Counting occurrences of some subword patterns We find generating functions for the number of strings (words) containing a specified number of occurrences of certain types of order-isomorphic classes of substrings called subword patterns. In particular, we find generating functions for the number of strings containing a specified number of occurrences of a given 3-letter subword pattern.

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


Progressive encoding of binary voxel models using pyramidal decomposition In this paper, we propose a progressive encoding algorithm for the geometric information of a 3D object, which is represented by binary voxels. Using the morphological pyramidal decomposition, the proposed algorithm first generates the multi-resolution models of a 3D object. Then, each resolution model is predicted from its lower resolution model, and the prediction errors are encoded using an arithmetic coding technique. To yield high compression ratio, each model is partitioned into the inside, boundary, and outside regions based on the lower resolution model. This partitioning method greatly reduces the amount of data to be encoded, since the prediction errors are compactly concentrated near the boundary region. Moreover, the neighborhood relation of each boundary voxel is used as the context for the arithmetic coding to further increase the compression efficiency. It is demonstrated by extensive simulation results that the proposed algorithm provides better coding gain than the conventional voxel and mesh compression algorithms.

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 B I O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 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 and implementation of a standards-based interoperable clinical decision support architecture in the context of the Korean EHR In 2000 the Korean government initiated efforts to secure healthcare accessibility and efficiency anytime and anywhere via the nationwide healthcare information system by the end of 2010. According to the master plan, electronic health record (EHR) research and development projects were designed in 2005. One subproject was the design and implementation of standards-based interoperable clinical decision support (CDS) capabilities in the context of the EHR system. The purpose of this study was to describe the challenges, process, and outcomes of defining and implementing a national CDS architecture to stimulate and motivate the widespread adoption of CDS services in Korea. CDS requirements and design principles were established by conducting a selective literature review and a survey of clinicians, managers, and hospital and industrial health information technology engineers regarding issues related to CDS architectures. The previous relevant works of the American Medical Informatics Association, the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society, and Health Level Seven were used to validate the scope and themes of the service architecture. The Arden Syntax, Standards-Based Sharable Active Guideline Environment, First DataBank, and SEBASTIAN approaches were used to assess the coverage of the application architecture thus defined. A CDS prototype of an outpatient hypertension management system was implemented and assessed in a simulated experimental setting to evaluate the feasibility of the proposed architecture. Four CDS service features were identified: knowledge application, knowledge management, audit and evaluation, and CDS and knowledge governance. Five core components of CDS application architecture were also identified: knowledge-execution component, knowledge-authoring component, data-interface component, knowledge repository, and service-interface component. The coverage and characteristics of the architecture identified herein were found to be comparable with those described previously. Two scenarios of deployment architecture were identified in the context of Korean healthcare. The preliminary feasibility test revealed that the architecture exhibited good performance and made it easy to integrate patient data. We have described the efforts that have been made to realize CDS service features, core components, application, and deployment architectures in the context of the Korean EHR. These outcomes showed the potential to contribute to the adoption of CDS at the national level.

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

clinical decision support systems
electronic health records
system architecture
systems integration
knowledge bases


A comparison of genetic programming and artificial neural networks in metamodeling of discrete-event simulation models Genetic programming (GP) and artificial neural networks (ANNs) can be used in the development of surrogate models of complex systems. The purpose of this paper is to provide a comparative analysis of GP and ANNs for metamodeling of discrete-event simulation (DES) models. Three stochastic industrial systems are empirically studied: an automated material handling system (AMHS) in semiconductor manufacturing, an (s,S) inventory model and a serial production line. The results of the study show that GP provides greater accuracy in validation tests, demonstrating a better generalization capability than ANN. However, GP when compared to ANN requires more computation in metamodel development. Even given this increased computational requirement, the results presented indicate that GP is very competitive in metamodeling of DES models.

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

simulation metamodel
symbolic regression
design of experiments
decision support tool


Effect of trace platinum additions on the interfacial morphology of Sn3.8Ag0.7Cu alloy aged for long hours Pt was introduced into Sn3.8Ag0.7Cu (SAC387) solder alloy. Reflow was carried out on a hot plate at 240C for 60s. The interfacial samples were then aged up to 1000h at 150C. IMCs and Kirkendall voids decreased with increasing amount of Pt. SAC387Pt/Cu show a more reliable solder interconnection to SAC387/Cu.

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

composite solder
intermetallic layer
pt addition
isothermal aging


Pathogenic Mechanisms of Diseases Caused by Rickettsia The specter of bioterrorism employing genetically engineered Rickettsia resistant to all antibiotics should reawaken the world's desire to elucidate the pathogenesis of typhus and spotted fever rickettsioses in a search for mechanisms vulnerable to interdiction. The pathogenetic sequence includes rickettsial entry into the dermis, hematogenous dissemination to vascular endothelial cells (most critically in brain and lungs), increased vascular permeability, edema, and immunity mediated by NK cells, IFN-?, TNF-?, RANTES, antibodies, and cytotoxic T lymphocytes. Silverman has demonstrated the role of reactive oxygen species (ROS) produced by R. rickettsii-infected endothelial cells in peroxidative damage to cell membranes in vitro, and Heinzen has described actin-based rickettsial intracellular mobility and intercellular spread. At this point the availability of sequences of rickettsial genomes and excellent animal models of rickettsioses have yielded insufficient progress towards the identification of rickettsial virulence factors and knowledge of the importance of injury mediated by ROS, phospholipase A2, protease(s) or other mechanisms in vivo. Attention to the rickettsiosis-associated procoagulant state led to determination that hemostatic mechanisms largely prevent major hemorrhage without disseminated intravascular coagulation or thrombosis-mediated ischemia. Particularly lacking is knowledge of early events in vivo at the portal of entry in skin (or lung), of the effects of the inoculum medium (arthropod saliva or feces), mediators produced by infected endothelium under conditions of flow and of the contributions in vivo of immune effectors to pathology, of the role of apoptosis in rickettsial infection, and of the endothelial cell alterations that account for increased vascular permeability. The host cell receptor for the Rickettsia ligand and the mechanism of rickettsial escape from the phagosome need to be elucidated.

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


Inverse multi-objective combinatorial optimization Inverse multi-objective combinatorial optimization consists of finding a minimal adjustment of the objective functions coefficients such that a given set of feasible solutions becomes efficient. An algorithm is proposed for rendering a given feasible solution into an efficient one. This is a simplified version of the inverse problem when the cardinality of the set is equal to one. The adjustment is measured by the Chebyshev distance. It is shown how to build an optimal adjustment in linear time based on this distance, and why it is right to perform a binary search for determining the optimal distance. These results led us to develop an approach based on the resolution of mixed-integer linear programs. A second approach based on a branch-and-bound is proposed to handle any distance function that can be linearized. Finally, the initial inverse problem is solved by a cutting plane algorithm.

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

multi-objective optimization
inverse optimization


Dynamic system identification via recurrent multilayer perceptrons In this paper continuous-time recurrent multilayer perceptrons (RMLP) are proposed to identify nonlinear systems. Using the function approximation theorem for multilayer perceptrons (MLP), we conclude that RMLP can approximate any dynamic system in any degree of accuracy. By means of a Lyapunov-like analysis, a stable learning algorithm for RMLP is determined. The suggested learning algorithm is similar to the well-known backpropagation rule of the MLP but with an additional term which assure the stability of identification error.

