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The chapter concerns the measurement and forecasting of technological change, a topic relevant to many high-tech organizations and their customers. We revisit recent and classic data sets from technology forecasting data envelopment analysis (TFDEA) research and technometrics in light of a new visualization technique known as t-Distributed Stochastic Neighbor Embedding (t-SNE). The technique is a nonlinear visualization technique for preserving local structure in high-dimensional spaces of data. The technique may be classified as a form of topological data analysis. Specifically, each point in the space represents a potential technological design or implementation, and each line segment in the space represents a local measure of technological improvement or degradation. We hypothesize six distinct kinds of performance development in technology within this space, including the frontier, the fold, the salient, the soliton, and the lock-in. Then we examine the spaces to determine which kinds of development are the best explanations for observed development. The technique is not extrapolative and therefore cannot fully supplant the existing technometric methods. Nonetheless the approach offers a useful diagnostic to the existing technometric methods and may help advance theories of technological development.

Motivation: Methods like FBA and kinetic modeling are widely used to calculate fluxes in metabolic networks. For the analysis and understanding of simulation results and experimentally measured fluxes visualization software within the network context is indispensable.

Results: We present Flux Viz, an open-source Cytoscape plug-in for the visualization of flux distributions in molecular interaction networks. FluxViz supports (i) import of networks in a variety of formats (SBML, GML, XGMML, SIF, BioPAX, PSI-MI) (ii) import of flux distributions as CSV, Cytoscape attributes or VAL files (iii) limitation of views to flux carrying reactions (flux subnetwork) or network attributes like localization (iv) export of generated views (SVG, EPS, PDF, BMP, PNG). Though FluxViz was primarily developed as tool for the visualization of fluxes in metabolic networks and the analysis of simulation results from FASIMU, a flexible software for batch flux-balance computation in large metabolic networks, it is not limited to biochemical reaction networks and FBA but can be applied to the visualization of arbitrary fluxes in arbitrary graphs.

Availability: The platform-independent program is an open-source project, freely available at http://sourceforge.net/projects/fluxvizplugin/ under GNU public license, including manual, tutorial and examples.

The Beijing Spectrometer (BESIII) has operated on Beijing Electron-Positron Collider (BEPCII) at the τ-charm energy region since 2008. The recent upgrades of endcap Time-Of-Flight system (TOF) in BESIII provides better flight time measurement for particle identification. The event display tool plays an important role for data monitoring, reconstruction algorithms tuning and physics analysis in BESIII, it is necessary to update the event display with the new sub-detectors. In this paper, the updated detector geometry system and event visualization in the BESIII event display software is discussed, with focus on implementation of the new endcap TOF system.

This chapter focuses on supply chain risk management and the use and impact of digitization in this domain. The COVID-19 pandemic, geopolitical risks, and natural disasters in recent years underscored the vulnerabilities in supply chains. During the same timeframe, the world also witnessed the emergence of various digital technologies that enable real-time information sharing, data-driven decision-making, and collaboration to enhance operational performance and resilience. In this context, this chapter reviews the transformative role of digital technologies, such as supply chain mapping, visualization tools, Internet of Things (IoT), big data analytics, Blockchain, Artificial Intelligence (AI), and early warning systems.

Contrary to the fact that mathematics many ideas, beauty and inspiration are hidden within simple and intuitive patterns, which are easily noticed and ‘intuitively understood’, mathematics is considered very abstract. Therefore, the motivation for mathematics teaching and learning should be intuitive and the beauty of abstraction will rise from there. As teachers we need to challenge our sensibility for the importance of the intuitive in mathematics teaching and learning. We introduce these challenges by smartly chosen hands-on (and eyes-on) problems. Like some ‘graphic puzzles’, which are understood in seconds, but are often harder to formulate then to solve. Through examples we explore how understanding, motivation and challenge often lie within intuitive comprehension and how abstraction (especially on the primary level) only follows later.

Multimedia software engineering is an emerging area combining software engineering, multimedia computing, visual languages and visualization. We can view multimedia software engineering from two different, yet complementary, perspectives: (1) to apply multimedia computing, visual languages and visualization to the practice of software engineering; and (2) to apply software engineering principles to the development of multimedia applications and systems. This chapter surveys some of the approaches and recent advances in multimedia software engineering.

