id
stringlengths
9
16
title
stringlengths
4
278
categories
stringlengths
5
104
abstract
stringlengths
6
4.09k
1204.6181
The conduciveness of CA-rule graphs
nlin.CG cs.NE
Given two subsets A and B of nodes in a directed graph, the conduciveness of the graph from A to B is the ratio representing how many of the edges outgoing from nodes in A are incoming to nodes in B. When the graph's nodes stand for the possible solutions to certain problems of combinatorial optimization, choosing its edges appropriately has been shown to lead to conduciveness properties that provide useful insight into the performance of algorithms to solve those problems. Here we study the conduciveness of CA-rule graphs, that is, graphs whose node set is the set of all CA rules given a cell's number of possible states and neighborhood size. We consider several different edge sets interconnecting these nodes, both deterministic and random ones, and derive analytical expressions for the resulting graph's conduciveness toward rules having a fixed number of non-quiescent entries. We demonstrate that one of the random edge sets, characterized by allowing nodes to be sparsely interconnected across any Hamming distance between the corresponding rules, has the potential of providing reasonable conduciveness toward the desired rules. We conjecture that this may lie at the bottom of the best strategies known to date for discovering complex rules to solve specific problems, all of an evolutionary nature.
1204.6233
Strong Backdoors to Bounded Treewidth SAT
cs.DS cs.AI cs.CC cs.DM math.CO
There are various approaches to exploiting "hidden structure" in instances of hard combinatorial problems to allow faster algorithms than for general unstructured or random instances. For SAT and its counting version #SAT, hidden structure has been exploited in terms of decomposability and strong backdoor sets. Decomposability can be considered in terms of the treewidth of a graph that is associated with the given CNF formula, for instance by considering clauses and variables as vertices of the graph, and making a variable adjacent with all the clauses it appears in. On the other hand, a strong backdoor set of a CNF formula is a set of variables such that each possible partial assignment to this set moves the formula into a fixed class for which (#)SAT can be solved in polynomial time. In this paper we combine the two above approaches. In particular, we study the algorithmic question of finding a small strong backdoor set into the class W_t of CNF formulas whose associated graphs have treewidth at most t. The main results are positive: (1) There is a cubic-time algorithm that, given a CNF formula F and two constants k,t\ge 0, either finds a strong W_t-backdoor set of size at most 2^k, or concludes that F has no strong W_t-backdoor set of size at most k. (2) There is a cubic-time algorithm that, given a CNF formula F, computes the number of satisfying assignments of F or concludes that sb_t(F)>k, for any pair of constants k,t\ge 0. Here, sb_t(F) denotes the size of a smallest strong W_t-backdoor set of F. The significance of our results lies in the fact that they allow us to exploit algorithmically a hidden structure in formulas that is not accessible by any one of the two approaches (decomposability, backdoors) alone. Already a backdoor size 1 on top of treewidth 1 (i.e., sb_1(F)=1) entails formulas of arbitrarily large treewidth and arbitrarily large cycle cutsets.
1204.6250
Feature Selection for Generator Excitation Neurocontroller Development Using Filter Technique
cs.SY cs.LG
Essentially, motive behind using control system is to generate suitable control signal for yielding desired response of a physical process. Control of synchronous generator has always remained very critical in power system operation and control. For certain well known reasons power generators are normally operated well below their steady state stability limit. This raises demand for efficient and fast controllers. Artificial intelligence has been reported to give revolutionary outcomes in the field of control engineering. Artificial Neural Network (ANN), a branch of artificial intelligence has been used for nonlinear and adaptive control, utilizing its inherent observability. The overall performance of neurocontroller is dependent upon input features too. Selecting optimum features to train a neurocontroller optimally is very critical. Both quality and size of data are of equal importance for better performance. In this work filter technique is employed to select independent factors for ANN training.
1204.6284
The Network of French Legal Codes
cs.AI cs.SI physics.soc-ph
We propose an analysis of the codified Law of France as a structured system. Fifty two legal codes are selected on the basis of explicit legal criteria and considered as vertices with their mutual quotations forming the edges in a network which properties are analyzed relying on graph theory. We find that a group of 10 codes are simultaneously the most citing and the most cited by other codes, and are also strongly connected together so forming a "rich club" sub-graph. Three other code communities are also found that somewhat partition the legal field is distinct thematic sub-domains. The legal interpretation of this partition is opening new untraditional lines of research. We also conjecture that many legal systems are forming such new kind of networks that share some properties in common with small worlds but are far denser. We propose to call "concentrated world".
1204.6321
Efficient Video Indexing on the Web: A System that Leverages User Interactions with a Video Player
cs.MM cs.DL cs.HC cs.IR
In this paper, we propose a user-based video indexing method, that automatically generates thumbnails of the most important scenes of an online video stream, by analyzing users' interactions with a web video player. As a test bench to verify our idea we have extended the YouTube video player into the VideoSkip system. In addition, VideoSkip uses a web-database (Google Application Engine) to keep a record of some important parameters, such as the timing of basic user actions (play, pause, skip). Moreover, we implemented an algorithm that selects representative thumbnails. Finally, we populated the system with data from an experiment with nine users. We found that the VideoSkip system indexes video content by leveraging implicit users interactions, such as pause and thirty seconds skip. Our early findings point toward improvements of the web video player and its thumbnail generation technique. The VideSkip system could compliment content-based algorithms, in order to achieve efficient video-indexing in difficult videos, such as lectures or sports.
1204.6325
CELL: Connecting Everyday Life in an archipeLago
cs.HC cs.LG
We explore the design of a seamless broadcast communication system that brings together the distributed community of remote secondary education schools. In contrast to higher education, primary and secondary education establishments should remain distributed, in order to maintain a balance of urban and rural life in the developing and the developed world. We plan to deploy an ambient and social interactive TV platform (physical installation, authoring tools, interactive content) that supports social communication in a positive way. In particular, we present the physical design and the conceptual model of the system.
1204.6326
Background subtraction based on Local Shape
cs.CV
We present a novel approach to background subtraction that is based on the local shape of small image regions. In our approach, an image region centered on a pixel is mod-eled using the local self-similarity descriptor. We aim at obtaining a reliable change detection based on local shape change in an image when foreground objects are moving. The method first builds a background model and compares the local self-similarities between the background model and the subsequent frames to distinguish background and foreground objects. Post-processing is then used to refine the boundaries of moving objects. Results show that this approach is promising as the foregrounds obtained are com-plete, although they often include shadows.
1204.6341
Stochastic Ordering of Interferences in Large-scale Wireless Networks
cs.IT math.IT
Stochastic orders are binary relations defined on probability distributions which capture intuitive notions like being larger or being more variable. This paper introduces stochastic ordering of interference distributions in large-scale networks modeled as point process. Interference is the main performance-limiting factor in most wireless networks, thus it is important to understand its statistics. Since closed-form results for the distribution of interference for such networks are only available in limited cases, interference of networks are compared using stochastic orders, even when closed form expressions for interferences are not tractable. We show that the interference from a large-scale network depends on the fading distributions with respect to the stochastic Laplace transform order. The condition for path-loss models is also established to have stochastic ordering between interferences. The stochastic ordering of interferences between different networks are also shown. Monte-Carlo simulations are used to supplement our analytical results.
1204.6346
Magic Sets for Disjunctive Datalog Programs
cs.AI cs.LO
In this paper, a new technique for the optimization of (partially) bound queries over disjunctive Datalog programs with stratified negation is presented. The technique exploits the propagation of query bindings and extends the Magic Set (MS) optimization technique. An important feature of disjunctive Datalog is nonmonotonicity, which calls for nondeterministic implementations, such as backtracking search. A distinguishing characteristic of the new method is that the optimization can be exploited also during the nondeterministic phase. In particular, after some assumptions have been made during the computation, parts of the program may become irrelevant to a query under these assumptions. This allows for dynamic pruning of the search space. In contrast, the effect of the previously defined MS methods for disjunctive Datalog is limited to the deterministic portion of the process. In this way, the potential performance gain by using the proposed method can be exponential, as could be observed empirically. The correctness of MS is established thanks to a strong relationship between MS and unfounded sets that has not been studied in the literature before. This knowledge allows for extending the method also to programs with stratified negation in a natural way. The proposed method has been implemented in DLV and various experiments have been conducted. Experimental results on synthetic data confirm the utility of MS for disjunctive Datalog, and they highlight the computational gain that may be obtained by the new method w.r.t. the previously proposed MS methods for disjunctive Datalog programs. Further experiments on real-world data show the benefits of MS within an application scenario that has received considerable attention in recent years, the problem of answering user queries over possibly inconsistent databases originating from integration of autonomous sources of information.
1204.6350
Secure Computation in a Bidirectional Relay
cs.IT math.IT
Bidirectional relaying, where a relay helps two user nodes to exchange equal length binary messages, has been an active area of recent research. A popular strategy involves a modified Gaussian MAC, where the relay decodes the XOR of the two messages using the naturally-occurring sum of symbols simultaneously transmitted by user nodes. In this work, we consider the Gaussian MAC in bidirectional relaying with an additional secrecy constraint for protection against a honest but curious relay. The constraint is that, while the relay should decode the XOR, it should be fully ignorant of the individual messages of the users. We exploit the symbol addition that occurs in a Gaussian MAC to design explicit strategies that achieve perfect independence between the received symbols and individual transmitted messages. Our results actually hold for a more general scenario where the messages at the two user nodes come from a finite Abelian group, and the relay must decode the sum within the group of the two messages. We provide a lattice coding strategy and study optimal rate versus average power trade-offs for asymptotically large dimensions.
1204.6362
A Corpus-based Evaluation of Lexical Components of a Domainspecific Text to Knowledge Mapping Prototype
cs.IR cs.CL
The aim of this paper is to evaluate the lexical components of a Text to Knowledge Mapping (TKM) prototype. The prototype is domain-specific, the purpose of which is to map instructional text onto a knowledge domain. The context of the knowledge domain of the prototype is physics, specifically DC electrical circuits. During development, the prototype has been tested with a limited data set from the domain. The prototype now reached a stage where it needs to be evaluated with a representative linguistic data set called corpus. A corpus is a collection of text drawn from typical sources which can be used as a test data set to evaluate NLP systems. As there is no available corpus for the domain, we developed a representative corpus and annotated it with linguistic information. The evaluation of the prototype considers one of its two main components- lexical knowledge base. With the corpus, the evaluation enriches the lexical knowledge resources like vocabulary and grammar structure. This leads the prototype to parse a reasonable amount of sentences in the corpus.
1204.6364
A Corpus-based Evaluation of a Domain-specific Text to Knowledge Mapping Prototype
cs.CL
The aim of this paper is to evaluate a Text to Knowledge Mapping (TKM) Prototype. The prototype is domain-specific, the purpose of which is to map instructional text onto a knowledge domain. The context of the knowledge domain is DC electrical circuit. During development, the prototype has been tested with a limited data set from the domain. The prototype reached a stage where it needs to be evaluated with a representative linguistic data set called corpus. A corpus is a collection of text drawn from typical sources which can be used as a test data set to evaluate NLP systems. As there is no available corpus for the domain, we developed and annotated a representative corpus. The evaluation of the prototype considers two of its major components- lexical components and knowledge model. Evaluation on lexical components enriches the lexical resources of the prototype like vocabulary and grammar structures. This leads the prototype to parse a reasonable amount of sentences in the corpus. While dealing with the lexicon was straight forward, the identification and extraction of appropriate semantic relations was much more involved. It was necessary, therefore, to manually develop a conceptual structure for the domain to formulate a domain-specific framework of semantic relations. The framework of semantic relationsthat has resulted from this study consisted of 55 relations, out of which 42 have inverse relations. We also conducted rhetorical analysis on the corpus to prove its representativeness in conveying semantic. Finally, we conducted a topical and discourse analysis on the corpus to analyze the coverage of discourse by the prototype.
