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ABSTRACT: The transport of hazardous materials can have a negative impact on human health and the environment quality; therefore it represents a relevant concern for each national economy of Europe. In Italy, the Apulia Region funded a research project to face this problem. In this framework, the authors proposed a flexible intelligent transport system (ITS) designed to work in many complex situations on the road network. This ITS uses artificial intelligence methods to implement route planning. Essentially, the system specifies a route for each vehicle by optimising a multi-objective function. The objectives, which are optimised, depend on the specific application and in this work they are related to the hazardous material transport impact reduction. This goal is achieved by implementing a negotiation process among intelligent agents. The system monitors the route followed by each vehicle and verifies if it coincides with the specified route. A key element of the ITS is a flexible on-board unit mounted on vehicles. It has a modular structure that allows for a variety of sensors to be connected, depending on the application. In this case, a variety of parameters, such as the vehicle speed, position, load balance and accelerations are analysed. Using that data the system identifies some characteristics, for example, the driver behaviour and hazardous vehicle operating conditions. In order to represent this information, the authors propose a multi-level metaphor-based graphic user interface (GUI). The first level of the interface provides a quickly understood view of the situation being monitored and it is oriented towards on-site first response and route monitoring operators. The second level provides more detailed information for incident managers and other operators. This interface has been evaluated using a human panel. Each volunteer has compiled a questionnaire after that he/she has used the interface for a 30-min session. The focus of this work is to present the approach-
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IET Intelligent Transport Systems 10/2011; · 0.51 Impact Factor
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ABSTRACT: Aim of this paper is to present “WEGES” (ways, routes in German): a flexible and effective smart sensor for gas monitoring in environmental applications. In order to test the flexibility of this smart sensor, it was used into two different research projects requiring a module for air monitoring: “Ecourb”, and “Slimsafe”. Ecourb is a Strategic Project (P-047) funded by Apulia Region and finalized to the analysis and modeling of atmospheric (chemical and thermal) pollution and urban eco-labeling. Slim-Safe is funded by the European Seventh Framework Program for Research and Sustainable Development and it is finalized to increase safety in ports' mobility (activity Slim-Port). The case studies and the obtained results demonstrate the high flexibility of WEGES and its ability to work in complex operating scenarios such those of these two research projects.
Advances in Sensors and Interfaces (IWASI), 2011 4th IEEE International Workshop on; 07/2011
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ABSTRACT: Aim of this paper is to propose a solution to the correspondence problem in multi-camera systems. In these systems, two or more cameras are used to record the same scene from different view points. In this way it is possible to face the problem of occlusions in crowding scenes. In this work an object level motion detection algorithm is used and it is applied to the videos sampled by two cameras. The proposed approach does not require a calibration stage and it does not introduce any constraints about the camera positions. Once that the moving objects are detected, they are characterized using image retrieval techniques. The system was tested using two cameras. Object detection and tracking are primary tasks in automatic video streaming analysis. The obtained results in terms of correct classifications rate seem to be encouraging because they highlight the ability of the system to work also in presence of crowding scenes.
Computing and Communication Technologies, Research, Innovation, and Vision for the Future (RIVF), 2010 IEEE RIVF International Conference on; 12/2010
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ABSTRACT: Focus of this paper is to present an ITS used to certificate the correctness of vehicle activities. Due to the growing importance of transport system for the sustainability of the human society development, nowadays various intelligent transport systems (ITS) have been developed. In this work flexible ITS designed to handle various aspects of the hazardous material transport is presented. This system is able to monitor some vehicle's activities starting from the measurement of parameters such as accelerations, positions, etc. A fuzzy inference system (FIS) was implemented to test the possibility of using the proposed system as a certifier of the correctness of these activities. In particular, the loading and unloading activity of a vehicle fleet used for the rubbish collection was monitored. The proposed system was developed and tested in the framework of a research project funded by Apulia Region (Italy).
Instrumentation and Measurement Technology Conference (I2MTC), 2010 IEEE; 06/2010
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ABSTRACT: Aim of this paper is to present an intelligent distributed monitoring system designed to monitor the air quality in specific indoor environments. The proposed architecture is very flexible and the used design principles can be applied to various indoor and outdoor environments. In this work the authors describe the features of this system tuned for monitoring the air quality in a healthcare center. The system is based on a set of low cost sensors equipped with a communication module. These transponders are able to: measure various environmental parameters, compute various algorithms and communicate with a central server or other transponders. A multi agent system is used to handle various aspects of the monitoring system such as: data integration, data analysis, user centered interfaces, etc.
Environmental, Energy, and Structural Monitoring Systems, 2009. EESMS 2009. IEEE Workshop on; 10/2009
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ABSTRACT: Aim of this work is to present a new approach to the problem of user presence monitoring in working environments. Particularly, this work is focused on the evaluation of the presence or absence of a user in front of a terminal. This question is of paramount importance in applications requiring the user's presence e.g. video surveillance systems, control centrals, etc. The authors propose a technique of data fusion using signals from various low cost sensors.
