Ibid.

Ibid. is an installation of five images in juxtaposition to each other that explores expectation and interpretation on photographic images. It is a response to my struggle in finding meaning in my creative process of making images. I disrupt the representation of the images using strategies of appropriation, photo manipulation, sequencing, repetition, and performative photo handling. Highlighting the characteristics of both indexicality and ambiguity in photography, Ibid. calls attention to how we develop our phycological desire to address meaning on images. Although Ibid. is rooted in my personal creative experience, it questions image- making under a broader context. When the images fail to bring us new excitement regarding the content, what exists beyond the representation

QoS Provision for Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor network is a fast growing area of research, receiving attention not only within the computer science and electrical engineering communities, but also in relation to network optimization, scheduling, risk and reliability analysis within industrial and system engineering. The availability of micro-sensors and low-power wireless communications will enable the deployment of densely distributed sensor/actuator networks. And an integration of such system plays critical roles in many facets of human life ranging from intelligent assistants in hospitals to manufacturing process, to rescue agents in large scale disaster response, to sensor networks tracking environment phenomena, and others. The sensor nodes will perform significant signal processing, computation, and network self-configuration to achieve scalable, secure, robust and long-lived networks. More specifically, sensor nodes will do local processing to reduce energy costs, and key exchanges to ensure robust communications. These requirements pose interesting challenges for networking research. The most important technical challenge arises from the development of an integrated system which is 1)energy efficient because the system must be long-lived and operate without manual intervention, 2)reliable for data communication and robust to attackers because information security and system robustness are important in sensitive applications, such as military. Based on the above challenges, this dissertation provides Quality of Service (QoS) implementation and evaluation for the wireless sensor networks. It includes the following 3 modules, 1) energy-efficient routing, 2) energy-efficient coverage, 3). communication security. Energy-efficient routing combines the features of minimum energy consumption routing protocols with minimum computational cost routing protocols. Energy-efficient coverage provides on-demand sensing and measurement. Information security needs a security key exchange scheme to ensure reliable and robust communication links. QoS evaluation metrics and results are presented based on the above requirements

Dynamically Mitigating Data Discrepancy with Balanced Focal Loss for Replay Attack Detection

It becomes urgent to design effective anti-spoofing algorithms for vulnerable automatic speaker verification systems due to the advancement of high-quality playback devices. Current studies mainly treat anti-spoofing as a binary classification problem between bonafide and spoofed utterances, while lack of indistinguishable samples makes it difficult to train a robust spoofing detector. In this paper, we argue that for anti-spoofing, it needs more attention for indistinguishable samples over easily-classified ones in the modeling process, to make correct discrimination a top priority. Therefore, to mitigate the data discrepancy between training and inference, we propose to leverage a balanced focal loss function as the training objective to dynamically scale the loss based on the traits of the sample itself. Besides, in the experiments, we select three kinds of features that contain both magnitude-based and phase-based information to form complementary and informative features. Experimental results on the ASVspoof2019 dataset demonstrate the superiority of the proposed methods by comparison between our systems and top-performing ones. Systems trained with the balanced focal loss perform significantly better than conventional cross-entropy loss. With complementary features, our fusion system with only three kinds of features outperforms other systems containing five or more complex single models by 22.5% for min-tDCF and 7% for EER, achieving a min-tDCF and an EER of 0.0124 and 0.55% respectively. Furthermore, we present and discuss the evaluation results on real replay data apart from the simulated ASVspoof2019 data, indicating that research for anti-spoofing still has a long way to go.Comment: This work has been accepted by the 25th International Conference on Pattern Recognition (ICPR2020

Neuroendocrine markers insulinoma-associated protein 1, chromogranin, synaptophysin, and CD56 show rare positivity in adenocarcinoma ex-goblet cell carcinoids

Background: Adenocarcinoma ex-goblet cell carcinoid (AdexGCC) was considered a neuroendocrine adenocarcinoma, despite majority of tumor cells being negative for conventional neuroendocrine markers such as chromogranin and synaptophysin. Recently, insulinoma-associated protein 1 (INSM1) has been identified as a novel neuroendocrine marker that is more sensitive than chromogranin, synaptophysin, and CD56 in pulmonary neuroendocrine tumors. Methods: We studied this marker in conjunction with chromogranin, synaptophysin, and CD56 in 36 appendiceal AdexGCCs (21 primaries, 15 metastatic). Results: Primary AdexGCCs showed staining for INSM1, chromogranin, synaptophysin, and CD56 in 13/21 (62%), 18/21 (86%), 18/21 (86%), and 9/19 (47%) cases, respectively. However, the mean proportion of tumor cells stained for INSM1, chromogranin, synaptophysin, and CD56 was only 8.0% (median 1%, range 0-70%), 15.7% (median 2%, range 0-70%), 19.9% (median 5%, range 0-90%), and 5.6% (median 0%, range 0-50%), respectively. Metastatic AdexGCCs showed staining for INSM1, chromogranin, synaptophysin, and CD56 in 8/15 (53%), 11/15 (73%), 12/15 (80%), and 3/14 (21%) cases. The mean proportion of tumor cells stained for INSM1, chromogranin, synaptophysin, and CD56 in metastatic tumors was 1% (median 1%, range 0-3%), 12% (median 1%, range 0-85%), 17% (median 5%, range 0-85%), and 2% (median 0%, range 0-20%), respectively. Conclusions: Primary and metastatic AdexGCCs showed no difference in INSM1, chromogranin, synaptophysin, or CD56 staining. INSM1 exhibits low expression in AdexGCCs and is expressed by a lower proportion of tumor cells compared to chromogranin and synaptophysin

