Effective retrieval and new indexing method for case based reasoning: Application in chemical process design

In this paper we try to improve the retrieval step for case based reasoning for preliminary design. This improvement deals with three major parts of our CBR system. First, in the preliminary design step, some uncertainties like imprecise or unknown values remain in the description of the problem, because they need a deeper analysis to be withdrawn. To deal with this issue, the faced problem description is soften with the fuzzy sets theory. Features are described with a central value, a percentage of imprecision and a relation with respect to the central value. These additional data allow us to build a domain of possible values for each attributes. With this representation, the calculation of the similarity function is impacted, thus the characteristic function is used to calculate the local similarity between two features. Second, we focus our attention on the main goal of the retrieve step in CBR to find relevant cases for adaptation. In this second part, we discuss the assumption of similarity to find the more appropriated case. We put in highlight that in some situations this classical similarity must be improved with further knowledge to facilitate case adaptation. To avoid failure during the adaptation step, we implement a method that couples similarity measurement with adaptability one, in order to approximate the cases utility more accurately. The latter gives deeper information for the reusing of cases. In a last part, we present a generic indexing technique for the base, and a new algorithm for the research of relevant cases in the memory. The sphere indexing algorithm is a domain independent index that has performances equivalent to the decision tree ones. But its main strength is that it puts the current problem in the center of the research area avoiding boundaries issues. All these points are discussed and exemplified through the preliminary design of a chemical engineering unit operation

Conceptual modeling of multimedia databases

The gap between the semantic content of multimedia data and its underlying physical representation is one of the main problems in the modern multimedia research in general, and, in particular, in the field of multimedia database modeling. We believe that one of the principal reasons of this problem is the attempt to conceptually represent multimedia data in a way, which is similar to its low-level representation by applications dealing with encoding standards, feature-based multimedia analysis, etc. In our opinion, such conceptual representation of multimedia contributes to the semantic gap by separating the representation of multimedia information from the representation of the universe of discourse of an application, to which the multimedia information pertains. In this research work we address the problem of conceptual modeling of multimedia data in a way to deal with the above-mentioned limitations. First, we introduce two different paradigms of conceptual understanding of the essence of multimedia data, namely: multimedia as data and multimedia as metadata. The multimedia as data paradigm, which views multimedia data as the subject of modeling in its own right, is inherent to so-called multimedia-centric applications, where multimedia information itself represents the main part of the universe of discourse. The examples of such kind of applications are digital photo collections or digital movie archives. On the other hand, the multimedia as metadata paradigm, which is inherent to so-called multimedia-enhanced applications, views multimedia data as just another (optional) source of information about whatever universe of discourse that the application pertains to. An example of a multimedia-enhanced application is a human-resource database augmented with employee photos. Here the universe of discourse is the totality of company employees, while their photos simply represent an additional (possibly optional) kind of information describing the universe of discourse. The multimedia conceptual modeling approach that we present in this work allows addressing multimedia-centric applications, as well as, in particular, multimedia-enhanced applications. The model that we propose builds upon MADS (Modeling Application Data with Spatio-temporal features), which is a rich conceptual model defined in our laboratory, and which is, in particular, characterized by structural completeness, spatio-temporal modeling capabilities, and multirepresentation support. The proposed multimedia model is provided in the form of a new modeling dimension of MADS, whose orthogonality principle allows to integrate the new multimedia modeling dimension with already existing modeling features of MADS. The following multimedia modeling constructs are provided: multimedia datatypes, simple and complex representational constraints (relationships), a multimedia partitioning mechanism, and multimedia multirepresentation features. Following the description of our conceptual multimedia modeling approach based on MADS, we present the peculiarities of logical multimedia modeling and of conceptual-to-logical inter-layer transformations. We provide a set of mapping guidelines intended to help the schema designer in coming up with rich logical multimedia document representations of the application domain, which conform with the conceptual multimedia schema. The practical interest of our research is illustrated by a mock-up application, which has been developed to support the theoretical ideas described in this work. In particular, we show how the abstract conceptual set-based representations of multimedia data elements, as well as simple and complex multimedia representational relationships can be implemented using Oracle DBMS

