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Always-on intelligent visual perception applications are widely deployed in edges in the AIoT era. In order to eliminate power costs of data conversion and transmission, this paper proposes Senputing, an ultra-low-power processing-in-sensor chip that completely fuses sensing and computing together for a BNN-based hierarchical processing system. This chip could operate in two modes. In computation mode, photocurrents are directly utilized for computing without being converted into voltages, and the computation results of 1-st BNN layer are directly sent out to subsequent BNN processors for an always-on coarse classification, eliminating conversion power and storage cost of raw images. Once an interested objected is detected, this chip switches to sensor mode and sends raw images to potential full-precision processors or cloud servers for fine-grained recognition or segmentation. A 32x 32 prototype is fabricated with 180nm CMOS process. It accomplishes MNIST dataset classification task with the accuracy of 93.76% and the power consumption of 147nW at 156fps, achieving 13.1x energy efficiency compared with state-of-the-art work.

At present, it has been noticed that some patients recovered from COVID-19 present a recurrent positive RNA test of SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2) after being discharged from hospitals. The purpose of the current study was to characterize the clinical features of re-hospitalized patients with recurrent SARS-CoV-2 positive results. From January 12 to April 1 of 2020, our retrospective study was conducted in China. The exposure history, baseline data, laboratory findings, therapeutic schedule, and clinical endpoints of the patients were collected. All the patients were followed until April 10, 2020. Among all COVID-19 patients included in the current study, there were 14 re-hospitalized patients due to recurrent positive tests of SARS-CoV-2 RNA. Fever (11 [78.6%]), cough (10 [71.4%]), and fatigue (7 [50.0%]) were the most common symptoms on the patient’s first admission, and less symptoms were found on their second admission. The average duration from the onset of symptoms to admission to hospital was found to be 8.4 days for the first admission and 2.6 days for the second admission (P = 0.002). The average time from the detection of RNA (+) to hospitalization was 1.9 days for the first admission and 2.6 days for the second admission (P = 0.479), and the average time from RNA (+) to RNA (−) was 11.1 days for the first admission and 6.3 days for the second admission (P = 0.030). Moreover, the total time in hospital was 18.6 days for the first admission and 8.0 days for the second admission (P = 0.000). It may be necessary to increase the isolation observation time and RT-PCR tests should be timely performed on multiple samples as soon as possible.

Objective To examine the impact of autoimmune disease on the composite outcome of intensive care unit admission, intubation, or death, from COVID-19 in hospitalized patients. Methods Retrospective cohort study of 186 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 between March 1st–April 15th, 2020 at New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Irving Medical Center. The cohort included 62 patients with autoimmune disease and 124 age- and sex- matched controls. The primary outcome was a composite of intensive care unit admission, intubation, and death, with secondary outcome assessing time to in-hospital death. Baseline demographics, comorbidities, medications, vital signs, and laboratory values were collected. Conditional logistic regression and Cox proportional hazards regression were used to assess the association between autoimmune disease and clinical outcomes. Results Patients with autoimmune disease were more likely to have at least one comorbidity (25.8% vs. 12.9%, p=0.03), take chronic immunosuppressive medications (66.1% vs. 4.0%, p Conclusion Among patients hospitalized with COVID-19, individuals with autoimmune disease did not have an increased risk of a composite outcome of intensive care unit admission, intubation, or death. Kaplan-Meier curve examining death, stratified by the presence or absence of autoimmune disease in all 186 patients, with 16 patients censored as of 4/29/2020

In this brief, typical locations of the interface and oxide traps generated by the hot carrier degradation (HCD) in FinFETs are studied with experiments and “atomistic” TCAD simulations under the worst case stress conditions. The typical round-Fin locations of different types of traps are analyzed by comparing the experimentally extracted results with the calibrated TCAD simulations. Then, the traps’ different impacts on HCD variations in both forward and reverse bias modes are employed to disclose the typical lateral locations of different traps. The results suggest that for both n- and p-type of FinFETs under the worst case stress conditions, the interface traps and oxide traps (type 1) are mainly distributed in the midchannel region closer to the source side on the Fin side, whereas oxide traps (type 2) are mainly distributed in the midchannel region closer to the drain side on the Fin top. Therefore, the two types of oxide traps originate in the different generation locations but may share the same atomistic structures in the same device. The results are helpful to the physical understandings of HCD in the FinFET technology.

