Boosting expensive synchronizing heuristics

For automata, synchronization, the problem of bringing an automaton to a particular state regardless of its initial state, is important. It has several applications in practice and is related to a fifty-year-old conjecture on the length of the shortest synchronizing word. Although using shorter words increases the effectiveness in practice, finding a shortest one (which is not necessarily unique) is NP-hard. For this reason, there exist various heuristics in the literature. However, high-quality heuristics such as SynchroP producing relatively shorter sequences are very expensive and can take hours when the automaton has tens of thousands of states. The SynchroP heuristic has been frequently used as a benchmark to evaluate the performance of the new heuristics. In this work, we first improve the runtime of SynchroP and its variants by using algorithmic techniques. We then focus on adapting SynchroP for many-core architectures, and overall, we obtain more than 1000× speedup on GPUs compared to naive sequential implementation that has been frequently used as a benchmark to evaluate new heuristics in the literature. We also propose two SynchroP variants and evaluate their performance

Reducing the environmental impact of surgery on a global scale: systematic review and co-prioritization with healthcare workers in 132 countries

Abstract Background Healthcare cannot achieve net-zero carbon without addressing operating theatres. The aim of this study was to prioritize feasible interventions to reduce the environmental impact of operating theatres. Methods This study adopted a four-phase Delphi consensus co-prioritization methodology. In phase 1, a systematic review of published interventions and global consultation of perioperative healthcare professionals were used to longlist interventions. In phase 2, iterative thematic analysis consolidated comparable interventions into a shortlist. In phase 3, the shortlist was co-prioritized based on patient and clinician views on acceptability, feasibility, and safety. In phase 4, ranked lists of interventions were presented by their relevance to high-income countries and low–middle-income countries. Results In phase 1, 43 interventions were identified, which had low uptake in practice according to 3042 professionals globally. In phase 2, a shortlist of 15 intervention domains was generated. In phase 3, interventions were deemed acceptable for more than 90 per cent of patients except for reducing general anaesthesia (84 per cent) and re-sterilization of ‘single-use’ consumables (86 per cent). In phase 4, the top three shortlisted interventions for high-income countries were: introducing recycling; reducing use of anaesthetic gases; and appropriate clinical waste processing. In phase 4, the top three shortlisted interventions for low–middle-income countries were: introducing reusable surgical devices; reducing use of consumables; and reducing the use of general anaesthesia. Conclusion This is a step toward environmentally sustainable operating environments with actionable interventions applicable to both high– and low–middle–income countries

Synchronizing heuristics: speeding up the slowest

Computing a shortest synchronizing word of an automaton is an NP–hard problem. Therefore, heuristics are used to compute short synchronizing words. SynchroP is among the best heuristics in the literature in terms of word lengths. The heuristic and its variants such as SynchroPL have been frequently used as a baseline to judge the quality of the words generated by the new heuristics. Although, its quality is good, the heuristics are significantly slow especially compared to much cheaper heuristics such as Greedy and Cycle. This makes them in- feasible for large-scale automatons. In this paper, we show how one can improve the time performance of SynchroP and its variants by avoiding unnecessary computations which makes these heuristics more competitive than they already are. Our experimental results show that for 2500 states, SynchroP can be made 70–160× faster, via the proposed optimizations. In particular, for 2500 states and 32 letters, the SynchroP execution reduces to 66 seconds from 4745 seconds. Furthermore, the suggested optimizations become more effective as the number of states in the automata increase

The Isolation and Identification of Zoonotic Campylobacter jejuni from a Newborn Calf

