6664 research outputs found
Sort by
Quanta / Signal / Noise
No full textThis is an iOS app that provides an interactive music playback interface for the ensemble The Langham Research Centre
Assessment of wounds in adults
Get PDFHolistic wound assessment focusing on patients' physical and mental wellbeing is essential for effective wound treatment and management and ensuring quality patient care. Thorough, accurate and regular assessment can optimise wound healing and enhance patients' quality of life. This article discusses the stages of wound healing and some of the complications of wound healing, which inform an assessment
A hardware pseudo-random number generator using stochastic computing and logistic map
Get PDFRecent research showed that the chaotic maps are considered as alternative methods for generating pseudo-random numbers, and various approaches have been proposed for the corresponding hardware implementations. In this work, an efficient hardware pseudo-random number generator (PRNG) is proposed, where the one-dimensional logistic map is optimised by using the perturbation operation which effectively reduces the degradation of digital chaos. By employing stochastic computing, a hardware PRNG is designed with relatively low hardware utilisation. The proposed hardware PRNG is implemented by using a Field Programmable Gate Array device. Results show that the chaotic map achieves good security performance by using the perturbation operations and the generated pseudo-random numbers pass the TestU01 test and the NIST SP 800-22 test. Most importantly, it also saves 89% of hardware resources compared to conventional approaches
Learning spatiotemporal features for esophageal abnormality detection from endoscopic videos
Get PDFEsophageal cancer is categorized as a type of disease with a high mortality rate. Early detection of esophageal abnormalities (i.e. precancerous and early cancerous) can improve the survival rate of the patients. Recent deep learning-based methods for selected types of esophageal abnormality detection from endoscopic images have been proposed. However, no methods have been introduced in the literature to cover the detection from endoscopic videos, detection from challenging frames and detection of more than one esophageal abnormality type. In this paper, we present an efficient method to automatically detect different types of esophageal abnormalities from endoscopic videos. We propose a novel 3D Sequential DenseConvLstm network that extracts spatiotemporal features from the input video. Our network incorporates 3D Convolutional Neural Network (3DCNN) and Convolutional Lstm (ConvLstm) to efficiently learn short and long term spatiotemporal features. The generated feature map is utilized by a region proposal network and ROI pooling layer to produce a bounding box that detects abnormality regions in each frame throughout the video. Finally, we investigate a post-processing method named Frame Search Conditional Random Field (FS-CRF) that improves the overall performance of the model by recovering the missing regions in neighborhood frames within the same clip. We extensively validate our model on an endoscopic video dataset that includes a variety of esophageal abnormalities. Our model achieved high performance using different evaluation metrics showing 93.7% recall, 92.7% precision, and 93.2% F-measure. Moreover, as no results have been reported in the literature for the esophageal abnormality detection from endoscopic videos, to validate the robustness of our model, we have tested the model on a publicly available colonoscopy video dataset, achieving the polyp detection performance in a recall of 81.18%, precision of 96.45% and F-measure 88.16%, compared to the state-of-the-art results of 78.84% recall, 90.51% precision and 84.27% F-measure using the same dataset. This demonstrates that the proposed method can be adapted to different gastrointestinal endoscopic video applications with a promising performance
Disruption of the GABAergic system contributes to the development of perioperative neurocognitive disorders after anesthesia and surgery in aged mice
Get PDFAims:
Perioperative neurocognitive disorders (PND) are associated with cognitive impairment in the preoperative or postoperative period, and neuroinflammation is thought to be the most important mechanisms especially during the postoperative period. The GABAergic system is easily disrupted by neuroinflammation. This study investigated the impact of the GABAergic system on PND after anesthesia and surgery.
Methods:
An animal model of laparotomy with inhalation anesthesia in 16-month old mice was addressed. Effects of the GABAergic system were assessed using biochemical analysis. Pharmacological blocking of α5GABAARs or P38 mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) was applied to investigate the effect of the GABAergic system.
Results:
After laparotomy, the hippocampus-dependent memory and long-term potentiation were impaired, the levels of IL-6, IL-1β and TNF-α upregulated in the hippocampus, the concentration of GABA decreased, and the protein levels of the surface α5GABAARs up-regulated. Pharmacological blocking of α5GABAARs with L655,708 alleviated laparotomy induced cognitive deficits. A further study found that the P38 MAPK signaling pathway was involved and pharmacological blocking with SB203,580 alleviated memory dysfunction.
