The detection of non-technical losses (NTL) is a very important economic issue for power utilities. Diverse machine learning strategies have been proposed to support electric power companies tackling ...this problem. Methods performance is often measured using standard cost-insensitive metrics, such as the accuracy, true positive ratio, AUC, or F1. In contrast, we propose to design a NTL detection solution that maximizes the effective economic return. To that end, both the income recovered and the inspection cost are considered. Furthermore, the proposed framework can be used to design the infrastructure of the division in charge of performing customers inspections. Then, assisting not only short term decisions, e.g., which customer should be inspected first, but also the elaboration of long term strategies, e.g., planning of NTL company budget. The problem is formulated in a Bayesian risk framework. Experimental validation is presented using a large dataset of real users from the Uruguayan utility. The results obtained show that the proposed method can boost companies profit and provide a highly efficient and realistic countermeasure to NTL. Moreover, the proposed pipeline is general and can be easily adapted to other practical problems.
The technological upgrade of power utilities to smart metering is a process that can take several years. Meanwhile, smart meters coexist with previous generations of digital and electromechanical ...power meters. While the smart meters provide high-resolution power measurements, electromechanical meters are typically read by an operator once a month. The coexistence of these two technologies poses the challenge of monitoring non-technical losses (NTL) and fraud where some customers' consumption is sampled every 15 minutes, while others are sampled once a month. In addition, since companies already have years of monthly historical consumption, it is natural to reflect how the past data can be leveraged to predict and improve NTL on smart grids. This work addresses both problems by proposing a multi-resolution deep learning architecture capable of simultaneously training and predicting input consumption curves sampled 1 a month or every 15 minutes. The proposed algorithms are tested on an extensive data set of users with and without fraudulent behaviors collected from the Uruguayan utility company UTE and on a public access data set with synthetic fraud. Results show that the multi-resolution architecture performs better than algorithms trained for a specific type of meters (i.e., for a particular resolution).
Spoofing attacks are critical threats to modern face recognition systems, and most common countermeasures exploit 2D texture features as they are easy to extract and deploy. 3D shape-based methods ...can substantially improve spoofing prevention, but extracting the 3D shape of the face often requires complex hardware such as a 3D scanner and expensive computation. Motivated by the classical shape-from-shading model, we propose to obtain 3D facial features that can be used to recognize the presence of an actual 3D face, without explicit shape reconstruction. Such shading-based 3D features are extracted highly efficiently from a pair of images captured under different illumination, e.g., two images captured with and without flash. Thus the proposed method provides a rich 3D geometrical representation at negligible computational cost and minimal to none additional hardware. A theoretical analysis is provided to support why such simple 3D features can effectively describe the presence of an actual 3D shape while avoiding complicated calibration steps or hardware setup. Experimental validation shows that the proposed method can produce state-of-the-art spoofing prevention and enhance existing texture-based solutions.
Active illumination is a prominent complement to enhance 2D face recognition and make it more robust, e.g., to spoofing attacks and low-light conditions. In the present work we show that it is ...possible to adopt active illumination to enhance state-of-the-art 2D face recognition approaches with 3D features, while bypassing the complicated task of 3D reconstruction. The key idea is to project over the test face a high spatial frequency pattern, which allows us to simultaneously recover real 3D information plus a standard 2D facial image. Therefore, state-of-the-art 2D face recognition solution can be transparently applied, while from the high frequency component of the input image, complementary 3D facial features are extracted. Experimental results on ND-2006 dataset show that the proposed ideas can significantly boost face recognition performance and dramatically improve the robustness to spoofing attacks.
While early autism intervention can significantly improve outcomes, gaps in implementation exist globally. These gaps are clearest in Africa, where forty percent of the world's children will live by ...2050. Task-sharing early intervention to non-specialists is a key implementation strategy, given the lack of specialists in Africa. Naturalistic Developmental Behavioral Interventions (NDBI) are a class of early autism intervention that can be delivered by caregivers. As a foundational step to address the early autism intervention gap, we adapted a non-specialist delivered caregiver coaching NDBI for the South African context, and pre-piloted this cascaded task-sharing approach in an existing system of care.
First, we will test the effectiveness of the caregiver coaching NDBI compared to usual care. Second, we will describe coaching implementation factors within the Western Cape Department of Education in South Africa.
