Книги з теми "Classification based on generative models"

The material of module 2 "Electronics" is systematically presented in accordance with the modern university program of the discipline " Electrical Engineering and Electronics" for non-electrotechnical areas of training of bachelors and certified specialists. The element base of semiconductor electronics devices is considered: classification, voltage and frequency characteristics, features of the use of electronic devices in various operating modes are given. The principles of construction and functioning of typical analog, pulse and digital devices are described in detail. A separate chapter is devoted to the principles of converting light energy into electrical energy and vice versa, the design and operation of optoelectronic devices and fiber- optic lines of information transmission. Meets the requirements of the federal state educational standards of higher education of the latest generation. For students of higher educational institutions studying in non-electro- technical areas of bachelor's and graduate training.

The textbook describes the design features of offshore horizontal multi-hole production wells, as well as the bottom-hole components of horizontal multi-hole wells. The classification of complications of multi-hole horizontal wells, methods of their prevention and elimination are given. Methods of underground geonavigation of the development of offshore horizontal production wells are proposed. The geological and field bases of operation of horizontal offshore multi-hole oil and gas wells, modes and dynamics of oil, gas and associated water production, methods for calculating dynamic bottom-hole and reservoir pressures are specified. The technologies of operation of offshore horizontal multi-hole wells are presented. The composition and scope of environmental, field and research marine monitoring of the operation of offshore horizontal multi-hole wells and the protection of the marine environment in the production of oil and gas are justified. Meets the requirements of the federal state educational standards of higher education of the latest generation. It is intended for undergraduates of the enlarged group of "Earth Sciences" training areas, as well as for teachers, employees of the fuel and energy complex, industrial geological exploration and oil and gas production enterprises, scientific and design organizations.

The modern methods of assessing geological reserves and resources of oil, gas and condensate, concepts and criteria for allocating categories of reserves and resources in accordance with the properties of oils, gases and condensates, which are scientifically based on the international market, are described. For the first time, the calculation of the stocks of commercial products contained in the composition of oil, gas and condensate is given. The categories of reserves and resources according to Russian and foreign classifications are compared. The state of hydrocarbon reserves by countries and continents is described. The interrelationships of the stages of geological exploration with the calculation technologies and categories of reserves and resources are clarified. The ecological tasks of exploration and development of hydrocarbons are highlighted. The main directions and technologies of oil, gas and condensate refining, which are an integral stage of calculating and developing reserves, are given. At the end of each chapter, control questions and tasks are given to assess the level of knowledge and the volume of assimilation of materials. Meets the requirements of the federal state standards of higher education of the latest generation. It is intended for undergraduates of the "Geology" direction, graduate students of the "Earth Sciences" direction, students and teachers of universities, specialists in the exploration and processing of oil, gas and condensate, employees of the fuel and energy complex.

Presents the current status in modelling of metallurgical processes considered by the model the mathematical model used in the description of the processes of copper production and their classification. Set out a system of methods and models in the field of mathematical modeling of technological processes, including balance sheet, statistics, optimization models, forecasting models and predictive models. For specific technological processes are developed: the model of the balance of the cycle of pyrometallurgical production of copper, polynomial model for prediction of matte composition on the basis of the passive experiment, predictive model of quantitative estimation of the copper content in the matte based on fuzzy logic. Of interest to students, postgraduates, teachers of technical universities, engineers and research workers who use mathematical methods for processing of data of laboratory and industrial experiments.

The monograph is devoted to the issues of risk management in the organizations of the investment and construction complex. The issues of risk classification are consistently considered, approaches to determining the types and types of risks are established. Attention is paid to approaches to the construction of a risk management mechanism and the specifics of the impact on the identified risks in terms of minimizing possible damage. The issues of state regulation are highlighted, a complex economic problem related to the study of the effectiveness of the chosen strategy of real investment projects based on the use of various methods and models of risk analysis is considered. Modern educational and methodological materials tested in the practice of enterprises and organizations of the construction complex of Moscow and the Moscow region were used. For a wide range of readers interested in the issues of risk management in construction. It will be useful for students, postgraduates and teachers of economic universities.

