All-terrain vehicle use in agriculture: Exposure to whole body vibration and mechanical shock Whole body vibration (WBV) and mechanical shock were measured in 12 New Zealand farmers during their daily use of all-terrain vehicles (ATVs). As per the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) guidelines for WBV exposure, frequencies between 0 and 100Hz were recorded via a seat-pad tri-axial accelerometer during 20min of ATV use. The farmers were also surveyed to estimate seasonal variation in daily ATV usage as well as 7-day and 12-month prevalence of spinal pain. Frequency-weighted vibration exposure and total riding time were calculated to determine the daily vibration dose value (VDV). The daily VDV of 16.6m/s1.75 was in excess of the 9.1m/s1.75 action limit set by ISO guidelines suggesting an increased risk of low back injury from such exposure. However, the mean shock factor R, representing cumulative adverse health effects, was 0.31 indicating that these farmers were not exposed to excessive doses of mechanical shock. Extrapolation of daily VDV data to estimated seasonal variations of farmers in ATV riding time demonstrated that all participants would exceed the ISO recommended maximum permissible limits during the spring lambing season, as compared to lower exposures calculated for summer, autumn and winter. Low back pain was the most commonly reported complaint for both 7 day (50%) and 12 month prevalence (67%), followed by the neck (17% and 42%) and the upper back (17% and 25%) respectively. The results demonstrate high levels of vibration exposure within New Zealand farmers and practical recommendations are needed to reduce their exposure toWBV.

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

farmers
vibration dose value
low back pain
seasonal variation


evolving stylized images using a user-interactive genetic algorithm The application of evolutionary computation to art has produced very interesting results with respect to the generation of images [5]. Systems that rely on automatic image generation, where the computer is relied upon for the production of creative images, often fall short when results are presented to a user for feedback, as results in the field of visual arts are highly subjective. Many systems incorporate user-guided evolution to remedy this situation, requiring the user to supervise the evolutionary process at every step, though this task is largely repetitive. This paper introduces JNetic, a highly user-interactive image evolution system that does not rely on user feedback or supervision. It can be run in two modes, automatic and interactive, using color distance between a source image and generated image as a fitness function in automatic mode. JNetic is a tool for artists, created with user intervention and interaction in mind, but ultimately focusing on the automatic evolution of images.

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

evolutionary computation
genetic algorithm
stylized
automatic evolution
image generation
art


a comparative study of modulo scheduling techniques Modulo Scheduling is an instruction scheduling technique that is used by many current compilers. Different approaches have been proposed in the past but there is not a quantitative comparison among them, using the same compiling platform, benchmarks and architectures.This paper presents a performance comparison of the most relevant Modulo Scheduling techniques, based on a detailed quantitative evaluation of them. The results point out which are the most effective techniques for different architectures, which is useful for compiler designers when choosing the most appropriate technique for a particular processor architecture.

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

processor
comparative study
point
modulo scheduling
platform
instruction scheduling
architecture
performance
quantitative evaluation
paper

benchmark compilation relevance effect comparisons evaluation


a fast routability-driven router for fpgas Three factors are driving the demand for rapid FPGA compilation. First, as FPGAs have grown in logic capacity, the compile computation has grown more quickly than the compute power of the available computers. Second, there exists a subset of users who are willing to pay for very high speed compile with a decrease in quality of result, and accordingly being required to use a larger FPGA or use more real-estate on a given FPGA than is otherwise necessary. Third, very high speed compile has been a long-standing desire of those using FPGA-based custom computing machines, as they want compile times at least closer to those of regular computers. This paper focuses on the routing phase of the compile process, and in particular on routability-driven routing (as opposed to timing-driven routing). We present a routing algorithm and routing tool that has three unique capabilities relating to very high-speed compile: For a low stress routing problem (which we define as the case where the track supply is at least 10\% greater than the minimun number of tracks per channel actually needed to route a circuit) the routing time is very fast. For example, the routing phase (after the netlist is parsed and the routing graph is constructed) for a 20,000 LUT/FF pair circuit with 30\% extra tracks is only 23 seconds on a 300 MHz Sparcstation. For low-stress routing problems the routing time is near-linear in the size of the circuit, and the linearity constant is very small: 1.1 ms per LUT/FF pair, or roughly 55,000 LUT/FF pairs per minute. For more difficult routing problems (where the track supply is close to the minimum needed) we provide a method that quickly identifies and subdivides this class into two sub-classes: (i) those circuits which are difficult (but possible) to route and will take significantly more time than low-stress problems, and (ii) those circuits which are impossible to route. In the first case the user can choose to continue or reduce the amount of logic; in the second case the user is forced to reduce the amount of logic or obtain a larger FPGA.

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

fpgas quality use computation router tool case paper user method capabilities users size custom process graph compilation routing power logic stress class circuits

examples
drive
timing
factor
capacities
tracking
routing algorithm


Modeling the interaction of seven bisphosphonates with the hydroxyapatite(100) face The interaction of seven pamidronate bisphosphonate (Pami-BPs) and its analogs with the hydroxyapatite (HAP) (100) surface was studied using density functional theory (DFT) and molecular dynamic (MD) methods. Partial Mulliken oxygen atomic charges in protonated structures were calculated at the level of B3LYP/6-31G*. The MD simulation was performed using the Discover module of Material Studio by compass force field. The results indicate the abilities of donating electrons of the oxygen atoms of the phosphate groups that are closely associated with the antiresorptive potency. The binding energies, including vdw and electrostatic, are used to discuss the mechanism of antiresorption. The results of calculations show that the strength of interaction of the HAP (100) face with the bisphosphonates is N-4 > N-6 > N-7 > N-5 > N-3 > N-2 > N-1 according to their experimental pIC(50) values.

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

bisphosphonates
hydroxyapatite
density functional theory
molecular dynamic
antiresorption


Viewpoint Invariant Texture Description Using Fractal Analysis Image texture provides a rich visual description of the surfaces in the scene. Many texture signatures based on various statistical descriptions and various local measurements have been developed. Existing signatures, in general, are not invariant to 3D geometric transformations, which is a serious limitation for many applications. In this paper we introduce a new texture signature, called the multifractal spectrum (MFS). The MFS is invariant under the bi-Lipschitz map, which includes view-point changes and non-rigid deformations of the texture surface, as well as local affine illumination changes. It provides an efficient framework combining global spatial invariance and local robust measurements. Intuitively, the MFS could be viewed as a "better histogram" with greater robustness to various environmental changes and the advantage of capturing some geometrical distribution information encoded in the texture. Experiments demonstrate that the MFS codes the essential structure of textures with very low dimension, and thus represents an useful tool for texture classification.

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 B I

texture description
texture classification

fractal dimension
multi-fractal spectrum
viewpoint invariance


Optimization of piers for retaining walls The ultimate strength design of reinforced concrete members under flexure and axial loads is well known, with solutions dating back to the 1950s. There is little motivation for engineers to change solution approaches in the absence of a clear benefit, particularly given that current solution approaches are well-known and do not raise controversy. Recently, a different solution approach has been presented in the form of Reinforcement Sizing Diagrams and Optimal Domains, but applications to rectangular sections were limited and thus the approach has been mainly of academic or theoretical interest. This paper presents an application to circular sections, which allow the advantages to be realized in the commonly encountered situation of retaining walls supported by circular section piers. Using the approach presented herein, longitudinal reinforcement can be reduced up to 50% compared with traditional designs, allowing significant financial savings while also reducing the greenhouse gas emissions associated with the reinforcement component of reinforced concrete construction.

