36,288 research outputs found
Liu Kang
No full textLiu Kang: Essays on Art and Culture is a testament to the inexorable passion of an artist who knew no boundaries. This collection of essays, which Liu Kang wrote over 44 years, offers an insight into the artist’s myriad interests as well as his contributions as a first generation Nanyang artist and art educator. Translated into English for this volume, Liu Kang’s essays are accompanied by commentaries and photographs of the artist-author and his subjects
Transcriptomic and proteomic response of the organohalide respiring bacterium Desulfoluna spongiiphila to growth with 2,6-dibromophenol as electron acceptor
No full textPeer reviewe
A Hybrid Continuous Max-Sum Algorithm for Decentralised Coordination
No full textRecent advances in decentralised coordination of multiple agents have led to the proposal of the max-sum algorithm for solving distributed constraint optimisation problems (DCOPs). The max-sum algorithm is fully decentralised, converges to optimality for problems with acyclic constraint graphs and otherwise performs well in empirical studies. However, it requires agents to have discrete state spaces, which are of practical size to conduct repeated searches over. In contrast, there are decentralised non-linear optimisation methods that are capable of accurately finding local optima over multi-dimensional continuous state spaces, however these methods are not designed to navigate complex interactions between local constraints in order to find globally optimal solutions. Given this background, in this paper we tackle the problem of coordinating multiple decentralised agents with continuous state variables. Specifically we propose a hybrid approach, which combines the max-sum algorithm with continuous non-linear optimisation methods. We show that, for problems with acyclic factor graph representations, for suitable parameter choices, our proposed algorithm converges to a state with utility close to the global optimum. We empirically evaluate our approach for cyclic constraint graphs in a multi-sensor target classification problem, and compare its performance to the discrete max-sum algorithm, as well as a non-coordinated approach and the distributed stochastic algorithm (DSA). We show that our hybrid max-sum algorithm outperforms the non-coordinated algorithm, DSA and discrete max-sum considerably. Furthermore, the improvements in outcome over discrete max-sum come without significant increases in running time nor communication cost
Novel Reductive Dehalogenases from the Marine Sponge Associated Bacterium Desulfoluna spongiiphila
No full textDesulfoluna spongiiphila strain AA1 is an organohalide respiring bacterium, isolated from the marine sponge Aplysina aerophoba, that can use brominated and iodinated phenols, in addition to sulfate and thiosulfate as terminal electron acceptors. The genome of Desulfoluna spongiiphila strain AA1 is approximately 6.5 Mb. Three putative reductive dehalogenase (rdhA) genes involved in respiratory metabolism of organohalides were identified within the sequence. Conserved motifs found in respiratory reductive dehalogenases (a twin arginine translocation signal sequence and two iron-sulfur clusters) were present in all three putative AA1 rdhA genes. Transcription of one of the three rdhA genes was significantly upregulated during respiration of 2,6-dibromophenol and sponge extracts. Strain AA1 appears to have the ability to synthesize cobalamin, the key cofactor of most characterized reductive dehalogenase enzymes. The genome contains genes involved in cobalamin synthesis and uptake and can grow without cobalamin supplementation. Identification of this target gene associated with debromination lays the foundation for understanding how dehalogenating bacteria control the fate of organohalide compounds in sponges and their role in a symbiotic organobromine cycle. In the sponge environment, D. spongiiphila strain AA1 may thus take advantage of both brominated compounds and sulfate as electron acceptors for respiration.Peer reviewe
Spectroscopic detection of an arylchlorocarbene-ethyl acetate carbonyl ylide and subsequent oxirane formation
No full textLaser flash photolysis of 3-chloro-3-(p-nitrophenyl)diazirine (1) generates the corresponding ground-state singlet carbene (lambda-max = 310 nm), which reacts with ethyl acetate to form a carbonyl ylide of the ester (lambda-max = 490 nm). The absolute rate constant for ylide formation in CH2Cl2 is k = (2.85 +/- 0.17) X 10(6) M-1 s-1. Subsequent cyclization of the ylide to the corresponding oxirane (lambda-max = 350 nm) occurs with a rate constant of 1.26 x 10(6) S-1 (21-degrees-C) in ethyl acetate with Arrhenius activation parameters for oxirane formation of E(act) = 6.68 +/- 0.19 kcal/mol and log A (s-1) = 11.08 +/- 0.15. The carbonyl ylide is also intercepted with the dipolarophile, diethyl fumarate, with a rate constant of (1.04 +/- 0.07) x 10(7) M-1 s-1. Additionally, solvent polarity effects on (p-nitrophenyl)chlorocarbene reactivity and spectroscopic evidence of oxirane formation (lambda-max = 350 nm) from the related acetone ylide of (p-nitrophenyl)chlorocarbene are presented.PT: J; CR: BONNEAU R, 1989, J CHEM SOC CHEM COMM, P510 BONNEAU R, 1990, J AM CHEM SOC, V112, P744 IBATA T, 1987, CHEM LETT, V28, P2135 LIU MTH, 1972, CAN J CHEM, V50, P3009 LIU MTH, 1987, TETRAHEDRON LETT, V28, P1011 LIU MTH, 1990, J CHEM SOC CHEM COMM, P1482 NAGARAJAN V, 1985, J PHYS CHEM-US, V89, P2330 PAUL H, 1978, J AM CHEM SOC, V100, P4520 PLATZ MS, COMMUNICATION REICHARDT C, 1988, SOLVENTS SOLVENT EFF, P352 SOUNDARARAJAN N, 1988, J AM CHEM SOC, V110, P7143 SOUNDARARAJAN N, 1988, TETRAHEDRON LETT, V29, P3419; NR: 12; TC: 14; J9: J AMER CHEM SOC; PG: 4; GA: GB298Source type: Electronic(1
