Effect of Intensity on Prevalence of N3 Potential in Ears with Severe to Profound Hearing Loss

Objective of the study: To look for the presence of N3 potential at two different intensities in children and in adults. Method: A total of 260 ears with severe to profound hearing loss were studied from the participants in the age range of 1 to 50 years, with 170 subjects in the age group below 10 years and remaining 90 subjects of more than 10 years. Auditory brainstem response (ABR) was recorded at two intensities, 90 and 99dBnHL, to look for the presence of N3 potential. Result: N3 potential was observed in 30% of the total ears taken in the study at 90dBnHL and 38.8% at 99dBnHL. Presence of N3 potential in children was 45%, which was higher than the age group of above 10 years. When the intensity was increased there was an increase in amplitude and a reduction in latency with better wave morphology. Conclusion: It is better to use higher intensity for the identification of the N3 potential while doing ABR and thus with the single recording, auditory assessment as well as saccular assessment can be done

Designing fuzzy rule based classifier using self-organizing feature map for analysis of multispectral satellite images

We propose a novel scheme for designing fuzzy rule based classifier. An SOFM based method is used for generating a set of prototypes which is used to generate a set of fuzzy rules. Each rule represents a region in the feature space that we call the context of the rule. The rules are tuned with respect to their context. We justified that the reasoning scheme may be different in different context leading to context sensitive inferencing. To realize context sensitive inferencing we used a softmin operator with a tunable parameter. The proposed scheme is tested on several multispectral satellite image data sets and the performance is found to be much better than the results reported in the literature.Comment: 23 pages, 7 figure

Temporally-coherent terawatt attosecond XFEL synchronized with a few cycle laser

Attosecond metrology using laser-based high-order harmonics has been significantly advanced and applied to various studies of electron dynamics in atoms, molecules and solids. Laser-based high-order harmonics have a limitation of low power and photon energies. There is, however, a great demand for even higher power and photon energy. Here, we propose a scheme for a terawatt attosecond (TW-as) X-ray pulse in X-ray free-electron laser controlled by a few cycle IR pulse, where one dominant current spike in an electron bunch is used repeatedly to amplify a seeded radiation to a terawatt level. This scheme is relatively simple, compact, straightforward, and also produces a temporally and spectrally clean pulse. The viability of this scheme is demonstrated in simulations using Pohang accelerator laboratory (PAL)-XFEL beam parameters.1183Ysciescopu

Detection of coupling misalignment by extended orbits

In this paper a ‘SpectraQuest’ demonstrator is used to introduce misalignment into a rotating machinery set-up. Depending on the coupling used in the set-up, angular and/or parallel misalignment can be brought in the rotating system. Traditionally, the data captured by accelerometers is transferred into the frequency domain in order to interpret the vibrations measured by the accelerometers. The frequency domain has proven its usefulness but even the time domain can come in handy to draw the right conclusions regarding to misalignment in a rotating set-up. Orbit plots display the integrated data captured by accelerometers, in order to display the movement of the rotating shaft. The influence of the misalignment and imbalance on these orbits will be discussed

Sea level changes along the Indian coast: Observations and projections

Sea level changes can be of two types: (i) changes in the mean sea level and (ii) changes in the extreme sea level. The former is a global phenomenon while the latter is a regional phenomenon. Estimates of mean sea level rise made from past tide gauge data at selected stations along the coast of India indicate a rise of slightly less than 1 mm/year; however these estimates need to be corrected by including the rates of vertical land movements, whose measurements are not available at present. Simulation results of a regional climate model, HadRM2, were analysed for the northern Indian Ocean to provide the future scenarios of the occurrence of tropical cyclones in the Bay of Bengal for the period 2041-60. This model simulations consist of a control run with concentration of CO2 kept constant at 1990 levels and a perturbed run with transient increase in the concentrations of CO2 (GHG) according to the IS92a scenario for the period 2041-2060. The simulation results show increase in frequencies of tropical cyclones in the Bay, particularly intense events during the postmonsoon period, for the increased GHG run. A storm surge model was used to compute the surges associated with the cyclones generated by the climate model. The storm surge model was forced by the wind field from HadRM2 over the model domain and tides prescribed along the open boundary from a global tidal model. The frequency of high surges is found to be higher in the model run forced by winds from increased GHG run than in the model run forced by winds from the control run

