an access control framework for business processes for web services Business Processes for Web Services are the new paradigm for the lightweight integration of business from different enterprises.Whereas the security and access control policies for basic web services and distributed systems are well studied and almost standardized, there is not yet a comprehensive proposal for an access control architecture for business processes. The major issue is that a business process describe complex services that cross organizational boundaries and are provided by entities that see each other as just partners and nothing else.This calls for a number of differences with traditional aspects of access control architectures such as credential vs classical user-based access control, interactive and partner-based vs one-server-gathers-all requests of credentials from clients, controlled disclosure of information vs all-or-nothing access control decisions, abducing missing credentials for fulfilling requests vs deducing entailment of valid requests from credentials in formal models, "source-code" authorization processes vs data describing policies for communicating policies or for orchestrating the work of authorization servers.Looking at the access control field we find good approximation of most components but not their synthesis into one access control architecture for business processes for web services, which is the contribution of this paper.

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

distributed systems security
interactive access control
e-business
security management


Therapeutic Modulation of DMD Splicing by Blocking Exonic Splicing Enhancer Sites with Antisense Oligonucleotides Antisense oligonucleotides (AONs) can be used to correct the disrupted reading frame of Duchenne muscular dystophy patients (DMD). We have a collection of 121 AONs, of which 79 are effective in inducing the specific skipping of 38 out of the 79 different DMD exons. All AONs are located within exons and were hypothesized to act by steric hindrance of serine-arginine rich (SR) protein binding to exonic splicing enhancer (ESE) sites. Indeed, retrospective in silico analysis of effective versus ineffective AONs revealed that the efficacy of AONs is correlated to the presence of putative ESE sites (as predicted by the ESEfinder and RESCUE-ESE software). ESE predicting software programs are thus valuable tools for the optimization of exon-internal antisense target sequences

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

antisense oligonucleotides
aons
duchenne muscular dystophy
exonic splicing enhancer
ese


Bounded-degree polyhedronization of point sets In 1994 Grnbaum showed that, given a point set S in R3 R 3 , it is always possible to construct a polyhedron whose vertices are exactly S. Such a polyhedron is called a polyhedronization of S . Agarwal et al. extended this work in 2008 by showing that there always exists a polyhedronization that can be decomposed into a union of tetrahedra (tetrahedralizable). In the same work they introduced the notion of a serpentine polyhedronization for which the dual of its tetrahedralization is a chain. In this work we present a randomized algorithm running in O ( n log 6 n ) expected time which constructs a serpentine polyhedronization that has vertices with degree at most 7, answering an open question by Agarwal et al.

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


An efficient k nearest neighbor search for multivariate time series Multivariate time series (MTS) datasets are common in various multimedia, medical and financial applications. In order to efficiently perform k nearest neighbor searches for NITS datasets, we present a similarity measure, Eros (extended frobenius norm), an index structure, Muse (multilevel distance-based Index structure for Eros), and a feature subset selection technique, Ropes (recursive feature elimination on common principal components for Eros). Eros is based on principal component analysis, and computes the similarity between two MTS items by measuring how close the corresponding principal components are using the eigenvalues as weights. Muse constructs each level as a distance-based index structure Without using the weights, LIP to z levels, which are combined at the query time with the weights. Ropes utilizes both the common principal components and the weights recursively in order to select a subset of features for Eros. The experimental results show the superiority of our techniques as compared to earlier approaches. (C) 2006 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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

multivariate time series
similarity measure
principal component analysis
feature subset selection


A combined finite/discrete element simulation of shot peening processes - Part I: studies on 2D interaction laws In the first part of this series of papers on the combined finite/discrete element simulation of shot peening processes, different contact interaction laws for 2D cases are extensively studied with special attention given to the proper selection of the parameter values involved, which is one of the key issues for successful direct simulation. In addition, computational issues including contact forces, partial contact, energy dissipation, and rheological representation are addressed. Numerical examples for a single shot impact system simulated by the coupled finite/discrete element method using different interaction laws are provided to verify the proposed approaches. The results are also compared with those obtained by using only finite element methods. Findings obtained by performing 2D simulations will, in the subsequent article, be used in realistic computational simulations of 3D shot peening processes.

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

numerical simulation
finite element method
discrete element method
analysis


Human-reliability analysis of cooperative redundancy to support diagnosis This paper presents a human reliability analysis method of cooperative redundancy in support of diagnosis. We use a particular redundancy on which a diagnosis function is realized jointly by interacting human and automated controllers. The proposed cooperative redundancy supports a retrospective and experiential failure location function. It integrates an automated controller, based on several points of view: on a list of possible system failures, on a model of coherence between points of view, and on different operations such as focusing on or excluding components or cancellation of a previous operation. A particular dialogue interface is specified for an industrial case to join the human and automated controllers' reasoning, in order to optimize their mutual understanding when making inferences on failures. Such a cooperative redundancy is analyzed with a discrete human reliability approach in order to evaluate its efficiency. This new approach is a conditional, multi-objective probabilistic method which takes into account two types of constraints: constraints based on human behavior, e.g., the time consuming human reasoning, and constraints regarding the system being diagnosed, e.g., the quality of the diagnosis. It is based on different modes of reasoning: the normal mode, the degraded mode, the failed mode, and the success mode. Both normal and degraded modes concern the human behavior dependent constraints. The outputs of both modes are either the success mode if system dependent constraints are satisfied, or the failed mode if not. The cooperative redundancy for diagnosis support is applied to the phone network troubleshooting, and experimental results are analyzed by using the defined analysis method. Conclusions have shown the feasibility of applying cooperative redundancy to diagnosis support. However, even if this cooperative redundancy improves the quality of the diagnosis, future researchers have to improve this redundancy in order to reduce the average delay to make a diagnosis.

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

cooperative redundancy
diagnosis
human reliability


One-dimensional smoothing using extreme envelope average In this paper, a new de-noising technique called extreme envelope average (EEA) is presented. This technique is related to the energy reduction of the noisy data throughout the successive averages between the maximum and minimum extreme envelopes. The basic principle is simple and is based on the central tendency of the extreme averages after a specific number of sets of the process. Important structures of the signal, representing low-frequency components, are maintained. It is a very fast convergence method, requires a unique noisy data, and presents satisfactory results. There are no constraints about the linearity, stationary or harmonic content in relation to of the test signal, that make it a useful approach for signal that presenting abrupt changes along of its curvature. And, it can also be used for non-equally-spaced data. The present study is limited to signals numerically corrupted by white Gaussian noise with zero mean.

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


first-class macros have types In modern Scheme, a macro captures the lexical environment where it is defined. This creates an opportunity for extending Scheme so that macros are first-class values. The key to achieving this goal, while preserving the ability to compile programs into reasonable code, is the addition of a type system. Many interesting things can be done with first-class macros, including the construction of a useful module system in which modules are also first-class. Clams got legs! B.C.

