Energieinformatik

Due to the increasing importance of producing and consuming energy more sustainably, Energy Informatics (EI) has evolved into a thriving research area within the CS/IS community. The article attempts to characterize this young and highly dynamic field of research by describing current EI research topics and methods and provides an outlook of how the field might evolve in the future. It is shown that two general research questions have received the most attention so far and are likely to dominate the EI research agenda in the coming years: How to leverage information and communication technology (ICT) to (1) improve energy efficiency, and (2) to integrate decentralized renewable energy sources into the power grid. Selected EI streams are reviewed, highlighting how the respective research questions are broken down into specific research projects and how EI researchers have made contributions based on their individual academic background.     

Pointillist video stylization based on particle tracing

We present an algorithm that stylizes an input video into a painterly animation without user intervention. In particular, we focus on pointillist animation with stable temporal coherence. Temporal coherence is an important problem in non-photorealistic rendering for videos. To realize pointillist animation, the various characters of pointillism should be considered in painting process to maintain temporal coherence. For this, weused the particle video algorithm which is a new approach to long-range motion estimation in video. Based on this method, we introduce a method to control the density of particles considering the features of frames and importance maps. Finally, the propagation methods of stroke to minimize flickering effects of brush strokes are introduced.     

Quantum correlations at negative absolute temperatures

We study behavior of quantum discord, a kind of quantum correlation, in systems of dipole–dipole interacting spins in an external magnetic field in the whole temperature range ( \(-\infty ). It was shown that negative temperatures, which are introduced to describe inversions in the population in a finite level system, provide more favorable conditions for emergence of quantum correlations including entanglement. We show that at negative temperature, the correlations become more intense and discord exists between remote spins being in separated states.     

Model reduction based on limited‐time interval impulse response Gramians

In this paper, three new Gramians are introduced namely ‐ limited‐time interval impulse response Gramians (LTIRG), generalized limited‐time Gramians (GLTG) and generalized limited‐time impulse response Gramians (GLTIRG). GLTG and GLTIRG are applicable to both unstable systems and also to systems which have eigenvalues of opposite polarities and equal magnitude. The concept of these Gramians is utilized to develop model reduction algorithms for linear time‐invariant continuous‐time single‐input single‐output (SISO) systems. In the cases of GLTIRG and GLTG based model reduction, the standard time‐limited Gramians are generalized to be applied to unstable systems by transforming the original system into a new system which requires the solution of two Riccati equations. Two numerical examples are included to illustrate the proposed methods. The results are also compared with standard techniques.     

Effect of photoaligning azo dye structure on liquid crystal anchoring energy

A method of controlling anchoring energy of surface interaction of liquid crystal photoaligning substances is considered to enhance the liquid crystal display performances. An important parameter of the dye's molecular structure that determines the ratio of polar and azimuthal anchoring energy is the ability to form dimers. The values of dimerization thermodynamic potentials have been found. The probability of the formation of dye molecules dimers is evaluated. The bonds conjugation transfer via intermolecular hydrogen bond is revealed, and anisotropy of polarizability of the hydrogen bond is evaluated. The effect of dimerization on polar and azimuthal anchoring energy of liquid crystal — azo dye system — is shown.     

Efficient product sampling using hierarchical thresholding

We present an efficient method for importance sampling the product of multiple functions. Our algorithm computes a quick approximation of the product on the fly, based on hierarchical representations of the local maxima and averages of the individual terms. Samples are generated by exploiting the hierarchical properties of many low-discrepancy sequences, and thresholded against the estimated product. We evaluate direct illumination by sampling the triple product of environment map lighting, surface reflectance, and a visibility function estimated per pixel. Our results show considerable noise reduction compared to existing state-of-the-art methods using only the product of lighting and BRDF.     

The Strong Property of Morphological Connected Alternated Filters

This paper studies connectivity aspects that arise in image operators that process connected components. The focus is on morphological image analysis (i.e., on increasing image operators) and, in particular, on a robustness property satisfied by certain morphological filters that is denominated the strong property. The behavior of alternated compositions of openings and closings is investigated under certain assumptions, particularly connectedness and a connected component preserving condition. It is shown that these conditions cannot in general guarantee the strong property of certain connected alternated filters because of issues related to the locality of the filters. As treated in the paper, there have been a series of misunderstandings in the literature concerning this topic, and it is important to clarify them. The root cause of those problems is discussed, and a solution is indicated. The class of connected openings and closings used to build connected alternated filters should therefore be defined to avoid such situations, since the strong property of alternated filters should be a distinctive characteristic of this class.

Continuity versus Discretization

The threefold interest in architecture, biology and mathematics motivated us to examine and justify new architectural forms. We discuss some notions of rhythm: Euclidean, morphogenetic and morphologic. Contemporary relationships between structure and form are based on the generation of shape by technological processes, thus the resulting objects are restricted to their material expression. Here a phenomenological organisation of form and its continuity with the landscape arise out of the mathematical and architectural creativity. The use of the computer is applied from outside to inside instead from inside to outside; this means that we are dealing with the organisational processes via continuous methods instead of evolutionary processes given by computer simulations, known as genetic algorithms, where the resulting configurations are reduced to a matter of routine. The role of design as an aesthetic component innovates the theoretical framework of structural engineering to establish the architectural environments.     

Striate cortex extracts higher-order spatial correlations from visual textures

Spatial correlations define the statistical structure of any visual image. Two-point correlations inform the visual system about the spatial frequency content of an image. Higher-order correlations can capture salient features such as object contours. We studied "isodipole" texture discrimination in V1 to determine if higher-order spatial correlations can be extracted by early stages of cortical processing. We made epicortical, local field potential, and single-cell recordings of responses elicited by isodipole texture interchange in anesthetized monkeys. Our studies demonstrate that single neurons in V1 can signal the presence of higher-order spatial correlations in visual textures. This places a computational mechanism, which may be essential for form vision at the earliest stage of cortical processing.