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Investigating the role of computer-supported annotation in problem-solving-based teaching: An empirical study of a Scratch programming pedagogy | For more than 2 years, Scratch programming has been taught in Taiwanese elementary schools. However, past studies have shown that it is difficult to find appropriate learning methods or tools to boost students’ Scratch programming performance. This inability to readily identify tutoring tools has become one of the primary challenges addressed in Scratch programming studies. To cope with this problem, we propose an innovative approach, which combines an Annotation-based Scratch Programming (ASP) tool with the problem-solving-based teaching approach in Scratch programming pedagogy. The ASP tool was developed to enable students to create, review and share Scratch programming and homework annotations. In a quasi-experimental study, we have evaluated Scratch programming pedagogy at a North Taiwanese elementary school to investigate the effects of instructional-tools-supported programming instructional modes on Scratch programming performance. The experimental results show that students who received ASP tool support in conjunction with a problem-solving-based teaching approach performed significantly better than the other groups. Based on our findings, the innovative approach was believed to play an important role in improving the learning patterns of younger pupils.Therefore, we suggest that teachers consider incorporating the innovative method into their teaching environments in order to boost students’ learning achievements in the area of Scratch programming and the subsequent learning process. Introduction Logo programming supports cognitive skills to help younger pupils learn important programming language concepts and design methods that carry over to non-programming domains (Wing, 2006). Papert (1980) presented Logo programming as a cornerstone for rethinking approaches to elementary education and learning. Winslow (1996) argued that Logo programming led students to think about their own knowledge and experience. A proper Logo programming environment can help students make the transition from a complicated programming British Journal of Educational Technology Vol 45 No 4 2014 647–665 doi:10.1111/bjet.12058 © 2013 British Educational Research Association language to a simplified Logo programming expression. Garner (2009) applied the mental models to raise children’s interest and confidence for learning Scratch programming. Scratch programming is akin to Logo programming, which is ideal for younger students at Taiwanese elementary schools. Hsiao and Brusilovsky (2010) have reported that the annotation system can support community feedback in the process of learning programming languages. Furthermore, this approach can inspire students’ note-taking and cognitive skills, such as encouraging students to create helpful annotations, solving homework and reviewing them subsequently. An Annotation-based Scratch Programming (ASP) system allows students to create, review and share Scratch programming and homework annotations. However, students face various problems in Scratch programming studies, and invariably students try to find particular ways to solve these problems. In this respect, it is important for students to be prepared for potential problems by facing real predicaments in their learning environment, which require the identification and application of appropriate solutions. To learn problem-solving techniques is a study in learning itself. The incorporation of the ASP tool, within the context of problem-solving-based teaching, enables students to become aware of learning. Furthermore, this combined learning support structure allows students to Practitioner Notes What is already known about this topic • Scratch programming is akin to Logo programming, which is ideal for younger students at elementary and secondary schools. • Problem-solving-based teaching approach has been recognized as being an important instructional strategy. • An annotation system, which provides creation and review of annotations, has been developed to foster learning process for students. • The integration of the annotation system, with the problem-solving-based teaching approach, is helpful in improving Scratch programming achievements. What this paper adds • Exploring the effects of different instructional tools (the ASP tool and the traditional tool) supported different types of programming instructional modes (the problemsolving-based teaching mode and the traditional teaching mode) on students’ Scratch programming performance. • Students using the ASP tool performed significantly better than students using the traditional tool in their tasks. • Students who participated in the problem-solving-based teaching mode performed significantly better than students in the traditional teaching mode. • Students received both ASP tool support and worked in a problem-solving-based teaching mode performed significantly better than the remaining student groups. Implications for practice and/or policy • The incorporation of the ASP tool with the problem-solving-based teaching approach could enable students to develop a sound understanding of this course as well as to improve their learning performance. • Teaching institutes are encouraged to incorporate the ASP-tool-supported problemsolving-based teaching approach into instructors’ educational environment in order to boost students’ learning achievements in the area of Scratch programming. 648 British Journal of Educational Technology Vol 45 No 4 2014 © 2013 British Educational Research Association determine their problem-solving abilities and learning needs. Students can thereby “learn how to learn” while enhancing their Scratch programming performance. In the classrooms wherein the innovative approach is used, students progressively take more responsibility for their own learning. Therefore, it is recommended that teachers consider incorporating the innovative method into their teaching environments in order to boost students’ learning potential in the area of Scratch programming. Implications of the findings based on an empirical study of Scratch programming pedagogy are discussed in this paper. The rest of this paper is organized as follows. The second section provides a brief survey of the literature review. The third section describes the ASP-supported problem-solving-based teaching approach in Scratch programming pedagogy. The fourth section presents the methodology of this research, and results are presented in the fifth section. The sixth section presents the detailed discussions. The conclusion and implication are drawn in the seventh section. |
Neuroimaging in anxiety disorders | Over the last few years, neuroimaging techniques have contributed greatly to the identification of the structural and functional neuroanatomy of anxiety disorders. The amygdala seems to be a crucial structure for fear and anxiety, and has consistently been found to be activated in anxiety-provoking situations. Apart from the amygdala, the insula and anterior cinguiate cortex seem to be critical, and ail three have been referred to as the "fear network." In the present article, we review the main findings from three major lines of research. First, we examine human models of anxiety disorders, including fear conditioning studies and investigations of experimentally induced panic attacks. Then we turn to research in patients with anxiety disorders and take a dose look at post-traumatic stress disorder and obsessive-compulsive disorder. Finally, we review neuroimaging studies investigating neural correlates of successful treatment of anxiety, focusing on exposure-based therapy and several pharmacological treatment options, as well as combinations of both. |
Min-Hash Fingerprints for Graph Kernels: A Trade-off among Accuracy, Efficiency, and Compression | Graph databases that emerge from several relevant scenarios (e.g., social networks, the Web) require powerful data management algorithms and techniques. A fundamental operation in graph data management is computing the similarity between two graphs. However, due to the large scale and high dimensionality of real graph databases, computing graph similarity becomes a challenging problem in real settings. Many graph data management tasks, such as graph mining, classi cation, and retrieval, can be contextualized in the framework of graph kernels. A graph kernel is, roughly speaking, a function that computes the similarity between graph structures as means to enable the application of linear methods to graph data. Nevertheless, large databases usually require the use of compact representations of graphs known as graph ngerprints (or signatures). Graph ngerprinting techniques provide a solution that is a trade-o among accuracy, e ciency, and compression in graph kernels. In this article, we study the problem of generating ngerprints for graph kernels. We introduce a graph ngerprinting technique based on the min-hashing scheme, which is a powerful strategy for computing the similarity between large sets of items using a small amount of data. An algorithm for the generation of graph ngerprints as vectors of min-hash values is presented and integrated into the framework of graph kernels. Results show that graph ngerprinting achieves e ciency gains of up to one order of magnitude with up to 97% space savings when compared against the complete set of graph substructures. Moreover, the proposed technique is up to 9 times more accurate than a baseline method. |
A qualitative study of key stakeholders' perspectives on compassion in healthcare and the development of a framework for compassionate interpersonal relations. | AIMS AND OBJECTIVES
To report findings from a qualitative study of key stakeholders' perspectives on 'compassion' in the health care context. To present the 'Framework for Compassionate Interpersonal Relations'.
BACKGROUND
Although many research articles, health policies and health care strategies identify compassion as an underpinning value and key component of health care quality, identifying a unified definition of compassion is challenging. For Higher Education Institutions implementing 'values-based' recruitment processes, a clearer understanding of this core concept is vital.
DESIGN
Exploratory, qualitative design.
METHODS
Academic staff, health care students, clinicians and service users (n = 45), participated in nine focus groups where they were asked to define compassion in the context of health care. Data were transcribed verbatim and analysed using thematic analysis.
RESULTS
Four overarching themes were drawn from the data. The first theme centred on the participants' definitions of compassion, while the second identified compassionate behaviours. The third theme related to the barriers and threats to compassionate practice and the fourth, focused on ways to support compassion in practice. Participants believed that the health care staff should be 'consistently compassionate', and were emphatic that compassion should not be substituted with a 'care without engagement' approach.
CONCLUSIONS
The findings concur with other research, which identifies the link between compassion and empathy and the importance of establishing meaningful connections with others. While participants in this study recognised the pressures of health care work and accepted that the expectation of 'consistent compassion' was not necessarily realistic, it was still seen as an important goal.
RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE
Participants held clear expectations regarding practitioners' communication skills and used these as a proxy for compassionate practice. The 'Framework for Compassionate Inter-personal Relations' may be used to promote reflection on the implementation of compassionate practice. It may also be used to highlight areas of focus when conducting values-based recruitment activities. |
Is cannabis an anti-antipsychotic? The experience in psychiatric intensive care. | BACKGROUND
Cannabis use is a major problem in inner cities and has been causally implicated in psychosis. Very few of the available hospital-based studies of the implications of cannabis usage have involved psychiatric intensive care units (PICU); but PICU receive many of the most challenging and resource-hungry-and incompletely understood-patients in the mental health system.
AIMS
To study the clinical impact of cannabis abuse in a PICU, and to compare the use of atypical and typical antipsychotics in this setting.
METHOD
115 patients admitted to a PICU consented to take part in an open label naturalistic study. BPRS, TCI-240, weight, length of admission and routine bloods were evaluated in all participants.
RESULTS
There was a high rate of cannabis abuse (71.3%) in the PICU population. Patients who abused cannabis spent longer in PICU because their psychoses were more severe. They were younger at first hospital admission. Cannabis also had metabolic implications, with higher blood glucose levels at admission and greater weight increase. Atypical antipsychotics were effective in treating psychosis inpatients positive to cannabis at admission.
CONCLUSION
Our findings suggest that cannabis abusers had a more severe psychotic illness, especially in schizophrenia. There are additional complications in terms of weight gain for cannabis users. |
BotMosaic: Collaborative Network Watermark for Botnet Detection | Recent research has made great strides in the field of detecting botnets. However, botnets of all kinds continue to plague the Internet, as many ISPs and organizations do not deploy these techniques. We aim to mitigate this state by creating a very low-cost method of detecting infected bot host. Our approach is to leverage the botnet detection work carried out by some organizations to easily locate collaborating bots elsewhere. We created BotMosaic as a countermeasure to IRC-based botnets. BotMosaic relies on captured bot instances controlled by a watermarker, who inserts a particular pattern into their network traffic. This pattern can then be detected at a very low cost by client organizations and the watermark can be tuned to provide acceptable false-positive rates. A novel feature of the watermark is that it is inserted collaboratively into the flows of multiple captured bots at once, in order to ensure the signal is strong enough to be detected. BotMosaic can also be used to detect stepping stones and to help trace back to the botmaster. It is content agnostic and can operate on encrypted traffic. We evaluate BotMosaic using simulations and a testbed deployment. |
EFFECT OF LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT ON EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE IN PAKISTAN | The study was aimed to examine the effect of leadership development on employee performance in Pakistan. This study was conducted considering five factors of leadership development, i.e. coaching, training and development, empowerment, participation and delegation and it was found that the combined effect of these factors influences employee performance with 50%. However, rest of the 50% contribution towards employee performance other than leadership development factors can be the result of other factors such as: attitude, commitment, motivational factors, and trust in the organization, and other factors such as compensation, reward and bonuses etc. can also increase the employee performance. The five variables collectively as leadership development factors prove a synergic effect and increase the overall employee performance. The policy alternative should be that organizations must be cleared about the learning requirement of the employees. Therefore, both managers and employees must collaborate effectively and communicate the requisite for performance. |
A Mixed Hierarchical Attention based Encoder-Decoder Approach for Standard Table Summarization | Structured data summarization involves generation of natural language summaries from structured input data. In this work, we consider summarizing structured data occurring in the form of tables as they are prevalent across a wide variety of domains. We formulate the standard table summarization problem, which deals with tables conforming to a single predefined schema. To this end, we propose a mixed hierarchical attention based encoderdecoder model which is able to leverage the structure in addition to the content of the tables. Our experiments on the publicly available WEATHERGOV dataset show around 18 BLEU (∼ 30%) improvement over the current state-of-the-art. |
Atezolizumab versus docetaxel in patients with previously treated non-small-cell lung cancer (OAK): a phase 3, open-label, multicentre randomised controlled trial | BACKGROUND
Atezolizumab is a humanised antiprogrammed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) monoclonal antibody that inhibits PD-L1 and programmed death-1 (PD-1) and PD-L1 and B7-1 interactions, reinvigorating anticancer immunity. We assessed its efficacy and safety versus docetaxel in previously treated patients with non-small-cell lung cancer.
METHODS
We did a randomised, open-label, phase 3 trial (OAK) in 194 academic or community oncology centres in 31 countries. We enrolled patients who had squamous or non-squamous non-small-cell lung cancer, were 18 years or older, had measurable disease per Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors, and had an Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status of 0 or 1. Patients had received one to two previous cytotoxic chemotherapy regimens (one or more platinum based combination therapies) for stage IIIB or IV non-small-cell lung cancer. Patients with a history of autoimmune disease and those who had received previous treatments with docetaxel, CD137 agonists, anti-CTLA4, or therapies targeting the PD-L1 and PD-1 pathway were excluded. Patients were randomly assigned (1:1) to intravenously receive either atezolizumab 1200 mg or docetaxel 75 mg/m2 every 3 weeks by permuted block randomisation (block size of eight) via an interactive voice or web response system. Coprimary endpoints were overall survival in the intention-to-treat (ITT) and PD-L1-expression population TC1/2/3 or IC1/2/3 (≥1% PD-L1 on tumour cells or tumour-infiltrating immune cells). The primary efficacy analysis was done in the first 850 of 1225 enrolled patients. This study is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov, number NCT02008227.