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

module
type system
macros
values
code
scheme
types


Integrating bulk-data transfer into the aurora distributed shared data system The Aurora distributed shared data system implements a shared-data abstraction on distributed-memory platforms, such as clusters, using abstract data types. Aurora programs are written in C++ and instantiate shared-data objects whose data-sharing behaviour can be optimized using a novel technique called scoped behaviour. Each object and each phase of the computation (i.e., use-context) can be independently optimized with per-object and per-context flexibility. Within the scoped behaviour framework, optimizations such as bulk-data transfer can be implemented and made available to the application programmer. Scoped behaviour carries semantic information regarding the specific data-sharing pattern through various layers of software. We describe how the optimizations are integrated from the uppermost application-programmer layers down to the lowest UDP-based layers of the Aurora system. A bulk-data transfer network protocol bypasses some bottlenecks associated with TCP/IP and achieves higher performance on an ATM network than either TreadMarks (distributed shared memory) or MPICH (message passing) for matrix multiplication and parallel sorting. (C) 2001 Academic Press.

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

shared data
optimizations
scoped behaviour
clusters

bulk-data transfer
distributed-memory computing
data-sharing patterns
network of workstations


analysis of the contribution of computer-supported learning to organizational knowledge management The competitive advantage of organizations is more and more related to the competence of the workers and to the capacity the organization shows in improving the organizational learning. Computer-supported learning (CSL) contributes to improve the organizational learning by supporting the knowledge sharing process. Sharing knowledge, however, is not sufficient to increase the intellectual capital of an organization. It is necessary to share the kind of knowledge that can be useful to add value to the organization business. This kind of knowledge can be identified and mapped by applying knowledge management (KM) processes. However, although positive effects of a comprehensive approach that addresses both CSL (formal learning) and KM (informal learning) could seem obvious, and despite the fact that organizations are starting to perceive the interrelations among CSL and KM, these integrations ideas are rarely implemented in practice and, in many cases, are not technologically operational. This paper fills in this gap by discussing how CSL can be useful for satisfying the requirements of KM.

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

corporate education
computer-supported learning


Simulated Annealing for Pattern Detection and Seismic Applications Simulated annealing (SA) is adopted to detect the parameters of circles, ellipses, hyperbolas, and to treat lines as asymptotes of hyperbola in image, Also, the algorithm is applied to seismic pattern detection. We use the general equation for ellipses and hyperbolas in detection and define the distance from a point to a pattern such that the detection becomes feasible. The system error between N points and K patients is defined. The proposed simulated annealing parameter detection system has the capability of searching a set of parameter vectors with global minimal error with respect to the input data. Experiments oil the detection of circles, ellipses, hyperbolas, and lines in images are quite successful. The detection system is also applied to detect the line pattern of direct wave and the hyperbolic pattern of reflection wave in the simulated and real one-shot seismogram. The results Can improve seismic interpretations and further seismic data processing

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

global optimization
seismic pattern recognition
hough transform
hyperbolic pattern detection


Numerical error control for second-order explicit TVD scheme with limiters in advection simulation This paper analyzes the causes of the numerical errors in terms of numerical diffusion and compression arising from the use of explicit second-order total variation diminishing (TVD) schemes in one-dimensional advection simulation. It demonstrates that different TVD limiters may have very different performances in different advection simulations, because of the so-called numerical diffusion and compression. The accuracy of the computed results is found to depend on not only the limiter functions themselves but also the advection features such as the concentration distribution, advection velocity and time step, etc. According to such relations, the effective ranges of the MIN_MOD, Van Leer and SUPERBEE limiters are characterized by introducing a dimensionless parameter which reflects the key features of advections, aiming to provide an approach to select a proper TVD limiter in advection simulation.

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

numerical compression
total variation diminishing (tvd)
explicit scheme
finite volume method (fvm)


Multilayer Protection with Availability Guarantees in Optical WDM Networks Survivability is a key concern in modern network design. This paper investigates the problem of survivable dynamic connection provisioning in general telecom backbone networks, that are mesh structured. We assume differentiated services where connections may have different availability requirements, so they may be provisioned differently with protection (if needed) based on their availability requirements and current network state. The problem of effectively provisioning differentiated-service requests, that has been widely investigated for connections routed at the physical layer, assumes peculiar features if we consider sub-wavelength requests at the logical layer that have to be protected (or more generically, whose availability target has to be guaranteed), but also have to be groomed for an efficient use of network resources. An integrated multilayer approach is necessary that considers requirements and grooming of connections at the logical layer as well as their routing and availability at the physical layer. Joint availability-guaranteed routing and traffic grooming may lead to a negative interaction, since the objective of the first problem (guaranteeing a given level of availability to the connections) clashes with the objective of the other problem (minimizing resource consumption). For a multilayer WDM mesh network, we propose new multilayer routing strategies that perform effective availability-guaranteed grooming of sub-wavelength connections. These strategies jointly considers connection availability satisfaction and resource optimization and are developed under two different practical hypotheses: guaranteed target, i.e., a connection is routed only if its availability target is satisfied, and best-effort target, a connection is always routed and, when the availability target cannot be guaranteed, the path with the best possible availability is provisioned. Numerical results are reported and discussed for the two approaches mentioned above. In both cases, the results show high effectiveness of our provisioning strategy.

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

multilayer protection
availability
traffic grooming


Capturing Router Congestion and Delay Using a unique monitoring experiment, we capture all packets crossing a (lightly utilized) operational access router from a Tier-1 provider, and use them to provide a detailed examination of router congestion and packet delays. The complete capture enables not,just statistics as seen from outside the router, but also an accurate physical router model to be identified. This enables a comprehensive examination of congestion and delay from three points of view: the understanding of origins, measurement, and reporting. Our study defines new methodologies and metrics. In particular, the traffic reporting enables a rich description of the diversity of microcongestion behavior, without model assumptions, and at achievable computational cost.

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


Dealing with noise in multiframe structure from motion The problem of structure from motion (SFM) is to obtain a 3D model of a scene using multiple images taken from different camera locations, Traditional SFM algorithms using just two images often produce inaccurate 3D reconstructions, mainly due to incorrect estimation of the camera's motion, More recent algorithms have used multiple (>2) image sequences. This paper describes a new incremental algorithm for reconstructing structure from multi-image sequences which estimates and corrects for the error in computing the camera motion. Experimental results of the algorithm are reported on one synthetic and three real image sequences. Unlike many previous incremental algorithms, the new algorithm in principle is capable of reconstructing a 3D model of the scene to arbitrary accuracy given a sufficient number of images, It is demonstrated experimentally that the algorithm gives superior results compared to others which do not correct for the error in recovering motion. (C) 1999 Academic Press.

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

structure from motion (sfm)
multiframe sfm
modeling motion error
kalman filtering
3d scene reconstruction
automatic model acquisition


Energetic basis for drug resistance of HIV-1 protease mutants against amprenavir Amprenavir (APV) is a high affinity (0.15 nM) HIV-1 protease (PR) inhibitor. However, the affinities of the drug resistant protease variants V32I, I50V, I54V, I54M, I84V and L90M to amprenavir are decreased 3 to 30-fold compared to the wild-type. In this work, the popular molecular mechanics Poisson-Boltzmann surface area method has been used to investigate the effectiveness of amprenavir against the wild-type and these mutated protease variants. Our results reveal that the protonation state of Asp25/Asp25' strongly affects the dynamics, the overall affinity and the interactions of the inhibitor with individual residues. We emphasize that, in contrast to what is often assumed, the protonation state may not be inferred from the affinities but requires pK(a) calculations. At neutral pH, Asp25 and Asp25' are ionized or protonated, respectively, as suggested from pK(a) calculations. This protonation state was thus mainly considered in our study. Mutation induced changes in binding affinities are in agreement with the experimental findings. The decomposition of the binding free energy reveals the mechanisms underlying binding and drug resistance. Drug resistance arises from an increase in the energetic contribution from the van der Waals interactions between APV and PR (V32I, I50V, and I84V mutant) or a rise in the energetic contribution from the electrostatic interactions between the inhibitor and its target (I54M and I54V mutant). For the V32I mutant, also an increased free energy for the polar solvation contributes to the drug resistance. For the L90M mutant, a rise in the van der Waals energy for APV-PR interactions is compensated by a decrease in the polar solvation free energy such that the net binding affinity remains unchanged. Detailed understanding of the molecular forces governing binding and drug resistance might assist in the design of new inhibitors against HIV-1 PR variants that are resistant against current drugs.

