Admission control in wireless ad hoc networks: a survey Wireless mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs) have emerged as a key technology for next-generation wireless networking. Because of their advantages over other wireless networks, MANETs are undergoing rapid progress and inspiring numerous applications. However, many technical issues are still facing the deployment of this technology, and one of the most challenging aspects is the quality of service (QoS) provisioning for multimedia real-time applications. MANETs are expected to offer a diverse range of services to support real-time traffic and conventional data in an integrated fashion. Because of the diversified QoS requirements of these services, QoS models are needed for an efficient usage of network resources. One of the most crucial mechanisms for providing QoS support is admission control (AC). AC has the task of estimating the state of network's resources and thereby to decide which application data flows can be admitted without promising more resources than are available and thus violating previously made guarantees. In order to provide a better understanding of the AC research challenges in MANETs, this paper presents a detailed investigation of current state-of-the-art AC models in ad hoc networks. A brief outline of the admission function, feedback to route failures, as well as the advantages and drawbacks of each discussed model are given.

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

quality of service
wireless mobile ad hoc networks
admission control


Improving goodputs of IP packets under ATM UBR traffic with port-based queueing schemes ATM networks are widely adopted as backbone networks. TCP/IP are the most popular protocols today and it is quite possible that packets are forwarded by ATM networks. In ATM networks, UBR (unspecified bit rate) service and ABR (available bit rate) service are common in transmitting IP packets. Because TCP has its own flow control mechanism, the flow control of ABR service could become redundant. Moreover, it could interfere with the TCP flow control. In this paper, we will focus on buffer management schemes of ATM switches with UBR service. Researchers have proposed several buffer management schemes for UBR service. However, all schemes do not consider the influence of output rates. In addition, most researchers assume that each port has its own buffers. A basic scheme called dedicated buffers per port is compared with four proposed schemes. The paper considers the situation that switch buffers are shared among all output ports and proposes a scheme called shared buffers among all ports. Then, two schemes, dedicated buffers with early packet discarding (EPD) and shared buffers with EPD, are proposed. The EPD scheme is modified. Instead of using a threshold for each flow, only one threshold is applied to buffers of each output port. The fifth proposed scheme is called shared buffers with EPD+differential buffer allocation (DBA), which also considers the effects of various output rates. Results show that goodputs are increased apparently by applying the DBA scheme. Results also show that for goodputs, when packets pass two or more switches, packet discarding schemes are far more important than whether we adopt schemes of shared buffers or schemes of dedicated buffers. Hence, we can simply adopt schemes of dedicated buffers, which are easy to implement, and incorporate a packet-discarding scheme in most cases.

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

atm
ip
buffer allocation
unspecified bit rate
early packet discarding


Helping business schools engage with real problems: The contribution of critical realism and systems thinking We argue that business schools have difficulty in tackling real world problems. We present a model of the factors generating this problem. We make recommendations for improving the situation. These include critical realism, multimethodology, transdisciplinarity and ethics. Possibilities for bringing about change are considered.

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

education
societal problems
soft or
critical management


Experimental study of electrical FitzHughNagumo neurons with modified excitability We present an electronical circuit modelling a FitzHughNagumo neuron with a modified excitability. To characterize this basic cell, the bifurcation curves between stability with excitation threshold, bistability and oscillations are investigated. An electrical circuit is then proposed to realize a unidirectional coupling between two cells, mimicking an inter-neuron synaptic coupling. In such a masterslave configuration, we show experimentally how the coupling strength controls the dynamics of the slave neuron, leading to frequency locking, chaotic behavior and synchronization. These phenomena are then studied by phase map analysis. The architecture of a possible neural network is described introducing different kinds of coupling between neurons.

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

bifurcation
synaptic coupling
synchronization
phase map


competitive advantage through pleasurable products Firms have realised that establishing competitive advantage is critical to their survival. With Customer requirements having evolved from merely meeting functional requirements and expecting quality, to the present demand for pleasurable features as well, the design of pleasurable products is beginning to take centre stage as firms try to gain competitive advantage through the establishment of strong product demand. While the result of this is very visible, it is important to realise that the application of pleasurable products actually contributes more significantly to a firm's competitive advantage when introduced to the work environment. This is due to improved performance which in turn leads to the development of intellectual products of higher quality, hence sustaining the established competitive advantage.

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

pleasurable products
intellectual products
competitive advantage

intellectual resources
intellectual capital


Quality-driven design for video applications This paper presents a novel system-level design methodology, called quality-driven design, by which application-specific optimization can be achieved; furthermore the entire functionality can be shared to maximize design reuse. As a case of study, this paper focuses on quality-driven design for video applications and introduces an output quality adaptive approach based on variable bitwidth optimization to explore a new design space. MPEG2 video is used as the driver application to illustrate the potential of the presented methodology. Experimental results show the effectiveness of the methodology.

O O O O O O O O O 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

quality-driven design
variable analysis
application-specific optimization


The acquisition of novel N-glycosylation sites in conserved proteins during human evolution N-linked protein glycosylation plays an important role in various biological processes, including protein folding and trafficking, and cell adhesion and signaling. The acquisition of a novel N-glycosylation site may have significant effect on protein structure and function, and therefore, on the phenotype.

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


A representation of a comonotone-additive and monotone functional by two Sugeno integrals There is obtained a representation of acomonotone- v-additive, weak -homogeneous and monotone functional L (defined on the class of functions on finite set) as a symmetric maximum of two Sugeno integrals. This representation is a generalization of certain previous results, which are useful for cumulative prospect theory. As a consequence of a result on general fuzzy rank and sign-dependent functionals considered on functions defined on the infinitely countable basic set X it is obtained that the symmetric Sugeno integral is comonotone-v-additive functional on the class of functions with finite support. (C) 2005 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 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 B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

sugeno integral
cumulative prospect theory


Personalization via Friendsourcing When information is known only to friends in a social network, traditional crowdsourcing mechanisms struggle to motivate a large enough user population and to ensure accuracy of the collected information. We thus introduce friendsourcing, a form of crowdsourcing aimed at collecting accurate information available only to a small, socially-connected group of individuals. Our approach to friendsourcing is to design socially enjoyable interactions that produce the desired information as a side effect. We focus our analysis around Collabio, a novel social tagging game that we developed to encourage friends to tag one another within an online social network. Collabio encourages friends, family, and colleagues to generate useful information about each other. We describe the design space of incentives in social tagging games and evaluate our choices by a combination of usage log analysis and survey data. Data acquired via Collabio is typically accurate and augments tags that could have been found on Facebook or the Web. To complete the arc from data collection to application, we produce a trio of prototype applications to demonstrate how Collabio tags could be utilized: an aggregate tag cloud visualization, a personalized RSS feed, and a question and answer system. The social data powering these applications enables them to address needs previously difficult to support, such as question answering for topics comprehensible only to a few of a user's friends.

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 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 I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 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


Fuzzy classifier based on fuzzy support vector machine Support vector machines (SVMs) have been very successful in pattern recognition and function estimation problems. When SVMs are used for classification, the inputs of the training example are real-valued and the outputs are class label y = +/- 1. However, in practice, the training examples usually belong to a class with certain fuzzy membership, therefore it is important to consider uncertain class label for classification problems. For this purpose, this paper introduces the new concept of fuzzy hyperplane, and constructs the fuzzy classifiers based on fuzzy support vector machines. At the end of the paper, we apply our new methods to medical diagnosis problems.

