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1009.1166
Functorial Data Migration
cs.DB math.CT
In this paper we present a simple database definition language: that of categories and functors. A database schema is a small category and an instance is a set-valued functor on it. We show that morphisms of schemas induce three "data migration functors", which translate instances from one schema to the other in canonical ways. These functors parameterize projections, unions, and joins over all tables simultaneously and can be used in place of conjunctive and disjunctive queries. We also show how to connect a database and a functional programming language by introducing a functorial connection between the schema and the category of types for that language. We begin the paper with a multitude of examples to motivate the definitions, and near the end we provide a dictionary whereby one can translate database concepts into category-theoretic concepts and vice-versa.
1009.1174
Parameterized Complexity Results in Symmetry Breaking
cs.AI cs.CC
Symmetry is a common feature of many combinatorial problems. Unfortunately eliminating all symmetry from a problem is often computationally intractable. This paper argues that recent parameterized complexity results provide insight into that intractability and help identify special cases in which symmetry can be dealt with more tractably
1009.1193
Coarse Network Coding: A Simple Relay Strategy to Resolve Interference
cs.IT math.IT
Reminiscent of the parity function in network coding for the butterfly network, it is shown that forwarding an even/odd indicator bit for a scalar quantization of a relay observation recovers 1 bit of information at the two destinations in a noiseless interference channel where interference is treated as noise. Based on this observation, a coding strategy is proposed to improve the rate of both users at the same time using a relay node in an interference channel. In this strategy, the relay observes a linear combination of the two source signals, and broadcasts a common message to the two destinations over a shared out-of-band link of rate R0 bits per channel use. The relay message consists of the bin index of a structured binning scheme obtained from a 2^R0-way partition of the squared lattice in the complex plane. We show that such scalar quantization-binning relay strategy asymptotically achieves the cut-set bound in an interference channel with a common out-of-band relay link of limited rate, improving the sum rate by two bits for every bit relayed, asymptotically at high signal to noise ratios (SNR) and when interference is treated as noise. We then use low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes along with bit-interleaved coded-modulation (BICM) as a practical coding scheme for the proposed strategy. We consider matched and mismatched scenarios, depending on whether the input alphabet of the interference signal is known or unknown to the decoder, respectively. For the matched scenario, we show the proposed strategy results in significant gains in SNR. For the mismatched scenario, we show that the proposed strategy results in rate improvements that, without the relay, cannot be achieved by merely increasing transmit powers. Finally, we use generalized mutual information analysis to characterize the theoretical performance of the mismatched scenario and validate our simulation results.
1009.1225
A family of sequences with large size and good correlation property arising from $M$-ary Sidelnikov sequences of period $q^d-1$
cs.IT math.IT
Let $q$ be any prime power and let $d$ be a positive integer greater than 1. In this paper, we construct a family of $M$-ary sequences of period $q-1$ from a given $M$-ary, with $M|q-1$, Sidelikov sequence of period $q^d-1$. Under mild restrictions on $d$, we show that the maximum correlation magnitude of the family is upper bounded by $(2d -1) \sqrt { q }+1$ and the asymptotic size, as $q\rightarrow \infty$, of that is $\frac{ (M-1)q^{d-1}}{d }$. This extends the pioneering work of Yu and Gong for $d=2$ case.
1009.1254
Multiuser broadcast erasure channel with feedback - capacity and algorithms
cs.IT cs.DM math.IT
We consider the $N$-user broadcast erasure channel with $N$ unicast sessions (one for each user) where receiver feedback is regularly sent to the transmitter in the form of ACK/NACK messages. We first provide a generic outer bound to the capacity of this system; we then propose a virtual-queue-based inter-session mixing coding algorithm, determine its rate region and show that it achieves capacity under certain conditions on channel statistics, assuming that instantaneous feedback is known to all users. Removing this assumption results in a rate region that asymptotically differs from the outer bound by 1 bit as $L\to \infty$, where $L$ is the number of bits per packet (packet length). For the case of arbitrary channel statistics, we present a modification of the previous algorithm whose rate region is identical to the outer bound for N=3, when instant feedback is known to all users, and differs from the bound by 1 bit as $L\to \infty$, when the 3 users know only their own ACK. The proposed algorithms do not require any prior knowledge of channel statistics.
1009.1305
Wideband Spectrum Sensing at Sub-Nyquist Rates
cs.AR cs.IT math.IT
We present a mixed analog-digital spectrum sensing method that is especially suited to the typical wideband setting of cognitive radio (CR). The advantages of our system with respect to current architectures are threefold. First, our analog front-end is fixed and does not involve scanning hardware. Second, both the analog-to-digital conversion (ADC) and the digital signal processing (DSP) rates are substantially below Nyquist. Finally, the sensing resources are shared with the reception path of the CR, so that the lowrate streaming samples can be used for communication purposes of the device, besides the sensing functionality they provide. Combining these advantages leads to a real time map of the spectrum with minimal use of mobile resources. Our approach is based on the modulated wideband converter (MWC) system, which samples sparse wideband inputs at sub-Nyquist rates. We report on results of hardware experiments, conducted on an MWC prototype circuit, which affirm fast and accurate spectrum sensing in parallel to CR communication.
1009.1362
Approximate Lesion Localization in Dermoscopy Images
cs.CV
Background: Dermoscopy is one of the major imaging modalities used in the diagnosis of melanoma and other pigmented skin lesions. Due to the difficulty and subjectivity of human interpretation, automated analysis of dermoscopy images has become an important research area. Border detection is often the first step in this analysis. Methods: In this article, we present an approximate lesion localization method that serves as a preprocessing step for detecting borders in dermoscopy images. In this method, first the black frame around the image is removed using an iterative algorithm. The approximate location of the lesion is then determined using an ensemble of thresholding algorithms. Results: The method is tested on a set of 428 dermoscopy images. The localization error is quantified by a metric that uses dermatologist determined borders as the ground truth. Conclusion: The results demonstrate that the method presented here achieves both fast and accurate localization of lesions in dermoscopy images.
1009.1446
Comparing Prediction Market Structures, With an Application to Market Making
q-fin.TR cs.AI cs.CE
Ensuring sufficient liquidity is one of the key challenges for designers of prediction markets. Various market making algorithms have been proposed in the literature and deployed in practice, but there has been little effort to evaluate their benefits and disadvantages in a systematic manner. We introduce a novel experimental design for comparing market structures in live trading that ensures fair comparison between two different microstructures with the same trading population. Participants trade on outcomes related to a two-dimensional random walk that they observe on their computer screens. They can simultaneously trade in two markets, corresponding to the independent horizontal and vertical random walks. We use this experimental design to compare the popular inventory-based logarithmic market scoring rule (LMSR) market maker and a new information based Bayesian market maker (BMM). Our experiments reveal that BMM can offer significant benefits in terms of price stability and expected loss when controlling for liquidity; the caveat is that, unlike LMSR, BMM does not guarantee bounded loss. Our investigation also elucidates some general properties of market makers in prediction markets. In particular, there is an inherent tradeoff between adaptability to market shocks and convergence during market equilibrium.
1009.1460
Two-Way Transmission Capacity of Wireless Ad-hoc Networks
cs.IT math.IT
The transmission capacity of an ad-hoc network is the maximum density of active transmitters per unit area, given an outage constraint at each receiver for a fixed rate of transmission. Most prior work on finding the transmission capacity of ad-hoc networks has focused only on one-way communication where a source communicates with a destination and no data is sent from the destination to the source. In practice, however, two-way or bidirectional data transmission is required to support control functions like packet acknowledgements and channel feedback. This paper extends the concept of transmission capacity to two-way wireless ad-hoc networks by incorporating the concept of a two-way outage with different rate requirements in both directions. Tight upper and lower bounds on the two-way transmission capacity are derived for frequency division duplexing. The derived bounds are used to derive the optimal solution for bidirectional bandwidth allocation that maximizes the two-way transmission capacity, which is shown to perform better than allocating bandwidth proportional to the desired rate in both directions. Using the proposed two-way transmission capacity framework, a lower bound on the two-way transmission capacity with transmit beamforming using limited feedback is derived as a function of bandwidth, and bits allocated for feedback.
1009.1498
A Statistical Measure of Complexity
nlin.AO cs.IT math.IT physics.data-an
In this chapter, a statistical measure of complexity is introduced and some of its properties are discussed. Also, some straightforward applications are shown.
1009.1512
Applications of semidefinite programming to coding theory
cs.IT math.IT
We survey recent generalizations and improvements of the linear programming method that involve semidefinite programming. A general framework using group representations and tools from graph theory is provided.
1009.1513
Artificial Neural Networks, Symmetries and Differential Evolution
cs.NE
Neuroevolution is an active and growing research field, especially in times of increasingly parallel computing architectures. Learning methods for Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) can be divided into two groups. Neuroevolution is mainly based on Monte-Carlo techniques and belongs to the group of global search methods, whereas other methods such as backpropagation belong to the group of local search methods. ANN's comprise important symmetry properties, which can influence Monte-Carlo methods. On the other hand, local search methods are generally unaffected by these symmetries. In the literature, dealing with the symmetries is generally reported as being not effective or even yielding inferior results. In this paper, we introduce the so called Minimum Global Optimum Proximity principle derived from theoretical considerations for effective symmetry breaking, applied to offline supervised learning. Using Differential Evolution (DE), which is a popular and robust evolutionary global optimization method, we experimentally show significant global search efficiency improvements by symmetry breaking.
1009.1533
Sensing Matrix Optimization for Block-Sparse Decoding
cs.IT math.IT
Recent work has demonstrated that using a carefully designed sensing matrix rather than a random one, can improve the performance of compressed sensing. In particular, a well-designed sensing matrix can reduce the coherence between the atoms of the equivalent dictionary, and as a consequence, reduce the reconstruction error. In some applications, the signals of interest can be well approximated by a union of a small number of subspaces (e.g., face recognition and motion segmentation). This implies the existence of a dictionary which leads to block-sparse representations. In this work, we propose a framework for sensing matrix design that improves the ability of block-sparse approximation techniques to reconstruct and classify signals. This method is based on minimizing a weighted sum of the inter-block coherence and the sub-block coherence of the equivalent dictionary. Our experiments show that the proposed algorithm significantly improves signal recovery and classification ability of the Block-OMP algorithm compared to sensing matrix optimization methods that do not employ block structure.
1009.1686
Statistical Behavior of Embeddedness and Communities of Overlapping Cliques in Online Social Networks
cs.SI physics.soc-ph
Degree distribution of nodes, especially a power law degree distribution, has been regarded as one of the most significant structural characteristics of social and information networks. Node degree, however, only discloses the first-order structure of a network. Higher-order structures such as the edge embeddedness and the size of communities may play more important roles in many online social networks. In this paper, we provide empirical evidence on the existence of rich higherorder structural characteristics in online social networks, develop mathematical models to interpret and model these characteristics, and discuss their various applications in practice. In particular, 1) We show that the embeddedness distribution of social links in many social networks has interesting and rich behavior that cannot be captured by well-known network models. We also provide empirical results showing a clear correlation between the embeddedness distribution and the average number of messages communicated between pairs of social network nodes. 2) We formally prove that random k-tree, a recent model for complex networks, has a power law embeddedness distribution, and show empirically that the random k-tree model can be used to capture the rich behavior of higherorder structures we observed in real-world social networks. 3) Going beyond the embeddedness, we show that a variant of the random k-tree model can be used to capture the power law distribution of the size of communities of overlapping cliques discovered recently.
