gebhart/patrepeval huggingface dataset:
Automated segmentation and characterization of choroidal vessels in high-penetration optical coherence tomography (2013)

An automated choroidal vessel segmentation and quantification method for high-penetration optical coherence tomography (OCT) was developed for advanced visualization and evaluation of the choroidal vasculature. This method uses scattering OCT volumes for the segmentation of choroidal vessels by using a multi-scale adaptive threshold. The segmented choroidal vessels are then processed by multi-scale morphological analysis to quantify the vessel diameters. The three-dimensional structure and the diameter distribution of the choroidal vasculature were then obtained. The usefulness of the method was then evaluated by analyzing the OCT volumes of normal subjects.
An Economic Analysis of Microbial Reduction of Sulfur Dioxide with Anaerobically Digested Sewage Biosolids as Electron Donor (1996)

A concentrated stream of sulfur dioxide (SO2) is produced by regeneration of the sorbent in certain new regenerable processes for the desulfurization of flue gas (1). It has been previously proposed that this SO2can be converted to elemental sulfur for disposal or byproduct recovery using a microbial/Claus process (2,3). In this process, two-thirds of the SO2-containing gas stream would be contacted with a mixed culture containing sulfate-reducing bacteria (SRB) where SO2would act as an electron acceptor with reduction to hydrogen sulfide (H2S). This H2S could then be recombined with the remaining SO2and sent to a Claus unit to produce elemental sulfur. The Claus process is well known in the natural gas industry(4).
Radially Layered Poly(amidoamine−organosilicon) Dendrimers (2000)

A versatile approach to a new family of radially layered copolymeric poly(amidoamine−organosilicon) (PAMAMOS) dendrimers containing hydrophilic polyamidoamine (PAMAM) interiors and hydrophobic organosilicon (OS) exteriors is described. The synthesis involves either Michael addition of organosilicon acrylates or methacrylates to amine-terminated PAMAM dendrimer precursors or their haloalkylation by chloroalkyl- or iodoalkylsilanes. Convenient NMR techniques were developed to monitor the course of these reactions and to enable preparation of products with precisely controlled degree of OS coverage. Compositional variety of the resulting dendrimers is achieved by variation of the generation of PAMAM precursor and the type and functionality of the organosilicon reagent. A range of different PAMAMOS dendrimers was prepared having (a) different number of PAMAM branch cell layers in their interiors, (b) one or two layers of OS branch cells in their exteriors, (c) a variety of inert (e.g., trimethylsilyl or trimethylsiloxy) or reactive (e.g., alkoxysilyl, vinylsilyl, or vinylsiloxy) end groups, and (d) different relative amounts of these end groups. NMR, electrospray−ionization mass spectroscopy, and gel permeation chromatography confirmed the expected structures. Evaluation of selected physical properties of these PAMAMOS dendrimers showed that while solubility and glass transition temperatures were compositionally and architecturally dependent, their thermal and thermooxidative stability were limited by the presence of the less stable PAMAM component.
Novel context template design scheme for lossless color halftone image compression (2008)

A novel template design algorithm is presented for lossless compression of color halftone images. First, we extract the line pattern in the neighbor local region of each bi-level pixel. Then, the representative line pattern is evaluated from these obtained lines, using the least square error minimization. According to the evaluated line pattern and two design constraints, therefore, the context template is shaped. With the designed template, finally, each color channel image is compressed by a context-based binary arithmetic encoder. Based on the adaptiveness of the template to the input image, the proposed templates yield better compression performance than the conventional JBIG templates, which saves 35% of the JBIG bitstream.
CXCL10/IP-10 Is a Biomarker and Mediator for Kawasaki Disease (2015)

IP-10 may be used as a biomarker to facilitate KD diagnosis, and it may provide clues about the pathogenesis of KD.
A role for 3-O-sulfated heparan sulfate in cell fusion induced by herpes simplex virus type 1 (2004)

Membrane fusion induced by herpes simplex virus (HSV) is required for both entry and cell-to-cell spread. It is mediated by the viral glycoprotein gB, gD, gH-gL and gD receptors. Although 3-O-sulfated heparan sulfate (3-OS HS) is a receptor for HSV-1 entry, the requirement for heparan sulfate in the fusion process has been ruled out. Here, it is demonstrated that cells expressing 3-OS HS, generated by D-glucosaminyl 3-O-sulfotransferase isoforms-3 and/or -5 (3-OST-3 and 3-OST-5), fused with cells expressing the four glycoproteins. The cell fusion observed exhibited similar requirements but was independent of protein receptors, HVEM or nectin-1. Additionally, removal of 3-OS HS from the cell surface by heparinase-I treatment and, in separate experiments, the presence of soluble 3-OST-3- and 3-OST-5-modified HS, significantly inhibited fusion. Taken together, these results indicate that 3-OS HS can play a crucial role in virus entry and cell fusion.
Imidazole Aldoximes Effective in Assisting Butyrylcholinesterase Catalysis of Organophosphate Detoxification (2014)

