Biodiversity metrics on ecological networks: Demonstrated with animal gastrointestinal microbiomes

Biodiversity has become a terminology familiar to virtually every citizen in modern societies.It is said that ecology studies the economy of nature,and economy studies the ecology of humans;then measuring biodiversity should be similar with measuring national wealth.Indeed,there have been many parallels between ecology and economics,actually beyond analogies.For example,arguably the second most widely used biodiversity metric,Simpson(1949)’s diversity index,is a function of familiar Gini-index in economics.One of the biggest challenges has been the high“diversity”of diversity indexes due to their excessive“speciation”-there are so many indexes,similar to each country’s sovereign currency-leaving confused diversity practitioners in dilemma.In 1973,Hill introduced the concept of“numbers equivalent”,which is based on Renyi entropy and originated in economics,but possibly due to his abstruse interpretation of the concept,his message was not widely received by ecologists until nearly four decades later.What Hill suggested was similar to link the US dollar to gold at the rate of$35 per ounce under the Bretton Woods system.The Hill numbers now are considered most appropriate biodiversity metrics system,unifying Shannon,Simpson and other diversity indexes.Here,we approach to another paradigmatic shift-measuring biodiversity on ecological networks-demonstrated with animal gastrointestinal microbiomes representing four major invertebrate classes and all six vertebrate classes.The network diversity can reveal the diversity of species interactions,which is a necessary step for understanding the spatial and temporal structures and dynamics of biodiversity across environmental gradients.

Percolation transitions in edge-coupled interdependent networks with directed dependency links

We propose a model of edge-coupled interdependent networks with directed dependency links(EINDDLs)and develop the theoretical analysis framework of this model based on the self-consistent probabilities method.The phase transition behaviors and parameter thresholds of this model under random attacks are analyzed theoretically on both random regular(RR)networks and Erd¨os-Renyi(ER)networks,and computer simulations are performed to verify the results.In this EINDDL model,a fractionβof connectivity links within network B depends on network A and a fraction(1-β)of connectivity links within network A depends on network B.It is found that randomly removing a fraction(1-p)of connectivity links in network A at the initial state,network A exhibits different types of phase transitions(first order,second order and hybrid).Network B is rarely affected by cascading failure whenβis small,and network B will gradually converge from the first-order to the second-order phase transition asβincreases.We present the critical values ofβfor the phase change process of networks A and B,and give the critical values of p andβfor network B at the critical point of collapse.Furthermore,a cascading prevention strategy is proposed.The findings are of great significance for understanding the robustness of EINDDLs.

Research on Weighted Directed Dynamic Multiplexing Network of World Grain Trade Based on Improved MLP Framework

As the main food source for humans, the global movement of the three major grains significantly impacts human survival and development. To investigate the evolution of the world cereal trade network and its development trend, a weighted directed dynamic multiplexed network was established using historical data on cereal trade, cereal import dependency ratio, and arable land per capita. Inspired by the MLP framework, we redefined the weight determination method for computing layer weights and edge weights of the target layer, modified the CN, RA, AA, and PA indicators, and proposed the node similarity indicator for weighted directed networks. The AUC metric, which measures the accuracy of the algorithm, has also been improved in order to finally obtain the link prediction results for the grain trading network. The prediction results were processed, such as web-based presentation and community partition. It was found that the number of generalized trade agreements does not have a decisive impact on inter-country cereal trade. The former large grain exporters continue to play an important role in this trade network. In the future, the world trade in cereals will develop in the direction of more frequent intercontinental trade and gradually weaken the intracontinental cereal trade.

