Intraspecific floral colour variation in three Pedicularis species

Flower constancy describes the phenomenon that pollinators tend to successively visit flowers of a single species during foraging,reducing reproductive interference in natural communities.The extent of flower constancy is largely determined by the floral traits of co-flowering species.Both higher inter-specific and lower intraspecific differences of floral traits should contribute to a higher level of flower constancy.However,previous studies mainly focused on interspecific difference,and the intraspecific variation(consistency)of floral traits received much less attention.We hypothesise that selection may favour lower intraspecific floral trait variation in communities composed of multiple co-flowering congeners.We investigated the floral colour variation of three focal Pedicularis species that share pollinators in 19communities composed of either single or multiple Pedicularis species.Colour was quantified using image-based colour analysis as perceived by pollinators.We found that most of the intrapopulation floral colour variation was below the colour discrimination threshold of bumblebees,implying strongly constrained by the visual selection by pollinators.Contrary to the hypothesis,there is no significant difference in intraspecific floral colour variation between different community contexts.It may be due to the relatively large interspecific floral colour differences of most co-flowering species.The influence of community context on intraspecific variation may be reflected in floral traits other than colours.

Color constancy using color edge moments and regularized regression in anchored neighborhood

To improve the accuracy of illumination estimation while maintaining a relative fast execution speed, a novel learning-based color constancy using color edge moments and regularized regression in an anchored neighborhood is proposed. First, scene images are represented by the color edge moments of various orders. Then, an iterative regression with a squared Frobenius norm（F-norm） regularizer is introduced to learn the mapping between the edge moments and illuminants in the neighborhood of the anchored sample.Illumination estimation for the test image finally becomes the nearest anchored point search followed by a matrix multiplication using the associated mapping matrix which can be precalculated and stored. Experiments on two standard image datasets show that the proposed approach significantly outperforms the state-of-the-art algorithms with a performance increase of at least 10. 35% and 7. 44% with regard to median angular error.

RESEARCH ON COLOR CONSTANCY UNDER OPEN ILLUMINATION CONDITIONS

Color information plays a key role in the research fields of object recognition and image retrieval. However, the actual color varies by the conditions of illumination, especially the open natural daylight. Four different color constancy schemes are proposed in the paper to minimize the effects of open illumination conditions. (1) The color constancy scheme based on the image statistics is proposed, which includes the color cast detection and removal. (2) The color constancy scheme based on the color temperature curve is proposed, which combines Gaussian model with linear fitting to estimate color temperature curve. (3) The color constancy scheme based on the double exposure theory is proposed, which is able to reproduce a color image under typical illumination. (4) According to the concepts of supervised learning, the supervised color constancy scheme is proposed. The transformation of color values from unknown illumination to typical illumination is solved by improved Support Vector Regression (SVR).

The Planck Length and the Constancy of the Speed of Light in Five Dimensional Spacetime Parametrized with Two Time Coordinates

In relativity and quantum field theory, the vacuum speed of light is assumed to be constant;the range of validity of general relativity is determined by the Planck length. However, there has been no convincing theory explaining the constancy of the light speed. In this paper, we assume a five dimensional spacetime with three spatial dimensions and two local time coordinates giving us a hint about the constancy of the speed of light. By decomposing the five dimensional spacetime vector into four-dimensional vectors for each time dimension and by minimizing the resulting action, for a certain class of additional time dimensions, we observe the existence of a minimal length scale, which we identify as the Planck scale. We derive an expression for the speed of light as a function of space and time and observe the constancy of the vacuum speed of light in the observable universe.

Estimation of illumination chromaticity via adaptive reduced relevance vector machine

A new regression algorithm of an adaptive reduced relevance vector machine is proposed to estimate the illumination chromaticity of an image for the purpose of color constancy. Within the framework of sparse Bayesian learning, the algorithm extends the relevance vector machine by combining global and local kernels adaptively in the form of multiple kernels, and the improved locality preserving projection （LLP） is then applied to reduce the column dimension of the multiple kernel input matrix to achieve less training time. To estimate the illumination chromaticity, the algorithm is trained by fuzzy central values of chromaticity histograms of a set of images and the corresponding illuminants. Experiments with real images indicate that the proposed algorithm performs better than the support vector machine and the relevance vector machine while requiring less training time than the relevance vector machine.

