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1212.5877
Blinking Molecule Tracking
cs.CV cs.DM
We discuss a method for tracking individual molecules which globally optimizes the likelihood of the connections between molecule positions fast and with high reliability even for high spot densities and blinking molecules. Our method works with cost functions which can be freely chosen to combine costs for distances between spots in space and time and which can account for the reliability of positioning a molecule. To this end, we describe a top-down polyhedral approach to the problem of tracking many individual molecules. This immediately yields an effective implementation using standard linear programming solvers. Our method can be applied to 2D and 3D tracking.
1212.5882
The Kernel-SME Filter for Multiple Target Tracking
cs.SY
We present a novel method called Kernel-SME filter for tracking multiple targets when the association of the measurements to the targets is unknown. The method is a further development of the Symmetric Measurement Equation (SME) filter, which removes the data association uncertainty of the original measurement equation with the help of a symmetric transformation. The underlying idea of the Kernel-SME filter is to construct a symmetric transformation by means of mapping the measurements to a Gaussian mixture. This transformation is scalable to a large number of targets and allows for deriving a Gaussian state estimator that has a cubic time complexity in the number of targets.
1212.5921
Distributed optimization of deeply nested systems
cs.LG cs.NE math.OC stat.ML
In science and engineering, intelligent processing of complex signals such as images, sound or language is often performed by a parameterized hierarchy of nonlinear processing layers, sometimes biologically inspired. Hierarchical systems (or, more generally, nested systems) offer a way to generate complex mappings using simple stages. Each layer performs a different operation and achieves an ever more sophisticated representation of the input, as, for example, in an deep artificial neural network, an object recognition cascade in computer vision or a speech front-end processing. Joint estimation of the parameters of all the layers and selection of an optimal architecture is widely considered to be a difficult numerical nonconvex optimization problem, difficult to parallelize for execution in a distributed computation environment, and requiring significant human expert effort, which leads to suboptimal systems in practice. We describe a general mathematical strategy to learn the parameters and, to some extent, the architecture of nested systems, called the method of auxiliary coordinates (MAC). This replaces the original problem involving a deeply nested function with a constrained problem involving a different function in an augmented space without nesting. The constrained problem may be solved with penalty-based methods using alternating optimization over the parameters and the auxiliary coordinates. MAC has provable convergence, is easy to implement reusing existing algorithms for single layers, can be parallelized trivially and massively, applies even when parameter derivatives are not available or not desirable, and is competitive with state-of-the-art nonlinear optimizers even in the serial computation setting, often providing reasonable models within a few iterations.
1212.5932
Fully scalable online-preprocessing algorithm for short oligonucleotide microarray atlases
q-bio.QM cs.CE cs.LG q-bio.GN stat.AP stat.ML
Accumulation of standardized data collections is opening up novel opportunities for holistic characterization of genome function. The limited scalability of current preprocessing techniques has, however, formed a bottleneck for full utilization of contemporary microarray collections. While short oligonucleotide arrays constitute a major source of genome-wide profiling data, scalable probe-level preprocessing algorithms have been available only for few measurement platforms based on pre-calculated model parameters from restricted reference training sets. To overcome these key limitations, we introduce a fully scalable online-learning algorithm that provides tools to process large microarray atlases including tens of thousands of arrays. Unlike the alternatives, the proposed algorithm scales up in linear time with respect to sample size and is readily applicable to all short oligonucleotide platforms. This is the only available preprocessing algorithm that can learn probe-level parameters based on sequential hyperparameter updates at small, consecutive batches of data, thus circumventing the extensive memory requirements of the standard approaches and opening up novel opportunities to take full advantage of contemporary microarray data collections. Moreover, using the most comprehensive data collections to estimate probe-level effects can assist in pinpointing individual probes affected by various biases and provide new tools to guide array design and quality control. The implementation is freely available in R/Bioconductor at http://www.bioconductor.org/packages/devel/bioc/html/RPA.html
1212.5943
Modeling page-view dynamics on Wikipedia
cs.CY cs.SI physics.data-an physics.soc-ph
We introduce a model for predicting page-view dynamics of promoted content. The regularity of the content promotion process on Wikipedia provides excellent experimental conditions which favour detailed modelling. We show that the popularity of an article featured on Wikipedia's main page decays exponentially in time if the circadian cycles of the users are taken into account. Our model can be explained as the result of individual Poisson processes and is validated through empirical measurements. It provides a simpler explanation for the evolution of content popularity than previous studies.
1212.5969
The Strength of Varying Tie Strength
physics.soc-ph cs.SI
``The Strength of Weak Ties" argument (Granovetter 1973) says that the most valuable information is best collected through bridging ties with other social circles than one's own, and that those ties tend to be weak. Aral and Van Alstyne (2011) added that to access complex information, actors need strong ties (``high bandwidth") instead. These insights I integrate and generalize by pointing at actors' benefits and costs. Weak ties are well-suited for relatively simple information at low costs, whereas for complex information, the best outcomes are expected for those actors who vary their bandwidths along with the value of information accessed. To support my claim I use all patents in the USA (two million) over the period 1975---1999.
1212.5981
Core organization of directed complex networks
cond-mat.dis-nn cs.SI math-ph math.MP physics.soc-ph
The recursive removal of leaves (dead end vertices) and their neighbors from an undirected network results, when this pruning algorithm stops, in a so-called core of the network. This specific subgraph should be distinguished from $k$-cores, which are principally different subgraphs in networks. If the vertex mean degree of a network is sufficiently large, the core is a giant cluster containing a finite fraction of vertices. We find that generalization of this pruning algorithm to directed networks provides a significantly more complex picture of cores. By implementing a rate equation approach to this pruning procedure for directed uncorrelated networks, we identify a set of cores progressively embedded into each other in a network and describe their birth points and structure.
1212.6009
Distributed Sparse Signal Recovery For Sensor Networks
cs.IT math.IT
We propose a distributed algorithm for sparse signal recovery in sensor networks based on Iterative Hard Thresholding (IHT). Every agent has a set of measurements of a signal x, and the objective is for the agents to recover x from their collective measurements at a minimal communication cost and with low computational complexity. A naive distributed implementation of IHT would require global communication of every agent's full state in each iteration. We find that we can dramatically reduce this communication cost by leveraging solutions to the distributed top-K problem in the database literature. Evaluations show that our algorithm requires up to three orders of magnitude less total bandwidth than the best-known distributed basis pursuit method.
1212.6018
Exponentially Weighted Moving Average Charts for Detecting Concept Drift
stat.ML cs.LG stat.AP
Classifying streaming data requires the development of methods which are computationally efficient and able to cope with changes in the underlying distribution of the stream, a phenomenon known in the literature as concept drift. We propose a new method for detecting concept drift which uses an Exponentially Weighted Moving Average (EWMA) chart to monitor the misclassification rate of an streaming classifier. Our approach is modular and can hence be run in parallel with any underlying classifier to provide an additional layer of concept drift detection. Moreover our method is computationally efficient with overhead O(1) and works in a fully online manner with no need to store data points in memory. Unlike many existing approaches to concept drift detection, our method allows the rate of false positive detections to be controlled and kept constant over time.
1212.6027
Belief propagation for optimal edge cover in the random complete graph
math.PR cs.DM cs.IT math.IT
We apply the objective method of Aldous to the problem of finding the minimum-cost edge cover of the complete graph with random independent and identically distributed edge costs. The limit, as the number of vertices goes to infinity, of the expected minimum cost for this problem is known via a combinatorial approach of Hessler and W\"{a}stlund. We provide a proof of this result using the machinery of the objective method and local weak convergence, which was used to prove the $\zeta(2)$ limit of the random assignment problem. A proof via the objective method is useful because it provides us with more information on the nature of the edge's incident on a typical root in the minimum-cost edge cover. We further show that a belief propagation algorithm converges asymptotically to the optimal solution. This can be applied in a computational linguistics problem of semantic projection. The belief propagation algorithm yields a near optimal solution with lesser complexity than the known best algorithms designed for optimality in worst-case settings.
1212.6030
Bounds on the state vector growth rate in stochastic dynamical systems
math.OC cs.SY
A stochastic dynamical system represented through a linear vector equation in idempotent algebra is considered. We propose simple bounds on the mean growth rate of the system state vector, and give an analysis of absolute error of a bound. As an illustration, numerical results of evaluation of the bounds for a test system are also presented.
1212.6031
Tangent Bundle Manifold Learning via Grassmann&Stiefel Eigenmaps
cs.LG
One of the ultimate goals of Manifold Learning (ML) is to reconstruct an unknown nonlinear low-dimensional manifold embedded in a high-dimensional observation space by a given set of data points from the manifold. We derive a local lower bound for the maximum reconstruction error in a small neighborhood of an arbitrary point. The lower bound is defined in terms of the distance between tangent spaces to the original manifold and the estimated manifold at the considered point and reconstructed point, respectively. We propose an amplification of the ML, called Tangent Bundle ML, in which the proximity not only between the original manifold and its estimator but also between their tangent spaces is required. We present a new algorithm that solves this problem and gives a new solution for the ML also.
1212.6050
Applying Social Network Analysis to Analyze a Web-Based Community
cs.SI cs.CY
This paper deals with a very renowned website (that is Book-Crossing) from two angles: The first angle focuses on the direct relations between users and books. Many things can be inferred from this part of analysis such as who is more interested in book reading than others and why? Which books are most popular and which users are most active and why? The task requires the use of certain social network analysis measures (e.g. degree centrality). What does it mean when two users like the same book? Is it the same when other two users have one thousand books in common? Who is more likely to be a friend of whom and why? Are there specific people in the community who are more qualified to establish large circles of social relations? These questions (and of course others) were answered through the other part of the analysis, which will take us to probe the potential social relations between users in this community. Although these relationships do not exist explicitly, they can be inferred with the help of affiliation network analysis and techniques such as m-slice.
1212.6051
Automatic approach for generating ETL operators
cs.DB
This article addresses the generation of the ETL operators(Extract-Transform-Load) for supplying a Data Warehouse from a relational data source. As a first step, we add new rules to those proposed by the authors of [1], these rules deal with the combination of ETL operators. In a second step, we propose an automatic approach based on model transformations to generate the ETL operations needed for loading a data warehouse. This approach offers the possibility to set some designer requirements for loading.
1212.6054
New design of Robotics Remote lab
cs.RO
The Robotic Remote Laboratory controls the Robot labs via the Internet and applies the Robot experiment in easy and advanced way. If we want to enhance the RRL system, we must study requirements of the Robot experiment in a deeply way. One of key requirements of the Robot experiment is the Control algorithm that includes all important activities to affect the Robot; one of them relates the path or obstacle. Our goal is to produce a new design of the RRL includes a new treatment to the Control algorithm depends on isolation one of the Control algorithm's activities that relates the paths in a separated algorithm, i.e., design the (Path planning algorithm) is independent of the original Control algorithm. This aim can be achieved by depending on the light to produce the Light obstacle. To apply the Light obstacle, we need to hardware (Light control server and Light arms) and soft ware (path planning algorithm).The NXT 2.0 Robot will sense the Light obstacle depending on the Light sensor of it. The new design has two servers, one for the path (Light control server) and other for the other activities of the Control algorithm (Robot control server).The website of the new design includes three main parts (Lab Reservation, Open Lab, Download Simulation).We proposed a set of scenarios for organizing the reservation of the Remote Lab. Additionally, we developed an appropriate software to simulate the Robot and to practice it before usage the Remote lab.
