ALBERT

Description:    Evolutionary computation has been little, but steadily, used in the CAD community during the past 20 years. Nowadays, due to their overwhelming complexity, significant steps in the validation of microprocessors must be performed on silicon, i.e., running experiments on physical devices after tape-out. The scenario created new space for innovative heuristics. This paper shows a methodology based on an evolutionary algorithm that can be used to devise assembly programs suitable for a range of on-silicon activities. The paper describes how to take into account complex hardware characteristics and architectural details. The experimental evaluation performed on two high-end Intel microprocessors demonstrates the potentiality of this line of research. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-18 DOI 10.1007/s00607-011-0157-9 Authors Giovanni Squillero, Politecnico di Torino, Turin, Italy Journal Computing Online ISSN 1436-5057 Print ISSN 0010-485X

Description:    Fault tree analysis is a method to determine the likelihood of a system attaining an undesirable state based on the information about its lower level parts. However, conventional approaches cannot process imprecise or incomplete data. There are a number of ways to solve this problem. In this paper, we will consider the one that is based on the Dempster–Shafer theory. The major advantage of the techniques proposed here is the use of verified methods (in particular, interval analysis) to handle Dempster–Shafer structures in an efficient and consistent way. First, we concentrate on DSI (Dempster–Shafer with intervals), a recently developed tool. It is written in MATLAB and serves as a basis for a new add-on for Dempster–Shafer based fault tree analysis. This new add-on will be described in detail in the second part of our paper. Here, we propagate experts’ statements with uncertainties through fault trees, using mixing based on arithmetic averaging. Furthermore, we introduce an implementation of the interval scale based algorithm for estimating system reliability, extended by new input distributions. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-12 DOI 10.1007/s00607-011-0179-3 Authors Gabor Rebner, University of Duisburg-Essen, 47048 Duisburg, Germany Ekaterina Auer, University of Duisburg-Essen, 47048 Duisburg, Germany Wolfram Luther, University of Duisburg-Essen, 47048 Duisburg, Germany Journal Computing Online ISSN 1436-5057 Print ISSN 0010-485X

Description:    The deployment of sensors without enough coverage can result in unreliable outputs in wireless sensor networks (WSNs). Thus sensing coverage is one of the most important quality of service factors in WSNs. A useful metric for quantifying the coverage reliability is the coverage rate that is the area covered by sensor nodes in a region of interest. The network sink can be informed about locations of all nodes and calculate the coverage rate centrally. However, this approach creates huge load on the network nodes that had to send their location information to the sink. Thus, a distributed approach is required to calculate the coverage rate. This paper is among the very first to provide a localized approach to calculate the coverage rate. We provide two coverage rate calculation (CRC) protocols, namely distributed exact coverage rate calculation (DECRC) and distributed probabilistic coverage rate calculation (DPCRC). DECRC calculates the coverage rate precisely using the idealized disk graph model. Precise calculation of the coverage rate is a unique property of DECRC compared to similar works that have used the disk graph model. In contrast, DPCRC uses a more realistic model that is probabilistic coverage model to determine an approximate coverage rate. DPCRC is in fact an extended version of DECRC that uses a set of localized techniques to make it a low cost protocol. Simulation results show significant overall performance improvement of CRC protocols compared to related works. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-24 DOI 10.1007/s00607-012-0192-1 Authors Saeed Sedighian Kashi, Iran University of Science and Technology, Tehran, Iran Mohsen Sharifi, Iran University of Science and Technology, Tehran, Iran Journal Computing Online ISSN 1436-5057 Print ISSN 0010-485X

