Evolutionary Decision-Making and Planning for Autonomous Driving Based on Safe and Rational Exploration and Exploitation

Decision-making and motion planning are extremely important in autonomous driving to ensure safe driving in a real-world environment.This study proposes an online evolutionary decision-making and motion planning framework for autonomous driving based on a hybrid data-and model-driven method.First,a data-driven decision-making module based on deep reinforcement learning(DRL)is developed to pursue a rational driving performance as much as possible.Then,model predictive control(MPC)is employed to execute both longitudinal and lateral motion planning tasks.Multiple constraints are defined according to the vehicle’s physical limit to meet the driving task requirements.Finally,two principles of safety and rationality for the self-evolution of autonomous driving are proposed.A motion envelope is established and embedded into a rational exploration and exploitation scheme,which filters out unreasonable experiences by masking unsafe actions so as to collect high-quality training data for the DRL agent.Experiments with a high-fidelity vehicle model and MATLAB/Simulink co-simulation environment are conducted,and the results show that the proposed online-evolution framework is able to generate safer,more rational,and more efficient driving action in a real-world environment.

Attention Markets of Blockchain-Based Decentralized Autonomous Organizations

The attention is a scarce resource in decentralized autonomous organizations(DAOs),as their self-governance relies heavily on the attention-intensive decision-making process of“proposal and voting”.To prevent the negative effects of pro-posers’attention-capturing strategies that contribute to the“tragedy of the commons”and ensure an efficient distribution of attention among multiple proposals,it is necessary to establish a market-driven allocation scheme for DAOs’attention.First,the Harberger tax-based attention markets are designed to facilitate its allocation via continuous and automated trading,where the individualized Harberger tax rate(HTR)determined by the pro-posers’reputation is adopted.Then,the Stackelberg game model is formulated in these markets,casting attention to owners in the role of leaders and other competitive proposers as followers.Its equilibrium trading strategies are also discussed to unravel the intricate dynamics of attention pricing.Moreover,utilizing the single-round Stackelberg game as an illustrative example,the existence of Nash equilibrium trading strategies is demonstrated.Finally,the impact of individualized HTR on trading strategies is investigated,and results suggest that it has a negative correlation with leaders’self-accessed prices and ownership duration,but its effect on their revenues varies under different conditions.This study is expected to provide valuable insights into leveraging attention resources to improve DAOs’governance and decision-making process.

Designing a Secure and Scalable Data Sharing Mechanism Using Decentralized Identifiers(DID)

Centralized storage and identity identification methods pose many risks,including hacker attacks,data misuse,and single points of failure.Additionally,existing centralized identity management methods face interoperability issues and rely on a single identity provider,leaving users without control over their identities.Therefore,this paper proposes a mechanism for identity identification and data sharing based on decentralized identifiers.The scheme utilizes blockchain technology to store the identifiers and data hashed on the chain to ensure permanent identity recognition and data integrity.Data is stored on InterPlanetary File System(IPFS)to avoid the risk of single points of failure and to enhance data persistence and availability.At the same time,compliance with World Wide Web Consortium(W3C)standards for decentralized identifiers and verifiable credentials increases the mechanism’s scalability and interoperability.

On Designs of Decentralized Reputation Management for Permissioned Blockchain Networks

In permissioned blockchain networks,the Proof of Authority(PoA)consensus,which uses the election of authorized nodes to validate transactions and blocks,has beenwidely advocated thanks to its high transaction throughput and fault tolerance.However,PoA suffers from the drawback of centralization dominated by a limited number of authorized nodes and the lack of anonymity due to the round-robin block proposal mechanism.As a result,traditional PoA is vulnerable to a single point of failure that compromises the security of the blockchain network.To address these issues,we propose a novel decentralized reputation management mechanism for permissioned blockchain networks to enhance security,promote liveness,and mitigate centralization while retaining the same throughput as traditional PoA.This paper aims to design an off-chain reputation evaluation and an on-chain reputation-aided consensus.First,we evaluate the nodes’reputation in the context of the blockchain networks and make the reputation globally verifiable through smart contracts.Second,building upon traditional PoA,we propose a reputation-aided PoA(rPoA)consensus to enhance securitywithout sacrificing throughput.In particular,rPoA can incentivize nodes to autonomously form committees based on reputation authority,which prevents block generation from being tracked through the randomness of reputation variation.Moreover,we develop a reputation-aided fork-choice rule for rPoA to promote the network’s liveness.Finally,experimental results show that the proposed rPoA achieves higher security performance while retaining transaction throughput compared to traditional PoA.