1212.6058
High Quality Image Interpolation via Local Autoregressive and Nonlocal 3-D Sparse Regularization
cs.MM cs.CV
In this paper, we propose a novel image interpolation algorithm, which is formulated via combining both the local autoregressive (AR) model and the nonlocal adaptive 3-D sparse model as regularized constraints under the regularization framework. Estimating the high-resolution image by the local AR regularization is different from these conventional AR models, which weighted calculates the interpolation coefficients without considering the rough structural similarity between the low-resolution (LR) and high-resolution (HR) images. Then the nonlocal adaptive 3-D sparse model is formulated to regularize the interpolated HR image, which provides a way to modify these pixels with the problem of numerical stability caused by AR model. In addition, a new Split-Bregman based iterative algorithm is developed to solve the above optimization problem iteratively. Experiment results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm achieves significant performance improvements over the traditional algorithms in terms of both objective quality and visual perception
1212.6069
Evaluation of Lyapunov exponent in generalized linear dynamical models of queueing networks
math.OC cs.SY
The problem of evaluation of Lyapunov exponent in queueing network analysis is considered based on models and methods of idempotent algebra. General existence conditions for Lyapunov exponent to exist in generalized linear stochastic dynamic systems are given, and examples of evaluation of the exponent for systems with matrices of particular types are presented. A method which allow one to get the exponent is proposed based on some appropriate decomposition of the system matrix. A general approach to modeling of a wide class of queueing networks is taken to provide for models in the form of stochastic dynamic systems. It is shown how to find the mean service cycle time for the networks through the evaluation of Lyapunov exponent for their associated dynamic systems. As an illustration, the mean service time is evaluated for some systems including open and closed tandem queues with finite and infinite buffers, fork-join networks, and systems with round-robin routing.
1212.6074
On the Diversity-Multiplexing Tradeoff of Unconstrained Multiple-Access Channels
cs.IT math.IT
In this work the optimal diversity-multiplexing tradeoff (DMT) is investigated for the multiple-input multiple-output fading multiple-access channels with no power constraints (infinite constellations). For K users (K>1), M transmit antennas for each user, and N receive antennas, infinite constellations in general and lattices in particular are shown to attain the optimal DMT of finite constellations for the case N equals or greater than (K+1)M-1, i.e., user limited regime. On the other hand for N<(K+1)M-1 it is shown that infinite constellations can not attain the optimal DMT. This is in contrast to the point-to-point case in which infinite constellations are DMT optimal for any M and N. In general, this work shows that when the network is heavily loaded, i.e. K>max(1,(N-M+1)/M), taking into account the shaping region in the decoding process plays a crucial role in pursuing the optimal DMT. By investigating the cases where infinite constellations are optimal and suboptimal, this work also gives a geometrical interpretation to the DMT of infinite constellations in multiple-access channels.
1212.6079
Evaluation of the Lyapunov exponent for generalized linear second-order exponential systems
math.OC cs.SY math.PR
We consider generalized linear stochastic dynamical systems with second-order state transition matrices. The entries of the matrix are assumed to be either independent and exponentially distributed or equal to zero. We give an overview of new results on evaluation of asymptotic growth rate of the system state vector, which is called the Lyapunov exponent of the system.
1212.6086
A Method to determine Partial Weight Enumerator for Linear Block Codes
cs.IT math.IT
In this paper we present a fast and efficient method to find partial weight enumerator (PWE) for binary linear block codes by using the error impulse technique and Monte Carlo method. This PWE can be used to compute an upper bound of the error probability for the soft decision maximum likelihood decoder (MLD). As application of this method we give partial weight enumerators and analytical performances of the BCH(130,66), BCH(103,47) and BCH(111,55) shortened codes; the first code is obtained by shortening the binary primitive BCH (255,191,17) code and the two other codes are obtained by shortening the binary primitive BCH(127,71,19) code. The weight distributions of these three codes are unknown at our knowledge.
1212.6094
Large Scale Strongly Supervised Ensemble Metric Learning, with Applications to Face Verification and Retrieval
cs.CV
Learning Mahanalobis distance metrics in a high- dimensional feature space is very difficult especially when structural sparsity and low rank are enforced to improve com- putational efficiency in testing phase. This paper addresses both aspects by an ensemble metric learning approach that consists of sparse block diagonal metric ensembling and join- t metric learning as two consecutive steps. The former step pursues a highly sparse block diagonal metric by selecting effective feature groups while the latter one further exploits correlations between selected feature groups to obtain an accurate and low rank metric. Our algorithm considers all pairwise or triplet constraints generated from training samples with explicit class labels, and possesses good scala- bility with respect to increasing feature dimensionality and growing data volumes. Its applications to face verification and retrieval outperform existing state-of-the-art methods in accuracy while retaining high efficiency.
1212.6098
Evaluation of the mean cycle time in stochastic discrete event dynamic systems
math.OC cs.SY math.PR
We consider stochastic discrete event dynamic systems that have time evolution represented with two-dimensional state vectors through a vector equation that is linear in terms of an idempotent semiring. The state transitions are governed by second-order random matrices that are assumed to be independent and identically distributed. The problem of interest is to evaluate the mean growth rate of state vector, which is also referred to as the mean cycle time of the system, under various assumptions on the matrix entries. We give an overview of early results including a solution for systems determined by matrices with independent entries having a common exponential distribution. It is shown how to extend the result to the cases when the entries have different exponential distributions and when some of the entries are replaced by zero. Finally, the mean cycle time is calculated for systems with matrices that have one random entry, whereas the other entries in the matrices can be arbitrary nonnegative and zero constants. The random entry is always assumed to have exponential distribution except for one case of a matrix with zero row when the particular form of the matrix makes it possible to obtain a solution that does not rely on exponential distribution assumptions.
1212.6110
Hyperplane Arrangements and Locality-Sensitive Hashing with Lift
cs.LG cs.IR stat.ML
Locality-sensitive hashing converts high-dimensional feature vectors, such as image and speech, into bit arrays and allows high-speed similarity calculation with the Hamming distance. There is a hashing scheme that maps feature vectors to bit arrays depending on the signs of the inner products between feature vectors and the normal vectors of hyperplanes placed in the feature space. This hashing can be seen as a discretization of the feature space by hyperplanes. If labels for data are given, one can determine the hyperplanes by using learning algorithms. However, many proposed learning methods do not consider the hyperplanes' offsets. Not doing so decreases the number of partitioned regions, and the correlation between Hamming distances and Euclidean distances becomes small. In this paper, we propose a lift map that converts learning algorithms without the offsets to the ones that take into account the offsets. With this method, the learning methods without the offsets give the discretizations of spaces as if it takes into account the offsets. For the proposed method, we input several high-dimensional feature data sets and studied the relationship between the statistical characteristics of data, the number of hyperplanes, and the effect of the proposed method.
1212.6147
Finding Nemo: Searching and Resolving Identities of Users Across Online Social Networks
cs.SI
An online user joins multiple social networks in order to enjoy different services. On each joined social network, she creates an identity and constitutes its three major dimensions namely profile, content and connection network. She largely governs her identity formulation on any social network and therefore can manipulate multiple aspects of it. With no global identifier to mark her presence uniquely in the online domain, her online identities remain unlinked, isolated and difficult to search. Earlier research has explored the above mentioned dimensions, to search and link her multiple identities with an assumption that the considered dimensions have been least disturbed across her identities. However, majority of the approaches are restricted to exploitation of one or two dimensions. We make a first attempt to deploy an integrated system (Finding Nemo) which uses all the three dimensions of an identity to search for a user on multiple social networks. The system exploits a known identity on one social network to search for her identities on other social networks. We test our system on two most popular and distinct social networks - Twitter and Facebook. We show that the integrated system gives better accuracy than the individual algorithms. We report experimental findings in the report.
1212.6167
Transfer Learning Using Logistic Regression in Credit Scoring
cs.LG cs.CE
The credit scoring risk management is a fast growing field due to consumer's credit requests. Credit requests, of new and existing customers, are often evaluated by classical discrimination rules based on customers information. However, these kinds of strategies have serious limits and don't take into account the characteristics difference between current customers and the future ones. The aim of this paper is to measure credit worthiness for non customers borrowers and to model potential risk given a heterogeneous population formed by borrowers customers of the bank and others who are not. We hold on previous works done in generalized gaussian discrimination and transpose them into the logistic model to bring out efficient discrimination rules for non customers' subpopulation. Therefore we obtain several simple models of connection between parameters of both logistic models associated respectively to the two subpopulations. The German credit data set is selected to experiment and to compare these models. Experimental results show that the use of links between the two subpopulations improve the classification accuracy for the new loan applicants.
1212.6177
How Much of the Web Is Archived?
cs.DL cs.IR
Although the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine is the largest and most well-known web archive, there have been a number of public web archives that have emerged in the last several years. With varying resources, audiences and collection development policies, these archives have varying levels of overlap with each other. While individual archives can be measured in terms of number of URIs, number of copies per URI, and intersection with other archives, to date there has been no answer to the question "How much of the Web is archived?" We study the question by approximating the Web using sample URIs from DMOZ, Delicious, Bitly, and search engine indexes; and, counting the number of copies of the sample URIs exist in various public web archives. Each sample set provides its own bias. The results from our sample sets indicate that range from 35%-90% of the Web has at least one archived copy, 17%-49% has between 2-5 copies, 1%-8% has 6-10 copies, and 8%-63% has more than 10 copies in public web archives. The number of URI copies varies as a function of time, but no more than 31.3% of URIs are archived more than once per month.
1212.6193
Learning Joint Query Interpretation and Response Ranking
cs.IR
Thanks to information extraction and semantic Web efforts, search on unstructured text is increasingly refined using semantic annotations and structured knowledge bases. However, most users cannot become familiar with the schema of knowledge bases and ask structured queries. Interpreting free-format queries into a more structured representation is of much current interest. The dominant paradigm is to segment or partition query tokens by purpose (references to types, entities, attribute names, attribute values, relations) and then launch the interpreted query on structured knowledge bases. Given that structured knowledge extraction is never complete, here we use a data representation that retains the unstructured text corpus, along with structured annotations (mentions of entities and relationships) on it. We propose two new, natural formulations for joint query interpretation and response ranking that exploit bidirectional flow of information between the knowledge base and the corpus.One, inspired by probabilistic language models, computes expected response scores over the uncertainties of query interpretation. The other is based on max-margin discriminative learning, with latent variables representing those uncertainties. In the context of typed entity search, both formulations bridge a considerable part of the accuracy gap between a generic query that does not constrain the type at all, and the upper bound where the "perfect" target entity type of each query is provided by humans. Our formulations are also superior to a two-stage approach of first choosing a target type using recent query type prediction techniques, and then launching a type-restricted entity search query.