Description:    Nanoinformatics has recently emerged to address the need of computing applications at the nano level. In this regard, the authors have participated in various initiatives to identify its concepts, foundations and challenges. While nanomaterials open up the possibility for developing new devices in many industrial and scientific areas, they also offer breakthrough perspectives for the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of diseases. In this paper, we analyze the different aspects of nanoinformatics and suggest five research topics to help catalyze new research and development in the area, particularly focused on nanomedicine. We also encompass the use of informatics to further the biological and clinical applications of basic research in nanoscience and nanotechnology, and the related concept of an extended “nanotype” to coalesce information related to nanoparticles. We suggest how nanoinformatics could accelerate developments in nanomedicine, similarly to what happened with the Human Genome and other -omics projects, on issues like exchanging modeling and simulation methods and tools, linking toxicity information to clinical and personal databases or developing new approaches for scientific ontologies, among many others. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-19 DOI 10.1007/s00607-012-0191-2 Authors Victor Maojo, Biomedical Informatics Group, Departamento de Inteligencia Artificial, Faculdad de Informática, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Boadilla del Monte, 28660 Madrid, Spain Martin Fritts, SAIC-Frederick Inc., National Cancer Institute at Frederick, Frederick, MD, USA Fernando Martin-Sanchez, Health and Biomedical Informatics Research Laboratory Medical School-IBES, The University of Melbourne, Parkville, VIC, Australia Diana De la Iglesia, Biomedical Informatics Group, Departamento de Inteligencia Artificial, Faculdad de Informática, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Boadilla del Monte, 28660 Madrid, Spain Raul E. Cachau, Advanced Biomedical Computing Center, National Cancer Institute, SAIC-Frederick Inc., Frederick, MD, USA Miguel Garcia-Remesal, Biomedical Informatics Group, Departamento de Inteligencia Artificial, Faculdad de Informática, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Boadilla del Monte, 28660 Madrid, Spain Jose Crespo, Biomedical Informatics Group, Departamento de Inteligencia Artificial, Faculdad de Informática, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Boadilla del Monte, 28660 Madrid, Spain Joyce A. Mitchell, Biomedical Informatics Department, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA Alberto Anguita, Biomedical Informatics Group, Departamento de Inteligencia Artificial, Faculdad de Informática, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Boadilla del Monte, 28660 Madrid, Spain Nathan Baker, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Richland, WA, USA Jose Maria Barreiro, Biomedical Informatics Group, Departamento de Inteligencia Artificial, Faculdad de Informática, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Boadilla del Monte, 28660 Madrid, Spain Sonia E. Benitez, Department of Medical Informatics, Hospital Italiano de Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires, Argentina Guillermo De la Calle, Biomedical Informatics Group, Departamento de Inteligencia Artificial, Faculdad de Informática, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Boadilla del Monte, 28660 Madrid, Spain Julio C. Facelli, Biomedical Informatics Department, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA Peter Ghazal, Division of Pathway Medicine and Centre for Systems Biology Edinburgh, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK Antoine Geissbuhler, Division of Medical Informatics, University Hospitals of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland Fernando Gonzalez-Nilo, Center for Bioinformatics and Molecular Simulation, Universidad de Talca, Talca, Chile Norbert Graf, Department of Pediatric Oncology and Hematology, University of the Saarland, Homburg, Germany Pierre Grangeat, Laboratoire d’Electronique et de Technologie de l’Information (LETI), MINATEC Campus, Commissariat à l’Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives (CEA), Grenoble, France Isabel Hermosilla, Department of Medical Bioinformatics, Institute of Health “Carlos III”, Madrid, Spain Rada Hussein, Information Technology Institute, Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, Cairo, Egypt Josipa Kern, Department of Medical Statistics, Epidemiology and Medical Informatics, Andrija Stampar School of Public Health, Zagreb University Medical School, Zagreb, Croatia Sabine Koch, Health Informatics Centre, Department of Learning, Informatics, Management and Ethics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden Yannick Legre, Health Grid Organization, Clermont-Ferrand, France Victoria Lopez-Alonso, Department of Medical Bioinformatics, Institute of Health “Carlos III”, Madrid, Spain Guillermo Lopez-Campos, Department of Medical Bioinformatics, Institute of Health “Carlos III”, Madrid, Spain Luciano Milanesi, Institute of Biomedical Technology, National Research Council, Milan, Italy Vassilis Moustakis, Technical University of Crete, Chania, Crete, Greece Cristian Munteanu, Department of Information and Communication Technologies, University of A Coruña, A Coruña, Spain Paula Otero, Department of Medical Informatics, Hospital Italiano de Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires, Argentina Alejandro Pazos, Department of Information and Communication Technologies, University of A Coruña, A Coruña, Spain David Perez-Rey, Biomedical Informatics Group, Departamento de Inteligencia Artificial, Faculdad de Informática, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Boadilla del Monte, 28660 Madrid, Spain George Potamias, Institute of Computer Science, FORTH, Heraklion, Crete, Greece Ferran Sanz, Biomedical Informatics Research Programme (GRIB), IMIM, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain Casimir Kulikowski, Department of Computer Science, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, Newark, USA Journal Computing Online ISSN 1436-5057 Print ISSN 0010-485X

