bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
A Decision Support System for Solving Linear Programming Problems
Authors: Ploskas Nikolaos , Samaras Nikolaos , Papathanasiou Jason
Published: February 2015

Linear programming algorithms have been widely used in Decision Support Systems. These systems have incorporated linear programming algorithms for the solution of the given problems. Yet, the special structure of each linear problem may take advantage of different linear programming algorithms or different techniques used in these algorithms. This paper proposes a web-based DSS that assists decision makers in the solution of linear programming problems with a variety of linear programming algorithms and techniques. Two linear programming algorithms have been included in the DSS: (i) revised simplex algorithm and (ii) exterior primal simplex algorithm. Furthermore, ten scaling techniques, five basis update methods and eight pivoting rules have been incorporated in the DSS. All linear programming algorithms and methods have been implemented using MATLAB and converted to Java classes using MATLAB Builder JA, while the web interface of the DSS has been designed using Java Server Pages.
A Decision Support System for Sizing the Call Center of an Electrical Power Distributor
Authors: Filho Adiel Teixeira de Almeida , Henriques de Gusmão Ana Paula , Clemente Thárcylla , Moura Jadielson , Costa Ana Paula Cabral Seixas , de Almeida Adiel Teixeira
Published: February 2015

Sizing the capacity of a call center is a well known problem. However, in some cases there are regulatory aspects that must be observed that, combined with specificities of the service provided and how it operates, affects the manner of the process for forecasting the inbound call rate and decisions on sizing capacity. This paper presents a real problem relating to several electric power distributors in Brazil regulated by ANEEL (the Brazilian regulatory agency for electric power companies). Amongst the available data, this kind of call center is affected by commercial actions, debt collection actions, billing activities, the health of the state of the distribution network and maintenance activities, which are not integrated and planned together. Considering the dynamics on the company cash flow these factors may change and adversely affect the demands on the call center. Thus in this article, a description is given of how experts' knowledge has been integrated so as to improve the forecast of incoming calls and the decision process. For this purpose a model to evaluate the sizing of this type of call center is developed in order to comply with regulatory requirements for this service.
Examining the impact of Emotional Intelligence on Organizational Role Stress
Authors: Rathore Shubhangini , Ahuja Vandana
Published: February 2015

The nature of jobs in the service industry, are characterized by complex work systems and customer orientation; which require huge emotional labor. These multitudinous demands on the personal and professional fronts, lead to a depletion and exhaustion of resources of the mind and body. Prolonged exposure to such situations has been found to have dysfunctional effects on the individuals; leading to organizational role stress. It has been observed that employees with higher emotional intelligence are more aware of the coping strategies to deal with stress. The acknowledgement to develop emotional competencies of the workforce is therefore, a focal point of concern for human resource practitioners today. This paper attempts to explore the relationship between organizational Role Stress and Emotional Intelligence in the Indian IT industry. Data was collected from a total of 160 employees, both Managers and Non Managers working in the Delhi NCR Region. Emotional Intelligence was measured by developing a scale consisting of 27 items, which was developed by the researchers in the previous studies; by adapting to Indian and Western perspectives on emotional Intelligence. Stress was measured using the Organizational Role Stress questionnaire comprising of 50 items. The results show a strong correlation between Role Stress and Emotional Intelligence and significant impact of Emotional Intelligence and Organizational Stress.
A Balanced Perspective to Perioperative Process Management Aligned to Hospital Strategy
Authors: Ryan Jim , Doster Barbara , Daily Sandra , Lewis Carmen
Published: February 2015

Dynamic technological activities of analysis, evaluation, and synthesis can highlight complex relationships within integrated processes to target improvement and ultimately yield improved processes. Likewise, the identification of existing process limitations, potential capabilities, and subsequent contextual understanding are contributing factors that yield measured improvement. Based on a 120-month longitudinal study of an academic medical center, this study investigates how integrated information systems and business analytics can improve perioperative efficiency and effectiveness across patient quality of care, stakeholder satisfaction, clinical operations, and financial cost effectiveness. This case study examines process management practices of balanced scorecard and dashboards to monitor and improve the perioperative process, aligned to overall hospital goals at strategic, tactical, and operational levels. The conclusion includes discussion of study implications and limitations.
Monitoring and Assisting Maternity-Infant Care in Rural Areas (MAMICare)
Authors: Lavariega Juan C. , Córdova Gustavo A. , Gómez Lorena G. , Avila Alfonso
Published: February 2015

Presented is the project called MAMICare, which is motivated by the alarming number of maternity and infant deaths in rural areas due mainly to a poor monitoring of pregnancy progress and lack of appropriate alerting mechanism in case of abnormal gestation evolution. This work proposes an information technology solution based on mobile devices, and health sensors such as ECG (electrocardiogram), stethoscope, pulse-oximeter, and blood-glucose meter to collect automatically relevant health data for a better monitoring of pregnant women. This article addresses the status of the maternity infant death problem especially in rural areas of Mexico. It reviews some applications of IT in health systems (known also as Electronic Health or simply e-Health) and discusses how these are related to the presented proposal and how they differ. The article presents the proposed solution and discuss the current status of the work.
Centrality-Based Connected Dominating Sets for Complex Network Graphs
Authors: Meghanathan Natarajan
Published: February 2015