1204.6376
The Landscape of Complex Networks
stat.ME cs.SI physics.soc-ph q-bio.MN
Topological landscape is introduced for networks with functions defined on the nodes. By extending the notion of gradient flows to the network setting, critical nodes of different indices are defined. This leads to a concise and hierarchical representation of the network. Persistent homology from computational topology is used to design efficient algorithms for performing such analysis. Applications to some examples in social and biological networks are demonstrated, which show that critical nodes carry important information about structures and dynamics of such networks.
1204.6385
A 3D Segmentation Method for Retinal Optical Coherence Tomography Volume Data
cs.CV physics.optics
With the introduction of spectral-domain optical coherence tomography (OCT), much larger image datasets are routinely acquired compared to what was possible using the previous generation of time-domain OCT. Thus, the need for 3-D segmentation methods for processing such data is becoming increasingly important. We present a new 3D segmentation method for retinal OCT volume data, which generates an enhanced volume data by using pixel intensity, boundary position information, intensity changes on both sides of the border simultaneously, and preliminary discrete boundary points are found from all A-Scans and then the smoothed boundary surface can be obtained after removing a small quantity of error points. Our experiments show that this method is efficient, accurate and robust.
1204.6389
Rigidity and flexibility of biological networks
physics.bio-ph cond-mat.dis-nn cs.CE cs.CG nlin.PS q-bio.MN
The network approach became a widely used tool to understand the behaviour of complex systems in the last decade. We start from a short description of structural rigidity theory. A detailed account on the combinatorial rigidity analysis of protein structures, as well as local flexibility measures of proteins and their applications in explaining allostery and thermostability is given. We also briefly discuss the network aspects of cytoskeletal tensegrity. Finally, we show the importance of the balance between functional flexibility and rigidity in protein-protein interaction, metabolic, gene regulatory and neuronal networks. Our summary raises the possibility that the concepts of flexibility and rigidity can be generalized to all networks.
1204.6408
Standing on the Shoulders of Their Peers: Success Factors for Massive Cooperation Among Children Creating Open Source Animations and Games on Their Smartphones
cs.CY cs.SI
We developed a website for kids where they can share new as well as remixed animations and games, e.g., interactive music videos, which they created on their smartphones or tablets using a visual "LEGO-style" programming environment called Catroid. Online communities for children like our website have unique requirements, and keeping the commitment of kids on a high level is a continuous challenge. For instance, one key motivator for kids is the ability to entertain their friends. Another success factor is the ability to learn from and cooperate with other children. In this short position paper we attempt at identifying the requirements for the success of such an online community, both from the point of view of the kids as well as of their parents, and at finding ways to make it attractive for both.
1204.6411
Catroid: A Mobile Visual Programming System for Children
cs.PL cs.CY cs.HC cs.RO
Catroid is a free and open source visual programming language, programming environment, image manipulation program, and website. Catroid allows casual and first-time users starting from age eight to develop their own animations and games solely using their Android phones or tablets. Catroid also allows to wirelessly control external hardware such as Lego Mindstorms robots via Bluetooth, Bluetooth Arduino boards, as well as Parrot's popular and inexpensive AR.Drone quadcopters via WiFi.
1204.6415
A Fuzzy Model for Analogical Problem Solving
cs.AI
In this paper we develop a fuzzy model for the description of the process of Analogical Reasoning by representing its main steps as fuzzy subsets of a set of linguistic labels characterizing the individuals' performance in each step and we use the Shannon- Wiener diversity index as a measure of the individuals' abilities in analogical problem solving. This model is compared with a stochastic model presented in author's earlier papers by introducing a finite Markov chain on the steps of the process of Analogical Reasoning. A classroom experiment is also presented to illustrate the use of our results in practice.
1204.6423
Minimum Description Length Principle for Maximum Entropy Model Selection
cs.IT math.IT
Model selection is central to statistics, and many learning problems can be formulated as model selection problems. In this paper, we treat the problem of selecting a maximum entropy model given various feature subsets and their moments, as a model selection problem, and present a minimum description length (MDL) formulation to solve this problem. For this, we derive normalized maximum likelihood (NML) codelength for these models. Furthermore, we prove that the minimax entropy principle is a special case of maximum entropy model selection, where one assumes that complexity of all the models are equal. We apply our approach to gene selection problem and present simulation results.
1204.6441
"I Wanted to Predict Elections with Twitter and all I got was this Lousy Paper" -- A Balanced Survey on Election Prediction using Twitter Data
cs.CY cs.CL cs.SI physics.soc-ph
Predicting X from Twitter is a popular fad within the Twitter research subculture. It seems both appealing and relatively easy. Among such kind of studies, electoral prediction is maybe the most attractive, and at this moment there is a growing body of literature on such a topic. This is not only an interesting research problem but, above all, it is extremely difficult. However, most of the authors seem to be more interested in claiming positive results than in providing sound and reproducible methods. It is also especially worrisome that many recent papers seem to only acknowledge those studies supporting the idea of Twitter predicting elections, instead of conducting a balanced literature review showing both sides of the matter. After reading many of such papers I have decided to write such a survey myself. Hence, in this paper, every study relevant to the matter of electoral prediction using social media is commented. From this review it can be concluded that the predictive power of Twitter regarding elections has been greatly exaggerated, and that hard research problems still lie ahead.
1204.6453
The Role of Vertex Consistency in Sampling-based Algorithms for Optimal Motion Planning
cs.RO
Motion planning problems have been studied by both the robotics and the controls research communities for a long time, and many algorithms have been developed for their solution. Among them, incremental sampling-based motion planning algorithms, such as the Rapidly-exploring Random Trees (RRTs), and the Probabilistic Road Maps (PRMs) have become very popular recently, owing to their implementation simplicity and their advantages in handling high-dimensional problems. Although these algorithms work very well in practice, the quality of the computed solution is often not good, i.e., the solution can be far from the optimal one. A recent variation of RRT, namely the RRT* algorithm, bypasses this drawback of the traditional RRT algorithm, by ensuring asymptotic optimality as the number of samples tends to infinity. Nonetheless, the convergence rate to the optimal solution may still be slow. This paper presents a new incremental sampling-based motion planning algorithm based on Rapidly-exploring Random Graphs (RRG), denoted RRT# (RRT "sharp") which also guarantees asymptotic optimality but, in addition, it also ensures that the constructed spanning tree of the geometric graph is consistent after each iteration. In consistent trees, the vertices which have the potential to be part of the optimal solution have the minimum cost-come-value. This implies that the best possible solution is readily computed if there are some vertices in the current graph that are already in the goal region. Numerical results compare with the RRT* algorithm.
1204.6458
Active Contour with A Tangential Component
cs.CV
Conventional edge-based active contours often require the normal component of an edge indicator function on the optimal contours to approximate zero, while the tangential component can still be significant. In real images, the full gradients of the edge indicator function along the object boundaries are often small. Hence, the curve evolution of edge-based active contours can terminate early before converging to the object boundaries with a careless contour initialization. We propose a novel Geodesic Snakes (GeoSnakes) active contour that requires the full gradients of the edge indicator to vanish at the optimal solution. Besides, the conventional curve evolution approach for minimizing active contour energy cannot fully solve the Euler-Lagrange (EL) equation of our GeoSnakes active contour, causing a Pseudo Stationary Phenomenon (PSP). To address the PSP problem, we propose an auxiliary curve evolution equation, named the equilibrium flow (EF) equation. Based on the EF and the conventional curve evolution, we obtain a solution to the full EL equation of GeoSnakes active contour. Experimental results validate the proposed geometrical interpretation of the early termination problem, and they also show that the proposed method overcomes the problem.
1204.6482
Tradeoff Analysis of Delay-Power-CSIT Quality of Dynamic BackPressure Algorithm for Energy Efficient OFDM Systems
cs.SY
In this paper, we analyze the fundamental power-delay tradeoff in point-to-point OFDM systems under imperfect channel state information quality and non-ideal circuit power. We consider the dynamic back- pressure (DBP) algorithm, where the transmitter determines the rate and power control actions based on the instantaneous channel state information (CSIT) and the queue state information (QSI). We exploit a general fluid queue dynamics using a continuous time dynamic equation. Using the sample-path approach and renewal theory, we decompose the average delay in terms of multiple unfinished works along a sample path, and derive an upper bound on the average delay under the DBP power control, which is asymptotically accurate at small delay regime. We show that despite imperfect CSIT quality and non-ideal circuit power, the average power (P) of the DBP policy scales with delay (D) as P = O(Dexp(1/D)) at small delay regime. While the impacts of CSIT quality and circuit power appears as the coefficients of the scaling law, they may be significant in some operating regimes.
1204.6509
Dissimilarity Clustering by Hierarchical Multi-Level Refinement
stat.ML cs.LG
We introduce in this paper a new way of optimizing the natural extension of the quantization error using in k-means clustering to dissimilarity data. The proposed method is based on hierarchical clustering analysis combined with multi-level heuristic refinement. The method is computationally efficient and achieves better quantization errors than the
1204.6512
An adaptive, high-order phase-space remapping for the two-dimensional Vlasov-Poisson equations
math.NA cs.CE physics.comp-ph
The numerical solution of high dimensional Vlasov equation is usually performed by particle-in-cell (PIC) methods. However, due to the well-known numerical noise, it is challenging to use PIC methods to get a precise description of the distribution function in phase space. To control the numerical error, we introduce an adaptive phase-space remapping which regularizes the particle distribution by periodically reconstructing the distribution function on a hierarchy of phase-space grids with high-order interpolations. The positivity of the distribution function can be preserved by using a local redistribution technique. The method has been successfully applied to a set of classical plasma problems in one dimension. In this paper, we present the algorithm for the two dimensional Vlasov-Poisson equations. An efficient Poisson solver with infinite domain boundary conditions is used. The parallel scalability of the algorithm on massively parallel computers will be discussed.
1204.6521
Harnessing Folksonomies for Resource Classification
cs.DL cs.IR cs.SI
In our daily lives, organizing resources into a set of categories is a common task. Categorization becomes more useful as the collection of resources increases. Large collections of books, movies, and web pages, for instance, are cataloged in libraries, organized in databases and classified in directories, respectively. However, the usual largeness of these collections requires a vast endeavor and an outrageous expense to organize manually. Recent research is moving towards developing automated classifiers that reduce the increasing costs and effort of the task. Little work has been done analyzing the appropriateness of and exploring how to harness the annotations provided by users on social tagging systems as a data source. Users on these systems save resources as bookmarks in a social environment by attaching annotations in the form of tags. It has been shown that these tags facilitate retrieval of resources not only for the annotators themselves but also for the whole community. Likewise, these tags provide meaningful metadata that refers to the content of the resources. In this thesis, we deal with the utilization of these user-provided tags in search of the most accurate classification of resources as compared to expert-driven categorizations. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first research work performing actual classification experiments utilizing social tags. By exploring the characteristics and nature of these systems and the underlying folksonomies, this thesis sheds new light on the way of getting the most out of social tags for the sake of automated resource classification tasks. Therefore, we believe that the contributions in this work are of utmost interest for future researchers in the field, as well as for the scientific community in order to better understand these systems and further utilize the knowledge garnered from social tags.
