2024 |
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Aura Hernandez-Sabate, Jose Elias Yauri, Pau Folch, Daniel Alvarez, & Debora Gil. (2024). EEG Dataset Collection for Mental Workload Predictions in Flight-Deck Environment . Sensors, 24(4), 1174.
Abstract: High mental workload reduces human performance and the ability to correctly carry out complex tasks. In particular, aircraft pilots enduring high mental workloads are at high risk of failure, even with catastrophic outcomes. Despite progress, there is still a lack of knowledge about the interrelationship between mental workload and brain functionality, and there is still limited data on flight-deck scenarios. Although recent emerging deep-learning (DL) methods using physiological data have presented new ways to find new physiological markers to detect and assess cognitive states, they demand large amounts of properly annotated datasets to achieve good performance. We present a new dataset of electroencephalogram (EEG) recordings specifically collected for the recognition of different levels of mental workload. The data were recorded from three experiments, where participants were induced to different levels of workload through tasks of increasing cognition demand. The first involved playing the N-back test, which combines memory recall with arithmetical skills. The second was playing Heat-the-Chair, a serious game specifically designed to emphasize and monitor subjects under controlled concurrent tasks. The third was flying in an Airbus320 simulator and solving several critical situations. The design of the dataset has been validated on three different levels: (1) correlation of the theoretical difficulty of each scenario to the self-perceived difficulty and performance of subjects; (2) significant difference in EEG temporal patterns across the theoretical difficulties and (3) usefulness for the training and evaluation of AI models.
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2022 |
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Aura Hernandez-Sabate, Jose Elias Yauri, Pau Folch, Miquel Angel Piera, & Debora Gil. (2022). "Recognition of the Mental Workloads of Pilots in the Cockpit Using EEG Signals " . Applied Sciences, 12(5), 2298.
Abstract: The commercial flightdeck is a naturally multi-tasking work environment, one in which interruptions are frequent come in various forms, contributing in many cases to aviation incident reports. Automatic characterization of pilots’ workloads is essential to preventing these kind of incidents. In addition, minimizing the physiological sensor network as much as possible remains both a challenge and a requirement. Electroencephalogram (EEG) signals have shown high correlations with specific cognitive and mental states, such as workload. However, there is not enough evidence in the literature to validate how well models generalize in cases of new subjects performing tasks with workloads similar to the ones included during the model’s training. In this paper, we propose a convolutional neural network to classify EEG features across different mental workloads in a continuous performance task test that partly measures working memory and working memory capacity. Our model is valid at the general population level and it is able to transfer task learning to pilot mental workload recognition in a simulated operational environment.
Keywords: Cognitive states; Mental workload; EEG analysis; Neural networks; Multimodal data fusion
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Debora Gil, Aura Hernandez-Sabate, Julien Enconniere, Saryani Asmayawati, Pau Folch, Juan Borrego-Carazo, et al. (2022). "E-Pilots: A System to Predict Hard Landing During the Approach Phase of Commercial Flights " . IEEE Access, 10, 7489–7503.
Abstract: More than half of all commercial aircraft operation accidents could have been prevented by executing a go-around. Making timely decision to execute a go-around manoeuvre can potentially reduce overall aviation industry accident rate. In this paper, we describe a cockpit-deployable machine learning system to support flight crew go-around decision-making based on the prediction of a hard landing event.
This work presents a hybrid approach for hard landing prediction that uses features modelling temporal dependencies of aircraft variables as inputs to a neural network. Based on a large dataset of 58177 commercial flights, the results show that our approach has 85% of average sensitivity with 74% of average specificity at the go-around point. It follows that our approach is a cockpit-deployable recommendation system that outperforms existing approaches.
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Saad Minhas, Aura Hernandez-Sabate, Shoaib Ehsan, & Klaus McDonald Maier. (2022). "Effects of Non-Driving Related Tasks during Self-Driving mode " . IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems, 23(2), 1391–1399.
