On dynamics of flexible branched shell structures undergoing large overall motion using finite elements The general, statically and kinematically exact, six-field theory of branched shell structures, extended to nonlinear problems of shell dynamics involving also large overall motion, is discussed. The generalized Newmark algorithm on the proper orthogonal group SO(3) with Newton iterations is proposed. Numerical simulations of the behavior of an elastically twisted T-shaped shell structure in forced and free rotations with large overall motion are presented.

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


exploring schema repositories with schemr Schemr is a schema search engine, and provides users the ability to search for and visualize schemas stored in a metadata repository. Users may search by keywords and by example -- using schema fragments as query terms. Schemr uses a novel search algorithm, based on a combination of text search and schema matching techniques, as well as a structurally-aware scoring metric. Schemr presents search results in a GUI that allows users to explore which elements match and how well they do. The GUI supports interactions, including panning, zooming, layout and drilling-in. We demonstrate schema search and visualization, introduce Schemr as a new component of the information integration toolbox, and discuss its benefits in several applications.

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


Adaptive Call Admission Control Scheme for Heterogeneous Overlay Networks Any future heterogeneous overlay network system must be able to support ubiquitous access across multiple wireless networks. To coordinate these diverse network environments, one challenging task is a call admission decision among different types of network. In this paper, we propose a new call admission control scheme to provide quality of service (QoS) while ensuring system efficiency. Based on the interplay between network structure and dynamics, we estimate the network's QoS level and adjust the service price adaptively with the aim of maximizing the network performance. A simulation shows that the proposed scheme can approximate an optimized solution while ensuring a well-balanced network performance in widely different network environments.

O B I I 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 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

call admission control
heterogeneous overlay networks

price control
quality of service (qos)
vickrey-clarke-groves (vcg) mechanism


A nanoanalytical investigation of the Ga2O3/GaGdO dielectric gate stack for InGaAs based MOSFET devices In this paper, a subnanometer characterization of the Ga2O3/GdGaO dielectric gate stack grown on top of InGaAs lattice matched to n+ InP substrate is presented. The paper shows the analysis of two samples grown using different substrate temperature. This clearly affects the electrical characteristics as well as the photoluminescence properties. The paper also describes how the growth conditions of oxide stack affect the elemental distribution across the interface region.

O O O 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 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

tem
eels
chemical analysis
electrical properties
dielectric stack
oxide layer


Towards expressive ontology-based approaches to manufacturing knowledge representation and sharing The present capability that ontological approaches offer to formally represent and share manufacturing knowledge is dependent on the choice of ontological formalism. Currently, there exists a spectrum of these formalisms, which is being subjectively exploited across multiple domains in design and manufacture. Hence, there is an important prerequisite to achieve an understanding of which family of formalism strictly enables the expressive capture of semantics to progress towards meaningful information and viable knowledge sharing. This article analyses the relative strengths and weaknesses in employing a 'lightweight' ontology versus a 'heavyweight' version of the ontology to represent and share knowledge between multiple domains in injection moulding design and manufacture. A pertinent direction, from an ontology perspective, is then exposed as a prescription for the improved capture and dissemination of formal semantics, to support multi-domain knowledge sharing.

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

design and manufacture
lightweight ontology
semantics
knowledge sharing
injection moulding


A new shooting algorithm for the search of periodic orbits The periodic orbit theory gives the basic framework to study a quantum and classical correspondence. In this paper, we firstly report that we have found the existence of a certain surface, which we call the devils staircase surface. Secondly, taking the advantage of some intriguing properties of this surface, we propose a new method to exhaustively search for periodic orbits in the anisotropic Kepler problem. Our method fully takes into account of an intriguing property of the initial value problem of the anisotropic Kepler problem, and it reduces the two-dimensional search into the one-dimensional search. Using this method, all of the periodic orbits up to the length \(2N=20\) (altogether 19284 distinct periodic orbits) have been successfully obtained, which exceeds the world record of 76 periodic orbits up to \(2N=10\).

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 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 B I I 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

anisotropic kepler problem
devils staircase
periodic orbit theory


Evolutionary optimization for disaster relief operations: A survey We provide an overview of evolutionary algorithms for disaster relief operations. We show major strengths and shortcomings of the state-of-the-arts. We discuss potential directions for future research.

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

emergency operational problems
evolutionary algorithms (eas)


Reproducing polynomial (singularity) particle methods and adaptive meshless methods for two-dimensional elliptic boundary value problems Oh et al. [H.-S. Oh, J.G. Kim, J.W. Jeong, The closed form reproducing polynomial particle shape functions for meshfree particle methods, Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Engrg. 196 (2007) 34353461] introduced the reproducing polynomial particle (RPP) shape functions that are piecewise polynomial and satisfy the Kronecker delta property. In this paper, we introduce reproducing polynomial particle methods (RPPM) that is the Galerkin approximation method associated with the use of the RPP approximation space. Planting particles in the computation domain in a patchwise uniform manner, we also introduce patchwise RPPM. Furthermore, constructing partition of unity functions with flat-top adaptively, we introduce adaptive patchwise RPPM and compare it with reproducing singularity particle methods (RSPM) that is the Galerkin approximation method associated with the use of reproducing singularity particle (RSP) shape functions.

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

reproducing polynomial particle (rpp) shape functions

reproducing singularity particle (rsp) shape functions

partition of unity function with flat-top


Support vector machine-based optimized decision threshold adjustment strategy for classifying imbalanced data We analyze the reason why SVM can be damaged by class imbalance in theory. We propose SVM-OTHR algorithm to find the optimal moving distance of hyperplane. We integrate SVM-OTHR into Bagging ensemble framework to promote its robustness. The time complexity of SVM-OTHR is merely a little higher than standard SVM. Two proposed algorithms often outperform some other bias correction algorithms.

O O O O B I 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

class imbalance
decision threshold adjustment

support vector machine
optimization search
ensemble learning


Unraveling the contribution of ectoenzymes to myeloma life and survival in the bone marrow niche The bone marrow provides a protected environment for generating a vast array of cell types. Bones are thus a dynamic source of structural components and soluble factors used either locally or at a distance from their site of production. We discuss the role of ectoenzymes in the bone niche where human myeloma grows. Selected ectoenzymes have been tested for their ability to promote production of substrates involved in signaling, synthesis of growth factors and hormones, and modulation of the immune response. Because of the difficulty of simultaneously tracking all these activities, we narrow our focus to events potentially influencing synthesis of adenosine (ADO), an important regulator of multiple biological functions, including local immunological tolerance. Our working hypothesis, to be discussed and partially tested herein, is that CD38, and likely BST1/CD157both NAD+-consuming enzymes, are active in the myeloma niche and lead a discontinuous chain of ectoenzymes whose final products are exploited by the neoplastic plasma cell as part of its local survival strategy. Coadjuvant ectoenzymes include PC-1/CD203a, CD39, and CD73, which control the production of ADO. Results discussed here and from ongoing experiments indicate that the myeloma niche hosts the canonical, as well as alternative, pathways of ADO generation. Other possibilities are presented and discussed.

