Robust gait recognition under variable covariate conditions

PhDGait is a weak biometric when compared to face, fingerprint or iris because it can be easily affected by various conditions. These are known as the covariate conditions and include clothing, carrying, speed, shoes and view among others. In the presence of variable covariate conditions gait recognition is a hard problem yet to be solved with no working system reported. In this thesis, a novel gait representation, the Gait Flow Image (GFI), is proposed to extract more discriminative information from a gait sequence. GFI extracts the relative motion of body parts in different directions in separate motion descriptors. Compared to the existing model-free gait representations, GFI is more discriminative and robust to changes in covariate conditions. In this thesis, gait recognition approaches are evaluated without the assumption on cooperative subjects, i.e. both the gallery and the probe sets consist of gait sequences under different and unknown covariate conditions. The results indicate that the performance of the existing approaches drops drastically under this more realistic set-up. It is argued that selecting the gait features which are invariant to changes in covariate conditions is the key to developing a gait recognition system without subject cooperation. To this end, the Gait Entropy Image (GEnI) is proposed to perform automatic feature selection on each pair of gallery and probe gait sequences. Moreover, an Adaptive Component and Discriminant Analysis is formulated which seamlessly integrates the feature selection method with subspace analysis for fast and robust recognition. Among various factors that affect the performance of gait recognition, change in viewpoint poses the biggest problem and is treated separately. A novel approach to address this problem is proposed in this thesis by using Gait Flow Image in a cross view gait recognition framework with the view angle of a probe gait sequence unknown. A Gaussian Process classification technique is formulated to estimate the view angle of each probe gait sequence. To measure the similarity of gait sequences across view angles, the correlation of gait sequences from different views is modelled using Canonical Correlation Analysis and the correlation strength is used as a similarity measure. This differs from existing approaches, which reconstruct gait features in different views through 2D view transformation or 3D calibration. Without explicit reconstruction, the proposed method can cope with feature mis-match across view and is more robust against feature noise

Testing strategies for stakeholders in Component Based Software Development

Like other methodologies, Component Based Software Development (CBSD) has become emerging software development paradigm due to selecting reliable, reusable and robust software components and assembling all these into suitable software architecture. In CBSD, more emphasis is given to select, test and to adapt new component into existing software architecture. If these activities are not performed properly then it will impact the functionality and quality of software. During development life cycles of software all stakeholders especially tester roles are involved to overcome the errors and reduce the defects rates, so they need proper guidelines. In this paper, authors propose a strategy via workflow chart which helps the stakeholders at various phases of software development life cycle. Moreover, this strategy leads to synchronize the work of tester role and ensure the quality product on time Keywords: CBD, Tester, functional testing, stakeholders, quality, CBSD, Third party

Sectoral Investment and Economic Performance of Pakistan: A Time Series Analysis (1990 – 2021)

The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact that various types of investments have had on Pakistan's overall economic performance. GDP, GDP per capita, inflation, and trade are the variables that are used to measure economic performance. For the purpose of this investigation, time series data from 1990 to 2021 has been collected, and the ADF unit root test and the ARDL technique have been utilized for analysis. The results of the ADF unit root explicate that GDP, GDP per capita, Trade, Investments in Agriculture, Manufacturing, Infrastructure, Energy, and Labor force are stationary at 1st difference and Inflation & Investment in Mining are stationary at the level. So, it is decided to apply the ARDL technique for long-run relationships. The results of ARDL long-run express that Investment in Agriculture sector, Infrastructure, Energy, Manufacturing, and Mining are a source of higher Nominal GDP and GDP per capita. The labor force has been positive for growth but negative with the price level. On the other hand, investments in agriculture and infrastructure may increase the price level of the economy but investment in energy, manufacturing, and mining may reduce the price level. The labor force also turns out to reduce price levels by enhancing output levels. For the trade model, Investments in Agriculture, Manufacturing, Infrastructure, and Energy have turned out to increase the trade of Pakistan while investment in mining and the labor force has been reducing factors for trade

