Search results for: convolutional long short-term memory

Authors: Jason M. Hegenauer, Nicholas Fucci

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In the late 1990s, a major deinstitutionalization movement of elderly patients took place, since which, the design of long-term care facilities has not been adequately analyzed in the United States. Over the course of the last 25 years, major innovations in construction methods, technology, and medicine have been developed, drastically changing the landscape of healthcare architecture. In light of recent events, and the expected increase in elderly populations with the aging of the baby-boomer generation, it is evident that reconsideration of these facilities is essential for the proper care of aging populations. The global response has been effective in stifling this pandemic; however, widespread disease still poses an imminent threat to the human race. Having witnessed the devastation Covid-19 has reaped throughout nursing homes and long-term care facilities, it is evident that the current strategies for protecting our most vulnerable populations are not enough. Light renovation of existing facilities and previously overlooked considerations for new construction projects can drastically lower the risk at nursing homes and long-term care facilities. A reconfigured entry sequence supplements several of the features which have been long-standing essentials of the design of these facilities. This research focuses on several aspects identified as needing improvement, including indoor environment quality, security measures incorporated into healthcare architecture and design, and architectural mitigation strategies for sick building syndrome. The results of this study have been compiled as 'best practices' for the design of future healthcare construction projects focused on the health, safety, and quality of life of the residents of these facilities. These design strategies, which can easily be implemented through renovation of existing facilities and new construction projects, minimize risk of infection and spread of disease while allowing routine functions to continue with minimal impact, should the need for future lockdowns arise. Through the current lockdown procedures, which were implemented during the Covid-19 pandemic, isolation of residents has caused great unrest and worry for family members and friends as they are cut off from their loved ones. At this time, data is still being reported, leaving infection and death rates inconclusive; however, recent projections in some states list long-term care facility deaths as high as 60% of all deaths in the state. The population of these facilities consists of residents who are elderly, immunocompromised, and have underlying chronic medical conditions. According to the Centers for Disease Control, these populations are particularly susceptible to infection and serious illness. The obligation to protect our most vulnerable population cannot be overlooked, and the harsh measures recently taken as a response to the Covid-19 pandemic prove that the design strategies currently utilized for doing so are inadequate.

Keywords: building security, healthcare architecture and design, indoor environment quality, new construction, sick building syndrome, renovation

Procedia PDF Downloads 98

Authors: K. Urukundu, K. A. Aravind, Pradeep M. Nirgude, K. Sandhya

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Transmission of bulk power over a long distance through HVDC transmission lines is gaining importance. This is because the transfer of bulk power through HVDC, from generating stations to load centers over long distances is more economical. However, these HVDC transmission lines create environmental and interference effects under the right of way of the line due to the ionization of the surrounding atmosphere in the vicinity of HVDC lines. The measurement of ground-level electric field and ionic current density is essential for the evaluation of human effects due to electromagnetic interference of the HVDC transmission line. In this paper, experimental laboratory results of the ground-level electric field under the miniature model of 800 kV monopole HVDC line of length 8 meters are presented in lateral configuration with different heights of the conductor from the ground plane. The results are compared with the simulated test results obtained through Finite Element based software.

Keywords: bundle, conductor, hexagonal, transmission line, ground-level electric field

Procedia PDF Downloads 221

Authors: Ciro Sobrinho Campolina Martins, Halison da Silva Pereira, Vitor Mainenti Leal Lopes

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Unmanned Aerial vehicles (UAVs) has been used in a wide range of applications, from precise agriculture monitoring for irrigation and fertilization to military attack missions. Long range performance is required for many of these applications. Tailless aircrafts are commonly used as long-range configurations and, due to its small amount of stability, the airfoil shape design of its wings plays a central role on the performance of the airplane. In this work, a new family of flying wing airfoils is designed for low Reynolds number flows, typical of small-middle UAVs. Camber, thickness and their maximum positions in the chord are variables used for the airfoil geometry optimization. Aerodynamic non-dimensional coefficients were obtained by the well-established Panel Method. High efficient airfoils with small pitch moment coefficient are obtained from the analysis described and its aerodynamic polars are plotted.

Keywords: airfoil design, flying wing, low Reynolds number, tailless aircraft, UAV

Procedia PDF Downloads 629

Authors: Niousha Bagheri Khulenjani, Mohammad Saniee Abadeh

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Learning from very big datasets is a significant problem for most present data mining and machine learning algorithms. MicroRNA (miRNA) is one of the important big genomic and non-coding datasets presenting the genome sequences. In this paper, a hybrid method for the classification of the miRNA data is proposed. Due to the variety of cancers and high number of genes, analyzing the miRNA dataset has been a challenging problem for researchers. The number of features corresponding to the number of samples is high and the data suffer from being imbalanced. The feature selection method has been used to select features having more ability to distinguish classes and eliminating obscures features. Afterward, a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) classifier for classification of cancer types is utilized, which employs a Genetic Algorithm to highlight optimized hyper-parameters of CNN. In order to make the process of classification by CNN faster, Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) is recommended for calculating the mathematic equation in a parallel way. The proposed method is tested on a real-world dataset with 8,129 patients, 29 different types of tumors, and 1,046 miRNA biomarkers, taken from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database.

