E-commerce and export promotion policies for small- and medium-sized enterprises: East Asian and Latin American experiences

Includes bibliography

E-commerce environment and trade promotion for Latin America: policy implications from East Asian and advanced economies' experiences

Includes bibliography

Microscopic and dielectric analyses of vanadium and tungsten modified barium zirconium titanate ceramics

Dielectric spectroscopy was used in this study to examine polycrystalline vanadium and tungstendoped BaZr 0.1Ti 0.90O 3 (BZT10:2V and BZT10:2W) ceramics obtained by the mixed oxide method. According to X-ray diffraction analyses, addition of vanadium and tungsten lead to ceramics free of secondary phases. SEM analyses reveal that both dopants result in slower oxygen ion motion and consequently lower grain growth rate. Temperature dependence dielectric study showed normal ferroelectric to paraelectric transition well above the room temperature for the BZT10 and BZT10:2V ceramics. However, BZT10:2W ceramic showed a relaxor-like behavior near phase transition characterized by the empirical parameter γ. Piezoelectric force microscopy images reveals that the piezoelectric coefficient is strongly influenced by type of donor dopant suggesting promising applications for dynamic random access memories and data-storage media. Copyright © 2010 American Scientific Publishers All rights reserved.

Architecture for peer-to-peer databases with routing queries using ant colony algorithm and semantic support

In a peer-to-peer network, the nodes interact with each other by sharing resources, services and information. Many applications have been developed using such networks, being a class of such applications are peer-to-peer databases. The peer-to-peer databases systems allow the sharing of unstructured data, being able to integrate data from several sources, without the need of large investments, because they are used existing repositories. However, the high flexibility and dynamicity of networks the network, as well as the absence of a centralized management of information, becomes complex the process of locating information among various participants in the network. In this context, this paper presents original contributions by a proposed architecture for a routing system that uses the Ant Colony algorithm to optimize the search for desired information supported by ontologies to add semantics to shared data, enabling integration among heterogeneous databases and the while seeking to reduce the message traffic on the network without causing losses in the amount of responses, confirmed by the improve of 22.5% in this amount. © 2011 IEEE.

Sparse arrays and image compounding techniques for non-destructive testing using guided acoustic waves

Piezoelectric array transducers applications are becoming usual in the ultrasonic non-destructive testing area. However, the number of elements can increase the system complexity, due to the necessity of multichannel circuitry and to the large amount of data to be processed. Synthetic aperture techniques, where one or few transmission and reception channels are necessary, and the data are post-processed, can be used to reduce the system complexity. Another possibility is to use sparse arrays instead of a full-populated array. In sparse arrays, there is a smaller number of elements and the interelement spacing is larger than half wavelength. In this work, results of ultrasonic inspection of an aluminum plate with artificial defects using guided acoustic waves and sparse arrays are presented. Synthetic aperture techniques are used to obtain a set of images that are then processed with an image compounding technique, which was previously evaluated only with full-populated arrays, in order to increase the resolution and contrast of the images. The results with sparse arrays are equivalent to the ones obtained with full-populated arrays in terms of resolution. Although there is an 8 dB contrast reduction when using sparse arrays, defect detection is preserved and there is the advantage of a reduction in the number of transducer elements and data volume. © 2013 Brazilian Society for Automatics - SBA.

Local data fusion algorithm for fire detection through mobile robot

Multisensor data fusion is a technique that combines the readings of multiple sensors to detect some phenomenon. Data fusion applications are numerous and they can be used in smart buildings, environment monitoring, industry and defense applications. The main goal of multisensor data fusion is to minimize false alarms and maximize the probability of detection based on the detection of multiple sensors. In this paper a local data fusion algorithm based on luminosity, temperature and flame for fire detection is presented. The data fusion approach was embedded in a low cost mobile robot. The prototype test validation has indicated that our approach can detect fire occurrence. Moreover, the low cost project allow the development of robots that could be discarded in their fire detection missions. © 2013 IEEE.

