A survey on approaches to gridification

The Grid shows itself as a globally distributed computing environment, in which hardware and software resources are virtualized to transparently provide applications with vast capabilities. Just like the electrical power grid, the Grid aims at offering a powerful yet easy‐to‐use computing infrastructure to which applications can be easily ‘plugged’ and efficiently executed. Unfortunately, it is still very difficult to Grid‐enable applications, since current tools force users to take into account many details when adapting applications to run on the Grid. In this paper, we survey some of the recent efforts in providing tools for easy gridification of applications and propose several taxonomies to identify approaches followed in the materialization of such tools. We conclude this paper by describing common features among the proposed approaches, and by pointing out open issues and future directions in the research and development of gridification methods. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Synthesis of distillation trains by thermodynamic analysis

Thermodynamic principles, involving mainly: (1) minimum reversible work of separation and (2) second-law analysis that accounts for irreversibility, are used to synthesize separation trains. These principles lead to a development and classification into two groups of many of the heuristics appearing in the literature. An efficient algorithm based on reversible thermodynamics leads to optimal structures for simple acyclic trains. Complex structures are efficiently synthesized by algorithms using reversible thermodynamics and second-law analysis. The procedures presented are depth-first algorithms. The optimal structures developed are shown to be strongly influenced by feed and product compositions.     

Adsorption isotherms of sesame oil in a concentrated miscella system

The adsorption of peroxides, unsaturated carbonyls, free fatty acids and carotenoids from unrefined sesame oil on vegetable carbon (5%, w/w) in a miscella system was studied. Three different solvent conditions (hexane/ethanol, 100:0, 95:5 and 75:25, vol/vol), combined in a factorial design with five levels of solvent (0, 10, 20, 30 and 40%, w/w), were used to develop the miscella. Equilibrium adsorption was not achieved during the 100 min of adsorption, mainly because the oil components were involved in oxidation reactions during the adsorption process. However, for a given solvent concentration, adsorption of the oil components showed a significant linear regression on their respective initial concentration in the miscella (C_i). Peroxides and carbonyls showed, at all solvent levels investigated, an affinity for the carbon more independent of their C_i than free fatty acids and carotenoids. In general, at the same C_i, a higher adsorption was achieved as solvent concentration increased. The results indicated that free fatty acid adsorption may depend on competitive adsorption based on molecule hydrophobicity. However, in spite of the higher hydrophobicity of carotenoids, compared with free fatty acids, they might not be competing for the same adsorbing sites. Ethanol showed a prooxidant effect that increased peroxide production during adsorption but did not affect the reaction involved in carbonyl production.     

Fast training procedure for Viola–Jones type object detectors using Laplacian clutter models

This paper presents a fast training strategy for the Viola–Jones (VJ) type object-detection systems. The VJ object- detection system, popular for its high accuracy at real-time testing speeds, has a drawback that it is slow to train. A face detector, for example, can take days to train. In content-based image retrieval (CBIR), where search needs to be performed instantaneously, VJ’s long training time is not affordable. Therefore, VJ’s method is hardly used for such applications. This paper proposes two modifications to the training algorithm of VJ-type object detection systems which reduces the training time to the order of seconds. Firstly, Laplacian clutter (non-object) models are used to train the weak classifier, thus eliminating the need to read and evaluate thousands of clutter images. Secondly, the training procedure is simplified by removing the time-consuming AdaBoost-based feature selection procedure. An object detector, trained with 500 images, approximately takes 2 s for training in a conventional 3 GHz machine. Our results show that the accuracy of the detector, built with the proposed approach, is inferior to that of VJ for difficult object class such as frontal faces. However, for objects with lesser degree of intra-class variations such as hearts, state-of-the-art accuracy can be obtained. Importantly, for CBIR applications, the fast testing speed of the VJ type object detector is maintained.     