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


Using conditional random fields for result identification in biomedical abstracts The abstracts of biomedical papers usually contain three sections: objective, methods, and results-conclusion. The results-conclusion section is the most important because it usually describes the main contribution of a paper. Unfortunately, not all biomedical journals follow this three-section format. In this paper, we propose a machine learning (ML) based approach to automatically identify the results-conclusion section. The results-conclusion section identification problem is formulated as a sequence labeling task. Four feature sets, including Position, Named Entity, Tense, and Word Frequency, are employed with Conditional Random Fields (CRFs) as the underlying ML model. The experiment results show that the proposed approach can achieve F-measure, precision, and recall of 97.08%, 96.63% and 97.53%, respectively.

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

result identification
sequence labeling
conditional random fields


The effects of magnetic field on the energy levels of shallow donor impurities in GaAs/AlxGa1?x as quantum dots In the present work, we report a calculation of the electron energy levels (1s,2p?,2p+) and the binding energies of a shallow impurity placed in the center of a circular quantum dot of a GaAs surrounded by AlGaAs in the presence of a uniform magnetic field applied perpendicularly to the plane of the dot. We also present results for the 1s?2p+ transition energy as a function of the magnetic field.

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


Dynamic p-adaptive RungeKutta discontinuous Galerkin methods for the shallow water equations In this paper, dynamic p-adaptive RungeKutta discontinuous Galerkin (RKDG) methods for the two-dimensional shallow water equations (SWE) are investigated. The p-adaptive algorithm that is implemented dynamically adjusts the order of the elements of an unstructured triangular grid based on a simple measure of the local flow properties of the numerical solution. Time discretization is accomplished using optimal strong-stability-preserving (SSP) RK methods. The methods are tested on two idealized problems of coastal ocean modeling interest with complex bathymetry namely, the idealization of a continental shelf break and a coastal inlet. Numerical results indicate the stability, robustness, and accuracy of the algorithm, and it is shown that the use of dynamic p-adaptive grids offers savings in CPU time relative to grids with elements of a fixed order p that use either local h-refinement or global p-refinement to adequately resolve the solution while offering comparable accuracy.

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

discontinuous galerkin
shallow water equations


Exploring Nursing E-Learning Systems Success Based on Information System Success Model E-learning is thought of as an innovative approach to enhance nurses' care service knowledge. Extensive research has provided rich information toward system development, courses design, and nurses' satisfaction with an e-learning system. However, a comprehensive view in understanding nursing e-learning system success is an important but less focused-on topic. The purpose of this research was to explore net benefits of nursing e-learning systems based on the updated DeLone and McLean's Information System Success Model. The study used a self-administered questionnaire to collected 208 valid nurses' responses from 21 of Taiwan's medium-and large-scale hospitals that have implemented nursing e-learning systems. The result confirms that the model is sufficient to explore the nurses' use of e-learning systems in terms of intention to use, user satisfaction, and net benefits. However, while the three exogenous quality factors (system quality, information quality, and service quality) were all found to be critical factors affecting user satisfaction, only information quality showed a direct effect on the intention to use. This study provides useful insights for evaluating nursing e-learning system qualities as well as an understanding of nurses' intentions and satisfaction related to performance benefits.

O B 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 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 B 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 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 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 B 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

information system success model
intention
nursing
satisfaction


Reliable routing in wireless ad hoc networks: The virtual routing protocol A novel routing protocol for wireless, mobile ad hoc networks is presented. This protocol incorporates features that enhance routing reliability, defined as the ability to provide almost 100% packet delivery rate. The protocol is based on a virtual structure, unrelated to the physical network topology, where mobile nodes are connected by virtual links and are responsible for keeping physical routes to their neighbors in the virtual structure. Routes between pairs of mobiles are set up by using information to translate virtual paths discovered in the virtual structure. Route discovery and maintenance phases of the protocol are based on unicast messages travelling across virtual paths, with sporadic use of flooding protocol. Most flooding is executed in the background using low priority messages. The routing protocol has been evaluated and compared with the Dynamic Source Routing protocol and with the Zone Routing Protocol by means of simulation.

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

hybrid routing protocols for ad hoc networks


An interactive desirability function method to multiresponse optimization Multiresponse optimization problems often involve incommensurate and conflicting responses. To obtain a satisfactory compromise in such a case, a decision maker (DM)s preference information on the tradeoffs among the responses should be incorporated into the problem. This paper proposes an interactive method based on the desirability function approach to facilitate the preference articulation process. The proposed method allows the DM to adjust any of the preference parameters, namely, the shape, bound, and target of a desirability function in a single, integrated framework. The proposed method would be highly effective in generating a compromise solution that is faithful to the DMs preference structure.

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

multiresponse optimization
desirability function approach


Harnessing consumer reviews for marketing intelligence: a domain-adapted sentiment classification approach With the success and proliferation of Web 2.0 applications, consumers can use the Internet for shopping, comparing products, and publishing product reviews on various social media sites. Such consumer reviews are valuable assets in applications supporting marketing intelligence. However, the rapidly increasing number of consumer reviews makes it difficult for businesses or consumers to obtain a comprehensive view of consumer opinions pertaining to a product of interest when manual analysis techniques are used. Thus, developing data analysis tools that can automatically analyze consumer reviews to summarize consumer sentiments is both desirable and essential. Accordingly, this study was focused on the sentiment classification of consumer reviews. To address the domain-dependency problem typically encountered in sentiment classification and other sentiment analysis applications, we propose a domain-adapted sentiment-classification (DA-SC) technique for inducing a domain-independent base classifier and using a cotraining mechanism to adapt the base classifier to a specific application domain of interest. Our empirical evaluation results show that the performance of the proposed DA-SC technique is superior or comparable to similar techniques for classifying consumer reviews into appropriate sentiment categories.

