Advanced conceptual clustering and associated querying facilities in object-oriented databases Conventional object-oriented database (OODB) systems follow a class-based approach to model real world entities and their relationships, which imposes several difficulties when more advanced "dynamic functions" are needed by the applications. One of such dynamic functions is conceptual clustering - the ability to dynamically group a set of existing objects together as a higher-level abstract object (called a "cluster"). The conceptual clustering model (CCM) that we have defined is an extension to current object-oriented models, which facilitates the modeling of dynamic, evolving, and/or ad hoc object clusters through a well-devised clustering mechanism that incorporates "roles". This paper presents the advanced features of CCM, along with its associated query language facilities devised for supporting general definition and access of clusters (and roles). An experimental prototype of the CCM has been constructed on top of a persistent object storage manager, running on a Sun4 workstation.

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

object-oriented databases
dynamic roles
query languages
meta-level retrieval


Creeping analysis with variable temperature applying the boundary element method This paper presents the implementation of two creep rate equations in the boundary element method (BEM) to predict the creep strain rate at different temperatures and stresses. The creep analysis is basically applied to metals, but particular attention is focused on the numerical evaluation of creeping components subject to variable temperature. The constitutive model used in the numerical calculation is confined to standard power law creep equations. The direct formulation of the BEM is applied to secondary creep problems in a two-dimensional analysis. Numerical results are compared with solutions obtained from references to illustrate the accuracy of the proposed formulation, where a single test was simulated under the mentioned criteria.

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


Quota-control routing in delay-tolerant networks Delay-tolerant networks (DTNs) are network environments that are subject to delays and disruptions. Traditional end-to-end routing protocols fail in such challenging network conditions because of intermittent connections and/or long delays. Research results have shown that per-hop forwarding of multiple copies of the same message to the destination can produce satisfactory routing performance in DTNs. Current methods rely on the fixed setting of a quota value to limit the number of message copies. This paper proposes a dynamic quota-control mechanism, allowing routing to operate effectively with different traffic loads. To remove useless message copies from the network, a low-cost probability-based method is also presented. The proposed routing framework is then extended to interest-based information dissemination, which is used to efficiently disseminate an event message to all interested users. A performance evaluation was conducted using a real social contact trace, and performance comparisons with other DTN routing protocols are provided.

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

delay-tolerant network (dtn)
quota control
buffer management


Information Security Governance: A model based on the Direct-Control Cycle It is generally accepted that Information Security Governance is an integral part of Corporate Governance. It is therefore essential for any company to have a proper Information Security Governance program which reflects this integration with Corporate Governance. one of the core principles of Governance, and specifically Corporate Governance, is the Direct-Control Cycle which, in its simplest form, 'prescribes' and 'checks'. This paper presents an Information Security Governance model based on this cycle. (C) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

corporate governance
information security governance
direct-control cycle
compliance enforcement
management levels


Oral Diseases In addition to saliva, other oral components such as gingival crevicular fluid, epithelial cells, bacteria, breath, and dental plaque have diagnostic potential. For oral diseases such as caries and periodontal disease, visual diagnosis is usually adequate, but objective diagnostic tests with predictive value are desired. Therefore, prediction models like the Cariogram have been developed that also include oral aspects such as saliva secretion, buffering capacity, and Streptococcus mutans counts for the prediction of caries. Correlation studies on salivary components and caries have not been conclusive, but correlation studies on functional aspects, such as saliva-induced bacterial aggregation and caries, look promising. Modern proteomic techniques make it possible to study simultaneously the many salivary components involved in these functions

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


Retirement Planning and Expectations of Australian Babyboomers The babyboomer generation, those who were born between 1946 and 1965, account for over 30% of the population in Australia, and it is no surprise that the government is concerned about the financial implications for future healthcare costs. While many babyboomers are more financially secure than previous generations have been on account of compulsory superannuation contributions made over the past 15years, there are still some who are financially vulnerable and expect to rely on government pensions and welfare assistance. Changes to family structures and job security also mean that those who are less financially secure will need social support. Using an ecological framework model, we explored the retirement expectations and experiences of some Australian babyboomers through focus groups and individual interviews to identify key issues and their plans to address these issues. Four main themes are reported in this pape

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


Short-time matrix series based singular value decomposition for rolling bearing fault diagnosis Rolling element bearing faults are among the main causes of rotating machines breakdown. It is important to distinguish the incipient fault before the bearings step into serious failure. Based on the traditional singular value decomposition (SVD) theory, short-time matrix series (STMS) and singular value ratio (SVR) are introduced to the vibration signal processing. The proposed signal processing method is called S-SVDR (STMS based SVD method using SVR) and it has been proved to have a good local identification capability in the rolling bearing fault diagnosis. The detailed description of applying S-SVDR methods to rolling bearing fault diagnosis is given through the artificial fault signal processing in experiment 1. In experiment 2, rolling element bearing accelerated life test is performed in Hangzhou Bearing Test & Research Center (HBRC). The experimental result shows that the incipient fault can be well detected through S-SVDR processing method. However, the envelope analysis of original signal cannot detect the fault due to the existence of signal interference. A conclusion can be made that the proposed S-SVDR method has a good effect on de-noising and eliminating the signal interference of rolling bearing for the fault diagnosis.

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

singular value decomposition
fault diagnosis
accelerated life test


Interpolation of the extended Boolean retrieval model An interpolation theorem for the p-norm model, 1?p??, of Salton, Fox, and Wu for extended Boolean document retrieval is stated and proven. This result asserts roughly that whenever two or more documents are similarly ranked at any two points along the p-continuum with respect to this model for either an AND or an OR query containing exactly two terms, then they are similarly ranked at all points in between. An analogous result can fail for queries with more than two terms and an example is given to show this.

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

information retrieval
extended boolean model
p-norm
interpolation of linear operators


The travelling salesman problem with time windows: Adapting algorithms from travel-time to makespan optimization In combinatorial optimization it is not rare to find problems whose mathematical structure is nearly the same, differing only in some aspect related to the motivating application. For example, many problems in machine scheduling and vehicle routing have equivalent formulations and only differ with respect to the optimization objective, or particular constraints. Moreover, while some problems receive a lot of attention from the research community, their close relatives receive hardly any attention at all. Given two closely related problems, it is intuitive that it may be effective to adapt state-of-the-art algorithms-initially introduced for the well-studied problem variant-to the less-studied problem variant. In this paper we provide an example based on the travelling salesman problem with time windows that supports this intuition. In this context, the well-studied problem variant minimizes the travel time, while the less-studied problem variant minimizes the makespan. Indeed, the results show that the algorithms that we adapt from travel-time minimization to makespan minimization significantly outperform the existing state-of-the-art approaches for makespan minimization. (C) 2013 Elsevier B. V. All rights reserved.

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

ant colony optimization
compressed simulated annealing
hybridization


saving space by algebraization The Subset Sum and Knapsack problems are fundamental NP-complete problems and the pseudo-polynomial time dynamic programming algorithms for them appear in every algorithms textbook. The algorithms require pseudo-polynomial time and space. Since we do not expect polynomial time algorithms for Subset Sum and Knapsack to exist, a very natural question is whether they can be solved in pseudo-polynomial time and polynomial space . In this paper we answer this question affirmatively, and give the first pseudo-polynomial time, polynomial space algorithms for these problems. Our approach is based on algebraic methods and turns out to be useful for several other problems as well. Then we show how the framework yields polynomial space exact algorithms for the classical Traveling Salesman, Weighted Set Cover and Weighted Steiner Tree problems as well. Our algorithms match the time bound of the best known pseudo-polynomial space algorithms for these problems.

