psychologically-based vision and attention for the simulation of human behaviour We describe a system designed to improve the simulation of human crowd behaviour by considering the visual perception and attention of each individual in the crowd. All of our techniques are based on psychology research; the ways this has been used are explained in detail. Our system runs in real-time, allowing quick experimentation with different ideas. The attention shifts for each actor, along with the associated gaze shifts, are controlled by a set of communicating agents. The agents can make requests for shifts of gaze and a gaze control agent sorts these according to priority. In our system each actor builds its own mental model of the world, based on its monitoring of other actors in the crowd. We argue that because we are using only the limited information from this mental model to decide the actor's behaviour, our simulation produces more realistic behaviour than previous work.

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


Evaluation of linear diaphragmchest expansion models for magnetic resonance imaging motion artifact correction The efficacy of Fourier analysis, autoregressive with exogenous input (ARX) and adaptive models to estimate diaphragm position from respiratory belt signal (a measure of chest expansion) was evaluated for the purpose of correcting respiratory motion artifacts in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Respiratory belt signal and diaphragm position data were obtained simultaneously during one-dimensional MRI scans with sampling intervals of 100 ms for 128 s (1280 samples). The models were trained using the first 512 data samples for the Fourier method and the first 640 samples for the ARX and adaptive methods. The remaining samples were used as a test set for evaluating the models. Both ARX and adaptive methods produced more accurate results than the Fourier method as reflected by the normalized mean square error (NMSE) and correlation coefficient (R) between the estimated and actual diaphragm position during normal breathing (P<0.05). However, all three models had difficulty modeling diaphragm positions during breathing plateaus.

O O O O O O O B I I O O O O O O B I O O O O O O B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O B I O B I I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 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 analysis
adaptive models
magnetic resonance imaging
motion artifacts

linear models
autoregressive models
respiration
medical imaging
motion correction


process modelling using petri nets This paper discusses the reasons, which impose Petri nets as a conceptual standard for modelling and analysis of workflow. Petri nets notation is used for representation of the main routing constructs as weft as for the workflow process description. The correspondence of Petri-net-based model and graph model is demonstrated.

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

routing constructs
workflow
process modelling


direct chosen ciphertext security from identity-based techniques We describe a new encryption technique that is secure in the standard model against chosen ciphertext attacks. We base our method on two very efficient Identity-Based Encryption (IBE) schemes without random oracles due to Boneh and Boyen, and Waters.Unlike previous CCA2-secure cryptosystems that use IBE as a black box, our approach is very simple and compact. It makes direct use of the underlying IBE structure, and requires no cryptographic primitive other than the IBE scheme itself. This conveys several advantages. We achieve shorter ciphertext size than the best known instantiations of the other methods, and our technique is as efficient as the Boneh and Katz method (and more so than that of Canetti, Halevi, and Katz). Further, our method operates nicely on hierarchical IBE, and since it allows the validity of ciphertexts to be checked publicly, it can be used to construct systems with non-interactive threshold decryption.In this paper we describe two main constructions: a full encryption system based on the Waters adaptive-ID secure IBE, and a KEM based on the Boneh-Boyen selective-ID secure IBE. Both systems are shown CCA2-secure in the standard model, the latter with a tight reduction. We discuss several uses and extensions of our approach, and draw comparisons with other schemes that are provably secure in the standard model.

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


Almost Sure Optimality of Sliding Window Lempel-Ziv Algorithm and Variants Revisited The sliding window Lempel-Ziv (SWLZ) algorithm has been studied extensively in the information theory literature and has been used in several commercial compression packages. The asymptotic behavior of this algorithm has been studied by Wyner and Ziv and by Shields using different approaches. Shields' results proving asymptotic optimality for all individual sequences with respect to the class of all finite state encoders is known to imply the almost sure asymptotic optimality for the class of stationary and ergodic sources. We establish the almost sure asymptotic optimality (without any mixing conditions) by extending the ideas of Wyner and Ziv using results on recurrence times from ergodic theory. A nonuniversal fixed shift version of the algorithm is introduced to gain more insight into its behavior. Pointwise optimality results are also obtained for several variants based on match-length functions introduced by Gavish and Lempel. We also propose variants of the algorithm for sources with countable alphabet and demonstrate their pointwise optimality.

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

almost sure
countable alphabet
pointwise
recurrence times
sliding window
swlz

asymptotically mean stationary (ams)
match-length function


Action machines: A framework for encoding and composing partial behaviors We describe action machines, a framework for encoding and composing partial behavioral descriptions. Action machines encode behavior as a variation of labeled transition systems where the labels are observable activities of the described artifact and the states capture full data models. Labels may also have structure, and both labels and states may be partial with a symbolic representation of the unknown parts. Action machines may stem from software models or programs, and can be composed in a variety of ways to synthesize new behaviors. The composition operators described here include synchronized and interleaving parallel composition, sequential composition, and alternating simulation. We use action machines in analysis processes such as model checking and model-based testing. The current main application is in the area of model-based conformance testing, where our approach addresses practical problems users at Microsoft have in applying model-based testing technology.

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

partial behaviors
alternating simulation

behavior composition
model-based testing


enabling technologies on hybrid camera networks for behavioral analysis of unattended indoor environments and their surroundings This paper presents a layered network architecture and the enabling technologies for accomplishing vision-based behavioral analysis of unattended environments. Specifically the vision network covers both the attended environment and its surroundings by means of hybrid cameras. The layer overlooking at the surroundings is laid outdoor and tracks people, monitoring entrance/exit points. It recovers the geometry of the site under surveillance and communicates people positions to a higher level layer. The layer monitoring the unattended environment undertakes similar goals, with the addition of maintaining a global mosaic of the observed scene for further understanding. Moreover, it merges information coming from sensors beyond the vision to deepen the understanding or increase the reliability of the system. The behavioral analysis is demanded to a third layer that merges the information received from the two other layers and infers knowledge about what happened, happens and will be likely happening in the environment. The paper also describes a case study that was implemented in the Engineering Campus of the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, where our surveillance system has been deployed in a computer laboratory which was often unaccessible due to lack of attendance.

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

hybrid camera network
surveillance of unattended environments
behaviour analysis


The incremental editing of faceted models in an integrated design environment Faceted/meshed models play an important role in product development cycle. Due to the fact that such models typically involve huge amounts of data, the exchanging of them in network-based integrated design environments (IDEs) is a critical issue. In this paper, an approach known as incremental editing is presented to expedite such a data exchange process through tracking changed portions of a faceted model after it has been edited at one application, transmitting these portions, and finally embedding them into the associated faceted model at another application. This new approach is expected to bring two benefits to current IDEs: (a) the editing of a faceted model at an application can be done without completely reconstructing all its underlying facets, and (b) the consistency between faceted models in different applications can be maintained without repeatedly transferring large amounts of facet data over computer networks.

