No description available.

This thesis describes the development of a software system for color sorting hardwood edge-glued panel parts. Conceptually, this system can be broken down into three separate processing steps. The first step is to segment color images of each of the two part faces into background and part. The second step involves extracting color information from each region labeled part and using this information to classify each part face as one of a pre-selected number of color classes plus an out class. The third step involves using the two face labels and some distance information to determine which part face is the better to use in the face of an edge-glued panel. Since a part face is illuminated while the background is not, the segmentation into background and part can be done using very simple computational methods. The color classification component of this system is based on the Trichromatic Color Theory. It uses an estimate of a part's 3-dimension (3-D) color probability function, P, to characterize the surface color of the part. Each color class is also represented by an estimate of the 3-D color probability function that describes the permissible distribution of colors within this color class. Let P_omega_i denote the estimated probability function for color class omega_i. Classification is accomplished by finding the color difference between the estimated color probability function for the part and each of the estimated 3-D color probability functions that represent the color classes. The distance function used is the sum of the absolute values of the differences between the elements of the estimated probability function for a class and the estimated probability function of the part. The sample is given the label of the color class to which it is closest if this distance is less than some class specific threshold for that class. If the distance to the class to which the part is closest is larger than the threshold for that class, the part is called an out. This supervised classification procedure first requires one to select training samples from each of the color classes to be considered. These training samples are used to generate P_omega_i for each color class omega_i and to establish the value of the threshold T_i that is used to determine when a part is an out. To aid in determining which part face is better to use in making a panel, the system allows one to prioritize the various color classes so that one or more color classes can have the same priority. Using these priorities, labels for each of the part faces, and the distance from each of the part faces' estimated probability functions to the estimated probability function of the class to which each face was assigned, the decision logic selects which is the ``better'' face. If the two part faces are assigned to color classes that have different priorities, the part face assigned to the color class with higher priority is chosen as the better face. If the two part faces have been assigned to the same color class or to two different classes having the same priority, the part face that is closest to the estimated probability function of the color class to which it has been assigned is chosen to be the better face. Finally, if both faces are labeled out, the part becomes an out part. This software system has been implemented on a prototype machine vision system that has undergone several months of in-plant testing. To date the system has only been tested on one type of material, southern red oak, with which it has proven itself capable of significantly out performing humans in creating high-quality edge-glued panels. Since southern red oak has significantly more color variation than any other hardwood type or species, it is believed that this system will work very well on any hardwood material. / Master of Science

This work is a critique to the stigmatisation of trash as something we should not live close together with. Due to this derogative conceptualisation of waste together with the inherent characteristics of landfills, Mexico City’s government implemented a “far and out” policy locating the final disposal areas distant and out from the city. Then, the proposal is the opposite approach: a local waste management system. So waste that usually ends kilometers away is handled in the community where it was produced in order to lengthen the life cycle of materials. The project is developed in Xochimilco for the challenges regarding the door-to-door collection of waste in this municipality. The local system focuses in the sorting process; being the most inefficient part of the current system as this activity is primarily executed by informal workforce. Besides, the type of waste that the community is able to manage completely locally is organic materials which are the principal element of the system for the regeneration of wetlands.

No description available.

The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) is investing heavily in research and development of automated mail handling systems. A major component in these systems is the use of Optical Character Recognition (OCR) to read the destination address and ZIP Code, and then bar code the mail piece. High speed sorting equipment can then sort the mail using the bar code. Current USPS OCR/automated mail handling systems only process letter mail (no automated address-reading systems exist for nonletter mail). Moreover, these OCR systems only capture and read a restricted field-of-view image. Letters can be rejected by these OCR systems because of nonstandard address location (outside the field-of-view), skewed address lines, or handwritten addresses. Current research is working toward building OCR systems capable of processing all forms of mail which include letters, flats, and irregular parcel and pieces (IPPs). These systems must scan an entire mail image for the destination address block which can assume any orientation. For nonletter mail, such as magazines, this is an exceedingly difficult task, since the entire face of up to 11 by 14 inches must be searched, and the address block must be chosen from all the other extraneous nonaddress information. This paper details an experimental address block location system developed at MITRE. The" system uses a backpropagation neural network trained to discriminate the frequency characteristics of address blocks from other candidates. The current system is trained on magazine flat mail. / Master of Science

