Algebraic properties for selector functions The nondeterministic advice complexity of the P-selective sets is known to be exactly linear. Regarding the deterministic advice complexity of the P-selective sets - i.e., the amount of Karp-Lipton advice needed for polynomial-time machines to recognize them in general - the best current upper bound is quadratic [K. Ko, J. Comput. System Sci., 26 (1983), pp. 209 - 221] and the best current lower bound is linear [L. Hemaspaandra and L. Torenvliet, Theoret. Comput. Sci., 154 (1996), pp. 367 - 377]. We prove that every associatively P-selective set is commutatively, associatively P-selective. Using this, we establish an algebraic sufficient condition for the P-selective sets to have a linear upper bound ( which thus would match the existing lower bound) on their deterministic advice complexity: If all P-selective sets are associatively P-selective, then the deterministic advice complexity of the P-selective sets is linear. The weakest previously known sufficient condition was P = NP. We also establish related results for algebraic properties of, and advice complexity of, the non-deterministically selective sets.

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

selector functions
advice complexity
algebraic properties

computational complexity theory
p-selectivity
np-selectivity
nondeterministic selectivity
nonuniform complexity
semifeasible computation
associativity
commutativity
immunity
printability
tournaments
digraphs


LEADER-FOLLOWING CONSENSUS OF MULTIPLE LINEAR SYSTEMS UNDER SWITCHING TOPOLOGIES: AN AVERAGING METHOD The leader-following consensus of multiple linear time invariant (LTI) systems under switching topology is considered. The leader-following consensus problem consists of designing for each agent a distributed protocol to make all agents track a leader vehicle, which has the same LTI dynamics as the agents. The interaction topology describing the information exchange of these agents is time-varying. An averaging method is proposed. Unlike the existing results in the literatures which assume the LTI agents to be neutrally stable, we relax this condition, only making assumption that the LTI agents are stablizable and detectable. Observer-based leader-following consensus is also considered.

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


An algorithm for automatic capturing of the font outlines A new technique and an algorithm have been designed which are meant to automatically capture the outlines of fonts. A more flexible class of Bzier cubic (generalized Hermite cubic) functions are the basis of this technique. This class of functions involves two families of control parameters, to produce more flexible shapes than ordinary Hermite or Bzier cubics, in each segment. These functions, together with the control parameters, are utilized in an optimal way to fit a design curve to the data arose from the boundaries of the fonts. The optimal technique has used various ideas for curve design. These ideas include end-point interpolation, detection of characteristic points, least-squares method, recursive subdivision, and parametrization. The final shape is achieved as a generalized Hermite spline with GC1 smoothness.

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


Modeling Consumer Purchasing Behavior in Social Shopping Communities with Clickstream Data Social shopping communities (SSCs) evolve from a linkage of social networking and online shopping. Apart from direct shopping features in shopbots (e. g., search fields), SSCs additionally offer user-generated social shopping features. These include recommendation lists, ratings, styles (i.e., assortments arranged by users), tags, and user profiles. Purchases can be made by following a link to a participating online shop ("clickout"). SSCs are experiencing high growth rates in consumer popularity (e. g., Polyvore attracts more than 6 million unique visitors per month). Thus, this business model has received considerable venture capital in recent years. By analyzing clickstream data, we investigate which factors, especially social shopping features, are significant for predicting purchasing behavior within SSCs. Our logit model includes about 2.73 million visiting sessions and shows that social shopping features exert a significant impact, both positive and negative. Tags and high ratings have a positive impact on a click-out. In contrast, the more lists and styles used, the less likely the user is to make a click-out. Yet, lists and styles seem to enhance site stickiness and browsing. Moreover, the more direct shopping features that are used, the less likely the user is to conduct a click-out. Increasing transaction costs and information overload could be potential reasons. We also found that community members are more likely to make a click-out than ordinary users. This implies that community members are more profitable.

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

online consumer purchasing behavior
user-generated content
virtual community


A casual model for using collaborative technologies to facilitate student team projects Colleges of business are particularly known for using team projects as a means of enhancing student learning. Though students may assemble in one location for traditional, classroom-based learning, time and distance may create challenges as students attempt to fulfill requirements associated with team projects. This study explores the use of collaborative technologies found in common course management systems (e.g. Blackboard(C) and WebCT(C)) and community sites (e.g. MSN Communities(C)) as a means to address logistic and material organizational problems associated with team projects in colleges of business. Specifically, this study uses qualitative inquiry of team stakeholders to compare perceptions of the use of collaborative technologies from both a user and non-user perspective. Through this process, a causal model was developed to identify potential net benefits from the use of collaborative technologies, as well as antecedents to the outcomes in order to facilitate current understanding, as well as future research.

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

team projects
collaborative technologies
net benefits


digital energy metering for electrical system management Electrical energy metering is investigated due to the demand for energy efficiency. The scope was digital DC metering (AC later), in a cost effective and accurate manner. Accurate voltage, current and time values were necessary. Detailed algorithms were needed and created. An energy calibrator system was designed with two Agilent meters, an RTO-B sense resistor, and a PC interface (Visual Basic). A prototype meter was designed using the MSP430 microcontroller and BVS-M sense resistor (1m?), and was tested. Special attention had to be given to the MSP430's embedded 16-bit ADC and op-amp system which was complicated, yet powerful. From the MSP430, a highly functional, low cost energy meter was realized.

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

microcontroller
digital
sense resistor
msp430
meter
energy


Topologically guaranteed bivariate solutions of under-constrained multivariate piecewise polynomial systems ? A subdivision algorithm for 2-DOF nonlinear algebraic systems. Topologically guaranteed subdivision termination criteria in Rn R n , n?3 n ? 3 . A tessellation method for two-manifolds in Rn R n .

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

subdivision solvers
polynomial equations
implicit surfaces
b-spline basis functions


A stabilised PetrovGalerkin formulation for linear tetrahedral elements in compressible, nearly incompressible and truly incompressible fast dynamics A mixed second order stabilised PetrovGalerkin finite element framework was recently introduced by the authors (Lee et al., 2014) [46]. The new mixed formulation, written as a system of conservation laws for the linear momentum and the deformation gradient, performs extremely well in bending dominated scenarios (even when linear tetrahedral elements are used) yielding equal order of convergence for displacements and stresses. In this paper, this formulation is further enhanced for nearly and truly incompressible deformations with three key novelties. First, a new conservation law for the Jacobian of the deformation is added into the system providing extra flexibility to the scheme. Second, a variationally consistent PetrovGalerkin stabilisation methodology is derived. Third, an adapted fractional step method is presented for both incompressible and nearly incompressible materials in the context of nonlinear elastodynamics. For completeness and ease of understanding, these three improvements are presented both in small and large strain regimes, studying the eigenstructure of the resulting systems. A series of numerical examples are presented in order to demonstrate the robustness of the enhanced methodology with respect to the work previously published by the authors.

