Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Electromagnetic Compatibility-Oriented Study on Through Silicon Single-Walled Carbon Nanotube Bundle Via (TS-SWCNTBV) Arrays

Electromagnetic compatibility-oriented study is performed for accurately characterizing through silicon single-walled carbon nanotube bundle via (TS-SWCNTBV) array in this paper. Based on the modified equivalent lumped-element circuit model of a pair of TS-SWCNTBVs, its forward transmission coefficient, in comparison with copper- and tungsten-based TSVs, is investigated for different metallic fractions of the SWCNTs, with quantum effects treated appropriately. The 3-D transmission-line method (TLM) is further employed for studying mutual couplings in three, four, and nine TS-SWCNTBV arrays, respectively, where the effects of their geometrical and physical parameters on the effective capacitance and conductance are examined in detail. Also, transient coupling noises in different arrays excited by a clock signal, respectively, are predicted and compared, which are useful for the design of high density TS-SWCNTBV arrays with better signal transmission performance.
Approche énergétique pour la représentation, la structuration et la synthèse des Systèmes d’Assistance à Opérateur : application aux chaînes de commande de vol d’hélicoptère

Un aeronef a voilure tournante est un systeme physique dynamique complexe. Le developpement de ce type de systeme necessite methodes d’analyse (structurelle et comportementale) et de commande afin de maitriser ses comportements. L’approche energetique (bond graph et formalisme hamiltonien a port) permet une representation multi-physique non lineaire, modulaire (acausale) et a differents niveaux de granularite. Parmi ses organes, les commandes de vol de l’aeronef permettent la transmission du pilotage aux rotors : canaliser la puissance motrice (2 MW) a partir d’une commande manuelle est impossible sans organes actifs d’assistance. Afin de representer les cheminements et traitements des informations necessaires aux organes actifs, la representation multi-physique est completee par une representation informationnelle causale (schema bloc). Les travaux exposes dans ce memoire visent a ajouter le niveau de granularite intermediaire et necessaire entre la representation multi-physique pure et une representation combinee physique et informationnelle. Basee sur la demarche du PMBC (Physical Model Based Control), ils proposent une methode originale permettant de representer les organes d’assistance et leur commande par un modele physique equivalent. La methode est ici enrichie dans une demarche de conception des Systemes d’Assistance a Operateur : nous determinons ou doivent agir les organes actifs, selon quelles mesures et suivant quelles lois de commande. La methode est illustree sur un cas d’etude industriel : nous obtenons deux representations de l’espace des solutions (les representations physico-informationnelle detaillee et globale de son comportement) incluant la solution industrielle actuelle.
Potentially Preventable Hospitalization among Patients with CKD and High Inpatient Use.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES Although patients with CKD are commonly hospitalized, little is known about those with frequent hospitalization and/or longer lengths of stay (high inpatient use). The objective of this study was to explore clinical characteristics, patterns of hospital use, and potentially preventable acute care encounters among patients with CKD with at least one hospitalization. DESIGN, SETTING, PARTICIPANTS, & MEASUREMENTS We identified all adults with nondialysis CKD (eGFR<60 ml/min per 1.73 m2) in Alberta, Canada between January 1 and December 31, 2009, excluding those with prior kidney failure. Patients with CKD were linked to administrative data to capture clinical characteristics and frequency of hospital encounters, and they were followed until death or end of study (December 31, 2012). Patients with one or more hospital encounters were categorized into three groups: persistent high inpatient use (upper 5% of inpatient use in 2 or more years), episodic high use (upper 5% in 1 year only), or nonhigh use (lower 95% in all years). Within each group, we calculated the proportion of potentially preventable hospitalizations as defined by four CKD-specific ambulatory care sensitive conditions: heart failure, hyperkalemia, volume overload, and malignant hypertension. RESULTS During a median follow-up of 3 years, 57,007 patients with CKD not on dialysis had 118,671 hospitalizations, of which 1.7% of patients were persistent high users, 12.3% were episodic high users, and 86.0% were nonhigh users of hospital services. Overall, 24,804 (20.9%) CKD-related ambulatory care sensitive condition encounters were observed in the cohort. The persistent and episodic high users combined (14% of the cohort) accounted for almost one half (45.5%) of the total ambulatory care sensitive condition hospitalizations, most of which were attributed to heart failure and hyperkalemia. Risk of hospitalization for any CKD-specific ambulatory care sensitive condition was higher among older patients, higher CKD stage, lower income, registered First Nations status, and those with poor attachment to primary care. CONCLUSIONS Many hospitalizations among patients with CKD and high inpatient use are ambulatory care sensitive condition related, suggesting opportunities to improve outcomes and reduce cost by focusing on better community-based care for this population.
Hand decontamination practices and the appropriate use of gloves in two adult intensive care units in Malaysia.

