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Background: Time of diagnosis (TOD) of benign esophageal perforation is regarded as an important risk factor for clinical outcome, although convincing evidence is lacking. The aim of this study is to assess whether time between onset of perforation and diagnosis is associated with clinical outcome in patients with iatrogenic esophageal perforation (IEP) and Boerhaave’s syndrome (BS). Methods: We searched MEDLINE, Embase and Cochrane library through June 2018 to identify studies. Authors were invited to share individual patient data and a meta-analysis was performed (PROSPERO: CRD42018093473). Patients were subdivided in early (≤ 24 h) and late (> 24 h) TOD and compared with mixed effects multivariable analysis while adjusting age, gender, location of perforation, initial treatment and center. Primary outcome was overall mortality. Secondary outcomes were length of hospital stay, re-interventions and ICU admission. Results: Our meta-analysis included IPD of 25 studies including 576 patients with IEP and 384 with BS. In IEP, early TOD was not associated with overall mortality (8% vs. 13%, OR 2.1, 95% CI 0.8–5.1), but was associated with a 23% decrease in ICU admissions (46% vs. 69%, OR 3.0, 95% CI 1.2–7.2), a 22% decrease in re-interventions (23% vs. 45%, OR 2.8, 95% CI 1.2–6.7) and a 36% decrease in length of hospital stay (14 vs. 22 days, p < 0.001), compared with late TOD. In BS, no associations between TOD and outcomes were found. When combining IEP and BS, early TOD was associated with a 6% decrease in overall mortality (10% vs. 16%, OR 2.1, 95% CI 1.1–3.9), a 19% decrease in re-interventions (26% vs. 45%, OR 1.9, 95% CI 1.1–3.2) and a 35% decrease in mean length of hospital stay (16 vs. 22 days, p = 0.001), compared with late TOD. Conclusions: This individual patient data meta-analysis confirms the general opinion that an early (≤ 24 h) compared to a late diagnosis (> 24 h) in benign esophageal perforations, particularly in IEP, is associated with im

In this paper, we address the issue of privacy in 5th generation (5G) driven Internet of Things (IoT) and related technologies while presenting a comparison with previous technologies for communication and unaddressed issues in 5G. Initially, an overview of 5G driven IoT is presented with details about both technologies and eventually leading to problems that 5th generation will face. Details about 5G are also presented while comparing them with previous technologies. The architecture of 5G is presented hence explaining layers of 5G and technologies like SDN, NFV and cloud computing that compose these layers. The architecture for 5g based IoT is also presented for providing visual understanding as well as explained based on how this addresses the issues present in 4G. Privacy is highlighted in 5G driven IoT while providing details about how SDN, NFV and cloud computing helps in elimination of this issue. The issues presented will be compared with 4G based IoT and solutions are provided about mitigation of these issues particularly bandwidth and security. Moreover, techniques used by 4G and 5G technologies for handling the issues of privacy in IoT are presented in a nutshell as a table. Paper also presents a detailed overview of technologies making 5G possible meanwhile giving an explanation about how these technologies resolve privacy issues in 5G., Comment: 11 pages, 2 Figures and 4 Tables

A smart home is grounded on the sensors that endure automation, safety, and structural integration. The security mechanism in digital setup possesses vibrant prominence and the biometric facial recognition system is novel addition to accrue the smart home features. Understanding the implementation of such technology is the outcome of user behavior modeling. However, there is the paucity of empirical research that explains the role of cognitive, functional, and social aspects of end-users acceptance behavior towards biometric facial recognition systems at homes. Therefore, a causal research survey was conducted to comprehend the behavioral intention towards the use of a biometric facial recognition system. Technology Acceptance Model (TAM)was implied with Perceived System Quality (PSQ) and Social Influence (SI)to hypothesize the conceptual framework. Data was collected from 475respondents through online questionnaires. Structural Equation Modeling(SEM) and Artificial Neural Network (ANN) were employed to analyze the surveyed data. The results showed that all the variables of the proposed framework significantly affected the behavioral intention to use the system. The PSQ appeared as the noteworthy predictor towards biometric facial recognition system usability through regression and sensitivity analyses. A multi-analytical approach towards understanding the technology user behavior will support the efficient decision-making process in Human-centric computing., Comment: 15 Pages, 04 Figures, 05 Tables, FICC-2021 Conference 29-30 April 2021, Vancouver, Canada

