Fingerprint impressions are frequently encountered during the investigation of crime scenes, and may establish a crucial linkage between the suspect and the crime scene. Plastic fingerprint impressions found at crime scenes are often transient and delicate, leaving photography the sole means of documentation. A traditional photography approach can be inadequate in documenting impressions that contain three-dimensional (3D) details due to the limitations of camera and lighting conditions on scene. In this study, 3D scanning was proposed as a novel method for the documentation of plastic fingerprints. Structured-light 3D scanning (SLS) captures the distortion of projected light patterns on the subject to obtain its 3D profile, which allows fast acquisition of the complete 3D geometric information of the surface. The contactless operation of SLS also eliminates the risk of destroying fragile evidence, making it a sound choice for forensic applications. In this study, the feasibility of 3D scanning of plastic fingerprint impressions was evaluated and compared with traditional photography regarding the quantity and quality of perceptible friction ridge features. Attempts were made to develop a procedure to extract curvature features from 3D scanned fingerprints and flatten the friction ridge features into two-dimensional (2D) images to allow direct comparison with the traditional photography method in the CSIpix® Matcher and NFIQ 2.0 software. One of the developed methods (3DR) utilizing a discrete geometry operator and convexity features outperformed traditional photography, both in minutiae count and match quality, while traditional photography could not always capture enough high-quality minutiae for comparisons, even after digital enhancement. The reproducibility of the 3D scanning process was evaluated using 3D point cloud statistics. The pair-wise mean distance and standard deviation were calculated for four levels of comparisons with theoretically increasing disparity, including pairs of scans of the same impressions. The results showed minimal shape deviation from scan to scan for the same impression, but high variations for different impressions.

The purpose of the present study was to examine the role of timeouts in competitive elite table tennis in relation to psychological momentum (PM). To that end, archival data from elite top-international matches (N= 48) was firstly examined to gather information on when timeouts are most taken, and whether these have any objective influence on subsequent performance (set outcome and ultimately match outcome). Secondly, similar archival data for Swedish League matches (N= 36) was examined and interviews with elite coaches from the highest Swedish league (N= 6) at these given matches were carried out to gain further knowledge and understanding on the role and use of timeouts in competitive elite table tennis. Findings showed that timeouts were mostly called following a sequence of three consecutive lost points; that is, coaches used timeouts to break negative PM. However, findings also showed that these given timeouts had no objective impact on neither set nor match outcomes; that is, sets and matches were ultimately lost. Future research examining the subjective coach-player experience revolving around timeouts is needed to comprehend potential ‘secondary’ purposes when calling timeouts and, subsequently, understand timeouts role in table tennis fully.

The purpose of the current study was to investigate factors in the work environment that impact job burnout among academic support professionals who work with college student-athletes. Specifically, the factors of job control match, fairness march, rewards match, and workload match were explored. Additionally, the extent to which emotional exhaustion and depersonalization had an effect on turnover intention was explored. Job burnout has been found to have negative impacts on professionals in human services professions. The sample consisted of academic advisors and learning specialists affiliated with National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I programs. Results suggest academic support professionals experience a high level of emotional exhaustion related to a mismatch in perceived job control, rewards, and workload. Additionally, higher levels of emotional exhaustion were found to significantly impact turnover intention. Practical solutions that address job mismatches are discussed along with theoretical implications for the person-environment fit framework applied in the context of the sport industry.

If an organism is explicitly taught an A->B association, then might it also spontaneously learn the symmetrical B->A association? There is only a small amount of evidence that attests to the detection of emergent symmetry in nonhuman animals (e.g., one chimpanzee and two pigeons). This report examines the necessary and sufficient conditions for finding emergent symmetry in pigeons while attempting to control for the problems of spatial and temporal location found in previous symmetry and stimulus equivalence experiments. Using a successive go/no go matching-to-sample procedure, which showed all of the training and testing stimuli in one location, four experimental manipulations were examined. In Experiment 1 temporal location was controlled without the inclusion of identity matching intermixed with arbitrary matching; Experiment 2 contained identity matching with stimuli different from arbitrary matching; in Experiment 3 identity matching was trained to criterion and then intermixed with arbitrary matching; and in Experiment 4 two sets of arbitrary matching were trained (e.g., AB and CD) but only one of those stimulus sets was trained in identity matching (e.g., AB). No evidence of emergent symmetry was found in Experiments 1 and 2. In Experiment 3, two pigeons showed moderate evidence of emergent symmetry, one pigeon showed suggestive evidence of emergent symmetry, and one pigeon did not show any evidence of emergent symmetry. In Experiment 4, two pigeons showed moderate evidence of emergent symmetry with the AB Stimulus Set (one of those pigeons also showed suggestive evidence of emergent symmetry with the CD Stimulus Set) and one pigeon did not show any evidence of emergent symmetry with either stimulus set. These data suggest that intermixing identity matching with the same stimuli used in arbitrary matching is a necessary, but not sufficient condition to obtaining emergent symmetry in pigeons.

