Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
An Information-TheoreticFramework for ConsistencyMaintenance in DistributedInteractive Applications

Distributed Interactive Applications (DIAs) enable geographically dispersed users to interact with each other in a virtual environment. A key factor to the success of a DIA is the maintenance of a consistent view of the shared virtual world for all the participants. However, maintaining consistent states in DIAs is difficult under real networks. State changes communicated by messages over such networks suffer latency leading to inconsistency across the application. Predictive Contract Mechanisms (PCMs) combat this problem through reducing the number of messages transmitted in return for perceptually tolerable inconsistency. This thesis examines the operation of PCMs using concepts and methods derived from information theory. This information theory perspective results in a novel information model of PCMs that quantifies and analyzes the efficiency of such methods in communicating the reduced state information, and a new adaptive multiple-model-based framework for improving consistency in DIAs. The first part of this thesis introduces information measurements of user behavior in DIAs and formalizes the information model for PCM operation. In presenting the information model, the statistical dependence in the entity state, which makes using extrapolation models to predict future user behavior possible, is evaluated. The efficiency of a PCM to exploit such predictability to reduce the amount of network resources required to maintain consistency is also investigated. It is demonstrated that from the information theory perspective, PCMs can be interpreted as a form of information reduction and compression. The second part of this thesis proposes an Information-Based Dynamic Extrapolation Model for dynamically selecting between extrapolation algorithms based on information evaluation and inferred network conditions. This model adapts PCM configurations to both user behavior and network conditions, and makes the most information-efficient use of the available network resources. In doing so, it improves PCM performance and consistency in DIAs.
Cosine Similarity for Article Section Classification: Using Structured Abstracts as a Proxy for an Annotated Corpus

During the last decade, the amount of research published in biomedical journals has grown significantly and at an accelerating rate. To fully explore all of this literature, new tools and techniques are needed for both information retrieval and processing. One such tool is the identification and extraction of key claims. In an effort to work toward claim-extraction, we aim to identify the key areas in the body of the article referred to by text in the abstract. In this project, our work is preliminary to that goal in that we attempt to match specific clauses in the abstract with the section of the article body to which they refer. For our data, we use journal articles from PubMed with structured abstracts. Our technique is based on the cosine-measure of feature vectors using a bag-of-words approach. We refine our technique through the application of five different experimental variables: feature-weighting, word and bi-gram based feature-sets, text pre-processing, fixedexpression filtering, and different classifier heuristics. We found that the choice of classifier dominates all other considerations, and while their performance with feature-weighting is synergistic, other variables were found to have little or no effect.
Ancient Greek Ekphrasis: Between Description and Narration

This thesis contains an investigation into the nature of five ancient Greek ekphraseis: 1. the shield of Achilles in the Iliad (18.478-608); 2. the shield of Heracles in the pseudo-Hesiodic Scutum (139-320); 3. the goatherd’s cup in Theocritus’ first Idyll (27-60); 4. Jason’s cloak in Apollonius Rhodius’ Argonautica (1.721-68); and 5. Europa’s basket in Moschus’ Europa (37-62). The main aim of this thesis is to investigate to what degree these ekphraseis can be regarded as descriptive, and to what degree as narrative. For definitions of narration and description, this thesis draws on modern narratological and discourse linguistic theory. By close analysis of the ekphraseis, it is shown that they contain both descriptive and narrative elements.
A Hybrid Nonlinear Predictor: Analysis of Learning Process and Predictability for Noisy Time Series (Special Section on Digital Signal Processing)

SUMMARY A nonlinear time series predictor was proposed, in which a nonlinear sub-predictor (NSP) and a linear subpredictor (LSP) are combined in a cascade form.This model is called “hybrid predictor” here.The nonlinearity analysis method of the input time series was also proposed to estimate the network size.We have considered the nonlinear prediction problem as a pattern mapping one.A multi-layer neural network, which consists of sigmoidal hidden neurons and a single linear output neuron, has been employed as a nonlinear sub-predictor.Since the NSP includes nonlinear functions, it can predict the nonlinearity of the input time series.However, the prediction is not complete in some cases.Therefore, the NSP prediction error is further compensated for by employing a linear sub-predictor after the NSP.In this paper, the prediction mechanism and a role of the NSP and the LSP are theoretically and experimentally analyzed.The role of the NSP is to predict the nonlinear and some part of the linear property of the time series.The LSP works to predict the NSP prediction error.Furthermore, predictability of the hybrid predictor for noisy time series is investigated. The sigmoidal functions used in the NSP can suppress the noise effects by using their saturation regions.Computer simulations, using several kinds of nonlinear time series and other conventional predictor models, are demonstrated.The theoretical analysis of the predictor mechanism is confirmed through these simulations. Furthermore, predictability is improved by slightly expanding or shifting the input potential of the hidden neurons toward the saturation regions in the learning process.
RDF Gears, a data integration framework for the Semantic Web

