bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Pattern of Red Cell Count and Red Cell Distribution Width (RDW %) in Beta Thalassaemia Trait in Adults
Authors: Rahman MMU , Nayem M , Begum W , Begum FA , Ahmed MNU , Sultana S
Published: March 2018

Microcytic hypochromic anemia is one of the commonest hematological abnormalities in Bangladeshi population. Iron deficiency anemia and beta thalassemia traits are the most frequent causes of microcytic hypochromic anemia which are sometimes difficult to differentiate clinically and by routine laboratory examinations due to similar blood picture. To differentiate between patients of beta thalassemia trait and iron deficiency anemia, physicians need a group of investigations including peripheral blood film, estimation of HbA2, serum ferritin, serum iron, total iron binding capacity and transferrin saturation. But these tests are relatively expensive, time consuming and need sophisticated techniques. The aim of this study was to evaluate the pattern of red cell count and RDW-CV (%) in beta thalassemia trait in adults and thereby determine the role of these parameters in differentiation between patients of beta thalassemia trait and iron deficiency anaemia. In this study 50 confirmed cases of beta thalassemia trait aged 18 to 60 years, both male and female were included as cases and 50 age- and sex-matched iron deficiency subjects were included as control. RBC count and RDW-CV (%) were measured by an electronic cell counter device. The present study revealed that RBC count was higher in patients with beta thalassemia trait than that in iron deficiency anemia and RDW-CV(%) was significantly higher in patients with iron deficiency anemia than that in beta thalassemia trait.Bangladesh J Med Biochem 2016; 9(1): 31-35
Synthesis, Molecular Docking Studies, In Vitro Antimicrobial and Antifungal Activities of Novel Dipeptide Derivatives Based on N-(2-(2-Hydrazinyl-2-oxoethylamino)-2-oxoethyl)-Nicotinamide
Authors: Moustafa Gaber , Khalaf Hemat , Naglah Ahmed , Al-Wasidi Asma , Al-Jafshar Nawal , Awad Hassan
Published: March 2018

A series of linear dipeptide derivatives (4–10) were prepared and evaluated as antimicrobial agents via the synthesis of N-(2-(2-hydrazinyl-2-oxoethylamino)-2-oxoethyl) nicotinamide (4). Compound 4 was reacted with 4-chlorobenzaldehyde or 4-hydroxybenzaldehyde, to give the hydrazones 5 and 6, respectively. On the other hand, Compound 4 was coupled with phenylisocyanate or methylisothiocyanate to give Compounds 7 and 8, respectively. The latter compounds (7 and 8) were coupled with chloroacetic acid to give oxazolidine (9) and thiazolidine (10), respectively. The newly synthesized dipeptide compounds were confirmed by means of their spectral data. The antimicrobial activity of the newly synthesized compounds 4–10 was evaluated by agar well diffusion, and they showed good activity. Compounds 4, 5, and 9 gave the most promising activity in this study. Most of the tested compounds possessed MIC values ranging from 50 to 500 µg/mL. Furthermore, docking studies were carried out on enoyl reductase from E. coli and cytochrome P450 14 α-sterol demethylase (Cyp51) from Candida albicans active sites. The MolDock scores of the seven tested compounds ranged between −117 and −171 and between −107 and −179, respectively.
Computational Simulation Studies on the Binding Selectivity of 1-(1H-Benzimidazol-5-yl)-5-aminopyrazoles in Complexes with FGFR1 and FGFR4
Authors: Pan You-Lu , Liu Yan-Ling , Chen Jian-Zhong
Published: March 2018

Fibroblast growth factor receptor 1 (FGFR1) has become a potential target for the treatment of cancer. Designing FGFR1-selective inhibitors remains fundamental to the development of anti-cancer drugs because of highly sequential homology among FGFR subtypes. In present work, four inhibitors were examined with intermolecular interaction patterns with FGFR1 and FGFR4, respectively, for the exploration of binding mechanisms by applying a combined approach of computational techniques, including flexible docking, binding site analyses, electronic structure computations, molecular dynamic simulations, and binding free energy predictions. Molecular simulation-predicted binding conformations and pharmacophoric features of these molecules in the active pocket of either FGFR1 or FGFR4. MMPB(GB)SA-calculated binding free energies were accordant with the ordering of their tested potency values. Furthermore, in silico mutations of two residues (FGFR1: Tyr563 and Ser565) were also performed to check their impact on ligand binding by applying MD simulations and binding free energy calculations. The present studies may provide a structural understanding of the FGFR1-selective mechanism. The viewpoints from computational simulations would be valuable guidelines for the development of novel FGFR1-selective inhibitors.
Oleylamine-Mediated Hydrothermal Growth of Millimeter-Long Cu Nanowires and Their Electrocatalytic Activity for Reduction of Nitrate
Authors: Zheng Yifan , Chen Nana , Wang Chunxiao , Zhang Xiaoping , Liu Zongjian
Published: March 2018