脱炭酸を伴わないクライゼン縮合を触媒する新規ケトシンターゼに関する構造解析

学位の種別: 課程博士審査委員会委員 : （主査）東京大学教授 阿部 郁朗, 東京大学教授 井上 将行, 東京大学教授 金井 求, 東京大学准教授 岡田 正弘, 東京大学准教授 折原 裕University of Tokyo(東京大学

A Tool for Evaluating Environmental Sustainability of Plastic Waste Reduction Innovations

Plastics and their byproducts are littering our cities, oceans, and waterways, and contributing to health problems in humans and animals. Since plastics have become significant in our economic and social activities, it is urgent and essential to make progress in plastic waste reduction. Many large investors are looking into technologies and solutions that reduce plastic waste, but a sole plastic waste reduction innovation or project does not guarantee or equate to sustainability performance. In this Master’s project, the team at the School of Environment and Sustainability (SEAS) investigated the plastics industry, with the objective of developing a framework and sustainability assessment tool for evaluating plastic reduction innovations to support investment decisions. The team reviewed sustainability assessment literature and studied plastic waste reduction strategies to determine key criteria and a process for evaluating sustainability performance of plastic waste reduction innovations. Through this work, the Plastic Waste Reduction Innovation Sustainability Evaluation Tool (PRISET) was created, setting educational guidelines around the criteria for both investors and other potential users. General guidance is presented for evaluating environmental sustainability of basic business models that focuses on the company’s mission & vision, circular economy attributes, and potential scale of the waste reduction innovation. More indepth tools for evaluating specific technology innovations include third party certifications and life cycle assessments that require expertise to conduct. Waste reduction innovations were classified into four categories: reuse & refill, alternative materials, innovative design and recycling; and specific guidance criteria in the form of questions were presented to highlight key drivers of sustainability performance in each category. Finally, we also conducted a case study to test the feasibility of the tool. Those innovations that address a wider set of criteria are expected to be more preferrable, while feedback from the assessment will also be useful for innovation companies themselves to focus efforts on those criteria they have not addressed.Master of ScienceSchool for Environment and SustainabilityUniversity of Michiganhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/167287/1/Eval Env Sus of Plastic Waste Red.pd

Feature evaluation for building facade images - an empirical study

The classification of building facade images is a challenging problem that receives a great deal of attention in the photogrammetry community. Image classification is critically dependent on the features. In this paper, we perform an empirical feature evaluation task for building facade images. Feature sets we choose are basic features, color features, histogram features, Peucker features, texture features, and SIFT features. We present an approach for region-wise labeling using an efficient randomized decision forest classifier and local features. We conduct our experiments with building facade image classification on the eTRIMS dataset, where our focus is the object classes building, car, door, pavement, road, sky, vegetation, and window

SP-8356 (A Verbenone Derivative) Inhibits Proliferation, Suppresses Cell Migration and Invasion and Decreases Tumor Growth of Osteosarcoma: Role of PGC-1α/TFAM and AMPK-Activation

Objective: Osteosarcoma (OS) is an uncommon sarcoma with osteoid formation in conjunction with malignantmesenchymal cells on histological examination. SP-8356 has been reported to exhibit anti-cancer properties in humancancers. However the impact of SP-8356 on OS is largely unknown. The metabolic pathways are coordinated by AMPactivatedprotein kinase (AMPK), which maintains a balance between the supply and demand of nutrients and energy.This study aimed to investigate effect of SP-8356 on proliferation and apoptosis of OS cells and tumor growth in mice.Furthermore, involvement of PGC-1α/TFAM and AMPK-activation was studied.Materials and Methods: In the experimental study, Saos-2 and MG63 cells were cultured with SP-8356 for 24hours and analysed for cellular proliferation using MTT assay. DNA fragmentation was studied using ELISA basedkit. Furthermore, transwell chambers assay was used to determine cell migration and cell invasion. Targeted proteinexpression levels were assessed using western blotting. For in vivo studies, mice (5-6 weeks old) were implanted witheither Saos-2 or MG63 cells on dorsal surface subcutaneously and they were administered with SP-8356 (10 mg/kg)for two weeks prior to bone tumor induction.Results: We found that SP-8356 exerted anti-proliferative effects on Saos-2 and MG63 cells. Furthermore, SP-8356treatment significantly restricted migration and invasion of Saos-2 and MG63 cells. Compared to the control, SP-8356significantly reduced apoptotic cell death, while it increased PGC-1α and TFAM expressions. Without affecting bodyweight, SP-8356 significantly reduced tumor development in mice, as compared to the control group.Conclusion: SP-8356 was found to inhibit proliferation, suppressed cells migration and invasion and decreased OStumor growth. Furthermore, SP-8356 was found to act through PGC-1α/TFAM and AMPK activations. SP-8356 can betherefore used as therapeutic agent for OS treatment