Search results for: clinical psychology

Authors: Sara Kakuk

Abstract:

Pedagogy has always been open to other disciplines that reflect about the educational process (philosophy, sociology, psychology, anthropology, technology, etc.). Its interdisciplinary openness puts education, as the subject of pedagogy within a broader context of the community, enabling the knowledge of other disciplines to contribute to a better understanding of the fundamental pedagogical notion of education. The purpose of pedagogy as a science serves humans, strives towards humans, must be for humans, and this is its ultimate goal. Humans are essentially dependent on education, which is also considered as a category of humans’ being, because through education an entire world develops in humans. Anthropological assumptions of humans as "deficient beings" see the solution in education, but they also indicate a wealth of shortcomings, because they provide an opportunity for enrichment and formation of culture, living and the self. In that context, this paper illustrates the determination of pedagogy through an anthropological conception of humans and the phenomenon of education. It presents a review of anthropological ideas about education, by providing an analysis of relevant literature dealing with the anthropological notion of humans, which provides fruitful conditions for a pedagogical reconsideration of education.

Keywords: Pedagogy, education, humans, anthropology, culture.

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Authors: M. Izvercianu, L. Ivascu

Abstract:

This paper presents an innovative computer system that contributes to sustainable development of the enterprise. The research refers to a rethinking of traditional systems of collaboration and risk assessment, present in any organization, leading to a sustainable enterprise. This concept integrates emerging tools that allow the implementation and exploitation of the collective intelligence of the enterprise, allowing the exchange of contextual, agile and simplified information, and collaboration with networks of customers and partners in an environment where risks are controlled. Risk assessment is done in a systemic way: the enterprise as the system compared to the contained departments and the enterprise as a subsystem compared to: families of international standards and sustainability-s responsibilities. The enterprise, in this systemic vision, responds to the requirements that any existing system to operate continuously in an indefinite future without reaching key resource depletion. The research is done by integrating collaborative science, engineering, management, psychology, obtaining thus a cornerstone of sustainable development of the enterprise.

Keywords: Enterprise 2.0, ISO, Risk management, Sustainable development

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Authors: Denis Trcek

Abstract:

Trust is essential for further and wider acceptance of contemporary e-services. It was first addressed almost thirty years ago in Trusted Computer System Evaluation Criteria standard by the US DoD. But this and other proposed approaches of that period were actually solving security. Roughly some ten years ago, methodologies followed that addressed trust phenomenon at its core, and they were based on Bayesian statistics and its derivatives, while some approaches were based on game theory. However, trust is a manifestation of judgment and reasoning processes. It has to be dealt with in accordance with this fact and adequately supported in cyber environment. On the basis of the results in the field of psychology and our own findings, a methodology called qualitative algebra has been developed, which deals with so far overlooked elements of trust phenomenon. It complements existing methodologies and provides a basis for a practical technical solution that supports management of trust in contemporary computing environments. Such solution is also presented at the end of this paper.

Keywords: internet security, trust management, multi-agent systems, reasoning and judgment, modeling and simulation, qualitativealgebra

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Authors: Young Geun Kim, Tae Woo Lee, Changmin Yeo, Jung min Yoo, Yeo Jin Kang, Tack-Joong Kim, Byungjo Jung, Ji Hun Cha, Chan Hoi Hur, Dong-Sup Kim, Ki Jung Park, Han Sung Kim

Abstract:

The intention of this lessons is to assess the probability of optical coherence tomography (OCT) for biometric recognition. The OCT is the foundation on an optical signal acquisition and processing method and has the micrometer-resolution. In this study, we used the porcine skin for verifying the abovementioned means. The porcine tissue was sound acknowledged for structural and immunohistochemical similarity with human skin, so it could be suitable for pre-clinical trial as investigational specimen. For this reason, it was tattooed by the tattoo machine with the tattoo-pigment. We detected the pattern of the tattooed skin by the OCT according to needle speed. The result was consistent with the histology images. This result showed that the OCT was effective to examine the tattooed skin section noninvasively. It might be available to identify morphological changes inside the skin.