This is a type 1 effectiveness-implementation hybrid design; assessor-blinded, group randomized controlled trial. Participants include 150 autistic children (18-72 months) and their caregivers who live in Cape Town, South Africa, and those involved in intervention implementation. Early Childhood Development practitioners, employed by the Department of Education, will deliver 12, one hour, coaching sessions to the intervention group. The control group will receive usual care. Distal co-primary outcomes include the Communication Domain Standard Score (Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales, Third Edition) and the Language and Communication Developmental Quotient (Griffiths Scales of Child Development, Third Edition). Proximal secondary outcome include caregiver strategies measured by the sum of five items from the Joint Engagement Rating Inventory. We will describe key implementation determinants.
Participant enrolment started in April 2023. Estimated primary completion date is March 2027.
The ACACIA trial will determine whether a cascaded task-sharing intervention delivered in an educational setting leads to meaningful improvements in communication abilities of autistic children, and identify implementation barriers and facilitators.
NCT05551728 in Clinical Trial Registry (https://clinicaltrials.gov).
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Objective
To characterize helpful parent feeding strategies using reflections on childhood eating experiences of adults with symptoms of Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID).
Method
We ...explored a unique text‐based dataset gathered from a population of N = 19,239 self‐identified adult “picky eaters.” The sample included adults with symptoms of ARFID as evidenced by marked interference in psychosocial functioning, weight loss/sustained low weight, and/or nutritional deficiency (likely ARFID), and non‐ARFID participants. We leveraged state‐of‐the‐art natural language processing (NLP) methods to classify feeding strategies that were perceived as helpful or not helpful. The best classifiers that distinguished helpful approaches were further analyzed using qualitative coding according to a grounded theory approach.
Results
NLP reliably and accurately classified the perceived helpfulness of caregivers' feeding strategies (82%) and provided information about features of helpful parent strategies using recollections of adults with varying degrees of food avoidance. Strategies perceived as forceful were regarded as not helpful. Positive and encouraging strategies were perceived as helpful in improving attitudes toward food and minimizing social discomfort around eating. Although food variety improved, adults still struggled with a degree of avoidance/restriction.
Discussion
Adults perceived that positive parent feeding strategies were helpful even though they continued to experience some degree of food avoidance. Creating a positive emotional context surrounding food and eating with others may help to eliminate psychosocial impairment and increase food approach in those with severe food avoidance. Nevertheless, additional tools to optimize parent strategies and improve individuals' capacity to incorporate avoided foods and cope with challenging eating situations are needed.
Context:
Maternal obesity and gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) can both contribute to adverse neonatal outcomes. The extent to which this may be mediated by differences in placental metabolism and ...nutrient transport remains to be determined.
Objective:
Our objective was to examine whether raised maternal body mass index (BMI) and/or GDM contributed to a resetting of the expression of genes within the placenta that are involved in energy sensing, oxidative stress, inflammation, and metabolic pathways.
Methods:
Pregnant women from Spain were recruited as part of the “Study of Maternal Nutrition and Genetics on the Foetal Adiposity Programming” survey at the first antenatal visit (12–20 weeks of gestation) and stratified according to prepregnancy BMI and the incidence of GDM. At delivery, placenta and cord blood were sampled and newborn anthropometry measured.
Results:
Obese women with GDM had higher estimated fetal weight at 34 gestational weeks and a greater risk of preterm deliveries and cesarean section. Birth weight was unaffected by BMI or GDM; however, women who were obese with normal glucose tolerance had increased placental weight and higher plasma glucose and leptin at term. Gene expression for markers of placental energy sensing and oxidative stress, were primarily affected by maternal obesity as mTOR was reduced, whereas SIRT-1 and UCP2 were both upregulated. In placenta from obese women with GDM, gene expression for AMPK was also reduced, whereas the downstream regulator of mTOR, p70S6KB1 was raised.
Conclusions:
Placental gene expression is sensitive to both maternal obesity and GDM which both impact on energy sensing and could modulate the effect of either raised maternal BMI or GDM on birth weight.
Background
Early differences in sensorimotor functioning have been documented in young autistic children and infants who are later diagnosed with autism. Previous research has demonstrated that ...autistic toddlers exhibit more frequent head movement when viewing dynamic audiovisual stimuli, compared to neurotypical toddlers. To further explore this behavioral characteristic, in this study, computer vision (CV) analysis was used to measure several aspects of head movement dynamics of autistic and neurotypical toddlers while they watched a set of brief movies with social and nonsocial content presented on a tablet.
