Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
RGB-D fusion toward accurate 3D mapping

Recently announced RGB-D cameras like Microsoft Kinect are attractive sensing systems providing RGB images along with registered depth information at a high frame rate. This advantage makes such cameras greatly useful in the context of robotics, especially for dense 3D mapping in home environment. However, depth information they provide is usually incomplete and imprecise. This paper presents a method that effectively rectifies depth maps, particularly for missing regions, via fusion of 2D-3D images. Segmentation for plane fitting as well as Markov random field based optimization are applied successively to achieve our objective. We test our algorithm on a range of data with varying kinds and amount of incompleteness.
COMMON BOTTLENOSE DOLPHIN ( Tursiops truncatus truncatus ): Barataria Bay Estuarine System Stock

STOCK DEFINITION AND GEOGRAPHIC RANGE Common bottlenose dolphins are distributed throughout the bays, sounds and estuaries of the Gulf of Mexico (Mullin 1988). Long-term (year-round, multi-year) residency by at least some individuals has been reported from nearly every site where photographic identification (photo-ID) or tagging studies have been conducted in the Gulf of Mexico (e.g., Irvine and Wells 1972; Shane 1977; Gruber 1981; Irvine et al. 1981; Wells 1986; Wells et al. 1987; Scott et al. 1990; Shane 1990; Wells 1991; Bräger 1993; Bräger et al. 1994; Fertl 1994; Wells et al. 1996a,b; Wells et al. 1997; Weller 1998; Maze and Würsig 1999; Lynn and Würsig 2002; Wells 2003; Hubard et al. 2004; Irwin and Würsig 2004; Shane 2004; Balmer et al. 2008; Urian et al. 2009; Bassos-Hull et al. 2013). In many cases, residents predominantly use the bay, sound or estuary waters, with limited movements through passes to the Gulf of Mexico (Shane 1977; Shane 1990; Gruber 1981; Irvine et al. 1981; Shane 1990; Maze and Würsig 1999; Lynn and Würsig 2002; Fazioli et al. 2006; Bassos-Hull et al. 2013). Early studies indicating year-round residency to bays in both the eastern and western Gulf of Mexico led to the delineation of 33 bay, sound and estuary stocks, including Barataria Bay, with the first stock assessment reports published in 1995. More recently, genetic data also support the concept of relatively discrete bay, sound and estuary stocks (Duffield and Wells 2002; Sellas et al. 2005). Sellas et al. (2005) examined population subdivision among dolphins sampled in Sarasota Bay, Tampa Bay, Charlotte Harbor, Matagorda Bay, Texas, and the coastal Gulf of Mexico (1-12 km offshore) from just outside Tampa Bay to the south end of Lemon Bay, and found evidence of significant population differentiation among all areas on the basis of both mitochondrial DNA control region sequence data and 9 nuclear microsatellite loci. The Sellas et al. (2005) findings support the identification of bay, sound and estuary populations distinct from those occurring in adjacent Gulf coastal waters. Differences in reproductive seasonality from site to site also suggest genetic-based distinctions among areas (Urian Figure 1. Geographic extent of the Barataria Bay Estuarine System (BBES) Stock, located on the coast of Louisiana. The borders are denoted by solid lines.
Frequency of dimension distortion under quasisymmetric mappings

We study the distortion of Hausdorff dimension of families of Ahlfors regular sets under quasisymmetric map $f$ between metric spaces. We show that $f$ cannot increase the dimension of "most" $d$-regular sets and we estimate the number of exceptional sets whose images have dimension $\geq d' > d$; the precise statements of both results involve modulus estimates for families of measures. For planar quasiconformal maps, the general estimates imply that if $E \subset \reals$ is $d$-regular, then some component of $f(E \times \reals)$ has dimension $\leq 2/(d+1)$, and we construct examples to show this bound is sharp. In addition, we construct 1-dimensional sets $E$ so that $f(E \times \reals)$ contains no rectifiable sub-arc. These results generalize work of Balogh, Monti and Tyson \cite{Tyson:frequency} and answer questions posed in \cite{Tyson:frequency}, \cite{AimPL}.
Can videos play a role in promoting good landscape management behaviors?