Keywords: mechanical skin damage, optical coherence tomography, tattooed skin

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Authors: Dení Stincer Gómez, Zuraya Monroy Nasr

Abstract:

Pedagogy of science historically has given priority to teaching strategies that mobilize the cognitive mechanisms leaving out emotional mechanisms. Modern epistemology, cognitive psychology and psychoanalysis begin to argue and prove that emotions are relevant epistemological functions. They are 1) the selection function: that allows the perception and reason choose, to multiple alternative explanation of a particular fact, those are relevant and discard those that are not, 2) heuristic function: that is related to the activation cognitive processes that are effective in the process of knowing; and 3) the so-called content-bearing function: it argues that emotions provide the material reasoning that is subsequently transformed into linguistic propositions. According to these hypotheses, scientific knowledge seems to come from emotions that meet these functions. This paper argues that science education must start from the presence of certain emotions in the learner if we want to form citizens with a scientific or cultural future.

Keywords: Epistemic emotions, science education, formation of citizens and scientists, epistemic functions of emotions.

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Authors: J. Luché-Thayer, C. Perronne, C. Meseko

Abstract:

We reviewed how certain institutional policies and practices, as well as questionable research, are creating obstacles to care and informed consent for Lyme and relapsing fever Borreliosis patients. The interference is denying access to treatments that meet the internationally accepted standards as set by the Institute of Medicine. This obstruction to care contributes to significant human suffering, disability and negative economic effect across many nations and in many regions of the world. We note how evidence based medicine emphasizes the importance of clinical experience and patient-centered care and how these patients benefit significantly when their rights to choose among treatment options are upheld.  

Keywords: Conflicts of interest, obstacles to healthcare accessibility, patient-centered care, the right to informed consent.

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Authors: Khin May Win, Nan Sai Moon Kham

Abstract:

Identification of cancer genes that might anticipate the clinical behaviors from different types of cancer disease is challenging due to the huge number of genes and small number of patients samples. The new method is being proposed based on supervised learning of classification like support vector machines (SVMs).A new solution is described by the introduction of the Maximized Margin (MM) in the subset criterion, which permits to get near the least generalization error rate. In class prediction problem, gene selection is essential to improve the accuracy and to identify genes for cancer disease. The performance of the new method was evaluated with real-world data experiment. It can give the better accuracy for classification.

Keywords: Microarray data, feature selection, recursive featureelimination, support vector machines.

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Authors: Simon Brown

Abstract:

Glomerular filtration rate (GFR) is a measure of kidney function. It is usually estimated from serum concentrations of cystatin C or creatinine although there has been considerable debate in the literature about (i) the best equation to use and (ii) the variability in the correlation between the concentrations of creatinine and cystatin C. The equations for GFR can be written in a general form and from these I calculate the error of the GFR estimates associated with analyte measurement error. These show that the error of the GFR estimates is such that it is not possible to distinguish between the equations over much of the concentration range of either analyte. The general forms of the equations are also used to derive an expression for the concentration of cystatin C as a function of the concentration of creatinine. This equation shows that these analyte concentrations are not linearly related. Clinical reports of cystatin C and creatinine concentration are consistent with the expression derived.

Keywords: creatinine, cystatin C, error analysis, glomerularfiltration rate, measurement error.

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Authors: T. Bovornvirakit, K. Viravaidya

Abstract:

Acute kidney injury (AKI) is a new worldwide public health problem. A diagnosis of this disease using creatinine is still a problem in clinical practice. Therefore, a measurement of biomarkers responsible for AKI has received much attention in the past couple years. Cytokine interleukin-18 (IL-18) was reported as one of the early biomarkers for AKI. The most commonly used method to detect this biomarker is an immunoassay. This study used a planar platform to perform an immunoassay using fluorescence for detection. In this study, anti-IL-18 antibody was immobilized onto a microscope slide using a covalent binding method. Make-up samples were diluted at the concentration between 10 to 1000 pg/ml to create a calibration curve. The precision of the system was determined using a coefficient of variability (CV), which was found to be less than 10%. The performance of this immunoassay system was compared with the measurement from ELISA.