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

fast dynamics
petrovgalerkin
fractional step
incompressible


Modeling learned categorical perception in human vision A long standing debate in cognitive neuroscience has been the extent to which perceptual processing is influenced by prior knowledge and experience with a task. A converging body of evidence now supports the view that a task does influence perceptual processing, leaving us with the challenge of understanding the locus of, and mechanisms underpinning, these influences. An exemplar of this influence is learned categorical perception (CP), in which there is superior perceptual discrimination of stimuli that are placed in different categories. Psychophysical experiments on humans have attempted to determine whether early cortical stages of visual analysis change as a result of learning a categorization task. However, while some results indicate that changes in visual analysis occur, the extent to which earlier stages of processing are changed is still unclear. To explore this issue, we develop a biologically motivated neural model of hierarchical vision processes consisting of a number of interconnected modules representing key stages of visual analysis, with each module learning to exhibit desired local properties through competition. With this system level model, we evaluate whether a CP effect can be generated with task influence to only the later stages of visual analysis. Our model demonstrates that task learning in just the later stages is sufficient for the model to exhibit the CP effect, demonstrating the existence of a mechanism that requires only a high-level of task influence. However, the effect generalizes more widely than is found with human participants, suggesting that changes to earlier stages of analysis may also be involved in the human CP effect, even if these are not fundamental to the development of CP. The model prompts a hybrid account of task-based influences on perception that involves both modifications to the use of the outputs from early perceptual analysis along with the possibility of changes to the nature of that early analysis itself.

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

modular neural networks
hebbian learning


Leakage current reduction in VLSI systems There is a growing need to analyze and optimize the stand-by component of power in digital circuits designed for portable and battery-powered applications. Since these circuits remain in stand-by (or sleep) mode significantly longer than in active mode, their stand-by current, and not their active switching current, determines their battery life. Hence, stringent specifications are being placed on the stand-by (or leakage) current drawn by such devices. As the power supply voltage is reduced, the threshold voltage of transistors is scaled down to maintain a constant switching speed. Since reducing the threshold voltage increases the leakage of a device exponentially, leakage current has become a dominant factor in the design of VLSI circuits. In this paper, we describe a method that uses simultaneous dynamic voltage scaling (DVS) and adaptive body biasing (ABB) to reduce the total power consumption of a processor under dynamic computational workloads. Analytical models of the leakage current, dynamic power, and frequency as a function of supply voltage and body bias are derived and verified with SPICE simulation. Given these models, we show how to derive an analytical expression for the optimal trade-off between supply voltage and body bias, given a required clock frequency and duration of operation. The proposed method is then applied to a processor and is compared with DVS alone for workloads obtained using real-time monitoring of processor utilization for four typical applications.

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

dynamic voltage scaling
adaptive body biasing


On minimum divergence adaptation of discrete bivariate distributions to given marginals This correspondence considers the class P of discrete bivariate distributions p with marginals a(p), b(p) and the subclass P-a,P-b subset of P of distributions with given marginals a and b. For an arbitrary q is an element of P we study the distributions (p) over tilde is an element of P-a,P-b minimizing on P-a,P-b various phi-divergences D-phi (p, q) for convex phi with finite phi(0).

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

approximation of contingency tables
bivariate discrete distributions
hellinger divergence
information divergence
minimization of divergences
pearson divergence


on-line large screen display system for computer instruction This paper is concerned with a new instructional method to teach computer programming techniques to students in Computer Science as well as other scientific and non-scientific disciplines. Several courses in the Computer Science curriculum could be substantially enhanced if the instructional gap between the classroom lecture and the computer programming excercises could be eliminated. Rochester Institute of Technology has experimented to achieve this objective by means of an on-line large screen display system which will permit the instructors to perform classroom demonstrations to emphasize the key point of concepts or example of applications to a class of students through a keyboard with a computer. This new instructional method will eliminate deficiencies in conventional chalkboard approaches which result in material being covered too fast to be digested by the students or the course content to be diluted to match the pace of the class.

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

computer science
point
applications
method
instruction
material
paper
computer programming
class

contention
examples
systems
technologies
computation
matching
concept
object
demonstrate
computer science curriculum
student


A review of protein-small molecule docking methods The binding of small molecule ligands to large protein targets is central to numerous biological processes. The accurate prediction of the binding modes between the ligand and protein, (the docking problem) is of fundamental importance in modern structure-based drug design. An overview of current docking techniques is presented with a description of applications including single docking experiments and the virtual screening of databases.

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

lead optimisation
molecular docking
protein-ligand complexes
scoring


Fuzzy class logistic regression analysis Distribution mixtures are used as models to analyze grouped data. The estimation of parameters is an important step for mixture distributions. The latent class model is generally used as the analysis of mixture distributions for discrete data. In this paper, we consider the parameter estimation for a mixture of logistic regression models. We know that the expectation maximization (EM) algorithm was most used for estimating the parameters of logistic regression mixture models. In this paper, we propose a new type of fuzzy class model and then derive an algorithm for the parameter estimation of a fuzzy class logistic regression model. The effects of the explanatory variables on the response variables are described. The focus is on binary responses for the logistic regression mixture analysis with a fuzzy class model. An algorithm, called a fuzzy classification maximum likelihood (FCML), is then created. The mean squared error (MSE) based accuracy criterion for the FCML and EM algorithms to the parameter estimation of logistic regression mixture models are compared using the samples drawn from logistic regression mixtures of two classes. Numerical results show that the proposed FCML algorithm presents good accuracy and is recommended as a new tool for the parameter estimation of the logistic regression mixture models.

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

latent class
fuzzy class
parameter estimation

fuzzy set
fuzzy clustering
generalized linear model
mixture logistic regression model


an electric fence for kernel buffers Improper access of data buffers is one of the most common errors in programs written in assembler, C, C++, and several other languages. Existing programs and OSs frequently access the data beyond the allocated buffers or access buffers that were already freed. Such programs and OSs may run for years before their problems can be detected because improper memory accesses frequently result in a silent data corruption. Not surprisingly, most computer worms exploit buffer overflow errors to gain complete control over computer systems. Only after recent worm epidemics, did code developers begin to realize the scale of the problem and the number of potential memory-access violations in existing code.Due to the syntax and flexibility of many programming languages, memory access violation problems cannot be detected at compile time. Tools that verify correctness before every memory access impose unacceptably high overheads. As a result, most of the developed techniques focus on preventing the hijacking of control by hackers and worms due to stack overflows. Consequently, hidden data corruption is given less attention.Memory access violations can be efficiently detected using the hardware support of the paging and virtual memory.Kefence is the general run-time solution we developed that allows to detect and avoid in-kernel overflow, underflow, and stale access problems for internal kernel buffers. Kefence is especially applicable to file system code because file systems operate at a high level of abstraction and require no direct access to the physical memory. At the same time, file systems use a large number of kernel buffers and file system errors are most harmful for users because users' persistent data can be corrupted.

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


Social media institutionalization in the U.S. federal government Social media adoption changes the existing organizational technology paradigm of public sector organizations. This paper explains the internal decisions that are necessary before new technologies can be used to support the strategic mission of a government organization and which behavioral and technological changes are integrated into the organization's standard operating procedures. This is an important theoretical contribution, because social media technologies are developed and hosted by third parties outside of government, with government's role limited to reactively evaluating their internal needs, strategic alignment, and existing routines. Evidence from qualitative interviews with social media directors in the U.S. federal government and a digital ethnography of their online practices expand the existing theory of social media adoption by adding two distinct activities: strategic alignment and routinization which lead to the institutionalization of new technologies.