The book describes the basic issues concerning consumer behavior on the basis of the simulation of the decision-making process on buying behavior of customers in the sales area of the store and shopping Internet sites. The classification of models of consumer behavior, based on research in the area of economic, social and psychological theories and empirical evidence regarding decision-making by consumers when purchasing the goods, including online stores. Methods of qualitative and quantitative research of consumer behavior, fundamentals of statistical processing of empirical data. Attention is paid to the processes of consumers ' perception of brands (brands) and advertising messages, the basic rules for the display of goods (merchandising) and its impact on consumer decision, recommendations on the use of psychology of consumer behavior in personal sales. Presents an integrated model of consumer behavior in the Internet environment, the process of perception of the visitor of the company, the factors influencing consumer choice of goods online. Is intended for preparation of bachelors in directions of preparation 38.03.02 "Management", 38.03.06 "trading business" and can be used for training of bachelors in direction of training 43.03.01 "Service", and will also be useful for professionals working in the field of marketing, distribution and sales.

The monograph discusses the application of telematics in dispatch control systems in urban passenger transport. The role of telematics as a technological basis in automating the solution of control tasks, accounting and analysis of the volume and quality of transport work in modern dispatch control systems on urban passenger transport is shown. Analytical models have been developed to estimate the capacity of a high-speed bus transportation system on a dedicated line. Mathematical models and algorithms for predicting passenger vehicle interior filling at critical stages of urban passenger transport routes are presented. The issues of application of the concept of the phase space of states introduced by the authors to assess the quality of the passenger transportation process on the route of urban passenger transport are described. The developed classification of service levels and their application in order to inform passengers at stopping points about the degree of filling of the passenger compartment of the arriving vehicle is described. The material is based on the results of theoretical research and practical work on the creation and implementation of automated control systems for urban passenger transport in Russian cities. The material of M.H. Duque Sarango's dissertation submitted for the degree of Candidate of Technical Sciences in the specialty 05.22.10 "Operation of motor transport" was used. It will be useful to specialists in the field of telematics on urban passenger transport.

In the monograph reviewed the development of the inventory management of railway transport in the new economic environment of market economy. According to the results of theoretical research, innovative and production potential of the supply system of railway transport the main directions and methods of transformation of the restructuring process under the corporate changes of JSC "RZD", positioned value system of the logistics of railway transportation, and developed a classification model used logistical resources. Evaluation of activity of structural divisions of Russian Railways supply is proposed to be viewed through an integrated and comprehensive approach to the development of systems of balanced indicators of supply and prompt handling of material resources, the implementation of which allows to distribute the strategic objectives of the company "Russian Railways" activities in the system of logistics of the Railways and also to involve in economic circulation of excessive and unused inventories of material and technical resources and efficiently reallocate them among enterprises at the site of the railway. Recommendations for the implementation of the developed algorithms and models are long term in nature and are based on the concept of logistics management and improve the business processes of the logistics system. Will be useful for managers and specialists of directorates of logistics of Russian Railways supply, undergraduates and graduate students interested in the economy of railway transport.

The purpose of this chapter is to elucidate the key issues regarding the classification of eating disorders. To this end, a review of nosological research in the area of eating disorders is presented, with a particular focus on empirically based techniques such as taxometric analysis, latent class analysis, and factor mixture modeling. This is followed by a section outlining areas of overlap between the current Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders–Fifth Edition (DSM-5) eating disorder categories and their symptoms. Next, eating disorder classification models that are alternatives to the DSM-5 are described and critically examined in light of available empirical data. Finally, areas of controversy and considerations for change in next version of the DSM (i.e., the applicability of DSM criteria to minority groups, children, and males; the question of whether clinical categories should be differentiated from research categories) are discussed.

This chapter explores how mechanisms and their constituents can be classified into kinds. It argues for a weakly realist account of natural kinds—one which suggests that classification into kinds is based upon real similarities between instances of those kinds, but which denies that kinds have essences or have some reality apart from their instances. I introduce a models-first account of kinds, which suggests that two things are of the same kind to the extent that they can be represented by the same model. Because target entities can be represented by multiple models, they will belong to multiple kinds. I illustrate the approach by showing how the entities and activities that make up mechanisms can be classified into kinds.