BACKGROUND Hand decontamination is a critical infection control practice in the prevention of nosocomial infection. This study was conducted to observe the hand hygiene practices of nurses and doctors in two intensive care units (ICUs) in Malaysia. METHODOLOGY Staff members were observed during patient contacts, and their hand washing techniques and hand hygiene practices were monitored. Five contact periods were observed for staff members while they cared for their assigned patients. Hand hygiene practices before and after patient contacts were categorized as clean uncontaminated, clean recontaminated, new gloves, and unchanged contaminated gloves. Compliance to hand-washing steps and time taken for hand washing were analyzed. Appropriate use of gloves based on CDC criteria also was assessed. RESULTS Compliance to hand hygiene practices was 70% before each patient contact. Staff members did not completely adhere to the hand-washing steps. The average time taken to wash hands was 20 seconds, and the necessary steps (rubbing palm over dorsum; rubbing fingers interlaced, and rotational rubbing of thumbs) were practiced minimally by all staff. Hand washing protocol was generally followed by all staff (100%). Alcohol hand rubs were available but were used moderately (60%); when used, staff members did not wait for the alcohol to dry. Only 4% of staff changed contaminated gloves between patients. CONCLUSIONS Hand hygiene compliance by ICU staff members needs to be improved. Improving adherence to correct hand hygiene techniques will require effective education programs and behavioral modification techniques. Moreover, hand hygiene guidelines must be incorporated into new staff orientation programs and the continuing education curriculum in the two hospitals studied.
Multi-resolution Volume Rendering of Large Time-Varying Data using Video-based Compression

We present a new framework that combines the hierarchical multi-resolution representation with video-based compression to manage and render large scale time-varying data. In the preprocessing step, the proposed method first constructs a multi-resolution hierarchy using octree structure for each individual time step, and then applies a motion-compensation-based prediction to compress the octree nodes. During rendering stage, the data is decompressed on-the-fly and rendered using hardware texture mapping. The proposed approach eliminates the hierarchical decompression dependency commonly found in the conventional hierarchical wavelet representation methods, which leads to a more efficient reconstruction of data along the time axis. The system provides the user with a spatial region-of-interest (ROI) to adjust the spatial level-of-detail (LOD) selection, and a temporal ROI which is a sub-region only for frequent update during playback. With a suitable control of both ROIs, our system can reach an interactive playback frame rate. This allows the user to observe the dynamic nature of large time-varying data sets.
Procedimiento para el diseño de un arreglo faseado de exploración electrónica.