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

new technology adoption
u.s. federal government


incorporating issues of fairness into development of a multi-agent negotiation support system One of the major concerns raised by people using Negotiation Support Systems is about the fairness of the process. Individuals undertake negotiation to derive better outcomes than could be obtained from conflict and litigation. Thus they often engage in interest based negotiation. But interest based negotiation focuses upon the interests of disputants rather than upon objective measures of fairness or justice. For example in family law, differences in power between men and women may lead to negotiated results that favor men. Bargaining imbalances can thus produce unfair results unless mediators or Negotiation Support Systems overcome them. It is thus vital to incorporate measures to address fairness in the development of Negotiation Support Systems. The paper describes the development of a multi-agent based Negotiation Support System designed to assist disputants to achieve legally fairer negotiated outcomes. The system uses a Bayesian Belief Network and Artificial Intelligence techniques to incorporate Best Alternatives to Negotiated Agreements into an integrative bargaining process. Through this system, we aim to demonstrate how principles of legal fairness can be applied in Australian Family Law.

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

bayesian belief networks
integrative negotiation
multi-agent systems
negotiation supports systems
batnas


Dual Functions of Rift Valley Fever Virus NSs Protein: Inhibition of Host mRNA Transcription and Post-transcriptional Downregulation of Protein Kinase PKR Rift Valley fever virus (RVFV), which belongs to the genus Phlebovirus, family Bunyaviridae, is a negative-stranded RNA virus carrying a single-stranded, tripartite RNA genome. RVFV is an important zoonotic pathogen transmitted by mosquitoes and causes large outbreaks among ruminants and humans in Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. Human patients develop an acute febrile illness, followed by a fatal hemorrhagic fever, encephalitis, or ocular diseases. A viral nonstructural protein, NSs, is a major viral virulence factor. Past studies showed that NSs suppresses the transcription of host mRNAs, including interferon-? mRNAs. Here we demonstrated that the NSs protein induced post-transcriptional downregulation of dsRNA-dependent protein kinase (PKR), to prevent phosphorylation of eIF2? and promoted viral translation in infected cells. These two biological activities of the NSs most probably have a synergistic effect in suppressing host innate immune functions and facilitate efficient viral replication in infected mammalian hosts.

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

rift valley fever virus
pkr
nss protein
interferon


redesigning traditional media and assessing entertainment value with online comics As traditional media make the transition to the web, the need for a systematic way of assessing the entertainment value of interfaces becomes increasingly important. In this paper we describe an experiment using online manipulations of traditional paper comic books to a) evaluate the effectiveness of different online presentations of a traditional entertainment medium and b) contrast systematic evaluation methods for assessing entertainment value. Paper comic books were transferred online and manipulated in two ways: the degree of user control in advancing through the story ("user control") and the amount of the original page presented on the screen at a one time ("visual scope"). We used a combination of methods to measure entertainment value: pre and post questionnaires, active experience surveys, facial expression analysis, heart rate measurement and time spent on the interface. From this study, it was determined that the most successful way of presenting comic books online is by giving the user full control over the navigation ("manual" condition), and by presenting each comic book page panel by panel ("panel in page" condition). The most effective and practical way for assessing entertainment value, according to the results of this study, is the use of post questionnaires, and either active experience surveys or facial expression analysis.

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


Acoustic chemometrics for fluid flow quantifications - II: A small constriction will go a long way A new approach for non-invasive quantitative measurement of volume flow rare, multicomponent mixture concentrations as well as density and other physico-chemical intensive parameters of liquid mixtures flowing in pipelines is presented, based on novel application extensions of the well-known orifice plate principle (extensively used for flow measurement in pipes). By deliberately transgressing the conventional usage limits, the orifice plate configuration may now also be used for a range of new measurement types, all based on acoustic sensor technology. R&D has been carried out since 1987 by Sensorteknikk A/S and since 1994 in collaboration with ACRG. The acoustic chemometrics concept is characterized by easy 'clamp-on' deployment of acoustic sensors (primarily accelerometers), followed by an essential, integrated signal analysis/multivariate calibration data modelling, well known from chemometrics. The signal analysis step in this endeavour is often critical although rarely outside conventional electrical engineering scopes. We present three fluid/fluid or fluid/solid mixture application type cases: (1) trace oil-in-water determination (representing one-analyte systems); (2) jet-fuel/ glycol mixture determination (representing two-analyte systems); (3) paper-pulp constituent(s) determination (representing analyte-interferents systems). We also describe extension studies of these first quantitative acoustic chemometrics forays, e.g. for alternative measurement of(conventional) flow velocities of both fluid/fluid and fluid/solid (slurries) systems (average volume flow rate of heterogeneous multiphase systems), for flow regime characterization and for measurement of the effective in-line density of (fluid/fluid and fluid/solid) mixtures. There would appear to be a vast potential for technological and industrial applications of this new type of acoustic chemometric process and product characterization/monitering. Copyright (C) 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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

acoustic sensor technology
acoustic chemometrics
chemometrics
industrial applications

orifice plate extensions
multivariate calibration
analyte predictions
measurement technology


Synaptic potentiation and depression in Al:HfO2-based memristor An Al:HfO2 memristor emulates the strength change observed in biological synapses. The memristor is self-compliant, so there is no need of external current limitation. A train of identical pulses is applied to the memristor to change its conductance. Pulses with proper voltagetime width gradually change the memristor conductance.

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

hfo2
resistive switching
artificial synapse
synaptic plasticity
memristive device


General framework for mining, processing and storing large amounts of electronic texts for language modeling purposes The paper describes a general framework for mining large amounts of text data from a defined set of Web pages. The acquired data are meant to constitute a corpus for training robust and reliable language models and thus the framework needs to also incorporate algorithms for appropriate text processing and duplicity detection in order to secure quality and consistency of the data. As we expect the resulting corpus to be very large, we have also implemented topic detection algorithms that allow us to automatically select subcorpora for domain-specific language models. The description of the framework architecture and the implemented algorithms is complemented with a detailed evaluation section. It analyses the basic properties of the gathered Czech corpus containing more than one billion text tokens collected using the described framework, shows the results of the topic detection methods and finally also describes the design and outcomes of the automatic speech recognition experiments with domain-specific language models estimated from the collected data.

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 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


Solving longest common subsequence and related problems on graphical processing units Modern graphical processing units (GPUs) offer much more computational power than modern central processing units. Therefore, it is natural that GPUs are applied not only for their original purposes, but also for general processing (GPGPU). In the field of sequence processing, one of the most important problems is the measuring of sequence similarity. There are many sequence similarity measures, e.g. edit distance, longest common subsequence length, and their derivatives. We examine the possibility of speeding up the algorithms computing some of them. We chose three measures useful in different situations. The experimental results show that the GPU versions of the examined algorithms are faster than their serial counterparts by a factor between 4 and 65. Copyright (C) 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

O B I I 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 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

longest common subsequence
graphical processing units

constrained longest common subsequence
transposition invariance
general processing using gpu
cuda


design and performance evaluation of a web-based multi-tier federated system for a catalogue of life In the SPICE (SPecies 2000 Interoperability Co-ordination Environment) project, we are designing and evaluating a web-based multi-tier federated system, intended as a scalable infrastructure for a globally distributed federated database of biological knowledge. It is designed to harness specialist expertise on classification of individual groups of organisms to form a 'catalogue of life' of high taxonomic quality, and to solve problems of heterogeneity, scale and component database unreliability while providing a reconfigurable, flexible, cost-effective Internet online gateway to the distributed catalogue. This paper outlines our design and design rationale, explaining how our multi-tier federated approach makes maintenance of a consistent classification easier. We present the conceptual architecture and several intelligent agents prototyped to improve system performance with respect to scalability, stability and adaptability, and discuss the evaluation of this system. Our most important finding is that a knowledge based search using suitable caching techniques will effectively reduce the response time unless the core system is excessively loaded.

