EEG sleep stages identification based on weighted undirected complex networks

Sleep scoring is important in sleep research because any errors in the scoring of the patient's sleep electroencephalography (EEG) recordings can cause serious problems such as incorrect diagnosis, medication errors, and misinterpretations of patient's EEG recordings. The aim of this research is to develop a new automatic method for EEG sleep stages classification based on a statistical model and weighted brain networks. Methods each EEG segment is partitioned into a number of blocks using a sliding window technique. A set of statistical features are extracted from each block. As a result, a vector of features is obtained to represent each EEG segment. Then, the vector of features is mapped into a weighted undirected network. Different structural and spectral attributes of the networks are extracted and forwarded to a least square support vector machine (LS-SVM) classifier. At the same time the network's attributes are also thoroughly investigated. It is found that the network's characteristics vary with their sleep stages. Each sleep stage is best represented using the key features of their networks. Results In this paper, the proposed method is evaluated using two datasets acquired from different channels of EEG (Pz-Oz and C3-A2) according to the R&K and the AASM without pre-processing the original EEG data. The obtained results by the LS-SVM are compared with those by Naïve, k-nearest and a multi-class-SVM. The proposed method is also compared with other benchmark sleep stages classification methods. The comparison results demonstrate that the proposed method has an advantage in scoring sleep stages based on single channel EEG signals. Conclusions An average accuracy of 96.74% is obtained with the C3-A2 channel according to the AASM standard, and 96% with the Pz-Oz channel based on the R&K standard

Analysis of EEG signals using complex brain networks

The human brain is so complex that two mega projects, the Human Brain Project and the BRAIN Initiative project, are under way in the hope of answering important questions for peoples' health and wellbeing. Complex networks become powerful tools for studying brain function due to the fact that network topologies on real-world systems share small world properties. Examples of these networks are the Internet, biological networks, social networks, climate networks and complex brain networks. Complex brain networks in real time biomedical signal processing applications are limited because some graph algorithms (such as graph isomorphism), cannot be solved in polynomial time. In addition, they are hard to use in single-channel EEG applications, such as clinic applications in sleep scoring and depth of anaesthesia monitoring. The first contribution of this research is to present two novel algorithms and two graph models. A fast weighted horizontal visibility algorithm (FWHVA) overcoming the speed limitations for constructing a graph from a time series is presented. Experimental results show that the FWHVA can be 3.8 times faster than the Fast Fourier Transfer (FFT) algorithm when input signals exceed 4000 data points. A linear time graph isomorphism algorithm (HVGI) can determine the isomorphism of two horizontal visibility graphs (HVGs) in a linear time domain. This is an efficient way to measure the synchronized index between two time series. Difference visibility graphs (DVGs) inherit the advantages of horizontal visibility graphs. They are noise-robust, and they overcome a pitfall of visibility graphs (VG): that the degree distribution (DD) doesn't satisfy a pure power-law. Jump visibility graphs (JVGs) enhance brain graphs allowing the processing of non-stationary biomedical signals. This research shows that the DD of JVGs always satisfies a power-lower if the input signals are purely non-stationary. The second highlight of this work is the study of three clinical biomedical signals: alcoholic, epileptic and sleep EEGs. Based on a synchronization likelihood and maximal weighted matching method, this work finds that the processing repeated stimuli and unrepeated stimuli in the controlled drinkers is larger than that in the alcoholics. Seizure detections based on epileptic EEGs have also been investigated with three graph features: graph entropy of VGs, mean strength of HVGs, and mean degrees of JVGs. All of these features can achieve 100% accuracy in seizure identification and differentiation from healthy EEG signals. Sleep EEGs are evaluated based on VG and DVG methods. It is shown that the complex brain networks exhibit more small world structure during deep sleep. Based on DVG methods, the accuracy peaks at 88:9% in a 5-state sleep stage classification from 14; 943 segments from single-channel EEGs. This study also introduces two weighted complex network approaches to analyse the nonlinear EEG signals. A weighted horizontal visibility graph (WHVG) is proposed to enhance noise-robustness properties. Tested with two Chaos signals and an epileptic EEG database, the research shows that the mean strength of the WHVG is more stable and noise-robust than those features from FFT and entropy. Maximal weighted matching algorithms have been applied to evaluate the difference in complex brain networks of alcoholics and controlled drinkers. The last contribution of this dissertation is to develop an unsupervised classifier for biomedical signal pattern recognition. A Multi-Scale Means (MSK-Means) algorithm is proposed for solving the subject-dependent biomedical signals classification issue. Using JVG features from the epileptic EEG database, the MSK-Means algorithm is 4:7% higher in identifying seizures than those by the K-means algorithm and achieves 92:3% accuracy for localizing the epileptogenic zone. The findings suggest that the outcome of this thesis can improve the performance of complex brain networks for biomedical signal processing and nonlinear time series analysis

