Measurement Uncertainty Estimation of a Robust Photometer Circuit

In this paper the uncertainty of a robust photometer circuit (RPC) was estimated. Here, the RPC was considered as a measurement system, having input quantities that were inexactly known, and output quantities that consequently were also inexactly known. Input quantities represent information obtained from calibration certificates, specifications of manufacturers, and tabulated data. Output quantities describe the transfer function of the electrical part of the photodiode. Input quantities were the electronic components of the RPC, the parameters of the model of the photodiode and its sensitivity at 670 nm. The output quantities were the coefficients of both numerator and denominator of the closed-loop transfer function of the RPC. As an example, the gain and phase shift of the RPC versus frequency was evaluated from the transfer function, with their uncertainties and correlation coefficient. Results confirm the robustness of photodiode design

Band-pass filtering of the time sequences of spectral parameters for robust wireless speech recognition

In this paper we address the problem of automatic speech recognition when wireless speech communication systems are involved. In this context, three main sources of distortion should be considered: acoustic environment, speech coding and transmission errors. Whilst the first one has already received a lot of attention, the last two deserve further investigation in our opinion. We have found out that band-pass filtering of the recognition features improves ASR performance when distortions due to these particular communication systems are present. Furthermore, we have evaluated two alternative configurations at different bit error rates (BER) typical of these channels: band-pass filtering the LP-MFCC parameters or a modification of the RASTA-PLP using a sharper low-pass section perform consistently better than LP-MFCC and RASTA-PLP, respectively.Publicad

Uncertainty decoding on Frequency Filtered parameters for robust ASR

The use of feature enhancement techniques to obtain estimates of the clean parameters is a common approach for robust automatic speech recognition (ASR). However, the decoding algorithm typically ignores how accurate these estimates are. Uncertainty decoding methods incorporate this type of information. In this paper, we develop a formulation of the uncertainty decoding paradigm for Frequency Filtered (FF) parameters using spectral subtraction as a feature enhancement method. Additionally, we show that the uncertainty decoding method for FF parameters admits a simple interpretation as a spectral weighting method that assigns more importance to the most reliable spectral components. Furthermore, we suggest combining this method with SSBD-HMM (Spectral Subtraction and Bounded Distance HMM), one recently proposed technique that is able to compensate for the effects of features that are highly contaminated (outliers). This combination pursues two objectives: to improve the results achieved by uncertainty decoding methods and to determine which part of the improvements is due to compensating for the effects of outliers and which part is due to compensating for other less deteriorated features.Publicad

Compounds produced by two robust Bacillus amyloliquefaciens biocontrol strains involved in antimicrobial activity and plant-growth promotion

Several members of the Bacillus genus are potential candidates to be used as biological control agents to combat pests or plant diseases. The bacterial attributes associated to Bacillus behaviour are mainly: the production of antimicrobial compounds, the plant-growth promotion capability and the induction of systemic resistance in plant host. In previous works, we have demonstrated this multifaceted biocontrol activity of B. amyloliquefaciens CECT8237 (UMAF6639) and CECT8238 (UMAF6614) strains, which contributes to plant protection against bacterial and fungal pathogens. In order to identify the bacterial features responsible for the outstanding biocontrol activity of these strains, their genomes were sequenced and analysed. Firstly, those features previously described for other Bacillus to be involved in the biocontrol activity were localized: i) Biosynthetic genes of secondary metabolites. Apart from the lipopeptides, formerly detected, we have demonstrated the production of other additional compounds that might participate in the antibiosis activity; ii) Biosynthetic genes of the volatile compounds 2,3-butanediol and acetoin, both involved in the induction of plant defence responses. Secondly, genetic singularities non-conserved within the Bacillus genus, which might contribute to the biocontrol ability of B. amyloliquefaciens CECT8237 and CECT8238 were identified in both genomes. Among them, we highlight two genomic regions hypothetically implicated in the production of non-characterized secondary metabolites. Ongoing studies are focused on elucidating the functionality of these uncharacterized regions, leading to a better understanding of the mechanisms of action involved in the robust biocontrol skills of these strains.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