While high-aspect-ratio metal nanowires are essential for producing nanowire-based electrodes of good performance used in electronics and electrocatalysis, the synthesis of millimeter-long Cu nanowires remains a challenge. This work demonstrates an oleylamine-mediated hydrothermal method for synthesis of Cu nanowires with an average diameter of ~80 nm and a length up to several millimeters. An investigation on the role of oleylamine in nanowire formation by mass spectroscopy, small angle X-ray diffraction and transmission electron microscopy reveals that oleylamine serves as a mild reducing agent for slow reduction of Cu(II) to Cu, a complexing agent to form Cu(II)-oleylamine complex for guiding the nanowire growth, as well as a surfactant to generate lamellar phase structure for the formation of nanowire bundles. The growth mechanism of these millimeter-long Cu nanowire bundles is proposed based on the experimental observations. Electrochemical measurements by linear sweep voltammetry indicate that the self-supported nanowire electrode prepared from as-formed Cu nanowire bundles shows high catalytic activity for electroreduction of nitrate in water.
Green Roofs and Green Walls for Biodiversity Conservation: A Contribution to Urban Connectivity?
Authors: Mayrand Flavie , Clergeau Philippe
Published: March 2018

Green roofs and walls have recently emerged as conservation tools, and they offer promising additional opportunities to enhance biodiversity in cities. However, their ecological conditions remain poorly considered when planning wildlife corridors. To discuss the role of vegetated buildings in landscape connectivity, we reviewed the ecological and technical specificities of green walls and green roofs in light of the key factors concerning urban wildlife (patch size, quality, abundance, and isolation). Green roofs and walls show limited patch sizes, distinct habitat quality at the building scale, and limited redundancy of patch quality within the landscape. We also highlight that the abundance of roof and wall patches is often low. Future research is needed to establish if walls can be vertical corridors for wildlife, thereby reducing the isolation of green roofs. We argue that creating 3D ecological connectivity within the city requires substantial modifications of the design and maintenance of existing green building systems. We suggest that research is needed to integrate the biotic and abiotic characteristics of green buildings to make them more closely resemble those of open green spaces.
IMPACT OF RECYCLED ASPHALT PAVEMENT ON PROPERTIES OF FOAMED BITUMINOUS MIXTURES
Authors: KAR Siksha Swaroopa , SWAMY Aravind Krishna , TIWARI Devesh , JAIN Pramod Kumar
Published: March 2018

In recent years, the use of foamed bitumen technology along with Reclaimed Asphalt Pavement is gaining popularity across the world. The mechanical response of foamed bitumen mixtures containing reclaimed asphalt pavement is significantly influenced by constituent material properties and aggregate gradation. This article presents results from a study where foamed bitumen mixtures conforming to Indian specifications were evaluated. For this purpose, foamed bitumen mixtures using a different percentage of reclaimed asphalt pavement and bitumens were prepared. Initially, the foaming characteristics of virgin bitumens were evaluated to optimize for optimum water content and foaming temperature. In the second stage, mixture design was conducted to optimize for foamed bitumen content in foamed bitumen mixtures containing a different percentage of reclaimed asphalt pavement. Finally, these foamed bitumen mixtures were evaluated for their mechanical properties. The results from this laboratory study indicated properties of foamed bitumen and foamed mixtures are significantly influenced by properties of bitumen, the quantity of bitumen, and reclaimed asphalt pavement. Among the different mixtures, a mixture containing 50% reclaimed asphalt pavement exhibited best results in resilient modulus and resistance to moisture damage tests. A mixture containing 80% reclaimed asphalt pavement also shows acceptable strength and resistance to water susceptibility. Thus, it is possible to design high-quality bituminous mixes using higher reclaimed asphalt pavement percentages, which meet the required volumetric and desired performance criteria.
LOAD TRANSFER-CRACK WIDTH RELATION OF NON-DOWELLED JOINTED PLAIN CONCRETE SHORT SLABS
Authors: PRADENA Mauricio , HOUBEN Lambert
Published: March 2018

Non-dowelled short slabs are a cost-effective innovation of jointed plain concrete pavements. The development of this innovation has been concentrated in their structural performance. Still there is a lack of specific studies of the relation load transfer – crack width, being the crack width at joint the direct cause of the aggregate interlock. Considering that their provision of load transfer relies on aggregate interlock, the objective of the present article is to develop the relationship between the load transfer by aggregate interlock and its direct cause (the crack width) specifically for innovative non-dowelled short concrete slabs pavements. For that, the analysis includes a validated nonlinear aggregate interlock model incorporated in a 3D Finite Element program, laboratory results, and field measurements performed as part of the present investigation. The results show that due to the small crack widths, the short slabs are able to provide adequate load transfer (not less than 70%) even without dowels bars. Indeed, in this case, the load transfer relies on aggregate interlock and the results of the Faultimeter (residual value more than 0) have confirmed this interlocking for crack widths at joints not more than 1.2 mm, which are typical values in short slabs when the joints are activated. For that, the Early Entry saw cutting method needs to be modified or applied as a complementary method to perform the joints. Although in short concrete slabs pavements the provision of load transfer is already guaranteed by the small crack widths at joints, the application of high-quality coarse aggregates provides even higher load transfer.
NON-DESTRUCTIVE MODULUS TESTING AND PERFORMANCE EVALUATION FOR ASPHALT PAVEMENT REFLECTIVE CRACKING MITIGATION TREATMENTS
Authors: CHEN Can , LIN Shibin , WILLIAMS Ronald Christopher , ASHLOCK Jeramy Curtis
Published: March 2018

