T2MAC: Targeted and Trusted Multi-Agent Communication through Selective Engagement and Evidence-Driven Integration

Communication stands as a potent mechanism to harmonize the behaviors of multiple agents. However, existing works primarily concentrate on broadcast communication, which not only lacks practicality, but also leads to information redundancy. This surplus, one-fits-all information could adversely impact the communication efficiency. Furthermore, existing works often resort to basic mechanisms to integrate observed and received information, impairing the learning process. To tackle these difficulties, we propose Targeted and Trusted Multi-Agent Communication (T2MAC), a straightforward yet effective method that enables agents to learn selective engagement and evidence-driven integration. With T2MAC, agents have the capability to craft individualized messages, pinpoint ideal communication windows, and engage with reliable partners, thereby refining communication efficiency. Following the reception of messages, the agents integrate information observed and received from different sources at an evidence level. This process enables agents to collectively use evidence garnered from multiple perspectives, fostering trusted and cooperative behaviors. We evaluate our method on a diverse set of cooperative multi-agent tasks, with varying difficulties, involving different scales and ranging from Hallway, MPE to SMAC. The experiments indicate that the proposed model not only surpasses the state-of-the-art methods in terms of cooperative performance and communication efficiency, but also exhibits impressive generalization.Comment: AAAI2

Synthesis of polyacrylamide-based aerosol fixative and its fixation effect on tellurium aerosol

The removal control of radioactive aerosols in a nuclear emergency is an important issue, and capture fixation is a parameter for studying the purification effect of aerosol fixatives on aerosols. Herein, PAM-g-PAA, PAM-g-PHEA, and PAM-g-PAA/PHEA were obtained by chemical grafting with polyacrylamide as the substrate, acrylic acid and 2-hydroxyethyl acrylate as grafting monomers. The grafting product was confirmed by infrared spectroscopy and the grafting rate was calculated. The microstructure of different products were compared and discussed by scanning electron microscope images of freeze-drying and film formation. The capture and sedimentation effects of tellurium (simulated polonium) aerosol were studied by surface tension and fixed sedimentation experiments (PAM, PAM-g-PAA, PAM-g-PHEA, PAM-g-PAA/PHEA aqueous solution), and the mechanism of aerosol fixation was discussed. The results showed that the surface tension of the grafted product was significantly lower than that of the substrate PAM. Among them, the aerosol fixing agent PAM-g-PHEA grafted with HEA modified polyacrylamide can more effectively capture and fix tellurium aerosol particles, and its fixed sedimentation efficiency is 94.34%, which provides a research idea for the purification of polonium radioactive aerosol by atomization fixation method

Antibodies against H10N8 avian influenza virus among animal workers in Guangdong Province before November 30, 2013, when the first human H10N8 case was recognized

BACKGROUND: Considered an epicenter of pandemic influenza virus generation, southern China has recently seen an increasing number of human H7N9 infections. However, it is not the only threat. On 30 November 2013, a human H10N8 infection case was first described in China. The origin and genetic diversity of this novel virus is similar to that of H7N9 virus. As H10N8 avian influenza virus (AIV) was first identified from a duck in Guangdong Province during 2012 and there is also evidence of H10N8 infected dogs in this region, we sought to examine archived sera from animal workers to see if there was evidence of subclinical human infections before the first human H10N8 cases. METHODS: We studied archived serum samples (cross-sectional study, convenience sample) collected between May and September 2013 from 710 animal workers and 107 non-animal exposed volunteers living in five cities of Guangdong Province. Study participants’ sera were tested by horse red blood cells (RBCs) hemagglutination inhibition (HI) and microneutralization (MN) assays according to World Health Organization guidelines. The A/Jiangxi-Donghu/346-1/2013(H10N8) virus was used. Sera which have an HI assay ≥1:20 were further tested with the MN assay. Questionnaire data were examined for risk factor associations with positive serological assays. Risk factor analyses failed to identify specific factors associated with probable H10N8 infections. RESULTS: Among the 827 sera, only 21 animal workers had an HI titer ≥1:20 (18 had an HI titer of 1:20 and 3 had an HI titer of 1:40). None of these 21 subjects reported experiencing any influenza symptoms during the three months before enrollment. Among the three subjects with HI titers of 1:40, two had MN antibody titers of 1:40, and one had a MN antibody titer of 1:80 (probable H10N8 infections). CONCLUSIONS: Study data suggest that animal workers may have been infected with the H10N8 virus before the first recognized H10N8 human infection cases. It seems prudent to continue surveillance for H10N8 viruses among animal workers