AN INVESTIGATION OF RETINEX ALGORITHMS FOR IMAGE ENHANCEMENT

This letter introduces color constancy and Retinex theory for image enhancement.It clas- sifies Retinex algorithms into four categories and provides their principles and implementations in general.The experimental results of Frankle-McCann,MSR (Multi-Scale Retinex) and PNSD (Pro- jected Normalized Steepest Descent) Retinex algorithms are presented and compared.Moreover, variance and average gradient are proposed to evaluate the performance of the different algorithms.

A ROBUST OPTICAL FLOW COMPUTATION

This paper presents a new method for robust and accurate optical flow estimation.The sig- nificance of this work is twofold.Firstly,the idea of bi-directional scheme is adopted to reduce the model error of optical flow equation,which allows the second order Taylor's expansion of optical flow equation for accurate solution without much extra computational burden;Secondly,this paper establishs a new optical flow equation based on LSCM (Local Structure Constancy Model) instead of BCM (Brightness Constancy Model),namely the optical flow equation does not act on scalar but on tensor-valued (ma- trix-valued) field,due to the two reason:(1) structure tensor-value contains local spatial structure information,which provides us more useable cues for computation than scalar;(2) local image structure is less sensitive to illumination variation than intensity,which weakens the disturbance of non-uniform illumination in real sequences.Qualitative and quantitative results for synthetic and real-world scenes show that the new method can produce an accurate and robust results.

Foraging Behaviour of <i>Apis mellifera</i>L. and <i>Scaptotrigona bipunctata</i>on <i>Dombeya wallichii</i>Flowers in Southern Brazil

This research was carried out to evaluate the foraging behaviour of Apis mellifera and Scaptotrigona bipunctata and its relationship with environmental variables in Dombeya wallichii considering the following aspects: 1) Type of resource harvested, 2) Visitation rate, 3) Length of visit, 4) sugar concentration in the stored nectar in the honey crop of A. mellifera and secreted by the flower and 5) floral constancy. Both species collected mainly nectar, with a visitation rate of 4.2 flowers for A. mellifera and 1.1 flowers for S. bipunctata and visit length of 9.2 and 34.2 seconds, respectively. The sugar concentration had a positive relationship with temperature and luminosity, with mean values of 12.3% in the nectar and 14.2% in the honey crop. Bees were classified by specialists because the pollen of D. wallichii was predominant in the pollen basket, but the pollen of Emilia sonchifolia and Raphanus sativus was also found. These results suggest that the species under study take advantage of the resources offered by D. wallichii, therefore, this species is an important source for the maintenance of the bees in the season of lack of food.

Update Planning and Design Concepts of Taiping Old Downtown Areas in Shuangliu

China has witnessed unprecedented rapid and massive urbanization in recent years, and the urbanization has infl uenced almost all corners of the country, which is a natural process and necessary result of the social and economic development. Development and expansion of cities has been the keynote of the contemporary era. Meanwhile, existence and future development of traditional urban areas that have gone through the long-term natural development have been faced with serious crisis. This paper focused on the relative constancy and changeability of major elements in the natural evolution of traditional cities and towns, so as to explore an organic development mechanism, and make a daring attempt in update planning of old downtown areas of Taiping Town in Shuangliu County. On this basis, the paper aims at exploring a new development concept for common cities and towns that balances inheritance and innovation.

The Modification of Special Relativity

In this paper, the phenomenon of light velocity invariance is analyzed by using a new etheric view, and the physical mechanism of light velocity invariance is given, the principle of constancy of light velocity and the principle of special relativity are modified, and the Lorentz transformation is deduced by using these two modified principles. The relationship between mass and speed, the relationship between time and speed, and the relationship between length and speed are reanalyzed, and physical explanations different from the Special Relativity are given. Experiments for verification of the new theory are designed and presented. Experiment 1: Verify that the kinetic energy of a particle is only related to the speed of the particle relative to the ether, independent of the observer’s motion. Experiment 2: Verify that magnetic field is produced by electric charge’s motion relative to ether, and is independent of the observer. Experiment 3: Redoing the Michelson-Morley experiment on the space station to prove the existence of the ether. Experiment 4: Simulation of the generation and reversal of the Earth’s magnetic field, thus proving that the magnetic field is generated by the relative motion of the electric charge to the ether. Experiment 5: Simulate the formation of the natural iron meteorites and show that the atom becomes smaller with the increase of the etheric density of the space. Experiment 6: Aberrations contrast experiment to prove that for the observers on Earth, according to the theory of this paper, stars have aberration but the light sources on Earth have no aberration;according to the theory of special relativity, there are aberrations for both the stars and the light sources on Earth.

