A computational approach to implicit entities and events in text and discourse

In this paper we will focus on the notion of “implicit” or lexically unexpressed linguistic elements that are nonetheless necessary for a complete semantic interpretation of a text. We refer to “entities” and “events” because the recovery of the implicit material may affect all the modules of a system for semantic processing, from the grammatically guided components to the inferential and reasoning ones. Reference to the system GETARUNS offers one possible implementation of the algorithms and procedures needed to cope with the problem and enables us to deal with all the spectrum of phenomena. The paper will address at first the following three types of “implicit” entities and events:

the grammatical ones, as suggested by a linguistic theories like LFG or similar generative theories;

the semantic ones suggested in the FrameNet project, i.e. CNI, DNI, INI;

the pragmatic ones: here we will present a theory and an implementation for the recovery of implicit entities and events of (non-) standard implicatures.

In particular we will show how the use of commonsense knowledge may fruitfully contribute to find relevant implied meanings. Last Implicit Entity only touched on, though for lack of space, is the Subject of Point of View, which is computed by Semantic Informational Structure and contributes the intended entity from whose point of view a given subjective statement is expressed.     

An organic donor/acceptor lateral superlattice at the nanoscale

A precise control of the nanometer-scale morphology in systems containing mixtures of donor/acceptor molecules is a key factor to improve the efficiency of organic photovoltaic devices. Here we report on a scanning tunneling microscopy study of the first stages of growth of 2-[9-(1,3-dithiol-2-ylidene)anthracen-10(9H)-ylidene]-1,3-dithiole, as electron donor, and phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester, as electron acceptor, on a Au(111) substrate under ultrahigh vacuum conditions. Due to differences in bonding strength with the substrate and different interactions with the Au(111) herringbone surface reconstruction, mixed thin films spontaneously segregate into a lateral superlattice of interdigitated nanoscale stripes with a characteristic width of about 10-20 nm, a morphology that has been predicted to optimize the efficiency of organic solar cells.     

Scope and Post‐Transformations for the Borane‐Isocyanide Multicomponent Reactions: Concise Access to Structurally Diverse Heterocyclic Compounds

A recently described family of multicomponent reactions (MCRs) involving isocyanides, aldehydes, dipolarophiles and alkylboranes that yield highly substituted aziridines, oxazolidines and pyrrolidines has been studied in detail. In this work the scope of these processes is significantly increased by preparing the borane input through hydroboration of alkenes or organometallic processes, in tandem with the MCR. The aldehyde range is also expanded, and indole‐3‐carbaldehydes yield reactive imines and bis‐indolyloxazolidines, depending on the electron density of the heterocycle. Finally, the obtained adducts constitute an ideal platform to generate structurally diverse compounds using simple post‐condensation modifications. In this way, indole imines undergo stereoselective hydrocyanation and oxazolidines are reductively opened to give amino alcohols. Additionally, palladium‐, ruthenium‐ and gold‐catalyzed processes lead to a variety of complex heterocycles. The methodology is simple, efficient and highly divergent, leading to an array of interesting scaffolds for medicinal chemistry.

     

Previsional estimation of the energy output of windgenerators

This paper illustrates a simple method for evaluating the energy output of windgenerators of known main characteristics in a site of known wind typology. The method is based on the matching of a model of the WECS with the Weibull model of wind regime. To enter the method the following quantities must be known: Weibull shape parameter and mean wind speed, turbine diameter, hub height, cut-in and nominal wind speeds and nominal power. With these quantities one can enter a diagram that gives the value of the plant utilisation factor for any specific siting. An example shows how to make a choice among several models of small size.     

Reducing the power of wireless terminals by adaptive baseband processing

In this paper, we illustrate specific power savings obtained from exploiting a reconfigurable mobile terminal under the 3GPP LTE standard. Building on traditional link adaptation towards maximum throughput and extended towards minimal power consumption, we add two flexible baseband components: the turbo decoder and the multiple input multiple output (MIMO) detector. Optimizing their configuration leads to larger power savings when compared to non-flexible systems only performing link adaptation. The gain observed strongly depends on the scenario. For low-activity set-ups with a few minutes of voice per day, the idle power dominates and the active data rate is relatively low. This makes analog front-end and time-domain processing dominant given their constant power consumption while MIMO detection and turbo decoding that scale with data rate play a smaller role. Still, because of its ability to improve the system spectral efficiency and hence reduce its duty cycle, an advanced MIMO detector can save 10% in power consumption, on the condition that the network requires to use MIMO. Otherwise single input single output is more power-efficient in downlink. In high-throughput scenarios, larger gains are obtained. The flexible MIMO detector can save up to 35% of average power consumption. The turbo decoding also brings some gain, saving up to 12% of power when the full bandwidth is allocated to a single user.     

CMOS harmonic upconverter with power management of $$2{\bf nd}$$ harmonic for wideband short-range communications

The design and simulation of a 2nd harmonic based upconverter is introduced. With the proposed upconverter, it is possible to reach a good noise figure with power and area reduction. The design of the circuit was made with the UMC \(0.18\,\upmu \hbox {m}\) Mixed Mode/RF CMOS technology. However, the design methodology can be extended to a different CMOS process. According to the performance exhibited by the purposed mixer, it may be useful in wideband short-range communication technologies, such as certified wireless USB.     

Platform designer: An approach for modeling multiprocessor platforms based on SystemC

This paper[3.5pc] presents the Platform Designer (PD) framework, a set of SystemC based tools that provide support for modeling, simulation and analysis of multiprocessor SoC platforms (MPSoC), at different abstraction levels. PD provides mechanisms for interconnection specification, process synchronization and communication, thus allowing the modeling of a complete platform, in a unified environment. To do that it uses an extension of the ArchC ADL and acsys, a tool that enables the automatic generation of a SystemC simulator of the platform. The main advantages of this approach are twofold. First, designers have more flexibility since they can integrate and configure different processors to the platform, using a single environment. Second, it enables a faster design space exploration, given that it automatically generates SystemC simulators of whole platforms at distinct abstraction levels. A number of platform variations can be tried out with minor design changes, thus reducing design time. Experimental results show the suitability of the platform simulator for design space exploration. Real applications (with medium complexity) run in the platform in few minutes. Combined with the facility to generate platforms with minor changes, this feature allows an improvement of the design space exploration.