O O O O B I 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 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


Stability of multivariate polynomials, part 4: Conic sets Robust stability of conic sets of multivariate polynomials is the main topic of the paper. Stability and semistability conditions for a cone starting at the origin are obtained along with stability conditions for a cone of the form p(s) K, where p(s) is a given polynomial and K is a cone starting at the origin. Some new results on convex directions for mulivariate polynomials are also presented.

B O O O O O 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 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

multivariate polynomial
robust stability


Information networking as an instrument of sustainable development - Connectivity, content, and (Co-) capacity building This report reviews novel initiatives for improving the content of information on sustainable development and novel initiatives for increasing access to this information with an emphasis on outreach to rural areas. Improving information content and improving the outreach of the network are the two key elements of any successful communications project. The combination of communications services and other development activities create an opportunity for co-capacity building in that the implementation of one builds capacity for more successful implementation of the other. The co-capacity building of energy and communications services is considered. Integrating connectivity, content, and capacity-building initiatives in a decentralized network for exchange of information on sustainable development can result in greater progress than can improvement of each of the parts.

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

communications network
development information
rural electrification


A modular approach to generating fuzzy rules with reduced attributes for the monitoring of complex systems The building of intelligent monitoring and diagnostic systems for complex industrial domains tends to be hindered by the knowledge-acquisition bottleneck. Creating good knowledge bases for such tasks is notoriously difficult, especially where human experts are not readily available. High dimensionality of the domain attributes presents a further obstacle for a number of rule-induction algorithms which would, otherwise, have the potential for automating knowledge acquisition. This paper attempts to tackle both problems, by proposing a highly modular framework for data-driven fuzzy ruleset induction incorporating a dimensionality-reduction step based on rough set theory. This removes redundant and information-poor attributes from the data, thereby significantly increasing the speed of the induction algorithm, which is employed to generalise historic data into fuzzy association rules. The aid of dimensionality reduction extends past the training stage of the system into its runtime. By removing information-poor attributes, the implemented system is kept simple by requiring fewer connections to physical instrumentation, while the systems response times are increased. The paper introduces the techniques jointly forming the proposed framework, and demonstrates the applicability of the approach by building a monitoring system for an urban water treatment plant. The results of this application are presented and discussed, and comparisons to alternative approaches are given.

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

systems monitoring
fuzzy rule induction
rough dimensionality reduction
knowledge-based systems


DEMD-based video coding for textured videos in an H.264/MPEG framework This paper proposes a DEMD-based textured video coding scheme for efficient representation of textured data compatible with an H.264/MPEG framework. We encode the DEMD residue image of all non-I frames (P and B frames in H.264/MPEG) instead of the original frame. All non-I frames are synthesized using correlation search and patch-based multi-level IMF synthesis from the DEMD representation of key frames (I frames, in the H.264/MPEG framework) and the DEMD residual image of the frame being synthesized. Experimental results show that the proposed scheme provides better compression results as compared to MPEG/H.264 with acceptable reconstruction quality.

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

directional empirical mode decomposition (demd)


Robust speech/non-speech detection based on LDA-derived parameter and voicing parameter for speech recognition in noisy environments Every speech recognition system contains a speech/non-speech detection stage. Detected speech sequences are only passed through the speech recognition stage later on. In a very noisy environment, the noise detection stage is generally responsible for most of the recognition errors. Indeed, many detected noisy periods can be recognized as a vocabulary word. This manuscript provides solutions to improve the performance of a speech/non-speech detection system in very noisy environment (for both stationary and short-time energetic noise), with an application to the France Tlcom system. The improvement we propose are threefold. First, noise reduction is considered in order to reduce stationary noise effects on the speech detection system. Then, in order to decrease detections of noise characterized by brief duration and high energy, two new versions of the speech/non-speech detection stage are proposed. On the one hand, a linear discriminate analysis algorithm applied to the Mel frequency cepstrum coefficients is incorporated in the speech/non-speech detection algorithm. On the other hand, the use of a voicing parameter is introduced in the speech/non-speech detection in order to reduce the probability of false noise detections.

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

speech recognition
noise reduction
voicing parameter


What lies beneath?: Knowledge infrastructures in the subseafloor biosphere and beyond We present preliminary findings from a three-year research project comprised of longitudinal qualitative case studies of data practices in four large, distributed, highly multidisciplinary scientific collaborations. This project follows a 2 \(\times \) 2 research design: two of the collaborations are big science while two are little science, two have completed data collection activities while two are ramping up data collection. This paper is centered on one of these collaborations, a project bringing together scientists to study subseafloor microbial life. This collaboration is little science, characterized by small teams, using small amounts of data, to address specific questions. Our case study employs participant observation in a laboratory, interviews (\(n=49\) to date) with scientists in the collaboration, and document analysis. We present a data workflow that is typical for many of the scientists working in the observed laboratory. In particular, we show that, although this workflow results in datasets apparently similar in form, nevertheless a large degree of heterogeneity exists across scientists in this laboratory in terms of the methods they employ to produce these datasetseven between scientists working on adjacent benches. To date, most studies of data in little science focus on heterogeneity in terms of the types of data produced: this paper adds another dimension of heterogeneity to existing knowledge about data in little science. This additional dimension makes more complex the task of management and curation of data for subsequent reuse. Furthermore, the nature of the factors that contribute to heterogeneity of methods suggest that this dimension of heterogeneity is a persistent and unavoidable feature of little science.

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 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 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 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 B I

big science
little science
knowledge infrastructures

data deluge
multidisciplinary scholarship


Simulating vesiclesubstrate adhesion using two phase field functions ? A phase field model for simulating the adhesion of a cell membrane to a substrate is constructed. The model features two phase field functions which are used to simulate the membrane and the substrate. An energy model is defined which accounts for the elastic bending energy and the contact potential energy as well as, through a penalty method, vesicle volume and surface area constraints. Numerical results are provided to verify our model and to provide visual illustrations of the interactions between a lipid vesicle and substrates having complex shapes. Examples are also provided for the adhesion process in the presence of gravitational and point pulling forces. A comparison with experimental results demonstrates the effectiveness of the two phase field approach.

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 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

elastic bending energy
phase field model

vesicle membrane
lipid bilayer
energetic variational formulation
numerical methods
three-dimensional simulation


integrated videos and maps for driving directions While onboard navigation systems are gaining in importance, maps are still the medium of choice for laying out a route to a destination and for way finding. However, even with a map, one is almost always more comfortable navigating a route the second time due to the visual memory of the route. To make the first time navigating a route feel more familiar, we present a system that integrates a map with a video automatically constructed from panoramic imagery captured at close intervals along the route. The routing information is used to create a variable speed video depicting the route. During playback of the video, the frame and field of view are dynamically modulated to highlight salient features along the route and connect them back to the map. A user interface is demonstrated to allow exploration of the combined map, video, and textual driving directions. We discuss the construction of the hybrid map and video interface. Finally, we report the results of a study that provides evidence of the effectiveness of such a system for route following.

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


Time series forecasting: Obtaining long term trends with self-organizing maps Kohonen self-organisation maps are a well know classification tool, commonly used in a wide variety of problems, but with limited applications in time series forecasting context. In this paper, we propose a forecasting method specifically designed for multi-dimensional long-term trends prediction, with a double application of the Kohonen algorithm. Practical applications of the method are also presented.

