A hybrid dynamic forecast model for analyzing celebrity endorsement effects on consumer attitudes This study investigates the time-varying effects of celebrity endorsements on consumer purchase attitudes toward promoted products using a novel dynamic hierarchical multi-attribute attitude forecast model. The induced direct and indirect effects via constructs of product attributes and net product value are then incorporated into the proposed conceptual model, which is formulated with a discrete-time nonlinear stochastic system. An empirical study of product categories of sport shoes and note book computers demonstrates the feasibility of the proposed methodology. The analytical results demonstrate the capability of the proposed model to forecast consumer attitudes toward a promoted product and reveal the potential heterogeneity in patterns of attitude changes characterized by product attributes, price, and endorser performance as perceived by consumers. Furthermore, we infer that celebrity endorsement can significantly influence consumer purchase attitudes via both direct and indirect effects through product-attribute construct. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

O O B I I O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

dynamic forecast model
nonlinear stochastic system
celebrity endorsement


Learning a hierarchical image manifold for Web image classification Image classification is an essential task in content-based image retrieval. However, due to the semantic gap between low-level visual features and high-level semantic concepts, and the diversification of Web images, the performance of traditional classification approaches is far from users' expectations. In an attempt to reduce the semantic gap and satisfy the urgent requirements for dimensionality reduction, high-quality retrieval results, and batch-based processing, we propose a hierarchical image manifold with novel distance measures for calculation. Assuming that the images in an image set describe the same or similar object but have various scenes, we formulate two kinds of manifolds, object manifold and scene manifold, at different levels of semantic granularity. Object manifold is developed for object-level classification using an algorithm named extended locally linear embedding (ELLE) based on intra- and inter-object difference measures. Scene manifold is built for scene-level classification using an algorithm named locally linear submanifold extraction (LLSE) by combining linear perturbation and region growing. Experimental results show that our method is effective in improving the performance of classifying Web images.

O O O B I O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

web image classification
image manifold
semantic granularity


Impact of Identifier-Locator Split Mechanism on DDoS Attacks The semantic overload of IP address, representing not only the identifiers of nodes but also the locators of nodes, is one of the fundamental reasons for hindering the development of current Internet. Therefore, the identifier-locator split mapping network which separates the two functions has become one of the federating themes for future Internet architecture. However, DDoS attacks are still in existence in this network. In this paper, we use the attack traffic to discuss and compare the effects of DDoS attacks on the current Internet and the identifier-locator split mapping network. The numerical and simulation analyses show that the identifier-locator split mapping network alleviates DDoS attacks more effectively compared with the current Internet.

O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O

network security
identifier-locator split
lisp


Coupling of finite element method with material point method by local multi-mesh contact method ? As a Lagrangian particle method, the material point method (MPM) has the potential to model extreme deformation of materials, where the traditional finite element method (FEM) often encounters mesh distortion and element entanglement which lead to numerical difficulties. However, FEM is more accurate and efficient than MPM for problems with small deformation. It is therefore desirable to model the body with extreme deformation by MPM and the body with small deformation by FEM, respectively. In this paper, a method to handle the contact interaction between the MPM body and the FEM body is proposed, which is implemented on the background grid of MPM. By this method, FEM is coupled with MPM and a hexahedral element is incorporated into our 3D explicit MPM code MPM3D. Several numerical examples, including plate impact, sphere rolling, perforation of thick plate, and fluidstructure interaction problems, are studied and the numerical results are in good agreement with analytical solution and results available in the literature. The coupling of FEM and MPM offers advantages of both FEM and MPM.

O O B I I O B I I O O O B O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O B I O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

material point method
finite element method
extreme deformation
contact


Increasing the crowd's capacity to create: how alternative generation affects the diversity, relevance and effectiveness of generated ads Crowds can generate ideas by searching for new designs. A model for such crowd-based search is proposed consisting of three major forces: the problem domain, the actors, and the process. One particular process that can perform such search is that described by human based genetic algorithms, in which crowds are responsible for creating, modifying, and combining designs. This study looks at one aspect of the process: the alternative generation algorithm. Three systems were built that performed greenfield, modification and combination-based alternative generation. These were compared in an experiment involving 2220 participants who played different roles in creating and evaluating advertisements. The results favor the modification system. This suggests for domains like advertising, crowd-based design systems should encourage a series of modifications of initial ideas. For designers of other crowd-based systems in other problem domains, this study suggests that both modification and combination processes should be tested and their ratio of use adjusted according to the results obtained, much as the ratio of mutation and crossover are adjusted in genetic algorithms.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

creativity
advertisement
crowdsourcing
evolutionary computing


New cancer targets emerging from studies of the Von Hippel-Lindau tumor suppressor protein Inactivation of the von Hippel-Lindau tumor suppressor protein (pVHL) causes the most common form of kidney cancer. pVHL is part of a complex that polyubiquitinates the alpha subunit of the heterodimeric transcription factor HIF. In the presence of oxygen, HIF1? is prolyl hydroxylated by EglN1 (also called PHD2); this modification recruits pVHL, which then targets HIF1? for proteasomal degradation. In hypoxic or pVHL-defective cells, HIF1? accumulates, binds to HIF1?, and transcriptionally activates genes such as VEGF. VEGF inhibitors and mTOR inhibitors, which indirectly affect HIF, are now approved for the treatment of kidney cancer. EglN1 is a 2-oxoglutaratedependent dioxygenase; such enzymes can be inhibited with drug-like small molecules and EglN1 inhibitors are currently being tested for the treatment of anemia. EglN2 (PHD1) and EglN3 (PHD3), which are EglN1 paralogs, appear to play HIF-independent roles in cell proliferation and apoptosis, respectively, and are garnering interest as potential cancer targets. A number of JmjC-containing proteins, including RBP2 and PLU-1, are 2-oxoglutaratedependent dioxygenases that demethylate histones. Preclinical data suggest that inhibition of RBP2 or PLU-1 would suppress tumor growth.

O B O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

cancer
tumor suppressor protein
transcription factor


Maintenance strategies for routing indexes Query processing in large-scale unstructured P2P networks is a crucial part of operating such systems. In order to avoid expensive flooding of the network during query processing so-called routing indexes are used. Each peer maintains such an index for its neighbors. It provides a compact representation (data summary) of data accessible via each neighboring peer. An important problem in this context is to keep these data summaries up-to-date without paying high maintenance costs. In this paper, we investigate the problem of maintaining distributed data summaries in P2P-based environments without global knowledge and central instances. Based on a classification of update propagation strategies, we discuss several approaches to reduce maintenance costs and present results from an experimental evaluation.

O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

routing indexes
distributed data summaries

unstructured p2p systems
index maintenance
peer data management systems


The economics of natural language interfaces: natural language processing technology as a scarce resource This paper discusses appropriate application areas for natural language interfaces (NLIs) to databases. This requires comparing NLIs with competing approaches, including other user-friendly interfaces, and training of users with less user-friendly interfaces. Also, since NLI technology is still limited, users may need to learn how to use NLIs themselves. This suggests that NLI popularity may snowball at some point, as users become familiar with NLIs. We use a simple prototype NLI to illustrate when NLIs can achieve flexibility unattainable by simpler interfaces. Currently existing commercial NLIs and application-specific customization are also discussed.