Intoxication by organophosphate (OP) nerve agents and pesticides should be addressed by efficient, quickly deployable countermeasures such as antidotes reactivating acetylcholinesterase or scavenging the parent OP. We present here synthesis and initial in vitro characterization of 14 imidazole aldoximes and their structural refinement into three efficient reactivators of human butyrylcholinesterase (hBChE) inhibited covalently by nerve agent OPs, sarin, cyclosarin, VX, and the OP pesticide metabolite, paraoxon. Rapid reactivation of OP-hBChE conjugates by uncharged and nonprotonated tertiary imidazole aldoximes allows the design of a new OP countermeasure by conversion of hBChE from a stoichiometric to catalytic OP bioscavenger with the prospect of oral bioavailability and central nervous system penetration. The enhanced in vitro reactivation efficacy determined for tertiary imidazole aldoximes compared to that of their quaternary N-methyl imidazolium analogues is attributed to ion pairing of the cationic imidazolium with Asp 70, altering a reactive alignment of the aldoxime with the phosphorus in the OP-hBChE conjugate.
Two-Dimensional Curving Techniques from Flat Diffraction Grating to Concave Diffraction Grating (2019)

This paper evaluates the performance of concave diffraction grating fabricated using two-dimensional curving techniques. This concave diffraction grating was fabricated by assembling flat diffraction grating film on a convex glass and replicating from this convex diffraction grating mold. The diffraction efficiency of prototype was almost the same as that of flat diffraction grating. This shows that two-dimensional curving techniques were successfully able to facilitate the fabrication of concave diffraction grating with a high diffraction efficiency.
Database-Guided Segmentation of Anatomical Structures with Complex Appearance (2005)

The segmentation of anatomical structures has been traditionally formulated as a perceptual grouping task, and solved through clustering and variational approaches. However, such strategies require the a priori knowledge to be explicitly defined in the optimization criterion, e.g., "high-gradient border", "smoothness"', or "similar intensity or texture". This approach is limited by the validity of underlying assumptions and cannot capture complex structure appearance. This paper introduces database-guided segmentation as a new data-driven paradigm that directly exploits expert annotation of interest structures in large medical databases. Segmentation is formulated as a two-step learning problem. The first step is structure detection where we learn how to discriminate between the object of interest and background. The resulting classifier based on a boosted cascade of simple features also provides a global rigid transformation of the structure. The second step is shape inference where we use a sample-based representation of the joint distribution of appearance and shape annotations. To learn the association between the complex appearance and shape we propose a feature selection mechanism and the corresponding metric. We show that the selected features are better than using directly the appearance and illustrate the performance of the proposed method on a large set of ultrasound heart images.
Submicron Spatial Resolution in Thermal Desorption Mass Spectrometry via Rapid Heating Functions using Thermal AFM Probes (2016)

An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. As you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.
Impact of power spread constraints on a multiuser detection enabled ad hoc network (2011)

Multiuser detection (MUD) in a mobile ad-hoc network can significantly improve throughput by exploiting the natural power spreads (PS) between users. Scheduling algorithms can take advantage of the network geometry to enable this increase in throughput by reusing space to allow multiple transmissions at the same time when there is no penalty to the individual links. We show through simulation that MUD power scheduling algorithms can significantly increase network throughput as a function of the number of simultaneous transmissions and MUD algorithm capabilities. Without the need for spreading, a receiver is able to decode multiple transmitted signals when there is a power spread between the signals. Thus with a priori knowledge of scheduling information and received powers, a MUD power scheduling algorithm can efficiently allocate transmission times to increase network throughput at virtually no cost to the individual links. In this paper we motivate the usefulness of MUD without spreading in an ad-hoc network. Next we present the range of acceptable power spreads (both upper and lower limits) that lead to these gains. Additionally, using random node locations we show the likelihood of finding scenarios where scheduling leads to this low cost MUD network gain and show the corresponding network throughput gain.
Harmonic analysis for the characterization and correction of geometric distortion in MRI (2014)

A novel harmonic approach to the characterization of system-related distortions in MRI is presented. This method permits a complete and accurate mapping of the DVF within a specified ROI using a limited measurement of the distortion on the ROI boundary. This technique eliminates the requirement to exhaustively sample the DVF at a dense 3D array of points, thereby permitting the design of simple, inexpensive phantoms that may incorporate additional modules for auxiliary quality assurance objectives.
Design and analysis of linear distributed MIMO relaying algorithms (2006)

