LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
Influence of Etching Protocol and Silane Treatment with a Universal Adhesive on Lithium Disilicate Bond Strength.

OBJECTIVES
To measure the effects of hydrofluoric acid (HF) etching and silane prior to the application of a universal adhesive on the bond strength between lithium disilicate and a resin.


METHODS AND MATERIALS
Sixty blocks of lithium disilicate (e.max CAD, Ivoclar Vivadent) were sectioned into coupons and polished. Specimens were divided into six groups (n=10) based on surface pretreatments, as follows: 1) no treatment (control); 2) 5% HF etch for 20 seconds (5HF); 3) 9.5% HF etch for 60 seconds (9.5HF); 4) silane with no HF (S); 5) 5% HF for 20 seconds + silane (5HFS); and 6) 9.5% HF for 60 seconds + silane (9.5HFS). All etching was followed by rinsing, and all silane was applied in one coat for 20 seconds and then dried. The universal adhesive (Scotchbond Universal, 3M ESPE) was applied onto the pretreated ceramic surface, air thinned, and light cured for 10 seconds. A 1.5-mm-diameter plastic tube filled with Z100 composite (3M ESPE) was applied over the bonded ceramic surface and light cured for 20 seconds on all four sides. The specimens were thermocycled for 10,000 cycles (5°C-50°C/15 s dwell time). Specimens were loaded until failure using a universal testing machine at a crosshead speed of 1 mm/min. The peak failure load was used to calculate the shear bond strength. Scanning electron microscopy images were taken of representative e.max specimens from each group.


RESULTS
A two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) determined that there were significant differences between HF etching, silane treatment, and the interaction between HF and silane treatment (p<0.01). Silane treatment provided higher shear bond strength regardless of the use or concentration of the HF etchant. Individual one-way ANOVA and Tukey post hoc analyses were performed for each silane group. Shear bond strength values for each etch time were significantly different (p<0.01) and could be divided into significantly different groups based on silane treatment: no silane treatment: 0 HF < 5% HF < 9.5% HF; and RelyX silane treatment: 0 HF < 5% HF and 9.5% HF.


CONCLUSIONS
Both HF and silane treatment significantly improved the bond strength between resin and lithium disilicate when used with a universal adhesive.
Symptoms and impact of COPD assessed by an electronic diary in patients with moderate-to-severe COPD: psychometric results from the SHINE study

BACKGROUND
Symptoms, particularly dyspnea, and activity limitation, have an impact on the health status and the ability to function normally in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).


METHODS
To develop an electronic patient diary (eDiary), qualitative patient interviews were conducted from 2009 to 2010 to identify relevant symptoms and degree of bother due to symptoms. The eDiary was completed by a subset of 209 patients with moderate-to-severe COPD in the 26-week QVA149 SHINE study. Two morning assessments (since awakening and since the last assessment) and one evening assessment were made each day. Assessments covered five symptoms ("shortness of breath," "phlegm/mucus," "chest tightness," "wheezing," and "coughing") and two impact items ("bothered by COPD" and "difficulty with activities") and were scored on a 10-point numeric scale.


RESULTS
Patient compliance with the eDiary was 90.4% at baseline and 81.3% at week 26. Correlations between shortness of breath and impact items were >0.95. Regression analysis showed that shortness of breath was a highly significant (P<0.0001) predictor of impact items. Exploratory factor analysis gave a single factor comprising all eDiary items, including both symptoms and impact items. Shortness of breath, the total score (including five symptoms and two impact items), and the five-item symptom score from the eDiary performed well, with good consistency and reliability. The eDiary showed good sensitivity to change, with a 0.6 points reduction in the symptoms scores (on a 0-10 point scale) representing a meaningful change.


