Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Facial Expression Recognition Based on Modular Two Dimensional Canonical Correlation Analysis

Traditional canonical correlation analysis as an effective feature extraction method has been widely used in many areas of pattern recognition, including facial expression recognition. The canonical correlation analysis makes the within-class covariance matrix constituted of two groups of feature vectors to be singular, resulting in small sample size problem, meanwhile the canonical correlation analysis as a global linear projection method, not a good description of nonlinear facial expression recognition problem. In order to solve the above problems, we present a facial expression recognition algorithm based on modular two dimensional canonical correlation analysis. The algorithm uses a modular method, and better takes advantage of local non-linear characteristics of the facial expression image, meanwhile the direct use of two-dimensional facial expression feature matrix is effective to relieve the small sample size problem. In recognition stage, we use the voting method, which can improve the robustness of local expression feature changes. Experiments on JAFFE facial expression database show that the proposed method is robust and effective.
On the Problem of Self-Incompatibility Alleles

The presence of large numbers of different self-incompatibility alleles in small populations has been explained either by assuming a high mutation rate, or by assuming recent massive diminution in population size. Recently, criticism has been made of the methods used in such investigations, and the suggestion has been made that self-incompatibility alleles are lost very slowly by random sampling. Self-incompatibility populations have been simulated with the aid of a computer to estimate the rate of loss of alleles, and the mutation rate necessary to maintain a given number of alleles, in various small populations. It is found that alleles are lost quite rapidly from the population, and that, consequently, a high mutation rate is needed to maintain the alleles in the populations.
Likelihood-based inference for multivariate space-time wrapped-Gaussian fields

ABSTRACT Directional spatial data, typically represented through angles, are of central importance in many scientific disciplines, such as environmental sciences, oceanography and meteorology, among others. We propose a wrapped-Gaussian field to model directions in a multivariate spatial or spatio-temporal context. The n-dimensional distributions of a wrapped Gaussian field can be written as a sum over the n-dimensional lattice of , making likelihood-based inference impracticable. We adopt a parametric approach and develop composite likelihood methods to estimate the parameters associated with location, as well as the spatial or spatio-temporal dependence. Our approach outperforms the analytical and computational limitations of full likelihood, because it works with the marginal bivariate distributions of the random field. We study the performance of the method through simulation experiments and by analysing a real data set of wave directions from the Adriatic coast of Italy.
VIRUS early installation and commissioning

VIRUS is a massively replicated spectrograph built for HETDEX, the Hobby Eberly Telescope Dark Energy Experiment. It consists of 156 channels within 78 units fed by 34944 fibers over the 22 arcminute field of the upgraded HET. VIRUS covers a relatively narrow bandpass (350-550nm) at low resolution (R ~ 700) to target the emission of Lyman-alpha emitters (LAEs) for HETDEX. VIRUS is a first demonstration of industrial style assembly line replication in optical astronomy. Installation and testing of VIRUS units began in November of 2015. This winter we celebrated the first on sky instrument activity of the upgraded HET, using a VIRUS unit and LRS2-R (the upgraded facility Low Resolution Spectrograph for the HET). Here we describe progress in VIRUS installation and commissioning through June 2016. We include early sky data obtained to characterize spectrograph performance and on sky performance of the newly upgraded HET. As part of the instrumentation for first science light at the HET, the IFU fed spectrographs were used to test a full range of telescope system functionality including the field calibration unit (FCU). We also use placement of strategic IFUs to map the new HET field to the fiber placement, and demonstrate actuation of the dithering mechanism key to HETDEX observations.
Numerical investigation of the generation and growth of coherent flow structures in a triggered turbulent spot

Abstract Multiple mechanisms for the regeneration of hairpin-like coherent flow structures in transitional and turbulent boundary layers have been proposed in the published literature, but a complete understanding of the typical topologies of coherent structures observed in the literature has not yet been achieved. To contribute to this understanding, a numerical study is performed of a turbulent spot triggered in a zero-pressure-gradient laminar boundary layer by a pulsed, transverse jet. Two direct numerical simulations (DNS) capture the growth of the spot into a mature turbulent region containing a large number of coherent vortical flow structures. The boundary-layer Reynolds number based on the test-surface streamwise length is $\mathit{Re}_{L}=309\,200$ . The internal structure of the spot is characterized by densely spaced packets of hairpin vortices. Lateral growth of the spot occurs as new hairpin vortices form along the spanwise edges of the spot. The formation of these hairpin vortices is attributed to unstable shear layers that develop in the streamwise–spanwise plane due to the wall-normal motions induced by the streamwise oriented legs of hairpin vortices within the spot. Results are presented that highlight the mechanism by which the instability of such shear layers forms wavepackets of hairpin vortices; how the formation of these vortices produces a flow environment that promotes the creation of new hairpin vortices; and how the newly created hairpin vortices impact the production of turbulence kinetic energy in the flow region surrounding the spot. A quantitative description of the hairpin-vortex regeneration mechanism based on the transport of the instantaneous vorticity vector is presented to illustrate how the velocity and vorticity fields interact with the local strain rates to promote the growth of coherent vortical structures. The simulation results also shed light on a mechanism that seems to have a dominant influence on the formation of the calmed region in the wake of the turbulent spot.
SpIOMM and SITELLE: Wide-field Imaging FTS for the Study of Galaxy Evolution