The expression profile of secondary metabolites in biofilms of B. amyloliquefaciens CECT 8237 biocontrol strain

The contribution of Bacillus amyloliquefaciens CECT 8237 (UMAF6639) strain to the plant protection against bacterial and fungal pathogens is mainly based on: i) the production of antimicrobial compounds, ii) the plant-growth promotion capability and iii) the induction of systemic resistance in plant host. In previous works, we demonstrated the relevant implication of the three families of lipopeptides in the biocontrol activity and biofilm formation on melon leaves. The analysis of the genome sequence revealed features previously identified in other Bacillus strains, such as genes related to biofilm formation, phytostimulation and induction of systemic resistance in the host plant, and novel genomic regions non-conserved within the Bacillus genus, and therefore with potential genes implicated in the biocontrol activity. Considering the relevance of biofilm formation and production of secondary metabolites in biocontrol, we analyzed the expression profile of several secondary metabolites produced by CECT 8237 in biofilm inducing conditions. To do so, we optimized an in situ detection method based on MALDI-TOF analysis of secondary metabolites within the bacterial colony and in supernatants and pellicles of B. amyloliquefaciens biofilms. We found a major accumulation of these secondary metabolites in the core and middle area of the colony and in the spent medium compared to pellicle. Further studies will help elucidating the real implication of these molecules in the bacterial ecology or in its mechanisms of defence, against competitors, and/or offense, against pathogens and its possible relation with the niche they occupy. This work was supported by grants from the Plan Nacional I+D+I (AGL-2012-31968) and Incentivos a Proyectos de Excelencia de la Junta de Andalucía (P10-AGR-57-97), both cofinanced by FEDER funds (EU). This work was also supported by grant from Koppert B.V. (8.06/60.4086) and European Research Council-Starting Grant BacBio ERC637971.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

The synergy between bounded-distance HMM and spectral subtraction for robust speech recognition

Additive noise generates important losses in automatic speech recognition systems. In this paper, we show that one of the causes contributing to these losses is the fact that conventional recognisers take into consideration feature values that are outliers. The method that we call bounded-distance HMM is a suitable method to avoid that outliers contribute to the recogniser decision. However, this method just deals with outliers, leaving the remaining features unaltered. In contrast, spectral subtraction is able to correct all the features at the expense of introducing some artifacts that, as shown in the paper, cause a larger number of outliers. As a result, we find that bounded-distance HMM and spectral subtraction complement each other well. A comprehensive experimental evaluation was conducted, considering several well-known ASR tasks (of different complexities) and numerous noise types and SNRs. The achieved results show that the suggested combination generally outperforms both the bounded-distance HMM and spectral subtraction individually. Furthermore, the obtained improvements, especially for low and medium SNRs, are larger than the sum of the improvements individually obtained by bounded-distance HMM and spectral subtraction.Publicad

Plan de marketing aplicado a Equaflor-a enla industria florícola

El presente trabajo de Investigación tiene como propósito elaborar un Plan de Marketing aplicado Equaflor-a en la Industria Florícola , el mismo que resulta un poderoso instrumento de gestión para la microempresa con el fin de alcanzar los objetivos planteados. Por otra parte este tipo de plan es muy utilizado en la mayoría de las empresas que buscan un mejor posicionamiento en el mercado, siendo el marketing una herramienta adecuada para este fin. El desarrollo del tema, comienza en primera instancia con un breve resumen sobre los antecedentes de Equaflor-a, dentro del mismo se destaca su reseña histórica; seguido de un Análisis Situacional del Mercado, dentro del cual se efectuó una Análisis Micro y Macroambiente y una Investigación de Mercado recopilando información a través de encuestas a las floristerías de la ciudad de Cuenca que son el mercado objetivo de la microempresa. El Plan se desarrollo en tres etapas, en la primera se aplicó el Plan Estratégico, dentro del cual se definió las estrategias a utilizar, dentro de la segunda se implementó el Plan Operativo, en el que se aplicó el Mix de Marketing, y se determinó el presupuesto necesario para implementar el plan, y por último su evaluación correspondiente. Finalmente, se concluye que el presente trabajo de investigación es factible para Equaflor-a, ya que actualmente no cuenta con un plan adecuado, y a través de la investigación de mercado se determinó su posición actual.Ingeniero ComercialCuenc