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 O O 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

support vector machine
fuzzy hyperplane
fuzzy classifier

possibility measure
fuzzy linear separable example


Model-based evaluation: From dependability to security The development of techniques for quantitative, model-based evaluation of computer system dependability has a long and rich history. A wide array of model-based evaluation techniques is now available, ranging from combinatorial methods, which are useful for quick, rough-cut analyses, to state-based methods, such as Markov reward models, and detailed, discrete-event simulation. The use of quantitative techniques for security evaluation is much less common, and has typically taken the form of formal analysis of small parts of an overall design, or experimental red team-based approaches. Alone, neither of these approaches is fully satisfactory, and we argue that there is much to be gained through the development of a sound model-based methodology for quantifying the security one can expect from a particular design. In this work, we survey existing model-based techniques for evaluating system dependability, and summarize how they are now being extended to evaluate system security. We find that many techniques from dependability evaluation can be applied in the security domain, but that significant challenges remain, largely due to fundamental differences between the accidental nature of the faults commonly assumed in dependability evaluation, and the intentional, human nature of cyber attacks.

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

dependability evaluation
security evaluation

performability evaluation
stochastic modeling


ON AN EFFICIENT SPARSE REPRESENTATION OF OBJECTS OF GENERAL SHAPE VIA CONTINUOUS EXTENSION AND WAVELET APPROXIMATION In this paper, we discuss the continuous extension and wavelet approximation of the detected object on a general domain Omega of R(2). We first extend continuously the image to a square T such that it vanishes on the boundary. T. On T\Omega, the extension has a simple and clear representation which is determined by the equation of the boundary partial derivative Omega. We expand the extension into wavelet series on R(2). Since the extension tools are polynomials, by the moment theorem, we know that the sequence of wavelet coefficients obtained by us is sparse. Therefore, we can approximate and analyze the internal information of the object very well even if we only store a few wavelet coefficients.

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

continuous extension
wavelet approximation


Public key authentication schemes for local area networks The invention of public-key cryptography makes many new network applications, such as electronic commerce (CE), possible. However, the widely used Internet is open and unprotected. Therefore, verifying the legitimacy of an individual's public key is very important. Most of the key authentication schemes require one or more trustworthy authorities to authenticate the key of a user. Consequently, the system security is mainly dependent on the honesty of these third parties. Unfortunately, a security solution in wide area networks (for example, the Internet) often cannot be applied to local area networks directly without any modification. Sometimes, a complete rebuild is necessary, especially for performance criteria consideration. In this paper, we propose two simple key authentication schemes that require no certification authorities for computer systems in local area networks, in which a host is responsible for user authentication and it uses a designated password authentication mechanism.

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

public key cryptosystems
key management
certificate
local area network


Constructing a family of conics by curvature-dependent offsetting from a given conic Three new general properties of conic sections are established, namely: (1) By offsetting from a given conic (ellipse, parabola or hyperbola) perpendicularly to it by a distance proportional to the cube root of its radius of curvature, another conic of the same kind is generated; (2) The cube root (or proportional to it) is the only function for with such a property can be stated; (3) The cube root of the radius of curvature at any point is proportional to its distance to any one of the principal axes of the conic, taken perpendicularly to it. Starting from any particular conic, and taking the proportionality constant k as a parameter, a family of conics of its kind is generated. Piling these conics up in the 3D space, different surfaces can be defined. If one of the Cartesian coordinates is made to be proportional to k, these surfaces are ruled, which greatly facilitates their constructive applications. We derive the parametric equations of these surfaces and represent them graphically, choosing viewpoints for a good visualization. Some ideas of applications are proposed for further development. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

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

geometry of conics
ruled surface of conic sections


Simulation of three-dimensional bubbles using desingularized boundary integral method A very simple model based on the three-dimensional desingularized boundary integral method is applied to study the evolution of bubble(s) with or without the presence of solid structures. The choice of the desingularization parameters, which is crucial to the success of the method, is studied in the context of bubble dynamics. With the proper choice of parameters, the new model is far more efficient than previous models with virtually the same level of accuracy being achieved. This is largely attributed to the simplicity of the desingularization method. Furthermore, the new model offers a simple and attractive way for mesh refinement. Although it has limitations in the sense that, with this model the time stepping tends to slow down as two surfaces approach each other, this can be easily rectified by switching over to a direct method so that the two surfaces can be drawn closer as required in the context of jet impact. After this the new model can be reinstated to treat the complicated doubly connected geometry involving toroidal bubbles that would otherwise be very difficult to deal with. Copyright (C) 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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

bubble dynamics
desingularized boundary integral method


A grey-based rough approximation model for interval data processing ? A new rough set model for interval data named grey-rough set is proposed in this paper. Information system in the real world are quite complicated. Most of information tables record not only categorical data but also numerical data including a range of interval data. The grey lattice operation in grey system theory is one of the operations for interval data that modifies endpoints non-arithmetically, and which is useful for interval data processing. The grey-rough approximation is based on an interval coincidence relation and an interval inclusion relation instead of an equivalence relation and an indiscernibility relation in Pawlaks model. Numerical examples and four fields of practical examples, decision-making, information retrieval, knowledge discovery and kansei engineering are shown. The advantages of the proposal include: extending a treatable value compared with classical rough set for non-deterministic information systems, providing a maximum solution and minimum solution both in upper and lower approximations, and not only providing mathematical support to SQL but also functions for further extension in the future.

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

grey lattice operation
information systems
interval data

rough sets
upper approximation
lower approximation
uncertainty
certainty
possibility
grey systems


Dispatching and coordination in multi-area railway traffic management This paper deals with the development of decision support systems for traffic management of large and busy railway networks in case of severe disturbances. Railway operators typically structure the control of complicated networks into the coordinated control of several local dispatching areas. A dispatcher takes rescheduling decisions on the trains running on its local area while a coordinator addresses global issues that may arise between areas. While several advanced train dispatching models and algorithms have been proposed to support the dispatchers' task, the coordination problem did not receive much attention in the literature on train scheduling. This paper presents new heuristic algorithms for both local dispatching and coordination and compares centralized and distributed procedures to support the task of dispatchers and coordinators. We adopt dispatching procedures driven by optimization algorithms and based on local or global information and decisions. Computational experiments on a Dutch railway network, actually controlled by ten dispatchers, assess the performance of the centralized and distributed procedures. Various traffic disturbances, including entrance delays and blocked tracks, are analyzed on various time horizons of traffic prediction. Results show that the new heuristics clearly improve the global performance of the network with respect to the state of the art.

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

centralized and distributed optimization


Developing a varietal GA with ESMA strategy for solving the pick and place problem in printed circuit board assembly line The main issue for enhancing the productivity in Printed Circuit Board (PCB) is to reduce the cycle time for pick and place (PAP) operations; i.e., to minimize the time for the PAP operations. According to the characteristics of the PAP problems, the sequence for the placement of components can be mostly treated as the Travelling Salesman Problem (TSP). In this paper, a Genetic Algorithm (GA) with External Self-evolving Multiple Archives (ESMA) is developed for minimizing the PAP operations in PCB assembly line. ESMA focuses on the issue of improving the premature convergence time in GA by adopting efficient measures for population diversity, effective diversity control and mutation strategies to enhance the global searching ability. Three mechanisms for varietal GA such as Clustering Strategy, Switchable Mutation and Elitist Propagation have been designed based on the concept of increasing the dynamic diversity of the population. The experimental results in PCB and TSP instances show that the proposed approach is very promising and it contains the ability of local and global searching. The experimental results show ESMA can further improve the performance of GA by searching the solution space with more promising results.

