Team I2R-VI-FF Technical Report on EPIC-KITCHENS VISOR Hand Object Segmentation Challenge 2023

In this report, we present our approach to the EPIC-KITCHENS VISOR Hand Object Segmentation Challenge, which focuses on the estimation of the relation between the hands and the objects given a single frame as input. The EPIC-KITCHENS VISOR dataset provides pixel-wise annotations and serves as a benchmark for hand and active object segmentation in egocentric video. Our approach combines the baseline method, i.e., Point-based Rendering (PointRend) and the Segment Anything Model (SAM), aiming to enhance the accuracy of hand and object segmentation outcomes, while also minimizing instances of missed detection. We leverage accurate hand segmentation maps obtained from the baseline method to extract more precise hand and in-contact object segments. We utilize the class-agnostic segmentation provided by SAM and apply specific hand-crafted constraints to enhance the results. In cases where the baseline model misses the detection of hands or objects, we re-train an object detector on the training set to enhance the detection accuracy. The detected hand and in-contact object bounding boxes are then used as prompts to extract their respective segments from the output of SAM. By effectively combining the strengths of existing methods and applying our refinements, our submission achieved the 1st place in terms of evaluation criteria in the VISOR HOS Challenge

PO-018 A Follow-up Study of 8-10 age pupil's physical activity status and related factor

Objective Regular physical activity in children has many benefits，including reducing the occurrence of obesity and lower levels of cardiovascular disease risk factors, promote bone mass deposition, improve health. Our research in order to using accelerometer survey children daily PA status in our country, and analyzes its characteristic. Methods Our research assessed the PA of the same group of children in Beijing yuxin Primary school for three consecutive years using ActiGraph accelerometers. The total available valid data are 183 children (male 94, female 89). Results (1)The average total PA is 627.2±134.5 counts/min（boy accrued 665.6 ± 139.1 counts/min and girl 579.8 ± 112.2 counts/min ）, among them boy accrued 59.0min/d and girl 48.1min/d of MVPA. 35% of participants could meet the WHO PA guideline (boys =49%, girls = 18%). (2) MVPA increased significantly from 8 to 9 years of age（MVPA of 8year-old children:53.2min/d,9year-old children:56.1min/d）and MVPA decline slightly from 9 to 10 (10 year-old children:55.8min/d).And both boys and girls meet this regular. (3) Both in weekdays and weekend, the MVPA time of boys (60.2min/d,57.8min/d) are outstandingly higher than girls ( 49.7min/d ,46.5min/d). (4) TWO-way (gender *BMI category) ANOVA revealed that girls were less active than boys. (5) The moderate and vigorous physical activity time of obese children in weekends are 42.3 min/d while those of normal children are 49.7 min/d, (p<0.05). (6) The total PA level, VPA, MVPA are negatively correlated with body fat percentage while LPA is positively correlated with BMI. Conclusions Objective data indicated that Chinese youth are generally not physically active enough, and lower levels of PA were observed in girls, and during weekend days. The findings of this study will better inform the development of PA-related policies in schools, the design of PA intervention programs. &nbsp

Connection of the proto-Yangtze River to the East China Sea traced by sediment magnetic properties

The evolution of the Yangtze River, and specifically how and when it connected to the East China Sea, has been hotly debated with regard to possible linkages with the so-called ‘Cenozoic Topographic Reversal’ (tectonic tilting of continental east China in the Cenozoic) and particularly the relationship to the uplift history of the Tibetan Plateau. Resolving this key question would shed light on the development of large Asian rivers and related changes in landforms and monsoon climate during this interval. Here, we use the magnetic properties of both Plio-Quaternary sediments in the Yangtze delta and of surficial river sediments to identify a key mid-late Quaternary switch in sediment source-sink relationships. Our results reveal a fundamental shift in sediment magnetic properties at this time; the upper 145 m of sediment has magnetic mineral concentrations 5 to 10 times higher than those of the underlying late Pliocene/early Quaternary sediments. We show that the distinctive magnetic properties of the upper core sediments closely match those of surficial river sediments of the upper Yangtze basin, where the large-scale E'mei Basalt block (2.5 × 105 km2) is the dominant magnetic mineral source. This switch in sediment magnetic properties occurred at around the Jaramillo event (~ 1.2–1.0 Ma), which indicates that both the westward extension of the proto-Yangtze River into the upper basin and completion of the connection to the East China Sea occurred no later than at that age