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 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


NONLINEAR MULTIPLE OBJECTIVE OPTIMIZATION - AN ALGORITHM AND SOME THEORY This paper presents an algorithm and the supporting theory for solving a class of nonlinear multiple criteria optimization problems using Zionts-Wallenius type of interaction. The Zionts-Wallenius method, as extended in this paper, can be used for solving multiple criteria problems with concave objective and (implicit) value functions and convex feasible regions. Modifications of the method to handle nonconvex feasible regions and general nonlinear objective functions are also discussed.

O 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

interactive optimization
proxy value functions
nonlinear programming
goal programming


Transmission lines fabricated with CMOS interconnect technology Transmission lines, microstrip and coplanar waveguide, have been fabricated on lossy silicon substrates embedded in CMOS Cu/SiO2 interconnect layers. The characteristic impedance, the loss and the slowing factor have been studied in detail with the geometric size of transmission lines. It is shown that microstrips and coplanar waveguides embedded in silicon oxide can be achieved with CMOS compatible interconnect technology and with low loss on lossy silicon wafers, which provide the essential passive components for designing microwave and millimetre-wave circuits on silicon wafers.

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

cmos interconnect technology
microstrip
coplanar waveguide


Detection of new in-path targets by drivers using Stop & Go Adaptive Cruise Control This paper reports on the design and evaluation of in-car displays used to support Stop & Go Adaptive Cruise Control. Stop & Go Adaptive Cruise Control is an extension of Adaptive Cruise Control, as it is able to bring the vehicle to a complete stop. Previous versions of Adaptive Cruise Control have only operated above 26kph. The greatest concern for these technologies is the appropriateness of the drivers response in any given scenario. Three different driver interfaces were proposed to support the detection of modal, spatial and temporal changes of the system: an iconic display, a flashing iconic display, and a representation of the radar. The results show that drivers correctly identified more changes detected by the system with the radar display than with the other displays, but higher levels of workload accompanied this increased detection.

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


Detection Capability of Downlink Signals in Mobile WiMAX and 3GPP LTE with an FFT-Based UWB Receiver The paper presents capability of signal detection for realizing coexistence between broadband wireless access (BWA) systems and ultra wideband (UWB) devices. The capability is experimentally evaluated for baseband signals of downlink (DL) in both mobile WiMAX and 3GPP LTE. An UWB receiver based on fast Fourier transform (FFT) compliant with MB-OFDM standard is implemented as a detector of the BWA signals. The capability is evaluated in terms of elapsed time required to achieve signal detection with probability of 99% by the implemented FFT-based UWB receiver at different conditions of the receiver. Decisions on the signal detection are made by the simplest method which is by setting a threshold which is determined by noise floor of the receiver as reference. The experiments have been conducted though baseband signals for both AWGN and multipath fading channels without any synchronization between the DL signals and UWB receiver. In AWGN environment, results show that the elapsed time depends on the duty ratio of the DL signal to be detected, however, the correlation between the required time and duty ratio is not linear since their envelopes of the DL signals are not constant. In multipath fading environments based on channel models commonly employed as mobile radio environments, the required time for the signal detection becomes as 17 times longer than that in AWGN due to its signal attenuation. For robust signal detection in multipath fading environments, it has been revealed that the number of quantization bits at ADC is crucial through the experiments.

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 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 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

ultra wideband (uwb)
detect-and-avoid (daa)


On many-valued stratified L-fuzzy convergence spaces (vol 159, pg 2503, 2008) The purpose of this note is to point out a mistake in [W Yao, On many-valued L-fuzzy convergence spaces, Fuzzy Sets and Systems 159 (2009) 2503-2519] and to give a solution (C) 2009 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

topology
(stratified) l-filter
(stratified) l-fuzzy convergence space
(enriched) l-fuzzy topological space


dynamic register file resizing and frequency scaling to improve embedded processor performance and energy-delay efficiency With CMOS scaling leading to ever increasing levels of transistor integration on a chip, designers of high-performance embedded processors have ample area available to increase processor resources in order to improve performance. However, increasing resource sizes can increase power dissipation and also reduce access time, which can limit maximum achievable operating frequency. In this paper, we explore optimizations for the processor register file ( RF ), to improve performance and reduce the energy-delay product. We show that while increasing the size of the RF can potentially increase the IPC, overall it results in an increase in program execution time. In response we propose L2MRFS -- a dynamic register file resizing scheme in tandem with frequency scaling, which exploits L2 cache misses to noticeably improve processor performance (11\% on average) and also significantly reduce the energy-delay product (7\%).

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

embedded processor
register file
performance


Smallest independent dominating sets in Kronecker products of cycles Let k?2,n=2k+1, and let m0,,mk?1 each be a multiple of n. The graph Cm0?Cmk?1 consists of isomorphic connected components, each of which is (n?1)-regular and admits of a vertex partition into n smallest independent dominating sets. Accordingly, (independent) domination number of each connected component of this graph is equal to (1/n)th of the number of vertices in it.

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 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

perfect dominating sets
codes
kronecker product
cycle


Lattice quantum mechanics: An application to Bose-Einstein condensation A lattice formulation of nonrelativistic quantum mechanics is presented, based on a formal analogy with discrete kinetic theory. The method is applied to the Gross-Pitaevski equation, a specific form of self-interacting nonlinear Schrodinger equation relevant to the study of Bose-Einstein condensation.

O B I O O 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


Bottom-Up/Top-Down Image Parsing with Attribute Grammar This paper presents a simple attribute graph grammar as a generative representation for man-made scenes such as buildings, hallways, kitchens, and living rooms and studies an effective top-down/bottom-up inference algorithm for parsing images in the process of maximizing a Bayesian posterior probability or equivalently minimizing a description length (MDL). This simple grammar has one class of primitives as its terminal nodes, i. e., the projection of planar rectangles in 3-space into the image plane, and six production rules for the spatial layout of the rectangular surfaces. All of the terminal and nonterminal nodes in the grammar are described by attributes for their geometric properties and image appearance. Each production rule is associated with some equations that constrain the attributes of a parent node and those of its children. Given an input image, the inference algorithm computes (or constructs) a parse graph, which includes a parse tree for the hierarchical decomposition and a number of spatial constraints. In the inference algorithm, the bottom-up step detects an excessive number of rectangles as weighted candidates, which are sorted in a certain order and activate top-down predictions of occluded or missing components through the grammar rules. The whole procedure is, in spirit, similar to the data-driven Markov chain Monte Carlo paradigm [ 39], [ 33], except that a greedy algorithm is adopted for simplicity. In the experiment, we show that the grammar and top-down inference can largely improve the performance of bottom-up detection.

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

bottom-up/top-down
primal sketch
generative model


A Verification and Analysis Tool Set for Embedded System Design This paper presents a verification and analysis tool set for embedded systems. Recently, the development scale of embedded systems has been increasing since they are used for mobile systems, automobile platforms, and various consumer systems with rich functionality. This has increased the amount of time and cost needed to develop them. Consequently, it is very important to develop tools to reduce development time and cost. This paper describes a tool set consisting of three tools to enhance the efficiency of embedded system design. The first tool is an integrated tool platform. The second is a remote debugging system. The third is a clock-accurate verification system based on a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) for custom embedded systems. This tool set promises to significantly reduce the time and cost needed to develop embedded systems.