Keywords: cancer classification, feature selection, deep learning, genetic algorithm

Procedia PDF Downloads 111

Authors: Vikas S. Minchekar

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The eyewitness is a crucial source of evidence in the criminal judicial system. However, rely on the reminiscence of an eyewitness especially intoxicated eyewitness is not always judicious. It might lead to some serious consequences. Day by day, alcohol-related crimes or the criminal incidences in bars, nightclubs, and restaurants are increasing rapidly. Tackling such cases is very complicated to any investigation officers. The people in that incidents are violated due to the alcohol consumption hence, their ability to identify the suspects or recall these phenomena is affected. The studies on the effects of alcohol consumption on motor activities such as driving and surgeries have received much attention. However, the effect of alcohol intoxication on memory has received little attention from the psychology, law, forensic and criminology scholars across the world. In the Indian context, the published articles on this issue are equal to none up to present day. This field experiment investigation aimed at to finding out the effect of alcohol consumption on identification accuracy in lineups. Forty adult, social drinkers, and twenty sober adults were randomly recruited for the study. The sober adults were assigned into 'placebo' beverage group while social drinkers were divided into two group e. g. 'low dose' of alcohol (0.2 g/kg) and 'high dose' of alcohol (0.8 g/kg). The social drinkers were divided in such a way that their level of blood-alcohol concentration (BAC) will become different. After administering the beverages for the placebo group and liquor to the social drinkers for 40 to 50 minutes of the period, the five-minute video clip of mock crime is shown to all in a group of four to five members. After the exposure of video, clip subjects were given 10 portraits and asked them to recognize whether they are involved in mock crime or not. Moreover, they were also asked to describe the incident. The subjects were given two opportunities to recognize the portraits and to describe the events; the first opportunity is given immediately after the video clip and the second was 24 hours later. The obtained data were analyzed by one-way ANOVA and Scheffe’s posthoc multiple comparison tests. The results indicated that the 'high dose' group is remarkably different from the 'placebo' and 'low dose' groups. But, the 'placebo' and 'low dose' groups are equally performed. The subjects in a 'high dose' group recognized only 20% faces correctly while the subjects in a 'placebo' and 'low dose' groups are recognized 90 %. This study implied that the intoxicated witnesses are less accurate to recognize the suspects and also less capable of describing the incidents where crime has taken place. Moreover, this study does not assert that intoxicated eyewitness is generally less trustworthy than their sober counterparts.

Keywords: intoxicated eyewitness, memory, social drinkers, lineups

Procedia PDF Downloads 268

Authors: N. Pitcheswara Rao

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In the process of conveying the information there may be a chance of signal being corrupted which leads to the erroneous bits in the message. The message may consist of single, double and multiple bit errors. In high-reliability applications, memory can sustain multiple soft errors due to single or multiple event upsets caused by environmental factors. The traditional hamming code with SEC-DED capability cannot be address these types of errors. It is possible to use powerful non-binary BCH code such as Reed-Solomon code to address multiple errors. However, it could take at least a couple dozen cycles of latency to complete first correction and run at a relatively slow speed. In order to overcome this drawback i.e., to increase speed and latency we are using reed-Muller code.

Keywords: SEC-DED, BCH code, Reed-Solomon code, Reed-Muller code

Procedia PDF Downloads 428

Authors: Anjali Sadanand, R. V. Nagarajan

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Architecture morphs with advances in technology and the roof, wall, and floor as basic elements of a building, follow in redefining themselves over time. Their contribution is bound by time and held by design principles that deal with function, sturdiness, and beauty. Architecture engages with people to give joy through its form, material, design structure, and spatial qualities. This paper attempts to re-interpret John Ruskin’s “Seven lamps of Architecture” in the context of the architecture of the modern and present period. The paper focuses on the “wall” as an element of study in this context. Four of Ruskin’s seven lamps will be discussed, namely beauty, truth, life, and memory, through examples of architecture ranging from modernism to contemporary architecture of today. The study will focus on the relevance of Ruskin’s principles to the “wall” in specific, in buildings of different materials and over a range of typologies from all parts of the world. Two examples will be analyzed for each lamp. It will be shown that in each case, there is relevance to the significance of Ruskin’s lamps in modern and contemporary architecture. Nature to which Ruskin alludes to for his lamp of “beauty” is found in the different expressions of interpretation used by Corbusier in his Villa Stein façade based on proportion found in nature and in the direct expression of Toyo Ito in his translation of an understanding of the structure of trees into his façade design of the showroom for a Japanese bag boutique. “Truth” is shown in Mies van der Rohe’s Crown Hall building with its clarity of material and structure and Studio Mumbai’s Palmyra House, which celebrates the use of natural materials and local craftsmanship. “Life” is reviewed with a sustainable house in Kerala by Ashrams Ravi and Alvar Aalto’s summer house, which illustrate walls as repositories of intellectual thought and craft. “Memory” is discussed with Charles Correa’s Jawahar Kala Kendra and Venturi’s Vana Venturi house and discloses facades as text in the context of its materiality and iconography. Beauty is reviewed in Villa Stein and Toyo Ito’s Branded Retail building in Tokyo. The paper thus concludes that Ruskin’s Lamps can be interpreted in today’s context and add richness to meaning to the understanding of architecture.

