LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
Microstrip Rat-Race Couplers

With the rapid development of modern wireless communication systems, the desirable miniaturization, multifunctionality strong harmonic suppression, and enhanced bandwidth of the rat-race coupler has generated much interest and continues to be a focus of research. Whether the current rat-race coupler is sufficient to adapt to the future development of microwave systems has become a heated topic.
Developing New Processes for COTS-Based Systems

processes, 4,5 no one has yet comprehensively described the processes—engineering, business , and management—that arise or change in response to this growing use of COTS products and technology. While such factors as domain and life cycle stage prevent any one process from working for all CBS projects, we can define and organize the activities common to most endeavors. At the Software Engineering Institute , we are developing a CBS process framework for guiding projects during their detailed planning. The preliminary results described here arise from our work with over 30 medium-sized and large projects, ranging from business information management systems to embedded weapon and military command and control systems. 6–8 We have captured information about the engineering, business, and management practices that worked and those that did not. After analyzing this information to understand and characterize the common points of success and failure, we also identified where projects departed from traditional development processes. This article will identify the resulting process changes required to address these real-life lessons and articulate a framework for organizing the new and changed process elements. CBS Process Drivers In lieu of coding components, many CBS developers assume they can just " plug in " COTS products. They assume using COTS products will shorten their programming and testing effort, with little other lifecycle process effect. Our experiences at the SEI, however, invariably show that the use of COTS products has more pervasive ramifications. We define a COTS product as one that is focus Although commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) products are becoming increasingly popular, little information is available on how they affect existing software development processes or what new processes are needed. At the Carnegie Mellon University's Software Engineering Institute (SEI), we are developing a process framework for working with COTS-based systems. I n response to the particular system circumstances their projects face, developers use various processes to create and maintain their custom-developed systems. Projects to create COTS-based systems (CBSs) thus run into difficulties in trying to follow custom-development processes. 1–3 The use of COTS products introduces new system circumstances , which then requires new software development processes. Although researchers and practitioners have been grappling with these new process diversity
Nonionic contrast neurotoxicity after coronary angiography mimicking subarachnoid hemorrhage.

Introduction The incidence of neurotoxic events due to intravascular application of iodinated x-ray contrast media (CM) has decreased markedly since the introduction of nonionic CM [1]. Severe neurotoxic complications are accompanied by disruption of the blood-brain barrier and CM extravasation [1–6]. Coronary angiography involving only nonionic CM has been reported to cause transient cortical blindness, confusion and amnesia, but no focal deficits [3, 4], whereas coronary angiography involving ionic CM was followed by more severe complications including seizures, motor and speech deficits [5, 6]. Here we report on a patient who developed transient hemiparesis, aphasia and confusion due to neurotoxicity of nonionic CM after coronary angiography, and whose CT findings mimicked subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH).
Multicategory Crowdsourcing Accounting for Variable Task Difficulty, Worker Skill, and Worker Intention

Crowdsourcing allows instant recruitment of workers on the web to annotate image, webpage, or document databases. However, worker unreliability prevents taking a worker's responses at “face value”. Thus, responses from multiple workers are typically aggregated to more reliably infer ground-truth answers. We study two approaches for crowd aggregation on multicategory answer spaces: stochastic modeling-based and deterministic objective function-based. Our stochastic model for answer generation plausibly captures the interplay between worker skills, intentions, and task difficulties and captures a broad range of worker types. Our deterministic objective-based approach aims to maximize the average aggregate confidence of weighted plurality crowd decision making. In both approaches, we explicitly model the skill and intention of individual workers, which is exploited for improved crowd aggregation. Our methods are applicable in both unsupervised and semi-supervised settings, and also when the batch of tasks is heterogeneous, i.e., from multiple domains, with task-dependent answer spaces. As observed experimentally, the proposed methods can defeat “tyranny of the masses”, i.e., they are especially advantageous when there is an (a priori unknown) minority of skilled workers amongst a large crowd of unskilled (and malicious) workers.
How to Run Turing Machines on Encrypted Data

