BORIS/CTCFL is an RNA-binding protein that associates with polysomes

© 2013 Ogunkolade et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited

Skin Lesion Analyser: An Efficient Seven-Way Multi-Class Skin Cancer Classification Using MobileNet

Skin cancer, a major form of cancer, is a critical public health problem with 123,000 newly diagnosed melanoma cases and between 2 and 3 million non-melanoma cases worldwide each year. The leading cause of skin cancer is high exposure of skin cells to UV radiation, which can damage the DNA inside skin cells leading to uncontrolled growth of skin cells. Skin cancer is primarily diagnosed visually employing clinical screening, a biopsy, dermoscopic analysis, and histopathological examination. It has been demonstrated that the dermoscopic analysis in the hands of inexperienced dermatologists may cause a reduction in diagnostic accuracy. Early detection and screening of skin cancer have the potential to reduce mortality and morbidity. Previous studies have shown Deep Learning ability to perform better than human experts in several visual recognition tasks. In this paper, we propose an efficient seven-way automated multi-class skin cancer classification system having performance comparable with expert dermatologists. We used a pretrained MobileNet model to train over HAM10000 dataset using transfer learning. The model classifies skin lesion image with a categorical accuracy of 83.1 percent, top2 accuracy of 91.36 percent and top3 accuracy of 95.34 percent. The weighted average of precision, recall, and f1-score were found to be 0.89, 0.83, and 0.83 respectively. The model has been deployed as a web application for public use at (https://saketchaturvedi.github.io). This fast, expansible method holds the potential for substantial clinical impact, including broadening the scope of primary care practice and augmenting clinical decision-making for dermatology specialists.Comment: This is a pre-copyedited version of a contribution published in Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, Hassanien A., Bhatnagar R., Darwish A. (eds) published by Chaturvedi S.S., Gupta K., Prasad P.S. The definitive authentication version is available online via https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-3383-9_1

Psicologia pediátrica: Do comportamento a saúde infantil

Os autores começam por caracterizar de forma sucinta a psicologia da saúde, realçando o papel do comportamento na saúde e na doença. Em seguida, são apresentados aspectos característicos da intervenção psicológica no âmbito da saúde da criança, denominada desde há alguns anos como psicologia pediátrica. Esta é definida e caracterizada como uma prática psicológica nos serviços médicos de crianças, cujos objectivos são contribuir para a promoção da saúde e prevenção da doença na criança, colaborar no tratamento, recuperação e apoio a criança doente, apoio a família, e participar na investigação aplicada dos factores psicossociais associados a saúde e a doença. E descrita a orientação predominante e objectivos da intervenção psicológica realizada pelos autores, no serviço pediátrico em que estão integrados desde há alguns anos. Finalmente é apresentada uma referência crítica e breve a legislação, recentemente publicada no nosso país, que enquadra os psicólogos que trabalham na saúde na carreira dos técnicos superiores de saúde, regulamentando o papel e funções, e a formação destes.The authors caracterize the pediatric psychology witch is defined as a psychology applied to children’s medical context, and conceptualized as a health psychology and different from the clinic psychology. Some aspects of the psychological intervention in this context are discribed such as prevention and promotion of children’s health, intervention in children’s illness and family, and research directions in the field. Some relevant aspects of the psychological intervention in a portuguese pediatric service are discribed. Recente portuguese legislation about health psychologist’s role definition and trainning is analised.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

An Application of Molecular Genotyping in Mice

Microsatellite markers are simple sequence repeats within the mammalian genome that can be used for identifying disease loci, mapping genes of interest as well as studying segregation patterns related to meiotic nondisjunction. Different strains of mice have variable CA repeat lengths and PCR based methods can be used to identify them, thus allowing for specific genotypes to be assigned. Molecular genotyping offers such identification at any developmental stage, which allows for a broad range of anomalies to be studied. We studied chromosomal segregation in relation to nondisjunction in early-gestation mouse embryos using molecular genotyping. Information on the parental origin as well as the number of chromosomes a given progeny carried was obtained in our analysis

