Query: Antipodal Vivaldi antenna for phased array antenna applications

Relevant passages:
Ultra-wideband antipodal vivaldi antenna array with Wilkinson power divider feeding network <=SEP=> In this paper, a two element antipodal Vivaldi antenna array in combination with an ultra-wideband (UWB) Wilkinson power divider feeding network is presented. The antennas are placed in a stacked configuration to provide more gain and to limit cross talk between transmit and receive antennas in radar applications. Each part can be realized with standard planar technology. For a single antenna element, a comparison in performance is done between standard FR4 and a Rogers® RO3003 substrate. The antenna spacing is obtained using the parametric optimizer of CST MWS®. The performance of the power divider and the antenna array is analyzed by means of simulations and measurements.

The Vivaldi Aerial <=SEP=> The Vivaldi Aerial is a new member of the class of aperiodic continuously scaled antenna structures and, as such, it has theoretically unlimited instantaneous frequency bandwidth. This aerial has significant gain and linear polarisation and can be made to conform to a constant gain vs. frequency performance. One such design has been made with approximately 10 dBI gain and ¿20 dB sidelobe level over an instantaneous frequency bandwidth extending from below 2 GHz to above 40 GHz.

Ultra-wideband Vivaldi arrays for see-through-wall imaging radar applications <=SEP=> Two Vivaldi antenna arrays have been presented. First is an 8-element tapered slot array covering 1.2 to 4 GHz band for STW applications for brick/concrete wall imaging. Second is a 16-element antipodal array operating at 8 to 10.6 GHz for high resolution imaging when penetrating through dry wall. Based on the two designs, and utilizing a smooth wide band slot to microstrip transition to feed the Vivaldi antenna array, a 1–10 GHz frequency band can be covered. Alternatively, the design can be used in a reconfigurable structure to cover either a 1–3 GHz or 8–10 GHz band. Experimental and measured results have been completed and will be discussed in detail. The designs will significantly impact the development of compact reconfigurable and portable systems.

Analysis of Ultra Wideband Antipodal Vivaldi Antenna Design <=SEP=> The characteristics of antipodal Vivaldi antennas with different structures and the key factors that affect the performance of the antipodal antennas have been investigated. The return loss, radiation pattern and current distribution with various elliptical loading sizes, opening rates and ground plane sizes have been analyzed and compared using full wave simulation tool. Based on the parameter study, a design that is capable of achieving a bandwidth from 2.1 GHz to 20 GHz has been identified.

A 324-Element Vivaldi Antenna Array for Radio Astronomy Instrumentation <=SEP=> This paper presents a 324-element 2-D broadside array for radio astronomy instrumentation which is sensitive to two mutually orthogonal polarizations. The array is composed of cruciform units consisting of a group of four Vivaldi antennas arranged in a cross-shaped structure. The Vivaldi antenna used in this array exhibits a radiation intensity characteristic with a symmetrical main beam of 87.5° at 3 GHz and 44.2° at 6 GHz. The measured maximum side/backlobe level is 10.3 dB below the main beam level. The array can operate at a high frequency of 5.4 GHz without the formation of grating lobes.

Finger printing on the web <=SEP=> Nowadays, companies such as Google [1] and Facebook [2] are present on most websites either through advertising services or through social plugins. They follow users around the web collecting information to create unique user profiles. This serious threat to privacy is a major cause for concern, as this reveals that there are no restrictions on the type of information that can be collected, the duration it can be stored, the people who can access it and the purpose of use or misuse. In order to determine if there indeed is any statistically significant evidence that fingerprinting occurs on certain web services, we integrated 2 software namely, FPBlock [6], a prototype browser extension that blocks web-based device fingerprinting, and AdFisher [10], an automated tool that sending out thousands of automated Web browser instances, in such a manner so that the data collected by FP-Block could be fed to AdFisher for analysis.

