Wavelet cross-correlation analysis of wind speed series generated by ANN based models

International audienceTo obtain, over medium term periods, wind speed time series on a site, located in the southern part of the Paris region (France), where long recording are not available, but where nearby meteorological stations provide large series of data, use was made of ANN based models. The performance of these models have been evaluated by using several commonly used statistics such as average absolute error, root mean square error, normalized mean square error, and correlation coefficient. Such global criteria are good indicators of the "robustness" of the models but are unable to provide useful information about their "effectiveness" in accurately generating wind speed fluctuations over a wide range of scales. Therefore a complementary wavelet cross coherence analysis has been performed. Wavelet cross coherence, wavelet cross-correlation and spectral wavelet cross-correlation coefficients, have been calculated and displayed as functions of the equivalent Fourier period. These coefficients provide quantitative measures of the scale-dependence of the model performance. In particular the spectral wavelet cross coherence coefficient can be used to have a rapid and efficient identification of the validity range of the models. The results show that the ANN models employed in this study are only effective in computing large-scale fluctuations of large amplitude. To obtain a more representative time series, with much higher resolution, small-scale fluctuations have to be simulated by a superimposed statistical model. By combining ANN and statistical models, both the high and the low-frequency segments of the wind velocity spectra can be simulated, over a range of several hours, at the target site.Pour générer des signaux synthétiques représentatifs du vent, sur un site situé dans le sud de la région parisienne (France) où très peu de données étaient disponibles, nous avons utilisé des données météo enregistrées dans des stations météorologiques voisines et des modèles basés sur des réseaux de neurones artificiels (RNA). Les performances de tels modèles sont généralement évaluées à l'aide d’indicateurs statistiques, tels que l'erreur absolue moyenne, l'erreur quadratique moyenne, l'erreur quadratique moyenne normalisée et le coefficient de corrélation. Ces indicateurs globaux servent à mesurer la « robustesse » des modèles, mais ils ne permettent pas, à priori, de mesurer leur aptitude à restituer l’ensemble des échelles contenues dans un signal multi-échelles. Aussi, nous avons proposé de mesurer leur efficacité à l’aide des propriétés temps-échelles des transformées en ondelettes continues. Pour cela, nous avons calculé, à différentes échelles, les fonctions de corrélation croisée en ondelettes, de cohérence croisée en ondelettes et les coefficients de corrélation croisée en ondelettes. Ces coefficients fournissent des mesures quantitatives, à chaque échelle, de la performance du modèle. Ils permettent, en particulier, de définir rapidement et efficacement la gamme de fluctuation que le modèle est apte à restituer. Les résultats ont montré que les modèles RNA utilisés dans cette étude ne reconstruisent correctement que les grandes échelles du vent, qui correspondent aux fluctuations lentes. Pour reconstruire les fluctuations turbulentes, rapides, un modèle classique de génération de processus stochastique a été utilisé. Ainsi, en combinant les deux types de modèles, sur le site considéré, toutes les gammes de fluctuation ont pu être simulées, sur des périodes de plusieurs heures

"Educateurs Justice" : un statut vaut-il qualification ?

Je vous propose d'examiner rapidement comment l'éducateur de l'Éducation surveillée passera d'une position de relatif privilégié, à une situation que j'ai intitulée « d'incertaine qualification professionnelle ». Le statut de 1956 des personnels de l'Éducation surveillée, représente, à l'époque, un modèle sur lequel nous reviendrons brièvement. Nous nous arrêterons sur ce qui, à mon sens, constitue, avec l'usure du temps, son maillon faible : le dispositif de formation. Nous évoquerons le dip..

Are the “100 of the world’s worst” invasive species also the costliest?

Biological invasions are increasing worldwide, damaging ecosystems and socioeconomic sectors. Two decades ago, the “100 of the world’s worst” invasive alien species list was established by the IUCN to improve communications , identifying particularly damaging ‘flagship’ invaders globally (hereafter, worst). Whilst this list has bolstered invader awareness, whether worst species are especially economically damaging and how they compare to other invaders (hereafter, other) remain unknown. Here, we quantify invasion costs using the most comprehensive global database compiling them (InvaCost). We compare these costs between worst and other species against sectorial, taxonomic and regional descriptors, and examine temporal cost trends. Only 60 of the 100 worst species had invasion costs considered as highly reliable and actually observed estimates (median: US$43 million). On average, these costs were significantly higher than the 463 other invasive species recorded in InvaCost (median: US$ 0.53 million), although some other species had higher costs than most worst species. Damages to the environment from the worst species dominated, whereas other species largely impacted agriculture. Disproportionately highest worst species costs were incurred in North America, whilst costs were more evenly distributed for other species; animal invasions were always costliest. Proportional management expenditures were low for the other species, and surprisingly, over twice as low for the worst species. Temporally, costs increased more for the worst than other taxa; however, management spending has remained very low for both groups. Nonetheless, since 40 species had no robust and/or reported costs, the “true” cost of “some of the world’s worst” 100 invasive species still remains unknown

