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Author C. Alejandro Parraga; Robert Benavente; Maria Vanrell; Ramon Baldrich edit  url
openurl 
Title Psychophysical measurements to model inter-colour regions of colour-naming space Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2009 Publication Journal of Imaging Science and Technology Abbreviated Journal  
Volume 53 Issue 3 Pages 031106 (8 pages)  
Keywords image processing; Analysis  
Abstract JCR Impact Factor 2009: 0.391
In this paper, we present a fuzzy-set of parametric functions which segment the CIE lab space into eleven regions which correspond to the group of common universal categories present in all evolved languages as identified by anthropologists and linguists. The set of functions is intended to model a color-name assignment task by humans and differs from other models in its emphasis on the inter-color boundary regions, which were explicitly measured by means of a psychophysics experiment. In our particular implementation, the CIE lab space was segmented into eleven color categories using a Triple Sigmoid as the fuzzy sets basis, whose parameters are included in this paper. The model’s parameters were adjusted according to the psychophysical results of a yes/no discrimination paradigm where observers had to choose (English) names for isoluminant colors belonging to regions in-between neighboring categories. These colors were presented on a calibrated CRT monitor (14-bit x 3 precision). The experimental results show that inter- color boundary regions are much less defined than expected and color samples other than those near the most representatives are needed to define the position and shape of boundaries between categories. The extended set of model parameters is given as a table.
 
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Notes CIC Approved no  
Call Number CAT @ cat @ PBV2009 Serial 1157  
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Author Javier Vazquez; C. Alejandro Parraga; Maria Vanrell; Ramon Baldrich edit  doi
openurl 
Title Color Constancy Algorithms: Psychophysical Evaluation on a New Dataset Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2009 Publication Journal of Imaging Science and Technology Abbreviated Journal  
Volume 53 Issue 3 Pages 031105–9  
Keywords  
Abstract The estimation of the illuminant of a scene from a digital image has been the goal of a large amount of research in computer vision. Color constancy algorithms have dealt with this problem by defining different heuristics to select a unique solution from within the feasible set. The performance of these algorithms has shown that there is still a long way to go to globally solve this problem as a preliminary step in computer vision. In general, performance evaluation has been done by comparing the angular error between the estimated chromaticity and the chromaticity of a canonical illuminant, which is highly dependent on the image dataset. Recently, some workers have used high-level constraints to estimate illuminants; in this case selection is based on increasing the performance on the subsequent steps of the systems. In this paper we propose a new performance measure, the perceptual angular error. It evaluates the performance of a color constancy algorithm according to the perceptual preferences of humans, or naturalness (instead of the actual optimal solution) and is independent of the visual task. We show the results of a new psychophysical experiment comparing solutions from three different color constancy algorithms. Our results show that in more than a half of the judgments the preferred solution is not the one closest to the optimal solution. Our experiments were performed on a new dataset of images acquired with a calibrated camera with an attached neutral grey sphere, which better copes with the illuminant variations of the scene.  
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Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CIC Approved no  
Call Number CAT @ cat @ VPV2009a Serial 1171  
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Author Javier Vazquez; C. Alejandro Parraga; Maria Vanrell edit  openurl
Title Ordinal pairwise method for natural images comparison Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2009 Publication Perception Abbreviated Journal PER  
Volume 38 Issue Pages 180  
Keywords  
Abstract 38(Suppl.)ECVP Abstract Supplement
We developed a new psychophysical method to compare different colour appearance models when applied to natural scenes. The method was as follows: two images (processed by different algorithms) were displayed on a CRT monitor and observers were asked to select the most natural of them. The original images were gathered by means of a calibrated trichromatic digital camera and presented one on top of the other on a calibrated screen. The selection was made by pressing on a 6-button IR box, which allowed observers to consider not only the most natural but to rate their selection. The rating system allowed observers to register how much more natural was their chosen image (eg, much more, definitely more, slightly more), which gave us valuable extra information on the selection process. The results were analysed considering both the selection as a binary choice (using Thurstone's law of comparative judgement) and using Bradley-Terry method for ordinal comparison. Our results show a significant difference in the rating scales obtained. Although this method has been used in colour constancy algorithm comparisons, its uses are much wider, eg to compare algorithms of image compression, rendering, recolouring, etc.