1212.6207
Irrespective Priority-Based Regular Properties of High-Intensity Virtual Environments
cs.AI
We have a lot of relation to the encoding and the Theory of Information, when considering thinking. This is a natural process and, at once, the complex thing we investigate. This always was a challenge - to understand how our mind works, and we are trying to find some universal models for this. A lot of ways have been considered so far, but we are looking for Something, we seek for approaches. And the goal is to find a consistent, noncontradictory view, which should at once be enough flexible in any dimensions to allow to represent various kinds of processes and environments, matters of different nature and diverse objects. Developing of such a model is the destination of this article.
1212.6209
Efficient Multiple Object Tracking Using Mutually Repulsive Active Membranes
q-bio.QM cs.CV physics.bio-ph
Studies of social and group behavior in interacting organisms require high-throughput analysis of the motion of a large number of individual subjects. Computer vision techniques offer solutions to specific tracking problems, and allow automated and efficient tracking with minimal human intervention. In this work, we adopt the open active contour model to track the trajectories of moving objects at high density. We add repulsive interactions between open contours to the original model, treat the trajectories as an extrusion in the temporal dimension, and show applications to two tracking problems. The walking behavior of Drosophila is studied at different population density and gender composition. We demonstrate that individual male flies have distinct walking signatures, and that the social interaction between flies in a mixed gender arena is gender specific. We also apply our model to studies of trajectories of gliding Myxococcus xanthus bacteria at high density. We examine the individual gliding behavioral statistics in terms of the gliding speed distribution. Using these two examples at very distinctive spatial scales, we illustrate the use of our algorithm on tracking both short rigid bodies (Drosophila) and long flexible objects (Myxococcus xanthus). Our repulsive active membrane model reaches error rates better than $5\times 10^{-6}$ per fly per second for Drosophila tracking and comparable results for Myxococcus xanthus.
1212.6216
Generating Motion Patterns Using Evolutionary Computation in Digital Soccer
cs.AI cs.RO
Dribbling an opponent player in digital soccer environment is an important practical problem in motion planning. It has special complexities which can be generalized to most important problems in other similar Multi Agent Systems. In this paper, we propose a hybrid computational geometry and evolutionary computation approach for generating motion trajectories to avoid a mobile obstacle. In this case an opponent agent is not only an obstacle but also one who tries to harden dribbling procedure. One characteristic of this approach is reducing process cost of online stage by transferring it to offline stage which causes increment in agents' performance. This approach breaks the problem into two offline and online stages. During offline stage the goal is to find desired trajectory using evolutionary computation and saving it as a trajectory plan. A trajectory plan consists of nodes which approximate information of each trajectory plan. In online stage, a linear interpolation along with Delaunay triangulation in xy-plan is applied to trajectory plan to retrieve desired action.
1212.6225
Joint Sensing and Power Allocation in Nonconvex Cognitive Radio Games: Quasi-Nash Equilibria
cs.IT math.IT
In this paper, we propose a novel class of Nash problems for Cognitive Radio (CR) networks composed of multiple primary users (PUs) and secondary users (SUs) wherein each SU (player) competes against the others to maximize his own opportunistic throughput by choosing jointly the sensing duration, the detection thresholds, and the vector power allocation over a multichannel link. In addition to power budget constraints, several (deterministic or probabilistic) interference constraints can be accommodated in the proposed general formulation, such as constraints on the maximum individual/aggregate (probabilistic) interference tolerable from the PUs. To keep the optimization as decentralized as possible, global interference constraints, when present, are imposed via pricing; the prices are thus additional variables to be optimized. The resulting players' optimization problems are nonconvex and there are price clearance conditions associated with the nonconvex global interference constraints to be satisfied by the equilibria of the game, which make the analysis of the proposed game a challenging task; none of classical results in the game theory literature can be successfully applied. To deal with the nonconvexity of the game, we introduce a relaxed equilibrium concept, the Quasi-Nash Equilibrium (QNE), and study its main properties, performance, and connection with local Nash equilibria. Quite interestingly, the proposed game theoretical formulations yield a considerable performance improvement with respect to current centralized and decentralized designs of CR systems, which validates the concept of QNE.
1212.6235
Real and Complex Monotone Communication Games
cs.GT cs.IT math.IT
Noncooperative game-theoretic tools have been increasingly used to study many important resource allocation problems in communications, networking, smart grids, and portfolio optimization. In this paper, we consider a general class of convex Nash Equilibrium Problems (NEPs), where each player aims to solve an arbitrary smooth convex optimization problem. Differently from most of current works, we do not assume any specific structure for the players' problems, and we allow the optimization variables of the players to be matrices in the complex domain. Our main contribution is the design of a novel class of distributed (asynchronous) best-response- algorithms suitable for solving the proposed NEPs, even in the presence of multiple solutions. The new methods, whose convergence analysis is based on Variational Inequality (VI) techniques, can select, among all the equilibria of a game, those that optimize a given performance criterion, at the cost of limited signaling among the players. This is a major departure from existing best-response algorithms, whose convergence conditions imply the uniqueness of the NE. Some of our results hinge on the use of VI problems directly in the complex domain; the study of these new kind of VIs also represents a noteworthy innovative contribution. We then apply the developed methods to solve some new generalizations of SISO and MIMO games in cognitive radios and femtocell systems, showing a considerable performance improvement over classical pure noncooperative schemes.
1212.6246
Gaussian Process Regression with Heteroscedastic or Non-Gaussian Residuals
stat.ML cs.LG
Gaussian Process (GP) regression models typically assume that residuals are Gaussian and have the same variance for all observations. However, applications with input-dependent noise (heteroscedastic residuals) frequently arise in practice, as do applications in which the residuals do not have a Gaussian distribution. In this paper, we propose a GP Regression model with a latent variable that serves as an additional unobserved covariate for the regression. This model (which we call GPLC) allows for heteroscedasticity since it allows the function to have a changing partial derivative with respect to this unobserved covariate. With a suitable covariance function, our GPLC model can handle (a) Gaussian residuals with input-dependent variance, or (b) non-Gaussian residuals with input-dependent variance, or (c) Gaussian residuals with constant variance. We compare our model, using synthetic datasets, with a model proposed by Goldberg, Williams and Bishop (1998), which we refer to as GPLV, which only deals with case (a), as well as a standard GP model which can handle only case (c). Markov Chain Monte Carlo methods are developed for both modelsl. Experiments show that when the data is heteroscedastic, both GPLC and GPLV give better results (smaller mean squared error and negative log-probability density) than standard GP regression. In addition, when the residual are Gaussian, our GPLC model is generally nearly as good as GPLV, while when the residuals are non-Gaussian, our GPLC model is better than GPLV.
1212.6273
Human-Recognizable Robotic Gestures
cs.RO cs.AI cs.HC
For robots to be accommodated in human spaces and in humans daily activities, robots should be able to understand messages from the human conversation partner. In the same light, humans must also understand the messages that are being communicated by robots, including the non-verbal ones. We conducted a web-based video study wherein participants gave interpretations on the iconic gestures and emblems that were produced by an anthropomorphic robot. Out of the 15 gestures presented, we found 6 robotic gestures that can be accurately recognized by the human observer. These were nodding, clapping, hugging, expressing anger, walking, and flying. We reviewed these gestures for their meaning from literatures in human and animal behavior. We conclude by discussing the possible implications of these gestures for the design of social robots that are aimed to have engaging interactions with humans.
1212.6276
Echo State Queueing Network: a new reservoir computing learning tool
cs.NE cs.AI cs.LG
In the last decade, a new computational paradigm was introduced in the field of Machine Learning, under the name of Reservoir Computing (RC). RC models are neural networks which a recurrent part (the reservoir) that does not participate in the learning process, and the rest of the system where no recurrence (no neural circuit) occurs. This approach has grown rapidly due to its success in solving learning tasks and other computational applications. Some success was also observed with another recently proposed neural network designed using Queueing Theory, the Random Neural Network (RandNN). Both approaches have good properties and identified drawbacks. In this paper, we propose a new RC model called Echo State Queueing Network (ESQN), where we use ideas coming from RandNNs for the design of the reservoir. ESQNs consist in ESNs where the reservoir has a new dynamics inspired by recurrent RandNNs. The paper positions ESQNs in the global Machine Learning area, and provides examples of their use and performances. We show on largely used benchmarks that ESQNs are very accurate tools, and we illustrate how they compare with standard ESNs.
1212.6298
Design of Intelligent Agents Based System for Commodity Market Simulation with JADE
cs.MA cs.AI
A market of potato commodity for industry scale usage is engaging several types of actors. They are farmers, middlemen, and industries. A multi-agent system has been built to simulate these actors into agent entities, based on manually given parameters within a simulation scenario file. Each type of agents has its own fuzzy logic representing actual actors' knowledge, to be used to interpreting values and take appropriated decision of it while on simulation. The system will simulate market activities with programmed behaviors then produce the results as spreadsheet and chart graph files. These results consist of each agent's yearly finance and commodity data. The system will also predict each of next value from these outputs.
1212.6303
A brief experience on journey through hardware developments for image processing and its applications on Cryptography
cs.AR cs.CR cs.CV
The importance of embedded applications on image and video processing,communication and cryptography domain has been taking a larger space in current research era. Improvement of pictorial information for betterment of human perception like deblurring, de-noising in several fields such as satellite imaging, medical imaging etc are renewed research thrust. Specifically we would like to elaborate our experience on the significance of computer vision as one of the domains where hardware implemented algorithms perform far better than those implemented through software. So far embedded design engineers have successfully implemented their designs by means of Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) and/or Digital Signal Processors (DSP), however with the advancement of VLSI technology a very powerful hardware device namely the Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) combining the key advantages of ASICs and DSPs was developed which have the possibility of reprogramming making them a very attractive device for rapid prototyping.Communication of image and video data in multiple FPGA is no longer far away from the thrust of secured transmission among them, and then the relevance of cryptography is indeed unavoidable. This paper shows how the Xilinx hardware development platform as well Mathworks Matlab can be used to develop hardware based computer vision algorithms and its corresponding crypto transmission channel between multiple FPGA platform from a system level approach, making it favourable for developing a hardware-software co-design environment.
1212.6316
On-line relational SOM for dissimilarity data
stat.ML cs.LG
In some applications and in order to address real world situations better, data may be more complex than simple vectors. In some examples, they can be known through their pairwise dissimilarities only. Several variants of the Self Organizing Map algorithm were introduced to generalize the original algorithm to this framework. Whereas median SOM is based on a rough representation of the prototypes, relational SOM allows representing these prototypes by a virtual combination of all elements in the data set. However, this latter approach suffers from two main drawbacks. First, its complexity can be large. Second, only a batch version of this algorithm has been studied so far and it often provides results having a bad topographic organization. In this article, an on-line version of relational SOM is described and justified. The algorithm is tested on several datasets, including categorical data and graphs, and compared with the batch version and with other SOM algorithms for non vector data.
