Pattern Motion Perception: Feature Tracking or Integration of Component Motions?

A key question regarding primate visual motion perception is whether the motion of 2D patterns is recovered by tracking distinctive localizable features [Lorenceau and Gorea, 1989; Rubin and Hochstein, 1992] or by integrating ambiguous local motion estimates [Adelson and Movshon, 1982; Wilson and Kim, 1992]. For a two-grating plaid pattern, this translates to either tracking the grating intersections or to appropriately combining the motion estimates for each grating. Since both component and feature information are simultaneously available in any plaid pattern made of contrast defined gratings, it is unclear how to determine which of the two schemes is actually used to recover the plaid"s motion. To address this problem, we have designed a plaid pattern made with subjective, rather than contrast defined, gratings. The distinguishing characteristic of such a plaid pattern is that it contains no contrast defined intersections that may be tracked. We find that notwithstanding the absence of such features, observers can accurately recover the pattern velocity. Additionally we show that the hypothesis of tracking "illusory features" to estimate pattern motion does not stand up to experimental test. These results present direct evidence in support of the idea that calls for the integration of component motions over the one that mandates tracking localized features to recover 2D pattern motion. The localized features, we suggest, are used primarily as providers of grouping information - which component motion signals to integrate and which not to.

Learning and Example Selection for Object and Pattern Detection

This thesis presents a learning based approach for detecting classes of objects and patterns with variable image appearance but highly predictable image boundaries. It consists of two parts. In part one, we introduce our object and pattern detection approach using a concrete human face detection example. The approach first builds a distribution-based model of the target pattern class in an appropriate feature space to describe the target's variable image appearance. It then learns from examples a similarity measure for matching new patterns against the distribution-based target model. The approach makes few assumptions about the target pattern class and should therefore be fairly general, as long as the target class has predictable image boundaries. Because our object and pattern detection approach is very much learning-based, how well a system eventually performs depends heavily on the quality of training examples it receives. The second part of this thesis looks at how one can select high quality examples for function approximation learning tasks. We propose an {em active learning} formulation for function approximation, and show for three specific approximation function classes, that the active example selection strategy learns its target with fewer data samples than random sampling. We then simplify the original active learning formulation, and show how it leads to a tractable example selection paradigm, suitable for use in many object and pattern detection problems.

Some Aspects of Pattern Recognition by Computer

A computer may gather a lot of information from its environment in an optical or graphical manner. A scene, as seen for instance from a TV camera or a picture, can be transformed into a symbolic description of points and lines or surfaces. This thesis describes several programs, written in the language CONVERT, for the analysis of such descriptions in order to recognize, differentiate and identify desired objects or classes of objects in the scene. Examples are given in each case. Although the recognition might be in terms of projections of 2-dim and 3-dim objects, we do not deal with stereoscopic information. One of our programs (Polybrick) identifies parallelepipeds in a scene which may contain partially hidden bodies and non-parallelepipedic objects. The program TD works mainly with 2-dimensional figures, although under certain conditions successfully identifies 3-dim objects. Overlapping objects are identified when they are transparent. A third program, DT, works with 3-dim and 2-dim objects, and does not identify objects which are not completely seen. Important restrictions and suppositions are: (a) the input is assumed perfect (noiseless), and in a symbolic format; (b) no perspective deformation is considered. A portion of this thesis is devoted to the study of models (symbolic representations) of the objects we want to identify; different schemes, some of them already in use, are discussed. Focusing our attention on the more general problem of identification of general objects when they substantially overlap, we propose some schemes for their recognition, and also analyze some problems that are met.

Heuristics for protecting competitive knowledge in association rule mining.

2006

Changes in innovation styles - comprehensive study of the changes in innovation styles to identify the causes and effects of different influencing factors and capabilities to create a general innovation pattern.

