Circle Detection Using the Image Ray Transform

Physical analogies are an exciting paradigm for creating techniques for image feature extraction. A transform using an analogy to light rays has been developed for the detection of circular and tubular features. It uses a 2D ray tracing algorithm to follow rays through an image, interacting at a low level, to emphasise higher level features. It has been empirically tested as a pre-processor to aid circle detection with the Hough Transform and has been shown to provide a clear improvement over standard techniques. The transform was also used on natural images and we show its ability to highlight circles even in complex scenes. We also show the flexibility available to the technique through adjustment of parameters

From Affordable to Open: Evaluating Open Educational Resources

The following is the text of a presentation given by Mark Cummings at the Charleston Conference on November 8, 2018. It was delivered as part of a three-person panel exploring “The Library’s Opportunity in Affordable Textbooks.” Also presenting were Mark McBride, Library Senior Strategist at SUNY, and Gwen Evans, Executive Director of OhioLINK

The image ray transform for structural feature detection

The use of analogies to physical phenomena is an exciting paradigm in computer vision that allows unorthodox approaches to feature extraction, creating new techniques with unique properties. A technique known as the "image ray transform" has been developed based upon an analogy to the propagation of light as rays. The transform analogises an image to a set of glass blocks with refractive index linked to pixel properties and then casts a large number of rays through the image. The course of these rays is accumulated into an output image. The technique can successfully extract tubular and circular features and we show successful circle detection, ear biometrics and retinal vessel extraction. The transform has also been extended through the use of multiple rays arranged as a beam to increase robustness to noise, and we show quantitative results for fully automatic ear recognition, achieving 95.2% rank one recognition across 63 subjects

Developing Broad Business Perspective Competencies By Partnering With Practitioners

The CPA Vision Project - 2011 and Beyond) is a blueprint for the accounting profession of the 21st Century. From this visioning process the AICPA Core Competency Framework for Entry into the Accounting Profession (1999) was developed. It is from this framework that accounting educators are invited to adjust curriculum to provide students with the opportunity to develop these functional, personal, and broad business perspective core competencies so that students can meet the accounting profession challenges of the 21st century. This paper provides a specific model for developing broad business perspective competencies by partnering with a practitioner. Although using professionals in the classroom is not a new idea, this paper offers a unique perspective of the process by juxtaposing the perspectives of the academic and the practitioner in the processes of developing the partnership, planning the classroom event (which includes developing the broad business perspective competencies), designing and collecting student feedback, and evaluating the results of the classroom event and partnership

Population structure, long-term connectivity, and effective size of mutton snapper (Lutjanus analis) in the Caribbean Sea and Florida Keys

Genetic structure and average long-term connectivity and effective size of mutton snapper (Lutjanus analis) sampled from offshore localities in the U.S. Caribbean and the Florida Keys were assessed by using nuclear-encoded microsatellites and a fragment of mitochondrial DNA. No significant differences in allele, genotype (microsatellites), or haplotype (mtDNA) distributions were detected; tests of selective neutrality (mtDNA) were nonsignificant after Bonferroni correction. Heuristic estimates of average long-term rate of migration (proportion of migrant individuals/generation) between geographically adjacent localities varied from 0.0033 to 0.0054, indicating that local subpopulations could respond independently of environmental perturbations. Estimates of average longterm effective population sizes varied from 341 to 1066 and differed significantly among several of the localities. These results indicate that over time larval drift and interregional adult movement may not be sufficient to maintain population sustainability across the region and that there may be different demographic stocks at some of the localities studied. The estimate of long-term effective population size at the locality offshore of St. Croix was below the minimum threshold size considered necessary to maintain the equilibrium between the loss of adaptive genetic variance from genetic drift and its replacement by mutation. Genetic variability in mutton snapper likely is maintained at the intraregional level by aggregate spawning and random mating of local populations. This feature is perhaps ironic in that aggregate spawning also renders mutton snapper especially vulnerable to overexploitation

Appraising Work Group Performance: New Productivity Opportunities in Hospitality Management

In - Appraising Work Group Performance: New Productivity Opportunities in Hospitality Management – a discussion by Mark R. Edwards, Associate Professor, College of Engineering, Arizona State University and Leslie Edwards Cummings, Assistant Professor, College of Hotel Administration University of Nevada, Las Vegas; the authors initially provide: “Employee group performance variation accounts for a significant portion of the degree of productivity in the hotel, motel, and food service sectors of the hospitality industry. The authors discuss TEAMSG, a microcomputer based approach to appraising and interpreting group performance. TEAMSG appraisal allows an organization to profile and to evaluate groups, facilitating the targeting of training and development decisions and interventions, as well as the more equitable distribution of organizational rewards.” “The caliber of employee group performance is a major determinant in an organization\u27s productivity and success within the hotel and food service industries,” Edwards and Cummings say. “Gaining accurate information about the quality of performance of such groups as organizational divisions, individual functional departments, or work groups can be as enlightening...” the authors further reveal. This perspective is especially important not only for strategic human resources planning purposes, but also for diagnosing development needs and for differentially distributing organizational rewards.” The authors will have you know, employee requirements in an unpredictable environment, which is what the hospitality industry largely is, are difficult to quantify. In an effort to measure elements of performance Edwards and Cummings look to TEAMSG, which is an acronym for Team Evaluation and Management System for Groups. They develop the concept. In discussing background for employees, Edwards and Cummings point-out that employees - at the individual level - must often possess and exercise varied skills. In group circumstances employees often work at locations outside of, or move from corporate unit-to-unit, as in the case of a project team. Being able to transcend individual-to-group mentality is imperative. “A solution which addresses the frustration and lack of motivation on the part of the employee is to coach, develop, appraise, and reward employees on the basis of group achievement,” say the authors. “An appraisal, effectively developed and interpreted, has at least three functions,” Edwards and Cummings suggest, and go on to define them. The authors do place a great emphasis on rewards and interventions to bolster the assertion set forth in their thesis statement. Edwards and Cummings warn that individual agendas can threaten, erode, and undermine group performance; there is no - I - in TEAM