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

pick and place
printed circuit board
travelling salesman problem

genetic algorithms
combinatorial optimization
diversity measure
mutation strategy


Weighted Association Rule Mining for Item Groups with Different Properties and Risk Assessment for Networked Systems In market-basket analysis, weighted association rule (WAR) discovery can mine the rules that include more beneficial information by reflecting item importance for special products. In the point-of-sale database, each transaction is composed of items with similar properties, and item weights are pre-defined and fixed by a factor such as the profit. However, when items are divided into more than one group and the item importance must be measured independently for each group, traditional weighted association rule discovery cannot be used. To solve this problem, we propose a new weighted association rule mining methodology. The items should be first divided into subgroups according to their properties, and the item importance, i.e. item weight, is defined or calculated only with the items included in the subgroup. Then, transaction weight is measured by appropriately summing the item weights from each subgroup, and the weighted support is computed as the fraction of the transaction weights that contains the candidate items relative to the weight of all transactions. As an example, our proposed methodology is applied to assess the vulnerability to threats of computer systems that provide networked services. Our algorithm provides both quantitative risk-level values and qualitative risk rules for the security assessment of networked computer systems using WAR discovery. Also, it can be widely used for new applications with many data sets in which the data items are distinctly separated.

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

weighted association rule
networked systems
risk assessment


Impacts of impression changes on freeway driver intention to adopt electronic toll collection service This paper proposes conceptual frameworks incorporating technology acceptance model, theory of planned behavior and three additional constructs impression changes, attitude of government, and risk to investigate the factors affecting freeway driver intention to adopt electronic toll collection service for both users and nonusers of electronic toll collection. The proposed frameworks are unique because of the incorporation of media and word-of-mouth effects to represent the impression changes, respectively. The respondents were specifically asked about their impressions of electronic toll collection related policies and strategies spread through media and word-of-mouth before and after electronic toll collection operation. Estimated results obtained from structural equations modeling validate that impression changes in both media and word-of-mouth exhibit significant direct or indirect effects on freeway driver intention to adopt electronic toll collection service. Corresponding strategies to enhance electronic toll collection adoption rate are then proposed accordingly.

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

media
electronic toll collection
structural equations modeling


Evolutionary parallel and gradually distributed lateral tuning of fuzzy rule-based systems The tuning of Fuzzy Rule-Based Systems is often applied to improve their performance as a post-processing stage once an initial set of fuzzy rules has been extracted. This optimization problem can become a hard one when the size of the considered system in terms of the number of variables, rules and, particularly, data samples is big. Distributed Genetic Algorithms are excellent optimization algorithms which exploit the nowadays available parallel hardware (multicore microprocessors and clusters) and could help to alleviate this growth in complexity. In this work, we present a study on the use of the Distributed Genetic Algorithms for the tuning of Fuzzy Rule-Based Systems. To this end, we analyze the application of a specific Gradual Distributed Real-Coded Genetic Algorithm which employs eight subpopulations in a hypercube topology and local parallelization at each subpopulation. We tested our approach on nine real-world datasets of different sizes and with different numbers of variables. The empirical performance in solution quality and computing time is assessed by comparing its results with those from a highly effective sequential tuning algorithm. The results show that the distributed approach achieves better results in terms of quality and execution time as the complexity of the problem grows.

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

genetic fuzzy system
fuzzy rule-based systems
genetic tuning


EFFECTIVE RESOURCE ALLOCATION IN PARALLEL QUANTUM-CHEMICAL CALCULATIONS Key factors affecting the parallel efficiency of archetypical quantum-chemical calculations are discussed. Effective load balancing schemes are proposed. Introduction of the memory affinity to the balancing process is shown to result in super-linear scaling.

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

computational chemistry
parallelization
optimization
super-linear scaling


An ontology-based Enterprise Architecture The Enterprise Architecture refers to a comprehensive description of all of the key elements and relationships that make up an organization [Harmon, P. (2003). Developing an Enterprise Architecture, Business process trends: Whitepaper]. Through the Enterprise Architecture, enterprises can implement enterprise integration to cope with dynamically changing business environment. Existing Enterprise Architectures, however, lack of semantics for humans and systems to understand them exactly and commonly, which causes communication problems between humans or between systems or between human and system. These communication problems keep enterprises from implementing integration and collaborating with other enterprises. In order to solve this problem, the ontology-based Enterprise Architecture is suggested in this paper. The Enterprise Architecture ontology is composed of ontologies in three levels. Ontologies of business terms are in the first level, ontologies of Enterprise Architecture components are in the second level, and ontologies of relationships among Enterprise Architecture components are in the top level. The ontologies of business terms are defined in the approach of the WordNet, and the ontologies of Enterprise Architecture components and relationships of them are defined in the approach of the SBVR. Through these ontologies, it is expected that humans and systems can understand Enterprise Architectures exactly and commonly, which supports integrations in enterprises and collaborations between enterprises.

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

ontology-based enterprise architecture
enterprise ontology


Comparison of simulation models in terms of quantity and allocation of land change We compare three runs of models that simulate transitions among land categories. Pattern validation compares a reference map of transition to maps from pairs of runs. Quantity and allocation are helpful concepts to describe models and to compare maps. Quantity refers to the size of each transition from one category to another category. Allocation refers to the spatial distribution of the transitions.

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 B 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

assessment
land change model
land use and cover change (lucc)


privacy-preserving computation of benchmarks on item-level data using rfid Currently, companies are about to optimize their internal processes by monitoring items they handle with Radio Frequency Identification (RFID). However, there is a risk that sensitive information is disclosed when sharing RFID data with other companies. Therefore, companies are unwilling to share RFID data. At first glance, Secure Multi-Party Computation (SMC) might reconciliate data sharing with the privacy concerns. However, SMC requires the collaboration of all parties involved in a protocol. This prevents using SMC for many applications based on item-level RFID data collected in supply chains, since some parties may be competitors or have conflicting interests. We present protocols for securely and privately computing item-level metrics using only existing communication links (e.g., messages stored on RFID tags) and an oblivious third party. This enables optimizing the supply chain using novel item-level metrics without compromising sensitive information.

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

supply chain metrics
secure multi-party computation


First-order methods of smooth convex optimization with inexact oracle We introduce the notion of inexact first-order oracle and analyze the behavior of several first-order methods of smooth convex optimization used with such an oracle. This notion of inexact oracle naturally appears in the context of smoothing techniques, MoreauYosida regularization, Augmented Lagrangians and many other situations. We derive complexity estimates for primal, dual and fast gradient methods, and study in particular their dependence on the accuracy of the oracle and the desired accuracy of the objective function. We observe that the superiority of fast gradient methods over the classical ones is no longer absolute when an inexact oracle is used. We prove that, contrary to simple gradient schemes, fast gradient methods must necessarily suffer from error accumulation. Finally, we show that the notion of inexact oracle allows the application of first-order methods of smooth convex optimization to solve non-smooth or weakly smooth convex problems.

