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By RUSTY McDONALD
Battalion Reporter
Intensive care units of hospitals
are using “early warning” systems
that have, in part, been developed
by a Texas A&M University profes
sor of statistics.
Dr. Emanuel Parzen, one ol 15
distinguished professors on campus,
came to Texas A&M about a year
a g 0 . In addition to medical uses, he
said, statistics are important in
people’s everyday lives — by giving
them information on which they can
rationally make decisions. The ap
plication of statistics in medicine
aids in life-or-death decisions.
Parzen said, “We can measure
patterns and relationships of bodily
functions and give doctors patterns
to look for.”
These patterns are developed
through research known as “time
series analysis,” which Parzen has
studied for the last 25 years.
Time series analyses are careful
observations that reliable predic
tions.
Parzen said the time series
analysis interests researchers in
physical science, engineering, biol-
°gy. medicine, social sciences, eco
nomics and management.
In medicine, Parzen said, the
time series analysis is clinically use
ful.
“The patterns we give the doctors
to look for are based on what a
healthy body produces,” Parzen
said. The body is constantly mov-
mg. This motion is in cycles and it is
these cycles we make the patterns
from.”
Parzen said the constant motion
of the body enables it to react and
adapt to stress or change.
A healthy body produces regular
patterns. When the body is sick or
failing the healthy pattern breaks up
until there is no longer a pattern to
Poison
course
closes
Dr. Emanuel Parzen, a distinguished professor of statistics,
explains that statistics are useful in making rational decisions
— whether in everyday life or in a hospital’s intensive care
THE BATTALION Page 5
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 20, 1979
United Press International
EAST LANSING, Mich. — Next semester, Michigan State Uni
versity veterinary students wanting to see animals fatally poisoned
will have to settle for instant replays.
Controversy over the killing of animals for toxicology students has
put an end to a laboratory course that featured the poisonings.
“We feel very sorry there was so much emotion attached to this
issue,” said course coordinator Dr. Frank Welsch, who opposed the
decision. “We re not making the animals suffer because we enjoy it,
but because it has been an important teaching (tool.)”
Attention was drawn to the program last summer after magazine
accounts of the practice. An administration-faculty committee rec
ommended an end to the classroom poisonings after this semester.
The goal of the killings was to help students quickly identify the
nature of the poison affecting the animal. Instead, videotapes will be
used for such instruction.
Dr. Jack Judy, an associate dean of veterinary medicine, said that
method is not as effective as live presentations.
“You have to be there to see and feel the symptoms,” Judy said.
umt.
follow,” Parzen said.
The basis of predicting these pat
terns is statistical data, Parzen said,
so statistics are important.
“Statistics are something an edu
cated person should know about,”
Parzen said. “It’s an integral part of
professional sciences.
“All of life is on a cost/benefit
analysis,” said Parzen, who has a
Air traffic computer to help
controllers unclog skyways
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United Press International
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A $3.2
million computerized air traffic cop
help unjam the skies to keep
airlines and travelers on schedule
when ice and snow sock-in northern
airports next winter.
Even more important eco
nomically, thousands of barrels of
jet fuel won’t be burned needlessly
hy airliners forced to maintain hold
ing patterns over congested or par-
il butl* itially closed airports.
The computer system to help con
trollers monitor and direct the flow
arrivedi of a j r traffic between major U.S.
jtsaideri airports is being developed in
nvoWi Jacksonville for the Federal Aviation
released Administration by Computer Sci-
caped fit ences Corp.
At present, the FAA does not
r ' rave an automated way of knowing
from Pen ,vhen an ai plane took off, for in-
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any
stance, said David J. Stewart, the
project director.
In some cases, he said, one air
traffic control center has to tele
phone another to verify a plane ac
tually took off and is airborne.
Operating from official airline
schedules augmented by real-time
information from en route control
centers, the new system will allow
the FAA’s Central Flow Control
Facility in Washington to monitor
the actual movement of aircraft
under the influence of wind,
weather and other conditions.
Armed with this information,
FAA controllers will be able to
foresee potential traffic jams and
landing delays, and take action to
reduce congestion, such as holding
departures of some flights.
In case of a snowstorm at
Chicago’s O’Hare International Air-
r—
I
Texas A&M
University
MSC
OPAS
presents
Cosi Fan Tutte
In Mozart’s merriest musical,
absence makes the heart go wander.
A cynical old bachelor, who’s determined to
prove that all women are fickle, entangles two
young couples in his plot. Texas Opera Thea
ter’s performance is energetic, entertaining,
and in English. A delightful family evening.
Don’t miss it.
TEXAS EDPERA.THEATER
port, which handles an average of 60
aircraft an hour, Stewart said, “We
can find out how many planes are in
the air and on their way to that air
port.
“We also can run a simulation to
find out what the capacity of the air
port is, so we don’t get a stack of
planes in Chicago.”
The system being developed by
65 computer programmers and
analysts will perform 26 defined op
erations. Stewart said, including
— four basic ones — listing traffic,
accounting for traffic, simulations
and updating information.
“This system doesn’t require
additional equipment, just some
additional data communications
lines,” Stewart said.
The new system is scheduled for
completion in October and the
target date for putting it in opera
tion is December. CSC will remain
under contract during the first year
of the system’s operation.
Battalion photo by Kayce Classe
doctorate in mathematics from the
University of California at Berkeley.
He said people are faced with deci
sions and statistics provide the in
formation to make those decisions.
“Statistics show how to assess
risks and then decide on a course of
action.
“It’s all based on theory and
data, ” Parzen said. “The data either
backs up the theory or disproves it.”
But Parzen said there are three
problems with data.
The data can be collected poorly,
thus giving bad results. Or it can be
non-existent. Parzen explained that
the data needed by a researcher
may not have been collected in the
past, so he has nothing to compare
his recent data with.
The third problem with data —
and the most important, according
to Parzen — is that people may not
even look at the data. He said that
data may disprove a theory, but if
nobody looks at the data, the theory
may be taken as fact.
Parzen joined Texas A&M a year
ago when he left the State Univer
sity of New York at Buffalo. He is
one of 15 distinguished professors
on campus — each must be so rec^
ognized by the Board of Regents —
and the only one in the statistics
field. At SUNY, he was a professor
of statistical science and director of
the university’s statistical science
division.
At Texas A&M, Parzen is teach
ing graduate students and has pro
posed a course in which he will
teach the basic methods of time se
ries analysis.
Parzen has written more than 50
papers and books on time series
analysis and other related fields in
statistics.
Technics
FACTORY DISCOUNT SPECIAL
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