Towards Efficient Incident Detection in Real-time Traffic Management

Incident detection is a key component in real-time traffic management systems that allows efficient response plan generation and decision making by means of risk alerts at critical affected sections in the network. State-of-the-art incident detection techniques traditionally require: i) good quality data from closely located sensor pairs, ii) a minimum of two reliable measurements from the flow- occupancy-speed triad, and iii) supervised adjustment of thresholds that will trigger anomalous traffic states. Despite such requirements may be reasonably achieved in simulated scenarios, real-time downstream applications rarely work under such ideal conditions and must deal with low reliability data, missing measurements, and scarcity of curated incident labelled datasets, among other challenges. This paper proposes an unsupervised technique based on univariate timeseries anomaly detection for computationally efficient incident detection in real-world scenarios. Such technique is proved to successfully work when only flow measurements are available, and to dynamically adjust thresholds that adapt to changes in the supply. Moreover, results show good performance with low-reliability and missing data

The coupon collector urn model with unequal probabilities in ecology and evolution

International audienceThe sequential sampling of populations with unequal probabilities and with replacement in a closed population is a recurrent problem in ecology and evolution. Examples range from biodiversity sampling, epidemiology to the estimation of signal repertoire in animal communication. Many of these ques- tions can be reformulated as urn problems, often as special cases of the coupon collector problem, most simply expressed as the number of coupons that must be collected to have a complete set. We aimed to apply the coupon collector model in a comprehensive manner to one example—hosts (balls) being searched (draws) and parasitized (ball colour change) by parasitic wasps— to evaluate the influence of differences in sampling probabilities between items on collection speed. Based on the model of a complete multinomial process over time, we define the distribution, distribution function, expectation and variance of the number of hosts parasitized after a given time, as well as the inverse problem, estimating the sampling effort. We develop the relationship between the risk distribution on the set of hosts and the speed of parasitization and propose a more elegant proof of the weak stochastic dominance among speeds of parasitization, using the concept of Schur convexity and the ‘Robin Hood transfer’ numerical operation. Numerical examples are provided and a conjecture about strong dominance—an ordering characteristic of random variables—is proposed. The speed at which new items are discovered is a function of the entire shape of the sampling probability distribution. The sole comparison of values of variances is not sufficient to compare speeds associated with different distributions, as generally assumed in ecological studies

Parametrization of Seesaw Models and Light Sterile Neutrinos

The recent recomputation of the neutrino fluxes from nuclear reactors relaxes the tension between the LSND and MiniBooNE anomalies and disappearance data when interpreted in terms of sterile neutrino oscillations. The simplest extension of the Standard Model with such fermion singlets is the addition of right-handed sterile neutrinos with small Majorana masses. Even when introducing three right-handed neutrinos, this scenario has less free parameters than the 3+2 scenarios studied in the literature. This begs the question whether the best fit regions obtained can be reproduced by this simplest extension of the Standard Model. In order to address this question, we devise an exact parametrization of Standard Model extensions with right-handed neutrinos. Apart from the usual 3x3 neutrino mixing matrix and the 3 masses of the lightest neutrinos, the extra degrees of freedom are encoded in another 3x3 unitary matrix and 3 additional mixing angles. The parametrization includes all the correlations among masses and mixings and is valid beyond the usual seesaw approximation. Through this parametrization we find that the best fit regions for the LSND and MiniBooNE anomalies in a 3+2 scenario can indeed be reproduced despite the smaller number of degrees of freedom.Comment: 18 pages, REVTeX4. Minor correction

