Decomposition by Partial Linearization: Parallel Optimization of Multi-Agent Systems

We propose a novel decomposition framework for the distributed optimization of general nonconvex sum-utility functions arising naturally in the system design of wireless multiuser interfering systems. Our main contributions are: i) the development of the first class of (inexact) Jacobi best-response algorithms with provable convergence, where all the users simultaneously and iteratively solve a suitably convexified version of the original sum-utility optimization problem; ii) the derivation of a general dynamic pricing mechanism that provides a unified view of existing pricing schemes that are based, instead, on heuristics; and iii) a framework that can be easily particularized to well-known applications, giving rise to very efficient practical (Jacobi or Gauss-Seidel) algorithms that outperform existing adhoc methods proposed for very specific problems. Interestingly, our framework contains as special cases well-known gradient algorithms for nonconvex sum-utility problems, and many blockcoordinate descent schemes for convex functions.Comment: submitted to IEEE Transactions on Signal Processin

GBE-MLZSL: A Group Bi-Enhancement Framework for Multi-Label Zero-Shot Learning

This paper investigates a challenging problem of zero-shot learning in the multi-label scenario (MLZSL), wherein, the model is trained to recognize multiple unseen classes within a sample (e.g., an image) based on seen classes and auxiliary knowledge, e.g., semantic information. Existing methods usually resort to analyzing the relationship of various seen classes residing in a sample from the dimension of spatial or semantic characteristics, and transfer the learned model to unseen ones. But they ignore the effective integration of local and global features. That is, in the process of inferring unseen classes, global features represent the principal direction of the image in the feature space, while local features should maintain uniqueness within a certain range. This integrated neglect will make the model lose its grasp of the main components of the image. Relying only on the local existence of seen classes during the inference stage introduces unavoidable bias. In this paper, we propose a novel and effective group bi-enhancement framework for MLZSL, dubbed GBE-MLZSL, to fully make use of such properties and enable a more accurate and robust visual-semantic projection. Specifically, we split the feature maps into several feature groups, of which each feature group can be trained independently with the Local Information Distinguishing Module (LID) to ensure uniqueness. Meanwhile, a Global Enhancement Module (GEM) is designed to preserve the principal direction. Besides, a static graph structure is designed to construct the correlation of local features. Experiments on large-scale MLZSL benchmark datasets NUS-WIDE and Open-Images-v4 demonstrate that the proposed GBE-MLZSL outperforms other state-of-the-art methods with large margins.Comment: 11 pages, 8 figure

Automated optical inspection of FAST’s reflector surface using drones and computer vision

The Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (FAST) is the world ’ s largest single-dish radio telescope. Its large reflecting surface achieves unprecedented sensitivity but is prone to damage, such as dents and holes, caused by naturally-occurring falling objects. Hence, the timely and accurate detection of surface defects is crucial for FAST’s stable operation. Conventional manual inspection involves human inspectors climbing up and examining the large surface visually, a time-consuming and potentially unreliable process. To accelerate the inspection process and increase its accuracy, this work makes the first step towards automating the inspection of FAST by integrating deep-learning techniques with drone technology. First, a drone flies over the surface along a predetermined route. Since surface defects significantly vary in scale and show high inter-class similarity, directly applying existing deep detectors to detect defects on the drone imagery is highly prone to missing and misidentifying defects. As a remedy, we introduce cross-fusion, a dedicated plug-in operation for deep detectors that enables the adaptive fusion of multi-level features in a point-wise selective fashion, depending on local defect patterns. Consequently, strong semantics and fine-grained details are dynamically fused at different positions to support the accurate detection of defects of various scales and types. Our AI-powered drone-based automated inspection is time-efficient, reliable, and has good accessibility, which guarantees the long-term and stable operation of FAST

IIoT based trustworthy demographic dynamics tracking with advanced Bayesian learning

Tracking demographic dynamics for the built environment is important for a smart city. As a kind of ubiquitous Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) device, portable devices (e.g., mobile phones) afford a great potential to achieve this goal. Tracking the demographic dynamics illuminates two things: populations mobility (where do people go) and the related demographics (who are they). Many past studies have investigated the tracking of population dynamics; however, few of them tried tracking the demographic dynamics. In this context, our study proposed a ubiquitous IIoT based trustworthy approach for built environment demographic dynamics tracking. First, we employed a meta-graph-based data structure to represent users life patterns and projected them into a low-dimension space as uniform features. Then, based on the life-pattern features, we derived a variation-inference-based advanced Bayesian model to infer the demographics. Finally, taking a region in Tokyo as a case study, we compared our methods with baseline methods (heuristic algorithm, deep learning), and the result proved a superior accuracy (the MAPE improved by 0.07 to 0.28) as well as reliability (0.78 Pearson correlation coefficient with survey data)

