A Vanishing Result for the Universal Bundle on a Toric Quiver Variety

Let Q be a finite quiver without oriented cycles. Denote by U --> M the fine moduli space of stable thin sincere representations of Q with respect to the canonical stability notion. We prove Ext^i(U,U) = 0 for all i >0 and compute the endomorphism algebra of the universal bundle U. Moreover, we obtain a necessary and sufficient condition for when this algebra is isomorphic to the path algebra kQ of the quiver Q. If so, then the bounded derived category of finitely generated right kQ-modules is embedded into that of coherent sheaves on M.Comment: 13 pages with a couple of small figures LaTeX 2.0

Colour appearance is affected not only by perceptual but also by linguistic context

Terminology is a crucial problem in science, since quite often the terms used to denote theoretical concepts are directly taken from the vocabulary of common words, which usually have multiple meanings. To solve this problem, scientists must operationalize the theoretical concepts they use but, in psychology, sometimes, this can be a difficult task, since the meaning of the terms used to give the instructions to observers can interfere with the spontaneous meaning that observers give to those terms. Starting from some empirical observations, we show that colour appearance is affected not only by the perceptual but also by the linguistic context

Lemmings is PSPACE-complete

Lemmings is a computer puzzle game developed by DMA Design and published by Psygnosis in 1991, in which the player has to guide a tribe of lemming creatures to safety through a hazardous landscape, by assigning them specific skills that modify their behavior in different ways. In this paper we study the optimization problem of saving the highest number of lemmings in a given landscape with a given number of available skills. We prove that the game is PSPACE-complete, even if there is only one lemming to save, and only Builder and Basher skills are available. We thereby settle an open problem posed by Cormode in 2004, and again by Forisek in 2010. However we also prove that, if we restrict the game to levels in which the available Builder skills are only polynomially many (and there is any number of other skills), then the game is solvable in NP. Similarly, if the available Basher, Miner, and Digger skills are polynomially many, the game is solvable in NP. Furthermore, we show that saving the maximum number of lemmings is APX-hard, even when only one type of skill is available, whatever this skill is. This contrasts with the membership in P of the decision problem restricted to levels with no "deadly areas" (such as water or traps) and only Climber and Floater skills, as previously established by Cormode.Comment: 26 pages, 11 figure

A survey about framing the bases of Impulsive Mechanics of constrained systems into a jet-bundle geometric context

We illustrate how the different kinds of constraints acting on an impulsive mechanical system can be clearly described in the geometric setup given by the configuration space--time bundle $\pi_t:\mathcal{M} \to \mathbb{E}$ and its first jet extension $\pi: J_1 \to \mathcal{M}$ in a way that ensures total compliance with axioms and invariance requirements of Classical Mechanics. We specify the differences between geometric and constitutive characterizations of a constraint. We point out the relevance of the role played by the concept of frame of reference, underlining when the frame independence is mandatorily required and when a choice of a frame is an inescapable need. The thorough rationalization allows the introduction of unusual but meaningful kinds of constraints, such as unilateral kinetic constraints or breakable constraints, and of new theoretical aspects, such as the possible dependence of the impulsive reaction by the active forces acting on the system

ImageSpirit: Verbal Guided Image Parsing

Humans describe images in terms of nouns and adjectives while algorithms operate on images represented as sets of pixels. Bridging this gap between how humans would like to access images versus their typical representation is the goal of image parsing, which involves assigning object and attribute labels to pixel. In this paper we propose treating nouns as object labels and adjectives as visual attribute labels. This allows us to formulate the image parsing problem as one of jointly estimating per-pixel object and attribute labels from a set of training images. We propose an efficient (interactive time) solution. Using the extracted labels as handles, our system empowers a user to verbally refine the results. This enables hands-free parsing of an image into pixel-wise object/attribute labels that correspond to human semantics. Verbally selecting objects of interests enables a novel and natural interaction modality that can possibly be used to interact with new generation devices (e.g. smart phones, Google Glass, living room devices). We demonstrate our system on a large number of real-world images with varying complexity. To help understand the tradeoffs compared to traditional mouse based interactions, results are reported for both a large scale quantitative evaluation and a user study.Comment: http://mmcheng.net/imagespirit