Toward Trustworthy Decision-Making for Autonomous Vehicles:A Robust Reinforcement Learning Approach with Safety Guarantees

While autonomous vehicles are vital components of intelligent transportation systems,ensuring the trustworthiness of decision-making remains a substantial challenge in realizing autonomous driving.Therefore,we present a novel robust reinforcement learning approach with safety guarantees to attain trustworthy decision-making for autonomous vehicles.The proposed technique ensures decision trustworthiness in terms of policy robustness and collision safety.Specifically,an adversary model is learned online to simulate the worst-case uncertainty by approximating the optimal adversarial perturbations on the observed states and environmental dynamics.In addition,an adversarial robust actor-critic algorithm is developed to enable the agent to learn robust policies against perturbations in observations and dynamics.Moreover,we devise a safety mask to guarantee the collision safety of the autonomous driving agent during both the training and testing processes using an interpretable knowledge model known as the Responsibility-Sensitive Safety Model.Finally,the proposed approach is evaluated through both simulations and experiments.These results indicate that the autonomous driving agent can make trustworthy decisions and drastically reduce the number of collisions through robust safety policies.

Orientation and Decision-Making for Soccer Based on Sports Analytics and AI:A Systematic Review

Due to ever-growing soccer data collection approaches and progressing artificial intelligence(AI) methods, soccer analysis, evaluation, and decision-making have received increasing interest from not only the professional sports analytics realm but also the academic AI research community. AI brings gamechanging approaches for soccer analytics where soccer has been a typical benchmark for AI research. The combination has been an emerging topic. In this paper, soccer match analytics are taken as a complete observation-orientation-decision-action(OODA) loop.In addition, as in AI frameworks such as that for reinforcement learning, interacting with a virtual environment enables an evolving model. Therefore, both soccer analytics in the real world and virtual domains are discussed. With the intersection of the OODA loop and the real-virtual domains, available soccer data, including event and tracking data, and diverse orientation and decisionmaking models for both real-world and virtual soccer matches are comprehensively reviewed. Finally, some promising directions in this interdisciplinary area are pointed out. It is claimed that paradigms for both professional sports analytics and AI research could be combined. Moreover, it is quite promising to bridge the gap between the real and virtual domains for soccer match analysis and decision-making.

Transparent and Accountable Training Data Sharing in Decentralized Machine Learning Systems

In Decentralized Machine Learning(DML)systems,system participants contribute their resources to assist others in developing machine learning solutions.Identifying malicious contributions in DML systems is challenging,which has led to the exploration of blockchain technology.Blockchain leverages its transparency and immutability to record the provenance and reliability of training data.However,storing massive datasets or implementing model evaluation processes on smart contracts incurs high computational costs.Additionally,current research on preventing malicious contributions in DML systems primarily focuses on protecting models from being exploited by workers who contribute incorrect or misleading data.However,less attention has been paid to the scenario where malicious requesters intentionally manipulate test data during evaluation to gain an unfair advantage.This paper proposes a transparent and accountable training data sharing method that securely shares data among potentially malicious system participants.First,we introduce a blockchain-based DML system architecture that supports secure training data sharing through the IPFS network.Second,we design a blockchain smart contract to transparently split training datasets into training and test datasets,respectively,without involving system participants.Under the system,transparent and accountable training data sharing can be achieved with attribute-based proxy re-encryption.We demonstrate the security analysis for the system,and conduct experiments on the Ethereum and IPFS platforms to show the feasibility and practicality of the system.