Rationale: The global death toll from coronavirus disease (COVID-19) virus as of May 12, 2020, exceeds 286,000. The risk factors for death were attributed to advanced age and comorbidities but have not been accurately defined. Objectives: To report the clinical features of 85 fatal cases of COVID-19 in two hospitals in Wuhan. Methods: Medical records were collected of 85 fatal cases of COVID-19 between January 9, 2020, and February 15, 2020. Information recorded included medical history, exposure history, comorbidities, symptoms, signs, laboratory findings, computed tomographic scans, and clinical management. Measurements and Main Results: The median age of the patients was 65.8 years, and 72.9% were male. Common symptoms were fever (78 [91.8%]), shortness of breath (50 [58.8%]), fatigue (50 [58.8%]), and dyspnea (60 [70.6%]). Hypertension, diabetes, and coronary heart disease were the most common comorbidities. Notably, 81.2% of patients had very low eosinophil counts on admission. Complications included respiratory failure (80 [94.1%]), shock (69 [81.2%]), acute respiratory distress syndrome (63 [74.1%]), and arrhythmia (51 [60%]), among others. Most patients received antibiotic (77 [90.6%]), antiviral (78 [91.8%]), and glucocorticoid (65 [76.5%]) treatments. A total of 38 (44.7%) and 33 (38.8%) patients received intravenous immunoglobulin and IFN-α2b, respectively. Conclusions: In this depictive study of 85 fatal cases of COVID-19, most cases were males aged over 50 years with noncommunicable chronic diseases. The majority of the patients died of multiple organ failure. Early onset of shortness of breath may be used as an observational symptom for COVID-19 exacerbations. Eosinophilopenia may indicate a poor prognosis. A combination of antimicrobial drugs did not offer considerable benefit to the outcome of this group of patients.

The IL-23/IL-17 pathway has been implicated in the etiopathogenesis of axial spondyloarthritis through studies of genetic polymorphisms associated with disease, an animal model with over-expression of IL-23 that resembles human disease, and observations that cytokines in this pathway can be found at the site of disease in both humans and animal models. However, the most direct evidence has emerged from clinical trials of agents targeting cytokines in this pathway. Monoclonal antibodies targeting IL-17A have been shown to ameliorate signs and symptoms, as well as MRI inflammation in the spine and sacroiliac joints, in patients with radiographic and non-radiographic axial spondyloarthritis. This was evident in patients refractory to non-steroidal anti-inflammatory agents as well as patients failing treatment with tumor necrosis factor inhibitor therapies. Treatment with a bispecific antibody targeting both IL-17A and IL-17F was also effective in a phase II study. Post-hoc analyses have even suggested a potential disease-modifying effect in reducing development of spinal ankylosis. However, benefits for extra-articular manifestations were limited to psoriasis and did not extend to colitis and uveitis. Conversely, trials of therapies targeting IL-23 did not demonstrate any significant impact on signs, symptoms, and MRI inflammation in axial spondyloarthritis. These developments coincide with recent observations that expression of these cytokines is evident in many different cell types with roles in innate as well as adaptive immunity. Moreover, evidence has emerged for the existence of both IL-23-dependent and IL-23-independent pathways regulating expression of IL-17, potentially associated with different roles in intestinal and axial skeletal inflammation.

Purpose Assess feasibility of ultrashort echo time (UTE) T2* cartilage mapping in sacroiliac (SI) joints. Methods Prospective magnetic resonance imagings with UTE T2* cartilage maps obtained on 20 SI joints in 10 subjects. Each joint was segmented into thirds by 2 radiologists. The UTE T2* maps were analyzed; reliability and differences in UTE T2* values between radiologists were assessed. Results Mean UTE T2* value was 10.44 ± 0.60 ms. No difference between right/left SI joints (median, 10.52 vs 10.45 ms; P = 0.940), men/women (median, 10.34 vs. 10.57 ms; P = 0.174), or different anatomic regions (median range 10.55-10.69 ms; P = 0.805). Intraclass correlation coefficients were 0.94 to 0.99 (intraobserver) and 0.91 to 0.96 (interobserver). Mean bias ± standard deviation on Bland-Altman was -0.137 ± 0.196 ms (limits of agreement -0.521 and 0.247) without proportional bias (β = 0.148, P = 0.534). Conclusions The UTE T2* cartilage mapping in the SI joints is feasible with high reader reliability.

Frontline healthcare nurses devoted themselves to deal with the outbreak of COVID-19, saving many lives. However, they are under incredible unknown psychological pressures with a considerable risk of infection. In this study, a self-administered questionnaire was used to survey 593 frontline nurses in Wuhan City and non-Hubei provinces for psychological responses from March 1 to March 10, 2020. Compared with nurses outside Hubei Province, those working in Wuhan were more likely to feel physically and mentally exhausted. Their probable depression and anxiety were significantly higher than those of nurses outside Hubei province (31.2%, 18.3% vs. 13.8%, 5.9%). Correspondingly, the depressive symptoms were more often reported in the Wuhan group (70.8% vs. 41.4%). Although Wuhan received wishes, concerns, and abundant psychological and material resources from all of the world, the survey-based study found that frontline nurses in Wuhan still had higher depression and anxiety with less social support compared with nurses from non-Hubei provinces. Unexpectedly, only 4.0% of nurses have sought psychological assistance. These findings suggested that the short-term psychological impact of frontline nurses in Wuhan during the COVID-19 outbreak was extremely high compared with nurses outside Hubei Province. This research enlightened the efficient integration of psychological resources, the optimization of the nurse emergency psychological assistance system, and the mental health care of medical staff during the outbreak of epidemics.