FoxK mediates TGF-β signalling during midgut differentiation in flies

Inductive signals across germ layers are important for the development of the endoderm in vertebrates and invertebrates (Tam, P.P., M. Kanai-Azuma, and Y. Kanai. 2003. Curr. Opin. Genet. Dev. 13:393–400; Nakagoshi, H. 2005. Dev. Growth Differ. 47:383–392). In flies, the visceral mesoderm secretes signaling molecules that diffuse into the underlying midgut endoderm, where conserved signaling cascades activate the Hox gene labial, which is important for the differentiation of copper cells (Bienz, M. 1997. Curr. Opin. Genet. Dev. 7:683–688). We present here a Drosophila melanogaster gene of the Fox family of transcription factors, FoxK, that mediates transforming growth factor β (TGF-β) signaling in the embryonic midgut endoderm. FoxK mutant embryos fail to generate midgut constrictions and lack Labial in the endoderm. Our observations suggest that TGF-β signaling directly regulates FoxK through functional Smad/Mad-binding sites, whereas FoxK, in turn, regulates labial expression. We also describe a new cooperative activity of the transcription factors FoxK and Dfos/AP-1 that regulates labial expression in the midgut endoderm. This regulatory activity does not require direct labial activation by the TGF-β effector Mad. Thus, we propose that the combined activity of the TGF-β target genes FoxK and Dfos is critical for the direct activation of lab in the endoderm

Myristic acid potentiates palmitic acid-induced lipotoxicity and steatohepatitis associated with lipodystrophy by sustaning de novo ceramide synthesis.

Palmitic acid (PA) induces hepatocyte apoptosis and fuels de novo ceramide synthesis in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). Myristic acid (MA), a free fatty acid highly abundant in copra/palmist oils, is a predictor of nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) and stimulates ceramide synthesis. Here we investigated the synergism between MA and PA in ceramide synthesis, ER stress, lipotoxicity and NASH. Unlike PA, MA is not lipotoxic but potentiated PA-mediated lipoapoptosis, ER stress, caspase-3 activation and cytochrome c release in primary mouse hepatocytes (PMH). Moreover, MA kinetically sustained PA-induced total ceramide content by stimulating dehydroceramide desaturase and switched the ceramide profile from decreased to increased ceramide 14:0/ceramide16:0, without changing medium and long-chain ceramide species. PMH were more sensitive to equimolar ceramide14:0/ceramide16:0 exposure, which mimics the outcome of PA plus MA treatment on ceramide homeostasis, than to either ceramide alone. Treatment with myriocin to inhibit ceramide synthesis and tauroursodeoxycholic acid to prevent ER stress ameliorated PA plus MA induced apoptosis, similar to the protection afforded by the antioxidant BHA, the pan-caspase inhibitor z-VAD-Fmk and JNK inhibition. Moreover, ruthenium red protected PMH against PA and MA-induced cell death. Recapitulating in vitro findings, mice fed a diet enriched in PA plus MA exhibited lipodystrophy, hepatosplenomegaly, increased liver ceramide content and cholesterol levels, ER stress, liver damage, inflammation and fibrosis compared to mice fed diets enriched in PA or MA alone. The deleterious effects of PA plus MA-enriched diet were largely prevented by in vivo myriocin treatment. These findings indicate a causal link between ceramide synthesis and ER stress in lipotoxicity, and imply that the consumption of diets enriched in MA and PA can cause NASH associated with lipodystrophy

Boundary control of quasilinear elliptic equations

Résumé disponible dans les fichiers attaché

Radiation Tests on the Complete System of the Instrumentation of the LHC Cryogenics at the CERN Neutrinos to Gran Sasso (CNGS) Test Facility

There are more than 6000 electronic cards for the instrumentation of the LHC cryogenics, housed in crates and distributed around the 27 km tunnel. Cards and crates will be exposed to a complex radiation field during the 10 years of LHC operation. Rad-tol COTS and rad-hard ASIC have been selected and individually qualified during the design phase of the cards. The test setup and the acquired data presented in this paper target the qualitative assessment of the compliance with the LHC radiation environment of an assembled system. It is carried out at the CNGS test facility which provides exposure to LHC-like radiation field