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


an optimization framework for joint sensor deployment, link scheduling and routing in underwater sensor networks Underwater sensor networks are a very interesting case of wireless communication in extreme conditions. They exploit acoustic communication in sea water and are nowadays used in surveillance and monitoring applications. These networks present very challenging aspects, such as low data rates and large delays, as well as the special propagation characteristics of the underwater medium. We propose an integer-linear programming approach to jointly optimize routing, link-scheduling and node placement in such a scenario. Accounting for these special aspects of underwater wireless communications leads to re-thinking traditional approaches; this results in original solutions, which highlight novel directions for further research in this area.

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

routing
scheduling
underwater sensor networks

acoustic communications
energy efficient protocols


HOMOGENEOUS P COLONIES We study P colonies introduced in [8] as a class of abstract computing devices composed of independent membrane agents, acting and evolving in a shared environment. In the present paper especially P colonies are considered, which are homogeneous with respect to the type of rules in each program of agents. The number of agents, as well as the number of programs in each agent are bounded, which are sufficient to guarantee computational completeness of homogeneous P colonies. We present results for P colonies with one and with two objects inside each agent.

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


High Resolution TOA Estimation Based on Compressed Sensing This paper proposes a novel time of arrival (TOA) estimation method which achieves the sub-chip resolution. In this proposed method, the sparsity of the wireless channel is utilized to adopt the emerging technique of compressive sensing (CS) for accurate TOA estimation. The received signal is first processed to make the sensing matrix satisfy the restrict isometry property requirement of CS framework; then the signal samples with the amplified noise are removed to improve the recovery performance; finally, the dantzig selector method is used to recover the sparse channel for TOA estimation.

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

toa estimation
compressed sensing
dantzig selector


A structural view definition for RDF data Resource description framework (RDF) data are modeled as a set of triples, each of which is composed of a subject, a property and an object. As in traditional relational data models, existing RDF data views are defined by filtering out some of these triples. However, a finer-grained view definition could allow subject-or object-level filtering, which would be useful for many applications including view-based access controls. We have devised a sophisticated view definition method and a supporting system for RDF data. Since the subject and object of an RDF triple are usually resources, the finest unit of an RDF view definition is a resource rather than a triple. The resource is not disposed as is, but is formed in a more abstract form by hiding information details, if necessary. The final view is built up structurally, based on abstract resources. We implemented a view-based access control system RDF data on the proposed view definition system.

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


Linear buckling analysis of thin-walled members combining the Generalised Beam Theory and the Finite Element Method A finite element procedure to carry out linear buckling analysis of thin-walled members is developed on the basis of the existing Generalised Beam Theory (GBT) and constrained Finite Strip Method (cFSM). It allows designers to uncouple the buckling modes of a finite element model and, consequently, to calculate pure elastic buckling loads. The procedure can easily be applied to members with general boundary conditions subjected to compression or bending. The results obtained are rather accurate when compared to the values calculated via GBT and cFSM. As a consequence, it is demonstrated that linear buckling analyses can be performed with the Finite Element Method in a similar way as can be done with the existing GBT and cFSM procedures.

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

linear buckling analysis
generalised beam theory
constrained finite strip method


supporting polyrepresentation in a quantum-inspired geometrical retrieval framework The relevance of a document has many facets, going beyond the usual topical one, which have to be considered to satisfy a user's information need. Multiple representations of documents, like user-given reviews or the actual document content, can give evidence towards certain facets of relevance. In this respect polyrepresentation of documents, where such evidence is combined, is a crucial concept to estimate the relevance of a document. In this paper, we discuss how a geometrical retrieval framework inspired by quantum mechanics can be extended to support polyrepresentation. We show by example how different representations of a document can be modelled in a Hilbert space, similar to physical systems known from quantum mechanics. We further illustrate how these representations are combined by means of the tensor product to support polyrepresentation, and discuss the case that representations of documents are not independent from a user point of view. Besides giving a principled framework for polyrepresentation, the potential of this approach is to capture and formalise the complex interdependent relationships that the different representations can have between each other.

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


A wireless extension of Profibus DP based on the Bluetooth radio system Wireless networks are beginning to be employed in industrial automation systems as extensions of field networks (fieldbuses), in order to link devices which may not be equipped with a wired connection. In this way, all the benefits deriving from the use of a fieldbus may be maintained. This paper investigates a wireless extension of Profibus DP, one of the most popular fieldbus standards, based on the Bluetooth radio interface. After a description of how the data link layer services of Bluetooth could be used to implement the Profibus DP functions, we present a theoretical network performance analysis. The results obtained are then validated by means of numerical simulations.

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


Rule-based learning systems for support vector machines In this article, we propose some methods for deriving symbolic interpretation of data in the form of rule based learning systems by using Support Vector Machines (SVM). First, Radial Basis Function Neural Networks (RBFNN) learning techniques are explored, as is usual in the literature, since the local nature of this paradigm makes it a suitable platform for performing rule extraction. By using support vectors from a learned SVM it is possible in our approach to use any standard Radial Basis Function (RBF) learning technique for the rule extraction, whilst avoiding the overlapping between classes problem. We will show that merging node centers and support vectors explanation rules can be obtained in the form of ellipsoids and hyper-rectangles. Next, in a dual form, following the framework developed for RBFNN, we construct an algorithm for SVM. Taking SVM as the main paradigm, geometry in the input space is defined from a combination of support vectors and prototype vectors obtained from any clustering algorithm. Finally, randomness associated with clustering algorithms or RBF learning is avoided by using only a learned SVM to define the geometry of the studied region. The results obtained from a certain number of experiments on benchmarks in different domains are also given, leading to a conclusion on the viability of our proposal.

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

rule based learning system
rbf neural networks
support vector machine


Building a tuple space on structured peer-to-peer networks Research on peer-to-peer (P2P) networks has attracted much attention recently. A key factor is their ability to handle dynamics in the system in a distributed fashion, including ad hoc and dynamic join and departure of the peers and dynamic changes in the underlying network environment. As more and more innovating P2P applications appear, the need to support intuitive communication and synchronization among the peers in the P2P system becomes imperative. In this paper, we discuss how to build a tuple space on top of P2P systems and use on-line games as a target application. A simple API is supported for accessing the data stored in the tuple space and communicating between the peers. Through experiments and a demonstration game, we show that our system can facilitate the development of network games in a fully distributed environment.