O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

database management systems
network externalities
economics of information systems


Improvement in demand-controlled ventilation simulation on multi-purposed facilities under an occupant based ventilation standard The objective of this paper was to find an effective way of improving demand-controlled ventilation (DCV) simulation performed under an occupant based ventilation standard established in many countries. Two attractive DCV approaches, CO2DCV and RFIDDCV, were applied to DCV simulations for a theoretical public assembly space served by a dedicated outdoor air system (DOAS) with an enthalpy recovery device. A numerical model for predicting the real-time occupant number, required ventilation amount, CO2 and formaldehyde (HCHO) concentrations under given conditions was developed using a commercial equation solver program. The current ventilation standard used in Korea was applied as a case of occupant based ventilation standards. It was found that the current standard might cause unstable DCV simulation results, especially under CO2DCV. This is because the ventilation rate (per person) indicated in the standard is the sum of the outdoor air required to remove or dilute air contaminants generated by both occupants and the buildings themselves, and not a pure function of occupant numbers. Finally, it makes DCV control unstable when ventilation flow is regulated only by the number of occupants. In order to solve this problem, the current occupant based ventilation standard was modified as a form of ASHRAE Standard 62.1-2007 showing good applicability to various DCV approaches. It was found that this modification enhances applicability of the current ventilation standard to CO2DCV significantly and can maintain acceptable HCHO concentrations during the entire time of operation. Fan energy reduction can also be expected from DCV operations.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

demand-controlled ventilation
indoor air quality
rfid


locality and parallelism optimization for dynamic programming algorithm in bioinformatics Dynamic programming has been one of the most efficient approaches to sequence analysis and structure prediction in biology. However, their performance is limited due to the drastic increase in both the number of biological data and variety of the computer architectures. With regard to such predicament, this paper creates excellent algorithms aimed at addressing the challenges of improving memory efficiency and network latency tolerance for nonserial polyadic dynamic programming where the dependences are nonuniform. By relaxing the nonuniform dependences, we proposed a new cache oblivious scheme to enhance its performance on memory hierarchy architectures. Moreover we develop and extend a tiling technique to parallelize this nonserial polyadic dynamic programming using an alternate block-cyclic mapping strategy for balancing the computational and memory load, where an analytical parameterized model is formulated to determine the tile volume size that minimizes the total execution time and an algorithmic transformation is used to schedule the tile to overlap communication with computation to further minimize communication overhead on parallel architectures. The numerical experiments were carried out on several high performance computer systems. The new cache-oblivious dynamic programming algorithm achieve 2-10 speedup and the parallel tiling algorithm with communication-computation overlapping shows a desired potential for fine-grained parallel computing on massively parallel computer systems.

B O B O O B I O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

tiling
locality
dynamic programming
parallelism


A rule-based system for automatic decidability and combinability We present a many-sorted schematic superposition calculus for non-unit theories. The calculus is presented as a rule-based system. The implementation automatically checks termination for some theories of interest. Combinability of signature-disjoint theories can also be checked.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

decision procedures
schematic saturation


LdShake support for team-based learning design Existing tooling hardly supports the integral design of learning environments. A learning design tool should support team formation, design exchange and co-creation. The LdShake environment proves to support the design of learning. The LdShake environment appears to provide affordances for devising research ideas.

O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

networked teams
learning and innovation
sharing
co-editing
research design


graph structured program evolution with automatically defined nodes Currently, various automatic programming techniques have been proposed and applied in various fields. Graph Structured Program Evolution (GRAPE) is a recent automatic programming technique with graph structure. This technique can generate complex programs automatically. In this paper, we introduce the concept of automatically defined functions, called automatically defined nodes (ADN), in GRAPE. The proposed GRAPE program has a main program and several subprograms. We verified the effectiveness of ADN through several program evolution experiments, and report the results of evolution of recursive programs using GRAPE modified with ADN.

B I I I O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O B I I I O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

automatic programming
graph structured program evolution

automatically defined function
genetic algorithm
recursive program
graph-based genetic programming
evolutionary algorithm
genetic programming


self-adaptive simulated binary crossover for real-parameter optimization Simulated binary crossover (SBX) is a real-parameter recombinationoperator which is commonly used in the evolutionary algorithm (EA) literature. The operatorinvolves a parameter which dictates the spread of offspring solutionsvis-a-vis that of the parent solutions. In all applications of SBX sofar, researchers have kept a fixed value throughout a simulation run. In this paper, we suggest a self-adaptive procedure of updating theparameter so as to allow a smooth navigation over the functionlandscape with iteration. Some basic principles of classicaloptimization literature are utilized for this purpose. The resultingEAs are found to produce remarkable and much better results comparedto the original operator having a fixed value of the parameter. Studieson both single and multiple objective optimization problems are madewith success.

O B I I O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

self-adaptation
real-parameter optimization
recombination operator


Extracting and sharing knowledge from medical texts In recent years, we have been developing a new framework for acquiring medical knowledge from Encyclopedic texts. This framework consists of three major parts. The first part is an extended high-level conceptual language (called HLCL 1.1) for use by knowledge engineers to formalize knowledge texts in an encyclopedia. The other part is an HLCL 1.1 compiler for parsing and analyzing the formalized texts into knowledge models. The third part is a set of domain-specific ontologies for sharing knowledge.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

encyclopedia of china
knowledge acquisition
high-level conceptual language
knowledge compilation
io-model


A construction of rational manifold surfaces of arbitrary topology and smoothness from triangular meshes Given a closed triangular mesh, we construct a smooth free-form surface which is described as a collection of rational tensor-product and triangular surface patches. The surface is obtained by a special manifold surface construction, which proceeds by blending together geometry functions for each vertex. The transition functions between the charts, which are associated with the vertices of the mesh, are obtained via subchart parameterization. (C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

geometric continuity
smooth free-form rational surface
arbitrary topological genus


efficient control of epidemics over random networks Motivated by the modeling of the spread of viruses or epidemics with coordination among agents, we introduce a new model generalizing both the basic contact model and the bootstrap percolation. We analyze this percolated threshold model when the underlying network is a random graph with fixed degree distribution. Our main results unify many results in the random graphs literature. In particular, we provide a necessary and sufficient condition under which a single node can trigger a large cascade. Then we quantify the possible impact of an attacker against a degree based vaccination and an acquaintance vaccination. We define a security metric allowing to compare the different vaccinations. The acquaintance vaccination requires no knowledge of the node degrees or any other global information and is shown to be much more efficient than the uniform vaccination in all cases.

O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O


Providing DoS Resistance for Signature-Based Broadcast Authentication in Sensor Networks Recent studies have demonstrated that it is feasible to perform public key cryptographic operations on resource-constrained sensor platforms. However, the significant energy consumption introduced by public key operations makes any public key-based protocol an easy target of Denial-of-Service (DoS) attacks. For example, if digital signature schemes such as ECDSA are used directly for broadcast authentication without further protection, an attacker can simply broadcast fake messages and force the receiving nodes to perform a huge number of unnecessary signature verifications, eventually exhausting their battery power. This paper shows how to mitigate such DoS attacks when digital signatures are used for broadcast authentication in sensor networks. Specifically, this paper first presents two filtering techniques, the group-based filter and the key chain-based filter, to handle the DoS attacks against signature verification. Both methods can significantly reduce the number of unnecessary signature verifications when a sensor node is under DoS attacks. This paper then combines these two filters and proposes a hybrid solution to further improve the performance.

O O O O O B I O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O B I O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

sensor networks
broadcast authentication
dos attacks


System structure identification and adaptive control of a seismic isolator test rig A system structure identification is performed. A non-linear first order model of the seismic isolator test rig is derived. A parameter sensitivity analysis is carried out. A non-linear adaptive control is designed.