Keywords: Acute kidney injury, Acute renal failure, Antibody immobilization, Interleukin-18

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Authors: Stuart Henry, Philip Morrow, John Winder, Bryan Scotney

Abstract:

The stereophotogrammetry modality is gaining more widespread use in the clinical setting. Registration and visualization of this data, in conjunction with conventional 3D volumetric image modalities, provides virtual human data with textured soft tissue and internal anatomical and structural information. In this investigation computed tomography (CT) and stereophotogrammetry data is acquired from 4 anatomical phantoms and registered using the trimmed iterative closest point (TrICP) algorithm. This paper fully addresses the issue of imaging artifacts around the stereophotogrammetry surface edge using the registered CT data as a reference. Several iterative algorithms are implemented to automatically identify and remove stereophotogrammetry surface edge outliers, improving the overall visualization of the combined stereophotogrammetry and CT data. This paper shows that outliers at the surface edge of stereophotogrammetry data can be successfully removed automatically.

Keywords: Data cleansing, stereophotogrammetry.

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Authors: Dorota Witkowska, Paweł Gosek, Lukasz Swiecicki, Wojciech Jernajczyk, Bruce J. West, Miroslaw Latka

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In clinical practice, the selection of an antidepressant often degrades to lengthy trial-and-error. In this work we employ a normalized wavelet power of alpha waves as a biomarker of antidepressant treatment response. This novel EEG metric takes into account both non-stationarity and intersubject variability of alpha waves. We recorded resting, 19-channel EEG (closed eyes) in 22 inpatients suffering from unipolar (UD, n=10) or bipolar (BD, n=12) depression. The EEG measurement was done at the end of the short washout period which followed previously unsuccessful pharmacotherapy. The normalized alpha wavelet power of 11 responders was markedly different than that of 11 nonresponders at several, mostly temporoparietal sites. Using the prediction of treatment response based on the normalized alpha wavelet power, we achieved 81.8% sensitivity and 81.8% specificity for channel T4.

Keywords: Alpha waves, antidepressant, treatment outcome, wavelet.

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Authors: Campbell Townsend, David Hamilton

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Previous research has demonstrated that negative attitudes towards people with physical disabilities and obesity are predicted by a component of perceived vulnerability to disease; germ aversion. These findings have been suggested as illustrations of an evolved but over-active mechanism which promotes the avoidance of pathogen-carrying individuals. To date, this interpretation of attitude formation has not been explored with regard to people with intellectual disability, and no attempts have been made to examine possible mediating factors. This study examined attitudes in 333 adults and demonstrated that the moderate positive relationship between germ aversion and negative attitudes toward people with intellectual disability is fully mediated by social dominance orientation, a general preference for hierarchies and inequalities among social groups. These findings have implications for the design of programs which attempt to promote community acceptance and inclusion of people with disabilities.

Keywords: avoidance, evolutionary psychology, intellectual disability, prejudice

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Authors: Pamela L. Knox, Linda R. Guthrie

Abstract:

Trauma in early life is widely regarded as a cause for adult mental health problems. This study explores the role of secondary trauma on later functioning in a sample of 359 university students enrolled in undergraduate psychology classes in the United States. Participants were initially divided into four groups based on 1) having directly experienced trauma (assaultive violence), 2) having directly experienced trauma and secondary traumatization through the unanticipated death of a close friend or family member or witnessing of an injury or shocking even), 3) having no experience of direct trauma but having experienced indirect trauma (secondary trauma), or 4) reporting no exposure. Participants completed a battery of measures on concepts associated with psychological functioning which included measures of psychological well-being, problem solving, coping and resiliency. Findings discuss differences in psychological functioning and resilience based on participants who experienced secondary traumatization and assaultive violence versus secondary traumatization alone.

Keywords: Psychological Functioning, Resiliency, Trauma, Abuse

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Authors: Amr A. Fouad, Waleed H. Albuali, Iyad Jresat

Abstract:

The possible therapeutic effect of cannabidiol, the major non-psychotropic Cannabis constituent, was investigated against acute hepatotoxicity induced by a single oral dose of acetaminophen (500mg/kg) in mice. Cannabidiol (two intraperitoneal injections, 5mg/kg, each) was given 1 hour and 12 hours following acetaminophen administration. Acetaminophen administration caused significant elevations of serum alanine aminotransferase, and hepatic malondialdehyde, and nitric oxide levels, and a significant decrease in hepatic reduced glutathione. Cannabidiol significantly attenuated the deterioration in the measured biochemical parameters resulted from acetaminophen administration. Also, histopathological examination showed that cannabidiol markedly attenuated ameliorated acetaminophen-induced liver tissue damage. These results emphasize that cannabidiol represents a potential therapeutic option to protect against acetaminophen hepartotoxicity which is a common clinical problem.

