Multimodal sensing, recognizing and browsing group social dynamics

Group social dynamics is crucial for determining whether a meeting was well organized and the conclusion well reasoned. In this paper, we propose multimodal approaches for sensing, recognition and browsing of social dynamics, specifically human semantic interactions and group interests in small group meetings. Unlike physical interactions (e.g., turn-taking and addressing), the human interactions considered here are incorporated with semantics, i.e., user intention or attitude toward a topic. Group interests are defined as episodes in which participants engaged in an emphatic and heated discussion. We adopt multiple sensors, such as video cameras, microphones and motion sensors for meeting capture. Multimodal methods are proposed for human interaction recognition and group interest recognition based on a variety of features. A graphical user interface, the MMBrowser, is presented for browsing group social dynamics. Experimental results have demonstrated the feasibility of the proposed approaches.     

Dynamic measurements of the load on castings and the contraction of castings during cooling in sand molds

The load on flange castings in sand molds was gradually increased beginning from the end of the solidification process until the final cooling stage. The maximum tensile load on the flange castings in furan sand molds was larger than that of the flange castings in green sand molds. With the furan sand mold, permanent deformation in the flange castings occurred beginning from the end of the solidification process until reaching a temperature of approximately 250 °C. The mechanical interaction between the casting and the sand mold should be considered for more accurate stress calculations, particularly in furan sand molds.     

Superfluid Transition of a 4He Thin Film Pressurized by Bulk Liquid 3He

We measured transverse acoustic impedance Z of normal fluid ³He at 46.6 MHz on a surface coated with a thin ⁴He film. The real component of the impedance, Z′, in the coated samples deviates from Z′ in the pure ³He in the low temperature region. Z′ on the coated samples is almost identical with Z′ in the pure sample at high temperature and gradually deviates below a particular temperature T _onset . T _onset  is possibly the superfluid onset temperature of the ⁴He film pressurized by the bulk liquid ³He. The gradual decrease in Z′ means that the superfluid component in ⁴He film increases gradually, which is expected from the dynamic KT transition at high frequency. The thicker is the film, the higher is the T _onset . The range of T _onset we observed was between 40 and 160 mK. This is much lower than that at the saturated vapor pressure. Suppression of T _onset achieved by the applied pressure from bulk liquid ³He was presumably caused by the dissolved ³He in the film, thickening of the inert layers and/or by the strong correlation effect. The result shows that the specularity of ³He quasiparticle scattering is strongly affected by superfluidity of the ⁴He film.     

Virtual assistant: enhancing content acquisition by eliciting information from humans

In this paper, we propose the “Virtual Assistant,” a novel framework for supporting knowledge capturing in videos. The Virtual Assistant is an artificial agent that simulates a human assistant shown in TV programs and prompts users to provide feedback by asking questions. This framework ensures that sufficient information is provided in the captured content while users interact in a natural and enjoyable way with the agent. We developed a prototype agent based on a chatbot-like approach and applied it to a daily cooking scene. Experimental results demonstrate the potential of the Virtual Assistant framework, as it allows a person to provide feedback easily with few interruptions and elicits a variety of useful information.

A plastic holographic waveguide combiner for light‐weight and highly‐transparent augmented reality glasses

There is a high demand for light‐weight, stylishly designed augmented reality (AR) glasses with natural see‐through capabilities for the wide‐spread distribution of novel wearable device to general consumers. We have successfully developed a unique production process of a holographic waveguide combiner that enables us to laminate holographic optical elements (HOEs) onto a plastic substrate with optical grade quality. The plastic substrate waveguide combiner has a number of advantages over conventional glass substrate combiners; the plastic substrate makes AR glasses lighter in weight and unbreakable. With the lamination process of HOEs, we can apply them to a various designs to satisfy general customers' wide range of preferences for the style. We also potentially made it possible for the holographic waveguide combiner to be produced in larger volumes at lower costs by using our novel roll‐to‐roll hologram recording and laminating process. In this paper, we present our approach of the plastic substrate HOE production process for AR glasses.     

A new genetic algorithm for the asymmetric traveling salesman problem

The asymmetric traveling salesman problem (ATSP) is one of the most important combinatorial optimization problems. It allows us to solve, either directly or through a transformation, many real-world problems. We present in this paper a new competitive genetic algorithm to solve this problem. This algorithm has been checked on a set of 153 benchmark instances with known optimal solution and it outperforms the results obtained with previous ATSP heuristic methods.     

Methanol Synthesis from Carbon Monoxide and Hydrogen over Ceria-Supported Copper Catalyst Prepared by a Coprecipitation Method

High catalytic activity in the synthesis of methanol from carbon monoxide and hydrogen can be produced with ceria-supported copper catalysts prepared by a coprecipitation method. The activity at 468 K is comparable with that produced with commercial copper-zinc catalysts at 503-523 K, while it is still unstable. Although the reaction atmosphere is reductive, metallic copper particles on cerium oxide are oxidized during the reaction and the catalyst is activated. Hence, formation of the copper oxide species is indispensable for the appearance of the high catalytic activity.     

Ad-Molecule Orientation and Thermo- and Photo-Induced Surface-Aligned Desorption

Two-directional N₂ desorption was found in N₂O decomposition on Pd(110) at 100–160 K. It collimated ±43° off the surface normal in the (001) plane. A hot-atom-assisted model is proposed for N₂ desorption. Inclined O₂ desorption was simulated by hot atoms emitted from aligned oxygen molecules on stepped Pt(112) at 308 nm irradiation.     

Preparation of Highly Dispersed Ultrafine Barium Titanate Powder by Using Microbial-Derived Surfactant

To uniformly disperse ultrafine BaTiO₃ particles with a stoichiometric composition and several tens of nanometers in diameter to primary particles during the sol–gel synthesis process, a new aqueous surfactant with a high hydrophilic group density and special cis-structure was prepared from a microbial product and added to solution before the sol–gel synthesis reaction. Because of the rapid formation of large and porous aggregates which were 30–50 μm in diameter in suspension without addition of this unique structural surfactant, the prepared ultrafine BaTiO₃ particles caused rapid sedimentation in suspension. The addition of the surfactant in the range of 7.1 wt% for the synthesized BaTiO₃ particles made it possible to decrease the size of the aggregates in suspension as well as the sedimentation velocity while maintaining the stoichiometric composition. The optimum additive content to obtain the minimum aggregate size of about 100–200 nm in diameter and the highest dispersion stability in suspension while maintaining the stoichiometric composition of prepared ultrafine BaTiO₃ particles without other phases was determined at about 7.1 wt%. Because the excess addition of this surfactant at more than 8.5 wt% inhibited the uniform synthesis of BaTiO₃ particles, an amorphous phase with a highly specific surface area and a BaCO₃ phase formed in the synthesized particles.     

Nano-sized crystallites of vanadyl pyrophosphate as a highly selective catalyst for n-butane oxidation

Exfoliation-reduction of VOPO₄ · 2H₂O in a mixed alcohol consisting of 2-butanol and ethanol, followed by the thermal treatment in the presence of n-butane, O₂, and He at 663 K for 300 h, produces novel nano-sized crystallites (~ 50 nm) of (VO)₂P₂O₇. The nano-sized (VO)₂P₂O₇ crystallites exhibit a high selectivity to maleic anhydride (~ 84%) for the selective oxidation of n-butane.