Description:    This paper presents an hp -adaptive flux-corrected transport algorithm for continuous finite elements. The proposed approach is based on a continuous Galerkin approximation with unconstrained higher-order elements in smooth regions and constrained P 1 / Q 1 elements in the neighborhood of steep fronts. Smooth elements are found using a hierarchical smoothness indicator based on discontinuous higher-order reconstructions. A gradient-based error indicator determines the local mesh size h and polynomial degree p . The discrete maximum principle for linear/bilinear finite elements is enforced using a linearized flux-corrected transport (FCT) algorithm. The same limiting strategy is employed when it comes to constraining the L 2 projection of data from one finite-dimensional space into another. The new algorithm is implemented in the open-source software package Hermes . The use of hierarchical data structures that support arbitrary-level hanging nodes makes the extension of FCT to hp -FEM relatively straightforward. The accuracy of the proposed method is illustrated by a numerical study for a two-dimensional benchmark problem with a known exact solution. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-22 DOI 10.1007/s00607-012-0223-y Authors Melanie Bittl, Applied Mathematics III, University Erlangen-Nuremberg, Cauerstr. 11, 91058 Erlangen, Germany Dmitri Kuzmin, Applied Mathematics III, University Erlangen-Nuremberg, Cauerstr. 11, 91058 Erlangen, Germany Journal Computing Online ISSN 1436-5057 Print ISSN 0010-485X

Description:    A set of wireless mobile terminals, which cooperate by routing packets to each other creates a Mobile Ad-hoc Network (MANET). MANETs are continuing to grow their interest in research environment and they are attracting attention for their potential use in several fields such as collaborative computing and disaster recovery environments. Considering mobility of the terminals, the topology changes rapidly and routing becomes a key process for operation of MANETs. In this paper, we analyze the performance of Better Approach To MANET (BATMAN) routing protocol in an outdoor bridge environment considering mobility and vertical communication. We implement two scenarios on our testbed and evaluate the performance in terms of throughput and packetloss. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-14 DOI 10.1007/s00607-012-0225-9 Authors Elis Kulla, Fukuoka Institute of Technology, Fukuoka, Japan Makoto Ikeda, Fukuoka Institute of Technology, Fukuoka, Japan Tetsuya Oda, Fukuoka Institute of Technology, Fukuoka, Japan Leonard Barolli, Fukuoka Institute of Technology, Fukuoka, Japan Fatos Xhafa, Technical University of Catalonia, Barcelon, Spain Aleksander Biberaj, Polytechnic University of Tirana, Tirana, Albania Journal Computing Online ISSN 1436-5057 Print ISSN 0010-485X

Description: Letter to the editor regarding the article by Khattri: derivative free algorithm for solving nonlinear equations Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-4 DOI 10.1007/s00607-012-0207-y Authors Fazlollah Soleymani, Department of Mathematics, Islamic Azad University, Zahedan Branch, Zahedan, Iran Journal Computing Online ISSN 1436-5057 Print ISSN 0010-485X