1212.6323
Localized Algorithm of Community Detection on Large-Scale Decentralized Social Networks
cs.SI physics.soc-ph stat.ML
Despite the overwhelming success of the existing Social Networking Services (SNS), their centralized ownership and control have led to serious concerns in user privacy, censorship vulnerability and operational robustness of these services. To overcome these limitations, Distributed Social Networks (DSN) have recently been proposed and implemented. Under these new DSN architectures, no single party possesses the full knowledge of the entire social network. While this approach solves the above problems, the lack of global knowledge for the DSN nodes makes it much more challenging to support some common but critical SNS services like friends discovery and community detection. In this paper, we tackle the problem of community detection for a given user under the constraint of limited local topology information as imposed by common DSN architectures. By considering the Personalized Page Rank (PPR) approach as an ink spilling process, we justify its applicability for decentralized community detection using limited local topology information.Our proposed PPR-based solution has a wide range of applications such as friends recommendation, targeted advertisement, automated social relationship labeling and sybil defense. Using data collected from a large-scale SNS in practice, we demonstrate our adapted version of PPR can significantly outperform the basic PR as well as two other commonly used heuristics. The inclusion of a few manually labeled friends in the Escape Vector (EV) can boost the performance considerably (64.97% relative improvement in terms of Area Under the ROC Curve (AUC)).
1212.6325
Existence of Oscillations in Cyclic Gene Regulatory Networks with Time Delay
cs.SY math.OC q-bio.MN
This paper is concerned with conditions for the existence of oscillations in gene regulatory networks with negative cyclic feedback, where time delays in transcription, translation and translocation process are explicitly considered. The primary goal of this paper is to propose systematic analysis tools that are useful for a broad class of cyclic gene regulatory networks, and to provide novel biological insights. To this end, we adopt a simplified model that is suitable for capturing the essence of a large class of gene regulatory networks. It is first shown that local instability of the unique equilibrium state results in oscillations based on a Poincare-Bendixson type theorem. Then, a graphical existence condition, which is equivalent to the local instability of a unique equilibrium, is derived. Based on the graphical condition, the existence condition is analytically presented in terms of biochemical parameters. This allows us to find the dimensionless parameters that primarily affect the existence of oscillations, and to provide biological insights. The analytic conditions and biological insights are illustrated with two existing biochemical networks, Repressilator and the Hes7 gene regulatory networks.
1212.6331
Modeling collective human mobility: Understanding exponential law of intra-urban movement
physics.soc-ph cs.SI
It is very important to understand urban mobility patterns because most trips are concentrated in urban areas. In the paper, a new model is proposed to model collective human mobility in urban areas. The model can be applied to predict individual flows not only in intra-city but also in countries or a larger range. Based on the model, it can be concluded that the exponential law of distance distribution is attributed to decreasing exponentially of average density of human travel demands. Since the distribution of human travel demands only depends on urban planning, population distribution, regional functions and so on, it illustrates that these inherent properties of cities are impetus to drive collective human movements.
1212.6371
The Weight Distribution of a Class of Cyclic Codes Related to Hermitian Forms Graphs
cs.IT math.CO math.IT
The determination of weight distribution of cyclic codes involves evaluation of Gauss sums and exponential sums. Despite of some cases where a neat expression is available, the computation is generally rather complicated. In this note, we determine the weight distribution of a class of reducible cyclic codes whose dual codes may have arbitrarily many zeros. This goal is achieved by building an unexpected connection between the corresponding exponential sums and the spectrums of Hermitian forms graphs.
1212.6383
Heuristics Miners for Streaming Event Data
cs.DB
More and more business activities are performed using information systems. These systems produce such huge amounts of event data that existing systems are unable to store and process them. Moreover, few processes are in steady-state and due to changing circumstances processes evolve and systems need to adapt continuously. Since conventional process discovery algorithms have been defined for batch processing, it is difficult to apply them in such evolving environments. Existing algorithms cannot cope with streaming event data and tend to generate unreliable and obsolete results. In this paper, we discuss the peculiarities of dealing with streaming event data in the context of process mining. Subsequently, we present a general framework for defining process mining algorithms in settings where it is impossible to store all events over an extended period or where processes evolve while being analyzed. We show how the Heuristics Miner, one of the most effective process discovery algorithms for practical applications, can be modified using this framework. Different stream-aware versions of the Heuristics Miner are defined and implemented in ProM. Moreover, experimental results on artificial and real logs are reported.
1212.6388
Trajectory tracking control of kites with system delay
cs.SY math.OC
A previously published algorithm for trajectory tracking control of tethered wings, i.e. kites, is updated in light of recent experimental evidence. The algorithm is, furthermore, analyzed in the framework of delay differential equations. It is shown how the presence of system delay influences the stability of the control system, and a methodology is derived for gain selection using the Lambert W function. The validity of the methodology is demonstrated with simulation results. The analysis sheds light on previously poorly understood stability problems.
1212.6437
Joint Sensing and Power Allocation in Nonconvex Cognitive Radio Games: Nash Equilibria and Distributed Algorithms
cs.IT math.IT
In this paper, we propose a novel class of Nash problems for Cognitive Radio (CR) networks, modeled as Gaussian frequency-selective interference channels, wherein each secondary user (SU) competes against the others to maximize his own opportunistic throughput by choosing jointly the sensing duration, the detection thresholds, and the vector power allocation. The proposed general formulation allows to accommodate several (transmit) power and (deterministic/probabilistic) interference constraints, such as constraints on the maximum individual and/or aggregate (probabilistic) interference tolerable at the primary receivers. To keep the optimization as decentralized as possible, global (coupling) interference constraints are imposed by penalizing each SU with a set of time-varying prices based upon his contribution to the total interference; the prices are thus additional variable to optimize. The resulting players' optimization problems are nonconvex; moreover, there are possibly price clearing conditions associated with the global constraints to be satisfied by the solution. All this makes the analysis of the proposed games a challenging task; none of classical results in the game theory literature can be successfully applied. The main contribution of this paper is to develop a novel optimization-based theory for studying the proposed nonconvex games; we provide a comprehensive analysis of the existence and uniqueness of a standard Nash equilibrium, devise alternative best-response based algorithms, and establish their convergence.
1212.6456
A universal assortativity measure for network analysis
physics.soc-ph cs.SI physics.data-an
Characterizing the connectivity tendency of a network is a fundamental problem in network science. The traditional and well-known assortativity coefficient is calculated on a per-network basis, which is of little use to partial connection tendency of a network. This paper proposes a universal assortativity coefficient(UAC), which is based on the unambiguous definition of each individual edge's contribution to the global assortativity coefficient (GAC). It is able to reveal the connection tendency of microscopic, mesoscopic, macroscopic structures and any given part of a network. Applying UAC to real world networks, we find that, contrary to the popular expectation, most networks (notably the AS-level Internet topology) have markedly more assortative edges/nodes than dissortaive ones despite their global dissortativity. Consequently, networks can be categorized along two dimensions--single global assortativity and local assortativity statistics. Detailed anatomy of the AS-level Internet topology further illustrates how UAC can be used to decipher the hidden patterns of connection tendencies on different scales.
1212.6465
Quantized Iterative Message Passing Decoders with Low Error Floor for LDPC Codes
cs.IT math.IT
The error floor phenomenon observed with LDPC codes and their graph-based, iterative, message-passing (MP) decoders is commonly attributed to the existence of error-prone substructures -- variously referred to as near codewords, trapping sets, absorbing sets, or pseudocodewords -- in a Tanner graph representation of the code. Many approaches have been proposed to lower the error floor by designing new LDPC codes with fewer such substructures or by modifying the decoding algorithm. Using a theoretical analysis of iterative MP decoding in an idealized trapping set scenario, we show that a contributor to the error floors observed in the literature may be the imprecise implementation of decoding algorithms and, in particular, the message quantization rules used. We then propose a new quantization method -- (q+1)-bit quasi-uniform quantization -- that efficiently increases the dynamic range of messages, thereby overcoming a limitation of conventional quantization schemes. Finally, we use the quasi-uniform quantizer to decode several LDPC codes that suffer from high error floors with traditional fixed-point decoder implementations. The performance simulation results provide evidence that the proposed quantization scheme can, for a wide variety of codes, significantly lower error floors with minimal increase in decoder complexity.
1212.6478
The degrees of freedom of the Group Lasso for a General Design
cs.IT math.IT
In this paper, we are concerned with regression problems where covariates can be grouped in nonoverlapping blocks, and where only a few of them are assumed to be active. In such a situation, the group Lasso is an at- tractive method for variable selection since it promotes sparsity of the groups. We study the sensitivity of any group Lasso solution to the observations and provide its precise local parameterization. When the noise is Gaussian, this allows us to derive an unbiased estimator of the degrees of freedom of the group Lasso. This result holds true for any fixed design, no matter whether it is under- or overdetermined. With these results at hand, various model selec- tion criteria, such as the Stein Unbiased Risk Estimator (SURE), are readily available which can provide an objectively guided choice of the optimal group Lasso fit.
1212.6519
Dialectics of Knowledge Representation in a Granular Rough Set Theory
cs.AI cs.LO
The concepts of rough and definite objects are relatively more determinate than those of granules and granulation in general rough set theory (RST) [1]. Representation of rough objects can however depend on the dialectical relation between granulation and definiteness. In this research, we make this exact in the context of RST over proto-transitive approximation spaces. This approach can be directly extended to many other types of RST. These are used for formulating an extended concept of knowledge interpretation (KI)(relative the situation for classical RST) and the problem of knowledge representation (KR) is solved. These will be of direct interest in granular KR in RST as developed by the present author [2] and of rough objects in general. In [3], these have already been used for five different semantics by the present author. This is an extended version of [4] with key examples and more results.
1212.6521
A Frequency-Domain Encoding for Neuroevolution
cs.AI
Neuroevolution has yet to scale up to complex reinforcement learning tasks that require large networks. Networks with many inputs (e.g. raw video) imply a very high dimensional search space if encoded directly. Indirect methods use a more compact genotype representation that is transformed into networks of potentially arbitrary size. In this paper, we present an indirect method where networks are encoded by a set of Fourier coefficients which are transformed into network weight matrices via an inverse Fourier-type transform. Because there often exist network solutions whose weight matrices contain regularity (i.e. adjacent weights are correlated), the number of coefficients required to represent these networks in the frequency domain is much smaller than the number of weights (in the same way that natural images can be compressed by ignore high-frequency components). This "compressed" encoding is compared to the direct approach where search is conducted in the weight space on the high-dimensional octopus arm task. The results show that representing networks in the frequency domain can reduce the search-space dimensionality by as much as two orders of magnitude, both accelerating convergence and yielding more general solutions.
1212.6526
High-SNR Asymptotics of Mutual Information for Discrete Constellations with Applications to BICM
cs.IT math.IT
Asymptotic expressions of the mutual information between any discrete input and the corresponding output of the scalar additive white Gaussian noise channel are presented in the limit as the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) tends to infinity. Asymptotic expressions of the symbol-error probability (SEP) and the minimum mean-square error (MMSE) achieved by estimating the channel input given the channel output are also developed. It is shown that for any input distribution, the conditional entropy of the channel input given the output, MMSE and SEP have an asymptotic behavior proportional to the Gaussian Q-function. The argument of the Q-function depends only on the minimum Euclidean distance (MED) of the constellation and the SNR, and the proportionality constants are functions of the MED and the probabilities of the pairs of constellation points at MED. The developed expressions are then generalized to study the high-SNR behavior of the generalized mutual information (GMI) for bit-interleaved coded modulation (BICM). By means of these asymptotic expressions, the long-standing conjecture that Gray codes are the binary labelings that maximize the BICM-GMI at high SNR is proven. It is further shown that for any equally spaced constellation whose size is a power of two, there always exists an anti-Gray code giving the lowest BICM-GMI at high SNR.
