cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Narrative and life

The universality of narrative When we think of narrative, we usually think of it as art, however modest. We think of it as novels or sagas or folk tales or, at the least, as anecdotes. We speak of a gift for telling stories. But as true as it is that narrative can be an art and that art thrives on narrative, narrative is also something we all engage in, artists and non-artists alike. We make narratives many times a day, every day of our lives. And we start doing so almost from the moment we begin putting words together. As soon as we follow a subject with a verb, there is a good chance we are engaged in narrative discourse. “I fell down,” the child cries, and in the process tells her mother a little narrative, just as I have told in this still unfinished sentence a different, somewhat longer narrative that includes the action of the child's telling (“‘I fell down,’ the child cries”). Given the presence of narrative in almost all human discourse, there is little wonder that there are theorists who place it next to language itself as the distinctive human trait. Fredric Jameson, for example, writes about the “all-informing process of narrative ,” which he describes as “the central function or instance of the human mind.” Jean-Francois Lyotard calls narration “the quintessential form of customary knowledge.”
10 – Electric Power Quality

This chapter discusses electric power quality, which generally applies to the goodness of the electric power supply, its voltage regulation, its frequency, voltage wave shape, current wave shape, level of impulses and noise, and the absence of momentary outages. Electric power quality studies generally span the entire electrical system, but the main points of emphasis are in the primary and secondary distribution systems. There are two main classes of electric power quality disturbances: the steady-state disturbance that lasts for a long period of time (and is often periodic) and the transient. Because power quality is often stated in terms of voltages and currents, the main instrumentation needed to assess power quality relates to bus voltages and line and load currents. In terms of voltages, usually bus voltages are measured using potential transformers because isolation from the power circuit is desirable and because power system voltages are usually too high to measure directly. Furthermore, the analysis techniques for power quality studies are explained in the chapter.
The effect of obesity on the anatomical relationship of the popliteal artery and tibial nerve in the proximal and distal popliteal fossa: relevance to popliteal sciatic nerve block and a traceback technique using the popliteal artery.

Abstract Study Objective To determine the effect of body mass index (BMI) on the relationship of the popliteal artery to the sciatic and tibial nerves in the popliteal fossa. Design Prospective, observational study. Setting University medical center. Subjects One hundred patients scheduled for magnetic resonance imaging scans of the knee. Measurements BMI was recorded and magnetic resonance imaging scans were assessed at 3 different measurement points along the femur for the distance and angle between the popliteal artery and tibial nerve, or sciatic nerve if the sciatic nerve had not bifurcated at the measurement point. Main Results At the distal femur, the tibial nerve was a mean of 2.9 mm from the popliteal artery. The nerve was consistently posterior to the artery; however, it was variably located medial or lateral to the artery. At the 5- and 8-cm measurement points, the nerve was 10.0 and 16.1 mm (SD, 4.1 and 5.2 mm), and 31° and 44° (SD, 15° and 16°) lateral to the popliteal artery, respectively. Zero degree was defined as directly posterior to the artery. Increasing BMI was correlated with increasing distance between the nerve and the artery at the 5- and 8-cm measurement points ( r = 0.36 P > | t | .000 and .45 P > | t | .002). Conclusions At 5 cm proximal to the distal femoral condyles, the popliteal artery is a reliable sonographic landmark to locate the tibial nerve due to the close proximity and consistent location of the nerve 1 cm posterolateral to the artery, with only a moderate effect of BMI.
Copper-64 Labelled Fingolimod for PET Imaging of the Sphingolipid-1-Phosphate Axis in Prostate Cancer

1123 Objectives The sphingolipid-1-phosphate axis including sphingosine kinase (SPhK) and sphingosine-1-phosphate receptors (S1PRs) is implicated in human cancer development and progression.1 Fingolimod (FTY720), a synthetic sphingosine analogue, is an FDA-approved immunmodulating drug, which has been documented as anti-tumor agent by targeting SPhK/S1PRs.2 In this work, we report the development of copper-64 labelled FTY720 for PET imaging of the sphingolipid signaling axis in prostate cancer. Methods To be labeled with 64Cu, FTY720 was conjugated with a chelator,p-SCN-Bn-NOTA. After the in vitro stability and lipophilicity evaluation of the radiotracer, preliminary small animal PET/CT imaging with 64Cu-NOTA-FTY720 was performed in two prostate cancer xenograft models, the SPhK overexpressing PC-3 and the low SPhK expressing LNCaP. The imaging specificity was tested by a blockade experiment of co-injecting the radiotracer with FTY720. Results The conjugate NOTA-FTY720, was obtained in 50.1% yield and characterized by LC-MS, and 1H-NMR. NOTA-FTY720 was labeled with 64Cu in 94.7% radiochemical yield. After HPLC purification and reconstitution with 8% ethanol in saline, 64Cu-NOTA-FTY720 was obtained with > 99.5% radiochemical purity and a specific activity of 403-806 mCi/μmol. The radiotracer remained > 99.0% intact within 24 h incubation in rat serum and its log P value was 1.07. As expected, the radiotracer showed higher uptake in PC-3 xenografts than that in LnCaP xenografts on in vivo PET/CT images at 24 h. Both tumors’ uptakes in the presence of FTY720 were significantly reduced, indicating that the imaging is specifically targeting sphingolipid-1-phosphate axis. Conclusions A radiotracer for noninvasive assessment of the sphingolipid-1-phosphate axis was successfully developed by derivatizing an FDA-approved immunomodulating drug. The preliminary evaluation of the radiotracer 64Cu-NOTA-FTY720 demonstrated its potential utility in prostate cancer imaging and therapy. Further imaging studies and biological validation are ongoing.
Evaluation of different solvents to extract antibacterial compounds from jalapeño peppers.