Optimized functional linked neural network for predicting diaphragm wall deflection induced by braced excavations in clays

Deep excavation during the construction of underground systems can cause movement on the ground,especially in soft clay layers.At high levels,excessive ground movements can lead to severe damage to adjacent structures.In this study,finite element analyses(FEM)and the hardening small strain(HSS)model were performed to investigate the deflection of the diaphragm wall in the soft clay layer induced by braced excavations.Different geometric and mechanical properties of the wall were investigated to study the deflection behavior of the wall in soft clays.Accordingly,1090 hypothetical cases were surveyed and simulated based on the HSS model and FEM to evaluate the wall deflection behavior.The results were then used to develop an intelligent model for predicting wall deflection using the functional linked neural network(FLNN)with different functional expansions and activation functions.Although the FLNN is a novel approach to predict wall deflection;however,in order to improve the accuracy of the FLNN model in predicting wall deflection,three swarm-based optimization algorithms,such as artificial bee colony(ABC),Harris’s hawk’s optimization(HHO),and hunger games search(HGS),were hybridized to the FLNN model to generate three novel intelligent models,namely ABC-FLNN,HHO-FLNN,HGS-FLNN.The results of the hybrid models were then compared with the basic FLNN and MLP models.They revealed that FLNN is a good solution for predicting wall deflection,and the application of different functional expansions and activation functions has a significant effect on the outcome predictions of the wall deflection.It is remarkably interesting that the performance of the FLNN model was better than the MLP model with a mean absolute error(MAE)of 19.971,root-mean-squared error(RMSE)of 24.574,and determination coefficient(R^(2))of 0.878.Meanwhile,the performance of the MLP model only obtained an MAE of 20.321,RMSE of 27.091,and R^(2)of 0.851.Furthermore,the results also indicated that the proposed hybrid models,i.e.,ABC-FLNN,HHO-FLNN,HGS-FLNN,yielded more superior performances than those of the FLNN and MLP models in terms of the prediction of deflection behavior of diaphragm walls with an MAE in the range of 11.877 to 12.239,RMSE in the range of 15.821 to 16.045,and R^(2)in the range of 0.949 to 0.951.They can be used as an alternative tool to simulate diaphragm wall deflections under different conditions with a high degree of accuracy.

Adaptive functional link network control of near-space vehicles with dynamical uncertainties

The control law design for a near-space hypersonic vehicle（NHV） is highly challenging due to its inherent nonlinearity,plant uncertainties and sensitivity to disturbances.This paper presents a novel functional link network（FLN） control method for an NHV with dynamical thrust and parameter uncertainties.The approach devises a new partially-feedback-functional-link-network（PFFLN） adaptive law and combines it with the nonlinear generalized predictive control（NGPC） algorithm.The PFFLN is employed for approximating uncertainties in flight.Its weights are online tuned based on Lyapunov stability theorem for the first time.The learning process does not need any offline training phase.Additionally,a robust controller with an adaptive gain is designed to offset the approximation error.Finally,simulation results show a satisfactory performance for the NHV attitude tracking,and also illustrate the controller＇s robustness.

Functional Link Neural Network for Predicting Crystallization Temperature of Ammonium Chloride in Air Cooler System

The air cooler is an important equipment in the petroleum refining industry.Ammonium chloride(NH4 Cl)deposition-induced corrosion is one of its main failure forms.In this study,the ammonium salt crystallization temperature is chosen as the key decision variable of NH4 Cl deposition-induced corrosion through in-depth mechanism research and experimental analysis.The functional link neural network(FLNN)is adopted as the basic algorithm for modeling because of its advantages in dealing with non-linear problems and its fast-computational ability.A hybrid FLNN attached to a small norm is built to improve the generalization performance of the model.Then,the trained model is used to predict the NH4 Cl salt crystallization temperature in the air cooler of a sour water stripper plant.Experimental results show the proposed improved FLNN algorithm can achieve better generalization performance than the PLS,the back propagation neural network,and the conventional FLNN models.

Numeral eddy current sensor modelling based on genetic neural network

This paper presents a method used to the numeral eddy current sensor modelling based on the genetic neural network to settle its nonlinear problem. The principle and algorithms of genetic neural network are introduced. In this method, the nonlinear model parameters of the numeral eddy current sensor are optimized by genetic neural network （GNN） according to measurement data. So the method remains both the global searching ability of genetic algorithm and the good local searching ability of neural network. The nonlinear model has the advantages of strong robustness, on-line modelling and high precision. The maximum nonlinearity error can be reduced to 0.037% by using GNN. However, the maximum nonlinearity error is 0.075% using the least square method.

