Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
c.-61G>A in OVOL2 is a Pathogenic 5′ Untranslated Region Variant Causing Posterior Polymorphous Corneal Dystrophy 1

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the clinical and genetic features of a man and his daughter with posterior polymorphous corneal dystrophy (PPCD), referred to our clinic for Descemet membrane endothelial keratoplasty. No other known relatives were affected. Methods: Ophthalmic examination and histology, including electron microscopy, were performed. Genetic testing was conducted by means of whole exome sequencing, and variant analysis was achieved by using an internal in silico pipeline. Molecular tests included a dual-luciferase assay. Results: Slowly progressive blurred vision was reported from childhood by the daughter. The father's symptoms started at age 55. Best-corrected visual acuity was reduced in both patients (0.2–0.4). Slit-lamp examination in both patients revealed bilateral corneal clouding with gray endothelial lesions; other family members had no ophthalmological signs. Descemet membrane endothelial keratoplasty was performed uneventfully in both patients. Histology showed thickened Descemet membrane and abnormal endothelium resembling epithelial-like cells. Both patients carried the OVOL2 5′ untranslated region NM_021220.4.c. -61G>A variant in the heterozygous state. This change was associated with increased promoter activity and was not present in the unaffected members of the family. Conclusions: The 5′ untranslated region mutation c. -61G>A in OVOL2 has been previously found in 1 individual with PPCD1 and reported as a variant of unknown significance because of insufficient evidence supporting its pathogenicity. Identification of the second family with 2 individuals affected by PPCD1 carrying this change, together with functional data, provides further proofs that it is disease-causing.
IMPROVING THE INTERNAL ACCURACY OF UAV-IMAGE BLOCKS USING LOCAL LOW-ALTITUDE FLIGHTS AND SCALE-BARS

Accurate image-based measurement based on UAV data is attracting attention in various applications. While the external accuracy of the UAV image blocks could be mainly affected by object-space information like number and distribution of ground control points and RTK-GNSS accuracy, its internal accuracy highly depends on camera specifications, flight height, data capturing setup and accuracy of scale estimation. For many small-scale projects accurate local measurements are highly demanded. This necessitates high internal accuracy of images block which could be transferred from model space to object space by accurate estimation of the scale parameter. This research aims at improving the internal accuracy of UAV image blocks using low-altitude flight(s) over small parts of the project area without using any ground control points. Possible further improvement by using calibrated scale-bars which serve as scale-constraints is also investigated. To this end, different scenarios of the flight configuration and distance measurements in the two photogrammetric blocks are also considered and the results are analyzed. Our investigations show 50% accuracy improvement achieved by performing local flights over small parts of the scene, given that RTK information is available. Moreover, adding accurate scale-bars increased the accuracy improvement to 67%. Furthermore, when RTK information is not available, adding local low-altitude flights and scale-bars decrease the error of local distance measurement form 1-3 meters to less than 4 centimeters.
General practitioner diagnosis and management of acute knee injuries: summary of an evidence-based guideline.

AIMS To summarise evidence and key recommendations for general practitioner diagnosis and management of acute soft-tissue knee injuries, based on the New Zealand guideline. METHODS A multidisciplinary team developed the guideline by critically appraising and grading retrieved literature using the Graphic Appraisal Tools for Epidemiology, Clinical decision rules and the Scottish Intercollegiate Guideline Network. Recommendations were derived from resulting evidence tables. RESULTS For both diagnosis and management there is a paucity of good evidence to support diagnosis and treatment of internal derangements of the knee, hence some aspects of the guideline are guideline team consensus. Good evidence supports the use of the Ottawa Knee rules to guide decisions about the use of X-ray, and the Lachman test in diagnosing anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tears. Evidence supports inclusion of proprioceptive training in rehabilitation programmes following ACL reconstruction and in people with ACL-deficient knees. There is good evidence that ultrasound is of little benefit, and there is no evidence that physiotherapy be routinely advocated following meniscectomy. CONCLUSION This guideline provides an evidence-based framework for diagnosis and management of internal derangements of the knee following acute injury. Moreover, its development highlights significant gaps in the evidence base and identifies priorities for new research.
Impact of Foreign Direct Investment on Small and Medium Scale Enterprises in Pakistan

a Professor, School of Economics, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan, Pakistan Email: zahirfaridi@bzu.edu. pk b PHD Scholar, School of Economics, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan, Pakistan Email: saddamHussainsial1@gmail.com c PHD Scholar, School of Economics, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan, Pakistan Email: hopeimran@gmail.com d Assistant Professor, School of Economics, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan, Pakistan Email: rashidahmad@bzu.edu. pk
Echocardiographic assessment of left ventricular mass index and function in hypertensive patients with preserved ejection fraction

