Real-Time Video Stylization Using Object Flows.

Science.gov (United States)

Lu, Cewu; Xiao, Yao; Tang, Chi-Keung

2017-05-05

We present a real-time video stylization system and demonstrate a variety of painterly styles rendered on real video inputs. The key technical contribution lies on the object flow, which is robust to inaccurate optical flow, unknown object transformation and partial occlusion as well. Since object flows relate regions of the same object across frames, shower-door effect can be effectively reduced where painterly strokes and textures are rendered on video objects. The construction of object flows is performed in real time and automatically after applying metric learning. To reduce temporal flickering, we extend the bilateral filtering into motion bilateral filtering. We propose quantitative metrics to measure the temporal coherence on structures and textures of our stylized videos, and perform extensive experiments to compare our stylized results with baseline systems and prior works specializing in watercolor and abstraction.

Dynamic Scheduling of Object Invocations in Distributed Object Oriented Real-Time Systems

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jørgensen, Bo Nørregaard; Joosen, Wouter

1998-01-01

This paper describes some of the issues that we investigate in order to develop distributed object computing middleware for application domains where timely cooperation and coordination between objects are crucial for guaranteeing correct system behavior. In particular, issues on admission contro...

Domain-Specific Self-Reported and Objectively Measured Physical Activity in Children

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ole Sprengeler

2017-03-01

Full Text Available Little is known about the extent that different domains contribute to total sedentary (SED, light (LPA and moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA. We aimed to identify domain-specific physical activity (PA patterns in school-aged children who were assessed by questionnaire and accelerometry. For the study, 298 German school children and adolescents aged 6–17 years wore an accelerometer for one week and completed a PA recall-questionnaire for the same period. Spearman coefficients (r were used to evaluate the agreement between self-reported and objectively measured PA in five domains (transport, school hours, physical education, leisure-time, organized sports activities. School hours mainly contributed to the total objectively measured SED, LPA and MVPA (55%, 53% and 46%, respectively, whilst sports activities contributed only 24% to total MVPA. Compared to accelerometry, the proportion of self-reported LPA and MVPA during school hours was substantially underestimated but overestimated during leisure-time. The agreement of self-reported and objectively measured PA was low for total LPA (r = 0.09, 95% CI (confidence interval: −0.03–0.20 and total MVPA (r = 0.21, 95% CI: 0.10–0.32, while moderate agreement was only found for total SED (r = 0.44, 95% CI: 0.34–0.53, LPA during transport (r = 0.59; 95% CI: 0.49–0.67 and MVPA during organized sports activities (r = 0.54; 95% CI: 0.38–0.67. Since school hours mainly contribute to total SED, LPA and MVPA and self-reported LPA and MVPA during school were importantly underestimated compared to objectively measured LPA and MVPA, the application of objective measurements is compulsory to characterize the entire activity pattern of school-aged children.

Do overarching mitigation objectives dominate transport-specific targets in the EU?

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ghersi, Frédéric; McDonnell, Simon; Sassi, Olivier

2013-01-01

This research investigates if the stringent 2020 and 2050 overarching CO 2 mitigation objectives set out by the European Union dominate its 2010 to 2020 targets specific to the transportation arena, specifically its biofuel penetration objectives and gram CO 2 per kilometre emission caps. Using a dynamic recursive general equilibrium model, IMACLIM-R, we demonstrate that these overarching targets do not dominate the interim transportation targets when the carbon policy triggering compliance with the mitigation objectives boils down to the theoretical least-cost option of uniform carbon pricing. Ground transportation is confirmed as quite insensitive to high carbon prices, even when such prices are applied over a long term. It is tempting to conclude that pursuing the mitigation objectives specific to transportation will impose unnecessary costs. However, because of the second best conditions prevailing in actual economies, and of the risk of lock-in in carbon intensive trajectories, we conclude with the urgent need for some ambitious transport-specific policy design research agenda. - Highlights: ► We review the European Union’s climate and transportation policy. ► We describe the IMACLIM-R model and how it represents transport. ► We develop an EU carbon pricing scenario that meets its aggregate CO 2 targets. ► This does not require meeting biofuel nor g/km 2010 to 2020 objectives. ► We conclude on the policy implications of this apparent inefficiency

Do overarching mitigation objectives dominate transport-specific targets in the EU?

OpenAIRE

GHERSI , Frédéric; Mcdonnell , Simon; Sassi , Olivier

2013-01-01

International audience; This research investigates if the stringent 2020 and 2050 overarching CO2 mitigation objectives set out by the European Union dominate its 2010 to 2020 targets specific to the transportation arena, specifically its biofuel penetration objectives and gram CO2 per kilometre emission caps. Using a dynamic recursive general equilibrium model, IMACLIM-R, we demonstrate that these overarching targets do not dominate the interim transportation targets when the carbon policy t...

Humanoid Robotics: Real-Time Object Oriented Programming

Science.gov (United States)

Newton, Jason E.

2005-01-01

Programming of robots in today's world is often done in a procedural oriented fashion, where object oriented programming is not incorporated. In order to keep a robust architecture allowing for easy expansion of capabilities and a truly modular design, object oriented programming is required. However, concepts in object oriented programming are not typically applied to a real time environment. The Fujitsu HOAP-2 is the test bed for the development of a humanoid robot framework abstracting control of the robot into simple logical commands in a real time robotic system while allowing full access to all sensory data. In addition to interfacing between the motor and sensory systems, this paper discusses the software which operates multiple independently developed control systems simultaneously and the safety measures which keep the humanoid from damaging itself and its environment while running these systems. The use of this software decreases development time and costs and allows changes to be made while keeping results safe and predictable.

The active blind spot camera: hard real-time recognition of moving objects from a moving camera

OpenAIRE

Van Beeck, Kristof; Goedemé, Toon; Tuytelaars, Tinne

2014-01-01

This PhD research focuses on visual object recognition under specific demanding conditions. The object to be recognized as well as the camera move, and the time available for the recognition task is extremely short. This generic problem is applied here on a specific problem: the active blind spot camera. Statistics show a large number of accidents with trucks are related to the so-called blind spot, the area around the vehicle in which vulnerable road users are hard to perceive by the truck d...

Comparison of Objectively Measured and Self-reported Time Spent Sitting

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Lagersted-Olsen, Julie; Korshøj, M; Skotte, J

2014-01-01

Until recently, methods for objective quantification of sitting time have been lacking. The aim of this study was to validate self-reported measures against objectively measured total sitting time and longest continuous time with uninterrupted sitting during working hours, leisure time on workday...... a retrospective 7-day questionnaire. A generalized linear model showed the difference between the methods. No significant correlations were found between objective and self-reported sitting time (r...

Category Specificity in Normal Episodic Learning: Applications to Object Recognition and Category-Specific Agnosia

Science.gov (United States)

Bukach, Cindy M.; Bub, Daniel N.; Masson, Michael E. J.; Lindsay, D. Stephen

2004-01-01

Studies of patients with category-specific agnosia (CSA) have given rise to multiple theories of object recognition, most of which assume the existence of a stable, abstract semantic memory system. We applied an episodic view of memory to questions raised by CSA in a series of studies examining normal observers' recall of newly learned attributes…

Patterns of muscle activity underlying object-specific grasp by the macaque monkey.

Science.gov (United States)

Brochier, T; Spinks, R L; Umilta, M A; Lemon, R N

2004-09-01

During object grasp, a coordinated activation of distal muscles is required to shape the hand in relation to the physical properties of the object. Despite the fundamental importance of the grasping action, little is known of the muscular activation patterns that allow objects of different sizes and shapes to be grasped. In a study of two adult macaque monkeys, we investigated whether we could distinguish between EMG activation patterns associated with grasp of 12 differently shaped objects, chosen to evoke a wide range of grasping postures. Each object was mounted on a horizontal shuttle held by a weak spring (load force 1-2 N). Objects were located in separate sectors of a "carousel," and inter-trial rotation of the carousel allowed sequential presentation of the objects in pseudorandom order. EMG activity from 10 to 12 digit, hand, and arm muscles was recorded using chronically implanted electrodes. We show that the grasp of different objects was characterized by complex but distinctive patterns of EMG activation. Cluster analysis shows that these object-related EMG patterns were specific and consistent enough to identify the object unequivocally from the EMG recordings alone. EMG-based object identification required a minimum of six EMGs from simultaneously recorded muscles. EMG patterns were consistent across recording sessions in a given monkey but showed some differences between animals. These results identify the specific patterns of activity required to achieve distinct hand postures for grasping, and they open the way to our understanding of how these patterns are generated by the central motor network.

RTDB: A memory resident real-time object database

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Nogiec, Jerzy M.; Desavouret, Eugene

2003-01-01

RTDB is a fast, memory-resident object database with built-in support for distribution. It constitutes an attractive alternative for architecting real-time solutions with multiple, possibly distributed, processes or agents sharing data. RTDB offers both direct and navigational access to stored objects, with local and remote random access by object identifiers, and immediate direct access via object indices. The database supports transparent access to objects stored in multiple collaborating dispersed databases and includes a built-in cache mechanism that allows for keeping local copies of remote objects, with specifiable invalidation deadlines. Additional features of RTDB include a trigger mechanism on objects that allows for issuing events or activating handlers when objects are accessed or modified and a very fast, attribute based search/query mechanism. The overall architecture and application of RTDB in a control and monitoring system is presented

Enhancing State-of-the-art Multi-objective Optimization Algorithms by Applying Domain Specific Operators

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ghoreishi, Newsha; Sørensen, Jan Corfixen; Jørgensen, Bo Nørregaard

2015-01-01

optimization problems where the environment does not change dynamically. For that reason, the requirement for convergence in static optimization problems is not as timecritical as for dynamic optimization problems. Most MOEAs use generic variables and operators that scale to static multi-objective optimization...... problem. The domain specific operators only encode existing knowledge about the environment. A comprehensive comparative study is provided to evaluate the results of applying the CONTROLEUM-GA compared to NSGAII, e-NSGAII and e- MOEA. Experimental results demonstrate clear improvements in convergence time...

Time and multiple objectives in scheduling and routing problems

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Dabia, S.

2012-01-01

Many optimization problems encountered in practice are multi-objective by nature, i.e., different objectives are conflicting and equally important. Many times, it is not desirable to drop some of them or to optimize them in a composite single objective or hierarchical manner. Furthermore, cost

Tracking multiple objects is limited only by object spacing, not by speed, time, or capacity.

Science.gov (United States)

Franconeri, S L; Jonathan, S V; Scimeca, J M

2010-07-01

In dealing with a dynamic world, people have the ability to maintain selective attention on a subset of moving objects in the environment. Performance in such multiple-object tracking is limited by three primary factors-the number of objects that one can track, the speed at which one can track them, and how close together they can be. We argue that this last limit, of object spacing, is the root cause of all performance constraints in multiple-object tracking. In two experiments, we found that as long as the distribution of object spacing is held constant, tracking performance is unaffected by large changes in object speed and tracking time. These results suggest that barring object-spacing constraints, people could reliably track an unlimited number of objects as fast as they could track a single object.

Design Specifications for Adaptive Real-Time Systems

Science.gov (United States)

1991-12-01

TICfl \\ E CT E Design Specifications for JAN’\\ 1992 Adaptive Real - Time Systems fl Randall W. Lichota U, Alice H. Muntz - December 1991 \\ \\\\/ 0 / r...268-2056 Technical Report CMU/SEI-91-TR-20 ESD-91-TR-20 December 1991 Design Specifications for Adaptive Real - Time Systems Randall W. Lichota Hughes...Design Specifications for Adaptive Real - Time Systems Abstract: The design specification method described in this report treats a software

A Real-Time Method to Estimate Speed of Object Based on Object Detection and Optical Flow Calculation

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, Kaizhan; Ye, Yunming; Li, Xutao; Li, Yan

2018-04-01

In recent years Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) has been widely used in computer vision field and makes great progress in lots of contents like object detection and classification. Even so, combining Convolutional Neural Network, which means making multiple CNN frameworks working synchronously and sharing their output information, could figure out useful message that each of them cannot provide singly. Here we introduce a method to real-time estimate speed of object by combining two CNN: YOLOv2 and FlowNet. In every frame, YOLOv2 provides object size; object location and object type while FlowNet providing the optical flow of whole image. On one hand, object size and object location help to select out the object part of optical flow image thus calculating out the average optical flow of every object. On the other hand, object type and object size help to figure out the relationship between optical flow and true speed by means of optics theory and priori knowledge. Therefore, with these two key information, speed of object can be estimated. This method manages to estimate multiple objects at real-time speed by only using a normal camera even in moving status, whose error is acceptable in most application fields like manless driving or robot vision.

Time coordination of heterogeneous distance protections using a domain specific language

OpenAIRE

Marcin Kowalski; Jan Magott

2012-01-01

BACKGROUND: Distance protections are widely used in protection of energy transmission lines, but their time coordination is still an important and difficult problem. Inappropriate configuration leads to a hazard event: remote circuit breaker tripping provided the local circuit breaker can be opened, which severely impairs power system operation.OBJECTIVE: To describe a method and provide software tools to alleviate the hazard in power systems.METHODS: A domain specific language (DSL) for repr...

Improving a real-time object detector with compact temporal information

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ahrnbom, Martin; Jensen, Morten Bornø; Åström, Kalle

2017-01-01

Neural networks designed for real-time object detection have recently improved significantly, but in practice, look- ing at only a single RGB image at the time may not be ideal. For example, when detecting objects in videos, a foreground detection algorithm can be used to obtain compact temporal......, a problem this approach is well suited for. The ac- curacy was found to improve significantly (up to 66%), with a roughly 40% increase in computational time....

Configuration management issues and objectives for a real-time research flight test support facility

Science.gov (United States)

Yergensen, Stephen; Rhea, Donald C.

1988-01-01

Presented are some of the critical issues and objectives pertaining to configuration management for the NASA Western Aeronautical Test Range (WATR) of Ames Research Center. The primary mission of the WATR is to provide a capability for the conduct of aeronautical research flight test through real-time processing and display, tracking, and communications systems. In providing this capability, the WATR must maintain and enforce a configuration management plan which is independent of, but complimentary to, various research flight test project configuration management systems. A primary WATR objective is the continued development of generic research flight test project support capability, wherein the reliability of WATR support provided to all project users is a constant priority. Therefore, the processing of configuration change requests for specific research flight test project requirements must be evaluated within a perspective that maintains this primary objective.

Real time object localization based on histogram of s-RGB

Science.gov (United States)

Mudjirahardjo, Panca; Suyono, Hadi; Setyawan, Raden Arief

2017-09-01

Object localization is the first task in pattern detection and recognition. This task is very important due to it reduces the searching time to the interest object. In this paper we introduce our novel method of object localization based on color feature. Our novel method is a histogram of s-RGB. This histogram is used in the training phase to determine the color dominant in the initial Region of Interest (ROI). Then this information is used to label the interest object. To reduce noise and localize the interest object, we apply the row and column density function of pixels. The comparison result with some processes, our system gives a best result and takes a short computation time of 26.56 ms, in the video rate of 15 frames per second (fps).

Deficits in Coordinative Bimanual Timing Precision in Children With Specific Language Impairment.

Science.gov (United States)

Vuolo, Janet; Goffman, Lisa; Zelaznik, Howard N

2017-02-01

Our objective was to delineate components of motor performance in specific language impairment (SLI); specifically, whether deficits in timing precision in one effector (unimanual tapping) and in two effectors (bimanual clapping) are observed in young children with SLI. Twenty-seven 4- to 5-year-old children with SLI and 21 age-matched peers with typical language development participated. All children engaged in a unimanual tapping and a bimanual clapping timing task. Standard measures of language and motor performance were also obtained. No group differences in timing variability were observed in the unimanual tapping task. However, compared with typically developing peers, children with SLI were more variable in their timing precision in the bimanual clapping task. Nine of the children with SLI performed greater than 1 SD below the mean on a standardized motor assessment. The children with low motor performance showed the same profile as observed across all children with SLI, with unaffected unimanual and impaired bimanual timing precision. Although unimanual timing is unaffected, children with SLI show a deficit in timing that requires bimanual coordination. We propose that the timing deficits observed in children with SLI are associated with the increased demands inherent in bimanual performance.

Atypical right hemisphere specialization for object representations in an adolescent with specific language impairment

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Timothy T. Brown

2014-02-01

Full Text Available Individuals with a diagnosis of specific language impairment (SLI show abnormal spoken language occurring alongside normal nonverbal abilities. Behaviorally, people with SLI exhibit diverse profiles of impairment involving phonological, grammatical, syntactic, and semantic aspects of language. In this study, we used a multimodal neuroimaging technique called anatomically constrained magnetoencephalography (aMEG to measure the dynamic functional brain organization of an adolescent with SLI. Using single-subject statistical maps of cortical activity, we compared this patient to a sibling and to a cohort of typically developing subjects during the performance of tasks designed to evoke semantic representations of concrete objects. Localized, real-time patterns of brain activity within the language impaired patient showed marked differences from the typical functional organization, with significant engagement of right hemisphere heteromodal cortical regions generally homotopic to the left hemisphere areas that usually show the greatest activity for such tasks. Functional neuroanatomical differences were evident at early sensoriperceptual processing stages and continued through later cognitive stages, observed specifically at latencies typically associated with semantic encoding operations. Our findings show with real-time temporal specificity evidence for an atypical right hemisphere specialization for the representation of concrete entities, independent of verbal motor demands. More broadly, our results demonstrate the feasibility and potential utility of using aMEG to characterize individual patient differences in the dynamic functional organization of the brain.

Holographic cinematography of time-varying reflecting and time-varying phase objects using a Nd:YAG laser

Science.gov (United States)

Decker, A. J.

1982-01-01

The use of a Nd:YAG laser to record holographic motion pictures of time-varying reflecting objects and time-varying phase objects is discussed. Sample frames from both types of holographic motion pictures are presented. The holographic system discussed is intended for three-dimensional flow visualization of the time-varying flows that occur in jet-engine components.

Predictive coding of visual object position ahead of moving objects revealed by time-resolved EEG decoding.

Science.gov (United States)

Hogendoorn, Hinze; Burkitt, Anthony N

2018-05-01

Due to the delays inherent in neuronal transmission, our awareness of sensory events necessarily lags behind the occurrence of those events in the world. If the visual system did not compensate for these delays, we would consistently mislocalize moving objects behind their actual position. Anticipatory mechanisms that might compensate for these delays have been reported in animals, and such mechanisms have also been hypothesized to underlie perceptual effects in humans such as the Flash-Lag Effect. However, to date no direct physiological evidence for anticipatory mechanisms has been found in humans. Here, we apply multivariate pattern classification to time-resolved EEG data to investigate anticipatory coding of object position in humans. By comparing the time-course of neural position representation for objects in both random and predictable apparent motion, we isolated anticipatory mechanisms that could compensate for neural delays when motion trajectories were predictable. As well as revealing an early neural position representation (lag 80-90 ms) that was unaffected by the predictability of the object's trajectory, we demonstrate a second neural position representation at 140-150 ms that was distinct from the first, and that was pre-activated ahead of the moving object when it moved on a predictable trajectory. The latency advantage for predictable motion was approximately 16 ± 2 ms. To our knowledge, this provides the first direct experimental neurophysiological evidence of anticipatory coding in human vision, revealing the time-course of predictive mechanisms without using a spatial proxy for time. The results are numerically consistent with earlier animal work, and suggest that current models of spatial predictive coding in visual cortex can be effectively extended into the temporal domain. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Site-Specific Analyses for Demonstrating Compliance with 10 CFR 61 Performance Objectives - 12179

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Grossman, C.J.; Esh, D.W.; Yadav, P.; Carrera, A.G. [U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 11545 Rockville Pike, Rockville, MD 20852 (United States)

2012-07-01

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is proposing to amend its regulations at 10 CFR Part 61 to require low-level radioactive waste disposal facilities to conduct site-specific analyses to demonstrate compliance with the performance objectives in Subpart C. The amendments would require licensees to conduct site-specific analyses for protection of the public and inadvertent intruders as well as analyses for long-lived waste. The amendments would ensure protection of public health and safety, while providing flexibility to demonstrate compliance with the performance objectives, for current and potential future waste streams. NRC staff intends to submit proposed rule language and associated regulatory basis to the Commission for its approval in early 2012. The NRC staff also intends to develop associated guidance to accompany any proposed amendments. The guidance is intended to supplement existing low-level radioactive waste guidance on issues pertinent to conducting site-specific analyses to demonstrate compliance with the performance objectives. The guidance will facilitate implementation of the proposed amendments by licensees and assist competent regulatory authorities in reviewing the site-specific analyses. Specifically, the guidance provides staff recommendations on general considerations for the site-specific analyses, modeling issues for assessments to demonstrate compliance with the performance objectives including the performance assessment, intruder assessment, stability assessment, and analyses for long-lived waste. This paper describes the technical basis for changes to the rule language and the proposed guidance associated with implementation of the rule language. The NRC staff, per Commission direction, intends to propose amendments to 10 CFR Part 61 to require licensees to conduct site-specific analyses to demonstrate compliance with performance objectives for the protection of public health and the environment. The amendments would require a

The specifics of the Russian market of confectionery: subject-object certainty

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tsarenko Elena

2012-12-01

Full Text Available This article describes a study of the Russian confectionery market. Determining the specificity of the market in Russia, identified and examined the components of this market with the help of subject - object orientation. As well as the actuality of considering new approaches to promote sales of confectionery products.

Category-specificity in visual object recognition

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gerlach, Christian

2009-01-01

Are all categories of objects recognized in the same manner visually? Evidence from neuropsychology suggests they are not: some brain damaged patients are more impaired in recognizing natural objects than artefacts whereas others show the opposite impairment. Category-effects have also been...... demonstrated in neurologically intact subjects, but the findings are contradictory and there is no agreement as to why category-effects arise. This article presents a Pre-semantic Account of Category Effects (PACE) in visual object recognition. PACE assumes two processing stages: shape configuration (the...... binding of shape elements into elaborate shape descriptions) and selection (among competing representations in visual long-term memory), which are held to be differentially affected by the structural similarity between objects. Drawing on evidence from clinical studies, experimental studies...

Time-dependent inhomogeneous jet models for BL Lac objects

Science.gov (United States)

Marlowe, A. T.; Urry, C. M.; George, I. M.

1992-05-01

Relativistic beaming can explain many of the observed properties of BL Lac objects (e.g., rapid variability, high polarization, etc.). In particular, the broadband radio through X-ray spectra are well modeled by synchrotron-self Compton emission from an inhomogeneous relativistic jet. We have done a uniform analysis on several BL Lac objects using a simple but plausible inhomogeneous jet model. For all objects, we found that the assumed power-law distribution of the magnetic field and the electron density can be adjusted to match the observed BL Lac spectrum. While such models are typically unconstrained, consideration of spectral variability strongly restricts the allowed parameters, although to date the sampling has generally been too sparse to constrain the current models effectively. We investigate the time evolution of the inhomogeneous jet model for a simple perturbation propagating along the jet. The implications of this time evolution model and its relevance to observed data are discussed.

Modular specification of real-time systems

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Inal, Recep

1994-01-01

Duration Calculus, a real-time interval logic, has been embedded in the Z specification language to provide a notation for real-time systems that combines the modularisation and abstraction facilities of Z with a logic suitable for reasoning about real-time properties. In this article the notation...

Development and investigation of aggregate models for nuclear objects with time shifts

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gharakhanlou, J.; Kazachkov, I.V.

2012-01-01

The development and investigation of aggregate models for nuclear objects with shift arguments are discussed.The nonlinear differential equations of the model are described and the Cauchy problem is stated. The specific feature of the mathematical model for potentially hazardous nuclear objects are analyzed and computer simulation is presented

Stimulus Dependency of Object-Evoked Responses in Human Visual Cortex: An Inverse Problem for Category Specificity

Science.gov (United States)

Graewe, Britta; De Weerd, Peter; Farivar, Reza; Castelo-Branco, Miguel

2012-01-01

Many studies have linked the processing of different object categories to specific event-related potentials (ERPs) such as the face-specific N170. Despite reports showing that object-related ERPs are influenced by visual stimulus features, there is consensus that these components primarily reflect categorical aspects of the stimuli. Here, we re-investigated this idea by systematically measuring the effects of visual feature manipulations on ERP responses elicited by both structure-from-motion (SFM)-defined and luminance-defined object stimuli. SFM objects elicited a novel component at 200–250 ms (N250) over parietal and posterior temporal sites. We found, however, that the N250 amplitude was unaffected by restructuring SFM stimuli into meaningless objects based on identical visual cues. This suggests that this N250 peak was not uniquely linked to categorical aspects of the objects, but is strongly determined by visual stimulus features. We provide strong support for this hypothesis by parametrically manipulating the depth range of both SFM- and luminance-defined object stimuli and showing that the N250 evoked by SFM stimuli as well as the well-known N170 to static faces were sensitive to this manipulation. Importantly, this effect could not be attributed to compromised object categorization in low depth stimuli, confirming a strong impact of visual stimulus features on object-related ERP signals. As ERP components linked with visual categorical object perception are likely determined by multiple stimulus features, this creates an interesting inverse problem when deriving specific perceptual processes from variations in ERP components. PMID:22363479

Object instance recognition using motion cues and instance specific appearance models

Science.gov (United States)

Schumann, Arne

2014-03-01

In this paper we present an object instance retrieval approach. The baseline approach consists of a pool of image features which are computed on the bounding boxes of a query object track and compared to a database of tracks in order to find additional appearances of the same object instance. We improve over this simple baseline approach in multiple ways: 1) we include motion cues to achieve improved robustness to viewpoint and rotation changes, 2) we include operator feedback to iteratively re-rank the resulting retrieval lists and 3) we use operator feedback and location constraints to train classifiers and learn an instance specific appearance model. We use these classifiers to further improve the retrieval results. The approach is evaluated on two popular public datasets for two different applications. We evaluate person re-identification on the CAVIAR shopping mall surveillance dataset and vehicle instance recognition on the VIVID aerial dataset and achieve significant improvements over our baseline results.

Effect of objective function on multi-objective inverse planning of radiation therapy

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Li Guoli; Wu Yican; Song Gang; Wang Shifang

2006-01-01

There are two kinds of objective functions in radiotherapy inverse planning: dose distribution-based and Dose-Volume Histogram (DVH)-based functions. The treatment planning in our days is still a trial and error process because the multi-objective problem is solved by transforming it into a single objective problem using a specific set of weights for each object. This work investigates the problem of objective function setting based on Pareto multi-optimization theory, and compares the effect on multi-objective inverse planning of those two kinds of objective functions including calculation time, converge speed, etc. The basis of objective function setting on inverse planning is discussed. (authors)

A reaction time advantage for calculating beliefs over public representations signals domain specificity for 'theory of mind'.

Science.gov (United States)

Cohen, Adam S; German, Tamsin C

2010-06-01

In a task where participants' overt task was to track the location of an object across a sequence of events, reaction times to unpredictable probes requiring an inference about a social agent's beliefs about the location of that object were obtained. Reaction times to false belief situations were faster than responses about the (false) contents of a map showing the location of the object (Experiment 1) and about the (false) direction of an arrow signaling the location of the object (Experiment 2). These results are consistent with developmental, neuro-imaging and neuropsychological evidence that there exist domain specific mechanisms within human cognition for encoding and reasoning about mental states. Specialization of these mechanisms may arise from either core cognitive architecture or via the accumulation of expertise in the social domain.

Specification and Automated Verification of Real-Time Behaviour

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kristensen, C.H.; Andersen, J.H.; Skou, A.

1995-01-01

In this paper we sketch a method for specification and automatic verification of real-time software properties.......In this paper we sketch a method for specification and automatic verification of real-time software properties....

Specification and Automated Verification of Real-Time Behaviour

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Andersen, J.H.; Kristensen, C.H.; Skou, A.

1996-01-01

In this paper we sketch a method for specification and automatic verification of real-time software properties.......In this paper we sketch a method for specification and automatic verification of real-time software properties....

Online decoding of object-based attention using real-time fMRI.

Science.gov (United States)

Niazi, Adnan M; van den Broek, Philip L C; Klanke, Stefan; Barth, Markus; Poel, Mannes; Desain, Peter; van Gerven, Marcel A J

2014-01-01

Visual attention is used to selectively filter relevant information depending on current task demands and goals. Visual attention is called object-based attention when it is directed to coherent forms or objects in the visual field. This study used real-time functional magnetic resonance imaging for moment-to-moment decoding of attention to spatially overlapped objects belonging to two different object categories. First, a whole-brain classifier was trained on pictures of faces and places. Subjects then saw transparently overlapped pictures of a face and a place, and attended to only one of them while ignoring the other. The category of the attended object, face or place, was decoded on a scan-by-scan basis using the previously trained decoder. The decoder performed at 77.6% accuracy indicating that despite competing bottom-up sensory input, object-based visual attention biased neural patterns towards that of the attended object. Furthermore, a comparison between different classification approaches indicated that the representation of faces and places is distributed rather than focal. This implies that real-time decoding of object-based attention requires a multivariate decoding approach that can detect these distributed patterns of cortical activity. © 2013 Federation of European Neuroscience Societies and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Worst-case execution time analysis-driven object cache design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Huber, Benedikt; Puffitsch, Wolfgang; Schoeberl, Martin

2012-01-01

result in a WCET analysis‐friendly design. Aiming for a time‐predictable design, we therefore propose to employ WCET analysis techniques for the design space exploration of processor architectures. We evaluated different object cache configurations using static analysis techniques. The number of field......Hard real‐time systems need a time‐predictable computing platform to enable static worst‐case execution time (WCET) analysis. All performance‐enhancing features need to be WCET analyzable. However, standard data caches containing heap‐allocated data are very hard to analyze statically....... In this paper we explore a new object cache design, which is driven by the capabilities of static WCET analysis. Simulations of standard benchmarks estimating the expected average case performance usually drive computer architecture design. The design decisions derived from this methodology do not necessarily...

Ranking Specific Sets of Objects.

Science.gov (United States)

Maly, Jan; Woltran, Stefan

2017-01-01

Ranking sets of objects based on an order between the single elements has been thoroughly studied in the literature. In particular, it has been shown that it is in general impossible to find a total ranking - jointly satisfying properties as dominance and independence - on the whole power set of objects. However, in many applications certain elements from the entire power set might not be required and can be neglected in the ranking process. For instance, certain sets might be ruled out due to hard constraints or are not satisfying some background theory. In this paper, we treat the computational problem whether an order on a given subset of the power set of elements satisfying different variants of dominance and independence can be found, given a ranking on the elements. We show that this problem is tractable for partial rankings and NP-complete for total rankings.

Guidance and methods for satisfying low specific activity material and surface contaminated object regulatory requirements

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Pope, R.B.; Shappert, L.B.; Michelhaugh, R.D.; Boyle, R.W.; Easton, E.P.; Coodk, J.R.

1998-01-01

The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) have prepared a comprehensive set of draft guidance for shippers and inspectors to use when applying the newly imposed regulatory requirements for low specific activity (LSA) material and surface contaminated objects (SCOs). These requirements represent significant departures in some areas from the manner in which these materials and objects were regulated by the earlier versions of the regulations. The proper interpretation and application of the regulatory criteria can require a fairly complex set of decisions be made. To assist those trying these regulatory requirements, a detailed set of logic-flow diagrams representing decisions related to multiple factors were prepared and included in the draft report for comment on Categorizing and Transporting Low Specific Activity Materials and Surface Contaminated Objects, (DOT/NRC, 1997). These logic-flow diagrams, as developed, are specific to the U.S. regulations, but were readily adaptable to the IAEA regulations. The diagrams have been modified accordingly and tied directly to specific paragraphs in IAEA Safety Series No. 6. This paper provides the logic-flow diagrams adapted in the IAEA regulations, and demonstrated how these diagrams can be used to assist consignors and inspectors in assessing compliance of shipments with the LSA material and SCO regulatory requirements. (authors)

The USL NASA PC R and D project: Detailed specifications of objects

Science.gov (United States)

Dominick, Wayne D. (Editor); Chum, Frank Y.; Hall, Philip P.; Moreau, Dennis R.; Triantafyllopoulos, Spiros

1984-01-01

The specifications for a number of projects which are to be implemented within the University of Southwestern Louisiana NASA PC R and D Project are discussed. The goals and objectives of the PC development project and the interrelationships of the various components are discussed. Six projects are described. They are a NASA/RECON simulator, a user interface to multiple remote information systems, evaluation of various personal computer systems, statistical analysis software development, interactive presentation system development, and the development of a distributed processing environment. The relationships of these projects to one another and to the goals and objectives of the overall project are discussed.

The USL NASA PC R and D project: General specifications of objectives

Science.gov (United States)

Dominick, Wayne D. (Editor)

1984-01-01

Given here are the general specifications of the objectives of the University of Southwestern Louisiana Data Base Management System (USL/DBMS) NASA PC R and D Project, a project initiated to address future R and D issues related to PC-based processing environments acquired pursuant to the NASA contract work; namely, the IBM PC/XT systems.

Identification of Auditory Object-Specific Attention from Single-Trial Electroencephalogram Signals via Entropy Measures and Machine Learning

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yun Lu

2018-05-01

Full Text Available Existing research has revealed that auditory attention can be tracked from ongoing electroencephalography (EEG signals. The aim of this novel study was to investigate the identification of peoples’ attention to a specific auditory object from single-trial EEG signals via entropy measures and machine learning. Approximate entropy (ApEn, sample entropy (SampEn, composite multiscale entropy (CmpMSE and fuzzy entropy (FuzzyEn were used to extract the informative features of EEG signals under three kinds of auditory object-specific attention (Rest, Auditory Object1 Attention (AOA1 and Auditory Object2 Attention (AOA2. The linear discriminant analysis and support vector machine (SVM, were used to construct two auditory attention classifiers. The statistical results of entropy measures indicated that there were significant differences in the values of ApEn, SampEn, CmpMSE and FuzzyEn between Rest, AOA1 and AOA2. For the SVM-based auditory attention classifier, the auditory object-specific attention of Rest, AOA1 and AOA2 could be identified from EEG signals using ApEn, SampEn, CmpMSE and FuzzyEn as features and the identification rates were significantly different from chance level. The optimal identification was achieved by the SVM-based auditory attention classifier using CmpMSE with the scale factor τ = 10. This study demonstrated a novel solution to identify the auditory object-specific attention from single-trial EEG signals without the need to access the auditory stimulus.

Compiling graphical real-time specifications into silicon

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Fränzle, Martin; Lüth, Karsten

1998-01-01

The basic algorithms underlying an automatic hardware synthesis environment using fully formal graphical requirements specifications as source language are outlined. The source language is real-time symbolic timing diagrams [FeyerabendJosko97], which are a metric-time temporal logic such that hard...

Context-specific outdoor time and physical activity among school-children across gender and age: Using accelerometers and GPS to advance methods

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Charlotte Demant Klinker

2014-03-01

Full Text Available Introduction: Being outdoors has a positive influence on health among children. Evidence in this area is limited and many studies have used self-reported measures. Objective context-specific assessment of physical activity patterns and correlates, such as outdoor time, may progress this field.Aims: To employ novel objective measures to assess age and gender differences in context-specific outdoor weekday behavior patterns among school-children (outdoor time and outdoor MVPA and to investigate associations between context-specific outdoor time and MVPA.Methods: A total of 170 children had at least one weekday of nine hours combined accelerometer and GPS data and were included in the analyses. The data were processed using the Personal Activity and Location Measurement System and a purpose-built PostgreSQL database resulting in context-specific measures for outdoor time, outdoor MVPA and overall daily MVPA. In addition, four domains (leisure, school, transport and home and 11 subdomains (e.g. urban green space, sports facilities were created and assessed. Multilevel analyses provided results on age and gender differences and the association between outdoor time and MVPA.Results: Girls compared to boys had fewer outdoors minutes (pConclusion:A new methodology to assess context-specific outdoor time and physical activity patterns has been developed and can be expanded to other populations. Different context-specific patterns were found for gender and age, suggesting different strategies may be needed to promote physical activity

A unified computational model of the development of object unity, object permanence, and occluded object trajectory perception.

Science.gov (United States)

Franz, A; Triesch, J

2010-12-01

The perception of the unity of objects, their permanence when out of sight, and the ability to perceive continuous object trajectories even during occlusion belong to the first and most important capacities that infants have to acquire. Despite much research a unified model of the development of these abilities is still missing. Here we make an attempt to provide such a unified model. We present a recurrent artificial neural network that learns to predict the motion of stimuli occluding each other and that develops representations of occluded object parts. It represents completely occluded, moving objects for several time steps and successfully predicts their reappearance after occlusion. This framework allows us to account for a broad range of experimental data. Specifically, the model explains how the perception of object unity develops, the role of the width of the occluders, and it also accounts for differences between data for moving and stationary stimuli. We demonstrate that these abilities can be acquired by learning to predict the sensory input. The model makes specific predictions and provides a unifying framework that has the potential to be extended to other visual event categories. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Early (M170) activation of face-specific cortex by face-like objects.

Science.gov (United States)

Hadjikhani, Nouchine; Kveraga, Kestutis; Naik, Paulami; Ahlfors, Seppo P

2009-03-04

The tendency to perceive faces in random patterns exhibiting configural properties of faces is an example of pareidolia. Perception of 'real' faces has been associated with a cortical response signal arising at approximately 170 ms after stimulus onset, but what happens when nonface objects are perceived as faces? Using magnetoencephalography, we found that objects incidentally perceived as faces evoked an early (165 ms) activation in the ventral fusiform cortex, at a time and location similar to that evoked by faces, whereas common objects did not evoke such activation. An earlier peak at 130 ms was also seen for images of real faces only. Our findings suggest that face perception evoked by face-like objects is a relatively early process, and not a late reinterpretation cognitive phenomenon.

Real-time object detection and semantic segmentation for autonomous driving

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Baojun; Liu, Shun; Xu, Weichao; Qiu, Wei

2018-02-01

In this paper, we proposed a Highly Coupled Network (HCNet) for joint objection detection and semantic segmentation. It follows that our method is faster and performs better than the previous approaches whose decoder networks of different tasks are independent. Besides, we present multi-scale loss architecture to learn better representation for different scale objects, but without extra time in the inference phase. Experiment results show that our method achieves state-of-the-art results on the KITTI datasets. Moreover, it can run at 35 FPS on a GPU and thus is a practical solution to object detection and semantic segmentation for autonomous driving.

Demographic correlates of screen time and objectively measured sedentary time and physical activity among toddlers: a cross-sectional study

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Valerie Carson

2017-02-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Determining the most important demographic correlates of sedentary behavior and physical activity will help identify the groups of children that are most in need of intervention. Little is known in regards to the demographic correlates of sedentary behavior and physical activity in toddlers (aged 12–35 months, where long-term behavioral patterns may initially be formed. Therefore, the objective of this study was to examine the associations between demographic correlates and specific types of sedentary behavior and physical activity in this age group. Methods Findings are based on 149 toddlers (19.0 ± 1.9 months and their parents (33.7 ± 4.7 years recruited from immunization clinics in Edmonton, Canada as part of the Parents’ Role in Establishing healthy Physical activity and Sedentary behavior habits (PREPS project. Toddlers’ and parental demographic characteristics and toddlers’ television viewing, video/computer games, and overall screen time were measured via the PREPS parental questionnaire. Toddlers’ objectively measured sedentary time and physical activity (light, moderate to vigorous, and total were accelerometer-derived using Actigraph wGT3X-BT monitors. Simple and multiple linear regression models were conducted to examine associations. Results In the multiple linear regression models, toddlers’ age, toddlers’ sex (female versus male, toddlers’ race/ethnicity (other versus European-Canadian/Caucasian, and household income ($50,001 to $100,000 versus > $100,000 were significantly positively associated, and main type of child care (child care center versus parental care was significantly negatively associated with screen time. Similar findings were observed with television viewing, except null associations were observed for toddlers’ sex. Toddlers’ race/ethnicity (other versus European-Canadian/Caucasian was significantly positively associated and main type of child care (child care

Online decoding of object-based attention using real-time fMRI

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Niazi, A.M.; Broek, P.L.C. van den; Klanke, S.; Barth, M.; Poel, M.; Gerven, M.A.J. van

2014-01-01

Visual attention is used to selectively filter relevant information depending on current task demands and goals. Visual attention is called object-based attention when it is directed to coherent forms or objects in the visual field. This study used real-time functional magnetic resonance imaging for

Online decoding of object-based attention using real-time fMRI

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Niazi, Adnan M.; van den Broek, Philip L.C.; Klanke, Stefan; Barth, Markus; Poel, Mannes; Desain, Peter; van Gerven, Marcel A.J.

Visual attention is used to selectively filter relevant information depending on current task demands and goals. Visual attention is called object-based attention when it is directed to coherent forms or objects in the visual field. This study used real-time functional magnetic resonance imaging for

The Prototype of Real-time Object Detection System Based on SMS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

M. Hana Mirza

2010-08-01

Full Text Available The powerful algorithm to detect object movement in development of room monitoring system is very urgent. The commond algorithm needs complex computation. In this research, the prototype of real-time object detection system using simple algorithm is developed, i.e. using the determination of the max noise/pixel value and the tolerance threshold of image accurately, and then the system automatically send a SMS (short message services to user when the object movement is detected. The developed prototype used a Logitech QuickCam webcam, a Siemens C45 mobile phone and a data cable, and the Borland Delphi 7 with additional components and Serial PortNG Tvideo as system software. The application also includes a database to store the captured images whenever object movement is detected. The test results by varying conditions of light intensities using a 5-watt light bulb, fluorescent lamp 20 and 40 watts indicate that the application is able to automatically detect the presence of moving objects with 100% success rate. The success rate is strongly influenced by the determination of the max noise/pixel value and the tolerance threshold during system configuration. This application is also capable of sending SMS automatically when the system detects a moving object with an average time of 8.35 seconds.

Early (N170) activation of face-specific cortex by face-like objects

Science.gov (United States)

Hadjikhani, Nouchine; Kveraga, Kestutis; Naik, Paulami; Ahlfors, Seppo P.

2009-01-01

The tendency to perceive faces in random patterns exhibiting configural properties of faces is an example of pareidolia. Perception of ‘real’ faces has been associated with a cortical response signal arising at about 170ms after stimulus onset; but what happens when non-face objects are perceived as faces? Using magnetoencephalography (MEG), we found that objects incidentally perceived as faces evoked an early (165ms) activation in the ventral fusiform cortex, at a time and location similar to that evoked by faces, whereas common objects did not evoke such activation. An earlier peak at 130 ms was also seen for images of real faces only. Our findings suggest that face perception evoked by face-like objects is a relatively early process, and not a late re-interpretation cognitive phenomenon. PMID:19218867

Specific and Class Object Recognition for Service Robots through Autonomous and Interactive Methods

Science.gov (United States)

Mansur, Al; Kuno, Yoshinori

Service robots need to be able to recognize and identify objects located within complex backgrounds. Since no single method may work in every situation, several methods need to be combined and robots have to select the appropriate one automatically. In this paper we propose a scheme to classify situations depending on the characteristics of the object of interest and user demand. We classify situations into four groups and employ different techniques for each. We use Scale-invariant feature transform (SIFT), Kernel Principal Components Analysis (KPCA) in conjunction with Support Vector Machine (SVM) using intensity, color, and Gabor features for five object categories. We show that the use of appropriate features is important for the use of KPCA and SVM based techniques on different kinds of objects. Through experiments we show that by using our categorization scheme a service robot can select an appropriate feature and method, and considerably improve its recognition performance. Yet, recognition is not perfect. Thus, we propose to combine the autonomous method with an interactive method that allows the robot to recognize the user request for a specific object and class when the robot fails to recognize the object. We also propose an interactive way to update the object model that is used to recognize an object upon failure in conjunction with the user's feedback.

Early (N170) activation of face-specific cortex by face-like objects

OpenAIRE

Hadjikhani, Nouchine; Kveraga, Kestutis; Naik, Paulami; Ahlfors, Seppo P.

2009-01-01

The tendency to perceive faces in random patterns exhibiting configural properties of faces is an example of pareidolia. Perception of ‘real’ faces has been associated with a cortical response signal arising at about 170ms after stimulus onset; but what happens when non-face objects are perceived as faces? Using magnetoencephalography (MEG), we found that objects incidentally perceived as faces evoked an early (165ms) activation in the ventral fusiform cortex, at a time and location similar t...

Emerging Object Representations in the Visual System Predict Reaction Times for Categorization

Science.gov (United States)

Ritchie, J. Brendan; Tovar, David A.; Carlson, Thomas A.

2015-01-01

Recognizing an object takes just a fraction of a second, less than the blink of an eye. Applying multivariate pattern analysis, or “brain decoding”, methods to magnetoencephalography (MEG) data has allowed researchers to characterize, in high temporal resolution, the emerging representation of object categories that underlie our capacity for rapid recognition. Shortly after stimulus onset, object exemplars cluster by category in a high-dimensional activation space in the brain. In this emerging activation space, the decodability of exemplar category varies over time, reflecting the brain’s transformation of visual inputs into coherent category representations. How do these emerging representations relate to categorization behavior? Recently it has been proposed that the distance of an exemplar representation from a categorical boundary in an activation space is critical for perceptual decision-making, and that reaction times should therefore correlate with distance from the boundary. The predictions of this distance hypothesis have been born out in human inferior temporal cortex (IT), an area of the brain crucial for the representation of object categories. When viewed in the context of a time varying neural signal, the optimal time to “read out” category information is when category representations in the brain are most decodable. Here, we show that the distance from a decision boundary through activation space, as measured using MEG decoding methods, correlates with reaction times for visual categorization during the period of peak decodability. Our results suggest that the brain begins to read out information about exemplar category at the optimal time for use in choice behaviour, and support the hypothesis that the structure of the representation for objects in the visual system is partially constitutive of the decision process in recognition. PMID:26107634

Mathematics Objectives and Measurement Specifications 1986-1990. Exit Level. Texas Educational Assessment of Minimum Skills (TEAMS).

Science.gov (United States)

Texas Education Agency, Austin. Div. of Educational Assessment.

This document lists the objectives for the Texas educational assessment program in mathematics. Eighteen objectives for exit level mathematics are listed, by category: number concepts (4); computation (3); applied computation (5); statistical concepts (3); geometric concepts (2); and algebraic concepts (1). Then general specifications are listed…

Time coordination of heterogeneous distance protections using a domain specific language

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Marcin Kowalski

2012-01-01

Full Text Available BACKGROUND: Distance protections are widely used in protection of energy transmission lines, but their time coordination is still an important and difficult problem. Inappropriate configuration leads to a hazard event: remote circuit breaker tripping provided the local circuit breaker can be opened, which severely impairs power system operation.OBJECTIVE: To describe a method and provide software tools to alleviate the hazard in power systems.METHODS: A domain specific language (DSL for representation of a transmission line with its distance protection schema, and a translation algorithm from the DSL to probabilistic fault trees with time dependencies (PFTTDs are employed.RESULTS: The paper presents software tools that can support power protection experts in time coordination of distance protections. The tools are based upon abstract and concrete syntax of the DSL designed specifically for the purpose of the distance protection time coordination problem. In order to render creation of power line and its protection schema models easier, a DSL-dedicated editor supporting syntax and semantic aspects of the DSL has been developed. Additionally, a translator from the DSL into PFTTD language has been implemented.CONCLUSIONS: Power system experts are enabled to perform hazard probability assessment and sensitivity analysis.LIMITATIONS: Translation supports two types of distance protections, which are: single-system relays with starting elements as well as multi-system relays without starting elements. For the single-system relay, there is one timer per relay. For multi-system relays, there is one timer for each of possibly many protection zones. Other types of protections, e.g. overcurrent are not considered.

