6,537 research outputs found

    Location Reference Recognition from Texts: A Survey and Comparison

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    A vast amount of location information exists in unstructured texts, such as social media posts, news stories, scientific articles, web pages, travel blogs, and historical archives. Geoparsing refers to recognizing location references from texts and identifying their geospatial representations. While geoparsing can benefit many domains, a summary of its specific applications is still missing. Further, there is a lack of a comprehensive review and comparison of existing approaches for location reference recognition, which is the first and core step of geoparsing. To fill these research gaps, this review first summarizes seven typical application domains of geoparsing: geographic information retrieval, disaster management, disease surveillance, traffic management, spatial humanities, tourism management, and crime management. We then review existing approaches for location reference recognition by categorizing these approaches into four groups based on their underlying functional principle: rule-based, gazetteer matching–based, statistical learning-–based, and hybrid approaches. Next, we thoroughly evaluate the correctness and computational efficiency of the 27 most widely used approaches for location reference recognition based on 26 public datasets with different types of texts (e.g., social media posts and news stories) containing 39,736 location references worldwide. Results from this thorough evaluation can help inform future methodological developments and can help guide the selection of proper approaches based on application needs

    Spatial adaptive settlement systems in archaeology. Modelling long-term settlement formation from spatial micro interactions

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    Despite research history spanning more than a century, settlement patterns still hold a promise to contribute to the theories of large-scale processes in human history. Mostly they have been presented as passive imprints of past human activities and spatial interactions they shape have not been studied as the driving force of historical processes. While archaeological knowledge has been used to construct geographical theories of evolution of settlement there still exist gaps in this knowledge. Currently no theoretical framework has been adopted to explore them as spatial systems emerging from micro-choices of small population units. The goal of this thesis is to propose a conceptual model of adaptive settlement systems based on complex adaptive systems framework. The model frames settlement system formation processes as an adaptive system containing spatial features, information flows, decision making population units (agents) and forming cross scale feedback loops between location choices of individuals and space modified by their aggregated choices. The goal of the model is to find new ways of interpretation of archaeological locational data as well as closer theoretical integration of micro-level choices and meso-level settlement structures. The thesis is divided into five chapters, the first chapter is dedicated to conceptualisation of the general model based on existing literature and shows that settlement systems are inherently complex adaptive systems and therefore require tools of complexity science for causal explanations. The following chapters explore both empirical and theoretical simulated settlement patterns based dedicated to studying selected information flows and feedbacks in the context of the whole system. Second and third chapters explore the case study of the Stone Age settlement in Estonia comparing residential location choice principles of different periods. In chapter 2 the relation between environmental conditions and residential choice is explored statistically. The results confirm that the relation is significant but varies between different archaeological phenomena. In the third chapter hunter-fisher-gatherer and early agrarian Corded Ware settlement systems were compared spatially using inductive models. The results indicated a large difference in their perception of landscape regarding suitability for habitation. It led to conclusions that early agrarian land use significantly extended land use potential and provided a competitive spatial benefit. In addition to spatial differences, model performance was compared and the difference was discussed in the context of proposed adaptive settlement system model. Last two chapters present theoretical agent-based simulation experiments intended to study effects discussed in relation to environmental model performance and environmental determinism in general. In the fourth chapter the central place foragingmodel was embedded in the proposed model and resource depletion, as an environmental modification mechanism, was explored. The study excluded the possibility that mobility itself would lead to modelling effects discussed in the previous chapter. The purpose of the last chapter is the disentanglement of the complex relations between social versus human-environment interactions. The study exposed non-linear spatial effects expected population density can have on the system and the general robustness of environmental inductive models in archaeology to randomness and social effect. The model indicates that social interactions between individuals lead to formation of a group agency which is determined by the environment even if individual cognitions consider the environment insignificant. It also indicates that spatial configuration of the environment has a certain influence towards population clustering therefore providing a potential pathway to population aggregation. Those empirical and theoretical results showed the new insights provided by the complex adaptive systems framework. Some of the results, including the explanation of empirical results, required the conceptual model to provide a framework of interpretation

    Urbanised forested landscape: Urbanisation, timber extraction and forest care on the Vișeu Valley, northern Romania