CONCLUSION
The eDiary was found to be valid, reliable, and responsive. The high correlations obtained between "shortness of breath" and the ratings of "bother" and "difficulty with activities" confirmed the relevance of this symptom in patients with COPD. Future studies will be required to explore further psychometric properties and their ability to differentiate between COPD treatments.
Ovarian endometrioma in the adolescent: a plea for early-stage diagnosis and full surgical treatment

The incidence and severity of endometriosis in adolescent are comparable with the incidence in adult women. The mean delay between the onset of symptoms and the final diagnosis varies between 6.4 and 11.7 years. The longer the diagnosis is delayed, the more the endometriosis can progress to a more severe stage certainly in the group of patients with pelvic pain. The evolution of endometriosis and its progressivity are not predictable, and the severity of the disease is not directly related to the degree of pain. Endometriotic cysts have a detrimental effect on the ovarian reserve by the evolution in time and the surgical excision technique. Already, in small endometriotic cysts (<4 cm), loss of follicular reserve is present together with the formation of fibrosis in the cortex of the ovary. Early diagnosis of endometriosis in the adolescent deserves our full attention. Non-invasive imaging techniques like 2-D and 3-D ultrasound are helpful in the early diagnosis. Early ablative surgery is recommendable. Although laparoscopy is traditionally recommended, transvaginal laparoscopy has been shown to be most effective in ablating endometriomas with a maximum diameter of 3 cm. Early detection and intervention will contribute to a better quality of life in these adolescents and also to a lower damage of the ovarian tissue by a less invasive ablative surgery.
A modified parallel approach to Single Source Shortest Path Problem for massively dense graphs using CUDA

Today's Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) possess enormous computation power with highly parallel and multithreaded architecture, and the most attractive feature being their low costs. NVIDIA's CUDA provides an interface to the developers to use the GPUs for General Purpose Parallel Computing. In this paper, we present a modified algorithm of Single Source Shortest Path Problem on GPU using CUDA. First, we modify the standard BELLMAN-FORD algorithm to remove its drawbacks and make it suitable for parallel implementation, and then implement it using CUDA. For dense graphs, our Algorithm gains a speedup of 10×–12× over the previously proposed parallel algorithm. Our Algorithm also accept graphs with negative weighted edges and can detect any reachable Negative Weighted Cycle, which widens its scope to accept generalized problems.
Key Management Mechanisms in Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are wireless ad hoc networks of tiny sensor nodes increasingly deployed for multiple civilian and military applications, including patient monitoring, wildlife monitoring, battlefield surveillance, enemy tracking, etc. Like other computer networks, WSNs must be provided of security services such as key management, confidentiality, integrity and authentication. However, the nature of WSNs and their operational requirements introduce new exciting challenges on security design. Key management is a fundamental security service and a hot topic of research in security for WSNs. In this paper, we will review the state of the art on key management for WSNs and provide a glimpse on current and future developments in this area.
Educational gradient in HIV diagnosis delay, mortality, antiretroviral treatment initiation and response in a country with universal health care.

BACKGROUND
The aim of this study was to analyse associations between educational level and delayed HIV diagnosis (DD), late initiation of combined antiretroviral therapy (cART), overall and in subjects with timely HIV diagnosis, virological and immunological responses to cART, and mortality from HIV diagnosis and cART initiation.


METHODS
This was a multicentre cohort study of HIV-positive treatment-naive subjects in Spain between 2004-2009. Logistic and Cox regression analyses were used.


RESULTS
Of 4,549 subjects, 44.5% had low education level (LOW), 34.4% medium education level (MED) and 21.1% high education level (HIG). In men, DD was more common in MED (OR 1.3 [95% CI 1.0, 1.7]) or LOW [OR 1.8 (95% CI 1.4, 2.3)] compared to HIG. In women, the opposite was observed; women with HIG were 40% more likely to have DD than those with LOW (OR 1.4 [95% CI 0.8, 2.5]). In individuals with timely HIV diagnoses, percentages of late cART initiators were similar (LOW 9.5%, MED 11.4% and HIG 7.0%; P=0.114). Immunological (LOW 68%, MED 76% and HIG 84%) and virological (LOW 76%, MED 83% and HIG 86%) responses to cART increased significantly with educational level; these increases remained significant in multivariate analyses. Mortality for LOW subjects was higher than for HIG, from HIV diagnosis (hazard ratio [HR] 2.3 [95% CI 1.1, 4.9]) and from cART initiation (HR 1.8 [95% CI 0.8, 3.9]).


