A new design of evolutionary hybrid optimization of SVR model in predicting the blast-induced ground vibration

This study aims to identify the suitability of hybridizing the firefly algorithm (FA), genetic algorithm (GA), and particle swarm optimization (PSO) with two well-known data-driven models of support vector regression (SVR) and artificial neural network (ANN) to predict blast-induced ground vibration. Here, these combinations are abbreviated using FA–SVR, PSO–SVR, GA–SVR, FA–ANN, PSO–ANN, and GA–ANN models. In addition, a modified FA (MFA) combined with SVR model is also proposed in this study, namely, MFA–SVR. The feasibility of the proposed models is examined using a case study, located in Johor, Malaysia. Then, to provide an objective assessment of performances of the predictive models, their results were compared based on several well known and popular statistical criteria. According to the results, the MFA–SVR with the coefficient of determination (R²) of 0.984 and root mean square error (RMSE) of 0.614 was more accurate model to predict PPV than the PSO–SVR with R² = 0.977 and RMSE = 0.725, the FA–SVR with R² = 0.964 and RMSE = 0.923, the GA–SVR with R² = 0.957 and RMSE = 1.016, the GA–ANN with R² = 0.936 and RMSE = 1.252, the FA–ANN with R² = 0.925 and RMSE = 1.368, and the PSO–ANN with R² = 0.924 and RMSE = 1.366. Consequently, the MFA–SVR model can be sufficiently employed in estimating the ground vibration, and has the capacity to generalize.

     

Nanofluids thermal conductivity prediction applying a novel hybrid data-driven model validated using Monte Carlo-based sensitivity analysis

Accurate estimation of the thermal conductivity of nanofluids plays a key role in industrial heat transfer applications. Currently available experimental and empirical relationships can be used to estimate thermal conductivity. However, since the environmental conditions and properties of the nanofluids constituents are not considered these models cannot provide the expected accuracy and reliability for researchers. In this research, a robust hybrid artificial intelligence model was developed to accurately predict wide variety of relative thermal conductivity of nanofluids. In the new approach, the improved simulated annealing (ISA) was used to optimize the parameters of the least-squares support vector machine (LSSVM-ISA). The predictive model was developed using a data bank, consist of 1800 experimental data points for nanofluids from 32 references. The volume fraction, average size and thermal conductivity of nanoparticles, temperature and thermal conductivity of base fluid were selected as influent parameters and relative thermal conductivity was chosen as the output variable. In addition, the obtained results from the LSSVM-ISA were compared with the results of the radial basis function neural network (RBF-NN), K-nearest neighbors (KNN), and various existing experimental correlations models. The statistical analysis shows that the performance of the proposed hybrid predictor model for testing stage (R = 0.993, RMSE = 0.0207) is more reliable and efficient than those of the RBF-NN (R = 0.970, RMSE = 0.0416 W/m K), KNN (R = 0.931, RMSE = 0.068 W/m K) and all of the existing empirical correlations for estimating thermal conductivity of wide variety types of nanofluids. Finally, robustness and convergence analysis were conducted to evaluate the model reliability. A comprehensive sensitivity analysis using Monte Carlo simulation was carried out to identify the most significant variables of the developed models affecting the thermal conductivity predictions of nanofluids.

     