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


Uses and applications of Software & Systems Process Engineering Meta-Model process models. A systematic mapping study Software process engineering is a discipline, which aims to study and improve software development and maintenance processes. The explicit definition of software processes is essential. To this end, the Object Management Group consortium proposed the Software & Systems Process Engineering Meta-Model (SPEM) that exploits the benefits of the Model Driven Architecture paradigm applied to software process models, instead of software specification models. The aim of this study is to discover evidence clusters and evidence deserts in the use and application of SPEM from a business process management point of view. To reach the proposed objective, we have undertaken a systematic mapping study of the existing scientific literature. The reviewed literature deals mainly with process modeling and, to a lesser extent, with process adaptability, verification, and validation, enactment and evaluation. Wide agreement exists in using the SPEM meta-model to develop different types of methods and processes. Further research efforts are needed in areas related to enactment and evaluation of software processes. There is a need to evolve to a new version of the meta-model that incorporates the improvements proposed by different authors. Copyright (c) 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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

spem
software process engineering
systematic mapping study
business process management


supporting effective user navigation in digital documents Electronic documents such as PDFs are becoming increasingly popular as we move further towards the notion of the paperless office. The harsh truth however is that e-documents differ greatly from their physical paper counterparts, with many users opting to print them before reading. This paper describes several novel implementations that utilize a technique known as 'lightweight interaction'; a term that describes activities that can be performed without excessive cognitive attention. Incorporating tools into digital document readers to aid users in day-to-day tasks will enhance their performance and hopefully increase user uptake of digital reading. My research on this topic centers on several areas of document navigation, focusing specifically on current physical (paper) practices, in order to enhance their digital equivalents.

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


wireless interconnects for clock distribution A wireless interconnect system for clock distribution which transmits and receives microwave signals across a chip using integrated antennas, receivers, and transmitters is presented. All of the com-ponents of the system are demonstrated at 15 GHz in a 0.18-m CMOS technology. Wireless interconnection is achieved over a distance of 5.6 mm.

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

wireless communication
integrated antenna
rf cmos
wireless interconnect


Handover management based on the number of data frame retransmissions for VoWLAN Ubiquitous networks enabling access by mobile nodes (MNs) at any time and at any location will consist of innumerable Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs). In such ubiquitous networks, it is very likely that an MN will traverse several WLANs, due to each having a small service area, during VoIP communication. Thus, a single communication may experience several handovers between WLANs divided into different IP subnets by Internet Service Providers (ISPs), during which the communication quality may be degraded due to packet loss. In this paper, we propose an effective handover management scheme for Voice over IP (VoIP) communication in which the quality is sensitive to packet loss. For this purpose, our handover management scheme employs a transport protocol supporting multiple connections for VoIP communication and makes handover decisions based on a new criterion: the number of retransmissions experienced by a data frame on layer 2. Furthermore, to prevent packet loss during handover and to investigate the wireless link condition, the proposed handover management scheme selects single-path transmission or multi-path transmission according to the number of frame retransmissions. Through simulation experiments, we show that the proposed handover management scheme can promptly and reliably detect the degradation in a wireless link, and can reduce packet loss during handover. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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

wlan handover
frame retransmission
multihoming
cross-layer


A hybrid hierarchical decision support system for cardiac surgical intensive care patients. Part II. Clinical implementation and evaluation Patients emerging from cardiac surgery can display varying degrees of cardiovascular instability arising from potentially complex, multi-factorial and interlinked causes. Stabilization and control of the cardiovascular system are currently managed by healthcare experts using experiential knowledge, and, in some centers, manually inputted decision pathway algorithms. This paper describes a clinical trial undertaken to determine the basic functioning of a clinical decision support system (CDSS) designed and constructed by the authors to facilitate the control of the major cardiovascular components in the early post-operative phase. Part II follows Part I's description of the software and simulation testing of the CDSS, and describes the hardware setup of a patient monitoring and CDSS. The system is evaluated on three post-cardiac surgery intensive care patients whom had all undergone cardio-pulmonary bypass. The study was approved by the Sheffield Teaching Hospitals National Health Service (NHS) Foundation Trust Research Ethics Committee and conducted at the North Trent cardio-thoracic surgical unit and cardiac intensive care unit (CICU), Northern General Hospital, Sheffield (UK). Patients considered as very likely to require active intervention to support the cardiovascular function following routine cardiac surgery were recruited during pre-operative surgical and anesthetic assessment, giving written informed consent when admitted for their operation. These patients underwent routine induction and maintenance of anesthesia by a non-study consultant anesthetist and the operation performed. There were no restrictions placed on the types of invasive monitoring used, on the use of trans-oesophageal echocardiography, drug selection, or the anesthetic agents selected by the clinicians performing the operations. All patients had full, routine invasive and non-invasive monitoring applied, including electrocardiography, central venous and peripheral arterial catheterisation, urine outputs and central temperature. After chest closure the patients were transferred to the CICU, sedated and ventilated, and the study commenced by the study anesthetist (1st author). The patients were in a clinically stable condition when admitted to the unit, and were attended by the treating clinicians until the handover to the study anesthetist occurred. The LiDCOplus (lithium dilution cardiac output) monitor (LiDCO Limited, Flowers Building, Granta Park, Cambridge CB1 6GU, United Kingdom) was calibrated after attachment to the patient's arterial line, and the patient's beat-to-beat hemodynamic data transferred to the host laptop computer. The CDSS graphical interface displays the patient's clinical details and specific cardiovascular data and prompts the anesthetist to input the target ranges for each parameter, and select a suitable advisor frequency. This is the frequency with which the therapeutic advice is displayed on screen with an audible prompt for a control inputs from the anesthetist. In each case this was selected to be 30s. When the study anesthetist agreed with the CDSS advice (administration of fluid, commencing a drug, altering the drug infusion rate) the syringe motif on the Advisor Infusion Rates panel of the graphical interface was clicked on and the infusion rate immediately and manually inputted to Graseby 3400 pumps. If any disagreement between the anesthetist and the computer's advice arose, the syringe motif on the Expert Infusion Rates panel of the preferred drug was clicked on and the expert's therapeutic decision (e.g. infusion rate) was entered in the corresponding data field and then applied to the pump. During all trials, data was stored for off-line analysis. The CDSS successfully selected suitable drug therapies for each case and advised reasonable and appropriate infusion rates such that the study anesthetist did not have to override the suggested CDSS instructions and infusion rates. Under differing clinical conditions the system was able to maintain clinically appropriate and stable control of the cardiovascular system (CVS), with good profiles under noisy physiological measurements, and was readily able to regain control following transient deterioration of the patient hemodynamic parameters (coughing, or during blood sampling).

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

cardiac intensive care unit
decision support system
lidcoplus


LPmade: Link Prediction Made Easy LPmade is a complete cross-platform software solution for multi-core link prediction and related tasks and analysis. Its first principal contribution is a scalable network library supporting high-performance implementations of the most commonly employed unsupervised link prediction methods. Link prediction in longitudinal data requires a sophisticated and disciplined procedure for correct results and fair evaluation, so the second principle contribution of LPmade is a sophisticated GNU make architecture that completely automates link prediction, prediction evaluation, and network analysis. Finally, LPmade streamlines and automates the procedure for creating multivariate supervised link prediction models with a version of WEKA modified to operate effectively on extremely large data sets. With mere minutes of manual work, one may start with a raw stream of records representing a network and progress through hundreds of steps to generate plots, gigabytes or terabytes of output, and actionable or publishable results.

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

link prediction
network analysis
multicore
gnu make


Generalizations of ( ? , ? ? q ) -fuzzy subalgebras in BCK/BCI-algebras More general form of the notion of quasi-coincidence of a fuzzy point with a fuzzy set is considered, and generalizations of results in the papers [Y. B. Jun, On (?,?) ( ? , ? ) -fuzzy subalgebras of BCK/BCI-algebras, Bull. Korean Math. Soc. 42 (4) (2005) 703711; Y. B. Jun, Fuzzy subalgebras of type (?,?) ( ? , ? ) in BCK/BCI-algebras, Kyungpook Math. J. 47 (2007) 403410] are discussed. The notions of ( ? , q k ) -fuzzy subalgebras and ( ? , ? ? q k ) -fuzzy subalgebras in a BCK/BCI-algebra X X are introduced, and several properties are investigated. Characterizations of ( ? , ? ? q k ) -fuzzy subalgebra in a BCK/BCI-algebra X X are discussed.