O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

mechatronics
shaking table
hydraulic actuator modeling
vibration control
parameter identification


An agent system for managing uncertainty in the integration of spatio-environmental data Recent applications in environmental systems have necessitated the integration of data from multiple, heterogeneous sources. The integration process involves challenges related to issues of uncertainty and imprecision associated with both the data and the process itself. While the handling of uncertainty in geographical information systems (GIS) has been a focal point of research in recent years, the additional challenges of dealing with multiple data sources and types, as well as specific fields of analysis, lead to much more complex situations. In this paper, we present a framework for the use of fuzzy mobile agents to address these additional challenges from the standpoint of large-scale environmental systems.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

fuzzy databases
information retrieval
large-scale systems
geography


Extending the applicability of the O-ring theory to proteinDNA complexes The O-ring theory is a well-established theory for proteinprotein interfaces. Lacks confirmation for other protein-based systems. Molecular Dynamics simulations of several protein-DNA complexes. High ?SASA values for hot-spots and fewer water molecules around them. The work confirms the applicability of the O-ring theory to protein-DNA interfaces.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

proteindna interaction
dna
alanine-scanning mutagenesis
o-ring


TAP expression level in tumor cells defines the nature and processing of MHC class I peptides for recognition by tumor-specific cytotoxic T lymphocytes We identified that the antigen preprocalcitonin (ppCT) is recognized on a human lung carcinoma by a cytotoxic T lymphocyte clone derived from autologous tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes. The antigenic peptide ppCT1625 is encoded by the gene calcitonin-related polypeptide alpha (CALCA), which codes for CT and is overexpressed in several lung carcinomas compared with normal tissues. The ppCT peptide is derived from the C-terminal region of the signal peptide and is processed independently of proteasomes and the transporter associated with antigen processing (TAP)1/TAP2 heterodimeric complexes. Instead, processing occurs within the endoplasmic reticulum by a novel mechanism involving signal pepsidase (SP) and signal peptide peptidase (SPP). Although lung cancer cells bearing the ppCT1625 epitope displayed low levels of TAP, restoration of TAP expression by interferon (IFN)-? treatment or by TAP1/TAP2 gene transfer inhibited ppCT antigen presentation. Thus, the ppCT1625 human tumor epitope requires low TAP expression for efficient presentation. These results indicate that emerging SP-generated peptides represent alternative T cell targets that permit cytotoxic T lymphocytes to destroy TAP-impaired tumors, a process that helps to overcome tumor escape from CD8+ T cell immunity. Additionally, our data suggest that ppCT is a promising candidate for cancer immunotherapy.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

lung cancer
cytotoxic t lymphocytes
antigen processing


An affine transformation invariance approach to cell tracking Accurate and robust methods for automatically tracking rolling leukocytes facilitate inflammation research as leukocyte motion is a primary indicator of inflammatory response in the microvasculature. This paper reports on an affine transformation invariance approach we proposed to track rolling leukocyte in intravital microscopy image sequences. The method is based on the affine transformation invariance property, which enables the accommodation of linear affine transformations (translation, rotation, and/or scaling) of the target, and a particle filter that overcomes the effect of image clutter. In our data set of 50 sequences, we compared the new approach with an active contour tracking method and a Monte Carlo tracker. With the manual tracking result provided by an operator as the reference, the root mean square errors for the active contour tracking method, the Monte Carlo tracker and the affine transformation invariance approach were 0.95?m, 0.79?m and 0.74?m, respectively, and the percentage of frames tracked were 72%, 75% and 89%, respectively. The affine transformation invariance approach demonstrated more robust (being able to successfully locate target leukocyte in more frames) and more accurate (lower root mean square error) tracking performance. We also separately studied the ability of the affine transformation invariance approach to track a dark target leukocyte and a bright target leukocyte by using the number of frames tracked as an evaluation measure. Dark target leukocyte possesses similar image intensity to the background, making it difficult to be located. In 20 sequences where the target leukocyte was dark, the affine transformation invariance approach tracked more frames in 18 sequences and fewer frames in 2 sequences when compared with the active contour tracking method. In comparison with the Monte Carlo tracker, the affine invariance method tracked more frames in 9 sequences, the same number of frames in 7 sequences and fewer frames in 4 sequences. In tracking a bright target leukocyte in 30 sequences, the affine transformation invariance approach demonstrated superior performance in 7 sequences and inferior performance in 1 sequence when compared with the active contour tracking method. It outperformed the Monte Carlo tracker in 15 sequences and underperformed in 1 sequence.

O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

linear affine transformation
in vivo
leukocyte rolling velocity


Improving routing performance in wireless ad hoc networks using cross-layer interactions This article presents a combined layer two and three control loop, which allows prediction of link breakage in wireless ad hoc networks. The method monitors the physical layer transmission mode on layer two and exploits the gained knowledge at layer three. The mechanism bases on link adaptation, which is used in IEEE 802.11a WLAN to select the transmission mode according to the link quality. The process of link adaptation contains information that is useful to predict link stability and link lifetime. After introducing the IEEE 802.11a Medium Access Control (MAC) and PHY layer, we present insight to the IEEE 802.11a link adaptation behaviour in multi-hop ad hoc networks. The link adaptation algorithm presented here is derived from Auto Rate Fallback (ARF) algorithm. We survey the performance gain of two newly developed route adaptation approaches exploding the prediction results. One approach is Early Route ReArrangement (ERRA) that starts a route reconstruction procedure before link breakage. Hence, an alternative route is available before connectivity is lost. Early Route Update (ERU) is a complementing approach that enhances this process, by communications among routing nodes surrounding the breaking link. The delay caused by route reconstruction can be significantly reduced if prediction and either of our new route discovery processes is used.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

ad hoc network
ad hoc routing
aodv
link breakage prediction
iponair
ieee 802.11 mac


Optimizing data aggregation for cluster-based internet services Large-scale cluster-based Internet services often host partitioned datasets to provide incremental scalability. The aggregation of results produced from multiple partitions is a fundamental building block for the delivery of these services. This paper presents the design and implementation of a programming primitive-Data Aggregation Call (DAC)-to exploit partition parallelism for cluster-based Internet services. A DAC request specifies a local processing operator and a global reduction operator, and it aggregates the local processing results from participating nodes through the global reduction operator. Applications may allow a DAC request to return partial aggregation results as a tradeoff between quality and availability. Our architecture design aims at improving interactive responses with sustained throughput for typical cluster environments where platform heterogeneity and software/hardware failures are common. At the cluster level, our load-adaptive reduction tree construction algorithm balances processing and aggregation load across servers while exploiting partition parallelism. Inside each node, we employ an event-driven thread pool design that prevents slow nodes from adversely affecting system throughput under highly concurrent workload. We further devise a staged time-out scheme that eagerly prunes slow or unresponsive servers from the reduction tree to meet soft deadlines, We have used the DAC primitive to implement several applications: a search engine document retriever, a parallel protein sequence matcher, and an online parallel facial recognizer. Our experimental and simulation results validate the effectiveness of the proposed optimization techniques for reducing response time, improving throughput, and gracefully handling server unresponsiveness. We also demonstrate the ease-of-use of the DAC primitive and the scalability of our architecture design.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B

algorithms
experimentation
performance
reliability
scalable data aggregation
load-adaptive tree formation
cluster-based network services
fault tolerance


Symplectic Partitioned RungeKutta methods with minimal phase-lag Symplectic Partitioned RungeKutta (SPRK) methods with minimal phase-lag are derived. Specifically two new symplectic methods are constructed of second and third order with fifth phase-lag order. The methods are tested on the numerical integration of Hamiltonian problems and the Schrdinger equation.

