Image-based Recommendations on Styles and Substitutes

Humans inevitably develop a sense of the relationships between objects, some of which are based on their appearance. Some pairs of objects might be seen as being alternatives to each other (such as two pairs of jeans), while others may be seen as being complementary (such as a pair of jeans and a matching shirt). This information guides many of the choices that people make, from buying clothes to their interactions with each other. We seek here to model this human sense of the relationships between objects based on their appearance. Our approach is not based on fine-grained modeling of user annotations but rather on capturing the largest dataset possible and developing a scalable method for uncovering human notions of the visual relationships within. We cast this as a network inference problem defined on graphs of related images, and provide a large-scale dataset for the training and evaluation of the same. The system we develop is capable of recommending which clothes and accessories will go well together (and which will not), amongst a host of other applications.Comment: 11 pages, 10 figures, SIGIR 201

Adaptation of the MacNew quality of life questionnaire after myocardial infarction in an Iranian population

BACKGROUND: Health-related quality of life (HRQL) assessment is an important measure of the impact of a wide range of disease process on an individual. To date, no HRQL tool has been evaluated in an Iranian population with cardiovascular disorders, specifically myocardial infarction, a major cause of mortality and morbidity. The MacNew Heart Disease Health-related Quality of Life instrument is a disease-specific HRQL questionnaire with satisfactory validity and reliability when applied cross-culturally. METHOD: A Persian version of MacNew was prepared by both forward and backward translation by bilinguals after which a feasibility test was performed. Consecutive patients (n = 51) admitted to a coronary care unit with acute myocardial infarction were recruited for measurement of their HRQL with retest one month after discharge in the follow-up clinic. Principal components analysis, intra-class correlation reliability, internal consistency, and test-retest reliability were assessed. RESULTS: Trivial rates of missing data confirmed the acceptability of the tool. Principal component analysis revealed that the three domains, emotional, social and physical, performed as well as in the original studies. Internal consistency was high and comparable to other studies, ranging from 0.92 for the emotional and physical domains, to 0.94 for the social domain, and to 0.95 for the Global score. Domain means of 5, 5.3 and 4.9 for emotional, physical and social respectively indicate that our Iranian population has similar emotional and physical but worse social HRQL scores. Test-retest analysis showed significant correlation in emotional and physical domains (P < 0.05). CONCLUSION: The Persian version of the MacNew questionnaire is comparable to the English version. It has high internal consistency and reasonable reproducibility, making it an appropriate specific quality of life tool for population-based studies and clinical practice in Iran in patients who have survived an acute myocardial infraction. Further studies are needed to confirm its validity in larger populations with cardiovascular diseas

Effects of Acute Physical Activity on NIH Toolbox-Measured Cognitive Functions Among Children in Authentic Education Settings

Introduction: Identifying a dose of physical activity (PA) that can improve cognitive function in children has important implications for school-day PA recommendations. Researchers and educators have interest in this link as it relates to both health and academic performance. This study examined the dose-response relationship between PA and improvement in cognition in a sample of fifth and sixth grade students. Methods: Participants (n = 156) from eight classes each completed two of four different cognitive assessments on an iPad, both before and after exposure to one of four randomized, 10-min PA conditions (sedentary, light, moderate, and vigorous). Conditions were standardized through use of videos to lead movement, and participants wore accelerometers to confirm fidelity to PA condition. The four cognitive assessments were selected from the NIH Toolbox Cognition Battery, and included Dimensional Change Card Sort, Flanker, Pattern Comparison, and Picture Sequence Memory tests. Hierarchical linear regression models were used to estimate the effects of condition on each test using an intention to treat analysis. Results: Fidelity to PA condition was acceptable for sedentary and light conditions, but became less precise for moderate and vigorous conditions. No significant time by condition interaction was observed for any of the cognitive assessment scores. Conclusions: Results did not substantiate a dose-response link between PA intensity and selected measures of cognitive function. More research is needed to investigate the potentially nuanced effects of short bouts of PA on cognitive functioning in children

Aquifer thermal energy storage : A well doublet experiment at increased temperatures

This is the published version. Copyright 1983 American Geophysical UnionThe two main objectives of this communication are to present a study of potential advantages and disadvantages of the doublet supply-injection well configuration in an aquifer thermal energy storage (ATES) system and to report on aquifer storage problems with injection temperatures in the 80°C range. A 3-month injection-storage-recovery cycle followed by a 7.3-month cycle constituted the main experiment. The injection volumes were 25,402 m3 and 58,063 m3 at average temperatures of 58.5°C and 81°C respectively. Unlikely previous experiments at the Mobile site, no clogging of the injection well due to clay particle swelling, dispersion, and migration was observed. This is attributed to the fact that the supply water used for injection contained a cation concentration equal to or slightly greater than that in the native groundwater. For cycles I and II, the fraction of injected energy recovered in a volume of water equal to the injection volume was 0.56 and 0.45 respectively. Both groundwater temperature and tracer data support the conclusion that this relatively low recovery was due to the detrimental effects of free thermal convection, possibly augmented by longitudinal zones of high permeability. Construction of a partially penetrating recovery well improved recovery efficiency but is not thought to be an adequate solution to thermal stratification. A maximum increase of 1.24 cm in relative land surface elevation was recorded near the end of second cycle injection. The engineering implications of such an elevation change would have to be considered, especially if an ATES system were being designed in an urban environment. A third cycle was started at the Mobile site on April 7, 1982. This final experiment contains a partially penetrating, dual-recovery well system which is expected to maximize energy recovery from a thermally stratified storage aquifer

