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We studied patients with chronic lymphocytic inflammation with pontine perivascular enhancement responsive to steroids (CLIPPERS) associated with or without lymphoma and measured risk factors suggestive of an underlying lymphoma and follow-up outcomes.CLIPPERS patients associated with or without lymphoma were included into this study. Clinical presentations were documented, risk factors suggestive of an underlying lymphoma were tested, and prognostic differences in terms of death were compared.Ten patients had a diagnosis of CLIPPERS associated with lymphoma, with 6 B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma, 2 T-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma and 2 Hodgkin lymphoma. Using multivariate logistic analysis, the following 3 independent risk factors were found to be related to a final diagnosis of lymphoma: hyperreflexia (HR 16.56; 95% CI 1.03-265.29; p = 0.032), elevated protein in CSF (HR 11.59; 95% CI 1.24-108.39; p = 0.047), and recurrences between 2 months and 1 year after treatment (HR 29.27; 95% CI 2.09-409.58; p = 0.012). The model calibration was satisfactory (p = 0.392 with the Hosmer-Lemeshow test), and the discrimination power was good (area under the receiver operating characteristic curve 0.921; p 0.001, 95% CI 0.826-1.000). Patients with CLIPPERS associated with lymphoma had higher mortality rate and lymphoma was a significant predictor of total mortality (HR 0.040; 95% CI 0.006-0.262; p = 0.001).Hyperreflexia, elevated protein in CSF and recurrences between 2 months and 1 year after treatment are risk factors suggesting an underlying lymphoma. Relapses during high-dose steroids maintenance therapy can be indicative of lymphoma, too. Patients having CLIPPERS associated with lymphoma have a worse prognosis than those without lymphoma.

We examined the cross-sectional association between mushroom intake and mild cognitive impairment (MCI) using data from 663 participants aged 60 and above from the Diet and Healthy Aging (DaHA) study in Singapore. Compared with participants who consumed mushrooms less than once per week, participants who consumed mushrooms >2 portions per week had reduced odds of having MCI (odds ratio = 0.43, 95% CI 0.23-0.78, p = 0.006) and this association was independent of age, gender, education, cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption, hypertension, diabetes, heart disease, stroke, physical activities, and social activities. Our cross-sectional data support the potential role of mushrooms and their bioactive compounds in delaying neurodegeneration.

A wireless sensor network (WSN) eliminates physical cables and reduces the difficulty of structural information collection in a structural health monitoring (SHM) system. This paper present...

Optoelectronic synapses integrating synaptic and optical-sensing functions exhibit large advantages in neuromorphic computing for visual information processing and complex learning, recognition, and memory in an energy-efficient way. However, electric stimulation is still essential for existing optoelectronic synapses to realize bidirectional weight-updating, restricting the processing speed, bandwidth, and integration density of the devices. Herein, a two-terminal optical synapse based on a wafer-scale pyrenyl graphdiyne/graphene/PbS quantum dot heterostructure is proposed that can emulate both the excitatory and inhibitory synaptic behaviors in an optical pathway. The simple device architecture and low-dimensional features of the heterostructure endow the optical synapse with robust flexibility for wearable electronics. This optical synapse features a linear and symmetric conductance-update trajectory with numerous conductance states and low noise, which facilitates the demonstration of accurate and effective pattern recognition with a strong fault-tolerant capability even at bending states. A series of logic functions and associative learning capabilities have been demonstrated by the optical synapses in optical pathways, significantly enhancing the information processing capability for neuromorphic computing. Moreover, an integrated visible information sensing memory processing system based on the optical synapse array is constructed to perform real-time detection, in situ image memorization, and distinction tasks. This work is an important step toward the development of optogenetics-inspired neuromorphic computing and adaptive parallel processing networks for wearable electronics.

Background: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the cause of an overwhelming number of cancer-related deaths across the world. Developing precise and noninvasive biomarkers is critical for diagnosing HCC. Our research was designed to explore potentially useful biomarkers of host peripheral blood mononuclear cell (PBMC) in HCC by integrating comprehensive bioinformatic analysis. Methods: Gene expression data of PBMC in both healthy individuals and patients with HCC were extracted from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) to identify differentially expressed genes (DEGs). The gene ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) analysis were applied to annotate the function of DEGs. Protein-protein interaction analysis was performed to screen the hub genes from DEGs. cBioportal database analysis was performed to assess the prognostic significance of hub genes. The Cancer Cell Line Encyclopedia (CCLE) and The Human Protein Atlas (HPA) database analyses were performed to confirm the expression levels of the hub genes in HCC cells and tissue. Results: A total of 95 DEGs were screened. Results of the GO analysis revealed that DEGs were primarily involved in platelet degranulation, cytoplasm, and protein binding. Results of the KEGG analysis indicated that DEGs were primarily enriched in focal adhesion. Five genes, namely, myosin light chain kinase (MYLK), interleukin 1 beta (IL1B), phospholipase D1 (PLD1), cortactin (CTTN), and moesin (MSN), were identified as hub genes. A search in the CCLE and HPA database showed that the expression levels of these hub genes were remarkably increased in the HCC samples. Survival analysis revealed that the overexpression of MYLK, IL1B, and PLD1 may have a significant effect on HCC survival. The aberrant high expression levels of MYLK, IL1B, and PLD1 strongly indicated worse prognosis in patients with HCC. Conclusions: The identified hub genes may be closely linked with HCC tumorigenicity and may act as potentially useful biomarkers for the prognostic prediction of HCC in PBMC samples.