1009.1690
Probabilistic Models over Ordered Partitions with Application in Learning to Rank
cs.IR stat.ML
This paper addresses the general problem of modelling and learning rank data with ties. We propose a probabilistic generative model, that models the process as permutations over partitions. This results in super-exponential combinatorial state space with unknown numbers of partitions and unknown ordering among them. We approach the problem from the discrete choice theory, where subsets are chosen in a stagewise manner, reducing the state space per each stage significantly. Further, we show that with suitable parameterisation, we can still learn the models in linear time. We evaluate the proposed models on the problem of learning to rank with the data from the recently held Yahoo! challenge, and demonstrate that the models are competitive against well-known rivals.
1009.1691
Multi-scale turbulence modeling and maximum information principle. Part 1
physics.flu-dyn cs.IT math.IT
We discuss averaged turbulence modeling of multi-scales of length for an incompressible Newtonian fluid, with the help of the maximum information principle. We suppose that there exists a function basis to decompose the turbulent fluctuations in a flow of our concern into the components associated with various spatial scales and that there is a probability density function $\pdf$ of these fluctuation components. The unbiased form for $\pdf$ is determined and the turbulence model is closed, with the multi-scale correlations up to the fourth order, through maximizing the information under the constraints of equality and inequality for that flow. Due to the computational difficulty to maximize the information, a closely related but simple alternative objective is sought, like the determinant or the trace of the second order correlations of the turbulent flow. Some preliminary results and implications from the application to homogeneous turbulence are presented. Some issues yet to be resolved are indicated.
1009.1720
Is there a physically universal cellular automaton or Hamiltonian?
quant-ph cs.AI
It is known that both quantum and classical cellular automata (CA) exist that are computationally universal in the sense that they can simulate, after appropriate initialization, any quantum or classical computation, respectively. Here we introduce a different notion of universality: a CA is called physically universal if every transformation on any finite region can be (approximately) implemented by the autonomous time evolution of the system after the complement of the region has been initialized in an appropriate way. We pose the question of whether physically universal CAs exist. Such CAs would provide a model of the world where the boundary between a physical system and its controller can be consistently shifted, in analogy to the Heisenberg cut for the quantum measurement problem. We propose to study the thermodynamic cost of computation and control within such a model because implementing a cyclic process on a microsystem may require a non-cyclic process for its controller, whereas implementing a cyclic process on system and controller may require the implementation of a non-cyclic process on a "meta"-controller, and so on. Physically universal CAs avoid this infinite hierarchy of controllers and the cost of implementing cycles on a subsystem can be described by mixing properties of the CA dynamics. We define a physical prior on the CA configurations by applying the dynamics to an initial state where half of the CA is in the maximum entropy state and half of it is in the all-zero state (thus reflecting the fact that life requires non-equilibrium states like the boundary between a hold and a cold reservoir). As opposed to Solomonoff's prior, our prior does not only account for the Kolmogorov complexity but also for the cost of isolating the system during the state preparation if the preparation process is not robust.
1009.1731
Identifying the Community Structure of the International-Trade Multi Network
physics.soc-ph cs.SI
We study the community structure of the multi-network of commodity-specific trade relations among world countries over the 1992-2003 period. We compare structures across commodities and time by means of the normalized mutual information index (NMI). We also compare them with exogenous community structures induced by geographical distances and regional trade agreements. We find that commodity-specific community structures are very heterogeneous and much more fragmented than that characterizing the aggregate ITN. This shows that the aggregate properties of the ITN may result (and be very different) from the aggregation of very diverse commodity-specific layers of the multi network. We also show that commodity-specific community structures, especially those related to the chemical sector, are becoming more and more similar to the aggregate one. Finally, our findings suggest that geographical distance is much more correlated with the observed community structure than RTAs. This result strengthens previous findings from the empirical literature on trade.
1009.1759
On Compression of Data Encrypted with Block Ciphers
cs.IT cs.CR math.IT
This paper investigates compression of data encrypted with block ciphers, such as the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES). It is shown that such data can be feasibly compressed without knowledge of the secret key. Block ciphers operating in various chaining modes are considered and it is shown how compression can be achieved without compromising security of the encryption scheme. Further, it is shown that there exists a fundamental limitation to the practical compressibility of block ciphers when no chaining is used between blocks. Some performance results for practical code constructions used to compress binary sources are presented.
1009.1889
Spatially regularized compressed sensing of diffusion MRI data
cs.IT math.IT physics.med-ph
The present paper introduces a method for substantial reduction of the number of diffusion encoding gradients required for reliable reconstruction of HARDI signals. The method exploits the theory of compressed sensing (CS), which establishes conditions on which a signal of interest can be recovered from its under-sampled measurements, provided that the signal admits a sparse representation in the domain of a linear transform. In the case at hand, the latter is defined to be spherical ridgelet transformation, which excels in sparsifying HARDI signals. What makes the resulting reconstruction procedure even more accurate is a combination of the sparsity constraints in the diffusion domain with additional constraints imposed on the estimated diffusion field in the spatial domain. Accordingly, the present paper describes a novel way to combine the diffusion- and spatial-domain constraints to achieve a maximal reduction in the number of diffusion measurements, while sacrificing little in terms of reconstruction accuracy. Finally, details are provided on a particularly efficient numerical scheme which can be used to solve the aforementioned reconstruction problem by means of standard and readily available estimation tools. The paper is concluded with experimental results which support the practical value of the proposed reconstruction methodology.
1009.1983
Evolutionary Computational Method of Facial Expression Analysis for Content-based Video Retrieval using 2-Dimensional Cellular Automata
cs.CV
In this paper, Deterministic Cellular Automata (DCA) based video shot classification and retrieval is proposed. The deterministic 2D Cellular automata model captures the human facial expressions, both spontaneous and posed. The determinism stems from the fact that the facial muscle actions are standardized by the encodings of Facial Action Coding System (FACS) and Action Units (AUs). Based on these encodings, we generate the set of evolutionary update rules of the DCA for each facial expression. We consider a Person-Independent Facial Expression Space (PIFES) to analyze the facial expressions based on Partitioned 2D-Cellular Automata which capture the dynamics of facial expressions and classify the shots based on it. Target video shot is retrieved by comparing the similar expression is obtained for the query frame's face with respect to the key faces expressions in the database video. Consecutive key face expressions in the database that are highly similar to the query frame's face, then the key faces are used to generate the set of retrieved video shots from the database. A concrete example of its application which realizes an affective interaction between the computer and the user is proposed. In the affective interaction, the computer can recognize the facial expression of any given video shot. This interaction endows the computer with certain ability to adapt to the user's feedback.
1009.1990
Complexity of Non-Monotonic Logics
cs.CC cs.AI cs.LO
Over the past few decades, non-monotonic reasoning has developed to be one of the most important topics in computational logic and artificial intelligence. Different ways to introduce non-monotonic aspects to classical logic have been considered, e.g., extension with default rules, extension with modal belief operators, or modification of the semantics. In this survey we consider a logical formalism from each of the above possibilities, namely Reiter's default logic, Moore's autoepistemic logic and McCarthy's circumscription. Additionally, we consider abduction, where one is not interested in inferences from a given knowledge base but in computing possible explanations for an observation with respect to a given knowledge base. Complexity results for different reasoning tasks for propositional variants of these logics have been studied already in the nineties. In recent years, however, a renewed interest in complexity issues can be observed. One current focal approach is to consider parameterized problems and identify reasonable parameters that allow for FPT algorithms. In another approach, the emphasis lies on identifying fragments, i.e., restriction of the logical language, that allow more efficient algorithms for the most important reasoning tasks. In this survey we focus on this second aspect. We describe complexity results for fragments of logical languages obtained by either restricting the allowed set of operators (e.g., forbidding negations one might consider only monotone formulae) or by considering only formulae in conjunctive normal form but with generalized clause types. The algorithmic problems we consider are suitable variants of satisfiability and implication in each of the logics, but also counting problems, where one is not only interested in the existence of certain objects (e.g., models of a formula) but asks for their number.
1009.2003
AI 3D Cybug Gaming
cs.AI
In this short paper I briefly discuss 3D war Game based on artificial intelligence concepts called AI WAR. Going in to the details, I present the importance of CAICL language and how this language is used in AI WAR. Moreover I also present a designed and implemented 3D War Cybug for AI WAR using CAICL and discus the implemented strategy to defeat its enemies during the game life.
1009.2009
Hierarchical Semi-Markov Conditional Random Fields for Recursive Sequential Data
stat.ML cs.AI
Inspired by the hierarchical hidden Markov models (HHMM), we present the hierarchical semi-Markov conditional random field (HSCRF), a generalisation of embedded undirectedMarkov chains tomodel complex hierarchical, nestedMarkov processes. It is parameterised in a discriminative framework and has polynomial time algorithms for learning and inference. Importantly, we consider partiallysupervised learning and propose algorithms for generalised partially-supervised learning and constrained inference. We demonstrate the HSCRF in two applications: (i) recognising human activities of daily living (ADLs) from indoor surveillance cameras, and (ii) noun-phrase chunking. We show that the HSCRF is capable of learning rich hierarchical models with reasonable accuracy in both fully and partially observed data cases.
1009.2021
The Complexity of Causality and Responsibility for Query Answers and non-Answers
cs.DB cs.AI
An answer to a query has a well-defined lineage expression (alternatively called how-provenance) that explains how the answer was derived. Recent work has also shown how to compute the lineage of a non-answer to a query. However, the cause of an answer or non-answer is a more subtle notion and consists, in general, of only a fragment of the lineage. In this paper, we adapt Halpern, Pearl, and Chockler's recent definitions of causality and responsibility to define the causes of answers and non-answers to queries, and their degree of responsibility. Responsibility captures the notion of degree of causality and serves to rank potentially many causes by their relative contributions to the effect. Then, we study the complexity of computing causes and responsibilities for conjunctive queries. It is known that computing causes is NP-complete in general. Our first main result shows that all causes to conjunctive queries can be computed by a relational query which may involve negation. Thus, causality can be computed in PTIME, and very efficiently so. Next, we study computing responsibility. Here, we prove that the complexity depends on the conjunctive query and demonstrate a dichotomy between PTIME and NP-complete cases. For the PTIME cases, we give a non-trivial algorithm, consisting of a reduction to the max-flow computation problem. Finally, we prove that, even when it is in PTIME, responsibility is complete for LOGSPACE, implying that, unlike causality, it cannot be computed by a relational query.
1009.2032
Feedback stabilisation of switched systems via iterative approximate eigenvector assignment
cs.SY math.OC
This paper presents and implements an iterative feedback design algorithm for stabilisation of discrete-time switched systems under arbitrary switching regimes. The algorithm seeks state feedback gains so that the closed-loop switching system admits a common quadratic Lyapunov function (CQLF) and hence is uniformly globally exponentially stable. Although the feedback design problem considered can be solved directly via linear matrix inequalities (LMIs), direct application of LMIs for feedback design does not provide information on closed-loop system structure. In contrast, the feedback matrices computed by the proposed algorithm assign closed-loop structure approximating that required to satisfy Lie-algebraic conditions that guarantee existence of a CQLF. The main contribution of the paper is to provide, for single-input systems, a numerical implementation of the algorithm based on iterative approximate common eigenvector assignment, and to establish cases where such algorithm is guaranteed to succeed. We include pseudocode and a few numerical examples to illustrate advantages and limitations of the proposed technique.