Decentralized Optimal Control and Stabilization of Interconnected Systems With Asymmetric Information

The paper addresses the decentralized optimal control and stabilization problems for interconnected systems subject to asymmetric information.Compared with previous work,a closed-loop optimal solution to the control problem and sufficient and necessary conditions for the stabilization problem of the interconnected systems are given for the first time.The main challenge lies in three aspects:Firstly,the asymmetric information results in coupling between control and estimation and failure of the separation principle.Secondly,two extra unknown variables are generated by asymmetric information(different information filtration)when solving forward-backward stochastic difference equations.Thirdly,the existence of additive noise makes the study of mean-square boundedness an obstacle.The adopted technique is proving and assuming the linear form of controllers and establishing the equivalence between the two systems with and without additive noise.A dual-motor parallel drive system is presented to demonstrate the validity of the proposed algorithm.

Ethical Decision-Making Framework Based on Incremental ILP Considering Conflicts

Humans are experiencing the inclusion of artificial agents in their lives,such as unmanned vehicles,service robots,voice assistants,and intelligent medical care.If the artificial agents cannot align with social values or make ethical decisions,they may not meet the expectations of humans.Traditionally,an ethical decision-making framework is constructed by rule-based or statistical approaches.In this paper,we propose an ethical decision-making framework based on incremental ILP(Inductive Logic Programming),which can overcome the brittleness of rule-based approaches and little interpretability of statistical approaches.As the current incremental ILP makes it difficult to solve conflicts,we propose a novel ethical decision-making framework considering conflicts in this paper,which adopts our proposed incremental ILP system.The framework consists of two processes:the learning process and the deduction process.The first process records bottom clauses with their score functions and learns rules guided by the entailment and the score function.The second process obtains an ethical decision based on the rules.In an ethical scenario about chatbots for teenagers’mental health,we verify that our framework can learn ethical rules and make ethical decisions.Besides,we extract incremental ILP from the framework and compare it with the state-of-the-art ILP systems based on ASP(Answer Set Programming)focusing on conflict resolution.The results of comparisons show that our proposed system can generate better-quality rules than most other systems.

Finite-time decentralized event-triggered state estimation for coupled neural networks under unreliable Markovian network against mixed cyberattacks

This article investigates the issue of finite-time state estimation in coupled neural networks under random mixed cyberattacks,in which the Markov process is used to model the mixed cyberattacks.To optimize the utilization of channel resources,a decentralized event-triggered mechanism is adopted during the information transmission.By establishing the augmentation system and constructing the Lyapunov function,sufficient conditions are obtained for the system to be finite-time bounded and satisfy the H∞ performance index.Then,under these conditions,a suitable state estimator gain is obtained.Finally,the feasibility of the method is verified by a given illustrative example.

Stroke Risk Assessment Decision-Making Using a Machine Learning Model:Logistic-AdaBoost

Stroke is a chronic cerebrovascular disease that carries a high risk.Stroke risk assessment is of great significance in preventing,reversing and reducing the spread and the health hazards caused by stroke.Aiming to objectively predict and identify strokes,this paper proposes a new stroke risk assessment decision-making model named Logistic-AdaBoost(Logistic-AB)based on machine learning.First,the categorical boosting(CatBoost)method is used to perform feature selection for all features of stroke,and 8 main features are selected to form a new index evaluation system to predict the risk of stroke.Second,the borderline synthetic minority oversampling technique(SMOTE)algorithm is applied to transform the unbalanced stroke dataset into a balanced dataset.Finally,the stroke risk assessment decision-makingmodel Logistic-AB is constructed,and the overall prediction performance of this new model is evaluated by comparing it with ten other similar models.The comparison results show that the new model proposed in this paper performs better than the two single algorithms(logistic regression and AdaBoost)on the four indicators of recall,precision,F1 score,and accuracy,and the overall performance of the proposed model is better than that of common machine learning algorithms.The Logistic-AB model presented in this paper can more accurately predict patients’stroke risk.