Assessment of composite beam performance using GWO–ELM metaheuristic algorithm

Composite beams (CBs) include concrete slabs jointed to the steel parts by the shear connectors, which highly popular in modern structures such as high rise buildings and bridges. This study has investigated the structural behavior of simply supported CBs in which a concrete slab is jointed to a steel beam by headed stud shear connector. Determining the behavior of CB through empirical study except its costly process can also lead to inaccurate results. In this case, AI models as metaheuristic algorithms could be effectively used for solving difficult optimization problems, such as Genetic algorithm, Differential evolution, Firefly algorithm, Cuckoo search algorithm, etc. This research has used hybrid Extreme machine learning (ELM)–Grey wolf optimizer (GWO) to determine the general behavior of CB. Two models (ELM and GWO) and a hybrid algorithm (GWO–ELM) were developed and the results were compared through the regression parameters of determination coefficient (R²) and root mean square (RMSE). In testing phase, GWO with the RMSE value of 2.5057 and R² value of 1.2510, ELM with the RMSE value of 4.52 and R² value of 1.927, and GWO–ELM with the RMSE value of 0.9340 and R² value of 0.9504 have demonstrated that the hybrid of GWO–ELM could indicate better performance compared to solo ELM and GWO models. In this case, GWO–ELM could determine the general behavior of CB faster, more accurate and with the least error percentages, so the hybrid of GWO–ELM is more reliable model than ELM and GWO in this study.

     

Several non-linear models in estimating air-overpressure resulting from mine blasting

This research presents several non-linear models including empirical, artificial neural network (ANN), fuzzy system and adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS) to estimate air-overpressure (AOp) resulting from mine blasting. For this purpose, Miduk copper mine, Iran was investigated and results of 77 blasting works were recorded to be utilized for AOp prediction. In the modeling procedure of this study, results of distance from the blast-face and maximum charge per delay were considered as predictors. After constructing the non-linear models, several performance prediction indices, i.e. root mean squared error (RMSE), variance account for (VAF), and coefficient of determination (R ²) and total ranking method are examined to choose the best predictive models and evaluation of the obtained results. It is obtained that the ANFIS model is superior to other utilized techniques in terms of R ², RMSE, VAF and ranking herein. As an example, RMSE values of 5.628, 3.937, 3.619 and 2.329 were obtained for testing datasets of empirical, ANN, fuzzy and ANFIS models, respectively, which indicate higher performance capacity of the ANFIS technique to estimate AOp compared to other implemented methods.     

Non-tuned machine learning approach for hydrological time series forecasting

Stream-flow forecasting is a crucial task for hydrological science. Throughout the literature, traditional and artificial intelligence models have been applied to this task. An attempt to explore and develop better expert models is an ongoing endeavor for this hydrological application. In addition, the accuracy of modeling, confidence and practicality of the model are the other significant problems that need to be considered. Accordingly, this study investigates modern non-tuned machine learning data-driven approach, namely extreme learning machine (ELM). This data-driven approach is containing single layer feedforward neural network that selects the input variables randomly and determine the output weights systematically. To demonstrate the reliability and the effectiveness, one-step-ahead stream-flow forecasting based on three time-scale pattern (daily, mean weekly and mean monthly) for Johor river, Malaysia, were implemented. Artificial neural network (ANN) model is used for comparison and evaluation. The results indicated ELM approach superior the ANN model level accuracies and time consuming in addition to precision forecasting in tropical zone. In measureable terms, the dominance of ELM model over ANN model was indicated in accordance with coefficient determination (R ²) root-mean-square error (RMSE) and mean absolute error (MAE). The results were obtained for example the daily time scale R ² = 0.94 and 0.90, RMSE = 2.78 and 11.63, and MAE = 0.10 and 0.43, for ELM and ANN models respectively.

     

Predicting discharge coefficient of triangular labyrinth weir using extreme learning machine,artificial neural network and genetic programming

Weirs are a type of hydraulic structure used to direct and transfer water flows in the canals and overflows in the dams. The important index in computing flow discharge over the weir is discharge coefficient (C _d). The aim of this study is accurate determination of the C _d in triangular labyrinth side weirs by applying three intelligence models [i.e., artificial neural network (ANN), genetic programming (GP) and extreme learning machine (ELM)]. The calculated discharge coefficients were then compared with some experimental results. In order to examine the accuracy of C _d predictions by ANN, GP and ELM methods, five statistical indices including coefficient of determination (R ²), root-mean-square error (RMSE), mean absolute percentage error (MAPE), SI and δ have been used. Results showed that R ² values in the ELM, ANN and GP methods were 0.993, 0.886 and 0.884, respectively, at training stage and 0.971, 0.965 and 0.963, respectively, at test stage. The ELM method, having MAPE, RMSE, SI and δ values of 0.81, 0.0059, 0.0082 and 0.81, respectively, at the training stage and 0.89, 0.0063, 0.0089 and 0.88, respectively, at the test stage, was superior to ANN and GP methods. The ANN model ranked next to the ELM model.

