Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Acquiring neural signals for developing a perception and cognition model

The understanding of how humans process information, determine salience, and combine seemingly unrelated information is essential to automated processing of large amounts of information that is partially relevant, or of unknown relevance. Recent neurological science research in human perception, and in information science regarding contextbased modeling, provides us with a theoretical basis for using a bottom-up approach for automating the management of large amounts of information in ways directly useful for human operators. However, integration of human intelligence into a game theoretic framework for dynamic and adaptive decision support needs a perception and cognition model. For the purpose of cognitive modeling, we present a brain-computer-interface (BCI) based humanoid robot system to acquire brainwaves during human mental activities of imagining a humanoid robot-walking behavior. We use the neural signals to investigate relationships between complex humanoid robot behaviors and human mental activities for developing the perception and cognition model. The BCI system consists of a data acquisition unit with an electroencephalograph (EEG), a humanoid robot, and a charge couple CCD camera. An EEG electrode cup acquires brainwaves from the skin surface on scalp. The humanoid robot has 20 degrees of freedom (DOFs); 12 DOFs located on hips, knees, and ankles for humanoid robot walking, 6 DOFs on shoulders and arms for arms motion, and 2 DOFs for head yaw and pitch motion. The CCD camera takes video clips of the human subject's hand postures to identify mental activities that are correlated to the robot-walking behaviors. We use the neural signals to investigate relationships between complex humanoid robot behaviors and human mental activities for developing the perception and cognition model.
LBM-HPC - An Open-Source Tool for Fluid Simulations. Case Study: Unified Parallel C (UPC-PGAS)

The main motivation of this work is the evaluation of the Unified Parallel C (UPC) model, for Boltzmann-fluid simulations. UPC is one of the current models in the so-called Partitioned Global Address Space paradigm. This paradigm attempts to increase the simplicity of codes and achieve a better efficiency and scalability. Two different UPC-based implementations, explicit and implicit, are presented and evaluated. We compare the fundamental features of our UPC implementations with other parallel programming model, MPI-OpenMP. In particular each of the major steps of any LBM code, i.e., Boundary Conditions, Communication, and LBM solver, are analyzed.
Travelling Wave Mechanism and Novel Analysis of the Planar Archimedean Spiral Antenna in Free Space

While Archimedean spiral antennas were invented a half-century ago, only self- complementary impedance can be evaluated directly from the Babinet's principle. This paper examines the efiects of metal width and arm spacing on printed spiral's input impedance. A model is proposed based on examination by decomposition of planar spiral. A closed-form expression for the input impedance of Archimedean spiral antenna is obtained by evaluating the proposed model with conformal mapping techniques. Full-wave numerical simulations, Babinet's principle, and a fabricated antenna demonstrate the accuracy of the proposed model. The expression in this work can be used to flnd the impedance of a variety of spiral complementary structures analytically. The examination and discussion on the efiects of other parameters and features in addition to the spiral itself are also provided through numerical simulation.
Wild capuchin monkeys (Cebus libidinosus) use anvils and stone pounding tools

We conducted an exploratory investigation in an area where nut‐cracking by wild capuchin monkeys is common knowledge among local residents. In addition to observing male and female capuchin monkeys using stones to pound open nuts on stone “anvils,” we surveyed the surrounding area and found physical evidence that monkeys cracked nuts on rock outcrops, boulders, and logs (collectively termed anvils). Anvils, which were identified by numerous shallow depressions on the upper surface, the presence of palm shells and debris, and the presence of loose stones of an appropriate size to pound nuts, were present even on the tops of mesas. The stones used to crack nuts can weigh >1 kg, and are remarkably heavy for monkeys that weigh <4 kg. The abundance of shell remains and depressions in the anvil surface at numerous anvil sites indicate that nut‐cracking activity is common and long‐enduring. Many of the stones found on anvils (presumably used to pound nuts) are river pebbles that are not present in the local area we surveyed (except on or near the anvils); therefore, we surmise that they were transported to the anvil sites. Ecologically and behaviorally, nut‐cracking by capuchins appears to have strong parallels to nut‐cracking by wild chimpanzees. The presence of abundant anvil sites, limited alternative food resources, abundance of palms, and the habit of the palms in this region to produce fruit at ground level all likely contribute to the monkeys' routine exploitation of palm nuts via cracking them with stones. This discovery provides a new reference point for discussions regarding the evolution of tool use and material culture in primates. Routine tool use to exploit keystone food resources is not restricted to living great apes and ancestral hominids. Am. J. Primatol. 64:359–366, 2004. © 2004 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Application of Freeman Chain Codes: An Alternative Recognition Technique for Malaysian Car Plates