CONCLUSIONS
We found important differences by educational level in diagnosis delay, virological and immunological responses to cART and mortality in a country with universal health care. Women with high educational level are at higher risk of having delayed HIV diagnoses. Educational level should be taken into account when designing HIV testing and clinical management strategies.
Electrical Impedance Tomography: Tissue Properties to Image Measures

Electrical impedance tomography (EIT) uses electrical stimulation and measurement at the body surface to image the electrical properties of internal tissues. It has the advantage of noninvasiveness and high temporal resolution but suffers from poor spatial resolution and sensitivity to electrode movement and contact quality. EIT can be useful to applications, where there are conductive contrasts between tissues, fluids, or gasses, such as imaging of cancerous or ischemic tissue or functional monitoring of breathing, blood flow, gastric motility, and neural activity. The past decade has seen clinical application and commercial activity using EIT for ventilation monitoring. Interpretation of EIT-based measures is complex, and this review paper focuses on describing the image interpretation “pathway.” We review this pathway, from Tissue Electrical Properties, EIT Electrodes & Hardware, Sensitivity, Image Reconstruction, Image Processing to EIT Measures. The relationship is discussed between the clinically relevant parameters and the reconstructed properties. An overview is given of areas of EIT application and of our perspectives for research and development.
The Examination of the Effect of Ownership Structure on Firm Performance in Listed Firms of Tehran Stock Exchange Based on the Type of the Industry

This study is aimed to determine the role of ownership structure on firm performance. Using panel data regression analysis method, the role of variables of ownership structure which includes: ownership concentration, institutional ownership and institutional ownership concentration have been examined for 137 listed firms of Tehran stock exchange within the period 2001 to 2006. It is concluded that ownership concentration doesn’t have any significant effect on firm performance but the effect of two other variables are significant: institutional ownership has positive significant effect on firm performance but the effect of concentrated institutional ownership is negative. In the next part of this research the effect of ownership structure on firm performance based on type of the industry has been studied and it is concluded that the industry factor moderates this effectiveness relationship. The findings of this research shed light on the role of ownership structure plays in corporate performance and thus offer insights to policy makers interested in improving corporate governance system.
Efficient method-of-moments formulation for the modeling of planar conductive layers in a shielded guided-wave structure

An electric field integral equation formulation discretized via the method of moments (MoM) is proposed for the analysis of arbitrarily shaped planar conductive layers in a shielded guided-wave structure. The method results in a Generalized Scattering Matrix (GSM) for the planar structure and can be used with other GSMs, derived using this or other techniques, to model cascaded structures in waveguide. The Kummer transformation is applied to accelerate slowly converging double series expansions of impedance matrix elements obtained in the MoM solution. In this transformation the quasi-static part associated with a singularity of the electric-type Green’s function in the region of a conductive layer is extracted and evaluated in terms of modified Bessel functions resulting in a dramatic reduction of terms in a double series summation. The proposed technique permits the modeling of a variety of conductive frequency selective surfaces, including quasi-optical grids and patch arrays for application to spatial power combining.
Introduction to The Digital Supply Chain of the Future: Technologies, Applications and Business Models Minitrack

The following paper describes the mini-track on the digital supply chain of the future. After an introduction to the topic the different papers are addressed and integrated into an overall context. At the end of the text we added some recommendations concerning future research on the digital transformation of companies, business models and supply chains.
Turbo decoding for partial response channels

