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Militino, Ana F.

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Militino

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Ana F.

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Estadística, Informática y Matemáticas

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InaMat2. Instituto de Investigación en Materiales Avanzados y Matemáticas

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0000-0002-0631-3919

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220

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 10
  • PublicationOpen Access
    Improving the quality of satellite imagery based on ground-truth data from rain gauge stations
    (MDPI, 2018) Militino, Ana F.; Ugarte Martínez, María Dolores; Pérez Goya, Unai; Estatistika eta Ikerketa Operatiboa; Institute for Advanced Materials and Mathematics - INAMAT2; Estadística e Investigación Operativa; Gobierno de Navarra / Nafarroako Gobernua
    Multitemporal imagery is by and large geometrically and radiometrically accurate, but the residual noise arising from removal clouds and other atmospheric and electronic effects can produce outliers that must be mitigated to properly exploit the remote sensing information. In this study, we show how ground-truth data from rain gauge stations can improve the quality of satellite imagery. To this end, a simulation study is conducted wherein different sizes of outlier outbreaks are spread and randomly introduced in the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and the day and night land surface temperature (LST) of composite images from Navarre (Spain) between 2011 and 2015. To remove outliers, a new method called thin-plate splines with covariates (TpsWc) is proposed. This method consists of smoothing the median anomalies with a thin-plate spline model, whereby transformed ground-truth data are the external covariates of the model. The performance of the proposed method is measured with the square root of the mean square error (RMSE), calculated as the root of the pixel-by-pixel mean square differences between the original data and the predicted data with the TpsWc model and with a state-space model with and without covariates. The study shows that the use of ground-truth data reduces the RMSE in both the TpsWc model and the state-space model used for comparison purposes. The new method successfully removes the abnormal data while preserving the phenology of the raw data. The RMSE reduction percentage varies according to the derived variables (NDVI or LST), but reductions of up to 20% are achieved with the new proposal.
  • PublicationOpen Access
    Checking unimodality using isotonic regression: an application to breast cancer mortality rates
    (Springer, 2016) Rueda, C.; Ugarte Martínez, María Dolores; Militino, Ana F.; Estatistika eta Ikerketa Operatiboa; Institute for Advanced Materials and Mathematics - INAMAT2; Estadística e Investigación Operativa
    In some diseases it is well-known that a unimodal mortality pattern exists. A clear example in developed countries is breast cancer, where mortality increased sharply until the nineties and then decreased. This clear unimodal pattern is not necessarily applicable to all regions within a country. In this paper, we develop statistical tools to check if the unimodality pattern persists within regions using order restricted inference. Break points as well as confidence intervals are also provided. In addition, a new test for checking monotonicity against unimodality is derived allowing to discriminate between a simple increasing pattern and an up-then-down response pattern. A comparison with the widely used joinpoint regression technique under unimodality is provided. We show that the joinpoint technique could fail when the underlying function is not piecewise linear. Results will be illustrated using age-specific breast cancer mortality data from Spain in the period 1975-2005.
  • PublicationOpen Access
    Tendencias en las tasas de incidencia de cáncer colorrectal en Navarra en el periodo 1990-2005
    (Gobierno de Navarra, 2012) Etxeberria Andueza, Jaione; Ugarte Martínez, María Dolores; Barricarte Gurrea, Aurelio; Goicoa Mangado, Tomás; Moreno Iribas, Conchi; Azagra, M. J.; San Roman, E.; Burgui, Rosana; Militino, Ana F.; Ardanaz, Eva; Estadística e Investigación Operativa; Estatistika eta Ikerketa Operatiboa
    Fundamento. En España, se ha observado un aumento de la incidencia de cáncer colorrectal (CCR) en ambos sexos en los últimos años, posiblemente debido a las mejoras diagnósticas, a la occidentalización de la dieta y al empeoramiento de los niveles de obesidad entre otros. En este trabajo se han estudiado las tendencias de la incidencia de CCR en las diferentes áreas de salud de Navarra (norte de España) durante el período 1990-2005. Métodos. Para cada sexo y área, se obtuvieron las tendencias de las tasas de incidencia y los correspondientes intervalos de confianza mediante modelos de P-splines. Resultados. Se observa una tendencia creciente de la incidencia de CCR en la mayoría de las áreas para ambos sexos, siendo menos pronunciada en las mujeres que en los hombres. En la zona centro de Pamplona (la capital) se observa una tendencia decreciente para los hombres durante el período estudiado. Conclusiones. Para cambiar las tendencias crecientes observadas en la mayoría de las áreas de la provincia, la prevención primaria es la mejor estrategia. Sin embargo, adquirir estilos de vida saludables tiene resultados a largo plazo por lo que un programa de detección temprana serviría como estrategia de prevención a más corto plazo.