The author proposes the use of centrality-metrics to determine connected dominating sets (CDS) for complex network graphs. The author hypothesizes that nodes that are highly ranked by any of these four well-known centrality metrics (such as the degree centrality, eigenvector centrality, betweeness centrality and closeness centrality) are likely to be located in the core of the network and could be good candidates to be part of the CDS of the network. Moreover, the author aims for a minimum-sized CDS (fewer number of nodes forming the CDS and the core edges connecting the CDS nodes) while using these centrality metrics. The author discusses our approach/algorithm to determine each of these four centrality metrics and run them on six real-world network graphs (ranging from 34 to 332 nodes) representing various domains. The author observes the betweeness centrality-based CDS to be of the smallest size in five of the six networks and the closeness centrality-based CDS to be of the smallest size in the smallest of the six networks and incur the largest size for the remaining networks.
Next Generation Wearable Devices
Authors: Shakhakarmi Niraj
Published: February 2015

The next generation wearable devices are Smart health monitoring device and Smart sousveillance hat which are capable of using wearable sensors for measuring physiological information, sousveillanace, navigation, as well as smart device to smart device communications over cellular coverage. Smart health monitoring device collect and observe different health related information deploying biosensors and can predict health problems. Smart sousveillance hat provides the brainwaves based fatigue state, training and sousveillance around the wearer. The next generation wearable smart devices deploy the device to device communications in LTE assisted networks with D2D server, D2D Application server and D2D enhanced LTE signalling for D2D service management, spectrum utilization and broad cellular coverage, which make them portable, social, commercial and sustainable. Thus, the wearable device technology will merge with the smart communications besides the health and wellness. Furthermore, the simulation and performance evaluation shows that LTE-D2D wearable smart device communications provides two times more energy efficiency than LTE-UEs cellular communications. The LTE-D2D data rate is also found significantly higher with higher D2D-SINR for lower relative mobility (= 30m/s) and lower D2D distance (<400m) between devices.
A Weighted Method to Update Network User Preference Profile Dynamically
Authors: Zhang Zhi-Yuan , Liu Yun , Zeng Qing-An
Published: February 2015

There are many alternatives in a Recommender System (RS) that can be represented by numerical attributes. One of the most challenging tasks in developing RS is the design of techniques that can infer user preferences through observation of their actions. A RS usually stores a personal preference profile associated with each user, but the initial profile of a user is usually incomplete and imprecise. Therefore, it is necessary to update a user's preference profile dynamically. Some previous research has covered this area, but neglected an important fact in real situations, where different weights should be considered for every attribute when selecting alternatives and updating a user preference profile. This paper provides a realistic and weighted method to update network user preferences through analysis of user selections. More specifically, an algorithm to compute and update weights of different attributes in a dynamic way is presented. The weights are used in the adaptation process of network user preference profile. The method is tested by extensive simulations and the obtained results show that it is more effective than previous methods.
Spectral Graph and Minimal Spanning Tree for 3D Polygonal Meshes Fingerprinting
Authors: Abdallah Emad E. , Al-Oqily Ibrahim , Abdallah Alaa E. , Otoom Ahmed F. , Alsarhan Ayoub
Published: February 2015

In this paper, the authors present a robust three-dimensional fingerprint algorithm for verification, indexing, and identification. The core idea behind our technique is to apply the eigen-decomposition to the mesh Laplacian matrix, and then compute minimum spanning trees (MST) of several concentrations of the mesh shape structure. The fixed size hash vector of a 3D mesh is defined in terms of the MST values and number of the initial patches. The extensive experimental results on several 3D meshes prove the uniqueness of the extracted hash vectors and the robustness of the proposed technique against the most common attacks including distortion-less attacks, compression, noise, smoothing, scaling, rotation as well as mixtures of these attacks.
Cluster-Based Online Routing Protocols for Ad Hoc Network
Authors: Abdallah Alaa E. , Bsoul Mohammad , Abdallah Emad E. , Al–Oqily Ibrahim , Kao George
Published: February 2015

In geographical routing algorithms, mobile nodes rely on geographical position to make routing judgments. Researchers frequently discuss such routing algorithms in (2D) space. However, in reality, mobile nodes spread in (3D) space. In this paper the authors present four new 3D geographical-based routing algorithms Cylinder, Greedy-Cylinder, Cluster-Cylinder, and Greedy-cluster-Cylinder. In Cylinder routing, the nodes are locally projected on the inner surface of a cylinder, perimeter routing is executed after that. Greedy-Cylinder starts with Greedy routing algorithm until a local minimum is reached. The algorithm then switches to Cylinder routing. Cluster-Cylinder elects a dominating set for all nodes and then uses this set for projection and routing. The fourth algorithm Greedy-cluster-Cylinder is a combination between Greedy-Cylinder and Cluster-Cylinder. The authors evaluate their new algorithms and compare them with many classical known algorithms. The simulation outcomes show the substantial enhancement in delivery rate over other algorithms.
Product Line Stakeholder Preference Elicitation via Decision Processes
Authors: Bashari Mahdi , Noorian Mahdi , Bagheri Ebrahim
Published: February 2015