Cloud-assisted body area networks: state-of-the-art and future challenges <=SEP=> Body Area Networks (BANs) are emerging as enabling technology for many human-centered application domains such as health-care, sport, fitness, wellness, ergonomics, emergency, safety, security, and sociality. A BAN, which basically consists of wireless wearable sensor nodes usually coordinated by a static or mobile device, is mainly exploited to monitor single assisted livings. Data generated by a BAN can be processed in real-time by the BAN coordinator and/or transmitted to a server-side for online/offline processing and long-term storing. A network of BANs worn by a community of people produces large amount of contextual data that require a scalable and efficient approach for elaboration and storage. Cloud computing can provide a flexible storage and processing infrastructure to perform both online and offline analysis of body sensor data streams. In this paper, we motivate the introduction of Cloud-assisted BANs along with the main challenges that need to be addressed for their development and management. The current state-of-the-art is overviewed and framed according to the main requirements for effective Cloud-assisted BAN architectures. Finally, relevant open research issues in terms of efficiency, scalability, security, interoperability, prototyping, dynamic deployment and management, are discussed.

Visual and Infrared Sensor Data-Based Obstacle Detection for the Visually Impaired Using the Google Project Tango Tablet Development Kit and the Unity Engine <=SEP=> A novel visual and infrared sensor data-based system to assist visually impaired users in detecting obstacles in their path while independently navigating indoors is presented. The system has been developed for the recently introduced Google Project Tango Tablet Development Kit equipped with a powerful graphics processor and several sensors which allow it to track its motion and orientation in 3-D space in real-time. It exploits the inbuilt functionalities of the Unity engine in the Tango SDK to create a 3-D reconstruction of the surrounding environment, then associates a Unity collider component with the user and utilizes it to determine his interaction with the reconstructed mesh in order to detect obstacles. The user is warned about any detected obstacles via audio alerts. An extensive empirical evaluation of the obstacle detection component has yielded favorable results, thus, confirming the potential of this system for future development work.

BioGlass: Physiological parameter estimation using a head-mounted wearable device <=SEP=> This work explores the feasibility of using sensors embedded in Google Glass, a head-mounted wearable device, to measure physiological signals of the wearer. In particular, we develop new methods to use Glass's accelerometer, gyroscope, and camera to extract pulse and respiratory rates of 12 participants during a controlled experiment. We show it is possible to achieve a mean absolute error of 0.83 beats per minute (STD: 2.02) for heart rate and 1.18 breaths per minute (STD: 2.04) for respiration rate when considering different combinations of sensors. These results included testing across sitting, supine, and standing still postures before and after physical exercise.

Monocular Depth Estimation: A Survey <=SEP=> Monocular depth estimation is often described as an illposed and inherently ambiguous problem. Estimating depth from 2D images is a crucial step in scene reconstruction, 3D object recognition, segmentation, and detection. The problem can be framed as: given a single RGB image as input, predict a dense depth map for each pixel. This problem is worsened by the fact that most scenes have large texture and structural variations, object occlusions, and rich geometric detailing. All these factors contribute to difficulty in accurate depth estimation. In this paper, we review five papers that attempt to solve the depth estimation problem with various techniques including supervised, weakly-supervised, and unsupervised learning techniques. We then compare these papers and understand the improvements made over one another. Finally, we explore potential improvements that can aid to better solve this problem.