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

smooth convex optimization
inexact oracle
gradient methods


Two tree-based methods for the waterfall We present two new methods for the classical waterfall transform. Both methods are tree-based and easier to implement than the state-of-the-art. The Simplified Waterfall (SW) method is 32% faster than the state-of-the-art; the Balanced Waterfall (BW) method is 16% faster. The Balanced Waterfall method additionally handles non-minimal plateaux robustly.

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


Confidence intervals for ratio of two Poisson rates using the method of variance estimates recovery Inference based on ratio of two independent Poisson rates is common in epidemiological studies. We study the performance of a variety of unconditional method of variance estimates recovery (MOVER) methods of combining separate confidence intervals for two single Poisson rates to form a confidence interval for their ratio. We consider confidence intervals derived from (1) the Fiellers theorem, (2) the logarithmic transformation with the delta method and (3) the substitution method. We evaluate the performance of 13 such types of confidence intervals by comparing their empirical coverage probabilities, empirical confidence widths, ratios of mesial non-coverage probability and total non-coverage probabilities. Our simulation results suggest that the MOVER Rao score confidence intervals based on the Fiellers theorem and the substitution method are preferable. We provide two applications to construct confidence intervals for the ratio of two Poisson rates in a breast cancer study and in a study that examines coronary heart diseases incidences among post menopausal women treated with or without hormones.

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

agresticoull binomial method
bayes interval
jeffreys interval
mover method


Simulation of Na/Ca Exchange Activity during Ischemia Simulation of sodium-calcium exchange activity during the rise of intracellular sodium that occurs during ischemia suggests that the exchanger may not reverse direction except transiently during calcium oscillations. This conclusion depends on the presence of a small resting leak of calcium into the cell, consistent with radioactive calcium flux measurements. The conditions for intracellular calcium to rise to around 3 ?M were explored. A combination of extracellular potassium accumulation and extracellular sodium depletion is sufficient to explain this result. The computations also show a counterintuitive result concerning the role of the exchanger in the mechanism of calcium oscillations. Reducing its activity would be expected to enhance these oscillations, whereas increasing it can reduce or suppress oscillations. If such oscillations play a role in acute ischemic arrhythmias, then block of Na/Ca exchange may not be therapeutic.

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


Group announcement logic Two currently active strands of research on logics for multi-agent systems are dynamic epistemic logic. focusing on the epistemic consequences of actions, and logics of coalitional ability, focusing on what coalitions of agents can achieve by cooperating strategically. In this paper we bridge these topics by considering the question: "what can a coalition achieve by making public announcements?". We propose an extension of public announcement logic with constructs of the form phi, where G is a group of agents, with the intuitive meaning that G can jointly execute a publicly observable action such that phi will be true afterwards. Actions here are taken to be truthful public announcements, but turn out also to include sequences of such joint actions as well as protocols with alternating actions by different agents, in response to the actions of others. We also study in detail the difference between 'knowing how' (knowing de re) and 'knowing that' (knowing de dicto) in our framework: both can elegantly be expressed in the single-agent case. We present several meta-logical properties of this Group Announcement Logic, including a sound and complete axiomatization, expressivity and the complexity of model checking. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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 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

dynamic epistemic logic
coalitional ability


Lipid Rafts and Apical Membrane Traffic Lipid rafts are dynamic assemblies floating freely in the surrounding membranes of living cells. This membrane heterogeneity provides a useful concept for understanding processes as diverse as cell polarity, signal transduction, and membrane sorting. Individual rafts are small entities containing thousands of lipids but only a few proteins. Regulation of raft association and size is an elementary feature of interactions at the molecular level. By clustering small rafts into a bigger platform, proteins are brought together for modification. Oligomerization might transform a monomeric weakly raft-associated protein into an assembly with higher raft affinity. Lectins are multivalent glycoprotein-binding proteins and are likely to be key players in mediating the clustering of rafts in vivo. Glycosylation-dependent surface delivery in a polarized fashion is a feature conserved across evolution, and we expect lectins to be at the heart of the molecular machinery responsible for lipid raft delivery to the cell surface. Currently, we are evaluating candidate proteins by affinity chromatography, proteomics, and RNA interference.

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


Rule learning for classification based on neighborhood covering reduction Rough set theory has been extensively discussed in the domain of machine learning and data mining. Pawlaks rough set theory offers a formal theoretical framework for attribute reduction and rule learning from nominal data. However, this model is not applicable to numerical data, which widely exist in real-world applications. In this work, we extend this framework to numerical feature spaces by replacing partition of universe with neighborhood covering and derive a neighborhood covering reduction based approach to extracting rules from numerical data. We first analyze the definition of covering reduction and point out its advantages and disadvantages. Then we introduce the definition of relative covering reduction and develop an algorithm to compute it. Given a feature space, we compute the neighborhood of each sample and form a neighborhood covering of the universe, and then employ the algorithm of relative covering reduction to the neighborhood covering, thus derive a minimal covering rule set. Some numerical experiments are presented to show the effectiveness of the proposed technique.

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

rough set
neighborhood covering
covering reduction
rule learning


Representation primitives, process models and patient data in computer-interpretable clinical practice guidelines:: A literature review of guideline representation models Representation of clinical practice guidelines in a computer-interpretable format is a critical issue for guideline development, implementation, and evaluation. We studied 11 types of guideline representation models that can be used to encode guidelines in computer-interpretable formats. We have consistently found in all reviewed models that primitives for representation of actions and decisions are necessary components of a guideline representation model. Patient states and execution states are important concepts that closely relate to each other. Scheduling constraints on representation primitives can be modeled as sequences, concurrences, alternatives, and loops in a guideline's application process. Nesting of guidelines provides multiple views to a guideline with different granularities. Integration of guidelines with electronic medical records can be facilitated by the introduction of a formal model for patient data. Data collection, decision, patient state, and intervention constitute four basic types of primitives in a guideline's logic flow. Decisions clarify our understanding on a patient's clinical state, while interventions lead to the change from one patient state to another.

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 O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 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 representation
theoretical models
computer-assisted decision making
clinical decision support systems


Is Greater China a currency union? A tale of the Chinese trio With the rapid flow of knowledge and capital from Hong Kong and Taiwan to Mainland China, a dynamic economy of "Greater China" has emerged, making the Chinese trio increasingly interdependent on trade and investment. In this paper we develop a three-variable VAR model to assess empirically the feasibility of forming a currency union in the Greater China area. The empirical results suggest that, from an economic perspective, it is feasible for the Chinese trio to move toward a currency union because of the increasing symmetry of shocks, the dynamic economic integration among the Greater China economies, and the speed of adjustment to shocks. (C) 2008 IMACS. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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