This thesis describes the design and implementation of RDF Gears, a data integration framework for the Semantic Web. The RDF Gears Language combines the Semantic Web technologies with the Nested Relational Algebra. It provides an expressive Domain Specific Language for the development of workflows integrating RDF data with other sources. It allows Semantic Web developers and researchers to work on new, domain specific algorithms without wasting time on the implementation details of data transformation, storage and optimization. A web-based user interface is presented to create RGL workflows that are visualized with a graphical syntax. An execution engine is developed to function as a workflow interpreter. It implements aggressive pipelining, lazy evaluation and other optimizations. A comparison with the Silk Framework shows that this first implementation is already quite efficient.
Dynamic Modeling and Applications for Global Economic Analysis: INTRODUCTION AND OVERVIEW

The book presents applications that deal with important policy issues using an original global dynamic CGE framework. The applications can be grouped into two major areas – environmental and integration issues. The environmental issues, well suited for analysis with dynamic GTAP, range from CO2 emissions trading, to carbon policies such as reforestation programs and carbon subsidies, to technological progress in agriculture. The rest of the applications focus on integration issues and issues on which there are very few simulation studies such as behind the border measures (e.g. rules governing foreign investment, e-commerce regulations, trade in services, harmonization of technical standards, sanitary and phyto-sanitary regulations, the streamlining of customs procedures), demographic change and migration. Available for purchase at: Cambridge University Press Applications available at: www.gtap. agecon.purdue. edu/models/Dynamic/applications.asp
A novel approach to computer aided analysis of human serum proteins chromatoelectrophoresis

Chromatoelectrophoresis is a laboratory technique which depicts changes in multiple protein fractions inclusively. The combined, simultaneous analysis based on two key protein features (charge and molecular weight) offers a unique opportunity for better understanding of serum protein composition as well as it indicates the fraction which needs more thorough investigation. Because of those promising features, the chromatoelectrophoresis with automated analysis is expected to be a valuable laboratory test, aiding the process of medical diagnosis. However, without information technology support, analyzing the results of chromatoelectrophoresis would be tedious and time-consuming. For better optimization, both an algorithm for output image analysis and application with user-friendly interface were developed. Planning, development and testing were conducted at AGH University of Science and Technology and Jagiellonian University, Medical College in Cracow, Poland. With this article, we present the results of the first year of cooperation, code-named ChromSee.org project. The algorithm for distinguishing, naming and analyzing the content of fractions, the application and their utility in real-life settings are described, as well as potential future developments.
Warping-Based Approach to Offline Handwriting Recognition

Warping-Based Approach to Offline Handwriting Recognition Douglas J. Kennard Department of Computer Science, BYU Doctor of Philosophy An enormous amount of the historical record is currently trapped in non-indexed handwritten format. Even after being scanned into images, only a minute fraction of the existing records can be manually transcribed / indexed with reasonable amounts of time and cost. Although progress continues to be made with automatic handwriting recognition (HR), it is not yet good enough to replace manual transcription or indexing. Much of the recent HR work has focused on incremental improvements to methods based on Hidden Markov Models (HMMs) and other similar probabilistic approaches. In this dissertation we present a fundamentally new approach to HR based on 2-D geometric warping of word images. The results of our experimentation indicate that our approach is significantly more accurate than an existing whole-word approach used for word-spotting, and may also be better than HMM-based HR approaches. Since it is a completely new method, we also believe there is potential for improvement and future work that builds on this approach. In addition, we demonstrate that the approach can be used effectively in the related application domain of signature verification and forgery detection.
Parallelizing the 2.5D airborne electromagnetic inversion program ArgunAir

This thesis describes the development of a parallel version of the 2.5D airborne electromagnetic modelling and inversion program ArjunAir. The program uses a finite-element scheme to model the response of an earth with a 2D conductivity structure to a 3D electromagnetic source. The program uses a Gauss-Newton like iterative inversion algorithm, stabilized by singular value damping, to estimate the conductivity of a 2D depth section of the earth beneath an airborne electromagnetic survey line. The forward modelling code was parallelized and whenever possible, bottleneck routines were replaced by more efficient versions. Shared and distributed memory parallel versions of the ArjunAir forward solver were developed, with the shared memory version being incorporated into a modified ArjunAir inversion program based on the Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm. The new shared memory parallel ArjunAir inversion algorithm ran up to 8 times faster than the original algorithm when running with 8 threads, with speedup due both to parallelization and the use of more efficient sequential routines.
Classification of medical data using Restricted Boltzmann Machines

