Community Seismic Network

The article describes the design of the Community Seismic Network, which is a dense open seismic network based on low cost sensors. The inputs are from sensors hosted by volunteers from the community by direct connection to their personal computers, or through sensors built into mobile devices. The server is cloud-based for robustness and to dynamically handle the load of impulsive earthquake events. The main product of the network is a map of peak acceleration, delivered within seconds of the ground shaking. The lateral variations in the level of shaking will be valuable to first responders, and the waveform information from a dense network will allow detailed mapping of the rupture process. Sensors in buildings may be useful for monitoring the state-of-health of the structure after major shaking

Pre-operative assessment to predict post-operative complications in patients undergoing lung resection surgeries in a tertiary hospital in India

BACKGROUND: Post-operative complications that are commonly encountered following lung resection surgeries are atelectasis, pneumonia and bronchopleural fistula and increased ICU stay. Previous studies have shown that FEV-1, ppo (predicted post-operative) FEV-1 and DLCO have value in predicting cardiopulmonary complications. We evaluated the potential of pre-operative Spirometry parameters, primarily FEV-1 and other pulmonary function tests, six minute walk test and cardiopulmonary exercise testing and also quality of life questionnaire (SGRQ – St George Respiratory Questionnaire) to predict these post operative complications. AIM OF THE STUDY: 1. To show that pre-operative tests, mainly FEV-1 can predict post-operative complications like atelectasis, pneumonia, bronchopleural fistula, increased duration of post-operative hospital stay, duration of admission in HDU and mortality rates. 2. To show that other pulmonary function tests like FVC, 6min walk test and also Cardiopulmonary testing like V02 max and VE/VCO2 can predict these outcomes. 3. To obtain a clinical profile of patients undergoing lung resection surgery. 4. To evaluate actual post-operative lung function and exercise capacity and its correlation with the predicted post operative lung function. METHODS: It is a prospective observational study done in a single tertiary centre with co-ordination between the departments of Thoracic Surgery and Pulmonary Medicine. Patients who were planned for lung resection surgery were included. Sample size was 99 and data collection began from March 29th 2016. Patients were monitored for perioperative and post-operative complications and after discharge monitoring was done via phone calls or email. RESULTS: A total of 49 post operative patients have reviewed till date with repeat pulmonary function testing and quality of life questionnaire assessments done. The most common indication for lung resection surgery was malignancy (37%) with Carcinoid tumors being the most common type. Lobectomy was the most common type of lung resection surgery performed. The spirometrical parameters which showed statistical significance in predicting post operative fever were - FVC(Forced vital capacity), TLC(Total lung capacity), RV(residual volume), PEFR(Peak expiratory flow rate) and DLCO% (diffusion capacity of the lung for carbon monoxide %). For atelectasis, RV, RV% and TLC had statistically significance. PPO FEV-1 had a strong Spearman’s correlation co-efficient with both FEV-1 pre op and FEV-1 post op with values of 0.910 and 0.838 respectively. CONCLUSION: In our series of 100 patients of lung resection surgery the morbidity and mortality is low and comparable to published international literature. Only in 37% of patients, surgery was done for resection of neoplasm. Remaining surgeries were done for infections and post infective sequelae. Although FEV-1 could not predict post lung resection surgery complications, they are valuable to select appropriate patients and to achieve good outcomes and low mortality. Quality of life as measured by SGRQ, exercise capacity as measured by six minute walk test and DLCO/VA ratio had improved, which could imply that resecting the diseased lung improved overall functional capacity of the patient. FEV1/FVC ratio can affect duration of ICU stay. Predicted post-operative FEV-1 (ppo FEV-1) correlated very strongly with the actual post-operative FEV-1. It is accurate to predict FEV1 within - 76 ml to + 76 ml of actual post-operative FEV-1 but using the anatomical formula for the prediction of post-operative VO2 max and DLCO were not so accurate

Plasmodium falciparum EPCR-binding PfEMP1 expression increases with malaria disease severity and is elevated in retinopathy negative cerebral malaria.