1204.6529
Generalising unit-refutation completeness and SLUR via nested input resolution
cs.LO cs.AI
We introduce two hierarchies of clause-sets, SLUR_k and UC_k, based on the classes SLUR (Single Lookahead Unit Refutation), introduced in 1995, and UC (Unit refutation Complete), introduced in 1994. The class SLUR, introduced in [Annexstein et al, 1995], is the class of clause-sets for which unit-clause-propagation (denoted by r_1) detects unsatisfiability, or where otherwise iterative assignment, avoiding obviously false assignments by look-ahead, always yields a satisfying assignment. It is natural to consider how to form a hierarchy based on SLUR. Such investigations were started in [Cepek et al, 2012] and [Balyo et al, 2012]. We present what we consider the "limit hierarchy" SLUR_k, based on generalising r_1 by r_k, that is, using generalised unit-clause-propagation introduced in [Kullmann, 1999, 2004]. The class UC, studied in [Del Val, 1994], is the class of Unit refutation Complete clause-sets, that is, those clause-sets for which unsatisfiability is decidable by r_1 under any falsifying assignment. For unsatisfiable clause-sets F, the minimum k such that r_k determines unsatisfiability of F is exactly the "hardness" of F, as introduced in [Ku 99, 04]. For satisfiable F we use now an extension mentioned in [Ansotegui et al, 2008]: The hardness is the minimum k such that after application of any falsifying partial assignments, r_k determines unsatisfiability. The class UC_k is given by the clause-sets which have hardness <= k. We observe that UC_1 is exactly UC. UC_k has a proof-theoretic character, due to the relations between hardness and tree-resolution, while SLUR_k has an algorithmic character. The correspondence between r_k and k-times nested input resolution (or tree resolution using clause-space k+1) means that r_k has a dual nature: both algorithmic and proof theoretic. This corresponds to a basic result of this paper, namely SLUR_k = UC_k.
1204.6535
Citations, Sequence Alignments, Contagion, and Semantics: On Acyclic Structures and their Randomness
cs.DM cs.DB
Datasets from several domains, such as life-sciences, semantic web, machine learning, natural language processing, etc. are naturally structured as acyclic graphs. These datasets, particularly those in bio-informatics and computational epidemiology, have grown tremendously over the last decade or so. Increasingly, as a consequence, there is a need to build and evaluate various strategies for processing acyclic structured graphs. Most of the proposed research models the real world acyclic structures as random graphs, i.e., they are generated by randomly selecting a subset of edges from all possible edges. Unfortunately the graphs thus generated have predictable and degenerate structures, i.e., the resulting graphs will always have almost the same degree distribution and very short paths. Specifically, we show that if $O(n \log n \log n)$ edges are added to a binary tree of $n$ nodes then with probability more than $O(1/(\log n)^{1/n})$ the depth of all but $O({\log \log n} ^{\log \log n})$ vertices of the dag collapses to 1. Experiments show that irregularity, as measured by distribution of length of random walks from root to leaves, is also predictable and small. The degree distribution and random walk length properties of real world graphs from these domains are significantly different from random graphs of similar vertex and edge size.
1204.6537
Recovery of Low-Rank Plus Compressed Sparse Matrices with Application to Unveiling Traffic Anomalies
cs.IT cs.NI math.IT stat.ML
Given the superposition of a low-rank matrix plus the product of a known fat compression matrix times a sparse matrix, the goal of this paper is to establish deterministic conditions under which exact recovery of the low-rank and sparse components becomes possible. This fundamental identifiability issue arises with traffic anomaly detection in backbone networks, and subsumes compressed sensing as well as the timely low-rank plus sparse matrix recovery tasks encountered in matrix decomposition problems. Leveraging the ability of $\ell_1$- and nuclear norms to recover sparse and low-rank matrices, a convex program is formulated to estimate the unknowns. Analysis and simulations confirm that the said convex program can recover the unknowns for sufficiently low-rank and sparse enough components, along with a compression matrix possessing an isometry property when restricted to operate on sparse vectors. When the low-rank, sparse, and compression matrices are drawn from certain random ensembles, it is established that exact recovery is possible with high probability. First-order algorithms are developed to solve the nonsmooth convex optimization problem with provable iteration complexity guarantees. Insightful tests with synthetic and real network data corroborate the effectiveness of the novel approach in unveiling traffic anomalies across flows and time, and its ability to outperform existing alternatives.
1204.6549
Power Law Distributions of Patents as Indicators of Innovation
physics.soc-ph cs.SI
The total number of patents produced by a country (or the number of patents produced per capita) is often used as an indicator for innovation. Here we present evidence that the distribution of patents amongst applicants within many OECD countries is well-described by power laws with exponents that vary between 1.66 (Japan) and 2.37 (Poland). Using simulations based on simple preferential attachment-type rules that generate power laws, we find we can explain some of the variation in exponents between countries, with countries that have larger numbers of patents per applicant generally exhibiting smaller exponents in both the simulated and actual data. Similarly we find that the exponents for most countries are inversely correlated with other indicators of innovation, such as R&D intensity or the ubiquity of export baskets. This suggests that in more advanced economies, which tend to have smaller values of the exponent, a greater proportion of the total number of patents are filed by large companies than in less advanced countries.
1204.6552
A Game-Theoretic Model Motivated by the DARPA Network Challenge
cs.GT cs.AI cs.MA
In this paper we propose a game-theoretic model to analyze events similar to the 2009 \emph{DARPA Network Challenge}, which was organized by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) for exploring the roles that the Internet and social networks play in incentivizing wide-area collaborations. The challenge was to form a group that would be the first to find the locations of ten moored weather balloons across the United States. We consider a model in which $N$ people (who can form groups) are located in some topology with a fixed coverage volume around each person's geographical location. We consider various topologies where the players can be located such as the Euclidean $d$-dimension space and the vertices of a graph. A balloon is placed in the space and a group wins if it is the first one to report the location of the balloon. A larger team has a higher probability of finding the balloon, but we assume that the prize money is divided equally among the team members. Hence there is a competing tension to keep teams as small as possible. \emph{Risk aversion} is the reluctance of a person to accept a bargain with an uncertain payoff rather than another bargain with a more certain, but possibly lower, expected payoff. In our model we consider the \emph{isoelastic} utility function derived from the Arrow-Pratt measure of relative risk aversion. The main aim is to analyze the structures of the groups in Nash equilibria for our model. For the $d$-dimensional Euclidean space ($d\geq 1$) and the class of bounded degree regular graphs we show that in any Nash Equilibrium the \emph{richest} group (having maximum expected utility per person) covers a constant fraction of the total volume.
1204.6563
Parametric annealing: a stochastic search method for human pose tracking
cs.CV
Model based methods to marker-free motion capture have a very high computational overhead that make them unattractive. In this paper we describe a method that improves on existing global optimization techniques to tracking articulated objects. Our method improves on the state-of-the-art Annealed Particle Filter (APF) by reusing samples across annealing layers and by using an adaptive parametric density for diffusion. We compare the proposed method with APF on a scalable problem and study how the two methods scale with the dimensionality, multi-modality and the range of search. Then we perform sensitivity analysis on the parameters of our algorithm and show that it tolerates a wide range of parameter settings. We also show results on tracking human pose from the widely-used Human Eva I dataset. Our results show that the proposed method reduces the tracking error despite using less than 50% of the computational resources as APF. The tracked output also shows a significant qualitative improvement over APF as demonstrated through image and video results.
1204.6564
A New Family of Low-Complexity STBCs for Four Transmit Antennas
cs.IT math.IT
Space-Time Block Codes (STBCs) suffer from a prohibitively high decoding complexity unless the low-complexity decodability property is taken into consideration in the STBC design. For this purpose, several families of STBCs that involve a reduced decoding complexity have been proposed, notably the multi-group decodable and the fast decodable (FD) codes. Recently, a new family of codes that combines both of these families namely the fast group decodable (FGD) codes was proposed. In this paper, we propose a new construction scheme for rate-1 FGD codes for 2^a transmit antennas. The proposed scheme is then applied to the case of four transmit antennas and we show that the new rate-1 FGD code has the lowest worst-case decoding complexity among existing comparable STBCs. The coding gain of the new rate-1 code is optimized through constellation stretching and proved to be constant irrespective of the underlying QAM constellation prior to normalization. Next, we propose a new rate-2 FD STBC by multiplexing two of our rate-1 codes by the means of a unitary matrix. Also a compromise between rate and complexity is obtained through puncturing our rate-2 FD code giving rise to a new rate-3/2 FD code. The proposed codes are compared to existing codes in the literature and simulation results show that our rate-3/2 code has a lower average decoding complexity while our rate-2 code maintains its lower average decoding complexity in the low SNR region. If a time-out sphere decoder is employed, our proposed codes outperform existing codes at high SNR region thanks to their lower worst-case decoding complexity.
1204.6583
A Conjugate Property between Loss Functions and Uncertainty Sets in Classification Problems
stat.ML cs.LG
In binary classification problems, mainly two approaches have been proposed; one is loss function approach and the other is uncertainty set approach. The loss function approach is applied to major learning algorithms such as support vector machine (SVM) and boosting methods. The loss function represents the penalty of the decision function on the training samples. In the learning algorithm, the empirical mean of the loss function is minimized to obtain the classifier. Against a backdrop of the development of mathematical programming, nowadays learning algorithms based on loss functions are widely applied to real-world data analysis. In addition, statistical properties of such learning algorithms are well-understood based on a lots of theoretical works. On the other hand, the learning method using the so-called uncertainty set is used in hard-margin SVM, mini-max probability machine (MPM) and maximum margin MPM. In the learning algorithm, firstly, the uncertainty set is defined for each binary label based on the training samples. Then, the best separating hyperplane between the two uncertainty sets is employed as the decision function. This is regarded as an extension of the maximum-margin approach. The uncertainty set approach has been studied as an application of robust optimization in the field of mathematical programming. The statistical properties of learning algorithms with uncertainty sets have not been intensively studied. In this paper, we consider the relation between the above two approaches. We point out that the uncertainty set is described by using the level set of the conjugate of the loss function. Based on such relation, we study statistical properties of learning algorithms using uncertainty sets.
1204.6610
Residual Belief Propagation for Topic Modeling
cs.LG cs.IR
Fast convergence speed is a desired property for training latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA), especially in online and parallel topic modeling for massive data sets. This paper presents a novel residual belief propagation (RBP) algorithm to accelerate the convergence speed for training LDA. The proposed RBP uses an informed scheduling scheme for asynchronous message passing, which passes fast-convergent messages with a higher priority to influence those slow-convergent messages at each learning iteration. Extensive empirical studies confirm that RBP significantly reduces the training time until convergence while achieves a much lower predictive perplexity than other state-of-the-art training algorithms for LDA, including variational Bayes (VB), collapsed Gibbs sampling (GS), loopy belief propagation (BP), and residual VB (RVB).