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    By looking at urbanisation processes from the vantage point of the forest, and the ways in which it both constitutes our living space while having been separated from the bounded space of the urban in modern history, the thesis asks: How can we (re)imagine urbanisation beyond the limits of the urban? How can a feminine line of thinking engage with the forest beyond the capitalist-colonial paradigm and its extractive project? and How can we “think with care” (Puig de la Bellacasa 2017) towards the forest as an inhabitant of our common world, instead of perpetuating the image of the forest as a space outside the delimited boundaries of the city? Through a case study research, introducing the Vișeu Valley in northern Romania as both a site engaged in the circulation of the global timber flow, a part of what Brenner and Schmid (2014) name “planetary urbanisation”, where the extractive logging operations beginning in the late XVIIIth century have constructed it as an extractive landscape, and a more than human landscape inhabited by a multitude of beings (animal, plant, and human) the thesis argues towards the importance of forest care and indigenous knowledge in landscape management understood as a trans-generational transmission of knowledge, that is interdependent with the persistence of the landscape as such. Having a trans-scalar approach, the thesis investigates the ways in which the extractive projects of the capitalist-colonial paradigm have and still are shaping forested landscapes across the globe in order to situate the case as part of a planetary forest landscape and the contemporary debates it is engaged in. By engaging with emerging paradigms within the fields of plant communication, forestry, legal scholarship and landscape urbanism that present trees and forests as intelligent beings, and look at urbanisation as a way of inhabiting the landscape in both indigenous and modern cultures, the thesis argues towards viewing forested landscapes as more than human living spaces. Thinking urbanisation through the case of the Vișeu Valley’s urbanised forested landscape, the thesis aligns with alternate ways of viewing urbanisation as co-habitation with more than human beings, particularly those emerging from interdisciplinary research in the Amazon river basin (Tavares 2017, Heckenberger 2012) and, in light of emerging discourses on the rights of nature, proposes an expanded concept of planetary citizenship, to include non-human personhood

    Study of neural circuits using multielectrode arrays in movement disorders

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    Treballs Finals de Grau d'Enginyeria Biomèdica. Facultat de Medicina i Ciències de la Salut. Universitat de Barcelona. Curs: 2022-2023. Tutor/Director: Rodríguez Allué, Manuel JoséNeurodegenerative movement-related disorders are characterized by a progressive degeneration and loss of neurons, which lead to motor control impairment. Although the precise mechanisms underlying these conditions are still unknown, an increasing number of studies point towards the analysis of neural networks and functional connectivity to unravel novel insights. The main objective of this work is to understand cellular mechanisms related to dysregulated motor control symptoms in movement disorders, such as Chorea-Acanthocytosis (ChAc), by employing multielectrode arrays to analyze the electrical activity of neuronal networks in mouse models. We found no notable differences in cell viability between neurons with and without VPS13A knockdown, that is the only gene known to be implicated in the disease, suggesting that the absence of VPS13A in neurons may be partially compensated by other proteins. The MEA setup used to capture the electrical activity from neuron primary cultures is described in detail, pointing out its specific characteristics. At last, we present the alternative backup approach implemented to overcome the challenges faced during the research process and to explore the advanced algorithms for signal processing and analysis. In this report, we present a thorough account of the conception and implementation of our research, outlining the multiple limitations that have been encountered all along the course of the project. We provide a detailed analysis on the project’s economical and technical feasibility, as well as a comprehensive overview of the ethical and legal aspects considered during the execution

    A conceptual framework for developing dashboards for big mobility data

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    Dashboards are an increasingly popular form of data visualization. Large, complex, and dynamic mobility data present a number of challenges in dashboard design. The overall aim for dashboard design is to improve information communication and decision making, though big mobility data in particular require considering privacy alongside size and complexity. Taking these issues into account, a gap remains between wrangling mobility data and developing meaningful dashboard output. Therefore, there is a need for a framework that bridges this gap to support the mobility dashboard development and design process. In this paper we outline a conceptual framework for mobility data dashboards that provides guidance for the development process while considering mobility data structure, volume, complexity, varied application contexts, and privacy constraints. We illustrate the proposed framework’s components and process using example mobility dashboards with varied inputs, end-users and objectives. Overall, the framework offers a basis for developers to understand how informational displays of big mobility data are determined by end-user needs as well as the types of data selection, transformation, and display available to particular mobility datasets

    InternVid: A Large-scale Video-Text Dataset for Multimodal Understanding and Generation