In the software product line configuration process, certain features are selected based on the stakeholders' needs and preferences regarding the available functional and quality properties. This book chapter presents how a product configuration can be modeled as a decision process and how an optimal strategy representing the stakeholders' desirable configuration can be found. In the decision process model of product configuration, the product is configured by making decisions at a number of decision points. The decisions at each of these decision points contribute to functional and quality attributes of the final product. In order to find an optimal strategy for the decision process, a utility-based approach can be adopted, through which, the strategy with the highest utility is selected as the optimal strategy. In order to define utility for each strategy, a multi-attribute utility function is defined over functional and quality properties of a configured product and a utility elicitation process is then introduced for finding this utility function. The utility elicitation process works based on asking gamble queries over functional and quality requirement from the stakeholder. Using this utility function, the optimal strategy and therefore optimal product configuration is determined.
Mobile Game Based Learning
Authors: Roy Anupama , Sharples Mike
Published: February 2015

This paper describes an investigatory project to pilot an SMS based game to enhance the training of peer educators of MSM (Males having Sex with Males) groups in India. The objective of this research was to increase the efficacy of the MSM peer educators by bridging the gap between the training needs and their real life experiences. An SMS based game was designed using participatory approaches as a learning support, upholding their real life experiences in game form. The game was designed on an existing platform which provides text role-play games accessed through SMS messages. This paper examines the learning benefits. The findings show that after the intervention the peer educators had better understanding of peer education and organizational support. They also learnt to think critically.
Questionable Benefit of Visual and Peer Mediated Learning on Overall Learning Outcomes of a First-Year Physiology Course
Authors: Ernst Hardy , McGahan William T. , Harrison John
Published: February 2015

This paper reports on attempts to incorporate creative visual literacy, by way of student owned technology, and sharing of student-generated multimedia amongst peers to enhance learning in a first year human physiology course*. In 2013, students were set the task of producing an animated video, which outlined the pathogenesis of a chosen disease. Students were then encouraged to view each other's videos. Students in the same course in 2012 engaged in a purely written, non-shared task. The depth of topic understanding did not change between 2012 and 2013. Moderating for cohort variation, students in 2013 showed poorer overall learning outcomes** than students in the 2012 cohort. The authors speculate that the peer mediated aspect of the learning activity failed, and that the video task was disruptive to wider learning, due to it being time consuming and unfamiliar to students. * We refer to a “course” as a semester long program/unit of learning activities, around a specific subject, for which a grade and credit towards a degree is awarded upon successful completion. A full time study load at the University of Queensland typically involves four courses a semester. **By “learning outcomes” we refer in general terms to the knowledge and understanding of prescribed course content displayed by students through their scores for summative course assessment.
Podcasting as a Mobile Learning Technology
Authors: Rosell-Aguilar Fernando
Published: February 2015

Despite the fact that portability was perceived as one of the major benefits of podcasting as a teaching and learning tool, little evidence has been found of users taking advantage of this feature for academic use. This paper reports on a major study (1886 responses) of iTunes U users. The analysis compares the responses of those participants who use static devices to play the materials they download with those of users who utilise mobile devices. The results show that more users play iTunes U materials from mobile devices than static devices. Users share some similarities in their use of podcasts but some marked differences as well, in contrast with previous research. The author argues that different perceptions and practices are based on whether the users are formal or informal learners and discuss the implications for the use of podcasting as a mobile learning technology.
Analysis of Hardness by Parametric Optimization of Gravity Die Casting for A-356 Aluminium Alloy Using Taguchi Technique
Authors: Karna Shyam Kumar , Singh Ran Vijay , Sahai Rajeshwar
Published: February 2015

This paper attempts to investigate Hkb Box (A-356 aluminium alloy) manufactured by Gravity Die casting process. Main objective of this research paper is to find the most influencing parameters on hardness of gravity die casting. Taguchi Technique is a powerful and efficient method for optimizing the process, quality and performance output of manufacturing processes. Taguchi's orthogonal array method and S/N Ratio were used for experiments and it was found that Pouring Time and Pouring Temperature are the most influencing parameters to improve hardness. Finally ANOVA was used to confirm the design of experiment.
Implementing Software as a Service-Based E-Governance Solution
Authors: Mital Monika , Pani Ashis , Damodaran Suma
Published: February 2015