Graphdiyne is a new two-dimensional carbon allotrope with many attractive properties and has been widely used in various applications. However, the synthesis of large-area, high-quality, and ultrathin (especially monolayer) graphdiyne and its analogues remains a challenge, hindering its application in optoelectronic devices. Here, a wafer-scale monolayer pyrenyl graphdiyne (Pyr-GDY) film is obtained on hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) via a van der Waals epitaxial strategy, and top-floating-gated multibit nonvolatile optoelectronic memory based on Pyr-GDY/hBN/graphene is constructed, using Pyr-GDY as a photoresponsive top-floating gate. Benefiting from the excellent charge trapping capability and strong absorption of the graphdiyne film, as well as the top-floating-gated structure and the ultrathin hBN film used in the device, the optoelectronic memory exhibits high storage performance and robust reliability. A huge difference in the current between the programmed and erased states (>26 μA μm-1 at Vds = 0.1 V) and a prolonged retention time (>105 s) enable the device to achieve multibit storage, for which eight and nine distinct storage levels (3-bit) are obtained by applying periodic gate voltages and optical pulses in the programming and erasing processes, respectively. This work provides an important step toward realizing versatile graphdiyne-based optoelectronic devices in the future.

Wireless sensor networks are becoming attractive data communication patterns in structural health monitoring systems. Designing and applying effective wireless sensor network–based structural health monitoring systems for large-scale civil infrastructure require a great number of wireless sensors and the optimal wireless sensor networks configuration becomes critical for such spatially separated large structures. In this article, optimal wireless sensor network configuration for structural health monitoring is treated as a discrete optimization problem, where parameter identification and network performance are simultaneously addressed. To solve this rather complicated optimization problem, a novel swarm intelligence algorithm called the automatic-learning firefly algorithm is proposed by integrating the original firefly algorithm with the Lévy flight and the automatic-learning mechanism. In the proposed algorithm, the Lévy flight is adopted to maximize the searching capability in unknown solution space and avoid premature convergence and the automatic-learning mechanism is designed to drive fireflies to move toward better locations at high speed. Numerical experiments are performed on a long-span bridge to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed automatic-learning firefly algorithm. Results indicate that automatic-learning firefly algorithm can find satisfactory wireless sensor network configurations, which facilitate easy discrimination of identified mode vectors and long wireless sensor network lifetime, and the innovations in automatic-learning firefly algorithm make it superior to the simple discrete firefly algorithm as to solution quality and convergence speed.

Plants play a very important role in our daily life providing us with food and oxygen. It is necessary to build an aut omatic system for recognizing plant Convolutional neural netw orks (CNNs) have become effective identification method especial ly in computer vision in recent years because they achieved outst anding performance on different tasks, such as image classificatio ns. In this paper, we have shown performance comparison of usin g the seven pretrained deep convolutional neural network(Alexne t, Googlenet, Resnet50, Resnet101, Inceptionv3, Inceptionresnetv 2, Squeezenet) that employed fine-tuning technique to retain the l ast three full connection layers and get the classication model. We applied our method to Cinnamomum Camphora leaf dataset clas sification,.the experimental results showed that the proposed met hod is quite effective and feasible.

The purpose of this work was to study the influences of Realgar-Indigo naturalis(RIF) and its principal element realgar on 4 main cytochrome P450 enzymes activities in rats. A simple and efficient cocktail method was developed to detect the four probe drugs simultaneously. In this study, Wistar rats were administered intragastric RIF and realgar for 14 days; mixed probe drugs were injected into rats by caudal vein. Through analyzing the pharmacokinetic parameter of mixed probe drugs in rats, we can calculate the CYPs activities. The results showed that RIF could inhibit CYP1A2 enzyme activity and induce CYP2C11 enzyme activity significantly. Interestingly, in realgar high dosage group, CYP3A1/2 enzyme activity was inhibited significantly, and different dosage of realgar manifested a good dose-dependent manner. The RIF results indicated that drug coadministrated with RIF may need to be paid attention in relation to drug-drug interactions (DDIs). Realgar, a toxic traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), does have curative effect on acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL). Its toxicity studies should be focused on. We found that, in realgar high dosage group, CYP3A1/2 enzymes activity was inhibited. This phenomenon may explain its potential toxicity mechanism.