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

data exchange
integrated design environment

faceted/meshed model
boundary representation/b-rep model


Visual search in dynamic 3D visualisations of unstructured picture collections We present two empirical studies of visual search in dynamic 3D visualisations of large, randomly ordered, photo collections. The aim is to assess the possible effects of geometrical distortions on visual search effectiveness, efficiency and comfort, by comparing the influence of two perspective representations of photo collections on participants' performance results and subjective judgments. Thumbnails of the 1000 or so photographs in each collection are plastered on the lateral surface of a vertical cylinder, either on the inside (inner view, IV) or on the outside (outer view, OV). IV and OV suggest two different interaction metaphors: locomotion in a virtual space (IV) versus manipulation of a virtual object (DV). They also implement different perspective distortions: enlargement and distortion of lateral columns (IV) versus enlargement of central columns and dwindling plus distortion of lateral columns (OV). Presentation of results focus on the second study, S2, which involved 20 participants and offered them strictly identical interaction facilities with the two views, unlike the initial pilot study, Si (8 participants and slightly different interaction facilities between the two views). Participants in both studies were experienced computer users (average age: 25.15 years, SD: 3.13). They performed two types of basic visual tasks that are carried out repeatedly while navigating photo collections: (i) searching for a photo meeting specific, visual and thematic, criteria, the photo and its location in the collection being unknown to participants (ST1) and (ii) looking for a visually familiar photo, the location of the photo being familiar to participants (ST2). According to post-experiment questionnaires and debriefings, all participants in S2 save one judged both 3D views positively in reference to standard 2D visualisations. Half of them preferred IV over OV, four appreciated OV better, and six expressed no clear opinion. Preferences were mainly motivated by the effects of perspective distortions on thumbnail visibility. They were barely influenced by interaction metaphors (e.g., the feeling of immersion induced by IV). Despite large inter-individual differences in performance, a majority of participants carried out ST1 tasks more effectively and efficiently with IV than with OV, as regards error rates (statistically significant difference) and search times (tendency). Performance results for ST2 tasks were similar with the two views, due, probably, to the simplicity and brevity of ST2 tasks. Perspective distortions seem to have exerted less influence on participants' visual strategies than horizontal scrolling, a dynamic feature common to both views. Qualitative analyses of participants' behaviours suggest that IV has the potential to support spatial memory better than OV, presumably thanks to the locomotion metaphor. These results indicate that perspective views have the potential to facilitate and improve visual search in unstructured picture collections provided that distortions are adapted to users' individual visual capabilities. Further research is needed to better understand: (i) the actual relations between visual exploration strategies and geometrical properties of perspective visualisations and (ii) the influence of the manipulation and locomotion metaphors on spatial memory. This knowledge is necessary to further improve the comfort and effectiveness of visual search in large unstructured picture collections, using 3D visualisations. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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

interactive 3d visualisations
picture browsers
ergonomic evaluation
usability


A fast exploration procedure for analog high-level specification translation This paper presents an exploration procedure for mapping given functional specifications of an analog system to the specification parameters of individual component blocks of the system topology. A meet-in-the-middle approach has been followed for constructing the feasible design space. It is constructed as the intersection of an application-bounded specification space and a circuit-realizable specification space. The least squares support vector machine principle is used to accurately identify the actual geometry of the feasible design space. The reduced design space speeds up the exploration procedure. The benefit of our methodology is the ability to obtain practically correct circuit-level specifications of the component blocks of the system in a single pass. The effectiveness of the procedure has been demonstrated by considering a complete system. The simulation results satisfy the desired specifications of the system, validating the overall procedure.

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

least squares support vector machine (ls-svm)


Parallel blind digital image watermarking in spatial and frequency domains The protection of copyrights of digital images authors is one of the most important tasks set before watermarking. What is especially important is to ensure the high robustness of a watermarked images against attacks, preventing the reading of additional information about the author. In addition, the used processing of the original image must be absolutely invisible. The presented algorithm embeds information in a parallel wayindependently of the luminance and chrominance matrices in the spatial and frequency domains. The main factor motivating the use of a parallel watermark embedding via the proposed way was the mutual complementing of robustness, offered by processing in spatial and frequency domains. Additional information is recovered in a 2D cepstrum domain and in coefficients of the cosine transform. The article shows a description of a mathematical model, tests of invisibility, effectiveness and the robustness of the method were carried out. The robustness of the algorithm was shown against the following attacks: JPEG and JPEG2000 lossy compression, noise, median filtering, Low-Pass and High-Pass filtering, desynchronization, simple and inverse D/A conversion, majority cropping, photomontage and affine transformsrotation, scaling, shearing, translation.

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


An automatic variational level set segmentation framework for computer aided dental X-rays analysis in clinical environments An automatic variational level set segmentation framework for Computer Aided Dental X-rays Analysis (CADXA) in clinical environments is proposed. Designed for clinical environments, the segmentation contains two stages: a training stage and a segmentation stage. During the training stage, first, manually chosen representative images are segmented using hierarchical level set region detection. Then the window based feature extraction followed by principal component analysis (PCA) is applied and results are used to train a support vector machine (SVM) classifier. During the segmentation stage, dental X-rays are classified first by the trained SVM. The classifier provides initial contours which are close to correct boundaries for three coupled level sets driven by a proposed pathologically variational modeling which greatly accelerates the level set segmentation. Based on the segmentation results and uncertainty maps that are built based on a proposed uncertainty measurement, a computer aided analysis scheme is applied. The experimental results show that the proposed method is able to provide an automatic pathological segmentation which naturally segments those problem areas. Based on the segmentation results, the analysis scheme is able to provide indications of possible problem areas of bone loss and decay to the dentists. As well, the experimental results show that the proposed segmentation framework is able to speed up the level set segmentation in clinical environments.

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

variational level set
segmentation
support vector machine
principal component analysis

computer-aided detection
dental x-rays
energy minimization


Validating the semantics of a medical iconic language using ontological reasoning To help clinicians read medical texts such as clinical practice guidelines or drug monographs, we proposed an iconic language called VCM. This language can use icons to represent the main medical concepts, including diseases, symptoms, treatments and follow-up procedures, by combining various pictograms, shapes and colors. However, the semantics of this language have not been formalized, and users may create inconsistent icons, e.g. by combining the tumor shape and the sleeping pictograms into a tumor of sleeping icon. This work aims to represent the VCM language using DLs and OWL for evaluating its semantics by reasoners, and in particular for determining inconsistent icons. We designed an ontology for formalized the semantics of VCM icons using the Protg editor and scripts for translating the VCM lexicon in OWL. We evaluated the ability of the ontology to determine icon consistency for a set of 100 random icons. The evaluation showed good results for determining icon consistency, with a high sensitivity. The ontology may also be useful for the design of mapping between VCM and other medical terminologies, for generating textual labels for icons, and for developing user interfaces for creating VCM icons.

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


Two Distributed-State Models For Generating High-Dimensional Time Series In this paper we develop a class of nonlinear generative models for high-dimensional time series. We first propose a model based on the restricted Boltzmann machine (RBM) that uses an undirected model with binary latent variables and real-valued "visible" variables. The latent and visible variables at each time step receive directed connections from the visible variables at the last few time-steps. This "conditional" RBM (CRBM) makes on-line inference efficient and allows us to use a simple approximate learning procedure. We demonstrate the power of our approach by synthesizing various sequences from a model trained on motion capture data and by performing on-line filling in of data lost during capture. We extend the CRBM in a way that preserves its most important computational properties and introduces multiplicative three-way interactions that allow the effective interaction weight between two variables to be modulated by the dynamic state of a third variable. We introduce a factoring of the implied three-way weight tensor to permit a more compact parameterization. The resulting model can capture diverse styles of motion with a single set of parameters, and the three-way interactions greatly improve its ability to blend motion styles or to transition smoothly among them. Videos and source code can be found at http://www.cs.nyu.edu/(similar to)gwtaylor/publications/ jmlr2011.