Predictive (Un)distortion model and 3-D reconstruction by biplane snakes This paper is concerned with the three-dimensional (3-D) reconstruction of coronary vessel centerlines and with how distortion of X-ray angiographic images affects it. Angiographies suffer from pincushion and other geometrical distortions, caused by the peripheral concavity of the image intensifier (II) and the nonlinearity of electronic acquisition devices. In routine clinical practice, where a field-of-view (FOV) of 17-23 cm is commonly used for the acquisition of coronary vessels, this distortion introduces a positional error of up to 7 pixels for an image matrix size of 512 x 512 and an FOV of 17 cm. This error increases with the size of the FOV. Geometrical distortions have a significant effect on the validity of the 3-D reconstruction of vessels from these images. We show how this effect can be reduced by integrating a predictive model of (un)distortion into the biplane snakes formulation for 3-D reconstruction. First, we prove that the distortion can be accurately modeled using a polynomial for each view. Also, we show that the estimated polynomial is independent of focal length, but not of changes in anatomical angles, as the II is influenced by the earth's magnetic field. Thus, we decompose the polynomial into two components: the steady and the orientation-dependent component. We determine the optimal polynomial degree for each component, which is empirically determined to be five for the steady component and three for the orientation-dependent component. This fact simplifies the prediction of the orientation-dependent polynomial, since the number of polynomial coefficients to be predicted is lower. The integration of this model into the biplane snakes formulation enables us to avoid image unwarping, which deteriorates image quality and therefore complicates vessel centerline feature extraction. Moreover, we improve the biplane snake behavior when dealing with wavy vessels, by means of using generalized gradient vector flow. Our experiments show that the proposed methods in this paper decrease up to 88% the reconstruction error obtained when geometrical distortion effects are ignored. Tests on imaged phantoms and real cardiac images are presented as well.

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

angiography
three-dimensional (3-d) reconstruction


Description of shape information for 2-D and 3-D objects The description of the spatial characteristics of two- and three-dimensional objects, in the framework of MPEG-7, is considered. The shape of an object is one of its fundamental properties, and this paper describes an efficient way to represent the coarse shape, scale and composition properties of an object. This representation is invariant to resolution, translation and rotation, and may be used for both two-dimensional (2-D) and three-dimensional (3-D) objects. This coarse shape descriptor will be included in the eXperimentation Model (XM) of MPEG-7. Applications of such a description to search object databases, in particular the CAESAR anthropometric database are discussed.

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

mpeg-7
shape description
content-based search
filtering
query


Sketching piecewise clothoid curves We present a novel approach to sketching 2D curves with minimally varying curvature as piecewise clothoids. A stable and efficient algorithm fits a sketched piecewise linear curve using a number of clothoid segments with G2 G 2 continuity based on a specified error tolerance. Further, adjacent clothoid segments can be locally blended to result in a G3 G 3 curve with curvature that predominantly varies linearly with arc length. We also handle intended sharp corners or G1 G 1 discontinuities, as independent rotations of clothoid pieces. Our formulation is ideally suited to conceptual design applications where aesthetic fairness of the sketched curve takes precedence over the precise interpolation of geometric constraints. We show the effectiveness of our results within a system for sketch-based road and robot-vehicle path design, where clothoids are already widely used.

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


A meta-data update policy in a flash memory file system This paper describes a new mechanism for meta-data update in file systems using flash memory. To fulfill flash memory as a stable storage system, one of its main draw-backs, meta-data update, which occupies the majority of write operations, must be reduced. That is, the file system should avoid weaknesses of flash memory, such as a limited number of program/erase cycles and its inability of in-place updates. We exploit two types of i-nodes which are allocated in separate flash areas and also introduce a delta logging method to efficiently utilise flash memory space. A trace-driven simulation shows the results that the performance of our system with two workloads is improved in terms of both time and space utilisation.

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


DERIVING VOCAL-TRACT AREA FUNCTIONS FROM MIDSAGITTAL PROFILES AND FORMANT FREQUENCIES - A NEW MODEL FOR VOWELS AND FRICATIVE CONSONANTS BASED ON EXPERIMENTAL-DATA In order to achieve better understanding of the articulatory-acoustic relationships, more data are still very much needed. The two-fold aim of the present study was thus (1) to provide a set of coherent midsagittal functions, area functions and formant frequencies, for a small corpus of vowels and fricative consonants produced by one subject, and (2) to derive a midsagittal profile to area function conversion model optimised for this given subject. Simultaneous tomography and sound recording were available for the subject, as well as some complementary data such as lip geometry or casts of the hard palate. The model is based on Heinz and Stevens' A = alpha d(beta) area function model, modified so that alpha varies continuously along the vocal tract midline as a function of the midsagittal distance. The coefficients of the model have been determined with the help of an optimisation algorithm based on a gradient descent technique. The gradient of the error between actual and desired formant values was computed through a back-propagation network implementing both sagittal-to-area conversion and acoustic wave propagation. The fact that the model should work for sounds as different as vowels and consonants and be coherent at both midsagittal and acoustic levels ensures the reliability of the area functions determined in such a way.

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

articulatory acoustic relationship
articulatory data


Speech recovery based on the linear canonical transform ? As is well known, speech signal processing is one of the hottest signal processing directions. There are exist lots of speech signal models, such as speech sinusoidal model, straight speech model, AMFM model, gaussian mixture model and so on. This paper investigates AMFM speech model by the linear canonical transform (LCT). The LCT can be considered as a generalization of traditional Fourier transform and fractional Fourier transform, and proved to be one of the powerful tools for non-stationary signal processing. This has opened up the possibility of a new range of potentially promising and useful applications based on the LCT. Firstly, two novel recovery methods of speech based on the AMFM model are presented in this paper: one depends on the LCT domain filtering; the other one is based on the chirp signal parameter estimation to restore the speech signal in LCT domain. Then, experiments results are presented to verify the performance of the proposed methods. Finally, the summarization and the conclusion of the paper is given.

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

linear canonical transform
chirp signal
the amfm model
speech


Designing free software samples: a game theoretic approach We develop a vertical differentiation game-theoretic model that addresses the issue of designing free software samples (shareware) for attaining follow-on sales. When shareware can be reinstalled, cannibalization of sales of the commercial product may ensue. We analyze the optimal design of free software according to two characteristics: the evaluation period allotted for sampling (potentially renewable) and the proportion of features included in the sample. We introduce a new software classification scheme based on the characteristics of the sample that aid consumer learning. We find that the optimal combination of features and trial time greatly depends on the category of software within the classification scheme. Under alternative learning scenarios, we show that the monopolist may be better off not suppressing potential shareware reinstallation.

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

shareware
vertical differentiation
monopolist

free sample
optimal software design
sales cannibalization


Multimedia educational software for producing graphs of mathematical functions The informative society needs important changes in educational programs. The informational techniques needs a reconsideration of the learning process, of the programs, manuals structures, a reconsideration of the methods and organization forms of the didactic activities, taking into account the computer assisted instruction and self instruction. This paper presents a software package, which can be used as educational software. This paper present a graphical user interface implement in C++ Builder useful for producing graphs of mathematical functions.

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


a memory-optimal buffering protocol for preservation of synchronous semantics under preemptive scheduling Recently, we have proposed a set of buffering schemes to preserve the semantics of a synchronous program when the latter is implemented as a set of multiple tasks running under preemptive scheduling. These schemes, however, are not optimal in terms of memory (buffer usage). In this paper we propose a new protocol which generalizes the previous schemes. The new protocol is not only semantics-preserving but also memory-optimal in two senses: first, in terms of the number of buffers required to preserve semantics in the worst case (i.e.,for the "worst" possible arrival/execution pattern of the tasks); second, in terms of the number of buffers required to preserve semantics for any arrival/execution pattern and at any time, assuming no knowledge of future arrivals.