The Digital Predistortion of the SC-FDMA Signals in LTE Uplink System

The single-carrier frequency-division multiple access (SC-FDMA) is used in the uplink of the long-term evolution (LTE) and LTE-advanced systems because of the lower peak-to-average-power ratio (PAPR) compared with the widely used orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) scheme. However, the non-linearity caused by the characteristic of the radio frequency (RF) power amplifiers (PAs) is still a critical problem, and there are few researches about the linearisation for the SC-FDMA signals. The digital predistorter is widely applied by employing digital baseband distortion ahead of the amplifier to compensate for the non-linearity effects and provide efficiency enhancements for high PAs in the different communication systems. This letter presents an efficient and flexible inverse autoregressive moving-average (ARMA) model-based digital predistorter to linearise the PA distortion with memory in the LTE uplink system. The proposed digital predistortion (DPD) algorithm is for the first time applied to SC-FDMA signals and verified with a series of experimental measurements. The spectrum regrowth of SC-FDMA signals is improved by up to 12 dB from both simulation and measurement. The proposed predistorter has been shown to solve the distortion problem caused by the memory effect effectively in RF PA

Machine-learning and water energy harvesting based wireless water consumption sensing system in buildings

In recent years, smart wireless remote water meters have become popular, but this kind of smart water meter needs an external power supply, and every 100 to 200 installed this type of water meter, needs to set up an independent collector. This kind of water meter is expensive, and the external power supply will increase the energy consumption of the building, which is not conducive to the circuit safety of the old community. In order to reduce the burden of manual meter reading and reduce the building's ''carbon emissions''. A wireless water consumption sensing system for buildings based on machine learning and water energy collection is designed. Images are collected and recognized by visual sensors to realize the visual reading of water meter data. The system is powered by a 12V micro water generator and transferred to lithium battery energy storage to realize the self-energy supply of the whole system. The lightweight YOLOv5 was used to implement the model training process. Then, on the premise of the small sample data set, the data set was expanded by a data enhancement method which randomly changed the image brightness and hue. Finally, the training model is deployed on MCU through the TensorFlow Lite framework to realize edge AI detection. Experiments show that the size of the lightweight YOLOv5 is reduced by 87.1% and the mAP reaches 92.3%. The system can complete the water meter wireless meter reading and realize the system self-power stably. In addition, the system can be expanded for other meter reading tasks based on visual features

Evolution of ecosystem services under the impact of urbanization using the InVEST model in the xiongan new area, China

Understanding the impact of land use on ecosystem service functions is crucial for guiding land management and ecological environment protection in Xiongan New Area (XANA), China. This paper employs the InVEST model to assess the temporal and spatial characteristics of water yield, carbon storage, water purification, and soil conservation ecosystem services in XANA from 1980 to 2020, analyzing geographical and spatial variations in ecosystem service capabilities. Through correlation analysis and the grid Moran’s I index, we explored the mechanisms of ecosystem action and the trade-offs and synergies among these services. Our results revealed that urban land use in XANA increased throughout the 1980–2020 period, with the fastest growth occurring from 2010 to 2020, primarily due to cultivated land conversion. Prior to 2010, cultivated land expanded rapidly, consuming significant amounts of water resources. Changes in land use structure drove increases in water yield and nitrogen output in the XANA ecosystem while decreasing carbon storage and soil erosion. Urban land area change was the primary factor influencing water yield and nitrogen output, while reduced water area was the main driver behind decreased carbon storage in the region. Cultivated land was identified as the primary contributor to soil erosion. The synergy between carbon storage and water conservation is closely tied to water area and urban land, while the synergies between carbon storage and water quality purification, soil conservation and water quality purification hinge on water areas and cultivated land areas. To ensure the sustainable development of XANA, it is essential to protect the wetland ecosystem in the Baiyangdian Lake basin, enhance forest and grassland coverage, and monitor temporal and spatial changes in different ecosystem services and their interrelationships closely

