An Intelligent Threat Prevention Framework with Heterogeneous Information

Three issues usually are associated with threat prevention intelligent surveillance systems. First, the fusion and interpretation of large scale incomplete heterogeneous information; second, the demand of effectively predicting suspects’ intention and ranking the potential threats posed by each suspect; third, strategies of allocating limited security resources (e.g., the dispatch of security team) to prevent a suspect’s further actions towards critical assets. However, in the literature, these three issues are seldomly considered together in a sensor network based intelligent surveillance framework. To address
this problem, in this paper, we propose a multi-level decision support framework for in-time reaction in intelligent surveillance. More specifically, based on a multi-criteria event modeling framework, we design a method to predict the most plausible intention of a suspect. Following this, a decision support model is proposed to rank each suspect based on their threat severity and to determine resource allocation strategies. Finally, formal properties are discussed to justify our framework.

Modeling relativistic soliton interactions in overdense plasmas: A perturbed nonlinear Schrodinger equation framework

We investigate the dynamics of localized solutions of the relativistic cold-fluid plasma model in the small but finite amplitude limit, for slightly overcritical plasma density. Adopting a multiple scale analysis, we derive a perturbed nonlinear Schrodinger equation that describes the evolution of the envelope of circularly polarized electromagnetic field. Retaining terms up to fifth order in the small perturbation parameter, we derive a self-consistent framework for the description of the plasma response in the presence of localized electromagnetic field. The formalism is applied to standing electromagnetic soliton interactions and the results are validated by simulations of the full cold-fluid model. To lowest order, a cubic nonlinear Schrodinger equation with a focusing nonlinearity is recovered. Classical quasiparticle theory is used to obtain analytical estimates for the collision time and minimum distance of approach between solitons. For larger soliton amplitudes the inclusion of the fifth-order terms is essential for a qualitatively correct description of soliton interactions. The defocusing quintic nonlinearity leads to inelastic soliton collisions, while bound states of solitons do not persist under perturbations in the initial phase or amplitude

Summary of the Snowmastodon Project Special Volume: A high-elevation, multi-proxy biotic and environmental record of MIS 6-4 from the Ziegler Reservoir fossil site, Snowmass Village, Colorado, USA

In North America, terrestrial records of biodiversity and climate change that span Marine Oxygen Isotope Stage (MIS) 5 are rare. Where found, they provide insight into how the coupling of the ocean-atmosphere system is manifested in biotic and environmental records and how the biosphere responds to climate change. In 2010-2011, construction at Ziegler Reservoir near Snowmass Village, Colorado (USA) revealed a nearly continuous, lacustrine/wetland sedimentary sequence that preserved evidence of past plant communities between similar to 140 and 55 lea, including all of MIS 5. At an elevation of 2705 m, the Ziegler Reservoir fossil site also contained thousands of well-preserved bones of late Pleistocene megafauna, including mastodons, mammoths, ground sloths, horses, camels, deer, bison, black bear, coyotes, and bighorn sheep. In addition, the site contained more than 26,000 bones from at least 30 species of small animals including salamanders, otters, muskrats, minks, rabbits, beavers, frogs, lizards, snakes, fish, and birds. The combination of macro- and micro-vertebrates, invertebrates, terrestrial and aquatic plant macrofossils, a detailed pollen record, and a robust, directly dated stratigraphic framework shows that high-elevation ecosystems in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado are climatically sensitive and varied dramatically throughout MIS 5 

Adherence to treatment in children and adolescents with cystic fibrosis: a cross-sectional, multi-method study investigating the influence of beliefs about treatment and parental depressive symptoms

BACKGROUND: Adherence to treatment is often reported to be low in children with cystic fibrosis. Adherence in cystic fibrosis is an important research area and more research is needed to better understand family barriers to adherence in order for clinicians to provide appropriate intervention. The aim of this study was to evaluate adherence to enzyme supplements, vitamins and chest physiotherapy in children with cystic fibrosis and to determine if any modifiable risk factors are associated with adherence.

