Algorithm Selection for Edge Detection in Satellite Images by Neutrosophic WASPAS Method

A new method for image processing using generalized linguistic neutrosophic cubic aggregation operator

Image processing is a technique of scrutinizing an image and extricating important information. Indecisive situations are generally undergone when the picture processes with profuse noise. Neutrosophic set (NS), a part of neutrosophy theory, studies the scope of neutralities and is essential to reasoning with incomplete and uncertain information. However, the linguistic neutrosophic cubic set (LNCS) is one of the extensions of the NS. In LNCS, each element is characterized by the interval-valued and single-valued neutrosophic numbers to handle the data uncertainties. Keeping these features in mind, we apply LNCS for image processing after defining their aggregation operators and operations. In this study, noisy grey-scale images were transformed into the LNCS domain using three membership degrees, then aggregated using aggregation operators. The proposed method clarifies the noise in the Lena image and three other test images. It has justified the utilization of operators based on visual clarity obtained. Suitable comparison analysis and efficiency testing is performed on the proposed theory by considering noise types, such as Gaussian, Poisson, and Speckle. In addition, we have also compared the computational efficiency of our proposed method with existing ones. The results show that our approach consumes less memory and executes quicker than the existing methods. A decision-maker can select a more effective operator to segment the images more effectively using the obtained results.

Procedural Video Game Scene Generation by Genetic and Neutrosophic WASPAS Algorithms

The demand for automated game development assistance tools can be fulfilled by computational creativity algorithms. The procedural generation is one of the topics for creative content development. The main procedural generation challenge for game level layout is how to create a diverse set of levels that could match a human-crafted game scene. Our game scene layouts are created randomly and then sculpted using a genetic algorithm. To address the issue of fitness calculation with conflicting criteria, we use weighted aggregated sum product assessment (WASPAS) in a single-valued neutrosophic set environment (SVNS) that models the indeterminacy with truth, intermediacy, and falsehood memberships. Results are presented as an encoded game object grid where each game object type has a specific function. The algorithm creates a diverse set of game scene layouts by combining game rules validation and aesthetic principles. It successfully creates functional aesthetic patterns without specifically defining the shapes of the combination of games’ objects.

A Robust Method for Detecting Wind-Fallen Stems from Aerial RGB Images Using a Line Segment Detection Algorithm

Increased frequencies and windspeeds of storms may cause disproportionately high increases in windthrow damage. Storm-felled trees provide a surplus of breeding material for bark beetles, often resulting in calamities in the subsequent years. Thus, the timely removal of fallen trees is regarded as a good management practice that requires strategic planning of salvage harvesting. Precise information on the number of stems and their location and orientation are needed for the efficient planning of strip roads and/or cable yarding lines. An accurate assessment of these data using conventional field-based methods is very difficult and time-consuming; remote sensing techniques may be a cost-efficient alternative. In this research, a methodology for the automatic detection of fallen stems from aerial RGB images is presented. The presented methodology was based on a line segment detection algorithm and proved to be robust regarding image quality. It was shown that the method can detect frequency, position, spatial distribution and orientation of fallen stems with high accuracy, while stem lengths were systematically underestimated. The methodology can be used for the optimized planning of salvage harvesting in the future and may thus help to reduce consequential bark beetle calamities after storm events.

A Hybrid Spherical Fuzzy MCDM Approach to Prioritize Governmental Intervention Strategies against the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Case Study from Vietnam