En la actualidad es necesario emplear sistemas sofisticados que cumplan con los requerimientos actuales de los sistemas de radiocomunicaciones, de radar u otros. En los sistemas de radar son ampliamente utilizados los arreglos faseados controlados electronicamente para la exploracion del espacio. Por tal motivo en este trabajo se expone un procedimiento a seguir para el diseno de un arreglo faseado con modulos Transmision/Recepcion (T/R) a partir de las exigencias planteadas de: ancho del haz de media potencia, angulo de exploracion en el plano vertical y nivel de lobulos laterales (NLL), entre otras. En el presente articulo se desarrolla una propuesta de diseno de arreglos faseados con el objetivo de lograr el barrido de fase que permita direccionar el haz de radiacion en la direccion deseada a partir de la seleccion de la amplitud y fase necesaria en cada elemento radiante. Inicialmente se muestran los resultados de los analisis del diseno mediante el software de analisis Mathcad. Posteriormente, considerando la regla de la multiplicacion de las caracteristicas direccionales (CD) y la simulacion, se obtiene la CD del sistema en conjunto. Se muestra como se obtiene el haz de radiacion en la direccion deseada lograndose una alta directividad, aproximadamente de 38 dB, con lo que se cumple con el objetivo planteado.
Sodium Ion Cycle in Bacterial Pathogens: Evidence from Cross-Genome Comparisons

SUMMARY Analysis of the bacterial genome sequences shows that many human and animal pathogens encode primary membrane Na+ pumps, Na+-transporting dicarboxylate decarboxylases or Na+-translocating NADH:ubiquinone oxidoreductase, and a number of Na+-dependent permeases. This indicates that these bacteria can utilize Na+ as a coupling ion instead of or in addition to the H+ cycle. This capability to use a Na+ cycle might be an important virulence factor for such pathogens as Vibrio cholerae, Neisseria meningitidis, Salmonella enterica serovar Typhi, and Yersinia pestis. In Treponema pallidum, Chlamydia trachomatis, and Chlamydia pneumoniae, the Na+ gradient may well be the only energy source for secondary transport. A survey of preliminary genome sequences of Porphyromonas gingivalis, Actinobacillus actinomycetemcomitans, and Treponema denticola indicates that these oral pathogens also rely on the Na+ cycle for at least part of their energy metabolism. The possible roles of the Na+ cycling in the energy metabolism and pathogenicity of these organisms are reviewed. The recent discovery of an effective natural antibiotic, korormicin, targeted against the Na+-translocating NADH:ubiquinone oxidoreductase, suggests a potential use of Na+ pumps as drug targets and/or vaccine candidates. The antimicrobial potential of other inhibitors of the Na+ cycle, such as monensin, Li+ and Ag+ ions, and amiloride derivatives, is discussed.
The role of the sinus cavities in the production of nasal vowels

The acoustic wave propagation inside the vocal tract was simulated assuming plane waves. When an acoustic tube having appropriate area function but no side branching cavities was used as the nasal tract, the low frequency nasal formant below the first formant of low vowels as observed in natural speech could not be simulated. The relatively short nasal tract with both ends open cannot produce the low nasal formant. We therefore employed a side cavity for the nasal tract system, which gave rise to the nasal formant in the expected frequency region. The computed output signals for different nasalized vowels sounded very naturally nasal.
Dermal and Transdermal Delivery of Active Substances from Semisolid Bases

The selection of a semisolid base type (hydrophobic, hydrophilic or emulsion) has an essential influence on the skin and transdermal delivery of active substances. The cutaneous and percutaneous absorption may be influenced by interactions occurring between base components and skin on the one hand and interactions between base components and the active ingredient on the other hand. The present article discusses the utility of different types of semisolid bases as carriers of active substances and summarizes results of studies comparing delivery of active substances from different semisolid bases.
Role of bacteriophage Mu C protein in activation of the mom gene promoter

The phage Mu C gene product is a specific activator of Mu late gene transcription, including activation of the mom operon. Fusion of the C gene to the efficient translation initiation region of the Escherichia coli atpE gene allowed significant overproduction of C protein, which was subsequently purified and assayed for DNA binding by gel retardation and nuclease footprinting techniques. C protein binds to a site immediately upstream of the -35 region both of the mom promoter and the related phage D108 mod promoter. The location of the mom promoter has been determined by primer extension. Upstream deletions extending more than 3 base pairs into the C-binding site abolished activation of the mom promoter in vivo. In vitro binding of C was not significantly affected by DNA methylation. A second, C-dependent promoter was identified just downstream of the C coding region; comparison with the mom promoter revealed common structural elements.
De l'usage des opérateurs en combinatoire : construction, analyse et génération aléatoire