Methods
Data were collected from 457 toddlers, 17–36 months old, during their well‐child visit to four pediatric primary care clinics. Forty‐one toddlers were subsequently diagnosed with autism. An application (app) displayed several brief movies on a tablet, and the toddlers watched these movies while sitting on their caregiver's lap. The front‐facing camera in the tablet recorded the toddlers' behavioral responses. CV was used to measure the participants' head movement rate, movement acceleration, and complexity using multiscale entropy.
Results
Autistic toddlers exhibited significantly higher rate, acceleration, and complexity in their head movements while watching the movies compared to neurotypical toddlers, regardless of the type of movie content (social vs. nonsocial). The combined features of head movement acceleration and complexity reliably distinguished the autistic and neurotypical toddlers.
Conclusions
Autistic toddlers exhibit differences in their head movement dynamics when viewing audiovisual stimuli. Higher complexity of their head movements suggests that their movements were less predictable and less stable compared to neurotypical toddlers. CV offers a scalable means of detecting subtle differences in head movement dynamics, which may be helpful in identifying early behaviors associated with autism and providing insight into the nature of sensorimotor differences associated with autism.
Precise predictions of the antineutrino spectra emitted by nuclear reactors is a key ingredient in measurements of reactor neutrino oscillations as well as in recent applications to the surveillance ...of power plants in the context of nonproliferation of nuclear weapons. We report new calculations including the latest information from nuclear databases and a detailed error budget. The first part of this work is the so-called ab initio approach where the total antineutrino spectrum is built from the sum of all {beta} branches of all fission products predicted by an evolution code. Systematic effects and missing information in nuclear databases lead to final relative uncertainties in the 10-20% range. A prediction of the antineutrino spectrum associated with the fission of {sup 238}U is given based on this ab initio method. For the dominant isotopes we developed a more accurate approach combining information from nuclear databases and reference electron spectra associated with the fission of {sup 235}U, {sup 239}Pu, and {sup 241}Pu, measured at Institut Laue-Langevin (ILL) in the 1980s. We show how the anchor point of the measured total {beta} spectra can be used to suppress the uncertainty in nuclear databases while taking advantage of all the information they contain. We provide new reference antineutrino spectra for {sup 235}U, {sup 239}Pu, and {sup 241}Pu isotopes in the 2-8 MeV range. While the shapes of the spectra and their uncertainties are comparable to those of the previous analysis of the ILL data, the normalization is shifted by about +3% on average. In the perspective of the reanalysis of past experiments and direct use of these results by upcoming oscillation experiments, we discuss the various sources of errors and their correlations as well as the corrections induced by off-equilibrium effects.
Non-neuronal expression of components of the glutamatergic system has been increasingly observed, and our laboratory previously had demonstrated the etiological role of ectopically expressed ...metabotropic glutamate receptor 1 (Grm1/mGluR1) in mouse models of melanoma. We hypothesize that inappropriate glutamatergic signaling in other cell types can dysregulate growth leading to transformation and tumorigenesis. As most cancers are carcinomas, we selected an immortalized primary baby mouse kidney (iBMK) cell model to assess whether Grm1 can transform epithelial cells. These iBMK cells, engineered to be immortal yet nontumorigenic and retaining normal epithelial characteristics, were used as recipients for exogenous Grm1 cDNA. Several stable Grm1-expressing clones were isolated and the Grm1-receptors were shown to be functional, as evidenced by the accumulation of second messengers in response to Grm1 agonist. Additionally activated by agonist were mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) and AKT/protein kinase B signaling cascades, the major intracellular pathways shown by many investigators to be critical in melanomagenesis and other neoplasms. These Grm1-iBMK cells exhibited enhanced cell proliferation in in vitro methylthiazolyldiphenyl-tetrazolium bromide (MTT) assays and significant tumorigenicity in in vivo allografts. Persistent Grm1 expression was required for the maintenance of the in vivo tumorigenic phenotype as demonstrated by an inducible Grm1-silencing RNA. These are the first results that indicate that Grm1 can be an oncogene in epithelial cells. In addition, relevance to human disease in the corresponding tumor type of renal cell carcinoma (RCC) may be suggested by observed expression of GRM1/mGluR1 in a number of RCC tumor biopsy samples and cell lines, and the effects of GRM1 modulation on tumorigenicity therein. Moreover, RCC cell lines exhibited elevated levels of extracellular glutamate, and some lines responded to drugs, which modulate the glutamatergic system. These findings imply a possible role for glutamate signaling apparatus in RCC cell growth, and that the glutamatergic system may be a therapeutic target in RCC.
PDF
