Interconnection of electric power systems is becoming increasingly widespread as part of the power exchange between countries as well as regions within countries in many parts of the world. There are numerous examples of interconnection of remotely separated regions within one country. Such are found in the Nordic countries, Argentina, and Brazil. In cases of long distance AC transmission, as in interconnected power systems, care has to be taken for safeguarding of synchronism as well as stable system voltages, particularly in conjunction with system faults. With series compensation, bulk AC power transmission over very long distances (over 1000 km) is a reality today. These long distance power transfers cause, however, the system low-frequency oscillations to become more lightly damped. As a result, many power network operators are taking steps to add supplementary damping devices in their systems to improve the system security by damping these undesirable oscillations. With the advent of thyristor controlled series compensation, AC power system interconnections can be brought to their fullest benefit by optimizing their power transmission capability, safeguarding system stability under various operating conditions and optimizing the load sharing between parallel circuits at all times. This thesis reports the results of digital time-domain simulation studies that are carried out to investigate the effectiveness of a phase imbalanced hybrid single-phase-Thyristor Controlled Series Capacitor (TCSC) compensation scheme in damping power system oscillations in multi-machine power systems. This scheme which is feasible, technically sound, and has an industrial application potential, is economically attractive when compared with the full three-phase TCSC which has been used for power oscillations damping.<p> Time-domain simulations are conducted on a benchmark model using the ElectroMagnetic Transients program (EMTP-RV). The results of the investigations have demonstrated that the hybrid single-phase-TCSC compensation scheme is very effective in damping power system oscillations at different loading profiles.

We describe an ensemble approach to learning salient spatial regions from arbitrarily partitioned simulation data. Ensemble approaches for anomaly detection are also explored. The partitioning comes from the distributed processing requirements of large-scale simulations. The volume of the data is such that classifiers can train only on data local to a given partition. Since the data partition reflects the needs of the simulation, the class statistics can vary from partition to partition. Some classes will likely be missing from some or even most partitions. We combine a fast ensemble learning algorithm with scaled probabilistic majority voting in order to learn an accurate classifier from such data. Since some simulations are difficult to model without a considerable number of false positive errors, and since we are essentially building a search engine for simulation data, we order predicted regions to increase the likelihood that most of the top-ranked predictions are correct (salient). Results from simulation runs of a canister being torn and from a casing being dropped show that regions of interest are successfully identified in spite of the class imbalance in the individual training sets. Lift curve analysis shows that the use of data driven ordering methods provides a statistically significant improvement over the use of the default, natural time step ordering. Significant time is saved for the end user by allowing an improved focus on areas of interest without the need to conventionally search all of the data. We have also found that using random forests weighted and distance-based outlier ensemble methods for supervised learning of anomaly detection provide significant accuracy improvements when compared to existing methods on the same dataset. Further, distance-based outlier and local outlier factor ensemble methods for unsupervised learning of anomaly detection also compare favorably to existing methods.

As information technology advances, the demands for developing a reliable and highly accurate predictive model from many domains are increasing. Traditional classification algorithms can be limited in their performance on highly imbalanced data sets. In this dissertation, we study two common problems when training data is imbalanced, and propose effective algorithms to solve them. Firstly, we investigate the problem in building a multi-class classification model from imbalanced class distribution. We develop an effective technique to improve the performance of the model by formulating the problem as a multi-class SVM with an objective to maximize G-mean value. A ramp loss function is used to simplify and solve the problem. Experimental results on multiple real-world datasets confirm that our new method can effectively solve the multi-class classification problem when the datasets are highly imbalanced. Secondly, we explore the problem in learning a global classification model from distributed data sources with privacy constraints. In this problem, not only data sources have different class distributions but combining data into one central data is also prohibited. We propose a privacy-preserving framework for building a global SVM from distributed data sources. Our new framework avoid constructing a global kernel matrix by mapping non-linear inputs to a linear feature space and then solve a distributed linear SVM from these virtual points. Our method can solve both imbalance and privacy problems while achieving the same level of accuracy as regular SVM. Finally, we extend our framework to handle high-dimensional data by utilizing Generalized Multiple Kernel Learning to select a sparse combination of features and kernels. This new model produces a smaller set of features, but yields much higher accuracy.