Keywords: cannabidiol, acetaminophen, liver, mice.

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Authors: Joseph Ignagni, Rebecca E. Deen

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There are many views on how human decision makers behave. In this work, the Justices of the United States Supreme Court will be viewed in terms of constrained maximization and cognitivecybernetic theory. This paper will integrate research in such fields as law, political science, psychology, economics and decision making theory. It will be argued that due to its heavy workload, the Supreme Court is forced to make decisions in a boundedly rational manner. The ideas and theory put forward here will be tested in the area of the Court’s decisions involving religion. Therefore, the cases involving the U.S. Constitution’s Free Exercise Clause and Establishment Clause will be analyzed. Also, variables such as the U.S. government’s involvement in these cases will be considered. The years to be studied will be 1987-2011.

Keywords: Establishment Clause, Free Exercise Clause, U.S. Constitution, U.S. Supreme Court.

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Authors: Jeevan Malayan, Aparna Warrier, Padmasani Venkat Ramanan, Sanjeeva Reddy N, Elanchezhiyan Manickan

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MMR vaccine failure had been reported globally and here we report that it occurs now in India. Samples were collected from clinically suspected mumps cases were subjected for anti mumps antibodies, virus isolation, RT-PCR, sequencing and phylogenetic tree analysis. 56 samples collected from men and women belonging to various age groups. 30 had been vaccinated and the status of 26 patients was unknown. 28 out of 30 samples were found to be symptomatic and positive for Mumps IgM, indicating active mumps infection in 93.4% of the vaccinated population. A phylogenetic tree comparison of the clinical isolate is shown to be genotype C which is distinct from vaccine strain. Our study clearly sending warning signs that MMR vaccine is a failure and it needs to be revamped for the human use by increasing its efficacy and efficiency.

Keywords: Genotype C, Mumps virus, MMR vaccine, Sero types.

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Authors: Revanth Sai Kosaraju, Michael Ramscar, Melody Dye

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Accounts of language acquisition differ significantly in their treatment of the role of prediction in language learning. In particular, nativist accounts posit that probabilistic learning about words and word sequences has little to do with how children come to use language. The accuracy of this claim was examined by testing whether distributional probabilities and frequency contributed to how well 3-4 year olds repeat simple word chunks. Corresponding chunks were the same length, expressed similar content, and were all grammatically acceptable, yet the results of the study showed marked differences in performance when overall distributional frequency varied. It was found that a distributional model of language predicted the empirical findings better than a number of other models, replicating earlier findings and showing that children attend to distributional probabilities in an adult corpus. This suggested that language is more prediction-and-error based, rather than on abstract rules which nativist camps suggest.

Keywords: Abstractness, child psychology, language acquisition, prediction and error.

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Authors: Takashi Yamauchi, Anju Sudo, Yoshihiko Tanno

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Recently, it has been suggested that thought control strategies aimed at controlling unwanted thoughts may be used to cope with paranoid thoughts in both clinical and nonclinical samples. The current study aims to examine the type of thought control strategies that were associated with the frequency of paranoid thoughts in nonclinical samples. A total of 159 Japanese undergraduate students completed the two scales–the Paranoia Checklist and the Thought Control Questionnaire. A hierarchical multiple regression analysis demonstrated that worry-based control strategies were associated with paranoid thoughts, whereas distraction- and social-based control strategies were inversely associated with paranoid thoughts. Our findings suggest that in a nonclinical population, worry-based strategies may be especially maladaptive, whereas distraction- and social-based strategies may be adaptive to paranoid thoughts.

Keywords: Nonclinical population, paranoid thoughts, thoughtcontrol strategies.