Computational Intelligence for Measurement Systems and Applications, 2009. CIMSA '09. IEEE International Conference on; 06/2009
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ABSTRACT: Aim of this work is to present a metaphor based multilevel interface for an Intelligent Transport System (ITS) designed to handle the transport of hazardous materials. This ITS was developed by the authors in the framework of a research project funded by Apulia Region (Italy). Starting from monitoring some parameters of a vehicle in motion such as position, speed, load balancing, stress conditions, etc., this system identifies various situations such as driver's behavior, hazardous conditions, and so on. In order to represent this information, the authors propose a multi level metaphor based graphic user interface (GUI). The first level of the interface allows for a rapid system view at a glance and is oriented to unskilled users while the second level reports more detailed information for the expert users.
Instrumentation and Measurement Technology Conference, 2009. I2MTC '09. IEEE; 06/2009
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ABSTRACT: Aim of this paper is to present a decision support system designed to optimize the transport of hazardous materials. Various parameters have to be in-depth analyzed for handling this kind of transport. Traditional systems, based on multi-objective functions optimization, have serious limits regarding the scalability both of the considered parameters and the number of vehicles involved into transport. The transport of hazardous material is regulated by specific rules in many countries. The system presented in this work was developed by the authors in the framework of a research project funded by Regione Puglia (Italy). In this work the authors present the adopted intelligent multi-agent system architecture focusing the attention on the proposed decision support system based on the multi agent cooperative negotiation.
Computational Intelligence for Modelling Control & Automation, 2008 International Conference on; 01/2009
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ABSTRACT: In a Web-oriented society, organization, retrieval, and classification of digital images have become one of the major endeavors. In this paper, we study the mechanisms of fuzzy clustering and fuzzy clustering with partial supervision in the analysis and classification of images. It is demonstrated that the main features of fuzzy clustering become essential in revealing the structure in a collection of images and supporting their classification. The discussed operational framework of fuzzy clustering is realized by means of fuzzy c-means (FCM). When dealing with the mode of partial supervision, we augment an original objective function guiding the clustering process by an additional component expressing a level of coincidence between the membership degrees produced by the FCM and class allocation supplied by the user(s). The study also contrasts the use of the technology of fuzzy sets in image clustering with other approaches studied in this area. A suite of experiments deals with two collections of images, namely, Columbia object image library (COIL-20) and a database composed of 2000 outdoor images.
IEEE Transactions on Fuzzy Systems 09/2008; · 4.26 Impact Factor
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ABSTRACT: Aim of this paper is to present a method to improve the accuracy of a GPS receiver. It is well known that there are many factors affecting the accuracy of a GPS receiver. In this work, the authors point out that many of these factors, considered in a given geographic area, have a certain periodicity. An important example of this kind of factors is the sky satellite position relative to receiver. The proposed method uses a neural network to correct the position computed by the receiver. The neural network is trained to learn the errors introduced into the measuring system by the cyclic phenomenon in the various hours of the day.
Computational Intelligence for Measurement Systems and Applications, 2008. CIMSA 2008. 2008 IEEE International Conference on; 08/2008
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ABSTRACT: This work proposes to use a decision tree classifier for time series data reconstruction. Object of this analysis is to study environmental data acquired by a distributed multi-sensors monitoring system placed in Taranto. The performance obtained in data reconstruction using the proposed decision tree is compared with those obtained using two well known signal reconstruction methods: mean value and polynomial interpolation. The results show that the decision tree outperforms the other two methods in almost all the analyzed cases.
Instrumentation and Measurement Technology Conference Proceedings, 2008. IMTC 2008. IEEE; 06/2008
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ABSTRACT: GPS sentences carry the UTC time information. In the case of extended sensor grids or world wide sensor networks the UTC information appears to be very attractive but one risk is to have degraded timing accuracy imputable to much noise on the signal transmission path. Well known problems are time delays due to ionosphere, troposphere or receiver hardware specifics. The software phase instead is often skipped although it can represent actually a noisy element for the correct synchronization. This paper presents a GPS-based lightweight low-cost system architecture that can support multi-sensor data synchronization through an accurate timestamp of the incoming data streams. The proposed architecture handles both hardware and software problems in order to achieve correct post-processing data synchronization by means of software timestamping. Particular attention is paid to the combined hardware/software solution that minimises the overall delay time before the software timestamp event. The proposed architecture is also suitable to provide accurate evaluation of software algorithms impact over multi-sensor measurements.
Instrumentation and Measurement Technology Conference Proceedings, 2008. IMTC 2008. IEEE; 06/2008
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ABSTRACT: Information and communications technology (ICT) applications for healthcare industry are proliferating and so it is quite common to find different applications among the various hospital departments that are unable to exchange data among them. On the other hand, in this field, database integration at world wide level is becoming an issue of primary importance because it is the key to handle extreme events such as sudden spreading pandemic viruses. Aim of this paper is to present a new architecture which is able to integrate information stored in heterogeneous geographically-distributed healthcare centers. The proposed approach is based on multi-agent system and grid technology to overcome the typical limitations of a n-tiered architecture and the data structure (tables and records). The medical doctor will see disparate computing and data resources in a uniform manner, so that these resources can be accessed remotely without a priori knowledge of used data structures and the possible query.
