pwc-archive/papers-with-abstracts huggingface dataset:
DiVR: incorporating context from diverse VR scenes for human trajectory prediction
Authors: Franz Franco Gallo, Hui-Yin Wu, Lucile Sassatelli
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: Human motion prediction, motion prediction, Trajectory Modeling, Trajectory Prediction

Virtual environments provide a rich and controlled setting for collecting detailed data on human behavior, offering unique opportunities for predicting human trajectories in dynamic scenes. However, most existing approaches have overlooked the potential of these environments, focusing instead on static contexts without considering userspecific factors. Employing the CREATTIVE3D dataset, our work models trajectories recorded in virtual reality (VR) scenes for diverse situations including road-crossing tasks with user interactions and simulated visual impairments. We propose Diverse Context VR Human Motion Prediction (DiVR), a cross-modal transformer based on the Perceiver architecture that integrates both static and dynamic scene context using a heterogeneous graph convolution network. We conduct extensive experiments comparing DiVR against existing architectures including MLP, LSTM, and transformers with gaze and point cloud context. Additionally, we also stress test our model's generalizability across different users, tasks, and scenes. Results show that DiVR achieves higher accuracy and adaptability compared to other models and to static graphs. This work highlights the advantages of using VR datasets for context-aware human trajectory modeling, with potential applications in enhancing user experiences in the metaverse. Our source code is publicly available at https://gitlab.inria.fr/ffrancog/creattive3d-divr-model.
BAMAX: Backtrack Assisted Multi-Agent Exploration using Reinforcement Learning
Authors: Geetansh Kalra, Amit Patel, Atul Chaudhari, Divye Singh
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: reinforcement-learning, Reinforcement Learning

Autonomous robots collaboratively exploring an unknown environment is still an open problem. The problem has its roots in coordination among non-stationary agents, each with only a partial view of information. The problem is compounded when the multiple robots must completely explore the environment. In this paper, we introduce Backtrack Assisted Multi-Agent Exploration using Reinforcement Learning (BAMAX), a method for collaborative exploration in multi-agent systems which attempts to explore an entire virtual environment. As in the name, BAMAX leverages backtrack assistance to enhance the performance of agents in exploration tasks. To evaluate BAMAX against traditional approaches, we present the results of experiments conducted across multiple hexagonal shaped grids sizes, ranging from 10x10 to 60x60. The results demonstrate that BAMAX outperforms other methods in terms of faster coverage and less backtracking across these environments.
RLInspect: An Interactive Visual Approach to Assess Reinforcement Learning Algorithm
Authors: Geetansh Kalra, Divye Singh, Justin Jose
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: reinforcement-learning, Reinforcement Learning, Reinforcement Learning (RL)

Reinforcement Learning (RL) is a rapidly growing area of machine learning that finds its application in a broad range of domains, from finance and healthcare to robotics and gaming. Compared to other machine learning techniques, RL agents learn from their own experiences using trial and error, and improve their performance over time. However, assessing RL models can be challenging, which makes it difficult to interpret their behaviour. While reward is a widely used metric to evaluate RL models, it may not always provide an accurate measure of training performance. In some cases, the reward may seem increasing while the model's performance is actually decreasing, leading to misleading conclusions about the effectiveness of the training. To overcome this limitation, we have developed RLInspect - an interactive visual analytic tool, that takes into account different components of the RL model - state, action, agent architecture and reward, and provides a more comprehensive view of the RL training. By using RLInspect, users can gain insights into the model's behaviour, identify issues during training, and potentially correct them effectively, leading to a more robust and reliable RL system.
Physics Informed Distillation for Diffusion Models
Authors: Joshua Tian Jin Tee, Kang Zhang, Hee Suk Yoon, Dhananjaya Nagaraja Gowda, Chanwoo Kim, Chang D. Yoo
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: Dataset Generation, Image Generation