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 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 O O O O O O 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 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 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

mesenchymal stem cells
msc
osteoblasts
osteoclasts


VoxeLine: a software program for 3D real-time visualization of biomedical images The architecture and implementation of VoxeLine, a new interactive environment for display and analysis of 2D and 3D images in real-time, is discussed. This modular software project comprises two main parts: a user part (without programming expertise) and a programming part which permits its adaptation to specific problems. VoxeLine has the ability to deal with almost all sorts of data types encountered in the biomedical field (e.g. images, vectors). Another important feature is its ability to show datasets in all directions without duplicating data into the main memory. This feature allows VoxeLine to be used on machines with limited memory capacities and power. Real-time 3D manipulations (10Hz for a 256256124 MRI dataset) are possible on a classic monoprocessor architecture such as a personal computer.

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


Bandwidth enhancement of a printed wide-slot antenna with small slots In this paper, four printed wide-slot antenna fed by a microstrip line with a polygonal slot for bandwidth enhancement is proposed and experimentally studied. One of these antennas is fabricated and measured. Impedance, radiation and gaincharacteristics of this antenna are presented and discussed. From experimental results, the measured impedance bandwidth, defined by 10-dB return loss, can reach an operating bandwidth of 4.03GHz at operating frequencies from approximately 1.87 to 5.90GHz.

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 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

microstrip-line-fed antennas
printed slot antennas


Effective load balancing for cluster-based servers employing job preemption ? A cluster-based server consists of a front-end dispatcher and multiple back-end servers. The dispatcher receives incoming jobs, and then decides how to assign them to back-end servers, which in turn serve the jobs according to some discipline. Cluster-based servers have been widely deployed, as they combine good performance with low costs. Several assignment policies have been proposed for cluster-based servers, most of which aim to balance the load among back-end servers. There are two main strategies for load balancing: The first aims to balance the amount of workload at back-end servers, while the second aims to balance the number of jobs assigned to back-end servers. Examples of policies using these strategies are Dynamic and LC (Least Connected), respectively. In this paper we propose a policy, called LC*, which combines the two aforementioned strategies. The paper shows experimentally that when preemption is admitted (i.e.,when jobs execute concurrently on back-end servers), LC* substantially outperforms bothDynamic and LC in terms of response-time metrics. This improved performance is achieved by using only information readily available to the dispatcher, rendering LC* a practical policy to implement. Finally, we study a refinement, called ALC* (Adaptive LC*), which further improves on the response-time performance of LC* by adapting its actions to incoming traffic rates.

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

cluster-based servers
back-end server architecture
simulation


Phase lagging model of brain response to external stimuli-modeling of single action potential In this paper we detail a phase lagging model of brain response to external stimuli. The model is derived using the basic laws of physics like conservation of energy law. This model eliminates the paradox of instantaneous propagation of the action potential in the brain. The solution of this model is then presented. The model is further applied in the case of a single neuron and is verified by simulating a single action potential. The results of this modeling are useful not only for the fundamental understanding of single action potential generation, but also they can be applied in case of neuronal interactions, where the results can be verified against the real EEG signal. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

phase lagging model
brain response
external stimuli
action potential
single neuron


Efficient substructure RMSD query algorithms Protein structure analysis is a very important research topic in the molecular biology of the post-genomic era. The root mean square deviation (RMSD) is the most frequently used measure for comparing two protein three-dimensional (3-D) structures. In this paper, we deal with two fundamental problems related to the RMSD. We first deal with a problem called the "range RMSD query" problem. Given an aligned pair of structures, the problem is to compute the RMSD between two aligned substructures of them without gaps. This problem has many applications in protein structure analysis. We propose a linear-time preprocessing algorithm that enables constant-time RMSD computation. Next, we consider a problem called the "substructure RMSD query" problem, which is a generalization of the above range RMSD query problem. It is a problem to compute the RMSD between any substructures of two unaligned structures without gaps. Based on the algorithm for the range RMSD problem, we propose an O(nm) preprocessing algorithm that enables constant-time RMSD computation, where n and m are the lengths of the given structures. Moreover, we propose O(nm log r/r) time and O(nm/r) space preprocessing algorithm that enables O(r) query, where r is an arbitrary integer such that 1 <= r <= min(n, m). We also show that our strategy also works for another measure called the unit-vector root mean square deviation (URMSD), which is a variant of the RMSD.

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

computational complexity
protein 3-d structure comparison


A NOVEL TWO PHASE RETRIEVAL MECHANISM FOR A CLINICAL CASE BASED REASONING SYSTEM FOR RADIOTHERAPY TREATMENT PLANNING This paper presents a decision support system for radiotherapy treatment planning for head, neck and brain cancer. The aim of a treatment plan is to apply radiation to kill tumor cells, while minimizing the damage to healthy tissue and critical organs. Since treatment planning is a complex decision-making process that relies heavily on the subjective experience of clinicians, we propose the use of case-based reasoning (CBR), in which problems are solved based on the solutions of similar past problems. This paper focuses on the case retrieval process of a CBR system. The attributes, which describe the cases, are selected by assessing their effect on the performance of the CBR system. We have developed a context sensitive local weighting scheme that assigns weights to attributes based on their value and the values of other attributes in the target case. A novel two phase retrieval mechanism is developed, in which each phase is optimized to retrieve a particular part of the solution. We also present an original use of fuzzy logic in order to represent nonlinearity in the similarity measure. Experiments, which evaluate the similarity measure using real brain cancer patient cases, show promising results.

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

case-based reasoning
weighted nearest neighbor
local weights
nonlinear


EMILIA, the LS counting efficiency for electron-capture and capture-gamma emitters This version includes new aspects that improve the computation of the counting efficiency for each one of the three available atomic rearrangement detection models (i.e., KLM, KL1L2L3M and KLMN). The first modification involves a correction algorithm that simulates the non-linear response of the detector to photoionization for low-energy X-ray photons. Although this correction has the inconvenience of substantially increasing the number of atomic rearrangement detection pathways, the computed counting efficiency for low-Z nuclides is reduced by 2% for moderate quenching in agreement with experiment. The program also simulates how the addition of extra components, such as a quencher or aqueous solutions, affects the counting efficiency. Since the CIEMAT/NIST method requires identical ionization quench functions for the electron-capture nuclide and the tracer, the computation of the counting efficiency for H-3, the low-energy beta-ray emitter commonly used as tracer, is included in the program as an option.

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

radioactivity
liquid-scintillation counting
electron-capture decay


Optimal error estimate of a projection based interpolation for the p-version approximation in three dimensions Optimal p-interpolation error estimate is derived for the local, projection-based interpolation for H-1-conforming elements in three space dimensions. Two different procedures leading to the same logarithmic term ln(3/2)p in the estimate, are discussed. (c) 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

the p-version of the finite-element method


Evaluation on the Influence of Internet Prefix Hijacking Events The inter-domain routing system based on the BGP protocol is a kernel establishment in the Internet. There have been many incidents of IP prefix hijacking by BGP protocol in the Internet. Attacks may hijack victim's address space to disrupt network services or perpetrate malicious activities such as spamming and DoS attacks without disclosing identity. The relation between prefix hijacking and the Internet hierarchy is presented in this paper. The Internet is classified into three tiers based on the power-law and commercial relations of autonomous systems. The relation between network topology and prefix hijacking influence is presented for all sorts of hijacking events in different layers. The results assert that the hierarchical nature of network influences the prefix hijacking greatly.

