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In addition to affecting individual health the COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted efforts to deliver essential health services around the world. In this article we present an overview of the immediate programmatic and epidemiologic impact of the pandemic on polio eradication as well as the adaptive strategic and operational measures taken by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) from March through September 2020. Shortly after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared a global pandemic on 11 March 2020, the GPEI initially redirected the programme’s assets to tackle COVID-19 and suspended house-to-house supplementary immunization activities (SIAs) while also striving to continue essential poliovirus surveillance functions. From March to May 2020, 28 countries suspended a total of 62 polio vaccine SIAs. In spite of efforts to continue poliovirus surveillance, global acute flaccid paralysis (AFP) cases reported from January-July 2020 declined by 34% compared with the same period in 2019 along with decreases in the mean number of environment samples collected per active site in the critical areas of the African and Eastern Mediterranean regions. The GPEI recommended countries should resume planning and implementation of SIAs starting in July 2020 and released guidelines to ensure these could be done safely for front line workers and communities. By the end of September 2020, a total of 14 countries had implemented circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 (cVDPV2) outbreak response vaccination campaigns and Afghanistan and Pakistan restarted SIAs to stop ongoing wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) transmission. The longer-term impacts of disruptions to eradication efforts remain to be determined, especially in terms of the effect on poliovirus epidemiology. Adapting to the pandemic situation has imposed new considerations on program implementation and demonstrated not only GPEI’s contribution to global health security, but also identified potential opportunities for coordinated approaches across immunization and health services.

In 2019, India, along with other countries in the World Health Organization (WHO) South-East Asia Region,* adopted the goal of measles and rubella elimination by 2023

Induction motor (IM) drives have tremendous applications as high-performance drives in things such as mine winders, machine tools, electric vehicles, and elevators. Usually, IM drives controlled by direct torque control are preferred for these applications due to their fast torque control and simplicity compared with IM drives with field-oriented control. Proportional–integral–derivative (PID) controllers are commonly used to control IM drives using DTC. Though these controllers are simple and provide excellent response for linear systems with constant set points, they perform poorly with variable set points and IM motor parameter uncertainties. Hence, many control techniques and optimization algorithms have been applied to improve IM drive performance. This paper proposes an IM drive controlled using direct torque control principles, but with the power converter operation optimized to give fast torque performance. The IM drive speed response is improved using an optimized fuzzy PID (FPID). The FPID optimization is accomplished by the ant colony optimization (ACO) algorithm. All components of the IM drive with the optimized control system were simulated using the MATLAB/Simulink platform. The responses of the introduced drive using three different controllers—conventional PID, FPID, and optimized FPID—were compared. The simulation results indicate that the optimized FPID controller provided the best performance in terms of speed and torque. Additionally, the performance of the IM with the proposed optimized FPID under parameter uncertainties was studied. The simulation results indicated the robustness of the optimized FPID controller against parameter uncertainties.

BACKGROUND: Afghanistan is one of two countries with endemic wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1). The oral poliovirus vaccine (OPV) is the predominant vaccine used for polio eradication. Although OPV has been administered in routine childhood immunization and during frequent supplementary immunization activities, WPV1 continues to circulate in Afghanistan and case incidence has been increasing since 2017. We estimated the effectiveness of OPV in Afghanistan during 2010–2020. METHODS: We conducted a matched case-control analysis using acute flaccid paralysis (AFP) surveillance data from 29,370 children < 15 years with AFP onset between January 1, 2010 and December 31, 2020. We matched children with confirmed WPV1 (cases) with children with non-polio AFP (controls) by age at onset of paralysis (+/− 3 months), date of onset of paralysis (+/− 3 months), and province of residence, and compared their reported OPV vaccination history to estimate the effectiveness of OPV in preventing paralysis by WPV1 using conditional logistic regression. To account for changes in OPV formulations provided over the analysis period, we stratified the analysis based on dates of the global switch from trivalent OPV (tOPV) to bivalent OPV (bOPV) in April 2016. RESULTS: Between January 1, 2010 and December 31, 2020, there were 329 WPV1 cases in Afghanistan. The per-dose estimated effectiveness of OPV against WPV1 was 19% (95% CI: 15%–22%) and of ≥ 7 doses was 94% (95% CI: 90%-97%). Before the global switch from tOPV to bOPV, the per-dose estimated effectiveness of OPV was 14% (95% CI: 11%-18%) and of ≥ 7 doses was 92% (95% CI: 85%-96%). After the switch, the per-dose estimated effectiveness of OPV against WPV1 was 32% (24%-39%) and of ≥ 7 doses was 96% (95% CI: 90%-99%). DISCUSSION: OPV is highly effective in preventing paralysis by WPV1; these results indicate that continued WPV1 transmission in Afghanistan is due to failure to vaccinate, not failure of the vaccine. Although difficult to implement in parts of country, improving the administration of OPV in routine immunization and supplementary immunization activities will be critical for achieving polio eradication in Afghanistan.