Use of neuraminidase inhibitors in primary health care during pandemic and seasonal influenza between 2009 and 2013: Outpatient influenza antiviral treatment

International audienceBACKGROUND:In a context of controversy about influenza antiviral treatments, this study assessed primary health-care physicians' prescription of neuraminidase inhibitors (NIs) in France during pandemic and seasonal influenza between 2009 and 2013.METHODS:This observational study, using data recorded in three national databases, estimated the rate of NI prescription among influenza-like illness (ILI) patients seen in GP and paediatrician consultations, and determined factors associated with this prescription according to a multivariate analysis. NI delivery by pharmacists was also evaluated.RESULTS:Rates of NI prescription were estimated to be 61.1% among ILI patients with a severe influenza risk factor seen in GP consultation during the A(H1N1)pdm2009 pandemic versus an average rate of 25.9% during the three following seasonal influenza epidemics. Factors associated with NI prescription were a chronic disease in patients under 65 years (OR 14.85; 95% CI 13.00, 16.97) and in those aged 65 and older (OR 7.54; 5.86, 9.70), an age ≥65 years in patients without chronic disease (OR 1.35; 1.04, 1.74), a pregnancy (OR 10.63; 7.67, 15.76), obesity (OR 4.67; 3.50, 6.22) and a consultation during the pandemic A(H1N1)pdm2009 (OR 3.19; 2.93, 3.48). The number of antiviral treatments delivered by pharmacists during the A(H1N1)pdm2009 pandemic was 835 per 100,000 inhabitants, and an average of 275 per 100,000 inhabitants during the three following seasonal influenza epidemics.CONCLUSIONS:Although physicians seem to follow the recommended indications for NIs in primary health-care practice, this study confirms the low rate of NI prescription to ILI patients with a severe influenza risk factor, especially during seasonal epidemics

Economic costs of protecting islands from invasive alien species

Funding Information: This work was conducted following a workshop funded by the AXA Research Fund Chair of Invasion Biology and is part of the AlienScenario project funded by BiodivERsA‐Belmont Forum Project “Alien Scenarios” (BL: FWF project no. I 4011‐B32). The authors also acknowledge the French National Research Agency (ANR‐14‐CE02‐0021) and the BNP‐Paribas Foundation Climate Initiative for funding the InvaCost project and enabling the construction of the database, with particular thanks to C. Diagne. T.W.B. acknowledges funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program Marie Skłodowska‐Curie fellowship (grant 747120). J.F.L. thanks the Auburn University School of Forestry and Wildlife Sciences for travel support to attend the InvaCost workshop. Funding for E.A. came from the AXA Research Fund Chair of Invasion Biology of the University of Paris Saclay. We also thank J. Albers and 2 anonymous reviewers and for their comments that strengthened this manuscript. Publisher Copyright: © 2022 The Authors. Conservation Biology published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of Society for Conservation Biology.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Global economic costs of herpetofauna invasions

Biological invasions by amphibian and reptile species (i.e. herpetofauna) are numerous and widespread, having caused severe impacts on ecosystems, the economy and human health. However, there remains no synthesised assessment of the economic costs of these invasions. Therefore, using the most comprehensive database on the economic costs of invasive alien species worldwide (InvaCost), we analyse the costs caused by invasive alien herpetofauna according to taxonomic, geographic, sectoral and temporal dimensions, as well as the types of these costs. The cost of invasive herpetofauna totaled at 17.0 billion US$between 1986 and 2020, divided split into 6.3 billion US$ for amphibians, 10.4 billion US$for reptiles and 334 million US$ for mixed classes. However, these costs were associated predominantly with only two species (brown tree snake Boiga irregularis and American bullfrog Lithobates catesbeianus), with 10.3 and 6.0 billion US$ in costs, respectively. Costs for the remaining 19 reported species were relatively minor ( 99%), while for reptiles, impacts were reported mostly through damages to mixed sectors (65%). Geographically, Oceania and Pacific Islands recorded 63% of total costs, followed by Europe (35%) and North America (2%). Cost reports have generally increased over time but peaked between 2011 and 2015 for amphibians and 2006 to 2010 for reptiles. A greater effort in studying the costs of invasive herpetofauna is necessary for a more complete understanding of invasion impacts of these species. We emphasise the need for greater control and prevention policies concerning the spread of current and future invasive herpetofauna.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Web-based participatory surveillance of infectious diseases: the Influenzanet participatory surveillance experience.

