Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Responsible Conduct of Research in Audiology

The goal of science is knowledge. The goal of research is to draw inferences about a study sample and ultimately about the real world. The challenge is to minimize error. Adherence to scientiﬁc principles and accepted scientiﬁc practices minimizes error and facilitates accurate inferences. Research integrity and the responsible conduct of research is critical to the research process, maintaining trust in science, and preventing harm to those that research is meant to beneﬁt. The responsible conduct of research in Audiology is reviewed here from the perspectives of an established researcher and a student investigator (i.e., doctoral candidate). The discussion begins with an illustrative vignette to spark contemplation and discussion of the topic. Ethical principles, regulations, and guidelines that promote research integrity are considered and additional materials for further study are provided.
Expansion as a Tool for Adaptation to Amplification

Wide dynamic range compression (WDRC) has been successful at managing recruitment and reducing the discomfort of loud stimuli while making soft speech audible. However, WDRC can contribute to the complaint that hearing aids are noisy and that soft environmental sounds are abnormally loud. This situation can result in annoyance, stress, listener fatigue, and the possibility of a compromised signal-to-noise ratio for soft speech. Audio expansion is a tool that can be used to minimize these complaints. Although audio expansion has been in wide use as a noise reduction tool in telecommunications and professional audio for several decades, its use in hearing aids is comparatively recent.To understand better how expansion can be used to promote listener comfort and adaptation to hearing aid use, this article will present a basic review of expansion parameters. Subsequent sections will examine how expansion has been applied in hearing aids and how it behaves from a clinical standpoint. Finally, the use of expansion in multichannel WDRC hearing aid fittings will be discussed with a view toward improving listening comfort and helping new hearing aid users adapt to amplification.
Radiofrequency Ablation as a Treatment Strategy for Liver Metastases from Breast Cancer

The American Cancer Society estimates that in 2007, 178,000 women in the United States will be diagnosed, and that 40,000 women will die from breast cancer. Metastatic breast cancer is a systemic disease, uncommonly involving an isolated organ. Liver metastases from breast cancer occur in (cid:1) 50% of the patients who develop breast cancer metastases and are associated with a poor outcome. Hepatic metastasectomy as an adjuvant treatment even in patients with stable extrahepatic disease has been shown to impart a signiﬁcant survival advantage over chemotherapy alone. In the treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and colorectal liver metastases (CRLM), radiofrequency ablation (RFA) has been shown to be a safe, minimally invasive treatment option with low morbidity and short hospital stay that is more readily repeatable than resection. The data supporting RFA of breast cancer liver metastases (BCLM) is currently limited to small, retrospective series that, like hepatic resection, have demonstrated adjuvant RFA improves survival compared with chemotherapy alone. This review will examine the rationale, indications, supportive data, and complications of RFA in the treatment of BCLM.
Numerical Methods for Ordinary Differential Equations

In this chapter we discuss numerical method for ODE. We will discuss the two basic methods, Euler's Method and Runge-Kutta Method. 1. Numerical Algorithm and Programming in Mathcad 1.1. Numerical Algorithm. If you look at dictionary, you will the following definition for algorithm, 1. a set of rules for solving a problem in a finite number of steps; 2. a sequence of steps designed for programming a computer to solve a specific problem. A numerical algorithm is a set of rules for solving a problem in finite number of steps that can be easily implemented in computer using any programming language. The following is an algorithm for compute the root of f (x) = 0, Input f , a, N and tol. Output: the approximate solution to f (x) = 0 with initial guess a or failure message. • Step One: Set x = a • Step Two: For i=0 to N do Step Three-Four Step Three: Compute x = x − f (x) f (x) Step Four: If f (x) ≤ tol return x • Step Five return " failure ". In analogy, a numerical algorithm is like a cook recipe that specify the input — cooking material, the output—the cooking product, and steps of carrying computation — cooking steps. In an algorithm, you will see loops (for, while), decision making statements(if, then, else(otherwise)) and return statements. • for loop: Typically used when specific number of steps need to be carried out. You can break a for loop with return or break statement.
Progression of Outer Hair Cell Death in the Chinchilla Cochlea following Traumatic Noise Exposure

Permanent hearing loss by noise exposure is the functional consequence of a complex set of pathological changes in the cochlea. Among these changes, hair cell (HC) death may contribute most to the loss of auditory function. It has been known that noise-induced HC death starts during a noise exposure and continues even after the termination of the noise exposure. Biological mechanisms underlying the progression of HC death are not fully understood. Here we describe progression of HC death in the chinchilla cochlea after exposure to a 4-kHz narrow band noise at 110 dB sound pressure level (SPL) for 1 hour. Morphological examination of HC nuclei revealed typical nuclear changes for both apoptosis and necrosis. Apoptosis appeared to be a major death pathway leading to progression of the cochlear lesion in noise-damaged cochleas. The study also showed that expansion of HC death developed asymmetrically toward the apical and basal parts of the cochleas. Detection of caspase-3 activation showed a spatial agreement between the apoptotic nuclear changes and caspase-3 activation. These results clearly implicate the apoptotic pathway in the postexposure progression of HC demise.
Percutaneous Ablation of Hepatic Tumors

