approaches.As algorithms increasingly support different aspects of modern life, a greater level of transparency is sorely needed, not least because discrimination and biases have to be avoided. With contributions from domain experts, this book provides an overview of an emerging area of data mining that has profound societal consequences, and provides the technical background to for readers to contribute to the field or to put existing approaches to practical use.

This book introduces readers to MesoBioNano (MBN) Explorer - a multi-purpose software package designed to model molecular systems at various levels of size and complexity. In addition, it presents a specially designed multi-task toolkit and interface - the MBN Studio - which enables the set-up of input files, controls the simulations, and supports the subsequent visualization and analysis of the results obtained. The book subsequently provides a systematic description of the capabilities of this universal and powerful software package within the framework of computational molecular science, and guides readers through its applications in numerous areas of research in bio- and chemical physics and material science - ranging from the nano- to the mesoscale. MBN Explorer is particularly suited to computing the system's energy, to optimizing molecular structure, and to exploring the various facets of molecular and random walk dynamics. The package allows the use of a broad variety of interatomic potentials and can, e.g., be configured to select any subset of a molecular system as rigid fragments, whenever a significant reduction in the number of dynamical degrees of freedom is required for computational practicalities. MBN Studio enables users to easily construct initial geometries for the molecular, liquid, crystalline, gaseous and hybrid systems that serve as input for the subsequent simulations of their physical and chemical properties using MBN Explorer. Despite its universality, the computational efficiency of MBN Explorer is comparable to that of other, more specialized software packages, making it a viable multi-purpose alternative for the computational modeling of complex molecular systems. A number of detailed case studies presented in the second part of this book demonstrate MBN Explorer's usefulness and efficiency in the fields of atomic clusters and nanoparticles, biomolecular systems, nanostructured materials, composite materials and hybrid systems, crystals, liquids and gases, as well as in providing modeling support for novel and emerging technologies. Last but not least, with the release of the 3rd edition of MBN Explorer in spring 2017, a free trial version will be available from the MBN Research Center website (mbnresearch.com).

This book disseminates the current trends among innovative and high-quality research regarding the implementation of conceptual frameworks, strategies, techniques, methodologies, informatics platforms and models for developing advanced industrial tools and techniques and their application in different fields. It presents a collection of theoretical, real-world and original research works in the field of applied industrial tools and techniques. The text goes beyond the state-of-the-art in the field of industrial and software engineering, listing successful applications and use cases of studies of new approaches, applications, methods, techniques for developing advanced industrial tools, methodologies and techniques and their application in different fields. The topics covered in this book are of interest to academics, researchers, students, stakeholders and consultants.

This book is open access under a CC BY 4.0 license. This book summarizes work being pursued in the context of the CIPRNet (Critical Infrastructure Preparedness and Resilience Research Network) research project, co-funded by the European Union under the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7). The project is intended to provide concrete and on-going support to the Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP) research communities, enhancing their preparedness for CI-related emergencies, while also providing expertise and technologies for other stakeholders to promote their understanding and mitigation of the consequences of CI disruptions, leading to enhanced resilience. The book collects the tutorial material developed by the authors for several courses on the modelling, simulation and analysis of CIs, representing extensive and integrated CIP expertise. It will help CI stakeholders, CI operators and civil protection authorities understand the complex system of CIs, and help them adapt to these changes and threats in order to be as prepared as possible for mitigating emergencies and crises affecting or arising from CIs.

This book presents for the first time a methodology that combines the power of a modelling formalism such as colored petri nets with the flexibility of a discrete event program such as SIMIO. Industrial practitioners have seen the growth of simulation as a methodology for tacking problems in which variability is the common denominator. Practically all industrial systems, from manufacturing to aviation are considered stochastic systems. Different modelling techniques have been developed as well as mathematical techniques for formalizing the cause-effect relationships in industrial and complex systems. The methodology in this book illustrates how complexity in modelling can be tackled by the use of coloured petri nets, while at the same time the variability present in systems is integrated in a robust fashion. The book can be used as a concise guide for developing robust models, which are able to efficiently simulate the cause-effect relationships present in complex industrial systems without losing the simulation power of discrete-event simulation. In addition SIMIO's capabilities allows integration of features that are becoming more and more important for the success of projects such as animation, virtual reality, and geographical information systems (GIS).