Determination of the best materials for development and designing product using a multi-criteria decision-making

Purpose–Material selection,driven by wide and often conflicting objectives,is an important,sometimes difficult problem in material engineering.In this context,multi-criteria decision-making(MCDM)methodologies are effective.An approach of MCDM is needed to cater to criteria of material assortment simultaneously.More firms are now concerned about increasing their productivity using mathematical tools.To occupy a gap in the previous literature this research recommends an integrated MCDM and mathematical Bi-objective model for the selection of material.In addition,by using the Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution(TOPSIS),the inherent ambiguities of decision-makers in paired evaluations are considered in this research.It goes on to construct a mathematical bi-objective model for determining the best item to purchase.Design/methodology/approach–The entropy perspective is implemented in this paper to evaluate the weight parameters,while the TOPSIS technique is used to determine the best and worst intermediate pipe materials for automotive exhaust system.The intermediate pipes are used to join the components of the exhaust systems.The materials usually used to manufacture intermediate pipe are SUS 436LM,SUS 430,SUS 304,SUS 436L,SUH 409 L,SUS 441 L and SUS 439L.These seven materials are evaluated based on tensile strength(TS),hardness(H),elongation(E),yield strength(YS)and cost(C).A hybrid methodology combining entropy-based criteria weighting,with the TOPSIS for alternative ranking,is pursued to identify the optimal design material for an engineered application in this paper.This study aims to help while filling the information gap in selecting the most suitable material for use in the exhaust intermediate pipes.After that,the authors searched for and considered eight materials and evaluated them on the following five criteria:(1)TS,(2)YS,(3)H,(4)E and(5)C.The first two criteria have been chosen because they can have a lot of influence on the behavior of the exhaust intermediate pipes,on their performance and on the cost.In this structure,the weights of the criteria are calculated objectively through the entropy method in order to have an unbiased assessment.This essentially measures the quantity of information each criterion contribution,indicating the relative importance of these criteria better.Subsequently,the materials were ranked using the TOPSIS method in terms of their relative performance by measuring each material from an ideal solution to determine the best alternative.The results show that SUS 309,SUS 432L and SUS 436 LM are the first three materials that the exhaust intermediate pipe optimal design should consider.Findings–The material matrix of the decision presented in Table 3 was normalized through Equation 5,as shown in Table 5,and the matrix was multiplied with weighting criteriaß_j.The obtained weighted normalized matrix V_ij is presented in Table 6.However,the ideal,worst and best value was ascertained by employing Equation 7.This study is based on the selection of material for the development of intermediate pipe using MCDM,and it involves four basic stages,i.e.method of translation criteria,screening process,method of ranking and search for methods.The selection was done through the TOPSIS method,and the criteria weight was obtained by the entropy method.The result showed that the top three materials are SUS 309,SUS 432L and SUS 436 LM,respectively.For the future work,it is suggested to select more alternatives and criteria.The comparison can also be done by using different MCDM techniques like and Choice Expressing Reality(ELECTRE),Decision-Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory(DEMATEL)and Preference Ranking Organization Method for Enrichment Evaluation(PROMETHEE).Originality/value–The results provide important conclusions for material selection in this targeted application,verifying the employment of mutual entropy-TOPSIS methodology for a series of difficult engineering decisions in material engineering concepts that combine superior capacity with better performance as well as cost-efficiency in various engineering design.

