State Of The Art

From New York Times bestselling and modern master of science fiction, Iain M. Banks, The State of the Art is the acclaimed collection of Banks's short fiction. “Banks is a phenomenon...writing pure science fiction of a peculiarly gnarly energy and elegance.” –William Gibson This is a striking addition to the body of Culture lore, and adds definition and scale to the previous works by using the Earth of 1977 as contrast. The stories in the collection range from science fiction to horror, dark-coated fantasy to morality tale. All bear the indefinable stamp of Iain Banks's staggering talent. “Few of us have been exposed to a talent so manifest and of such extraordinary breadth.” –New York Review of Science Fiction “[Banks] can summon up sense-of-wonder Big Concepts you've never seen before and display them with narration as deft as a conjuror's fingers." –scifi.com The Culture series: Consider Phlebas The Player of Games Use of Weapons The State of the Art Excession Inversions Look to Windward Matter Surface Detail The Hydrogen Sonata

Narrative – State of the Art which was originally published as a Special Issue of Narrative Inquiry 16:1 (2006) is edited by Michael Bamberg and contains 24 chapters (with a brief introduction by the editor) that look back and take stock of developments in narrative theorizing and empirical work with narratives. The attempt has been made to bring together researchers from different disciplines, with very different concerns, and have them express their conceptions of the current state of the art from their perspectives. Looking back and taking stock, this volume further attempts to begin to deliver answers to the questions (i) What was it that made the original turn to narrative so successful? (ii) What has been accomplished over the last 40 years of narrative inquiry? (iii) What are the future directions for narrative inquiry? The contributions to this volume are deliberately kept short so that the readers can browse through them and get a feel about the diversity of current narrative theorizing and emerging new trends in narrative research. It is the ultimate aim of this edited volume to stir up discussions and dialogue among narrative researchers across these disciplines and to widen and open up the territory of narrative inquiry to new and innovative work.

State of the Art in Neural Networks and Their Applications presents the latest advances in artificial neural networks and their applications across a wide range of clinical diagnoses. Advances in the role of machine learning, artificial intelligence, deep learning, cognitive image processing and suitable data analytics useful for clinical diagnosis and research applications are covered, including relevant case studies. The application of Neural Network, Artificial Intelligence, and Machine Learning methods in biomedical image analysis have resulted in the development of computer-aided diagnostic (CAD) systems that aim towards the automatic early detection of several severe diseases. State of the Art in Neural Networks and Their Applications is presented in two volumes. Volume 1 covers the state-of-the-art deep learning approaches for the detection of renal, retinal, breast, skin, and dental abnormalities and more. Includes applications of neural networks, AI, machine learning, and deep learning techniques to a variety of imaging technologies Provides in-depth technical coverage of computer-aided diagnosis (CAD), with coverage of computer-aided classification, Unified Deep Learning Frameworks, mammography, fundus imaging, optical coherence tomography, cryo-electron tomography, 3D MRI, CT, and more Covers deep learning for several medical conditions including renal, retinal, breast, skin, and dental abnormalities, Medical Image Analysis, as well as detection, segmentation, and classification via AI

This book provides an archival forum for researchers, academics, practitioners and industry professionals interested and/or engaged in reforming teaching and learning methods by transforming today’s learning environments into smart learning environments. It will facilitate opportunities for discussions and constructive dialogue between various stakeholders on the limitations of current learning environments, the need for reform, innovative uses of emerging pedagogical approaches and technologies, and sharing and promoting best practices, which will lead to the evolution, design and implementation of smart learning environments. The focus of the contributions is on the interplay and fusion of pedagogy and technology to create these new environments. The components of this interplay include but are not limited to: Pedagogy: learning paradigms, assessment paradigms, social factors, policy Technology: emerging technologies, innovative uses of mature technologies, adoption, usability, standards, and emerging/new technological paradigms (open educational resources, cloud computing, etc.) Fusion of pedagogy and technology: transformation of curricula, transformation of teaching behavior, transformation of administration, best practices of infusion, piloting of new ideas.

Selected topics and papers from the first international workshop on computer animation, held in Geneva in 1989, provide a comprehensive overview of the problems encountered in the rising field of computer animation. To foster interactive links between researchers, end-users, and artists, roundtables and discussions have been included as well as presentations of concepts and research themes such as keyframe to task-level animation, artificial intelligence, natural language and simulation for human animation, choreography, anthropometry for animated human figures, facial animation and expressions, the use of dynamic simulation, motion control and blur, and data-base oriented animation design.

Reinforcement learning encompasses both a science of adaptive behavior of rational beings in uncertain environments and a computational methodology for finding optimal behaviors for challenging problems in control, optimization and adaptive behavior of intelligent agents. As a field, reinforcement learning has progressed tremendously in the past decade. The main goal of this book is to present an up-to-date series of survey articles on the main contemporary sub-fields of reinforcement learning. This includes surveys on partially observable environments, hierarchical task decompositions, relational knowledge representation and predictive state representations. Furthermore, topics such as transfer, evolutionary methods and continuous spaces in reinforcement learning are surveyed. In addition, several chapters review reinforcement learning methods in robotics, in games, and in computational neuroscience. In total seventeen different subfields are presented by mostly young experts in those areas, and together they truly represent a state-of-the-art of current reinforcement learning research. Marco Wiering works at the artificial intelligence department of the University of Groningen in the Netherlands. He has published extensively on various reinforcement learning topics. Martijn van Otterlo works in the cognitive artificial intelligence group at the Radboud University Nijmegen in The Netherlands. He has mainly focused on expressive knowledge representation in reinforcement learning settings.

Winner, 2013 PROSE Award, Engineering and Technology Concise, high quality and comparative overview of state-of-the-art electron device development, manufacturing technologies and applications Guide to State-of-the-Art Electron Devices marks the 60th anniversary of the IRE electron devices committee and the 35th anniversary of the IEEE Electron Devices Society, as such it defines the state-of-the-art of electron devices, as well as future directions across the entire field. Spans full range of electron device types such as photovoltaic devices, semiconductor manufacturing and VLSI technology and circuits, covered by IEEE Electron and Devices Society Contributed by internationally respected members of the electron devices community A timely desk reference with fully-integrated colour and a unique lay-out with sidebars to highlight the key terms Discusses the historical developments and speculates on future trends to give a more rounded picture of the topics covered A valuable resource R&D managers; engineers in the semiconductor industry; applied scientists; circuit designers; Masters students in power electronics; and members of the IEEE Electron Device Society.

The papers were selected from more than a dozen sources, including IEEE Computer, Software -- Practice & Experience, IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, and Communications of the ACM.