On the Expressiveness of Single-Pass Instruction Sequences We perceive programs as single-pass instruction sequences. A single-pass instruction sequence under execution is considered to produce a behaviour to be controlled by some execution environment. Threads as considered in basic thread algebra model such behaviours. We show that all regular threads, i.e. threads that can only be in a finite number of states, can be produced by single-pass instruction sequences without jump instructions if use can be made of Boolean registers. We also show that, in the case where goto instructions are used instead of jump instructions, a bound to the number of labels restricts the expressiveness.

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 B

single-pass instruction sequence
regular thread
jump-free instruction sequence


Adaptive two-stage QoS provisioning schemes for CDMA networks in this paper, adaptive QoS provisioning schemes are proposed for CDMA wireless networks. The proposed schemes consist of two stages. in the first stage, a call admission control (CAC) and a bandwidth allocation schemes are proposed to determine the bandwidth assignment for new connections according to available bandwidth and adaptable range of active connections. The proposed methods utilize the Markov chain model to estimate the required bandwidth for all connections. This Markov chain model considers the traffic characteristics of both the incoming call request and the existing connections, and estimates the resulting quality of service (QoS). In the second stage, Net-CBK and Net-Share schemes are presented to regulate the active connections according to call blocking rates and unused bandwidth. From the simulation results, the proposed schemes are able to carry more connections and improve system utilization.

O O O O O O O O O O O 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 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

quality of service
call admission control

code division multiple access
variable bit rate
packet lost rate


A fine motor skill training system using multi-fingered haptic interface robot ? We proposed optimal switching method for transferring multiple fingertip forces. Based on the proposed method, a haptic training system was developed. The proposed method enhanced the training effect compared with our earlier method.

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

virtual reality
humancomputer interaction
skill transfer
fine motor skill in fingers


Visualization of Bubble-Fluid Interaction by a Moving Object Flow Image Analyzer System This paper deals with interaction between a bubble and fluid around it, visualized by a moving object flow image analyzer (MOFIA) consisting of a three-dimensional (3D) moving object image analyzer (MOIA) and two-dimensional particle image velocimetry (PIV). The experiments were carried out for rising bubbles of various sizes and shapes in stagnant water in a vertical pipe. In the MOFIA employed, 3D-MOIA was used to measure bubble motion and PIV to measure fluid flow. The 3D position and shape of a bubble and the velocity field were measured simultaneously. The experimental results showed that the interaction was characterized by the shape, size and density of a bubble. Concretely, they showed the characteristics of bubble motion, wake shedding, and flow field.

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


Fibonacci (p p , r r )-cubes which are median graphs ? The Fibonacci (p p , r r )-cube is an interconnection topology, which unifies a wide range of connection topologies, such as hypercube, Fibonacci cube, postal network, etc. It is known that the Fibonacci cubes are median graphs [S. Klavar, On median nature and enumerative properties of Fibonacci-like cubes, Discrete Math. 299 (2005) 145153]. The question for determining which Fibonacci (p p , r r )-cubes are median graphs is solved completely in this paper. We show that Fibonacci (p p , r r )-cubes are median graphs if and only if either r?p r ? p and r?2 r ? 2 , or p=1 p = 1 and r=n r = n .

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

fibonacci (p p
r r )-cube p p p p p r r r r r
median graph


Fast isogeometric boundary element method based on independent field approximation We present an alternative isogeometric BEM for elasticity on NURBS patches. Boundary data and geometry are approximated independently which avoids redundancies. Hierarchical matrices provide almost linear computational complexity. Comparison of different Ansatz functions on NURBS patches. The results show optimal convergence for all tested orders.

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

hierarchical matrices
elasticity
nurbs
convergence

subparametric formulation
isogeometric analysis


Expectations of Random Sets and Their Boundaries Using Oriented Distance Functions Shape estimation and object reconstruction are common problems in image analysis. Mathematically, viewing objects in the image plane as random sets reduces the problem of shape estimation to inference about sets. Currently existing definitions of the expected set rely on different criteria to construct the expectation. This paper introduces new definitions of the expected set and the expected boundary, based on oriented distance functions. The proposed expectations have a number of attractive properties, including inclusion relations, convexity preservation and equivariance with respect to rigid motions. The paper introduces a special class of decomposable oriented distance functions for parametric sets and gives the definition and properties of decomposable random closed sets. Further, the definitions of the empirical mean set and the empirical mean boundary are proposed and empirical evidence of the consistency of the boundary estimator is presented. In addition, the paper discusses loss functions for set inference in frequentist framework and shows how some of the existing expectations arise naturally as optimal estimators. The proposed definitions are illustrated on theoretical examples and real data.

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

random closed sets
expected set
set inference
loss functions
boundary estimator

oriented distance function
boundary reconstruction


A

numerical

comparison

of

several

unconditional

exact

tests

in

problems

of

equivalence

based

on

the

difference

of

proportions

In

order

to

compare

two

independent

proportions

and

there

are

several

useful

tests

for

the

parameter

d

H(SG)

d

delta,

d

delta

vs.

d

not

equal

delta

(where

Delta

(where

Delta

and

H(PE)

vertical

bar

d

vertical

bar

Delta

vs.

K(PE)

vertical

bar

d

vertical

bar

The

exact

unconditional

test

requires

an

ordering

statistic,

which

is

usually

the

z-pooled

statistic,

to

be

defined.

The

paper

gives

the

definition

of

new

ordering

statistics

with

a

similar

computational

time,

and

compares

the

number

of

points

which

each

introduces

into

the

critical

region

obtained

to

error

alpha

The

article

reaches

the

conclusion

that

the

most

generally

powerful

statistics

are:

the

z-pooled

one

with

a

small

continuity

correction

(c

if

not

equal

or

c

if

where

N

and

n(i)

are

the

sample

sizes)

and

those

z-pooled

with

Yates'

continuity

correction

(c

In

this

paper

the

author

also

showed

that

Barnard's

two

classic

convexity

conditions

are

redundant,

because

when

one

of

them

is

verified

the

other

is

also

verified.

The

programs

for

these

tests

may

be

obtained

free

of

charge

from

the

site

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

equivalence of proportions
exact confidence intervals
non-inferiority
power
unconditional tests
2 x 2 tables


MINIMUM ENERGY CONTROL OF POSITIVE CONTINUOUS-TIME LINEAR SYSTEMS WITH BOUNDED INPUTS The minimum energy control problem for positive continuous-time linear systems with bounded inputs is formulated and solved. Sufficient conditions for the existence of a solution to the problem are established. A procedure for solving the problem is proposed and illustrated with a numerical example.

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


Relevance-Zone-Oriented Proof Search for Connect6 Wu and Huang (Advances in Computer Games, pp. 180-194, 2006) presented a new family of k-in-a-row games, among which Connect6 (a kind of six-in-a-row) attracted much attention. For Connect6 as well as the family of k-in-a-row games, this paper proposes a new threat-based proof search method, named relevance-zone-oriented proof (RZOP) search, developed from the lambda search proposed by Thomsen (Int. Comput. Games Assoc. J., vol. 23, no. 4, pp. 203-217, 2000). The proposed RZOP search is a novel, general, and elegant method of constructing and promoting relevance zones. Using this method together with a proof number search, this paper solved effectively and successfully many new Connect6 game positions, including several Connect6 openings, especially the Mickey Mouse opening, which used to be one of the popular openings before we solved it.