Background: The Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has been a major threat to global health. Regional differences in epidemiological and clinical characteristics, treatment and outcomes of patients have not yet been investigated. This study was conducted to investigate these differences amongCOVID-19 patients in Hubei Province, China.Methods: This retrospective cross-sectional study analyzed data on 289 COVID-19 patients from designated hospitals in three regions:Urban (Wuhan Union West Hospital), Suburban areas of Wuhan (Hannan Hospital) and Enshi city, between February 8 and 20, 2020. The final date of follow-up was December 14th, 2020. The outcomes were case fatality rate and epidemiological and clinical data.Results: Urban Wuhan experienced a significantly higher case fatality rate (21.5%) than suburban Wuhan (5.23%) and rural area of Enshi (3.51%). Urban Wuhan had a higher proportion of patients on mechanical ventilation (24.05%) than suburban Wuhan (0%) and rural Enshi (3.57%). Treatment with glucocorticoids was equivalent in urban and suburban Wuhan (46.84 and 45.75%, respectively) and higher than Enshi (25.00%). Urban Wuhan had a higher proportion of patients with abnormal tests including liver function and serum electrolytes and a higher rate of pneumonia (p < 0.01 for all). Urban Wuhan also had a higher incidence of respiratory failure, heart disease, liver disease and shock, compared with the other two regions (all p < 0.05).Conclusions: Our findings revealed that there are regional differences in COVID-19. These findings provide novel insights into the distribution of appropriate resources for the prevention, control and treatment of COVID-19 for the global community.

In this paper, our recent studies on the hot carrier degradation (HCD) in FinFETs, as well as HCD-induced dynamic variability, are summarized. The kinetics and statistics of FinFET HCD are experimentally investigated. New observations on HCD are reported, which are due to the simultaneous generation of both interface and oxide traps. Based on the trap-based approach, instead of the conventional carrier-based approach, the HCD and its variations are well-described with the proposed multi trap-based compact models, that are unified over the full $\{V_{gs},V_{ds}\}$ bias region. The typical average locations of the HCD-induced traps in FinFET under the worst-case stress condition are also identified. The results are helpful for the physical understanding and modeling of HCD, and the reliability-aware circuit design for FinFET technology.

Cloud computing is applied in various domains, among which social recommender systems are well-received because of their effectivity to provide suggestions for users. Social recommender systems perform well in alleviating cold start problem, but it suffers from shilling attack due to its natural openness. Shilling attack is an injection attack mainly acting on the training process of machine learning, which aims to advance or suppress the recommendation ranking of target items. Some researchers have studied the influence of shilling attacks in two perspectives simultaneously, which are user-item's rating and user-user's relation. However, they take more consideration into user-item's rating, and up to now, the construction of user-user's relation has not been explored in depth. To explore shilling attacks with complex relations, in this paper, we propose two novel attack models based on triangle relations in social networks. Furthermore, we explore the influence of these models on five social recommendation algorithms. The experimental results on three datasets show that the recommendation can be affected by the triangle relation attacks. The attack model combined with triangle relation has a better attack effect than the model only based on rating injection and the model combined with random relation. Besides, we compare the functions of triangle relations in friend recommendation and product recommendation.

Background Optimal fluid management in patients with COVID-19 has not been reported. This retrospective, multicenter study investigated the impact of intravenous infusion volume in the early stage of COVID-19 on clinical outcomes. Methods 127 patients from two tertiary hospitals were separated into the “conservative” and “liberal” groups based on average daily intravenous infusion volume within the first seven days after admission. Basic information, demographic and epidemiological characteristics, laboratory findings, treatments, and outcome measures were retrieved from medical records. The disease progression and prognosis were analyzed and compared. Results The average daily intravenous infusion volume within 7 days was 500 (150–700) ml/day in the conservative-strategy group (n = 87), and 1100 (1000–1288) ml/day in the liberal-strategy group (n = 40) (p p > 0.05). The final K+ in the liberal group was slightly higher than that at admission, and the final hematocrit level in the conservative group had a significant difference than that at admission (p p = 0.120). However, compared to the liberal group, conservative group had statistically lower rates of disease progression (9.3% vs 37.5%, p p p = 0.012). Conclusions Although there appeared to be no significant difference in the duration of hospitalization between using conservative and liberal fluid management strategies, the former was associated with lower rates of disease progression, mechanical ventilation and in-hospital mortality without increased nonpulmonary-organ dysfunction. These results support the importance of implementing conservative intravenous fluid infusion in the early stage of COVID-19.

Correlation filter-based trackers have achieved excellent performance in visual tracking in recent decade. Compared with traditional trackers, they show better robustness and efficiency. Most correlation filter based trackers learn the appearance model using only a single feature, like Histogram of Oriented Gridients feature, color naming feature, Gray features and so on. However, single-feature model can’t maintain great robustness in various complex situations. In order to solve this problem, we propose a High confidence correlation filter tacker based on multi-feature adaptive weighting. The tracker can acquire the initial weights using the information obtained in the second frame, and adaptively adjust the weights of different feature according to the tracking results of each frame. Moreover, we use a high confidence update strategy, and exploit the high confidence tracking results to update the model, so as to reduce the probability of model drift. We experiment the algorithm on 36 sequences of OTB-50 benchmark dataset, the experimental results show that our algorithm has a better performance compared with the original algorithm on multiple sequences such as Dragonbaby, Deer and Skating1. We also experiment our algorithm on our own sequence, in which our algorithm still has a better performance.

