Optical flow and advection on 2-Riemannian manifolds: a common framework

Dynamic pattern analysis and motion extraction can be efficiently addressed using optical flow techniques. This article presents a generalization of these questions to non-flat surfaces, where optical flow is tackled through the problem of evolution processes on non-Euclidian domains. The classical equations of optical flow in the Euclidian case are transposed to the theoretical framework of differential geometry. We adopt this formulation for the regularized optical flow problem, prove its mathematical well-posedness and combine it with the advection equation. The optical flow and advection problems are dual: a motion field may be retrieved from some scalar evolution using optical flow; conversely, a scalar field may be deduced from a velocity field using advection. These principles are illustrated with qualitative and quantitative evaluations from numerical simulations bridging both approaches. The proof-of-concept is further demonstrated with preliminary results from time-resolved functional brain imaging data, where organized propagations of cortical activation patterns are evidenced using our approach.     

Powell–Sabin B‐splines and unstructured standard T‐splines for the solution of the Kirchhoff–Love plate theory exploiting Bézier extraction

The equations that govern Kirchhoff–Love plate theory are solved using quadratic Powell–Sabin B‐splines and unstructured standard T‐splines. Bézier extraction is exploited to make the formulation computationally efficient. Because quadratic Powell–Sabin B‐splines result in ‐continuous shape functions, they are of sufficiently high continuity to capture Kirchhoff–Love plate theory when cast in a weak form. Unlike non‐uniform rational B‐splines (NURBS), which are commonly used in isogeometric analysis, Powell–Sabin B‐splines do not necessarily capture the geometry exactly. However, the fact that they are defined on triangles instead of on quadrilaterals increases their flexibility in meshing and can make them competitive with respect to NURBS, as no bending strip method for joined NURBS patches is needed. This paper further illustrates how unstructured T‐splines can be modified such that they are ‐continuous around extraordinary points, and that the blending functions fulfil the partition of unity property. The performance of quadratic NURBS, unstructured T‐splines, Powell–Sabin B‐splines and NURBS‐to‐NURPS (non‐uniform rational Powell–Sabin B‐splines, which are obtained by a transformation from a NURBS patch) is compared in a study of a circular plate. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

63Cu NMR in the normal state of HgBa2Ca2Cu3O8+δ

We present a⁶³Cu NMR study of HgBa₂Ca₂Cu₃O₈₊ underdoped single crystals with T_c 115 K. While the uniform spin susceptibility decreases below T_o 370 K, relaxation rate measurements demonstrate the opening of a spingap at Q = (, ) below T* 230 K, the highest temperature reported so far. The characteristic energy of spin fluctuations is shown to be higher than in underdoped YBa₂Cu₃O_7–, and the analysis of the quadrupole and hyperfine couplings suggests that the in-plane Cu-O hybridization is also stronger. The T-dependence of T₁ is the same in the three CuO₂ planes which seems hardly compatible with the pure interlayer spin-pairing picture.     

Characterization of renal tumours based on Raman spectra classification

In this study, we propose to evaluate the potential of Raman spectroscopy (RS) to assess renal tumours at surgery. Different classes of Raman renal spectra acquired during a clinical protocol are discriminated using support vector machines classifiers. The influence on the classification scores of various preprocessing steps generally involved in RS are also investigated and evaluated in the particular context of renal tumour characterization. Encouraging results show the interest of RS to evaluate kidney cancer and suggest the potential of this technique as a surgical assistance during partial nephrectomy.     

Accelerating scientific computations with mixed precision algorithms

On modern architectures, the performance of 32-bit operations is often at least twice as fast as the performance of 64-bit operations. By using a combination of 32-bit and 64-bit floating point arithmetic, the performance of many dense and sparse linear algebra algorithms can be significantly enhanced while maintaining the 64-bit accuracy of the resulting solution. The approach presented here can apply not only to conventional processors but also to other technologies such as Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA), Graphical Processing Units (GPU), and the STI Cell BE processor. Results on modern processor architectures and the STI Cell BE are presented.

