Entry Name: "NENU-Xu-MC2"

VAST Challenge 2019
Mini-Challenge 2

 

 

Team Members:

Shaobin Xu, Northeast Normal University, xusb531@nenu.edu.cn PRIMARY
Yiming Lin, Northeast Normal University, linym762@nenu.edu.cn 
Dezhan Qu, Northeast Normal University, qudz862@nenu.edu.cn

Ke Ren, Northeast Normal University, renk205@nenu.edu.cn

Huijie Zhang, Northeast Normal University, zhanghj167@nenu.edu.cn (Advisor)

Student Team: YES

 

Tools Used:

A system developed using node.js, vue.js, d3.js and Echarts

 

Approximately how many hours were spent working on this submission in total?

500 hours

 

May we post your submission in the Visual Analytics Benchmark Repository after VAST Challenge 2019 is complete? YES

 

Video

https://youtu.be/EWGKhuc4iDs

 

 

Questions

Your task, as supported by visual analytics that you apply, is to help St. Himark's emergency management team combine data from the government-operated stationary monitors with data from citizen-operated mobile sensors to help them better understand conditions in the city and identify likely locations that will require further monitoring, cleanup, or even evacuation. Will data from citizen scientists clarify the situation or make it more uncertain? Use visual analytics to develop responses to the questions below. Novel visualizations of uncertainty are especially interesting for this mini-challenge.

We have used GIF files in our submission for better tracking mobile sensors in animated map. Please wait patiently.

1 Visualize radiation measurements over time from both static and mobile sensors to identify areas where radiation over background is detected. Characterize changes over time. Limit your response to 6 images and 500 words.

Time division

Fig. 1: Radiation measurements over time.

A heat map (Fig. 1) is employed to visualize radiation measurements over time from both static and mobile sensors, in which each grid is colored according to the level of average measurements in an hour. Two visual enhancements are implemented to make the view expressively.

Layout: Instead of simply arranging the sensors in order of name on the vertical axis, we use MDS to project the 59 sensors to 1D, based on similarity in radiation measurements over time. Arranging similar sensors together helps to discover local features.

Statistics: We add a bar chart attached to the heat map, which can provide an overview of the mean value for each row or column. Time steps or sensors with high radiation measurements can be captured clearly.

The following meaningful periods can be clearly found.

1.       Before the earthquake (Fig. 1, purple box): All of the sensors exhibit low measurements.

2.       Early stage after the earthquake (Fig 1, yellow box): A small number of sensors detect higher radiation means initially. Some of them return to normal after a few hours, while others maintained high measurements. Some sensors fail to obtain their measurements, which may be affected by the earthquake.

3.       Later period after the earthquake (Fig 1, red box): Radiation measurements peak, accompanied by a large number of sensors leaving the area.

Discovery of contaminated areas

We use an animated map to track changes in the sensors over periods, by brushing in the heat map. The borders of the static sensors are purple to make them easier to distinguish.

1.       Before the earthquake (Fig. 2): Sensors distributed in various areas show low measurements overall, although some of them occasionally have higher monitoring values. There are no abnormal regions during this time period.

 

Fig. 2: Animated map before the earthquake.

 

2.       Early stage after the earthquake (Fig. 3): Sensors in the vicinity of Always Safe Nuclear plant have clearly monitored the radiation. Higher radiation measurements are detected in both East Parton and the Jude Bridge than before, which may be related to the spread of contamination or the movement of contaminated cars.

Fig. 3 Animated map at early stage of the earthquake

3.       Later period after the earthquake (Fig. 4): The radiation in the above areas still exists, at the same time continuously high measurements are detected in the southeastern regions (Scenic Vista and Wilson Forest). There is no longer a mobile sensor entering Chapparal and Terrapin Springs at this period. Considering that these two regions are adjacent to the radiation region, radiation may also occur. Sensors in the central area have become more unstable, but in view of the overall situation, radiation has not spread there.

 

Fig. 4: Animated map at later period after the earthquake. Some cars leave in three directions

Exploration of changes over time

Although the animated map plays a great role in detecting radiation areas, it is not good at summarizing changes over long periods of time. To give a clear display of the changes over time for each region, we design a view to aggregate time, which consists of two parts. Grids are employed by us to achieve more granular analysis.

