Using Text Similarity to Detect Social Interactions not Captured by Formal Reply Mechanisms

In modeling social interaction online, it is important to understand when people are reacting to each other. Many systems have explicit indicators of replies, such as threading in discussion forums or replies and retweets in Twitter. However, it is likely these explicit indicators capture only part of people's reactions to each other, thus, computational social science approaches that use them to infer relationships or influence are likely to miss the mark. This paper explores the problem of detecting non-explicit responses, presenting a new approach that uses tf-idf similarity between a user's own tweets and recent tweets by people they follow. Based on a month's worth of posting data from 449 ego networks in Twitter, this method demonstrates that it is likely that at least 11% of reactions are not captured by the explicit reply and retweet mechanisms. Further, these uncaptured reactions are not evenly distributed between users: some users, who create replies and retweets without using the official interface mechanisms, are much more responsive to followees than they appear. This suggests that detecting non-explicit responses is an important consideration in mitigating biases and building more accurate models when using these markers to study social interaction and information diffusion.Comment: A final version of this work was published in the 2015 IEEE 11th International Conference on e-Science (e-Science

Complex Dirac Structures : Invariants and Local Structure

Acord transformatiu CRUE-CSICWe study complex Dirac structures, that is, Dirac structures in the complexified generalized tangent bundle. These include presymplectic foliations, transverse holomorphic structures, CR-related geometries and generalized complex structures. We introduce two invariants, the order and the (normalized) type. We show that, together with the real index, they allow us to obtain a pointwise classification of complex Dirac structures. For constant order, we prove the existence of an underlying real Dirac structure, which generalizes the Poisson structure associated to a generalized complex structure. For constant real index and order, we prove a splitting theorem, which gives a local description in terms of a presymplectic leaf and a small transversal

Between the Greater and Lesser Caucasus: An Analysis of the Belts from the Tli Burial Ground and Their Contexts (Graves 40b, 215b, 425)

This article presents a new study of three burial contexts from the important Tli graveyard located in the Southern Caucasus. The three tombs contained bronze belts with features mainly pertaining to an Assyro-Urartian tradition. An analysis of the belts’ iconographic apparatuses is given, together with a new chronological position proposed for the belts and the tombs: our idea is that a possible date for them should be within the period between the 7th and 6th centuries B.C.E. The analysis showed, moreover, that the Tli necropolis must be considered a great example of the complex contacts and cultural exchanges between multiple realities located both in the Caucasus and in the Mesopotamian region

Smart Sensor Based Obstacle Detection for High-Speed Unmanned Surface Vehicle

This paper describes an obstacle detection system for a high-speed and agile unmanned surface vehicle (USV), running at speeds up to 30m/s. The aim is a real-time and high performance obstacle detection system using both radar and vision technologies to detect obstacles within a range of 175 m. A computer vision horizon detector enables a highly accurate attitude estimation despite large and sudden vehicle accelerations. This further facilitates the reduction of sea clutter by utilising a attitude based statistical measure. Full scale sea trials show a significant increase in obstacle tracking performance using sensor fusion of radar and computer vision

Coral-bead Skin Lesions Associated with Erosive Arthritis: A Quiz

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Semantically Derived Geometric Constraints for {MVS} Reconstruction of Textureless Areas

Conventional multi-view stereo (MVS) approaches based on photo-consistency measures are generally robust, yet often fail in calculating valid depth pixel estimates in low textured areas of the scene. In this study, a novel approach is proposed to tackle this challenge by leveraging semantic priors into a PatchMatch-based MVS in order to increase confidence and support depth and normal map estimation. Semantic class labels on image pixels are used to impose class-specific geometric constraints during multiview stereo, optimising the depth estimation on weakly supported, textureless areas, commonly present in urban scenarios of building facades, indoor scenes, or aerial datasets. Detecting dominant shapes, e.g., planes, with RANSAC, an adjusted cost function is introduced that combines and weighs both photometric and semantic scores propagating, thus, more accurate depth estimates. Being adaptive, it fills in apparent information gaps and smoothing local roughness in problematic regions while at the same time preserves important details. Experiments on benchmark and custom datasets demonstrate the effectiveness of the presented approach

Time variation of Kepler transits induced by stellar spots - a way to distinguish between prograde and retrograde motion. II. Application to KOIs

