Mobile systems for monitoring Parkinson's disease

A challenge for the clinical management of Parkinson's disease (PD) is the large within- and between-patient variability in symptom profiles as well as the emergence of motor complications which represent a significant source of disability in patients. This thesis deals with the development and evaluation of methods and systems for supporting the management of PD by using repeated measures, consisting of subjective assessments of symptoms and objective assessments of motor function through fine motor tests (spirography and tapping), collected by means of a telemetry touch screen device. One aim of the thesis was to develop methods for objective quantification and analysis of the severity of motor impairments being represented in spiral drawings and tapping results. This was accomplished by first quantifying the digitized movement data with time series analysis and then using them in data-driven modelling for automating the process of assessment of symptom severity. The objective measures were then analysed with respect to subjective assessments of motor conditions. Another aim was to develop a method for providing comparable information content as clinical rating scales by combining subjective and objective measures into composite scores, using time series analysis and data-driven methods. The scores represent six symptom dimensions and an overall test score for reflecting the global health condition of the patient. In addition, the thesis presents the development of a web-based system for providing a visual representation of symptoms over time allowing clinicians to remotely monitor the symptom profiles of their patients. The quality of the methods was assessed by reporting different metrics of validity, reliability and sensitivity to treatment interventions and natural PD progression over time. Results from two studies demonstrated that the methods developed for the fine motor tests had good metrics indicating that they are appropriate to quantitatively and objectively assess the severity of motor impairments of PD patients. The fine motor tests captured different symptoms; spiral drawing impairment and tapping accuracy related to dyskinesias (involuntary movements) whereas tapping speed related to bradykinesia (slowness of movements). A longitudinal data analysis indicated that the six symptom dimensions and the overall test score contained important elements of information of the clinical scales and can be used to measure effects of PD treatment interventions and disease progression. A usability evaluation of the web-based system showed that the information presented in the system was comparable to qualitative clinical observations and the system was recognized as a tool that will assist in the management of patients.

Automatic spiral analysis for objective assessment of motor symptoms in Parkinson's disease