Chili peppers (Capsicum spp.) may possess antibacterial properties and have potential to be used in foods as antimicrobial. The complete chili pepper extract should be evaluated to determine which compounds are responsible for the antimicrobial activity. Extraction of compounds from the pepper is completed using a solvent. The type of solvent used for extraction influences which compounds are isolated, therefore the best extraction method needs to be determined. The purpose of this study was to identify which solvent is most successful at extracting unknown antibacterial compounds from jalapeno peppers. Fresh jalapeno peppers were chopped, weighed, and blended with a solvent (sterilized hot water, 70% methanol, 95% methanol, 70% ethanol, or 95% ethanol) at a 1:1 ratio (g/g) until the mixture was homogenized, followed by shaking for 15 min. The slurry was centrifuged; supernatant was removed and used for antibacterial testing against Listeria monocytogenes, Escherichia coli O157:H7, and Salmonella enterica. The diameter of growth inhibition was measured and statistically evaluated using ANOVA to determine the extract with the greatest antimicrobial activity. Solvents were tested alone as a control. There was greater bacterial inhibition from extracts created with methanol and ethanol than hot water. Listeria monocytogenes was significantly more susceptible to the extracts than E. coli or Salmonella isolates. Each solvent extract was then analyzed using high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and fractions (A–G) were collected and used for subsequent disk diffusion analysis against L. monocytogenes. Fractions E and F (eluded between 20 and 30 min) exhibited the most antibacterial activity. There were no differences between solvents used (p = .05). Further investigation into specific compounds within these extracts will be completed in the future.
Moral Distress, Moral Injury, and Moral Luck

In “A Broader Understanding of Moral Distress,” Stephen M. Campbell, Connie M. Ulrich, and Christine Grady (2016) build a strong case for broadening the characterization of moral distress as it man...
A Unique Case of Systemic Lupus Erythematosus Pelvic Vasculitis

The clinical presentation of Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (SLE) is diverse and vasculitis can be a potential manifestation. Cutaneous lesions involving small vessels are the most frequent presentation. However, medium and large vessel vasculitis may present with life-threatening visceral manifestations. We present a unique case of pelvic vasculitis mimicking a pelvic mass as an initial presentation of SLE. There are case reports of systemic vasculitis involving the female genital tract with giant cell arteritis (GCA), polyarteritis nodosa (PAN), and granulomatous with polyangiitis and microscopic polyangiitis (GPA/MPA), among others, but only a few cases attributed to SLE. Awareness of this condition and a prompt diagnosis are warranted as this is a severe and potentially life-threatening condition.
Should Legacy Highway Advisory Radio and Citizens’ Band Radio Advisory Systems Be Continued?: Analysis of Traveler Usage and Satisfaction Regarding These Systems

Advanced traveler information systems (ATIS) are important to provide travelers with accurate, up-to-date travel information. With the advent of new ATIS technologies, such as smartphone applications, roadway agencies need to understand how travelers use existing ATIS technologies, such as the legacy Highway Advisory Radio (HAR). The University of Central Florida implemented three traveler surveys and one truck driver survey to obtain the opinions of Florida roadway users regarding HAR, the Citizens’ Band Radio Advisory System (CBRAS), and other traffic information sources. Travelers typically preferred dynamic message signs (32%), smartphone applications (23%), and vehicle navigation devices (21%) for general traffic information. Some 57% of travelers were aware of HAR, and 42% of these travelers had used HAR, with 84% of users expressing satisfaction with HAR. Additionally, 87% of travelers said that they would use HAR during emergencies, such as hurricanes. A tree model targeting user satisfaction was ...
Ventral Hernia Repair: A Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials

Abstract Background: From the patient's perspective, a ventral hernia (VH) can cause pain, adversely affect function, increase size, cosmetically distort the abdomen, and incarcerate/strangulate abdominal contents. The only known “cure” for a VH is surgical repair. The aim of this study was to review systematically the published randomized controlled trials (RCTs) of the surgical care of VH. Method: A search of the Ovid, MEDLINE, EMBASE, and Cochrane databases was performed to obtain reports of RCTs on the use of mesh reinforcement in abdominal wall hernia repair. The outcomes assessed were hernia recurrence and surgical site infection (SSI). The overall quality of evidence was assessed using Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE). When feasible, based on assessment of heterogeneity, data were pooled and analyzed in a meta-analysis. Results: Of the 10,349 titles screened, 25 articles (23 studies) met the search criteria. Evidence indicates that mesh reinforcement in cle...
Approximate Grassmannian Intersections: Subspace-Valued Subspace Learning