While bottom-up visual processing is important, the brain integrates this information with top-down, generative expectations from very early on in the visual processing hierarchy. Indeed, our brain should not be viewed as a classification system, but rather as a generative system, which perceives something by integrating sensory evidence with the available, learned, predictive knowledge about that thing. The involved generative models continuously produce expectations over time, across space, and from abstracted encodings to more concrete encodings. Bayesian information processing is the key to understand how information integration must work computationally – at least in approximation – also in the brain. Bayesian networks in the form of graphical models allow the modularization of information and the factorization of interactions, which can strongly improve the efficiency of generative models. The resulting generative models essentially produce state estimations in the form of probability densities, which are very well-suited to integrate multiple sources of information, including top-down and bottom-up ones. A hierarchical neural visual processing architecture illustrates this point even further. Finally, some well-known visual illusions are shown and the perceptions are explained by means of generative, information integrating, perceptual processes, which in all cases combine top-down prior knowledge and expectations about objects and environments with the available, bottom-up visual information.

The Droseraceae belongs to the botanical order Nepenthales and comprises three genera: Drosera (sundews) with adhesive traps; and the sister genera Dionaea (Venus’ flytrap) and Aldrovanda (waterwheel plant), each of which evolved snap-traps. Vegetative and generative morphology of each genus are illustrated and interpreted based on phylogenetic evidence. Phylogeny, evolutionary history, and infrageneric classification of Drosera are discussed in light of molecular phylogenetic data, and illustrated with phylogenetic trees and maps of their distribution.

In this chapter we explain how methods from statistical language processing serve as a foundation for the design of probabilistic text entry methods and error correction methods. We review concepts from information theory and language modelling and explain how to design a statistical decoder for text entry—a generative probabilistic model based on the token-passing paradigm. We then present five example applications of statistical language processing for text entry: correcting typing mistakes, enabling fast typing on a smartwatch, improving prediction in augmentative and alternative communication, enabling dwell-free eye-typing and intelligently supporting error correction of probabilistic text entry. We then discuss the limitations of the models presented in this chapter and highlight the importance of establishing solution principles based on engineering science and empirical research in order to guide the design of probabilistic text entry.

With the rise of new scholarly paradigms in the study of Native American histories and cultures, and the emergence of the Native South as a key concept in US southern studies, the time is more than ripe for a critical reassessment of Native sites, characters, communities, customs, narratives, ways of knowing, and other indigenous elements in the writings of William Faulkner—and of Faulkner’s significance for Native American writers, artists, and intellectuals. From new insights into the Chickasaw sources and far-reaching implications of Faulkner’s fictional place-name “Yoknapatawpha,” to discussions that reveal the potential for indigenous land-, family-, and story-based worldviews to deepen understanding of Faulkner’s fiction (including but not limited to the novels and stories he devoted explicitly to Indian topics), the eleven essays of this volume take the critical analysis of Faulkner’s Native South and the Native South’s Faulkner beyond no-longer generative assessments of the historical accuracy of his Native representations or the colonial hybridity of his Indian characters, turning instead to indigenous intellectual culture for new models, problems, and questions to bring to Faulkner studies. Along the way, readers are treated to illuminating comparisons between Faulkner’s writings and the work of a number of Native American authors, filmmakers, tribal leaders, and historical figures. Faulkner and the Native South brings together Native and non-Native scholars in a stimulating and often surprising critical dialogue about the indigenous wellsprings of Faulkner’s creative energies and about Faulkner’s own complicated presence in Native American literary history.

