A Multi-Label Machine Learning Approach to Support Pathologist\u27s Histological Analysis

This paper proposes a new tool in the field of telemedicine, defined as a specific branch where IT supports medicine, in case distance impairs the proper care to be delivered to a patient. All the information contained into medical texts, if properly extracted, may be suitable for searching, classification, or statistical analysis. For this reason, in order to reduce errors and improve quality control, a proper information extraction tool may be useful. In this direction, this work presents a Machine Learning Multi-Label approach for the classification of the information extracted from the pathology reports into relevant categories. The aim is to integrate automatic classifiers to improve the current workflow of medical experts, by defining a Multi-Label approach, able to consider all the features of a model, together with their relationships. This work is licensed under a&nbsp;Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.</p

Generalization of the complete data fusion to multi-target retrieval of atmospheric parameters and application to FORUM and IASI-NG simulated measurements

Abstract In the context of a growing need for innovatory techniques to take advantage of the largest amount of information from the great number of available remote sensing data, the Complete Data Fusion (CDF) algorithm was presented as a new method to combine independent measurements of the same vertical profile of an atmospheric parameter into a single estimate for a concise and complete characterization of the atmospheric state. The majority of the atmospheric composition measurements determine the altitude distribution of a great number of quantities: multi-target retrievals (MTRs) are increasingly applied to remote sensing observations to determine simultaneously atmospheric constituents with the purpose to reduce the systematic error caused by interfering species. In this work, we optimised the CDF for the application to MTR products. We applied the method to simulated retrievals in the thermal infrared and in the far infrared spectral ranges, considering the instrumental specifications and performances of IASI-NG (Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer New Generation) and FORUM (Far-Infrared Outgoing Radiation Understanding and Monitoring) instruments, respectively. The obtained results show that the CDF algorithm can cope with state vectors from MTRs, that must share at least one retrieved variable. In particular, the results show that the fused profile has the greatest number of degrees of freedom and the smallest error for all considered cases. The comparison between the CDF products and the synergistic retrieval ones shows the equivalence of the two methods when the linear approximation is adopted to simplify the treatment of the retrieval problem

Critical Review of the Pivotal Studies of Four rFVIII Products for the Treatment of Hemophilia A Patients: The Role of Octocog Alfa

INTRODUCTION: Hemophilia A is a rare congenital bleeding disorder caused by a deficiency of clotting factor VIII (FVIII). The severe form of the disease is characterized by spontaneous bleeds, especially into the joints. Prophylaxis, based on regularly intravenous administration of the missing factor to avoid hemorrhages, represents the gold standard of treatment. In recent years, new products that significantly improve the treatment management options for patients with hemophilia have become available in the market.OBJECTIVE: To critically evaluate the pivotal studies of recombinant FVIII (rFVIII) products, approved in Europe within the first half of 2018 having obtained the indication for a prophylaxis dosing regimen based also on a twice weekly infusion frequency or even less, highlighting their limitations or strengths.METHODS: A systematic literature search was conducted, and several databases (PubMed and Embase) were consulted.RESULTS: Nine clinical trials involving patients with severe hemophilia A without inhibitor were included in this analysis. Four rFVIII products (Elocta®, Biogen, Cambridge, MA, USA; Kovaltry®, Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals, Germany; Afstyla®, CSL Behring GmbH, Germany; Adynovi®, Baxalta Innovation GmbH, Austria) with different pharmacokinetic profiles were evaluated. The trials included in this analysis had different designs and heterogeneous methods were utilized to assess the study outcomes. The baseline characteristics of the patients enrolled in the studies were also often different and sometimes not adequately described. LEOPOLD II, a trial to compare prophylaxis to on-demand therapy with an unmodified rFVIII product (Kovaltry®, octocog alfa), was the only completely randomized trial that enrolled a more critical patient population in terms of compromised joint condition than the other studies. Based on these side-by-side comparison, Octocog alfa reported similar efficacy, in terms of annualized bleeding rate, to the other rFVIII products, including extended half-life.CONCLUSIONS: Even without structural modifications, octocog alfa may be considered a useful treatment option for two times a week prophylaxis in a selected population of haemophilia patients