The liver is a common site of both primary and secondary malignancy resulting in signiﬁcant morbidity and mortality. Careful patient evaluation and triage allows for optimal utilization of all oncologic therapies, including radiation, systemic chemotherapy, surgery, transarterial therapies, and ablation. Although the role of interventional oncologists in the management of hepatic malignancies continues to evolve, the use of percutaneous ablation therapies has proven to be an effective and minimally invasive modality for treatment. Percutaneous ablation therapies have diversiﬁed from direct ethanol injection to multiple modalities including radiofrequency ablation (RFA), cryoablation, acetic acid injection, laser ablation, microwave ablation, high-intensity focused ultrasound, and irreversible electroporation. RFA is the most commonly utilized modality for hepatic interventions and has proven efﬁcacy in both hepatocellular carcinoma and colorectal carcinoma metastases. Although tumor size remains a challenge, combination therapies and new device innovations continue to allow for improved ablation zones and more durable results.
What Learning a Second Language Might Teach Us about Auditory Training

In this article, we apply theory and research from the ﬁeld of second language acquisition (SLA) to issues in auditory training for adults with postlingual deafness. Two areas of SLA theory and research are discussed. The ﬁrst area concerns ﬁve hypotheses proposed by S. Krashen about SLA. We apply these hypotheses to issues in auditory training, such as the issue of using instructional techniques that promote development of implicit knowledge of target structures, the role of meaning-bearing comprehensible input, and the importance of creating an affectively positive learning environment. The second area concerns research on acoustic variability and second language (L2) learning. This research reinforces Krashen’s hypothesis about attending to the nature of input during SLA, but does so with regard to how spoken input may be acoustically varied to facilitate acquisition. Studies have demonstrated that presentation formats with talker variability are effective for training learners on L2 phonemic contrasts and that presentation formats with talker, speaking-style, and speaking-rate variability (but not amplitude and fundamental-frequency variability) yield positive additive effects on L2 vocabulary learning. In light of these ﬁndings, we discuss how acoustically varied presentation formats may be used in auditory training.
K/DOQI Guidelines: What Should an Interventionalist Know?

The Kidney Disease Outcomes Quality Initiative (K/DOQI) is an evolving, literature-based set of practice guidelines designed to improve measurably the quality of life for dialysis patients. As is characteristic of guidelines, they do not change as rapidly as the literature. The K/DOQI guidelines are not meant as the deﬁnitive document and should be not treated as such. Although the guidelines are not perfect, everyone caring for chronic renal patients should be very familiar with the guidelines. It is perfectly acceptable to adopt approaches that differ from the guidelines as long as they are supported by literature. An attempt is made in this article to review the aspects of the guidelines most pertinent to the interventionalist and outline deviations from the guidelines that are supported by literature.
Data Mining for Business Intelligence–Concepts, Techniques, and Applications in Microsoft Office Excel® with XLMiner®

Quality3 refers to the three main components in the quality journey: structure, strategies and leadership. It begins with a basic discussion of the definition of quality (fulfillment of customer expectations) and some foundational quality strategies. After this foundational portion, the bulk and heart of the book discusses the five C’s (Care, Contain, Control, Correct and Create) which are essentially five strategies that can be used to improve quality. The commonly used quality tools are presented within these strategies. A partial listing of some of the tools discussed include Pareto charts, DOE, SPC, mistake proofing, DFSS, FMEA, 5 Why’s, root cause analysis and robust design. The final chapter discusses issues related to implementation of quality strategies and success factors such as leadership, innovation and change management.
Effects of Spectro-Temporal Asynchrony in Auditory and Auditory-Visual Speech Processing

Throughout his career, Ira Hirsh studied and published articles and books pertaining to many aspects of the auditory system. These included sound conduction in the ear, cochlear mechanics, masking, auditory localization, psychoacoustic behavior in animals, speech perception, medical and audiological applications, coupling between psychophysics and physiology, and ecological acoustics. However, it is Hirsh’s work on auditory timing of simple and complex rhythmic patterns, the backbone of speech and music, that are at the heart of his more recent work. In this article, we report on several aspects of temporal processing of speech signals, both within and across sensory systems. Data are presented on perceived simultaneity and intelligibility of auditory and auditory-visual speech stimuli in which stimulus components are presented either synchronously or asynchronously. Differences in the symmetry and shape of temporal windows derived from these datasets are highlighted. Results show two distinct ranges for temporal integration for speech processing; one relatively short window, (cid:1) 40 milliseconds, and the other much longer, around 250 milliseconds. In the case of auditory-visual speech processing, the temporal window is highly asymmetric, strongly favoring conditions where the visual stimulus precedes the acoustic stimulus.
Sensory and Cognitive Constraints in Comprehension of Spoken Language in Adult Aging