Reflective cracking is a common type of pavement distress, which manifests as cracks in an underlying layer propagating through to the surface of a pavement structure. To minimize reflective cracking of asphalt layers in composite pavements, four treatments are commonly used: standard/full rubblization, modified rubblization, crack and seat, and rock interlayer. The four types of treatment were evaluated to determine their effectiveness in mitigating reflective cracking via non-destructive Falling Weight Deflectometer tests and Surface Wave Method tests to measure layer modulus, along with field pavement performance surveys. It is found that moduli measurements from Surface Wave Method tests have reduced uncertainty comparing to those from Falling Weight Deflectometer tests, (2) the moduli of thin rock interlayers were captured by Surface Wave Method, but missed by Falling Weight Deflectometer. In addition, the Surface Wave Method results show that (1) crack and seat treatments provide the highest moduli, followed by modified rubblization, and (2) standard rubblization and rock interlayers provide moduli that are slightly lower than the other two treatments. Pavement performance survey was also conducted concurrently with the in-situ modulus tests. Based on the results of this study, modified rubblization and rock interlayer treatments are recommended for mitigation of reflective cracking.
Loss to follow-up and Associated Factors of Patients in the National AIDS Program in Thailand
Authors: Teeraananchai Sirinya , Kerr Stephen J , Ruxrungtham Kiat , Avihingsanon Anchalee , Chaivooth Suchada , Teeraratkul Achara , Bhakeecheep Sorakij , Ongwandee Sumet , Thanprasertsuk Sombat , Law Matthew G
Published: March 2018

Background

Loss to follow-up (LTFU) is a crucial indicator to evaluate the effectiveness of HIV care and treatment programmes. We assessed the LTFU rate and associated factors of Thai HIV-infected patients who enrolled in the National AIDS Program (NAP) for two periods: prior to (pre-ART) and after starting ART (ART-patients).

Methods

Thai HIV patients aged ≥15 years enrolled in NAP from 2008 to 2014. Vital status was ascertained by linkage with the National Death Registry. Competing risk models were used to calculate the adjusted sub-distribution hazards (aSHR) for LTFU for pre-ART and ART-patients, with death considered as a competing risk.

Results

A total of 157,026 patients registered in care and were included in analyses. The cumulative incidence of LTFU in pre-ART patients at 1 year was 10.2%, whereas in ART-patients it was 12.8%. Among pre-ART patients, younger age (<30 versus ≥45 years, aSHR 1.60, 95% CI 1.49, 1.72), less advanced HIV stage (aSHR 1.29, 95% CI 1.21, 1.37) and higher CD4+ T-cell count (≥350 versus <100, aSHR 6.31, 95% CI 5.74, 6.95) had a higher chance of LTFU. ART-patients with high baseline CD4+ T-cell count (CD4 ≥350 versus CD4 <50, aSHR 2.06, 95% CI 1.97, 2.15) and non-advanced HIV stage had increased risk of LTFU.

Conclusions

Our findings provide new evidence of the LTFU rate in Thai HIV-infected patients in NAP. Emphasis needs to be placed on improving follow-up in all patients with higher CD4+ T-cell counts. LTFU will be important to monitor as programmes move to commence ART regardless of CD4+ T-cell count.
Investigation of the activity of new derivatives of 1,3-diazinone-4 and their acyclic precursors with respect to bacteria of the genus Proteus
Authors: Luzhnova Svetlana A. , Voronkov Andrey V. , Gabitova Narmina M. , Billel Souda
Published: March 2018

Introduction: The present paper provides a study of the activity of the new 1,3-diazinon-4 derivatives and their acyclic precursors under the laboratory cipher PYaTd1, PYaTs2, PYaTs3 and PYaTs4 against microorganisms of the genus Proteus, which is of high importance at the moment as the growing resistance of the Proteus to previously highly active antibiotics dictates the need to search for effective antimicrobial agents that meet modern safety requirements.

Materials and Methods: The study of the activity of the compounds was carried out on collection and freshly isolated strains from patients with different pathologies. The strains were identified using the BIOMIC V3 apparatus (Giles Scientific, USA) to verify genus and species identity. The strains used in the study were previously examined for sus­ceptibility to antibacterial drugs by the Disc Method to assess the presence or absence of resistance. The activity of the new compounds was studied by the serial dilution method.

Results: The results of the study showed that the compounds PYaTd1, PYaTs2, PYaTs3 and PYaTs4 show a different activity against bacteria of the genus Proteus. The substance PYaTs2 is ineffective. With respect to strains P. mirabilis and P. rettgeri, the minimum inhibitory concentration of the compounds PYaTs3, PYaTs4 and PYaTd1 ranges from 4 μg/ml to 16 μg/ml.