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

multi-tier
federated information system
biodiversity informatics


A Fourier domain framework for variational image registration Image registration is a widely used task in image analysis, having applications in various fields. Its classical formulation is usually given in the spatial domain. In this paper, a novel theoretical framework defined in the frequency domain is proposed for approaching the multidimensional image registration problem. The variational minimization of the joint energy functional is performed entirely in the frequency domain, leading to a simple formulation and design, and offering important computational savings if the multidimensional FFT algorithm is used. Therefore the proposed framework provides more efficient implementations of the most common registration methods than already existing approaches, adding simplicity to the variational image registration formulation and allowing for an easy extension to higher dimensions by using the multidimensional Fourier transform of discrete multidimensional signals. The new formulation also provides an interesting framework to design tailor-made regularization models apart from the classical, spatial domain based schemes. Simulation examples validate the theoretical results.

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 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 O O O O O O O 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 methods
fourier transforms
multidimensional signal processing


Variational Bayesian sparse additive matrix factorization Principal component analysis (PCA) approximates a data matrix with a low-rank one by imposing sparsity on its singular values. Its robust variant can cope with spiky noise by introducing an element-wise sparse term. In this paper, we extend such sparse matrix learning methods, and propose a novel framework called sparse additive matrix factorization (SAMF). SAMF systematically induces various types of sparsity by a Bayesian regularization effect, called model-induced regularization. Although group LASSO also allows us to design arbitrary types of sparsity on a matrix, SAMF, which is based on the Bayesian framework, provides inference without any requirement for manual parameter tuning. We propose an efficient iterative algorithm called the mean update (MU) for the variational Bayesian approximation to SAMF, which gives the global optimal solution for a large subset of parameters in each step. We demonstrate the usefulness of our method on benchmark datasets and a foreground/background video separation problem.

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

variational bayes
robust pca
model-induced regularization


A hierarchical model for automatic nuchal translucency detection from ultrasound images The nuchal translucency (NT) thickness is an important parameter in the diagnosis of fetuses. The previous computerized methods often require manual operations to select the NT region, which leads to the time-consuming problem and the detection variability. In the paper, a hierarchical model is proposed for the automated detection of the NT region. Three discriminative classifiers are first trained with Gaussian pyramids to represent the NT, head and body of fetuses respectively. Then a spatial model is proposed to denote the spatial constrains among them. Finally the dynamic programming and generalized distance transform are applied for the inference from the proposed model, which ensures that the optimal solution can be obtained for the NT detection. The direction problem of fetuses is resolved by the introduced OR node. The performance of the proposed model is verified by the experimental results of 690 clinical NT ultrasound images.

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

ultrasound images
hierarchical model
spatial model

fetal nuchal translucency
support vector machine


Financial planning via multi-stage stochastic optimization This paper describes a framework for modeling significant financial planning problems based on multi-stage optimization under uncertainty. Applications include risk management for institutions, banks, government entities, pension plans, and insurance companies. The approach also applies to individual investors who are interested in integrating investment choices with savings and borrowing strategies. A dynamic discrete-time structure addresses realistic financial issues. The resulting stochastic program is enormous by current computer standards, but it possesses a special structure that lends itself to parallel and distributed optimization algorithms. Interior-point methods are particularly attractive. Solving these stochastic programs presents a major challenge for the computational operations research and computer science community. The globalization of financial markets and the introduction of complex products such as exotic derivatives have increased volatility and risks. Strides in computer and information technology has eliminated any delays between the occurrence of an event and the impact on the marketswithin the home country and internationally. Thus there is a great need for an integrative approach to financial analysis and planning that encompasses the decisional environment as well as the stochastic elements in a dynamic fashion. The financial optimization model presented here incorporates several popular approaches to the problem of investment strategies, including stochastic programming and dynamic stochastic control.

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

financial optimization
stochastic programming


Local procrustes for manifold embedding: a measure of embedding quality and embedding algorithms We present the Procrustes measure, a novel measure based on Procrustes rotation that enables quantitative comparison of the output of manifold-based embedding algorithms such as LLE (Roweis and Saul, Science 290(5500), 2323-2326, 2000) and Isomap (Tenenbaum et al., Science 290(5500), 2319-2323, 2000). The measure also serves as a natural tool when choosing dimension-reduction parameters. We also present two novel dimension-reduction techniques that attempt to minimize the suggested measure, and compare the results of these techniques to the results of existing algorithms. Finally, we suggest a simple iterative method that can be used to improve the output of existing algorithms.

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

dimension reducing
manifold learning
procrustes analysis
local pca
simulated annealing


Business process redesign in healthcare: Towards a structured approach This paper focuses on the potential contribution of Business Process Redesign to society's demand for decreasing costs of healthcare. Our focus is on the reduction of throughput times and service times by exploiting business process redesign techniques, i.e. rules of thumb that aim to optimise the business process by improving its tasks, its routing structure, the resource organisation, etc. We define a redesign approach based on a set of existing redesign heuristics (Reijers, 2003) and apply this approach in a mental healthcare case. We show seven alternative redesigns for an intake process and evaluate their impact on throughput times and service times. Our conclusion is that the approach is feasible and results in a fruitful input for the organisation in question. This result is in line with results from the evolutionary approach of (Buchanan, 1998). The application of best practices in the mental healthcare setting shows its potency in this specific context and very similar settings. A next necessary step towards a wider application in healthcare seems to be a more structured method on how to select or combine an effective set of best practices for a specific medical context.

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

mental health care
process reengineering
throughput time


the design of an apl primitive function for the eigenproblem This is a proposal for the addition to APL of a primitive function to solve the generalized algebraic eigenvalue problem. After a discussion of the issues involved in the design a specific proposal is given which suggests the use of the QZ algorithm as the basis of a primitive to find both eigenvalues and eigenvectors. An APL workspace which simulates the proposal primitive is described and examples of its use are given.

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

apl
eigenvalue problem
use
examples
algorithm
eigenvalues
design


Using content analysis to investigate the research paths chosen by scientists over time We present an application of a clustering technique to a large original dataset of SCI publications which is capable at disentangling the different research lines followed by a scientist, their duration over time and the intensity of effort devoted to each of them. Information is obtained by means of software-assisted content analysis, based on the co-occurrence of words in the full abstract and title of a set of SCI publications authored by 650 American star-physicists across 17years. We estimated that scientists in our dataset over the time span contributed on average to 16 different research lines lasting on average 3.5years and published nearly 5 publications in each single line of research. The technique is potentially useful for scholars studying science and the research community, as well as for research agencies, to evaluate if the scientist is new to the topic and for librarians, to collect timely biographic information.

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

academic scientists
semantic search
research trajectories
knowledge development


A methodology for transferring principles of plant movements to elastic systems in architecture Plant movements. Kinetic structures. Biomimetics. Facade shading. Compliant mechanisms.

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

plant movements
kinetic structures
biomimetics
facade shading
compliant mechanisms


A genetic algorithm for assessing flatness in automated manufacturing systems The measurement of flatness for manufactured parts is one of the most frequently used procedures in automated manufacturing systems. Measuring instruments are commonly utilized in taking measurement data from manufactured surfaces for inspection purposes. The measurement data is then used to evaluate the geometric information, from errors associated with its surface. The study proposes the computational approaches for flatness with respect to ASME Y14.5M-1994 standard. The proposed methods consider the trade-off between the accuracy of flatness and the efficiency of inspection. Two approaches of computational metrology based on genetic algorithms are proposed to explore the optimality of flatness measurement and the flatness feasibility analysis. The results show that the optimization algorithms provide exact flatness errors and adequate tolerance size.