The partial response channel can be viewed as a rate-1 encoder in which the output alphabet differs from the input alphabet. In serially concatenated coding schemes, the partial response channel can serve as the inner encoder. Recent work on the application of turbo decoding techniques to partial response channels has focused on using a parallel concatenation of convolutional encoders as the outer code and the partial response channel as the inner code. This system requires three a posteriori probability (APP) detectors—one matched to the channel and two matched to the constituent encoders. A simplified system will be presented that uses as its outer code a single convolutional code and as its inner code the partial response channel. The simplified system requires only two APP detectors, offering significant savings in complexity and computation time. This single convolutional code system will be shown to perform as well as the more complicated system, offering substantial gains over uncoded systems. Simulation results for three magnetic recording channel models will be presented: a partial response channel with additive white Gaussian noise, an equalized Lorentzian channel model, and a media noise model called the microtrack model. Since the use of an outer Reed–Solomon code is anticipated in an actual system, the burst-error statistics are investigated. System performance with various interleaver designs and precoders is also investigated.
Effectiveness of early physiotherapy to prevent lymphoedema after surgery for breast cancer: randomised, single blinded, clinical trial

OBJECTIVE
To determine the effectiveness of early physiotherapy in reducing the risk of secondary lymphoedema after surgery for breast cancer.


DESIGN
Randomised, single blinded, clinical trial.


SETTING
University hospital in Alcalá de Henares, Madrid, Spain.


PARTICIPANTS
120 women who had breast surgery involving dissection of axillary lymph nodes between May 2005 and June 2007.


INTERVENTION
The early physiotherapy group was treated by a physiotherapist with a physiotherapy programme including manual lymph drainage, massage of scar tissue, and progressive active and action assisted shoulder exercises. This group also received an educational strategy. The control group received the educational strategy only.


MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE
Incidence of clinically significant secondary lymphoedema (>2 cm increase in arm circumference measured at two adjacent points compared with the non-affected arm).


RESULTS
116 women completed the one year follow-up. Of these, 18 developed secondary lymphoedema (16%): 14 in the control group (25%) and four in the intervention group (7%). The difference was significant (P=0.01); risk ratio 0.28 (95% confidence interval 0.10 to 0.79). A survival analysis showed a significant difference, with secondary lymphoedema being diagnosed four times earlier in the control group than in the intervention group (intervention/control, hazard ratio 0.26, 95% confidence interval 0.09 to 0.79).


CONCLUSION
Early physiotherapy could be an effective intervention in the prevention of secondary lymphoedema in women for at least one year after surgery for breast cancer involving dissection of axillary lymph nodes.


TRIAL REGISTRATION
Current controlled trials ISRCTN95870846.
A linear goal programming priority method for fuzzy analytic hierarchy process and its applications in new product screening

Fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (AHP) has been widely used for a variety of applications such as supplier selection, customer requirements assessment and the like. The vast majority of the applications, however, were found avoiding the use of sophisticated approaches for fuzzy AHP such as fuzzy least squares method while using a simple extent analysis for the sake of simplicity. The extent analysis proves to be incorrect and may lead to a wrong decision being made. This paper proposes a sound yet simple priority method for fuzzy AHP which utilizes a linear goal programming (LGP) model to derive normalized fuzzy weights for fuzzy pairwise comparison matrices. The proposed LGP priority method is tested with three numerical examples including an application of fuzzy AHP to new product development (NDP) project screening decision making. 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Maternal mortality and severe morbidity associated with low-risk planned cesarean delivery versus planned vaginal delivery at term.

BACKGROUND
The rate of elective primary cesarean delivery continues to rise, owing in part to the widespread perception that the procedure is of little or no risk to healthy women.


METHODS
Using the Canadian Institute for Health Information's Discharge Abstract Database, we carried out a retrospective population-based cohort study of all women in Canada (excluding Quebec and Manitoba) who delivered from April 1991 through March 2005. Healthy women who underwent a primary cesarean delivery for breech presentation constituted a surrogate "planned cesarean group" considered to have undergone low-risk elective cesarean delivery, for comparison with an otherwise similar group of women who had planned to deliver vaginally.


