Group testing involves discovering a small subset of distinguished subjects from a large population while efficiently reducing the total number of tests.It has been widely used for industrial testing,information techn...Group testing involves discovering a small subset of distinguished subjects from a large population while efficiently reducing the total number of tests.It has been widely used for industrial testing,information technology,and biology,especially epidemic screening.Tests,in reality,are noisy for the presence of false outcomes.Some tests are accurate but time-consuming,while others are cheaper but less accurate.Exactly which test to use is constrained by various considerations,such as availability,cost,accuracy,and efficiency.In this paper,we propose flexible,efficient,and accurate tests(FEATs).FEATs are based on group testing with simple but careful designs by incorporating ideas such as close contact cliques and repeated tests.FEATs could dramatically improve the efficiency or accuracy of existing tests.For example,for accurate but slow tests,the FEAT can improve efficiency multiple times without compromising accuracy.On the other hand,for fast but inaccurate tests,the FEAT can sharply reduce the false-negative rate(FNR)and significantly increase efficiency.Theoretical justifications are provided.We point out some scenarios where the FEAT can be effectively employed.展开更多
文摘Group testing involves discovering a small subset of distinguished subjects from a large population while efficiently reducing the total number of tests.It has been widely used for industrial testing,information technology,and biology,especially epidemic screening.Tests,in reality,are noisy for the presence of false outcomes.Some tests are accurate but time-consuming,while others are cheaper but less accurate.Exactly which test to use is constrained by various considerations,such as availability,cost,accuracy,and efficiency.In this paper,we propose flexible,efficient,and accurate tests(FEATs).FEATs are based on group testing with simple but careful designs by incorporating ideas such as close contact cliques and repeated tests.FEATs could dramatically improve the efficiency or accuracy of existing tests.For example,for accurate but slow tests,the FEAT can improve efficiency multiple times without compromising accuracy.On the other hand,for fast but inaccurate tests,the FEAT can sharply reduce the false-negative rate(FNR)and significantly increase efficiency.Theoretical justifications are provided.We point out some scenarios where the FEAT can be effectively employed.