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

( ? ? q k ) -level subalgebra ( ? ? q k ) ( ? ? q k ) ( ? ? q k )


Statistical efficiency of curve fitting algorithms We study the problem of fitting parameterized curves to noisy data. Under certain assumptions (known as Cartesian and radial functional models), we derive asymptotic expressions for the bias and the covariance matrix of the parameter estimates. We also extend Kanatani's version of the Cramer-Rao lower bound, which he proved for unbiased estimates only, to more general estimates that include many popular algorithms (most notably, the orthogonal least squares and algebraic fits). We then show that the gradient-weighted algebraic fit is statistically efficient and describe all other statistically efficient algebraic fits.

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

least squares fit
circle fitting
rao-cramer bound
functional model


Feedback control of wave propagation in a rectangular panel, Part 1: Theoretical investigation of fundamental characteristics This study presents the feedback control of flexural waves propagating in a rectangular panel. The objective of this paper (part 1) is to theoretically investigate the fundamental properties of the feedback wave control system. First, a transfer matrix method in the Laplace domain is introduced which is based on a wave solution of a rectangular panel. This is followed by the derivation of the characteristic equation and the feedback control laws for absorbing the reflected waves. Then, from a viewpoint of numerical simulations, the control performance of the proposed method is clarified. It is found that the reflected wave absorbing control enables inactivation of vibration modes since standing waves which cause resonant phenomena disappear from the structural vibration. Finally, the stability verification of the proposed control system is conducted using Nyquist diagram. It is shown that although the controller has unstable poles in some cases, the nominal control system is stable irrespective of whether the collocation holds or not. Furthermore, it is clarified that a wave-absorbing control system becomes robust for the parameter fluctuation if the uncontrolled region does not exist.

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

rectangular panel
feedback control
inactivation of vibration modes

active wave control
ideal wave absorption


Posterior probability measure for image matching Template matching is one of the principle techniques in visual tracking. Various similarity measures have been developed to find the target in an acquired image by matching with a template. However, mismatching or misidentification may sporadically occur due to the influence of the background pixels included in the designated target model. Taking into account the statistical features of a search region, a novel similarity measure is proposed, which can decrease the interference of the background pixels enclosed in the model. It highlights the significant target features and at the same time reduces the influence of the features shared by both the target and the background. It exhibits an excellent monotonic property and a distinct peak-like distribution. This new measure is also demonstrated to have a direct interpretation of posterior probability and is named as posterior probability measure (PPM). The proposed PPM can be obtained through a pixel-wise computation and exhibits suitability for image matching. The pixel-wise computation also enables a fast measure update after a target region has changed, which results in a new adaptive scaling method for tracking a target with a varying size. Experiments show that it provides a higher precision in the localization and a discriminatory power superior to the existing similarity measures, such as Bhattacharyya coefficient, KullbackLeibler divergence, and normalized cross correlation. The effectiveness of the adaptive scaling method is demonstrated in experiments.

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

similarity measure
image matching
visual tracking
posterior probability


Scheduling linearly deteriorating jobs by two agents to minimize the weighted sum of two criteria We consider scheduling jobs by two agents on a single machine. Each job is defined by a common release date, a deteriorating processing time that is a linear function of the job starting time and a weight or a due-date. Every agent constructs a partial schedule that includes only the agent?s jobs and is evaluated by the agent?s optimality criterion: the total weighted completion time or the maximum lateness. The aim is to find a complete schedule minimizing a weighted sum of the two criteria. We prove that the problem is NP-hard NP - hard and show several properties that describe the structure of schedules for the problem. We also propose an exact algorithm and a meta-heuristic for the problem. Finally, we report the results of evaluation of the proposed algorithms by computational experiments.

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

deteriorating jobs
total weighted completion time
maximum lateness
algorithms

np-hardness np - hardness np-hardness np - hardness np-hardness np - hardness np - hardness


Shielding TCP from wireless link errors: Retransmission effort and fragmentation A known problem for TCP connections over wireless links is that errors in the wireless channel interfere with the TCP protocol even for minor packet loss. In the first part of this paper we evaluate how the data rate reduction depends on the channel delay. For comparatively short delays in the order of 100 ms, the decrease of the throughout is noticeable but not dramatic. This indicates that the problem is not severe if the communication partners are located in the same WLAN or interact over a fast Internet connection. A significant throughput reduction arises in the case of a large network delay. Simulation results for the uplink transmission are presented as part of an overall strategy in which all improvements are made by optimizing the mobile end device only, an approach which allows performance improvements without any protocol modifications.

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

802.11x mac
wireless networks
energy saving
adaptable protocols


An ANOVA test for the equivalency of means under unequal variances In this paper, we present a two-stage test procedure for testing the hypothesis that the normal means are falling into a practically indifferent zone. Both the level and the power associated with the proposed test are controllable and are completely independent of the unknown variances. Relation to a single-stage procedure is discussed when the two-stage sampling procedure cannot be completely carried through. An example and tables needed for implementation are given.

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

analysis of variance
two stage
single stage


improving web performance by client characterization driven server adaptation We categorize the set of clients communicating with a server on the Web based on information that can be determined by the server. The Web server uses the information to direct tailored actions. Users with poor connectivity may choose not to stay at a Web site if it takes a long time to receive a page, even if the Web server at the site is not the bottleneck. Retaining such clients may be of interest to a Web site. Better connected clients can receive enhanced representations of Web pages, such as with higher quality images.We explore a variety of considerations that could be used by a Web server in characterizing a client. Once a client is characterized as poor or rich, the server can deliver altered content, alter how content is delivered, alter policy and caching decisions, or decide when to redirect the client to a mirror site. We also use network-aware client clustering techniques to provide a coarser level of client categorization and use it to categorize subsequent clients from that cluster for which a client-specific categorization is not available.Our results for client characterization and applicable server actions are derived from real, recent, and diverse set of Web server logs. Our experiments demonstrate that a relatively simple characterization policy can classify poor clients such that these clients subsequently make the majority of badly performing requests to a Web server. This policy is also stable in terms of clients staying in the same class for a large portion of the analysis period. Client clustering can significantly help in initially classifying clients for which no previous information about the client is known. We also show that different server actions can be applied to a significant number of request sequences with poor performance.

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

help
web server
quality
use
policy
characterization
analysis
web
performance
direct
users
demonstrate
server adaptation
server
class
cluster

network
communication
paging
web-based
experience
timing
imaging
informal
exploration
contention
adapt
web page
web site
categorical
classifiation
caches
client connectivity
client characterization
connection
sequence
action


Multi-core real-time scheduling for generalized parallel task models Multi-core processors offer a significant performance increase over single-core processors. They have the potential to enable computation-intensive real-time applications with stringent timing constraints that cannot be met on traditional single-core processors. However, most results in traditional multiprocessor real-time scheduling are limited to sequential programming models and ignore intra-task parallelism. In this paper, we address the problem of scheduling periodic parallel tasks with implicit deadlines on multi-core processors. We first consider a synchronous task model where each task consists of segments, each segment having an arbitrary number of parallel threads that synchronize at the end of the segment. We propose a new task decomposition method that decomposes each parallel task into a set of sequential tasks. We prove that our task decomposition achieves a resource augmentation bound of 4 and 5 when the decomposed tasks are scheduled using global EDF and partitioned deadline monotonic scheduling, respectively. Finally, we extend our analysis to a directed acyclic graph (DAG) task model where each node in the DAG has a unit execution requirement. We show how these tasks can be converted into synchronous tasks such that the same decomposition can be applied and the same augmentation bounds hold. Simulations based on synthetic workload demonstrate that the derived resource augmentation bounds are safe and sufficient.

