Utilization of Goddard and IITRI formulae for the evaluation of the cost of satellites - Application to the ESRO programs

Use of Goddard and IITRI formulae for evaluating cost of ESRO satellite program

Sound Event Detection in Synthetic Audio: Analysis of the DCASE 2016 Task Results

As part of the 2016 public evaluation challenge on Detection and Classification of Acoustic Scenes and Events (DCASE 2016), the second task focused on evaluating sound event detection systems using synthetic mixtures of office sounds. This task, which follows the `Event Detection - Office Synthetic' task of DCASE 2013, studies the behaviour of tested algorithms when facing controlled levels of audio complexity with respect to background noise and polyphony/density, with the added benefit of a very accurate ground truth. This paper presents the task formulation, evaluation metrics, submitted systems, and provides a statistical analysis of the results achieved, with respect to various aspects of the evaluation dataset

Memory Resilient Gain-scheduled State-Feedback Control of Uncertain LTI/LPV Systems with Time-Varying Delays

The stabilization of uncertain LTI/LPV time delay systems with time varying delays by state-feedback controllers is addressed. At the difference of other works in the literature, the proposed approach allows for the synthesis of resilient controllers with respect to uncertainties on the implemented delay. It is emphasized that such controllers unify memoryless and exact-memory controllers usually considered in the literature. The solutions to the stability and stabilization problems are expressed in terms of LMIs which allow to check the stability of the closed-loop system for a given bound on the knowledge error and even optimize the uncertainty radius under some performance constraints; in this paper, the $\mathcal{H}_\infty$ performance measure is considered. The interest of the approach is finally illustrated through several examples

The bag-of-frames approach: a not so sufficient model for urban soundscapes

The "bag-of-frames" approach (BOF), which encodes audio signals as the long-term statistical distribution of short-term spectral features, is commonly regarded as an effective and sufficient way to represent environmental sound recordings (soundscapes) since its introduction in an influential 2007 article. The present paper describes a concep-tual replication of this seminal article using several new soundscape datasets, with results strongly questioning the adequacy of the BOF approach for the task. We show that the good accuracy originally re-ported with BOF likely result from a particularly thankful dataset with low within-class variability, and that for more realistic datasets, BOF in fact does not perform significantly better than a mere one-point av-erage of the signal's features. Soundscape modeling, therefore, may not be the closed case it was once thought to be. Progress, we ar-gue, could lie in reconsidering the problem of considering individual acoustical events within each soundscape

Influence of Clinical Instructor and Physical Therapist Student Characteristics on the Use of Standardized Tests and Measures in Clinical Practice

Problem Statement: Physical therapist (PT) students report discord between what they learn in the academic environment and what they experience in clinical practice. Despite increasing reporting requirements, standardized tests and measures (STMs) are not well integrated into routine clinical practice. The primary purposes of this study were to (1) examine clinical instructor (CI) and PT student characteristics and beliefs that influence the use of STMs in clinical practice, and (2) explore alignment between the STMs students learn during academic preparation to those commonly reported in clinical practice. Procedures/Methodology: In this mixed method sequential explanatory study, participant demographic characteristics, perceived STM confidence, value, attitudes/beliefs, and use were examined for relationships. PT students (n=123) and CIs (n=127) were surveyed during a terminal clinical experience (CE). Surveys were validated for face and content validity and internal consistency. A purposively selected subset of PT students (n=8) and CIs (n=9) were interviewed. Results: Significant, fair to moderate correlations were found between constructs of value, use, and confidence for both groups. Significant differences in STM value change were found between CIs and PT students. Significant change in student confidence in STM selection, administration, and interpretation occurred over the CE. Differences in STM selection confidence change by clinical focus area, and setting were identified. Clinical instructor APTA member status and number of students supervised were correlated with STM value and use constructs. A significant relationship was found between extrinsic and intrinsic drivers for STM use. Barriers and concerns regarding STMs are prevalent, with differences by practice setting and patient/client populations noted. Five primary themes and twelve subthemes were identified and consistent across groups. Report of STM use was high, although both groups identified concerns with STM suitability and applicability. Both groups felt students brought new knowledge to the clinic; neither group asserted definitively that this led to lasting change in practice as a result. Significance: Results from this study provides a clearer picture of the current state of STM utilization in PT practice, may guide efforts to advance STM use, and could aid academic programs in establishing priorities and teaching strategies for STM education within the curricula

The Violence and Monstrosity of Time: The Symbolism of Oceans and the Representations of Leviathan and the Kraken in English Poetry and Literature

Jusqu’au XVIIIe siècle, la vision des océans et du Léviathan comme forces du mal et du chaos primordial, que seul Dieu pouvait tenir en respect, était essentiellement d’inspiration biblique. Dans son essai de 1757, A Philosophical Enquiry, Edmund Burke en fit pour la première fois des modèles du sublime. Ce nouveau statut, les remous de l’histoire européenne de la fin du XVIIIe siècle, et le fait que les Romantiques aient redécouvert la Grèce antique (la mer étant un symbole majeur dans Œdipe à Colone de Sophocle) expliquent la récurrence accrue du tragique et de la mort associés aux voyages maritimes. Mais cette nouvelle approche se démarquait radicalement de la théologie de la Grâce et de la promesse de la destruction ultime de la Bête. Les poèmes de Coleridge, Shelley, ou Tennyson et l’autobiographie d’Osbert Sitwell évoqués ici expriment la désorientation des auteurs dans un monde incompréhensible abandonné de Dieu, et leur expérience de la création comme tout autant consolatrice qu’angoissante et « prométhéenne ». Nous analyserons donc la manière dont les océans déchaînés et leurs créatures répondaient au besoin des artistes de métaphoriser la monstruosité du temps dans un monde sans Dieu, de donner forme au trauma individuel et collectif, et de définir leur statut de créateurs.Until the eighteenth century, the vision of oceans and Leviathan as forces of evil and primordial chaos, only controlled by God, had mainly been influenced by the Biblical tradition. In his 1757 A Philosophical Enquiry, Edmund Burke reassessed them as paradigms of the sublime. This new status, together with the violent episodes of late eighteenth-century European history, and the Romantics’ turning to Ancient Greece—the sea being a major symbol in Sophocles’ Oedipus at Colonus—, accounted for the increasing frequency of the fatal and tragic voyage and shipwreck topoï in literature. But this also meant a complete break with the theology of Grace promising the ultimate destruction of the Beast. The poems by Coleridge, Shelley, or Tennyson, and Osbert Sitwell’s autobiography express the artists’ disorientation in an incomprehensible world forsaken by God, and their experience of creation as compensatory but angst-ridden and “Promethean”. This paper will address the way furious oceans and their creatures answered writers’ need to metaphorize the monstrosity of time in a godless world, to image individual and collective trauma, and define themselves as creators