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

board games
k-in-a-row games
threat-based proof search
threat-space search


Interaction of TCP flows as billiards The aim of this paper is to analyze the performance of a large number of long-lived TCP controlled flows sharing many routers (or links), from the knowledge of the network parameters (capacity, buffer size, topology) and of the characteristics of each TCP flow (RTT, route etc.) when taking synchronization into account. It is shown that in the small buffer case, the dynamics of such a network can be described in terms of iterate of random piecewise affine maps, or geometrically as a billiards in the Euclidean space with as many dimensions as the number of flow classes and as many reflection facets as there are routers. This class of billiards exhibits both periodic and nonperiodic asymptotic oscillations, the characteristics of which are extremely sensitive to the parameters of the network. It is also shown that for large populations and in the presence of synchronization, aggregated throughputs exhibit fluctuations that are due to the network as a whole, that follow some complex fractal patterns, and that come on top of other and more classical flow or packet level fluctuations. The consequences on TCP's fairness are exemplified on a few typical cases of small dimension.

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

bandwidth sharing
dynamical system
flow level modeling
ip traffic
product of random matrices
tcp fairness


Feature selection, mutual information, and the classification of high-dimensional patterns We propose a novel feature selection filter for supervised learning, which relies on the efficient estimation of the mutual information between a high-dimensional set of features and the classes. We bypass the estimation of the probability density function with the aid of the entropic-graphs approximation of Rnyi entropy, and the subsequent approximation of the Shannon entropy. Thus, the complexity does not depend on the number of dimensions but on the number of patterns/samples, and the curse of dimensionality is circumvented. We show that it is then possible to outperform algorithms which individually rank features, as well as a greedy algorithm based on the maximal relevance and minimal redundancy criterion. We successfully test our method both in the contexts of image classification and microarray data classification. For most of the tested data sets, we obtain better classification results than those reported in the literature.

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

filter feature selection
entropic spanning graphs


Analyzing the techniques that improve fault tolerance of aggregation trees in sensor networks Sensor networks are finding significant applications in large scale distributed systems. One of the basic operations in sensor networks is in-network aggregation. Among the various approaches to in-network aggregation, such as gossip and tree, including the hash-based techniques, the tree-based approaches have better performance and energy-saving characteristics. However, sensor networks are highly prone to failures. Numerous techniques suggested in the literature to counteract the effect Of failures have not been carefully analyzed. In this paper, we focus on the performance of these tree-based aggregation techniques in the presence of failures. First, we identify a fault model that Captures the important failure traits of the system. Then, we analyze the correctness of simple tree aggregation with Our fault model. We then use the same fault model to analyze the techniques that utilize redundant trees to improve the variance. The impact of techniques for maintaining the correctness under faults, Such as rebuilding or locally fixing the tree, is then studied under the same fault model. We also do the cost-benefit analysis Of using the hash-based schemes which are based on FM sketches, We conclude that these fault tolerance techniques for tree aggregation do not necessarily result in substantial improvement in fault tolerance. (C) 2009 Published by Elsevier Inc.

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

reliability
sensor network
modeling faults


Lean government and platform-based governanceDoing more with less Governments from all over the world are looking for ways to reduce costs while at the same time to stimulate innovation. While pursuing both objectives, governments face a major challengeto operate in a connected environment, engage stakeholders and solve societal problems by utilizing new methods, tools, practices and governance models. As result, fundamental changes are taking place on how government operates. Such changes are under the larger umbrella of lean government (l-Government). Lean government is a new wave which is appearing as a response to traditional approacheslike electronic government (e-Government) and transformational government (t-Government), and aims at reducing the complexity of the public sector by simplifying and streamlining organizational structures and processes, at the same time at stimulating innovation by mobilizing stakeholders. In l-Government, public organizations introduce platforms facilitating innovation and interactions with other public organizations, business and citizens, and focus on their orchestration role. Experimentation, assessment and gradual improvement based on user requirements are key factors for realizing l-Government.

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

e-government
open government
public sector reform
platform
government as a platform
infrastructure


Resolving IP Aliases in Building Traceroute-Based Internet Maps Alias resolution, the task of identifying IP addresses belonging to the same router, is an important step in building traceroute-based Internet topology maps. Inaccuracies in alias resolution affect the representativeness of constructed topology maps. This in turn affects the conclusions derived from studies that use these maps. This paper presents two complementary studies on alias resolution. First, we present an experimental study to demonstrate the impact of alias resolution on topology measurement studies. Then, we introduce an alias resolution approach called analytic and probe-based alias resolver (APAR). APAR consists of an analytical component and a probe-based component. Given a set of path traces, the analytical component utilizes the common IP address assignment scheme to infer IP aliases. The probe-based component introduces a minimal probing overhead to improve the accuracy of APAR. Compared to the existing state-of-the-art tool ally, APAR uses an orthogonal approach to resolve a large number of IP aliases that ally fails to identify. Our extensive verification study on sample data sets shows that our approach is effective in resolving many aliases with good accuracy. Our evaluations also indicate that the two approaches (ally and APAR) should be used together to maximize the success of the alias resolution process.

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


beta P: A novel approach to filter out malicious rating profiles from recommender systems Recommender systems are widely deployed to provide user purchasing suggestion on eCommerce websites. The technology that has been adopted by most recommender systems is collaborative filtering. However, with the open nature of collaborative filtering recommender systems, they suffer significant vulnerabilities from being attacked by malicious raters, who inject profiles consisting of biased ratings. In recent years, several attack detection algorithms have been proposed to handle the issue. Unfortunately, their applications are restricted by various constraints. PCA-based methods while having good performance on paper, still suffer from missing values that plague most user-item matrixes. Classification-based methods require balanced numbers of attacks and normal profiles to train the classifiers. The detector based on SPC (Statistical Process Control) assumes that the rating probability distribution for each item is known in advance. In this research, Beta-Protection ( beta P) is proposed to alleviate the problem without the abovementioned constraints. beta P grounds its theoretical foundation on Beta distribution for easy computation and has stable performance when experimenting with data derived from the public websites of MovieLens. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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


On the lifetime of node-to-node communication in wireless ad hoc networks Lifetime of node-to-node communication in a wireless ad hoc network is defined as the duration that two nodes can communicate with each other. Failure of the two nodes or failure of the last available route between them ends their communication. In this paper, we analyze the maximum lifetime of node-to-node communication in static ad hoc networks when alternative routes that keep the two nodes connected to each other are node-disjoint. We target ad hoc networks with random topology modeled as a random geometric graph. The analysis is provided for (1) networks that support automatic repeat request (ARQ) at the medium access control level and (2) networks that do not support ARQ. On the basis of this analysis, we propose numerical algorithms to predict at each moment of network operation, the maximum duration that two nodes can still communicate with each other. Then, we derive a closed-form expression for the expected value of maximum node-to-node communication lifetime in the network. As a byproduct of our analysis, we also derive upper and lower bounds on the lifetime of node-disjoint routes in static ad hoc networks. We verify the accuracy of our analysis using extensive simulation studies. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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

node-to-node communication lifetime
node-disjoint routes
route lifetime
network connectivity


