A propositional probabilistic logic with discrete linear time for reasoning about evidence

The aim of the paper is to present a sound, strongly complete and decidable probabilistic temporal logic that can model reasoning about evidence. The formal system developed here is actually a solution of a problem proposed by Halpern and Pucella (J Artif Intell Res 26:1–34, 2006).     

Flow profile measurement in microchannel using the optical feedback interferometry sensing technique

The need to accurately measure flow profiles in microfluidic channels is well recognised. In this work, we present a new optical feedback interferometry (OFI) flow sensor that accurately measures local velocity in fluids and enables reconstruction of a velocity profile inside a microchannel. OFI is a self-aligned interferometric technique that uses the laser as both the transmitter and the receiver thus offering high sensitivity, fast response, and a simple and compact optical design. The system described here is based on a commercial semiconductor laser and has been designed to achieve a micrometer-range spatial resolution. The sensor performance was validated by reconstructing the velocity profile inside a circular cross-section flow-channel with 320  $\upmu $ m internal diameter, with a relative error smaller than 1.8 %. The local flow velocity is directly measured, thus avoiding the need for model based profile calculation and uncertainties inherent to this approach. The system was validated by successfully extracting the flow profiles in both Newtonian and shear-thinning liquids.     

Parallel programming for multimedia applications

Computing capabilities are continuing to increase with the availability of multi core and many core processors. The wide availability of multi core processors has made parallel programming possible for end user applications running on desktops, workstations, and mobile devices. While parallel hardware has become common, software that exploits parallel capabilities is just beginning to take hold. Multimedia applications, with their data parallel nature and large computing requirements will benefit significantly from parallel programming. In this paper an overview of parallel programming is presented and languages and tools for parallel programming such as OpenMP and CUDA are introduced within the scope of multimedia applications.     

Adaptive content-based music retrieval system

This paper presents a tunable content-based music retrieval (CBMR) system suitable the for retrieval of music audio clips. The audio clips are represented as extracted feature vectors. The CBMR system is expert-tunable by altering the feature space. The feature space is tuned according to the expert-specified similarity criteria expressed in terms of clusters of similar audio clips. The main goal of tuning the feature space is to improve retrieval performance, since some features may have more impact on perceived similarity than others. The tuning process utilizes our genetic algorithm. The R-tree index for efficient retrieval of audio clips is based on the clustering of feature vectors. For each cluster a minimal bounding rectangle (MBR) is formed, thus providing objects for indexing. Inserting new nodes into the R-tree is efficiently performed because of the chosen Quadratic Split algorithm. Our CBMR system implements the point query and the n-nearest neighbors query with the O(logn) time complexity. Different objective functions based on cluster similarity and dissimilarity measures are used for the genetic algorithm. We have found that all of them have similar impact on the retrieval performance in terms of precision and recall. The paper includes experimental results in measuring retrieval performance, reporting significant improvement over the untuned feature space.     

FM radio for indoor localization with spontaneous recalibration

The position of mobile users has become highly important information in pervasive computing environments. Indoor localization systems based on Wi–Fi signal strength fingerprinting techniques are widely used in office buildings with an existing Wi–Fi infrastructure. Our previous work has proposed a solution based on exploitation of a FM signal to deal with environments not covered with Wi–Fi signal or environments with only a single Wi–Fi access point. However, a general problem of indoor wireless positioning systems pertains to signal degradation due to the environmental factors affecting signal propagation. Therefore, in order to maintain a desirable level of localization accuracy, it becomes necessary to perform periodic calibrations of the system, which is either time consuming or requires dedicated equipment and expert knowledge. In this paper, we present a comparison of FM versus Wi–Fi positioning systems and a combination of both systems, exploiting their strengths for indoors positioning. We also address the problem of recalibration by introducing a novel concept of spontaneous recalibration and demonstrate it using the FM localization system. Finally, the results related to device orientation and localization accuracy are discussed.     