Implementation of MPEG-4s Subdivision Surfaces Tools

This work is about the implementation of a MPEG-4 decoder for subdivision surfaces, which are powerful 3D paradigms allowing to compactly represent piecewise smooth surfaces. This study will take place in the framework of MPEG-4 AFX, the extension of the MPEG-4 standard including the subdivision surfaces. This document will introduce, with some details, the theory of subdivision surfaces in the two forms present in MPEG-4: plain and detailed/ wavelet subdivision surfaces. It will particularly concentrate on wavelet subdivision surfaces, which permit progressive 3D mesh compression

The 1980 land cover for the Puget Sound region

Both LANDSAT imagery and the video information communications and retrieval software were used to develop a land cover classifiction of the Puget Sound of Washington. Planning agencies within the region were provided with a highly accurate land cover map registered to the 1980 census tracts which could subsequently be incorporated as one data layer in a multi-layer data base. Many historical activities related to previous land cover mapping studies conducted in the Puget Sound region are summarized. Valuable insight into conducting a project with a large community of users and in establishing user confidence in a multi-purpose land cover map derived from LANDSAT is provided

Systems analysis of the space shuttle

Developments in communications systems, computer systems, and power distribution systems for the space shuttle are described. The use of high speed delta modulation for bit rate compression in the transmission of television signals is discussed. Simultaneous Multiprocessor Organization, an approach to computer organization, is presented. Methods of computer simulation and automatic malfunction detection for the shuttle power distribution system are also described

The visualization of natural history museum habitat dioramas by Maltese primary school children

The thesis addresses a relatively under-explored area in this field of study within the socio-constructivist paradigm. The main aim is to investigate how 9-year-old school children visualize habitat dioramas to build a mental model, how they make sense of the dioramas to understand local flora and fauna, and how previous knowledge influences the way they visualise habitat dioramas. Data collected included a first drawing done in class, a second drawing done at the Natural History Museum before and a third following the viewing of the habitat dioramas. Each pupil was interviewed after the respective task to allow for a comprehensive description of the content of the drawings. The children we also asked to produce a web (mind map) and they were also observed as they interacted with the dioramas. Data was mainly analysed qualitatively through direct examination of the drawings and with the aid of the computer package Atlas.ti. Some general trends emerge in the findings such as animals being more present in drawings than plants. Animal diversity ranks in decreasing order from birds, mammals, arthropods and fish to reptiles, while plants are mainly seeded and ornamental. Generally drawings progress from imaginative in class and before seeing the diorama, to increasingly drawing from observation in the diorama drawings. More significantly, pupils undergo a transformation through their drawings, which may show a change from isolated organisms on a sheet of paper to greater elaboration or better accuracy in placing organisms in habitat. However, others show an opposite transformation or no significant change at all. To a certain extent, children seem to interpret the diorama through the lens of their previously held mental model. What children already know partly influences what they choose to represent, but they also accommodate new knowledge they obtain from the diorama. Dioramas that help recall familiar environments are more likely to capture attention and afford a longer viewing time, thus imparting new knowledge and moulding the child’s mental model. Habitat dioramas have the potential to serve as models for learning in Biology and Environmental Education at primary level. An interpretative model for museum settings is proposed, while its potential applications in other areas of science education and limitations are considered

Recent Trends in Communication Networks

In recent years there has been many developments in communication technology. This has greatly enhanced the computing power of small handheld resource-constrained mobile devices. Different generations of communication technology have evolved. This had led to new research for communication of large volumes of data in different transmission media and the design of different communication protocols. Another direction of research concerns the secure and error-free communication between the sender and receiver despite the risk of the presence of an eavesdropper. For the communication requirement of a huge amount of multimedia streaming data, a lot of research has been carried out in the design of proper overlay networks. The book addresses new research techniques that have evolved to handle these challenges