Phoebus 10: A Journal of Art History
No full texttableOfContents: Homage to the Past: The Art of Yin Xiaofeng by Ralph Gabbard and Liu Liu.. pages 5-1
Cultural exploitation in chinese politics: Reinterpreting liu sanjie
No full textLiu Sanjie is a typical Chinese legendary figure, adapted from folk custom and transformed during many historical and political stages. By comparing the musical film Liu Sanjie with the landscape performing art Impression Liu Sanjie, this paper explores how Liu Sanjie is reconstructed in the Impression to be in accord with contemporary demands (shidaixing). In the film, made during the 1960s, Liu Sanjie was promoted as a heroine fighting against the privileged classes, but in the Impression, her class struggle has been erased and only a harmonious and abstract legend remains. Her ethnicity is promoted by Han elites as not exclusive Zhuang, but shared equally with Han, Miao and Dong ethnicity in an imagined community to propagate a sense of ethnic harmony and unified Chineseness. Her transformation from a realistic character, full of a rebelling spirit, to an abstract and disembodied ‘sense of harmony’, is a complete reinterpretation of a Chinese historical legend. Utilizing a term from Wang Ban (1997), ‘the sublime figure of history’, which refers to an ideology aestheticized by the party state for securing its governance, this paper refers to the bold artistic treatment of Liu Sanjie for cultural exploitation as ‘Liu Sanjie’s sublime’. The paper explores the evolutionary progress of Liu Sanjie from class revolution to art revolution in response to political requirements. The author is a stage-trained performing artist, specialized in both Western opera and Chinese classical and folk singing and dance. He is also a critic and art consultant in the Chinese landscape performing arts industry. These professional roles have allowed privileged access to the top people in this industry
Decentralised Control of Continuously Valued Control Parameters using the Max-Sum Algorithm
No full textIn this paper we address the problem of decentralised coordination for agents that must make coordinated decisions over continuously valued control parameters (as is required in many real world applications). In particular, we tackle the social welfare maximisation problem, and derive a novelcontinuous version of the max-sum algorithm. In order to do so, we represent the utility functionof the agents by multivariate piecewise linear functions, which in turn are encoded as simplexes.We then derive analytical solutions for the fundamental operations required to implement the max-sum algorithm (specifically, addition and marginal maximisation of general n-ary piecewise linearfunctions). We empirically evaluate our approach on a simulated network of wireless, energy constrained sensors that must coordinate their sense/sleep cycles in order to maximise the system-wide probability of event detection. We compare the conventional discrete max-sum algorithm with our novel continuous version, and show that the continuous approach obtains more accurate solutions (up to a 10% increase) with a lower communication overhead (up to half of the total message size)
Bounded Approximate Decentralised Coordination using the Max-Sum Algorithm
No full textIn this paper we propose a novel algorithm that provides bounded approximate solutions for decentralised coordination problems. Our approach removes cycles in any general constraint network by eliminating dependencies between functions and variables which have the least impact on the solution quality. It uses the max-sum algorithm to optimally solve the resulting tree structured constraint network, providing a bounded approximation specific to the particular problem instance. We formally prove that our algorithm provides a bounded approximation of the original problem and we present an empirical evaluation in a synthetic scenario. This shows that the approximate solutions that our algorithm provides are typically within 95% of the optimum and the approximation ratio that our algorithm provides is typically 1.23
Test Make Sense?
No full textCorresponding author Changyu Liu should be listed as the first corresponding author.No Full Tex
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