Quantitative electroencephalography (QEEG) was used in this study to describe cognitive processing, particularly brain locations used, during performance of the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST). The hypothesis was that significant cognitive functioning is not limited to the frontal lobes. Significant EEG activity was found in non-frontal areas as well as frontal areas.

O objetivo desta tese é identificar a contribuição dos efeitos de aglomeração e do sorting espacial, associado às heterogeneidades não observadas dos trabalhadores e firmas, para a determinação dos salários individuais e dos salários locais nos arranjos populacionais do Brasil. Os dados do mercado de trabalho (RAIS-MTE) mostram que existe um diferencial espacial de salários, o qual pode ser explicado pelas distintas composições produtivas e de trabalhadores entre os locais e pelos diferenciais de custo de vida. A disponibilidade crescente de micro dados longitudinais permitiu a inclusão das habilidades não observadas individuais na equação de salários. Os estudos da Economia do Trabalho mostram que as habilidades são responsáveis por uma grande parcela dos diferenciais de salários. No entanto, os estudos nacionais ainda encontram um diferencial significativo, mesmo após o controle dos componentes individuais e do custo de vida, sugerindo a existência de efeitos específicos associados à localização das firmas e dos trabalhadores. A Economia Urbana considera as economias de aglomeração como um determinante salarial relevante nos mercados de trabalhos densos, particularmente a partir dos trabalhos de Glaeser e Maré (1994; 2001). Por sua vez, a maior produtividade das áreas densas pode ser atribuída à concentração de trabalhadores e firmas mais produtivos, o que ficou conhecido nessa literatura como sorting. Os estudos da Economia Urbana controlam somente o sorting dos atributos individuais não observados. Este trabalho contribui com a literatura ao considerar o sorting espacial dos atributos não observados das firmas e dos trabalhadores na determinação dos salários e dos efeitos de aglomeração. O estudo utiliza um modelo de decomposição salarial para lidar com múltiplos efeitos fixos no painel pareado de trabalhadores e firmas. Os efeitos puros da aglomeração (densidade) sobre os salários locais serão estimados em um modelo de dois estágios. O primeiro estágio estima uma equação salarial incluindo as características observadas dos trabalhadores e do emprego e os efeitos de localização, com um painel de micro dados da RAIS (2002-2014). O segundo estágio realiza a decomposição dos efeitos de localização em componentes associados às características locais dos arranjos e aos atributos não observados das firmas e dos trabalhadores. A estratégia de identificação propõe o controle dos efeitos fixos dos trabalhadores e firmas e o uso de variável instrumental para identificar os efeitos da aglomeração. Ademais, os dados de satélite sobre a luminosidade noturna são usados para estimar a proporção da área total dos arranjos habitada, a qual é utilizada para calcular a densidade. Os resultados mostraram que os efeitos do trabalhador foram mais relevantes do que os efeitos da firma para explicar a variação dos salários individuais e locais. O modelo principal, que utiliza o instrumento Bartik e a área iluminada, encontrou um efeito da densidade sobre os salários locais de 4,9%, o qual é superior ao lower bound da literatura prévia (3%). Os resultados sugerem que ignorar as limitações indicadas neste estudo pode levar a uma subestimação nas estimativas dos efeitos da densidade / The goal of this study is to identify the contribution of agglomeration effects and spatial sorting for the determination of individual and local wages in Brazilian urban agglomerations. Administrative records from the Ministry of Labor (RAIS-MTE) show a spatial differential in wages, which can be explained by the different productive structures and compositions of workers across cities, and by differentials in cost-of-living. The longitudinal microdata allowed the inclusion of unobserved individual skills in the wage equation. Studies in Labor Economics show that skills are responsible for a large portion of the wage differential. However, the available studies on Brazil still find a significant differential, even after controlling for the individual components and the cost of living. This suggests the existence of specific effects associated with the location of firms and workers. The literature on Urban Economics considers the economies of agglomeration as a relevant wage determinant in dense labor markets. The higher productivity of dense areas can be attributed to the concentration of more productive workers and firms more productive, which became known in this literature as sorting. Studies in Urban Economics only control the sorting of unobserved individual attributes. This dissertation contributes to the literature by considering the spatial sorting of unobserved attributes of firms and of workers in the determination of wages and of the effects of agglomeration. The study uses a wage decomposition model to deal with multiple fixed effects in a matched panel of workers and firms. The pure effects of agglomeration (density) on local wages are estimated in a two-stage model. The first stage estimates a wage equation including the observed characteristics of workers and firms and the effects of location, with a microdata panel of RAIS (2002-2014). The second stage decomposes the location effects into components associated to local characteristics and to unobserved attributes of firms and workers. The identification strategy involves controlling for fixed effects of workers and firms, and using an instrumental variable to identifying the effects of agglomeration. Satellite data on illumination are used to estimate the proportion of the overall area occupied with population and firms in each local labour markets. The results indicate that the worker effects are more relevant to explain wage variation than the firm\'s effects. The model of preference indicates a density effect on wages of 4.9%, much higher than the literature lower bound (3%). This suggests that ignoring the variables included in this study can lead to an underestimation of the effects of agglomeration

