Privacy-Preserving Deep Learning With Homomorphic Encryption: An Introduction

Privacy-preserving deep learning with homomorphic encryption (HE) is a novel and promising research area aimed at designing deep learning solutions that operate while guaranteeing the privacy of user data. Designing privacy-preserving deep learning solutions requires one to completely rethink and redesign deep learning models and algorithms to match the severe technological and algorithmic constraints of HE. This paper provides an introduction to this complex research area as well as a methodology for designing privacy-preserving convolutional neural networks (CNNs). This methodology was applied to the design of a privacy-preserving version of the well-known LeNet-1 CNN, which was successfully operated on two benchmark datasets for image classification. Furthermore, this paper details and comments on the research challenges and software resources available for privacy-preserving deep learning with HE

Stented Porcine and Pericardial Bioprostheses - A historical review

Stented bioprostheses have been extensively used clinically to replace diseased cardiac valves with the clear advantage over mechanical prostheses of avoiding the use of chronic anticoagulation in most cases. During the past five decades, however, based on clinical and pathological experience, tissue calcification and cusp tears were identified as the main determinants of failure of porcine and pericardial bioprostheses, respectively. Tissue treatments to mitigate dystrophic calcification together with structural modifications in valve design have produced a current generation of bioprosthetic valves which show excellent overall performance and considerably increased durability when compared with old models. Further ongoing research aims to provide even more durable bioprostheses in order to allow reduction of the age threshold for implantation also in younger subjects, helping to contrast effectively the rapidly expanding role of catheter-based interventions

Influence of the viscosity of poly(methyl methacrylate) on the cellular structure of nanocellular materials

Three different grades of poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) with different rheological properties are used for the production of nanocellular materials using gas dissolution foaming. The influences of both the viscosity of the different polymers and the processing parameters on the final cellular structure are studied using a wide range of saturation and foaming conditions. Foaming conditions affect similarly all cellular materials. It is found that an increase of the foaming temperature results in less dense nanocellular materials, with higher cell nucleation densities. In addition, it is demonstrated that a lower viscosity leads to cellular polymers with a lower relative density but larger cell sizes and smaller cell nucleation densities, these differences being more noticeable for the conditions in which low solubilities are reached. It is possible to produce nanocellular materials with relative densities of 0.24 combined with cell sizes of 75 nm and cell nucleation densities of 1015 nuclei cm−3 using the PMMA with the lowest viscosity. In contrast, minimum cell sizes of around 14 nm and maximum cell nucleation densities of 3.5 × 1016 nuclei cm−3 with relative densities of 0.4 are obtained with the most viscous one. © 2019 Society of Chemical Industr

The Italian coronavirus disease 2019 outbreak: recommendations from clinical practice

none14siNovel coronavirus 2019 is a single-stranded, ribonucleic acid virus that has led to an international pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019. Clinical data from the Chinese outbreak have been reported, but experiences and recommendations from clinical practice during the Italian outbreak have not. We report the impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 outbreak on regional and national healthcare infrastructure. We also report on recommendations based on clinical experiences of managing patients throughout Italy. In particular, we describe key elements of clinical management, including: safe oxygen therapy; airway management; personal protective equipment; and non-technical aspects of caring for patients diagnosed with coronavirus disease 2019. Only through planning, training and team working will clinicians and healthcare systems be best placed to deal with the many complex implications of this new pandemic.embargoed_20210313Sorbello M.; El-Boghdadly K.; Di Giacinto I.; Cataldo R.; Esposito C.; Falcetta S.; Merli G.; Cortese G.; Corso R.M.; Bressan F.; Pintaudi S.; Greif R.; Donati A.; Petrini F.Sorbello, M.; El-Boghdadly, K.; Di Giacinto, I.; Cataldo, R.; Esposito, C.; Falcetta, S.; Merli, G.; Cortese, G.; Corso, R. M.; Bressan, F.; Pintaudi, S.; Greif, R.; Donati, A.; Petrini, F