METHODS: A sample of 100 children (≤18 years) with cystic fibrosis (44 male; median [range] 10.1 [0.2-18.6] years) and their parents were recruited to the study from the Northern Ireland Paediatric Cystic Fibrosis Centre. Adherence to enzyme supplements, vitamins and chest physiotherapy was assessed using a multi-method approach including; Medication Adherence Report Scale, pharmacy prescription refill data and general practitioner prescription issue data. Beliefs about treatments were assessed using refined versions of the Beliefs about Medicines Questionnaire-specific. Parental depressive symptoms were assessed using the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale.

RESULTS: Using the multi-method approach 72% of children were classified as low-adherers to enzyme supplements, 59% low-adherers to vitamins and 49% low-adherers to chest physiotherapy. Variations in adherence were observed between measurement methods, treatments and respondents. Parental necessity beliefs and child age were significant independent predictors of child adherence to enzyme supplements and chest physiotherapy, but parental depressive symptoms were not found to be predictive of adherence.

CONCLUSIONS: Child age and parental beliefs about treatments should be taken into account by clinicians when addressing adherence at routine clinic appointments. Low adherence is more likely to occur in older children, whereas, better adherence to cystic fibrosis therapies is more likely in children whose parents strongly believe the treatments are necessary. The necessity of treatments should be reinforced regularly to both parents and children.

Empirical evaluation of multi-device profiling side-channel attacks

Side-channel analysis of cryptographic systems can allow for the recovery of secret information by an adversary even where the underlying algorithms have been shown to be provably secure. This is achieved by exploiting the unintentional leakages inherent in the underlying implementation of the algorithm in software or hardware. Within this field of research, a class of attacks known as profiling attacks, or more specifically as used here template attacks, have been shown to be extremely efficient at extracting secret keys. Template attacks assume a strong adversarial model, in that an attacker has an identical device with which to profile the power consumption of various operations. This can then be used to efficiently attack the target device. Inherent in this assumption is that the power consumption across the devices under test is somewhat similar. This central tenet of the attack is largely unexplored in the literature with the research community generally performing the profiling stage on the same device as being attacked. This is beneficial for evaluation or penetration testing as it is essentially the best case scenario for an attacker where the model built during the profiling stage matches exactly that of the target device, however it is not necessarily a reflection on how the attack will work in reality. In this work, a large scale evaluation of this assumption is performed, comparing the key recovery performance across 20 identical smart-cards when performing a profiling attack.

Hierarchical energy management system for multi-source multi-product microgrids

This paper proposes a hierarchical energy management system for multi-source multi-product (MSMP) microgrids. Traditional energy hub based scheduling method is combined with a hierarchical control structure to incorporate transient characteristics of natural gas flow and dynamics of energy converters in microgrids. The hierarchical EMS includes a supervisory control layer, an optimizing control layer, and an execution control layer. In order to efficiently accommodate the systems multi time-scale characteristics, the optimizing control layer is decomposed into three sub-layers: slow, medium and fast. Thermal, gas and electrical management systems are integrated into the slow, medium, and fast control layer, respectively. Compared with wind energy, solar energy is easier to integrate and more suitable for the microgrid environment, therefore, potential impacts of the hierarchical EMS on MSMP microgrids is investigated based on a building energy system integrating photovoltaic and microturbines. Numerical studies indicate that by using a hierarchical EMS, MSMP microgrids can be economically operated. Also, interactions among thermal, gas, and electrical system can be effectively managed.

Dynamic Modeling and Interaction of Hybrid Natural Gas and Electricity Supply System in Microgrid

Natural gas (NG) network and electric network are becoming tightly integrated by microturbines in the microgrid. Interactions between these two networks are not well captured by the traditional microturbine (MT) models. To address this issue, two improved models for single-shaft MT and split-shaft MT are proposed in this paper. In addition, dynamic models of the hybrid natural gas and electricity system (HGES) are developed for the analysis of their interactions. Dynamic behaviors of natural gas in pipes are described by partial differential equations (PDEs), while the electric network is described by differential algebraic equations (DAEs). So the overall network is a typical two-time scale dynamic system. Numerical studies indicate that the two-time scale algorithm is faster and can capture the interactions between the two networks. The results also show the HGES with a single-shaft MT is a weakly coupled system in which disturbances in the two networks mainly influence the dc link voltage of the MT, while the split-shaft MT is a strongly coupled system where the impact of an event will affect both networks.