Background: We use the max function as our aggregation criterion, which means the background of each cell is colored by the max measurements of all the 120 time steps. The irradiated regions can then be quickly identified.

Uncertainty Glyph (Fig. 5): The outer ring is divided into 120 sectors, which are colored according to the measured means. Changes over time of each gird can be clearly visualized. This view also contains a lot of additional information that will be described in question 2.

 

Fig. 5: Uncertainty glyph of mobile 10th.

The below figure shows:

1.       The western and central grids are not significantly affected by nuclear radiation, but sensor measurements become more unstable after the earthquake.

2.       Eastern part of the Safe Town area remained at a low radiation level before the earthquake, but high levels of radiation are detected immediately after the earthquake (Fig. 6 purple box).

3.       Western part of the Safe Town area and East Parton are affected by radiation diffusion at the beginning of the earthquake. Grid 65 (in Western part of the Safe Town area) has high measurements in a short time but recovers quickly. Nevertheless grid 38 maintains consistently high measurements after the earthquake. (Fig. 6 green box)

4.       Grid 6 (in Scenic Vista) and grid 14 (in WILSON FOREST) show high radiation measurements in the later stage of the earthquake, and grid 14 has the highest value in all grids. (Fig. 6 red box)

5.       Many grids in the south were well measured before and during the earthquake, but no sensors entered these areas later in the earthquake.

 

Fig. 6: Grid Summarization View of the 5 days.

 

2 Use visual analytics to represent and analyze uncertainty in the measurement of radiation across the city.

Division of time and space

To measure uncertainty accurately, we divide both the time range and the space region. For the time range, a time interval is one hour. As for the space region, we introduce the grid to take the place of the administrative district. Subsequently, uncertainty can be measured on a smaller scale. (e.g., one hour in a grid)

Description of uncertainty

We introduce the uncertainty of sensors to determine whether a sensor has completed the task of measurement accurately within all the five days. This kind of uncertainty is quantified for two indicators: consistency and missing.

Consistency: Consistency is used to represent the difference in multiple measurements of the same sensor in a grid over a time interval. We model the difference with Gaussian distribution. Mean and standard deviation are extracted to measure uncertainty. High standard deviation means low consistency. We will use “standard deviation” more often in the answers for ease of understanding. Note that if a mobile sensor passes two girds in one hour, it can generate two Gaussian distribution, we average the mean and standard deviation of these two distributions.

Missing: Missing values are used extensively to measure sensor uncertainty. One sensor is usually considered to have high uncertainty if it is often missing. In this challenge, the missing is caused by two cases: sensor failure and car with sensor driving out of the island. We consider both cases together because they all mean that the sensors cannot perform measurement tasks on the island. For the purpose of visualization, we use the number of measurements to represent the missing, which means the total number of sensor readings in an hour.

As for uncertainty of regions, we measure it by similar two indicators. The difference is that when constructing the Gaussian distribution, we use measurements from all sensors in the region in an hour.

Visualization of uncertainty

In order to better visualize uncertainty with two indicators, two design goals are proposed: visualize all the sensors or regions to compare their differences and visualize a single sensor or region for detailed information. To fulfill the both two design goals, we put forward an uncertainty graph as a portrait of a sensor or a region. For a single sensor or region, the portrait shows the mean, standard deviation, number of measurements, and detailed distribution of measurements for each time step (Fig. 5). As for all the sensors or regions, we use a simplified version of the portrait by removing the detailed distribution. Three views are implemented via this design

1.       Grid Summarization View: As mentioned in question 1, background of each cell is colored by the max measurements of all the 120 time steps. One uncertainty graph is added to each grid (Fig. 6).

2.       Sensor Projection View: MDS is employed for 2D layout of sensors. We use an improved distance function to calculate the similarity between sensors. We calculate the Euclidean distance of the mean if two sensors have measurements at a certain time step. But if one of the sensors is missing for an entire hour, we add a penalty for the distance. Missing is paid more attention by this distance function. (Fig. 7)

3.        Detail Inspection View: When a region or sensor is clicked, this view displays its information completely (Fig 5).

 

a.       Compare uncertainty of the static sensors to the mobile sensors. What anomalies can you see? Are there sensors that are too uncertain to trust?

In the Sensor View, different sensor patterns can be clearly found via the appearance and location of the graphs.