Object-orientated DBMS techniques for time-oriented medical record.

Science.gov (United States)

Pinciroli, F; Combi, C; Pozzi, G

1992-01-01

In implementing time-orientated medical record (TOMR) management systems, use of a relational model played a big role. Many applications have been developed to extend query and data manipulation languages to temporal aspects of information. Our experience in developing TOMR revealed some deficiencies inside the relational model, such as: (a) abstract data type definition; (b) unified view of data, at a programming level; (c) management of temporal data; (d) management of signals and images. We identified some first topics to face by an object-orientated approach to database design. This paper describes the first steps in designing and implementing a TOMR by an object-orientated DBMS.

Tracking of multiple objects with time-adjustable composite correlation filters

Science.gov (United States)

Ruchay, Alexey; Kober, Vitaly; Chernoskulov, Ilya

2017-09-01

An algorithm for tracking of multiple objects in video based on time-adjustable adaptive composite correlation filtering is proposed. For each frame a bank of composite correlation filters are designed in such a manner to provide invariance to pose, occlusion, clutter, and illumination changes. The filters are synthesized with the help of an iterative algorithm, which optimizes the discrimination capability for each object. The filters are adapted to the objects changes online using information from the current and past scene frames. Results obtained with the proposed algorithm using real-life scenes are presented and compared with those obtained with state-of-the-art tracking methods in terms of detection efficiency, tracking accuracy, and speed of processing.

Objectively-measured outdoor time and physical and psychological function among older adults.

Science.gov (United States)

Harada, Kazuhiro; Lee, Sangyoon; Lee, Sungchul; Bae, Seongryu; Harada, Kenji; Suzuki, Takao; Shimada, Hiroyuki

2017-10-01

Objective measurements of outdoor time are essential to establishing evidence about the health benefits of going outdoors among older adults. To better understanding the health benefits of going outdoors, clarification of potential mediators to connect going outdoors with health benefits is necessary. The present study aimed to investigate associations of objectively-measured outdoor time with older adults' physical and psychological function, and examine the mediating role of physical activity on these associations. Baseline data from a randomized control trial of physical activity among older adults with global cognitive impairment was used. Data from 192 participants were analyzed. Measures included steps-per-day, objectively-measured outdoor time per day using global positioning systems, physical function (cardiorespiratory fitness, lower-extremity strength), psychological function (depression, well-being) and basic factors. Path analysis showed that outdoor time was significantly associated with steps-per-day (path coefficient = 0.23) and depression (path coefficient = -0.16). Outdoor time was not directly associated with cardiorespiratory fitness, lower-extremity strength and well-being. However, steps-per-day was associated with cardiorespiratory fitness (path coefficient = 0.18), lower-extremity strength (path coefficient = -0.22) and well-being (path coefficient = 0.14). We found that objectively-measured outdoor time was indirectly associated with physical function, and both directly and indirectly with psychological function through physical activity among older adults. This finding indicates that going outdoors influences older adults' health outcomes, and is mainly mediated by physical activity. Geriatr Gerontol Int 2017; 17: 1455-1462. © 2016 Japan Geriatrics Society.

Comparative Evaluations of Four Specification Methods for Real-Time Systems

Science.gov (United States)

1989-12-01

December 1989 Comparative Evaluations of Four Specification Methods for Real - Time Systems David P. Wood William G. Wood Specification and Design Methods...Methods for Real - Time Systems Abstract: A number of methods have been proposed in the last decade for the specification of system and software requirements...and software specification for real - time systems . Our process for the identification of methods that meet the above criteria is described in greater

Automated real time constant-specificity surveillance for disease outbreaks.

Science.gov (United States)

Wieland, Shannon C; Brownstein, John S; Berger, Bonnie; Mandl, Kenneth D

2007-06-13

For real time surveillance, detection of abnormal disease patterns is based on a difference between patterns observed, and those predicted by models of historical data. The usefulness of outbreak detection strategies depends on their specificity; the false alarm rate affects the interpretation of alarms. We evaluate the specificity of five traditional models: autoregressive, Serfling, trimmed seasonal, wavelet-based, and generalized linear. We apply each to 12 years of emergency department visits for respiratory infection syndromes at a pediatric hospital, finding that the specificity of the five models was almost always a non-constant function of the day of the week, month, and year of the study (p accounting for not only the expected number of visits, but also the variance of the number of visits. The expectation-variance model achieves constant specificity on all three time scales, as well as earlier detection and improved sensitivity compared to traditional methods in most circumstances. Modeling the variance of visit patterns enables real-time detection with known, constant specificity at all times. With constant specificity, public health practitioners can better interpret the alarms and better evaluate the cost-effectiveness of surveillance systems.

Automated real time constant-specificity surveillance for disease outbreaks

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Brownstein John S

2007-06-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background For real time surveillance, detection of abnormal disease patterns is based on a difference between patterns observed, and those predicted by models of historical data. The usefulness of outbreak detection strategies depends on their specificity; the false alarm rate affects the interpretation of alarms. Results We evaluate the specificity of five traditional models: autoregressive, Serfling, trimmed seasonal, wavelet-based, and generalized linear. We apply each to 12 years of emergency department visits for respiratory infection syndromes at a pediatric hospital, finding that the specificity of the five models was almost always a non-constant function of the day of the week, month, and year of the study (p Conclusion Modeling the variance of visit patterns enables real-time detection with known, constant specificity at all times. With constant specificity, public health practitioners can better interpret the alarms and better evaluate the cost-effectiveness of surveillance systems.

Category-specificity in visual object recognition

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gerlach, Christian

2009-01-01

binding of shape elements into elaborate shape descriptions) and selection (among competing representations in visual long-term memory), which are held to be differentially affected by the structural similarity between objects. Drawing on evidence from clinical studies, experimental studies...

Modeling of requirement specification for safety critical real time computer system using formal mathematical specifications

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sankar, Bindu; Sasidhar Rao, B.; Ilango Sambasivam, S.; Swaminathan, P.

2002-01-01

Full text: Real time computer systems are increasingly used for safety critical supervision and control of nuclear reactors. Typical application areas are supervision of reactor core against coolant flow blockage, supervision of clad hot spot, supervision of undesirable power excursion, power control and control logic for fuel handling systems. The most frequent cause of fault in safety critical real time computer system is traced to fuzziness in requirement specification. To ensure the specified safety, it is necessary to model the requirement specification of safety critical real time computer systems using formal mathematical methods. Modeling eliminates the fuzziness in the requirement specification and also helps to prepare the verification and validation schemes. Test data can be easily designed from the model of the requirement specification. Z and B are the popular languages used for modeling the requirement specification. A typical safety critical real time computer system for supervising the reactor core of prototype fast breeder reactor (PFBR) against flow blockage is taken as case study. Modeling techniques and the actual model are explained in detail. The advantages of modeling for ensuring the safety are summarized

Deep Learning for Real-Time Capable Object Detection and Localization on Mobile Platforms

Science.gov (United States)

Particke, F.; Kolbenschlag, R.; Hiller, M.; Patiño-Studencki, L.; Thielecke, J.

2017-10-01

Industry 4.0 is one of the most formative terms in current times. Subject of research are particularly smart and autonomous mobile platforms, which enormously lighten the workload and optimize production processes. In order to interact with humans, the platforms need an in-depth knowledge of the environment. Hence, it is required to detect a variety of static and non-static objects. Goal of this paper is to propose an accurate and real-time capable object detection and localization approach for the use on mobile platforms. A method is introduced to use the powerful detection capabilities of a neural network for the localization of objects. Therefore, detection information of a neural network is combined with depth information from a RGB-D camera, which is mounted on a mobile platform. As detection network, YOLO Version 2 (YOLOv2) is used on a mobile robot. In order to find the detected object in the depth image, the bounding boxes, predicted by YOLOv2, are mapped to the corresponding regions in the depth image. This provides a powerful and extremely fast approach for establishing a real-time-capable Object Locator. In the evaluation part, the localization approach turns out to be very accurate. Nevertheless, it is dependent on the detected object itself and some additional parameters, which are analysed in this paper.

Passive UHF RFID Tags with Specific Printed Antennas for Dielectric and Metallic Objects Applications

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

K. Siakavara

2017-09-01

Full Text Available Design process and respective results for the synthesis of specific Radiofrequency Identification(RFID tag antennas, suitable for dielectric and metallic objects, are presented. The antennas were designed for the UHF(865MHz-869MHz band and their basic configuration is that of the printed spiral type. Six modification steps to the classical spiral layout are proposed and it was proved that they can lead to tags with high readability and reading distances up to 10m when designed for dielectric object and up to 7m in the case of metallic objects. The results of the measurements of the fabricated tags are explained via theoretical evaluations which take into account reflection phenomena, that are present in a real environment at which the tags are used.

Temporal Specification and Verification of Real-Time Systems.

Science.gov (United States)

1991-08-30

of concrete real - time systems can be modeled adequately. Specification: We present two conservative extensions of temporal logic that allow for the...logic. We present both model-checking algorithms for the automatic verification of finite-state real - time systems and proof methods for the deductive verification of real - time systems .

Fragile visual short-term memory is an object-based and location-specific store.

Science.gov (United States)

Pinto, Yaïr; Sligte, Ilja G; Shapiro, Kimron L; Lamme, Victor A F

2013-08-01

Fragile visual short-term memory (FM) is a recently discovered form of visual short-term memory. Evidence suggests that it provides rich and high-capacity storage, like iconic memory, yet it exists, without interference, almost as long as visual working memory. In the present study, we sought to unveil the functional underpinnings of this memory storage. We found that FM is only completely erased when the new visual scene appears at the same location and consists of the same objects as the to-be-recalled information. This result has two important implications: First, it shows that FM is an object- and location-specific store, and second, it suggests that FM might be used in everyday life when the presentation of visual information is appropriately designed.

Time-Correlated Single-Photon Counting Range Profiling of Moving Objects

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hedborg Julia

2016-01-01

TCSPC is a statistic method that requires an acquisition time and therefore the range profile of a non-stationary object (target may be corrupted. Here, we present results showing that it is possible to reconstruct the range profile of a moving target and calculate the velocity of the target.

Objective-guided image annotation.

Science.gov (United States)

Mao, Qi; Tsang, Ivor Wai-Hung; Gao, Shenghua

2013-04-01

Automatic image annotation, which is usually formulated as a multi-label classification problem, is one of the major tools used to enhance the semantic understanding of web images. Many multimedia applications (e.g., tag-based image retrieval) can greatly benefit from image annotation. However, the insufficient performance of image annotation methods prevents these applications from being practical. On the other hand, specific measures are usually designed to evaluate how well one annotation method performs for a specific objective or application, but most image annotation methods do not consider optimization of these measures, so that they are inevitably trapped into suboptimal performance of these objective-specific measures. To address this issue, we first summarize a variety of objective-guided performance measures under a unified representation. Our analysis reveals that macro-averaging measures are very sensitive to infrequent keywords, and hamming measure is easily affected by skewed distributions. We then propose a unified multi-label learning framework, which directly optimizes a variety of objective-specific measures of multi-label learning tasks. Specifically, we first present a multilayer hierarchical structure of learning hypotheses for multi-label problems based on which a variety of loss functions with respect to objective-guided measures are defined. And then, we formulate these loss functions as relaxed surrogate functions and optimize them by structural SVMs. According to the analysis of various measures and the high time complexity of optimizing micro-averaging measures, in this paper, we focus on example-based measures that are tailor-made for image annotation tasks but are seldom explored in the literature. Experiments show consistency with the formal analysis on two widely used multi-label datasets, and demonstrate the superior performance of our proposed method over state-of-the-art baseline methods in terms of example-based measures on four

Media, journalism, objectivity

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Vlajki Emil

2013-01-01

Full Text Available This is the text around the themes: Media and Journalism, are confronted two directions of opinions: humanism and elitism. Humanism believes that media and journalism must be metaphysically objective: able to tell the truth regardless of time, place and terms of events. Another approach, elitism, is connected with Hegel's philosophy of history. Hegel's conceptual apparatus includes: Idea, History dialectic, 'cunning mind,' self- development and self-realization. In this context, media and journalism are considered as organic unity, an inseparable part of some dialectical totality. More specifically media and journalism can be objective only if they defend concrete ideological assumptions of society to which they belong. Any other understanding of these two concepts is non-objective, mere moralizing and / or demagoguery.

Timing, timing, timing: Fast decoding of object information from intracranial field potentials in human visual cortex

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, Hesheng; Agam, Yigal; Madsen, Joseph R.; Kreiman, Gabriel

2010-01-01

Summary The difficulty of visual recognition stems from the need to achieve high selectivity while maintaining robustness to object transformations within hundreds of milliseconds. Theories of visual recognition differ in whether the neuronal circuits invoke recurrent feedback connections or not. The timing of neurophysiological responses in visual cortex plays a key role in distinguishing between bottom-up and top-down theories. Here we quantified at millisecond resolution the amount of visual information conveyed by intracranial field potentials from 912 electrodes in 11 human subjects. We could decode object category information from human visual cortex in single trials as early as 100 ms post-stimulus. Decoding performance was robust to depth rotation and scale changes. The results suggest that physiological activity in the temporal lobe can account for key properties of visual recognition. The fast decoding in single trials is compatible with feed-forward theories and provides strong constraints for computational models of human vision. PMID:19409272

Prostate-specific antigen doubling time as a progression criterion in an active surveillance programme for patients with localized prostate cancer

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Thomsen, Frederik Birkebaek; Christensen, Ib Jarle; Brasso, Klaus

2014-01-01

OBJECTIVES: To elucidate the role of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) doubling time (PSAdt) as a progression criterion in patients with low-risk prostate cancer managed by active surveillance (AS). To assess the correlation between PSAdt during AS and final histopathology after radical prostatectomy...

Conceptual Modeling of Events as Information Objects and Change Agents

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Bækgaard, Lars

as a totality of an information object and a change agent. When an event is modeled as an information object it is comparable to an entity that exists only at a specific point in time. It has attributes and can be used for querying and specification of constraints. When an event is modeled as a change agent...... it is comparable to an executable transaction schema. Finally, we briefly compare our approach to object-oriented approaches based on encapsulated objects....

The time course of activation of object shape and shape+colour representations during memory retrieval.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Toby J Lloyd-Jones

Full Text Available Little is known about the timing of activating memory for objects and their associated perceptual properties, such as colour, and yet this is important for theories of human cognition. We investigated the time course associated with early cognitive processes related to the activation of object shape and object shape+colour representations respectively, during memory retrieval as assessed by repetition priming in an event-related potential (ERP study. The main findings were as follows: (1 we identified a unique early modulation of mean ERP amplitude during the N1 that was associated with the activation of object shape independently of colour; (2 we also found a subsequent early P2 modulation of mean amplitude over the same electrode clusters associated with the activation of object shape+colour representations; (3 these findings were apparent across both familiar (i.e., correctly coloured - yellow banana and novel (i.e., incorrectly coloured - blue strawberry objects; and (4 neither of the modulations of mean ERP amplitude were evident during the P3. Together the findings delineate the timing of object shape and colour memory systems and support the notion that perceptual representations of object shape mediate the retrieval of temporary shape+colour representations for familiar and novel objects.

The time course of activation of object shape and shape+colour representations during memory retrieval.

Science.gov (United States)

Lloyd-Jones, Toby J; Roberts, Mark V; Leek, E Charles; Fouquet, Nathalie C; Truchanowicz, Ewa G

2012-01-01

Little is known about the timing of activating memory for objects and their associated perceptual properties, such as colour, and yet this is important for theories of human cognition. We investigated the time course associated with early cognitive processes related to the activation of object shape and object shape+colour representations respectively, during memory retrieval as assessed by repetition priming in an event-related potential (ERP) study. The main findings were as follows: (1) we identified a unique early modulation of mean ERP amplitude during the N1 that was associated with the activation of object shape independently of colour; (2) we also found a subsequent early P2 modulation of mean amplitude over the same electrode clusters associated with the activation of object shape+colour representations; (3) these findings were apparent across both familiar (i.e., correctly coloured - yellow banana) and novel (i.e., incorrectly coloured - blue strawberry) objects; and (4) neither of the modulations of mean ERP amplitude were evident during the P3. Together the findings delineate the timing of object shape and colour memory systems and support the notion that perceptual representations of object shape mediate the retrieval of temporary shape+colour representations for familiar and novel objects.

State-of-the-art Versus Time-triggered Object Tracking in Advanced Driver Assistance Systems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Moritz Koplin

2013-04-01

Full Text Available Most state-of-the-art driver assistance systems cannot guarantee that real-time images of object states are updated within a given time interval, because the object state observations are typically sampled by uncontrolled sensors and transmitted via an indeterministic bus system such as CAN. To overcome this shortcoming, a paradigm shift toward time-triggered advanced driver assistance systems based on a deterministic bus system, such as FlexRay, is under discussion. In order to prove the feasibility of this paradigm shift, this paper develops different models of a state-of-the-art and a time-triggered advanced driver assistance system based on multi-sensor object tracking and compares them with regard to their mean performance. The results show that while the state-of-the-art model is advantageous in scenarios with low process noise, it is outmatched by the time-triggered model in the case of high process noise, i.e., in complex situations with high dynamic.

Dynamic information processing states revealed through neurocognitive models of object semantics

Science.gov (United States)

Clarke, Alex

2015-01-01

Recognising objects relies on highly dynamic, interactive brain networks to process multiple aspects of object information. To fully understand how different forms of information about objects are represented and processed in the brain requires a neurocognitive account of visual object recognition that combines a detailed cognitive model of semantic knowledge with a neurobiological model of visual object processing. Here we ask how specific cognitive factors are instantiated in our mental processes and how they dynamically evolve over time. We suggest that coarse semantic information, based on generic shared semantic knowledge, is rapidly extracted from visual inputs and is sufficient to drive rapid category decisions. Subsequent recurrent neural activity between the anterior temporal lobe and posterior fusiform supports the formation of object-specific semantic representations – a conjunctive process primarily driven by the perirhinal cortex. These object-specific representations require the integration of shared and distinguishing object properties and support the unique recognition of objects. We conclude that a valuable way of understanding the cognitive activity of the brain is though testing the relationship between specific cognitive measures and dynamic neural activity. This kind of approach allows us to move towards uncovering the information processing states of the brain and how they evolve over time. PMID:25745632

Real-time visual tracking of less textured three-dimensional objects on mobile platforms

Science.gov (United States)

Seo, Byung-Kuk; Park, Jungsik; Park, Hanhoon; Park, Jong-Il

2012-12-01

Natural feature-based approaches are still challenging for mobile applications (e.g., mobile augmented reality), because they are feasible only in limited environments such as highly textured and planar scenes/objects, and they need powerful mobile hardware for fast and reliable tracking. In many cases where conventional approaches are not effective, three-dimensional (3-D) knowledge of target scenes would be beneficial. We present a well-established framework for real-time visual tracking of less textured 3-D objects on mobile platforms. Our framework is based on model-based tracking that efficiently exploits partially known 3-D scene knowledge such as object models and a background's distinctive geometric or photometric knowledge. Moreover, we elaborate on implementation in order to make it suitable for real-time vision processing on mobile hardware. The performance of the framework is tested and evaluated on recent commercially available smartphones, and its feasibility is shown by real-time demonstrations.

Time-dependent bow shocks and the condensation structure of Herbig-Haro objects

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Raga, A.C.; Bohm, K.H.

1987-01-01

Some Herbig-Haro objects show a structure which appears to look like a bow shock, but also show a number of condensations superposed on this bow-shaped structure. In the case of HH 1 and HH 2 considerably different proper motions have been measured for the individual condensations. It is, however, very hard to explain why the condensations remain so close to each other if they are indeed separate entities. In this paper it is shown that an interpretation of the whole Herbig-Haro object as a single, time-dependent bow shock provides a natural explanation for the occurrence of condensations (which in numerical calculations appear to be associated with thermal instabilities in the postshock flow) with different proper motions. To this effect, time-dependent, axisymmetric, nonadiabatic bow shock models have been developed from which predictions were obtained for spatially resolved H-alpha intensity maps, and then these predictions are compared qualitatively with observations of a few Herbig-Haro objects. 57 references

Multiple containment for LSA [low specific activity] and SCO [surface contaminated objects] wastes

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Burgess, M.H.

1993-09-01

Radioactive wastes are generally transported in the form of Low Specific Activity (LSA) materials or Surface Contaminated Objects (SCO). This report proposes that a method of acknowledging the beneficial effects of multiple containment for such wastes should be written into the 1996 Edition of the IAEA Transport Regulations. Experience used to assess risks from on-site movements of radioactive material in the UK can be applied to develop safety arguments justifying the alleviation of off-site transport risks. (UK)

Category-specific responses to faces and objects in primate auditory cortex

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kari L Hoffman

2008-03-01

Full Text Available Auditory and visual signals often occur together, and the two sensory channels are known to infl uence each other to facilitate perception. The neural basis of this integration is not well understood, although other forms of multisensory infl uences have been shown to occur at surprisingly early stages of processing in cortex. Primary visual cortex neurons can show frequency-tuning to auditory stimuli, and auditory cortex responds selectively to certain somatosensory stimuli, supporting the possibility that complex visual signals may modulate early stages of auditory processing. To elucidate which auditory regions, if any, are responsive to complex visual stimuli, we recorded from auditory cortex and the superior temporal sulcus while presenting visual stimuli consisting of various objects, neutral faces, and facial expressions generated during vocalization. Both objects and conspecifi c faces elicited robust fi eld potential responses in auditory cortex sites, but the responses varied by category: both neutral and vocalizing faces had a highly consistent negative component (N100 followed by a broader positive component (P180 whereas object responses were more variable in time and shape, but could be discriminated consistently from the responses to faces. The face response did not vary within the face category, i.e., for expressive vs. neutral face stimuli. The presence of responses for both objects and neutral faces suggests that auditory cortex receives highly informative visual input that is not restricted to those stimuli associated with auditory components. These results reveal selectivity for complex visual stimuli in a brain region conventionally described as non-visual unisensory cortex.

Real-time underwater object detection based on an electrically scanned high-resolution sonar

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Henriksen, Lars

1994-01-01

The paper describes an approach to real time detection and tracking of underwater objects, using image sequences from an electrically scanned high-resolution sonar. The use of a high resolution sonar provides a good estimate of the location of the objects, but strains the computers on board, beca...

Real-time Pipeline for Object Modeling and Grasping Pose Selection via Superquadric Functions

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Giulia Vezzani

2017-11-01

Full Text Available This work provides a novel real-time pipeline for modeling and grasping of unknown objects with a humanoid robot. Such a problem is of great interest for the robotic community, since conventional approaches fail when the shape, dimension, or pose of the objects are missing. Our approach reconstructs in real-time a model for the object under consideration and represents the robot hand both with proper and mathematically usable models, i.e., superquadric functions. The volume graspable by the hand is represented by an ellipsoid and is defined a priori, because the shape of the hand is known in advance. The superquadric representing the object is obtained in real-time from partial vision information instead, e.g., one stereo view of the object under consideration, and provides an approximated 3D full model. The optimization problem we formulate for the grasping pose computation is solved online by using the Ipopt software package and, thus, does not require off-line computation or learning. Even though our approach is for a generic humanoid robot, we developed a complete software architecture for executing this approach on the iCub humanoid robot. Together with that, we also provide a tutorial on how to use this framework. We believe that our work, together with the available code, is of a strong utility for the iCub community for three main reasons: object modeling and grasping are relevant problems for the robotic community, our code can be easily applied on every iCub, and the modular structure of our framework easily allows extensions and communications with external code.

Objectively measured total and occupational sedentary time in three work settings

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Dommelen, P. van; Coffeng, J. K.; Ploeg, H.P. van der; Beek, A.J. van der; Boot, C.R.; Hendriksen, I.J.

2016-01-01

Background. Sedentary behaviour increases the risk for morbidity. Our primary aim is to determine the proportion and factors associated with objectively measured total and occupational sedentary time in three work settings. Secondary aim is to study the proportion of physical activity and prolonged

Faster R-CNN: Towards Real-Time Object Detection with Region Proposal Networks

OpenAIRE

Ren, Shaoqing; He, Kaiming; Girshick, Ross; Sun, Jian

2015-01-01

State-of-the-art object detection networks depend on region proposal algorithms to hypothesize object locations. Advances like SPPnet and Fast R-CNN have reduced the running time of these detection networks, exposing region proposal computation as a bottleneck. In this work, we introduce a Region Proposal Network (RPN) that shares full-image convolutional features with the detection network, thus enabling nearly cost-free region proposals. An RPN is a fully convolutional network that simultan...

Real-time, resource-constrained object classification on a micro-air vehicle

Science.gov (United States)

Buck, Louis; Ray, Laura

2013-12-01

A real-time embedded object classification algorithm is developed through the novel combination of binary feature descriptors, a bag-of-visual-words object model and the cortico-striatal loop (CSL) learning algorithm. The BRIEF, ORB and FREAK binary descriptors are tested and compared to SIFT descriptors with regard to their respective classification accuracies, execution times, and memory requirements when used with CSL on a 12.6 g ARM Cortex embedded processor running at 800 MHz. Additionally, the effect of x2 feature mapping and opponent-color representations used with these descriptors is examined. These tests are performed on four data sets of varying sizes and difficulty, and the BRIEF descriptor is found to yield the best combination of speed and classification accuracy. Its use with CSL achieves accuracies between 67% and 95% of those achieved with SIFT descriptors and allows for the embedded classification of a 128x192 pixel image in 0.15 seconds, 60 times faster than classification with SIFT. X2 mapping is found to provide substantial improvements in classification accuracy for all of the descriptors at little cost, while opponent-color descriptors are offer accuracy improvements only on colorful datasets.

Spanish Tourist Behaviour: A Specific Objective-base Segmantation

OpenAIRE

González, Pablo Rodríguez; Molina, Oscar

2009-01-01

This work uses data from the Spanish Tourism Demand Segments Survey (N=6900) conducted by the IESA-CSIC for Turismo Andaluz, SA. The objective of the paper is to develop a statistical segmentation or typology of Spanish tourists based on objective aspects of tourist behaviour measured in the survey including destinations visited, theme of the trip, lodging, transportation and travel group. Initial categorical data are reduced using multiple correspondence analysis and grouped through cluster ...

Specification and Test of Real-Time Systems

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielsen, Brian

of the system, and a set of constraint patterns which describes and enforces the timing and synchronization constraints among components. We propose new techniques for automated black box conformance testing of real-time systems against densely timed speci cations. A test generator tool examines a specification......Distributed real-time computer based systems are very complex and intrinsically difficult to specify and implement correctly; in part this is caused by the overwhelming number of possible interactions between system components, but especially by a lack of adequate methods and tools to deal...... of the desired system behavior and generates the necessary test cases. A main problem is to construct a reasonably small test suite that can be executed within allotted resources, while having a high likelihood of detecting unknown errors. Our goal has been to treat the time dimension of this problem thoroughly...

Blind source separation based on time-frequency morphological characteristics for rigid acoustic scattering by underwater objects

Science.gov (United States)

Yang, Yang; Li, Xiukun

2016-06-01

Separation of the components of rigid acoustic scattering by underwater objects is essential in obtaining the structural characteristics of such objects. To overcome the problem of rigid structures appearing to have the same spectral structure in the time domain, time-frequency Blind Source Separation (BSS) can be used in combination with image morphology to separate the rigid scattering components of different objects. Based on a highlight model, the separation of the rigid scattering structure of objects with time-frequency distribution is deduced. Using a morphological filter, different characteristics in a Wigner-Ville Distribution (WVD) observed for single auto term and cross terms can be simplified to remove any cross-term interference. By selecting time and frequency points of the auto terms signal, the accuracy of BSS can be improved. An experimental simulation has been used, with changes in the pulse width of the transmitted signal, the relative amplitude and the time delay parameter, in order to analyzing the feasibility of this new method. Simulation results show that the new method is not only able to separate rigid scattering components, but can also separate the components when elastic scattering and rigid scattering exist at the same time. Experimental results confirm that the new method can be used in separating the rigid scattering structure of underwater objects.

Collaborative real-time scheduling of multiple PTZ cameras for multiple object tracking in video surveillance

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, Yu-Che; Huang, Chung-Lin

2013-03-01

This paper proposes a multi-PTZ-camera control mechanism to acquire close-up imagery of human objects in a surveillance system. The control algorithm is based on the output of multi-camera, multi-target tracking. Three main concerns of the algorithm are (1) the imagery of human object's face for biometric purposes, (2) the optimal video quality of the human objects, and (3) minimum hand-off time. Here, we define an objective function based on the expected capture conditions such as the camera-subject distance, pan tile angles of capture, face visibility and others. Such objective function serves to effectively balance the number of captures per subject and quality of captures. In the experiments, we demonstrate the performance of the system which operates in real-time under real world conditions on three PTZ cameras.

A Bayesian alternative for multi-objective ecohydrological model specification

Science.gov (United States)

Tang, Yating; Marshall, Lucy; Sharma, Ashish; Ajami, Hoori

2018-01-01

Recent studies have identified the importance of vegetation processes in terrestrial hydrologic systems. Process-based ecohydrological models combine hydrological, physical, biochemical and ecological processes of the catchments, and as such are generally more complex and parametric than conceptual hydrological models. Thus, appropriate calibration objectives and model uncertainty analysis are essential for ecohydrological modeling. In recent years, Bayesian inference has become one of the most popular tools for quantifying the uncertainties in hydrological modeling with the development of Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) techniques. The Bayesian approach offers an appealing alternative to traditional multi-objective hydrologic model calibrations by defining proper prior distributions that can be considered analogous to the ad-hoc weighting often prescribed in multi-objective calibration. Our study aims to develop appropriate prior distributions and likelihood functions that minimize the model uncertainties and bias within a Bayesian ecohydrological modeling framework based on a traditional Pareto-based model calibration technique. In our study, a Pareto-based multi-objective optimization and a formal Bayesian framework are implemented in a conceptual ecohydrological model that combines a hydrological model (HYMOD) and a modified Bucket Grassland Model (BGM). Simulations focused on one objective (streamflow/LAI) and multiple objectives (streamflow and LAI) with different emphasis defined via the prior distribution of the model error parameters. Results show more reliable outputs for both predicted streamflow and LAI using Bayesian multi-objective calibration with specified prior distributions for error parameters based on results from the Pareto front in the ecohydrological modeling. The methodology implemented here provides insight into the usefulness of multiobjective Bayesian calibration for ecohydrologic systems and the importance of appropriate prior

Real-Time FPGA-Based Object Tracker with Automatic Pan-Tilt Features for Smart Video Surveillance Systems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sanjay Singh

2017-05-01

Full Text Available The design of smart video surveillance systems is an active research field among the computer vision community because of their ability to perform automatic scene analysis by selecting and tracking the objects of interest. In this paper, we present the design and implementation of an FPGA-based standalone working prototype system for real-time tracking of an object of interest in live video streams for such systems. In addition to real-time tracking of the object of interest, the implemented system is also capable of providing purposive automatic camera movement (pan-tilt in the direction determined by movement of the tracked object. The complete system, including camera interface, DDR2 external memory interface controller, designed object tracking VLSI architecture, camera movement controller and display interface, has been implemented on the Xilinx ML510 (Virtex-5 FX130T FPGA Board. Our proposed, designed and implemented system robustly tracks the target object present in the scene in real time for standard PAL (720 × 576 resolution color video and automatically controls camera movement in the direction determined by the movement of the tracked object.

Black objects and hoop conjecture in five-dimensional space-time

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Yamada, Yuta; Shinkai, Hisa-aki, E-mail: m1m08a26@info.oit.ac.j, E-mail: shinkai@is.oit.ac.j [Faculty of Information Science and Technology, Osaka Institute of Technology, 1-79-1 Kitayama, Hirakata, Osaka 573-0196 (Japan)

2010-02-21

We numerically investigated the sequences of initial data of a thin spindle and a thin ring in five-dimensional space-time in the context of the cosmic censorship conjecture. We modeled the matter in non-rotating homogeneous spheroidal or toroidal configurations under the momentarily static assumption, solved the Hamiltonian constraint equation and searched the apparent horizons. We discussed when S{sup 3} (black-hole) or S{sup 1} x S{sup 2} (black-ring) horizons ('black objects') are formed. By monitoring the location of the maximum Kretchmann invariant, an appearance of 'naked singularity' or 'naked ring' under special situations is suggested. We also discuss the validity of the hyper-hoop conjecture using a minimum area around the object, and show that the appearance of the ring horizon does not match with this hoop.

Balancing Exploration, Uncertainty Representation and Computational Time in Many-Objective Reservoir Policy Optimization

Science.gov (United States)

Zatarain-Salazar, J.; Reed, P. M.; Quinn, J.; Giuliani, M.; Castelletti, A.

2016-12-01

As we confront the challenges of managing river basin systems with a large number of reservoirs and increasingly uncertain tradeoffs impacting their operations (due to, e.g. climate change, changing energy markets, population pressures, ecosystem services, etc.), evolutionary many-objective direct policy search (EMODPS) solution strategies will need to address the computational demands associated with simulating more uncertainties and therefore optimizing over increasingly noisy objective evaluations. Diagnostic assessments of state-of-the-art many-objective evolutionary algorithms (MOEAs) to support EMODPS have highlighted that search time (or number of function evaluations) and auto-adaptive search are key features for successful optimization. Furthermore, auto-adaptive MOEA search operators are themselves sensitive to having a sufficient number of function evaluations to learn successful strategies for exploring complex spaces and for escaping from local optima when stagnation is detected. Fortunately, recent parallel developments allow coordinated runs that enhance auto-adaptive algorithmic learning and can handle scalable and reliable search with limited wall-clock time, but at the expense of the total number of function evaluations. In this study, we analyze this tradeoff between parallel coordination and depth of search using different parallelization schemes of the Multi-Master Borg on a many-objective stochastic control problem. We also consider the tradeoff between better representing uncertainty in the stochastic optimization, and simplifying this representation to shorten the function evaluation time and allow for greater search. Our analysis focuses on the Lower Susquehanna River Basin (LSRB) system where multiple competing objectives for hydropower production, urban water supply, recreation and environmental flows need to be balanced. Our results provide guidance for balancing exploration, uncertainty, and computational demands when using the EMODPS

IAEA co-ordinated research programme on the transport of low specific activity materials and surface contaminated objects

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gray, I.L.S.

2000-01-01

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) prepares regulations for the safe transport of radioactive material, and periodically revised editions of these are published. These regulations are adopted by individual countries across the world and by international organisations concerned with transport. Whilst it is desirable to have a stable framework of regulatory requirements, there is also a need to take account of technical advances and operational experience and revise the regulations. From time to time Co-ordinated Research Programmes (CRP) are established to investigate particular areas of the regulations that are giving concern. In 1996 the IAEA Standing Advisory Group on the Transport of Radioactive Material (SAGSTRAM) concluded that the requirements for classification, packaging and transport of low specific activity (LSA) material and surface contaminated objects (SCO) did not always have a strong radiation protection basis. Accordingly SAGSTRAM established a CRP with an overall objective to develop a dose-based approach for establishing LSA/SCO requirements. Six countries are participating in this CRP. Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, United Kingdom and United States. Each country is carrying out work that is outlined in agreements with the IAEA, with the work aimed at meeting the specific objective of the agreement and also contributing to achieving the overall objective of the CRP. Completion of the CRP usually involves the preparation of an IAEA TECDOC by a Consultant Services Meeting (CSM), and this TECDOC will summarise the work performed under the CRP and include any recommendations made by the CRP. Following the establishment of the CRP in 1997, the first Research Co-ordination Meeting (RCM) was held in December 1997. The second RCM was held in March 1999, with the final RCM planned for the end of 2000. The work being carried out by Brazil and Canada is focused upon the transport of uranium and thorium ores, and is a mixture of theoretical and

Formal Specification and Verification of Real-Time Multi-Agent Systems using Timed-Arc Petri Nets

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

QASIM, A.

2015-08-01

Full Text Available In this study we have formally specified and verified the actions of communicating real-time software agents (RTAgents. Software agents are expected to work autonomously and deal with unfamiliar situations astutely. Achieving cent percent test cases coverage for these agents has always been a problem due to limited resources. Also a high degree of dependability and predictability is expected from real-time software agents. In this research we have used Timed-Arc Petri Net's for formal specification and verification. Formal specification of e-agents has been done in the past using Linear Temporal Logic (LTL but we believe that Timed-Arc Petri Net's being more visually expressive provides a richer framework for such formalism. A case study of Stock Market System (SMS based on Real Time Multi Agent System framework (RTMAS using Timed-Arc Petri Net's is taken to illustrate the proposed modeling approach. The model was verified used AF, AG, EG, and EF fragments of Timed Computational Tree Logic (TCTL via translations to timed automata.

Semantic-Based Concurrency Control for Object-Oriented Database Systems Supporting Real-Time Applications

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Lee, Juhnyoung; Son, Sang H

1994-01-01

.... This paper investigates major issues in designing semantic-based concurrency control for object-oriented database systems supporting real-time applications, and it describes approaches to solving...

Objective measures for detecting the auditory brainstem response: comparisons of specificity, sensitivity and detection time

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Chesnaye, M. A.; Bell, S. L.; Harte, J. M.

2018-01-01

of the Hotelling's T-2 test (applied in either time or frequency domain), two versions of the modified q-sample uniform scores test and both the Fsp and Fmp, which were evaluated using both conventional F-distributions with assumed degrees of freedom and a bootstrap approach. Study sample: Data consisted of click......-level when evaluating statistical significance using the bootstrap approach, as opposed to using conventional F-distributions. The FPRs of the remaining methods were slightly higher than expected. Conclusions: In this work, Hotelling's T-2 outperformed the alternative methods for automatically detecting ABRs......-evoked ABRs and recordings of EEG background activity from 12 to 17 normal hearing adults, respectively. Results: An overall advantage in sensitivity and detection time was demonstrated for the Hotelling's T-2 test. The false-positive rates (FPRs) of the Fsp and Fmp were also closer to the nominal alpha...

Application of the multi-objective cross-entropy method to the vehicle routing problem with soft time windows

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

C Hauman

2014-06-01

Full Text Available The vehicle routing problem with time windows is a widely studied problem with many real-world applications. The problem considered here entails the construction of routes that a number of identical vehicles travel to service different nodes within a certain time window. New benchmark problems with multi-objective features were recently suggested in the literature and the multi-objective optimisation cross-entropy method is applied to these problems to investigate the feasibility of the method and to determine and propose reference solutions for the benchmark problems. The application of the cross-entropy method to the multi-objective vehicle routing problem with soft time windows is investigated. The objectives that are evaluated include the minimisation of the total distance travelled, the number of vehicles and/or routes, the total waiting time and delay time of the vehicles and the makespan of a route.

Categorization for Faces and Tools-Two Classes of Objects Shaped by Different Experience-Differs in Processing Timing, Brain Areas Involved, and Repetition Effects.

Science.gov (United States)

Kozunov, Vladimir; Nikolaeva, Anastasia; Stroganova, Tatiana A

2017-01-01

The brain mechanisms that integrate the separate features of sensory input into a meaningful percept depend upon the prior experience of interaction with the object and differ between categories of objects. Recent studies using representational similarity analysis (RSA) have characterized either the spatial patterns of brain activity for different categories of objects or described how category structure in neuronal representations emerges in time, but never simultaneously. Here we applied a novel, region-based, multivariate pattern classification approach in combination with RSA to magnetoencephalography data to extract activity associated with qualitatively distinct processing stages of visual perception. We asked participants to name what they see whilst viewing bitonal visual stimuli of two categories predominantly shaped by either value-dependent or sensorimotor experience, namely faces and tools, and meaningless images. We aimed to disambiguate the spatiotemporal patterns of brain activity between the meaningful categories and determine which differences in their processing were attributable to either perceptual categorization per se , or later-stage mentalizing-related processes. We have extracted three stages of cortical activity corresponding to low-level processing, category-specific feature binding, and supra-categorical processing. All face-specific spatiotemporal patterns were associated with bilateral activation of ventral occipito-temporal areas during the feature binding stage at 140-170 ms. The tool-specific activity was found both within the categorization stage and in a later period not thought to be associated with binding processes. The tool-specific binding-related activity was detected within a 210-220 ms window and was located to the intraparietal sulcus of the left hemisphere. Brain activity common for both meaningful categories started at 250 ms and included widely distributed assemblies within parietal, temporal, and prefrontal regions

Categorization for Faces and Tools—Two Classes of Objects Shaped by Different Experience—Differs in Processing Timing, Brain Areas Involved, and Repetition Effects

Science.gov (United States)

Kozunov, Vladimir; Nikolaeva, Anastasia; Stroganova, Tatiana A.

2018-01-01

The brain mechanisms that integrate the separate features of sensory input into a meaningful percept depend upon the prior experience of interaction with the object and differ between categories of objects. Recent studies using representational similarity analysis (RSA) have characterized either the spatial patterns of brain activity for different categories of objects or described how category structure in neuronal representations emerges in time, but never simultaneously. Here we applied a novel, region-based, multivariate pattern classification approach in combination with RSA to magnetoencephalography data to extract activity associated with qualitatively distinct processing stages of visual perception. We asked participants to name what they see whilst viewing bitonal visual stimuli of two categories predominantly shaped by either value-dependent or sensorimotor experience, namely faces and tools, and meaningless images. We aimed to disambiguate the spatiotemporal patterns of brain activity between the meaningful categories and determine which differences in their processing were attributable to either perceptual categorization per se, or later-stage mentalizing-related processes. We have extracted three stages of cortical activity corresponding to low-level processing, category-specific feature binding, and supra-categorical processing. All face-specific spatiotemporal patterns were associated with bilateral activation of ventral occipito-temporal areas during the feature binding stage at 140–170 ms. The tool-specific activity was found both within the categorization stage and in a later period not thought to be associated with binding processes. The tool-specific binding-related activity was detected within a 210–220 ms window and was located to the intraparietal sulcus of the left hemisphere. Brain activity common for both meaningful categories started at 250 ms and included widely distributed assemblies within parietal, temporal, and prefrontal regions

Race, time and folded objects: the HeLa error

NARCIS (Netherlands)

M'charek, A.

2014-01-01

Given their commitment to practices science studies have bestowed considerable attention upon objects. We have the boundary object, the standardized package, the network object, the immutable mobile, the fluid object, even a fire object has entered the scene. However, these objects do not provide us

Real-time object tracking system based on field-programmable gate array and convolution neural network

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Congyi Lyu

2016-12-01

Full Text Available Vision-based object tracking has lots of applications in robotics, like surveillance, navigation, motion capturing, and so on. However, the existing object tracking systems still suffer from the challenging problem of high computation consumption in the image processing algorithms. The problem can prevent current systems from being used in many robotic applications which have limitations of payload and power, for example, micro air vehicles. In these applications, the central processing unit- or graphics processing unit-based computers are not good choices due to the high weight and power consumption. To address the problem, this article proposed a real-time object tracking system based on field-programmable gate array, convolution neural network, and visual servo technology. The time-consuming image processing algorithms, such as distortion correction, color space convertor, and Sobel edge, Harris corner features detector, and convolution neural network were redesigned using the programmable gates in field-programmable gate array. Based on the field-programmable gate array-based image processing, an image-based visual servo controller was designed to drive a two degree of freedom manipulator to track the target in real time. Finally, experiments on the proposed system were performed to illustrate the effectiveness of the real-time object tracking system.

Real-time object detection, tracking and occlusion reasoning

Science.gov (United States)

Divakaran, Ajay; Yu, Qian; Tamrakar, Amir; Sawhney, Harpreet Singh; Zhu, Jiejie; Javed, Omar; Liu, Jingen; Cheng, Hui; Eledath, Jayakrishnan

2018-02-27

A system for object detection and tracking includes technologies to, among other things, detect and track moving objects, such as pedestrians and/or vehicles, in a real-world environment, handle static and dynamic occlusions, and continue tracking moving objects across the fields of view of multiple different cameras.

Object-based attention: strength of object representation and attentional guidance.

Science.gov (United States)

Shomstein, Sarah; Behrmann, Marlene

2008-01-01

Two or more features belonging to a single object are identified more quickly and more accurately than are features belonging to different objects--a finding attributed to sensory enhancement of all features belonging to an attended or selected object. However, several recent studies have suggested that this "single-object advantage" may be a product of probabilistic and configural strategic prioritizations rather than of object-based perceptual enhancement per se, challenging the underlying mechanism that is thought to give rise to object-based attention. In the present article, we further explore constraints on the mechanisms of object-based selection by examining the contribution of the strength of object representations to the single-object advantage. We manipulated factors such as exposure duration (i.e., preview time) and salience of configuration (i.e., objects). Varying preview time changes the magnitude of the object-based effect, so that if there is ample time to establish an object representation (i.e., preview time of 1,000 msec), then both probability and configuration (i.e., objects) guide attentional selection. If, however, insufficient time is provided to establish a robust object-based representation, then only probabilities guide attentional selection. Interestingly, at a short preview time of 200 msec, when the two objects were sufficiently different from each other (i.e., different colors), both configuration and probability guided attention selection. These results suggest that object-based effects can be explained both in terms of strength of object representations (established at longer exposure durations and by pictorial cues) and probabilistic contingencies in the visual environment.

From climate change uncertainties to strategic options. Objectives, instruments, timing issues

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Philibert, C. [French Agency for Environment and Energy Management, Paris (France)

1995-12-31

The question of climate change is characterised by major uncertainties. For some, this means that no action should be undertaken for the time being. For others, forceful action is needed to avoid potentially disastrous consequences: targets and timetables for emission reductions must be agreed. This communication is an attempt to suggest a third alternative, with two main conclusions. The international decision process should focus on instruments and degrees of effort, rather than on `emission trajectories` (the evolution of emission levels over time), rather than on quantitative objectives tied to precise timetables. In this perspective action can start right away. (author)

From climate change uncertainties to strategic options. Objectives, instruments, timing issues

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Philibert, C [French Agency for Environment and Energy Management, Paris (France)

1996-12-31

The question of climate change is characterised by major uncertainties. For some, this means that no action should be undertaken for the time being. For others, forceful action is needed to avoid potentially disastrous consequences: targets and timetables for emission reductions must be agreed. This communication is an attempt to suggest a third alternative, with two main conclusions. The international decision process should focus on instruments and degrees of effort, rather than on `emission trajectories` (the evolution of emission levels over time), rather than on quantitative objectives tied to precise timetables. In this perspective action can start right away. (author)

Subsurface Scattering-Based Object Rendering Techniques for Real-Time Smartphone Games

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Won-Sun Lee

2014-01-01

Full Text Available Subsurface scattering that simulates the path of a light through the material in a scene is one of the advanced rendering techniques in the field of computer graphics society. Since it takes a number of long operations, it cannot be easily implemented in real-time smartphone games. In this paper, we propose a subsurface scattering-based object rendering technique that is optimized for smartphone games. We employ our subsurface scattering method that is utilized for a real-time smartphone game. And an example game is designed to validate how the proposed method can be operated seamlessly in real time. Finally, we show the comparison results between bidirectional reflectance distribution function, bidirectional scattering distribution function, and our proposed subsurface scattering method on a smartphone game.

Quantifying the Time Course of Visual Object Processing Using ERPs: It's Time to Up the Game

Science.gov (United States)

Rousselet, Guillaume A.; Pernet, Cyril R.