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Authors: D.O. Omondi, M.K. Walingo, G.M. Mbagaya, L.O.A. Othuon

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Many studies have applied the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) in predicting health behaviors among unique populations. However, a new paradigm is emerging where focus is now directed to modification and expansion of the TPB model rather than utilization of the traditional theory. This review proposes new models modified from the Theory of Planned Behavior and suggest an appropriate study design that can be used to test the models within physical activity and dietary practice domains among Type 2 diabetics in Kenya. The review was conducted by means of literature search in the field of nutrition behavior, health psychology and mixed methods using predetermined key words. The results identify pre-intention and post intention gaps within the TPB model that need to be filled. Additional psychosocial factors are proposed to be included in the TPB model to generate new models and the efficacy of these models tested using mixed methods design.

Keywords: Physical activity, diet, Type 2 diabetes, behaviorchange theory, model.

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Authors: E. Muneera, A. Anuar, A. S. Zulkiflee

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The evolution in project management was triggered by the changes in management philosophy and practices in order to maintain competitive advantage and continuous success in the field. The purpose of this paper is to highlight the practicality of cognitive style and unlearning approach in influencing the achievement of project success by project managers. It introduces the concept of planning, knowing and creating style from cognitive style field in the light of achieving time, cost, quality and stakeholders appreciation in project success context. Further it takes up a discussion of the unlearning approach as a moderator in enhancing the relationship between cognitive style and project success. The paper bases itself on literature review from established disciplines like psychology, sociology and philosophy regarding cognitive style, unlearning and project success in general. The analysis and synthesis of literature in the subject area a conceptual paper is utilized as the basis of future research to form a comprehensive framework for project managers in enhancing the project management competency.

Keywords: Cognitive Style, Project Managers, Project Success, Unlearning.

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Authors: Ruth Lijtmaer, Roy Moodley, Shafik Sunderani

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The argument that self-disclosure will change the psychoanalytic process into a socio-cultural niche distorting the therapeutic alliance and compromise therapeutic effectiveness is still the widely held belief amongst many psychotherapists. This paper considers the issues surrounding culture, disclosure and concealment since they remain largely untheorized and clinically problematic. The first part of the paper will critically examine the theory and practice of psychoanalysis across cultures, and explore the reasons for culturally diverse patients to conceal rather than disclose their feelings and thoughts in the transference. This is followed by a discussion on how immigrant analysts- anonymity is difficult to maintain since diverse nationalities, language and accents provide clues to the therapist-s and patient-s origins. Through personal clinical examples of one the author-s (who is an immigrant) the paper analyses the transference-countertransference paradigm and how it reflects in the analyst-s self-revelation.

Keywords: Self-disclosure, cross-cultural, transferencecountertransference, immigrant therapist.

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Authors: Mustafa M. Donma, Orkide Donma

Abstract:

Cardiovascular (CV) pathology is one of the expected consequences of excessive fat gain. The role of zinc (Zn) in thyroid hormone metabolism (THM) is a matter of debate. Both thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH) and Zn levels are subject to variation in obese individuals. Zn participates in THM. It is closely related to TSH. Since thyroid hormones are required for Zn absorption, hypothyroidism can lead to Zn deficiency and vice versa. Zn exhibits protective effects on CV health and it is inversely correlated with CV markers in childhood obesity. The association between subclinical hypothyroidism (SCHT) and metabolic disorders is under investigation due to its clinical importance. SCHT is defined as the elevated serum TSH levels in the presence of normal free thyroxin (T4) concentrations. The aim of this study is to evaluate the associations between TSH levels and Zn concentrations in SCHT cases detected in morbid obese (MO) children with and without metabolic syndrome (MetS) [(MOMetS+ and MOMetS-)], respectively. 42 children were present in each study group. Informed consent forms were obtained. Tekrdag Namik Kemal University Faculty of Medicine Non-Interventional Clinical Investigations Ethical Committee approved the study protocol. World Health Organization criteria were used for obesity classification. Children with age and sex-dependent body mass index percentile values above 99 were defined as MO. Children exhibiting at least two of MetS criteria were included in MOMetS+ group. Elevated fasting blood glucose, elevated triglycerides (TRG)/decreased high density lipoprotein-cholesterol (HDL-C) concentrations, elevated blood pressure values in addition to central obesity were listed as MetS criteria. Anthropometric measures were recorded. Routine biochemical analyses were performed. In MOMetS- group 13, in MOMetS+ group 15 children were with SCHT. Statistical analyses were performed. p < 0.05 was accepted as statistically significant. In MOMetS- and MOMetS+ groups, TSH levels were 4.1 ± 2.9 mU/L and 4.6 ± 3.1 mU/L, respectively. Corresponding values for SCHT cases were 7.3 ± 3.1 mU/L and 8.0 ± 2.7 mU/L. Free T4 levels were within normal limits. Zn concentrations were negatively correlated with TSH levels in both groups. Significant negative correlation calculated in MOMetS+ group (r = -0.909; p < 0.001) was much stronger than that found in MOMetS- group (r = -0.706; p < 0.05). This strong correlation (r = -0.909; p < 0.001) calculated for cases with SCHT in MOMetS+ group was much lower in the same group (r = -0.793; p < 0.001) when all cases were considered. In conclusion, the presence of strong correlations between TSH and Zn in SCHT in both MOMetS- and MOMetS+ groups have pointed out that MO children were under the threat of CV pathologies. The detection of the much stronger correlation in MOMetS+ group in comparison with the correlation found in MOMetS- group was the indicator of greater CV risk due to the presence of MetS. In MOMetS+ group, correlation in SCHT cases found higher than correlation calculated for all cases confirmed much higher CV risk due to the contribution of SCHT.