The 2019-nCoV is officially called SARS-CoV-2 and the disease is named COVID-19. This viral epidemic in China has led to the deaths of over 1800 people, mostly elderly or those with an underlying chronic disease or immunosuppressed state. This is the third serious Coronavirus outbreak in less than 20 years, following SARS in 2002-2003 and MERS in 2012. While human strains of Coronavirus are associated with about 15% of cases of the common cold, the SARS-CoV-2 may present with varying degrees of severity, from flu-like symptoms to death. It is currently believed that this deadly Coronavirus strain originated from wild animals at the Huanan market in Wuhan, a city in Hubei province. Bats, snakes and pangolins have been cited as potential carriers based on the sequence homology of CoV isolated from these animals and the viral nucleic acids of the virus isolated from SARS-CoV-2 infected patients. Extreme quarantine measures, including sealing off large cities, closing borders and confining people to their homes, were instituted in January 2020 to prevent spread of the virus, but by that time much of the damage had been done, as human-human transmission became evident. While these quarantine measures are necessary and have prevented a historical disaster along the lines of the Spanish flu, earlier recognition and earlier implementation of quarantine measures may have been even more effective. Lessons learned from SARS resulted in faster determination of the nucleic acid sequence and a more robust quarantine strategy. However, it is clear that finding an effective antiviral and developing a vaccine are still significant challenges. The costs of the epidemic are not limited to medical aspects, as the virus has led to significant sociological, psychological and economic effects globally. Unfortunately, emergence of SARS-CoV-2 has led to numerous reports of Asians being subjected to racist behavior and hate crimes across the world.

The COVID-19 pandemic is a significant global event in the history of infectious diseases. The SARS-CoV-2 appears to have originated from bats but is now easily transmissible among humans, primarily through droplet or direct contact. Clinical features of COVID-19 include high fever, cough, and fatigue which may progress to ARDS. Respiratory failure can occur rapidly after this. The primary laboratory findings include lymphopenia and eosinopenia. Elevated D-dimer, procalcitonin, and CRP levels may correlate with disease severity. Imaging findings include ground-glass opacities and patchy consolidation on CT scan. Mortality is higher in patients with hypertension, cardiac disease, diabetes mellitus, cancer, and COPD. Elderly patients are more susceptible to severe disease and death, while children seem to have lower rates of infection and lower mortality. Diagnostic criteria and the identification of persons under investigation have evolved as more data has emerged. However, the approach to diagnosis is still very variable from region to region, country to country, and even among different hospitals in the same city. The importance of a clinical pathway to implement the most effective and relevant diagnostic strategy is of critical importance to establish the control of this virus that is responsible for more and more deaths each day.

Objective Since the outbreak of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) in December 2019, various digestive symptoms have been frequently reported in patients infected with the virus. In this study, we aimed to further investigate the prevalence and outcomes of COVID-19 patients with digestive symptoms. Methods In this descriptive, cross-sectional, multicenter study, we enrolled confirmed patients with COVID-19 who presented to 3 hospitals from January 18, 2020, to February 28, 2020. All patients were confirmed by real-time polymerase chain reaction and were analyzed for clinical characteristics, laboratory data, and treatment. Data were followed up until March 18, 2020. Results In the present study, 204 patients with COVID-19 and full laboratory, imaging, and historical data were analyzed. The average age was 52.9 years (SD ± 16), including 107 men and 97 women. Although most patients presented to the hospital with fever or respiratory symptoms, we found that 103 patients (50.5%) reported a digestive symptom, including lack of appetite (81 [78.6%] cases), diarrhea (35 [34%] cases), vomiting (4 [3.9%] cases), and abdominal pain (2 [1.9%] cases). If lack of appetite is excluded from the analysis (because it is less specific for the gastrointestinal tract), there were 38 total cases (18.6%) where patients presented with a gastrointestinal-specific symptom, including diarrhea, vomiting, or abdominal pain. Patients with digestive symptoms had a significantly longer time from onset to admission than patients without digestive symptoms (9.0 days vs 7.3 days). In 6 cases, there were digestive symptoms, but no respiratory symptoms. As the severity of the disease increased, digestive symptoms became more pronounced. Patients with digestive symptoms had higher mean liver enzyme levels, lower monocyte count, longer prothrombin time, and received more antimicrobial treatment than those without digestive symptoms. Discussion We found that digestive symptoms are common in patients with COVID-19. Moreover, these patients have a longer time from onset to admission, evidence of longer coagulation, and higher liver enzyme levels. Clinicians should recognize that digestive symptoms, such as diarrhea, are commonly among the presenting features of COVID-19 and that the index of suspicion may need to be raised earlier in at-risk patients presenting with digestive symptoms. However, further large sample studies are needed to confirm these findings.