Keywords: beauty, design, facade, modernism

Procedia PDF Downloads 118

Authors: Jelena Bašić, Višnjica Vučetić, Mislav Anić, Tomislav Bašić

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Lack of precipitation combined with high temperatures causes great damage to the agriculture and economy in Croatia. Therefore, it is important to understand water circulation and balance. We decided to gain a better insight into the spatial distribution of water balance components (WBC) and their long-term changes in Croatia. WBC are precipitation (P), potential evapotranspiration (PET), actual evapotranspiration (ET), soil moisture content (S), runoff (RO), recharge (R), and soil moisture loss (L). Since measurements of the mentioned components in Croatia are very rare, the Palmer model has been applied to estimate them. We refined method by setting into the account the corrective factor to include influence effects of the wind as well as a maximum soil capacity for specific soil types. We will present one hundred years’ time series of PET and ET showing the trends at few meteorological stations and a comparison of components of two climatological periods. The meteorological data from 109 stations have been used for the spatial distribution map of the WBC of Croatia.

Keywords: croatia, long-term trends, the palmer method, water balance components

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Authors: Jacopo Baboni Schilingi

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We here describe the theoretical and philosophical understanding of a long term use and development of algorithmic computer-based tools applied to music composition. The findings of our research lead us to interrogate some specific processes and systems of communication engaged in the discovery of specific cultural artworks: artistic creation in the sono-musical domain. Our hypothesis is that the patterns of auditory learning cannot be only understood in terms of social transmission but would gain to be questioned in the way they rely on various ranges of acoustic stimuli modes of consciousness and how the different types of memories engaged in the percept-action expressive systems of our cultural communities also relies on these shadowy conscious entities we named “Reduced Descriptive Structures”.

Keywords: algorithmic sonic computation, corrected and self-correcting learning patterns in acoustic perception, morphological derivations in sensorial patterns, social unconscious modes of communication

Procedia PDF Downloads 154

Authors: P. Hajyalikhani, B. Hudson, D. Boll, L. Boren, Z. Sparks, M. Ward

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Wood Light frame construction is one of the most common types of construction methods for residential and light commercial building in North America and parts of Europe. The typical roof framing for wood framed building is sloped and consists of several structural members such as rafters, hips, and valleys which are connected to the ridge and ceiling joists. The common slopes for roofs are 3/12, 8/12, and 12/12. Wood framed residential roof failure is most commonly caused by wind damage in such buildings. In the recent study, one of the weaknesses of wood framed roofs is long unsupported structural member lengths, such as hips and valleys. The purpose of this research is to find the critical support location for long hips and valleys with different slopes. ForteWeb software is used to find the critical location. The analysis results demonstrating the maximum unbraced hip and valley length are from 8.5 to 10.25 ft. dependent on the slope and roof type.

Keywords: wood frame, stick framing, hip, valley

Procedia PDF Downloads 117

Authors: Amritanshu Shriwastav, Purnendu Bose

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Algal photo bioreactors were operated at incident light intensities of 0.24, 2.52 and 5.96 W L-1 to determine the impact of light on algal growth. Low specific Chlorophyll-a content of algae was a strong indicator of light induced stress on algal cells. It was concluded that long term operation of photo bioreactors in the continuous illumination mode was infeasible under the range of incident light intensities examined and provision of a dark period after each light period was necessary for algal cells to recover from light-induced stress. Long term operation of photo bioreactors in the intermittent illumination mode was however possible at light intensities of 0.24 and 2.52 W L-1. Further, the incident light intensity in the photo bioreactors was found to decline exponentially with increase in algal concentration in the reactor due to algal ‘self-shading’. This may be an important determinant for photo bioreactor performance at higher algal concentrations.

Keywords: Algae, algal growth, photo bioreactor, photo-inhibition, ‘self-shading’

Procedia PDF Downloads 319

Authors: Cheng Fang, Lingwei Quan, Cunyue Lu

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Human pose estimation and tracking are to accurately identify and locate the positions of human joints in the video. It is a computer vision task which is of great significance for human motion recognition, behavior understanding and scene analysis. There has been remarkable progress on human pose estimation in recent years. However, more researches are needed for human pose tracking especially for online tracking. In this paper, a framework, called PoseSRPN, is proposed for online single-person pose estimation and tracking. We use Siamese network attaching a pose estimation branch to incorporate Single-person Pose Tracking (SPT) and Visual Object Tracking (VOT) into one framework. The pose estimation branch has a simple network structure that replaces the complex upsampling and convolution network structure with deconvolution. By augmenting the loss of fully convolutional Siamese network with the pose estimation task, pose estimation and tracking can be trained in one stage. Once trained, PoseSRPN only relies on a single bounding box initialization and producing human joints location. The experimental results show that while maintaining the good accuracy of pose estimation on COCO and PoseTrack datasets, the proposed method achieves a speed of 59 frame/s, which is superior to other pose tracking frameworks.