Genomic mosaicism due to homoeologous exchange generates extensive phenotypic diversity in nascent allopolyploids

Allopolyploidy is an important process in plant speciation, yet newly formed allopolyploid species typically suffer from extreme genetic bottlenecks. One escape from this impasse might be homoeologous meiotic pairing, during which homoeologous exchanges (HEs) generate phenotypically variable progeny. However, the immediate genome-wide patterns and resulting phenotypic diversity generated by HEs remain largely unknown. Here, we analyzed the genome composition of 202 phenotyped euploid segmental allopolyploid individuals from the 4th selfed generation following chromosomal doubling of reciprocal F1 hybrids of crosses between rice subspecies, using whole genome sequencing. We describe rampant occurrence of HEs that, by overcoming incompatibility or conferring superiority of hetero-cytonuclear interactions, generate extensive and individualized genomic mosaicism across the analyzed tetraploids. We show that the resulting homoeolog copy number alteration in tetraploids affects known-function genes and their complex genetic interactions, in the process creating extraordinary phenotypic diversity at the population level following a single initial hybridization. Our results illuminate the immediate genomic landscapes possible in a tetraploid genomic environment, and underscore HE as an important mechanism that fuels rapid phenotypic diversification accompanying the initial stages of allopolyploid evolution

Large expert-curated database for benchmarking document similarity detection in biomedical literature search

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translated into practice. To overcome this bottleneck, we have established the RElevant LIterature SearcH consortium consisting of more than 1500 scientists from 84 countries, who have collectively annotated the relevance of over 180 000 PubMed-listed articles with regard to their respective seed (input) article/s. The majority of annotations were contributed by highly experienced, original authors of the seed articles. The collected data cover 76% of all unique PubMed Medical Subject Headings descriptors. No systematic biases were observed across different experience levels, research fields or time spent on annotations. More importantly, annotations of the same document pairs contributed by different scientists were highly concordant. We further show that the three representative baseline methods used to generate recommended articles for evaluation (Okapi Best Matching 25, Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency and PubMed Related Articles) had similar overall performances. Additionally, we found that these methods each tend to produce distinct collections of recommended articles, suggesting that a hybrid method may be required to completely capture all relevant articles. The established database server located at https://relishdb.ict.griffith.edu.au is freely available for the downloading of annotation data and the blind testing of new methods. We expect that this benchmark will be useful for stimulating the development of new powerful techniques for title and title/abstract-based search engines for relevant articles in biomedical research.Peer reviewe

Flow-induced vibration of curved pipe conveying fluid by a new transfer matrix method

A new transfer matrix method based on the Laplace transform is proposed to analyze the flow-induced vibration of curved pipe conveying fluid. After the comparison with the existing literature, the proposed method is verified to be of high accuracy in calculating critical flowing velocity. Three examples including cantilevered, clamped-elastically supported, and periodic cantilevered curved pipes are investigated by the proposed method, natural frequency as a function of the flowing velocity for the former two cases and critical velocity for all of them are calculated not only to obtain some discoveries never mentioned in other literatures, but also to show its broad applications. For the first time, it is pointed out that the steady combined force should be considered in an appropriate interval during the calculation of clamped-elastically supported curved pipe. The method can also be radiated to study other forms of vibration problems concerning fluid conveying pipes or other problems characterized by the chain structure

Temporal and spatial distribution of trace metals in sediments from the northern Yellow Sea coast, China: implications for regional anthropogenic processes