Deep Salience: Visual Salience Modeling via Deep Belief Propagation

Visual salience is an intriguing phenomenon observed in biological neural systems. Numerous attempts have been made to model visual salience mathematically using various feature contrasts, either locally or globally. However, these algorithmic models tend to ignore the problem’s biological solutions, in which visual salience appears to arise during the propagation of visual stimuli along the visual cortex. In this paper, inspired by the conjecture that salience arises from deep propagation along the visual cortex, we present a Deep Salience model where a multi-layer model based on successive Markov random fields (sMRF) is proposed to analyze the input image successively through its deep belief propagation. As a result, the foreground object can be automatically separated from the background in a fully unsupervised way. Experimental evaluation on the benchmark dataset validated that our Deep Salience model can consistently outperform eleven state-of-the-art salience models, yielding the higher rates in the precision-recall tests and attaining the best F-measure and mean-square error in the experiments.

Automating fault tolerance in high-performance computational biological jobs using multi-agent approaches

Background: Large-scale biological jobs on high-performance computing systems require manual intervention if one or more computing cores on which they execute fail. This places not only a cost on the maintenance of the job, but also a cost on the time taken for reinstating the job and the risk of losing data and execution accomplished by the job before it failed. Approaches which can proactively detect computing core failures and take action to relocate the computing core's job onto reliable cores can make a significant step towards automating fault tolerance. Method: This paper describes an experimental investigation into the use of multi-agent approaches for fault tolerance. Two approaches are studied, the first at the job level and the second at the core level. The approaches are investigated for single core failure scenarios that can occur in the execution of parallel reduction algorithms on computer clusters. A third approach is proposed that incorporates multi-agent technology both at the job and core level. Experiments are pursued in the context of genome searching, a popular computational biology application. Result: The key conclusion is that the approaches proposed are feasible for automating fault tolerance in high-performance computing systems with minimal human intervention. In a typical experiment in which the fault tolerance is studied, centralised and decentralised checkpointing approaches on an average add 90% to the actual time for executing the job. On the other hand, in the same experiment the multi-agent approaches add only 10% to the overall execution time

Age-related prevalence and met need for correctable and uncorrectable near vision impairment in a multi-country study

Purpose: To estimate the prevalence, potential determinants, and proportion of met need for near vision impairment (NVI) correctable with refraction approximately 2 years after initial examination of a multi-country cohort. Design: Population-based, prospective cohort study. Participants: People aged ≥35 years examined at baseline in semi-rural (Shunyi) and urban (Guangzhou) sites in China; rural sites in Nepal (Kaski), India (Madurai), and Niger (Dosso); a semi-urban site (Durban) in South Africa; and an urban site (Los Angeles) in the United States. Methods: Near visual acuity (NVA) with and without current near correction was measured at 40 cm using a logarithm of the minimum angle of resolution near vision tumbling E chart. Participants with uncorrected binocular NVA ≤20/40 were tested with plus sphere lenses to obtain best-corrected binocular NVA. Main Outcome Measures: Prevalence of total NVI (defined as uncorrected NVA ≤20/40) and NVI correctable and uncorrectable to >20/40, and current spectacle wearing among those with bilateral NVA ≤20/63 improving to >20/40 with near correction (met need). Results: Among 13 671 baseline participants, 10 533 (77.2%) attended the follow-up examination. The prevalence of correctable NVI increased with age from 35 to 50-60 years and then decreased at all sites. Multiple logistic regression modeling suggested that correctable NVI was not associated with gender at any site, whereas more educated persons aged >54 years were associated with a higher prevalence of correctable NVI in Nepal and India. Although near vision spectacles were provided free at baseline, wear among those who could benefit was <40% at all but 2 centers (Guangzhou and Los Angeles). Conclusions: Prevalence of correctable NVI is greatest among persons of working age, and rates of correction are low in many settings, suggesting that strategies targeting the workplace may be needed.

