Internet-based Multiagent Architecture

Research in intelligent agents and multiagent systems that run on the Internet has received increased attention and importance in recent years. Since the Internet continues to grow, intelligent agent technology is progressively being introduced to many Internet-based applications for communications between different applications. The aim of this paper is to present an Internet-based architecture for multiagent systems which offers a communication infrastructure and coordination services for agents to achieve their goals. A structured architecture is proposed to support communication facilities among several agents and coordinate agent activities in distributed environments such as the Internet and Intranets. The architecture consists of 1) Application agents, 2) Communication handler, 3) Knowledge manager, and 4) Repository. (Yuen, et al. 1999; Leung, et al. 1999). These four layers cooperate together and provide common facilities necessary for typical multiagent systems or agent-based applications with various choices. An Internet-based prototype for auditing and detecting unauthorized transactions within an organization over the Internet or an Intranet is implemented to demonstrate the practicability and feasibility of the proposed Internet-based architecture for multiagent systems

Risk profiles and one-year outcomes of patients with newly diagnosed atrial fibrillation in India: Insights from the GARFIELD-AF Registry.

BACKGROUND: The Global Anticoagulant Registry in the FIELD-Atrial Fibrillation (GARFIELD-AF) is an ongoing prospective noninterventional registry, which is providing important information on the baseline characteristics, treatment patterns, and 1-year outcomes in patients with newly diagnosed non-valvular atrial fibrillation (NVAF). This report describes data from Indian patients recruited in this registry. METHODS AND RESULTS: A total of 52,014 patients with newly diagnosed AF were enrolled globally; of these, 1388 patients were recruited from 26 sites within India (2012-2016). In India, the mean age was 65.8 years at diagnosis of NVAF. Hypertension was the most prevalent risk factor for AF, present in 68.5% of patients from India and in 76.3% of patients globally (P < 0.001). Diabetes and coronary artery disease (CAD) were prevalent in 36.2% and 28.1% of patients as compared with global prevalence of 22.2% and 21.6%, respectively (P < 0.001 for both). Antiplatelet therapy was the most common antithrombotic treatment in India. With increasing stroke risk, however, patients were more likely to receive oral anticoagulant therapy [mainly vitamin K antagonist (VKA)], but average international normalized ratio (INR) was lower among Indian patients [median INR value 1.6 (interquartile range {IQR}: 1.3-2.3) versus 2.3 (IQR 1.8-2.8) (P < 0.001)]. Compared with other countries, patients from India had markedly higher rates of all-cause mortality [7.68 per 100 person-years (95% confidence interval 6.32-9.35) vs 4.34 (4.16-4.53), P < 0.0001], while rates of stroke/systemic embolism and major bleeding were lower after 1 year of follow-up. CONCLUSION: Compared to previously published registries from India, the GARFIELD-AF registry describes clinical profiles and outcomes in Indian patients with AF of a different etiology. The registry data show that compared to the rest of the world, Indian AF patients are younger in age and have more diabetes and CAD. Patients with a higher stroke risk are more likely to receive anticoagulation therapy with VKA but are underdosed compared with the global average in the GARFIELD-AF. CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION-URL: http://www.clinicaltrials.gov. Unique identifier: NCT01090362

Student Profiling System for an Agent-Based Educational System

Web-based educational systems are receiving more and more attention, because of the explosive growth of the Internet and World Wide Web. However, such kinds of self-study systems still lack several aspects, compared to a real life classroom setting and so suffer from their passive nature. They are often dull and plodding and leave students unmotivated. Unlike human teachers, these systems are not able to know individual students, to identify students’ learning problem and to provide tailored aids to specific students. The major objective of our project is to establish a student profiling system that provides storage of learning and an interaction history for each individual student who has used a web-based teaching system. Our system will provide the functions of recording students’ learning activities, providing webbased assessments to students, measuring students’ academic performance, and allowing teachers to analyze students’ activities