The NWRA Classification Infrastructure: Description and Extension to the Discriminant Analysis Flare Forecasting System (DAFFS)

A classification infrastructure built upon Discriminant Analysis has been developed at NorthWest Research Associates for examining the statistical differences between samples of two known populations. Originating to examine the physical differences between flare-quiet and flare-imminent solar active regions, we describe herein some details of the infrastructure including: parametrization of large datasets, schemes for handling "null" and "bad" data in multi-parameter analysis, application of non-parametric multi-dimensional Discriminant Analysis, an extension through Bayes' theorem to probabilistic classification, and methods invoked for evaluating classifier success. The classifier infrastructure is applicable to a wide range of scientific questions in solar physics. We demonstrate its application to the question of distinguishing flare-imminent from flare-quiet solar active regions, updating results from the original publications that were based on different data and much smaller sample sizes. Finally, as a demonstration of "Research to Operations" efforts in the space-weather forecasting context, we present the Discriminant Analysis Flare Forecasting System (DAFFS), a near-real-time operationally-running solar flare forecasting tool that was developed from the research-directed infrastructure.Comment: J. Space Weather Space Climate: Accepted / in press; access supplementary materials through journal; some figures are less than full resolution for arXi

Hypercube orientations with only two in-degrees

We consider the problem of orienting the edges of the $n$-dimensional hypercube so only two different in-degrees $a$ and $b$ occur. We show that this can be done, for two specified in-degrees, if and only if an obvious necessary condition holds. Namely, there exist non-negative integers $s$ and $t$ so that $s+t=2^n$ and $as+bt=n2^{n-1}$. This is connected to a question arising from constructing a strategy for a "hat puzzle."Comment: 9 pages, 4 figure

The Networked Naturalist: Mobile phone data collection for citizen science and education

*Background/Question/Methods*
Citizen science projects engage individual volunteers or groups to observe, measure, and contribute data to scientific studies. CENS is building a collection of mobile phone and web-based tools to make the citizen scientist experience more engaging and flexible. CENS is an NSF-funded Information and Technology Center that employs graduate students from Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at UCLA to create open-source software that is environmentally and socially responsible. The overarching goal of the Networked Naturalist project is to enhance participatory learning experiences through citizen science campaigns and help transform the associated learning process. We are collaborating with national field campaigns, such Project BudBurst, and also with the National Park Service to increase participation and retention in citizen scientist campaigns through two main avenues afforded by the use of new technologies: (1) to offer new methods for data collection, primarily using mobile phones, through text, picture, and smart-phone applications, and (2) to provide immediate feedback and automated, engaging analysis of data for informal learning opportunities. We are working to create a robust data collection system to enhance citizen science by ensuring data quality and improving data submission, and to transform participation into an active learning, engaging experience.

*Results/Conclusions*
Our experience with volunteers for software testing at UCLA and at the National Park Service has indicated that using mobile phones is an efficient method for collecting environmental and location data and raises public awareness of environmental issues through attracting the attention of the mass media. Individual participation in the What’s Invasive! project by volunteer citizen scientists seems to have been limited by smartphone application availability (iPhone app is currently only available for Santa Monica), although methods for making observations based on text and picture messaging are also available. We have found that running short-term "campaigns" partnered with NPS officials and groups such as schools has been the most effective in not only education-related efforts but also in efficiently identifying and locating species and objects of interest using mobile phones

Pilots’ visual scan pattern and attention distribution during the pursuit of a dynamic target

Introduction: The current research is investigating pilots’ visual scan patterns in order to assess attention distribution during air-to-air manoeuvers. Method: A total of thirty qualified mission-ready fighter pilots participated in this research. Eye movement data were collected by a portable head-mounted eye-tracking device, combined with a jet fighter simulator. To complete the task, pilots have to search for, pursue, and lock-on a moving target whilst performing air-to-air tasks. Results: There were significant differences in pilots’ saccade duration (msec) in three operating phases including searching (M=241, SD=332), pursuing (M=311, SD=392), and lock-on (M=191, SD=226). Also, there were significant differences in pilots’ pupil sizes (pixel2) of which lock-on phase was the largest (M=27237, SD=6457), followed by pursuing (M=26232, SD=6070), then searching (M=25858, SD=6137). Furthermore, there were significant differences between expert and novice pilots on the percentage of fixation on the HUD, time spent looking outside the cockpit, and the performance of situational awareness (SA). Discussion: Experienced pilots have better SA performance and paid more attention to the HUD but focused less outside the cockpit when compared with novice pilots. Furthermore, pilots with better SA performance exhibited a smaller pupil size during the operational phase of lock-on whilst pursuing a dynamic target. Understanding pilots’ visual scan patterns and attention distribution are beneficial to the design of interface displays in the cockpit and in developing human factors training syllabi to improve safety of flight operations

Diving in Two Marine Lakes in Croatia

We describe the diving methods used for in-situ observations of the scyphozoan medusa, Aurelia sp., in two marine lakes on the island of Mljet, Croatia. Both lakes have a strong pycnocline at approximately 15 m. During this study (May, 2004) surface temperature was about 20o C; bottom temperature about 10o C. Visibility was 15 m to 30 m. Tide and currents were negligible. A dense resident population of Aurelia sp. and a predictable environment made this an ideal study site. Aurelia was most abundant in mid-water around the pycnocline. There were several dive objectives: specimen collection for laboratory analysis, population census, discrete plankton tows and direct observation of flow around swimming medusae. We used several methods for maintaining our orientation underwater including working from an anchor line, towing a tethered buoy, and use of a blue water rig. Because the environment was relatively benign we allowed the rig to drift free while the boat was standing by at a short distance. Often a tether was not required. This plan allowed the most freedom and provided an excellent reference throughout the dive

CharManteau: Character Embedding Models For Portmanteau Creation

Portmanteaus are a word formation phenomenon where two words are combined to form a new word. We propose character-level neural sequence-to-sequence (S2S) methods for the task of portmanteau generation that are end-to-end-trainable, language independent, and do not explicitly use additional phonetic information. We propose a noisy-channel-style model, which allows for the incorporation of unsupervised word lists, improving performance over a standard source-to-target model. This model is made possible by an exhaustive candidate generation strategy specifically enabled by the features of the portmanteau task. Experiments find our approach superior to a state-of-the-art FST-based baseline with respect to ground truth accuracy and human evaluation.Comment: Accepted for publication in EMNLP 201

Gendered Paths to Formal and Informal Resources in Post-Disaster Development in the Ecuadorian Andes

The devastating eruptions of Mount Tungurahua in the Ecuadorian highlands in 1999 and 2006 left many communities struggling to rebuild their homes and others permanently displaced to settlements built by state and nongovernmental organizations. For several years afterward, households diversified their economic strategies to compensate for losses, communities organized to promote local development, and the state and nongovernmental organizations sponsored many economic recovery programs in the affected communities. Our study examined the ways in which gender and gender roles were associated with different levels and paths of access to scarce resources in these communities. Specifically, this article contrasts the experiences of men and women in accessing household necessities and project assistance through formal institutions and informal networks. We found that women and men used different types of informal social support networks, with men receiving significantly more material, emotional, and informational support than women. We also found that men and women experienced different challenges and advantages when pursuing support through local and extralocal institutions and that these institutions often coordinated in ways that reified their biases. We present a methodology that is replicable in a wide variety of disaster, resettlement, and development settings, and we advocate an inductive, evidence-based approach to policy, built upon an understanding of local gender, class, and ethnic dynamics affecting access to formal and informal resources. This evidence should be used to build more robust local institutions that can resist wider social and cultural pressures for male dominance and gendered exclusion