1009.2041
Multi-Agent Only-Knowing Revisited
cs.AI
Levesque introduced the notion of only-knowing to precisely capture the beliefs of a knowledge base. He also showed how only-knowing can be used to formalize non-monotonic behavior within a monotonic logic. Despite its appeal, all attempts to extend only-knowing to the many agent case have undesirable properties. A belief model by Halpern and Lakemeyer, for instance, appeals to proof-theoretic constructs in the semantics and needs to axiomatize validity as part of the logic. It is also not clear how to generalize their ideas to a first-order case. In this paper, we propose a new account of multi-agent only-knowing which, for the first time, has a natural possible-world semantics for a quantified language with equality. We then provide, for the propositional fragment, a sound and complete axiomatization that faithfully lifts Levesque's proof theory to the many agent case. We also discuss comparisons to the earlier approach by Halpern and Lakemeyer.
1009.2054
Multiplex Structures: Patterns of Complexity in Real-World Networks
cs.SI cs.AI physics.soc-ph
Complex network theory aims to model and analyze complex systems that consist of multiple and interdependent components. Among all studies on complex networks, topological structure analysis is of the most fundamental importance, as it represents a natural route to understand the dynamics, as well as to synthesize or optimize the functions, of networks. A broad spectrum of network structural patterns have been respectively reported in the past decade, such as communities, multipartites, hubs, authorities, outliers, bow ties, and others. Here, we show that most individual real-world networks demonstrate multiplex structures. That is, a multitude of known or even unknown (hidden) patterns can simultaneously situate in the same network, and moreover they may be overlapped and nested with each other to collaboratively form a heterogeneous, nested or hierarchical organization, in which different connective phenomena can be observed at different granular levels. In addition, we show that the multiplex structures hidden in exploratory networks can be well defined as well as effectively recognized within an unified framework consisting of a set of proposed concepts, models, and algorithms. Our findings provide a strong evidence that most real-world complex systems are driven by a combination of heterogeneous mechanisms that may collaboratively shape their ubiquitous multiplex structures as we observe currently. This work also contributes a mathematical tool for analyzing different sources of networks from a new perspective of unveiling multiplex structures, which will be beneficial to multiple disciplines including sociology, economics and computer science.
1009.2077
A new sufficient condition for sum-rate tightness in quadratic Gaussian multiterminal source coding
cs.IT math.IT
This work considers the quadratic Gaussian multiterminal (MT) source coding problem and provides a new sufficient condition for the Berger-Tung sum-rate bound to be tight. The converse proof utilizes a set of virtual remote sources given which the MT sources are block independent with a maximum block size of two. The given MT source coding problem is then related to a set of two-terminal problems with matrix-distortion constraints, for which a new lower bound on the sum-rate is given. Finally, a convex optimization problem is formulated and a sufficient condition derived for the optimal BT scheme to satisfy the subgradient based Karush-Kuhn-Tucker condition. The set of sum-rate tightness problems defined by our new sufficient condition subsumes all previously known tight cases, and opens new direction for a more general partial solution.
1009.2084
Ontology Temporal Evolution for Multi-Entity Bayesian Networks under Exogenous and Endogenous Semantic Updating
cs.AI cs.LO
It is a challenge for any Knowledge Base reasoning to manage ubiquitous uncertain ontology as well as uncertain updating times, while achieving acceptable service levels at minimum computational cost. This paper proposes an application-independent merging ontologies for any open interaction system. A solution that uses Multi-Entity Bayesan Networks with SWRL rules, and a Java program is presented to dynamically monitor Exogenous and Endogenous temporal evolution on updating merging ontologies on a probabilistic framework for the Semantic Web.
1009.2118
Restricted strong convexity and weighted matrix completion: Optimal bounds with noise
cs.IT math.IT math.ST stat.TH
We consider the matrix completion problem under a form of row/column weighted entrywise sampling, including the case of uniform entrywise sampling as a special case. We analyze the associated random observation operator, and prove that with high probability, it satisfies a form of restricted strong convexity with respect to weighted Frobenius norm. Using this property, we obtain as corollaries a number of error bounds on matrix completion in the weighted Frobenius norm under noisy sampling and for both exact and near low-rank matrices. Our results are based on measures of the "spikiness" and "low-rankness" of matrices that are less restrictive than the incoherence conditions imposed in previous work. Our technique involves an $M$-estimator that includes controls on both the rank and spikiness of the solution, and we establish non-asymptotic error bounds in weighted Frobenius norm for recovering matrices lying with $\ell_q$-"balls" of bounded spikiness. Using information-theoretic methods, we show that no algorithm can achieve better estimates (up to a logarithmic factor) over these same sets, showing that our conditions on matrices and associated rates are essentially optimal.
1009.2221
Performance Bounds and Design Criteria for Estimating Finite Rate of Innovation Signals
cs.IT math.IT
In this paper, we consider the problem of estimating finite rate of innovation (FRI) signals from noisy measurements, and specifically analyze the interaction between FRI techniques and the underlying sampling methods. We first obtain a fundamental limit on the estimation accuracy attainable regardless of the sampling method. Next, we provide a bound on the performance achievable using any specific sampling approach. Essential differences between the noisy and noise-free cases arise from this analysis. In particular, we identify settings in which noise-free recovery techniques deteriorate substantially under slight noise levels, thus quantifying the numerical instability inherent in such methods. This instability, which is only present in some families of FRI signals, is shown to be related to a specific type of structure, which can be characterized by viewing the signal model as a union of subspaces. Finally, we develop a methodology for choosing the optimal sampling kernels based on a generalization of the Karhunen--Lo\`eve transform. The results are illustrated for several types of time-delay estimation problems.
1009.2270
Active Integrity Constraints and Revision Programming
cs.DB
We study active integrity constraints and revision programming, two formalisms designed to describe integrity constraints on databases and to specify policies on preferred ways to enforce them. Unlike other more commonly accepted approaches, these two formalisms attempt to provide a declarative solution to the problem. However, the original semantics of founded repairs for active integrity constraints and justified revisions for revision programs differ. Our main goal is to establish a comprehensive framework of semantics for active integrity constraints, to find a parallel framework for revision programs, and to relate the two. By doing so, we demonstrate that the two formalisms proposed independently of each other and based on different intuitions when viewed within a broader semantic framework turn out to be notational variants of each other. That lends support to the adequacy of the semantics we develop for each of the formalisms as the foundation for a declarative approach to the problem of database update and repair. In the paper we also study computational properties of the semantics we consider and establish results concerned with the concept of the minimality of change and the invariance under the shifting transformation.
1009.2274
Robust Beamforming for Security in MIMO Wiretap Channels with Imperfect CSI
cs.IT math.IT
In this paper, we investigate methods for reducing the likelihood that a message transmitted between two multiantenna nodes is intercepted by an undetected eavesdropper. In particular, we focus on the judicious transmission of artificial interference to mask the desired signal at the time it is broadcast. Unlike previous work that assumes some prior knowledge of the eavesdropper's channel and focuses on maximizing secrecy capacity, we consider the case where no information regarding the eavesdropper is available, and we use signal-to-interference-plus-noise-ratio (SINR) as our performance metric. Specifically, we focus on the problem of maximizing the amount of power available to broadcast a jamming signal intended to hide the desired signal from a potential eavesdropper, while maintaining a prespecified SINR at the desired receiver. The jamming signal is designed to be orthogonal to the information signal when it reaches the desired receiver, assuming both the receiver and the eavesdropper employ optimal beamformers and possess exact channel state information (CSI). In practice, the assumption of perfect CSI at the transmitter is often difficult to justify. Therefore, we also study the resulting performance degradation due to the presence of imperfect CSI, and we present robust beamforming schemes that recover a large fraction of the performance in the perfect CSI case. Numerical simulations verify our analytical performance predictions, and illustrate the benefit of the robust beamforming schemes.
1009.2275
PhishDef: URL Names Say It All
cs.CR cs.LG cs.NI
Phishing is an increasingly sophisticated method to steal personal user information using sites that pretend to be legitimate. In this paper, we take the following steps to identify phishing URLs. First, we carefully select lexical features of the URLs that are resistant to obfuscation techniques used by attackers. Second, we evaluate the classification accuracy when using only lexical features, both automatically and hand-selected, vs. when using additional features. We show that lexical features are sufficient for all practical purposes. Third, we thoroughly compare several classification algorithms, and we propose to use an online method (AROW) that is able to overcome noisy training data. Based on the insights gained from our analysis, we propose PhishDef, a phishing detection system that uses only URL names and combines the above three elements. PhishDef is a highly accurate method (when compared to state-of-the-art approaches over real datasets), lightweight (thus appropriate for online and client-side deployment), proactive (based on online classification rather than blacklists), and resilient to training data inaccuracies (thus enabling the use of large noisy training data).
1009.2305
Message Error Analysis of Loopy Belief Propagation for the Sum-Product Algorithm
cs.IT math.IT
Belief propagation is known to perform extremely well in many practical statistical inference and learning problems using graphical models, even in the presence of multiple loops. The iterative use of belief propagation algorithm on loopy graphs is referred to as Loopy Belief Propagation (LBP). Various sufficient conditions for convergence of LBP have been presented; however, general necessary conditions for its convergence to a unique fixed point remain unknown. Because the approximation of beliefs to true marginal probabilities has been shown to relate to the convergence of LBP, several methods have been explored whose aim is to obtain distance bounds on beliefs when LBP fails to converge. In this paper, we derive uniform and non-uniform error bounds on messages, which are tighter than existing ones in literature, and use these bounds to derive sufficient conditions for the convergence of LBP in terms of the sum-product algorithm. We subsequently use these bounds to study the dynamic behavior of the sum-product algorithm, and analyze the relation between convergence of LBP and sparsity and walk-summability of graphical models. We finally use the bounds derived to investigate the accuracy of LBP, as well as the scheduling priority in asynchronous LBP.
1009.2370
Optimized IR-HARQ Schemes Based on Punctured LDPC Codes over the BEC
cs.IT math.IT
We study incremental redundancy hybrid ARQ (IR-HARQ) schemes based on punctured, finite-length, LDPC codes. The transmission is assumed to take place over time varying binary erasure channels, such as mobile wireless channels at the applications layer. We analyze and optimize the throughput and delay performance of these IR-HARQ protocols under iterative, message-passing decoding. We derive bounds on the performance that are achievable by such schemes, and show that, with a simple extension, the iteratively decoded, punctured LDPC code based IR-HARQ protocol can be made rateless, and operating close to the general theoretical optimum for a wide range of channel erasure rates.
1009.2443
Delay-Optimal User Scheduling and Inter-Cell Interference Management in Cellular Network via Distributive Stochastic Learning
cs.IT math.IT
In this paper, we propose a distributive queueaware intra-cell user scheduling and inter-cell interference (ICI) management control design for a delay-optimal celluar downlink system with M base stations (BSs), and K users in each cell. Each BS has K downlink queues for K users respectively with heterogeneous arrivals and delay requirements. The ICI management control is adaptive to joint queue state information (QSI) over a slow time scale, while the user scheduling control is adaptive to both the joint QSI and the joint channel state information (CSI) over a faster time scale. We show that the problem can be modeled as an infinite horizon average cost Partially Observed Markov Decision Problem (POMDP), which is NP-hard in general. By exploiting the special structure of the problem, we shall derive an equivalent Bellman equation to solve the POMDP problem. To address the distributive requirement and the issue of dimensionality and computation complexity, we derive a distributive online stochastic learning algorithm, which only requires local QSI and local CSI at each of the M BSs. We show that the proposed learning algorithm converges almost surely (with probability 1) and has significant gain compared with various baselines. The proposed solution only has linear complexity order O(MK).
