Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The effect of hypoalbuminema on postoperative mortality and morbidity in open heart surgery

Introduction: Hypoalbuminemia is a key factor which increases mortality and morbidity among various patient groups. The aim of this study is to evaluate the effects of hypoalbuminemia on the postoperative mortality and morbidity in open heart surgery patients and contribute to the literature. Materials and method: This retrospective study was conducted on patients who had open heart surgery with cardiopulmonary bypass in our clinic between 1 April 2014 and 31 March 2017. Ethical approval was obtained in accordance with the guidelines of Declaration of Helsinki. In total, 52 patients in Group 1 and 47 patients in Group 2 were randomly selected. The preoperative serum albumin levels of the patients in Group 1 were 3.5 g/dL and higher. The preoperative serum albumin levels of the patients in Group 2 were lower than 3.5 g/dL. Results: There was no statistically significant difference between the groups with regards to age, gender, ejection fraction and Europe Cardicac Operational Risk Evaluation System scores (EuroSCORE). Any significant difference was not found in terms of intraoperative findings among the groups. Mean time until extubation, length of stay in the intensive care unit (ICU) and hospitalization duration of Group 1 were significantly shorter than group 2 (intubation duration: 8.46±2.01 hours vs. 9.23±2.25 hours, P=0.032, ICU stay: 50.75±10.01 hours vs. 62.15±13.57 hours, P<0.001 and post-operative hospitalization: 7.83±0.94 days vs. 8.47±1.56 days, P=0.047, respectively). Arrythmia incidences of Groups 1 and 2 were 5.8% and 21.3%, respectively (P=0.023). Group 1 received significantly less blood transfusions than Group 2 (Erythrocyte Suspension Transfusion: 1.62±0.87 Units vs 2.72±0.95 Units, P<0.001 and Fresh Frozen Plasma Transfusion: 1.29±0.78 Units vs 3.40±1.21 Units, P<0.001, respectively). During the postoperative period, serum albumin and hematocrit values of both groups decreased significantly (P<0.001) while blood creatinine levels increased, which was significant in the hypoalbuminemia group only (P<0.001). Conclusion: Hypoalbuminemia may negatively affect postoperative prognosis. We believe that providing necessary nutritional support to hypoalbuminemic patients due for open heart surgery may contribute to shortening the time until extubation, ICU length of stay and duration of hospitalization as well as decreasing blood transfusions and postoperative morbidity and mortality.
Assessment and Comparison of Intraocular Pressure in Patients with Diabetes Mellitus and those who are not Diabetic

Aim: The aim of the present study was to compare the intraocular pressure in diabetes mellitus and non diabetic’s individuals. Methods: This prospective observational study was done in the Department of Ophthalmology, M.G. M. Medical college & Hospital, Jamshedpur, Jharkhand, India for 12 months, all the Patients having diabetes mellitus on treatment and Non diabetic individuals was included in this study. Two groups were formed which includes Group A constituting diabetes mellitus patients and Group B constitutes Non diabetic individuals. Detailed history of diabetes mellitus patient was taken regarding duration of diabetes, treatment, fasting, post prandial blood sugar levels and HbA1c was recorded. Intra ocular pressure was compared between Group A and Group B, to correlate intra ocular pressure in relation to duration of diabetes mellitus and different stages of diabetic retinopathy. Results: Mean intra-ocular pressure higher (18.23±4.02 mmHg) in diabetic patients as compared with (15.02±3.97 mmHg) in non-diabetic, p value < 0.0001 which is statistically significant. Mean intra-ocular pressure (19.27±3.99 mmHg) higher in diabetic patients with HbA1c value >6.5% as compared (18.12±3.59 mmHg) with diabetic patients with HbA1c value <6.5%, p value < 0.0005 which is statistically significant. Mean intra ocular pressure was (18.78±3.77mmHg) in diabetic patients with duration greater than 10 years as compared with (18.03±4.03mmHg) in diabetic patients with duration less than 10 years, p value <0.33 which is not significant. Conclusion: The diabetes mellitus is a risk factor for raised IOP. Tight glycemic control prevents the rise in IOP. Patients with poor glycemic control were found to be more prone to raised IOP. Diabetic patients should be regularly screened for IOP so that burden ocular morbidity due to glaucoma can be reduced.
Developers' Views of Potential Causes of Variation Orders for Institutional Buildings in Singapore