In 2013, member states of the World Health Organization (WHO) South-East Asia Region* (SEAR) adopted the goal of measles elimination and rubella and congenital rubella syndrome control

This paper deal with a practical development technology on a highly accurate faster response adjustable speed drive implementation for the three-phase sinewave fed general purpose induction motor system which is based upon sensorless slip frequency type vector control scheme with an automatic auto-tuning machine parameter estimation strategy. The essential procedure and considerations to measure and estimate the exact stator and cage rotor circuit parameters of the induction motor treated here are discussed under its operating conditions. The speed regulation characteristics of the induction motor is illustrated and evaluated for the induction machine parameter variations under the actual operating conditions ranging from a low frequency to a high frequency for various specified load torque setting. The variable speed induction motor drive system employing sensorless slip frequency-based vector control scheme which incorporates the current controlled three-phase high frequency carrier PWM switching inverter with automatic auto-tuning estimation strategy on the temperature-dependent and -independent machine circuit parameters is practically implemented using DSP-based vector controller. The dynamic speed response performances under essentially changed load torque disturbances as well as steady state speed against torque characteristics of the proposed variable speed drive control and implementations are illustrated and discussed from an experimental point of view.

The research aimed to measuring the Efficiency of the Agricultural Economic Resources Used in Summer Tomato Production in Alexandria Governorate, the research is relied on using of some descriptive and quantitative economic analysis methods in data analysis, especially Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) method, based on field data collected during the 2020 season from 30 summer tomato's farmers in Alexandria Governorate. The research reached a set of results, the most important of which can be reviewed as follows: (1) The overall efficiency criteria for a feddan of summer tomatoes in the research sample are: the net return is about 12.52 thousand pounds, the income over variable costs is about 17 thousand pounds, the benefitcosts ratio is about 1.41, and the profit of the spent pound is about 0.41 pounds. (2) The average Scale Efficiency was about 95.6%, which means that the percentage of exploitation of economic resources used in production in summer tomato farms in the research sample was about 95.6%, indicating that there is a possibility of expansion of 4.4% to reach the optimum volume of production on these farms. (3) The average Technical Efficiency according to the (BCC) model is about 98.4%, and this confirms the possibility of increasing the summer tomato production by 1.6% without increasing the amount of economic resources used. (4) Inefficient farms can achieve complete technical efficiency as reference farms by reducing the economic resources used, which are: the human labor by 7.22%, the automated work hours by 8.36%, the seedlings by 2%, the fertilizer Municipal by 4.62%, nitrogen fertilizer by 4.39%, phosphate fertilizer by 4.96%, potassium fertilizer by 4.93%, and pesticides by 6.81%, while keeping the same volume of production of summer tomatoes research sample. (5) The average Allocative Efficiency of summer tomato farms was about 79.7%, which means that re-employing the used economic resources will save about 20.3% of the production cost through adopting better technology and optimal employment of resources. (6) The average Cost-Efficiency of summer tomato farms in the research sample was about 78.4%, which means that production costs can be reduced by about 21.6% of the current production costs without affecting the production level of summer tomatoes. (7) Achieving the technical efficiency of summer tomato production at the level of Alexandria Governorate the following: (a) Increasing production by 13.07 tons, with a monetary value estimated at 23.59 milliom pounds, (b) providing an area of agricultural land with a horizontal expansion of 586.12 feddans, which is equivalent to the increase achieved In production as a result of raising technical efficiency, (c) rationalizing the use of irrigation water in Alexandria, with a total of about 2.04 million m3 , which is the amount of savings achieved in irrigation water that is necessary for the area of land that has been provided in Alexandria. In light of the findings of the research, it recommends the necessity; (1) Educating summer tomato farmers about the optimal the economic resources used in production to reach the optimum volume of production, (2) Reduce the prices of agricultural production inputs and provide them in a timely manner so that the farmer does not resort to the black market, (3) Issuing advisory bulletins to confront the changing climate and high temperatures in summer tomato cultivation.