1009.2464
Various virtual structures on single file system
cs.IT math.IT
The article provides a new approach to creating hierarchical structure of file system. First, it gives overview of the existing ways of storing files in current operating systems. Second, it describes the new way of building structures of a file system. This approach allows creating various structures by different attributes on the same set of files using multiple tree-like structures.
1009.2528
Is Witsenhausen's counterexample a relevant toy?
cs.IT cs.SY math.IT
This paper answers a question raised by Doyle on the relevance of the Witsenhausen counterexample as a toy decentralized control problem. The question has two sides, the first of which focuses on the lack of an external channel in the counterexample. Using existing results, we argue that the core difficulty in the counterexample is retained even in the presence of such a channel. The second side questions the LQG formulation of the counterexample. We consider alternative formulations and show that the understanding developed for the LQG case guides the investigation for these other cases as well. Specifically, we consider 1) a variation on the original counterexample with general, but bounded, noise distributions, and 2) an adversarial extension with bounded disturbance and quadratic costs. For each of these formulations, we show that quantization-based nonlinear strategies outperform linear strategies by an arbitrarily large factor. Further, these nonlinear strategies also perform within a constant factor of the optimal, uniformly over all possible parameter choices (for fixed noise distributions in the Bayesian case). Fortuitously, the assumption of bounded noise results in a significant simplification of proofs as compared to those for the LQG formulation. Therefore, the results in this paper are also of pedagogical interest.
1009.2556
Securing Dynamic Distributed Storage Systems against Eavesdropping and Adversarial Attacks
cs.IT cs.CR math.IT
We address the problem of securing distributed storage systems against eavesdropping and adversarial attacks. An important aspect of these systems is node failures over time, necessitating, thus, a repair mechanism in order to maintain a desired high system reliability. In such dynamic settings, an important security problem is to safeguard the system from an intruder who may come at different time instances during the lifetime of the storage system to observe and possibly alter the data stored on some nodes. In this scenario, we give upper bounds on the maximum amount of information that can be stored safely on the system. For an important operating regime of the distributed storage system, which we call the 'bandwidth-limited regime', we show that our upper bounds are tight and provide explicit code constructions. Moreover, we provide a way to short list the malicious nodes and expurgate the system.
1009.2566
Reinforcement Learning by Comparing Immediate Reward
cs.LG
This paper introduces an approach to Reinforcement Learning Algorithm by comparing their immediate rewards using a variation of Q-Learning algorithm. Unlike the conventional Q-Learning, the proposed algorithm compares current reward with immediate reward of past move and work accordingly. Relative reward based Q-learning is an approach towards interactive learning. Q-Learning is a model free reinforcement learning method that used to learn the agents. It is observed that under normal circumstances algorithm take more episodes to reach optimal Q-value due to its normal reward or sometime negative reward. In this new form of algorithm agents select only those actions which have a higher immediate reward signal in comparison to previous one. The contribution of this article is the presentation of new Q-Learning Algorithm in order to maximize the performance of algorithm and reduce the number of episode required to reach optimal Q-value. Effectiveness of proposed algorithm is simulated in a 20 x20 Grid world deterministic environment and the result for the two forms of Q-Learning Algorithms is given.
1009.2602
Joint Channel Probing and Proportional Fair Scheduling in Wireless Networks
cs.IT math.IT
The design of a scheduling scheme is crucial for the efficiency and user-fairness of wireless networks. Assuming that the quality of all user channels is available to a central controller, a simple scheme which maximizes the utility function defined as the sum logarithm throughput of all users has been shown to guarantee proportional fairness. However, to acquire the channel quality information may consume substantial amount of resources. In this work, it is assumed that probing the quality of each user's channel takes a fraction of the coherence time, so that the amount of time for data transmission is reduced. The multiuser diversity gain does not always increase as the number of users increases. In case the statistics of the channel quality is available to the controller, the problem of sequential channel probing for user scheduling is formulated as an optimal stopping time problem. A joint channel probing and proportional fair scheduling scheme is developed. This scheme is extended to the case where the channel statistics are not available to the controller, in which case a joint learning, probing and scheduling scheme is designed by studying a generalized bandit problem. Numerical results demonstrate that the proposed scheduling schemes can provide significant gain over existing schemes.
1009.2631
Google matrix of business process management
cs.CY cs.IR physics.soc-ph q-fin.GN
Development of efficient business process models and determination of their characteristic properties are subject of intense interdisciplinary research. Here, we consider a business process model as a directed graph. Its nodes correspond to the units identified by the modeler and the link direction indicates the causal dependencies between units. It is of primary interest to obtain the stationary flow on such a directed graph, which corresponds to the steady-state of a firm during the business process. Following the ideas developed recently for the World Wide Web, we construct the Google matrix for our business process model and analyze its spectral properties. The importance of nodes is characterized by Page-Rank and recently proposed CheiRank and 2DRank, respectively. The results show that this two-dimensional ranking gives a significant information about the influence and communication properties of business model units. We argue that the Google matrix method, described here, provides a new efficient tool helping companies to make their decisions on how to evolve in the exceedingly dynamic global market.
1009.2651
Left-Inverses of Fractional Laplacian and Sparse Stochastic Processes
cs.IT math.IT math.ST stat.TH
The fractional Laplacian $(-\triangle)^{\gamma/2}$ commutes with the primary coordination transformations in the Euclidean space $\RR^d$: dilation, translation and rotation, and has tight link to splines, fractals and stable Levy processes. For $0<\gamma<d$, its inverse is the classical Riesz potential $I_\gamma$ which is dilation-invariant and translation-invariant. In this work, we investigate the functional properties (continuity, decay and invertibility) of an extended class of differential operators that share those invariance properties. In particular, we extend the definition of the classical Riesz potential $I_\gamma$ to any non-integer number $\gamma$ larger than $d$ and show that it is the unique left-inverse of the fractional Laplacian $(-\triangle)^{\gamma/2}$ which is dilation-invariant and translation-invariant. We observe that, for any $1\le p\le \infty$ and $\gamma\ge d(1-1/p)$, there exists a Schwartz function $f$ such that $I_\gamma f$ is not $p$-integrable. We then introduce the new unique left-inverse $I_{\gamma, p}$ of the fractional Laplacian $(-\triangle)^{\gamma/2}$ with the property that $I_{\gamma, p}$ is dilation-invariant (but not translation-invariant) and that $I_{\gamma, p}f$ is $p$-integrable for any Schwartz function $f$. We finally apply that linear operator $I_{\gamma, p}$ with $p=1$ to solve the stochastic partial differential equation $(-\triangle)^{\gamma/2} \Phi=w$ with white Poisson noise as its driving term $w$.
1009.2653
Opinion fluctuations and disagreement in social networks
cs.SI cs.SY math.OC math.PR
We study a tractable opinion dynamics model that generates long-run disagreements and persistent opinion fluctuations. Our model involves an inhomogeneous stochastic gossip process of continuous opinion dynamics in a society consisting of two types of agents: regular agents, who update their beliefs according to information that they receive from their social neighbors; and stubborn agents, who never update their opinions. When the society contains stubborn agents with different opinions, the belief dynamics never lead to a consensus (among the regular agents). Instead, beliefs in the society fail to converge almost surely, the belief profile keeps on fluctuating in an ergodic fashion, and it converges in law to a non-degenerate random vector. The structure of the network and the location of the stubborn agents within it shape the opinion dynamics. The expected belief vector evolves according to an ordinary differential equation coinciding with the Kolmogorov backward equation of a continuous-time Markov chain with absorbing states corresponding to the stubborn agents and converges to a harmonic vector, with every regular agent's value being the weighted average of its neighbors' values, and boundary conditions corresponding to the stubborn agents'. Expected cross-products of the agents' beliefs allow for a similar characterization in terms of coupled Markov chains on the network. We prove that, in large-scale societies which are highly fluid, meaning that the product of the mixing time of the Markov chain on the graph describing the social network and the relative size of the linkages to stubborn agents vanishes as the population size grows large, a condition of \emph{homogeneous influence} emerges, whereby the stationary beliefs' marginal distributions of most of the regular agents have approximately equal first and second moments.
1009.2706
Minimization Strategies for Maximally Parallel Multiset Rewriting Systems
cs.FL cs.CC cs.CL cs.DM
Maximally parallel multiset rewriting systems (MPMRS) give a convenient way to express relations between unstructured objects. The functioning of various computational devices may be expressed in terms of MPMRS (e.g., register machines and many variants of P systems). In particular, this means that MPMRS are computationally complete; however, a direct translation leads to quite a big number of rules. Like for other classes of computationally complete devices, there is a challenge to find a universal system having the smallest number of rules. In this article we present different rule minimization strategies for MPMRS based on encodings and structural transformations. We apply these strategies to the translation of a small universal register machine (Korec, 1996) and we show that there exists a universal MPMRS with 23 rules. Since MPMRS are identical to a restricted variant of P systems with antiport rules, the results we obtained improve previously known results on the number of rules for those systems.
1009.2722
Learning Latent Tree Graphical Models
stat.ML cs.IT math.IT
We study the problem of learning a latent tree graphical model where samples are available only from a subset of variables. We propose two consistent and computationally efficient algorithms for learning minimal latent trees, that is, trees without any redundant hidden nodes. Unlike many existing methods, the observed nodes (or variables) are not constrained to be leaf nodes. Our first algorithm, recursive grouping, builds the latent tree recursively by identifying sibling groups using so-called information distances. One of the main contributions of this work is our second algorithm, which we refer to as CLGrouping. CLGrouping starts with a pre-processing procedure in which a tree over the observed variables is constructed. This global step groups the observed nodes that are likely to be close to each other in the true latent tree, thereby guiding subsequent recursive grouping (or equivalent procedures) on much smaller subsets of variables. This results in more accurate and efficient learning of latent trees. We also present regularized versions of our algorithms that learn latent tree approximations of arbitrary distributions. We compare the proposed algorithms to other methods by performing extensive numerical experiments on various latent tree graphical models such as hidden Markov models and star graphs. In addition, we demonstrate the applicability of our methods on real-world datasets by modeling the dependency structure of monthly stock returns in the S&P index and of the words in the 20 newsgroups dataset.
1009.2764
A Blink Tree latch method and protocol to support synchronous node deletion
cs.DB
A Blink Tree latch method and protocol supports synchronous node deletion in a high concurrency environment. Full source code is available.
1009.2913
Information filtering in complex weighted networks
physics.soc-ph cond-mat.dis-nn cond-mat.stat-mech cs.IR
Many systems in nature, society and technology can be described as networks, where the vertices are the system's elements and edges between vertices indicate the interactions between the corresponding elements. Edges may be weighted if the interaction strength is measurable. However, the full network information is often redundant because tools and techniques from network analysis do not work or become very inefficient if the network is too dense and some weights may just reflect measurement errors, and shall be discarded. Moreover, since weight distributions in many complex weighted networks are broad, most of the weight is concentrated among a small fraction of all edges. It is then crucial to properly detect relevant edges. Simple thresholding would leave only the largest weights, disrupting the multiscale structure of the system, which is at the basis of the structure of complex networks, and ought to be kept. In this paper we propose a weight filtering technique based on a global null model (GloSS filter), keeping both the weight distribution and the full topological structure of the network. The method correctly quantifies the statistical significance of weights assigned independently to the edges from a given distribution. Applications to real networks reveal that the GloSS filter is indeed able to identify relevantconnections between vertices.