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

sentiment classification
cotraining mechanism

domain adaption
opinion mining
consumer review


Options for the Destruction of Chemical Weapons and Management of the Associated Risks The destruction of chemical weapons is a hazardous operation. The degree of hazard posed, however, is not uniform and is dependent on the specific chemical agent and the configuration of the weapon or bulk storage vessel in which it is contained. For example, a highly volatile nerve agent in an explosively configured munition, such as a rocket, poses a very different hazard from that of a bulk storage container of viscous mustard gas. Equally the handling of recovered, often highly corroded, World War (WW)I or WWII chemical munitions will pose a very different hazard from that associated with dealing with modern chemical weapons stored under the appropriate conditions. Over the years, a number of technologies have been developed for the destruction of chemical weapons. Each has its advantages and disadvantages. None of them provide a universal solution to the problem. When assessing options for the destruction of these weapons and the management of the associated risks, therefore, it is important to give due consideration and weight to these differences. To ensure that the destruction technology selected takes due account of them and that the resulting overall risk assessment accurately reflects the actual risks involved

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

chemical weapons
chemical munitions
destruction
risk


A new parallel algorithm for solving large-scale Markov chains In this paper, we propose a new parallel sparse iterative method (PPSIA) for computing the stationary distribution of large-scale Markov chains. The PPSIA method is based on Markov chain state isolation and aggregation techniques. The parallel method conserves as much as possible the benefits of aggregation, and GaussSeidel effects contained in the sequential algorithm (SIA) using a pipelined technique. Both SIA and PPSIA exploit sparse matrix representation in order to solve large-scale Markov chains. Some Markov chains have been tested to compare the performance of SIA, PPSIA algorithms with other techniques such as the power method, and the generalized minimal residual GMRES method. In all the tested models, PPSIA outperforms the other methods and shows a super-linear speed-up.

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

performance evaluation
iterative methods


Schottky barrier height engineering of Al contacts on Si by embedded Au nanoparticles By controlling the number of Au NPs on Si, the Al/Au NPs/Si SBH has been modified. Au NPs induced SBH lowering is more effective in Al/n-Si (0.11eV) compared with Al/p-Si (0.05eV). The size of NPs is the primary influential factor in local electric field enhancement. Other factors are Al/Au work function difference and Al/SiAu/Si SBH difference. ETTI model was determined to best describe the Al/Au NPs/Si SBH lowering.

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

aluminum contact
colloidal gold nanoparticles (au nps)
silicon-based schottky barrier diode
spin-coating


Statistical multiplexing and mix-dependent alternative routing in multiservice VP networks We consider problems in traffic integration and routing for virtual path (VP)-based multiservice networks. The objective is to exploit statistical multiplexing among various traffic types in order to improve system utilization. Difficulties arise due to statistical multiplexing since a connection's bandwidth requirement depends on the characteristics of the interfering traffic. We first consider whether segregating heterogeneous traffic with different quality of service (QoS) requirements on separate VP's is desirable. Next we consider routing heterogeneous permanent connections given a predefined traffic type mix onto multiple VP's between a source destination pair. We show that it is not necessarily advantageous to have each VP carry every traffic type. In fact, perhaps surprisingly, an optimum solution to this problem suggests that only a small number of traffic types, or even homogeneous traffic, need be present on each VP. Based on this observation, we propose a simple alternative routing algorithm with routing sequences depending on the traffic mix.

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

alternative routing
statistical multiplexing
traffic mix
virtual path


DISTRIBUTION OF MULTI-WORDS IN CHINESE AND ENGLISH DOCUMENTS As a hybrid of N-gram in natural language processing and collocation in statistical linguistics, multi-word is becoming a hot topic in area of text mining and information retrieval. In this paper, a study concerning distribution of multi-words is carried out to explore a theoretical basis for probabilistic term-weighting scheme. Specifically, the Poisson distribution, zero-inflated binomial distribution, and G-distribution are comparatively studied on a task of predicting probabilities of multi-words' occurrences using these distributions, for both technical multi-words and nontechnical multi-words. In addition, a rule-based multi-word extraction algorithm is proposed to extract multi-words from texts based on words' occurring patterns and syntactical structures. Our experimental results demonstrate that G-distribution has the best capability to predict probabilities of frequency of multi-words' occurrence and the Poisson distribution is comparable to zero-inflated binomial distribution in estimation of multi-word distribution. The outcome of this study validates that burstiness is a universal phenomenon in linguistic count data, which is applicable not only for individual content words but also for multi-words.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 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 B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 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-word
term distribution
zero-inflated distribution
g-distribution


Who and what links to the Internet Archive The Internet Archives (IA) Wayback Machine is the largest and oldest public Web archive and has become a significant repository of our recent history and cultural heritage. Despite its importance, there has been little research about how it is discovered and used. Based on Web access logs, we analyze what users are looking for, why they come to IA, where they come from, and how pages link to IA. We find that users request English pages the most, followed by the European languages. Most human users come to Web archives because they do not find the requested pages on the live Web. About 65% of the requested archived pages no longer exist on the live Web. We find that more than 82% of human sessions connect to the Wayback Machine via referrals from other Web sites, while only 15% of robots have referrers. Most of the links (86%) from Websites are to individual archived pages at specific points in time, and of those 83% no longer exist on the live Web. Finally, we find that users who come from search engines browse more pages than users who come from external Web sites.

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

web archiving
web server logs
web usage mining
robots detection
language detection


Cluster synchronization in an array of hybrid coupled neural networks with delay This paper investigates cluster synchronization in an array of hybrid coupled neural networks with delay. By constructing a special coupling matrix, a new method is proposed to realize cluster synchronization. In particular, the coupling configuration matrix is not assumed to be symmetric or irreducible and the inner coupling matrix is not assumed to be diagonal or positive definite. Moreover, several sufficient conditions for cluster synchronization are derived, based on Lyapunov stability theory and the linear matrix inequality (LMI) technique. Finally, an example is given to demonstrate the effectiveness of the theoretical results.

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

lyapunovkrasovskii function
linear matrix inequality (lmi)
delayed neural network
hybrid coupling


online synchronous interviewing of the info-savvy This poster illustrates our experience using Internet Relay Chat (IRC) to conduct qualitative interviews with web developers. E-interviews with our sample did not suffer from methodological limitations identified in other studies due to the participants' familiarity and proficiency with this form of communication.

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

qualitative research methods
remote data collection
internet relay chat (irc)


Dendritic action potentials connect distributed dendrodendritic microcircuits Lateral inhibition of cells surrounding an excited area is a key property of sensory systems, sharpening the preferential tuning of individual cells in the presence of closely related input signals. In the olfactory pathway, a dendrodendritic synaptic microcircuit between mitral and granule cells in the olfactory bulb has been proposed to mediate this type of interaction through granule cell inhibition of surrounding mitral cells. However, it is becoming evident that odor inputs result in broad activation of the olfactory bulb with interactions that go beyond neighboring cells. Using a realistic modeling approach we show how backpropagating action potentials in the long lateral dendrites of mitral cells, together with granule cell actions on mitral cells within narrow columns forming glomerular units, can provide a mechanism to activate strong local inhibition between arbitrarily distant mitral cells. The simulations predict a new role for the dendrodendritic synapses in the multicolumnar organization of the granule cells. This new paradigm gives insight into the functional significance of the patterns of connectivity revealed by recent viral tracing studies. Together they suggest a functional wiring of the olfactory bulb that could greatly expand the computational roles of the mitralgranule cell network.

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


adaptive execution techniques for smt multiprocessor architectures In simultaneous multithreading (SMT) multiprocessors, using all the available threads (logical processors) to run a parallel loop is not always beneficial due to the interference between threads and parallel execution overhead. To maximize performance in an SMT multiprocessor, finding the optimal number of threads is important. This paper presents adaptive execution techniques to find the optimal execution mode for SMT multiprocessor architectures. A compiler preprocessor generates code that, based on dynamic feedback, automatically determines at run time the optimal number of threads for each parallel loop in the application. Using 10 standard numerical applications and running them with our techniques on an Intel 4-processor Hyper-Threading Xeon SMP with 8 logical processors, our code is, on average, about 2 and 18 times faster than the original code executed on 4 and 8 logical processors, respectively.

