Four-class Skew-symmetric Association Schemes

An association scheme is called skew-symmetric if it has no symmetric adjacency relations other than the diagonal one. In this paper, we study 4-class skew-symmetric association schemes. In J. Ma [On the nonexistence of skew-symmetric amorphous association schemes, submitted for publication], we discovered that their character tables fall into three types. We now determine their intersection matrices. We then determine the character tables and intersection numbers for 4-class skew-symmetric pseudocyclic association schemes, the only known examples of which are cyclotomic schemes. As a result, we answer a question raised by S. Y. Song [Commutative association schemes whose symmetrizations have two classes, J. Algebraic Combin. 5(1) 47-55, 1996]. We characterize and classify 4-class imprimitive skew-symmetric association schemes. We also prove that no 2-class Johnson scheme can admit a 4-class skew-symmetric fission scheme. Based on three types of character tables above, a short list of feasible parameters is generated.Comment: 12 page

KV-match: A Subsequence Matching Approach Supporting Normalization and Time Warping [Extended Version]

The volume of time series data has exploded due to the popularity of new applications, such as data center management and IoT. Subsequence matching is a fundamental task in mining time series data. All index-based approaches only consider raw subsequence matching (RSM) and do not support subsequence normalization. UCR Suite can deal with normalized subsequence match problem (NSM), but it needs to scan full time series. In this paper, we propose a novel problem, named constrained normalized subsequence matching problem (cNSM), which adds some constraints to NSM problem. The cNSM problem provides a knob to flexibly control the degree of offset shifting and amplitude scaling, which enables users to build the index to process the query. We propose a new index structure, KV-index, and the matching algorithm, KV-match. With a single index, our approach can support both RSM and cNSM problems under either ED or DTW distance. KV-index is a key-value structure, which can be easily implemented on local files or HBase tables. To support the query of arbitrary lengths, we extend KV-match to KV-match$_{DP}$, which utilizes multiple varied-length indexes to process the query. We conduct extensive experiments on synthetic and real-world datasets. The results verify the effectiveness and efficiency of our approach.Comment: 13 page

Reliable camera motion estimation from compressed MPEG videos using machine learning approach

As an important feature in characterizing video content, camera motion has been widely applied in various multimedia and computer vision applications. A novel method for fast and reliable estimation of camera motion from MPEG videos is proposed, using support vector machine for estimation in a regression model trained on a synthesized sequence. Experiments conducted on real sequences show that the proposed method yields much improved results in estimating camera motions while the difficulty in selecting valid macroblocks and motion vectors is skipped

Determination of Density of Trap States at Y\u3csub\u3e2\u3c/sub\u3eO\u3csub\u3e3\u3c/sub\u3e-Stabilized ZrO\u3csub\u3e2\u3c/sub\u3e/Si Interface of Yba\u3csub\u3e2\u3c/sub\u3eCu\u3csub\u3e3\u3c/sub\u3eO\u3csub\u3e7-δ\u3c/sub\u3e/Y\u3csub\u3e2\u3c/sub\u3eO\u3csub\u3e3\u3c/sub\u3e-Stabilized ZrO\u3csub\u3e2\u3c/sub\u3e/Si Capacitors

Yba2Cu3O7-δ/yttria‐stabilized zirconia (YSZ)/silicon superconductor‐insulator‐semiconductor capacitors are characterized with current‐voltage and capacitance‐voltage (C‐V) measurements at different temperatures between 223 and 80 K. As a result of ‘‘freezing’’ of mobile ions in YSZ, effects of trapped charge at the YSZ/Si interface dominate the device electrical properties at superconducting temperatures. Density of interface states and its temperature dependence are determined using a modified high frequency C‐V method, in which the temperature dependences of band gap, Fermi level, and active dopant and intrinsic carrier concentrations are considered. At superconducting temperatures, e.g., 80 K, the interface state density within the band gap is reduced to lower than 1×1011 cm−2 eV at midgap. The low interface state density at the YSZ/Si interface is important for acceptable performance and reliability devices made up of such capacitors