Conclusion: Thus, by the average aggregate indices, regardless of the species and strain of bacteria, the most effective compound is PYaTd1, the MIC50 of which is within 10 μg/ml, which proves it to be promising and makes further de­velopment worthwhile.
L’épave miraculeuse d’Arles
Authors: Denise Fabrice , Marlier Sabrina
Published: March 2018

L’épave d’un chaland antique découverte sous le Rhône se transforme en fée qui change les destins de ceux qui se penchent sur son berceau : les connaissances des scientifiques évoluent, les conservateurs recueillent des données précieuses sur le monde antique et le musée d’Arles change d’échelle.
Le printemps du design français
Authors: Souletie Jean-Baptiste , Thiault Jennifer , Bath Jean-Paul
Published: March 2018

Depuis une dizaine d’années, une nouvelle génération d’éditeurs français s’affirme dans l’univers du design. La Chance est l’une de ces nouvelles maisons qui ont la culture et l’agilité des start-up, affichent un positionnement pointu en termes de style et pensent d’emblée à l’échelle internationale.
L’émergence du patient-acteur dans la sécurité des soins en France : une revue narrative de la littérature entre sciences sociales et santé publique
Authors: Mougeot Frédéric , Robelet Magali , Rambaud Claude , Occelli Pauline , Buchet-Poyau Karine , Touzet Sandrine , Michel Philippe
Published: March 2018

Introduction : Depuis une quarantaine d’années, les patients sont incités à prendre leur part dans la prise en charge de leur maladie et sont appelés à participer à l’amélioration de la qualité et de la sécurité des soins. Ce phénomène invite à penser les conditions d’émergence de ce nouveau rôle de patient ainsi qu’à penser ses implications en matière de santé publique. Méthodes : Une revue narrative de la littérature a été réalisée. Les bases de données Medline, Cairn et Persée ont été interrogées. Résultats : L’interrogation des bases de données a référencé 2 206 documents dont 106 ont été retenus. L’émergence du patient-acteur est un phénomène lié aux crises sanitaires sous l’impulsion de collectifs associatifs tels que le Lien en matière de sécurité des patients. Ce mouvement induit une transformation du rôle du patient qui va au-delà de la sécurité des soins puisqu’il révolutionne sa contribution au système de santé et à la santé en général. Conclusion : Cette revue narrative de la littérature permet de mettre en évidence la manière dont les crises sanitaires ont permis l’émergence d’une nouvelle figure : celle du patient-acteur. Cette figure s’accompagne d’une sémantique nouvelle sur le pouvoir des malades. Dans le domaine de la sécurité des soins, le patient occupe une place spécifique. En complémentarité des personnels de santé, il doit être une ressource pour l’amélioration de la sécurité des patients. Les différentes contributions des patients sont détaillées et un questionnement sur l’acceptabilité de la participation des patients est proposé.
Peut-on défendre l’industrie pharmaceutique ?
Authors: von der Weid Guillaume
Published: March 2018

L’industrie pharmaceutique est victime d’une image détestable dans l’opinion publique. Alors même qu’elle a pour but de soigner, elle est plus déconsidérée encore que les cigarettiers ou l’industrie automobile. Il est nécessaire d’analyser cette situation par trois prismes imbriqués : 1) la complexité d’un marché dont la plupart des coûts sont cachés ; 2) la difficulté d’une société hyperconnectée à organiser des débats sur des questions politiques qui touchent aux valeurs ; 3) et enfin la disjonction qui structure nos mentalités, entre la morale et le profit. C’est à cette condition qu’une industrie aussi critique humainement que porteuse économiquement pourra redevenir un acteur à part entière du monde de la santé, qui puisse participer à l’amélioration de l’offre de santé pour les populations.
Logistics Management and Risk Management
Authors: Kasemsap Kijpokin
Published: March 2018

Logistics management is an important part of supply chain management and deals with the movement and storage of products and services in order to meet customer demands. Risk management is the business growth strategy that can help executives handle any crisis within company toward achieving improved business planning, reduced costs, and enhanced organizational reliability. The chapter argues that applying logistics management and risk management has the potential to enhance operational performance and gain sustainable competitive advantage in global operations.
Analyzing an Impact of Industry 4.0 on Logistics and Supply Chain
Authors: Jirsak Petr
Published: March 2018

The chapter presents an impact of Industry 4.0 transformation on logistics and supply chain management. Logistics and later supply chain management discipline has gone through a number of changes in the last 50 years, namely transition among mass, lean, agile, resilient, and green. All of them are paradigm changes as each significantly reshapes the orientation of the discipline in the source of competitiveness, risk concern, customer services, productivity, process management, externalities, costs, and other aspects of the disciplines. The author presents findings gained in the exploration of these fundamental changes and provides a comparison with a previous change of paradigm. The chapter proposes a transformation that the company supply chain system has to go through to re-establish its competitive position at the time of Industry 4.0. The chapter provides a case study of 3PL perception of Industry 4.0 based on in-depth interviews conducted among the major global 3PLs operating in the Czech Republic.
Balancing Exploration and Exploitation Through Customer Development Model
Authors: Bhandari Krishna Raj
Published: March 2018

