Yes / This work presents a methodology to optimize the selection of multiple parameter levels of an image acquisition, degradation, or post-processing process applied to stimuli intended to be used in a subjective image or video quality assessment (QA) study. It is known that processing parameters (e.g. compression bit-rate) or techni- cal quality measures (e.g. peak signal-to-noise ratio, PSNR) are often non-linearly related to human quality judgment, and the model of either relationship may not be known in advance. Using these approaches to select parameter levels may lead to an inaccurate estimate of the relationship between the parameter and subjective quality judgments – the system’s quality model. To overcome this, we propose a method for modeling the rela- tionship between parameter levels and perceived quality distances using a paired comparison parameter selection procedure in which subjects judge the perceived similarity in quality. Our goal is to enable the selection of evenly sampled parameter levels within the considered quality range for use in a subjective QA study. This approach is tested on two applications: (1) selection of compression levels for laparoscopic surgery video QA study, and (2) selection of dose levels for an interventional X-ray QA study. Subjective scores, obtained from the follow-up single stimulus QA experiments conducted with expert subjects who evaluated the selected bit-rates and dose levels, were roughly equidistant in the perceptual quality space - as intended. These results suggest that a similarity judgment task can help select parameter values corresponding to desired subjective quality levels. / Parts of this work were performed within the Telesurgery project (co-funded by iMinds, a digital research institute founded by the Flemish Government; project partners are Unilabs Teleradiology, SDNsquare and Barco, with project support from IWT) and the PANORAMA project (co-funded by grants from Belgium, Italy, France, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the ENIAC Joint Undertaking).

Acquérir et traiter des données est de moins en moins coûteux, à la fois en matériel et en temps, mais encore faut-il pouvoir les analyser et les interpréter malgré leur complexité. La dimensionnalité est un des aspects de cette complexité intrinsèque. Pour aider à interpréter et à appréhender ces données le recours à la visualisation est indispensable au cours du processus d’analyse. La projection représente les données sous forme d’un nuage de points 2D, indépendamment du nombre de dimensions. Cependant cette technique de visualisation souffre de distorsions dues à la réduction de dimension, ce qui pose des problèmes d’interprétation et de confiance. Peu d’études ont été consacrées à la considération de l’impact de ces artefacts, ainsi qu’à la façon dont des utilisateurs non-familiers de ces techniques peuvent analyser visuellement une projection. L’approche soutenue dans cette thèse repose sur la prise en compte interactive des artefacts, afin de permettre à des analystes de données ou des non-experts de réaliser de manière fiable les tâches d’analyse visuelle des projections. La visualisation interactive des proximités colore la projection en fonction des proximités d’origine par rapport à une donnée de référence dans l’espace des données. Cette technique permet interactivement de révéler les artefacts de projection pour aider à appréhender les détails de la structure sous-jacente aux données. Dans cette thèse, nous revisitons la conception de cette technique et présentons ses apports au travers de deux expérimentations contrôlées qui étudient l’impact des artefacts sur l’analyse visuelle des projections. Nous présentons également une étude de l’espace de conception d’une technique basée sur la métaphore de lentille et visant à s’affranchir localement des problématiques d’artefacts de projection. / The cost of data acquisition and processing has radically decreased in both material and time. But we also need to analyze and interpret the large amounts of complex data that are stored. Dimensionality is one aspect of their intrinsic complexity. Visualization is essential during the analysis process to help interpreting and understanding these data. Projection represents data as a 2D scatterplot, regardless the amount of dimensions. However, this visualization technique suffers from artifacts due to the dimensionality reduction. Its lack of reliability implies issues of interpretation and trust. Few studies have been devoted to the consideration of the impact of these artifacts, and especially to give feedbacks on how non-expert users can visually analyze projections. The main approach of this thesis relies on an taking these artifacts into account using interactive techniques, in order to allow data scientists or non-expert users to perform a trustworthy visual analysis of projections. The interactive visualization of the proximities applies a coloring of the original proximities relatives to a reference in the data-space. This interactive technique allows revealing projection artifacts in order to help grasping details of the underlying data-structure. In this thesis, we redesign this technique and we demonstrate its potential by presenting two controlled experiments studying the impact of artifacts on the visual analysis of projections. We also present a design-space based on the lens metaphor, in order to improve this technique and to locally visualize a projection free of artifacts issues.