In electric vehicles (EVs) and hybrid EVs, energy efficiency is essential where the energy storage is limited. Adding to its high stability and low cost, the induction motor efficiency improves with loss minimisation. Also, it can consume more power than the actual need to perform its working when it is operating in less than full load condition. This study proposes a control strategy based on the fuzzy logic control (FLC) for EV applications. FLC controller can improve the starting current amplitude and saves more power. Through the MATLAB/SIMULINK software package, the performance of this control was verified through simulation. As compared with the conventional proportional integral derivative controller, the simulation schemes show good, high-performance results in time-domain response and rapid rejection of system-affected disturbance. Therefore, the core losses of the induction motor are greatly reduced, and in this way improves the efficiency of the driving system. Finally, the suggested control system is validated by the experimental results obtained in the authors’ laboratory, which are in good agreement with the simulation results.

The performance of controlled hybrid renewable hydro matrix wheels/ wind in micro grid application during the variations of water speed and load is described and investigated. This hybrid contained three wheels and three wind turbines modeled in MATLAB Simulink. This presented hybrid model consists of a water wheel and a generator in the main channel, wind turbine drives an induction generator, battery, variable static load, DC link, and control unit. Appropriate controllers are used to maintain the DC-link voltage constant at its desired value with variations of load, water and wind speed. The obtained simulated result shows that the studied hybrid system with the proposed controller and the storage system have a better performance of load voltage and current waveform compared with the case of not using an energy storage unit and the case of without a controller under the water, wind speed and load variations.

This paper presents a recent metaheuristic optimization approach of multi-verse optimizer (MVO) to design load frequency control (LFC) based model predictive control (MPC) incorporated in large multi-interconnected system. The constructed system comprises six plants with renewable energy sources (RESs). MVO is employed to determine the optimal parameters of MPC-LFC to achieve the desired output of the interconnected system in case of load disturbances. The presented system comprises reheat thermal, hydro, photovoltaic (PV) model with maximum power point tracker (MPPT), wind turbine (WT), diesel generation (DG), and superconducting magnetic energy storage (SMES). The integral time absolute error (ITAE) of the frequencies and tie-line powers deviations is proposed as objective function. The effects of governor dead zone and generation rate constraint (GRC) of thermal plants are considered. The performance of the proposed MPC optimized via MVO is compared with the other designed via intelligent water drops (IWD) and genetic algorithm (GA). Additionally, the robustness of the proposed MPC-LFC based MVO with variation of the system parameters is presented. The obtained results confirmed the superiority and reliability of the proposed controller compared to the others.

Recently, energy storage technologies are not only protruded as sources of energy rather; these technologies provide a great contribution to improve the stability, power quality and reliability in the electrical system. The high utilizing of renewable energy sources can be harnessed by using these energy storage systems. This paper shows the role of supercapacitor in DC Microgrid to be stable under partial shading issue. For studying the effect of adding supercapacitor, the microgrid system is simulated with and even without supercapacitor. The fluctuations of the DC link bus voltage of the microgrid is reduced as a result of integration with supercapacitor unit. The simulation results approve that supercapacitor improve the DC microgrid stability.

This paper introduces a novel metaheuristic approach of sooty terns optimization algorithm (STOA) to determine the optimum parameters of model predictive control (MPC)-based deregulated load frequency control (LFC). The system structure consists of three interconnected plants with nonlinear multisources comprising wind turbine, photovoltaic model with maximum power point tracker, and superconducting magnetic energy storage under deregulated environment. The proposed objective function is the integral time absolute error (ITAE) of the deviations in frequencies and powers in tie-lines. The analysis aims at determining the optimum parameters of MPC via STOA such that ITAE is minimized. Moreover, the proposed STOA-MPC is examined under variation of the system parameters and random load disturbance. The time responses and performance specifications of the proposed STOA-MPC are compared to those obtained with MPC optimized via differential evolution, intelligent water drops algorithm, stain bower braid algorithm, and firefly algorithm. Furthermore, a practical case study of interconnected system comprising the Kuraymat solar thermal power station is analyzed based on actual recorded solar radiation. The obtained results via the proposed STOA-MPC-based deregulated LFC confirmed the competence and robustness of the designed controller compared to the other algorithms.

