Operations Research Computing And Homeland Defense

This book is published in conjunction with the 12th Computing Society Conference, held January 9, 2011, in Monterey, California. The themes of the conference and this book are operations research, computing, and homeland defense. The papers cover topics on the theory of computing, mathematical programming, game theory, statistics and more; over half have applications to homeland defense.

Two-person zero-sum game theory deals with situations that are perfectly competitive—there are exactly two decision makers for whom there is no possibility of cooperation or compromise. It is the most fundamental part of game theory, and the part most commonly applied. There are diverse applications to military battles, sports, parlor games, economics and politics. The theory was born in World War II, and has by now matured into a significant and tractable body of knowledge about competitive decision making. The advent of modern, powerful computers has enabled the solution of many games that were once beyond computational reach. Two-Person Zero-Sum Games, 4th Ed. offers an up-to-date introduction to the subject, especially its computational aspects. Any finite game can be solved by the brute force method of enumerating all possible strategies and then applying linear programming. The trouble is that many interesting games have far too many strategies to enumerate, even with the aid of computers. After introducing ideas, terminology, and the brute force method in the initial chapters, the rest of the book is devoted to classes of games that can be solved without enumerating every strategy. Numerous examples are given, as well as an extensive set of exercises. Many of the exercises are keyed to sheets of an included Excel workbook that can be freely downloaded from the SpringerExtras website. This new edition can be used as either a reference book or as a textbook.

This book constitutes the proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Green, Pervasive, and Cloud Computing, GPC 2017, held in Cetara, Italy, in May 2017 and the following colocated workshops: First International Workshop on Digital Knowledge Ecosystems 2017; and First Workshop on Cloud Security Modeling, Monitoring and Management, CS3M 2017. The 58 full papers included in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 169 initial submissions. They deal with cryptography, security and biometric techniques; advances network services, algorithms and optimization; mobile and pervasive computing; cybersecurity; parallel and distributed computing; ontologies and smart applications; and healthcare support systems.

This book offers a bridge between our current understanding of supply chain risk in practice and theory, and the monumental shifts caused by the emergence of the fourth industrial revolution. Supply chain risk and its management have experienced significant attention in scholarship and practice over the past twenty years. Our understanding of supply chain risk and its many facets, such as uncertainty and vulnerability, has expanded beyond utilizing approaches such as deploying inventory to buffer the initial effects of disruptions. Even with our increased knowledge of supply chain risk, being in the era of lean supply chain practices, digitally managed global supply chains, and closely interconnected networks, firms are exposed as ever to supply chain uncertainties that can damage, or even destroy, their ability to compete in the marketplace. The book acknowledges the criticality of big data analytics in Supply Chain Risk Management (SCRM) processes and provides appropriate tools and approaches for creating robust SCRM processes. Revisiting Supply Chain Risk presents a state-of-the-art look at SCRM through current research and philosophical thought. It is divided into six sections that highlight established themes, as well as provide new insights to developing areas of inquiry and contexts on the topic. Section 1 examines the first step in managing supply chain risk, risk assessment. The chapters in Section 2 encompass resiliency in supply chains, while Section 3 looks at relational and behavioral perspectives from varying units of analysis including consortiums, teams and decision makers. Section 4 focuses on examining supply chain risk in the contexts of sustainability and innovation. Section 5 provides insight on emerging typologies and taxonomies for classifying supply chain risk. The book concludes with Section 6, featuring illustrative case studies as real-world examples in assessing and managing supply chain risk.

This book shows the breadth and depth of stochastic programming applications. All the papers presented here involve optimization over the scenarios that represent possible future outcomes of the uncertainty problems. The applications, which were presented at the 12th International Conference on Stochastic Programming held in Halifax, Nova Scotia in August 2010, span the rich field of uses of these models. The finance papers discuss such diverse problems as longevity risk management of individual investors, personal financial planning, intertemporal surplus management, asset management with benchmarks, dynamic portfolio management, fixed income immunization and racetrack betting. The production and logistics papers discuss natural gas infrastructure design, farming Atlantic salmon, prevention of nuclear smuggling and sawmill planning. The energy papers involve electricity production planning, hydroelectric reservoir operations and power generation planning for liquid natural gas plants. Finally, two telecommunication papers discuss mobile network design and frequency assignment problems.

The goal to improve the resilience of social systems – communities and their economies – is increasingly adopted by decision makers. This unique and comprehensive Handbook focuses on the interdependencies of these social systems and the technologies that support them. Special attention is given to the ways in which resilience is conceptualized by different disciplines, how resilience may be assessed, and how resilience strategies are implemented. Case illustrations are presented throughout to aid understanding.

This new Handbook addresses the state of the art in the application of operations research models to problems in preventing terrorist attacks, planning and preparing for emergencies, and responding to and recovering from disasters. The purpose of the book is to enlighten policy makers and decision makers about the power of operations research to help organizations plan for and respond to terrorist attacks, natural disasters, and public health emergencies, while at the same time providing researchers with one single source of up-to-date research and applications. The Handbook consists of nine separate chapters: Using Operations Research Methods for Homeland Security Problems Operations Research and Homeland Security: Overview and Case Study of Pandemic Influenza Deployed Security Games for Patrol Planning Interdiction Models and Applications Time Discrepant Shipments in Manifest Data Achieving Realistic Levels of Defensive Hedging Mitigating the Risk of an Anthrax Attack with Medical Countermeasures Service Networks for Public Health Preparedness and Large-scale Disaster Relief Efforts Disaster Response Planning in the Private Sector

Optimization is of critical importance in engineering. Engineers constantly strive for the best possible solutions, the most economical use of limited resources, and the greatest efficiency. As system complexity increases, these goals mandate the use of state-of-the-art optimization techniques. In recent years, the theory and methodology of optimization have seen revolutionary improvements. Moreover, the exponential growth in computational power, along with the availability of multicore computing with virtually unlimited memory and storage capacity, has fundamentally changed what engineers can do to optimize their designs. This is a two-way process: engineers benefit from developments in optimization methodology, and challenging new classes of optimization problems arise from novel engineering applications. Advances and Trends in Optimization with Engineering Applications reviews 10 major areas of optimization and related engineering applications, providing a broad summary of state-of-the-art optimization techniques most important to engineering practice. Each part provides a clear overview of a specific area and discusses a range of real-world problems. The book provides a solid foundation for engineers and mathematical optimizers alike who want to understand the importance of optimization methods to engineering and the capabilities of these methods.