O cenário atual das commodities minerais tem obrigado as empresas de mineração a otimizar suas operações e buscar soluções inovadoras para manter a lucratividade desejada de suas minas, controlar os riscos envolvidos e garantir a sobrevivência do negócio. Neste contexto, com a menor disponibilidade de minérios de alto teor, os depósitos minerais remanescentes exigem a lavra e o beneficiamento de grande quantidade de massa por tonelada de metal produzido. Apesar de apresentarem um teor médio decrescente, estes depósitos frequentemente contêm regiões com minério de teor mais elevado incorporados às porções de baixo teor ou mesmo na massa estéril. Por melhor que seja o conhecimento das reservas, a lavra seletiva dessa massa de teor mais elevado é praticamente inviável operacionalmente. A forma mais eficiente de aproveitar estas reservas é por meio do processo de pré-concentração de minério por ore sorting (seleção/classificação de minério). O objetivo deste processo é remover, quanto antes possível, o material com teor não econômico. A consequência imediata é uma potencial redução dos custos de processamento e do consumo de água e energia para a mesma massa de metal produzido. Existem várias tecnologias aplicáveis em pré-concentração; este estudo é focado especificamente na apresentação e discussão dos impactos causados no empreendimento mineiro de Phu Kham (PanAust), a partir da instalação e utilização do equipamento de pré-concentração, bulk ore sorter. Este equipamento faz uso de um sensor de ressonância magnética, e tem por objetivo a separação de grandes volumes de estéril direto no transportador de correias totalmente carregado (in-pit ou correia de alimentação da usina), baseando-se nos teores medidos ou inferidos a partir de seu sensor. A pré-concentração com bulk ore sorter é fundamentalmente utilizada para aumentar a produtividade baseada na capacidade fixa da usina e atenuar os prejuízos causados pelas incertezas nas definições de teores da mina. Isto é, a partir da maior precisão no controle do teor, pode-se reduzir a diluição e a perda de minério oriundas da operacionalização e explotação das reservas minerais, controlar o teor de corte e o teor médio na alimentação da usina ou ainda separar os diversos tipos de minérios para serem tratados em diferentes rotas no processo de beneficiamento. Este trabalho estuda a viabilidade técnica e econômica da aplicação do bulk ore sorter na mina de Phu Kham, no Laos. Inicialmente a tecnologia de sorting é apresentada, juntamente com os sensores disponíveis e o sistema diversor. Os resultados econômicos foram avaliados a partir dos dados de produção da mina no ano de 2014. Sem a possibilidade da realização de estudos de amostragem, a variabilidade do minério foi estimada a partir da variância de dispersão, uma ferramenta geoestatística. A estimativa do desempenho da separação inclui os erros associados a leitura do sensor e do sistema diversor. Avaliações econômicas foram realizadas para diferentes cenários e demonstraram que o bulk ore sorter tem o potencial de aumentar a produção metálica e o lucro. Este sistema de pré-concentração permite a que apenas o material com valor agregado alimente a planta de beneficiamento. / The current scenario of mineral commodities has forced the mining companies to optimize their operations and look for innovative solutions to maintain the desired profitability of their mines, control the risks involved and ensure the survival of the business. In this context, with the depletion of high grade deposits, the remaining lower grade deposits require the mining and processing of larger volumes of material per tonne of product. These low grade deposits often contain a large proportion of barren gangue. The aim of pre-concentration is to remove this barren material at as coarse a particle size and as early in the process as possible. This has the potential to reduce processing costs, energy and water consumption and possibly ore transport requirements. There are several technologies that may be applicable for pre-concentration; this work looks specifically at bulk ore sorting. This involves the separation of a large volume of barren gangue from a fully loaded conveyor belt (in-pit or plant feed belt) based on the grade as measured or inferred from a sensor measurement. Bulk ore sorting may be used to increase the production rate through fixed plant capacity, or reduce the required size of downstream processing equipment. Uneconomic or marginal reserves may be upgraded making them economic to treat and improving the resource utilisation. Bulk ore sorting could also be used to reduce dilution and ore loss in mining operations by improving grade control, or to separate ore types to treat via different process routes. Thus, bulk ore sorting has the potential to improve the profitability and reduce the environmental impact of mining operations and may be applied in different ways. This study investigates three examples of how bulk ore sorting may be employed and the associated economic benefits. The technical and economic viability of bulk ore sorting is evaluated for a copper deposit in Laos. Bulk ore sorting technology is described briefly along with discussion of appropriate sensor and diversion systems for the copper deposit considered. The economic implications were evaluated using the actual mined material and costs from 2014 as the base-case. In the absence of sampling data, ore grade variability was estimated using geo-statistical tools based on mine grade control data. A process model of the sorter was developed considering the accuracy of the sensor measurement and errors associated with material diversion. This was used to simulate the separation performance. Economic evaluations were conducted for a number of different scenarios and demonstrated that bulk ore sorting has the potential to increase the amount of metal in product and annual profit for the operation considered. This is because it is cheaper to sort and reject below cut-off grade material contained in the plant feed than to treat this material through the processing plant. The sorter acts as a gatekeeper - only above cut-off grade material (value-adding) reports to the processing plant.