An investigation in innovation management and entrepreneurial management is conducted in this thesis. The aim of the research is to explore changes of innovation styles in the transformation process from a start-up company to a more mature phase of business, to predict in a second step future sustainability and the probability of success. As businesses grow in revenue, corporate size and functional complexity, various triggers, supporters and drivers affect innovation and company's success. In a comprehensive study more than 200 innovative and technology driven companies have been examined and compared to identify patterns in different performance levels. All of them have been founded under the same formal requirements of the Munich Business Plan Competition -a research approach which allowed a unique snapshot that only long-term studies would be able to provide. The general objective was to identify the correlation between different factors, as well as different dimensions, to incremental and radical innovations realised. The 12 hypothesis were formed to prove have been derived from a comprehensive literature review. The relevant academic and practitioner literature on entrepreneurial, innovation, and knowledge management as well as social network theory revealed that the concept of innovation has evolved significantly over the last decade. A review of over 15 innovation models/frameworks contributed to understand what innovation in context means and what the dimensions are. It appears that the complex theories of innovation can be described by the increasing extent of social ingredients in the explanation of innovativeness. Originally based on tangible forms of capital, and on the necessity of pull and technology push, innovation management is today integrated in a larger system. Therefore, two research instruments have been developed to explore the changes in innovations styles. The Innovation Management Audits (IMA Start-up and IMA Mature) provided statements related to product/service development, innovativeness in various typologies, resources for innovations, innovation capabilities in conjunction to knowledge and management, social networks as well as the measurement of outcomes to generate high-quality data for further exploration. In obtaining results the mature companies have been clustered in the performance level low, average and high, while the start-up companies have been kept as one cluster. Firstly, the analysis exposed that knowledge, the process of acquiring knowledge, interorganisational networks and resources for innovations are the most important driving factors for innovation and success. Secondly, the actual change of the innovation style provides new insights about the importance of focusing on sustaining success and innovation ii 16 key areas. Thirdly, a detailed overview of triggers, supporters and drivers for innovation and success for each dimension support decision makers in putting their company in the right direction. Fourthly, a critical review of contemporary strategic management in conjunction to the findings provides recommendation of how to apply well-known management tools. Last but not least, the Munich cluster is analysed providing an estimation of the success probability of the different performance cluster and start-up companies. For the analysis of the probability of success of the newly developed as well as statistically and qualitative validated ICP Model (Innovativeness, Capabilities & Potential) has been developed and applied. While the model was primarily developed to evaluate the probability of success of companies; it has equal application in the situation to measure innovativeness to identify the impact of various strategic initiatives within small or large enterprises. The main findings of the model are that competitor, and customer orientation and acquiring knowledge important for incremental and radical innovation. Formal and interorganisation networks are important to foster innovation but informal networks appear to be detrimental to innovation. The testing of the ICP model h the long term is recommended as one subject of further research. Another is to investigate some of the more intangible aspects of innovation management such as attitude and motivation of mangers. IV

Advanced interatrial block: A well-defined electrocardiographic pattern with clinical arrhythmological implications

3.050 JCR (2013) Q2, 44/125 Cardiac & cardiovascular systems

Scalable Multi-Relational Association Mining

Clare, A., Williams, H. E. and Lester, N. M. (2004) Scalable Multi-Relational Association Mining. In proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Data Mining ICDM '04.

Confirmation of Data Mining Based Predictions of Protein Function

King, R. D. and Wise, P. H. and Clare, A. (2004) Confirmation of Data Mining Based Predictions of Protein Function. Bioinformatics 20(7), 1110-1118

Data mining the yeast genome in a lazy functional language

Clare, A. and King R.D. (2003) Data mining the yeast genome in a lazy functional language. In Practical Aspects of Declarative Languages (PADL'03) (won Best/Most Practical Paper award).

A dichotomic search algorithm for mining and learning in domain-specific logics

Ferr?, S. and King, R. D. (2004) A dichotomic search algorithm for mining and learning in domain-specific logics. Fundamenta Informaticae. IOS Press. To appear

Analyses of patterns of copper and lead mineralisation in human skeletons excavated from an ancient mining and smelting centre in the Jordanian desert

Grattan, J.P., Al-Saad, Z., Gilbertson, D.D., Karaki, L.O., Pyatt, F.B 2005 Analyses of patterns of copper and lead mineralisation in human skeletons excavated from an ancient mining and smelting centre in the Jordanian desert Mineralogical Magazine. 69(5) 653-666.

An Imperial Legacy? An Exploration of the environmental impact of ancient metal mining and smelting in southern Jordan

Pyatt, B. Gilmore, G. Grattan, J. Hunt, C. McLaren, S. An imperial legacy? An exploration of the environmental impact of ancient metal mining and smelting in southern Jordan. Journal of Archaeological Science. 2000. 27 pp 771-778

'Death...more desirable than life'? The human skeletal record and toxicological implications of ancient copper mining and smelting in Wadi Faynan, southwestern Jordan

Grattan, J., Huxley, S., Karaki, L. A., Toland, H., Gilbertson, D., Pyatt, B., Saad, Z. A. (2002). 'Death . . . more desirable than life'? The human skeletal record and toxicological implications of ancient copper mining and smelting in Wadi Faynan, southwestern Jordan. Toxicology and Industrial Health, 18 (6), 297-307.

Geochemical evidence for atmospheric pollution derived from prehistoric copper mining at Copa hill, Cwmystwyth, mid-Wales. UK

Mighall, T. Abrahams, P. Grattan, J. Hayes, D. Timberlake, S. Forsyth, S. Geochemical evidence for atmospheric pollution derived from prehistoric copper mining at Copa Hill, Cwmystwyth, mid-Wales, UK. The Science of the Total Environment. 2002. 292 pp 69-80

The local and global dimensions of metalliferous pollution derived from a reconstruction of an eight thousand year record of copper smelting and mining at a desert-mountain frontier in southern Jordan

Grattan, J.P., Gilbertson, D.D., Hunt, C.O. (2007). The local and global dimensions of metaliferrous air pollution derived from a reconstruction of an 8 thousand year record of copper smelting and mining at a desert-mountain frontier in southern Jordan. Journal of Archaeological Science 34, 83-110