Cross-Cultural Software Production and Use: A Structurational Analysis <=SEP=> This paper focuses on cross-cultural software production and use, which is increasingly common in today's more globalized world. A theoretical basis for analysis is developed, using concepts drawn from structuration theory. The theory is illustrated using two cross-cultural case studies. It is argued that structurational analysis provides a deeper examination of cross-cultural working and IS than is found in the current literature, which is dominated by Hofstede-type studies, in particular, the theoretical approach can be used to analyze cross-cultural conflict and contradiction, cultural heterogeneity, detailed work patterns, and the dynamic nature of culture. The paper contributes to the growing body of literature that emphasizes the essential role of cross-cultural understanding in contemporary society. 'Michael D. Myers was the accepting senior editor for this paper. introduction There has been much debate over the last decade about the major sociat transformations taking place in the world such as the increasing interconnectedness of different societies, the compression of time and space, and an intensification of consciousness of the world as a whole (Robertson 1992), Such changes are often tabeted with the term globatization, atthough the precise nature of this phenomenon is highly complex on closer examination. For example. Beck (2000) distinguishes between globality, the change in consciousness of the world as a single entity, and globaiism, the ideology of neoliberatism which argues that the world market eliminates or supplants the importance of locat potiticat action. Despite the complexity of the globalization phenomena, all commentators would agree that information and communication technologies (ICTs) are deeply implicated in the changes that are taking ptace through their abitity to enabte new modes of work, communication, and organization MiS Quarterly Vol. 26 No. 4. pp. 359-380/December 2002 359 Walsham/Cross-Cultural Software Production & Use across time and space. For example, the influential work of Castells (1996, 1997, 1998) argues that we are in the "information age" where information generation, processing, and transformation are fundamental to societal functioning and societal change, and where ICTs enable the pervasive expansion of networking throughout the social structure. However, does globalization, and the related spread of ICTs, imply that the world is becoming a homogeneous arena for gtobat business and gtobal attitudes, with differences between organizations and societies disappearing? There are many authors who take exception to this conclusion. For exampie, Robertson (1992) discussed the way in which imported themes are indigenized in particular societies with tocat culture constraining receptivity to some ideas rather than others, and adapting them in specific ways. He cited Japan as a good example of these glocalization processes. White accepting the idea of time-space compression facilitated by ICTs, Robertson argued that one of its main consequences is an exacerbation of collisions between gtobat, societat, and communat attitudes. Simitarty, Appadural {1997), coming from a nonWestern background, argued against the gtobat homogenization thesis on the grounds that difl'erent societies witt appropriate the "materials of modernity" differently depending on their specific geographies, histories, and languages. Watsham {2001) devetoped a related argument, with a specific focus on the rote of ICTs, concluding that globat diversity needs to be a key focus when devetoping and using such technotogies. If these latter arguments are broadty correct, then working with tCTs in and across different cuttures should prove to be problematic, in that there wilt be different views ofthe relevance, appticabitity, and vatue of particular modes of working and use of ICTs which may produce conflict. For exampte, technotogy transfer from one society to another involves the importing of that technology into an "atien" cutturat context where its value may not be similarly perceived to that in its original host cutture. Simitarty, cross-cuttural communication through tCTs, or cross-cultural information systems (IS) devetopment teams, are likely to confront issues of incongruence of values and attitudes. The purpose of this paper is to examine a particular topic within the area of cross-cutturat working and tCTs, namety that of software production and use; in particutar, where the software is not devetoped in and for a specific cutturat group. A primary goat is to devetop a theoreticat basis for anatysis of this area. Key eiements of this basis, which draws on structuration theory, are described in the next section of the paper, tn order to iltustrate the theoreticat basis and its vatue in analyzing real situations, the subsequent sections draw on the field data from two published case studies of cross-cultural software development and application. There is an extensive titerature on cross-cutturat working and IS, and the penultimate section ofthe paper reviews key etements of this titerature, and shows how the anatysis of this paper makes a new contribution. In particular, it witt be argued that the structurationat analysis enabtes a more sophisticated and detailed consideration of issues in cross-culturat software production under four specific headings: cross-cultural contradiction and conflict; cultural heterogeneity; detailed work patterns in different cuttures; and the dynamic, emergent nature of cutture. The final section of the paper wilt summarize some theoretical and practical implications. Structuration Theory, Cuiture and iS The theoretical basis for this paper draws on structuration theory {Giddens 1979, 1984). This theory has been highty inftuentiat in sociology and the social sciences generalty since Giddens first developed the ideas some 20 years ago. In addition, the theory has received considerable attention in the IS field {for a good review, see Jones 1998). The focus here, however, wilt be on how structuration theory can offer a new way of looking 360 MIS Quarterly Vol. 26 No. 4/December 2002 Walsham/Cross-Cuitural Software Production & Use Table 1. Structuration Theory, Culture, and ICTs: Some Key Concepts

