Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Transscleral Suture Fixation and Anterior Chamber Intraocular Lenses Implanted after Removal of Posteriorly Dislocated Crystalline Lenses

The surgical technique is described for simultaneous removal of posteriorly dislocated crystalline lenses and implantation of anterior chamber (AC) or scleral fixation posterior chamber (PC) intraocular lenses (IOL) using pars plana vitrectomy. Twenty-two patients underwent this complex operation. Observation time ranged from 2 to 10 months (mean 5 months). Best-corrected post-operative visual acuity was 1.0 in half the patients in the AC group (n=12), and in 80% of the PC group (n=10). It was less than 0.5 in 25% of cases in the AC group whereas all PC patients had visual acuity 0.5 or better. In nine cases with pre-operative ocular hypertension, post-operative intraocular pressure became normal, although topical glaucoma therapy was necessary in three patients in the AC group and in one from the PC group. No severe complications were found. Removal of posteriorly dislocated crystalline lens using pars plana vitrectomy and limbal incision is a safe procedure. Simultaneous AC or transscleral PC lens implantation is a good alternative to contact lenses. Visual rehabilitation was good in both groups of patients, although post-operative visual acuity was better after PC transscleral fixation than after AC surgery.
Safety of collaborative industrial robots: Certification possibilities for a collaborative assembly robot concept

Industrial requirements for automation of small parts assembly operations are driving technology into the direction of scalable robotic automation, suitable for operation in shared environments with human workers and exhibiting highest flexibility and ease of use. One of the challenges is developing solutions for personnel safety under these conditions. This paper discusses both the presently viable approaches to risk assessment for collaborative robots and a more detailed future methodology that will be better able to resolve the relevant low-level injury risks.
Economic Shocks and Household Decisions

Author(s): Milosch, Jennifer | Advisor(s): Lundberg, Shelly | Abstract: This dissertation concerns various types of economic shocks and the implications of such shocks on the decisions of households. There has been a long history in the theoretical economics literature of modeling agents as forward-looking and thus in making their life-cycle decisions they will have accounted for the paths they expect their income, wealth, or economic opportunities to take. Therefore, these chapters will focus on households' responses to unexpected changes in economic factors. The two types of economic shocks to be explored are income shocks, a shock that will affect only one spouse, and house price shocks, a shock that affects both spouses. Particular care is given to trying to identify exogenous and unexpected changes in income or wealth for the households. The asymmetric responses to financial gains versus losses are explored for each type of shock.Throughout the analyses are conducted using longitudinal data on individuals or households. These data allow for observations of the sample household through a long portion of its life cycle and through changes in their economic situation. In the first chapter, I explore the effects of unpredicted changes in permanent income of each spouse on the probability of divorce for the couple. I find that if the husband experiences a negative income shock, the probability of divorce increases. If the wife experiences a negative income shock, this effect on divorce is only true if she had a switch into unemployment. In Chapter 2, I continue the analysis of economic shocks on probability of divorce by looking at responses to local house price shocks. These local housing prices give us changes in wealth for the households that are exogenous to many of the other decisions an individual household makes. In response to a positive house price shock, the risk of divorce decreases for couples. Finally in the third chapter, I analyze the effect of housing prices on another household behavior: labor supply choices. Married female homeowners are less likely to be employed following a positive house price shock in their metropolitan area. Conversely, older married male homeowners are more likely to be employed when there are negative house price shocks in their area.
Determining enabling factors of University Technology Business Incubation program: Resource-based view theory

University Technology Business Incubation (UTBI) is a program developed for an entrepreneurial company by providing a variety of resources and services to a selected start-up or entrepreneurial groups in early-stage technology-related ventures. To promote the success of UTBI program, it is important for management team to understand the necessary resources required by the program. The purpose of this paper is to determine enabling factors with respect to company resources in enhancing the success of UTBI. Resource-Based View (RBV) theory was considered as a grounded theory to develop those enabling factors. After reviewing literature on UTBIs and RBV theory, four categories of resources were identified. These are human, technological, financial, and organizational resources. Then, the attributes representing each category were assigned using the Q-sort technique. Finally, the model of analytical hierarchy decision making process is proposed to examine the relative importance of each resource to the success of UTBI program. Panel of experts will be carried out in the next stage of this research project.
Probability estimation for pedestrian crossing intention at signalized crosswalks