Background: The aim of the present study is to detect left ventricular (LV) mass and to find out sub clinical LV diastolic dysfunction in hypertensive patients with preserved LV ejection fraction (EF) using echocardiographic parameters.Methods: 96 patients with hypertension were randomly selected irrespective of their sex, race and risk factor and enrolled into this study. Left ventricular mass index (LVMI) and geometrical pattern LV structure were measured. Sub clinical diastolic dysfunction was also assessed by tissue Doppler.Results: Out of 96 patients, 24 had ECG evidence of LV hypertrophy (LVH) 66 were having increased LVMI (154±20), rest 30 had normal LVMI (108±12). They were divided by LV geometrical pattern into concentric LVH (40), eccentric LVH (26), concentric remodeling (19) and normal (11). Diastolic dysfunction in these patients were assessed by E/E´ measurement which was abnormally increased in 42 out of 66 patients with increased LVMI (20±3.4) and 16 out of 30 patients with normal LVMI.Conclusions: Echocardiographic examination help us to find out LVH precisely by calculating LVMI. It also reveals structural changes like concentric LVH, eccentric LVH, concentric remodeling. A significant number of patients with hypertension with normal LV ejection fraction has sub clinical LV diastolic dysfunction which was detected by tissue Doppler imaging (E/E′). The increase in LVMI with or without concentric LVH is an independent risk factor and prognostic marker for cardio vascular events that occur in hypertensive patients. In this study we infer that patients with increase in LVMI with concentric LVH pattern with normal ejection fraction needs more aggressive treatment and regular follow up to prevent cardiovascular complications.
Masticatory performance and other oral functions in community-dwelling elderly patients without posterior occlusal support by natural teeth.

PURPOSE To evaluate masticatory performance (MP), maximum occlusal force (MOF), maximum tongue pressure (MTP) and oral diadochokinesis (ODK) among community-dwelling elderly patients without posterior occlusal support. METHODS This study enrolled community-dwelling elderly patients (≥65 years old) who belonged to Eichner A, B4, C1, C2, and C3. Each oral function was statistically compared among groups. Correlations between MP and other variables were examined in Eichner B4 and C patients. RESULTS MP and MOF values in Eichner B4 and C patients were significantly lower than in Eichner A patients. There were significant differences in MTP values between Eichner "A and C2, C3", and "B4 and C2, C3". ODK in Eichner C patients showed significantly lower values compared to Eichner A patients in general. Although there were statistically significant correlations of MP with age, the number of remaining teeth and all oral functions were identified, and multiple regression analysis indicated that MOF and MTP were independently related to MP. CONCLUSION Oral functions in Eichner B4 and C patients were lower compared to Eichner A patients. MP was significantly correlated with MOF and MTP in elderly patients without posterior occlusal support, suggesting the importance of rehabilitation of MOF and MTP in MP.
MOHE-NET: MONOCULAR OBJECT HEIGHT ESTIMATION NETWORK USING DEEP LEARNING AND SCENE GEOMETRY

Estimating the heights of objects in the field of view has applications in many tasks such as robotics, autonomous platforms and video surveillance. Object height is a concrete and indispensable characteristic people or machine could learn and capture. Many actions such as vehicle avoiding obstacles will be taken based on it. Traditionally, object height can be estimated using laser ranging, radar or stereo camera. Depending on the application, cost of these techniques may inhibit their use, especially in autonomous platforms. Use of available sensors with lower cost would make the adoption of such techniques at higher rates. Our approach to height estimation requires only a single 2D image. To solve this problem we introduce the Monocular Object Height Estimation Network (MOHE-Net) that includes a cascade of two networks. The first network performs the object detection task. This network detects the bounding box of objects of interest. This information is then input to a second network to estimate the object height and is a linear Multi-layer Perceptron (MLP). The linear MLP model models the camera-scene geometry and does not require training or contain activation function as normal MLP did. The developed approach works for static camera set up as well as moving platform. The proposed approach performs state-of-the-art and can be deployed for obstacle avoidance on autonomous platforms. Our code is available at https://github.com/OSUPCVLab/Ford2019/tree/master/Moving%20Object%20Height% 20Estimation%20Network
Characterizing Detection Thresholds for Six Orthogonal Modes of Vibrotactile Display Via Stylus With Precision Grasp