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

time series
generative models
motion capture

unsupervised learning
restricted boltzmann machines


Credit scoring using support vector machines with direct search for parameters selection Support vector machines (SVM) is an effective tool for building good credit scoring models. However, the performance of the model depends on its parameters' setting. In this study, we use direct search method to optimize the SVM-based credit scoring model and compare it with other three parameters optimization methods, such as grid search, method based on design of experiment (DOE) and genetic algorithm (GA). Two real-world credit datasets are selected to demonstrate the effectiveness and feasibility of the method. The results show that the direct search method can find the effective model with high classification accuracy and good robustness and keep less dependency on the initial search space or point setting.

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

credit scoring
direct search
support vector machines
genetic algorithm


automatic test bench generation for simulation-based validation In current design practice synthesis tools play a key role, letting designers to concentrate on the specification of the system being designed by carrying out repetitive tasks such as architecture synthesis and technology mapping. However, in the new design flow, validation still remains a challenge: while new technologies based on formal verification are only marginally accepted for large designs, standard techniques based on simulation are beginning to fall behind the increased system complexity. This paper proposes an approach to simulation-based validation, in which an evolutionary algorithm computes useful input sequences to be included in the test bench. The feasibility of the proposed approach is assessed with a preliminary implementation of the proposed algorithm.

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

genetic algorithm
simulation-based validation


digimatge, a rich internet application for video retrieval from a multimedia asset management system This paper describes the integration of two new services aimed at assisting into the retrieval of video content from an existing Multimedia Asset Manager (MAM) of a TV broadcaster archive. The first tool suggests tags after a first textual query, and the second ranks the keyframe of retrieved assets according to their visual similarity. Both applications were integrated as web services that are accessed from a Rich Internet Application via REST calls.

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

ria
image similarity
content-based video retrieval
tag suggestion
web service


Detecting ALS and Parkinsons disease in rats through locomotion analysis We describe a method that detects locomotion deficiencies due to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and Parkinsons disease (PD) in laboratory rats. The locomotion deficiencies are recognized by performing three different comparisons: (1) comparing the locomotion of an ALS model, G93A mutation of SOD1 with control rats, (2) comparing the locomotion of a PD model, 6-OHDA lesioned with control rats, and (3) comparing the locomotion of G93A/SOD1 and 6-OHDA lesioned rats. Each comparison resulted in different set of locomotion parameters for ALS and PD that characterized the locomotion deficiencies and resulted in the best logistic regression model that classifies the rats into diseased/healthy groups with minimum error. The sensitivity and the specificity of the classification for comparisons (1), (2), and (3) were above 90%.

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

als
pd
rats
locomotion analysis
logistic regression model


Pharmacophore search for anti-fertility and estrogenic potencies of estrogen analogs Estrogen mediates its action following binding to the estrogen receptor to form an estrogen-receptor complex. The complex initiates gene transcription and produces estrogen-induced cell and/or tissue responses, i.e., estrogenic actions. High doses of estrogen can be used effectively as a contraceptive but are associated with side effects. Considering the long-term benefit-to-risk ratio of estrogen analogs as oral contraceptives, the present study was performed to deduce the active pharmacophore features required to differentiate the anti-fertility potency from the estrogenic activity of the steroidal motif. Implementing classical quantitative structure-activity relationship (QSAR) studies, substitution by an electron-donating group at the C-17 position and the presence of a hydrogen bond acceptor at C-11, along with the orientation and conformational rigidity of the molecule, were found to be critically important features for estrogenic potency, including anti-fertility activity. However, low electron density at C-2 and high electronegativity at C-16, which may be due to substitution on those and/or neighboring atoms, favor contraceptive potency, whereas high electron density at C-5 and substitution by an electron-withdrawing group at C-7, which may confer hydrophobicity on the steroidal scaffold and an overall increment of electron affinity of the molecule, are favorable for estrogenicity. Further CATALYST-based 3D space modeling demonstrates that the presence of the aromatic ring (ring A), hydrophobic zone (ring B), and hydrogen bond acceptor at C-17 in ring D, along with steric influence due to conformational rigidity of the compound, impart estrogenic contraceptive activity, but the presence of a second acceptor in ring A, and the critical distances between these features, selectively differentiate the anti-fertility potency from the estrogenic activity.

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


motor efficiency of text entry in a combination of a soft keyboard and unistrokes We describe a text entry system called UniKeyb where a character is entered when the stylus lands on a key on a soft keyboard. Optionally, a second character may be entered by doing a unistroke gesture before lifting the stylus. A simulation suggested a speed advantage of about 20\% in expert use. In an experiment, we verified that learning needed for UniKeyb use is possible. Unikeyb may indeed outperform conventional soft keyboards in expert use. However, reaching such level of expertise requires learning the skill of chunking writing into two-character chunks. UniKeyb offers a soft transition to Unistroke writing because the use of Unistrokes is not compulsory.

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

unistroke
text entry
unikeyb
soft keyboard


a parallel low-rank multilevel matrix compression algorithm for parasitic extraction of electrically large structures Simulation of distributed electromagnetic effects of electrically large structures is no longer a luxury but a necessity in the accurate prediction of modern day circuit performance. In this regard, integral equation based methods have steadily gained in popularity but suffer from the time and memory bottlenecks arising from the resultant dense matrix. Fast linear complexity solvers have been introduced in the past but with the growing complexity of circuit layouts parallel implementations are the only viable options in addressing practical circuit layouts. In this paper, we present a parallel implementation of the low-rank compression based fast solver with linear cost reduction capacity with respect to the number of processors. The main problems in parallelizing a hierarchical algorithm are discussed and the advantages of the implemented scheme are highlighted. The new solver enables the simulation of full-chip problems consisting of millions of unknowns with acceptable accuracy and modest time and memory requirements.

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


Experimental analysis of online algorithms for the bicriteria scheduling problem ? In this paper, we experimentally evaluate the performances of some natural online algorithms for the bicriteria version of the classical Graham's scheduling problem. In such a setting, jobs are characterized by a processing time and a memory size. Every job must be scheduled on one of the m processors so as to minimize the time makespan and the maximum memory occupation per processor simultaneously. We consider four fundamental classes of algorithms obtained by combining known single-criterion algorithms according to different strategies. The performances of such algorithms have been evaluated according to real world sequences of jobs and to sequences generated by fundamental probability distributions. As a conclusion of our investigation, three particular algorithms have been identified that seem to perform significantly better than the others. One has been presented in Bil et al. (18th International Parallel and Distributed Processing Symposium (IPDPS), IEEE Press, New York) and is the direct bicriteria extension of the basic Graham's greedy algorithm, while the other ones are given by two different combinations of the Graham's algorithm and the Albers' algorithm proposed in Albers (SIAM J. Comput. 29(2) (1999) 459).