Objective: To develop a method for objective quantification of PD motor symptoms related to Off episodes and peak dose dyskinesias, using spiral data gathered by using a touch screen telemetry device. The aim was to objectively characterize predominant motor phenotypes (bradykinesia and dyskinesia), to help in automating the process of visual interpretation of movement anomalies in spirals as rated by movement disorder specialists. Background: A retrospective analysis was conducted on recordings from 65 patients with advanced idiopathic PD from nine different clinics in Sweden, recruited from January 2006 until August 2010. In addition to the patient group, 10 healthy elderly subjects were recruited. Upper limb movement data were collected using a touch screen telemetry device from home environments of the subjects. Measurements with the device were performed four times per day during week-long test periods. On each test occasion, the subjects were asked to trace pre-drawn Archimedean spirals, using the dominant hand. The pre-drawn spiral was shown on the screen of the device. The spiral test was repeated three times per test occasion and they were instructed to complete it within 10 seconds. The device had a sampling rate of 10Hz and measured both position and time-stamps (in milliseconds) of the pen tip. Methods: Four independent raters (FB, DH, AJ and DN) used a web interface that animated the spiral drawings and allowed them to observe different kinematic features during the drawing process and to rate task performance. Initially, a number of kinematic features were assessed including ‘impairment’, ‘speed’, ‘irregularity’ and ‘hesitation’ followed by marking the predominant motor phenotype on a 3-category scale: tremor, bradykinesia and/or choreatic dyskinesia. There were only 2 test occasions for which all the four raters either classified them as tremor or could not identify the motor phenotype. Therefore, the two main motor phenotype categories were bradykinesia and dyskinesia. ‘Impairment’ was rated on a scale from 0 (no impairment) to 10 (extremely severe) whereas ‘speed’, ‘irregularity’ and ‘hesitation’ were rated on a scale from 0 (normal) to 4 (extremely severe). The proposed data-driven method consisted of the following steps. Initially, 28 spatiotemporal features were extracted from the time series signals before being presented to a Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) classifier. The features were based on different kinematic quantities of spirals including radius, angle, speed and velocity with the aim of measuring the severity of involuntary symptoms and discriminate between PD-specific (bradykinesia) and/or treatment-induced symptoms (dyskinesia). A Principal Component Analysis was applied on the features to reduce their dimensions where 4 relevant principal components (PCs) were retained and used as inputs to the MLP classifier. Finally, the MLP classifier mapped these components to the corresponding visually assessed motor phenotype scores for automating the process of scoring the bradykinesia and dyskinesia in PD patients whilst they draw spirals using the touch screen device. For motor phenotype (bradykinesia vs. dyskinesia) classification, the stratified 10-fold cross validation technique was employed. Results: There were good agreements between the four raters when rating the individual kinematic features with intra-class correlation coefficient (ICC) of 0.88 for ‘impairment’, 0.74 for ‘speed’, 0.70 for ‘irregularity’, and moderate agreements when rating ‘hesitation’ with an ICC of 0.49. When assessing the two main motor phenotype categories (bradykinesia or dyskinesia) in animated spirals the agreements between the four raters ranged from fair to moderate. There were good correlations between mean ratings of the four raters on individual kinematic features and computed scores. The MLP classifier classified the motor phenotype that is bradykinesia or dyskinesia with an accuracy of 85% in relation to visual classifications of the four movement disorder specialists. The test-retest reliability of the four PCs across the three spiral test trials was good with Cronbach’s Alpha coefficients of 0.80, 0.82, 0.54 and 0.49, respectively. These results indicate that the computed scores are stable and consistent over time. Significant differences were found between the two groups (patients and healthy elderly subjects) in all the PCs, except for the PC3. Conclusions: The proposed method automatically assessed the severity of unwanted symptoms and could reasonably well discriminate between PD-specific and/or treatment-induced motor symptoms, in relation to visual assessments of movement disorder specialists. The objective assessments could provide a time-effect summary score that could be useful for improving decision-making during symptom evaluation of individualized treatment when the goal is to maximize functional On time for patients while minimizing their Off episodes and troublesome dyskinesias.

Decision Tree Classification Model In Water Supply Network

With the service life of water supply network (WSN) growth, the growing phenomenon of aging pipe network has become exceedingly serious. As urban water supply network is hidden underground asset, it is difficult for monitoring staff to make a direct classification towards the faults of pipe network by means of the modern detecting technology. In this paper, based on the basic property data (e.g. diameter, material, pressure, distance to pump, distance to tank, load, etc.) of water supply network, decision tree algorithm (C4.5) has been carried out to classify the specific situation of water supply pipeline. Part of the historical data was used to establish a decision tree classification model, and the remaining historical data was used to validate this established model. Adopting statistical methods were used to access the decision tree model including basic statistical method, Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) and Recall-Precision Curves (RPC). These methods has been successfully used to assess the accuracy of this established classification model of water pipe network. The purpose of classification model was to classify the specific condition of water pipe network. It is important to maintain the pipeline according to the classification results including asset unserviceable (AU), near perfect condition (NPC) and serious deterioration (SD). Finally, this research focused on pipe classification which plays a significant role in maintaining water supply networks in the future.

Newly Automated System For Integrated Assessment Of The Conditions Of Underwater Gas Pipelines