 

Fig. 7: Sensor view after MDS projection.

Static sensor

1.       Static sensors (the inner ring is made into purple) except the 15th are in a large cluster in common. No missing occurs in all five days, but the uncertainty of these sensors increases after the earthquake, which can be clearly found by the changes of the blue fold line of the outer ring.

2.       In contrast, the static 15th lose its measurement function after a period of the earthquake. This sensor around the nuclear power plant is difficult to be trusted for the analysis of nuclear leak.

Mobile sensor

1.       The mobile sensors in the large cluster at the lower right are similar to the first pattern of the static sensors, although the overall uncertainty is larger. These sensors are rarely missing, and the uncertainty is very low before the earthquake except mobile 19th and 20th. These two sensor are considered to be not accurate enough to trust.

2.       Mobile sensors in the central and top have experienced two long-term missing in later period after the earthquake (Fig.7 yellow polygon). The upper left part is more uncertain after the earthquake (Fig.7 blue polygon). Among them, the 21st sensor has a high uncertainty before the earthquake, we believe it is not trusted based on the same reason as in 1.

3.       The sensor on the lower left is similar to the static sensor 15th, and the measurement function is lost after a certain time, but the missing phenomenon is more serious. This may mean damage to the sensor or the departure of the vehicle with the sensor.

4.       An abnormal sensor numbered 18 can be found at the bottom right. Considering its missing and standard deviation, this is an untrusted sensor.

5.       There is also a sensor that is always trustworthy until their measurements no longer change after the time of the earthquake. They have zero standard deviation, which can be found by observing whether the outer circle is existing (Fig. 8). These sensors cannot trust after the earthquake. They are the 1st, 26th, 35th, 23rd, 47th mobile sensors (Fig. 7 red ovals).

 

Fig. 8: A simplified diagram of mobile 26th. Its standard deviation turn into 0 after the earthquake, which means the reading no longer changes.

 

b.      Which regions of the city have greater uncertainty of radiation measurement? Use visual analytics to explain your rationale.

In order to analyze the uncertainty of the regions by means of the measurements of the sensor, we use a line chart to show the changes of sensor readings in the selected region. Several patterns can be found.

1.       A large number of missing: Many regions of the city are not adequately measured throughout the 5 days.

2.       Medium uncertainty with large number of measurements: Many central area grids exhibit this pattern and do not have high anomaly measurements. The accumulation of many sensor uncertainties leads to this phenomenon.

 

Fig. 9: Sensor measurements over time in grid 45.

 

3.       Short time high uncertainty with medium number of measurements: Grid 38 (in East Parton) and grid 65 (in Safe Town) exhibit this pattern. For grid 38, high uncertainty may be related to anomalous events (Fig. 10). The first peak is caused by the spread of nuclear radiation, and the second one may be related to aftershocks.

 

Fig. 10: Uncertainty Glyph of grid 38

For grid 65, between 16:00 and 23:00 on the 8th, there is a great difference between the three sensors (static 12th, mobile 10th, and mobile 8th) measurements in this region. Mobile 10th has an abnormality affected by the environment at this time, most likely because of a contaminated car (Fig. 11).

 

Fig. 11: Sensor measurements over time in grid 65. The measurements of mobile 10th is significantly different from other sensors

 

4.       High uncertainty with small number of measurements: As for grid 50 (in Wilson Forest) and grid 70 (in Safe Town), there is no car passing through these two regions most of the time, but the measurements will be high once they are measured after the earthquake (Fig. 12). This may be related to that vehicles go through the bridges in the grid to leave the island.

 

Fig. 12: Uncertainty Glyph of grid 70.

 

5.       Some grids contain only damaged sensors for a long time (Fig. 13).

 

Fig. 13: Some areas in the south contain only damaged sensors after the earthquake.

 

c.       What effects do you see in the sensor readings after the earthquake and other major events? What effect do these events have on uncertainty?

We use the sensor matrix view mentioned in question 1 to visualize the sensor readings over time. More detailed information as well as the uncertainty can be found in other views. With these views, we can summarize the effects of events on sensor readings and uncertainty.

1.       Earthquake caused growth in sensor measurements of some sensors. The uncertainty of both mobile and static sensors is significantly increased, showing more missing and larger standard deviations.

