A multimodal corpus of rapid dialogue games

Ponencia presentada en la Ninth International Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC'14)This paper presents a multimodal corpus of spoken human-human dialogues collected as participants played a series of Rapid DialogueGames (RDGs). The corpus consists of a collection of about 11 hours of spoken audio, video, and Microsoft Kinect data taken from 384game interactions (dialogues). The games used for collecting the corpus required participants to give verbal descriptions of linguisticexpressions or visual images and were specifically designed to engage players in a fast-paced conversation under time pressure. As aresult, the corpus contains many examples of participants attempting to communicate quickly in specific game situations, and it alsoincludes a variety of spontaneous conversational phenomena such as hesitations, filled pauses, overlapping speech, and low-latencyresponses. The corpus has been created to facilitate research in incremental speech processing for spoken dialogue systems. Potentially,the corpus could be used in several areas of speech and language research, including speech recognition, natural language understanding,natural language generation, and dialogue management.Fil: Paetzel, Maike. University of Southern California. Institute for Creative Technologies; United States of America.Fil: Racca, David Nicolás. University of Southern California. Institute for Creative Technologies; United States of America.Fil: Racca, David Nicolás. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Facultad de Matemática, Astronomía y Física; Argentina.Fil: De Vault, David. University of Southern California. Institute for Creative Technologies; United States of America.Ciencias de la Computació

Dissipative Tunneling in 2 DEG: Effect of Magnetic Field, Impurity and Temperature

We have studied the transport process in the two dimensional electron gas (2DEG) in presence of a magnetic field and a dissipative environment at temperature T. By means of imaginary time series functional integral method we calculate the decay rates at finite temperature and in the presence of dissipation. We have studied decay rates for wide range of temperatures -- from the thermally activated region to very low temperature region where the system decays by quantum tunneling. We have shown that dissipation and impurity helps the tunneling. We have also shown that tunneling is strongly affected by the magnetic field. We have demonstrated analytical results for all the cases mentioned above.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figure

Toward the Development of Ethical Guidelines for Family Preservation

Family preservation workers need a standard set of ethical guidelines to assist them in providing their service in a proper manner. This paper describes how ethical codes have been developed for the traditional mental health care disciplines and why such codes are not sufficient for the type of work done in family preservation. The paper further provides examples of the types of ethical dilemmas family preservation workers encounter as well as suggestions for workers, supervisors, and agencies in dealing with such dilemmas

Broad frequency shift of parametric processes in epsilon-near-zero time-varying media

Data relevant to the publication, including all the published figures

Increasing Electron Transfer Rates with Increasing Donor-Acceptor Distance

Electron transfer can readily occur over long (≥15 Å) distances. Usually reaction rates decrease with increasing distance between donors and acceptors, but theory predicts a regime in which electron-transfer rates increase with increasing donor–acceptor separation. This counter-intuitive behavior can result from the interplay of reorganization energy and electronic coupling, but until now experimental studies have failed to provide unambiguous evidence for this effect. We report here on a homologous series of rigid rodlike donor-bridge-acceptor compounds in which the electron-transfer rate increases by a factor of 8 when the donor–acceptor distance is extended from 22.0 to 30.6 Å, and then it decreases by a factor of 188 when the distance is increased further to 39.2 Å. This effect has important implications for solar energy conversion

PT-symetrically regularized Eckart,Poeschl-Teller and Hulthen potentials

Version 1: The well known Eckart's singular s-wave potential is PT-symmetrically regularized and continued to the whole real line. The new model remains exactly solvable and its bound states remain proportional to Jacobi polynomials. Its real and discrete spectrum exhibits several unusual features. Version 2: Parity times time-reversal symmetry of complex Hamiltonians with real spectra is usually interpreted as a weaker mathematical substitute for Hermiticity. Perhaps an equally important role is played by the related strengthened analyticity assumptions. In a constructive illustration we complexify a few potentials solvable only in s-wave. Then we continue their domain from semi-axis to the whole axis and get the new exactly solvable models. Their energies come out real as expected. The new one-dimensional spectra themselves differ quite significantly from their s-wave predecessors.Comment: Original 10-page letter ``PT-symmetrized exact solution of the singular Eckart oscillator" is extended to a full pape

Quantum physics meets biology

Quantum physics and biology have long been regarded as unrelated disciplines, describing nature at the inanimate microlevel on the one hand and living species on the other hand. Over the last decades the life sciences have succeeded in providing ever more and refined explanations of macroscopic phenomena that were based on an improved understanding of molecular structures and mechanisms. Simultaneously, quantum physics, originally rooted in a world view of quantum coherences, entanglement and other non-classical effects, has been heading towards systems of increasing complexity. The present perspective article shall serve as a pedestrian guide to the growing interconnections between the two fields. We recapitulate the generic and sometimes unintuitive characteristics of quantum physics and point to a number of applications in the life sciences. We discuss our criteria for a future quantum biology, its current status, recent experimental progress and also the restrictions that nature imposes on bold extrapolations of quantum theory to macroscopic phenomena.Comment: 26 pages, 4 figures, Perspective article for the HFSP Journa

Nigellissima: A Study of Glamour, Performativity and Embodiment

This is a study of glamour, its complexities and its relationship with and role within celebrity culture. We explore glamour in the context of Nigella, the London-born TV cook, food writer and self-proclaimed ‘domestic goddess’ of British culinary culture. In our study we consider the interconnections between glamour, specifically Italian-style retro-glamour, and performativity in Nigella’s career. We also address the role of embodiment and authenticity in the masquerade of femininity. Our analysis focuses on Nigella’s glamour over time, considering its creation, enactment and reaffirmation following scandal. We conclude by speculating on glamour’s complex and ambivalent relationship with celebrity culture, and the role of vulnerability in creating authentic and enduring glamour in contemporary consumer society