Ambient Multi-Camera Personal Documentary

Polymnia is an automated solution for the creation of ambient multi-camera personal documentary films. This short paper introduces the system, emphasising the rule-based documentary generation engine that we have created to assemble an edited narrative from source footage. We describe how such automatically generated media can be integrated with and augment personally-authored images and videos as a contribution to an individual’s personal digital memory

Insulation for cryogenic tanks has reduced thickness and weight

Dual seal insulation, consisting of an inner layer of sealed-cell Mylar honeycomb core and an outer helium purge channel of fiber glass reinforced phenolic honeycomb core, is used as a thin, lightweight insulation for external surfaces of cryogenic-propellant tanks

A Feature-Augmented Grammar for Automated Media Production

The IST Polymnia project is creating a fully automated system for personalised video generation, including content creation, selection and composition. This paper presents a linguistically motivated solution using context-free feature-augmented grammar rules to describe editing tasks and hence automate video editing. The solution is media and application independent

Benefits and Risks of Weight-Loss Treatment for Older, Obese Women

Background: A key issue in the treatment of obesity in older adults is whether the health benefits of weight loss outweigh the potential risks with respect to musculoskeletal injury. Objective: To compare change in weight, improvements in metabolic risk factors, and reported musculoskeletal adverse events in middle-aged (50-59 years) and older (65-74 years), obese women. Materials and methods: Participants completed an initial 6-month lifestyle intervention for weight loss, comprised of weekly group sessions, followed by 12 months of extended care with biweekly contacts. Weight and fasting blood samples were assessed at baseline, month 6, and month 18; data regarding adverse events were collected throughout the duration of the study. Results: Both middle-aged (n = 162) and older (n = 56) women achieved significant weight reductions from baseline to month 6 (10.1 +/- 0.68 kg and 9.3 +/- 0.76 kg, respectively) and maintained a large proportion of their losses at month 18 (7.6 +/- 0.87 kg and 7.6 +/- 1.3 kg, respectively); there were no significant differences between the two groups with respect to weight change. Older women further experienced significant reductions in systolic blood pressure, HbA(1c), and C-reactive protein from baseline to month 6 and maintained these improvements at month 18. Despite potential safety concerns, we found that older women were no more likely to experience musculoskeletal adverse events during the intervention as compared with their middle-aged counterparts. Conclusion: These results suggest that older, obese women can experience significant health benefits from lifestyle treatment for obesity, including weight loss and improvements in disease risk factors. Further investigation of the impact of weight loss on additional health-related parameters and risks (eg, body composition, muscular strength, physical functioning, and injuries) in older adults is needed.National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute R18HL73326University of FloridaDivision of Statistics and Scientific Computatio

The low or retrograde spin of the first extragalactic microquasar: implications for Blandford-Znajek powering of jets

Transitions to high mass accretion rates in black hole X-ray binaries are associated with the ejection of powerful, relativistically moving jets. The mechanism that powers such events is thought to be linked to tapping of the angular momentum (spin) of the black hole, the rate of accretion through the disc or some combination of the two. We can attempt to discriminate between these different possibilities by comparing proxies for jet power with spin estimates. Because of the small number of sources that reach Eddington mass accretion rates and have therefore been suggested to act as ‘standard candles’, there has been much recent debate as to whether a significant correlation exists between jet power and black hole spin. We perform continuum fitting to the high-quality, disc-dominated XMM–Newton spectra of the extragalactic microquasar discovered in M31. Assuming prograde spin, we find that for sensible constraints the spin is always very low (a* ≤ 0.15 at 3s).When combined with a proxy for jet power derived from the maximum 5 GHz radio luminosity during a bright flaring event, we find that the source sits well above the previously reported, rising correlation that would indicate that spin tapping is the dominant mechanism for powering the jets, i.e. it is too ‘radio loud’ for such a low spin. The notable exceptions require the inclination to be improbably small or the jet to be very fast. We investigate whether this could be a byproduct of selecting prograde-only spin, finding that the data statistically favour a substantially retrograde spin for the same constraints (a* ≤-0.17 at 3s). Although theoretically improbable, this remarkable finding could be confirmation that retrograde spin can power such jets via spin-tapping, as has been suggested for certain radio quasars. In either case this work demonstrates the value of studying local extragalactic microquasars as a means to better understand the physics of jet launching

First excitations in two- and three-dimensional random-field Ising systems

We present results on the first excited states for the random-field Ising model. These are based on an exact algorithm, with which we study the excitation energies and the excitation sizes for two- and three-dimensional random-field Ising systems with a Gaussian distribution of the random fields. Our algorithm is based on an approach of Frontera and Vives which, in some cases, does not yield the true first excited states. Using the corrected algorithm, we find that the order-disorder phase transition for three dimensions is visible via crossings of the excitations-energy curves for different system sizes, while in two-dimensions these crossings converge to zero disorder. Furthermore, we obtain in three dimensions a fractal dimension of the excitations cluster of d_s=2.42(2). We also provide analytical droplet arguments to understand the behavior of the excitation energies for small and large disorder as well as close to the critical point.Comment: 17 pages, 12 figure

Global stability analysis of birhythmicity in a self-sustained oscillator

We analyze global stability properties of birhythmicity in a self-sustained system with random excitations. The model is a multi-limit cycles variation of the van der Pol oscillatorintroduced to analyze enzymatic substrate reactions in brain waves. We show that the two frequencies are strongly influenced by the nonlinear coefficients $\alpha$ and $\beta$. With a random excitation, such as a Gaussian white noise, the attractor's global stability is measured by the mean escape time $\tau$ from one limit-cycle. An effective activation energy barrier is obtained by the slope of the linear part of the variation of the escape time $\tau$ versus the inverse noise-intensity 1/D. We find that the trapping barriers of the two frequencies can be very different, thus leaving the system on the same attractor for an overwhelming time. However, we also find that the system is nearly symmetric in a narrow range of the parameters.Comment: 17 pages, 8 figures, to appear on Choas, 201