1212.6527
Discovering Basic Emotion Sets via Semantic Clustering on a Twitter Corpus
cs.AI cs.CL
A plethora of words are used to describe the spectrum of human emotions, but how many emotions are there really, and how do they interact? Over the past few decades, several theories of emotion have been proposed, each based around the existence of a set of 'basic emotions', and each supported by an extensive variety of research including studies in facial expression, ethology, neurology and physiology. Here we present research based on a theory that people transmit their understanding of emotions through the language they use surrounding emotion keywords. Using a labelled corpus of over 21,000 tweets, six of the basic emotion sets proposed in existing literature were analysed using Latent Semantic Clustering (LSC), evaluating the distinctiveness of the semantic meaning attached to the emotional label. We hypothesise that the more distinct the language is used to express a certain emotion, then the more distinct the perception (including proprioception) of that emotion is, and thus more 'basic'. This allows us to select the dimensions best representing the entire spectrum of emotion. We find that Ekman's set, arguably the most frequently used for classifying emotions, is in fact the most semantically distinct overall. Next, taking all analysed (that is, previously proposed) emotion terms into account, we determine the optimal semantically irreducible basic emotion set using an iterative LSC algorithm. Our newly-derived set (Accepting, Ashamed, Contempt, Interested, Joyful, Pleased, Sleepy, Stressed) generates a 6.1% increase in distinctiveness over Ekman's set (Angry, Disgusted, Joyful, Sad, Scared). We also demonstrate how using LSC data can help visualise emotions. We introduce the concept of an Emotion Profile and briefly analyse compound emotions both visually and mathematically.
1212.6550
Alternating Directions Dual Decomposition
cs.AI
We propose AD3, a new algorithm for approximate maximum a posteriori (MAP) inference on factor graphs based on the alternating directions method of multipliers. Like dual decomposition algorithms, AD3 uses worker nodes to iteratively solve local subproblems and a controller node to combine these local solutions into a global update. The key characteristic of AD3 is that each local subproblem has a quadratic regularizer, leading to a faster consensus than subgradient-based dual decomposition, both theoretically and in practice. We provide closed-form solutions for these AD3 subproblems for binary pairwise factors and factors imposing first-order logic constraints. For arbitrary factors (large or combinatorial), we introduce an active set method which requires only an oracle for computing a local MAP configuration, making AD3 applicable to a wide range of problems. Experiments on synthetic and realworld problems show that AD3 compares favorably with the state-of-the-art.
1212.6556
Quantitative Timed Simulation Functions and Refinement Metrics for Timed Systems (Full Version)
cs.SY cs.GT
We introduce quantatitive timed refinement and timed simulation (directed) metrics, incorporating zenoness check s, for timed systems. These metrics assign positive real numbers between zero and infinity which quantify the \emph{timing mismatches} between two timed systems, amongst non-zeno runs. We quantify timing mismatches in three ways: (1) the maximal timing mismatch that can arise, (2) the "steady-state" maximal timing mismatches, where initial transient timing mismatches are ignored; and (3) the (long-run) average timing mismatches amongst two systems. These three kinds of mismatches constitute three important types of timing differences. Our event times are the \emph{global times}, measured from the start of the system execution, not just the time durations of individual steps. We present algorithms over timed automata for computing the three quantitative simulation distances to within any desired degree of accuracy. In order to compute the values of the quantitative simulation distances, we use a game theoretic formulation. We introduce two new kinds of objectives for two player games on finite-state game graphs: (1) eventual debit-sum level objectives, and (2) average debit-sum level objectives. We present algorithms for computing the optimal values for these objectives in graph games, and then use these algorithms to compute the values of the timed simulation distances over timed automata.
1212.6574
Proceedings First International Workshop on Formal Techniques for Safety-Critical Systems
cs.LO cs.SE cs.SY
This volume contains the proceedings of the First International Workshop of Formal Techniques for Safety-Critical Systems (FTSCS 2012), held in Kyoto on November 12, 2012, as a satellite event of the ICFEM conference. The aim of this workshop is to bring together researchers and engineers interested in the application of (semi-)formal methods to improve the quality of safety-critical computer systems. FTSCS is particularly interested in industrial applications of formal methods. Topics include: - the use of formal methods for safety-critical and QoS-critical systems, including avionics, automotive, and medical systems; - methods, techniques and tools to support automated analysis, certification, debugging, etc.; - analysis methods that address the limitations of formal methods in industry; - formal analysis support for modeling languages used in industry, such as AADL, Ptolemy, SysML, SCADE, Modelica, etc.; and - code generation from validated models. The workshop received 25 submissions; 21 of these were regular papers and 4 were tool/work-in-progress/position papers. Each submission was reviewed by three referees; based on the reviews and extensive discussions, the program committee selected nine regular papers, which are included in this volume. Our program also included an invited talk by Ralf Huuck.
1212.6592
Social Teaching: Being Informative vs. Being Right in Sequential Decision Making
cs.IT math.IT
We show that it can be suboptimal for Bayesian decision-making agents employing social learning to use correct prior probabilities as their initial beliefs. We consider sequential Bayesian binary hypothesis testing where each individual agent makes a binary decision based on an initial belief, a private signal, and the decisions of all earlier-acting agents---with the actions of precedent agents causing updates of the initial belief. Each agent acts to minimize Bayes risk, with all agents sharing the same Bayes costs for Type I (false alarm) and Type II (missed detection) errors. The effect of the set of initial beliefs on the decision-making performance of the last agent is studied. The last agent makes the best decision when the initial beliefs are inaccurate. When the private signals are described by Gaussian likelihoods, the optimal initial beliefs are not haphazard but rather follow a systematic pattern: the earlier-acting agents should act as if the prior probability is larger than it is in reality when the true prior probability is small, and vice versa. We interpret this as being open minded toward the unlikely hypothesis. The early-acting agents face a trade-off between making a correct decision and being maximally informative to the later-acting agents.
1212.6602
Multidimensional Analytic Signals and the Bedrosian Identity
cs.IT math.CA math.IT
The analytic signal method via the Hilbert transform is a key tool in signal analysis and processing, especially in the time-frquency analysis. Imaging and other applications to multidimensional signals call for extension of the method to higher dimensions. We justify the usage of partial Hilbert transforms to define multidimensional analytic signals from both engineering and mathematical perspectives. The important associated Bedrosian identity $T(fg)=fTg$ for partial Hilbert transforms $T$ are then studied. Characterizations and several necessity theorems are established. We also make use of the identity to construct basis functions for the time-frequency analysis.
1212.6626
Blind Adaptive Interference Suppression Based on Set-Membership Constrained Constant-Modulus Algorithms with Time-Varying Bounds
cs.IT math.IT
This work presents blind constrained constant modulus (CCM) adaptive algorithms based on the set-membership filtering (SMF) concept and incorporates dynamic bounds {for interference suppression} applications. We develop stochastic gradient and recursive least squares type algorithms based on the CCM design criterion in accordance with the specifications of the SMF concept. We also propose a blind framework that includes channel and amplitude estimators that take into account parameter estimation dependency, multiple access interference (MAI) and inter-symbol interference (ISI) to address the important issue of bound specification in multiuser communications. A convergence and tracking analysis of the proposed algorithms is carried out along with the development of analytical expressions to predict their performance. Simulations for a number of scenarios of interest with a DS-CDMA system show that the proposed algorithms outperform previously reported techniques with a smaller number of parameter updates and a reduced risk of overbounding or underbounding.
1212.6627
Exploring Relay Cooperation Scheme for Load-Balance Control in Two-hop Secure Communication System
cs.IT cs.CR cs.NI math.IT
This work considers load-balance control among the relays under the secure transmission protocol via relay cooperation in two-hop wireless networks without the information of both eavesdropper channels and locations. The available two-hop secure transmission protocols in physical layer secrecy framework cannot provide a flexible load-balance control, which may significantly limit their application scopes. This paper proposes a secure transmission protocol in case that the path-loss is identical between all pairs of nodes, in which the relay is randomly selected from the first $k$ preferable assistant relays. This protocol enables load-balance among relays to be flexibly controlled by a proper setting of the parameter $k$, and covers the available works as special cases, like ones with the optimal relay selection ($k=1$) and ones with the random relay selection ($k = n$, i.e. the number of system nodes). The theoretic analysis is further provided to determine the maximum number of eavesdroppers one network can tolerate by applying the proposed protocol to ensure a desired performance in terms of the secrecy outage probability and transmission outage probability.
1212.6636
A Dichotomy on the Complexity of Consistent Query Answering for Atoms with Simple Keys
cs.DB
We study the problem of consistent query answering under primary key violations. In this setting, the relations in a database violate the key constraints and we are interested in maximal subsets of the database that satisfy the constraints, which we call repairs. For a boolean query Q, the problem CERTAINTY(Q) asks whether every such repair satisfies the query or not; the problem is known to be always in coNP for conjunctive queries. However, there are queries for which it can be solved in polynomial time. It has been conjectured that there exists a dichotomy on the complexity of CERTAINTY(Q) for conjunctive queries: it is either in PTIME or coNP-complete. In this paper, we prove that the conjecture is indeed true for the case of conjunctive queries without self-joins, where each atom has as a key either a single attribute (simple key) or all attributes of the atom.
1212.6640
Exploring mutexes, the Oracle RDBMS retrial spinlocks
cs.DB cs.DC cs.PF
Spinlocks are widely used in database engines for processes synchronization. KGX mutexes is new retrial spinlocks appeared in contemporary Oracle versions for submicrosecond synchronization. The mutex contention is frequently observed in highly concurrent OLTP environments. This work explores how Oracle mutexes operate, spin, and sleep. It develops predictive mathematical model and discusses parameters and statistics related to mutex performance tuning, as well as results of contention experiments.
1212.6643
Nonanticipative Rate Distortion Function and Filtering Theory: A weak Convergence Approach
cs.IT cs.SY math.IT
In this paper the relation between nonanticipative rate distortion function (RDF) and Bayesian filtering theory is further investigated on general Polish spaces. The relation is established via an optimization on the space of conditional distributions of the so-called directed information subject to fidelity constraints. Existence of the optimal reproduction distribution of the nonanticipative RDF is shown using the topology of weak convergence of probability measures. Subsequently, we use the solution of the nonanticipative RDF to present the realization of a multidimensional partially observable source over a scalar Gaussian channel. We show that linear encoders are optimal, establishing joint source-channel coding in real-time.
1212.6646
Blind Adaptive MIMO Receivers for Space-Time Block-Coded DS-CDMA Systems in Multipath Channels Using the Constant Modulus Criterion
cs.IT math.IT
We propose blind adaptive multi-input multi-output (MIMO) linear receivers for DS-CDMA systems using multiple transmit antennas and space-time block codes (STBC) in multipath channels. A space-time code-constrained constant modulus (CCM) design criterion based on constrained optimization techniques is considered and recursive least squares (RLS) adaptive algorithms are developed for estimating the parameters of the linear receivers. A blind space-time channel estimation method for MIMO DS-CDMA systems with STBC based on a subspace approach is also proposed along with an efficient RLS algorithm. Simulations for a downlink scenario assess the proposed algorithms in several situations against existing methods.