Abstract SpIOMM, a wide-field Imaging Fourier Transform Spectrometer attached to the Mont Mégantic 1.6-m telescope, is capable of obtaining the visible spectrum of every source of light in a 12 arcminute field of view, with a spectral resolution ranging from R = 1 (wide-band image) to R = 25 000, resulting in 1.7 million spectra with a spatial resolution of one arcsecond. SITELLE will be a similar instrument attached to the Canada-France-Hawaii telescope, and will be in operation in early 2013. We present a short description of these instruments and illustrate their capabilities to study nearby galaxies with the results of a data cube of M51.
A Network Traffic Mutation Based Ontology, and Its Application to 5G Networks

This paper presents an ontology based on mutation techniques for the modelling of cybersecurity attacks and its application to 5G networks. Main concepts of network protocols, mutation operators, flow of network packets and network traffic are introduced. An ontology is designed based on different mutation operators that allow to design models that can be assimilated with known and unknown attacks. This approach has been implemented in our open source 5G network traffic fuzzer, 5Greplay, and has been applied to three use cases that are representative of attacks against 5G networks: NAS Replay attack, Denial of Service by Sending Malformed NGAP Packets and 5G encapsulation of IoT traffic.
Analysing 20 years of the TQM&BE journal: a bibliometric approach

The study is an attempt to recognise the contributions of the Total Quality Management & Business Excellence journal and its editorial team toward the development of the field of quality management. The authors performed a bibliometric analysis on the Scopus-indexed publications of the journal from 2003 to 2022 using the VOSviewer software package. This study outlines the findings through various analyses of bibliographic data relating to citations, contributing authors, country-wise contributions, and keywords used. The research found that the journal has a solid reputation among researchers across the globe, with publications coming from all continents. The average number of citations per document is approximately 24, which portrays the quality and recognition of the works published in the journal. The journal consistently accepted and published research articles relevant to the scope, as reflected through the keyword analysis. The top three contributors to the journal in terms of documents and total citations are Dahlgaard, Dahlgaard-Park, and Antony. The journal’s editorial board has made a very noteworthy contribution to the growth of the journal and the development of the field of quality management.
Viewpoint-Controllable Telepresence: A Robotic-Arm-Based Mixed-Reality Telecollaboration System

In mixed-reality (MR) telecollaboration, the local environment is remotely presented to a remote user wearing a virtual reality (VR) head-mounted display (HMD) via a video capture device. However, remote users frequently face challenges in naturally and actively manipulating their viewpoints. In this paper, we propose a telepresence system with viewpoint control, which involves a robotic arm equipped with a stereo camera in the local environment. This system enables remote users to actively and flexibly observe the local environment by moving their heads to manipulate the robotic arm. Additionally, to solve the problem of the limited field of view of the stereo camera and limited movement range of the robotic arm, we propose a 3D reconstruction method combined with a stereo video field-of-view enhancement technique to guide remote users to move within the movement range of the robotic arm and provide them with a larger range of local environment perception. Finally, a mixed-reality telecollaboration prototype was built, and two user studies were conducted to evaluate the overall system. User study A evaluated the interaction efficiency, system usability, workload, copresence, and user satisfaction of our system from the remote user’s perspective, and the results showed that our system can effectively improve the interaction efficiency while achieving a better user experience than two traditional view-sharing techniques based on 360 video and based on the local user’s first-person view. User study B evaluated our MR telecollaboration system prototype from both the remote-user side and the local-user side as a whole, providing directions and suggestions for the subsequent design and improvement of our mixed-reality telecollaboration system.
Effects of Scapular Interventions on Pain and Disability in Subjects with Neck Pain: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials

Background Musculoskeletal neck pain is the fourth common cause of disability worldwide. Scapula dysfunction can subsequently lead to neck pain. Previous literature could not establish the effectiveness of scapular stabilization exercises on neck pain due to the different definitions used for exercise in different studies. There is a need for quality evidence examining the effectiveness of scapular interventions on pain and disability in patients with neck pain. Data Sources PubMed, EMBASE, Scopus, Cochrane, OVID, and PEDro were searched from 1 April 2011 to 31 March 2022. Methods We included randomized controlled trials that focused on scapular interventions and other active strategies in the management of neck pain. The following outcomes were assessed: pain, disability, and quality of life. PEDro scale was used to assess the risk of bias and the data pooled was analyzed using standardized mean difference. Results The 5 trials included in the review assessed (116 participants) the effects of scapular interventions in patients with chronic nonspecific neck pain. Risk of bias for one study was low and that for the others was moderate. The meta-analysis showed that there was a significant difference between the combined effect of neck and scapula interventions and only neck interventions group (Standardized mean difference −1.51, 95% CI [−2.79, −0.23], z=2.32, p=0.02). On assessing the effect of scapula interventions on disability, the results revealed that there was no significant (p=0.40) impact. Conclusion Moderate quality evidence was found for the combined effect of scapular and neck interventions in reducing pain in patients with neck pain. However, it was not effective in improving the disability.
Aspects of Nonlocality: from Particles to Black Holes

This dissertation is a collection of works on different aspects of the following subjects: causal set–continuum correspondence, wave propagation on causal sets, nonlocal quantum field theory, potential connection between dark matter and quantum gravity and causal structure of black holes in Lorentz violating gravitational theories. We present two results which concern certain aspects of the question: when is a causal set well approximated by a Lorentzian manifold? The first result is a theorem which shows that the number-volume correspondence, if required to hold even for arbitrarily small regions, is best realized via Poisson sprinkling. The second result concerns a family of lattices in 1+1 dimensional Minkowski space, known as Lorentzian lattices, which we show provide a much better number-volume correspondence than Poisson sprinkling for large volumes. We argue, however, that this feature should not persist in higher dimensions and conclude by conjecturing a form of the aforementioned theorem that holds under weaker assumptions, namely that Poisson sprinkling provides the best number-volume correspondence in 3+1 dimensions for spacetime regions with macroscopically large volumes. We then study wave propagation on a background causal set. We introduce a family of generalized d’Alembertian operators in D-dimensional MinkowskiM spacetimes which are manifestly Lorentz-invariant, retarded, and non-local. The prototypes of these operators arose in earlier work as averages of matrix operators meant to describe the propagation of a scalar field in a causal set. We generalize the original definitions to produce an infinite family of ”Generalized Causet Box (GCB) operators” parametrized by certain coefficients {a, bn}, and we derive the conditions on the latter needed for the usual d’Alembertian, , to be recovered in the infrared limit. The continuum average of a GCB operator is an integral operator inM, and it is these continuum operators that we mainly study. To that end, we compute their action on plane waves, or equivalently their Fourier transforms g(p) [p being the momentum-vector]. For timelike p, g(p) has an imaginary part whose sign depends on whether p is past or future-directed. For small p, g(p) is necessarily proportional to p · p, but for large p it becomes constant, raising the possibility of a genuinely Lorentzian perturbative regulator for quantum field theory in M. We also address the question of whether or not the evolution defined by the GCB operators is stable, finding evidence that the original 4D causal set d’Alembertian is unstable, while its 2D counterpart is stable. Following our earlier work on wave propagation on a causal set, we study the quantum theory of a massless scalar field whose evolution is given not by the the d’Alembertian, but by an operator  which is Lorentz invariant, reduces to at low energies, and defines an explicitly retarded evolution: φ(x) only depends on φ(y), with y is in the causal past
Quantization Simulation and Fidelity Validation of Infrared Staring Imaging Sensors

Aiming at the new generation of infrared staring imaging sensors,primary physical effects modeling of imaging system elements was accomplished based on thermal infrared radiative transfer and energy conversion in imaging physical processes.The simulation model,which is different from those qualitative models available now,quantitatively represents the modulation characteristics of input information by design parameters of imaging system elements.Through building the signal response model,spatial transfer model,spatial sampling model,and noise characterization model for infrared imaging sensors,a perfect simulator could be established and high-fidelity simulation could be realized for the imaging process.For credibility validation of the simulation model,an experiment platform was constructed to capture the system performance curve and output image of a real infrared camera.Subsequently the similarities of performance curves and output images between the simulator and the real device were calculated and compared,and a quantitive evaluation of the simulation fidelity was made.Finally,the credibility of the simulation model was validated by the fidelity data.
A Fully Integrated 0–200-MHz System BW Wireless Direct Sampling Receiver in 14-nm FinFET