 
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ISSN ISBN Medium  
Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CIC Approved no  
Call Number CAT @ cat @ VPV2009b Serial 1191  
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Author Robert Benavente; C. Alejandro Parraga; Maria Vanrell edit  openurl
Title Colour categories boundaries are better defined in contextual conditions Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2009 Publication Perception Abbreviated Journal PER  
Volume 38 Issue Pages 36  
Keywords  
Abstract In a previous experiment [Parraga et al, 2009 Journal of Imaging Science and Technology 53(3)] the boundaries between basic colour categories were measured by asking subjects to categorize colour samples presented in isolation (ie on a dark background) using a YES/NO paradigm. Results showed that some boundaries (eg green – blue) were very diffuse and the subjects' answers presented bimodal distributions, which were attributed to the emergence of non-basic categories in those regions (eg turquoise). To confirm these results we performed a new experiment focussed on the boundaries where bimodal distributions were more evident. In this new experiment rectangular colour samples were presented surrounded by random colour patches to simulate contextual conditions on a calibrated CRT monitor. The names of two neighbouring colours were shown at the bottom of the screen and subjects selected the boundary between these colours by controlling the chromaticity of the central patch, sliding it across these categories' frontier. Results show that in this new experimental paradigm, the formerly uncertain inter-colour category boundaries are better defined and the dispersions (ie the bimodal distributions) that occurred in the previous experiment disappear. These results may provide further support to Berlin and Kay's basic colour terms theory.  
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ISSN ISBN Medium  
Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CIC Approved no  
Call Number CAT @ cat @ BPV2009 Serial 1192  
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Author C. Alejandro Parraga; Javier Vazquez; Maria Vanrell edit  openurl
Title A new cone activation-based natural images dataset Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2009 Publication Perception Abbreviated Journal PER  
Volume 36 Issue Pages 180  
Keywords  
Abstract We generated a new dataset of digital natural images where each colour plane corresponds to the human LMS (long-, medium-, short-wavelength) cone activations. The images were chosen to represent five different visual environments (eg forest, seaside, mountain snow, urban, motorways) and were taken under natural illumination at different times of day. At the bottom-left corner of each picture there was a matte grey ball of approximately constant spectral reflectance (across the camera's response spectrum,) and nearly Lambertian reflective properties, which allows to compute (and remove, if necessary) the illuminant's colour and intensity. The camera (Sigma Foveon SD10) was calibrated by measuring its sensor's spectral responses using a set of 31 spectrally narrowband interference filters. This allowed conversion of the final camera-dependent RGB colour space into the Smith and Pokorny (1975) cone activation space by means of a polynomial transformation, optimised for a set of 1269 Munsell chip reflectances. This new method is an improvement over the usual 3 × 3 matrix transformation which is only accurate for spectrally-narrowband colours. The camera-to-LMS transformation can be recalculated to consider other non-human visual systems. The dataset is available to download from our website.  
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Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
Language Summary Language Original Title  
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
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ISSN ISBN Medium  
Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CIC Approved no  
Call Number CAT @ cat @ PVV2009 Serial 1193  
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Author C. Alejandro Parraga; Robert Benavente; Maria Vanrell edit  openurl
Title Towards a general model of colour categorization which considers context Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2010 Publication Perception. ECVP Abstract Supplement Abbreviated Journal PER  
Volume 39 Issue Pages 86  
Keywords  
Abstract In two previous experiments [Parraga et al, 2009 J. of Im. Sci. and Tech 53(3) 031106; Benavente et al,2009 Perception 38 ECVP Supplement, 36] the boundaries of basic colour categories were measured.
In the first experiment, samples were presented in isolation (ie on a dark background) and boundaries were measured using a yes/no paradigm. In the second, subjects adjusted the chromaticity of a sample presented on a random Mondrian background to find the boundary between pairs of adjacent colours.
Results from these experiments showed significant di erences but it was not possible to conclude whether this discrepancy was due to the absence/presence of a colourful background or to the di erences in the paradigms used. In this work, we settle this question by repeating the first experiment (ie samples presented on a dark background) using the second paradigm. A comparison of results shows that
although boundary locations are very similar, boundaries measured in context are significantly di erent(more di use) than those measured in isolation (confirmed by a Student’s t-test analysis on the subject’s answers statistical distributions). In addition, we completed the mapping of colour name space by measuring the boundaries between chromatic colours and the achromatic centre. With these results we
completed our parametric fuzzy-sets model of colour naming space.