With the rapid development of the techniques for autonomous driving and ADAS in the last decade, more advanced methods to understand pedestrian behavior are required. Crosswalks at intersections are the one of most hazardous where many accidents between turning-vehicles and pedestrians occur. In this paper, we present a method for estimating the pedestrian's intention to cross a signalized crosswalk or stop in front of it. The intention is crucial to not only the collision avoidance but also smooth traffic in the context of autonomous driving by reducing unnecessary risk margins. Regarding the behavioral flow of pedestrian: assessment, decision-making and physical movement, as a stochastic process, we construct a probabilistic model with the Dynamic Bayesian Network. It takes account of not only pedestrian physical states but also contextual information and integrates the relationship among them. By employing the particle filter as a Bayesian filtering framework, the model estimates the pedestrian state from signal information and pedestrian position measurements. Evaluation using experimental data collected in real traffic scene shows that the proposed model has an ability to detect the pedestrian intention to cross a crosswalk even when he/she is far from it.
Individual Characteristics and Relocation Factors Affecting Adjustment among Relocated American and Egyptian Older Adults

Worldwide, the population of elders is increasing significantly. Relocation can be a positive or a negative experience, depending on many factors, including culture. The purpose of this study is to compare individual characteristics (age, gender, marital status, education, perceived health status, activities of daily living), relocation factors (movement preparation, time passed since relocation, closeness of prior home to the present, and whether relocation was from home or another facility), and adjustment in relocated American and Egyptian elders. This secondary analysis study merged data from two cross-sectional descriptive studies of a 104 elders relocated to retirement communities in Northeast Ohio and 94 elders relocated to retirement communities in Alexandria, Egypt. Our findings indicated that American elders have greater independence in daily activities (t (161.23) = −3.03, p = . 003); better perceived health (χ2[3, N = 198] = 53.21, p < .001), better education (χ2[1, N = 198] = 47.28, p < .001), better preparation before the move (χ2[1, N = 198] = 40.58, p < .001), and better relocation adjustment (t (196) = 9.42, p < . 001) than relocated Egyptian elders. Our results indicate that culture should be taken into account when caring for older adults who relocate to retirement communities. Additionally, interventions, such as counseling, and preparation before relocation are needed to help elders adjust to relocation.
A Dynamic Force Analysis System for Climbing of Large Primates

Registering substrate reaction forces from primates during climbing requires the design and construction of customized recording devices. The technical difficulties in constructing a reliable apparatus hinder research on the kinetics of primate locomotion. This is unfortunate since arboreal locomotion, especially vertical climbing, is an important component of the hominoid locomotor repertoire. In this technical paper, we describe a custom-built climbing pole that allows recordings of dynamic 3-dimensional forces during locomotion on horizontal and sloping substrates and during vertical climbing. The pole contains an instrumented section that can readily be modified and enables us to register forces of a single limb or multiple limbs in a broad range of primates. For verification, we constructed a similar set-up (which would not be usable for primates) using a conventional force plate. Data for a human subject walking on both set-ups were compared. The experimental set-up records accurate and reliable substrate reaction forces in three orthogonal directions. Because of its adjustability, this type of modular set-up can be used for a great variety of primate studies. When combining such kinetic measurements together with kinematic information, data of great biomechanical value can be generated. These data will hopefully allow biological anthropologists to answer current questions about primate behaviours on vertical substrates.
Prediction of Gross Energy Consumption for Chongqing Based on GM(1,1) Model

This paper selects the total energy consumption data and the coal,oil,natural gas,electricity consumption data of Chongqing from 2000 to 2011,and establishes the energy consumption model based on GM(1,1) model for short-term energy consumption prediction and energy consumption structure prediction of Chongqing. The results show that,the gray GM(1,1) model owns higher prediction accuracy,and is suitable for short-term prediction of gross energy consumption; at the same time,it will still maintain a high growth for Chongqing city in the next few years. While the coal consumption decreased year by year,but the energy consumption structure is not obviously improved. Finally,the proposal of energy development strategy is put forward for Chongqing during 12 th Five year.
Early Surgical Correction for Isolated Gastric Stricture following Acid Corrosion Injury

Objective: To evaluate the feasibility and long-term results of early gastric surgery for patients with isolated gastric stricture following acid corrosion injury. Materials and Methods: Upper gastrointestinal (UGI) series was routinely performed around the 4th week after acid corrosion injury. Patients with gastric stricture and no risk of delayed esophageal stricture underwent early solitary gastric surgery, which was defined when performance of the procedure took place within 2 months of the injury. Results: From June 1988 to June 2000, 35 of 378 patients with acid corrosion injury developed isolated gastric stricture. Twenty-four (68.6%) lesions were located in the antrum, and 11 (31.4%) in the gastric body. Postprandial vomiting presented earlier for the antral stricture group (17.6 ± 1.1 versus 25.4 ± 3.4 days after injury; p = 0.005). The UGI series was performed from 16 to 41 days after injury (average 25 days). Of the 35 acid corrosion injury patients in this study, 4 were excluded because of late referrals to our institution or the patient’s hesitation which resulted in delayed surgery. The remaining 31 patients underwent gastric surgery 35.7 ± 3.2 days after ingestion (34.6 ± 3.6 and 38.1 ± 3.4 days for cases of antral and gastric body stricture, respectively). Surgical procedures consisted of hemigastrectomy (n = 16), antrectomy (n = 2), gastroenterostomy (n = 2), subtotal gastrectomy (n = 6), and total gastrectomy (n = 5). There were 4 cases of postoperative complications (12.9%) including adhesion ileus (n = 2), wound infection (n = 1), and massive, postoperative UGI bleeding (n = 1). Surgical mortality was zero. All patients tolerated oral intake well after surgery. During the minimum follow-up period of 1 year, 1 patient developed esophagojejunostomy stenosis, which was resolved by dilation, and there was 1 case of dumping syndrome, which was treated by diet control. Conclusion: Early surgery correction is feasible and safe if patients with isolated gastric stricture following acid corrosion injury are carefully selected. All patients in our study recovered early, with a low morbidity rate.
Identification of four loci isolated from two Streptococcus thermophilus phage genomes responsible for mediating bacteriophage resistance.

