Abstract: This article presents a new approach for gait-based gender recognition using depth cameras, that can run in real time. The main contribution of this study is a new fast feature extraction strategy that uses the 3D point cloud obtained from the frames in a gait cycle. For each frame, these points are aligned according to their centroid and grouped. After that, they are projected into their PCA plane, obtaining a representation of the cycle particularly robust against view changes. Then, final discriminative features are computed by first making a histogram of the projected points and then using linear discriminant analysis. To test the method we have used the DGait database, which is currently the only publicly available database for gait analysis that includes depth information. We have performed experiments on manually labeled cycles and over whole video sequences, and the results show that our method improves the accuracy significantly, compared with state-of-the-art systems which do not use depth information. Furthermore, our approach is insensitive to illumination changes, given that it discards the RGB information. That makes the method especially suitable for real applications, as illustrated in the last part of the experiments section.

Abstract: IF JCR CCIA 1.303 2009 54/103
The classification of large number of object categories is a challenging trend in the pattern recognition field. In literature, this is often addressed using an ensemble of classifiers. In this scope, the Error-correcting output codes framework has demonstrated to be a powerful tool for combining classifiers. However, most state-of-the-art ECOC approaches use a linear or exponential number of classifiers, making the discrimination of a large number of classes unfeasible. In this paper, we explore and propose a minimal design of ECOC in terms of the number of classifiers. Evolutionary computation is used for tuning the parameters of the classifiers and looking for the best minimal ECOC code configuration. The results over several public UCI datasets and different multi-class computer vision problems show that the proposed methodology obtains comparable (even better) results than state-of-the-art ECOC methodologies with far less number of dichotomizers.

Abstract: JCR Impact Factor 2010: 3.349
Background This study aimed to determine the proportion of cases with abnormal intestinal motility among patients with functional bowel disorders. To this end, we applied an original method, previously developed in our laboratory, for analysis of endoluminal images obtained by capsule endoscopy. This novel technology is based on computer vision and machine learning techniques.
 Methods The endoscopic capsule (Pillcam SB1; Given Imaging, Yokneam, Israel) was administered to 80 patients with functional bowel disorders and 70 healthy subjects. Endoluminal image analysis was performed with a computer vision program developed for the evaluation of contractile events (luminal occlusions and radial wrinkles), non-contractile patterns (open tunnel and smooth wall patterns), type of content (secretions, chyme) and motion of wall and contents. Normality range and discrimination of abnormal cases were established by a machine learning technique. Specifically, an iterative classifier (one-class support vector machine) was applied in a random population of 50 healthy subjects as a training set and the remaining subjects (20 healthy subjects and 80 patients) as a test set.
 Key Results The classifier identified as abnormal 29% of patients with functional diseases of the bowel (23 of 80), and as normal 97% of healthy subjects (68 of 70) (P < 0.05 by chi-squared test). Patients identified as abnormal clustered in two groups, which exhibited either a hyper- or a hypodynamic motility pattern. The motor behavior was unrelated to clinical features.
Conclusions &  Inferences With appropriate methodology, abnormal intestinal motility can be demonstrated in a significant proportion of patients with functional bowel disorders, implying a pathologic disturbance of gut physiology.