Keywords: computer vision, pose estimation, pose tracking, Siamese network

Procedia PDF Downloads 153

Authors: P. H. Mukti, I. Kurniawati, F. Oktaviansyah, A. D. Adhitya, N. Rachmadani, R. Corputty, G. Hendrantoro, T. Fukusako

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HF Communication system is one of the attractive fields among many researchers since it can be reached long-distance areas with low-cost. This long-distance communication can be achieved by exploiting the ionosphere as a transmission medium for the HF radio wave. However, due to the dynamic nature of ionosphere, the channel characteristic of HF communication has to be investigated in order to gives better performances. Many techniques to characterize HF channel are available in the literature. However, none of those techniques describe the HF channel characteristic in low-latitude regions, especially equatorial areas. Since the ionosphere around equatorial region has an ESF phenomenon, it becomes an important investigation to characterize the wideband HF Channel in low-latitude region. On the other sides, the appearance of software-defined radio attracts the interest of many researchers. Accordingly, in this paper a SDR-based channel measurement system is proposed to be used for characterizing the HF channel in low-latitude region.

Keywords: channel characteristic, HF communication system, LabVIEW, software-defined radio, universal software radio peripheral

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Authors: Saleh Alagla, Murya Habbash

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The paper investigates whether the board of directors plays a monitoring role or not in CEO compensation for the UK firms during the eve of the recent financial crisis, 2004-2008. The use of heteroscedastic and autocorrelated error consistent estimation of the panel data shows, surprisingly, that four board characteristics variables are found to play a significant role in increasing the level of CEO compensation. This insightful result would suggest evidence of the managerial power theory in general and the cronyism hypothesis in particular. Moreover, the interesting evidence supporting managerial power perspective is that CEO-Chair duality reduces long-term compensation while increasing short-term compensation, thus suggesting that CEOs are risk averse who prefer short-term compensation to long-term compensation. Finally, consistent with the agency perspective board size is found to increase all compensation variables as expected.

Keywords: corporate governance, CEO compensation, board of directors, internal governance mechanisms, agency theory, managerial power theory, cronyism hypothesis

Procedia PDF Downloads 803

Authors: Maria Del Mar Maira Vidal, Alvaro Briales

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In this paper, we will conduct an analysis of the results of the I+D+i research project “New types of socio-existential vulnerability, support and care in Spain” (VULSOCU) (2016-20). This project had the objective to analyze the new types of vulnerability that are the result of the combination of several factors as the economic crisis, the unemployment, the transformations of the Welfare State, the individualization, etc. We have, therefore, analyzed the way that Spanish long-term unemployed over 45 years experience vulnerability and its consequences on their lives. We have focused on long-term unemployed over 45 that had previously developed stable career paths and have been looking for a job for two years or more. In order to carry out this analysis, we will try to break the dichotomy between the social and the individual, between the socio-historical and the subjectivity, to overcome some of the limits of the research on unemployment. The fieldwork consisted of more than ten focus groups and fifty in-depth interviews. The work and life ethics completely changed at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In the nineteenth century, companies had trouble maintaining their staff, but in the 21st century, unemployed workers feel that they are useless people. Workers value themselves if they have a job. This unveils that labor is a comprehensive social relationship in capitalist societies. In general, unemployed workers are not able to analyze their unemployment as a social problem. They analyze their unemployment as an individual problem. They blame themselves for their unemployment; instead of taking into account that there are millions of unemployed, they talk about themselves as if they were on their own. And the problems caused by unemployment are explained as psychological problems and are medicalized. Anyway, it is important to highlight that this is the result of an ideology and a social relationship that is part of our historical time.

Keywords: life ethics, work ethics, unemployment, unemployed over 45 years old

Procedia PDF Downloads 145

Authors: Pitcheswara Rao Nelapati

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In the process of conveying the information there may be a chance of signal being corrupted which leads to the erroneous bits in the message. The message may consist of single, double and multiple bit errors. In high-reliability applications, memory can sustain multiple soft errors due to single or multiple event upsets caused by environmental factors. The traditional hamming code with SEC-DED capability cannot be address these types of errors. It is possible to use powerful non-binary BCH code such as Reed-Solomon code to address multiple errors. However, it could take at least a couple dozen cycles of latency to complete first correction and run at a relatively slow speed. In order to overcome this drawback i.e., to increase speed and latency we are using reed-Muller code.