2011-01-01

Hundreds of studies have investigated the early ERPs to faces and objects using scalp and intracranial recordings. The vast majority of these studies have used uncontrolled stimuli, inappropriate designs, peak measurements, poor figures, and poor inferential and descriptive group statistics. These problems, together with a tendency to discuss any effect p  condition B. Here we describe the main limitations of face and object ERP research and suggest alternative strategies to move forward. The problems plague intracranial and surface ERP studies, but also studies using more advanced techniques – e.g., source space analyses and measurements of network dynamics, as well as many behavioral, fMRI, TMS, and LFP studies. In essence, it is time to stop amassing binary results and start using single-trial analyses to build models of visual perception. PMID:21779262

Time-domain single-source integral equations for analyzing scattering from homogeneous penetrable objects

KAUST Repository

Valdé s, Felipe; Andriulli, Francesco P.; Bagci, Hakan; Michielssen, Eric

2013-01-01

Single-source time-domain electric-and magnetic-field integral equations for analyzing scattering from homogeneous penetrable objects are presented. Their temporal discretization is effected by using shifted piecewise polynomial temporal basis

Gist in time: Scene semantics and structure enhance recall of searched objects.

Science.gov (United States)

Josephs, Emilie L; Draschkow, Dejan; Wolfe, Jeremy M; Võ, Melissa L-H

2016-09-01

Previous work has shown that recall of objects that are incidentally encountered as targets in visual search is better than recall of objects that have been intentionally memorized (Draschkow, Wolfe, & Võ, 2014). However, this counter-intuitive result is not seen when these tasks are performed with non-scene stimuli. The goal of the current paper is to determine what features of search in a scene contribute to higher recall rates when compared to a memorization task. In each of four experiments, we compare the free recall rate for target objects following a search to the rate following a memorization task. Across the experiments, the stimuli include progressively more scene-related information. Experiment 1 provides the spatial relations between objects. Experiment 2 adds relative size and depth of objects. Experiments 3 and 4 include scene layout and semantic information. We find that search leads to better recall than explicit memorization in cases where scene layout and semantic information are present, as long as the participant has ample time (2500ms) to integrate this information with knowledge about the target object (Exp. 4). These results suggest that the integration of scene and target information not only leads to more efficient search, but can also contribute to stronger memory representations than intentional memorization. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Real-time multiple objects tracking on Raspberry-Pi-based smart embedded camera

Science.gov (United States)

Dziri, Aziz; Duranton, Marc; Chapuis, Roland

2016-07-01

Multiple-object tracking constitutes a major step in several computer vision applications, such as surveillance, advanced driver assistance systems, and automatic traffic monitoring. Because of the number of cameras used to cover a large area, these applications are constrained by the cost of each node, the power consumption, the robustness of the tracking, the processing time, and the ease of deployment of the system. To meet these challenges, the use of low-power and low-cost embedded vision platforms to achieve reliable tracking becomes essential in networks of cameras. We propose a tracking pipeline that is designed for fixed smart cameras and which can handle occlusions between objects. We show that the proposed pipeline reaches real-time processing on a low-cost embedded smart camera composed of a Raspberry-Pi board and a RaspiCam camera. The tracking quality and the processing speed obtained with the proposed pipeline are evaluated on publicly available datasets and compared to the state-of-the-art methods.

Dynamic multi-objective optimization using PSO

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Helbig, M

2012-01-01

Full Text Available by replacing objective functions with new ones at specific times. DMOOPs based on the static MOO two- objective ZDT functions [9] and the scalable DTLZ functions [10] was presented by Farina et al. [5]. Some adaptions to these test functions were proposed.... if space in archive 9. add new solutions to archive 10. else 11. remove solutions from archive 12. add new solutions to archive 13. select sentry particles The default configuration of DVEPSO algorithm that is used for this research is as follows...

Bi-Objective Flexible Job-Shop Scheduling Problem Considering Energy Consumption under Stochastic Processing Times.

Science.gov (United States)

Yang, Xin; Zeng, Zhenxiang; Wang, Ruidong; Sun, Xueshan

2016-01-01

This paper presents a novel method on the optimization of bi-objective Flexible Job-shop Scheduling Problem (FJSP) under stochastic processing times. The robust counterpart model and the Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm II (NSGA-II) are used to solve the bi-objective FJSP with consideration of the completion time and the total energy consumption under stochastic processing times. The case study on GM Corporation verifies that the NSGA-II used in this paper is effective and has advantages to solve the proposed model comparing with HPSO and PSO+SA. The idea and method of the paper can be generalized widely in the manufacturing industry, because it can reduce the energy consumption of the energy-intensive manufacturing enterprise with less investment when the new approach is applied in existing systems.

Will Instructors Save Time Using a Specifications Grading System?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sarah Grace Prescott

2015-08-01

Full Text Available Review of: Specifications Grading: Restoring Rigor, Motivating Students, and Saving Faculty Time; Linda Nilson and Claudia J. Stranny; (2014. Stylus Publishing, Sterling, VA. 184 pages.

Ownership transfer for non-federate object and time management in developing an hla compliant logistics model.

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Li, Z.

1998-01-12

A seaport simulation model, PORTSIM, has been developed for the Department of Defense (DOD) at Argonne National Laboratory. PORTSIM simulates the detailed processes of cargo loading and unloading in a seaport and provides throughput capability, resource utilization, and other important information on the bottlenecks in a seaport operation, which are crucial data in determining troop and equipment deployment capability. There are two key problems to solve in developing the HLA-compliant PORTSIM model. The first is the cargo object ownership transfer problem. In PORTSIM, cargo items, e.g. vehicles, containers, and pallets, are objects having asset attributes. Cargo comes to a seaport for loading or unloading. The ownership of a cargo object transfers from its carrier to the port and then from the port to a new carrier. Each owner of the cargo object is responsible for publishing and updating the attributes of the cargo object when it has the ownership. This creates a unique situation in developing the PORTSIM federate object model, that is, the ownership of the object instead of the attributes needs to be changed in handling the cargo object in the PORTSIM federate. The ownership management service provided by the current RTI does not directly address this issue. The second is the time management issue. PORTSIM is an event-driven simulation that models seaport operations over time. To make PORTSIM HLA compliant, time management must be addressed to allow for synchronization with other simulation models. This paper attempts to address these two issues and methodologies developed for solving these two problems.

Real-Time Projection-Based Augmented Reality System for Dynamic Objects in the Performing Arts

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jaewoon Lee

2015-02-01

Full Text Available This paper describes the case study of applying projection-based augmented reality, especially for dynamic objects in live performing shows, such as plays, dancing, or musicals. Our study aims to project imagery correctly inside the silhouettes of flexible objects, in other words, live actors or the surface of actor’s costumes; the silhouette transforms its own shape frequently. To realize this work, we implemented a special projection system based on the real-time masking technique, that is to say real-time projection-based augmented reality system for dynamic objects in performing arts. We installed the sets on a stage for live performance, and rehearsed particular scenes of a musical. In live performance, using projection-based augmented reality technology enhances technical and theatrical aspects which were not possible with existing video projection techniques. The projected images on the surfaces of actor’s costume could not only express the particular scene of a performance more effectively, but also lead the audience to an extraordinary visual experience.

Indexing of Network-Constrained Moving Objects

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Pfoser, Dieter; Jensen, Christian Søndergaard

2003-01-01

With the proliferation of mobile computing, the ability to index efficiently the movements of mobile objects becomes important. Objects are typically seen as moving in two-dimensional (x,y) space, which means that their movements across time may be embedded in the three-dimensional (x,y,t) space....... Further, the movements are typically represented as trajectories, sequences of connected line segments. In certain cases, movement is restricted, and specifically in this paper, we aim at exploiting that movements occur in transportation networks to reduce the dimensionality of the data. Briefly, the idea...

Do infant Japanese macaques ( Macaca fuscata) categorize objects without specific training?

Science.gov (United States)

Murai, Chizuko; Tomonaga, Masaki; Kamegai, Kimi; Terazawa, Naoko; Yamaguchi, Masami K

2004-01-01

In the present study, we examined whether infant Japanese macaques categorize objects without any training, using a similar technique also used with human infants (the paired-preference method). During the familiarization phase, subjects were presented twice with two pairs of different objects from one global-level category. During the test phase, they were presented twice with a pair consisting of a novel familiar-category object and a novel global-level category object. The subjects were tested with three global-level categories (animal, furniture, and vehicle). It was found that they showed significant novelty preferences as a whole, indicating that they processed similarities between familiarization objects and novel familiar-category objects. These results suggest that subjects responded distinctively to objects without training, indicating the possibility that infant macaques possess the capacity for categorization.

Real time natural object modeling framework

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Rana, H.A.; Shamsuddin, S.M.; Sunar, M.H.

2008-01-01

CG (Computer Graphics) is a key technology for producing visual contents. Currently computer generated imagery techniques are being developed and applied, particularly in the field of virtual reality applications, film production, training and flight simulators, to provide total composition of realistic computer graphic images. Natural objects like clouds are an integral feature of the sky without them synthetic outdoor scenes seem unrealistic. Modeling and animating such objects is a difficult task. Most systems are difficult to use, as they require adjustment of numerous, complex parameters and are non-interactive. This paper presents an intuitive, interactive system to artistically model, animate, and render visually convincing clouds using modern graphics hardware. A high-level interface models clouds through the visual use of cubes. Clouds are rendered by making use of hardware accelerated API -OpenGL. The resulting interactive design and rendering system produces perceptually convincing cloud models that can be used in any interactive system. (author)

Action semantics: A unifying conceptual framework for the selective use of multimodal and modality-specific object knowledge.

Science.gov (United States)

van Elk, Michiel; van Schie, Hein; Bekkering, Harold

2014-06-01

Our capacity to use tools and objects is often considered one of the hallmarks of the human species. Many objects greatly extend our bodily capabilities to act in the physical world, such as when using a hammer or a saw. In addition, humans have the remarkable capability to use objects in a flexible fashion and to combine multiple objects in complex actions. We prepare coffee, cook dinner and drive our car. In this review we propose that humans have developed declarative and procedural knowledge, i.e. action semantics that enables us to use objects in a meaningful way. A state-of-the-art review of research on object use is provided, involving behavioral, developmental, neuropsychological and neuroimaging studies. We show that research in each of these domains is characterized by similar discussions regarding (1) the role of object affordances, (2) the relation between goals and means in object use and (3) the functional and neural organization of action semantics. We propose a novel conceptual framework of action semantics to address these issues and to integrate the previous findings. We argue that action semantics entails both multimodal object representations and modality-specific sub-systems, involving manipulation knowledge, functional knowledge and representations of the sensory and proprioceptive consequences of object use. Furthermore, we argue that action semantics are hierarchically organized and selectively activated and used depending on the action intention of the actor and the current task context. Our framework presents an integrative account of multiple findings and perspectives on object use that may guide future studies in this interdisciplinary domain. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Objectively Measured Total and Occupational Sedentary Time in Three Work Settings

OpenAIRE

van Dommelen, Paula; Coffeng, Jennifer K.; van der Ploeg, Hidde P.; van der Beek, Allard J.; Boot, C?cile R. L.; Hendriksen, Ingrid J. M.

2016-01-01

Background. Sedentary behaviour increases the risk for morbidity. Our primary aim is to determine the proportion and factors associated with objectively measured total and occupational sedentary time in three work settings. Secondary aim is to study the proportion of physical activity and prolonged sedentary bouts. Methods. Data were obtained using ActiGraph accelerometers from employees of: 1) a financial service provider (n = 49 men, 31 women), 2) two research institutes (n = 30 men, 57 wom...

Can Previewing Sport-Specific Video Influence Reactive-Agility Response Time?

Science.gov (United States)

Holding, Ryan; Meir, Rudi; Zhou, Shi

2017-02-01

The purpose of this study was to examine whether a video-based warm-up could provide an acute performance benefit to response time for athletes in a sport-specific agility task. In addition, 2 learning strategies, explicit and implicit, were compared for their effectiveness in facilitating an improvement in sport-specific agility. Thirty representative male junior rugby union players (age 14-16 y, mean age 14.6 ± 1.09 y) were placed in 3 experimental groups (explicit, implicit, and control) and completed 2 intervention sessions. Testing sessions included preintervention testing, completion of the video-based warm-up intervention, and postintervention testing. A 3D motion-analysis system was used to assess response time in the testing battery. The athletes' response times on the pre- to postintervention tests were compared to determine the effectiveness of the video-based warm-up. A 2-way general linear model with repeated-measures analysis indicated that both the explicit (P = .030, d = 0.28) and implicit (P = .049, d = 0.33) groups significantly improved their response time by the intervention compared with the control group (P = .367, d = 0.08). The mean postintervention response time for the explicit group improved by 19.1% (from 0.246 s pre to 0.199 s post), and the implicit group improved by 15.7% (from 0.268 s to 0.226 s). Findings suggest that a video-based warm-up may provide an acute benefit to sport-specific agility performance for junior athletes.

Children’s sedentary behaviour: descriptive epidemiology and associations with objectively-measured sedentary time

OpenAIRE

Klitsie, Tessa; Corder, Kirsten; Visscher, Tommy LS; Atkin, Andrew J; Jones, Andrew P; van Sluijs, Esther MF

2013-01-01

Background: Little is known regarding the patterning and socio-demographic distribution of multiple sedentary behaviours in children. The aims of this study were to: 1) describe the leisure-time sedentary behaviour of 9-10 year old British children, and 2) establish associations with objectively-measured sedentary time. Methods. Cross-sectional analysis in the SPEEDY study (Sport, Physical activity and Eating behaviour: Environmental Determinants in Young people) (N=1513, 44.3% boys). Twelve ...

Self-efficacy for exercise, more than disease-related factors, is associated with objectively assessed exercise time and sedentary behaviour in rheumatoid arthritis.

Science.gov (United States)

Huffman, K M; Pieper, C F; Hall, K S; St Clair, E W; Kraus, W E

2015-01-01

Until recently, reports of physical activity in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) were limited to self-report methods and/or leisure-time physical activity. Our objectives were to assess, determine correlates of, and compare to well-matched controls both exercise and sedentary time in a typical clinical cohort of RA. Persons with established RA (seropositive or radiographic erosions; n = 41) without diabetes or cardiovascular disease underwent assessments of traditional and disease-specific correlates of physical activity and 7 days of triaxial accelerometry. Twenty-seven age, gender, and body mass index (BMI)-matched controls were assessed. For persons with RA, objectively measured median (25th-75th percentile) exercise time was 3 (1-11) min/day; only 10% (n = 4) of participants exercised for ≥ 30 min/day. Time spent in sedentary activities was 92% (89-95%). Exercise time was not related to pain but was inversely related to disease activity (r = -0.3, p self-efficacy for endurance activity (r = 0.4, p self-efficacy for endurance activity (r = -0.4, p self-efficacy for physical activity but similar amounts of exercise and sedentary time. For persons with RA and without diabetes or cardiovascular disease, time spent in exercise was well below established guidelines and activity patterns were predominantly sedentary. For optimal care in RA, in addition to promoting exercise, clinicians should consider assessing sedentary behaviour and self-efficacy for exercise. Future interventions might determine whether increased self-efficacy can increase physical activity in RA.

Specification and Compilation of Real-Time Stream Processing Applications

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Geuns, S.J.

2015-01-01

This thesis is concerned with the specification, compilation and corresponding temporal analysis of real-time stream processing applications that are executed on embedded multiprocessor systems. An example of such applications are software defined radio applications. These applications typically

Objectively-determined intensity- and domain-specific physical activity and sedentary behavior in relation to percent body fat.

Science.gov (United States)

Scheers, Tineke; Philippaerts, Renaat; Lefevre, Johan

2013-12-01

This study examined the independent and joint associations of overall, intensity-specific and domain-specific physical activity and sedentary behavior with bioelectrical impedance-determined percent body fat. Physical activity was measured in 442 Flemish adults (41.4 ± 9.8 years) using the SenseWear Armband and an electronic diary. Two-way analyses of covariance investigated the interaction of physical activity and sedentary behavior with percent body fat. Multiple linear regression analyses, adjusted for potential confounders, examined the associations of intensity-specific and domain-specific physical activity and sedentary behavior with percent body fat. Results showed a significant main effect for physical activity in both genders and for sedentary behavior in women, but no interaction effects. Light activity was positively (β = 0.41 for men and 0.43 for women) and moderate (β = -0.64 and -0.41), vigorous (β = -0.21 and -0.24) and moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) inversely associated with percent body fat, independent of sedentary time. Regarding domain-specific physical activity, significant associations were present for occupation, leisure time and household chores, irrespective of sedentary time. The positive associations between body fat and total and domain-specific sedentary behavior diminished after MVPA was controlled for. MVPA during leisure time, occupation and household chores may be essential to prevent fat gain. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd and European Society for Clinical Nutrition and Metabolism. All rights reserved.

Association between maternal education and objectively measured physical activity and sedentary time in adolescents

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sherar, Lauren B; Griffin, T. P.; Ekelund, U.

2016-01-01

Background Investigating socioeconomic variation in physical activity (PA) and sedentary time is important as it may represent a pathway by which socioeconomic position (SEP) leads to ill health. Findings on the association between children's SEP and objectively assessed PA and/or sedentary time......) and regression coefficients combined across studies using random effects metaanalyses. Analyses were conducted in March 2014. Results Adolescents of university educated mothers spent more time sedentary (9.5 min/day, p=0.005) and less time in light activity (10 min/day, p

Reasoning about Function Objects

Science.gov (United States)

Nordio, Martin; Calcagno, Cristiano; Meyer, Bertrand; Müller, Peter; Tschannen, Julian

Modern object-oriented languages support higher-order implementations through function objects such as delegates in C#, agents in Eiffel, or closures in Scala. Function objects bring a new level of abstraction to the object-oriented programming model, and require a comparable extension to specification and verification techniques. We introduce a verification methodology that extends function objects with auxiliary side-effect free (pure) methods to model logical artifacts: preconditions, postconditions and modifies clauses. These pure methods can be used to specify client code abstractly, that is, independently from specific instantiations of the function objects. To demonstrate the feasibility of our approach, we have implemented an automatic prover, which verifies several non-trivial examples.

76 FR 53524 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Once Upon Many Times...

Science.gov (United States)

2011-08-26

... DEPARTMENT OF STATE [Public Notice: 7568] Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: ``Once Upon Many Times: Legends and Myths in Himalayan Art'' SUMMARY: Notice is hereby given of... included in the exhibition ``Once Upon Many Times: Legends and Myths in Himalayan Art,'' imported from...

Towards lexicographic multi-objective linear programming using grossone methodology

Science.gov (United States)

Cococcioni, Marco; Pappalardo, Massimo; Sergeyev, Yaroslav D.

2016-10-01

Lexicographic Multi-Objective Linear Programming (LMOLP) problems can be solved in two ways: preemptive and nonpreemptive. The preemptive approach requires the solution of a series of LP problems, with changing constraints (each time the next objective is added, a new constraint appears). The nonpreemptive approach is based on a scalarization of the multiple objectives into a single-objective linear function by a weighted combination of the given objectives. It requires the specification of a set of weights, which is not straightforward and can be time consuming. In this work we present both mathematical and software ingredients necessary to solve LMOLP problems using a recently introduced computational methodology (allowing one to work numerically with infinities and infinitesimals) based on the concept of grossone. The ultimate goal of such an attempt is an implementation of a simplex-like algorithm, able to solve the original LMOLP problem by solving only one single-objective problem and without the need to specify finite weights. The expected advantages are therefore obvious.

REAL-TIME OBJECT DETECTION IN PARALLEL THROUGH ATOMIC TRANSACTIONS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

K Sivakumar

2016-11-01

Full Text Available Object detection and tracking is important operation involved in embedded systems like video surveillance, Traffic monitoring, campus security system, machine vision applications and other areas. Detecting and tracking multiple objects in a video or image is challenging problem in machine vision and computer vision based embedded systems. Implementation of such a object detection and tracking systems are done in sequential way of processing and also it was implemented using hardware synthesize tools like verilog HDL with FPGA, achieves considerably lesser performance in speed and it does support lesser atomic transactions. There are many object detection and tracking algorithm were proposed and implemented, among them background subtraction is one of them. This paper proposes a implementation of detecting and tracking multiple objects based on background subtraction algorithm using java and .NET and also discuss about the architecture concept for object detection through atomic transactional, modern hardware synthesizes language called Bluespec.

The associations of objectively measured physical activity and sedentary time with cognitive functions in school-aged children.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Heidi J Syväoja

Full Text Available Low levels of physical activity among children have raised concerns over the effects of a physically inactive lifestyle, not only on physical health but also on cognitive prerequisites of learning. This study examined how objectively measured and self-reported physical activity and sedentary behavior are associated with cognitive functions in school-aged children. The study population consisted of 224 children from five schools in the Jyväskylä school district in Finland (mean age 12.2 years; 56% girls, who participated in the study in the spring of 2011. Physical activity and sedentary time were measured objectively for seven consecutive days using the ActiGraph GT1M/GT3X accelerometer. Self-reported moderate to vigorous physical activity (MVPA and screen time were evaluated with the questions used in the "WHO Health Behavior in School-aged Children" study. Cognitive functions including visual memory, executive functions and attention were evaluated with a computerized Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery by using five different tests. Structural equation modeling was applied to examine how objectively measured and self-reported MVPA and sedentary behavior were associated with cognitive functions. High levels of objectively measured MVPA were associated with good performance in the reaction time test. High levels of objectively measured sedentary time were associated with good performance in the sustained attention test. Objectively measured MVPA and sedentary time were not associated with other measures of cognitive functions. High amount of self-reported computer/video game play was associated with weaker performance in working memory test, whereas high amount of computer use was associated with weaker performance in test measuring shifting and flexibility of attention. Self-reported physical activity and total screen time were not associated with any measures of cognitive functions. The results of the present study propose

Specific MRI quality control: development and production of a multimodal test-object. Assessment of MRI sequences

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Dedieu, Veronique; Bard, Jean-Jacques; Bonnet, Jacques; Buchheit, Isabelle; Confort-Gouny, Sylviane; Certaines, Jacques de; Lacaze, Brigitte; Vincensini, Dominique; Joffre, Francis

2007-02-01

After a first part recalling the operation principle of a MRI imager and the modalities of acquisition of MRI images (base MNR experiment, image quality, technical issues, artefacts and main defects of MRI imagers), this document addresses the different types of quality control in MRI and regulatory issues. The third part presents the characteristics of a multimodal test-object which has been developed, the parameters of the specific quality control, and control procedures

Objectively measured physical activity and sedentary time in youth

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Cooper, Ashley R; Goodman, Anna; Page, Angie S

2015-01-01

.8-18.4 years) who provided at least three days of valid accelerometer data. Linear regression was used to examine associations between age, sex, weight status, country and physical activity outcomes. RESULTS: Boys were less sedentary and more active than girls at all ages. After 5 years of age......BACKGROUND: Physical activity and sedentary behaviour in youth have been reported to vary by sex, age, weight status and country. However, supporting data are often self-reported and/or do not encompass a wide range of ages or geographical locations. This study aimed to describe objectively......-measured physical activity and sedentary time patterns in youth. METHODS: The International Children's Accelerometry Database (ICAD) consists of ActiGraph accelerometer data from 20 studies in ten countries, processed using common data reduction procedures. Analyses were conducted on 27,637 participants (2...

Objectively measured and self-reported leisure-time sedentary behavior and academic performance in youth: The UP&DOWN Study.

Science.gov (United States)

Esteban-Cornejo, Irene; Martinez-Gomez, David; Sallis, James F; Cabanas-Sánchez, Verónica; Fernández-Santos, Jorge; Castro-Piñero, Jose; Veiga, Oscar L

2015-08-01

To examine the associations of (i) objectively measured and self-reported sedentary behavior during leisure time with academic performance and (ii) patterns of sedentary behavior with academic performance. This study was conducted with 1146 youth aged 12.5±2.5years in Spain during 2011-2012. Leisure-time sedentary behavior during out-of-school hours was assessed by accelerometry and self-report. Academic performance was assessed through school grades. Objectively measured sedentary leisure-time was not significantly associated with academic performance. Time spent in Internet surfing, listening to music, and sitting without doing anything were negatively associated with all academic performance indicators (β ranging from -0.066 to -0.144; all pacademic indicators (β ranging from -0.085 to -0.148; all pacademic indicators (β ranging from 0.063 to 0.105; all pleisure-time, but not objectively measured sedentary leisure time, may influence academic performance. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Registration of Space Objects

Science.gov (United States)

Schmidt-Tedd, Bernhard

2017-07-01

Space objects are subject to registration in order to allocate "jurisdiction and control" over those objects in the sovereign-free environment of outer space. This approach is similar to the registration of ships in view of the high sea and for aircrafts with respect to the international airspace. Registration is one of the basic principles of space law, starting with UN General Assembly Resolution 1721 B (XVI) of December 20, 1961, followed by Resolution 1962 (XVIII) of December 13, 1963, then formulated in Article VIII of the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 and as specified in the Registration Convention of 1975. Registration of space objects can be seen today as a principle of customary international law, relevant for each spacefaring state. Registration is divided into a national and an international level. The State Party establishes a national registry for its space objects, and those registrations have to be communicated via diplomatic channel to the UN Register of space objects. This UN Register is handled by the UN Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) and is an open source of information for space objects worldwide. Registration is linked to the so-called launching state of the relevant space object. There might be more than one launching state for the specific launch event, but only one state actor can register a specific space object. The state of registry gains "jurisdiction and control" over the space object and therefore no double registration is permissible. Based on the established UN Space Law, registration practice was subject to some adaptions due to technical developments and legal challenges. After the privatization of the major international satellite organizations, a number of non-registrations had to be faced. The state actors reacted with the UN Registration Practice Resolution of 2007 as elaborated in the Legal Subcommittee of UNCOPUOS, the Committee for the Peaceful Use of Outer Space. In this context an UNOOSA Registration Information

Adobe Boxes: Locating Object Proposals Using Object Adobes.

Science.gov (United States)

Fang, Zhiwen; Cao, Zhiguo; Xiao, Yang; Zhu, Lei; Yuan, Junsong

2016-09-01

Despite the previous efforts of object proposals, the detection rates of the existing approaches are still not satisfactory enough. To address this, we propose Adobe Boxes to efficiently locate the potential objects with fewer proposals, in terms of searching the object adobes that are the salient object parts easy to be perceived. Because of the visual difference between the object and its surroundings, an object adobe obtained from the local region has a high probability to be a part of an object, which is capable of depicting the locative information of the proto-object. Our approach comprises of three main procedures. First, the coarse object proposals are acquired by employing randomly sampled windows. Then, based on local-contrast analysis, the object adobes are identified within the enlarged bounding boxes that correspond to the coarse proposals. The final object proposals are obtained by converging the bounding boxes to tightly surround the object adobes. Meanwhile, our object adobes can also refine the detection rate of most state-of-the-art methods as a refinement approach. The extensive experiments on four challenging datasets (PASCAL VOC2007, VOC2010, VOC2012, and ILSVRC2014) demonstrate that the detection rate of our approach generally outperforms the state-of-the-art methods, especially with relatively small number of proposals. The average time consumed on one image is about 48 ms, which nearly meets the real-time requirement.

The effect of substrate composition and storage time on urine specific gravity in dogs.

Science.gov (United States)

Steinberg, E; Drobatz, K; Aronson, L

2009-10-01

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effects of substrate composition and storage time on urine specific gravity in dogs. A descriptive cohort study of 15 dogs. The urine specific gravity of free catch urine samples was analysed during a 5-hour time period using three separate storage methods; a closed syringe, a diaper pad and non-absorbable cat litter. The urine specific gravity increased over time in all three substrates. The syringe sample had the least change from baseline and the diaper sample had the greatest change from baseline. The urine specific gravity for the litter and diaper samples had a statistically significant increase from the 1-hour to the 5-hour time point. The urine specific gravity from canine urine stored either on a diaper or in a non-absorbable litter increased over time. Although the change was found to be statistically significant over the 5-hour study period it is unlikely to be clinically significant.

Perceived and objectively measured physical activity and sedentary time among South Asian women in the UK.

Science.gov (United States)

Curry, Whitney Babakus; Duda, Joan L; Thompson, Janice L

2015-03-16

Limited self-report data suggest that South Asian (SA) women fail to meet physical activity (PA) recommendations. Recent research using objective measures reveals SA women living in the UK have higher PA levels than previously reported, and a pattern of under-reporting PA and sedentary time (ST). There is limited research on SA women's understanding and experiences of PA/ST, and the cultural contexts and conditions within which they occur. Therefore the aims of this mixed-methods study were to compare perceived PA and ST to objectively measured data and explore PA- and ST-specific contexts, experiences, and sources of PA and ST amongst SA women in the UK. 24 women were purposively sampled to participate in a semi-structured interview from a larger study of 140 women who wore an accelerometer for 7 days. Demographic and anthropometric data were also collected. Notable qualitative themes on contextualisation were of adequate PA as "keeping busy" or "being healthy", and of ST as "lazy" or "resting in old age". Few participants reported being sedentary, and most believed they were sufficiently physically active. Objectively measured PA/ST indicated that 66% women were less active than perceived (with regard to duration and intensity), with none able to estimate duration of ST. Findings suggest that overall, SA women have contextualisations of PA/ST that may not coincide with those of researchers, health professionals and policy makers, and lack awareness of the intensity of PA in which they engage and the health risks of high levels of ST. These findings highlight the need for objective measures of PA and ST in this population combined with in-depth qualitative assessments to provide more accurate assessments of these behaviours. This information can subsequently be used to develop health promotion messages and interventions focusing on increasing duration and/or intensity levels of daily activities (e.g., walking, housework) and reducing ST in this population.

Perceived and Objectively Measured Physical Activity and Sedentary Time among South Asian Women in the UK

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Whitney Babakus Curry

2015-03-01

Full Text Available Introduction: Limited self-report data suggest that South Asian (SA women fail to meet physical activity (PA recommendations. Recent research using objective measures reveals SA women living in the UK have higher PA levels than previously reported, and a pattern of under-reporting PA and sedentary time (ST. There is limited research on SA women’s understanding and experiences of PA/ST, and the cultural contexts and conditions within which they occur. Therefore the aims of this mixed-methods study were to compare perceived PA and ST to objectively measured data and explore PA- and ST-specific contexts, experiences, and sources of PA and ST amongst SA women in the UK. Methods: 24 women were purposively sampled to participate in a semi-structured interview from a larger study of 140 women who wore an accelerometer for 7 days. Demographic and anthropometric data were also collected. Results: Notable qualitative themes on contextualisation were of adequate PA as “keeping busy” or “being healthy”, and of ST as “lazy” or “resting in old age”. Few participants reported being sedentary, and most believed they were sufficiently physically active. Objectively measured PA/ST indicated that 66% women were less active than perceived (with regard to duration and intensity, with none able to estimate duration of ST. Discussion: Findings suggest that overall, SA women have contextualisations of PA/ST that may not coincide with those of researchers, health professionals and policy makers, and lack awareness of the intensity of PA in which they engage and the health risks of high levels of ST. These findings highlight the need for objective measures of PA and ST in this population combined with in-depth qualitative assessments to provide more accurate assessments of these behaviours. This information can subsequently be used to develop health promotion messages and interventions focusing on increasing duration and/or intensity levels of daily

Non-specific Effects of Vaccines and Stunting: Timing May Be Essential

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mike L.T. Berendsen

2016-06-01

Conclusions: We found a general time-dependent pattern of non-specific effects of vaccination, with positive associations for vaccinations given early in life and negative associations for vaccinations given later in infancy. If confirmed in further research, our findings may provide a new perspective on the non-specific effects of vaccination.

A multiple ship routing and speed optimization problem under time, cost and environmental objectives

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Wen, M.; Pacino, Dario; Kontovas, C.A.

2017-01-01

The purpose of this paper is to investigate a multiple ship routing and speed optimization problem under time, cost and environmental objectives. A branch and price algorithm as well as a constraint programming model are developed that consider (a) fuel consumption as a function of payload, (b......) fuel price as an explicit input, (c) freight rate as an input, and (d) in-transit cargo inventory costs. The alternative objective functions are minimum total trip duration, minimum total cost and minimum emissions. Computational experience with the algorithm is reported on a variety of scenarios....

Temperament and Objectively Measured Physical Activity and Sedentary Time among Canadian Preschoolers

OpenAIRE

Jennifer D. Irwin; Andrew M. Johnson; Leigh M. Vanderloo; Shauna M. Burke; Patricia Tucker

2015-01-01

This study sought to assess the influence of preschoolers' temperament on their objectively measured physical activity and sedentary time. Actical? accelerometers were used to measure preschoolers' from London, Canada's (n?=?216; 2.5?5?years) physical activity and sedentary levels during childcare hours (5 consecutive days; 15?s epoch). The Child Temperament Questionnaire (CTQ) was used to assess child temperament via parent/guardian report. The six subscales of the CTQ (i.e., reaction to foo...

Forebrain-Specific Loss of BMPRII in Mice Reduces Anxiety and Increases Object Exploration.

Science.gov (United States)

McBrayer, Zofeyah L; Dimova, Jiva; Pisansky, Marc T; Sun, Mu; Beppu, Hideyuki; Gewirtz, Jonathan C; O'Connor, Michael B

2015-01-01

To investigate the role of Bone Morphogenic Protein Receptor Type II (BMPRII) in learning, memory, and exploratory behavior in mice, a tissue-specific knockout of BMPRII in the post-natal hippocampus and forebrain was generated. We found that BMPRII mutant mice had normal spatial learning and memory in the Morris water maze, but showed significantly reduced swimming speeds with increased floating behavior. Further analysis using the Porsolt Swim Test to investigate behavioral despair did not reveal any differences in immobility between mutants and controls. In the Elevated Plus Maze, BMPRII mutants and Smad4 mutants showed reduced anxiety, while in exploratory tests, BMPRII mutants showed more interest in object exploration. These results suggest that loss of BMPRII in the mouse hippocampus and forebrain does not disrupt spatial learning and memory encoding, but instead impacts exploratory and anxiety-related behaviors.

Forebrain-Specific Loss of BMPRII in Mice Reduces Anxiety and Increases Object Exploration.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Zofeyah L McBrayer

Full Text Available To investigate the role of Bone Morphogenic Protein Receptor Type II (BMPRII in learning, memory, and exploratory behavior in mice, a tissue-specific knockout of BMPRII in the post-natal hippocampus and forebrain was generated. We found that BMPRII mutant mice had normal spatial learning and memory in the Morris water maze, but showed significantly reduced swimming speeds with increased floating behavior. Further analysis using the Porsolt Swim Test to investigate behavioral despair did not reveal any differences in immobility between mutants and controls. In the Elevated Plus Maze, BMPRII mutants and Smad4 mutants showed reduced anxiety, while in exploratory tests, BMPRII mutants showed more interest in object exploration. These results suggest that loss of BMPRII in the mouse hippocampus and forebrain does not disrupt spatial learning and memory encoding, but instead impacts exploratory and anxiety-related behaviors.

Testing of toxicity based methods to develop site specific clean up objectives - phase 1: Toxicity protocol screening and applicability

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hamilton, H.; Kerr, D.; Thorne, W.; Taylor, B.; Zadnik, M.; Goudey, S.; Birkholz, D.

1994-03-01

A study was conducted to develop a cost-effective and practical protocol for using bio-assay based toxicity assessment methods for remediation of decommissioned oil and gas production, and processing facilities. The objective was to generate site-specific remediation criteria for contaminated sites. Most companies have used the chemical-specific approach which, however, did not meet the ultimate land use goal of agricultural production. The toxicity assessment method described in this study dealt with potential impairment to agricultural crop production and natural ecosystems. Human health concerns were not specifically addressed. It was suggested that chemical-specific methods should be used when human health concerns exist. . Results showed that toxicity tests will more directly identify ecological stress caused by site contamination than chemical-specific remediation criteria, which can be unnecessarily protective. 11 refs., 7 tabs., 6 figs

Combining monitoring with run-time assertion checking

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Gouw, Stijn de

2013-01-01

We develop a new technique for Run-time Checking for two object-oriented languages: Java and the Abstract Behavioral Specification language ABS. In object-oriented languages, objects communicate by sending each other messages. Assuming encapsulation, the behavior of objects is completely

Finite-time convergent recurrent neural network with a hard-limiting activation function for constrained optimization with piecewise-linear objective functions.

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, Qingshan; Wang, Jun

2011-04-01

This paper presents a one-layer recurrent neural network for solving a class of constrained nonsmooth optimization problems with piecewise-linear objective functions. The proposed neural network is guaranteed to be globally convergent in finite time to the optimal solutions under a mild condition on a derived lower bound of a single gain parameter in the model. The number of neurons in the neural network is the same as the number of decision variables of the optimization problem. Compared with existing neural networks for optimization, the proposed neural network has a couple of salient features such as finite-time convergence and a low model complexity. Specific models for two important special cases, namely, linear programming and nonsmooth optimization, are also presented. In addition, applications to the shortest path problem and constrained least absolute deviation problem are discussed with simulation results to demonstrate the effectiveness and characteristics of the proposed neural network.

MULTILOOP PI CONTROLLER FOR ACHIEVING SIMULTANEOUS TIME AND FREQUENCY DOMAIN SPECIFICATIONS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

M. SENTHILKUMAR

2015-08-01

Full Text Available Most of the controllers in control system are designed to satisfy either time domain or frequency domain specifications. This work presents the computation of a multiloop PI controller for achieving time and frequency domain specifications simultaneously. The desired time and frequency domain measures are to be specified initially to the design. To obtain the desired value of the performance measures the graphical relationship between the PI controller and the performance criteria is given. Thus by using graphical method a set of PI controller parameters to meet the desired performance measures are obtained in an effective and simpler way. The coupled tank has become a classic design of control engineering for multivariable process. The proposed control strategy has been implemented in the same coupled tank process and validated through simulation studies.

Multi-objective compared to single-objective optimization with application to model validation and uncertainty quantification

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Schulze-Riegert, R.; Krosche, M.; Stekolschikov, K. [Scandpower Petroleum Technology GmbH, Hamburg (Germany); Fahimuddin, A. [Technische Univ. Braunschweig (Germany)

2007-09-13

History Matching in Reservoir Simulation, well location and production optimization etc. is generally a multi-objective optimization problem. The problem statement of history matching for a realistic field case includes many field and well measurements in time and type, e.g. pressure measurements, fluid rates, events such as water and gas break-throughs, etc. Uncertainty parameters modified as part of the history matching process have varying impact on the improvement of the match criteria. Competing match criteria often reduce the likelihood of finding an acceptable history match. It is an engineering challenge in manual history matching processes to identify competing objectives and to implement the changes required in the simulation model. In production optimization or scenario optimization the focus on one key optimization criterion such as NPV limits the identification of alternatives and potential opportunities, since multiple objectives are summarized in a predefined global objective formulation. Previous works primarily focus on a specific optimization method. Few works actually concentrate on the objective formulation and multi-objective optimization schemes have not yet been applied to reservoir simulations. This paper presents a multi-objective optimization approach applicable to reservoir simulation. It addresses the problem of multi-objective criteria in a history matching study and presents analysis techniques identifying competing match criteria. A Pareto-Optimizer is discussed and the implementation of that multi-objective optimization scheme is applied to a case study. Results are compared to a single-objective optimization method. (orig.)

Planning GPS Measurements of a Linear Object for a Specified Time Interval

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Specht Cezary

2017-12-01

Full Text Available The previous measurement campaigns planning used in geodesy is conducted exclusively for individual points. For the natural process aimed at the adoption of the introduction of the planning (prediction of constellation state in navigation, which is characterized by the movement, one should adopt measurement campaigns planning for linear objects. In contrast to the existing planning solutions, focused on point presentation of the state of the constellation of navigation system, the author of this article rearranges the proposal of determination of geometrical factors, and their summation. In the presented simulation, one has specified the route of passing at certain times and it was assumed that the receiver will move with variable motion. One has defined the geometric ratios (PDOP, which allow to distinguish the results corresponding to the adopted criteria for the measurement of linear object to be conducted with the best possible accuracy.

Multi-objective decisions in land-use planning involving chemical sites

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Rasmussen, B.; Bertelsen, I.; Burchard, V.

1999-01-01

A methodology for land-use planning involving chemical sites has been developed for making decisions in local and regional administrations. The methodology structures the planning process in seven steps, where one can loop through the steps several times.Essential parts of the methodology...... are the specification of objectives and the development of alternatives where the objectives sets the frame in which the alternatives are assessed and compared. The list of objectives includes the following items: safetyand accidents, public distortion and health, environmental impact, cultural and natural heritage...

Cosmic bombardment V: Threat object-dispersing approaches to active planetary defense

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Teller, E.; Wood, L. [Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace]|[Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States); Ishikawa, M. [Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Dept. of Aeronautics and Astronautics]|[Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States); Hyde, R. [Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States)

1995-05-24

Earth-impacting comets and asteroids with diameters {approx}0.03 - 10 km pose the greatest threats to the terrestrial biosphere in terms of impact frequency-weighted impact consequences, and thus are of most concern to designers of active planetary defenses. Specific gravitational binding energies of such objects range from 10{sup -7} to 10{sup -2} J/gm, and are small compared with the specific energies of 1x10{sup 3} to 3x10{sup 3} J/gm required to vaporize objects of typical composition or the specific energies required to pulverize them, which are 10{sup -1} to 10 J/gm. All of these are small compared to the specific kinetic energy of these objects in the Earth- centered frame, which is 2x10{sup 5} to 2x10{sup 6} J/gm. The prospect naturally arises of negating all such threats by deflecting, pulverizing or vaporizing the objects. Pulverization-with-dispersal is an attractive option of reasonable defensive robustness. Examples of such equipments - which employ no explosives of any type - are given. Vaporization is the maximally robust defensive option, and may be invoked to negate threat objects not observed until little time is left until Earth-strike, and pulverization-with-dispersal has proven inadequate. Physically larger threats may be vaporized with nuclear explosives. No contemporary technical means of any kind appear capable of directly dispersing the -100 km diameter scale Charon- class cometary objects recently observed in the outer solar system, although such objects may be deflected to defensively useful extents. Means of implementing defenses of each of these types are proposed for specificity, and areas for optimization noted. Biospheric impacts of threat object debris are briefly considered, for bounding purposes. Experiments are suggested on cometary and asteroidal objects.

Planning and setting objectives in field studies: Chapter 2

Science.gov (United States)

Fisher, Robert N.; Dodd, C. Kenneth

2016-01-01

This chapter enumerates the steps required in designing and planning field studies on the ecology and conservation of reptiles, as these involve a high level of uncertainty and risk. To this end, the chapter differentiates between goals (descriptions of what one intends to accomplish) and objectives (the measurable steps required to achieve the established goals). Thus, meeting a specific goal may require many objectives. It may not be possible to define some of them until certain experiments have been conducted; often evaluations of sampling protocols are needed to increase certainty in the biological results. And if sampling locations are fixed and sampling events are repeated over time, then both study-specific covariates and sampling-specific covariates should exist. Additionally, other critical design considerations for field study include obtaining permits, as well as researching ethics and biosecurity issues.

Risk-based technical specifications: Development and application of an approach to the generation of a plant specific real-time risk model

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Puglia, B.; Gallagher, D.; Amico, P.; Atefi, B.

1992-10-01

This report describes a process developed to convert an existing PRA into a model amenable to real time, risk-based technical specification calculations. In earlier studies (culminating in NUREG/CR-5742), several risk-based approaches to technical specification were evaluated. A real-time approach using a plant specific PRA capable of modeling plant configurations as they change was identified as the most comprehensive approach to control plant risk. A master fault tree logic model representative of-all of the core damage sequences was developed. Portions of the system fault trees were modularized and supercomponents comprised of component failures with similar effects were developed to reduce the size of the model and, quantification times. Modifications to the master fault tree logic were made to properly model the effect of maintenance and recovery actions. Fault trees representing several actuation systems not modeled in detail in the existing PRA were added to the master fault tree logic. This process was applied to the Surry NUREG-1150 Level 1 PRA. The master logic mode was confirmed. The model was then used to evaluate frequency associated with several plant configurations using the IRRAS code. For all cases analyzed computational time was less than three minutes. This document Volume 2, contains appendices A, B, and C. These provide, respectively: Surry Technical Specifications Model Database, Surry Technical Specifications Model, and a list of supercomponents used in the Surry Technical Specifications Model

Investigation of some specific industry objects effect on plants

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kadirova, M.; Mukhamedshina, N. M.; Mirsagatova, A. A.; Norboev, N.; Amanov, M.; Baynazarov, B.; Khushvaktov, T.

2001-01-01

Such industry objects as metallurgical works, chemical fertilizers manufacture, automobile industry and others are contribute to contaminate an environment. For example, it is known, that aluminum factories throw out in an environment fluorine hydride, solid fluorides, nitrogen dioxide, sulpher dioxide, hydrocarbons, ions of heavy metals and others. For comparison of harmful action of various industrial objects on plants we had investigate some leaves and seed of plants grown in areas of Tadjik aluminum factory, Chirchik works of heatproof and refractory metals, Asaka automobile works and Tashkent nuclear reactor action. Investigations were conduct by nuclear techniques and by physical and agrotechnical ethods. The alternative methods have been used by Tashkent state agrarian university. High sensitive and reliable multielement instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) and X-ray radiometric techniques for determination of 27 elements in plant have been developed in the Institute of nuclear physics (INP)

Association between birth weight and objectively measured sedentary time is mediated by central adiposity

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hildebrand, Maria; Kolle, Elin; Hansen, Bjørge H

2015-01-01

BACKGROUND: Birth weight is an early correlate of disease later in life, and animal studies suggest that low birth weight is associated with reduced activity and increased sedentary time. Whether birth weight predicts later sedentary time in humans is uncertain. OBJECTIVES: We examined the relation...... between birth weight and sedentary time in youth and examined whether this association was mediated by central adiposity. DESIGN: We used pooled cross-sectional data from 8 observational studies conducted between 1997 and 2007 that consisted of 10,793 youth (boys: 47%) aged 6-18 y from the International...... Children's Accelerometry Database. Birth weight was measured in hospitals or maternally reported, sedentary time was assessed by using accelerometry (

Time-domain single-source integral equations for analyzing scattering from homogeneous penetrable objects

KAUST Repository

Valdés, Felipe

2013-03-01

Single-source time-domain electric-and magnetic-field integral equations for analyzing scattering from homogeneous penetrable objects are presented. Their temporal discretization is effected by using shifted piecewise polynomial temporal basis functions and a collocation testing procedure, thus allowing for a marching-on-in-time (MOT) solution scheme. Unlike dual-source formulations, single-source equations involve space-time domain operator products, for which spatial discretization techniques developed for standalone operators do not apply. Here, the spatial discretization of the single-source time-domain integral equations is achieved by using the high-order divergence-conforming basis functions developed by Graglia alongside the high-order divergence-and quasi curl-conforming (DQCC) basis functions of Valdés The combination of these two sets allows for a well-conditioned mapping from div-to curl-conforming function spaces that fully respects the space-mapping properties of the space-time operators involved. Numerical results corroborate the fact that the proposed procedure guarantees accuracy and stability of the MOT scheme. © 2012 IEEE.

Long-Term Correlates of Objectively Measured Physical Activity and Sedentary Time in Norwegian Men and Women.

Science.gov (United States)

Solbraa, Ane Kristiansen; Ekelund, Ulf; Holme, Ingar M; Graff-Iversen, Sidsel; Steene-Johannessen, Jostein; Aadland, Eivind; Anderssen, Sigmund Alfred

2015-11-01

Sex, age, body mass index (BMI), perceived health and health behavior are correlates known to affect physical activity and sedentary time. However, studies have often been cross-sectional, and less is known about long-term correlates. Thus, the aims were to investigate 1) the associations between a set of characteristics (demographic, biological, psychological, and behavioral) and objectively measured physical activity and sedentary time at 13-year follow-up, and 2) the association between changes in these characteristics over time and physical activity and sedentary time. Baseline characteristics were collected in 40-year-olds in 1996, and follow-up data on objectively measured physical activity and sedentary time were obtained in 2009 (n = 240). Data were analyzed by multiple linear regressions. Self-reported physical activity (P physical activity (MVPA) whereas BMI (P = .034) and increased BMI (P = .014) were negatively associated with MVPA at follow-up. Women spent less time being sedentary than men (P = .019). Education (P < .001) was positively associated and improved perceived health (P = .010) was negatively associated with sedentary time at follow-up. MVPA and sedentary time at follow-up were associated with behavioral, biological and demographic correlates. However, the nature of our analyses prevents us from inferring causality.