Quality and Safety Aspects of Infant Nutrition

Quality and safety aspects of infant nutrition are of key importance for child health, but oftentimes they do not get much attention by health care professionals whose interest tends to focus on functional benefits of early nutrition. Unbalanced diets and harmful food components induce particularly high risks for untoward effects in infants because of their rapid growth, high nutrient needs, and their typical dependence on only one or few foods during the first months of life. The concepts, standards and practices that relate to infant food quality and safety were discussed at a scientific workshop organized by the Child Health Foundation and the Early Nutrition Academy jointly with the European Society for Paediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition, and a summary is provided here. The participants reviewed past and current issues on quality and safety, the role of different stakeholders, and recommendations to avert future issues. It was concluded that a high level of quality and safety is currently achieved, but this is no reason for complacency. The food industry carries the primary responsibility for the safety and suitability of their products, including the quality of composition, raw materials and production processes. Introduction of new or modified products should be preceded by a thorough science based review of suitability and safety by an independent authority. Food safety events should be managed on an international basis. Global collaboration of food producers, food-safety authorities, paediatricians and scientists is needed to efficiently exchange information and to best protect public health. Copyright (C) 2012 S. Karger AG, Base

Aortic dissection at the University hospital of the West Indies: A 20-year clinicopathological study of autopsy cases

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>An autopsy study of aortic dissection (AD) at our institution was previously reported. In the approximately 20 years since then, however, many aspects of diagnosis and treatment of this disease have changed, with a fall in mortality reported in many centers around the world. An impression amongst our pathologists that, there might be an increase in the prevalence of AD in the autopsy service at our hospital, since that earlier report, led to this repeated study, in an attempt to validate that notion. We also sought to identify any changes in clinicopathological features between the two series or any occurring during this study period itself.</p> <p>Findings</p> <p>All cases of AD identified at autopsy, during the 20-year period since the conclusion of the last study, were collected and pertinent clinical and pathological data were analyzed and compared, both within the two decades of this study period and against the results of the last study.</p> <p>Fifty-six cases comprised this study group including 36 males and 20 females, with a mean age of 63.9 years. There were, more patients in the second decade (n = 33; 59%) compared with the first decade (n = 23; 41%). Hypertension as a risk factor was identified in 52 (93%) cases and rupture occurred in 49 (88%) cases. A clinical diagnosis of AD was considered prior to surgery or autopsy in 25 (45%) cases overall, more during the second decade. Surgery was attempted in 25% of all cases with an increase in the second decade compared with the first.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Compared with the earlier review, a variety of changes in the profile of patients with AD in the autopsy service has been noted, including a reversal in the female predominance seen previously. Other observations include an increase in cases where the correct clinical diagnosis was considered and in which surgical treatment was attempted, changes also evident when the second decade of the present study was compared with the earlier decade. Overall, there were many positive trends. However, areas that could still be improved include an increased index of suspicion for the diagnosis of AD and perhaps in the initiation of treatment, earlier, in those cases where the correct diagnosis was considered.</p

Nasal Chemosensory-Stimulation Evoked Activity Patterns in the Rat Trigeminal Ganglion Visualized by In Vivo Voltage-Sensitive Dye Imaging

Mammalian nasal chemosensation is predominantly mediated by two independent neuronal pathways, the olfactory and the trigeminal system. Within the early olfactory system, spatiotemporal responses of the olfactory bulb to various odorants have been mapped in great detail. In contrast, far less is known about the representation of volatile chemical stimuli at an early stage in the trigeminal system, the trigeminal ganglion (TG), which contains neurons directly projecting to the nasal cavity. We have established an in vivo preparation that allows high-resolution imaging of neuronal population activity from a large region of the rat TG using voltage-sensitive dyes (VSDs). Application of different chemical stimuli to the nasal cavity elicited distinct, stimulus-category specific, spatiotemporal activation patterns that comprised activated as well as suppressed areas. Thus, our results provide the first direct insights into the spatial representation of nasal chemosensory information within the trigeminal ganglion imaged at high temporal resolution