Cryptographic schemes for computing on encrypted data promise to be a fundamental building block of cryptography. The way one models such algorithms has a crucial effect on the efficiency and usefulness of the resulting cryptographic schemes. As of today, almost all known schemes for fully homomorphic encryption, functional encryption, and garbling schemes work by modeling algorithms as circuits rather than as Turing machines. As a consequence of this modeling, evaluating an algorithm over encrypted data is as slow as the worst-case running time of that algorithm, a dire fact for many tasks. In addition, in settings where an evaluator needs a description of the algorithm itself in some “encoded” form, the cost of computing and communicating such encoding is as large as the worst-case running time of this algorithm. In this work, we construct cryptographic schemes for computing Turing machines on encrypted data that avoid the worst-case problem. Specifically, we show: – An attribute-based encryption scheme for any polynomial-time Turing machine and Random Access Machine (RAM). – A (single-key and succinct) functional encryption scheme for any polynomialtime Turing machine. – A reusable garbling scheme for any polynomial-time Turing machine. These three schemes have the property that the size of a key or of a garbling for a Turing machine is very short: it depends only on the description of the Turing machine and not on its running time. Previously, the only existing constructions of such schemes were for depth-d circuits, where all the parameters grow with d. Our constructions remove this depth d restriction, have short keys, and moreover, avoid the worst-case running time. – A variant of fully homomorphic encryption scheme for Turing machines, where one can evaluate a Turing machine M on an encrypted input x in time that is dependent on the running time of M on input x as opposed to the worst-case runtime of M . Previously, such a result was known only for a restricted class of Turing machines and it required an expensive preprocessing phase (with worst-case runtime); our constructions remove both restrictions. Our results are obtained via a reduction from SNARKs (Bitanski et al) and an “extractable” variant of witness encryption, a scheme introduced by Garg et al.. We prove that the new assumption is secure in the generic group model. We also point out the connection between (the variant of) witness encryption and the obfuscation of point filter functions as defined by Goldwasser and Kalai in 2005.
Towards Participatory Action Design Research: Adapting Action Research and Design Science Research Methods for Urban Informatics

This paper proposes a new research method, Participatory Action Design Research (PADR), for studies in the Urban Informatics domain. PADR supports Urban Informatics research in developing new technological means (e.g. using mobile and ubiquitous computing) to resolve contemporary issues or support everyday life in urban environments. The paper discusses the nature, aims and inherent methodological needs of Urban Informatics research, and proposes PADR as a method to address these needs. Situated in a socio-technical context, Urban Informatics requires a close dialogue between social and design-oriented fields of research as well as their methods. PADR combines Action Research and Design Science Research, both of which are used in Information Systems, another field with a strong socio-technical emphasis, and further adapts them to the cross-disciplinary needs and research context of Urban Informatics. Introduction: Urban Informatics – A Research Field at the Intersection of People, Place and Technology The introduction of information and communication technology (ICT), particularly the more recent introduction of mobile and ubiquitous computing technology, continues to trigger profound changes in everyday life. ICTs have entered and become an established component of our cities, infrastructure and daily environments. They have blurred the borders between the physical and the digital and reshaped the way people interact and communicate with each other. People’s interaction and communication patterns in everyday life constantly and seamlessly shift back and forth between physical and digital spaces. The domain of daily sociability and experience has become a ‘hybrid space’ (De Souza e Silva, 2006) – a space that
Detection and characterisation of beta-globin gene cluster deletions in Chinese using multiplex ligation-dependent probe amplification.

BACKGROUND
Deletions in the beta-globin cluster causing thalassaemia and hereditary persistence of fetal haemoglobin (HPFH) are uncommon and difficult to detect. Data in Chinese are very scarce.