B I I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O B I

symplectic partitioned rungekutta methods


an instant semantics acquisition system of live soccer video with application to live event alert and on-the-fly language selection Automatic indexing of recorded sports video is a hard problem, even more so for live sports video, though a lot of advances have been achieved in the recent years. This paper presents a semi-automatic instant semantics generation system of live soccer video and its two applications: live event alert and instant semantics embedding. A key technical challenge of building the proposed system is how to acquire the desired semantics in a very short time lag. To confront this challenge, we develop a three-channel approach to accurately and quickly acquire semantics. The hree channels are (1) developing the tool for inputting gamelog, (2) signal communication for getting commands of referee and director, and (3) video analysis for finding event boundary. The proposed system requires only a very small amount of manual work to operate gamelog acquisition tool using an icon-based interface for entering event log. Experimental results show that our system can quickly obtain the semantics of live soccer video, alert live events with a very small latency, and embed semantics into broadcasting video with a short time lag.

O B I I O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

instant semantics acquisition
sports video
gamelog
live event alert

icon-based input
on-the-fly language selection


Impacts of handset bundling on mobile data usage: The case of Finland Promotion of the adoption of new services has emerged as a possible driver for the regulation of handset bundling and subsidies. Handset bundling, however, has complex implications not only on mobile data service adoption, the focus of this research, but also more broadly on the mobile market dynamics. Due to the complexity, regulators have difficulties in anticipating the possible resulting impacts. Using a case study, expert interviews, and usage measurements as research method, an empirical framework was constructed to make the service usage impacts more explicit. The framework enables the identification of the regulator's steering options and their qualitative impacts. Results are based on observations before and after the change of law on handset bundling in the Finnish market. According to the findings, handset bundling regulation is a possible but risky tool for steering the market.

O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O B I O O B I O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O B I B O O O O O O O O O O

handset bundling
service adoption
regulation


Characterization on Simultaneous Approximation for Left Gamma Quasi-Interpolants in L-p Spaces M.W.Muller [9] gave the Gamma quasi-interpolants and obtained approximation equivalence theorems with w(phi)(2r)(f, t)(p). In this paper we obtain characterizations on simultaneous approximation for left Gamma quasi-interpolants with w(phi)(2r)(f, t)(p).

B O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O

gamma operator
quasi-interpolants
modulus of smoothness


CORRECTNESS OF GOSSIP-BASED MEMBERSHIP UNDER MESSAGE LOSS Due to their simplicity and effectiveness, gossip-based membership protocols have become the method of choice for maintaining partial membership in large peer-to-peer systems. A variety of gossip-based membership protocols were proposed. Some were shown to be effective empirically, lacking analytic understanding of their properties. Others were analyzed under simplifying assumptions, such as lossless and delayless network. It is not clear whether the analysis results hold in dynamic networks, where both nodes and network links can fail. In this paper we try to bridge this gap. We first enumerate the desirable properties of a gossip-based membership protocol, such as view uniformity, independence, and load balance. We then propose a simple send & forget protocol, and show that even in the presence of message loss, it achieves the desirable properties.

O O O B O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O


Identifying the global core-periphery structure of science While there is a consensus that there is a core-periphery structure in the global scientific enterprise, there have not been many methodologies developed for identifying this structure. This paper develops a methodology by looking at the differences in the power law structure of article outputs and degree centrality distributions of countries. This methodology is applied to five different scientific fields: astronomy and astrophysics, energy and fuels, nanotechnology and nanosciences, nutrition, and oceanography. This methodology uncovers a two-tiered power law structure that exists in all examined fields. The core-periphery structure that is unique to each field is characterized by the cores size, minimum degree, and exponent of its power law distribution. Stark differences are identified between technology and non-technology intensive scientific fields.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

core-periphery structure
power law analysis
network centrality
global science


Structure-activity study of thiazides by magnetic resonance methods (NQR, NMR, EPR) and DFT calculations The paper presents a comprehensive analysis of the relationship between the electronic structure of thiazides and their biological activity. The compounds of interest were studied in solid state by the resonance methods nuclear quadrupole resonance (NQR), nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) and quantum chemistry (ab inito and DFT) methods. Detailed parallel analysis of the spectroscopic parameters such as quadrupole coupling constant (QCC) NQR chemical shift (?), chemical shift anisotropy (CSA), asymmetry parameter (?), NMR and hyperfine coupling constant (A), EPR was performed and the electronic effects (polarisation and delocalisation) were revealed and compared. Biological activity of thiazides has been found to depend on many factors, but mainly on the physico-chemical properties whose assessment was possible on the basis of electron density determination in the molecules performed by experimental and theoretical methods.

O O O B O O O O B B B O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O B O O O O B O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O


Dictionary Learning with Incoherence and Sparsity Constraints for Sparse Representation of Nonnegative Signals This paper presents a method for learning an overcomplete, nonnegative dictionary and for obtaining the corresponding coefficients so that a group of nonnegative signals can be sparsely represented by them. This is accomplished by posing the learning as a problem of nonnegative matrix factorization (NMF) with maximization of the incoherence of the dictionary and of the sparsity of coefficients. By incorporating a dictionary-incoherence penalty and a sparsity penalty in the NMF formulation and then adopting a hierarchically alternating optimization strategy, we show that the problem can be cast as two sequential optimal problems of quadratic functions. Each optimal problem can be solved explicitly so that the whole problem can be efficiently solved, which leads to the proposed algorithm, i.e., sparse hierarchical alternating least squares (SHALS). The SHALS algorithm is structured by iteratively solving the two optimal problems, corresponding to the learning process of the dictionary and to the estimating process of the coefficients for reconstructing the signals. Numerical experiments demonstrate that the new algorithm performs better than the nonnegative K-SVD (NN-KSVD) algorithm and several other famous algorithms, and its computational cost is remarkably lower than the compared algorithms.

B I O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

dictionary learning
sparse representation

hierarchical alternating least squares (hals)


Multi-agent learning in recommender systems for information filtering on the Internet Recommender Systems (RS), allow users to share information about items they like or dislike and obtain, in a timely fashion, recommendations based on predictions about unseen items (physical or information goods and/or services). In this process, users' preferences are considered to be the learning target functions. We study Agent-based Recommender Systems (ARS) under the scope of online learning in Multi-Agent systems (MAS). This approach models the problem as a pool of independent cooperative predictor agents, one per each user (the masters) in the system, in situations in which each agent (the learners) faces a sequence of trials, with a prediction to make in every step, eventually getting the correct value from its master. Each learner is willing to discover the degree of similarity among the target function of its master and those of other agents' masters (i.e. preference similarity). The agent uses this information for the calculation of its own prediction task, the goal being to make as few mistakes as possible. A simple, yet effective method is introduced in order to construct a compound algorithm for each agent by combining memory-based individual prediction and online weighted-majority voting. We give a theoretical mistake bound for this algorithm that is closely related to the total loss of the best predictor agent in the pool. Finally, we conduct some experiments obtaining results that empirically support these ideas and theories.

