CU encoding depth prediction,early CU splitting termination and fast mode decision for fast HEVC intra-coding

High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) is a new video coding standard achieving about a 50% bit rate reduction compared to the popular H.264/AVC High Profile with the same subjective reproduced video quality. Better coding efficiency is attained, however, at the cost of significantly increased encoding complexity. Therefore, fast encoding algorithms with little loss in coding efficiency is necessary for HEVC to be successfully adopted for real applications. In this paper we propose a fast encoding technique applicable to HEVC all intra encoding. The proposed fast encoding technique consists of coding unit (CU) search depth prediction, early CU splitting termination, and fast mode decision. In CU search depth prediction, the depth of encoded CU in the current coding tree unit (CTU) is limited to predicted range, which is mostly narrower than the full depth range. Early CU splitting skips mode search of its sub-CUs when rate distortion (RD) cost of current CU is below the estimated RD cost at the current CU depth. RD cost and encoded CU depth distribution of the collocated CTU of the previous frame are utilized both to predict the encoding CU depth search range and to estimate the RD cost for CU splitting termination. Fast mode decision reduces the number of candidate modes for full rate distortion optimized quantization on the basis of the low complexity costs computed in the preceding rough mode decision step. When all these three methods are applied, proposed fast HEVC intra encoding technique reduces the encoding time of the reference encoder by 57% on the average, with only 0.6% of coding efficiency loss in terms of Bjontegaard delta (BD) rate increase under the HEVC common test conditions.     

Award for distinguished scientific early career contributions to psychology: Elissa Sarah Epel.

Presents the citation, biography, and selected bibliography for Elissa Sarah Epel, one of the 2008 recipients of the American Psychological Association's Award for Distinguished Scientific Early Career Contributions to Psychology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Factors contributing to early age shrinkage cracking of slag concretes subjected to 7-days moist curing

The objective of this study was to investigate all the factors contributing to early age shrinkage cracking in concrete, namely, shrinkage, tensile creep, tensile elastic modulus, tensile strength of concretes, and to study the effect of slag as a binder on these factors. The above-mentioned factors were measured in early age concretes made with 0, 35, 50 and 65% level replacement of ordinary Portland cement by slag. All the concretes studied were moist cured for 7-days. It was found that, at lower slag replacement levels (0, 35 and 50%), the tensile strength decreased with increasing slag replacement. However, this is more than compensated by decreasing tensile elastic modulus and shrinkage. There was no significant change found in tensile creep with the changing slag levels. The study shows that the influence of the tensile elastic modulus is a major consideration for early age cracking of slag concretes.     

Curvature weighted gradient based shape orientation

Determining the orientation of a shape is a common task in many image processing applications. It is usually part of the image preprocessing stages and further processing may rely on an adequate method to determine the orientation. There are several methods for computing the orientation of a shape, each of them with its own strengths and weaknesses; a method which performs outstandingly for one application may have a poor performance for a different application. In this paper we present a new method for computing shape orientation based on the projection of the tangent vectors of a shape onto a line and weighting them using a function of the curvature. Some of the results from ?uni? (2008) [14] are particular cases of the results presented here.     

Thiamine and Fatty Acid Content of Lake Michigan Chinook Salmon

Nutritional status of Lake Michigan Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) is inadequately documented. An investigation was conducted to determine muscle and liver thiamine content and whole body fatty acid composition in small, medium and large Chinook salmon. Muscle and liver thiamine concentrations were highest in small salmon, and tended to decrease with increasing fish size. Muscle thiamine was higher in fall than spring in large salmon. The high percentage of Chinook salmon (24–32% in fall and 58–71% in spring) with muscle thiamine concentration below 500 pmol/g, which has been associated with loss of equilibrium and death in other Great Lake salmonines, suggest that Chinook appear to rely less on thiamine than other Great Lakes species for which such low concentrations would be associated with thiamine deficiency (Brown et al. 2005b). A positive correlation was observed between liver total thiamine and percent liver lipids (r = 0.53, P < 0.0001, n = 119). In medium and large salmon, liver lipids were observed to be low in fish with less than 4,000 pmol/g liver total thiamine. In individuals with greater than 4,000 pmol/g liver thiamine, liver lipid increased with thiamine concentration. Individual fatty acids declined between fall and spring. Essential omega-3 fatty acids appear to be conserved as lipid content declined. Arachidonic acid (C20:4n6), an essential omega-6 fatty acid was not different between fall and spring, although the sum of omega-6 (Sw6) fatty acids declined over winter. Elevated concentrations of saturated fatty acids (sum) were observed in whole body tissue lipid. In summary, thiamine, a dietary essential vitamin, and individual fatty acids were found to vary in Lake Michigan Chinook salmon by fish size and season of the year.     

Autogenous shrinkage of high-strength concrete containing silica fume under drying at early ages

The present study investigated experimentally autogenous shrinkage of high-strength concrete containing silica fume under drying at early ages. The influence of drying on hydration of cementitious materials in the high-strength concrete with water-binder ratios of 0.25, 0.35 and 0.45 was evaluated based on bound water content (BWC), which was exposed to drying at the ages of 0.5, 1.0 and 3.0 days, respectively. By establishing the relationship between the BWC and autogenous shrinkage strain under sealed conditions, autogenous shrinkage strain under drying conditions and drying shrinkage strain were separated from total shrinkage strain, and, then, the contribution of autogenous shrinkage in total shrinkage was discussed. The results showed that the percentage of autogenous shrinkage was macroscopically 50-20% based on the present method, while that was 70-30% based on the conventional superposition principle (SP). The latter resulted in overestimating autogenous shrinkage strain under drying conditions.     

Award for Distinguished Scientific Early Career Contributions to Psychology: James J. Gross.

Presents a citation for James J. Gross, who received the 2001 Award for Distinguished Scientific Early Career Contributions to Psychology, "for reminding us that emotions do not merely happen to us but rather are actively modified and altered in a number of different ways." A biography and selected bibliography accompany the citation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Award for Distinguished Scientific Early Career Contributions to Psychology: Stephen A. Maren.

Presents a citation for Stephen Maren, who received the 2001 Award for Distinguished Scientific Early Career Contributions to Psychology. "With an ability to move seamlessly between multiple levels of analysis, from cognitive to behavioral to synaptic, Stephen A. Maren has provided important insight into the synaptic mechanisms underlying learning and memory for emotional events." Accompanying the citation are a biography and selected bibliography. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Distinguished scientific awards for an early career contribution to psychology: Frank C. Keil.

Presents the citation, biography, and selected bibliography for Frank C. Keil, one of the 1985 recipients of the American Psychological Association's Distinguished Scientific Awards for an Early Career Contribution to Psychology. Keil was honored for his work in the field of developmental psychology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Deanna M. Barch: Award for Distinguished Scientific Early Career Contributions to Psychology.

Announces Deanna M. Barch as a recipient of the Award for Distinguished Scientific Early Career Contributions to Psychology for 2002. A biographical statement is included, along with major works and contributions for the field. Barch received this award for research on the relationship between clinical, cognitive, and neurobiological disturbances in schizophrenia. Using behavioral methods, functional neuroimaging, and computational modeling, her work has taken ideas from basic research on the function of prefrontal cortex and used these to dissect the specific contribution that prefrontal deficits make to cognitive abnormalities in attention, memory, and language in schizophrenia and their expression as clinical symptoms. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)