An underwater gas pipeline is the portion of the pipeline that crosses a river beneath its bottom. Underwater gas pipelines are subject to increasing dangers as time goes by. An accident at an underwater gas pipeline can lead to technological and environmental disaster on the scale of an entire region. Therefore, timely troubleshooting of all underwater gas pipelines in order to prevent any potential accidents will remain a pressing task for the industry. The most important aspect of resolving this challenge is the quality of the automated system in question. Now the industry doesn't have any automated system that fully meets the needs of the experts working in the field maintaining underwater gas pipelines. Principle Aim of this Research: This work aims to develop a new system of automated monitoring which would simplify the process of evaluating the technical condition and decision making on planning and preventive maintenance and repair work on the underwater gas pipeline. Objectives: Creation a shared model for a new, automated system via IDEF3; Development of a new database system which would store all information about underwater gas pipelines; Development a new application that works with database servers, and provides an explanation of the results obtained from the server; Calculation of the values MTBF for specified pipelines based on quantitative data obtained from tests of this system. Conclusion: The new, automated system PodvodGazExpert has been developed for timely and qualitative determination of the physical conditions of underwater gas pipeline; The basis of the mathematical analysis of this new, automated system uses principal component analysis method; The process of determining the physical condition of an underwater gas pipeline with this new, automated system increases the MTBF by a factor of 8.18 above the existing system used today in the industry.

Evaluation Of Reservoir Model Integration With Deterministic And Probabilistic Streamflow Forecasts

Due to the increase in water demand and hydropower energy, it is getting more important to operate hydraulic structures in an efficient manner while sustaining multiple demands. Especially, companies, governmental agencies, consultant offices require effective, practical integrated tools and decision support frameworks to operate reservoirs, cascades of run-of-river plants and related elements such as canals by merging hydrological and reservoir simulation/optimization models with various numerical weather predictions, radar and satellite data. The model performance is highly related with the streamflow forecast, related uncertainty and its consideration in the decision making. While deterministic weather predictions and its corresponding streamflow forecasts directly restrict the manager to single deterministic trajectories, probabilistic forecasts can be a key solution by including uncertainty in flow forecast scenarios for dam operation. The objective of this study is to compare deterministic and probabilistic streamflow forecasts on an earlier developed basin/reservoir model for short term reservoir management. The study is applied to the Yuvacık Reservoir and its upstream basin which is the main water supply of Kocaeli City located in the northwestern part of Turkey. The reservoir represents a typical example by its limited capacity, downstream channel restrictions and high snowmelt potential. Mesoscale Model 5 and Ensemble Prediction System data are used as a main input and the flow forecasts are done for 2012 year using HEC-HMS. Hydrometeorological rule-based reservoir simulation model is accomplished with HEC-ResSim and integrated with forecasts. Since EPS based hydrological model produce a large number of equal probable scenarios, it will indicate how uncertainty spreads in the future. Thus, it will provide risk ranges in terms of spillway discharges and reservoir level for operator when it is compared with deterministic approach. The framework is fully data driven, applicable, useful to the profession and the knowledge can be transferred to other similar reservoir systems.

Integração de dados em ambiente SIG para mapeamento de favorabilidade mineral de ouro na ilha cristalina de Rivera (Uruguai)