Because the 3D sights is very complex, it is difficult to realize the simulation and visualization of 3D sights on internet. We design and develop a system of B/S architecture for interactively browsing the 3D sights on the Web. To support the simulation of 3D sights with high performance, an extended-relational logical model of 3D sights is designed, based on this model, the sights data can be organized and managed effectively by Oracle spatial. In addition, a specification for transporting sights data between Web server and browser is defined with XML, Additionally, an effective strategy for sights data schedule is designed to support the real-time rendering of 3D sights. With our system, user can interactively browse complex 3D sights on the node of internet.

In this article we will explore the visualization of volume data from industrial computed tomography (CT), which is applied to non-destructive testing (NDT) and non-destructive evaluation (NDE). The volume data is preprocessed on decimation and interpolation to reduce the data quantity and ensure its isotropic resolution. The preprocessed volume data are respectively represented by iso-surface and transparent volume. To extract the volumetric regions of interesting (VROI) from the volume data, the volumetric region-growing algorithm based on Fisher Distance (FD) is taken. In this algorithm, we transform the formula for computing FD to speed the computation. The visualization can be applied into NDT and NDE to assist the engineers with testing and analyzing the products quality.

Taiwan situates right on the rim of the Asia Continental Shelf. A typical profile of the shelf bathymetry around the coast of Taiwan is shown as Figure 1. Due to the topographical effect of the shelf (Lin, et al., 2001), the oscillation patterns of a partially standing tides appeared in the Taiwan Strait are investigated firstly by using the theory of co-oscillation, Figure 2. To further identify the oscillation patterns, a two-dimensional depth-averaged shallow water wave model: MIKE21_HD, developed by Danish Hydraulic Institute (DHI, 1996), is applied to compute the regional tidal characteristics (Juang, et al., 2001). By extracting the computed variations of water surface elevation from sections along the coast of China and around Taiwan, Figure 3, the visualizations of tides oscillating in the Taiwan Strait are finally produced as animations and shown statically as Figures 4 and 5, respectively. From Figure 4 of the tidal oscillation along the coast of China, one can visualize a Kelvin wave equipped with nearly constant amplitude propagating from north to south, and accompanied with a partially standing tides oscillating adjacent to the southern end. From Figure 5 of the tidal oscillation around the coast of Taiwan, it is easily to identify that a partially standing tides oscillating on a topographical shelf with the anti-node appeared almost at the central part of the shelf and the nodes located adjacent to the rims. With the aids of the visualizations associated with the animations, the oscillation appearances as well as the characteristics of tides in the Taiwan Strait are illustrated completely…

Having underlined a rationale for visualizing the knowledge of geometry, the paper describes two tools whereby computer-assisted visualization can be realized. It then summarizes research findings regarding the use of these tools in mathematics education, suggesting promising directions for further research.

Microcirculation plays a direct role in the accomplishment of the principal purpose of the circulation system. The functions of the microcirculation incorporates oxygen supply, transport, diffusion, and exchange of nutrients and metabolites between blood and tissue, maintenance of body temperature, regulation of blood pressure, tissue defense and repair. These complex functions are carried out in the microcirculation by a number of dynamic changes in the blood within the vessels, the vessels themselves or the tissues surrounding the vessels. Intravital microscopic approaches have greatly contributed to the advancement of research in the fields of microcirculation. The techniques represent the only method that allows direct visualization and quantitative analysis of the microcirculation. In this chapter in vivo microscopic techniques with useful experimental models, which provide significant information regarding the microcirculation, are introduced.

Decision support for planning and improving software development projects is a crucial success factor. The special characteristics of software development aggregate these tasks in contrast to the planning of many other processes, such as production processes. Process simulation can be used to support decisions on process alternatives on the basis of existing knowledge. Thereby, new development knowledge can be gained faster and more cost effective.

This chapter gives a short introduction to experimental software engineering, describes simulation approaches within that area, and introduces a method for systematically developing discrete-event software process simulation models. Advanced simulation modeling techniques will point out key problems and possible solutions, including the use of visualization techniques for better simulation result interpretation.

VisIVO is a package for supporting the visualization and analysis of astrophysical multidimensional data and has several built-in tools which allow the user an efficient manipulation and analysis of data. We are integrating VisIVO with VO services: connection to VO web services, retrieval and dealing with data in the VOTable format, interoperation with other VO compliant tools.

The paper presents a new result on dynamical properties of the skeleton (medial axis) of a 2D/3D shape and a Java program for visualization, description, and study of dynamic 2D shapes via curvature. The program was developed by the first author and was used by the second author as an education tool for a number of courses (Applied Differential Geometry, Computational Geometry, Mathematical Methods in Computer Graphics) taught at the University of Aizu.