The study identifies the causes of variations in institutional building projects in Singapore. To achieve the study objectives, a questionnaire survey and interviews were carried out to collect information on potential causes of variations. Responses from 28 professionals with a government agency from the client's side were analyzed. The results suggest that the errors and omissions in design, change in specifications by owner, design discrepancies, change in specifications by consultant and lack of coordination were considered as the most important causes of variations in institutional building projects. Recommendations were suggested based on the findings of the research and literature review. The involvement of professionals during the design phase, thorough detailing of design, involvement of owner during the design phase and approval of the design by government bodies before the inception of construction activities were suggested for controlling the most important causes of variation orders for institutional buildings in Singapore. The causes of variation orders that were identified would be helpful for building professionals in assessing variation orders; furthermore, the suggested controls would also assist them in taking proactive measures for reducing variation orders for institutional buildings.
PROBABILISTIC MODELING OF FAILURE DISTRIBUTION AND RELIABILITY ANALYSIS OF SMALL WELDING MACHINE

Abstract The need for performance evaluation and planned maintenance of industrial machines is an imperative for reliability study. This ensures that users have needed information on the likelihood of failure, when to repair and how long the repair would last. In this work, the failure distribution of a locally fabricated welding machine was shown to follow gamma distribution with shape parameter,
Bazı Pamuk Genotiplerinde Lif Kalite Özelikleri Bakımından Fenotipik Analizi

Dunya capinda buyuk oneme sahip olan pamuk bitkisinin ozellikle lif kalite ozellikleri bakimindan ihtiyaclara yonelik olarak daha kaliteli ve verimi daha yuksek olmasi icin gunumuze kadar pek cok calismada bulunulmus, bunun neticesinde de yaygin olarak kullanilan ticari cesitler gelistirilmistir. Yapmis oldugumuz bu calismada, lif kalite ozelliklerinden circir randimani, incelik, esneklik, uzunluk ve mukavemet ozellikleri analiz edilmis ve standart cesitlerle mukayese edilmistir. Bunun neticesinde, circir randiman degerlerinin % 0.08-0.40 arasinda degisiklik gosterdigi ve ortalama degerinin % 0.20, standart sapma degerinin ise 0.05 oldugu belirlenmistir. Genotipler arasinda 31 nolu (G.hirsutum/Crincle Leaf) genotipin en dusuk verimde oldugu, 104 nolu (Famosa*) genotipin ise en yuksek verimlilige sahip oldugu ve genotiplerin geneline ait sonuclara bakildigindan cogunluguna ait degerlerin ortalama degerden dusuk oldugu belirlenmistir. Genotipler incelik bakimindan incelendiginde verilerin 3.12-5.24 μg/inch arasinda degistigi ve ortalama degerinin 4.40 μg/inch ve standart sapmasinin 0.39 μg/inch oldugu gorulmustur. Bunlardan 31 nolu (G.hirsutum/Crincle Leaf) genotip en ince, 14 nolu (G.hirsutum/Aktas-3) genotip en kalin life sahip oldugu belirlenmistir. Mukavemet ozelligi dikkate alindiginda elde edilen degerlerin 22.5-34.39 N/mm2, ortalama degerinin 28.48 N/mm2 ve std sapmanin ise 1,80 N/mm2 oldugu belirlenmistir. Bunlardan 55 nolu (G.herbaceum/ Maydos Yerlisi) genotip en dayaniksiz, 50 nolu (G.barbadense/Giza-45) genotip en dayanikli olarak belirlenmistir. Esneklik degerleri 19-45.15 tppsi arasinda degismekte olup, ortalama deger 32.34 tppsi ve std. sapmasi ise 3.71 tppsi olarak belirlenmistir. Bu degerlere gore 31 nolu (G.hirsutum/Crincle Leaf) genotip esneklik bakimindan en dusuk, 50 nolu (G.barbadense/Giza-45) genotip esneklik bakimindan en yuksek genotip olarak belirlenmistir. Uzunluk degerlerine baktigimizda ise degerler 4.80-8 mm arasinda degisip, ortalama olarak 6.12 mm belirlenmistir. Std sapma ise 0.56 mm oldugu belirlenmis olup, bunlar icerisinden 27 nolu (G.hirsutum/Ca-228) genotip en kisa lif ozelligine sahipken, en uzun life sahip olan genotip 74 nolu (Rknr 261) genotip olarak belirlenmistir.
Real-world response of COVID-19 patients in Mexico