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 I I 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

power law
inter-domain routing system
internet service providers


Synthesis and photoluminescence of Y2O3:Yb3+Er3+ nanofibers The influence of the solvent ratio in the hydrothermal synthesis of co-doped Y2O3:Yb3+Er3+, via CTAB complex, is presented. The nanophosphors for two different ethanol/water solvent ratios, 1:1 and 1:3, shown the following features: the samples exhibit cubic phase, TEM image of the sample synthesized using a 1:3 solvent ratio shows a homogeneous nanofibers morphology in opposition with the sample obtained from a 1:1 solvent ratio which reveals different morphologies prevailing big irregular particles. In both cases the absorption spectra are similar as well as the upconversion emission. These results suggest that the solvent ratio plays an important role in the morphology and on the luminescence properties of the nanostructured materials.

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 O O O O O O O O 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


Estimation of heart rate signals for mental stress assessment using neuro fuzzy technique This paper presents the evaluation of mental stress assesment using heart-rate variability (HRV). The activity of the autonomic nervous system (ANS) is studied by means of time-frequency analysis (TFA) of the heart-rate variability signal. Spectral decomposition of the heart-rate variability before smoking and after smoking was obtained. Mental stress is accompanied by dynamic changes in ANS activity. HRV analysis is a popular tool for assessing the activities of autonomic nervous system. The approach consists of (1) monitoring of heart rate signals, (2) signal processing using wavelet transform (WT) (different wavelets), (3) neuro fuzzy evaluation techniques to provide robustness in HRV analysis, (4) monitoring the function of ANS under different stress conditions. Our experiment involves 20 physically fit persons under different times (before smoking and after smoking). Nero fuzzy technique have been used to model the experimental data.

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

adaptive neuro fuzzy inference system (anfis)


A mixed integer formulation for maximal covering by inclined parallelograms In this paper, we introduce a zeroone mixed integer formulation for a maximal covering problem where points are covered by inclined parallelograms in a plane. The special case of covering rectangles with sides parallel to the axis is treated with a separate formulation. Finally, an alternative algorithm for solving covering by inclined parallelograms is presented. The formulations proposed can be easily adapted for other location and material cutting applications.

O O O O O O B O O B 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 B 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


Modelling epistasis in genetic disease using Petri nets, evolutionary computation and frequent itemset mining Petri nets are useful for mathematically modelling disease-causing genetic epistasis. A Petri net model of an interaction has the potential to lead to biological insight into the cause of a genetic disease. However, defining a Petri net by hand for a particular interaction is extremely difficult because of the sheer complexity of the problem and degrees of freedom inherent in a Petri net's architecture. We propose therefore a novel method, based on evolutionary computation and data mining, for automatically constructing Petri net models of non-linear gene interactions. The method comprises two main steps. Firstly, an initial partial Petri net is set up with several repeated sub-nets that model individual genes and a set of constraints, comprising relevant common sense and biological knowledge, is also defined. These constraints characterise the class of Petri nets that are desired. Secondly, this initial Petri net structure and the constraints are used as the input to a genetic algorithm. The genetic algorithm searches for a Petri net architecture that is both a superset of the initial net, and also conforms to all of the given constraints. The genetic algorithm evaluation function that we employ gives equal weighting to both the accuracy of the net and also its parsimony. We demonstrate our method using an epistatic model related to the presence of digital ulcers in systemic sclerosis patients that was recently reported in the literature. Our results show that although individual "perfect" Petri nets can frequently be discovered for this interaction, the true value of this approach lies in generating many different perfect nets, and applying data mining techniques to them in order to elucidate common and statistically significant patterns of interaction. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

petri net
genetic algorithm
frequent itemset mining
epistasis
genetic disease


a verifiable protocol for arguing about rejections in negotiation Recently argumentation-based approaches to negotiation have become popular [3]. The idea is that if negotiating agents exchange reasons for their proposals and rejections, the negotiation process may become more efficient and the negotiation outcome may be of higher quality. This paper especially focuses on reasons given for rejections of proposals. If an agent explains why he rejects a proposal, the other agent knows which of her future proposals will certainly be rejected so she will not waste effort at such proposals. Also, if a reason for rejection can be disputed, the negotiation process may be of higher quality since flawed reasons may be revised as a result. Accordingly, the aim of this paper is to formulate a protocol for negotiation with embedded persuasion dialogues about the reasons for rejecting a proposal. The key idea is that the propositional commitments incurred by the agents in the embedded persuasion dialogue constrain their behaviour in the surrounding negotiation dialogue.

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


A variational multiscale method for turbulent flow simulation with adaptive large scale space In turbulent flows it is only feasible to simulate large flow structures. Variational multiscale (VMS) methods define these flow structures by projections onto appropriate function spaces. This paper presents a finite element VMS method which chooses the large scale projection space adaptively. The adaption controls the influence of an eddy viscosity model and it is based on the size of the so-called resolved small scales. The adaptive procedure is described in detail. Numerical studies at a turbulent channel flow and a turbulent flow around a cylinder are presented. It is shown that the method selects the large scale space in a reasonable way and that appropriately chosen parameters improve the results compared to the basic method, which uses the same local large scale space in the whole domain and for all times.

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

variational multiscale method
turbulent flows
large scale space


accurate and efficient sla compliance monitoring Service level agreements (SLAs) define performance guarantees made by service providers, e.g , in terms of packet loss, delay, delay variation, and network availability. In this paper, we describe a new active measurement methodology to accurately monitor whether measured network path characteristics are in compliance with performance targets specified in SLAs. Specifically, (1) we describe a new methodology for estimating packet loss rate that significantly improves accuracy over existing approaches; (2) we introduce a new methodology for measuring mean delay along a path that improves accuracy over existing methodologies, and propose a method for obtaining confidence intervals on quantiles of the empirical delay distribution without making any assumption about the true distribution of delay; (3) we introduce a new methodology for measuring delay variation that is more robust than prior techniques; and (4) we extend existing work in network performance tomography to infer lower bounds on the quantiles of a distribution of performance measures along an unmeasured path given measurements from a subset of paths. We unify active measurements for these metrics in a discrete time-based tool called SLA M . The unified probe stream from SLA M consumes lower overall bandwidth than if individual streams are used to measure path properties. We demonstrate the accuracy and convergence properties of SLA M in a controlled laboratory environment using a range of background traffic scenarios and in one- and two-hop settings, and examine its accuracy improvements over existing standard techniques.

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

network congestion
network jitter
service-level agreements
slam
network delay


QoSNC: A Novel Approach to QoS-Based Network Coding for Fixed Networks In this paper, we present a decentralized algorithm to find minimum cost quality of service (QoS) flow subgraphs in network coded multicast schemes. The main objective is to find minimum cost subgraphs that also satisfy user-specified QoS constraints, specifically with respect to rate and delay demands. We consider networks with multiple multicast sessions. Although earlier network coding algorithms in this area have demonstrated performance improvements in terms of QoS parameters, the proposed QoS network coding approach provides a framework that guarantees QoS constraints are actually met over the network.

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 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

flow optimization
quality of service (qos)


Integrated access to cultural heritage information pieces in Iran over Imam Reza's 4th Zarih (burial chamber) as a sample Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to offer an example of how ontology, such as CIDOC, can be turned into a format from the perspective of an object. In fact, it illustrates the possible semantic analysis of an object description into a view neutral machine-interpretable form. The aim is to show that a museum object located in a museum can be described in detail and then related to other information objects located in other memory institutions such as libraries and archives. Design/methodology/approach - Studying different documents, all the information about Imam Reza's Zarih 4th was derivated. Then the most important were listed and represented in detail, according to CIDOC CRM entities. Findings - The figures explicitly reveal the existing semantic correlations between the heterogeneous cultural heritage information in various memory institutions, such as Organization of Libraries, Museums and Documents Centre of Astan Quds Razavi. Originality/value - The authors capture the knowledge from different resources and relate them in a semantic description with the aid of a semantic conceptual model like CIDOC CRM, to show more effective information integration in a cultural institution such as Organization of Libraries, Museums and Documents Centre of Astan Quds Razavi, in order to provide unified access to collection-level information.

