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Homayoun Najjaran

Publications and source records attributed to Homayoun Najjaran.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

A Task-Driven Evaluation of UAV Detection and Tracking under Synthetic Fog

Fog severely degrades the visibility of small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in skydominant, long-range imagery, reducing the reliability of downstream detection and tracking. This paper presents a task-driven evaluation framework that links depth-aware synthetic fog generation, image restoration, object detection, and tracking within a unified pipeline. Given the practical difficulty of collecting and annotating foggy UAV scenes, synthetic fog is generated from real clear-weather outdoor images containing UAV targets using monocular depth estimation and the atmospheric scattering model. Representative restoration methods from classical, convolutional neural network (CNN)-based, and transformer-based families are first compared, after which the selected restoration model is integrated into the downstream perception pipeline. Detection is evaluated under both clean-only and fog-inclusive training regimes using multiple detector variants, while tracking-by-detection is assessed on clean, foggy, and restored video sequences. Beyond image-level restoration metrics, the study evaluates how fog and restoration affect detection robustness and tracking performance. The results show that fog substantially degrades both detection and tracking, primarily through increased missed detections. Fog-inclusive training provides the most consistent improvement in robustness, whereas test-time restoration is most beneficial when the detector has been trained only on clean imagery. These findings show that restoration quality does not necessarily translate into proportional gains in downstream perception and therefore should be evaluated jointly with detection and tracking performance.

cs.CV

SMAC-Talk: A Natural Language Extension of the StarCraft Multi-Agent Challenge for Large Language Models

As LLMs become more widely deployed, they are increasingly expected to work alongside other AI agents rather than operating in isolation. Effective coordination in these settings requires agents to communicate, share information and make decisions under uncertainty. We introduce SMAC-Talk, a natural language extension of the StarCraft Multi-Agent Challenge for evaluating LLM-based agents in cooperative multi-agent environments. The environment has several key features such as decentralized control, partial observability and long-horizon decision making. SMAC-Talk includes a natural language communication channel which is used to probe agent coordination and trust. We use this communication channel to construct different evaluation scenarios, including settings with an embedded deceptive communicator that tries to disrupt and deceive allies through communication alone. We provide three agents for benchmarking using 4 models from the Qwen3.5 family and study how reasoning structure, memory and model scale affect coordination between agents. We release SMAC-Talk as an open benchmark to support the research community in developing and evaluating LLM agents in cooperative multi-agent settings.

cs.AI

A Hybrid Intelligent Framework for Uncertainty-Aware Condition Monitoring of Industrial Systems

Hybrid approaches that combine data-driven learning with physics-based insight have shown promise for improving the reliability of industrial condition monitoring. This work develops a hybrid condition monitoring framework that integrates primary sensor measurements, lagged temporal features, and physics-informed residuals derived from nominal surrogate models. Two hybrid integration strategies are examined. The first is a feature-level fusion approach that augments the input space with residual and temporal information. The second is a model-level ensemble approach in which machine learning classifiers trained on different feature types are combined at the decision level. Both hybrid approaches of the condition monitoring framework are evaluated on a continuous stirred-tank reactor (CSTR) benchmark using several machine learning models and ensemble configurations. Both feature-level and model-level hybridization improve diagnostic accuracy relative to single-source baselines, with the best model-level ensemble achieving a 2.9\% improvement over the best baseline ensemble. To assess predictive reliability, conformal prediction is applied to quantify coverage, prediction-set size, and abstention behavior. The results show that hybrid integration enhances uncertainty management, producing smaller and well-calibrated prediction sets at matched coverage levels. These findings demonstrate that lightweight physics-informed residuals, temporal augmentation, and ensemble learning can be combined effectively to improve both accuracy and decision reliability in nonlinear industrial systems.

cs.LG

An Innovative Next Activity Prediction Using Process Entropy and Dynamic Attribute-Wise-Transformer in Predictive Business Process Monitoring

