<p>Researchers tend to use their own or favourite gene names in scientific literature, even though there are official names. Some names may even be used for more than one gene. This leads to problems with ambiguity when automatically mining biological literature. To disambiguate the gene names, gene normalization is used. In this thesis, we look into an existing gene normalization system, and develop a new method to find gene candidates for the ambiguous genes. For the new method a lexicon is created, using information about the gene names, symbols and synonyms from three different databases. The gene mention found in the scientific literature is used as input for a search in this lexicon, and all genes in the lexicon that match the mention are returned as gene candidates for that mention. These candidates are then used in the system's disambiguation step. Results show that the new method gives a better over all result from the system, with an increase in precision and a small decrease in recall.</p>

<p>Within this thesis an algorithm for object recognition called Cluster Matching has been developed, implemented and evaluated. The image information is sampled at arbitrary sample points, instead of interest points, and local image features are extracted. These sample points are used as a compact representation of the image data and can quickly be searched for prior known objects. The algorithm is evaluated on a test set of images and the result is surprisingly reliable and time efficient.</p>

<p>In this paper I study how the repeal of the Swedish wealth tax (1 of January 2007) has affected people´s labour supply behaviour. This particular issue is relevant because it may help us understand some of the effects of the earnings tax changes that have taken place in Sweden. Accoring to standard economic theory a repealed wealth tax is similar to an income effect for the persons who previously paid the tax. That means that they theoretically will want to consume more leisure, that is decrease their labour supply. The method I am using to test this hypothesis is a difference-in-difference approach where the treatment group consists of persons who previously paid the tax and the control group of comparable persons who did not pay the tax. The data I am using is taken from a Swedish database called LINDA, compiled by the Swedish Central Agency for Statistics (SCB). My main result in this paper is that the repealed wealth tax does not seem to have had any influnece on the labour supply behavior of the persons who previously paid the tax.</p>

R.M. Fano. / "January 2, 1948." / Bibliography: p. 34. / Army Signal Corps Contract W-36-039 sc-32037.

We describe a technique for finding pixelwise correspondences between two images by using models of objects of the same class to guide the search. The object models are 'learned' from example images (also called prototypes) of an object class. The models consist of a linear combination ofsprototypes. The flow fields giving pixelwise correspondences between a base prototype and each of the other prototypes must be given. A novel image of an object of the same class is matched to a model by minimizing an error between the novel image and the current guess for the closest modelsimage. Currently, the algorithm applies to line drawings of objects. An extension to real grey level images is discussed.

This thesis presents there important results in visual object recognition based on shape. (1) A new algorithm (RAST; Recognition by Adaptive Sudivisions of Tranformation space) is presented that has lower average-case complexity than any known recognition algorithm. (2) It is shown, both theoretically and empirically, that representing 3D objects as collections of 2D views (the "View-Based Approximation") is feasible and affects the reliability of 3D recognition systems no more than other commonly made approximations. (3) The problem of recognition in cluttered scenes is considered from a Bayesian perspective; the commonly-used "bounded-error errorsmeasure" is demonstrated to correspond to an independence assumption. It is shown that by modeling the statistical properties of real-scenes better, objects can be recognized more reliably.

We present a serially concatenated coding scheme for partial response channels. The encoder consists of an outer irregular LDPC code and an inner matched spectrum trellis code. These codes are shown to offer considerable improvement over the i.i.d. capacity (> 1 dB) of the channel for low rates (approximately 0.1 bits per channel use). We also present a qualitative argument on the optimality of these codes for low rates. We also formulate a performance index for such codes to predict their performance for low rates. The results have been verified via simulations for the (1-D)/sqrt(2) and the (1-D+0.8D^2)/sqrt(2.64) channels. The structure of the encoding/decoding scheme is considerably simpler than the existing scheme to maximize the information rate of encoders over partial response channels.

This paper reports on pilot work on the expression of Information Structure in Vietnamese and argues that Focus in Vietnamese is exclusively expressed prosodically: there are no specific focus markers, and the language uses phonology to express intonational emphasis in similar ways to languages like English or German. The exploratory data indicates that (i) focus is prosodically expressed while word order remains constant, (ii) listeners show good recoverability of the intended focus structure, and (iii) that there is a trading relationship between several phonetic parameters (duration, f0, amplitude) involved to signal prosodic (acoustic) emphasis.

We study the capture of a particle into resonance at a potential hole with dissipative perturbation and periodic outside force. The measure of resonance solutions is evaluated. We also derive an asymptotic formula for the parameter range of those solutions which are captured into resonance.

Every year many students are graduating from their university and are faced with the difficulty of acquiring an employment, especially large difficulty in Sweden as the unemployment rate is large amongst young adults. The companies are also facing a challenge, of how to receive the best applicants to their job openings, to ensure they will stay competitive as companies. The authors are examining how the students will acquire employment by investigating what demands companies have on applicants and employees at their companies, and what demands the students in Umeå believe the companies have. It is also examined how the companies are marketing themselves to future employees and students and how these marketing efforts are perceived by the students. The theories of interest to examine the research questions mentioned concern employer branding, marketing tools and planned behaviour. This thesis is using a mixed method approach. In the qualitative part of the thesis the authors used semi-structured interviews that were conducted with companies within the business sector in the municipality of Umeå. A survey in the form of a self-completion questionnaire was used in the quantitative part to measure the perception of Umeå University’s business program students. The result showed that the companies valued experience within their field and personality traits highest. The students had a good understanding of what demands the companies had on their employees and felt that they could fulfil most demands, however having experience within the field the company operates within was most difficult. Most companies used marketing tools such as attending recruitment fairs, holding lectures or engaging in student run organisations. The students did like these techniques the best, i.e. marketing through the university and through recruitment fairs, however, did not appreciate marketing through advertisement. The students value the opportunity to talk to current staff at a company and therefore like recruitment fairs and activities that are organized by the university. The main recommendation is that the students should get more work experience and the companies need to make it easier for the students to achieve this, hence, it will enable the students to fulfil more criterions companies have on their employees.