O O O B I O B I O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O B I O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

information filtering
recommender systems
online learning
mas


A comparative study of high resolution schemes for solving population balances in crystallization This article demonstrates the applicability and usefulness of high resolution finite volume schemes for the solution of population balance equations (PBEs) in crystallization processes. The population balance equation is considered to be a statement of continuity. It tracks the change in particle size distribution as particles are born, die, grow or leave a given control volume. In the population balance models, the one independent variable represents the time, the other(s) are "property coordinate(s)", e.g. the particle size in the present case. They typically describe the temporal evolution of the number density functions and have been used to model various processes. These include crystallization, polymerization, emulsion and cell dynamics. The high resolution schemes were originally developed for compressible fluid dynamics. The schemes resolve sharp peaks and shock discontinuities on coarse girds, as well as avoid numerical diffusion and numerical dispersion. The schemes are derived for general purposes and can be applied to any hyperbolic model. Here, we test the schemes on the one-dimensional population balance models with nucleation and growth. The article mainly concentrates on the re-derivation of a high resolution scheme of Koren (Koren, B. (1993). A robust upwind discretization method for advection, diffusion and source terms. In C. B. Vreugdenhill, & B. Koren (Eds.), Numerical methods for advection-diffusion problems, Braunschweig: Vieweg Verlag, pp. 117-138 [vol. 45 of notes on numerical fluid mechanics, chapter 5]) which is then compared with other high resolution finite volume schemes. The numerical test cases reported in this paper show clear advantages of high resolutions schemes for the solution of population balances. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

O O O O B I I O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

population balance models
high resolution schemes
crystallization
nucleation and growth

distributed parameter systems
hyperbolic conservation laws


Image compression for fast wavelet-based subregion retrieval In an image browsing environment there is need for progressively viewing image subregions at various resolutions. We describe a storage scheme that accomplishes good image compression, while supporting fast image subregion retrieval. We evaluate analytically and experimentally the compression performance of our algorithm. We also provide results on the speed of the algorithm to demonstrate its effectiveness, and present an extension to a client/server environment. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

B I O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

wavelet
digital library
quadtrees
huffman code


On the potential advantages of exploiting behavioural information for contract-based service discovery and composition The importance of service contracts providing a suitably synthetic description of software services is widely accepted. While different types of information - ranging from extra-functional properties to ontological annotations to behavioural descriptions - have been proposed to be included in service contracts, no widely accepted de facto standard has yet emerged for describing service contracts, except for signature information. The lack of a de facto standard is inhibiting large scale deployment of techniques and tools supporting enhanced discovery and composition of services. In this paper we discuss the potentially huge advantages of exploiting behavioural information for service discovery and composition, and relate them to the cost of generating such information and to the needed trade-off between expressiveness and cost and value of analysing such information. On such ground, we also discuss the potential suitability of some well-known modelling approaches to become the de facto standard to represent service behaviour in contracts, also in view of contextual factors (such as required know-how and current employment). (C) 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

service-oriented computing
service descriptions
behaviour information


intelligent pervasive middleware for context-based and localized telematics services Telematics is arguably the next-wave in mobile computing: with most cars already equipped with multiple embedded computing platforms, we shall witness the development of a variety of mobile services and applications with significant commercial potential. Telematics will only become a commercial reality when the underlying architecture is able to address significant concerns related to the security and privacy of telematics data, and is able to provide context information from and to a large number of mobile data sources in a scalable and device-independent manner. A telematics platform should utilize existing Internet components and technologies but cannot rely exclusively on these, especially since mobile commerce applications in the telematics environment impose specific requirements on the relationships between various services and data providers. In this paper we describe how we are developing an open standards telematics platform based on the ts-PWLAN wireless service environment and the Telematics Resource Manager middleware. Our design employs existing web service interfaces coupled with novel technology for connecting to these through a wireless gateway. Our middleware acts as a common substrate for building and deploying a wide range of telematics applications. We describe how several of these applications are currently being built on our infrastructure.

O O O O O O O B O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O


Bootstrap for neural model selection Bootstrap techniques (also called resampling computation techniques) have introduced new advances in modeling and model evaluation (Principles of Neural Model Identification, Selection and Adequacy, Springer, New York, 1999). Using resampling methods to construct a series of new samples which are based on the original data set, allows to estimate the stability of the parameters. Properties such as convergence and asymptotic normality can be checked for any particular observed data set. In most cases, the statistics computed on the generated data sets give a good idea of the confidence regions of the estimates. In this paper, we debate on the contribution of such methods for model selection, in the case of feedforward neural networks. The method is described and compared with the leave-one-out resampling method. The effectiveness of the bootstrap method, versus the leave-one-out method, is checked through a number of examples.

B O O B I B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O


A New Perspective for Neural Networks: Application to a Marketing Management Problem Over the last few years, connectionism or neural networks (NN) have successfully been applied to a wide range of areas and have demonstrated their capabilities in solving complex problems. Current indications show that these techniques are very important and rapidly developing areas of research and applications, particularly, in the area of data mining for knowledge discovery. One particular neural network model, the back-propagation (BP) algorithm, has performed very well in this regard and it is now accepted as a reliable method for data mining. However, these models have their shortcomings. The major difficulty lies in the fact that the relationships between specific variables and the neural network results are, at best, difficult to explain. This article presents an innovative but simple method for using NN to understand the pattern/outcome correlation to interpret a cause and effect relationship. A comparative analysis and experimental results are also presented to show the validity of the proposed scheme.

O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

sensitivity analysis
cart
logistic regression


FixTag: An Algorithm for Identifying and Tagging Fixations to Simplify the Analysis of Data Collected by Portable Eye Trackers Video-based eye trackers produce an output video showing where a subject is looking, the subject's Point-of-Regard (POR), for each frame of a video of the scene. This information can be extremely valuable, but its analysis can be overwhelming. Analysis of eye-tracked data from portable (wearable) eye trackers is especially daunting, as the scene video may be constantly changing, rendering automatic analysis more difficult. A common way to begin analysis of POR data is to group these data into fixations. In a previous article, we compared the fixations identified (i.e., start and end marked) automatically by an algorithm to those identified manually by users (i.e., manual coders). Here, we extend this automatic identification of fixations to tagging each fixation to a Region-of-Interest (ROI). Our fixation tagging algorithm, FixTag, requires the relative 3D positions of the vertices of ROIs and calibration of the scene camera. Fixation tagging is performed by first calculating the camera projection matrices for keyframes of the scene video (captured by the eye tracker) via an iterative structure and motion recovery algorithm. These matrices are then used to project 3D ROI vertices into the keyframes. A POR for each fixation is matched to a point in the closest keyframe, which is then checked against the 2D projected ROI vertices for tagging. Our fixation tags were compared to those produced by three manual coders tagging the automatically identified fixations for two different scenarios. For each scenario, eight ROIs were defined along with the 3D positions of eight calibration points. Therefore, 17 tags were available for each fixation: 8 for ROIs, 8 for calibration points, and 1 for "other." For the first scenario, a subject was tracked looking through products on four store shelves, resulting in 182 automatically identified fixations. Our automatic tagging algorithm produced tags that matched those produced by at least one manual coder for 181 out of the 182 fixations (99.5% agreement). For the second scenario, a subject was tracked looking at two posters on adjoining walls of a room. Our algorithm matched at least one manual coder's tag for 169 fixations out of 172 automatically identified (98.3% agreement).