Smart city is synchronized with digital environment and its transportation system is vitalized with RFID sensors, Internet of Things (IoT) and Artificial Intelligence. However, without user's behavioral assessment of technology, the ultimate usefulness of smart mobility cannot be achieved. This paper aims to formulate the research framework for prediction of antecedents of smart mobility by using SEM-Neural hybrid approach towards preliminary data analysis. This research undertook smart mobility services adoption in Malaysia as study perspective and applied the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) as theoretical basis. An extended TAM model was hypothesized with five external factors (digital dexterity, IoT service quality, intrusiveness concerns, social electronic word of mouth and subjective norm). The data was collected through a pilot survey in Klang Valley, Malaysia. Then responses were analyzed for reliability, validity and accuracy of model. Finally, the causal relationship was explained by Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) and Artificial Neural Networking (ANN). The paper will share better understanding of road technology acceptance to all stakeholders to refine, revise and update their policies. The proposed framework will suggest a broader approach to individual level technology acceptance., Comment: 12 pages, 08 figures, 05 tables

The Internet of Things (IoT) is undergoing rapid growth in the IT industry, but, it continues to be associated with several security and privacy concerns as a result of its massive scale, decentralised topology, and resource-constrained devices. Blockchain (BC), a distributed ledger technology used in cryptocurrency has attracted significant attention in the realm of IoT security and privacy. However, adopting BC to IoT is not straightforward in most cases, due to overheads and delays caused by BC operations. In this paper, we apply a BC technology known as Hyperledgder Fabric, to an IoT network. This technology introduces an execute-order technique for transactions that separates the transaction execution from consensus, resulting in increased efficiency. We demonstrate that our proposed IoT-BC architecture is sufficiently secure with regard to fundamental security goals i.e., confidentiality, integrity, and availability. Finally, the simulation results are highlighted that shows the performance overheads associated with our approach are as minimal as those associated with the Hyperledger Fabric framework and negligible in terms of security and privacy., Comment: 9 pages, 4 Figures, 2 tables

With a rapid growth in the IT industry, Internet of Things (IoT) has gained a tremendous attention and become a central aspect of our environment. In IoT the things (devices) communicate and exchange the data without the act of human intervention. Such autonomy and proliferation of IoT ecosystem make the devices more vulnerable to attacks. In this paper, we propose a behavior monitor in IoT-Blockchain setup which can provide trust-confidence to outside networks. Behavior monitor extracts the activity of each device and analyzes the behavior using deep auto-encoders. In addition, we also incorporate Trusted Execution Technology (Intel SGX) in order to provide a secure execution environment for applications and data on blockchain. Finally, in evaluation we analyze three IoT devices data that is infected by mirai attack. The evaluation results demonstrate the ability of our proposed method in terms of accuracy and time required for detection., Comment: 6 pages, 5 Figures, International Conference on Omni-Layer Intelligent Systems, COINS May 2019. arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:2001.01841

Big Data is used by data miner for analysis purpose which may contain sensitive information. During the procedures it raises certain privacy challenges for researchers. The existing privacy preserving methods use different algorithms that results into limitation of data reconstruction while securing the sensitive data. This paper presents a clustering based privacy preservation probabilistic model of big data to secure sensitive information..model to attain minimum perturbation and maximum privacy. In our model, sensitive information is secured after identifying the sensitive data from data clusters to modify or generalize it.The resulting dataset is analysed to calculate the accuracy level of our model in terms of hidden data, lossed data as result of reconstruction. Extensive experiements are carried out in order to demonstrate the results of our proposed model. Clustering based Privacy preservation of individual data in big data with minimum perturbation and successful reconstruction highlights the significance of our model in addition to the use of standard performance evaluation measures., Comment: 08 Page, 07 figures