Guias para exploração mineral são normalmente baseados em modelos conceituais de depósitos. Esses guias são, normalmente, baseados na experiência dos geólogos, em dados descritivos e em dados genéticos. Modelamentos numéricos, probabilísticos e não probabilísticos, para estimar a ocorrência de depósitos minerais é um novo procedimento que vem a cada dia aumentando sua utilização e aceitação pela comunidade geológica. Essa tese utiliza recentes metodologias para a geração de mapas de favorablidade mineral. A denominada Ilha Cristalina de Rivera, uma janela erosional da Bacia do Paraná, situada na porção norte do Uruguai, foi escolhida como estudo de caso para a aplicação das metodologias. A construção dos mapas de favorabilidade mineral foi feita com base nos seguintes tipos de dados, informações e resultados de prospecção: 1) imagens orbitais; 2) prospecção geoquimica; 3) prospecção aerogeofísica; 4) mapeamento geo-estrutural e 5) altimetria. Essas informacões foram selecionadas e processadas com base em um modelo de depósito mineral (modelo conceitual), desenvolvido com base na Mina de Ouro San Gregorio. O modelo conceitual (modelo San Gregorio), incluiu características descritivas e genéticas da Mina San Gregorio, a qual abrange os elementos característicos significativos das demais ocorrências minerais conhecidas na Ilha Cristalina de Rivera. A geração dos mapas de favorabilidade mineral envolveu a construção de um banco de dados, o processamento dos dados, e a integração dos dados. As etapas de construção e processamento dos dados, compreenderam a coleta, a seleção e o tratamento dos dados de maneira a constituírem os denominados Planos de Informação. Esses Planos de Informação foram gerados e processados organizadamente em agrupamentos, de modo a constituírem os Fatores de Integração para o mapeamento de favorabilidade mineral na Ilha Cristalina de Rivera. Os dados foram integrados por meio da utilização de duas diferentes metodologias: 1) Pesos de Evidência (dirigida pelos dados) e 2) Lógica Difusa (dirigida pelo conhecimento). Os mapas de favorabilidade mineral resultantes da implementação das duas metodologias de integração foram primeiramente analisados e interpretados de maneira individual. Após foi feita uma análise comparativa entre os resultados. As duas metodologias xxiv obtiveram sucesso em identificar, como áreas de alta favorabilidade, as áreas mineralizadas conhecidas, além de outras áreas ainda não trabalhadas. Os mapas de favorabilidade mineral resultantes das duas metodologias mostraram-se coincidentes em relação as áreas de mais alta favorabilidade. A metodologia Pesos de Evidência apresentou o mapa de favorabilidade mineral mais conservador em termos de extensão areal, porém mais otimista em termos de valores de favorabilidade em comparação aos mapas de favorabilidade mineral resultantes da implementação da metodologia Lógica Difusa. Novos alvos para exploração mineral foram identificados e deverão ser objeto de investigação em detalhe.

Minha escola transparente: uma análise comparativa do uso de dados governamentais abertos na educação básica no Brasil e Inglaterra

This research attempts to analyze the effects of open government data on the administration and practice of the educational process by comparing the contexts of Brazil and England. The findings illustrate two principal dynamics: control and collaboration. In the case of control, or what is called the "data-driven" paradigm, data help advance the cause of political accountability through the disclosure of school performance. In collaboration, or what is referred to as the "data-informed" paradigm, data is intended to support the decision-making process of administrators through dialogical processes with other social actors.

Cherry picking with synthetic controls

The synthetic control (SC) method has been recently proposed as an alternative method to estimate treatment e ects in comparative case studies. Abadie et al. [2010] and Abadie et al. [2015] argue that one of the advantages of the SC method is that it imposes a data-driven process to select the comparison units, providing more transparency and less discretionary power to the researcher. However, an important limitation of the SC method is that it does not provide clear guidance on the choice of predictor variables used to estimate the SC weights. We show that such lack of speci c guidances provides signi cant opportunities for the researcher to search for speci cations with statistically signi cant results, undermining one of the main advantages of the method. Considering six alternative speci cations commonly used in SC applications, we calculate in Monte Carlo simulations the probability of nding a statistically signi cant result at 5% in at least one speci cation. We nd that this probability can be as high as 13% (23% for a 10% signi cance test) when there are 12 pre-intervention periods and decay slowly with the number of pre-intervention periods. With 230 pre-intervention periods, this probability is still around 10% (18% for a 10% signi cance test). We show that the speci cation that uses the average pre-treatment outcome values to estimate the weights performed particularly bad in our simulations. However, the speci cation-searching problem remains relevant even when we do not consider this speci cation. We also show that this speci cation-searching problem is relevant in simulations with real datasets looking at placebo interventions in the Current Population Survey (CPS). In order to mitigate this problem, we propose a criterion to select among SC di erent speci cations based on the prediction error of each speci cations in placebo estimations

Paleodistributions and Comparative Molecular Phylogeography of Leafcutter Ants (Atta spp.) Provide New Insight into the Origins of Amazonian Diversity

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Including the sub-grid scale plume rise of vegetation fires in low resolution atmospheric transport models