Background Researchers have discovered a large number of DNA methylation patterns in human cancer. These cancer-specific methylation patterns can provide information for the diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis of cancer. Methylation studies can find new biomarkers based on epigenetic analysis and apply these biomarkers to clinical oncology. Many studies on the association between RAASF1A methylation status and susceptibility to hepatitis B virus (HBV)/hepatitis C virus (HCV)-induced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) have reached controversial conclusions. Hence, the current review comprehensively assessed the correlation between Ras association domain family 1A (RASSF1A) methylation and the risk of the HCV/HBV-induced HCC. Methods The appropriated publications were extracted in EMBASE, PubMed, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, and China National Knowledge Infrastructure databases using STATA 5.0 software. The odds ratios (ORs) with 95 % confidence interval (95 % CI) of RASSF1A methylation were computed. Results A total of 1015 HBV/HCV-related HCC samples, 124 non-HBV/HCV-related HCC (NBNC-HCC) samples, and 1225 nontumorous controls were extracted and examined in this research. The frequency of the methylated RASSF1A in the HBV/HCV-related tumor cases displayed a significantly increased OR compared with the overall nontumor samples (OR = 19.372, 95 % CI = 11.060–33.931, P = 0.000). The frequency of the methylated RASSF1A in HBV/HCV-related neoplasm cases displayed a significantly increased OR compared with the non-HBV/HCV-related neoplasm (NBNC-neoplasm) samples (OR = 2.150, 95 % CI = 1.398–3.308, P = 0.000). Compared with normal, chronic hepatitis B or C, cirrhosis, and paracancerous samples, the pooled OR of the RASSF1A promoter methylation in the HBV/HCV-induced HCC samples was 62.785(95 % CI = 35.224–111.909), 25.07 (95 % CI = 13.85–45.36), 6.89 (95 % CI = 3.33–14.264) and 9.02 (95 % CI = 0.91–89.80), respectively. The rate of RASSF1A hypermethylation was robustly correlated with tumor size and vascular invasion, and the pooled OR was 0.346 (95 % CI = 0.210 – 0.569) and 0.081 (95 % CI = 0.022 – 0.303), respectively. Conclusion Results showed robust associations between RASSF1A gene methylation in promoter region and enhanced HBV/HCV-related HCC susceptibility, thereby revealing that RASSF1A methylation status may serve as an important indicator for HCC oncogenesis.

Aiming at the problem of the chinese rubbing image segmentation under a denoising algorithm based on deep convolutional neural network is proposed. Document enhancement and binarization is the main pre-processing step in document analysis process. At first, a feed-forward denoising convolutional neural networks as a pre-processing methods for document image has been used for denoise images of additive white Gaussian noise(AWGN). The residual learning mechanism is used to learn the mapping from the noisy image to the residual image between the noisy image and the clean image in the neural network training process. A median filtering has been employed for denoising 'salt and pepper' noise. Given the learned denoising and enhanced image, we compute the adaptive threshold image using local adaptive threshold algorithm and then applies it to produce a binary output image. Experimental results show that combined those algorithms is robust in dealing with non-uniform illuminated, low contrast historic document images in terms of both accuracy and efficiency.

VRML has already become the main file format of 3D model transmission on Internet. It is known that a large amount of information is incorporated in the complex scene model. Though the compression technology of a certain form has been adopted by the traditional VRML file, its file is still relatively large. Therefore, in this paper, a binary compression coding technology is presented which is based on VRML files. Here the files are compressed with the application of the binary compression technology. The size is anticipated to be suitable for transmission in the network. Meanwhile, the compressed data information does not affect the display quality of virtual visualization.

Background Chronic lymphocytic inflammation with pontine perivascular enhancement responsive to steroids (CLIPPERS) is an inflammatory disorder in the central nervous system (CNS) with distinct clinical, radiological, and pathological characteristics. The pathophysiology of CLIPPERS still remains unclear. Because a few cases about lymphoma mimicking the manifestations of CLIPPERS were reported and the prognosis of lymphoma is much worse, early identification of lymphoma is very important. Case presentation A 31-year-old woman was admitted with 3 months’ history of diplopia, dizziness, gait ataxia, and right facial numbness. The diagnosis of CLIPPERS was established based on the finding of punctate enhancing lesions in the cerebellum, thalamus, pons, medulla, and midbrain region in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), together with the favorable clinical and radiological responses to corticosteroids. However, she was diagnosed as peripheral T cell lymphoma, not otherwise specified (PTCL-NOS) by the pulmonary nodular and the skin biopsy almost 10 years later, and she got complete remission within 1 year after chemotherapy. Conclusion We report the first case of CLIPPERS developing PTCL-NOS. This case proposes that when brain biopsy was difficult to achieve, biopsies in extra-cerebral lesions under the assisting examination of positron emission tomography-computed tomography (PET-CT) can be helpful in further identification.