 
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Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
Language Summary Language Original Title  
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
ISSN ISBN Medium  
Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CIC Approved no  
Call Number CAT @ cat @ PBV2010b Serial 1326  
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Author Olivier Penacchio; C. Alejandro Parraga; Maria Vanrell edit  openurl
Title Natural Scene Statistics account for Human Cones Ratios Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2010 Publication Perception. ECVP Abstract Supplement Abbreviated Journal PER  
Volume 39 Issue Pages 101  
Keywords  
Abstract In two previous experiments [Parraga et al, 2009 J. of Im. Sci. and Tech 53(3) 031106; Benavente et al,2009 Perception 38 ECVP Supplement, 36] the boundaries of basic colour categories were measured.
In the first experiment, samples were presented in isolation (ie on a dark background) and boundaries were measured using a yes/no paradigm. In the second, subjects adjusted the chromaticity of a sample presented on a random Mondrian background to find the boundary between pairs of adjacent colours.
Results from these experiments showed significant di erences but it was not possible to conclude whether this discrepancy was due to the absence/presence of a colourful background or to the di erences in the paradigms used. In this work, we settle this question by repeating the first experiment (ie samples presented on a dark background) using the second paradigm. A comparison of results shows that
although boundary locations are very similar, boundaries measured in context are significantly di erent(more di use) than those measured in isolation (confirmed by a Student’s t-test analysis on the subject’s answers statistical distributions). In addition, we completed the mapping of colour name space by measuring the boundaries between chromatic colours and the achromatic centre. With these results we completed our parametric fuzzy-sets model of colour naming space.
 
Address  
Corporate Author Thesis  
Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
Language Summary Language Original Title  
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
ISSN ISBN Medium  
Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CIC Approved no  
Call Number CAT @ cat @ PPV2010 Serial 1357  
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Author Xavier Otazu; C. Alejandro Parraga; Maria Vanrell edit  url
doi  openurl
Title Towards a unified chromatic inducction model Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2010 Publication Journal of Vision Abbreviated Journal VSS  
Volume 10 Issue 12:5 Pages 1-24  
Keywords Visual system; Color induction; Wavelet transform  
Abstract In a previous work (X. Otazu, M. Vanrell, & C. A. Párraga, 2008b), we showed how several brightness induction effects can be predicted using a simple multiresolution wavelet model (BIWaM). Here we present a new model for chromatic induction processes (termed Chromatic Induction Wavelet Model or CIWaM), which is also implemented on a multiresolution framework and based on similar assumptions related to the spatial frequency and the contrast surround energy of the stimulus. The CIWaM can be interpreted as a very simple extension of the BIWaM to the chromatic channels, which in our case are defined in the MacLeod-Boynton (lsY) color space. This new model allows us to unify both chromatic assimilation and chromatic contrast effects in a single mathematical formulation. The predictions of the CIWaM were tested by means of several color and brightness induction experiments, which showed an acceptable agreement between model predictions and psychophysical data.  
Address  
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Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
Language Summary Language Original Title  
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
ISSN ISBN Medium  
Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CIC Approved no  
Call Number CAT @ cat @ OPV2010 Serial 1450  
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Author Eduard Vazquez; Ramon Baldrich; Joost Van de Weijer; Maria Vanrell edit   pdf
url  doi
openurl 
Title Describing Reflectances for Colour Segmentation Robust to Shadows, Highlights and Textures Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2011 Publication IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence Abbreviated Journal TPAMI  
Volume 33 Issue 5 Pages 917-930  
Keywords  
Abstract The segmentation of a single material reflectance is a challenging problem due to the considerable variation in image measurements caused by the geometry of the object, shadows, and specularities. The combination of these effects has been modeled by the dichromatic reflection model. However, the application of the model to real-world images is limited due to unknown acquisition parameters and compression artifacts. In this paper, we present a robust model for the shape of a single material reflectance in histogram space. The method is based on a multilocal creaseness analysis of the histogram which results in a set of ridges representing the material reflectances. The segmentation method derived from these ridges is robust to both shadow, shading and specularities, and texture in real-world images. We further complete the method by incorporating prior knowledge from image statistics, and incorporate spatial coherence by using multiscale color contrast information. Results obtained show that our method clearly outperforms state-of-the-art segmentation methods on a widely used segmentation benchmark, having as a main characteristic its excellent performance in the presence of shadows and highlights at low computational cost.  