2.       The earthquake caused some sensor failures, including sensors with loss of measurement or with measurement no longer changing (Fig. 14).

 

Fig. 14: Animated map of sensor 6th and sensor 34th. These two sensors fail at similar times.

 

Fig. 15: Some damaged sensors. The readings of these sensors no longer change after 8:30. This may mean the time of the earthquake.

 

3.       Some vehicles enter and leave the island multiple times, which makes the two bridges (Jade Bridge and Wilson Forest HWY) highly uncertain.

4.       Aftershocks caused a lot of changes in the readings of some sensors (Fig. 16, Fig 10 red ovals).

 

Fig. 16: Measurements over time for static 9th. An obvious ladder can be found.

 

3  Given the uncertainty you observed in question 2, are the radiation measurements reliable enough to locate areas of concern?

a.       Highlight potential locations of contamination, including the locations of contaminated cars. Should St. Himark officials be worried about contaminated cars moving around the city?

b.      Estimate how many cars may have been contaminated when coolant leaked from the Always Safe plant. Use visual analysis of radiation measurements to determine if any have left the area.

c.       Indicated where you would deploy more sensors to improve radiation monitoring in the city. Would you recommend more static sensors or more mobile sensors or both? Use your visualization of radiation measurement uncertainty to justify your recommendation.

In the first two questions, we explore nuclear radiation contamination from the perspectives of both the regions and the sensors. After analysis, we can clearly see that there is a close relationship between the two. Regional contamination affects the readings of the sensors, and sensor anomalies can affect the assessment of regional measurements and uncertainty. In this question, we will explore the relationship between the two in more depth, which can provide a better assessment of contaminated cars and locations of contamination.

a.       locations of contamination

1.       Locations around Always Safe Nuclear plant: Grid 49 is a typical contaminated region. This area is rarely measured, but different sensors have detected high radiation measurements in this region at different periods.

 

Fig. 17: Sensor measurements over time in grid 49.

 

2.       Locations which the radiation is spread to: Two areas are identified as potentially contaminated areas: grid 38 (in East Parton) and grid 65 (in Safe Town). In question 2.b, we have explored the uncertainty of these two grids. Gird 38 is a contaminated region as the reason that the measured values of the sensors passing through this area have increased after a period of the earthquake. Contamination has been spread here. In contrast, in the grid 65, only one sensor (mobile 10th) has detected high pollution in this area for a short time, which lead to high uncertainty. We prefer to trust other sensors in this grid, especially the static sensor 12. Contamination has never spread to this area. Considering that the mobile 10th is in the normal state for the rest of the time, we think that some abnormality occurred during this time, for example, a contaminated car is near it. In total, locations on the south of the nuclear power plant are more likely to become a potentially contaminated area, especially the regions with great uncertainty after the earthquake.

 

Fig. 18: Uncertainty Glyph of mobile 10th. No obvious abnormalities except for high values in a short time. There may be a contaminated car near it at that time.

 

3.       Locations in the south: Grid 6 is monitored for contamination on the afternoon of the 9th. The radiation measurement starts to increase significantly at 3.p.m., as shown by the mobile 20th readings. The start time corresponds to the peak time of the uncertainty in grid 38, which means possible anomalous events, such as aftershocks. It is worth noting that other areas in the south have not been well measured during this time. Some of them have no sensors passing through, and some only have malfunction sensors. They are all potential locations of contamination.

 

Fig. 19: Sensor measurements over time in grid 6. The increase in the measured value of mobile 20th coincides with the aftershock time we guessed.

 

4.       Locations around bridges and the highway: A bridge and a highway have caught our attention because of their uncertainty. Grid 14 (containing Wilson Forest HWY) is monitored for very high radiation measurements on the evening of the 9th. Despite its high standard deviation, we trust this result because of the similar trends of all the sensors in the grid (Fig. 20). However, for grid 70 (containing JADE BRIDGE), we don't think this is a contaminated area based on the discussion above.

 

Fig. 20: Sensor measurements over time in grid 14(containing Wilson Forest HWY). The sensors that stay on the bridge are showing high levels of radiation measurements.