Recommender constantly suffers from the problems of data sparsity and cold-start. As suggested by social theories, people often alter their ways of behaving and thinking to cater to social environments, especially their friends. For this reason, prior studies have integrated social relations into recommender systems to help infer user preference when there are few available data, which is known as social recommendation. However, explicit social relations are also sparse and meanwhile are usually noisy. To enhance social recommendation, a few studies identify more reliable implicit relations for each user over the user-item and user-user networks. Among these research efforts, meta-paths guided search shows state-of-the-art performance. However, designing meta-paths requires prior knowledge from domain experts, which may hinder the applicability of this line of research. In this work, we propose a novel social recommendation model (JUST-BPR) with a meta-path-free strategy to search for implicit friends. Concretely, We adopt the idea of ’Jump and Stay’, which is a heterogeneous random walk technique, to social recommendation. Based on this idea, we manage to bypass the design of meta-paths and obtain high-quality implicit relations in a more efficient way. Then we integrate these implicit relations into an augmented social Bayesian Personalized Ranking model for top-N recommendation. Experiments on two real-world datasets show the superiority of the proposed method and demonstrate the differences between implicit friends discovered by meta-paths and JUST-BPR, respectively.

As a promising alternative to the fundamental device structure, the gate-all-around silicon nanowire transistor (GAA SNWT) has been studied extensively for decades. In this chapter, the device physics, compact modeling, and fabrication process of GAA SNWT are systematically reviewed, as well as its potential applications in terms of different technology diversities. In the first part, the bulk-Si based integration scheme, quasi-ballistic transport characterization, parasitic capacitance, and self-heating modeling of GAA SNWT are presented. Following that, the variability and reliability physics and models of GAA SNWT are studied in-depth. Finally, the application examples in electrostatic discharging, radio frequency/analog circuit, and bio-sensor of GAA SNWT are demonstrated.

In this work, ultrathin indium tin oxide (ITO) radio frequency (RF) transistors have been demonstrated for the first time, where inverted gate structure are used with a flexible polyimide substrate using magnetron sputtering at a thermal budget below 200 °C. The 160 nm channel length device exhibits excellent DC characteristics, including mobility of 26 cm2/V•s and an I on /I off ratio of 6.6×108. A record-high extrinsic cut-off frequency (f T ) of 2.1 GHz and an extrinsic maximum oscillation frequency (f max ) of 3.7 GHz have also been obtained, which are more than one order of magnitude higher than previous results on flexible substrate. A high conversion gain of -20.9 dB has been achieved for the gigahertz frequency mixer based on flexible ITO RF transistor. Moreover, the stability of DC and RF performance under different bending conditions up to 50,000 bending cycles or down to 1 mm bending radius are studied without device failure.

In this paper, we report high-speed ultrathin-body (3.5 nm) indium-tin-oxide (ITO) transistors using high-k HfLaO dielectrics with a thickness of 5 nm. Because of its low dielectric constant and large bandgap, ITO is a promising channel material for scaling below the 5 nm regime for advanced low-power electronics with excellent short-channel-immunity. Here, we fabricate sub-100-nm channel length ITO transistors with ultrahigh on/off ratio near 1011 and ultralow off-state current below 10 fA/μm. The 15-nm-long ITO transistor exhibits high performance with the maximum on-state current of 970 μA/μm and peak g m of 400 μS/μm at V ds = 0.5 V. NAND, NOR, and SRAM based on enhancement/depletion mode (E/D) inverters have achieved full rail-to-rail output characteristics and stable memory function. Finally, We demonstrated a stage delay of 0.49 ns/stage for a 5-stage ring oscillator based on bootstrapped mode (BST) inverter, which is the best among all results based on metal-oxides transistors.

Background Vertebral compression fracture is one of the most common complications of osteoporosis. In this study an unilateral curved vertebroplasty device was developed, and the safety, effectiveness, and surgical parameters of curved vertebroplasty (CVP) in the treatment of painful osteoporotic vertebral compression fractures was investigated and compared with traditional bipedicular vertebroplasty (BVP). Methods We investigated 104 vertebral augmentation procedures performed over 36 months. CVP and BVP procedures were compared for baseline clinical variables, pain relief (Visual Analog Scale, VAS), disability improvement (Oswestry Disability Index, ODI), operation time, number of fluoroscopic images, volume of cement per level, and cement leakage rate for each level treated. Complications and refracture incidence were also recorded in the two groups. Results The VAS and ODI in both group had no significant difference preoperative (P > 0.05), and a significant postoperative improvement in the VAS scores and ODI was found in both group (P P 0.05). Neither group had any serious complications. Five and two patients in the BVP group developed refractures at non-adjacent and adjacent levels, respectively, with one patient developing refractures twice; however, none of the patients in the CVP group developed refractures at any level. Conclusions Our findings revealed that both CVP and BVP were safe and effective treatments for osteoporotic vertebral compression fractures, and CVP entails a shorter operation time, less exposure to fluoroscopy, and lower rate of cement leakage.