Comprehension of rapid speech in complex environments is constrained by a number of factors. On the sensory side, the listener must deal with rapid, often poorly articulated speech, a challenge that is exacerbated in older adults with high-frequency hearing loss and reduced efﬁciency in temporal processing and frequency discrimination. These ‘‘bottom-up’’ declines can be ameliorated by ‘‘top-down’’ use of linguistic context for recognition of words as the speech unfolds in time and also for retrospective recognition of an indistinct word based on the context that follows it. A second major factor in speech comprehension is the use of prosody, to include pitch contour, stress, and temporal patterning, such as the lengthening of clause-ﬁnal words to signal that a clause boundary has been reached. In all adults, and especially older adults, these operations are constrained by limitations in working memory or processing resources, a factor that shows bidirectional interaction with sensory challenge. We describe work from our and others’ laboratories on speech comprehension and memory investigating each of these factors in young and older adults with good hearing and with mild to moderate hearing loss.
Particle swarm optimization for constrained circular-arc/line-segment fitting of discrete data points

Abstract In this paper, a new non-gradient-based optimization scheme is designed for constrained circle–circle/circle–line fitting of discrete data points. It contains two important technical components: (a) constrained least-squares fitting of circular arcs and line segments, and (b) specially designed particle swarm algorithm for optimal corner/edge points. Our approach is developed for both two-dimensional and three-dimensional cases. The results of numerical computation demonstrate the better performance of the proposed approach, compared to the conventional methods. It can be used for the accurate determination of sharp edges in the form of circular arcs and/or line segments measured in high-precision inspection and manufacturing.
Fluid‐structure coupling of linear elastic model with compressible flow models

Cavitation erosion is caused in solids exposed to strong pressure waves developing in an adjacent fluid field. The knowledge of the transient distribution of stresses in the solid is important to understand the cause of damaging by comparisons with breaking points of the material. The modeling of this problem requires the coupling of the models for the fluid and the solid. For this purpose, we use a strategy based on the solution of coupled Riemann problems that has been originally developed for the coupling of 2 fluids. This concept is exemplified for the coupling of a linear elastic structure with an ideal gas. The coupling procedure relies on the solution of a nonlinear equation. Existence and uniqueness of the solution is proven. The coupling conditions are validated by means of quasi‐1D problems for which an explicit solution can be determined. For a more realistic scenario, a 2D application is considered where in a compressible single fluid, a hot gas bubble at low pressure collapses in a cold gas at high pressure near an adjacent structure.
Reliable Differential Diagnosis and Effective Management of Auditory Processing and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorders

Children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) manifest behaviors strikingly similar to children with Auditory Processing Disorders (APD). Recent research suggests that these two disorders are often co-morbid, but can occur independently. The appropriate management of ADHD and APD is dependent upon a reliable and valid diagnosis using multiple sources of information and measures. The most effective evidence based approaches for these two disorders are reviewed with an emphasis on the importance of differential diagnosis.
Aspects of Voice Measurement with Young Users of Cochlear Implants

This brief study has two essential aims. First, it is directed toward the measurement of changes in voice control that may be consequent on the overnight deactivation of cochlear implants (CIs) by individual young children in a residential school for the deaf. Second, the work is based on the exploratory use of a set of voice analytic procedures that, although developed in the ﬁrst instance for work on connected speech with hearing-impaired children, have subsequently been applied extensively in voice clinic environments. Acoustic and electrolaryngograph speech recordings have been made and analyzed for a group of children with CIs, early in the morning with acoustic and CI aids switched off and at the end of a normal day’s use. Special attention has been paid to the analysis of perceptually relevant physical aspects of pitch, intonation, and voice quality. Differences in voice control between these conditions of implant use have been found for all of the children.
Study of Oblique Shock Wave Control by Surface Arc Discharge Plasma

