Multi-agent Based Hierarchy Simulation Models of Carrier-based Aircraft Catapult Launch

With the aid of multi-agent based modeling approach to complex systems, the hierarchy simulation models of carrier-based aircraft catapult launch are developed. Ocean, carrier, aircraft, and atmosphere are treated as aggregation agents, the detailed components like catapult, landing gears, and disturbances are considered as meta-agents, which belong to their aggregation agent. Thus, the model with two layers is formed i.e. the aggregation agent layer and the meta-agent layer. The information communication among all agents is described. The meta-agents within one aggregation agent communicate with each other directly by information sharing, but the meta-agents, which belong to different aggregation agents exchange their information through the aggregation layer first, and then perceive it from the sharing environment, that is the aggregation agent. Thus, not only the hierarchy model is built, but also the environment perceived by each agent is specified. Meanwhile, the problem of balancing the independency of agent and the resource consumption brought by real-time communication within multi-agent system （MAS） is resolved. Each agent involved in carrier-based aircraft catapult launch is depicted, with considering the interaction within disturbed atmospheric environment and multiple motion bodies including carrier, aircraft, and landing gears. The models of reactive agents among them are derived based on tensors, and the perceived messages and inner frameworks of each agent are characterized. Finally, some results of a simulation instance are given. The simulation and modeling of dynamic system based on multi-agent system is of benefit to express physical concepts and logical hierarchy clearly and precisely. The system model can easily draw in kinds of other agents to achieve a precise simulation of more complex system. This modeling technique makes the complex integral dynamic equations of multibodies decompose into parallel operations of single agent, and it is convenient to expand, maintain, and reuse the program codes.

Molecular Dynamics Numerical Simulation of Adsorption Characteristics and Exploitation Limits in Shale Oil Microscopic Pore Spaces

Microscopic pore structure in continental shale oil reservoirs is characterized by small pore throats and complex micro-structures.The adsorption behavior of hydrocarbons on the pore walls exhibits unique physical and chemical properties.Therefore,studying the adsorption morphology of hydrocarbon components in nanometer-sized pores and clarifying the exploitation limits of shale oil at the microscopic level are of great practical significance for the efficient development of continental shale oil.In this study,molecular dynamics simulations were employed to investigate the adsorption characteristics of various single-component shale oils in inorganic quartz fissures,and the influence of pore size and shale oil hydrocarbon composition on the adsorption properties in the pores was analyzed.The results show that different molecules have different adsorption capacities in shale oil pores,with lighter hydrocarbon components(C6H14)exhibiting stronger adsorption abilities.For the same adsorbed molecule,the adsorption amount linearly increases with the increase in pore diameter,but larger pores contribute more to shale oil adsorption.In shale pores,the thickness of the adsorption layer formed by shale oil molecules ranges from 0.4 to 0.5 nm,which is similar to the width of alkane molecules.Shale oil in the adsorbed state that is difficult to be exploited is mainly concentrated in the first adsorption layer.Among them,the volume fraction of adsorbed shale oil in 6 nm shale pores is 40.8%,while the volume fraction of shale oil that is difficult to be exploited is 16.2%.

Discrete decision model and multi-agent simulation of the Liang Zong two-chain hierarchical organization in a complex project

Different from the organization structure of complex projects in Western countries, the Liang Zong hierarchical organization structure of complex projects in China has two different chains, the chief-engineer chain and the general-director chain,to handle the trade-off between technical and management decisions. However, previous works on organization search have mainly focused on the single-chain hierarchical organization in which all decisions are regarded as homogeneous. The heterogeneity and the interdependency between technical decisions and management decisions have been neglected. A two-chain hierarchical organization structure mapped from a real complex project is constructed. Then, a discrete decision model for a Liang Zong two-chain hierarchical organization in an NK model framework is proposed. This model proves that this kind of organization structure can reduce the search space by a large amount and that the search process should reach a final stable state more quickly. For a more complicated decision mechanism, a multi-agent simulation based on the above NK model is used to explore the effect of the two-chain organization structure on the speed, stability, and performance of the search process. The results provide three insights into how, compared with the single-chain hierarchical organization, the two-chain organization can improve the search process: it can reduce the number of iterations efficiently; the search is more stable because the search space is a smoother hill-like fitness landscape; in general, the search performance can be improved.However, when the organization structure is very complicated, the performance of a two-chain organization is inferior to that of a single-chain organization. These findings about the efficiency of the unique Chinese-style organization structure can be used to guide organization design for complex projects.