Balancing exploration and exploitation in entrepreneurial ventures enabled by Industry 4.0 has not been the focus of the existing literature. It is because the phenomenon is emerging and the focus has been to use practitioners' best practices in studying such phenomenon. In this chapter, the author combines the literature in balancing exploration and exploitation with the practitioners' best practices such as customer development model and lean startup. The author proposes that the existing models are good in principle but in order to really solve the problem in such an uncertain environment driven by big data, cloud computing, internet of things (IoT), and artificial intelligence, managers need to embed optimization algorithms in their decision making.
Knowledge Transfer and Introduction of Industry 4.0 in SMEs
Authors: Matt Dominik T. , Rauch Erwin , Riedl Michael
Published: March 2018

Industry 4.0 is for most companies and especially for small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) one of the major challenges after the wave of lean management. The aim of this chapter is to provide a methodological guidance for the practical use of the Industry 4.0 vision and principles in production system design in the specific context of SMEs. Based on the analysis of literature, a procedure model for the target-oriented introduction of Industry 4.0 principles in SMEs is proposed. A first practical evaluation of the approach is carried out based on two industrial case studies. The experiences made in the industrial cases show that Industry 4.0 is not limited to the application in large enterprises but is very suitable also for SME. This chapter contributes, with its case-study-based methodology, to the existing sparse knowledge on the introduction of Industry 4.0 in SME production systems.
Positioning Theoretical Perspective in Academic Writing
Authors: Cordeiro Cheryl Marie
Published: March 2018

A main challenge for academic writing for students at master thesis level is to find the right perspective from which to launch the argument of the thesis. In the context of international business (IB) studies, the eclectic theoretical paradigm of the field offers students myriad frameworks from which to frame their research questions. The purpose of this chapter is to illustrate how perspective in academic writing can be taught and learnt in a systematic manner. Taking the example of the teaching of culture theory in international business (IB) studies, this chapter illustrates how the deictic or “pointer” function of the pronoun system in language can be used to help perspective research position and research design.
Process Excellence and Industry 4.0
Authors: Martinez Felipe
Published: March 2018

The process excellence discipline comprises several philosophies, approaches, and techniques with different headings and origins. The history of the industrial revolutions is related with the beginnings and development of these process excellence approaches. Therefore, the aim of this chapter is to explore the evolution of process excellence throughout these four industrial revolutions in order to propose recommendations to successfully cope this new revolution from the process excellence perspective. The chapter reviews publications about the history of the industrial revolutions, technologies of the fourth industrial revolution, and it includes the outputs from a roundtable with Industry 4.0 experts. The chapter concludes that the concept of process and process excellence is essential to implement this new revolution and that the current practices of process excellence most be review in with the perspective of Industry 4.0.
Contemporary Foreign Trade Policy of China in the Region of Central and Northeast Asia
Authors: Erokhin Vasilii
Published: March 2018

China is one of the fastest growing economies in the world. To ensure a continual increase in trade, China's contemporary policies are aimed at the creation of new market opportunities for China's companies abroad. The chapter addresses the major challenges of collaboration between China and the countries of Central and Northeast Asia, reviews the milestones of China's trade policies in Eurasia, analyses China's recent trade and development initiative (One Belt One Road project) and its convergence with other integration initiatives in the region, and reviews trade flows between China and the countries of Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan) and Northeast Asia (Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Japan, Mongolia, and the Republic of Korea) during 2015. The chapter is concluded with an analysis of how China can pursue shaping an inter-regional market by looking across national boundaries and with the discussion of structural changes needed for China to ensure its competitiveness in the markets of the studied country.
Lattice Boltzmann Method for Sparse Geometries
Authors: Tomczak Tadeusz
Published: March 2018

This chapter presents the challenges and techniques in the efficient LBM implementations for sparse geometries. The first part contains a review of applications requiring support for sparse geometries including industry, geology, and life sciences. For each category, a short description of a geometry characteristic and the typical LBM extensions are provided. The second part describes implementations for single-core and parallel computers. Four main methods allowing for the reduction of memory usage and computational complexity are presented: hierarchical grids, tiles, and two techniques based on the indirect addressing (the fluid index array and the connectivity matrix). For parallel implementations, the advantages and disadvantages of the different methods of domain decomposition and workload balancing are discussed.
Pulse Oximetry
Authors: Komalla Ashoka Reddy
Published: March 2018