The purpose of the study is to investigate the existence of network governance in the software as a service value network. The study analyzes the processes of Software as a Service solution implementation through participatory design methodology. The study followed the participatory design methodology to analyze how the existence of four conditions: uncertain demand with stable supply, customized exchange high in human asset specificity, complex task under intense time pressure and frequent exchange among parties, lead to the emergence of network governance. The study further tries to find out how the social mechanisms for coordination and control emerge through network governance in the context of SaaS value network. The study found that network governance enabled coordination, control and safeguarding through social mechanisms of restricted access, macro cultures, collective sanctions and reputation. The major research implications is that network governance acts as a partial substitute to formal contracts and complements relational governance mechanisms in network product/service chains. The main contribution of the study is to investigate the emergence of network governance in a real life context of the software as a service value network through a case study.
Effects of Information and Communication Technology on Diplomacy and Foreign Policy Administration
Authors: Mattoš Boris
Published: February 2015

The rapid development in information and communication technologies had a multiple effect on the tools, forms and overall nature of diplomacy. The work with information has a major share in the activities of foreign service and in those of a diplomat. Over the past decades, however, the collection and processing of information underwent major changes as a result of the revolution in ICT. The approach to and use of information itself changed and the analytical approach to information processing in diplomacy has become crucial. Despite the initial incompatibility of the internet and social networks with diplomatic activities – unlike diplomacy, social media tend to be a more informal communication tool – a number of examples in diplomatic practice show synergy possible also in this field. The ICT is not an end in itself, but represents a means and/or communication tool for a ministry of foreign affairs to increase efficiency in some of its operations. The innovation process in eDiplomacy and within the context of progressive development in new ICT is likely to continue to affect the future of diplomacy considerably.
Evaluation of the Website Content of Hospitality Businesses
Authors: Ergun Gozde Seval , Cetin Hakan , Yirik Sevket
Published: February 2015

Humanity has faced and continues to face many major changes since the introduction of the internet in the last 20 years. Time, location and costs have never been so important in any other period of time. Human beings have started to live at a more rapid pace with less cost. Need for a holiday, which is a part of life, is fulfilled in a much easier and efficient way through the internet world and its positive aspects. In the present study, websites of 5 and 4 star hotels operating in Antalya have been analyzed in terms of their content. Data gathered has been analyzed with SPSS package program. According to the results of the analysis, websites of 5 and 4 star hotels operating in Antalya are observed to be inefficient and also, they do not have adequate technical equipment.
Elections and Social Media
Authors: Sarıtaş Ahmet , Aydın Elif Esra
Published: February 2015

Today, using of the internet extended social media by individuals habitually enables both the business firms and politicians to reach their target mass at any time. In this context, internet has become a popular place recently where political communication and campaigns are realized by ensuring a new dimension to political campaigns. When we examine the posts and discussions in the social media, we can say that they are converted into open political sessions. As there are no censorship in such channels, individuals have a freedom to reach to any partial/impartial information and obtain transparent and fast feedback, and with this regard, political parties, leaders and candidates have a chance to be closer to electors. In this study, it is aimed to give information about the social media, present what medium has been used for election campaigns from the past until today and besides, by considering the effects of effective and efficient use of social media and new trends related to the internet by politicians, together with their applications in the world, to make suggestions about its situation and application in Turkey.
Education, Technical Progress, and Economic Growth in the Information Age
Authors: Sekmen Fuat , Toptas Mehmet
Published: February 2015

Recent studies consider education and human capital growth as a main source of economic growth. In the classical model, population growth and capital accumulation was envisaged as an engine of economic development. Population and market rate of wages were believed to have mutual affinity. Neoclassical model, it is known as Solow Model, shows capital accumulation would increase the growth rates in the short run, but cannot generate any long run GDP growth rate increase. The Solow model implies that economies will conditionally converge to the same level of income, given that they have the same rates of savings, depreciation, labor force growth, and productivity growth. This study firstly examines the structural and economic changes in Turkish economy and then analysis the effect of education and the role of technical progress on Turkish economic growth during the period 1990-2012. This study finds out that the real GDP growth rate is dependent on capital formation and growth rate of labor force.
Hybrid Segmentation Prototype for Arabic Text-Based Documents
Authors: Alouane-Ksouri Sonia , Hidri Minyar Sassi
Published: February 2015

The contribution of this work relates to the field of Arabic text-based document analysis for the detection of plagiarism. This analysis will be carried out according to the triadic computation model of document similarity. The authors propose a hybrid segmentation prototype for Arabic text-based documents that links different processing steps in order to generate the similarity rate between the documents of an Arabic corpus. It involves two segmentation systems and a morphological analysis in order to obtain a matrix representation adapted to the triadic similarity computation according to three abstraction levels: documents, sentences and words.
A Standardized Marketing Audit Model for Entrepreneurship Education in Egypt
Authors: Abou-Warda Sherein H.
Published: February 2015