Semi-supervised learning with concept drift using particle dynamics applied to network intrusion detection data

Concept drift, which refers to non stationary learning problems over time, has increasing importance in machine learning and data mining. Many concept drift applications require fast response, which means an algorithm must always be (re)trained with the latest available data. But the process of data labeling is usually expensive and/or time consuming when compared to acquisition of unlabeled data, thus usually only a small fraction of the incoming data may be effectively labeled. Semi-supervised learning methods may help in this scenario, as they use both labeled and unlabeled data in the training process. However, most of them are based on assumptions that the data is static. Therefore, semi-supervised learning with concept drifts is still an open challenging task in machine learning. Recently, a particle competition and cooperation approach has been developed to realize graph-based semi-supervised learning from static data. We have extend that approach to handle data streams and concept drift. The result is a passive algorithm which uses a single classifier approach, naturally adapted to concept changes without any explicit drift detection mechanism. It has built-in mechanisms that provide a natural way of learning from new data, gradually "forgetting" older knowledge as older data items are no longer useful for the classification of newer data items. The proposed algorithm is applied to the KDD Cup 1999 Data of network intrusion, showing its effectiveness.

Effect of oxidizing and reducing atmospheres on Ba(Ti0.90 Zr0.10)O3:2V ceramics as characterized by piezoresponse force microscopy

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Partitioning the relative contribution of one-phase and two-phase seed dispersal when evaluating seed dispersal effectiveness

Seed dispersal effectiveness (SDE) is a conceptual framework that aims at quantifying the contribution of seed dispersal vectors to plant fitness. While it is well recognized that diplochorous dispersal systems, characterized by two successive dispersal steps performed by two different vectors (Phase I=primary seed dispersal and Phase II=secondary seed dispersal) which are common in temperate and tropical regions, little attention has been given to distinguishing the relative contribution of one-phase and two-phase dispersal to overall SDE. This conceptual gap probably results from the lack of a clear methodology to include Phase II dispersal into the calculation of SDE and to quantify its relative contribution. We propose a method to evaluate the relative contribution of one-phase and two-phase dispersal to SDE and determine whether two seed dispersers are better than one. To do so, we used the SDE landscape and an extension of the SDE landscape, the Phase II effect landscape, which measures the direction and magnitude of the Phase II dispersal effect on overall SDE. We used simulated and empirical data from a diplochorous dispersal system in the Peruvian Amazon to illustrate this new approach. Our approach provides the relative contribution of one-phase SDE (SDE1) and two-phase SDE (SDE2) to overall SDE and quantifies how much SDE changes with the addition of Phase II dispersal. Considering that the seed dispersal process is context dependent so that Phase II depends on Phase I, we predict the possible range of variation of SDE according to the variation of the probability of Phase II dispersal. In our specific study system composed of two primate species as primary dispersal vectors and different species of dung beetles as secondary dispersal vectors, the relative contribution of SDE1 and SDE2 to overall SDE varied between plant species. We discuss the context dependency of the Phase II dispersal and the potential applications of our approach. This extension to the conceptual framework of SDE enables quantitative evaluation of the effect of Phase II dispersal on plant fitness and can be easily adapted to other biotic and/or abiotic diplochorous dispersal systems.

Bone morphogenetic proteins: promising molecules for bone healing, bioengineering, and regenerative medicine

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

A New Cryptographic Scheme for Securing Dynamic Conferences in Data Networks

Dynamic conferencing refers to a scenario wherein any subset of users in a universe of users form a conference for sharing confidential information among themselves. The key distribution (KD) problem in dynamic conferencing is to compute a shared secret key for such a dynamically formed conference. In literature, the KD schemes for dynamic conferencing either are computationally unscalable or require communication among users, which is undesirable. The extended symmetric polynomial based dynamic conferencing scheme (ESPDCS) is one such KD scheme which has a high computational complexity that is universe size dependent. In this paper we present an enhancement to the ESPDCS scheme to develop a KD scheme called universe-independent SPDCS (UI-SPDCS) such that its complexity is independent of the universe size. However, the UI-SPDCS scheme does not scale with the conference size. We propose a relatively scalable KD scheme termed as DH-SPDCS that uses the UI-SPDCS scheme and the tree-based group Diffie- Hellman (TGDH) key exchange protocol. The proposed DH-SPDCS scheme provides a configurable trade-off between computation and communication complexity of the scheme.