Sugar concentration influences decision making in Apis mellifera L.workers during early-stage honey storage behaviour

Decision making in honeybees is based on information which is acquired and processed in order to make choices between two or more alternatives. These choices lead to the expression of optimal behaviour strategies such as floral constancy. Optimal foraging strategies such as floral constancy improve a colony’s chances of survival, however to our knowledge, there has been no research on decision making based on optimal storage strategies. Here we show, using diagnostic radioentomology, that decision making in storer bees is influenced by nectar sugar concentrations and that, within 48 hours of collection, honeybees workers store carbohydrates in groups of cells with similar sugar concentrations in a nonrandom way. This behaviour, as evidenced by patchy spatial cell distributions, would help to hasten the ripening process by reducing the distance between cells of similar sugar concentrations. Thus, colonies which exhibit optimal storage strategies such as these would have an evolutionary advantage and im- prove colony survival expectations over less efficient colonies and it should be plausible to select colonies that exhibit these preferred traits.

A Fundamentally Irreversible World as an Opportunity towards a Consistent Understanding of Quantum and Cosmological Contexts

In a preceding publication a fundamentally oriented and irreversible world was shown to be derivable from the important principle of least action. A consequence of such a paradigm change is avoidance of paradoxes within a “dynamic” quantum physics. This becomes essentially possible because fundamental irreversibility allows consideration of the “entropy” concept in elementary processes. For this reason, and for a compensation of entropy in the spread out energy of the wave, the duality of particle and wave has to be mediated via an information self-image of matter. In this publication considerations are extended to irreversible thermodynamics, to gravitation and cosmology with its dependence on quantum interpretations. The information self-image of matter around particles could be identified with gravitation. Because information can also impose an always constant light velocity there is no need any more to attribute such a property to empty space, as done in relativity theory. In addition, the possibility is recognized to consider entropy generation by expanding photon fields in the universe. Via a continuous activation of information on matter photons can generate entropy and release small energy packages without interacting with matter. This facilitates a new interpretation of galactic redshift, emphasizes an information link between quantum- and cosmological phenomena, and evidences an information-triggered origin of the universe. Self-organized processes approach maximum entropy production within their constraints. In a far from equilibrium world also information, with its energy content, can self-organize to a higher hierarchy of computation. It is here identified with consciousness. This appears to explain evolution of spirit and intelligence on a materialistic basis. Also gravitation, here identified as information on matter, could, under special conditions, self-organize to act as a super-gravitation, offering an alternative to dark matter. Time is not an illusion, but has to be understood as flux of action, which is the ultimate reality of change. The concept of an irreversible physical world opens a route towards a rational understanding of complex contexts in nature.

Theoretical Explanation of m = E/c2

The aim of this theory is to study and explain the phenomena that have been predicted by Einstein in the year 1905 which affirms that the mass of a body increases with velocity;the mass of a body increases when it travels at high speed. In classical physics, it gains in the energy of motion. In relativity that kinetic energy makes itself felt as additional mass. As the object reaches the speed of light, theoretically, its mass becomes “infinite”. Nevertheless, the concept of “infinite mass” is still a subject we know little about. In the following paper, I will be focusing on how and why such phenomena take place. Furthermore, we shall discuss antimatter. Antimatter is now known to shower down from the sky above us, and when a particle meets its antiparticle, both of them disappear in a burst of radiant energy, exactly in accordance with E = mc2 .

How generalists coexist: the role of floral phenotype and spatial factors in the pollination systems of two Ranunculus species

Aims Competition for pollinators between phenotypically similar flowers is believed to play an important role in floral trait diversification in the angiosperms.However,in many plant communities,species with apparently similar floral phenotypes and generalist pollina-tion systems co-flower.Here,the pollination systems of Ranunculus acris L.and Ranunculus repens L.were investigated to determine the factors enabling the species to coexist within apparently over-lapping pollination niches.Methods Sympatrically flowering populations of R.acris and R.repens were investigated at three study sites in West Wales.The flo-ral phenotypes of the two species were compared using meas-urements of floral morphology and spectral analyses of petal reflectance,using principal component analysis and bee and fly colour-space models.Evidence of inter-specific discrimina-tion by foraging insects was tested for in the field and using floral arrays.The relative roles of behavioural constancy and spatial patchiness in maintaining pollinator fidelity were estimated.Important Findings The floral phenotypes of R.acris and R.repens differed significantly.Social bees were highly constant when foraging at flowers of the two species and patchy floral distribution explained some of the observed fidelity.Dipterans visiting mixed floral arrays appeared to discriminate between the species,visiting more R.acris than R.repens flowers,but there was no difference in the number of vis-its to single-species arrays.Social bees were more likely to display constancy to flowers of R.repens in the field.Patchiness in floral distribution,subtle differences in floral phenotype,pollinator preferences and behavioural constancy are all likely to con-tribute to the continued coexistence of R.acris and R.repens,despite apparent overlap in their pollination niches.Such differences have the potential to facilitate the maintenance of species diversity in plant com-munities,even where plants appear to share similar floral phenotypes.