Submitted by Maria Aparecida (cidazen@gmail.com) on 2017-09-04T15:04:55Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Marcos Vinicius Lopes.pdf: 7214975 bytes, checksum: 3d8e5de44c75de5f02b3f6101759f37a (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-09-04T15:04:55Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Marcos Vinicius Lopes.pdf: 7214975 bytes, checksum: 3d8e5de44c75de5f02b3f6101759f37a (MD5) Previous issue date: 2013-02-27 / CAPES / Independent component analysis (ICA) is a method which objective is to find a non gaussian, linear or non linear representation such that the components are statistically independent. As a representation, tries to capture the input data essential structure. One of ICA applications is feature extraction. A main digital signal processing issue is finding a satisfactory representation, whether for image, speech signal or any signal type for purposes such as compression and de-noise. ICA can be aplied in this direction to propose generative models of the phenomena to be represented. This work presents the problem of spike classification in extracellular records, denominated spike sorting. It is assumed that the waveforms of spikes depend on factors such as the morphology of the neuron and the distance from the electrode, so that different neurons will present different forms of spikes. However, since different neurons may have similar spikes, what makes classification very difficult, the problem is even worse due to background noise and variation os spikes of the same neuron. The spike sorting algorithm is usually divided into three parts: firstly, the spikes are detected, then projected into a feature space (with possible dimensionality reduction) to facilitate differentiation between the waveforms from different neurons, finally the cluster algorithm is run for identifying these characteristics so the spikes from the same neuron. Here, we propose the use of ICA in feature extraction stage, being this step critical to the spike sorting process, thus distinguishing the activity of each neuron detected, supporting the analysis of neural population activity near the electrode. The method was compared with conventional techniques such as Principal Component Analysis and Wavelets, demonstrating a significant improvement in results. / A análise de componentes independentes (ICA, do inglês Indepdendent Component Analysis) é um método no qual o objetivo é encontrar uma representação linear ou não linear, não-gaussiana, tal que as componentes sejam estatisticamente independentes. Como uma representação busca capturar a estrutura essencial dos dados de entrada. Uma das aplicações de ICA é em extração de características. Um grande problema no processamento digital de sinais é encontrar uma representação adequada, seja para imagem, sinal de fala ou qualquer outro tipo de sinal para objetivos como compressão e remoção de ruído. ICA pode ser aplicada nesta direção ao tentar propor modelos geradores para os fenômenos a serem representados. Neste trabalho é apresentado o problema da classificação de espículas em gravações extracelulares, denominado spike sorting. Assume-se que as formas de onda das espículas dependem de fatores como a morfologia do neurônio e da distância deste para o eletrodo, então diferentes neurônios irão apresentar diferentes formas de espículas. Contudo diferentes neurônios podem apresentar espículas semelhantes, tornando a classificação mais difícil, o problema ainda é agravado devido ao ruído de fundo e a variação das espículas de um mesmo neurônio. O algoritmo de spike sorting geralmente é dividido em três partes: inicialmente as espículas são detectadas, em seguida são projetadas em um espaço de características (podendo haver redução de dimensionalidade) para facilitar a diferenciação entre as formas de onda de diferentes neurônios, por fim é feito o agrupamento dessas características identificando assim as espículas pertencentes ao mesmo neurônio. Aqui propomos a utilização de ICA na etapa de extração de características das espículas, sendo esta etapa crítica para o processo de spike sorting, permitindo assim distinguir a atividade de cada neurônio detectado, auxiliando a análise da atividade da população neural próxima ao eletrodo. O método foi comparado com técnicas convencionais como Análise de componentes principais (PCA, do inglês Principal Component Analysis) e Wavelets, demonstrando significativa melhora nos resultados.