Pulse rate, body temperature, blood pressure, and respiratory rate are four vital signs indicating health status of a patient. Oxygen saturation of arterial blood (SaO2) is regarded as fifth vital sign of health status. Pulse oximeters are used in post-operative intensive care units for monitoring pulse rate and SaO2. They make non-invasive simultaneous estimation of pulse rate and SaO2 using photoplethysmogram (PPG) signals captured at red and IR wavelengths. This chapter describes the concept of oximetry, importance of non-invasive medical measurements, principle of pulse oximetry, and the block diagram approach for the design of pulse oximeters. It also presents an exhaustive review on various methods in-vogue for SaO2 estimation, identifies the problems associated with pulse oximeters. The critical limitation is that commercial pulse oximeters are as accurate as their calibration curves. Finally, it presents state-of-the-art research aimed at performance enhancement of pulse oximeters and directions for future work.
Attacks and Countermeasures
Authors: Sharma Mukta
Published: March 2018

Information technology has benefitted the society enormously in all spheres of life. Medical sciences have not been left untouched, rather it is using information technology extensively for storing, retrieving, transmitting, and manipulating data. There are various simulators and software designed using virtual reality explicitly to train the medical students like computer-assisted learning (CAL). Biomedical science is a discipline that connects information science, computer science, and healthcare. Biomedical science is critically analyzing, understanding, and knowing the human body. Real-time monitoring can help studying and analyzing the chronic diseases and managing it before the adverse events. Information technology has been proven as a boon in all areas, but it has certain limitations, making it vulnerable to attacks. Information security is a matter of great concern, especially when the data is traveling through the internet, which is an insecure channel. This chapter focuses on varied attacks and their countermeasures.
Wireless Enhanced Security Based on Speech Recognition
Authors: Nidhyananthan S. Selva , A. Joe Virgin , R. Shantha Selva Kumari
Published: March 2018

Security is the most notable fact of all computerized control gadgets. In this chapter, a voice ID computerized gadget is utilized for the security motivation using speech recognition. Mostly, the voices are trained by extracting mel frequency cepstral coefficient feature (MFCC), but it is very sensitive to noise interference and degrades the performance; hence, dynamic MFCC is used for speech and speaker recognition. The registered voices are stored in a database. When the device senses any voice, it cross checks with the registered voice. If any mismatches occur, it gives an alert to the authorized person through global system for mobile communication (GSM) to intimate the unauthorized access. GSM works at a rate of 168 Kb/s up to 40 km and it operates at different operating frequencies like 800MHz, 900MHz, etc. This proposed work is more advantageous for the security systems to trap the unauthorized persons through an efficient communication.
A Novel Approach for Computer-Aided Diagnosis for Distinction Between Benign and Malignant of Lung Nodules Based on Machine Learning Techniques
Authors: Bola Shashidhara
Published: March 2018

A new method is proposed to classify the lung nodules as benign and malignant. The method is based on analysis of lung nodule shape, contour, and texture for better classification. The data set consists of 39 lung nodules of 39 patients which contain 19 benign and 20 malignant nodules. Lung regions are segmented based on morphological operators and lung nodules are detected based on shape and area features. The proposed algorithm was tested on LIDC (lung image database consortium) datasets and the results were found to be satisfactory. The performance of the method for distinction between benign and malignant was evaluated by the use of receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis. The method achieved area under the ROC curve was 0.903 which reduces the false positive rate.
Mutual Correlation-Based Anonymization for Privacy Preserving Medical Data Publishing
Authors: Kukkuvada Ashoka , Basavaraju Poornima
Published: March 2018

Currently the industry is focused on managing, retrieving, and securing massive amounts of data. Hence, privacy preservation is a significant concern for those organizations that publish/share personal data for vernacular analysis. In this chapter, the authors presented an innovative approach that makes use of information gain of the quasi attributes with respect to sensitive attributes for anonymizing the data, which gives the fruitfulness of an attribute in classifying the data elements, which is a two-way correlation among attributes. The authors show that the proposed approach preserves better data utility and has lesser complexity than former methods.
Medical Signal Security Enhancement Using Chaotic Map and Watermarking Technique
Authors: Sahay Ajita , Pradhan Chittaranjan , Sinha Amandip
Published: March 2018

This chapter explores medical signal security enhancement using chaotic map and watermarking techniques. This new approach provides security to both the medical image and also maintains the confidentially of both the patient and doctor. Medical image encryption is done by using 2D Gaussian iterated map and BARCODE ECC200. Personal data is encoded in barcode. The encrypted image and barcode are embedded using DCT and DWT, which provides high PSNR values and higher NC value, which help to provide more security.
Novel Techniques for Trigeminal Neuralgia Including Trigeminal Neurostimulators
Authors: Wali Arvin R. , Lopez Christian , Abraham Peter , Brandel Michael G. , Santiago-Dieppa David R. , Steinberg Jeffrey A. , Rennert Robert C. , Pannell Jeffrey Scott , Alksne John F. , Khalessi Alexander A.
Published: March 2018

Several innovative surgical options for the management of trigeminal neuralgia have emerged over the past 40 years. In addition to microvascular decompression, other techniques have been introduced for the treatment of trigeminal neuralgia and facial nerve pain. This chapter describes the following novel therapeutic modalities: endoscopic microvascular decompression, radiosurgery, radiofrequency, thermocoagulation, glycerol rhizotomoy, balloon compression, Gasserian ganglion stimulation, and subcutaneous trigeminal nerve stimulation. For each of these techniques, this chapter provides a description of the procedure, criteria for patient selection, and discusses published data regarding patient outcomes.
Development of Adaptive Social Network Based on Learners' Thinking and Learning Styles
Authors: Lamia Mahnane , Mohamed Hafidi
Published: March 2018