FINDINGS
Between March 11, 2014, and April 29, 2015, 1225 patients were recruited. In the primary population, 425 patients were randomly assigned to receive atezolizumab and 425 patients were assigned to receive docetaxel. Overall survival was significantly longer with atezolizumab in the ITT and PD-L1-expression populations. In the ITT population, overall survival was improved with atezolizumab compared with docetaxel (median overall survival was 13·8 months [95% CI 11·8-15·7] vs 9·6 months [8·6-11·2]; hazard ratio [HR] 0·73 [95% CI 0·62-0·87], p=0·0003). Overall survival in the TC1/2/3 or IC1/2/3 population was improved with atezolizumab (n=241) compared with docetaxel (n=222; median overall survival was 15·7 months [95% CI 12·6-18·0] with atezolizumab vs 10·3 months [8·8-12·0] with docetaxel; HR 0·74 [95% CI 0·58-0·93]; p=0·0102). Patients in the PD-L1 low or undetectable subgroup (TC0 and IC0) also had improved survival with atezolizumab (median overall survival 12·6 months vs 8·9 months; HR 0·75 [95% CI 0·59-0·96]). Overall survival improvement was similar in patients with squamous (HR 0·73 [95% CI 0·54-0·98]; n=112 in the atezolizumab group and n=110 in the docetaxel group) or non-squamous (0·73 [0·60-0·89]; n=313 and n=315) histology. Fewer patients had treatment-related grade 3 or 4 adverse events with atezolizumab (90 [15%] of 609 patients) versus docetaxel (247 [43%] of 578 patients). One treatment-related death from a respiratory tract infection was reported in the docetaxel group.
INTERPRETATION
To our knowledge, OAK is the first randomised phase 3 study to report results of a PD-L1-targeted therapy, with atezolizumab treatment resulting in a clinically relevant improvement of overall survival versus docetaxel in previously treated non-small-cell lung cancer, regardless of PD-L1 expression or histology, with a favourable safety profile.
FUNDING
F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd, Genentech, Inc. |
Subcutaneous Stimulation as ADD-ON Therapy to Spinal Cord Stimulation Is Effective in Treating Low Back Pain in Patients With Failed Back Surgery Syndrome: A Multicenter Randomized Controlled Trial. | OBJECTIVE
Suppression of back pain with traditional spinal cord stimulation (SCS) in failed back surgery syndrome patients is often insufficient. The objective of this study was to investigate the efficacy of subcutaneous stimulation (SubQ) as ADD-ON therapy to SCS in treating back pain in failed back surgery syndrome patients.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Patients with a minimal pain score of 50 on a 100 mm visual analog scale for both leg and back pain were eligible. If pain reduction after trial SCS was ≥50% for the leg but <50% for the back, patients received additional SubQ leads and were randomized in a 1:1 ratio in a study arm with subcutaneous leads switched on (SubQ ADD-ON) and an arm with subcutaneous leads switched off (Control). The primary outcome was the percentage of the patients, at three months since implantation, with ≥50% reduction of back pain.
RESULTS
A total of 97 patients were treated with SCS for leg and back pain. Of these, 52 patients were randomized and allocated to the Control group (n = 24) or to the SubQ ADD-ON group (n = 28). The percentage of patients with ≥50% reduction of back pain was significantly higher in the SubQ ADD-ON group (42.9%) compared to the Control group (4.2%). Mean visual analog scale for back pain, at three months, was a statistically significant 28.1 mm lower in the SubQ ADD-ON group compared to the Control group.
CONCLUSION
Subcutaneous stimulation as an ADD-ON therapy to SCS is effective in treating back pain in failed back surgery syndrome patients where SCS is only effective for pain in the leg. |
ECONOMIC EFFICIENCY AND CONSTRAINTS OF MAIZE PRODUCTION IN THE NORTHERN REGION OF BANGLADESH | Faruq Hasan M. 2008. Economic Efficiency and Constraints of Maize Production in the Northern Region of Bangladesh. j. innov.dev.strategy 1(1): 18-32 The study was conducted at the Sadar upazila of Dinajpur and Panchagarh to estimate the costs, returns and economic efficiency of maize production compared to Boro rice. The growth rate of maize in the country and constraints to maize production at farm level was also emphasized. The sample size of the study was 100 equally from each district. All the farmers used hybrid seeds for maize cultivation with an average yield of 6.27 ton/ha, which is higher in Dinajpur (6.35 ton/ha) compared to Panchagarh district (6.18 ton/ha). The returns of scale of the selected inputs were 0.72 and 0.68 for Dinajpur and Panchagarh respectively. The technical efficiency was found on an average 0.84 at Dinajpur and 0.80 at Panchagarh. It was also found that, farmers in the study area had scope to increase maize productivity by attaining full efficiency through reallocating the resources. Economic analysis of maize and maize-based cropping pattern in comparison to Boro rice and Boro-based cropping pattern indicates the high profitability of maize production system than that of Boro rice. Comparatively high growth rate was found in area, production as well as in yield of maize since 1987-88 to 2005-06 as the composite and hybrid varieties were introduced in this period. High seed price, low grain price, and unavailability of fertilizers at time when required are the top most three constraints as indicated by the maize farmers. It was suggested that, supply of inputs at fair price at time when required and an organized marketing system is essential for expanding the maize production in the country. |
A Method for Mapping Sensor Data to SSN Ontology | Along with the continuous development of the sensor network technology, sensors from all over the world are constantly producing sensor data. However, the sensor data from different source is hard to work together for lack of semantic. Fortunately, SSN ontology provide a way to represent sensor data semantically, but how to transform sensor data into the instance of SSN ontology conveniently is still an issue to be considered. This paper proposed a solution to map sensor data to SSN ontology automatically based on a predefined XML-based document. We design a mapping language SASML (Sensors Annotation and Semantic Mapping Language) which provide a schema to annotate sensors and sources so as to generate a XML document for mapping. Then, an algorithm (namely SDRM) is designed to automatically transform sensor data, which described by SASML, to RDF conforming to SSN ontology, according to the mapping document and the element correspondences between the SASML and SSN ontology. Further, a case study about sensor data from greenhouse is presented to illustrate our method, and a prototype is also developed to demonstrate the feasibility and effectiveness. |
The effects of scapular stabilization based exercise therapy on pain, posture, flexibility and shoulder mobility in patients with shoulder impingement syndrome: a controlled randomized clinical trial | BACKGROUND
Dysfunction in the kinetic chain caused by poor scapula stabilization can contribute to shoulder injuries and Shoulder Impingement Syndrome (SIS). The purpose of this study was to compare the effectiveness of two treatment approaches scapular stabilization based exercise therapy and physical therapy in patients with SIS.
METHODS
The study is a randomized clinical trial in which 68 patients with SIS were randomly assigned in two groups of exercise therapy (ET) and physical therapy (PT) and received 18 sessions of treatment. Pain, shoulders' range of abduction and external rotation, shoulder protraction, scapular rotation and symmetry as well as postural assessment and Pectoralis minor length were evaluated pre and post intervention. The paired-sample t test and the independent sample t test were applied respectively to determine the differences in each group and between two groups.
RESULTS
Our findings indicated significant differences in abduction and external rotation range, improvement of forward shoulder translation and increase in the flexibility of the involved shoulder between the two groups (respectively ; p=0.024, p=0.001, p<0/0001, p<0/0001). No significant difference was detected in pain reduction between the groups (p=0.576). Protraction of the shoulder (p<0.0001), forward head posture (p<0/0001) and mid thoracic curvature (p<0.0001) revealed a significant improvement in the ET group. Apparent changes occurred in scapular rotation and symmetry in both groups but no significant differences were observed between the two groups (respectively; p=0.183, p=0.578).
CONCLUSION
The scapular stabilization based exercise intervention was successful in increasing shoulder range, decreasing forward head and shoulder postures and Pectoralis minor flexibility. |
Hiding data in images by simple LSB substitution | In this paper, a data hiding scheme by simple LSB substitution is proposed. By applying an optimal pixel adjustment process to the stego-image obtained by the simple LSB substitution method, the image quality of the stego-image can be greatly improved with low extra computational complexity. The worst case mean-square-error between the stego-image and the cover-image is derived. Experimental results show that the stego-image is visually indistinguishable from the original cover-image. The obtained results also show a signi7cant improvement with respect to a previous work. ? 2003 Pattern Recognition Society. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. |
OIL AND THE MACROECONOMY: A QUANTITATIVE STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS | We model an open economy where macroeconomic variables uctuate in response to oil supply shocks, as well as aggregate demand and supply shocks generated domestically and abroad. We use several robust predictions of the model to identify ve fundamental shocks underlying the uctuations of the (real) oil price, the US activity and the global business cycle. The estimates show that supply shocks generated in the global economy explain the largest fraction of the oil price uctuations, about four times more than canonical oil-supply shocks. The correlation between oil prices and the US activity varies with the type of shock. (JEL: C32, E3, F4) E-mail: [email protected] (Lippi); [email protected] (Nobili) Journal of the European Economic Association Preprint prepared on 21 July 2011 using jeea.cls v1.0. |
Is Pretraining Necessary for Hyperspectral Image Classification? | We address two questions for training a convolutional neural network (CNN) for hyperspectral image classification: i) is it possible to build a pre-trained network? and ii) is the pretraining effective in furthering the performance? To answer the first question, we have devised an approach that pre-trains a network on multiple source datasets that differ in their hyperspectral characteristics and fine-tunes on a target dataset. This approach effectively resolves the architectural issue that arises when transferring meaningful information between the source and the target networks. To answer the second question, we carried out several ablation experiments. Based on the experimental results, a network trained from scratch performs as good as a network fine-tuned from a pre-trained network. However, we observed that pre-training the network has its own advantage in achieving better performances when deeper networks are required. |
Bee Colony Optimization (BCO) | Swarm Intelligence is the part of Artificial Intel ligence based on study of actions of individuals in various decentralized sys tems. The Bee Colony Optimization (BCO) metaheuristic has been introduce fairly recently as a new direction in the field of Swarm Intelligence. Artif icial bees represent agents, which collaboratively solve complex combinatorial optimiz ation problem. The chapter presents a classification and analysis of the resul ts achieved using Bee Colony Optimization (BCO) to model complex engineering and management processes. The primary goal of this chapter is to acquaint readers with the basic principles of Bee Colony Optimization, as well as to indicate potenti al BCO applications in engineering and management. |
Aesthetics in Breast Conserving Therapy: Do Objectively Measured Results Match Patients’ Evaluations? | To analyze the relationship of objective and subjective evaluation tools of breast aesthetics, we compare the results of the BCCT.core (breast cancer conservative treatment.cosmetic results) software, a semiautomated objective symmetry evaluation tool, with those of the Aesthetic Status of the BCTOS (Breast Cancer Treatment Outcome Scale) patient questionnaire. We included 128 patients with one-sided, primary breast cancer, treated conservatively in a prospective, exploratory study in order to assess the inter-rater reliability of the BCCT.core and the agreement between the BCCT.core and the BCTOS preoperatively, shortly and 1 year after surgery. Therefore, we use agreement rates, multiple (mk), and weighted (wk) kappa coefficients as statistical methods. Furthermore, we analyzed patient-, tumor-, and therapy-related variables as possible covariates to explain agreement. The inter-rater reliability for the semiautomated BCCT.core is very good with agreement rates up to 84% (mk = 0.80). The agreement rates of the BCCT.core and the BCTOS Aesthetic Status range between 35 and 44% subject to the different times of assessment (wk = 0.34 at best). Moreover, the patients judge their aesthetic outcome more positively than the software. None of the considered patient-, tumor-, and therapy-related covariates turned out to explain agreement. The BCCT.core is a reliable instrument that shows fair agreement with patient’s perspective. |
Security in Automotive Networks: Lightweight Authentication and Authorization | With the increasing amount of interconnections between vehicles, the attack surface of internal vehicle networks is rising steeply. Although these networks are shielded against external attacks, they often do not have any internal security to protect against malicious components or adversaries who can breach the network perimeter. To secure the in-vehicle network, all communicating components must be authenticated, and only authorized components should be allowed to send and receive messages. This is achieved through the use of an authentication framework. Cryptography is widely used to authenticate communicating parties and provide secure communication channels (e.g., Internet communication). However, the real-time performance requirements of in-vehicle networks restrict the types of cryptographic algorithms and protocols that may be used. In particular, asymmetric cryptography is computationally infeasible during vehicle operation.
In this work, we address the challenges of designing authentication protocols for automotive systems. We present Lightweight Authentication for Secure Automotive Networks (LASAN), a full lifecycle authentication approach. We describe the core LASAN protocols and show how they protect the internal vehicle network while complying with the real-time constraints and low computational resources of this domain. By leveraging the fixed structure of automotive networks, we minimize bandwidth and computation requirements. Unlike previous work, we also explain how this framework can be integrated into all aspects of the automotive product lifecycle, including manufacturing, vehicle maintenance, and software updates. We evaluate LASAN in two different ways: First, we analyze the security properties of the protocols using established protocol verification techniques based on formal methods. Second, we evaluate the timing requirements of LASAN and compare these to other frameworks using a new highly modular discrete event simulator for in-vehicle networks, which we have developed for this evaluation. |
Working mechanisms of a behavioural intervention promoting physical activity in persons with subacute spinal cord injury. | OBJECTIVE
In order to unravel the working mechanisms that underlie the effectiveness of a behavioural intervention promoting physical activity in persons with subacute spinal cord injury, the aim of this study was to assess the mediating effects of physical and psychosocial factors on the intervention effect on physical activity.
DESIGN
Randomized controlled trial.
SETTING
Four rehabilitation centres in the Netherlands.
SUBJECTS
Thirty-nine persons with subacute spinal cord injury.
INTERVENTION
Behavioural intervention promoting an active lifestyle, based on motivational interviewing. The intervention involved a total of 13 individual sessions beginning 2 months before and ending 6 months after discharge from initial inpatient rehabilitation.
MAIN MEASURES
The potential mediating effects of fatigue, pain, depression, illness cognition, exercise self-efficacy, coping and social support on the effect of the behavioural intervention on objectively measured physical activity (B = 0.35 h, p < 0.01) were studied. Measurements were performed at baseline, discharge, 6 months and 1 year after discharge.
RESULTS
No single factor was found that strongly mediated the effect of the behavioural intervention on physical activity; however, multiple factors could partly explain the effect. Mediating effects greater than 10% were found for proactive coping (17.6%), exercise self-efficacy (15.9%), pain disability (15.3%) and helplessness (12.5%).