Currently in Mexico, the available clinical guidelines published for COVID-19 treatment recommend symptom treatment and home isolation for mild forms; and other medications for severe and acute forms. The effectiveness of how real-world treatment patterns impact mortality and recovery is still unknown. In this retrospective observational study, we investigated 5,575 medicated patients with COVID-19 treated at two Mexican states seen in the largest healthcare system in Mexico. A survival analysis was performed using death and discharge as primary and secondary outcomes (respectively). Machine learning models were built to predict mortality and discharge. The higher prevalence of obesity, diabetes, and heart disease comorbidities is consistent with Mexico's epidemiological profile. Mortality occurs around 15-20 days from the start of symptoms. Antivirals in combination with antibiotics present lower survival rates, with patients undertaking neuraminidase inhibitors (NAIs) being the most affected. Our findings recommend against using specific treatment combinations with NAIs, and should help improve the country's clinical guidelines.
Highly efficient 3-stage Doherty power amplifier using gate bias adaption

This paper demonstrates a highly efficient 3-stage Doherty power amplifier (PA) employing an envelope tracking (ET) technique. The ‘3-stage’ Doherty PA is the most efficient architecture for a high peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) signal among the various Doherty PAs. However, because of the lower peaking biases than those of the ‘N-way’ Doherty PA, the proper load modulation is hard to be achieved. To get proper modulation, the peaking PAs' gate biases have been adaptively controlled using the ET technique, and the peak power and maximum efficiency characteristic along the backed-off output power region is successfully achieved. By ADS and Matlab simulations, the overall behavior of the 3-stage Doherty PA employing the ET technique has been fully analyzed. To maximize the overall efficiency of the proposed 3-stage Doherty PA, the unit PA has been designed using class F−1 PA. For verification, the amplifier is implemented using 5 W and 10 W PEP LDMOSFETs for the 802.16e mobile world interoperability for microwave access (WiMAX) at 1 GHz with a 8.5 dB PAPR. The measured drain efficiency of the proposed 3-stage Doherty PA is 55.5% at an average output power of 37 dBm, which is a 7.54 dB backed-off output power. The digital feedback predistortion (DFBPD) algorithm has been used to linearize the proposed PA considering the ET technique. After linearization, the −33.15 dB of relative constellation error (RCE) performance is achieved, satisfying the system specification. These results show that the 3-stage Doherty employing the ET technique and saturated PA is the most suitable PA for the highly efficient and linear transmitter.
Studying how state health services delivery policies can mitigate the effects of disasters on drug addiction treatment and overdose: Protocol for a mixed-methods study