Description:    A hierarchical human activity recognition (HAR) system is proposed to recognize abnormal activities from the daily life activities of elderly people living alone. The system is structured to have two-levels of feature extraction and activity recognition. The first level consists of R-transform, kernel discriminant analysis (KDA), k -means algorithm and HMM to recognize the video activity. The second level consists of KDA, k -means algorithm and HMM, and is selectively applied to the recognized activities from the first level when it belongs to the specified group. The proposed hierarchical approach is useful in increasing the recognition rate for the highly similar activities. System performance is analyzed by selecting the optimized number of features, number of HMM states and the number of frames per second to achieve maximum recognition rate. The system is validated by a novel set of six abnormal activities; falling backward, falling forward, chest pain, headache, vomiting, and fainting and a normal activity walking. Experimental results show an average recognition rate of 97.1 % for all the activities by using the proposed hierarchical HAR system. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-19 DOI 10.1007/s00607-012-0216-x Authors Zafar Ali Khan, Kyung Hee University, Yongin, Republic of Korea Won Sohn, Kyung Hee University, Yongin, Republic of Korea Journal Computing Online ISSN 1436-5057 Print ISSN 0010-485X

Description:    Several complex event processing ( CEP ) middleware solutions have been proposed in the past. They act by processing primitive events generated by sources, extracting new knowledge in the form of composite events, and delivering them to interested sinks. Event-based applications often involve a large number of sources and sinks, possibly dispersed over a wide geographical area. To better support these scenarios, the CEP middleware can be internally built around several, distributed processors , which cooperate to provide the processing and routing service. This paper introduces and compares different deployment strategies for a CEP middleware, which define (i) how the processing load is distributed over different processors and (ii) how these processors interact to produce the required results and to deliver them to sinks. Our evaluation compares the presented solutions and shows their benefits with respect to a centralized deployment, both in terms of network traffic and in terms of forwarding delay. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-28 DOI 10.1007/s00607-012-0217-9 Authors Gianpaolo Cugola, Dipartimento di Elettronica e Informazione (DEI), Politecnico di Milano, Piazza Leonardo Da Vinci, 32, 20133 Milan, Italy Alessandro Margara, Dipartimento di Elettronica e Informazione (DEI), Politecnico di Milano, Piazza Leonardo Da Vinci, 32, 20133 Milan, Italy Journal Computing Online ISSN 1436-5057 Print ISSN 0010-485X

Description:    The need for efficient and effective optimization problem solving methods arouses nowadays the design and development of new heuristic algorithms. This paper present ideas that leads to a novel multiagent metaheuristic technique based on creative social systems suported on music composition concepts. This technique, called “Musical Composition Method” ( MMC ), which was proposed in Mora-Gutiérrez et al. (Artif Intell Rev 2012 ) as well as a variant, are presented in this study. The performance of MMC is evaluated and analyzed over forty instances drawn from twenty-two benchmark global optimization problems. The solutions obtained by the MMC algorithm were compared with those of various versions of particle swarm optimizer and harmony search on the same problem set. The experimental results demonstrate that MMC significantly improves the global performances of the other tested metaheuristics on this set of multimodal functions. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-28 DOI 10.1007/s00607-012-0205-0 Authors Roman Anselmo Mora-Gutiérrez, Posgrado de Ingeniería, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, C.P. 04360 Mexico, D.F., Mexico Javier Ramírez-Rodríguez, Departamento de Sistemas, Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, C.P. 02200 Mexico, D.F., Mexico Eric Alfredo Rincón-García, Departamento de Sistemas, Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, C.P. 02200 Mexico, D.F., Mexico Antonin Ponsich, Departamento de Sistemas, Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, C.P. 02200 Mexico, D.F., Mexico Oscar Herrera, Departamento de Sistemas, Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, C.P. 02200 Mexico, D.F., Mexico Journal Computing Online ISSN 1436-5057 Print ISSN 0010-485X