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    This paper introduces InternVid, a large-scale video-centric multimodal dataset that enables learning powerful and transferable video-text representations for multimodal understanding and generation. The InternVid dataset contains over 7 million videos lasting nearly 760K hours, yielding 234M video clips accompanied by detailed descriptions of total 4.1B words. Our core contribution is to develop a scalable approach to autonomously build a high-quality video-text dataset with large language models (LLM), thereby showcasing its efficacy in learning video-language representation at scale. Specifically, we utilize a multi-scale approach to generate video-related descriptions. Furthermore, we introduce ViCLIP, a video-text representation learning model based on ViT-L. Learned on InternVid via contrastive learning, this model demonstrates leading zero-shot action recognition and competitive video retrieval performance. Beyond basic video understanding tasks like recognition and retrieval, our dataset and model have broad applications. They are particularly beneficial for generating interleaved video-text data for learning a video-centric dialogue system, advancing video-to-text and text-to-video generation research. These proposed resources provide a tool for researchers and practitioners interested in multimodal video understanding and generation.Comment: Data and Code: https://github.com/OpenGVLab/InternVideo/tree/main/Data/InternVi

    Soundscape in Urban Forests

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    This Special Issue of Forests explores the role of soundscapes in urban forested areas. It is comprised of 11 papers involving soundscape studies conducted in urban forests from Asia and Africa. This collection contains six research fields: (1) the ecological patterns and processes of forest soundscapes; (2) the boundary effects and perceptual topology; (3) natural soundscapes and human health; (4) the experience of multi-sensory interactions; (5) environmental behavior and cognitive disposition; and (6) soundscape resource management in forests

    Exploring Agency in the Construction of a Translated Character Narrative: A Multiple-Case Study on Early Sibelius-Related Translations into Finnish

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    This dissertation explores the application of the sociological narrative theory in Translation Studies, with a focus on the Finnish translations of texts related to Finland’s national composer, Jean Sibelius. Drawing on Mona Baker and the scholars upon whom she bases her theory, the study first critically examines the premise of the approach and then aims to throw light upon how the theory can be used in the analysis of narratives focussing on an individual. For this purpose, particular attention is paid to translators’ agency and translatorship. In the dissertation, I conduct a multiple-case study on 12 Sibelius-related texts published in Finland and translated into Finnish from Swedish, English and German between 1916 and 1965. A three-part contextual framework is introduced to elucidate some of the relational settings from which the literary materials examined emerged and to provide an understanding of the overall literary genre of non-fiction texts. The texts are then studied with the help of various paratextual sources to uncover different narrative strands and the agencies involved in creating and promoting the nationally significant Sibelius narrative. The results of the study suggest that combining the sociological narrative theory in Translation Studies with agential considerations can provide valuable insights into the mechanisms of narrative construction and help to examine translators’ role in social developments that may have a considerable lifespan. At the same time, it acknowledges that further research into the underlying principles and history of the theory is needed to truly solidify the narrative approach as an academically viable option within Translation Studies. The findings of the study also suggest that questions concerning narrative construction extend beyond the technicalities and structural aspects of the building process. Based on the multiple-case study conducted, I argue that narrative construction needs to be considered more broadly if the aim is to gain a more comprehensive understanding of the narrative examined. KEYWORDS: translation, narrative theory, agency, translatorshipVäitöskirja tarkastelee käännöstieteessä sovellettua sosiologista narratiiviteoriaa ja keskittyy erityisesti Suomen kansallissäveltäjään, Jean Sibeliukseen, liittyviin suomeksi käännettyihin teksteihin. Tutkimus pohjautuu Mona Bakerin ja tämän hyödyntämien tutkijoiden teoreettisiin havaintoihin. Tutkimuksessa Bakerin lähestymistavan perusteita tarkastellaan ensin kriittisesti, minkä jälkeen tapaustutkimusten avulla selvitetään, miten teoriaa voidaan hyödyntää analysoitaessa yksilöön keskittyviä narratiiveja. Erityistä huomiota kiinnitetään kääntäjien toimijuuteen ja kääntäjyyteen. Väitöskirja sisältää tapaustutkimusten sarjan, jossa keskitytään tarkastelemaan 12:ta Sibeliukseen liittyvää vuosien 1916 ja 1965 välillä julkaistua ja suomeksi ruotsista, englannista ja saksasta käännettyä tekstiä. Tapauksia tarkastellaan suhteessa kolmiosaiseen kontekstuaaliseen kehykseen, joka valaisee niitä relationaalisia puitteita, joissa kirjalliset materiaalit syntyivät. Tämän jälkeen tekstejä tarkastellaan paratekstuaalisten lähteiden avulla pyrkimyksenä tunnistaa erilaisia narratiivijuonteita sekä kansallisesti merkittävän Sibelius-narratiivin luomiseen ja ylläpitämiseen vaikuttaneita toimijuuksia. Tutkimuksen tulosten perusteella esitän, että käännöstieteessä hyödynnetyn sosiologisen narratiiviteorian ja toimijuuden tarkastelun yhdistäminen voi tarjota arvokasta tietoa narratiivien rakentumisesta ja auttaa tutkimaan kääntäjien roolia pitkän aikavälin yhteiskunnallisissa kehityskuluissa. Tutkimus paljastaa myös, että narratiiviteorian taustaperiaatteet ja historia vaativat lisätutkimusta ja selvennystä, jos sen halutaan pysyvän elinvoimaisena osana käännöstiedettä. Tutkimuksen löydökset osoittavat, että narratiivien rakentumista koskevat kysymykset eivät rajoitu vain narratiivien synnyn mekaniikkaan ja teknisiin kysymyksiin. Tehtyjen tapaustutkimusten perusteella esitän, että narratiivien rakentumista on tarkasteltava laajemmalla perspektiivillä, jos tavoitteena on syvällinen ymmärrys tarkasteltavasta narratiivista. ASIASANAT: kääntäminen, narratiiviteoria, toimijuus, kääntäjyy