Human factors in the adoption and performance of advanced manufacturing technology in unionized firms Some researchers have found that unionized firms are less likely to pursue automation because high wage demands deprive them of the necessary capital required to invest in advanced manufacturing technology (AMT). it has also been suggested that stringent work rules and technology agreements can make the substitution of new technology for union labor too expensive. Others have found, however, that the pursuit of high wage policies and the resultant requirement for improved worker and machine productivity can create a positive environment for technological change. This exploratory study examines the relationships between firm-level union status and the adoption and performance of AMT in the discrete parts durable-goads manufacturing industry. Analyses of our sample, which included Chi-square tests, t-tests, correlation analyses and multiple linear regression analyses. revealed a union effect an the adoption of just-in-time technology and a moderately positive union effect on performance. Results of analyses of the impact of union status, firm sire and several human factor variables on firm performance are also presented and 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 O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

industrial relations
trade unions
advanced manufacturing technologies
implementation


Dividing protein interaction networks for modular network comparative analysis The increasing growth of data on protein-protein interaction (PPI) networks has boosted research on their comparative analysis. In particular, recent studies proposed models and algorithms for performing network alignment, that is, the comparison of networks across species for discovering conserved functional complexes. In this paper, we present an algorithm for dividing PPI networks, prior to their alignment, into small sub-graphs that are likely to cover conserved complexes. This allows one to perform network alignment in a modular fashion, by acting on pairs of resulting small sub-graphs from different species. The proposed dividing algorithm combines a graph-theoretical property (articulation) with a biological one (orthology). Extensive experiments on various PPI networks are conducted in order to assess how well the sub-graphs generated by this dividing algorithm cover protein functional complexes and whether the proposed pre-processing step can be used for enhancing the performance of network alignment algorithms. Source code of the dividing algorithm is available upon request for academic use. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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

protein interaction network division
modular network alignment
conserved protein complexes


Clustering with the multivariate normal inverse Gaussian distribution ? Many model-based clustering methods are based on a finite Gaussian mixture model. The Gaussian mixture model implies that the data scatter within each group is elliptically shaped. Hence non-elliptical groups are often modeled by more than one component, resulting in model over-fitting. An alternative is to use a meanvariance mixture of multivariate normal distributions with an inverse Gaussian mixing distribution (MNIG) in place of the Gaussian distribution, to yield a more flexible family of distributions. Under this model the component distributions may be skewed and have fatter tails than the Gaussian distribution. The MNIG based approach is extended to include a broad range of eigendecomposed covariance structures. Furthermore, MNIG models where the other distributional parameters are constrained is considered. The Bayesian Information Criterion is used to identify the optimal model and number of mixture components. The method is demonstrated on three sample data sets and a novel variation on the univariate KolmogorovSmirnov test is used to assess goodness of fit.

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

multivariate normal inverse gaussian distribution

model-based clustering
mclust
information metrics
kolmogorovsmirnov goodness of fit


Linear multiuser receivers: Effective interference, effective bandwidth and user capacity Multiuser receivers improve the performance of spread-spectrum and antenna-array systems by exploiting the structure of the multiaccess interference when demodulating the signal of a user. Much of the previous work on the performance analysis of multiuser receivers has focused on their ability to reject worst case interference. Their performance in a power-controlled network and the resulting user capacity are less well-understood. In this paper, me show that in a large system with each user using random spreading sequences, the limiting interference effects under several linear multiuser receivers can be decoupled, such that each interferer can be ascribed a level of effective interference that it provides to the user to be demodulated, Applying these results to the uplink of a single power-controlled cell, we derive an effective bandwidth characterization of the user capacity: the signal-to-interference requirements of all the users can be met if and only if the sum of the effective bandwidths of the users is less than the total number of degrees of freedom in the system. The effective bandwidth of a user depends only on its own SIR requirement, and simple expressions are derived for three linear receivers: the conventional matched filter, the decorrelator, and the MMSE receiver. The effective bandwidths under the three receivers serve as a basis for performance comparison.

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

decorrelator
effective bandwidth
effective interference
mmse receiver
user capacity
random spreading sequences


The multiple originator broadcasting problem in graphs ? Given a graph G G and a vertex subset S S of V(G) V ( G ) , the broadcasting time with respect to S S , denoted by b(G,S) b ( G , S ) , is the minimum broadcasting time when using S S as the broadcasting set. And the k k -broadcasting number , denoted by bk(G) b k ( G ) , is defined by bk(G)=min{b(G,S)|S?V(G),|S|=k} b k ( G ) = min { b ( G , S ) | S ? V ( G ) , | S | = k } . Given a graph G G and two vertex subsets S S , S? S ? of V(G) V ( G ) , define d ( v , S ) = min u ? S d ( v , u ) , d(S,S?)=min{d(u,v)|u?S d ( S , S ? ) = min { d ( u , v ) | u ? S , v?S?} v ? S ? } , and d ( G , S ) = max v ? V ( G ) d ( v , S ) for all v?V(G) v ? V ( G ) . For all k k , 1?k?|V(G)| 1 ? k ? | V ( G ) | , the k k -radius of G G , denoted by rk(G) r k ( G ) , is defined as rk(G)=min{d(G,S)|S?V(G) r k ( G ) = min { d ( G , S ) | S ? V ( G ) , |S|=k} | S | = k } . In this paper, we study the relation between the k k -radius and the k k -broadcasting numbers of graphs. We also give the 2 2 -radius and the 2 2 -broadcasting numbers of the grid graphs, and the k k -broadcasting numbers of the complete n n -partite graphs and the hypercubes.

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

k k -radius k k k k k
k k -broadcasting number k k k k k
cartesian product
path
hypercube


A concurrent rule scheduling algorithm for active rules The use of rules in a distributed environment creates new challenges for the development of active rule execution models. In particular, since a single event can trigger multiple rules that execute over distributed sources of data, it is important to make use of concurrent rule execution whenever possible. This paper presents the details of the integration rule scheduling (IRS) algorithm. Integration rules are active database rules that are used for component integration in a distributed environment. The IRS algorithm identifies rule conflicts for multiple rules triggered by the same event through static, compile-time analysis of the read and write sets of each rule. A unique aspect of the algorithm is that the conflict analysis includes the effects of nested rule execution that occurs as a result of using an execution model with an immediate coupling mode. The algorithm therefore identifies conflicts that may occur as a result of the concurrent execution of different rule triggering sequences. The rules are then formed into a priority graph before execution, defining the order in which rules triggered by the same event should be processed. Rules with the same priority can be executed concurrently. The IRS algorithm guarantees confluence in the final state of the rule execution. The IRS algorithm is applicable for rule scheduling in both distributed and centralized rule execution environments.

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

active rules
concurrent rule execution
rule scheduling algorithm


Identification of human implicit visual search intention based on eye movement and pupillary analysis We propose a novel approach for the identification of human implicit visual search intention based on eye movement patterns and pupillary analysis, in general, as well as pupil size, gradient of pupil size variation, fixation length and fixation count corresponding to areas of interest, and fixation count corresponding to non-areas of interest, in particular. The proposed model identifies human implicit visual search intention as task-free visual browsing or task-oriented visual search. Task-oriented visual search is further identified as task-oriented visual search intent generation, task-oriented visual search intent maintenance, or task-oriented visual search intent disappearance. During a visual search, measurement of the pupillary response is greatly influenced by external factors such the intensity and size of the visual stimulus. To alleviate the effects of external factors, we propose a robust baseline model that can accurately measure the pupillary response. Graphical representation of the measured parameter values shows significant differences among the different intent conditions, which can then be used as features for identification. By using the eye movement patterns and pupillary analysis, we can detect the transitions between different implicit intentionstask-free visual browsing intent to task-oriented visual search intent and task-oriented visual search intent maintenance to task-oriented visual search intent disappearanceusing a hierarchical support vector machine. In the proposed model, the hierarchical support vector machine is able to identify the transitions between different intent conditions with greater than 90% accuracy.