MHD Wave Modes Resolved in Fine-Scale Chromospheric Magnetic Structures

Due to its complex and dynamic fine-scale structure, the chromosphere is a particularly challenging region of the Sun's atmosphere to understand. It is now widely accepted that to model chromospheric dynamics, even on a magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) scale, while also calculating spectral line emission, one must realistically include the effects of partial ionization and radiative transfer in a multi-fluid plasma under non-LTE conditions. Accurate quantification of MHD wave energetics must befounded on a precise identification of the actual wave mode being observed. This chapter focuses on MHD kink-mode identification, MHD sausage mode identification, and MHD torsional Alfvén wave identification. It then reviews progress in determining more accurate energy flux estimations of specific MHD wave modes observed in the chromosphere. The chapter finally examines how the discovery of these MHD wave modes has helped us advance the field of chromosphericmagnetoseismology.

Evidence for the reliability and validity, but not the practical utility of the two-factor Consideration of Future Consequences Scale-14

Researchers have proposed 1-factor, 2-factor, and bifactor solutions to the 12-item Consideration of Future Consequences Scale (CFCS-12). In order to overcome some measurement problems and to create a robust and conceptually useful two-factor scale the CFCS-12 was recently modified to include two new items and to become the CFCS-14. Using a University sample, we tested four competing models for the CFCS-14: (a) a 12-item unidimensional model, (b) a model fitted for two uncorrelated factors (CFC-Immediate and CFC-Future), (c) a model fitted for two correlated factors (CFC-I and CFC-F), and (d) a bifactor model. Results suggested that the addition of the two new items has strengthened the viability of a two factor solution of the CFCS-14. Results of linear regression models suggest that the CFC-F factor is redundant. Further studies using alcohol and mental health indicators are required to test this redundancy.

Measurement and modeling of hyperfine properties in ferroic materials

This thesis presents the results of perturbed angular correlation (PAC) experiments , an experimental technique which measures the hyperfine interaction at probes (radioactive ions implanted in the materials to study), from which one infers local information on an atomic scale. Furthermore, abinitio calculations using density functional theory electronic obtain results that directly complement the experiments, and are also used for theoretical research. These methods were applied in two families of materials. The manganites, with the possible existence of magnetic, charge, orbital and ferroelectric orders, are of fundamental and technological interest. The experimental results are obtained in the alkaline-earth manganites (Ca, Ba, Sr), with special interest due to the structural variety of possible polymorphs. With probes of Cd and In the stability of the probe and its location in a wide temperature range is established and a comparison with calculations allows the physical interpretation of the results. Calculations of hyperfine properties in rare-earth manganites are also presented. The second type of materials in which hyperfine properties were studied are the Manganese pnictides: MnAs, MnSb, and MnBi, compounds in which magnetism is fundamental. The experimental results obtained mainly consider the MnAs compound, whose magneto-structural transition is of great interest. The transition is analyzed in detail with the local resolution characteristic of the technique, obtaining information of the character of the transition also with complementary, more conventional techniques. The last work in this thesis uses only the first principles calculations, continuing the theme of the hyperfine interactions, but this time with respect to ferroelectrics. Several transition metal oxides with perovskite or distorted structures are considered. The electric field gradient which exists due to the quadrupole interaction in nuclei is related to the spontaneous electric polarization, the main quantity measured in ferroelectrics. This study provides a fundamental theoretical basis for previous empirical studies, suggesting new directions for research in ferroelectrics and multiferroics using techniques which measure the electric field gradient.