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

performance counters
performance estimation
simultaneous multi-threading
compilers


feature engineering for mobile (sms) spam filtering Mobile spam in an increasing threat that may be addressed using filtering systems like those employed against email spam. We believe that email filtering techniques require some adaptation to reach good levels of performance on SMS spam, especially regarding message representation. In order to test this assumption, we have performed experiments on SMS filtering using top performing email spam filters on mobile spam messages using a suitable feature representation, with results supporting our hypothesis.

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


semantic-based delivery of olap summary tables in wireless environments With the rapid growth in mobile and wireless technologies and the availability, pervasiveness and cost effectiveness of wireless networks, mobile computers are quickly becoming the normal front-end devices for accessing enterprise data. In this paper, we are addressing the issue of efficient delivery of business decision support data in the form of summary tables to mobile clients equipped with OLAP front-end tools. Towards this, we propose a new on-demand scheduling algorithm, called SBS , that exploits both the derivation semantics among OLAP summary tables and the mobile clients' capabilities of executing simple SQL queries. It maximizes the aggregated data sharing between clients and reduces the broadcast length compared to the already existing techniques. The degree of aggregation can be tuned to control the tradeoff between access time and energy consumption. Further, the proposed scheme adapts well to different request rates, access patterns and data distributions. The algorithm effectiveness with respect to access time and power consumption is evaluated using simulation.

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

mobile computing
broadcast scheduling
broadcast pull


hidden voip calling records from networking intermediaries While confidentiality of telephone conversation contents has recently received considerable attention in Internet telephony (VoIP), the protection of the caller--callee relation is largely unexplored. From the privacy research community we learn that this relation can be protected by Chaum's mixes. In early proposals of mix networks, however, it was reasonable to assume that high latency is acceptable. While the general idea has been deployed for low latency networks as well, important security measures had to be dropped for achieving performance. The result is protection against a considerably weaker adversary model in exchange for usability. In this paper, we show that it is unjustified to conclude that low latency network applications imply weak protection. On the contrary, we argue that current Internet telephony protocols provide a range of promising preconditions for adopting anonymity services with security properties similar to those of high latency anonymity networks. We expect that implementing anonymity services becomes a major challenge as customer privacy becomes one of the most important secondary goals in any (commercial) Internet application.

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


Yoda, an adaptive soft classification model: content-based similarity queries and beyond Providing a customized result set based upon a user preference is the ultimate objective of many content-based image retrieval systems. There are two main challenges in meeting this objective: First, there is a gap between the physical characteristics of digital images and the semantic meaning of the images. Secondly, different people may have different perceptions on the same set of images. To address both these challenges, we propose a model, named Yoda, that conceptualizes content-based querying as the task of soft classifying images into classes. These classes can overlap, and their members are different for different users. The "soft" classification is hence performed for each and every image feature, including both physical and semantic features. Subsequently, each image will be ranked based on the weighted aggregation of its classification memberships. The weights are user-dependent, and hence different users would obtain different result sets for the same query. Yoda employs a fuzzy-logic based aggregation function for ranking images. We show that, in addition to some performance benefits, fuzzy aggregation is less sensitive to noise and can support disjunctive queries as compared to weighted-average aggregation used by other content-based image retrieval systems. Finally, since Yoda heavily relies on user-dependent weights (i.e., user profiles) for the aggregation task, we utilize the users' relevance feedback to improve the profiles using genetic algorithms (GA). Our learning mechanism requires fewer user interactions, and results in a faster convergence to the user's preferences as compared to other learning techniques.

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

fuzzy logic
customization
soft query
genetic algorithm


A comparative DFT study on aquation and nucleobase binding of ruthenium (II) and osmium (II) arene complexes The potential energy surfaces of the reactions of organometallic arene complexes of the type [(eta (6)-arene)M-II(pic)Cl] (where pic = 2-picolinic acid, M = Ru or Os) were examined by a DFT computational study. Among the seven density functional methods, hybrid exchange functional B3LYP outperforms the others to explain the aquation of the complexes. The reactions and binding energies of Ru-II and Os-II arene complexes with both 9EtG and 9EtA were studied to gain insight into the reactivity of these types of organometallic complexes with DNA. The obtained data rationalize experimental observation, contributing to partly understanding the potential biological and medical applications of organometallic complexes.

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

dft ruthenium osmium aquation nucleobase


calculating accurate volume of spontaneous intracerebral hematoma In this paper we introduce a method for calculating the volume of spontaneous intracerebral hematomas from a sequence of tomographic scans. The described approach is a modification of a gold standard method called step-section planimetry. It uses image interpolation techniques to increase the accuracy of the obtained volume and employs semi-automatic segmentation to facilitate physicians' work. The method is designed to perform especially well for highly irregular shapes that are characteristic for intracerebral hematomas. The obtained results are compared with two existing commercial approaches.

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

volumetry
step-section planimetry
region growing image segmentation
fuzzy control


Statistical timing and leakage power analysis of PD-SOI digital circuits This paper presents a fast statistical static timing and leakage power analysis in Partially-Depleted Silicon-On-Insulator (PD-SOI) CMOS circuits in BSIMSOI3.2 100 nm technology. The proposed timing analysis considers floating body effect on the propagation delay for more accurate timing analysis in PD-SOI CMOS circuits. The accuracy of modeling the leakage power in PD-SOI CMOS circuits is improved by considering the interactions between the subthreshold leakage and the gate tunneling leakage, the stacking effect, the history effect, and the fanout effect. The proposed timing and leakage power analysis algorithms are implemented in Matlab, Hspice, and C language. The proposed methodology is applied to ISCAS85 benchmarks, and the results show that the error is within 5% compared with random simulation results.

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

pd-soi (partially-depleted silicon on insulator)


The role of metadata in the Statistical Knowledge Network - An emerging research agenda Metadata (data about data) is integral to many processes in the Statistical Knowledge Network (SKN). Recently, efforts such as the Semantic Web and others express the importance of metadata in supporting integration of information across multiple sources. Critical challenges in building the SKN are identifying what metadata. is needed, and at what point in the cycle of production and use of statistical information it must be available, and establishing an architecture that supports metadata acquisition and use throughout the SKN. This article provides a research agenda in those areas, building on our current work in helping users to find the statistical information they need and understand what they find.

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 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

statistical metadata
digital government
user studies


Local search based heuristics for global optimization: Atomic clusters and beyond Finding good solutions to large scale, hard, global optimization problems, is a demanding task with many relevant applications. It is well known that, in order to tackle a difficult problem, an algorithm has to incorporate all of the available information on the problem domain. However, as we will show in this paper, some general purpose methods and the ideas on which they are built can provide guidance towards the efficient solution of difficult instances. Most of this paper will be devoted to heuristic techniques applied to the problem of finding a minimum energy configuration of a cluster of atoms in R3 R 3 . This is a very relevant problem with a large set of applications which has triggered considerable research efforts in the last decade. We will show how some relatively simple ideas can be used to generate fairly efficient methods which have been employed to discover many new cluster structures. In this paper we will introduce some of the main algorithmic ideas which have proven to be particularly successful in the field of global optimization applied to atomic cluster conformation problems. We will mainly discuss Basin Hopping methods, as well as their populationbased variant, and some specific technique based on direct moves. These methods, although designed for the specific problem, have a much wider applicability. In fact, one of the aims of this paper is also that of suggesting that similar ideas can be employed in order to design innovative methods even for totally different global optimization problems, like, e.g., circle packing and space trajectory planning.

