Abstract

In this paper, we propose a novel two-step technique for text classification using autoregressive Language Models (LM). In the first step, a set of perplexity and log-likelihood based numeric features are elicited from an LM for a text instance to be classified. Then, in the second step, a classifier based on these features is trained to predict the final label. The classifier used is usually a simple machine learning classifier like Support Vector Machine (SVM) or Logistic Regression (LR) and it is trained using a small set of training examples. We believe, our technique presents a whole new way of exploiting the available training instances, in addition to the existing ways like fine-tuning LMs or in-context learning. Our approach stands out by eliminating the need for parameter updates in LMs, as required in fine-tuning, and does not impose limitations on the number of training examples faced while building prompts for in-context learning. We evaluate our technique across 5 different datasets and compare with multiple competent baselines.

Abstract

To employ Pre-trained Language Models (PLMs) as knowledge containers in niche domains it is important to gauge the knowledge of these PLMs about facts in these domains. It is also an important pre-requisite to know how much enrichment effort is required to make them better. As part of this work, we aim to gauge and enrich small PLMs for knowledge of world geography. Firstly, we develop a moderately sized dataset of masked sentences covering 24 different fact types about world geography to estimate knowledge of PLMs on these facts. We hypothesize that for this niche domain, smaller PLMs may not be well equipped. Secondly, we enrich PLMs with this knowledge through fine-tuning and check if the knowledge in the dataset is infused sufficiently. We further hypothesize that linguistic variability in the manual templates used to embed the knowledge in masked sentences does not affect the knowledge infusion. Finally, we demonstrate the application of PLMs to tourism blog search and Wikidata KB augmentation. In both applications, we aim at showing the effectiveness of using PLMs to achieve competitive performance.

Abstract

The intricate link between brain textbf{Functional Connectivity (FC)} and textbf{Structural Connectivity (SC)} is explored through models performing diffusion on SC to derive FC, using varied methodologies from single to multiple textbf{Graph Diffusion Kernels}. However, existing studies have not correlated diffusion scales with specific brain Regions of Interest (RoIs), limiting the applicability of graph diffusion. We propose a novel approach using textbf{Graph Diffusion Wavelets} to learn the appropriate diffusion scale for each RoI to accurately estimate the SC-FC mapping. Using the open Human Connectome Project (HCP) dataset, we achieve an average textbf{Pearson's correlation} value of 0.833, surpassing the state-of-the-art methods for prediction of FC. It is important to note that the proposed architecture is entirely linear, computationally efficient, and notably demonstrates the textbf{power-law} distribution of diffusion scales. Our results show that the bilateral frontal pole, by virtue of it having large diffusion scale, forms a large community structure. The finding is in line with the current literature on the role of the frontal pole in resting-state networks. Overall, the results underscore the potential of graph diffusion wavelet framework for understanding how the brain structure leads to functional connectivity.

Abstract

Given the challenge of fragmentary or scattered archives, how can we construct a historical and socio-cultural profile of urban micro-minorities that are acutely affected by the “global flows” (Arjun Appadurai 1990) of people, commodities, and capital? Secunderabad, once a town in princely Hyderabad state in colonial South Asia, was shaped critically by the arrival of migrant communities from different parts of the subcontinent. One such group was that of educated, professional, Tamil-speaking migrants from Madras Presidency. Testament to this migration today are multiple localities with a dominance of Tamil-speaking people, cultural events, and related institutions and associations. Using this community as a case study, this paper demonstrates that the biggest challenge in studying the history of a micro-minority is their marginal presence in archives. We find that the keepers of such history are individuals and communities. Hence, we examine private archives, oral histories, and community records in conjunction and contestation with literary texts and official sources, such as census data, civil lists, and gazettes. This paper offers an account of how we addressed methodological challenges by building community networks, and adopting and adapting a mixed-methods, interdisciplinary approach to creatively trace migration, settlement, linguistic, and socio-cultural patterns. Our findings suggest that such approaches have positive implications for city and urban studies and research methods in this area.

Abstract

The concept of raga in Indian classical music serves as a complex, multifaceted melodic entity that can be approached through various perspectives. Compositions within a raga act as foundational structures, serving as the bedrock for improvisations. Analyzing their textual notations is easier and more objective in comparison with analyzing audio samples. A significant amount of musical insights can be derived from the discrete swara sequences alone. This paper aims to construct an intuitive visualization of raga space, using swara sequences from raga compositions. Notations from public sources are normalized, and their TF-IDF features are projected into a low-dimensional space. This approach allows for qualitative analysis of both Carnatic and Hindustani ragas, mapping them to known raga theory.