  • PublicationOpen Access
    Stochastic spatio-temporal models for analysing NDVI distribution of GIMMS NDVI3g images
    (MDPI, 2017) Militino, Ana F.; Ugarte Martínez, María Dolores; Pérez Goya, Unai; Estatistika eta Ikerketa Operatiboa; Institute for Advanced Materials and Mathematics - INAMAT2; Estadística e Investigación Operativa; Gobierno de Navarra / Nafarroako Gobernua: Project PI015, 2016
    The normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) is an important indicator for evaluating vegetation change, monitoring land surface fluxes or predicting crop models. Due to the great availability of images provided by different satellites in recent years, much attention has been devoted to testing trend changes with a time series of NDVI individual pixels. However, the spatial dependence inherent in these data is usually lost unless global scales are analyzed. In this paper, we propose incorporating both the spatial and the temporal dependence among pixels using a stochastic spatio-temporal model for estimating the NDVI distribution thoroughly. The stochastic model is a state-space model that uses meteorological data of the Climatic Research Unit (CRU TS3.10) as auxiliary information. The model will be estimated with the Expectation-Maximization (EM) algorithm. The result is a set of smoothed images providing an overall analysis of the NDVI distribution across space and time, where fluctuations generated by atmospheric disturbances, fire events, land-use/cover changes or engineering problems from image capture are treated as random fluctuations. The illustration is carried out with the third generation of NDVI images, termed NDVI3g, of the Global Inventory Modeling and Mapping Studies (GIMMS) in continental Spain. This data are taken in bymonthly periods from January 2011 to December 2013, but the model can be applied to many other variables, countries or regions with different resolutions.
  • PublicationOpen Access
    Interpolation of the mean anomalies for cloud filling in land surface temperature and normalized difference vegetation index
    (IEEE, 2019) Militino, Ana F.; Ugarte Martínez, María Dolores; Pérez Goya, Unai; Genton, Marc G.; Estatistika, Informatika eta Matematika; Institute for Advanced Materials and Mathematics - INAMAT2; Estadística, Informática y Matemáticas
    When monitoring time series of remote sensing data, it is advisable to fill gaps, i.e., missing or distorted data, caused by atmospheric effects or technical failures. In this paper, a new method for filling these gaps called interpolation of the mean anomalies (IMA) is proposed and compared with some competitors. The method consists of: 1) defining a neighborhood for the target image from previous and subsequent images across previous and subsequent years; 2) computing the mean target image of the neighborhood; 3) estimating the anomalies in the target image by subtracting the mean image from the target image; 4) filtering the anomalies; 5) averaging the anomalies over a predefined window; 6) interpolating the averaged anomalies; and 7) adding the interpolated anomalies to the mean image. To assess the performance of the IMA method, both a real example and a simulation study are conducted with a time series of Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) TERRA and MODIS AQUA images captured over the region of Navarre (Spain) from 2011 to 2013. We analyze the land surface temperature (LST) day and night, and the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI). In the simulation study, seven sizes of artificial clouds are randomly introduced to each image in the studied time series. The square root of the mean-squared prediction error (RMSE) between the original and the filled data is chosen as an indicator of the goodness of fit. The results show that the IMA method outperforms Timesat, Hants, and Gapfill (GF) in filling small, moderate, and big cloud gaps in both the day and night LST and NDVI data, reaching RMSE reductions of up to 23%.
  • PublicationOpen Access
    Flexible Bayesian P-splines for smoothing age-specific spatio-temporal mortality patterns
    (SAGE, 2019) Goicoa Mangado, Tomás; Adin Urtasun, Aritz; Etxeberria Andueza, Jaione; Militino, Ana F.; Ugarte Martínez, María Dolores; Estadística, Informática y Matemáticas; Estatistika, Informatika eta Matematika; Institute for Advanced Materials and Mathematics - INAMAT2
    In this paper age-space-time models based on one and two-dimensional P-splines with B-spline bases are proposed for smoothing mortality rates, where both xed relative scale and scale invariant two-dimensional penalties are examined. Model tting and inference are carried out using integrated nested Laplace approximations (INLA), a recent Bayesian technique that speeds up computations compared to McMC methods. The models will be illustrated with Spanish breast cancer mortality data during the period 1985-2010, where a general decline in breast cancer mortality has been observed in Spanish provinces in the last decades. The results reveal that mortality rates for the oldest age groups do not decrease in all provinces.
  • PublicationOpen Access
    Detecting change-points in the time series of surfaces occupied by pre-defined NDVI categories in continental Spain from 1981 to 2015