O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O


An iterative linearized optimization technique for non-linear ill-posed problems applied to cardiac activation time imaging A promising approach for the solution of the electrocardiographic inverse problem is the calculation of the cardiac activation sequence from body surface potential (BSP) mapping data. Here, a two-fold regularization scheme is applied in order to stabilize the inverse solution of this intrinsically ill-posed problem. The solution of the inverse problem is defined by the minimum of a non-linear cost function. The L-curve method can be applied for regularization parameter determination. Solving the optimization problem by a Newton-like method, the L-curve may be of pronged shape. Then a numerically unique determination of the optimal regularization parameter will become difficult. This problem can be avoided applying an iterative linearized algorithm. It is shown that activation time imaging due to temporal and spatial regularization is stable with respect to large model errors. Even neglecting cardiac anisotropy in activation time imaging results in an acceptable inverse solution.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O


A learning algorithm for fault tolerant feedforward neural networks A new learning algorithm is proposed to enhance fault tolerance ability of the feedforward neural networks. The algorithm focuses on;he links (weights) that may cause errors at the output when they are open faults. The relevances of the synaptic weights to the output error (i.e. the sensitivity of the output error to the weight fault) are estimated in each training cycle of the standard backpropagation using the Taylor expansion of the output around fault-free weights. Then the weight giving the maximum relevance is decreased. The approach taken by the algorithm described in this paper is to prevent the weights from having large relevances. The simulation results indicate that the network trained with the proposed algorithm do have significantly better fault tolerance than the network trained with the standard backpropagation algorithm. The simulation results show that the fault tolerance and the generalization abilities are improved.

O B I O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

feedforward neural network
relevance of synaptic weights
essential link


An information system for drug prescription and distribution in a public hospital With 773 beds and 3696 employees, the Hospital das Cl??nicas da Faculdade de Medicina de Ribeiro Preto (HCFMRP)-Universidade de So Paulo, is one of the largest medical institutions in Latin America. The complete process of prescribing and distributing medication at HCFMRP involves the following stages: prescribing (physicians); ordering (infirmary); separating and dispensing (main drugstore); verifying and administering (infirmary). This was a manual process, normally taking place in the morning. Bottlenecks were inevitable and the risk of errors was elevated. An information system (IS) was devised and implemented with a view to controlling such problems. This article addresses the construction of this system and reports on a survey in which different groups of users have evaluated the project.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

hospital administration
information systems
materials administration
medication storage
electronic prescription


Investigating prefix propagation through active BGP probing To devise effective network engineering strategies and to assess the quality of upstream providers, network operators would greatly benefit from the knowledge of which Internet paths might be traversed by the traffic flows entering their networks in the case of network faults or when traffic engineering measures are used. However, current methodologies do not provide this information. This paper presents methodologies to discover alternate paths that might be selected in the presence of network faults or different routing policies and to deduce the routing policies of other operators. The techniques are validated through extensive experimentation on the Internet. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

networking
internet probing
interdomain routing
border gateway protocol (bgp)
internet service provider (isp)


Timeliness-accuracy balanced collection of dynamic context data In the future, we are likely to see a tremendous need for context-aware applications which adapt to available context information such as physical surroundings, network, or system conditions. We aim to provide a fundamental support for these applications - a real-time context information collection service. This service delivers the right context information to the right user at the right time. The complexity of providing the real-time context information service arises from 1) the dynamically changing status of information sources, 2) the diverse user requirements in terms of data accuracy and service latency, and 3) constantly changing system conditions. In this paper, we take into consideration these dynamics and focus on addressing the trade-offs between timeliness, accuracy, and cost for information collection in distributed real-time environments. We propose a middleware-based approach to enable a judicious composition of services for accuracy-aware scheduling and cost-aware database maintenance. Specifically, we characterize the problem in terms of Quality-of-Service Satisfaction (QoSSat), Quality-of-Data Satisfaction (QoDSat), and Cost. We propose a middleware framework for the real-time information collection process, where the information mediator coordinates and facilitates communication between information sources and consumers. We design a family of algorithms for real-time request scheduling, request servicing, and directory service maintenance to be implemented at the mediator to support QoSSat and QoDSat. Our studies indicate that the composition of our proposed scheduling algorithm and directory service maintenance policy can improve the overall efficiency of the system. We also observe that the proposed policies perform very well as the system scales in the number of information sources and consumer requests.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

distributed systems
context-sensitive middleware
real-time
quality of service
quality of data


Module placement for fault-tolerant microfluidics-based biochips Microfluidics-based biochips are soon expected to revolutionize clinical diagnosis, DNA sequencing, and other laboratory procedures involving molecular biology. Most microfluidic biochips today are based on the principle of continuous fluid flow and they rely on permanently etched microchannels, micropumps, and microvalves. We focus here on the automated design of "digital" droplet-based microfluidic biochips. In contrast to conventional continuous-flow systems, digital microfluidics offers dynamic reconfigurability; groups of cells in a microfluidics array can be reconfigured to change their functionality during the concurrent execution of a set of bioassays. We present a simulated annealing-based technique for module placement in such biochips. The placement procedure not only addresses chip area, but also considers fault tolerance, which allows a microfluidic module to be relocated elsewhere in the system when a single cell is detected to be faulty. Simulation results are presented for case studies involving the polymerase chain reaction and multiplexed in vitro clinical diagnostics.

B I O O O B O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O B O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

design
module placement
microfluidics
biochips

algorithms
performance
reliability
physical design automation


On discretization errors and subgrid scale model implementations in large eddy simulations We analyze the impact of discretization errors on the performance of the Smagorinsky model in large eddy simulations (LES). To avoid difficulties related to solid boundaries, we focus on decaying homogeneous turbulence. It is shown that two numerical implementations of the model in the same finite volume code lead to significantly different results in terms of kinetic energy decay, time evolutions of the viscous dissipation and kinetic energy spectra. In comparison with spectral LES results, excellent predictions are however obtained with a novel formulation of the model derived from the discrete NavierStokes equations. We also highlight the effect of discretization errors on the measurement of physical quantities that involve scales close to the grid resolution.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

large eddy simulation
finite volume method
homogeneous isotropic turbulence


fast instruction cache modeling for approximate timed hw/sw co-simulation Approximate timed co-simulation has been proposed as a fast solution for system modeling in early design steps. This co-simulation technique enables the simulation of systems at speeds close to functional execution, while considering timing effects. As a consequence, system performance estimations can be obtained early, enabling efficient design space exploration and system refinement. To achieve fast simulation speeds, first the SW code is pre-annotated with time information and then it is natively executed, performing what is called native-based co-simulation. To obtain sufficiently accurate performance estimations, the effect of the system components must be considered. Among them, processor caches are really important, as they have a strong impact on the overall system performance. However, no efficient techniques for cache modeling in native-based co-simulation have been proposed. Previous works considering caches apply slow cache models based on tag search, similar to ISS-based models. This solution slows down the simulation speed, greatly reducing the efficiency of native based co-simulations. In this paper, a high-level instruction cache model is proposed, along with the required instrumentation for native simulation. This model allows the designer to obtain cache hit/miss rate estimations with simulation speeds very close to native execution. Results present a speed-up of two orders of magnitude with respect to ISS and one order of magnitude regarding previous approaches in native simulation. Miss rate estimation error remains below 5\%.

