A warehouse delivery problem consists of a set of robots that undertake delivery jobs within a warehouse. Items are moved around the warehouse in response to events. A solution to a warehouse ...delivery problem is a collision-free schedule of robot movements and actions that ensures that all delivery jobs are completed and each robot is returned to its docking station. While the warehouse delivery problem is related to existing research, such as the study of multi-agent path finding (MAPF), the specific industrial requirements necessitated a novel approach that diverges from these other approaches. For example, our problem description was more suited to formalizing the warehouse in terms of a weighted directed graph rather than the more common grid-based formalization. We formalize and encode the warehouse delivery problem in Answer Set Programming (ASP) extended with difference constraints. We systematically develop and study different encoding variants, with a view to computing good quality solutions in near real-time. In particular, application specific criteria are contrasted against the traditional notion of makespan minimization as a measure of solution quality. The encoding is tested against both crafted and industry data and experiments run using the Hybrid ASP solver clingodl.
Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC, Vietnam) is one of the fastest growing megacities in the world. In this paper, we attempt to analyse the dynamics of nutrients, suspended sediments, and water discharges in ...its aquatic systems today and in the future. The work is based on nine sampling sites along the Saigon River and one on the Dongnai River to identify the reference water status upstream from the urban area and the increase in fluxes that occur within the city and its surroundings. For the first time, the calculated fluxes allow drawing up sediment and nutrient budgets at the basin scale and the quantification of total nutrient loading to the estuarine and coastal zones (2012–2016 period). Based on both national Vietnamese and supplementary monitoring programs, we estimated the water, total suspended sediment, and nutrients (Total N, Total P, and dissolved silica: DSi) fluxes at 137 m3 year−1, 3,292 × 103 tonSS year−1, 5,323 tonN year−1, 450 tonP year−1, and 2,734 tonSi year−1 for the Saigon River and 1,693 m3 year−1, 1,175 × 103 tonSS year−1, 31,030 tonN year−1, 1,653 tonP year−1, and 31,138 tonSi year−1 for the Dongnai River, respectively. Nutrient fluxes provide an indicator of coastal eutrophication potential (indicator of coastal eutrophication potential), using nutrient stoichiometry ratios. Despite an excess of nitrogen and phosphorus over silica, estuarine waters downstream of the megacity are not heavily impacted by HCMC. Finally, we analysed scenarios of future trends (2025–2050) for the nutrient inputs on the basis of expected population growth in HCMC and improvement of wastewater treatment capacity. We observed that without the construction of a large number of additional wastewater treatment plants, the eutrophication problem is likely to worsen. The results are discussed in the context of the wastewater management policy.
•A quick and easy method was proposed for the extraction of levo-tetrahydropalmatine from plasma.•Berberine was used as internal standard and obtained good results.•In-housed method validation showed ...good performance.•Oral bioavailability of two drug forms was compared in a pharmacokinetic study.
A rapid extraction method was developed and validated for levo-tetrahydropalmatine (l-THP) determination in rabbit plasma by liquid chromatography tandem–mass spectrometry (LC–MS/MS). The sample preparation included a single-step acetonitrile extraction and salting out liquid–liquid partitioning from the water in plasma with MgSO4. Berberine was used as internal standard. The mass spectrometry source was negative electrospray ionization. The method showed good performance in the concentration range from 5 to 200ngmL−1. The limit of quantification (LOQ) was 1ngmL−1. The method was successfully applied to a pharmacokinetic study in rabbit comparing the two drug formulation of l-THP including the raw material and the self-microemulsifying drug delivery system pellet.