ABSTRACT This study tested the effect of four short videos appealing to environmental values on home irrigation users' intent to use good irrigation and fertilization practices. The videos were largely ineffective, and there was only a small effect on one of the behaviors within the fertilizer loss treatment group. Implications point to a need for environmental education professionals to develop strategies to address environmental issues fatigue and conduct audience research that informs communications and educational programs. Environmental education professionals should encourage water protection with nonenvironmental appeals, possibly by connecting to personal or social values.
A Novel Method for Pre-Encoding Video Quality Prediction

This paper presents a novel method for fast and quantified estimation of the video quality for H.264 video content. Taking into account the instant video quality variation due to the video dynamics within a given H.264 encoded content, this paper introduces the Mean PQoS as a function of the video encoding rate and the picture resolution, and exploits it as a metric for objective video quality assessment. Based on the proposed metric, the paper presents a novel method for pre-encoding video quality prediction.
Support-Vector-Machine-Based Ranking Significantly Improves the Effectiveness of Similarity Searching Using 2D Fingerprints and Multiple Reference Compounds

Similarity searching using molecular fingerprints is computationally efficient and a surprisingly effective virtual screening tool. In this study, we have compared ranking methods for similarity searching using multiple active reference molecules. Different 2D fingerprints were used as search tools and also as descriptors for a support vector machine (SVM) algorithm. In systematic database search calculations, a SVM-based ranking scheme consistently outperformed nearest neighbor and centroid approaches, regardless of the fingerprints that were tested, even if only very small training sets were used for SVM learning. The superiority of SVM-based ranking over conventional fingerprint methods is ascribed to the fact that SVM makes use of information about database molecules, in addition to known active compounds, during the learning phase.
SWAPHI-LS: Smith-Waterman Algorithm on Xeon Phi coprocessors for Long DNA Sequences

As an optimal method for sequence alignment, the Smith-Waterman (SW) algorithm is widely used. Unfortunately, this algorithm is computationally demanding, especially for long sequences. This has motivated the investigation of its acceleration on a variety of high-performance computing platforms. However, most work in the literature is only suitable for short sequences. In this paper, we present SWAPHI-LS, the first parallel SW algorithm exploiting emerging Xeon Phi coprocessors to accelerate the alignment of long DNA sequences. In SWAPHI-LS, we have investigated three parallelization approaches (naïve, tiled, and distributed) in order to deeply explore the inherent parallelism within Xeon Phis. To achieve high speed, we have explored two levels of parallelism within a single Xeon Phi and one more level of parallelism between Xeon Phis. Within a single Xeon Phi we exploit instruction-level parallelism within 512-bit single instruction multiple data (SIMD) instructions (vectorization) as well as thread-level parallelism over the many cores (multi-threading). Between Xeon Phis we employ device-level parallelism in order to harness the compute power of Xeon Phi clusters (distributed computing based on the MPI offload model). The performance of our algorithm has been evaluated using a variety of genome sequences of lengths ranging from 4.4 million to 50 million nucleotides. Our performance evaluation reveals that our implementation achieves a stable performance of up to 30.1 billion cell updates per second (GCUPS) on a single Xeon Phi and up to 111.4 GCUPS on four Xeon Phis sharing the same host. SWAPHI-LS is written in C++ (with a set of SIMD intrinsics), OpenMP and MPI. The source code is publicly available at http://swaphi-ls.sourceforge. net.
Ray tracing for characterize the radiowave propagation at 1.9GHz and 2.4GHz inside building

This is paper presents a ray tracing simulation technique for characterize the radiowave propagation inside building. The effective dielectric constants of the building structure in the simulations are indicated. The results confirm that the received power can be determined from Directional of Arrival (DOA) based on ray tracing method for Line of Sight (LOS) and NonLine of Sight (NLOS) applications. Work reported in this paper has shown that the received power coverage in inside buildings can vary considerably according to the furniture and polarizations.
Location Estimation in Wireless Sensor Networks Using Spring-Relaxation Technique