     

Rock brittleness prediction through two optimization algorithms namely particle swarm optimization and imperialism competitive algorithm

Brittleness index (BI) is a significant rock parameter when dealing with projects performed in rocks. The main goal of this research work is to propose the novel practical models to predict the BI through particle swarm optimization (PSO) and imperialism competitive algorithm (ICA). For this aim, two forms of equations, i.e., linear and power are considered and the weights of these equations are optimized by PSO and ICA. In the other words, four predictive models, namely ICA linear, ICA power, PSO linear, and PSO power models are developed to predict BI in this study. In the modeling of the predictive models, 79 datasets are used, so that Schmidt hammer rebound number, wave velocity, density, and Point Load Index (Is₅₀) are selected as the independent (input) parameters and the BI values are considered as the dependent (output) parameter. Then, the performances of the proposed predicting models are checked using two error indices, namely coefficient correlation (R²) and root mean squared error (RMSE). The results showed that the PSO power model has superior fitting specification for the prediction of the BI compared to the other prediction models and is quite practical for use. As a result, linear and power models of PSO received higher performance prediction compared to ICA. PSO power (with R² train = 0.937, R² test = 0.959, RMSE train = 0.377 and RMES test = 0.289) showed the most powerful technique to predict BI of the granite samples.

     

Comparison of modelling ANN and ELM to estimate solar radiation over Turkey using NOAA satellite data

In this study, solar radiation (SR) is estimated at 61 locations with varying climatic conditions using the artificial neural network (ANN) and extreme learning machine (ELM). While the ANN and ELM methods are trained with data for the years 2002 and 2003, the accuracy of these methods was tested with data for 2004. The values for month, altitude, latitude, longitude, and land-surface temperature (LST) obtained from the data of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (NOAA-AVHRR) satellite are chosen as input in developing the ANN and ELM models. SR is found to be the output in modelling of the methods. Results are then compared with meteorological values by statistical methods. Using ANN, the determination coefficient (R²), mean bias error (MBE), root mean square error (RMSE), and Willmott’s index (WI) values were calculated as 0.943, ?0.148 MJ m^?2, 1.604 MJ m^?2, and 0.996, respectively. While R² was 0.961, MBE, RMSE, and WI were found to be in the order 0.045 MJ m^?2, 0.672 MJ m^?2, and 0.997 by ELM. As can be understood from the statistics, ELM is clearly more successful than ANN in SR estimation.     

GA-SVR: a novel hybrid data-driven model to simulate vertical load capacity of driven piles

Piles are widely applied to substructures of various infrastructural buildings. Soil has a complex nature; thus, a variety of empirical models have been proposed for the prediction of the bearing capacity of piles. The aim of this study is to propose a novel artificial intelligent approach to predict vertical load capacity of driven piles in cohesionless soils using support vector regression (SVR) optimized by genetic algorithm (GA). To the best of our knowledge, no research has been developed the GA-SVR model to predict vertical load capacity of driven piles in different timescales as of yet, and the novelty of this study is to develop a new hybrid intelligent approach in this field. To investigate the efficacy of GA-SVR model, two other models, i.e., SVR and linear regression models, are also used for a comparative study. According to the obtained results, GA-SVR model clearly outperformed the SVR and linear regression models by achieving less root mean square error (RMSE) and higher coefficient of determination (R²). In other words, GA-SVR with RMSE of 0.017 and R² of 0.980 has higher performance than SVR with RMSE of 0.035 and R² of 0.912, and linear regression model with RMSE of 0.079 and R² of 0.625.