Adaptive social network sites (ASNS) are an innovative approach to a web learning experience delivery. They try to solve the main shortcomings of classical social networks—“one-size-fits-all” approach and “lost-in-hyperspace” phenomena—by adapting the learning content and its presentation to needs, goals, thinking styles, and learning styles of every individual learner. This chapter outlines a new approach to automatically detect learners' thinking and learning styles, and takes into account that thinking and learning styles may change during the learning process in unexpected and unpredictable ways. The approach is based on the Felder learning styles model and Hermann thinking styles model.
Using the Web While Offline
Authors: Dillon Stuart , Rastrick Karyn , Stahl Florian , Vossen Gottfried
Published: March 2018

Whilst access to the internet is becoming increasingly ubiquitous in highly populated, urban areas, for much of the planet web connectively is still largely absent. This is mainly due to geographic remoteness, but bad connectivity or governmental controls might also prevent web users from accessing desired resources. The authors have previously outlined a general approach to cope with such situations, which they termed “Web in your Pocket” (WiPo). WiPo assumes that the user has a smart device to which appropriate data, ideally in curated form, can be pre-loaded so that it remains accessible offline. In this chapter, the authors present the potential usability of WiPo by considering three important use-cases (tourism, health, and search and rescue) demonstrating the vast potential of WiPo. The chapter concludes by considering the practical issues that need to be overcome before it might be implemented in real-world situations.
TempClass
Authors: Pradhan Rahul , Sharma Dilip Kumar
Published: March 2018

Information retrieval is a field that is emerging day by day as user needs are growing. Users nowadays are not satisfied with results that merely match the query textual words; they want the query to be understood well and then results to be retrieved. These changing requirements need the query to be processed and its hidden intent uncovered. The authors address this problem by creating a system that understands the hidden temporal intent of the query and classifies it into proposed classes. This chapter works on temporal expressions in the document and classifies the query with respect to the temporal expressions in the document. The work is not limited to just classifying the query but also explores how these classifications will help search engines to make modifications in their user interface, which helps users to reach their desired information faster. Temporal boundaries of queries can be found using this work, which will help to disambiguate certain queries.
Integrating Heterogeneous Services for Semantic Mashup Construction
Authors: Bencherif Khayra , Bensaber Djamel Amar , Malki Mimoun
Published: March 2018

Semantic mashup applications allow automating the process of services and data integration to create a composite application with a new user interface. Nevertheless, existing mashup applications need to improve the matching methods for discovering semantic services. Moreover, they have to create or modify workflows in mashup applications without the assistance of the original developers. Automating the combination of user interfaces is another challenge in the context of semantic mashups construction. In this chapter, the authors propose an approach that allows automating the combination of data, services, and user interfaces to provide a composite application with an enhanced user interface. The construction of the semantic mashup application is based on the use of domain ontology, a matching tool, and a collection of patterns. In order to demonstrate the effectiveness of this proposal, the authors present a use case to construct a semantic mashup application for a travel agency.
Effective Entity Linking and Disambiguation Algorithms for User-Generated Content (UGC)
Authors: Narayanasamy Senthil Kumar , Muruganantham Dinakaran
Published: March 2018

The exponential growth of data emerging out of social media is causing challenges in decision-making systems and poses a critical hindrance in searching for the potential information. The major objective of this chapter is to convert the unstructured data in social media into the meaningful structure format, which in return brings the robustness to the information extraction process. Further, it has the inherent capability to prune for named entities from the unstructured data and store the entities into the knowledge base for important facts. In this chapter, the authors explain the methods to identify all the critical interpretations taken over to find the named entities from Twitter streams and the techniques to proportionally link it with appropriate knowledge sources such as DBpedia.
Mathematics Education Technology Professional Development
Authors: Driskell Shannon O. , Bush Sarah B. , Ronau Robert N. , Niess Margaret L. , Rakes Christopher R. , Pugalee David K.
Published: March 2018

The effective use of digital technologies in school settings calls for appropriate professional development opportunities that will transform inservice teachers' knowledge for integrating technologies as effective mathematics learning tools. To inform such opportunities, this study examined the contents of published mathematics education technology professional development papers over several decades using Sztajn's (2011) standards for high quality reporting in mathematics professional development research studies, the Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge framework, and the Comprehensive Framework for Teacher Knowledge. Both the Professional Development Implementation and Evaluation Model and Education Professional Development Research Framework are recommended for further guidance on reporting key features of mathematics education technology professional development.
Mathematics Teachers' Knowledge-of-Practice With Technologies in an Online Masters' Program
Authors: Niess Margaret L. , Gillow-Wiles Henry
Published: March 2018