Accurate and low-cost autonomous self-localization is a critical requirement of various applications of a large-scale distributed wireless sensor network (WSN). Due to its massive deployment of sensors, explicit measurements based on specialized localization hardware such as the Global Positioning System (GPS) is not practical. In this paper, we propose a low-cost WSN localization solution. Our design uses received signal strength indicators for ranging, light weight distributed algorithms based on the spring-relaxation technique for location computation, and the cooperative approach to achieve certain location estimation accuracy with a low number of nodes with known locations. We provide analysis to show the suitability of the spring-relaxation technique for WSN localization with cooperative approach, and perform simulation experiments to illustrate its accuracy in localization.
Toward unsupervised discovery of pronunciation error patterns using universal phoneme posteriorgram for computer-assisted language learning

In Computer-Aided Pronunciation Training, we hope to specify the type of mispronunciation, or Error Pattern (EP), the language learner has made as a more effective feedback. But derivation of EPs usually requires expert knowledge and pedagogical experiences, which is not easy to obtain for each pair of target and native languages. In this paper we propose a preliminary framework toward unsupervised discovery of EPs from a corpus of learners' recordings. We use Universal Phoneme Posteriorgram, derived from Multi-Layer Perceptron trained with a corpus of mixed languages, as features to bring supervised knowledge into the unsupervised task. We also use Hierarchical Agglomerative Clustering algorithm to explore sub-segmental variation of phoneme segments for distinguishing EPs. We tested K-means (assuming known number of EPs) and Gaussian Mixture Model with minimum description length principle (estimating unknown number of EPs) for EP discovery. Preliminary experimental results illustrated the effectiveness of the proposed framework, although there is still a long way to go compared to human annotators.
Wide-Area IP Multicast Tra–c Characterization (Extended Version)

| IP multicast is gaining acceptance among service providers as the protocols and infrastructure mature. Yet characteristics of multicast tra–c remain poorly understood. Using passive OC-12 monitors we observe multicast tra–c on links connecting aggregated customers and peer networks to our native multicast backbone network. We ﬂrst reﬂne existing tra–c (cid:176)ow proﬂling methodologies via an exploration of temporal diﬁerences in multicast packet trains. Based on this framework we collect multicast (cid:176)ow traces from four geographically dispersed nodes in the vBNS network over a one-month period. We present multicast-speciﬂc tra–c characteristics including packet and (cid:176)ow size distributions, packet duplication and fragmentation, address accumulation and address space distributions. We analyze the distribution of sources per group and the implications on the applicability of emerging single-source protocols. Analysis reveals results contrary to prevailing wisdom, including: (i) a preponderance of single-packet (cid:176)ows; (ii) a highly variable packet size distribution, with many large packets and strong modes; (iii) the existence of fragmented multi-cast tra–c; and (iv) an insigniﬂcant number of simultaneous multiple-source groups. Based on our analysis, we recommend policies for deployment and improvements to protocol implementations.
An immersive multitouch workspace

Multitouch interaction has some unique strengths, one of them being that direct touch on 2D screens makes it fast and easy. Unfortunately, because of stereo disparity and content occlusion, direct touch interaction becomes an issue as soon as 3D stereoscopic content is visualized. We propose a new system that combines efficient direct multitouch interaction with co-located 3D stereoscopic visualization. In our approach, users benefit from well-known 2D metaphors and widgets displayed on a monoscopic touchscreen while visualizing 3D objects floating above the surface at an optically correct distance (see Figure 1(a)).
On-Device Mobile Landmark Recognition Using Binarized Descriptor with Multifeature Fusion

Along with the exponential growth of high-performance mobile devices, on-device Mobile Landmark Recognition (MLR) has recently attracted increasing research attention. However, the latency and accuracy of automatic recognition remain as bottlenecks against its real-world usage. In this article, we introduce a novel framework that combines interactive image segmentation with multifeature fusion to achieve improved MLR with high accuracy. First, we propose an effective vector binarization method to reduce the memory usage of image descriptors extracted on-device, which maintains comparable recognition accuracy to the original descriptors. Second, we design a location-aware fusion algorithm that can fuse multiple visual features into a compact yet discriminative image descriptor to improve on-device efficiency. Third, a user-friendly interaction scheme is developed that enables interactive foreground/background segmentation to largely improve recognition accuracy. Experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithms for on-device MLR applications.
A Differential Word Use Measure for Content Analysis in Automated Essay Scoring. Research Report. ETS RR-11-36.