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

implicit intention detection
task-free visual browsing intent
task-oriented visual search intent
intention recognition
human computer interface & interaction
eye tracking
pupil dilation


A methodology and tools for applying context-specific usability guidelines to interface design This paper presents a methodology and an associated technology to create context-specific usability guidelines. The objective is to transform usability guidelines into a proactive resource that software developers can employ early and often in the development process. The methodology ensures conformance with established guidelines, but has the flexibility to use design experiences to adapt the guidelines to meet the emergent and diverse requirements of modern user interface design. Case-based and organizational learning technology is used to support the methodology and provide valuable resources for software developers. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

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

human-computer interaction
software development methodologies
software engineering
standards
tools for working with guidelines


towards an engineering tool for implementing reusable distributed control systems The IEC model for distributed control systems (DCSs) was adopted for the implementation of a new generation engineering tool. However, it was found that this approach does not exploit all the benefits of the object and component technologies. In this paper, we present the enhanced 4-layer architecture that proved to be very helpful in the identification of the key abstractions required for the design of the new generation of function block based engineering tools. Despite being IEC-compliant, the proposed approach introduces a number of extensions and modifications to the IEC-model to improve the development process. The Unified Modelling Language is exploited during the requirements phase of DCSs, but the use of the FB construct is confected during the design phase.

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

distributed control systems
engineering tool
function block


Power Allocation in Cooperative Communication System Based on Stackelberg Game Cooperative communication has great potential to improve the wireless channel capacity by exploiting the antennas on wireless devices for spatial diversity. The performance in cooperative communication depends on careful resource allocation such as relay selection and power control. In this paper, the network is expanded and more than one source is used. What is proposed is a distributed buyer/seller game theoretic framework over multiuser cooperative communication networks in order to stimulate cooperation and improve the system performance. A two-level Stackelberg game is employed to jointly consider the benefits of the source node and the relay nodes in which the source node is modeled as a buyer and the relay nodes are modeled as sellers, respectively. In this work we proposed coded method in which relays amplify and code Source data and send it to destination at the same time and then signal detection occur in destination, but in the codeless network relays send source data separately to destination. So, here coded and codeless networks are compared and contrasted. The stimulation results revealed that the proposed coded method performed better than the codeless ones; furthermore, the research shows that relays near the sources can play a significant role in increasing source nodes utility, so every source would like to buy more power from these preferred relays. Also, the proposed algorithm enforces truthful power demands.

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

cooperative communication
power control
stackelberg game


Inhibitory conductance dynamics in cortical neurons during activated states ? During activated states in vivo, neocortical neurons are subject to intense synaptic activity and high-amplitude membrane potential (Vm) ( V m ) fluctuations. These high-conductance states may strongly affect the integrative properties of cortical neurons. We investigated the responsiveness of cortical neurons during different states using a combination of computational models and in vitro experiments (dynamic-clamp) in the visual cortex of adult guinea pigs. Spike responses were monitored following stochastic conductance injection in both experiments and models. We found that cortical neurons can operate in a continuum between two different modes: during states with equal excitatory and inhibitory conductances, the firing is mostly correlated with an increase in excitatory conductance, which is a rather classic scenario. In contrast, during states dominated by inhibition, the firing is mostly related to a decrease in inhibitory conductances (dis-inhibition). This model prediction was tested experimentally using dynamic-clamp, and the same modes of firing were identified. We also found that the signature of spikes evoked by dis-inhibition is a transient drop of the total membrane conductance prior to the spike, which is typical of states with dominant inhibitory conductances. Such a drop should be identifiable from intracellular recordings in vivo, which would provide an important test for the presence of inhibition-dominated states. In conclusion, we show that in artificial activated states, not only inhibition can determine the conductance state of the membrane, but inhibitory inputs may also have a determinant influence on spiking. Future analyses and models should focus on verifying if such a determinant influence of inhibitory conductance dynamics is also present in vivo.

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


Centralized fleet management system for cybernetic transportation In this article, we present a centralized fleet management system (CFMS) for cybernetic vehicles called cybercars. Cybercars are automatically guided vehicles for passenger transport on dedicated networks like amusement parks, shopping centres etc. The users make reservations for the vehicles through phone, internet, kiosk etc and the CFMS schedules the cybercars to pick the users at their respective stations at desired time intervals. The CFMS has centralized control of the routing network and performs pooling of customer requests, scheduling and routing of cybercars to customers, empty cybercars to new services or parking stations and those running below their threshold battery levels to recharging stations. The challenges before CFMS are to assure conflict-free routing, accommodate immediate requests from customers, dynamic updation of vehicle paths and minimize congestion on the whole network. We present the approaches used by CFMS to ensure these functionalities and demonstrate a numerical illustration on a test network.

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


Signal processing interpolation educational workbench This article presents an educational tool to be used in signal processing interpolation-related subjects. The aim is to contribute to the better consolidation of acquired theoretical knowledge, allowing students to test signal reconstruction algorithms and visualize the results obtained by the usage of such algorithms, and how several parameters affect their convergence and performance. 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Comput Appl Eng Educ 20: 356363, 2012

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

signal reconstruction educational interpolation


Unsupervised view and rate invariant clustering of video sequences ? Videos play an ever increasing role in our everyday lives with applications ranging from news, entertainment, scientific research, security and surveillance. Coupled with the fact that cameras and storage media are becoming less expensive, it has resulted in people producing more video content than ever before. This necessitates the development of efficient indexing and retrieval algorithms for video data. Most state-of-the-art techniques index videos according to the global content in the scene such as color, texture, brightness, etc. In this paper, we discuss the problem of activity-based indexing of videos. To address the problem, first we describe activities as a cascade of dynamical systems which significantly enhances the expressive power of the model while retaining many of the computational advantages of using dynamical models. Second, we also derive methods to incorporate view and rate-invariance into these models so that similar actions are clustered together irrespective of the viewpoint or the rate of execution of the activity. We also derive algorithms to learn the model parameters from a video stream and demonstrate how a single video sequence may be clustered into different clusters where each cluster represents an activity. Experimental results for five different databases show that the clusters found by the algorithm correspond to semantically meaningful activities.

O O O O O O O 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

video clustering
summarization
cascade of linear dynamical systems
view invariance
affine invariance
rate invariance


Closed inter-sequence pattern mining Inter-sequence pattern mining can find associations across several sequences in a sequence database, which can discover both a sequential pattern within a transaction and sequential patterns across several different transactions. However, inter-sequence pattern mining algorithms usually generate a large number of recurrent frequent patterns. We have observed mining closed inter-sequence patterns instead of frequent ones can lead to a more compact yet complete result set. Therefore, in this paper, we propose a model of closed inter-sequence pattern mining and an efficient algorithm called CISP-Miner for mining such patterns, which enumerates closed inter-sequence patterns recursively along a search tree in a depth-first search manner. In addition, several effective pruning strategies and closure checking schemes are designed to reduce the search space and thus accelerate the algorithm. Our experiment results demonstrate that the proposed CISP-Miner algorithm is very efficient and outperforms a compared EISP-Miner algorithm in most cases.

