On Quantifying Qualitative Geospatial Data: A Probabilistic Approach

Living in the era of data deluge, we have witnessed a web content explosion, largely due to the massive availability of User-Generated Content (UGC). In this work, we specifically consider the problem of geospatial information extraction and representation, where one can exploit diverse sources of information (such as image and audio data, text data, etc), going beyond traditional volunteered geographic information. Our ambition is to include available narrative information in an effort to better explain geospatial relationships: with spatial reasoning being a basic form of human cognition, narratives expressing such experiences typically contain qualitative spatial data, i.e., spatial objects and spatial relationships. To this end, we formulate a quantitative approach for the representation of qualitative spatial relations extracted from UGC in the form of texts. The proposed method quantifies such relations based on multiple text observations. Such observations provide distance and orientation features which are utilized by a greedy Expectation Maximization-based (EM) algorithm to infer a probability distribution over predefined spatial relationships; the latter represent the quantified relationships under user-defined probabilistic assumptions. We evaluate the applicability and quality of the proposed approach using real UGC data originating from an actual travel blog text corpus. To verify the quality of the result, we generate grid-based maps visualizing the spatial extent of the various relations

Invariance of visual operations at the level of receptive fields

Receptive field profiles registered by cell recordings have shown that mammalian vision has developed receptive fields tuned to different sizes and orientations in the image domain as well as to different image velocities in space-time. This article presents a theoretical model by which families of idealized receptive field profiles can be derived mathematically from a small set of basic assumptions that correspond to structural properties of the environment. The article also presents a theory for how basic invariance properties to variations in scale, viewing direction and relative motion can be obtained from the output of such receptive fields, using complementary selection mechanisms that operate over the output of families of receptive fields tuned to different parameters. Thereby, the theory shows how basic invariance properties of a visual system can be obtained already at the level of receptive fields, and we can explain the different shapes of receptive field profiles found in biological vision from a requirement that the visual system should be invariant to the natural types of image transformations that occur in its environment.Comment: 40 pages, 17 figure

Combining logic and probability in tracking and scene interpretation

The paper gives a high-level overview of some ways in which logical representations and reasoning can be used in computer vision applications, such as tracking and scene interpretation. The combination of logical and statistical approaches is also considered

Techniques for Representation of Regional Clusters in Geographical In-formation Systems

This paper provides an overview of visualization techniques adapted for regional clusters presentation in Geographic Information Systems. Clusters are groups of companies and insti-tutions co-located in a specific geographic region and linked by interdependencies in providing a related group of products and services. The regional clusters can be visualized by projecting the data into two-dimensional space or using parallel coordinates. Cluster membership is usually represented by different colours or by dividing clusters into several panels of a grille display. Taking into consideration regional clusters requirements and the multilevel administrative division of the Romania’s territory, I used two cartograms: NUTS2- regions and NUTS3- counties, to illustrate the tools for regional clusters representation.Geographic Information Systems, Regional Clusters, Spatial Statistics, Geographic Data Visualisation

A framework for quantification and physical modeling of cell mixing applied to oscillator synchronization in vertebrate somitogenesis

In development and disease, cells move as they exchange signals. One example is found in vertebrate development, during which the timing of segment formation is set by a ‘segmentation clock’, in which oscillating gene expression is synchronized across a population of cells by Delta-Notch signaling. Delta-Notch signaling requires local cell-cell contact, but in the zebrafish embryonic tailbud, oscillating cells move rapidly, exchanging neighbors. Previous theoretical studies proposed that this relative movement or cell mixing might alter signaling and thereby enhance synchronization. However, it remains unclear whether the mixing timescale in the tissue is in the right range for this effect, because a framework to reliably measure the mixing timescale and compare it with signaling timescale is lacking. Here, we develop such a framework using a quantitative description of cell mixing without the need for an external reference frame and constructing a physical model of cell movement based on the data. Numerical simulations show that mixing with experimentally observed statistics enhances synchronization of coupled phase oscillators, suggesting that mixing in the tailbud is fast enough to affect the coherence of rhythmic gene expression. Our approach will find general application in analyzing the relative movements of communicating cells during development and disease.Fil: Uriu, Koichiro. Kanazawa University; JapónFil: Bhavna, Rajasekaran. Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics; Alemania. Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems; AlemaniaFil: Oates, Andrew C.. Francis Crick Institute; Reino Unido. University College London; Reino UnidoFil: Morelli, Luis Guillermo. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. Instituto de Investigación en Biomedicina de Buenos Aires - Instituto Partner de la Sociedad Max Planck; Argentina. Max Planck Institute for Molecular Physiology; Alemania. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Departamento de Física; Argentin

Empirical characteristics of different types of pedestrian streams

Reliable empirical data and proper understanding of pedestrian dynamics are necessary for fire safety design. However, specifications and data in different handbooks as well as experimental studies differ considerably. In this study, series of experiments under laboratory conditions were carried out to study the characteristics of uni- and bidirectional pedestrian streams in straight corridor. The Voronoi method is used to resolve the fine structure of the resulting velocity-density relations and spatial dependence of the measurements. The result shows differences in the shape of the relation for \rho > 1.0 m-2. The maximal specific flow of unidirectional streams is significantly larger than that of all bidirectional streams examined