This paper proposes a novel bidirectional interleaved hybrid converter which uses coupled inductors (CIs) for battery electric vehicles (BEVs) in order to optimize the performance of the power train. In this paper, a hybrid converter is proposed and designed to realize the integration of the DC/DC converter, and DC/AC inverter together in the BEVs power train with high performance in any operating mode, acting as a backup generator to supply emergency power directly to home. The proposed hybrid converter can improve the system cost, volume, and increase efficiency and reliability. Here, interleaving structure is used to increase power rating, reduce the input current ripple, output voltage ripple, power loss, and increase efficiency. The performance of the proposed converter is improved by using CIs of energy storage inductors. This integrated magnetic design structure reduces the size and improves the converter performance, both steady state and transient. A detailed study of the operating principle and design considerations is presented. In addition, low electromagnetic interference and low stress in the power switching devices are expected. The proposed topology and its control strategy are designed and analyzed using MATLAB/Simulink. Finally, the proposed topology is experimentally validated with results experimental work obtained from the prototype that has been built and integrated into our lab.

This study presents a novel power management strategy (PMS) for a small urban electric vehicle. Enhancing battery electric vehicles driving range and their batteries’ lifetime are possible through developing a more effective PMS for them. Fuzzy logic control (FLC) is proposed to control the power control unit (PCU) of the battery management system. The control devices used are verified and experimented by simulations to evaluate their performance using the MATLAB software. The good performance of FLC can be observed in terms of settling time and peak overshoot from the simulations result. The simulation results show that the proposed PCU can decrease the energy loss inside the battery and increase the battery lifetime.

This paper proposes optimal load frequency control (LFC) designed by Adaptive Neuro Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS) trained via antlion optimizer (ALO) for multi-interconnected system comprising renewable energy sources (RESs). Two systems are modeled and investigated; the first one has two plants of grid connected photovoltaic (PV) system with maximum power point tracker (MPPT) and thermal plant while the second comprises four plants of thermal, wind turbine and grid connected PV systems. ALO is employed to get the optimal gains of Proportional-Integral (PI) controller such that the integral time absolute error (ITAE) of frequency and tie line power deviations is minimized. The input and output of the optimized PI controller are used to train the ANFIS-LFC with Gaussian surface membership functions. Different load disturbances are studied and the results are compared with other reported approaches. The obtained results confirmed the accuracy and reliability of the proposed approach in designing LFC for multi-interconnected power systems.

Background and Objective Community mitigation strategies could help reduce COVID-19 incidence, but there are few studies that explore associations nationally and by urbanicity. In a national county-level analysis, we examined the probability of being identified as a county with rapidly increasing COVID-19 incidence (rapid riser identification) during the summer of 2020 by implementation of mitigation policies prior to the summer, overall and by urbanicity. Methods We analyzed county-level data on rapid riser identification during June 1–September 30, 2020 and statewide closures and statewide mask mandates starting March 19 (obtained from state government websites). Poisson regression models with robust standard error estimation were used to examine differences in the probability of rapid riser identification by implementation of mitigation policies (P-value Results Counties in states that closed for 0–59 days were more likely to become a rapid riser county than those that closed for >59 days, particularly in nonmetropolitan areas. The probability of becoming a rapid riser county was 43% lower among counties that had statewide mask mandates at reopening (adjusted prevalence ratio = 0.57; 95% confidence intervals = 0.51–0.63); when stratified by urbanicity, associations were more pronounced in nonmetropolitan areas. Conclusions These results underscore the potential value of community mitigation strategies in limiting the COVID-19 spread, especially in nonmetropolitan areas.