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

system identification
function approximation
recurrent multilayer perceptrons


A reliable and timely medium access control protocol for vehicular ad hoc networks Many vehicular safety applications can be implemented more easily and practically by using reliable and real-time communications between vehicles and roadside infrastructures. Neither schedule-based nor contention-based conventional MAC protocols can properly satisfy the safety requirements of such applications. In contention-based protocols, packets may experience unbounded delays and schedule-based protocols are sensitive to users' motion. In this paper, a new STDMA MAC protocol which provides both reliable and real-time medium access is introduced. Simulation results show that the proposed protocol has succeeded in providing an acceptable level of reliable and real-time communications, simultaneously.

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

vehicular ad hoc networks
mac
medium access control

vanets
ivc
inter-vehicular communications
reliable and real-time communications


Unsteady flow of viscous fluid over the vacillate stretching cylinder In this paper, we consider the unsteady boundary layer flow of an incompressible viscous fluid produced by periodic motion of an elastic cylinder. The number of independent variables involved in the governing partial differential equations is reduced by using the similarity transformation. The transformed equations are then solved numerically with the help of a finite difference scheme by altering the semi-infinite domain to a finite domain. The numerical results are compared with a previously published work and a good agreement is achieved. The imperative parameters rising in the governing equations because of the effects of oscillations and the curvature are St (Strouhal number), Re (Reynolds number), and epsilon (amplitude of oscillations). The effects of these parameters on the vacillating velocity and the skin friction are discussed through graphs and tables. The large values of Re correspond to small curvature, so for large Reynolds number the solution approaches to that of the stretching flat plate case. Copyright (c) 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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

oscillatory stretching cylinder
numerical solution


exploiting novelty, coverage and balance for topic-focused multi-document summarization Novelty, coverage and balance are important requirements in topic-focused summarization, which to a large extent determine the quality of a summary. In this paper, we propose a novel method that incorporates these requirements into a sentence ranking probability model. It differs from the existing methods in that the novelty, coverage and balance requirements are all modeled w.r.t. a given topic, so that summaries are highly relevant to the topic and at the same time comply with topic-aware novelty, coverage and balance. Experimental results on the DUC 2005, 2006 and 2007 benchmark data sets demonstrate the effectiveness of our 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

topic-focused summarization
topic-aware novelty
topic-aware coverage and balance
relevance measure


Reliability-based assessment of vehicle safety in adverse driving conditions The framework of a reliability-based assessment model of vehicle safety under adverse driving conditions is developed. Such a framework is built based on the advanced transient dynamic vehicle simulation models which can consider the coupling effects between vehicles and adverse driving conditions, such as wind gust, snow-covered or icy road surface and/or curving. The single-vehicle safety index is introduced to provide rational assessment of accident risks by considering uncertainties of critical variables. In order to consider the complicated implicit limit state functions, the response surface method (RMS) is adopted to provide an efficient estimation of accident risks. Finally, a parametric study is conducted to demonstrate the methodology and the impacts of different critical variables on accident risks of a typical truck under several representative hazardous scenarios are investigated.

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

traffic
truck safety
reliability
implicit limit state function
response surface method (rsm)


an extensible digital ink segmentation and classification framework for natural notetaking With the emergence of digital pen and paper technologies, we have witnessed an increasing number of enhanced paper-digital notetaking solutions. However, the natural notetaking process includes a variety of individual work practices that complicate the automatic processing of paper notes and require user intervention for the classification of digital ink data. We present an extensible digital ink processing framework that simplifies the classification of digital ink data in natural notetaking applications. Our solution deals with the manual as well as automatic ink data segmentation and classification based on Delaunay triangulation and a strongest link algorithm. We further highlight how our solution can be extended with new digital ink classifiers and describe a paper-digital reminder application that has been realised based on the presented digital ink processing framework.

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

natural notetaking
digital ink
digital pen and paper


The integration of design of experiments, surrogate modeling and optimization for thermoscience research This paper presents an integrated approach for the solution of complex optimization problems in thermoscience research. The cited approach is based on the design of computational experiments (DOE), surrogate modeling, and optimization. The DOE/surrogate modeling techniques under consideration include: A-optimal/classical linear regression, Latin hypercube/artificial neural networks, and Latin hypercube/Sugeno-type fuzzy models. These techniques are coupled with both local (modified Newtons method) and global (genetic algorithms) optimization methods. The proposed approach proved to be an effective, efficient and robust modeling and optimization tool in the context of a case study, and holds promise for use in larger scale optimization problems in thermoscience research.

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


Consistency issues in distributed checkpoints A global checkpoint is a set of local checkpoints, one per process. The traditional consistency criterion for global checkpoints states that a global checkpoint is consistent if it does not include messages received and not sent. This paper investigates other consistency criteria, transitlessness, and strong consistency. A global checkpoint is transitless if it does not exhibit messages sent and nor received. Transitlessness can be seen as a dual of traditional consistency. Strong consistency is the addition of transitlessness to traditional consistency. The main result of this paper is a statement of the necessary and sufficient condition answering the following question: "Given an arbitrary set of local checkpoints, can this set be extended to a global checkpoint that satisfies P-m (where LP is traditional consistency, transitlessness, or strong consistency). From a practical point of view, this condition, when applied to transitlessness, is particularly interesting as it helps characterize which messages do not need to be recorded by checkpointing protocols.

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

strong consistency
distributed systems
fault-tolerance
rollback recovery


Adaptive simulation of two dimensional hyperbolic problems by Collocated Discrete Least Squares Meshless method An adaptive refinement technique is presented in this paper and used in conjunction with the Collocated Discrete Least Squares Meshless (CDLSM) method for the effective simulation of two-dimensional shocked hyperbolic problems. The CDLSM method is based on minimizing the least squares functional calculated at collocation points chosen on the problem domain and its boundaries. The functional is defined as the weighted sum of the squared residuals of the differential equation and its boundary conditions. A Moving Least Squares (MLS) method is used here to construct the meshless shape functions. An error estimator based on the value of functional at nodal points used to discretize the problem domain and its boundaries is developed and used to predict the areas of poor solutions. A node moving strategy is then used to refine the predicted zones of poor solutions before the problem is resolved on the refined distribution of nodes. The proposed methodology is applied to some two dimensional hyperbolic benchmark problems and the results are presented and compared to the exact solutions. The results clearly show the capabilities of the proposed method for the effective and efficient solution of hyperbolic problems of shocked and high gradient solutions. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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

adaptive refinement
meshless method
node moving
hyperbolic problems


Mitochondrial DNA Alterations in Aging During the aging process, the increase of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) alterations has been reported. In this study, we investigated deletions/insertions in the ? 2.4-kb region (from 14680 to 578 bp) of mtDNA covering D-loop region. A total of 96 individuals (ages between 20 and 94 years) were screened in this study. Genomic DNA was purified from whole blood samples. The 2.4-kb region of mtDNA was amplified with PCR and visualized by agarose gel electrophoresis. The sequence of the amplicon was confirmed in one sample by sequencing. We detected mtDNA deletions in only two cases (ages 26 and 30 years) at this resolution. As a result, there is no increase in the major deletions/insertions in the analyzed mtDNA region with aging. Complete sequencing of this region is needed to detect any age-dependent changes

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


Statistics for the dynamic analysis of scientometric data: the evolution of the sciences in terms of trajectories and regimes The gap in statistics between multi-variate and time-series analysis can be bridged by using entropy statistics and recent developments in multi-dimensional scaling. For explaining the evolution of the sciences as non-linear dynamics, the configurations among variables can be important in addition to the statistics of individual variables and trend lines. Animations enable us to combine multiple perspectives (based on configurations of variables) and to visualize path-dependencies in terms of trajectories and regimes. Path-dependent transitions and systems formation can be tested using entropy statistics.