Abstract: Perception reaction time and mental workload have proven to be crucial in manual driving. Moreover, in highly automated cars, where most of the research is focusing on Level 4 Autonomous driving, take-over performance is also a key factor when taking road safety into account. This study aims to investigate how the immersion in non-driving related tasks affects the take-over performance of drivers in given scenarios. The paper also highlights the use of virtual simulators to gather efficient data that can be crucial in easing the transition between manual and autonomous driving scenarios. The use of Computer Aided Simulations is of absolute importance in this day and age since the automotive industry is rapidly moving towards Autonomous technology. An experiment comprising of 40 subjects was performed to examine the reaction times of driver and the influence of other variables in the success of take-over performance in highly automated driving under different circumstances within a highway virtual environment. The results reflect the relationship between reaction times under different scenarios that the drivers might face under the circumstances stated above as well as the importance of variables such as velocity in the success on regaining car control after automated driving. The implications of the results acquired are important for understanding the criteria needed for designing Human Machine Interfaces specifically aimed towards automated driving conditions. Understanding the need to keep drivers in the loop during automation, whilst allowing drivers to safely engage in other non-driving related tasks is an important research area which can be aided by the proposed study.
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Saad Minhas, Zeba Khanam, Shoaib Ehsan, Klaus McDonald Maier, & Aura Hernandez-Sabate. (2022). "Weather Classification by Utilizing Synthetic Data " . Sensors, 22(9), 3193.
Abstract: Weather prediction from real-world images can be termed a complex task when targeting classification using neural networks. Moreover, the number of images throughout the available datasets can contain a huge amount of variance when comparing locations with the weather those images are representing. In this article, the capabilities of a custom built driver simulator are explored specifically to simulate a wide range of weather conditions. Moreover, the performance of a new synthetic dataset generated by the above simulator is also assessed. The results indicate that the use of synthetic datasets in conjunction with real-world datasets can increase the training efficiency of the CNNs by as much as 74%. The article paves a way forward to tackle the persistent problem of bias in vision-based datasets.
Keywords: Weather classification; synthetic data; dataset; autonomous car; computer vision; advanced driver assistance systems; deep learning; intelligent transportation systems
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2021 |
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Jose Elias Yauri, Aura Hernandez-Sabate, Pau Folch, & Debora Gil. (2021). "Mental Workload Detection Based on EEG Analysis " In Artificial Intelligent Research and Development. Proceedings 23rd International Conference of the Catalan Association for Artificial Intelligence. (Vol. 339, pp. 268–277).
Abstract: The study of mental workload becomes essential for human work efficiency, health conditions and to avoid accidents, since workload compromises both performance and awareness. Although workload has been widely studied using several physiological measures, minimising the sensor network as much as possible remains both a challenge and a requirement.
Electroencephalogram (EEG) signals have shown a high correlation to specific cognitive and mental states like workload. However, there is not enough evidence in the literature to validate how well models generalize in case of new subjects performing tasks of a workload similar to the ones included during model’s training.
In this paper we propose a binary neural network to classify EEG features across different mental workloads. Two workloads, low and medium, are induced using two variants of the N-Back Test. The proposed model was validated in a dataset collected from 16 subjects and shown a high level of generalization capability: model reported an average recall of 81.81% in a leave-one-out subject evaluation.
Keywords: Cognitive states; Mental workload; EEG analysis; Neural Networks.
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2020 |
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Aura Hernandez-Sabate, Lluis Albarracin, & F. Javier Sanchez. (2020). "Graph-Based Problem Explorer: A Software Tool to Support Algorithm Design Learning While Solving the Salesperson Problem " . Mathematics, 20(8(9)), 1595.
Abstract: In this article, we present a sequence of activities in the form of a project in order to promote
learning on design and analysis of algorithms. The project is based on the resolution of a real problem, the salesperson problem, and it is theoretically grounded on the fundamentals of mathematical modelling. In order to support the students’ work, a multimedia tool, called Graph-based Problem Explorer (GbPExplorer), has been designed and refined to promote the development of computer literacy in engineering and science university students. This tool incorporates several modules to allow coding different algorithmic techniques solving the salesman problem. Based on an educational design research along five years, we observe that working with GbPExplorer during the project provides students with the possibility of representing the situation to be studied in the form of graphs and analyze them from a computational point of view.
