Material Recognition CNNs and Hierarchical Planning for Biped Robot Locomotion on Slippery Terrain

In this paper we tackle the problem of visually predicting surface friction for environments with diverse surfaces, and integrating this knowledge into biped robot locomotion planning. The problem is essential for autonomous robot locomotion since diverse surfaces with varying friction abound in the real world, from wood to ceramic tiles, grass or ice, which may cause difficulties or huge energy costs for robot locomotion if not considered. We propose to estimate friction and its uncertainty from visual estimation of material classes using convolutional neural networks, together with probability distribution functions of friction associated with each material. We then robustly integrate the friction predictions into a hierarchical (footstep and full-body) planning method using chance constraints, and optimize the same trajectory costs at both levels of the planning method for consistency. Our solution achieves fully autonomous perception and locomotion on slippery terrain, which considers not only friction and its uncertainty, but also collision, stability and trajectory cost. We show promising friction prediction results in real pictures of outdoor scenarios, and planning experiments on a real robot facing surfaces with different friction

A General Class of Transfer Learning Regression without Implementation Cost

We propose a novel framework that unifies and extends existing methods of transfer learning (TL) for regression. To bridge a pretrained source model to the model on a target task, we introduce a density-ratio reweighting function, which is estimated through the Bayesian framework with a specific prior distribution. By changing two intrinsic hyperparameters and the choice of the density-ratio model, the proposed method can integrate three popular methods of TL: TL based on cross-domain similarity regularization, a probabilistic TL using the density-ratio estimation, and fine-tuning of pretrained neural networks. Moreover, the proposed method can benefit from its simple implementation without any additional cost; the regression model can be fully trained using off-the-shelf libraries for supervised learning in which the original output variable is simply transformed to a new output variable. We demonstrate its simplicity, generality, and applicability using various real data applications.Comment: 31 pages, 6 figure

父親の家事・育児意識と行動の変容とその要因に関する研究 ―2000 年と2011 年のデータ比較を通して―

本研究は、今日の父親の育児意識・行動の変化と、その変化を規定する要因について、父親の内的特性との関連を検討し、父親の育児参画と養育性、親役割アイデンティティの形成を促し支援の視点について論議することを目的とした。　研究Ⅰでは、方法は、2000 年と2011 年に、父親・母親107 組を対象にアンケート調査を行い、育児意識と行動の変化について検討した。その結果、父親の家事・育児意識と参加度の自己評価は、11 年前に比べ高まっていた。母親の父親も評価高かったが、11 年前に比べ低下していた。　研究Ⅱでは、研究Ⅰにおける2011 年の被験者を対象に、父親の養育経験、不安・愛着に関する質問項目を津付加して調査し、今日の父親の育児意識・行動を規定する要因について検討した。その結果、父親の親との親密性、父親の父親との良好な関係、子ども時代の熱中経験、父親自身の受容的愛着と関連していた。これらの結果をもとに、育児における父親参画の在り方と養育性支援の視点について検討した。　The purpose of this study was to discuss about perspectives of the support in fathers’ child-rearing, comparing the fathers’ consciousness and daily practices of household and child-rearing with presence and eleven years ago. Furthermore we analyzed on relationships with father’s inner factors of their changes.　The method was to use the face-sheet. We gathered the data from 107 father and mother dyads in 2011, and 137 dyads in 2000. The data suggested that fathers’ believes of their roles on household and child-rearing changed from traditional thought to new perspectives. Participation of daily practices increased than eleven years ago. Their wives evaluated them as he father and as husband. The father’s practices were related with their experiences in childhood of intimacy of parents, good relationships with father’s father and exploring interested things in childhood, also related with father’s attachment.　Based on these consequences, we discussed about how to develop the fathers’ nurturance and social support