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

dynamic evolution trajectories regimes entropy


A recurrent self-evolving fuzzy neural network with local feedbacks and its application to dynamic system processing This paper proposes a recurrent self-evolving fuzzy neural network with local feedbacks (RSEFNN-LF) for dynamic system processing A RSEFNN-LF is composed of zero-order or first-order Takagi-Sugeno-Kang (TSK)-type recurrent fuzzy if-then rules The recurrent structure in a RSEFNN-LF comes from locally feeding the tiring strength of a fuzzy rule back to itself. A RSEFNN-LF is constructed on-line via simultaneous structure and parameter learning In structure learning, an efficient rule and fuzzy set generation algorithm is proposed to generate fuzzy rules on-line and reduce the number of fuzzy sets in each dimension In parameter learning, the consequent part parameters are learned (hi nth a varying-dimensional Kalman filter algorithm whose input dimension varies with structure learning The antecedent part and feedback loop parameters are learned using a gradient descent algorithm The RSEFNN-LF is applied to dynamic system identification, chaotic sequence prediction, and speech recognition problems. This paper also compares the performance of the RSEFNN-LF with other recurrent fuzzy neural networks. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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

dynamic system identification
speech recognition

fuzzy system models
neuro-fuzzy systems
recurrent fuzzy systems
dynamic sequence prediction


Inside the adaptive enterprise: an information technology capabilities perspective on business process agility Recent innovations in utility computing, web services, and service-oriented architectures, combined with a growing array of IT skills, have improved firms ability to be more agile in responding to change. Using the resource-based view of the firm, prior research suggests that IT resources, in isolation, are unlikely to yield superior performance and so as firms try to boost their agility, the question becomes how to configure IT resources to prepare for, or react to, change. In this paper, we posit that managerial IT capabilities based on IT-business partnerships, strategic planning, and ex-post IT project analysis lead to the development of technical IT capabilities associated with a flexible IT infrastructure which in turn drives agility or a firms ability to react to change in its products and markets. Using data from matched surveys of IT and business executives in 241 firms, we find that managerial and technical capabilities affect agility. In further testing, we reveal that in a stable setting, technical IT capabilities are more important to agility than managerial IT capabilities, while in a dynamic setting, the opposite is true. Thus, for firms operating in volatile markets, effective models of managerial IT governance are essential for delivering superior agility or adaptiveness.

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

it capabilities
process agility
it governance

it infrastructure flexibility
environmental dynamism


built-in self test architectures for multistage interconnection networks A novel built-in self test architecture for locally controlled cube-type N x N multistage interconnection networks (MINs) is presented. First, a state-based pseudoexhaustive test procedure for this class of MINs is outlined. Then, a labelling algorithm on a binary n-cube is described which generates the necessary inputs for the tests. From the dependence graph of this algorithm a tree architecture is derived which results in a hardware overhead of O(1/log N).

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

dependence graph
labelling algorithm
tree architecture
multistage interconnection networks
hardware overhead

multistage interconnection network
locally controlled min
built-in self testing
state-based pseudoexhaustive test
trees (mathematics)
binary n-cube
hypercube networks
built-in self test


Voting almost maximizes social welfare despite limited communication In cooperative multiagent systems an alternative that maximizes the social welfare the sum of utilities can only be selected if each agent reports its full utility function. This may be infeasible in environments where communication is restricted. Employing a voting rule to choose an alternative greatly reduces the communication burden, but leads to a possible gap between the social welfare of the optimal alternative and the social welfare of the one that is ultimately elected. Procaccia and Rosenschein (2006) [13] have introduced the concept of distortion to quantify this gap. In this paper, we present the notion of embeddings into voting rules: functions that receive an agent's utility function and return the agent's vote. We establish that very low distortion can be obtained using randomized embeddings, especially when the number of agents is large compared to the number of alternatives. We investigate our ideas in the context of three prominent voting rules with low communication costs: Plurality, Approval, and Veto. Our results arguably provide a compelling reason for employing voting in cooperative multiagent systems. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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


using a distance metric to guide pso algorithms for many-objective optimization In this paper we propose to use a distance metric based on user-preferences to efficiently find solutions for many-objective problems. We use a particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm as a baseline to demonstrate the usefulness of this distance metric, though the metric can be used in conjunction with any evolutionary multi-objective (EMO) algorithm. Existing user-preference based EMO algorithms rely on the use of dominance comparisons to explore the search-space. Unfortunately, this is ineffective and computationally expensive for many-objective problems. In the proposed distance metric based PSO, particles update their positions and velocities according to their closeness to preferred regions in the objective-space, as specified by the decision maker. The proposed distance metric allows an EMO algorithm's search to be more effective especially for many-objective problems, and to be more focused on the preferred regions, saving substantial computational cost. We demonstrate how to use a distance metric with two user-preference based PSO algorithms, which implement the reference point and light beam search methods. These algorithms are compared to a user-preference based PSO algorithm relying on the conventional dominance comparisons. Experimental results suggest that the distance metric based algorithms are more effective and efficient especially for difficult many-objective 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 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 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

particle swarm optimization
light beam search

multi-objective optimization
user-preference methods
reference point method
many-objective optimization


The effects of inhomogeneities on MCG forward solution The aim of this study was to quantify the effects of inhomogeneities on magnetocardiography (MCG) forward solutions. It can serve to guide the selection of inhomogeneities to include in any geometric model used to compute magnetocardiographies fields. A numerical model of a human torso was used which construction included geometry for major anatomical structures such as subcutaneous fat, skeletal muscle, lungs, major arteries and veins, and the bones. Simulations were done with a single current dipole placed at different sites of heart. The boundary element method (BEM) was utilized for numerical treatment of magnetic field calculations. Comparisons of the effects of different conductivity on MCG forward solution followed one of two basic schemes: 1) consider the difference between the magnetic fields of the homogeneous torso model and the same model with one inhomogeneity of a single organ or tissue added; 2) consider the difference between the magnetic fields of the full inhomogeneous model and the same model with one inhomogeneity of individual organ or tissue removed. When single inhomogeneities were added to an otherwise homogeneous model, the skeletal muscle, the right lung, the both lungs and the left lung had larger average effects (15.9, 15.1, 14.9, 14.4% relative error (RE), respectively) than the other inhomogeneities tested. When single inhomogeneities were removed from an otherwise full inhomogeneneous model, the both lungs, the left, lung, and the skeletal muscle and the right lung had larger effects (17.3, 14.9, 14.3, 14.2% relative error (RE) respectively) than other inhomogeneities tested. The results of this study suggested that accurate representation of tissue inhomogeneity has a significant effect on the accuracy of the MCG forward solution. Our results showed that the inclusion of the boundaries also had effects on the topology of the magnetic fields and on the MCG inverse solution accuracy.

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


Criteria for inductive inference with mind changes and anomalies of recursive real-valued functions This paper investigates the interaction of mind changes and anomalies for inductive inference of recursive real-valued functions. We show that the criteria for inductive inference of recursive real-valued functions by bounding the number of mind changes and anomalies preserve the same hierarchy as that of recursive functions, if the length of each anomaly as an interval is bounded. However, we also show that, without bounding it, the hierarchy of some criteria collapses. More precisely, while the class of recursive real-valued functions inferable in the limit allowing no more than one anomaly is properly contained in the class allowing just two anomalies, the latter class coincides with the class allowing arbitrary and bounded number of anomalies.