Keywords: SEC-DED, BCH code, Reed-Solomon code, Reed-Muller code

Procedia PDF Downloads 429

Authors: Salma Loukman, Reda Benmrid, Najat Bouchmaa, Hicham Hboub, Rachid El Fatimy, Rachid Benhida

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In this study, it use integrated transcriptomic datasets from the GEO repository with the purpose of investigating immune dysregulation in COVID-19. Thus, in this context, we decided to be focused on NK cells and CD14+ monocytes gene expression, considering datasets GSE165461 and GSE198256, respectively. Other datasets with PBMCs, lung, olfactory, and sensory epithelium and lymph were used to provide robust validation for our results. This approach gave an integrated view of the immune responses in COVID-19, pointing out a set of potential biomarkers and therapeutic targets with special regard to standards of physiological conditions. IFI27, MKI67, CENPF, MBP, HBA2, TMEM158, THBD, HBA1, LHFPL2, SLA, and AC104564.3 were identified as key genes from our analysis that have critical biological processes related to inflammation, immune regulation, oxidative stress, and metabolic processes. Consequently, such processes are important in understanding the heterogeneous clinical manifestations of COVID-19—from acute to long-term effects now known as 'long COVID'. Subsequent validation with additional datasets consolidated these genes as robust biomarkers with an important role in the diagnosis of COVID-19 and the prediction of its severity. Moreover, their enrichment in key pathophysiological pathways presented them as potential targets for therapeutic intervention.The results provide insight into the molecular dynamics of COVID-19 caused by cells such as NK cells and other monocytes. Thus, this study constitutes a solid basis for targeted diagnostic and therapeutic development and makes relevant contributions to ongoing research efforts toward better management and mitigation of the pandemic.

Keywords: SARS-COV-2, RNA-seq, biomarkers, severity, long COVID-19, bio analysis

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Authors: Bandar Alahmadi, Lethia Jackson

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Machine Learning model is used today in many real-life applications. The safety and security of such model is important, so the results of the model are as accurate as possible. One challenge of machine learning model security is the adversarial examples attack. Adversarial examples are designed by the attacker to cause the machine learning model to misclassify the input. We propose a method to generate adversarial examples to attack image classifiers. We are modifying the successfully classified images, so a classifier misclassifies them after the modification. In our method, we do not update the whole image, but instead we detect the important region, modify it, place it back to the original image, and then run it through a classifier. The algorithm modifies the detected region using two methods. First, it will add abstract image matrix on back of the detected image matrix. Then, it will perform a rotation attack to rotate the detected region around its axes, and embed the trace of image in image background. Finally, the attacked region is placed in its original position, from where it was removed, and a smoothing filter is applied to smooth the background with foreground. We test our method in cascade classifier, and the algorithm is efficient, the classifier confident has dropped to almost zero. We also try it in CNN (Convolutional neural network) with higher setting and the algorithm was successfully worked.

Keywords: adversarial examples, attack, computer vision, image processing

Procedia PDF Downloads 339

Authors: Paul Essel, Eric T. Glover, Gustav Gbeddy, Yaw Adjei-Kyereme, Abdallah M. A. Dawood, Evans M. Ameho, Emmanuel A. Aberikae

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Radioactive materials mainly in the form of Sealed Radioactive Sources are being used in various sectors (medicine, agriculture, industry, research, and teaching) for the socio-economic development of Ghana. The use of these beneficial radioactive materials has resulted in an inventory of Disused Sealed Radioactive Sources (DSRS) in storage. Most of the DSRS are legacy/historic sources which cannot be returned to their manufacturer or country of origin. Though small in volume, DSRS can be intensively radioactive and create a significant safety and security liability. They need to be managed in a safe and secure manner in accordance with the fundamental safety objective. The Radioactive Waste Management Center (RWMC) of the Ghana Atomic Energy Commission (GAEC) is currently storing a significant volume of DSRS. The initial activities of the DSRS range from 7.4E+5 Bq to 6.85E+14 Bq. If not managed properly, such DSRS can represent a potential hazard to human health and the environment. Storage is an important interim step, especially for DSRS containing very short-lived radionuclides, which can decay to exemption levels within a few years. Long-term storage, however, is considered an unsustainable option for DSRS with long half-lives hence the need for a disposal facility. The GAEC intends to use the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA’s) Borehole Disposal System (BDS) to provide a safe, secure, and cost-effective disposal option to dispose of its DSRS in storage. The proposed site for implementation of the BDS is on the GAEC premises at Kwabenya. The site has been characterized to gain a general understanding in terms of its regional setting, its past evolution and likely future natural evolution over the assessment time frame. Due to the long half-lives of some of the radionuclides to be disposed of (Ra-226 with half-life of 1600 years), the engineered barriers of the system must be robust to contain these radionuclides for this long period before they decay to harmless levels. There is the need to assess the safety related functions of the engineered barriers of this disposal system.

Keywords: radionuclides, disposal, radioactive waste, engineered barrier

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Authors: Eman Merza, Stephen Pearson, Glen Lichtwark, Peter Malliaras

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The Achilles tendon (AT) exhibits volume changes related to fluid flow under acute load which may be linked to changes in stiffness. Fluid flow provides a mechanical signal for cellular activity and may be one mechanism that facilitates tendon adaptation. This study aimed to investigate whether isometric intervention involving a high level of load duration and intensity could maximize the immediate reduction in AT volume and stiffness compared to interventions involving a lower level of load duration and intensity. Sixteen healthy participants (12 males, 4 females; age= 24.4 ± 9.4 years; body mass= 70.9 ± 16.1 kg; height= 1.7 ± 0.1 m) performed three isometric interventions of varying levels of load duration (2 s and 8 s) and intensity (35% and 75% maximal voluntary isometric contraction) over a 3 week period. Freehand 3D ultrasound was used to measure free AT volume (at rest) and length (at 35%, 55%, and 75% of maximum plantarflexion force) pre- and post-interventions. The slope of the force-elongation curve over these force levels represented individual stiffness (N/mm). Large reductions in free AT volume and stiffness resulted in response to long-duration high-intensity loading whilst less reduction was produced with a lower load intensity. In contrast, no change in free AT volume and a small increase in AT stiffness occurred with lower load duration. These findings suggest that the applied load on the AT must be heavy and sustained for a long duration to maximize immediate volume reduction, which might be an acute response that enables optimal long-term tendon adaptation via mechanotransduction pathways.