LTSA-WS: a tool for model-based verification of web service compositions and choreography <=SEP=> In this paper we describe a tool for a model-based approach to verifying compositions of web service implementations. The tool supports verification of properties created from design specifications and implementation models to confirm expected results from the viewpoints of both the designer and implementer. Scenarios are modeled in UML, in the form of Message Sequence Charts (MSCs), and then compiled into the Finite State Process (FSP) process algebra to concisely model the required behavior. BPEL4WS implementations are mechanically translated to FSP to allow an equivalence trace verification process to be performed. By providing early design verification and validation, the implementation, testing and deployment of web service compositions can be eased through the understanding of the behavior exhibited by the composition. The approach is implemented as a plug-in for the Eclipse development environment providing cooperating tools for specification, formal modeling, verification and validation of the composition process.

Breaking the News: First Impressions Matter on Online News <=SEP=> A growing number of people are changing the way they consume news, replacing the traditional physical newspapers and magazines by their virtual online versions or/and weblogs. The interactivity and immediacy present in online news are changing the way news are being produced and exposed by media corporations. News websites have to create effective strategies to catch people’s attention and attract their clicks. In this paper we investigate possible strategies used by online news corporations in the design of their news headlines. We analyze the content of 69,907 headlines produced by four major global media corporations during a minimum of eight consecutive months in 2014. In order to discover strategies that could be used to attract clicks, we extracted features from the text of the news headlines related to the sentiment polarity of the headline. We discovered that the sentiment of the headline is strongly related to the popularity of the news and also with the dynamics of the posted comments on that particular news.

A new method for decontamination of de novo transcriptomes using a hierarchical clustering algorithm <=SEP=> Motivation
The identification of contaminating sequences in a de novo assembly is challenging because of the absence of information on the target species. For sample types where the target organism is impossible to isolate from its matrix, such as endoparasites, endosymbionts and soil-harvested samples, contamination is unavoidable. A few post-assembly decontamination methods are currently available but are based only on alignments to databases, which can lead to poor decontamination.


Results
We present a new decontamination method based on a hierarchical clustering algorithm called MCSC. This method uses frequent patterns found in sequences to create clusters. These clusters are then linked to the target species or tagged as contaminants using classic alignment tools. The main advantage of this decontamination method is that it allows sequences to be tagged correctly even if they are unknown or misaligned to a database.


Availability and Implementation
Scripts and documentation about the MCSC decontamination method are available at https://github.com/Lafond-LapalmeJ/MCSC_Decontamination .


Contact
: benjamin.mimee@agr.gc.ca.


Supplementary information
Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.

Understanding self-reflection: how people reflect on personal data through visual data exploration <=SEP=> Rapid advancements in consumer technologies enable people to collect a wide range of personal data. With a proper means for people to ask questions and explore their data, longitudinal data feeds from multiple self-tracking tools pose great opportunities to foster deep self-reflection. However, most self-tracking tools lack support for self-reflection beyond providing simple feedback. Our overarching goal is to support self-trackers in reflecting on their data and gaining rich insights through visual data exploration. As a first step toward the goal, we built a web-based application called Visualized Self, and conducted an in-lab think-aloud study (N = 11) to examine how people reflect on their personal data and what types of insights they gain throughout the reflection. We discuss lessons learned from studying with Visualized Self, and suggest directions for designing visual data exploration tools for fostering self-reflection.