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

online scheduling
bicriteria optimization
experimental performance evaluation


Elasto-plastic statistical model of strongly anisotropic rough surfaces for finite element 3D-contact analysis The complete elasto-plastic microcontact model of anisotropic rough surfaces is proposed. The description of anisotropic random surfaces is restricted here to strongly rough surfaces; for such surfaces the summits are represented by highly eccentric elliptic paraboloids having their semi-major axes oriented in the direction of the grain. The present model is based on the volume conservation of asperities in which the plasticity index is modified to suit more general geometric contact shapes during plastic deformation process. This model is utilized to determine the total contact area, contact load and contact stiffness which are a mixture of both the elastic and plastic components. For low nominal pressures both the elastic and elasto-plastic contact stiffness is found to be almost linear in relation to the normal load. The elastic and elasto-plastic stiffness coefficients decrease with increasing variance of the surface height about the mean plane. The standard deviation of slopes and standard deviation of curvatures have no observable effects on the normal contact stiffness.

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

statistical modelling
finite element method


Modification in microstrip low pass filter using bulb shape patch This paper presents bulb type semicircular microstrip low pass filter with the sharp rejection and wide stop band. The proposed design is based on the calculation of parameters from traditional highlow impedance method and is available in the literature of microstrip filter. To further improve the design performance, high impedance lines are magnetically coupled, resulting an attenuation pole near ?3dB cut off point of the filter. This design gives insight in designing a low pass filter with reduced size with an arbitrary geographical shape.

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

microstrip low pass filter
highlow impedance


Representing conics by low degree rational DP curves A DP curve is a new kind of parametric curve defined by Delgado and Pena (2003); it has very good properties when used in both geometry and algebra, i.e., ills shape preserving and has a linear time complexity for evaluation. It overcomes the disadvantage of some generalized Ball curves that are fast for evaluation but cannot preserve shape, and the disadvantage of the Bezier curve that is shape preserving but slow for evaluation. It also has potential applications in computer-aided design and manufacturing (CAD/CAM) systems. As conic section is often used in shape design, this paper deduces the necessary and sufficient conditions for rational cubic or quartic DP representation of conics to expand the application area of DP curves. The main idea is based on the transformation relationship between low degree DP basis and Bernstein basis, and the representation theory of conics in rational low degree Bezier form. The results can identify whether a rational low degree DP curve is a conic section and also express a given conic section in rational low degree DP form, i.e., give positions of the control points and values of the weights of rational cubic or quartic DP conics. Finally, several numerical examples are presented to validate the effectiveness of the method.

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

conic sections
rational low degree bezier curves
rational low degree dp curves


Grouping parts based on geometrical shapes and manufacturing attributes using a neural network This paper proposes a new part family classification system (IPFACS: Image Processing and Fuzzy ART based Clustering System), which incorporates image processing techniques and a modified Fuzzy ART neural network algorithm. IPFACS can classify parts based on geometrical shape and manufacturing attributes, simultaneously. With a proper reduction and normalization of an image data through the image processing methods and scaling capability in the modified Fuzzy ART, different types of geometrical shape data and manufacturing attribute data can be simultaneously classified in the same system. IPFACS has been tested for an example set of hypothetical parts. The results show that IPFACS provides a good feasible approach to form part families based on both geometrical shape and manufacturing attributes.

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

part family classification
image processing
fuzzy art
manufacturing attributes


parallel programming models for a multi-processor soc platform applied to high-speed traffic management In this paper, we describe the MultiFlex multi-processor SoC programming environment, with focus on two programming models: a distributed system object component (DSOC) message passing model, and a symmetrical multi-processing (SMP) model using shared memory. The MultiFlex tools map these models onto the StepNP multi-processor SoC platform, while making use of harware accelerators for message passing and task scheduling. We present the results of mapping an Internet traffic management application, running at 2.5Gb/s.

embedded software
system-on-chip
multi-processor systems


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


Clustering cliques for graph-based summarization of the biomedical research literature Graph-based notions are increasingly used in biomedical data mining and knowledge discovery tasks. In this paper, we present a clique-clustering method to automatically summarize graphs of semantic predications produced from PubMed citations (titles and abstracts).

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

clique clustering
graph-based summarization
multi-document summarization


Asynchronous replica exchange software for grid and heterogeneous computing Parallel replica exchange sampling is an extended ensemble technique often used to accelerate the exploration of the conformational ensemble of atomistic molecular simulations of chemical systems. Inter-process communication and coordination requirements have historically discouraged the deployment of replica exchange on distributed and heterogeneous resources. Here we describe the architecture of a software (named ASyncRE) for performing asynchronous replica exchange molecular simulations on volunteered computing grids and heterogeneous high performance clusters. The asynchronous replica exchange algorithm on which the software is based avoids centralized synchronization steps and the need for direct communication between remote processes. It allows molecular dynamics threads to progress at different rates and enables parameter exchanges among arbitrary sets of replicas independently from other replicas. ASyncRE is written in Python following a modular design conducive to extensions to various replica exchange schemes and molecular dynamics engines. Applications of the software for the modeling of association equilibria of supramolecular and macromolecular complexes on BOINC campus computational grids and on the CPU/MIC heterogeneous hardware of the XSEDE Stampede supercomputer are illustrated. They show the ability of ASyncRE to utilize large grids of desktop computers running the Windows, MacOS, and/or Linux operating systems as well as collections of high performance heterogeneous hardware devices.

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

replica exchange molecular dynamics
grid computing
distributed computing
proteinligand binding
peptide dimerization


Analysis of residue curve maps of reactive and extractive distillation units The aim of this work is to focus in the simultaneous analysis of reactive and extractive distillation, including the solvent recovery system. Residue curve maps can provide valuable insights and design assistance for a variety of separation processes, in which reactive distillation has been incorporated. These graphical techniques reveal the sensitivity of design options by giving us a visual representation over the whole composition space and assist the engineer to detect separation constraints. Simulation results show the reaction effect in the diagram topology: existence and position of nodes, saddles and distillation boundaries (separatrices or surfaces). Advanced distillation synthesis and design techniques, which are now supported by available software tools, were used to develop case studies for extractive distillation, entrainer influence in reactive systems and reactive distillation analysis with consecutive and/or competitive reactions. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

residue curve maps
reactive distillation
extractive distillation


Regularity criteria and small data global existence to the generalized viscous Hall-magnetohydrodynamics In this paper we establish the regularity criteria of solutions to the three space dimensions generalized viscous Hall-magnetohydrodynamics. Moreover, we also prove that there exist classical solutions globally in time to the generalized viscous Hall-MHD if the initial data is small enough or the fractional Laplacian dissipation powers ? ? and ? ? are suitably large. These results are some improvements of very recent work (Chae and Lee, 2014) established by Chae and Lee.

hall-magnetohydrodynamics
fractional dissipation
regularity criterion
small-data global existence


The Economics of Egg Trading: Mating Rate, Sperm Competition and Positive Frequency-Dependence Egg tradingthe alternating exchange of egg parcels during mating by simultaneous hermaphroditesis one of the best-documented examples of reciprocity between non-relatives. By offering eggs only to partners who reciprocate, traders increase their reproductive success in the male role, but at a potential cost of delaying or reducing fertilisation of their own eggs. Although several authors have considered the evolutionary stability of egg trading once it has evolved, little attention has been paid to how egg trading can invade a population in the first place. We begin to tackle this problem by formally showing that egg trading is under positive frequency-dependent selection: once the proportion of traders in a population exceeds a certain threshold, egg trading will go to fixation. We show that if mate encounters occur frequently, then the cost of withholding eggs from unreciprocating partners is reduced, making it easier for egg trading to evolve. In contrast, the presence of opportunistic streaking, where unpaired individuals join mating pairs but contribute only sperm, makes it more difficult for egg trading to invade. This is because streakers weaken the link between the number of eggs an individual can offer and its male-role reproductive success.