Sequence data derived from the Streptococcus thermophilus phages phiO1205 and phi7201 indicated that each of these phages contains a distinct DNA region dedicated to replication. Southern blotting experiments showed that phages infecting S. thermophilus may be divided into at least two groups, each containing the presumptive replication functions of either φO1205 (group I) or φ7201 (group II). Specific regions from the putative replication module of each of the two phages were examined for their ability to provide phage resistance.
Power spectral entropy analysis of EEG signal based-on BCI

Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) system uses electroencephalography (EEG) signals recorded from the scalp to create a new communication channel between the brain and an output device by bypassing conventional motor output pathways of nerves and muscles. One of the most important components is feature extraction of EEG signals. How to rapidly and reliably extract EEG features for expressing the brain states of different mental tasks is the crucial element for exact classification. This paper presents an approach that performs EEG feature extraction during imagined right and left hand movement by using power spectral entropy (PSE). It acquires good classification results with the time-variable linear classifier. The maximal accuracy achieves 90%. The results show that the PSE is a sensitive parameter for EEG of imaginary hand movements. The method is simple and quick and it provides a promising method for on-line BCI system.
Speech Activity Detection in online broadcast transcription using Deep Neural Networks and Weighted Finite State Transducers

In this paper, a new approach to online Speech Activity Detection (SAD) is proposed. This approach is designed for the use in a system that carries out 24/7 transcription of radio/TV broadcasts containing a large amount of non-speech segments, such as advertisements or music. To improve the robustness of detection, we adopt Deep Neural Networks (DNNs) trained on artificially created mixtures of speech and non-speech signals at desired levels of signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). An integral part of our approach is an online decoder based on Weighted Finite State Transducers (WFSTs); this decoder smooths the output from DNN. The employed transduction model is context-based, i.e., both speech and non-speech events are modeled using sequences of states. The presented experimental results show that our approach yields state-of-the-art results on standardized QUT-NOISE-TIMIT data set for SAD and, at the same time, it is capable of a) operating with low latency and b) reducing the computational demands and error rate of the target transcription system.
FPGA Frequency Domain Based GPS Coarse Acquisition Processor Using FFT

In this paper we describe the use of the FFT on an FPGA to perform lock on coarse acquisition (C/A) code and carrier frequency in a global positioning system (GPS) receiver. A novel technique of sub-sampling is used in this system to obtain data block sizes that match hardware limitations. The system uses 10 ms of data to perform the lock with 6 ms of processing time and theoretically can operate on signals 20 db below the noise floor
Low-loss on-chip transformers for CMOS RFICs

On-chip transformers with high mutual coupling factors (~0.9) are designed and characterized. The transformers are integrated into a 5.0-GHz receiver front-end to provide single-to-differential conversion and voltage gain. The CMOS receiver frond-end exhibits a voltage gain of 25.0 dB and an IIP3 of −5.9 dBm at 5.0 GHz at a power consumption of 36 mW.
Cluster modelling of disease incidence via RJMCMC methods: a comparative evaluation. Reversible jump Markov chain Monte Carlo.

The spatial modelling of small area health data has, for some time, included spatial autocorrelation as a random effect. This effect is non-specific and global and does not address the location of clusters of disease (a specific task). This paper addresses the need for specific and non-specific random effects within spatial epidemiology. In addition, individual frailty is also considered important and a computational algorithm based on reversible jump Markov chain Monte Carlo (RJMCMC) methods is described.
Combining dual-source computed tomography coronary angiography and calcium scoring: added value for the assessment of coronary artery disease