AIMS
To use a recently available technique to investigate the frequencies and nature of beta-globin cluster deletions in Chinese.


METHODS
106 subjects with phenotypes of thalassaemia or HPFH and suspected to have deletions in the beta-globin cluster were studied. A commercially available kit employing multiplex ligation-dependent probe amplification (MLPA) was used to screen for deletions. Gap PCR and direct nucleotide sequencing were used to characterise deletions detected.


RESULTS
17 deletions in the beta-globin cluster were found in 17 patients: 8 of Chinese ((A)gammadeltabeta)(0) thalassaemia, 7 of Southeast Asian (Vietnamese) deletion and 2 of Thai ((A)gammadeltabeta)(0) thalassaemia. The only type of deletion detected in deltabeta-thalassaemia was Chinese ((A)gammadeltabeta)(0) thalassaemia. The deletional form of HPFH was rarely seen in only 1 case of Thai ((A)gammadeltabeta)(0) thalassaemia. Deletions presenting as beta-thalassaemia trait and raised HbF were all of the Southeast Asian (Vietnamese) deletion type. When these deletions were co-inherited with classical beta-thalassaemia mutations in compound heterozygous states, the phenotypes could be very variable.


CONCLUSIONS
In the Chinese population, there are only relatively few types of deletions seen in the beta-globin cluster. MLPA is a fast and effective way of screening for these deletions. Characterisation of these deletions allows the development of simpler and more specific PCR-based tests for routine diagnostic use. Accurate prediction of phenotype is not always feasible. The molecular defects in many cases of HPFH still await discovery.
Nepafenac 0.3% after Cataract Surgery in Patients with Diabetic Retinopathy: Results of 2 Randomized Phase 3 Studies.

PURPOSE
To demonstrate the efficacy and safety of once-daily nepafenac 0.3% ophthalmic suspension versus vehicle, based on clinical outcomes, after cataract surgery in patients with diabetes.


DESIGN
Two prospective, randomized, multicenter, double-masked, vehicle-controlled phase 3 studies.


PARTICIPANTS
Total, 615 patients in study 1 and 605 patients in study 2.


METHODS
Patients were randomized (1:1) to topical nepafenac 0.3% or vehicle once-daily starting the day before surgery and continuing for 90 days thereafter.


MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES
Key efficacy variables were: patients (%) in whom macular edema (ME) developed (≥30% increase from preoperative baseline central subfield macular thickness) within 90 days after cataract surgery and the patients (%) with a best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA) improvement of ≥15 letters from preoperative baseline through day 14 maintained through day 90. Secondary end points included: patients (%) with a BCVA improvement of ≥15 letters from preoperative baseline through days 90 and 60 and safety over 3 months.


RESULTS
A significantly lower percentage of patients demonstrated ME within 90 days after surgery with nepafenac 0.3% versus vehicle (study 1: 2.3% vs. 17.3%; P < 0.001; study 2: 5.9% vs. 14.3%; P = 0.001; pooled: 4.1% vs. 15.9%; P < 0.001). The percentage of patients achieving a ≥15-letter improvement from baseline through day 14 maintained through day 90 with nepafenac 0.3% versus vehicle was 61.7% versus 43.0% (P < 0.001) in study 1, 48.8% versus 50.5% (P = 0.671) in study 2, and 55.4% versus 46.7% (P = 0.003) in the pooled analysis. A greater percentage of patients treated with nepafenac 0.3% versus vehicle in study 1 and similar percentage in study 2 had a BCVA improvement of ≥15 letters from preoperative baseline through day 90 (77.2% vs. 67.7% [P = 0.009] and 65.4% vs. 65.9% [P = 0.888]) and through day 60 (76.2% vs. 64.7% [P = 0.002] and 68.9% vs. 62.1% [P = 0.092]). No unanticipated adverse events were observed.