RESULTS
The planned cesarean group comprised 46,766 women v. 2,292,420 in the planned vaginal delivery group; overall rates of severe morbidity for the entire 14-year period were 27.3 and 9.0, respectively, per 1000 deliveries. The planned cesarean group had increased postpartum risks of cardiac arrest (adjusted odds ratio [OR] 5.1, 95% confidence interval [CI] 4.1-6.3), wound hematoma (OR 5.1, 95% CI 4.6-5.5), hysterectomy (OR 3.2, 95% CI 2.2-4.8), major puerperal infection (OR 3.0, 95% CI 2.7-3.4), anesthetic complications (OR 2.3, 95% CI 2.0-2.6), venous thromboembolism (OR 2.2, 95% CI 1.5-3.2) and hemorrhage requiring hysterectomy (OR 2.1, 95% CI 1.2-3.8), and stayed in hospital longer (adjusted mean difference 1.47 d, 95% CI 1.46-1.49 d) than those in the planned vaginal delivery group, but a lower risk of hemorrhage requiring blood transfusion (OR 0.4, 95% CI 0.2-0.8). Absolute risk increases in severe maternal morbidity rates were low (e.g., for postpartum cardiac arrest, the increase with planned cesarean delivery was 1.6 per 1000 deliveries, 95% CI 1.2-2.1). The difference in the rate of in-hospital maternal death between the 2 groups was nonsignificant (p = 0.87).


INTERPRETATION
Although the absolute difference is small, the risks of severe maternal morbidity associated with planned cesarean delivery are higher than those associated with planned vaginal delivery. These risks should be considered by women contemplating an elective cesarean delivery and by their physicians.
Early intensive care unit mobility therapy in the treatment of acute respiratory failure.

OBJECTIVE
Immobilization and subsequent weakness are consequences of critical illness. Despite the theoretical advantages of physical therapy to address this problem, it has not been shown that physical therapy initiated in the intensive care unit offers benefit.


DESIGN AND SETTING
Prospective cohort study in a university medical intensive care unit that assessed whether a mobility protocol increased the proportion of intensive care unit patients receiving physical therapy vs. usual care.


PATIENTS
Medical intensive care unit patients with acute respiratory failure requiring mechanical ventilation on admission: Protocol, n = 165; Usual Care, n = 165.


INTERVENTIONS
An intensive care unit Mobility Team (critical care nurse, nursing assistant, physical therapist) initiated the protocol within 48 hrs of mechanical ventilation.


MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS
The primary outcome was the proportion of patients receiving physical therapy in patients surviving to hospital discharge. Baseline characteristics were similar between groups. Outcome data are reflective of survivors. More Protocol patients received at least one physical therapy session than did Usual Care (80% vs. 47%, p < or = .001). Protocol patients were out of bed earlier (5 vs. 11 days, p < or = .001), had therapy initiated more frequently in the intensive care unit (91% vs. 13%, p < or = .001), and had similar low complication rates compared with Usual Care. For Protocol patients, intensive care unit length of stay was 5.5 vs. 6.9 days for Usual Care (p = .025); hospital length of stay for Protocol patients was 11.2 vs. 14.5 days for Usual Care (p = .006) (intensive care unit/hospital length of stay adjusted for body mass index, Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation II, vasopressor). There were no untoward events during an intensive care unit Mobility session and no cost difference (survivors + nonsurvivors) between the two arms, including Mobility Team costs.


CONCLUSIONS
A Mobility Team using a mobility protocol initiated earlier physical therapy that was feasible, safe, did not increase costs, and was associated with decreased intensive care unit and hospital length of stay in survivors who received physical therapy during intensive care unit treatment compared with patients who received usual care.