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

closed patterns
data mining
inter-sequence pattern


Symmetry detection by generalized complex (GC) moments: A close-form solution This paper presents a unified method for detecting both reflection-symmetry and rotation-symmetry of 2D images based on an identical set of features, i.e., the first three nonzero generalized complex (GC) moments. This method is theoretically guaranteed to detect all the axes of symmetries of every 2D image, if more nonzero GC moments are used in the feature set. Furthermore, we establish the relationship between reflectional symmetry and rotational symmetry in an image, which can be used to check the correctness of symmetry detection. This method has been demonstrated experimentally using more than 200 images.

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

reflectional and rotational symmetry
symmetric axis
generalized complex (gc) moments
fold number
fold axes
rotationally symmetric image
reflection-symmetric image


On "drunken sinusoids" and their Fourier series The Fourier series of trigonometric-exponential functions f(alpha)(x) = sin(x + alpha) exp(cos(x)) are studied. Dual recursive formulae for the corresponding Fourier coefficients are derived. The above coefficients are transcendental. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

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

fourier series and coefficients
wave function
transcendental number


Automated Abstractions for Contract Validation Pre/postcondition-based specifications are commonplace in a variety of software engineering activities that range from requirements through to design and implementation. The fragmented nature of these specifications can hinder validation as it is difficult to understand if the specifications for the various operations fit together well. In this paper, we propose a novel technique for automatically constructing abstractions in the form of behavior models from pre/postcondition-based specifications. Abstraction techniques have been used successfully for addressing the complexity of formal artifacts in software engineering; however, the focus has been, up to now, on abstractions for verification. Our aim is abstraction for validation and hence, different and novel trade-offs between precision and tractability are required. More specifically, in this paper, we define and study enabledness-preserving abstractions, that is, models in which concrete states are grouped according to the set of operations that they enable. The abstraction results in a finite model that is intuitive to validate and which facilitates tracing back to the specification for debugging. The paper also reports on the application of the approach to two industrial strength protocol specifications in which concerns were identified.

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


Communication-Delay-Distribution-Dependent

Networked

Control

for

a

Class

of

T-S

Fuzzy

Systems

This

paper

investigates

a

robust

networked

control

for

a

class

of

Takagi-Sugeno

(T-S)

fuzzy

systems.

The

controller

design

specifically

takes

probabilistic

interval

distribution

of

the

communication

delay

into

account.

A

general

framework

of

networked

control

is

first

proposed.

The

two

main

features

are

the

zero-order

hold

can

choose

the

latest

control

input

signal

when

the

packets

received

are

out-of-order,

and

as

the

result

of

the

models

of

the

all

kinds

of

uncertainties

in

networked

signal

transfer-including

network-induced

delay

and

data

packet

dropout-are

under

a

unified

framework.

Next,

if

the

probability

distribution

of

communication

delay

is

known

or

specified

in

a

design

process,

sufficient

stability

conditions

for

networked

T-S

fuzzy

systems

are

derived,

which

are

based

on

the

Lyapunov

theory.

Following

this,

a

stabilizing

controller

design

method

is

developed,

which

shows

that

the

solvability

of

the

design

depends

not

only

on

the

upper

and

lower

bounds

of

the

delay

but

on

its

probability

distribution

as

well.

Finally,

a

numerical

example

is

used

to

show

the

application

of

the

theoretical

results

obtained

in

this

paper.

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

linear matrix inequalities (lmis)
networked control systems (ncss)
takagi-sugeno (t-s) fuzzy systems


Branched Polymers and Hyperplane Arrangements We generalize the construction of connected branched polymers and the notion of the volume of the space of connected branched polymers studied by Brydges and Imbrie (Ann Math, 158:1019-1039, 2003), and Kenyon and Winkler (Am Math Mon, 116(7):612-628, 2009) to any central hyperplane arrangement . The volume of the resulting configuration space of connected branched polymers associated to the hyperplane arrangement is expressed through the value of the characteristic polynomial of at 0. We give a more general definition of the space of branched polymers, where we do not require connectivity, and introduce the notion of q-volume for it, which is expressed through the value of the characteristic polynomial of at . Finally, we relate the volume of the space of branched polymers to broken circuits and show that the cohomology ring of the space of branched polymers is isomorphic to the Orlik-Solomon algebra.

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

polymers
hyperplane arrangement
characteristic polynomial

braid arrangement
broken circuit
orlik-solomon algebra


mobile dynamic content distribution networks Mobile networks are becoming increasingly popular as means for distributing inform tion to large number of users. In comparison to wired networks, mobile networks distinguished by potentially much higher variability in demand due to user mobility. Most previous content techniques ssume static client demand distribution and, thus, may not perform well in mobile networks.This paper proposes and analyzes Mobile Dynamic Content Distribution Network model, which takes demand variations into account to decide whether to replicate content and whether to remove previously created replicas in order to minimize total network traffic. We develop two solutions to our model: an offline optimal, which provides an ideal lower-bound on the total traffic, and practical heuristic online algorithm, which uses demand forecasting to make replication decisions. We provide thorough evaluation of our solutions, comparing them against ACDN, the only previous dynamic content placement algorithm targeting bandwidth minimization that we are aware of. Our results show that our online algorithm significantly outperforms the ACDN one, reducing total network traffic by up to 85\% in a number of experiments covering large system design space.

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

demand forecasting
dynamic content placement
online algorithm


An empirical investigation of the effects of data warehousing on decision performance Organizations implement data warehouses to overcome the limitations of DSS by adding this database component and thereby improve decision performance. However, no empirical evidence is available to show the effects of a data warehouse (DW) on decision quality and performance. To examine this, a laboratory experiment was conducted. The data warehouse variables considered were the time horizon of the data and its level of aggregation. It was found that using a full data warehouse resulted in significantly better performance and that using it resulted in better performance than using a partial data warehouse (long-time history with no aggregated data). However, using a partial data warehouse was not significantly better than not using a data warehouse at all.

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

decision support systems
is success
database management


Measuring and modelling the performance of a parallel ODMG compliant object database server Object database management systems (ODBMSs) are now established as the database management technology of choice for a range of challenging data intensive applications. Furthermore, the applications associated with object databases typically have stringent performance requirements, and some are associated with very large data sets. An important feature for the performance of object databases is the speed at which relationships can be explored. In queries, this depends on the effectiveness of different join algorithms into which queries that follow relationships can be compiled. This paper presents a performance evaluation of the Polar parallel object database system, focusing in particular on the performance of parallel join algorithms. Polar is a parallel, shared-nothing implementation of the Object Database Management Group (ODMG) standard for object databases. The paper presents an empirical evaluation of queries expressed in the ODMG Query Language (OQL), as well as a cost model for the parallel algebra that is used to evaluate OQL queries. The cost model is validated against the empirical results for a collection of queries using four different join algorithms, one that is value based and three that are pointer based. Copyright (c) 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

O O O O O O O O B 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 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 B O 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 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


Performance comparison of machine learning methods for prognosis of hormone receptor status in breast cancer tissue samples We examined the classification and prognostic scoring performances of several computer methods on different feature sets to obtain objective and reproducible analysis of estrogen receptor status in breast cancer tissue samples. Radial basis function network, k-nearest neighborhood search, support vector machines, naive bayes, functional trees, and k-means clustering algorithm were applied to the test datasets. Several features were employed and the classification accuracies of each method for these features were examined. The assessment results of the methods on test images were also experimentally compared with those of two experts. According to the results of our experimental work, a combination of functional trees and the naive bayes classifier gave the best prognostic scores indicating very good kappa agreement values (?=0.899 and ?=0.949, p<0.001) with the experts. This combination also gave the best dichotomization rate (96.3%) for assessment of estrogen receptor status. Wavelet color features provided better classification accuracy than Laws texture energy and co-occurrence matrix features.