Keywords: Cardiovascular risk, child morbid obesity, subclinical hypothyroidism, zinc.

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Authors: Sara A.Yones, Ahmed S. Moussa

Abstract:

Quantitative measurements of tumor in general and tumor volume in particular, become more realistic with the use of Magnetic Resonance imaging, especially when the tumor morphological changes become irregular and difficult to assess by clinical examination. However, tumor volume estimation strongly depends on the image segmentation, which is fuzzy by nature. In this paper a fuzzy approach is presented for tumor volume segmentation based on the fuzzy connectedness algorithm. The fuzzy affinity matrix resulting from segmentation is then used to estimate a fuzzy volume based on a certainty parameter, an Alpha Cut, defined by the user. The proposed method was shown to highly affect treatment decisions. A statistical analysis was performed in this study to validate the results based on a manual method for volume estimation and the importance of using the Alpha Cut is further explained.

Keywords: Alpha Cut, Fuzzy Connectedness, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Tumor volume estimation.

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Authors: Teresa L. Ju, Szu-Yuan Sun, Pei-Ju Chao, Chang-Yao Wu

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This study aims to examine the factors affecting knowledge sharing behavior in knowledge-based electronic communities (e-communities) because quantity and quality of knowledge shared among the members play a critical role in the community-s sustainability. Past research has suggested three perspectives that may affect the quantity and quality of knowledge shared: economics, social psychology, and social ecology. In this study, we strongly believe that an economic perspective may be suitable to validate factors influencing newly registered members- knowledge contribution at the beginning of relationship development. Accordingly, this study proposes a model to validate the factors influencing members- knowledge sharing based on Transaction Cost Theory. By doing so, we may empirically test our hypotheses in various types of e-communities to determine the generalizability of our research models.

Keywords: Electronic community, individual behavior, knowledge sharing, transaction cost theory.

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Authors: Fotios N. Vlachos, Anastasios D. Garetsos, Nikolaos K. Uzunoglu, Efstathios D. Gotsis

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A four element prototype phased array surface probe has been designed and constructed to improve clinical human prostate spectroscopic data. The probe consists of two pairs of adjacent rectangular coils with an optimum overlap to reduce the mutual inductance. The two pairs are positioned on the anterior and the posterior pelvic region and two couples of varactors at the input of each coil undertake the procedures of tuning and matching. The probe switches off and on automatically during the consecutive phases of the MR experiment with the use of an analog switch that is triggered by a microcontroller. Experimental tests that were carried out resulted in high levels of tuning accuracy. Also, the switching mechanism functions properly for various applied loads and pulse sequence characteristics, producing only 10 μs of latency.

Keywords: Automatic tuning, prostate imaging, phased array, spectroscopy.

