28 research outputs found
Epidemic Threshold in Continuous-Time Evolving Networks
Current understanding of the critical outbreak condition on temporal networks
relies on approximations (time scale separation, discretization) that may bias
the results. We propose a theoretical framework to compute the epidemic
threshold in continuous time through the infection propagator approach. We
introduce the {\em weak commutation} condition allowing the interpretation of
annealed networks, activity-driven networks, and time scale separation into one
formalism. Our work provides a coherent connection between discrete and
continuous time representations applicable to realistic scenarios.Comment: 13 pages, 2 figure
Understanding Communication Patterns in MOOCs: Combining Data Mining and qualitative methods
Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) offer unprecedented opportunities to
learn at scale. Within a few years, the phenomenon of crowd-based learning has
gained enormous popularity with millions of learners across the globe
participating in courses ranging from Popular Music to Astrophysics. They have
captured the imaginations of many, attracting significant media attention -
with The New York Times naming 2012 "The Year of the MOOC." For those engaged
in learning analytics and educational data mining, MOOCs have provided an
exciting opportunity to develop innovative methodologies that harness big data
in education.Comment: Preprint of a chapter to appear in "Data Mining and Learning
Analytics: Applications in Educational Research
Fast filtering and animation of large dynamic networks
Detecting and visualizing what are the most relevant changes in an evolving
network is an open challenge in several domains. We present a fast algorithm
that filters subsets of the strongest nodes and edges representing an evolving
weighted graph and visualize it by either creating a movie, or by streaming it
to an interactive network visualization tool. The algorithm is an approximation
of exponential sliding time-window that scales linearly with the number of
interactions. We compare the algorithm against rectangular and exponential
sliding time-window methods. Our network filtering algorithm: i) captures
persistent trends in the structure of dynamic weighted networks, ii) smoothens
transitions between the snapshots of dynamic network, and iii) uses limited
memory and processor time. The algorithm is publicly available as open-source
software.Comment: 6 figures, 2 table
Efficient detection of contagious outbreaks in massive metropolitan encounter networks
Physical contact remains difficult to trace in large metropolitan networks,
though it is a key vehicle for the transmission of contagious outbreaks.
Co-presence encounters during daily transit use provide us with a city-scale
time-resolved physical contact network, consisting of 1 billion contacts among
3 million transit users. Here, we study the advantage that knowledge of such
co-presence structures may provide for early detection of contagious outbreaks.
We first examine the "friend sensor" scheme --- a simple, but universal
strategy requiring only local information --- and demonstrate that it provides
significant early detection of simulated outbreaks. Taking advantage of the
full network structure, we then identify advanced "global sensor sets",
obtaining substantial early warning times savings over the friends sensor
scheme. Individuals with highest number of encounters are the most efficient
sensors, with performance comparable to individuals with the highest travel
frequency, exploratory behavior and structural centrality. An efficiency
balance emerges when testing the dependency on sensor size and evaluating
sensor reliability; we find that substantial and reliable lead-time could be
attained by monitoring only 0.01% of the population with the highest degree.Comment: 4 figure
Quantifying the effect of temporal resolution on time-varying networks
Time-varying networks describe a wide array of systems whose constituents and interactions evolve over time. They are defined by an ordered stream of interactions between nodes, yet they are often represented in terms of a sequence of static networks, each aggregating all edges and nodes present in a time interval of size Δt. In this work we quantify the impact of an arbitrary Δt on the description of a dynamical process taking place upon a time-varying network. We focus on the elementary random walk, and put forth a simple mathematical framework that well describes the behavior observed on real datasets. The analytical description of the bias introduced by time integrating techniques represents a step forward in the correct characterization of dynamical processes on time-varying graphs