Computational studies with ESTs: assembly, SNP detection, and applications in alternative splicing

EST sequences are important in functional genomics studies. To better use available EST resources, clustering and assembling are crucial techniques. For EST sequences with deep coverage, no current assembly program can handle them well. We describe a deep assembly program named DA. The program keeps the number of differences in each contig alignment under control by making corrections to differences that are likely due to sequencing errors. Experimental results on the 115 clusters from the UniGene database show that DA can handle data sets of deep coverage efficiently. A comparison of the DA consensus sequences with the finished human and mouse genomes indicates that the consensus sequences are of acceptable quality;EST sequences can be used in SNP discovery. We describe a computational method for finding common SNPs with allele frequencies in single-pass sequences of deep coverage. The method enhances a widely used program named PolyBayes in several aspects. We present results from our method and PolyBayes on eighteen data sets of human expressed sequence tags (ESTs) with deep coverage. The results indicate that our method used almost all single-pass sequences in computation of the allele frequencies of SNPs;EST sequences can also be used to study alternative splicing (AS), which is the most common post transcription event in metazoans. We first developed a pipeline to identify AS forms by comparing alignments between expressed sequences and genomic sequences. Then we studied the relationship between AS and gene duplication. We observed that duplicate genes have fewer AS forms than single-copy genes; we also found that the loss of alternative splicing in duplicate genes may occur shortly after the gene duplication. Further analysis of the alternative splicing distribution in human duplicate pairs showed the asymmetric evolution of alternative splicing after gene duplications. We also compared AS among six species. We found significant differences on both AS rates and splice forms per gene among the studied species by detailed and categorized studies. The difference in AS rate between rice and Arabidopsis is significant enough to lead to a difference in protein diversity between those two species

WIKI-style administration of online course content

A Wiki is a piece of server software that allows users to freely create and edit Web page content using any Web browser. This project created the program, Wiki-Style Administration of Online Course Content (WAOCC) which can be used as a teaching assistant board. Students can edit their works online and the instructor can review the work and correct it directly if necessary from the WAOCC

Responses of Land Surface Phenology to Wildfire Disturbances in the Western United States Forests

Land surface phenology (LSP) characterizes the seasonal dynamics in the vegetation communities observed for a satellite pixel and it has been widely associated with global climate change. However, LSP and its long-term trend can be influenced by land disturbance events, which could greatly interrupt the LSP responses to climate change. Wildfire is one of the main disturbance agents in the western United States (US) forests, but its impacts on LSP have not been investigated yet. To gain a comprehensive understanding of the LSP responses to wildfires in the western US forests, this dissertation focused on three research objectives: (1) to perform a case study of wildfire impacts on LSP and its trend by comparing the burned and a reference area, (2) to investigate the distribution of wildfire impacts on LSP and identify control factors by analyzing all the wildfires across the western US forests, and (3) to quantify the contributions of land cover composition and other environmental factors to the spatial and interannual variations of LSP in a recently burned landscape. The results reveal that wildfires play a significant role in influencing spatial and interannual variations in LSP across the western US forests. First, the case study showed that the Hayman Fire significantly advanced the start of growing season (SOS) and caused an advancing SOS trend comparing with a delaying trend in the reference area. Second, summarizing \u3e800 wildfires found that the shifts in LSP timing were divergent depending on individual wildfire events and burn severity. Moreover, wildfires showed a stronger impact on the end of growing season (EOS) than SOS. Last, LSP trends were interrupted by wildfires with the degree of impact largely dependent on the wildfire occurrence year. Third, LSP modeling showed that land cover composition, climate, and topography co-determine the LSP variations. Specifically, land cover composition and climate dominate the LSP spatial and interannual variations, respectively. Overall, this research improves the understanding of wildfire impacts on LSP and the underlying mechanism of various factors driving LSP. This research also provides a prototype that can be extended to investigate the impacts on LSP from other disturbances