Structured Course Objects in a Digital Library

Science.gov (United States)

Maly, K.; Zubair, M.; Liu, X.; Nelson, M.; Zeil, S.

1999-01-01

We are developing an Undergraduate Digital Library Framework (UDLF) that will support creation/archiving of courses and reuse of existing course material to evolve courses. UDLF supports the publication of course materials for later instantiation for a specific offering and allows the addition of time-dependent and student-specific information and structures. Instructors and, depending on permissions, students can access the general course materials or the materials for a specific offering. We are building a reference implementation based on NCSTRL+, a digital library derived from NCSTRL. Digital objects in NCSTRL+ are called buckets, self-contained entities that carry their own methods for access and display. Current bucket implementations have a two level structure of packages and elements. This is not a rich enough structure for course objects in UDLF. Typically, courses can only be modeled as a multilevel hierarchy and among different courses, both the syntax and semantics of terms may vary. Therefore, we need a mechanism to define, within a particular library, course models, their constituent objects, and the associated semantics in a flexible, extensible way. In this paper, we describe our approach to define and implement these multilayered course objects. We use XML technology to emulate complex data structures within the NCSTRL+ buckets. We have developed authoring and browsing tools to manipulate these course objects. In our current implementation a user downloading an XML based course bucket also downloads the XML-aware tools: an applet that enables the user to edit or browse the bucket. We claim that XML provides an effective means to represent multi-level structure of a course bucket.

Reactionless robust finite-time control for manipulation of passive objects by free-floating space robots

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Guo Sheng-Peng; Li Dong-Xu; Meng Yun-He; Fan Cai-Zhi

2014-01-01

On-orbit servicing requires efficient techniques for manipulating passive objects. The paper aims at developing a reactionless control method that drives the manipulator to manipulate passive objects with high precision, while inducing no disturbances to its base attitude. To this end, decomposition of the target dynamics from the base dynamics is discussed, so that they can be considered as two independent subsystems. A reactionless nonlinear controller is presented, which ensures high-precision manipulation of the targets and that the base orientation is unchanged. This is achieved by combining the robust finite-time control with the reaction null space. Finally, the performance of the proposed method is examined by comparing it with that of a reactionless PD controller and a pure finite-time controller. (electromagnetism, optics, acoustics, heat transfer, classical mechanics, and fluid dynamics)

Category-Specific Visual Recognition and Aging from the PACE Theory Perspective: Evidence for a Presemantic Deficit in Aging Object Recognition

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Bordaberry, Pierre; Gerlach, Christian; Lenoble, Quentin

2016-01-01

Background/Study Context: The objective of this study was to investigate the object recognition deficit in aging. Age-related declines were examined from the presemantic account of category effects (PACE) theory perspective (Gerlach, 2009, Cognition, 111, 281–301). This view assumes that the stru......Background/Study Context: The objective of this study was to investigate the object recognition deficit in aging. Age-related declines were examined from the presemantic account of category effects (PACE) theory perspective (Gerlach, 2009, Cognition, 111, 281–301). This view assumes...... that the structural similarity/dissimilarity inherent in living and nonliving objects, respectively, can account for a wide range of category-specific effects. Methods: In two experiments on object recognition, young (36 participants, 18–27 years) and older (36 participants, 53–69 years) adult participants...... in the selection stage of the PACE theory (visual long-term memory matching) could be responsible for these impairments. Indeed, the older group showed a deficit when this stage was most relevant. This article emphasize on the critical need for taking into account structural component of the stimuli and type...

Determinants of Three-Year Change in Children's Objectively Measured Sedentary Time.

Science.gov (United States)

Atkin, Andrew J; Foley, Louise; Corder, Kirsten; Ekelund, Ulf; van Sluijs, Esther M F

2016-01-01

Sedentary behaviours (SB) are highly prevalent in young people and may be adversely associated with physical and mental health. Understanding of the modifiable determinants of SB is necessary to inform the design of behaviour change interventions but much of the existing research is cross-sectional and focussed upon screen-based behaviours. To examine the social, psychological and environmental determinants of change in children's objectively measured sedentary time from age 11 to 14 years. Data are from the second (2008) and third (2011) waves of assessment in the Sport, Physical Activity, and Eating Behaviour: Environmental Determinants in Young People (SPEEDY) study, conducted in the county of Norfolk, United Kingdom. Longitudinal data on accelerometer assessed sedentary time were available for 316 (53.5% female, 11.2±0.3 years at baseline) and 264 children after-school and at the weekend respectively. Information on 14 candidate determinants, including school travel mode and electronic media ownership, was self-reported. Change in the proportion of registered time spent sedentary was used as the outcome variable in cross-classified linear regression models, adjusted for age, sex, body mass index and baseline sedentary time. Simple and multiple models were run and interactions with sex explored. Daily sedentary time increased by 30-40 minutes after-school and at the weekend from baseline to follow-up. Participants who travelled to school by cycle exhibited smaller increases in after-school sedentary time (beta; 95%CI for change in % time spent sedentary: -3.3;-6.7,-0.07). No significant determinants of change in weekend sedentary time were identified. Time spent sedentary increased during the three-year duration of follow-up but few of the variables examined were significantly associated with changes in sedentary time. Children's mode of school travel may influence changes in their sedentary time over this period and should be examined further, alongside

Determinants of Three-Year Change in Children's Objectively Measured Sedentary Time.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Andrew J Atkin

Full Text Available Sedentary behaviours (SB are highly prevalent in young people and may be adversely associated with physical and mental health. Understanding of the modifiable determinants of SB is necessary to inform the design of behaviour change interventions but much of the existing research is cross-sectional and focussed upon screen-based behaviours.To examine the social, psychological and environmental determinants of change in children's objectively measured sedentary time from age 11 to 14 years.Data are from the second (2008 and third (2011 waves of assessment in the Sport, Physical Activity, and Eating Behaviour: Environmental Determinants in Young People (SPEEDY study, conducted in the county of Norfolk, United Kingdom. Longitudinal data on accelerometer assessed sedentary time were available for 316 (53.5% female, 11.2±0.3 years at baseline and 264 children after-school and at the weekend respectively. Information on 14 candidate determinants, including school travel mode and electronic media ownership, was self-reported. Change in the proportion of registered time spent sedentary was used as the outcome variable in cross-classified linear regression models, adjusted for age, sex, body mass index and baseline sedentary time. Simple and multiple models were run and interactions with sex explored.Daily sedentary time increased by 30-40 minutes after-school and at the weekend from baseline to follow-up. Participants who travelled to school by cycle exhibited smaller increases in after-school sedentary time (beta; 95%CI for change in % time spent sedentary: -3.3;-6.7,-0.07. No significant determinants of change in weekend sedentary time were identified.Time spent sedentary increased during the three-year duration of follow-up but few of the variables examined were significantly associated with changes in sedentary time. Children's mode of school travel may influence changes in their sedentary time over this period and should be examined further

Effect of Colour of Object on Simple Visual Reaction Time in Normal Subjects

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sunita B. Kalyanshetti

2014-01-01

Full Text Available The measure of simple reaction time has been used to evaluate the processing speed of CNS and the co-ordination between the sensory and motor systems. As the reaction time is influenced by different factors; the impact of colour of objects in modulating the reaction time has been investigated in this study. 200 healthy volunteers (female gender 100 and male gender100 of age group 18-25 yrs were included as subjects. The subjects were presented with two visual stimuli viz; red and green light by using an electronic response analyzer. Paired‘t’ test for comparison of visual reaction time for red and green colour in male gender shows p value<0.05 whereas in female gender shows p<0.001. It was observed that response latency for red colour was lesser than that of green colour which can be explained on the basis of trichromatic theory.

Prototyping real-time systems

OpenAIRE

Clynch, Gary

1994-01-01

The traditional software development paradigm, the waterfall life cycle model, is defective when used for developing real-time systems. This thesis puts forward an executable prototyping approach for the development of real-time systems. A prototyping system is proposed which uses ESML (Extended Systems Modelling Language) as a prototype specification language. The prototyping system advocates the translation of non-executable ESML specifications into executable LOOPN (Language of Object ...

Objectively Measured Total and Occupational Sedentary Time in Three Work Settings

Science.gov (United States)

van Dommelen, Paula; Coffeng, Jennifer K.; van der Ploeg, Hidde P.; van der Beek, Allard J.; Boot, Cécile R. L.; Hendriksen, Ingrid J. M.

2016-01-01

Background Sedentary behaviour increases the risk for morbidity. Our primary aim is to determine the proportion and factors associated with objectively measured total and occupational sedentary time in three work settings. Secondary aim is to study the proportion of physical activity and prolonged sedentary bouts. Methods Data were obtained using ActiGraph accelerometers from employees of: 1) a financial service provider (n = 49 men, 31 women), 2) two research institutes (n = 30 men, 57 women), and 3) a construction company (n = 38 men). Total (over the whole day) and occupational sedentary time, physical activity and prolonged sedentary bouts (lasting ≥30 minutes) were calculated by work setting. Linear regression analyses were performed to examine general, health and work-related factors associated with sedentary time. Results The employees of the financial service provider and the research institutes spent 76–80% of their occupational time in sedentary behaviour, 18–20% in light intensity physical activity and 3–5% in moderate-to-vigorous intensity physical activity. Occupational time in prolonged sedentary bouts was 27–30%. Total time was less sedentary (64–70%), and had more light intensity physical activity (26–33%). The employees of the construction company spent 44% of their occupational time in sedentary behaviour, 49% in light, and 7% in moderate intensity physical activity, and spent 7% in sedentary bouts. Total time spent in sedentary behavior was 56%, 40% in light, and 4% in moderate intensity physical behaviour, and 12% in sedentary bouts. For women, low to intermediate education was the only factor that was negatively associated with occupational sedentary time. Conclusions Sedentary behaviour is high among white-collar employees, especially in highly educated women. A relatively small proportion of sedentary time was accrued in sedentary bouts. It is recommended that worksite health promotion efforts should focus on reducing sedentary

No Evidence for Phase-Specific Effects of 40 Hz HD–tACS on Multiple Object Tracking

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Nicholas S. Bland

2018-03-01

Full Text Available Phase synchronization drives connectivity between neural oscillators, providing a flexible mechanism through which information can be effectively and selectively routed between task-relevant cortical areas. The ability to keep track of objects moving between the left and right visual hemifields, for example, requires the integration of information between the two cerebral hemispheres. Both animal and human studies have suggested that coherent (or phase-locked gamma oscillations (30–80 Hz might underlie this ability. While most human evidence has been strictly correlational, high-density transcranial alternating current stimulation (HD-tACS has been used to manipulate ongoing interhemispheric gamma phase relationships. Previous research showed that 40 Hz tACS delivered bilaterally over human motion complex could bias the perception of a bistable ambiguous motion stimulus (Helfrich et al., 2014. Specifically, this work showed that in-phase (0° offset stimulation boosted endogenous interhemispheric gamma coherence and biased perception toward the horizontal (whereby visual tokens moved between visual hemifields—requiring interhemispheric integration. By contrast, anti-phase (180° offset stimulation decreased interhemispheric gamma coherence and biased perception toward the vertical (whereby tokens moved within separate visual hemifields. Here we devised a multiple object tracking arena comprised of four quadrants whereby discrete objects moved either entirely within the left and right visual hemifields, or could cross freely between visual hemifields, thus requiring interhemispheric integration. Using the same HD-tACS montages as Helfrich et al. (2014, we found no phase-specific effect of 40 Hz stimulation on overall tracking performance. While tracking performance was generally lower during between-hemifield trials (presumably reflecting a cost of integration, this difference was unchanged by in- vs. anti-phase stimulation. Our null results

Development of radiation hardened robot for nuclear facility - Development of real-time stereo object tracking system using the optical correlator

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kim, Eun Soo; Lee, S. H.; Lee, J. S. [Kwangwoon University, Seoul (Korea)

2000-03-01

Object tracking, through Centroide method used in the KAERI-M1 Stereo Robot Vision System developed at Atomic Research Center, is too sensitive to target's light variation and because it has a fragility which can't reflect the surrounding background, the application in the actual condition is very limited. Also the correlation method can constitute a relatively stable object tracker in noise features but the digital calculation amount is too massive in image correlation so real time materialization is limited. So the development of Optical Correlation based on Stereo Object Tracking System using high speed optical information processing technique will put stable the real time stereo object tracking system and substantial atomic industrial stereo robot vision system to practical use. This research is about developing real time stereo object tracking algorithm using optical correlation system through the technique which can be applied to Atomic Research Center's KAERI-M1 Stereo Vision Robot which will be used in atomic facility remote operations. And revise the stereo disparity using real time optical correlation technique, and materializing the application of the stereo object tracking algorithm to KAERI-M1 Stereo Robot. 19 refs., 45 figs., 2 tabs. (Author)

Testing object Interactions

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Grüner, Andreas

2010-01-01

In this thesis we provide a unit testing approach for multi-purposes object-oriented programming languages in the style of Java and C#. Our approach includes the definition of a test specification language which results from extending the programming language with new designated specification

Object formation in visual working memory: Evidence from object-based attention.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhou, Jifan; Zhang, Haihang; Ding, Xiaowei; Shui, Rende; Shen, Mowei

2016-09-01

We report on how visual working memory (VWM) forms intact perceptual representations of visual objects using sub-object elements. Specifically, when objects were divided into fragments and sequentially encoded into VWM, the fragments were involuntarily integrated into objects in VWM, as evidenced by the occurrence of both positive and negative object-based attention effects: In Experiment 1, when subjects' attention was cued to a location occupied by the VWM object, the target presented at the location of that object was perceived as occurring earlier than that presented at the location of a different object. In Experiment 2, responses to a target were significantly slower when a distractor was presented at the same location as the cued object (Experiment 2). These results suggest that object fragments can be integrated into objects within VWM in a manner similar to that of visual perception. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Eating patterns and leisure-time exercise among active duty military personnel: comparison to the Healthy People objectives.

Science.gov (United States)

Smith, Tracey J; Dotson, Laura E; Young, Andrew J; White, Alan; Hadden, Louise; Bathalon, Gaston P; Funderburk, LesLee; Marriott, Bernadette P

2013-07-01

To assess whether active duty military personnel meet Healthy People 2010 objectives for physical activity and fruit, vegetable, and whole-grain intake; the relationship of select demographic characteristics, lifestyle factors (eg, smoking), and eating patterns (eg, frequency and location of meals) on achieving diet and exercise-related Healthy People 2010 objectives; and the relationship of eating patterns to self-reported weight gain. Secondary data from 15,747 participants in the 2005 Department of Defense Health Related Behaviors Survey was analyzed. More than 57% of respondents met the Healthy People 2010 guidelines for moderate or vigorous leisure exercise but only 3% reported eating fruit (once), vegetables (3 times), and whole grains (3 times) daily. Individuals who reported gaining weight during the previous year were more likely to skip breakfast and eat at, or from, a restaurant ≥2 times per week compared with those who did not gain weight (Pexercise (OR 0.71). Military personnel who skipped breakfast ≥2 times per week (OR 0.45) or ate at a restaurant/takeout food (OR 0.54) ≥2 times per week were significantly less likely to meet Healthy People 2010 guidelines for food intake (defined as achieving a daily intake of one or more fruits, three or more vegetables, and three or more servings of whole grains) and exercise (OR 0.88 and 0.82, respectively). Although the majority of military personnel met guidelines for physical activity, their intake of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains was suboptimal. Skipping breakfast and eating at, or from, restaurants were risk factors for poor nutrient intake and associated with weight gain. These data suggest that skipping breakfast and eating out deter achieving Healthy People 2010 objectives and provide targets for military programs to promote achieving these objectives. Copyright © 2013 Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Multi objective multi refinery optimization with environmental and catastrophic failure effects objectives

Science.gov (United States)

Khogeer, Ahmed Sirag

2005-11-01

Petroleum refining is a capital-intensive business. With stringent environmental regulations on the processing industry and declining refining margins, political instability, increased risk of war and terrorist attacks in which refineries and fuel transportation grids may be targeted, higher pressures are exerted on refiners to optimize performance and find the best combination of feed and processes to produce salable products that meet stricter product specifications, while at the same time meeting refinery supply commitments and of course making profit. This is done through multi objective optimization. For corporate refining companies and at the national level, Intea-Refinery and Inter-Refinery optimization is the second step in optimizing the operation of the whole refining chain as a single system. Most refinery-wide optimization methods do not cover multiple objectives such as minimizing environmental impact, avoiding catastrophic failures, or enhancing product spec upgrade effects. This work starts by carrying out a refinery-wide, single objective optimization, and then moves to multi objective-single refinery optimization. The last step is multi objective-multi refinery optimization, the objectives of which are analysis of the effects of economic, environmental, product spec, strategic, and catastrophic failure. Simulation runs were carried out using both MATLAB and ASPEN PIMS utilizing nonlinear techniques to solve the optimization problem. The results addressed the need to debottleneck some refineries or transportation media in order to meet the demand for essential products under partial or total failure scenarios. They also addressed how importing some high spec products can help recover some of the losses and what is needed in order to accomplish this. In addition, the results showed nonlinear relations among local and global objectives for some refineries. The results demonstrate that refineries can have a local multi objective optimum that does not

Experimental Evaluation of Processing Time for the Synchronization of XML-Based Business Objects

Science.gov (United States)

Ameling, Michael; Wolf, Bernhard; Springer, Thomas; Schill, Alexander

Business objects (BOs) are data containers for complex data structures used in business applications such as Supply Chain Management and Customer Relationship Management. Due to the replication of application logic, multiple copies of BOs are created which have to be synchronized and updated. This is a complex and time consuming task because BOs rigorously vary in their structure according to the distribution, number and size of elements. Since BOs are internally represented as XML documents, the parsing of XML is one major cost factor which has to be considered for minimizing the processing time during synchronization. The prediction of the parsing time for BOs is an significant property for the selection of an efficient synchronization mechanism. In this paper, we present a method to evaluate the influence of the structure of BOs on their parsing time. The results of our experimental evaluation incorporating four different XML parsers examine the dependencies between the distribution of elements and the parsing time. Finally, a general cost model will be validated and simplified according to the results of the experimental setup.

Correlates of objectively measured sedentary time and self-reported screen time in Canadian children.

Science.gov (United States)

LeBlanc, Allana G; Broyles, Stephanie T; Chaput, Jean-Philippe; Leduc, Geneviève; Boyer, Charles; Borghese, Michael M; Tremblay, Mark S

2015-03-18

Demographic, family, and home characteristics play an important role in determining childhood sedentary behaviour. The objective of this paper was to identify correlates of total sedentary time (SED) and correlates of self-reported screen time (ST) in Canadian children. Child- and parent-reported household, socio-demographic, behavioural, and diet related data were collected; directly measured anthropometric and accelerometer data were also collected for each child. Participants with complete demographic, anthropometric, and either SED (n=524, 41% boys) or ST (n=567, 42% boys) data from the Canadian site of the International Study of Childhood Obesity Lifestyle and the Environment (ISCOLE) were included in analysis. Sixteen potential correlates of SED and ST were examined using multilevel general linear models, adjusting for sex, ethnicity, number of siblings, and socio-economic status. All explanatory variables moderately associated (peducation, and unhealthy eating pattern score and negatively associated with healthy eating pattern score, and weekend breakfast consumption. Few common correlates existed between boys and girls. Several factors were identified as correlates of SED and/or of ST in Canadian children; however, few correlates were common for both SED and ST, and for both boys and girls. This suggests that a single strategy to reduce SED and ST is unlikely to be effective. Future work should examine a variety of other, non-screen based sedentary behaviours and their potential correlates in the hopes of creating tailored public health messages to reduce SED and ST in both boys, and girls.

Verifying OCL specifications of UML models : tool support and compositionality

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Kyas, Marcel

2006-01-01

The Unified Modelling Language (UML) and the Object Constraint Language (OCL) serve as specification languages for embedded and real-time systems used in a safety-critical environment. In this dissertation class diagrams, object diagrams, and OCL constraints are formalised. The formalisation

Composing Synchronisation and Real-Time Constraints

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Bergmans, Lodewijk; Aksit, Mehmet

There have been a number of publications illustrating the successes of object-oriented techniques in creating highly reusable software systems. Several concurrent languages have been proposed for specifying reusable synchronization specifications. Recently, a number of real-time object-oriented

Correspondence between objective and perceived walking times to urban destinations: Influence of physical activity, neighbourhood walkability, and socio-demographics

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Dewulf Bart

2012-10-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Doing regular physical activity has positive effects on health. Several environmental factors are identified as important correlates of physical activity. However, there seems to be a difference between perceived and objective measures of the environment. This study examines the influence of physical activity, neighbourhood walkability, and socio-demographic characteristics on the correspondence between self-reported and objectively measured walking time to urban destinations of adults in the city of Ghent (Belgium. Methods Previously collected survey data was used from 1164 respondents in the city of Ghent who reported walking times to various closest destinations in the neighbourhood of residence. These were compared with corresponding walking times that were objectively measured through geographical information systems. Physical activity was recorded over a 7-day period using accelerometers. Neighbourhood walkability was assessed on the basis of residential density, connectivity, and land-use mix. Results We observed a relatively poor agreement between objective and perceived walking times. Stronger agreements were noted amongst the most physically active group, while low-level walkers tended to overestimate walking time. Surprisingly, however, people residing in a low-walkable neighbourhood underestimated walking times more frequently relative to those in high-walkable neighbourhoods. Conclusions Researchers investigating the influence of environmental attributes on physical activity behavior should thus be cautious when using only self-reported environmental data, since these are a priori influenced by physical activity levels and various socio-demographic factors.

Real time radial and tangential tomosynthesis system dedicated to on line x-ray examination of moving objects

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Antonakios, M.; Rizo, Ph.; Lamarque, P.

2000-01-01

This presentation describes a system able to compute and display in real time a reconstructed image of a moving object using tomosynthesis methods. The object being moved on a known trajectory between the x-ray source and a detector, the tomosynthesis is focused on a given surface of the object and allows to reconstruct a sharp image of the structure on the surface superimposed to a blurred image of the surrounding plane. The developed tomosynthesis algorithm is based on a set of look up tables which provide for each position of the object on the trajectory, the projection of a given point of the imaged surface of the object on the detector. Several hundreds of frames can be combined to compute the tomosynthesis image. The signal-to-noise ratio obtained on processed images is equivalent to the one obtained by averaging images with a static object. In order to speed up the tomosynthesis reconstruction and to reach the video frame rate, we integrated a DSP based hardware in a PC host. The geometric calibration parameters and the look up tables are pre-computed on the PC. The on-line tomosynthesis calculation is carried out by the multi DSP architecture which manages in real time, frame acquisition, parallel tomosynthesis calculation and output image display. On this particular implementation of tomosynthesis, up to hundred video frames can be combined. We illustrate the potential of this system on an application of the tomosynthesis to solid rocket motor examination

Travel-time source-specific station correction improves location accuracy

Science.gov (United States)

Giuntini, Alessandra; Materni, Valerio; Chiappini, Stefano; Carluccio, Roberto; Console, Rodolfo; Chiappini, Massimo

2013-04-01

Accurate earthquake locations are crucial for investigating seismogenic processes, as well as for applications like verifying compliance to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). Earthquake location accuracy is related to the degree of knowledge about the 3-D structure of seismic wave velocity in the Earth. It is well known that modeling errors of calculated travel times may have the effect of shifting the computed epicenters far from the real locations by a distance even larger than the size of the statistical error ellipses, regardless of the accuracy in picking seismic phase arrivals. The consequences of large mislocations of seismic events in the context of the CTBT verification is particularly critical in order to trigger a possible On Site Inspection (OSI). In fact, the Treaty establishes that an OSI area cannot be larger than 1000 km2, and its larger linear dimension cannot be larger than 50 km. Moreover, depth accuracy is crucial for the application of the depth event screening criterion. In the present study, we develop a method of source-specific travel times corrections based on a set of well located events recorded by dense national seismic networks in seismically active regions. The applications concern seismic sequences recorded in Japan, Iran and Italy. We show that mislocations of the order of 10-20 km affecting the epicenters, as well as larger mislocations in hypocentral depths, calculated from a global seismic network and using the standard IASPEI91 travel times can be effectively removed by applying source-specific station corrections.

Multi-objective engineering design using preferences

Science.gov (United States)

Sanchis, J.; Martinez, M.; Blasco, X.

2008-03-01

System design is a complex task when design parameters have to satisy a number of specifications and objectives which often conflict with those of others. This challenging problem is called multi-objective optimization (MOO). The most common approximation consists in optimizing a single cost index with a weighted sum of objectives. However, once weights are chosen the solution does not guarantee the best compromise among specifications, because there is an infinite number of solutions. A new approach can be stated, based on the designer's experience regarding the required specifications and the associated problems. This valuable information can be translated into preferences for design objectives, and will lead the search process to the best solution in terms of these preferences. This article presents a new method, which enumerates these a priori objective preferences. As a result, a single objective is built automatically and no weight selection need be performed. Problems occuring because of the multimodal nature of the generated single cost index are managed with genetic algorithms (GAs).

Multi-objective optimization model of CNC machining to minimize processing time and environmental impact

Science.gov (United States)

Hamada, Aulia; Rosyidi, Cucuk Nur; Jauhari, Wakhid Ahmad

2017-11-01

Minimizing processing time in a production system can increase the efficiency of a manufacturing company. Processing time are influenced by application of modern technology and machining parameter. Application of modern technology can be apply by use of CNC machining, one of the machining process can be done with a CNC machining is turning. However, the machining parameters not only affect the processing time but also affect the environmental impact. Hence, optimization model is needed to optimize the machining parameters to minimize the processing time and environmental impact. This research developed a multi-objective optimization to minimize the processing time and environmental impact in CNC turning process which will result in optimal decision variables of cutting speed and feed rate. Environmental impact is converted from environmental burden through the use of eco-indicator 99. The model were solved by using OptQuest optimization software from Oracle Crystal Ball.

Time integration and statistical regulation applied to mobile objects detection in a sequence of images

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Letang, Jean-Michel

1993-01-01

This PhD thesis deals with the detection of moving objects in monocular image sequences. The first section presents the inherent problems of motion analysis in real applications. We propose a method robust to perturbations frequently encountered during acquisition of outdoor scenes. It appears three main directions for investigations, all of them pointing out the importance of the temporal axis, which is a specific dimension for motion analysis. In the first part, the image sequence is considered as a set of temporal signals. The temporal multi-scale decomposition enables the characterization of various dynamical behaviors of the objects being in the scene at a given instant. A second module integrates motion information. This elementary trajectography of moving objects provides a temporal prediction map, giving a confidence level of motion presence. Interactions between both sets of data are expressed within a statistical regularization. Markov random field models supply a formal framework to convey a priori knowledge of the primitives to be evaluated. A calibration method with qualitative boxes is presented to estimate model parameters. Our approach requires only simple computations and leads to a rather fast algorithm, that we evaluate in the last section over various typical sequences. (author) [fr

User-Defined Clocks in the Real-Time Specification for Java

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Wellings, Andy; Schoeberl, Martin

2011-01-01

This paper analyses the new user-defined clock model that is to be supported in Version 1.1 of the Real-Time Specification for Java (RTSJ). The model is a compromise between the current position, where there is no support for user-defined clocks, and a fully integrated model. The paper investigat...

Individual and environmental correlates of objectively measured sedentary time in Dutch and Belgian adults.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Femke van Nassau

Full Text Available As the detrimental health effects of sedentary behaviour are well established, insight into the individual and environmental factors that influence adults' sedentary behaviour is needed. Most studies to date rely on self-reported measures of sedentary time. Therefore, the aim of the current study was to examine individual and environmental correlates of objectively measured sedentary time in Dutch and Belgian adults. Between March and August 2014, Belgian (n = 133 and Dutch (n = 223 adults, recruited as sub-sample of the SPOTLIGHT survey, wore an ActiGraph accelerometer to provide objectively measured sedentary and moderate to vigorous physical activity time. Participants completed a questionnaire assessing sociodemographic (country of residence, age, gender and educational level, lifestyle (sleep, smoking, sugar-containing beverage consumption, alcohol intake, health (body mass index, self-rated health, work (employment status and type of work, happiness, physical environmental (owning a car, number of screens, socioeconomic status and residential density and social environmental factors (social network, social cohesion. Univariate and multivariable regression analyses showed that Belgian participants had a lower odds of being sedentary for at least 9 hours per day compared to Dutch participants. Women, older participants and those meeting the WHO recommendation for physical activity were also less likely to sit for 9 hours or more per day. Participants doing (heavy manual work or being in education, homemaker, unemployed had lower odds of being sedentary for at least 9 hours per day compared to participants with a sitting job. Those with a higher self-reported social network also had lower odds for sedentary time. No associations between physical and other social environmental characteristics and sedentary time were found. Our findings add to the growing evidence of factors associated with prolonged sedentary time in adults. These findings may

Object-Based Classification of Grasslands from High Resolution Satellite Image Time Series Using Gaussian Mean Map Kernels

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mailys Lopes

2017-07-01

Full Text Available This paper deals with the classification of grasslands using high resolution satellite image time series. Grasslands considered in this work are semi-natural elements in fragmented landscapes, i.e., they are heterogeneous and small elements. The first contribution of this study is to account for grassland heterogeneity while working at the object level by modeling its pixels distributions by a Gaussian distribution. To measure the similarity between two grasslands, a new kernel is proposed as a second contribution: the α -Gaussian mean kernel. It allows one to weight the influence of the covariance matrix when comparing two Gaussian distributions. This kernel is introduced in support vector machines for the supervised classification of grasslands from southwest France. A dense intra-annual multispectral time series of the Formosat-2 satellite is used for the classification of grasslands’ management practices, while an inter-annual NDVI time series of Formosat-2 is used for old and young grasslands’ discrimination. Results are compared to other existing pixel- and object-based approaches in terms of classification accuracy and processing time. The proposed method is shown to be a good compromise between processing speed and classification accuracy. It can adapt to the classification constraints, and it encompasses several similarity measures known in the literature. It is appropriate for the classification of small and heterogeneous objects such as grasslands.

Methods for providing decision makers with optimal solutions for multiple objectives that change over time

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Greeff, M

2010-09-01

Full Text Available Decision making - with the goal of finding the optimal solution - is an important part of modern life. For example: In the control room of an airport, the goals or objectives are to minimise the risk of airplanes colliding, minimise the time that a...

A Psychoacoustic-Based Multiple Audio Object Coding Approach via Intra-Object Sparsity

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Maoshen Jia

2017-12-01

Full Text Available Rendering spatial sound scenes via audio objects has become popular in recent years, since it can provide more flexibility for different auditory scenarios, such as 3D movies, spatial audio communication and virtual classrooms. To facilitate high-quality bitrate-efficient distribution for spatial audio objects, an encoding scheme based on intra-object sparsity (approximate k-sparsity of the audio object itself is proposed in this paper. The statistical analysis is presented to validate the notion that the audio object has a stronger sparseness in the Modified Discrete Cosine Transform (MDCT domain than in the Short Time Fourier Transform (STFT domain. By exploiting intra-object sparsity in the MDCT domain, multiple simultaneously occurring audio objects are compressed into a mono downmix signal with side information. To ensure a balanced perception quality of audio objects, a Psychoacoustic-based time-frequency instants sorting algorithm and an energy equalized Number of Preserved Time-Frequency Bins (NPTF allocation strategy are proposed, which are employed in the underlying compression framework. The downmix signal can be further encoded via Scalar Quantized Vector Huffman Coding (SQVH technique at a desirable bitrate, and the side information is transmitted in a lossless manner. Both objective and subjective evaluations show that the proposed encoding scheme outperforms the Sparsity Analysis (SPA approach and Spatial Audio Object Coding (SAOC in cases where eight objects were jointly encoded.

Real-time tracking of visually attended objects in virtual environments and its application to LOD.

Science.gov (United States)

Lee, Sungkil; Kim, Gerard Jounghyun; Choi, Seungmoon

2009-01-01

This paper presents a real-time framework for computationally tracking objects visually attended by the user while navigating in interactive virtual environments. In addition to the conventional bottom-up (stimulus-driven) saliency map, the proposed framework uses top-down (goal-directed) contexts inferred from the user's spatial and temporal behaviors, and identifies the most plausibly attended objects among candidates in the object saliency map. The computational framework was implemented using GPU, exhibiting high computational performance adequate for interactive virtual environments. A user experiment was also conducted to evaluate the prediction accuracy of the tracking framework by comparing objects regarded as visually attended by the framework to actual human gaze collected with an eye tracker. The results indicated that the accuracy was in the level well supported by the theory of human cognition for visually identifying single and multiple attentive targets, especially owing to the addition of top-down contextual information. Finally, we demonstrate how the visual attention tracking framework can be applied to managing the level of details in virtual environments, without any hardware for head or eye tracking.

A closure test for time-specific capture-recapture data

Science.gov (United States)

Stanley, T.R.; Burnham, K.P.

1999-01-01

The assumption of demographic closure in the analysis of capture-recapture data under closed-population models is of fundamental importance. Yet, little progress has been made in the development of omnibus tests of the closure assumption. We present a closure test for time-specific data that, in principle, tests the null hypothesis of closed-population model M(t) against the open-population Jolly-Seber model as a specific alternative. This test is chi-square, and can be decomposed into informative components that can be interpreted to determine the nature of closure violations. The test is most sensitive to permanent emigration and least sensitive to temporary emigration, and is of intermediate sensitivity to permanent or temporary immigration. This test is a versatile tool for testing the assumption of demographic closure in the analysis of capture-recapture data.

Neutral vs positive oral contrast in diagnosing acute appendicitis with contrast-enhanced CT: sensitivity, specificity, reader confidence and interpretation time

Science.gov (United States)

Naeger, D M; Chang, S D; Kolli, P; Shah, V; Huang, W; Thoeni, R F

2011-01-01

Objective The study compared the sensitivity, specificity, confidence and interpretation time of readers of differing experience in diagnosing acute appendicitis with contrast-enhanced CT using neutral vs positive oral contrast agents. Methods Contrast-enhanced CT for right lower quadrant or right flank pain was performed in 200 patients with neutral and 200 with positive oral contrast including 199 with proven acute appendicitis and 201 with other diagnoses. Test set disease prevalence was 50%. Two experienced gastrointestinal radiologists, one fellow and two first-year residents blindly assessed all studies for appendicitis (2000 readings) and assigned confidence scores (1=poor to 4=excellent). Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were generated. Total interpretation time was recorded. Each reader's interpretation with the two agents was compared using standard statistical methods. Results Average reader sensitivity was found to be 96% (range 91–99%) with positive and 95% (89–98%) with neutral oral contrast; specificity was 96% (92–98%) and 94% (90–97%). For each reader, no statistically significant difference was found between the two agents (sensitivities p-values >0.6; specificities p-values>0.08), in the area under the ROC curve (range 0.95–0.99) or in average interpretation times. In cases without appendicitis, positive oral contrast demonstrated improved appendix identification (average 90% vs 78%) and higher confidence scores for three readers. Average interpretation times showed no statistically significant differences between the agents. Conclusion Neutral vs positive oral contrast does not affect the accuracy of contrast-enhanced CT for diagnosing acute appendicitis. Although positive oral contrast might help to identify normal appendices, we continue to use neutral oral contrast given its other potential benefits. PMID:20959365

Fast neuromimetic object recognition using FPGA outperforms GPU implementations.

Science.gov (United States)

Orchard, Garrick; Martin, Jacob G; Vogelstein, R Jacob; Etienne-Cummings, Ralph

2013-08-01

Recognition of objects in still images has traditionally been regarded as a difficult computational problem. Although modern automated methods for visual object recognition have achieved steadily increasing recognition accuracy, even the most advanced computational vision approaches are unable to obtain performance equal to that of humans. This has led to the creation of many biologically inspired models of visual object recognition, among them the hierarchical model and X (HMAX) model. HMAX is traditionally known to achieve high accuracy in visual object recognition tasks at the expense of significant computational complexity. Increasing complexity, in turn, increases computation time, reducing the number of images that can be processed per unit time. In this paper we describe how the computationally intensive and biologically inspired HMAX model for visual object recognition can be modified for implementation on a commercial field-programmable aate Array, specifically the Xilinx Virtex 6 ML605 evaluation board with XC6VLX240T FPGA. We show that with minor modifications to the traditional HMAX model we can perform recognition on images of size 128 × 128 pixels at a rate of 190 images per second with a less than 1% loss in recognition accuracy in both binary and multiclass visual object recognition tasks.

Context-specific activation of hippocampus and SN/VTA by reward is related to enhanced long-term memory for embedded objects.

Science.gov (United States)

Loh, Eleanor; Kumaran, Dharshan; Koster, Raphael; Berron, David; Dolan, Ray; Duzel, Emrah

2016-10-01

Animal studies indicate that hippocampal representations of environmental context modulate reward-related processing in the substantia nigra and ventral tegmental area (SN/VTA), a major origin of dopamine in the brain. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in humans, we investigated the neural specificity of context-reward associations under conditions where the presence of perceptually similar neutral contexts imposed high demands on a putative hippocampal function, pattern separation. The design also allowed us to investigate how contextual reward enhances long-term memory for embedded neutral objects. SN/VTA activity underpinned specific context-reward associations in the face of perceptual similarity. A reward-related enhancement of long-term memory was restricted to the condition where the rewarding and the neutral contexts were perceptually similar, and in turn was linked to co-activation of the hippocampus (subfield DG/CA3) and SN/VTA. Thus, an ability of contextual reward to enhance memory for focal objects is closely linked to context-related engagement of hippocampal-SN/VTA circuitry. Copyright © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Determinants of Three-Year Change in Children’s Objectively Measured Sedentary Time

Science.gov (United States)

Foley, Louise; Corder, Kirsten; Ekelund, Ulf; van Sluijs, Esther M. F.

2016-01-01

Background Sedentary behaviours (SB) are highly prevalent in young people and may be adversely associated with physical and mental health. Understanding of the modifiable determinants of SB is necessary to inform the design of behaviour change interventions but much of the existing research is cross-sectional and focussed upon screen-based behaviours. Purpose To examine the social, psychological and environmental determinants of change in children’s objectively measured sedentary time from age 11 to 14 years. Methods Data are from the second (2008) and third (2011) waves of assessment in the Sport, Physical Activity, and Eating Behaviour: Environmental Determinants in Young People (SPEEDY) study, conducted in the county of Norfolk, United Kingdom. Longitudinal data on accelerometer assessed sedentary time were available for 316 (53.5% female, 11.2±0.3 years at baseline) and 264 children after-school and at the weekend respectively. Information on 14 candidate determinants, including school travel mode and electronic media ownership, was self-reported. Change in the proportion of registered time spent sedentary was used as the outcome variable in cross-classified linear regression models, adjusted for age, sex, body mass index and baseline sedentary time. Simple and multiple models were run and interactions with sex explored. Results Daily sedentary time increased by 30–40 minutes after-school and at the weekend from baseline to follow-up. Participants who travelled to school by cycle exhibited smaller increases in after-school sedentary time (beta; 95%CI for change in % time spent sedentary: -3.3;-6.7,-0.07). No significant determinants of change in weekend sedentary time were identified. Conclusions Time spent sedentary increased during the three-year duration of follow-up but few of the variables examined were significantly associated with changes in sedentary time. Children’s mode of school travel may influence changes in their sedentary time over this

Infants' Recognition of Objects Using Canonical Color

Science.gov (United States)

Kimura, Atsushi; Wada, Yuji; Yang, Jiale; Otsuka, Yumiko; Dan, Ippeita; Masuda, Tomohiro; Kanazawa, So; Yamaguchi, Masami K.

2010-01-01

We explored infants' ability to recognize the canonical colors of daily objects, including two color-specific objects (human face and fruit) and a non-color-specific object (flower), by using a preferential looking technique. A total of 58 infants between 5 and 8 months of age were tested with a stimulus composed of two color pictures of an object…

The Object Context-place-location Paradigm for Testing Spatial Memory in Mice.

Science.gov (United States)

Lesburguères, Edith; Tsokas, Panayiotis; Sacktor, Todd Charlton; Fenton, André Antonio

2017-04-20

This protocol was originally designed to examine long-term spatial memory in PKMζ knockout ( i.e ., PKMζ-null) mice (Tsokas et al ., 2016). Our main goal was to test whether the ability of these animals to maintain previously acquired spatial information was sensitive to the type and complexity of the spatial information that needs to be remembered. Accordingly, we modified and combined into a single protocol, three novelty-preference tests, specifically the object-in-context, object-in-place and object-in-location tests, adapted from previous studies in rodents (Mumby et al ., 2002; Langston and Wood, 2010; Barker and Warburton, 2011). During the training (learning) phase of the procedure, mice are repeatedly exposed to three different environments in which they learn the spatial arrangement of an environment-specific set of non-identical objects. After this learning phase is completed, each mouse receives three different memory tests configured as environment mismatches, in which the previously learned objects-in-space configurations have been modified from the original training situation. The mismatch tests differ in their cognitive demands due to the type of spatial association that is manipulated, specifically evaluating memory for object-context and object-place associations. During each memory test, the time differential spent exploring the novel (misplaced) and familiar objects is computed as an index of novelty discrimination. This index is the behavioral measure of memory recall of the previously acquired spatial associations.

HAL/S-360 compiler system specification

Science.gov (United States)

Johnson, A. E.; Newbold, P. N.; Schulenberg, C. W.; Avakian, A. E.; Varga, S.; Helmers, P. H.; Helmers, C. T., Jr.; Hotz, R. L.

1974-01-01

A three phase language compiler is described which produces IBM 360/370 compatible object modules and a set of simulation tables to aid in run time verification. A link edit step augments the standard OS linkage editor. A comprehensive run time system and library provide the HAL/S operating environment, error handling, a pseudo real time executive, and an extensive set of mathematical, conversion, I/O, and diagnostic routines. The specifications of the information flow and content for this system are also considered.

Objectively measured sedentary time may predict insulin resistance independent of moderate- and vigorous-intensity physical activity

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Helmerhorst, Hendrik J. F.; Wijndaele, Katrien; Brage, Søren; Wareham, Nicholas J.; Ekelund, Ulf

2009-01-01

To examine the prospective association between objectively measured time spent sedentary and insulin resistance and whether this association is independent of moderate- and vigorous-intensity physical activity (MVPA) and other relevant confounders. This was a population-based study (Medical Research

Task and spatial frequency modulations of object processing: an EEG study.

Science.gov (United States)

Craddock, Matt; Martinovic, Jasna; Müller, Matthias M

2013-01-01

Visual object processing may follow a coarse-to-fine sequence imposed by fast processing of low spatial frequencies (LSF) and slow processing of high spatial frequencies (HSF). Objects can be categorized at varying levels of specificity: the superordinate (e.g. animal), the basic (e.g. dog), or the subordinate (e.g. Border Collie). We tested whether superordinate and more specific categorization depend on different spatial frequency ranges, and whether any such dependencies might be revealed by or influence signals recorded using EEG. We used event-related potentials (ERPs) and time-frequency (TF) analysis to examine the time course of object processing while participants performed either a grammatical gender-classification task (which generally forces basic-level categorization) or a living/non-living judgement (superordinate categorization) on everyday, real-life objects. Objects were filtered to contain only HSF or LSF. We found a greater positivity and greater negativity for HSF than for LSF pictures in the P1 and N1 respectively, but no effects of task on either component. A later, fronto-central negativity (N350) was more negative in the gender-classification task than the superordinate categorization task, which may indicate that this component relates to semantic or syntactic processing. We found no significant effects of task or spatial frequency on evoked or total gamma band responses. Our results demonstrate early differences in processing of HSF and LSF content that were not modulated by categorization task, with later responses reflecting such higher-level cognitive factors.

Objective specific beam generation for image guided robotic radiosurgery

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Schlaefer, A.; Jungmann, O.; Schweikard, A.; Kilby, W.

2007-01-01

Robotic radiosurgery enables precise dose delivery throughout the body. Planning for robotic radiosurgery comprises of finding a suitable set of beams and beam weights. The problem can be addressed by generating a large set of candidate beams, and selection of beams with nonzero weight by mathematical programming. We propose to use different randomized beam generation methods depending on the type of lesion and the clinical objective. Results for three patient cases indicate that this can improve the plan quality. (orig.)

Objective specific beam generation for image guided robotic radiosurgery

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Schlaefer, A.; Jungmann, O.; Schweikard, A. [Inst. for Robotics and Cognitive Systems, Univ. of Luebeck (Germany); Kilby, W. [Accuray Inc., Sunnyvale, CA (United States)

2007-06-15

Robotic radiosurgery enables precise dose delivery throughout the body. Planning for robotic radiosurgery comprises of finding a suitable set of beams and beam weights. The problem can be addressed by generating a large set of candidate beams, and selection of beams with nonzero weight by mathematical programming. We propose to use different randomized beam generation methods depending on the type of lesion and the clinical objective. Results for three patient cases indicate that this can improve the plan quality. (orig.)

Magnesium Object Manager Sandbox, A More Effective Sandbox Method for Windows 7

Science.gov (United States)

2012-03-01

keys, synchronization primitives , etc.). The object body is specific to, and the same for, each object type; it contains information common to each...the Object Directory Specific Rights Synchronization Object (Event, Mutex, Semaphore , Timer) Synchronization objects allow multiple threads to... Synchronization Object Specific Rights . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 2.5 File Object Specific Rights

Channels as Objects in Concurrent Object-Oriented Programming

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Joana Campos

2011-10-01

Full Text Available There is often a sort of a protocol associated to each class, stating when and how certain methods should be called. Given that this protocol is, if at all, described in the documentation accompanying the class, current mainstream object-oriented languages cannot provide for the verification of client code adherence against the sought class behaviour. We have defined a class-based concurrent object-oriented language that formalises such protocols in the form of usage types. Usage types are attached to class definitions, allowing for the specification of (1 the available methods, (2 the tests clients must perform on the result of methods, and (3 the object status - linear or shared - all of which depend on the object's state. Our work extends the recent approach on modular session types by eliminating channel operations, and defining the method call as the single communication primitive in both sequential and concurrent settings. In contrast to previous works, we define a single category for objects, instead of distinct categories for linear and for shared objects, and let linear objects evolve into shared ones. We introduce a standard sync qualifier to prevent thread interference in certain operations on shared objects. We formalise the language syntax, the operational semantics, and a type system that enforces by static typing that methods are called only when available, and by a single client if so specified in the usage type. We illustrate the language via a complete example.

Specification of real-time automation systems with HybridUML; Spezifikation von Echtzeit-Automatisierungssystemen mit HybridUML

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Berkenkoetter, K.; Bisanz, S.; Hannemann, U.; Peleska, J. [Univ. Bremen (Germany)

2004-07-01

Complex automation systems require specification formalisms supporting the description of real-time requirements with respect to both discrete and time-continuous observables. For this purpose, the authors have designed the HybridUML specification language. Discrete events, communication, and variable assignments are specified by state machines, timers, and invariant conditions. The time-continuous aspects of system behaviour are described by associating differential equations or time-dependent algebraic conditions with system states. The complexity of large systems is controlled by decomposing the specification into parallel components and hierarchical state machines. Instead of inventing a new language syntax, HybridUML is represented as a profile of the Unified Modeling Language UML 2.0. This allows to re-use the syntactic framework of well-accepted graphical UML constructs and development support provided by various UML case tools. The profile is associated with a precise language semantics linking unambiguous meaning to all HybridUML specifications. As a consequence, HybridUML specifications can be compiled into executable code which is suitable for execution in hard realtime on multi-processor computers. This serves both for the development of automation systems and for specification-based testing in real-time. This paper contains an introduction to HybridUML which is illustrated by an example from the field of automated train control. (orig.)