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


A Survey on the p-Cycle Protection Method This paper presents a comprehensive survey for the pre-configured cycle (p-cycle) protection method which is a relatively new scheme for network survivability with many interesting properties, and has been attracting quite a lot of attention. We review different aspects of p-cycles and survey the studies on this and other related survivability schemes. This survey paper is the first attempt to present a rapid overview of this interesting subject and provide and agile reference of the broad p-cycle topic. In addition to addressing the concepts and preliminaries, this survey covers advanced topics related to p-cycles such as path protecting p-cycles, availability-aware design with p-cycles, p-cycle reconfiguration, column generation approach for p-cycle network design and p-cycles in multicast networks.

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


creating multiplatform user interfaces by annotation and adaptation This paper presents our novel framework, which creates user interfaces (UIs) for a variety of devices by annotating and reusing an existing one originally designed for large devices. It distinguishes itself from previous work by the unique combination of reusing existing UIs, intuitive graphical support and adaptation-based approach. It is extensible by supporting UI developers to build and integrate their customized transformation strategies into our framework.

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


determining confidence when integrating contributions from multiple agents Integrating contributions received from other agents is an essential activity in multi-agent systems (MASs). Not only must related contributions be integrated together, but the confidence in each integrated contribution must be determined. In this paper we look specifically at the issue of confidence determination and its effect on developing "principled," highly collaborating MASs. Confidence determination is often masked by ad hoc contribution-integration techniques, viewed as being addressed by agent trust and reputation models, or simply assumed away. We present a domain-independent analysis model that can be used to measure the sensitivity of a collaborative problem-solving system to potentially incorrect confidence-integration assumptions. In analyses performed using our model, we focus on the typical assumption of independence among contributions and the effect that unaccounted-for dependencies have on the expected error in the confidence that the answers produced by the MAS are correct. We then demonstrate how the analysis model can be used to determine confidence bounds on integrated contributions and to identify where efforts to improve contribution-dependency estimates lead to the greatest improvement in solution-confidence accuracy.

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

contribution integration
analysis models


Solvability of implicit complementarity problems In this paper, we introduce some new notions of (alpha, gamma)-exceptional family of elements (in short, (alpha, gamma)-(EFE)) and (alpha, beta, gamma)-exceptional family of elernents (in short, (alpha, beta, gamma)-(EFE)) for a pair of continuous functions involved in the implicit complementarity problem (in short, ICP). Based upon these notions and the topological degree theory, we studied the feasibility and strictly feasibility of (ICP) in R-n and an infinite-dimensional Hilbert space H, respectively. As special cases, we obtain the feasibility and strictly feasibility of complementarity problems and partly answered the second open problem (P2) proposed by Isac [G. Isac, Exceptional families of elements, feasibility and complementarity, J. Optim. Theory Appl. 104 (2000) 577-588]. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. 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 B I 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 B I I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

exceptional families of elements
topological degree
implicit complementarity problem


A lack-of-fit test for quantile regression models with high-dimensional covariates A new lack-of-fit test for quantile regression models, that is suitable even with high-dimensional covariates, is proposed. The test is based on the cumulative sum of residuals with respect to unidimensional linear projections of the covariates. To approximate the critical values of the test, a wild bootstrap mechanism convenient for quantile regression is used. An extensive simulation study was undertaken that shows the good performance of the new test, particularly when the dimension of the covariate is high. The test can also be applied and performs well under heteroscedastic regression models. The test is illustrated with real data about the economic growth of 161 countries.

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 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

lack-of-fit testing
high-dimensional covariates


Universal approximation by hierarchical fuzzy system with constraints on the fuzzy rule This paper presents a special hierarchical fuzzy system where the outputs of the previous layer are not used in the IF-parts, but used only in the THEN-parts of the fuzzy rules of the current layer. The proposed scheme can be shown to be a universal approximator to any continuous function on a compact set if complete fuzzy sets are used in the IF-parts of the fuzzy rules with singleton fuzzifier and center average defuzzifier. From the simulation of ball and beam control system, it is demonstrated that the proposed scheme approximates with good accuracy the model nonlinear controller with fewer fuzzy rules than the centralized fuzzy system and its control performance is comparable to that of the nonlinear controller. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

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

hierarchical fuzzy logic system
stone-weierstrass theorem
fuzzy control


Parallel algorithm on inversion for adjacent pentadiagonal matrices with MPI In this work, the method based on the work of Huang and McColl on analytical inversion of general tridiagonal matrices is parallelized with MPI. The proposed method is not only capable of finding inverses of full pentadiagonal matrices, but also of those with pentadiagonal envelope, such as tridiagonal matrices. The method is modified to generate an MPI algorithm. The speed-up performance of the parallelized algorithm is also analyzed on different cases.

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 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

parallel algorithm
pentadiagonal matrices


approximate quantiles and the order of the stream Recently, there has been an increased focus on modeling uncertainty by distributions. Suppose we wish to compute a function of a stream whose elements are samples drawn independently from some distribution. The distribution is unknown, but the order in which the samples are presented to us will not be completely adversarial. In this paper, we investigate the importance of the ordering of a data stream, without making any assumptions about the actual distribution of the data. Using quantiles as an example application, we show that we can design provably better algorithms, and settle several open questions on the impact of order on streams. With the recent impetus in the investigation of models for sensor networks, we believe that our approach will allow the construction of novel and significantly improved algorithms.

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 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

data streams
random order
adversarial order


Dynamic-range estimation It has been widely recognized that the dynamic-range information of an application can be exploited to reduce the datapath bitwidth of either processors or application-specific integrated circuits and, therefore, the overall circuit area, delay, and power consumption. While recent proposals of analytical dynamic-range-estimation methods have shown significant advantages over the traditional profiling-based method in terms of runtime, it is argued here that the rather simplistic treatment of input correlation and system nonlinearity may lead to significant error. In this paper, three mathematical tools, namely Karhunen-Loe've expansion, polynomial chaos expansion, and independent component analysis are introduced, which enable not only the orthogonal decomposition of input random processes, but also the propagation of random processes through both linear and nonlinear systems with difficult constructs such as multiplications, divisions, and conditionals. It is shown that when applied to interesting nonlinear applications such as adaptive filters, polynomial filters, and rational filters, this method can produce complete accurate statistics of each internal variable, thereby allowing the synthesis of bitwidth with the desired tradeoff between circuit performance and signal-to-noise ratio.

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

bitwidth correlation
dynamic range
independent component analysis (ica)
non-gaussian
polynomial chaos expansion (pce)
karhunen-loeve expansion (kle)


Feature-based interpolation of diffusion tensor fields and application to human cardiac DT-MRI Diffusion tensor interpolation is an important issue in the application of diffusion tensor magnetic resonance imaging (DT-MRI) to the human heart, all the more as the points representing the myocardium of the heart are often sparse. We propose a feature-based interpolation framework for the tensor fields from cardiac DT-MRI, by taking into account inherent relationships between tensor components. In this framework, the interpolation consists in representing a diffusion tensor in terms of two tensor features, eigenvalues and orientation, interpolating the Euler angles or the quaternion relative to tensor orientation and the logarithmically transformed eigenvalues, and reconstructing the tensor to be interpolated from the interpolated eigenvalues and tensor orientations. The results obtained with the aid of both synthetic and real cardiac DT-MRI data demonstrate that the feature-based schemes based on Euler angles or quaternions not only maintain the advantages of Log-Euclidean and Riemannian interpolation as for preserving the tensors symmetric positive-definiteness and the monotonic determinant variation, but also preserve, at the same time, the monotonicity of fractional anisotropy (FA) and mean diffusivity (MD) values, which is not the case with Euclidean, Cholesky and Log-Euclidean methods. As a result, both interpolation schemes remove the phenomenon of FA collapse, and consequently avoid introducing artificial fiber crossing, with the difference that the quaternion is independent of coordinate system while Euler angles have the property of being more suitable for sophisticated interpolations.