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

altruism
cooperation
direct reciprocity
mate choice
assortative mating


toward multimodal fusion of affective cues During face to face communication, it has been suggested that as much as 70\% of what people communicate when talking directly with others is through paralanguage involving multiple modalities combined together (e.g. voice tone and volume, body language). In an attempt to render humancomputer interaction more similar to human-human communication and enhance its naturalness, research on sensory acquisition and interpretation of single modalities of human expressions have seen ongoing progress over the last decade. These progresses are rendering current research on artificial sensor fusion of multiple modalities an increasingly important research domain in order to reach better accuracy of congruent messages on the one hand, and possibly to be able to detect incongruent messages across multiple modalities (incongruency being itself a message about the nature of the information being conveyed). Accurate interpretation of emotional signals - quintessentially multimodal - would hence particularly benefit from multimodal sensor fusion and interpretation algorithms. In this paper we provide a state of the art multimodal fusion and describe one way to implement a generic framework for multimodal emotion recognition. The system is developed within the MAUI framework [31] and Scherer's Component Process Theory (CPT) [49, 50, 51, 24, 52], with the goal to be modular and adaptive. We want the designed framework to be able to accept different single and multi modality recognition systems and to automatically adapt the fusion algorithm to find optimal solutions. The system also aims to be adaptive to channel (and system) reliability.

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


Partially Evaluating Finite-State Runtime Monitors Ahead of Time Finite-state properties account for an important class of program properties, typically related to the order of operations invoked on objects. Many library implementations therefore include manually written finite-state monitors to detect violations of finite-state properties at runtime. Researchers have recently proposed the explicit specification of finite-state properties and automatic generation of monitors from the specification. However, runtime monitoring only shows the presence of violations, and typically cannot prove their absence. Moreover, inserting a runtime monitor into a program under test can slow down the program by several orders of magnitude. In this work, we therefore present a set of four static whole-program analyses that partially evaluate runtime monitors at compile time, with increasing cost and precision. As we show, ahead-of-time evaluation can often evaluate the monitor completely statically. This may prove that the program cannot violate the property on any execution or may prove that violations do exist. In the remaining cases, the partial evaluation converts the runtime monitor into a residual monitor. This monitor only receives events from program locations that the analyses failed to prove irrelevant. This makes the residual monitor much more efficient than a full monitor, while still capturing all property violations at runtime. We implemented the analyses in CLARA, a novel framework for the partial evaluation of AspectJ-based runtime monitors, and validated our approach by applying CLARA to finite-state properties over several large-scale Java programs. CLARA proved that most of the programs never violate our example properties. Some programs required monitoring, but in those cases CLARA could often reduce the monitoring overhead to below 10%. We observed that several programs did violate the stated properties.

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

algorithms
experimentation
performance
verification
typestate analysis
static analysis


A scalable and dynamic application-level secure communication framework for inter-cloud services We have designed a secure communication framework for inter-cloud computing model. We use three security schemes in a novel way to minimize the performance overhead. We implemented our design and measured the overhead caused by the security features on two commercial clouds. Our results show the cost of the throughput overhead as a 5% decrease in throughput. Our results show the cost of the latency overhead as a 10% increase in latency.

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

cloud computing
virtual private networks


efficient message routing in mega-micro-computer networks With rapidly developing microprocessor technology, we can anticipate an entire microcomputer being contained on a single, low-cost LSI chip. It will be technically and economically feasible to interconnect thousands or millions of these microcomputers to form a very large and powerful machinea Mega-Micro-Computer (MMC). This paper defines a system of interlocking buses allowing dense message flow within an MMC. Each microcomputer shares two buses; each bus is shared by sixteen computers. There is a simple algorithm for optimal routing of messages. Data activity on each bus is analytically determined as a function of network size and the spatial distribution of messages between nodes. MMCs are about equally efficient whether connected by buses or by Pierce rings. For equal line costs, an MMC can allow 200 times denser message flow than a million computer network structured like Illiac IV.

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

network spatial microprocessor size message data flow routing interconnect algorithm paper microcomputer

sharing
activation
structure
efficiency
technologies
systems
optimality
computer network
functional
computation
distributed
cost


A new interpolatory type quadrature rule for weighted Cauchy principal value integrals This paper presents a new interpolatory type quadrature rule for approximating the weighted Cauchy principal value integrals integral(-1)(1)(1 - t(2))(lambda-1/2)f(t)/(t - c)dt where - 1/2 = 0 and the derivative f(P)(t) satisfies Holder continuity of order p, we obtain that the rule has the convergence rate of O((A + B log n + n(2v))n(-p-rho)), where v is as small as we like and A and B are constants depending on c.

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

cauchy principal value integral
trigonometric interpolation
singular integral


Remarks on context-free parallel communicating grammar systems generating crossed agreements Parallel communicating grammar systems are language generating devices consisting of several grammars which derive synchronously their sentential forms and communicate with each other by sending their sentential forms to another component on request. Due to collaboration, grammar systems with context-free components are more powerful than a single context-free grammar; they even can generate all recursively enumerable languages. In natural languages, there occur constructions that cannot be modelled by context-free languages. Three important phenomena are the so-called multiple agreements, crossed agreements and replication which are represented by the three non-context-free languages K-1 = {a(n)b(n)c(n) vertical bar n >= 1}, K-2 = {a(n) b(m)c(n)d(m) vertical bar m >= l, n >= 1}, and K-3 = {ww vertical bar w is an element of {a, b}(+)}, respectively. In the present paper, we give parallel communicating grammar systems ( PC grammar systems) that are context-free and that generate the language K-2, working in different modes. In two cases, the results are optimal.

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

parallel communicating grammar systems
crossed agreements


Memristive port-Hamiltonian Systems The port-Hamiltonian modelling framework is extended to a class of systems containing memristive elements and phenomena. First, the concept of memristance is generalised to the same generic level as the port-Hamiltonian framework. Second, the underlying Dirac structure is augmented with a memristive port. The inclusion of memristive elements in the port-Hamiltonian framework turns out to be almost as straightforward as the inclusion of resistive elements. Although a memristor is a resistive element, it is also a dynamic element since the associated Ohmian laws are rather expressed in terms of differential equations. This means that the state space manifold, as naturally defined by the storage elements, is augmented by the states associated with the memristive elements. Hence the order of complexity is, in general, defined by the number of storage elements plus the number of memristors in the system. Apart from enlarging our repertoire of modelling building blocks, the inclusion of memristive elements in the existing port-Hamiltonian formalism possibly opens up new ideas for controller synthesis and design.