Mazeh, Holczer, and Shporer (2015) have presented an approach that can, in principle, use the derived transit timing variation (TTV) of some transiting planets observed by the $Kepler$ mission to distinguish between prograde and retrograde motion of their orbits with respect to their parent stars' rotation. The approach utilizes TTVs induced by spot-crossing events that occur when the planet moves across a spot on the stellar surface, looking for a correlation between the derived TTVs and the stellar brightness derivatives at the corresponding transits. This can work even in data that cannot temporally resolve the spot-crossing events themselves. Here we apply this approach to the $Kepler$ KOIs, identifying nine systems where the photometric spot modulation is large enough and the transit timing accurate enough to allow detection of a TTV-brightness-derivatives correlation. Of those systems five show highly significant prograde motion (Kepler-17b, Kepler-71b, KOI-883.01, KOI-895.01, and KOI-1074.01), while no system displays retrograde motion, consistent with the suggestion that planets orbiting cool stars have prograde motion. All five systems have impact parameter $0.2\lesssim b\lesssim0.5$, and all systems within that impact parameter range show significant correlation, except HAT-P-11b where the lack of a correlation follows its large stellar obliquity. Our search suffers from an observational bias against detection of high impact parameter cases, and the detected sample is extremely small. Nevertheless, our findings may suggest that stellar spots, or at least the larger ones, tend to be located at a low stellar latitude, but not along the stellar equator, similar to the Sun.Comment: V2: accepted to Ap

Introducción del factor humano al análisis de riesgo

The frequency of occurrence of an accident is a key aspect in the risk assessment field. Variables such as the human factor, which is a major cause of undesired events in process industries, are usually not considered explicitly, mainly due to the uncertainty related to the lack of knowledge and the complexity associated to it. In this thesis, a frequency modifier has been developed in order to introduce the human factor in the failure frequency estimation. This modifier takes into account variables such as: the organizational factor, the job characteristic factor and the personal characteristic factor. The inclusion of the human factor was done through the application of two methodologies: the fuzzy logic and the Monte Carlo simulation. The first one is based on the operation of the human reason, because of that, the contribution of international experts on the subject area was taken into account through a questionnaire. In the second one, Monte Carlo, the variables are represented by probability functions through a probabilitic treatment. The modifiers were applied to four case studies of real chemical plants: two related to the storage of flammable products and another two dedicated to the toxic and flammable products storage. The new frequency values are considered more realistic and accurate since the human factor is now reflected. In addition, the models were validated with the comparison of the obtained results with a widely international recognized method: the Quantitative Risk Analysis (QRA). Consequently, the final evaluation of the risk is more conservative but in the same line as the results obtained through a QRA.La frecuencia de los accidentes es un aspecto muy importante en el campo del análisis del riesgo. Variables cómo el factor humano en general no se consideran explícitamente en su evaluación. Esto se debe a la incertidumbre que se genera debido a la falta de información y la complejidad para calcular este factor. No obstante, el factor humano es una de las mayores causas de eventos no deseados en las industrias de proceso. En esta tesis, se desarrolló un modificador de la frecuencia de accidentes con el objetivo de introducir el factor humano en la estimación de riesgo. Este modificador tiene en cuenta variables como: el factor organizacional, el factor de las características del trabajo y el factor de las características personales. La inclusión del factor humano se hizo mediante la aplicación de dos metodologías: La lógica difusa y la simulación de Monte Carlo. La primera de ellas se basa en el funcionamiento del razón humana, por ello fue necesaria la contribución de expertos internacionales en el área de estudio a través de su contribución en un cuestionario. En la segunda, Montecarlo, las variables son representades por funciones de probabilidad a través de un tratamiento probabilístico. Los modificadores fueron aplicados a cuatro casos de estudio de industrias químicas reales: dos relacionados con empresas que almacenan productos inflamables y dos que almancenan productos tóxicos e inflamables. Los nuevos valores de frecuencia, después de aplicar el modificador obtenido, son considerados más realistas debido a que ya incluyen el factor humano. Además, los modelos fueron validados con la comparación de los resultados obtenidos con el método internacionalmente aceptado para la evaluación de riesgo: el Análisis Cuantitativo de Riesgo (ACR). Consecuentemente, la evaluación final de riesgo es más conservadora aunque en la línia de los resultados obtenidos a partir de un ACR