Optimization of a Turboprop UAV for Maximum Loiter and Specific Power Using Genetic Algorithm

Science.gov (United States)

Dinc, Ali

2016-09-01

In this study, a genuine code was developed for optimization of selected parameters of a turboprop engine for an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) by employing elitist genetic algorithm. First, preliminary sizing of a UAV and its turboprop engine was done, by the code in a given mission profile. Secondly, single and multi-objective optimization were done for selected engine parameters to maximize loiter duration of UAV or specific power of engine or both. In single objective optimization, as first case, UAV loiter time was improved with an increase of 17.5% from baseline in given boundaries or constraints of compressor pressure ratio and burner exit temperature. In second case, specific power was enhanced by 12.3% from baseline. In multi-objective optimization case, where previous two objectives are considered together, loiter time and specific power were increased by 14.2% and 9.7% from baseline respectively, for the same constraints.

Adolescents' technology and face-to-face time use predict objective sleep outcomes.

Science.gov (United States)

Tavernier, Royette; Heissel, Jennifer A; Sladek, Michael R; Grant, Kathryn E; Adam, Emma K

2017-08-01

The present study examined both within- and between-person associations between adolescents' time use (technology-based activities and face-to-face interactions with friends and family) and sleep behaviors. We also assessed whether age moderated associations between adolescents' time use with friends and family and sleep. Adolescents wore an actigraph monitor and completed brief evening surveys daily for 3 consecutive days. Adolescents (N=71; mean age=14.50 years old, SD=1.84; 43.7% female) were recruited from 3 public high schools in the Midwest. We assessed 8 technology-based activities (eg, texting, working on a computer), as well as time spent engaged in face-to-face interactions with friends and family, via questions on adolescents' evening surveys. Actigraph monitors assessed 3 sleep behaviors: sleep latency, sleep hours, and sleep efficiency. Hierarchical linear models indicated that texting and working on the computer were associated with shorter sleep, whereas time spent talking on the phone predicted longer sleep. Time spent with friends predicted shorter sleep latencies, while family time predicted longer sleep latencies. Age moderated the association between time spent with friends and sleep efficiency, as well as between family time and sleep efficiency. Specifically, longer time spent interacting with friends was associated with higher sleep efficiency but only among younger adolescents. Furthermore, longer family time was associated with higher sleep efficiency but only for older adolescents. Findings are discussed in terms of the importance of regulating adolescents' technology use and improving opportunities for face-to-face interactions with friends, particularly for younger adolescents. Copyright © 2017 National Sleep Foundation. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Procedures for evaluating technical specifications (PETS)

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Samanta, P.K.; Boccio, J.L.; Vesely, W.E.

1987-01-01

In this paper, aspects of technical specifications relating to Generic Issues B-56 and B-61 are discussed from a risk-standpoint. These primarily deal with the risk issues associated with (1) adaptive diesel test requirements/surveillance test intervals, and (2) the effectiveness of cumulative outage time requirements for controlling downtime risk. Risk and reliability approaches are presented which (1) allow risk-acceptable test intervals to be determined for any diesel and (2) show the potential risk-control capability of prescribed allowed cumulative outage times. This work was conducted through NRC's Procedures for Evaluating Technical Specifications (PETS) Program. The overall objective of this program is to develop and demonstrate methodologies that utilize risk insights and reliability techniques for evaluating the scope, detailed requirements, and safety impact of plant technical specifications

DETERMINATION OF THE RESIDUAL OPERATING TIME OF UNRESTORABLE ELEMENT OF THE ELECTRIC POWER OBJECT AT THE WAYBALL DISTRIBUTION

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Namgaladze, D.; Gurgenidze, D.

2007-01-01

In practice, it is often essential to determinethe residual operating time for an unrestorable element of the electric power object which has operated without failure for a certain time. The density of probability distribution of operating time can be determined from the initial probability distribution of operating time. In this work, the relations for determination of the function of residual operating time of the unrestorable element at the exponential and Wayball distributions are analytically derived. (author)

Developmental Change and Time-Specific Variation in Global and Specific Aspects of Self-Concept in Adolescence and Association with Depressive Symptoms

Science.gov (United States)

Kuzucu, Yasar; Bontempo, Daniel E.; Hofer, Scott M.; Stallings, Michael C.; Piccinin, Andrea M.

2014-01-01

Previous research has demonstrated that adolescents make differential self-evaluations in multiple domains that include physical appearance, academic competence, and peer acceptance. We report growth curve analyses over a seven year period from age 9 to age 16 on the six domains of the Harter Self-Perception Profile for Children. In general, we find little change in self-concept, on average, but do find substantial individual differences in level, rate of change, and time-specific variation in these self- evaluations. The results suggest that sex differences and adoptive status were related to only certain aspects of the participants’ self-concept. Depressive symptoms were found to have significant effects on individual differences in rate of change and on time-specific variation in general self-concept, as well as on some of the specific domains of self-concept. PMID:25143664

The "neuro-mapping locator" software. A real-time intraoperative objective paraesthesia mapping tool to evaluate paraesthesia coverage of the painful zone in patients undergoing spinal cord stimulation lead implantation.

Science.gov (United States)

Guetarni, F; Rigoard, P

2015-03-01

Conventional spinal cord stimulation (SCS) generates paraesthesia, as the efficacy of this technique is based on the relationship between the paraesthesia provided by SCS on the painful zone and an analgesic effect on the stimulated zone. Although this basic postulate is based on clinical evidence, it is clear that this relationship has never been formally demonstrated by scientific studies. There is a need for objective evaluation tools ("transducers") to transpose electrical signals to clinical effects and to guide therapeutic choices. We have developed a software at Poitiers University hospital allowing real-time objective mapping of the paraesthesia generated by SCS lead placement and programming during the implantation procedure itself, on a touch screen interface. The purpose of this article is to describe this intraoperative mapping software, in terms of its concept and technical aspects. The Neuro-Mapping Locator (NML) software is dedicated to patients with failed back surgery syndrome, candidates for SCS lead implantation, to actively participate in the implantation procedure. Real-time geographical localization of the paraesthesia generated by percutaneous or multicolumn surgical SCS lead implanted under awake anaesthesia allows intraoperative lead programming and possibly lead positioning to be modified with the patient's cooperation. Software updates should enable us to refine objectives related to the use of this tool and minimize observational biases. The ultimate goals of NML software should not be limited to optimize one specific device implantation in a patient but also allow to compare instantaneously various stimulation strategies, by characterizing new technical parameters as "coverage efficacy" and "device specificity" on selected subgroups of patients. Another longer-term objective would be to organize these predictive factors into computer science ontologies, which could constitute robust and helpful data for device selection and programming

Real-time PCR for type-specific identification of herpes simplex in clinical samples: evaluation of type-specific results in the context of CNS diseases.

Science.gov (United States)

Meylan, Sylvain; Robert, Daniel; Estrade, Christine; Grimbuehler, Valérie; Péter, Olivier; Meylan, Pascal R; Sahli, Roland

2008-02-01

HSV-1 and HSV-2 cause CNS infections of dissimilar clinico-pathological characteristics with prognostic and therapeutic implications. To validate a type-specific real-time PCR that uses MGB/LNA Taqman probes and to review the virologico-clinical data of 25 eligible patients with non-neonatal CNS infections. This real-time PCR was evaluated against conventional PCR (26 CSF and 20 quality controls), and LightCycler assay (51 mucocutaneous, 8 CSF and 32 quality controls) and culture/immunofluorescence (75 mucocutaneous) to assess typing with independent methods. Taqman real-time PCR detected 240 HSV genomes per ml CSF, a level appropriate for the management of patients, and provided unambiguous typing for the 104 positive (62 HSV-1 and 42 HSV-2) out the 160 independent clinical samples tested. HSV type diagnosed by Taqman real-time PCR predicted final diagnosis (meningitis versus encephalitis/meningoencephalitis, p<0.001) in 24/25 patients at time of presentation, in contrast to clinical evaluation. Our real-time PCR, as a sensitive and specific means for type-specific HSV diagnosis, provided rapid prognostic information for patient management.

Objective Sedentary Time, Moderate-to-Vigorous Physical Activity, and Physical Capability in a British Cohort

Science.gov (United States)

KEEVIL, VICTORIA L.; COOPER, ANDREW J. M.; WIJNDAELE, KATRIEN; LUBEN, ROBERT; WAREHAM, NICHOLAS J.; BRAGE, SOREN; KHAW, KAY-TEE

2016-01-01

ABSTRACT Purpose Sedentariness has been proposed as an independent risk factor for poor health. However, few studies have considered associations of sedentary time (ST) with physical functional health independent of time spent in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA). Methods Community-based men and women (n = 8623, 48–92 yr old) in the European Prospective Investigation of Cancer—Norfolk study attended a health examination for objective measurement of physical capability, including grip strength (Smedley dynamometer (kg)), usual walking speed (UWS (cm·s−1)), and timed chair stand speed (TCSS (stands per minute)). Of these, 4051 participants wore an accelerometer (GT1M ActiGraph) for 7 d to estimate time spent in MVPA (MVPA, ≥1952 counts per minute) and ST (ST, 0.05). Conclusions More time spent in MVPA was associated with higher physical capability, but there were no independent ST associations. PMID:26501232

Non-specific Effects of Vaccines and Stunting: Timing May Be Essential

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Berendsen, M.L.T.; Smits, J.P.J.M.; Netea, M.G.; Ven, A.J.A.M. van der

2016-01-01

BACKGROUND - Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccination possesses effects on health beyond its target disease, the so called “non-specific effects”. We evaluate these effects, as well as the effect of timing of BCG and other vaccinations, on stunting in Sub-Saharan African (SSA) children under

A bi-objective model for optimizing replacement time of age and block policies with consideration of spare parts’ availability

Science.gov (United States)

Alsyouf, Imad

2018-05-01

Reliability and availability of critical systems play an important role in achieving the stated objectives of engineering assets. Preventive replacement time affects the reliability of the components, thus the number of system failures encountered and its downtime expenses. On the other hand, spare parts inventory level is a very critical factor that affects the availability of the system. Usually, the decision maker has many conflicting objectives that should be considered simultaneously for the selection of the optimal maintenance policy. The purpose of this research was to develop a bi-objective model that will be used to determine the preventive replacement time for three maintenance policies (age, block good as new, block bad as old) with consideration of spare parts’ availability. It was suggested to use a weighted comprehensive criterion method with two objectives, i.e. cost and availability. The model was tested with a typical numerical example. The results of the model demonstrated its effectiveness in enabling the decision maker to select the optimal maintenance policy under different scenarios and taking into account preferences with respect to contradicting objectives such as cost and availability.

Spatialization of social process vs singular object of architecture

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Lujak Mihailo

2010-01-01

Full Text Available The fundamental subject of this research is spatialization of social process in the period of modernism manifested through transformation and/or change in meaning of space under a variety of social processes without changing the physical structure of space. These changes in meaning represent the specificity of development in space under the influence of the said social processes, which in this case is Yugoslav modernism, resulting in the creation of a singular object of architecture specific of a certain environment. These processes have been researched in the residential complex of Block 19a in New Belgrade, designed by architects Milan Lojanica, Predrag Cagić, and Borivoje Jovanović, and constructed between 1975 and 1982. The basic objective of this paper is to establish crucial causes for this complex to be considered the landmark in the designing practice of the time in Yugoslavia through research and critical analysis of the residential complex of Block 19a, and to try and determine the importance and potential influence in further architectural development in the period following its construction. In other words, the basic objective of this paper is to establish whether residential complex Block 19a represents a singular object of architecture in Yugoslavia/Serbia.

Associations of office workers' objectively assessed occupational sitting, standing and stepping time with musculoskeletal symptoms.

Science.gov (United States)

Coenen, Pieter; Healy, Genevieve N; Winkler, Elisabeth A H; Dunstan, David W; Owen, Neville; Moodie, Marj; LaMontagne, Anthony D; Eakin, Elizabeth A; O'Sullivan, Peter B; Straker, Leon M

2018-04-22

We examined the association of musculoskeletal symptoms (MSS) with workplace sitting, standing and stepping time, as well as sitting and standing time accumulation (i.e. usual bout duration of these activities), measured objectively with the activPAL3 monitor. Using baseline data from the Stand Up Victoria trial (216 office workers, 14 workplaces), cross-sectional associations of occupational activities with self-reported MSS (low-back, upper and lower extremity symptoms in the last three months) were examined using probit regression, correcting for clustering and adjusting for confounders. Sitting bout duration was significantly (p < 0.05) associated, non-linearly, with MSS, such that those in the middle tertile displayed the highest prevalence of upper extremity symptoms. Other associations were non-significant but sometimes involved large differences in symptom prevalence (e.g. 38%) by activity. Though causation is unclear, these non-linear associations suggest that sitting and its alternatives (i.e. standing and stepping) interact with MSS and this should be considered when designing safe work systems. Practitioner summary: We studied associations of objectively assessed occupational activities with musculoskeletal symptoms in office workers. Workers who accumulated longer sitting bouts reported fewer upper extremity symptoms. Total activity duration was not significantly associated with musculoskeletal symptoms. We underline the importance of considering total volumes and patterns of activity time in musculoskeletal research.

Piles of objects

KAUST Repository

Hsu, Shu-Wei

2010-01-01

We present a method for directly modeling piles of objects in multi-body simulations. Piles of objects represent some of the more interesting, but also most time-consuming portion of simulation. We propose a method for reducing computation in many of these situations by explicitly modeling the piles that the objects may form into. By modeling pile behavior rather than the behavior of all individual objects, we can achieve realistic results in less time, and without directly modeling the frictional component that leads to desired pile shapes. Our method is simple to implement and can be easily integrated with existing rigid body simulations. We observe notable speedups in several rigid body examples, and generate a wider variety of piled structures than possible with strict impulse-based simulation. © 2010 ACM.

MULTIPLE OBJECTS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

A. A. Bosov

2015-04-01

Full Text Available Purpose. The development of complicated techniques of production and management processes, information systems, computer science, applied objects of systems theory and others requires improvement of mathematical methods, new approaches for researches of application systems. And the variety and diversity of subject systems makes necessary the development of a model that generalizes the classical sets and their development – sets of sets. Multiple objects unlike sets are constructed by multiple structures and represented by the structure and content. The aim of the work is the analysis of multiple structures, generating multiple objects, the further development of operations on these objects in application systems. Methodology. To achieve the objectives of the researches, the structure of multiple objects represents as constructive trio, consisting of media, signatures and axiomatic. Multiple object is determined by the structure and content, as well as represented by hybrid superposition, composed of sets, multi-sets, ordered sets (lists and heterogeneous sets (sequences, corteges. Findings. In this paper we study the properties and characteristics of the components of hybrid multiple objects of complex systems, proposed assessments of their complexity, shown the rules of internal and external operations on objects of implementation. We introduce the relation of arbitrary order over multiple objects, we define the description of functions and display on objects of multiple structures. Originality.In this paper we consider the development of multiple structures, generating multiple objects.Practical value. The transition from the abstract to the subject of multiple structures requires the transformation of the system and multiple objects. Transformation involves three successive stages: specification (binding to the domain, interpretation (multiple sites and particularization (goals. The proposed describe systems approach based on hybrid sets

Formal Transformations from Graphically-Based Object-Oriented Representations to Theory-Based Specifications

Science.gov (United States)

1996-06-01

for Software Synthesis." KBSE 󈨡. IEEE, 1993. 51. Kang, Kyo C., et al. Feature-Oriented Domain Analysis ( FODA ) Feasibility Study. Technical Report...Algebra. New York, NY: Chelsea Publishing Company , 1993. 72. Martin, James. Principles of Object-Oriented Analysis and Design. Englewood Cliffs, New...and usefulness in domain analysis and modeling. Rumbaugh uses three distinct views to describe a domain: (1) the object model describes structural

Per Object statistical analysis

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

2008-01-01

of a specific class in turn, and uses as pair of PPO stages to derive the statistics and then assign them to the objects' Object Variables. It may be that this could all be done in some other, simply way, but several other ways that were tried did not succeed. The procedure ouptut has been tested against...

Stimulating at the right time: phase-specific deep brain stimulation.

Science.gov (United States)

Cagnan, Hayriye; Pedrosa, David; Little, Simon; Pogosyan, Alek; Cheeran, Binith; Aziz, Tipu; Green, Alexander; Fitzgerald, James; Foltynie, Thomas; Limousin, Patricia; Zrinzo, Ludvic; Hariz, Marwan; Friston, Karl J; Denison, Timothy; Brown, Peter

2017-01-01

SEE MOLL AND ENGEL DOI101093/AWW308 FOR A SCIENTIFIC COMMENTARY ON THIS ARTICLE: Brain regions dynamically engage and disengage with one another to execute everyday actions from movement to decision making. Pathologies such as Parkinson's disease and tremor emerge when brain regions controlling movement cannot readily decouple, compromising motor function. Here, we propose a novel stimulation strategy that selectively regulates neural synchrony through phase-specific stimulation. We demonstrate for the first time the therapeutic potential of such a stimulation strategy for the treatment of patients with pathological tremor. Symptom suppression is achieved by delivering stimulation to the ventrolateral thalamus, timed according to the patient's tremor rhythm. Sustained locking of deep brain stimulation to a particular phase of tremor afforded clinically significant tremor relief (up to 87% tremor suppression) in selected patients with essential tremor despite delivering less than half the energy of conventional high frequency stimulation. Phase-specific stimulation efficacy depended on the resonant characteristics of the underlying tremor network. Selective regulation of neural synchrony through phase-locked stimulation has the potential to both increase the efficiency of therapy and to minimize stimulation-induced side effects. © The Author (2016). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Guarantors of Brain.

The programming language HAL: A specification

Science.gov (United States)

1971-01-01

HAL accomplishes three significant objectives: (1) increased readability, through the use of a natural two-dimensional mathematical format; (2) increased reliability, by providing for selective recognition of common data and subroutines, and by incorporating specific data-protect features; (3) real-time control facility, by including a comprehensive set of real-time control commands and signal conditions. Although HAL is designed primarily for programming on-board computers, it is general enough to meet nearly all the needs in the production, verification and support of aerospace, and other real-time applications.

Task and spatial frequency modulations of object processing: an EEG study.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Matt Craddock

Full Text Available Visual object processing may follow a coarse-to-fine sequence imposed by fast processing of low spatial frequencies (LSF and slow processing of high spatial frequencies (HSF. Objects can be categorized at varying levels of specificity: the superordinate (e.g. animal, the basic (e.g. dog, or the subordinate (e.g. Border Collie. We tested whether superordinate and more specific categorization depend on different spatial frequency ranges, and whether any such dependencies might be revealed by or influence signals recorded using EEG. We used event-related potentials (ERPs and time-frequency (TF analysis to examine the time course of object processing while participants performed either a grammatical gender-classification task (which generally forces basic-level categorization or a living/non-living judgement (superordinate categorization on everyday, real-life objects. Objects were filtered to contain only HSF or LSF. We found a greater positivity and greater negativity for HSF than for LSF pictures in the P1 and N1 respectively, but no effects of task on either component. A later, fronto-central negativity (N350 was more negative in the gender-classification task than the superordinate categorization task, which may indicate that this component relates to semantic or syntactic processing. We found no significant effects of task or spatial frequency on evoked or total gamma band responses. Our results demonstrate early differences in processing of HSF and LSF content that were not modulated by categorization task, with later responses reflecting such higher-level cognitive factors.

Use of artificial neural networks and geographic objects for classifying remote sensing imagery

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Pedro Resende Silva

2014-06-01

Full Text Available The aim of this study was to develop a methodology for mapping land use and land cover in the northern region of Minas Gerais state, where, in addition to agricultural land, the landscape is dominated by native cerrado, deciduous forests, and extensive areas of vereda. Using forest inventory data, as well as RapidEye, Landsat TM and MODIS imagery, three specific objectives were defined: 1 to test use of image segmentation techniques for an object-based classification encompassing spectral, spatial and temporal information, 2 to test use of high spatial resolution RapidEye imagery combined with Landsat TM time series imagery for capturing the effects of seasonality, and 3 to classify data using Artificial Neural Networks. Using MODIS time series and forest inventory data, time signatures were extracted from the dominant vegetation formations, enabling selection of the best periods of the year to be represented in the classification process. Objects created with the segmentation of RapidEye images, along with the Landsat TM time series images, were classified by ten different Multilayer Perceptron network architectures. Results showed that the methodology in question meets both the purposes of this study and the characteristics of the local plant life. With excellent accuracy values for native classes, the study showed the importance of a well-structured database for classification and the importance of suitable image segmentation to meet specific purposes.

Fast region-based object detection and tracking using correlation of features

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Senekal, F

2010-11-01

Full Text Available and track a target object (or objects) over a series of digital images. Visual target tracking can be accomplished by feature-based or region-based approaches. In feature-based approaches, interest points are calculated in a digital image, and a local...-time performance based on the computational power that is available on a specific platform. To further reduce the computational requirements, process- ing is restricted to the region of interest (ROI). The region of interest is provided as an input parameter...

Object oriented distributed programming: studies and proposals

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Guerraoui, Rachid

1992-01-01

This thesis contributes to the investigation of the object concept in distributed programming. Henceforth, this programming style has become a reality in the computer science world, since it allows to increase of the availability of applications and to decrease their execution time. Nevertheless, designing a distributed application is a hard task: the various abstraction levels that must be considered hinder the software reusability and maintenance, while errors and concurrent accesses are often sources of executions incoherence. The object concept improves the software modularity, and raises the computing abstraction level. Integrating distribution related aspects into the object model brings up the issues of expressing the concurrency and maintaining the coherency. The investigation of these problems in this thesis has been guided by a major concern for the preservation of the intrinsic properties of object-orientation, and the orthogonality of the solutions given. The main contributions of the thesis are: (i) the classification, regarding modularity, of the different design alternatives for object-oriented concurrent languages; (ii) the evaluation of various transactional mechanisms in object-based concurrent languages, and the design of an atomic asynchronous communication protocol named ACS; (iii) the definition of a transaction-based object-oriented concurrent language called KAROS; (iv) the implementation of a modular framework which allows to combine in a same application, various concurrency control and error recovery mechanisms; (v) the identification of a formal property, named general atomicity, which constitutes a correctness criteria for atomic objects specifications. (author) [fr

A Learning Object Approach To Evidence based learning

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Zabin Visram

2005-06-01

implement a range of teaching and learning strategies that would accommodate the flexibility required by such a scheme. At the same time the specific requirements of individual programmes are satisfied. The body of elements provide an integrated path taking students through the range of operational, tactical and strategic issues involved in Web Based Learning, sustained by learning object abstract framework and Agent technology, within a distant learning context.

Objects in Motion

Science.gov (United States)

Damonte, Kathleen

2004-01-01

One thing scientists study is how objects move. A famous scientist named Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727) spent a lot of time observing objects in motion and came up with three laws that describe how things move. This explanation only deals with the first of his three laws of motion. Newton's First Law of Motion says that moving objects will continue…

Status of the object-oriented EGS interface project

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yacout, A.M.; Dunn, W.L.; Nelson, W.R.; Lui, P.; Bielajew, A.F.; Hirayama, H.; Namito, Y.

2000-01-01

The object-oriented EGS interface project seeks to simplify - using modern object-oriented and visual user interface techniques - the geometry and scoring aspects of the process of running the EGS code. The project will create an extremely user-friendly EGS package that retains and exploits the well documented physics advantages of EGS but removes the requirement that the user write HOWFAR and AUSGAB subroutines to define the geometry and scoring aspects of each new problem. In addition, several physics enhancements will be incorporated in EGS5. Although EGS5 will be able to be used in the traditional way - in a stand-alone fashion with users writing their own geometry and scoring subroutines - it is designed to be used in a completely new way - linked to a user interface through which users can manage all aspects of problem specification and code operation. This paper concentrates on the object-oriented user interface, which will dramatically simplify defining problem-specific detail for EGS. The 'EGS5 + VUI1' package will allow users to solve independent problems by run-time linking of the EGS5 code with class libraries that encapsulate the geometry and scoring aspects of each problem. Some simple example problems are considered in order to illustrate features of the EGS5 + VUI1 package. (author)

Piles of objects

KAUST Repository

Hsu, Shu-Wei; Keyser, John

2010-01-01

We present a method for directly modeling piles of objects in multi-body simulations. Piles of objects represent some of the more interesting, but also most time-consuming portion of simulation. We propose a method for reducing computation in many

Specific phobia predicts psychopathology in young women

OpenAIRE

Trumpf, Julia; Margraf, Jürgen; Vriends, Noortje; Meyer, Andrea Hans; Becker, Eni S.

2010-01-01

Background Although specific phobia is characterized by an early age at onset and by high rates of comorbidity, few studies have examined comorbid relationships prospectively. Objectives The present study investigated the association between specific phobia and the risk of a broad range of psychopathology among young women in the community. Method Data came from the Dresden Predictor Study in which 1,538 German women (18?25?years) completed a diagnostic interview at two time points. Results W...

The subjective experience of object recognition: comparing metacognition for object detection and object categorization.

Science.gov (United States)

Meuwese, Julia D I; van Loon, Anouk M; Lamme, Victor A F; Fahrenfort, Johannes J

2014-05-01

Perceptual decisions seem to be made automatically and almost instantly. Constructing a unitary subjective conscious experience takes more time. For example, when trying to avoid a collision with a car on a foggy road you brake or steer away in a reflex, before realizing you were in a near accident. This subjective aspect of object recognition has been given little attention. We used metacognition (assessed with confidence ratings) to measure subjective experience during object detection and object categorization for degraded and masked objects, while objective performance was matched. Metacognition was equal for degraded and masked objects, but categorization led to higher metacognition than did detection. This effect turned out to be driven by a difference in metacognition for correct rejection trials, which seemed to be caused by an asymmetry of the distractor stimulus: It does not contain object-related information in the detection task, whereas it does contain such information in the categorization task. Strikingly, this asymmetry selectively impacted metacognitive ability when objective performance was matched. This finding reveals a fundamental difference in how humans reflect versus act on information: When matching the amount of information required to perform two tasks at some objective level of accuracy (acting), metacognitive ability (reflecting) is still better in tasks that rely on positive evidence (categorization) than in tasks that rely more strongly on an absence of evidence (detection).

Object interaction competence model v. 2.0

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Bennedsen, Jens; Schulte, C.

2013-01-01

Teaching and learning object oriented programming has to take into account the specific object oriented characteristics of program execution, namely the interaction of objects during runtime. Prior to the research reported in this article, we have developed a competence model for object interaction...

Object-oriented Programming Laws for Annotated Java Programs

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Gabriel Falconieri Freitas

2010-03-01

Full Text Available Object-oriented programming laws have been proposed in the context of languages that are not combined with a behavioral interface specification language (BISL. The strong dependence between source-code and interface specifications may cause a number of difficulties when transforming programs. In this paper we introduce a set of programming laws for object-oriented languages like Java combined with the Java Modeling Language (JML. The set of laws deals with object-oriented features taking into account their specifications. Some laws deal only with features of the specification language. These laws constitute a set of small transformations for the development of more elaborate ones like refactorings.

Multi-objective optimization of discrete time-cost tradeoff problem in project networks using non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm

Science.gov (United States)

Shahriari, Mohammadreza

2016-06-01

The time-cost tradeoff problem is one of the most important and applicable problems in project scheduling area. There are many factors that force the mangers to crash the time. This factor could be early utilization, early commissioning and operation, improving the project cash flow, avoiding unfavorable weather conditions, compensating the delays, and so on. Since there is a need to allocate extra resources to short the finishing time of project and the project managers are intended to spend the lowest possible amount of money and achieve the maximum crashing time, as a result, both direct and indirect costs will be influenced in the project, and here, we are facing into the time value of money. It means that when we crash the starting activities in a project, the extra investment will be tied in until the end date of the project; however, when we crash the final activities, the extra investment will be tied in for a much shorter period. This study is presenting a two-objective mathematical model for balancing compressing the project time with activities delay to prepare a suitable tool for decision makers caught in available facilities and due to the time of projects. Also drawing the scheduling problem to real world conditions by considering nonlinear objective function and the time value of money are considered. The presented problem was solved using NSGA-II, and the effect of time compressing reports on the non-dominant set.

Time-wise change in neck pain in response to rehabilitation with specific resistance training

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Zebis, Mette Kreutzfeldt; Andersen, Christoffer H; Sundstrup, Emil

2014-01-01

in Copenhagen, Denmark. Women with neck pain >30 mm VAS (N = 131) were included in the present analysis. The training group (N = 77) performed specific resistance training for the neck/shoulder muscles three times a week, and the control group (N = 54) received advice to stay active. Participants of both groups......Purpose To determine the time-wise effect of specific resistance training on neck pain among industrial technicians with frequent neck pain symptoms. Methods Secondary analysis of a parallel-group cluster randomized controlled trial of 20 weeks performed at two large industrial production units...

Travel time estimation using Bluetooth.

Science.gov (United States)

2015-06-01

The objective of this study was to investigate the feasibility of using a Bluetooth Probe Detection System (BPDS) to : estimate travel time in an urban area. Specifically, the study investigated the possibility of measuring overall congestion, the : ...

Has Work Replaced Home as a Haven? Re-examining Arlie Hochschild's Time Bind Proposition with Objective Stress Data

Science.gov (United States)

Damaske, Sarah; Smyth, Joshua M.; Zawadzki, Matthew J.

2014-01-01

Using innovative data with objective and subjective measures of stress collected from 122 employed men and women, this paper tests the thesis of the Time Bind by asking whether people report lower stress levels at work than at home. The study finds consistent support for the Time Bind hypothesis when examining objective stress data: when participants were at work they had lower values of the stress hormone cortisol than when they were at home. Two variables moderated this association – income and children at home – such that the work as haven effect was stronger for those with lower incomes and no children living at home. Participants also, however, consistently reported higher subjective stress levels on work days than on non-work days, which is in direct contrast to the Time Bind hypothesis. Although our overall findings support Hochschild's hypothesis that stress levels are lower at work, it appears that combining work and home increases people's subjective experience of daily stress. PMID:24869785

Has work replaced home as a haven? Re-examining Arlie Hochschild's Time Bind proposition with objective stress data.

Science.gov (United States)

Damaske, Sarah; Smyth, Joshua M; Zawadzki, Matthew J

2014-08-01

Using innovative data with objective and subjective measures of stress collected from 122 employed men and women, this paper tests the thesis of the Time Bind by asking whether people report lower stress levels at work than at home. The study finds consistent support for the Time Bind hypothesis when examining objective stress data: when participants were at work they had lower values of the stress hormone cortisol than when they were at home. Two variables moderated this association - income and children at home - such that the work as haven effect was stronger for those with lower incomes and no children living at home. Participants also, however, consistently reported higher subjective stress levels on work days than on non-work days, which is in direct contrast to the Time Bind hypothesis. Although our overall findings support Hochschild's hypothesis that stress levels are lower at work, it appears that combining work and home increases people's subjective experience of daily stress. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

A Prototype Lisp-Based Soft Real-Time Object-Oriented Graphical User Interface for Control System Development

Science.gov (United States)

Litt, Jonathan; Wong, Edmond; Simon, Donald L.

1994-01-01

A prototype Lisp-based soft real-time object-oriented Graphical User Interface for control system development is presented. The Graphical User Interface executes alongside a test system in laboratory conditions to permit observation of the closed loop operation through animation, graphics, and text. Since it must perform interactive graphics while updating the screen in real time, techniques are discussed which allow quick, efficient data processing and animation. Examples from an implementation are included to demonstrate some typical functionalities which allow the user to follow the control system's operation.

Real-time surgical simulation for deformable soft-tissue objects with a tumour using Boundary Element techniques

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, P.; Becker, A. A.; Jones, I. A.; Glover, A. T.; Benford, S. D.; Vloeberghs, M.

2009-08-01

A virtual-reality real-time simulation of surgical operations that incorporates the inclusion of a hard tumour is presented. The software is based on Boundary Element (BE) technique. A review of the BE formulation for real-time analysis of two-domain deformable objects, using the pre-solution technique, is presented. The two-domain BE software is incorporated into a surgical simulation system called VIRS to simulate the initiation of a cut on the surface of the soft tissue and extending the cut deeper until the tumour is reached.

Real-time surgical simulation for deformable soft-tissue objects with a tumour using Boundary Element techniques

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Wang, P; Becker, A A; Jones, I A; Glover, A T; Benford, S D; Vloeberghs, M

2009-01-01

A virtual-reality real-time simulation of surgical operations that incorporates the inclusion of a hard tumour is presented. The software is based on Boundary Element (BE) technique. A review of the BE formulation for real-time analysis of two-domain deformable objects, using the pre-solution technique, is presented. The two-domain BE software is incorporated into a surgical simulation system called VIRS to simulate the initiation of a cut on the surface of the soft tissue and extending the cut deeper until the tumour is reached.

Modelling and multi-objective optimization of a variable valve-timing spark-ignition engine using polynomial neural networks and evolutionary algorithms

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Atashkari, K.; Nariman-Zadeh, N.; Goelcue, M.; Khalkhali, A.; Jamali, A.

2007-01-01

The main reason for the efficiency decrease at part load conditions for four-stroke spark-ignition (SI) engines is the flow restriction at the cross-sectional area of the intake system. Traditionally, valve-timing has been designed to optimize operation at high engine-speed and wide open throttle conditions. Several investigations have demonstrated that improvements at part load conditions in engine performance can be accomplished if the valve-timing is variable. Controlling valve-timing can be used to improve the torque and power curve as well as to reduce fuel consumption and emissions. In this paper, a group method of data handling (GMDH) type neural network and evolutionary algorithms (EAs) are firstly used for modelling the effects of intake valve-timing (V t ) and engine speed (N) of a spark-ignition engine on both developed engine torque (T) and fuel consumption (Fc) using some experimentally obtained training and test data. Using such obtained polynomial neural network models, a multi-objective EA (non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm, NSGA-II) with a new diversity preserving mechanism are secondly used for Pareto based optimization of the variable valve-timing engine considering two conflicting objectives such as torque (T) and fuel consumption (Fc). The comparison results demonstrate the superiority of the GMDH type models over feedforward neural network models in terms of the statistical measures in the training data, testing data and the number of hidden neurons. Further, it is shown that some interesting and important relationships, as useful optimal design principles, involved in the performance of the variable valve-timing four-stroke spark-ignition engine can be discovered by the Pareto based multi-objective optimization of the polynomial models. Such important optimal principles would not have been obtained without the use of both the GMDH type neural network modelling and the multi-objective Pareto optimization approach

Time domain SAR raw data simulation using CST and image focusing of 3D objects

Science.gov (United States)

Saeed, Adnan; Hellwich, Olaf

2017-10-01

This paper presents the use of a general purpose electromagnetic simulator, CST, to simulate realistic synthetic aperture radar (SAR) raw data of three-dimensional objects. Raw data is later focused in MATLAB using range-doppler algorithm. Within CST Microwave Studio a replica of TerraSAR-X chirp signal is incident upon a modeled Corner Reflector (CR) whose design and material properties are identical to that of the real one. Defining mesh and other appropriate settings reflected wave is measured at several distant points within a line parallel to the viewing direction. This is analogous to an array antenna and is synthesized to create a long aperture for SAR processing. The time domain solver in CST is based on the solution of differential form of Maxwells equations. Exported data from CST is arranged into a 2-d matrix of axis range and azimuth. Hilbert transform is applied to convert the real signal to complex data with phase information. Range compression, range cell migration correction (RCMC), and azimuth compression are applied in time domain to obtain the final SAR image. This simulation can provide valuable information to clarify which real world objects cause images suitable for high accuracy identification in the SAR images.

Objectively measured physical activity and sedentary time are associated with cardiometabolic risk factors in adults with prediabetes

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Swindell, Nils; Mackintosh, Kelly; McNarry, Melitta

2018-01-01

OBJECTIVE: The aim of the present cross-sectional study was to examine the association among physical activity (PA), sedentary time (ST), and cardiometabolic risk in adults with prediabetes. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS: Participants (n = 2,326; 25-70 years old, 67% female) from eight countries...

Removing defocused objects from single focal plane scans of cytological slides

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

David Friedrich

2016-01-01

Full Text Available Background: Virtual microscopy and automated processing of cytological slides are more challenging compared to histological slides. Since cytological slides exhibit a three-dimensional surface and the required microscope objectives with high resolution have a low depth of field, these cannot capture all objects of a single field of view in focus. One solution would be to scan multiple focal planes; however, the increase in processing time and storage requirements are often prohibitive for clinical routine. Materials and Methods: In this paper, we show that it is a reasonable trade-off to scan a single focal plane and automatically reject defocused objects from the analysis. To this end, we have developed machine learning solutions for the automated identification of defocused objects. Our approach includes creating novel features, systematically optimizing their parameters, selecting adequate classifier algorithms, and identifying the correct decision boundary between focused and defocused objects. We validated our approach for computer-assisted DNA image cytometry. Results and Conclusions: We reach an overall sensitivity of 96.08% and a specificity of 99.63% for identifying defocused objects. Applied on ninety cytological slides, the developed classifiers automatically removed 2.50% of the objects acquired during scanning, which otherwise would have interfered the examination. Even if not all objects are acquired in focus, computer-assisted DNA image cytometry still identified more diagnostically or prognostically relevant objects compared to manual DNA image cytometry. At the same time, the workload for the expert is reduced dramatically.

Countermovement jump height: gender and sport-specific differences in the force-time variables.

Science.gov (United States)

Laffaye, Guillaume; Wagner, Phillip P; Tombleson, Tom I L

2014-04-01

The goal of this study was to assess (a) the eccentric rate of force development, the concentric force, and selected time variables on vertical performance during countermovement jump, (b) the existence of gender differences in these variables, and (c) the sport-specific differences. The sample was composed of 189 males and 84 females, all elite athletes involved in college and professional sports (primarily football, basketball, baseball, and volleyball). The subjects performed a series of 6 countermovement jumps on a force plate (500 Hz). Average eccentric rate of force development (ECC-RFD), total time (TIME), eccentric time (ECC-T), Ratio between eccentric and total time (ECC-T:T) and average force (CON-F) were extracted from force-time curves and the vertical jumping performance, measured by impulse momentum. Results show that CON-F (r = 0.57; p differ between both sexes (p differ, showing a similar temporal structure. The best way to jump high is to increase CON-F and ECC-RFD thus minimizing the ECC-T. Principal component analysis (PCA) accounted for 76.8% of the JH variance and revealed that JH is predicted by a temporal and a force component. Furthermore, the PCA comparison made among athletes revealed sport-specific signatures: volleyball players revealed a temporal-prevailing profile, a weak-force with large ECC-T:T for basketball players and explosive and powerful profiles for football and baseball players.

Fixed, object-specific intensity compensation for cone beam optical CT radiation dosimetry

Science.gov (United States)

Dekker, Kurtis H.; Hazarika, Rubin; Silveira, Matheus A.; Jordan, Kevin J.

2018-03-01

Optical cone beam computed tomography (CT) scanning of radiochromic gel dosimeters, using a CCD camera and a low stray light convergent source, provides fast, truly 3D radiation dosimetry with high accuracy. However, a key limiting factor in radiochromic gel dosimetry at large (⩾10 cm diameter) volumes is the initial attenuation of the dosimeters. It is not unusual to observe a 5–10×  difference in signal intensity through the dosimeter center versus through the surrounding medium in pre-irradiation images. Thus, all dosimetric information in a typical experiment is measured within the lower 10%–20% of the camera sensor’s range, and re-use of gels is often not possible due to a lack of transmission. To counteract this, in this note we describe a simple method to create source compensators by printing on transparent films. This technique, which is easily implemented and inexpensive, is an optical analogue to the bowtie filter in x-ray CT. We present transmission images and solution phantom reconstructions to demonstrate that (1) placing compensators beyond the focal zone of the imaging lens prevents high spatial frequency features of the printed films from generating reconstruction artifacts, and (2) object-specific compensation considerably reduces the range of intensities measured in projection images. This will improve the measurable dose range in optical CT dosimetry, and will enable imaging of larger gel volumes (∼15 cm diameter). Additionally, it should enable re-use of dosimeters by printing a new compensator for a second experiment.

An analytic solution to the alibi query in the space-time prisms model for moving object data

OpenAIRE

GRIMSON, Rafael; KUIJPERS, Bart; OTHMAN, Walied

2010-01-01

Moving objects produce trajectories, which are stored in databases by means of finite samples of time-stamped locations. When also speed limitations in these sample points are known, space-time prisms (also called beads) (Egenhofer 2003, Miller 2005, Pfoser and Jensen 1999) can be used to model the uncertainty about an object’s location in between sample points. In this setting, a query of particular interest, that has been studied in the literature of geographic information systems (GIS), is...

Object permanence in lemurs.

Science.gov (United States)

Deppe, Anja M; Wright, Patricia C; Szelistowski, William A

2009-03-01

Object permanence, the ability to mentally represent objects that have disappeared from view, should be advantageous to animals in their interaction with the natural world. The objective of this study was to examine whether lemurs possess object permanence. Thirteen adult subjects representing four species of diurnal lemur (Eulemur fulvus rufus, Eulemur mongoz, Lemur catta and Hapalemur griseus) were presented with seven standard Piagetian visible and invisible object displacement tests, plus one single visible test where the subject had to wait predetermined times before allowed to search, and two invisible tests where each hiding place was made visually unique. In all visible tests lemurs were able to find an object that had been in clear view before being hidden. However, when lemurs were not allowed to search for up to 25-s, performance declined with increasing time-delay. Subjects did not outperform chance on any invisible displacements regardless of whether hiding places were visually uniform or unique, therefore the upper limit of object permanence observed was Stage 5b. Lemur species in this study eat stationary foods and are not subject to stalking predators, thus Stage 5 object permanence is probably sufficient to solve most problems encountered in the wild.

Time-domain full waveform inversion of exponentially damped wavefield using the deconvolution-based objective function

KAUST Repository

Choi, Yun Seok

2017-11-15

Full waveform inversion (FWI) suffers from the cycle-skipping problem when the available frequency-band of data is not low enough. We apply an exponential damping to the data to generate artificial low frequencies, which helps FWI avoid cycle skipping. In this case, the least-square misfit function does not properly deal with the exponentially damped wavefield in FWI, because the amplitude of traces decays almost exponentially with increasing offset in a damped wavefield. Thus, we use a deconvolution-based objective function for FWI of the exponentially damped wavefield. The deconvolution filter includes inherently a normalization between the modeled and observed data, thus it can address the unbalanced amplitude of a damped wavefield. We, specifically, normalize the modeled data with the observed data in the frequency-domain to estimate the deconvolution filter and selectively choose a frequency-band for normalization that mainly includes the artificial low frequencies. We calculate the gradient of the objective function using the adjoint-state method. The synthetic and benchmark data examples show that our FWI algorithm generates a convergent long wavelength structure without low frequency information in the recorded data.

Time-domain full waveform inversion of exponentially damped wavefield using the deconvolution-based objective function

KAUST Repository

Choi, Yun Seok; Alkhalifah, Tariq Ali

2017-01-01

Full waveform inversion (FWI) suffers from the cycle-skipping problem when the available frequency-band of data is not low enough. We apply an exponential damping to the data to generate artificial low frequencies, which helps FWI avoid cycle skipping. In this case, the least-square misfit function does not properly deal with the exponentially damped wavefield in FWI, because the amplitude of traces decays almost exponentially with increasing offset in a damped wavefield. Thus, we use a deconvolution-based objective function for FWI of the exponentially damped wavefield. The deconvolution filter includes inherently a normalization between the modeled and observed data, thus it can address the unbalanced amplitude of a damped wavefield. We, specifically, normalize the modeled data with the observed data in the frequency-domain to estimate the deconvolution filter and selectively choose a frequency-band for normalization that mainly includes the artificial low frequencies. We calculate the gradient of the objective function using the adjoint-state method. The synthetic and benchmark data examples show that our FWI algorithm generates a convergent long wavelength structure without low frequency information in the recorded data.

First off-time treatment prostate-specific antigen kinetics predicts survival in intermittent androgen deprivation for prostate cancer.

Science.gov (United States)

Sanchez-Salas, Rafael; Olivier, Fabien; Prapotnich, Dominique; Dancausa, José; Fhima, Mehdi; David, Stéphane; Secin, Fernando P; Ingels, Alexandre; Barret, Eric; Galiano, Marc; Rozet, François; Cathelineau, Xavier

2016-01-01

Prostate-specific antigen (PSA) doubling time is relying on an exponential kinetic pattern. This pattern has never been validated in the setting of intermittent androgen deprivation (IAD). Objective is to analyze the prognostic significance for PCa of recurrent patterns in PSA kinetics in patients undergoing IAD. A retrospective study was conducted on 377 patients treated with IAD. On-treatment period (ONTP) consisted of gonadotropin-releasing hormone agonist injections combined with oral androgen receptor antagonist. Off-treatment period (OFTP) began when PSA was lower than 4 ng/ml. ONTP resumed when PSA was higher than 20 ng/ml. PSA values of each OFTP were fitted with three basic patterns: exponential (PSA(t) = λ.e(αt)), linear (PSA(t) = a.t), and power law (PSA(t) = a.t(c)). Univariate and multivariate Cox regression model analyzed predictive factors for oncologic outcomes. Only 45% of the analyzed OFTPs were exponential. Linear and power law PSA kinetics represented 7.5% and 7.7%, respectively. Remaining fraction of analyzed OFTPs (40%) exhibited complex kinetics. Exponential PSA kinetics during the first OFTP was significantly associated with worse oncologic outcome. The estimated 10-year cancer-specific survival (CSS) was 46% for exponential versus 80% for nonexponential PSA kinetics patterns. The corresponding 10-year probability of castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) was 69% and 31% for the two patterns, respectively. Limitations include retrospective design and mixed indications for IAD. PSA kinetic fitted with exponential pattern in approximately half of the OFTPs. First OFTP exponential PSA kinetic was associated with a shorter time to CRPC and worse CSS. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Cross-Sectional Analysis of Levels and Patterns of Objectively Measured Sedentary Time in Adolescent Females

LENUS (Irish Health Repository)

Harrington, Deirdre M.

2011-10-28

Abstract Background Adolescent females have been highlighted as a particularly sedentary population and the possible negative effects of a sedentary lifestyle are being uncovered. However, much of the past sedentary research is based on self-report or uses indirect methods to quantity sedentary time. Total time spent sedentary and the possible intricate sedentary patterns of adolescent females have not been described using objective and direct measure of body inclination. The objectives of this article are to examine the sedentary levels and patterns of a group of adolescent females using the ActivPAL™ and to highlight possible differences in sedentary levels and patterns across the week and within the school day. A full methodological description of how the data was analyzed is also presented. Methods One hundred and eleven adolescent females, age 15-18 yrs, were recruited from urban and rural areas in the Republic of Ireland. Participants wore an ActivPAL physical activity monitor for a 7.5 day period. The ActivPAL directly reports total time spent sitting\\/lying every 15 seconds and accumulation (frequency and duration) of sedentary activity was examined using a customized MATLAB ® computer software programme. Results While no significant difference was found in the total time spent sitting\\/lying over the full 24 hour day between weekday and weekend day (18.8 vs. 18.9 hours; p = .911), significantly more sedentary bouts of 1 to 5 minutes and 21 to 40 minutes in duration were accumulated on weekdays compared to weekend days (p < .001). The mean length of each sedentary bout was also longer (9.8 vs. 8.8 minutes; p < .001). When school hours (9 am-3 pm) and after school hours (4 pm-10 pm) were compared, there was no difference in total time spent sedentary (3.9 hours; p = .796) but the pattern of accumulation of the sedentary time differed. There were a greater number of bouts of > 20 minutes duration during school hours than after school hours (4.7 vs. 3

PARTICULARITIES OF EDUCATIONAL OBJECTS IN COMPUTER-ASSISTED LEARNING FOR PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Narcisa ISĂILĂ

2010-12-01

Full Text Available The current trend in computer-assisted learning is the creation of reusable learning objects. They can be used independently or can be coupled to make lessons that best fit the users' learning needs. From this perspective, the specific of learning objects for people with disabilities is to ensure accessibility and usability. Using standards in the process of creating learning objects provide flexibility in achieving lessons, thus being helpful for educational content creators (teachers. Metadata have an essential role in achieving interoperability and provide standardized information about the learning objects, allowing the searching, accessing and their finding. The compliance of eLearning standards ensures the compatibility and portability of materials from one system to another, which reduces the time and cost of development.