Objective Inflammatory back pain (IBP) is often an early manifestation of spondyloarthritis (SpA), but the prognosis of patients with incident IBP is unknown. This study was undertaken to investigate long-term outcomes in patients with IBP, and predictors of progression to SpA, in a population-based cohort. Methods We conducted a retrospective, longitudinal study using the Rochester Epidemiology Project, a longstanding population-based cohort of residents of Olmsted County, MN. Patients ages 16-35 years with clinical visits for back pain from 1999 to 2003 were identified, and we screened these patients for the presence of new-onset IBP and performed medical record reviews to collect data on clinical, laboratory, and imaging features of SpA. Outcomes in these patients were followed up until July 2016. We used survival analysis for competing risks to examine progression to either SpA, a non-SpA diagnosis, or resolution of back pain. Recursive partitioning was used to identify predictors of progression to SpA. Results Among 5,304 patients with back pain, we identified 124 patients with new-onset IBP. After a median follow-up of 13.2 years, IBP had progressed to SpA in 39 patients, 15 patients developed a non-SpA diagnosis, and 58 patients had resolution of IBP. At 10 years, the probability of having SpA was 30%, while the probability of resolution of IBP was 43%. The most important predictors for progression to SpA were uveitis, male sex, and family history of SpA. Conclusion In a minority of patients, new-onset IBP progresses to SpA, while IBP resolves in many. That IBP often resolves may explain the difference between the prevalence of IBP (3-6%) and the prevalence of SpA (0.4-1.3%).

To provide an update of the prevalence and incidence of axial spondyloarthritis in the general population and in patients with spondyloarthritis-related conditions, environmental risk factors for ankylosing spondylitis, progression from nonradiographic axial spondyloarthritis to ankylosing spondylitis, mortality, and risks for cardiovascular events in patients with ankylosing spondylitis.Increasingly, administrative healthcare data have been used to study disease frequency and outcomes. The prevalence of ankylosing spondylitis ranged from 9 to 30 per 10 000 persons, which are lower than previous estimates. Data on whether childhood infections influence the risk of ankylosing spondylitis were equivocal, while having been breast-fed may be protective. Progression of patients with nonradiographic axial spondyloarthritis to ankylosing spondylitis is slow, with estimates of 5.1% in 5 years and 19% in 10 years. Risk of mortality is slightly increased in ankylosing spondylitis. Risks for cardiovascular events in ankylosing spondylitis were either not different from, or only slightly higher than in controls. No studies have examined these outcomes in the broader group of patients with axial spondyloarthritis.Expanded use of administrative and registry data has facilitated studies of the epidemiology of ankylosing spondylitis, but lack of specific diagnostic codes limits use of these resources for studying axial spondyloarthritis in general.

With the downscaling of CMOS devices, dynamic variability induced by negative bias temperature instability (NBTI) has become a critical issue. In addition to the time-dependent device-to-device variation (DDV) of NBTI degradation, the cycle-to-cycle variation (CCV) originated from random trap occupation is found non-negligible and should be added into the total dynamic variation. This paper summarizes our recent studies on NBTI-induced dynamic variability, focusing on the CCV effect, with more details on the statistical modeling, circuit reliability simulation methodologies and experimental results. By adding the random trap occupation into consideration, a statistical model for total dynamic variation (DDV + CCV) is proposed. The effective occupancy probability peff is introduced as a key parameter for modeling and circuit reliability simulation. With the statistical trap response (STR) method and modified on-the-fly method, the proposed model is validated by the experimental evidence under both DC and AC NBTI. According to the model and experimental results, circuit reliability simulation framework is proposed for both long-term quasi-static and short-term transient performance evaluation with the additional impact of CCV. Two representative digital circuit units, ring oscillator (RO) and SRAM cell, are simulated under different conditions, indicating it necessary to consider the evident influence of the CCV in accurate circuit reliability evaluation. The results are helpful for the reliability/variability-aware circuit design in nanoscale technology.

Objective.To compare the efficacy of 6 tumor necrosis factor–α inhibitors (TNFi) in treatment of ankylosing spondylitis (AS) at 12 weeks and 24 weeks.Methods.We performed a systematic literature review of randomized controlled trials of TNFi in patients with active AS. We included trials that reported efficacy at 10 to 14 weeks (12–week analysis) and at 24 to 30 weeks (24-week analysis). We used Bayesian network metaanalysis (NMA) to compare their relative efficacy to improve the Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index (BASDAI), Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Functional Index (BASFI), and C-reactive protein (CRP) level.Results.We included 20 trials of 6 TNFi, with 43 treatment arms and 3220 participants. All TNFi were significantly better than placebo in reducing BASDAI and BASFI at 12 weeks and 24 weeks; all but certolizumab pegol (CZP) were statistically better than placebo in reducing CRP at 12 weeks; all but CZP and infliximab-dyyb (IFX biosimilar) were significantly better than placebo in reducing CRP at 24 weeks. IFX was superior to the other TNFi in decreasing BASDAI at 12 weeks, but not at 24 weeks. Excluding 1 open-label trial, there were no differences among TNFi.Conclusion.Based on this NMA of clinical trials, IFX was superior to other TNFi in reducing BASDAI at 12 weeks, but sensitive to inclusion of an open-label trial, and its efficacy was diminished at 24 weeks. The analysis was limited by few direct comparison trials. Further study of relative safety and longterm effectiveness will help inform the choice of TNFi in treating active AS.