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

minimum zone flatness
non-linear programs


Online self-management interventions for chronically ill patients: Cognitive impairment and technology issues As the fraction of the population with chronic diseases continues to grow, methods and/or technologies must be found to help the chronically ill to take more responsibility to self-manage their illnesses. Internet based and/or mobile support for disease self-management interventions have often proved effective, but patients with chronic illnesses may have co-occurring cognitive impairment, making it more difficult for them to cope with technologies. Many older patients are also not familiar with technologies or they may have cognitive disabilities or dementia that reduce their ability to self-manage their healthcare. On-line solutions to the needs of chronically ill patients must be investigated and acted upon with care in an integrated manner, since resources invested in these solutions will be lost if patients do not adopt and continue to use them successfully. To review the capabilities of online and mobile support for self-management of chronic illnesses, and the impacts that age and disease-related issues have on these interventions, including cognitive impairment and lack of access or familiarity with Internet or mobile technologies. This study includes a review of the co-occurrence of cognitive impairment with chronic diseases, and discusses how cognitive impairment, dyadic caregiver patient support, patient efficacy with technology, and smart home technologies can impact the effectiveness and sustainability of online support for disease self-management. Disease self-management interventions (SMIs) using online patient centered support can often enable patients to manage their own chronic illnesses. However, our findings show that cognitive impairment often co-occurs in patients with chronic disease. This, along with age-related increases in multiple chronic illnesses and lack of technology efficacy, can be obstacles to Internet and mobile support for chronic disease self-management. Patients with chronic diseases may have greater than expected difficulties in using Internet and mobile technologies for disease self-management, often due to cognitive impairment or unfamiliarity with technology. Approaches to dealing with such barriers include suitable integration of solutions involving patientcaregiver dyads, better design of online applications, careful attention to technology adoption and sustainability, and smart home technologies.

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

chronic disease
cognitive impairment
caregiver
technology adoption
internet

health self care
smart homes
mobile technology


SimpleGrid toolkit: Enabling geosciences gateways to cyberinfrastructure Cyberinfrastructure science and engineering gateways have become an important modality to connect science and engineering communities and cyberinfrastructure. The use of cyberinfrastructure through gateways is fundamental to the advancement of science and engineering. However, learning science gateway technologies and developing science gateways remain a significant challenge, given that science gateway technologies are still actively evolving and often include a number of sophisticated components. A geosciences gateway must be designed to accommodate legacy methods that geoscientists use in conventional computational tools. The research described in this paper establishes an open-source toolkit-SimpleGrid for learning and developing science gateways based on a service-oriented architecture using a component-based approach that allows flexible separation and integration of the components between geocomputation applications and cyberinfrastructure. The design and implementation of SimpleGrid is based on the National Science Foundation TeraGrid-a key element of the U.S. and world cyberinfrastructure. This paper illustrates our experience of using SimpleGrid and a spatial interpolation method in a tutorial to teach TeraGrid science gateways. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

cyberinfrastructure
science and engineering gateways
spatial interpolation

component-based software engineering
grid computing
service-oriented architecture


Protection throughout the Life Span The Indo-Tibetan tradition claims that proficiency in the suggested longevity practices of meditation, diet, and physical exercise (yoga), will result in profound anti-aging, stress-mediating and health enhancing effects. Western biomedical research has begun to demonstrate that the psychobiological states induced and cultivated by cognitive behavioral practices which are emblematic of those contained within the Indo-Tibetan tradition (hypnosis, meditation, visualization, systematic relaxation), indeed do have a profound impact on the body's protective and regulatory systems. Although continued study is necessary, much of the early research illuminating the mechanisms responsible for the life-span extending and health-enhancing effects of these cognitive behavioral practices points to the importance of their anti-inflammatory, anti-stress, and antioxidant effects as well as their impact in enhancing the production of endogenous substances that possess general longevity-enhancing, regenerative properties.

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 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


The competitive advantage of nations: An application to academia Theories of the competitive advantage of nations are applied academic disciplines. Countries display distinct combinations of revealed comparative advantage. Our Academic Diamond details factors likely to explain a country's research profile. A better understanding of the roots of academic competitiveness will become more important.

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

revealed comparative advantage
academic disciplines

essential science indicators
scientific productivity


On-demand Geographic Forwarding for data delivery in wireless sensor networks A purely on-demand network protocol, called On-demand Geographic Forwarding (OGF), is proposed for data delivery in large-scale and resource-constrained static wireless sensor networks with unreliable sensors. OGF is a cross-layer protocol that employs (i) an explicit contention scheme to establish a next-hop node in a distributed fashion, (ii) a simple scheme using a forwarding table to maintain the learned next-hop information, and (iii) a novel partial source routing scheme to handle communication voids. The operation of our protocol is based on the actual demands of the application, data traffic, and network dynamics. Packet-level simulations show that OGF exhibits a superior performance in terms of energy consumption, scalability, and void handling. Our study demonstrates that OGF is viable for efficient data delivery in the targeted sensor networks. (C) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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

sensor networks
geographic forwarding
data delivery


Design of Fast and Efficient Energy-Aware Gradient-Based Scheduling Algorithms for Heterogeneous Embedded Multiprocessor Systems In this paper, we present two heuristic energy-aware scheduling algorithms - 1) Energy Gradient-based Multiprocessor Scheduling (EGMS) algorithm and 2) Energy Gradient-based Multiprocessor Scheduling with Intratask Voltage scaling (EGMSIV) algorithm - for scheduling task precedence graphs in an embedded multiprocessor system having processing elements with dynamic voltage scaling capabilities. Unlike most energy-aware scheduling algorithms that consider task ordering and voltage scaling separately from task mapping, our algorithms consider them in an integrated way. EGMS uses the concept of energy gradient to select tasks to be mapped onto new processors and voltage levels. EGMSIV extends EGMS by introducing intratask voltage scaling using a Linear Programming (LP) formulation to further reduce the energy consumption. Through rigorous simulations, we compare the performance of our proposed algorithms with a few approaches presented in the literature. The results demonstrate that our algorithms are capable of obtaining energy-efficient schedules using less optimization time. On the average, our algorithms produce schedules which consume 10 percent less energy with more than 47 percent reduction in optimization time when compared to a few approaches presented in the literature. In particular, our algorithms perform better in generating energy-efficient schedules for larger task graphs. Our results show a reduction of up to 57 percent in energy consumption for larger task graphs compared to other 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 O O O O O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

energy-aware scheduling
power management
energy minimization
heterogeneous multiprocessor scheduling
embedded systems


Reconstructing relief surfaces This paper generalizes Markov Random Field (MRF) stereo methods to the generation of surface relief (height) fields rather than disparity or depth maps. This generalization enables the reconstruction of complete object models using the same algorithms that have been previously used to compute depth maps in binocular stereo. In contrast to traditional dense stereo where the parametrization is image based, here we advocate a parametrization by a height field over any base surface. In practice, the base surface is a coarse approximation to the true geometry, e.g., a bounding box, visual hull or triangulation of sparse correspondences, and is assigned or computed using other means. A dense set of sample points is defined on the base surface, each with a fixed normal direction and unknown height value. The estimation of heights for the sample points is achieved by a belief propagation technique. Our method provides a viewpoint independent smoothness constraint, a more compact parametrization and explicit handling of occlusions. We present experimental results on real scenes as well as a quantitative evaluation on an artificial scene.