Flavonoids in food and their health benefits. <=SEP=> There has been increasing interest in the research of flavonoids from dietary sources, due to growing evidence of the versatile health benefits of flavonoids through epidemiological studies. As occurrence of flavonoids is directly associated with human daily dietary intake of antioxidants, it is important to evaluate flavonoid sources in food. Fruits and vegetables are the main dietary sources of flavonoids for humans, along with tea and wine. However, there is still difficulty in accurately measuring the daily intake of flavonoids because of the complexity of existence of flavonoids from various food sources, the diversity of dietary culture, and the occurrence of a large amount of flavonoids itself in nature. Nevertheless, research on the health aspects of flavonoids for humans is expanding rapidly. Many flavonoids are shown to have antioxidative activity, free-radical scavenging capacity, coronary heart disease prevention, and anticancer activity, while some flavonoids exhibit potential for anti-human immunodeficiency virus functions. As such research progresses. further achievements will undoubtedly lead to a new era of flavonoids in either foods or pharmaceutical supplements. Accordingly, an appropriate model for a precise assessment of intake of flavonoids needs to be developed. Most recent research has focused on the health aspects of flavonoids from food sources for humans. This paper reviews the current advances in flavonoids in food, with emphasis on health aspects on the basis of the published literature, which may provide some guidance for researchers in further investigations and for industries in developing practical health agents.

Open/Closed Eye Analysis for Drowsiness Detection <=SEP=> Drowsiness detection is vital in preventing traffic accidents. Eye state analysis - detecting whether the eye is open or closed - is critical step for drowsiness detection. In this paper, we propose an easy algorithm for pupil center and iris boundary localization and a new algorithm for eye state analysis, which we incorporate into a four step system for drowsiness detection: face detection, eye detection, eye state analysis, and drowsy decision. This new system requires no training data at any step or special cameras. Our eye detection algorithm uses Eye Map, thus achieving excellent pupil center and iris boundary localization results on the IMM database. Our novel eye state analysis algorithm detects eye state using the saturation (S) channel of the HSV color space. We analyze our eye state analysis algorithm using five video sequences and show superior results compared to the common technique based on distance between eyelids.

Indoors forensic entomology: colonization of human remains in closed environments by specific species of sarcosaprophagous flies. <=SEP=> Fly species that are commonly recovered on human corpses concealed in houses or other dwellings are often dependent on human created environments and might have special features in their biology that allow them to colonize indoor cadavers. In this study we describe nine typical cases involving forensically relevant flies on human remains found indoors in southern Finland. Eggs, larvae and puparia were reared to adult stage and determined to species. Of the five species found the most common were Lucilia sericata Meigen, Calliphora vicina Robineau-Desvoidy and Protophormia terraenovae Robineau-Desvoidy. The flesh fly Sarcophaga caerulescens Zetterstedt is reported for the first time to colonize human cadavers inside houses and a COI gene sequence based DNA barcode is provided for it to help facilitate identification in the future. Fly biology, colonization speed and the significance of indoors forensic entomological evidence are discussed.

Affordances in Grounded Language Learning <=SEP=> We present a novel methodology involving mappings between different modes of semantic representations. We propose distributional semantic models as a mechanism for representing the kind of world knowledge inherent in the system of abstract symbols characteristic of a sophisticated community of language users. Then, motivated by insight from ecological psychology, we describe a model approximating affordances, by which we mean a language learner’s direct perception of opportunities for action in an environment. We present a preliminary experiment involving mapping between these two representational modalities, and propose that our methodology can become the basis for a cognitively inspired model of grounded language learning.

LSTM-Based ECG Classification for Continuous Monitoring on Personal Wearable Devices <=SEP=> A novel ECG classification algorithm is proposed for continuous cardiac monitoring on wearable devices with limited processing capacity. The proposed solution employs a novel architecture consisting of wavelet transform and multiple LSTM recurrent neural networks (Fig. 1). Experimental evaluations show superior ECG classification performance compared to previous works. Measurements on different hardware platforms show the proposed algorithm meets timing requirements for continuous and real-time execution on wearable devices. In contrast to many compute-intensive deep-learning based approaches, the proposed algorithm is lightweight, and therefore, brings continuous monitoring with accurate LSTM-based ECG classification to wearable devices. The source code is available online [1].