1204.6624
Theorems about Ergodicity and Class-Ergodicity of Chains with Applications in Known Consensus Models
math.DS cs.SY eess.SY math.OC
In a multi-agent system, unconditional (multiple) consensus is the property of reaching to (multiple) consensus irrespective of the instant and values at which states are initialized. For linear algorithms, occurrence of unconditional (multiple) consensus turns out to be equivalent to (class-) ergodicity of the transition chain (A_n). For a wide class of chains, chains with so-called balanced asymmetry property, necessary and sufficient conditions for ergodicity and class-ergodicity are derived. The results are employed to analyze the limiting behavior of agents' states in the JLM model, the Krause model, and the Cucker-Smale model. In particular, unconditional single or multiple consensus occurs in all three models. Moreover, a necessary and sufficient condition for unconditional consensus in the JLM model and a sufficient condition for consensus in the Cucker-Smale model are obtained.
1204.6638
Modelling the emergence of spatial patterns of economic activity
cs.MA cs.SI physics.soc-ph q-fin.GN
Understanding how spatial configurations of economic activity emerge is important when formulating spatial planning and economic policy. A simple model was proposed by Simon, who assumed that firms grow at a rate proportional to their size, and that new divisions of firms with certain probabilities relocate to other firms or to new centres of economic activity. Simon's model produces realistic results in the sense that the sizes of economic centres follow a Zipf distribution, which is also observed in reality. It lacks realism in the sense that mechanisms such as cluster formation, congestion (defined as an overly high density of the same activities) and dependence on the spatial distribution of external parties (clients, labour markets) are ignored. The present paper proposed an extension of the Simon model that includes both centripetal and centrifugal forces. Centripetal forces are included in the sense that firm divisions are more likely to settle in locations that offer a higher accessibility to other firms. Centrifugal forces are represented by an aversion of a too high density of activities in the potential location. The model is implemented as an agent-based simulation model in a simplified spatial setting. By running both the Simon model and the extended model, comparisons are made with respect to their effects on spatial configurations. To this end a series of metrics are used, including the rank-size distribution and indices of the degree of clustering and concentration.
1204.6653
Elimination of Glass Artifacts and Object Segmentation
cs.CV
Many images nowadays are captured from behind the glasses and may have certain stains discrepancy because of glass and must be processed to make differentiation between the glass and objects behind it. This research paper proposes an algorithm to remove the damaged or corrupted part of the image and make it consistent with other part of the image and to segment objects behind the glass. The damaged part is removed using total variation inpainting method and segmentation is done using kmeans clustering, anisotropic diffusion and watershed transformation. The final output is obtained by interpolation. This algorithm can be useful to applications in which some part of the images are corrupted due to data transmission or needs to segment objects from an image for further processing.
1204.6703
A Spectral Algorithm for Latent Dirichlet Allocation
cs.LG stat.ML
The problem of topic modeling can be seen as a generalization of the clustering problem, in that it posits that observations are generated due to multiple latent factors (e.g., the words in each document are generated as a mixture of several active topics, as opposed to just one). This increased representational power comes at the cost of a more challenging unsupervised learning problem of estimating the topic probability vectors (the distributions over words for each topic), when only the words are observed and the corresponding topics are hidden. We provide a simple and efficient learning procedure that is guaranteed to recover the parameters for a wide class of mixture models, including the popular latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA) model. For LDA, the procedure correctly recovers both the topic probability vectors and the prior over the topics, using only trigram statistics (i.e., third order moments, which may be estimated with documents containing just three words). The method, termed Excess Correlation Analysis (ECA), is based on a spectral decomposition of low order moments (third and fourth order) via two singular value decompositions (SVDs). Moreover, the algorithm is scalable since the SVD operations are carried out on $k\times k$ matrices, where $k$ is the number of latent factors (e.g. the number of topics), rather than in the $d$-dimensional observed space (typically $d \gg k$).
1204.6725
OCT Segmentation Survey and Summary Reviews and a Novel 3D Segmentation Algorithm and a Proof of Concept Implementation
cs.CV physics.optics
We overview the existing OCT work, especially the practical aspects of it. We create a novel algorithm for 3D OCT segmentation with the goals of speed and/or accuracy while remaining flexible in the design and implementation for future extensions and improvements. The document at this point is a running draft being iteratively "developed" as a progress report as the work and survey advance. It contains the review and summarization of select OCT works, the design and implementation of the OCTMARF experimentation application and some results.
1205.0030
A Market for Unbiased Private Data: Paying Individuals According to their Privacy Attitudes
cs.CY cs.SI physics.soc-ph
Since there is, in principle, no reason why third parties should not pay individuals for the use of their data, we introduce a realistic market that would allow these payments to be made while taking into account the privacy attitude of the participants. And since it is usually important to use unbiased samples to obtain credible statistical results, we examine the properties that such a market should have and suggest a mechanism that compensates those individuals that participate according to their risk attitudes. Equally important, we show that this mechanism also benefits buyers, as they pay less for the data than they would if they compensated all individuals with the same maximum fee that the most concerned ones expect.
1205.0038
Percolation Computation in Complex Networks
cs.SI physics.soc-ph
K-clique percolation is an overlapping community finding algorithm which extracts particular structures, comprised of overlapping cliques, from complex networks. While it is conceptually straightforward, and can be elegantly expressed using clique graphs, certain aspects of k-clique percolation are computationally challenging in practice. In this paper we investigate aspects of empirical social networks, such as the large numbers of overlapping maximal cliques contained within them, that make clique percolation, and clique graph representations, computationally expensive. We motivate a simple algorithm to conduct clique percolation, and investigate its performance compared to current best-in-class algorithms. We present improvements to this algorithm, which allow us to perform k-clique percolation on much larger empirical datasets. Our approaches perform much better than existing algorithms on networks exhibiting pervasively overlapping community structure, especially for higher values of k. However, clique percolation remains a hard computational problem; current algorithms still scale worse than some other overlapping community finding algorithms.
1205.0044
A Singly-Exponential Time Algorithm for Computing Nonnegative Rank
cs.DS cs.IR cs.LG
Here, we give an algorithm for deciding if the nonnegative rank of a matrix $M$ of dimension $m \times n$ is at most $r$ which runs in time $(nm)^{O(r^2)}$. This is the first exact algorithm that runs in time singly-exponential in $r$. This algorithm (and earlier algorithms) are built on methods for finding a solution to a system of polynomial inequalities (if one exists). Notably, the best algorithms for this task run in time exponential in the number of variables but polynomial in all of the other parameters (the number of inequalities and the maximum degree). Hence these algorithms motivate natural algebraic questions whose solution have immediate {\em algorithmic} implications: How many variables do we need to represent the decision problem, does $M$ have nonnegative rank at most $r$? A naive formulation uses $nr + mr$ variables and yields an algorithm that is exponential in $n$ and $m$ even for constant $r$. (Arora, Ge, Kannan, Moitra, STOC 2012) recently reduced the number of variables to $2r^2 2^r$, and here we exponentially reduce the number of variables to $2r^2$ and this yields our main algorithm. In fact, the algorithm that we obtain is nearly-optimal (under the Exponential Time Hypothesis) since an algorithm that runs in time $(nm)^{o(r)}$ would yield a subexponential algorithm for 3-SAT . Our main result is based on establishing a normal form for nonnegative matrix factorization - which in turn allows us to exploit algebraic dependence among a large collection of linear transformations with variable entries. Additionally, we also demonstrate that nonnegative rank cannot be certified by even a very large submatrix of $M$, and this property also follows from the intuition gained from viewing nonnegative rank through the lens of systems of polynomial inequalities.
1205.0047
$QD$-Learning: A Collaborative Distributed Strategy for Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning Through Consensus + Innovations
stat.ML cs.LG cs.MA math.OC math.PR
The paper considers a class of multi-agent Markov decision processes (MDPs), in which the network agents respond differently (as manifested by the instantaneous one-stage random costs) to a global controlled state and the control actions of a remote controller. The paper investigates a distributed reinforcement learning setup with no prior information on the global state transition and local agent cost statistics. Specifically, with the agents' objective consisting of minimizing a network-averaged infinite horizon discounted cost, the paper proposes a distributed version of $Q$-learning, $\mathcal{QD}$-learning, in which the network agents collaborate by means of local processing and mutual information exchange over a sparse (possibly stochastic) communication network to achieve the network goal. Under the assumption that each agent is only aware of its local online cost data and the inter-agent communication network is \emph{weakly} connected, the proposed distributed scheme is almost surely (a.s.) shown to yield asymptotically the desired value function and the optimal stationary control policy at each network agent. The analytical techniques developed in the paper to address the mixed time-scale stochastic dynamics of the \emph{consensus + innovations} form, which arise as a result of the proposed interactive distributed scheme, are of independent interest.
1205.0076
Robust Distributed Routing in Dynamical Networks with Cascading Failures
cs.SY math.DS
Robustness of routing policies for networks is a central problem which is gaining increased attention with a growing awareness to safeguard critical infrastructure networks against natural and man-induced disruptions. Routing under limited information and the possibility of cascades through the network adds serious challenges to this problem. This abstract considers the framework of dynamical networks introduced in our earlier work [1,2], where the network is modeled by a system of ordinary differential equations derived from mass conservation laws on directed acyclic graphs with a single origin-destination pair and a constant inflow at the origin. The rate of change of the particle density on each link of the network equals the difference between the inflow and the outflow on that link. The latter is modeled to depend on the current particle density on that link through a flow function. The novel modeling element in this paper is that every link is assumed to have finite capacity for particle density and that the flow function is modeled to be strictly increasing as density increases from zero up to the maximum density capacity, and is discontinuous at the maximum density capacity, with the flow function value being zero at that point. This feature, in particular, allows for the possibility of spill-backs in our model. In this paper, we present our results on resilience of such networks under distributed routing, towards perturbations that reduce link-wise flow functions.
1205.0079
Complexity Analysis of the Lasso Regularization Path
stat.ML cs.LG math.OC
The regularization path of the Lasso can be shown to be piecewise linear, making it possible to "follow" and explicitly compute the entire path. We analyze in this paper this popular strategy, and prove that its worst case complexity is exponential in the number of variables. We then oppose this pessimistic result to an (optimistic) approximate analysis: We show that an approximate path with at most O(1/sqrt(epsilon)) linear segments can always be obtained, where every point on the path is guaranteed to be optimal up to a relative epsilon-duality gap. We complete our theoretical analysis with a practical algorithm to compute these approximate paths.
1205.0085
Spectrum Leasing via Cooperation for Enhanced Physical-Layer Secrecy
cs.IT math.IT
Spectrum leasing via cooperation refers to the possibility of primary users leasing a portion of the spectral resources to secondary users in exchange for cooperation. In the presence of an eavesdropper, this correspondence proposes a novel application of this concept in which the secondary cooperation aims at improving secrecy of the primary network by creating more interference to the eavesdropper than to the primary receiver. To generate the interference in a positive way, this work studies an optimal design of a beamformer at the secondary transmitter with multiple antennas that maximizes a secrecy rate of the primary network while satisfying a required rate for the secondary network. Moreover, we investigate two scenarios depending upon the operation of the eavesdropper: i) the eavesdropper treats the interference by the secondary transmission as an additive noise (single-user decoding) and ii) the eavesdropper tries to decode and remove the secondary signal (joint decoding). Numerical results confirm that, for a wide range of required secondary rate constraints, the proposed spectrum-leasing strategy increases the secrecy rate of the primary network compared to the case of no spectrum leasing.