To evaluate the power of transvaginal ultrasound cervical length (CL) and fetal fibronectin (fFN) measurement for the prediction of preterm delivery (PTD) in asymptomatic women with risk factors.Between January 2010 and October 2012, 218 women with singleton pregnancies and a high risk for PTD (i.e. prior history of PTD, cervical surgeries, late miscarriages, uterine abnormalities or premature rupture of the membranes) were selected. CL was measured by transvaginal ultrasonography between 14 and 22 weeks, and a CL2.5 cm was considered to be short. The fFN was measured with a sterile speculum examination. The primary outcome was the spontaneous PTD rate at34(+0) and37(+0) weeks, and the PTD rate was analyzed by either of two methods alone or combined.There were 213 cases included in the analysis, and 47 women (22.1%) had positive fFN. The average CL of women with positive fFN (2.3 ± 0.9 cm) was significantly shorter than that of women with negative fFN (3.1 ± 0.8 cm; p=0.02). There were 25 (11.7%) and 38 (18.8%) cases with PTD at34(+0) and37(+0) weeks, respectively. By individual analyses, the highest PTD rate was 51.2% in women with positive fFN at37(+0) weeks. The sensitivity and diagnostic efficiency values for PTD prediction by CL were low at34(+0) and37(+0) weeks. The values of diagnostic efficiency by fFN were80% at34(+0) and37(+0) weeks. In the combined analysis, the highest PTD rate was 57.1% in women with CL ≤ 2.5 cm and positive fFN at37(+0) weeks. The Kaplan-Meier curve indicated that there were significant differences among the four groups (χ(2)=54.261; p=0.000).These results indicate a significant correlation between fFN and PTD prediction. The PTD prediction could be enhanced by combined CL and fFN measurement.

Solar photovoltaic power generation, as a kind of clean and environmental protection of green energy, is the recent much-needed supplement energy, is the basis of the future energy structure. Based on the semiconductor photovoltaic effect of photovoltaic power generation technology, can satisfy the needs of human beings. In this paper, based on rural residential distributed photovoltaic, 3 kw photovoltaic roof is introduced systematically the principle, classification and the hardware equipment, the working principle of the inverter was discussed several common method of maximum power tracking.

Rationale: Concomitant cryoglobulinemic vasculitis and cold agglutinin disease (CAD) is an extremely uncommon clinical scenario. The role of bortezomib in the treatment of cryoglobulinemic vasculitis needs further investigation. Patient concerns: A 72-year-old Chinese woman presented with a 25-year history of cyanosis of the extremities after cold exposure, which worsened and was accompanied with purpuric skin lesions and proteinuria in recent years. Laboratory data demonstrated hemolysis. Cold agglutinin and cryoglobulin tests were positive. There was no evidence for malignancies after blood, image, and pathologic tests. Diagnoses: Concomitant cryoglobulinemic vasculitis and CAD. Interventions: The patient was treated with bortezomib-based regimen, including bortezomib, cyclophosphamide, and dexamethasone. Outcomes: The patient responded well to the treatment. Both symptoms and laboratory tests significantly improved. The patient's condition was in a state of sustained remission in the 6-month follow-up. Lessons: This rare case promotes further understanding of these 2 diseases and suggests that bortezomib is a promising treatment in type I cryoglobulinemic vasculitis.

Recent years have been higher demands for automatic speech recognition (ASR) systems that are able to operate robustly in an acoustically noisy environment. This paper proposes an improved product hidden markov model (HMM) used for bimodal speech recognition. A two-dimensional training model is built based on dependently trained audio-HMM and visual-HMM, reflecting the asynchronous characteristics of the audio and video streams. A weight coefficient is introduced to adjust the weight of the video and audio streams automatically according to differences in the noise environment. Experimental results show that compared with other bimodal speech recognition approaches, this approach obtains better speech recognition performance.

This paper puts forward a novel cross-media retrieval approach, which can process multimedia data of different modalities and measure cross-media similarity, such as image-audio similarity. Both image and audio data are selected for experiments and comparisons. Given the same visual and auditory features the new approach outperforms ICA, PCA and PLS methods both in precision and recall performance. Overall cross-media retrieval results between images and audios are very encouraging.