A New Modeling Method Based on Genetic Neural Network for Numeral Eddy Current Sensor

In this paper,we present a method used to the numeral eddy current sensor modeling based on genetic neural network to settle its nonlinear problem.The principle and algorithms of genetic neural network are introduced.In this method, the nonlinear model parameters of the numeral eddy current sensor are optimized by genetic neural network (GNN) according to measurement data.So the method remains both the global searching ability of genetic algorithm and the good local searching ability of neural network.The nonlinear model has the advantages of strong robustness,on-line scaling and high precision.The maximum nonlinearity error can be reduced to 0.037% using GNN.However,the maximum nonlinearity error is 0.075% using least square method (LMS).

Link Budget and Networking Analysis of FuTURE 4G TDD Trial System

The FuTURE 4G Time Division Duplex (TDD) trial system uses 3.5 GHz carrier frequency and several crucial technologies including broadband Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) and Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM). These technologies challenge the link budget and networking analysis of the FuTURE 4G TDD trial network. This paper analyzes the practical 3.5 GHz propagation model and the link budget of Radio Frequency (RF) parameters of the trial system. Moreover,it introduces networking analysis and network planning of the trial system,which combines the field test results of the MIMO system. The FuTURE 4G TDD trial system and its trial network have been accomplished with successful checkup. The trial system fulfills all the requirements with two Access Points (AP) and three Mobile Terminals (MT),which supports multi-user,mobility,a high peak rate of 100 Mb/s,High-Definition TV (HDTV),high-speed data download,and Voice over IP (VoIP) services.

Semantic Link Network Based Knowledge Graph Representation and Construction

A knowledge graph consists of a set of interconnected typed entities and their attributes,which shows a better performance to organize,manage and understand knowledge.However,because knowledge graphs contain a lot of knowledge triples,it is difficult to directly display to researchers.Semantic Link Network is an attempt,and it can deal with the construction,representation and reasoning of semantics naturally.Based on the Semantic Link Network,this paper explores the representation and construction of knowledge graph,and develops an academic knowledge graph prototype system to realize the representation,construction and visualization of knowledge graph.

A Machine Learning Approach for Artifact Removal from Brain Signal

Electroencephalography(EEG),helps to analyze the neuronal activity of a human brain in the form of electrical signals with high temporal resolution in the millisecond range.To extract clean clinical information from EEG signals,it is essential to remove unwanted artifacts that are due to different causes including at the time of acquisition.In this piece of work,the authors considered the EEG signal contaminated with Electrocardiogram(ECG)artifacts that occurs mostly in cardiac patients.The clean EEG is taken from the openly available Mendeley database whereas the ECG signal is collected from the Physionet database to create artifacts in the EEG signal and verify the proposed algorithm.Being the artifactual signal is non-linear and non-stationary the Random Vector Functional Link Network(RVFLN)model is used in this case.The Machine Learning approach has taken a leading role in every field of current research and RVFLN is one of them.For the proof of adaptive nature,the model is designed with EEG as a reference and artifactual EEG as input.The peaks of ECG signals are evaluated for artifact estimation as the amplitude is higher than the EEG signal.To vary the weight and reduce the error,an exponentially weighted Recursive Least Square(RLS)algorithm is used to design the adaptive filter with the novel RVFLN model.The random vectors are considered in this model with a radial basis function to satisfy the required signal experimentation.It is found that the result is excellent in terms of Mean Square Error(MSE),Normalized Mean Square Error(NMSE),Relative Error(RE),Gain in Signal to Artifact Ratio(GSAR),Signal Noise Ratio(SNR),Information Quantity(IQ),and Improvement in Normalized Power Spectrum(INPS).Also,the proposed method is compared with the earlier methods to show its efficacy.