Experimental measurement and clustered equal diameter particle model of permeability with methane hydrate in glass beads

Permeability is a key parameter for gas recovery from marine hydrate reservoirs. In this study, two kinds of BZ02 and BZ04 glass beads provided skeleton structure for methane hydrate synthesis in pressure vessel. Based on the observation of Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), the glass beads in the pressure vessel were considered to be equal diameter spheres and stacked in the form of orthorhombic. The water effective permeability KW of glass beads with different hydrate saturations (S-H) were carried out by steady-state water injection method. Experimental results indicated that the presence of methane hydrate could cause significant decrease of K-W, and the gas produced by hydrate dissociation would reduce the resistance of fluid flow in pores. The permeability ratio in the presence and absence of hydrate Kr-W was exponentially decreasing with the SH. A clustered equal diameter particle (CEDP) model was proposed that methane hydrate was clustered as equal diameter spheres and occupied in the center of pore space. The internal surface area of pore space with and without hydrate was simplified and the KrW-SH relationship was deduced in detail. When the saturation exponent n of BZ02 and BZ04 were recommended to be 10 and 18, respectively, the K-rW in the CEDP model was fitted well with the experimental results. This model also revealed that the radius of glass beads and hydrate particles had a stronger effect on the KrW

Data_Sheet_1_Associations between diet and incidence risk of lung cancer: A Mendelian randomization study.docx

BackgroundObservational studies have revealed associations between diet and lung cancer. However, it is unclear whether the association is disturbed by confounding factors. We used a two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) method to characterize the associations between diet and the lung cancer risk (including 3 subtypes: lung adenocarcinoma (LA), squamous cell lung carcinoma (SqCLC), and small cell lung cancer (SCLC)).Materials and methodsData on 20 diets were screened from the UK Biobank. Lung cancer data came from a large meta-analysis of 85,716 individuals. The inverse-variance weighted method was used as the main analysis. Sensitivity analysis was also used to explain the different multiplicity patterns of the final model.ResultsOur results showed significant evidence that 3 diets were associated with lung cancer [odds ratio (OR): 0.271, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.150–0.488, p = 1.46 × 10−4, dried fruit; OR: 3.010, 95% CI: 1.608–5.632, p = 5.70 × 10−4, beer] and SqCLC (OR: 0.135, 95% CI: 0.062–0.293, p = 2.33 × 10−5, dried fruit; OR: 0.485, 95% CI: 0.328–0.717, p = 2.9 × 10−4, cheese). There were also suggestive correlations between 5 dietary intakes and lung cancer (OR: 0.441, 95% CI: 0.250–0.778, p = 0.008, cereal; OR: 2.267, 95% CI: 1.126–4.564, p = 0.022, beef), LA (OR: 0.494, 95% CI: 0.285–0.858, p = 0.012, dried fruit; OR: 3.536, 95% CI: 1.546–8.085, p = 0.003, beer) and SCLC (OR: 0.006, 95% CI: 0.000–0.222, p = 0.039, non-oily fish; OR: 0.239, 95% CI: 0.086–0.664, p = 0.006, dried fruit). No other association between diet and lung cancer was observed.ConclusionOur study preliminary found that cheese, dried fruit, and beer intake were significantly associated with the risk of lung cancer or its subtypes, while cereal, beef, and non-oily fish intake were suggestively associated with the risk of lung cancer or its subtypes. Well-designed prospective studies are still needed to confirm our findings in the future.</p