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

synchronous programming
embedded software
semantical preservation
process communication
optimality
model-based design


Simulation-Based Tactics Generation for Warship Combat Using the Genetic Algorithm In most existing warships combat simulation system, the tactics of a warship is manipulated by human operators. For this reason, the simulation results are restricted due to the capabilities of human operators. To deal with this, we have employed the genetic algorithm for supporting the evolutionary simulation environment. In which, the tactical decision by human operators is replaced by the human model with a rule-based chromosome for representing tactics so that the population of simulations are created and hundreds of simulation runs are continued on the basis of the genetic algorithm without any human intervention until finding emergent tactics which shows the best performance throughout the simulation. Several simulation tests demonstrate the techniques.

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

genetic algorithm
warship combat
tactics generation
evolutionary simulation


a cross-collection mixture model for comparative text mining In this paper, we define and study a novel text mining problem, which we refer to as Comparative Text Mining (CTM). Given a set of comparable text collections, the task of comparative text mining is to discover any latent common themes across all collections as well as summarize the similarity and differences of these collections along each common theme. This general problem subsumes many interesting applications, including business intelligence and opinion summarization. We propose a generative probabilistic mixture model for comparative text mining. The model simultaneously performs cross-collection clustering and within-collection clustering, and can be applied to an arbitrary set of comparable text collections. The model can be estimated efficiently using the Expectation-Maximization (EM) algorithm. We evaluate the model on two different text data sets (i.e., a news article data set and a laptop review data set), and compare it with a baseline clustering method also based on a mixture model. Experiment results show that the model is quite effective in discovering the latent common themes across collections and performs significantly better than our baseline mixture model.

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

review
news
task
applications
method
laptop
text mining
clustering
summarization
text
data
business intelligence
similarity
general
algorithm
model
paper

generation
collect
mixture models
experience
comparative text mining
effect
evaluation
expectation - maximization


Energy-efficient and intrusion-resilient authentication for ubiquitous access,to factory floor information Linking factory floors to the Internet, coupled with the rapid deployment of wireless access networks, is initiating a new paradigm for factory automation-a corporate employee with a handheld computing device can have anytime, anywhere access to the latest factory floor information. Authentication between a factory database and a remote user is crucial for such paradigm, however, existing authentication protocols are inadequate to defend against strong adversaries with break-in capabilities. In this paper, we design and implement the Energy-Efficient and Intrusion-Resilient Authentication (ERA) protocol. Through a novel combination of hash chain, pin, and message authentication code (MAC), ERA can achieve the security self-recovery when strong adversaries compromise either a user's handheld device or a factory authentication server to obtain the authentication secrets. The technique of mutual MAC is proposed to defend against online pin-guessing attacks launched by strong adversaries. Furthermore, an optimization of tuning hash chain iteration is introduced to reduce energy consumption of a handheld device. Analytical and experimental results show that ERA provides a better security guarantee and incurs much less computation and communication overhead than the existing authentication protocols.

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

factory communication systems
factory security
mobile device
remote access


cross-language linking of news stories on the web using interlingual topic modelling We have studied the problem of linking event information across different languages without the use of translation systems or dictionaries. The linking is based on interlingua information obtained through probabilistic topic models trained on comparable corpora written in two languages (in our case English and Dutch). The achieve this, we expand the Latent Dirichlet Allocation model to process documents in two languages. We demonstrate the validity of the learned interlingual topics in a document clustering task, where the evaluation is performed on Google News.

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


Synthesis of high-complexity rhythmic signals for closed-loop electrical neuromodulation We propose an approach to synthesizing high-complexity rhythmic signals for closed-loop electrical neuromodulation using cognitive rhythm generator (CRG) networks, wherein the CRG is a hybrid oscillator comprised of (1) a bank of neuronal modes, (2) a ring device (clock), and (3) a static output nonlinearity (mapper). Networks of coupled CRGs have been previously implemented to simulate the electrical activity of biological neural networks, including in silico models of epilepsy, producing outputs of similar waveform and complexity to the biological system. This has enabled CRG network models to be used as platforms for testing seizure control strategies. Presently, we take the application one step further, envisioning therapeutic CRG networks as rhythmic signal generators creating neuromimetic signals for stimulation purposes, motivated by recent research indicating that stimulus complexity and waveform characteristics influence neuromodulation efficacy. To demonstrate this concept, an epileptiform CRG network generating spontaneous seizure-like events (SLEs) was coupled to a therapeutic CRG network, forming a closed-loop neuromodulation system. SLEs are associated with low-complexity dynamics and high phase coherence in the network. The tuned therapeutic network generated a high-complexity, multi-banded rhythmic stimulation signal with prominent theta and gamma-frequency power that suppressed SLEs and increased dynamic complexity in the epileptiform network, as measured by a relative increase in the maximum Lyapunov exponent and decrease in phase coherence. CRG-based neuromodulation outperformed both low and high-frequency periodic pulse stimulation, suggesting that neuromodulation using complex, biomimetic signals may provide an improvement over conventional electrical stimulation techniques for treating neurological disorders such as epilepsy.

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

brain stimulation
neural rhythm generation
coupled oscillator


Lower bounds for online makespan minimization on a small number of related machines In online makespan minimization, the jobs characterized by their processing time arrive one-by-one and each has to be assigned to one ofthe m uniformly related machines. The goal is to minimize the length ofthe schedule. We prove new combinatorial lower bounds for m=4 and m=5, and computer-assisted lower bounds for m?11.

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


Effects of environmental heterogeneity on predictions of tree species' abundance in response to climate warming We use a coupled modeling approach to predict tree species' distributions. We examine the effects of different environmental heterogeneities on predictions. Seed dispersal is an uncertainty source; competition reduces the uncertainty. For late-successional species, prediction uncertainties are comparatively low. For early-successional species, prediction uncertainties are comparatively high.

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 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

climate warming
environmental heterogeneity
seed dispersal

forest landscape model
interspecies competition
landis


The stochastic p p -hub center problem with service-level constraints Small package delivery companies offer services where packages are guaranteed to be delivered within a given time-frame. With variability in travel time, the configuration on the hub-and-spoke delivery network is vital in ensuring a high probability of meeting the service-level guarantee. We present the stochastic p p -hub center problem with chance constraints, which we use to model the service-level guarantees. We discuss analytical results, propose solution heuristics, and present the results from computational experiments.

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

hub-and-spoke network
stochastic programming
chance-constrained formulation


efficient interactive configuration of unbounded modular systems Interactive configuration guides a user searching through a large combinatorial space of solutions to a system of constraints. We investigate a class of very expressive underlying constraint satisfaction problems: modular recursive constraint systems of unbounded size. A precomputation step is used to obtain a configuration algorithm for such systems that supports the user efficiently with bounded response time. This precomputation step determines all solutions for each module, which are computed and stored in compact data structures such as Binary Decision Diagrams (BDDs), in order to eliminate run-time search. The precomputation step also detects ill-behaved module collections that have no finite solutions. The runtime interaction algorithm scales well as its response time only depends on the amount of the information passed locally between the modules, and not on the size of the entire configured structure. Our algorithm was implemented and tested on an industrial example, and gives good response times. We believe this is the first known sound and complete algorithm for solving unbounded interactive configuration problems, with bounded response time per interaction.