Analysis, modeling, design and optimization of future communications systems: from theory to practice

Esta tese descreve uma framework de trabalho assente no paradigma multi-camada para analisar, modelar, projectar e optimizar sistemas de comunicação. Nela se explora uma nova perspectiva acerca da camada física que nasce das relações entre a teoria de informação, estimação, métodos probabilísticos, teoria da comunicação e codificação. Esta framework conduz a métodos de projecto para a próxima geração de sistemas de comunicação de alto débito. Além disso, a tese explora várias técnicas de camada de acesso com base na relação entre atraso e débito para o projeto de redes sem fio tolerantes a atrasos. Alguns resultados fundamentais sobre a interação entre a teoria da informação e teoria da estimação conduzem a propostas de um paradigma alternativo para a análise, projecto e optimização de sistemas de comunicação. Com base em estudos sobre a relação entre a informação recíproca e MMSE, a abordagem descrita na tese permite ultrapassar, de forma inovadora, as dificuldades inerentes à optimização das taxas de transmissão de informação confiáveis em sistemas de comunicação, e permite a exploração da atribuição óptima de potência e estruturas óptimas de pre-codificação para diferentes modelos de canal: com fios, sem fios e ópticos. A tese aborda também o problema do atraso, numa tentativa de responder a questões levantadas pela enorme procura de débitos elevados em sistemas de comunicação. Isso é feito através da proposta de novos modelos para sistemas com codificação de rede (network coding) em camadas acima da sua camada física. Em particular, aborda-se a utilização de sistemas de codificação em rede para canais que variam no tempo e são sensíveis a atrasos. Isso foi demonstrado através da proposta de um novo modelo e esquema adaptativo, cujos algoritmos foram aplicados a sistemas sem fios com desvanecimento (fading) complexo, de que são exemplos os sistemas de comunicação via satélite. A tese aborda ainda o uso de sistemas de codificação de rede em cenários de transferência (handover) exigentes. Isso é feito através da proposta de novos modelos de transmissão WiFi IEEE 801.11 MAC, que são comparados com codificação de rede, e que se demonstram possibilitar transferência sem descontinuidades. Pode assim dizer-se que esta tese, através de trabalho de análise e de propostas suportadas por simulações, defende que na concepção de sistemas de comunicação se devem considerar estratégias de transmissão e codificação que sejam não só próximas da capacidade dos canais, mas também tolerantes a atrasos, e que tais estratégias têm de ser concebidas tendo em vista características do canal e a camada física.

Modeling the Western Iberian margin circulation: present and future

The purpose of this work is to carry out a comprehensive study on the Western Iberian Margin (WIM) circulation my means of numerical modeling, and to postulate what this circulation will be in the future. The adopted approach was the development of a regional ocean model configuration with high resolution, capable of reproducing the largeand small-scale dynamics of the coastal transition zone. Four numerical experiences were carried out according to these objectives: (1) a climatological run, in order to study the system’s seasonal behavior and its mean state; (2) a run forced with real winds and fluxes for period 2001-2011 in order to study the interannual variability of the system; (3) a run forced with mean fields from Global Climate Models (GCMs) for the present, in order to validate GCMs as adequate forcing for regional ocean modeling; (4) a similar run (3) for period 2071-2100, in order to assess possible consequences of a future climate scenario on the hydrography and dynamics of the WIM. Furthermore, two Lagrangian particle studies were carried out: one in order to trace the origin of the upwelled waters along the WIM; the other in order to portrait the patterns of larval dispersal, accumulation and connectivity. The numerical configuration proved to be adequate in the reproduction of the system’s mean state, seasonal characterization and an interannual variability study. There is prevalence of poleward flow at the slope, which coexists with the upwelling jet during summer, although there is evidence of its shifting offshore, and which is associated with the Mediterranean Water flow at deeper levels, suggesting a barotropic character. From the future climate scenario essay, the following conclusions were drawn: there is general warming and freshening of upper level waters; there is still poleward tendency, and despite the upwellingfavorable winds strengthening in summer the respective coastal band becomes more restricted in width and depth. In what concerns larval connectivity and dispersion along the WIM, diel vertical migration was observed to increase recruitment throughout the domain, and while smooth coastlines are better suppliers, there is higher accumulation where the topography is rougher.