Experimental evaluation of IEEE 802.15.4/ZigBee for multi-patient ECG monitoring

IEEE 802.15.4/ZigBee wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are a promising alternative to cabled systems for patient monitoring in hospitals. Some areas where monitoring systems based on WSNs can be successfuly used are ambulatory, waiting and triage rooms, post-op, and emergency rooms. The low power and small size ZigBee devices have the ability to form self-configuring networks that can extend themselves through a hospital wing or floor. Using spatially distributed networks, it is possible to cover an extended area and serve several patients. However, the low data rate protocols provided by IEEE 802.15.4 poses several challenges, mainly because its protocols were primarily designed to operate in low traffic load scenarios but some vital signs sensors generate a large volume of data. This work presents an experimental evaluation of the performance of multi-hop ZigBee networks comprised of several nodes that carry the traffic of wearable electrocardiogram (ECG) sensors. The results indicate that star networks can relay 100% of the traffic generated by at least 12 ECG nodes. In tree topologies, the increase of the network traffic load reduces the performance but even these networks can reliably relay the traffic of a considerable number of ECG nodes.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT)Grupo AMI – Assistência Médica Integral (Casa de Saúde Guimarães, SA

Opacidades de las prácticas educativas en una Institución Pública de la Ciudad de Medellín en torno a la inclusión y la construcción de paces

Maestría en Educación y Desarrollo Humano, Facultad de Ciencias Sociales y Humanas.El artículo recoge las narrativas de los maestros de una Institución Educativa en la ciudad de Medellín, en torno a las categorías de inclusión y construcción de paces. A partir de la investigación cualitativa con enfoque hermenéutico comprensivo, se analizan las opacidades de las prácticas educativas, presentando como principales hallazgos: la inclusión educativa desde la atención a personas en situación de discapacidad hasta el enfoque excluyente de género con la educación diferenciada, además, describe elementos de las diferentes violencias que vive una escuela pública en Medellín

Provenance and tectonic setting of the Paleozoic Tamatán Group, NE Mexico: Implications for the closure of the Rheic Ocean

The Huizachal–Peregrina Anticlinorium in northeastern Mexico comprises a wide variety of Precambrian and Paleozoic basement units. In this work, Silurian-to-Permian unmetamorphosed siliciclastic successions (i.e., Cañón de Caballeros, Vicente Guerrero, Del Monte, and Guacamaya formations) forming the Tamatán Group is described; the group overlies the Novillo metamorphic complex, which is the northernmost exposed region of the Oaxaquia microcontinent. In this paper, a provenance model for the Tamatán Group is proposed based on new petrological data, whole-rock geochemical data, and U–Pb LA-ICP-MS detrital zircon age data from these marine fossiliferous strata. The results show a shallowmarine to deep-water clastic succession classified as feldspatho-lithic-quartzose and litho-feldspathoquartzose (Cañón de Caballeros and Vicente Guerrero formations) and feldspatho-quartzo-lithic and litho-quartzo-feldspathic (Del Monte and Guacamaya formations). The petrological and geochemical data indicate a derivation from felsitic, intermediate, and basic rocks, intense to moderate weathering, and high to moderate recycling of the source area. The geochronological data can be organized into three main detrital zircon U–Pb age groups: (1) a Meso-Neoproterozoic group, likely derived from Oaxaquia and the Maya block, which is also the probable source of 1.5–1.6 Ga zircon grains; (2) an Ordovician–Silurian group that is likely sourced by igneous Maya Block intrusions or from local units such as the Ordovician Peregrina Tonalite; and (3) Pennsylvanian and Permian zircon that can be derived from magmatic arc-related intrusions from the diachronous Rheic closure. Additionally, major, trace, and rare earth element concentrations and ratios from the Tamatán Group indicate a passive margin that evolved into magmatic arc sources within the upper continental crust. The integration of our data indicates that the Tamatán Group was deposited in an unreported back-arc basin from the northernmost part of Oaxaquia near the Maya Block along the northwestern Gondwanan margin during the closure of the Rheic Ocean priori to complete Pangea