Ophidiidae are major benthopelagic fishes with wide distribution and depth range. Three types of sonic structural patterns have been described in some studied ophidiid fishes, however, the significance of the different types of the sonic apparatus, and the distribution in the subfamilies remain unclear. In addition, although the sonic apparatus and the sonic mechanisms of the high frequency sounds produced by cusk-eels has been explained, the characteristics of extrinsic swimbladder sonic muscle is still unknown. In this study, I investigated three ophidiid subfamilies from Taiwan and reviewed the published data to study the morphological traits of their sonic apparatus. Inaddition, Hoplobrotula armata were related to study the proteomic characterization of the extrinsic swimbladder sonic muscle. Results indicate that the 13 ophidiid species in this study could be grouped into five sonic structural patterns, and three subfamilies could be separated accordingly. Furthermore, because the sister group of the family Ophidiidae-carapidae is soniferous, I suggest that the common ancestor of the three ophidiid subfamilies should also be soniferous. Comparisons made in regarded to environmental factors indicate that diversity of sonic apparatus in three ophidiids subfamiliesis depth dependent. The extrinsic swimbladder sonic muscles could be separated into ventral sonic muscle and intermediate sonic muscle. The histological cross-sections of the ventral sonic muscle fibers show peripheral ring myofibrillar region and central core and they are similar with the sonic muscle. Ventral muscle weights were higher in males than females, but the muscle fibers are smaller in males. Protein values of ventral sonic muscles showed high expression in fast and long duration constructional proteins, and males were higher in protein expression than females. Intermediate sonic muscles, on the other hand, were larger in females than males. The cross-sections of muscle fibers were similar to the white muscle. Expression in the fast constructional related protein in the intermediate sonic muscle was higher than ventral sonic muscles, and the metabolically related protein was lower than ventral sonic muscles. The phylogeny of ophidiiform fishes is not clear at present; the sonic-apparatus diversity in ophidiid fishes observed in this study becomes useful to reveal the relationship phylogenetic of ophidiids fishes. Regard the physiology of sound production, I suggest that the larger ventral sonic muscle in males are be provides a better constructional ability, and their smaller fibers are adaptative for energy metabolism regarded for continuous fast constraction and fatigue resistance. The longer intermediate sonic muscle in females is a better constructional ability than male. In intermediate sonic muscle were be fast constructional related protein, higher in expression than the ventral sonic muscles, the metabolic related protein was lower than the ventral sonic muscles. These results suggest that the intermediate sonic muscle has a hight constructional ability but has a disventage of being easily fatigue.

Spiranthes parksii Correll is an endemic terrestrial orchid to the Post Oak Savannah of East Texas and is currently listed as federally endangered. The construction of Twin Oaks landfill, approximately 20 km east of College Station, TX, will destroy an estimated 379 S. parksii individuals and 44.7 ha of its habitat. Research has been funded to mitigate for this loss and includes documenting demographics, life cycle, local and landscape habitat, and on-site transplantation of S. parksii. Results found that S. parksii was highly variable between years at Twin Oaks and might be due to seasonal rainfall in rosette and early flowering growth. It was also found variable in its production of a rosette and influorescence from year to year. Individual plants were found to occur farther from drainages in higher count years, probably due to soil moisture, although further research should be conducted to confirm this hypothesis. A significant difference (p = 0.026) was found for percent canopy cover > 2 m above 1 m x 1 m quadrats with and without S. parksii, with a mean of 55 percent with S. parksii and 97 percent without S. parksii. A Non-Metric Multidimensional Scaling ordination revealed three different combinations of herbaceous species that occur with S. parksii, which were driven by the presence of three dominant bunch grasses of the Post Oak Savannah: Schizachyrium scoparium, Chasmanthium laxum var. sessiliflorum, and Andropogon ternarius. A close to significant difference (p = 0.07) was found for the leaf litter depth between quadrats with and without S. parksii, with a fewer number of stacked leaves with S. parksii. Analysis of aerial images indicated woody encroachment on Twin Oaks from 1958 to 2004 in areas that have not been mechanically cleared. Additionally, S. parksii was found to persist in an open savannah landscape and likely occurred in the same locations and more widespread in 1958 than are currently found. Transplantation of S. parksii was documented to be successful by a soil-intact method. While a bare-root method showed success with S. cernua, no conclusions can be made of its success for S. parksii due to a low sample size (n = 10).