Evaluation of dog owners' perceptions concerning radiation therapy

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>External radiation therapy (RT) has been available for small animals in Sweden since 2006. This study was designed to obtain information on owner experiences and perceptions related to RT of cancer in their dogs. Another survey was used to determine the attitudes about use of RT in a group of Swedish veterinarians. Their responses were analyzed and compared to their level of knowledge of oncology and RT.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Owners of all dogs (n = 23) who had undergone RT for malignancy at Jönköping Small Animal Hospital between March 2006 to September 2007 were interviewed. A questionnaire was given to a selected group of veterinarians.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>All 23 owners responded. All owners thought that their dog did well during RT and most that their dog was also fine during the following phase when acute RT-related skin reactions occur and heal. Three owners stated that their dog had pain that negatively impacted quality of life because of radiation dermatitis. Five owners reported that RT positively impacted quality of life of the dog during the first weeks after RT because palliation was achieved. The owners were not disturbed by the efforts required of them. All but one owner (22 of 23) stated that they would make the same decision about RT again if a similar situation occurred. The most important factor for this decision was the chance to delay occurrence of tumour-related discomfort. The chance for cure was of less importance but still essential, followed by expected side effects. Time commitments, travel, number of treatments required and financial cost; all had low impact. The veterinarian survey showed that less background knowledge of small animal oncology/RT was associated with more negative expectations of RT for small animals.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The results show that for these owners, RT was a worthwhile treatment modality and that the discomfort for the dog was manageable and acceptable relative to the benefits. Improved continuing education about small animal RT in Sweden will likely result in increased evidence-based and positive treatment recommendations concerning RT by veterinarians.</p

The relation between the producer and consumer price indices: a two-country study

© 2017, Macmillan Publishers Ltd., part of Springer Nature. Marketing managers are often in a dilemma about which pricing index to rely on while calculating the annual increase in the prices for their product. To provide insights that can reduce this dilemma, a critical comparison of the Producer Price index and consumer price index is called for. In this study, the relation between the Producer Price Index (PPI) and Consumer Price Index (CPI) was investigated through a comparison between Turkey and UK. Unlike many other previous studies, this study tried to determine the dominant pricing approach in an economy by examining the relation between the producer and consumer prices. In this context, VAR, impulse-response, variance decomposition, and Granger causality tests were used for the analyses of time series data. The results of study showed that there was bidirectional causality between the producer and consumer prices in both countries. Therefore, it was asserted that businesses in both countries generally apply mixed pricing approach. The results thus provide some interesting insights that can aid marketing managers in their pricing decisions

An Improved Test for Detecting Multiplicative Homeostatic Synaptic Scaling

Homeostatic scaling of synaptic strengths is essential for maintenance of network “gain”, but also poses a risk of losing the distinctions among relative synaptic weights, which are possibly cellular correlates of memory storage. Multiplicative scaling of all synapses has been proposed as a mechanism that would preserve the relative weights among them, because they would all be proportionately adjusted. It is crucial for this hypothesis that all synapses be affected identically, but whether or not this actually occurs is difficult to determine directly. Mathematical tests for multiplicative synaptic scaling are presently carried out on distributions of miniature synaptic current amplitudes, but the accuracy of the test procedure has not been fully validated. We now show that the existence of an amplitude threshold for empirical detection of miniature synaptic currents limits the use of the most common method for detecting multiplicative changes. Our new method circumvents the problem by discarding the potentially distorting subthreshold values after computational scaling. This new method should be useful in assessing the underlying neurophysiological nature of a homeostatic synaptic scaling transformation, and therefore in evaluating its functional significance