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

global optimization
basin hopping
atomic clusters

neighborhood structures
diversification
population based methods


A systematic modelling and simulation approach for JIT performance optimisation Robust computer aided simulation and modelling tools help to visualise, analyse and optimise complex production processes with a reasonable amount of time and investment. A review of the literature shows that simulation and modelling have not been extensively applied in just-in-time (JIT) manufacturing environments. Also there remains a lack of a comprehensive mechanism to identify the most significant JIT drivers for the purpose of system process optimisation. The prime objective of this study is to close this gap by applying computer based simulation tools and linear mathematical modelling to identify the impact of selected key JIT parameters on performance in an automotive component-manufacturing environment. Research shows that variables such as inconsistent task distribution, variation on operator performance, misconception of total quality management philosophy and lack of set-up time elimination plans disrupt ideal JIT production. In this study, ProModel simulation and modelling software is used to model and simulate different experimental scenarios in order to understand and quantify the impact of selected input key JIT variables on objective functions (i.e. process time and takt time). The outcome is a robust mathematical model that highlights the significance of JIT drivers in the manually operated mixed-model assembly lines.

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

performance optimisation
simulation
mathematical modelling


Orientation analysis for rotated human face detection In this paper, we present a framework of orientation analysis for rotated human face detection. A novel orientation histogram is constructed for statistical analysis of face images, which can show a proper symmetry with respect to the orientation of the principal axis and a local peak at its orthogonal orientation. By analyzing the orientation histogram, we can easily find the principal axis' orientation of the rotated face. Then an upright frontal face detector based on orientation analysis and other knowledge is designed to verify the given face. The experimental results illustrate the effectiveness of our framework.

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

orientation analysis
human face detection
orientation histogram


Parameter setting of the Hopfield network applied to TSP The major drawbacks of the continuous Hopfield network (CHN) model when it is used to solve some combinatorial problems, for instance, the traveling salesman problem (TSP), are the non feasibility of the obtained solutions and the trial-and-error setting values process of the model parameters. In this paper, both drawbacks are avoided by introducing a set of analytical conditions guaranteeing that any equilibrium point of the CHN characterizes a tour for the TSP. In this way, any instance of the TSP can be solved with this parameter setting. Some computational experiences are also included, allowing the solution of instances with sizes of up to 1000 cities.

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


On constant composition codes A constant composition code over a k-ary alphabet has the property that the numbers of occurrences of the k symbols within a codeword is the same for each codeword. These specialize to constant weight codes in the binary case, and permutation codes in the case that each symbol occurs exactly once. Constant composition codes arise in powerline communication and balanced scheduling, and are used in the construction of permutation codes. In this paper, direct and recursive methods are developed for the construction of constant composition codes.

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


Forbidden (0,1)-vectors in hyperplanes of R-n: The restricted case In this paper we continue our investigation on "Extremal problems under dimension constraint" introduced in [2]. Let E(n, k) be the set of (0,1)-vectors in R-n with k one's. Given 1 less than or equal to m, w less than or equal to n let X subset of E(n, m) satisfy span(X) boolean AND E(n, w) = empty set. How big can \X\ be? This is the main problem studied in this paper. We solve this problem for all parameters 1 less than or equal to m, w less than or equal to n and n > n(0) (m, w).

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

combinatorial extremal theory
(0,1)-vectors
forbidden weights
nontrivial intersecting systems


Linear time construction of 5-phylogenetic roots for tree chordal graphs Inspired by phylogenetic tree construction in computational biology, Lin et al. (The 11th Annual International Symposium on Algorithms and Computation (ISAAC 2000), pp. 539-551, 2000) introduced the notion of a k -phylogenetic root. A k-phylogenetic root of a graph G is a tree T such that the leaves of T are the vertices of G, two vertices are adjacent in G precisely if they are within distance k in T, and all non-leaf vertices of T have degree at least three. The k-phylogenetic root problem is to decide whether such a tree T exists for a given graph G. In addition to introducing this problem, Lin et al. designed linear time constructive algorithms for ka parts per thousand currency sign4, while left the problem open for ka parts per thousand yen5. In this paper, we partially fill this hole by giving a linear time constructive algorithm to decide whether a given tree chordal graph has a 5-phylogenetic root; this is the largest class of graphs known to have such a construction.

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

graph algorithms
phylogenetic roots
leaf roots
steiner roots
linear time recognition


advanced code coverage analysis using substring holes Code coverage is a common aid in the testing process. It is generally used for marking the source code segments that were executed and, more importantly, those that were not executed. Many code coverage tools exist, supporting a variety of languages and operating systems. Unfortunately, these tools provide little or no assistance when code coverage data is voluminous. Such quantities are typical of system tests and even for earlier testing phases. Drill-down capabilities that look at different granularities of the data, starting with directories and going through files to functions and lines of source code, are insufficient. Such capabilities make the assumption that the coverage issues themselves follow the code hierarchy. We argue that this is not the case for much of the uncovered code. Two notable examples are error handling code and platform-specific constructs. Both tend to be spread throughout the source in many files, even though the related coverage, or lack thereof, is highly dependent. To make the task more manageable, and therefore more likely to be performed by users, we developed a hole analysis algorithm and tool that is based on common substrings in the names of functions. We tested its effectiveness using two large IBM software systems. In both of them, we asked domain experts to judge the results of several hole-ranking heuristics. They found that 57\% - 87\% of the 30 top-ranked holes identified by the effective heuristics are relevant. Moreover, these holes are often unexpected. This is especially impressive because substring hole analysis relies only on the names of functions, whereas domain experts have a broad and deep understanding of the system. We grounded our results in a theoretical framework that states desirable mathematical properties of hole ranking heuristics. The empirical results show that heuristics with these properties tend to perform better, and do so more consistently, than heuristics lacking them.

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


Patent information centres a broader service concept to back up the dissemination of patent information This paper reports on further progress in the development of the concept of patent information centres in Finland integrated into the services of the regional Employment and Economic Development Centres (EED-Centres). The problems with the initial pilot scheme stemmed from the patent information services being a separate module within those available to SMEs and entrepreneurs in these centres. A closer integration, specifically into the product development projects is described.

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

patent information centre
regional assistance
integrated service concept
product development package


Continuous point projection to planar freeform curves using spiral curves We present an efficient algorithm for projecting a continuously moving query point to a family of planar freeform curves. The algorithm is based on the one-sided Hausdorff distance from the trajectory curve (of the query point) to the planar curves. Using a bounding volume hierarchy (BVH) of the planar curves, we estimate an upper bound (h) over bar of the one-sided Hausdorff distance and eliminate redundant curve segments when they are more than distance (h) over bar away from the trajectory curve. Recursively subdividing the trajectory curve and repeating the same elimination procedure to the BVH of the remaining curves, we can efficiently determine where to project the moving query point. The explicit continuous point projection is then interpreted as a curve reparameterization problem, for which we propose a few simple approximation techniques. Using several experimental results, we demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach.