New Results on Timed Specifications

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Bourke, Timothy; David, Alexandre; Larsen, Kim Guldstrand

2010-01-01

Recently, we have proposed a new design theory for timed systems. This theory, building on Timed I/O Automata with game semantics, includes clas- sical operators like satisfaction, consistency, logical composition and structural composition. This paper presents a new efficient algorithm for check...

Generalized motor abilities and timing behavior in children with specific language impairment.

Science.gov (United States)

Zelaznik, Howard N; Goffman, Lisa

2010-04-01

To examine whether children with specific language impairment (SLI) differ from normally developing peers in motor skills, especially those skills related to timing. Standard measures of gross and fine motor development were obtained. Furthermore, finger and hand movements were recorded while children engaged in 4 different timing tasks, including tapping and drawing circles in time with a metronome or a visual target. Fourteen children with SLI (age 6 to 8 years) and 14 age-matched peers who were typically developing participated. As expected, children with SLI showed poorer performance on a standardized test of gross and fine motor skill than did their normally developing peers. However, timing skill in the manual domain was equivalent to that seen in typically developing children. Consistent with earlier findings, relatively poor gross and fine motor performance is observed in children with SLI. Surprisingly, rhythmic timing is spared.

Generalized Motor Abilities and Timing Behavior in Children with Specific Language Impairment

Science.gov (United States)

Zelaznik, Howard N.; Goffman, Lisa

2010-01-01

Purpose: To examine whether children with specific language impairment (SLI) differ from normally developing peers in motor skills, especially those skills related to timing. Method: Standard measures of gross and fine motor development were obtained. Furthermore, finger and hand movements were recorded while children engaged in 4 different timing…

The role of space and time in object-based visual search

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Schreij, D.B.B.; Olivers, C.N.L.

2013-01-01

Recently we have provided evidence that observers more readily select a target from a visual search display if the motion trajectory of the display object suggests that the observer has dealt with it before. Here we test the prediction that this object-based memory effect on search breaks down if

Sensor agnostic object recognition using a map seeking circuit

Science.gov (United States)

Overman, Timothy L.; Hart, Michael

2012-05-01

Automatic object recognition capabilities are traditionally tuned to exploit the specific sensing modality they were designed to. Their successes (and shortcomings) are tied to object segmentation from the background, they typically require highly skilled personnel to train them, and they become cumbersome with the introduction of new objects. In this paper we describe a sensor independent algorithm based on the biologically inspired technology of map seeking circuits (MSC) which overcomes many of these obstacles. In particular, the MSC concept offers transparency in object recognition from a common interface to all sensor types, analogous to a USB device. It also provides a common core framework that is independent of the sensor and expandable to support high dimensionality decision spaces. Ease in training is assured by using commercially available 3D models from the video game community. The search time remains linear no matter how many objects are introduced, ensuring rapid object recognition. Here, we report results of an MSC algorithm applied to object recognition and pose estimation from high range resolution radar (1D), electrooptical imagery (2D), and LIDAR point clouds (3D) separately. By abstracting the sensor phenomenology from the underlying a prior knowledge base, MSC shows promise as an easily adaptable tool for incorporating additional sensor inputs.

Specification and testing of Multiplicative Time-Varying GARCH models with applications

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Amado, Cristina; Teräsvirta, Timo

2017-01-01

In this article, we develop a specification technique for building multiplicative time-varying GARCH models of Amado and Teräsvirta (2008, 2013). The variance is decomposed into an unconditional and a conditional component such that the unconditional variance component is allowed to evolve smooth...... is illustrated in practice with two real examples: an empirical application to daily exchange rate returns and another one to daily coffee futures returns....

Human active X-specific DNA methylation events showing stability across time and tissues

Science.gov (United States)

Joo, Jihoon Eric; Novakovic, Boris; Cruickshank, Mark; Doyle, Lex W; Craig, Jeffrey M; Saffery, Richard

2014-01-01

The phenomenon of X chromosome inactivation in female mammals is well characterised and remains the archetypal example of dosage compensation via monoallelic expression. The temporal series of events that culminates in inactive X-specific gene silencing by DNA methylation has revealed a ‘patchwork' of gene inactivation along the chromosome, with approximately 15% of genes escaping. Such genes are therefore potentially subject to sex-specific imbalance between males and females. Aside from XIST, the non-coding RNA on the X chromosome destined to be inactivated, very little is known about the extent of loci that may be selectively silenced on the active X chromosome (Xa). Using longitudinal array-based DNA methylation profiling of two human tissues, we have identified specific and widespread active X-specific DNA methylation showing stability over time and across tissues of disparate origin. Our panel of X-chromosome loci subject to methylation on Xa reflects a potentially novel mechanism for controlling female-specific X inactivation and sex-specific dimorphisms in humans. Further work is needed to investigate these phenomena. PMID:24713664

Early object relations into new objects.

Science.gov (United States)

Downey, T W

2001-01-01

Two strands of change are suggested by this review, one maturational, the other therapeutic or developmental (Hartmann and Kris, 1945). By "maturational" I mean to suggest energies that infuse the individual from earliest life in a manner that includes object relations, but for the healthy exercise of which object relations per se need not be of central and crucial importance. Within wide limits such energies may be delayed until growth conditions prevail without significant distortion of certain of the organism's ego functions. Therapeutic change is analogous to developmental change in that both involve the crucial presence of another to release energies. In therapeutic change these are energies that have been repressed beyond the reach of developmental dynamics. In everyday development crisis and synthesis alternate in conjunction with new and emerging objects to add to the psychological structures brought to the fore by maturation. In many instances, as we see with John, over time and in a less focussed manner, developmental changes can approximate therapeutic change and visa versa. Freud-Dann in their "experiment" pursued one line, in which the equipmental delay brought on by extremely adverse living circumstances was redressed by providing an interpersonally enriching, loving, developmentally facilitating milieu. The sketches of individual children and John's subsequent story provide a perspective into what becomes the stuff of growth and what remains the stuff of neurosis. The developmental reserves and ego resilience of these children were impressive but probably not extraordinary. Usual growth ensued as soon as they were provided with the rich soil of Bulldogs Bank instead of the desert sand of the Tereszin concentration camp. However, no one can escape such adverse circumstances without having taken in the stuff of neurosis. Affects and percepts that were not assimilatable or even available to consciousness at the time remain buried in the unconscious

Gamifying Video Object Segmentation.

Science.gov (United States)

Spampinato, Concetto; Palazzo, Simone; Giordano, Daniela

2017-10-01

Video object segmentation can be considered as one of the most challenging computer vision problems. Indeed, so far, no existing solution is able to effectively deal with the peculiarities of real-world videos, especially in cases of articulated motion and object occlusions; limitations that appear more evident when we compare the performance of automated methods with the human one. However, manually segmenting objects in videos is largely impractical as it requires a lot of time and concentration. To address this problem, in this paper we propose an interactive video object segmentation method, which exploits, on one hand, the capability of humans to identify correctly objects in visual scenes, and on the other hand, the collective human brainpower to solve challenging and large-scale tasks. In particular, our method relies on a game with a purpose to collect human inputs on object locations, followed by an accurate segmentation phase achieved by optimizing an energy function encoding spatial and temporal constraints between object regions as well as human-provided location priors. Performance analysis carried out on complex video benchmarks, and exploiting data provided by over 60 users, demonstrated that our method shows a better trade-off between annotation times and segmentation accuracy than interactive video annotation and automated video object segmentation approaches.

Scientists' Prioritization of Communication Objectives for Public Engagement.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Anthony Dudo

Full Text Available Amid calls from scientific leaders for their colleagues to become more effective public communicators, this study examines the objectives that scientists' report drive their public engagement behaviors. We explore how scientists evaluate five specific communication objectives, which include informing the public about science, exciting the public about science, strengthening the public's trust in science, tailoring messages about science, and defending science from misinformation. We use insights from extant research, the theory of planned behavior, and procedural justice theory to identify likely predictors of scientists' views about these communication objectives. Results show that scientists most prioritize communication designed to defend science from misinformation and educate the public about science, and least prioritize communication that seeks to build trust and establish resonance with the public. Regression analyses reveal factors associated with scientists who prioritize each of the five specific communication objectives. Our findings highlight the need for communication trainers to help scientists select specific communication objectives for particular contexts and audiences.

Scientists’ Prioritization of Communication Objectives for Public Engagement

Science.gov (United States)

2016-01-01

Amid calls from scientific leaders for their colleagues to become more effective public communicators, this study examines the objectives that scientists’ report drive their public engagement behaviors. We explore how scientists evaluate five specific communication objectives, which include informing the public about science, exciting the public about science, strengthening the public’s trust in science, tailoring messages about science, and defending science from misinformation. We use insights from extant research, the theory of planned behavior, and procedural justice theory to identify likely predictors of scientists' views about these communication objectives. Results show that scientists most prioritize communication designed to defend science from misinformation and educate the public about science, and least prioritize communication that seeks to build trust and establish resonance with the public. Regression analyses reveal factors associated with scientists who prioritize each of the five specific communication objectives. Our findings highlight the need for communication trainers to help scientists select specific communication objectives for particular contexts and audiences. PMID:26913869

Design of the real time systems using temporal logic specifications: a case study

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

A. Ursu

1996-07-01

Full Text Available An implementation method for real time systems is proposed in this article. The implementation starts with the design of the functional specifications of the systems behaviour. The functional specifications are introduced as a set of rules describing the partial time ordering of the actions performed by the system. These rules are then written in terms of temporal logic formulae. The temporal logic formulae are checked using Z.Manna-P.Wolper satisfiability analysis procedure [1]. It is known that this procedure generates a state-graph which can be regarded as a state- based automaton of the system. The sate-based automaton is used then to generate the dual (inverted automaton of the system. The dual automaton is called action-based automaton and can be created using the procedure proposed by authors in [4,5]. Using the action-based automaton of the system the design method introduced in [5,6] is applied to implement the system driver in a systematic manner which can be computerised. The method proposed in this paper is an efficient complementation and generalisation of the results [4,5,6] mentioned above. The method is used for a case study. An elevator control system is designed using the proposed method. The design is carried out in a systematic manner which includes: a design of functional specifications, b design of temporal logic specifications, c satisfiability analysis of temporal logic specifications, d design of the state-based automaton of the specifications, e design of the action-based automaton of the system, f design of the transition activation conditions, g design of the action activation conditions, h design of the functional model of the elevator control system, i implementation of the elevator's actions, j design of the elevator control system driver.

Data Rods: High Speed, Time-Series Analysis of Massive Cryospheric Data Sets Using Object-Oriented Database Methods

Science.gov (United States)

Liang, Y.; Gallaher, D. W.; Grant, G.; Lv, Q.

2011-12-01

Change over time, is the central driver of climate change detection. The goal is to diagnose the underlying causes, and make projections into the future. In an effort to optimize this process we have developed the Data Rod model, an object-oriented approach that provides the ability to query grid cell changes and their relationships to neighboring grid cells through time. The time series data is organized in time-centric structures called "data rods." A single data rod can be pictured as the multi-spectral data history at one grid cell: a vertical column of data through time. This resolves the long-standing problem of managing time-series data and opens new possibilities for temporal data analysis. This structure enables rapid time- centric analysis at any grid cell across multiple sensors and satellite platforms. Collections of data rods can be spatially and temporally filtered, statistically analyzed, and aggregated for use with pattern matching algorithms. Likewise, individual image pixels can be extracted to generate multi-spectral imagery at any spatial and temporal location. The Data Rods project has created a series of prototype databases to store and analyze massive datasets containing multi-modality remote sensing data. Using object-oriented technology, this method overcomes the operational limitations of traditional relational databases. To demonstrate the speed and efficiency of time-centric analysis using the Data Rods model, we have developed a sea ice detection algorithm. This application determines the concentration of sea ice in a small spatial region across a long temporal window. If performed using traditional analytical techniques, this task would typically require extensive data downloads and spatial filtering. Using Data Rods databases, the exact spatio-temporal data set is immediately available No extraneous data is downloaded, and all selected data querying occurs transparently on the server side. Moreover, fundamental statistical

USING OF OBJECT-ORIENTED DESIGN PRINCIPLES IN ELECTRIC MACHINES DEVELOPMENT

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

N.N. Zablodskii

2016-03-01

Full Text Available Purpose. To develop the theoretical basis of electrical machines object-oriented design, mathematical models and software to improve their design synthesis, analysis and optimization. Methodology. We have applied object-oriented design theory in electric machines optimal design and mathematical modelling of electromagnetic transients and electromagnetic field distribution. We have correlated the simulated results with the experimental data obtained by means of the double-stator screw dryer with an external solid rotor, brushless turbo-generator exciter and induction motor with squirrel cage rotor. Results. We have developed object-oriented design methodology, transient mathematical modelling and electromagnetic field equations templates for cylindrical electrical machines, improved and remade Cartesian product and genetic optimization algorithms. This allows to develop electrical machines classifications models, included not only structure development but also parallel synthesis of mathematical models and design software, to improve electric machines efficiency and technical performance. Originality. For the first time, we have applied a new way of design and modelling of electrical machines, which is based on the basic concepts of the object-oriented analysis. For the first time is suggested to use a single class template for structural and system organization of electrical machines, invariant to their specific variety. Practical value. We have manufactured screw dryer for coil dust drying and mixing based on the performed object-oriented theory. We have developed object-oriented software for design and optimization of induction motor with squirrel cage rotor of AIR series and brushless turbo-generator exciter. The experimental studies have confirmed the adequacy of the developed object-oriented design methodology.

Minimum Delay Moving Object Detection

KAUST Repository

Lao, Dong

2017-05-14

This thesis presents a general framework and method for detection of an object in a video based on apparent motion. The object moves, at some unknown time, differently than the “background” motion, which can be induced from camera motion. The goal of proposed method is to detect and segment the object as soon it moves in an online manner. Since motion estimation can be unreliable between frames, more than two frames are needed to reliably detect the object. Observing more frames before declaring a detection may lead to a more accurate detection and segmentation, since more motion may be observed leading to a stronger motion cue. However, this leads to greater delay. The proposed method is designed to detect the object(s) with minimum delay, i.e., frames after the object moves, constraining the false alarms, defined as declarations of detection before the object moves or incorrect or inaccurate segmentation at the detection time. Experiments on a new extensive dataset for moving object detection show that our method achieves less delay for all false alarm constraints than existing state-of-the-art.

Observations of pretreatment prostate-specific antigen doubling time in 107 patients referred for definitive radiotherapy

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Lee, W. Robert; Hanks, Gerald E.; Corn, Benjamin W.; Schultheiss, Timothy E.

1995-01-01

Purpose: To determine pretreatment prostate-specific antigen doubling times (PSADT) in patients referred for definitive radiotherapy. Methods and Materials: One hundred and seven patients with histologically proven nonmetastatic prostate cancer and an elevated prostate-specific antigen (PSA) who were referred for radiation therapy had three serum PSA values obtained prior to the start of definitive therapy. Prostate-specific antigen doubling times were calculated by linear regression. Results: Prostate-specific antigen values increased during the period of observation in 78 patients (73%). Forty-three patients (40%) had calculated PSADT of less than 2 years and of those patients with pretreatment serum PSA values of greater than 10 ng/mL more than 50% has calculated PSADT of less than 2 years. Conclusions: A significant minority of patients referred for radiotherapy have calculated PSADT of less than 2 years. The significance of this relatively fast growth rate is as yet undetermined, but suggests that patients referred for radiotherapy may have aggressive disease prior to treatment

Object-location memory in adults with autism spectrum disorder.

Science.gov (United States)

Ring, Melanie; Gaigg, Sebastian B; Bowler, Dermot M

2015-10-01

This study tested implicit and explicit spatial relational memory in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Participants were asked to study pictures of rooms and pictures of daily objects for which locations were highlighted in the rooms. Participants were later tested for their memory of the object locations either by being asked to place objects back into their original locations or into new locations. Proportions of times when participants choose the previously studied locations for the objects irrespective of the instruction were used to derive indices of explicit and implicit memory [process-dissociation procedure, Jacoby, 1991, 1998]. In addition, participants performed object and location recognition and source memory tasks where they were asked about which locations belonged to the objects and which objects to the locations. The data revealed difficulty for ASD individuals in actively retrieving object locations (explicit memory) but not in subconsciously remembering them (implicit memory). These difficulties cannot be explained by difficulties in memory for objects or locations per se (i.e., the difficulty pertains to object-location relations). Together these observations lend further support to the idea that ASD is characterised by relatively circumscribed difficulties in relational rather than item-specific memory processes and show that these difficulties extend to the domain of spatial information. They also lend further support to the idea that memory difficulties in ASD can be reduced when support is provided at test. © 2015 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Real-time object tracking based on scale-invariant features employing bio-inspired hardware.

Science.gov (United States)

Yasukawa, Shinsuke; Okuno, Hirotsugu; Ishii, Kazuo; Yagi, Tetsuya

2016-09-01

We developed a vision sensor system that performs a scale-invariant feature transform (SIFT) in real time. To apply the SIFT algorithm efficiently, we focus on a two-fold process performed by the visual system: whole-image parallel filtering and frequency-band parallel processing. The vision sensor system comprises an active pixel sensor, a metal-oxide semiconductor (MOS)-based resistive network, a field-programmable gate array (FPGA), and a digital computer. We employed the MOS-based resistive network for instantaneous spatial filtering and a configurable filter size. The FPGA is used to pipeline process the frequency-band signals. The proposed system was evaluated by tracking the feature points detected on an object in a video. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Use of multiple objective evolutionary algorithms in optimizing surveillance requirements

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Martorell, S.; Carlos, S.; Villanueva, J.F.; Sanchez, A.I; Galvan, B.; Salazar, D.; Cepin, M.

2006-01-01

This paper presents the development and application of a double-loop Multiple Objective Evolutionary Algorithm that uses a Multiple Objective Genetic Algorithm to perform the simultaneous optimization of periodic Test Intervals (TI) and Test Planning (TP). It takes into account the time-dependent effect of TP performed on stand-by safety-related equipment. TI and TP are part of the Surveillance Requirements within Technical Specifications at Nuclear Power Plants. It addresses the problem of multi-objective optimization in the space of dependable variables, i.e. TI and TP, using a novel flexible structure of the optimization algorithm. Lessons learnt from the cases of application of the methodology to optimize TI and TP for the High-Pressure Injection System are given. The results show that the double-loop Multiple Objective Evolutionary Algorithm is able to find the Pareto set of solutions that represents a surface of non-dominated solutions that satisfy all the constraints imposed on the objective functions and decision variables. Decision makers can adopt then the best solution found depending on their particular preference, e.g. minimum cost, minimum unavailability

A Requirement Specification Language for AADL

Science.gov (United States)

2016-06-01

models. The objective of ReqSpec is to support the elicitation , definition, and modeling of requirements for real-time embedded systems in an iterative...A Requirement Specification Language for AADL Peter H. Feiler Julien Delange Lutz Wrage June 2016 TECHNICAL REPORT CMU/SEI-2016-TR-008...is required for any other external and/or commercial use. Requests for permission should be directed to the Software En- gineering Institute at

Parameter Estimation of a Delay Time Model of Wearing Parts Based on Objective Data

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Y. Tang

2015-01-01

Full Text Available The wearing parts of a system have a very high failure frequency, making it necessary to carry out continual functional inspections and maintenance to protect the system from unscheduled downtime. This allows for the collection of a large amount of maintenance data. Taking the unique characteristics of the wearing parts into consideration, we establish their respective delay time models in ideal inspection cases and nonideal inspection cases. The model parameters are estimated entirely using the collected maintenance data. Then, a likelihood function of all renewal events is derived based on their occurring probability functions, and the model parameters are calculated with the maximum likelihood function method, which is solved by the CRM. Finally, using two wearing parts from the oil and gas drilling industry as examples—the filter element and the blowout preventer rubber core—the parameters of the distribution function of the initial failure time and the delay time for each example are estimated, and their distribution functions are obtained. Such parameter estimation based on objective data will contribute to the optimization of the reasonable function inspection interval and will also provide some theoretical models to support the integrity management of equipment or systems.

Just-in-time Design and Additive Manufacture of Patient-specific Medical Implants

Science.gov (United States)

Shidid, Darpan; Leary, Martin; Choong, Peter; Brandt, Milan

Recent advances in medical imaging and manufacturing science have enabled the design and production of complex, patient-specific orthopaedic implants. Additive Manufacture (AM) generates three-dimensional structures layer by layer, and is not subject to the constraints associated with traditional manufacturing methods. AM provides significant opportunities for the design of novel geometries and complex lattice structures with enhanced functional performance. However, the design and manufacture of patient-specific AM implant structures requires unique expertise in handling various optimization platforms. Furthermore, the design process for complex structures is computationally intensive. The primary aim of this research is to enable the just-in-time customisation of AM prosthesis; whereby AM implant design and manufacture be completed within the time constraints of a single surgical procedure, while minimising prosthesis mass and optimising the lattice structure to match the stiffness of the surrounding bone tissue. In this research, a design approach using raw CT scan data is applied to the AM manufacture of femoral prosthesis. Using the proposed just-in-time concept, the mass of the prosthesis was rapidly designed and manufactured while satisfying the associated structural requirements. Compressive testing of lattice structures manufactured using proposed method shows that the load carrying capacity of the resected composite bone can be recovered by up to 85% and the compressive stiffness of the AM prosthesis is statistically indistinguishable from the stiffness of the initial bone.

Rapid detection and subtyping of European swine influenza viruses in porcine clinical samples by haemagglutinin- and neuraminidase-specific tetra- and triplex real-time RT-PCRs

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Henritzi, Dinah; Zhao, Na; Starick, Elke

2016-01-01

diagnostic methods which allow for cost-effective large-scale analysis. Methods New SIV haemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA) subtype- and lineage-specific multiplex real-time RT-PCRs (RT-qPCR) have been developed and validated with reference virus isolates and clinical samples. Results A diagnostic....... Swine influenza viruses (SIV) are widespread in European domestic pig populations and evolve dynamically. Knowledge regarding occurrence, spread and evolution of potentially zoonotic SIV in Europe is poorly understood. Objectives Efficient SIV surveillance programmes depend on sensitive and specific......Background A diversifying pool of mammalian-adapted influenza A viruses (IAV) with largely unknown zoonotic potential is maintained in domestic swine populations worldwide. The most recent human influenza pandemic in 2009 was caused by a virus with genes originating from IAV isolated from swine...

Does real-time objective feedback and competition improve performance and quality in manikin CPR training--a prospective observational study from several European EMS.

Science.gov (United States)

Smart, J R; Kranz, K; Carmona, F; Lindner, T W; Newton, A

2015-10-15

Previous studies have reported that the quality of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) is important for patient survival. Real time objective feedback during manikin training has been shown to improve CPR performance. Objective measurement could facilitate competition and help motivate participants to improve their CPR performance. The aims of this study were to investigate whether real time objective feedback on manikins helps improve CPR performance and whether competition between separate European Emergency Medical Services (EMS) and between participants at each EMS helps motivation to train. Ten European EMS took part in the study and was carried out in two stages. At Stage 1, each EMS provided 20 pre-hospital professionals. A questionnaire was completed and standardised assessment scenarios were performed for adult and infant out of hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA). CPR performance was objectively measured and recorded but no feedback given. Between Stage 1 and 2, each EMS was given access to manikins for 6 months and instructed on how to use with objective real-time CPR feedback available. Stage 2 was undertaken and was a repeat of Stage 1 with a questionnaire with additional questions relating to usefulness of feedback and the competition nature of the study (using a 10 point Likert score). The EMS that improved the most from Stage 1 to Stage 2 was declared the winner. An independent samples Student t-test was used to analyse the objective CPR metrics with the significance level taken as p Competition between EMS organisations recorded a mean score of 5.8 and competition between participants recorded a mean score of 6.0. The results suggest that the use of real time objective feedback can significantly help improve CPR performance. Competition, especially between participants, appeared to encourage staff to practice and this study suggests that competition might have a useful role to help motivate staff to perform CPR training.

Total and domain-specific sitting time among employees in desk-based work settings in Australia.

Science.gov (United States)

Bennie, Jason A; Pedisic, Zeljko; Timperio, Anna; Crawford, David; Dunstan, David; Bauman, Adrian; van Uffelen, Jannique; Salmon, Jo

2015-06-01

To describe the total and domain-specific daily sitting time among a sample of Australian office-based employees. In April 2010, paper-based surveys were provided to desk-based employees (n=801) in Victoria, Australia. Total daily and domain-specific (work, leisure-time and transport-related) sitting time (minutes/day) were assessed by validated questionnaires. Differences in sitting time were examined across socio-demographic (age, sex, occupational status) and lifestyle characteristics (physical activity levels, body mass index [BMI]) using multiple linear regression analyses. The median (95% confidence interval [CI]) of total daily sitting time was 540 (531-557) minutes/day. Insufficiently active adults (median=578 minutes/day, [95%CI: 564-602]), younger adults aged 18-29 years (median=561 minutes/day, [95%CI: 540-577]) reported the highest total daily sitting times. Occupational sitting time accounted for almost 60% of total daily sitting time. In multivariate analyses, total daily sitting time was negatively associated with age (unstandardised regression coefficient [B]=-1.58, pphysical activity (minutes/week) (B=-0.03, pemployees reported that more than half of their total daily sitting time was accrued in the work setting. Given the high contribution of occupational sitting to total daily sitting time among desk-based employees, interventions should focus on the work setting. © 2014 Public Health Association of Australia.

Optimisation of chromatographic resolution using objective functions including both time and spectral information.

Science.gov (United States)

Torres-Lapasió, J R; Pous-Torres, S; Ortiz-Bolsico, C; García-Alvarez-Coque, M C

2015-01-16

The optimisation of the resolution in high-performance liquid chromatography is traditionally performed attending only to the time information. However, even in the optimal conditions, some peak pairs may remain unresolved. Such incomplete resolution can be still accomplished by deconvolution, which can be carried out with more guarantees of success by including spectral information. In this work, two-way chromatographic objective functions (COFs) that incorporate both time and spectral information were tested, based on the peak purity (analyte peak fraction free of overlapping) and the multivariate selectivity (figure of merit derived from the net analyte signal) concepts. These COFs are sensitive to situations where the components that coelute in a mixture show some spectral differences. Therefore, they are useful to find out experimental conditions where the spectrochromatograms can be recovered by deconvolution. Two-way multivariate selectivity yielded the best performance and was applied to the separation using diode-array detection of a mixture of 25 phenolic compounds, which remained unresolved in the chromatographic order using linear and multi-linear gradients of acetonitrile-water. Peak deconvolution was carried out using the combination of orthogonal projection approach and alternating least squares. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Minimum Delay Moving Object Detection

KAUST Repository

Lao, Dong; Sundaramoorthi, Ganesh

2017-01-01

We present a general framework and method for detection of an object in a video based on apparent motion. The object moves relative to background motion at some unknown time in the video, and the goal is to detect and segment the object as soon

Using recruitment source timing and diagnosticity to enhance applicants' occupation-specific human capital.

Science.gov (United States)

Campion, Michael C; Ployhart, Robert E; Campion, Michael A

2017-05-01

[Correction Notice: An Erratum for this article was reported in Vol 102(5) of Journal of Applied Psychology (see record 2017-14296-001). In the article, the following headings were inadvertently set at the wrong level: Method, Participants and Procedure, Measures, Occupation specific human capital, Symbolic jobs, Relevant majors, Occupation-specific capital hotspots, Source timing, Source diagnosticity, Results, and Discussion. All versions of this article have been corrected.] This study proposes that reaching applicants through more diagnostic recruitment sources earlier in their educational development (e.g., in high school) can lead them to invest more in their occupation-specific human capital (OSHC), thereby making them higher quality candidates. Using a sample of 78,157 applicants applying for jobs within a desirable professional occupation in the public sector, results indicate that applicants who report hearing about the occupation earlier, and applicants who report hearing about the occupation through more diagnostic sources, have higher levels of OSHC upon application. Additionally, source timing and diagnosticity affect the likelihood of candidates applying for jobs symbolic of the occupation, selecting relevant majors, and attending educational institutions with top programs related to the occupation. These findings suggest a firm's recruiting efforts may influence applicants' OSHC investment strategies. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved).

Credit assignment between body and object probed by an object transportation task.

Science.gov (United States)

Kong, Gaiqing; Zhou, Zhihao; Wang, Qining; Kording, Konrad; Wei, Kunlin

2017-10-17

It has been proposed that learning from movement errors involves a credit assignment problem: did I misestimate properties of the object or those of my body? For example, an overestimate of arm strength and an underestimate of the weight of a coffee cup can both lead to coffee spills. Though previous studies have found signs of simultaneous learning of the object and of the body during object manipulation, there is little behavioral evidence about their quantitative relation. Here we employed a novel weight-transportation task, in which participants lift the first cup filled with liquid while assessing their learning from errors. Specifically, we examined their transfer of learning when switching to a contralateral hand, the second identical cup, or switching both hands and cups. By comparing these transfer behaviors, we found that 25% of the learning was attributed to the object (simply because of the use of the same cup) and 58% of the learning was attributed to the body (simply because of the use of the same hand). The nervous system thus seems to partition the learning of object manipulation between the object and the body.

Evaluation of a Chlamydia trachomatis-specific, commercial, real-time PCR for use with ocular swabs.

Science.gov (United States)

Pickering, Harry; Holland, Martin J; Last, Anna R; Burton, Matthew J; Burr, Sarah E

2018-02-20

Trachoma, the leading infectious cause of blindness worldwide, is caused by conjunctival Chlamydia trachomatis infection. Trachoma is diagnosed clinically by observation of conjunctival inflammation and/or scarring; however, there is evidence that monitoring C. trachomatis infection may be required for elimination programmes. There are many commercial and 'in-house' nucleic acid amplification tests for the detection of C. trachomatis DNA, but the majority have not been validated for use with ocular swabs. This study evaluated a commercial assay, the Fast-Track Vaginal swab kit, using conjunctival samples from trachoma-endemic areas. An objective, biostatistical-based method for binary classification of continuous PCR data was developed, to limit potential user-bias in diagnostic settings. The Fast-Track Vaginal swab assay was run on 210 ocular swab samples from Guinea-Bissau and Tanzania. Fit of individual amplification curves to exponential or sigmoid models, derivative and second derivative of the curves and final fluorescence value were examined for utility in thresholding for determining positivity. The results from the Fast-Track Vaginal swab assay were evaluated against a commercial test (Amplicor CT/NG) and a non-commercial test (in-house droplet digital PCR), both of whose performance has previously been evaluated. Significant evidence of exponential amplification (R 2  > 0.99) and final fluorescence > 0.15 were combined for thresholding. This objective approach identified a population of positive samples, however there were a subset of samples that amplified towards the end of the cycling protocol (at or later than 35 cycles), which were less clearly defined. The Fast-Track Vaginal swab assay showed good sensitivity against the commercial (95.71) and non-commercial (97.18) tests. Specificity was lower against both (90.00 and 96.55, respectively). This study defined a simple, automated protocol for binary classification of continuous, real-time q

Learning Deep Visual Object Models From Noisy Web Data: How to Make it Work

OpenAIRE

Massouh, Nizar; Babiloni, Francesca; Tommasi, Tatiana; Young, Jay; Hawes, Nick; Caputo, Barbara

2017-01-01

Deep networks thrive when trained on large scale data collections. This has given ImageNet a central role in the development of deep architectures for visual object classification. However, ImageNet was created during a specific period in time, and as such it is prone to aging, as well as dataset bias issues. Moving beyond fixed training datasets will lead to more robust visual systems, especially when deployed on robots in new environments which must train on the objects they encounter there...

Real-time object recognition in multidimensional images based on joined extended structural tensor and higher-order tensor decomposition methods

Science.gov (United States)

Cyganek, Boguslaw; Smolka, Bogdan

2015-02-01

In this paper a system for real-time recognition of objects in multidimensional video signals is proposed. Object recognition is done by pattern projection into the tensor subspaces obtained from the factorization of the signal tensors representing the input signal. However, instead of taking only the intensity signal the novelty of this paper is first to build the Extended Structural Tensor representation from the intensity signal that conveys information on signal intensities, as well as on higher-order statistics of the input signals. This way the higher-order input pattern tensors are built from the training samples. Then, the tensor subspaces are built based on the Higher-Order Singular Value Decomposition of the prototype pattern tensors. Finally, recognition relies on measurements of the distance of a test pattern projected into the tensor subspaces obtained from the training tensors. Due to high-dimensionality of the input data, tensor based methods require high memory and computational resources. However, recent achievements in the technology of the multi-core microprocessors and graphic cards allows real-time operation of the multidimensional methods as is shown and analyzed in this paper based on real examples of object detection in digital images.

Visual Working Memory Capacity for Objects from Different Categories: A Face-Specific Maintenance Effect

Science.gov (United States)

Wong, Jason H.; Peterson, Matthew S.; Thompson, James C.

2008-01-01

The capacity of visual working memory was examined when complex objects from different categories were remembered. Previous studies have not examined how visual similarity affects object memory, though it has long been known that similar-sounding phonological information interferes with rehearsal in auditory working memory. Here, experiments…

Searching for the Pareto frontier in multi-objective protein design.

Science.gov (United States)

Nanda, Vikas; Belure, Sandeep V; Shir, Ofer M

2017-08-01

The goal of protein engineering and design is to identify sequences that adopt three-dimensional structures of desired function. Often, this is treated as a single-objective optimization problem, identifying the sequence-structure solution with the lowest computed free energy of folding. However, many design problems are multi-state, multi-specificity, or otherwise require concurrent optimization of multiple objectives. There may be tradeoffs among objectives, where improving one feature requires compromising another. The challenge lies in determining solutions that are part of the Pareto optimal set-designs where no further improvement can be achieved in any of the objectives without degrading one of the others. Pareto optimality problems are found in all areas of study, from economics to engineering to biology, and computational methods have been developed specifically to identify the Pareto frontier. We review progress in multi-objective protein design, the development of Pareto optimization methods, and present a specific case study using multi-objective optimization methods to model the tradeoff between three parameters, stability, specificity, and complexity, of a set of interacting synthetic collagen peptides.

Objectively measured physical environmental neighbourhood factors are not associated with accelerometer-determined total sedentary time in adults

OpenAIRE

Compernolle, Sofie; De Cocker, Katrien; Mackenbach, Joreintje D.; Van Nassau, Femke; Lakerveld, Jeroen; Cardon, Greet; De Bourdeaudhuij, Ilse

2017-01-01

Background: The physical neighbourhood environment may influence adults' sedentary behaviour. Yet, most studies examining the association between the physical neighbourhood environment and sedentary behaviour rely on self-reported data of either the physical neighbourhood environment and/or sedentary behaviour. The aim of this study was to investigate the associations between objectively measured physical environmental neighbourhood factors and accelerometer-determined total sedentary time in...

Projector-Based Augmented Reality for Quality Inspection of Scanned Objects

Science.gov (United States)

Kern, J.; Weinmann, M.; Wursthorn, S.

2017-09-01

After scanning or reconstructing the geometry of objects, we need to inspect the result of our work. Are there any parts missing? Is every detail covered in the desired quality? We typically do this by looking at the resulting point clouds or meshes of our objects on-screen. What, if we could see the information directly visualized on the object itself? Augmented reality is the generic term for bringing virtual information into our real environment. In our paper, we show how we can project any 3D information like thematic visualizations or specific monitoring information with reference to our object onto the object's surface itself, thus augmenting it with additional information. For small objects that could for instance be scanned in a laboratory, we propose a low-cost method involving a projector-camera system to solve this task. The user only needs a calibration board with coded fiducial markers to calibrate the system and to estimate the projector's pose later on for projecting textures with information onto the object's surface. Changes within the projected 3D information or of the projector's pose will be applied in real-time. Our results clearly reveal that such a simple setup will deliver a good quality of the augmented information.

A framework for inverse planning of beam-on times for 3D small animal radiotherapy using interactive multi-objective optimisation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Balvert, Marleen; Den Hertog, Dick; Van Hoof, Stefan J; Granton, Patrick V; Trani, Daniela; Hoffmann, Aswin L; Verhaegen, Frank

2015-01-01

Advances in precision small animal radiotherapy hardware enable the delivery of increasingly complicated dose distributions on the millimeter scale. Manual creation and evaluation of treatment plans becomes difficult or even infeasible with an increasing number of degrees of freedom for dose delivery and available image data. The goal of this work is to develop an optimisation model that determines beam-on times for a given beam configuration, and to assess the feasibility and benefits of an automated treatment planning system for small animal radiotherapy.The developed model determines a Pareto optimal solution using operator-defined weights for a multiple-objective treatment planning problem. An interactive approach allows the planner to navigate towards, and to select the Pareto optimal treatment plan that yields the most preferred trade-off of the conflicting objectives. This model was evaluated using four small animal cases based on cone-beam computed tomography images. Resulting treatment plan quality was compared to the quality of manually optimised treatment plans using dose-volume histograms and metrics.Results show that the developed framework is well capable of optimising beam-on times for 3D dose distributions and offers several advantages over manual treatment plan optimisation. For all cases but the simple flank tumour case, a similar amount of time was needed for manual and automated beam-on time optimisation. In this time frame, manual optimisation generates a single treatment plan, while the inverse planning system yields a set of Pareto optimal solutions which provides quantitative insight on the sensitivity of conflicting objectives. Treatment planning automation decreases the dependence on operator experience and allows for the use of class solutions for similar treatment scenarios. This can shorten the time required for treatment planning and therefore increase animal throughput. In addition, this can improve treatment standardisation and

The motivational function of an objective in physical activity and sport

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mariusz Lipowski

2017-12-01

Full Text Available Background As a conscious activity of an individual, physical activity (PA constitutes an element of the free-time dimension. The type of goal allows us to distinguish between sport and PA: sport performance vs. psychophysical health. Drawing on the theory of the motivational function of an objective, this study examined the motivational function of an objective in physical activity and sport. Participants and procedures The sample consisted of 2141 individuals: 1163 women aged 16-64 years (M = 23.90, SD = 8.30 and 978 men aged 16-66 years (M = 24.50, SD = 9.40 who completed the Inventory of Physical Activity Objectives (IPAO, which includes the following scales: 1 motivational value, 2 time management, 3 persistence in action, and 4 motivational conflict. There are also questions that allow one to control for variables such as the variety of forms, duration, and frequency of PA, and socio-demographic variables. Results Males presented different motives of physical activity than females. Motives related to shapely body and health were more important for females. The most important motives for males were physical fitness and shapely body. The gender of participants moderates the motivational value of the specific objectives of physical activity and persistence in action. Conclusions With knowledge about the purposefulness of actions, it is possible to support and shape additional motivation experienced by an individual, by setting new, realistic objectives.

Propensity score estimation to address calendar time-specific channeling in comparative effectiveness research of second generation antipsychotics.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Stacie B Dusetzina

Full Text Available Channeling occurs when a medication and its potential comparators are selectively prescribed based on differences in underlying patient characteristics. Drug safety advisories can provide new information regarding the relative safety or effectiveness of a drug product which might increase selective prescribing. In particular, when reported adverse effects vary among drugs within a therapeutic class, clinicians may channel patients toward or away from a drug based on the patient's underlying risk for an adverse outcome. If channeling is not identified and appropriately managed it might lead to confounding in observational comparative effectiveness studies.To demonstrate channeling among new users of second generation antipsychotics following a Food and Drug Administration safety advisory and to evaluate the impact of channeling on cardiovascular risk estimates over time.Florida Medicaid data from 2001-2006.Retrospective cohort of adults initiating second generation antipsychotics. We used propensity scores to match olanzapine initiators with other second generation antipsychotic initiators. To evaluate channeling away from olanzapine following an FDA safety advisory, we estimated calendar time-specific propensity scores. We compare the performance of these calendar time-specific propensity scores with conventionally-estimated propensity scores on estimates of cardiovascular risk.Increased channeling away from olanzapine was evident for some, but not all, cardiovascular risk factors and corresponded with the timing of the FDA advisory. Covariate balance was optimized within period and across all periods when using the calendar time-specific propensity score. Hazard ratio estimates for cardiovascular outcomes did not differ across models (Conventional PS: 0.97, 95%CI: 0.81-3.18 versus calendar time-specific PS: 0.93, 95%CI: 0.77-3.04.Changes in channeling over time was evident for several covariates but had limited impact on cardiovascular risk

Real-time prostate-specific antigen detection with prostate-specific antigen imprinted capacitive biosensors

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Ertürk, Gizem [Department of Biotechnology, Lund University, Lund (Sweden); Department of Biology, Hacettepe University, Ankara (Turkey); Hedström, Martin [Department of Biotechnology, Lund University, Lund (Sweden); CapSenze HB, Medicon Village, SE-223 63 Lund (Sweden); Tümer, M. Aşkın [Department of Biology, Hacettepe University, Ankara (Turkey); Denizli, Adil [Department of Chemistry, Hacettepe University, Ankara (Turkey); Mattiasson, Bo, E-mail: Bo.Mattiasson@biotek.lu.se [Department of Biotechnology, Lund University, Lund (Sweden); CapSenze HB, Medicon Village, SE-223 63 Lund (Sweden)

2015-09-03

Prostate specific antigen (PSA) is a valuable biomarker for early detection of prostate cancer, the third most common cancer in men. Ultrasensitive detection of PSA is crucial to screen the prostate cancer in an early stage and to detect the recurrence of the disease after treatment. In this report, microcontact-PSA imprinted (PSA-MIP) capacitive biosensor chip was developed for real-time, highly sensitive and selective detection of PSA. PSA-MIP electrodes were prepared in the presence of methacrylic acid (MAA) as the functional monomer and ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (EGDMA) as the cross-linker via UV polymerization. Immobilized Anti-PSA antibodies on electrodes (Anti-PSA) for capacitance measurements were also prepared to compare the detection performances of both methods. The electrodes were characterized by atomic force microscopy (AFM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and cyclic voltammetry (CV) and real-time PSA detection was performed with standard PSA solutions in the concentration range of 10 fg mL{sup −1}–100 ng mL{sup −1}. The detection limits were found as 8.0 × 10{sup −5} ng mL{sup −1} (16 × 10{sup −17} M) and 6.0 × 10{sup −4} ng mL{sup −1} (12 × 10{sup −16} M) for PSA-MIP and Anti-PSA electrodes, respectively. Selectivity studies were performed against HSA and IgG and selectivity coefficients were calculated. PSA detection was also carried out from diluted human serum samples and finally, reproducibility of the electrodes was tested. The results are promising and show that when the sensitivity of the capacitive system is combined with the selectivity and reproducibility of the microcontact-imprinting procedure, the resulting system might be used successfully for real-time detection of various analytes even in very low concentrations. - Highlights: • Microcontact imprinting method was used for preparing the sensor chip for capacitive biosensing. • High sensitivity was obtained. • Good selectivity was

Real-time prostate-specific antigen detection with prostate-specific antigen imprinted capacitive biosensors

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ertürk, Gizem; Hedström, Martin; Tümer, M. Aşkın; Denizli, Adil; Mattiasson, Bo

2015-01-01

Prostate specific antigen (PSA) is a valuable biomarker for early detection of prostate cancer, the third most common cancer in men. Ultrasensitive detection of PSA is crucial to screen the prostate cancer in an early stage and to detect the recurrence of the disease after treatment. In this report, microcontact-PSA imprinted (PSA-MIP) capacitive biosensor chip was developed for real-time, highly sensitive and selective detection of PSA. PSA-MIP electrodes were prepared in the presence of methacrylic acid (MAA) as the functional monomer and ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (EGDMA) as the cross-linker via UV polymerization. Immobilized Anti-PSA antibodies on electrodes (Anti-PSA) for capacitance measurements were also prepared to compare the detection performances of both methods. The electrodes were characterized by atomic force microscopy (AFM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and cyclic voltammetry (CV) and real-time PSA detection was performed with standard PSA solutions in the concentration range of 10 fg mL"−"1–100 ng mL"−"1. The detection limits were found as 8.0 × 10"−"5 ng mL"−"1 (16 × 10"−"1"7 M) and 6.0 × 10"−"4 ng mL"−"1 (12 × 10"−"1"6 M) for PSA-MIP and Anti-PSA electrodes, respectively. Selectivity studies were performed against HSA and IgG and selectivity coefficients were calculated. PSA detection was also carried out from diluted human serum samples and finally, reproducibility of the electrodes was tested. The results are promising and show that when the sensitivity of the capacitive system is combined with the selectivity and reproducibility of the microcontact-imprinting procedure, the resulting system might be used successfully for real-time detection of various analytes even in very low concentrations. - Highlights: • Microcontact imprinting method was used for preparing the sensor chip for capacitive biosensing. • High sensitivity was obtained. • Good selectivity was demonstrated. • Stability of

Functional dissociation between action and perception of object shape in developmental visual object agnosia.

Science.gov (United States)

Freud, Erez; Ganel, Tzvi; Avidan, Galia; Gilaie-Dotan, Sharon

2016-03-01

According to the two visual systems model, the cortical visual system is segregated into a ventral pathway mediating object recognition, and a dorsal pathway mediating visuomotor control. In the present study we examined whether the visual control of action could develop normally even when visual perceptual abilities are compromised from early childhood onward. Using his fingers, LG, an individual with a rare developmental visual object agnosia, manually estimated (perceptual condition) the width of blocks that varied in width and length (but not in overall size), or simply picked them up across their width (grasping condition). LG's perceptual sensitivity to target width was profoundly impaired in the manual estimation task compared to matched controls. In contrast, the sensitivity to object shape during grasping, as measured by maximum grip aperture (MGA), the time to reach the MGA, the reaction time and the total movement time were all normal in LG. Further analysis, however, revealed that LG's sensitivity to object shape during grasping emerged at a later time stage during the movement compared to controls. Taken together, these results demonstrate a dissociation between action and perception of object shape, and also point to a distinction between different stages of the grasping movement, namely planning versus online control. Moreover, the present study implies that visuomotor abilities can develop normally even when perceptual abilities developed in a profoundly impaired fashion. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Analysis and optimization with ecological objective function of irreversible single resonance energy selective electron heat engines

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Zhou, Junle; Chen, Lingen; Ding, Zemin; Sun, Fengrui

2016-01-01

Ecological performance of a single resonance ESE heat engine with heat leakage is conducted by applying finite time thermodynamics. By introducing Nielsen function and numerical calculations, expressions about power output, efficiency, entropy generation rate and ecological objective function are derived; relationships between ecological objective function and power output, between ecological objective function and efficiency as well as between power output and efficiency are demonstrated; influences of system parameters of heat leakage, boundary energy and resonance width on the optimal performances are investigated in detail; a specific range of boundary energy is given as a compromise to make ESE heat engine system work at optimal operation regions. Comparing performance characteristics with different optimization objective functions, the significance of selecting ecological objective function as the design objective is clarified specifically: when changing the design objective from maximum power output into maximum ecological objective function, the improvement of efficiency is 4.56%, while the power output drop is only 2.68%; when changing the design objective from maximum efficiency to maximum ecological objective function, the improvement of power output is 229.13%, and the efficiency drop is only 13.53%. - Highlights: • An irreversible single resonance energy selective electron heat engine is studied. • Heat leakage between two reservoirs is considered. • Power output, efficiency and ecological objective function are derived. • Optimal performance comparison for three objective functions is carried out.

