AD-Graph: weakly supervised anomaly detection graph neural network

The main challenge faced by video-based real-world anomaly detection systems is the accurate learning of unusual events that are irregular, complicated, diverse, and heterogeneous in nature. Several techniques utilizing deep learning have been created to detect anomalies, yet their effectiveness on real-world data is often limited due to the insufficient incorporation of motion patterns. To address these problems and enhance the traditional functionality of anomaly detection systems for surveillance video data, we propose a weakly supervised graph neural-network-assisted video anomaly detection framework called AD-Graph. To identify temporal information from a series of frames, we extract 3D visual and motion features and represent these in a language-based knowledge graph format. Next, a robust clustering strategy is applied to group together meaningful neighbourhoods of the graph with similar vertices. Furthermore, spectral filters are applied to these graphs, and spectral graph theory is used to generate graph signals and detect anomalous events. Extensive experimental results over two challenging datasets, UCF-Crime and ShanghaiTech, show improvements of 0.35% and 0.78% against a state-of-the-art model

Bianchi Type I Cosmology in Generalized Saez-Ballester Theory via Noether Gauge Symmetry

In this paper, we investigate the generalized Saez-Ballester scalar-tensor theory of gravity via Noether gauge symmetry (NGS) in the background of Bianchi type I cosmological spacetime. We start with the Lagrangian of our model and calculate its gauge symmetries and corresponding invariant quantities. We obtain the potential function for the scalar field in the exponential form. For all the symmetries obtained, we determine the gauge functions corresponding to each gauge symmmetry which include constant and dynamic gauge. We discuss cosmological implications of our model and show that it is compatible with the observational data.Comment: 13 pages, 2 figures, accepted for publication in 'European Physical Journal C

Hamiltonian dynamics and Noether symmetries in Extended Gravity Cosmology

We discuss the Hamiltonian dynamics for cosmologies coming from Extended Theories of Gravity. In particular, minisuperspace models are taken into account searching for Noether symmetries. The existence of conserved quantities gives selection rule to recover classical behaviors in cosmic evolution according to the so called Hartle criterion, that allows to select correlated regions in the configuration space of dynamical variables. We show that such a statement works for general classes of Extended Theories of Gravity and is conformally preserved. Furthermore, the presence of Noether symmetries allows a straightforward classification of singularities that represent the points where the symmetry is broken. Examples of nonminimally coupled and higher-order models are discussed.Comment: 20 pages, Review paper to appear in EPJ

Riboflavin alleviates cardiac failure in Type I diabetic cardiomyopathy

Heart failure (HF) is a common and serious comorbidity of diabetes. Oxidative stress has been associated with the pathogenesis of chronic diabetic complications including cardiomyopathy. The ability of antioxidants to inhibit injury has raised the possibility of new therapeutic treatment for diabetic heart diseases. Riboflavin constitutes an essential nutrient for humans and animals and it is an important food additive. Riboflavin, a precursor of flavin mononucleotide (FMN) and flavin adenine dinucleotide (FAD), enhances the oxidative folding and subsequent secretion of proteins. The objective of this study was to investigate the cardioprotective effect of riboflavin in diabetic rats. Diabetes was induced in 30 rats by a single injection of streptozotocin (STZ) (70 mg /kg). Riboflavin (20 mg/kg) was orally administered to animals immediately after induction of diabetes and was continued for eight weeks. Rats were examined for diabetic cardiomyopathy by left ventricular (LV) remadynamic function. Myocardial oxidative stress was assessed by measuring the activity of superoxide dismutase (SOD), the level of malondialdehyde (MDA) as well as heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1) protein level. Myocardial connective tissue growth factor (CTGF) level was measured by Western blot in all rats at the end of the study. In the untreated diabetic rats, left ventricular systolic pressure (LVSP) rate of pressure rose (+dp/dt), and rate of pressure decay (−dp/dt) were depressed while left ventricular end-diastolic pressure (LVEDP) was increased, which indicated the reduced left ventricular contractility and slowing of left ventricular relaxation. The level of SOD decreased, CTGF and HO-1 protein expression and MDA content rose. Riboflavin treatment significantly improved left ventricular systolic and diastolic function in diabetic rats, there were persistent increases in significant activation of SOD and the level of HO-1 protein, and a decrease in the level of CTGF. These results suggest that riboflavin treatment ameliorates myocardial function and improves heart oxidant status, whereas raising myocardial HO-1 and decreasing myocardial CTGF levels have beneficial effects on diabetic cardiomyopathy