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

memristive systems
port-hamiltonian systems
port-based modelling


Guessing the extreme values in a data set: a Bayesian method and its applications For a large number of data management problems, it would be very useful to be able to obtain a few samples from a data set, and to use the samples to guess the largest (or smallest) value in the entire data set. Min/max online aggregation, Top-k query processing, outlier detection, and distance join are just a few possible applications. This paper details a statistically rigorous, Bayesian approach to attacking this problem. Just as importantly, we demonstrate the utility of our approach by showing how it can be applied to four specific problems that arise in the context of data management.

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

online aggregation
extreme values
bayesian


Improvements to single-objective constrained predator-prey evolutionary optimization algorithm In predator-prey algorithm, a relatively small number of predators ("lions") and a much larger number of prey ("antelopes") are randomly placed on a two dimensional lattice with connected ends representing an unfolded surface of a torus. The predators are partially or completely biased towards one or more objectives, based on which each predator kills the weakest prey in its neighborhood. A stronger prey created through evolution replaces this prey. In case of constrained problems, the sum of constraint violations serves as an additional objective. Modifications of the basic predator-prey algorithm have been implemented in this paper regarding the selection procedure, apparent movement of the predators, and mutation strategy. Further modifications have been made making the algorithm capable of handling multiple equality and inequality constraints. The final modified algorithm was tested on standard linear/nonlinear and constrained/unconstrained single-objective optimization problems.

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

predator-prey algorithm
constrained optimization
evolutionary algorithms
crossover


Surgical case scheduling as a generalized job shop scheduling problem Surgical case scheduling allocates hospital resources to individual surgical cases and decides on the time to perform the surgeries. This task plays a decisive role in utilizing hospital resources efficiently while ensuring quality of care for patients. This paper proposes a new surgical case scheduling approach which uses a novel extension of the Job Shop scheduling problem called multi-mode blocking job shop (MMBJS). It formulates the MMBJS as a mixed integer linear programming (MILP) problem and discusses the use of the MMBJS model for scheduling elective and add-on cases. The model is illustrated by a detailed example, and preliminary computational experiments with the CPLEX solver on practical-sized instances are reported.

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 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 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

surgical case scheduling
blocking job shop

or in health services
multimode job shop
job insertion


Mobile follower robot as an assistive device for home oxygen therapy evaluation of tether control algorithms Home Oxygen Therapy (H.O.T.) is a medical treatment for severe lung diseases in which the patients are supplied concentrated oxygen. This paper investigates the use of a follower robot as a support device for H.O.T. patients, consisting of a two-wheeled differential drive robot connected to the user by tether. Two different control algorithms were studied using dynamic simulation and motion capture experiments with healthy subjects. In further experiments with H.O.T. patients, including a questionnaire survey, it was confirmed that Follow the Leader control was capable of following the users trajectory more accurately than Pseudo-Joystick control, and that overall H.O.T. patients showed a preference for Follow the Leader control.

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


developing a content management system for siguccs In this paper, I will explore the development of an open source Plone content management system for the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Special Interest Group on University and College Computing Services (SIGUCCS) 2008 Fall Conference committee. I will recount the first year of development and look at where the site is headed. This includes challenges and limitations faced as well as looking at the improvements that will be made in order to alleviate problems.

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


Low rank updated LS-SVM classifiers for fast variable selection Least squares support vector machine (LS-SVM) classifiers are a class of kernel methods whose solution follows from a set of linear equations. In this work we present low rank modifications to the LS-SVM classifiers that are useful for fast and efficient variable selection. The inclusion or removal of a candidate variable can be represented as a low rank modification to the kernel matrix (linear kernel) of the LS-SVM classifier. In this way, the LS-SVM solution can be updated rather than being recomputed, which improves the efficiency of the overall variable selection process. Relevant variables are selected according to a closed form of the leave-one-out (LOO) error estimator, which is obtained as a by-product of the low rank modifications. The proposed approach is applied to several benchmark data sets as well as two microarray data sets. When compared to other related algorithms used for variable selection, simulations applying our approach clearly show a lower computational complexity together with good stability on the generalization error. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

low rank matrix modifications
least-squares support vector machines
leave-one-out error


Optimal advertising and pricing in a class of general new-product adoption models In [21], Sethi et al. introduced a particular new-product adoption model. They determine optimal advertising and pricing policies of an associated deterministic infinite horizon discounted control problem. Their analysis is based on the fact that the corresponding HamiltonJacobiBellman (HJB) equation is an ordinary non-linear differential equation which has an analytical solution. In this paper, generalizations of their model are considered. We take arbitrary adoption and saturation effects into account, and solve finite and infinite horizon discounted variations of associated control problems. If the horizon is finite, the HJB-equation is a 1st order non-linear partial differential equation with specific boundary conditions. For a fairly general class of models we show that these partial differential equations have analytical solutions. Explicit formulas of the value function and the optimal policies are derived. The controlled Bass model with isoelastic demand is a special example of the class of controlled adoption models to be examined and will be analyzed in some detail.

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

optimal control
dynamic programming
or in marketing
sethi/bass model


Planar shape interpolation using relative velocity fields AIAP interpolation between 2D shapes is formulated by an edge-centered energy. A local algorithm is devised to drastically accelerate the AIAP interpolation. A simple approach is introduced to initialize the sequence of edge vectors. Shape transfer and sequence editing are supported by using relative velocity fields.

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

2d shape interpolation
shape sequence editing
relative velocity field
as isometric as possible


Practical Speculative Parallelization of Variable-Length Decompression Algorithms Variable-length coding is widely used for efficient data compression. Typically, the compressor splits the original data into blocks and compresses each block with variable-length codes, hence producing variable-length compressed blocks. Although the compressor can easily exploit ample block-level parallelism, it is much more difficult to extract such coarse-grain parallelism from the decompressor because a block boundary cannot be located until decompression of the previous block is completed. This paper presents novel algorithms to efficiently predict block boundaries and a runtime system that enables efficient block-level parallel decompression, called SDM. The SDM execution model features speculative pipelining with three stages: Scanner, Decompressor, and Merger. The scanner stage employs a high-confidence prediction algorithm that finds compressed block boundaries without fully decompressing individual blocks. This information is communicated to the parallel decompressor stage in which multiple blocks are decompressed in parallel. The decompressed blocks are merged in order by the merger stage to produce the final output. The SDM runtime is specialized to execute this pipeline correctly and efficiently on resource-constrained embedded platforms. With SDM we effectively parallelize three production-grade variable-length decompression algorithms-zlib, bzip2, and H.264-with maximum speedups of 2.50x and 8.53x (and geometric mean speedups of 1.96x and 4.04x) on 4-core and 36-core embedded platforms, respectively.

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

design
performance
speculation
multicores
embedded systems


Genetic programming with one-point crossover and subtree mutation for effective problem solving and bloat control Genetic programming (GP) is one of the most widely used paradigms of evolutionary computation due to its ability to automatically synthesize computer programs and mathematical expressions. However, because GP uses a variable length representation, the individuals within the evolving population tend to grow rapidly without a corresponding return in fitness improvement, a phenomenon known as bloat. In this paper, we present a simple bloat control strategy for standard tree-based GP that achieves a one order of magnitude reduction in bloat when compared with standard GP on benchmark tests, and practically eliminates bloat on two real-world problems. Our proposal is to substitute standard subtree crossover with the one-point crossover (OPX) developed by Poli and Langdon (Second online world conference on soft computing in engineering design and manufacturing, Springer, Berlin (1997)), while maintaining all other GP aspects standard, particularly subtree mutation. OPX was proposed for theoretical purposes related to GP schema theorems, however since it curtails exploration during the search it has never achieved widespread use. In our results, on the other hand, we are able to show that OPX can indeed perform an effective search if it is coupled with subtree mutation, thus combining the bloat control capabilities of OPX with the exploration provided by standard mutation.