Electrical and Computer Engineering, 2008. CCECE 2008. Canadian Conference on; 06/2008
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ABSTRACT: This paper reports the features of a web-based multi-agent system (MAS) which aims at supporting electronic data interchange (EDI) among seaport operators and providing interoperability among ports. The MAS architecture here proposed performs process automation, data integration, security and quality of managed information better than a tradional client-server. The case study is represented by the italian port of Taranto and three greek ports (Igoumenitsa, Salonica and Kavala). This paper draws on a work in progress within INTERREG III ARCHIMED PROGRAMME for New.Ton. Project, a project co-financed by the European regional development fund (ERDF).
Electrical and Computer Engineering, 2008. CCECE 2008. Canadian Conference on; 06/2008
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ABSTRACT: An information system supporting environmental applications must be reliable, scalable and able to acquire and integrate data from a lot of monitoring stations distributed in different places. This paper proposes a system integrating the data acquired by a distributed network of sensors for air quality monitoring. The monitoring system is based on a well-tested Multi Agent System architecture based on functions layering. Aim of this paper is to highlight the behavior of the MAS while it is integrating data from multiple information sources and present an innovative method for Web based information source integration.
Virtual Environments, Human-Computer Interfaces and Measurement Systems, 2007. VECIMS 2007. IEEE Symposium on; 07/2007
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ABSTRACT: Aim of this work is to present a new human computer interface for Web search engines. Despite the noteworthy improvements introduced in the Web search engines, their human interface still remain surprisingly based on a textual sorted list. The position of a site in this list expresses its distance from the user's query. The authors propose a graphical user interface for search engines based on the geomorphologic metaphor. This interface makes user aware of the semantic distribution of the Web sites retrieved by the search engine. The proposed interface is implemented as a browser plug-in and it is able to work with all the modern search engines.
Virtual Environments, Human-Computer Interfaces and Measurement Systems, 2007. VECIMS 2007. IEEE Symposium on; 07/2007
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ABSTRACT: This work proposes a model of an intelligent short term demand side management system (DSM) based on a distributed measurement and management data system. The system is designed to avoid peaks of power request greater than a given threshold and to give maximum comfort to user. The DSM problem is modeled as a multi objectives scheduling problem and it is solved using a metaheuristic approach based on a multi agent system. The proposed system is composed of a distributed network of processing nodes (PN). Each PN hosts one agent and it is able to manage a single node of a distribution network allowing or disallowing it to supply power. Each agent reacts to a new critical condition entering in competition with the others to gain the access at a shared limited resource. As the results shown the proposed system can be the consumer's key to take advantage of a DSM program automatically.
Instrumentation and Measurement Technology Conference Proceedings, 2007. IMTC 2007. IEEE; 06/2007
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ABSTRACT: This work proposes a model of an intelligent short term demand side management system based on a MAS. The system is designed to avoid peaks of power request greater than a given threshold and to give maximum comfort to user. The proposed system is composed of a distributed network of processing nodes (PN). Each PN hosts one agent and it is able to manage a single socket tap allowing or disallowing it to supply power. Each agent reacts to a new critical condition entering in competition with the others to gain the access at a shared limited resource. As the results shown the proposed agency can be the consumer's key to take advantage of a DSM program automatically
Computational Intelligence for Measurement Systems and Applications, Proceedings of 2006 IEEE International Conference on; 08/2006
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ABSTRACT: Grid computing systems are emerging as a consequence of the growing Internet connectivity in combination with the need of shared resources to deploy large-scale scientific applications. In such a context, heterogeneity, decentralization, location, access and availability of resources need to be dealt with suitable simulation tools. In particular, overloading conditions may be critical and difficult to analyse when the grid is requested to guarantee affordable high performances. To deal with such a challenging task, a virtual simulation environment provided with a suitable graphical interface has been developed as the means for comparative analysis with real test bed activities
Virtual Environments, Human-Computer Interfaces and Measurement Systems, Proceedings of 2006 IEEE International Conference on; 08/2006
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ABSTRACT: Focus of this work is the presentation of an interface for an image retrieval system that makes users aware of the overall organization of the image database. The main features of this system are the multi-images query approach and the use of a dynamic knowledge base in order to improve the system performances. The multi-images query is utilized because often a single image does not fully cover the semantic query idea of the user, so, this work presents a system that allows the user to submit multi query images. Another relevant feature of the proposed system is the use of a dynamic knowledge based approach. This knowledge base is composed of two sets of clusters: the first one is obtained with an automatic clustering algorithm and the second one is built dynamically by the user when using the system. The results presented in this paper demonstrate that this approach provides accurate retrieval results showing acceptable interaction speed that can be compared with existing methods
Computational Intelligence for Modelling, Control and Automation, 2005 and International Conference on Intelligent Agents, Web Technologies and Internet Commerce, International Conference on; 12/2005