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


a semantics-based aspect-oriented approach to adaptation in web engineering In the modern Web, users are accessing their favourite Web applications from any place, at any time and with any device. In this setting, they expect the application to user-tailor and personalize content access upon their particular needs. Exhibiting some kind of user- and context-dependency is thus crucial in Web Engineering. In this research, we focus on separating the adaptation engineering process from regular Web engineering by applying aspect-oriented techniques. We show how semantic information and metadata associated with the content can be exploited in our aspect-oriented approach. Furthermore, the approach allows the use of global (structural) properties of the Web application in adaptation specification. We thus obtain several advantages, which are demonstrated in this paper: to control adaptation specification) separate from (regular) Web Engineering oncerns in a richer, more consistent, robust and flexible way.

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


Approximation Properties of Some Multivariate Generalized Singular Integrals in the Unit Polydisk The aim of this paper is to obtain several results in approximation by Jackson-type generalizations of multi-complex Picard, Poisson-Cauchy and Gauss-Weierstrass singular integrals in terms of higher order moduli of smoothness in polydisks.

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

generalized multi-complex singular integrals


Autocontinuity, convergence in measure, and convergence in distribution It is shown that the autocontinuity is equivalent to the property that the convergence in measure implies the convergence in distribution. This result is applied to Denneberg's dominated convergence theorem for the Choquet integral. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science B.V.

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

choquet integral
autocontinuity
convergence in measure
convergence in distribution


Molecular recognition of CYP26A1 binding pockets and structureactivity relationship studies for design of potent and selective retinoic acid metabolism blocking agents The homology modeling of CYP26A1 was constructed. The superimposition, pharmacophore model and molecular docking were performed. The structureactivity relationship (SAR) was obtained by the model. This study provides guidance for the design of more potent RAMBAs.

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

cyp26a1
homology modeling
pharmacophore model

retinoic acid metabolism blocking agents (rambas)


Performance modeling of microsecond scale biological molecular dynamics simulations on heterogeneous architectures Performance improvements in biomolecular simulations based on molecular dynamics (MD) codes are widely desired. Unfortunately, the factors, which allowed past performance improvements, particularly the microprocessor clock frequencies, are no longer increasing. Hence, novel software and hardware solutions are being explored for accelerating performance of widely used MD codes. In this paper, we describe our efforts on porting, optimizing and tuning of Large-scale Atomic/Molecular Massively Parallel Simulator, a popular MD framework, on heterogeneous architectures: multi-core processors with graphical processing unit (GPU) accelerators. Our implementation is based on accelerating the most computationally expensive non-bonded interaction terms on the GPUs and overlapping the computation on the CPU and GPUs. This functionality is built on top of message passing interface that allows multi-level parallelism to be extracted even at the workstation level with the multi-core CPUs and allows extension of the implementation on GPU-enabled clusters. We hypothesize that the optimal benefit of heterogeneous architectures for applications will come by utilizing all possible resources (for example, CPU-cores and GPU devices on GPU-enabled clusters). Benchmarks for a range of biomolecular system sizes are provided, and an analysis is performed on four generations of NVIDIA's GPU devices. On GPU-enabled Linux clusters, by overlapping and pipelining computation and communication, we observe up to 10-folds application acceleration in multi-core and multi-GPU environments illustrating significant performance improvements. Detailed analysis of the implementation is presented that allows identification of bottlenecks in algorithm, indicating that code optimization and improvements on GPUs could allow microsecond scale simulation throughput on workstations and inexpensive GPU clusters, putting widely desired biologically relevant simulation time-scales within reach of a large user community. In order to systematically optimize simulation throughput and to enable performance prediction, we have developed a parameterized performance model that will allow developers and users to explore the performance potential of future heterogeneous systems for biological simulations. Copyright (C) 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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

performance modeling
gpus
molecular dynamics


An interactive framework for power system harmonics measurement using graphical programming and the Internet Traditional methods to measure power system harmonics employ the power harmonic analyser or the software package such as Matlab. They, however, have limitations in capability of graphical programming environment and extension to the Internet connection for remote monitoring and control. This paper presents an alternative approach using a virtual instrument (VI) that can carry out power system harmonics measurement based on Fast Fourier Transform (FFT). The experimental results testify to its good performance and remote monitoring capability. (c) 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

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

fft
power system harmonics
virtual instrument


A multiobjective approach for solving cooperative n-person games A linear programming model is introduced to solve cooperative games. The solution is always Pareto optimal. It is based on the idea of the core but instead of requiring rationality for all groups, a multiobjective approach is proposed including the importance weights of the players. A case study illustrates the application of this 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

game theory
multiobjective programming
transmission expansion cost allocation


using landing pages for sponsored search ad selection We explore the use of the landing page content in sponsored search ad selection. Specifically, we compare the use of the ad's intrinsic content to augmenting the ad with the whole, or parts, of the landing page. We explore two types of extractive summarization techniques to select useful regions from the landing pages: out-of-context and in-context methods. Out-of-context methods select salient regions from the landing page by analyzing the content alone, without taking into account the ad associated with the landing page. In-context methods use the ad context (including its title, creative, and bid phrases) to help identify regions of the landing page that should be used by the ad selection engine. In addition, we introduce a simple yet effective unsupervised algorithm to enrich the ad context to further improve the ad selection. Experimental evaluation confirms that the use of landing pages can significantly improve the quality of ad selection. We also find that our extractive summarization techniques reduce the size of landing pages substantially, while retaining or even improving the performance of ad retrieval over the method that utilize the entire landing page.

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

extractive summarization
sponsored search
landing pages


The exploration of consumers' behavior in choosing hospital by the application of neural network The economic in Taiwan has been dramatically improved in the last two decades. During this period, the national health insurance was first conducted in 1995 and plans of health insurance payment have been modified several times. Demands of high quality and service on medical care are brought up in consumers' mind. Nowadays, hospital operating environment is getting more and more competitive. Therefore, how to take the advantage of competitiveness is the urgent topic of gaining advantage of competitiveness. The research applied neural network to classify consumers' behavior in choosing hospitals. A quantitative research of questionnaire was first conducted to explore consumers' behavior in choosing hospitals in southern Taiwan. Factors of consumers' behavior were categorized into four types. Then, a back propagation neural network classification model was developed. The model demonstrates the usefulness of 85.1% classification rate in classifying consumers' styles. Finally, their marketing implications were discussed. Based on the results of the research, the evidence is enough to suggest that the neural network model is useful in identifying existing patterns of hospitals' consumers. (c) 2006 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 O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

consumers' behavior
neural networks
recognition
marketing strategy


Obesity-induced metabolic stresses in breast and colon cancer Epidemiological studies have suggested that excess body weight gain may be a major risk factor for colon and breast cancer. A positive energy balance creates metabolic stresses, including the excess production of reactive oxygen species (ROS), hyperinsulinemia, the elevated adipokine secretion, and increased gut permeability. Obesity is a risk factor for breast cancer in postmenopausal women, and overweight women are more likely to have poor outcomes. The higher circulating concentration of insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) in overweight and obese women is thought to be an important mediator to promote cell proliferation and survival via the activation of phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3K)/Akt and mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK)/p38 signaling pathways. In an animal model of colon carcinogenesis, overweight mice fed a high-fat diet exhibited a greater number of colon tumors than lean animals. The increased abdominal fat was associated with higher concentrations of leptin, insulin, and IGF-1, which possibly mediate tumor growth. These data suggest that the metabolic burden created by excess adiposity accelerates uncontrolled cell growth and survival, thereby increasing the risk of developing breast and colon cancer.

