On combining the facial movements of a talking head

We present work on Obie, an embodied conversational agent framework. An embodied conversational agent, or talking head, consists of three main components. The graphical part consists of a face model and a facial muscle model. Besides the graphical part, we have implemented an emotion model and a mapping from emotions to facial expressions. The animation part of the framework focuses on the combination of different facial movements temporally. In this paper we propose a scheme of combining facial movements on a 3D talking head

Toward Affective Dialogue Modeling using Partially Observable Markov Decision Processes

We propose a novel approach to developing a dialogue model which is able to take into account some aspects of the user’s emotional state and acts appropriately. The dialogue model uses a Partially Observable Markov Decision Process approach with observations composed of the observed user’s emotional state and action. A simple example of route navigation is explained to clarify our approach and preliminary results & future plans are briefly discussed

Arterial-portal fistula treated with hepatic arterial embolization and portal venous aneurysm stent-graft exclusion complicated by type 2 endoleak.

Intrahepatic arterioportal fistulas may be complicated by portal hypertension. An associated portal venous aneurysm (PVA) may impinge upon adjacent structures or rupture. We present a 65-year-old man with an intrahepatic Intrahepatic arterioportal fistula and 6.4 × 5.8 cm right portal vein aneurysm extending within 0.4 cm of the hepatic margin, associated with pain concerning for impending rupture. The PVA was refractory to transarterial embolization due to recruitment of arterial collaterals. Therefore, it was additionally excluded from the portal vein with a 12 mm × 9.5 cm venous stent graft. Although endovascular therapy thrombosed the aneurysm and improved symptoms, it was complicated by a type 2 endoleak into the PVA

The influence of oscillations on energy estimates for damped wave models with time-dependent propagation speed and dissipation

The aim of this paper is to derive higher order energy estimates for solutions to the Cauchy problem for damped wave models with time-dependent propagation speed and dissipation. The model of interest is \begin{equation*} u_{tt}-\lambda^2(t)\omega^2(t)\Delta u +\rho(t)\omega(t)u_t=0, \quad u(0,x)=u_0(x), \,\, u_t(0,x)=u_1(x). \end{equation*} The coefficients $\lambda=\lambda(t)$ and $\rho=\rho(t)$ are shape functions and $\omega=\omega(t)$ is an oscillating function. If $\omega(t)\equiv1$ and $\rho(t)u_t$ is an "effective" dissipation term, then $L^2-L^2$ energy estimates are proved in [2]. In contrast, the main goal of the present paper is to generalize the previous results to coefficients including an oscillating function in the time-dependent coefficients. We will explain how the interplay between the shape functions and oscillating behavior of the coefficient will influence energy estimates.Comment: 37 pages, 2 figure

Modeling rammed earth wall using discrete element method

International audienceRammed earth is attracting renewed interest throughout the world thanks to its “green” characteristics in the context of sustainable development. Several research studies have thus recently been carried out to investigate this material. Some of them attempted to simulate the rammed earth’s mechanical behavior by using analytical or numerical models. Most of these studies assumed that there was a perfect cohesion at the interface between earthen layers. This hypothesis proved to be acceptable for the case of vertical loading, but it could be questionable for horizontal loading. To address this problem, discrete element modeling seems to be relevant to simulate a rammed earth wall. To our knowledge, no research has been conducted thus far using discrete element modeling to study a rammed earth wall. This paper presents an assessment of the discrete element modeling’s robustness for rammed earth walls. Firstly, a brief description of the discrete element modeling is presented. Then the parameters necessary for discrete element modeling of the material law of the earthen layers and their interfaces law following the Mohr–Coulomb model with a tension cut-off and post-peak softening were given. The relevance of the model and the material parameters were assessed by comparing them with experimental results from the literature. The results showed that, in the case of vertical loading, interfaces did not have an important effect. In the case of diagonal loading, model with interfaces produced better results. Interface characteristics can vary from 85 to 100% of the corresponding earthen layer’s characteristics