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


A Survey On MAC Protocols for Wireless Adhoc Networks with Beamforming Antennas The beamforming antenna technology is a promising solution to many challenges facing wireless ad hoc networks. Beamforming antennas have the ability to increase the spatial reuse, improve the transmission reliability, extend the transmission range and/or save the power consumption. If they are effectively used, they can significantly improve the network capacity, lifetime, connectivity and security. However, traditional Medium Access Control (MAC) protocols fail to exploit the potential benefits due to the unique characteristics of wireless ad hoc networks with beamforming antennas. To that end, numerous MAC protocols have been designed over the years to harness the offered potential. In this paper, we survey the literature on MAC protocols proposed for wireless ad hoc networks with beamforming antennas during the last decade. We discuss the main beamforming-related challenges facing the medium access control in ad hoc networks. We present taxonomy of the MAC protocols proposed in the literature based on their mode of operation and the mechanisms used to address the challenges. In addition, we provide a qualitative comparison of the protocols highlighting their features, benefits and requirements. Finally, we provide directions for possible future work.

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

medium access control
beamforming antennas
wireless ad hoc networks


Two-step fuzzy logic-based method for impulse noise detection in colour images We present a novel fuzzy noise detector based on a fuzzy metric specifically designed to detect impulses. The fuzzy detector is inspired on the recent rank-ordered differences (ROD) statistic. We propose a noise detection process performed in two steps followed by noise filtering using the vector median filter. Experimental results show that the method is among the best-performing methods for impulse noise reduction and computational analysis indicates that the method is pretty efficient.

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


Friendly information retrieval through adaptive restructuring of information space Although a technique of relevance feedback is common in the field of information retrieval(IR), the feedback: is usually done by means of query refinement; restructuring of the information space has not been attempted yet. The restructuring not only allows useful applications such as clustering but also is indispensable for IR if a modeling function employs correlation of terms. In this paper we present a new method of relevance feedback through the restructuring of the information space. Our method adapts document space to the user's mental model by manipulating a dictionary vector. Therefore, user's viewpoint is preserved after a series of retrieval processes and reused for retrieval performed later. We show its effectiveness through the retrieval experiments on FAQ(Frequently Asked Questions) documents.

O B I 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 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

information retrieval
relevance feedback
dictionary vector

vector space model
frequently asked questions


topology optimization of compliant mechanism using multi-objective particle swarm optimization In this paper, a multi-objective particle swarm optimization approach (popularly known as MOPSO) for topology optimization of compliant mechanism is proposed. Multi-objective strategy has a great advantage, over other single objective approaches, in finding a well distributed set of non-dominated solutions in a single run which makes post-processing and decision making convenient. The stochastic multi-objective strategy also overcomes the issue of 'initialization of design space' upon which the final solutions may depend. Here, MOPSO is coupled with Material-Mask overlay strategy using honeycomb discretization to obtain optimal single-material compliant topologies that are free from the pathologies of .checker board. and 'point flexure' . An attempt to study the performance of proposed MOPSO is made by employing different techniques, both existing and newly proposed, of selecting the 'personal best' and 'global best' . In particular, a newer idea of allowing each particle to memorize all non-dominated personal best particles which it has encountered is introduced, i.e. if updated personal best position be indifferent to the old one, we keep both in the personal archive. This newly proposed strategy of particle memory seems to outperform the existing ones significantly.

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


An optimization framework for monitoring multi-channel multi-radio wireless mesh networks ? This paper studies an optimal monitoring problem for behavior-based detection in multi-channel multi-radio wireless mesh networks. In behavior-based detection, nodes overhear communications in their neighborhood to determine if the behaviors of their neighbors are legitimate. The objective of this work is to maximize the number of nodes being monitored by judiciously choosing a set of monitoring nodes and also channels for the chosen monitoring nodes. This problem is NP-hard, growing exponentially with the number of monitoring nodes. We develop three approximation algorithms, each of which achieves at least a constant factor of the optimum. Furthermore, one of our algorithms achieves the best possible approximation ratio among all polynomial-time algorithms, unless P=NP. We conduct simulations in random networks and scale-free networks to evaluate the coverage and the execution time of the three algorithms.

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

multi-channel multi-radio wireless networks


Volume and surface-area measurements using tomography, with an example from the Brenham pallasite meteorite Increased computer speed has helped to proliferate tomography throughout the geosciences. Although best known from the medical CATscan, tomography is also a powerful tool for geological problems. Whereas qualitative tomography is widely used, quantitative data from tomograms are not so commonly available. Presented here are two programs, Electron Tomography Segmentation, surface Area, and Volume (ETSAV) and Electron Tomography CUTter (ETCut), that were written to obtain quantitative volume and surface-area data from tomograms. Based on a specified threshold value, ETSAV distinguishes objects within a tomogram and then returns volume and surface-area data for each object. If object separation is unsatisfactory using a single threshold, ETCut is called to digitally separate objects that appear connected in the tomogram, allowing ETSAV to perform its functions. By knowing the nature of the object of interest, error can be corrected to, on average, less than 5% for a single object; combined volumes of many particles of different sizes may result in lesser errors. A section of the Brenham pallasite meteorite was examined using the programs. Olivine comprises 67.2% of the volume (50.4%wt%), followed by FeNi metal at 23.1% (39.3%wt%), troilite at 4.4% (4.8%wt%), and schreibersite at 3.4% (5.5%wt%). In all, 56.1% and 44.7% of the troilite and schreibersite surface areas, respectively, border olivine, suggesting that they wet olivine. Since the programs can be applied to any tomogram, from any field, there are many potential applications.

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

tomography
brenham pallasite
segmentation

quantitative tomography
tomogram volume
tomogram surface area
fractal particles


Duality gaps in nonconvex stochastic optimization We consider multistage stochastic optimization models containing nonconvex constraints, e.g., due to logical or integrality requirements. We study three variants of Lagrangian relaxations and of the corresponding decomposition schemes, namely, scenario, nodal and geographical decomposition. Based on convex equivalents for the Lagrangian duals, we compare the duality gaps for these decomposition schemes. The first main result states that scenario decomposition provides a smaller or equal duality gap than nodal decomposition. The second group of results concerns large stochastic optimization models with loosely coupled components. The results provide conditions implying relations between the duality gaps of geographical decomposition and the duality gaps for scenario and nodal decomposition, respectively.

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

stochastic programming
nonconvex optimization
lagrangian relaxation
integer programming


SEGRA: A very fast general area router for multichip modules We present a very fast area router for multichip module (MCM) design. Given a set of nets and a routing area, the router repeatedly selects two layers from top to bottom and routes as many nets as possible until all the nets are routed. The router uses a line sweep technique and a simple net selection algorithm. By employing efficient data structures and a novel priority scheme, the routing can be completed in time almost proportional to the size of the routing area. When applied to the benchmark circuits, the proposed router generated comparable routing results 23 times faster on the average than the previously reported fastest and effective router, When compared with the previously reported best routing result achiever, our router produced slightly worse results but ran 102 times faster on the average. Its effectiveness and ultra fast computation time make this router ideally suited for the next generation of large scale MCM designs.

O O O O O 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 B 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 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


Wear detection by means of wavelet-based acoustic emission analysis Real-time investigation of surface damage using acoustic emission. Automated classification of three wear phases. Establishing a correlation between state-of-wear and AE features. Complex AE-feature generation based on Wavelet. Identification of specific frequencies related to the different wear states.