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In this dissertation, the problem of learning from highly imbalanced data is studied. Imbalance data learning is of great importance and challenge in many real applications. Dealing with a minority class normally needs new concepts, observations and solutions in order to fully understand the underlying complicated models. We try to systematically review and solve this special learning task in this dissertation.We propose a new ensemble learning framework—Diversified Ensemble Classifiers for Imbal-anced Data Learning (DECIDL), based on the advantages of existing ensemble imbalanced learning strategies. Our framework combines three learning techniques: a) ensemble learning, b) artificial example generation, and c) diversity construction by reversely data re-labeling. As a meta-learner, DECIDL utilizes general supervised learning algorithms as base learners to build an ensemble committee. We create a standard benchmark data pool, which contains 30 highly skewed sets with diverse characteristics from different domains, in order to facilitate future research on imbalance data learning. We use this benchmark pool to evaluate and compare our DECIDL framework with several ensemble learning methods, namely under-bagging, over-bagging, SMOTE-bagging, and AdaBoost. Extensive experiments suggest that our DECIDL framework is comparable with other methods. The data sets, experiments and results provide a valuable knowledge base for future research on imbalance learning. We develop a simple but effective artificial example generation method for data balancing. Two new methods DBEG-ensemble and DECIDL-DBEG are then designed to improve the power of imbalance learning. Experiments show that these two methods are comparable to the state-of-the-art methods, e.g., GSVM-RU and SMOTE-bagging. Furthermore, we investigate learning on imbalanced data from a new angle—active learning. By combining active learning with the DECIDL framework, we show that the newly designed Active-DECIDL method is very effective for imbalance learning, suggesting the DECIDL framework is very robust and flexible.Lastly, we apply the proposed learning methods to a real-world bioinformatics problem—protein methylation prediction. Extensive computational results show that the DECIDL method does perform very well for the imbalanced data mining task. Importantly, the experimental results have confirmed our new contributions on this particular data learning problem.

Searches for pulsars during the past fifty years, have been characterised by two problems making their discovery difficult: i) an increasing volume of data to be searched, and ii) an increasing number of `candidate' pulsar detections arising from that data, requiring analysis. Whilst almost all are caused by noise or interference, these are often indistinguishable from real pulsar detections. Deciding which candidates should be studied is therefore difficult. Indeed it has become known as the `candidate selection problem'. This thesis presents an interdisciplinary study of the selection problem, with the aim of developing a new method able to mitigate it. Specifically for future pulsar surveys undertaken with the Square kilometre Array (SKA). Through a combination of critical literature evaluations, theoretical modelling exercises, and empirical investigations, the selection problem is described in-depth here for the first time. It is shown to be characterised by the dominance of Gaussian distributed noise signals, a factor that no existing selection method accounts for. It also reveals the presence of a significant trend in survey data rates, which suggest that candidate selection is transitioning from an off-line processing procedure, to an on-line, and real-time, decision making process. In response, a new real-time machine learning based method, the GH-VFDT, is introduced in this thesis. The results presented here show that a significant improvement in selection performance can be achieved using the GH-VFDT, which utilises a learning procedure optimised for data characterised by skewed class distributions. Whilst the principled development of new numerical features that maximise the separation between pulsars and Gaussian noise, have also greatly improved GH-VFDT pulsar recall. It is therefore concluded that the sub-optimal performance of existing selection systems, is due to a combination of poor feature design, insensitivity to noise, and an inability to deal with skewed class distributions.

