Correspondence and Affine Shape from Two Orthographic Views: Motion and Recognition

The paper presents a simple model for recovering affine shape and correspondence from two orthographic views of a 3D object. It is shown that four corresponding points along two orthographic views, taken under similar illumination conditions, determine affine shape and correspondence for all other points. The scheme is useful for purposes of visual recognition by generating novel views of an object given two model views. It is also shown that the scheme can handle objects with smooth boundaries, to a good approximation, without introducing any modifications or additional model views

Generation and analysis of expressed sequence tags from Botrytis cinerea

http://www.scielo.cl/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0716-97602006000200018&lng=es&nrm=isoBotrytis cinerea is a filamentous plant pathogen of a wide range of plant species, and its infection may cause enormous damage both during plant growth and in the post-harvest phase. We have constructed a cDNA library from an isolate of B. cinerea and have sequenced 11,482 expressed sequence tags that were assembled into 1,003 contigs sequences and 3,032 singletons. Approximately 81% of the unigenes showed significant similarity to genes coding for proteins with known functions: more than 50% of the sequences code for genes involved in cellular metabolism, 12% for transport of metabolites, and approximately 10% for cellular organization. Other functional categories include responses to biotic and abiotic stimuli, cell communication, cell homeostasis, and cell development. We carried out pair-wise comparisons with fungal databases to determine the B. cinerea unisequence set with relevant similarity to genes in other fungal pathogenic counterparts. Among the 4,035 non-redundant B. cinerea unigenes, 1,338 (23%) have significant homology with Fusarium verticillioides unigenes. Similar values were obtained for Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Aspergillus nidulans (22% and 24%, respectively). The lower percentages of homology were with Magnaporthe grisae and Neurospora crassa (13% and 19%, respectively). Several genes involved in putative and known fungal virulence and general pathogenicity were identified. The results provide important information for future research on this fungal pathogen

Motion analysis report

Human motion analysis is the task of converting actual human movements into computer readable data. Such movement information may be obtained though active or passive sensing methods. Active methods include physical measuring devices such as goniometers on joints of the body, force plates, and manually operated sensors such as a Cybex dynamometer. Passive sensing de-couples the position measuring device from actual human contact. Passive sensors include Selspot scanning systems (since there is no mechanical connection between the subject's attached LEDs and the infrared sensing cameras), sonic (spark-based) three-dimensional digitizers, Polhemus six-dimensional tracking systems, and image processing systems based on multiple views and photogrammetric calculations

Abnormal Human Chondrocyte Morphology is Related to Increased Levels of Cell-Associated IL-1β and Disruption to Pericellular Collagen Type VI

Early osteoarthritis (OA) is poorly understood, but abnormal chondrocyte morphology might be important. We studied IL-1β and pericellular collagen type VI in morphologically normal and abnormal chondrocytes. In situ chondrocytes within explants from nondegenerate (grade 0/1) areas of human tibial plateaus (n = 21) were fluorescently labeled and visualized [2-photon laser scanning microscopy (2PLSM)]. Normal chondrocytes exhibited a “smooth” membrane surface, whereas abnormal cells were defined as demonstrating ≥1 cytoplasmic process. Abnormal chondrocytes were further classified by number and average length of cytoplasmic processes/cell. IL-1β or collagen type VI associated with single chondrocytes were visualized by fluorescence immuno-histochemistry and confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM). Fluorescence was quantified as the number of positive voxels (i.e., 3D pixels with fluorescence above baseline)/cell. IL-1β-associated fluorescence increased between normal and all abnormal cells in the superficial (99.7 ± 29.8 [11 (72)] vs. 784 ± 382 [15 (132)]; p = 0.04, positive voxels/cell) and deep zones (66.5 ± 29.4 [9 (64)] vs. 795 ± 224 [9 (56)]; p = 0.006). There was a correlation (r2 = 0.988) between the number of processes/cell (0–5) and IL-1β, and an increase particularly with short processes (≤5 µm; p = 0.022). Collagen type VI coverage and thickness decreased (p < 0.001 and p = 0.005, respectively) with development of processes. Abnormal chondrocytes in macroscopically nondegenerate cartilage demonstrated a marked increase in IL-1β and loss of pericellular type VI collagen, changes that could lead to cartilage degeneration. © 2010 Orthopaedic Research Society. Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Orthop Res 28:1507–1514, 201

Feeding ecology of the endemic freshwater puffer fish Carinotetradon travancoricus (Hora & Nair, 1941) in Western Ghats hotspot, India

The study aimed to investigate the feeding ecology of a vulnerable freshwater puffer fish, Carinotetradon travancoricus from the Chalakudy river of Kerala, Western Ghats, a biodiversity hotspot of India. Fishes were sampled from October 2018 to September 2019. Stomach condition of the fishes showed the percentage of empty gut to be significantly higher during all seasons (P&lt; 0.01). Feeding intensity depicted the fish to follow an "˜active' feeding strategy (31.59±10.32%) during pre-monsoon season. Diet composition and relative length of gut analysis indicated that the fish during its early stages relied on an omnivorous diet however preferring autochthonous food materials such as insects (27.91%) and crustaceans (25.30%) during its adult stages. A perceptible variation in the feeding strategy associated with the spawning season of C. travancoricus was also noticed. During their spawning season (May-August), a greater preponderance towards animal matter (52.18%) was noticed in their diet. The results of gastrosomatic index indicated that feeding activity of C. travancoricus is considerably reduced (2.99) during the spawning period. The present study provides the baseline information on the feeding ecology of C. travancoricus which could be helpful to aquarists for breeding and rearing of this species in captivity and thereby reducing their fishing pressure in wild

Classification of Satellite Time Series-derived Land Surface Phenology Focused on the Northern Fertile Crescent

Land surface phenology describes events in a seasonal vegetation cycle and can be used in a variety of applications from predicting onset of future drought conditions, to revealing potential limits of historical dry farming, to guiding more accurate dating of archeological sites. Traditional methods of monitoring vegetation phenology use data collected in situ. However, vegetation health indices derived from satellite remote sensor data, such as the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), have been used as proxy for vegetation phenology due to their repeated acquisition and broad area coverage. Land surface phenology is accessible in the NDVI satellite record when images are processed to be intercomparable over time and temporally ordered to create a time series. This study utilized NDVI time series to classify areas of similar vegetation phenology in the northern Fertile Crescent, an area from the middle Mediterranean coast to southern/south-eastern Turkey to western Iran and northern Iraq. Phenological monitoring of the northern Fertile Crescent is critical due to the area\u27s minimal water resources, susceptibility to drought, and understanding ancient historical reliance on precipitation for subsistence dry farming. Delineation of phenological classes provides areal and temporal synopsis of vegetation productivity time series. Phenological classes were developed from NDVI time series calculated from NOAA\u27s Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) imagery with 8 × 8 km spatial resolution over twenty-five years, and by NASA\u27s Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) with 250 × 250 m spatial resolution over twelve years. Both AVHRR and MODIS time series were subjected to data reduction techniques in spatial and temporal dimensions. Optimized ISODATA clusters were developed for both of these data reduction techniques in order to compare the effects of spatial versus temporal aggregation. Within the northern Fertile Crescent study area, the spatial reduction technique showed increased cluster cohesion over the temporal reduction method. The latter technique showed an increase in temporal smoothing over the spatial reduction technique. Each technique has advantages depending on the desired spatial or temporal granularity. Additional work is required to determine optimal scale size for the spatial data reduction technique