1212.6659
Focus of Attention for Linear Predictors
stat.ML cs.AI cs.LG
We present a method to stop the evaluation of a prediction process when the result of the full evaluation is obvious. This trait is highly desirable in prediction tasks where a predictor evaluates all its features for every example in large datasets. We observe that some examples are easier to classify than others, a phenomenon which is characterized by the event when most of the features agree on the class of an example. By stopping the feature evaluation when encountering an easy- to-classify example, the predictor can achieve substantial gains in computation. Our method provides a natural attention mechanism for linear predictors where the predictor concentrates most of its computation on hard-to-classify examples and quickly discards easy-to-classify ones. By modifying a linear prediction algorithm such as an SVM or AdaBoost to include our attentive method we prove that the average number of features computed is O(sqrt(n log 1/sqrt(delta))) where n is the original number of features, and delta is the error rate incurred due to early stopping. We demonstrate the effectiveness of Attentive Prediction on MNIST, Real-sim, Gisette, and synthetic datasets.
1212.6663
Blind Multilinear Identification
cs.IT math.IT
We discuss a technique that allows blind recovery of signals or blind identification of mixtures in instances where such recovery or identification were previously thought to be impossible: (i) closely located or highly correlated sources in antenna array processing, (ii) highly correlated spreading codes in CDMA radio communication, (iii) nearly dependent spectra in fluorescent spectroscopy. This has important implications --- in the case of antenna array processing, it allows for joint localization and extraction of multiple sources from the measurement of a noisy mixture recorded on multiple sensors in an entirely deterministic manner. In the case of CDMA, it allows the possibility of having a number of users larger than the spreading gain. In the case of fluorescent spectroscopy, it allows for detection of nearly identical chemical constituents. The proposed technique involves the solution of a bounded coherence low-rank multilinear approximation problem. We show that bounded coherence allows us to establish existence and uniqueness of the recovered solution. We will provide some statistical motivation for the approximation problem and discuss greedy approximation bounds. To provide the theoretical underpinnings for this technique, we develop a corresponding theory of sparse separable decompositions of functions, including notions of rank and nuclear norm that specialize to the usual ones for matrices and operators but apply to also hypermatrices and tensors.
1212.6686
Outage Performance of AF-based Time Division Broadcasting Protocol in the Presence of Co-channel Interference
cs.IT math.IT
In this paper, we investigate the outage performance of time division broadcasting (TDBC) protocol in independent but non-identical Rayleigh flat-fading channels, where all nodes are interfered by a finite number of co-channel interferers. We assume that the relay operates in the amplified-and-forward mode. A tight lower bound as well as the asymptotic expression of the outage probability is obtained in closed-form. Through both theoretic analyses and simulation results, we show that the achievable diversity of TDBC protocol is zero in the interference-limited scenario. Moreover, we study the impacts of interference power, number of interferers and relay placement on the outage probability. Finally, the correctness of our analytic results is validated via computer simulations.
1212.6734
Pushing the Limits of LTE: A Survey on Research Enhancing the Standard
cs.IT math.IT
Cellular networks are an essential part of todays communication infrastructure. The ever-increasing demand for higher data-rates calls for a close cooperation between researchers and industry/standardization experts which hardly exists in practice. In this article we give an overview about our efforts in trying to bridge this gap. Our research group provides a standard-compliant open-source simulation platform for 3GPP LTE that enables reproducible research in a well-defined environment. We demonstrate that much innovative research under the confined framework of a real-world standard is still possible, sometimes even encouraged. With examplary samples of our research work we investigate on the potential of several important research areas under typical practical conditions.
1212.6745
Two-Dimensional Kolmogorov Complexity and Validation of the Coding Theorem Method by Compressibility
cs.CC cs.IT math.IT
We propose a measure based upon the fundamental theoretical concept in algorithmic information theory that provides a natural approach to the problem of evaluating $n$-dimensional complexity by using an $n$-dimensional deterministic Turing machine. The technique is interesting because it provides a natural algorithmic process for symmetry breaking generating complex $n$-dimensional structures from perfectly symmetric and fully deterministic computational rules producing a distribution of patterns as described by algorithmic probability. Algorithmic probability also elegantly connects the frequency of occurrence of a pattern with its algorithmic complexity, hence effectively providing estimations to the complexity of the generated patterns. Experiments to validate estimations of algorithmic complexity based on these concepts are presented, showing that the measure is stable in the face of some changes in computational formalism and that results are in agreement with the results obtained using lossless compression algorithms when both methods overlap in their range of applicability. We then use the output frequency of the set of 2-dimensional Turing machines to classify the algorithmic complexity of the space-time evolutions of Elementary Cellular Automata.
1212.6806
Leveraging Sociological Models for Predictive Analytics
cs.SI physics.soc-ph
There is considerable interest in developing techniques for predicting human behavior, for instance to enable emerging contentious situations to be forecast or the nature of ongoing but hidden activities to be inferred. A promising approach to this problem is to identify and collect appropriate empirical data and then apply machine learning methods to these data to generate the predictions. This paper shows the performance of such learning algorithms often can be improved substantially by leveraging sociological models in their development and implementation. In particular, we demonstrate that sociologically-grounded learning algorithms outperform gold-standard methods in three important and challenging tasks: 1.) inferring the (unobserved) nature of relationships in adversarial social networks, 2.) predicting whether nascent social diffusion events will go viral, and 3.) anticipating and defending future actions of opponents in adversarial settings. Significantly, the new algorithms perform well even when there is limited data available for their training and execution.
1212.6808
Early Warning Analysis for Social Diffusion Events
cs.SI physics.soc-ph
There is considerable interest in developing predictive capabilities for social diffusion processes, for instance to permit early identification of emerging contentious situations, rapid detection of disease outbreaks, or accurate forecasting of the ultimate reach of potentially viral ideas or behaviors. This paper proposes a new approach to this predictive analytics problem, in which analysis of meso-scale network dynamics is leveraged to generate useful predictions for complex social phenomena. We begin by deriving a stochastic hybrid dynamical systems (S-HDS) model for diffusion processes taking place over social networks with realistic topologies; this modeling approach is inspired by recent work in biology demonstrating that S-HDS offer a useful mathematical formalism with which to represent complex, multi-scale biological network dynamics. We then perform formal stochastic reachability analysis with this S-HDS model and conclude that the outcomes of social diffusion processes may depend crucially upon the way the early dynamics of the process interacts with the underlying network's community structure and core-periphery structure. This theoretical finding provides the foundations for developing a machine learning algorithm that enables accurate early warning analysis for social diffusion events. The utility of the warning algorithm, and the power of network-based predictive metrics, are demonstrated through an empirical investigation of the propagation of political memes over social media networks. Additionally, we illustrate the potential of the approach for security informatics applications through case studies involving early warning analysis of large-scale protests events and politically-motivated cyber attacks.
1212.6810
Web Analytics for Security Informatics
cs.SI physics.soc-ph
An enormous volume of security-relevant information is present on the Web, for instance in the content produced each day by millions of bloggers worldwide, but discovering and making sense of these data is very challenging. This paper considers the problem of exploring and analyzing the Web to realize three fundamental objectives: 1.) security relevant information discovery; 2.) target situational awareness, typically by making (near) real-time inferences concerning events and activities from available observations; and 3.) predictive analysis, to include providing early warning for crises and forming predictions regarding likely outcomes of emerging issues and contemplated interventions. The proposed approach involves collecting and integrating three types of Web data, textual, relational, and temporal, to perform assessments and generate insights that would be difficult or impossible to obtain using standard methods. We demonstrate the efficacy of the framework by summarizing a number of successful real-world deployments of the methodology.
1212.6817
Stability Analysis Of Delayed System Using Bodes Integral
cs.SY
The PID controller parameters can be adjusted in such a manner that it gives the desired frequency response and the results are found using the Bodes integral formula in order to adjust the slope of the nyquist curve in a desired manner. The same idea is applied for plants with time delay . The same has also been done in a new approach . The delay term is approximated as a transfer function using Pade approximation and then the Bode integral is used to determine the controller parameters. Both the methodologies are demonstrated with MATLAB simulation of representative plants and accompanying PID controllers. A proper comparison of the two methodologies is also done. The PID controller parameters are also tuned using a real coded Genetic Algorithm (GA) and a proper comparison is done between the three methods.
1212.6837
Autonomously Learning to Visually Detect Where Manipulation Will Succeed
cs.RO cs.AI cs.CV
Visual features can help predict if a manipulation behavior will succeed at a given location. For example, the success of a behavior that flips light switches depends on the location of the switch. Within this paper, we present methods that enable a mobile manipulator to autonomously learn a function that takes an RGB image and a registered 3D point cloud as input and returns a 3D location at which a manipulation behavior is likely to succeed. Given a pair of manipulation behaviors that can change the state of the world between two sets (e.g., light switch up and light switch down), classifiers that detect when each behavior has been successful, and an initial hint as to where one of the behaviors will be successful, the robot autonomously trains a pair of support vector machine (SVM) classifiers by trying out the behaviors at locations in the world and observing the results. When an image feature vector associated with a 3D location is provided as input to one of the SVMs, the SVM predicts if the associated manipulation behavior will be successful at the 3D location. To evaluate our approach, we performed experiments with a PR2 robot from Willow Garage in a simulated home using behaviors that flip a light switch, push a rocker-type light switch, and operate a drawer. By using active learning, the robot efficiently learned SVMs that enabled it to consistently succeed at these tasks. After training, the robot also continued to learn in order to adapt in the event of failure.
1212.6846
Maximizing a Nonnegative, Monotone, Submodular Function Constrained to Matchings
cs.DS cs.AI cs.CC cs.LG stat.ML
Submodular functions have many applications. Matchings have many applications. The bitext word alignment problem can be modeled as the problem of maximizing a nonnegative, monotone, submodular function constrained to matchings in a complete bipartite graph where each vertex corresponds to a word in the two input sentences and each edge represents a potential word-to-word translation. We propose a more general problem of maximizing a nonnegative, monotone, submodular function defined on the edge set of a complete graph constrained to matchings; we call this problem the CSM-Matching problem. CSM-Matching also generalizes the maximum-weight matching problem, which has a polynomial-time algorithm; however, we show that it is NP-hard to approximate CSM-Matching within a factor of e/(e-1) by reducing the max k-cover problem to it. Our main result is a simple, greedy, 3-approximation algorithm for CSM-Matching. Then we reduce CSM-Matching to maximizing a nonnegative, monotone, submodular function over two matroids, i.e., CSM-2-Matroids. CSM-2-Matroids has a (2+epsilon)-approximation algorithm - called LSV2. We show that we can find a (4+epsilon)-approximate solution to CSM-Matching using LSV2. We extend this approach to similar problems.