Anomaly-Resistant Decentralized State Estimation Under Minimum Error Entropy With Fiducial Points for Wide-Area Power Systems

This paper investigates the anomaly-resistant decentralized state estimation(SE) problem for a class of wide-area power systems which are divided into several non-overlapping areas connected through transmission lines. Two classes of measurements(i.e., local measurements and edge measurements) are obtained, respectively, from the individual area and the transmission lines. A decentralized state estimator, whose performance is resistant against measurement with anomalies, is designed based on the minimum error entropy with fiducial points(MEEF) criterion. Specifically, 1) An augmented model, which incorporates the local prediction and local measurement, is developed by resorting to the unscented transformation approach and the statistical linearization approach;2) Using the augmented model, an MEEF-based cost function is designed that reflects the local prediction errors of the state and the measurement;and 3) The local estimate is first obtained by minimizing the MEEF-based cost function through a fixed-point iteration and then updated by using the edge measuring information. Finally, simulation experiments with three scenarios are carried out on the IEEE 14-bus system to illustrate the validity of the proposed anomaly-resistant decentralized SE scheme.

The Spherical q-Linear Diophantine Fuzzy Multiple-Criteria Group Decision-Making Based on Differential Measure

Spherical q-linearDiophantine fuzzy sets(Sq-LDFSs)provedmore effective for handling uncertainty and vagueness in multi-criteria decision-making(MADM).It does not only cover the data in two variable parameters but is also beneficial for three parametric data.By Pythagorean fuzzy sets,the difference is calculated only between two parameters(membership and non-membership).According to human thoughts,fuzzy data can be found in three parameters(membership uncertainty,and non-membership).So,to make a compromise decision,comparing Sq-LDFSs is essential.Existing measures of different fuzzy sets do,however,can have several flaws that can lead to counterintuitive results.For instance,they treat any increase or decrease in the membership degree as the same as the non-membership degree because the uncertainty does not change,even though each parameter has a different implication.In the Sq-LDFSs comparison,this research develops the differentialmeasure(DFM).Themain goal of the DFM is to cover the unfair arguments that come from treating different types of FSs opposing criteria equally.Due to their relative positions in the attribute space and the similarity of their membership and non-membership degrees,two Sq-LDFSs formthis preference connectionwhen the uncertainty remains same in both sets.According to the degree of superiority or inferiority,two Sq-LDFSs are shown as identical,equivalent,superior,or inferior over one another.The suggested DFM’s fundamental characteristics are provided.Based on the newly developed DFM,a unique approach tomultiple criterion group decision-making is offered.Our suggestedmethod verifies the novel way of calculating the expert weights for Sq-LDFSS as in PFSs.Our proposed technique in three parameters is applied to evaluate solid-state drives and choose the optimum photovoltaic cell in two applications by taking uncertainty parameter zero.The method’s applicability and validity shown by the findings are contrasted with those obtained using various other existing approaches.To assess its stability and usefulness,a sensitivity analysis is done.

A NovelMethod for Determining Tourism Carrying Capacity in a Decision-Making Context Using q−Rung Orthopair Fuzzy Hypersoft Environment

Tourism is a popular activity that allows individuals to escape their daily routines and explore new destinations for various reasons,including leisure,pleasure,or business.A recent study has proposed a unique mathematical concept called a q−Rung orthopair fuzzy hypersoft set(q−ROFHS)to enhance the formal representation of human thought processes and evaluate tourism carrying capacity.This approach can capture the imprecision and ambiguity often present in human perception.With the advanced mathematical tools in this field,the study has also incorporated the Einstein aggregation operator and score function into the q−ROFHS values to supportmultiattribute decision-making algorithms.By implementing this technique,effective plans can be developed for social and economic development while avoiding detrimental effects such as overcrowding or environmental damage caused by tourism.A case study of selected tourism carrying capacity will demonstrate the proposed methodology.