DISCUSSION
Proactive coping (the ability to anticipate and deal with potential threats before they occur), exercise self-efficacy (self-confidence with respect to performing exercise and daily physical activities), pain disability (interference by pain of daily activities) and helplessness (emphasizing the aversive meaning of the disease) are important concepts in interventions promoting physical activity in persons with subacute spinal cord injury. |
Abordagens jurídicas transnacionais sobre direito administrativo: a conceituação dos contratos públicos na | O advento da globalizacao confere desafios a teoria do direito administrativo. Esses desafios consistem na crescente incongruencia entre o direito administrativo e o Estado-nacao, na estrita interacao continua e, algumas vezes, fusao, de acoes e leis administrativas domesticas e internacionais, alem da ampla dissolucao da divisao publico-privada, da contribuicao de atores privados junto a administracao publica, e da migracao de ideias do direito administrativo pelas ordens juridicas. O direito administrativo e entao colocado em um espaco juridico transnacional e se torna sujeito a processos transnacionais juridicos. Isso possui repercussoes tambem na teoria do direito administrativo, caso a meta dessa teoria seja promover um quadro geral para reflexao sobre o direito administrativo, sempre e onde quer que a acao administrativa ocorra, incluindo momentos de crescente distanciamento do direito administrativo entre as fontes juridicas domesticas e as instituicoes publicas. Essa teoria, argumenta o artigo, deveria ter uma perspectiva transnacional que abranja leis domesticas e internacionais, e envolvam a ideia de que, tanto os atores e instrumentos publicos, quanto os privados contribuem para a geracao de normas no direito administrativo. O artigo ilustra a ideia de um direito administrativo transnacional por meio da observacao da legislacao e que provenha da cooperacao entre administracoes e atores privados atraves de contratos (publicos), tais como parcerias publico-privadas, contratos de concessao ou contratos de Estado. Transnational legal approaches to administrative law: conceptualizing public contracts in globalization The advent of globalization poses challenges to the theory of administrative law. These challenges consist in the growing disconnect between administrative law and the nation-state and the continuously close interaction, and at times fusion, of domestic and international administrative law and action, but also in the incremental dissolution of the public-private divide, the contribution of private actors to public governance, and the migration of administrative law ideas across legal orders. Administrative law is thereby placed in a transnational legal space and becomes subject to transnational legal processes. This also has repercussions for the theory of administrative law if the goal of such a theory is to provide an overarching framework for thinking about administrative law whenever and wherever administrative action occurs, including in times of increasing detachment of administrative law from domestic legal sources and domestic public institutions. Such a theory, the article argues, should take a transnational outlook that overarches domestic and international law and encompasses the idea that both public and private actors and instruments contribute to norm-generation in administrative law. The article illustrates the idea of a transnational administrative law by looking at the law governing, and emerging from, cooperation between administrations and private actors through (public) contracts, such as public-private partnerships, concession agreements, or state contracts. |
Nebulised beclomethasone dipro ' pionate suspension | SUMMARY We compared nebulised beclomethasone dipropionate suspension against placebo in 16 children with moderately severe asthma in double blind crossover fashion. Three children withdrew due to deterioration while on placebo. Of the remaining 13, eight were better on beclomethasone and five on placebo. These trends in favour of nebulised beclomethasone were not significant and do not suggest that the suspension is as effective as inhaled powder or aerosol topical steroid formulation. The role of beclomethasone dipropionate in childhood asthma is well established, with proven clinical efficacy when administered by either metered dose inhaler' or powder capsule2 3 form. Neither of these two delivery systems is suitable, however, for treatment of very young children, due to the degree of cooperation and coordination required in their use. It is only fairly recently that a suspension form of beclomethasone, for delivery by nebuliser, has become available, but to date there is only one published clinical trial of its effectiveness in a suitable population of young children.4 We have therefore conducted a randomised double blind crossover study, comparing beclomethasone dipro-pionate suspension against placebo in a group of children with moderately severe asthma aged between 18 months and 6 years. Patients and methods The age limits of 18 months and 6 years were chosen to include those children old enou h to be responsive to treatment with bronchodilator but too young to be able to manage treatment with rotahaler or metered dose aerosol effectively. All the children had an established clinical diagnosis of asthma and all had been considered to be inadequately controlled on regular nebulised sodium cromoglycate with nebulised bronchodilator as required. After an initial two week run in period, during which regular prophylactic treatment was stopped, the patients entered two consecutive two month treatment periods. In each of these they received, through a Pari Inhalierboy nebuliser and face mask, either beclomethasone respirator suspension 150 ug (3 ml) or placebo 3 ml (the commercially available preparation minus the active ingredient) on a double blind, randomised crossover basis, and as the sole form of prophylactic treatment. Throughout the trial the parents were asked to maintain a daily diary record of: (i) symptom score, allocating a score of 0-3 for each of cough, wheeze, and breathlessness for both day and night, giving a worst possible score of 18 for each 24 hours; (ii) morning and evening peak expiratory flow rate if the child was capable, using … |
Effects of the SATZ teacher-led school HIV prevention programmes on adolescent sexual behaviour: cluster randomised controlled trials in three sub-Saharan African sites. | In this study, the effects on young adolescent sexual risk behaviour of teacher-led school HIV prevention programmes were examined in two sites in South Africa (Cape Town and Mankweng) and one site in Tanzania (Dar es Salaam). In Cape Town, Dar es Salaam and Mankweng, 26, 24 and 30 schools, respectively, were randomly allocated to intervention or comparison groups. Primary outcomes were delayed sexual debut and condom use among adolescents aged 12-14 years (grade 8 in South Africa and grades 5 and 6 in Tanzania). In total, 5352, 4197 and 2590 students participated at baseline in 2004 in Cape Town, Dar es Salaam and Mankweng, respectively, and 73% (n = 3926), 88% (n = 3693) and 83% (n = 2142) were retained 12-15 months later. At baseline, 13% (n = 224), 5% (n = 100) and 17% (n = 164) had had their sexual debut, and 44% (n = 122), 20% (n = 17) and 37% (n = 57) of these used a condom at last sex, respectively. In Dar es Salaam, students in the intervention were less likely to have their sexual debut during the study (OR 0.65, 95% CI 0.48-0.87). In Cape Town and Mankweng, the intervention had no impact. The current interventions were effective at delaying sexual debut in Dar es Salaam but not in South Africa, where they need to be supplemented with programmes to change the environment in which adolescents make decisions about sexual behaviour. |
Topological Representations of Vector Fields | This chapter gives an overview on topological methods for vector field processing. After introducing topological features for 2D and 3D vector fields, we discuss how to extract and use them as visualization tools for complex flow phenomena. We do so both for static and dynamic fields. Finally, we introduce further applications of topological methods for compressing, simplifying, comparing, and constructing vector fields. |
Review of state-of-the-arts in artificial intelligence with application to AI safety problem | Here, I review current state-of-the-arts in many areas of AI to estimate when it’s reasonable to expect human level AI development. Predictions of prominent AI researchers vary broadly from very pessimistic predictions of Andrew Ng to much more moderate predictions of Geoffrey Hinton and optimistic predictions of Shane Legg, DeepMind cofounder. Given huge rate of progress in recent years and this broad range of predictions of AI experts, AI safety questions are also discussed. |
Cascaded H-bridge with bidirectional boost converters for energy storage | This paper presents the design and control of a cascaded H-bridge converter for energy storage with bidirectional boost converter as charge/discharge unit. The disadvantage of the second harmonic on the main energy storage unit as well as its voltage variation with the state of charge is solved by this structure. The independent phase grid control is proposed for this topology. This strategy is able to control the average dc-link voltage for each phase independently and to balance the cells capacitors voltages. The balance of the energy storage units is achieved by controlling independently each cell charge/discharge current, together with the capacitors voltage control and balancing. Converter cell loss distribution and total loss over a wide battery voltage variation is calculated for charge/discharge operation modes for a 4.16 kV grid coupling point and 5 MW rated power. |
IPA: A New Class of Power Attacks | We present Inferential Power Analysis (IPA), a new class of attacks based on power analysis. An IPA attack has two stages: a profiling stage and a key extraction stage. In the profiling stage, intratrace differencing, averaging, and other statistical operations are performed on a large number of power traces to learn details of the implementation, leading to the location and identification of key bits. In the key extraction stage, the key is obtained from a very few power traces; we have successfully extracted keys from a single trace. Compared to differential power analysis, IPA has the advantages that the attacker does not need either plaintext or ciphertext, and that, in the key extraction stage, a key can be obtained from a small number of traces. |
Avulsion of the proximal hamstring origin. | BACKGROUND
The torn hamstring is a common athletic injury. The purpose of the present study was to review the clinical presentation of this injury, the diagnostic imaging findings, the surgical technique of reattachment, and the likely clinical outcome of surgery for the treatment of avulsion of the proximal hamstring origin.
METHODS
Seventy-two consecutive reconstructions in seventy-one patients with avulsion of the proximal hamstring origin were performed at a single center. The mean age at the time of the operation was 40.2 years. The mean duration of follow-up was twenty-four months, and all patients with a minimum duration of follow-up of six months were included. There were no exclusions. Patients were independently reviewed, and the mean postoperative isotonic hamstring strength was compared with that on the uninjured side.
RESULTS
Waterskiing was the most frequent cause of injury (twenty-one cases). The mean time between the injury and the operation was twelve months. The most common pathological finding was a complete avulsion of the proximal hamstring origin (sixty-three cases; 87.5%), with a mean retraction of 7 cm (range, 0 to 20 cm). The mean postoperative isotonic hamstring strength measured 84% (range, 43% to 122%) and the mean postoperative hamstring endurance measured 89% (range, 26% to 161%) when compared with the values on the contralateral side.
CONCLUSIONS
It is important to distinguish proximal hamstring origin avulsions (for which we recommend early surgical repair) from the majority of hamstring muscle injuries (which respond well to nonoperative treatment). The present study suggests that, in cases of complete avulsion with hamstring retraction, a delay in surgical repair renders the repair more technically challenging, may increase the likelihood of sciatic nerve involvement, increases the need for postoperative bracing, and reduces postoperative outcome in terms of hamstring strength and endurance. Once the nature of the injury has been established, the surgical treatment of hamstring origin avulsions has predictable and satisfactory results. |
AN AUTOMATIC SYSTEM FOR DETECTING AND COUNTING RBC AND WBC USING FUZZY LOGIC | Blood cell detection and counting is the initial process for detecting and diagnosing diseases. Several image processing algorithms are there for the blood cell classification and counting. The processed image helps to detect different blood related diseases. In all those algorithms several pre-processing steps are there for the process of detection and counting. Though all the algorithms give accurate results, the pre-processing steps are complex and time-consuming. This paper discusses about the RBC and WBC detection using fuzzy logic. Fuzzy logic toolbox software in MATLAB is used to develop the model on virtual platform. |
Cognitive , Affective , and Attribute of the Satisfaction Response | An attempt to extend current thinking on postpurchase response to include attribute satisfaction and dissatisfaction as separate determinants not fully reflected in either cognitive (i.e.. expectancy disconfirmation) or affective paradigms is presented. In separate studies of automobile satisfaction and satisfaction with course instruction, respondents provided the nature of emotional experience, disconfirmation perceptions, and separate attribute satisfaction and dissatisfaction judgments. Analysis confirmed the disconfirmation effect and tbe effects of separate dimensions of positive and negative affect and also suggested a multidimensional structure to the affect dimensions. Additionally, attribute satisfaction and dissatisfaction were significantly related to positive and negative affect, respectively, and to overall satisfaction. It is suggested that all dimensions tested are needed for a full accounting of postpurchase responses in usage. |
Development and Validation of a Social Capital Questionnaire for Adolescent Students (SCQ-AS) | OBJECTIVES
Social capital has been studied due to its contextual influence on health. However, no specific assessment tool has been developed and validated for the measurement of social capital among 12-year-old adolescent students. The aim of the present study was to develop and validate a quick, simple assessment tool to measure social capital among adolescent students.
METHODS
A questionnaire was developed based on a review of relevant literature. For such, searches were made of the Scientific Electronic Library Online, Latin American and Caribbean Health Sciences, The Cochrane Library, ISI Web of Knowledge, International Database for Medical Literature and PubMed Central bibliographical databases from September 2011 to January 2014 for papers addressing assessment tools for the evaluation of social capital. Focus groups were also formed by adolescent students as well as health, educational and social professionals. The final assessment tool was administered to a convenience sample from two public schools (79 students) and one private school (22 students), comprising a final sample of 101 students. Reliability and internal consistency were evaluated using the Kappa coefficient and Cronbach's alpha coefficient, respectively. Content validity was determined by expert consensus as well as exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis.
RESULTS
The final version of the questionnaire was made up of 12 items. The total scale demonstrated very good internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha: 0.71). Reproducibility was also very good, as the Kappa coefficient was higher than 0.72 for the majority of items (range: 0.63 to 0.97). Factor analysis grouped the 12 items into four subscales: School Social Cohesion, School Friendships, Neighborhood Social Cohesion and Trust (school and neighborhood).