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

museums and documents centre of astan quds razavi


understanding and designing cool technologies for teenagers This paper describes how initial principles for the designs of an interactive application were informed from a study of 'coolness' with two different ages of teenagers. The study used drawings to examine how teenagers might design their environments and these were then analysed by the research team based on a set of characteristics of cool that were drawn from the literature. Results from the teenagers' drawings demonstrate some change in emphasis between the younger and older age groups and between the genders. A design space around innovation and rebellion is implicated in the findings.

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


creating meta-indexes for digital domains The back-of-book indexes for test collections of digital books in the domains of Economics and Geology have been deconstructed and analyzed, and the entries aggregated to create domain-level meta-indexes. Metrics comparing the two domains are presented.

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

digital collections
digital libraries
index
meta-indexes


Landscape development modeling based on statistical framework Introduction of the statistical DEM model and its uncertainties. Statistical land uplift model parameter estimation using 14C radiocarbon data. Future surface water body estimation using GIS-based analysis. Area and volume probabilities for the future lakes based on statistical modeling.

O O O 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

biosphere modeling
digital elevation model
post-glacial land uplift


Revisiting the role of web assurance seals in business-to-consumer electronic commerce There is conflicting evidence as to the current level of awareness and impact of Web Assurance Seal Services (WASSs). This study examines the effects of an educational intervention designed to increase consumer's knowledge, of security and privacy aspect of business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce websites and assurance seal services. The study further explores the relationships among consumers' perceptions about online security, including WASSs awareness, importance of WASS, privacy concerns, security concerns, and information quality, before and after the educational intervention. The study finds that educating consumers about the security and privacy dangers of the web, as well as the role of web assurance seals, does increase their awareness and perceived importance of the seals. However, despite this increased awareness, there is little association between these assurance seals and the two indicators of trustworthiness, concerns about privacy and perceived information quality, of an e-commerce site, even after the intervention. Only security concerns have a statistically significant relationship with WASSs awareness before and after the educational intervention. Implications for theory and practice are 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 O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 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

web assurance seal service
awareness of assurance seal service
online privacy


On the effect of test-suite reduction on automatically generated model-based tests Model checking techniques can be successfully employed as a test-case generation technique to generate tests from formal models. The number of tests-cases produced, however, is typically large for complex coverage criteria such as MC/DC. Test-suite reduction can provide us with a smaller set of test-cases that preserve the original coverageoften a dramatically smaller set. Nevertheless, one potential drawback with test-suite reduction is that this might affect the quality of the test-suite in terms of fault finding. Previous empirical studies provide conflicting evidence on this issue. To further investigate the problem and determine its effect when testing implementations derived from formal models of software we performed an experiment using a large case example of a Flight Guidance System, generated reduced test-suites for a variety of structural coverage criteria while preserving coverage, and recorded their fault finding effectiveness. Our results indicate that the size of the specification based test-suites can be dramatically reduced and that the fault detection of the reduced test-suites is adversely affected. In this report we describe our experiment, analyze the results, and discuss the implications for testing based on formal specifications.

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

specification-based testing
test reduction
model checkers
automated test generation


Efficient computation of time-based customer service levels in a multi-item, multi-echelon supply chain: A practical approach for inventory optimization Time-based item fill rates, or channel fill rates, are the building blocks needed to evaluate steady-state compliance with time-based customer service agreements. Exact computation of channel fill rates is both difficult and time-consuming, yet their accurate assessment is essential for system-wide inventory optimization. We describe and validate a practical method for computing channel fill rates in a multi-item, multi-echelon service parts distribution system. A simulation study is presented which shows that, in a three-echelon setting, our estimation errors are very small over a wide range of base stock level vectors. A more accurate, though less efficient, approximation method is also evaluated for comparison.

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

inventory and service optimization
distribution resource planning
multi-echelon inventory
service parts management
time-based fill rates
modeling methodologies


An efficient linear elastic FEM solver using automatic local grid refinement and accuracy control This paper presents an overview of an efficient FEM solver with an accuracy control strategy using automatic local grid refinement. Cheap accuracy estimators are briefly described and some concepts concerning a multigrid FE solver are presented. Several (2D/3D) numerical examples demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed strategy in terms of computation time and memory requirement. Some large scale calculations are presented, up to 200 million degrees of freedom. A particular implementation care has been devoted to ensure both a linear time complexity of every intermediate step and a minimal memory requirement.

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

error estimator
automatic local refinement
structural mechanics


collaborative virtual environments for training As the cost of training individuals to learn how to use new technologies increases, the need for virtual environments that facilitate training becomes more noticeable. More specifically, the use of Collaborative Virtual Environments for training in industrial applications is of special interest. What follows is a discussion of two prototypes designed and implemented for the purpose of using Collaborative Virtual Environments in training scenarios.

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


exploiting subjectivity analysis in blogs to improve political leaning categorization In this paper, we address a relatively new and interesting text categorization problem: classify a political blog as either liberal or conservative , based on its political leaning. Our subjectivity analysis based method is twofold: 1) we identify subjective sentences that contain at least two strong subjective clues based on the General Inquirer dictionary; 2) from subjective sentences identified, we extract opinion expressions and other features to build political leaning classifiers. Experimental results with a political blog corpus we built show that by using features from subjective sentences can significantly improve the classification performance. In addition, by extracting opinion expressions from subjective sentences, we are able to reveal opinions that are characteristic of a specific political leaning to some extent.

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

subjectivity analysis
political leaning categorization


ODE/PDE analysis of corneal curvature We solve numerically a nonlinear boundary-value problem modeling corneal topography. We use the method of lines to facilitate fast computation and include the R routines. We derive some estimates which demonstrate the order of convergence of the algorithm.

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

boundary value ordinary differential equation (bvode)


Automatic analysis of facial expressions: The state of the art Humans detect and interpret faces and facial expressions in a scene with little or no effort. Still, development of an automated system that accomplishes this task is rather difficult. There are several related problems: detection of an image segment as a face, extraction of the facial expression information. and classification of the expression (e.g., in emotion categories). A system that performs these operations accurately and in real time would form a big step in achieving a human-like interaction between man and machine. This paper surveys the past work in solving these problems. The capability of the human Visual system with respect to these problems is discussed. too, it is meant to serve as an ultimate goal and a guide for determining recommendations for development of an automatic facial expression analyzer.

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

facial expression information extraction

facial expression emotional classification


Termination checking with types The paradigm of type-based termination is explored for functional programming with recursive data types. The article introduces Lambda(mu)(+), a lambda-calculus with recursion, inductive types, subtyping and bounded quanti. cation. Decorated type variables representing approximations of inductive types are used to track the size of function arguments and return values. The system is shown to be type safe and strongly normalizing. The main novelty is a bidirectional type checking algorithm whose soundness is established formally.