A Fundamental Study on Multi-agent Pedestrian Model Based on Risk Avoidance Behavior during Road Blockage and Evacuation Simulation of Regional Urban Disaster

Regional cities in Japan are at the risk of experiencing big fire accidents or earthquakes every day.However,neither the number nor the capacity of shelters has increased because local governments might not consider them owing to budget shortfall.By contrast,wide-area evacuation simulations can easily provide an antagonizing image of regional urban disasters.After a disaster,the city collapses and the evacuation routes are closed;consequently,evacuees feel anxious and they cannot move as usual.This anxiety behavior has not been considered in previous related studies and simulations.In this study,a wide-area evacuation simulation is developed;this model can not only calculate the possibility of blocking escape routes when the city is broken but also provide safe and more realistic evacuation plans before a disaster occurs by incorporating into the simulation the risk avoidance behaviors of evacuees from road blockage,such as“the route re-seeking behavior”and“the shelter re-selecting behavior”.

Evaluation of Behavior of Evacuees on a Floor in a Disaster Situation Using Multi-agent Simulation and Mixed Reality Game： Effectiveness of the Field of Vision and Priority of Referred Objects

In this study, we develop a mixed reality game system to investigate characteristics ofjudgrnents of individual players in an evacuation process. The characteristics of judgments of the players that are inferred from the performance of the game are then incorporated into a multi-agent simulation as rules. The behavior of evacuees is evaluated in approximations of real situations, by using the agent simulation including different judgments of evacuees. Using the results of the simulation, effective methods are discussed for achieving the escape of the evacuees within a short time.

Evaluation of the Behavior of Evacuees on Dynamic Floor Condition by Using Multi-agent Simulation

The prediction of the behavior of people in a disaster has a useful role to play in the design of urban structures such as department stores, schools, and office buildings. We focus on using emergency exit signs to effectively guide the evacuation of people on a floor with a dynamically changing layout. A multi-agent simulation is developed to simulate the behavior of evacuees on a floor. A mathematical model is constructed to obtain optimal sign locations to efficiently assist evacuation under the condition that obstacles are dynamically generated on the floor. The optimal sign locations are calculated by the mathematical model. Then, the developed simulation is performed to evaluate the effectiveness of the emergency exit signs and the behavior of evacuees on simple layout models using the calculated optimal sign locations.

WEDM oriented micro gear design and mesh simulation

For the design of gears manufactured with wire electrical discharge machining （WEDM） technology, determination of the primary gear parameters is discussed considering the characteristics of the machining method. Some constraint conditions on gear parameters are abnegated, which makes micro gear design more flexible. Based on gear mesh theory, the algorithm of generating gear tooth profiles is studied, which includes involute and non-involute curve segments. The phenomena of tooth profile interferences during gear mesh are analyzed, and a gear mesh simulation algorithm is designed. Based on ACIS, the WEDM oriented software for the design and mesh simulation of micro gears is developed, by which the modeling, mesh simulation and interference check can be implemented. An experiment is carried out to design and manufacture a pair of micro involute gears, and the proposed method is proved feasible.

ISOLATION DESIGN AND SIMULATIONAL EXPERIMENT OF NANOMETER MICRO MOVEMENT TEST-BED

The relation of mass, stiffness and rate of damping is obtained by using the mechanical analysis of the obstructive vibration system of two dimensions for the design of the obstructive vibration system of more freedom and the micro vibration test bed. The result of stimulational experiment indicates that the isolation of vibration of this system is satisfactory. The design method of vibration can be used as the reference to ultra precision machine tool, super micro orientation machanism and so on.

Numerical Simulation of Shrinkage Cavity Formation in Spheroidal Graphite Iron Castings Based on Micro Modeling

A micro-modeling method (MM) for the quantitative prediction of the shrinkage cavity formation in SGiron castings is proposed. The mathematical models describing the volume changes during the solidification ofspheroidal graphite cast iron are established based on the models of solidification kinetics. The shrinkage cavityformation of T-shaped SG iron castings is calculated with MM method. The calculated results are compared with theexperimental results. It is shown that the predicted size, shape and distribution of shrinkage cavity by MM methodare in good agreement with the measured results.

Reliability Assessment of Microgrid Using Sequential Monte Carlo Simulation

Sequential Monte Carlo simulation method is introduced to the reliability assessment of microgrid,and a Weibull distribution wind speed model is built to simulate the hourly wind speed of a specific site.Wind turbine generator model combined with a two-state reliability model is applied to Monte Carlo simulation method,and results show that the wind turbine reliability model works well with sequential Monte Carlo simulation.A two-state reliability model of micro gas turbine and a load model from IEEE reliability test system （IEEE RTS） are also introduced to the reliability evaluation of microgrid.Case studies show that Monte Carlo simulation method is flexible and efficient dealing with microgrid consisting of renewable resources with fluctuation characteristics.