     

A swarm intelligence-based machine learning approach for predicting soil shear strength for road construction: a case study at Trung Luong National Expressway Project (Vietnam)

Determining the shear strength of soil is an important task in the design phase of construction project. This study puts forward an artificial intelligence (AI) solution to estimate this parameter of soil. The proposed approach is a hybrid AI model that integrates the least squares support vector machine (LSSVM) and the cuckoo search optimization (CSO). A dataset of 332 soil samples collected from the Trung Luong National Expressway Project in Viet Nam have been used for constructing and validating the AI model. The sample depth, sand percentage, loam percentage, clay percentage, moisture content, wet density of soil, specific gravity, liquid limit, plastic limit, plastic index, and liquid index are used as input variables to predict the output variable of shear strength. In the hybrid AI framework, LSSVM is employed to generalize the functional mapping that estimates the shear strength from the information provided by the aforementioned input variables. Since the model establishment of LSSVM requires a proper setting of the regularization and the kernel function parameters, the CSO algorithm is utilized to automatically determine these parameters. Experimental results show that the prediction accuracy of the hybrid method of LSSVM and CSO (RMSE = 0.082, MAPE = 14.841, and R² = 0.885) is better than those of the benchmark approaches including the standard LSSVM, the artificial neural network, and the regression tree. Therefore, the proposed method is a promising alternative for assisting construction engineers in the task of soil shear strength estimation.

     

Optimization of optical lens-controlled scanning electron microscopic resolution using generalized regression neural network and genetic algorithm

A scanning electron microscope (SEM) is a sophisticated equipment employed for fine imaging of a variety of surfaces. In this study, prediction models of SEM were constructed by using a generalized regression neural network (GRNN) and genetic algorithm (GA). The SEM components examined include condenser lens 1 and 2 and objective lens (coarse and fine) referred to as CL1, CL2, OL-Coarse, and OL-Fine. For a systematic modeling of SEM resolution (R), a face-centered Box–Wilson experiment was conducted. Two sets of data were collected with or without the adjustment of magnification. Root-mean-squared prediction error of optimized GRNN models are GA 0.481 and 1.96×10^-12 for non-adjusted and adjusted data, respectively. The optimized models demonstrated a much improved prediction over statistical regression models. The optimized models were used to optimize parameters particularly under best tuned SEM environment. For the variations in CL2 and OL-Coarse, the highest R could be achieved at all conditions except a larger CL2 either at smaller or larger OL-Coarse. For the variations in CL1 and CL2, the highest R was obtained at all conditions but larger CL2 and smaller CL1.     

Performance evaluation of hybrid FFA-ANFIS and GA-ANFIS models to predict particle size distribution of a muck-pile after blasting

Accurately predicting the particle size distribution of a muck-pile after blasting is always an important subject for mining industry. Adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS) has emerged as a synergic intelligent system. The main contribution of this paper is to optimize the premise and consequent parameters of ANFIS by firefly algorithm (FFA) and genetic algorithm (GA). To the best of our knowledge, no research has been published that assesses FFA and GA with ANFIS for fragmentation prediction and no research has tested the efficiency of these models to predict the fragmentation in different time scales as of yet. To show the effectiveness of the proposed ANFIS-FFA and ANFIS-GA models, their modelling accuracy has been compared with ANFIS, support vector regression (SVR) and artificial neural network (ANN). Intelligence predictions of fragmentation by ANFIS-FFA, ANFIS-GA, ANFIS, SVR and ANN are compared with observed values of fragmentation available in 88 blasting event of two quarry mines, Iran. According to the results, both ANFIS-FFA and ANFIS-GA prediction models performed satisfactorily; however, the lowest root mean square error (RMSE) and the highest correlation of determination (R²) values were obtained from ANFIS-GA model. The values of R² and RMSE obtained from ANFIS-GA, ANFIS-FFA, ANFIS, SVR and ANN models were equal to (0.989, 0.974), (0.981, 1.249), (0.956, 1.591), (0.924, 2.016) and (0.948, 2.554), respectively. Consequently, the proposed ANFIS-GA model has the potential to be used for predicting aims on other fields.