CONCLUSIONS
The present findings indicate the validity and reliability of the Social Capital Questionnaire for Adolescent Students. |
Review: IT-Dependent Strategic Initiatives and Sustained Competitive Advantage: A Review and Synthesis of the Literature | The role of information systems in the creation and appropriation of economic value has a long tradition of research, within which falls the literature on the sustainability of IT-dependent competitive advantage. In this article, we formally define the notion of IT-dependent strategic initiative and use Jane Webster was the accepting senior editor for this paper. Anitesh Barua was the associate editor. Jeanne Ross, Anandhi Bharadwaj, and Paul Pavlou served as reviewers. it to frame a review of the literature on the sustainability of competitive advantage rooted in information systems use. We offer a framework that articulates both the dynamic approach to ITdependent strategic advantage currently receiving attention in the literature and the underlying drivers of sustainability. This framework models how and why the characteristics of the IT-dependent strategic initiative enable sustained competitive advantage, and how the determinants of sustainability are developed and strengthened over time. Such explanation facilitates the pre-implementation analysis of planned initiatives by innovators, as well as the post-implementation evaluation of existing initiatives so as to identify the basis of their sustainability. In carrying out this study, we examined the interdisciplinary literature on strategic information systems. Using a structured methodology, we reviewed the titles and abstracts of 648 articles drawn from information systems, strategic management, and marketing literature. We then examined and individually coded a relevant subset of 117 articles. The literature has identified four barriers to erosion of competitive advantage for ITdependent strategic initiatives and has surfaced the structural determinants of their magnitude. Previous work has also begun to theorize about the process by which these barriers to erosion evolve over time. Our review reveals that signifiPiccoli & Ives/IT-Dependent Strategic Initiatives 748 MIS Quarterly Vol. 29 No. 4/December 2005 cant exploratory research and theoretical development have occurred in this area, but there is a paucity of research providing rigorous tests of theoretical propositions. Our work makes three principal contributions. First, it formalizes the definition of IT-dependent strategic initiative. Second, it organizes the extant interdisciplinary research around an integrative framework that should prove useful to both research and practice. This framework offers an explanation of how and why IT-dependent strategic initiatives contribute to sustained competitive advantage, and explains the process by which they evolve over time. Finally, our review and analysis of the literature offers the basis for future research directions. |
A randomized controlled study of the efficacy of six-month supplementation with concentrated fish oil rich in omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids in first episode schizophrenia. | Short-term clinical trials of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (n-3 PUFA) as add-on therapy in patients with schizophrenia revealed mixed results. The majority of these studies used an 8- to 12-week intervention based on ethyl-eicosapentaenoic acid. A randomized placebo-controlled trial was designed to compare the efficacy of 26-week intervention, composed of either 2.2 g/day of n-3 PUFA, or olive oil placebo, with regard to symptom severity in first-episode schizophrenia patients. Seventy-one patients (aged 16-35) were enrolled in the study and randomly assigned to the study arms. The primary outcome measure of the clinical evaluation was schizophrenia symptom severity change measured by the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS). Mixed models repeated measures analysis revealed significant differences between the study arms regarding total PANSS score change favouring n-3 PUFA (p = 0.016; effect size (ES) = 0.29). A fifty-percent improvement in symptom severity was achieved significantly more frequently in the n-3 PUFA group than in the placebo group (69.4 vs 40.0%; p = 0.017). N-3 PUFA intervention was also associated with an improvement in general psychopathology, measured by means of PANSS (p = 0.009; ES = 0.32), depressive symptoms (p = 0.006; ES = 0.34), the level of functioning (p = 0.01; ES = 0.31) and clinical global impression (p = 0.046; ES = 0.29). The findings suggest that 6-month intervention with n-3 PUFA may be a valuable add-on therapy able to decrease the intensity of symptoms and improve the level of functioning in first-episode schizophrenia patients. |
Polymer–Ceramic Composites for Microwave Applications: Fabrication and Performance Assessment | We present a novel technique to fabricate conformal and pliable substrates for microwave applications including systems-on-package. The produced materials are fabricated by combining ceramic powders with polymers to generate a high-contrast substrate that is concurrently pliable (bendable). Several such polymer-ceramic substrates are fabricated and used to examine the performance of a patch antenna and a coupled line filter. This paper presents the substrate mixing method while measurements are given to evaluate the loss performance of the substrates. Overall, the fabricated composites lead to flexible substrates with a permittivity of up to epsivr=20 and sufficiently low loss |
Monotonic Wide-Range Digitally Controlled Oscillator Compensated for Supply Voltage Variation | A digitally controlled oscillator (DCO) to be used in an all-digital phase-locked loop (PLL) is presented which offers a wide operating frequency range, a monotonic gain curve, and compensation for instantaneous supply voltage variation. The monotonic and wide oscillation frequency is achieved by interpolating at the fine tuning block between two nodes selected from a coarse delay line. Supply voltage compensation is obtained by dynamically adjusting the strength of the feedback latch of the delay cell in response to the change of the supply voltage. |
Nursing informatics competencies required of nurses in Taiwan | PURPOSE
In today's workplace, nurses are highly skilled professionals possessing expertise in both information technology and nursing. Nursing informatics competencies are recognized as an important capability of nurses. No established guidelines existed for nurses in Asia. This study focused on identifying the nursing informatics competencies required of nurses in Taiwan.
METHODS
A modified Web-based Delphi method was used for two expert groups in nursing, educators and administrators. Experts responded to 323 items on the Nursing Informatics Competencies Questionnaire, modified from the initial work of Staggers, Gassert and Curran to include 45 additional items. Three Web-based Delphi rounds were conducted. Analysis included detailed item analysis. Competencies that met 60% or greater agreement of item importance and appropriate level of nursing practice were included.
RESULTS
N=32 experts agreed to participate in Round 1, 23 nursing educators and 9 administrators. The participation rates for Rounds 2 and 3=68.8%. By Round 3, 318 of 323 nursing informatics competencies achieved required consensus levels. Of the new competencies, 42 of 45 were validated. A high degree of agreement existed for specific nursing informatics competencies required for nurses in Taiwan (97.8%).
CONCLUSIONS
This study provides a current master list of nursing informatics competency requirements for nurses at four levels in the U.S. and Taiwan. The results are very similar to the original work of Staggers et al. The results have international relevance because of the global importance of information technology for the nursing profession. |
In Conflict and Community A Century of Turbulence Working and Living in Groups | This article examines the century-long pairing of international wars followed by periods of resurgent interest in group psychotherapy and community-based treatment. It then focuses on the evolution of group and community treatment models, drawing on the work of Sigmund Freud, Trigant Burrow, Wilfred Bion, S. H. Foulkes, and Eric Berne to explore and illustrate the societal functions and difficulties of living and working in groups. The author offers his personal reflections on working with groups and concludes with a discussion of how group analytic models can extend the traditional models of transactional analysis group treatment to enhance the capacity of members to work with conflict, difference, and unconscious projections. |
Metformin reduces cisplatin-mediated apoptotic death of cancer cells through AMPK-independent activation of Akt. | Metformin is an antidiabetic drug with anticancer properties, which mainly acts through induction of AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK). In the present study we investigated the influence of metformin on the in vitro anticancer activity of the well-known chemotherapeutic agent cisplatin. Cell viability was determined by MTT and LDH release assay, oxidative stress and apoptosis (caspase activation, DNA fragmentation, and phosphatidylserine exposure) were assessed by flow cytometry, while activation of AMPK and Akt was analyzed by immunoblotting. Although metformin reduced the number of tumour cells when applied alone, it surprisingly antagonized the cytotoxicity of cisplatin towards U251 human glioma, C6 rat glioma, SHSY5Y human neuroblastoma, L929 mouse fibrosarcoma and HL-60 human leukemia cell lines. Only in B16 mouse melanoma cells metformin augmented the cytotoxicity of cisplatin. In U251 glioma cells metformin suppressed cisplatin-induced apoptotic cell death through inhibition of oxidative stress and caspase activation. The observed cytoprotection was apparently AMPK-independent, as metformin did not further increase cisplatin-induced AMPK activation in U251 cells and other pharmacological AMPK activators failed to block cisplatin-mediated apoptosis. On the other hand, metformin induced Akt activation in cisplatin-treated cells and Akt inhibitor 10-DEBC hydrochloride or phosphoinositide 3-kinase/Akt inhibitor LY294002 abolished metformin-mediated antioxidant and antiapoptotic effects. In conclusion, the antidiabetic drug metformin reduces cisplatin in vitro anticancer activity through AMPK-independent upregulation of Akt survival pathway. These data warrant caution when considering metformin for treatment of diabetic cancer patients receiving cisplatin or as a potential adjuvant in cisplatin-based chemotherapeutic regimens. |
Designing for interaction immediacy to enhance social skills of children with autism | Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder often require therapeutic interventions to support engagement in effective social interactions. In this paper, we present the results of a study conducted in three public schools that use an educational and behavioral intervention for the instruction of social skills in changing situational contexts. The results of this study led to the concept of interaction immediacy to help children maintain appropriate spatial boundaries, reply to conversation initiators, disengage appropriately at the end of an interaction, and identify potential communication partners. We describe design principles for Ubicomp technologies to support interaction immediacy and present an example design. The contribution of this work is twofold. First, we present an understanding of social skills in mobile and dynamic contexts. Second, we introduce the concept of interaction immediacy and show its effectiveness as a guiding principle for the design of Ubicomp applications. |
MR mammography using diffusion-weighted imaging in evaluating breast cancer: a correlation with proliferation index | To evaluate whether the variation of the apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) values obtained with DWI can predict elevated levels of Ki67 proliferation index and aggressive subtypes in patients with breast cancer. Breast MRI studies of 115 patients (mean age 57.3 years, range 36–81 years) with a biopsy-proven breast cancers were evaluated in this retrospective IRB-approved study. Examinations were performed on a 1.5 T magnet and included a Single-Shot Echoplanar DWI sequence with b values of 0 and 1000 s/mm2. For each target lesion, ADC was measured. ADC values were compared considering Ki67 status (≥20 % or <20 %), histology, grade (G1, G2 or G3) and clinical–pathological classification (Luminal A, Luminal B HER2-positive, Luminal B HER-2 negative, HER-2 enriched and Triple Negative). Mann–Whitney U test and Kruskal–Wallis test were used for comparisons and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were obtained. Inter- and intra-reader variability was evaluated in a subset of 40 patients, using interclass correlation coefficient (ICC) and Bland–Altman plots. Of 115 lesions, 53 (46.1 %) were assessed as Ki67 positive and 62 (53.9 %) as Ki67 negative. ADC values were significantly (p < 0.0001) lower in Ki67-positive patients (median 0.86 × 10−3 mm2/s; interquartile range 0.75–0.92) compared to Ki67-negative (median 1.03 × 10−3 mm2/s; interquartile range 0.92–1.13). Median ADC was also lower in G2 and G3 cancer and in the Luminal B Her2-negative subtype (p = 0.0015). No differences were found when evaluating histology. ROC curve showed a sensitivity and specificity of 83.0 and 66.1 %, respectively, when using a cutoff of 0.95 s/mm2 to differentiate Ki67-positive from Ki67-negative cancers. Inter- and intra-reader variability was moderate (ICC = 0.623; ICC = 0.548, respectively). No systematic differences were identified with Bland–Altman plots. Lower ADC values are associated with elevated Ki67 proliferation index and more aggressive pathologic features. Moderate agreement in ADC measurement could be a limitation. |
Analysis and Synthesis of Double-Sided Parallel-Strip Transitions | Antenna feeders, mixers, and filters made in double-sided parallel-strip technology usually must be adapted to unbalanced lines like the microstrip structure, needing transitions from asymmetric to symmetric waveguides (baluns). In this paper, we propose a new method for the evaluation of a generic tapered balun based on a conformal-mapping technique and an integral equation. This method, along with the use of an optimization technique such as genetic algorithms, allows for quick evaluation of the return losses of any tapered balun and the synthesizing of specific shapes to achieve desired responses in terms of return losses or impedance values. |
Investigation of the TiN Gate Electrode With Tunable Work Function and Its Application for FinFET Fabrication | The titanium nitride (TiN) gate electrode with a tunable work function has successfully been deposited on the sidewalls of upstanding Si-fin channels of FinFETs by using a conventional reactive sputtering. It was found that the work function of the TiN (phi<sub>TiN</sub>) slightly decreases with increasing nitrogen (N<sub>2</sub>) gas flow ratio, R<sub>N</sub>=N<sub>2</sub>/(Ar+N<sub>2</sub>) in the sputtering, from 17% to 100%. The experimental threshold voltage (V<sub>th</sub>) dependence on the R<sub>N</sub> shows that the more R<sub>N</sub> offers the lower V<sub>th</sub> for the TiN gate n-channel FinFETs. The composition analysis of the TiN films with different R<sub>N</sub> showed that the more amount of nitrogen is introduced into the TiN films with increasing R<sub>N</sub>, which suggests that the lowering of phi <sub>TiN</sub> with increasing R<sub>N</sub> should be related to the increase in nitrogen concentration in the TiN film. The desirable V<sub>th</sub> shift from -0.22 to 0.22 V was experimentally confirmed by fabricating n<sup>+</sup> poly-Si and TiN gate n-channel multi-FinFETs without a channel doping. The developed simple technique for the conformal TiN deposition on the sidewalls of Si-fin channels is very attractive to the TiN gate FinFET fabrication |