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


An experimental comparison of different real-time schedulers on multicore systems In this work, an experimental comparison among the Rate Monotonic (RM) and Earliest Deadline First (EDF) multiprocessor real-time schedulers is performed, with a focus on soft real-time systems. We generated random workloads of synthetic periodic task sets and executed them on a big multi-core machine, using Linux as Operating System, gathering an extensive amount of data related to their exhibited performance under various real-time scheduling strategies. The comparison involves the fixed-priority scheduler for multiprocessors as available in the Linux kernel (with priorities set so as to achieve RM), and on our own implementation of EDF, both configured in global, partitioned and clustered mode. The impact of the various scheduling strategies on the performance of the applications, as well as the generated scheduling overheads, are compared presenting an extensive set of experimental results. These provide a comprehensive view of the performance achievable by the different schedulers under various workload conditions. (C) 2012 Elsevier Inc. 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

real-time scheduling
global edf
multi-core systems
experimental evaluation


A new order-theoretic characterisation of the polytime computable functions ? We propose a new order-theoretic characterisation of the class of polytime computable functions. To this avail we define the small polynomial path order (sPOP? sPOP ? for short). This termination order entails a new syntactic method to analyse the innermost runtime complexity of term rewrite systems fully automatically: for any rewrite system compatible with sPOP? sPOP ? that employs recursion up to depth d, the (innermost) runtime complexity is polynomially bounded of degree d. This bound is tight. Thus we obtain a direct correspondence between a syntactic (and easily verifiable) condition of a program and the asymptotic worst-case complexity of the program.

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

term rewriting
complexity analysis
implicit computational complexity
automation


Root-metaphors for understanding: A framework for teachers and teacher educators of information and communication technologies This paper argues for understanding ICT from the standpoint of philosophical world views. We present a framework, based on Pepper's root-metaphors (Formism, Contextualism, Mechanism, Organicism, and Animism/Mysticism) and we illustrate the use of the framework by looking at a common example of ICT: e-mail. It is argued that such a framework is potentially helpful to ICT teachers, especially when they work with pre-service education students who are struggling with how to integrate ICT critically into their future classrooms. (C) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. 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

pedagogical issues
post-secondary education
teacher education


A mixed-enhanced strain method: Part I: Geometrically linear problems A general formulation of an assumed strain method in the context of mixed finite elements is presented. A mixed strain field is presented to which an enhancement is added resulting in a formulation which produces coarse mesh accuracy in bending dominated problems and locking-free response in the near incompressible limit. The structure of the mixed fields present permits a consistent variational stress recovery. Also, the construction of the formulation is such that the mixed parameters may be obtained explicitly and the resulting finite element arrays obtain full rank using standard order quadrature. In this paper our attention is restricted to the area of geometrically linear problems in solid mechanics. Specifically, we investigate the proposed formulation in the setting of nearly incompressible elasticity, physically nonlinear plasticity and thin shell structures. Representative simulations show favorable performance of the formulation.

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

mixed enhanced
finite element incompressibility


microbending optical fiber sensors and their applications Microbending optical fiber sensors based on bend-induced loss in optical fiber have proved themselves useful for detecting environmental changes. Many different mechanical elements have been developed to perform the sensing, each with attributes suitable for a particular application. The key structures and principles of microbending optical fiber sensors for special applications are introduced in this paper. It mainly includes strain sensor, liquid lever and pressure sensor, differential force and displacement sensor, and temperature sensor specially.

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

pressure sensor
temperature sensor
strain sensor


Design of a compact reversible fault tolerant field programmable gate array: A novel approach in reversible logic synthesis This paper demonstrates the reversible fault tolerant logic synthesis for the Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) and its realization using MOS transistors. Algorithms to design a compact reversible fault tolerant n -to-2n 2 n decoder, 4n-to-n multiplexers, a random access memory and a Plessey logic block of the FPGA have been presented. In addition, several lower bounds on the numbers of garbage outputs, constant inputs and quantum cost of the FPGA have been proposed. The comparative results show that the proposed design is much better in terms of gate count, garbage outputs, quantum cost, delay, and hardware complexity than the existing approaches.

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

garbage output
low power design
reversible and fault tolerant computing


On priority queues with priority jumps In this paper, we investigate a simplified head-of-the-line with priority jumps (HOL-PJ) scheduling discipline. Therefore, we consider a discrete-time single-server queueing system with two priority queues of infinite capacity and with a newly introduced HOL-PJ priority scheme. We derive expressions for the probability generating function of the system contents and the packet delay. Some performance measures (such as mean and variance) of these quantities are derived and are used to illustrate the impact and significance of the HOL-PJ priority scheduling discipline in an output queueing switch. We compare this dynamic priority scheduling discipline with a first-in, first-out (FIFO) scheduling and a static priority scheduling (HOL) and we investigate the influence of the different parameters of the simplified HOL-PJ scheduling discipline.

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

discrete-time
queueing theory
performance analysis


Emerging market for mobile remote physiological monitoring services This paper offers an initial analysis of economic and market issues in the development and deployment of mobile remote physiological monitoring services for medical patients through wireless wearable sensors and actuators. Examining the characteristics of the service technologies and related industries, this study focuses on the structure, participants and roles of standardisation of the layers within the emerging mobile remote physiological monitoring industry. The study concludes that the structure of the emerging mobile remote physiological monitoring industry will be oriented about service provision, be integrated with other personal / patient data storage services and be heavily influenced by the interplay of technological developments, the health market structure, existing players and regulation. Additionally, the keys players are likely to be the system integrators and service providers concentrating on large institutional customers. A focus of the paper is analysing both the causes and implications of a modular, horizontally layered industry structure likely to result from the mix of technologies, suppliers and customers as this market develops. The paper discusses why, although horizontal specialisation is the most likely outcome, there is little risk of key layers becoming commoditised. The paper also discusses the appropriate types and levels of standardisation and equipment certification activities that should be encouraged, along with from which groups and industries the pressure for these will come.

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

physiological monitoring
market structure
horizontal specialisation


The Use of Conducting Polymers in Membrane-Based Separations As a material family, ?-conjugated polymers (also known as intrinsically conductive polymers) elicit the possibility of both exploiting the chemical and physical attributes of the polymer for membrane-based separations and incorporating its electronic and electrochemical properties to enhance the separation figures-of-merit. This review article, although by no means comprehensive, provides a current snapshot of the investigations from many research laboratories in the use of conducting polymers for membrane-based separations. The review focuses primarily on polyaniline, polypyrrole, and substituted-polythiophene and includes applications in gas separations, liquid (and/or vapor) separations, and ion separations. Additionally, we discuss the broad challenges and accomplishments in membrane formation from conducting polymers.