Next activity prediction in predictive business process monitoring is crucial for operational efficiency and informed decision-making. While machine learning and Artificial Intelligence have achieved promising results, challenges remain in balancing interpretability and accuracy, particularly due to the complexity and evolving nature of event logs. This paper presents two contributions: (i) an entropy-based model selection framework that quantifies dataset complexity to recommend suitable algorithms, and (ii) the DAW-Transformer (Dynamic Attribute-Wise Transformer), which integrates multi-head attention with a dynamic windowing mechanism to capture long-range dependencies across all attributes. Experiments on six public event logs show that the DAW-Transformer achieves superior performance on high-entropy datasets (e.g., Sepsis, Filtered Hospital Logs), whereas interpretable methods like Decision Trees perform competitively on low-entropy datasets (e.g., BPIC 2020 Prepaid Travel Costs). These results highlight the importance of aligning model choice with dataset entropy to balance accuracy and interpretability.

cs.LG

Sub-Region-Aware Modality Fusion and Adaptive Prompting for Multi-Modal Brain Tumor Segmentation

The successful adaptation of foundation models to multi-modal medical imaging is a critical yet unresolved challenge. Existing models often struggle to effectively fuse information from multiple sources and adapt to the heterogeneous nature of pathological tissues. To address this, we introduce a novel framework for adapting foundation models to multi-modal medical imaging, featuring two key technical innovations: sub-region-aware modality attention and adaptive prompt engineering. The attention mechanism enables the model to learn the optimal combination of modalities for each tumor sub-region, while the adaptive prompting strategy leverages the inherent capabilities of foundation models to refine segmentation accuracy. We validate our framework on the BraTS 2020 brain tumor segmentation dataset, demonstrating that our approach significantly outperforms baseline methods, particularly in the challenging necrotic core sub-region. Our work provides a principled and effective approach to multi-modal fusion and prompting, paving the way for more accurate and robust foundation model-based solutions in medical imaging.

cs.CV

Context Representation via Action-Free Transformer encoder-decoder for Meta Reinforcement Learning

Reinforcement learning (RL) enables robots to operate in uncertain environments, but standard approaches often struggle with poor generalization to unseen tasks. Context-adaptive meta reinforcement learning addresses these limitations by conditioning on the task representation, yet they mostly rely on complete action information in the experience making task inference tightly coupled to a specific policy. This paper introduces Context Representation via Action Free Transformer encoder decoder (CRAFT), a belief model that infers task representations solely from sequences of states and rewards. By removing the dependence on actions, CRAFT decouples task inference from policy optimization, supports modular training, and leverages amortized variational inference for scalable belief updates. Built on a transformer encoder decoder with rotary positional embeddings, the model captures long range temporal dependencies and robustly encodes both parametric and non-parametric task variations. Experiments on the MetaWorld ML-10 robotic manipulation benchmark show that CRAFT achieves faster adaptation, improved generalization, and more effective exploration compared to context adaptive meta--RL baselines. These findings highlight the potential of action-free inference as a foundation for scalable RL in robotic control.

cs.RO

A Cross-Environment and Cross-Embodiment Path Planning Framework via a Conditional Diffusion Model

Path planning for a robotic system in high-dimensional cluttered environments needs to be efficient, safe, and adaptable for different environments and hardware. Conventional methods face high computation time and require extensive parameter tuning, while prior learning-based methods still fail to generalize effectively. The primary goal of this research is to develop a path planning framework capable of generalizing to unseen environments and new robotic manipulators without the need for retraining. We present GADGET (Generalizable and Adaptive Diffusion-Guided Environment-aware Trajectory generation), a diffusion-based planning model that generates joint-space trajectories conditioned on voxelized scene representations as well as start and goal configurations. A key innovation is GADGET's hybrid dual-conditioning mechanism that combines classifier-free guidance via learned scene encoding with classifier-guided Control Barrier Function (CBF) safety shaping, integrating environment awareness with real-time collision avoidance directly in the denoising process. This design supports zero-shot transfer to new environments and robotic embodiments without retraining. Experimental results show that GADGET achieves high success rates with low collision intensity in spherical-obstacle, bin-picking, and shelf environments, with CBF guidance further improving safety. Moreover, comparative evaluations indicate strong performance relative to both sampling-based and learning-based baselines. Furthermore, GADGET provides transferability across Franka Panda, Kinova Gen3 (6/7-DoF), and UR5 robots, and physical execution on a Kinova Gen3 demonstrates its ability to generate safe, collision-free trajectories in real-world settings.

cs.RO

Sample-Efficient Reinforcement Learning with Symmetry-Guided Demonstrations for Robotic Manipulation