Leptonic and Semileptonic Decays of Charm and Bottom Hadrons

We review the experimental measurements and theoretical descriptions of leptonic and semileptonic decays of particles containing a single heavy quark, either charm or bottom. Measurements of bottom semileptonic decays are used to determine the magnitudes of two fundamental parameters of the standard model, the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix elements $V_{cb}$ and $V_{ub}$. These parameters are connected with the physics of quark flavor and mass, and they have important implications for the breakdown of CP symmetry. To extract precise values of $|V_{cb}|$ and $|V_{ub}|$ from measurements, however, requires a good understanding of the decay dynamics. Measurements of both charm and bottom decay distributions provide information on the interactions governing these processes. The underlying weak transition in each case is relatively simple, but the strong interactions that bind the quarks into hadrons introduce complications. We also discuss new theoretical approaches, especially heavy-quark effective theory and lattice QCD, which are providing insights and predictions now being tested by experiment. An international effort at many laboratories will rapidly advance knowledge of this physics during the next decade.Comment: This review article will be published in Reviews of Modern Physics in the fall, 1995. This file contains only the abstract and the table of contents. The full 168-page document including 47 figures is available at http://charm.physics.ucsb.edu/papers/slrevtex.p

All-particle cosmic ray energy spectrum measured with 26 IceTop stations

We report on a measurement of the cosmic ray energy spectrum with the IceTop air shower array, the surface component of the IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the South Pole. The data used in this analysis were taken between June and October, 2007, with 26 surface stations operational at that time, corresponding to about one third of the final array. The fiducial area used in this analysis was 0.122 km^2. The analysis investigated the energy spectrum from 1 to 100 PeV measured for three different zenith angle ranges between 0{\deg} and 46{\deg}. Because of the isotropy of cosmic rays in this energy range the spectra from all zenith angle intervals have to agree. The cosmic-ray energy spectrum was determined under different assumptions on the primary mass composition. Good agreement of spectra in the three zenith angle ranges was found for the assumption of pure proton and a simple two-component model. For zenith angles {\theta} < 30{\deg}, where the mass dependence is smallest, the knee in the cosmic ray energy spectrum was observed between 3.5 and 4.32 PeV, depending on composition assumption. Spectral indices above the knee range from -3.08 to -3.11 depending on primary mass composition assumption. Moreover, an indication of a flattening of the spectrum above 22 PeV were observed.Comment: 38 pages, 17 figure

An improved method for measuring muon energy using the truncated mean of dE/dx

The measurement of muon energy is critical for many analyses in large Cherenkov detectors, particularly those that involve separating extraterrestrial neutrinos from the atmospheric neutrino background. Muon energy has traditionally been determined by measuring the specific energy loss (dE/dx) along the muon's path and relating the dE/dx to the muon energy. Because high-energy muons (E_mu > 1 TeV) lose energy randomly, the spread in dE/dx values is quite large, leading to a typical energy resolution of 0.29 in log10(E_mu) for a muon observed over a 1 km path length in the IceCube detector. In this paper, we present an improved method that uses a truncated mean and other techniques to determine the muon energy. The muon track is divided into separate segments with individual dE/dx values. The elimination of segments with the highest dE/dx results in an overall dE/dx that is more closely correlated to the muon energy. This method results in an energy resolution of 0.22 in log10(E_mu), which gives a 26% improvement. This technique is applicable to any large water or ice detector and potentially to large scintillator or liquid argon detectors.Comment: 12 pages, 16 figure

Shrinking a large dataset to identify variables associated with increased risk of Plasmodium falciparum infection in Western Kenya

Large datasets are often not amenable to analysis using traditional single-step approaches. Here, our general objective was to apply imputation techniques, principal component analysis (PCA), elastic net and generalized linear models to a large dataset in a systematic approach to extract the most meaningful predictors for a health outcome. We extracted predictors for Plasmodium falciparum infection, from a large covariate dataset while facing limited numbers of observations, using data from the People, Animals, and their Zoonoses (PAZ) project to demonstrate these techniques: data collected from 415 homesteads in western Kenya, contained over 1500 variables that describe the health, environment, and social factors of the humans, livestock, and the homesteads in which they reside. The wide, sparse dataset was simplified to 42 predictors of P. falciparum malaria infection and wealth rankings were produced for all homesteads. The 42 predictors make biological sense and are supported by previous studies. This systematic data-mining approach we used would make many large datasets more manageable and informative for decision-making processes and health policy prioritization

Measurement of the Bottom-Strange Meson Mixing Phase in the Full CDF Data Set

We report a measurement of the bottom-strange meson mixing phase \beta_s using the time evolution of B0_s -> J/\psi (->\mu+\mu-) \phi (-> K+ K-) decays in which the quark-flavor content of the bottom-strange meson is identified at production. This measurement uses the full data set of proton-antiproton collisions at sqrt(s)= 1.96 TeV collected by the Collider Detector experiment at the Fermilab Tevatron, corresponding to 9.6 fb-1 of integrated luminosity. We report confidence regions in the two-dimensional space of \beta_s and the B0_s decay-width difference \Delta\Gamma_s, and measure \beta_s in [-\pi/2, -1.51] U [-0.06, 0.30] U [1.26, \pi/2] at the 68% confidence level, in agreement with the standard model expectation. Assuming the standard model value of \beta_s, we also determine \Delta\Gamma_s = 0.068 +- 0.026 (stat) +- 0.009 (syst) ps-1 and the mean B0_s lifetime, \tau_s = 1.528 +- 0.019 (stat) +- 0.009 (syst) ps, which are consistent and competitive with determinations by other experiments.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures, Phys. Rev. Lett 109, 171802 (2012