The Zebrafish Information Network: the zebrafish model organism database

The Zebrafish Information Network (ZFIN; ) is a web based community resource that implements the curation of zebrafish genetic, genomic and developmental data. ZFIN provides an integrated representation of mutants, genes, genetic markers, mapping panels, publications and community resources such as meeting announcements and contact information. Recent enhancements to ZFIN include (i) comprehensive curation of gene expression data from the literature and from directly submitted data, (ii) increased support and annotation of the genome sequence, (iii) expanded use of ontologies to support curation and query forms, (iv) curation of morpholino data from the literature, and (v) increased versatility of gene pages, with new data types, links and analysis tools

Transcriptome analysis of orange-spotted grouper (Epinephelus coioides) spleen in response to Singapore grouper iridovirus

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Orange-spotted grouper (<it>Epinephelus coioides</it>) is an economically important marine fish cultured in China and Southeast Asian countries. The emergence of infectious viral diseases, including iridovirus and betanodavirus, have severely affected food products based on this species, causing heavy economic losses. Limited available information on the genomics of <it>E. coioides </it>has hampered the understanding of the molecular mechanisms that underlie host-virus interactions. In this study, we used a 454 pyrosequencing method to investigate differentially-expressed genes in the spleen of the <it>E. coioides </it>infected with Singapore grouper iridovirus (SGIV).</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Using 454 pyrosequencing, we obtained abundant high-quality ESTs from two spleen-complementary DNA libraries which were constructed from SGIV-infected (V) and PBS-injected fish (used as a control: C). A total of 407,027 and 421,141 ESTs were produced in control and SGIV infected libraries, respectively. Among the assembled ESTs, 9,616 (C) and 10,426 (V) ESTs were successfully matched against known genes in the NCBI non-redundant (nr) database with a cut-off E-value above 10^-5. Gene ontology (GO) analysis indicated that "cell part", "cellular process" and "binding" represented the largest category. Among the 25 clusters of orthologous group (COG) categories, the cluster for "translation, ribosomal structure and biogenesis" represented the largest group in the control (185 ESTs) and infected (172 ESTs) libraries. Further KEGG analysis revealed that pathways, including cellular metabolism and intracellular immune signaling, existed in the control and infected libraries. Comparative expression analysis indicated that certain genes associated with mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK), chemokine, toll-like receptor and RIG-I signaling pathway were alternated in response to SGIV infection. Moreover, changes in the pattern of gene expression were validated by qRT-PCR, including cytokines, cytokine receptors, and transcription factors, apoptosis-associated genes, and interferon related genes.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>This study provided abundant ESTs that could contribute greatly to disclosing novel genes in marine fish. Furthermore, the alterations of predicted gene expression patterns reflected possible responses of these fish to the virus infection. Taken together, our data not only provided new information for identification of novel genes from marine vertebrates, but also shed new light on the understanding of defense mechanisms of marine fish to viral pathogens.</p

Robust MIMO Cognitive Radio Systems Under Interference Temperature Constraints

Cognitive Radio (CR) systems are built on the coexistence of primary users (PUs) and secondary users (SUs), the latter being allowed to share spectral resources with the PUs but under strict interference limitations. However, such limitations may easily be violated by SUs if perfect SU-to-PU channel state information (CSI) is not available at the secondary transmitters, which always happens in practice. In this paper, we propose a distributed design of MIMO CR networks under global interference temperature constraints that is robust (in the worst-case sense) against SU-to-PU channel uncertainties. More specifically, we consider two alternative formulations that are complementary to each other in terms of signaling and system performance, namely: a game-theoretical design and a social-oriented optimization. To study and solve the proposed formulations we hinge on the new theory of finite-dimensional variational inequalities (VI) in the complex domain and a novel parallel decomposition technique for nonconvex sum-utility problems with coupling constraints, respectively. A major contribution of this paper is to devise a new class of distributed best-response algorithms with provable convergence. The algorithms differ in computational complexity, convergence speed, communication overhead, and achievable performance; they are thus applicable to a variety of CR scenarios, either cooperative or non-cooperative, which allow the SUs to explore the trade-off between signaling and performance

Robust MIMO cognitive radio systems under temperature interference constraints

In cognitive radio (CR) systems, the primary users (PU) are protected by temperature interference constraints imposed on secondary users (SU). However, such limitations may be easily violated by SUs if perfect SU-to-PU channel state information (CSI) is not available at the secondary transmitters. In this paper, we propose a novel and distributed design of MIMO CR networks that is robust against imperfect SU-to-PU CSI. Specifically, we formulate the system design as a noncooperative game and robust global interference constraints are enforced via pricing; the prices are thus additional variables to be optimized. Building on the advanced and new theory of finite-dimensional variational inequalities (VI) in the complex domain, we analyze the proposed NE problem and devise alternative distributed algorithms along with their convergence properties. © 2013 IEEE