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

estrogen receptor (er) status evaluation


Corpus-based HIT-MW database for offline recognition of general-purpose Chinese handwritten text A Chinese handwriting database named HIT-MW is presented to facilitate the offline Chinese handwritten text recognition. Both the writers and the texts for handcopying are carefully sampled with a systematic scheme. To collect naturally written handwriting, forms are distributed by postal mail or middleman instead of face to face. The current version of HIT-MW includes 853 forms and 186,444 characters that are produced under an unconstrained condition without preprinted character boxes. The statistics show that the database has an excellent representation of the real handwriting. Many new applications concerning real handwriting recognition can be supported by the database.

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

standardization
data acquisition
optical character recognition
handwritten chinese text


Fault diagnosis based on Walsh transform and rough sets An accurate and fast method for fault diagnosis is an important issue most techniques have sought to. For this reason, a fast fault diagnosis method based on Walsh transform and rough sets is proposed in this paper. Firstly, fault signals are fast transformed by Walsh matrix, and the Walsh spectrums are obtained, whose statistical characteristics constitute feature vectors. Secondly, the feature vectors are discretized and reduced by the rough sets theory, as a result, key features are retained and diagnosis rules are provided. Finally, utilized these diagnosis rules, fault diagnosis is carried out experimentally in the spectrum domain and its performance is compared with that of other methods, the higher accuracy is achieved and much time is saved, which fully validates the effectiveness of our approach.

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

fault diagnosis
walsh transform
rough sets

discernable matrix
attribution reduction


Weighted fuzzy interpolative reasoning for sparse fuzzy rule-based systems In this paper, we present a weighted fuzzy interpolative reasoning method for sparse fuzzy rule-based systems, where the antecedent variables appearing in the fuzzy rules have different weights. We also present a weights-learning algorithm to automatically learn the optimal weights of the antecedent variables of the fuzzy rules for the proposed weighted fuzzy interpolative reasoning method. We also apply the proposed weighted fuzzy interpolative reasoning method and the proposed weights-learning algorithm to handle the truck backer-upper control problem. The experimental results show that the proposed fuzzy interpolative reasoning method using the optimally learned weights by the proposed weights-learning algorithm gets better truck backer-upper control results than the ones by the traditional fuzzy inference system and the existing fuzzy interpolative reasoning methods. The proposed method provides us with a useful way for fuzzy rules interpolation in sparse fuzzy rule-based systems.

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

sparse fuzzy rule-based systems
weighted antecedent variables
weights-learning algorithm


A Plug-in Approach to Neyman-Pearson Classification The Neyman-Pearson (NP) paradigm in binary classification treats type I and type II errors with different priorities. It seeks classifiers that minimize type II error, subject to a type I error constraint under a user specified level a. In this paper, plug-in classifiers are developed under the NP paradigm. Based on the fundamental Neyman-Pearson Lemma, we propose two related plug-in classifiers which amount to thresholding respectively the class conditional density ratio and the regression function. These two classifiers handle different sampling schemes. This work focuses on theoretical properties of the proposed classifiers; in particular, we derive oracle inequalities that can be viewed as finite sample versions of risk bounds. NP classification can be used to address anomaly detection problems, where asymmetry in errors is an intrinsic property. As opposed to a common practice in anomaly detection that consists of thresholding normal class density, our approach does not assume a specific form for anomaly distributions. Such consideration is particularly necessary when the anomaly class density is far from uniformly distributed.

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

plug-in approach
neyman-pearson paradigm
nonparametric statistics
oracle inequality


Analytical transformation of the volume integral in the boundary integral equation for 3D anisotropic elastostatics involving body force In the boundary element method (BEM), it is well known that the presence of body force shall give rise to an additional volume integral that conventionally requires domain discretization for numerical computations. To restore the BEMs distinctive notion of boundary discretization, the present work analytically transforms the volume integral to surface ones for the body-force effect in the 3D anisotropic elasticity. On applying Greens Theorem, new fundamental solutions with explicit forms of Fourier series are introduced to facilitate the volume-to-surface transformation. The coefficients of the Fourier-series representations are determined by solving a banded matrix formulated from integrations of the constrained equation. Of no doubt, such an approach has fully restored the boundary element method as a truly boundary solution technique for analyzing 3D anisotropic elasticity involving body force. At the end, numerical verifications of the volume-to-surface integral transformation are presented. Also, such an approach has been implemented in an existing BEM code. For demonstrating the implementation, numerical examples are presented with comparisons with ANSYS analysis. To the authors knowledge, this is the first work in the open literature that reports the successful transformation for 3D anisotropic elasticity.

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

3d anisotropic elasticity
body force
boundary element method


An integrated framework for adapting WS-BPEL scenario execution using QoS and collaborative filtering techniques We present an algorithm combining QoS and collaborative filtering for BPEL adaptation. The combination introduces collaborating filtering functionality maintaining high QoS. We exploit the sparsity of the rating matrix to tackle known issues of CF. We evaluate the approach both in terms of performance and adaptation QoS.

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

ws-bpel
quality of service
metasearch algorithms


Basic skeletons in 11c 11c is a high-level parallel language that provides support for some of the most widely used algorithmic skeletons. The language has a syntax based on OpenMP-like directives and the compiler uses direct translation to MPI to produce parallel code. To evaluate the performance of our prototype compiler we present computational results for some of the skeletons available in the language on different architectures. Particularly in the presence of coarse-grain parallelism, the results reflect similar performances for the 11c compiled version and ad hoc MPI or OpenMP implementations. In all cases, the performance loss with respect to a direct MPI implementation is clearly compensated by a significantly smaller development effort. (c) 2006 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 B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B 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

parallel programming
high-level language
compilers


A multisolution method for cell formation - Exploring practical alternatives in group technology manufacturing An approach based on the decision maker's judgment is proposed by furnishing multiple solutions of part-family and machine-cell formation of a cellular manufacturing system. The reason for relying on the judgment of the decision-maker is due to the complexity and the many constraints encountered in practice. Some examples of these practical constraints are workload balancing, ill-defined systems, the existence of exceptional elements, and the presence of the various uncertain factors in the system. The basic approach is based on the concept of nearest-neighborhood between machines and parts. The procedure, which can be used to identify multiple grouping pat terns of machines and parts, consists of two algorithms: grouping and branching, association, and combining. Numerical examples are provided, especially for ill-structured problems, to illustrate the approach. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

multiple grouping patterns
interactive decision making


A complex communication network for distribution automation using a fiber optic network and WLANs In order to provide electricity economically and safely to users, a Distribution Automation System (DAS) monitors and operates the components of distribution systems remotely through communication networks. Fiber optic communication networks have primarily been used for DASs in Korea because of their huge bandwidth and dielectric noise immunity. However, the fiber optic communication network has some shortcomings, particularly that its installation cost and communication fees are expensive. This paper proposes a complex communication network, where WLANs are linked into a fiber optic network to expand DASs in distribution lines inexpensively. A DAS wireless bridge (DWB) is designed for the proposed communication network using IEEE 802.11a WLAN technology. Feasibility of the proposed network is checked experimentally.