Airway Ultrasound as Predictor of Difficult Direct Laryngoscopy: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Background: Despite several clinical index tests that are currently applied for airway assessment, unpredicted difficult laryngoscopy may still represent a serious problem in anesthesia practice. The aim of this systematic review and meta-analysis was to evaluate whether preoperative airway ultrasound can predict difficult direct laryngoscopy in adult patients undergoing elective surgery under general anesthesia. Methods: We searched the Medline, Scopus, and Web of Science databases from their inception to December 2020. The population of interest included adults who required tracheal intubation for elective surgery under general anesthesia without clear anatomical abnormalities suggesting difficult laryngoscopy. A bivariate model has been used to assess the accuracy of each ultrasound index test to predict difficult direct laryngoscopy. Results: Fifteen studies have been considered for quantitative analysis of summary receiver operating characteristic (SROC). The sensitivity for distance from skin to epiglottis (DSE), distance from skin to hyoid bone (DSHB), and distance from skin to vocal cords (DSVC) was 0.82 (0.74-0.87), 0.71 (0.58-0.82), and 0.75 (0.62-0.84), respectively. The specificity for DSE, DSHB, and DSVC was 0.79 (0.70-0.87), 0.71 (0.57-0.82), and 0.72 (0.45-0.89), respectively. The area under the curve (AUC) for DSE, DSHB, DSVC, and ratio between the depth of the pre-epiglottic space and the distance from the epiglottis to the vocal cords (Pre-E/E-VC) was 0.87 (0.84-0.90), 0.77 (0.73-0.81), 0.78 (0.74-0.81), and 0.71 (0.67-0.75), respectively. Patients with difficult direct laryngoscopy have higher DSE, DSVC, and DSHB values than patients with easy laryngoscopy, with a mean difference of 0.38 cm (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.17-0.58 cm; P = .0004), 0.18 cm (95% CI, 0.01-0.35 cm; P = .04), and 0.23 cm (95% CI, 0.08-0.39 cm; P = .004), respectively. Conclusions: Our study demonstrates that airway ultrasound index tests are significantly different between patients with easy versus difficult direct laryngoscopy, and the DSE is the most studied index test in literature to predict difficult direct laryngoscopy. However, it is not currently possible to reach a definitive conclusion. Further studies are needed with better standardization of ultrasound assessment to limit all possible sources of heterogeneity

Preoperative airway ultrasound assessment in the sniffing position: a prospective observational study.

BACKGROUND Clinical airway screening tests intend to predict difficult airways, but none have a high predictive value. Recent systematic reviews correlate ultrasound with difficult laryngoscopy. This study aimed primarily to correlate ultrasound measurements of anatomical upper airway structures in the sniffing position with difficult direct laryngoscopy. The secondary aim was to observe gender-based differences. METHODS This prospective, cross-sectional, single-center observational study included 209 patients requiring general anesthesia for elective surgery. Preoperatively, we performed six clinical airway assessments and three ultrasound measurements, which were the Distance from Skin to the Hyoid Bone (DSHB), to the Epiglottis (DSE), and to the anterior commissure of the vocal cords (DSAC) in a sniffing position. Benumof's criteria for the "best view at the first attempt" for direct laryngoscopy assessed the difficulty of laryngoscopy. RESULTS The distance from skin to the epiglottis was the best predictor of direct difficult laryngoscopy (defined as Cormack-Lehane grade ≥ 2b) with a minimum thickness cut-off at 2.70 ± 0.19 cm (sensitivity 91.3%; specificity 96.9%). The skin to the hyoid bone distance cut-off was 1.41 ± 0.30 cm with moderate correlation (sensitivity 80.4%; specificity 60.1%). No correlation was found for the distance to the anterior commissure of the vocal cords. In women compared to men, the skin to the epiglottis distance was more sensitive (92.3% vs. 90.9%) and specific (98.8% vs. 95.2%). CONCLUSIONS DSE in the sniffing position is the most reliable parameter for preoperative airway ultrasound assessment in the Caucasian population, with higher sensitivity and specificity in women, and might be considered as an independent predictor for direct difficult laryngoscopy

Atomic and molecular complex resonances from real eigenvalues using standard (hermitian) electronic structure calculations

Complex eigenvalues, resonances, play an important role in large variety of fields in physics and chemistry. For example, in cold molecular collision experiments and electron scattering experiments, autoionizing and pre-dissociative metastable resonances are generated. However, the computation of complex resonance eigenvalues is difficult, since it requires severe modifications of standard electronic structure codes and methods. Here we show how resonance eigenvalues, positions and widths, can be calculated using the standard, widely used, electronic-structure packages. Our method enables the calculations of the complex resonance eigenvalues by using analytical continuation procedures (such as Pad\'{e}). The key point in our approach is the existence of narrow analytical passages from the real axis to the complex energy plane. In fact, the existence of these analytical passages relies on using finite basis sets. These passages become narrower as the basis set becomes more complete, whereas in the exact limit, these passages to the complex plane are closed. As illustrative numerical examples we calculated the autoionization resonances of helium, hydrogen anion and hydrogen molecule. We show that our results are in an excellent agreement with the results obtained by other theoretical methods and with available experimental results