Serum cystatin C and serum creatinine levels in type 2 diabetes mellitus

Background: Diabetes mellitus is a metabolic disorder resulting from deficient insulin secretion, inefficient insulin action or both leading to chronic hyperglycemia. Diabetic complications result from the toxic effects of chronic hyperglycemia combined with other metabolic derangements. Diabetic nephropathy eventually leads to loss of kidney function, which is the most common cause of End stage renal disease. Measurement of GFR is an important parameter in assessing kidney function for which Creatinine is currently being used despite its inherent fallacies. Cystatin C is an alternative marker with some advantages. Aims and objectives: To measure the serum cystatin C levels in type 2 diabetes mellitus patients. To compare serum cystatin C levels with serum creatinine levels in type 2 diabetes mellitus patients.Methods: The study was carried out in 30 type-2 diabetic patients and 30 non-diabetic controls, in the age group of 35 to 75 years. Both the groups were age and gender matched. Serum cystatin C levels and serum creatinine levels were measured in both the groups. Serum creatinine was estimated by Jaffe's kinetic method, while the estimation of serum cystatin C was done by Immunoturbidimetric method.Results: Serum creatinine as well as serum cystatin C levels were significantly elevated in the study group as compared to non-diabetic controls. There was a strong positive correlation of serum cystatin C with serum creatinine.Conclusion: Serum cystatin C can be used as an alternative to serum creatinine in determining GFR in type 2 diabetes mellitus.

Signal Propagation in Feedforward Neuronal Networks with Unreliable Synapses

In this paper, we systematically investigate both the synfire propagation and firing rate propagation in feedforward neuronal network coupled in an all-to-all fashion. In contrast to most earlier work, where only reliable synaptic connections are considered, we mainly examine the effects of unreliable synapses on both types of neural activity propagation in this work. We first study networks composed of purely excitatory neurons. Our results show that both the successful transmission probability and excitatory synaptic strength largely influence the propagation of these two types of neural activities, and better tuning of these synaptic parameters makes the considered network support stable signal propagation. It is also found that noise has significant but different impacts on these two types of propagation. The additive Gaussian white noise has the tendency to reduce the precision of the synfire activity, whereas noise with appropriate intensity can enhance the performance of firing rate propagation. Further simulations indicate that the propagation dynamics of the considered neuronal network is not simply determined by the average amount of received neurotransmitter for each neuron in a time instant, but also largely influenced by the stochastic effect of neurotransmitter release. Second, we compare our results with those obtained in corresponding feedforward neuronal networks connected with reliable synapses but in a random coupling fashion. We confirm that some differences can be observed in these two different feedforward neuronal network models. Finally, we study the signal propagation in feedforward neuronal networks consisting of both excitatory and inhibitory neurons, and demonstrate that inhibition also plays an important role in signal propagation in the considered networks.Comment: 33pages, 16 figures; Journal of Computational Neuroscience (published

A framework for accessible m-government implementation

The great popularity and rapid diffusion of mobile technologies at worldwide level has also been recognised by the public sector, leading to the creation of m-government. A major challenge for m-government is accessibility – the provision of an equal service to all citizens irrespective of their psychical, mental or technical capabilities. This paper sketches the profiles of six citizen groups: Visually Impaired, Hearing Impaired, Motor Impaired, Speech Impaired, Cognitive Impaired and Elderly. M-government examples that target the aforementioned groups are discussed and a framework for accessible m-government implementation with reference to the W3C Mobile Web Best Practices is proposed

Nanofiber fabrication in a temperature and humidity controlled environment for improved fibre consistency

To fabricate nanofibers with reproducible characteristics, an important demand for many applications, the effect of controlled atmospheric conditions on resulting electrospun cellulose acetate (CA) nanofibers was evaluated for temperature ranging 17.5 - 35°C and relative humidity ranging 20% - 70%. With the potential application of nanofibers in many industries, especially membrane and filter fabrication, their reproducible production must be established to ensure commercially viability.
Cellulose acetate (CA) solution (0.2 g/ml) in a solvent mixture of acetone/DMF/ethanol (2:2:1) was electrospun into nonwoven fibre mesh with the fibre diameter ranging from 150nm to 1µm.
The resulting nanofibers were observed and analyzed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), showing a correlation of reducing average fibre diameter with increasing atmospheric temperature. A less pronounced correlation was seen with changes in relative humidity regarding fibre diameter, though it was shown that increased humidity reduced the effect of fibre beading yielding a more consistent, and therefore better quality of fibre fabrication.
Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) studies observed lower melt enthalpies for finer CA nanofibers in the first heating cycle confirming the results gained from SEM analysis. From the conditions that were explored in this study the temperature and humidity that gave the most suitable fibre mats for a membrane purpose were 25.0°C and 50%RH due to the highest level of fibre diameter uniformity, the lowest level of beading while maintaining a low fibre diameter for increased surface area and increased pore size homogeneity. This study has highlighted the requirement to control the atmospheric conditions during the electrospinning process in order to fabricate reproducible fibre mats