The book presents findings, views and ideas on what exact problems of image processing, pattern recognition and generation can be efficiently solved by cellular automata architectures. This volume provides a convenient collection in this area, in which publications are otherwise widely scattered throughout the literature. The topics covered include image compression and resizing; skeletonization, erosion and dilation; convex hull computation, edge detection and segmentation; forgery detection and content based retrieval; and pattern generation.

The book advances the theory of image processing, pattern recognition and generation as well as the design of efficient algorithms and hardware for parallel image processing and analysis. It is aimed at computer scientists, software programmers, electronic engineers, mathematicians and physicists, and at everyone who studies or develops cellular automaton algorithms and tools for image processing and analysis, or develops novel architectures and implementations of massive parallel computing devices.

The book will provide attractive reading for a general audience because it has do-it-yourself appeal: all the computer experiments presented within it can be implemented with minimal knowledge of programming. The simplicity yet substantial functionality of the cellular automaton approach, and the transparency of the algorithms proposed, makes the text ideal supplementary reading for courses on image processing, parallel computing, automata theory and applications."

Non-photorealistic rendering (NPR) is a combination of computer graphics and computer vision that produces renderings in various artistic, expressive or stylized ways such as painting and drawing. This book focuses on image and video based NPR, where the input is a 2D photograph or a video rather than a 3D model. 2D NPR techniques have application in areas as diverse as consumer and professional digital photography and visual effects for TV and film production. The book covers the full range of the state of the art of NPR with every chapter authored by internationally renowned experts in the field, covering both classical and contemporary techniques. It will enable both graduate students in computer graphics, computer vision or image processing and professional developers alike to quickly become familiar with contemporary techniques, enabling them to apply 2D NPR algorithms in their own projects.

Ranging across academic disciplines and historical time periods, the essays in Morality and Health offer a compelling assessment of the powerful role of moral systems for judging the complex questions of risk and responsibility for disease, the experience of illness, and social and cultural responses to those who are sick. Contributors focus on the history of attitudes and values about particular disease-related behaviours such as drinking, smoking and diet, as well as social, psychological and cultural perspectives on the process by which morality shapes our understanding of who gets sick and why.

Contributors include Keith Thomas, Charles Rosenberg, Richard Shweder, Arthur Kleinman, David Mechanic, Nancy Tomes and Linda Gordon.

From the castigation and stigmatization of victims of AIDS to our celebration of diet, exercise and fitness, the moral categorization of health and disease reflects contemporary notions that disease results from moral failure and that health is the representation of moral triumph. Ranging across academic disciplines and historical time periods, the essays in Morality and Health offer a compelling assessment of the powerful role of moral systems for judging the complex questions of risk and responsibility for disease, the experience of illness, and social and cultural responses to those who are sick. Contributors include Keith Thomas, Charles Rosenberg, Richard Shweder, Arthur Kleinman, David Mechanic, Nancy Tomes and Linda Gordon.

The book presents findings, views and ideas on what exact problems of image processing, pattern recognition and generation can be efficiently solved by cellular automata architectures. This volume provides a convenient collection in this area, in which publications are otherwise widely scattered throughout the literature. The topics covered include image compression and resizing; skeletonization, erosion and dilation; convex hull computation, edge detection and segmentation; forgery detection and content based retrieval; and pattern generation. The book advances the theory of image processing, pattern recognition and generation as well as the design of efficient algorithms and hardware for parallel image processing and analysis. It is aimed at computer scientists, software programmers, electronic engineers, mathematicians and physicists, and at everyone who studies or develops cellular automaton algorithms and tools for image processing and analysis, or develops novel architectures and implementations of massive parallel computing devices. The book will provide attractive reading for a general audience because it has do-it-yourself appeal: all the computer experiments presented within it can be implemented with minimal knowledge of programming. The simplicity yet substantial functionality of the cellular automaton approach, and the transparency of the algorithms proposed, makes the text ideal supplementary reading for courses on image processing, parallel computing, automata theory and applications.

In the first half of the twentieth century, psychology was a discipline in search of scientific legitimacy. Debates raged over how much of human and animal behavior is instinctive and how much is learned, and how behavior could be quantified accurately. At the Johns Hopkins University's new Phipps Psychiatric Clinic, Curt P. Richter stood aside from these heated theoretical arguments, choosing instead to apply his data-collection methods, innovative measurement techniques, playful sense of exploration, and consummate surgical skill to laboratory examinations of the biological basis of behavior. From identifying the biological clocks that govern behavior and physiology to observing the self-regulation of nutrient levels by the body, the cyclical nature of some mental illnesses, and the causes of hopelessness, Richter's wide-ranging discoveries not only influenced the burgeoning field of psychobiology and paved the way for later researchers but also often had implications for the treatment of patients in the clinic. At the time of his death in 1988, Richter left behind a massive collection of laboratory data. For this book, Jay Schulkin mined six decades of Richter's archived research data, personal documents, and interviews to flesh out an engaging portrait of a "laboratory artisan" in the context of his work.