Turk-2, a multi-modal chess player

In this paper we present Turk-2, a hybrid multi-modal chess player with a robot arm and a screen-based talking head. Turk-2 can not only play chess, but can see and hear the opponent, can talk to him and display emotions. We were interested to find out if a simple embodiment with human-like communication capabilities enhances the experience of playing chess against a computer. First, give an overview of the development road to multi-modal communication with computers. Then we motivate our research with a hybrid system, we introduce the architecture of Turk-2, we describe the human experiments and its evaluation. The results justify that multi-modal interaction makes game playing more engaging, enjoyable – and even more effective. These findings for a specific game situation provide yet another evidence of the power of human-like interaction in turning computer systems more attractive and easier to use.     

A note on the security of PAP

In this letter, we analyze the security of an RFID authentication protocol proposed by Liu and Bailey [1], called privacy and authentication protocol (PAP). We present two traceability attacks and an impersonation attack.     

A Faà di Bruno Hopf algebra for a group of Fliess operators with applications to feedback

A Faà di Bruno type Hopf algebra is developed for a group of integral operators known as Fliess operators, where operator composition is the group product. Such operators are normally written in terms of generating series over a noncommutative alphabet. Using a general series expansion for the antipode, an explicit formula for the generating series of the compositional inverse operator is derived. The result is applied to analytic nonlinear feedback systems to produce an explicit formula for the feedback product, that is, the generating series for the Fliess operator representation of the closed-loop system written in terms of the generating series of the Fliess operator component systems. This formula is employed to provide a proof that local convergence is preserved under feedback.     

Constructive semantics for instantaneous reactions

This paper presents some results towards a game-theoretic account of the constructive semantics of step responses for synchronous languages, providing a coherent semantic framework encompassing both non-deterministic Statecharts (as per Pnueli & Shalev) and deterministic esterel. In particular, it is shown that esterel arises from a finiteness condition on strategies whereas Statecharts permits infinite games. Beyond giving a novel and unifying account of these concrete languages the paper sketches a general theory for obtaining different notions of constructive responses in terms of winning conditions for finite and infinite games and their characterisation as maximal post-fixed points of functions in directed complete lattices of intensional truth-values.     

Some Statistical-Estimation Methods for Stochastic Finite-State Transducers

Formal translations constitute a suitable framework for dealing with many problems in pattern recognition and computational linguistics. The application of formal transducers to these areas requires a stochastic extension for dealing with noisy, distorted patterns with high variability. In this paper, some estimation criteria are proposed and developed for the parameter estimation of regular syntax-directed translation schemata. These criteria are: maximum likelihood estimation, minimum conditional entropy estimation and conditional maximum likelihood estimation. The last two criteria were proposed in order to deal with situations when training data is sparse. These criteria take into account the possibility of ambiguity in the translations: i.e., there can be different output strings for a single input string. In this case, the final goal of the stochastic framework is to find the highest probability translation of a given input string. These criteria were tested on a translation task which has a high degree of ambiguity.     

Stochastic automata-based estimators for adaptively compressing files with nonstationary distributions.

This correspondence shows that learning automata techniques, which have been useful in developing weak estimators, can be applied to data compression applications in which the data distributions are nonstationary. The adaptive coding scheme utilizes stochastic learning-based weak estimation techniques to adaptively update the probabilities of the source symbols, and this is done without resorting to either maximum likelihood, Bayesian, or sliding-window methods. The authors have incorporated the estimator in the adaptive Fano coding scheme and in an adaptive entropy-based scheme that "resembles" the well-known arithmetic coding. The empirical results obtained for both of these adaptive methods are obtained on real-life files that possess a fair degree of nonstationarity. From these results, it can be seen that the proposed schemes compress nearly 10% more than their respective adaptive methods that use maximum-likelihood estimator-based estimates.     

A comparison of directed formulations for the capacitated minimal spanning tree problem

In this paper, we compare linear integer programming directed formulations for the capacitated minimal spanning tree (CMST) problem. This problem is directly related to network design and consists of finding the cheapest way to link a set of terminals at different locations with a central node (a computer site, for instance). The present work focuses on a single commodity flow formulation presented in [3,4]. This formulation includes two sets of variables and, hence, it also must include coupling constraints between the two sets of variables. These coupling constraints can be defined in several ways. The main result of this work establishes that when the strongest form of the coupling constraints is used in the flow formulation (as in [4]), the equivalent formulation using only theX _ij variables satisfies the so-called multistar constraints. These constraints are shown to be stronger than the weakest form of the generalized subtour breaking constraints and, hence, our result improves on the characterization given in [5] for the flow formulation presented in [4]. For certain parameters, the multistar constraints induce facets of the non-directed CMST polytope (see [2]). We also show that it is not possible to compare the linear relaxations of a formulation that involves the multistar constraints with one that involves the generalized subtour breaking constraints.     

Alphonse de Candolle's early scientometrics(1883, 1885) with references to recent trends in the field (1978–1983)

De Candolle analyzed in 1883 and 1885, respectively two important fields of human cultural evolution: the domestication of crop plants and the emergence of modern science. In hisHistoire de science et des savants depuis deux sciecles, principles were established, science indicators outlined, interactions examined and mathematical methods applied to the study of a selected data set related to scientific development. In order to compare national and international scientific communities twenty standard factors were considered and national participation in international scientific societies was analysed for 14 European countries and the United States.De Candolle was the first to analyse mathematically the number, dynamics and national distribution of scientists in their professional organisations, the specialization and professionalization of scientists and characterized the scientific potential of different countries with the number of international science society members per inhabitant per period (1750–1884). The role ofde Candolle as a forerunner of modern scientometrics and the science of science is revealed in a comparison of his work with recent trends. In the first five volumes of the journalScientometrics 51 papers were identified dealing with topics related to those dealt with byde Candolle.