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Authors: Ahsan Bin Tufail, Ali Abidi, Adil Masood Siddiqui, Muhammad Shahzad Younis

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An early and accurate detection of Alzheimer's disease (AD) is an important stage in the treatment of individuals suffering from AD. We present an approach based on the use of structural magnetic resonance imaging (sMRI) phase images to distinguish between normal controls (NC), mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and AD patients with clinical dementia rating (CDR) of 1. Independent component analysis (ICA) technique is used for extracting useful features which form the inputs to the support vector machines (SVM), K nearest neighbour (kNN) and multilayer artificial neural network (ANN) classifiers to discriminate between the three classes. The obtained results are encouraging in terms of classification accuracy and effectively ascertain the usefulness of phase images for the classification of different stages of Alzheimer-s disease.

Keywords: Biomedical image processing, classification algorithms, feature extraction, statistical learning.

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Authors: Hyunhee Ryu, Young Ju Jeon, Jaeuk U. Kim, Hae Jung Lee, Yu Jung Lee, Jong Yeol Kim

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The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of blood viscosity on the radial pulse wave. For this, we obtained the radial pulse wave of 15 males with abnormal high hematocrit level and 47 males with normal hematocrit level at the age of thirties and forties. Various variables of the radial pulse wave between two groups were analyzed and compared by Student's T test. There are significant differences in several variables about height, time and area of the pulse wave. The first peak of the radial pulse wave was higher in abnormal high hematocrit group, but the third peak was higher and longer in normal hematocrit group. Our results suggest that the radial pulse wave can be used for diagnosis of high blood viscosity and more clinical application.

Keywords: Radial pulse wave, Blood viscosity, Hematocrit.

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Authors: Chin-Ming Hong, Chin-Teng Lin, Chao-Yen Huang, Yi-Ming Lin

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In this article, we propose an Intelligent Medical Diagnostic System (IMDS) accessible through common web-based interface, to on-line perform initial screening for osteoporosis. The fundamental approaches which construct the proposed system are mainly based on the fuzzy-neural theory, which can exhibit superiority over other conventional technologies in many fields. In diagnosis process, users simply answer a series of directed questions to the system, and then they will immediately receive a list of results which represents the risk degrees of osteoporosis. According to clinical testing results, it is shown that the proposed system can provide the general public or even health care providers with a convenient, reliable, inexpensive approach to osteoporosis risk assessment.

Keywords: BMD, osteoporosis, IMDS, fuzzy-neural theory, web interface.

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Authors: Mounira Rouaïnia, Mohamed Salah Medjram, Noureddine Doghmane

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In Multiple Sclerosis, pathological changes in the brain results in deviations in signal intensity on Magnetic Resonance Images (MRI). Quantitative analysis of these changes and their correlation with clinical finding provides important information for diagnosis. This constitutes the objective of our work. A new approach is developed. After the enhancement of images contrast and the brain extraction by mathematical morphology algorithm, we proceed to the brain segmentation. Our approach is based on building statistical model from data itself, for normal brain MRI and including clustering tissue type. Then we detect signal abnormalities (MS lesions) as a rejection class containing voxels that are not explained by the built model. We validate the method on MR images of Multiple Sclerosis patients by comparing its results with those of human expert segmentation.

Keywords: EM algorithm, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Mathematical morphology, Markov random model.

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Authors: Rizna Triana Dewi, Sanro Tachibana, Ahmad Darmawan

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The bioassay-guided isolation and purification of an ethyl acetate extract of Aspergillus terreus MC751 led to the characterization of butyrolactone I as an antidiabetic and antioxidant. The antidiabetic activity of butyrolactone I was evaluated by α- glucosidase and α-amylase inhibition assays. Butyrolactone I demonstrated significant concentration-dependent, mixed-type inhibitory activity against yeast α-glucosidase with an IC50 of 54μM. However, the compound exhibited less activity against rat intestinal α-glucosidase and α-amylase. This is the first report on α-glucosidase inhibitory activity of butyrolactone I. The antioxidative activity of butyrolactone I was evaluated based on scavenging effects on 1,1- diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) (IC50 =51 μM) and hydrogen peroxide (IC50= 141 μM) radicals as well as a reducing power assay. The results suggest that butyrolactone I is a promising antidiabetic as well as antioxidant and should be considered for clinical trials.

Keywords: Aspergillus terreus MC751, antidiabetic, antioxidant, Butyrolactone I.

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