This letter presents a fully integrated wireless direct sampling receiver (DSR) that covers from dc to 200-MHz system bandwidth implemented with a single-channel SAR ADC in 14-nm FinFET. To demonstrate the proposed architecture, frequency modulation (FM) among the applicable standard frequency bands is adopted as a prototype. The measured demodulated SNR is 73.9 dB with −47-dBm input power at 108 MHz and the sensitivity level is −106 dBm. The proposed DSR shows a robust performance over a 30-dB-demodulated SNR even in the presence of the interference, such as a strong adjacent channel and an in-band spur. Furthermore, the FM channel scan time is drastically reduced since the proposed receiver simultaneously samples all channels without adjusting analog building blocks.
A Critical Cybersecurity Analysis and Future Research Directions for the Internet of Things: A Comprehensive Review

The emergence of the Internet of Things (IoT) technology has brought about tremendous possibilities, but at the same time, it has opened up new vulnerabilities and attack vectors that could compromise the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of connected systems. Developing a secure IoT ecosystem is a daunting challenge that requires a systematic and holistic approach to identify and mitigate potential security threats. Cybersecurity research considerations play a critical role in this regard, as they provide the foundation for designing and implementing security measures that can address emerging risks. To achieve a secure IoT ecosystem, scientists and engineers must first define rigorous security specifications that serve as the foundation for developing secure devices, chipsets, and networks. Developing such specifications requires an interdisciplinary approach that involves multiple stakeholders, including cybersecurity experts, network architects, system designers, and domain experts. The primary challenge in IoT security is ensuring the system can defend against both known and unknown attacks. To date, the IoT research community has identified several key security concerns related to the architecture of IoT systems. These concerns include issues related to connectivity, communication, and management protocols. This research paper provides an all-inclusive and lucid review of the current state of anomalies and security concepts related to the IoT. We classify and analyze prevalent security distresses regarding IoT’s layered architecture, including connectivity, communication, and management protocols. We establish the foundation of IoT security by examining the current attacks, threats, and cutting-edge solutions. Furthermore, we set security goals that will serve as the benchmark for assessing whether a solution satisfies the specific IoT use cases.
A Study of Missing Data Imputation in Predictive Modeling of a Wood-Composite Manufacturing Process

Problem: Real-time process data and destructive test data were collected and merged from a wood-composite manufacturer in the southeastern US for the purpose of developing real-time predictive models for strength properties of manufactured particleboard. Sensor malfunction and other real-time data problems lead to null fields in the company's data warehouse, resulting in information loss. Many manufacturers attempt to build accurate predictive models excluding entire records with null fields or use summary statistics such as the average or median in place of the null field. However, predictive-model errors in validation may be higher in the presence of information loss and may misguide the production process. Approach: This paper summarizes an application of missing-data imputation methods in predictive modeling of a wood-composite manufacturing process. Variable selection was applied prior to imputing missing data. Two missing data-imputation methods were selected after comparing six possible methods. Predictive models of imputed data were developed using partial least squares regression (PLSR) and were compared with models developed from nonimputed data. Results: Maximum–likelihood-based imputation using the expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm and multiple imputation (MI) using Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) simulation achieved lower root mean-square error of prediction results than imputation based on the mean/median substitution, last-observation-carried-forward (LOCF), or a “hot-deck” method using single imputation. Predictive models based on the imputed dataset generated more precise prediction results than models based on nonimputed datasets. Outcomes of the study included avoiding rework and scrap when model predictions alerted of an imminent strength failure and minor reductions were made in resin input set points. Senior management of the company indicated that a savings occurred as a result of the study from lower resin usage (the second highest cost component of manufactured product).
Assessment of time implicit discretizations for the computation of turbulent compressible flows

Restrictions on the maximum allowable time step of explicit time integration methods for direct and large eddy simulations of compressible turbulent flows at high Reynolds numbers can be very severe, because of the extremely small space steps used close to solid walls to capture tiny and elongated boundary layer structures. A way of increasing stability limits is to use implicit time integration schemes. However, the price to pay is a higher computational cost per time step, higher discretization errors and lower parallel scalability. A successful implicit time scheme for scale-resolving simulations should provide the best possible compromise between these opposite requirements. In this paper, several implicit schemes are assessed against two explicit time integration techniques, namely a standard four-stage and a six-stage optimized Runge–Kutta method, in terms of computational cost required to achieve a threshold level of accuracy. Precisely, a second-order backward scheme solved by means of matrix-free quasi-exact Newton subiterations is compared to time-accurate Runge–Kutta implicit residual smoothing (IRS) schemes. A new IRS scheme of fourth-order accuracy, based on a bilaplacian operator, is developed to improve the accuracy of the classical second-order approach. Numerical results show that the proposed IRS scheme leads to reductions in computational time by about a factor 5 for an accuracy comparable to that of the corresponding explicit Runge-Kutta scheme.