Background: Use of ultrasound-guided techniques to facilitate central venous cannulation (CVC) may reduce the risk of misplacement and complications. A meta-analysis was conducted to compare real-time two-dimensional ultrasound (RTUS) guidance technique with anatomical landmark technique for CVC to determine whether RTUS has any advantages. Methods: Randomized studies comparing outcomes in patients undergoing CVC with either RTUS or landmark technique were retrieved from PubMed, ISI Web of Knowledge, EMBASE, and OVID EBM Reviews from their inception to March 2012. Results: Twenty-six studies involving 4,185 CVC procedures met the inclusion criteria. Compared with landmark technique, patients with RTUS had a pooled relative risk (RR) of 0.18 (95% CI: 0.10–0.32) for cannulation failure, 0.25 (95% CI: 0.15–0.42) for arterial puncture, 0.30 (95% CI: 0.19–0.46) for hematoma, 0.21 (95% CI: 0.06–0.73) for pneumothorax, and 0.10 (95% CI: 0.02–0.54) for hemothorax from random-effects models. However, RTUS did not show a reduction in the risk of cannulation failure (RR = 0.26, 95% CI: 0.03–2.55), arterial puncture (RR = 0.34, 95% CI: 0.05–2.60), hematoma (RR = 0.13, 95% CI: 0.01–2.42), pneumothorax (RR = 0.40, 95% CI: 0.02–9.61), and hemothorax (RR = 0.40, 95% CI: 0.02–9.61) in children or infants when the limited data were analyzed. Conclusions: Among adults receiving CVC, RTUS was associated with decreased risks of cannulation failure, arterial puncture, hematoma, and hemothorax. Additional data of randomized studies are necessary to evaluate these outcomes in pediatric patients.

In this paper, some applications of natural language processing techniques for information retrieval have been introduced, but the results are known not to be satisfied. In order to find the roles of some classical natural language processing techniques in information retrieval and to find which one is better we compared the effects with the various natural language techniques for information retrieval precision, and the experiment results show that basic natural language processing techniques with small calculated consumption and simple implementation help a small for information retrieval. Senior high complexity of natural language processing techniques with high calculated consumption and low precision can not help the information retrieval precision even harmful to it, so the role of natural language understanding may be larger in the question answering system, automatic abstract and information extraction.

In the system of the machine tool, the position error is directly affected by the thermal deformation of ball screw. Screw system is a complex thermal system, which is affected by the processing conditions, the processing cycle, the use of cooling fluid, and the surrounding environment. Due to non-linear and interaction of the thermal error, a RBF network thermal error model is proposed in the paper and the model is tested in XHFA2420 large machining center.

At present，the open arehitecture controller and the field bus for motion control is a hotspot at home and abroad in the field of numerieal control system.This paper analyses the advantage of the typieal open arehitecture controller and improves.The open movement contro1 Platform based on BUS,which uses the open numrerieal control arehiteehire, that is，in order to control the system intelligently, We use a signal wire or optical fibre which connects all the drivers and the I/O port to transmit signals. In the system，all the control is operated by the up-pc machine，and the intelligent control nod is only used for communicating and translating the instruction.The control system uses Visual C# to empolder the up-pc software, and uses C to empolder the intelligent control interface. Experiments show that the system with the velocity error of less than 5%, the transition time of less than 0.1s, position error of less than 1mm. It can achieve not only the customization of the human-machine interface, and the parameterization of the real-time control parts, but also the exact travel path, the fast response, high accuracy positioning and other performance.

CT-guided microwave coagulation is a minimally invasive surgery for patients with liver cancer. Total intravenous anesthesia with propofol and fentanyl is commonly used. The depth of anesthesia during microwave coagulation for liver cancer is still monitored by clinical signs. There are few subjective and effective indicators. This study explored the application of Narcotrend-assisted "depth of anesthesia" monitoring on microwave coagulation for patients with liver cancer during total intravenous anesthesia with propofol and fentanyl.Forty liver cancer patients underwent CT-guided microwave coagulation were randomly assigned to receive Narcotrend index monitoring or standard clinical monitoring for depth of anesthesia with 20 patients in each group. All patients received total intravenous anesthesia with propofol and fentanyl. The depth of anesthesia for patients in the Narcotrend group was measured according to a Narcotrend index, which was maintained between D2 and E0. The depth of anesthesia for those in the standard clinical practice group was measured according to heart rate, mean arterial pressure, and patient movement. Changes of hemodynamics, the duration of the emergence from anesthesia, and the recovery of orientation were recorded. The doses of propofol and fentanyl, postoperative visual analogue scores (VAS), and the incidence of postoperative nausea and vomiting were also recorded.There was no significant alteration in heart rate or mean arterial pressure between the two groups. Compared with other anesthetic stages, both heart rate and mean arterial pressure decreased during the induction of the anesthesia in the two groups(P0.05). The doses of propofol were higher in the standard clinical practice group than in the Narcotrend group [(460+/-30) mg vs. (380+/-35) mg, P0.01]. The duration of emergence and orientation were longer in the standard clinical practice group than in the Narcotrend group [(9.5+/-2.9) min vs. (4.9+/-2.2) min, P0.01; (12.2+/-3.5) min vs. (6.6+/-3.2) min, P0.01, respectively]. There was no difference in the dosage of fentanyl, VAS, or the incidence of postoperative nausea or vomiting between the two groups (P0.05).For patients with liver cancer, monitoring the depth of anesthesia with Narcotrend on microwave coagulation can contribute to lower dosage of propofol and shorten duration of recovery during total intravenous anesthesia with propofol and fentanyl.

