A comparative analysis of decision trees vis-a-vis other computational data mining techniques in automotive insurance fraud detection

The development and application of computational data mining techniques in financial fraud detection and business failure prediction has become a popular cross-disciplinary research area in recent times involving financial economists, forensic accountants and computational modellers. Some of the computational techniques popularly used in the context of - financial fraud detection and business failure prediction can also be effectively applied in the detection of fraudulent insurance claims and therefore, can be of immense practical value to the insurance industry. We provide a comparative analysis of prediction performance of a battery of data mining techniques using real-life automotive insurance fraud data. While the data we have used in our paper is US-based, the computational techniques we have tested can be adapted and generally applied to detect similar insurance frauds in other countries as well where an organized automotive insurance industry exists

Diseño experimental para el mejoramiento de la calidad: Optimización de la línea de producción Bühler 600 de fideo laminado formato fantasía en la empresa Fideos PACA

This project is about an actual operation within a manufacturing company whose main product is the pasta. The investigation is focused on optimizing the production line Bühler 600 in the company Fideos PACA. From the knowledge of how this production takes place, will determine and monitor what are the variables of the quality of response more sensitive, to improve and strengthen them.Este proyecto tratará acerca de una operación real dentro de una empresa de manufactura, cuyo producto principal es la pasta. La investigación está enfocada a la optimización de la línea de producción de Pasta Bühler 600 de la empresa Fideos PACA. A partir del conocimiento de cómo se lleva a cabo esta producción, se podrá determinar y monitorear, cuales son las variables de respuesta de la calidad más sensibles; para así mejorarlas y fortalecerlas. Para cumplir con este objetivo, dentro del proyecto se plantea la utilización del Control Estadístico de Procesos (CEP), a través de las gráficas de control; para determinar el comportamiento de los procesos, realizar mejoras menores y controlar el proceso productivo

A Software Approach to Improving Cloud Computing Datacenter Energy Efficiency and Enhancing Security through Botnet Detection

This work presents positive experiment results on the efficiency and security potential of an optimized and novel approach to an Autonomous Management Distributed System (AMDS) running in a Cloud Computing environment. The results validate the AMDS software design and demonstrate its potential as an industrial application to be used in modern datacenters. On one hand, from an operational performance point of view, they show the AMDS’ ability of reconfiguring itself on the fly, thus resulting in 14 percent increased efficiency over the lifetime of the first experiment. On the other hand, they show an overall malicious (Botnet) data packet detection rate of over 52 percent, a significant percentage for only 5000 network data samples analyzed by the Botnet software module plugged into the AMDS. Both experiments have been performed in a VMWare run cloud environment, however due to the AMDS’ abstract architecture, it has the potential to interface with any existing cloud management system that exposes an API

A cloud-based virtual computing laboratory for teaching computer networks

This paper presents a novel ‘Cloud-based’ solution for teaching computer networks in an educational context. One key advantage of the system is its ability to commission and decommission virtual infrastructures comprised of routers, switches and virtual machines on demand. It makes use of hardware located in different physical locations, VMWare software to manage the virtual resources and NetLab+ to manage the configuration of multiple different virtual scenarios. The key features of the cloud infrastructure are described and evaluated

A novel autonomous management distributed system for cloud computing environments

This paper describes a novel modular design of an autonomous management distributed system (AMDS) for cloud computing environments and it presents its implementation with the Scala programming language. The AMDS was designed from the ground up with distributed deployment, modularity and security in mind, using a full object oriented approach. A key feature of this system is the ability to gather and store information from various networking and monitoring devices from within the same computing cluster. Another key feature is the ability to intelligently control VMWare vSphere local instances based on analysis of collected data and predefined parameters. vSphere in turn, once it receives commands from the AMDS, proceeds to issue instructions to multiple locally monitored ESXi severs in order to maximize energy efficiency, reduce the carbon footprint and minimize running costs. The predefined parameters are based on results from a previous paper written by the authors. The AMDS has been deployed on the authors’ test bed and is currently running successfully. Test results show highly potential industrial applications in datacenter energy management and lowering of operating costs

Scaling law for the transient behavior of type-II neuron models

We study the transient regime of type-II biophysical neuron models and determine the scaling behavior of relaxation times $\tau$ near but below the repetitive firing critical current, $\tau \simeq C (I_c-I)^{-\Delta}$. For both the Hodgkin-Huxley and Morris-Lecar models we find that the critical exponent is independent of the numerical integration time step and that both systems belong to the same universality class, with $\Delta = 1/2$. For appropriately chosen parameters, the FitzHugh-Nagumo model presents the same generic transient behavior, but the critical region is significantly smaller. We propose an experiment that may reveal nontrivial critical exponents in the squid axon.Comment: 6 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.

The lincRNA MIRAT binds to IQGAP1 and modulates the MAPK pathway in NRAS mutant melanoma.

Despite major advances in targeted melanoma therapies, drug resistance limits their efficacy. Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) are transcriptome elements that do not encode proteins but are important regulatory molecules. LncRNAs have been implicated in cancer development and response to different therapeutics and are thus potential treatment targets; however, the majority of their functions and molecular interactions remain unexplored. In this study, we identify a novel cytoplasmic intergenic lincRNA (MIRAT), which is upregulated following prolonged MAPK inhibition in NRAS mutant melanoma and modulates MAPK signaling by binding to the MEK scaffold protein IQGAP1. Collectively, our results present MIRAT's direct modulatory effect on the MAPK pathway and highlight the relevance of cytoplasmic lncRNAs as potential targets in drug resistant cancer

Constraining causes of fish mass mortality using ultra-high-resolution biomarker measurement

Peer reviewedPostprin

Enabling lightweight, high load aero-bearings

Environmental and commercial considerations are strongly driving research into weight saving in aircraft. In this research, innovative manufacturing processes were developed to produce lightweight titanium alloy bearings capable of withstanding high bearing pressures. This will enable the replacement of heavier conventional bearing materials with titanium alloy bearings of the same size thereby saving weight. Plasma processing and PVD coating techniques were refined and combined and a sound scientific understanding of the resulting novel processes developed to assure high performance, reliability and repeatability. These techniques were applied to test discs and small bearing (bush) samples, which were tested under progressively greater loads (pressures). FEA was also used to evaluate pressure distribution in a bush test assembly. The novel treatment has potential applications for many bearings and bearing surfaces throughout aircraft.peer-reviewe