Natural and synthetic smart polymers in drug targeting: A smart approach

Among various polymers, smart polymers have taken much importance in drug delivery systems due to their targeting ability. This review mainly describes the expansion of biodegradable polymers in pharmaceuticals drug delivery that provides mechanism of targeting from both physiological and pathological point of view. Thus, smart polymers due to various actions and responsive drug delivery get more importance in era of novel techniques especially in nanotechnology by formulation of nanoparticles. This progress descends into two categories: i) open loop system that is also known as externally regulated or pulsatile systems, ii) closed loop system that is actually self-regulated systems. External triggers like ultrasonic, magnetic, electric, light and chemical or biochemical agents involved in release of open loop or pulstile drug delivery system whereas self-regulated systems are the systems where controlled variable is detected due to which the system output is adjusted consequently. Several approaches like thermal response, pH-sensitive drug or polymers action, enzyme-substrate reactions are applied for achieving targeted drug delivery systems. The release rate can also be controlled by selection of natural and synthetic nature of smart polymers on the basis of their feedback mechanism. Keywords: Biodegradable, Closed Loop, Open Loop, Novel, Natural, Synthetic and Smart Polymers

Efficacy of memantine in treating patients with fibromyalgia

To evaluate the efficacy of Memantine as a therapeutic intervention for fibromyalgia. Methods: This clinical trial was conducted between October 2014 and December 2014. A total of 30 subjects with diagnosed fibromyalgia presenting to a private neurology clinic in Karachi, Pakistan were selected through purposive sampling technique. Adult patients belonging to both genders were included in the study. Patients were treated with incremental doses of Memantine. Data was analyzed using SPSS version 20 and associations were made using Chi square test with p-value of less than 0.05 taken as significant. Results: Out of 30 patients, 2 (6.7%) were males and 28 (93.3%) were females which shows a very high occurrence of fibromyalgia in females. The mean age of the subjects was found to be 38 years. Efficacy of the drug in patients with fibromyalgia was observed to be 93.3% which is significantly high. The baseline FIQ score when compared with the score at 3-month follow-up by applying Wilcoxon signed rank test showed mean ± S.D (67.18±13.23 vs. 34.17±15.18) where p=0.000. This shows a highly significant result (≤0.05). All of the patients with fibromyalgia reported improvement in their physical functioning and majority of the patients felt less anxious and less depressed on their final follow-up visit. By the end of the 3rd month, the level of stiffness and intensity of pain decreased significantly and patients reported less difficulty in performing work. Conclusion: Memantine has shown significant beneficial effects in reducing the intensity of pain and disability in patients with fibromyalgia

Analytic study of clinical presentation of intracranial space-occupying lesions in adult patients

Intracranial space-occupying lesions can be caused by a variety of disease processes, ranging from neoplasms to non-neoplastic lesions including hematomas, abscesses and vascular malformations. This article provides an overview of varied clinical presentations of patients with intracranial space-occupying lesions.Methods:A total of 200 cases of intracranial space-occupying lesions presenting at Neuro Clinic and Care were retrospectively analyzed. Adult patients from all age groups and both genders were included in this study. Results: 165 patients (82.5%) had neoplastic lesions while 35 (17.5%) had non-neoplastic lesions. Metastatic lesions from primary tumor elsewhere in the body comprised the most common group with81 cases (40.5%), followed by meningiomas with 27 cases (13.5%). Males were affected slightly more than females (1:0.8). The most common presenting symptom was headache 87 patients (43.5%,) followed by focal symptoms such as numbness, tingling or weakness being present in 80 (40%)and seizures observed in 65 (32.5%).Conclusion: The study reviews the wide range of symptoms the patients with intracranial space-occupying lesions present with, the most common being headache, followed by focal symptoms such as numbness, tingling or weakness, seizures and vomiting. Knowledge of these typical as well as atypical patterns of clinical presentation can aid physicians in timely detection and prompt application of diagnostic and therapeutic modalities