Progress in molecular-simulation-based research on the effects of interface-induced fluid microstructures on flow resistance

In modern chemical engineering processes, solid interface involvement is the most important component of process intensification techniques, such as nanoporous membrane separation and heterogeneous catalysis. The fundamental mechanism underlying interfacial transport remains incompletely understood given the complexity of heterogeneous interfacial molecular interactions and the high nonideality of the fluid involved. Thus, understanding the effects of interface-induced fluid microstructures on flow resistance is the first step in further understanding interfacial transport. Molecular simulation has become an indispensable method for the investigation of fluid microstructure and flow resistance. Here, we reviewed the recent research progress of our group and the latest relevant works to elucidate the contribution of interface-induced fluid microstructures to flow resistance.We specifically focused on water, ionic aqueous solutions, and alcohol–water mixtures given the ubiquity of these fluid systems in modern chemical engineering processes. We discussed the effects of the interfaceinduced hydrogen bond networks of water molecules, the ionic hydration of ionic aqueous solutions, and the spatial distributions of alcohol and alcohol–water mixtures on flow resistance on the basis of the distinctive characteristics of different fluid systems.

Assessing the Carrying Capacity of Tourist Resorts: An Application of Tourists’ Spatial Behavior Simulator Based on GIS and Multi-Agent System

Based on the study of visitors' individual spatial behaviors, a tourists'spatial behavior simulator (TSBS) to assess the carrying capacity of tourist resorts was developed,TSBS employs GIS (Geographic Information System) to manage the spatial data,and Multi-Agent systemto simulate the actions of individual visitors. By utilizing TSBS, visitors' travel patterns such aslocation, cost, and state can be analyzed and predicted. Based on this analysis and prediction, themodel of assessing the carrying capacity of resorts is built. Our results show that TSBS will be aneffective tool to accurately assess the carrying capacity of tourist resorts.

Numerical simulation method for weld line development in micro injection molding process

In order to reduce the "trial-mold" risk and cost,numerical simulation method was applied to micro injection molding weld line development investigation. The micro tensile specimen which has the size of 0.1 mm(depth) ×0.4 mm(width) ×12 mm(length) in test area was selected as the objective part,and polypropylene(PP) as the experimental material. Respectively with specific commercial software(Mold Flow) and general computational fluid dynamic(CFD) software(Comsol Multiphysics) ,the simulation experiments for development of weld line in micro injection molding process were executed and the real comparison experiments were also carried out. The results show that during micro injection molding process,the specific commercial software for normal injection molding process is not valid to describe the micro flow process,the shape of flow front in micro cavity flowing which is important in weld line developing study and the contact angle due to surface tension are not able to be simulated. In order to improve the simulation results for micro weld line development,the general CFD software,which is more flexible in user defining function,is applied. The results show better effects in describing micro fluid flow behavior. As a conclusion,as for weld line forming process,the numerical simulation method can give a characteristic analysis results for processing parameters optimizing in micro injection molding process;but for both kinds of softwares quantitative analysis cannot be obtained unless the boundary condition and micro fluid mathematic model are improved in the future.

Efficient Origin-Destination Estimation Using Microscopic Traffic Simulation with Restricted Rerouting

Traffic simulators are utilized to solve a variety of traffic-related problems.For such simulators,origin-destination(OD)traffic volumes as mobility demands are required to input,and we need to estimate them.The authors regard an OD estimation as a bi-level programming problem,and apply a microscopic traffic simulation model to it.However,the simulation trials can be computationally expensive if full dynamic rerouting is allowed,when employing multi-agent-based models in the estimation process.This paper proposes an efficient OD estimation method using a multi-agent-based simulator with restricted dynamic rerouting to reduce the computational load.Even though,in the case of large traffic demand,the restriction on dynamic rerouting can result in heavier congestion.The authors resolve this problem by introducing constraints of the bi-level programming problem depending on link congestion.Test results show that the accuracy of the link traffic volume reproduced with the proposed method is virtually identical to that of existing methods but that the proposed method is more computationally efficient in a wide-range or high-demand context.