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


Quantitative fault analysis of roller bearings based on a novel matching pursuit method with a new step-impulse dictionary We proposed a novel matching pursuit method forquantitative analysis of roller bearings. A new step-impulse dictionary is constructed for atom selecting. The method presents good results in the application of both simulated signals and experimental signals. An atomic selection mechanism is proposed to improve the measure accuracy of the bearing spall-like fault size.

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

spall-like fault size assessment
step-impulse dictionary
bearing fault


Using Articulated Models for Tracking Multiple C. elegans in Physical Contact We present a method for tracking and distinguishing multiple C. elegans in a video sequence, including when they are in physical contact with one another. The worms are modeled with an articulated model composed of rectangular blocks, arranged in a deformable configuration represented by a spring-like connection between adjacent parts. Dynamic programming is applied to reduce the computational complexity of the matching process. Our method makes it possible to identify two worms correctly before and after they touch each other, and to find the body poses for further feature extraction. All joint points in our model can be also considered to be the pseudo skeleton points of the worm body. It solves the problem that a previously presented morphological skeleton-based reversal detection algorithm fails when two worms touch each other. The algorithm has many applications in the study of physical interactions between C. elegans.

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

c. elegans
computer vision
image processing
model matching


Making context-sensitive points-to analysis with heap cloning practical for the real world Context-sensitive pointer analysis algorithms with full "heap cloning" are powerful but are widely considered to be too expensive to include in production compilers. This paper shows, for the first time, that a context-sensitive, field-sensitive algorithm with full heap cloning (by acyclic call paths) can indeed be both scalable and extremely fast in practice. Overall, the algorithm is able to analyze programs in the range of 100K-200K lines of C code in 1-3 seconds, takes less than 5% of the time it takes for GCC to compile the code (which includes no whole-program analysis), and scales well across five orders of magnitude of code size. It is also able to analyze the Linux kernel (about 355K lines of code) in 3.1 seconds. The paper describes the major algorithmic and engineering design choices that are required to achieve these results, including (a) using flow-insensitive and unification-based analysis, which are essential to avoid exponential behavior in practice; (b) sacrificing context-sensitivity within strongly connected components of the call graph; and (c) carefully eliminating several kinds of O(N-2) behaviors (largely without affecting precision). The techniques used for (b) and (c) eliminated several major bottlenecks to scalability, and both are generalizable to other context-sensitive algorithms. We show that the engineering choices collectively reduce analysis time by factors of up to 3x-21x in our ten largest programs, and that the savings grow strongly with program size. Finally, we briefly summarize results demonstrating the precision of the analysis.

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

context-sensitive
field-sensitive
interprocedural
static analysis
recursive data structure


using signal processing to analyze wireless data traffic Experts have long recognized that theoretically it was possible to perform traffic analysis on encrypted packet streams by analyzing the timing of packet arrivals (or transmissions). We report on experiments to realize this possiblity using basic signal processing techniques taken from acoustics to perform traffic analysis on encrypted transmissions over wireless networks. While the work discussed here is preliminary, we are able to demonstrate two very interesting results. First, we can extract timing information, such as round-trip times of TCP connections, from traces of aggregated data traffic. Second, we can determine how data is routed through a network using coherence analysis. These results show that signal processing techniques may prove to be valuable network analysis tools in the future.

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

network
signal processing
wireless
traces
traffic analysis
analysis
data
demonstrate
timing
future
traffic
tools
coherence

extraction
encryption
wireless networks
experience
network analysis
connection
informal


Analog Layout Retargeting Using Geometric Programming To satisfy the requirements of complex and special analog layout constraints, a new analog layout retargeting method is presented in this article. Our approach uses geometric programming (GP) to achieve new technology design rules, implement device symmetry and matching constraints, and manage parasitics optimization. The GP, a class of nonlinear optimization problem, can be transferred or fitted into a convex optimization problem. Therefore, a global optimum solution can be achieved. Moreover, the GP can address problems with large-scale variables and constraints without setting an initialization variable range. To meet the prerequisites of the GP methodology for analog layout automation, we propose three kinds of mathematical transformations, including negative coefficient transformation, fraction transformation, and maximum of posynomial transformation. The efficiency and effectiveness of the proposed algorithm, as compared with the other existing methods, are demonstrated by a basic case-study example: a two-stage Miller-compensated operational amplifier and a single-ended folded cascode operational amplifier.

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

geometric programming
layout
retargeting
transformation


Modeling and forecasting duration-dependent mortality rates Mortality data of disabled individuals are studied and parametric modeling approaches for the force of mortality are discussed. Empirical observations show that the duration since disablement has a strong effect on mortality rates. In order to incorporate duration effects, different generalizations of the LeeCarter model are proposed. For each proposed model, uniqueness properties and fitting techniques are developed, and parameters are calibrated to mortality observations of the German Pension Insurance. Difficulties with coarse tabulation of the empirical data are solved by an ageperiod-duration Lexis diagram. Forecasting is demonstrated for an exemplary model, leading to the conclusion that duration dependence should not be neglected. While the data shows a clear longevity trend with respect to age, significant fluctuations but no systematic trend is observed for the duration effects.

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

duration dependence
leecarter model
lexis diagram

stochastic mortality
disability insurance


DRBEM for Cauchy convection-diffusion problems with variable coefficients In this study we present a numerical technique based on the Dual Reciprocity Boundary Element Method (DRBEM) combined with the Tikhonov regularisation method, or with the Truncated Singular Value Decomposition (TSVD) method, in order to solve the Cauchy problem associated with the steady-state convection-diffusion equation with variable coefficients. This is an interesting problem from the practical point of view as it can be used to model certain water pollution problems. The numerical results obtained in the test examples investigated show that the Tikhonov regularisation method is very suitable for the smooth geometries considered, i.e. circular and annular domains, while for the non-smooth rectangular domain the TSVD method is preferable. The choice of the regularisation parameter and of the truncation parameter is based on the L-curve method.

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

cauchy problem
drbem
tikhonov regularisation
tsvd


On the Dimension of a Face Exposed by Proper Separation of Convex Polyhedra Whenever two nonempty convex polyhedra can be properly separated, a separating hyperplane may be chosen to contain a face of either polyhedron. It is demonstrated that, in fact, one or the other of the polyhedra admits such an exposed face having dimension no smaller than approximately half the larger dimension of the two polyhedra. An example shows that the bound on face dimension is optimal, and a linear programming representation of the problem is given.