Magnetic phase transitions in Gd64Sc36 studied using non-contact ultrasonics

The speed and attenuation of ultrasound propagation can be used to determine material properties and identify phase transitions. Standard ultrasonic contact techniques are not always convenient due to the necessity of using couplant; however, recently reliable non-contact ultrasonic techniques involving electromagnetic generation and detection of ultrasound with electromagnetic acoustic transducers (EMATs) have been developed for use on electrically conducting and/or magnetic materials. We present a detailed study of magnetic phase transitions in a single crystal sample of Gd64Sc36 magnetic alloy using contact and non-contact ultrasonic techniques for two orientations of external magnetic field. Phase diagrams are constructed based on measurements of elastic constant C33, the attenuation and the efficiency of generation when using an EMAT. The EMATs are shown to provide additional information related to the magnetic phase transitions in the studied sample, and results identify a conical helix phase in Gd64Sc36 in the magnetic field orientation

Grazing Behaviour of Dorper Sheep and Farmed Goats and Their Implications for Natural Resource Management in Western NSW

The introduction of exotic herbivores into the semi-arid and arid zones of Australia resulted in dramatic change in the native vegetation (e.g. Noble and Tongway 1986; Friedel et al. 1990). Overgrazing and trampling reduced ground cover and changed species composition from dominance by perennial grasses and shrubs to dominance by annual species over extensive areas (e.g. Gunn 1986), or assisted the encroachment of woody species (Wilcox and Cunningham 1994). It is particularly in this context that the recent introduction of new sheep breeds, reputedly hardier than traditional Merinos, and the increasing trend to farming or re-domestication of feral goats, poses serious questions for the ecological sustainability of the region. This ongoing project aims to combine information from laboratory experiments, field studies and producer experience to develop practical management strategies that are supportive of regional and national ground cover targets aimed at reducing wind erosion and maintaining biodiversity values. We report the preliminary results and recommend management strategies

Fermi Surface as the Driving Mechanism for Helical Antiferromagnetic Ordering in Gd-Y Alloys

The first direct experimental evidence for the Fermi surface (FS) driving the helical antiferromagnetic ordering in a gadolinium-yttrium alloy is reported. The presence of a FS sheet capable of nesting is revealed, and the nesting vector associated with the sheet is found to be in excellent agreement with the periodicity of the helical ordering.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

Challenges in context-aware mobile language learning: the MASELTOV approach

Smartphones, as highly portable networked computing devices with embedded sensors including GPS receivers, are ideal platforms to support context-aware language learning. They can enable learning when the user is en-gaged in everyday activities while out and about, complementing formal language classes. A significant challenge, however, has been the practical implementation of services that can accurately identify and make use of context, particularly location, to offer meaningful language learning recommendations to users. In this paper we review a range of approaches to identifying context to support mobile language learning. We consider how dynamically changing aspects of context may influence the quality of recommendations presented to a user. We introduce the MASELTOV project’s use of context awareness combined with a rules-based recommendation engine to present suitable learning content to recent immigrants in urban areas; a group that may benefit from contextual support and can use the city as a learning environment

Generating spatially entangled itinerant photons with waveguide quantum electrodynamics

Realizing a fully connected network of quantum processors requires the ability to distribute quantum entanglement. For distant processing nodes, this can be achieved by generating, routing, and capturing spatially entangled itinerant photons. In this work, we demonstrate the deterministic generation of such photons using superconducting transmon qubits that are directly coupled to a waveguide. In particular, we generate two-photon N00N states and show that the state and spatial entanglement of the emitted photons are tunable via the qubit frequencies. Using quadrature amplitude detection, we reconstruct the moments and correlations of the photonic modes and demonstrate state preparation fidelities of 84%. Our results provide a path toward realizing quantum communication and teleportation protocols using itinerant photons generated by quantum interference within a waveguide quantum electrodynamics architecture

A qualitative study of stakeholders' perspectives on the social network service environment

Over two billion people are using the Internet at present, assisted by the mediating activities of software agents which deal with the diversity and complexity of information. There are, however, ethical issues due to the monitoring-and-surveillance, data mining and autonomous nature of software agents. Considering the context, this study aims to comprehend stakeholders' perspectives on the social network service environment in order to identify the main considerations for the design of software agents in social network services in the near future. Twenty-one stakeholders, belonging to three key stakeholder groups, were recruited using a purposive sampling strategy for unstandardised semi-structured e-mail interviews. The interview data were analysed using a qualitative content analysis method. It was possible to identify three main considerations for the design of software agents in social network services, which were classified into the following categories: comprehensive understanding of users' perception of privacy, user type recognition algorithms for software agent development and existing software agents enhancement