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 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 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 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

stereo
reconstruction
mrf
belief propagation


An input-oriented super-efficiency measure in stochastic data envelopment analysis: Evaluating chief executive officers of US public banks and thrifts We develop an input-oriented super-efficiency measure in stochastic data envelopment analysis. A deterministic equivalent of the stochastic super-efficiency model is given. It is shown that this deterministic model can be converted to a quadratic program. Sensitivity analysis of the proposed super-efficiency model is discussed. The SNL Executive Compensation database is used to illustrate the methods developed in this article.

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

stochastic dea
super-efficiency
chance constraints


Cross-cultural comparison of interactivity and advertising appeals on antismoking web sites in the United States and South Korea Purpose - This study aims to examine the content of health promotional web sites in two culturally distinct countries, the USA and South Korea, by investigating the level of interactivity and types of advertising appeals presented on antismoking web sites. Design/methodology/approach - Antismoking web sites in the two countries were collected through the three major search engines (msn, Yahoo and Google) using relevant keywords. The final sample contained a total of 89 web sites (USA = 67, South Korea = 22) that met the condition of promoting antismoking behavior rather than just selling antismoking products. Three bilingual coders were hired for the analysis. Findings - The South Korean antismoking web sites presented significantly higher levels of interactivity than their USA counterparts. By contrast, there is hardly any differentiation between the two countries in the amount of advertising appeals used on the health web sites. Research limitations/implications - Even though antismoking is certainly an important global issue, the findings related to antismoking web sites may not be generalizable to various other health-related topics. Future research should replicate our findings on interactivity and advertising appeals in the context of various health issues. Practical implications - To cross-cultural researchers, the results provide more theoretical and practical rationales for cross-cultural differences beyond such well-known typologies as Hofstede's Individualism/Collectivism and Hall's high-low context. Originality/value - This study provided at least two useful findings for practitioners and researchers: better definition of the roles of cultural differences in the level of interactivity and the types of advertising appeals in promoting health information online and a broadening of the scope of cross-cultural advertising research to health promotional contexts online.

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

worldwide web
cigarettes
advertising media
cross-cultural studies
united states of america


classification-enhanced ranking Many have speculated that classifying web pages can improve a search engine's ranking of results. Intuitively results should be more relevant when they match the class of a query. We present a simple framework for classification-enhanced ranking that uses clicks in combination with the classification of web pages to derive a class distribution for the query. We then go on to define a variety of features that capture the match between the class distributions of a web page and a query, the ambiguity of a query, and the coverage of a retrieved result relative to a query's set of classes. Experimental results demonstrate that a ranker learned with these features significantly improves ranking over a competitive baseline. Furthermore, our methodology is agnostic with respect to the classification space and can be used to derive query classes for a variety of different taxonomies.

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


decentralized real-time monitoring of network-wide aggregates The traditional monitoring paradigm of network and systems management, characterized by a central entity polling individual devices, is not adequate for today's large-scale networked systems whose states and configurations are highly dynamic. We outline principles for monitoring such new systems and stress the need for protocols that continuously monitor network-wide aggregates. To keep the overhead at acceptable levels, such protocols must be tunable, e.g., allow controlling the trade-off between accuracy and overhead. We describe and compare two of our efforts in developing protocols for decentralized monitoring of aggregates; one is based on spanning trees, the other on gossiping.

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

tree-based protocols
gossip protocols
aggregation


An approach for the identification of diffusion coefficients in the quasi-steady state of a post-discharge nitriding process This work presents a model for the nitrogen concentration in iron nitride layers at the quasi-steady state and a method for computing the diffusion coefficients for post-discharge nitriding. The method is based upon an inverse problem of coefficient identification. The related moving boundary diffusion problem is modeled assuming constant diffusion coefficients and taking into account the observed qualitative behavior of the post-discharge nitriding process. To develop an algorithm for the identification of the diffusion coefficients the solution of the least square problem is transformed, with some algebraic manipulations, into a simple geometrical rule. (C) 2007 IMACS. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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

inverse problem
coefficient identification
diffusion


Design and implementation of a low-cost starlight optical tracker system with 500 Hz active tip/tilt control A cost-effective optical tilt corrector system has been developed to meet an experimental requirement [1]. The entire system can be assembled from scratch in only 12 weeks and delivers the following performance specifications: 500Hz useable closed-loop bandwidth; 1.7 mrad/V sensitivity; >10 mrad range; 25.4mm dia. mirror with quarter-wave optical quality.

O O O O O O O B 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 B O


Achieving the way for automated segmentation of nuclei in cancer tissue images through morphology-based approach: A quantitative evaluation In this paper we address the problem of nuclear segmentation in cancer tissue images, that is critical for specific protein activity quantification and for cancer diagnosis and therapy. We present a fully automated morphology-based technique able to perform accurate nuclear segmentations in images with heterogeneous staining and multiple tissue layers and we compare it with an alternate semi-automated method based on a well established segmentation approach, namely active contours. We discuss active contours limitations in the segmentation of immunohistochemical images and we demonstrate and motivate through extensive experiments the better accuracy of our fully automated approach compared to various active contours implementations.

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

tissue images
nuclear segmentation
active contours


Finite element analysis of superelastic, large deformation behavior of shape memory alloy helical springs Brinson's one-dimensional constitutive modeling for shape memory alloy (SMA) is extended to consider the asymmetric tensile and compressive behavior as well as the torsional behavior. The incremental finite element method using linear Timoshenko beam elements is formulated by the total Lagrangian approach for the superelastic, large deformation analysis of SMA helical springs. The NiTi helical springs are analyzed and the calculated results are compared with the experimental results to show the validity of the present computational procedure in actual design of SMA actuators.

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

finite element method
shape memory alloy
large deformation

computational mechanics
constitutive equation
superelasticity


An approximation algorithm for nonpreemptive scheduling on hypercube parallel task systems We study a generalization of the nonpreemptive scheduling problem on hypercube parallel task systems. We generalize the problem by limiting the maximum number of tasks that can be simultaneously executed. We describe a simple 3-approximation algorithm for this problem when speedup and execution times are monotone in the number of processors assigned to a task. (C) 1999 Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

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

nonpreemptive scheduling
parallel task systems


AUTOMATIC KNOWLEDGE LEARNING IN AN EXPERT SYSTEM FOR SPACE MANAGEMENT AND PLANNING A procedure of self-learning and knowledge reducing is described. It concerns the step of knowledge acquisition for an expert system for space management and planning. Section 1 gives a general presentation of the expert system. It underlines the main characteristics of the tool. Section 2 describes the problem of knowledge acquisition and internal representation: it underlines that experts often give different expressions for the same 'reality', so that it becomes necessary to define knowledge conflict resolution'. Section 3 explains the logical bases of self-learning and knowledge reducing: we propose: an index of consistency which 'evaluates' if two proposed rules are 'near' and can be reduced into a unique one, or not; an index of leadership which defines, while knowledge reducing, what is the 'predominant' rule; a 'compromise law' which makes the system able to operate this reducing. Section 4 briefly presents the developed procedure (Appendix 1 presents the corresponding algorithm).