Objective: To prospectively investigate the diagnostic accuracy of dual-source 64-slice computed tomography coronary angiography (CTCA), calcium scoring (CS) and both methods combined for assessing significant coronary artery stenoses relative to conventional coronary angiography (CCA). Design, setting and patients: Prospective, single-centre study conducted in a referral centre enrolling 74 consecutive patients (24 women; mean age 62 (SD 12) years) from August-October 2006. All study participants underwent CS, CTCA and CCA. Diagnostic accuracy was calculated for CS, CTCA and both methods combined relative to CCA. Not-evaluative segments at computed tomography were considered false positive. Results: CCA identified 139 stenoses in 36 patients. Average heart rate during CTCA was 68 (13) bpm (range 35–102 bpm), and 2% of segments (21/1001) in 11% of patients (8/74) were not evaluative. Considering these as false positives, per-patient sensitivity and specificity was 98% and 87%. When using CS cut-off values of 0 to exclude and ⩾400 to predict stenosis, sensitivity and specificity of CS was 100% and 70%, respectively. Combining CS and CTCA in all patients correctly reclassified five patients, while six were falsely classified as stenotic, all of them correctly classified with CTCA alone. Using CS only in patients with not-evaluative segments correctly reclassified five patients while avoiding misclassifications (sensitivity 98%, specificity 100%). Conclusion: Dual-source CTCA allows the diagnosis of significant stenoses with a high diagnostic accuracy. Selectively combining CS with CTCA in patients with not-evaluative coronary segments improves specificity from 87% to 100% without decreasing the high sensitivity of 98%.
The Association between Employee Obesity and Employer Costs: Evidence from a Panel of U.S. Employers

Purpose. To estimate the employer costs associated with employee obesity. Design. The study used cross-sectional analysis of employee health-risk assessment, disability, workers' compensation, and medical claims data from 2006 to 2008. Setting. The study took place in the United States from 2006 to 2008. Subjects. A panel database with 29,699 employees drawn from a panel of employers and observed for 3 years each (N = 89,097) was used. Measures. Workdays lost owing to illness and disability; the cost of medical, short-term disability, and workers' compensation claims; and employees' adjusted body mass indices (BMI) were measured. Analysis. We model the number and probability of workdays lost from illness, short-term disability, and workers' compensation events; short-term disability and workers' compensation payments; and health care spending as a function of BMI. We estimate spline regression models and fit results using a third-degree fractional polynomial. Results. Probability of disability, workers' compensation claims, and number of days missed owing to any cause increase with BMI above 25, as do total employer costs. The probability of a short-term disability claim increases faster for employees with hypertension, hyperlipidemia, or diabetes. Normal weight employees cost on average $3830 per year in covered medical, sick day, short-term disability, and workers' compensation claims combined; morbidly obese employees cost more than twice that amount, or $8067, in 2011 dollars. Conclusion. Obesity is associated with large employer costs from direct health care and insurance claims and indirect costs from lost productivity owing to workdays lost because of illness and disability.
Segmentation improvement of pig contour based on registration and fusion of IR thermal and optical images

To improve the effect of pig contour segmentation, an image preprocessing method is proposed based on registration and fusion of infrared (IR) thermal and optical images. An infrared thermal imager is used to acquire the thermal image and optical image of pig at the same time. The weighted partial Hausdorff distance (WPHD) is used as the similarity measurement to register the two source images. A resilient propagation (RPROP) algorithm is adopted to accelerate the iteration process. After decomposing the registered images by non-subsample contourlet transform (NSCT) separately, a fusion rule for low-pass sub-band coefficients is proposed by weighted averaging the combined values of the two images. This combined value is constructed by the average energy and variance of neighbor area. For the fusion of band-pass sub-band coefficients, the rule based neighbor area energy maximum is adopted. Then a fusion image is reconstructed through inverse transform of NSCT. Experimental results show that the fusion image has better visual effect and the segmental result of pig contour is more accurate and robust.
A Giant Phosphoprotein Localized at the Spongiome Region of Crithidia luciliae thermophila

Abstract A giant protein with an apparent molecular mass of 2,300-kDa was identified in the Triton X-100 soluble fraction of Crithidia luciliae thermophila. Polyclonal antibody raised against this protein reacted by immunoblot analysis with proteins of similar molecular mass in Crithidia fasciculata and Crithidia oncopelti. In addition, the antibody immunoprecipitates the protein either after in vivo phosphorylation with [32P]orthophosphoric acid or after metabolically labeling with [35S]methionine. Indirect immunofluorescence microscopy analysis performed either with fixed or with live parasites showed a single fluorescent spot at the level of the flagellar pocket region. Immunogold electron microscopy of thin sections of the parasite revealed that the antigen is localized at a restricted area of the spongiome, between the contractile vacuole and the flagellar pocket. Furthermore, Triton X-114 phase separation of whole cell membrane proteins, metabolically labeled with [35S]methionine, demonstrated that the giant protein remains in the aqueous phase. These results indicate that this phosphoprotein behaves as a peripheral membrane protein localized at the spongiome region, suggesting that it might be involved in the osmoregulatory process.