Restricted Boltzmann Machines are generative models commonly used for feature extraction and for training deep neural networks. In this thesis, their applicability for classification of medical data is researched. Three different approaches are evaluated using two small medical data sets. It is shown that the resulting classifiers are able to form sensible models of the data, having competitive performance when compared to other methods on these data sets.
How danger is encoded: towards a systems, cellular, and computational understanding of cognitive-emotional interactions

Book description: The first edition of The Cognitive Neurosciences helped to define the field. The second edition reflects the many advances that have taken place-particularly in imaging and recording techniques. From the molecular level up to that of human consciousness, the contributions cover one of the most fascinating areas of science--the relationship between the structural and physiological mechanisms of the brain/nervous system and the psychological reality of mind. The majority of the chapters in this edition of The Cognitive Neurosciences are new, and those from the first edition have been completely rewritten and updated. This major reference work is now available online as part of MIT CogNet, The Cognitive and Brain Sciences Community online.
Perceptual depth cue evaluation on an autostereoscopic display

In this work an application for evaluating different 3D displays is developed.The work is carried out in collaboration with Setred AB that develops an autostereoscopic display. A stereoscopic display lets the user see different perspectives of a scene with each eye. A presentation of previous research within depth perception and stereoscopic 3D displays is made. Based on results from previous evaluations, a test environment is designed. It is implemented in C++ and OpenGL and a small Interface Library is developed. A couple of test sessions are carried out with a relative small number of subjects to provide results for an evaluation of the test environment. Results from the evaluation are used in combination with previous research to conclude the design of an evaluation environment. Tracking 3D paths is suggested as a suitable task for evaluating 3D displays. Three types of parameters are suggested for use as dependent variables: response time, rate of correct answers and accuracy. The parameters are used in the evaluation environment developed. One test developed intends to give an appreciation of how small differences in depth that are noticeable on the display. No distinct value for the depth resolution is found. In a scene influence test, the task is to position three objects in specific places on the walls of a room. For this test the accuracy is measured and used as the dependent variable. The presence of a reference structure improves the result in this test. Two different tests are carried out to evaluate occlusion. A number of tiles are to be ordered in increasing depth and the error rate of the ordering is used as dependent variable in this test. The results from the two tests indicate that occlusion overrides binocular disparity. A user interaction test that requires movement in three dimensions is developed. It evaluates six different methods to do this. The keyboard interaction method is preferred by some of the test subjects and provides the best results.
Career Counselors' Perception of the Structure of Vocational Interests.

The perceived structure of vocational interest fields of 29 career counselors was compared with the structures represented by the circular-hexagonal model (CM) and the hierarchical model (HM). The counselors' grouping of Holland's (1973) 6 types and then Roe's (1956) 8 fields were compatible with both structures, with a slight advantage to the HM. The counselors then examined the similarity between adjacent pairs of fields. Their judgments indicated that, in contrast to the predictions of the model of the perfect hexagon or of the circle with equal distances, the distances are unequal as predicted by the HM. These findings indicate that the counselors' perceived structure of interests is more compatible with the hierarchical than with the hexagonal-circular model.
Illinois' Forests, 2005: Statistics, Methods, and Quality Assurance

The first full annual inventory of Illinois' forests was completed in 2005. This report contains 1) descriptive information on methods, statistics, and quality assurance of data collection, 2) a glossary of terms, 3) tables that summarize quality assurance, and 4) a core set of tabular estimates for a variety of forest resources. A detailed analysis of inventory data is presented in a separate publication. (Crocker et al. 2009) http://www.nrs. fs.fed. us/pubs/7094/
Random Multiple Access in WiMAX : Problems and Solutions

The development of media access control protocols for next generation metropolitan wireless networks is a challenging task nowadays. WiMAX is the most promising candidate for such a ubiquitous broadband wireless access system. This paper discusses both theoretical and practical issues of the random multiple access algorithm standardized in IEEE 802.16. A simple and efficient alternative for the binary exponential backoff is presented and analyzed. Tradeoffs, advantages and disadvantages of the introduced approach are investigated. The analysis is conducted by means of both analysis and simulation.
Mapping speech streams to conceptual structures