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

sliding wear
signal-based wear detection
automated wear classification
continuous wavelet transform


Electronic structure calculations of oxygen-doped diamond using DFT technique DFT calculations of oxygen doping in diamond supercell using VASP codes. Electron charge distributions using PDOS, spin PDOS in oxygen-doped diamond. Band structure, O C4 bond lengths, role of electronegativity in oxygen-doped diamond. O-donor creates impurity states in band gap region and enhances conductivity. DFT calculations verify our experimental results for oxygen-doped diamond.

O O O 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 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

band structure
oxygen doping
dft calculations


A hybrid approach for fuzzy multi-attribute decision making in machine tool selection with consideration of the interactions of attributes We construct a hierarchical model for fuzzy multi-attribute decision making. Expert judgments are handled using fuzzy numbers in the fuzzy ANP and grey numbers in COPRAS-G. We present an integrated hierarchy of solutions based on the fuzzy ANP and COPRAS-G to evaluate the machine tools. We compare the results of fuzzy ANP and COPRAS-G with other methods (TOPSIS-G, SAW-G, GRA). We conduct a case study in machine tool selection at the University Lab of Manufacturing.

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


shared-memory performance profiling This paper describes a new approach to finding performance bottlenecks in shared-memory parallel programs and its embodiment in the Paradyn Parallel Performance Tools running with the Blizzard fine-grain distributed shared memory system. This approach exploits the underlying system's cache coherence protocol to detect data sharing patterns that indicate potential performance bottlenecks and presents performance measurements in a data-centric manner. As a demonstration, Parodyn helped us improve the performance of a new shared-memory application program by a factor of four.

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

cache coherence
data sharing
shared memory
systems
factor
parallel
performance
paper
tools

embodied
applications
exploit
performance measurement
parallel programming
data
demonstrate
profiles
distributed shared memory
pattern


partial method compilation using dynamic profile information The traditional tradeoff when performing dynamic compilation is that of fast compilation time versus fast code performance. Most dynamic compilation systems for Java perform selective compilation and/or optimization at a method granularity. This is the not the optimal granularity level. However, compiling at a sub-method granularity is thought to be too complicated to be practical. This paper describes a straightforward technique for performing compilation and optimizations at a finer, sub-method granularity. We utilize dynamic profile data to determine intra-method code regions that are rarely or never executed, and compile and optimize the code without those regions. If a branch that was predicted to be rare is actually taken at run time, we fall back to the interpreter or dynamically compile another version of the code. By avoiding compiling and optimizing code that is rarely executed, we are able to decrease compile time significantly, with little to no degradation in performance. Futhermore, ignoring rarely-executed code can open up more optimization opportunities on the common paths. We present two optimizations---partial dead code elimination and rare-path-sensitive pointer and escape analysis---that take advantage of rare path information. Using these optimizations, our technique is able to improve performance beyond the compile time improvements

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

method systems dynamic code performance data compilation version paper practical

select
sensitive
optimality
region
analysis
interpretation
dynamic compilation
timing
pointers
profiles
informal


VDM semantics of programming languages: combinators and monads The Vienna Development Method (VDM) was developed in the early 1970s as a variant of denotational semantics. VDM descriptions of programming languages differ from the original Scott-Strachey style by making extensive use of combinators which have a fixed operational interpretation. After recalling the main features of denotational semantics and the Scott-Strachey style, we examine the combinators of the VDM specification language, and relate them to monads, which were introduced more than 15 years later. We also suggest that use of further monadic combinators in VDM could be beneficial. Finally, we provide an overview of published VDM semantic descriptions of major programming languages.

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

denotational semantics
vdm
combinators
monads


Coordinating mobile agents in interaction spaces We present a kernel coordination language for mobile agent systems that considers as first-class citizens both the agents and the channels they use to interact with each other. Channels implement distributed, asynchronous communications with FIFO ordering and multicast routing. Features related to mobility include agent migration as well as remote cloning. Most importantly, a virtual form of channel mobility inspired by the pi-calculus is also supported. This expressive feature allows mobile agents to adapt dynamically to their changing environment. The language semantics, presented formally, is based on a geometrical model named the Interaction Spaces. This provides an intuitive interpretation of the agent features and capabilities in terms of combined spatial projections and transformations. Through spatial composition, we show that standard labeled transition systems and bisimulation-based semantics may be defined above the geometry, enabling reasoning and formal verification. Finally, we describe prototype implementations of the proposed model and language. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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


An iterative multimodal framework for the transcription of handwritten historical documents The transcription of historical documents is one of the most interesting tasks in which Handwritten Text Recognition can be applied, due to its interest in humanities research. One alternative for transcribing the ancient manuscripts is the use of speech dictation by using Automatic Speech Recognition techniques. In the two alternatives similar models (Hidden Markov Models and n-grams) and decoding processes (Viterbi decoding) are employed, which allows a possible combination of the two modalities with little difficulties. In this work, we explore the possibility of using recognition results of one modality to restrict the decoding process of the other modality, and apply this process iteratively. Results of these multimodal iterative alternatives are significantly better than the baseline uni-modal systems and better than the non-iterative alternatives.

O 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 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

handwritten text recognition
speech dictation

ancient text transcription
multimodal systems
iterative systems
language modelling


Development of compatible wet-clean stripper for integration of CoWP metal cap in Cu/low-k interconnects Implementation of CoWP metal caps into Cu/low-k integration schemes requires a wet stripper that not only gives efficient cleaning but also has good compatibility to CoWP and low-k dielectrics. This paper describes a novel non-fluoride CoWP compatible stripper, developed based on a systematic study of the effect of stripper components, i.e. solvent, corrosion inhibitor, and stripper pH. Electrochemical methods were used to characterize galvanic corrosion of the CoWP/Cu couple and to estimate CoWP etch rate. Our studies showed that a traditional fluoride stripper caused severe damage to CoWP capping layer. The new stripper achieved a good balance between cleaning efficiency and compatibility to CoWP and low-k dielectrics, and demonstrated significant advantages in electrical properties over the traditional fluoride stripper.

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

cu/low-k integration
wet-clean stripper
cowp compatibility
cowp/cu galvanic corrosion
porous low-k compatibility


dynamic web page authoring by example using ontology-based domain knowledge Authoring dynamic web pages is an inherently difficult task. We present DESK, an interactive authoring tool that allows the customization of dynamic page generation procedures with no a-priori tool-specific skill requirements from authors. Our approach consists of combining Programming By Example (PBE) techniques with an ontology-based representation of knowledge displayed in web pages. DESK acts as a client-side complement of a dynamic web page generation system, PEGASUS, which generates HTML pages from a formally structured domain model and an abstract presentation model. Authorized users can modify the internal presentation model by editing the generated HTML pages with DESK in a WYSIWYG environment. DESK keeps track of all users actions and exploits the explicitly represented domain semantics to enhance the power of PBE techniques

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

model-based paradigm
knowledge-based ui design
ontology


THE RISE FALL CONNECTION MODEL OF INTONATION This paper describes a new model of intonation for English. The paper proposes that intonation can be described using a sequence of rise, fall and connection elements. Pitch accents and boundary rises are described using rise and fall elements, and connection elements are used to describe everything else. Equations can be used to synthesize fundamental frequency (F0) contours from these elements. An automatic labelling system is described which can derive a rise/fall/connection description from any utterance without using prior knowledge or top-down processing. Synthesis and analysis experiments are described using utterances from six speakers of various English accents. An analysis/resynthesis experiment is described which shows that the contours produced by the model are similar to within 3.6 to 7.3 Hz of the originals. An assessment of the automatic labeller shows 72% to 92% agreement between automatic and hand labels. The paper concludes with a comparison between this model and others, and a discussion of the practical applications of the model.