CONCLUSIONS
These studies demonstrated the clinical benefits of nepafenac 0.3% over vehicle in reducing the risk of postoperative ME, with the integrated analysis showing improved BCVA after cataract surgery in patients with diabetic retinopathy, with no unanticipated safety events.
Retropubic Intracorporeal Placement of a Suburethral Autologous Sling During Robot-Assisted Radical Prostatectomy to Improve Early Urinary Continence Recovery: Preliminary Data.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE
Urinary continence (UC) recovery remains bothersome for patients even after robot-assisted radical prostatectomy (RARP). We describe the first retropubic suburethral autologous sling created and placed during RARP. The surgical technique and preliminary data regarding its effectiveness in improving early UC recovery are presented.


PATIENTS AND METHODS
Between November 2013 and February 2014, 60 patients who underwent RARP at a single high-volume center were prospectively randomized into sling and nonsling groups. Early UC was assessed at 5 days (time of catheter removal), 10 days, and 30 days postoperatively by the daily number of pads used and the International Consultation on Incontinence Questionnaire-Urinary Incontinence-Short Form (ICIQ-UI-SF) score. Sling-related operative time and urethral erosion were also analyzed. Chi-square and independent sample t tests were used to investigate surgical and functional outcomes between groups.


RESULTS
Complete data were available for all patients. Mean ± standard deviation (SD) numbers of pads used daily in nonsling and sling groups, respectively, were 1.9 ± 1.2 versus 1.7 ± 1.4 (P = 0.5) at 5 days, 1.8 ± 1.3 versus 1.3 ± 1.3 (P = 0.1) at 10 days, and 1.1 ± 1.2 versus 0.4 ± 0.8 (P = 0.01) at 30 days. At 1 month, mean ± SD ICIQ-UI-SF scores in nonsling and sling groups, respectively, were 4.8 ± 4.6 versus 1.8 ± 3.4 (P = 0.01); sling patients were associated with pad-free status (76% vs 46%, P = 0.03). The advantage in UC recovery was also observed in sling patients at 3, 6, and 12 months postoperatively. Surgical time did not differ between groups, and in sling patients, no cases of urethral erosion or uroflowmetry suggestive of urinary obstruction were found. Limitations included the small sample size and the lack of assessment of morphologic and urodynamic changes produced by the sling.


CONCLUSIONS
The suburethral autologous sling is technically feasible and may improve early UC recovery after RARP. These preliminary results should be confirmed in a larger sample of patients.
Thiazide use is associated with reduced risk for incident lower extremity fractures in men with spinal cord injury.

OBJECTIVE
To determine the association between thiazide use and lower extremity fractures in patients who are men with a spinal cord injury (SCI).


DESIGN
Cohort study from fiscal years 2002 to 2007.


SETTING
Medical centers.


PARTICIPANTS
Men (N=6969) with an SCI from the Veterans Affairs (VA) Spinal Cord Dysfunction (SCD) Registry, including 1433 users of thiazides and 5536 nonusers of thiazides.


INTERVENTION
Thiazide use versus nonuse.


MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE
Incident lower extremity fractures.


RESULTS
Among the men, 21% in the VA SCD Registry (fiscal years 2002-2007) included in these analyses used thiazide diuretics. There were 832 incident lower extremity fractures over the time period of this study: 110 fractures (7.7%) in 1433 thiazide users and 722 fractures (13%) in 5536 nonusers of thiazides. In unadjusted and adjusted models alike, thiazide use was associated with at least a one-quarter risk reduction in lower extremity fracture at any given point in time (unadjusted: hazard ratio (HR)=.75; 95% confidence interval (CI), .59-.94; adjusted: HR=.74; 95% CI, .58-.95).