This paper proposes an alternative content measure for essay scoring, based on the difference in the relative frequency of a word in high-scored versus low-scored essays. The differential word use (DWU) measure is the average of these differences across all words in the essay. A positive value indicates the essay is using vocabulary more typical of high-scoring essays in this task, and vice versa. In addition to the traditional prompt level, this measure is also computed at the generic task level, where the content of an essay is evaluated in the context of the general vocabulary of the writing task (e.g., GRE® issue), across different prompts. Evaluation results across four GRE and TOEFL® tasks are presented. Factor analyses show that both the prompt and task DWU measures load on the same factor as the prompt-specific content analysis measures of e-rater®. Regression results on the human essay scores show that the generic task DWU measure is a strong predictor of human scores, second only to essay length among noncontent e-rater features. This measure provides a way to conduct a task-level content analysis that is related to the prompt-specific content analysis of e-rater but does not require prompt-specific training. Regression results for the prompt-level DWU show that it can be used as a replacement to prompt-specific content-vector analysis (CVA) features.
Evaluating Search Result Diversity using Intent Hierarchies

Search result diversification aims at returning diversified document lists to cover different user intents for ambiguous or broad queries. Existing diversity measures assume that user intents are independent or exclusive, and do not consider the relationships among the intents. In this paper, we introduce intent hierarchies to model the relationships among intents. Based on intent hierarchies, we propose several hierarchical measures that can consider the relationships among intents. We demonstrate the feasibility of hierarchical measures by using a new test collection based on TREC Web Track 2009-2013 diversity test collections. Our main experimental findings are: (1) Hierarchical measures are generally more discriminative and intuitive than existing measures using flat lists of intents; (2) When the queries have multilayer intent hierarchies, hierarchical measures are less correlated to existing measures, but can get more improvement in discriminative power; (3) Hierarchical measures are more intuitive in terms of diversity or relevance. The hierarchical measures using the whole intent hierarchies are more intuitive than only using the leaf nodes in terms of diversity and relevance.
PENGARUH LAYANAN MEDIASI TERHADAP PERILAKU BULLYING PADA SISWA KELAS IX SMP NEGERI 2 GONDANGREJO TAHUN PELAJARAN 2015-2016

Tujuan yang ingin dicapai dalam penelitian ini adalah untuk mengetahui pengaruh layanan mediasi terhadap perilaku bullying pada kelas IX SMP N 2 Gondangrejo tahun pelajaran 2015/2016. Metode penelitian yang digunakan adalah penelitian kualitatif, dengan strategi deskriptif kualitatif. Teknik pengumpulan sumber data melalui wawancara, observasi dan dokumentasi. Sumber data berupa data primer dan data sekunder. Data primer berupa hasil wawancara dengan klien yang sedang berkonflik. Data sekunder berupa buku catatan kenakalan siswa, dokumen Guru BK, dan melalui wawancara dengan Guru BK dan teman sekelas. Subjek penelitian adalah kelas IX A SMP N 2 Gondangrejo yang berjumlah 2 siswa, 1 orang sebagai pelaku dan 1 orang sebagai korban bullying. Sementara obyek penelitian berupa perilaku bullying melalui layanan mediasi. Keabsahan data menggunakan trianggulasi sumber dan teknik. Analisis data yang digunakan adalah analisis deskriptif kualitatif dengan langkah-langkah reduksi data, penyajian data kemudian kesimpulan. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa layanan mediasi dapat mengurangi perilaku bullying. Keberhasilan ini dapat dilihat melalui indikator keberhasilan yang menunjukan berkurangnya perilaku bullying. Berdasarkan perubahan yang terjadi antara pelaku dan korban bullying maka telah membuktikan bahwa pada penelitian dengan menggunakan layanan mediasi efektif untuk mengurangi perilaku bullying siswa kelas IX A SMP N 2 Gondangrejo tahun ajaran 2015/2016 Kata kunci : layanan mediasi, perilaku bullying
On the Impact of Within-Die Process Variation in GALS-Based NoC Performance

