Mining Spatio-Temporal Datasets: Relevance, Challenges and Current Research Directions

Spatio-temporal data usually records the states over time of an object, an event or a position in space. Spatio-temporal data can be found in several application fields, such as traffic management, environment monitoring, weather forerast, etc. In the past, huge effort was devoted to spatial data representation and manipulation with particular focus on its visualisation. More recently, the interest of many users has shifted from static views of geospatial phenomena, which capture its “spatiality” only, to more advanced means of discovering dynamic relationships among the patterns and events contained in the data as well as understanding the changes occurring in spatial data over time

Early cardiac abnormalities and increased C-reactive protein levels in a cohort of children with sleep disordered breathing

This study aims to evaluate left ventricular (LV) structure and function and inflammation in a paediatric population with sleep disordered breathing (SDB) and in control subjects. Forty-nine children with SDB and 21 healthy, age-matched subjects were enrolled. The diagnosis of obstructive sleep apnoea syndrome (OSAS) was confirmed by the laboratory polysomnography, showing an obstructive apnoea/hypopnoea index of more than one per hour, according to the criteria of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and modified for paediatric population. Fasting blood samples for the biochemical evaluation (including high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hsCRP) were drawn in the morning, after the polysomnographic examination in all patients with SDB and in the control group. All children underwent a two-dimensional colour Doppler cardiac examination with LV mass assessment and systolic and diastolic function evaluation. Higher hsCRP levels were observed in subjects with OSAS than in children with primary snoring and in controls (0.8 +/- 0.7 vs 0.3 +/- 0.1 ng/dl, p = 0.001, and 0.4 +/- 0.2 ng/dl, p = 0.01, respectively). The LV diastolic dysfunction was significantly more frequent in patients with severe OSAS and higher hsCRP levels than in control group. This study shows that OSAS in children is associated with higher LV mass, early LV diastolic dysfunction and a pro-inflammatory state (high CRP levels). These findings might help to explain the higher incidence of cardiovascular morbidity in patients with OSAS