Subspace learning is one of the most foundational tasks in computer vision with applications ranging from dimensionality reduction to data denoising. As geometric objects, subspaces have also been successfully used for efficiently representing certain types of invariant data. However, methods for subspace learning from subspace-valued data have been notably absent due to incompatibilities with standard problem formulations. To fill this void, we introduce Approximate Grassmannian Intersections (AGI), a novel geometric interpretation of subspace learning posed as finding the approximate intersection of constraint sets on a Grassmann manifold. Our approach can naturally be applied to input subspaces of varying dimension while reducing to standard subspace learning in the case of vector-valued data. Despite the nonconvexity of our problem, its globally-optimal solution can be found using a singular value decomposition. Furthermore, we also propose an efficient, general optimization approach that can incorporate additional constraints to encourage properties such as robustness. Alongside standard subspace applications, AGI also enables the novel task of transfer learning via subspace completion. We evaluate our approach on a variety of applications, demonstrating improved invariance and generalization over vector-valued alternatives.
Zika virus-induced acute myelitis and motor deficits in adult interferon αβ/γ receptor knockout mice

Zika virus (ZIKV) has received widespread attention because of its effect on the developing fetus. It is becoming apparent, however, that severe neurological sequelae, such as Guillian-Barre syndrome (GBS), myelitis, encephalitis, and seizures can occur after infection of adults. This study demonstrates that a contemporary strain of ZIKV can widely infect astrocytes and neurons in the brain and spinal cord of adult, interferon α/β receptor knockout mice (AG129 strain) and cause progressive hindlimb paralysis, as well as severe seizure-like activity during the acute phase of disease. The severity of hindlimb motor deficits correlated with increased numbers of ZIKV-infected lumbosacral spinal motor neurons and decreased numbers of spinal motor neurons. Electrophysiological compound muscle action potential (CMAP) amplitudes in response to stimulation of the lumbosacral spinal cord were reduced when obvious motor deficits were present. ZIKV immunoreactivity was high, intense, and obvious in tissue sections of the brain and spinal cord. Infection in the brain and spinal cord was also associated with astrogliosis as well as T cell and neutrophil infiltration. CMAP and histological analysis indicated that peripheral nerve and muscle functions were intact. Consequently, motor deficits in these circumstances appear to be primarily due to myelitis and possibly encephalitis as opposed to a peripheral neuropathy or a GBS-like syndrome. Thus, acute ZIKV infection of adult AG129 mice may be a useful model for ZIKV-induced myelitis, encephalitis, and seizure activity.
Enhanced methane conversion in chemical looping partial oxidation systems using a copper doping modification

Abstract Chemical looping partial oxidation (CLPO) is a promising strategy of methane conversion to syngas with low cost and minimal environmental impact. A major challenge is the development of oxygen carriers that have high reactivity, high oxygen carrying capacity, and recyclability. We demonstrate that the addition of a low concentration (1%) of copper dopant to iron-based oxygen carriers can dramatically enhance the reactivity in CLPO process at low temperatures while maintaining the recyclability of these carriers. With the dopant, the methane conversion rate at 700 °C is 470% higher than that of carriers without the dopant. These results are substantiated by ab initio DFT + U and thermochemistry analyses. It is noted that operating a chemical looping system at 700 °C can result in energy consumption savings of ∼35% as compared to a chemical looping operation at 1000 °C. Thus, our findings provide a pathway to significantly lowering the methane reaction temperature in chemical looping systems, which will lead to substantial energy savings with desired oxygen carrier recyclability.
Linguistic Features of Sarcasm and Metaphor Production Quality.

Using linguistic features to detect figurative language has provided a deeper in-sight into figurative language. The purpose of this study is to assess whether linguistic features can help explain differences in quality of figurative language. In this study a large corpus of metaphors and sarcastic responses are collected from human subjects and rated for figurative language quality based on theoretical components of metaphor, sarcasm, and creativity. Using natural language processing tools, specific linguistic features related to lexical sophistication and semantic cohesion were used to predict the human ratings of figurative language quality. Results demonstrate linguistic features were able to predict small amounts of variance in metaphor and sarcasm production quality.
Perception and Its Development in Childhood

The theme of our lecture today1 is the problem of perception in child psychology. You know, of course, that no chapter of contemporary psychology has been as fundamentally rewritten in the past 15–20 years as that concerned with the problem of perception. You know that the skirmish between the representatives of the old and the new psychology has been more intense here than in any other domain of research. Nowhere has the structural tradition placed its new conceptions and experimental research methods in such sharp opposition to the old, associative tradition. If we consider concrete experimental material, the chapter on perception has clearly been more extensively rewritten than any other chapter of experimental psychology.
A large healthcare-associated outbreak of hepatitis C virus genotype 1a in a clinic in Korea.