Objective To update evidence-based recommendations for the treatment of patients with ankylosing spondylitis (AS) and nonradiographic axial spondyloarthritis (SpA). Methods We conducted updated systematic literature reviews for 20 clinical questions on pharmacologic treatment addressed in the 2015 guidelines, and for 26 new questions on pharmacologic treatment, treat-to-target strategy, and use of imaging. New questions addressed the use of secukinumab, ixekizumab, tofacitinib, tumor necrosis factor inhibitor (TNFi) biosimilars, and biologic tapering/discontinuation, among others. We used the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation methodology to assess the quality of evidence and formulate recommendations and required at least 70% agreement among the voting panel. Results Recommendations for AS and nonradiographic axial SpA are similar. TNFi are recommended over secukinumab or ixekizumab as the first biologic to be used. Secukinumab or ixekizumab is recommended over the use of a second TNFi in patients with primary nonresponse to the first TNFi. TNFi, secukinumab, and ixekizumab are favored over tofacitinib. Co-administration of low-dose methotrexate with TNFi is not recommended, nor is a strict treat-to-target strategy or discontinuation or tapering of biologics in patients with stable disease. Sulfasalazine is recommended only for persistent peripheral arthritis when TNFi are contraindicated. For patients with unclear disease activity, spine or pelvis magnetic resonance imaging could aid assessment. Routine monitoring of radiographic changes with serial spine radiographs is not recommended. Conclusion These recommendations provide updated guidance regarding use of new medications and imaging of the axial skeleton in the management of AS and nonradiographic axial SpA.

Hole velocity in black phosphorus exceeds most other semiconductors at room temperature and is even higher at low temperatures., As a strong candidate for future electronics, atomically thin black phosphorus (BP) has attracted great attention in recent years because of its tunable bandgap and high carrier mobility. Here, we show that the transport properties of BP device under high electric field can be improved greatly by the interface engineering of high-quality HfLaO dielectrics and transport orientation. By designing the device channels along the lower effective mass armchair direction, a record-high drive current up to 1.2 mA/μm at 300 K and 1.6 mA/μm at 20 K can be achieved in a 100-nm back-gated BP transistor, surpassing any two-dimensional semiconductor transistors reported to date. The highest hole saturation velocity of 1.5 × 107 cm/s is also achieved at room temperature. Ballistic transport shows a record-high 36 and 79% ballistic efficiency at room temperature and 20 K, respectively, which is also further verified by theoretical simulations.

Stochastic computing (SC) presents high error tolerance and low hardware cost, and has great potential in applications such as neural networks and image processing. However, the bitstream generator, which converts a binary number to bitstreams, occupies a large area and energy consumption, thus weakening the superiority of SC. In this paper, we propose a novel technique for generating bitstreams in parallel, which needs only one clock for conversion and significantly reduces the hardware cost. Synthesis results demonstrate that the proposed parallel bitstream generator improves 2.5x area and 712x energy consumption.

Convolutional neural network (CNN) achieves excellent performance on fascinating tasks such as image recognition and natural language processing at the cost of high power consumption. Stochastic computing (SC) is an attractive paradigm implemented in low power applications which performs arithmetic operations with simple logic and low hardware cost. However, conventional memory structure designed and optimized for binary computing leads to extra data conversion costs, which significantly decreases the energy efficiency. Therefore, a new memory system designed for SC-based multiply-accumulate (MAC) engine applied in CNN which is compatible with conventional memory system is proposed in this paper. As a result, the overall energy consumption of our new computing structure is 0.91pJ, which is reduced by 82.1% compared with the conventional structure, and the energy efficiency achieves 164.8 TOPS/W., 6 pages, 6 figures

Objective The long-term outcome of patients with nonradiographic axial spondyloarthritis (SpA) is unclear, particularly whether few or most progress to ankylosing spondylitis (AS). Our objective was to examine the progression to AS in a population-based inception cohort of patients with nonradiographic axial SpA. Methods The Rochester Epidemiology Project (REP) is a longstanding population-based study of health in the residents of Olmsted County, Minnesota. We searched the REP from 1985 to 2010 using diagnostic and procedural codes for back pain, HLA–B27, and magnetic resonance imaging of the pelvis, and we performed detailed chart reviews to identify subjects who fulfilled the Assessment of SpondyloArthritis international Society classification criteria for axial SpA but did not have AS. We followed these subjects from disease onset to March 15, 2015, and used survival analysis to measure the time to progression to AS. Results After screening 2,151 patients, we identified 83 subjects with new-onset nonradiographic axial SpA. Over a mean follow-up of 10.6 years, progression to AS occurred in 16 patients. The probability that the condition would remain as nonradiographic axial SpA at 5, 10, and 15 years was 93.6%, 82.7%, and 73.6%, respectively. There was more frequent and more rapid progression among subjects in the imaging arm (n = 18) than among those in the clinical arm (n = 65) (28% versus 17%; hazard ratio 3.50 [95% confidence interval 1.15–10.6], P = 0.02). Conclusion Progression to AS occurred in a minority (26%) of patients with nonradiographic axial SpA over as long as 15 years of follow-up. This suggests that the classification criteria for nonradiographic axial SpA identifies many patients in whom the condition is unlikely to progress to AS or that nonradiographic axial SpA represents a prolonged prodromal state that takes longer to evolve to AS and thus requires longer follow-up.