1212.6855
Multi-Directional Flow as Touch-Stone to Assess Models of Pedestrian Dynamics
physics.soc-ph cs.MA
For simulation models of pedestrian dynamics there are always the issues of calibration and validation. These are usually done by comparing measured properties of the dynamics found in observation, experiments and simulation in certain scenarios. For this the scenarios first need to be sensitive to parameter changes of a particular model or - if models are compared - differences between models. Second it is helpful if the exhibited differences can be expressed in quantities which are as simple as possible ideally a single number. Such a scenario is proposed in this contribution together with evaluation measures. In an example evaluation of a particular model it is shown that the proposed evaluation measures are very sensitive to parameter changes and therefore summarize differences effects of parameter changes and differences between models efficiently, sometimes in a single number. It is shown how the symmetry which exists in the achiral geometry of the proposed example scenario is broken in particular simulation runs exhibiting chiral dynamics, while in the statistics of 1,000 simulation runs there is a symmetry between left- and right-chiral dynamics. In the course of the symmetry breaking differences between models and parameter settings are amplified which is the origin of the high sensitivity of the scenario against parameter changes.
1212.6856
Emergence of Equilibria from Individual Strategies in Online Content Diffusion
cs.GT cs.NI cs.SI
Social scientists have observed that human behavior in society can often be modeled as corresponding to a threshold type policy. A new behavior would propagate by a procedure in which an individual adopts the new behavior if the fraction of his neighbors or friends having adopted the new behavior exceeds some threshold. In this paper we study the question of whether the emergence of threshold policies may be modeled as a result of some rational process which would describe the behavior of non-cooperative rational members of some social network. We focus on situations in which individuals take the decision whether to access or not some content, based on the number of views that the content has. Our analysis aims at understanding not only the behavior of individuals, but also the way in which information about the quality of a given content can be deduced from view counts when only part of the viewers that access the content are informed about its quality. In this paper we present a game formulation for the behavior of individuals using a meanfield model: the number of individuals is approximated by a continuum of atomless players and for which the Wardrop equilibrium is the solution concept. We derive conditions on the problem's parameters that result indeed in the emergence of threshold equilibria policies. But we also identify some parameters in which other structures are obtained for the equilibrium behavior of individuals.
1212.6857
A Trichotomy for Regular Simple Path Queries on Graphs
cs.DB cs.DM
Regular path queries (RPQs) select nodes connected by some path in a graph. The edge labels of such a path have to form a word that matches a given regular expression. We investigate the evaluation of RPQs with an additional constraint that prevents multiple traversals of the same nodes. Those regular simple path queries (RSPQs) find several applications in practice, yet they quickly become intractable, even for basic languages such as (aa)* or a*ba*. In this paper, we establish a comprehensive classification of regular languages with respect to the complexity of the corresponding regular simple path query problem. More precisely, we identify the fragment that is maximal in the following sense: regular simple path queries can be evaluated in polynomial time for every regular language L that belongs to this fragment and evaluation is NP-complete for languages outside this fragment. We thus fully characterize the frontier between tractability and intractability for RSPQs, and we refine our results to show the following trichotomy: Evaluations of RSPQs is either AC0, NL-complete or NP-complete in data complexity, depending on the regular language L. The fragment identified also admits a simple characterization in terms of regular expressions. Finally, we also discuss the complexity of the following decision problem: decide, given a language L, whether finding a regular simple path for L is tractable. We consider several alternative representations of L: DFAs, NFAs or regular expressions, and prove that this problem is NL-complete for the first representation and PSPACE-complete for the other two. As a conclusion we extend our results from edge-labeled graphs to vertex-labeled graphs and vertex-edge labeled graphs.
1212.6922
Training a Functional Link Neural Network Using an Artificial Bee Colony for Solving a Classification Problems
cs.NE cs.LG
Artificial Neural Networks have emerged as an important tool for classification and have been widely used to classify a non-linear separable pattern. The most popular artificial neural networks model is a Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) as it is able to perform classification task with significant success. However due to the complexity of MLP structure and also problems such as local minima trapping, over fitting and weight interference have made neural network training difficult. Thus, the easy way to avoid these problems is to remove the hidden layers. This paper presents the ability of Functional Link Neural Network (FLNN) to overcome the complexity structure of MLP by using single layer architecture and propose an Artificial Bee Colony (ABC) optimization for training the FLNN. The proposed technique is expected to provide better learning scheme for a classifier in order to get more accurate classification result
1212.6930
Private Broadcasting over Independent Parallel Channels
cs.IT math.IT
We study private broadcasting of two messages to two groups of receivers over independent parallel channels. One group consists of an arbitrary number of receivers interested in a common message, whereas the other group has only one receiver. Each message must be kept confidential from the receiver(s) in the other group. Each of the sub-channels is degraded, but the order of receivers on each channel can be different. While corner points of the capacity region were characterized in earlier works, we establish the capacity region and show the optimality of a superposition strategy. For the case of parallel Gaussian channels, we show that a Gaussian input distribution is optimal. We also discuss an extension of our setup to broadcasting over a block-fading channel and demonstrate significant performance gains using the proposed scheme over a baseline time-sharing scheme.
1212.6933
On Automation and Medical Image Interpretation, With Applications for Laryngeal Imaging
cs.CV
Indeed, these are exciting times. We are in the heart of a digital renaissance. Automation and computer technology allow engineers and scientists to fabricate processes that amalgamate quality of life. We anticipate much growth in medical image interpretation and understanding, due to the influx of computer technologies. This work should serve as a guide to introduce the reader to core themes in theoretical computer science, as well as imaging applications for understanding vocal-fold vibrations. In this work, we motivate the use of automation, review some mathematical models of computation. We present a proof of a classical problem in image analysis that cannot be automated by means of algorithms. Furthermore, discuss some applications for processing medical images of the vocal folds, and discuss some of the exhilarating directions the art of automation will take vocal-fold image interpretation and quite possibly other areas of biomedical image analysis.
1212.6952
On Minimizing Data-read and Download for Storage-Node Recovery
cs.IT math.IT
We consider the problem of efficient recovery of the data stored in any individual node of a distributed storage system, from the rest of the nodes. Applications include handling failures and degraded reads. We measure efficiency in terms of the amount of data-read and the download required. To minimize the download, we focus on the minimum bandwidth setting of the 'regenerating codes' model for distributed storage. Under this model, the system has a total of n nodes, and the data stored in any node must be (efficiently) recoverable from any d of the other (n-1) nodes. Lower bounds on the two metrics under this model were derived previously; it has also been shown that these bounds are achievable for the amount of data-read and download when d=n-1, and for the amount of download alone when d<n-1. In this paper, we complete this picture by proving the converse result, that when d<n-1, these lower bounds are strictly loose with respect to the amount of read required. The proof is information-theoretic, and hence applies to non-linear codes as well. We also show that under two (practical) relaxations of the problem setting, these lower bounds can be met for both read and download simultaneously.
1212.6958
Fast Solutions to Projective Monotone Linear Complementarity Problems
cs.LG math.OC
We present a new interior-point potential-reduction algorithm for solving monotone linear complementarity problems (LCPs) that have a particular special structure: their matrix $M\in{\mathbb R}^{n\times n}$ can be decomposed as $M=\Phi U + \Pi_0$, where the rank of $\Phi$ is $k<n$, and $\Pi_0$ denotes Euclidean projection onto the nullspace of $\Phi^\top$. We call such LCPs projective. Our algorithm solves a monotone projective LCP to relative accuracy $\epsilon$ in $O(\sqrt n \ln(1/\epsilon))$ iterations, with each iteration requiring $O(nk^2)$ flops. This complexity compares favorably with interior-point algorithms for general monotone LCPs: these algorithms also require $O(\sqrt n \ln(1/\epsilon))$ iterations, but each iteration needs to solve an $n\times n$ system of linear equations, a much higher cost than our algorithm when $k\ll n$. Our algorithm works even though the solution to a projective LCP is not restricted to lie in any low-rank subspace.
1301.0006
Predictive Non-equilibrium Social Science
cs.SI physics.soc-ph
Non-Equilibrium Social Science (NESS) emphasizes dynamical phenomena, for instance the way political movements emerge or competing organizations interact. This paper argues that predictive analysis is an essential element of NESS, occupying a central role in its scientific inquiry and representing a key activity of practitioners in domains such as economics, public policy, and national security. We begin by clarifying the distinction between models which are useful for prediction and the much more common explanatory models studied in the social sciences. We then investigate a challenging real-world predictive analysis case study, and find evidence that the poor performance of standard prediction methods does not indicate an absence of human predictability but instead reflects (1.) incorrect assumptions concerning the predictive utility of explanatory models, (2.) misunderstanding regarding which features of social dynamics actually possess predictive power, and (3.) practical difficulties exploiting predictive representations.
1301.0014
Propelinear 1-perfect codes from quadratic functions
cs.IT cs.DM math.CO math.IT
Perfect codes obtained by the Vasil'ev--Sch\"onheim construction from a linear base code and quadratic switching functions are transitive and, moreover, propelinear. This gives at least $\exp(cN^2)$ propelinear $1$-perfect codes of length $N$ over an arbitrary finite field, while an upper bound on the number of transitive codes is $\exp(C(N\ln N)^2)$. Keywords: perfect code, propelinear code, transitive code, automorphism group, Boolean function.
1301.0015
Bethe Bounds and Approximating the Global Optimum
cs.LG stat.ML
Inference in general Markov random fields (MRFs) is NP-hard, though identifying the maximum a posteriori (MAP) configuration of pairwise MRFs with submodular cost functions is efficiently solvable using graph cuts. Marginal inference, however, even for this restricted class, is in #P. We prove new formulations of derivatives of the Bethe free energy, provide bounds on the derivatives and bracket the locations of stationary points, introducing a new technique called Bethe bound propagation. Several results apply to pairwise models whether associative or not. Applying these to discretized pseudo-marginals in the associative case we present a polynomial time approximation scheme for global optimization provided the maximum degree is $O(\log n)$, and discuss several extensions.
1301.0026
Bounding Lossy Compression using Lossless Codes at Reduced Precision
cs.MM cs.IT math.IT
An alternative approach to two-part 'critical compression' is presented. Whereas previous results were based on summing a lossless code at reduced precision with a lossy-compressed error or noise term, the present approach uses a similar lossless code at reduced precision to establish absolute bounds which constrain an arbitrary lossy data compression algorithm applied to the original data.
1301.0039
Generating Property-Directed Potential Invariants By Backward Analysis
cs.LO cs.CE cs.SE
This paper addresses the issue of lemma generation in a k-induction-based formal analysis of transition systems, in the linear real/integer arithmetic fragment. A backward analysis, powered by quantifier elimination, is used to output preimages of the negation of the proof objective, viewed as unauthorized states, or gray states. Two heuristics are proposed to take advantage of this source of information. First, a thorough exploration of the possible partitionings of the gray state space discovers new relations between state variables, representing potential invariants. Second, an inexact exploration regroups and over-approximates disjoint areas of the gray state space, also to discover new relations between state variables. k-induction is used to isolate the invariants and check if they strengthen the proof objective. These heuristics can be used on the first preimage of the backward exploration, and each time a new one is output, refining the information on the gray states. In our context of critical avionics embedded systems, we show that our approach is able to outperform other academic or commercial tools on examples of interest in our application field. The method is introduced and motivated through two main examples, one of which was provided by Rockwell Collins, in a collaborative formal verification framework.