Address Los Alamitos; CA; USA;  
Corporate Author Thesis  
Publisher IEEE Computer Society Place of Publication Editor  
Language Summary Language Original Title  
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
ISSN 0162-8828 ISBN Medium  
Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CIC Approved no  
Call Number Admin @ si @ VBW2011 Serial 1715  
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Author C. Alejandro Parraga; Olivier Penacchio; Maria Vanrell edit  openurl
Title Retinal Filtering Matches Natural Image Statistics at Low Luminance Levels Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2011 Publication Perception Abbreviated Journal PER  
Volume 40 Issue Pages 96  
Keywords  
Abstract The assumption that the retina’s main objective is to provide a minimum entropy representation to higher visual areas (ie efficient coding principle) allows to predict retinal filtering in space–time and colour (Atick, 1992 Network 3 213–251). This is achieved by considering the power spectra of natural images (which is proportional to 1/f2) and the suppression of retinal and image noise. However, most studies consider images within a limited range of lighting conditions (eg near noon) whereas the visual system’s spatial filtering depends on light intensity and the spatiochromatic properties of natural scenes depend of the time of the day. Here, we explore whether the dependence of visual spatial filtering on luminance match the changes in power spectrum of natural scenes at different times of the day. Using human cone-activation based naturalistic stimuli (from the Barcelona Calibrated Images Database), we show that for a range of luminance levels, the shape of the retinal CSF reflects the slope of the power spectrum at low spatial frequencies. Accordingly, the retina implements the filtering which best decorrelates the input signal at every luminance level. This result is in line with the body of work that places efficient coding as a guiding neural principle.  
Address  
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Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
Language Summary Language Original Title  
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
ISSN ISBN Medium  
Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CIC Approved no  
Call Number Admin @ si @ PPV2011 Serial 1720  
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Author C. Alejandro Parraga; Jordi Roca; Maria Vanrell edit  url
doi  openurl
Title Do Basic Colors Influence Chromatic Adaptation? Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2011 Publication Journal of Vision Abbreviated Journal VSS  
Volume 11 Issue 11 Pages 85  
Keywords  
Abstract Color constancy (the ability to perceive colors relatively stable under different illuminants) is the result of several mechanisms spread across different neural levels and responding to several visual scene cues. It is usually measured by estimating the perceived color of a grey patch under an illuminant change. In this work, we hypothesize whether chromatic adaptation (without a reference white or grey) could be driven by certain colors, specifically those corresponding to the universal color terms proposed by Berlin and Kay (1969). To this end we have developed a new psychophysical paradigm in which subjects adjust the color of a test patch (in CIELab space) to match their memory of the best example of a given color chosen from the universal terms list (grey, red, green, blue, yellow, purple, pink, orange and brown). The test patch is embedded inside a Mondrian image and presented on a calibrated CRT screen inside a dark cabin. All subjects were trained to “recall” their most exemplary colors reliably from memory and asked to always produce the same basic colors when required under several adaptation conditions. These include achromatic and colored Mondrian backgrounds, under a simulated D65 illuminant and several colored illuminants. A set of basic colors were measured for each subject under neutral conditions (achromatic background and D65 illuminant) and used as “reference” for the rest of the experiment. The colors adjusted by the subjects in each adaptation condition were compared to the reference colors under the corresponding illuminant and a “constancy index” was obtained for each of them. Our results show that for some colors the constancy index was better than for grey. The set of best adapted colors in each condition were common to a majority of subjects and were dependent on the chromaticity of the illuminant and the chromatic background considered.  
Address  
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Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
Language Summary Language Original Title  
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
ISSN 1534-7362 ISBN Medium  
Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CIC Approved no  
Call Number Admin @ si @ PRV2011 Serial 1759  
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Author Susana Alvarez; Anna Salvatella; Maria Vanrell; Xavier Otazu edit   pdf
url  doi
openurl 
Title Low-dimensional and Comprehensive Color Texture Description Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2012 Publication Computer Vision and Image Understanding Abbreviated Journal CVIU  
Volume 116 Issue I Pages 54-67  
Keywords  
Abstract Image retrieval can be dealt by combining standard descriptors, such as those of MPEG-7, which are defined independently for each visual cue (e.g. SCD or CLD for Color, HTD for texture or EHD for edges).