Rubbings are important components of ancient Chinese books, and are the main source for people to learn, study, and research history. Image segmentation plays a crucial role in extracting useful information and characteristics of Chinese character from the rubbing images. In this paper, binarization using a Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM) with 2 components for representation of background and foreground distribution in a Chinese rubbing image has been proposed. To model the likelihood of each pixel belonging to foreground or background, a foreground and background color model are learned from three color bands samples that using RGB color space. The standard Expectation-Maximisation (EM) algorithm had been used to estimate the GMM parameters. Experimental results on real rubbing images validate the effectiveness of the model when working with Chinese rubbing images.

A retrospective study was conducted, and 576 human immunodeficiency virus-infected children with total lymphocyte count (TLC) and CD4 count were recruited from China. Spearman rank order correlation and receiver-operating characteristic were used. An overall positive correlation was noted between TLC and CD4 count (prehighly active antiretroviral therapy [pre-HAART], r = 0.789, 6 months of HAART, r = 0.642, 12 months of HAART, r = 0.691, P = 0.001). TLC ≤ 2600 cells/mm(3) predicted a CD4 count of ≤ 350 cells/mm(3) with 82.9% sensitivity, 79.6% specificity pre-HAART. Meanwhile, the optimum prediction for CD4 count of ≤ 350 cells/mm(3) was a TLC of ≤ 2400 cells/mm at 6 months (73.6% sensitivity and 74.1% specificity) and 12 months (81.7% sensitivity and 76.5% specificity) of HAART. TLC can be used as a surrogate marker for predicting CD4 count of human immunodeficiency virus-infected children before and during HAART in resource-limited countries.

Railway tunnel clearance is directly related to the safe operation of trains and upgrading of freight capacity. As more and more railway are put into operation and the operation is continuously becoming faster, the railway tunnel clearance inspection should be more precise and efficient. In view of the problems existing in traditional tunnel clearance inspection methods, such as low density, slow speed and a lot of manual operations, this paper proposes a tunnel clearance inspection approach based on 3D point clouds obtained by a mobile laser scanning system (MLS). First, a dynamic coordinate system for railway tunnel clearance inspection has been proposed. A rail line extraction algorithm based on 3D linear fitting is implemented from the segmented point cloud to establish a dynamic clearance coordinate system. Second, a method to seamlessly connect all rail segments based on the railway clearance restrictions, and a seamless rail alignment is formed sequentially from the middle tunnel section to both ends. Finally, based on the rail alignment and the track clearance coordinate system, different types of clearance frames are introduced for intrusion operation with the tunnel section to realize the tunnel clearance inspection. By taking the Shuanghekou Tunnel of the Chengdu–Kunming Railway as an example, when the clearance inspection is carried out by the method mentioned herein, its precision can reach 0.03 m, and difference types of clearances can be effectively calculated. This method has a wide application prospects.

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are promising technology in structural health monitoring (SHM) applications for their low cost and high efficiency. The limited wireless sensors and restricted power resources in WSNs highlight the significance of optimal wireless sensor placement (OWSP) during designing SHM systems to enable the most useful information to be captured and to achieve the longest network lifetime. This paper presents a holistic approach, including an optimization criterion and a solution algorithm, for optimally deploying self-organizing multi-hop WSNs on large-scale structures. The combination of information effectiveness represented by the modal independence and the network performance specified by the network connectivity and network lifetime is first formulated to evaluate the performance of wireless sensor configurations. Then, an information-fusing firefly algorithm (IFFA) is developed to solve the OWSP problem. The step sizes drawn from a L?vy distribution are adopted to drive fireflies toward brighter individuals. Following the movement with L?vy flights, information about the contributions of wireless sensors to the objective function as carried by the fireflies is fused and applied to move inferior wireless sensors to better locations. The reliability of the proposed approach is verified via a numerical example on a long-span suspension bridge. The results demonstrate that the evaluation criterion provides a good performance metric of wireless sensor configurations, and the IFFA outperforms the simple discrete firefly algorithm.