Advanced Techniques for Assets Maintenance Management

16th IFAC Symposium on Information Control Problems in Manufacturing INCOM 2018 Bergamo, Italy, 11–13 June 2018. Edited by Marco Macchi, László Monostori, Roberto PintoThe aim of this paper is to remark the importance of new and advanced techniques supporting decision making in different business processes for maintenance and assets management, as well as the basic need of adopting a certain management framework with a clear processes map and the corresponding IT supporting systems. Framework processes and systems will be the key fundamental enablers for success and for continuous improvement. The suggested framework will help to define and improve business policies and work procedures for the assets operation and maintenance along their life cycle. The following sections present some achievements on this focus, proposing finally possible future lines for a research agenda within this field of assets management

An approach to quantify value provided by an engineered asset according to the ISO 5500x series of standards

Asset Intelligence through Integration and Interoperability and Contemporary Vibration Engineering Technologies : Proceedings of the 12th World Congress on Engineering Asset Management and the 13th International Conference on Vibration Engineering and Technology of Machinery. 2-4 August 2017, Brisbane, AustraliaThe purpose of any asset is to provide value to the organization and its stakeholders. In Asset Management, the concept of value encompasses quantitative and qualitative, as well as tangible and intangible benefits that assets may provide to an organization. The definitions of asset and value are not only closely linked but also complementary. An “asset” provides the means for the realisation of “value” thus the management of an asset is strategic and has to be linked to an organization’s value norms. This paper extrapolates from the definitions in ISO 5500x series of standards to describe a generic approach for quantifying the value provided by engineered assets deployed by a business organisation.Unión Europea. 64573