     

Assessing the efficacy of Landsat-8 OLI imagery derived models for remotely estimating chlorophyll-a concentration in the Upper Ganga River,India

ABSTRACT

Chlorophyll-a (chl-a) serves as an indicator of productivity in surface water. Estimating chl-a concentration is pivotal for monitoring and subsequent conservation of surface water quality. Artificial neural network (ANN) based models were validated and tested for their efficacy against various regression models to determine the chl-a concentration in the Upper Ganga river. Landsat-8 Operational Land Imager (OLI) surface reflectance (SR) imagery for May and October along with in-situ data over a period of 2 years (2016–2017) was used to develop and validated models. Regression model performance was acceptable with a coefficient of determination (R²) of 0.57, 0.63, 0.66 and 0.68 for linear, exponential, logarithmic and power model, respectively. However, there was a significant improvement in the efficacy of chl-a determination using ANN model performance having a root mean square error (RMSE) of 1.52 µg l^–1 and R² = 0.97 in comparison to the best-performing regression model (power) with RMSE = 9.86 µg l^–1 and R² = 0.68. ANN exhibited comparatively more precise spatial and seasonal variability with mean absolute error (MAE) of 1.26 µg l^–1 as compared to the best regression model (power) MAE = 7.98 µg l^–1 suggesting the applicability of ANN for large-scale spatial and temporal monitoring river stretches using Landsat-8 OLI SR images.     

A novel artificial intelligence technique for analyzing slope stability using PSO-CA model

This study aims to develop a new artificial intelligence model for analyzing and evaluating slope stability in open-pit mines. Indeed, a novel hybrid intelligent technique based on an optimization of the cubist algorithm by an evolutionary method (i.e., PSO), namely PSO-CA technique, was developed for predicting the factor of safety (FS) in slope stability; 450 simulations from the Geostudio software for the FS of a quarry mine (Vietnam) were used as the datasets for this aim. Five factors include bench height, slope angle, angle of internal friction, cohesion, and unit weight were used as the input variables for estimating FS in this work. To clarify the performance of the proposed PSO-CA technique in slope stability analysis, SVM, CART, and kNN models were also developed and assessed. Three performance indices, such as mean absolute error (MAE), root-mean-squared error (RMSE), and determination coefficient (R²), were computed to evaluate the accuracy of the predictive models. The results clarified that the proposed PSO-CA technique was the most dominant accuracy with an MAE of 0.009, RMSE of 0.025, and R² of 0.981, in estimating the stability of slope. The remaining models (i.e., SVM, CART, kNN) obtained poorer performance with MAE from 0.014 to 0.038, RMSE 0.030–0.056, and R² 0.917–0.974.

     

Reinforced concrete deep beam shear strength capacity modelling using an integrative bio-inspired algorithm with an artificial intelligence model

The design and sustainability of reinforced concrete deep beam are still the main issues in the sector of structural engineering despite the existence of modern advancements in this area. Proper understanding of shear stress characteristics can assist in providing safer design and prevent failure in deep beams which consequently lead to saving lives and properties. In this investigation, a new intelligent model depending on the hybridization of support vector regression with bio-inspired optimization approach called genetic algorithm (SVR-GA) is employed to predict the shear strength of reinforced concrete (RC) deep beams based on dimensional, mechanical and material parameters properties. The adopted SVR-GA modelling approach is validated against three different well established artificial intelligent (AI) models, including classical SVR, artificial neural network (ANN) and gradient boosted decision trees (GBDTs). The comparison assessments provide a clear impression of the superior capability of the proposed SVR-GA model in the prediction of shear strength capability of simply supported deep beams. The simulated results gained by SVR-GA model are very close to the experimental ones. In quantitative results, the coefficient of determination (R²) during the testing phase (R² = 0.95), whereas the other comparable models generated relatively lower values of R² ranging from 0.884 to 0.941. All in all, the proposed SVR-GA model showed an applicable and robust computer aid technology for modelling RC deep beam shear strength that contributes to the base knowledge of material and structural engineering perspective.

