Digital Commons Network^™

A Hybrid Communications Network Simulation-Independent Toolkit, David M. Dines

Theses and Dissertations

Net-centric warfare requires information superiority to enable decision superiority, culminating in insurmountable combat power against our enemies on the battlefield. Information superiority must be attained and retained for success in today’s joint/coalition battlespace. To accomplish this goal, our combat networks must reliably, expediently and completely deliver over a wide range of mobile and fixed assets. Furthermore, each asset must be given special consideration for the sensitivity, priority and volume of information required by the mission. Evolving a grand design of the enabling network will require a flexible evaluation platform to try and select the right combination of network strategies and …

Enhancing Jswat For Monitor-Based Executions, Arun Ramani

Computer Science and Engineering Theses - Archive

Concurrent programs contain more than one thread that executes concurrently to accomplish a particular task. Since the threads in a concurrent program work together to accomplish a common goal, they share the data, code, resources and address space of their process. This reduces the overhead involved in creating and managing the threads but leads to side effects like race conditions, critical section problem and deadlocks. There are several operating system constructs to solve these issues such as locks, semaphores, monitors etc. Locks are associated with each object to control access of shared resources. Semaphores can be described as counters used …

Visualization Of Monitor-Based Executions, Keerthika Koteeswaran

Computer Science and Engineering Theses - Archive

Concurrent programs play a vital role in the world of software engineering. Concurrent programs are used in various fields such as safety critical applications, applications involving advanced graphical user interface, operating system implementation etc. Concurrent programs due to their inherent multi-threaded nature pose a challenge to software engineers not only in coding but also in ensuring data consistency and accuracy. One of the important software constructs used by concurrent programmers to handle critical sections and data synchronization is monitors. A monitor is an encapsulation of shared data, operations on the data and any synchronization required to access the data~\cite{CarTai06:ModMulti}. Monitors …

Semantic Components: A Model For Enhancing Retrieval Of Domain- Specific Information, Susan Loucette Price

Dissertations and Theses

Despite the success of general Internet search engines, information retrieval remains an incompletely solved problem. Our research focuses on supporting domain experts when they search domain-specific libraries to satisfy targeted information needs. The semantic components model introduces a schema specific to a particular document collection. A semantic component schema consists of a two-level hierarchy, document classes and semantic components. A document class represents a document grouping, such as topic type or document purpose. A semantic component is a characteristic type of information that occurs in a particular document class and represents an important aspect of the document’s main topic. …

Sub-Symbolic Re-Representation To Facilitate Learning Transfer, Dan A. Ventura

Faculty Publications

We consider the issue of knowledge (re-)representation in the context of learning transfer and present a subsymbolic approach for effecting such transfer. Given a set of data, manifold learning is used to automatically organize the data into one or more representational transformations, which are then learned with a set of neural networks. The result is a set of neural filters that can be applied to new data as re-representation operators. Encouraging preliminary empirical results elucidate the approach and demonstrate its feasibility, suggesting possible implications for the broader field of creativity.

Automatic Drift Compensation Using Phase Correlation Method For Nanomanipulation, Qinmin Yang, Jagannathan Sarangapani, Eric W. Bohannan

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Nanomanipulation and nanofabrication with an atomic force microscope (AFM) or other scanning probe microscope (SPM) are a precursor for nanomanufacturing. It is still a challenging task to accomplish nanomanipulation automatically. In ambient conditions without stringent environmental controls, the task of nanomanipulation requires extensive human intervention to compensate for the spatial uncertainties of the SPM. Among these uncertainties, the thermal drift, which affects spatial resolution, is especially hard to solve because it tends to increase with time, and cannot be compensated simultaneously by feedback from the instrument. In this paper, a novel automatic compensation scheme is introduced to measure and estimate …

Output Feedback Controller For Operation Of Spark Ignition Engines At Lean Conditions Using Neural Networks, Jonathan B. Vance, Brian C. Kaul, Jagannathan Sarangapani, J. A. Drallmeier

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Spark ignition (SI) engines operating at very lean conditions demonstrate significant nonlinear behavior by exhibiting cycle-to-cycle bifurcation of heat release. Past literature suggests that operating an engine under such lean conditions can significantly reduce NO emissions by as much as 30% and improve fuel efficiency by as much as 5%-10%. At lean conditions, the heat release per engine cycle is not close to constant, as it is when these engines operate under stoichiometric conditions where the equivalence ratio is 1.0. A neural network controller employing output feedback has shown ability in simulation to reduce the nonlinear cyclic dispersion observed under …