Current integration scales allow designing chip multiprocessors (CMP), where cores are interconnected by means of a network-on-chip (NoC). Unfortunately, the small feature size of current integration scales causes some unpredictability in manufactured devices because of process variation. In NoCs, variability may affect links and routers causing them not to match the parameters established at design time. In this paper, we first analyze the way that manufacturing deviations affect the components of a NoC by applying a new comprehensive and detailed within-die variability model to 200 instances of an 8×8 mesh NoC synthesized using 45 nm technology. Later, we show that GALS-based NoCs present communication bottlenecks under process variation which cannot be avoided by using just device-level solutions but higher level architectural approaches are required. Therefore, to overcome this performance reduction, we draft a novel architectural approach, called performance domains, intended to reduce the negative impact of variability on application execution time. This mechanism is suitable when several applications are simultaneously running in the CMP chip.
DISCOVERY OF THE THIRD TRANSIENT X-RAY BINARY IN THE GALACTIC GLOBULAR CLUSTER TERZAN 5

We report and study the outburst of a new transient X-ray binary (XRB) in Terzan 5, the third detected in this globular cluster, Swift J174805.3-244637 or Terzan 5 X-3. We find clear spectral hardening in Swift/XRT data during the outburst rise to the hard state, thanks to our early coverage (starting at LX ∼ 4 × 1034 erg s−1) of the outburst. This hardening appears to be due to the decline in relative strength of a soft thermal component from the surface of the neutron star (NS) during the rise. We identify a Type I X-ray burst in Swift/XRT data with a long (16 s) decay time, indicative of hydrogen burning on the surface of the NS. We use Swift/BAT, MAXI/GSC, Chandra/ACIS, and Swift/XRT data to study the spectral changes during the outburst, identifying a clear hard-to-soft state transition. We use a Chandra/ACIS observation during outburst to identify the transient's position. Seven archival Chandra/ACIS observations show evidence for variations in Terzan 5 X-3's nonthermal component but not the thermal component during quiescence. The inferred long-term time-averaged mass accretion rate, from the quiescent thermal luminosity, suggests that if this outburst is typical and only slow cooling processes are active in the NS core, such outbursts should recur every ∼10 yr.
High Efficiency Envelope Tracking LDMOS Power Amplifier for W-CDMA

A high performance W-CDMA base station power amplifier is presented, which uses an envelope tracking bias system along with an advanced 0.4mum gate length LDMOS transistor, to achieve high efficiency. High linearity is also achieved by employing digital predistortion. For a target WCDMA envelope with a peak-to-average power ratio of 7.6 dB, the measured overall power-added efficiency (PAE) is as high as 40.4 %. Within this system, the RF power amplifier has an average drain efficiency of approximately 64%, and the envelope amplifier has about 60% efficiency. After the memoryless digital predistortion the normalized power RMS error is 3.3%, at an average output power of 27 W and gain of 14.9 dB. After memory mitigation the normalized power RMS error drops to below 1.0%. The efficiency ranks among the highest reported for a single stage LDMOS W-CDMA base station amplifier
ArchiMate(R) for Integrated Modelling Throughout the Architecture Development and Implementation Cycle

The ArchiMate standard offers an integrated language for enterprise architecture modelling. It allows for the description and visualization of different architecture domains, as well as their underlying relationships and dependencies. Since its adoption as a standard of The Open Group, the international interest in ArchiMate has been growing rapidly. ArchiMate complements TOGAF, the standard of The Open Group for developing enterprise architectures. To provide modelling support throughout TOGAF's architecture development and implementation cycle as defined by TOGAF, two extensions to the original ArchiMate language have been proposed: a Motivation extension and an Implementation and Migration extension.
Lifting Graph Automorphisms by Voltage Assignments

The problem of lifting graph automorphisms along covering projections and the analysis of lifted groups is considered in a purely combinatorial setting. The main tools employed are: (1) a systematic use of the fundamental groupoid; (2) unification of ordinary, relative and permutation voltage constructions into the concept of a voltage space; (3) various kinds of invariance of voltage spaces relative to automorphism groups; and (4) investigation of geometry of the lifted actions by means of transversals over a localization set. Some applications of these results to regular maps on surfaces are given. Because of certain natural applications and greater generality, graphs are allowed to have semiedges. This requires careful re-examination of the whole subject and at the same time leads to simplification and generalization of several known results.