Surface sediment samples from 17 sites in the Yantai coastal area, the northern Yellow Sea, China, combined with a sediment core were employed for geochemical and chronological analyses for the purpose of characterizing the temporal and spatial distribution of trace metals in sediments and their implications for anthropogenic processes. The results indicated that the spatial distribution of trace metals (Cr, Ni, Ti, Pb, As, Zn, Mn and Cu) in surface sediments was significantly contributed by the sewage discharges along the Yantai coast, and the coastal currents played a major role for transporting the pollutants to offshore. The temporal concentrations of trace metals in the sediment core based on the chronology determined by a combination of radionuclide Cs-137 and 210 Pb activity demonstrated that trace metal concentrations increased step-wisely over the last ca. 100 years, corresponding to the intensity of anthropogenic processes in the Yantai area. The high levels of Cu and As before the late 1970s indicated the agricultural emission from the application of pesticides. While, all the high-trace metal concentrations since the early 1980s could be seen as diagnostic indictors of increasing industrialization, urbanization and sewage discharge in the Yantai area. Although the potential ecological risk evaluation of trace metals in the coastal area suggests low-potential ecological risk at present, some trace metals, such as As and Pb need particular attention due to their slight contamination.Surface sediment samples from 17 sites in the Yantai coastal area, the northern Yellow Sea, China, combined with a sediment core were employed for geochemical and chronological analyses for the purpose of characterizing the temporal and spatial distribution of trace metals in sediments and their implications for anthropogenic processes. The results indicated that the spatial distribution of trace metals (Cr, Ni, Ti, Pb, As, Zn, Mn and Cu) in surface sediments was significantly contributed by the sewage discharges along the Yantai coast, and the coastal currents played a major role for transporting the pollutants to offshore. The temporal concentrations of trace metals in the sediment core based on the chronology determined by a combination of radionuclide Cs-137 and 210 Pb activity demonstrated that trace metal concentrations increased step-wisely over the last ca. 100 years, corresponding to the intensity of anthropogenic processes in the Yantai area. The high levels of Cu and As before the late 1970s indicated the agricultural emission from the application of pesticides. While, all the high-trace metal concentrations since the early 1980s could be seen as diagnostic indictors of increasing industrialization, urbanization and sewage discharge in the Yantai area. Although the potential ecological risk evaluation of trace metals in the coastal area suggests low-potential ecological risk at present, some trace metals, such as As and Pb need particular attention due to their slight contamination

Primitive Photosynthetic Architectures Based on Self-Organization and Chemical Evolution of Amino Acids and Metal Ions

The emergence of light-energy-utilizing metabolism is likely to be a critical milestone in prebiotic chemistry and the origin of life. However, how the primitive pigment is spontaneously generated still remains unknown. Herein, a primitive pigment model based on adaptive self-organization of amino acids (Cystine, Cys) and metal ions (zinc ion, Zn2+) followed by chemical evolution under hydrothermal conditions is developed. The resulting hybrid microspheres are composed of radially aligned cystine/zinc (Cys/Zn) assembly decorated with carbonate-doped zinc sulfide (C-ZnS) nanocrystals. The part of C-ZnS can work as a light-harvesting antenna to capture ultraviolet and visible light, and use it in various photochemical reactions, including hydrogen (H-2) evolution, carbon dioxide (CO2) photoreduction, and reduction of nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD(+)) to nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide hydride (NADH). Additionally, guest molecules (e.g., glutamate dehydrogenase, GDH) can be encapsulated within the hierarchical Cys/Zn framework, which facilitates sustainable photoenzymatic synthesis of glutamate. This study helps deepen insight into the emergent functionality (conversion of light energy) and complexity (hierarchical architecture) from interaction and reaction of prebiotic molecules. The primitive pigment model is also promising to work as an artificial photosynthetic microreactor

Lead–Acid Battery SOC Prediction Using Improved AdaBoost Algorithm

Research on the state of charge (SOC) prediction of lead–acid batteries is of great importance to the use and management of batteries. Due to this reason, this paper proposes a method for predicting the SOC of lead–acid batteries based on the improved AdaBoost model. By using the online sequence extreme learning machine (OSELM) as its weak learning machine, this model can achieve incremental learning of the model, which has a high computational efficiency, and does not require repeated training of old samples. Through improvement of the AdaBoost algorithm, the local prediction accuracy of the algorithm for the sample is enhanced, the scores of the proposed model in the maximum absolute error (AEmax) and maximum absolute percent error (APEmax) indicators are 6.8% and 8.8% lower, and the accuracy of the model is further improved. According to the verification with experimental data, when there are a large number of prediction samples, the improved AdaBoost model can reduce the prediction accuracy indicators of mean absolute percent error (MAPE), mean absolute error (MAE), and mean square error (MSE) to 75.4%, 58.3, and 84.2%, respectively. Compared with various other prediction methods in the prediction accuracy of battery SOC, the prediction accuracy indicators MAE, MSE, MAPE, AEmax, and APEmax of the model proposed in this paper are all optimal, which proves the validity and adaptive ability of the model