How can I help you? Design principles for task-oriented speech dialog systems in customer service

Organizations are increasingly delegating customer inquiries to speech dialog systems (SDSs) to save personnel resources. However, customers often report frustration when interacting with SDSs due to poorly designed solutions. Despite these issues, design knowledge for SDSs in customer service remains elusive. To address this research gap, we employ the design science approach and devise a design theory for SDSs in customer service. The design theory, including 14 requirements and five design principles, draws on the principles of dialog theory and undergoes validation in three iterations using five hypotheses. A summative evaluation comprising a two-phase experiment with 205 participants yields positive results regarding the user experience of the artifact. This study contributes to design knowledge for SDSs in customer service and supports practitioners striving to implement similar systems in their organizations.

     

Efficient duration and hierarchical modeling for human activity recognition

A challenge in building pervasive and smart spaces is to learn and recognize human activities of daily living (ADLs). In this paper, we address this problem and argue that in dealing with ADLs, it is beneficial to exploit both their typical duration patterns and inherent hierarchical structures. We exploit efficient duration modeling using the novel Coxian distribution to form the Coxian hidden semi-Markov model (CxHSMM) and apply it to the problem of learning and recognizing ADLs with complex temporal dependencies. The Coxian duration model has several advantages over existing duration parameterization using multinomial or exponential family distributions, including its denseness in the space of nonnegative distributions, low number of parameters, computational efficiency and the existence of closed-form estimation solutions. Further we combine both hierarchical and duration extensions of the hidden Markov model (HMM) to form the novel switching hidden semi-Markov model (SHSMM), and empirically compare its performance with existing models. The model can learn what an occupant normally does during the day from unsegmented training data and then perform online activity classification, segmentation and abnormality detection. Experimental results show that Coxian modeling outperforms a range of baseline models for the task of activity segmentation. We also achieve a recognition accuracy competitive to the current state-of-the-art multinomial duration model, while gaining a significant reduction in computation. Furthermore, cross-validation model selection on the number of phases K in the Coxian indicates that only a small K is required to achieve the optimal performance. Finally, our models are further tested in a more challenging setting in which the tracking is often lost and the activities considerably overlap. With a small amount of labels supplied during training in a partially supervised learning mode, our models are again able to deliver reliable performance, again with a small number of phases, making our proposed framework an attractive choice for activity modeling.     

Robust control via concave minimization local and global algorithms

This paper is concerned with the robust control problem of linear fractional representation (LFT) uncertain systems depending on a time-varying parameter uncertainty. Our main result exploits a linear matrix inequality (LMI) characterization involving scalings and Lyapunov variables subject to an additional essentially nonconvex algebraic constraint. The nonconvexity enters the problem in the form of a rank deficiency condition or matrix inverse relation on the scalings only. It is shown that such problems, but also more generally rank inequalities and bilinear constraints, can be formulated as the minimization of a concave functional subject to LMI constraints. First of all, a local Frank and Wolfe (1956) feasible direction algorithm is introduced in this context to tackle this hard optimization problem. Exploiting the attractive concavity structure of the problem, several efficient global concave programming methods are then introduced and combined with the local feasible direction method to secure and certify global optimality of the solutions. Computational experiments indicate the viability of our algorithms, and in the worst case, they require the solution of a few LMI programs     

AH-64D main transmission accessory drive spur gear installation fault detections

The US Army has launched an aggressive program to implement condition based maintenance on its rotary wing assets. Condition Based Maintenance takes advantage of technology developments in the areas of machinery monitoring, signal processing and fault modeling to reduce the cost of ownership through improved maintenance procedures. Documenting the reduction in maintenance burden, cost savings and increased safety through early detection of helicopter faults is an important step in justifying the program. This paper describes a novel technique used to detect a serious fault in the accessory section of the AH-64D Apache main transmission. The technique determines if the primary or secondary clutch system is driving the aircraft accessories through a tachometer speed ratio. The method has identified three aircraft operating on the secondary system allowing Army maintenance crews to replace the affected transmissions and quickly restore the aircraft to operational status.     

Low temperature synthesis and characterisation of lecontite, (NH4)Na(SO4)·2H20

Lecontite, (NH₄)Na(SO₄).2H₂O, was synthesised at room temperature in high purity compared to earlier work with a minor impurity of mascagnite, (NH₄)₂SO₄. Rietveld refinement of the XRD results confirmed the crystal structure and unit cell dimensions as published earlier. Raman and Infrared spectroscopy, in conjunction with factor group analysis, resulted in a complex pattern of overlapping sulphate, NH and OH modes. The NH modes υ₁ was observed around 2880 cm⁻¹, υ₂ around 1700 cm⁻¹ overlapping with water OH-bending modes, υ₃ around 3300 cm⁻¹ overlapping with water OH-stretching modes around 3023, 3185 and 3422 cm⁻¹, and υ₄ around 1432, 1447 and 1462 cm⁻¹. The sulphate group in the crystal structure displays a decrease in symmetry from T_d as evidenced by the activation of the ν₁ mode at 982 cm⁻¹ and the ν₂ mode around 452 cm⁻¹ in the Infrared spectrum. The υ₃ mode shows clear splitting in the infrared spectra with a strong band at 1064 cm⁻¹ accompanied by two shoulders at 1107 and 1139 cm⁻¹. The Raman spectra show three weak bands at 1068, 1109 and 1135 cm⁻¹ with a shoulder at 1155 cm⁻¹. Similar splitting was observed for the υ₄ mode around 611 and 632 cm⁻¹ in the Infrared and Raman spectra, respectively.     

Physical,mechanical and thermal properties of cross laminated timber made with coconut wood

European Journal of Wood and Wood Products - The fundamental material properties of coconut wood cross-laminated timber (CLT) were experimentally evaluated with a focus on the effect of the...     

The APOA5-rs662799 Polymorphism Is a Determinant of Dyslipidemia in Vietnamese Primary School Children

Apolipoprotein A-V encoded by apolipoprotein 5 (APOA5) gene plays an important role in lipid metabolism, especially in the regulation of plasma triglycerol levels. The study aimed to evaluate the association of the APOA5-rs662799 polymorphism with dyslipidemia in Vietnamese children and the potential modification of obesity-related traits (body mass index, waist circumference, hip circumference, and waist-to-hip ratio) on this association. A case–control study was conducted with a total of 154 dyslipidemia cases and 389 controls at the age of 6 to 10 recruited at 31 primary schools in Hanoi city of Vietnam. Genotype for APOA5-rs662799 polymorphism was determined by the restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis. The association of APOA5-rs662799 polymorphism with dyslipidemia adjusting for age, sex, residence, and obesity-related traits was analyzed by binary logistic regression analysis. The results showed that in comparison with T/T and T/C carriers, the C/C carriers had a higher concentration of serum TAG in cases (p =0.049). Carriers of the C allele (C/C + T/C) had higher risk for developing dyslipidemia and hypertriglyceridemia than subjects with T/T genotype (odds ratio, OR = 1.7, p =0.0062 and OR = 1.6, p = 0.026, respectively). The association remained significant after adjusting for age, gender, residence, and obesity status (OR = 1.75, p = 0.006 and OR = 1.53, p = 0.049, respectively) or other obesity-related traits. The study suggested that the APOA5-rs662799 polymorphism may be a determinant of dyslipidemia and hypertriglyceridemia in Vietnamese children, independent of obesity-related traits.