Abstract

Link prediction can help rectify inaccuracies in various graph algorithms, stemming from unaccounted-for or overlooked links within networks. However, many existing works use a baseline approach, which incurs unnecessary computational costs due to its high time complexity. Further, many studies focus on smaller graphs, which can lead to misleading conclusions. Here, we study the prediction of links using neighborhood-based similarity measures on large graphs. In particular, we improve upon the baseline approach (IBase), and propose a heuristic approach that additionally disregards large hubs (DLH), based on the idea that high-degree nodes contribute little similarity among their neighbors. On a server equipped with dual 16-core Intel Xeon Gold 6226R processors, DLH is on average 1019x faster than IBase, especially on web graphs and social networks, while maintaining similar prediction accuracy. Notably, DLH achieves a link prediction rate of 38.1M edges/s and improves performance by 1.6x for every doubling of threads.

Abstract

The demand for high-quality parallel speech data has been increasing as deep learning-based Speech to Speech Machine Translation (SSMT) and automatic dubbing approaches gain popularity in speech applications. Traditional and well-established speech applications such as Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) and Text-to-Speech (TTS) heavily rely on large corpus of monolingual speech and the corresponding text. While there is a wealth of parallel text data available for both English and Indic languages, parallel speech data is available only for English and other European languages, yet it often lacks natural prosody and semantic alignment between the languages. For achieving cross-lingual prosody transfer, end-to-end SSMT models, and high-quality dubbing from English to Hindi, in this work, an English-Hindi parallel bilingual speech-text corpus named lIlT-Speech Twins 1.0 is created. This data contains twin-like English and Hindi speech-text pairs obtained from publicly available children's stories in both the languages, through manual and automatic processing. Starting with 8 stories in each language, totaling around 4 hours of audio, the final outcome was a 2-hour dataset. This was achieved through systematic segmentation, re-moval of non-speech background audio, and sentence-by-sentence alignment to ensure accurate meaning in both languages. In addition to ensuring proper alignment and transcription, this dataset offers a rich source of natural prosody, expressions, and emotions, due to the narrative diversity within the stories. The dataset also provides sig-nificant speaker variability, with different characters being voiced by various speakers, enhancing the richness of the lIlT-Speech Twins 1.0 corpus.

Abstract

Celebrated for its stunning landscapes, Himachal Pradesh has become a renowned tourist destination, experiencing a surge in visitors. Since the 1980s, the state has witnessed significant economic growth, supported by a boom in the tourism industry. This research aims to correlate tourism with economic growth and analyse the unique tourism-driven development of Himachal Pradesh. We used urban built-up areas in key tourist hotspots as a proxy, and employed Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and visual interpretation techniques to examine urban growth around Solang Valley, Bhagsunag Temple, Chail, Kufri, and Khajjiar from 1990 to 2020. Historical Landsat satellite imagery was utilised to quantify urban built-up changes. The findings revealed a significant increase in built-up areas within all tourist buffer zones, with Bhagsunag Temple showing the most dramatic growth (~1000%). Non-tourist locations with similar demographics showed an average increase of 55%, compared to 427% in tourist buffers. This study demonstrates that built-up areas have expanded more rapidly in tourist areas, highlighting the substantial impact of tourism on urban growth. These findings suggest the need for further exploration into tourism, policy studies, and economics in Himachal Pradesh. Keywords: GIS, Tourism, Urbanisation, Remote Sensing, Landsat, Himachal Pradesh.

Abstract

Edge–cloud coordination offers the chance to mitigate the enormous storage and processing load brought on by a massive increase in traffic at the network’s edge. Though this paradigm has benefits on a large scale, outsourcing the sensitive data from the smart devices deployed in an Internet of Things (IoT) application may lead to privacy leakage. With an attribute-based keyword search (ABKS), the search over ciphertext can be achieved; this reduces the risk of sensitive data explosion. However, ABKS has several issues, like huge computational overhead to perform multi-keyword searches and tracing malicious users. To address these issues and enhance the performance of ABKS, we propose a novel traceable and lightweight attribute-based keyword search technique in an Edge–cloud-assisted IoT, named TL-ABKS, using edge–cloud coordination. With TL-ABKS, it is possible to do effective multi-keyword searches and implement fine-grained access control. Further, TL-ABKS outsources the encryption and decryption computation to edge nodes to enable its usage to resource-limited IoT smart devices. In addition, TL-ABKS achieves tracing user identity who misuse their secret keys. TL-ABKS is secure against modified secret keys, chosen plaintext, and chosen keyword attacks. By comparing the proposed TL-ABKS with the current state-of-the-art schemes, and conducting a theoretical and experimental evaluation of its performance and credibility, TL-ABKS is efficient.

Abstract

Obtaining sufficient information in one’s mother tongue is crucial for satisfying the information needs of the users. While high-resource languages have abundant online resources, the situation is less than ideal for very low-resource languages. Moreover, the insufficient reporting of vital national and international events continues to be a worry, especially in languages with scarce resources, like Mizo. In this paper, we conduct a study to investigate the effectiveness of a simple methodology designed to generate a holistic summary for Mizo news articles, which leverages English-language news to supplement and enhance the information related to the corresponding news events. Furthermore, we make available 500 Mizo news articles and corresponding enriched holistic summaries. Human evaluation confirms that our approach significantly enhances the information coverage of Mizo news articles.