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

parallel task
resource augmentation bound

multi-core processor
real-time scheduling


Coupled mechanical and hydraulic modeling of a geosynthetic-reinforced and pile-supported embankment The increasing application of conventional geosynthetic-reinforced and pile-supported (GRPS) embankments (called CT embankments) for ground improvement has resulted in many problems, for example, intolerable total or differential settlements, large lateral displacements, local instabilities, and low efficiencies of the geosynthetic. In this study, a new ground improvement technique, referred to as fixed-geosynthetic-reinforced and pile-supported embankment (called FGT embankment), is proposed. A two-dimensional numerical simulation that uses coupled mechanical and hydraulic modeling is conducted to investigate the performance of an FGT embankment. A sensitivity analysis is performed to investigate influencing factors, such as the tensile stiffness of the geosynthetic, the pile wall spacing, the elastic modulus of the soft clay, the elastic modulus of the pile wall and the pile wall width. The numerical results show that the FGT embankment can sufficiently reduce the total and differential settlements, lateral displacement and excess pore water pressure, and enhance the stability of the embankment.

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

geosynthetic
embankment
numerical simulation


Continuous Birdsong Recognition Using Gaussian Mixture Modeling of Image Shape Features Traditional birdsong recognition approaches used acoustic features based on the acoustic model of speech production or the perceptual model of the human auditory system to identify the associated bird species. In this paper, a new feature descriptor that uses image shape features is proposed to identify bird species based on the recognition of fixed-duration birdsong segments where their corresponding spectrograms are viewed as gray-level images. The MPEG-7 angular radial transform (ART) descriptor, which can compactly and efficiently describe the gray-level variations within an image region in both angular and radial directions, will be employed to extract the shape features from the spectrogram image. To effectively capture both frequency and temporal variations within a birdsong segment using ART, a sector expansion algorithm is proposed to transform its spectrogram image into a corresponding sector image such that the frequency and temporal axes of the spectrogram image will align with the radial and angular directions of the ART basis functions, respectively. For the classification of 28 bird species using Gaussian mixture models (GMM), the best classification accuracy is 86.30% and 94.62% for 3-second and 5-second birdsong segments using the proposed ART descriptor, which is better than traditional descriptors such as LPCC, MFCC, and TDMFCC.

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

angular radial transform (art)
gaussian mixture models (gmm)


Decompositions of graphs of functions and fast iterations of lookup tables ? We show that every function f implemented as a lookup table can be implemented such that the computational complexity of evaluating fm(x) f m ( x ) is small, independently of m and x. The implementation only increases the storage space by a small constant factor.

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

fast forward functions
fast forward permutations
cycle decomposition
cycle structure


The effect of elbow joint centre displacement on force generation and neural excitation Joint centre displacement may occur following total elbow replacement due to aseptic loosening or surgical misalignment, and has been linked to implant failure. In this study, the effects of joint centre displacement were examined using a neuromusculoskeletal model of the elbow joint. Isometric contractions were simulated at a range of joint angles during elbow flexion and extension. Displacement of the joint centre affected the force-generating capacity about the joint, due to changes in both muscle lengths and moment arms. The magnitude and direction of the maximum joint reaction force were also altered, potentially contributing to aseptic loosening and compromising joint stability. The relationship between force generated and the level of neural excitation to the elbow flexor and extensor muscles was also affected, suggesting that altered neural control patterns could be required following joint centre displacement.

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

neuromusculoskeletal model
aseptic loosening
joint reaction force
isometric


default interactions for multi-agent simulations of complex organizations Default interactions are a novel concept that supports the agent-based simulation framework and modeling toolset that is built around the TALL language. This paper argues that default interactions are ubiquitous in business processes that are mostly constituted and driven by human interactions. Therefore, it is necessary to make the default interactions explicit by developing and imposing protocols for their execution. The paper shows how interactions that otherwise need a very complex execution scheme can be radically simplified by employing various types of default interactions, depending on the type of the organization that is modeled and simulated.

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

interaction protocols
agent-based simulation
organizational interactions


Analysis of EEG signals using Lyapunov exponents In this study, a new approach based on the consideration that electroencephalogram (EEG) signals are chaotic signals was presented for automated diagnosis of electroencephalographic changes. This consideration was tested successfully using the nonlinear dynamics tools, like the computation of Lyapunov exponents. Multilayer perceptron neural network (MLPNN) architectures were formulated and used as basis for detection of electroencephalographic changes. Three types of EEG signals (EEG signals recorded from healthy volunteers with eyes open, epilepsy patients in the epileptogenic zone during a seizure-free interval, and epilepsy patients during epileptic seizures) were classified. The computed Lyapunov exponents of the EEG signals were used as inputs of the MLPNNs trained with backpropagation, delta-bar-delta, extended delta-bar-delta, quick propagation, and Levenberg-Marquardt algorithms. The performances of the MLPNN classifiers were evaluated in terms of training performance and classification accuracies. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were used to assess the performance of the detection process. The results confirmed that the proposed MLPNN trained with the Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm has potentiality in detecting the electroencephalographic changes.

O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 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 perceptron neural network (mlpnn)


ubiquitous home control based on sip and presence service This paper describes an approach to use the IP Multimedia Subsystem as a communication platform between mobile devices and home automation systems. The Session Initiation Protocol and the Presence Service are used to build a concept based on open source, standardized software services. The paper manifests the possible used components and potential purposes of the concept.

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

presence service
ip multimedia subsystem
sip
home automation


aiding evolution with concern-oriented guides Program documentation is often incomplete and out of date due to its tediousness and perceived low value. This requires evolution tasks to be preceded by time-consuming exploration. In this paper, we explore a concern-oriented approach to documentation that focuses on the code artifacts and their relationships to make the process of creating and using program documentation more efficient. As opposed to traditional documents or tutorials, guides created using this approach are interactive, almost wordless and automatically maintain implementation examples. We also present the rationale and the architecture of Mismar, a toolset tightly integrated in the Eclipse environment and implementing this approach. Moreover, since program documentation involves different artifact types, Mismar was build from the ground up to be extensible, and to support artifacts written in multiple languages or modeling approaches.

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

software evolution
concern modeling
separation of concerns
aspect-oriented software development
user guidance


Smart Medication Dispenser: Design, Architecture and Implementation This paper presents the architecture and implementation of an automatic medication dispenser for users who take medications without close professional supervision. By relieving the user from the error-prone tasks of interpreting medication directions and administrating medications accordingly, the device can improve the rigor in compliance and prevent serious medication errors. By taking advantage of scheduling flexibility provided by medication directions, the device makes the user's medication schedule easy to adhere and tolerant to tardiness whenever possible. The medication scheduler and dispenser controller do this work collaboratively in an action-oriented manner. An advantage of this design is that new functions can be added and existing ones removed or revised with little or no need to modify the dispenser control structure.