Cette thèse est une contribution à un projet dont l'objet est de construire un outil d'analyse fiable de la conduite en compétition de match-racing. Le comportement dynamique du voilier résulte de l'équilibre entre de nombreuses actions qu'il faut prendre en compte dans leur ensemble pour ne pas arriver à des conclusions erronées sur la performance et le comportement. Nous avons construit un simulateur dont la structure modulaire permettra d'intégrer les modèles de toutes les actions en présence au fur et à mesure que la connaissance progresse dans les différents domaines concernés. Des modèles empiriques éprouvés sont utilisés pour la partie aérodynamique. L'interaction aérodynamique est représentée par l'addition de deux modèles simples, une singularité de type tourbillon et un sillage plan auto préservé. Ces modèles sont globaux et relativement rudimentaire mais des investigations plus poussées semblent aujourd'hui aventureuses tant les paramètres de réglage des voiles sont nombreux et complexes. Nous avons privilégié l'étude des efforts hydrodynamiques stationnaires. Des campagnes d'essais ont été menées en adaptant des techniques expérimentales existantes. L'objectif était de quantifier l'influence des paramètres d'attitude, de vitesse et de position. La méthode des plans d'expériences a été mise en oeuvre pour structurer la démarche et pour construire des modèles simples et rapides compatibles avec la simulation en temps réel. La rigueur de cette méthode permet en outre de réaliser une analyse de l'erreur de mesure et de comparer différentes modélisations. Des exemples de simulation illustrent en fin de document les possibilités offertes par la version actuelle du simulateur

<p>För att skapa kraftfullare presentationer måste nya metoder implementeras för att visualisera projekt. Ett aktivitetshus för ungdomar visualiseras i detta projekt genom att 3D-modellen av huset placeras i ett filmklipp från den plats där huset skall stå. Stegen som togs för att realisera detta var förarbete i form av inskaffande av ritningar, filmande, matchmoving, 3D-modellering, rendering, compositing och ljuddesign. Resultatet blev ett filmklipp som ur ett första persons perspektiv både visar exteriören och interiören.</p>

The representation and manipulation of visual content in a computer vision system requires a suitable abstraction of raw visual content such as pixels in an image. In this thesis, we study region-based feature representations and in particular, hierarchical segmentations because they do make no assumptions about region granularity. Hierarchical segmentations create a large feature space that increases the cost of subsequent processing in computer vision systems. We introduce a segment filter to reduce the feature space of hierarchical segmentations by identifying unique regions in the images. The filter uses appearance-based properties of the regions and the structure of the segmentation for the selection of a small set of descriptive regions. The filter works in two phases: selection with a criteria based on relative region size and a sorting based on a variational criteria. The filter is applicable to any hierarchical segmentation algorithm, in particular to bottom-up and region growing approaches. We evaluate the filter's performance against an extensive set of ground-truth regions from a dataset containing image sequences with scenes of different complexity. We demonstrate a novel region-to-region image matching approach as a possible application of our segment filter. A reduced segmentation tree is reconstructed based on the set of regions provided by the filtering. The reduction of the feature space by the segment filter simplifies our region-to-region matching approach. The correspondences between regions from two different images is established by a similarity measure. We use a modified mutual information measurement to compute the similarity of regions. The identified region correspondences are refined using the reduced segmentation tree. Our region-to-region matching approach is evaluated with an extensive set of ground-truth correspondences. This evaluation shows the large potential of both, our filtering and our matching approach.