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

distribution automation
wireless bridge
complex communication network


Multiscale morphological segmentation of gray-scale images In this paper, the authors have proposed a method of segmenting gray level images using multiscale morphology. The approach resembles watershed algorithm in the sense that the dark (respectively bright) features which are basically canyons (respectively mountains) on the surface topography of the gray level image are gradually filled (respectively clipped) using multiscale morphological closing (respectively opening) by reconstruction with isotropic structuring element. The algorithm detects valid segments at each scale using three criteria namely growing, merging and saturation. Segments extracted at various scales are integrated in the final result. The algorithm is composed of two passes preceded by a preprocessing step for simplifying small scale details of the image that might cause over-segmentation. In the first pass feature images at various scales are extracted and kept in respective level of morphological towers. In the second pass, potential features contributing to the formation of segments at various scales are detected. Finally the algorithm traces the contours of all such contributing features at various scales. The scheme after its implementation is executed on a set of test images (synthetic as well as real) and the results are compared with those of few other standard methods. A quantitative measure of performance is also formulated for comparing the methods.

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

morphological towers
multiscale morphology
opening by reconstruction

closing by reconstruction
gray-level image segmentation
performance analysis


Data mining in Web services discovery and monitoring The business needs, the availability of huge volumes of data and the continuous evolution in Web services functions derive the need of application of data mining in the Web service domain. This article recommends several data mining applications that can leverage problems concerned with the discovery and monitoring of Web services. This article then presents a case study on applying the clustering data mining technique to the Web service usage data to improve the Web service discovery process. This article also discusses the challenges that arise when applying data mining to Web services usage data and abstract information.

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

data mining
service discovery
web services


Reasoning theories Our long-term goal is the development of a general framework for specifying, structuring, and interoperating provers. Our main focus is on the formalization of the architectural and implementational choices that underlie the construction of such systems. This paper has two main goals. The first is to introduce the main intuitions underlying the proposed framework. We concentrate on its use in the integration of provers. The second is the development of the notion of reasoning theory, meant as the formalization of the notion of "implementation of the logic" of a prover. As an example we sketch an analysis, at the reasoning theory level, of the integration of linear arithmetic into the NQTHM simplification process.

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

reasoning theory
nqthm
linear arithmetic


Automatic generation of human animation based on motion programming In motion simulations, video games and animation films, lots of interactions between characters and virtual environments are needed. Even though realistic motion data can be derived from MoCap system, motion editing and synthesis, animators must adapt these motion data to specific virtual environment manually, which is a boring and time-consuming job. Here we propose a framework to program the movements of characters and generate navigation animations in virtual environment. Given a virtual environment, a visual user interface is provided for animators to interactively generate motion scripts, describing the characters' movements in this scene and finally used to retrieve motion clips from MoCap database and generate navigation animations automatically. This framework also provides flexible mechanism for animators to get varied resulting animations by configurable table of motion bias coefficients and interactive visual user interface. Copyright (c) 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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

human animation
motion programming
motion scripts


Bipartite graph-based mismatch removal for wide-baseline image matching The conventional wide-baseline image matching aims to establish point-to-point correspondence pairs across the two images under matching. This is normally accomplished by identifying those feature points with most similar local features represented by feature descriptors and measuring the feature-vector distance based on the nearest neighbor matching criterion. However, a large number of mismatches would be incurred especially when the two images under comparison have a large viewpoint variation with respect to each other or involve very different backgrounds. In this paper, a new mismatch removal method is proposed by utilizing the bipartite graph to first establish one-to-one coherent region pairs (CRPs), which are then used to verify whether each point-to-point matching pair is a correct match or not. The generation of CRPs is achieved by applying the Hungarian method to the bipartite graph, together with the use of the proposed region-to-region similarity measurement metric. Extensive experimental results have demonstrated that our proposed mismatch removal method is able to effectively remove a significant number of mismatched point-to-point correspondences.

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

wide-baseline image matching
region correspondence
point correspondence
coherent region pair
sift feature descriptor
bipartite graph matching
region similarity measurement metric


performance evaluation of evolutionary algorithms for road detection In this paper we present the first comparative study of evolutionary classifiers for the problem of road detection. We use seven evolutionary algorithms ( GAssist-ADI, XCS, UCS, cAnt, EvRBF,Fuzzy-AB and FuzzySLAVE ) for this purpose and to develop better understanding we also compare their performance with two well-known non-evolutionary classifiers ( kNN, C4.5 ). Further we identify vision based features that enable a single classifier to learn to successfully classify a variety of regions in various roads as opposed to training a new classifier for each type of road. For this we collect a real-world dataset of road images of various roads taken at different times of the day. Then, using Information Gain (I.G) and CfsSubsetMerit values we evaluate the efficacy of our features in facilitating the detection. Our results indicate that intelligent features coupled with right evolutionary technique provides a promising solution for the domain of road detection.

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


Modeling dynamic scenarios for local sensor-based motion planning This paper addresses the modeling of the static and dynamic parts of the scenario and how to use this information with a sensor-based motion planning system. The contribution in the modeling aspect is a formulation of the detection and tracking of mobile objects and the mapping of the static structure in such a way that the nature (static/dynamic) of the observations is included in the estimation process. The algorithm provides a set of filters tracking the moving objects and a local map of the static structure constructed on line. In addition, this paper discusses how this modeling module is integrated in a real sensor-based motion planning system taking advantage selectively of the dynamic and static information. The experimental results confirm that the complete navigation system is able to move a vehicle in unknown and dynamic scenarios. Furthermore, the system overcomes many of the limitations of previous systems associated to the ability to distinguish the nature of the parts of the scenario.

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

mobile robots
mapping dynamic environments
sensor-based motion planning


Large-margin feature selection for monotonic classification Monotonic classification plays an important role in the field of decision analysis, where decision values are ordered and the samples with better feature values should not be classified into a worse class. The monotonic classification tasks seem conceptually simple, but difficult to utilize and explain the order structure in practice. In this work, we discuss the issue of feature selection under the monotonicity constraint based on the principle of large margin. By introducing the monotonicity constraint into existing margin based feature selection algorithms, we design two new evaluation algorithms for monotonic classification. The proposed algorithms are tested with some artificial and real data sets, and the experimental results show its effectiveness.

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

monotonic classification
monotonicity constraint
feature selection

ordinal classification
classification margin


Using formal metamodels to check consistency of functional views in information systems specification UML notations require adaptation for applications such as Information Systems (IS). Thus we have defined IS-UML. The purpose of this article is twofold. First, we propose an extension to this language to deal with functional aspects of IS. We use two views to specify IS transactions: the first one is defined as a combination of behavioural UML diagrams (collaboration and state diagrams), and the second one is based on the definition of specific classes of an extended class diagram. The final objective of the article is to consider consistency issues between the various diagrams of an IS-UML specification. In common with other UML languages, we use a metamodel to define IS-UML. We use class diagrams to summarize the metamodel structure and a formal language, B, for the full metamodel. This allows us to formally express consistency checks and mapping rules between specific metamodel concepts.