Background Symptoms of mild COVID‐19 illness are non‐specific and may persist for prolonged periods. Effects on quality of life of persistent poor physical or mental health associated with COVID‐19 are not well understood. Methods Adults aged ≥18 years with laboratory‐confirmed COVID‐19 and matched control patients who tested negative for SARS‐CoV‐2 infection at outpatient facilities associated with 11 medical centers in the United States were interviewed to assess symptoms, illness duration, and health‐related quality of life. Duration of symptoms, health‐related quality of life measures, and days of poor physical health by symptoms experienced during illness were compared between case patients and controls using Wilcoxon rank‐sum tests. Symptoms associated with COVID‐19 case status were evaluated by multivariable logistic regression. Results Among 320 participants included, 157 were COVID‐19 cases and 163 were SARS‐CoV‐2 negative controls. Loss of taste or smell was reported by 63% of cases and 6% of controls and was strongly associated with COVID‐19 in logistic regression models (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] = 32.4; 95% confidence interval [CI], 12.6‐83.1). COVID‐19 cases were more likely than controls to have experienced fever, body aches, weakness, or fatigue during illness, and to report ≥1 persistent symptom more than 14 days after symptom onset (50% vs 32%, P

This article focuses on the energy-saving of each driving distance for battery electric vehicle (BEV) applications, by developing a more effective energy management strategy (EMS), under different driving cycles. Fuzzy logic control (FLC) is suggested to control the power management unit (PMU) for the battery management system (BMS) for BEV applications. The adaptive neural fuzzy inference system (ANFIS) is a modeling technique that is mainly based on data. Membership functions and FLC rules can be improved by simply training the ANFIS with real driving cycle data gathered from the MATLAB/SIMULINK program. Then, FLC console blocks are rewritten by enhanced membership functions by ANFIS traineeship. Two different driving cycles are chosen to check the improvement in the efficiency of this proposed system. The suggested control system is validated by simulation and comparison with the traditional proportional-integral (PI) control. The optimized FLC shows better energy-saving.

This paper presents a novel optimal fuzzy proportional–integral–derivative (fuzzy PID) controller for load frequency control (LFC) designed by a proposed approach of mine blast algorithm (MBA) for multi-interconnected areas. The system includes reheat thermal connected power systems with the effect of the governor dead zone and turbine generation rate constraint nonlinearity. The proposed approach is used to determine the optimal parameters of the fuzzy PID controller to minimize the integral time absolute error. The proposed controller is inserted in multi-interconnected power systems which are built in Simulink/MATLAB library; triangular membership function is used for fuzzy PID controller. Additionally, the optimum adjustment of the fuzzy PID controller parameters under contracted scenario for large step demands and disturbances is investigated by MBA. The obtained results are compared to those obtained via antlion optimizer, artificial bee colony, hybrid differential evolution particle swarm optimization and hybrid PSO pattern search algorithm. The obtained results confirmed the superiority of the proposed MBA in designing the fuzzy PID-LFC as it provides less error with best statistical parameters compared to the others.

Energy storage systems are wildly included in the electrical system to enhance the stability, power quality and reliability of the electrical systems as well as harnessing the high penetration of renewable energy sources. In this paper, assessment of application energy management in the microgrid system incorporating a hybrid energy storage system including batteries and supercapacitor unit. The energy management algorithm aims to enhance the system performance by diminishing the fluctuations of the DC link bus voltage of the microgrid. The simulation results reveal that the proposed energy management technique can improve system stability considerably.

In Electric Vehicles (EVs)and Hybrid Electric Vehicles (HEVs), energy efficiency is essential where energy storage is limited. Adding to its high stability and low cost, the induction motor efficiency improves with loss minimization. Also, it can consume more power than you actually need to perform its working when it operating in less than full load condition. In this paper, a proposed topology and its control strategies based on the Fuzzy Logic Control (FLC) are used. FLC makes control of start current amplitude and saves more power. Through the MATLAB/SIMULINK software package, the performance of this control was verified through simulation. Compare with the conventional Proportional Integral Derivative (PID) controller, the simulation schemes show good, high-performance results in time-domain response and rapid rejection of system-affected disturbance. Therefore, the core losses of the induction motor are greatly reduced, and in this way improved the efficiency of the driving system. Finally, the suggested control system is validated by the experimental results obtained in our laboratory, which are in good agreement with the simulation results.

Background Calcaneo valgus deformity is postural deformity of infancy which is characterized by dramatic hyperdorsiflexion of the foot that appears to be plastered up against the anterior surface of the tibia. Planter flexion of the foot is frequently limited as a result of contracture of the anterior ankle and foot structures. Aim of the work:To asses radiological parameters of calcaenovalgus deformity of the foot in children. Patients and methods:The patients were children up to 5 years old. The participants were 7 males and 13 females. The affected foot were 10 right sided and 10 left sided. Results: The present study was designed to asses radiological parameters of calcaenovalgus deformity of the foot in children. Conclusion The radiological parameters of calcaenovalgus deformity of the foot in children varies widly accodrding it is vevtical talus or oblique talus deformity.