Program summary

Program title: ITER-REFCatalogue identifier: AECO_v1_0Program summary URL:http://cpc.cs.qub.ac.uk/summaries/AECO_v1_0.htmlProgram obtainable from: CPC Program Library, Queen's University, Belfast, N. IrelandLicensing provisions: Standard CPC licence, http://cpc.cs.qub.ac.uk/licence/licence.htmlNo. of lines in distributed program, including test data, etc.: 7211No. of bytes in distributed program, including test data, etc.: 41 862Distribution format: tar.gzProgramming language: FORTRAN 77Computer: desktop, serverOperating system: Unix/LinuxRAM: 512 MbytesClassification: 4.8External routines: BLAS (optional)Nature of problem: On modern architectures, the performance of 32-bit operations is often at least twice as fast as the performance of 64-bit operations. By using a combination of 32-bit and 64-bit floating point arithmetic, the performance of many dense and sparse linear algebra algorithms can be significantly enhanced while maintaining the 64-bit accuracy of the resulting solution.Solution method: Mixed precision algorithms stem from the observation that, in many cases, a single precision solution of a problem can be refined to the point where double precision accuracy is achieved. A common approach to the solution of linear systems, either dense or sparse, is to perform the LU factorization of the coefficient matrix using Gaussian elimination. First, the coefficient matrix A is factored into the product of a lower triangular matrix L and an upper triangular matrix U. Partial row pivoting is in general used to improve numerical stability resulting in a factorization PA=LU, where P is a permutation matrix. The solution for the system is achieved by first solving Ly=Pb (forward substitution) and then solving Ux=y (backward substitution). Due to round-off errors, the computed solution, x, carries a numerical error magnified by the condition number of the coefficient matrix A. In order to improve the computed solution, an iterative process can be applied, which produces a correction to the computed solution at each iteration, which then yields the method that is commonly known as the iterative refinement algorithm. Provided that the system is not too ill-conditioned, the algorithm produces a solution correct to the working precision.Running time: seconds/minutes     

Partial 3D Shape Retrieval by Reeb Pattern Unfolding

This paper presents a novel approach for fast and efficient partial shape retrieval on a collection of 3D shapes. Each shape is represented by a Reeb graph associated with geometrical signatures. Partial similarity between two shapes is evaluated by computing a variant of their maximum common sub-graph.
By investigating Reeb graph theory, we take advantage of its intrinsic properties at two levels. First, we show that the segmentation of a shape by a Reeb graph provides charts with disk or annulus topology only. This topology control enables the computation of concise and efficient sub-part geometrical signatures based on parameterisation techniques. Secondly, we introduce the notion of Reeb pattern on a Reeb graph along with its structural signature. We show this information discards Reeb graph structural distortion and still depicts the topology of the related sub-parts. The number of combinations to evaluate in the matching process is then dramatically reduced by only considering the combinations of topology equivalent Reeb patterns.
The proposed framework is invariant against rigid transformations and robust against non-rigid transformations and surface noise. It queries the collection in interactive time (from 4 to 30 seconds for the largest queries). It outperforms the competing methods of the SHREC 2007 contest in term of NDCG vector and provides, respectively, a gain of 14.1% and 40.9% on the approaches by Biasotti et al. [ BMSF06 ] and Cornea et al. [ CDS*05 ].
As an application, we present an intelligent modelling-by-example system which enables a novice user to rapidly create new 3D shapes by composing shapes of a collection having similar sub-parts.     

The role of algorithm and result comprehensibility of automated scheduling on complacency

Several studies have stressed that even expert operators who are aware of a machine's limits could adopt its proposals without questioning them (i.e., the complacency phenomenon). In production scheduling for manufacturing, this is a significant problem, as it is often suggested that the machine be allowed to build the production schedule, confining the human role to that of rescheduling. This article evaluates the characteristics of scheduling algorithms on human rescheduling performance, the quality of which was related to complacency. It is suggested that scheduling algorithms be characterized as having result comprehensibility (the result respects the scheduler's expectations in terms of the discourse rules of the information display) or algorithm comprehensibility (the complexity of the algorithm hides some important constraints). The findings stress, on the one hand, that result comprehensibility is necessary to achieve good production performance and to limit complacency. On the other hand, algorithm comprehensibility leads to poor performance due to the very high cost of understanding the algorithm. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

An efficient and generic extension to ITK to process arbitrary shaped regions of interest

The paper describes a software method to extend ITK (Insight ToolKit, supported by the National Library of Medicine), leading to ITK++. This method, which is based on the extension of the iterator design pattern, allows the processing of regions of interest with arbitrary shapes, without modifying the existing ITK code. We experimentally evaluate this work by considering the practical case of the liver vessel segmentation from CT-scan images, where it is pertinent to constrain processings to the liver area. Experimental results clearly prove the interest of this work: for instance, the anisotropic filtering of this area is performed in only 16 s with our proposed solution, while it takes 52 s using the native ITK framework. A major advantage of this method is that only add-ons are performed: this facilitates the further evaluation of ITK++ while preserving the native ITK framework.