Pneumonia is one of the major causes of child mortality, yet with a timely diagnosis, it is usually curable with antibiotic therapy. In many developing regions, diagnosing pneumonia remains a challenge, due to shortages of medical resources. Lung ultrasound has proved to be a useful tool to detect lung consolidation as evidence of pneumonia. However, diagnosis of pneumonia by ultrasound has limitations: it is operator-dependent, and it needs to be carried out and interpreted by trained personnel. Pattern recognition and image analysis is a potential tool to enable automatic diagnosis of pneumonia consolidation without requiring an expert analyst. This paper presents a method for automatic classification of pneumonia using ultrasound imaging of the lungs and pattern recognition. The approach presented here is based on the analysis of brightness distribution patterns present in rectangular segments (here called “characteristic vectors“) from the ultrasound digital images. In a first step we identified and eliminated the skin and subcutaneous tissue (fat and muscle) in lung ultrasound frames, and the “characteristic vectors”were analyzed using standard neural networks using artificial intelligence methods. We analyzed 60 lung ultrasound frames corresponding to 21 children under age 5 years (15 children with confirmed pneumonia by clinical examination and X-rays, and 6 children with no pulmonary disease) from a hospital based population in Lima, Peru. Lung ultrasound images were obtained using an Ultrasonix ultrasound device. A total of 1450 positive (pneumonia) and 1605 negative (normal lung) vectors were analyzed with standard neural networks, and used to create an algorithm to differentiate lung infiltrates from healthy lung. A neural network was trained using the algorithm and it was able to correctly identify pneumonia infiltrates, with 90.9% sensitivity and 100% specificity. This approach may be used to develop operator-independent computer algorithms for pneumonia diagnosis using ultrasound in young children.
BackgroundAutism spectrum disorder (ASD) currently affects nearly 1 in 160 children worldwide. In over two-thirds of evaluations, no validated diagnostics are used and gold standard diagnostic tools are used in less than 5% of evaluations. Currently, the diagnosis of ASD requires lengthy and expensive tests, in addition to clinical confirmation. Therefore, fast, cheap, portable, and easy-to-administer screening instruments for ASD are required. Several studies have shown that children with ASD have a lower preference for social scenes compared with children without ASD. Based on this, eye-tracking and measurement of gaze preference for social scenes has been used as a screening tool for ASD. Currently available eye-tracking software requires intensive calibration, training, or holding of the head to prevent interference with gaze recognition limiting its use in children with ASD.MethodsIn this study, we designed a simple eye-tracking algorithm that does not require calibration or head holding, as a platform for future validation of a cost-effective ASD potential screening instrument. This system operates on a portable and inexpensive tablet to measure gaze preference of children for social compared to abstract scenes. A child watches a one-minute stimulus video composed of a social scene projected on the left side and an abstract scene projected on the right side of the tablet’s screen. We designed five stimulus videos by changing the social/abstract scenes. Every child observed all the five videos in random order. We developed an eye-tracking algorithm that calculates the child’s gaze preference for the social and abstract scenes, estimated as the percentage of the accumulated time that the child observes the left or right side of the screen, respectively. Twenty-three children without a prior history of ASD and 8 children with a clinical diagnosis of ASD were evaluated. The recorded video of the child´s eye movement was analyzed both manually by an observer and automatically by our algorithm.ResultsThis study demonstrates that the algorithm correctly differentiates visual preference for either the left or right side of the screen (social or abstract scenes), identifies distractions, and maintains high accuracy compared to the manual classification. The error of the algorithm was 1.52%, when compared to the gold standard of manual observation.DiscussionThis tablet-based gaze preference/eye-tracking algorithm can estimate gaze preference in both children with ASD and without ASD to a high degree of accuracy, without the need for calibration, training, or restraint of the children. This system can be utilized in low-resource settings as a portable and cost-effective potential screening tool for ASD.
International audienceIn this article we offer a communication system to people who undergo a severe loss of motor function as a result of various accidents and/or diseases so that they can control and interact better with the environment, for which a braincomputer interface has been implemented through the acquisition of EEG signals by electrodes and implementation of algorithms to extract characteristics and execute a method of classification that would interpret these signals and execute corresponding actions The first objective is to design and construct a system of communication and control based on the thought, able to catch and measure EEG signals. The second objective is to implement the system of data acquisition including a digital filter in real time that allows us to eliminate the noise. The third objective is to analyze the variation of the EEG signals in front of the different tasks under study and of implementing an algorithm of extraction of characteristics. The fourth objective is to work on the basis of the characteristics of the EEG signals, to implement a classification system that can discriminate between the two tasks under study on the basis of the corresponding battles
Pneumonia is one of the major causes of child mortality. Unfortunately, in developing countries there is a lack of infrastructure and medical experts in rural areas to provide the required diagnostics opportunely. Lung ultrasound echography has proved to be an important tool to detect lung consolidates as evidence of pneumonia. This paper presents a method for automatic diagnostics of pneumonia using ultrasound imaging of the lungs. The approach presented here is based on the analysis of patterns present in rectangular segments from the ultrasound digital images. Specific features from the characteristic vectors were obtained and classified with standard neural networks. A training and testing set of positive and negative vectors were compiled. Vectors obtained from a single patient were included only in the testing or in the training set, but never in both. Our approach was able to correctly classify vectors with evidence of pneumonia, with 91.5% sensitivity and 100% specificity.
Terrorist attacks affect the confidence and security of citizens; it is a violent form of a political struggle that ends in the destruction of order. In the current decade, along with the growth of social networks, terrorist attacks around the world are still ongoing and have had potential growth in recent years. Consequently, it is necessary to identify where the attacks were committed and where is the possible area for an attack. The objective is to provide assertive solutions to these events. As a solution, this research focuses on one of the branches of artificial intelligence (AI), which is the Automatic Learning, also called Machine Learning. The idea is to use AI techniques to visualize and predict possible terrorist attacks using classification models, the decision trees, and the Random Forest. The input would be a database that has a systematic record of worldwide terrorist attacks from 1970 to the last recorded year, which is 2018. As a final result, it is necessary to know the number of terrorist attacks in the world, the most frequent types of attacks and the number of seizures caused by region; furthermore, to be able to predict what kind of terrorist attack will occur and in which areas of the world. Finally, this research aims to help the scientific community use artificial intelligence to provide various types of solutions related to global events.
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