The use of multiple antennas at both ends of a wireless link, also known as multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) wireless, has been shown to offer significant improvements in the quality of communication in terms of both higher data rates and better reliability at no additional cost of spectrum or power. In this paper, MIMO communication in a wireless network is considered where multiple MIMO source-destination pair terminals simultaneously communicate through a large common set of MIMO relay terminals. With ever increasing demands for tetherless, ubiquitous and high data rate applications, there has been great interest in developing novel decentralised communication methods through distributed relaying techniques to enhance performance and enable more efficient usage of system resources. Distributed MIMO linear relaying techiques are designed that take advantage of local channel state information (CSI) at the relay terminals to simultaneously beamform multiple users' signals to their intended destinations. The merits of distributed MIMO relaying over direct transmissions through the analytical characterisation of the signal-to-interference ratio (SIR) statistics in the high and low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) regimes are demonstrated and theoretical predictions are verified by numerical simulations. Finally, relay beamforming based on the quantised finite-rate feedback of the channel states is considered and the SIR degradation through Monte-Carlo simulations is quantified.
Joint Scheduling and Resource Allocation in CDMA Systems (2010)

In this paper, the scheduling and resource allocation problem for the downlink in a code-division multiple access (CDMA)-based wireless network is considered. The problem is to select a subset of the users for transmission and for each of the users selected, to choose the modulation and coding scheme, transmission power, and number of codes used. We refer to this combination as the physical layer operating point (PLOP). Each PLOP consumes different amounts of code and power resources. The resource allocation task is to pick the ¿optimal¿ PLOP taking into account both system-wide and individual user resource constraints that can arise in a practical system. This problem is tackled as part of a utility maximization problem framed in earlier papers that includes both scheduling and resource allocation. In this setting, the problem reduces to maximizing the weighted throughput over the state-dependent downlink capacity region while taking into account the system-wide and individual user constraints. This problem is studied for the downlink of a Gaussian broadcast channel with orthogonal CDMA transmissions. This results in a tractable convex optimization problem. A dual formulation is used to obtain several key structural properties. By exploiting this structure, algorithms are developed to find the optimal solution with geometric convergence.
EGFR Activation and Signaling in Cancer Cells Are Enhanced by the Membrane-Bound Metalloprotease MT4-MMP (2014)

MT4-MMP (MMP-17) is a glycosylphosphatidyl inositol-anchored matrix metalloprotease expressed on the surface of cancer cells that promotes tumor growth and metastasis. In this report, we identify MT4-MMP as an important driver of cancer cell proliferation through CDK4 activation and retinoblastoma protein inactivation. We also determine a functional link between MT4-MMP and the growth factor receptor EGFR. Mechanistic experiments revealed direct association of MT4-MMP and its positive effects on EGFR phosphorylation in response to TGFα and EGF in cancer cells. Notably, the effects of MT4-MMP on proliferation and EGFR activation did not rely on metalloprotease activity. Clinically, MT4-MMP and EGFR expressions were correlated in human triple-negative breast cancer specimens. Altogether, our results identify MT4-MMP as a positive modifier of EGFR outside-in signaling that acts to cooperatively drive cancer cell proliferation.
Terrain slope measurement accuracy using polarimetric SAR data (2003)

The measurement of changes in polarimetric orientation induced by terrain slopes in the azimuthal (or along-track) direction may be made using polarimetric SAR data and a new method described by Schuler et al. (1998). The conversion of these orientation changes into terrain slope estimates requires a knowledge of the radar look-angle and the range-direction terrain slope. The solution for slopes is, therefore, a problem coupled between the range and azimuthal directions. Equations are available to solve for the complete set of slopes in the range and azimuthal directions when orthogonal, or quasi-orthogonal, two-pass polarimetric SAR data is available. This study attempts to determine the accuracy of the slopes derived from polarimetric SAR data. Co-registered interferometric SAR slope values are used as a benchmark for estimating this accuracy.
Tools and strategies for debugging distributed stream processing applications (2009)