1205.0088
ProPPA: A Fast Algorithm for $\ell_1$ Minimization and Low-Rank Matrix Completion
cs.LG math.OC
We propose a Projected Proximal Point Algorithm (ProPPA) for solving a class of optimization problems. The algorithm iteratively computes the proximal point of the last estimated solution projected into an affine space which itself is parallel and approaching to the feasible set. We provide convergence analysis theoretically supporting the general algorithm, and then apply it for solving $\ell_1$-minimization problems and the matrix completion problem. These problems arise in many applications including machine learning, image and signal processing. We compare our algorithm with the existing state-of-the-art algorithms. Experimental results on solving these problems show that our algorithm is very efficient and competitive.
1205.0110
Modelling spatial patterns of economic activity in the Netherlands
cs.MA
Understanding how spatial configurations of economic activity emerge is important when formulating spatial planning and economic policy. Not only micro-simulation and agent-based model such as UrbanSim, ILUMAS and SIMFIRMS, but also Simon's model of hierarchical concentration have widely applied, for this purpose. These models, however, have limitations with respect to simulating structural changes in spatial economic systems and the impact of proximity. The present paper proposes a model of firm development that is based on behavioural rules such as growth, closure, spin-off and relocation. An important aspect of the model is that locational preferences of firms are based on agglomeration advantages, accessibility of markets and congestion, allowing for a proper description of concentration and deconcentration tendencies. By comparing the outcomes of the proposed model with real world data, we will calibrate the parameters and assess how well the model predicts existing spatial configurations and decide. The model is implemented as an agent-based simulation model describing firm development in the Netherlands in 21 industrial sectors from 1950 to 2004.
1205.0111
Alternatives for optimization in systems and control: convex and non-convex approaches
math.OC cs.SY
In this presentation, we will develop a short overview of main trends of optimization in systems and control, and from there outline some new perspectives emerging today. More specifically, we will focus on the current situation, where it is clear that convex and Linear Matrix Inequality (LMI) methods have become the most common option. However, because of its vast success, the convex approach is often the only direction considered, despite the underlying problem is non-convex and that other optimization methods specifically equipped to handle such problems should have been used instead. We will present key points on this topic, and as a side result we will propose a method to produce a virtually infinite number of papers.
1205.0149
Non-Universality in Semi-Directed Barabasi-Albert Networks
physics.comp-ph cs.SI physics.soc-ph
In usual scale-free networks of Barabasi-Albert type, a newly added node selects randomly m neighbors from the already existing network nodes, proportionally to the number of links these had before. Then the number N(k) of nodes with k links each decays as 1/k^gamma where gamma=3 is universal, i.e. independent of m. Now we use a limited directedness in the construction of the network, as a result of which the exponent gamma decreases from 3 to 2 for increasing m.
1205.0162
Joint Power and Resource Allocation for Block-Fading Relay-Assisted Broadcast Channels
cs.IT math.IT math.OC
We provide the solution for optimizing the power and resource allocation over block-fading relay-assisted broadcast channels in order to maximize the long term average achievable rates region of the users. The problem formulation assumes regenerative (repetition coding) decode-and-forward (DF) relaying strategy, long-term average total transmitted power constraint, orthogonal multiplexing of the users messages within the channel blocks, possibility to use a direct transmission (DT) mode from the base station to the user terminal directly or a relaying (DF) transmission mode, and partial channel state information. We show that our optimization problem can be transformed into an equivalent "no-relaying" broadcast channel optimization problem with each actual user substituted by two virtual users having different channel qualities and multiplexing weights. The proposed power and resource allocation strategies are expressed in closed-form that can be applied practically in centralized relay-assisted wireless networks. Furthermore, we show by numerical examples that our scheme enlarges the achievable rates region significantly.
1205.0181
Distributed Linear Precoder Optimization and Base Station Selection for an Uplink Heterogeneous Network
cs.IT math.IT
In a heterogeneous wireless cellular network, each user may be covered by multiple access points such as macro/pico/relay/femto base stations (BS). An effective approach to maximize the sum utility (e.g., system throughput) in such a network is to jointly optimize users' linear procoders as well as their base station associations. In this paper we first show that this joint optimization problem is NP-hard and thus is difficult to solve to global optimality. To find a locally optimal solution, we formulate the problem as a noncooperative game in which the users and the BSs both act as players. We introduce a set of new utility functions for the players and show that every Nash equilibrium (NE) of the resulting game is a stationary solution of the original sum utility maximization problem. Moreover, we develop a best-response type algorithm that allows the players to distributedly reach a NE of the game. Simulation results show that the proposed distributed algorithm can effectively relieve local BS congestion and simultaneously achieve high throughput and load balancing in a heterogeneous network.
1205.0207
Shortest Path Set Induced Vertex Ordering and its Application to Distributed Distance Optimal Multi-agent Formation Path Planning
cs.RO cs.SY
For the task of moving a group of indistinguishable agents on a connected graph with unit edge lengths into an arbitrary goal formation, it was previously shown that distance optimal paths can be scheduled to complete with a tight convergence time guarantee, using a fully centralized algorithm. In this study, we show that the problem formulation in fact induces a more fundamental ordering of the vertices on the underlying graph network, which directly leads to a more intuitive scheduling algorithm that assures the same convergence time and runs faster. More importantly, this structure enables a distributed scheduling algorithm once individual paths are assigned to the agents, which was not possible before. The vertex ordering also readily extends to more general graphs - those with non-unit capacities and edge lengths - for which we again guarantee the convergence time until the desired formation is achieved.
1205.0211
Non-conservative kinetic exchange model of opinion dynamics with randomness and bounded confidence
physics.soc-ph cond-mat.stat-mech cs.SI
The concept of a bounded confidence level is incorporated in a nonconservative kinetic exchange model of opinion dynamics model where opinions have continuous values $\in [-1,1]$. The characteristics of the unrestricted model, which has one parameter $\lambda$ representing conviction, undergo drastic changes with the introduction of bounded confidence parametrised by $\delta$. Three distinct regions are identified in the phase diagram in the $\delta-\lambda$ plane and the evidences of a first order phase transition for $\delta \geq 0.3$ are presented. A neutral state with all opinions equal to zero occurs for $\lambda \leq \lambda_{c_1} \simeq 2/3$, independent of $\delta$, while for $\lambda_{c_1} \leq \lambda \leq \lambda_{c_2}(\delta)$, an ordered region is seen to exist where opinions of only one sign prevail. At $\lambda_{c_2}(\delta)$, a transition to a disordered state is observed, where individual opinions of both signs coexist and move closer to the extreme values ($\pm 1$) as $\lambda$ is increased. For confidence level $\delta < 0.3$, the ordered phase exists for a narrow range of $\lambda$ only. The line $\delta = 0$ is apparently a line of discontinuity and this limit is discussed in some detail.
1205.0213
Convex dwell-time characterizations for uncertain linear impulsive systems
math.OC cs.SY math.CA math.DS
New sufficient conditions for the characterization of dwell-times for linear impulsive systems are proposed and shown to coincide with continuous decrease conditions of a certain class of looped-functionals, a recently introduced type of functionals suitable for the analysis of hybrid systems. This approach allows to consider Lyapunov functions that evolve non-monotonically along the flow of the system in a new way, broadening then the admissible class of systems which may be analyzed. As a byproduct, the particular structure of the obtained conditions makes the method is easily extendable to uncertain systems by exploiting some convexity properties. Several examples illustrate the approach.
1205.0243
Poultry Diseases Expert System using Dempster-Shafer Theory
cs.AI stat.AP
Based on World Health Organization (WHO) fact sheet in the 2011, outbreaks of poultry diseases especially Avian Influenza in poultry may raise global public health concerns due to their effect on poultry populations, their potential to cause serious disease in people, and their pandemic potential. In this research, we built a Poultry Diseases Expert System using Dempster-Shafer Theory. In this Poultry Diseases Expert System We describe five symptoms which include depression, combs, wattle, bluish face region, swollen face region, narrowness of eyes, and balance disorders. The result of the research is that Poultry Diseases Expert System has been successfully identifying poultry diseases.
1205.0260
Littlewood Polynomials with Small $L^4$ Norm
math.NT cs.IT math.CO math.IT
Littlewood asked how small the ratio $||f||_4/||f||_2$ (where $||.||_\alpha$ denotes the $L^\alpha$ norm on the unit circle) can be for polynomials $f$ having all coefficients in $\{1,-1\}$, as the degree tends to infinity. Since 1988, the least known asymptotic value of this ratio has been $\sqrt[4]{7/6}$, which was conjectured to be minimum. We disprove this conjecture by showing that there is a sequence of such polynomials, derived from the Fekete polynomials, for which the limit of this ratio is less than $\sqrt[4]{22/19}$.
1205.0281
Improving Achievable Rate for the Two-User SISO Interference Channel with Improper Gaussian Signaling
cs.IT math.IT
This paper studies the achievable rate region of the two-user single-input-single-output (SISO) Gaussian interference channel, when the improper Gaussian signaling is applied. Under the assumption that the interference is treated as additive Gaussian noise, we show that the user's achievable rate can be expressed as a summation of the rate achievable by the conventional proper Gaussian signaling, which depends on the users' input covariances only, and an additional term, which is a function of both the users' covariances and pseudo-covariances. The additional degree of freedom given by the pseudo-covariance, which is conventionally set to be zero for the case of proper Gaussian signaling, provides an opportunity to improve the achievable rate by employing the improper Gaussian signaling. Since finding the optimal solution for the joint covariance and pseudo-covariance optimization is difficult, we propose a sub-optimal but efficient algorithm by separately optimizing these two sets of parameters. Numerical results show that the proposed algorithm provides a close-to-optimal performance as compared to the exhaustive search method, and significantly outperforms the optimal proper Gaussian signaling and other existing improper Gaussian signaling schemes.
1205.0288
A Randomized Mirror Descent Algorithm for Large Scale Multiple Kernel Learning
cs.LG stat.ML
We consider the problem of simultaneously learning to linearly combine a very large number of kernels and learn a good predictor based on the learnt kernel. When the number of kernels $d$ to be combined is very large, multiple kernel learning methods whose computational cost scales linearly in $d$ are intractable. We propose a randomized version of the mirror descent algorithm to overcome this issue, under the objective of minimizing the group $p$-norm penalized empirical risk. The key to achieve the required exponential speed-up is the computationally efficient construction of low-variance estimates of the gradient. We propose importance sampling based estimates, and find that the ideal distribution samples a coordinate with a probability proportional to the magnitude of the corresponding gradient. We show the surprising result that in the case of learning the coefficients of a polynomial kernel, the combinatorial structure of the base kernels to be combined allows the implementation of sampling from this distribution to run in $O(\log(d))$ time, making the total computational cost of the method to achieve an $\epsilon$-optimal solution to be $O(\log(d)/\epsilon^2)$, thereby allowing our method to operate for very large values of $d$. Experiments with simulated and real data confirm that the new algorithm is computationally more efficient than its state-of-the-art alternatives.