A Temporal Same-Object Advantage in the Tunnel Effect: Facilitated Change Detection for Persisting Objects

Science.gov (United States)

Flombaum, Jonathan I.; Scholl, Brian J.

2006-01-01

Meaningful visual experience requires computations that identify objects as the same persisting individuals over time, motion, occlusion, and featural change. This article explores these computations in the tunnel effect: When an object moves behind an occluder, and then an object later emerges following a consistent trajectory, observers…

Computational issues in complex water-energy optimization problems: Time scales, parameterizations, objectives and algorithms

Science.gov (United States)

Efstratiadis, Andreas; Tsoukalas, Ioannis; Kossieris, Panayiotis; Karavokiros, George; Christofides, Antonis; Siskos, Alexandros; Mamassis, Nikos; Koutsoyiannis, Demetris

2015-04-01

Modelling of large-scale hybrid renewable energy systems (HRES) is a challenging task, for which several open computational issues exist. HRES comprise typical components of hydrosystems (reservoirs, boreholes, conveyance networks, hydropower stations, pumps, water demand nodes, etc.), which are dynamically linked with renewables (e.g., wind turbines, solar parks) and energy demand nodes. In such systems, apart from the well-known shortcomings of water resources modelling (nonlinear dynamics, unknown future inflows, large number of variables and constraints, conflicting criteria, etc.), additional complexities and uncertainties arise due to the introduction of energy components and associated fluxes. A major difficulty is the need for coupling two different temporal scales, given that in hydrosystem modeling, monthly simulation steps are typically adopted, yet for a faithful representation of the energy balance (i.e. energy production vs. demand) a much finer resolution (e.g. hourly) is required. Another drawback is the increase of control variables, constraints and objectives, due to the simultaneous modelling of the two parallel fluxes (i.e. water and energy) and their interactions. Finally, since the driving hydrometeorological processes of the integrated system are inherently uncertain, it is often essential to use synthetically generated input time series of large length, in order to assess the system performance in terms of reliability and risk, with satisfactory accuracy. To address these issues, we propose an effective and efficient modeling framework, key objectives of which are: (a) the substantial reduction of control variables, through parsimonious yet consistent parameterizations; (b) the substantial decrease of computational burden of simulation, by linearizing the combined water and energy allocation problem of each individual time step, and solve each local sub-problem through very fast linear network programming algorithms, and (c) the substantial

32 CFR 636.2 - Program objectives.

Science.gov (United States)

2010-07-01

... 32 National Defense 4 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 true Program objectives. 636.2 Section 636.2 National Defense Department of Defense (Continued) DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY (CONTINUED) LAW ENFORCEMENT AND CRIMINAL INVESTIGATIONS MOTOR VEHICLE TRAFFIC SUPERVISION (SPECIFIC INSTALLATIONS) Fort Stewart, Georgia § 636.2 Program objectives. In addition to the...

Modulation of neural activity during object naming: Effects of time and practice

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Turennout, M.I. van; Bielamowicz, L.; Martin, A.

2003-01-01

Repeated exposure to objects improves our ability to identify and name them, even after a long delay. Previous brain imaging studies have demonstrated that this experience-related facilitation of object naming is associated with neural changes in distinct brain regions. We used event-related

Shape configuration and category-specificity

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gerlach, Christian; Law, Ian; Paulson, Olaf B.

2006-01-01

a recent account of category-specificity and lends support to the notion that category-specific impairments can occur for both natural objects and artefacts following damage to pre-semantic stages in visual object recognition. The implications of the present findings are discussed in relation to theories...

Objectively measured sedentary time, physical activity, and metabolic risk: the Australian Diabetes, Obesity and Lifestyle Study (AusDiab).

Science.gov (United States)

Healy, Genevieve N; Wijndaele, Katrien; Dunstan, David W; Shaw, Jonathan E; Salmon, Jo; Zimmet, Paul Z; Owen, Neville

2008-02-01

We examined the associations of objectively measured sedentary time and physical activity with continuous indexes of metabolic risk in Australian adults without known diabetes. An accelerometer was used to derive the percentage of monitoring time spent sedentary and in light-intensity and moderate-to-vigorous-intensity activity, as well as mean activity intensity, in 169 Australian Diabetes, Obesity and Lifestyle Study (AusDiab) participants (mean age 53.4 years). Associations with waist circumference, triglycerides, HDL cholesterol, resting blood pressure, fasting plasma glucose, and a clustered metabolic risk score were examined. Independent of time spent in moderate-to-vigorous-intensity activity, there were significant associations of sedentary time, light-intensity time, and mean activity intensity with waist circumference and clustered metabolic risk. Independent of waist circumference, moderate-to-vigorous-intensity activity time was significantly beneficially associated with triglycerides. These findings highlight the importance of decreasing sedentary time, as well as increasing time spent in physical activity, for metabolic health.

Identification of computer graphics objects

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Rossinskyi Yu.M.

2016-04-01

Full Text Available The article is devoted to the use of computer graphics methods in problems of creating drawings, charts, drafting, etc. The widespread use of these methods requires the development of efficient algorithms for the identification of objects of drawings. The article analyzes the model-making algorithms for this problem and considered the possibility of reducing the time using graphics editing operations. Editing results in such operations as copying, moving and deleting objects specified images. These operations allow the use of a reliable identification of images of objects methods. For information on the composition of the image of the object along with information about the identity and the color should include information about the spatial location and other characteristics of the object (the thickness and style of contour lines, fill style, and so on. In order to enable the pixel image analysis to structure the information it is necessary to enable the initial code image objects color. The article shows the results of the implementation of the algorithm of encoding object identifiers. To simplify the process of building drawings of any kind, and reduce time-consuming, method of drawing objects identification is proposed based on the use as the ID information of the object color.

Demand-specific work ability, poor health and working conditions in middle-aged full-time employees

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nabe-Nielsen, Kirsten; Thielen, Karsten; Nygaard, Else

2014-01-01

-sectional questionnaire data from 3381 full-time employees responding to questions about vocational education, job demands and social support (working conditions), musculoskeletal pain (MSP) and major depression (MD) (poor health) and seven questions about difficulty managing different job demands (reduced demand......We investigated the prevalence of reduced demand-specific work ability, its association with age, gender, education, poor health, and working conditions, and the interaction between poor health and working conditions regarding reduced demand-specific work ability. We used cross...... was associated with six measures of reduced demand-specific work ability. We found no interaction between working conditions and poor health regarding reduced demand-specific work ability....

Objectively measured sedentary time and physical activity in women with fibromyalgia: a cross-sectional study.

Science.gov (United States)

Ruiz, Jonatan R; Segura-Jiménez, Víctor; Ortega, Francisco B; Alvarez-Gallardo, Inmaculada C; Camiletti-Moirón, Daniel; Aparicio, Virginia A; Carbonell-Baeza, Ana; Femia, Pedro; Munguía-Izquierdo, Diego; Delgado-Fernández, Manuel

2013-06-20

To characterise levels of objectively measured sedentary time and physical activity in women with fibromyalgia. Cross-sectional study. Local Association of Fibromyalgia (Granada, Spain). The study comprised 94 women with diagnosed fibromyalgia who did not have other severe somatic or psychiatric disorders, or other diseases that prevent physical loading, able to ambulate and to communicate and capable and willing to provide informed consent. Sedentary time and physical activity were measured by accelerometry and expressed as time spent in sedentary behaviours, average physical activity intensity (counts/minute) and amount of time (minutes/day) spent in moderate intensity and in moderate-to-vigorous-intensity physical activity (MVPA). The proportion of women meeting the physical activity recommendations of 30 min/day of MVPA on 5 or more days a week was 60.6%. Women spent, on average, 71% of their waking time (approximately 10 h/day) in sedentary behaviours. Both sedentary behaviour and physical activity levels were similar across age groups, waist circumference and percentage body fat categories, years since clinical diagnosis, marital status, educational level and occupational status, regardless of the severity of the disease (all p>0.1). Time spent on moderate-intensity physical activity and MVPA was, however, lower in those with greater body mass index (BMI) (-6.6 min and -7 min, respectively, per BMI category increase, 30 kg/m(2); p values for trend were 0.056 and 0.051, respectively). Women spent, on average, 10 min less on MVPA (pfibromyalgia.

Visual search for arbitrary objects in real scenes

Science.gov (United States)

Alvarez, George A.; Rosenholtz, Ruth; Kuzmova, Yoana I.; Sherman, Ashley M.

2011-01-01

How efficient is visual search in real scenes? In searches for targets among arrays of randomly placed distractors, efficiency is often indexed by the slope of the reaction time (RT) × Set Size function. However, it may be impossible to define set size for real scenes. As an approximation, we hand-labeled 100 indoor scenes and used the number of labeled regions as a surrogate for set size. In Experiment 1, observers searched for named objects (a chair, bowl, etc.). With set size defined as the number of labeled regions, search was very efficient (~5 ms/item). When we controlled for a possible guessing strategy in Experiment 2, slopes increased somewhat (~15 ms/item), but they were much shallower than search for a random object among other distinctive objects outside of a scene setting (Exp. 3: ~40 ms/item). In Experiments 4–6, observers searched repeatedly through the same scene for different objects. Increased familiarity with scenes had modest effects on RTs, while repetition of target items had large effects (>500 ms). We propose that visual search in scenes is efficient because scene-specific forms of attentional guidance can eliminate most regions from the “functional set size” of items that could possibly be the target. PMID:21671156

Visual search for arbitrary objects in real scenes.

Science.gov (United States)

Wolfe, Jeremy M; Alvarez, George A; Rosenholtz, Ruth; Kuzmova, Yoana I; Sherman, Ashley M

2011-08-01

How efficient is visual search in real scenes? In searches for targets among arrays of randomly placed distractors, efficiency is often indexed by the slope of the reaction time (RT) × Set Size function. However, it may be impossible to define set size for real scenes. As an approximation, we hand-labeled 100 indoor scenes and used the number of labeled regions as a surrogate for set size. In Experiment 1, observers searched for named objects (a chair, bowl, etc.). With set size defined as the number of labeled regions, search was very efficient (~5 ms/item). When we controlled for a possible guessing strategy in Experiment 2, slopes increased somewhat (~15 ms/item), but they were much shallower than search for a random object among other distinctive objects outside of a scene setting (Exp. 3: ~40 ms/item). In Experiments 4-6, observers searched repeatedly through the same scene for different objects. Increased familiarity with scenes had modest effects on RTs, while repetition of target items had large effects (>500 ms). We propose that visual search in scenes is efficient because scene-specific forms of attentional guidance can eliminate most regions from the "functional set size" of items that could possibly be the target.

APPLICATION OF OBJECT ORIENTED PROGRAMMING TECHNIQUES IN FRONT END COMPUTERS

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

SKELLY, J.F.

1997-01-01

The Front End Computer (FEC) environment imposes special demands on software, beyond real time performance and robustness. FEC software must manage a diverse inventory of devices with individualistic timing requirements and hardware interfaces. It must implement network services which export device access to the control system at large, interpreting a uniform network communications protocol into the specific control requirements of the individual devices. Object oriented languages provide programming techniques which neatly address these challenges, and also offer benefits in terms of maintainability and flexibility. Applications are discussed which exhibit the use of inheritance, multiple inheritance and inheritance trees, and polymorphism to address the needs of FEC software

Sensory-specific clock components and memory mechanisms: investigation with parallel timing.

Science.gov (United States)

Gamache, Pierre-Luc; Grondin, Simon

2010-05-01

A challenge for researchers in the time-perception field is to determine whether temporal processing is governed by a central mechanism or by multiple mechanisms working in concert. Behavioral studies of parallel timing offer interesting insights into the question, although the conclusions fail to converge. Most of these studies focus on the number-of-clocks issue, but the commonality of memory mechanisms involved in time processing is often neglected. The present experiment aims to address a straightforward question: do signals from different modalities marking time intervals share the same clock and/or the same memory resources? To this end, an interval reproduction task involving the parallel timing of two sensory signals presented either in the same modality or in different modalities was conducted. The memory component was tested by manipulating the delay separating the presentation of the target intervals and the moment when the reproduction of one of these began. Results show that there is more variance when only visually marked intervals are presented, and this effect is exacerbated with longer retention delays. Finally, when there is only one interval to process, encoding the interval with signals delivered from two modalities helps to reduce variance. Taken together, these results suggest that the hypothesis stating that there are sensory-specific clock components and memory mechanisms is viable.

Object-Based Attention on Social Units: Visual Selection of Hands Performing a Social Interaction.

Science.gov (United States)

Yin, Jun; Xu, Haokui; Duan, Jipeng; Shen, Mowei

2018-05-01

Traditionally, objects of attention are characterized either as full-fledged entities or either as elements grouped by Gestalt principles. Because humans appear to use social groups as units to explain social activities, we proposed that a socially defined group, according to social interaction information, would also be a possible object of attentional selection. This hypothesis was examined using displays with and without handshaking interactions. Results demonstrated that object-based attention, which was measured by an object-specific attentional advantage (i.e., shorter response times to targets on a single object), was extended to two hands performing a handshake but not to hands that did not perform meaningful social interactions, even when they did perform handshake-like actions. This finding cannot be attributed to the familiarity of the frequent co-occurrence of two handshaking hands. Hence, object-based attention can select a grouped object whose parts are connected within a meaningful social interaction. This finding implies that object-based attention is constrained by top-down information.

What Makes an Object Memorable?

KAUST Repository

Dubey, Rachit

2016-02-19

Recent studies on image memorability have shed light on what distinguishes the memorability of different images and the intrinsic and extrinsic properties that make those images memorable. However, a clear understanding of the memorability of specific objects inside an image remains elusive. In this paper, we provide the first attempt to answer the question: what exactly is remembered about an image? We augment both the images and object segmentations from the PASCAL-S dataset with ground truth memorability scores and shed light on the various factors and properties that make an object memorable (or forgettable) to humans. We analyze various visual factors that may influence object memorability (e.g. color, visual saliency, and object categories). We also study the correlation between object and image memorability and find that image memorability is greatly affected by the memorability of its most memorable object. Lastly, we explore the effectiveness of deep learning and other computational approaches in predicting object memorability in images. Our efforts offer a deeper understanding of memorability in general thereby opening up avenues for a wide variety of applications. © 2015 IEEE.

What Makes an Object Memorable?

KAUST Repository

Dubey, Rachit; Peterson, Joshua; Khosla, Aditya; Yang, Ming-Hsuan; Ghanem, Bernard

2016-01-01

Recent studies on image memorability have shed light on what distinguishes the memorability of different images and the intrinsic and extrinsic properties that make those images memorable. However, a clear understanding of the memorability of specific objects inside an image remains elusive. In this paper, we provide the first attempt to answer the question: what exactly is remembered about an image? We augment both the images and object segmentations from the PASCAL-S dataset with ground truth memorability scores and shed light on the various factors and properties that make an object memorable (or forgettable) to humans. We analyze various visual factors that may influence object memorability (e.g. color, visual saliency, and object categories). We also study the correlation between object and image memorability and find that image memorability is greatly affected by the memorability of its most memorable object. Lastly, we explore the effectiveness of deep learning and other computational approaches in predicting object memorability in images. Our efforts offer a deeper understanding of memorability in general thereby opening up avenues for a wide variety of applications. © 2015 IEEE.

Laser sources for object illumination

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Albrecht, G.F. [Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States)

1994-11-15

The considerations which formulate the specifications for a laser illuminator are explained, using the example of an underwater object. Depending on the parameters which define the scenario, widely varying laser requirements result.

The dream of objectivity: A myth of one profession

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jevtović Zoran B.

2014-01-01

Full Text Available Reporting is usually seen as a process in which different facts get sense and specific meaning in a society. The complex nature of media discourse turns occurrences, conflicts, processes and individuals into news, reports, interviews an other genres. The whole process was for a long time followed by a conception of objectivity as one of the most crucial postulates in journalism. During the centuries, a specific myth of good journalism was developed, that promoted honesty, balance, fair play, impartiality, in a word - objectivity. However, globalization and the digital revolution, supported by corporate capital, pointed out the manipulative context and ideological construct of contemporary mediapractice, one that subordinated the structuring and distribution of information to the interests of the ruling elites. In that new journalism, visible and invisible are blended in a convincing narrative, constructed images make critical thinking impossible, and ideological concepts are hidden by lexical meaning. Between an archaic desire to transmit the truth, with full consideration of professional standards, and clientelistic journalism, which develops a close relationship with advertisers and media owners, grows an unbridgeable gap, which significantly changes the character of journalism across the globe.

Quasi-objects, Cult Objects and Fashion Objects

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Andersen, Bjørn Schiermer

2011-01-01

This article attempts to rehabilitate the concept of fetishism and to contribute to the debate on the social role of objects as well as to fashion theory. Extrapolating from Michel Serres’ theory of the quasi-objects, I distinguish two phenomenologies possessing almost opposite characteristics. T...... as a unique opportunity for studying the interchange between these two forms of fetishism and their respective phenomenologies. Finally, returning to Serres, I briefly consider the theoretical consequences of introducing the fashion object as a quasi-object.......This article attempts to rehabilitate the concept of fetishism and to contribute to the debate on the social role of objects as well as to fashion theory. Extrapolating from Michel Serres’ theory of the quasi-objects, I distinguish two phenomenologies possessing almost opposite characteristics....... These two phenomenologies are, so I argue, essential to quasi-object theory, yet largely ignored by Serres’ sociological interpreters. They correspond with the two different theories of fetishism found in Marx and Durkheim, respectively. In the second half of the article, I introduce the fashion object...

Time course of spatial and feature selective attention for partly-occluded objects.

Science.gov (United States)

Kasai, Tetsuko; Takeya, Ryuji

2012-07-01

Attention selects objects/groups as the most fundamental units, and this may be achieved by an attention-spreading mechanism. Previous event-related potential (ERP) studies have found that attention-spreading is reflected by a decrease in the N1 spatial attention effect. The present study tested whether the electrophysiological attention effect is associated with the perception of object unity or amodal completion through the use of partly-occluded objects. ERPs were recorded in 14 participants who were required to pay attention to their left or right visual field and to press a button for a target shape in the attended field. Bilateral stimuli were presented rapidly, and were separated, connected, or connected behind an occluder. Behavioral performance in the connected and occluded conditions was worse than that in the separated condition, indicating that attention spread over perceptual object representations after amodal completion. Consistently, the late N1 spatial attention effect (180-220 ms post-stimulus) and the early phase (230-280 ms) of feature selection effects (target N2) at contralateral sites decreased, equally for the occluded and connected conditions, while the attention effect in the early N1 latency (140-180 ms) shifted most positively for the occluded condition. These results suggest that perceptual organization processes for object recognition transiently modulate spatial and feature selection processes in the visual cortex. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Parallel object-oriented term rewriting : the booleans

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Rodenburg, P.H.; Vrancken, J.L.M.

As a first case study in parallel object-oriented term rewriting, we give two implementations of term rewriting algorithms for boolean terms, using the parallel object-oriented features of the language Pool-T. The term rewriting systems are specified in the specification formalism

Does long-term object priming depend on the explicit detection of object identity at encoding?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Carlos Alexandre Gomes

2015-03-01

Full Text Available It is currently unclear whether objects have to be explicitly identified at encoding for reliable behavioural long-term object priming to occur. We conducted two experiments that investigated long-term object and non-object priming using a selective-attention encoding manipulation that reduces explicit object identification. In Experiment 1, participants either counted dots flashed within an object picture (shallow encoding or engaged in an animacy task (deep encoding at study, whereas, at test, they performed an object-decision task. Priming, as measured by reaction times, was observed for both types of encoding, and was of equivalent magnitude. In Experiment 2, non-object priming (faster reaction times for studied relative to unstudied non-objects was also obtained under the same selective-attention encoding manipulation as in Experiment 1, and the magnitude of the priming effect was equivalent between experiments. In contrast, we observed a linear decrement in recognition memory accuracy across conditions (deep encoding of Experiment 1 > shallow encoding Experiment 1 > shallow encoding of Experiment 2, suggesting that priming was not contaminated by explicit memory strategies. We argue that our results are more consistent with the identification/production framework than the perceptual/conceptual distinction, and we conclude that priming of pictures largely ignored at encoding can be subserved by the automatic retrieval of two types of instances: one at the motor-level and another at an object-decision level.

The impact of technical specification surveillance requirements and allowable outage times on plant availability

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Webster, S.A.; Finnicum, D.J.

1985-01-01

Surveillances required to be conducted by a plant's Technical Specifications have resulted in plant shutdowns and lost availability. This paper looks at shutdowns which have occurred due to required surveillance testing and insufficient repair time allowed by Technical Specifications. A loss of plant availability of almost 3% per plant year was found for U.S. pressurized water reactors during the five year period, 1979 to 1984. This figure excludes major problems which required plant shutdown whether or not mandated by the Technical Specifications. In addition to their affect on availability, such shutdowns can add to the challenges to plant safety systems and can affect plant aging by increasing the thermal cycles on plant components

Time-specific measurements of energy deposition from radiation fields in simulated sub-micron tissue volumes

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Famiano, M.A.

1997-01-01

A tissue-equivalent spherical proportional counter is used with a modified amplifier system to measure specific energy deposited from a uniform radiation field for short periods of time (∼1 micros to seconds) in order to extrapolate to dose in sub-micron tissue volumes. The energy deposited during these time intervals is compared to biological repair processes occurring within the same intervals after the initial energy deposition. The signal is integrated over a variable collection time which is adjusted with a square-wave pulse. Charge from particle passages is collected on the anode during the period in which the integrator is triggered, and the signal decays quickly to zero after the integrator feedback switch resets; the process repeats for every triggering pulse. Measurements of energy deposited from x rays, 137 Cs gamma rays, and electrons from a 90 Sr/ 90 Y source for various time intervals are taken. Spectral characteristics as a function of charge collection time are observed and frequency plots of specific energy and collection time-interval are presented. In addition, a threshold energy flux is selected for each radiation type at which the formation of radicals (based on current measurements) in mammalian cells equals the rate at which radicals are repaired

Dynamics of plasma levels of specific IgE in chlorhexidine allergic patients with and without accidental re-exposure

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Opstrup, Morten Schjørring; Poulsen, Lars K.; Malling, Hans Jørgen

2016-01-01

longer time periods is lacking and it is unknown whether levels fall below influences levels of specific IgE. OBJECTIVE: To investigate the dynamics of specific IgE in chlorhexidine allergic patients...

Observing how others lift light or heavy objects: time-dependent encoding of grip force in the primary motor cortex.

Science.gov (United States)

Alaerts, Kaat; de Beukelaar, Toon T; Swinnen, Stephan P; Wenderoth, Nicole

2012-07-01

During movement observation, corticomotor excitability of the observer's primary motor cortex (M1) is modulated according to the force requirements of the observed action. Here, we explored the time course of observation-induced force encoding. Force-related changes in M1-excitability were assessed by delivering transcranial magnetic stimulations at distinct temporal phases of an observed reach-grasp-lift action. Temporal changes in force-related electromyographic activity were also assessed during active movement execution. In observation conditions in which a heavy object was lifted, M1-excitability was higher compared to conditions in which a light object was lifted. Both during observation and execution, differential force encoding tended to gradually increase from the grasping phase until the late lift phase. Surprisingly, however, during observation, force encoding was already present at the early reach phase: a time point at which no visual cues on the object's weight were available to the observer. As the observer was aware that the same weight condition was presented repeatedly, this finding may indicate that prior predictions concerning the upcoming weight condition are reflected by M1 excitability. Overall, findings may provide indications that the observer's motor system represents motor predictions as well as muscular requirements to infer the observed movement goal.

The simulation of sanitary objects evacuation: An example of hotel 'Radon' in Niška Banja

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jevtić Radoje B.

2015-01-01

Full Text Available Object evacuation is one of the most important, the most responsible and the most complex tasks for human safety in objects generally. This is especially important for objects with lot oh humans, such as health facilities, high residential objects, hotels, schools, etc. This is still an open and ongoing problem which can be confirmed by many injured people who were not evacuated in the disasters. This paper has written to show the possible evacuation situation and calculate minimal time for evacuation in case of Hotel Radon in Niška Banja, as one specific health facility with hardly moving and immobile patients.

Exploiting core knowledge for visual object recognition.

Science.gov (United States)

Schurgin, Mark W; Flombaum, Jonathan I

2017-03-01

Humans recognize thousands of objects, and with relative tolerance to variable retinal inputs. The acquisition of this ability is not fully understood, and it remains an area in which artificial systems have yet to surpass people. We sought to investigate the memory process that supports object recognition. Specifically, we investigated the association of inputs that co-occur over short periods of time. We tested the hypothesis that human perception exploits expectations about object kinematics to limit the scope of association to inputs that are likely to have the same token as a source. In several experiments we exposed participants to images of objects, and we then tested recognition sensitivity. Using motion, we manipulated whether successive encounters with an image took place through kinematics that implied the same or a different token as the source of those encounters. Images were injected with noise, or shown at varying orientations, and we included 2 manipulations of motion kinematics. Across all experiments, memory performance was better for images that had been previously encountered with kinematics that implied a single token. A model-based analysis similarly showed greater memory strength when images were shown via kinematics that implied a single token. These results suggest that constraints from physics are built into the mechanisms that support memory about objects. Such constraints-often characterized as 'Core Knowledge'-are known to support perception and cognition broadly, even in young infants. But they have never been considered as a mechanism for memory with respect to recognition. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved).

Object tracking mask-based NLUT on GPUs for real-time generation of holographic videos of three-dimensional scenes.

Science.gov (United States)

Kwon, M-W; Kim, S-C; Yoon, S-E; Ho, Y-S; Kim, E-S

2015-02-09

A new object tracking mask-based novel-look-up-table (OTM-NLUT) method is proposed and implemented on graphics-processing-units (GPUs) for real-time generation of holographic videos of three-dimensional (3-D) scenes. Since the proposed method is designed to be matched with software and memory structures of the GPU, the number of compute-unified-device-architecture (CUDA) kernel function calls and the computer-generated hologram (CGH) buffer size of the proposed method have been significantly reduced. It therefore results in a great increase of the computational speed of the proposed method and enables real-time generation of CGH patterns of 3-D scenes. Experimental results show that the proposed method can generate 31.1 frames of Fresnel CGH patterns with 1,920 × 1,080 pixels per second, on average, for three test 3-D video scenarios with 12,666 object points on three GPU boards of NVIDIA GTX TITAN, and confirm the feasibility of the proposed method in the practical application of electro-holographic 3-D displays.

From brain synapses to systems for learning and memory: Object recognition, spatial navigation, timed conditioning, and movement control.

Science.gov (United States)

Grossberg, Stephen

2015-09-24

This article provides an overview of neural models of synaptic learning and memory whose expression in adaptive behavior depends critically on the circuits and systems in which the synapses are embedded. It reviews Adaptive Resonance Theory, or ART, models that use excitatory matching and match-based learning to achieve fast category learning and whose learned memories are dynamically stabilized by top-down expectations, attentional focusing, and memory search. ART clarifies mechanistic relationships between consciousness, learning, expectation, attention, resonance, and synchrony. ART models are embedded in ARTSCAN architectures that unify processes of invariant object category learning, recognition, spatial and object attention, predictive remapping, and eye movement search, and that clarify how conscious object vision and recognition may fail during perceptual crowding and parietal neglect. The generality of learned categories depends upon a vigilance process that is regulated by acetylcholine via the nucleus basalis. Vigilance can get stuck at too high or too low values, thereby causing learning problems in autism and medial temporal amnesia. Similar synaptic learning laws support qualitatively different behaviors: Invariant object category learning in the inferotemporal cortex; learning of grid cells and place cells in the entorhinal and hippocampal cortices during spatial navigation; and learning of time cells in the entorhinal-hippocampal system during adaptively timed conditioning, including trace conditioning. Spatial and temporal processes through the medial and lateral entorhinal-hippocampal system seem to be carried out with homologous circuit designs. Variations of a shared laminar neocortical circuit design have modeled 3D vision, speech perception, and cognitive working memory and learning. A complementary kind of inhibitory matching and mismatch learning controls movement. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled SI: Brain and Memory

Talk of time

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Johann-Albrecht Meylahn

2015-06-01

Full Text Available Maybe, before we speak of time, or maybe whilst we are speaking of time, or maybe after we have spoken of time, in the various modes of time’s insistence to exist, one should give time to the talk of time. There are various different modes of time’s insistence to exist, such as quantum physics in conversation with relativity theory where time is constructed as a fourth dimension of space. Or there are the modes of time in history, religion, psychology and philosophy, and each of these modes is composed, and composes its own specific object called time, and a particular subject who understands and interprets time in that particular mode. Yet, before, whilst or after these modes of time’s insistence to exist, one should maybe give time to time’s time. Give time for the various times to articulate themselves in the various modes of existence, thereby creating both a whole plurality of differing subjects, as well as plurality of differing objects, all called ‘time’. Once time has been given time to talk its talk, to articulate itself within the various modes, it will be interrupted by the articulations of time in various modes of time still to come. These disruptions of time by time always still to come opens the door for a theological narrative – a narrative on time, but created by the coming of messianic times, interpreted in the mode of hope but also in the mode of a promise from the past.

System safety and reliability using object-oriented programming techniques

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Patterson-Hine, F.A.; Koen, B.V.

1987-01-01

Direct evaluation fault tree codes have been written in recursive, list-processing computer languages such as PL/1 (PATREC-I) and LISP (PATREC-L). The pattern-matching strategy implemented in these codes has been used extensively in France to evaluate system reliability. Recent reviews of the risk management process suggest that a data base containing plant-specific information be integrated with a package of codes used for probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) to alleviate some of the difficulties that make a PRA so costly and time-intensive. A new programming paradigm, object-oriented programming, is uniquely suited for the development of such a software system. A knowledge base and fault tree evaluation algorithm, based on previous experience with PATREC-L, have been implemented using object-oriented techniques, resulting in a reliability assessment environment that is easy to develop, modify, and extend

Comparative Analysis of Several Real-Time Systems for Tracking People and/or Moving Objects using GPS

OpenAIRE

Radinski, Gligorcho; Mileva, Aleksandra

2015-01-01

When we talk about real-time systems for tracking people and/or moving objects using a Global Positioning System (GPS), there are several categories of such systems and the ways in which they work. Some uses additional hardware to extend the functionality of the offered opportunities, some are free, some are too complex and cost too much money. This paper aims to provide a clearer picture of several such systems and to show results from a comparative analysis of some popular systems for trac...

Near-Earth Objects. Chapter 27

Science.gov (United States)

Harris, Alan W.; Drube, Line; McFadden, Lucy A.; Binzel, Richard P.

2014-01-01

A near-Earth object (NEO) is an asteroid or comet orbiting the Sun with a perihelion distance of less than 1.3 Astronomical Units (AU) (1 AU, an astronomical unit, is the mean distance between the Earth and the Sun, around 150 million kilometers). If the orbit of an NEO can bring it to within 0.05 AU of the Earth's orbit, and it is larger than about 120 meters, it is termed a potentially hazardous object (PHO); an object of this size is likely to survive passage through the atmosphere and cause extensive damage on impact. (The acronyms NEA and PHO are used when referring specifically to asteroids.)

QUASI-STELLAR OBJECT SELECTION ALGORITHM USING TIME VARIABILITY AND MACHINE LEARNING: SELECTION OF 1620 QUASI-STELLAR OBJECT CANDIDATES FROM MACHO LARGE MAGELLANIC CLOUD DATABASE

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kim, Dae-Won; Protopapas, Pavlos; Alcock, Charles; Trichas, Markos; Byun, Yong-Ik; Khardon, Roni

2011-01-01

We present a new quasi-stellar object (QSO) selection algorithm using a Support Vector Machine, a supervised classification method, on a set of extracted time series features including period, amplitude, color, and autocorrelation value. We train a model that separates QSOs from variable stars, non-variable stars, and microlensing events using 58 known QSOs, 1629 variable stars, and 4288 non-variables in the MAssive Compact Halo Object (MACHO) database as a training set. To estimate the efficiency and the accuracy of the model, we perform a cross-validation test using the training set. The test shows that the model correctly identifies ∼80% of known QSOs with a 25% false-positive rate. The majority of the false positives are Be stars. We applied the trained model to the MACHO Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) data set, which consists of 40 million light curves, and found 1620 QSO candidates. During the selection none of the 33,242 known MACHO variables were misclassified as QSO candidates. In order to estimate the true false-positive rate, we crossmatched the candidates with astronomical catalogs including the Spitzer Surveying the Agents of a Galaxy's Evolution LMC catalog and a few X-ray catalogs. The results further suggest that the majority of the candidates, more than 70%, are QSOs.

Lineage-Specific Real-Time RT-PCR for Yellow Fever Virus Outbreak Surveillance, Brazil.

Science.gov (United States)

Fischer, Carlo; Torres, Maria C; Patel, Pranav; Moreira-Soto, Andres; Gould, Ernest A; Charrel, Rémi N; de Lamballerie, Xavier; Nogueira, Rita Maria Ribeiro; Sequeira, Patricia C; Rodrigues, Cintia D S; Kümmerer, Beate M; Drosten, Christian; Landt, Olfert; Bispo de Filippis, Ana Maria; Drexler, Jan Felix

2017-11-01

The current yellow fever outbreak in Brazil prompted widespread yellow fever virus (YFV) vaccination campaigns, imposing a responsibility to distinguish between vaccine- and wild-type YFV-associated disease. We developed novel multiplex real-time reverse transcription PCRs that differentiate between vaccine and American wild-type YFV. We validated these highly specific and sensitive assays in an outbreak setting.

Lineage-Specific Real-Time RT-PCR for Yellow Fever Virus Outbreak Surveillance, Brazil

OpenAIRE

Fischer, Carlo; Torres, Maria C.; Patel, Pranav; Moreira-Soto, Andres; Gould, Ernest A.; Charrel, Rémi N.; de Lamballerie, Xavier; Nogueira, Rita Maria Ribeiro; Sequeira, Patricia C.; Rodrigues, Cintia D.S.; Kümmerer, Beate M.; Drosten, Christian; Landt, Olfert; Bispo de Filippis, Ana Maria; Drexler, Jan Felix

2017-01-01

The current yellow fever outbreak in Brazil prompted widespread yellow fever virus (YFV) vaccination campaigns, imposing a responsibility to distinguish between vaccine- and wild-type YFV-associated disease. We developed novel multiplex real-time reverse transcription PCRs that differentiate between vaccine and American wild-type YFV. We validated these highly specific and sensitive assays in an outbreak setting.

Time in Science: Reversibility vs. Irreversibility

Science.gov (United States)

Pomeau, Yves

To discuss properly the question of irreversibility one needs to make a careful distinction between reversibility of the equations of motion and the choice of the initial conditions. This is also relevant for the rather confuse philosophy of the wave packet reduction in quantum mechanics. The explanation of this reduction requires also to make precise assumptions on what initial data are accessible in our world. Finally I discuss how a given (and long) time record can be shown in an objective way to record an irreversible or reversible process. Or: can a direction of time be derived from its analysis? This leads quite naturally to examine if there is a possible spontaneous breaking of the time reversal symmetry in many body systems, a symmetry breaking that would be put in evidence objectively by looking at certain specific time correlations.

Constraints on reusability of learning objects

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

May, Michael; Hussmann, Peter Munkebo; Jensen, Anne Skov

2010-01-01

It is the aim of this paper to discuss some didactic constraints on the use and reuse of digital modular learning objects. Engineering education is used as the specific context of use with examples from courses in introductory electronics and mathematics. Digital multimedia and modular learning....... Constraints on reuse arise from the nature of conceptual understanding in higher education and the functionality of learning objects within present technologies. We will need didactic as well as technical perspectives on learning objects in designing for understanding....

Towards an Artificial Space Object Taxonomy

Science.gov (United States)

Wilkins, M.; Schumacher, P.; Jah, M.; Pfeffer, A.

2013-09-01

Object recognition is the first step in positively identifying a resident space object (RSO), i.e. assigning an RSO to a category such as GPS satellite or space debris. Object identification is the process of deciding that two RSOs are in fact one and the same. Provided we have appropriately defined a satellite taxonomy that allows us to place a given RSO into a particular class of object without any ambiguity, one can assess the probability of assignment to a particular class by determining how well the object satisfies the unique criteria of belonging to that class. Ultimately, tree-based taxonomies delineate unique signatures by defining the minimum amount of information required to positively identify a RSO. Therefore, taxonomic trees can be used to depict hypotheses in a Bayesian object recognition and identification process. This work describes a new RSO taxonomy along with specific reasoning behind the choice of groupings. An alternative taxonomy was recently presented at the Sixth Conference on Space Debris in Darmstadt, Germany. [1] The best example of a taxonomy that enjoys almost universal scientific acceptance is the classical Linnaean biological taxonomy. A strength of Linnaean taxonomy is that it can be used to organize the different kinds of living organisms, simply and practically. Every species can be given a unique name. This uniqueness and stability are a result of the acceptance by biologists specializing in taxonomy, not merely of the binomial names themselves. Fundamentally, the taxonomy is governed by rules for the use of these names, and these are laid down in formal Nomenclature Codes. We seek to provide a similar formal nomenclature system for RSOs through a defined tree-based taxonomy structure. Each categorization, beginning with the most general or inclusive, at any level is called a taxon. Taxon names are defined by a type, which can be a specimen or a taxon of lower rank, and a diagnosis, a statement intended to supply characters that

Object-oriented user interfaces for personalized mobile learning

CERN Document Server

Alepis, Efthimios

2014-01-01

This book presents recent research in mobile learning and advanced user interfaces. It is shown how the combination of this fields can result in personalized educational software that meets the requirements of state-of-the-art mobile learning software. This book provides a framework that is capable of incorporating the software technologies, exploiting a wide range of their current advances and additionally investigating ways to go even further by providing potential solutions to future challenges. The presented approach uses the well-known Object-Oriented method in order to address these challenges. Throughout this book, a general model is constructed using Object-Oriented Architecture. Each chapter focuses on the construction of a specific part of this model, while in the conclusion these parts are unified. This book will help software engineers build more sophisticated personalized software that targets in mobile education, while at the same time retaining a high level of adaptivity and user-friendliness w...

Development of guidance on applications of regulatory requirements for low specific activity materials and surface contaminated objects

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Pope, R.B.; Easton, E.P.; Shankman, S.F.

1997-01-01

In 1985, the International Atomic Energy Agency issued revised regulations for the safe transport of radioactive material. Significant among the changes were major revisions to requirements for Low Specific Activity (LSA) material and Surface Contaminated Objects (SCOs). In preparation for the adoption of these requirements into regulations in the United States, it became apparent that guidance on how to apply these requirements, clarifying technical uncertainties and ensuring proper implementation, would be needed both by the regulators and those regulated. Thus, the US Department of Transportation and the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, with the assistance of staff from Oak Ridge National Laboratory, are preparing regulatory guidance for LSA material and SCO transport. The guidance will present examples of acceptable methods for demonstrating compliance with the revised rules. Ideas being investigated for inclusion in the pending guidance are discussed in this paper. Under current plans, the guidance will be issued for public comment prior to final issuance of the guidance in 1997

Development of guidance on applications of regulatory requirements for low specific activity materials and surface contaminated objects

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Pope, R.B.; Easton, E.P.; Shankman, S.F.; Boyle, R.W.

1997-01-01

In 1985, the International Atomic Energy Agency issued revised regulations for the safe transport of radioactive material. Significant among the changes were major revisions to requirements for Low Specific Activity (LSA) material and Surface Contaminated Objects (SCOs). In preparation for the adoption of these requirements into regulations in the United States, it became apparent that guidance on how to apply these requirements, clarifying technical uncertainties and ensuring proper implementation, would be needed both by the regulators and those regulated. Thus, the US Department of Transportation and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, with the assistance of staff from Oak Ridge National Laboratory, are preparing regulatory guidance for LSA material and SCO transport. The guidance will present examples of acceptable methods for demonstrating compliance with the revised rules. Ideas being investigated for inclusion in the pending guidance are discussed in this paper. Under current plans, the guidance will be issued for public comment prior to final issue of the guidance in 1997. (Author)

Minimum Delay Moving Object Detection

KAUST Repository

Lao, Dong

2017-11-09

We present a general framework and method for detection of an object in a video based on apparent motion. The object moves relative to background motion at some unknown time in the video, and the goal is to detect and segment the object as soon it moves in an online manner. Due to unreliability of motion between frames, more than two frames are needed to reliably detect the object. Our method is designed to detect the object(s) with minimum delay, i.e., frames after the object moves, constraining the false alarms. Experiments on a new extensive dataset for moving object detection show that our method achieves less delay for all false alarm constraints than existing state-of-the-art.

Minimum Delay Moving Object Detection

KAUST Repository

Lao, Dong

2017-01-08

We present a general framework and method for detection of an object in a video based on apparent motion. The object moves relative to background motion at some unknown time in the video, and the goal is to detect and segment the object as soon it moves in an online manner. Due to unreliability of motion between frames, more than two frames are needed to reliably detect the object. Our method is designed to detect the object(s) with minimum delay, i.e., frames after the object moves, constraining the false alarms. Experiments on a new extensive dataset for moving object detection show that our method achieves less delay for all false alarm constraints than existing state-of-the-art.

Minimum Delay Moving Object Detection

KAUST Repository

Lao, Dong; Sundaramoorthi, Ganesh

2017-01-01

We present a general framework and method for detection of an object in a video based on apparent motion. The object moves relative to background motion at some unknown time in the video, and the goal is to detect and segment the object as soon it moves in an online manner. Due to unreliability of motion between frames, more than two frames are needed to reliably detect the object. Our method is designed to detect the object(s) with minimum delay, i.e., frames after the object moves, constraining the false alarms. Experiments on a new extensive dataset for moving object detection show that our method achieves less delay for all false alarm constraints than existing state-of-the-art.

Transforming clinical imaging and 3D data for virtual reality learning objects: HTML5 and mobile devices implementation.

Science.gov (United States)

Trelease, Robert B; Nieder, Gary L

2013-01-01

Web deployable anatomical simulations or "virtual reality learning objects" can easily be produced with QuickTime VR software, but their use for online and mobile learning is being limited by the declining support for web browser plug-ins for personal computers and unavailability on popular mobile devices like Apple iPad and Android tablets. This article describes complementary methods for creating comparable, multiplatform VR learning objects in the new HTML5 standard format, circumventing platform-specific limitations imposed by the QuickTime VR multimedia file format. Multiple types or "dimensions" of anatomical information can be embedded in such learning objects, supporting different kinds of online learning applications, including interactive atlases, examination questions, and complex, multi-structure presentations. Such HTML5 VR learning objects are usable on new mobile devices that do not support QuickTime VR, as well as on personal computers. Furthermore, HTML5 VR learning objects can be embedded in "ebook" document files, supporting the development of new types of electronic textbooks on mobile devices that are increasingly popular and self-adopted for mobile learning. © 2012 American Association of Anatomists.

Prolonged activated prothromboplastin time and breed specific variation in haemostatic analytes in healthy adult Bernese Mountain dogs

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielsen, Lise; Wiinberg, Bo; Kjelgaard-Hansen, Mads

2011-01-01

Coagulation tests are often performed in dogs suspected of haemostatic dysfunction and are interpreted according to validated laboratory reference intervals (RIs). Breed specific RIs for haematological and biochemical analytes have previously been identified in Bernese Mountain dogs, but it remains...... to be determined if breed specific RIs are necessary for haemostasis tests. Activated prothromboplastin time (aPTT), prothrombin time (PT), selected coagulation factors, D-dimers, fibrinogen, von Willebrand factor and thromboelastography (TEG) were analyzed in healthy Bernese Mountain dogs using the CLSI model...

Demand-specific work ability, poor health and working conditions in middle-aged full-time employees.

Science.gov (United States)

Nabe-Nielsen, Kirsten; Thielen, Karsten; Nygaard, Else; Thorsen, Sannie Vester; Diderichsen, Finn

2014-07-01

We investigated the prevalence of reduced demand-specific work ability, its association with age, gender, education, poor health, and working conditions, and the interaction between poor health and working conditions regarding reduced demand-specific work ability. We used cross-sectional questionnaire data from 3381 full-time employees responding to questions about vocational education, job demands and social support (working conditions), musculoskeletal pain (MSP) and major depression (MD) (poor health) and seven questions about difficulty managing different job demands (reduced demand-specific work ability). Reduced demand-specific work ability varied from 9% to 19% among the 46-year old and from 11% to 21% among the 56-year old. Age was associated with two, gender with four, and education with all measures of reduced demand-specific work ability. MSP was associated with four and MD was associated with six measures of reduced demand-specific work ability. We found no interaction between working conditions and poor health regarding reduced demand-specific work ability. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd and The Ergonomics Society. All rights reserved.

Environmental Impact Specification for Direct Space Weathering of Kuiper Belt and Oort Cloud Objects

Science.gov (United States)

Cooper, John F.

2010-01-01

The Direct Space Weathering Project of NASA's Outer Planets Research Program addresses specification of the plasma and energetic particle environments for irradiation and surface chemical processing of icy bodies in the outer solar system and the local interstellar medium. Knowledge of the radiation environments is being expanded by ongoing penetration of the twin Voyager spacecraft into the heliosheath boundary region of the outer heliosphere and expected emergence within the next decade into the very local interstellar medium. The Voyager measurements are being supplemented by remote sensing from Earth orbit of energetic neutral atom emission from this boundary region by NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX). Although the Voyagers long ago passed the region of the Classical Kuiper Belt, the New Horizons spacecraft will encounter Pluto in 2015 and thereafter explore one or more KBOs, meanwhile providing updated measurements of the heliospheric radiation environment in this region. Modeling of ion transport within the heliosphere allows specification of time-integrated irradiation effects while the combination of Voyager and IBEX data supports projection of the in-situ measurements into interstellar space beyond the heliosheath. Transformation of model ion flux distributions into surface sputtering and volume ionization profiles provides a multi-layer perspective for space weathering impact on the affected icy bodies and may account for some aspects of color and compositional diversity. Other important related factors may include surface erosion and gardening by meteoritic impacts and surface renewal by cryovolcanism. Chemical products of space weathering may contribute to energy resources for the latter.

Aggregating and Disaggregating Flexibility Objects

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Siksnys, Laurynas; Valsomatzis, Emmanouil; Hose, Katja

2015-01-01

In many scientific and commercial domains we encounter flexibility objects, i.e., objects with explicit flexibilities in a time and an amount dimension (e.g., energy or product amount). Applications of flexibility objects require novel and efficient techniques capable of handling large amounts...... and aiming at energy balancing during aggregation. In more detail, this paper considers the complete life cycle of flex-objects: aggregation, disaggregation, associated requirements, efficient incremental computation, and balance aggregation techniques. Extensive experiments based on real-world data from...

The production of direct object clitics in pre-school- and primary school-aged children with specific language impairments.