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

calculation of supporting hyperplanes
detecting set intersection
polyhedral relative interiors


Estrogen Sulfotransferases in Breast and Endometrial Cancers Estrogen sulfotransferase is significantly more active in the normal breast cell (e.g., Human 7) than in the cancer cell (e.g., MCF-7). The data suggest that in breast cancer sulfoconjugated activity is carried out by another enzyme, the SULT1A, which acts at high concentration of the substrates. In breast cancer cells sulfotransferase (SULT) activity can be stimulated by various progestins: medrogestone, promegestone, and nomegestrol acetate, as well as by tibolone and its metabolites. SULT activities can also be controlled by other substances including phytoestrogens, celecoxib, flavonoids (e.g., quercetin, resveratrol), and isoflavones. SULT expression was localized in breast cancer cells, which can be stimulated by promegestone and correlated with the increase of the enzyme activity. The estrogen sulfotransferase (SULT1E1), which acts at nanomolar concentration of estradiol, can inactivate most of this hormone present in the normal breast; however, in the breast cancer cells, the sulfotransferase denoted as SULT1A1 is mainly present, and this acts at micromolar concentrations of E2. A correlation was postulated among breast cancer cell proliferation, the effect of various progestins, and sulfotransferase stimulation. In conclusion, it is suggested that factors involved in the stimulation of the estrogen sulfotransferases could provide new possibilities for the treatment of patients with hormone-dependent breast and endometrial cancers.

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

estrogens
sulfotransferase (sult)
endometrium
estrogen sulfotransferase (est)


Coordination and communication issues in multi-agent expert system: concurrent configuration design advisor The model of concurrent configuration design and the architecture of Concurrent Configuration Design Advisor (CCDA) are considered. The CCDA is developed as an open dynamic expert system of interacting agents. In the context of this article a configuration problem is defined as a decision-making procedure performed by concurrent processes (agents). The analysis of concurrent and sequential activities in this system is based on structural transformations (in the form of graph grammars) that permits the definition of correct criteria for data integrity and the consistency of configured project data model, and any dynamic changes in the project to be modeled conveniently. This approach also makes it possible to handle complex hierarchial data structures of real configured objects and to model communication and synchronization of decision making in a distributed expert system in a common formalism. The system to be configured is decomposed into structured objects, called fragments. The proposed model consists of three types of agents. D-agents are those capable of the object configuration design within the constraints on their attributes. To cope with agents' coordination, objects' consistency and data integrity problems, a special type of agent, facilitator or F-agent, is introduced. Finally, project assistants or A-agents are responsible for the user interface at the stage of object model definition. The discussion is illustrated with examples from the application domain of flexible manufacturing systems. Experimental results, current and future work on the expert system implementation are considered.

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

expert systems
agent concurred configuration design


A methodology for strategic sourcing Strategic sourcing is critical for firms practicing the principles of supply chain management. It specifically deals with managing the supply base in an effective manner by identifying and selecting suppliers for strategic long-term partnerships, involving in supplier development initiatives by effectively allocating resources to enhance supplier performance, providing benchmarks and continuous feedback to suppliers, and in some cases involving in supplier pruning activities. Currently, the methodologies in practice for strategic sourcing have mostly been subjective in nature with few objective decision models focused at supplier evaluation, which are also not devoid of limitations. This paper proposes an objective framework for effective supplier sourcing, which considers multiple strategic and operational factors in the evaluation process. Suppliers are categorized into groups based on performance, which assists managers in identifying candidates for strategic long-term partnerships, supplier development programs, and pruning. In addition, this research investigates the differences among supplier groups in proposing possible improvement strategies for ineffectively performing suppliers. Also, we demonstrate the methodological richness of our framework when compared to some of the traditional methods proposed and utilized for supplier evaluation purposes. The supplier data utilized in the study is obtained from a large multinational corporation in the telecommunications industry.

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

nonparametric efficiency analysis
purchasing


Offline recognition of unconstrained handwritten texts using HMMs and statistical language models This paper presents a system for the offline recognition of large vocabulary unconstrained handwritten texts. The only assumption made about the data is that it is written in English. This allows the application of Statistical Language Models in order to improve the performance of our system. Several experiments have been performed using both single and multiple writer data. Lexica of variable size (from 10,000 to 50,000 words) have been used. The use of language models is shown to improve the accuracy of the system (when the lexicon contains 50,000 words, the error rate is reduced by similar to 50 percent for single writer data and by similar to 25 percent for multiple writer data). Our approach is described in detail and compared with other methods presented in the literature to deal with the same problem. An experimental setup to correctly deal with unconstrained text recognition is proposed.

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

offline cursive handwriting recognition
n-grams
continuous density hidden markov models


QR code based blind digital image watermarking with attack detection code A QR code based blind digital image watermarking technique with an attack detection feature is described here. The technique describes a key based framework to incorporate image, server port address or website address as watermark data; which increases the extended usability of the embedded data and the adaptability of the verification application. The watermarking problem is formulated as a signal communication problem with watermark data representation, embedding of watermark and attack detection as a source encoding, channel encoding and attenuation detection problems respectively. The mathematical aspects of the respective signal processing problems are extended to digital image watermarking with sufficient background support. The use of QR code ensures extended usability, while the application specific watermark data achieves adaptability of the verification application. The QR code is embedded into the attack resistant HH component of 1st level DWT domain of the cover image and to detect malicious interference by an attacker, a unique image registry code generated from the high frequency structural components of the stego-image is used. The key based approach and the attack resistant embedding domain makes this method robust against visually invariant attacks. The testing results show the compliance of the method with all the proposed aspects.

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

blind watermarking
data hiding
distortion detection


AN IMPROVED RULE-BASED DUMMY METAL FILL METHOD FOR 65 NM ASIC DESIGN Chemical-mechanical polishing (CMP) is an essential process in deep-submicrometer LSI manufacturing to achieve Chip's planarization. It includes two processes: back-end-of-line (BEOL) and front-end-of-line (FEOL). This paper focuses on the problem of BEOL in 65 nm copper process. Although model-based dummy metal fill has become a tendency recently, the proposed improved rule-based dummy fill is appropriate still. A middle scale design is used for simulation. The metal density, oxide thickness, copper thickness, capacitance variation and variation of layout data size were investigated. The results show that improved rule-based dummy fill and model-based dummy fill have the same planarization, and proposed method has small capacitance variation. The GDS file size of the proposed rule-based fill is less than the model-based fill's.

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

chemical-mechanical polishing (cmp)
rule-based fill
dfm


Numerical

simulation

code

for

self-gravitating

BoseEinstein

condensates

We

completed

the

development

of

simulation

code

that

is

designed

to

study

the

behavior

of

a

conjectured

dark

matter

galactic

halo

that

is

in

the

form

of

a

BoseEinstein

Condensate

(BEC).

The

BEC

is

described

by

the

GrossPitaevskii

equation,

which

can

be

solved

numerically

using

the

CrankNicholson

method.

The

gravitational

potential,

in

turn,

is

described

by

Poissons

equation,

that

can

be

solved

using

the

relaxation

method.

Our

code

combines

these

two

methods

to

study

the

time

evolution

of

a

self-gravitating

BEC.

The

inefficiency

of

the

relaxation

method

is

balanced

by

the

fact

that

in

subsequent

time

iterations,

previously

computed

values

of

the

gravitational

field

serve

as

very

good

initial

estimates.

The

code

is

robust

(as

evidenced

by

its

stability

on

coarse

grids)

and

efficient

enough

to

simulate

the

evolution

of

a

system

over

the

course

of

years

using

a

finer

spatial

grid,

in

less

than

a

day

of

processor

time

on

a

contemporary

desktop

computer.

Program

title:

Catalogue

identifier:

Program

summary

Program

obtainable

from:

CPC

Program

Library,

Queens

University,

Belfast,

N.