Diffusion models have recently emerged as a potent tool in generative modeling. However, their inherent iterative nature often results in sluggish image generation due to the requirement for multiple model evaluations. Recent progress has unveiled the intrinsic link between diffusion models and Probability Flow Ordinary Differential Equations (ODEs), thus enabling us to conceptualize diffusion models as ODE systems. Simultaneously, Physics Informed Neural Networks (PINNs) have substantiated their effectiveness in solving intricate differential equations through implicit modeling of their solutions. Building upon these foundational insights, we introduce Physics Informed Distillation (PID), which employs a student model to represent the solution of the ODE system corresponding to the teacher diffusion model, akin to the principles employed in PINNs. Through experiments on CIFAR 10 and ImageNet 64x64, we observe that PID achieves performance comparable to recent distillation methods. Notably, it demonstrates predictable trends concerning method-specific hyperparameters and eliminates the need for synthetic dataset generation during the distillation process. Both of which contribute to its easy-to-use nature as a distillation approach for Diffusion Models. Our code and pre-trained checkpoint are publicly available at: https://github.com/pantheon5100/pid_diffusion.git.
Developing an Effective Training Dataset to Enhance the Performance of AI-based Speaker Separation Systems
Authors: Rawad Melhem, Assef Jafar, Oumayma Al Dakkak
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: Speaker Separation

This paper addresses the challenge of speaker separation, which remains an active research topic despite the promising results achieved in recent years. These results, however, often degrade in real recording conditions due to the presence of noise, echo, and other interferences. This is because neural models are typically trained on synthetic datasets consisting of mixed audio signals and their corresponding ground truths, which are generated using computer software and do not fully represent the complexities of real-world recording scenarios. The lack of realistic training sets for speaker separation remains a major hurdle, as obtaining individual sounds from mixed audio signals is a nontrivial task. To address this issue, we propose a novel method for constructing a realistic training set that includes mixture signals and corresponding ground truths for each speaker. We evaluate this dataset on a deep learning model and compare it to a synthetic dataset. We got a 1.65 dB improvement in Scale Invariant Signal to Distortion Ratio (SI-SDR) for speaker separation accuracy in realistic mixing. Our findings highlight the potential of realistic training sets for enhancing the performance of speaker separation models in real-world scenarios.
A Fuzzy Reinforcement LSTM-based Long-term Prediction Model for Fault Conditions in Nuclear Power Plants
Authors: Siwei Li, Jiayan Fang, Yichun Wua, Wei Wang, Chengxin Li, Jiangwen Chen
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: Anomaly Detection, Decision Making, Fault Detection, Management, Scheduling

Early fault detection and timely maintenance scheduling can significantly mitigate operational risks in NPPs and enhance the reliability of operator decision-making. Therefore, it is necessary to develop an efficient Prognostics and Health Management (PHM) multi-step prediction model for predicting of system health status and prompt execution of maintenance operations. In this study, we propose a novel predictive model that integrates reinforcement learning with Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) neural networks and the Expert Fuzzy Evaluation Method. The model is validated using parameter data for 20 different breach sizes in the Main Steam Line Break (MSLB) accident condition of the CPR1000 pressurized water reactor simulation model and it demonstrates a remarkable capability in accurately forecasting NPP parameter changes up to 128 steps ahead (with a time interval of 10 seconds per step, i.e., 1280 seconds), thereby satisfying the temporal advance requirement for fault prognostics in NPPs. Furthermore, this method provides an effective reference solution for PHM applications such as anomaly detection and remaining useful life prediction.
Surprisingly Popular Voting for Concentric Rank-Order Models
Authors: Hadi Hosseini, Debmalya Mandal, Amrit Puhan
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00