Keywords: STEM education; Project-based learning; Coding; software tool
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Debora Gil, Katerine Diaz, Carles Sanchez, & Aura Hernandez-Sabate. (2020). "Early Screening of SARS-CoV-2 by Intelligent Analysis of X-Ray Images ".
Abstract: Future SARS-CoV-2 virus outbreak COVID-XX might possibly occur during the next years. However the pathology in humans is so recent that many clinical aspects, like early detection of complications, side effects after recovery or early screening, are currently unknown. In spite of the number of cases of COVID-19, its rapid spread putting many sanitary systems in the edge of collapse has hindered proper collection and analysis of the data related to COVID-19 clinical aspects. We describe an interdisciplinary initiative that integrates clinical research, with image diagnostics and the use of new technologies such as artificial intelligence and radiomics with the aim of clarifying some of SARS-CoV-2 open questions. The whole initiative addresses 3 main points: 1) collection of standardize data including images, clinical data and analytics; 2) COVID-19 screening for its early diagnosis at primary care centers; 3) define radiomic signatures of COVID-19 evolution and associated pathologies for the early treatment of complications. In particular, in this paper we present a general overview of the project, the experimental design and first results of X-ray COVID-19 detection using a classic approach based on HoG and feature selection. Our experiments include a comparison to some recent methods for COVID-19 screening in X-Ray and an exploratory analysis of the feasibility of X-Ray COVID-19 screening. Results show that classic approaches can outperform deep-learning methods in this experimental setting, indicate the feasibility of early COVID-19 screening and that non-COVID infiltration is the group of patients most similar to COVID-19 in terms of radiological description of X-ray. Therefore, an efficient COVID-19 screening should be complemented with other clinical data to better discriminate these cases.
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2019 |
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Katerine Diaz, Jesus Martinez del Rincon, Marçal Rusiñol, & Aura Hernandez-Sabate. (2019). "Feature Extraction by Using Dual-Generalized Discriminative Common Vectors " . Journal of Mathematical Imaging and Vision, 61(3), 331–351.
Abstract: In this paper, a dual online subspace-based learning method called dual-generalized discriminative common vectors (Dual-GDCV) is presented. The method extends incremental GDCV by exploiting simultaneously both the concepts of incremental and decremental learning for supervised feature extraction and classification. Our methodology is able to update the feature representation space without recalculating the full projection or accessing the previously processed training data. It allows both adding information and removing unnecessary data from a knowledge base in an efficient way, while retaining the previously acquired knowledge. The proposed method has been theoretically proved and empirically validated in six standard face recognition and classification datasets, under two scenarios: (1) removing and adding samples of existent classes, and (2) removing and adding new classes to a classification problem. Results show a considerable computational gain without compromising the accuracy of the model in comparison with both batch methodologies and other state-of-art adaptive methods.
Keywords: Online feature extraction; Generalized discriminative common vectors; Dual learning; Incremental learning; Decremental learning
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2018 |
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Katerine Diaz, Francesc J. Ferri, & Aura Hernandez-Sabate. (2018). "An overview of incremental feature extraction methods based on linear subspaces " . Knowledge-Based Systems, 145, 219–235.
Abstract: With the massive explosion of machine learning in our day-to-day life, incremental and adaptive learning has become a major topic, crucial to keep up-to-date and improve classification models and their corresponding feature extraction processes. This paper presents a categorized overview of incremental feature extraction based on linear subspace methods which aim at incorporating new information to the already acquired knowledge without accessing previous data. Specifically, this paper focuses on those linear dimensionality reduction methods with orthogonal matrix constraints based on global loss function, due to the extensive use of their batch approaches versus other linear alternatives. Thus, we cover the approaches derived from Principal Components Analysis, Linear Discriminative Analysis and Discriminative Common Vector methods. For each basic method, its incremental approaches are differentiated according to the subspace model and matrix decomposition involved in the updating process. Besides this categorization, several updating strategies are distinguished according to the amount of data used to update and to the fact of considering a static or dynamic number of classes. Moreover, the specific role of the size/dimension ratio in each method is considered. Finally, computational complexity, experimental setup and the accuracy rates according to published results are compiled and analyzed, and an empirical evaluation is done to compare the best approach of each kind.
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