Data Series Management: Fulfilling the Need for Big Sequence Analytics <=SEP=> Massive data sequence collections exist in virtually every scientific and social domain, and have to be analyzed to extract useful knowledge. However, no existing data management solution (such as relational databases, column stores, array databases, and time series management systems) can offer native support for sequences and the corresponding operators necessary for complex analytics. We argue for the need to study the theory and foundations for sequence management of big data sequences, and to build corresponding systems that will enable scalable management and analysis of very large sequence collections. To this effect, we need to develop novel techniques to efficiently support a wide range of sequence queries and mining operations, while leveraging modern hardware. The overall goal is to allow analysts across domains to tap in the goldmine of the massive and ever-growing sequence collections they (already) have.

DocChat: An Information Retrieval Approach for Chatbot Engines Using Unstructured Documents <=SEP=> Most current chatbot engines are designed to reply to user utterances based on existing utterance-response (or Q-R)1 pairs. In this paper, we present DocChat, a novel information retrieval approach for chatbot engines that can leverage unstructured documents, instead of Q-R pairs, to respond to utterances. A learning to rank model with features designed at different levels of granularity is proposed to measure the relevance between utterances and responses directly. We evaluate our proposed approach in both English and Chinese: (i) For English, we evaluate DocChat on WikiQA and QASent, two answer sentence selection tasks, and compare it with state-of-the-art methods. Reasonable improvements and good adaptability are observed. (ii) For Chinese, we compare DocChat with XiaoIce2, a famous chitchat engine in China, and side-by-side evaluation shows that DocChat is a perfect complement for chatbot engines using Q-R pairs as main source of responses.

An integrated cloud-based platform for labor monitoring and data analysis in precision agriculture <=SEP=> Harvest labor has became a prevailing cost in cherry and other Specialty Crops industry. We developed an integrated solution that provided real-time labor monitoring, payroll accrual, and labor-data-based analysis. At the core of our solution is a cloud-based information system that collects labor data from purposely designed labor monitoring devices, and visualizes real-time labor productivity data through a mobile-friendly user interface. Our solution used a proprietary process [1] to accurately associate labor data with its related worker and position under a many-to-many employment relation. We also describe our communication API and protocol, which are specifically designed to improve the reliability of data communication within an orchard. Besides its immediate benefits in improving the efficiency and accuracy of labor monitoring, our solution also enables data analysis and visualization based on harvest labor data. As an example, we discuss our approach of yield mapping based on harvest labor data. We implemented the platform and deployed the system on a cloud-based computing platform for better scalability. An early version of the system has been tested during the 2012 harvest season in cherry orchards in the U.S. Pacific Northwest Region.

PALSAR Radiometric and Geometric Calibration <=SEP=> This paper summarizes the results obtained from geometric and radiometric calibrations of the Phased-Array L-Band Synthetic Aperture Radar (PALSAR) on the Advanced Land Observing Satellite, which has been in space for three years. All of the imaging modes of the PALSAR, i.e., single, dual, and full polarimetric strip modes and scanning synthetic aperture radar (SCANSAR), were calibrated and validated using a total of 572 calibration points collected worldwide and distributed targets selected primarily from the Amazon forest. Through raw-data characterization, antenna-pattern estimation using the distributed target data, and polarimetric calibration using the Faraday rotation-free area in the Amazon, we performed the PALSAR radiometric and geometric calibrations and confirmed that the geometric accuracy of the strip mode is 9.7-m root mean square (rms), the geometric accuracy of SCANSAR is 70 m, and the radiometric accuracy is 0.76 dB from a corner-reflector analysis and 0.22 dB from the Amazon data analysis (standard deviation). Polarimetric calibration was successful, resulting in a VV/HH amplitude balance of 1.013 (0.0561 dB) with a standard deviation of 0.062 and a phase balance of 0.612deg with a standard deviation of 2.66deg .