1009.2927
Underlay Cognitive Radio with Full or Partial Channel Quality Information
cs.IT math.IT
Underlay cognitive radios (UCRs) allow a secondary user to enter a primary user's spectrum through intelligent utilization of multiuser channel quality information (CQI) and sharing of codebook. The aim of this work is to study two-user Gaussian UCR systems by assuming the full or partial knowledge of multiuser CQI. Key contribution of this work is motivated by the fact that the full knowledge of multiuser CQI is not always available. We first establish a location-aided UCR model where the secondary user is assumed to have partial CQI about the secondary-transmitter to primary-receiver link as well as full CQI about the other links. Then, new UCR approaches are proposed and carefully analyzed in terms of the secondary user's achievable rate, denoted by $C_2$, the capacity penalty to primary user, denoted by $\Delta C_1$, and capacity outage probability. Numerical examples are provided to visually compare the performance of UCRs with full knowledge of multiuser CQI and the proposed approaches with partial knowledge of multiuser CQI.
1009.2955
Throughput Analysis of Buffer-Constrained Wireless Systems in the Finite Blocklength Regime
cs.IT math.IT
In this paper, wireless systems operating under queueing constraints in the form of limitations on the buffer violation probabilities are considered. The throughput under such constraints is captured by the effective capacity formulation. It is assumed that finite blocklength codes are employed for transmission. Under this assumption, a recent result on the channel coding rate in the finite blocklength regime is incorporated into the analysis and the throughput achieved with such codes in the presence of queueing constraints and decoding errors is identified. Performance of different transmission strategies (e.g., variable-rate, variable-power, and fixed-rate transmissions) is studied. Interactions between the throughput, queueing constraints, coding blocklength, decoding error probabilities, and signal-to-noise ratio are investigated and several conclusions with important practical implications are drawn.
1009.2997
Sensor Scheduling for Energy-Efficient Target Tracking in Sensor Networks
cs.MA
In this paper we study the problem of tracking an object moving randomly through a network of wireless sensors. Our objective is to devise strategies for scheduling the sensors to optimize the tradeoff between tracking performance and energy consumption. We cast the scheduling problem as a Partially Observable Markov Decision Process (POMDP), where the control actions correspond to the set of sensors to activate at each time step. Using a bottom-up approach, we consider different sensing, motion and cost models with increasing levels of difficulty. At the first level, the sensing regions of the different sensors do not overlap and the target is only observed within the sensing range of an active sensor. Then, we consider sensors with overlapping sensing range such that the tracking error, and hence the actions of the different sensors, are tightly coupled. Finally, we consider scenarios wherein the target locations and sensors' observations assume values on continuous spaces. Exact solutions are generally intractable even for the simplest models due to the dimensionality of the information and action spaces. Hence, we devise approximate solution techniques, and in some cases derive lower bounds on the optimal tradeoff curves. The generated scheduling policies, albeit suboptimal, often provide close-to-optimal energy-tracking tradeoffs.
1009.3029
Invariant Spectral Hashing of Image Saliency Graph
cs.CV
Image hashing is the process of associating a short vector of bits to an image. The resulting summaries are useful in many applications including image indexing, image authentication and pattern recognition. These hashes need to be invariant under transformations of the image that result in similar visual content, but should drastically differ for conceptually distinct contents. This paper proposes an image hashing method that is invariant under rotation, scaling and translation of the image. The gist of our approach relies on the geometric characterization of salient point distribution in the image. This is achieved by the definition of a "saliency graph" connecting these points jointly with an image intensity function on the graph nodes. An invariant hash is then obtained by considering the spectrum of this function in the eigenvector basis of the Laplacian graph, that is, its graph Fourier transform. Interestingly, this spectrum is invariant under any relabeling of the graph nodes. The graph reveals geometric information of the image, making the hash robust to image transformation, yet distinct for different visual content. The efficiency of the proposed method is assessed on a set of MRI 2-D slices and on a database of faces.
1009.3041
Secret Sharing LDPC Codes for the BPSK-constrained Gaussian Wiretap Channel
cs.IT cs.CR math.IT
The problem of secret sharing over the Gaussian wiretap channel is considered. A source and a destination intend to share secret information over a Gaussian channel in the presence of a wiretapper who observes the transmission through another Gaussian channel. Two constraints are imposed on the source-to-destination channel; namely, the source can transmit only binary phase shift keyed (BPSK) symbols, and symbol-by-symbol hard-decision quantization is applied to the received symbols of the destination. An error-free public channel is also available for the source and destination to exchange messages in order to help the secret sharing process. The wiretapper can perfectly observe all messages in the public channel. It is shown that a secret sharing scheme that employs a random ensemble of regular low density parity check (LDPC) codes can achieve the key capacity of the BPSK-constrained Gaussian wiretap channel asymptotically with increasing block length. To accommodate practical constraints of finite block length and limited decoding complexity, fixed irregular LDPC codes are also designed to replace the regular LDPC code ensemble in the proposed secret sharing scheme.
1009.3052
Secret-key Agreement with Channel State Information at the Transmitter
cs.IT math.IT
We study the capacity of secret-key agreement over a wiretap channel with state parameters. The transmitter communicates to the legitimate receiver and the eavesdropper over a discrete memoryless wiretap channel with a memoryless state sequence. The transmitter and the legitimate receiver generate a shared secret key, that remains secret from the eavesdropper. No public discussion channel is available. The state sequence is known noncausally to the transmitter. We derive lower and upper bounds on the secret-key capacity. The lower bound involves constructing a common state reconstruction sequence at the legitimate terminals and binning the set of reconstruction sequences to obtain the secret-key. For the special case of Gaussian channels with additive interference (secret-keys from dirty paper channel) our bounds differ by 0.5 bit/symbol and coincide in the high signal-to-noise-ratio and high interference-to-noise-ratio regimes. For the case when the legitimate receiver is also revealed the state sequence, we establish that our lower bound achieves the the secret-key capacity. In addition, for this special case, we also propose another scheme that attains the capacity and requires only causal side information at the transmitter and the receiver.
1009.3078
Asymmetric Totally-corrective Boosting for Real-time Object Detection
cs.CV
Real-time object detection is one of the core problems in computer vision. The cascade boosting framework proposed by Viola and Jones has become the standard for this problem. In this framework, the learning goal for each node is asymmetric, which is required to achieve a high detection rate and a moderate false positive rate. We develop new boosting algorithms to address this asymmetric learning problem. We show that our methods explicitly optimize asymmetric loss objectives in a totally corrective fashion. The methods are totally corrective in the sense that the coefficients of all selected weak classifiers are updated at each iteration. In contract, conventional boosting like AdaBoost is stage-wise in that only the current weak classifier's coefficient is updated. At the heart of the totally corrective boosting is the column generation technique. Experiments on face detection show that our methods outperform the state-of-the-art asymmetric boosting methods.
1009.3083
The Capacity of the Semi-Deterministic Cognitive Interference Channel and its Application to Constant Gap Results for the Gaussian Channel
cs.IT math.IT
The cognitive interference channel (C-IFC) consists of a classical two-user interference channel in which the message of one user (the "primary" user) is non-causally available at the transmitter of the other user (the "cognitive" user). We obtain the capacity of the semi-deterministic C-IFC: a discrete memoryless C-IFC in which the cognitive receiver output is a noise-less deterministic function of the channel inputs. We then use the insights obtained from the capacity-achieving scheme for the semi-deterministic model to derive new, unified and tighter constant gap results for the complex-valued Gaussian C-IFC. We prove: (1) a constant additive gap (difference between inner and outer bounds) of half a bit/sec/Hz per real dimension, of relevance at high SNRs, and (b) a constant multiplicative gap (ratio between outer and inner bounds) of a factor two, of relevance at low SNRs
1009.3090
Open-Loop Spatial Multiplexing and Diversity Communications in Ad Hoc Networks
cs.IT math.IT
This paper investigates the performance of open-loop multi-antenna point-to-point links in ad hoc networks with slotted ALOHA medium access control (MAC). We consider spatial multiplexing transmission with linear maximum ratio combining and zero forcing receivers, as well as orthogonal space time block coded transmission. New closed-form expressions are derived for the outage probability, throughput and transmission capacity. Our results demonstrate that both the best performing scheme and the optimum number of transmit antennas depend on different network parameters, such as the node intensity and the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio operating value. We then compare the performance to a network consisting of single-antenna devices and an idealized fully centrally coordinated MAC. These results show that multi-antenna schemes with a simple decentralized slotted ALOHA MAC can outperform even idealized single-antenna networks in various practical scenarios.
1009.3130
Strong Secrecy on the Binary Erasure Wiretap Channel Using Large-Girth LDPC Codes
cs.IT math.IT
For an arbitrary degree distribution pair (DDP), we construct a sequence of low-density parity-check (LDPC) code ensembles with girth growing logarithmically in block-length using Ramanujan graphs. When the DDP has minimum left degree at least three, we show using density evolution analysis that the expected bit-error probability of these ensembles, when passed through a binary erasure channel with erasure probability $\epsilon$, decays as $\mathcal{O}(\exp(-c_1 n^{c_2}))$ with the block-length $n$ for positive constants $c_1$ and $c_2$, as long as $\epsilon$ is lesser than the erasure threshold $\epsilon_\mathrm{th}$ of the DDP. This guarantees that the coset coding scheme using the dual sequence provides strong secrecy over the binary erasure wiretap channel for erasure probabilities greater than $1 - \epsilon_\mathrm{th}$.
1009.3145
Universal Rate-Efficient Scalar Quantization
cs.IT math.IT
Scalar quantization is the most practical and straightforward approach to signal quantization. However, it has been shown that scalar quantization of oversampled or Compressively Sensed signals can be inefficient in terms of the rate-distortion trade-off, especially as the oversampling rate or the sparsity of the signal increases. In this paper, we modify the scalar quantizer to have discontinuous quantization regions. We demonstrate that with this modification it is possible to achieve exponential decay of the quantization error as a function of the oversampling rate instead of the quadratic decay exhibited by current approaches. Our approach is universal in the sense that prior knowledge of the signal model is not necessary in the quantizer design, only in the reconstruction. Thus, we demonstrate that it is possible to reduce the quantization error by incorporating side information on the acquired signal, such as sparse signal models or signal similarity with known signals. In doing so, we establish a relationship between quantization performance and the Kolmogorov entropy of the signal model.
1009.3186
Group Testing with Probabilistic Tests: Theory, Design and Application
cs.IT math.IT
Identification of defective members of large populations has been widely studied in the statistics community under the name of group testing. It involves grouping subsets of items into different pools and detecting defective members based on the set of test results obtained for each pool. In a classical noiseless group testing setup, it is assumed that the sampling procedure is fully known to the reconstruction algorithm, in the sense that the existence of a defective member in a pool results in the test outcome of that pool to be positive. However, this may not be always a valid assumption in some cases of interest. In particular, we consider the case where the defective items in a pool can become independently inactive with a certain probability. Hence, one may obtain a negative test result in a pool despite containing some defective items. As a result, any sampling and reconstruction method should be able to cope with two different types of uncertainty, i.e., the unknown set of defective items and the partially unknown, probabilistic testing procedure. In this work, motivated by the application of detecting infected people in viral epidemics, we design non-adaptive sampling procedures that allow successful identification of the defective items through a set of probabilistic tests. Our design requires only a small number of tests to single out the defective items. In particular, for a population of size $N$ and at most $K$ defective items with activation probability $p$, our results show that $M = O(K^2\log{(N/K)}/p^3)$ tests is sufficient if the sampling procedure should work for all possible sets of defective items, while $M = O(K\log{(N)}/p^3)$ tests is enough to be successful for any single set of defective items. Moreover, we show that the defective members can be recovered using a simple reconstruction algorithm with complexity of $O(MN)$.