A Graph-Temporal fused dual-input Convolutional Neural Network for Detecting Sleep Stages from EEG Signals

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant Nos. 61922062, and 61873181.Peer reviewedPostprin

Detection of EEG K-complexes using fractal dimension of time-frequency images technique coupled with undirected graph features

K-complexes identification is a challenging task in sleep research. The detection of k-complexes in electroencephalogram (EEG) signals based on visual inspection is time consuming, prone to errors, and requires well-trained knowledge. Many existing methods for k-complexes detection rely mainly on analyzing EEG signals in time and frequency domains. In this study, an efficient method is proposed to detect k-complexes from EEG signals based on fractal dimension (FD) of time frequency (T-F) images coupled with undirected graph features. Firstly, an EEG signal is partitioned into smaller segments using a sliding window technique. Each EEG segment is passed through a spectrogram of short time Fourier transform (STFT) to obtain the T-F images. Secondly, the box counting method is applied to each T-F image to discover the FDs in EEG signals. A vector of FD features are extracted from each T-F image and then mapped into an undirected graph. The structural properties of the graphs are used as the representative features of the original EEG signals for the input of a least square support vector machine (LS-SVM) classifier. Key graphic features are extracted from the undirected graphs. The extracted graph features are forwarded to the LS-SVM for classification. To investigate the classification ability of the proposed feature extraction combined with the LS-SVM classifier, the extracted features are also forwarded to a k-means classifier for comparison. The proposed method is compared with several existing k-complexes detection methods in which the same datasets were used. The findings of this study shows that the proposed method yields better classification results than other existing methods in the literature. An average accuracy of 97% for the detection of the k-complexes is obtained using the proposed method. The proposed method could lead to an efficient tool for the scoring of automatic sleep stages which could be useful for doctors and neurologists in the diagnosis and treatment of sleep disorders and for sleep research

Data selection in EEG signals classification

The alcoholism can be detected by analyzing electroencephalogram (EEG) signals. However, analyzing multi-channel EEG signals is a challenging task, which often requires complicated calculations and long execution time. This paper proposes three data selection methods to extract representative data from the EEG signals of alcoholics. The methods are the principal component analysis based on graph entropy (PCA-GE), the channel selection based on graph entropy (GE) difference, and the mathematic combinations channel selection, respectively. For comparison purposes, the selected data from the three methods are then classified by three classifiers: the J48 decision tree, the K-nearest neighbor and the Kstar, separately. The experimental results show that the proposed methods are successful in selecting data without compromising the classification accuracy in discriminating the EEG signals from alcoholics and non-alcoholics. Among them, the proposed PCA-GE method uses only 29.69 % of the whole data and 29.5 % of the computation time but achieves a 94.5 % classification accuracy. The channel selection method based on the GE difference also gains a 91.67 % classification accuracy by using only 29.69 % of the full size of the original data. Using as little data as possible without sacrificing the final classification accuracy is useful for online EEG analysis and classification application design