1301.0043
A Framework for Analysing Driver Interactions with Semi-Autonomous Vehicles
cs.HC cs.RO cs.SY
Semi-autonomous vehicles are increasingly serving critical functions in various settings from mining to logistics to defence. A key characteristic of such systems is the presence of the human (drivers) in the control loop. To ensure safety, both the driver needs to be aware of the autonomous aspects of the vehicle and the automated features of the vehicle built to enable safer control. In this paper we propose a framework to combine empirical models describing human behaviour with the environment and system models. We then analyse, via model checking, interaction between the models for desired safety properties. The aim is to analyse the design for safe vehicle-driver interaction. We demonstrate the applicability of our approach using a case study involving semi-autonomous vehicles where the driver fatigue are factors critical to a safe journey.
1301.0047
On Distributed Online Classification in the Midst of Concept Drifts
math.OC cs.DC cs.LG cs.SI physics.soc-ph
In this work, we analyze the generalization ability of distributed online learning algorithms under stationary and non-stationary environments. We derive bounds for the excess-risk attained by each node in a connected network of learners and study the performance advantage that diffusion strategies have over individual non-cooperative processing. We conduct extensive simulations to illustrate the results.
1301.0048
Generating High-Order Threshold Functions with Multiple Thresholds
cs.NE
In this paper, we consider situations in which a given logical function is realized by a multithreshold threshold function. In such situations, constant functions can be easily obtained from multithreshold threshold functions, and therefore, we can show that it becomes possible to optimize a class of high-order neural networks. We begin by proposing a generating method for threshold functions in which we use a vector that determines the boundary between the linearly separable function and the high-order threshold function. By applying this method to high-order threshold functions, we show that functions with the same weight as, but a different threshold than, a threshold function generated by the generation process can be easily obtained. We also show that the order of the entire network can be extended while maintaining the structure of given functions.
1301.0068
Optimal Assembly for High Throughput Shotgun Sequencing
q-bio.GN cs.DS cs.IT math.IT q-bio.QM
We present a framework for the design of optimal assembly algorithms for shotgun sequencing under the criterion of complete reconstruction. We derive a lower bound on the read length and the coverage depth required for reconstruction in terms of the repeat statistics of the genome. Building on earlier works, we design a de Brujin graph based assembly algorithm which can achieve very close to the lower bound for repeat statistics of a wide range of sequenced genomes, including the GAGE datasets. The results are based on a set of necessary and sufficient conditions on the DNA sequence and the reads for reconstruction. The conditions can be viewed as the shotgun sequencing analogue of Ukkonen-Pevzner's necessary and sufficient conditions for Sequencing by Hybridization.
1301.0079
Zero-Delay and Causal Single-User and Multi-User Lossy Source Coding with Decoder Side Information
cs.IT math.IT
We consider zero-delay single-user and multi-user source coding with average distortion constraint and decoder side information. The zero-delay constraint translates into causal (sequential) encoder and decoder pairs as well as the use of instantaneous codes. For the single-user setting, we show that optimal performance is attained by time sharing at most two scalar encoder-decoder pairs, that use zero-error side information codes. Side information lookahead is shown to useless in this setting. We show that the restriction to causal encoding functions is the one that causes the performance degradation, compared to unrestricted systems, and not the sequential decoders or instantaneous codes. Furthermore, we show that even without delay constraints, if either the encoder or decoder are restricted a-priori to be scalar, the performance loss cannot be compensated by the other component, which can be scalar as well without further loss. Finally, we show that the multi-terminal source coding problem can be solved in the zero-delay regime and the rate-distortion region is given.
1301.0080
How to Understand LMMSE Transceiver Design for MIMO Systems From Quadratic Matrix Programming
cs.IT math.IT
In this paper, a unified linear minimum mean-square-error (LMMSE) transceiver design framework is investigated, which is suitable for a wide range of wireless systems. The unified design is based on an elegant and powerful mathematical programming technology termed as quadratic matrix programming (QMP). Based on QMP it can be observed that for different wireless systems, there are certain common characteristics which can be exploited to design LMMSE transceivers e.g., the quadratic forms. It is also discovered that evolving from a point-to-point MIMO system to various advanced wireless systems such as multi-cell coordinated systems, multi-user MIMO systems, MIMO cognitive radio systems, amplify-and-forward MIMO relaying systems and so on, the quadratic nature is always kept and the LMMSE transceiver designs can always be carried out via iteratively solving a number of QMP problems. A comprehensive framework on how to solve QMP problems is also given. The work presented in this paper is likely to be the first shoot for the transceiver design for the future ever-changing wireless systems.
1301.0082
CloudSVM : Training an SVM Classifier in Cloud Computing Systems
cs.LG cs.DC
In conventional method, distributed support vector machines (SVM) algorithms are trained over pre-configured intranet/internet environments to find out an optimal classifier. These methods are very complicated and costly for large datasets. Hence, we propose a method that is referred as the Cloud SVM training mechanism (CloudSVM) in a cloud computing environment with MapReduce technique for distributed machine learning applications. Accordingly, (i) SVM algorithm is trained in distributed cloud storage servers that work concurrently; (ii) merge all support vectors in every trained cloud node; and (iii) iterate these two steps until the SVM converges to the optimal classifier function. Large scale data sets are not possible to train using SVM algorithm on a single computer. The results of this study are important for training of large scale data sets for machine learning applications. We provided that iterative training of splitted data set in cloud computing environment using SVM will converge to a global optimal classifier in finite iteration size.
1301.0087
Opportunistic DF-AF Selection Relaying with Optimal Relay Selection in Nakagami-m Fading Environments
cs.IT math.IT
An opportunistic DF-AF selection relaying scheme with maximal received signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at the destination is investigated in this paper. The outage probability of the opportunistic DF-AF selection relaying scheme over Nakagami-m fading channels is analyzed, and a closed-form solution is obtained. We perform asymptotic analysis of the outage probability in high SNR domain. The coding gain and the diversity order are obtained. For the purpose of comparison, the asymptotic analysis of opportunistic AF scheme in Nakagami-m fading channels is also performed by using the Squeeze Theorem. In addition, we prove that compared with the opportunistic DF scheme and opportunistic AF scheme, the opportunistic DF-AF selection relaying scheme has better outage performance.
1301.0091
On the Robust Optimal Stopping Problem
math.PR cs.SY math.OC q-fin.PR
We study a robust optimal stopping problem with respect to a set $\cP$ of mutually singular probabilities. This can be interpreted as a zero-sum controller-stopper game in which the stopper is trying to maximize its pay-off while an adverse player wants to minimize this payoff by choosing an evaluation criteria from $\cP$. We show that the \emph{upper Snell envelope $\ol{Z}$} of the reward process $Y$ is a supermartingale with respect to an appropriately defined nonlinear expectation $\ul{\sE}$, and $\ol{Z}$ is further an $\ul{\sE}-$martingale up to the first time $\t^*$ when $\ol{Z}$ meets $Y$. Consequently, $\t^*$ is the optimal stopping time for the robust optimal stopping problem and the corresponding zero-sum game has a value. Although the result seems similar to the one obtained in the classical optimal stopping theory, the mutual singularity of probabilities and the game aspect of the problem give rise to major technical hurdles, which we circumvent using some new methods.
1301.0093
Robustness of Sparse Recovery via $F$-minimization: A Topological Viewpoint
cs.IT math.IT
A recent trend in compressed sensing is to consider non-convex optimization techniques for sparse recovery. The important case of $F$-minimization has become of particular interest, for which the exact reconstruction condition (ERC) in the noiseless setting can be precisely characterized by the null space property (NSP). However, little work has been done concerning its robust reconstruction condition (RRC) in the noisy setting. We look at the null space of the measurement matrix as a point on the Grassmann manifold, and then study the relation between the ERC and RRC sets, denoted as $\Omega_J$ and $\Omega_J^r$, respectively. It is shown that $\Omega_J^r$ is the interior of $\Omega_J$, from which a previous result of the equivalence of ERC and RRC for $\ell_p$-minimization follows easily as a special case. Moreover, when $F$ is non-decreasing, it is shown that $\overline{\Omega}_J\setminus\interior(\Omega_J)$ is a set of measure zero and of the first category. As a consequence, the probabilities of ERC and RRC are the same if the measurement matrix $\mathbf{A}$ is randomly generated according to a continuous distribution. Quantitatively, if the null space $\mathcal{N}(\bf A)$ lies in the "$d$-interior" of $\Omega_J$, then RRC will be satisfied with the robustness constant $C=\frac{2+2d}{d\sigma_{\min}(\mathbf{A}^{\top})}$; and conversely if RRC holds with $C=\frac{2-2d}{d\sigma_{\max}(\mathbf{A}^{\top})}$, then $\mathcal{N}(\bf A)$ must lie in $d$-interior of $\Omega_J$. We also present several rules for comparing the performances of different cost functions. Finally, these results are capitalized to derive achievable tradeoffs between the measurement rate and robustness with the aid of Gordon's escape through the mesh theorem or a connection between NSP and the restricted eigenvalue condition.
1301.0094
Joint Iterative Power Allocation and Linear Interference Suppression Algorithms in Cooperative DS-CDMA Networks
cs.IT math.IT
This work presents joint iterative power allocation and interference suppression algorithms for spread spectrum networks which employ multiple hops and the amplify-and-forward cooperation strategy for both the uplink and the downlink. We propose a joint constrained optimization framework that considers the allocation of power levels across the relays subject to individual and global power constraints and the design of linear receivers for interference suppression. We derive constrained linear minimum mean-squared error (MMSE) expressions for the parameter vectors that determine the optimal power levels across the relays and the linear receivers. In order to solve the proposed optimization problems, we develop cost-effective algorithms for adaptive joint power allocation, and estimation of the parameters of the receiver and the channels. An analysis of the optimization problem is carried out and shows that the problem can have its convexity enforced by an appropriate choice of the power constraint parameter, which allows the algorithms to avoid problems with local minima. A study of the complexity and the requirements for feedback channels of the proposed algorithms is also included for completeness. Simulation results show that the proposed algorithms obtain significant gains in performance and capacity over existing non-cooperative and cooperative schemes.
1301.0097
Set-Membership Adaptive Algorithms based on Time-Varying Error Bounds for Interference Suppression
cs.IT math.IT
This work presents set-membership adaptive algorithms based on time-varying error bounds for CDMA interference suppression. We introduce a modified family of set-membership adaptive algorithms for parameter estimation with time-varying error bounds. The algorithms considered include modified versions of the set-membership normalized least mean squares (SM-NLMS), the affine projection (SM-AP) and the bounding ellipsoidal adaptive constrained (BEACON) recursive least-squares technique. The important issue of error bound specification is addressed in a new framework that takes into account parameter estimation dependency, multi-access and inter-symbol interference for DS-CDMA communications. An algorithm for tracking and estimating the interference power is proposed and analyzed. This algorithm is then incorporated into the proposed time-varying error bound mechanisms. Computer simulations show that the proposed algorithms are capable of outperforming previously reported techniques with a significantly lower number of parameter updates and a reduced risk of overbounding or underbounding.
1301.0104
Policy Evaluation with Variance Related Risk Criteria in Markov Decision Processes
cs.LG stat.ML
In this paper we extend temporal difference policy evaluation algorithms to performance criteria that include the variance of the cumulative reward. Such criteria are useful for risk management, and are important in domains such as finance and process control. We propose both TD(0) and LSTD(lambda) variants with linear function approximation, prove their convergence, and demonstrate their utility in a 4-dimensional continuous state space problem.