1009.3238
Tableaux for the Lambek-Grishin calculus
cs.CL
Categorial type logics, pioneered by Lambek, seek a proof-theoretic understanding of natural language syntax by identifying categories with formulas and derivations with proofs. We typically observe an intuitionistic bias: a structural configuration of hypotheses (a constituent) derives a single conclusion (the category assigned to it). Acting upon suggestions of Grishin to dualize the logical vocabulary, Moortgat proposed the Lambek-Grishin calculus (LG) with the aim of restoring symmetry between hypotheses and conclusions. We develop a theory of labeled modal tableaux for LG, inspired by the interpretation of its connectives as binary modal operators in the relational semantics of Kurtonina and Moortgat. As a linguistic application of our method, we show that grammars based on LG are context-free through use of an interpolation lemma. This result complements that of Melissen, who proved that LG augmented by mixed associativity and -commutativity was exceeds LTAG in expressive power.
1009.3240
A Unified View of Regularized Dual Averaging and Mirror Descent with Implicit Updates
cs.LG
We study three families of online convex optimization algorithms: follow-the-proximally-regularized-leader (FTRL-Proximal), regularized dual averaging (RDA), and composite-objective mirror descent. We first prove equivalence theorems that show all of these algorithms are instantiations of a general FTRL update. This provides theoretical insight on previous experimental observations. In particular, even though the FOBOS composite mirror descent algorithm handles L1 regularization explicitly, it has been observed that RDA is even more effective at producing sparsity. Our results demonstrate that FOBOS uses subgradient approximations to the L1 penalty from previous rounds, leading to less sparsity than RDA, which handles the cumulative penalty in closed form. The FTRL-Proximal algorithm can be seen as a hybrid of these two, and outperforms both on a large, real-world dataset. Our second contribution is a unified analysis which produces regret bounds that match (up to logarithmic terms) or improve the best previously known bounds. This analysis also extends these algorithms in two important ways: we support a more general type of composite objective and we analyze implicit updates, which replace the subgradient approximation of the current loss function with an exact optimization.
1009.3243
The "Unfriending" Problem: The Consequences of Homophily in Friendship Retention for Causal Estimates of Social Influence
stat.AP cs.SI physics.data-an physics.soc-ph
An increasing number of scholars are using longitudinal social network data to try to obtain estimates of peer or social influence effects. These data may provide additional statistical leverage, but they can introduce new inferential problems. In particular, while the confounding effects of homophily in friendship formation are widely appreciated, homophily in friendship retention may also confound causal estimates of social influence in longitudinal network data. We provide evidence for this claim in a Monte Carlo analysis of the statistical model used by Christakis, Fowler, and their colleagues in numerous articles estimating "contagion" effects in social networks. Our results indicate that homophily in friendship retention induces significant upward bias and decreased coverage levels in the Christakis and Fowler model if there is non-negligible friendship attrition over time.
1009.3253
Transmission Strategies in Multiple Access Fading Channels with Statistical QoS Constraints
cs.IT math.IT
Effective capacity, which provides the maximum constant arrival rate that a given service process can support while satisfying statistical delay constraints, is analyzed in a multiuser scenario. In particular, the effective capacity region of fading multiple access channels (MAC) in the presence of quality of service (QoS) constraints is studied. Perfect channel side information (CSI) is assumed to be available at both the transmitters and the receiver. It is initially assumed the transmitters send the information at a fixed power level and hence do not employ power control policies. Under this assumption, the performance achieved by superposition coding with successive decoding techniques is investigated. It is shown that varying the decoding order with respect to the channel states can significantly increase the achievable throughput region. In the two-user case, the optimal decoding strategy is determined for the scenario in which the users have the same QoS constraints. The performance of orthogonal transmission strategies is also analyzed. It is shown that for certain QoS constraints, time-division multiple-access (TDMA) can achieve better performance than superposition coding if fixed successive decoding order is used at the receiver side. In the subsequent analysis, power control policies are incorporated into the transmission strategies. The optimal power allocation policies for any fixed decoding order over all channel states are identified. For a given variable decoding order strategy, the conditions that the optimal power control policies must satisfy are determined, and an algorithm that can be used to compute these optimal policies is provided.
1009.3291
Rebuilding for Array Codes in Distributed Storage Systems
cs.IT cs.DC cs.NI math.IT
In distributed storage systems that use coding, the issue of minimizing the communication required to rebuild a storage node after a failure arises. We consider the problem of repairing an erased node in a distributed storage system that uses an EVENODD code. EVENODD codes are maximum distance separable (MDS) array codes that are used to protect against erasures, and only require XOR operations for encoding and decoding. We show that when there are two redundancy nodes, to rebuild one erased systematic node, only 3/4 of the information needs to be transmitted. Interestingly, in many cases, the required disk I/O is also minimized.
1009.3321
Niche as a determinant of word fate in online groups
cs.CL cond-mat.dis-nn nlin.AO physics.soc-ph q-bio.PE
Patterns of word use both reflect and influence a myriad of human activities and interactions. Like other entities that are reproduced and evolve, words rise or decline depending upon a complex interplay between {their intrinsic properties and the environments in which they function}. Using Internet discussion communities as model systems, we define the concept of a word niche as the relationship between the word and the characteristic features of the environments in which it is used. We develop a method to quantify two important aspects of the size of the word niche: the range of individuals using the word and the range of topics it is used to discuss. Controlling for word frequency, we show that these aspects of the word niche are strong determinants of changes in word frequency. Previous studies have already indicated that word frequency itself is a correlate of word success at historical time scales. Our analysis of changes in word frequencies over time reveals that the relative sizes of word niches are far more important than word frequencies in the dynamics of the entire vocabulary at shorter time scales, as the language adapts to new concepts and social groupings. We also distinguish endogenous versus exogenous factors as additional contributors to the fates of words, and demonstrate the force of this distinction in the rise of novel words. Our results indicate that short-term nonstationarity in word statistics is strongly driven by individual proclivities, including inclinations to provide novel information and to project a distinctive social identity.
1009.3345
Cooperative Feedback for MIMO Interference Channels
cs.IT math.IT
Multi-antenna precoding effectively mitigates the interference in wireless networks. However, the precoding efficiency can be significantly degraded by the overhead due to the required feedback of channel state information (CSI). This paper addresses such an issue by proposing a systematic method of designing precoders for the two-user multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) interference channels based on finite-rate CSI feedback from receivers to their interferers, called cooperative feedback. Specifically, each precoder is decomposed into inner and outer precoders for nulling interference and improving the data link array gain, respectively. The inner precoders are further designed to suppress residual interference resulting from finite-rate cooperative feedback. To regulate residual interference due to precoder quantization, additional scalar cooperative feedback signals are designed to control transmitters' power using different criteria including applying interference margins, maximizing sum throughput, and minimizing outage probability. Simulation shows that such additional feedback effectively alleviates performance degradation due to quantized precoder feedback.
1009.3346
Conditional Random Fields and Support Vector Machines: A Hybrid Approach
cs.LG
We propose a novel hybrid loss for multiclass and structured prediction problems that is a convex combination of log loss for Conditional Random Fields (CRFs) and a multiclass hinge loss for Support Vector Machines (SVMs). We provide a sufficient condition for when the hybrid loss is Fisher consistent for classification. This condition depends on a measure of dominance between labels - specifically, the gap in per observation probabilities between the most likely labels. We also prove Fisher consistency is necessary for parametric consistency when learning models such as CRFs. We demonstrate empirically that the hybrid loss typically performs as least as well as - and often better than - both of its constituent losses on variety of tasks. In doing so we also provide an empirical comparison of the efficacy of probabilistic and margin based approaches to multiclass and structured prediction and the effects of label dominance on these results.
1009.3353
A Lower Bound on the Estimator Variance for the Sparse Linear Model
math.ST cs.IT math.IT stat.TH
We study the performance of estimators of a sparse nonrandom vector based on an observation which is linearly transformed and corrupted by additive white Gaussian noise. Using the reproducing kernel Hilbert space framework, we derive a new lower bound on the estimator variance for a given differentiable bias function (including the unbiased case) and an almost arbitrary transformation matrix (including the underdetermined case considered in compressed sensing theory). For the special case of a sparse vector corrupted by white Gaussian noise-i.e., without a linear transformation-and unbiased estimation, our lower bound improves on previously proposed bounds.
1009.3354
Direct vs. Two-Step Approach for Unique Word Generation in UW-OFDM
cs.IT math.IT
Unique word OFDM is a novel technique for constructing OFDM symbols, that has many advantages over cyclic prefix OFDM. In this paper we investigate two different approaches for the generation of an OFDM symbol containing a unique word in its time domain representation. The two-step and the direct approach seem very similar at first sight, but actually produce completely different OFDM symbols. Also the overall system's bit error ratio differs significantly for the two approaches. We will prove these propositions analytically, and we will give simulation results for further illustration.
1009.3387
Distributed STBCs with Full-diversity Partial Interference Cancellation Decoding
cs.IT math.IT
Recently, Guo and Xia introduced low complexity decoders called Partial Interference Cancellation (PIC) and PIC with Successive Interference Cancellation (PIC-SIC), which include the Zero Forcing (ZF) and ZF-SIC receivers as special cases, for point-to-point MIMO channels. In this paper, we show that PIC and PIC-SIC decoders are capable of achieving the full cooperative diversity available in wireless relay networks. We give sufficient conditions for a Distributed Space-Time Block Code (DSTBC) to achieve full diversity with PIC and PIC-SIC decoders and construct a new class of DSTBCs with low complexity full-diversity PIC-SIC decoding using complex orthogonal designs. The new class of codes includes a number of known full-diversity PIC/PIC-SIC decodable Space-Time Block Codes (STBCs) constructed for point-to-point channels as special cases. The proposed DSTBCs achieve higher rates (in complex symbols per channel use) than the multigroup ML decodable DSTBCs available in the literature. Simulation results show that the proposed codes have better bit error rate performance than the best known low complexity, full-diversity DSTBCs.
1009.3396
Collaborative Decoding of Interleaved Reed-Solomon Codes using Gaussian Elimination
cs.IT math.IT
We propose an alternative method for collaborative decoding of interleaved Reed-Solomon codes. Simulation results for a concatenated coding scheme using polar codes as inner codes are included.
1009.3455
A control-theoretical methodology for the scheduling problem
cs.SY
This paper presents a novel methodology to develop scheduling algorithms. The scheduling problem is phrased as a control problem, and control-theoretical techniques are used to design a scheduling algorithm that meets specific requirements. Unlike most approaches to feedback scheduling, where a controller integrates a "basic" scheduling algorithm and dynamically tunes its parameters and hence its performances, our methodology essentially reduces the design of a scheduling algorithm to the synthesis of a controller that closes the feedback loop. This approach allows the re-use of control-theoretical techniques to design efficient scheduling algorithms; it frames and solves the scheduling problem in a general setting; and it can naturally tackle certain peculiar requirements such as robustness and dynamic performance tuning. A few experiments demonstrate the feasibility of the approach on a real-time benchmark.
1009.3481
Linear Transceiver Design for Interference Alignment: Complexity and Computation
cs.IT math.IT
Consider a MIMO interference channel whereby each transmitter and receiver are equipped with multiple antennas. The basic problem is to design optimal linear transceivers (or beamformers) that can maximize system throughput. The recent work [1] suggests that optimal beamformers should maximize the total degrees of freedom and achieve interference alignment in high SNR. In this paper we first consider the interference alignment problem in spatial domain and prove that the problem of maximizing the total degrees of freedom for a given MIMO interference channel is NP-hard. Furthermore, we show that even checking the achievability of a given tuple of degrees of freedom for all receivers is NP-hard when each receiver is equipped with at least three antennas. Interestingly, the same problem becomes polynomial time solvable when each transmit/receive node is equipped with no more than two antennas. Finally, we propose a distributed algorithm for transmit covariance matrix design, while assuming each receiver uses a linear MMSE beamformer. The simulation results show that the proposed algorithm outperforms the existing interference alignment algorithms in terms of system throughput.