The paper consists of two main sections. A rough description of the program and demonstration of its basic visualization capabilities is provided in the first section. The second section presents a new mathematical result describing dynamical properties of the skeleton (medial axis) of a 2D/3D bounded figure. The 2D version of the result was discovered during authors' experiments with the program.

The problem of assembly process planning is critical for the automation and integration of production, due to the combinatorial complexity and the requirement of both flexibility and productivity. This chapter presents an integrated knowledgebased approach and system for automatic generation, evaluation and selection, and visualization of assembly sequences. In this chapter, information and knowledge about a product and its assembly processes is modeled and represented by using integrated object model and generic P/T net formalisms. The comprehensive knowledge-based integration coordinates design and assembly sequence planning in the complex interactions and domain knowledge between the technical and economical aspects. By using the integrated representational model, all feasible assembly sequences are generated by decomposing and reasoning the leveled feasible subassemblies, and represented through Petri net modeling. Both qualitative and quantitative constraints are then used to evaluate each assembly part and operation sequence individually and the entire sequences as well. Based on assemblability analysis and evaluation and predefined task time analysis, estimates are made for the assembly time and cost and operation's difficulty of product when each of these sequences is used. Some quantitative criteria such as assembly time and cost, operation difficulty and part priority index are applied to select the optimal assembly sequence. Finally, a prototype integrated knowledge-based assembly planning system is developed to achieve the integration of generation, evaluation and selection, and visualization of the assembly sequences.

Many different techniques for visualizing data exist, and often users must experiment with several before selecting the most effective one for their problem. Knowledge of the characteristics of the human visual system can assist in our choice of visualization techniques. Limits imposed by our visual “cognitive bandwidth” mean that only detail up to these limits needs to be generated in a visualization scene. Some aspects of our visual process will be discussed and an approach will be described for modeling scene detail, which takes visual limits of such aspects into account.

The use of computer visualization as a means to analyze complex geographic datasets is discussed. Visualization is a valuable tool for conducting exploratory data analysis on geographical data; making good use of the human eye's unparalleled ability to recognize structure and relationships that may be inherent within the data. Traditional GIS are extremely poor at visualization, being limited to a very restricted set of visual attributes with which to convey information (position, size, color). The use of a more sophisticated approach is discussed in detail. Specifically, a system to visualise complex environmental datasets is described, which makes use of knowledge concerning the problem domain as well as knowledge concerning human cognition.

In the realizations produced, the most salient attributes in the data, for a particular task, are assigned to the most striking visual attributes. Assignments are controlled by heuristics that may be changed to alter system behavior. Results are presented showing the application of this approach on datasets involving several multi-dimensional thematic layers of environmental data, used in mineral exploration.

This paper describes the problem of developing working paradigms for advanced spatial data applications. The key role of interactive visualization in enabling the expertise of specialists, if effectively integrated into their working environments, is described. The scope for applying intelligence in designing visualizations to support, rather than to supplant, the expert is explored. A systematic framework describing the visualization design process, and an approach to applying intelligence around metavisualizations of the visualization design process, are summarized.

A Simulation, Animation, Visualization and Interactive Control (SAVIC) environment has been developed for the design and operation of an integrated robotic manipulator system. This unique system possesses the abilities for (1) multi-sensor simulation, (2) kinematics and locomotion animation, (3) dynamic motion and manipulation animation, (4) transformation between real and virtual modes within the same graphics system, (5) ease in exchanging software modules and hardware devices between real and virtual world operations, and (6) interfacing with a real robotic system. This research is focused on enhancing the overall productivity of an integrated human-robot system. This paper describes a working system and illustrates the concepts by presenting the simulation, animation and control methodologies for a unique mobile robot with articulated tracks, a manipulator, and sensory modules.

Innovation management and research direction planning are challenged by the understanding of the technology space in which a research entity is placed. In order to succeed in the market, a given institution has to understand the relationships of its patent portfolio with the respect to competitors.

Patent databases provide useful information for exploring a given technology area, but only when such details are being properly analyzed are they able to provide fruitful insights. The approach of technology trajectories can be extended toward a more intuitive technology map.

This work presents an interactive approach to the exploration of technology space based on patents. Patents are analyzed using citation graphs, integrated with textual analysis. The technology map presents the technology topics on a landscape displaying the patent density, and the main actors in the area. The map is interactively displayed allowing the user to focus on specific patents or companies. Finally, a specific case study is provided presenting the application of this approach focusing on the area of medical, and virtual reality devices.