I examined the effects of fire frequency on reptile and amphibian community composition in a periodically burned sandhill habitat in west-central Florida. Plots burned in 2003 had lower species richness, diversity, and evenness indices than plots that had not been burned during the previous six years. Community composition was different among plots burned at different times and followed a gradient of change that corresponded to the time since the last fire. Aspidoscelis sexlineata were the most abundant lizards in recently burned plots, while Scincella lateralis and Plestiodon inexpectatus were relatively more abundant in unburned plots. Gopherus polyphemus were least abundant in unburned plots. Community composition among plots was correlated with mean leaf litter cover and herbaceous ground cover. Mean percent cover of leaf litter and herbaceous vegetation responded to the time since the last fire. Fire indirectly affects community composition through changes in environmental variables, such as percent coverage of leaf litter and herbaceous vegetation.Additionally, I examined annual variation in reptile and amphibian community composition over a period of four years in the mid 1980s and again in 2004. Differences existed in number of individuals captured, diversity, and evenness among years. Community composition was different between all consecutive years except 1986 and 1987. Number of individuals captured per year and annual differences in community composition were correlated with summer rainfall. The annual pattern of variation in community composition over time was no different in unburned experimental plots than in experimentally burned treatments. The power to detect such a difference is low, however, because of low replication. No apparent loss of species occurred between the 1980s and 2004, but the abundances of two non-native species were significantly higher in 2004 than in the 1980s. A third exotic species was documented at the site for the first time in 2004. Because of the increasing number of exotic reptiles and amphibians in Florida, the site is at risk of invasions of other species.

To help organizations better understand and improve the management of information systems development (ISD) projects, this dissertation aims to understand what ISD project knowledge and beliefs ISD professionals work with and how the knowledge and beliefs are organized in their minds. Drawing on the cognitive perspective using a mental model approach, I define a new construct, ISD Project (ISDP) mental model, which refers to ISD professionals’ knowledge and belief structures that help them understand, conduct, and manage ISD projects. Particularly, two essential elements of ISDP mental models - content and structure – were explored. Regarding the content, forty fundamental concepts were derived from literature reviews and cognitive interviews with 19 ISD experts. Analysis of 95 ISD professionals’ cognitive responses using Multidimensional Scaling revealed four types of evaluative beliefs - customer-, team-, enterprise-, and product-oriented beliefs. This new construct, along with its assessment procedures, provides a useful starting point for academics and organizations to explore the people factor in ISD. To investigate the impact of ISDP mental models, I examined work relationships between project managers and developers where effective work relationships are crucial to project success. Specifically, I explored how the similarity of mental models and an understanding of others’ mental models influence work relationships. Through a multiple case study on 6 project manager-developer pairs in different case conditions (i.e., similarity of mental models x accuracy of understanding), the results provide preliminary support that the project manager-developer pairs who hold accurate understanding have more effective implicit coordination - they are sensitive to one another’s knowledge, beliefs, and preferences and they adjust their task and interpersonal coordination accordingly. Accurate understanding also stimulates the process of knowledge integration in which the dyad builds upon one another’s knowledge to resolve project challenges. This dissertation contributes to the literature on ISD project management by capturing the organization of ISDP knowledge in ISD professionals’ minds and identifying underlying beliefs. Furthermore, it contributes to an understanding of how project managers and developers can coordinate effectively when they have high cross-understanding, despite dissimilarities of knowledge and beliefs. / Thesis (Ph.D, Management) -- Queen's University, 2014-04-17 11:18:07.356