Since the late eighteenth century, writers and thinkers have used the idea of love—often unrequited or impossible love—to comment on the changing cultural, social, and political position of Jews in the German-speaking countries. This book asks what it means for literature (and philosophy) to use love between individuals as a metaphor for group relations. This question is of renewed interest today, when theorists of multiculturalism turn toward love in their search for new models of particularity and universality. The book is structured around two transformative moments in German Jewish culture and history that produced particularly rich clusters of interfaith love stories. Around 1800, literature promoted the rise of the Romantic love ideal and the shift from prearranged to love-based marriages. In the German-speaking countries, this change in the theory and practice of love coincided with the beginnings of Jewish emancipation, and both its supporters and opponents linked their arguments to tropes of love. The book explores the generative powers of such tropes in Moses Mendelssohn, G. E. Lessing, Friedrich Schlegel, Dorothea Veit, and Achim von Arnim. Around 1900, the rise of racial antisemitism had called into question the promises of emancipation and led to a crisis of German Jewish identity. At the same time, Jewish-Christian intermarriage prompted public debates that were tied up with racial discourses and concerns about procreation, heredity, and the mutability and immutability of the Jewish body. The text shows how modern German Jewish writers such as Arthur Schnitzler, Else Lasker-Schüler, and Franz Rosenzweig wrestle with this idea of love away from biologist thought and reinstate it as a model of sociopolitical relations. It concludes by tracing the relevance of this model in post-Holocaust works by Gershom Scholem, Hannah Arendt, and Barbara Honigmann.

This book presents a unified approach to evolutionary psychopathology, and advances an integrative framework for the analysis and classification of mental disorders based on the concepts of life history theory. The framework does not aim to replace existing evolutionary models of specific disorders—which are reviewed and critically discussed in the book—but to connect them in a broader perspective and explain the large-scale patterns of risk and comorbidity that characterize psychopathology. The life history framework permits a seamless integration of mental disorders with normative individual differences in personality and cognition, and offers new conceptual tools for the analysis of developmental, genetic, and neurobiological data. The concepts synthesized in the book are used to derive a new taxonomy of mental disorders, the fast-slow-defense (FSD) model. The FSD model is the first classification system explicitly based on evolutionary concepts, a biologically grounded alternative to transdiagnostic models based on empirical correlations between symptoms. The book reviews a wide range of common mental disorders, discusses their classification in the FSD model, and identifies functional subtypes within existing diagnostic categories.

For more than 2000 years Greek philosophers have thought about the puzzling introspectively assessed dichotomy between our physical bodies and our seemingly non-physical minds. How is it that we can think highly abstract thoughts, seemingly fully detached from actual, physical reality? Despite the obvious interactions between mind and body (we get tired, we are hungry, we stay up late despite being tired, etc.), until today it remains puzzling how our mind controls our body, and vice versa, how our body shapes our mind. Despite a big movement towards embodied cognitive science over the last 20 years or so, introductory books with a functional and computational perspective on how human thought and language capabilities may actually have come about – and are coming about over and over again – are missing. This book fills that gap. Starting with a historical background on traditional cognitive science and resulting fundamental challenges that have not been resolved, embodied cognitive science is introduced and its implications for how human minds have come and continue to come into being are detailed. In particular, the book shows that evolution has produced biological bodies that provide “morphologically intelligent” structures, which foster the development of suitable behavioral and cognitive capabilities. While these capabilities can be modified and optimized given positive and negative reward as feedback, to reach abstract cognitive capabilities, evolution has furthermore produced particular anticipatory control-oriented mechanisms, which cause the development of particular types of predictive encodings, modularizations, and abstractions. Coupled with an embodied motivational system, versatile, goal-directed, self-motivated behavior, learning becomes possible. These lines of thought are introduced and detailed from interdisciplinary, evolutionary, ontogenetic, reinforcement learning, and anticipatory predictive encoding perspectives in the first part of the book. A short excursus then provides an introduction to neuroscience, including general knowledge about brain anatomy, and basic neural and brain functionality, as well as the main research methodologies. With reference to this knowledge, the subsequent chapters then focus on how the human brain manages to develop abstract thought and language. Sensory systems, motor systems, and their predictive, control-oriented interactions are detailed from a functional and computational perspective. Bayesian information processing is introduced along these lines as are generative models. Moreover, it is shown how particular modularizations can develop. When control and attention come into play, these structures develop also dependent on the available motor capabilities. Vice versa, the development of more versatile motor capabilities depends on structural development. Event-oriented abstractions enable conceptualizations and behavioral compositions, paving the path towards abstract thought and language. Also evolutionary drives towards social interactions play a crucial role. Based on the developing sensorimotor- and socially-grounded structures, the human mind becomes language ready. The development of language in each human child then further facilitates the self-motivated generation of abstract, compositional, highly flexible thought about the present, past, and future, as well as about others. In conclusion, the book gives an overview over how the human mind comes into being – sketching out a developmental pathway towards the mastery of abstract and reflective thought, while detailing the critical body and neural functionalities, and computational mechanisms, which enable this development.