We describe a software system that processes textual data and spoken input streams of natural language and arranges the information in a meaningful way on the screen: concepts as nodes, relations as edges. For spoken input, the software simulates conceptual awareness. A naturally spoken speech stream is converted into a word stream (speech-to-text), the most significant concepts are extracted and associated to related concepts, which have not been mentioned by the speaker(s) yet. The result is displayed on a screen as a conceptual structure.
Laptop XO Dentro e Fora da Sala de Aula: Expressão, Diversão e Alfabetização

Romper com o modelo de ensino-aprendizagem praticado anteriormente à presença de tecnologia digital em nossa sociedade envolve mudar a postura passiva dos alunos numa sala de aula onde repetem no papel com o lápis e borracha, o que o professor escreve com giz no quadro negro. Este artigo relata e discute uma experiência inicial com o uso do laptop XO dentro e fora da sala de aula por alunos em processo de alfabetização de uma escola pública de Ensino Fundamental de Campinas, SP. Os resultados deste estudo demonstram como o uso de tecnologia digital na Educação pode promover, de fato, a alfabetização de crianças de forma lúdica e em sintonia com as mudanças do novo século.
Emergence of cooperation in the IPD game using spatial interactions

This paper presents a comparative study of two evolving populations, one in a non-spatial environment, and the other in a spatial environment, playing the Iterated Prisoner’s Dilemma. The effect of the environment on the emergence of cooperation is studied. The populations are evolved using a genetic algorithm and the performance of the evolved individuals evaluated against expert and naive strategies. The spatial environment is shown to encourage the emergence of cooperation further than the non-spatial structure. We also demonstrate that a spatially evolved popuation is less resistant to incoming individuals, less exploitative in nature, and more able to be exploited than the strategies evolved in the nonspatial environment.
An evolutionary multi-agent based search method for stackelberg solutions of bilevel facility location problems

This paper considers the bilevel facility location problem (BFLP) on a plane with the situation that a facility must be located at more than a certain distance from another facility. Since the strict solution method for finding a Stackelberg solution of the BFLP needs much computational time for large scale BFLPs, the evolutionary multiagent system is proposed for finding an approximate Stackelberg solution efficiently by utilizing characteristics of the BFLP. The efficiency of the solution method is shown by applying it to numerical examples of the BFLP.
A contingent method for usability evaluation of Web-based learning systems

The research was conducted with the aim to develop a customizable, user-centred method for formative usability evaluation of such systems. The method can be used for usability evaluation of Web-based learning system during its development stages, from screen-based prototypes to near completion. At the heart of the method is a set of empirically-validated usability factors and a set of contingent rules that allow the customization of these factors for different users and context of usage. Additionally, an online prototype was developed to implement the usability evaluation method and semi-automated the usability evaluation process.
Schema-less Data-gathering, Integration, and Processing: Towards Support for Knowledge Discovery Process in Heterogeneous Environments

Research question Sara, a compliance officer in a bank, is analyzing a case flagged as suspicious to inform the authorities of a crime (if necessary) and use the gathered data to refine the fraud‐ detection system. To that end she needs to access a variety of different data sources such as the transaction‐chains connected to the case from the transaction processing systems, information from other intuitions about in‐/outgoing transactions, case notes from the police, marketing databases, etc., in order to understand the case's nature and refine the knowledge discovery process used by the automated fraud‐detection system. Peter would like to predict if a new protein might be able to curb the growth of cancer cells. To that end he needs to determine the structure of the protein using NMR spectrometer, process the specimens' gene sequences, combine them with data from a number of protein, cross‐reference these with references from Medline, and use the gathered data to build a predictor for the likelihood that the protein will curb cancer‐cell growth. Sara's and Peter's problem is complex and ubiquitous to knowledge‐intensive industries. To achieve their goal they need to: 1. Access a number of data‐sources, each having its own scheme in different formalisms and gather them for processing 2. Integrate these different data, and generate an interoperable " data‐could ". 3. Devise a suitable inference experiment to induce/test an inference model. Indeed, these hurdles reflect the overall knowledge discovery process as outlined Fayad et al (1996, see also Figure 1). Unfortunately, however, whilst much work has gone into each of the steps in this process support for the overall process has been largely neglected: enormous advances have been made in the areas such as feature selection, development of advanced induction algorithms, visualizations, data integration techniques, etc. – an integrated environment, that guides real‐world users in the overall process from the heterogeneous data sources to the results is still missing. The goal of this study is to present and evaluate the suitability of three technologies to overcome the abovementioned hurdles and serve as the major building blocks for such an integrated environment. Specifically, we propose (i) the use of schema‐less, typed graph knowledge bases (Weiss et al, 2008; Stocker et al, 2008) as an efficient means to store gathered heterogeneous information, (ii) the use of approximate/probabilistic