Multiangle observations of Arctic clouds from FIRE ACE: June 3, 1998, case study

In May and June 1998 the Airborne Multiangle Imaging Spectroradiometer (AirMISR) participated in the FIRE Arctic Cloud Experiment (ACE). AirMISR is an airborne instrument for obtaining multiangle imagery similar to that of the satellite-borne MISR instrument. This paper presents a detailed analysis of the data collected on June 3, 1998. In particular, AirMISR radiance measurements are compared with measurements made by two other instruments, the Cloud Absorption Radiometer (CAR) and the MODIS airborne simulator (MAS), as well as to plane-parallel radiative transfer simulations. It is found that the AirMISR radiance measurements and albedo estimates compare favorably both with the other instruments and with the radiative transfer simulations. In addition to radiance and albedo, the multiangle AirMISR data can be used to obtain estimates of cloud top height using stereoimaging techniques. Comparison of AirMISR retrieved cloud top height (using the complete MISR-based stereoimaging approach) shows excellent agreement with the measurements from the airborne Cloud Lidar System (CLS) and ground-based millimeterwave cloud radar

An EEG-Based Fatigue Detection and Mitigation System

© 2016 World Scientific Publishing Company. Research has indicated that fatigue is a critical factor in cognitive lapses because it negatively affects an individual's internal state, which is then manifested physiologically. This study explores neurophysiological changes, measured by electroencephalogram (EEG), due to fatigue. This study further demonstrates the feasibility of an online closed-loop EEG-based fatigue detection and mitigation system that detects physiological change and can thereby prevent fatigue-related cognitive lapses. More importantly, this work compares the efficacy of fatigue detection and mitigation between the EEG-based and a nonEEG-based random method. Twelve healthy subjects participated in a sustained-attention driving experiment. Each participant's EEG signal was monitored continuously and a warning was delivered in real-time to participants once the EEG signature of fatigue was detected. Study results indicate suppression of the alpha-and theta-power of an occipital component and improved behavioral performance following a warning signal; these findings are in line with those in previous studies. However, study results also showed reduced warning efficacy (i.e. increased response times (RTs) to lane deviations) accompanied by increased alpha-power due to the fluctuation of warnings over time. Furthermore, a comparison of EEG-based and nonEEG-based random approaches clearly demonstrated the necessity of adaptive fatigue-mitigation systems, based on a subject's cognitive level, to deliver warnings. Analytical results clearly demonstrate and validate the efficacy of this online closed-loop EEG-based fatigue detection and mitigation mechanism to identify cognitive lapses that may lead to catastrophic incidents in countless operational environments

Classification of patients with knee osteoarthritis in clinical phenotypes: data from the osteoarthritis initiative

<div><p>Objectives</p><p>The existence of phenotypes has been hypothesized to explain the large heterogeneity characterizing the knee osteoarthritis. In a previous systematic review of the literature, six main phenotypes were identified: Minimal Joint Disease (MJD), Malaligned Biomechanical (MB), Chronic Pain (CP), Inflammatory (I), Metabolic Syndrome (MS) and Bone and Cartilage Metabolism (BCM). The purpose of this study was to classify a sample of individuals with knee osteoarthritis (KOA) into pre-defined groups characterized by specific variables that can be linked to different disease mechanisms, and compare these phenotypes for demographic and health outcomes.</p><p>Methods</p><p>599 patients were selected from the OAI database FNIH at 24 months’ time to conduct the study. For each phenotype, cut offs of key variables were identified matching the results from previous studies in the field and the data available for the sample. The selection process consisted of 3 steps. At the end of each step, the subjects classified were excluded from the further classification stages. Patients meeting the criteria for more than one phenotype were classified separately into a ‘complex KOA’ group.</p><p>Results</p><p>Phenotype allocation (including complex KOA) was successful for 84% of cases with an overlap of 20%. Disease duration was shorter in the MJD while the CP phenotype included a larger number of Women (81%). A significant effect of phenotypes on WOMAC pain (F = 16.736 p <0.001) and WOMAC physical function (F = 14.676, p < 0.001) was identified after controlling for disease duration.</p><p>Conclusion</p><p>This study signifies the feasibility of a classification of KOA subjects in distinct phenotypes based on subgroup-specific characteristics.</p></div

Simultaneous determination of natural and synthetic steroid estrogens and their conjugates in aqueous matrices by liquid chromatography / mass spectrometry