Distributed Intelligent Microgrid Control Using Multi-Agent Systems

In the future, the individual entities of microgrids such as distributed generators and smart loads may need to determine their power generation or consumption in more economic ways. Intelligent agents can help the decision-making procedure of the entities by intelligent algorithms and state-of-the-art communication with central controller and other local agents. This paper presents the development of atable-top microgrid control system using multi-agent systems and also the demonstration of demand response programs during power shortage. In our table-top system, agents are implemented using microcontrollers and Zigbee wireless communication technology is applied for efficient data communication in the multi-agent system. The power system models of distributed generators and loads are implemented in the real-time simulator using Opal-RT system. The whole test system that includes real-time system simulation and agent hardware is implemented in the hardware-in-the-loop simulation framework. The performance of the developed system is tested for emergency demand response cases.

Recent Advances in Computational Simulation of Macro-,Meso-,and Micro-Scale Biomimetics Related Fluid Flow Problems

Over the last decade, computational methods have been intensively applied to a variety of scientific researches and engineering designs. Although the computational fluid dynamics （CFD） method has played a dominant role in studying and simulating transport phenomena involving fluid flow and heat and mass transfers, in recent years, other numerical methods for the simulations at meso- and micro-scales have also been actively applied to solve the physics of complex flow and fluid-interface interactions. This paper presents a review of recent advances in multi-scale computational simulation of biomimetics related fluid flow problems. The state-of-the-art numerical techniques, such as lattice Boltzmann method （LBM）, molecular dynamics （MD）, and conventional CFD, applied to different problems such as fish flow, electro-osmosis effect of earthworm motion, and self-cleaning hydrophobic surface, and the numerical approaches are introduced. The new challenging of modelling biomimetics problems in developing the physical conditions of self-clean hydrophobic surfaces is discussed.

Simulation of Fluid Flow, Heat Transfer and Micro-Segregation in Twin-roll Strip Casting of Stainless Steel

In twin-roll strip casting process, metal flow and temperature distribution in the molten pool directly affect the stability of the process and the quality of products. In this paper, a 3D coupled thermal-flow fenite element modeling （FEM） simulation for twin-roll strip casting of stainless steel was performed. Influences of the pouring temperature and casting speed on the temperature fields were obtained from the numerical simulation. The micro-segregation of the solutes during the strip casting process of stainless steel was also simulated. A developed micro-segregation model was used to calculate the micro-segregation of solutes in twin-roll casting of stainless steel. The relationship between the solidus fraction in solidification and temperature was given, which was used to determine the LIT （liquid impermeable temperature）, ZST （zero strength temperature） and ZDT （zero ductility temperature） in the period of non-equilibrium solidification. The effect of temperature on the micro-segregation was discussed. According to the computational results, the solidification completion temperature in the twin-roll strip casting of stainless steel was then determined, which can provide a basis for controlling the location of solidification completion temperature and analysing the crack of the casting strip.

The Simulation of Rumor’S Spreading and Controlling in Micro-Blog Users’ Network

In this work, a rumor’s spreading and controlling in a directed Micro-blog user network being consisted with 580 000 nodes are simulated. By defining some authority nodes that release anti-rumor information as the prevention strategy, the effect of the nodes’ role in network on rumor’s suppression is studied. The findings show that rumor will be spread out fast and reach a stable level within limited steps. The suppression of rumor is more predominated by the intervening opportunity, the earlier the intervention strategy was implemented, the better the rumor’s controlling could be achieved. The controlling effect is less relevant with the role of the authority nodes in network.

Effect of t_(8/5) on the microstructure and properties of the HAZ of ASME SA213-T92 steel by thermal simulation

The relationship between the t8/5 and micro-hardness, impact toughness in the heat affected zone （HAZ） of ASME SA213-792 at peak temperature of 1 350 ℃ was studied by thermal simulation. The result shows that the micro-hardness of HAZ rises at the beginning and then decreases with increasing of t8/5 , whereas the impact toughness presents reverse trend. The distribution of precipitates in substrate has great influence on the impact toughness of HAZ. When the t8/5 is 40 s, chain-like precipitates lower the impact toughness of HAZ seriously.

Driving Cycle for Motorcycle Using Micro-Simulation Model

Driving cycle of vehicle has been used in emission estimation and fuel consumption study. Existing method of data collection using car chasing technique is expensive. The technique using micro simulation approach is cheaper and fast to derive the driving cycle. In this paper a traffic simulation model Driving Cycle Micro-Simulation Model for Motorcycle has been developed. The issue of lateral and longitudinal movement aspect in motorcycle driving has been examined in the model. Parameters to cover such movement have been built in the model and applied on a stretch in Edinburgh city of Scotland. Results from model have been both calibrated and validated. The results show that Driving Cycle Micro-Simulation Model for Motorcycle gives better representation of driving cycle and it can be used to understand the effect of driving modes on emission for better understanding of vehicular emission control.