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

action-oriented collaboration
embedded systems
smart device architecture


A quantitative phosphorus loss assessment tool for agricultural fields In the United States, government sponsored conservation programs are under increasing pressure to quantify the environmental benefits of practices they subsidize. To meet this objective, conservation planners need tools to accurately predict phosphorus (P) loss from agricultural lands. Existing P export coefficient based tools are easy to use, but do not adequately account for local conditions. Hydrologic and water quality models are more accurate, but are prohibitively complex for conservation planners to use. Pasture Phosphorus Management (PPM) Plus was developed as a user-friendly P and sediment loss prediction tool based on the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT), a popular comprehensive hydrologic and water quality model. PPM Plus is applicable under a wide variety of management options and conservation practices and simple enough for use by conservation planners. SWAT hydrologic components were calibrated to allow application anywhere in the State of Oklahoma. The SWAT model was modified to include soil P algorithm updates and improved representation of conservation practices. This tool was successfully validated using 286 field years of measured data from the southern United States. PPM Plus allows the development of more effective conservation plans by allowing planners to evaluate pollutant losses resulting from a particular management strategy prior to implementation.

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

spatial targeting
farmland preservation
modeling
watershed management
nutrients
nonpoint source pollution


Hypermedia management in television through text processing Purpose - This paper aims to describe a working routine for the analysis of audio-visual documents for serving the needs of television journalists. Design/methodology/approach - A description in the form of a synthesis is given of the process by which television information must be put at the user's disposal with a response that is both fast and exhaustive. Findings - In television, there is a need to adapt the habits and methods of documentation to the productive processes of journalists in order to attain the common goals of information retrieval and reuse of the documents. Research limitations/implications - The main drawback of using this working method lies in the intensive use of large numbers of personnel with knowledge in specific areas. Practical implications - Well-designed hypermedia management based on knowledge of the creation processes in television will allow the construction of an information management system that adds value to the documents that have been analysed and facilitates the organisation's creation of future audio-visual products. Originality/value - It is hoped that readers use this paper in a critical spirit to adapt it to their own particular requirements, and to serve as a guide both for setting up a document/information system and for organising such departments within the TV industry.

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


An irregular grid method for high-dimensional free-boundary problems in finance We propose and test a new method for pricing American options in a high-dimensional setting. The method is centred around the approximation of the associated variational inequality on an irregular grid. We approximate the effect of the partial differential operator on this grid by appealing to the stochastic differential equation (SDE) representation of the stock process and computing a root of the transition probability matrix of an approximating Markov chain. The results of numerical tests in five dimensions are promising.

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

high-dimensional problems
free-boundary problems
optimal stopping
variational inequalities
numerical methods


Induced aggregation operators in the Euclidean distance and its application in financial decision making We develop a new decision making method by using induced aggregation operators in the Euclidean distance. We introduce a new aggregation operator called the induced Euclidean ordered weighted averaging distance (IEOWAD) operator. It is an aggregation operator that parameterizes a wide range of distance measures by using the induced OWA (IOWA) operator such as the maximum distance, the minimum distance, the normalized Euclidean distance (NED) and the weighted Euclidean distance (WED). The main advantage of this operator is that it is able to consider complex attitudinal characters of the decision maker by using order inducing variables in the aggregation of the Euclidean distance. As a result, we get a more general formulation of the Euclidean distance that considers the Euclidean distance as a particular case and a lot of other possible situations depending on the interests of the decision maker. We study some of its main properties giving special attention to the analysis of different particular types of IEOWAD operators. We apply this aggregation operator in a business decision making problem regarding the selection of investments. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

induced aggregation operators
euclidean distance
decision making
selection of investments


a study of learning a merge model for multilingual information retrieval This paper proposes a learning approach for the merging process in multilingual information retrieval (MLIR). To conduct the learning approach, we also present a large number of features that may influence the MLIR merging process; these features are mainly extracted from three levels: query, document, and translation. After the feature extraction, we then use the FRank ranking algorithm to construct a merge model; to our knowledge, this practice is the first attempt to use a learning-based ranking algorithm to construct a merge model for MLIR merging. In our experiments, three test collections for the task of crosslingual information retrieval (CLIR) in NTCIR3, 4, and 5 are employed to assess the performance of our proposed method; moreover, several merging methods are also carried out for a comparison, including traditional merging methods, the 2-step merging strategy, and the merging method based on logistic regression. The experimental results show that our method can significantly improve merging quality on two different types of datasets. In addition to the effectiveness, through the merge model generated by FRank, our method can further identify key factors that influence the merging process; this information might provide us more insight and understanding into MLIR merging.

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


On Energy Security of Server Systems Power management has become increasingly important for server systems. Numerous techniques have been proposed and developed to optimize server power consumption and achieve energy proportional computing. However, the security perspective of server power management has not yet been studied. In this paper, we investigate energy attacks, a new type of malicious exploits on server systems. Targeted solely at abusing server power consumption, energy attacks exhibit very different attacking behaviors and cause very different victim symptoms from conventional cyberspace attacks. First, we unveil that today's server systems with improved power saving technologies are more vulnerable to energy attacks. Then, we demonstrate a realistic energy attack on a stand-alone server system in three steps: 1) by profiling energy cost of an open web service under different operation conditions, we identify the vulnerabilities that subject a server to energy attacks; 2) exploiting the discovered attack vectors, we design an energy attack that can be launched anonymously from remote; and 3) we execute the attack and measure the extent of its damage in a systematic manner. Finally, we highlight the challenges in defending against energy attacks, and we propose an effective defense scheme to meet the challenges and evaluate its effectiveness.

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

server security
energy-aware programming


Treatment of Neurodegenerative Disorders with Radical Nanomedicine In engineering and materials science, nanotechnology has provided many advances that effectively reduce oxidative damage generated by free radical production. Despite such advances, there has been little application to biomedical problems. Increased oxidative stress and free radical production are associated with neurodegenerative conditions, including aging, trauma, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases, and many others. The antioxidant properties of cerium oxide nanoparticles show promise in the treatment of such diseases. Here, we summarize the work on the biological antioxidant actions of cerium oxide nanoparticles in extension of cell and organism longevity, protection against free radical insult, and protection against trauma-induced neuronal damage. We discuss establishment of effective dosing parameters, along with the physicochemical properties that regulate the pharmacological action of these new nanomaterials. Taken together, these studies suggest that nanotechnology can take pharmacological treatment to a new level, with a novel generation of nanopharmaceuticals.

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


Comparing variance reduction to managing system variance in a job shop Variance within the manufacturing system leads to uneven shop loads, long manufacturing lead times, and unreliable customer service. This study compares techniques that reduce system variance to techniques that manage system variance. The study is placed in a dual resource constrained job shop. Results indicate that reducing system variance improves flow time and customer service performance measures, such as mean tardiness and percent tardy jobs more than techniques that react to system variance. (C) 2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

system variance
variance reduction
customer service


Color segmentation robust to brightness variations by using B-spline curve modeling Color segmentation takes a great attention because color is an effective and robust visual cue for characterizing an object from the others. However, color segmentation suffers from color variations incurred by irregular illumination changes. We propose a reliable color modeling approach in huesaturationintensity (HSI) color space while considering intensity information by adopting the B-spline curve fitting to make a mathematical model for statistical characteristics of a color with respect to intensity. It is based on the fact that color distribution of a single-colored object is not invariant with respect to brightness variations even in the HS (huesaturation) plane. The statistical characteristics contain the mean and standard deviation of hue and saturation with respect to intensity. They are mathematically expressed as four bar graphs. In order to fit the bar graphs to continuous curves, we use B-spline curve fitting procedure. From several experimental results, we verify that the proposed algorithm is successfully applied to color segmentation under various illumination conditions.