 

b.      contaminated cars

Cars with mobile sensors: In fact, there is no car in grid 49(containing Always Safe Nuclear plant) in the period of the earthquake. Some cars entered this area for a period of time after the earthquake and are considered by us to be potentially contaminated vehicles. We track these cars on the map and find out if they are contaminated. When they left the area, the readings immediately return to normal low values (Fig. 21).

Fig. 21: Animated map of sensor 9th. This vehicle is not contaminated though it has stayed in a contaminated area.

 

Cars without mobile sensors: After the earthquake, the uncertainty of some areas in the city has become greater, which is most likely due to the movement of contaminated cars in the city. We evaluate this impact by exploring these uncertain regions.

1.       Grid 65 has been mentioned many times. The abnormality of the mobile 10th is probably caused by the presence of contaminated cars in the vicinity, considering that it is reliable for most of the rest of the time.

2.       It is likely that there are contaminated cars parked in grid 70 for the reason that every car passing through this grid presents a large uncertainty with high measurement in a short time (Fig 22).

 

Fig. 22: Sensor measurements over time in grid 70. Short-lived high values occur when the sensor passes through these areas

Cars leaving the area: We observe the sensors that have left the area. When sensors leaving from the Jade Bridge return to the area, they have higher mean values than before (Fig. 23). Cars with these sensors are contaminated at varying levels, especially mobile 46th and mobile 36th. These contaminated cars travel to and from the city and the outside world, affecting the uncertainty of some areas (Fig. 24).

 

Fig. 23: Measurements over time for mobile 8th. When it returned to the island from Jude Bridge, the readings became higher.

 

Fig. 24: Animated map of sensors leaving the city from Jude Bridge. These sensors have greater measurement and uncertainty after returning

St. Himark officials should be worried about contaminated cars because they are moving around the city and affecting some areas and cars, although for most areas this effect is not serious.

 

c.       Extra sensors

Areas where sensors are needed: We believe that areas with high uncertainty, especially high missing, need to be added more sensors (Fig. 25).

1.       Most areas on the edge of the island are not well measured.

2.       In the south, many areas have no sensors or only damaged sensors after the earthquake.

3.       Nuclear power plants are rarely measured after a period of the earthquake.

4.       There must be some abnormal events in Jade Bridge and Wilson Forest HWY.

 

Fig. 25: Grid Summarization View. Many areas have high uncertainty and require more sensors

Selection of sensors: Mobile sensors expand the range of measurements (Fig. 26), while static sensors provide long-term accurate measurements (We discuss this in question 4). We hope to add sensors through the following scheme:

 

Fig. 26: Mobile sensors trajectory. Mobile sensors cover most regions of the island

1         Few cars will pass through the edge area of the island, static sensors need to be added if necessary.

2         Most of the southern part of the island needs to be more fully measured, and more mobile sensors can do the task, if the owners of these cars work or live in the southern regions.

3         More static sensors are needed in the nuclear power plant area because few cars will enter after nuclear radiation.

4         These two locations require more static sensors because the mobile sensors are very unstable in these areas. Static sensors can reduce this uncertainty and feed back reliable results

5         In addition, placing additional mobile sensors in taxis is a viable option, considering their more frequent movements.

 

4  Summarize the state of radiation measurements at the end of the available period. Use your novel visualizations and analysis approaches to suggest a course of action for the city. Use visual analytics to compare the static sensor network to the mobile sensor network. What are the strengths and weaknesses of each approach? How do they support each other? Limit your response to 6 images and 800 words.

Summary and suggestions

1         The animated map for the last few hours shows that sensors in the city are still not stable enough. There are still some sensors with high radiation measurements in the area (Fig. 27). Contaminated cars should be effectively controlled and handled centrally.

 

Fig. 27: Measurements over time of all the sensors. There are still some sensors that monitor contamination

2         For nuclear power plants, contamination still exists in this area, which is found by the readings of mobile 32nd. This area should be regulated and prohibited from entering by unrelated vehicles (Fig. 17).

3         Grid 38 is still suffering from the spread of contamination, and there are still vehicles staying here for a long time (Fig. 28). The impact of contamination in this area on people needs to be effectively assessed to determine whether it is accessible.

Fig. 28: Sensor measurements over time in grid 38. There are still cars in this contaminated area.

4         There is a need to take measures to prevent contaminated vehicles from coming in and out on Jade Bridge and Wilson Forest HWY.