The unprecedented coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) is fluctuating worldwide. Since the COVID-19 epidemic has a negative impact on all countries and has become a significant threat, it is necessary to determine the most effective strategy for governments by considering a variety of criteria; however, few studies in the literature can assist governments in this topic. Selective governmental intervention during the COVID-19 outbreak is considered a Multi-Criteria Decision-Making (MCDM) problem under a vague and uncertain environment when governments and medical communities adjust their priorities in response to rising issues and the efficacy of interventions applied in various nations. In this study, a novel hybrid Spherical Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (SF-AHP) and Fuzzy Weighted Aggregated Sum Product Assessment (WASPAS-F) model is proposed to help stakeholders such as governors and policymakers to prioritize governmental interventions for dealing with the COVID-19 outbreak. The SF-AHP is implemented to measure the significance of the criteria, while the WASPAS-F approach is deployed to rank intervention alternatives. An empirical case study is conducted in Vietnam. From the SF-AHP findings, the criteria of “effectiveness in preventing the spread of COVID-19”, “ease of implementation”, and “high acceptability to citizens” were recognized as the most important criteria. As for the ranking of strategies, “vaccinations”, “enhanced control of the country’s health resources”, “common health testing”, “formation of an emergency response team”, and “quarantining patients and those suspected of infection” are the top five strategies. Aside from that, the robustness of the approach was tested by performing a comparative analysis. The results illustrate that the applied methods reach the general best strategy rankings. The applied methodology and its analysis will provide insight to authorities for fighting against the severe pandemic in the long run. It may aid in solving many complicated challenges in government strategy selection and assessment. It is also a flexible design model for considering the evaluation criteria. Finally, this research provides valuable guidance for policymakers in other nations.

Assessment of Successful Drivers of Crowdfunding Projects Based on Visual Analogue Scale Matrix for Criteria Weighting Method

When investing in crowdfunding projects, every investor has some difficulties in selecting the right one. The most important issue is choosing criteria that show the value of the specific project. The aim of this study was to determine which of the criteria are the most important for investors when selecting various crowdfunding projects to fund. A visual analogue scale matrix for criteria weighting (VASMA weighting) methodology was used to determine the main criteria that affect investors’ decisions to invest. The VASMA methodology can capture both objective and subjective parts of criteria weighting. In addition, the risk factor was considered a success driver of crowdfunding projects. The main findings reveal that the criteria of the three risk groups have the highest weights of the VASMA weighting methodology. In this research, only investor preferences were chosen and analyzed for successful crowdfunding project investment. The VASMA weighting methodology’s criteria ranking might help investors select the most exciting crowdfunding project to fund.

Qualitative Rating of Lossy Compression for Aerial Imagery by Neutrosophic WASPAS Method

The monitoring and management of consistently changing landscape patterns are accomplished through a large amount of remote sensing data using satellite images and aerial photography that requires lossy compression for effective storage and transmission. Lossy compression brings the necessity to evaluate the image quality to preserve the important and detailed visual features of the data. We proposed and verified a weighted combination of qualitative parameters for the multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) framework to evaluate the quality of the compressed aerial images. The aerial imagery of different contents and resolutions was tested using the transform-based lossy compression algorithms. We formulated an MCDM problem dedicated to the rating of lossy compression algorithms, governed by the set of qualitative parameters of the images and visually acceptable lossy compression ratios. We performed the lossy compression algorithms’ ranking with different compression ratios by their suitability for the aerial images using the neutrosophic weighted aggregated sum product assessment (WASPAS) method. The novelty of our methodology is the use of a weighted combination of different qualitative parameters for lossy compression estimation to get a more precise evaluation of the effect of lossy compression on the image content. Our methodology includes means of solving different subtasks, either by altering the weights or the set of aspects.

A Study of the Neutrosophic Set Significance on Deep Transfer Learning Models: an Experimental Case on a Limited COVID-19 Chest X-ray Dataset