Abstract Distributed data stream processing applications are often characterized by data flow graphs consisting of a large number of built‐in and user‐defined operators connected via streams. These flow graphs are typically deployed on a large set of nodes. The data processing is carried out on‐the‐fly, as tuples arrive at possibly very high rates, with minimum latency. It is well known that developing and debugging distributed, multi‐threaded, and asynchronous applications, such as stream processing applications, can be challenging. Thus, without domain‐specific debugging support, developers struggle when debugging distributed applications. In this paper, we describe tools and language support to support debugging distributed stream processing applications. Our key insight is to view debugging of stream processing applications from four different, but related, perspectives. First, debugging the semantics of the application involves verifying the operator‐level composition and inspecting the flows at the logical level. Second, debugging the user‐defined operators involves traditional source‐code debugging, but strongly tied to the stream‐level interactions. Third, debugging the deployment details of the application require understanding the runtime physical layout and configuration of the application. Fourth, debugging the performance of the application requires inspecting various performance metrics (such as communication rates, CPU utilization, etc.) associated with streams, operators, and nodes in the system. In light of this characterization, we developed several tools such as a debugger‐aware compiler and an associated stream debugger , composition and deployment visualizers , and performance visualizers , as well as language support, such as configuration knobs for logging and tracing, deployment configurations such as operator‐to‐process and process‐to‐node mappings, monitoring directives to inspect streams, and special sink adapters to intercept and dump streaming data to files and sockets, to name a few. We describe these tools in the context of Spade —a language for creating distributed stream processing applications, and System S —a distributed stream processing middleware under development at the IBM Watson Research Center. Published in 2009 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Development of the dense plasma focus for short-pulse applications (2017)

The dense plasma focus (DPF) has long been considered a compact source for pulsed neutrons and has traditionally been optimized for the total neutron yield. In this paper, we describe the efforts to optimize the DPF for short-pulse applications by introducing a reentrant cathode at the end of the coaxial plasma gun. The resulting neutron pulse widths are reduced by an average of 21±9% from the traditional long-drift DPF design. Pulse widths and yields achieved from deuterium-tritium fusion at 2 MA are 61.8±30.7 ns FWHM and 1.84±0.49×1012 neutrons per shot. Simulations were conducted concurrently to elucidate the DPF operation and confirm the role of the reentrant cathode. A hybrid fluid-kinetic particle-in-cell modeling capability demonstrates correct sheath velocities, plasma instabilities, and fusion yield rates. Consistent with previous findings that the DPF is dominated by beam-target fusion from superthermal ions, we estimate that the thermonuclear contribution is at the 1% level.
Advances in compact discharge-pumped soft X-ray lasers and applications (2001)

Summary form only given. For many years researchers have envisioned the development of compact high repetition rate soft lasers with high spatial coherence that be routinely used in numerous applications. With demonstrated average powers of several mW and millijoule-level pulse energy at 46.9 nm the Ne-like Ar capillary discharge-pumped laser is the first compact laser to reach this goal. We summarize the development status of tabletop soft X-ray lasers based on capillary discharge excitation, and give examples of their successful use in dense plasma interferometry, soft X-ray reflectometry for the determination of optical constants, characterization of diffraction gratings, laser ablation of materials, and plasma generation. Lasing at 52.9 nm line in Ne-like Cl, and the prospects for lasing at shorter wavelengths are also discussed.
Achromatic waveguide input-output couplers (1990)

Waveguide input-output couplers are key components in many integrated optical devices. Prism and grating couplers are two of the most commonly used types of waveguide couplers, but the characteristics of these components are highly wavelength-dependent. Both the coupling angle of an out-coupled beam and the coupling efficiency of an incoupled beam are strong functions of wavelength. For many applications these chromatic characteristics place tight constraints on the stability and bandwidth of the laser source that is used. In this paper a method to achromatize waveguide input-output couplers is described. The basic approach involves the use of an external diffraction grating to correct for the angular dispersion of the conventional coupler types. Two specific configurations are considered: a hybrid prism/grating coupler and a double-grating coupler. Expressions are derived for values of the grating parameters that produce achromatic coupling. It is shown that, for typical waveguide materials and performance specifications, double-grating couplers can be used to obtain an achromatic wavelength range of approximately 10 nm, and hybrid prism/grating couplers can potentially yield an achromatic range of the order of 200 nm.
Rangefinder with fast multiple range capability (1992)

A rangefinder is described that uses the propagation time of a beam of infrared radiation to measure distances of up to 120 m with errors of less than 50 μm. The instrument is capable of measuring up to five different distances per second by directing an amplitude modulated infrared beam to a retroreflector located at the far end of each path. The instrument is being tested with the expectation that such a system could be used to make precise and rapid measurements on a large radio telescope. Such measurements would be used to adjust the shape of the telescope reflector surface to correct for thermal and gravitational deformations taking place during astronomical observations. It is possible that the measuring system could be extended to relate the positions of certain moving parts of the structure to a reference system fixed in the ground, thus opening the possibility of making corrections to the telescope pointing.