O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

electronic system level
performance estimation


Guided latent space regression for human motion generation In the present work, we describe a mathematical model to generate human-like motion trajectories in space. We use linear regression in a latent space to find the model parameters from a set of demonstration examples. The learning procedure requires a relevant set of similar examples. The apprehended models encode both the typical shapes of motion and their variability towards specific boundary conditions (BC). We will show the added value of encoding both properties in a unique model and we apply this ability to common problems of error compensation and target tracking. The models allow us to describe human motion using expansion-function series (EFS), thus avoiding typical stability issues that arise in the use of differential equation models. To cope with variable scenarios, we show two specific algorithms that morph and adapt the evolution trajectory. In analogy to splines, the EFS preserve an analytical structure on which we develop the optimisation steps. In such a way, we managed to combine multiple single segments into complex motions that preserve continuity and may simultaneously optimise other criteria. In the present work, after having analysed similar tools, we present the basic model and its features. Then we develop a robust tool to gather the model from examples, and to achieve real-time trajectory adaptation. The achieved results will be analysed through an experimental analysis on data collected in a ball catching experiment.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

motion models
trajectory generation
programming by demonstration
robust regression


Influence of shear deformation and rotary inertia on nonlinear free vibration of a beam with pinned ends The method of multiple scales is used to analyze the nonlinear vibrations of a beam with pinned ends. The formulation incorporates the effects of the transverse shear deformation as well as the rotary inertia on the large amplitude vibration behaviour. A uniformly valid higher second-order perturbation solution is obtained. The predictions of nonlinear frequencies at different beam parameters are given. The influences of shear and rotary inertia are significant in the case of moderately thick and short beams undergoing large amplitude vibrations.

O O B I O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O

shear deformation
rotary inertia
nonlinear vibrations
beams


Modeling lane-changing behavior in a connected environment: A game theory approach Models lane changing behavior in connected environment using game theory concepts. Formulates 2-person non-zero-sum non-cooperative game under complete information. Model parameters estimated using NGSIM vehicle trajectories. Implemented in simulation framework to evaluate effect of connectivity.

O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

lane-changing
simulated moments
fictitious play


Evolutionary approaches to solve three challenging engineering tasks Three applications of evolutionary algorithms, namely the optimization of the nuclear core reload design, the synthesis of multi-layer optical coatings, and the synthesis of chemical engineering plants, are presented in this paper. The examples demonstrate the applicability of the evolutionary approach to solve complex real-world problems. These problems are often mixed-integer, variable-dimensional and multi-criteria optimization problems. Additionally, instead of an objective function, given in a closed form, complex simulation models are used as an objective function, thus prohibiting success by means of classical analysis. Although standard evolutionary algorithms are not able to solve the three complex tasks presented here, enhanced evolutionary algorithms (EAs) clearly demonstrate their potential to do so. Through the three examples, we show the necessary ingredients for tackling real-world optimization problems. In addition to adequate representations and appropriate evolutionary operators, one needs to integrate expert knowledge and heuristic operators to guide the search. Finally, parallel EAs are needed to improve the reliability and speed up of evolutionary algorithms.

O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I

evolutionary algorithms
multilayer optical coatings
chemical engineering plants

engineering applications
nuclear reactors


the use of static column ram as a memory hierarchy The Static Column RAM devices recently introduced offer the potential for implementing a direct-mapped cache on-chip with only a small increase in complexity over that needed for a conventional dynamic RAM memory system. Trace-driven simulation shows that such a cache can only be marginally effective if used in the obvious way. However it can be effective in satisfying the requests from a processor containing an on-chip cache. The SCRAM cache is more effective if the processor cache handles both instructions and data.

O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O B O O O O O O B O B I O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O B O O B O O O O O B B O O O O B

processor
cache
use
dynamic
memory system
data
complexity

device
trace driven simulation
instruction
direct
effect
memory hierarchies


parallel and distributed algorithms: laboratory assignments in joyce/linda A NSF ILI grant funded development of parallel and distributed laboratories for an undergraduate course in parallel algorithms. The laboratory assignments explored various parallel and distributed architectures, and paradigms. These assignments were implemented using the Joyce/Linda[McDonald92] language. The Joyce/Linda software was also utilized to develop parallel and distributed laboratory assignments for courses in data structures, operating systems and computer networks. The parallel and distributed algorithms course examined both theoretical and practical areas of study.

B O B I B O O O O O O O O O O B O B O O O O O O B O O B O O O B O B O O O O O O O O O O B O O B O O O O O B O B B O O O O B I O O O O O O B O B I O O O O O B O O O

software
distributed algorithms
parallel
language
data structures
distributed
practical
laboratory

visualization
computer network
developer
parallel algorithm
architecture
operating system
assignment
parallel computing


Quantum chemical study of the intermediate complex required for iron-mediated reactivity and antimalarial activity of dispiro-1,2,4-trioxolanes Quantum chemical methods were used to obtain a structure for the peroxideiron intermediate complex required for the inner-sphere reduction of dispiro-1,2,4-trioxolane antimalarials. Investigation of this biologically important interaction with iron(II) allows further understanding of the mechanisms of action and clearance of this promising new class of fully synthetic peroxide antimalarials. UHF, B3LYP and B3LYP//MP2 calculations were undertaken to provide structural and energetic information about the coordination complex of iron(II) with five representative trioxolanes, ranging in both iron-mediated reactivity and antimalarial activity. Significant energy differences were observed between the conformational isomers of these trioxolanes, indicating the importance of steric interactions between the iron complex ligands and the trioxolane substituents. These calculations may explain the slower iron-mediated reaction rates of trioxolanes that preferentially adopt a conformation that sterically shields the peroxide bond. The relationship between antimalarial activity and accessibility of the peroxide bond to iron has also been demonstrated for these trioxolanes.

O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O

quantum chemistry
density functional methods


Universal Design for Learning: meeting the challenge of individual learning differences through a neurocognitive perspective The traditional one-size-fits-all approach to curriculum denies the vast individual differences in learning strengths, challenges, and interests. The focus of this article is a novel approach, called Universal Design for Learning, to addressing the challenge of individual learner differences. Cognitive science research suggests the joint action of three broad sets of neural networks in cognition and learning: one that recognizes patterns, one that plans and generates patterns, and one that determines which patterns are important. These networks, referred to in this paper as recognition, strategic, and affective networks, are subject to individual differences that impact how individual students learn. This paper describes these networks and how the Universal Design for Learning framework makes use of this networks-based perspective to structure the consideration of individual learner differences and guide the design of a flexible, technology-rich curriculum that provides rich options for meeting diverse student needs.

B I I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

cognition and learning
universal design for learning

disabilities
brain
educational technology


Energy efficient joint data aggregation and link scheduling in solar sensor networks Solar sensor nodes equipped with micro-solar subsystems 111 provide a novel approach to harvest ambient energy, which partially alleviated the energy-limitation in traditional wireless sensor networks. However, it also poses new challenges that the amounts of energy harvested by nodes are dynamic and unbalanced among them thus network life cannot be necessarily prolonged if no well-designed energy-scheduling is adopted. Herein, we present an algorithm to construct Energy-efficient Data Aggregation Tree (EDAT) based on a Maximum-Weighted Connected Dominating Set (MaCDS). The EDAT aims to prolong network life by minimizing differences in energy consumption among sensor nodes. Here we assume that the amount of harvested energy randomly and uniformly distributes in the interval [H-min, H-max], where H-min and H-max are respectively the maximum and the minimum of H. The total energy consumption difference of an EDAT is at most where 5 (H) over tildes(2)/n-1, where (H) over tilde = vertical bar[H-min, H-max]vertical bar and S is the dominating set and it the total number of nodes. Furthermore, we designed a link-scheduling algorithm to minimize the number of time slots necessary for scheduling all links in the whole network based on EDAT. The number of time slots is bounded in the interval [4 delta - 1,2/k(Q)(2)], where l(k) is determined by hops k; Q = max {Delta, left perpendicularH(max)/H(min)right perpendicular}, and delta and Delta are respectively the minimal and maximal degree of the network. We found the most efficient work period is not determined by the node with the minimum harvested energy but by the one with the minimum where d is the node's degree in the EDAT. We determine the necessary condition required for every node to have sufficient energy to support consecutive operation. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O


Incorporating angular information into parametric models The problem is considered of fitting a parametrically defined model in two or three dimensions to observed data, when angular information about the measured data points is available. Gauss-Newton methods based on correct separation of variables are developed. Some numerical results axe included.