Keywords: Achilles tendon, volume, stiffness, free tendon, 3d ultrasound

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Authors: Izabela Poprawa, Alina Chachulska-Zymelka, Lukasz Chajec, Grazyna Wilczek, Piotr Wilczek, Sebastian Student, Magdalena Rost-Roszkowska

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Heavy metals polluting the environment, especially soil, have a harmful effect on organisms, because they can damage the organ structure, disturb their function and cause developmental disorders. They can affect not only the somatic tissues but also the germinal tissues. In the natural environment, plants and animals are exposed to short- and long-term exposure to these stressors, which have a major influence on the functioning of these organisms. Numerous animals have been treated as the bioindicators of the environment. Therefore, studies on any alterations caused by, e.g., heavy metals are in the center of interests of not only environmental but also medical and biological science. Myriapods are invertebrates which are bioindicators of the environment. One of the species which lives in the upper layers of soil, particularly under stones and rocks is Lithobius forficatus (Chilopoda), commonly known as the brown centipede or stone centipede. It is a European species of the family Lithobiidae. This centipede living in the soil is exposed to, e.g., heavy metals such as cadmium, lead, arsenic. The main goal of our project was to analyze the impact of long-term exposure to cadmium on the structure of ovary with the emphasis on the course of oogenesis. As the material for analysis of cadmium exposure to ovaries, we chose the centipede species, L. forficatus. Animals were divided into two experimental groups: C – the control group, the animals cultured in laboratory conditions in a horticultural soil; Cd2 – the animals cultured in a horticultural soil supplemented with 80 mg/kg (dry weight) of CdCl2 for 45 days – long-term exposure. Animals were fed with Acheta and Chironomus larvae maintained in tap water. The analyzes were carried out using transmission electron microscopy (TEM), flow cytometry and laser scanning (confocal) microscopy. Here we present the results of long-term exposure to cadmium concentration in soil on the organ responsible for female germ cell formation. Analysis with the use of the transmission electron microscope showed changes in the ultrastructure of both somatic and germ cells in the ovary. Moreover, quantitative analysis revealed the decrease in the percentage of cells viability, the increase in the percentage of cells with depolarized mitochondria and increasing the number of early apoptotic cells. All these changes were statistically significant compared to the control. Additionally, an increase in the ADP/ATP index was recorded. However, changes were not statistically significant to the control. Acknowledgment: The study has been financed by the National Science Centre, Poland, grant no 2017/25/B/NZ4/00420.

Keywords: cadmium, centipede, ovary, ultrastructure

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Authors: Sultan Daud, John P. Forth, Nikolaos Nikitas

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The current study aims to highlight the loading characteristics impact on the time evolution (focusing particularly on long term effects) of the deformation of realized reinforced concrete beams. Namely the tension stiffening code provisions (i.e. within Eurocode 2) are reviewed with a clear intention to reassess their operational value and predicting capacity. In what follows the experimental programme adopted along with some preliminary findings and numerical modelling attempts are presented. For a range of long slender reinforced concrete simply supported beams (4200 mm) constant static sustained and repeated cyclic loadings were applied mapping the time evolution of deformation. All experiments were carried out at the Heavy Structures Lab of the University of Leeds. During tests the mid-span deflection, creep coefficient and shrinkage strains were monitored for duration of 90 days. The obtained results are set against the values predicted by Eurocode 2 and the tools within an FE commercial package (i.e. Midas FEA) to yield that existing knowledge and practise is at times over-conservative.

Keywords: Eurocode2, midas fea, repeated, sustained loading.

Procedia PDF Downloads 347

Authors: Vidhu Mitha Goutham, Ruma Mukherjee

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The low availability of well-trained, unlimited, dynamic-access models for specific languages makes it hard for corporate users to adopt quick translation techniques and incorporate them into product solutions. As translation tasks increasingly require a dynamic sequence learning curve; stable, cost-free opensource models are scarce. We survey and compare current translation techniques and propose a modified sequence to sequence model repurposed with attention techniques. Sequence learning using an encoder-decoder model is now paving the path for higher precision levels in translation. Using a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) encoder and a Recurrent Neural Network (RNN) decoder background, we use Fairseq tools to produce an end-to-end bilingually trained Spanish-English machine translation model including source language detection. We acquire competitive results using a duo-lingo-corpus trained model to provide for prospective, ready-made plug-in use for compound sentences and document translations. Our model serves a decent system for large, organizational data translation needs. While acknowledging its shortcomings and future scope, it also identifies itself as a well-optimized deep neural network model and solution.