Adaptive Control of Discrete-time Nonlinear Systems Using ITF-ORVFL

Random vector functional ink(RVFL)networks belong to a class of single hidden layer neural networks in which some parameters are randomly selected.Their network structure in which contains the direct links between inputs and outputs is unique,and stability analysis and real-time performance are two difficulties of the control systems based on neural networks.In this paper,combining the advantages of RVFL and the ideas of online sequential extreme learning machine(OS-ELM)and initial-training-free online extreme learning machine(ITFOELM),a novel online learning algorithm which is named as initial-training-free online random vector functional link algo rithm(ITF-ORVFL)is investigated for training RVFL.The link vector of RVFL network can be analytically determined based on sequentially arriving data by ITF-ORVFL with a high learning speed,and the stability for nonlinear systems based on this learning algorithm is analyzed.The experiment results indicate that the proposed ITF-ORVFL is effective in coping with nonparametric uncertainty.

Correction of sensor’s dynamic error caused by system limitations

The method based on particle swarm optimization(PSO)integrated with functional link articial neural network(FLANN)for correcting dynamic characteristics of sensor is used to reduce sensor’s dynamic error caused by its system limitations.Combining the advantages of PSO and FLANN,with this method a dynamic compensator can be realized without knowing the dynamic model of the sensor.According to the input and output of the sensor and the reference model,the weights of the network trained were used to initialize one particle station of the whole particle swarm when the training of the FLANN had been finished.Then PSO algorithm was applied,and the global best particle station of the particle swarm was the parameters of the compensator.The feasibility of dynamic compensation method is tested.Simulation results from simulator of sensor show that the results after being compensated have given a good description to input signals.

Multilayer perceptron and Chebyshev polynomials-based functional link artificial neural network for solving differential equations

This paper discusses the issues of computational efforts and the accuracy of solutions of differential equations using multilayer perceptron and Chebyshev polynomials-based functional link artificial neural networks.Some ordinary and partial differential equations have been solved by both these techniques and pros and cons of both these type of feedforward networks have been discussed in detail.Apart from that,various factors that affect the accuracy of the solution have also been analyzed.

Combining Topological Properties and Strong Ties for Link Prediction

Link prediction is an important task that estimates the probability of there being a link between two disconnected nodes. The similarity-based algorithm is a very popular method that employs the node similarities to find links. Most of these types of algorithms focus only on the contribution of common neighborhoods between two nodes. In sociological theory relationships within three degrees are the strong ties that can trigger social behaviors.Thus, strong ties can provide more connection opportunities for unconnected nodes in the networks. As critical topological properties in networks, nodes degrees and node clustering coefficients are well-suited for describing the tightness of connections between nodes. In this paper, we characterize node similarity by utilizing the strong ties of the ego network（i.e., paths within three degrees） and its close connections（node degrees and node clustering coefficients）. We propose a link prediction algorithm that combines topological properties with strong ties, which we called the TPSR algorithm. This algorithm includes TPSR2, TPSR3, and the TPSR4 indices. We evaluate the performance of the proposed algorithm using the metrics of precision and the Area Under the Curve（AUC）. Our experimental results show the TPSR algorithm to perform remarkably better than others.

Latent Co-interests' Relationship Prediction

With the development of the social media and Internet, discovering latent information from massive information is becoming particularly relevant to improving user experience. Research efforts based on preferences and relationships between users have attracted more and more attention. Predictive problems, such as inferring friend relationship and co-author relationship between users have been explored. However, many such methods are based on analyzing either node features or the network structures separately, few have tried to tackle both of them at the same time. In this paper, in order to discover latent co-interests＇ relationship, we not only consider users＇ attributes but network information as well. In addition, we propose an Interest-based Factor Graph Model （I-FGM） to incorporate these factors. Experiments on two data sets （bookmarking and music network） demonstrate that this predictive method can achieve better results than the other three methods （ANN, NB, and SVM）.