1205.0312
Least Information Modeling for Information Retrieval
cs.IR cs.IT math.IT
We proposed a Least Information theory (LIT) to quantify meaning of information in probability distribution changes, from which a new information retrieval model was developed. We observed several important characteristics of the proposed theory and derived two quantities in the IR context for document representation. Given probability distributions in a collection as prior knowledge, LI Binary (LIB) quantifies least information due to the binary occurrence of a term in a document whereas LI Frequency (LIF) measures least information based on the probability of drawing a term from a bag of words. Three fusion methods were also developed to combine LIB and LIF quantities for term weighting and document ranking. Experiments on four benchmark TREC collections for ad hoc retrieval showed that LIT-based methods demonstrated very strong performances compared to classic TF*IDF and BM25, especially for verbose queries and hard search topics. The least information theory offers a new approach to measuring semantic quantities of information and provides valuable insight into the development of new IR models.
1205.0326
Performance Analysis of Decode-and-Forward Relaying in Gamma-Gamma Fading Channels
cs.IT math.IT
Decode-and-forward (DF) cooperative communication based on free space optical (FSO) links is studied in this letter. We analyze performance of the DF protocol in the FSO links following the Gamma-Gamma distribution. The cumulative distribution function (CDF) and probability density function (PDF) of a random variable containing mixture of the Gamma- Gamma and Gaussian random variables is derived. By using the derived CDF and PDF, average bit error rate of the DF relaying is obtained.
1205.0329
An Adaptive Conditional Zero-Forcing Decoder with Full-diversity, Least Complexity and Essentially-ML Performance for STBCs
cs.IT math.IT
A low complexity, essentially-ML decoding technique for the Golden code and the 3 antenna Perfect code was introduced by Sirianunpiboon, Howard and Calderbank. Though no theoretical analysis of the decoder was given, the simulations showed that this decoding technique has almost maximum-likelihood (ML) performance. Inspired by this technique, in this paper we introduce two new low complexity decoders for Space-Time Block Codes (STBCs) - the Adaptive Conditional Zero-Forcing (ACZF) decoder and the ACZF decoder with successive interference cancellation (ACZF-SIC), which include as a special case the decoding technique of Sirianunpiboon et al. We show that both ACZF and ACZF-SIC decoders are capable of achieving full-diversity, and we give sufficient conditions for an STBC to give full-diversity with these decoders. We then show that the Golden code, the 3 and 4 antenna Perfect codes, the 3 antenna Threaded Algebraic Space-Time code and the 4 antenna rate 2 code of Srinath and Rajan are all full-diversity ACZF/ACZF-SIC decodable with complexity strictly less than that of their ML decoders. Simulations show that the proposed decoding method performs identical to ML decoding for all these five codes. These STBCs along with the proposed decoding algorithm outperform all known codes in terms of decoding complexity and error performance for 2,3 and 4 transmit antennas. We further provide a lower bound on the complexity of full-diversity ACZF/ACZF-SIC decoding. All the five codes listed above achieve this lower bound and hence are optimal in terms of minimizing the ACZF/ACZF-SIC decoding complexity. Both ACZF and ACZF-SIC decoders are amenable to sphere decoding implementation.
1205.0345
Bounds on List Decoding Gabidulin Codes
cs.IT math.IT
An open question about Gabidulin codes is whether polynomial-time list decoding beyond half the minimum distance is possible or not. In this contribution, we give a lower and an upper bound on the list size, i.e., the number of codewords in a ball around the received word. The lower bound shows that if the radius of this ball is greater than the Johnson radius, this list size can be exponential and hence, no polynomial-time list decoding is possible. The upper bound on the list size uses subspace properties.
1205.0406
Minimax Classifier for Uncertain Costs
cs.LG
Many studies on the cost-sensitive learning assumed that a unique cost matrix is known for a problem. However, this assumption may not hold for many real-world problems. For example, a classifier might need to be applied in several circumstances, each of which associates with a different cost matrix. Or, different human experts have different opinions about the costs for a given problem. Motivated by these facts, this study aims to seek the minimax classifier over multiple cost matrices. In summary, we theoretically proved that, no matter how many cost matrices are involved, the minimax problem can be tackled by solving a number of standard cost-sensitive problems and sub-problems that involve only two cost matrices. As a result, a general framework for achieving minimax classifier over multiple cost matrices is suggested and justified by preliminary empirical studies.
1205.0411
Hypothesis testing using pairwise distances and associated kernels (with Appendix)
cs.LG stat.ME stat.ML
We provide a unifying framework linking two classes of statistics used in two-sample and independence testing: on the one hand, the energy distances and distance covariances from the statistics literature; on the other, distances between embeddings of distributions to reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces (RKHS), as established in machine learning. The equivalence holds when energy distances are computed with semimetrics of negative type, in which case a kernel may be defined such that the RKHS distance between distributions corresponds exactly to the energy distance. We determine the class of probability distributions for which kernels induced by semimetrics are characteristic (that is, for which embeddings of the distributions to an RKHS are injective). Finally, we investigate the performance of this family of kernels in two-sample and independence tests: we show in particular that the energy distance most commonly employed in statistics is just one member of a parametric family of kernels, and that other choices from this family can yield more powerful tests.
1205.0435
Scalable Social Coordination using Enmeshed Queries
cs.DB cs.SI physics.soc-ph
Social coordination allows users to move beyond awareness of their friends to efficiently coordinating physical activities with others. While specific forms of social coordination can be seen in tools such as Evite, Meetup and Groupon, we introduce a more general model using what we call enmeshed queries. An enmeshed query allows users to declaratively specify an intent to coordinate by specifying social attributes such as the desired group size and who/what/when, and the database returns matching queries. Enmeshed queries are continuous, but new queries (and not data) answer older queries; the variable group size also makes enmeshed queries different from entangled queries, publish-subscribe systems, and dating services. We show that even offline group coordination using enmeshed queries is NP-hard. We then introduce efficient heuristics that use selective indices such as location and time to reduce the space of possible matches; we also add refinements such as delayed evaluation and using the relative matchability of users to determine search order. We describe a centralized implementation and evaluate its performance against an optimal algorithm. We show that the combination of not stopping prematurely (after finding a match) and delayed evaluation results in an algorithm that finds 86% of the matches found by an optimal algorithm, and takes an average of 40 usec per query using 1 core of a 2.5 Ghz server machine. Further, the algorithm has good latency, is reasonably fair to large group size requests, and can be scaled to global workloads using multiple cores and multiple servers. We conclude by describing potential generalizations that add prices, recommendations, and data mining to basic enmeshed queries.
1205.0439
TH*:Scalable Distributed Trie Hashing
cs.DS cs.DB cs.DC
In today's world of computers, dealing with huge amounts of data is not unusual. The need to distribute this data in order to increase its availability and increase the performance of accessing it is more urgent than ever. For these reasons it is necessary to develop scalable distributed data structures. In this paper we propose a TH* distributed variant of the Trie Hashing data structure. First we propose Thsw new version of TH without node Nil in digital tree (trie), then this version will be adapted to multicomputer environment. The simulation results reveal that TH* is scalable in the sense that it grows gracefully, one bucket at a time, to a large number of servers, also TH* offers a good storage space utilization and high query efficiency special for ordering operations.
1205.0483
High availability using virtualization - 3RC
cs.SY
High availability has always been one of the main problems for a data center. Till now high availability was achieved by host per host redundancy, a highly expensive method in terms of hardware and human costs. A new approach to the problem can be offered by virtualization. Using virtualization, it is possible to achieve a redundancy system for all the services running on a data center. This new approach to high availability allows the running virtual machines to be distributed over a small number of servers, by exploiting the features of the virtualization layer: start, stop and move virtual machines between physical hosts. The 3RC system is based on a finite state machine, providing the possibility to restart each virtual machine over any physical host, or reinstall it from scratch. A complete infrastructure has been developed to install operating system and middleware in a few minutes. To virtualize the main servers of a data center, a new procedure has been developed to migrate physical to virtual hosts. The whole Grid data center SNS-PISA is running at the moment in virtual environment under the high availability system.
1205.0537
A greedy-navigator approach to navigable city plans
physics.soc-ph cs.SI
We use a set of four theoretical navigability indices for street maps to investigate the shape of the resulting street networks, if they are grown by optimizing these indices. The indices compare the performance of simulated navigators (having a partial information about the surroundings, like humans in many real situations) to the performance of optimally navigating individuals. We show that our simple greedy shortcut construction strategy generates the emerging structures that are different from real road network, but not inconceivable. The resulting city plans, for all navigation indices, share common qualitative properties such as the tendency for triangular blocks to appear, while the more quantitative features, such as degree distributions and clustering, are characteristically different depending on the type of metrics and routing strategies. We show that it is the type of metrics used which determines the overall shapes characterized by structural heterogeneity, but the routing schemes contribute to more subtle details of locality, which is more emphasized in case of unrestricted connections when the edge crossing is allowed.
1205.0540
A Fitness Model for Scholarly Impact Analysis
stat.AP cs.DL cs.SI physics.soc-ph
We propose a model to analyze citation growth and influences of fitness (competitiveness) factors in an evolving citation network. Applying the proposed method to modeling citations to papers and scholars in the InfoVis 2004 data, a benchmark collection about a 31-year history of information visualization, leads to findings consistent with citation distributions in general and observations of the domain in particular. Fitness variables based on prior impacts and the time factor have significant influences on citation outcomes. We find considerably large effect sizes from the fitness modeling, which suggest inevitable bias in citation analysis due to these factors. While raw citation scores offer little insight into the growth of InfoVis, normalization of the scores by influences of time and prior fitness offers a reasonable depiction of the field's development. The analysis demonstrates the proposed model's ability to produce results consistent with observed data and to support meaningful comparison of citation scores over time.
1205.0541
Percolation threshold determines the optimal population density for public cooperation
physics.soc-ph cs.SI q-bio.PE
While worldwide census data provide statistical evidence that firmly link the population density with several indicators of social welfare, the precise mechanisms underlying these observations are largely unknown. Here we study the impact of population density on the evolution of public cooperation in structured populations and find that the optimal density is uniquely related to the percolation threshold of the host graph irrespective of its topological details. We explain our observations by showing that spatial reciprocity peaks in the vicinity of the percolation threshold, when the emergence of a giant cooperative cluster is hindered neither by vacancy nor by invading defectors, thus discovering an intuitive yet universal law that links the population density with social prosperity.
1205.0561
Multi-level agent-based modeling - A literature survey
cs.MA
During last decade, multi-level agent-based modeling has received significant and dramatically increasing interest. In this article we present a comprehensive and structured review of literature on the subject. We present the main theoretical contributions and application domains of this concept, with an emphasis on social, flow, biological and biomedical models.