    (Springer, 2018) Militino, Ana F.; Ugarte Martínez, María Dolores; Pérez Goya, Unai; Estadística, Informática y Matemáticas; Estatistika, Informatika eta Matematika; Institute for Advanced Materials and Mathematics - INAMAT2
    The free access to satellite images since more than 40 years ago has provoked a rapid increase of multitemporal derived information of remote sensing data that should be summarized and analyzed for future inferences. In particular, the study of trends and trend changes is of crucial interest in many studies of phenology, climatology, agriculture, hydrology, geology or many other environmental disciplines. Overall, the normalized dierence vegetation index (NDVI), as a satellite derived variable, plays a crucial role because of its usefulness for vegetation and landscape characterization, land use and land cover mapping, environmental monitoring, climate change or crop prediction models. Since the eighties, it can be retrieved all over the world from dierent satellites. In this work we propose to analyze its temporal evolution, looking for breakpoints or change-points in trends of the surfaces occupied by four NDVI classications made in Spain from 1981 to 2015. The results show a decrease of bare soils and semi-bare soils starting in the middle nineties or before, and a slight increase of middle-vegetation and high-vegetation soils starting in 1990 and 2000 respectively.
  • PublicationOpen Access
    Age- and sex-specific spatio-temporal patterns of colorectal cancer mortality in Spain (1975-2008)
    (BioMed Central, 2014) Etxeberria Andueza, Jaione; Ugarte Martínez, María Dolores; Goicoa Mangado, Tomás; Militino, Ana F.; Estadística e Investigación Operativa; Estatistika eta Ikerketa Operatiboa
    In this paper, space-time patterns of colorectal cancer (CRC) mortality risks are studied by sex and age group (50-69, ≥70) in Spanish provinces during the period 1975-2008. Space-time conditional autoregressive models are used to perform the statistical analyses. A pronounced increase in mortality risk has been observed in males for both age-groups. For males between 50 and 69 years of age, trends seem to stabilize from 2001 onward. In females, trends reflect a more stable pattern during the period in both age groups. However, for the 50-69 years group, risks take an upward trend in the period 2006-2008 after the slight decline observed in the second half of the period. This study offers interesting information regarding CRC mortality distribution among different Spanish provinces that could be used to improve prevention policies and resource allocation in different regions.
  • PublicationOpen Access
    An introduction to the spatio-temporal analysis of satellite remote sensing data for geostatisticians
    (Springer International Publishing, 2018) Militino, Ana F.; Ugarte Martínez, María Dolores; Pérez Goya, Unai; Estatistika, Informatika eta Matematika; Institute for Advanced Materials and Mathematics - INAMAT2; Estadística, Informática y Matemáticas; Gobierno de Navarra / Nafarroako Gobernua
    Satellite remote sensing data have become available in meteorology, agriculture, forestry, geology, regional planning, hydrology or natural environment sciences since several decades ago, because satellites provide routinely high quality images with different temporal and spatial resolutions. Joining, combining or smoothing these images for a better quality of information is a challenge not always properly solved. In this regard, geostatistics, as the spatiotemporal stochastic techniques of georeferenced data, is a very helpful and powerful tool not enough explored in this area yet. Here, we analyze the current use of some of the geostatistical tools in satellite image analysis, and provide an introduction to this subject for potential researchers.
  • PublicationOpen Access
    Filling missing data and smoothing altered data in satellite imagery with a spatial functional procedure
    (Springer, 2019) Militino, Ana F.; Ugarte Martínez, María Dolores; Montesino San Martín, Manuel; Estatistika, Informatika eta Matematika; Institute for Advanced Materials and Mathematics - INAMAT2; Estadística, Informática y Matemáticas
    Outliers and missing data are commonly found in satellite imagery. These are usually caused by atmospheric or electronic failures, hampering the correct monitoring of remote-sensing data. To avoid distorted data, we propose a procedure called 'spatial functional prediction' (SFP). The SFP procedure consists of the following: (1) aggregating remote-sensing data for reducing the number of missing data and/or outliers; (2) additively decomposing the time series of images into a trend, a seasonal, and an error component; (3) defining the spatial functional data and predicting the trend component using an ordinary kriging; and (4) adding back the seasonal and error components to the predicted trend. The benefits of the SFP procedure are illustrated in the following scenarios: introducing random outliers, random missing data, mixtures of both, and artificial clouds in an extensive simulation study of composite images, and using daily images with real clouds. The following two derived variables are considered: land surface temperature (LST day) and normalized vegetation index (NDVI), which are obtained as remote-sensing data in a region in northern Spain during 2003–2016. The performance of SFP was checked using the root mean squared error (RMSE). A comparison with a procedure based on predicting with thin-plate splines (TpsP) is also made. We conclude that SFP is simpler and faster than TpsP, and provides smaller values of RMSE.