    A Survey on Deep Multi-modal Learning for Body Language Recognition and Generation

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    Body language (BL) refers to the non-verbal communication expressed through physical movements, gestures, facial expressions, and postures. It is a form of communication that conveys information, emotions, attitudes, and intentions without the use of spoken or written words. It plays a crucial role in interpersonal interactions and can complement or even override verbal communication. Deep multi-modal learning techniques have shown promise in understanding and analyzing these diverse aspects of BL. The survey emphasizes their applications to BL generation and recognition. Several common BLs are considered i.e., Sign Language (SL), Cued Speech (CS), Co-speech (CoS), and Talking Head (TH), and we have conducted an analysis and established the connections among these four BL for the first time. Their generation and recognition often involve multi-modal approaches. Benchmark datasets for BL research are well collected and organized, along with the evaluation of SOTA methods on these datasets. The survey highlights challenges such as limited labeled data, multi-modal learning, and the need for domain adaptation to generalize models to unseen speakers or languages. Future research directions are presented, including exploring self-supervised learning techniques, integrating contextual information from other modalities, and exploiting large-scale pre-trained multi-modal models. In summary, this survey paper provides a comprehensive understanding of deep multi-modal learning for various BL generations and recognitions for the first time. By analyzing advancements, challenges, and future directions, it serves as a valuable resource for researchers and practitioners in advancing this field. n addition, we maintain a continuously updated paper list for deep multi-modal learning for BL recognition and generation: https://github.com/wentaoL86/awesome-body-language

    Metaverse: A Vision, Architectural Elements, and Future Directions for Scalable and Realtime Virtual Worlds

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    With the emergence of Cloud computing, Internet of Things-enabled Human-Computer Interfaces, Generative Artificial Intelligence, and high-accurate Machine and Deep-learning recognition and predictive models, along with the Post Covid-19 proliferation of social networking, and remote communications, the Metaverse gained a lot of popularity. Metaverse has the prospective to extend the physical world using virtual and augmented reality so the users can interact seamlessly with the real and virtual worlds using avatars and holograms. It has the potential to impact people in the way they interact on social media, collaborate in their work, perform marketing and business, teach, learn, and even access personalized healthcare. Several works in the literature examine Metaverse in terms of hardware wearable devices, and virtual reality gaming applications. However, the requirements of realizing the Metaverse in realtime and at a large-scale need yet to be examined for the technology to be usable. To address this limitation, this paper presents the temporal evolution of Metaverse definitions and captures its evolving requirements. Consequently, we provide insights into Metaverse requirements. In addition to enabling technologies, we lay out architectural elements for scalable, reliable, and efficient Metaverse systems, and a classification of existing Metaverse applications along with proposing required future research directions
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