The monograph considers the fundamentals of systems theory and mathematical modeling using the principles of the systems approach. In the monograph, much attention is paid to set-theoretic, dynamic, as well as aggregative and combined models. Based on the group-theoretical approach, a generalization of the theory of signals, their characteristics are considered, their classification and some theorems are carried out. A separate chapter is devoted to mathematical models of signal interaction with the propagation medium. The monograph also considers mathematical models of stochastic signal processing and control systems based on spline filtering, artificial intelligence models and neural networks. The monograph can be useful for a wide range of specialists in various fields of knowledge dealing with mathematical modeling in their research, and can also be used as a teaching aid for conducting both classroom and independent theoretical and practical classes with bachelors, masters, graduate students in the discipline "System Theory and System Analysis", "Mathematical Modeling" and "Optimal and Suboptimal Estimation of Random Processes and Systems".

Theoretically grounded aphasia assessment that matches clinical practice settings is critical to planning intervention and assisting individuals with aphasia and their family members. This chapter begins with an overview of aphasia assessment in three historical periods: clinical description prior to 1935, standardized testing into the 1960s, and the postmodern era of multifaceted assessment. Topics in this section include aphasia classification; screening; assessing specific linguistic ability, functional communication, and quality of life; and assessment within cognitive neuropsychological and information-processing models. The second section describes contemporary assessment practices including the purpose and models of assessment, personal and environmental factors influencing assessment decisions, assessing conversation and connected speech, and related assessment areas such as cognition, executive function, and emotional state. Finally, emerging trends in assessment are discussed including evidence-based practice, treatment candidacy and prognosis, psychosocial models of assessment, and telehealth. Successful aphasia assessment should be a principled, systematic, and dynamic component of managing and living with aphasia.

This handbook presents the state-of-the-art of the statistics dealing with functional data analysis. With contributions from international experts in the field, it discusses a wide range of the most important statistical topics (classification, inference, factor-based analysis, regression modeling, resampling methods, time series, random processes) while also taking into account practical, methodological, and theoretical aspects of the problems. The book is organised into three sections. Part I deals with regression modeling and covers various statistical methods for functional data such as linear/nonparametric functional regression, varying coefficient models, and linear/nonparametric functional processes (i.e. functional time series). Part II considers related benchmark methods/tools for functional data analysis, including curve registration methods for preprocessing functional data, functional principal component analysis, and resampling/bootstrap methods. Finally, Part III examines some of the fundamental mathematical aspects of the infinite-dimensional setting, with a focus on the stochastic background and operatorial statistics: vector-valued function integration, spectral and random measures linked to stationary processes, operator geometry, vector integration and stochastic integration in Banach spaces, and operatorial statistics linked to quantum statistics.

What constitutes an archive in architecture? What forms does it take? What epistemology does it perform? What kind of craft is archiving? This book provides answers and offers insights on the ontological granularity of the archive and its relationship with architecture as a complex enterprise that starts and ends much beyond the act of building or the life of a creator. In this book we learn how objects are processed and catalogued, how a classification scheme is produced, how models and drawings are preserved, and how born-digital material battles time and technology obsolescence. We follow the work of conservators, librarians, cataloguers, digital archivists, museum technicians, curators, and architects, and we capture archiving in its mundane and practical course. Based on ethnographic observation at the Canadian Centre for Architecture and interviews with a range of practitioners, including Álvaro Siza and Peter Eisenman, the book traces archiving through the daily work and care of all its participants, scrutinizing their variable ontology, scale, and politics. It addresses the strategies practicing architects employ to envisage an archive-based future and tells a story about how architectural collections are crafted so as to form the epistemological basis of architectural history.

