NASA Scientific and Technical Aerospace Reports

Bayesian belief networks are graphical tools that aid reasoning and decision-making under uncertainty. The networks
represent a system over which a probability distribution is defined, modelling uncertainty both quantitatively and qualitatively.
They allow a user to make inferences when only limited information is available. Mathematically, a Bayesian network is a
directed acyclic graph whose nodes represent variables. A link from one node to another represents a causal dependency. This
report investigates the use of Bayesian networks in the land force environment. It provides a simple introduction to the
networks, how they are constructed and how they are used. Some examples are presented to demonstrate the capabilities of
the networks, a range of land force applications are discussed, and some theoretical extensions are examined.
Author
Belief Networks; Decision Making; Bayes Theorem
20040050328 General Accounting Office, Washington, DC
Federal Law Enforcement: Information on Use of Investigation and Arrest Statistics
Mar. 2004; 70 pp.; In English
Report No.(s): PB2004-104286; GAO-04-411; No Copyright; Avail: CASI; A04, Hardcopy
The 21st Century Department of Justice Appropriations Authorization Act (P.L. 107-273) requires GAO to report on how
investigation and arrest statistics are reported and used by federal law enforcement agencies. This report provides information
on (1) the guidance and procedures followed by federal law enforcement agencies regarding counting investigations and
arrests, (2) how investigation and arrest statistics are used, and (3) whether multiple agencies are counting and reporting the
same investigations and arrests. GAO selected six agencies for review: the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), the
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the former Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), the U.S. Marshals Service,
the former U.S. Customs Service, and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service (USPIS).
NTIS
Law (Jurisprudence); Investigation
20040050612 Brookhaven National Lab., Upton, NY, USA
Negative Binomial Fits to Multiplicity Distributions from Central Collisions of (16)O+Cu at 14.6A GeV/c and
Intermittency
Tannenbaum, M. J.; October 14, 1994; 16 pp.; In English; Hot Hadronic Matter: Theory and Experiment, 27 Jun. - 1 Jul. 1994,
Divonne-Les-Bains, France
Contract(s)/Grant(s): W-31-109-eng-38; DE-AC02-76CH-00016; DE-FG02-86ER-40281; W-7405-eng-48;
DE-AC02-76ER-03069; DE-FG03-86ER-40271; NGR-05-003-513
Report No.(s): BNL-61074; Conf-9406274-4; No Copyright; Avail: CASI; A03, Hardcopy
The concept of ’Intermittency‘ was introduced by Bialas and Peschanski to try to explain the ’large‘ fluctuations of
multiplicity in restricted intervals of rapidity or pseudorapidity. A formalism was proposed to to study non-statistical (more
precisely, non-Poisson) fluctuations as a function of the size of rapidity interval, and it was further suggested that the ’spikes‘
in the rapidity fluctuations were evidence of fractal or intermittent behavior, in analogy to turbulence in fluid dynamics which
is characterized by self-similar fluctuations at all scales-the absence of well defined scale of length.
Derived from text
Binomials; Fluid Dynamics; Analogies; Statistical Distributions
20040050668 University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
Experimental and Detailed Numerical Studies of Fundamental Flame Properties of Gaseous and Liquid Fuels
Egolfopoulos, Fokion N.; Nov. 2003; 14 pp.; In English
Contract(s)/Grant(s): F49620-02-1-0002; Proj-2308
Report No.(s): AD-A420935; AFRL-SR-AR-TR-04-0150; No Copyright; Avail: CASI; A03, Hardcopy
The dynamic behavior of laminar flames was studied for a wide range of conditions. The parameters considered included
the fuel type, reactant composition, flame temperature, and combustion mode. The derived experimental data constitute a basis
for partially validating the combustion chemistry for fuels ranging from hydrogen to gaseous and liquid hydrocarbons and
alcohols. Emphasis was given to kinetics regimes that have not been systematically probed and/or in which current knowledge
of combustion chemistry appears to be inadequate. The phenomena of ignition, propagation, and extinction were studied
experimentally in the counterflow configuration. The experiments were modeled through the use of a quasi one-dimensional
code and included detailed description of chemical kinetics and molecular transport. The results of this research showed that
state of the art kinetics models have notable limitations in predicting flame properties even for simple molecules such as H2
167