Abstract Background In November 2015, reuse of needles and syringes in conjunction with an increase in cases of HCV at a clinic in Korea was reported and investigated by public health authorities. Patients who received injections at the clinic from the first time this infection control breach may have occurred in 2008 through 2015 when the practice was stopped were offered screening for HCV and other blood-borne pathogens such as HIV, HTLV, HBV, syphilis, and malaria. Objectives The aim of this study was to assess whether an outbreak of hepatitis C had occurred among the potentially exposed clinic patients due to this infection control breach. Study Design We performed hepatitis C viral RNA load tests and genotyping using plasma from hepatitis C antibody-positive individuals who had visited the clinic between May 2008 and November 2015. We analyzed the core-E2 and NS5B regions of the virus from RNA-positive samples by constructing a phylogenetic tree based on maximum likelihood analysis. To identify transmission risk factors and epidemiological relationships among the patients, we reviewed their medical records, assessed staff infection control practices and performed environmental inspection of the clinic. Environmental samples from medication room surfaces and medication vial contents were tested for HCV RNA. Results and Conclusions Among the 1721 patients tested, 96 were IgG-positive and 70 were viral RNA-positive. Among the 61 patients whose viral loads were greater than the detection limit, 41 (67.2%) were classified as genotype 1a, 1 (1.6%) as genotype 1b, 18 (29.5%) as genotype 1, and one (1.6%) as genotype 2. After sequencing, 12 genotype 1 cases were further classified as genotype 1a (11) or 1b (1). The sequences of the core-E2 and NS5B regions of 45 patients formed a monophyletic cluster distinct from genotype 1a. The hepatitis C virus sequences from patients and environmental specimens were well-matched in the partial E1 gene region. We detected genotype 1a RNA in environmental specimens, indicating a healthcare-associated outbreak caused by reuse of syringes and contaminated multi-dose vials. Our molecular epidemiological investigation of hepatitis C genotype 1a, rare in Korea, will aid investigations of infection sources during future pathogen outbreaks.
Allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation for mantle cell lymphoma in a heavily pretreated patient population.

7558Background: Allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (allo-SCT) is the only potential curative treatment option for patients with MCL due to its potent graft-versus-lymphoma (GVL) eff...
Cellular and molecular mechanisms of regeneration in colonial and solitary Ascidians

Regenerative ability is highly variable among the metazoans. While many invertebrate organisms are capable of complete regeneration of entire bodies and organs, whole-organ regeneration is limited to very few species in the vertebrate lineages. Tunicates, which are invertebrate chordates and the closest extant relatives of the vertebrates, show robust regenerative ability. Colonial ascidians of the family of the Styelidae, such as several species of Botrylloides, are able to regenerate entire new bodies from nothing but fragments of vasculature, and they are the only chordates that are capable of whole body regeneration. The cell types and signaling pathways involved in whole body regeneration are not well understood, but some evidence suggests that blood borne cells may play a role. Solitary ascidians such as Ciona can regenerate the oral siphon and their central nervous system, and stem cells located in the branchial sac are required for this regeneration. Here, we summarize the cellular and molecular mechanisms of tunicate regeneration that have been identified so far and discuss differences and similarities between these mechanisms in regenerating tunicate species.
GENETICALLY INFORMED SUBTYPING OF SCHIZOPHRENIA

Background Schizophrenia is a mental disorder with heterogeneous clinical presentation and genetic predisposition. In DSM IV, schizophrenia was classified into five subtypes based on clinical features. Due to its limited application in clinical practice and the lack of biological underpinning, these subtypes were removed in DSM V. In recent years, many large scale genome-wide association studies have been conducted and numerous genetic factors have been identified for various diseases and traits, including schizophrenia. This provides an opportunity to explore subtyping of complex diseases into genetically homogeneous subgroups so that more effective treatments can be developed. Methods We calculated polygenic scores for the cases of the Molecular Genetics of Schizophrenia (MGS) study (N=2,681) for a variety of diseases and traits, and evaluated their potential as classifiers to subtype schizophrenia using k-means clustering algorithm. We verified the cluster structure in the Sweden Study of Schizophrenia (SSS) study (N=2,895). We further validated the clusters with functional data from the Clinical Antipsychotic Trials of Intervention Effectiveness (CATIE) study (N=741). Results Using k-means algorithm, we found that the polygenic scores of neuroticism and blood creatinine level could reliably classify MGS patients into two clusters (subtypes) and the cluster structures had been verified in the patients of SSCC and CATIE studies. Furthermore, using the rich data of neurocognitive and lab tests in the CATIE study, we found that the cluster memberships were associated neurocognitive functions (Wide Range Achievement Test 3rd edition, Reading score: P=0.0015) and lab tests (creatine phosphokinase test: P=7.2×10-7; HDL: P=0.0003; triglycerides: P=0.0015; white blood cells: P=0.0022; Neutrophil cells: 0.0064). Furthermore, by the end of phase 1 trial, the minor subtype (84 out of 650 subjects) had improved positive symptoms (P=0.0479) comparing to the baseline at enrollment. The negative symptoms showed a trend (P=0.0843). Discussion The results indicate that genetically informed subtyping has functional and biological underpinning. More importantly, our subtyping may be linked to treatment outcomes when measured by the symptom presentation. While our results need to be verified, the implication to clinical practice is clear and significant.
Development of a computerized adaptive screening tool for overall psychopathology ("p").