The kinematic design of spatial,hybrid closed chains including planar parallelograms

It is presented an integral approach for the kinematic design of spatial, hybrid closed chains which include planar parallelograms into their kinematic structure. It is based on a systematic application of recursive formulae intended for describing the evolution of screws through time. Due to the particular nature of the proposed approach, it can be closely related with Lie algebras and allows to overcome the lacking of group structure offered by a parallelogram when it is going to be considered as a component of a hybrid closed chain. Several application examples are presented in order to show the potential of the proposed approach.     

An integrated tool for loop calculations: aITALC

aITALC, a new tool for automating loop calculations in high energy physics, is described. The package creates Fortran code for two-fermion scattering processes automatically, starting from the generation and analysis of the Feynman graphs. We describe the modules of the tool, the intercommunication between them and illustrate its use with three examples.

Program summary

Title of the program:aITALC version 1.2.1 (9 August 2005)Catalogue identifier:ADWOProgram summary URL:http://cpc.cs.qub.ac.uk/summaries/ADWOProgram obtainable from:CPC Program Library, Queen's University of Belfast, N. IrelandComputer:PC i386Operating system:GNU/Linux, tested on different distributions SuSE 8.2 to 9.3, Red Hat 7.2, Debian 3.0, Ubuntu 5.04. Also on SolarisProgramming language used:GNU Make, Diana, Form, Fortran77Additional programs/libraries used:Diana 2.35 (Qgraf 2.0), Form 3.1, LoopTools 2.1 (FF)Memory required to execute with typical data:Up to about 10 MBNo. of processors used:1No. of lines in distributed program, including test data, etc.:40 926No. of bytes in distributed program, including test data, etc.:371 424Distribution format:tar gzip fileHigh-speed storage required:from 1.5 to 30 MB, depending on modules present and unfolding of examplesNature of the physical problem:Calculation of differential cross sections for e⁺e⁻ annihilation in one-loop approximation.Method of solution:Generation and perturbative analysis of Feynman diagrams with later evaluation of matrix elements and form factors.Restriction of the complexity of the problem:The limit of application is, for the moment, the 2→2 particle reactions in the electro-weak standard model.Typical running time:Few minutes, being highly depending on the complexity of the process and the Fortran compiler.     

A framework for weighted fusion of multiple statistical models of shape and appearance

This paper presents a framework for weighted fusion of several active shape and active appearance models. The approach is based on the eigenspace fusion method proposed by Hall et al., which has been extended to fuse more than two weighted eigenspaces using unbiased mean and covariance matrix estimates. To evaluate the performance of fusion, a comparative assessment on segmentation precision as well as facial verification tests are performed using the AR, EQUINOX, and XM2VTS databases. Based on the results, it is concluded that the fusion is useful when the model needs to be updated online or when the original observations are absent     

An efficient model for studying the dynamics of frustrated systems

We present a model based on determinist cellular automata architecture for studying systems with frustrated interactions that present elemental excitations, such as magnetic monopoles. This model is especially designed to be applied for systems with components that have energy levels much higher than $kT$. This would imply that for these systems thermal fluctuations are negligible and they can be analyzed under the supposition that the dynamic is produced at zero temperature. This category includes artificial magnetic spin ice systems and donor and recipient electrical charge molecular systems. The dynamics of these systems can be simulated in real time with this model, with a minimum of computational requirements. It can be an excellent complement to Monte Carlo methods and in some cases can even replace them directly. In this report, we show the designed structure and some interesting results obtained in studying the dynamics of emergent magnetic monopoles in artificial spin ice systems and excitations in graphane molecular arrays.     

Stress recovery in geometrically nonlinear membranes by a Hu-Washizu finite element formulation

A class of mixed finite elements based on the Hu-Washizu functional is introduced as a strategy to reduce the spurious stress phenomena encountered with standard or displacement-based formulations for geometrically exact membranes. Selected examples compare the performance of this class of elements with that of the standard formulation and demonstrate that reduction of spurious stresses is obtained and that the stresses are more accurate than those optimally sampled in the standard formulation.