Dynamic Protocol Reverse Engineering A Grammatical Inference Approach, Mark E. Deyoung

Theses and Dissertations

Round trip engineering of software from source code and reverse engineering of software from binary files have both been extensively studied and the state-of-practice have documented tools and techniques. Forward engineering of protocols has also been extensively studied and there are firmly established techniques for generating correct protocols. While observation of protocol behavior for performance testing has been studied and techniques established, reverse engineering of protocol control flow from observations of protocol behavior has not received the same level of attention. State-of-practice in reverse engineering the control flow of computer network protocols is comprised of mostly ad hoc approaches. We …

On-Line Discovery Of Hot Motion Paths, Dimitris Sacharidis, Kostas Patroumpas, Manolis Terrovitis, Verena Kantere, Michalis Potamias, Kyriakos Mouratidis, Timos Sellis

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

We consider an environment of numerous moving objects, equipped with location-sensing devices and capable of communicating with a central coordinator. In this setting, we investigate the problem of maintaining hot motion paths, i.e., routes frequently followed by multiple objects over the recent past. Motion paths approximate portions of objects' movement within a tolerance margin that depends on the uncertainty inherent in positional measurements. Discovery of hot motion paths is important to applications requiring classification/profiling based on monitored movement patterns, such as targeted advertising, resource allocation, etc. To achieve this goal, we delegate part of the path extraction process to objects, …

Processing Transitive Nearest-Neighbor Queries In Multi-Channel Access Environments, Xiao Zhang, Wang-Chien Lee, Prasnjit Mitra, Baihua Zheng

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Wireless broadcast is an efficient way for information dissemination due to its good scalability [10]. Existing works typically assume mobile devices, such as cell phones and PDAs, can access only one channel at a time. In this paper, we consider a scenario of near future where a mobile device has the ability to process queries using information simultaneously received from multiple channels. We focus on the query processing of the transitive nearest neighbor (TNN) search [19]. Two TNN algorithms developed for a single broadcast channel environment are adapted to our new broadcast enviroment. Based on the obtained insights, we propose …

Harmoni: Context-Aware Filtering Of Sensor Data For Continuous Remote Health Monitoring, Iqbal Mohomed, Archan Misra, Maria Ebling, William Jerome

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

A promising architecture for remote healthcare monitoring involves the use of a pervasive device (such as a cellular phone), which aggregates data from multiple body-worn medical sensors and transmits the data to the backend. Unfortunately, the volume of data generated by increasingly sophisticated continuouslyactive sensors can overwhelm the resources on the mobile device. We propose imbuing the mobile device with the intelligence to perform context-aware filtering of sensor data streams in order to reduce transmissions in cases where the observed data corresponds to the norm expected by the system in a given context. To investigate the efficacy of this technique, …

Controlling Information Technology Costs And Reporting Roi In Large Organizations, Darrell Jones

Regis University Student Publications (comprehensive collection)

Controlling the cost of information technology (IT) and reporting return on investment in such technologies in large organizations has long been problematic because IT is a significant cost center that in most companies does not contribute directly to the generation of revenue. At the same time, the services provided by IT departments directly affect the bottom lines of modern companies and provide valuable efficiencies. Measuring and reporting the effects of those efficiencies has been hampered by two fairly typical shortcomings of IT managers. IT managers whose primary training is in their own discipline tend to view technology issues in terms …

Knowledge Management For Disparate Etruscan Cultural Heritage, John Mcauley, James Carswell

Conference papers

This paper introduces the TARCHNA approach to managing and presenting contextualised heritage content. The system uses the CIDOC CRM ontology to consolidate a virtual repository of geographically disparate heritage databases and present a holistic view of a fragmented heritage. While previous approaches to presenting heritage collections have focused on the browse and search paradigm, the TARCHNA system uses narrative concepts as a means of presenting and re-using contextualised heritage artefacts within a broader cultural setting.