A CASE STUDY ON THE EFFECT OF NEWS ON CRUDE OIL PRICE

Crude oil price volatility has an impact on the global economy and oil-dependent industries and is influenced by supply and demand, geopolitical tensions, and the global economy. Every day, a massive amount of textual information flows in the form of news articles, which humans use to forecast future trends. News articles can have a significant impact on the price of crude oil because they contain information about recent events, trends, and advancements in the industry. The purpose of this work is to investigate how news articles may affect crude oil prices, using the concept of topic modeling and its potential for handling data. Using the webscraping method, the data for the study comes from a large dataset of news articles about the crude oil industry. These news articles were published between January 1 and December 31, 2022, and come from four different sources. The data was compiled using the source Exchange Rates UK to demonstrate how the price of crude oil fluctuated during this period. After the cleaning process was completed, the dataset contained a total of 1532 news articles. The Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) technique is suggested for extracting relevant keywords from news articles and then using the findings as input features to forecast the crude oil price. The forecasting methods employed in the study were the Ridge model, the Random Forest and XGBoost techniques, and the time series method ARIMAX. The outcomes of the experiment indicate that the association between the meaning of the news articles and the crude oil price is not sufficiently strong. It is additionally concluded that the XGBoost algorithm reveal superior predictive performance in the training set. As a result, XGBoost models for each month of 2022 were developed to investigate the impact of features and determine the most important ones for the problem.A volatilidade dos preços do petróleo bruto tem um impacto na economia global e nas indústrias dependentes do petróleo e é influenciada pela oferta e procura, por tensões geopolíticas e pela economia global. Todos os dias uma enorme quantidade de informação flui sob a forma de artigos de notícias e é utilizada pelo ser humano para prever tendências futuras. Os artigos de notícias podem influenciar significativamente o preço do petróleo bruto porque contêm informação sobre eventos recentes, tendências e avanços na indústria. O objetivo deste trabalho é investigar como os artigos de notícias podem afetar os preços do petróleo bruto, utilizando o conceito de modelação de tópicos. Utilizando o método web-scraping, os dados para o estudo provêm de um grande conjunto de artigos de notícias sobre a indústria do petróleo bruto. Estes artigos foram publicados entre 1 de janeiro e 31 de dezembro de 2022 e resultam de quatro fontes diferentes. Os dados foram compilados usando a fonte Exchange Rates UK para demonstrar como o preço do petróleo bruto flutuou ao longo deste período. Após a conclusão do processo de limpeza, obteve-se um total de 1532 artigos de notícias. A técnica Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) é sugerida para extrair as palavras-chave pertinentes dos artigos de notícias. Os seus resultados foram depois utilizados como variáveis de entrada para prever o preço do petróleo bruto. Os métodos de previsão utilizados no estudo foram os modelos Ridge, Random Forest, XGBoost e ARIMAX. Os resultados indicam que a relação entre os artigos de notícias e o preço do petróleo bruto não é suficientemente forte. Conclui-se que o algoritmo XGBoost revela um desempenho preditivo superior no conjunto de treino. Como resultado, foram desenvolvidos modelos XGBoost para cada mês de 2022 para investigar o impacto das características e determinar as mais importantes para o problema

Energy Data Analytics for Smart Meter Data

The principal advantage of smart electricity meters is their ability to transfer digitized electricity consumption data to remote processing systems. The data collected by these devices make the realization of many novel use cases possible, providing benefits to electricity providers and customers alike. This book includes 14 research articles that explore and exploit the information content of smart meter data, and provides insights into the realization of new digital solutions and services that support the transition towards a sustainable energy system. This volume has been edited by Andreas Reinhardt, head of the Energy Informatics research group at Technische Universität Clausthal, Germany, and Lucas Pereira, research fellow at Técnico Lisboa, Portugal