Internet of Things (IoT) occupies a vital aspect of our everyday lives. IoT networks composed of smart-devices which communicate and transfer the information without the physical intervention of humans. Due to such proliferation and autonomous nature of IoT systems make these devices threatened and prone to a severe kind of threats. In this paper, we introduces a behavior capturing, and verification procedures in blockchain supported smart-IoT systems that can be able to show the trust-level confidence to outside networks. We defined a custom \emph{Behavior Monitor} and implement on a selected node that can extract the activity of each device and analyzes the behavior using deep machine learning strategy. Besides, we deploy Trusted Execution Technology (TEE) which can be used to provide a secure execution environment (enclave) for sensitive application code and data on the blockchain. Finally, in the evaluation phase we analyze various IoT devices data that is infected by Mirai attack. The evaluation results show the strength of our proposed method in terms of accuracy and time required for detection., Comment: 15 Pages, 6 Figures, Workshops at the Second International Conference on Applied Informatics 2019

Various fractal geometries are characterized by the self-similarity and space-filling properties. The space-filling feature has been successfully applied to design multiband antenna structures for a wide variety of multifunction wireless systems. On another hand, the second feature has proved its validity to produce miniaturized antennas and passive microwave circuits including the band-pass filters (BPF). This chapter demonstrates the design of miniaturized microstrip BPFs that are derived from fractal-based DGS resonators. Many microstrip BPFs based on the Minkowski fractal DGS resonators will be presented together with those based on Moore and Peano fractal geometries. Simulation results, of all of the presented BPFs, show that an extra-size reduction can be obtained as the iteration level becomes higher. Measured and simulated results agree well with each other. A comparison has been conducted with other filters based on Peano and Hilbert fractal geometries. The results reveal that the proposed BPF offers acceptable performance and a significant decrease of higher harmonics.

Mega construction projects such as bridges and skyscapes are highly vulnerable to the natural disasters such as an earthquake, floods, and hurricanes. Any unfortunate accident may risk the life of residents living in such structures, the people might be trapped under the rubbles. Due to the reason, there is a requirement for efficient search and rescue systems to pull the victims out of the debris. Ground penetrating radar (GPR) plays an important role under in such circumstances to rescue the precious lives. In recent decades, the under-debris victim detection system using Doppler radar technique was developed and after that, the use of ultra-wideband (UWB) radar was also the part of a study for some years. However, the limitations in such systems are penetration depth and resolution imaging, and there is a need for such a system which addresses both while designing the single antenna. This research is about the designing of an antenna and its array that will be able to operate in entire UWB band defined from 3.1 GHz to 10.6 GHz, which is available freely for research and experimentation purpose. The reason for designing UWB antenna array is due to its ability to address penetration depth and high-resolution imaging of the detected object. Another purpose of designing an array is to achieve high gain and less power in order to nullify the adverse biological effects ofthe antenna. The designing of the antenna is the first task followed by the component testing and an experimentation setup to determine the detection capability. For the purpose, a new arc shape configuration is introduced in this research with the gain of around 6 dB and 13 GHz ofbandwidth. After the design simulation and fabrication, the experimentation was carried out using obstacles such as wood and concrete, and targeted human skin to validate the proposed detection scheme. The simulation and measurement results showed a good agreement in terms of detection depth and underground imagery. Thus it c

Risks and hazards associated with climate change and geological factors, especially in the world's youngest mountains, are inevitable and may have been exacerbated in recent decades. However reports about increased landslips and landslides in some areas are being presented as examples to argue that most natural hazards in mountain areas are due to climate change. Based on a field study in the Yourjogh area of Chitral District in Pakistan, we argue that this discourse is based on generalized conclusions that do not hold in all cases and for all types of disasters. Our study challenges the climate change discourse as disregarding the political dimension of water management that also contributes to landslides and landslips in Pakistan's mountainous regions. The climate change discourse has taken the politics out of external-donor-led development interventions that replaced traditional irrigation management practices and institutions with an arrangement in which external development agencies and the state control crucial economic and social processes that shape the distribution of water. This not only depoliticizes disasters and their effects but also leads to further mismanagement of abundantly available irrigation water, contributing to the frequent occurrence of landslips in our study area. We conclude that attributing hazards only to climatic or geological factors leaves little room to promote locally appropriate solutions for locally created hazards.