Expression of p63 in conjunctival intraepithelial neoplasia and squamous cell carcinoma | p63 is a homologue of the tumour suppressor gene p53, which is expressed in human basal squamous epithelium. Some investigators maintain that p63 plays a role in the development of squamous epithelium and, despite its homology to p53, it is considered to act as an oncogene. This study investigated the expression of p63 in conjunctival intraepithelial neoplasia of different grades, and conjunctival squamous cell carcinoma and its correlation to the proliferation marker MIB-1. Seventeen conjunctival specimens excised with the suspicion of either conjunctival intraepithelial neoplasia (CIN) or squamous cell carcinoma were diagnosed histologically as follows: 2 squamous cell carcinomas of the conjunctiva, 2 CIN grade I, 3 CIN grade II, 7 CIN grade III, 2 CIN with beginning invasion and 1 normal conjunctiva with no dysplasia. Sixteen microscopically-normal postmortem conjunctival specimens and normal conjunctiva, CIN and carcinoma specimens were stained immunohistochemically with antibodies against p63 and MIB-1. At least 500 cells per specimen were counted and the percentage of positively-stained cells of each antibody was calculated. A mean of 80% (57–89%) of the dysplastic cells from the CIN specimens stained positively with antibodies against p63, especially in the lower two-thirds of the epithelium, statistically significantly more compared with the normal specimens (9–55%, mean 36%, p<0.001). Nevertheless, we did not find a correlation between the percentage of p63-positive cells and the differentiation grade of the malignant specimens. MIB-1 positivity was shown by 0–1% of the cells in the normal postmortem controls, by 3–30% (mean 12%) of the cells in the basal and occasionally in the middle layer of the CIN specimens, and 16–61% (mean 23%) in the carcinoma specimens. In conjunctival intraepithelial neoplasia and squamous cell carcinoma of the conjunctiva, p63 is preferentially expressed in the immature dysplastic epithelial cells. Its staining does not correlate with MIB-1-expression, and therefore does not appear to be linked to cell proliferation. |
Group identity and peer relations: a longitudinal study of group identity, perceived peer acceptance, and friendships amongst ethnic minority English children. | This research examined whether peer relationships amongst ethnic minority status children reflect the social groups to which children belong and the degree to which they identify with these groups. A longitudinal study was conducted to investigate the influence of group identities (i.e., ethnic and national) on children's perceived peer acceptance and preference for same-ethnic friendships. Measures of ethnic and English identification, perceived peer acceptance, and friendship choice were administered to 207 south-Asian English children, aged between 5 and 11, at two time points 6 months apart. In line with predictions, longitudinal analysis showed that bicultural identification (i.e., higher ethnic and English identity) was related to higher perceived peer acceptance and less preference for same-ethnic friendships. Importantly, as hypothesized, this finding was limited to the older children with more advanced social-cognitive abilities. The results suggest that older children who adopted a bicultural identity were able to strategically 'flag' their multiple group identities, within their multicultural peer groups, to obtain acceptance amongst the maximum number of peers and show less preference for same-ethnic friendships. This study extends previous peer relations research, which has typically focused on individual social deficits or classroom norms, by showing that group identities influence peer relationships amongst ethnic minority status children. |
An Intrusion Detection System Based on KDD-99 Data using Data Mining Techniques and Feature Selection | Internet and internet users are increasing day by day. Also due to rapid development of internet technology , security is becoming big issue. Intruders are monitoring comput er network continuously for attacks. A sophisticated firewall with efficient intrusion detection system (IDS) is required to pre vent computer network from attacks. A comprehensive study of litera tures proves that data mining techniques are more powerful techni que to develop IDS as a classifier. Performance of classif ier is a crucial issue in terms of its efficiency, also number of fe ature to be scanned by the IDS should also be optimized. In thi s paper two techniques C5.0 and artificial neural network (ANN) ar e utilized with feature selection. Feature selection techniques will discard some irrelevant features while C5.0 and ANN acts as a classifier to classify the data in either normal type or one of t he five types of attack.KDD99 data set is used to train and test the models ,C5.0 model with numbers of features is producing better r sults with all most 100% accuracy. Performances were also verified in terms of data partition size. |
A cluster validity index for fuzzy clustering | Cluster validity indexes have been used to evaluate the fitness of partitions produced by clustering algorithms. This paper presents a new validity index for fuzzy clustering called a partition coefficient and exponential separation (PCAES) index. It uses the factors from a normalized partition coefficient and an exponential separation measure for each cluster and then pools these two factors to create the PCAES validity index. Considerations involving the compactness and separation measures for each cluster provide different cluster validity merits. In this paper, we also discuss the problem that the validity indexes face in a noisy environment. The efficiency of the proposed PCAES index is compared with several popular validity indexes. More information about these indexes is acquired in series of numerical comparisons and also three real data sets of Iris, Glass and Vowel. The results of comparative study show that the proposed PCAES index has high ability in producing a good cluster number estimate and in addition, it provides a new point of view for cluster validity in a noisy environment. 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. |
Yoga for anxiety: a systematic review of the research evidence. | Between March and June 2004, a systematic review was carried out of the research evidence on the effectiveness of yoga for the treatment of anxiety and anxiety disorders. Eight studies were reviewed. They reported positive results, although there were many methodological inadequacies. Owing to the diversity of conditions treated and poor quality of most of the studies, it is not possible to say that yoga is effective in treating anxiety or anxiety disorders in general. However, there are encouraging results, particularly with obsessive compulsive disorder. Further well conducted research is necessary which may be most productive if focused on specific anxiety disorders. |
Strategies for automatic segmentation of audio data | In many applications,like indexing of broadcast news or surveillanceapplications,theinput dataconsistsof a continuous,unsegmentedaudio stream. Speechrecognitiontechnology , however, usuallyrequiressegmentsof relatively shortlengthasinput. For suchapplications,effective methodsto segmentcontinuousaudio streamsinto homogeneousegmentsarerequired. In this paper , threedifferentsegmentingstrategies(model-based, metric-basedandenergy-based)arecomparedon thesamebroadcast news test data. It is shown that model-basedand metric-basedtechniquesoutperformthe simpler energy-basedalgorithms. While model-basedsegmentersachieve very high level of segmentboundaryprecision,the metric-basedsegmenterperformes better in terms of segment boundaryrecall (RCL). To combinethe advantagesof both strategies, a new hybrid algorithm is introduced. For this, the resultsof a preliminary metric-basedsegmentationare usedto constructthe modelsfor the final model-basedsegmenterrun. The new hybrid approachis shown to outperformtheothersegmentingstrategies. |
Copysets: Reducing the Frequency of Data Loss in Cloud Storage | Random replication is widely used in data center storage systems to prevent data loss. However, random replication is almost guaranteed to lose data in the common scenario of simultaneous node failures due to cluster-wide power outages. Due to the high fixed cost of each incident of data loss, many data center operators prefer to minimize the frequency of such events at the expense of losing more data in each event. We present Copyset Replication, a novel generalpurpose replication technique that significantly reduces the frequency of data loss events. We implemented and evaluated Copyset Replication on two open source data center storage systems, HDFS and RAMCloud, and show it incurs a low overhead on all operations. Such systems require that each node’s data be scattered across several nodes for parallel data recovery and access. Copyset Replication presents a near optimal tradeoff between the number of nodes on which the data is scattered and the probability of data loss. For example, in a 5000-node RAMCloud cluster under a power outage, Copyset Replication reduces the probability of data loss from 99.99% to 0.15%. For Facebook’s HDFS cluster, it reduces the probability from 22.8% to 0.78%. |
The fibula osteocutaneous flap in head and neck reconstruction: a critical evaluation of donor site morbidity. | OBJECTIVES
To (1) compare the complications and functional outcome of primary closure vs split-thickness skin grafting of the fibula osteocutaneous flap donor site, (2) identify patient-mix or treatment factors related to donor site complications, and (3) address early detection and management of donor site complications.
DESIGN
Retrospective review and questionnaire study.
SETTING
Two university tertiary referral centers.
PATIENTS
Fifty-three patients (31 men and 22 women, ages 20 to 80 years) who underwent fibula osteocutaneous free tissue transfer between February 1992 and January 1997.
MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES
Minor complications; major complications; and postoperative function, including sensory and motor deficits, pain, swelling, temperature intolerance, and activities of daily living.
RESULTS
Four patients developed major wound complications (group 1), 11 patients developed minor wound complications (group 2), and 38 patients had no wound complications (group 3). The donor site was closed primarily in 26 patients and with a split-thickness skin graft in the remaining 27 patients. Major wound complications developed in 3 patients (12%) who underwent primary closure and 1 patient (4%) who underwent split-thickness skin grafting. Minor wound complications developed in 7 (27%) of the patients who underwent primary closure and 4 patients (15%) who underwent split-thickness skin grafting. Three patients who had major complications had residual sensory or motor deficits that resulted in impaired gait or alteration in their daily activities. Comparing all patients with complications (groups 1 and 2) to patients with no complications (group 3) demonstrated an increased incidence of donor site complications in heavy smokers (P<.05) and a strong trend toward higher donor site complications in patients who underwent primary closure (P =.10). Although trends were identified, no significant differences were found in age, comorbid illnesses, alcohol use, preoperative laboratory values, operating time, tourniquet time, or skin paddle width.
CONCLUSIONS
A variety of patient-mix and operative factors are likely related to the development of donor site wound complications. Width of the skin paddle alone is not a reliable criterion for determining the need to skin graft the donor site. Primary closure tended to result in a higher rate of both major and minor wound complications compared with split-thickness skin grafting. Primary closure of fibula donor site defects should be undertaken if this can be accomplished with no tension along the suture line. If tension at the suture line is present, a skin graft should be strongly considered to minimize the possibility of a wound complication. Arch Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg. 2000;126:1467-1472 |
Exploring the Conceptual Model of Digital Ecosystem | Digital ecosystem, as a neoteric terminology, has emerged along with the appearance of Business Ecosystem which is a form of naturally existing business network of small and medium enterprises. However, few researches have been found in the field of defining digital ecosystem. In this paper, by means of ontology technology as our research methodology, we propose to develop a conceptual model for digital ecosystem. By introducing an innovative ontological notation system, we create the hierarchical framework of digital ecosystem form up to down, based on the related theories form Digital ecosystem and business intelligence institute. |
Correntropy: Properties and Applications in Non-Gaussian Signal Processing | The optimality of second-order statistics depends heavily on the assumption of Gaussianity. In this paper, we elucidate further the probabilistic and geometric meaning of the recently defined correntropy function as a localized similarity measure. A close relationship between correntropy and M-estimation is established. Connections and differences between correntropy and kernel methods are presented. As such correntropy has vastly different properties compared with second-order statistics that can be very useful in non-Gaussian signal processing, especially in the impulsive noise environment. Examples are presented to illustrate the technique. |
Neural Machine Translation for Query Construction and Composition | Research on question answering with knowledge base has recently seen an increasing use of deep architectures. In this extended abstract, we study the application of the neural machine translation paradigm for question parsing. We employ a sequence-to-sequence model to learn graph patterns in the SPARQL graph query language and their compositions. Instead of inducing the programs through question-answer pairs, we expect a semi-supervised approach, where alignments between questions and queries are built through templates. We argue that the coverage of language utterances can be expanded using late notable works in natural language generation. |
Lymphoproliferative disease of granular T lymphocytes presenting as aplastic anemia. | Lymphoproliferative disease of granular T lymphocyte (T-LDGL), also known as T-cell large granular lymphocyte leukemia, is a clonal disorder of cytotoxic T lymphocytes that is clinically manifested as chronic neutropenia and anemia. Association with autoimmune disorders is common. In 9 patients, T-LDGL is reported as presenting as aplastic anemia. The clinical characteristics were similar to acquired aplastic anemia. Morphologic evidence of increased granular lymphocytes in the peripheral blood and an excess of CD3(+)/CD8(+)/CD57(+) cells in the bone marrow were found in most cases. Cyclophosphamide was ineffective, but noncytotoxic immunosuppressive agents generally produced a good response. After a median follow-up of 49 months, 5 patients had died from the disease or related complications. Median survival was 40 months. Aplastic anemia can be a presenting manifestation of T-LDGL, and T-LDGL should be considered in the differential diagnosis of acquired aplastic anemia. |
Schema Networks: Zero-shot Transfer with a Generative Causal Model of Intuitive Physics | The recent adaptation of deep neural networkbased methods to reinforcement learning and planning domains has yielded remarkable progress on individual tasks. Nonetheless, progress on task-to-task transfer remains limited. In pursuit of efficient and robust generalization, we introduce the Schema Network, an objectoriented generative physics simulator capable of disentangling multiple causes of events and reasoning backward through causes to achieve goals. The richly structured architecture of the Schema Network can learn the dynamics of an environment directly from data. We compare Schema Networks with Asynchronous Advantage Actor-Critic and Progressive Networks on a suite of Breakout variations, reporting results on training efficiency and zero-shot generalization, consistently demonstrating faster, more robust learning and better transfer. We argue that generalizing from limited data and learning causal relationships are essential abilities on the path toward generally intelligent systems. |
Whole exome sequencing in 342 congenital cardiac left sided lesion cases reveals extensive genetic heterogeneity and complex inheritance patterns | Left-sided lesions (LSLs) account for an important fraction of severe congenital cardiovascular malformations (CVMs). The genetic contributions to LSLs are complex, and the mutations that cause these malformations span several diverse biological signaling pathways: TGFB, NOTCH, SHH, and more. Here, we use whole exome sequence data generated in 342 LSL cases to identify likely damaging variants in putative candidate CVM genes. Using a series of bioinformatics filters, we focused on genes harboring population-rare, putative loss-of-function (LOF), and predicted damaging variants in 1760 CVM candidate genes constructed a priori from the literature and model organism databases. Gene variants that were not observed in a comparably sequenced control dataset of 5492 samples without severe CVM were then subjected to targeted validation in cases and parents. Whole exome sequencing data from 4593 individuals referred for clinical sequencing were used to bolster evidence for the role of candidate genes in CVMs and LSLs. Our analyses revealed 28 candidate variants in 27 genes, including 17 genes not previously associated with a human CVM disorder, and revealed diverse patterns of inheritance among LOF carriers, including 9 confirmed de novo variants in both novel and newly described human CVM candidate genes (ACVR1, JARID2, NR2F2, PLRG1, SMURF1) as well as established syndromic CVM genes (KMT2D, NF1, TBX20, ZEB2). We also identified two genes (DNAH5, OFD1) with evidence of recessive and hemizygous inheritance patterns, respectively. Within our clinical cohort, we also observed heterozygous LOF variants in JARID2 and SMAD1 in individuals with cardiac phenotypes, and collectively, carriers of LOF variants in our candidate genes had a four times higher odds of having CVM (odds ratio = 4.0, 95% confidence interval 2.5–6.5). Our analytical strategy highlights the utility of bioinformatic resources, including human disease records and model organism phenotyping, in novel gene discovery for rare human disease. The results underscore the extensive genetic heterogeneity underlying non-syndromic LSLs, and posit potential novel candidate genes and complex modes of inheritance in this important group of birth defects. |