Reinforcement learning (RL) suffers from low sample efficiency, particularly in high-dimensional continuous state-action spaces of complex robotic manipulation tasks. RL performance can improve by leveraging prior knowledge, even when demonstrations are limited and collected from simplified environments. To address this, we define General Abstract Symmetry (GAS) for aggregating demonstrations from symmetrical abstract partitions of the robot environment. We introduce Demo-EASE, a novel training framework using a dual-buffer architecture that stores both demonstrations and RL-generated experiences. Demo-EASE improves sample efficiency through symmetry-guided demonstrations and behavior cloning, enabling strong initialization and balanced exploration-exploitation. Demo-EASE is compatible with both on-policy and off-policy RL algorithms, supporting various training regimes. We evaluate our framework in three simulation experiments using a Kinova Gen3 robot with joint-space control within PyBullet. Our results show that Demo-EASE significantly accelerates convergence and improves final performance compared to standard RL baselines, demonstrating its potential for efficient real-world robotic manipulation learning.

cs.RO

Intelligent Condition Monitoring of Industrial Plants: An Overview of Methodologies and Uncertainty Management Strategies

Condition monitoring is essential for ensuring the safety, reliability, and efficiency of modern industrial systems. With the increasing complexity of industrial processes, artificial intelligence (AI) has emerged as a powerful tool for fault detection and diagnosis, attracting growing interest from both academia and industry. This paper provides a comprehensive overview of intelligent condition monitoring methods, with a particular emphasis on chemical plants and the widely used Tennessee Eastman Process (TEP) benchmark. State-of-the-art machine learning (ML) and deep learning (DL) algorithms are reviewed, highlighting their strengths, limitations, and applicability to industrial fault detection and diagnosis. Special attention is given to key challenges, including imbalanced and unlabeled data, and to strategies by which models can address these issues. Furthermore, comparative analyses of algorithm performance are presented to guide method selection in practical scenarios. This survey is intended to benefit both newcomers and experienced researchers by consolidating fundamental concepts, summarizing recent advances, and outlining open challenges and promising directions for intelligent condition monitoring in industrial plants.

cs.LG

A Study of the Framework and Real-World Applications of Language Embedding for 3D Scene Understanding

Gaussian Splatting has rapidly emerged as a transformative technique for real-time 3D scene representation, offering a highly efficient and expressive alternative to Neural Radiance Fields (NeRF). Its ability to render complex scenes with high fidelity has enabled progress across domains such as scene reconstruction, robotics, and interactive content creation. More recently, the integration of Large Language Models (LLMs) and language embeddings into Gaussian Splatting pipelines has opened new possibilities for text-conditioned generation, editing, and semantic scene understanding. Despite these advances, a comprehensive overview of this emerging intersection has been lacking. This survey presents a structured review of current research efforts that combine language guidance with 3D Gaussian Splatting, detailing theoretical foundations, integration strategies, and real-world use cases. We highlight key limitations such as computational bottlenecks, generalizability, and the scarcity of semantically annotated 3D Gaussian data and outline open challenges and future directions for advancing language-guided 3D scene understanding using Gaussian Splatting.

cs.GR

A Deep Dive into Generic Object Tracking: A Survey

Generic object tracking remains an important yet challenging task in computer vision due to complex spatio-temporal dynamics, especially in the presence of occlusions, similar distractors, and appearance variations. Over the past two decades, a wide range of tracking paradigms, including Siamese-based trackers, discriminative trackers, and, more recently, prominent transformer-based approaches, have been introduced to address these challenges. While a few existing survey papers in this field have either concentrated on a single category or widely covered multiple ones to capture progress, our paper presents a comprehensive review of all three categories, with particular emphasis on the rapidly evolving transformer-based methods. We analyze the core design principles, innovations, and limitations of each approach through both qualitative and quantitative comparisons. Our study introduces a novel categorization and offers a unified visual and tabular comparison of representative methods. Additionally, we organize existing trackers from multiple perspectives and summarize the major evaluation benchmarks, highlighting the fast-paced advancements in transformer-based tracking driven by their robust spatio-temporal modeling capabilities.