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

constraint satisfaction
interactive configuration


multi-clock sva synthesis without re-writing This paper presents a compilation procedure for synthesizing multiclock SVA properties for formal verification. The synthesis framework is built upon an existing compilation algorithm for single-clock SVA properties. While we could use the SVA rewriting rules to transform a multi-clock property into a single-clocked property and then apply existing techniques, instead we propose techniques to selectively model the multi-clock operators to produce a smaller checker logic. Through recursive construction and syntactic transformation, we are able demonstrate the efficiency of the technique and the generated checker logic is provably equivalent to the rewritten version.

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


Investigations on combined XPM and FWM effects on optical pulse propagation in dynamic IP traffic over WDM networks The influence of IP bursty traffic on combined nonlinear effects of XPM (cross phase modulation) and FWM (four-wave mixing) in IP over WDM networks are investigated and calculated by solving the nonlinear Schrodinger equation (NLSE) using a novel method under two conditions: on-off Poisson distributed IP traffic and self-similar traffic. Different eye diagrams are obtained under various IP traffic types and input optical powers. When the input power of a single channel is larger than 3 dBm, the effect of IP bursty traffic will deteriorate eye diagrams dramatically in a 40-channel WDM network. We also calculate the FWM powers and interchannel power distribution under different IP traffic loads. Based on the interchannel power distribution, we could find out which channels affect the probe channel seriously by the FWM effect. All these numerical results are useful for the Quality-of-Service (QoS) design, traffic grooming, lightpath routing, and wavelength assignment of IP over WDM networks.

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 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 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

cross phase modulation
ip bursty traffic

wavelength division multiplexing
four-wave mixing
poisson distribution
self-similarity
eye diagram


Mapping impervious surfaces from superresolution enhanced CHRIS/Proba imagery using multiple endmember unmixing In this paper, the potential of superresolution (SR) image reconstruction methods for sub-pixel land-cover mapping in dense urban areas is studied. A multiple endmember approach (MESMA) is used for unmixing both original hyperspectral CHRIS/Proba and SR enhanced CHRIS/Proba data. Validation based on high resolution orthophotos (25cm) shows that land-cover fraction maps generated from SR-enhanced CHRIS/Proba data (9m) have a lower overall fractional error compared to the land-cover fractions produced from the original CHRIS data (18m), when validating both results at the 18m resolution. Validation of SR results at the 9m resolution produces an overall mean absolute error (OMAE) of 16.7% compared to an OMAE of 14.3% at the 18m resolution, with the original data, yet the impervious surface map produced at 9m has a much higher level of detail than the original map, better representing the built-up pattern of the urban environment. Detailed analysis of impervious surface mapping results for different reference proportion intervals points at smaller average fractional errors for impervious surface fractions produced from SR-enhanced data when validation is done at the original 18m resolution, over the entire range of proportions. Only for pixels not containing any impervious surface cover the fractional error is marginally higher than with the original data. These results demonstrate the potential of SR-enhanced data for more accurate impervious surface mapping in dense and heterogeneous urban areas.

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

superresolution
multiple endmember unmixing
impervious surface mapping
urban areas

angular hyperspectral imagery
chris/proba


An experimental analysis of the dependence among codeword bit errors in ECOC learning machines One of the main factors affecting the effectiveness of error correcting output coding (ECOC) methods for classification is the dependence among the errors of the computed codeword bits. We present an extensive experimental work for evaluating the dependence among output errors of the decomposition unit in ECOC learning machines. In particular, we apply measures based on mutual information to compare the dependence of ECOC multi-layer perceptron (ECOC MLP), made up by a single multi-input multi-output MLP, and ECOC ensembles made up by a set of independent and parallel dichotomizers (ECOC PND). Moreover, the experimentation analyzes the relationship between the architecture, the dependence among output errors and the performances of ECOC learning machines. The results show that the dependence among computed codeword bits is significantly smaller for ECOC PND, pointing out that ensembles of independent parallel dichotomizers are better suited for implementing ECOC classification methods. The experimental results suggest new architectures of ECOC learning machines to improve the independence among output errors and the diversity between base learners.

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

error correcting output coding
mutual information

dependence among output errors in learning machines


Real time tracking of borescope tip pose In this paper we present a technique for tracking borescope tip pose in real-time. While borescopes are used regularly to inspect machinery for wear or damage, knowing the exact location of a borescope is difficult due to its flexibility. We present a technique for incremental borescope pose determination consisting of off-line feature extraction and on-line pose determination. The off-line feature extraction precomputes from a CAD model of the object the features visible in a selected set of views. These cover the region over which the borescope should travel. The on-line pose determination starts from a current pose estimate, determines the visible model features, and projects them into a two-dimensional image coordinate system. It then matches each to the current borescope video image (without explicitly extracting features from this image), and uses the differences between the predicted and matched feature positions in a least squares technique to iteratively refine the pose estimate. Our approach supports the mixed use of both matched feature positions and errors along the gradient within the pose determination. It handles radial lens distortions inherent in borescopes and executes at video frame rates regardless of CAD model size. The complete algorithm provides a continual indication of borescope tip pose.

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

pose estimation
borescope inspection
idustrial inspection
lens distorsion


improving performance of small on-chip instruction caches Most current single-chip processors employ an on-chip instruction cache to improve performance. A miss in this instruction cache will cause an external memory reference which must compete with data references for access to the external memory, thus affecting the overall performance of the processor. One common way to reduce the number of off-chip instruction requests is to increase the size of the on-chip cache. An alternative approach is presented in this paper, in which a combination of an instruction cache, instruction queue and instruction queue buffer is used to achieve the same effect with a much smaller instruction cache size. Such an approach is significant for emerging technologies where high circuit densities are initially difficult to achieve yet a high level of performance is desired, or for more mature technologies where chip area can be used to provide more functionality. The viability of this approach is demonstrated by its implementation in an existing single-chip processor.

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

processor cache technologies size performance implementation instruction data access paper caches effect

functional
memorialized
buffers
instruction caches
combinational
emerging technologies
circuits


Neighborhood Filters and the Decreasing Rearrangement Nonlocal filters are simple and powerful techniques for image denoising. In this paper, we give new insights into the analysis of one kind of them, the Neighborhood filter, by using a classical although not commonly used transformation: the decreasing rearrangement of a function. Independently of the dimension of the image, we reformulate the Neighborhood filter and its iterative variants as an integral operator defined in a one-dimensional space. The simplicity of this formulation allows to perform a detailed analysis of its properties. Among others, we prove that the filtered image is a contrast change of the original image, an that the filtering procedure behaves asymptotically as a shock filter combined with a border diffusive term, responsible for the staircaising effect and the loss of contrast.

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

neighborhood filters
decreasing rearrangement
denoising


Real-time markerless tracking for augmented reality: The virtual visual servoing framework Tracking is a very important research subject in a real-time augmented reality context. The main requirements for trackers are high accuracy and little latency at a reasonable cost. In order to address these issues, a real-time, robust, and efficient 3D model-based tracking algorithm is proposed for a "video see through" monocular vision system. The tracking of objects in the scene amounts to calculating the pose between the camera and the objects. Virtual objects can then be projected into the scene using the pose. Here, nonlinear pose estimation is formulated by means of a virtual visual servoing approach. In this context, the derivation of point-to-curves interaction matrices are given for different 3D geometrical primitives including straight lines, circles, cylinders, and spheres. A local moving edges tracker is used in order to provide real-time tracking of points normal to the object contours. Robustness is obtained by integrating an M-estimator into the visual control law via an iteratively reweighted least squares implementation. This approach is then extended to address the 3D model-free augmented reality problem. The method presented in this paper has been validated on several complex image sequences including outdoor environments. Results show the method to be robust to occlusion, changes in illumination, and mistracking.