Revealing the Copy and Paste Habits of End Users

Transferring data across applications is a common end user task, and copying and pasting via the clipboard lets users do so relatively easily. Using the clipboard, however, can also introduce inefficiencies and errors in user tasks. To help researchers and tool developers understand and address these problems, we studied how end users interact with the clipboard through cut, copy, and paste actions. This study was performed by logging clipboard interactions while end users performed everyday tasks. From the clipboard usage data, we have identified several usage patterns that describe how data is transferred within the desktop environment. Such patterns help us understand end user behavior and indicate areas in which clipboard support tools can be improved.

Validating NCAR-CCSM last glacial maximum sea surface temperature in the tropical and South Atlantic with proxy-data

Last Glacial Maximum simulated sea surface temperature from the Paleo-Climate version of the National Center for Atmospheric Research Coupled Climate Model (NCAR-CCSM) are compared with available reconstructions and data-based products in the tropical and south Atlantic region. Model results are compared to data proxies based on the Multiproxy Approach for the Reconstruction of the Glacial Ocean surface product (MARGO). Results show that the model sea surface temperature is not consistent with the proxy-data in all of the region of interest. Discrepancies are found in the eastern, equatorial and in the high-latitude South Atlantic. The model overestimates the cooling in the southern South Atlantic (near 50 degrees S) shown by the proxy-data. Near the equator, model and proxies are in better agreement. In the eastern part of the equatorial basin the model underestimates the cooling shown by all proxies. A northward shift in the position of the subtropical convergence zone in the simulation suggests a compression or/and an equatorward shift of the subtropical gyre at the surface, consistent with what is observed in the proxy reconstruction. (C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved

Tokamak TCABR: Acquisition system, data analysis, and remote participation using MDSplus

Each plasma physics laboratory has a proprietary scheme to control and data acquisition system. Usually, it is different from one laboratory to another. It means that each laboratory has its own way to control the experiment and retrieving data from the database. Fusion research relies to a great extent on international collaboration and this private system makes it difficult to follow the work remotely. The TCABR data analysis and acquisition system has been upgraded to support a joint research programme using remote participation technologies. The choice of MDSplus (Model Driven System plus) is proved by the fact that it is widely utilized, and the scientists from different institutions may use the same system in different experiments in different tokamaks without the need to know how each system treats its acquisition system and data analysis. Another important point is the fact that the MDSplus has a library system that allows communication between different types of language (JAVA, Fortran, C, C++, Python) and programs such as MATLAB, IDL, OCTAVE. In the case of tokamak TCABR interfaces (object of this paper) between the system already in use and MDSplus were developed, instead of using the MDSplus at all stages, from the control, and data acquisition to the data analysis. This was done in the way to preserve a complex system already in operation and otherwise it would take a long time to migrate. This implementation also allows add new components using the MDSplus fully at all stages. (c) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

General results for the Kumaraswamy-G distribution

For any continuous baseline G distribution [G. M. Cordeiro and M. de Castro, A new family of generalized distributions, J. Statist. Comput. Simul. 81 (2011), pp. 883-898], proposed a new generalized distribution (denoted here with the prefix 'Kw-G'(Kumaraswamy-G)) with two extra positive parameters. They studied some of its mathematical properties and presented special sub-models. We derive a simple representation for the Kw-Gdensity function as a linear combination of exponentiated-G distributions. Some new distributions are proposed as sub-models of this family, for example, the Kw-Chen [Z.A. Chen, A new two-parameter lifetime distribution with bathtub shape or increasing failure rate function, Statist. Probab. Lett. 49 (2000), pp. 155-161], Kw-XTG [M. Xie, Y. Tang, and T.N. Goh, A modified Weibull extension with bathtub failure rate function, Reliab. Eng. System Safety 76 (2002), pp. 279-285] and Kw-Flexible Weibull [M. Bebbington, C. D. Lai, and R. Zitikis, A flexible Weibull extension, Reliab. Eng. System Safety 92 (2007), pp. 719-726]. New properties of the Kw-G distribution are derived which include asymptotes, shapes, moments, moment generating function, mean deviations, Bonferroni and Lorenz curves, reliability, Renyi entropy and Shannon entropy. New properties of the order statistics are investigated. We discuss the estimation of the parameters by maximum likelihood. We provide two applications to real data sets and discuss a bivariate extension of the Kw-G distribution.