cs.CV

LesionGen: A Concept-Guided Diffusion Model for Dermatology Image Synthesis

Deep learning models for skin disease classification require large, diverse, and well-annotated datasets. However, such resources are often limited due to privacy concerns, high annotation costs, and insufficient demographic representation. While text-to-image diffusion probabilistic models (T2I-DPMs) offer promise for medical data synthesis, their use in dermatology remains underexplored, largely due to the scarcity of rich textual descriptions in existing skin image datasets. In this work, we introduce LesionGen, a clinically informed T2I-DPM framework for dermatology image synthesis. Unlike prior methods that rely on simplistic disease labels, LesionGen is trained on structured, concept-rich dermatological captions derived from expert annotations and pseudo-generated, concept-guided reports. By fine-tuning a pretrained diffusion model on these high-quality image-caption pairs, we enable the generation of realistic and diverse skin lesion images conditioned on meaningful dermatological descriptions. Our results demonstrate that models trained solely on our synthetic dataset achieve classification accuracy comparable to those trained on real images, with notable gains in worst-case subgroup performance. Code and data are available here.

eess.IV

Object Recognition Datasets and Challenges: A Review

Object recognition is among the fundamental tasks in the computer vision applications, paving the path for all other image understanding operations. In every stage of progress in object recognition research, efforts have been made to collect and annotate new datasets to match the capacity of the state-of-the-art algorithms. In recent years, the importance of the size and quality of datasets has been intensified as the utility of the emerging deep network techniques heavily relies on training data. Furthermore, datasets lay a fair benchmarking means for competitions and have proved instrumental to the advancements of object recognition research by providing quantifiable benchmarks for the developed models. Taking a closer look at the characteristics of commonly-used public datasets seems to be an important first step for data-driven and machine learning researchers. In this survey, we provide a detailed analysis of datasets in the highly investigated object recognition areas. More than 160 datasets have been scrutinized through statistics and descriptions. Additionally, we present an overview of the prominent object recognition benchmarks and competitions, along with a description of the metrics widely adopted for evaluation purposes in the computer vision community. All introduced datasets and challenges can be found online at github.com/AbtinDjavadifar/ORDC.

cs.CV

An Innovative Data-Driven and Adaptive Reinforcement Learning Approach for Context-Aware Prescriptive Process Monitoring

The application of artificial intelligence and machine learning in business process management has advanced significantly, however, the full potential of these technologies remains largely unexplored, primarily due to challenges related to data quality and availability. We present a novel framework called Fine-Tuned Offline Reinforcement Learning Augmented Process Sequence Optimization (FORLAPS), which aims to identify optimal execution paths in business processes by leveraging reinforcement learning enhanced with a state-dependent reward shaping mechanism, thereby enabling context-sensitive prescriptions. Additionally, to compare FORLAPS with the existing models (Permutation Feature Importance and multi-task Long Short Term Memory model), we experimented to evaluate its effectiveness in terms of resource savings and process time reduction. The experimental results on real-life event logs validate that FORLAPS achieves 31% savings in resource time spent and a 23% reduction in process time span. To further enhance learning, we introduce an innovative process-aware data augmentation technique that selectively increases the average estimated Q-values in sampled batches, enabling automatic fine-tuning of the reinforcement learning model. Robustness was assessed through both prefix-level and trace-level evaluations, using the Damerau-Levenshtein distance as the primary metric. Finally, the model's adaptability across industries was further validated through diverse case studies, including healthcare treatment pathways, financial services workflows, permit applications from regulatory bodies, and operations management. In each domain, the proposed model demonstrated exceptional performance, outperforming existing state-of-the-art approaches in prescriptive decision-making, demonstrating its capability to prescribe optimal next steps and predict the best next activities within a process trace.

cs.LG

WQLCP: Weighted Adaptive Conformal Prediction for Robust Uncertainty Quantification Under Distribution Shifts

Conformal prediction (CP) provides a framework for constructing prediction sets with guaranteed coverage, assuming exchangeable data. However, real-world scenarios often involve distribution shifts that violate exchangeability, leading to unreliable coverage and inflated prediction sets. To address this challenge, we first introduce Reconstruction Loss-Scaled Conformal Prediction (RLSCP), which utilizes reconstruction losses derived from a Variational Autoencoder (VAE) as an uncertainty metric to scale score functions. While RLSCP demonstrates performance improvements, mainly resulting in better coverage, it quantifies quantiles based on a fixed calibration dataset without considering the discrepancies between test and train datasets in an unexchangeable setting. In the next step, we propose Weighted Quantile Loss-scaled Conformal Prediction (WQLCP), which refines RLSCP by incorporating a weighted notion of exchangeability, adjusting the calibration quantile threshold based on weights with respect to the ratio of calibration and test loss values. This approach improves the CP-generated prediction set outputs in the presence of distribution shifts. Experiments on large-scale datasets, including ImageNet variants, demonstrate that WQLCP outperforms existing baselines by consistently maintaining coverage while reducing prediction set sizes, providing a robust solution for CP under distribution shifts.

