On the use of textural features for writer identification in old handwritten music scores

Writer identification consists in determining the writer of a piece of handwriting from a set of writers. In this paper we present a system for writer identification in old handwritten music scores which uses only music notation to determine the author. The steps of the proposed system are the following. First of all, the music sheet is preprocessed for obtaining a music score without the staff lines. Afterwards, four different methods for generating texture images from music symbols are applied. Every approach uses a different spatial variation when combining the music symbols to generate the textures. Finally, Gabor filters and Grey-scale Co-ocurrence matrices are used to obtain the features. The classification is performed using a k-NN classifier based on Euclidean distance. The proposed method has been tested on a database of old music scores from the 17th to 19th centuries, achieving encouraging identification rates.

Development and validation of GT3X accelerometer cut-off points in 5- to 9-year-old children based on indirect calorimetry measurements

The ActiGraph accelerometer is commonly used to measure physical activity in children. Count cut-off points are needed when using accelerometer data to determine the time a person spent in moderate or vigorous physical activity. For the GT3X accelerometer no cut-off points for young children have been published yet. The aim of the current study was thus to develop and validate count cut-off points for young children. Thirty-two children aged 5 to 9 years performed four locomotor and four play activities. Activity classification into the light-, moderate- or vigorous-intensity category was based on energy expenditure measurements with indirect calorimetry. Vertical axis as well as vector magnitude cut-off points were determined through receiver operating characteristic curve analyses with the data of two thirds of the study group and validated with the data of the remaining third. The vertical axis cut-off points were 133 counts per 5 sec for moderate to vigorous physical activity (MVPA), 193 counts for vigorous activity (VPA) corresponding to a metabolic threshold of 5 MET and 233 for VPA corresponding to 6 MET. The vector magnitude cut-off points were 246 counts per 5 sec for MVPA, 316 counts for VPA - 5 MET and 381 counts for VPA - 6 MET. When validated, the current cut-off points generally showed high recognition rates for each category, high sensitivity and specificity values and moderate agreement in terms of the Kappa statistic. These results were similar for vertical axis and vector magnitude cut-off points. The current cut-off points adequately reflect MVPA and VPA in young children. Cut-off points based on vector magnitude counts did not appear to reflect the intensity categories better than cut-off points based on vertical axis counts alone.

Recognition memory across the lifespan: the impact of word frequency and study-test interval on estimates of familiarity and recollection

The goal of this study was to investigate recognition memory performance across the lifespan and to determine how estimates of recollection and familiarity contribute to performance. In each of three experiments, participants from five groups from 14 up to 85 years of age (children, young adults, middle-aged adults, young-old adults, and old-old adults) were presented with high- and low-frequency words in a study phase and were tested immediately afterwards and/or after a one day retention interval. The results showed that word frequency and retention interval affected recognition memory performance as well as estimates of recollection and familiarity. Across the lifespan, the trajectory of recognition memory followed an inverse u-shape function that was neither affected by word frequency nor by retention interval. The trajectory of estimates of recollection also followed an inverse u-shape function, and was especially pronounced for low-frequency words. In contrast, estimates of familiarity did not differ across the lifespan. The results indicate that age differences in recognition memory are mainly due to differences in processes related to recollection while the contribution of familiarity-based processes seems to be age-invariant.

A case of EDTA-dependent pseudothrombocytopenia: simple recognition of an underdiagnosed and misleading phenomenon

1. BMC Clin Pathol. 2014 May 1;14:19. doi: 10.1186/1472-6890-14-19. eCollection 2014. A case of EDTA-dependent pseudothrombocytopenia: simple recognition of an underdiagnosed and misleading phenomenon. Nagler M, Keller P, Siegrist D, Alberio L. Author information: Department of Hematology and Central Hematology Laboratory, Inselspital University Hospital and University of Berne, CH-3010 Berne, Switzerland. BACKGROUND: EDTA-dependent pseudothrombocytopenia (EDTA-PTCP) is a common laboratory phenomenon with a prevalence ranging from 0.1-2% in hospitalized patients to 15-17% in outpatients evaluated for isolated thrombocytopenia. Despite its harmlessness, EDTA-PTCP frequently leads to time-consuming, costly and even invasive diagnostic investigations. EDTA-PTCP is often overlooked because blood smears are not evaluated visually in routine practice and histograms as well as warning flags of hematology analyzers are not interpreted correctly. Nonetheless, EDTA-PTCP may be diagnosed easily even by general practitioners without any experiences in blood film examinations. This is the first report illustrating the typical patterns of a platelet (PLT) and white blood cell (WBC) histograms of hematology analyzers. CASE PRESENTATION: A 37-year-old female patient of Caucasian origin was referred with suspected acute leukemia and the crew of the emergency unit arranged extensive investigations for work-up. However, examination of EDTA blood sample revealed atypical lymphocytes and an isolated thrombocytopenia together with typical patterns of WBC and PLT histograms: a serrated curve of the platelet histogram and a peculiar peak on the left side of the WBC histogram. EDTA-PTCP was confirmed by a normal platelet count when examining citrated blood. CONCLUSION: Awareness of typical PLT and WBC patterns may alert to the presence of EDTA-PTCP in routine laboratory practice helping to avoid unnecessary investigations and over-treatment. PMCID: PMC4012027 PMID: 24808761 [PubMed]

Dramas of Recognition: Philosophy as Literary History

Offers a critique of the concept of recognition (Honneth, Fraser), arguing that, from a literary-historical perspective, it connstitutes a step back behing modernism toward the agenda of Realism.

A Critique of Authenticity and Recognition

While forms of ethics based upon authenticity and recognition are holding sway in contemporary philosophical debates (Ferrara, Honneth, Fraser, etc.), many of the implications of both processes – conceptual, moral, political – are still insufficiently reflected upon. The talk will offer a “critique” (in the Kantian sense) of both, based upon an analysis of the “semiotics” of authenticity and the resulting perpetuation of a regime of authority of experts, as well as commenting upon the striking absence of the realm of literature and the arts from this debate, except in some references to a rather abstract notion of Aesthetics. It will also critically revaluate the concept of agency implicit in an ethics of authenticity and recognition.