Entrepreneurship education (EPE) plays a vital role to enhance employment creation and reduce poverty. Marketing audit is a main tool for evaluating and improving the marketing performance in a manufacturing or service sector. Despite the vast amount of literature which emphasizes entrepreneurship education, no empirical studies address the marketing audit model for EPE in the higher education sector. This study aims to develop a standardized marketing audit model for the EPE at higher education generally, business schools specially. A total of 200 participants were chosen by a purposive judgmental sampling technique from the only two universities which took steps towards establishing EPE in Egypt. A descriptive survey method using a questionnaire, focus group, semi-structured interviews and workshops were employed to develop a standardized model. The results showed the importance of the six dimensions in a standardized marketing audit model for EPE at business schools in Egypt.
Ranitidine-Induced Hepatitis in a Young Man with Myalgia and Insomnia
Authors: Singh Shrutika , Biswas Rakesh
Published: February 2015

This is a conversational narrative of the learning experience of a group of medical students around an interesting case that was brought to them through the network of the user driven healthcare (UDHC) system. In addition to the traditional didactic framework of lecture-based clinical medicine, the students were exposed to patient-centered learning exercises where a patient of clinically complex issues was present as a part of the didactic experience in the classroom. As an innovative approach, which has not been trialed in the Indian medical education system, the teaching experience required following up with student narratives that reflected on the learning experience gleaned from the multidimensional clinical-didactic encounter. This paper outlines a case of ranitidine-associated hepatitis, a little known side effect of a vastly prescribed drug, and the associated discussion generated on online forums, mainly driven by the students who were involved in the clinical history of the case. There are reflective accounts of the student and preceptor involved in the teaching-learning exercise discussing the clinical encounter.
Case Study
Authors: Gupta Swarna Biseria , Verma Divya , Singh D. P.
Published: February 2015

Epidemic dropsy is a multi-system disease involving the cardiovascular, hepatic, renal, ocular and other systems. Onset is usually subacute or insidious with watery diarrhea and vomiting. This lasts from a few days to more than a week. Bilaterally symmetrical pitting edema of the lower limbs extending from the ankles up to the scrotum and abdominal wall is a constant feature. It is a toxic disease caused by the unintentional ingestion of Argemone mexicana (prickly yellow poppy) seeds as an adulterant of wheat flour, or more commonly, of cooking oil such as mustard oil. Sanguinarine and dehydrosanguinarine are two major toxic alkaloids of Argemone oil. It is a rare phenomenon for practicing ophthalmologists to observe cases of epidemic dropsy, and the possibility of glaucoma should be kept in mind in cases of epidemic dropsy, when members of same family or village report with raised IOP, pedal edema and history of use of mustard oil for cooking or massage. Glaucoma is hypersecretory in nature; prostaglandin and histamine release may have significant roles in its pathogenesis. The disease has self limiting course but needs good control of intraocular pressure (IOP) medically till it returns to normal and visual field changes have stabilized. Its early diagnosis is very important to prevent grievous complications; hence, all cases should be followed up regularly for IOP measurement and visual field analysis up to 8-12 weeks, because, if ignored, optic atrophy may develop.
Research on Comprehensive Evaluation of Network Marketing Performance in O2O Model-Measuring by GIOWA Operator
Authors: Xue Wanxin , Pei Yilei , Li Dandan
Published: February 2015

O2O is a new E-Commerce model, and has become an important strategy for the development of enterprises, which can improve not only corporate performance, but also corporate recognition through the combination of online and offline interaction. How to evaluate the effect of network marketing in O2O model scientifically and effectively will become the new research focus. Based on the GIOWA operator method, this paper determines important indicators of evaluating network marketing performance in O2O model, establishes the comprehensive evaluation system of network marketing performance in O2O model, and uses the AHP method to determine weights. Through the example, this method can be effectively applied to the evaluation of network marketing performance in O2O model of enterprises.
Research on Current Situation and Strategy of E-Marketing Applications in Chinese SMEs
Authors: Baoling Li
Published: February 2015

E-marketing has brought unprecedented opportunities for small and medium sized enterprises to compete with the large enterprises in China. Though they have started their online business actively with building their own websites and implementing e-marketing, the effect they have achieved is not as expected. The paper first discusses the definition and the competitive advantages e-marketing brings to small and medium-sized enterprises. Then, the paper examines the current situation of e-marketing applications in Chinese SMEs with the main purpose to gain an overall understanding of present situation and explore the issues when Chinese SMEs have applied e-marketing. Based on the collected data and deep analysis, the paper gets the result that Chinese SMEs are still at an initial stage in regard to the e-marketing applications, and it will take some time before they achieve a certain level of maturity. Finally, the paper proposes some related strategies to strengthen e-marketing applications based on the current problems in a regional economy.
Temporal Pattern of Communication
Authors: Wang Qinghua , Zhu Yan
Published: February 2015

With the emergence of mobile Internet and social media, human relationship has evolved into a new form due to the much broader reach and more efficient communications enabled by information technology. This paper examines the communication pattern and impact on social group in the context of a Chinese popular mobile social media app. It analyzes a dataset that comprised of the information about sending and receiving messages by 10,000 users over one month period. It found a strong temporal pattern of a significant difference between Monday and other days: the least frequent usages on Monday among the week. The average number of friends a user has messaging contacts with is about 2, far less than the number of friends a user has in total, which can reflect the attributes of users maintaining their social network and friendship.
A Hybrid Microblog Recommendation Model in Mobile Social Network
Authors: Chen Xiaoyan
Published: February 2015