1009.3499
Multiplicative Attribute Graph Model of Real-World Networks
cs.SI physics.soc-ph
Large scale real-world network data such as social and information networks are ubiquitous. The study of such social and information networks seeks to find patterns and explain their emergence through tractable models. In most networks, and especially in social networks, nodes have a rich set of attributes (e.g., age, gender) associated with them. Here we present a model that we refer to as the Multiplicative Attribute Graphs (MAG), which naturally captures the interactions between the network structure and the node attributes. We consider a model where each node has a vector of categorical latent attributes associated with it. The probability of an edge between a pair of nodes then depends on the product of individual attribute-attribute affinities. The model yields itself to mathematical analysis and we derive thresholds for the connectivity and the emergence of the giant connected component, and show that the model gives rise to networks with a constant diameter. We analyze the degree distribution to show that MAG model can produce networks with either log-normal or power-law degree distributions depending on certain conditions.
1009.3514
Reduced Complexity Decoding for Bit-Interleaved Coded Multiple Beamforming with Constellation Precoding
cs.IT math.IT
Multiple beamforming is realized by singular value decomposition of the channel matrix which is assumed to be known to both the transmitter and the receiver. Bit-Interleaved Coded Multiple Beamforming (BICMB) can achieve full diversity as long as the code rate Rc and the number of employed subchannels S satisfy the condition RcS<=1. Bit-Interleaved Coded Multiple Beamforming with Constellation Precoding (BICMB-CP), on the other hand, can achieve full diversity without the condition RcS<=1. However, the decoding complexity of BICMB-CP is much higher than BICMB. In this paper, a reduced complexity decoding technique, which is based on Sphere Decoding (SD), is proposed to reduce the complexity of Maximum Likelihood (ML) decoding for BICMB-CP. The decreased complexity decoding achieves several orders of magnitude reduction, in terms of the average number of real multiplications needed to acquire one precoded bit metric, not only with respect to conventional ML decoding, but also, with respect to conventional SD.
1009.3515
Safe Feature Elimination in Sparse Supervised Learning
cs.LG math.OC
We investigate fast methods that allow to quickly eliminate variables (features) in supervised learning problems involving a convex loss function and a $l_1$-norm penalty, leading to a potentially substantial reduction in the number of variables prior to running the supervised learning algorithm. The methods are not heuristic: they only eliminate features that are {\em guaranteed} to be absent after solving the learning problem. Our framework applies to a large class of problems, including support vector machine classification, logistic regression and least-squares. The complexity of the feature elimination step is negligible compared to the typical computational effort involved in the sparse supervised learning problem: it grows linearly with the number of features times the number of examples, with much better count if data is sparse. We apply our method to data sets arising in text classification and observe a dramatic reduction of the dimensionality, hence in computational effort required to solve the learning problem, especially when very sparse classifiers are sought. Our method allows to immediately extend the scope of existing algorithms, allowing us to run them on data sets of sizes that were out of their reach before.
1009.3520
Bit-Interleaved Coded Multiple Beamforming with Perfect Coding
cs.IT math.IT
When the Channel State Information (CSI) is known by both the transmitter and the receiver, beamforming techniques employing Singular Value Decomposition (SVD) are commonly used in Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) systems. Without channel coding, there is a trade-off between full diversity and full multiplexing. When channel coding is added, both of them can be achieved as long as the code rate Rc and the number of employed subchannels S satisfy the condition RcS<=1. By adding a properly designed constellation precoder, both full diversity and full multiplexing can be achieved for both uncoded and coded systems with the trade-off of a higher decoding complexity, e.g., Fully Precoded Multiple Beamforming (FPMB) and Bit-Interleaved Coded Multiple Beamforming with Full Precoding (BICMB-FP) without the condition RcS<=1. Recently discovered Perfect Space-Time Block Code (PSTBC) is a full-rate full-diversity space-time code, which achieves efficient shaping and high coding gain for MIMO systems. In this paper, a new technique, Bit-Interleaved Coded Multiple Beamforming with Perfect Coding (BICMB-PC), is introduced. BICMB-PC transmits PSTBCs through convolutional coded SVD systems. Similar to BICMB-FP, BICMB-PC achieves both full diversity and full multiplexing, and its performance is almost the same as BICMB-FP. The advantage of BICMB-PC is that it can provide a much lower decoding complexity than BICMB-FP, since the real and imaginary parts of the received signal can be separated for BICMB-PC of dimensions 2 and 4, and only the part corresponding to the coded bit is required to acquire one bit metric for the Viterbi decoder.
1009.3525
Analyzing Weighted $\ell_1$ Minimization for Sparse Recovery with Nonuniform Sparse Models\footnote{The results of this paper were presented in part at the International Symposium on Information Theory, ISIT 2009}
cs.IT math.IT
In this paper we introduce a nonuniform sparsity model and analyze the performance of an optimized weighted $\ell_1$ minimization over that sparsity model. In particular, we focus on a model where the entries of the unknown vector fall into two sets, with entries of each set having a specific probability of being nonzero. We propose a weighted $\ell_1$ minimization recovery algorithm and analyze its performance using a Grassmann angle approach. We compute explicitly the relationship between the system parameters-the weights, the number of measurements, the size of the two sets, the probabilities of being nonzero- so that when i.i.d. random Gaussian measurement matrices are used, the weighted $\ell_1$ minimization recovers a randomly selected signal drawn from the considered sparsity model with overwhelming probability as the problem dimension increases. This allows us to compute the optimal weights. We demonstrate through rigorous analysis and simulations that for the case when the support of the signal can be divided into two different subclasses with unequal sparsity fractions, the optimal weighted $\ell_1$ minimization outperforms the regular $\ell_1$ minimization substantially. We also generalize the results to an arbitrary number of classes.
1009.3567
Mobile Testbeds with an Attitude
cs.NI cs.RO cs.SI
There have been significant recent advances in mobile networks, specifically in multi-hop wireless networks including DTNs and sensor networks. It is critical to have a testing environment to realistically evaluate such networks and their protocols and services. Towards this goal, we propose a novel, mobile testbed of two main components. The first consists of a network of robots with personality- mimicking, human-encounter behaviors, which will be the focus of this demo. The personality is build upon behavioral profiling of mobile users based on extensive wireless-network measurements and analysis. The second component combines the testbed with the human society using a new concept that we refer to as participatory testing utilizing crowd sourcing.
1009.3589
Deep Self-Taught Learning for Handwritten Character Recognition
cs.LG cs.CV cs.NE
Recent theoretical and empirical work in statistical machine learning has demonstrated the importance of learning algorithms for deep architectures, i.e., function classes obtained by composing multiple non-linear transformations. Self-taught learning (exploiting unlabeled examples or examples from other distributions) has already been applied to deep learners, but mostly to show the advantage of unlabeled examples. Here we explore the advantage brought by {\em out-of-distribution examples}. For this purpose we developed a powerful generator of stochastic variations and noise processes for character images, including not only affine transformations but also slant, local elastic deformations, changes in thickness, background images, grey level changes, contrast, occlusion, and various types of noise. The out-of-distribution examples are obtained from these highly distorted images or by including examples of object classes different from those in the target test set. We show that {\em deep learners benefit more from out-of-distribution examples than a corresponding shallow learner}, at least in the area of handwritten character recognition. In fact, we show that they beat previously published results and reach human-level performance on both handwritten digit classification and 62-class handwritten character recognition.
1009.3593
Retrospective Interference Alignment
cs.IT math.IT
We explore similarities and differences in recent works on blind interference alignment under different models such as staggered block fading model and the delayed CSIT model. In particular we explore the possibility of achieving interference alignment with delayed CSIT when the transmitters are distributed. Our main contribution is an interference alignment scheme, called retrospective interference alignment in this work, that is specialized to settings with distributed transmitters. With this scheme we show that the 2 user X channel with only delayed channel state information at the transmitters can achieve 8/7 DoF, while the interference channel with 3 users is able to achieve 9/8 DoF. We also consider another setting where delayed channel output feedback is available to transmitters. In this setting the X channel and the 3 user interference channel are shown to achieve 4/3 and 6/5 DoF, respectively.
1009.3602
Construction of Frequency Hopping Sequence Set Based upon Generalized Cyclotomy
cs.IT math.IT
Frequency hopping (FH) sequences play a key role in frequency hopping spread spectrum communication systems. It is important to find FH sequences which have simultaneously good Hamming correlation, large family size and large period. In this paper, a new set of FH sequences with large period is proposed, and the Hamming correlation distribution of the new set is investigated. The construction of new FH sequences is based upon Whiteman's generalized cyclotomy. It is shown that the proposed FH sequence set is optimal with respect to the average Hamming correlation bound.
1009.3604
Geometric Decision Tree
cs.LG
In this paper we present a new algorithm for learning oblique decision trees. Most of the current decision tree algorithms rely on impurity measures to assess the goodness of hyperplanes at each node while learning a decision tree in a top-down fashion. These impurity measures do not properly capture the geometric structures in the data. Motivated by this, our algorithm uses a strategy to assess the hyperplanes in such a way that the geometric structure in the data is taken into account. At each node of the decision tree, we find the clustering hyperplanes for both the classes and use their angle bisectors as the split rule at that node. We show through empirical studies that this idea leads to small decision trees and better performance. We also present some analysis to show that the angle bisectors of clustering hyperplanes that we use as the split rules at each node, are solutions of an interesting optimization problem and hence argue that this is a principled method of learning a decision tree.
1009.3613
On the Doubt about Margin Explanation of Boosting
cs.LG
Margin theory provides one of the most popular explanations to the success of \texttt{AdaBoost}, where the central point lies in the recognition that \textit{margin} is the key for characterizing the performance of \texttt{AdaBoost}. This theory has been very influential, e.g., it has been used to argue that \texttt{AdaBoost} usually does not overfit since it tends to enlarge the margin even after the training error reaches zero. Previously the \textit{minimum margin bound} was established for \texttt{AdaBoost}, however, \cite{Breiman1999} pointed out that maximizing the minimum margin does not necessarily lead to a better generalization. Later, \cite{Reyzin:Schapire2006} emphasized that the margin distribution rather than minimum margin is crucial to the performance of \texttt{AdaBoost}. In this paper, we first present the \textit{$k$th margin bound} and further study on its relationship to previous work such as the minimum margin bound and Emargin bound. Then, we improve the previous empirical Bernstein bounds \citep{Maurer:Pontil2009,Audibert:Munos:Szepesvari2009}, and based on such findings, we defend the margin-based explanation against Breiman's doubts by proving a new generalization error bound that considers exactly the same factors as \cite{Schapire:Freund:Bartlett:Lee1998} but is sharper than \cite{Breiman1999}'s minimum margin bound. By incorporating factors such as average margin and variance, we present a generalization error bound that is heavily related to the whole margin distribution. We also provide margin distribution bounds for generalization error of voting classifiers in finite VC-dimension space.