An analytical method for the simultaneous determination of nine free and conjugated steroid estrogens was developed with application to environmental aqueous matrices. Solid phase extraction (SPE) was employed for isolation and concentration, with detection by liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry (LC/MS) using electrospray ionisation (ESI) in the negative mode. Method recoveries for various aqueous matrices (wastewater, lake and drinking water) were determined, recoveries proving to be sample dependent. When spiked at 50 ng/l concentrations in sewage influent, recoveries ranged from 62-89 % with relative standard deviations (RSD) < 8.1 %. In comparison, drinking water spiked at the same concentrations had recoveries between 82-100 % with an RSD < 5%. Ion suppression is a known phenomenon when using ESI; hence its impact on method recovery was elucidated for raw sewage. Both ion suppression from matrix interferences and the extraction procedure has bearing on the overall method recovery. Analysis of municipal raw sewage identified several of the analytes of interest at ng/l concentrations, estriol (E3) being the most abundant. Only one conjugate, estrone 3-sulphate (E1-3S) was observe

Spatial Filtering for EEG-Based Regression Problems in Brain-Computer Interface (BCI)

© 1993-2012 IEEE. Electroencephalogram (EEG) signals are frequently used in brain-computer interfaces (BCIs), but they are easily contaminated by artifacts and noise, so preprocessing must be done before they are fed into a machine learning algorithm for classification or regression. Spatial filters have been widely used to increase the signal-to-noise ratio of EEG for BCI classification problems, but their applications in BCI regression problems have been very limited. This paper proposes two common spatial pattern (CSP) filters for EEG-based regression problems in BCI, which are extended from the CSP filter for classification, by using fuzzy sets. Experimental results on EEG-based response speed estimation from a large-scale study, which collected 143 sessions of sustained-attention psychomotor vigilance task data from 17 subjects during a 5-month period, demonstrate that the two proposed spatial filters can significantly increase the EEG signal quality. When used in LASSO and k-nearest neighbors regression for user response speed estimation, the spatial filters can reduce the root-mean-square estimation error by 10.02-19.77\%, and at the same time increase the correlation to the true response speed by 19.39-86.47\%

Comparison of quality of life after stereotactic body radiotherapy and surgery for early-stage prostate cancer

Background: As the long-term efficacy of stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) becomes established and other prostate cancer treatment approaches are refined and improved, examination of quality of life (QOL) following prostate cancer treatment is critical in driving both patient and clinical treatment decisions. We present the first study to compare QOL after SBRT and radical prostatectomy, with QOL assessed at approximately the same times pre- and post-treatment and using the same validated QOL instrument. Methods: Patients with clinically localized prostate cancer were treated with either radical prostatectomy (n = 123 Spanish patients) or SBRT (n = 216 American patients). QOL was assessed using the Expanded Prostate Cancer Index Composite (EPIC) grouped into urinary, sexual, and bowel domains. For comparison purposes, SBRT EPIC data at baseline, 3 weeks, 5, 11, 24, and 36 months were compared to surgery data at baseline, 1, 6, 12, 24,and 36 months. Differences in patient characteristics between the two groups were assessed using Chi-squared tests for categorical variables and t-tests for continuous variables. Generalized estimating equation (GEE) models were constructed for each EPIC scale to account for correlation among repeated measures and used to assess the effect of treatment on QOL. Results: The largest differences in QOL occurred in the first 1-6 months after treatment, with larger declines following surgery in urinary and sexual QOL as compared to SBRT, and a larger decline in bowel QOL following SBRT as compared to surgery. Long-term urinary and sexual QOL declines remained clinically significantly lower for surgery patients but not for SBRT patients. Conclusions: Overall, these results may have implications for patient and physician clinical decision making which are often influenced by QOL. These differences in sexual, urinary and bowel QOL should be closely considered in selecting the right treatment, especially in evaluating the value of non-invasive treatments, such as SBRT

Measurement of the inclusive and dijet cross-sections of b-jets in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