5         More sensors need to be placed to reduce uncertainty in some areas, especially in the southern region. This will help determine the extent of contamination spread.

Comparison of mobile sensors network and static sensors network

A total of 50 mobile sensors and 9 static sensors are included in this area. We compare their differences from the following perspectives.

Radiation measurement

Static sensors maintain relatively low measurements for most of the time. In contrast, there are two peaks in the mobile sensor. Mobile sensors make it easier to find anomalous areas, which also means more susceptible to impact.

Uncertainty

We discussed this in detail in question 2. In total, Mobile sensors are more prone to missing and damaged than static sensors.

In some cases, more mobile sensors will not reduce uncertainty but will increase it (Fig. 9). The area of the city center is measured by multiple sensors, each of which is relatively stable, but with large differences between each other. This leads to a large standard deviation in the grid. We prefer to believe in the measurements of static sensors rather than to average measurements of mobile sensors.

Coverage

The distribution of the nine static sensors is not uniform, and most of them are distributed in the north of the island, especially around Always Safe Nuclear plant. In contrast, the mobile sensors trajectories cover most of the city, in addition to marginal areas such as Wilson Forest. However, cars with mobile sensors are stationary for most of the time, especially at night and during working hours. (Fig. 29).

Fig. 29: Animated map of all the sensors. At night, they are as stationary as static sensors.

At these times, mobile sensor networks can be viewed as larger and more inaccurate static sensor networks, with a similar uneven distribution. This means that although most areas are covered superficially, some areas are not well measured during these two periods, which is especially noticeable in the southern part of the island. In addition, after the earthquake, it may be because of the traffic control, the number of vehicles going to the southern region is significantly reduced, though these areas are precisely the regions that need to be measured (Fig. 30).

In general, static sensor measurements fluctuate within a small range, have higher stability, are less susceptible to unrelated factors, and are more difficult to produce missing. Smaller coverage is a major weakness of static sensors. For mobile sensors, they have measurements with greater floating range and uncertainty, and are more prone to missing and damaged. However, with the regular movement of vehicles in the city, they have a larger coverage range and are more likely to detect the generation and spread of radiation. Of course, as we discussed above, the coverage is time-varying rather than long-lasting, which means that anomalies cannot be immediately discovered if the car with the sensor does not happen to pass there.

 

Fig. 30: Mobile sensors’ trajectories in the first two days and the last two days. There are very few cars passing through the southern region after the earthquake.

The synergy between mobile sensor networks and static sensor networks provides cities with long-term monitoring of critical areas and intermittent measurements of the entire area. Mobile sensors can provide effective measurements in areas without static sensors, while static sensors can provide continuous and accurate monitoring when there are no mobile sensors in the area, and can also help reduce the uncertainty of mobile sensors in the area when they coexist. To some extent, these sensors effectively monitor the generation and spread of radiation and reduce its uncertainty. Regrettably, there are still some areas that have not been effectively measured, especially after the earthquake. Both dynamic sensor networks and static sensor networks need to be extended. In order to better cover more areas, it would be a better choice to install the sensor on a taxi, considering its more frequent movements.

 

5 The data for this challenge can be analyzed either as a static collection or as a dynamic stream of data, as it would occur in a real emergency. Describe how you analyzed the data - as a static collection or a stream. How do you think this choice affected your analysis? Limit your response to 200 words and 3 images.

Based on the data of MC2, containing radiation measurements from mobile and static radiation sensors, we analyze the data as a static collection and focuse on summarizing the temporal behaviors of all the sensors among the total period, finding the anomalies, and evaluating the uncertainty of sensors and regions. For the target of providing suggestions for the subsequent actions of the city based on our comprehensive analysis, we design and develop a visual analytics system with six coordinated views (Fig. 31). An uncertainty glyph which can describe the corresponding mean, the standard deviation, and the monitoring frequency in each hour is designed for giving a comprehensive portrait of a sensor or a gird. The overall views clearly summarize the situation within five days from time and space perspectives, while detail views provide explanations for our findings. Comparing to monitoring anomalies in real time simply, treating data as a static collection is more helpful in exploring events from the whole to the detail and evaluating existing conditions. In fact, the idea of real-time monitoring is applied to our animated maps, and our system can be extended to include the ability to process dynamic streaming data if necessary.

 

Fig. 31: System overview.