O B I O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

measured data
parametric models
angular information


Multilingual and cross-domain temporal tagging Extraction and normalization of temporal expressions from documents are important steps towards deep text understanding and a prerequisite for many NLP tasks such as information extraction, question answering, and document summarization. There are different ways to express (the same) temporal information in documents. However, after identifying temporal expressions, they can be normalized according to some standard format. This allows the usage of temporal information in a term- and language-independent way. In this paper, we describe the challenges of temporal tagging in different domains, give an overview of existing annotated corpora, and survey existing approaches for temporal tagging. Finally, we present our publicly available temporal tagger HeidelTime, which is easily extensible to further languages due to its strict separation of source code and language resources like patterns and rules. We present a broad evaluation on multiple languages and domains on existing corpora as well as on a newly created corpus for a language/domain combination for which no annotated corpus has been available so far.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O


Image time series processing for agriculture monitoring Image time series analysis is of increasing relevance for environmental monitoring. Dedicated tools are needed to process remote sensing image time series. SPIRITS is free software to process image time series for crop monitoring. SPIRITS has a user-friendly interface and is extensively documented.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

early warning
yield forecasting system
crop and vegetation monitoring


analyzing e-governance mainstays on municipalities websites E-Governance aims to provide citizens with a high quality of government. It covers services, information delivery and interactive community / government communication. This goal can be achieved by adopting the ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) tools in the government websites' design and content. This communication channel allows a redefinition of the traditional role played by each one of the actors in the relationship. The government as provider of: services, information, transparency and interactive communication. The citizens acting as active subjects with their government, using services, receiving information, controlling the government's decisions and returning feedback to them. This feedback includes opinions, complaints and suggestions delivered by the websites' interactive tools. This paper analyses local government websites and verifies if the adoption of tools provided by ICTs regarding national and international rules of design and contents, contributes to achieve a high level of: e-democracy, e-services, e-transparency and active and passive communication. All of them key concepts and mainstays to improve e-governance quality.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

municipality
e-democracy
e-services
e-governance
active and passive communicaton


Two constructions of permutation arrays In this correspondence, two new constructions of permutation arrays are given. A number of examples to illustrate the constructions are also provided.

O O O B I O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O


using bottom-up design techniques in the synthesis of digital hardware from abstract behavioral descriptions This paper reports on a new method for using bottom-up design information in the synthesis of integrated circuits from abstract behavioral descriptions. There are two important ways in which this method differs from traditional top-down synthesis techniques. First, it draws on a newly developed procedural database to collect detailed information on the physical and logical properties of the primitives available for building the design. Second, it uses a different method for representing and organizing knowledge about a design that makes possible estimates of physical placement and wiring in the analysis of that design, even at the abstract register-transfer level. This allows a more accurate evaluation of candidate register-transfer designs without doing a full logic-level or transistor-level layout. It also leads to a simple method for systematically exploring the space of possible designs in order to find the one that best meets the designer's objectives and constraints.

O O B I O O B O O B O O O O O B O O O O B O O O B O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O B O O O O O O O O O B O B O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O B O O O O B O O B O O O O O B B O O O O B O O B O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O B O O O O B O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O

design techniques
order
method
space
analysis
collect
design
layout
placement
physical
synthesis
hardware
knowledge
paper
database
evaluation

digitize
organization
abstraction
procedure
behavior
object
logic
integrated circuit
constraint
informal
exploration


the founding of the netscape user experience group Netscape Communications is a company that has grown faster than any other software company in history. Although the design effort at Netscape has evolved greatly, the initial experience of bringing design into an organization in hypergrowth provided some valuable lessons in the creation of a successful design organization.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

usability testing
visual design
organizations
human factors


Maximum Relative Margin and Data-Dependent Regularization Leading classification methods such as support vector machines (SVMs) and their counterparts achieve strong generalization performance by maximizing the margin of separation between data classes. While the maximum margin approach has achieved promising performance, this article identifies its sensitivity to affine transformations of the data and to directions with large data spread. Maximum margin solutions may be misled by the spread of data and preferentially separate classes along large spread directions. This article corrects these weaknesses by measuring margin not in the absolute sense but rather only relative to the spread of data in any projection direction. Maximum relative margin corresponds to a data-dependent regularization on the classification function while maximum absolute margin corresponds to an l(2) norm constraint on the classification function. Interestingly, the proposed improvements only require simple extensions to existing maximum margin formulations and preserve the computational efficiency of SVMs. Through the maximization of relative margin, surprising performance gains are achieved on real-world problems such as digit, text classification and on several other benchmark data sets. In addition, risk bounds are derived for the new formulation based on Rademacher averages.

O O O O O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

kernel methods
large margin
rademacher complexity


View planning for automated three-dimensional object reconstruction and inspection Laser scanning range sensors are widely used for high-precision, high-density three-dimensional (3D) reconstruction and inspection of the surface of physical objects. The process typically involves planning a set of views, physically altering the relative object-sensor pose, taking scans, registering the acquired geometric data in a common coordinate frame of reference, and finally integrating range images into a nonredundant model. Efficiencies could be achieved by automating or semiautomating this process. While challenges remain, there are adequate solutions to semiautomate the scan-register-integrate tasks. On the other hand, view planning remains an open problem-that is, the task of finding a suitably small set of sensor poses and configurations for specified reconstruction or inspection goals. This paper surveys and compares view planning techniques for automated 3D object reconstruction and inspection by means of active, triangulation-based range sensors.

B I O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O

view planning
range images
object reconstruction

algorithms
design
measurement
performance
object inspection


Virtual integration of sensor observation data Virtual observation data integration vs. prevailing data warehouse approaches. Flexible combination of Mediator/Wrapper architecture with OGC SWE interfaces. In situ and remote static and mobile sensors producing vector and raster data. Multi-thread implementation to leverage current hardware multicore architectures. Under validation in two Spanish public meteorological and oceanographic agencies.

O O O O B I O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

sos
sensor web
interoperability
data integration
sensor data


Modelling urban development with cellular automata incorporating fuzzy-set approaches This is the first part of a two-paper series on the development and application of a cellular automata model of urban development using geographic information systems (GIS) and fuzzy-set approaches. Under the paradigm of fuzzy-set theory, a cellular automata model of urban development was developed based on an understanding of the logistic trend of urban development processes. The model assigns membership of urban areas to multiple states of urban development using a fuzzy membership function. The transition rules based on linguistic variables are applied to represent the non-deterministic nature of urban development controls. By implementing the model in a raster based GIS format, experimental scenarios of development of a virtual city under realistic conditions are presented. Experimental application of the model to an artificial city produced realistic results and demonstrated the model was theoretically feasible and valid. Further work is needed to calibrate the model when applying it to simulate actual urban development. In the second part of the two-paper series, spatio-temporal simulations of urban development in Sydney, Australia, from 1971 to 1996 will be demonstrated and discussed.

O B I O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O B I O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O B I O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O