Background Expression of group A and the A-like subset of group B Plasmodium falciparumerythrocyte membrane protein 1 (PfEMP1) is associated with severe malaria (SM). The diversity of var sequences combined with the challenges of distinct classification of patient pathologies has made studying the role of distinct PfEMP1 variants on malaria disease severity challenging. The application of retinopathy in the recent years has provided a further method to clinically evaluate children with cerebral malaria (CM). The question of whether children with clinical CM but no retinopathy represent a completely different disease process or a subgroup within the spectrum of CM remains an important question in malaria. In the current study, we use newly designed primer sets with the best coverage to date in a large cohort of children with SM to determine the role of var genes in malaria disease severity and especially CM as discriminated by retinopathy. Methods We performed qRT-PCR targeting the different subsets of these var genes on samples from Ugandan children with CM (n = 98, of whom 50 had malarial retinopathy [RP] and 47 did not [RN]), severe malarial anemia (SMA, n = 47), and asymptomatic parasitemia (AP, n = 14). The primers used in this study were designed based on var sequences from 226 Illumina whole genome sequenced P. falciparum field isolates. Results Increasing severity of illness was associated with increasing levels of endothelial protein C receptor (EPCR)-binding PfEMP1. EPCR-binding PfEMP1 transcript levels were highest in children with combined CM and SMA and then decreased by level of disease severity: RP CM \u3e RN CM \u3e SMA \u3e AP. Conclusions The study findings indicate that PfEMP1 binding to EPCR is important in the pathogenesis of SM, including RN CM, and suggest that increased expression of EPCR-binding PfEMP1 is associated with progressively more severe disease. Agents that block EPCR-binding of PfEMP1 could provide novel interventions to prevent or decrease disease severity in malaria

Community Seismic Network: A Dense Array to Sense Earthquake Strong Motion

The Community Seismic Network (CSN) is currently a 500‐element strong‐motion network located in the Los Angeles area of California (see Fig. 1). The sensors in the network are low‐cost microelectromechanical (MEM) accelerometers that are capable of recording on scale up to accelerations of ±2g. The primary product of the network is a set of measurements of ground shaking in the seconds following a major earthquake. An example of this is shown in Figure 2. The shaking information will be contributed to U.S. Geological Survey products such as ShakeMap (Wald et al., 1999) and ShakeCast (Wald et al., 2006), with the goal of providing first responders a proxy for damage that can guide efforts immediately following the event. The basic premise is the strong ground‐motion shaking varies on a subkilometer scale, which will require a dense network to meaningfully measure the shaking. Evidence for this comes from earthquakes recorded by dense oil company surveys in the Los Angeles area (Clayton et al., 2011)

Recurrence of borderline ovarian tumors: a survival analysis

Background: Borderline ovarian tumors are non-invasive tumors that display greater epithelial proliferation and cytological atypia than benign tumors, but less than carcinomas. They may be treated conservatively in young women, however there is a concern for recurrence and progression to frank malignancy. We aimed to study the clinicopathological features of borderline ovarian tumors and their risk of recurrence.Methods: We reviewed the electronic and paper charts of all borderline ovarian tumors operated between January 1, 2001 and December 31, 2019 at a tertiary level teaching hospital in India. Descriptive statistics such as proportions and means were used. A survival analysis was done for recurrence and death.Results: A total of 93 borderline ovarian tumor patients were identified. The most common histology in our study was mucinous 60 (63%) followed by serous 28 (29%). Ninety two (99%) of them were stage I at diagnosis. Microinvasion was present in 27 (26%) of the cases. Out of the 30 fertility sparing operations performed (unilateral salpingo-oophorectomy/cytectomy), 4 (13%) had recurrences and progressed to malignancy. The overall malignancy rate was 4%. There was one mortality secondary to septic shock.Conclusions: Borderline ovarian tumors account for 10-20% of ovarian epithelial tumors and have extremely good prognosis affecting majorly the reproductive aged women. The low recurrence rate and good five year survival rate, at all the stages of the disease enables to incorporate fertility sparing surgeries as part of the staging