Summary Various applications of car plate recognition systems have been developed using various kinds of methods and techniques by researchers all over the world. The applications developed were only suitable for specific country due to its standard specification endorsed by the transport department of particular countries. The Road Transport Department of Malaysia also has endorsed a specification for car plates that includes the font and size of characters that must be followed by car owners. However, there are cases where this specification is not followed. Several applications have been developed in Malaysia to overcome this problem. However, there is still problem in achieving 100% recognition accuracy. This paper is mainly focused on conducting an experiment using chain codes technique to perform recognition for different types of fonts used in Malaysian car plates.
The construction and use of ontologies of criminal law in the e-Court European project

In this paper we describe the nature and use of various ontologies (knowledge bases) for the information management of documents coming from and related to criminal trial hearings. This work is part of the e-COURT European IST project, but it is also based on work in previous and current IST projects, aimed at legal knowledge management. We describe these ontologies, in particular an ‘upper’ ontology –LRI-core– that has the role of providing anchors and interpretation to the various legal domain ontologies. This upper ontology differs from existing (proposed) upper ontologies (e.g. SUMO or CYC) in several ways. One is that mental and social worlds are under-represented, while legal domains refer to social and mental concepts. The role of LRI-core is exemplified by an ontology about Dutch criminal law. Ontologies play also an important role in providing vocabularies that can be used to index and retrieve documents: in law the most typical kind of document are regulations (laws, provisions, contracts). We report work on the structuring of these legal sources that is part of the MetaLex iniative. In the second part of the paper we describe how these ontologies are to be used in tagging and annotating the hearing documents; in searching these documents, and in structuring the return set of retrieved documents. The technology used is based on emerging standards of the semantic web and we present arguments why AI based technologies reasons why one should not do with apparently simpler, non AI-based technologies.
Probabilistic graphic models applied to identification of diseases

ABSTRACT Decision-making is fundamental when making diagnosis or choosing treatment. The broad dissemination of computed systems and databases allows systematization of part of decisions through artificial intelligence. In this text, we present basic use of probabilistic graphic models as tools to analyze causality in health conditions. This method has been used to make diagnosis of Alzheimer´s disease, sleep apnea and heart diseases.
FM2: A real-time fast marching sensor-based motion planner

Path planning for autonomous robots is an essential capacity for these systems. One class of path planning algorithms use potential fields. However, some problems associated with these algorithms include (1) Trapping due to local minima, (2) No passage between closely spaced obstacles, and (3) Limit cycles. This paper presents a potential-field-based algorithm that does not exhibit the mentioned problems. The algorithm uses a two- part approach. The first part of the approach generates a "velocity map" of the environment that represents the admissible velocity at discrete cells in the workspace. This velocity map of the environment gives a grey scale that is darker near the obstacles and walls (black means zero speed) and more clear far from them (white means a predefined maximum robot speed). This velocity map imitates the repulsive electric potential from walls and obstacles, but with a limited maximum value. In the second step, the application of the Fast Marching method on the velocity map, represents and gives a potential map of the wave propagation with time as last axis. The propagation of this wave uses the previous velocity map. In this potential surface it is calculated the shortest time trajectory, by using the gradient method. The second part of the approach uses concepts of wave propagation to construct a smooth, safe, and time efficient path in the velocity map. This method is very fast, and can be used on line.
Why are Bug Reports Invalid?

Invalid bug reports cause overheads in the software process. This study examined the invalid bugs reported against a server application over four years time period and categorized the reasons. The research found that in addition to errors in testing, misunderstandings on functionality and environments, lack of background knowledge, problems in external systems and tools, and other reasons can lead to invalid bug reports. The details in each category were explored to reveal the weaknesses and mistakes in reporting invalid bugs. Based on these findings, the research proposed some suggestions on improving bug reporting quality and avoiding invalid bugs, such as optimal documentation and communication, sufficient training and learning, proper role setting, and testing methods like pair testing, etc. The value of this research is to share the experiences in software QA activities and provide references for other projects.
Ensemble method for classification of high-dimensional data

Ensemble methods, also known as classifier combination were often used to improve the performance of classification. Growing problem of data dimensionality makes a various challenges for supervised learning. Generally used classification methods such as decision tree, neural network and support vector machines were difficult to be directly applied on high-dimensional datasets. In this paper, we proposed an ensemble method for classification of high-dimensional data, with each classifier constructed from a different set of features determined by partition of redundant features. In our method, the redundancy of features was considered to divide the original feature space. Then, each generated feature subset was trained by support vector machine and the results of each classifier were combined by the majority voting method. The efficiency and effectiveness of our method were demonstrated through comparisons with other ensemble techniques, and the results showed that our method outperformed other methods.
The History and Growth of Vocational Education in America, Second Edition

