Finding a Needle in a Haystack of Data 173
Roland Piquepaille writes "Finding useful information in oceans of data is an increasingly complex problem in many scientific areas. This is why researchers from Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) have created new statistical techniques to isolate useful signals buried in large datasets coming from particle physics experiments, such as the ones run in a particle collider. But their method could also be applied to a broad range of applications, like discovering a new galaxy, monitoring transactions for fraud or identifying the carrier of a virulent disease among millions of people." Case Western has also provided a link to the original paper. [PDF Warning]
Ya' know... (Score:3, Funny)
Sounds useful. (Score:2, Funny)
Simplify your data set (Score:0, Funny)
The Real Challenge is Further Off (Score:4, Funny)
"But their method could also be applied to a broad range of applications, like discovering a new galaxy, monitoring transactions for fraud or identifying the carrier of a virulent disease among millions of people."
When asked about more advanced applications for the technology, researchers replied it will probably be "quite a while" before the technology could be used for extremely high noise environments. Said one, "I mean, it's going to be a long time before we're up to finding finding useful comments on Slashdot or something."
Re:Ya' know... (Score:2, Funny)
Well yeah, 50% of all statisticians finished in the bottom half of their class.
Numb3rs (Score:2, Funny)
Now that's a change... (Score:2, Funny)
So, basically its the one search engine that can only find the words "horny teen nekkid" if it is NOT on a pr0n-page. I can see uses for that. Not for me, but I'm sure SOMEONE is interested in finding other kinds of pages once in a while.
Re:Numb3rs (Score:5, Funny)
Speaking of needle in a haystack ... (Score:5, Funny)
1) INDUSTRIAL MAGNENT
2) BLIND LUCK
3) BURN THE HAY, PICK UP THE NEEDLE
4) STATISTICAL ANALYSIS (SINCE NEEDLES IN HAYSTACKS ARE NOT PLACED AT RANDOM, THEY ARE SUBJECT TO REGRESSION ANALYSIS)
5) OFFSHORE TO CHINA WHERE LABOR IS CHEAPER, SEARCH THE HAY WITH 10000 OF WORKERS.
6) WAIT YEARS UNTIL THE HAY DECAYS, PICK UP THE NEEDLE
7) SPREADOUT THE HAY, HIRE BAREFOOT HAY WALKERS
8) TAKE ALL THE HAY, PUT IN A POOL OF WATER - HAY WILL FLOAT, AND NEEDLE WILL SINK
9) LET COWS EAT THE HAY, X-RAY ALL THE COWS!
10) TRIAL AND ERROR - ONE PERSON
Re:Google (Score:3, Funny)
It's only in Beta thus it's not useful
Re:Case Western Reserve University (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Was it just me or was this story broken at firs (Score:4, Funny)
Maybe your interest in the story was deemed statistically insignificant.
Re:Google (Score:3, Funny)
Wow. There really are't any out there. Check it out on google [google.com] yourselves.
The same results come back in images, groups, news, etc. Man. What a sad bunch.
Re:Roland Alert (Score:1, Funny)
Don't you know the editors are in cahoots with the the Beatles Beatles guy now?
Please, try to keep up with the conspiracy theories, mkay? Jeez!
Re:1) INDUSTRIAL MAGNENT (Score:2, Funny)
DBAs everwhere are cringing and covering their data.
Re:Ya' know... (Score:3, Funny)
ITagging (Score:1, Funny)
Are you telling us there's such a thing as Intelligent Tagging?
Hey, wait a minute! (Score:4, Funny)
WTF? Roland? You feeling OK?
Re:As a nervous system. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Google (Score:2, Funny)