Impactos en la precipitación del norte de Chile de los regímenes de tiempo según el geopotencial de 500 hPa entre 1966 y 2015

Ponencia presentada en: XI Congreso de la Asociación Española de Climatología celebrado en Cartagena entre el 17 y el 19 de octubre de 2018.[ES]El norte de Chile se caracteriza por ser un clima desértico, englobando parte del desierto de Atacama, y por tener un gradiente altitudinal muy marcado como consecuencia de una orografía compleja. Sin embargo, de forma notablemente concentrada, en esta región se da una estación lluviosa que tiene lugar en los meses estivales del hemisferio austral. Es de especial interés determinar qué mecanismos se dan en altura (500 hPa) que proporcionan la humedad necesaria para la ocurrencia de las lluvias. Para ello, se han calculado las anomalías pluviométricas estacionales de 161 estaciones meteorológicas ubicadas en el norte de Chile (17ºS a 29ºS) y se han puesto en relación con las anomalías barométricas detectadas en el geopotencial de 500 hPa. Se determinaron 4 agrupaciones de regímenes de tiempo, las cuales mostraron impactos diferentes en los distintos observatorios, demostrando respuestas diferenciadas en función de la latitud y de la altitud de los mismos.[EN]Northern Chile is characterized by a desert climate, encompassing part of the Atacama Desert, and having a very marked altitudinal gradient because of a complex orography. However, in a remarkably concentrated way, in this region a rainy season takes place in the summer months of the Southern Hemisphere. It is of special interest to determine which mechanisms are given in height (500 hPa) that provide the necessary humidity for the occurrence of rains. For this, the seasonal rainfall anomalies of 161 meteorological stations located in the north of Chile (17ºS to 29ºS) have been calculated and have been related to the barometric anomalies detected in the 500 hPa geopotential. Four cluster of weather regimes were determined, which showed different impacts in the different observatories, demonstrating differentiated responses according to the latitude and altitude of them

Die Schleswig-Holsteinische Universitäts-Gesellschaft

Título del pre-print: Precipitation characterization of northern Chile using weather regimesNorthern Chile is one of the most arid regions in the world, with precipitation mainly occurring during austral summer, between December and April. The aim of this study is to classify the main weather regimes derived from sea level pressure, surface wind speed, 500 or 250 hPa geopotential heights, in order to measure their influence on precipitation anomalies and determine if they can be considered sources of predictability of rainfall in this region. Four weather regimes were found to optimally describe atmospheric circulation in the study area during 1966-2015 and for each of the four levels described above. Using daily precipitation data from a network of 161 meteorological stations across the region, the rainfall anomalies associated with each weather regime were quantified. They are coherent with the direction of flow derived from pressure and geopotential anomalies, bringing humid air masses from the Amazon Basin or the Pacific. The transitions between the different regimes are also coherent, representing transitions to and from similar regimes. A few negative and significant trends in the persistence of different regimes were detected, most likely linked to the absence of anthropogenic warming in the Antarctic as opposed to the Arctic. Finally, two of the regimes derived from surface wind speed exhibit a negative and significant trend in its frequency of occurrence, determining a precipitation decrease in the south of the study area (28–30°S), which can be compared with the Megadrought experienced in central Chile.The authors want to thank the support of the FONDECYT Project 11160059 (Chilean Government), the Climatology Group (2017 SGR 1362, Catalan Government), the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO) as part of the Juan de la Cierva - Incorporación grant (BOE-A-2010-3694), the New European Wind Atlas (NEWA) project (PCIN-2016-029), the Subseasonal to Seasonal for Energy (S2S4E) project (H2020-SC5-2016-2017), and the CLICES Project (CGL2017-83866-C3-2-R)