Granger-Causality-based air quality estimation with spatio-temporal (S-T) heterogeneous big data | This paper considers city-wide air quality estimation with limited available monitoring stations which are geographically sparse. Since air pollution is highly spatio-temporal (S-T) dependent and considerably influenced by urban dynamics (e.g., meteorology and traffic), we can infer the air quality not covered by monitoring stations with S-T heterogeneous urban big data. However, estimating air quality using S-T heterogeneous big data poses two challenges. The first challenge is due to with the data diversity, i.e., there are different categories of urban dynamics and some may be useless and even detrimental for the estimation. To overcome this, we first propose an S-T extended Granger causality model to analyze all the causalities among urban dynamics in a consistent manner. Then by implementing non-causality test, we rule out the urban dynamics that do not “Granger” cause air pollution. The second challenge is due to the time complexity when processing the massive volume of data. We propose to discover the region of influence (ROI) by selecting data with the highest causality levels spatially and temporally. Results show that we achieve higher accuracy using “part” of the data than “all” of the data. This may be explained by the most influential data eliminating errors induced by redundant or noisy data. The causality model observation and the city-wide air quality map are illustrated and visualized using data from Shenzhen, China. |
From Distributional Semantics to Conceptual Spaces: A Novel Computational Method for Concept Creation | We investigate the relationship between lexical spaces and contextually-defined conceptual spaces, offering applications to creative concept discovery. We define a computational method for discovering members of concepts based on semantic spaces: starting with a standard distributional model derived from corpus co-occurrence statistics, we dynamically select characteristic dimensions associated with seed terms, and thus a subspace of terms defining the related concept. This approach performs as well as, and in some cases better than, leading distributional semantic models on a WordNet-based concept discovery task, while also providing a model of concepts as convex regions within a space with interpretable dimensions. In particular, it performs well on more specific, contextualized concepts; to investigate this we therefore move beyond WordNet to a set of human empirical studies, in which we compare output against human responses on a membership task for novel concepts. Finally, a separate panel of judges rate both model output and human responses, showing similar ratings in many cases, and some commonalities and divergences which reveal interesting issues for computational concept discovery. |
LabelRankT: incremental community detection in dynamic networks via label propagation | An increasingly important challenge in network analysis is efficient detection and tracking of communities in dynamic networks for which changes arrive as a stream. There is a need for algorithms that can incrementally update and monitor communities whose evolution generates huge real-time data streams, such as the Internet or on-line social networks. In this paper, we propose LabelRankT, an on-line distributed algorithm for detection of communities in large-scale dynamic networks through stabilized label propagation. Results of tests on real-world networks demonstrate that LabelRankT has much lower computational costs than other algorithms. It also improves the quality of the detected communities compared to dynamic detection methods and matches the quality achieved by static detection approaches. Unlike most of other algorithms which apply only to binary networks, LabelRankT works on weighted and directed networks, which provides a flexible and promising solution for real-world applications. |
Inhibition of cytochrome P450 2D6 metabolism of hydrocodone to hydromorphone does not importantly affect abuse liability. | Enzymatic conversion of hydrocodone to hydromorphone is catalyzed by cytochrome P450 2D6, which is inactive in about 7% of Caucasians [poor metabolizers (PMs)] and can be inhibited by quinidine pretreatment in the remainder [extensive metabolizers (EMs)]. If hydromorphone, having a substantially higher mu-receptor affinity than hydrocodone, contributes importantly to the physiological and subjective effects of oral hydrocodone, then PMs should be less responsive to the same doses, and quinidine pretreatment should cause EMs to temporarily respond as PMs. Seventeen EMs and 8 PMs who previously responded positively to hydromorphone s.c. received placebo and hydrocodone (10 mg, 15 mg and 22.5 mg p.o.) and were retested with their favorite dose after placebo or quinidine (100 mg) pretreatment; physiological and subjective measures were collected at base line and four times after drug administration, and urine was collected for 8 hr. EMs and PMs were equally responsive to oral hydrocodone, and quinidine had no consistent effect on their responses, even though quinidine abolished the pre-existing metabolic differences in hydromorphone production, as measured in urine. These data suggest only a small role of hydromorphone in eliciting abuse-related responses to oral hydrocodone. |
Best-practice models that work: the CDC's Racial and Ethnic Adult Disparities Immunization Initiative (READII) Programs. | In this panel discussion, three health leaders provide information on techniques and approaches used to effectively implement the CDC's Racial and Ethnic Adult Disparities Immunization Initiative (READII) Programs. Part 1 offers an overview of READII and information on early results and program accomplishments. In Part 2, the Mississippi READII initiative is explored, with insights on how this program has served 10,000 African Americans in inner-city Jackson, Mississippi as well 23,000 elderly African Americans in 18 rural Delta counties, said to be the poorest counties in the nation. The third segment of this presentation explains challenges and successes found in San Antonio, Texas where READII efforts focused on immunizing the city's elderly Hispanics. Readers will find lessons learned and plans for future expansion to use as models when considering implementation of immunization programs in local communities. |
Prognostic impact of blast cell counts in dysplastic bone marrow disorders (MDS and CMML I) with concomitant fibrosis | In a retrospective study, 43 patients with dysplastic neoplasms of the bone marrow (myelodysplastic syndromes and myelodysplastic/myeloproliferative-overlap neoplasms) associated with marked (grades 2–3) fibrosis were examined. Histopathologic and morphologic findings as well as cytogenetic and molecular results were correlated with clinical endpoints. Multilineage dysplasia (34 of 43 patients, 79 %) and hypercellular bone marrow (64 %) were found in most patients. In ten of 35 patients, poor risk karyotypes according to the International Prognostic Scoring System (IPSS) were recorded. The JAK2 V617F mutation was detected in four of 30 patients (13 %), and the KIT D816V mutation was found in two of 30 patients (6 %). Patients were mainly treated with palliative drugs and best supportive care. After an observation time of 1–41 (median 21) months, ten of 43 patients (23 %) had developed a secondary acute leukemia. The median survival of all 43 patients was 21.4 months (range 1.8–88.2 months). Of all prognostic parameters examined, the blast cell count at diagnosis was found to be a most reliable and most predictive marker concerning survival and leukemia progression. This confirms previous studies in dysplastic bone marrow neoplasms without fibrosis. |
Analysis of Hotel Guest Satisfaction Ratings and Reviews : An Application in Singapore | The hotel industry in Singapore is an important part of the hospitality and tourism infrastructure and a strategic part of Singapore’s growth story. Hotels are primarily viewed as a service industry with intangible areas of guest experience and service levels. The research objective of this paper is to better understand the hotel guest satisfaction and the areas that hotel management can change, in order to get better results. For this purpose, an analysis of hotel guest satisfaction ratings based on attributes such as Location, Sleep quality, Rooms, Service quality, Value for money and Cleanliness was performed. Further, text analysis of customer reviews was also performed to better understand the positive and negative sentiments of hotel guests. We focused on identifying the attributes that differentiate one hotel from another, and then using these attribute insights to make recommendation to hotel management, on how they can improve their operations, guest satisfaction and generally differentiate themselves from their competition. Data from an online website, Trip Advisor, was used to analyse and compare customer ratings and reviews on five hotels. Statistical data analysis techniques were used to identify the key attributes that are most important in choosing hotels and are critical to focus on in order to ensure guest satisfaction expectations are met. Based on text analytics, the key results from this study indicated that hotel guests look for a good room and a hotel with a pool and good service. Based on the ratings analysis, the most important attributes for guest satisfaction turned out to be Rooms, Value for money and Location. |
The use of androgens or androgen-modulating agents in poor responders undergoing in vitro fertilization: a systematic review and meta-analysis. | BACKGROUND
The aim of this meta-analysis was to evaluate the role of androgens or androgen-modulating agents on the probability of pregnancy achievement in poor responders undergoing IVF.
METHODS
Medline, EMBASE, CENTRAL, Scopus and Web of Science databases were searched for the identification of randomized controlled trials evaluating the administration of testosterone, dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA), aromatase inhibitors, recombinant luteinizing hormone (rLH) and recombinant human chorionic gonadotrophin (rhCG) before or during ovarian stimulation of poor responders.
RESULTS
In two trials involving 163 patients, pretreatment with transdermal testosterone was associated with an increase in clinical pregnancy [risk difference (RD): +15%, 95% confidence interval (CI): +3 to +26%] and live birth rates (RD: +11%, 95% CI: +0.3 to +22%) in poor responders undergoing ovarian stimulation for IVF. No significant differences in clinical pregnancy and live birth rates were observed between patients who received DHEA and those who did not. Similarly, (i) the use of aromatase inhibitors, (ii) addition of rLH and (iii) addition of rhCG in poor responders stimulated with rFSH for IVF were not associated with increased clinical pregnancy rates. In the only eligible study that provided data, live birth rate was increased in patients who received rLH when compared with those who did not (RD: +19%, 95% CI:+1 to +36%).
CONCLUSIONS
Based on the limited available evidence, transdermal testosterone pretreatment seems to increase clinical pregnancy and live birth rates in poor responders undergoing ovarian stimulation for IVF. There is insufficient data to support a beneficial role of rLH, hCG, DHEA or letrozole administration in the probability of pregnancy in poor responders undergoing ovarian stimulation for IVF. |
Designing With Data : Moving Beyond The Design Space Catalog | Design space catalogs, which present a collection of different options for selection by human designers, have become commonplace in architecture. Increasingly, these catalogs are rapidly generated using parametric models and informed by simulations that describe energy usage, structural efficiency, daylight availability, views, acoustic properties, and other aspects of building performance. However, by conceiving of computational methods as a means for fostering interactive, collaborative, guided, expert-dependent design processes, many opportunities remain to improve upon the originally static archetype of the design space catalog. This paper presents developments in the areas of interaction, automation, simplification, and visualization that seek to improve on the current catalog model while also describing a vision for effective computer-aided, performance-based design processes in the future. |
Implicit Incremental Model Analyses and Transformations | In many engineering disciplines, abstract models are used to describe systems on a high level of abstraction. On this abstract level, it is often easier to gain insights about that system that is being described. When models of a system change – for example because the system itself has changed – any analyses based on these models have to be invalidated and thus have to be reevaluated again in order for the results to stay meaningful. In many cases, the time to get updated analysis results is critical. However, as most often only small parts of the model change, large parts of this reevaluation could be saved by using previous results but such an incremental execution is barely done in practice as it is non-trivial and error-prone. The approach of implicit incrementalization o ers a solution by deriving an incremental evaluation strategy implicitly from a batch speci cation of the analysis. This works by deducing a dynamic dependency graph that allows to only reevaluate those parts of an analysis that are a ected by a given model change. Thus advantages of an incremental execution can be gained without changes to the code that would potentially degrade its understandability. However, current approaches to implicit incremental computation only support narrow classes of analysis, are restricted to an incremental derivation at instruction level or require an explicit state management. In addition, changes are only propagated sequentially, meanwhile modern multi-core architectures would allow parallel change propagation. Even with such improvements, it is unclear whether incremental execution in fact brings advantages as changes may easily cause butter y e ects, making a reuse of previous analysis results pointless (i.e. ine cient). This thesis deals with the problems of implicit incremental model analyses by proposing multiple approaches that mostly can be combined. Further, the |
Sex hormone-binding globulin concentrations before conception as a predictor for gestational diabetes in women with polycystic ovary syndrome. | BACKGROUND
Low plasma sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG) concentrations during pregnancy have been associated with the risk of developing gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM). Women presenting with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) often exhibit low plasma SHBG concentration and are at increased risk of developing GDM. In this study, we investigate whether SHBG levels before conception are predictive of GDM in women with PCOS.
METHODS
A total of 50 women with PCOS were enrolled and followed up during pregnancy. Initial endocrine, metabolic and physical features were assessed according to a standardized preconception screening program. At 24-26 weeks of gestational age a 100-g glucose tolerance test was performed to screen for GDM.
RESULTS
Of the 50 women, 21 (42%) were diagnosed with GDM by a 100-g glucose tolerance test. Waist circumference, BMI, blood pressure, plasma glucose, insulin, homeostasis model assessment-insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) and SHBG levels before conception were significantly different between women who did and did not develop GDM. Stepwise logistic regression analysis showed that SHBG was the most significant predictive parameter for GDM (odds ratio 0.92; 95% confidence interval 0.87-0.97), without significant contribution of waist circumference and HOMA-IR. Receiver operator characteristic (ROC) analysis indicated that plasma SHBG (area under the curve 0.86) had the highest predictive value for subsequent development of GDM, however, the limited group size did not allow for calculation of a threshold value of SHBG.
CONCLUSIONS
In women with PCOS, preconception SHBG levels are strongly associated with subsequent development of GDM. Regression and ROC analysis show that preconception SHBG levels may be a better predictor for GDM in PCOS women compared with waist circumference or HOMA-IR.
CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER
NCT00821379. |
Robust Physical-World Attacks on Machine Learning Models | Deep neural network-based classifiers are known to be vulnerable to adversarial examples that can fool them into misclassifying their input through the addition of small-magnitude perturbations. However, recent studies have demonstrated that such adversarial examples are not very effective in the physical world—they either completely fail to cause misclassification or only work in restricted cases where a relatively complex image is perturbed and printed on paper. In this paper we propose a new attack algorithm—Robust Physical Perturbations (RP2)— that generates perturbations by taking images under different conditions into account. Our algorithm can create spatiallyconstrained perturbations that mimic vandalism or art to reduce the likelihood of detection by a casual observer. We show that adversarial examples generated by RP2 achieve high success rates under various conditions for real road sign recognition by using an evaluation methodology that captures physical world conditions. We physically realized and evaluated two attacks, one that causes a Stop sign to be misclassified as a Speed Limit sign in 100% of the testing conditions, and one that causes a Right Turn sign to be misclassified as either a Stop or Added Lane sign in 100% of the testing conditions. |
A REVIEW ON IoT PROTOCOLS FOR LONG DISTANCE AND LOW POWER | The evolution of IoT network is basically the effect of requirement of a system that is having better capabilities compared to existing ones. One main feature of the system that we need to satisfy is long range and low power. The protocols IEEE 802.15.4, 6LoWPAN, IPv6 and CoAP are used for achieving low rate, low power, large address space and reducing the data space respectively. In this paper we discuss other protocols which are intended mainly for providing long distance transmission with the less amount of power consumption. It mainly says about LoRa (Long Range protocol), IEEE 802.22 and weightless. |
Lipid metabolism in Alzheimer’s disease | Since the metabolic disorder may be the high risk that contribute to the progress of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Overtaken of High-fat, high-glucose or high-cholesterol diet may hasten the incidence of AD in later life, due to the metabolic dysfunction. But the metabolism of lipid in brain and the exact effect of lipid to brain or to the AD's pathological remain controversial. Here we summarize correlates of lipid metabolism and AD to provide more foundation for the daily nursing of AD sensitive patients. |
Design and Development of a Class EF$_2$ Inverter and Rectifier for Multimegahertz Wireless Power Transfer Systems | This paper presents the design and implementation of a Class EF2 inverter and Class EF2 rectifier for two -W wireless power transfer (WPT) systems, one operating at 6.78 MHz and the other at 27.12 MHz. It will be shown that the Class EF2 circuits can be designed to have beneficial features for WPT applications such as reduced second-harmonic component and lower total harmonic distortion, higher power-output capability, reduction in magnetic core requirements and operation at higher frequencies in rectification compared to other circuit topologies. A model will first be presented to analyze the circuits and to derive values of its components to achieve optimum switching operation. Additional analysis regarding harmonic content, magnetic core requirements and open-circuit protection will also be performed. The design and implementation process of the two Class-EF2-based WPT systems will be discussed and compared to an equivalent Class-E-based WPT system. Experimental results will be provided to confirm validity of the analysis. A dc-dc efficiency of 75% was achieved with Class-EF2-based systems. |
Control of Quantum-Confined Stark Effect in InGaN-Based Quantum Wells | This paper reviews current technological developments in polarization engineering and the control of the quantum-confined Stark effect (QCSE) for InxGa1- xN-based quantum-well active regions, which are generally employed in visible LEDs for solid-state lighting applications. First, the origin of the QCSE in III-N wurtzite semiconductors is introduced, and polarization-induced internal fields are discussed in order to provide contextual background. Next, the optical and electrical properties of InxGa1- xN-based quantum wells that are affected by the QCSE are described. Finally, several methods for controlling the QCSE of InxGa1- xN-based quantum wells are discussed in the context of performance metrics of visible light emitters, considering both pros and cons. These strategies include doping control, strain/polarization field/electronic band structure control, growth direction control, and crystalline structure control. |
Mental health in schools and system restructuring. | Because health is not the primary business of schools, a school's response to mental health and psychosocial concerns usually is limited to targeted problems seen as direct barriers to learning. And because resources are sparse, priority is given to problems defined in legislative mandates. As a result, school-based mental health services are available only to a small proportion of the many students who require assistance, and interventions generally are narrowly focused and short-term. To better meet the needs of those served and to serve greater numbers, emerging trends are pushing for restructuring of school-owned services and greater linkage with community resources to develop multifaceted, comprehensive, integrated approaches. This review (a) provides an overview of what schools currently do related to mental health and psychosocial concerns, (b) clarifies key emerging trends, and (c) explores implications for major systemic changes. |
Corrugated Textile based Triboelectric Generator for Wearable Energy Harvesting | Triboelectric energy harvesting has been applied to various fields, from large-scale power generation to small electronics. Triboelectric energy is generated when certain materials come into frictional contact, e.g., static electricity from rubbing a shoe on a carpet. In particular, textile-based triboelectric energy-harvesting technologies are one of the most promising approaches because they are not only flexible, light, and comfortable but also wearable. Most previous textile-based triboelectric generators (TEGs) generate energy by vertically pressing and rubbing something. However, we propose a corrugated textile-based triboelectric generator (CT-TEG) that can generate energy by stretching. Moreover, the CT-TEG is sewn into a corrugated structure that contains an effective air gap without additional spacers. The resulting CT-TEG can generate considerable energy from various deformations, not only by pressing and rubbing but also by stretching. The maximum output performances of the CT-TEG can reach up to 28.13 V and 2.71 μA with stretching and releasing motions. Additionally, we demonstrate the generation of sufficient energy from various activities of a human body to power about 54 LEDs. These results demonstrate the potential application of CT-TEGs for self-powered systems. |
Corticosterone Administration Alters Small Intestinal Morphology and Function of Broiler Chickens | Two experiments were carried out to study the effects of corticosterone (CORT) administration on intestinal morphology and function of broilers. In both experiments, birds were randomly divided into two equal groups. One group was the control group (CTRL), and the birds were fed with a basal diet. The other was the experimental group (CORT), and the birds were fed with the basal diet plus 30 mg of CORT/kg diet. At 21 days of age, performance, morphological characteristics of intestine, D-xylose level in plasma, activities of digestive enzymes in digesta, digestibility of nutrients and 5-bromo-2-deoxyuridine (BrdUrd)-labeling index of intestinal epithelial cells were determined. CORT administration decreased feed intake, daily gain and feed conversion ratio (p<0.05). CORT also decreased duodenal and jejunal villus height (p<0.05) as well as crypt depth (p<0.05). The D-xylose level in plasma of CORT-treated broilers was lower than that of the control (p<0.05). CORT treatment caused a decrease in apparent digestibility of protein (p<0.05), whereas fat and starch apparent digestibilities were unaffected (p>0.05). CORT administration increased activities of trypsin and amylase (p<0.05), and decreased BrdUrd-labeling index of duodenal and jejunal epithelial cells (p<0.05). In conclusion, CORT administration impaired the normal morphology and absorptive capacity of the small intestine of broiler chickens. ( |
Hierarchical coupling of phytochromes and cryptochromes reconciles stability and light modulation of Arabidopsis development. | In plants, development is a continuing process that takes place under strong fluctuations of the light environment. Here we show that in Arabidopsis thaliana plants grown under intense white light, coupling of the photoreceptor cryptochrome 2 to developmental processes is broader than previously appreciated. Compared to the wild type, the cry2 mutant showed reduced activity of a Lhcb1*2 promoter fused to a reporter, and delayed flowering. The cry2 mutation also reduced the inhibition of hypocotyl growth, the unfolding of the cotyledons, the rate of leaf production during the vegetative phase, and the pace of development after transition to the reproductive stage; but these effects were obvious only in the absence of cryptochrome 1 and in some cases phytochrome A and/or phytochrome B. Complementary, the cry2 mutation uncovered novel roles for cryptochrome 1 and phytochrome A. The activity of the Lhcb1*2 promoter was higher in the cry1 cry2 mutant than in the cry2 mutant, suggesting that cry1 could be involved in blue-light repression of photosynthetic genes. Surprisingly, the phyA cry1 cry2 triple mutant flowered earlier and showed better response to photoperiod than the cry1 cry2 double mutant, indicating that phyA is involved in light repression of flowering. Growth and development were severely impaired in the quadruple phyA phyB cry1 cry2 mutant. We propose that stability and light modulation of development are achieved by simultaneous coupling of phytochrome A, phytochrome B, cryptochrome 1 and cryptochrome 2 to developmental processes, in combination with context-dependent hierarchy of their relative activities. |
Open access and Scopus: A new approach to scientific visibility from the standpoint of access | The last few years have seen the emergence of several Open Access (OA) options in scholarly communication, which can broadly be grouped into two areas referred to as gold and green roads. Several recent studies showed how big the extent of OA is, but there have been few studies showing impact of OA in the visibility of journals covering all scientific fields and geographical regions. This research shows the extent of OA from the perspective of the journals indexed in Scopus, as well as influence on visibility, in view of the various geographic and thematic distributions. The results show that in all the disciplinary groups the presence of green road journals widely surpasses the percentage of gold road publications. The peripheral and emerging regions have greater proportions of gold road journals. These journals pertain for the 2 most part to the last quartile. The benefits of open access on visibility of the journals are to be found on the green route, but paradoxically this advantage is not lent by the OA per se, but rather of the quality of the articles/journals themselves, regardless of their mode of access. |
Occlusion-Aware Real-Time Object Tracking | The online learning methods are popular for visual tracking because of their robust performance for most video sequences. However, the drifting problem caused by noisy updates is still a challenge for most highly adaptive online classifiers. In visual tracking, target object appearance variation, such as deformation and long-term occlusion, easily causes noisy updates. To overcome this problem, a new real-time occlusion-aware visual tracking algorithm is introduced. First, we learn a novel two-stage classifier with circulant structure with kernel, named integrated circulant structure kernels (ICSK). The first stage is applied for transition estimation and the second is used for scale estimation. The circulant structure makes our algorithm realize fast learning and detection. Then, the ICSK is used to detect the target without occlusion and build a classifier pool to save these classifiers with noisy updates. When the target is in heavy occlusion or after long-term occlusion, we redetect it using an optimal classifier selected from the classifier-pool according to an entropy minimization criterion. Extensive experimental results on the full benchmark demonstrate our real-time algorithm achieves better performance than state-of-the-art methods. |
Porous titanium construct cup compared to porous coated titanium cup in total hip arthroplasty. A randomised controlled trial | The purpose of this study was to determine if a new titanium cup with increased porosity resulted in different periacetabular bone loss and migration compared to a porous coated cup. Fifty-one patients with primary hip osteoarthritis were randomized to either a cup with porous titanium construct backside (porous titanium group, n = 25) or a conventional porous coated titanium cup (control group, n = 26). The primary outcome variable was change in periacetabular bone mineral density two years after surgery measured with dual energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA). Secondary outcomes were implant fixation measured with radiostereometry (RSA) and clinical outcome scores. The pattern of bone remodelling was similar in the two groups with almost complete restoration to baseline values. BMD diminished in the two proximal zones and increased in the two distal zones. After minimal migration up to six months all implants in both groups became stable. We found no difference between the two groups in clinical outcome scores. In this prospective, randomized, controlled trial on a new porous titanium cup we found, compared to the control group, no clinically relevant differences regarding periacetabular bone preservation, implant fixation or clinical outcome up to two years postoperatively. |
A scalable approach to computing representative lowest common ancestor in directed acyclic graphs | LCA computation for vertex pairs in trees can be achieved in constant time after linear-time preprocessing. However, extension of these techniques to compute LCA for vertex-pairs in DAGs has been not possible due to the non-tree edges in a DAG. In this paper, we present an algorithm for computing the LCA for vertex pairs in a DAG which treats the DAG’s spanning tree and its non-tree edges separately. Our approach enables us to tap the efficiency of existing LCA algorithms for trees. Furthermore, our algorithm decomposes the DAG into a set of component trees called clusters which significantly reduces the preprocessing necessary to incorporate non-tree edges in the LCA computation. Our algorithm seamlessly interpolates the performance graph between the best reported algorithms for trees and the best reported algorithms for DAGs depending on the incidence of non-tree edges in the DAG. Using the proposed techniques, it is possible to achieve nearlinear preprocessing and constant query time for sparse DAGs. |
Approximate entropy (ApEn) as a complexity measure. | Approximate entropy (ApEn) is a recently developed statistic quantifying regularity and complexity, which appears to have potential application to a wide variety of relatively short (greater than 100 points) and noisy time-series data. The development of ApEn was motivated by data length constraints commonly encountered, e.g., in heart rate, EEG, and endocrine hormone secretion data sets. We describe ApEn implementation and interpretation, indicating its utility to distinguish correlated stochastic processes, and composite deterministic/ stochastic models. We discuss the key technical idea that motivates ApEn, that one need not fully reconstruct an attractor to discriminate in a statistically valid manner-marginal probability distributions often suffice for this purpose. Finally, we discuss why algorithms to compute, e.g., correlation dimension and the Kolmogorov-Sinai (KS) entropy, often work well for true dynamical systems, yet sometimes operationally confound for general models, with the aid of visual representations of reconstructed dynamics for two contrasting processes. (c) 1995 American Institute of Physics. |
Neural Extractive Text Summarization with Syntactic Compression | Recent neural network approaches to summarization are largely either sentence-extractive, choosing a set of sentences as the summary, or abstractive, generating the summary from a seq2seq model. In this work, we present a neural model for single-document summarization based on joint extraction and compression. Following recent successful extractive models, we frame the summarization problem as a series of local decisions. Our model chooses sentences from the document and then decides which of a set of compression options to apply to each selected sentence. We compute this set of options using discrete compression rules based on syntactic constituency parses; however, our approach is modular and can flexibly use any available source of compressions. For learning, we construct oracle extractive-compressive summaries that reflect uncertainty over our model’s decision sequence, then learn both of our components jointly with this supervision. Experimental results on the CNN/Daily Mail and New York Times datasets show that our model achieves the state-of-the-art performance on content selection evaluated by ROUGE. Moreover, human and manual evaluation show that our model’s output generally remains grammatical. |
Real-time non-rigid reconstruction using an RGB-D camera | We present a combined hardware and software solution for markerless reconstruction of non-rigidly deforming physical objects with arbitrary shape in real-time. Our system uses a single self-contained stereo camera unit built from off-the-shelf components and consumer graphics hardware to generate spatio-temporally coherent 3D models at 30 Hz. A new stereo matching algorithm estimates real-time RGB-D data. We start by scanning a smooth template model of the subject as they move rigidly. This geometric surface prior avoids strong scene assumptions, such as a kinematic human skeleton or a parametric shape model. Next, a novel GPU pipeline performs non-rigid registration of live RGB-D data to the smooth template using an extended non-linear as-rigid-as-possible (ARAP) framework. High-frequency details are fused onto the final mesh using a linear deformation model. The system is an order of magnitude faster than state-of-the-art methods, while matching the quality and robustness of many offline algorithms. We show precise real-time reconstructions of diverse scenes, including: large deformations of users' heads, hands, and upper bodies; fine-scale wrinkles and folds of skin and clothing; and non-rigid interactions performed by users on flexible objects such as toys. We demonstrate how acquired models can be used for many interactive scenarios, including re-texturing, online performance capture and preview, and real-time shape and motion re-targeting. |
