Image segmentation with adaptive region growing based on a polynomial surface model

A new method for segmenting intensity images into smooth surface segments is presented. The main idea is to divide the image into flat, planar, convex, concave, and saddle patches that coincide as well as possible with meaningful object features in the image. Therefore, we propose an adaptive region growing algorithm based on low-degree polynomial fitting. The algorithm uses a new adaptive thresholding technique with the L∞ fitting cost as a segmentation criterion. The polynomial degree and the fitting error are automatically adapted during the region growing process. The main contribution is that the algorithm detects outliers and edges, distinguishes between strong and smooth intensity transitions and finds surface segments that are bent in a certain way. As a result, the surface segments corresponding to meaningful object features and the contours separating the surface segments coincide with real-image object edges. Moreover, the curvature-based surface shape information facilitates many tasks in image analysis, such as object recognition performed on the polynomial representation. The polynomial representation provides good image approximation while preserving all the necessary details of the objects in the reconstructed images. The method outperforms existing techniques when segmenting images of objects with diffuse reflecting surfaces

Pressure rig for repetitive casting

The invention is a pressure rig for repetitive casting of metal. The pressure rig performs like a piston for feeding molten metal into a mold. Pressure is applied to an expandable rubber diaphragm which expands like a balloon to force the metal into the mold. A ceramic cavity which holds molten metal is lined with blanket-type insulating material, necessitating only a relining for subsequent use and eliminating the lengthy cavity preparation inherent in previous rigs. In addition, the expandable rubber diaphragm is protected by the insulating material thereby decreasing its vulnerability to heat damage. As a result of the improved design the life expectancy of the pressure rig contemplated by the present invention is more than doubled. Moreover, the improved heat protection has allowed the casting of brass and other alloys with higher melting temperatures than possible in the conventional pressure rigs

People tracking by cooperative fusion of RADAR and camera sensors

Accurate 3D tracking of objects from monocular camera poses challenges due to the loss of depth during projection. Although ranging by RADAR has proven effective in highway environments, people tracking remains beyond the capability of single sensor systems. In this paper, we propose a cooperative RADAR-camera fusion method for people tracking on the ground plane. Using average person height, joint detection likelihood is calculated by back-projecting detections from the camera onto the RADAR Range-Azimuth data. Peaks in the joint likelihood, representing candidate targets, are fed into a Particle Filter tracker. Depending on the association outcome, particles are updated using the associated detections (Tracking by Detection), or by sampling the raw likelihood itself (Tracking Before Detection). Utilizing the raw likelihood data has the advantage that lost targets are continuously tracked even if the camera or RADAR signal is below the detection threshold. We show that in single target, uncluttered environments, the proposed method entirely outperforms camera-only tracking. Experiments in a real-world urban environment also confirm that the cooperative fusion tracker produces significantly better estimates, even in difficult and ambiguous situations

Explosive Behavior in the 1990s Nasdaq: When Did Exuberance Escalate Asset Values?

A recursive test procedure is suggested that provides a mechanism for testing explosive behavior, date-stamping the origination and collapse of economic exuberance, and providing valid con?dence intervals for explosive growth rates. The method involves the recursive im- plementation of a right-side unit root test and a sup test, both of which are easy to use in practical applications, and some new limit theory for mildly explosive processes. The test procedure is shown to have discriminatory power in detecting periodically collapsing bubbles, thereby overcoming a weakness in earlier applications of unit root tests for economic bubbles. An empirical application to Nasdaq stock price index in the 1990s provides con?rmation of ex- plosiveness and date-stamps the origination of ?nancial exuberance to mid -1995, prior to the famous remark in December 1996 by Alan Greenspan about irrational exuberance in ?nancial market, thereby giving the remark empirical content.Explosive root, irrational exuberance, mildly explosive process, Nasdaq bubble, periodically collapsing bubble, sup test, unit root test

Explosive Behavior in the 1990s Nasdaq : When Did Exuberance Escalate Asset Values?

A recursive test procedure is suggested that provides a mechanism for testing explosive behavior, date-stamping the origination and collapse of economic exuberance, and providing valid conOdence intervals for explosive growth rates. The method involves the recursive im- plementation of a right-side unit root test and a sup test, both of which are easy to use in practical applications, and some new limit theory for mildly explosive processes. The test procedure is shown to have discriminatory power in detecting periodically collapsing bubbles, thereby overcoming a weakness in earlier applications of unit root tests for economic bubbles. An empirical application to Nasdaq stock price index in the 1990s provides conOrmation of ex- plosiveness and date-stamps the origination of Onancial exuberance to mid -1995, prior to the famous remark in December 1996 by Alan Greenspan about irrational exuberance in Onancial market, thereby giving the remark empirical content.Explosive root, irrational exuberance, Mildly explosive process, Nasdaq bubble, periodically collapsing bubble, sup test, unit root test

Shapes-from-silhouettes based 3D reconstruction for athlete evaluation during exercising

Shape-from-silhouettes is a very powerful tool to create a 3D reconstruction of an object using a limited number of cameras which are all facing an overlapping area. Synchronously captured video frames add the possibility of 3D reconstruction on a frame-by-frame-basis making it possible to watch movements in 3D. This 3D model can be viewed from any direction and therefore adds a lot of information for both athletes and coaches

TENNESSEE WILLIAMS: THE CHARACTERS ARE THE PLAYWRIGHT

Tennessee Williams was first and foremost a personage of the South, having been born, raised, and nurtured in the Mississippi Delta country. His early influences formed the concept of his “American Theatre.” He was a keen observer of people and places and wrote about the individuals he studied. He espoused the idea that as a homosexual he had the innate capability to write and appreciate various genders and sexualities, expressing himself as the character being developed in the moment of creation. Williams’s works, though containing moments of great humor, often trend toward darkness, becoming ever more pessimistic of human survival as he aged. Chapter 1: Biography contains a survey of the life of Williams, from the triumphs and catastrophes of his youth, through success, and into the psychological re-examination of his life through the help of Freudian psychologist Lawrence Kubie. Chapter 2: Character Development through Androgyny/Genderfluidity explores character development in A Streetcar Named Desire, Summer and Smoke, Something Unspoken, and Tell Sad Stories of the Death of Queens through the lens of Queer and 3rd Stage Gender Theory. Chapter 3: Expressionism in Williams’s American Theatre walks through the evolution of Williams’s use of expressionistic techniques from early works through his middle period, analyzing Mooney’s Kid Don’t Cry, The Dark Room, Not About Nightingales, Camino Real, The Glass Menagerie, Suddenly Last Summer, and wrapping with The Two Character Play. Chapter 4: Spirit and the Flesh dives into the homosexual economy in the plantation environment of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. Chapter 5: A Last Late Look into Williams’s Experimental Apocalyptic Expressionism shows the end progression of Williams’s slide into apocalypticism through The Three Plays for a Lyric Theatre: The Youthfully Departed, Now the Cats with the Jeweled Claws, and A Cavalier for Milady. Chapter 6: Music as a Methodology Toward Truth in the Literary Canon of Tennessee Williams plays with the many ways in which Williams embraced the music of his day, especially works by blues and jazz musicians, incorporating styles and themes into his works and cites specific examples in Fugitive Kind, The Glass Menagerie, and A Streetcar Named Desire. Finally, the Appendix contains a dramaturgical work-up of the play Summer and Smoke, created by Peter Philips