Στόχος της παρούσης διπλωματικής εργασίας είναι η διερεύνηση καταλληλότητας της μεθόδου πολυδιάστατης σταδιακής ανάλυσης για την αξιολόγηση σχεδιασμού ιστοσελίδων. Για την επίτευξη του στόχου, αναπτύχθηκε διαδικτυακή εφαρμογή αξιολόγησης με χρήση μεθόδων πολυδιάστατης σταδιακής ανάλυσης και αξιολογήθηκε τόσο η μέθοδος όσο και η εφαρμογή ως προς την χρησιμότητα της στο πλαίσιο που μας ενδιαφέρει, δηλαδή την αξιολόγηση σχεδιασμού ιστοσελίδων. Η εφαρμογή εκμεταλλεύεται τα πλεονεκτήματα των ιστοσελίδων πλούσιας διαδραστικότητας για την πλήρη υποστήριξη της διαδικασίας αξιολόγησης. / -

The objective of this work is to seek the perception of entrepreneurs on technological based company in Alagoas where it intends to identify defined dimensions for a entrepreneur schumpeterian on challenges of entrepreneurial management. In this way, it tries to describe how the innovating entrepreneur notices the company in relation to stages of development of the enterprise in the pre-founding, function and initial development on an integrated perspective of normative, strategic and operational levels. In order to do so, he made use of multidimensional scaling techniques for the construction of perceptual maps that indicate the understanding of the process of company management. The study is based on a qualitative descriptive research, where it is possible to distinguish and evaluate the main constraints, as well as the variables that companies have mastery to establish as a viable entity / FAPEAL - Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de Alagoas / Este trabalho tem como objetivo buscar a percepção de empreendedores de empresa de base tecnológica em Alagoas, onde pretende identificar dimensões definidas para um empreendedor schumpeteriano sobre desafios da gestão empreendedora. Desta forma, procura descrever como o empreendedor inovador nota a empresa em relação a estágios de desenvolvimento do empreendimento na pré-fundação, fundação e desenvolvimento inicial sobre uma perspectiva integrada de níveis normativo, estratégico e operacional. Para tanto, fez a utilização de técnicas de escalonamento multidimensional através da construção de mapas perceptuais que indicam a compreensão do processo de gestão das empresas. O estudo está baseado em uma pesquisa descritiva de natureza qualitativa, onde é possível distinguir e avaliar os principais entraves, como também as variáveis que as empresas têm domínio para se estabelecer como uma entidade viável.

In this thesis two collaborative localization techniques are studied: multidimensional scaling (MDS) and maximum likelihood estimator (MLE). A synthesis of a new location estimation method through a serial integration of these two techniques, such that an estimate is first obtained using MDS and then MLE is employed to fine-tune the MDS solution, was the subject of this research using various simulation and experimental studies. In the simulations, important issues including the effects of sensor node density, reference node density and different deployment strategies of reference nodes were addressed. In the experimental study, the path loss model of indoor environments is developed by determining the environment-specific parameters from the experimental measurement data. Then, the empirical path loss model is employed in the analysis and simulation study of the performance of collaborative localization techniques.

The Gray Fossil Site, northeastern Tennessee, is formed by multiple karst sub-basins filled with lacustrine sediments. The oldest sediments found were recently dated as Paleo-Eocene by palynological means, whereas the youngest sediments are considered Mio-Pliocene based on their faunal assemblage. In this study, we examined the Mio-Pliocene lacustrine sediments from the Gray Fossil Site to determine the Late Neogene floral characteristics of a site within the southern Appalachian Mountains. The Mio-Pliocene lacustrine sinkhole fill preserves a unique fossil assemblage, which includes invertebrate, vertebrate, and floral remains. Floral remains are represented by wood, seeds, leaves, and pollen grains. Forty-seven palynological samples from six different test-pits were analyzed. All pits exhibit a low pollen yield, a result of basic pH levels, drought, and fire events that occurred during deposition. The palynofloral assemblage has a low to moderate diversity and is largely dominated by a Quercus-Carya-Pinus assemblage (~ 90% of the palynoflora). The presence of Pterocarya grains supports a Late Neogene age for these lacustrine sediments. Comparison with modern pollen-based floras from North America suggests that: (1) examined pits can be discriminated into two separate groups based on their palynofloral signatures, (2) the Mio-Pliocene vegetation at the site ranged between a closed to open woodland setting, depending on the intensity and frequency of drought and fire events, and (3) the fossil palynofloral assemblage is comparable to what would be expected in the modern North American Mesophytic Forest region.