Conclusions:
Anesthesia and surgery caused neuroinflammation in the hippocampus, which consequently disrupted the GABAergic system, increased the expressions of surface α5GABAARs especially through the P38 MAPK signaling pathway, and eventually led to hippocampus-dependent memory dysfunctions
Integration of InSAR and GPR techniques for monitoring transition areas in railway bridges
Get PDFThis paper reports the integration of the Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) and the Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) techniques for the monitoring of the rail-abutment transition area in railway bridges. To this purpose, an experimental campaign was conducted on a rail truss bridge located in Puglia, Southern Italy. On one hand, GPR was used to obtain structural details of the subsurface (thickness of the ballasted layer, position of the sleepers, presence of clay/humidity spots) and to identify potential construction-related issues. Parallel to this, InSAR analyses were mainly addressed to monitor subsidence at the rail-abutment transition area. Outcomes of this investigation outlined presence of subsidence at both the areas of transition and have proven the proposed integrated approach as viable to achieve a more comprehensive assessment of the structural integrity of railway bridges
"I have guys call me and say 'I can't be the victim of domestic abuse'": Exploring the experiences of telephone support providers for male victims of domestic violence and abuse
Get PDFWhilst previous studies have begun to provide evidence on the experiences of male victims of domestic violence and abuse (DVA), current understanding in this area is still limited, and subject to narrow methods of inquiry. Moreover, little is known regarding the challenges of providing support to men in abusive relationships, and how barriers to effective service engagement are experienced by both men and service practitioners. This is an important area for exploration, as the gender-specific experiences and needs of men have been historically overlooked within academic research and service provision. The present study therefore had two principal aims; first, to provide more detailed information regarding the nature and context of abuse towards, and help-seeking experiences of, male victims, and second, to explore the experiences of those supporting abused men. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with four call handlers at a UK domestic abuse charity supporting male victims. Transcribed interviews were subjected to thematic analysis, revealing a superordinate theme of stereotypes and expectations of men which impacted all the other three overarching and eight subthemes, including those detailing the range and severity of abuse suffered, the role of family and friends, barriers to reporting for abused men, and challenges in supporting them. Implications for services working with male victims of DVA are discussed; centred around the need for recognition, increased awareness, increased resourcing, and the provision of gender inclusive services catering for the gender-specific needs of men
Health beliefs and perceptions: implications for type 2 diabetes self-management
Get PDFDiabetes is a major public health menace across the globe and it is associated with physical, emotional and socio-economic consequences. Existing literature supports the use of diabetes education as a tool to minimise the impact of the medical condition. However, the current figure revealed underutilisation of the service. Compliance with a heath advice is often challenging as demonstrated by anecdotal evidence pertaining to the initial period of lifestyle changes necessitated by the ongoing global Covid-19 pandemic. There are many reasons responsible for failure to comply with healthcare instructions, hence, this study provides insight into the impact of patient’s perceptions and beliefs on attendance at diabetes education centres
Regional cerebral metabolic levels and turnover in awake rats after acute or chronic spinal cord injury
Get PDFSpinal cord injury (SCI) is a common cause of disability, which often leads to sensorimotor cortex dysfunction above the spinal injury site. However, the cerebral regional effects on metabolic information after SCI have been little studied. Here, adult Sprague-Dawley rats were divided into acute and chronic treatment groups and sham groups with day-matched periods. The Basso, Beatte, and Bresnahan scores method were utilized to evaluate the changes in behaviors during the recovery of the animals, and the metabolic information was measured with the 1 H-observed/13 C-edited NMR method. Total metabolic concentrations in every region were almost similar in both treated groups. However, the metabolic kinetics in most regions in the acute group were significantly altered (P < .05), particularly in the cortical area, thalamus and medulla (P < .01). After long-term recovery, some metabolic kinetics were recovered, especially in the temporal cortex, occipital cortex, and medulla. The metabolic kinetic changes revealed the alteration of metabolism and neurotransmission in different brain regions after SCI, which present evidence for the alternation of brain glucose oxidation. Therefore, this shows the significant influence of SCI on cerebral function and neuroscience research. This study also provides the theoretical basis for clinical therapy after SCI, such as mitochondrial transplantation.
Keywords: NMR; brain regions; metabolic kinetics; neurotransmitters; spinal cord injury
(Dis)orientation and design preferences within an unfamiliar care environment: a content analysis of older adults’ qualitative reports after route learning
Get PDFEnsuring that environments are designed to cater for those with decreasing orientation, perceptual and mobility skills, is an example of how environments are being changed to become more age and dementia friendly. However, environmental design should directly involve potential users of the environment to ensure that their views are accounted for. Four open-ended questions, focusing on orientation strategies, reasons for disorientation, and design preferences, were given to 32 older adults after they had completed a route learning task through an unfamiliar environment. A Content Analysis found a strong focus on participants’ ability to memorise routes based on verbally encoding the route and on their ability to remember landmarks, with the reports linking closely to cognitive theories of navigation. Design suggestions included the importance of a homely and welcoming environment, memorable features, and access to the outdoors. The findings can be used inform age and dementia friendly design principles