As teacher education leverages online instructional environments, an important research focus is how best to re-conceptualize mathematics inservice teacher classroom observations. This chapter proposes an alternative methodology to the structure of traditional observations, where the Scoop Notebook provides a window into mathematics teachers' Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK), specifically their TPACK-of-practice. In this descriptive, cross-case study, a re-designed Scoop process frames teachers' engagement in classroom practices, putting into practice their scholarly formal knowledge and developing in-depth, rich reflections from their classroom actions and artifacts. This study illustrates how embedding the Scoop process into a graduate instructional strategies course as part of a Master's degree curriculum results in engaging teachers in action research where they use artifacts as objects to think with for transforming their TPACK for integrating technologies in teaching mathematics.
Recent Framework of TVET Teacher Education in a Country on the Path to Reform
Authors: Bünning Frank , Schmidt Ulrike
Published: March 2018

This chapter discussed TVET teacher education in Myanmar on the threshold of the 21st century; a qualitative analysis of the present state of the art. Recent status of Myanmar's TVET system was highlighted and the chapter strongly maintained that qualified and motivated teachers and instructors are key for effective learning and are as well at the heart of TVET quality. The chapter provided a comprehensive problem scenario with regard to TVET teacher training; to mention a few, that there is a low awareness for the relevance of TVET in general and with respect to its potential to develop a country's skilled and semi-skilled workers. In comparison to university degrees, graduating from training courses at vocational institutions is not perceived as a valuable career option. Lastly, this chapter attempts to add to the collection of vocational education and training research by consulting a case in Myanmar – a country which currently possesses only a sparse amount of data in this field.
Innovative Instructional Strategies for an Online Community of Learners
Authors: Niess Margaret L. , Gillow-Wiles Henry
Published: March 2018

This qualitative, design-based research identifies innovative instructional practices for teacher professional development that support an online community of learners in reconstructing their technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK) for teaching mathematics. This analysis describes instructional practices that guide inservice teacher participants in inquiring and reflecting to confront their knowledge-of-practice conceptions for integrating multiple technologies as learning tools. The research program describes an online learning trajectory and instructional strategies supporting the tools and processes in steering the content development in a social metacognitive constructivist instructional framework towards moving from “informal ideas, through successive refinements of representation, articulation, and reflection towards increasingly complex concepts over time” (Confrey & Maloney, 2012). The results provide recommendations for online professional development learning environments that engage the participants as a community of learners.
Video and Its Incorporation Into Social Networking Sites for Teacher Training
Authors: De Pablos-Pons Juan , Colás-Bravo Pilar , González-Ramírez Teresa , Conde-Jiménez Jesús , Reyes-de-Cózar Salvador , Contreras-Rosado José Antonio
Published: March 2018

This chapter is proposed with the primary aim of analysing the massive incorporation of the video in social networking sites, as a narrative resource support in those platforms. At the same time, and more specifically, it aims to show how they are able to be used in teacher training, since social networking sites appear as enhancing the use of video possibilities in open teacher training. However, in the educational field are shown as an aspect that still needs to explore and deepen this line of research. First, this chapter presents the phenomenon of the incorporation of video into social networking sites. Second, we present a systematization of the research work on the pedagogical value of videos and social networking sites in teacher training. This new scenario favours knowledge democratization and involves a reformulation of teacher training models and professional identity.
Scaffolding Subject Matter Content With Pedagogy and Technologies in Problem-Based Learning With the Online TPACK Learning Trajectory
Authors: Niess Margaret L.
Published: March 2018

This research-based application of an online inservice teacher education course highlights how scaffolding subject matter content, pedagogy, and technologies in a problem-based learning approach reframes teachers' TPACK for integrating digital image and video technologies with 21st century inquiry thinking skills: critical thinking, creative thinking, communicating and collaborating. The course design takes advantage of knowledge-building communities through the application of the online TPACK learning trajectory. The participants' products, interactions, and reflections demonstrate how the scaffolding engages them in high levels of thinking and learning in mathematics and science with digital image and video technologies. The result is an explanatory framework for how the scaffolding of the subject matter content, pedagogy, and technologies in problem-based learning with the online TPACK learning trajectory guides teachers in rethinking, relearning and reframing their TPACK knowledge for engaging students 21st century inquiry thinking with digital image and video technologies.
The Impact Upon Comprehension and Reading Tasks of Preservice Elementary Teachers Using a Web 2.0 Reading Extension
Authors: Thomas Jeff A. , Parkison Paul
Published: March 2018

This study explored the impact of using a Web 2.0 technology to augment and enhance the efficiency of face-to-face meetings and the amount and quality of time students spent out of class working with a reading assignment in an undergraduate science methods course. Treatment subjects (versus control subjects) used a discussion board style site called TitanPad® to respond to a journal prompt after reading an article and before attending a subsequent class to discuss the journal article. Results indicated that significantly more treatment students read the article and perceived that they more substantially contributed to a follow-up discussion. Results also indicated no significant differences between groups in the amount of time spent, between perceptions of being ready to discuss the reading material, and the groups' comprehension of the reading material. One inference was that with no additional time investment, instructors might increase student in-class participation using a Web 2.0 tool.