Abstract A substantial body of work supports the existence of a general psychopathology factor (“p”). Psychometrically, this is important because it implies that there is a psychological phenomenon (overall psychopathology) that can be measured and potentially used in clinical research or treatment. The present study aimed to construct, calibrate, and begin to validate a computerized adaptive (CAT) screener for “p”. In a large community sample (N = 4544; age 11–21), we modeled 114 clinical items using a bifactor multidimensional item response theory (MIRT) model and constructed a fully functional (and public) CAT for assessing “p” called the Overall mental illness (OMI) screener. In a random, non-overlapping sample (N = 1019) with extended phenotyping (neuroimaging) from the same community cohort, adaptive versions of the OMI screener (10-, 20-, and 40-item) were simulated and compared to the full 114-item test in their ability to predict demographic characteristics, common mental disorders, and brain parameters. The OMI screener performed almost as well as the full test, despite being only a small fraction of the length. For prediction of 13 mental disorders, the mid-length (20-item) adaptive version showed mean area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.76, compared to 0.79 for the full version. For prediction of brain parameters, mean absolute standardized relationship was 0.06 for the 20-item adaptive version, compared to 0.07 for the full form. This brief, public tool may facilitate the rapid and accurate measurement of overall psychopathology in large-scale studies and in clinical practice.
Modeling Time in REA/Real Databases: Planning and Availability

Modeling time to meet enterprise requirements in REA requires two orthogonal concepts: valid time and transaction time. Valid time can be multidimensional, including historical, planned and plan instantiation time. Transaction time is when the information is recorded.Valid time is proposed as an addition to the REA model for each of resources, events and agents. Transaction time can be associated with each REA tuple. Transaction time can be particularly critical from a control perspective, e.g., providing information for intrusion detection systems, and performance monitoring perspective, providing information that can be used to measure efficiency. In addition, given transaction time, the database can be “rolled-back” to the world as of some previous time.Historical valid time-based information can be captured to allow determination of resource, agent and location availability for planning. Valid time can also be used to capture time for events using either a single dimensional historical view or a multidimensional one that accounts for an enterprise planning model of time. This allows capture of planning event information, and linkage in a dual relationship to actual plan instantiation of planning events. Sequentially, generally, availability time proceeds planned usage time, which proceeds plan instantiation time. The planning event, along with the resources and agents, becomes the initiated basis of analysis, and provides an alternative type of “duality.”
Healing from Hate: How Young Men Get into—and out of—Violent Extremism

In this book, Michael Kimmel provides valuable insights into the radicalization process for men who join violent extremist groups as well as insights into successfully exiting from such organizatio...
Difference and dissent in the neoliberal university: relational geographies of race, caste, and violence

Higher education in both India and the United States has been experiencing a neoliberal turn discernable since the 1990s. At the same time, tensions around who does and does not belong on campuses ...
Verification: Constructive and Destructive Full Duplex Relays

With recent advances in in-band full duplex techniques, full duplex capable relays have been shown feasible in many recent works. Instead of generating data itself to transmit, a full duplex relay can forward the received signal while receiving it. It also has the opportunity to properly modify the signal before forwarding it, which has been explored to enable constructive and destructive full duplex relaying recently. With these designs, the signal through the full duplex relay could constructively or destructively add up with the signal from the direct link at the receiver side. As a result, the received signal power may be boosted or greatly reduced, compared with direct forwarding. In this paper, we do detailed analysis on whether such constructive and destructive full duplex relays are possible. We find that for OFDM signals, such relays can not be achieved if the additional latency of the relayed path is more than one sample time than the direct link. Our analysis and results challenge the assumptions on the relay latency requirements of previous works to realize such systems.
LE CINÉMA COMME OPÉRATEUR D’ANALYSE

Comment le film, d’abord objet d’analyse, est devenu un modele d’analyse. Le film et la nature disciplinaire de la theorie.
Conscious Intelligence Requires Lifelong Autonomous Programming For General Purposes.