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

conducting polymers
polyaniline
polypyrrole
separations


A framework of collaborative design environment for injection molding This paper describes the framework of a network-oriented design environment, enabled by eXtensible Markup Language (XML) and CORBA [2], capable of providing collaboration and validity evaluation in injection mold design problems. XML and CORBA [2] are appropriate resources for the construction of such a framework because they have vast potential to improve software interoperability and facilitate data exchange across applications and people from various disciplines and vendors. An overview of the framework is provided and an application to the design phase of injection molding is illustrated. This example illustrates how design validities are notified and new design directions provided to the designer during the design process. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

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

distributed object
network-based
design validity evaluation


A constraint programming approach to the multiple-venue, sport-scheduling problem In this paper, we consider the problem of scheduling sports competitions over several venues which are not associated with any of the competitors. A two-phase, constraint programming approach is developed, first identifying a solution that designates the participants and schedules each of the competitions, then assigning each competitor as the home or the away team. Computational experiments are conducted and the results are compared with an integer goal programming approach. The constraint programming approach achieves optimal solutions for problems with up to sixteen teams, and near-optimal solutions for problems with up to thirty teams.

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


Endometriosis and Infertility Endometriosis is an estrogen-dependent disorder defined as the presence of endometrial tissue outside of the uterine cavity. A leading cause of infertility, endometriosis has a prevalence of 0.55% in fertile and 2540% in infertile women. The optimal choice of management for endometriosis-associated infertility remains obscure. Removal or suppression of endometrial deposits by medical or surgical means constitutes the basis of endometriosis management. Current evidence indicates that suppressive medical treatment of endometriosis does not benefit fertility and should not be used for this indication alone. Surgery is probably efficacious for all stages of the disease. Controlled ovarian hyperstimulation with intrauterine insemination is recommended in early-stage and surgically corrected endometriosis when pelvic anatomy is normal. In advanced cases, in vitro fertilization is a treatment of choice, and its success may be augmented with prolonged gonadotropin-releasing hormone analog treatment. Further randomized clinical trials focusing on diverse etiopathogenic mechanisms and therapeutic innovation are necessary to find more conclusive, evidence-based answers regarding this enigmatic disease.

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


partitioning and placement for buildable qca circuits Quantum-dot Cellular Automata (QCA) is a novel computing mechanism that can represent binary information based on spatial distribution of electron charge configuration in chemical molecules. In this paper, we present partitioning and placement algorithms for a large-scale automatic QCA layout. The purpose of zone partitioning is to initially partition a given circuit such that a single clock potential modulates the interdot barriers in all of the QCA cells within each zone. We then place these zones during our placement step. We identify several objectives and constraints that will enhance the buildability of QCA circuits and use them in our optimization process. The results are intended to define what is computationally interesting and could actually be built within a set of predefined constraints.

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

quantum-dot cellular automata
nanotechnology


Pseudo Almost Periodic Solutions for CNNs with Continuously Distributed Leakage Delays In this paper, based on the exponential dichotomy theory, contraction mapping fixed point theorem and inequality analysis technique, we obtain some sufficient conditions ensuring the existence and global exponential stability of pseudo almost periodic solutions for a new generalized cellular neural network model with continuously distributed leakage delays. Our results complement with some recent ones. Moreover, an illustrative example and its numerical simulation are given to demonstrate the effectiveness of the obtained results.

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


Linearization of second-order superlinear oscillation theorems In this paper, for second-order superlinear differential equations, we present new oscillation criteria. Our results involve comparison with related linear and half-linear second-order differential equations, so that the known oscillation theorems from literature can be employed directly. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

oscillation comparison superlinear linearization


recent developments in representation in the science of design A recent goal in computer aided design is the representation of a design artifact in a form sufficient to support all analyses and to determine that the design is realizable. Some aspects of a theory of design representations are presented. Benefits of developing such a theory is discussed.

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

theory science support representation design


A tool for measuring and visualizing connectivity of transit stop, route and transfer center in a multimodal transportation network Agencies at the federal, state and local level are aiming to enhance the public transportation system (PTS) as one alternative to alleviate congestion and to cater to the needs of captive riders. To effectively act as a viable alternative transportation mode, the system must be highly efficient. One way to measure efficiency of the PTS is connectivity. In a multimodal transportation system, transit is a key component. Transit connectivity is relatively complex to calculate, as one has to consider fares, schedule, capacity, frequency and other features of the system at large. Thus, assessing transit connectivity requires a systematic approach using many diverse parameters involved in real-world service provision. In this paper, we use a graph theoretic approach to evaluate transit connectivity at various levels of service and for various components of transit, such as nodes, lines, and transfer centers in a multimodal transportation system. Further, we provide a platform for computing connectivity over large-scale applications, using visualization to communicate results in the context of their geography and to facilitate public transit decision-making. The proposed framework is then applied to a comprehensive transit network in the Washington-Baltimore region. Underpinning the visualization, we introduce a novel spatial data architecture and Web-based interface designed with free and open source libraries and crowd-sourced contextual data, accessible on various platforms such as mobile phones, tablets and personal computers. The proposed methodology is a useful tool for both riders and decision-makers in assessing transit connectivity in a multimodal transit network in a number of ways such as the identification of under-served transit areas, prioritization and allocation of funds to locations for improving transit service.

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

transit connectivity
public transportation
multimodal transportation system


Computations of steady and unsteady transport of pollutant in shallow water We present new models for simulating the steady and unsteady transport of pollutant. Then the simple central-upwind schemes based on central weighted essentially non-oscillatory reconstructions are proposed in this paper for computing the one- and two-dimensional steady and unsteady models. Since the non-uniform width of the different local Riemann fans is calculated more accurately, the central-upwind schemes enjoy a much smaller numerical viscosity as well as the staggering between two neighboring sets of grids is avoided. Synchronously, due to the central-upwind schemes are combined with the fourth-order central weighted essentially non-oscillatory reconstructions, the schemes have the non-oscillatory behavior. The numerical results show the desired accuracy, high-resolution, and robustness of our methods. (c) 2005 IMACS. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

O O O O O B I I 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

central weighted essentially non-oscillatory (cweno) schemes


Collective unary decision-making by decentralized multiple-robot systems applied to the task-sequencing problem When a complex mission must be undertaken, it often can be simplified by dividing it into a sequence of smaller subtasks, which are then completed in order. This strategy implicitly requires a system to recognize the completion of each subtask and make the decision to begin work on the next one. Decentralized multiple-robot systems can tackle many tasks, but their behavior is typified by continuous responses to stimuli. Task sequencing, however, demands a controlled, self-induced phase change in collective behavior-working on one task one moment and then on a different task the next-which is nontrivial for an emergent system. The main contribution of this study is a collective decision-making framework for decentralized multiple-robot systems that enables such a system to cooperatively decide that a current task has been completed and thus focus its attention on the next one in a sequence using only anonymous local communication. Central to the framework is the use of consensus, whereby task sequencing is delayed until a prespecified proportion of a system's robots agree that the current task is complete, reducing the likelihood of premature decisions. Two low-cost consensus estimation strategies are presented, both of which are practical for the extremely simple robots that are expected to compose large decentralized systems. Experiments in simulation and with real robots demonstrate that the proposed decision-making framework performs as predicted. Although the specific application of collective decision-making in this work is the cooperative task-sequencing problem, the proposed decision-making framework potentially has many additional applications.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 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-robot systems
swarms
decentralized control
behavior-based control
decision-making