Ireland

Licensing

provisions:

Standard

CPC

licence,

No.

of

lines

in

distributed

program,

including

test

data,

etc.:

No.

of

bytes

in

distributed

program,

including

test

data,

etc.:

Distribution

format:

tar.gz

Programming

language:

C++or

FORTRAN.

Computer:

PCs

or

workstations.

Operating

system:

Linux

or

Windows.

Classification:

Nature

of

problem:

Simulation

of

a

self-gravitating

BoseEinstein

condensate

by

simultaneous

solution

of

the

GrossPitaevskii

and

Poisson

equations

in

three

dimensions.

Solution

method:

The

GrossPitaevskii

equation

is

solved

numerically

using

the

CrankNicholson

method;

Poissons

equation

is

solved

using

the

relaxation

method.

The

time

evolution

of

the

system

is

governed

by

the

GrossPitaevskii

equation;

the

solution

of

Poissons

equation

at

each

time

step

is

used

as

an

initial

estimate

for

the

next

time

step,

which

dramatically

increases

the

efficiency

of

the

relaxation

method.

Running

time:

Depends

on

the

chosen

size

of

the

problem.

On

a

typical

personal

computer,

a

grid

can

be

solved

with

a

time

span

of

in

approx.

a

day

of

running

time.

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

poissons equation
grosspitaevskii equation
dark matter


Resource management and control in converged optical data center networks: Survey and enabling technologies In addition to the optical interconnection among servers for the Intra Data Center (IDC), the optical interconnection of geographically distributed data centers also becomes increasingly important since data centers are geographically distributed so that one data center maybe far away from another. So the converged Optical and Data Center Network (ODCN) emerges as the times require. In the ODCN, each optically interconnected IDC locates at the edge of the optical backbone. In this article, we first make an extensive survey on the resource management and control in the ODCN, and we find that: (1) for this new network paradigm, the intelligent coexistence of heterogeneous technologies should be considered because the ODCN will be required to satisfy diverse and highly dynamic network services; (2) the integrated virtualization of backbone bandwidth and computing resources should be performed for the resource management in ODCNs, with the objective to improve the underlying infrastructure utilization; (3) after performing the integrated virtualization, a set of virtual networks are generated, and each of them has virtual lightpaths and virtual machines. But a static virtual network merely satisfies a certain range of Service Level Agreements (SLAs), and it merely adapts to a particular network status. When the SLA significantly varies or the Quality of Transmission (QoT) gets worse, it is necessary to trigger the dynamic planning for the virtual network reconfiguration; (4) to decrease the control overhead and the delay of making decisions for the dynamic planning, it is practical to embed a highly effective network control plane into intelligent ODCN. Consequently, we make a blueprint where we execute the intelligent coexistence, integrated virtualization and dynamic planning for the resource management in ODCNs. Some preliminary works and simulation results will guide the future work.

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

converged optical and data center network


Comparing Malmquist and HicksMoorsteen productivity indices: Exploring the impact of unbalanced vs. balanced panel data ? Compare Malmquist and HicksMoorsteen productivity indices on several technologies. First test of impact of balancing unbalanced panel data. First test of ability of the Malmquist index to approximate the HicksMoorsteen index. Empirical differences show up between both indices due to unbalancedness. Malmquist index offers poor empirical approximation of HicksMoorsteen index.

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

malmquist productivity index
hicksmoorsteen productivity index


Square reflection cryptanalysis of 5-round Feistel networks with permutations New distinguishers are derived for 4-round Feistel Networks with permutational round functions under a weak key condition. A new generic attack is mounted on 5-round Feistel Networks by combining the square attack and the reflection attack. Hellman tables are utilized to construct a tradeoff between the time complexity and the memory complexity of the new attack. The generic attack is applied to 5-round DEAL as a concrete example. The complexity of the attack on DEAL is 265 DES encryptions, working on a key set of cardinality 272.

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

cryptography
block cipher
feistel network
fixed point


On the time-space complexity of geometric elimination procedures In [25] and [22] a new algorithmic concept was introduced for the symbolic solution of a zero dimensional complete intersection polynomial equation system satisfying a certain generic smoothness condition. The main innovative point of this algorithmic concept consists in thp introduction nf a innovative point of this algorithmic concept consists in the introduction of a new geometric invariant, called the degree of the input system, and the proof that the most common elimination problems have time complexity which is polynomial in this degree and the length of the input. In this paper we apply this algorithmic concept in order to exhibit an elimination procedure whose space complexity is only quadratic and its time complexity is only cubic in the degree of the input system.

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

algorithmic elimination theory
polynomial equation solving
symbolic computation
algebraic complexity theory
time-space complexity
computation tree
straight-line program


the future of multiprocessor systems-on-chips This paper surveys the state-of-the-art and pending challenges in MPSoC design. Standards in communications, multimedia, networking, and other areas encourage the development of high-performance platforms that can support a range of implementations of the standard. A multiprocessor system-on-chip includes embedded processors, digital logic, and mixed-signal circuits combined into a heterogeneous multiprocessor. This mix of technologies creates a major challenge for MPSoC design teams. We will look at some existing MPSoC designs and then describe some hardware and software challenges for MPSoC designers.

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

challenge design paper software technologies mpsoc multimedia support logic hardware future multiprocessor teams circuits

communication
network
platform
signaling
survey
developer
high-performance
standardization
art
real-time
heterogeneity
digitize
processor
systems
implementation
embedded software
system-on-chip
low power
embedding


A linguistic evaluation approach for universal design Universal design (UD) is an approach for developing products and environments that are usable by all people to the greatest extent possible. It benefits users of all ages and abilities without the need for adaptation or specialized design. Although a set of acknowledged principles has been developed and commonly used by industry and academia, it is difficult to quantitatively evaluate whether a product is indeed a good example of UD. This study improves the shortcomings of traditional analytical hierarchy process (AHP) methods in quantitative judgments, priority analysis, and aggregation performance, and proposes a linguistic evaluation approach for UD. The aims of this study are (1) to construct a hierarchy for evaluation using criteria against the UD principles, (2) to develop a convenient and effective eigenvalue algorithm for deriving the weights of criteria, and (3) to aggregate preference information and rank the order of decision alternatives by using linguistic variables associated with fuzzy weighted average techniques. An empirical study is conducted to illustrate the practicability of the proposed approach. In addition to UD, the proposed linguistic evaluation approach can be used to systematically assess alternatives from criteria that are relevant to a set of qualitative attributes.

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

universal design
linguistic evaluation
eigenvalue algorithm
fuzzy weighted average


Multi-Level Planning for Semi-autonomous Vehicles in Traffic Scenarios Based on Separation Maximization The planning of semi-autonomous vehicles in traffic scenarios is a relatively new problem that contributes towards the goal of making road travel by vehicles free of human drivers. An algorithm needs to ensure optimal real time planning of multiple vehicles (moving in either direction along a road), in the presence of a complex obstacle network. Unlike other approaches, here we assume that speed lanes are not present and that different lanes do not need to be maintained for inbound and outbound traffic. Our basic hypothesis is to carry forward the planning task to ensure that a sufficient distance is maintained by each vehicle from all other vehicles, obstacles and road boundaries. We present here a 4-layer planning algorithm that consists of road selection (for selecting the individual roads of traversal to reach the goal), pathway selection (a strategy to avoid and/or overtake obstacles, road diversions and other blockages), pathway distribution (to select the position of a vehicle at every instance of time in a pathway), and trajectory generation (for generating a curve, smooth enough, to allow for the maximum possible speed). Cooperation between vehicles is handled separately at the different levels, the aim being to maximize the separation between vehicles. Simulated results exhibit behaviours of smooth, efficient and safe driving of vehicles in multiple scenarios; along with typical vehicle behaviours including following and overtaking.