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

inductive types
bidirectional type checking

type-based termination
sized types
course-of-value recursion
strong normalization


Latency-minimizing data aggregation in wireless sensor networks under physical interference model Minimizing latency is of primary importance for data aggregation which is an essential application in wireless sensor networks. Many fast data aggregation algorithms under the protocol interference model have been proposed, but the model falls short of being an accurate abstraction of wireless interferences in reality. In contrast, the physical interference model has been shown to be more realistic and has the potential to increase the network capacity when adopted in a design. It is a challenge to derive a distributed solution to latency-minimizing data aggregation under the physical interference model because of the simple fact that global-scale information to compute the cumulative interference is needed at any node. In this paper, we propose a distributed algorithm that aims to minimize aggregation latency under the physical interference model in wireless sensor networks of arbitrary topologies. The algorithm uses O(K) time slots to complete the aggregation task, where K is the logarithm of the ratio between the lengths of the longest and shortest links in the network. The key idea of our distributed algorithm is to partition the network into cells according to the value K, thus obviating the need for global information. We also give a centralized algorithm which can serve as a benchmark for comparison purposes. It constructs the aggregation tree following the nearest-neighbor criterion. The centralized algorithm takes O( logn) and O(log3n) time slots when coupled with two existing link scheduling strategies, respectively (where n is the total number of nodes), which represents the current best algorithm for the problem in the literature. We prove the correctness and efficiency of our algorithms, and conduct empirical studies under realistic settings to validate our analytical results.

O B I O B I I O B I I O O O O O O O B I 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 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 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 B I I O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 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 aggregation
wireless sensor networks
physical interference model


Rough set theory for the interval-valued fuzzy information systems ? The notion of a rough set was originally proposed by Pawlak [Z. Pawlak, Rough sets, International Journal of Computer and Information Sciences 11 (5) (1982) 341356]. Later on, Dubois and Prade [D. Dubois, H. Prade, Rough fuzzy sets and fuzzy rough sets, International Journal of General System 17 (23) (1990) 191209] introduced rough fuzzy sets and fuzzy rough sets as a generalization of rough sets. This paper deals with an interval-valued fuzzy information system by means of integrating the classical Pawlak rough set theory with the interval-valued fuzzy set theory and discusses the basic rough set theory for the interval-valued fuzzy information systems. In this paper we firstly define the rough approximation of an interval-valued fuzzy set on the universe U in the classical Pawlak approximation space and the generalized approximation space respectively, i.e., the space on which the interval-valued rough fuzzy set model is built. Secondly several interesting properties of the approximation operators are examined, and the interrelationships of the interval-valued rough fuzzy set models in the classical Pawlak approximation space and the generalized approximation space are investigated. Thirdly we discuss the attribute reduction of the interval-valued fuzzy information systems. Finally, the methods of the knowledge discovery for the interval-valued fuzzy information systems are presented with an example.

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


Design of optimal binary filters under joint multiresolution-envelope constraint This paper examines binary filter design by jointly applying multiresolution design and. envelope constraint. In multiresolution design, the value of the designed filter for a configuration is defined at a resolution sufficiently low to have observed the configuration. Preference is given to higher resolutions, but the number of training observations is taken into account. In envelope design, the designed filter is constrained to lie in the envelope between two humanly designed filters. For small samples, the envelope-designed filter has the benefit of being in accord with expert knowledge, whereas for large samples statistical training provides more accurate filter design. To obtain the advantages of both approaches, they can be applied in combination. This can be done in more than a single way. This paper explores joint multiresolution-envelope design, extends the basic propositions for envelope design to the multiresolution setting, considers design consistency, and provides experimental support for the joint approach. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

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

non linear filtering
multiresolution analysis


Dynamic selection approaches for multiple classifier systems In this paper we propose a new approach for dynamic selection of ensembles of classifiers. Based on the concept named multistage organizations, the main objective of which is to define a multi-layer fusion function adapted to each recognition problem, we propose dynamic multistage organization (DMO), which defines the best multistage structure for each test sample. By extending Dos Santos etal.s approach, we propose two implementations for DMO, namely DSA m and DSA c . While the former considers a set of dynamic selection functions to generalize a DMO structure, the latter considers contextual information, represented by the output profiles computed from the validation dataset, to conduct this task. The experimental evaluation, considering both small and large datasets, demonstrated that DSA c dominated DSA m on most problems, showing that the use of contextual information can reach better performance than other existing methods. In addition, the performance of DSA c can also be enhanced in incremental learning. However, the most important observation, supported by additional experiments, is that dynamic selection is generally preferred over static approaches when the recognition problem presents a high level of uncertainty.

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

multiple classifier systems
dynamic selection
incremental learning
multistage organizations
ensembles of classifiers


The cybernetics of design and the design of cybernetics Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to connect two discourses, the discourse of cybernetics and that of design. Design/methodology/approach - The paper takes a comparative analysis of relevant definitions, concepts, and entailments in both discourse, and an integration of these into a cybernetically informed concept of human-centered design, on the one hand, and a design-informed concept of second-order cybernetics, on the other hand. In the course of this conceptual exploration, the distinction between science and design is explored with cybernetics located in the dialectic between the two. Technology-centered design is distinguished from human-centered design, and several axioms of the latter are stated and discussed. Findings - This paper consists of recommendations to think and do things differently. In particular, a generalization of interface is suggested as a replacement for the notion of products; a concept of meaning is developed to substitute for the meaninglessness of physical properties; a theory of stakeholder networks is discussed to replace the deceptive notion of THE user; and, above all, it is suggested that designers, in order to design something that affords use to others, engage in second-order understanding. Originality/value - The paper makes several radical suggestions that face likely rejection by traditionalists but acceptance by cyberneticians and designers attempting to make a contribution to contemporary information society.

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


Estimating sufficient statistics in co-evolutionary analysis by mutual information Mutual information (MI) is a standard measure in information theory to observe and quantify correlated signals and events in both, empirical data sets and theoretical models. In the field of computational biology the MI turned out to be particularly useful in studies on co-evolutionary signals of sites within biomolecules. A key issue in the applicability of the MI is, however, a correct reference system or null model to understand finite-size effects in the underlying, finite data set. Although some bioinformatics studies exist with rigorous results for theoretical, well-designed random distributions, data from real-world proteins was never used to quantify the effect of finite-size samples. The impact of real-world statistics is, however, most relevant for researchers in all fields concerned with detecting evolutionary signals within biological sequences. We present results on such effects in finite-sized biological data sets and point to future research directions. We are most of all concerned with bacterial, ribosomal proteins as a prototypical example in molecular evolution. We compare to previous published suggestions, give an empirical formula, and propose a protocol to guide future research projects.

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

sequence alignment
correlation
finite size
bacterial ribosome


Stochastic cost optimization of DNAPL remediation Field application A stochastic remediation design optimization methodology implemented in the program Stochastic Cost Optimization Toolkit (SCOToolkit) was successfully applied to evaluate remediation options at the East Gate Disposal Yard (EGDY) at the former Fort Lewis, now Joint Base Lewis-McChord (JBLM), Washington. Non-optimized forward simulations based on calibrated parameters and their uncertainty inferred from data prior to actual thermal source remediation system implementation at the site indicated a low probability of the actual thermal system design meeting remediation criteria in a reasonable time frame. Calibration using additional data collected during thermal treatment reduced prediction uncertainty, but still predicted a high probability of taking more than 100 years to reach compliance criteria using the actual thermal treatment design with no additional remedial action. Stochastic optimization of the thermal treatment design indicated larger treatment areas were needed to capture source mass due to uncertainty in source delineation. The expected cost for the enlarged thermal treatment system was estimated to be $22M, which is nearly twice that of the actual system, suggesting that additional characterization to reduce source delineation uncertainty or consideration of an alternative strategy that is less sensitive to delineation uncertainty may be warranted. Stochastic optimization of whey injection was investigated to accelerate source zone dense nonaqueous phase liquid (DNAPL) dissolution and enhance dissolved plume biodecay. The optimized design indicated a 93% probability of meeting compliance criteria by 2100 with an expected net present value cost of $4.7M. Whey injection substantially shortened the remediation time compared to no whey injection. The results indicate that the proposed stochastic cost optimization approach is able to reduce expected remediation costs, increase the probability of achieving remediation objectives, and identify data characterization needs.

