Abstract
This paper presents an approach for the detection and delineation of the interfaces at the near and far walls of carotid artery using B-mode ultrasound images. After the delineation the system measures automatically the carotid intima-media thickness (IMT) in order to aid the diagnosis of the atherosclerosis. In this method we start by the measurement, at a pixel level, of local features followed by the selection of the most discriminant ones. The next stage is a classification step which assigns a probability to the pixels to belong to an interface, enabling the detection of the carotid artery interfaces. The final artery boundaries are delineated using a dynamic programming approach. The final measurements of IMT produced by the automatic method proposed in this paper were compared with three manual tracings of experts. It was also compared with an automatic method previously developed. The results show that the two automatic detection methods have similar performance, although with slight improvements in the new method, particularly for the the far wall interface.

Abstract
A single decomposition strategy cannot capture all aspects of a concept, so we need to extend Object Oriented Decomposition (today most used strategy). We propose roles as a way to compose classes that provides a modular way of capturing and reusing those concerns that fall outside a concept's main purpose, while being a natural extension of the OO paradigm. Roles have been used successfully to model the different views a concept provides and we want to bring that experience to the programming level. We discuss how to make roles modular and reusable. We also show how to compose classes with roles using JavaStage, our role supporting language. To validate our approach we developed generic and reusable roles for the Gang of Four patterns. We developed reusable roles for 10 out of 23 patterns. We also were able to use some of these roles in JHotDraw framework.

Abstract
In structural health monitoring, the propagation of ultrasonic waves along a structure can reveal interesting data relevant to the integrity of the whole structure. The availability of a system for distributed sensing of ultrasonic waves could, in some cases (e.g. pipelines) provide extremely valuable information to civil engineers. Phase-sensitive optical time domain reflectometry (phi OTDR) is a simple and effective tool allowing the distributed monitoring of vibrations along single-mode fibers. Up to now, phi OTDRs have been used mostly for the measurement of sub-kHz vibrations. In this work, the authors present an experimental characterization of a high-visibility phi OTDR and its performance when used for ultrasonic vibration measurements. The sensor was able to measure vibrations of up to 39.5 kHz with a resolution of 5 m over a range which could go up to 1.25 km. This is the first time to our knowledge that a phi OTDR is demonstrated for distributed measurement of ultrasonic waves.

Abstract
This paper presents a review of short-term hydro scheduling tools reported by the scientific community, presenting different methodologies and models published over the last 20 years about operations, scheduling and optimization of hydro systems, in competitive electricity markets, considering the short-term horizon, i.e., between one day and one week, with the goal of maximizing profits and reducing losses, considering also different hydro configurations around the world. Hence, a comprehensive study is carried out in order to gather the maximum information possible to clarify and show the most recent advances in this field of research, contributing also for the appearance of future contributions.

Abstract
The perception of sound distance has been sparsely studied so far. It is assumed to depend on familiar loudness, reverberation, sound spectrum and parallax, but most of these factors have never been carefully addressed. Reverberation has been mostly analysed in terms of ratio between direct and indirect sound, and total duration. Here we were interested in assessing the impact of each reflection order on distance localization. We compared sound source discrimination at an intermediate and at a distant location with direct sound only, one, two, three, and four reflection orders in a 2AFC task. At the intermediate distances, normalized psychophysical curves reveal no differentiation between direct sound and up to three reflection orders, but sounds with four reflection orders have significantly lower thresholds. For the distant sources, sounds with four reflection orders yielded the best discrimination slopes, but there was also a clear benefit for sounds with three reflection orders. We conclude that at least three reflection orders are required so that reflection-related cues are accounted for in distance estimates. Also, these cues might interact differently with the direct sound pressure cues at different distances. © 2013 Acoustical Society of America.

Abstract
The simulation of a robot with a high number of joints can easily become unstable. Numerical errors on the first joint of the chain are propagated to the other joints. This is a very common problem in humanoid robots. A way to plan the gait for these robots is using simulation and optimization techniques. This paper addresses a new approach to optimizing gait parameter sets using an adaptive simulated annealing optimization algorithm, combined with a new joint model that reduces its instability. The new model and the optimization are implemented in SimTwo (a developed physical robot simulator that is capable of simulating user defined robots in a three-dimensional space, since it includes a physical model based on rigid body dynamics) and results are shown that validate the approach.