Keywords: attention, encoder-decoder, Fairseq, Seq2Seq, Spanish, translation

Procedia PDF Downloads 175

Authors: Sanjay Singh, Swati Jaiswal, Prashant Mishra

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Nanoparticle based formulations of drug delivery systems have shown their potential in improving the performance of existing drugs and have opened avenues for new therapies. Calendula extract is a low cost, wide spectrum bioactive material that has been used for a long term therapy of various infections. Aim: The aim of this study was to develop Calendula officinalis extract based nanoformulations and to study the antibacterial activity of either Calendula extract loaded chitosan nanoparticles or Calendula extract coated silver nanoparticles for increased bioavailability and their long term effect. Methods: Chitosan nanoparticles were prepared by the process of ionotropic gelation, based on interaction between the negative groups of tri polyphosphate (TPP) and positively charged amino groups of chitosan. The size of the Calendula extract-loaded chitosan particles was determined using dynamic light scattering and scanning electron microscopy. Antibacterial activities of these formulations were determined based on minimum inhibitory concentration and time kill studies. In addition, silver nanoparticles were also synthesized in the presence of Calendula extract and characterized by UV visible spectrum, DLS and XRD. Experiments were conducted on 96-plates against two Gram-positive bacteria; Staphylococcus aureus and Bacillus subtilis two Gram-negative bacteria; Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Results: Results demonstrated time dependent antibacterial activity against different microbes studied. Both Calendula extract and Calendula extract loaded chitosan nanoparticles have shown good antimicrobial activity against both Gram positive and Gram negative bacteria. Conclusion: Calendula extract loaded chitosan nanoparticles and calendula extract coated silver nanoparticles are potential antibacterial for their long term antibacterial effects.

Keywords: antibacterial, Calendula extract, chitosan nanoparticles, silver nanoparticles

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Authors: Abiodun Musbau Lawal, Benjamin Oladapo Olley

Abstract:

Long Distance Truck Drivers (LDTDs) have been found to be a high-risk group in the spread of HIV/AIDS globally; perhaps, due to their high Sexual Risk Behaviours (SRBs). Interventions for reducing SRBs in trucking population have not been fully exploited. A quasi-experimental control group pretest-posttest design was used to assess the efficacy of psycho-education and behavioural skills training in reducing SRBs among LDTDs. Sixteen drivers rivers were randomly assigned into either experimental or control groups using balloting technique. A questionnaire was used as an instrument for data collection. Repeated measures t-test and independent t-test were used to test hypotheses. The intervention had a significant effect on the SRBs among LDTDs at post-test(t{7}=6.01, p<.01) and at followup (t{7}=6.42, p<.01). No significant difference in sexual risk behaviour of LDTDs at post-test and at follow-up stage. Similarly, intervention had significant effects on sexual risk behaviour at post-test (t {14}=- 4.69, p<.05) and at follow-up (t {14}= -9.56, p < .05) respectively. At post-test and follow-up stages, drivers in experimental group reported reduced SRBs than those in the control group. Drivers in an experimental group reported lower sexual risk behaviour a week after intervention as well as at three months follow-up than those in the control group. It is concluded that HIV/AIDS preventive intervention that provides the necessary informational and behavioural skills content can significantly impact long distance truck drivers sexual risk behaviours.

Keywords: HIV/AIDS interventions, long distance truck drivers, Nigeria, sexual risk behaviours

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Authors: Shiliang Wu, Huanxin Zhang

Abstract:

Mercury has been well-known for its negative effects on wildlife, public health as well as the ecosystem. Once emitted into atmosphere, mercury can be transformed into different forms or enter the ecosystem through dry deposition or wet deposition. Some fraction of the mercury will be reemitted back into the atmosphere and be subject to the same cycle. In addition, the relatively long lifetime of elemental mercury in the atmosphere enables it to be transported long distances from source regions to receptor regions. Global change such as climate change and land use/land cover change impose significant challenges for mercury pollution control besides the efforts to regulate mercury anthropogenic emissions. In this study, we use a global chemical transport model (GEOS-Chem) to examine the potential impacts from changes in climate and land use/land cover on the global budget of mercury as well as its atmospheric transport, chemical transformation, and deposition. We carry out a suite of sensitivity model simulations to separate the impacts on atmospheric mercury associated with changes in climate and land use/land cover. Both climate change and land use/land cover change are found to have significant impacts on global mercury budget but through different pathways. Land use/land cover change primarily increase mercury dry deposition in northern mid-latitudes over continental regions and central Africa. Climate change enhances the mobilization of mercury from soil and ocean reservoir to the atmosphere. Also, dry deposition is enhanced over most continental areas while a change in future precipitation dominates the change in mercury wet deposition. We find that 2000-2050 climate change could increase the global atmospheric burden of mercury by 5% and mercury deposition by up to 40% in some regions. Changes in land use and land cover also increase mercury deposition over some continental regions, by up to 40%. The change in the lifetime of atmospheric mercury has important implications for long-range transport of mercury. Our case study shows that changes in climate and land use and cover could significantly affect the source-receptor relationships for mercury.