This book presents a collection of results from the interdisciplinary research project "ELLI" published by researchers at RWTH Aachen University, the TU Dortmund and Ruhr-Universitat Bochum between 2011 and 2016. All contributions showcase essential research results, concepts and innovative teaching methods to improve engineering education. Further, they focus on a variety of areas, including virtual and remote teaching and learning environments, student mobility, support throughout the student lifecycle, and the cultivation of interdisciplinary skills.

This book is a comprehensive guide to several aspects of risk, including information systems, disaster management, supply chain and disaster management perspectives. A major portion of this book is devoted to presenting a number of operations research models that have been (or could be) applied to enterprise supply risk management, especially from the supply chain perspective. Each chapter of this book can be used as a unique module on a different topics with dedicated examples, definitions and discussion notes. This book comes at a time when the world is increasingly challenged by different forms of risk and how to manage them. Events of the 21st Century have made enterprise risk management even more critical. Risks such as suspicions surrounding top-management structures, financial and technology bubbles (especially since 2008), as well as the demonstrated risk from terrorism, such as the 9/11 attack in the U.S. as well as more recent events in France, Belgium, and other locations in Europe, have a tremendous impact on many facets of business. Businesses, in fact, exist to cope with risk in their area of specialization.

This book presents a multi-disciplinary investigation into extortion rackets with a particular focus on the structures of criminal organisations and their collapse, societal processes in which extortion rackets strive and fail and the impacts of bottom-up and top-down ways of fighting extortion racketeering. Through integrating a range of disciplines and methods the book provides an extensive case study of empirically based computational social science. It is based on a wealth of qualitative data regarding multiple extortion rackets, such as the Sicilian Mafia, an international money laundering organisation and a predatory extortion case in Germany. Computational methods are used for data analysis, to help in operationalising data for use in agent-based models and to explore structures and dynamics of extortion racketeering through simulations. In addition to textual data sources, stakeholders and experts are extensively involved, providing narratives for analysis and qualitative validation of models. The book presents a systematic application of computational social science methods to the substantive area of extortion racketeering. The reader will gain a deep understanding of extortion rackets, in particular their entrenchment in society and processes supporting and undermining extortion rackets. Also covered are computational social science methods, in particular computationally assisted text analysis and agent-based modelling, and the integration of empirical, theoretical and computational social science.

There have been substantial developments in meshfree methods, particle methods, and generalized finite element methods since the mid 1990s. The growing interest in these methods is in part due to the fact that they offer extremely flexible numerical tools and can be interpreted in a number of ways. For instance, meshfree methods can be viewed as a natural extension of classical finite element and finite difference methods to scattered node configurations with no fixed connectivity. Furthermore, meshfree methods have a number of advantageous features that are especially attractive when dealing with multiscale phenomena: A-priori knowledge about the solution's particular local behavior can easily be introduced into the meshfree approximation space, and coarse scale approximations can be seamlessly refined by adding fine scale information. However, the implementation of meshfree methods and their parallelization also requires special attention, for instance with respect to numerical integration.

The book presents a compilation of studies regarding applied geomechanics, mining, and excavation analysis and simulation. The material is suitable for presentation to senior undergraduate and post-graduate students in both mining and geological engineering. It should also be of interest to students of other aspects of Geomechanics and, notably, engineering geologists interested in mining and underground excavation design. Practising mining engineers and rock mechanics engineers involved in mine design may use the book profitably to obtain an appreciation of the current state of engineering knowledge in their area of specialisation. Papers were selected from the 5th GeoChina International Conference on Civil Infrastructures Confronting Severe Weathers and Climate Changes: From Failure to Sustainability, held in July 23-25, 2018 in Hang Zhou, China.