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

augmented reality
virtual visual servoing

robust estimators
real-time
model-based tracking
model-free tracking


Use of Wrapper Algorithms Coupled with a Random Forests Classifier for Variable Selection in Large-Scale Genomic Association Studies Modern large-scale genetic association studies generate increasingly high-dimensional datasets. Therefore, some variable selection procedure should be performed before the application of traditional data analysis methods, for reasons of both computational efficiency and problems related to overfitting. We describe here a ``wrapper'' strategy (SIZEFIT) for variable selection that uses a Random Forests classifier, coupled with various local search/optimization algorithms. We apply it to a large dataset consisting of 2,425 African-American and non-Hispanic white individuals genotyped for 4,869 single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in a coronary heart disease (CHD) case-cohort association study (Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities), using incident CHD and plasma low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol levels as the dependent variables. We show that most SNPs can be safely removed from the dataset without compromising the predictive (classification) accuracy, with only a small number of SNPs (sometimes less than 100) containing any predictive signal. A statistical (SUMSTAT) approach is also applied to the dataset for comparison purposes. We describe a novel method for refining the subset of signal-containing SNPs (FIXFIT), based on an Extremal Optimization algorithm. Finally, we compare the top SNP rankings obtained by different methods and devise practical guidelines for researchers trying to generate a compact subset of predictive SNPs from genome-wide association datasets. Interestingly, there is a significant amount of overlap between seemingly very heterogeneous rankings. We conclude by constructing compact optimal predictive SNP subsets for CHD (less than 150 SNPs) and LDL (less than 300 SNPs) phenotypes, and by comparing various rankings for two well-known positive control SNPs for LDL in the apolipoprotein E gene.

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

coronary heart disease
random forests classifier
snps
variable selection


primitives for the dynamic evolution of component-based applications Due to the coarse granularity of components-based applications, components platforms are good candidates for enabling dynamic software evolution. The LuckyJ platform was designed to allow the dynamic evolution of applications. It implements the three primitives load, remove and replace to modify the components set. The design and implementation of a web server outlined several evolution patterns that should be integrated in LuckyJ to ease the task of maintainers and developers of applications that evolve dynamically. This leads to the definition of additional primitives as well as a language that could be used to automate the updating process in such a dynamic setting.

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


Multi-focus color image fusion in the HSI space using the sum-modified-laplacian and a coarse edge map This paper presented a simple algorithm for fusion of multi-focus color images. The algorithm was developed in HSI space where the intensity component was not very sensitive to noise. First, an initial decision map was generated by computing the classical SML (sum-modified-laplacian) as the pixels focus measure using the intensity component; second, by subtracting one of multi-focus images from another, a coarse edge map was obtained to refine the initial decision map; third, a fast region-filling method was used to build the final decision map; fourth, a soft fusion strategy was applied to the transition zone between focused and defocused regions and a nice-looking fused image was generated. Experiments showed that the algorithm was effective and the results were acceptable.

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

multi-focus
coarse-edge map
region-filling


A feature-free search query classification approach using semantic distance When classifying search queries into a set of target categories, machine learning based conventional approaches usually make use of external sources of information to obtain additional features for search queries and training data for target categories. Unfortunately, these approaches rely on large amount of training data for high classification precision. Moreover, they are known to suffer from inability to adapt to different target categories which may be caused by the dynamic changes observed in both Web topic taxonomy and Web content. In this paper, we propose a feature-free classification approach using semantic distance. We analyze queries and categories themselves and utilizes the number of Web pages containing both a query and a category as a semantic distance to determine their similarity. The most attractive feature of our approach is that it only utilizes the Web page counts estimated by a search engine to provide the search query classification with respectable accuracy. In addition, it can be easily adaptive to the changes in the target categories, since machine learning based approaches require extensive updating process, e.g., re-labeling outdated training data, re-training classifiers, to name a few, which is time consuming and high-cost. We conduct experimental study on the effectiveness of our approach using a set of rank measures and show that our approach performs competitively to some popular state-of-the-art solutions which, however, frequently use external sources and are inherently insufficient in flexibility. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

O O B I 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 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 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 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 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

search query
semantic distance
classification


Robust estimation of priorities in the AHP A pairwise comparison matrix of the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) is considered as a contingency table that helps to identify unusual or false data elicited from a judge. Special techniques are suggested for robust estimation of priority vectors. They include transformation of a Saaty matrix to matrix of shares of preferences and solving an eigenproblem designed for the transformed matrices. We also introduce an optimizing objective that produces robust priority estimation. Numerical results are compared using the AHP with these differing approaches. The comparison demonstrates that robust estimations yield priority vectors not prone to influence of possible errors among the elements of a pairwise comparison matrix.

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

analytic hierarchy process
contingency table


Tomographic Reconstruction of the Curl and Divergence of 2D Vector Fields Taking Refractions into Account This article is concerned with the problem of reconstructing the curl and divergence of two-dimensional (2D) vector fields from ultrasound time-of-flight measurements taking the refraction of the emitted ultrasound rays into account. Usually, in 2D vector field tomography the refraction of the ultrasound signal is neglected; i.e., one assumes that the signal propagates along straight lines. We address refractive effects, assuming that the ultrasound signal propagates along the geodesics of a Riemannian metric that is associated with the refractive index which is due to Fermat's principle. The investigated vector field, however, is still defined on a domain in R(2) that is equipped with the Euclidean metric. We show a connection between the ray transforms and the Radon transform along geodesic curves which generalizes a well-known result from the Euclidean case. Relying on this relation, we develop an asymptotic reconstruction formula for computing the curl and divergence of the vector field using Fourier integral operators. This article concludes with detailed numerical tests proving on the one hand a good performance of our method and showing on the other hand an improvement compared with computations that assume a propagation along straight lines.

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

longitudinal and transversal ray transform


Forecasting the winner of a tennis match We propose a method to forecast the winner of a tennis match, not only at the beginning of the match, but also (and in particular) during the match. The method is based on a fast and flexible computer program, and on a statistical analysis of a large data set from Wimbledon, both at match and at point level.

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


Conditions for and development of an information technology-support tool for manufacturing cost calculations and analyses Collecting data on manufacturing performance and making the results known to those involved could support efforts to improve manufacturing processes. This article describes the conditions for and development of manufacturing cost software developed for analysing connections between manufacturing performance parameters and economic parameters. The conditions for the software were investigated in two pre-studies. The first found that there are commercial software products for manufacturing data collection that support the collection of the data needed for the applied model. The second study demonstrated that the manufacturing companies participating in the second study were largely able to collect the needed data. The developed software, preliminary in character and needing further development, provides information on how the manufacturing performance of a company affects its manufacturing costs. It takes account of six categories of manufacturing cost. A what-if section is included, making it possible to alter the values of various parameters that affect costs in order to analyse how the part cost of a certain component changes with the use of new parameter values compared with historic values.

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

cost analysis
cost improvement
performance measures
manufacturing management