The stress stability of olanzapine: studies of interactions with excipients in solid state pharmaceutical formulations

Stress stability testing represents an important part of the drug development process. It is used as an important tool for the identification of degradation products and degradation pathways, as well as for the assessment of changes in physical form of drug molecules. The impact of excipients on the stability of olanzapine confirms that levels of impurities and degradants are limiting parameters and are therefore used for stability evaluation. The major degradation product of olanzapine was identified as 2-methyl-5,10-dihydro-4H-thieno[2,3-b][1,5]benzodiazepine-4-one (III). The structure of III was determined by using LC-MS, IR and NMR. Compatibility and stress stability results demonstrated that tablet formulations of olanzapine are sensitive to temperature and moisture. In samples protected from moisture, the increase in concentration of III was shown to be highly temperature dependent and the degradation followed zero-order kinetics. In addition, studies of olanzapine with excipients and in formulated tablets revealed polymorphic phase changes in some samples, influenced by a combination of stress temperature and humidity conditions. Polymorphic transitions were monitored using x-ray powder diffraction (XRPD) analysis and exhibited no correlation between the phase change (appearance of a new polymorph) and the degradation process.     

An electromagnetism metaheuristic for solving the Maximum Betweenness Problem

In this paper we present an electromagnetism (EM) metaheuristic for solving NP hard Maximum Betweenness Problem (MBP). A new encoding scheme with appropriate objective functions is implemented. Specific representation of the individuals enables the EM operators to explore the searching space in a way that achieves high quality solutions. An effective 1-swap based local search procedure improved by the specific caching technique is performed on each EM point. The algorithm is tested both on real and artificial instances from the literature. Experimental results show that the proposed EM approach achieves all previously known optimal solutions, except one, and achieves the best-known solutions or outperforms other approaches on all large-scale instances, except two. Provided statistical analysis indicates that the EM approach is significantly better than other approaches.     

Pre-Transplant Serum Leptin Levels and Relapse of Acute Myeloid Leukemia after Allogeneic Transplantation

Weight loss and metabolic activity influence outcome after allogeneic stem cell transplantation (alloSCT). This study evaluates pre-conditioning Leptin, a peptide hormone involved in metabolism and immune homeostasis, as a prognostic factor for survival, relapse and non-relapse mortality (NRM) following alloSCT. Leptin serum levels prior to conditioning were determined in a cohort of patients transplanted for various hematologic malignancies (n = 524) and correlated retrospectively with clinical outcome. Findings related to patients with acute leukemia (AL) from this sample were validated in an independent cohort. Low pre-conditioning serum Leptin was an independent prognostic marker for increased risk of relapse (but not of NRM and overall mortality) following alloSCT for AL of intermediate and advanced stage (beyond first complete remission). Multivariate analysis revealed a hazard ratio (HR) for relapse of 0.75 per log2 increase (0.59–0.96, p = 0.020). This effect was similar in an independent validation cohort. Pre-conditioning serum Leptin was validated as a prognostic marker for early relapse by fitting the multivariate Cox model to the validation data. Pre-conditioning serum Leptin levels may serve as an independent prognostic marker for relapse following alloSCT in intermediate and advanced stage AL patients. Prospective studies are required to prove whether serum Leptin could be used for guiding nutritional intervention in patients with AL undergoing alloSCT.     

CONVECTTVE HEAT AND MASS TRANSFER IN MOISTURE DESORPTION OF OAK WOOD BY INTRODUCING CHARACTERISTIC TRANSFER COEFFICIENTS

ABSTRACT

This paper presents the effect of forced convective heat and mass transfer coefficients on the predictive ability of a dynamic isothermal set of coupled partial differential equations. The analysis showed that the two coefficient two-dimensional model, resulted in a very good prediction of the experimental data.

The concept of experiment involves: six temperatures, six relative air humidities and three values of circulation velocity. Dimensions of oak (Quercus petraea) wood samples were 250×80×25mm. The experimental installation, designed and constructed for this study, enables the drying process of relatively small samples to be similar to the drying process of real timber.