Background The United States is experiencing a drug addiction and overdose crisis, made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic. Relative to other types of health services, addiction treatment and overdose prevention services are particularly vulnerable to disaster-related disruptions for multiple reasons including fragmentation from the general medical system and stigma, which may lead decisionmakers and providers to de-prioritize these services during disasters. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, U.S. states implemented multiple policies designed to mitigate disruptions to addiction treatment and overdose prevention services, for example policies expanding access to addiction treatment delivered via telehealth and policies designed to support continuity of naloxone distribution programs. There is limited evidence on the effects of these policies on addiction treatment and overdose. This evidence is needed to inform state policy design in future disasters, as well as to inform decisions regarding whether to sustain these policies post-pandemic. Methods The overall study uses a concurrent-embedded design. Aims 1–2 use difference-in-differences analyses of large-scale observational databases to examine how state policies designed to mitigate the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on health services delivery influenced addiction treatment delivery and overdose during the pandemic. Aim 3 uses a qualitative embedded multiple case study approach, in which we characterize local implementation of the state policies of interest; most public health disaster policies are enacted at the state level but implemented at the local level by healthcare systems and local public health authorities. Discussion Triangulation of results across methods will yield robust understanding of whether and how state disaster-response policies influenced drug addiction treatment and overdose during the COVID-19 pandemic. Results will inform policy enactment and implementation in future public health disasters. Results will also inform decisions about whether to sustain COVID-19 pandemic-related changes to policies governing delivery addiction and overdose prevention services long-term.
A broad-spectrum cloning vector that exists as both an integrated element and a free plasmid in Chlamydia trachomatis

Plasmid transformation of chlamydiae has created new opportunities to investigate host–microbe interactions during chlamydial infections; however, there are still limitations. Plasmid transformation requires a replicon derived from the native Chlamydia plasmid, and these transformations are species-specific. We explored the utility of a broad host-range plasmid, pBBR1MCS-4, to transform chlamydiae, with a goal of simplifying the transformation process. The plasmid was modified to contain chromosomal DNA from C. trachomatis to facilitate homologous recombination. Sequences flanking incA were cloned into the pBBR1MCS-4 vector along with the GFP:CAT cassette from the pSW2-GFP chlamydial shuttle vector. The final plasmid construct, pBVR2, was successfully transformed into C. trachomatis strain L2-434. Chlamydial transformants were analyzed by immunofluorescence microscopy and positive clones were sequentially purified using limiting dilution. PCR and PacBio-based whole genome sequencing were used to determine if the plasmid was maintained within the chromosome or as an episome. PacBio sequencing of the cloned transformants revealed allelic exchange events between the chromosome and plasmid pBVR2 that replaced chromosomal incA with the plasmid GFP:CAT cassette. The data also showed evidence of full integration of the plasmid into the bacterial chromosome. While some plasmids were fully integrated, some were maintained as episomes and could be purified and retransformed into E. coli. Thus, the plasmid can be successfully transformed into chlamydia without a chlamydial origin of replication and can exist in multiple states within a transformed population.
Novel feature extraction method for signal analysis based on independent component analysis and wavelet transform

Feature extraction is an important part of data processing that provides a basis for more complicated tasks such as classification or clustering. Recently many approaches for signal feature extraction were created. However, plenty of proposed methods are based on convolutional neural networks. This class of models requires a high amount of computational power to train and deploy and large dataset. Our work introduces a novel feature extraction method that uses wavelet transform to provide additional information in the Independent Component Analysis mixing matrix. The goal of our work is to combine good performance with a low inference cost. We used the task of Electrocardiography (ECG) heartbeat classification to evaluate the usefulness of the proposed approach. Experiments were carried out with an MIT-BIH database with four target classes (Normal, Vestibular ectopic beats, Ventricular ectopic beats, and Fusion strikes). Several base wavelet functions with different classifiers were used in experiments. Best was selected with 5-fold cross-validation and Wilcoxon test with significance level 0.05. With the proposed method for feature extraction and multi-layer perceptron classifier, we obtained 95.81% BAC-score. Compared to other literature methods, our approach was better than most feature extraction methods except for convolutional neural networks. Further analysis indicates that our method performance is close to convolutional neural networks for classes with a limited number of learning examples. We also analyze the number of required operations at test time and argue that our method enables easy deployment in environments with limited computing power.
Open-Source ESBs in Action