In this paper, a fractal-based complementary split-ring resonator (CSRR) has been introduced as a defected ground structure (DGS) in the ground plane of a dual-mode microstrip bandpass filter to produce a new compact filter with dual-band response. The conventional double square ring resonator structure is modified such that its inner ring is made with a fractal shape instead of a square. Measured and simulation results show that the resulting filter offers a dual passband response; the higher passband is attributed to the dual-mode microstrip ring structure, whereas the lower passband is as a result of the embedded CSRR DGS structure. In addition, the results show that the position of the lower passband could be varied, to a certain extent, without affecting the position of the higher passband by applying higher fractal iteration levels to the inner split ring. These features, together with the compact size the proposed filter offers, make it suitable for use in a wide variety of dual-band communication applications. Measured results, carried out on filter prototypes, have been found in agreement with those theoretically predicted.

Sixty-three samples of semen were collected from 11 bulls using an electroejaculator. The samples were washed and the sperm concentration was determined with a hemacytometer. The spermatozoa were treated with monoclonal H-Y antibody, fluorescein conjugated goat-anti mouse F(ab)2 fragments, and the percentage of spermatozoa labeled (fluorescing) was determined by analyzing 300 spermatozoa/sample under a fluorescent microscope. The percentages of spermatozoa labeled ranged from 40-65 for the treated samples and from 1-15 for the corresponding controls. Labeling was confined to the post-acrosomal region except when the acrosome was disrupted then, the acrosomal area was also labeled. A fluorescence activated cell sorter (FACS) was used to confirm the percentage of labeled spermatozoa. The FACS was also used to separate labeled from non-labeled spermatozoa. Control, labeled and nonlabeled samples from 3 bulls were prepared using a Feulgen staining process and the DNA content of each cell was analyzed using a scanning microdensitometer. Results obtained from analysis of control samples showed two distinct peaks. The peak with the smaller amount of DNA was assumed to represent Y-bearing spermatozoa and the other X-bearing spermatozoa. The mean difference between the 2 peaks was 3.95% of the 3 bulls. Results obtained from analysis of labeled samples showed 24:76, 12:88, and 23:77 while results obtained from analysis of non-labeled samples showed 74:26, 65:35, and 77:23 ratios of X- to Y-bearing spermatozoa for bulls 9, 10, and 11, respectively. The proportion of X- to Y-bearing spermatozoa in the control samples was not different (P > .5) among bulls while they were different (P < .001) between the treated and the corresponding control samples. These results were interpreted to indicate that monoclonal H-Y antibody (MoAb2) could be used to increase the proportion of X-bearing spermatozoa in a bovine semen sample since the H-Y antigen is apparently expressed on the surface

Game-based learning is a growing field that provides education with a new perspective of teaching through games. Game based learning is still considered an emerging field due to problems that have been identified in its real applications in official education in classes. The research conducted shows a very attractive market ahead for game based learning around the world. However the businesses success in this domain lie in providing value proposition that addresses the real barriers faced today. Prime Ace is a company that has been conceptualized to be starting up via an equal partnership among the four students from the University of Nottingham, Computer Science and Entrepreneurship course who are doing this dissertation. Prime Ace is a digital educational game solutions provider that is ambitious to be a leader of its focused market in providing education to children through games not only at home but also in class. Its products and services will span to the teachers and parents to help them through their mission of educating children in its innovative way. Based on the theory studied and practical opportunity, Prime Ace aims to target the Middle Eastern game based learning market. It has taken a focused marketing approach in targeting the attractive demographic group of kindergarten levels up to primary grade level two (prek-2). The company has drawn a detailed 5-year operational and financial plan. Based upon them, the company is seeking a seed investment of $150,000 (USD) at this stage in order to move on to its next stage of moving to Dubai. Prime Ace has so far conducted its first project and digitized and implemented a serious board game which targets its own market. The game aims to teach students how to manipulate DNA in a completely safe and low-cost environment rather than necessarily performing these tasks in actual labs to learn. Prime Ace have had a fair portion of experience in working with a real client, actually developing game and understanding sp