In this thesis several sampling methods for Statistical Learning with imbalanced data have been implemented and evaluated with a new metric, imbalanced accuracy. Several modifications and new algorithms have been proposed for intelligent sampling: Border links, Clean Border Undersampling, One-Sided Undersampling Modified, DBSCAN Undersampling, Class Adjusted Jittering, Hierarchical Cluster Based Oversampling, DBSCAN Oversampling, Fitted Distribution Oversampling, Random Linear Combinations Oversampling, Center Repulsion Oversampling. A set of requirements on a satisfactory performance metric for imbalanced learning have been formulated and a new metric for evaluating classification performance has been developed accordingly. The new metric is based on a combination of the worst class accuracy and geometric mean. In the testing framework nonparametric Friedman's test and post hoc Nemenyi’s test have been used to assess the performance of classifiers, sampling algorithms, combinations of classifiers and sampling algorithms on several data sets. A new approach of detecting algorithms with dominating and dominated performance has been proposed with a new way of visualizing the results in a network. From experiments on simulated and several real data sets we conclude that: i) different classifiers are not equally sensitive to sampling algorithms, ii) sampling algorithms have different performance within specific classifiers, iii) oversampling algorithms perform better than undersampling algorithms, iv) Random Oversampling and Random Undersampling outperform many well-known sampling algorithms, v) our proposed algorithms Hierarchical Cluster Based Oversampling, DBSCAN Oversampling with FDO, and Class Adjusted Jittering perform much better than other algorithms, vi) a few good combinations of a classifier and sampling algorithm may boost classification performance, while a few bad combinations may spoil the performance, but the majority of combinations are not significantly different in performance.

Os recentes avanços da ciência e tecnologia viabilizaram o crescimento de dados em quantidade e disponibilidade. Junto com essa explosão de informações geradas, surge a necessidade de analisar dados para descobrir conhecimento novo e útil. Desse modo, áreas que visam extrair conhecimento e informações úteis de grandes conjuntos de dados se tornaram grandes oportunidades para o avanço de pesquisas, tal como o Aprendizado de Máquina (AM) e a Mineração de Dados (MD). Porém, existem algumas limitações que podem prejudicar a acurácia de alguns algoritmos tradicionais dessas áreas, por exemplo o desbalanceamento das amostras das classes de um conjunto de dados. Para mitigar tal problema, algumas alternativas têm sido alvos de pesquisas nos últimos anos, tal como o desenvolvimento de técnicas para o balanceamento artificial de dados, a modificação dos algoritmos e propostas de abordagens para dados desbalanceados. Uma área pouco explorada sob a visão do desbalanceamento de dados são os problemas de classificação hierárquica, em que as classes são organizadas em hierarquias, normalmente na forma de árvore ou DAG (Direct Acyclic Graph). O objetivo deste trabalho foi investigar as limitações e maneiras de minimizar os efeitos de dados desbalanceados em problemas de classificação hierárquica. Os experimentos realizados mostram que é necessário levar em consideração as características das classes hierárquicas para a aplicação (ou não) de técnicas para tratar problemas dados desbalanceados em classificação hierárquica. / Recent advances in science and technology have made possible the data growth in quantity and availability. Along with this explosion of generated information, there is a need to analyze data to discover new and useful knowledge. Thus, areas for extracting knowledge and useful information in large datasets have become great opportunities for the advancement of research, such as Machine Learning (ML) and Data Mining (DM). However, there are some limitations that may reduce the accuracy of some traditional algorithms of these areas, for example the imbalance of classes samples in a dataset. To mitigate this drawback, some solutions have been the target of research in recent years, such as the development of techniques for artificial balancing data, algorithm modification and new approaches for imbalanced data. An area little explored in the data imbalance vision are the problems of hierarchical classification, in which the classes are organized into hierarchies, commonly in the form of tree or DAG (Direct Acyclic Graph). The goal of this work aims at investigating the limitations and approaches to minimize the effects of imbalanced data with hierarchical classification problems. The experimental results show the need to take into account the features of hierarchical classes when deciding the application of techniques for imbalanced data in hierarchical classification.