An important problem on social information sites is the recovery of ground truth from individual reports when the experts are in the minority. The wisdom of the crowd, i.e. the collective opinion of a group of individuals fails in such a scenario. However, the surprisingly popular (SP) algorithm~\cite{prelec2017solution} can recover the ground truth even when the experts are in the minority, by asking the individuals to report additional prediction reports--their beliefs about the reports of others. Several recent works have extended the surprisingly popular algorithm to an equivalent voting rule (SP-voting) to recover the ground truth ranking over a set of $m$ alternatives. However, we are yet to fully understand when SP-voting can recover the ground truth ranking, and if so, how many samples (votes and predictions) it needs. We answer this question by proposing two rank-order models and analyzing the sample complexity of SP-voting under these models. In particular, we propose concentric mixtures of Mallows and Plackett-Luce models with $G (\ge 2)$ groups. Our models generalize previously proposed concentric mixtures of Mallows models with $2$ groups, and we highlight the importance of $G > 2$ groups by identifying three distinct groups (expert, intermediate, and non-expert) from existing datasets. Next, we provide conditions on the parameters of the underlying models so that SP-voting can recover ground-truth rankings with high probability, and also derive sample complexities under the same. We complement the theoretical results by evaluating SP-voting on simulated and real datasets.
A Chinese Multi-label Affective Computing Dataset Based on Social Media Network Users
Authors: Jingyi Zhou, Senlin Luo, Haofan Chen
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: Marketing, valid

Emotion and personality are central elements in understanding human psychological states. Emotions reflect an individual subjective experiences, while personality reveals relatively stable behavioral and cognitive patterns. Existing affective computing datasets often annotate emotion and personality traits separately, lacking fine-grained labeling of micro-emotions and emotion intensity in both single-label and multi-label classifications. Chinese emotion datasets are extremely scarce, and datasets capturing Chinese user personality traits are even more limited. To address these gaps, this study collected data from the major social media platform Weibo, screening 11,338 valid users from over 50,000 individuals with diverse MBTI personality labels and acquiring 566,900 posts along with the user MBTI personality tags. Using the EQN method, we compiled a multi-label Chinese affective computing dataset that integrates the same user's personality traits with six emotions and micro-emotions, each annotated with intensity levels. Validation results across multiple NLP classification models demonstrate the dataset strong utility. This dataset is designed to advance machine recognition of complex human emotions and provide data support for research in psychology, education, marketing, finance, and politics.
Generative AI for Data Augmentation in Wireless Networks: Analysis, Applications, and Case Study
Authors: Jinbo Wen, Jiawen Kang, Dusit Niyato, Yang Zhang, Jiacheng Wang, Biplab Sikdar, Ping Zhang
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: Data Augmentation, Gesture Recognition

Data augmentation is a powerful technique to mitigate data scarcity. However, owing to fundamental differences in wireless data structures, traditional data augmentation techniques may not be suitable for wireless data. Fortunately, Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) can be an effective alternative to wireless data augmentation due to its excellent data generation capability. This article systemically explores the potential and effectiveness of GenAI-driven data augmentation in wireless networks. We first briefly review data augmentation techniques, discuss their limitations in wireless networks, and introduce generative data augmentation, including reviewing GenAI models and their applications in data augmentation. We then explore the application prospects of GenAI-driven data augmentation in wireless networks from the physical, network, and application layers, which provides a GenAI-driven data augmentation architecture for each application. Subsequently, we propose a general generative diffusion model-based data augmentation framework for Wi-Fi gesture recognition, which uses transformer-based diffusion models to generate high-quality channel state information data. Furthermore, we develop residual neural network models for Wi-Fi gesture recognition to evaluate the role of augmented data and conduct a case study based on a real dataset. Simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed framework. Finally, we discuss research directions for generative data augmentation.
DEEGITS: Deep Learning based Framework for Measuring Heterogenous Traffic State in Challenging Traffic Scenarios
Authors: Muttahirul Islam, Nazmul Haque, Md. Hadiuzzaman
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: Multi-Object Tracking, Object Tracking, Transfer Learning

