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At least 451 records · Page 25

When not to use machine learning: A perspective on potential and limitations

Abstract The unparalleled success of artificial intelligence (AI) in the technology sector has catalyzed an enormous amount of research in the scientific community. It has proven to be a powerful tool, but as with any rapidly developing field, the deluge of information can be overwhelming, confusing, and sometimes misleading. This can make it easy to become lost in the same hype cycles that have historically ended in the periods of scarce funding and depleted expectations known as AI winters. Furthermore, although the importance of innovative, high-risk research cannot be overstated, it is also imperative to understand the fundamental limits of available techniques, especially in young fields where the rules appear to be constantly rewritten and as the likelihood of application to high-stakes scenarios increases. In this article, we highlight the guiding principles of data-driven modeling, how these principles imbue models with almost magical predictive power, and how they also impose limitations on the scope of problems they can address. Particularly, understanding when not to use data-driven techniques, such as machine learning, is not something commonly explored, but is just as important as knowing how to apply the techniques properly. We hope that the discussion to follow provides researchers throughout the sciences with a better understanding of when said techniques are appropriate, the pitfalls to watch for, and most importantly, the confidence to leverage the power they can provide. Graphical abstract

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Use of Shallow Ice Core Measurements to Evaluate and Constrain 1980–1990 Global Reanalyses of Ice Sheet Precipitation Rates

Abstract Sea‐level rise (SLR) projections by Earth System Models (ESMs) depend on ice sheet surface mass balances. Accurate, global atmosphere reanalyses would be ideal for providing equilibrated ice sheet model initial conditions in fully coupled ESM simulations. Here we present the first evaluation of 1980–1990 global reanalysis precipitation over Greenland and Antarctica that uses independent observations of net accumulation rates derived from shallow ice cores. Precipitation distributions from both the European Centre for Medium‐Range Weather Forecast's Reanalysis (ERA5) and the Modern‐Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA‐2) are highly correlated with contemporaneous co‐located net accumulation rates from Greenland ( r 2 > 0.95) and West Antarctica ( r 2 > 0.7). Three other commonly used reanalyses (WFDE5, CRUNCEP, and GSWP3) exhibit significantly weaker correlations on one or both ice sheets. Our findings imply that ESMs should use ERA5 or MERRA‐2 in data‐forced simulations to validate ice sheet model dynamics and precondition firn for SLR projections.

Schneider, Adam↗

Data‐Efficient Generation of Synthetic Microstructures of Polymer‐Bonded Energetic Material With Fine‐Tuned Stable Diffusion

Among current deep learning approaches for synthetic image generation, diffusion-based models stand out in terms of algorithmic stability and ability to retain high-fidelity image features with detailed resolution. Here, in this work, we employ Dreambooth, a method for fine-tuning Stable Diffusion, on X-ray CT images of microstructure of the polymer-bonded form (PBX) of a commonly used high explosive, Pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN), which yields generative models for creating synthetic PBX images. The models developed here represent five classes (or ‘lots’) of microstructures and demonstrate successful generation of images of each class with high fidelity, as verified by computed classification accuracy of ∼ 94% or higher. Data augmentation afforded by such image synthesis can be used to more reliably decipher underlying statistics, build processing-structure correlations, recognize off-normal structural anomalies, and identify age-related changes. Ideas related to converting image data into appropriate density mapping and performing mesoscale simulation or surrogate modeling of detonation are also discussed.

Dreambooth↗

Quantitative XPS of plutonium: Evaluation of the Pu4f peak shape, relative sensitivity factors and estimated detection limits

We report that high-resolution X-ray photoelectron spectra have been acquired from sputter cleaned and in situ oxidized samples of α-plutonium and a face-centred cubic δ-plutonium–gallium alloy. The differences in the Pu4f peak shape in these two materials have been investigated, and the poorly screened satellite peaks have been quantified. Curve fitting parameters for the Pu4p 3/2 , Pu4d 5/2 , Pu4f and Pu6p 3/2 photoelectron peaks are reported, and relative sensitivity factors have been determined. The Pu4f curve fit model has been applied to data acquired using different spectrometers and alloys. Examples of quantification of the plutonium spectra are provided and minimum detection limits are calculated for common impurities in plutonium metal.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

phosaa14SB and phosaa19SB: Updated Amber Force Field Parameters for Phosphorylated Amino Acids