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


Out-of-core Data Management for Path Tracing on Hybrid Resources We present a software system that enables path-traced rendering of complex scenes. The system consists of two primary components: an application layer that implements the basic rendering algorithm, and an out-of-core scheduling and data-management layer designed to assist the application layer in exploiting hybrid computational resources (e.g., CPUs and GPUs) simultaneously. We describe the basic system architecture, discuss design decisions of the system's data-management layer, and outline an efficient implementation of a path tracer application, where GPUs perform functions such as ray tracing, shadow tracing, importance-driven light sampling, and surface shading. The use of GPUs speeds up the runtime of these components by factors ranging from two to twenty, resulting in a substantial overall increase in rendering speed. The path tracer scales well with respect to CPUs, GPUs and memory per node as well as scaling with the number of nodes. The result is a system that can render large complex scenes with strong performance and scalability.

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

computer graphics [i.3.7]: three-dimensional graphics and realism


What creates innovation in a globalized knowledge economy? A cybernetic point of view Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to uncover processes and the corresponding social mechanisms promoting innovation in organisations. Design/methodology/approach - It is the integration of organisational learning, the internal knowledge base of the company and its external knowledge base, viewed in relation to innovations in organisations, which are the main elements discussed in this paper. In the present paper, it is the systemic angle of incidence which will be used. Findings - An increased focus on information, knowledge and organisational learning, has provided a deeper understanding of factors and processes conducive to innovation and eventually to sustainable competitive advantages. However, little attention has been given to social mechanisms triggering innovations, which are uncovered in this paper. Practical implications - A conceptual model, which represents a synthesis of the social mechanisms which influence those processes affecting innovation in social systems is presented. Originality/value - The idea is that when several knowledge domains (practical, theoretical, internal and external) are connected for one specific purpose, the inherent variety may release what is creatively new, igniting innovation in social systems.

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 B 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 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 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 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 B O O O

innovation
organisational learning
social mechanisms

systemic thinking
cybernetics
tacit knowledge
knowledge management


Income distribution dynamics and cross-region convergence in Europe This paper presents a continuous version of the model of distribution dynamics to analyse the transition dynamics and implied long-run behaviour of the EU-27 NUTS-2 regions over the period 19952003. It departs from previous research in two respects: first, by introducing kernel estimation and three-dimensional stacked conditional density plots as well as highest density regions plots for the visualisation of the transition function, based on Hyndman etal. (J Comput Graph Stat 5(4):315336, 1996), and second, by combining Getis spatial filtering view with kernel estimation to explicitly account for the spatial dimension of the growth process. The results of the analysis indicate a very slow catching-up of the poorest regions with the richer ones, a process of shifting away of a small group of very rich regions, and highlight the importance of geography in understanding regional income distribution dynamics.

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

regional income
distribution dynamics
spatial filtering


Ensuring system performance for cluster and single server systems A new approach that is useful in identifying and eliminating performance degradation occurring in aging software is proposed. A customer-affecting metric is used to initiate the restoration of such a system to full capacity. A case study is described in which, by simulating an industrial software system, we are able to show that by monitoring a customer-affecting metric and frequently comparing its degradation to the performance objective, we can ensure system stability at a very low cost.

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

software rejuvenation
software performance
software monitoring
customer-affecting metric


Ground Target Tracking Control System for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles The work here presented contributes to the development of ground target tracking control systems for fixed wing unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The control laws are derived at the kinematic level, relying on a commercial inner loop controller onboard that accepts commands in indicated air speed and bank, and appropriately sets the control surface deflections and thrust in order to follow those references in the presence of unknown wind. Position and velocity of the target on the ground is assumed to be known. The algorithm proposed derives from a path following control law that enables the UAV to converge to a circumference centered at the target and moving with it, thus keeping the UAV in the vicinity of the target even if the target moves at a velocity lower than the UAV stall speed. If the target speed is close to the UAV speed, the control law behaves similar to a controller that tracks a particular point on the circumference centered at the target position. Real flight tests results show the good performance of the control scheme presented.

O B I 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


Identifying design parameters for fuzzy control of staged ventilation control systems Conventional staged ventilation systems are commonly used in agriculture to maintain interior environments near desired conditions for livestock housing and greenhouses. This paper identifies design parameters for fuzzy-based control of these staged ventilation systems. A simple non-steady state heat balance is used in conjunction with a broiler house simulation model, and coupled with a model for the control system, to simulate control system performance. Difficulties with implementation of conventional staged ventilation control, and the proposed fuzzy inference technique, arise because of the discontinuous nature of these highly non-linear systems. Comparisons between the new fuzzy stage controller and conventional staged control are made. Effects of varying the identified design parameters for the fuzzy stage controller, including different degrees of control precision and energy use, rule base complexity, and the rate of change of house temperature are made. Results indicate that existing staged ventilation control systems which utilize microprocessors could realize significantly enhanced control flexibility by a simple software modification to incorporate the fuzzy staged controller method.

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

agricultural building
fuzzy logic
thermal environment
heat flow


Strategy for constructing robust multivariate calibration models In multivariate calibrations usually a minimal residual error in the model's predictions is aimed at, while generally less attention is paid to the robustness of the model with respect to changes in instrumentation, laboratory conditions, or sample composition. In this paper, we propose a strategy for selecting a multivariate calibration model which possesses a small pre diction error and, simultaneously, is less sensitive to the above-mentioned variations. The strategy is applied to calibration models used to predict the density of poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) yarns from the Raman spectra. The strategy implies that spectra of calibration samples are measured under circumstances under which the application will be implemented, and spectra of a smaller set under different conditions (variations in ambient temperature, laser power, and laser frequency) according to an experimental design. The prediction results of the calibration model are used in a ruggedness test in order to test the sensitivity. In this study various calibration models using different spectral preprocessing techniques are tested. These ruggedness results together with the prediction error are used to select a good model. Moreover, it is possible in this way to provide the boundaries for the experimental conditions, where the model is valid. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science 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 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 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

multivariate calibration model
prediction error


On Feedback Vertex Set: New Measure and New Structures We present a new parameterized algorithm for the feedback vertex set problem (fvs) on undirected graphs. We approach the problem by considering a variation of it, the disjoint feedback vertex set problem (disjoint-fvs), which finds a feedback vertex set of size \(k\) that has no overlap with a given feedback vertex set \(F\) of the graph \(G\). We develop an improved kernelization algorithm for disjoint-fvs and show that disjoint-fvs can be solved in polynomial time when all vertices in \(G{\setminus }F\) have degrees upper bounded by three. We then propose a new branch-and-search process on disjoint-fvs, and introduce a new branch-and-search measure. The process effectively reduces a given graph to a graph on which disjoint-fvs becomes polynomial-time solvable, and the new measure more accurately evaluates the efficiency of the process. These algorithmic and combinatorial studies enable us to develop an \(O^*(3.83^k)\)-time parameterized algorithm for the general fvs problem, improving all previous algorithms for the problem.

