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From Augmentation to Inpainting:Improving Visual SLAM with Signal Enhancement Techniques and GAN-based Image Inpainting
Get PDFThis paper undertakes a comprehensive investigation that surpasses the conventional examination of signal enhancement techniques and their effects on visual Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (vSLAM) performance across diverse scenarios. Going beyond the conventional scope, the study extends its focus towards the seamless integration of signal enhancement techniques, aiming to achieve a substantial enhancement in the overall vSLAM performance. The research not only delves into the assessment of existing methods but also actively contributes to the field by proposing innovative denoising techniques that can play a pivotal role in refining the accuracy and reliability of vSLAM systems. This multifaceted approach encompasses a thorough exploration of the intricate relationships between signal enhancement, denoising strategies, their cumulative impact on the performance of vSLAM in real-world applications and the innovative use of Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) for image inpainting. The GANs effectively fill in missing spaces following object detection and removal, presenting a novel state-of-the-art approach that significantly enhances overall accuracy and execution speed of vSLAM. This paper aims to contribute to the advancement of vSLAM algorithms in real-world scenarios, demonstrating improved accuracy, robustness, and computational efficiency through the amalgamation of signal enhancement and advanced denoising techniques
Will voters polarize over pandemic restrictions? Theory and evidence from COVID-19
Get PDFIn a pandemic, voters will polarize over the choice of restrictions their society needs to impose. This is because in the eyes of voters, optimal restrictions vary with individual and aggregate productivity, vaccination status, and government fiscal transfer capacity. Specifically, less productive voters and those with a limited vaccination status prefer milder restrictions. In addition, voters in countries with superior vaccination programs prefer harsher restrictions, but the effect is weaker when their government has stronger fiscal transfer capacity. These propositions have been tested using the largest global dataset of pandemic restrictions and vaccination rates and are broadly confirmed. Consequently, the paper explains both cross-country variations in restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic and their development as vaccination programs gained traction. It also offers policy insights into the level of restrictions for future pandemics that different voters will deem tolerable
Contamination of depressional wetlands in the Mpumalanga Lake District of South Africa near a global emission hotspot
Get PDFThe Mpumalanga Lake District (MLD) of South Africa hosts a regionally unique cluster of water bodies of great importance for wetland biodiversity. It is also located close to a global hotspot for coal-fired power station emissions but the local impacts from these sources of pollution are poorly understood. Sediment cores from three contrasting wetlands were 210Pb dated and analysed for a range of contaminants linked to fossil fuel combustion, including trace elements, Hg, sulphur and spheroidal carbonaceous fly-ash particles (SCPs). At the two sites with pre-industrial (1900) baseline sediments, Pb, Zn and especially Cr concentrations and fluxes showed significant increases in the impact period (post-1975). Mercury showed the greatest proportional increase in flux (>4-fold) of all trace metals. Mercury and sulphur concentrations and fluxes showed highly significant correlations with emissions over the corresponding periods, while SCPs in sediments also closely tracked emissions. In a global context, levels of sediment contamination are relatively minor compared with other heavily industrialised regions, with only Cr exceeding the sediment Probable Effects Concentration for biological impact post-1975. Despite the relatively large increases in Hg, concentrations do not reach the Threshold Effects Concentration. The unexpectedly low levels of contamination may be due to i) low levels of many trace contaminants in South African coals compared to global averages, ii) prevailing recirculation patterns which transport pollution away from the study area during the wet season, minimising wet deposition, and iii) pollutant remobilisation through desiccation of wetlands or volatilization. The effects of hydrology and sediment accumulation rates lead to differential transport and preservation of organic-associated and more volatile contaminants (e.g. Hg, S) relative to non-volatile trace elements in wetlands of the MLD. The greatest fluxes of Hg and S are recorded in the site with the highest catchment: lake area ratio, lowest salinity and greatest sediment organic matter content
Stability or Stagnation:Non-Monotonic Association Between Party System Closure and Satisfaction with Democracy
Get PDFExploring goal taxonomies using the goal-based outcome tool in children and young people's mental health settings
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A T-PROPER KARHUNEN-LOÈVE EXPANSION AND ITS APPLICATION TO THE PROBLEM OF SIMULATION
Get PDFThe paper addresses the Karhunen-Loeve series representation in the tessarine domain. Based on augmented statistics, a tessarine widely linear Karhunen-Loeve expansion is defined. Then, the impact of T-properness on this representationis analyzed, leading to a T-proper Karhunen-Loeve expansion that means a dimensionality reduction. Furthermore, this series representation serves as a versatile simulation tool, valid for both stationary and non-stationary, Gaussian and non-Gaussian random signals. Finally, the applicability of the simulation technique proposed is examined numerically
Security Patchworking in Lebanon:Infrastructuring Across Failing Infrastructures
Get PDFIn this paper we bring to light the infrastructuring work carried out by people in Lebanon to establish and maintain everyday security in response to multiple simultaneously failing infrastructures. We do so through interviews with 13 participants from 12 digital and human rights organisations and two weeks of ethnographically informed fieldwork in Beirut, Lebanon, in July 2022. Through our analysis we develop the notion of security patchworking that makes visible the infrastructuring work necessitated to secure basic needs such as electricity provision, identity authentication and financial resources. Such practices are rooted in differing mechanisms of protection that often result in new forms of insecurity. We discuss theimplications for CSCW and HCI researchers and point to security patchworking as a lens to be used when designing technologies to support infrastructuring, while advocating for collaborative work across CSCW and security research
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