This book covers dynamic simulation of deformable objects, which is one of the most challenging tasks in computer graphics and visualization. It focuses on the simulation of deformable models with anisotropic materials, one of the less common approaches in the existing research. Both physically-based and geometrically-based approaches are examined. The authors start with transversely isotropic materials for the simulation of deformable objects with fibrous structures. Next, they introduce a fiber-field incorporated corotational finite element model (CLFEM) that works directly with a constitutive model of transversely isotropic material. A smooth fiber-field is used to establish the local frames for each element. To introduce deformation simulation for orthotropic materials, an orthotropic deformation controlling frame-field is conceptualized and a frame construction tool is developed for users to define the desired material properties. The orthotropic frame-field is coupled with the CLFEM model to complete an orthotropic deformable model. Finally, the authors present an integrated real-time system for animation of skeletal characters with anisotropic tissues. To solve the problems of volume distortion and high computational costs, a strain-based PBD framework for skeletal animation is explained; natural secondary motion of soft tissues is another benefit. The book is written for those researchers who would like to develop their own algorithms. The key mathematical and computational concepts are presented together with illustrations and working examples. It can also be used as a reference book for graduate students and senior undergraduates in the areas of computer graphics, computer animation, and virtual reality. Academics, researchers, and professionals will find this to be an exceptional resource.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 22nd International Symposium on Formal Methods, FM 2018, held in Oxford, UK, in July 2018. The 44 full papers presented together with 2 invited papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 110 submissions. They present formal methods for developing and evaluating systems. Examples include autonomous systems, robots, and cyber-physical systems in general. The papers cover a broad range of topics in the following areas: interdisciplinary formal methods; formal methods in practice; tools for formal methods; role of formal methods in software systems engineering; and theoretical foundations.

This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed proceedings of the Clausthal-Goettingen International Workshop on Simulation Science, held in Goettingen, Germany, in April 2017. The 16 full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 40 submissions. The papers are organized in topical sections on simulation and optimization in networks, simulation of materials, distributed simulations.

The book presents the state of the art in high-performance computing and simulation on modern supercomputer architectures. It explores general trends in hardware and software development, and then focuses specifically on the future of high-performance systems and heterogeneous architectures. It also covers applications such as computational fluid dynamics, material science, medical applications and climate research and discusses innovative fields like coupled multi-physics or multi-scale simulations. The papers included were selected from the presentations given at the 20th Workshop on Sustained Simulation Performance at the HLRS, University of Stuttgart, Germany in December 2015, and the subsequent Workshop on Sustained Simulation Performance at Tohoku University in February 2016.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Integrated Formal Methods, IFM 2018, held in Maynooth, Ireland, in September 2018. The 17 full papers and 5 short papers presented together with 3 invited talks were carefully reviewed and selected from 60 submissions. The conference covers a broad spectrum of topics: from language design, to verification and analysis techniques, to supporting tools and their integration into software engineering practice.

This classroom-texted textbook/reference presents a set of useful modeling techniques, describing how these can be combined into a powerful framework for the analysis and design of business systems. These techniques follow an interactive modeling and simulation (IMS) approach, enabling the modeling and simulation of separate parts of the system at different levels of abstraction, and the composition of these parts in a flexible crosscutting manner that preserves the behavior of the individual parts. Topics and features: presents a detailed introduction to the foundations of IMS for business system design, covering protocol modeling and goal modeling semantics; describes the practical application of IMS for business system design, illustrated by a selection of useful case studies; highlights the advantages of this approach to IMS for business system design, with a focus on performance management, motivation modeling, and communication; includes review questions and exercises at the end of each chapter.

This book focuses on computational modeling and simulation research that advances the current state-of-the-art regarding human factors in this area. It reports on cutting-edge simulators such as virtual and augmented reality, on multisensory environments, and on modeling and simulation methods used in various applications, including surgery, military operations, occupational safety, sports training, education, transportation and robotics. Based on the AHFE 2018 International Conference on Human Factors in Simulation and Modeling, held on July 21-25, 2018, in Orlando, Florida, USA, the book serves as a timely reference guide for researchers and practitioners developing new modeling and simulation tools for analyzing or improving human performance. It also offers a unique resource for modelers seeking insights into human factors research and more feasible and reliable computational tools to foster advances in this exciting research field.