Effect of atherothrombotic aorta on outcomes of total aortic arch replacement

ObjectiveThe effect of an atherothrombotic aorta on the short- and long-term outcomes of total aortic arch replacement, including postoperative neurologic deficits, remains unknown. We evaluated this relationship and also elucidated the synergistic effect of multiple other risk factors, in addition to an atherothrombotic aorta, on the neurologic outcome.MethodsA group of 179 consecutive patients undergoing total aortic arch replacement were studied. An atherothrombotic aorta was present in 34 patients (19%), more than moderate leukoaraiosis in 71 (39.7%), and significant extracranial carotid artery stenosis in 27 (15.1%). In-hospital deaths occurred in 2 patients, 1 (2.9%) of 34 patients with and 1 (0.7%) of 145 patients without an atherothrombotic aorta (P = .26). Permanent neurologic deficits occurred in 4 (2.2%) and transient neurologic deficits in 17 (9.5%) patients. Multivariate analysis demonstrated that the risk factors for transient neurologic deficits were an atherothrombotic aorta (odds ratio, 4.4), extracranial carotid artery stenosis (odds ratio, 5.5), moderate/severe leukoaraiosis (odds ratio, 3.6), and cardiopulmonary bypass time (odds ratio, 1.02). To calculate the probability of transient neurologic deficits, the following equation was derived: probability of transient neurologic deficits = {1 + exp [7.276 − 1.489 (atherothrombotic aorta) − 1.285 (leukoaraiosis) − 1.701 (extracranial carotid artery stenosis) − 0.017 (cardiopulmonary bypass time)]}−1. An exponential increase occurred in the probability of transient neurologic deficits with presence of an atherothrombotic aorta and other risk factors in relation to the cardiopulmonary bypass time. Survival at 3 years after surgery was significantly reduced in patients with vs without an atherothrombotic aorta (75.0% ± 8.8% vs 89.2% ± 3.1%, P = .01).ConclusionsPatients with an atherothrombotic aorta and associated preoperative comorbidities might be predisposed to adverse short- and long-term outcomes, including transient neurologic deficits

The YlmG protein has a conserved function related to the distribution of nucleoids in chloroplasts and cyanobacteria

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Reminiscent of their free-living cyanobacterial ancestor, chloroplasts proliferate by division coupled with the partition of nucleoids (DNA-protein complexes). Division of the chloroplast envelope membrane is performed by constriction of the ring structures at the division site. During division, nucleoids also change their shape and are distributed essentially equally to the daughter chloroplasts. Although several components of the envelope division machinery have been identified and characterized, little is known about the molecular components/mechanisms underlying the change of the nucleoid structure.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>In order to identify new factors that are involved in the chloroplast division, we isolated <it>Arabidopsis thaliana </it>chloroplast division mutants from a pool of random cDNA-overexpressed lines. We found that the overexpression of a previously uncharacterized gene (<it>AtYLMG1-1</it>) of cyanobacterial origin results in the formation of an irregular network of chloroplast nucleoids, along with a defect in chloroplast division. In contrast, knockdown of <it>AtYLMG1-1 </it>resulted in a concentration of the nucleoids into a few large structures, but did not affect chloroplast division. Immunofluorescence microscopy showed that AtYLMG1-1 localizes in small puncta on thylakoid membranes, to which a subset of nucleoids colocalize. In addition, in the cyanobacterium <it>Synechococcus elongates</it>, overexpression and deletion of <it>ylmG </it>also displayed defects in nucleoid structure and cell division.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>These results suggest that the proper distribution of nucleoids requires the YlmG protein, and the mechanism is conserved between cyanobacteria and chloroplasts. Given that <it>ylmG </it>exists in a cell division gene cluster downstream of <it>ftsZ </it>in gram-positive bacteria and that <it>ylmG </it>overexpression impaired the chloroplast division, the nucleoid partitioning by YlmG might be related to chloroplast and cyanobacterial division processes.</p

Transport Barrier Analysis of LHD Plasmas in Gomparison with Neoclassical Models

Abstract In the local Electron Cyclotron Heating (ECH) experiments, high electron temperature plasmas have been olrtained in Compact Helical System (CHS), and recently in the Large Helical Device (LHD). The internal transport barrier (ITB) with strong positive radial electric field has been experimentally observed in CHS, which reduces neo-classical ripple transport and anomalous transport losses. The same physics picture; are expected in LHD high temperature plasmas. Several ion temperature profiles are assumed for analyzing LHD experimental data, and it is found that the experimentally obtained electron thermal transpc,rt coefficients seem to roughly agree with neoclassical ripple transport outside the ITB region. Howeler, around ITB region, about ten times higher than the neoclassical coefficients with strong ambipc&apos;lar electric field prediction are obtained. The anomalous transport losses might be dominant and be redtLced by this strong electric field shear around the ITB region