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

information system design
unified modelling language notation
formal notation


Denoising and enhancing digital mammographic images for visual screening Dense regions in digital mammographic images are usually noisy and have low contrast, and their visual screening is difficult. This paper describes a new method for mammographic image noise suppression and enhancement, which can be effective particularly for screening image dense regions. Initially, the image is preprocessed to improve its local contrast and the discrimination of subtle details. Next, image noise suppression and edge enhancement are performed based on the wavelet transform. At each resolution, coefficients associated with noise are modelled by Gaussian random variables; coefficients associated with edges are modelled by Generalized Laplacian random variables, and a shrinkage function is assembled based on posterior probabilities. The shrinkage functions at consecutive scales are combined, and then applied to the wavelets coefficients. Given a resolution of analysis, the image denoising process is adaptive (i.e. does not require further parameter adjustments), and the selection of a gain factor provides the desired detail enhancement. The enhancement function was designed to avoid introducing artifacts in the enhancement process, which is essential in mammographic image analysis. Our preliminary results indicate that our method allows to enhance local contrast, and detect microcalcifications and other suspicious structures in situations where their detection would be difficult otherwise. Compared to other approaches, our method requires less parameter adjustments by the user.

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

mammography
contrast equalization
image enhancement
multiresolution analysis


Principles for modeling language design Modeling languages, like programming languages, need to be designed if they are to be practical, usable, accepted, and of lasting value. We present principles for the design of modeling languages. To arrive at these principles, we consider the intended use of modeling languages. We conject that the principles are applicable to the development of new modeling languages, and for improving the design of existing modeling languages that have evolved, perhaps through a process of unification. The principles are illustrated and explained by several examples, drawing on object-oriented and mathematical modeling languages.

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


Systems, systems of systems, and the education of engineers The thesis presented here is that the result of engineering is the design, construction, or operation of systems or their subsystems and components and that the teaching of systems must be central to engineering education. It is maintained that current undergraduate engineering curricula do not give the student adequate appreciation of this major intellectual element of their profession. Five proposals for approaches to correct this deficiency are offered: opportunities for clinical practice throughout all the undergraduate years; the use of distributed interactive simulation technology in semester-long projects; courses or course material on the phenomenology and behavior of systems; use of project management tools in engineering clinics; and encouraging engineering faculty to spend some part of their sabbaticals engaged in system design or operation. Issues of implementation are addressed, including the scaling of these ideas to universities that must meet the needs of large numbers of students.

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

system
systems of systems
engineering education
clinical practice
simulation


Optimal erasure protection for scalably compressed video streams with limited retransmission on channels with IID and bursty loss characteristics In this paper we combine priority encoding transmission (PET) with a limited retransmission (LR) capacity. We propose the resulting LR-PET scheme as a framework for efficient RD optimized delivery of streaming media. Previous work on scalable media protection with PET has largely ignored the possibility of retransmission. In the proposed LR-PET framework, an optimization algorithm determines the level of protection for each element in each transmission slot, subject to transmission bandwidth constraints. To balance the protection assigned to elements being transmitted for the first time with those being retransmitted, the proposed algorithm formulates a collection of hypotheses concerning its own behavior in future transmission slots. We show that this formulation of hypotheses is central to the success of the proposed LR-PET algorithm. Indeed, without this element, a greedy version of LR-PET performs only slightly better than PET without retransmission. Experimental results are reported using both IID and GE channel models, with a Motion JPEG2000 video source, demonstrating substantial performance benefits from the proposed framework.

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

retransmission
priority encoding transmission
bursty loss

channel coding
forward error correction
scalable video
erasure channels


Verification of various pipeline models The paper deals with the verification of three pipeline models: the non-linear distributed parameters model, the linear distributed parameter model and the linear lumped parameters model. All the models were comparatively verified on the basis of the measurements on a real pipeline. (C) 2000 IMACS. Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

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


On some test statistics for testing homogeneity of variances: a comparative study In this paper, we have reviewed 25 test procedures that are widely reported in the literature for testing the hypothesis of homogeneity of variances under various experimental conditions. Since a theoretical comparison was not possible, a simulation study has been conducted to compare the performance of the test statistics in terms of robustness and empirical power. Monte Carlo simulation was performed for various symmetric and skewed distributions, number of groups, sample size per group, degree of group size inequalities, and degree of variance heterogeneity. Using simulation results and based on the robustness and power of the tests, some promising test statistics are recommended for practitioners.

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

homogeneity of variances
monte carlo simulation
robustness

anova
levene's test
power of test
type i error rate


Synchronization control of stochastic memristor-based neural networks with mixed delays In this paper, the synchronization control of stochastic memristor-based neural networks with mixed delays is studied. Based on the drive-response concept, the stochastic differential inclusions theory and Lyapunov functional method some new criteria are established to guarantee the exponential synchronization in the pth moment of stochastic memristor-based neural networks. The obtained sufficient conditions can be checked easily and improve the results in earlier publications. Finally, a numerical example is given to illustrate the effectiveness of the new scheme.

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


Methods for parallel computation of complex flow problems This paper is an overview of some of the methods developed by the Team for Advanced Flow Simulation and Modeling (T*AFSM) [http://www, mems, rice. edu/TAFSM/] to support flow simulation and modeling in a number of "Targeted Challenges". The "Targeted Challenges" include unsteady flows with interfaces, fluid-object and fluid-structure interactions, airdrop systems, and air circulation and contaminant dispersion. The methods developed include special numerical stabilization methods for compressible and incompressible flows, methods for moving boundaries and interfaces, advanced mesh management methods, and multi-domain computational methods. We include in this paper a number of numerical examples from the simulation of complex flow problems. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

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

flow simulation
stabilization methods
multidomain computational methods

computational fluid dynamics
compressible flow
incompressible flow


Environmental sensor bridge system for communication robots This paper proposes an environmental sensor bridge system named COSPI for autonomous communication robots. In the near future, various sensors will get installed in day-to-day environments and robots will use information from these sensors to recognize their surroundings. To this end, different sensors can be installed in different environments. COSPI enables the robots to work with different sensor configuration environments without requiring any robot software reconfiguration. The basic idea of COSPI is the abstraction of recognition types. We investigate 278 recognition routines in behavior modules of a communication robot that works in practical situations and classify them based on communication cues of the communication robot. COSPI facilitates robot behavior development as robot behavior and sensor processing procedures can be independently developed. Furthermore, COSPI encourages the reuse of environmental sensor modules for other robot tasks or applications within the same environment. We have conducted an experiment to confirm that a robot can work in a visual sensor environment, in an infrared ray and pyroelectric sensor environment, and in an optical motion capture system environment. The results showed that robots can work using sensor information from environmental sensors in all these environments.

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

communication robot
robot behavior development


A note on machine scheduling with sum-of-logarithm-processing-time-based and position-based learning effects Recently, Biskup [2] classifies the learning effect models in scheduling environments into two types: position-based and sum-of-processing-time-based. In this paper, we study scheduling problem with sum-of-logarithm-processing-time-based and position-based learning effects. We show that the single machine scheduling problems to minimize the makespan and the total completion time can both be solved by the smallest (normal) processing time first (SPT) rule. We also show that the problems to minimize the maximum lateness, the total weighted completion times and the total tardiness have polynomial-time solutions under agreeable WSPT rule and agreeable EDD rule. In addition, we show that m-machine permutation flowshop problems are still polynomially solvable under the proposed learning model.

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