Recently, microblogs have emerged as a new open channel of communication for people on the Internet to read, commentate, socialize and so on. With the advent of a huge number of information in microblog spaces, including articles, profile, pictures and other multimedia resources, the “information overload” has become a critical problem for microblog users, which brings bloggers plethora of choices and options available that often varies in quality and may severely affected the recommendation quality. Accordingly, providing microblog users with articles that suit their particular preferences is an important issue. To solve this problem, this paper proposes a novel method integrating social network information and collaborative filtering. A user ranking model based on social network analysis is constructed to estimate the correlations between microblog users, and incorporated into similarity measure for improving the quality of microblog recommendation. Experiments on a real-world dataset are carried out to evaluate the performance of the presented method. The results show that the proposed method outperforms traditional KNN method and improves recommendation quality effectively.
Pathological Phenomena in Denjoy–Carleman Classes
Authors: Jaffe Ethan Y.
Published: February 2015

Let M denote a Denjoy–Carleman class of ∞ functions (for a given logarithmically-convex sequence M = (Mn)). We construct: (1) a function in M((−1, 1)) that is nowhere in any smaller class; (2) a function on ℝ that is formally M at every point, but not in M (ℝ); (3) (under the assumption of quasianalyticity) a smooth function on ℝp (p ≥ 2) that is M on every M curve, but not inM (ℝp).
Transformation Formulas for Bilinear Sums of Basic Hypergeometric Series
Authors: Kajihara Yasushi
Published: February 2015

A master formula of transformation formulas for bilinear sums of basic hypergeometric series is proposed. It is obtained from the author’s previous results on a transformation formula for Milne’s multivariate generalization of basic hypergeometric series of type A with diòerent dimensions and it can be considered as a generalization of theWhipple–Sears transformation formula for terminating balanced µh series. As an application of the master formula, the one-variable cases of some transformation formulas for bilinear sums of basic hypergeometric series are given as examples. The bilinear transformation formulas seemto be new in the literature, even in the one-variable case.
Случайные графы: модели и предельные характеристики
Authors: Zhukovskii Maksim Evgen'evich , Raigorodskii Andrei Mikhailovich
Published: February 2015

В настоящей статье представлен обзор известных результатов в области предельного поведения вероятностей свойств первого порядка случайных графов. Совокупность результатов, приведенных в статье, относится к законам нуля или единицы для свойств случайных графов. Мы сконцентрируемся на модели Эрдeша-Реньи случайного графа и рассмотрим также некоторые обобщения этой модели, мотивированные задачами теории кодирования и комбинаторной геометрии.
Библиография: 65 названий.
Псевдоторические структуры на гиперплоском сечении торического многообразия
Authors: Tyurin Nikolai Andreevich
Published: February 2015

Продолжены исследования псевдоторической геометрии, а именно представлен тип неторических многообразий, обладающих псевдоторическими структурами. В качестве приложения строится новая псевдоторическая структура на двумерной комплексной квадрике.
Солитоноподобные структуры на поверхности жидкости под ледяным покровом
Authors: Il'ichev Andrej Teimurazovich , Tomashpol'skii Viktor Yakovlevich
Published: February 2015

Доказано существование солитоноподобных решений, отвечающих семейству уединенных волн понижения уровня поверхности, для полной системы уравнений, которая описывает распространение волн в жидкости конечной глубины под ледяным покровом. Ледяной покров моделируется упругой пластиной Кирхгоффа-Лява и имеет значительную толщину, так что инерция пластины учитывается при формулировке модели. Упомянутое семейство уединенных волн параметризовано скоростью распространения волны, и его существование доказано для скоростей, ответвляющихся от характеристической скорости линейных волн и достаточно близких к этой скорости. Уединенные волны, в свою очередь, ответвляются от состояния покоя и находятся в некоторой его окрестности. Иными словами, доказано существование уединенных волн понижения уровня поверхности вода-лед малой амплитуды. Доказательство проводится при помощи проекции искомой системы уравнений на центральное многообразие (имеющее в данном случае размерность два) и дальнейшего анализа конечномерной приведенной динамической системы на центральном многообразии.
Приближение эффективного радиуса в задаче двумерного рассеяния центральным короткодействующим потенциалом
Authors: Pupyshev Vasily Veniaminovitch
Published: February 2015

Исследуется роль слабосвязанных и околопороговых резонансных состояний квантовой частицы в ее двумерном упругом низкоэнергетическом рассеянии. Энергии таких состояний определяются в приближении эффективного радиуса через корни трансцендентных уравнений. Это же приближение используется для анализа рассеяния. Получены и исследованы явные низкоэнергетические асимптотики всех парциальных фаз и сечений. Эти асимптотики содержат энергии слабосвязанных или околопороговых резонансных состояний.
Бигравитация в гамильтоновом формализме. Тетрадный подход
Authors: Soloviev Vladimir Olegovich
Published: February 2015