Phosphorylated amino acids are involved in many cell regulatory networks; proteins containing these post-translational modifications are widely studied both experimentally and computationally. Simulations are used to investigate a wide range of structural and dynamic properties of biomolecules, such as ligand binding, enzyme-reaction mechanisms, and protein folding. However, the development of force field parameters for the simulation of proteins containing phosphorylated amino acids using the Amber program has not kept pace with the development of parameters for standard amino acids, and it is challenging to model these modified amino acids with accuracy comparable to proteins containing only standard amino acids. In particular, the popular ff14SB and ff19SB models do not contain parameters for phosphorylated amino acids. Here, the dihedral parameters for the side chains of the most common phosphorylated amino acids are trained against reference data from QM calculations adopting the ff14SB approach, followed by validation against experimental data. Finally, library files and corresponding parameter files are provided, with versions that are compatible with both ff14SB and ff19SB.

77 NANOSCIENCE AND NANOTECHNOLOGY↗

Parameterization of electron attachment rate constants for impurities in LArTPC detectors

The ability of free electrons to drift long distances at high velocities in pure liquid argon under an applied electric field has been exploited for the past forty years to implement detectors with increasingly larger volumes for high energy physics research. The attachment of free electrons to impurities in the LAr is an important limit on the free instrumented volume of these extremely large detectors, and impurity concentrations as small as 100 ppt can reduce their resolution and efficiency. In this paper, we summarize the electron attachment rate constants as a function of the applied electric field, for common impurities in LArTPCs, obtained from data in the literature. Here, we further provide analytical functions to parameterize the data, which are useful to compare with new measurements, to model and analyze the performance of existing detectors, and to predict the performance of new detectors.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

Measurement of antiproton production from antihyperon decays in ${p} \textrm{He}$ collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\scriptscriptstyle \mathrm NN}} =110$ GeV

The interpretation of cosmic antiproton flux measurements from space-borne experiments is currently limited by the knowledge of the antiproton production cross-section in collisions between primary cosmic rays and the interstellar medium. Using collisions of protons with an energy of 6.5 TeV incident on helium nuclei at rest in the proximity of the interaction region of the LHCb experiment, the ratio of antiprotons originating from antihyperon decays to prompt production is measured for antiproton momenta between 12 and 110 GeV/c. The dominant antihyperon contribution, namely ${\overline{\varLambda }} \rightarrow {\overline{{p}}} {{\pi } ^+}$ decays from promptly produced $\overline{\varLambda }$ particles, is also exclusively measured. The results complement the measurement of prompt antiproton production obtained from the same data sample. At the energy scale of this measurement, the antihyperon contributions to antiproton production are observed to be significantly larger than predictions of commonly used hadronic production models.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

Date Release Report for Large Surface Explosion Coupling Experiment (LSECE) Nevada National Security Site

The DTRA sponsored 2020-2022 Large Surface Explosion Coupling Experiment (LSECE) consists of two large ground surface chemical explosions, data collection, analysis and modeling carried out in 2020-2022. The LSECE chemical explosions were carried out at the site of prior NNSA sponsored buried chemical explosions that were part of the Source Physics Experiment (SPE) Phase II in Dry Alluvium Geology (DAG). This report described the data collected under LSECE that is being made publicly available. The prior buried explosion DAG data are described in a separate report (https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1825534) and are also publicly available. The LSECE explosions, data analysis and numerical modeling work sponsored by DTRA were intended to address three objectives: 1) Generate seismo-acoustic data to test and improve numerical models of explosion energy coupling in dry alluvium geology; 2) To improve seismo-acoustic yield estimation techniques as a function of depth and medium properties; 3) To study and improve acoustic propagation modeling under two different atmospheric conditions. The LSECE data that were collected have expanded the prior DAG buried explosion dataset to include surface chemical explosions recorded on a common set of seismo-acoustic stations. They have allowed a more detailed study of above and below surface seismo-acoustic energy coupling with applications to explosion monitoring and assessment. The two approximately 1-ton TNT equivalent yield LSECE explosions were detonated at different times of the day to explore the effects of the different atmospheric conditions. The first chemical explosion “Artemis” was conducted before dawn when temperature inversions were present. The second chemical explosion “Apollo” was conducted on a sunny afternoon when the temperature gradient was more linear. The LSECE chemical explosion data were also collected across a variety of different sensor types to allow evaluation of their effectiveness in recovering useful information. The LSECE instrumentation included fiber optic or Distributed Acoustic Sensing (DAS), a dense array or Large-N array of seismometers, borehole accelerometers, DAS and a velocity meter, airborne acoustic instruments and a variety of visual and remote sensing data.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗

Rock Valley Direct Comparison Relocation Working Group Location Results and Recommendations

Work accomplished: Collected and compared historic data for the 1993 Rock Valley earthquake sequence; Compared preliminary and prior location work from different location algorithms, phase pick sets, station constellations, and velocity models; Selected a common set of stations that could be used across all location methods for consistency; Reviewed 8 different sets of phase picks and converged on a single, reviewed set of picks for all common stations; Evaluated four pre-existing regional velocity models and incorporated new and preliminary results for five new velocity models that provide information on the very shallow (< 2km) structure near station RTPP; Compared location results from different methods while using the common sets of picks, stations, and velocity models

58 GEOSCIENCES↗

Toward the Detection of Polyglot Files

Standardized file types play a key role in the development and use of computer software. However, it is possible to confound standardized file type processing by creating a file that is valid in multiple file types. The resulting polyglot (many languages) file can confuse file type identification, allowing elements of the file to evade analysis. This is especially problematic for malware detection systems that rely on file type identification for feature extraction. Although work has been done to identify file types using more comprehensive methods than file signatures, accurate identification of polyglot files remains an open problem. Since malware detection systems routinely perform file type-specific feature extraction, polyglot files need to be filtered out prior to ingestion by these systems. Otherwise, malicious content could pass through undetected. To address the problem of polyglot detection we assembled a data set using the mitra tool. We then evaluated the performance of the most commonly used file identification tools, including file, polydet, binwalk, and TrID. Our analysis demonstrates that existing file type detection tools fail to provide reliable polyglot detection. We then evaluated the ability of a range of machine and deep learning models to detect polyglot files. The most performant models were MalConv2 and Catboost, which demonstrated the highest recall on our data set with 95.16% and 95.45%, respectively. These models outperformed existing methods and could be incorporated into a malware detector’s file processing pipeline to filter out potentially malicious polyglots before file type-dependent feature extraction takes place.

Koch, Luke↗

Toward the Detection of Polyglot Files

Standardized file types play a key role in the development and use of computer software. However, it is possible to confound standardized file type processing by creating a file that is valid in multiple file types. The resulting polyglot (many languages) file can confuse file type identification, allowing elements of the file to evade analysis. This is especially problematic for malware detection systems that rely on file type identification for feature extraction. Although work has been done to identify file types using more comprehensive methods than file signatures, accurate identification of polyglot files remains an open problem. Since malware detection systems routinely perform file type-specific feature extraction, polyglot files need to be filtered out prior to ingestion by these systems. Otherwise, malicious content could pass through undetected. To address the problem of polyglot detection we assembled a data set using the mitra tool. We then evaluated the performance of the most commonly used file identification tools, including file, polydet, binwalk, and TrID. Our analysis demonstrates that existing file type detection tools fail to provide reliable polyglot detection. We then evaluated the ability of a range of machine and deep learning models to detect polyglot files. The most performant models were MalConv2 and Catboost, which demonstrated the highest recall on our data set with 95.16% and 95.45%, respectively. These models outperformed existing methods and could be incorporated into a malware detector’s file processing pipeline to filter out potentially malicious polyglots before file type-dependent feature extraction takes place.