Data streams are large sequences of data, possibly endless and temporarily ordered, that are common-place in Internet of Things (IoT) applications such as intrusion detection in computer networking, fraud detection in financial institutions, real-time tumor tracking in radiotherapy and social media analysis. Algorithms learning from such streams need to be able to construct near real-time models that continuously adapt to potential changes in patterns, in order to retain high performance throughout the stream. It follows that there are numerous challenges involved in supervised learning (or so-called classification) in such environments. One of the challenges in learning from streams is multi-class imbalance, in which the rates of instances in the different class labels differ substantially. Notably, classification algorithms may become biased towards the classes with more frequent instances, sacrificing the performance of the less frequent or so-called minority classes. Further, minority instances often arrive infrequently and in bursts, making accurate model construction problematic. For example, network intrusion detection systems must be able to distinguish between normal traffic and multiple minority classes corresponding to a variety of different types of attacks. Further, having labels for all instances are often infeasible, since we might have missing or late-arriving labels. For instance, when learning from a stream regarding the task of detecting network intrusions, the true label for all instances might not be available, or it might take time until the label is made available, especially for new types of attacks. In this thesis, we contribute to the advancements of online learning from evolving streams by focusing on the above-mentioned areas of multi-class imbalance and missing labels. First, we introduce a multi-class online ensemble algorithm designed to maintain a balanced performance over all classes. Specifically, our approach samples instances with replacement while dynamically increasing the weights of under-represented classes, in order to produce models that benefit all classes. Our experimental results show that our online ensemble method performs well against multi-class imbalanced data in various datasets. We further continue our study by introducing an approach to dealing with missing labels that utilize both labelled and unlabelled data to increase a model’s performance. That is, our method utilizes labelled data for pseudo-labelling unlabelled instances, allowing the model to perform better in environments where labels are scarce. More specifically, our approach features a meta-reinforcement learning agent, trained on multiple-source streams, that can effectively select the prediction of a K nearest neighbours (K-NN) classifier as the label for unlabelled instances. Extensive experiments on benchmark datasets demonstrate the value and effectiveness of our approach and confirm that our method outperforms state-of-the-art.

<div><p>Predictive modeling allows us to analyze historical patterns to forecast future events. When the data available for this analysis is imbalanced or skewed, many challenges arise. The lack of sensitivity towards the class with less data available hinders the sought-after predictive capabilities of the model. These imbalanced datasets are found across many different fields, including medical imaging, insurance claims and financial frauds. The objective of this thesis is to identify the challenges, and means to assess, the application of machine learning to transportation data that is imbalanced and using only one independent variable. </p><p>Airlines undergo a decision-making process on air route addition or deletion in order to adjust the services offered with respect to demand and cost, amongst other criteria. This process greatly affects the topology of the network, and results in a continuously evolving Air Traffic Network (ATN). Organizations like the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) are interested in the network transformation and the influence airlines have as stakeholders. For this reason, they attempt to model the criteria used by airlines to modify routes. The goal is to be able to predict trends and dependencies observed in the network evolution, by understanding the relation between the number of passengers per flight leg as the single independent variable and the airline’s decision to keep or eliminate that route (the dependent variable). Research to date has used optimization-based methods and machine learning algorithms to model airlines’ decision-making process on air route addition and deletion, but these studies demonstrate less than a 50% accuracy. </p><p>In particular, two machine learning (ML) algorithms are examined: Sparse Gaussian Classification (SGC) and Deep Neural Networks (DNN). SGC is the extension of Gaussian Process Classification models to large datasets. These models use Gaussian Processes (GPs), which are proven to perform well in binary classification problems. DNN uses multiple layers of probabilities between the input and output layers. It is one of the most popular ML algorithms currently in use, so the results obtained using SGC were compared to the DNN model. </p><p>At a first glance, these two models appear to perform equally, giving a high accuracy output of 97.77%. However, post-processing the results using a simple Bayes classifier and using the appropriate metrics for measuring the performance of models trained with imbalanced datasets reveals otherwise. The results in both SGC and DNN provided predictions with a 1% of precision and 20% of recall with an score of 0.02 and an AUC (Area Under the Curve) of 0.38 and 0.31 respectively. The low score indicates the classifier is not performing accurately, and the AUC value confirms the inability of the models to differentiate between the classes. This is probably due to the existing interaction and competition of the airlines in the market, which is not captured by the models. Interestingly enough, the behavior of both models is very different across the range of threshold values. The SGC model captured more effectively the low confidence in these results. In order to validate the model, a stratified K-fold cross-validation model was run. </p>The future application of Gaussian Processes in model-building for decision-making will depend on a clear understanding of its limitations and the imbalanced datasets used in the process, the central purpose of this thesis. Future steps in this investigation include further analysis of the training data as well as the exploration of variable-optimization algorithms. The tuning process of the SGC model could be improved by utilizing optimal hyperparameters and inducing inputs.<br></div><div><div><br></div></div>