On etudie en combinatoire les objets munis d’une taille (la taille dans le cadre informatique peut se traduire par exemple par la memoire occupee par l’objet). On appelle classe combinatoire un ensemble d’objets qui pour toute taille possede un nombre fini d’elements. On peut par exemple considerer les textes regis par une certaine grammaire, dans ce cas la taille est le nombre de caracteres, ou des arbres avec comme taille le nombre de noeuds. Une methode naturelle pour decrire les classes, la methode symbolique, consiste a decomposer les objets en sous-objets plus elementaires a l’aide d’operateurs (tels que l’union disjointe, le produit cartesien,.). On peut ensuite traduire ces decompositions sur des series formelles. Le premier volet de resultats presentes dans cette these traite de la methode symbolique et de son utilisation. On y presente des resultats asymptotiques sur des modeles d’arbres croissants issus de la theorie de la concurrence, puis une discussion sur comment decomposer certains operateurs en replications elementaires. Le deuxieme volet de resultats s’interesse au sujet de la generation aleatoire uniforme d’objets dans une classe donnee. On montre tout d’abord comment generer des structures croissantes en adaptant les methodes de generation recursive classiques aux operateurs de produit croissant. On presente ensuite des resultats sur la generation de Boltzmann, avec une comparaison quantitative de deux methodes, puis une extension permettant de conserver les proprietes d’uniformite de la generation en utilisant des approximations.
Low-complexity nonlinear adaptive filters for acoustic echo cancellation in GSM handset receivers

High-quality mobile services need to compensate for acoustic echoes that may affect modern cellular phone receivers. To this purpose, adaptive linear filters are generally used since their low complexity allows real-time implementations. However, they often have to identify an acoustic echo path that may contain significant nonlinearities. Therefore, in such cases, a nonlinear model is required. It is well known that Volterra filters are well suited for modeling a large class of nonlinear systems, but they often require too many computational resources for a real-time implementation. The purpose of this paper is twofold. First of all, we propose to use a simplified quadratic Volterra filter, derived taking into account the characteristics of the most important nonlinearities that affect cellular receivers. Second, an efficient adaptation algorithm is derived which extends the Affine Projection (AP) algorithm, proposed for linear filters, to quadratic Volterra filters. This adaptation algorithm offers better convergence and tracking capabilities with respect to the standard LMS and NLMS algorithms. The reduced complexity and the fast adaptation rate make the echo cancellers we are proposing attractive for real-time implementations. Copyright © 2003 AEI.
Radionuclide voiding pattern in children with unstable bladder.

BACKGROUND The purpose of this study was to investigate bladder function parameters by means of quantitative radionuclide cystography (QRC) in anxious, irritable children with unstable bladder. METHODS Quantitative radionuclide cystography was performed in 18 children aged between 8 and 12 years, without evidence of neurologic and nephrologic disorders. Findings were compared with those obtained in 10 healthy children aged between 7 and 10 years. The dynamics of the bladder emptying were studied after intravenous injection of 37 MBq/10 kg b.w. 99mTc-diethylenetriaminepentaacetic acid (DTPA) in the posterior views. Images of 90 frames every 2 sec. were stored in the 64 x 64 computer matrix during voiding. The patients voided into a container and the volumes were measured. RESULTS The parameters evaluated were: functional bladder capacity (ml)--FBC, expected bladder capacity (ml)--EBC, percentage of EBC (%), voided urine volume (ml)--VV, residual urine (ml)--RU, voiding time (sec)--VT, average flow rate (ml/sec)--AFR and peak flow rate (ml/sec)--PFR. There was a statistically significant difference between controls and children with unstable bladder in the following parameters: FBC 288 +/- 33 vs. 244 +/- 27 ml (p < 0.001), % of EBC 99 +/- 6 vs. 82 +/- 6% (p < 0.0001), VV 265 +/- 37 vs. 202 +/- 35 ml (p < 0.0001), RU 22 +/- 11 vs. 48 +/- 19 ml (p < 0.007), AFR 13 +/- 5 ml/sec vs. 9 +/- 4 ml/sec. (p < 0.01) and PFR 19 +/- 2 vs. 13 +/- 3 ml/s (p < 0.0001), respectively. The VT obtained from the control group of 23 +/- 9 s did not differ significantly from the value of children with unstable bladder of 28 +/- 14 s. CONCLUSION The results show that quantitative radionuclide cystography is a simple, noninvasive method, which allows a good separation of patients with unstable bladder from the children with normal voiding pattern.
A Technique of Torque Ripple Reduction in Interior Permanent Magnet Synchronous Motor