1009.3642
MIMO Identical Eigenmode Transmission System (IETS) - A Channel Decomposition Perspective
cs.IT cs.NI math.IT
In the past few years considerable attention has been given to the design of Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) Eigenmode Transmission Systems (EMTS). This paper presents an in-depth analysis of a new MIMO eigenmode transmission strategy. The non-linear decomposition technique called Geometric Mean Decomposition (GMD) is employed for the formation of eigenmodes over MIMO flatfading channel. Exploiting GMD technique, identical, parallel and independent transmission pipes are created for data transmission at higher rate. The system based on such decomposition technique is referred to as MIMO Identical Eigenmode Transmission System (IETS). The comparative analysis of the MIMO transceiver design exploiting nonlinear and linear decomposition techniques for variable constellation is presented in this paper. The new transmission strategy is tested in combination with the Vertical Bell Labs Layered Space Time (V-BLAST) decoding scheme using different number of antennas on both sides of the communication link. The analysis is supported by various simulation results.
1009.3657
On Bounded Weight Codes
cs.IT math.IT
The maximum size of a binary code is studied as a function of its length N, minimum distance D, and minimum codeword weight W. This function B(N,D,W) is first characterized in terms of its exponential growth rate in the limit as N tends to infinity for fixed d=D/N and w=W/N. The exponential growth rate of B(N,D,W) is shown to be equal to the exponential growth rate of A(N,D) for w <= 1/2, and equal to the exponential growth rate of A(N,D,W) for 1/2< w <= 1. Second, analytic and numerical upper bounds on B(N,D,W) are derived using the semidefinite programming (SDP) method. These bounds yield a non-asymptotic improvement of the second Johnson bound and are tight for certain values of the parameters.
1009.3663
Optimally Sparse Frames
math.NA cs.IT math.FA math.IT
Frames have established themselves as a means to derive redundant, yet stable decompositions of a signal for analysis or transmission, while also promoting sparse expansions. However, when the signal dimension is large, the computation of the frame measurements of a signal typically requires a large number of additions and multiplications, and this makes a frame decomposition intractable in applications with limited computing budget. To address this problem, in this paper, we focus on frames in finite-dimensional Hilbert spaces and introduce sparsity for such frames as a new paradigm. In our terminology, a sparse frame is a frame whose elements have a sparse representation in an orthonormal basis, thereby enabling low-complexity frame decompositions. To introduce a precise meaning of optimality, we take the sum of the numbers of vectors needed of this orthonormal basis when expanding each frame vector as sparsity measure. We then analyze the recently introduced algorithm Spectral Tetris for construction of unit norm tight frames and prove that the tight frames generated by this algorithm are in fact optimally sparse with respect to the standard unit vector basis. Finally, we show that even the generalization of Spectral Tetris for the construction of unit norm frames associated with a given frame operator produces optimally sparse frames.
1009.3665
A Dynamic Data Middleware Cache for Rapidly-growing Scientific Repositories
cs.DC cs.DB
Modern scientific repositories are growing rapidly in size. Scientists are increasingly interested in viewing the latest data as part of query results. Current scientific middleware cache systems, however, assume repositories are static. Thus, they cannot answer scientific queries with the latest data. The queries, instead, are routed to the repository until data at the cache is refreshed. In data-intensive scientific disciplines, such as astronomy, indiscriminate query routing or data refreshing often results in runaway network costs. This severely affects the performance and scalability of the repositories and makes poor use of the cache system. We present Delta, a dynamic data middleware cache system for rapidly-growing scientific repositories. Delta's key component is a decision framework that adaptively decouples data objects---choosing to keep some data object at the cache, when they are heavily queried, and keeping some data objects at the repository, when they are heavily updated. Our algorithm profiles incoming workload to search for optimal data decoupling that reduces network costs. It leverages formal concepts from the network flow problem, and is robust to evolving scientific workloads. We evaluate the efficacy of Delta, through a prototype implementation, by running query traces collected from a real astronomy survey.
1009.3702
Totally Corrective Multiclass Boosting with Binary Weak Learners
cs.LG
In this work, we propose a new optimization framework for multiclass boosting learning. In the literature, AdaBoost.MO and AdaBoost.ECC are the two successful multiclass boosting algorithms, which can use binary weak learners. We explicitly derive these two algorithms' Lagrange dual problems based on their regularized loss functions. We show that the Lagrange dual formulations enable us to design totally-corrective multiclass algorithms by using the primal-dual optimization technique. Experiments on benchmark data sets suggest that our multiclass boosting can achieve a comparable generalization capability with state-of-the-art, but the convergence speed is much faster than stage-wise gradient descent boosting. In other words, the new totally corrective algorithms can maximize the margin more aggressively.
1009.3711
Structural Learning of Attack Vectors for Generating Mutated XSS Attacks
cs.SE cs.CR cs.LG
Web applications suffer from cross-site scripting (XSS) attacks that resulting from incomplete or incorrect input sanitization. Learning the structure of attack vectors could enrich the variety of manifestations in generated XSS attacks. In this study, we focus on generating more threatening XSS attacks for the state-of-the-art detection approaches that can find potential XSS vulnerabilities in Web applications, and propose a mechanism for structural learning of attack vectors with the aim of generating mutated XSS attacks in a fully automatic way. Mutated XSS attack generation depends on the analysis of attack vectors and the structural learning mechanism. For the kernel of the learning mechanism, we use a Hidden Markov model (HMM) as the structure of the attack vector model to capture the implicit manner of the attack vector, and this manner is benefited from the syntax meanings that are labeled by the proposed tokenizing mechanism. Bayes theorem is used to determine the number of hidden states in the model for generalizing the structure model. The paper has the contributions as following: (1) automatically learn the structure of attack vectors from practical data analysis to modeling a structure model of attack vectors, (2) mimic the manners and the elements of attack vectors to extend the ability of testing tool for identifying XSS vulnerabilities, (3) be helpful to verify the flaws of blacklist sanitization procedures of Web applications. We evaluated the proposed mechanism by Burp Intruder with a dataset collected from public XSS archives. The results show that mutated XSS attack generation can identify potential vulnerabilities.
1009.3712
Preventing SQL Injection through Automatic Query Sanitization with ASSIST
cs.SE cs.DB
Web applications are becoming an essential part of our everyday lives. Many of our activities are dependent on the functionality and security of these applications. As the scale of these applications grows, injection vulnerabilities such as SQL injection are major security challenges for developers today. This paper presents the technique of automatic query sanitization to automatically remove SQL injection vulnerabilities in code. In our technique, a combination of static analysis and program transformation are used to automatically instrument web applications with sanitization code. We have implemented this technique in a tool named ASSIST (Automatic and Static SQL Injection Sanitization Tool) for protecting Java-based web applications. Our experimental evaluation showed that our technique is effective against SQL injection vulnerabilities and has a low overhead.
1009.3713
Relational Constraint Driven Test Case Synthesis for Web Applications
cs.SE cs.DB
This paper proposes a relational constraint driven technique that synthesizes test cases automatically for web applications. Using a static analysis, servlets can be modeled as relational transducers, which manipulate backend databases. We present a synthesis algorithm that generates a sequence of HTTP requests for simulating a user session. The algorithm relies on backward symbolic image computation for reaching a certain database state, given a code coverage objective. With a slight adaptation, the technique can be used for discovering workflow attacks on web applications.
1009.3728
Network-Error Correcting Codes using Small Fields
cs.IT math.IT
Existing construction algorithms of block network-error correcting codes require a rather large field size, which grows with the size of the network and the number of sinks, and thereby can be prohibitive in large networks. In this work, we give an algorithm which, starting from a given network-error correcting code, can obtain another network code using a small field, with the same error correcting capability as the original code. An algorithm for designing network codes using small field sizes proposed recently by Ebrahimi and Fragouli can be seen as a special case of our algorithm. The major step in our algorithm is to find a least degree irreducible polynomial which is coprime to another large degree polynomial. We utilize the algebraic properties of finite fields to implement this step so that it becomes much faster than the brute-force method. As a result the algorithm given by Ebrahimi and Fragouli is also quickened.
1009.3751
Matching Dyadic Distributions to Channels
cs.IT math.IT math.PR
Many communication channels with discrete input have non-uniform capacity achieving probability mass functions (PMF). By parsing a stream of independent and equiprobable bits according to a full prefix-free code, a modu-lator can generate dyadic PMFs at the channel input. In this work, we show that for discrete memoryless channels and for memoryless discrete noiseless channels, searching for good dyadic input PMFs is equivalent to minimizing the Kullback-Leibler distance between a dyadic PMF and a weighted version of the capacity achieving PMF. We define a new algorithm called Geometric Huffman Coding (GHC) and prove that GHC finds the optimal dyadic PMF in O(m \log m) steps where m is the number of input symbols of the considered channel. Furthermore, we prove that by generating dyadic PMFs of blocks of consecutive input symbols, GHC achieves capacity when the block length goes to infinity.
1009.3771
An extensible web interface for databases and its application to storing biochemical data
cs.PL cs.CE
This paper presents a generic web-based database interface implemented in Prolog. We discuss the advantages of the implementation platform and demonstrate the system's applicability in providing access to integrated biochemical data. Our system exploits two libraries of SWI-Prolog to create a schema-transparent interface within a relational setting. As is expected in declarative programming, the interface was written with minimal programming effort due to the high level of the language and its suitability to the task. We highlight two of Prolog's features that are well suited to the task at hand: term representation of structured documents and relational nature of Prolog which facilitates transparent integration of relational databases. Although we developed the system for accessing in-house biochemical and genomic data the interface is generic and provides a number of extensible features. We describe some of these features with references to our research databases. Finally we outline an in-house library that facilitates interaction between Prolog and the R statistical package. We describe how it has been employed in the present context to store output from statistical analysis on to the database.
1009.3802
Robust Low-Rank Subspace Segmentation with Semidefinite Guarantees
cs.CV cs.IT cs.LG math.IT
Recently there is a line of research work proposing to employ Spectral Clustering (SC) to segment (group){Throughout the paper, we use segmentation, clustering, and grouping, and their verb forms, interchangeably.} high-dimensional structural data such as those (approximately) lying on subspaces {We follow {liu2010robust} and use the term "subspace" to denote both linear subspaces and affine subspaces. There is a trivial conversion between linear subspaces and affine subspaces as mentioned therein.} or low-dimensional manifolds. By learning the affinity matrix in the form of sparse reconstruction, techniques proposed in this vein often considerably boost the performance in subspace settings where traditional SC can fail. Despite the success, there are fundamental problems that have been left unsolved: the spectrum property of the learned affinity matrix cannot be gauged in advance, and there is often one ugly symmetrization step that post-processes the affinity for SC input. Hence we advocate to enforce the symmetric positive semidefinite constraint explicitly during learning (Low-Rank Representation with Positive SemiDefinite constraint, or LRR-PSD), and show that factually it can be solved in an exquisite scheme efficiently instead of general-purpose SDP solvers that usually scale up poorly. We provide rigorous mathematical derivations to show that, in its canonical form, LRR-PSD is equivalent to the recently proposed Low-Rank Representation (LRR) scheme {liu2010robust}, and hence offer theoretic and practical insights to both LRR-PSD and LRR, inviting future research. As per the computational cost, our proposal is at most comparable to that of LRR, if not less. We validate our theoretic analysis and optimization scheme by experiments on both synthetic and real data sets.
1009.3824
Optimization and Convergence of Observation Channels in Stochastic Control
math.OC cs.IT math.IT
This paper studies the optimization of observation channels (stochastic kernels) in partially observed stochastic control problems. In particular, existence and continuity properties are investigated mostly (but not exclusively) concentrating on the single-stage case. Continuity properties of the optimal cost in channels are explored under total variation, setwise convergence, and weak convergence. Sufficient conditions for compactness of a class of channels under total variation and setwise convergence are presented and applications to quantization are explored.