The electric vehicle (EV) is one of the most important and common parts of modern life. Recently, EVs have undergone a big development thanks to the advantages of high efficiency, negligible pollution, low maintenance, and low noise. Charging stations are very important and mandatory services for electric vehicles. Nevertheless, they cause high stress on the electric utility grid. Therefore, renewable energy-sourced charging stations have been introduced. They improve the environmental issues of the electric vehicles and support remote area operation. This paper proposes the application of fuzzy control to an isolated charging station supplied by photovoltaic power. The system is modeled and simulated using Matlab/Simulink. The simulation results indicate that the disturbances in the solar insolation do not affect the electric vehicle charging process at all. Moreover, the controller perfectly manages the stored energy to compensate for the solar energy variations. Additionally, the system response with the fuzzy controller is compared to that with the PI controller. The comparison shows that the fuzzy controller provides an improved response.

This paper investigates the application of firefly optimization algorithm to design an optimal control for voltage stability of a stand-alone hybrid renewable generation unit based on reactive powe...

This paper proposed an improved Highly Efficient and Reliable Inverter Concept (HERIC) inverter with photovoltaic (PV)-grid connected power system. However, transformerless inverter based on HERIC topology is considered as one of the most reliable, efficient, and approximately leakage free inverters with the PV-grid connected systems. The main drawback of this inverter is drawing a discontinuous current from the photovoltaic generating unit. Also, continuous photovoltaic current is needed to guarantee the maximum power point tracking (MPPT) operation. Subsequently, the operation of the HERIC inverter at maximum power point tracking condition is not a clear issue. Therefore, the PV utilization factor (Kuf) value falls down to about 50%, which leads to increasing in the cost and size of the photovoltaic generator unit. In this study, derivation of the utilization factor based on the PV-grid connected through HERIC inverter analyses are presented. Also, an improved version of the HERIC inverter is introduced to remove the previous drawbacks. To validate the analysis and idea, digital simulation results are carried out for both the proposed and classical PV-grid via HERIC inverter system. The transient response of the proposed grid current controller, proportion resonance (PR) controller, is tested. The effects of parameters uncertainties on the system performance factors are also studied to validate the robustness of the control approach.

Background:Previous research regarding anxiety as a predictor of future cognitive decline in older adults is limited and inconsistent. We examined the independent relationship between anxiety symptoms and subsequent cognitive decline.Methods:We included 2,818 community-dwelling older men (mean age = 76.1, SD ±5.3 years) who were followed on an average for 3.4 years. We assessed anxiety symptoms at baseline using the Goldberg Anxiety Scale (GAS; range = 0–9). We assessed cognitive function at baseline and at two subsequent visits using the Modified Mini-Mental State Examination (3MS; global cognition) and the Trails B test (executive function).Results:At baseline, there were 690 (24%) men with mild anxiety symptoms (GAS 1–4) and 226 (8%) men with moderate/severe symptoms (GAS 5–9). Men with anxiety symptoms were more likely to have depressed mood, poor sleep, more chronic medical conditions, and more impairment in activities of daily living compared to those with no anxiety symptoms. Compared to those with no anxiety symptoms at baseline, men with any anxiety symptoms were more likely to have substantial worsening in Trails B completion time (OR = 1.56, 95% CI 1.19, 2.05). The association was attenuated after adjusting for potential confounders, including depression and poor sleep, but remained significant (OR = 1.40, 95% CI 1.04, 1.88).Conclusion:In cognitively healthy older men, mild anxiety symptoms may potentially predict future decline in executive functioning. Anxiety is likely a manifestation of an underlying neurodegenerative process rather than a cause.

The main objective of load frequency control (LFC) is to keep the frequency value at nominal value and force deviation of the frequency to zero in case of load change. This paper suggests LFC by using a model predictive control (MPC), based on Integral Square Error (ISE) method designed to optimize the damping of oscillations in a two-area power system. The MPC is designed and simulated with a model system in state space, for robust performance in the system response. The proposed MPC is tuned by ISE to achieve superior efficiency. Moreover, its performance has been assessed and compared with the PI and PID conventional controllers. The settling time and overshoot with MPC are extremely minimized as compared with conventional controllers.