Defences to copyright infringement have gained increased significance over the past twenty years. The fourth industrial revolution emerged with the development of innovative copy-reliant services and business models, transforming the way in which copyright works can be used, from digital learning methods to mass digitization initiatives, media monitoring services, image transformation tools, and content mining technologies. The lawfulness of such innovative services and business methods, which arguably have the potential to enhance public welfare, is dubious and challenges copyright law. EU copyright contains specifically enumerated, narrowly drafted, and strictly interpreted defensive rules, often taking the form of the so-called exceptions and limitations to copyright. Because the fourth industrial revolution promises innovation and business growth—stated objectives of EU copyright—it invites an examination of defensive rules as a whole. The book adopts a holistic approach in its exploration of the limits of permissibility under EU copyright, including legislatively mentioned exceptions and limitations, doctrinal principles, and rules external to copyright, with a view to unveiling possible gaps and overlaps, offering a novel classification of defensive rules, and evaluating the adaptability of the law towards technological change. Discussing recent legislative developments, such as the provisions of the Digital Single Market Directive, Court of Justice of the European Union case law, and insights from national laws and cases, the book tells the story of copyright from the perspective of copyright defences, offering positivist and normative insights into law and doctrine and arguing towards a principle-based understanding of the scope of defences that could inform future law and policy making.

Presented reasearch aimed to develop and analyse the suitability of the CART models for prediction of the extent and probability of occurrence of damage to outer soil layers caused by timber harvesting performed under varied conditions. Having employed these models, the author identified certain methods of logging works and conditions, under which they should be performed to minimise the risk of damaging forest soils. The analyses presented in this work covered the condition of soils upon completion of logging works, which was investigated in 48 stands located in central and south-eastern Poland. In the stands selected for these studies a few felling treatments were carried out, including early thinning, late thinning and final felling. Logging works were performed with use of the most popular technologies in Poland. Trees were cut down with chainsaws and timber was extracted by means of various skidding methods: with horses, semi-suspended skidding with the use of cable yarding systems, farm tractors equipped with cable winches or tractors of a skidder type, and forwarding employing farm tractors with trailers loaded mechanically by cranes or manually. The analyses also included mechanised forest operation with the use of a harvester and a forwarder. The information about the extent of damage to soil, in a form of wheel-ruts and furrows, gathered in the course of soil condition inventory served for construction of regression tree models using the CART method (Classification and Regression Trees), based on which the area, depth and the volume of soil damage under analysis, wheel-ruts and furrows, were determined, and the total degree of all soil disturbances was assessed. The CART classification trees were used for modelling the probability of occurrence of wheel-ruts and furrows, or any other type of soil damage. Qualitative independent variables assumed by the author for developing the models included several characteristics describing the conditions under which the logging works were performed, mensuration data of the stands and the treatments conducted there. These characteristics covered in particular: the season of the year when logging works were performed, the system of timber harvesting employed, the manner of timber skidding, the means engaged in the process of timber harvesting and skidding, habitat type, crown closure, and cutting category. Moreover, the author took into consideration an impact of the quantitative independent variables on the extent and probability of occurrence of soil disturbance. These variables included the following: the measuring row number specifying a distance between the particular soil damage and communication tracks, the age of a stand, the soil moisture content, the intensity of a particular cutting treatment expressed by units of harvested timber volume per one hectare of the stand, and the mean angle of terrain inclination. The CART models developed in these studies not only allowed the author to identify the conditions, under which the soil damage of a given degree is most likely to emerge, or determine the probability of its occurrence, but also, thanks to a graphical presentation of the nature and strength of relationships between the variables employed in the model construction, they facilitated a recognition of rules and relationships between these variables and the area, depth, volume and probability of occurrence of forest soil damage of a particular type. Moreover, the CART trees served for developing the so-called decision-making rules, which are especially useful in organising logging works. These rules allow the organisers of timber harvest to plan the management-related actions and operations with the use of available technical means and under conditions enabling their execution in such manner as to minimise the harm to forest soils. Furthermore, employing the CART trees for modelling soil disturbance made it possible to evaluate particular independent variables in terms of their impact on the values of dependent variables describing the recorded disturbance to outer soil layers. Thanks to this the author was able to identify, amongst the variables used in modelling the properties of soil damage, these particular ones that had the greatest impact on values of these properties, and determine the strength of this impact. Detailed results depended on the form of soil disturbance and the particular characteristics subject to analysis, however the variables with the strongest influence on the extent and probability of occurrence of soil damage, under the conditions encountered in the investigated stands, enclosed the following: the season of the year when logging works were performed, the volume-based cutting intensity of the felling treatments conducted, technical means used for completion of logging works, the soil moisture content during timber harvest, the manner of timber skidding, dragged, semi-suspended or forwarding, and finally a distance between the soil damage and transportation ducts. The CART models proved to be very useful in designing timber harvesting technologies that could minimise the risk of forest soil damage in terms of both, the extent of factual disturbance and the probability of its occurrence. Another valuable advantage of this kind of modelling is an opportunity to evaluate an impact of particular variables on the extent and probability of occurrence of damage to outer soil layers. This allows the investigator to identify, amongst all of the variables describing timber harvesting processes, those crucial ones, from which any optimisation process should start, in order to minimise the negative impact of forest management practices on soil condition.