Coronavirus, also known as COVID-19, has spread to several countries around the world. It was announced as a pandemic disease by The World Health Organization (WHO) in 2020 for its devastating impact on humans. With the advancements in computer science algorithms, the detection of this type of virus in the early stages is urgently needed for the fast recovery of patients. In this paper, a study of neutrosophic set significance on deep transfer learning models will be presented. The study will be conducted over a limited COVID-19 x-ray. The study relies on neutrosophic set and theory to convert the medical images from the grayscale spatial domain to the neutrosophic domain. The neutrosophic domain consists of three types of images, and they are the True (T) images, the Indeterminacy (I) images, and the Falsity (F) images. The dataset used in this research has been collected from different sources. The dataset is classified into four classes {COVID-19, normal, pneumonia bacterial, and pneumonia virus}. This study aims to review the effect of neutrosophic sets on deep transfer learning models. The selected deep learning models in this study are Alexnet, Googlenet, and Restnet18. Those models are selected as they have a small number of layers on their architectures. To test the performance of the conversion to the neutrosophic domain, more than 36 trials have been conducted and recorded. A combination of training and testing strategies by splitting the dataset into (90-10%, 80-20%, 70-30) is included in the experiments. Four domains of images are tested, and they are, the original domain, the True (T) domain, the Indeterminacy (I) domain, and the Falsity (F) domain. The four domains with the different training and testing strategies were tested using the selected deep transfer models. According to the experimental results, the Indeterminacy (I) neutrosophic domain achieves the highest accuracy possible with 87.1% in the testing accuracy and performance metrics such as Precision, Recall, and F1 Score. The study concludes that using the neutrosophic set with deep learning models may be an encouraging transition to achieve better testing accuracy, especially with limited COVID-19 datasets.

MULTIMOORA under Interval-Valued Neutrosophic Sets as the Basis for the Quantitative Heuristic Evaluation Methodology HEBIN

During the last decade, researchers put a lot of effort into the development of the multi-criteria decision methods (MCDM) capable of dealing with the uncertainty and vagueness of the initial information. MCDM approaches that work under the environment of the interval-valued neutrosophic sets (IVNS) demonstrate credibility for the analysis of different opinions as well as for the inconsistency of the criteria evaluation data. The novel multicriteria decision-making approach MULTIMOORA-IVNS (multi-objective optimisation by ratio analysis under interval-valued neutrosophic sets) is presented in this paper. A novel heuristic evaluation methodology HEBIN (heuristic evaluation based on interval numbers) that exploits MULTIMOORA-IVNS for the processing of the evaluation results is also presented in this research. HEBIN is able to increase the accuracy of the checklists-based heuristic evaluation and to diminish the impact of the inconsistencies caused by the evaluators. A comparison of six e-commerce websites is introduced to reveal the practicalities of the proposed multicriteria decision-making application.

VASMA Weighting: Survey-Based Criteria Weighting Methodology that Combines ENTROPY and WASPAS-SVNS to Reflect the Psychometric Features of the VAS Scales

Data symmetry and asymmetry might cause difficulties in various areas including criteria weighting approaches. Preference elicitation is an integral part of the multicriteria decision-making process. Weighting approaches differ in terms of accuracy, ease of use, complexity, and theoretical foundations. When the opinions of the wider audience are needed, electronic surveys with the matrix questions consisting of the visual analogue scales (VAS) might be employed as the easily understandable data collection tool. The novel criteria weighting technique VASMA weighting (VAS Matrix for the criteria weighting) is presented in this paper. It respects the psychometric features of the VAS scales and analyzes the uncertainties caused by the survey-based preference elicitation. VASMA weighting integrates WASPAS-SVNS for the determination of the subjective weights and Shannon entropy for the calculation of the objective weights. Numerical example analyzing the importance of the criteria that affect parents’ decisions regarding the choice of the kindergarten institution was performed as the practical application. Comparison of the VASMA weighting and the direct rating (DR) methodologies was done. It revealed that VASMA weighting is able to overcome the main disadvantages of the DR technique—the high biases of the collected data and the low variation of the criteria weights.

Subpixel Localization of Isolated Edges and Streaks in Digital Images

Many modern sensing systems rely on the accurate extraction of measurement data from digital images. The localization of edges and streaks in digital images is an important example of this type of measurement, with these techniques appearing in many image processing pipelines. Several approaches attempt to solve this problem at both the pixel level and subpixel level. While the subpixel methods are often necessary for applications requiring best-possible accuracy, they are often susceptible to noise, use iterative methods, or require pre-processing. This work investigates a unified framework for subpixel edge and streak localization using Zernike moments with ramp-based and wedge-based signal models. The method described here is found to outperform the current state-of-the-art for digital images with common signal-to-noise ratios. Performance is demonstrated on both synthetic and real images.