This publication provides a current synthesis of the history, philosophy, legislation, and organisational/curricular structure of vocational and technical education in the USA. Topics examined in detail include gender, ethnicity, special needs populations, and the increasingly important role of vocational education in meeting the training needs of the ageing workforce as they approach retirement. Part one contains an overview of the origins of vocational education in America and the influential leaders in vocational education curriculum development. Part two describes the effect of land-grant institutions on the professional growth of vocational education, other selected factors that influenced the development of vocational education, and the evolution of federal legislation that has fashioned vocational education. Part three examines the participation of women and special-needs populations in vocational education and part four looks at vocational instructional programs, vocational education teachers and vocational student organisations. Part five examines the effectiveness of the school-to-work initiative, the phenomena of the ageing workforce, and the globalisation of career and technical education. The chapters are: Early vocational education in America; Leaders who influenced vocational education curriculum development; Impact of land-grant institutions on the professional growth of vocational education; Selected factors that influenced vocational education development; Legislative history and the changing workforce; Participation of women in vocational education; Participation of special needs populations in vocational education; Vocational instructional programs and vocational education teachers; Development of vocational student organizations; The effectiveness of School-to-Work; The aging workforce; Globalization of career and technical education.
The influence of a new sole geometry while running

Abstract Running shoe construction influences the forces experienced by the human body while running. The aim of this study was to ascertain whether the new sole architecture of the On running shoe reduces ground reaction forces compared with running barefoot or with a conventional running shoe and whether it changes the physiological parameters of running in shoes. Thirty-seven trained male participants were studied while running at submaximal speeds wearing their conventional running shoe, wearing the On running shoe and while barefoot. Additional biomechanical and physiological values were investigated to determine whether the On running shoe induced any changes in these parameters compared with conventional running shoes. The On exhibited similar ground reaction forces as conventional shoes, and these were different from the forces experienced while running barefoot, showing that the On was more similar to typical shoed running. No difference was observed in running economy between the On and a conventional shoe model. However, a slightly lower heart rate (HR) (≈1.3%) and blood lactate concentration (≈5.5%) were observed during submaximal running with the On running shoe compared with a conventional running shoe, as well as a greater lateral deviation of the centre of pressure mid-stance. The ramifications of the reduced HR and blood lactate concentration for competitive performance are unknown.
Multi-model switching integrated control for a class of nonlinear systems

This paper proposes a multi-model switching integrated control for a class of nonlinear systems based on terminal sliding mode control and T-S fuzzy control. This class of nonlinear systems has two control loops: the outer loop and inner loop. The resulting controller utilizes two-loop controller and provides robust tracking of the required tracks. First, the required virtual control input is determined in the outer loop such that the given mission tracks are followed if the virtual control input is tracked. This is achieved by designing an outer-loop sliding mode controller for the kinematics equation of the outer loop. Second, a multi-model switching controller based on T-S fuzzy control is designed for the inner-loop such that the required virtual control input is tracked. With the reasonable integration and switching control, the proposed method reduces the chattering of actuators which is generated by employing sliding mode control method only. The effectiveness of the proposed method is demonstrated by the simulation results.
ACK signal based on-demand routing algorithm in Cognitive Radio Networks

The primary feature of cognitive radios (CR) for wireless communication systems is the capability to detect and rationally utilize Spectrum Opportunities (SOP), which realizes the effective use of spectrum resources. However, it brings some new challenges. Firstly, because of time-varying of SOP, making the network topology and routing are changing and need to establish and update at any time . In this paper; we propose the on-demand routing algorithm based the location of source and destination. Meanwhile, according to optimizing the relevant communication parameters given a dynamic wireless channel environment. , we present the perceived parameters of surrounding environment on receiving node in the form of ACK Frame are injected into RREP back to the sending node, which avoids the relevant problems caused by exchanging Network State Information(NSI). The effective node is selected by the environmental parameters resolved the ACK Frames.
ENHANCING ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING EDUCATION USING ONSITE, VIRTUAL

Limited financial resources for the acquisition of new laboratory hardware continue to marginalize the quality of electrical engineering education. However, the complementary use of onsite, remote, and virtual laboratories can be used to help overcome this trend. There is a variety of ways to integrate these three types of lab experiences into the curriculum. For fulltime, on-campus students, remote and virtual labs can be used as supplemental work to the onsite labs. Virtual and remote labs are especially useful for “predict and measure” experiments that focus on analytical learning. Onsite labs can continue to dwell on design and troubleshooting-oriented exercises. Remote labs can also be used to increase access to one-of-a-kind equipment among a group of students. This is especially true in upper-term courses where the quantity of advanced test equipment restricts availability. There are also opportunities to form collaborative arrangements with other institutions in which remote labs can be shared.
Tool Support for Change-Centric Test Development