FACING EXPERIENCE: A PAINTER’S CANVAS IN VIRTUAL REALITY

Full version unavailable due to 3rd party copyright restrictions.This research investigates how shifts in perception might be brought about through the development of visual imagery created by the use of virtual environment technology. Through a discussion of historical uses of immersion in art, this thesis will explore how immersion functions and why immersion has been a goal for artists throughout history. It begins with a discussion of ancient cave drawings and the relevance of Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. Next it examines the biological origins of “making special.” The research will discuss how this concept, combined with the ideas of “action” and “reaction,” has reinforced the view that art is fundamentally experiential rather than static. The research emphasizes how present-day virtual environment art, in providing a space that engages visitors in computer graphics, expands on previous immersive artistic practices. The thesis examines the technical context in which the research occurs by briefly describing the use of computer science technologies, the fundamentals of visual arts practices, and the importance of aesthetics in new media and provides a description of my artistic practice. The aim is to investigate how combining these approaches can enhance virtual environments as artworks. The computer science of virtual environments includes both hardware and software programming. The resultant virtual environment experiences are technologically dependent on the types of visual displays being used, including screens and monitors, and their subsequent viewing affordances. Virtual environments fill the field of view and can be experienced with a head mounted display (HMD) or a large screen display. The sense of immersion gained through the experience depends on how tracking devices and related peripheral devices are used to facilitate interaction. The thesis discusses visual arts practices with a focus on how illusions shift our cognition and perception in the visual modalities. This discussion includes how perceptual thinking is the foundation of art experiences, how analogies are the foundation of cognitive experiences and how the two intertwine in art experiences for virtual environments. An examination of the aesthetic strategies used by artists and new media critics are presented to discuss new media art. This thesis investigates the visual elements used in virtual environments and prescribes strategies for creating art for virtual environments. Methods constituting a unique virtual environment practice that focuses on visual analogies are discussed. The artistic practice that is discussed as the basis for this research also concentrates on experiential moments and shifts in perception and cognition and references Douglas Hofstadter, Rudolf Arnheim and John Dewey. iv Virtual environments provide for experiences in which the imagery generated updates in real time. Following an analysis of existing artwork and critical writing relative to the field, the process of inquiry has required the creation of artworks that involve tracking systems, projection displays, sound work, and an understanding of the importance of the visitor. In practice, the research has shown that the visitor should be seen as an interlocutor, interacting from a first-person perspective with virtual environment events, where avatars or other instrumental intermediaries, such as guns, vehicles, or menu systems, do not to occlude the view. The aesthetic outcomes of this research are the result of combining visual analogies, real time interactive animation, and operatic performance in immersive space. The environments designed in this research were informed initially by paintings created with imagery generated in a hypnopompic state or during the moments of transitioning from sleeping to waking. The drawings often emphasize emotional moments as caricatures and/or elements of the face as seen from a number of perspectives simultaneously, in the way of some cartoons, primitive artwork or Cubist imagery. In the imagery, the faces indicate situations, emotions and confrontations which can offer moments of humour and reflective exploration. At times, the faces usurp the space and stand in representation as both face and figure. The power of the placement of the caricatures in the paintings become apparent as the imagery stages the expressive moment. The placement of faces sets the scene, establishes relationships and promotes the honesty and emotions that develop over time as the paintings are scrutinized. The development process of creating virtual environment imagery starts with hand drawn sketches of characters, develops further as paintings on “digital canvas”, are built as animated, three-dimensional models and finally incorporated into a virtual environment. The imagery is generated while drawing, typically with paper and pencil, in a stream of consciousness during the hypnopompic state. This method became an aesthetic strategy for producing a snappy straightforward sketch. The sketches are explored further as they are worked up as paintings. During the painting process, the figures become fleshed out and their placement on the page, in essence brings them to life. These characters inhabit a world that I explore even further by building them into three dimensional models and placing them in computer generated virtual environments. The methodology of developing and placing the faces/figures became an operational strategy for building virtual environments. In order to open up the range of art virtual environments, and develop operational strategies for visitors’ experience, the characters and their facial features are used as navigational strategies, signposts and methods of wayfinding in order to sustain a stream of consciousness type of navigation. Faces and characters were designed to represent those intimate moments of self-reflection and confrontation that occur daily within ourselves and with others. They sought to reflect moments of wonderment, hurt, curiosity and humour that could subsequently be relinquished for more practical or purposeful endeavours. They were intended to create conditions in which visitors might reflect upon their emotional state, v enabling their understanding and trust of their personal space, in which decisions are made and the nature of world is determined. In order to extend the split-second, frozen moment of recognition that a painting affords, the caricatures and their scenes are given new dimensions as they become characters in a performative virtual reality. Emotables, distinct from avatars, are characters confronting visitors in the virtual environment to engage them in an interactive, stream of consciousness, non-linear dialogue. Visitors are also situated with a role in a virtual world, where they were required to adapt to the language of the environment in order to progress through the dynamics of a drama. The research showed that imagery created in a context of whimsy and fantasy could bring ontological meaning and aesthetic experience into the interactive environment, such that emotables or facially expressive computer graphic characters could be seen as another brushstroke in painting a world of virtual reality