Koch, Lucas↗

Field evaluation of semi‐automated moisture estimation from geophysics using machine learning

Geophysical methods can provide three-dimensional (3D), spatially continuous estimates of soil moisture. However, point-to-point comparisons of geophysical properties to measure soil moisture data are frequently unsatisfactory, resulting in geophysics being used for qualitative purposes only. This is because (1) geophysics requires models that relate geophysical signals to soil moisture, (2) geophysical methods have potential uncertainties resulting from smoothing and artifacts introduced from processing and inversion, and (3) results from multiple geophysical methods are not easily combined within a single soil moisture estimation framework. To investigate these potential limitations, an irrigation experiment was performed wherein soil moisture was monitored through time, and several surface geophysical datasets indirectly sensitive to soil moisture were collected before and after irrigation: ground penetrating radar, electrical resistivity tomography (ERT), and frequency domain electromagnetics (FDEM). Data were exported in both raw and processed form, and then snapped to a common 3D grid to facilitate moisture prediction by standard calibration techniques, multivariate regression, and machine learning. A combination of inverted ERT data, raw FDEM, and inverted FDEM data was most informative for predicting soil moisture using a random regression forest model (one-thousand 60/40 training/test cross-validation folds produced root mean squared errors ranging from 0.025–0.046 cm 3 /cm 3 ). This cross-validated model was further supported by a separate evaluation using a test set from a physically separate portion of the study area. Machine learning was conducive to a semi-automated model-selection process that could be used for other sites and datasets to locally improve accuracy.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

A Generalized Grain-Scale Model for the Non-Plasma and Plasma-Assisted Hydrogen Direct Reduction of Iron Ore

Direct Reduction of Iron ore using hydrogen (H-DRI) is a promising pathway towards efficient steelmaking and accurate predictive models are a necessity for scale-up and optimization of this technology. However, accurate models of this process remain limited because existing models oversimplify grain-scale phenomena, such as nonlinearity inside grain, self-sufficient porosity, surface reactions, and the role of plasma species. These phenomena are important for flash steelmaking and plasma-assisted H-DRI processes. To address this need, we present a phenomenological model for simulating H-DRI at the scale of a single micron-sized grain of the iron ore. We call this the Transient Reactive Grain Model (TRGM). TRGM incorporates key physical process: gas species transport, a chemical kinetics of material conversion, nanopore structural evolution and, adsorption-desorption surface kinetics at the reactive nanopore surface. The important contribution of this work is that the model provides a dependence on different reductant species, specifically hydrogen atoms versus molecules, so that role of hydrogen plasma reduction can be clarified compared to the use of pure hydrogen gas reduction. TRGM predictions agree well with experimental data for both molecular H2 reduction of Fe2O3 and plasma hydrogen reduction of Fe3O4. Results reveal species concentration gradients with a diffuse reaction zone, and enhanced hydrogen diffusion at the grain outer surface due to evolving porosity. These findings challenge common assumptions in existing models, including sharp reaction fronts, quasi-steady diffusion and kinetics, and the neglect of surface chemistry. As a generalized grain-scale model for H-DRI processes, TRGM has practical applications in flash steelmaking and in-flight reduction using both molecular and plasma hydrogen.

08 HYDROGEN↗

First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. IV. Variability, Morphology, and Black Hole Mass

In this paper we quantify the temporal variability and image morphology of the horizon-scale emission from Sgr A*, as observed by the EHT in 2017 April at a wavelength of 1.3 mm. We find that the Sgr A* data exhibit variability that exceeds what can be explained by the uncertainties in the data or by the effects of interstellar scattering. The magnitude of this variability can be a substantial fraction of the correlated flux density, reaching ~100% on some baselines. Through an exploration of simple geometric source models, we demonstrate that ring-like morphologies provide better fits to the Sgr A* data than do other morphologies with comparable complexity. We develop two strategies for fitting static geometric ring models to the time-variable Sgr A* data; one strategy fits models to short segments of data over which the source is static and averages these independent fits, while the other fits models to the full data set using a parametric model for the structural variability power spectrum around the average source structure. Both geometric modeling and image-domain feature extraction techniques determine the ring diameter to be 51.8 ± 2.3 μas (68% credible intervals), with the ring thickness constrained to have an FWHM between ~30% and 50% of the ring diameter. To bring the diameter measurements to a common physical scale, we calibrate them using synthetic data generated from GRMHD simulations. This calibration constrains the angular size of the gravitational radius to be ${4.8}_{-0.7}^{+1.4}$ μas, which we combine with an independent distance measurement from maser parallaxes to determine the mass of Sgr A* to be ${4.0}_{-0.6}^{+1.1}\times {10}^{6}$ M⊙.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