Multimodal News Story Clustering With Pairwise Visual Near-Duplicate Constraint, Xiao Wu, Chong-Wah Ngo, Alexander G. Hauptmann

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Story clustering is a critical step for news retrieval, topic mining, and summarization. Nonetheless, the task remains highly challenging owing to the fact that news topics exhibit clusters of varying densities, shapes, and sizes. Traditional algorithms are found to be ineffective in mining these types of clusters. This paper offers a new perspective by exploring the pairwise visual cues deriving from near-duplicate keyframes (NDK) for constraint-based clustering. We propose a constraint-driven co-clustering algorithm (CCC), which utilizes the near-duplicate constraints built on top of text, to mine topic-related stories and the outliers. With CCC, the duality between stories and their underlying …

A Suite Of Robust Controllers For The Manipulation Of Microscale Objects, Qinmin Yang, Jagannathan Sarangapani

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

A suite of novel robust controllers is introduced for the pickup operation of microscale objects in a microelectromechanical system (MEMS). In MEMS, adhesive, surface tension, friction, and van der Waals forces are dominant. Moreover, these forces are typically unknown. The proposed robust controller overcomes the unknown contact dynamics and ensures its performance in the presence of actuator constraints by assuming that the upper bounds on these forces are known. On the other hand, for the robust adaptive critic-based neural network (NN) controller, the unknown dynamic forces are estimated online. It consists of an action NN for compensating the unknown system …

Garuda: Achieving Effective Reliability For Downstream Communication In Wireless Sensor Networks, Seung Jong Park, Ramanuja Vedantham, Raghupathy Sivakumar, Ian F. Akyildiz

Computer Science Faculty Research & Creative Works

There exist several applications of sensor networks where the reliability of data delivery can be critical. Although the redundancy inherent in a sensor network might increase the degree of reliability, it by no means can provide any guaranteed reliability semantics. In this paper, we consider the problem of reliable sink-to-sensors data delivery. We first identify several fundamental challenges that need to be addressed and are unique to the environment of wireless sensor networks. We then propose a scalable framework for reliable downstream data delivery that is specifically designed to both address and leverage the characteristics of the wireless sensor networks …

Integrating Temporal Difference Methods And Self‐Organizing Neural Networks For Reinforcement Learning With Delayed Evaluative Feedback, Ah-Hwee Tan, Ning Lu, Dan Xiao

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

This paper presents a neural architecture for learning category nodes encoding mappings across multimodal patterns involving sensory inputs, actions, and rewards. By integrating adaptive resonance theory (ART) and temporal difference (TD) methods, the proposed neural model, called TD fusion architecture for learning, cognition, and navigation (TD-FALCON), enables an autonomous agent to adapt and function in a dynamic environment with immediate as well as delayed evaluative feedback (reinforcement) signals. TD-FALCON learns the value functions of the state-action space estimated through on-policy and off-policy TD learning methods, specifically state-action-reward-state-action (SARSA) and Q-learning. The learned value functions are then used to determine the …

On Ranking Controversies In Wikipedia: Models And Evaluation, Ba-Quy Vuong, Ee Peng Lim, Aixin Sun, Minh-Tam Le, Hady Wirawan Lauw, Kuiyu Chang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Wikipedia 1 is a very large and successful Web 2.0 example. As the number of Wikipedia articles and contributors grows at a very fast pace, there are also increasing disputes occurring among the contributors. Disputes often happen in articles with controversial content. They also occur frequently among contributors who are "aggressive" or controversial in their personalities. In this paper, we aim to identify controversial articles in Wikipedia. We propose three models, namely the Basic model and two Controversy Rank (CR) models. These models draw clues from collaboration and edit history instead of interpreting the actual articles or edited content. While …

Ontology Learning For The Semantic Deep Web, Yoo Jung An

Dissertations

Ontologies could play an important role in assisting users in their search for Web pages. This dissertation considers the problem of constructing natural ontologies that support users in their Web search efforts and increase the number of relevant Web pages that are returned. To achieve this goal, this thesis suggests combining the Deep Web information, which consists of dynamically generated Web pages and cannot be indexed by the existing automated Web crawlers, with ontologies, resulting in the Semantic Deep Web. The Deep Web information is exploited in three different ways: extracting attributes from the Deep Web data sources automatically, generating …

Complex Adaptive Systems Based Data Integration : Theory And Applications, Eliahu Rohn

Dissertations

Data Definition Languages (DDLs) have been created and used to represent data in programming languages and in database dictionaries. This representation includes descriptions in the form of data fields and relations in the form of a hierarchy, with the common exception of relational databases where relations are flat. Network computing created an environment that enables relatively easy and inexpensive exchange of data. What followed was the creation of new DDLs claiming better support for automatic data integration. It is uncertain from the literature if any real progress has been made toward achieving an ideal state or limit condition of automatic …

Leader Delegation And Trust In Global Software Teams, Suling Zhang

Dissertations

Virtual teams are an important work structure in global software development. The distributed team structure enables access to a diverse set of expertise which is often not available in one location, to a cheaper labor force, and to a potentially accelerated development process that uses a twenty-four hour work structure.