1205.0586
Enhanced Algebraic Error Control for Random Linear Network Coding
cs.IT math.IT
Error control is significant to network coding, since when unchecked, errors greatly deteriorate the throughput gains of network coding and seriously undermine both reliability and security of data. Two families of codes, subspace and rank metric codes, have been used to provide error control for random linear network coding. In this paper, we enhance the error correction capability of these two families of codes by using a novel two-tier decoding scheme. While the decoding of subspace and rank metric codes serves a second-tier decoding, we propose to perform a first-tier decoding on the packet level by taking advantage of Hamming distance properties of subspace and rank metric codes. This packet-level decoding can also be implemented by intermediate nodes to reduce error propagation. To support the first-tier decoding, we also investigate Hamming distance properties of three important families of subspace and rank metric codes, Gabidulin codes, Kotter--Kschischang codes, and Mahdavifar--Vardy codes. Both the two-tier decoding scheme and the Hamming distance properties of these codes are novel to the best of our knowledge.
1205.0591
Multi-Faceted Ranking of News Articles using Post-Read Actions
cs.IR
Personalized article recommendation is important to improve user engagement on news sites. Existing work quantifies engagement primarily through click rates. We argue that quality of recommendations can be improved by incorporating different types of "post-read" engagement signals like sharing, commenting, printing and e-mailing article links. More specifically, we propose a multi-faceted ranking problem for recommending news articles where each facet corresponds to a ranking problem to maximize actions of a post-read action type. The key technical challenge is to estimate the rates of post-read action types by mitigating the impact of enormous data sparsity, we do so through several variations of factor models. To exploit correlations among post-read action types we also introduce a novel variant called locally augmented tensor (LAT) model. Through data obtained from a major news site in the US, we show that factor models significantly outperform a few baseline IR models and the LAT model significantly outperforms several other variations of factor models. Our findings show that it is possible to incorporate post-read signals that are commonly available on online news sites to improve quality of recommendations.
1205.0596
Complex Networks from Simple Rewrite Systems
cs.SI nlin.AO physics.soc-ph
Complex networks are all around us, and they can be generated by simple mechanisms. Understanding what kinds of networks can be produced by following simple rules is therefore of great importance. We investigate this issue by studying the dynamics of extremely simple systems where are `writer' moves around a network, and modifies it in a way that depends upon the writer's surroundings. Each vertex in the network has three edges incident upon it, which are colored red, blue and green. This edge coloring is done to provide a way for the writer to orient its movement. We explore the dynamics of a space of 3888 of these `colored trinet automata' systems. We find a large variety of behaviour, ranging from the very simple to the very complex. We also discover simple rules that generate forms which are remarkably similar to a wide range of natural objects. We study our systems using simulations (with appropriate visualization techniques) and analyze selected rules mathematically. We arrive at an empirical classification scheme which reveals a lot about the kinds of dynamics and networks that can be generated by these systems.
1205.0610
Greedy Multiple Instance Learning via Codebook Learning and Nearest Neighbor Voting
cs.LG
Multiple instance learning (MIL) has attracted great attention recently in machine learning community. However, most MIL algorithms are very slow and cannot be applied to large datasets. In this paper, we propose a greedy strategy to speed up the multiple instance learning process. Our contribution is two fold. First, we propose a density ratio model, and show that maximizing a density ratio function is the low bound of the DD model under certain conditions. Secondly, we make use of a histogram ratio between positive bags and negative bags to represent the density ratio function and find codebooks separately for positive bags and negative bags by a greedy strategy. For testing, we make use of a nearest neighbor strategy to classify new bags. We test our method on both small benchmark datasets and the large TRECVID MED11 dataset. The experimental results show that our method yields comparable accuracy to the current state of the art, while being up to at least one order of magnitude faster.
1205.0618
Wireless Information and Power Transfer: Architecture Design and Rate-Energy Tradeoff
cs.IT math.IT
Simultaneous information and power transfer over the wireless channels potentially offers great convenience to mobile users. Yet practical receiver designs impose technical constraints on its hardware realization, as practical circuits for harvesting energy from radio signals are not yet able to decode the carried information directly. To make theoretical progress, we propose a general receiver operation, namely, dynamic power splitting (DPS), which splits the received signal with adjustable power ratio for energy harvesting and information decoding, separately. Three special cases of DPS, namely, time switching (TS), static power splitting (SPS) and on-off power splitting (OPS) are investigated. The TS and SPS schemes can be treated as special cases of OPS. Moreover, we propose two types of practical receiver architectures, namely, separated versus integrated information and energy receivers. The integrated receiver integrates the front-end components of the separated receiver, thus achieving a smaller form factor. The rate-energy tradeoff for the two architectures are characterized by a so-called rate-energy (R-E) region. The optimal transmission strategy is derived to achieve different rate-energy tradeoffs. With receiver circuit power consumption taken into account, it is shown that the OPS scheme is optimal for both receivers. For the ideal case when the receiver circuit does not consume power, the SPS scheme is optimal for both receivers. In addition, we study the performance for the two types of receivers under a realistic system setup that employs practical modulation. Our results provide useful insights to the optimal practical receiver design for simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT).
1205.0622
No-Regret Learning in Extensive-Form Games with Imperfect Recall
cs.GT cs.AI
Counterfactual Regret Minimization (CFR) is an efficient no-regret learning algorithm for decision problems modeled as extensive games. CFR's regret bounds depend on the requirement of perfect recall: players always remember information that was revealed to them and the order in which it was revealed. In games without perfect recall, however, CFR's guarantees do not apply. In this paper, we present the first regret bound for CFR when applied to a general class of games with imperfect recall. In addition, we show that CFR applied to any abstraction belonging to our general class results in a regret bound not just for the abstract game, but for the full game as well. We verify our theory and show how imperfect recall can be used to trade a small increase in regret for a significant reduction in memory in three domains: die-roll poker, phantom tic-tac-toe, and Bluff.
1205.0626
Advances in the merit factor problem for binary sequences
math.CO cs.IT math.IT
The identification of binary sequences with large merit factor (small mean-squared aperiodic autocorrelation) is an old problem of complex analysis and combinatorial optimization, with practical importance in digital communications engineering and condensed matter physics. We establish the asymptotic merit factor of several families of binary sequences and thereby prove various conjectures, explain numerical evidence presented by other authors, and bring together within a single framework results previously appearing in scattered form. We exhibit, for the first time, families of skew-symmetric sequences whose asymptotic merit factor is as large as the best known value (an algebraic number greater than 6.34) for all binary sequences; this is interesting in light of Golay's conjecture that the subclass of skew-symmetric sequences has asymptotically optimal merit factor. Our methods combine Fourier analysis, estimation of character sums, and estimation of the number of lattice points in polyhedra.
1205.0627
Rule-weighted and terminal-weighted context-free grammars have identical expressivity
cs.CL
Two formalisms, both based on context-free grammars, have recently been proposed as a basis for a non-uniform random generation of combinatorial objects. The former, introduced by Denise et al, associates weights with letters, while the latter, recently explored by Weinberg et al in the context of random generation, associates weights to transitions. In this short note, we use a simple modification of the Greibach Normal Form transformation algorithm, due to Blum and Koch, to show the equivalent expressivities, in term of their induced distributions, of these two formalisms.
1205.0651
Generative Maximum Entropy Learning for Multiclass Classification
cs.IT cs.LG math.IT
Maximum entropy approach to classification is very well studied in applied statistics and machine learning and almost all the methods that exists in literature are discriminative in nature. In this paper, we introduce a maximum entropy classification method with feature selection for large dimensional data such as text datasets that is generative in nature. To tackle the curse of dimensionality of large data sets, we employ conditional independence assumption (Naive Bayes) and we perform feature selection simultaneously, by enforcing a `maximum discrimination' between estimated class conditional densities. For two class problems, in the proposed method, we use Jeffreys ($J$) divergence to discriminate the class conditional densities. To extend our method to the multi-class case, we propose a completely new approach by considering a multi-distribution divergence: we replace Jeffreys divergence by Jensen-Shannon ($JS$) divergence to discriminate conditional densities of multiple classes. In order to reduce computational complexity, we employ a modified Jensen-Shannon divergence ($JS_{GM}$), based on AM-GM inequality. We show that the resulting divergence is a natural generalization of Jeffreys divergence to a multiple distributions case. As far as the theoretical justifications are concerned we show that when one intends to select the best features in a generative maximum entropy approach, maximum discrimination using $J-$divergence emerges naturally in binary classification. Performance and comparative study of the proposed algorithms have been demonstrated on large dimensional text and gene expression datasets that show our methods scale up very well with large dimensional datasets.
1205.0699
Time-Varying Space-Only Codes for Coded MIMO
cs.IT math.IT
Multiple antenna (MIMO) devices are widely used to increase reliability and information bit rate. Optimal error rate performance (full diversity and large coding gain), for unknown channel state information at the transmitter and for maximal rate, can be achieved by approximately universal space-time codes, but comes at a price of large detection complexity, infeasible for most practical systems. We propose a new coded modulation paradigm: error-correction outer code with space-only but time-varying precoder (as inner code). We refer to the latter as Ergodic Mutual Information (EMI) code. The EMI code achieves the maximal multiplexing gain and full diversity is proved in terms of the outage probability. Contrary to most of the literature, our work is not based on the elegant but difficult classical algebraic MIMO theory. Instead, the relation between MIMO and parallel channels is exploited. The theoretical proof of full diversity is corroborated by means of numerical simulations for many MIMO scenarios, in terms of outage probability and word error rate of LDPC coded systems. The full-diversity and full-rate at low detection complexity comes at a price of a small coding gain loss for outer coding rates close to one, but this loss vanishes with decreasing coding rate.
1205.0703
Paraunitary Matrices
cs.IT math.IT
Design methods for paraunitary matrices from complete orthogonal sets of idempotents and related matrix structures are presented. These include techniques for designing non-separable multidimensional paraunitary matrices. Properties of the structures are obtained and proofs given. Paraunitary matrices play a central role in signal processing, in particular in the areas of filterbanks and wavelets.
1205.0724
Using Data Warehouse to Support Building Strategy or Forecast Business Tend
cs.DB
The data warehousing is becoming increasingly important in terms of strategic decision making through their capacity to integrate heterogeneous data from multiple information sources in a common storage space, for querying and analysis. So it can evolve into a multi-tier structure where parts of the organization take information from the main data warehouse into their own systems. These may include analysis databases or dependent data marts. As the data warehouse evolves and the organization gets better at capturing information on all interactions with the customer. Data warehouse can track customer interactions over the whole of the customer's lifetime.
1205.0732
Discretization of a matrix in the problem of quadratic functional binary minimization
cs.NE
The capability of discretization of matrix elements in the problem of quadratic functional minimization with linear member built on matrix in N-dimensional configuration space with discrete coordinates is researched. It is shown, that optimal procedure of replacement matrix elements by the integer quantities with the limited number of gradations exist, and the efficient of minimization does not reduce. Parameter depends on matrix properties, which allows estimate the capability of using described procedure for given type of matrix, is found. Computational complexities of algorithm and RAM requirements are reduced by 16 times, correct using of integer elements allows increase minimization algorithm speed by the orders.
1205.0768
Optimization of Survivability Analysis for Large-Scale Engineering Networks
math.OC cs.SI physics.soc-ph
Engineering networks fall into the category of large-scale networks with heterogeneous nodes such as sources and sinks. The survivability analysis of such networks requires the analysis of the connectivity of the network components for every possible combination of faults to determine a network response to each combination of faults. From the computational complexity point of view, the problem belongs to the class of exponential time problems at least. Partially, the problem complexity can be reduced by mapping the initial topology of a complex large-scale network with multiple sources and multiple sinks onto a set of smaller sub-topologies with multiple sources and a single sink connected to the network of sources by a single link. In this paper, the mapping procedure is applied to the Florida power grid.
