Time-dependent prediction degradation assessment of neural-networks-based TEC forecasting models

An estimation of the difference in TEC prediction accuracy achieved when the prediction varies from 1 h to 7 days in advance is described using classical neural networks. Hourly-daily Faraday-rotation derived TEC measurements from Florence are used. It is shown that the prediction accuracy for the examined dataset, though degrading when time span increases, is always high. In fact, when a relative prediction error margin of +/-10% is considered, the population percentage included therein is almost always well above the 55%. It is found that the results are highly dependent on season and the dataset wealth, whereas they highly depend on the f(0)F2 - TEC variability difference and on hysteresis-like effect between these two ionospheric characteristics.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

TEC and foF2 variations: preliminary results

Investigation of the relationship between TEC and (foF2)2 shows that although they are highly correlated, a «hysteresis» effect exists between them. The slab thickness is greater before than after mid-day for equal cos ?values. Moreover, a comparison of the calculated upper and lower quartiles of variability in TEC, foF2 and Nmax, respectively shows that the variability of TEC lies between those of foF2 and Nmax depending on the level of solar activity

An artificial neural network predictor for tropospheric surface duct phenomena

International audienceIn this work, an artificial neural network (ANN) model is developed and used to predict the presence of ducting phenomena for a specific time, taking into account ground values of atmospheric pressure, relative humidity and temperature. A feed forward backpropagation ANN is implemented, which is trained, validated and tested using atmospheric radiosonde data from the Helliniko airport, for the period from 1991 to 2004. The network's quality and generality is assessed using the Area Under the Receiver Operating Characteristics (ROC) Curves (AUC), which resulted to a mean value of about 0.86 to 0.90, depending on the observation time. In order to validate the ANN results and to evaluate any further improvement options of the proposed method, the problem was additionally treated using Least Squares Support Vector Machine (LS-SVM) classifiers, trained and tested with identical data sets for direct performance comparison with the ANN. Furthermore, time series prediction and the effect of surface wind to the presence of tropospheric ducts appearance are discussed. The results show that the ANN model presented here performs efficiently and gives successful tropospheric ducts predictions

Investigating the effect of child maltreatment on early adolescent peer-on-peer sexual aggression: testing a multiple mediator model in a non-incarcerated sample of Danish adolescents

Objective: The aim of the present study was to investigate the relationship between child maltreatment and severe early adolescent peer-on-peer sexual aggression, using a multiple mediator model. Methods: The study comprised 330 male Grade 9 students with a mean age of 14.9 years (SD=0.5). Results: Estimates from the mediation model indicated significant indirect effects of child physical abuse on sexual aggression via peer influence and insecure-hostile masculinity. No significant total effect of child sexual abuse and child neglect on sexual aggression was found. Conclusions: Findings of the present study identify risk factors that are potentially changeable and therefore of value in informing the design of prevention programs aiming at early adolescent peer-on-peer sexual aggression in at-risk youth

Linear functional organization of the omic embedding space

Motivation: We are increasingly accumulating complex omics data that capture different aspects of cellular functioning. A key challenge is to untangle their complexity and effectively mine them for new biomedical information. To decipher this new information, we introduce algorithms based on network embeddings. Such algorithms represent biological macromolecules as vectors in d-dimensional space, in which topologically similar molecules are embedded close in space and knowledge is extracted directly by vector operations. Recently, it has been shown that neural networks used to obtain vectorial representations (embeddings) are implicitly factorizing a mutual information matrix, called Positive Pointwise Mutual Information (PPMI) matrix. Thus, we propose the use of the PPMI matrix to represent the human protein-protein interaction (PPI) network and also introduce the graphlet degree vector PPMI matrix of the PPI network to capture different topological (structural) similarities of the nodes in the molecular network. Results: We generate the embeddings by decomposing these matrices with Nonnegative Matrix Tri-Factorization. We demonstrate that genes that are embedded close in these spaces have similar biological functions, so we can extract new biomedical knowledge directly by doing linear operations on their embedding vector representations. We exploit this property to predict new genes participating in protein complexes and to identify new cancer-related genes based on the cosine similarities between the vector representations of the genes. We validate 80% of our novel cancer-related gene predictions in the literature and also by patient survival curves that demonstrating that 93.3% of them have a potential clinical relevance as biomarkers of cancer

To retain or remove the syndesmotic screw: a review of literature

Introduction: Syndesmotic positioning screws are frequently placed in unstable ankle fractures. Many facets of adequate placement techniques have been the subject of various studies. Whether or not the syndesmosis screw should be removed prior to weight-bearing is still debated. In this study, the recent literature is reviewed concerning the need for removal of the syndesmotic screw. Materials and methods: A comprehensive literature search was conducted in the electronic databases of the Cochrane Library, Pubmed Medline and EMbase from January 2000 to October 2010. Results: A total of seven studies were identified in the literature. Most studies found no difference in outcome between retained or removed screws. Patients with screws that were broken, or showed loosening, had similar or improved outcome compared to patients with removed screws. Removal of the syndesmotic screws, when deemed necessary, is usually not performed before 8-12 weeks. Conclusion: There is paucity in randomized controlled trials on the absolute need for removal of the syndesmotic screw. However, current literature suggests that it might be reserved for intact screws that cause hardware irritation or reduced range of motion after 4-6 months

Leo Strauss and International Relations: The politics of modernity's abyss

This article argues that an engagement with the political philosophy of Leo Strauss is of considerable value in International Relations (IR), in relation to the study of both recent US foreign policy and contemporary IR theory. The question of Straussian activities within and close to the foreign policy-making establishment in the United States during the period leading up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq has been the focus of significant scholarly and popular attention in recent years. This article makes the case that several individuals influenced by Strauss exercised considerable influence in the fields of intelligence production, the media and think tanks, and traces the ways in which elements of Strauss’ thought are discernible in their interventions in these spheres. It further argues that Strauss’ political philosophy is of broader significance for IR insofar as it can be read as a securitising response to the dangers he associated with the foundationlessness of the modern condition. The article demonstrates that the politics of this response are of crucial importance for contemporary debates between traditional and critical IR theorists

Hybrid Diffuse Optical Techniques for Continuous Hemodynamic Measurement in Gastrocnemius During Plantar Flexion Exercise

Occlusion calibrations and gating techniques have been recently applied by our laboratory for continuous and absolute diffuse optical measurements of foreann muscle hemodynamics during handgrip exercises. The translation of these techniques from the foreann to the lower limb is the goal of this study as various diseases preferentially affect muscles in the lower extremity. This study adapted a hybrid near-infrared spectroscopy and diffuse correlation spectroscopy system with a gating algorithm to continuously quantify hemodynamic responses of medial gastrocnemius during plantar flexion exercises in 10 healthy subjects. The outcomes from optical measurement include oxy-, deoxy-, and total hemoglobin poncentrations, blood oxygen ~aturation, and relative changes in blood flow (rBF) and oxygen consumption rate (rV02) . We calibrated rBF and rV02 profiles with absolute baseline values of BF and V02 obtained by venous and arterial occlusions, respectively. Results from this investigation were comparable to values from similar studies. Additionally, significant correlation was observed between resting local muscle BF measured by the optical technique and whole limb BF measured concurrently by a strain gauge venous plethysmography. The extensive hemodynamic and metabolic profiles during exercise will allow for future comparison studies to investigate the diagnostic value of hybrid technologies in muscles affected by disease