The reduced energy level of unstressed syllables compromises perceptibility of vowel distinctions, leading to the ‘neutralization’ of some of the distinctions. The difference between the collapse of most vowels into [M] in English, and more restricted effects in other languages is shown to be managed by constraint ranking within OT. The same factors that compromise perceptibility of Vquality ar...

Blockchain is a disruptive technology that has been used to address wide range of challenges in diverse domains including voting, logistics, healthcare and finance. Transaction malleability one the critical threats for blockchain, which can facilitate double-spending attacks by tampering with state blockchain. This paper investigates potential transaction attack within blockchain-based applicat...

We investigated the perceptibility of stop voicing in a domain-final neutralizing context in German that according to various phonological models is completely neutralized in favour of the voiceless category but that according to various empirical studies is distinguishable phonetically. A primary aim was to determine whether acoustic cues that were available for the stop voicing distinction we...

We present a novel approach to e-voting for elections, based on a new cryptographic construction, double-blind identity based encryption (IBE). In standard IBE, the identity string that is passed to a key generation centre (KGC) during the key extraction phase is visible to the KGC. Recent work introduced the notion of blinding the identity string, resulting in a private key generation protocol...

Researchers have suggested that dynamically increasing controlto-display (CD) gain can assist in targeting, by increasing the effective width of targets in motor space, which makes targets feel sticky. Although this method has been shown to be effective, there are several unexplored issues that could affect its use in real-world interfaces. One of these is perceptibility: in particular, the dif...

The perceptibility of scanner noise as a function of resolution is studied using a model for the human visual system and for the scanner noise. The visual system is modeled using a point-wise nonlinearity followed by a lightness contrast-sensitivity-function. The noise model incorporates a signal-dependent noise component and a signal-independent noise component. The system is analyzed to deter...

Do print media significantly impact political attitudes and party identification? To examine this question, we draw on a rare quasi-natural experiment that occurred when The Sun, a right-leaning UK tabloid, shifted its support to the Labour party in 1997 and back to the Conservative party in 2010. We compared changes in party identification and political attitudes among Sun readers with non-rea...

The current development of e-voting systems worldwide raises several specific interesting issues from a legal point of view. Auditability measures, identification procedures or guarantees for voting secrecy and equality are good examples, but we often forget a fundamental question: the usefulness of these new technologies. This paper intends to provide an answer that takes into account the comp...