Campylobacteriozis tüm dünyada yaygın görülen zoonoz bir enfeksiyondur. Bu olguda; iştahsızlık ve ishal gözlenen, antibiyotik ve vitamin preperatları ile yapılan semptomatik tedaviye de cevap vermeyerek ölen yeni doğan (yedi günlük) buzağıda Campylobacter jejuni tanımlanmıştır. Otopsisinde akciğerlerde hiperemi, karaciğerde dejenerasyonlar, dalakta nekrotik odaklar, barsaklarda kataral ve hemorajik değişiklikler görülen buzağının dokularının histopatolojik incelemesinde, barsak epitellerinde yer yer dökülmeler görüldü .Akciğerlerinde bağdoku artışı, alveollerde dejenerasyon ve çevrelerinde lenfosit infiltrasyonu, bronşlarda yoğun bakteri kümeleri, damar endotellerinde dökülmeler görüldü. Karaciğerde portal boşluklarda lenfosit infiltrasyonu, damarlarda trombozlar ve çeperlerinde kalınlaşmalar, hepatositlerde erime nekrozu ve dejenerasyon, dalakta kas trabeküllerinde kalınlaşmalar, kalp kasında ödem gözlendi. Bakteriyolojik incelemelerde Campylobacter jejuni izole ve identifiye edildi.Campylobacteriosis is a worldwide zoonotic infection. In this case report, Campylobacter jejuni was described in a newborn calf (seven days old) that had been suffered from diarrhea and loss of appetite and not responded to symptomatic antibiotic and vitamin treatments. In the necropsy, pulmonary hyperemia in the lungs, degenerations in the liver, focal necrosis in the spleen, cataral and necrotic alterations in the intestines were seen. In the histopathological examinations, desquamation in some areas of the intestinal epithelium of increases in the connective tissues of the lungs, degenerations in alveolus and lymphocyte infiltration around them, bacterial clumpsin bronches, disintegrations of endothelium of blood vessels were seen. Lymphocyte infiltrations in liver portal space, thrombosis in blood vessels and thickness in the blood vessel walls, degeneration in hepatocytes were seen. Thickness of spleen and muscle trabeculas, oedema in heart muscle were observed. In the bacteriological examinations, Campylobacter jejuni was isolated and identified

Stroke prevalence among the Turkish population in a rural area of Istanbul: A community-based study

Background: The population-based information on the prevalence of stroke from rural areas of Middle East countries including Turkey is unknown. Our aim is to evaluate the prevalence of stroke in those ⩾18 years in the Turkish population in a rural area of Istanbul. Methods: A cross-sectional door-to-door study was conducted in a rural area of Istanbul between 1 March and 30 March 2013. A research protocol recommended by World Health Organization for developing countries was used. Each screening teams consisted of one neurologist, one local nurse, and five surveyors. Teams were trained about the survey and questionnaire. The patients, who claimed to have suffered a stroke, were examined, and the diagnosis was confirmed by a neurologist on site. The findings and medical records were documented. Results: In total, 2906 people ⩾18 years were screened. 50 stroke cases were detected. 80% of those were found to have had an ischemic stroke, 14% of those were hemorrhagic cases, and 6% of those had an unclassified stroke type. The overall prevalence rate in those ⩾ 18 years was 1.7%. The male/female ratio was 0.92. Young (<45) stroke prevalence was found to be 0.6%. Conclusion: This study was the first of its kind to show the stroke prevalence among Turkish population ⩾ 18 years in a rural area of Istanbul. When compared to other studies which investigate people ⩾45 years from Turkey, the result (in the same age group) was moderate high. The male/female ratio was low compared to many other studies

The relationship between glomerular IgG staining and poor prognostic findings in patients with IgA nephropathy: the data from TSN-GOLD working group

Background Galactose-deficient IgA1 (Gd-IgA1) has an increased tendency to form immunocomplexes with IgG in the serum, contributing to IgAN pathogenesis by accumulating in the glomerular mesangium. Several studies showed that glomerular IgG deposition in IgAN is an important cause of mesangial proliferation and glomerular damage. This study aims to determine the association of the positivity of IgG and the intensity of IgG staining with a poor renal prognosis. Methods A total of 943 IgAN patients were included in the study. Glomerular IgG staining negative and positive patients were compared using Oxford classification scores, histopathological evaluations, proteinuria, eGFR, albumin, blood pressures. IgG positive patients were classified as (+), (++), (+++) based on their staining intensity, and the association with the prognostic criteria was also evaluated. Results 81% (n = 764) of the patients were detected as IgG negative, while 19% (n = 179) were positive. Age, gender, body mass index, blood pressure, proteinuria, eGFR, uric acid values were similar in IgG positive and negative patients who underwent biopsy (p > 0.05). Intensity of glomerular IgG positivity was not found to be associated with diastolic and systolic blood pressure, urea, uric acid, age, eGFR, albumin, proteinuria (p > 0.05 for all, r = - 0.084, r = - 0.102, r = - 0.006, r = 0.062, r = 0.014, r = - 0.044, r = - 0.061, r = - 0.066, r = 0.150, respectively). There was no difference for histopathological findings between IgG (+), IgG (++), IgG (+++) groups (for all, p > 0.05). Conclusion Glomerular IgG negativity and positivity detected by routine IFM in IgAN patients is not associated with poor renal prognostic risk factors