Science.gov (United States)

Guasti, Maria Teresa; Palma, Silvia; Genovese, Elisabetta; Stagi, Paolo; Saladini, Gabriella; Arosio, Fabrizio

2016-01-01

Third-person direct object (DO) clitic pronoun production is examined through an elicited production method in pre-school- and primary school-aged groups of Italian children with specific language impairment (SLI) to establish whether there is an improvement from age 5 years to age 7 years and whether there are qualitative differences in the two groups' responses. It was found that 5- and 7-year-old Italian children with SLI produce fewer third-person DO clitics than same-age peers. The kind of responses they provide changes: at 5 years, children with SLI tend to omit clitics, while at 7 years, they use a full noun. Production of third-person DO clitics is a persistent challenge for children with SLI and is confirmed to be a good clinical marker both at 5 and 7 years of age.

Application of object oriented techniques in the TRIUMF beam line 2C control system

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Wilkinson, N.A.; Ludgate, G.A.

1992-07-01

The KAON Factory central control system study employed a uniform approach to requirements analysis, architectural design and programming based on well established object oriented principles. These principles were applied to the successful analysis, design and implementation of the control system for the TRIUMF Beam Line 2C Solid Target Facility. The specification for this control system was created in collaboration with Beam Line 2C equipment management experts and, once the analysis models were validated, an approach was developed for the direct translation of these models into C code. A commercial real time database was central to this translation, as inter-object data and control flows are implemented by channels in the database. This paper focuses on the experience gained in the use of object oriented techniques during the complete analysis-design-implementation cycle of a working control system and on the utility of implementing such a system using a commercial real time database and graphical interface. (author)

Pretreatment prostate-specific antigen doubling times: clinical utility of this predictor of prostate cancer behavior

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hanks, Gerald E.; Hanlon, Alexandra L.; Lee, W. Robert; Slivjak, Anne; Schultheiss, Timothy E.

1996-01-01

Purpose: The distribution of pretreatment and posttreatment prostate specific antigen (PSA) doubling times (PSADT) varies widely. This report examines the pretreatment PSADT as an independent predictor of biochemical freedom from disease (bNED) and describes the clinical utility of PSADT. Methods and Materials: Ninety-nine patients with T1-3 NX, M-0 prostate cancer treated between February 1989 and November 1993 have pretreatment PSADTs calculated from three or more PSA levels. Biochemical disease-free (bNED) survival (failure is PSA ≥ 1.5 ngm/ml and rising) is evaluated by multivariate analysis of common prognostic indicators and PSADT. Results: Prostate-specific antigen doubling time (PSADT) is a significant predictor of survival along with radiation dose. Patients with a pretreatment PSADT of < 12 months show 50% failure by 18 months, while those with a PSADT that is not increasing show only 3% failure at 3 years. Conclusions: Prostate-specific antigen doubling time (PSADT) is a predictor of bNED outcome in prostate cancer. Patients with PSADT < 12 months have aggressive disease and should be considered for multimodal therapy. Slow PSADT (≥ 5 years) is observed in 57% of patients, and this end point may be considered in the decision to observe rather than to treat. After treatment failure, the PSADT may be used to determine which patients do not need immediate androgen deprivation

Minimum Delay Moving Object Detection

KAUST Repository

Lao, Dong

2017-01-01

This thesis presents a general framework and method for detection of an object in a video based on apparent motion. The object moves, at some unknown time, differently than the “background” motion, which can be induced from camera motion. The goal

Chinese and Australians showed difference in mental time travel in emotion and content but not specificity

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Xing-jie eChen

2015-06-01

Full Text Available Mental time travel refers to the ability to recall episodic past and imagine future events. The present study aimed to investigate cultural differences in mental time travel between Chinese and Australian university students. A total of 231 students (108 Chinese & 123 Australians participated in the study. Their mental time travel abilities were measured by the Sentence Completion for Events from the Past Test (SCEPT and the Sentence Completion for Events in the Future Test (SCEFT. Results showed that there were no cultural differences in the number of specific events generated for the past or future. Significant differences between the Chinese and Australian participants were found mainly in the emotional valence and content of the events generated. Both Chinese and Australian participants generated more specific positive events compared to negative events when thinking about the future and Chinese participants were more positive about their past than Australian participants when recalled specific events. For content, Chinese participants recalled more events about their interpersonal relationships, while Australian participants imagined more about personal future achievements. These findings shed some lights on cultural differences in episodic past and future thinking.

How learning might strengthen existing visual object representations in human object-selective cortex.

Science.gov (United States)

Brants, Marijke; Bulthé, Jessica; Daniels, Nicky; Wagemans, Johan; Op de Beeck, Hans P

2016-02-15

Visual object perception is an important function in primates which can be fine-tuned by experience, even in adults. Which factors determine the regions and the neurons that are modified by learning is still unclear. Recently, it was proposed that the exact cortical focus and distribution of learning effects might depend upon the pre-learning mapping of relevant functional properties and how this mapping determines the informativeness of neural units for the stimuli and the task to be learned. From this hypothesis we would expect that visual experience would strengthen the pre-learning distributed functional map of the relevant distinctive object properties. Here we present a first test of this prediction in twelve human subjects who were trained in object categorization and differentiation, preceded and followed by a functional magnetic resonance imaging session. Specifically, training increased the distributed multi-voxel pattern information for trained object distinctions in object-selective cortex, resulting in a generalization from pre-training multi-voxel activity patterns to after-training activity patterns. Simulations show that the increased selectivity combined with the inter-session generalization is consistent with a training-induced strengthening of a pre-existing selectivity map. No training-related neural changes were detected in other regions. In sum, training to categorize or individuate objects strengthened pre-existing representations in human object-selective cortex, providing a first indication that the neuroanatomical distribution of learning effects depends upon the pre-learning mapping of visual object properties. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

O-ODM Framework for Object-Relational Databases

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Carlos Alberto Rombaldo Jr

2012-09-01

Full Text Available Object-Relational Databases introduce new features which allow manipulating objects in databases. At present, many DBMS offer resources to manipulate objects in database, but most application developers just map class to relations tables, failing to exploit the O-R model strength. The lack of tools that aid the database project contributes to this situation. This work presents O-ODM (Object-Object Database Mapping, a persistent framework that maps objects from OO applications to database objects. Persistent Frameworks have been used to aid developers, managing all access to DBMS. This kind of tool allows developers to persist objects without solid knowledge about DBMSs and specific languages, improving the developers’ productivity, mainly when a different DBMS is used. The results of some experiments using O-ODM are shown.

Compact objects and accretion disks

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Blandford, Roger; Agol, Eric; Broderick, Avery; Heyl, Jeremy; Koopmans, Leon; Lee, Hee-Won

2002-01-01

Recent developments in the spectropolarimetric study of compact objects, specifically black holes (stellar and massive) and neutron stars are reviewed. The lectures are organized around five topics: disks, jets, outflows, neutron stars and black holes. They emphasize physical mechanisms and are

Patterns of objectively assessed physical activity and sedentary time: Are Nigerian health professional students complying with public health guidelines?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Adewale L Oyeyemi

Full Text Available Understanding patterns of physical activity and sedentary time is important to effective population-wide primary prevention and control of non-communicable diseases. This study examined the patterns of objectively assessed physical activity and sedentary time, and the prevalence of compliance with physical activity guidelines according to different public health recommendations in a sub-population of health professional students in Nigeria.A cross-sectional study was conducted among 102 health professional students (age = 19-34 years old, 43.1% women of the University of Maiduguri, Nigeria. Participants wore Actigraph accelerometers on their waist for minimum of 5 days/week to objectively measure intensity and duration of physical activity and sedentary time. Prevalence and demographic patterns of physical activity and sedentary time were examined using descriptive and inferential statistics.The students spent most time in sedentary activity (458.6 ± minutes/day, about 61% of daily time and the least in vigorous-intensity activity (2.1 ± 4.4 minutes/day, about 0.3% of daily time. Sedentary time was higher among older than younger students (P<0.038 and among medical laboratory science students than physiotherapy and nursing students (P = 0.046. Total physical activity was higher among nursing and medical students than medical laboratory science students (P = 0.041. Although, 85.3% of the students engaged in 150 minutes/week of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity, only 2.9% met the guideline of 75 minutes/week of vigorous intensity activity.Prevalence of sedentary time was high while that of vigorous-intensity activity was very low among health professional students in Nigeria. Compliance with physical activity guidelines was mainly through accumulation of moderate intensity activity. The results suggest that age and academic programme may influence physical activity level and sedentary behaviour of health professional students in Nigeria

Finding Specification Pages from the Web

Science.gov (United States)

Yoshinaga, Naoki; Torisawa, Kentaro

This paper presents a method of finding a specification page on the Web for a given object (e.g., ``Ch. d'Yquem'') and its class label (e.g., ``wine''). A specification page for an object is a Web page which gives concise attribute-value information about the object (e.g., ``county''-``Sauternes'') in well formatted structures. A simple unsupervised method using layout and symbolic decoration cues was applied to a large number of the Web pages to acquire candidate attributes for each class (e.g., ``county'' for a class ``wine''). We then filter out irrelevant words from the putative attributes through an author-aware scoring function that we called site frequency. We used the acquired attributes to select a representative specification page for a given object from the Web pages retrieved by a normal search engine. Experimental results revealed that our system greatly outperformed the normal search engine in terms of this specification retrieval.

Positron emission mammography (PEM): Effect of activity concentration, object size, and object contrast on phantom lesion detection

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

MacDonald, Lawrence R.; Wang, Carolyn L.; Eissa, Marna; Haseley, David; Kelly, Mary M.; Liu, Franklin; Parikh, Jay R.; Beatty, J. David; Rogers, James V.

2012-01-01

Purpose: To characterize the relationship between lesion detection sensitivity and injected activity as a function of lesion size and contrast on the PEM (positron emission mammography) Flex Solo II scanner using phantom experiments. Methods: Phantom lesions (spheres 4, 8, 12, 16, and 20 mm diameter) were randomly located in uniform background. Sphere activity concentrations were 3 to 21 times the background activity concentration (BGc). BGc was a surrogate for injected activity; BGc ranged from 0.44–4.1 kBq/mL, corresponding to 46–400 MBq injections. Seven radiologists read 108 images containing zero, one, or two spheres. Readers used a 5-point confidence scale to score the presence of spheres. Results: Sensitivity was 100% for lesions ≥12 mm under all conditions except for one 12 mm sphere with the lowest contrast and lowest BGc (60% sensitivity). Sensitivity was 100% for 8 mm spheres when either contrast or BGc was high, and 100% for 4 mm spheres only when both contrast and BGc were highest. Sphere contrast recovery coefficients (CRC) were 49%, 34%, 26%, 14%, and 2.8% for the largest to smallest spheres. Cumulative specificity was 98%. Conclusions: Phantom lesion detection sensitivity depends more on sphere size and contrast than on BGc. Detection sensitivity remained ≥90% for injected activities as low as 100 MBq, for lesions ≥8 mm. Low CRC in 4 mm objects results in moderate detection sensitivity even for 400 MBq injected activity, making it impractical to optimize injected activity for such lesions. Low CRC indicates that when lesions <8 mm are observed on PEM images they are highly tracer avid with greater potential of clinical significance. High specificity (98%) suggests that image statistical noise does not lead to false positive findings. These results apply to the 85 mm thick object used to obtain them; lesion detectability should be better (worse) for thinner (thicker) objects based on the reduced (increased) influence of photon attenuation.

Shape configuration and category-specificity

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gerlach, Christian; Law, I; Paulson, Olaf B.

2006-01-01

and fragmented drawings. We also examined whether fragmentation had different impact on the recognition of natural objects and artefacts and found that recognition of artefacts was more affected by fragmentation than recognition of natural objects. Thus, the usual finding of an advantage for artefacts...... in difficult object decision tasks, which is also found in the present experiments with outlines, is reversed when the stimuli are fragmented. This interaction between category (natural versus artefacts) and stimulus type (outlines versus fragmented forms) is in accordance with predictions derived from...... a recent account of category-specificity and lends support to the notion that category-specific impairments can occur for both natural objects and artefacts following damage to pre-semantic stages in visual object recognition. The implications of the present findings are discussed in relation to theories...

Misidentifying a tennis racket as keys: object identification in people with age-related macular degeneration.

Science.gov (United States)

Thibaut, Miguel; Tran, Thi Ha Chau; Delerue, Céline; Boucart, Muriel

2015-05-01

Previous studies showed that people with age-related macular degeneration (AMD) can categorise a pre-defined target object or scene with high accuracy (above 80%). In these studies participants were asked to detect the target (e.g. an animal) in serial visual presentation. People with AMD must rely on peripheral vision which is more adapted to the low resolution required for detection than for the higher resolution required to identify a specific exemplar. We investigated the ability of people with central vision loss to identify photographs of objects and scenes. Photographs of isolated objects, natural scenes and objects in scenes were centrally displayed for 2 s each. Participants were asked to name the stimuli. We measured accuracy and naming times in 20 patients with AMD, 15 age-matched and 12 young controls. Accuracy was lower (by about 30%) and naming times were longer (by about 300 ms) in people with AMD than in age-matched controls in the three categories of images. Correct identification occurred in 62-66% of the stimuli for patients. More than 20% of the misidentifications resulted from a structural and/or semantic similarity between the object and the name (e.g. spectacles for dog plates or dolphin for shark). Accuracy and naming times did not differ significantly between young and older normally sighted participants indicating that the deficits resulted from pathology rather than to normal ageing. These results show that, in contrast to performance for categorisation of a single pre-defined target, people with central vision loss are impaired at identifying various objects and scenes. The decrease in accuracy and the increase in response times in patients with AMD indicate that peripheral vision might be sufficient for object and scene categorisation but not for precise scene or object identification. © 2015 The Authors Ophthalmic & Physiological Optics © 2015 The College of Optometrists.

The lasting effects of process-specific versus stimulus-specific learning during infancy.

Science.gov (United States)

Hadley, Hillary; Pickron, Charisse B; Scott, Lisa S

2015-09-01

The capacity to tell the difference between two faces within an infrequently experienced face group (e.g. other species, other race) declines from 6 to 9 months of age unless infants learn to match these faces with individual-level names. Similarly, the use of individual-level labels can also facilitate differentiation of a group of non-face objects (strollers). This early learning leads to increased neural specialization for previously unfamiliar face or object groups. The current investigation aimed to determine whether early conceptual learning between 6 and 9 months leads to sustained behavioral advantages and neural changes in these same children at 4-6 years of age. Results suggest that relative to a control group of children with no previous training and to children with infant category-level naming experience, children with early individual-level training exhibited faster response times to human faces. Further, individual-level training with a face group - but not an object group - led to more adult-like neural responses for human faces. These results suggest that early individual-level learning results in long-lasting process-specific effects, which benefit categories that continue to be perceived and recognized at the individual level (e.g. human faces). © 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Associative Symmetry versus Independent Associations in the Memory for Object-Location Associations

Science.gov (United States)

Sommer, Tobias; Rose, Michael; Buchel, Christian

2007-01-01

The formation of associations between objects and locations is a vital aspect of episodic memory. More specifically, remembering the location where one experienced an object and, vice versa, the object one encountered at a specific location are both important elements for the memory of an event. Whether episodic associations are holistic…

Computational network design from functional specifications

KAUST Repository

Peng, Chi Han

2016-07-11

Connectivity and layout of underlying networks largely determine agent behavior and usage in many environments. For example, transportation networks determine the flow of traffic in a neighborhood, whereas building floorplans determine the flow of people in a workspace. Designing such networks from scratch is challenging as even local network changes can have large global effects. We investigate how to computationally create networks starting from only high-level functional specifications. Such specifications can be in the form of network density, travel time versus network length, traffic type, destination location, etc. We propose an integer programming-based approach that guarantees that the resultant networks are valid by fulfilling all the specified hard constraints and that they score favorably in terms of the objective function. We evaluate our algorithm in two different design settings, street layout and floorplans to demonstrate that diverse networks can emerge purely from high-level functional specifications.

Exploiting object constancy: effects of active exploration and shape morphing on similarity judgments of novel objects.

Science.gov (United States)

Lee, Haemy; Wallraven, Christian

2013-03-01

Humans are experts at shape processing. This expertise has been learned and fine tuned by actively manipulating and perceiving thousands of objects during development. Therefore, shape processing possesses an active component and a perceptual component. Here, we investigate both components in six experiments in which participants view and/or interact with novel, parametrically defined 3D objects using a touch-screen interface. For probing shape processing, we use a similarity rating task. In Experiments 1-3, we show that active manipulation leads to a better perceptual reconstruction of the physical parameter space than judging rotating objects, or passively viewing someone else's exploration pattern. In Experiment 4, we exploit object constancy-the fact that the visual system assumes that objects do not change their identity during manipulation. We show that slow morphing of an object during active manipulation systematically biases similarity ratings-despite the participants being unaware of the morphing. Experiments 5 and 6 investigate the time course of integrating shape information by restricting the morphing to the first and second half of the trial only. Interestingly, the results indicate that participants do not seem to integrate shape information beyond 5 s of exploration time. Finally, Experiment 7 uses a secondary task that suggests that the previous results are not simply due to lack of attention during the later parts of the trial. In summary, our results demonstrate the advantage of active manipulation for shape processing and indicate a continued, perceptual integration of complex shape information within a time window of a few seconds during object interactions.

Object similarity affects the perceptual strategy underlying invariant visual object recognition in rats

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Federica Bianca Rosselli

2015-03-01

Full Text Available In recent years, a number of studies have explored the possible use of rats as models of high-level visual functions. One central question at the root of such an investigation is to understand whether rat object vision relies on the processing of visual shape features or, rather, on lower-order image properties (e.g., overall brightness. In a recent study, we have shown that rats are capable of extracting multiple features of an object that are diagnostic of its identity, at least when those features are, structure-wise, distinct enough to be parsed by the rat visual system. In the present study, we have assessed the impact of object structure on rat perceptual strategy. We trained rats to discriminate between two structurally similar objects, and compared their recognition strategies with those reported in our previous study. We found that, under conditions of lower stimulus discriminability, rat visual discrimination strategy becomes more view-dependent and subject-dependent. Rats were still able to recognize the target objects, in a way that was largely tolerant (i.e., invariant to object transformation; however, the larger structural and pixel-wise similarity affected the way objects were processed. Compared to the findings of our previous study, the patterns of diagnostic features were: i smaller and more scattered; ii only partially preserved across object views; and iii only partially reproducible across rats. On the other hand, rats were still found to adopt a multi-featural processing strategy and to make use of part of the optimal discriminatory information afforded by the two objects. Our findings suggest that, as in humans, rat invariant recognition can flexibly rely on either view-invariant representations of distinctive object features or view-specific object representations, acquired through learning.

Remote Testing of Timed Specifications

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

David, Alexandre; Larsen, Kim Guldstrand; Mikucionis, Marius

2013-01-01

We present a study and a testing framework on black box remote testing of real-time systems using UPPAAL TIGA. One of the essential challenges of remote testing is the communication latency between the Tester and the System Under Test (IUT) that may lead to interleaving of inputs and outputs. Thi...

Intuitive modeling of vaporish objects

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sokolov, Dmitry; Gentil, Christian

2015-01-01

Attempts to model gases in computer graphics started in the late 1970s. Since that time, there have been many approaches developed. In this paper we present a non-physical method allowing to create vaporish objects like clouds or smoky characters. The idea is to create a few sketches describing the rough shape of the final vaporish object. These sketches will be used as condensation sets of Iterated Function Systems, providing intuitive control over the object. The advantages of the new method are: simplicity, good control of resulting shapes and ease of eventual object animation.

Hubble Space Telescope, Faint Object Camera

Science.gov (United States)

1981-01-01

This drawing illustrates Hubble Space Telescope's (HST's), Faint Object Camera (FOC). The FOC reflects light down one of two optical pathways. The light enters a detector after passing through filters or through devices that can block out light from bright objects. Light from bright objects is blocked out to enable the FOC to see background images. The detector intensifies the image, then records it much like a television camera. For faint objects, images can be built up over long exposure times. The total image is translated into digital data, transmitted to Earth, and then reconstructed. The purpose of the HST, the most complex and sensitive optical telescope ever made, is to study the cosmos from a low-Earth orbit. By placing the telescope in space, astronomers are able to collect data that is free of the Earth's atmosphere. The HST detects objects 25 times fainter than the dimmest objects seen from Earth and provides astronomers with an observable universe 250 times larger than visible from ground-based telescopes, perhaps as far away as 14 billion light-years. The HST views galaxies, stars, planets, comets, possibly other solar systems, and even unusual phenomena such as quasars, with 10 times the clarity of ground-based telescopes. The HST was deployed from the Space Shuttle Discovery (STS-31 mission) into Earth orbit in April 1990. The Marshall Space Flight Center had responsibility for design, development, and construction of the HST. The Perkin-Elmer Corporation, in Danbury, Cornecticut, developed the optical system and guidance sensors.

Popularity and user diversity of online objects

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Jia-Hua; Guo, Qiang; Yang, Kai; Zhang, Yi-Lu; Han, Jingti; Liu, Jian-Guo

2016-11-01

The popularity has been widely used to describe the object property of online user-object bipartite networks regardless of the user characteristics. In this paper, we introduce a measurement namely user diversity to measure diversity of users who select or rate one type of objects by using the information entropy. We empirically calculate the user diversity of objects with specific degree for both MovieLens and Diggs data sets. The results indicate that more types of users select normal-degree objects than those who select large-degree and small-degree objects. Furthermore, small-degree objects are usually selected by large-degree users while large-degree objects are usually selected by small-degree users. Moreover, we define 15% objects of smallest degrees as unpopular objects and 10% ones of largest degrees as popular objects. The timestamp is introduced to help further analyze the evolution of user diversity of popular objects and unpopular objects. The dynamic analysis shows that as objects become popular gradually, they are more likely accepted by small-degree users but lose attention among the large-degree users.

RASW : a Run-time Adaptive Sliding Window to Improve Viola-Jones object detection.

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Comaschi, F.; Stuijk, S.; Basten, T.; Corporaal, H.

2013-01-01

Abstract—In recent years accurate algorithms for detecting objects in images have been developed. Among these algorithms, the object detection scheme proposed by Viola and Jones gained great popularity, especially after the release of high-quality face classifiers by the OpenCV group. However, as

Real-Time Attitude Control Algorithm for Fast Tumbling Objects under Torque Constraint

Science.gov (United States)

Tsuda, Yuichi; Nakasuka, Shinichi

This paper describes a new control algorithm for achieving any arbitrary attitude and angular velocity states of a rigid body, even fast and complicated tumbling rotations, under some practical constraints. This technique is expected to be applied for the attitude motion synchronization to capture a non-cooperative, tumbling object in such missions as removal of debris from orbit, servicing broken-down satellites for repairing or inspection, rescue of manned vehicles, etc. For this objective, we have introduced a novel control algorithm called Free Motion Path Method (FMPM) in the previous paper, which was formulated as an open-loop controller. The next step of this consecutive work is to derive a closed-loop FMPM controller, and as the preliminary step toward the objective, this paper attempts to derive a conservative state variables representation of a rigid body dynamics. 6-Dimensional conservative state variables are introduced in place of general angular velocity-attitude angle representation, and how to convert between both representations are shown in this paper.

Object color affects identification and repetition priming.

Science.gov (United States)

Uttl, Bob; Graf, Peter; Santacruz, Pilar

2006-10-01

We investigated the influence of color on the identification of both non-studied and studied objects. Participants studied black and white and color photos of common objects and memory was assessed with an identification test. Consistent with our meta-analysis of prior research, we found that objects were easier to identify from color than from black and white photos. We also found substantial priming in all conditions, and study-to-test changes in an object's color reduced the magnitude of priming. Color-specific priming effects were large for color-complex objects, but minimal for color-simple objects. The pattern and magnitude of priming effects was not influenced either by the extent to which an object always appears in the same color (i.e., whether a color is symptomatic of an object) or by the object's origin (natural versus fabricated). We discuss the implications of our findings for theoretical accounts of object perception and repetition priming.

Objectively measured physical activity levels and sedentary time in 7–9-year-old Estonian schoolchildren: independent associations with body composition parameters

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Eva-Maria Riso

2016-04-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Sufficient daily physical activity (PA is necessary for physical, social and mental health benefits during growth. Most of the available data on children is based on subjective reports, while only limited data on objective PA and sedentary levels is available for primary school children. Increased PA is also an important health indicator of body composition parameters, especially body adiposity indices. The aim of the present study was to determine objectively the amount of daily PA levels at different intensities and sedentary time in normal-weight (NW and overweight (OW 7–9-year-old boys and girls, and to find associations between objectively measured PA levels and sedentary time with different body composition values. Methods Two hundred and seventy eight (142 boys and 136 girls primary school children aged 7.9 ± 0.7 years participated in this study. Objective PA intensity and sedentary levels were measured over 7 days by accelerometry. Indices of total fat mass (body fat %, sum of skinfolds, fat distribution (waist-to-height ratio and muscular component (fat free mass [FFM] were calculated from measured anthropometric parameters. Results There were no differences (p > 0.05 in PA intensity levels and sedentary time between boys and girls as well as between NW and OW children. About 11 % of children met the current guidelines of at least 60 min per day of moderate-to-vigorous PA (MVPA. Sedentary time was positively and negatively associated (p < 0.05 with all body fat and FFM values, respectively. Moderate and vigorous PA along with MVPA were negatively and positively associated (p < 0.05 with all body fat and FFM indices, respectively. Conclusions The results of present study showed that about 11 % of primary school children were engaged in PA of at least 60 min of MVPA daily. While MVPA is negatively associated with fat mass indices and positively associated with FFM regardless of different

On the health paradox of occupational and leisure-time physical activity using objective measurements: Effects on autonomic imbalance.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

David M Hallman

Full Text Available Leisure-time physical activity (LTPA has considerable benefits for cardiovascular health and longevity, while occupational physical activity (OPA is associated with an elevated cardiovascular risk. This "health paradox" may be explained by different effects on the autonomic nervous system from OPA and LTPA. Thus, we aimed to investigate whether objectively measured OPA and LTPA are differentially associated with autonomic regulation among workers.The study comprised 514 blue-collar workers from the Danish cohort DPHACTO. Physical activity (i.e. walking, climbing stairs, running and cycling was assessed objectively using accelerometers worn on the thigh, hip and trunk over multiple working days. During this period, a heart rate monitor was used to sample heart period intervals from the ECG signal. Heart rate and heart rate variability (HRV indices were analyzed during nocturnal sleep as markers of autonomic regulation. Multiple regression analysis was used to determine the main effects of OPA and LTPA and their interaction on heart rate and HRV, adjusting for multiple confounders.Statistically significant interaction was found between OPA and LTPA on heart rate (adjusted p<0.0001 and HRV indices in time (rMSSD, adjusted p = 0.004 and frequency-domains (HF, adjusted p = 0.022; LF, adjusted p = 0.033. The beneficial effect of LTPA on nocturnal heart rate and HRV clearly diminished with higher levels of OPA, and high levels of both OPA and LTPA had a detrimental effect.We found contrasting associations for objectively measured OPA and LTPA with heart rate and HRV during sleep. Differential effects of OPA and LTPA on autonomic regulation may contribute to the physical activity health paradox.

Associations between the Objectively Measured Office Environment and Workplace Step Count and Sitting Time: Cross-Sectional Analyses from the Active Buildings Study.

Science.gov (United States)

Fisher, Abi; Ucci, Marcella; Smith, Lee; Sawyer, Alexia; Spinney, Richard; Konstantatou, Marina; Marmot, Alexi

2018-06-01

Office-based workers spend a large proportion of the day sitting and tend to have low overall activity levels. Despite some evidence that features of the external physical environment are associated with physical activity, little is known about the influence of the spatial layout of the internal environment on movement, and the majority of data use self-report. This study investigated associations between objectively-measured sitting time and activity levels and the spatial layout of office floors in a sample of UK office-based workers. Participants wore activPAL accelerometers for at least three consecutive workdays. Primary outcomes were steps and proportion of sitting time per working hour. Primary exposures were office spatial layout, which was objectively-measured by deriving key spatial variables: 'distance from each workstation to key office destinations', 'distance from participant's workstation to all other workstations', 'visibility of co-workers', and workstation 'closeness'. 131 participants from 10 organisations were included. Fifty-four per cent were female, 81% were white, and the majority had a managerial or professional role (72%) in their organisation. The average proportion of the working hour spent sitting was 0.7 (SD 0.15); participants took on average 444 (SD 210) steps per working hour. Models adjusted for confounders revealed significant negative associations between step count and distance from each workstation to all other office destinations (e.g., B = -4.66, 95% CI: -8.12, -1.12, p office destinations (e.g., B = -6.45, 95% CI: -11.88, -0.41, p office destinations the less they walked, suggesting that changing the relative distance between workstations and other destinations on the same floor may not be the most fruitful target for promoting walking and reducing sitting in the workplace. However, reported effect sizes were very small and based on cross-sectional analyses. The approaches developed in this study could be applied to other

Creativity and Memory: Effects of an Episodic-Specificity Induction on Divergent Thinking.

Science.gov (United States)

Madore, Kevin P; Addis, Donna Rose; Schacter, Daniel L

2015-09-01

People produce more episodic details when imagining future events and solving means-end problems after receiving an episodic-specificity induction-brief training in recollecting details of a recent event-than after receiving a control induction not focused on episodic retrieval. Here we show for the first time that an episodic-specificity induction also enhances divergent creative thinking. In Experiment 1, participants exhibited a selective boost on a divergent-thinking task (generating unusual uses of common objects) after a specificity induction compared with a control induction; by contrast, performance following the two inductions was similar on an object association task thought to involve little divergent thinking. In Experiment 2, we replicated the specificity-induction effect on divergent thinking using a different control induction, and also found that participants performed similarly on a convergent-thinking task following the two inductions. These experiments provide novel evidence that episodic memory is involved in divergent creative thinking. © The Author(s) 2015.

Subjective time pressure: general or domain specific?

Science.gov (United States)

Kleiner, Sibyl

2014-09-01

Chronic time pressure has been identified as a pervasive societal problem, exacerbated by high demands of the labor market and the home. Yet time pressure has not been disaggregated and examined separately across home and work contexts, leaving many unanswered questions regarding the sources and potentially stressful consequences of time pressure. Using data collected in the United States General Social Survey waves 2002 and 2004, this study disaggregates time pressure into the domains of home and work, and asks whether considering time pressures within distinct work and home contexts reveals distinct predictors or associations with stress. Findings show that both predictors and stress associations differ across work and home pressures, revealing both methodological and theoretical implications for the study of time pressure and work and family life more generally. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Partial Evaluation for Class-Based Object-Oriented Languages

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Schultz, Ulrik Pagh

2001-01-01

Object-oriented programming facilitates the development of generic software, but at a significant cost in terms of performance. We apply partial evaluation to object-oriented programs, to automatically map generic software into specific implementations. In this paper we give a concise, formal...... description of a simple partial evaluator for a minimal object-oriented language, and give directions for extending this partial evaluator to handle realistic programs....

A Wavelet-Enhanced PWTD-Accelerated Time-Domain Integral Equation Solver for Analysis of Transient Scattering from Electrically Large Conducting Objects

KAUST Repository

Liu, Yang

2018-02-26

A wavelet-enhanced plane-wave time-domain (PWTD) algorithm for efficiently and accurately solving time-domain surface integral equations (TD-SIEs) on electrically large conducting objects is presented. The proposed scheme reduces the memory requirement and computational cost of the PWTD algorithm by representing the PWTD ray data using local cosine wavelet bases (LCBs) and performing PWTD operations in the wavelet domain. The memory requirement and computational cost of the LCB-enhanced PWTD-accelerated TD-SIE solver, when applied to the analysis of transient scattering from smooth quasi-planar objects with near-normal incident pulses, scale nearly as O(Ns log Ns) and O(Ns 1.5 ), respectively. Here, Ns denotes the number of spatial unknowns. The efficiency and accuracy of the proposed scheme are demonstrated through its applications to the analysis of transient scattering from a 185 wave-length-long NASA almond and a 123-wavelength long Air-bus-A320 model.

Quantum objects non-local correlation, causality and objective indefiniteness in the quantum world

CERN Document Server

Jaeger, Gregg

2013-01-01

This monograph identifies the essential characteristics of the objects described by current quantum theory and considers their relationship to space-time. In the process, it explicates the senses in which quantum objects may be consistently considered to have parts of which they may be composed or into which they may be decomposed. The book also demonstrates the degree to which reduction is possible in quantum mechanics, showing it to be related to the objective indefiniteness of quantum properties and the strong non-local correlations that can occur between the physical quantities of quantum

Ritualized Space and Objects of Sacrosanctity

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

2010-01-01

: such areas, buildings, places, and objects, stand out as ritualized physical structures. In the West, historically, such traditions have included hierarchies of sacred places (e.g. Jerusalem, Mecca, Rome), defined by mythical events and religious memory; sacred bodies (dead or alive) as manifested......The idea that formalized performative acts may manifest sacrosanctity spatially or in specific physical objects is often brought out in descriptions of ritual practices. Rituals of sanctification or dedication of sacred areas, temples, churches, and objects of veneration provide well-known examples...... by different kinds of ordination or initiation (e.g. saints, kings, priests, ordinary Christians); sacred buildings, places, and objects (churches and monasteries with their precincts including graveyards; various kinds of vessels, reliquaries, altars, crucifixes, books, thrones, statues, pictures, etc). Each...

RAMS+C informed decision-making with application to multi-objective optimization of technical specifications and maintenance using genetic algorithms

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Martorell, S.; Villanueva, J.F.; Carlos, S.; Nebot, Y.; Sanchez, A.; Pitarch, J.L.; Serradell, V.

2005-01-01

The role of technical specifications and maintenance (TSM) activities at nuclear power plants (NPP) aims to increase reliability, availability and maintainability (RAM) of Safety-Related Equipment, which, in turn, must yield to an improved level of plant safety. However, more resources (e.g. costs, task force, etc.) have to be assigned in above areas to achieve better scores in reliability, availability, maintainability and safety (RAMS). Current situation at NPP shows different programs implemented at the plant that aim to the improvement of particular TSM-related parameters where the decision-making process is based on the assessment of the impact of the change proposed on a subgroup of RAMS+C attributes. This paper briefly reviews the role of TSM and two main groups of improvement programs at NPP, which suggest the convenience of considering the approach proposed in this paper for the Integrated Multi-Criteria Decision-Making on changes to TSM-related parameters based on RAMS+C criteria as a whole, as it can be seem as a decision-making process more consistent with the role and synergic effects of TSM and the objectives and goals of current improvement programs at NPP. The case of application to the Emergency Diesel Generator system demonstrates the viability and significance of the proposed approach for the Multi-objective Optimization of TSM-related parameters using a Genetic Algorithm

Audiovisual communication of object-names improves the spatial accuracy of recalled object-locations in topographic maps.

Science.gov (United States)

Lammert-Siepmann, Nils; Bestgen, Anne-Kathrin; Edler, Dennis; Kuchinke, Lars; Dickmann, Frank

2017-01-01

Knowing the correct location of a specific object learned from a (topographic) map is fundamental for orientation and navigation tasks. Spatial reference systems, such as coordinates or cardinal directions, are helpful tools for any geometric localization of positions that aims to be as exact as possible. Considering modern visualization techniques of multimedia cartography, map elements transferred through the auditory channel can be added easily. Audiovisual approaches have been discussed in the cartographic community for many years. However, the effectiveness of audiovisual map elements for map use has hardly been explored so far. Within an interdisciplinary (cartography-cognitive psychology) research project, it is examined whether map users remember object-locations better if they do not just read the corresponding place names, but also listen to them as voice recordings. This approach is based on the idea that learning object-identities influences learning object-locations, which is crucial for map-reading tasks. The results of an empirical study show that the additional auditory communication of object names not only improves memory for the names (object-identities), but also for the spatial accuracy of their corresponding object-locations. The audiovisual communication of semantic attribute information of a spatial object seems to improve the binding of object-identity and object-location, which enhances the spatial accuracy of object-location memory.

Manually locating physical and virtual reality objects.

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, Karen B; Kimmel, Ryan A; Bartholomew, Aaron; Ponto, Kevin; Gleicher, Michael L; Radwin, Robert G

2014-09-01

In this study, we compared how users locate physical and equivalent three-dimensional images of virtual objects in a cave automatic virtual environment (CAVE) using the hand to examine how human performance (accuracy, time, and approach) is affected by object size, location, and distance. Virtual reality (VR) offers the promise to flexibly simulate arbitrary environments for studying human performance. Previously, VR researchers primarily considered differences between virtual and physical distance estimation rather than reaching for close-up objects. Fourteen participants completed manual targeting tasks that involved reaching for corners on equivalent physical and virtual boxes of three different sizes. Predicted errors were calculated from a geometric model based on user interpupillary distance, eye location, distance from the eyes to the projector screen, and object. Users were 1.64 times less accurate (p virtual versus physical box corners using the hands. Predicted virtual targeting errors were on average 1.53 times (p virtual targets but not significantly different for close-up virtual targets. Target size, location, and distance, in addition to binocular disparity, affected virtual object targeting inaccuracy. Observed virtual box inaccuracy was less than predicted for farther locations, suggesting possible influence of cues other than binocular vision. Human physical interaction with objects in VR for simulation, training, and prototyping involving reaching and manually handling virtual objects in a CAVE are more accurate than predicted when locating farther objects.

Early age-dependent impairments of context-dependent extinction learning, object recognition, and object-place learning occur in rats.

Science.gov (United States)

Wiescholleck, Valentina; Emma André, Marion Agnès; Manahan-Vaughan, Denise

2014-03-01

The hippocampus is vulnerable to age-dependent memory decline. Multiple forms of memory depend on adequate hippocampal function. Extinction learning comprises active inhibition of no longer relevant learned information concurrent with suppression of a previously learned reaction. It is highly dependent on context, and evidence exists that it requires hippocampal activation. In this study, we addressed whether context-based extinction as well as hippocampus-dependent tasks, such as object recognition and object-place recognition, are equally affected by moderate aging. Young (7-8 week old) and older (7-8 month old) Wistar rats were used. For the extinction study, animals learned that a particular floor context indicated that they should turn into one specific arm (e.g., left) to receive a food reward. On the day after reaching the learning criterion of 80% correct choices, the floor context was changed, no reward was given and animals were expected to extinguish the learned response. Both, young and older rats managed this first extinction trial in the new context with older rats showing a faster extinction performance. One day later, animals were returned to the T-maze with the original floor context and renewal effects were assessed. In this case, only young but not older rats showed the expected renewal effect (lower extinction ratio as compared to the day before). To assess general memory abilities, animals were tested in the standard object recognition and object-place memory tasks. Evaluations were made at 5 min, 1 h and 7 day intervals. Object recognition memory was poor at short-term and intermediate time-points in older but not young rats. Object-place memory performance was unaffected at 5 min, but impaired at 1 h in older but not young rats. Both groups were impaired at 7 days. These findings support that not only aspects of general memory, but also context-dependent extinction learning, are affected by moderate aging. This may reflect less flexibility in

A Time- and Compartment-Specific Activation of Lung Macrophages in Hypoxic Pulmonary Hypertension.

Science.gov (United States)

Pugliese, Steven C; Kumar, Sushil; Janssen, William J; Graham, Brian B; Frid, Maria G; Riddle, Suzette R; El Kasmi, Karim C; Stenmark, Kurt R

2017-06-15

Studies in various animal models suggest an important role for pulmonary macrophages in the pathogenesis of pulmonary hypertension (PH). Yet, the molecular mechanisms characterizing the functional macrophage phenotype relative to time and pulmonary localization and compartmentalization remain largely unknown. In this study, we used a hypoxic murine model of PH in combination with FACS to quantify and isolate lung macrophages from two compartments over time and characterize their programing via RNA sequencing approaches. In response to hypoxia, we found an early increase in macrophage number that was restricted to the interstitial/perivascular compartment, without recruitment of macrophages to the alveolar compartment or changes in the number of resident alveolar macrophages. Principal component analysis demonstrated significant differences in overall gene expression between alveolar and interstitial macrophages (IMs) at baseline and after 4 and 14 d hypoxic exposure. Alveolar macrophages at both day 4 and 14 and IMs at day 4 shared a conserved hypoxia program characterized by mitochondrial dysfunction, proinflammatory gene activation, and mTORC1 signaling, whereas IMs at day 14 demonstrated a unique anti-inflammatory/proreparative programming state. We conclude that the pathogenesis of vascular remodeling in hypoxic PH involves an early compartment-independent activation of lung macrophages toward a conserved hypoxia program, with the development of compartment-specific programs later in the course of the disease. Thus, harnessing time- and compartment-specific differences in lung macrophage polarization needs to be considered in the therapeutic targeting of macrophages in hypoxic PH and potentially other inflammatory lung diseases. Copyright © 2017 by The American Association of Immunologists, Inc.

Keep away from danger: Dangerous objects in dynamic and static situations

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Filomena eAnelli

2013-07-01

Full Text Available Behavioral and neuroscience studies have shown that objects observation evokes specific affordances (i.e., action possibilities and motor responses. Recent findings provide evidence that even dangerous objects can modulate the motor system evoking aversive affordances. This sounds intriguing since so far the majority of behavioral, brain imaging, and transcranial magnetic stimulation studies with painful and dangerous stimuli strictly concerned the domain of pain, excepted for evidence suggesting sensitivity to objects’ affordances when neutral objects are located in participants’ peripersonal space. This study investigates whether the observation of a neutral or dangerous object in a static or dynamic situation differently influences motor responses, and the time-course of the dangerous objects’ processing. In three experiments we manipulated: object dangerousness (neutral vs. dangerous; object category (artifact vs. natural; manual response typology (press vs. release a key; object presentation (Experiment 1: dynamic, Experiments 2 and 3: static; object movement direction (Experiment 1: away vs. toward the participant or size (Experiments 2 and 3: big vs. normal vs. small. The task required participants to decide whether the object was an artifact or a natural object, by pressing or releasing one key. Results showed a facilitation for neutral over dangerous objects in the static situation, probably due to an affordance effect. Instead, in the dynamic condition responses were modulated by the object movement direction, with a dynamic affordance effect of neutral objects and an escape-avoidance effect of dangerous objects (neutral objects were processed faster when they moved toward-approached the participant, whereas dangerous objects were processed faster when they moved away from the participant. Moreover, static stimuli influenced the manual response typology. These data indicate the emergence of dynamic affordance and escaping

Factors affecting infants' manual search for occluded objects and the genesis of object permanence.

Science.gov (United States)

Moore, M Keith; Meltzoff, Andrew N

2008-04-01

Two experiments systematically examined factors that influence infants' manual search for hidden objects (N=96). Experiment 1 used a new procedure to assess infants' search for partially versus totally occluded objects. Results showed that 8.75-month-old infants solved partial occlusions by removing the occluder and uncovering the object, but these same infants failed to use this skill on total occlusions. Experiment 2 used sound-producing objects to provide a perceptual clue to the objects' hidden location. Sound clues significantly increased the success rate on total occlusions for 10-month-olds, but not for 8.75-month-olds. An identity development account is offered for why infants succeed on partial occlusions earlier than total occlusions and why sound helps only the older infants. We propose a mechanism for how infants use object identity as a basis for developing a notion of permanence. Implications are drawn for understanding the dissociation between looking time and search assessments of object permanence.

Objectively Measured Physical Activity and Sedentary Time during Childhood, Adolescence and Young Adulthood: A Cohort Study

Science.gov (United States)

Ortega, Francisco B.; Hurtig-Wennlöf, Anita; Mäestu, Jarek; Löf, Marie; Harro, Jaanus; Bellocco, Rino; Labayen, Idoia; Veidebaum, Toomas; Sjöström, Michael

2013-01-01

Background To know how moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) and sedentary time change across lifespan periods is needed for designing successful lifestyle interventions. We aimed to study changes in objectively measured (accelerometry) MVPA and sedentary time from childhood to adolescence and from adolescence to young adulthood. Methods Estonian and Swedish participants from the European Youth Heart Study aged 9 and 15 years at baseline (N = 2312) were asked to participate in a second examination 6 (Sweden) to 9/10 (Estonia) years later. 1800 participants with valid accelerometer data were analyzed. Results MVPA decreased from childhood to adolescence (−1 to −2.5 min/d per year of follow-up, P = 0.01 and girls and boys respectively) and also from adolescence to young adulthood (−0.8 to −2.2 min/d per year, P = 0.02 and girls and boys, respectively). Sedentary time increased from childhood to adolescence (+15 and +20 min/d per year, for girls and boys respectively, Pboys than in girls. The magnitude of the change observed in sedentary time was 3–6 time larger than the change observed in MVPA. Conclusions The decline in MVPA (overall change = 30 min/d) and increase sedentary time (overall change = 2∶45 h/d) observed from childhood to adolescence are of concern and might increase the risk of developing obesity and other chronic diseases later in life. These findings substantially contribute to understand how key health-related behaviors (physical activity and sedentary) change across important periods of life. PMID:23637772

Objectively Measured Sedentary Time and Cardiovascular Risk Factor Control in US Hispanics/Latinos With Diabetes Mellitus: Results From the Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos (HCHS/SOL).

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Xueyin; Strizich, Garrett; Hua, Simin; Sotres-Alvarez, Daniela; Buelna, Christina; Gallo, Linda C; Gellman, Marc D; Mossavar-Rahmani, Yasmin; O'Brien, Matthew J; Stoutenberg, Mark; Wang, Tao; Avilés-Santa, M Larissa; Kaplan, Robert C; Qi, Qibin

2017-05-25

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk factor control is a cornerstone of diabetes mellitus management. Little is known about relationships of objectively measured sedentary time and physical activity with major CVD risk factor control in individuals with diabetes mellitus. We examined associations of objectively measured sedentary time and moderate-to-vigorous physical activity with reaching major CVD risk factor control goals among US Hispanic/Latino adults with diabetes mellitus. This cross-sectional analysis included 1699 participants with diabetes mellitus from the Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos (2008-2011). Logistic regression models were used to estimate the odds ratios (ORs) of meeting the following 5 major CVD risk factor control goals: hemoglobin A 1c 40/50 mg/dL for men/women. After adjustment for covariates including moderate-to-vigorous physical activity, less sedentary time was associated with increased odds of reaching hemoglobin A 1c (OR=1.76 [95% CI: 1.10, 2.82]) and triglyceride control goals (OR=2.16 [1.36, 3.46]), and reaching ≥3 CVD risk factor control goals (OR=2.08 [1.34, 3.23]) (all ORs for comparisons of extreme tertiles of sedentary time). Moderate-to-vigorous physical activity was not associated with reaching any CVD risk factor control goals. Substituting 60-min/day of sedentary time with light-intensity physical activity was associated with increased odds of reaching hemoglobin A 1c (OR=1.18 [1.04, 1.35]), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (OR=1.17 [1.04, 1.32]), and triglyceride (OR=1.20 [1.05, 1.36]) control goals. Among US Hispanic/Latino adults with diabetes mellitus, less sedentary time, but not moderate-to-vigorous physical activity, was associated with improved CVD risk factor control, specifically in reaching hemoglobin A 1c and triglyceride control goals. © 2017 The Authors. Published on behalf of the American Heart Association, Inc., by Wiley.

Multi-objective optimization using genetic algorithms: A tutorial

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Konak, Abdullah; Coit, David W.; Smith, Alice E.

2006-01-01

Multi-objective formulations are realistic models for many complex engineering optimization problems. In many real-life problems, objectives under consideration conflict with each other, and optimizing a particular solution with respect to a single objective can result in unacceptable results with respect to the other objectives. A reasonable solution to a multi-objective problem is to investigate a set of solutions, each of which satisfies the objectives at an acceptable level without being dominated by any other solution. In this paper, an overview and tutorial is presented describing genetic algorithms (GA) developed specifically for problems with multiple objectives. They differ primarily from traditional GA by using specialized fitness functions and introducing methods to promote solution diversity