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

stochastic cost optimization
uncertainty
dnapl
calibration
east gate disposal yard

monte carlo simulation
thermal source treatment
enhanced bioremediation


distributed path planning for mobile robots using a swarm of interacting reinforcement learners Path planning for mobile robots in stochastic, dynamic environments is a difficult problem and the subject of much research in the field of robotics. While many approaches to solving this problem put the computational burden of path planning on the robot, physical path planning methods place this burden on a set of sensor nodes distributed throughout the environment that can communicate information to each other about path costs. Previous approaches to physical path planning have looked at the performance of such networks in regular environments (e.g., office buildings) using highly structured, uniform deployments of networks (e.g., grids). Additionally, these networks do not make use of real experience obtained from the robots they assist in guiding. We extend previous work in this area by incorporating reinforcement learning techniques into these methods and show improved performance in simulated, rough terrain environments. We also show that these networks, which we term SWIRLs (Swarms of Interacting Reinforcement Learners), can perform well with deployment distributions that are not as highly structured as in previous approaches.

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

physical path planning
reinforcement learning


Exploiting persistent mappings in cross-domain analogical learning of physical domains Cross-domain analogies are a powerful method for learning new domains. This paper extends the Domain Transfer via Analogy (DTA) method with persistent mappings, correspondences between domains that are incrementally built up as a cognitive system gains experience with a new domain. DTA uses analogies between pairs of textbook example problems, or worked solutions, to create a domain mapping between a familiar and a new domain. This mapping enables the initialization of a new domain theory. Another analogy is then made between the domain theories themselves, providing additional conjectures about the new domain. After these conjectures are verified, the successful mappings are stored as persistent mappings to constrain future analogies between the domains. We show that DTA plus persistent mappings enables a Companion, the first structure mapping cognitive architecture, to learn the equation schemas and control knowledge necessary to solve problems in three domains (rotational mechanics, electricity, and heat) by analogy with linear mechanics. We provide a detailed analysis categorizing transfer failures. As with people, the most difficult step in cross-domain analogy is identifying an appropriate example. Once an analogous example has been found, DTA successfully transfers the domain knowledge necessary to solve the problem in the new domain 78% of the time. Furthermore, we illustrate how persistent mappings assist in retrieval of analogous examples and overcoming two types of mapping failures. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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

cross-domain analogy
cognitive systems
physics problem-solving


Fixed point theorems for convex contraction mappings on cone metric spaces In 2007, Huang and Zhang [L.G. Huang, X. Zhang, Cone metric spaces and fixed point theorems of contractive mappings, J. Math. Anal. Appl. 332 (2007) 1468-1476] rediscovered normal cone metric spaces and obtained the Banach contraction principle for this setting. Later on, Rezapour and Hamlbarani [Sh. Rezapour, R. Hamlbarani, Some notes on the paper: Cone metric spaces and fixed point theorems of contractive mappings, J. Math. Anal. Appl. 345 (2008) 719-724] showed that there are non-normal cones and that the assumption of normality is redundant. In this paper, we obtain a generalization of the Banach contraction principle to the class of convex contractions on non-normal cone metric spaces. Our result includes, as special cases, the recent results of Huang and Zhang (2007) [2] and Rezapour and Hamlbarani (2008) [3]. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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


Crushing failure in hollow cylinders made of quasi-brittle materials Several engineering problems, such as the collapse of borehole in rocks, can be investigated by means of multiaxial compression tests. However, the brittle failure that occurs during the excavation of circular tunnels in rock masses cannot be completely reproduced by laboratory tests on hollow cylinders having a diameter of few centimetres. Thus, referring to these specimens subjected to hydrostatic pressure, and made of concrete or other quasi-brittle materials, a numerical model capable of predicting their structural response at different scales is here presented. Due to the absence of confinement, strain localization and crushing failure appear around the inner surface of the cylinders, which behave nonlinearly even in the case of low pressures. Similarly to cement-based beams in bending, this phenomenon can be modelled by adopting a suitable stressinelastic displacement relationship for the post-peak response under compression. With regard to hollow cylinders subjected to multiaxial compression, it is possible to predict the size effect on fracture strength, which needs to be taken into account when laboratory tests are used to analyze the borehole failures. The effectiveness of the proposed approach is checked by comparing the computed results with the test data measured by Elkadi and van Mier [Elkadi AS, van Mier JGM. Experimental investigation of size effect in concrete fracture under multiaxial compression. Int J Fract 2006;140(14):5571] on concrete specimens.

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


Fingerprint verification on medical image reporting system The healthcare industry is recently going through extensive changes, through adoption of robust, interoperable healthcare information technology by means of electronic medical records (EMR). However, a major concern of EMR is adequate confidentiality of the individual records being managed electronically. Multiple access points over an open network like the Internet increases possible patient data interception. The obligation is on healthcare providers to procure information security solutions that do not hamper patient care while still providing the confidentiality of patient information. Medical images are also part of the EMR which need to be protected from unauthorized users. This study integrates the techniques of fingerprint verification, DICOM object, digital signature and digital envelope in order to ensure that access to the hospital Picture Archiving and Communication System (PACS) or radiology information system (RIS) is only by certified parties. (c) 2007 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. 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 B I B O B I 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

fingerprint verification
dicom
digital signature
pacs


Bridging the gaps: interoperability for language engineering architectures using GrAF This paper explores interoperability for data represented using the Graph Annotation Framework (GrAF) (Ide and Suderman, 2007) and the data formats utilized by two general-purpose annotation systems: the General Architecture for Text Engineering (GATE) (Cunningham etal., 2002) and the Unstructured Information Management Architecture (UIMA) (Ferrucci and Lally in Nat Lang Eng 10(34):327348, 2004). GrAF is intended to serve as a pivot to enable interoperability among different formats, and both GATE and UIMA are at least implicitly designed with an eye toward interoperability with other formats and tools. We describe the steps required to perform a round-trip rendering from GrAF to GATE and GrAF to UIMA CAS and back again, and outline the commonalities as well as the differences and gaps that came to light in the process.

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

linguistic annotation
standards
language resources
annotation processing software


Manifold learning by preserving distance orders ? A novel manifold learning method which preserves pairwise distance order relations in the projected space. Theoretical formulation of the constrained optimization problem extending classical MDS-based mean-squared error minimization. A new performance metric that involves number of preserved distance orders. Proposed method also provides the relation between distances in original and lower dimensional spaces.