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

continuous point projection
bounding volume hierarchy
hausdorff distance
curve reparameterization

axis-aligned bounding box
line swept sphere
minimum distance
culling
geometric algorithms


Laser pose estimation and tracking using fuzzy extended information filtering for an autonomous mobile robot This paper presents methodologies and techniques for posture estimation and tracking of an autonomous mobile robot (AMR) using a laser scanner with at least three retro-reflectors. A three-point laser triangulation method is presented to find an initial posture of the robot and then a fuzzy extended information filtering (FEIF) method is used to improve the accuracy of the robot's posture estimation. With the odometric information from the driving wheels, a FEIF-based posture tracking algorithm is proposed to continuously keep trace of the robot's posture at slow speeds. Simulation and experimental results are conducted to show the efficacy and usefulness of the proposed methods.

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

laser scanner
mobile robot
posture tracking

extended information filtering (eif)
fuzzy logics
self-localization
sensor fusion


Distributed chasing of network intruders Graph searching is one of the most popular tools for analyzing the chase for a powerful and hostile software agent (called the "intruder"), by a set of software agents (called the "searchers") in a network. The existing solutions for the graph searching problem suffer however from a serious drawback: they are mostly centralized and assume a global synchronization mechanism for the searchers. In particular: (1) the search strategy for every network is computed based on the knowledge of the entire topology of the network, and (2) the moves of the searchers are controlled by a centralized mechanism that decides at every step which searcher has to move, and what movement it has to perform. This paper addresses the graph searching problem in a distributed setting. We describe a distributed protocol that enables searchers with logarithmic size memory to clear any network, in a fully decentralized manner. The search strategy for the network in which the searchers are launched is computed online by the searchers themselves without knowing the topology of the network in advance. It performs in an asynchronous environment, i.e., it implements the necessary synchronization mechanism in a decentralized manner. In every network, our protocol performs a connected strategy using at most k + 1 searchers, where k is the minimum number of searchers required to clear the network in a monotone connected way using a strategy computed in the centralized and synchronous setting. (C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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


Representation of bone heterogeneity in subject-specific finite element models for knee Properly representing the heterogeneous distribution of bone tissue material properties is a key step in constructing subject-specific finite element (FE) bone models from computed tomography (CT) data. Conventional methods represent heterogeneity by subjectively grouping bone of similar attenuation together. A new technique characterizing the level of heterogeneity with an objective metric is presented. This technique identifies the minimal level of heterogeneity needed for an accurate FE model. Subject-specific models of the distal femur and proximal tibia were used in this study. An innovative application of an image processing technique in the context of material properties modeling was introduced to facilitate an objective grouping strategy, which gathered together bone based not only on density but also on location thus capturing the natural variation of bone density seen in CT images. A fully heterogeneous model containing unique material properties for each finite element was not necessary to generate an appropriate solution. Von Mises stress, strain energy density, and nodal displacements were predicted within 5% accuracy using a simplified FE femur model containing less than half the number of bone groups of the fully heterogeneous model. Each group contained attenuations varying less than 20% from the group mean. A substantial computational time savings of 60% was gained with the application of the new technique to assign bone mechanical properties.

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

computed tomography
material properties
image processing


Bandit-based local feature subset selection In this work we propose a method for local feature subset selection, where we simultaneously partition the sample space into localities and select features for them. The partitions and the corresponding local features are represented using a novel notion of feature tree. The problem of finding an appropriate feature tree is then formulated as a reinforcement learning problem. A value-based Monte Carlo tree search with the corresponding credit assignment policy is devised to learn near-optimal feature trees. Furthermore, the Monte Carlo tree search is enhanced in a way to be applicable for large numbers of actions (i.e., features). This objective is achieved by taking into account a bandit-based explorative policy while having a soft exploitive estimation policy. The results for synthetic datasets show that when local features are present in data, the proposed method can outperform other feature selection methods. Furthermore, the results for microarray classification show that the method can obtain results comparable to the state of the art, using a simple KNN classifier.

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

local feature subset selection
monte carlo tree search
reinforcement learning


An integrated approach to process design instruction Four key components of a chemical engineering curriculum prepare undergraduates to be effective process designers in industry: (a) a structured approach relying on fundamentals; (b) a balance between heuristic and algorithmic approaches; (c) achievement of competency in the use of process simulators; and (d) instruction in the integration of design and control. It is argued that the components should be included in an integrated fashion, with much of the material appearing gradually during the delivery of core courses. In this paper, each of the features is discussed in detail and demonstrated for the design of a typical process. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

process design instruction
process simulators
integrated approach


Adjoint algorithms for the NavierStokes equations in the low Mach number limit This paper describes a derivation of the adjoint low Mach number equations and their implementation and validation within a global mode solver. The advantage of using the low Mach number equations and their adjoints is that they are appropriate for flows with variable density, such as flames, but do not require resolution of acoustic waves. Two versions of the adjoint are implemented and assessed: a discrete-adjoint and a continuous-adjoint. The most unstable global mode calculated with the discrete-adjoint has exactly the same eigenvalue as the corresponding direct global mode but contains numerical artifacts near the inlet. The most unstable global mode calculated with the continuous-adjoint has no numerical artifacts but a slightly different eigenvalue. The eigenvalues converge, however, as the timestep reduces. Apart from the numerical artifacts, the mode shapes are very similar, which supports the expectation that they are otherwise equivalent. The continuous-adjoint requires less resolution and usually converges more quickly than the discrete-adjoint but is more challenging to implement. Finally, the direct and adjoint global modes are combined in order to calculate the wavemaker region of a low density jet.

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


The Pitch of Vibrato Tones We study vibrato as the more ubiquitous manifestation of a nonstationary tone that can evoke a single overall pitch. Some recent results using nonsymmetrical vibrato tones suggest that the perceived pitch could be governed by some stability-sensitive mechanism. For nonstationary sounds the adequate tools are timefrequency representations (TFRs). We show that a recently proposed TFR could be the simplest framework to explain this hypothetical stability-sensitive mechanism. We propose a one-parameter model within this framework that is able to predict previously reported results and we present new results obtained from psychophysical experiments performed in our laboratory.

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


Computational protein biomarker prediction: a case study for prostate cancer Recent technological advances in mass spectrometry pose challenges in computational mathematics and statistics to process the mass spectral data into predictive models with clinical and biological significance. We discuss several classification-based approaches to finding protein biomarker candidates using protein profiles obtained via mass spectrometry, and we assess their statistical significance. Our overall goal is to implicate peaks that have a high likelihood of being biologically linked to a given disease state, and thus to narrow the search for biomarker candidates.

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

anova f-statistic
b/w ratio
biomarker discovery
feature (peak) selection
seld1-tof mass spectrometry
statistical discrimination methods
support vector machine.


Proofs, Programs, Processes The objective of this paper is to provide a theoretical foundation for program extraction from inductive and coinductive proofs geared to practical applications. The novelties consist in the addition of inductive and coinductive definitions to a realizability interpretation for first-order proofs, a soundness proof for this system, and applications to the synthesis of non-trivial provably correct programs in the area of exact real number computation. We show that realizers, although per se untyped, can be assigned polymorphic recursive types and hence represent valid programs in a lazy functional programming language such as Haskell. Programs extracted from proofs using coinduction can be understood as perpetual processes producing infinite streams of data. Typical applications of such processes are computations in exact real arithmetic. As an example we show how to extract a program computing the average of two real numbers w.r.t. the binary signed digit representation.