Characterizing debate performance via aggregated twitter sentiment | Television broadcasters are beginning to combine social micro-blogging systems such as Twitter with television to create social video experiences around events. We looked at one such event, the first U.S. presidential debate in 2008, in conjunction with aggregated ratings of message sentiment from Twitter. We begin to develop an analytical methodology and visual representations that could help a journalist or public affairs person better understand the temporal dynamics of sentiment in reaction to the debate video. We demonstrate visuals and metrics that can be used to detect sentiment pulse, anomalies in that pulse, and indications of controversial topics that can be used to inform the design of visual analytic systems for social media events. |
A 3 DOF Piezohydraulic Parallel Micromanipulator | The paper presents a new parallel micromanipulator that is composed of three piezohydraulic actuation systems. The basic elements of the actuation system are a piezoelectric actuator, a bellows and hydraulic oil. The use of the flexible bellows results in a new type of parallel structure, where the joints are integrated into actuator links. The joint-free tripod-like micromanipulator is controlled using a real-time control software that is based on a multi-level architecture. Control is organised in four levels for non-linearity compensation, position feedback control, supervision and tackling of automatic operations. The presented micromanipulator provides an exceptional combination of submicrometer resolution, large work space, miniature size and advanced control. |
Caffeine and the central nervous system: mechanisms of action, biochemical, metabolic and psychostimulant effects | Caffeine is the most widely consumed central-nervous-system stimulant. Three main mechanisms of action of caffeine on the central nervous system have been described. Mobilization of intracellular calcium and inhibition of specific phosphodiesterases only occur at high non-physiological concentrations of caffeine. The only likely mechanism of action of the methylxanthine is the antagonism at the level of adenosine receptors. Caffeine increases energy metabolism throughout the brain but decreases at the same time cerebral blood flow, inducing a relative brain hypoperfusion. Caffeine activates noradrenaline neurons and seems to affect the local release of dopamine. Many of the alerting effects of caffeine may be related to the action of the methylxanthine on serotonin neurons. The methylxanthine induces dose-response increases in locomotor activity in animals. Its psychostimulant action on man is, however, often subtle and not very easy to detect. The effects of caffeine on learning, memory, performance and coordination are rather related to the methylxanthine action on arousal, vigilance and fatigue. Caffeine exerts obvious effects on anxiety and sleep which vary according to individual sensitivity to the methylxanthine. However, children in general do not appear more sensitive to methylxanthine effects than adults. The central nervous system does not seem to develop a great tolerance to the effects of caffeine although dependence and withdrawal symptoms are reported. |
The sweet taste of success: the presence of glucose in the oral cavity moderates the depletion of self-control resources. | According to the resource-depletion model, self-control is a limited resource that is depleted after a period of exertion. Evidence consistent with this model indicates that self-control relies on glucose metabolism and glucose supplementation to depleted individuals replenishes self-control resources. In five experiments, we tested an alternative hypothesis that glucose in the oral cavity counteracts the deleterious effects of self-control depletion. We predicted a glucose mouth rinse, as opposed to an artificially sweetened placebo rinse, would lead to better self-control after depletion. In Studies 1 to 3, participants engaging in a depleting task performed significantly better on a subsequent self-control task after receiving a glucose mouth rinse, as opposed to participants rinsing with a placebo. Studies 4 and 5 replicated these findings and demonstrated that the glucose mouth rinse had no effect on self-control in nondepleted participants. Results are consistent with a neural rather than metabolic mechanism for the effect of glucose supplementation on self-control. |
Contemplative meditation reduces ambulatory blood pressure and stress-induced hypertension: a randomized pilot trial | A total of 52 pharmacologically untreated subjects with essential hypertension were randomly allocated to either 8 weeks of contemplative meditation combined with breathing techniques (CMBT) or no intervention in this observer-blind controlled pilot trial. CMBT induced clinically relevant and consistent decreases in heart rate, systolic and diastolic blood pressure if measured during office readings, 24-h ambulatory monitoring and mental stress test. Longer-term studies should evaluate CMBT as an antihypertensive strategy. |
Biomimetics: its practice and theory. | Biomimetics, a name coined by Otto Schmitt in the 1950s for the transfer of ideas and analogues from biology to technology, has produced some significant and successful devices and concepts in the past 50 years, but is still empirical. We show that TRIZ, the Russian system of problem solving, can be adapted to illuminate and manipulate this process of transfer. Analysis using TRIZ shows that there is only 12% similarity between biology and technology in the principles which solutions to problems illustrate, and while technology solves problems largely by manipulating usage of energy, biology uses information and structure, two factors largely ignored by technology. |
Belowground nitrogen partitioning in experimental grassland plant communities of varying species richness. | Partitioning of soil nitrogen (N) by niche separation among species may be an important mechanism explaining species coexistence and positive biodiversity-productivity relationships in terrestrial plant communities. However, there is little experimental evidence for such partitioning, in particular, as assessed across a gradient of species richness. In experimental communities of one, three, and six temperate grassland species in the field, we tested whether increasing species richness (1) decreases niche breadths of individual species, (2) decreases niche overlap among species, and (3) increases niche breadth of whole communities. Six N sources consisting of three different chemical forms of 15N-labeled N (15NO3(-), 15NH4+, 13C2-15N-glycine) injected at two soil depths (3 and 12 cm) were applied to each community. The chemical form and the soil depth of N characterize the niches for which niche breadth (Levins' B) and overlap (proportional similarity) were measured. After 48 hours, aboveground plant material was harvested to measure 15N enrichment. As expected, niche breadth of single species and niche overlap among species decreased with increased species richness, but community niche breadth did not increase. The decrease in niche breadth and niche overlap mostly occurred among subordinate species or pairs of subordinate and dominant species, rather than among dominant species. Species in the six-species mixtures mostly preferred NO3(-) from shallow soil. This may be partly explained by the presence of legumes in all six-species mixtures which allowed "N sparing" (i.e., increased availability of soil N since legumes rely more on atmospheric N2 than on soil N). Niche separation with respect to N uptake from different chemical forms and soil depths did not contribute much to facilitating the coexistence of dominant species, nor do our results suggest it as a major driver of positive diversity-ecosystem functioning relationships. However, partitioning of N may be important for the persistence of subordinate species. |
Efficient ConvNet for real-time semantic segmentation | Semantic segmentation is a task that covers most of the perception needs of intelligent vehicles in an unified way. ConvNets excel at this task, as they can be trained end-to-end to accurately classify multiple object categories in an image at the pixel level. However, current approaches normally involve complex architectures that are expensive in terms of computational resources and are not feasible for ITS applications. In this paper, we propose a deep architecture that is able to run in real-time while providing accurate semantic segmentation. The core of our ConvNet is a novel layer that uses residual connections and factorized convolutions in order to remain highly efficient while still retaining remarkable performance. Our network is able to run at 83 FPS in a single Titan X, and at more than 7 FPS in a Jetson TX1 (embedded GPU). A comprehensive set of experiments demonstrates that our system, trained from scratch on the challenging Cityscapes dataset, achieves a classification performance that is among the state of the art, while being orders of magnitude faster to compute than other architectures that achieve top precision. This makes our model an ideal approach for scene understanding in intelligent vehicles applications. |
Omnidirectional Circularly Polarized Antenna Combining Monopole and Loop Radiators | In this letter, a new omnidirectional circularly polarized (CP) antenna is proposed. By adopting a coaxial probe, in which a metal sleeve acts as a monopole, and printed spoke-like metal strips fabricated on two substrates, which act as a loop, this antenna exhibits an omnidirectional circularly polarized radiation in the azimuthal plane. Theory, design, simulation, and experiment of the antenna are presented. Measurement results show that the proposed antenna can achieve a -10-dB impedance bandwidth of 13.8% (ranges from 1.55 to 1.78 GHz) and a 3-dB axial-ratio (AR) bandwidth of 17.5% (ranges from 1.46 to 1.74 GHz) in the azimuthal plane. At the frequency of 1.575 GHz, the measured average axial ratio and right-hand CP (RHCP) gain are 1.91 dB and 0.86 dBi, respectively, in the azimuthal plane. |
Design Decisions: The Bridge between Rationale and Architecture | Software architecture can be seen as a decision making process; it involves making the right decisions at the right time. Typically, these design decisions are not explicitly represented in the artifacts describing the design. They reside in the minds of the designers and are therefore easily lost. Rationale management is often proposed as a solution, but lacks a close relationship with software architecture artifacts. Explicit modeling of design decisions in the software architecture bridges this gap, as it allows for a close integration of rationale management with software architecture. This improves the understandability of the software architecture. Consequently, the software architecture becomes easier to communicate, maintain and evolve. Furthermore, it allows for analysis, improvement, and reuse of design decisions in the design process. |
Local path planning in a complex environment for self-driving car | This paper introduces an local path planning algorithm for the self-driving car in a complex environment. The proposed algorithm is composed of three parts: the novel path representation, the collision detection and the path modification using a voronoi cell. The novel path representation provides convenience for checking the collision and modifying the path and continuous control input for steering wheel rather than way point navigation. The proposed algorithm were applied to the self-driving car, EureCar(KAIST) and its applicability and feasibility of real time use were validated. |
Effects of Balloon Pulmonary Angioplasty on Oxygenation in Patients With Chronic Thromboembolic Pulmonary Hypertension - Importance of Intrapulmonary Shunt. | BACKGROUND
Although balloon pulmonary angioplasty (BPA) improves the hemodynamics and prognosis of patients with inoperable chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension (CTEPH), the mechanisms of improvement in oxygenation remain to be elucidated.
METHODSANDRESULTS
From August 2013 to May 2015, we performed a total of 113 BPA procedures in 24 patients with inoperable CTEPH (mean 4.7 procedures per patient). Median age was 70 [60, 74] years and 18 were female (75%). We examined hemodynamics, respiratory functions, and intrapulmonary shunt before and after the BPA procedure. Mean pulmonary arterial pressure (37 [28, 45] to 23[19, 27] mmHg, P<0.01), pulmonary vascular resistance (517 [389, 696] to 268 [239, 345] dyne/s/cm(5)) and 6-min walk distance (390 [286, 484] to 490 [411, 617] m, P<0.01) were significantly improved after BPA therapy. Furthermore, arterial oxygen partial pressure (PaO2, 54.8 [50.0, 60.8] to 65.2 [60.6, 73.2] %, P<0.01) and intrapulmonary shunt (23.4±6.0% to 19.3±5.0%, P<0.01) were also significantly ameliorated. In the multivariate analysis, decrease in intrapulmonary shunt after BPA was significantly correlated with improvement of both PaO2(r(2)=0.26, P<0.01) and SaO2(r(2)=0.49, P<0.01) after BPA.
CONCLUSIONS
These results indicated that BPA improved not only pulmonary hemodynamics but also oxygenation with a resultant decrease in intrapulmonary shunt. (Circ J 2016; 80: 2227-2234). |
Deep Structured Output Learning for Unconstrained Text Recognition | We develop a representation suitable for the unconstrained recognition of words in natural images, where unconstrained means that there is no fixed lexicon and words have unknown length. To this end we propose a convolutional neural network (CNN) based architecture which incorporates a Conditional Random Field (CRF) graphical model, taking the whole word image as a single input. The unaries of the CRF are provided by a CNN that predicts characters at each position of the output, while higher order terms are provided by another CNN that detects the presence of N-grams. We show that this entire model (CRF, character predictor, N-gram predictor) can be jointly optimised by back-propagating the structured output loss, essentially requiring the system to perform multi-task learning, and training requires only synthetically generated data. The resulting model is a more accurate system on standard real-world text recognition benchmarks than character prediction alone, setting a benchmark for systems that have not been trained on a particular lexicon. In addition, our model achieves state-of-the-art accuracy in lexicon-constrained scenarios, without being specifically modelled for constrained recognition. To test the generalisation of our model, we also perform experiments with random alpha-numeric strings to evaluate the method when no visual language model is applicable. |
Self-determination theory and work motivation | Cognitive evaluation theory, which explains the effects of extrinsic motivators on intrinsic motivation, received some initial attention in the organizational literature. However, the simple dichotomy between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation made the theory difficult to apply to work settings. Differentiating extrinsic motivation into types that differ in their degree of autonomy led to self-determination theory, which has received widespread attention in the education, health care, and sport domains. This article describes self-determination theory as a theory of work motivation and shows its relevance to theories of organizational behavior. Copyright # 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. |
On the Stability of the Passive Dynamics of Quadrupedal Running with a Bounding Gait | This paper examines the passive dynamics of quadrupedal bounding. First, an unexpected difference between local and global behavior of the forward speed versus touchdown angle in the selfstabilized Spring Loaded Inverted Pendulum (SLIP) model is exposed and discussed. Next, the stability properties of a simplified sagittal plane model of our Scout II quadrupedal robot are investigated. Despite its simplicity, this model captures the targeted steady state behavior of Scout II without dependence on the fine details of the robot structure. Two variations of the bounding gait, which are observed experimentally in Scout II, are considered. Surprisingly, numerical return map studies reveal that passive generation of a large variety of cyclic bounding motion is possible. Most strikingly, local stability analysis shows that the dynamics of the open loop passive system alone can confer stability to the motion! These results can be used in developing a general control methodology for legged robots, resulting from the synthesis of feedforward and feedback models that take advantage of the mechanical sysPortions of this paper have previously appeared in conference publications Poulakakis, Papadopoulos, and Buehler (2003) and Poulakakis, Smith, and Buehler (2005b). The first and third authors were with the Centre for Intelligent Machines at McGill University when this work was performed. Address all correspondence related to this paper to the first author. The International Journal of Robotics Research Vol. 25, No. 7, July 2006, pp. 669-687 DOI: 10.1177/0278364906066768 ©2006 SAGE Publications Figures appear in color online: http://ijr.sagepub.com tem, and might explain the success of simple, open loop bounding controllers on our experimental robot. KEY WORDS—passive dynamics, bounding gait, dynamic running, quadrupedal robot |
Cross-Site Scripting Attacks in Social Network APIs | Nowadays, it is becoming more popular that RESTful APIs are used by web developers to enhance the functionality of websites. However, this might raise potential XSS attack threats. Unlike traditional XSS attacks, XSS attacks in this scenario may take advantage of more characteristics of RESTful APIs. RESTful APIs are common in social networks. Consequently, in this paper, we took social networks as motivating examples to illustrate XSS attacks in |
Scars, marks and tattoos (SMT): Soft biometric for suspect and victim identification | Scars, marks and tattoos (SMT) are being increasingly used for suspect and victim identification in forensics and law enforcement agencies. Tattoos, in particular, are getting serious attention because of their visual and demographic characteristics as well as their increasing prevalence. However, current tattoo matching procedure requires human-assigned class labels in the ANSI/NIST ITL 1-2000 standard which makes it time consuming and subjective with limited retrieval performance. Further, tattoo images are complex and often contain multiple objects with large intra-class variability, making it very difficult to assign a single category in the ANSI/NIST standard. We describe a content-based image retrieval (CBIR) system for matching and retrieving tattoo images. Based on scale invariant feature transform (SIFT) features extracted from tattoo images and optional accompanying demographical information, our system computes feature-based similarity between the query tattoo image and tattoos in the criminal database. Experimental results on two different tattoo databases show encouraging results. |
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