In this paper, we propose using the Voltage-Controlled Magnetic Tunnel Junction (VC-MTJ) to build a kind of reconfigurable logic for stochastic computing. The output probability is controlled by the pulse current and the controlled voltage in a VC-MTJ, thus it can be used as a stochastic number generator (SNG) and/or a reconfigurable logic device under different operation modes. When the voltage is fixed and the current changes with the input, stochastic numbers can be generated while consuming less energy than the conventional MTJ; when the voltage and current change with the Boolean logic inputs 0 or 1, different logic operations can be realized, which make it suitable as a reconfigurable logic device in stochastic computing.

In this paper, the degradation of drain-induced barrier lowering (DIBL) in FinFETs is experimentally studied under various hot carrier degradation (HCD) stress conditions. A test method is developed to characterize channel barrier height modulation under different HCD stress conditions. A linear relationship of ΔV thlin and ΔV thsat after HCD is found. Then a compact model of HCD-induced ΔDIBL is proposed. The results are helpful for the physical understanding and modeling of HCD in nanoscale FinFETs and aging-aware circuit design.

In this paper, the impact of body bias on hot carrier degradation (HCD) in advanced FinFET devices is experimentally investigated. It is observed that the degradation of I dsat is increasing with body bias for the short-channel core devices, while an opposite tendency is found in the long-channel IO devices. The different dependences are found due to the mechanisms of the single-carrier event (SCE) in short-channel devices but the multi-carrier event (MVE) in long-channel devices. The results are helpful for the physical understanding of HCD in FinFET devices.

In this paper, based on the complex random telegraph noise (RTN) data in FinFETs, the impacts of the trap coupling effect on RTN amplitude are studied statistically. The coupling effect is found to be enhanced by the double-side coupling mechanism in FinFETs. The non-monotonic V g dependence of amplitude coupling strength is observed for the first time, which is contributed by the evolution of channel percolation paths. In addition, the impacts of HCI and NBTI stresses on the coupling strength are studied. Based on the new understandings on coupling effect in FinFETs, the impacts of amplitude coupling on typical digital circuits are also investigated. The results are helpful for comprehensive understanding of the RTN coupling mechanism in nanoscale FinFET technology and RTN-aware circuit design.

The interface between III-V and metal-oxide-semiconductor materials plays a central role in the operation of high-speed electronic devices, such as transistors and light-emitting diodes. The high-speed property gives the light-emitting diodes a high response speed and low dark current, and they are widely used in communications, infrared remote sensing, optical detection, and other fields. The rational design of high-performance devices requires a detailed understanding of the electronic structure at this interface; however, this understanding remains a challenge, given the complex nature of surface interactions and the dynamic relationship between the morphology evolution and electronic structures. Herein, in situ transmission electron microscopy is used to probe and manipulate the structural and electrical properties of ZrO2 films on Al2 O3 and InGaAs substrate at the atomic scale. Interfacial defects resulting from the spillover of the oxygen-atom conduction-band wavefunctions are resolved. This study unearths the fundamental defect-driven interfacial electric structure of III-V semiconductor materials and paves the way to future high-speed and high-reliability devices.

Compared with conventional tunneling field-effect transistor (TFET), the new junction-modulated TFET (JTFET) can reliably and effectively achieve much steeper switching behavior and higher ON current by only changing the gate layout configuration. To facilitate the JTFET circuit simulation, in this work, we establish a physical tunneling current model of JTFET based on the analytical surface potential modeling. The modeled results with different device parameters are in good agreement with the simulated results by Sentaurus TCAD tools, showing the validity of proposed model.

Purpose: To report successful treatment with transluminal Nd:YAG laser embolysis (TYE) combined with urokinase thrombolysis for reperfusion of occluded branch retinal arteries with visible emboli. Methods: A total of 34 eyes from 34 patients with acute, severe vision loss secondary to a branch retinal artery occlusion with visible emboli and retinal whitening were examined. Each patient was administered TYE therapy, which focused on the embolus, using an ocular contact lens; a 0.3–0.9 mJ laser pulse was delivered directly and gradually according to the reaction. Fundus photographs and fundus fluorescein angiography (FFA) were obtained before and immediately after the laser treatment. All patients received urokinase thrombolysis therapy drops intravenously for 5 days at 10–20 u/d. The follow-up period ranged from 6 to 14 months after therapy. The morphological characteristics of FFA associated with obstruction recovery of arterial fluorescence filling and visual function were analyzed. Results: After TYE therapy, FFA examinations showed that the retinal artery and its branches exhibited completely restored blood flow without obstruction in 13 eyes, accounting for 38.2% of the cases. The blood flow was mostly recovered in 11 eyes (32.4% of patients). FFA examinations following the combined intravenous urokinase thrombolysis therapy showed that the retinal artery and its branches exhibited completely restored blood flow after obstruction in 16 eyes (47.1% of patients). The blood flow was mostly recovered in 15 eyes (44.1% of patients). Conclusion: TYE combined with urokinase thrombolysis is effective for reperfusion of occluded branch retinal arteries and improving visual recovery in patients with visible emboli.