Optical manipulation of nanoscale objects is studied with particular emphasis on the role of plasmon resonance for enhancement of optical forces. The thesis provides an introduction to plasmon resonance and its role in confinement of light to a sub-diffraction volume. The strong light confinement and related enhancement of optical forces is then theoretically studied for a special case of nanoantenna supporting plasmon resonances. The calculation of optical forces, based on the Maxwell stress tensor approach, reveals relatively weak optical forces for incident powers that are used in typical realisations of trapping with nanoantenna. The optical forces are so weak that other non-optical effects should be considered to explain the observed trapping. These effects include heating induced convection, thermoporesis and chemical binding. The thesis also studies the optical effects of plasmon resonances for a fundamentally different application - size-based optical sorting of gold nanoparticles. Here, the plasmon resonances are not utilised for sub-diffraction light confinement but rather for their ability to increase the apparent cross-section of the particles for their respective resonant sizes. Exploiting these resonances, we realise sorting in a system of two counter-propagating evanescent waves, each at different wavelength that selectively guide gold nanoparticles of different sizes in opposite directions. The method is experimentally demonstrated for bidirectional sorting of gold nanoparticles of either 150 or 130 nm in diameter from those of 100 nm in diameter within a mixture. We conclude the thesis with a numerical study of the optimal beam-shape for optical sorting applications. The developed theoretical framework, based on the force optical eigenmode method, is able to find an illumination of the back-focal plane of the objective such that the force difference between nanoparticles of various sizes in the sample plane is maximised.