Most modern business systems include independent applications that exchange information with each other-a technique usually called enterprise integration. An architectural approach called the Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) offers developers a way to handle the messages between those independent applications without creating a lot of custom code. While commercial ESB solutions can be quite expensive to implement and maintain, a set of high-quality open source ESB tools offer the same functionality at a substantially lower cost. Open Source ESBs in Action shows you how to implement and use two open source ESB implementations: Mule and ServiceMix. The authors introduce you to these freely-available ESB tools and present practical examples of how to use them in real-world scenarios. You will learn how the various features of an ESB such as transformation, routing, security, connectivity and more can be implemented using Mule and ServiceMix. You will also learn how to solve common enterprise integration problems using a structured approach. Beyond simply learning how Mule and Service Mix work, you'll learn the core techniques of ESB implementation such as Process Choreography, or the implementation of complex business processes through an ESB, and Service Orchestration, or exposing a set of services as a single service. The book shows you the fundamentals of ESB-based event processing and Quality of Service concerns like security, reliable delivery, and transaction management. Working in integration projects is exciting, with new technologies and paradigms arriving every day. Open Source technologies like Mule and ServiceMix both offer lower-cost solutions and a higher degree of innovation than commercial ESB implementations. Open Source ESBs in Action will help you master ESB-driven integration techniques quickly and will provide you with knowledge you need to work effectively with Mule and ServiceMix.
Irma 5.1 multisensor signature prediction model

The Irma synthetic signature prediction code is being developed to facilitate the research and development of multisensor systems. Irma was one of the first high resolution Infrared (IR) target and background signature models to be developed for tactical weapon application. Originally developed in 1980 by the Munitions Directorate of the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL/MN), the Irma model was used exclusively to generate IR scenes. In 1988, a number of significant upgrades to Irma were initiated including the addition of a laser (or active) channel. This two-channel version was released to the user community in 1990. In 1992, an improved scene generator was incorporated into the Irma model, which supported correlated frame-to-frame imagery. A passive IR/millimeter wave (MMW) code was completed in 1994. This served as the cornerstone for the development of the co-registered active/passive IR/MMW model, Irma 4.0. In 2000, Irma version 5.0 was released which encompassed several upgrades to both the physical models and software. Circular polarization was added to the passive channel and the doppler capability was added to the active MMW channel. In 2002, the multibounce technique was added to the Irma passive channel. In the ladar channel, a user-friendly Ladar Sensor Assistant (LSA) was incorporated which provides capability and flexibility for sensor modeling. Irma 5.0 runs on several platforms including Windows, Linux, Solaris, and SGI Irix. Since 2000, additional capabilities and enhancements have been added to the ladar channel including polarization and speckle effect. Work is still ongoing to add time-jittering model to the ladar channel. A new user interface has been introduced to aid users in the mechanism of scene generation and running the Irma code. The user interface provides a canvas where a user can add and remove objects using mouse clicks to construct a scene. The scene can then be visualized to find the desired sensor position. The synthetic ladar signatures have been validated twice and underwent a third validation test near the end of 04. These capabilities will be integrated into the next release, Irma 5.1, scheduled for completion in the summer of FY05. Irma is currently being used to support a number of civilian and military applications. The Irma user base includes over 130 agencies within the Air Force, Army, Navy, DARPA, NASA, Department of Transportation, academia, and industry. The purpose of this paper is to report the progress of the Irma 5.1 development effort.
Riddled with holes: Understanding air space formation in plant leaves

Plants use energy from sunlight to transform carbon dioxide from the air into complex organic molecules, ultimately producing much of the food we eat. To make this complex chemistry more efficient, plant leaves are intricately constructed in 3 dimensions: They are flat to maximise light capture and contain extensive internal air spaces to increase gas exchange for photosynthesis. Many years of work has built up an understanding of how leaves form flat blades, but the molecular mechanisms that control air space formation are poorly understood. Here, I review our current understanding of air space formation and outline how recent advances can be harnessed to answer key questions and take the field forward. Increasing our understanding of plant air spaces will not only allow us to understand a fundamental aspect of plant development, but also unlock the potential to engineer the internal structure of crops to make them more efficient at photosynthesis with lower water requirements and more resilient in the face of a changing environment.