OBJECTIVES: Research is limited and findings conflict regarding anxiety as a predictor of future cognitive decline in the oldest old persons. We examined the relationship between levels of and changes in anxiety symptoms, and subsequent dementia and mild cognitive impairment (MCI) in the oldest old women. METHOD: We conducted secondary analyses of data collected from 1,425 community-dwelling women (mean age = 82.8, SD ±3.1 years) followed on average for five years. The Goldberg Anxiety Scale was used to assess anxiety symptoms at baseline, and an expert clinical panel adjudicated dementia and MCI at follow-up. Participants with probable cognitive impairment (Mini-Mental State Examination score

Introduction: Limb salvage has become the standard practice in the management of osteosarcoma. Limb salvage surgery represents a challenge in skeletally immature patients in whom further growth is anticipated. Several options are available for limb reconstruction in children, we report the long term results of using the freezing technique by liquid nitrogen for treatment of lower limb osteosarcoma in children using different reconstruction techniques. Method: This study includes 24 children with lower limb osteosarcoma, average age was13±3.2 y (6-18 y), ten boys. The mean follow-up period was 87.3±44.7 m (28-224 m). In 14 cases the lesion was in the femur, in ten patients it was in the tibia. Joint sparing and intercalary freezing was carried in out in 15 cases, while in five cases, osteoarticular freezing was performed, and a composite technique with a tumor prosthesis was performed in four cases. Results: Ten patients remained disease-free, eleven patients lived with no evidence of disease, one was alive with the disease, and two patients died of the disease. Five- and ten -year rates of survival were 91.76%. Graft five and ten years survival rates were 91.48% and 83.3 % respectively. Function on the Enneking scale was excellent in 19 patients (79.1%), and good in three patient (12.5%), fair in one (4.1%), and poor in two patients (8.3%), mean MSTS score was 25±5.4 (6-30). Mean union time was 8.7 m±2.1m (6-12m). Mean MSTS score was higher among children who receive a joint sparing rather than a joint sacrificing resection; 27.2 versus 21.3. Complications were recurrence in three cases (12.5%), all recurrences were from soft tissue, collapse of the osteoarticular graft occurred in two cases (8.3%). Fracture of the graft occurred in two cases (8.3%), nonunion occurred in three cases (12.5%). Leg length discrepancy occurred in seven cases, mean difference was 21.8mm±8.3mm (7-31mm), lengthening was carried out in four cases and finally got had equal leg length, in three cases, shoe lefts were enough. Conclusion: Reconstruction by frozen bone autograft for osteosarcoma around knee in children is easy, effective, biological, low-cost, immediate mobilization of joints, possible cryo-immune effects, with excellent long term functional outcome and with less complication.

Background We describe a measles outbreak and control measures implemented at a privately operated detention facility housing US Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainees in 2016. Methods Case-patients reported fever and rash and were either laboratory-confirmed or had an epidemiological link to a laboratory-confirmed case-patient. Immunoglobulin G (IgG) avidity and plaque reduction neutralization tests distinguished between primary acute and reinfection case-patients. Measles-specific IgG was measured to assess detainee immunity levels. We compared attack rates (ARs) among detainees and staff, between IgG-negative and IgG-positive detainees, and by detainee housing units and sexes. Results We identified 32 measles case-patients (23 detainees, 9 staff); rash onsets were during 6 May-26 June 2016. High IgG avidity and neutralizing-antibody titers >40000 to measles (indicating reinfection) were identified in 18 (95%) and 15 (84%) of 19 tested case-patients, respectively. Among 205 unit A detainees tested for presumptive immunity, 186 (91%) had detectable IgG. Overall, the AR was 1.65%. ARs were significantly higher among detainees in unit A (7.05%) compared with units B-F (0.59%), and among male (2.33%) compared with female detainees (0.38%); however, ARs were not significantly different between detainees and staff or between IgG-negative and IgG-positive detainees. Control measures included the vaccination of 1424 of 1425 detainees and 190 of 510 staff, immunity verification for 445 staff, case-patient isolation, and quarantine of affected units. Conclusions Although ARs were low, measles outbreaks can occur in intense-exposure settings, despite a high population immunity, underscoring the importance of high vaccination coverage and containment in limiting measles transmission.