An analysis of the existing literature on the issue of damage to regeneration caused by timber harvesting, revealed that a great majority of results reported in those publications was obtained through laborious and time-consuming field research conducted in two stages. Field research methods for gathering data, employed by various authors, differed in terms of the manner of establishing trial plots, the accuracy of counting and evaluating the number of saplings growing on the investigated sites, classification systems used for distinguishing particular groups of regeneration based on quantitative (diameter at breast height, tree height) and qualitative features (biosocial position within the certain layer and the entire stand), classification systems used for identifying types of damage caused by cutting and felling, as well as transporting operations, and finally the duration of observation intervals and time spent on gathering data on the response of damaged saplings from both, the individual and collective perspectives. Obviously, the most reliable manner of gathering such data would be to count all damaged elements of the environment being a subject of interest of particular investigators at the certain point of time. However, due to time and work consumption of this approach, which is besides very costly, any research should be designed in such a manner as to reduce the above-mentioned factors. This paper aimed to (1) analyse the probability of occurrence of damage to regeneration depending on the form of timber assortments dragged from the felling site to the skidding routes, and timber harvesting technology employed in logging works, and (2) identify a method ensuring that gathered data is sufficient for performing reliable evaluation of share of damage to regeneration at acceptable accuracy level, without necessity to establish trial plots before commencing harvesting works. The scope of these studies enclosed a comparison between two motor-manual methods of timber harvesting in thinned stands, with dragging of timber in the first stage of skidding from the stand to landings. According to one of these methods, a classical one, operations of felling and delimbing of trees were carried out by sawmen at the felling site. Timber obtained using different methods was skidded by carters and horses, and operators of a light-duty cable winch, driven by the chainsaw’s engine, as well as operators of cable winches combined with farm tractors. In the latter, alternative method, sawmen performed only cutting and felling of trees. Delimbing and cross-cutting of trunks, dragged from the felling sites, was carried out by operators of processors combined with farm tractors, worked on skidding routes. The research was conducted in the years 2002–2010 in stands within the age classes II–IV mostly, located in the territories of Regional Directorates of State Forests in Krakow and Katowice, and in the Forest Experimental Unit in Krynica-Zdrój. In the course of a preliminary stage of investigations 102 trial plots were established in stands within early and late tinning treatments. As a result of the field research carried out in two stages, more than 3.25 thsd. circular sites were established and marked, on the surface of which over 25 thsd. saplings constituting the regeneration layer were inventoried. Based on the results of investigations and analyses it was revealed that regardless of the category of thinning treatment, the highest probability of occurrence of destroying P(ZN) to regeneration (0.24–0.44) should be expected when the first stage of timber skidding is performed using cable winches. Slightly lower values of probability (0.17–0.33) should be expected in stands where timber is skidded by horses, while in respect to processor-based skidding technology the probability of destroying occurrence oscillates between 0.12 and 0.27, depending on the particular layer of regeneration. P(ZN) values, very close to those of skidding technology engaging processors, were recorded for skidding performed using the light-duty cable winch driven by the chainsaw’s engine (0.16–0.27). The highest probability of damage P(USZK) to regeneration (0.16–0.31) can be expected when processors are used in the first stage of timber skidding. Slightly lower values of probability (0.14–0.23) were obtained when skidding was performed with the use of cable winches, whereas engaging horses for hauling of trunks results in probability of damage occnrrence oscillating between 0.05–0.20, depending on the particular layer of regeneration. With regard to the probability of occurrence of both, destroying and damage P(ZNUSZK) to regeneration (0.33–0.54), the highest values can be expected when cable winches are engaged in the first stage of