Developing new techniques to analyse and classify EEG signals

A massive amount of biomedical time series data such as Electroencephalograph (EEG), electrocardiography (ECG), Electromyography (EMG) signals are recorded daily to monitor human performance and diagnose different brain diseases. Effectively and accurately analysing these biomedical records is considered a challenge for researchers. Developing new techniques to analyse and classify these signals can help manage, inspect and diagnose these signals. In this thesis novel methods are proposed for EEG signals classification and analysis based on complex networks, a statistical model and spectral graph wavelet transform. Different complex networks attributes were employed and studied in this thesis to investigate the main relationship between behaviours of EEG signals and changes in networks attributes. Three types of EEG signals were investigated and analysed; sleep stages, epileptic and anaesthesia. The obtained results demonstrated the effectiveness of the proposed methods for analysing these three EEG signals types. The methods developed were applied to score sleep stages EEG signals, and to analyse epileptic, as well as anaesthesia EEG signals. The outcomes of the project will help support experts in the relevant medical fields and decrease the cost of diagnosing brain diseases

Multilayer network methodologies for brain data analysis and modelling

The term neuroscience includes in itself a plethora of research areas devoted to undercover the most fascinating complex organ of our body: the brain. A common denominator of neuroscience areas, is the need for the application of methodologies to integrate different features. In this thesis, we focused on the analysis of two types of brain data: brain data coming from Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) patients and data collected for the study of neurocognitive healthy ageing. In both cases there was the need of applying computational techniques able to integrate different features. To do so we used multilayer networks. For two groups of TBI patients (adults and paediatrics), time series data were collected from the observations of IntraCranial Pressure (ICP) and Heart Rate (HR). We first detected events of simultaneous increase of HR and ICP, which we called brain-heart crosstalks. Subsequently time series were translated into graphs, and network measures, during brain-heart crosstalks, were obtained. These were then included as predictors in a mortality outcome model, with crosstalks. Causality measures were also investigated, using a Granger causality approach, to understand the dynamics of signals during these events. We further applied multilayer networks to study neurocognitive ageing. To do so, we implemented a pipeline for community detection, which we called NetRank, applying it to the Cam-CAN, a large cross-sectional cohort for the study of healthy neurocognitive ageing. Using multilayer networks modelling, we identified subgroups of individuals, with similar lifestyles, and we related them to structural and functional brain features. We believe that multilayer networks and their extensions represent a powerful tool to be used in integrative and cross modal neuroscience datasets. New insights on cognitive neuroscience and time series analysis, can in fact be gained trough multilayer network, possibly improving patients managements and allowing to develop new predictive tools.EPSR

The multiple pheromone Ant clustering algorithm

Ant Colony Optimisation algorithms mimic the way ants use pheromones for marking paths to important locations. Pheromone traces are followed and reinforced by other ants, but also evaporate over time. As a consequence, optimal paths attract more pheromone, whilst the less useful paths fade away. In the Multiple Pheromone Ant Clustering Algorithm (MPACA), ants detect features of objects represented as nodes within graph space. Each node has one or more ants assigned to each feature. Ants attempt to locate nodes with matching feature values, depositing pheromone traces on the way. This use of multiple pheromone values is a key innovation. Ants record other ant encounters, keeping a record of the features and colony membership of ants. The recorded values determine when ants should combine their features to look for conjunctions and whether they should merge into colonies. This ability to detect and deposit pheromone representative of feature combinations, and the resulting colony formation, renders the algorithm a powerful clustering tool. The MPACA operates as follows: (i) initially each node has ants assigned to each feature; (ii) ants roam the graph space searching for nodes with matching features; (iii) when departing matching nodes, ants deposit pheromones to inform other ants that the path goes to a node with the associated feature values; (iv) ant feature encounters are counted each time an ant arrives at a node; (v) if the feature encounters exceed a threshold value, feature combination occurs; (vi) a similar mechanism is used for colony merging. The model varies from traditional ACO in that: (i) a modified pheromone-driven movement mechanism is used; (ii) ants learn feature combinations and deposit multiple pheromone scents accordingly; (iii) ants merge into colonies, the basis of cluster formation. The MPACA is evaluated over synthetic and real-world datasets and its performance compares favourably with alternative approaches