A common problem is to combine similarities coming from descriptors representing different concepts in different spaces. In this paper we propose a color texture description that bypasses this problem from its inherent definition. It is based on a low dimensional space with 6 perceptual axes. Texture is described in a 3D space derived from a direct implementation of the original Julesz’s Texton theory and color is described in a 3D perceptual space. This early fusion through the blob concept in these two bounded spaces avoids the problem and allows us to derive a sparse color-texture descriptor that achieves similar performance compared to MPEG-7 in image retrieval. Moreover, our descriptor presents comprehensive qualities since it can also be applied either in segmentation or browsing: (a) a dense image representation is defined from the descriptor showing a reasonable performance in locating texture patterns included in complex images; and (b) a vocabulary of basic terms is derived to build an intermediate level descriptor in natural language improving browsing by bridging semantic gap
 
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Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
Language Summary Language Original Title  
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
ISSN 1077-3142 ISBN Medium  
Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CAT;CIC Approved no  
Call Number Admin @ si @ ASV2012 Serial 1827  
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Author Fahad Shahbaz Khan; Joost Van de Weijer; Maria Vanrell edit   pdf
url  doi
openurl 
Title Modulating Shape Features by Color Attention for Object Recognition Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2012 Publication International Journal of Computer Vision Abbreviated Journal IJCV  
Volume 98 Issue 1 Pages 49-64  
Keywords  
Abstract Bag-of-words based image representation is a successful approach for object recognition. Generally, the subsequent stages of the process: feature detection,feature description, vocabulary construction and image representation are performed independent of the intentioned object classes to be detected. In such a framework, it was found that the combination of different image cues, such as shape and color, often obtains below expected results. This paper presents a novel method for recognizing object categories when using ultiple cues by separately processing the shape and color cues and combining them by modulating the shape features by category specific color attention. Color is used to compute bottom up and top-down attention maps. Subsequently, these color attention maps are used to modulate the weights of the shape features. In regions with higher attention shape features are given more weight than in regions with low attention. We compare our approach with existing methods that combine color and shape cues on five data sets containing varied importance of both cues, namely, Soccer (color predominance), Flower (color and hape parity), PASCAL VOC 2007 and 2009 (shape predominance) and Caltech-101 (color co-interference). The experiments clearly demonstrate that in all five data sets our proposed framework significantly outperforms existing methods for combining color and shape information.  
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Corporate Author Thesis  
Publisher Springer Netherlands Place of Publication Editor  
Language Summary Language Original Title  
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
ISSN 0920-5691 ISBN Medium  
Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CIC Approved no  
Call Number Admin @ si @ KWV2012 Serial 1864  
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Author Jordi Roca; C. Alejandro Parraga; Maria Vanrell edit   pdf
doi  openurl
Title Chromatic settings and the structural color constancy index Type (up) Journal Article
Year 2013 Publication Journal of Vision Abbreviated Journal JV  
Volume 13 Issue 4-3 Pages 1-26  
Keywords  
Abstract Color constancy is usually measured by achromatic setting, asymmetric matching, or color naming paradigms, whose results are interpreted in terms of indexes and models that arguably do not capture the full complexity of the phenomenon. Here we propose a new paradigm, chromatic setting, which allows a more comprehensive characterization of color constancy through the measurement of multiple points in color space under immersive adaptation. We demonstrated its feasibility by assessing the consistency of subjects' responses over time. The paradigm was applied to two-dimensional (2-D) Mondrian stimuli under three different illuminants, and the results were used to fit a set of linear color constancy models. The use of multiple colors improved the precision of more complex linear models compared to the popular diagonal model computed from gray. Our results show that a diagonal plus translation matrix that models mechanisms other than cone gain might be best suited to explain the phenomenon. Additionally, we calculated a number of color constancy indices for several points in color space, and our results suggest that interrelations among colors are not as uniform as previously believed. To account for this variability, we developed a new structural color constancy index that takes into account the magnitude and orientation of the chromatic shift in addition to the interrelations among colors and memory effects.  
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ISSN ISBN Medium  
Area Expedition Conference  
Notes CIC; 600.052; 600.051; 605.203 Approved no  
Call Number Admin @ si @ RPV2013 Serial 2288  
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