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

unmanned ground vehicles
dijkstra's algorithm
optimization
robotic motion planning
nonholonomic constraints
autonomous vehicles


Integrating intrusion alert information to aid forensic explanation: An analytical intrusion detection framework for distributive IDS The objective of this research is to show an analytical intrusion detection framework (AIDF) comprised of (i) a probability model discovery approach, and (ii) a probabilistic inference mechanism for generating the most probable forensic explanation based on not only just the observed intrusion detection alerts, but also the unreported signature rules that are revealed in the probability model. The significance of the proposed probabilistic inference is its ability to integrate alert information available from IDS sensors distributed across subnets. We choose the open source Snort to illustrate its feasibility, and demonstrate the inference process applied to the intrusion detection alerts produced by Snort. Through a preliminary experimental study, we illustrate the applicability of AIDF for information integration and the realization of (i) a distributive IDS environment comprised of multiple sensors, and (ii) a mechanism for selecting and integrating the probabilistic inference results from multiple models for composing the most probable forensic explanation. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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

probabilistic inference
model discovery
intrusion detection


The effects of pre-processing of image data on self-modeling image analysis The use of chemical imaging of secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) data for self-modeling image analysis (SIA) has special challenges because of the following reasons: (a) At higher counting rates, the data are non-linear. (b) The heteroscedastic nature of the noise causes structure in the data which gives rise to extra components. (c) There is a high amount of noise in SIMS data and outliers often cause problems. This paper will discuss an adaptation of a pre-processing method to correct for heteroscedastic noise and a method to minimize the effect of outlying pixels. Examples will be given of the following: (a) Different mixtures of palmitic and stearic acid on aluminum foil. (b) A film coating of polyvinyl acetate (PVA) and polystyrene (PS). (c) A sample of copper and nickel and a fused layer. Copyright (C) 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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

chemometrics
self-modeling mixture analysis


on the critical success factors for b2b e-marketplace B2B e-marketplaces have a profound influence on the traditional market and on the way business is conducted. All kinds of e-marketplaces are emerging and developing now, and we have witnessed both successes and failures among these e-marketplaces. However, the failures are far outnumber the successes. Under this background, the paper discusses the critical success factors for operating e-marketplaces from different perspectives. It is shown that the core of e-marketplaces is to build liquidity and capture value. Based on these analyses, comprehensive critical factors including functional factors, strategic factors and technical Factors are discussed for the success of electronic marketplaces; then a tentative framework for the analysis on the critical success factors is proposed.

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


G2G information sharing among government agencies Despite its importance in government operations, G2G information sharing remains a challenge for IT professionals worldwide. While recent literature has examined this challenge in Western countries, little has been published on Eastern countries. We developed a four-layer model of G2G information sharing across horizontal functional agencies and used it to conduct an analysis of sites within Chinese contexts. Included in the model were the external environment, interagency partnership, organizational readiness, and user expectation. Through empirical testing, we found that the authority of the upper-level leadership, GuanXi, compatibility, top-management support, cost, process security, and expected risks and benefits had a significant influence on the degree of G2G information sharing. However, laws and policies, interagency trust and IT capability had no significant influence on the degree of G2G information sharing. Also, the expected benefits and the degree had positive effect on the performance of G2G information sharing while expected risks had no significant effect on the performance of G2G information sharing.

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

e-government
government to government (g2g)
realization degree
performance of g2g information sharing


Value-cell bar charts for visualizing large transaction data sets One of the common problems businesses need to solve is how to use large volumes of sales histories, Web transactions, and other data to understand the behavior of their customers and increase their revenues. Bar charts are widely used for daily analysis, but only show highly aggregated data. Users often need to visualize detailed multidimensional information reflecting the health of their businesses. In this paper, we propose an innovative visualization solution based on the use of value cells within bar charts to represent business metrics. The value of a transaction can be discretized into one or multiple cells: high-value transactions are mapped to multiple value cells, whereas many small-value transactions are combined into one cell. With value-cell bar charts, users can 1) visualize transaction value distributions and correlations, 2) identify high-value transactions and outliers at a glance, and 3) instantly display values at the transaction record level. Value-Cell Bar Charts have been applied with success to different sales and IT service usage applications, demonstrating the benefits of the technique over traditional charting techniques. A comparison with two variants of the well-known Treemap technique and our earlier work on Pixel Bar Charts is also included.

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

information visualization
multivariate visualization
visualization techniques
methodologies


Conceptualizing co-ordination and competition in supply chains as complex adaptive system A model has been developed to explore the dynamics of outsourcing strategies and specialization effects. Using transaction cost economics the literature showed that IT investments can create an incentive for a firm to pursue a specialization strategy, spinning off and outsourcing peripheral activities to focus on its core competence. Web services technology, for example, which has been explicitly designed to facilitate inter-operability of machine-to-machine communication, is expected to support such strategy. We extend this analysis proposing a research model that explicitly recognizes industry-level feedback. While specialized firms can enjoy lower production cost they are also more reliant on market conditions and interaction. This dependence exposes a specialized firm to the risk of market failure or vertical foreclose, all of which increase transaction cost. The complication from a modeling perspective has been to properly recognize industry structure and transaction cost as endogenous variables. As a solution we propose formalizing this problem as a complex adaptive system. We present a model with the firm as unit of analysis and its behavior based on micro-economic cost theory and the theory of noncooperative games. The paper follows Zmuds concept of a pure theory manuscript adapted from the Academy of Management Review (1998).

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

complex adaptive system (cas)
multi-agent system modeling
simulation
computational explanation


Collaboration - a new IT-service in the next generation of regional health care networks During the past 10-15 years, Regional Health Care Networks (RHCN) have been established in many regions throughout the world. RHCN build on well-known techniques, methodologies and appropriate standards. Most of the European Countries today have set up IT strategic plans that focus on the establishment of RHCN. The benefits of having access to all relevant information are tremendous and contribute to cost-effective and coherent health services. By the rapid spread and use of Internet, technology has made it possible to interconnect all kinds of applications. In 2000, the most experienced regions in Europe joined PICNIC, a European project to develop the Next Generation Regional Health Care Networks and to support their new ways of providing health and social care. The previous generation of Regional Health Care Networks supported the interconnection of applications by transfer of messages. Messaging is an effective means of integration for isolated high-specialised systems that only need to exchange data. This service will continue to be one of the most important services in the future health care networks. However, tighter coupling may be desirable in some instances to avoid replicating the same functionality in several applications. In other words, certain services can be common and used by a number of applications instead of building that service inside each application. These common services are called middleware services. In PICNIC (http://www.medcom.dk/picnic), a new middleware Collaboration IT service has been identified and developed. This service allows the end users to perform real-time clinical collaboration, with exchange of text, structured data, voice and images across the limits of a single region. A clinical collaboration is associated with the shared clinical context to provide a record of relevant clinical information and facilitates synchronous as well as asynchronous collaboration. This new ITservice builds on the increasing popularity of instance messaging and presence systems that facilitate smooth transition between synchronous and asynchronous interaction. The new Collaboration IT service is expected to have a strong impact on the practice of health care in the next generation of Regional Health Care Networks. (C) 2003 Published by Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd.

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

regional health care networks
picnic
collaboration it service