1205.0790
Automating embedded analysis capabilities and managing software complexity in multiphysics simulation part I: template-based generic programming
cs.MS cs.CE
An approach for incorporating embedded simulation and analysis capabilities in complex simulation codes through template-based generic programming is presented. This approach relies on templating and operator overloading within the C++ language to transform a given calculation into one that can compute a variety of additional quantities that are necessary for many state-of-the-art simulation and analysis algorithms. An approach for incorporating these ideas into complex simulation codes through general graph-based assembly is also presented. These ideas have been implemented within a set of packages in the Trilinos framework and are demonstrated on a simple problem from chemical engineering.
1205.0792
Exact Wavelets on the Ball
cs.IT astro-ph.IM math.IT
We develop an exact wavelet transform on the three-dimensional ball (i.e. on the solid sphere), which we name the flaglet transform. For this purpose we first construct an exact transform on the radial half-line using damped Laguerre polynomials and develop a corresponding quadrature rule. Combined with the spherical harmonic transform, this approach leads to a sampling theorem on the ball and a novel three-dimensional decomposition which we call the Fourier-Laguerre transform. We relate this new transform to the well-known Fourier-Bessel decomposition and show that band-limitedness in the Fourier-Laguerre basis is a sufficient condition to compute the Fourier-Bessel decomposition exactly. We then construct the flaglet transform on the ball through a harmonic tiling, which is exact thanks to the exactness of the Fourier-Laguerre transform (from which the name flaglets is coined). The corresponding wavelet kernels are well localised in real and Fourier-Laguerre spaces and their angular aperture is invariant under radial translation. We introduce a multiresolution algorithm to perform the flaglet transform rapidly, while capturing all information at each wavelet scale in the minimal number of samples on the ball. Our implementation of these new tools achieves floating-point precision and is made publicly available. We perform numerical experiments demonstrating the speed and accuracy of these libraries and illustrate their capabilities on a simple denoising example.
1205.0831
African Trypanosomiasis Detection using Dempster-Shafer Theory
cs.AI stat.CO
World Health Organization reports that African Trypanosomiasis affects mostly poor populations living in remote rural areas of Africa that can be fatal if properly not treated. This paper presents Dempster-Shafer Theory for the detection of African trypanosomiasis. Sustainable elimination of African trypanosomiasis as a public-health problem is feasible and requires continuous efforts and innovative approaches. In this research, we implement Dempster-Shafer theory for detecting African trypanosomiasis and displaying the result of detection process. We describe eleven symptoms as major symptoms which include fever, red urine, skin rash, paralysis, headache, bleeding around the bite, joint the paint, swollen lymph nodes, sleep disturbances, meningitis and arthritis. Dempster-Shafer theory to quantify the degree of belief, our approach uses Dempster-Shafer theory to combine beliefs under conditions of uncertainty and ignorance, and allows quantitative measurement of the belief and plausibility in our identification result.
1205.0835
Parameter Tracking via Optimal Distributed Beamforming in an Analog Sensor Network
cs.IT math.IT
We consider the problem of optimal distributed beamforming in a sensor network where the sensors observe a dynamic parameter in noise and coherently amplify and forward their observations to a fusion center (FC). The FC uses a Kalman filter to track the parameter using the observations from the sensors, and we show how to find the optimal gain and phase of the sensor transmissions under both global and individual power constraints in order to minimize the mean squared error (MSE) of the parameter estimate. For the case of a global power constraint, a closed-form solution can be obtained. A numerical optimization is required for individual power constraints, but the problem can be relaxed to a semidefinite programming problem (SDP), and we show how the optimal solution can be constructed from the solution to the SDP. Simulation results show that compared with equal power transmission, the use of optimized power control can significantly reduce the MSE.
1205.0837
Indexing Reverse Top-k Queries
cs.DB cs.CG
We consider the recently introduced monochromatic reverse top-k queries which ask for, given a new tuple q and a dataset D, all possible top-k queries on D union {q} for which q is in the result. Towards this problem, we focus on designing indexes in two dimensions for repeated (or batch) querying, a novel but practical consideration. We present the insight that by representing the dataset as an arrangement of lines, a critical k-polygon can be identified and used exclusively to respond to reverse top-k queries. We construct an index based on this observation which has guaranteed worst-case query cost that is logarithmic in the size of the k-polygon. We implement our work and compare it to related approaches, demonstrating that our index is fast in practice. Furthermore, we demonstrate through our experiments that a k-polygon is comprised of a small proportion of the original data, so our index structure consumes little disk space.
1205.0858
Controlled Sensing for Multihypothesis Testing
cs.IT math.IT
The problem of multiple hypothesis testing with observation control is considered in both fixed sample size and sequential settings. In the fixed sample size setting, for binary hypothesis testing, the optimal exponent for the maximal error probability corresponds to the maximum Chernoff information over the choice of controls, and a pure stationary open-loop control policy is asymptotically optimal within the larger class of all causal control policies. For multihypothesis testing in the fixed sample size setting, lower and upper bounds on the optimal error exponent are derived. It is also shown through an example with three hypotheses that the optimal causal control policy can be strictly better than the optimal open-loop control policy. In the sequential setting, a test based on earlier work by Chernoff for binary hypothesis testing, is shown to be first-order asymptotically optimal for multihypothesis testing in a strong sense, using the notion of decision making risk in place of the overall probability of error. Another test is also designed to meet hard risk constrains while retaining asymptotic optimality. The role of past information and randomization in designing optimal control policies is discussed.
1205.0908
Weighted Patterns as a Tool for Improving the Hopfield Model
cond-mat.dis-nn cs.LG cs.NE
We generalize the standard Hopfield model to the case when a weight is assigned to each input pattern. The weight can be interpreted as the frequency of the pattern occurrence at the input of the network. In the framework of the statistical physics approach we obtain the saddle-point equation allowing us to examine the memory of the network. In the case of unequal weights our model does not lead to the catastrophic destruction of the memory due to its overfilling (that is typical for the standard Hopfield model). The real memory consists only of the patterns with weights exceeding a critical value that is determined by the weights distribution. We obtain the algorithm allowing us to find this critical value for an arbitrary distribution of the weights, and analyze in detail some particular weights distributions. It is shown that the memory decreases as compared to the case of the standard Hopfield model. However, in our model the network can learn online without the catastrophic destruction of the memory.
1205.0910
On projections of arbitrary lattices
cs.CG cs.IT math.IT
In this paper we prove that given any two point lattices $\Lambda_1 \subset \mathbb{R}^n$ and $ \Lambda_2 \subset \nobreak \mathbb{R}^{n-k}$, there is a set of $k$ vectors $\bm{v}_i \in \Lambda_1$ such that $\Lambda_2$ is, up to similarity, arbitrarily close to the projection of $\Lambda_1$ onto the orthogonal complement of the subspace spanned by $\bm{v}_1, \ldots, \bm{v}_k$. This result extends the main theorem of \cite{Sloane2} and has applications in communication theory.
1205.0917
VIQI: A New Approach for Visual Interpretation of Deep Web Query Interfaces
cs.IR cs.AI
Deep Web databases contain more than 90% of pertinent information of the Web. Despite their importance, users don't profit of this treasury. Many deep web services are offering competitive services in term of prices, quality of service, and facilities. As the number of services is growing rapidly, users have difficulty to ask many web services in the same time. In this paper, we imagine a system where users have the possibility to formulate one query using one query interface and then the system translates query to the rest of query interfaces. However, interfaces are created by designers in order to be interpreted visually by users, machines can not interpret query from a given interface. We propose a new approach which emulates capacity of interpretation of users and extracts query from deep web query interfaces. Our approach has proved good performances on two standard datasets.
1205.0919
ViQIE: A New Approach for Visual Query Interpretation and Extraction
cs.IR
Web services are accessed via query interfaces which hide databases containing thousands of relevant information. User's side, distant database is a black box which accepts query and returns results, there is no way to access database schema which reflect data and query meanings. Hence, web services are very autonomous. Users view this autonomy as a major drawback because they need often to combine query capabilities of many web services at the same time. In this work, we will present a new approach which allows users to benefit of query capabilities of many web services while respecting autonomy of each service. This solution is a new contribution in Information Retrieval research axe and has proven good performances on two standard datasets.
1205.0927
An Energy-Efficient MIMO Algorithm with Receive Power Constraint
cs.IT cs.NI math.IT
We consider the energy-efficiency of Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) systems with constrained received power rather than constrained transmit power. A Energy-Efficient Water-Filling (EEWF) algorithm that maximizes the ratio of the transmission rate to the total transmit power has been derived. The EEWF power allocation policy establishes a trade-off between the transmission rate and the total transmit power under the total receive power constraint. The static and the uncorrelated fast fading Rayleigh channels have been considered, where the maximization is performed on the instantaneous realization of the channel assuming perfect information at both the transmitter and the receiver with equal number of antennas. We show, based on Monte Carlo simulations that the energy-efficiency provided by the EEWF algorithm can be more than an order of magnitude greater than the energy-efficiency corresponding to capacity achieving Water-Filling (WF) algorithm. We also show that the energy-efficiency increases with both the number of antennas and the signal-to-noise ratio. The corresponding transmission rate also increases but at a slower rate than the Shannon capacity, while the corresponding total transmit power decreases with the number of antennas.
1205.0960
Parallel clustering with CFinder
physics.soc-ph cs.DC cs.DS cs.SI physics.data-an
The amount of available data about complex systems is increasing every year, measurements of larger and larger systems are collected and recorded. A natural representation of such data is given by networks, whose size is following the size of the original system. The current trend of multiple cores in computing infrastructures call for a parallel reimplementation of earlier methods. Here we present the grid version of CFinder, which can locate overlapping communities in directed, weighted or undirected networks based on the clique percolation method (CPM). We show that the computation of the communities can be distributed among several CPU-s or computers. Although switching to the parallel version not necessarily leads to gain in computing time, it definitely makes the community structure of extremely large networks accessible.
1205.0968
Information Complexity versus Corruption and Applications to Orthogonality and Gap-Hamming
cs.CC cs.IT math.IT math.PR
Three decades of research in communication complexity have led to the invention of a number of techniques to lower bound randomized communication complexity. The majority of these techniques involve properties of large submatrices (rectangles) of the truth-table matrix defining a communication problem. The only technique that does not quite fit is information complexity, which has been investigated over the last decade. Here, we connect information complexity to one of the most powerful "rectangular" techniques: the recently-introduced smooth corruption (or "smooth rectangle") bound. We show that the former subsumes the latter under rectangular input distributions. We conjecture that this subsumption holds more generally, under arbitrary distributions, which would resolve the long-standing direct sum question for randomized communication. As an application, we obtain an optimal $\Omega(n)$ lower bound on the information complexity---under the {\em uniform distribution}---of the so-called orthogonality problem (ORT), which is in turn closely related to the much-studied Gap-Hamming-Distance (GHD). The proof of this bound is along the lines of recent communication lower bounds for GHD, but we encounter a surprising amount of additional technical detail.