Contribuciones al reconocimiento robusto de habla

En esta tesis doctoral abordamos el problema del reconocimiento robusto de habla. En primer lugar, estudiamos el efecto de los ruidos aditivos sobre el proceso de reconocimiento. Mostramos que el deterioro de la eficacia de los reconocedores se debe, en parte, al excesivo poder de decisión que recae sobre características de entrada que están contaminadas de forma muy severa (outliers). El método que denominamos bounded-distance HMM (BD-HMM) es capaz de limitar la contribución de estas muestras en el reconocedor. Sin embargo, BD-HMM no actúa sobre el resto de observaciones que, sin estar tan altamente contaminadas, sí que están afectadas por la presencia de ruidos aditivos. Por el contrario, sustracción espectral actúa sobre todas las observaciones pero presenta el inconveniente de introducir distorsiones que afectan negativamente a las prestaciones de los reconocedores. En esta tesis mostramos que estas distorsiones producen un aumento del número de outliers. De este modo, encontramos que BD-HMM y sustracción espectral se complementan perfectamente. Nuestros experimentos muestran que esta combinación generalmente supera las tasas de reconocimiento que consiguen tanto BD-HMM como sustracción espectral cuando se aplican de forma aislada. De hecho, las mejoras introducidas por la combinación propuesta, especialmente a SNRs bajas y medias, suelen ser superiores a la suma de las mejoras conseguidas por BD-HMM y sustracción espectral. Por otro lado, la estimación de los parámetros limpios que realiza sustracción espectral deja un cierto nivel de incertidumbre que los reconocedores convencionales no tienen en consideración. En esta tesis modificamos el proceso de reconocimiento para tener en cuenta esta incertidumbre cuando los sistemas se diseñan empleando la parametrización Frequency Filtered (FF). Al permanecer esta parametrización en el dominio del log-espectro, los métodos propuestos se pueden interpretar de una forma sencilla como métodos de ponderación espectral que asignan mayor poder discriminativo a las frecuencias del espectro más fiables. Los resultados que mostramos en esta tesis apoyan la necesidad de incorporar información sobre la incertidumbre de las observaciones para aumentar la robustez del proceso de reconocimiento. Por último, en esta tesis abordamos el problema del reconocimiento de habla cuando la señal de voz es transmitida a través de un canal inalámbrico. Las distorsiones que este tipo de entornos introducen en los parámetros de entrada son más difíciles de modelar que en el caso de tener ruidos aditivos y, por ello, su efecto se ha estudiado de forma experimental en el dominio del espectro de modulación. A la vista de nuestras observaciones, proponemos filtrar paso-banda la evolución temporal de los parámetros para aumentar la robustez del sistema reconocedor. Nuestra propuesta se evalúa para dos parametrizaciones bajo canales con diferentes tasas de error de bit (Bit Error Rate, BER) típicas de este tipo de comunicaciones inalámbricas: por un lado, filtramos paso-banda la evolución temporal de los parámetros LP-MCC y, por otro, sustituimos el filtro paso-banda RASTA-PLP por otro cuya sección paso bajo es más abrupta. Nuestros resultados encuentran mejores resultados con las secuencias filtradas. Finalmente, aplicamos la técnica BD-HMM para reducir el impacto de los outliers en este tipo de entornos inalámbricos. Nuestros resultados muestran que BD-HMM introduce importantes mejoras para canales con altas tasas de error de bit. ____________________________________________In this Ph.D. Thesis we address the problem of robust speech recognition.We start studying the effects of additive noises. We show that one of the causes contributing to the loss of performance in presence of noise is the fact that conventional recogniser take into consideration feature values that are actually outliers.We propose a method that we call Bounded-Distance HMM (BD-HMM) to mitigate the outlier contribution to the recogniser decision. Since BD-HMM just deals with outliers, leaving the remaining features unaltered, we suggest to combine it with other techniques that work on all the features. In particular, we propose to use spectral subtraction as feature enhancement technique, since it complements BD-HMM well. As we prove in the Thesis, spectral subtraction introduces some artifacts that cause a larger number of outliers that can be easily countered by BD-HMM. Our experimental results show that the combination of these techniques generally outperforms both BD-HMM and spectral subtraction individually. Furthermore, the obtained improvements, especially for low and medium SNRs, are generally larger than the sum of the improvements individually obtained by BD-HMM and spectral subtraction. On the other hand, the spectral subtraction-based estimates of the original parameters generate certain level of uncertainty that is not usually taken into account by the decoding algorithm. This Thesis takes into consideration this uncertainty in the recogniser for a specific type of features: the Frequency Filtered parameterization. Moreover, as this parameterization remains in the log-frequency domain, the proposed method admits a simple interpretation as a spectral weighting method that assigns more importance to the most reliable spectral components. Our results show the convenience of incorporating this information in the decoding process. Finally, in this Thesis we tackle the problem of speech recognition when wireless speech communication systems are involved. The distortions caused by this environment are more difficult to model analytically than the ones caused by additive noises. Thus, we experimentally study their effects on the feature spectra and we propose to band-pass filter the recognition features to improve the ASR performance. We have evaluated our proposal in two configurations at different Bit Error Rates (BER) typical of these channels: band-pass filtering the LP-MFCC parameters and a modification of the RASTA-PLP using a sharper low-pass section. Both filtered parameterizations perform consistently better than the unfiltered ones. Additionally, we remove the impact of the outliers by applying BD-HMM, what results in larger improvements for high BER channels