Cascaded seven level inverter with reduced number of switches using level shifting PWM technique <=SEP=> A multilevel inverter is a power electronic device that is used for high voltage and high power applications and has many advantages like, low switching stress, low total harmonic distortion (THD). Hence, the size and bulkiness of passive filters can be reduced. This paper proposes two new topologies of a 7-level cascaded multilevel inverter with reduced number of switches than that of conventional type which has 12 switches. The topologies consist of circuits with 9 switches and 7 switches for the same 7-level output. Therefore with less number of switches, there will be a reduction in gate drive circuitry and also very few switches will be conducting for specific intervals of time. The SPWM technique is implemented using multicarrier wave signals. Level Shifted triangular waves are used in comparison with sinusoidal reference to generate Sine PWM switching sequence. The number of level shifted triangular waves depends on the number of levels in the output. i.e. for n levels, n-1 number of carrier waves. This paper uses 1 KHz SPWM pulses with a modulation index of 0.8. The circuits are simulated using SPWM technique and the effect of the harmonic spectrum is analyzed. A comparison is made for the topologies with 9 switches and 7 switches and an effective reduction in THD has been observed for the circuits with less number of switches. The THD for 9 switches is 14% and the THD for 7 switches is 12.5%. The circuits are modeled and simulated with the help of MATLAB/SIMULINK.

Gaze estimation method based on an aspherical model of the cornea: surface of revolution about the optical axis of the eye <=SEP=> A novel gaze estimation method based on a novel aspherical model of the cornea is proposed in this paper. The model is a surface of revolution about the optical axis of the eye. The calculation method is explained on the basis of the model. A prototype system for estimating the point of gaze (POG) has been developed using this method. The proposed method has been found to be more accurate than the gaze estimation method based on a spherical model of the cornea.

Evaluation of Multi-view 3D Reconstruction Software <=SEP=> A number of software solutions for reconstructing 3D models from multi-view image sets have been released in recent years. Based on an unordered collection of photographs, most of these solutions extract 3D models using structure-from-motion (SFM) algorithms. In this work, we compare the resulting 3D models qualitatively and quantitatively. To achieve these objectives, we have developed different methods of comparison for all software solutions. We discuss the perfomance and existing drawbacks. Particular attention is paid to the ability to create printable 3D models or 3D models usable for other applications.

Beautiful Math, Part 2: Aesthetic Patterns Based on Fractal Tilings <=SEP=> A fractal tiling (f-tiling) is a tiling whose boundary is fractal. This article presents two families of rare, infinitely many f-tilings. Each f-tiling is constructed by reducing tiles by a fixed scaling factor, using a single prototile, which is a segment of a regular polygon. The authors designed invariant mappings to automatically produce appealing seamless, colored patterns from such tilings.

The art of deep learning ( applied to NLP ) <=SEP=> In many regards, tuning deep-learning networks is still more an art than it is a technique. Choosing the correct hyper-parameters and getting a complex network to learn properly can be daunting to people not well versed in that art. Taking the example of entailment classification, this work will analyze different methods and tools that can be used in order to diagnose learning problems. It will aim at providing an deep understanding of some key hyper-parameters, sketch out their effects and explain how to identify recurrent problems when tuning them.

Auditing and Assessment of Data Traffic Flows in an IoT Architecture <=SEP=> Recent advances in the development of the Internet of Things and ICT have completely changed the way citizens interact with Smart City environments increasing the demand of more services and infrastructures in many different contexts. Furthermore, citizens require to be active users in a flexible smart living lab, with the possibility to access Smart City data, analyze them, perform actions and receive notifications based on automated decision-making processes. Critical problems could arise if the continuity of data flows and communication among connected IoT devices and data-driven applications is interrupted or lost, due to some devices or system malfunction or unexpected behavior. The proposed solution is a set of instruments, aimed at real-time collecting and storing IoT and Smart City data (data shadow), as well as auditing data traffic flows in an IoT Smart City Architecture, with the purpose of quantitatively monitoring the status and detecting potential anomalies and malfunctions at level of single IoT device and/or service. These instruments are the DevDash and AMMA tools, designed and realized within the Snap4City framework. Specific use cases have been provided to highlight the capabilities of these instruments in terms of data indexing, monitoring and analysis.