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

program extraction
realizability
coinduction
exact real number computation


A three dimensional lattice model for thermal compressible flow on standard lattices A three-dimensional double distribution function thermal lattice Boltzmann model has been developed for simulation of thermal compressible flows in the low Mach number limit. Both the flow field and energy conservation equation are solved by LB approach. A higher order density distribution function on standard lattices is used to solve the flow field, while an energy distribution function is employed to compute the temperature field. The equation of state of thermal perfect gas is recovered by higher order Hermite polynomial expansions in NavierStokesFourier equations. The equilibrium distribution functions of D3Q15, D3Q19 and D3Q27 lattices are obtained from the Hermite expansion. They exhibit slight differences originating in differences in the discrete lattice symmetries. The correction terms in LB models for third order derivation are added using an external force in orthogonal polynomials form. Present models are successfully assessed considering several test cases, namely the thermal Couette flow, RayleighBnard convection, natural convection in square cavity and a spherical explosion in a 3D enclosed box. The numerical results are in good agreement with both analytical solution and results given by previous authors.

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


An equivalent method for blasting vibration simulation Due to the complicated blasting load, the diversified medium models and various constitutive relations of the rock mass, and a huge job for simulating blasting of multiple holes, it is very difficult and costly to simulate the blasting vibration accurately in numerical computation. This paper presents an equivalent simulation method so as to transform this complex dynamic problem into an approximate initial-boundary problem. The equivalent elastic boundary applied by the blasting load was developed for multiple holes according to the spatial distribution of rock damage around each blasthole. The equivalent mechanics process of the complex blasting load was performed through analysis of the expansion of the borehole volume, the growth of cracks, the movement of stemming and the outburst of detonation gases. In combination with the blasting excavation of the tailrace tunnel in the Pubugou Hydropower Station, particle vibration velocities in the surrounding rock at different distances from the explosion source were simulated by applying this equivalent method based on the dynamic finite element method. The comparison with field monitoring data indicates that this equivalent simulation method is applicable to predicting the far-field dynamic response of the ground subjected to blasting load, and the selection of rock mass properties near the equivalent elastic boundary has a significant impact on simulation results.

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 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 B 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 O O O 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 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

blasting vibration
equivalent simulation
dynamic finite element method
blasting load


Stability in terms of two measures of dynamic system on time scales By using a notion of upper quasi-monotone nondecreasing, this paper presents a new comparison principle which connects the solutions of two higher-dimensional dynamic systems on time scales. Then the stability criteria of a solution of a dynamic system in terms of two measures are obtained. Finally, two examples are provided to illustrate our results. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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


Top-k query processing for replicated data in mobile peer to peer networks ? A top-k query processing for replicated data in M-P2P networks is proposed. This method suppresses duplicate transmissions of same data through long paths. An intermediate node stops transmitting a query message on-demand. The simulation result shows that our proposed method achieves high performance.

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

top-k query
mobile peer to peer network
data replication


A neural network for the linear complementarity problem An artificial neural network is proposed in this paper for solving the linear complementarity problem. The new neural network is based on a reformulation of the linear complementarity problem into the unconstrained minimization problem. Our new neural network can be easily implemented on a circuit. On the theoretical aspect, we analyze the existence of the equilibrium points for our neural network. In addition, we prove that if the equilibrium point exists for the neural network, then any such equilibrium point is both asymptotically and bounded (Lagrange) stable for any initial state. Furthermore, linear programming and certain quadratical programming problems (not necessarily convex) can be also solved by the neural network. Simulation results on several problems including a nonconvex one are also reported. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

neural network
linear complementarity problem


Dynamic analysis of high speed railway bridge under articulated trains The problem of vehiclebridge dynamic interaction system under articulated high speed trains is studied in this paper. A dynamic interaction model of the bridge-articulated train system is established, which is composed of an articulated vehicle element model and a finite element bridge model. The vehicle model is established according to the structure and suspending properties of the articulated vehicles. A computer simulation program is worked out. As an example, the case of the Thalys articulated train passing along the Antoing Bridge on the ParisBrussels high speed railway line is analyzed. The dynamic responses of the bridge and the vehicles are calculated. The proposed analysis model and the solution method are verified through the comparison between the calculated results and the in situ measured data. The vibration behaviour of the articulated trains is discussed.

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Modeling the Dynamics of Network Technology Adoption and the Role of Converters New network technologies constantly seek to displace incumbents. Their success depends on technological superiority, the size of the incumbent's installed base, users' adoption behaviors, and various other factors. The goal of this paper is to develop an understanding of competition between network technologies and identify the extent to which different factors, in particular converters (a.k.a. gateways), affect the outcome. Converters can help entrants overcome the influence of the incumbent's installed base by enabling cross-technology interoperability. However, they have development, deployment, and operations costs and can introduce performance degradations and functionality limitations, so that if, when, why, and how they help is often unclear. To this end, the paper proposes and solves a model for adoption of competing network technologies by individual users. The model incorporates a simple utility function that captures key aspects of users' adoption decisions. Its solution reveals a number of interesting and at times unexpected behaviors, including the possibility for converters to reduce overall market penetration of the technologies and to prevent convergence to a stable state, something that never arises in their absence. The findings were tested for robustness, e.g., different utility functions and adoption models, and found to remain valid across a broad range of scenarios.

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Growth and trends in digital curation research: The case of the international journal of digital curation The growth of digital curation as a field of research has exploded in recent years. However, little work has been directed at the study of changes in the field, and no effort has been made to identify predominant trends and gaps in the research literature. This study examines the International Journal of Digital Curation (IJDC) over an eight-year period from its inception in 2006 to 2013. A total of 219 papers published in the IJDC was examined in terms of paper productivity, keywords in abstracts, authorship, citations received, and funding received. The preliminary results of this study found a steady upward trend in paper productivity. An overwhelming number of papers were coauthored papers from the United Kingdom and United States. The majority of the papers were cited more than once. Half the papers were supported by grants from federal government agencies.

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Coloring Uniform Hypergraphs With Few Edges A hypergraph is b-simple if no two distinct edges share more than b vertices. Let m(r, t, g) denote the minimum number of edges in an r-uniform non-t-colorable hypergraph of girth at least g. Erdos and Lovasz proved that m(r, t, 3) >= t(2(r-2))/16r(r - 1)(2) and m(r, t, g) 0 and sufficiently large r, every r-uniform b-simple hypergraph H with maximum edge-degree at most t(r) r(1-epsilon) is t-colorable. Some results hold for list coloring, as well. (C) 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Random Struct. Alg., 35, 348-368, 2009

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hypergraph coloring
maximum degree
edge-degree
small size


Sensory-motor coordination: The metaphor and beyond Any agent in the real world has to be able to make distinctions between different types of objects, i.e. it must have the competence of categorization. In mobile agents, there is a large variation in proximal sensory stimulation originating from the same object. Therefore, categorization behavior is hard to achieve, and the successes in the past in solving this problem have been limited. In this paper it is proposed that the problem of categorization in the real world is significantly simplified if it is viewed as one of sensory-motor coordination, rather than one of information processing happening ''on the input side''. A series of models are presented to illustrate the approach. It is concluded that we should consider replacing the metaphor of information processing for intelligent systems by the one of sensory-motor coordination. However, the principle of sensory-motor coordination is more than a metaphor. It offers concrete mechanisms for putting agents to work in the real world. These ideas are illustrated with a series of experiments.

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sensory-motor coordination
autonomous agents
learning