The mechanism of oblique shock wave control by surface arc discharge plasma is explored through a combined numerical and experimental study. The experiments are conducted in a supersonic wind tunnel with Mach number of 2.5, total pressure of 3.5–6.4 bar, and total temperature of 300 K. An oblique shock is formed by a compression ramp with an angle of 7 deg mounted on the lower wall of the wind tunnel. Six electrodes are arranged equally in the spanwise direction and upstream of the compression ramp. The schlieren images show that the angle of the original oblique shock is increased, and the surface pressure measurements indicate that the oblique shock is weakened by the addition of the stable discharge arc. The reason is that the arc heating decreases the Mach number upstream of the oblique shock; thus, the oblique shock is weakened and the shock angle is increased. A three-dimensional numerical simulation is performed using experimental configuration. Results show that the static pressure increases in fr.
Matrix‐Free Locally Adaptive Finite Element Solution of Density‐Functional Theory With Nonorthogonal Orbitals and Multigrid Preconditioning

In this paper, we propose a new numerical method to find the ground state energy of a given physical system within the Kohn–Sham density functional theory. The h‐adaptive finite element method is adopted for spatial discretization and implemented with matrix‐free operator evaluation. The ground state energy is found by performing unconstrained minimization with non‐orthogonal orbitals using the limited memory Broyden–Fletcher–Goldfarb–Shanno (BFGS) method. A geometric multigrid preconditioner is applied to improve the convergence. The clear advantage of the proposed approach is demonstrated on selected examples by comparing the performance to other methods such as preconditioned steepest descent minimization. The proposed method provides a solid framework toward O(N) complexity for the locally adaptive real‐space solution of density functional theory with finite elements.
State Licensure, National Certification, and Continuing Education

Without close inspection, the value, effectiveness, and differences between licensure and certiﬁcation, two important credentialing qualiﬁers for audiologists, can be difﬁcult to appreciate fully by both practitioners and consumers. Efforts to credential various health care providers have led to educational and political alliances with various groups that assist professional organizations and their members in developing guidelines and standards from conception to implementation. This article seeks to help the reader understand the history, nature, and goals of licensure and certiﬁ-cation, and the role of continuing education in the process of maintaining one’s private certiﬁcation and licensure to practice in the profession of audiology.
Universal D-modules, and factorisation structures on Hilbert schemes of points

This thesis concerns the study of chiral algebras over schemes of arbitrary dimension n. In Chapter I, we construct a chiral algebra over each smooth variety X of dimension n. We do this via the Hilbert scheme of points of X, which we use to build a factorisation space over X. Linearising this space produces a factorisation algebra over X, and hence, by Koszul duality, the desired chiral algebra. We begin the chapter with an overview of the theory of factorisation and chiral algebras, before introducing our main constructions. We compute the chiral homology of our factorisation algebra, and show that the D-modules underlying the corresponding chiral algebras form a universal D-module of dimension n. In Chapter II, we discuss the theory of universal D-modules and Omodules more generally. We show that universal modules are equivalent to sheaves on certain stacks of étale germs of n-dimensional varieties. Furthermore, we identify these stacks with the classifying stacks of groups of automorphisms of the n-dimensional disc, and hence obtain an equivalence between the categories of universal modules and the representation categories of these groups. We also define categories of convergent universal modules and study them from the perspectives of the stacks of étale germs and the representation theory of the automorphism groups.
Ultra wide band radar cross section reduction using multilayer artificial magnetic conductor metasurface

A new thin planar wideband radar cross section (RCS) surface is designed and fabricated by using two different artificial magnetic conductor (AMC) unit cells. These AMC unit cells are designed by both substrate height and relative permittivity variations to achieve an ultra wide bandwidth performance. Three layer low cost FR-4 substrates are used to simply implement these unit cells. The proposed structure reduces the RCS more than 10 dB from 13.1 GHz to 44.5 GHz (109% bandwidth), more than 20 dB from 16.43 GHz to 42.31 GHz (88.3%), and more than 30 dB from 24.7 GHz to 40.9 GHz (49.4%). Moreover, this surface has more than 103% RCS reduction bandwidth for TE polarized and more than 93% for TM polarized ones up to 50° oblique incident waves. The good agreement between the simulation and measurement results also prove the idea. In addition to using a low cost substrate, the proposed surface has a significant widest RCS reduction bandwidth compared with the state of the art references in the normal and oblique incident angles at both TE and TM polarizations.
Performance evaluation of 2D face recognition techniques under image processing attacks

Face recognition is a vastly researched topic in the field of computer vision. A lot of work have been done for facial recognition in two dimensions and three dimensions. The amount of work done with face recognition invariant of image processing attacks is very limited. This paper presents a total of three classes of image processing attacks on face recognition system, namely image enhancement attacks, geometric attacks and the image noise attacks. The well-known machine learning techniques have been used to train and test the face recognition system using two different databases namely Bosphorus Database and University of Milano Bicocca three-dimensional (3D) Face Database (UMBDB). Three classes of classification models, namely discriminant analysis, support vector machine and k-nearest neighbor along with ensemble techniques have been implemented. The significance of machine learning techniques has been mentioned. The visual verification has been done with multiple image processing attacks.