Universal Turing Machines [29, 10, 18] are well known in computer science but they are about manual programming for general purposes. Although human children perform conscious learning (i.e., learning while being conscious) from infancy [24, 23, 14, 4], it is unknown that Universal Turing Machiness can facilitate not only our understanding of Autonomous Programming For General Purposes (APFGP) by machines, but also enable early-age conscious learning. This work reports a new kind of AI---conscious learning AI from a machine's "baby" time. Instead of arguing what static tasks a conscious machine should be able to do during its "adulthood", this work suggests that APFGP is a computationally clearer and necessary criterion for us to judge whether a machine is capable of conscious learning so that it can autonomously acquire skills along its "career path". The results here report new concepts and experimental studies for early vision, audition, natural language understanding, and emotion, with conscious learning capabilities that are absent from traditional AI systems.
Non-Self-Adjacent Ray Classes for Parallelizable Shooting–Bouncing Ray Tracing Double Count Removal

We propose and experimentally validate a new ray spawning and associated double count removal (DCR) technique for shooting–bouncing ray tracing (SBR). This technique allows, for the first time, efficient parallelization of ray DCR, the major bottleneck and least parallel aspect of modern SBR ray-tracing relying on the ray-cone approximation (RCA). We define non-self-adjacent (NSA) ray classes on a recursively sampled icosahedron, guaranteeing removal of mutual adjacency data dependencies between rays that previously prevented efficient parallelization of ray DCR and, by extension, SBR. Using a GPU-parallelized implementation of the technique, we demonstrate speedups of DCR over 300×, limited in our testing only by the available hardware. As DCR is the asymptotically dominant contributor to the computation time of SBR-RCA, with respect to the number of parallel processes available, the achieved speedup applies to parallel SBR-RCA as a whole.
Trends and Outcomes of Surgical Management of Primary Papillary Carcinoma in the Pediatric Population.

Abstract Background Childhood papillary thyroid cancer is more aggressive than carcinomas in adults. Current American Thyroid Association pediatric guidelines recommend a total or near-total thyroidectomy for all pediatric patients without gross evidence of lymph node metastases. Our objective is to analyze trends in the surgical management of pediatric papillary thyroid cancer and assess how well the guidelines are implemented. Methods A retrospective cohort study of pediatric patients (ages 19 y and under) who underwent a thyroidectomy was conducted using the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results database 2006-2017. Procedure type was classified as lobectomy or less and subtotal or total thyroidectomy. Descriptive statistics to illustrate patient and tumor characteristics as well as chi-square analysis to evaluate frequency of treatment with total thyroidectomies versus lobectomy or less were performed. Logistic regression analysis controlling for age, sex, size of tumor, rural versus urban institutions, and surgery year was conducted to identify factors predictive of procedure type. Results A total of 2271 children underwent surgical management of papillary thyroid cancer between 2006 and 2017. Most patients received a subtotal or total thyroidectomy as surgical management (n = 2,085, 91.8%). One hundred eighty-six patients (8.2%) received a lobectomy or less. The number of lobectomies or less increased with time, with 41 (6.6%) patients between 2006 and 2009, 98 (8.0%) between 2009 and 2015, and 47 (11.1%) between 2016 and 2017 (P = 0.03). Mortality rates were low (n = 15, 0.7%). On logistic regression analysis, later stages, larger sizes, and earlier operative years were predictive of a near-total or total thyroidectomy. Conclusions Despite the American Thyroid Association Guidelines recommending a total thyroidectomy for pediatric well-differentiated thyroid cancer, the results of this study demonstrate that thyroid lobectomies are being performed in increasing frequency for smaller tumors in earlier stages of disease. Further investigation of whether this trend actually affects the outcomes in this patient cohort is needed.
Diameter-Based Volumetric Models May Inadequately Calculate Jugular Paraganglioma Volume Following Sub-Total Resection.

BACKGROUND As gross total resection of jugular paragangliomas (JPs) may result in cranial nerve deficits, JPs are increasingly managed with subtotal resection (STR) with postoperative radiological monitoring. However, the validity of commonly used diameter-based models that calculate postoperative volume to determine residual tumor growth is dubious. The purpose of this study was to assess the accuracy of these models compared to manual volumetric slice-by-slice segmentation. METHODS A senior neuroradiologist measured volumes via slice-by-slice segmentation of JPs pre- and postoperatively from patients who underwent STR from 2007 to 2019. Volumes from three linear-based models were calculated. Models with absolute percent error (APE) > 20% were considered unsatisfactory based on a common volumetric definition for residual growth. Bland-Altman plots were used to evaluate reproducibility, and Wilcoxon matched-pairs signed rank test evaluated model bias. RESULTS Twenty-one patients were included. Median postoperative APE exceeded the established 20% threshold for each of the volumetric models as cuboidal, ellipsoidal, and spherical model APE were 63%, 28%, and 27%, respectively. The postoperative cuboidal model had significant systematic bias overestimating volume (p = 0.002) whereas the postoperative ellipsoidal and spherical models lacked systematic bias (p = 0.11 and p = 0.82). CONCLUSION Cuboidal, ellipsoidal, and spherical models do not provide accurate assessments of postoperative JP tumor volume and may result in salvage therapies that are unnecessary or inappropriately withheld due to inaccurate assessment of residual tumor growth. While more time-consuming, slice-by-slice segmentation by an experienced neuroradiologist provides a substantially more accurate and precise measurement of tumor volume that may optimize clinical management.
Study of Pre-Processing Defenses Against Adversarial Attacks on State-of-the-Art Speaker Recognition Systems