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

color segmentation
brightness variations

color consistency
b-spline curve
color model


Modifying a knot of B-spline curves The modification of a knot of a B-spline curve of order k generates a family of B-spline curves. We show that an envelope of this family is a B-spline curve defined by the same control polygon, and its order is k - m, where m is the multiplicity of the modified knot. Moreover, their arbitrary order derivatives differ only in a multiplier. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

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


Optimized TQ-MAP: An adaptive mapping mechanism to guarantee the coherence of QoS support from IP to OBS Because of its scalability, the idea of coarse packet classification can be utilized to OBS networks. However, due to the limited number of priorities supported by OBS networks, we usually adopt a many-to-one composite class burst (CCB) assembly technique, e.g., N:1-CCB. In this kind of technique, there are two aspects related to scalable QoS support, i.e., mapping relationship and assembly resource allocation. This paper simultaneously takes the two aspects into consideration, and proposes a novel assembly mapping mechanism, called Optimized TQ-MAP, in which the most important feature is adaptivity. Based on nonlinear programming and differential calculus, it allocates the burst assembling capacity between classes fairly, efficiently and differentially, and matches IP QoS requirement with OBS QoS capacity as possible as it can. The simulation results show that Optimized TQ-MAP is more adaptive, and can efficiently guarantee the coherence of QoS support from IP to OBS.

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

burst assembly
map
optical burst switching (obs)


A stochastic model for generating disturbance patterns within landscapes A stochastic model for generating disturbances in landscapes that interfaces with geographic information systems (GIS) is presented. The model operates on a lattice (rectangular array of points) using a spacetime Markov process, which gives a stochastic simulation of growth patterns in terms of parameters of the local region. The model generates disturbance patterns on the landscape based on user-defined inputs of the total area disturbed and the number of patches to be disturbed. The model is developed in a C++ C ++ software package named TDsimulator (Terrain Disturbance Simulator) which can be used to predict changes in landscape cover under a variety of stochastic scenarios. The software comprises a set of GIS routines that collectively yield the disturbance patterns. A demonstration of the stochastic model is provided for simulating fire behaviour in a forested landscape. The numerical examples illustrate the total disturbance impact under different initial conditions and scenarios.

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

numerical model
stochastic modelling
geographic information system (gis)
terrain analysis system (tas)
forest fire


Exploring

medical

diagnostic

performance

using

interactive,

multi-parameter

sourced

receiver

operating

characteristic

scatter

plots

Determining

diagnostic

criteria

for

specific

disorders

is

often

a

tedious

task

that

involves

determining

optimal

diagnostic

thresholds

for

symptoms

and

biomarkers

using

receiver-operating

characteristic

(ROC)

statistics.

To

help

this

endeavor,

we

developed

softROC,

a

user-friendly

graphic-based

tool

that

lets

users

visually

explore

possible

ROC

tradeoffs.

The

software

requires

MATLAB

installation

and

an

Excel

file

containing

threshold

symptoms/biological

measures,

with

corresponding

gold

standard

diagnoses

for

a

set

of

patients.

The

software

scans

the

input

file

for

diagnostic

and

symptom/biomarkers

columns,

and

populates

the

graphical-user-interface

(GUI).

Users

select

symptoms/biomarkers

of

interest

using

Boolean

algebra

as

potential

inputs

to

create

diagnostic

criteria

outputs.

The

software

evaluates

subtests

across

the

user-established

range

of

cut-points

and

compares

them

to

a

gold

standard

in

order

to

generate

ROC

and

quality

ROC

scatter

plots.

These

plots

can

be

examined

interactively

to

find

optimal

cut-points

of

interest

for

a

given

application

(e.g.

sensitivity

versus

specificity

needs).

Split-set

validation

can

also

be

used

to

set

up

criteria

and

validate

these

in

independent

samples.

Bootstrapping

is

used

to

produce

confidence

intervals.

Additional

statistics

and

measures

are

provided,

such

as

the

area

under

the

ROC

curve

(AUC).

As

a

testing

set,

softROC

is

used

to

investigate

nocturnal

polysomnogram

measures

as

diagnostic

features

for

narcolepsy.

All

measures

can

be

outputted

to

a

text

file

for

offline

analysis.

The

softROC

toolbox,

with

clinical

training

data

and

tutorial

instruction

manual,

is

provided

as

supplementary

material

and

can

be

obtained

online

at

or

from

the

open

source

repository

at

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

diagnostic testing
bootstrap
data visualization
sleep


Joint Spatio-Temporal Alignment of Sequences Video alignment is important in different areas of computer vision such as wide baseline matching, action recognition, change detection, video copy detection and frame dropping prevention. Current video alignment methods usually deal with a relatively simple case of fixed or rigidly attached cameras or simultaneous acquisition. Therefore, in this paper we propose a joint video alignment for bringing two video sequences into a spatio-temporal alignment. Specifically, the novelty of the paper is to formulate the video alignment to fold the spatial and temporal alignment into a single alignment framework. This simultaneously satisfies a frame-correspondence and frame-alignment similarity; exploiting the knowledge among neighbor frames by a standard pairwise Markov random field (MRF). This new formulation is able to handle the alignment of sequences recorded at different times by independent moving cameras that follows a similar trajectory, and also generalizes the particular cases that of fixed geometric transformation and/or linear temporal mapping. We conduct experiments on different scenarios such as sequences recorded simultaneously or by moving cameras to validate the robustness of the proposed approach. The proposed method provides the highest video alignment accuracy compared to the state-of-the-art methods on sequences recorded from vehicles driving along the same track at different times.

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

direct-based
feature-based
image registration
markov random fields
synchronization
video retrieval


What factors are associated with the integration of evidence retrieval technology into routine general practice settings? Information retrieval systems have the potential to improve patient care but little is known about the variables which influence clinicians uptake and use of systems in routine work. To determine which factors influenced use of an online evidence retrieval system. Computer logs and pre- and post-system survey analysis of a 4-week clinical trial of the Quick Clinical online evidence system involving 227 general practitioners across Australia. Online evidence use was not linked to general practice training or clinical experience but female clinicians conducted more searches than their male counterparts (mean use=14.38 searches, S.D.=11.68 versus mean use=8.50 searches, S.D.=9.99; t=2.67, d.f.=157, P=0.008). Practice characteristics such as hours worked, type and geographic location of clinic were not associated with search activity. Information seeking was also not related to participants perceived information needs, computer skills, training nor Internet connection speed. Clinicians who reported direct improvements in patient care as a result of system use had significantly higher rates of system use than other users (mean use=12.55 searches, S.D.=13.18 versus mean use=8.15 searches, S.D.=9.18; t=2.322, d.f.=154 P=0.022). Comparison of participants views pre- and post- the trial, showed that post-trial clinicians expressed more positive views about searching for information during a consultation (?2=27.40, d.f.=4, P?0.001) and a significantly greater number reported seeking information between consultations as a result of having access to an online evidence system in their consulting rooms (?2=9.818, d.f.=2, P=0.010). Clinicians use of an online evidence system was directly related to their reported experiences of improvements in patient care. Post-trial clinicians positively changed their views about having time to search for information and pursued more questions during clinic hours.

