The First Five Challenges Revisited

The PhysioNet/Computers in Cardiology Challenge 2005

4 October 2005: The winners of this challenge were RJ Povinelli, of Marquette University, and the team of C Raab, N Wessel, A Schirdewan, and J Kurths, of the University of Potsdam. The abstracts of these papers are available here:

Large-Scale Dimension Densities for Heart Rate Variability Analysis

Towards the Prediction of Ischemia Onset

The papers entered in this challenge were published in Computers in Cardiology 2005, and they can be read on the CinC web site by following the links here.

Introduction

Our popular series of challenges presented in cooperation with Computers in Cardiology continues this year in a new mode. Participants are invited to choose one of the five previous challenges as a topic for a follow-up study:

The problems posed by these challenges have continued to interest many researchers long after the final deadlines have passed. We encourage you to read the papers published by previous challenge participants in the Computers in Cardiology proceedings and elsewhere, and to build upon this work in pursuit of even better solutions. This year, we will recognize the most outstanding papers inspired by a previous challenge, with special awards to be presented at Computers in Cardiology.

With knowledge gained from previously published papers, can you advance the state of the art further, either by combining efforts with other participants or by entirely new methods?

Organization of the Challenge

The data sets used for these challenges remain available; note, however, that the correct classifications, which were withheld during the original challenges, have also been posted. Pariticipants may wish to consider using additional relevant data from PhysioBank or other sources, or alternative methods of objectively evaluating their work.

Abstracts of the papers submitted for the original challenges are also available on the pages containing the results for each challenge, and the complete papers are available in proceedings of Computers in Cardiology 2000 through 2004 (available on-line to IEEE members and subscribing institutions via IEEE Xplore). Read these papers to learn what has been done already.

How to enter

Choose one of the challenge topics and get to work!
Write and submit an abstract describing your work following the instructions on the Computers in Cardiology web site. Please select "Computers in Cardiology Challenge" as the topic of your abstract, so that it can be identified easily by the abstract review committee. The abstract submission deadline is 2 May 2005.
Write and submit a complete paper describing your work, again following the instructions on the Computers in Cardiology web site. To permit sufficient time for all entries to be judged, your manuscript must be submitted no later than 1 August 2005.

Participants will present their work at Computers in Cardiology in September. The authors of the two best entries presented at the conference, as determined by a jury convened for this purpose, will receive awards of US$500. Awards will be presented during the final plenary session of the conference on Wednesday, 28 September 2005, at which time a new challenge for 2006 will be announced.

Important dates

Late submissions will not be accepted.

Monday, 2 May 2005
: Deadline for submission of abstracts for Computers in Cardiology 2005.
Monday, 1 August 2005, noon GMT: Deadline for submission of completed papers.
Sunday-Wednesday, 25-28 September 2005: Computers in Cardiology, Lyon, France.

Questions we expect may be frequently asked

If your question is not answered below, please consult the PhysioNet FAQ.

Do I need to follow the rules of the original Challenge for my chosen topic?

Absolutely not! You are encouraged to take the ideas, and perhaps some of the data, explored by the original challenge and do something novel with them.

You do need to follow the rules of this year's challenge, however.

Are papers submitted for the Rosanna Degani Young Investigator Award also eligible for the Challenge Awards?

Yes. Note that the YIA deadline for submission of completed papers is 2 May 2005; you will need to work quickly!

May I revise my completed paper before publication?

We follow the example of the YIA, which we paraphrase here.

Your paper will not be printed other than in the Conference Proceedings (the Abstract Book will contain your abstract and not your paper). Therefore you may revise your paper during the summer, you may improve the style and the language, remove errors, and even add more data. Since the original paper, however, determines if you will receive an award, we have to ask you not to abuse this freedom.

The final version of your paper must be submitted before the conclusion of the conference on Wednesday, 28 September 2005.