We describe and begin to evaluate a parameterization to include the vertical transport of hot gases and particles emitted from biomass burning in low resolution atmospheric-chemistry transport models. This sub-grid transport mechanism is simulated by embedding a 1-D cloud-resolving model with appropriate lower boundary conditions in each column of the 3-D host model. Through assimilation of remote sensing fire products, we recognize which columns have fires. Using a land use dataset appropriate fire properties are selected. The host model provides the environmental conditions, allowing the plume rise to be simulated explicitly. The derived height of the plume is then used in the source emission field of the host model to determine the effective injection height, releasing the material emitted during the flaming phase at this height. Model results are compared with CO aircraft profiles from an Amazon basin field campaign and with satellite data, showing the huge impact that this mechanism has on model performance. We also show the relative role of each main vertical transport mechanisms, shallow and deep moist convection and the pyro-convection (dry or moist) induced by vegetation fires, on the distribution of biomass burning CO emissions in the troposphere.

Gestión del conocimiento en la educación ambiental : Estudio de casoen el programa de educación ambiental de la universidad de São Paulo Brasil

The objective of this study was to analyze and to describe the process of knowledge creation in an environmental education program. The research can be defined as a case study, because a thorough study of the characteristics of an environmental education program at a public university in Brazil was carried out. The study had a descriptive character; it observed, ordered and recorded data and behavior, explaining and interpreting facts without manipulating them, using a method of qualitative data collection, the interview. The method of data analysis used was content analysis. At the end good practices for environmental education programs are suggested.

Measurement of the semileptonic charge asymmetry in B0 meson mixing with the D0 detector

We present a measurement of the semileptonic mixing asymmetry for B0 mesons, asld, using two independent decay channels: B0→μ +D -X, with D -→K +π -π -; and B0→μ +D *-X, with D * -→D ̄0π -, D ̄0→ K +π - (and charge conjugate processes). We use a data sample corresponding to 10.4fb -1 of pp̄ collisions at √s=1.96TeV, collected with the D0 experiment at the Fermilab Tevatron collider. We extract the charge asymmetries in these two channels as a function of the visible proper decay length of the B0 meson, correct for detector-related asymmetries using data-driven methods, and account for dilution from charge-symmetric processes using Monte Carlo simulation. The final measurement combines four signal visible proper decay length regions for each channel, yielding asld=[0.68±0.45(stat)±0.14(syst)]%. This is the single most precise measurement of this parameter, with uncertainties smaller than the current world average of B factory measurements. © 2012 American Physical Society.

Navegação de robôs em ambientes internos usando slam

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Bioinformática estrutural aplicada ao estudo de enzimas da via metabólica do ácido chiquímico

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Conversão grafema-fone para um sistema de reconhecimento de voz com suporte a grandes vocabulários para o português brasileiro

O processamento de voz tornou-se uma tecnologia cada vez mais baseada na modelagem automática de vasta quantidade de dados. Desta forma, o sucesso das pesquisas nesta área está diretamente ligado a existência de corpora de domínio público e outros recursos específicos, tal como um dicionário fonético. No Brasil, ao contrário do que acontece para a língua inglesa, por exemplo, não existe atualmente em domínio público um sistema de Reconhecimento Automático de Voz (RAV) para o Português Brasileiro com suporte a grandes vocabulários. Frente a este cenário, o trabalho tem como principal objetivo discutir esforços dentro da iniciativa FalaBrasil [1], criada pelo Laboratório de Processamento de Sinais (LaPS) da UFPA, apresentando pesquisas e softwares na área de RAV para o Português do Brasil. Mais especificamente, o presente trabalho discute a implementação de um sistema de reconhecimento de voz com suporte a grandes vocabulários para o Português do Brasil, utilizando a ferramenta HTK baseada em modelo oculto de Markov (HMM) e a criação de um módulo de conversão grafema-fone, utilizando técnicas de aprendizado de máquina.