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 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

clinical informatics
evidence-based medicine
family practice
evaluation studies


Absorbing boundary conditions for the Euler and NavierStokes equations with the spectral difference method Two absorbing boundary conditions, the absorbing sponge zone and the perfectly matched layer, are developed and implemented for the spectral difference method discretizing the Euler and NavierStokes equations on unstructured grids. The performance of both boundary conditions is evaluated and compared with the characteristic boundary condition for a variety of benchmark problems including vortex and acoustic wave propagations. The applications of the perfectly matched layer technique in the numerical simulations of unsteady problems with complex geometries are also presented to demonstrate its capability.

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

navierstokes equations
unstructured grids
spectral difference
absorbing sponge zone
perfectly matched layer

high-order methods
discontinuous galerkin
non-reflecting boundary condition


Streaming video over variable bit-rate wireless channels We consider streaming of video sequences over both constant and variable bit-rate (VBR) channels. Our goal is to enable decoding of each video unit before exceeding its displaying deadline and, hence, to guarantee successful sequence presentation even if the media rate does not match the channel rate. In this work, we will show that the separation between a delay jitter buffer and a decoder buffer is in general suboptimal for VBR video transmitted over VBR channels. We will specify the minimum initial delay and the minimum required buffer for a given video stream and a deterministic VBR channel. In addition, we provide some probabilistic statements in case that we observe a random behavior of the channel bit rate. A specific example tailored to wireless video streaming is discussed in greater details and bounds are derived which allow guaranteeing a certain quality-of-service even for random VBR channels in a wireless environment. Simulation results validate the findings.

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


Enterprise Application Integration in the electronic commerce world Electronic commerce is radically changing the competitive landscape. Increasingly, firms need to have stronger ties with customers and suppliers. In this business scenario, it is important for firms to have information systems (IS) that encourage the unhindered flow of information. The paradigm that addresses this need of firms is popularly known as Enterprise Application Integration (EAI). In this paper, we examine EAI in some detail and develop a case for EAI in today's business environment. We discuss various ways in which EAI can be realized and illustrate how firms can improve gains by implementing the appropriate EAI solution. It concludes with a discussion about the future directions that EAI might take.

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

enterprise application integration (eai)


Model-based biclustering of clickstream data Navigation patterns expressed by sequences of visited web-sites or categories can characterize the behavior and habits of users. Such web-page routes taken by individuals are commonly called clickstreams. Clustering clickstream sequences is a recent yet challenging problem with many applications. The main difficulty is related to the fact that one needs to group categorical data sequences rather than vectors and the majority of traditional clustering algorithms are not applicable in this setting. The time-related character of data suggests that dynamic models have a better promise than static ones. Model-based clustering relying on the mixture of first order Markov models will be considered. Since the number of distinct web-pages, and therefore the number of states in a Markov process, can be very high, such a mixture model involves a large number of parameters. Thus, grouping states by their similarity to reduce the number of parameters in the model is also proposed. Then, states are clustered along with users providing a biclustering framework. The developed methodology is illustrated on synthetic and real datasets with good results.

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

finite mixture model
model-based clustering
model selection


B Lymphocytes and the Skeleton Mesenchymal lineage cells arise from pluripotent stem cells in the bone marrow (BM) and transition through a series of developmental stages resulting in mature functional cells. This specification results in the development of osteoblast, adipocytes, myoblasts, chondroblasts, and stromal cells (part of the recticular network). The osteoblast developmental pathway is well understood particularly at the later stages of development. However, less is known about the very early stages, where cell fate decisions that lead to commitment to the osteoblast lineage occur. Adipocytes, the cells that produce fat, likely share a common early progenitor with osteoblasts, although little is known about the molecular control of this lineage bifurcation. Growing evidence indicates that transcription factors required for B lymphocyte development from hematopoietic stem cells are critical for proper skeletal development although as yet none have been implicated in osteoblast differentiation. We have discovered that O/E-1, a transcription factor essential for B cell development, is expressed in osteoblasts and plays a critical role in controlling osteoblast development. O/E-1-deficient mice are runted, have increased bone formation parameters, and have a striking increase in osteoblasts. Remarkably, these mice also exhibit a dramatic expansion of adipocytes in the medullary canal of long bones

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


Empirical evaluation of hash functions for multipoint measurements A broad spectrum of network measurement applications demand passive multipoint measurements in which data from multiple observation points has to be correlated. Examples are the passive are the passive measurement of one-way delay or the observation of the path that a packet takes through a network. Neverthless, due to high data rates and the need for fine granular measurements, the resource consumption for passive measurements can be immense. Furthermore, the resource consumption depends on the traffic in the network, which usually is highly dynamic. Packet and flow-selection methods provide a solution to reduce and control the resource consumption for passive measurements. In order to apply such techniques to multipoint measurements the selection processes need to be synchronized. Hash-based selection is a deterministic packet selection based on a hash function computed on selected parts of the packet content. This selection decision is considered throughout the network and enables packet tracing and the measurement of delay between network nodes. Because the selectio is based on deterministic function it can introduce bias which leads to wrong estimation of traffic characteristics. In this paper we define a set of quality criteria and select methods to investigate which hash function is most suitable for hash-based packet selection. We analyze 23 non-cryptographic and 2 cryptographic hash functions. Experiments are performed with real traffic traces from different networks. Based on the results we recommend 2 fast hash functions which show low bias and sample a reperesentative subset of the population.

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

network measurement
hash function
packet selection


a new clustering scheme for wireless sensor networks Energy consumption has always been the most serious issue to consider while deploying Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs). Sensor nodes are limited in power, computational capacities and memory so reporting the occurring of specific events, such as fire or flooding, as quickly as possible using minimal energy resources is definitely a challenging issue. In this work, we propose a novel, reactive and energy-efficient scheme in order to report events. In our algorithm, nodes that detect a certain event will organize themselves into a cluster, elect a clusterhead that will collect data from the cluster members, aggregate it and forward it to the mobile sink. Our approach considers the signal strength received from the mobile sink as well as the residual energy of sensor nodes. It is worth to mention that our scheme is completely reactive, so no pre-configuration phase is needed, which will lead to a high energy saving. In order to implement and evaluate our algorithm, we used Opnet simulator. A new Opnet sensor node model, where the network layer is implemented from scratch, is also proposed in this paper; our scheme is implemented using Opnet Process Modeling Methodology (PMM).

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

wsns
sensor node model
pmm
event
cluster
opnet simulator
mobile sink


The GIFI approach to non-linear PLS modeling The GIFI approach to non-linear modeling involves the transformation of quantitative variables to a set of 1/0 dummies in a similar manner to the way qualitative variables are coded, This is followed by analyzing the sets of 1/0 dummies by principal component analysis, multiple regression or, as discussed here, PLS. The patterns of the resulting coefficients indicate the nature of the non-linearities in the data. Here the potential uses and limitations of PLS regression, in combination with four variants of GIFI coding, are investigated using both simulated and empirical data sets. Copyright (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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