To overcome the limitations of the state-of-the-art influenza surveillance systems in Europe, we established in 2008 a European-wide consortium aimed at introducing an innovative information and communication technology approach for a web-based surveillance system across different European countries, called Influenzanet. The system, based on earlier efforts in The Netherlands and Portugal, works with the participation of the population in each country to collect real-time information on the distribution of influenza-like illness cases through web surveys administered to volunteers reporting their symptoms (or lack of symptoms) every week during the influenza season. Such a large European-wide web-based monitoring infrastructure is intended to rapidly identify public health emergencies, contribute to understanding global trends, inform data-driven forecast models to assess the impact on the population, optimize the allocation of resources, and help in devising mitigation and containment measures. In this article, we describe the scientific and technological issues faced during the development and deployment of a flexible and readily deployable web tool capable of coping with the requirements of different countries for data collection, during either a public health emergency or an ordinary influenza season. Even though the system is based on previous successful experience, the implementation in each new country represented a separate scientific challenge. Only after more than 5 years of development are the existing platforms based on a plug-and-play tool that can be promptly deployed in any country wishing to be part of the Influenzanet network, now composed of The Netherlands, Belgium, Portugal, Italy, the UK, France, Sweden, Spain, Ireland, and Denmark

Influenzanet: Citizens Among 10 Countries Collaborating to Monitor Influenza in Europe.

BACKGROUND: The wide availability of the Internet and the growth of digital communication technologies have become an important tool for epidemiological studies and health surveillance. Influenzanet is a participatory surveillance system monitoring the incidence of influenza-like illness (ILI) in Europe since 2003. It is based on data provided by volunteers who self-report their symptoms via the Internet throughout the influenza season and currently involves 10 countries. OBJECTIVE: In this paper, we describe the Influenzanet system and provide an overview of results from several analyses that have been performed with the collected data, which include participant representativeness analyses, data validation (comparing ILI incidence rates between Influenzanet and sentinel medical practice networks), identification of ILI risk factors, and influenza vaccine effectiveness (VE) studies previously published. Additionally, we present new VE analyses for the Netherlands, stratified by age and chronic illness and offer suggestions for further work and considerations on the continuity and sustainability of the participatory system. METHODS: Influenzanet comprises country-specific websites where residents can register to become volunteers to support influenza surveillance and have access to influenza-related information. Participants are recruited through different communication channels. Following registration, volunteers submit an intake questionnaire with their postal code and sociodemographic and medical characteristics, after which they are invited to report their symptoms via a weekly electronic newsletter reminder. Several thousands of participants have been engaged yearly in Influenzanet, with over 36,000 volunteers in the 2015-16 season alone. RESULTS: In summary, for some traits and in some countries (eg, influenza vaccination rates in the Netherlands), Influenzanet participants were representative of the general population. However, for other traits, they were not (eg, participants underrepresent the youngest and oldest age groups in 7 countries). The incidence of ILI in Influenzanet was found to be closely correlated although quantitatively higher than that obtained by the sentinel medical practice networks. Various risk factors for acquiring an ILI infection were identified. The VE studies performed with Influenzanet data suggest that this surveillance system could develop into a complementary tool to measure the effectiveness of the influenza vaccine, eventually in real time. CONCLUSIONS: Results from these analyses illustrate that Influenzanet has developed into a fast and flexible monitoring system that can complement the traditional influenza surveillance performed by sentinel medical practices. The uniformity of Influenzanet allows for direct comparison of ILI rates between countries. It also has the important advantage of yielding individual data, which can be used to identify risk factors. The way in which the Influenzanet system is constructed allows the collection of data that could be extended beyond those of ILI cases to monitor pandemic influenza and other common or emerging diseases