2019 Ridgecrest Earthquake Reveals Areas of Los Angeles That Amplify Shaking of High-Rises

The populace of Los Angeles, California, was startled by shaking from the M 7.1 earthquake that struck the city of Ridgecrest located 200 km to the north on 6 July 2019. Although the earthquake did not cause damage in Los Angeles, the experience in high‐rise buildings was frightening in contrast to the shaking felt in short buildings. Observations from 560 ground‐level accelerometers reveal large variations in shaking in the Los Angeles basin that occurred for more than 2 min. The observations come from the spatially dense Community Seismic Network (CSN), combined with the sparser Southern California Seismic Network and California Strong Motion Instrumentation Program networks. Site amplification factors for periods of 1, 3, 6, and 8 s are computed as the ratio of each station’s response spectral values combined for the two horizontal directions, relative to the average of three bedrock sites. Spatially coherent behavior in site amplification emerges for periods ≥3  s⁠, and the maximum calculated site amplifications are the largest, by factors of 7, 10, and 8, respectively, for 3, 6, and 8 s periods. The dense CSN observations show that the long‐period amplification is clearly, but only partially, correlated with the depth to basement. Sites with the largest amplifications for the long periods (⁠≥3  s⁠) are not close to the deepest portion of the basin. At 6 and 8 s periods, the maximum amplifications occur in the western part of the Los Angeles basin and in the south‐central San Fernando Valley sedimentary basin. The observations suggest that the excitation of a hypothetical high‐rise located in an area characterized by the largest site amplifications could be four times larger than in a downtown Los Angeles location

Downtown Los Angeles 52-Story High-Rise and Free-Field Response to an Oil Refinery Explosion

The ExxonMobil Corp. oil refinery in Torrance, California experienced an explosion on February 18, 2015 causing ground shaking equivalent to a magnitude 2.0 earthquake. The impulse response for the source was computed from Southern California Seismic Network data for a single force system with a value of 2×10^5 kN vertically downward. The refinery explosion produced an air pressure wave that was recorded 22.8 km away in a 52-story high-rise building in downtown Los Angeles by a dense accelerometer array that is a component of the Community Seismic Network. The array recorded anomalous waveforms on each floor displaying coherent arrivals that are consistent with the building's elastic response to a pressure wave caused by the refinery explosion. Using a finite-element model of the building, the force on the building on a floor-by-floor scale was found to range up to 1.42 kN, corresponding to a pressure perturbation of 7.7 Pa

The endothelial protein C receptor rs867186-GG genotype is associated with increased soluble EPCR and could mediate protection against severe malaria

The endothelial protein C receptor (EPCR) appears to play an important role in Plasmodium falciparum endothelial cell binding in severe malaria (SM). Despite consistent findings of elevated soluble EPCR (sEPCR) in other infectious diseases, field studies to date have provided conflicting data about the role of EPCR in SM. To better define this role, we performed genotyping for the rs867186-G variant, associated with increased sEPCR levels, and measured sEPCR levels in two prospective studies of Ugandan children designed to understand immunologic and genetic factors associated with neurocognitive deficits in SM including 551 SM children, 71 uncomplicated malaria (UM) and 172 healthy community children (CC). The rs867186-GG genotype was more frequent in CC (4.1%) than SM (0.6%, P = 0.002). The rs867186-G variant was associated with increased sEPCR levels and sEPCR was lower in children with SM than CC (P < 0.001). Among SM children, those who had a second SM episode showed a trend toward lower plasma sEPCR both at initial admission and at 6-month follow-up compared to those without repeated SM (P = 0.06 for both). The study findings support a role for sEPCR in severe malaria pathogenesis and emphasize a distinct role of sEPCR in malaria as compared to other infectious diseases