In this paper, we characterize the detection thresholds in six orthogonal modes of vibrotactile haptic display via stylus, including three orthogonal force directions and three orthogonal torque directions at the haptic interaction point. A psychophysical study is performed to determine detection thresholds over the frequency range 20–250 Hz, for six distinct styluses. Analysis of variance is used to test the hypothesis that force signals, as well as torque signals, applied in different directions have different detection thresholds. We find that people are less sensitive to force signals parallel to the stylus than to those orthogonal to the stylus at low frequencies, and far more sensitive to torque signals about the stylus than to those orthogonal to the stylus. Optimization techniques are used to determine four independent two-parameter models to describe the frequency-dependent thresholds for each of the orthogonal force and torque modes for a stylus that is approximately radially symmetric; six independent models are required if the stylus is not well approximated as radially symmetric. Finally, we provide a means to estimate the model parameters given stylus parameters, for a range of styluses, and to estimate the coupling between orthogonal modes.
Proposing Two Hybrid Data Mining Models for Discovering Students' Mental Health Problems

Mental health is an important issue for university students. The objective of this article was to apply and compare the different classification methods for students’ mental health problems. Furthermore, it presents an ensemble classification method to improve the accuracy of classifiers and assist psychologists in the decision making process. For this, 10 different classifiers were applied for classifying students into two groups. In addition, two methods of combining the classifiers are presented. In the first proposed method, the classifiers were selected based on their accuracy, and then voting was carried out based on maximum probability. In the second proposed method, the methods were combined based on the fields of the confusion table, and the voting was carried out based on majority voting scheme. These two methods were evaluated in two ways. Focusing on the accuracy and the maximum probability voting, the accuracy of the first method was 92.24%, whereas in the second method, it was 95.97%. Further, using confusion table and majority voting applied to the entire dataset, the accuracy reached 96.66%. The results are promising to assist the process of mental health assessment of students.
Triglyceride-rich lipoproteins and their remnants: metabolic insights, role in atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, and emerging therapeutic strategies—a consensus statement from the European Atherosclerosis Society

Abstract Recent advances in human genetics, together with a large body of epidemiologic, preclinical, and clinical trial results, provide strong support for a causal association between triglycerides (TG), TG-rich lipoproteins (TRL), and TRL remnants, and increased risk of myocardial infarction, ischaemic stroke, and aortic valve stenosis. These data also indicate that TRL and their remnants may contribute significantly to residual cardiovascular risk in patients on optimized low-density lipoprotein (LDL)-lowering therapy. This statement critically appraises current understanding of the structure, function, and metabolism of TRL, and their pathophysiological role in atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD). Key points are (i) a working definition of normo- and hypertriglyceridaemic states and their relation to risk of ASCVD, (ii) a conceptual framework for the generation of remnants due to dysregulation of TRL production, lipolysis, and remodelling, as well as clearance of remnant lipoproteins from the circulation, (iii) the pleiotropic proatherogenic actions of TRL and remnants at the arterial wall, (iv) challenges in defining, quantitating, and assessing the atherogenic properties of remnant particles, and (v) exploration of the relative atherogenicity of TRL and remnants compared to LDL. Assessment of these issues provides a foundation for evaluating approaches to effectively reduce levels of TRL and remnants by targeting either production, lipolysis, or hepatic clearance, or a combination of these mechanisms. This consensus statement updates current understanding in an integrated manner, thereby providing a platform for new therapeutic paradigms targeting TRL and their remnants, with the aim of reducing the risk of ASCVD.
Impact of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic on the volume of surgeries and visits to a tertiary urology service

Background: The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has caused countries and various sectors of the society to initiate measures to prevent its rapid spread, and thus, numerous political and hospital authorities have adopted measures to care for affected patients, limiting the assistance of several hospital sectors, including the urology service of the Hospital Geral de Fortaleza (HGF). Methods: A retrospective quantitative descriptive study was conducted by analyzing the data of the years 2019 and 2020 (January to June) rescued through the Center for patient safety and hospital quality (CPSHQ) of the HGF, correlating them through methods and statistical and numerical analyses with the aid of Excel and Epi Info programs, to compare and observe the impact of the pandemic in the urology service.Results: A 26.23% decrease was observed in relation to elective procedures, 25.6% for emergency procedures, 16.57% for minor surgeries, and 46.44% for outpatient consultations when compared to the first semester of 2019 compared to that in 2020.Conclusions: It is clear that the pandemic has negatively impacted the volume of various HGF urological services, and new studies should demonstrate the consequences of the lack of assistance in the period described.
Development and use of mucosal vaccines: Potential and limitations