One of the advantages of interior permanent magnet synchronous motors compared to surface permanent magnet synchronous motors is its convenience when modifying the air gap flux density of permanent magnets. This paper introduces a technique of torque ripple reduction by modifying the shape of the rotor to modify the air gap flux density. Three types of rotor surfaces, such as conventional round, slightly cut, and smoothed cut shape, are investigated. The average torque, torque ripple, cogging torque, phase back-EMF, and air gap flux density distribution are analyzed and compared through finite element analysis (FEA). The validity of the proposed model is also verified by comparison between analysis results and measured results.
Haematopoietic stem and progenitor cell-targeted therapies for thrombocytopenia

This review discusses the present outlook for new thrombocytopenia therapies that induce haematopoietic stem and progenitor cells to proliferate, differentiate and produce functional platelets. A brief overview of megakaryopoiesis and its regulation by thrombopoietin (TPO) is followed by a discussion of how early experience with recombinant TPO therapies stimulated the search for novel TPO receptor ligands. A summary is then provided of the results of Phase I clinical trials with the new small molecule and peptide TPO mimetics that are in development at present. Finally, recent developments in the ex vivo expansion of primitive haematopoietic cells and the potential enhancement of cell-based therapies by haematopoietic growth factors in vivo are briefly summarised as part of a look towards the future.
Detection of vessels in a retinal image using decomposed pixel classification method

The aim of this study, determination of blood vessels on high dimensional retinal images using decomposed pixel classification method. In this work intensity histograms are obtained by using vectoral directions. Local minimum and local maximum points are found by using these histograms to detect location of vessels. In addition to this, vessel thickness information are detected by determining a threshold point on these histograms.
Effects of hypoglycemic agents on vascular complications in patients with adult-onset diabetes. 3. Clinical implications of UGDP results.

"Field (clinical) trials are indispensable. They will continue to be an ordeal. They lack glamour, they strain our resources and our patience, and they protract the moment of truth to excruciating limits. Still, they are among the most challenging tests of our skills. If, in major medical dilemmas the alternative is to pay the cost of perpetual uncertainty, have we really any choice? " 1 The clinical trial of the effect of hypoglycemic agents on the vascular complications of diabetes mellitus conducted by the University Group Program (UGDP) for the past ten years bears witness to the truthfulness of the above quotation. The hypothesis that control of the blood glucose level prevents or delays the vascular complications of diabetes has been supported so far only by evidence which is largely conjectural. 2 Such a relationship can be documented only with prospective study of patients randomly assigned to treatment regimens that differ
Authentication traffics modeling and analysis in next generation wireless networks

Access security is an indispensable component in the future generation wireless networks to enable the trusted communications. During the User Equipment (UE) access procedure, the authentication overhead analysis is able to provide insights in understanding the security management performance. To unify the model for analyzing the authentication traffics under different location management schemes, we introduce the concept location update inter-arrival time. Furthermore, based on the UE's typical behavior, we propose a system model and define the metric number of User Authentication Request (UAR) in SGSN residence time to evaluate the authentication cost. Numerical results are illustrated to show the interaction between the parameters and the performance metrics. The sensitivity of call arrival process and the effects of location management schemes are also discussed. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.