cs.LG

From Flight to Insight: Semantic 3D Reconstruction for Aerial Inspection via Gaussian Splatting and Language-Guided Segmentation

High-fidelity 3D reconstruction is critical for aerial inspection tasks such as infrastructure monitoring, structural assessment, and environmental surveying. While traditional photogrammetry techniques enable geometric modeling, they lack semantic interpretability, limiting their effectiveness for automated inspection workflows. Recent advances in neural rendering and 3D Gaussian Splatting (3DGS) offer efficient, photorealistic reconstructions but similarly lack scene-level understanding. In this work, we present a UAV-based pipeline that extends Feature-3DGS for language-guided 3D segmentation. We leverage LSeg-based feature fields with CLIP embeddings to generate heatmaps in response to language prompts. These are thresholded to produce rough segmentations, and the highest-scoring point is then used as a prompt to SAM or SAM2 for refined 2D segmentation on novel view renderings. Our results highlight the strengths and limitations of various feature field backbones (CLIP-LSeg, SAM, SAM2) in capturing meaningful structure in large-scale outdoor environments. We demonstrate that this hybrid approach enables flexible, language-driven interaction with photorealistic 3D reconstructions, opening new possibilities for semantic aerial inspection and scene understanding.

cs.GR

Domain Adaptive Skin Lesion Classification via Conformal Ensemble of Vision Transformers

Exploring the trustworthiness of deep learning models is crucial, especially in critical domains such as medical imaging decision support systems. Conformal prediction has emerged as a rigorous means of providing deep learning models with reliable uncertainty estimates and safety guarantees. However, conformal prediction results face challenges due to the backbone model's struggles in domain-shifted scenarios, such as variations in different sources. To aim this challenge, this paper proposes a novel framework termed Conformal Ensemble of Vision Transformers (CE-ViTs) designed to enhance image classification performance by prioritizing domain adaptation and model robustness, while accounting for uncertainty. The proposed method leverages an ensemble of vision transformer models in the backbone, trained on diverse datasets including HAM10000, Dermofit, and Skin Cancer ISIC datasets. This ensemble learning approach, calibrated through the combined mentioned datasets, aims to enhance domain adaptation through conformal learning. Experimental results underscore that the framework achieves a high coverage rate of 90.38\%, representing an improvement of 9.95\% compared to the HAM10000 model. This indicates a strong likelihood that the prediction set includes the true label compared to singular models. Ensemble learning in CE-ViTs significantly improves conformal prediction performance, increasing the average prediction set size for challenging misclassified samples from 1.86 to 3.075.

cs.CV

Feature-Weighted MMD-CORAL for Domain Adaptation in Power Transformer Fault Diagnosis

Ensuring the reliable operation of power transformers is critical to grid stability. Dissolved Gas Analysis (DGA) is widely used for fault diagnosis, but traditional methods rely on heuristic rules, which may lead to inconsistent results. Machine learning (ML)-based approaches have improved diagnostic accuracy; however, power transformers operate under varying conditions, and differences in transformer type, environmental factors, and operational settings create distribution shifts in diagnostic data. Consequently, direct model transfer between transformers often fails, making techniques for domain adaptation a necessity. To tackle this issue, this work proposes a feature-weighted domain adaptation technique that combines Maximum Mean Discrepancy (MMD) and Correlation Alignment (CORAL) with feature-specific weighting (MCW). Kolmogorov-Smirnov (K-S) statistics are used to assign adaptable weights, prioritizing features with larger distributional discrepancies and thereby improving source and target domain alignment. Experimental evaluations on datasets for power transformers demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method, which achieves a 7.9% improvement over Fine-Tuning and a 2.2% improvement over MMD-CORAL (MC). Furthermore, it outperforms both techniques across various training sample sizes, confirming its robustness for domain adaptation.

cs.LG