Elastic Moduli: a Tool for Understanding Chemical Bonding and Thermal Transport in Thermoelectric Materials

Abstract The elastic behavior of a material can be a powerful tool to decipher thermal transport. In thermoelectrics, measuring the elastic moduli—directly tied to sound velocity—is critical to understand trends in lattice thermal conductivity, as well as study bond anharmonicity and phase transitions, given the sensitivity of elastic moduli to the chemical bonding. In this review, we introduce the basics of elasticity and explain the origin of high‐temperature lattice softening from a bonding perspective. We then review elasticity data throughout classes of thermoelectrics, and explore trends in sound velocity, anharmonicity, and thermal conductivity. We reveal how experimental sound velocities can improve the accuracy of common thermal conductivity models and present a critical discussion of Grüneisen parameter estimates from elastic moduli. Readers will be equipped with tools to leverage elasticity measurements or calculations to accurately interpret thermal transport trends.

Isotta, Eleonora↗

Elastic Moduli: a Tool for Understanding Chemical Bonding and Thermal Transport in Thermoelectric Materials

Abstract The elastic behavior of a material can be a powerful tool to decipher thermal transport. In thermoelectrics, measuring the elastic moduli—directly tied to sound velocity—is critical to understand trends in lattice thermal conductivity, as well as study bond anharmonicity and phase transitions, given the sensitivity of elastic moduli to the chemical bonding. In this review, we introduce the basics of elasticity and explain the origin of high‐temperature lattice softening from a bonding perspective. We then review elasticity data throughout classes of thermoelectrics, and explore trends in sound velocity, anharmonicity, and thermal conductivity. We reveal how experimental sound velocities can improve the accuracy of common thermal conductivity models and present a critical discussion of Grüneisen parameter estimates from elastic moduli. Readers will be equipped with tools to leverage elasticity measurements or calculations to accurately interpret thermal transport trends.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

Critical analysis of velocimetry methods for particulate flows from synthetic data

Particle tracking methods that extract high-fidelity particle velocity data from high speed video of particle laden flows is a common experimental technique applied to chemical processes. These measurements are used to better understand the motion of particles and fluids in complex systems and create data against which computational models are validated. However, the methods, codes, and experimental setups all have limitations. It is imperative that practitioners verify the methods and their implementation as well as understand the limitations of experimental setups. This work focuses on quantifying the visible depth of field in a high particle concentration fluidized bed. Following a precedent set by the particle imaging velocimetry community, a particle velocity field is manufactured using a computational fluid dynamics and discrete element method simulation. Photo realistic high-speed videos are rendered based on the simulated data using the three-dimensional creation software Blender. Particle velocities are extracted from the synthetic high-speed videos using three variants of Particle Tracking Velocimetry and Optical Flow Velocimetry methodologies. Here, the tracked results are then compared to the known solution, quantifying the error associated with the assumed visible depth. The results indicate that at depth of one particle diameter, all three particle tracking codes give accurate measurements, largely within 5%. However, the error increases when the full bed video measurements are compared to the known solution at one particle diameter, i.e., mimicking a validation study. Finally, for some statistics the constant depth assumption only increases the error slightly, for others significantly.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

Continual learning in the presence of repetition

Continual learning (CL) provides a framework for training models in ever-evolving environments. Although re-occurrence of previously seen objects or tasks is common in real-world problems, the concept of repetition in the data stream is not often considered in standard benchmarks for CL. Unlike with the rehearsal mechanism in buffer-based strategies, where sample repetition is controlled by the strategy, repetition in the data stream naturally stems from the environment. This report provides a summary of the CLVision challenge at CVPR 2023, which focused on the topic of repetition in class-incremental learning. The report initially outlines the challenge objective and then describes three solutions proposed by finalist teams that aim to effectively exploit the repetition in the stream to learn continually. The experimental results from the challenge highlight the effectiveness of ensemble-based solutions that employ multiple versions of similar modules, each trained on different but overlapping subsets of classes. This report underscores the transformative potential of taking a different perspective in CL by employing repetition in the data stream to foster innovative strategy design.

Class-incremental learning↗