A novel ultra-wideband (UWB) design of a single-layer coplanar waveguide-fed planar monopole antenna with dual band-notched characteristic is presented. By inserting two opened rectangular loop slots to the ground-notched trapezoidal patch and adjusting the dimensions of the slots, the proposed antenna, which includes two notched ground planes only 24 mm in width and 31 mm in height, can reach a frequency band-width, defined by voltage standing wave ratio

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is one of the most common cancers in the world and is particularly prevalent in China. China is also a hyperendemic area for hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. Although a strong association between HBV infection and HCC has been established previously, the role of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection and the interaction between HBV and HCV in the development of HCC has not been adequately explored. The major objective of this study is to determine the relationship between HBV or HCV infection and HCC by use of case-control study in Henan, China.In all, 152 HCC patients and 115 control patients were collected from four hospitals in Henan, China between January 1994 and October 1995. The demographic characteristics of the two groups were comparable. In further analysis, a 1:1 pair-matched case-control study was performed. Of 152 HCC patients, 113 were randomly selected to be pair-matched by sex and age (+/-5 years) to controls with non-hepatic disease. All the cases and controls were interviewed during hospitalization by two specially trained interviewers using a standard questionnaire. All sera were tested for HBV and HCV markers. Odds ratios (OR) and 95% CI for HCC risk factors were calculated by logistic regression model controlling for possible confounding factors such as sex and age. The multivariate analysis was done on the basis of the univariate analysis.The results of this study indicated that the prevalence of hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) and antibody to HCV (anti-HCV) were much higher in HCC patients (63.2% and 11.2% respectively) than in the control patients (5.2%, 3.5%). The difference between two groups was significant (P0.05). Risk factor analysis revealed that both HBV and HCV infection were important factors for HCC in Henan, China and HBV appeared to have a key role in the development of HCC. Odds ratios of HBsAg and HBV infection were 28.82 (95% CI: 11.18-78.78) and 31.22 (95% CI: 13.86-72.15), respectively. Moreover, the risk of developing HCC increased significantly and showed an additive effect when both viral markers of HBV and HCV infection were considered (OR = 42.85). Results from the 1:1 pair-matched case-control study also showed that HBV infection was an important risk factor for HCC, which was consistent with the results from the group-matched case-control study.This is the first reported case-control study of HCC in Henan, China. This study provides further evidence that chronic HBV infection is strongly associated with the development of HCC among this population. Our results have demonstrated that HCV and HBV infection are independent and probably additive risk factors for HCC.One of the most common cancers in the world, hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is particularly prevalent in China. China is also a hyperendemic area for hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. Findings are presented from a case-control study conducted in Henan, China, to determine the relationship between HBV or hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection and HCC. 152 HCC patients and 115 control patients were recruited from 4 hospitals in Henan between January 1994 and October 1995. In further analysis, 113 of the 152 HCC patients were randomly selected to be 1:1 pair-matched by sex and age to controls with nonhepatic disease. All cases and controls were interviewed and had their sera tested for HBV and HCV markers. The prevalences of hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) and antibody to HCV (anti-HCV) were 63.2% and 11.2%, respectively, in HCC patients, and 5.2% and 3.5%, respectively, in the controls. Risk factor analysis found that both HBV and HCV infection were important factors for HCC, with HBV appearing to have a central role in the development of HCC. Odds ratios of HBsAg and HBV infection were 28.82 and 31.22, respectively. The risk of developing HCC increased significantly and showed an additive effect when the viral markers of both HBV and HCV infection were considered. Results from the 1:1 pair-matched case-control study also showed HBV infection to be an important risk factor for HCC, consistent with the results from the group-matched case-control study.

For people to use numerous images effectively on the web, technologies must be able to explain image contents and must be capable of searching for data that users need. Moreover, images must be described with natural sentences based not only on the names of objects contained in an image but also on their mutual relations. We propose a novel system which generates sentential annotations for general images. Firstly, a weighted feature clustering algorithm is employed on the semantic concept clusters of the image regions. For a given cluster, we determine relevant features based on their statistical distribution and assign greater weights to relevant features as compared to less relevant features. In this way the computing of clustering algorithm can avoid dominated by trivial relevant or irrelevant features. Then, the relationship between clustering regions and semantic concepts is established according to the labeled images in the training set. Under the condition of the new unlabeled image regions, we calculate the conditional probability of each semantic keyword and annotate the new images with maximal conditional probability. Experiments on the Corel image set show the effectiveness of the new algorithm.