Тетрадный формализм используется для вычисления квадратного корня из матрицы, возникающего в потенциале де Рам-Габададзе-Толи. В минимальном случае получены уравнения связи и их алгебра. Показано, что число гравитационных степеней свободы соответствует безмассовому и массивному полям гравитации. Дух Бульвара-Дезера исключается благодаря двум связям второго рода.
Разрушающиеся решения модифицированного уравнения Веселова-Новикова и минимальные поверхности
Authors: Taimanov Iskander Asanovich
Published: February 2015

Предложена конструкция разрушающихся решений модифицированного уравнения Веселова-Новикова, основанная на преобразовании Мутара двумерных операторов Дирака и его геометрической интерпретации в терминах геометрии поверхностей. Рассмотрен явный пример такого решения, построенный с помощью минимальной поверхности Эннепера.
UD-статистика в подкритической области
Authors: Maslov Victor Pavlovich
Published: February 2015

В подкритической области, в отличие от суперкритической, в которой изотермы идеально совпадают с изотермами модели Ван-дер-Ваальса, введено дополнительное условие достижения максимума энтропии Хартли на спинодали. Для определения параметров распределения и изотерм используется уравнение спинодали.
A Comprehensive Approach to Thyroid Swellings: Clinical, Sonological, Cytological and Histopathological Correlation
Authors: Trupthi MC , Boobalan S
Published: February 2015

Objectives

This study was conducted with the aim of clinicopathological evaluation of thyroid swellings.

Setting

Tertiary referral centre, Davangere, Karnataka, India.

Design

Retrospective study.

Materials and methods

Clinical details, sonological reports, laboratory reports were retrieved from the records for the 110 patients with thyroid swellings who were included in our study, between May 2009 and April 2013 and the data was analyzed. Cytological smears in all patients and histopathology slides in operated patients were retrieved and studied.

Results

The highest incidence (37.4%) of thyroid swellings were found in age group of 21 to 30 years. The youngest patient being 10 years. Females (90%) predominated in this study, male to female ratio being 1:9. Majority of patients (35%) came with complaints of swelling of duration less than 6 months. Among 110 patients, 36.36% of them were treated conservatively, out of which 7 cases (17.5%) were hyperthyroid, 10 cases (25%) were hypothyroid and 23 cases (57.5%) were euthyroid and the remaining 63.63% of them underwent surgery. Of the 110 patients subjected to FNAC, 16 patients (14.54%) were neoplastic and 94 patients (85.45%) were non-neoplastic. Upon correlation with the histopathology report, the sensitivity of FNAC was 78.57%, specificity was 91.07%, with a positive predictive value of 68.75% and negative predictive value of 94.44%. Diagnostic accuracy of FNAC is 88.50%.

Conclusion

FNAC and USG are valuable tools in assessing the need for surgical intervention in thyroid swellings. USG guided aspiration will further enhance the cytological yield and diagnostic accuracy.

How to cite this article

Santosh UP, Sunil Kumar KB, Trupthi MC, Boobalan S. A Comprehensive Approach to Thyroid Swellings: Clinical, Sonological, Cytological and Histopathological Correlation. Int J Otorhinolaryngol Clin 2014;6(1):5-8.
Predicting Malignancy in a Solitary Thyroid Nodule: A Prospective Study on the Role of Color Doppler Ultrasonography
Authors: Varma Ravi , Rao Gururaja , Rao Shilpa , Bhagwat Nikhil M , Chadha Manoj D , Joshi Ameya S , Varthakavi Premlata K
Published: February 2015

Palpable thyroid nodules are fairly common. While many are benign, the clinician faces the challenge of detecting the 4 to 14% of malignant lesions. Fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) of thyroid nodules seems to have eclipsed all other techniques for diagnosis of thyroid cancer, but has its limitations when a nodule is inaccessible or in the case of follicular neoplasm. This study from a hospital from Indian west coast shows that vascular flow pattern of extensive peripheral and central flow (Type-3) or a central flow only (Type-4) and a resistive index (RI) of >0.75 on power Doppler sonography shows a healthy sensitivity and excellent specificity for predicting malignancy. The utility becomes even more apparent among follicular neoplasms where FNAC can offer little help in distinguishing malignancy.