Theorizing the Gendered Patriarchy of the Huaxia:Constancy(jing)/Expedience(quan)and Continuity(yin)/Change(bian)—From Male/Female Distinction to Inner/Outer Distinction in the Context of the Order of Family and State

The gender-based patriarchy of the Huaxia people,consisting of family and state order,inner/outer distinction and gender-based hierarchy,took shape in the period of radical transformation when the Zhou dynasty replaced the Shang dynasty and reached maturity in the Han dynasty,which had been established in the wake of the radical transformation conducted by the Zhou and Qin dynasties.On the basis of the principles of male/female distinction and the integration of family and state,Western Zhou aristocrats abolished the state structure the inner and outer governance systems(nei/waifuzhi内外服制),carried on in part the main patrilineage and surname exogamy of the Shang dynasty,and established the Huaxia patriarchal system.During the Qin and Han dynasties,the patriarchal system evolved into family and state isomorphism characterized by power-sharing between the royal house and its officials and by a two-pronged kinship system in which the male line was inner and the female line was outer.The system thus evolved into the Huaxia gender-based patriarchy,which covered spatial spheres,division of responsibilities,the kinship system,values and ethics,and codes of daily interaction and conduct.The distinction between the inner and the outer was not only a core value of the gender-based patriarchy but also its operational strategy.It also engendered such inter-related sub-systems as human functions,ethics and gender and such philosophical systems as the unity of heaven and man and the cosmic binaries of yin-yang(阴阳)and qian-kun(乾坤).The constancy(经jing)/Expedience(权quan)and Continuity(因yin)/Change(变bian)of the gender-based patriarchy,the jing/quan at the heart of the basic system and governance strategy within its constraints jointly ensured the stability and dynamism of the gender-based patriarchy of the Huaxia people.

A New Color Constancy Model for Machine Vision

Both physiological and psychological evidences suggest that the human visual system analyze images in neural subsystems tuned to different attributes of the stiamlus. Color module and lightness module are such subsystems. Under this general result, a new physical model of trichromatic system has been developed to deal with the color constancy of computer vision. A normal color image is split into two images: the gray scale image and the equal lightness color image for the two modules. Relatively a two-dimensional descriptor is applied to describe the property of surface reflectance in the equal lightness color image. This descrip- tion of surface spectral reflectance has the property of color constancy Image segmentation experiments based on color property of object show that the presented model is effective.

On Local Constancy of Topological Entropy for Certain Partially Hyperbolic Diffeomorphisms

Let f ： M → M be a partially hyperbolic diffeomorphism on a closed Riemannian manifold with uniformly compact center foliation. We show that if the center foliation of f is of dimension one then the topological entropy is constant on a small C1 neighborhood of f.

Color in machine vision and its application

Color is the phenomenon of human visual perception and the module of machine vision. Color information is widely used in the areas of virtual reality and human-computer interaction. Color is the product of a visual environment, illumination and the human brain. Research on color information representation and its processing is typically interdisciplinary. Based on our research work on human color perception and machine color vision and its application, we summarized the hotspots of color studies in recent developments and new approaches to color vision, including basic theories and the application of color information in virtual reality, content-based image retrieval, and face recognition.

An improved algorithm for McDowell＇s analytical model of residual stress

The analytical elastoplastic rolling/sliding model for two-dimensional contact proposed by McDowell is an important tool for predicting residual stress in rolling/sliding processes. In application of the model, a problem of low predicting precision near the surface layer of the component is found. According to the volume- constancy of plastic deformation, an improved algorithm for McDowell＇s model is proposed in order to improve its predicting accuracy of the surface residual stress. In the algorithm, a relationship between three normal stresses perpendicular to each other at any point within the component is derived, and the relationship is applied to McDowell＇s model. Meanwhile, an unnecessary hypothesis proposed by McDowell can be eliminated to make the model more reasonable. The simulation results show that the surface residual stress predicted by modified method is much closer to the FEM results than the results predicted by McDowell＇s model under the same simulation conditions.