LGJul 18, 2025
A Comparative Analysis of Traditional and Deep Learning Time Series Architectures for Influenza A Infectious Disease ForecastingEdmund F. Agyemang, Hansapani Rodrigo, Vincent Agbenyeavu
Influenza A is responsible for 290,000 to 650,000 respiratory deaths a year, though this estimate is an improvement from years past due to improvements in sanitation, healthcare practices, and vaccination programs. In this study, we perform a comparative analysis of traditional and deep learning models to predict Influenza A outbreaks. Using historical data from January 2009 to December 2023, we compared the performance of traditional ARIMA and Exponential Smoothing(ETS) models with six distinct deep learning architectures: Simple RNN, LSTM, GRU, BiLSTM, BiGRU, and Transformer. The results reveal a clear superiority of all the deep learning models, especially the state-of-the-art Transformer with respective average testing MSE and MAE of 0.0433 \pm 0.0020 and 0.1126 \pm 0.0016 for capturing the temporal complexities associated with Influenza A data, outperforming well known traditional baseline ARIMA and ETS models. These findings of this study provide evidence that state-of-the-art deep learning architectures can enhance predictive modeling for infectious diseases and indicate a more general trend toward using deep learning methods to enhance public health forecasting and intervention planning strategies. Future work should focus on how these models can be incorporated into real-time forecasting and preparedness systems at an epidemic level, and integrated into existing surveillance systems.
LGSep 10, 2025
Prediction of Coffee Ratings Based On Influential Attributes Using SelectKBest and Optimal HyperparametersEdmund Agyemang, Lawrence Agbota, Vincent Agbenyeavu et al.
This study explores the application of supervised machine learning algorithms to predict coffee ratings based on a combination of influential textual and numerical attributes extracted from user reviews. Through careful data preprocessing including text cleaning, feature extraction using TF-IDF, and selection with SelectKBest, the study identifies key factors contributing to coffee quality assessments. Six models (Decision Tree, KNearest Neighbors, Multi-layer Perceptron, Random Forest, Extra Trees, and XGBoost) were trained and evaluated using optimized hyperparameters. Model performance was assessed primarily using F1-score, Gmean, and AUC metrics. Results demonstrate that ensemble methods (Extra Trees, Random Forest, and XGBoost), as well as Multi-layer Perceptron, consistently outperform simpler classifiers (Decision Trees and K-Nearest Neighbors) in terms of evaluation metrics such as F1 scores, G-mean and AUC. The findings highlight the essence of rigorous feature selection and hyperparameter tuning in building robust predictive systems for sensory product evaluation, offering a data driven approach to complement traditional coffee cupping by expertise of trained professionals.