How to cite this article

Rao G, Rao S, Varma R, Bhagwat NM, Chadha MD, Joshi AS, Varthakavi PK. Predicting Malignancy in a Solitary Thyroid Nodule: A Prospective Study on the Role of Color Doppler Ultrasonography. Int J Otorhinolaryngol Clin 2014;6(1):9-14.
Impact of Bethesda System of Reporting for Thyroid Cytopathology
Authors: Dhume Varsha , Kavishwar Vikas
Published: February 2015

FNAC though considered the gold standard diagnostic test in the evaluation of a thyroid nodule, has many issues regarding the terminologies and interpretation. The National Cancer Institute (NCI) hosted the NCI Thyroid Fine needle Aspiration State of the Science Conference in 2007, which acknowledged the importance of developing a uniform terminology for reporting thyroid FNA results to facilitate effective communication among cytopathologists, endocrinologist, surgeons, radiologists and other healthcare providers. The NCI Conference concluded the terminology and morphologic criteria which formed the framework for The Bethesda system for reporting thyroid cytopathology (TBSRTC). It is a 6 tiered ‘The Bethesda System for Reporting Thyroid Cytopathology’ (TBSRTC) for unifying the terminology and morphologic criteria along with the corresponding risk of malignancy. Bethesda also offers management approach for all the categories. Bethesda system is presently widely accepted in western countries and is being introduced in rest of the world. This system of reporting undoubtedly represents a major step toward standardization, reproducibility and ultimately improvement in clinical significance, usefulness and predictive value of thyroid FNAC. The problems faced by the cytopathologist while implementing Bethesda during reporting are centred on AUS/FLUS category. The heterogeneity of this low-risk category leads to significant variability in its reported percentage as well as reported rate of malignancy.

How to cite this article

Dhume V, Kavishwar V. Impact of Bethesda System of Reporting for Thyroid Cytopathology. Int J Otorhinolaryngol Clin 2014;6(1):15-22.
Soft Tissue Fibrosarcoma Neck Mimicking as Thyroid Swelling
Authors: Bist SS , Mishra Sarita , Agrawal Vinish , Harsh Meena
Published: February 2015

Fibrosarcomas are relatively uncommon tumors, commonly arise in the extremities; approximately 10% occur in the head and neck region, most commonly in the sinonasal tract and neck. We hereby report a case of fibrosarcoma in neck clinically mimicking as a thyroid swelling in a 14 years old boy. The patient reported with difficulty in breathing along with stridor at the time of presentation so endotracheal intubation was done to secure the airway. Subsequent ultrasonography guided fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) showed atypical cells suggestive of mesenchymal origin. Contrast-enhanced computed tomography scan showed a large heterogeneously enhancing mass lesion in right side of neck with retrosternal extension, while the right lobe of thyroid was displaced superiorly and left lobe was normal. We performed a complete surgical excision of the tumor and histopathological examination showed intermediate to high grade spindle cell sarcoma, favoring fibrosarcoma. Postoperative period was uneventful and the patient was referred to oncology unit for radiotherapy and chemotherapy, but the patient succumbed to the disease 5 weeks after surgery.

How to cite this article

Bist SS, Mishra S, Varshney S, Agrawal V, Harsh M. Soft Tissue Fibrosarcoma Neck Mimicking as Thyroid Swelling. Int J Otorhinolaryngol Clin 2014; 6(1):50-52.
Total Ankle Arthroplasty: Why does it fail?
Authors: Thermann Hajo
Published: February 2015

Over the past 10 years, total ankle arthroplasty (TAA) has been established as an alternative to treat osteoarthritis of the ankle. In this review, problems occurring after TAA will be analyzed and solutions presented. Furthermore, my own 18 years experience regarding the failure or poor success of a TAA implantation will be illustrated. The range of revision options from leaving the prosthesis to a complete modification as well as the explantation with subsequent arthrodesis will be presented algorithmically. Another problem of the poor success of prosthetic implants exists in the flat learning curve resulting from the surgeons’ lack of routine coupled with the difficult pathology with deformity and stiffness of the ankle.

How to cite this article

Thermann H. Total Ankle Arthroplasty: Why does it fail? J Foot Ankle Surg (Asia-Pacific) 2014;1(2):41-47.
Isolated Fractures of the Sustentaculum Tali: Injury Characteristics and Surgical Technique for Reduction Management
Authors: Mu Hu , xiangyang xu , gang Bi
Published: February 2015

Isolated fractures of sustentaculum tali are rare and often missed at an initial visit. They can be difficult to manage and may have implications for future hindfoot function. This article describes sustentacular fracture patterns and characteristics, and a method of surgical treatment via a medial approach to the calcaneus. During the last 6 years, 11 recent isolated sustentacular fractures without calcaneal posterior facet involvement were surgically-treated at our hospital. Of these all underwent open reduction and internal fixation via medial approach to the calcaneus. Patient charts, X-ray radiographs and CT scans were reviewed for injury characteristics and associated musculoskeletal injures. Five patients had intra-articular middle facet involvement, and two had subtalar joint subluxation. By cannulated screws reduction was maintained through fractures rigidly fixation. Isolated fracture of the sustentaculum tali is tend to be ignored and easily misdiagnosed as acute ankle sprain. Open reduction and internal fixation of this fractures was reliable and should be procedure via medial approach.

How to cite this article

mu h, xiangyang x, gang b. Isolated Fractures of the Sustentaculum Tali: Injury Characteristics and Surgical Technique for Reduction Management. J Foot Ankle Surg (Asia-Pacific) 2014;1(2):48-51.