Challenges in the selection of atmospheric circulation patterns for the wind energy sector

Abstract Atmospheric circulation patterns that prevail for several consecutive days over a specific region can have consequences for the wind energy sector as they may lead to a reduction of the wind power generation, impacting market prices or repayments of investments. The main goal of this study is to develop a user-oriented classification of atmospheric circulation patterns in the Euro-Atlantic region that helps to mitigate the impact of the atmospheric variability on the wind industry at seasonal timescales. Particularly, the seasonal forecasts of these frequencies of occurrence can be also beneficial to reduce the risk of the climate variability in wind energy activities. K-means clustering has been applied on the sea level pressure from the ERA5 reanalysis to produce a classification with three, four, five and six clusters per season. The spatial similarity between the different ERA5 classifications has revealed that four clusters are a good option for all the seasons except for summer when the atmospheric circulation can be described with only three clusters. However, the use of these classifications to reconstruct wind speed and temperature, key climate variables for the wind energy sector, has shown that four clusters per season are a good choice. The skill of five seasonal forecast systems in simulating the year-to-year variations in the frequency of occurrence of the atmospheric patterns is more dependent on the inherent skill of the sea level pressure than on the number of clusters employed. This result suggests that more work is needed to improve the performance of the seasonal forecast systems in the Euro-Atlantic domain to extract skilful forecast information from the circulation classification. Finally, this analysis illustrates that from a user perspective it is essential to consider the application when selecting a classification and to take into account different forecast systems.This research has been funded by the S2S4E (GA 776787) Horizon 2020 project, the Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades as part of the CLINSA project (CGL2017‐85791‐R) and the Juan de la Cierva – Incorporación Grant (IJCI‐2016‐29776). The analyses and plots of this work have been performed with the s2dverification (Manubens et al., 2018), CSTools (https://CRAN.R-project.org/package=CSTools) and startR (https://CRAN.R-project.org/package=startR) R‐language‐based software packages. Finally, we would like to thank Pierre‐Antoine Bretonnière, Margarida Samsó, Nicolau Manubens and Núria Pérez‐Zanón for their technical support at different stages of this project. We also acknowledge the two anonymous reviewers for their useful comments.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Weather regimes as a tool to validate seasonal forecasts

The research leading to these results has received funding by the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) of the European Commission (GA30837, GA308291), the Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (MINECO) under the project CGL2013-41055R and the project PCIN-2014-012-C07-07.Postprint (published version

La variabilidad espacial de las temperaturas en la Península Ibérica explicada por los tipos de tiempo de circulación zonal: Este y Oeste. Un posible efecto Foehn a escala peninsular

Los tipos de tiempo se definen como situaciones sinópticas específicas, clasificadas según diversos criterios. La clasificación de Jeckinson y Collison es automática, y emplea datos de presión de superficie y diversos algoritmos que definen 26 tipos de tiempo. Se ha estudiado la relación entre los tipos de tiempo y las temperaturas mensuales de la Península Ibérica de la base de datos “MOnthly TEmperature DAtabase of Spain”. El análisis de la relación muestra una respuesta asimétrica entre las costas este y oeste peninsular en presencia de advecciones atlánticas o mediterráneas. Así, las advecciones del Oeste favorecen el descenso de temperaturas en la fachada atlántica del territorio, mientras que en la costa mediterránea se observa un aumento de las mismas. Sin embargo, cuando tiene lugar las advecciones del Este ocurre lo contrario, descenso de temperatura en la costa mediterránea y aumento térmico en la fachada atlántica. La distribución espacial de las principales cadenas montañosas parece ser la clave del reparto espacial de las temperaturas y del efecto foehn que tiene lugar a gran escala en la Península Ibérica.Weather types are defined as specific synoptic situations that can be classified using several criteria. Jeckinson and Collison’s classification is an automatic algorithm that uses surface pressure data to define 26 weather types. In this study, the relationship between weather types and monthly temperatures has been studied for the Iberian Peninsula, based on data from the “MOnthly TEmperature DAtabase of Spain” database. This analysis shows an asymmetric behaviour in the East and West coasts of the peninsula in response to Mediterranean and Atlantic advection. A west advection leads to decreases in temperatures in the Atlantic facade of the studied territory, while an increase of temperatures is observed along the Mediterranean coast. With an East advection the opposite phenomenon occurs: temperatures decay on the Mediterranean coast and increase in the Atlantic facade. The spatial distribution of the main mountain chains in the Iberian Peninsula appears to be the key element explaining the spatial distribution of temperatures and the observed Foehn’s effect occurring at a large scale in this territory.Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación, Gobierno de España, Proyecto DESEMON, CGL2014-52135-C3-3-R. Gobierno Regional de Aragón DGA-FSE (Grupo de Investigación Consolidado “Clima, Agua, Cambio Global y Sistemas Naturales”). Dhais Peña-Angulo es becaria de doctorado del Programa FPI del Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación

Sub-seasonal to seasonal climate predictions for wind energy forecasting

Both renewable energy supply and electricity demand are strongly influenced by meteorological conditions and their evolution over time in terms of climate variability and climate change. However, knowledge of power output and demand forecasting beyond a few days remains poor. Current methodologies assume that long-term resource availability is constant, ignoring the fact that future wind resources could be significantly different from the past wind energy conditions. Such uncertainties create risks that affect investment in wind energy projects at the operational stage where energy yields affect cash flow and the balance of the grid. Here we assess whether sub-seasonal to seasonal climate predictions (S2S) can skilfully predict wind speed in Europe. To illustrate S2S potential applications, two periods with an unusual climate behaviour affecting the energy market will be presented. We find that wind speed forecasted using S2S exhibits predictability some weeks and months in advance in important regions for the energy sector such as the North Sea. If S2S are incorporated into planning activities for energy traders, energy producers, plant operators, plant investors, they could help improve management climate variability related risks.We thank the S2S4E (GA776787), NEWA (PCIN-2014-012-C07-07), ERA4CS-INDECIS (GA690462) and ERA4CS-MEDSCOPE (GA690462) projects funding for allowing us to carry out this research. We acknowledge use of the s2dverification (http://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/s2dverification) and Specs-Verification (http://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/SpecsVerification)R-language-based software packages.We also acknowledge the ECMWF for the provision of the ECMWF SEAS5 and the Monthly Prediction Systemsand the ERA-Interim reanalysis datasets.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Variación espacial de las temperaturas medias mensuales (máximas y mínimas) en España (1981-2010)

Ponencia presentada en: IX Congreso de la Asociación Española de Climatología celebrado en Almería entre el 28 y el 30 de octubre de 2014.[ES]En este trabajo se analiza la variabilidad espacial de los promedios mensuales de las temperaturas diurnas (máximas, Tmax) y nocturnas (mínimas, Tmin) en la España peninsular (1981-2010), por medio de la función denominada Correlation Decay Distance (CDD), que estima la distancia a la que se mantiene un valor de varianza común entre observatorios vecinos.[EN]The spatial variability of the average monthly diurnal (maximum, Tmax) and nocturnal (minimum, Tmin) temperatures is analyzed in the Spanish conterminous land (1981- 2010). To this end, the Correlation Decay Distance function (CDD) is used. The CDD estimates the distance at which a common variance value, determined by the neighboring stations, is maintained.Apoyo financiero del Gobierno de España-FSE, Proyecto CGL2011-27574-C02-01, y Gobierno Regional de Aragón DGA-FSE, y el grupo de investigación consolidado "Clima, Agua y Cambio Global y Sistemas Naturales" (BOA 69, 11-06-2007)