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

knowledge acquisition-representation
possibility theory


An effective lower bound on Lmax L max in a worker-constrained job shop A common industrial operation is a dual resource constrained job shop where: (a) the objective is to minimize Lmax L max , the maximum job lateness; (b) machines are organized into groups; and (c) each worker is assigned to a specific machine group. Because this problem is NP-hard, finding optimal solutions by enumeration is impractical. This paper details a procedure to compute a lower bound on Lmax L max that will be used in follow-up work to effectively evaluate the absolute performance of heuristic solutions. Given an allocation of workers to machine groups, a lower bound on Lmax L max is first computed for each machine group using a network-flow formulation. The lower bound on Lmax L max for the job shop is the largest of the lower bounds for the machine groups. A search algorithm then finds a worker allocation yielding the smallest such lower bound on Lmax L max for the job shop; and the latter quantity is our proposed lower bound on Lmax L max . Given a worker allocation, we use the Virtual Factory (a heuristic scheduler developed by Hodgson et al. in 1998) to generate a schedule. Experiments with a wide variety of job shops indicated that the proposed lower bound on Lmax L max could often be achieved by a Virtual Factory schedule based on the worker allocation yielding this lower bound. However, there were problem instances for which other worker allocations enabled the Virtual Factory to generate better schedules. Follow-up work provides optimality criteria, and heuristics to find improved allocations if these criteria are not satisfied.

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

job shop scheduling
dual resource constrained systems
maximum lateness


Efficient median estimation for large-scale sensor RFID systems We consider the median estimation problem in a large-scale sensor augmented RFID system. The large-scale deployment of RFID technology has opened the door to innovative ways to integrate RFID and sensor technology. Sensor-tags are tags that can report over 50 types of physical information to a reader. The traditional way to obtain information from sensor-tags is to query each tag. When the number of tags is large, however, it is prohibitive to query tags individually due to the high delay. In this paper, we present a probabilistic algorithm to estimate the median of a set of sensor-RFID tags without individually querying each tag. The median estimation problem is solved using binary search. Our evaluation demonstrates that the median search algorithm exhibits high accuracy and reasonable time latency. Moreover, we also design an exact algorithm for the continuous median update problem. Our algorithm can incrementally compute the exact median in less time.

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

rfid tags
tcs
threshold checking scheme
continuous median update


Decentralized Guaranteed Cost Control for Large-Scale T-S Fuzzy Systems This paper studies the guaranteed cost control issues for the large-scale systems which are composed of Takagi-Sugeno (T-S) fuzzy subsystems with interconnections. A cost function is considered as the performance index for the system. By Lyapunov stability criterion and the parallel distributed compensation (PDC), some sufficient conditions are derived such that the large-scale fuzzy system is not only asymptotically stable but also cost-guaranteed. Furthermore, the interactive relations among the fuzzy subsystems are employed to relax previous results. The same ideas are also extended to the large-scale fuzzy system with uncertainty. Finally, two examples illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed criteria.

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


Robust smoothed analysis of a condition number for linear programming We perform a smoothed analysis of the GCC-condition number C(A) of the linear programming feasibility problem there exists x is an element of Rm+1 Ax is any matrix with rows (a) over bar (i) of euclidean norm 1 and, independently for all i, let a(i) be a random perturbation of (a) over bar (i) following the uniform distribution in the spherical disk in S-m of angular radius arcsin sigma and centered at (a) over bar (i). We prove that E(ln C(A)) = O(mn/sigma). A similar result was shown for Renegar's condition number and Gaussian perturbations by Dunagan et al. (Math Program Ser A, 2009). Our result is robust in the sense that it easily extends to radially symmetric probability distributions supported on a spherical disk of radius arcsin sigma, whose density may even have a singularity at the center of the perturbation. Our proofs combine ideas from a recent paper of Burgisser et al. (Math Comp 77(263), 2008) with techniques of Dunagan et al.

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

linear programming
perturbation
condition number
smoothed analysis


The envelope order spectrum based on generalized demodulation timefrequency analysis and its application to gear fault diagnosis The generalized demodulation timefrequency analysis is a novel signal processing method, which is particularly suitable for the processing of multi-component amplitude-modulated and frequency-modulated (AMFM) signals as it can decompose a multi-component signal into a set of single-component signals whose instantaneous frequencies own physical meaning. While fault occurs in gear, the vibration signals measured from gearbox would exactly display AMFM characteristics. Therefore, targeting the modulation feature of gear vibration signal in run-ups and run-downs, a fault diagnosis method in which generalized demodulation timefrequency analysis and envelope order spectrum technique are combined is put forward and applied to the transient analysis of gear vibration signal. Firstly the multi-component vibration signal of gear is decomposed into some mono-component signals using the generalized demodulation timefrequency analysis approach; secondly the envelope analysis is performed to each single-component signal; thirdly each envelope signal is re-sampled in angle domain; finally the spectrum analysis is applied to each re-sampled signal and the corresponding envelope order spectrum can be obtained. Furthermore, the gear working condition can be identified according to the envelope order spectrum. The analysis results from the simulation and experimental signals show that the proposed algorithm was effective in gear fault diagnosis.

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

generalized demodulation
timefrequency analysis
envelope order spectrum
gear
fault diagnosis


Identifying the security risks associated with governmental use of cloud computing Cloud computing, which refers to an emerging computing model where machines in large data centers can be used to deliver services in a scalable manner, has become popular for corporations in need of inexpensive, large scale computing. Recently, the United States government has begun to utilize cloud computing architectures, platforms, and applications to deliver services and meet the needs of their constituents. Surrounding the use of cloud computing are many risks that can have major impacts on the information and services supported by this technology. This paper discusses the current use of cloud computing in government, and the riskstangible and intangibleassociated with its use. Examining specific cases of government cloud computing, this paper explores the level of understanding of the risks by the departments and agencies that implement this technology. This paper argues that a defined risk management program focused on cloud computing is an essential part of the government IT environment.

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

it security
it governance
grid computing
governmental computing


Hybridation of Bayesian networks and evolutionary algorithms for multi-objective optimization in an integrated product design and project management context A better integration of preliminary product design and project management processes at early steps of system design is nowadays a key industrial issue. Therefore, the aim is to make firms evolve from classical sequential approach (first product design the project design and management) to new integrated approaches. In this paper, a model for integrated product/project optimization is first proposed which allows taking into account simultaneously decisions coming from the product and project managers. However, the resulting model has an important underlying complexity, and a multi-objective optimization technique is required to provide managers with appropriate scenarios in a reasonable amount of time. The proposed approach is based on an original evolutionary algorithm called evolutionary algorithm oriented by knowledge (EAOK). This algorithm is based on the interaction between an adapted evolutionary algorithm and a model of knowledge (MoK) used for giving relevant orientations during the search process. The evolutionary operators of the EA are modified in order to take into account these orientations. The MoK is based on the Bayesian Network formalism and is built both from expert knowledge and from individuals generated by the EA. A learning process permits to update probabilities of the BN from a set of selected individuals. At each cycle of the EA, probabilities contained into the MoK are used to give some bias to the new evolutionary operators. This method ensures both a faster and effective optimization, but it also provides the decision maker with a graphic and interactive model of knowledge linked to the studied project. An experimental platform has been developed to experiment the algorithm and a large campaign of tests permits to compare different strategies as well as the benefits of this novel approach in comparison with a classical EA.