Many software teams are partially distributed, that is, part of the team is colocated. Such partially distributed global software teams are an important work structure in software development projects. However, little is known about what affects or improves team members’ motivation and job satisfaction in the partially distributed environment. This …

Simulation And Visualization Of Environments With Multidimensional Time, Luther A. Tychonievich

Theses and Dissertations

This work introduces the notion of computational hypertime, or the simulation and visualization of hypothetical environments possessing multidimensional time. An overview of hypertime is provided,including an intuitive visualization paradigm and a discussion of the failure of common simulation techniques when extended to include multidimensional time. A condition for differential equations describing hypertime motion to be amenable to standard time-iterative simulation techniques is provided,but is not satisfied by any known model of physics. An alternate simulation algorithm involving iterative refinement of entire equations of motion is presented,with an example implementation to solve elastic collisions in hypertime. An artificial intelligence algorithm for …

Wireless Authentication Using Remote Passwords, Andrew S. Harding

Theses and Dissertations

Current authentication methods for wireless networks are difficult to maintain. They often rely on globally shared secrets or heavyweight public-key infrastructure. Wireless Authentication using Remote Passwords (WARP) mitigates authentication woes by providing usable mechanisms for both administrators and end-users. Administrators grant access by simply adding users' personal messaging identifiers (e.g., email addresses, IM handles, cell phone numbers) to an access control list. There is no need to store passwords or other account information. Users simply prove ownership of their authorized identifier to obtain wireless access.

Tr-2008007: Degeneration Of Structured Integer Matrices Modulo An Integer, Victor Y. Pan, Xinmao Wang

Computer Science Technical Reports

No abstract provided.

Tr-2008008: Schur Aggregation For Linear Systems And Determinants, V. Y. Pan, D. Grady, B. Murphy, G. Qian, R. E. Rosholt, A. D. Ruslanov

Computer Science Technical Reports

No abstract provided.

Extracting, Representing And Mining Semantic Metadata From Text: Facilitating Knowledge Discovery In Biomedicine, Cartic Ramakrishnan

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

The information access paradigm offered by most contemporary text information systems is a search-and-sift paradigm where users have to manually glean and aggregate relevant information from the large number of documents that are typically returned in response to keyword queries. Expecting the users to glean and aggregate information has lead to several inadequacies in these information systems. Owing to the size of many text databases, search-and-sift is a very tedious often requiring repeated keyword searches refining or generalizing queries terms. A more serious limitation arises from the lack of automated mechanisms to aggregate content across different documents to discover new …

Effective Progression Of Temporary Virtual Teams Over Time: A Pragmatic Investigation Towards The Development Of An Internal Structure To Support Knowledge Sharing, Jon F. Davis

Regis University Student Publications (comprehensive collection)

Enabled by communications and information technology, temporary virtual teams are able to utilize talent from anywhere in the globe to service customers, solve business problems, and provide unique educational experiences. Temporary virtual teams, however, face many challenges to their effectiveness. In particular, many challenges to effective communication and knowledge sharing exist. To be effective, methods intended to address the unique challenges presented in the temporary virtual team environment are needed. This paper presents practical methodologies that can be used towards the development of an internal structure to support knowledge sharing between temporary virtual teams.

Tr-2008015: An Efficient Heuristic For The Tree Alignment Problem, Andrés Varón, Ward Wheeler, Amotz Bar-Noy

Computer Science Technical Reports

No abstract provided.

Tr-2008013: Content-Based 3d Mosaics For Large-Scale Dynamic Urban Scenes, Hao Tang, Zhigang Zhu

Computer Science Technical Reports

No abstract provided.

Tr-2008012: Product-Free Lambek Calculus Is Np-Complete, Yury Savateev

Computer Science Technical Reports

No abstract provided.