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

machine learning
nonlinear dimensionality reduction


collaborative framework for supporting indigenous knowledge management Indigenous knowledge (IK) is an integral part of the culture and history of local communities. We need to learn from local communities to enrich the development process. IK systems are also dynamic; new knowledge is continuously added. IK is stored in people's memories, activities and is expressed and communicated orally and this posses a serious threat to its preservation and development. However this depicts Indigenous knowledge Management (IKM) as a complex, global and dynamic issue and hence a need for a collaborative framework that will enhance information exchange. Utilization of collaborative frameworks, are increasingly being used in solving problems whose efficiency depends on an interactive nature. Networking or collaboration allows for a more effective pooling of resources and sharing of experiences and information on indigenous knowledge, both among various individuals and organizations.

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

kms -knowledge management system
ik - indigenous knowledge


nash equilibria in graphical games on trees revisited Graphical games have been proposed as a game-theoretic model of large-scale distributed networks of non-cooperative agents. When the number of players is large, and the underlying graph has low degree, they provide a concise way to represent the players' payoffs. It has recently been shown that the problem of finding Nash equilibria in a general degree-3 graphical game with two actions per player is complete for the complexity class PPAD, indicating that it is unlikely that there is any polynomial-time algorithm for this problem. In this paper, we study the complexity of graphical games with two actions per player on bounded-degree trees. This setting was first considered by Kearns, Littman and Singh, who proposed a dynamic programming-based algorithm that computes all Nash equilibria of such games. The running time of their algorithm is exponential, though approximate equilibria can be computed efficiently. Later, Littman, Kearns and Singh proposed a modification to this algorithm that can find a single Nash equilibrium in polynomial time. We show that this modified algorithm is incorrect-the output is not always a Nash equilibrium. We then propose a new algorithm that is based on the ideas of Kearns et al. and computes all Nash equilibria in quadratic time if the input graph is a path, and in polynomial time if it is an arbitrary graph of maximum degree 2. Moreover, our algorithm can be used to compute Nash equilibria of graphical games on arbitrary trees, but the running time can be exponential, even when the tree has bounded degree. We show that this is inevitable -- any algorithm of this type will take exponential time, even on bounded-degree trees with pathwidth 2. It is an open question whether our algorithm runs in polynomial time on graphs with pathwidth 1, but we show that finding a Nash equilibrium for a 2-action graphical game in which the underlying graph has maximum degree 3 and constant pathwidth is PPAD-complete (so is unlikely to be tractable).

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


Introducing Preferences in Planning as Satisfiability Planning as Satisfiability is one of the most well-known and effective techniques for classical planning: satplan has been the winning system in the deterministic track for optimal planners in the 4th International Planning Competition (IPC) and a cow-inner in the 5th IPC. Given a planning problem Pi and a makespan n, the approach based on satisfiability (a.k.a. SAT-based) simply works by (i) constructing a SAT formula Pi(n) and (ii) checking Pi(n) for satisfiability: if there is a model for Pi(n) then we have found a plan, otherwise n is increased. The approach guarantees that the makespan is optimal, i. e. minimum. In this article we extend the Planning as Satisfiability approach in order to handle preferences and satplan in order to solve problems with simple preferences. This allows, e. g. to take into consideration 'plan quality' issues other than makespan, like number of actions and 'soft' goals. The basic idea is to explore the search space of possible plans in accordance with the given partially ordered preferences. We first prove that, at fixed makespan, our approach returns an 'optimal' plan, if any. Then, considering both classical planning problems and problems coming from IPC-5, we show that satplan extended in order to deal with preferences: (i) returns optimal plans that are often of considerable better quality, i. e. with fewer actions or with a better plan metric on soft goals, than satplan; and (ii) is overall competitive, in terms of plan quality, with SGPLAN, the winning system in the 'SimplePreferences' category of the IPC-5. Notably, such results are often obtained without sacrificing efficiency.

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


A Review on Interference Alignment in Multiuser Interference Channels As the density of base stations in wireless networks becomes higher, system performance is limited not by noise but by interference from other transmitters and so research on interference channels has been actively undertaken. In this article, we study interference alignment (IA) techniques, which are known to maximize the achievable degrees of freedom (DoF) under multiuser interference channels. First, the concepts and history of IA are introduced, and the results on achievable DoF are explained. From a practical aspect, beam design for multiple input multiple output interference channels is revisited. Additionally, channel information feedback, performance with feedback delay, blind techniques, cellular interference alignment and other recent results are explained. Based on these results, the feasibility and role of interference alignment are examined under various conditions.

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

interference alignment
interference channels
degrees of freedom


A partial Granger causality based method for analysis of parameter interactions in bioreactors In this article, we utilize the concept of partial Granger causality to study the penicillin production process under several operating conditions. We propose a graph-theoretic template (causal network) based method for intelligent process monitoring. We validate our results with the aid of existing knowledge and available literature. The proposed method is quite general and can be extended to analyze several physical, chemical or biological systems. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

bioreactors
partial granger causality
process monitoring


Service category-to-wavelength selection technique for QoS support in connection-oriented optical packet switching This paper considers an optical packet-switched node subject to asynchronous, variable-length packets and connection-oriented operation. We firstly address the problem of setting up the optical virtual connections and properly configuring the forwarding table at the node. We do not deal with routing aspects, but with the efficient mapping of the virtual connections to the wavelengths of the output ports. In this context, we suggest a wavelength assignment procedure that improves the node performance in comparison with simple random or balanced schemes. We then address the QoS provisioning problem. While existing solutions focus on applying some forms of resource reservation on top of the contention resolution algorithm, here we propose a method based on the well-known ATM scheme of defining different service categories. In particular, we define a case study with three OPS service categories, and for each category a specific contention resolution algorithm is applied. With such a strategy the algorithms present the problem of a different performance alignment; we solve it by designing an ad hoc optical buffer architecture based on non-degenerate delays. The performance of the final node architecture is evaluated by simulation. The results obtained indicate the merits of this method, which opens up interesting future developments for a whole optical network scenario.

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


Variational models for image colorization via chromaticity and brightness decomposition Colorization refers to an image processing task which recovers color in grayscale images when only small regions with color are given. We propose a couple of variational models using chromaticity color components to colorize black and white images. We first consider total variation minimizing (TV) colorization which is an extension from TV inpainting to color using chromaticity model. Second, we further modify our model to weighted harmonic maps for colorization. This model adds edge information from the brightness data, while it reconstructs smooth color values for each homogeneous region. We introduce penalized versions of the variational models, we analyze their convergence properties, and we present numerical results including extension to texture colorization.

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

color images
image decomposition
total variation (tv) minimization
variational methods


Fatigue of damascene copper lines under cyclic electrical loading Fatigue in damascene copper lines has been investigated by using alternating currents to generate cyclic temperatures and stresses/strains. Interconnects using beyond 65nm node design rules and materials have been studied. We demonstrate here that cyclic thermal strains lead to Cu or Cu/Co-based cap surface modification and open circuits in Cu lines during the application of an alternating electrical current. We underline that the narrower the copper lines are, the more reliable they are and the major role of the cap layer to improve the Cu lines reliability.

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

damascene copper line
thermal fatigue
alternative current
interconnect


Optimization of MPEG-2 SNR scaleable codecs It is shown how the signal-to-noise (SNR) scaleable coder can benefit from optimizing quantified discrete cosine transform (DCT) coefficients, in a rate-distortion context, in order to reduce bit-rate overheads. The technique is based on adjusting the quantized coefficients rather than dropping them, since the former gives finer control over rate-distortion trade-offs. The widely used Lagrangian optimization technique is then applied to arrive at the optimally adjusted coefficients block. We show that such an optimization is very efficient for the second layer, but has little effect on the base layer.