Mucosal surfaces represent a major gateway to microorganisms which may be harmful to health. The humoral immune response has an important action in the defense of these surfaces, as it is able to prevent the entry of pathogens in the body. Vaccines with local application have been evaluated in order to stimulate an efficient immune response in the mucous membranes, since conventional vaccines, for parenteral application, tend to stimulate a mostly systemic response. Vaccines that use the mucosa as an inoculation route are able to generate an immune response directly in the application mucosa and corresponding mucosa, since the mucosal system is integrated, which represents an important advantage in choosing the inoculation route. This paper aims to illustrate some concepts related to mucosal immunity in general, as well as to gather information about what has been studied in relation to mucosal routes of administration of vaccines, immunomodulators and antigen delivery systems.
Classification and genetic targeting of cell types in the primary taste and premotor center of the adult Drosophila brain

Neural circuits carry out complex computations that allow animals to evaluate food, select mates, move toward attractive stimuli, and move away from threats. In insects, the subesophageal zone (SEZ) is a brain region that receives gustatory, pheromonal, and mechanosensory inputs and contributes to the control of diverse behaviors, including feeding, grooming, and locomotion. Despite its importance in sensorimotor transformations, the study of SEZ circuits has been hindered by limited knowledge of the underlying diversity of SEZ neurons. Here, we generate a collection of split-GAL4 lines that provides precise genetic targeting of 138 different SEZ cell types in adult Drosophila melanogaster, comprising approximately one third of all SEZ neurons. We characterize the single-cell anatomy of these neurons and find that they cluster by morphology into six supergroups that organize the SEZ into discrete anatomical domains. We find that the majority of local SEZ interneurons are not classically polarized, suggesting rich local processing, whereas SEZ projection neurons tend to be classically polarized, conveying information to a limited number of higher brain regions. This study provides insight into the anatomical organization of the SEZ and generates resources that will facilitate further study of SEZ neurons and their contributions to sensory processing and behavior.
Conus Myelitis Associated with COVID-19 Infection- Report of a Case.

A 42-year old euglycemic and normotensive man had fever with dry cough for 2 days. On the 10th day of illness, he was hospitalised with acute onset urinary retention, constipation and weakness of both legs. Based upon the clinico-radiological findings coupled with urinary association with Covid-19 infection established the diagnosis in this case of "Covid-19 associated Conus Myelitis. " The patient received a 5-day course of intra-venous pulse methylprednisolone (1G/day) followed by tapering dose of oral steroids. The neurological deficits recovered over the next one month.
SMART HOME AUTOMATION SYSTEM USING IOT

-This provides an effective and flexible home control and monitoring system with the aid of an integrated micro-web server with IP connectivity for access to and control of equipment and devices remotely using. The proposed system does not require a dedicated server PC with respect to similar systems and offers a new communication protocol for monitoring and controlling the home environment with more than just switching functionality. Smart home interfaces and device definitions to ensure interoperability between ZigBee devices from various manufacturers of electrical equipment, meters and Smart Energy enables products to allow manufactured. We introduced the proposed home energy control systems design intelligent services for users
EXPLORING CROSS-CITY SEMANTIC SEGMENTATION OF ALS POINT CLOUDS

Abstract. Deep learning models achieve excellent semantic segmentation results for airborne laser scanning (ALS) point clouds, if sufficient training data are provided. Increasing amounts of annotated data are becoming publicly available thanks to contributors from all over the world. However, models trained on a specific dataset typically exhibit poor performance on other datasets. I.e., there are significant domain shifts, as data captured in different environments or by distinct sensors have different distributions. In this work, we study this domain shift and potential strategies to mitigate it, using two popular ALS datasets: the ISPRS Vaihingen benchmark from Germany and the LASDU benchmark from China. We compare different training strategies for cross-city ALS point cloud semantic segmentation. In our experiments, we analyse three factors that may lead to domain shift and affect the learning: point cloud density, LiDAR intensity, and the role of data augmentation. Moreover, we evaluate a well-known standard method of domain adaptation, deep CORAL (Sun and Saenko, 2016). In our experiments, adapting the point cloud density and appropriate data augmentation both help to reduce the domain gap and improve segmentation accuracy. On the contrary, intensity features can bring an improvement within a dataset, but deteriorate the generalisation across datasets. Deep CORAL does not further improve the accuracy over the simple adaptation of density and data augmentation, although it can mitigate the impact of improperly chosen point density, intensity features, and further dataset biases like lack of diversity.