The need for analytical methods that are fast, affordable, and ecologically friendly is expanding. Because of its low solvent consumption, minimal waste production, and speedy analysis, capillary ...electrophoresis is considered a “green” choice among analytical separation methods. With these “green” features, we have utilized the capillary electrophoresis method with capacitively coupled contactless conductivity detection (CE-C4D) to simultaneously determine glucosamine and Ca2+ in dietary supplements. The CE analysis was performed in fused silica capillaries (50 μm inner diameter, 40 cm total length, 30 cm effective length), and the analytical time was around 5 min. After optimization, the CE conditions for selective determination of glucosamine and Ca2+ were obtained, including a 10 mM tris (hydroxymethyl) aminomethane/acetic acid (Tris/Ace) buffer of pH 5.0 as the background electrolyte; separation voltage of 20 kV; and hydrodynamic injection (siphoning) at 25 cm height for 30 s. The method illustrated good linearity over the concentration range of 5.00 to 200 mg/L of for glucosamine (R2 = 0.9994) and 1.00 to 100 mg/L for Ca2+ (R2 = 0.9994). Under the optimum conditions, the detection limit of glucosamine was 1.00 mg/L, while that of Ca2+ was 0.05 mg/L. The validated method successfully analyzed glucosamine and Ca2+ in seven dietary supplement samples. The measured concentrations were generally in line with the values of label claims and with cross-checking data from reference methods (HPLC and ICP-OES).
•Ryegrass staggers is a neurotoxic condition that adversely affects livestock•Visual detection of ryegrass staggers is labor intensive•Accelerometers can detect behavior changes associated with ...ryegrass staggers•Machine learning and accelerometers have potential to detect ryegrass staggers•Random Forests was superior to Signal Vector Machines for prediction of staggers
Perennial ryegrass staggers (staggers) is a neurotoxic condition in livestock that is caused by consumption of ryegrass (Lolium perenne) infected with specific strains of Epichloë fungal endophytes. These grass-endophyte associations produce toxins that can adversely affect animals and can in some cases lead to death. In sheep, symptoms typically include head shaking, changes in gait, stiffness and falling. Affected sheep can recover after removing them from pastures containing toxic strains of endophyte. A pilot case study was conducted in Lincoln, New Zealand to determine if ryegrass staggers could be identified with data collected through GPS tracking and accelerometers. Fourteen sheep per treatment grazed in either a toxic endophyte-infected ryegrass paddock or an endophyte-free control paddock for 17 days in late March and early April 2017. Randomly selected sheep were fitted with collars containing a 3-axis accelerometer recording movements at 12 Hz (10 collars in endophyte infected paddock and 6 in the control paddock). Three sheep per treatment were also tracked at 3-minute intervals with GPS receivers. Sheep were scored by an experienced observer for symptoms of staggers weekly and at the end of the study using a 0 to 5 scale. Control sheep did not display any symptoms of staggers and 10 sheep in the infected pasture displayed little or no symptoms (0 or 1 score). The other 4 sheep in infected pasture had scores from 2 to 4 at the end of the study. Sheep grazing in the infected pasture (2.91 m/min ± 0.04 SE) moved slower (P=0.04) than sheep in the control pasture (3.12 m/min ± 0.05 SE). Distance travelled varied among days, but there did not appear to be any temporal trends. Machine learning analyses of accelerometer data showed that the behavior of affected sheep changed during the study. Activity of sheep displaying symptoms (scores ≥ 2) increased more in the morning and midday during the latter part of the study than control sheep and sheep with few or no symptoms (score < 2). However, behavior of individual sheep at night remained relatively consistent during the study. Accelerometers may be useful for remotely detecting perennial ryegrass staggers.
•Multiple sensors per animal during studies may create false data artifacts.•Differences in accelerometers were detected for 80 % of calculated metrics.•Using multiple calculated metrics will ...increase the prediction of behavior changes.
Application of sensors is becoming prevalent in research and production settings. With increasing battery power, improved case and component durability, and consistent data connectivity, precision technologies, such as accelerometers, can help identify changes in livestock behavior. The objective of this study is to identify the variation among individual animals and among different accelerometer devices. A repeated 4 × 4 Latin-square design was utilized to identify differences between accelerometer, animal, and week. Twelve ewes separated into three age groups were randomly assigned to 4 different accelerometers deployed as an ear tag weekly over the course of 4 weeks. Manual behavior observations were paired to calculated accelerometer metrics and were used for training and validation dataset to predict animal behavior using random forest machine learning. Movement variation had the greatest importance in predicting behaviors. Across the four week study, differences were found for animal and week through each of the calculated metrics. Differences in accelerometers were detected for 80 % of the calculated metrics. This study shows the importance to account for variation among individual animals and accelerometer devices in experimental designs.