This book is a practical, step-by-step introduction to microsimulation in demography. It shows how to use Modgen, a powerful and free microsimulation platform built by Statistics Canada. The authors' hands-on explanation of model development will help readers make their own. The book teaches how to create and run a simple cohort model with a single fixed-rate event, and builds upon this concept. It introduces how to develop both a single state life table as well as a multiple increment-decrement life table using the tools provided by Modgen. The authors illustrate how to easily upgrade an existing model by adding new modules and new dimensions as determinants of a risk already modeled. The integration of a fertility module and a base population allows the user to bring new actors into the simulation and transform a cohort-based model into a population-based one. The final addition of an international migration module allows the user to accomplish fully open, multi-regional projections. This accessible introduction will be of interest to researchers and students in population studies and other social sciences. It will also appeal to anyone interested in the computational modeling of population dynamics.

This book highlights recent developments in the field, presented at the Social Simulation 2015 conference in Groningen, The Netherlands. It covers advances both in applications and methods of social simulation. Societal issues addressed range across complexities in economic systems, opinion dynamics and civil violence, changing mobility patterns, different land-use, transition in the energy system, food production and consumption, ecosystem management and historical processes. Methodological developments cover how to use empirical data in validating models in general, formalization of behavioral theory in agent behavior, construction of artificial populations for experimentation, replication of models, and agent-based models that can be run in a web browser. Social simulation is a rapidly evolving field. Social scientists are increasingly interested in social simulation as a tool to tackle the complex non-linear dynamics of society. Furthermore, the software and hardware tools available for social simulation are becoming more and more powerful. This book is an important source for readers interested in the newest developments in the ways in which the simulation of social interaction contributes to our understanding and managing of complex social phenomena.

This book focuses on the mathematical potential and computational efficiency of the Boundary Element Method (BEM) for modeling seismic wave propagation in either continuous or discrete inhomogeneous elastic/viscoelastic, isotropic/anisotropic media containing multiple cavities, cracks, inclusions and surface topography. BEM models may take into account the entire seismic wave path from the seismic source through the geological deposits all the way up to the local site under consideration. The general presentation of the theoretical basis of elastodynamics for inhomogeneous and heterogeneous continua in the first part is followed by the analytical derivation of fundamental solutions and Green's functions for the governing field equations by the usage of Fourier and Radon transforms. The numerical implementation of the BEM is for antiplane in the second part as well as for plane strain boundary value problems in the third part. Verification studies and parametric analysis appear throughout the book, as do both recent references and seminal ones from the past. Since the background of the authors is in solid mechanics and mathematical physics, the presented BEM formulations are valid for many areas such as civil engineering, geophysics, material science and all others concerning elastic wave propagation through inhomogeneous and heterogeneous media. The material presented in this book is suitable for self-study. The book is written at a level suitable for advanced undergraduates or beginning graduate students in solid mechanics, computational mechanics and fracture mechanics.

The information infrastructure - comprising computers, embedded devices, networks and software systems - is vital to day-to-day operations in every sector: information and telecommunications, banking and finance, energy, chemicals and hazardous materials, agriculture, food, water, public health, emergency services, transportation, postal and shipping, government and defense. Global business and industry, governments, indeed society itself, cannot function effectively if major components of the critical information infrastructure are degraded, disabled or destroyed. Critical Infrastructure Protection describes original research results and innovative applications in the interdisciplinary field of critical infrastructure protection. Also, it highlights the importance of weaving science, technology and policy in crafting sophisticated, yet practical, solutions that will help secure information, computer and network assets in the various critical infrastructure sectors. Areas of coverage include: themes and issues; control systems security; infrastructure modeling and simulation; risk and impact assessment. This book is the tenth volume in the annual series produced by the International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP) Working Group 11.10 on Critical Infrastructure Protection, an international community of scientists, engineers, practitioners and policy makers dedicated to advancing research, development and implementation efforts focused on infrastructure protection. The book contains a selection of fourteen edited papers from the Tenth Annual IFIP WG 11.10 International Conference on Critical Infrastructure Protection, held at SRI International, Arlington, Virginia, USA in the spring of 2016. Critical Infrastructure Protection is an important resource for researchers, faculty members and graduate students, as well as for policy makers, practitioners and other individuals with interests in homeland security.