Keywords: mercury, toxic pollutant, atmospheric transport, deposition, climate change

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Authors: Earleen Jane Fuentes, Regeene Melarese Lim, Franklin Benjamin Tapia, Alexis Pantola

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Mobile Ad-hoc Network (MANET) is an infrastructure-less network of mobile devices, also known as nodes. These nodes heavily rely on each other’s resources such as memory, computing power, and energy. Thus, some nodes may become selective in forwarding packets so as to conserve their resources. These nodes are called misleading nodes. Several reputation-based techniques (e.g. CORE, CONFIDANT, LARS, SORI, OCEAN) and acknowledgment-based techniques (e.g. TWOACK, S-TWOACK, EAACK) have been proposed to detect such nodes. These techniques do not appropriately punish misleading nodes. Hence, this paper addresses the limitations of these techniques using a system called MINDRA.

Keywords: acknowledgment-based techniques, mobile ad-hoc network, selfish nodes, reputation-based techniques

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Authors: Achiron Anat, Mathilda Mandel, Mayust Sue, Achiron Reuven, Gurevich Michael

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Introduction: As coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccination is currently spreading around the world, it is of importance to assess the ability of multiple sclerosis (MS) patients to mount an appropriate immune response to the vaccine in the context of disease-modifying treatments (DMT’s). Objectives: Evaluate immunity generated following COVID-19 vaccination in MS patients, and assess factors contributing to protective humoral and cellular immune responses in MS patients vaccinated against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV2) virus infection. Methods: Review our recent data related to (1) the safety of PfizerBNT162b2 COVID-19 mRNA vaccine in adult MS patients; (2) the humoral post-vaccination SARS-CoV2 IgG response in MS vaccinees using anti-spike protein-based serology; and (3) the cellular immune response of memory B-cells specific for SARS-CoV-2 receptor-binding domain (RBD) and memory T-cells secreting IFN-g and/or IL-2 in response to SARS-CoV2 peptides using ELISpot/Fluorospot assays in MS patients either untreated or under treatment with fingolimod, cladribine, or ocrelizumab; (4) covariate parameters related to mounting protective immune responses. Results: COVID-19 vaccine proved safe in MS patients, and the adverse event profile was mainly characterised by pain at the injection site, fatigue, and headache. Not any increased risk of relapse activity was noted and the rate of patients with acute relapse was comparable to the relapse rate in non-vaccinated patients during the corresponding follow-up period. A mild increase in the rate of adverse events was noted in younger MS patients, among patients with lower disability, and in patients treated with DMTs. Following COVID-19 vaccination protective humoral immune response was significantly decreased in fingolimod- and ocrelizumab- treated MS patients. SARS-CoV2 specific B-cell and T-cell cellular responses were respectively decreased. Untreated MS patients and patients treated with cladribine demonstrated protective humoral and cellular immune responses, similar to healthy vaccinated subjects. Conclusions: COVID-19 BNT162b2 vaccine proved as safe for MS patients. No increased risk of relapse activity was noted post-vaccination. Although COVID-19 vaccination is new, accumulated data demonstrate differences in immune responses under various DMT’s. This knowledge can help to construct appropriate COVID-19 vaccine guidelines to ensure proper immune responses for MS patients.

Keywords: covid-19, vaccination, multiple sclerosis, IgG

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Authors: Yasemin Kaya, Ahmet N. Eraslan

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In this study, the thermoelastic behavior of a long tube is studied by taking into account the temperature dependency of all mechanical and thermal properties. As the tube is heated slowly, an uncoupled solution procedure is adopted under free and radially constrained boundary conditions. The nonlinear heat conduction equation is solved by a finite element collocation procedure and the corresponding distributions of stress and strain are computed by shooting iterations. The computational model is verified in comparison to the analytical solution by shutting down the temperature dependency of physical properties. In the analysis, experimental data available in the literature is used to describe the coefficient of thermal expansion $\alpha$, the thermal conductivity $k$, the modulus of rigidity $G$, the yield strength $\sigma_{0}$, and the Poisson's ratio $\nu$ of Nickel. Results of the analysis are presented in comparison to those having constant physical properties. As a result of the calculations, the temperature dependency of the material properties should be taken into account at higher temperature ranges.

Keywords: thermoelasticity, long tube, temperature-dependent properties, internal heating

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Authors: James Newman

Abstract:

Process mining is an emerging technology that looks to serialize enterprise data in time series data. It has been used by many companies and has been the subject of a variety of research papers. However, the majority of current efforts have looked at how to best create process mining from standard relational databases. This paper is the first pass at outlining a database custom-built for the minimal viable product of process mining. We present Block Miner, a blockchain protocol to store process mining data across a distributed network. We demonstrate the feasibility of storing process mining data on the blockchain. We present a proof of concept and show how the intersection of these two technologies helps to solve a variety of issues, including but not limited to ransomware attacks, tax documentation, and conflict resolution.

Keywords: blockchain, process mining, memory optimization, protocol

Procedia PDF Downloads 102