CONCLUSIONS
Thiazide use is common in men with SCI and is associated with a decreased likelihood for lower extremity fractures.
Assessing Community Health Among Indigenous Populations in Ecuador with a Participatory Approach: Implications for Health Reform

Health reform is an important movement in countries throughout the region of the Americas, which could profoundly influence how basic health services are provided and who receives them. Goals of health sector reform include to improve quality, correct inefficiencies, and reduce inequities in current systems. The latter may be especially important in countries with indigenous populations, which are thought to suffer from excess mortality and morbidity related to poverty. The purpose of this paper is to report the results of a community health assessment conducted in 26 indigenous communities in the Province of Cotopaxi in rural Ecuador. It is hoped that this information will inform the health reform movement by adding to the current understanding of the health and socioeconomic situation of indigenous populations in the region while emphasizing a participatory approach toward understanding the social forces impacting upon health. This approach may serve as a model for empowering people through collective action. Recommended health reform strategies include: 1) Develop a comprehensive plan for health improvement in conjunction with stakeholders in the general population, including representatives of minority groups; 2) Conduct research on the appropriate mix between traditional medicine, primary health care strategies, and high technology medical services in relation to the needs of the general population; 3) Train local health personnel and traditional healers in primary health care techniques; 4) Improve access to secondary and tertiary health services for indigenous populations in times of emergency; and 5) Advocate for intersectoral collaboration among government institutions as well as non-governmental organizations and the private sector.
Hydraulic and photosynthetic co-ordination in seasonally dry tropical forest trees

In the present study the linkage between hydraulic, photosynthetic and phenological properties of tropical dry forest trees were investigated. Seasonal patterns of stem-specific conductivity ( K SP ) described from 12 species, including deciduous, brevi-deciduous and evergreen species, indicated that only evergreen species were consistent in their response to a dry-to-wet season transition. In contrast, K SP in deciduous and brevi-deciduous species encompassed a range of responses, from an insignificant increase in K SP following rains in some species, to a nine-fold increase in others. Amongst deciduous species, the minimum K SP during the dry season ranged from 6 to 56% of wet season K SP, indicating in the latter case that a significant portion of the xylem remained functional during the dry season. In all species and all seasons, leaf-specific stem conductivity ( K L ) was strongly related to the photosynthetic capacity of the supported foliage, although leaf photosynthesis became saturated in species with high K L . The strength of this correlation was surprising given that much of the whole-plant resistance appears to be in the leaves. Hydraulic capacity, defined as the product of K L and the soil–leaf water potential difference, was strongly correlated with the photosynthetic rate of foliage in the dry season, but only weakly correlated in the wet season. Key-words : fluorescence; hydraulic conductivity; phenology; photosynthesis; tropical dry forest.
Design and performance issues of RF coils utilized in ultra high field MRI: experimental and numerical evaluations

In this paper, two TEM resonators were evaluated experimentally and numerically at 8 tesla (T) (340 MHz for /sup 1/H imaging). The coils were constructed to be 21.2-cm long (standard) and 11-cm long (a proposed less claustrophobic design). The experimental evaluation was done on a single cadaver using an ultra high field, 8 T, whole-body magnet. The numerical modeling was performed using an in-house finite difference time domain package that treats the coil and the load (anatomically detailed human head model) as a single system. The coils were tested with quadrature excitation at different coil alignment positions with respect to human head. For head imaging at 8 T, the overall numerical and experimental results demonstrated that when compared to the longer coil, the shorter coil provides superior signal-to-noise ratio, coil sensitivity, and excite field in the biological regions that lie within both of the coils' structures. A study of the RF (excite/receive fields) homogeneity showed variations in the performance of both coils that are mostly dependant on the region of interest and the position of coil with respect to the head. As such, depending on the application, the shorter coil could be effectively utilized.
Do Portfolio Managers Have an Inherent Conflict of Interest with Energy Efficiency

Portfolio managers, both public and private, can face conflicts of interest with energy efficiency when cost recovery and profits are tied to sales volume, but this problem can be solved. Regulators and utilities in states such as California, New York, Oregon, Washington, and Idaho are implementing policies that remove disincentives for investments in cost-effective energy efficiency and distributed resources.