Abstract
The massive use of distributed generation and electric vehicles will lead to a more complex management of the power system, requiring new approaches to be used in the optimal resource scheduling field. Electric vehicles with vehicle-to-grid capability can be useful for the aggregator players in the mitigation of renewable sources intermittency and in the ancillary services procurement. In this paper, an energy and ancillary services joint management model is proposed. A simulated annealing approach is used to solve the joint management for the following day, considering the minimization of the aggregator total operation costs. The case study considers a distribution network with 33-bus, 66 distributed generation and 2000 electric vehicles. The proposed simulated annealing is matched with a deterministic approach allowing an effective and efficient comparison. The simulated annealing presents a solution closer to the one obtained in the deterministic approach (1.03% error), yet representing 0.06% of the deterministic approach CPU time performance.

Abstract
Cyber Physical Systems (CPS) are expected to shape the evolution of production towards the fourth industrial revolution named Industry 4.0. The increasing integration of manufacturing processes and the strengthening of the autonomous capabilities of manufacturing systems make investigating the role of humans a primary research objective in view of emerging social and demographic megatrends. Understanding how the employees can be better integrated to enable increased flexibility in manufacturing systems is a prerequisite to allow technological solutions, as well as humans, to harness their full potential. Humans can supervise and adjust the settings, be a source of knowledge and competences, can diagnose situations, take decisions and several other activities influencing manufacturing performances, overall providing additional degrees of freedom to the systems. This paper, studies two different integration models: Human-in-the-Loop and Human-in-the-Mesh. They are both analysed in the context of four industrial cases of deployment of cyber physical systems in production.

Abstract
In this work, we report the design process for an optimal response of plasmonic sensors, exploiting gold nano-antenna array geometry realized on a D-shaped plastic optical fiber (POF). We have used different nano-slot arrays geometry, made by realizing rectangular slots on the gold layer. The numerical results obtained with different geometrical parameters, such as Slot's length, Slot's width and spacing, are presented. The aim of this work is to consider a different approach to obtain a plasmonic sensor in POFs, in which the geometrical parameters of the slots can modify the sensor's response to the different analytes placed and bound on the gold layer. The polarization of the Magnetic Field and the different patterns of the nano-slot array, for example different spacing among the slots, influence the plasmonic phenomena: Localized Surface Plasmon Resonance, Surface Plasmon Resonance or both. © 2016 The Authors.

Abstract
Heart auscultation is one of the basic exams performed during a patient physical examination, but it is also one that has a high skill ceiling. Decision support systems can provide physicians with a tool that can help to reduce the demanding skill requirements of this exam. Nevertheless, this second opinion needs to be delivered in a timely interval in order to be truly useful for a physician. To do this we need not only optimized algorithms, but also a well designed system. In this paper, we have studied how two different data exchange protocols, that define how data should be transferred from an acquisition to a process module, can impact the celerity of delivering second opinion to a physician. With data collected from real exams, acquired in a field hospital initiative in Brazil, we recreated two use cases that allowed us to measure performance in the form of time and resources spent, as well as power consumption. Results have shown that different data exchange protocols can have a significant impact on a decision support system response time.

Abstract

Abstract
Learning is understood as an educational activity which aims to help develop the capacities of individuals. These capabilities make individuals able to establish a personal relationship with the environment in which they are inserted. For the learning process to develop the individual has to use its sensory, motor, cognitive, affective and linguistic. Thus, this work aims at studying the effect of emotion in learning systems in online learning environments, analysing the extent to which emotional state can influence the thinking, decision making and learning process.