This paper describes our methodology for building conformant planners, which is based on recent advances in the theory of action and change and answer set programming. The development of a planner ...for a given dynamic domain starts with encoding the knowledge about fluents and actions of the domain as an action theory
D
of some action language. Our choice in this paper is
AL
– an action language with dynamic and static causal laws and executability conditions. An action theory
D
of
AL
defines a transition diagram
T
(
D
)
containing all the possible trajectories of the domain. A transition
〈
s
,
a
,
s
′
〉
belongs to
T
(
D
)
iff the execution of the action
a in the state
s may move the domain to the state
s
′
. The second step in the planner development consists in finding a deterministic transition diagram
T
l
p
(
D
)
such that nodes of
T
l
p
(
D
)
are partial states of
D
, its arcs are labeled by actions, and a path in
T
l
p
(
D
)
from an initial partial state
δ
0
to a partial state satisfying the goal
δ
f
corresponds to a conformant plan for
δ
0
and
δ
f
in
T
(
D
)
. The transition diagram
T
l
p
(
D
)
is called an ‘approximation’ of
T
(
D
)
. We claim that a concise description of an approximation of
T
(
D
)
can often be given by a logic program
π
(
D
)
under the answer sets semantics. Moreover, complex initial situations and constraints on plans can be also expressed by logic programming rules and included in
π
(
D
)
. If this is possible then the problem of finding a parallel or sequential conformant plan can be reduced to computing answer sets of
π
(
D
)
. This can be done by general purpose answer set solvers. If plans are sequential and long then this method can be too time consuming. In this case,
π
(
D
)
is used as a specification for a procedural graph searching conformant planning algorithm. The paper illustrates this methodology by building several conformant planners which work for domains with complex relationship between the fluents. The efficiency of the planners is experimentally evaluated on a number of new and old benchmarks. In addition we show that for a subclass of action theories of
AL
our planners are complete, i.e., if in
T
l
p
(
D
)
we cannot get from
δ
0
to a state satisfying the goal
δ
f
then there is no conformant plan for
δ
0
and
δ
f
in
T
(
D
)
.
Elimination of chemically synthesized pesticides, such as fungicides and nematicides, in agricultural products is a key to successful practice of the Vietnamese agriculture. We describe here the ...route for developing successful biostimulants based on members of the
species complex. A number of endospore-forming Gram-positive bacterial strains with antagonistic action against plant pathogens were isolated from Vietnamese crop plants. Based on their draft genome sequence, thirty of them were assigned to the
species complex. Most of them were assigned to the species
. Whole genome sequencing of strains BT2.4 and BP1.2A corroborated their close relatedness to
FZB42, the model strain for Gram-positive plant growth-promoting bacteria. Genome mining revealed that at least 15 natural product biosynthesis gene clusters (BGCs) are well conserved in all
strains. In total, 36 different BGCs were identified in the genomes of the strains representing
, and
.
and
assays demonstrated the potential of the
strains to enhance plant growth and to suppress phytopathogenic fungi and nematodes. Due to their promising potential to stimulate plant growth and to support plant health, the
strains TL7 and S1 were selected as starting material for the development of novel biostimulants, and biocontrol agents efficient in protecting the important Vietnamese crop plants black pepper and coffee against phytopathogens. The results of the large-scale field trials performed in the Central Highlands in Vietnam corroborated that TL7 and S1 are efficient in stimulating plant growth and protecting plant health in large-scale applications. It was shown that treatment with both bioformulations resulted in prevention of the pathogenic pressure exerted by nematodes, fungi, and oomycetes, and increased harvest yield in coffee, and pepper.
The paper introduces the notion of offline justification for answer set programming (ASP). Justifications provide a graph-based explanation of the truth value of an atom with respect to a given ...answer set. The paper extends also this notion to provide justification of atoms during the computation of an answer set (on-line justification) and presents an integration of online justifications within the computation model of Smodels. Offline and online justifications provide useful tools to enhance understanding of ASP, and they offer a basic data structure to support methodologies and tools for debugging answer set programs. A preliminary implementation has been developed in – .
PDF