PV grid connected power generation is the trend at present in the world and the grid-connected inverter is core part of PV power generation system, so high quality and low cost of inverter power supply become the focus of research. According to the characteristics of average household power, a type of photovoltaic generation system that is designed based on STC meet the need of power uses and a new type of control strategy of maximum power point tracking is suggested and make a prototype. The results show that the system can control simply, work stably, track the maximum power point faster and greatly improve the output power. Keywords-Photovoltaic;STC;grid-connected;Inverter;MPPT

The bilingual machine-readable dictionary is the commonly-used resources for query and translation based on the cross-language information retrieval; however, the traditional method of constructing the bilingual dictionary manually wastes time and energy. This paper uses the method of statistics to automatically obtain the translation dictionary from the English-Chinese parallel corpus for query and translation.

As the aqueous humor leaves the eye, it first passes through the trabecular meshwork (TM). Increased flow resistance in this region causes elevation of intraocular pressure (IOP), which leads to the occurrence of glaucoma. To quantitatively evaluate the effect of high IOP on the configuration and hydraulic permeability of the TM, second harmonic generation (SHG) microscopy was used to image the microstructures of the TM and adjacent tissues in control (normal) and high IOP conditions. Enucleated rabbit eyes were perfused at a pressure of 60 mmHg to achieve the high IOP. Through the anterior chamber of the eye, in situ images were obtained from different depths beneath the surface of the TM. Porosity and specific surface area of the TM in control and high IOP conditions were then calculated to estimate the effect of the high pressure on the permeability of tissue in different depths. We further photographed the histological sections of the TM and compared the in situ images. The following results were obtained in the control condition, where the region of depth was less than 55 μm with crossed branching beams and large pores in the superficial TM. The deeper meshwork is a silk-like tissue with abundant fluorescence separating the small size of pores. The total thickness of pathway tissues composed of TM and juxtacanalicular (JCT) is more than 100 μm. After putting a high pressure on the inner wall of the eye, the TM region progressively collapses and decreases to be less than 40 μm. Fibers of the TM became dense, and the porosity at 34 μm in the high IOP condition is comparable to that at 105 μm in the control condition. As a consequent result, the permeability of the superficial TM decreases rapidly from 120 μm2 to 49.6 μm2 and that of deeper TM decreases from 1.66 μm2 to 0.57 μm2. Heterogeneity reflected by descent in permeability reduces from 12.4 μm of the control condition to 3.74 μm of the high IOP condition. The persistently high IOP makes the TM region collapse from its normal state, in which the collagen fibers of the TM are arranged in regular to maintain the physiological permeability of the outflow pathway. In the scope of pathologically high IOP, the microstructure of the TM is sensitive to pressure and hydraulic permeability can be significantly affected by IOP.

Back-gate bias effect in SOI gate controlled hybrid transistor is discussed. Experimental results show the transconductance enhancement caused by the back-gate bias. Furthermore, the back-gate effect is alleviated in GCHT compared with conventional MOSFET.

Background Use of ultrasound-guided techniques to facilitate central venous cannulation (CVC) may reduce the risk of misplacement and complications. A meta-analysis was conducted to compare real-time two-dimensional ultrasound (RTUS) guidance technique with anatomical landmark technique for CVC to determine whether RTUS has any advantages. Methods Randomized studies comparing outcomes in patients undergoing CVC with either RTUS or landmark technique were retrieved from PubMed, ISI Web of Knowledge, EMBASE, and OVID EBM Reviews from their inception to March 2012. Results Twenty-six studies involving 4,185 CVC procedures met the inclusion criteria. Compared with landmark technique, patients with RTUS had a pooled relative risk (RR) of 0.18 (95% CI: 0.10-0.32) for cannulation failure, 0.25 (95% CI: 0.15-0.42) for arterial puncture, 0.30 (95% CI: 0.19-0.46) for hematoma, 0.21 (95% CI: 0.06-0.73) for pneumothorax, and 0.10 (95% CI: 0.02-0.54) for hemothorax from random-effects models. However, RTUS did not show a reduction in the risk of cannulation failure (RR = 0.26, 95% CI: 0.03-2.55), arterial puncture (RR = 0.34, 95% CI: 0.05-2.60), hematoma (RR = 0.13, 95% CI: 0.01-2.42), pneumothorax (RR = 0.40, 95% CI: 0.02-9.61), and hemothorax (RR = 0.40, 95% CI: 0.02-9.61) in children or infants when the limited data were analyzed. Conclusions Among adults receiving CVC, RTUS was associated with decreased risks of cannulation failure, arterial puncture, hematoma, and hemothorax. Additional data of randomized studies are necessary to evaluate these outcomes in pediatric patients.