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

parameterized computation
kernlization
measure and bound
cubic graphs
cographic matroid
matroid intersection problem


frequency and yield optimization using power gates in power-constrained designs Manufactured dies exhibit a large spread of maximum frequency and leakage power due to process variations, which have been increasing with technology scaling. Reducing the spread is very important for maximizing the frequency and the yield of power-constrained designs, because otherwise many dies that do not satisfy frequency or power constraints would be discarded. In this paper, we propose two optimization methods to improve the maximum operating frequency and the yield using power gates that already exist in many power-constrained designs. In the first method, we consider the designs of multiple cores, where each of them can be independently power-gated. When each core shows different frequencies due to within-die variations, the strength of a power gate in each core is adjusted to make their maximum operating frequencies even. This allows faster cores to consume less active leakage power, reducing the total power consumption well below a power constraint in a globally-clocked design. We subsequently increase global supply voltage for higher overall frequency until the power constraint is satisfied. In our experiments assuming multicore processors with 2--16 cores, the maximum operating frequency was improved by 4-23\%. In the second method, we take leaky-but-fast dies (which otherwise would be discarded) and adjust the strength of the power gates such that they can operate in an acceptable power and frequency region. The problem is extended to designs employing a frequency binning strategy, where we have an additional objective of maximizing the number of dies for higher frequency bins. In our experiments with ISCAS benchmark circuits, most discarded fast-but leaky dies were recovered using the second method.

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


A Catalog of Aspect Refactorings for Spring/AOP The importance of enterprise applications in current organizations makes it necessary to facilitate their maintenance and evolution along their life. These kind of systems are very complex and they have several requirements that orthogonally crosscut the system structure (called crosscutting concerns). Since many of the enterprise systems are developed with the Spring framework, can be taken advantage of the benefit provided by the aspect-oriented module of Spring in order to encapsulate the crosscutting concerns into aspects. In this way, the maintenance and evolution of the enterprise systems will be improved. However, most of the aspect refactorings presented in the literature are not directly applicable to Spring systems. Along this line, in this work we present an adaptation of a catalog of aspect refactorings, initially presented for AspectJ, to be used with Spring/AOP. Also, we conduct a case study in which two enterprise applications developed with the Spring framework are refactored in order to encapsulate their crosscutting concerns into aspects.

separation of concerns
refactoring
aspect-oriented programming


CAN ONLINE WAIT BE MANAGED? THE EFFECTS OF FILLER INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION MODES ON PERCEIVED WAITING TIME ONLINE Long waits online undermine users' evaluations of Web sites and their providers, triggering abandonment behaviors. Yet e-business researchers and practitioners have not perfected mechanisms to respond to online wait issues. A filler interface that runs during the wait for search results may influence online users perceived waiting time (PWT); however, no scientific investigation has attempted to design effective filler interfaces for managing online waits. By adopting resource allocation theory, cognitive absorption theory, and human computer interaction (HCI) theories (competition for attention, visual search, and motion effect), we design diverse filler interlaces and investigate their effects on antecedents of PWT. The proposed research model considers cognitive absorption factors such as temporal dissociation, focused immersion, and heightened enjoyment as antecedents of PWT, which in turn triggers three outcomes: affective appraisals, cognitive appraisals, and Web site use intention. A multistage, multimethod approach is used to test the research hypotheses. In the first stage, we compare a filler interface condition with a no-filler interface condition, and find the superiority of a filler interface with respect to inducing focused immersion and temporal dissociation. In the second stage, we conduct two controlled experiments to examine whether filler interfaces with various designs (varying the presence and relevance of image. text, and image motion) distinctly influence antecedents of PWT and confirm their distinctive effects on focused immersion, temporal dissociation, and heightened enjoyment. In addition, by conducting a structural equation modeling analysis, we find that our research model explains 51 percent, 51 percent, 44 percent, and 45 percent of the variance in PWT, affective appraisals, cognitive appraisals, and Web site use intention respectively. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are provided.

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

filler interface
perceived waiting time
cognitive absorption
motion effect
competition for attention
visual search
resource allocation


Mechatronic System for Mechanical Weed Control of the Intra-row Area in Row Crops The dissertation discusses the problem of mechanical weed control within the intra-row area in row crops. A novel concept featuring an electrically driven weeding tool similar to that applied in rotational crop thinning systems is proposed. The special characteristics of the system include the ability to tune rotational speed of the hoeing tool according to forward speed of the carrier, estimated in-row distance between adjacent plants and observed angular position of the arms. A laboratory prototype including an interim solution for detection of the single plants was developed and tested.

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

mechanical intra-row weed control
mechatronic weeding system
virtual prototype
simulation
kinematical analysis


Analysis of e-business models in real estate We use Canvas Application Framework to analyze e-business models of Realestate.yahoo.com, Yahoo.com, Redfin.com, Realtor.com, Trulia.com, Zillow.com, and Craigslist.com. We investigate the similarities and differences among e-business models and how e-business model differentiation affects company success. We looked at which business model components, such as distribution channels, business partnerships, attracting customers, revenue streams, etc., are important. We further investigate whether the web-advertising, brokerage, virtual value-chain, or the diversified internet business model is used by each company, and which ones are more successful. We discover similarities and differences among e-business models. Differences include the use of revenue streams for generating revenue, the extent of partnerships, and the role they play in a companys success.

B 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

canvas framework
business models
e-business


Gappy data: To Krig or not to Krig? Data recovery and reconstruction methods for unsteady flow fields with spatio-temporal missing data are studied based on proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) and on Kriging interpolation. It is found that for sufficient temporal resolution, POD-based methods outperform Kriging interpolation. However, for insufficient temporal resolution, large spatial gappiness or for flow fields with black zones, Kriging interpolation is more effective. The comparison is performed based on randomly generated laminar and turbulent flow fields obtained from simulations of uniform flow past a circular cylinder.

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 I I O O O B 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 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

kriging
proper orthogonal decomposition
unsteady flow


trace-driven hw/sw cosimulation using virtual synchronization technique Poor performance of HW/SW cosimulation is mainly caused by synchronization requirement between component simulators. Virtual synchronization technique was proposed to remove the need of synchronization in cycle accurate cosimulation. But the previous execution-driven simulation based on virtual synchronization has limitations in the application area. In this paper, we propose a novel trace-driven HW/SW cosimulation using virtual synchronization technique. Through OS modeling and channel modeling, the proposed cosimulation technique could be applied more widely while improving the simulation performance further. Experiments with a DIVX player example prove the viability of the proposed technique.

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 O O O B I 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


A new MLPG method for elastostatic problems This paper introduces a novel meshless local PetrovGalerkin (MLPG) method by presenting a new test function as a schema to solve the elasto-static problems. It is seen that the four ordinary MLPG methods can also be approached using the present test function. Both the moving least square (MLS) and the direct method have been applied to the method to estimate the shape function and to impose the essential boundary conditions. The results of three studied elasto-static cases; two dimensional cantilever beam, first mode fracture of a center-cracked strip and edge-cracked functionally graded strip show that by using less number of nodes, the present work gives sufficiently more accurate results. Meanwhile the method can also unify various kinds of MPLGs and one may conclude that the model is a good replacement for other common approaches.

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

the test function
functionally graded materials


Passive testing and application to the GSM-MAP protocol Passive testing is the process of collecting traces of messages exchanged between an operating implementation and its environment, in order to verify that these traces actually belong to the language accepted by the provided finite state machine specification. In this paper, we present an extension of the existing algorithms to consider an extended finite state machine as the specification. An algorithm is also introduced to take into account the number of transitions covered. These techniques are illustrated by the application to a real protocol, the GSM (global system for mobile communication)-MAP (mobile application part).

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

active testing
gsm-map protocol
conformance testing