Recent advances in directional statistics

Mainstream statistical methodology is generally applicable to data observed in Euclidean space. There are, however, numerous contexts of considerable scientific interest in which the natural supports for the data under consideration are Riemannian manifolds like the unit circle, torus, sphere and their extensions. Typically, such data can be represented using one or more directions, and directional statistics is the branch of statistics that deals with their analysis. In this paper we provide a review of the many recent developments in the field since the publication of Mardia and Jupp (1999), still the most comprehensive text on directional statistics. Many of those developments have been stimulated by interesting applications in fields as diverse as astronomy, medicine, genetics, neurology, aeronautics, acoustics, image analysis, text mining, environmetrics, and machine learning. We begin by considering developments for the exploratory analysis of directional data before progressing to distributional models, general approaches to inference, hypothesis testing, regression, nonparametric curve estimation, methods for dimension reduction, classification and clustering, and the modelling of time series, spatial and spatio-temporal data. An overview of currently available software for analysing directional data is also provided, and potential future developments discussed.Comment: 61 page

Observations of interstellar helium pickup ions in the inner heliosphere

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/98161/1/jgra50227.pd

Improving Sampling-Based Motion Planning Using Library of Trajectories

Plánování pohybu je jedním z podstatných problémů robotiky. Tato práce kombinuje pokroky v plánování pohybu a hodnocení podobnosti objektů za účelem zrychlení plánování ve statických prostředích. První část této práce pojednává o současných metodách používaných pro hodnocení podobnosti objektů a plánování pohybu. Prostřední část popisuje, jak jsou tyto metody použity pro zrychlení plánování s využitím získaných znalostí o prostředí. V poslední části jsou navržené metody porovnány s ostatními plánovači v nezávislém testu. Námi navržené algoritmy se v experimentech ukázaly být často rychlejší v porovnání s ostatními plánovači. Také často nacházely cesty v prostředích, kde ostatní plánovače nebyly schopny cestu nalézt.Motion planning is one of the fundamental problems in robotics. This thesis combines the advances in motion planning and shape matching to improve planning speeds in static environments. The first part of this thesis covers current methods used in object similarity evaluation and motion planning. The middle part describes how these methods are used together to improve planning speeds by utilizing prior knowledge about the environment, along with additional modifications. In the last part, the proposed methods are tested against other state-of-the-art planners in an independent benchmarking facility. The proposed algorithms are shown to be faster than other planners in many cases, often finding paths in environments where the other planners are unable to

Snazer: the simulations and networks analyzer

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Networks are widely recognized as key determinants of structure and function in systems that span the biological, physical, and social sciences. They are static pictures of the interactions among the components of complex systems. Often, much effort is required to identify networks as part of particular patterns as well as to visualize and interpret them.</p> <p>From a pure dynamical perspective, simulation represents a relevant <it>way</it>-<it>out</it>. Many simulator tools capitalized on the "noisy" behavior of some systems and used formal models to represent cellular activities as temporal trajectories. Statistical methods have been applied to a fairly large number of replicated trajectories in order to infer knowledge.</p> <p>A tool which both graphically manipulates reactive models and deals with sets of simulation time-course data by aggregation, interpretation and statistical analysis is missing and could add value to simulators.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We designed and implemented <it>Snazer</it>, the simulations and networks analyzer. Its goal is to aid the processes of visualizing and manipulating reactive models, as well as to share and interpret time-course data produced by stochastic simulators or by any other means.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p><it>Snazer </it>is a solid prototype that integrates biological network and simulation time-course data analysis techniques.</p