UAV maneuvering decision-making algorithm based on deep reinforcement learning under the guidance of expert experience

Autonomous umanned aerial vehicle(UAV) manipulation is necessary for the defense department to execute tactical missions given by commanders in the future unmanned battlefield. A large amount of research has been devoted to improving the autonomous decision-making ability of UAV in an interactive environment, where finding the optimal maneuvering decisionmaking policy became one of the key issues for enabling the intelligence of UAV. In this paper, we propose a maneuvering decision-making algorithm for autonomous air-delivery based on deep reinforcement learning under the guidance of expert experience. Specifically, we refine the guidance towards area and guidance towards specific point tasks for the air-delivery process based on the traditional air-to-surface fire control methods.Moreover, we construct the UAV maneuvering decision-making model based on Markov decision processes(MDPs). Specifically, we present a reward shaping method for the guidance towards area and guidance towards specific point tasks using potential-based function and expert-guided advice. The proposed algorithm could accelerate the convergence of the maneuvering decision-making policy and increase the stability of the policy in terms of the output during the later stage of training process. The effectiveness of the proposed maneuvering decision-making policy is illustrated by the curves of training parameters and extensive experimental results for testing the trained policy.

Influence of social media on maternal decision-making and breastfeeding practices

Breastfeeding practices are influenced by multifactorial determinants including individual characteristics,external support systems,and media influences.This commentary emphasizes such complex factors influencing breastfeeding practices.Potential methodological limitations and the need for diverse sampling in studying breastfeeding practices are highlighted.Further research must explore the interplay between social influences,cultural norms,government policies,and individual factors in shaping maternal breastfeeding decisions.

Decentralized Semi-Supervised Learning for Stochastic Configuration Networks Based on the Mean Teacher Method

The aim of this paper is to broaden the application of Stochastic Configuration Network (SCN) in the semi-supervised domain by utilizing common unlabeled data in daily life. It can enhance the classification accuracy of decentralized SCN algorithms while effectively protecting user privacy. To this end, we propose a decentralized semi-supervised learning algorithm for SCN, called DMT-SCN, which introduces teacher and student models by combining the idea of consistency regularization to improve the response speed of model iterations. In order to reduce the possible negative impact of unsupervised data on the model, we purposely change the way of adding noise to the unlabeled data. Simulation results show that the algorithm can effectively utilize unlabeled data to improve the classification accuracy of SCN training and is robust under different ground simulation environments.

Decision-Making and Management of Self-Care in Persons with Traumatic Spinal Cord Injuries: A Preliminary Study

Patients and physicians understand the importance of self-care following spinal cord injury (SCI), yet many individuals with SCI do not adhere to recommended self-care activities despite logistical supports. Neurobehavioral determinants of SCI self-care behavior, such as impulsivity, are not widely studied, yet understanding them could inform efforts to improve SCI self-care. We explored associations between impulsivity and self-care in an observational study of 35 US adults age 18 - 50 who had traumatic SCI with paraplegia at least six months before assessment. The primary outcome measure was self-reported self-care. In LASSO regression models that included all neurobehavioral measures and demographics as predictors of self-care, dispositional measures of greater impulsivity (negative urgency, lack of premeditation, lack of perseverance), and reduced mindfulness were associated with reduced self-care. Outcome (magnitude) sensitivity, a latent decision-making parameter derived from computationally modeling successive choices in a gambling task, was also associated with self-care behavior. These results are preliminary;more research is needed to demonstrate the utility of these findings in clinical settings. Information about associations between impulsivity and poor self-care in people with SCI could guide the development of interventions to improve SCI self-care and help patients with elevated risks related to self-care and secondary health conditions.

Research on Public Engineering Emergency Decision-Making Based on Multi-Granularity Language Information

To effectively deal with fuzzy and uncertain information in public engineering emergencies,an emergency decision-making method based on multi-granularity language information is proposed.Firstly,decision makers select the appropriate language phrase set according to their own situation,give the preference information of the weight of each key indicator,and then transform the multi-granularity language information through consistency.On this basis,the sequential optimization technology of the approximately ideal scheme is introduced to obtain the weight coefficient of each key indicator.Subsequently,the weighted average operator is used to aggregate the preference information of each alternative scheme with the relative importance of decision-makers and the weight of key indicators in sequence,and the comprehensive evaluation value of each scheme is obtained to determine the optimal scheme.Lastly,the effectiveness and practicability of the method are verified by taking the earthwork collapse accident in the construction of a reservoir as an example.