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Visual functions of children with hearing disability were evaluated in a school of Muscat, Oman in 2006. Two hundred and twenty-three children were tested for near vision, distant vision, contrast sensitivity, color vision, field of vision, motion perception and crowding. Profound and severe hearing loss was noted in 161 and 63 students respectively. Thirty-five (81%) students with refractive error were using spectacles. Color vision and field of vision was defective in one student each. In 286 (64.1%) eyes, contrast sensitivity was defective. Abnormal contrast sensitivity was not associated with the severity of hearing loss [RR = 1.04 (95% CI 0.91 to 1.29)]. Children with hearing impairment should be assessed for visual functions. Refractive error and defect in contrast sensitivity were unusually high among these children. In addition to visual aids, we recommend environmental changes to improve illumination and contrast to improve the quality of life of such children with double disability.

High-throughput screening has become one of the major strategies for the discovery of novel functional materials. However, its effectiveness is severely limited by the lack of sufficient and diverse materials in current materials repositories such as the open quantum materials database (OQMD). Recent progress in deep learning have enabled generative strategies that learn implicit chemical rules for creating hypothetical materials with new compositions and structures. However, current materials generative models have difficulty in generating structurally diverse, chemically valid, and stable materials. Here we propose CubicGAN, a generative adversarial network (GAN) based deep neural network model for large scale generative design of novel cubic materials. When trained on 375 749 ternary materials from the OQMD database, the authors show that the model is able to not only rediscover most of the currently known cubic materials but also generate hypothetical materials of new structure prototypes. A total of 506 such materials have been verified by phonon dispersion calculation. Considering the importance of cubic materials in wide applications such as solar panels, the GAN model provides a promising approach to significantly expand existing materials repositories, enabling the discovery of new functional materials via screening. The new crystal structures discovered are freely accessible at www.carolinamatdb.org., (© 2021 The Authors. Advanced Science published by Wiley-VCH GmbH.)

Background: The integration of the contact lens (CL) practice with the VISION 2020 initiative is important. We assessed the facilities at the private CL clinics of Muscat. Accordingly, we suggested the appropriate eye care for CL wearers in Oman., Study Design: This was a descriptive study., Materials and Methods: This study was conducted between May and July 2006. A team of optometrists and health inspectors visited clinics and collected information about the infrastructure, available human resources, and materials used in the CL practice. We used a pre-tested close-ended questionnaire to collect responses of the practitioners and observations of the field staff., Statistical Method: Univariate parametric type of analysis., Results: The team visited 67 CL clinics and interviewed 75 CL practitioners. Proper hand washing facility was available at 61 clinics. Thirty-nine practitioners had >10 years of experience in dispensing contact lenses. Only 13 clinics had a bio-microscope. None of the clinics had legal documents signed by both providers and end users of the contact lens., Conclusions: Contact lens has received less attention in areas outside the developed world. The CL practice in the private sectors of Oman needs to be strengthened. Minimum standards, standard operating procedures for CL practice, and its periodic supervision would be useful.

Background: The interpupillary distance (IPD) is usually measured between the centers of the pupils (anatomical IPD) or between the visual axes (physiological IPD). We have investigated the differences between the two methods of measuring IPD., Methods: A millimeter ruler was used to measure the distance between the nasal and lateral limbus of 400 male Arab subjects (anatomical IPD). An Essilor corneal reflex pupillometer was employed to also measure the inter visual axes distance (physiological IPD) of the same group of subjects., Results: The anatomical IPD is on the average 0.10mm and 0.30mm wider than the physiological IPD at distance and near respectively. The calculated near physiological IPD is significantly different from the measured near physiological IPD., Conclusions: Although individual differences between anatomical and physiological IPDs could be clinically significant, generally, there is good agreement between the two. It is preferable to employ the monocular components of the physiological IPD in ophthalmic procedures.