     

A hybrid extreme learning machine model with harris hawks optimisation algorithm: an optimised model for product demand forecasting applications

Accurate and real-time product demand forecasting is the need of the hour in the world of supply chain management. Predicting future product demand from historical sales data is a highly non-linear problem, subject to various external and environmental factors. In this work, we propose an optimised forecasting model - an extreme learning machine (ELM) model coupled with the Harris Hawks optimisation (HHO) algorithm to forecast product demand in an e-commerce company. ELM is preferred over traditional neural networks mainly due to its fast computational speed, which allows efficient demand forecasting in real-time. Our ELM-HHO model performed significantly better than ARIMA models that are commonly used in industries to forecast product demand. The performance of the proposed ELM-HHO model was also compared with traditional ELM, ELM auto-tuned using Bayesian Optimisation (ELM-BO), Gated Recurrent Unit (GRU) based recurrent neural network and Long Short Term Memory (LSTM) recurrent neural network models. Different performance metrics, i.e., Root Mean Squared Error (RMSE), Mean Absolute Percentage Error (MAPE) and Mean Percentage Error (MPE) were used for the comparison of the selected models. Horizon forecasting at 3 days and 7 days ahead was also performed using the proposed approach. The results revealed that the proposed approach is superior to traditional product demand forecasting models in terms of prediction accuracy and it can be applied in real-time to predict future product demand based on the previous week’s sales data. In particular, considering RMSE of forecasting, the proposed ELM-HHO model performed 62.73% better than the statistical ARIMA(7,1,0) model, 40.73% better than the neural network based GRU model, 34.05% better than the neural network based LSTM model, 27.16% better than the traditional non-optimised ELM model with 100 hidden nodes and 11.63% better than the ELM-BO model in forecasting product demand for future 3 months. The novelty of the proposed approach lies in the way the fast computational speed of ELMs has been combined with the accuracy gained by tuning hyperparameters using HHO. An increased number of hyperparameters has been optimised in our methodology compared to available models. The majority of approaches to improve the accuracy of ELM so far have only focused on tuning the weights and the biases of the hidden layer. In our hybrid model, we tune the number of hidden nodes, the number of input time lags and even the type of activation function used in the hidden layer in addition to tuning the weights and the biases. This has resulted in a significant increase in accuracy over previous methods. Our work presents an original way of performing product demand forecasting in real-time in industry with highly accurate results which are much better than pre-existing demand forecasting models.

     

A comparison of the performance of some extreme learning machine empirical models for predicting daily horizontal diffuse solar radiation in a region of southern Iran

This study uses the empirical models of extreme learning machine (ELM) method to predict daily horizontal diffuse solar radiation (HDSR). As a possibility for modification, the recent hybrid ELM methods such as complex ELM (C-ELM), self-adaptive evolutionary ELM (SaE-ELM), and online sequential ELM (OS-ELM) have been developed for the prediction of the daily HDSR. The empirical model of ELM predicts the HDSR using clearness index as the sole predictor. For this aim, two types of correlations are evaluated: (1) the diffuse fraction-clearness index and (2) the diffuse coefficient-clearness index. The measured diffuse and global solar radiation data sets of southern Iranian cities (Yazd, Shiraz, Bandar Abbas, Bushehr, and Zahedan) are utilized to evaluate the models. The precision of the C-ELM, SaE-ELM, OS-ELM, and ELM models is evaluated for different regions on the basis of five statistical performance evaluation parameters. The results confirm that the performance of hybrid ELM is pretty accurate and trustworthy. Fully complex ELM exhibits the best performance among these hybrid methods, having values of 0.87 and 0.30 for R² and RMSE measures, respectively, in the testing phase. Therefore, it is able to be recognized as an appropriate tool for daily solar radiation forecasting issues.     