Adversarial examples are designed to fool the speaker recognition (SR) system by adding a carefully crafted human-imperceptible noise to the speech signals. Posing a severe security threat to state-of-the-art SR systems, it becomes vital to deep-dive and study their vulnerabilities. Moreover, it is of greater importance to propose countermeasures that can protect the systems against these attacks. Addressing these concerns, we first investigated how state-of-the-art x-vector based SR systems are affected by white-box adversarial attacks, i.e., when the adversary has full knowledge of the system. x-Vector based SR systems are evaluated against white-box adversarial attacks common in the literature like fast gradient sign method (FGSM), basic iterative method (BIM)–a.k.a. iterative-FGSM–, projected gradient descent (PGD), and Carlini-Wagner (CW) attack. To mitigate against these attacks, we investigated four pre-processing defenses which do not need adversarial examples during training. The four pre-processing defenses–viz. randomized smoothing, DefenseGAN, variational autoencoder (VAE), and Parallel WaveGAN vocoder (PWG) are compared against the baseline defense of adversarial training. Performing powerful adaptive white-box adversarial attack (i.e., when the adversary has full knowledge of the system, including the defense), our conclusions indicate that SR systems were extremely vulnerable under BIM, PGD, and CW attacks. Among the proposed pre-processing defenses, PWG combined with randomized smoothing offers the most protection against the attacks, with accuracy averaging 93% compared to 52% in the undefended system and an absolute improvement >90% for BIM attacks with $L_\infty >0.001$ and CW attack.
The Kidney in Nonrenal Solid Organ Transplantation: Liver and Heart

Nonrenal solid organ transplantation is often complicated by acute kidney injury (AKI); it occurs in about one in four recipients of either liver or cardiac transplants in the perioperative period and is associated with increased morbidity, mortality, and length of hospital stay. A unique set of risk factors associates with kidney and electrolyte disorders among end-stage liver disease patients and liver transplant recipients. A slightly different set of perioperative factors determines the risk of AKI after cardiac transplant. There is also some degree of commonality across all of these patients in terms of long-term risk of chronic kidney disease, effects of calcineurin inhibitors on the kidney, and considerations for kidney transplantation. In this review, we discuss clinical approaches to diagnosis and management of renal issues in liver and cardiac transplantation. We discuss challenges in the measurement of renal function, the spectrum of renal injury over short and long term, and clinically relevant aspects of renal replacement therapy including transplantation.
Sample Compression, Learnability, and the Vapnik-Chervonenkis Dimension

Within the framework of pac-learning, we explore the learnability of concepts from samples using the paradigm of sample compression schemes. A sample compression scheme of size k for a concept class C C 2X consists of a compression function and a reconstruction function. The compression function receives a finite sample set consistent with some concept in C and chooses a subset of k examples as the compression set. The reconstruction function forms a hypothesis on X from a compression set of k examples. For any sample set of a concept in C the compression set produced by the compression function must lead to a hypothesis consistent with the whole original sample set when it is fed to the reconstruction function. We demonstrate that the existence of a sample compression scheme of fixed-size for a class C is sufficient to ensure that the class C is pac-learnable. Previous work has shown that a class is pac-learnable if and only if the Vapnik-Chervonenkis (VC) dimension of the class is finite. In the second half of this paper we explore the relationship between sample compression schemes and the VC dimension. We define maximum and maximal classes of VC dimension d. For every maximum class of VC dimension d, there is a sample compression scheme of size d, and for sufficiently-large maximum classes there is no sample compression scheme of size less than d. We discuss briefly classes of VC dimension d that are maximal but not maximum. It is an open question whether every class of VC dimension d has a sample compression scheme of size O(d).
Optimal sampling and speed-up for genetic algorithms on the sampled OneMax problem

This paper investigates the optimal sampling and the speed-up obtained through sampling for the sampled OneMax problem. Theoretical and experimental analyses are given for three different population-sizing models: the decision-making model, the gambler's ruin model, and the fixed population-sizing model. The results suggest that, when the desired solution quality is fixed to a high value, the decision-making model prefers a large sampling size, the fixed population-sizing model prefers a small sampling size, and the gambler's ruin model has no preference for large or small sizes. Among the three population-sizing models, sampling yields speed-up only when the fixed population-sizing model is valid. The results indicate that when the population is sized appropriately, sampling does not yield speed-up for problems with subsolutions of uniform salience.
Evaluating and Tuning Predictive Data Mining Models Using Receiver Operating Characteristic Curves

