Most of the information stored in digital form is hidden in natural language texts. Extracting and storing it in a formal representation (e.g. in form of relations in databases) allows efficient querying, easy administration and further automatic processing of the extracted data. The area of information extraction (IE) comprises techniques, algorithms and methods performing two important tasks:...

The use of the implantable left ventricular assist device (LVAD) for patients before a heart transplant is evolving and becoming more common. Almost all U.S. cardiac transplant programs have an implantable LVAD, either the HeartMate (Thoratec, Oakland, California) or Novacor (World Heart, Ottawa, Canada). With better technology, more predictable clinical results and greater widespread acceptanc...

Prediction and classification are two very active areas in modern data analysis. In this paper, prediction with nonlinear optimal scaling transformations of the variables is reviewed, and extended to the use of multiple additive components, much in the spirit of statistical learning techniques that are currently popular, among other areas, in data mining. Also, a classification/clustering metho...