A new combination of artificial neural network and <Emphasis Type="Italic">K</Emphasis>-nearest neighbors models to predict blast-induced ground vibration and air-overpressure

Blasting operation is widely used method for rock excavation in mining and civil works. Ground vibration and air-overpressure (AOp) are two of the most detrimental effects induced by blasting. So, evaluation and prediction of ground vibration and AOp are essential. This paper presents a new combination of artificial neural network (ANN) and K-nearest neighbors (KNN) models to predict blast-induced ground vibration and AOp. Here, this combination is abbreviated using ANN-KNN. To indicate performance of the ANN-KNN model in predicting ground vibration and AOp, a pre-developed ANN as well as two empirical equations, presented by United States Bureau of Mines (USBM), were developed. To construct the mentioned models, maximum charge per delay (MC) and distance between blast face and monitoring station (D) were set as input parameters, whereas AOp and peak particle velocity (PPV), as a vibration index, were considered as output parameters. A database consisting of 75 datasets, obtained from the Shur river dam, Iran, was utilized to develop the mentioned models. In terms of using three performance indices, namely coefficient correlation (R ²), root mean square error and variance account for, the superiority of the ANN-KNN model was proved in comparison with the ANN and USBM equations.     

Integrating spectral indices with environmental parameters for estimating heavy metal concentrations in rice using a dynamic fuzzy neural-network model

A generalized dynamic fuzzy neural network (GDFNN) was created to estimate heavy metal concentrations in rice by integrating spectral indices and environmental parameters. Hyperspectral data, environmental parameters, and heavy metal content were collected from field experiments with different levels of heavy metal pollution (Cu and Cd). Input variables used in the GDFNN model were derived from 10 variables acquired by gray relational analysis. The assessment models for Cd and Cu concentration employed five and six input variables, respectively. The results showed that the GDFNN for estimating Cu and Cd concentrations in rice performed well at prediction with a compact network structure using the training, validation, and testing sets (for Cu, fuzzy rules=9, R² greater than 0.75, and RMSE less than 2.5; for Cd, fuzzy rules=9, R² greater than 0.75, and RMSE less than 1.0). The final GDFNN model was then compared with a back-propagation (BP) neural network model, adaptive-network-based fuzzy interference systems (ANFIS), and a regression model. The accuracies of GDFNN model prediction were usually slightly better than those of the other three models. This demonstrates that the GDFNN model is more suitable for predicting heavy metal concentrations in rice.     

Comparison of connectionist and multiple regression approaches for prediction of body weight of goats

The Attappady Black goat is a native goat breed of Kerala in India and is mainly known for its valuable meat and skin. In this work, a comparative study of connectionist network [also known as artificial neural network (ANN)] and multiple regression is made to predict the body weight from body measurements in Attappady Black goats. A multilayer feed forward network with backpropagation of error learning mechanism was used to predict the body weight. Data collected from 824 Attappady Black goats in the age group of 0–12 months consisting of 370 males and 454 females were used for the study. The whole data set was partitioned into two data sets, namely training data set comprising of 75 per cent data (277 and 340 records in males and females, respectively) to build the neural network model and test data set comprising of 25 per cent (93 and 114 records in males and females, respectively) to test the model. Three different morphometric measurements viz. chest girth, body length and height at withers were used as input variables, and body weight was considered as output variable. Multiple regression analysis (MRA) was also done using the same training and testing data sets. The prediction efficiency of both models was compared using the R ² value and root mean square error (RMSE). The correlation coefficients between the actual and predicted body weights in case of ANN were found to be positive and highly significant and ranged from 90.27 to 93.69%. The low value of RMSE and high value of R ² in case of connectionist network (RMSE: male—1.9005, female—1.8434; R ²: male—87.34, female—85.70) in comparison with MRA model (RMSE: male—2.0798, female—2.0836; R ²: male—84.84, female—81.74) show that connectionist network model is a better tool to predict body weight in goats than MRA.