In this study, we conduct an empirical analysis of the performance of five popular data mining methods--neural networks, logistic regression, linear discriminant analysis, decision trees, and nearest neighbor--on two binary classification problems from the credit evaluation domain. Whereas most studies comparing data mining methods have employed accuracy as a performance measure, we argue that, for problems such as credit evaluation, the focus should be on minimizing misclassification cost. We first generate receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves for the classifiers and use the area under the curve (AUC) measure to compare aggregate performance of the five methods over the spectrum of decision thresholds. Next, using the ROC results, we propose a method for tuning the classifiers by identifying optimal decision thresholds. We compare the methods based on expected costs across a range of cost-probability ratios. In addition to expected cost and AUC, we evaluate the models on the basis of their generalizability to unseen data, their scalability to other problems in the domain, and their robustness against changes in class distributions. We found that the performance of logistic regression and neural network models was superior under most conditions. In contrast, decision tree and nearest neighbor models yielded higher costs, and were much less generalizable and robust than the other models. An important finding of this research is that the models can be effectively tuned post hoc to make them cost sensitive, even though they were built without incorporating misclassification costs.
"Meaningful use" provides a meaningful opportunity.

The article by Warren et al in this issue of Cancer is timely,1 because the US government has recently put into place a specific mandate for hospitals and health professionals to electronically screen for tobacco use. This mandate is spelled out in what are referred to as “meaningful use” regulations requiring that certain information be entered into each patient’s electronic health record (EHR) and be available to patients and their providers.2 In this editorial, we provide a model for meeting the mandate that includes implementation of a comprehensive smoking (tobacco) cessation program for cancer patients and the supporting evidence base for doing so as an alternative to the minimal intervention approach discussed by Warren et al. We also discuss the importance of an institution-wide, automated system to identify and refer tobacco users to treatment within the context of implementing the meaningful use regulations for EHR as required by the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act. Here, we briefly describe the effect of the meaningful use regulations for EHR on tobacco screening, the importance of automatic referrals for cessation assistance, and the continuing importance of provider referral and involvement. We then briefly discuss the Roswell Park Cancer Institute cessation program and the use of a public health model of care, which emphasizes providing minimal levels of intervention, and compare it with a more comprehensive model of cessation that provides a level of care tailored to the individual needs of cancer patients.Within this context, we discuss evidence supporting the use of a comprehensive treatment strategy for cancer patients that includes pharmacotherapy. To illustrate our points, we describe the comprehensive cessation programused at The University of TexasMDAnderson Cancer Center.
Prairie Soils of the Upper Mississippi Valley

Publisher Summary This chapter reviews the characteristics, concepts of genesis, and the geography of the Prairie soils of the upper Mississippi Valley and examines the concepts of Prairie soils in relation to the present system of soil classification. The degree of development of the texture profile—that is, the ratio of the percent of clay in the Al and B2 horizons is important for classifying the Prairie soils. The Tama silt loam is selected as the “modal” or “ideal” Prairie soil. In central and eastern Iowa the Tama soils are developed from loess on gently undulating to rolling upland sites. The loess is believed to have been deposited during or following the retreat of the Iowan ice sheet. The mechanical analysis of this Tama profile shows a slight accumulation of clay in the B horizon. The zone of clay enrichment is rather broad and no semblance of an abrupt claypan is evidenced. The sand fraction consists of some concretionary material. The carbon and nitrogen contents are highest in the surface and decrease gradually with depth. In no case does a layer have a higher content of carbon or nitrogen than the layer above it in the profile.
Amorphous semiconductor mobility limits

Abstract A physics-based model for electron and hole mobility in an amorphous semiconductor is developed to estimate the mobility limits of an amorphous semiconductor. The model involves band tail state trapping of a diffusive (Brownian motion) mobility and accounts for both drift- and diffusion-induced transport, as normally encountered in the operation of a thin-film transistor. Employing this model leads to a predicted maximum mobility of ~70 cm 2 V -1 s -1 (~10 cm 2 V -1 s -1 ) for electrons (holes).
Mucocele-like lesions of the breast: a clinical outcome and histologic analysis of 102 cases

Mucocele-like lesions (MLLs) of the breast are characterized by cystic architecture with stromal mucin and frequent atypia, but it is unknown whether they convey long-term breast cancer risk. We evaluated 102 MLLs that were derived from a single-institution benign breast disease cohort of 13412 women who underwent biopsy from 1967 to 2001. MLLs were histologically characterized by type of lining epithelium, architecture of the lesion, associated atypical hyperplasia (AH), and incidence of breast cancer (14.8-year median follow-up). A relatively large proportion of MLLs (42%) were diagnosed in women older than 55 years. AH was significantly more frequent in MLL patient compared to the cohort overall (27% versus 5%; P < .001). Breast cancer has developed in 13 patients with MLL. This frequency is only slightly higher than population expected rates overall (standardized incidence ratio, 2.28; 95% confidence interval, 1.21-3.91) and not significantly different from women in the cohort with (nonatypical) proliferative breast lesions. Younger women (<45) with MLL had a nonsignificant increase in risk of cancer compared to the general population (standardized incidence ratio, 5.16; 95% confidence interval, 1.41-13.23). We conclude that MLL is an uncommon breast lesion that is often associated with coexisting AH. However, in women older than 45 years, MLLs do not convey additional risk of breast cancer beyond that associated with the presence of proliferative disease.