The inclusive and dijet production cross-sections have been measured for jets containing b-hadrons (b-jets) in proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of sqrt(s) = 7 TeV, using the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The measurements use data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 34 pb^-1. The b-jets are identified using either a lifetime-based method, where secondary decay vertices of b-hadrons in jets are reconstructed using information from the tracking detectors, or a muon-based method where the presence of a muon is used to identify semileptonic decays of b-hadrons inside jets. The inclusive b-jet cross-section is measured as a function of transverse momentum in the range 20 < pT < 400 GeV and rapidity in the range |y| < 2.1. The bbbar-dijet cross-section is measured as a function of the dijet invariant mass in the range 110 < m_jj < 760 GeV, the azimuthal angle difference between the two jets and the angular variable chi in two dijet mass regions. The results are compared with next-to-leading-order QCD predictions. Good agreement is observed between the measured cross-sections and the predictions obtained using POWHEG + Pythia. MC@NLO + Herwig shows good agreement with the measured bbbar-dijet cross-section. However, it does not reproduce the measured inclusive cross-section well, particularly for central b-jets with large transverse momenta.Comment: 10 pages plus author list (21 pages total), 8 figures, 1 table, final version published in European Physical Journal

Observation of associated near-side and away-side long-range correlations in √sNN=5.02 TeV proton-lead collisions with the ATLAS detector

Two-particle correlations in relative azimuthal angle (Δϕ) and pseudorapidity (Δη) are measured in √sNN=5.02  TeV p+Pb collisions using the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The measurements are performed using approximately 1  μb-1 of data as a function of transverse momentum (pT) and the transverse energy (ΣETPb) summed over 3.1<η<4.9 in the direction of the Pb beam. The correlation function, constructed from charged particles, exhibits a long-range (2<|Δη|<5) “near-side” (Δϕ∼0) correlation that grows rapidly with increasing ΣETPb. A long-range “away-side” (Δϕ∼π) correlation, obtained by subtracting the expected contributions from recoiling dijets and other sources estimated using events with small ΣETPb, is found to match the near-side correlation in magnitude, shape (in Δη and Δϕ) and ΣETPb dependence. The resultant Δϕ correlation is approximately symmetric about π/2, and is consistent with a dominant cos⁡2Δϕ modulation for all ΣETPb ranges and particle pT

Search for new phenomena in final states with an energetic jet and large missing transverse momentum in pp collisions at √ s = 8 TeV with the ATLAS detector

Results of a search for new phenomena in final states with an energetic jet and large missing transverse momentum are reported. The search uses 20.3 fb−1 of √ s = 8 TeV data collected in 2012 with the ATLAS detector at the LHC. Events are required to have at least one jet with pT > 120 GeV and no leptons. Nine signal regions are considered with increasing missing transverse momentum requirements between Emiss T > 150 GeV and Emiss T > 700 GeV. Good agreement is observed between the number of events in data and Standard Model expectations. The results are translated into exclusion limits on models with either large extra spatial dimensions, pair production of weakly interacting dark matter candidates, or production of very light gravitinos in a gauge-mediated supersymmetric model. In addition, limits on the production of an invisibly decaying Higgs-like boson leading to similar topologies in the final state are presente

Dietary fibre intake and risk of ischaemic and haemorrhagic stroke in the UK Women’s Cohort Study

BACKGROUND: Stroke risk is modifiable through many risk factors, one being healthy dietary habits. Fibre intake was associated with a reduced stroke risk in recent meta-analyses; however, data were contributed by relatively few studies, and few examined different stroke types. METHODS: A total of 27 373 disease-free women were followed up for 14.4 years. Diet was assessed with a 217-item food frequency questionnaire and stroke cases were identified using English Hospital Episode Statistics and mortality records. Survival analysis was applied to assess the risk of total, ischaemic or haemorrhagic stroke in relation to fibre intake. RESULTS: A total of 135 haemorrhagic and 184 ischaemic stroke cases were identified in addition to 138 cases where the stroke type was unknown or not recorded. Greater intake of total fibre, higher fibre density and greater soluble fibre, insoluble fibre and fibre from cereals were associated with a significantly lower risk for total stroke. For total stroke, the hazard ratio per 6 g/day total fibre intake was 0.89 (95% confidence intervals: 0.81–0.99). Different findings were observed for haemorrhagic and ischaemic stroke in healthy-weight or overweight women. Total fibre, insoluble fibre and cereal fibre were inversely associated with haemorrhagic stroke risk in overweight/obese participants, and in healthy-weight women greater cereal fibre was associated with a lower ischaemic stroke risk. In non-hypertensive women, higher fibre density was associated with lower ischaemic stroke risk. CONCLUSIONS: Greater total fibre and fibre from cereals are associated with a lower stroke risk, and associations were more consistent with ischaemic stroke. The different observations by stroke type, body mass index group or hypertensive status indicates potentially different mechanisms