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

project management
evolutionary algorithm
bayesian network
learning

product preliminary design
experience feedback


A unified approach to analyze multiple access protocols for buffered finite users In this paper, a new approach is proposed to analyze the performance of buffered random multiple access protocols called tagged user analysis (TUA). In TUA, each user is modeled as an independent queueing system, which operates at its own equilibrium probability. As a result, the classical queueing theory can be employed to analyze the queueing behavior of each user. On the basis of the behavior of the tagged user, the performance of the whole system is analyzed. TUA is a unified method of analyzing most of random access methods including the heterogeneous random multiple access techniques that are difficult to analyze otherwise. Furthermore, TUA can also handle those systems where user terminals may have arbitrary packet size (in slots) distribution, arbitrary arrival processes such as batch packet arrivals in Bernoulli, arbitrary service principle such as priority queueing, last came first served, and random service. In this paper, in addition to analyzing for the distributions of several performance indices, their mean values are obtained.

O O O O O O O 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 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


On the road to invariant object recognition: How cortical area V2 transforms absolute to relative disparity during 3D vision Invariant recognition of objects depends on a hierarchy of cortical stages that build invariance gradually. Binocular disparity computations are a key part of this transformation. Cortical area V1 computes absolute disparity, which is the horizontal difference in retinal location of an image in the left and right foveas. Many cells in cortical area V2 compute relative disparity, which is the difference in absolute disparity of two visible features. Relative, but not absolute, disparity is invariant under both a disparity change across a scene and vergence eye movements. A neural network model is introduced which predicts that shunting lateral inhibition of disparity-sensitive layer 4 cells in V2 causes a peak shift in cell responses that transforms absolute disparity from V1 into relative disparity in V2. This inhibitory circuit has previously been implicated in contrast gain control, divisive normalization, selection of perceptual groupings, and attentional focusing. The model hereby links relative disparity to other visual functions and thereby suggests new ways to test its mechanistic basis. Other brain circuits are reviewed wherein lateral inhibition causes a peak shift that influences behavioral responses.

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

invariant recognition
3d vision
absolute disparity
relative disparity
layer 4
peak shift
v1
v2


Adaptive Internet integration of field bus systems Field buses are used to network sensors, actuators, and control devices inside automation systems. The Internet integration of field bus systems enables information from these devices to be exchanged across enterprises and businesses. An essential prerequisite to this aim is the interoperability of field bus systems with external systems and applications. Therefore, many efforts are made to establish a common information exchange standard which all field bus systems are supposed to support. However, the longer these efforts are ongoing the less it seems that they will ever yield the expected breakthrough. The present paper introduces an substantially different approach to interoperability. Field bus systems may keep their individual application interfaces and data exchange formats. All the same, external infrastructures do not have to be redesigned to match the specific needs of certain field bus systems. Rather, field bus systems become capable of adapting the information exchange flexibly according to the needs of the outside environment.

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

communication standards
information systems


Kernel

k-nearest

neighbor

algorithm

as

a

flexible

SAR

modeling

tool

A

kernel

version

of

k-nearest

neighbor

algorithm

(k-NN)

has

been

developed

to

model

the

complex

relationship

between

molecular

descriptors

and

bioactivities

of

compounds.

Kernel

k-NN

is

to

perform

the

original

k-NN

algorithm

by

mapping

the

training

samples

in

the

input

space

into

a

high-dimensional

feature

space.

It

can

be

easily

constructed

by

calculating

the

distance

between

samples

in

the

feature

space,

directly

deriving

from

the

simple

calculation

of

the

kernel

used.

The

developed

kernel

k-NN

is

very

flexible

to

deal

with

complex

nonlinear

relationship,

more

importantly;

it

can

also

conveniently

cope

with

some

non-vectorial

data

only

by

the

definition

of

different

kernels.

The

results

obtained

from

several

real

SAR

datasets

indicated

that

the

performance

of

kernel

k-NN

is

comparable

to

support

vector

machine

methods.

It

can

be

regarded

as

an

alternative

modeling

technique

for

several

chemical

problems

including

the

study

of

structure-activity

relationship

(SAR).

The

source

codes

implementing

kernel

k-NN

in

R

language

are

freely

available

at

(C)

Elsevier

B.V.

All

rights

reserved.

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

k-nearest neighbor (k-nn)
kernel methods
string kernel
structure-activity relationship (sar)


Molecular electronegativity distance vector model for the Prediction of bioconcentration factors in fish Molecular electronegativity distance vector (MEDV) derived directly from the molecular topological structures was used to describe the structures of 122 nonionic organic compounds (NOCs) and a quantitative relationship between the MEDV descriptors and the bioconcentration factors (BCF) of NOCs in fish was developed using the variable selection and modeling based on prediction (VSMP). It was found that some main structural factors influencing the BCFs of NOCs are the substructures expressed by four atomic types of nos. 2, 3, 5, and 13, i.e., atom groups -CH2- or =CH-, -CH < or =C <, -NH2, and -Cl or -Br where the former two groups exist in the molecular skeleton of NOC and the latter three groups are related closely to the substituting groups on a benzene ring. The best 5-variable model, with the correlation coefficient (r(2)) of 0.9500 and the leave-one-out cross-validation correlation coefficient (q(2)) of 0.9428, was built by multiple linear regressions, which shows a good estimation ability and stability. A predictive power for the external samples was tested by the model from the training set of 80 NOCs and the predictive correlation coefficient (u(2)) for the 42 external samples in the test set was 0.9028.

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

molecular electronegativity distance vector (medv)

variable selection and modeling based on prediction (vsmp)


A revised transformation protocol for unconditionally secure secret key exchange The transformation protocol can allow two players to share an unconditionally secure secret key using a random deal of cards. A sufficient condition on the number of cards for the transformation protocol to succeed was known. However, it has been an open problem to obtain a necessary and sufficient condition. This paper improves the transformation protocol and gives a necessary and sufficient condition for the resulting protocol to succeed.

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

random deal of cards
secret key exchange
transformation protocol


Image Super-Resolution Via Sparse Representation This paper presents a new approach to single-image superresolution, based upon sparse signal representation. Research on image statistics suggests that image patches can be well-represented as a sparse linear combination of elements from an appropriately chosen over-complete dictionary. Inspired by this observation, we seek a sparse representation for each patch of the low-resolution input, and then use the coefficients of this representation to generate the high-resolution output. Theoretical results from compressed sensing suggest that under mild conditions, the sparse representation can be correctly recovered from the downsampled signals. By jointly training two dictionaries for the low-and high-resolution image patches, we can enforce the similarity of sparse representations between the low-resolution and high-resolution image patch pair with respect to their own dictionaries. Therefore, the sparse representation of a low-resolution image patch can be applied with the high-resolution image patch dictionary to generate a high-resolution image patch. The learned dictionary pair is a more compact representation of the patch pairs, compared to previous approaches, which simply sample a large amount of image patch pairs [1], reducing the computational cost substantially. The effectiveness of such a sparsity prior is demonstrated for both general image super-resolution (SR) and the special case of face hallucination. In both cases, our algorithm generates high-resolution images that are competitive or even superior in quality to images produced by other similar SR methods. In addition, the local sparse modeling of our approach is naturally robust to noise, and therefore the proposed algorithm can handle SR with noisy inputs in a more unified framework.

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

face hallucination
sparse representation

image super-resolution (sr)
nonnegative matrix factorization
sparse coding


Calculating the proportion of triangles in a Poisson-Voronoi tessellation of the plane The proportion of triangles in a Poisson-Voronoi tessellation has been recently represented as a five-fold integral. Here we give a simpler representation, reduce it to a fourfold integral and discuss its numerical evaluation.

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

stochastic geometry
numerical integration
poisson
voronoi
pain probability
triangle
fundamental region