skidding. Little lower (0.30–0.43) was the probability of their occurrence if processor-based technology of skidding was employed, while in respect to horse skidding these values oscillated between 0.27–0.41, depending on the layer of regeneration. The lowest values of probability of occurrence of damage P(USZK), and destroying and damage treated collectively P(ZNUSZK), within all layers of regeneration, were recorded in stands where thinning treatments were performed using the light-duty cable winch driven by the chainsaw’s engine. The models evaluated and respective equations, developed based on those models, for evaluating the number of destroyed saplings ZNha (tab. 40, 42, 44, 46, 48) could be used for determining the share of damage expressed as a percentage, upon conducting only one field research at the investigated felling sites, once the timber harvesting and skidding would have been completed. As revealed by the results of analyses, evaluation of statistically significant regression models was possible for all layers of regeneration (tab. 39, 41, 43, 45, 47). Nevertheless, the smallest part of these models that could be considered positively verified, were those for the natural young regeneration, although almost a half of them revealed to be significant. Within the medium-sized regeneration over three-fourths of all models could be considered positively verified, four of which explained more than 50% of variability. Within the high-sized regeneration almost two-thirds of evaluated regression models were statistically significant, five of which were verified positively, moreover, one of them explained more than 50% of variability. The most promising results were those obtained for the advance growth. Nearly 90% of the evaluated models revealed to be statistically significant, ten of which could be considered positively verified. Furthermore, four statistically significant models explained over 50% of general variability. With regard to the entire regeneration more than 80% of evaluated models were statistically significant. However, due to insignificant coefficients of regression, eight of them could be considered positively verified. At this point it should be stressed that in respect to logging technology employing the light-duty cable winch FKS it was impossible to evaluate statistically significant models of regression. Whereas, in the case of processor-based logging technology, firstly regarding the advance growth, and then the entire regeneration, all of the evaluated statistically significant models could be considered positively verified, in terms of both, all of the stands, and particular categories of thinning treatments individually. This latter case also revealed the highest degree of matching of evaluated models (R2 popr 0.73–0.76 for advance growth and 0.78–0.94 for the entire regeneration). A significant impact of the kind of form of hauled timber on the probability of damage occurrence P(USZK), mainly in early thinning treatments, could have been reflected in the results obtained for all stands (early and late thinning treated collectively). Moreover, due to an insignificant impact of the form of hauled timber and logging technology employed, on the probability of occurrence of damage in late thinned stands, and a significant impact of the above-mentioned variables on early thinned stands, it should be assumed that for performing an evaluation of destroying and damage caused by timber harvesting the both thinning treatment categories should be analysed separately. Furthermore, when evaluating the probability of occurrence of destroying and damage caused by timber harvesting, the layers of natural young regeneration and advance growth should be analysed separately. As proved by the results presented in this paper, varying values of probability computed for each of the layers of regeneration seem to indicate that when investigating damage to regeneration caused by timber harvesting, it would be reasonable and recommended to perform a separate analysis of damage to the highest saplings as well, namely individuals with diameter at breast height close to 7 cm. In respect to studies on damage to regeneration caused by logging technologies mentioned above, the evaluation of number of destroyed saplings within the advance growth can be carried out using the proportions of damaged and undamaged saplings per 1 ha of the stand. The numbers evaluated in this manner can be used to calculate the damage share expressed in relative values (percentage of damaged saplings compared with the entire number of saplings before commencing the logging works). However, one should keep in mind that this is true only if the field research have been carried out based on the methodology described in this paper.