Using background knowledge to rank itemsets

Assessing the quality of discovered results is an important open problem in data mining. Such assessment is particularly vital when mining itemsets, since commonly many of the discovered patterns can be easily explained by background knowledge. The simplest approach to screen uninteresting patterns is to compare the observed frequency against the independence model. Since the parameters for the independence model are the column margins, we can view such screening as a way of using the column margins as background knowledge. In this paper we study techniques for more flexible approaches for infusing background knowledge. Namely, we show that we can efficiently use additional knowledge such as row margins, lazarus counts, and bounds of ones. We demonstrate that these statistics describe forms of data that occur in practice and have been studied in data mining. To infuse the information efficiently we use a maximum entropy approach. In its general setting, solving a maximum entropy model is infeasible, but we demonstrate that for our setting it can be solved in polynomial time. Experiments show that more sophisticated models fit the data better and that using more information improves the frequency prediction of itemsets.     

Using TINA concepts for IN evolution

This article proposes solutions that use TINA concepts for the future evolution of IN. It focuses on the specific need to provide a software architecture for the IN service control function which controls the transport network through INAP. After giving an overview of the TINA architecture, the article examines how it can be applied to IN. Several aspects are considered, such as architectural modeling, application of software technology and methodology, and definition of sets of standard open interfaces. The article concludes with a view on related activities in industrial fora     

Meeting the energy challenge for the environment: The role of safety

Nuclear power has an overwhelming potential to meet the demands of an energy hungry world while protecting the environment. However, the renaissance of nuclear energy will only become true when the public can be convinced that nuclear power plants are safe and that a strong safety culture exists around the globe. While the overall safety performance of the world's power plants had been steadily improved after the shock of Chernobyl, unfortunately, the overall plant availability has levelled off in the last few years. The main reason for this is found in a complacency toward nuclear safety issues which can be linked to the arrival of new CEOs in the nuclear industry who – all too often – have no nuclear background and who manage nuclear power plants in the same way they would manage any other industrial plants – being not at all aware of the necessity of a very special and very sensitive safety culture of nuclear installations.