This book extends the conventional two-dimensional (2D) magnet arrangement into 3D pattern for permanent magnet linear machines for the first time, and proposes a novel dual Halbach array. It can not only effectively increase the radial component of magnetic flux density and output force of tubular linear machines, but also significantly reduce the axial flux density, radial force and thus system vibrations and noises. The book is also the first to address the fundamentals and provide a summary of conventional arrays, as well as novel concepts for PM pole design in electric linear machines. It covers theoretical study, numerical simulation, design optimization and experimental works systematically. The design concept and analytical approaches can be implemented to other linear and rotary machines with similar structures. The book will be of interest to academics, researchers, R&D engineers and graduate students in electronic engineering and mechanical engineering who wish to learn the core principles, methods, and applications of linear and rotary machines.

This is a revised and updated second edition, including new chapters on temporal and point uncertainty model, as well as on sampling and deterministic modeling. It is a comprehensive presentation of spatial modeling techniques used in the earth sciences, outlining original techniques developed by the author. Data collection in the earth sciences is difficult and expensive, but simple, rational and logical approaches help the reader to appreciate the fundamentals of advanced methodologies. It requires special care to gather accurate geological, hydrogeological, meteorological and hydrological information all with risk assessments. Spatial simulation methodologies in the earth sciences are essential, then, if we want to understand the variability in features such as fracture frequencies, rock quality, and grain size distribution in rock and porous media. This book outlines in a detailed yet accessible way the main spatial modeling techniques, in particular the Kriging methodology. It also presents many unique physical approaches, field cases, and sample interpretations. Since Kriging's origin in the 1960s it has been developed into a number of new methods such as cumulative SV (CSV), point CSV (PCSV), and spatial dependence function, which have been applied in different aspects of the earth sciences. Each one of these techniques is explained in this book, as well as how they are used to model earth science phenomena such as geology, earthquakes, meteorology, and hydrology. In addition to Kriging and its variants, several alternatives to Kriging methodology are presented and the necessary steps in their applications are clearly explained. Simple spatial variation prediction methodologies are also revised with up-to-date literature, and the ways in which they relate to more advanced spatial modeling methodologies are explained. The book is a valuable resource for students, researchers and professionals of a broad range of disciplines including geology, geography, hydrology, meteorology, environment, image processing, spatial modeling and related topics. Keywords "Data mining - Geo-statistics - Kriging - Regional uncertainty - Spatial dependence - Spatial modeling - geographic data - geoscience - hydrology - image processing

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 11 workshops co-located with the 16th International Conference on Practical Applications of Agents and Multi-Agent Systems, PAAMS 2018, held in Toledo, Spain, in June 2018. The 47 full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 72 submissions. The volume presents the papers that have been accepted for the following workshops: Workshop on Agents and Multi-agent Systems for AAL and e-HEALTH; Workshop on Agent based Applications for Air Transport; Workshop on Agent-based Artificial Markets Computational Economics; Workshop on Agent-Based Solutions for Manufacturing and Supply Chain; Workshop on MAS for Complex Networks and Social Computation; Workshop on Intelligent Systems and Context Information Fusion; Workshop on Multi-agent based Applications for Energy Markets, Smart Grids and Sustainable Energy Systems; Workshop on Multiagent System based Learning Environments; Workshop on Smart Cities and Intelligent Agents; Workshop on Swarm Intelligence and Swarm Robotics; Workshop on Multi-Agent Systems and Simulation.