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

mpeg video
optimization methods
video signal processing


headbang hero Headbang Hero is a music/dance videogame for testing and improving your prowess at "headbanging". The player wears a wireless motion-sensing wig and is awarded points for her personal choreography as she shakes her head to the sound of a heavy-metal song. However, since the practice of "headbanging" presents a risk to the player's health, the game software also analyses how hazardous the performance is and prints a personal report once the song is over.

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


A meaning based information theory - informalogical space: Basic concepts and convergence of information sequences This paper presents an information theory that is based on meanings and relationships between information It first introduces the foundation of our approach, it binary relation contain between two pieces of information, based on inference between the two pieces of information Then, based on the contain relation, it introduces two basic operations union and intersection on a collection (i.e., set) of information. This paper lays the foundation of our approach by introducing the core concept, informalogical space. An informalogical space is a collection of information that satisfies certain conditions represented in terms of the contain relation, and the union and intersection operations. An informalogical space is similar to a topological space in a symbolic sense, but is different in nature This paper also introduces an information net in an informalogical space. An information net is a generalization of information sequence, just as a net is a generalization of sequence in general topology This paper builds a convergence theory for information nets that is similar in a symbolic sense to the Moore-Smith convergence theory in general topology. Then, this paper applies the results for information nets to information sequences (C) 2009 Elsevier Inc All rights reserved.

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

information
informalogical space
convergence

informalogy
accumulation information
information net
limit information
cluster information
information sequence


automating access to computing services When computer services were more limited in scope and users, providing those services could be handled manually by a minimum of staff. Over the years computer access has gone from a few researchers using a mainframe to nearly the entire University community using e-mail, computer labs, modem pools, and the World Wide Web. In addition, new initiatives have created on-line access to course scheduling, benefits revisions, and other critical operations. With this increase in the need for access to centrally provided computer services, the task could have become daunting. Without hiring additional staff, our Information Technology Services Accounts Office now provides access to 120,000 users. In addition, we can provide specifically requested access to certain services based on class registration or any aspect of a user's affiliation with the University.At Penn State, we've created an Oracle database system - Central Account Coordination Tracking of User Services or CACTUS - to provide and remove services based on official University student and employee data. Without hiring additional staff, our Information Technology Services Accounts Office now provides access to 120,000 users. In addition, we can provide specifically requested access to certain services based on class registration or any aspect of a user's affiliation with the University.Best of all, the structure of CACTUS allows us to look toward the future. We expect to further automate special requests so that manual entry will be a thing of the past. Also, we are now in a position to be able to expand our services to even more users. Our future plans are to extend some degree of services to potential applicants of the University, alumni, and anyone else who may wish to connect with Penn State electronically.

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a cheap, portable haptic device for a method to relay 2-d texture-enriched graphical information to individuals who are visually impaired This paper considers the development of a haptic device needed for a method of relaying 2-D texture enriched graphical information. The focus here is on the conversion of the optical, color-based representation of the formatted diagram, which is efficient for storage and distribution, to its haptic texture enriched form. For this, the device has two main components, an RGB color sensor and piezoelectric actuator, mounted in a casing that is wrapped around the finger. The resulting device has a spatial sensitivity (

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haptic rendering
texture rendering
tactile devices and display


A commonsense knowledge base supported multi-agent architecture As the global communication and knowledge exchange between different domains in multi-agent systems (MAS) becomes more important, domain-specific knowledge can no longer solely support reasoning in MAS, whereas commonsense knowledge becomes more critical to the reasoning quality. Incorporating the commonsense knowledge bases (CKB) is at the cutting edge of this field. We are interested in how to reuse CKB in multi-agent systems architectures. Our target is to identify the best way, in terms or efficiency and effectiveness, for MAS to reason with the support of the commonsense knowledge base. In this study, we analyze the reasons for and feasibility of commonsense knowledge reuse in MAS during the knowledge management process, and investigate the commonsense knowledge base-supported MAS architecture design. Four possible approaches to incorporating commonsense knowledge into MAS, with either homogeneous or heterogeneous data, are proposed and tested with the same scenario. The performances have been evaluated using standardized metrics. After comparing the results, one approach is recommended and justifications are given, which constitutes the main contribution of this paper. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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 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

multi-agent architecture
intelligent agents


A computational framework for analyzing the dynamic response of glassy polymers A framework is presented for analyzing the low temperature inelastic behavior of amorphous glassy polymers with full account taken of finite deformations and inertial effects. Two classes of viscoplastic constitutive equations are explored: rate-sensitive DruckerPrager type models and an elaborate macromolecular model. These constitutive equations are integrated using a forward gradient time integration scheme. The capabilities of the framework are illustrated by finite element solutions of initial/boundary-value problems under plane-strain conditions. The discretized equations of motion are integrated using a Newmark algorithm. Three illustrative benchmark problems are used to evaluate the proposed implementation: dynamic shear band formation and propagation in a polymer under compression, dynamic response of a polymer under impact and quasi-static response of a polymer composite plate with a hole under uniaxial tension along fibers.

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viscoplasticity
finite elements
explicit code


Parameter control in evolutionary algorithms The issue of controlling values of various parameters of an evolutionary algorithm is one of the most important and promising areas of research in evolutionary computation: It has a potential of adjusting the algorithm to the problem while solving the problem. In this paper we: 1) revise the terminology, which is unclear and confusing, thereby providing a classification of such control mechanisms, and 2) survey various forms of control which have been studied by the evolutionary computation community in recent years. Our classification covers the major forms of parameter control in evolutionary computation and suggests some directions for further research.

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evolutionary algorithms
parameter control


On the probabilistic behaviour of a heuristic algorithm for maximal Hamiltonian tours A heuristic algorithm for computing the longest Hamiltonian tour through a set of points in the plane is given in [S.P. Fekete, H. Meijer, A. Rohe, W. Tietze, Solving a hard problem to approximate and easy one: Good and fast heuristics for large geometric maximum matching and maximum traveling salesman problems, Journal of Experimental Algorithms 7 (2002), article 11]. Asymptotically the value of the heuristic solution is guaranteed to be within a factor of 3 / 2 of the optimal solution. It was shown experimentally that the algorithm does often find solutions that are much closer to the optimal answers. In this paper we will show that in practice the heuristic algorithm is better than the 3 / 2 bound suggests. We will prove that the heuristic algorithm is ?-optimal with a probability that approaches 1 as the input becomes a larger and larger set of points drawn from a balanced distribution.

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approximation algorithms
longest hamiltonian cycle
geometric algorithms


A lemma on binomial coefficients and applications to Lee weights modulo 2(e) of codes over Z(4) In this work, we prove that if C is a free Z(4)-module of rank k in Z(4)(n), and j is an element of Z and e >= 1, then the number of codewords in C with Lee weight congruent to j modulo 2(e) is divisible by 2[k-2(e-2)/2(e-2)]. We prove this result by introducing a lemma and applying the lemma in one of the theorems proved by Wilson. The method used is different than the one used in our previous work on Lee weight enumerators in which more general results were obtained. Moreover, Wilson's methods are used to prove that the results obtained are sharp by calculating the power of 2 that divides the number of codewords in the trivial code Z(4)(k) with Lee weight congruent to j modulo 2(e).

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