The representation and manipulation of visual content in a computer vision system requires a suitable abstraction of raw visual content such as pixels in an image. In this thesis, we study region-based feature representations and in particular, hierarchical segmentations because they do make no assumptions about region granularity. Hierarchical segmentations create a large feature space that increases the cost of subsequent processing in computer vision systems. We introduce a segment filter to reduce the feature space of hierarchical segmentations by identifying unique regions in the images. The filter uses appearance-based properties of the regions and the structure of the segmentation for the selection of a small set of descriptive regions. The filter works in two phases: selection with a criteria based on relative region size and a sorting based on a variational criteria. The filter is applicable to any hierarchical segmentation algorithm, in particular to bottom-up and region growing approaches. We evaluate the filter's performance against an extensive set of ground-truth regions from a dataset containing image sequences with scenes of different complexity. We demonstrate a novel region-to-region image matching approach as a possible application of our segment filter. A reduced segmentation tree is reconstructed based on the set of regions provided by the filtering. The reduction of the feature space by the segment filter simplifies our region-to-region matching approach. The correspondences between regions from two different images is established by a similarity measure. We use a modified mutual information measurement to compute the similarity of regions. The identified region correspondences are refined using the reduced segmentation tree. Our region-to-region matching approach is evaluated with an extensive set of ground-truth correspondences. This evaluation shows the large potential of both, our filtering and our matching approach.

Endorser is common in advertising for marketing strategies. The firms spend hundreds of million dollars to hire celebrities to endorse their products and brands. Appropriate endorsers are beneficial in brand differentiation and help competitive advantage building. Previous researches in match-up between endorser and product image have two diverse points of view (congruity vs. incongruity). The latest research reveals that in moderate incongruity would accommodate the two different views. Based on the three inconsistent findings, this study explores the effects of gender-based trait through different match-up levels of endorser and service type. The present study uses experimental design to investigate the advertising effects of endorser¡¦s gender (male vs. female), endorser¡¦s gendered traits (male vs. female), and service type (masculine vs. neutral vs. feminine). Thus, a 2x2x3 factorial design is conducted. The ad effects are measured by perceived quality, attitudes toward the brand, and purchase intention to observe the responses under twelve different and fictitious scenarios. The results indicate that a male endorser with female traits is more effective than a male endorser with male traits, especially promoting feminine-based service marketing. Besides, consumers¡¦ perceived quality is different when evaluating match-up combinations based on endorser¡¦s gender. Moreover, when promoting a masculine-based service, a female endorser with female trait is more effective than a male endorser with male traits in perceived quality and purchase intentions. According to these findings, the research provides implications for researchers and marketers on match-up between endorser and service type.

Genomic sequence databases, like GenBank, EMBL, are widely used by molecular biologists for homology searching. Because of the long length of each genomic sequence and the increase of the size of genomic sequence databases, the importance of efficient searching methods for fast queries grows. The DNA sequences are composed of four kinds of nucleotides, and these genomic sequences can be regarded as the text strings. However, there is no concept of words in a genomic sequence, which makes the search of the genomic sequence in the genomic database much difficult. Approximate String Matching (ASM) with k errors is considered for genomic sequences, where k errors would be caused by insertion, deletion, and replacement operations. Filtration of the DNA sequence is a widely adopted technique to reduce the number of the text areas (i.e., candidates) for further verification. In most of the filter methods, they first split the database sequence into q-grams. A sequence of grams (subpatterns) which match some part of the text will be passed as a candidate. The match problem of grams with the part of the text could be speed up by using the index structure for the exact match. Candidates will then be examined by dynamic programming to get the final result. However, in the previous methods for ASM, most of them considered the local order within each gram. Only the (k + s) h-samples filter considers the global order of the sequence of matched grams. Although the (k + s) h-samples filter keeps the global order of the sequence of the grams, it still has some disadvantages. First, to be a candidate in the (k + s) h-samples filter, the number of the ordered matched grams, s, is always fixed to 2 which results in low precision. Second, the (k + s) h-samples filter uses the query time to build the index for query patterns. In this thesis, we propose a new approximate string matching method, the hash trie filter, for efficiently searching in genomic databases. We build a hash trie in the pre-computing time for the genomic sequence stored in database. Although the size q of each split grams is also decided by the same formula used in the (k + s) h-samples filter, we have proposed a different way to find the ordered subpatterns in text T. Moreover, we reduce the number of candidates by pruning some unreasonable matched positions. Furthermore, unlike the (k + s) h-samples filter which always uses s = 2 to decide whether s matched subpatterns could be a candidate or not, our method will dynamically decide s, resulting in the increase of precision. The simulation results show that our hash trie filter outperforms the (k +s) h-samples filter in terms of the response time, the number of verified candidates, and the precision under different length of the query patterns and different error levels.