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The interesting aspect of the Dravidian languages is a commonality through a shared script, similar vocabulary, and their common root language. In this work, an attempt has been made to classify the four complex Dravidian languages using cepstral coefficients and prosodic features. The speech of Dravidian languages has been recorded in various environments and considered as a database. It is demonstrated that while cepstral coefficients can indeed identify the language correctly with a fair degree of accuracy, prosodic features are added to the cepstral coefficients to improve language identification performance. Legendre polynomial fitting and the principle component analysis (PCA) are applied on feature vectors to reduce dimensionality which further resolves the issue of time complexity. In the experiments conducted, it is found that using both cepstral coefficients and prosodic features, a language identification rate of around 87% is obtained, which is about 18% above the baseline system using Mel-frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCCs). It is observed from the results that the temporal variations and prosody are the important factors needed to be considered for the tasks of language identification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper presents results on optimizing the MOVPE technology of light-emitting diode (LED) structures in a Dragon-125 system to accelerate the technological cycle. Due to the high growth rate of GaN layers and optimization of the initial GaN growth phase, the total duration of the epitaxial process is reduced from 4 h 45 min to 2 h 44 min. The LED diode structures grown by this technique compare well in quality with LEDs grown by the standard method in the commercially available AIX2000HT system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The classical Chinese poetry is a remarkable form of art in traditional Chinese character. However, it is difficult for people who are unfamiliar with ancient Chinese to experience the artistic content of the poetry. In this study, a sonification scheme, Tx2Ms (Text-to-Music), is proposed to extract the poetry features between lines in verses; moreover, dynamics and interval relations are modeled to map those features to the movement of multi-dimensional musical elements such as durations. This conversion is based on poetry intonation and acoustic analysis of the pronunciations of poems; and a stochastic compositional algorithm is created by applying a Markov chain. In addition, the best pentatonic mode for a specific poem is recommended according to the formants analysis. Therefore, the sonification of classical Chinese poetry not only provides a novel way for people to appreciate Chinese poetry but also enriches the state of mind and imagery in the delivery process, and the experiment results show that the proposed system is successfully accepted by most people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Priority rules are one of the frequently used methods in project programming with resource-constraints. In this paper, the effects of project size and number of resource constraints on project duration are compared to the performances of pre-selected priority rules. Ten projects in different sizes have been programmed with 3, 5, 7, 9, and 11 limited-resource conditions by means of MRPL (Maximum Remaining Path Length), LFT (Latest Finish Time), MNSLCK (Minimum Slack Time), EFT (Earliest Finish Time), and LST (Latest Start Time) priority rules. When the number of resource constraints is low, the performance of MRPL is generally observed to be higher. As the number of resource constraints increases, a decrease in the performance of MRPL is observed in contrast with an increase in the performance of LFT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Humans were trained on two independent temporal discriminations, with correct choice dependent on the initial stimulus duration. In Experiment 1, the durations were 1.0 and 4.0 sec, with one set of choice stimuli, and 2.0 and 8.0 sec, with a different set of choice stimuli. The 2.0- and 4.0-sec values were selected to be the geometric mean of the two values in the other discrimination. In Experiment 2, the durations were 2.0 and 5.0 sec for one discrimination and 3.5 and 6.5 sec for the other. The 3.5- and 5.0-sec values were selected to be the arithmetic mean of the two values in the other discrimination. In both experiments, participants showed evidence for relational coding of the duration pairs. That is, the test durations were selected to be at the presumed bisection point (i.e., they should have produced indifferent choice), but instead the shorter test duration from the longer duration pair produced a "short" bias (in both experiments), whereas the longer duration from the shorter duration pair produced a "long" bias (in the second experiment). Results were similar to those from Zentall, Weaver, and Clement (2004) with pigeons. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Target distance affects movement duration in aiming tasks but its effect on reaction time (RT) is poorly documented. RT is a function of both preparation and initiation. Experiment 1 pre-cued movement (allowing advanced preparation) and found no influence of distance on RT. Thus, target distance does not affect initiation time. Experiment 2 removed pre-cue information and found that preparing a movement of increased distance lengthens RT. Experiment 3 explored movements to targets of cued size at non-cued distances and found size altered peak speed and movement duration but RT was influenced by distance alone. Thus, amplitude influences preparation time (for reasons other than altered duration) but not initiation time. We hypothesise that the RT distance effect might be due to the increased number of possible trajectories associated with further targets: a hypothesis that can be tested in future experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper concerns the longest common subsequence (LCS) shared by two sequences (or strings) of length N, whose elements are chosen at random from a finite alphabet. The exact distribution and the expected value of the length of the LCS, k say, between two random sequences is still an open problem in applied probability. While the expected valueE(N) of the length of the LCS of two random strings is known to lie within certain limits, the exact value ofE(N) and the exact distribution are unknown. In this paper, we calculate the length of the LCS for all possible pairs of binary sequences fromN=1 to 14. The length of the LCS and the Hamming distance are represented in color on two all-against-all arrays. An iterative approach is then introduced in which we determine the pairs of sequences whose LCS lengths increased by one upon the addition of one letter to each sequence. The pairs whose score did increase are shown in black and white on an array, which has an interesting fractal-like structure. As the sequence length increases,R(N) (the proportion of sequences whose score increased) approaches the Chvátal-Sankoff constantac (the proportionality constant for the linear growth of the expected length of the LCS with sequence length). We show thatR(N) is converging more rapidly toac thanE(N)/N. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Numerous temporal relations of verbal actions have been analysed in terms of various grammatical means of expressing verbal temporalisation such as tense, aspect, duration and iteration. Here the temporal relations within verb semantics, particularly ordered pairs of verb entailment, are studied using Allen's interval-based temporal formalism. Their application to the compositional visual definitions in our intelligent storytelling system, CONFUCIUS, is presented, including the representation of procedural events, achievement events and lexical causatives. In applying these methods we consider both language modalities and visual modalities since CONFUCIUS is a multimodal system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ryle (1949, Chapter V) discusses a range of predicates which in different ways exemplify a property I shall call quasi-duality – they appear to report two actions or events in one predicate. Quasi-duality is the key property of predicates Ryle classed as achievements. Ryle's criteria for classification were not temporal or aspectual, and Vendler's subsequent adoption of the term achievement for the aktionsart of momentary events changes the term – Rylean achievements and Vendlerian achievements are in principle different classes. Nevertheless, I shall argue in this paper that certain kinds of quasi-duality do have aspectual significance. This paper examines a number of quasi-dual predicates which are not generally discussed in the aktionsart literature, including break a promise, miscount, and cure the patient. Two types of quasi-dual predicates are identified and dubbed criterion predicates and causative upshot predicates. It is shown that both types of quasi-dual predicate lack process progressives, despite being durative, and it is argued that the lack of process progressives identifies these predicates as (aspectual) achievements. They are termed durative achievements to distinguish them from canonical, momentary achievements. It is argued that these predicates lack process progressives, and hence are achievements, because they express individual-level predicates on the event argument. A process progressive is stage-level for the event, and hence is incompatible with a predicate which is lexically individual-level for the event. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study investigated the effects of phrase length and scrambling in the processing of Japanese sentences. Reading times of short phrases, long phrases, verbs, and whole sentences, measured by the method of self-paced reading, did not differ in terms of phrase-length order and scrambling. In addition, four types of sentences constructed on the basis of phrase-length order and scrambling did not affect duration times of correctness decision-making for sentences. However, error rates differed between canonical and scrambled sentences regardless of phrase-length order. This result implies that scrambled sentences were harder to judge as correct sentences than canonical sentences. Thus, scrambling affects the appropriate integration of information, whereas phrase-length order is simply an indication of preference and not of cognitive processing. To explain the present result, the authors propose the “configurational structure without movement,” which predicts no difference in speed between the processing of canonical and scrambled sentences, apart from error rates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present short note aimed at further exploring data from a recent study showing socially modulated auditory contagious yawning in domestic dogs ( Canis familiaris). Two independent observers further extended the analysis of all video recordings made in the previous study and coded both the number of yawns performed by the dogs and the frequencies or durations of stress-related behaviors exhibited throughout the presentation of familiar and unfamiliar yawns. By showing no significant difference between conditions in the frequencies or durations of the coded behaviors, nor any association between the number of yawns and the frequencies or durations of stress-related behaviors, results raised doubt on the stress-induced yawn hypothesis, thus supporting social modulation. The exact mechanism underlying contagious yawning, however, needs further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]