Testing increases confidence in software's correctness, completeness, and quality. By executing a test on a program, developers can check the outcome against the program's specification to identify faults. Various testing levels can serve different purposes during development-for example, unit and integration testing let developers test an implementation and its effects on existing functionality. In test-driven development, a unit test acts as a functionality specification before implementation, letting developers apply only the code necessary to pass the test. Applying change impact analysis to test-driven development provides software designers quantitative feedback they can use to meet a coverage goal and avoid unanticipated change effects.
Wettability of Y2O3: A Relative Analysis of Thermally Oxidized, Reactively Sputtered and Template Assisted Nanostructured Coatings

The wettability of reactively sputtered Y2O3, thermally oxidized Y-Y2O3 and Cd-CdO template assisted Y2O3 coatings has been studied. The wettability of as-deposited Y2O3 coatings was determined by contact angle measurements. The water contact angles for reactively sputtered, thermally oxidized and template assisted Y2O3 nanostructured coatings were 99°, 117° and 155°, respectively. The average surface roughness values of reactively sputtered, thermally oxidized and template assisted Y2O3 coatings were determined by using atomic force microscopy and the corresponding values were 3, 11 and 180 nm, respectively. The low contact angle of the sputter deposited Y2O3 and thermally oxidized Y-Y2O3 coatings is attributed to a densely packed nano-grain like microstructure without any void space, leading to low surface roughness. A water droplet on such surfaces is mostly in contact with a solid surface relative to a void space, leading to a hydrophobic surface (low contact angle). Surface roughness is a crucial factor for the fabrication of a superhydrophobic surface. For Y2O3 coatings, the surface roughness was improved by depositing a thin film of Y2O3 on the Cd-CdO template (average roughness = 178 nm), which resulted in a contact angle greater than 150°. The work of adhesion of water was very high for the reactively sputtered Y2O3 (54 mJ/m2) and thermally oxidized Y-Y2O3 coatings (43 mJ/m2) compared to the Cd-CdO template assisted Y2O3 coating (7 mJ/m2).
Bayesian model comparison for compartmental models with applications in positron emission tomography

We develop strategies for Bayesian modelling as well as model comparison, averaging and selection for compartmental models with particular emphasis on those that occur in the analysis of positron emission tomography (PET) data. Both modelling and computational issues are considered. Biophysically inspired informative priors are developed for the problem at hand, and by comparison with default vague priors it is shown that the proposed modelling is not overly sensitive to prior specification. It is also shown that an additive normal error structure does not describe measured PET data well, despite being very widely used, and that within a simple Bayesian framework simultaneous parameter estimation and model comparison can be performed with a more general noise model. The proposed approach is compared with standard techniques using both simulated and real data. In addition to good, robust estimation performance, the proposed technique provides, automatically, a characterisation of the uncertainty in the resulting estimates which can be considerable in applications such as PET.
Distributed spectrum management and relay selection in interference-limited cooperative wireless networks

It is well known that the data transport capacity of a wireless network can be increased by leveraging the spatial and frequency diversity of the wireless transmission medium. This has motivated the recent surge of research in cooperative and dynamic-spectrum-access networks. Still, as of today, a key open research challenge is to design distributed control strategies to dynamically jointly assign (i) portions of the spectrum and (ii) cooperative relays to different traffic sessions to maximize the resulting network-wide data rate. In this article, we make a significant contribution in this direction. First, we mathematically formulate the problem of joint spectrum management and relay selection for a set of sessions concurrently utilizing an interference-limited infrastructure-less wireless network. We then study distributed solutions to this (nonlinear and nonconvex) problem. The overall problem is separated into two subproblems, (i) spectrum management through power allocation with given relay selection strategy, and (ii) relay selection for a given spectral profile. Distributed solutions for each of the two subproblems are proposed, which are then analyzed based on notions from variational inequality (VI) theory. The distributed algorithms can be proven to converge, under certain conditions, to VI solutions, which are also Nash equilibrium (NE) solutions of the equivalent NE problems. A distributed algorithm based on iterative solution of the two subproblems is then designed. Performance and price of anarchy of the distributed algorithm are then studied by comparing it to the globally optimal solution obtained with a centralized algorithm. Simulation results show that the proposed distributed algorithm achieves performance that is within a few percentage points of the optimal solution.