This paper presents DEEGITS (Deep Learning Based Heterogeneous Traffic State Measurement), a comprehensive framework that leverages state-of-the-art convolutional neural network (CNN) techniques to accurately and rapidly detect vehicles and pedestrians, as well as to measure traffic states in challenging scenarios (i.e., congestion, occlusion). In this study, we enhance the training dataset through data fusion, enabling simultaneous detection of vehicles and pedestrians. Image preprocessing and augmentation are subsequently performed to improve the quality and quantity of the dataset. Transfer learning is applied on the YOLOv8 pretrained model to increase the model's capability to identify a diverse array of vehicles. Optimal hyperparameters are obtained using the Grid Search algorithm, with the Stochastic Gradient Descent (SGD) optimizer outperforming other optimizers under these settings. Extensive experimentation and evaluation demonstrate substantial accuracy within the detection framework, with the model achieving 0.794 mAP@0.5 on the validation set and 0.786 mAP@0.5 on the test set, surpassing previous benchmarks on similar datasets. The DeepSORT multi-object tracking algorithm is incorporated to track detected vehicles and pedestrians in this study. Finally, the framework is tested to measure heterogeneous traffic states in mixed traffic conditions. Two locations with differing traffic compositions and congestion levels are selected: one motorized-dominant location with moderate density and one non-motorized-dominant location with higher density. Errors are statistically insignificant for both cases, showing correlations from 0.99 to 0.88 and 0.91 to 0.97 for heterogeneous traffic flow and speed measurements, respectively.
MIRe: Enhancing Multimodal Queries Representation via Fusion-Free Modality Interaction for Multimodal Retrieval
Authors: Yeong-Joon Ju, Ho-Joong Kim, Seong-Whan Lee
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: Image Comprehension, Information Retrieval, multimodal interaction, Retrieval

Recent multimodal retrieval methods have endowed text-based retrievers with multimodal capabilities by utilizing pre-training strategies for visual-text alignment. They often directly fuse the two modalities for cross-reference during the alignment to understand multimodal queries. However, existing methods often overlook crucial visual information due to a text-dominant issue, which overly depends on text-driven signals. In this paper, we introduce MIRe, a retrieval framework that achieves modality interaction without fusing textual features during the alignment. Our method allows the textual query to attend to visual embeddings while not feeding text-driven signals back into the visual representations. Additionally, we construct a pre-training dataset for multimodal query retrieval by transforming concise question-answer pairs into extended passages. Our experiments demonstrate that our pre-training strategy significantly enhances the understanding of multimodal queries, resulting in strong performance across four multimodal retrieval benchmarks under zero-shot settings. Moreover, our ablation studies and analyses explicitly verify the effectiveness of our framework in mitigating the text-dominant issue. Our code is publicly available: https://github.com/yeongjoonJu/MIRe
Are LLMs Prescient? A Continuous Evaluation using Daily News as the Oracle
Authors: Hui Dai, Ryan Teehan, Mengye Ren
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: RAG, Retrieval, Retrieval-augmented Generation

Many existing evaluation benchmarks for Large Language Models (LLMs) quickly become outdated due to the emergence of new models and training data. These benchmarks also fall short in assessing how LLM performance changes over time, as they consist of static questions without a temporal dimension. To address these limitations, we propose using future event prediction as a continuous evaluation method to assess LLMs' temporal generalization and forecasting abilities. Our benchmark, Daily Oracle, automatically generates question-answer (QA) pairs from daily news, challenging LLMs to predict "future" event outcomes. Our findings reveal that as pre-training data becomes outdated, LLM performance degrades over time. While Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) has the potential to enhance prediction accuracy, the performance degradation pattern persists, highlighting the need for continuous model updates.
Responsible AI in Construction Safety: Systematic Evaluation of Large Language Models and Prompt Engineering
Authors: Farouq Sammour, Jia Xu, Xi Wang, Mo Hu, Zhenyu Zhang
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: Management, Prompt Engineering

