Effect of varying neurons in the hidden layer of neural network for simple character recognition

Numerous advancements, which have been made in the development of intelligent system, are inspired by the biological activities. Neural network is one such complex adaptive system that is able to capture and represent complex input/output relationships. This paper gives an overview of the neural network and further highlights the effect of noise and the number of neurons on the performance of the neural network for simple character recognition application. The number of neurons in the hidden layer is varied during simulation and the effect is observed in the percentage of errors in the recognition of character

A Cadaveric Report on a Giant Ureteric Stone Led Right Hydro Ureter and Severe Hydronephrosis

BACKGROUND: The ureter shows natural constrictions in its course, and these are the potential site for the impaction of the renal calculus. Giant ureteral stones are associated with insidious growth and late presentation, often leading to renal failure.CASE PRESENTATION: In the present case, we observed a huge ureteric stone obstructing the right ureterovesical junction in a 58 year-old male cadaver. We also found hydroureter distal to the impaction of the calculus, renal damage and severe hydronephrosis on the right side. Histopathological analysis showed conditions of arterio-nephro-sclerosis and eroded ureter secondary to the calculus. Ureteric stones obstruction may result in hydroureter, hydronephrosis and progressive renal damage leading to irreversible renal function. The present case provides valuable information regarding the gross and histopathological alterations in ureteric calculi.CONCLUSION: It further enables clinicians to be armed with the knowledge of preventive approaches to educate patients with previous calculi, or those who may develop in the future.

Enhancing security and radio spectrum efficiency in cognitive IoT networks

The emergence of Internet of Things (IoT) has led to a technology breakthrough by facilitating a new generation of sensing and control applications such as smart cities, smart health, and smart homes to only name a few. However, such a large-scale network of sensors and actuators involve a set of new challenges including security, radio spectrum scarcity, complexity of network, data management, and lack of global standards. In order to accommodate the growing number of IoT devices which is predicted to be over 20.4 billion by the year 2020, a new generation wireless protocols are required to scale up to such huge networks. In this thesis, the problem of dynamic spectrum management and security in IoT networks are considered. Security is one of the critical challenges in IoT networks, where the connected devices need to be protected from potential malicious and selfish attacks. The malicious attacks refer to the attacks where illegitimate and intruding entities attempt to disrupt the network performance through jamming or other unauthorized actions. Several cryptographic methods have been widely utilized to protect the communication devices from such attacks. However, such conventional methods are not easily scalable to large-scale IoT networks as they often rely on generation, distribution, and storing secret keys in the devices and are prone to several attacks such as man-in-the-middle attacks. Hardware-based security methods attempt to utilize the unique variations in the electronic devices as a metric for identification, authentication, and even secret key generation. While such methods have been fairly successful in identification and authentication applications, they still cannot offer a reliable solution for key generation applications as the performance of such methods highly depends on the physical and environmental factors. In this work, we developed a hardware-based secret key generation mechanism that utilizes the random variations in embedded memories in IoT devices to generate reproducible and reliable cryptographic keys by proposing a new error correction and fuzzy extractor structure. Furthermore, we developed a reputation-based spectrum leasing mechanism to provide a potential solution for spectrum scarcity in IoT networks. While the current static approaches of spectrum management resulted in inefficient usage of spectrum which is an expensive resource, the recent advancements in communication devices led to development of dynamic spectrum management techniques. Such dynamic spectrum management can be in the forms of spectrum sharing without involving the licensed users or more sophisticated methods of spectrum leasing, where the spectrum owners can willingly allocate a part of their spectrum to the unlicensed users in exchange for some benefit. While such spectrum sharing solutions can generally enhance the efficiently of spectrum utilization and the Quality of Service (QoS) for spectrum owners, they are highly sensitive to potential selfish attacks. Selfish attacks refer to the attacks by authenticated users who try to increase their own benefits. For example, in cooperative spectrum leasing scenarios, the selfish users may attempt to increase their own transmission rate by using the leased spectrum for their own selfish transmissions by not allocating enough power for relaying licensed user packets. Here, we propose a reputation-based spectrum leasing model to monitor the behavior of self-interested users to enhance the performance of common spectrum leasing techniques against selfish attacks

Origin of superior thyroid artery: under the surgeon’s knife

Abstract Background The major arterial supply to the thyroid gland is from the superior and inferior thyroid arteries, arising from the external carotid artery and the thyrocervical trunk respectively. The external laryngeal nerve runs in close proximity to the origin of the superior thyroid artery in relation to the thyroid gland. The superior thyroid artery is clinically important in head and neck surgeries. Objectives To locate the origin of the superior thyroid artery, because wide variability is reported. To provide knowledge of possible variations in its origin, because it is important for surgical procedures in the neck. Methods The origin of the superior thyroid artery was studied by dissecting sixty adult human hemineck specimens from donated cadavers in a Department of Anatomy. Results The highest incidence observed was origin of the superior thyroid artery from the external carotid artery (88.33%), whereas origin from the common carotid bifurcation only occurred in 8.33%. However, in 3.33% of cases, the superior thyroid artery originated from the common carotid artery and in a single case, the external laryngeal nerve did not cross the stem of the superior thyroid artery at all, but ran ventral and parallel to the artery. Conclusions It is important to rule out anomalous origin of superior thyroid artery and verify its relationship to the external laryngeal nerve prior to ligation of the artery in thyroid surgeries, in order to prevent iatrogenic injuries. Moreover, because anomalous origins of the superior thyroid artery are only anatomic variants, thorough knowledge of these is decisive for head and neck surgeries

Serendipitous Discovery of a Benign Obturator Nerve Schwannoma: Case report with a brief clinical review

Schwannomas are typically benign tumours of the peripheral nerves. However, they seldom arise from the obturator nerve. We report a case of an uncommon swelling (2.5 × 3.5 cm) in a 65-year-old male cadaver, found during a routine dissection session for first Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery students in the Department of Anatomy, Kasturba Medical College, Manipal, India, in 2019. It was seen originating from the left obturator nerve in the pelvis at the level of the sacral promontory. Histopathological investigation revealed a schwannoma. The hypocellular tumour was arranged in a sweeping fascicle pattern with patches of myxoid degeneration. Obturator schwannomas, though rare, can exist in cadavers, as seen in the present case. Hence, it should be considered as a differential diagnosis for clinical cases of pelvic masses and eliminated only after thorough radiological examination. Knowledge about the existence of such schwannomas is therefore essential. Keywords: Schwannoma; Obturator Nerves; Neurilemmoma; Nerve Sheath Neoplasms; Case Report; India