Construction remains one of the most hazardous sectors. Recent advancements in AI, particularly Large Language Models (LLMs), offer promising opportunities for enhancing workplace safety. However, responsible integration of LLMs requires systematic evaluation, as deploying them without understanding their capabilities and limitations risks generating inaccurate information, fostering misplaced confidence, and compromising worker safety. This study evaluates the performance of two widely used LLMs, GPT-3.5 and GPT-4o, across three standardized exams administered by the Board of Certified Safety Professionals (BCSP). Using 385 questions spanning seven safety knowledge areas, the study analyzes the models' accuracy, consistency, and reliability. Results show that both models consistently exceed the BCSP benchmark, with GPT-4o achieving an accuracy rate of 84.6% and GPT-3.5 reaching 73.8%. Both models demonstrate strengths in safety management systems and hazard identification and control, but exhibit weaknesses in science, mathematics, emergency response, and fire prevention. An error analysis identifies four primary limitations affecting LLM performance: lack of knowledge, reasoning flaws, memory issues, and calculation errors. Our study also highlights the impact of prompt engineering strategies, with variations in accuracy reaching 13.5% for GPT-3.5 and 7.9% for GPT-4o. However, no single prompt configuration proves universally effective. This research advances knowledge in three ways: by identifying areas where LLMs can support safety practices and where human oversight remains essential, by offering practical insights into improving LLM implementation through prompt engineering, and by providing evidence-based direction for future research and development. These contributions support the responsible integration of AI in construction safety management toward achieving zero injuries.
PerceiverS: A Multi-Scale Perceiver with Effective Segmentation for Long-Term Expressive Symbolic Music Generation
Authors: Yungang Yi, Weihua Li, Matthew Kuo, Quan Bai
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: Audio Generation, Diversity, Music Generation, Segmentation

AI-based music generation has progressed significantly in recent years. However, creating symbolic music that is both long-structured and expressive remains a considerable challenge. In this paper, we propose PerceiverS (Segmentation and Scale), a novel architecture designed to address this issue by leveraging both Effective Segmentation and Multi-Scale attention mechanisms. Our approach enhances symbolic music generation by simultaneously learning long-term structural dependencies and short-term expressive details. By combining cross-attention and self-attention in a Multi-Scale setting, PerceiverS captures long-range musical structure while preserving musical diversity. The proposed model has been evaluated using the Maestro dataset and has demonstrated improvements in generating music of conventional length with expressive nuances. The project demos and the generated music samples can be accessed through the link: https://perceivers.github.io
R3HF: Reward Redistribution for Enhancing Reinforcement Learning from Human Feedback
Authors: Jiahui Li, Tai-Wei Chang, Fengda Zhang, Kun Kuang, Long Chen
Date: 2024-11-13 00:00:00
Tasks: reinforcement-learning, Reinforcement Learning

Reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF) provides a paradigm for aligning large language models (LLMs) with human preferences. This involves the initial training of a reward model based on pairwise human feedback. The reward model is subsequently utilized in reinforcement learning to assess the scores of each generated sentence as a whole, further guiding the optimization of LLMs. However, current approaches have a significant shortcoming: \emph{They allocate a single, sparse, and delayed reward to an entire sequence of output}. This may overlook some significant individual contributions of each token towards the desired outcome. To overcome this limitation, our paper proposes a novel reward redistribution method called R3HF, which facilitates a more fine-grained, token-level reward allocation. Specifically, our method treats the reward prediction task of the reward model as a regression problem. As a result, the redistributed rewards are computed by evaluating the specific contribution of each token to the reward model's output. This detailed approach improves the model's understanding of language nuances, leading to more precise enhancements in its performance. Our method is crafted to integrate seamlessly with most current techniques while incurring minimal computational costs. Through comprehensive experiments across diverse datasets and tasks, we have verified the effectiveness and superiority of our approach.