LAPSES: A Recipe for High-Performance Adaptive Router Design

Earlier research has shown that adaptive routing can help in improving network performance. However, it has not received adequate attention in commercial routers mainly due to the additional hardware complexity, and the perceived cost and performance degradation that may result from this complexity. These concerns can be mitigated if one can design a cost-effective router that can support adaptive routing. This paper proposes a three step recipe — Look-Ahead routing, intelligent Path Selection, and an Economic Storage implementation, called the LAPSES approach — for cost-effective high performance pipelined adaptive router design. The first step, look-ahead routing, reduces a pipeline stage in the router by making table lookup and arbitration concurrent. Next, three new traffic-sensitive path selection heuristics (LRU, LFU and MAX-CREDIT) are proposed to select one of the available alternate paths. Finally, two techniques for reducing routing table size of the adaptive router are presented. These are called meta-table routing and economical storage. The proposed economical storage needs a routing table with only 9 and 27 entries for two and three dimensional meshes, respectively. All these design ideas are evaluated on a (16 16) mesh network via simulation. A fully adaptive algorithm and various traffic patterns are used to examine the performance benefits. Performance results show that the look-ahead design as well as the path selection heuristics boost network performance, while the economical storage approach turns out to be an ideal choice in comparison to full-table and meta-table options. We believe the router resulting from these three design enhancements can make adaptive routing a viable choice for interconnects.

HUBUNGAN ANTARA SELF EFFICACYDAN DUKUNGAN SOSIAL ORANGTUA DENGAN SELF REGULATED LEARNING SERTA IMPLIKASINYA TERHADAP BIMBINGAN DAN KONSELING

This research was based on how important to increase the students self regulated learning. Self efficacy and parent social support were the factors assumed to affect the self regulated learning. The purpose of this research were to describe: (1) self efficacy, (2) parent social support, (3) self regulated learning, (4) the relationship between self efficacy with self regulated learning, (5) the relationship between parent social support with self regulated learning, and (6) the simultaneous relationship between self efficacy and parent social support with self regulated learning. This research used a quantitative method with correlative descriptive type. The population in this research was the students at SMP Negeri 29 Padang many as 522 students. The sample in this research was many as 213 students who selected with a proportional stratified random sampling technique. The instrument was a Likert scale model. The results of instrument reliability test showed that self efficacy was much as 0.851, parent social support 0.946 and self regulated learning 0.860. The data were analyzed by using descriptive statistic, simple regression, and multiple regression. This discover research show: (1) students self efficacy was at high category, (2) students parent social support was at high category, (3) students self regulated learning was at high category, (4) there was a positive and significant relationship between of self efficacy to self regulated learning, (5) there wasa positive and significant relationship between of parent social support to self regulated learning, and (6) there wasa positive and significant simultaneous relationship between of self efficacy and parent social support with self regulated learning. Implications of these results could be used as suggestion to arrange programs of guidance and counseling service at the school

Karakteristik Epidemiologi Kasus-kasus Flu Burung di Indonesia Juli 2005-oktober 2006

Influenza A (H5N1) human cases started to he reported since 1997. In Indonesia, the first human cases were reported in July 2005, as a cluster consisted of a father and two daughters; two of them were fatal confirmed cases. As of 31 October 2006, 72 cases have heen identified (25 were classified into 10 cluster) with a case fatality rate (CFR) of 76.4%. The patients were from 9 (27%) of the 33 provinces in Indonesia. The ratio between male and female patients was 4 to 3. with an extremely high CFR of the women (87%). Most patients were of young adult ages, 39% of them were less than 15 years old. Indirect and direct contact with sick or dead poultry was reported from 81% of these confirmed cases

Calcium alginate-based antimicrobial film dressings for potential healing of infected foot ulcers

Aim: Diabetic foot ulcers are susceptible to infection and nonmedicated dressings are ineffective because they have no antimicrobial activity. This study aimed to develop antimicrobial films to deliver ciprofloxacin for treating bacterial infection. Results/methodology: Ciprofloxacin-loaded calcium alginate films were characterized for porosity, swelling, equilibrium water content, water absorption, water vapor transmission, evaporative water loss, moisture content, mechanical strength, adhesion, IR spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy, x-ray diffraction, drug release, cytotoxicity and antimicrobial activity against Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus and Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Films were transparent, flexible, uniform, with ideal moisture handling, maximum drug release within 90 min, killing bacteria within 24 h and highly biocompatible with human keratinocyte cells. Conclusion: The results confirmed successful design of biocompatible dressings effective against Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria

The DESiGN trial (DEtection of Small for Gestational age Neonate), evaluating the effect of the Growth Assessment Protocol (GAP): study protocol for a randomised controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: Stillbirth rates in the United Kingdom (UK) are amongst the highest of all developed nations. The association between small-for-gestational-age (SGA) foetuses and stillbirth is well established, and observational studies suggest that improved antenatal detection of SGA babies may halve the stillbirth rate. The Growth Assessment Protocol (GAP) describes a complex intervention that includes risk assessment for SGA and screening using customised fundal-height growth charts. Increased detection of SGA from the use of GAP has been implicated in the reduction of stillbirth rates by 22%, in observational studies of UK regions where GAP uptake was high. This study will be the first randomised controlled trial examining the clinical efficacy, health economics and implementation of the GAP programme in the antenatal detection of SGA. METHODS/DESIGN: In this randomised controlled trial, clusters comprising a maternity unit (or National Health Service Trust) were randomised to either implementation of the GAP programme, or standard care. The primary outcome is the rate of antenatal ultrasound detection of SGA in infants found to be SGA at birth by both population and customised standards, as this is recognised as being the group with highest risk for perinatal morbidity and mortality. Secondary outcomes include antenatal detection of SGA by population centiles, antenatal detection of SGA by customised centiles, short-term maternal and neonatal outcomes, resource use and economic consequences, and a process evaluation of GAP implementation. Qualitative interviews will be performed to assess facilitators and barriers to implementation of GAP. DISCUSSION: This study will be the first to provide data and outcomes from a randomised controlled trial investigating the potential difference between the GAP programme compared to standard care for antenatal ultrasound detection of SGA infants. Accurate information on the performance and service provision requirements of the GAP protocol has the potential to inform national policy decisions on methods to reduce the rate of stillbirth. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Primary registry and trial identifying number: ISRCTN 67698474 . Registered on 2 November 2016

Lack of privileged access to awareness for rewarding social scenes in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Reduced social motivation is hypothesised to underlie social behavioural symptoms of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). The extent to which rewarding social stimuli are granted privileged access to awareness in ASD is currently unknown. We use continuous flash suppression to investigate whether individuals with and without ASD show privileged access to awareness for social over nonsocial rewarding scenes that are closely matched for stimulus features. Strong evidence for a privileged access to awareness for rewarding social over nonsocial scenes was observed in neurotypical adults. No such privileged access was seen in ASD individuals, and moderate support for the null model was noted. These results suggest that the purported deficits in social motivation in ASD may extend to early processing mechanisms

Reduced preference for social rewards in a novel tablet based task in young children with Autism Spectrum Disorders

Atypical responsivity to social rewards has been observed in young children with or at risk of Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). These observations contributed to the hypothesis of reduced social motivation in ASD. In the current study we develop a novel task to test social reward preference using a tablet computer (iPad), where two differently coloured buttons were associated with a social and a nonsocial rewarding image respectively. 63 young children, aged 14–68 months, with and without a diagnosis of ASD took part in the study. The experimental sessions were also recorded on video, using an in-built webcam on the tablet as well as an external camera. Children with ASD were found to show a reduced relative preference for social rewards, indexed by a lower proportion of touches for the button associated with the social reward image. Greater social preference as measured using the tablet-based task was associated with increased use of social communicative behaviour such as eye contact with the experimenter and social smile in response to the social reward image. These results are consistent with earlier findings from eye-tracking studies, and provide novel empirical insights into atypical social reward responsivity in ASD

Convalescent plasma in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 (RECOVERY): a randomised controlled, open-label, platform trial

Background: Many patients with COVID-19 have been treated with plasma containing anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies. We aimed to evaluate the safety and efficacy of convalescent plasma therapy in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19. Methods: This randomised, controlled, open-label, platform trial (Randomised Evaluation of COVID-19 Therapy [RECOVERY]) is assessing several possible treatments in patients hospitalised with COVID-19 in the UK. The trial is underway at 177 NHS hospitals from across the UK. Eligible and consenting patients were randomly assigned (1:1) to receive either usual care alone (usual care group) or usual care plus high-titre convalescent plasma (convalescent plasma group). The primary outcome was 28-day mortality, analysed on an intention-to-treat basis. The trial is registered with ISRCTN, 50189673, and ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT04381936. Findings: Between May 28, 2020, and Jan 15, 2021, 11558 (71%) of 16287 patients enrolled in RECOVERY were eligible to receive convalescent plasma and were assigned to either the convalescent plasma group or the usual care group. There was no significant difference in 28-day mortality between the two groups: 1399 (24%) of 5795 patients in the convalescent plasma group and 1408 (24%) of 5763 patients in the usual care group died within 28 days (rate ratio 1·00, 95% CI 0·93–1·07; p=0·95). The 28-day mortality rate ratio was similar in all prespecified subgroups of patients, including in those patients without detectable SARS-CoV-2 antibodies at randomisation. Allocation to convalescent plasma had no significant effect on the proportion of patients discharged from hospital within 28 days (3832 [66%] patients in the convalescent plasma group vs 3822 [66%] patients in the usual care group; rate ratio 0·99, 95% CI 0·94–1·03; p=0·57). Among those not on invasive mechanical ventilation at randomisation, there was no significant difference in the proportion of patients meeting the composite endpoint of progression to invasive mechanical ventilation or death (1568 [29%] of 5493 patients in the convalescent plasma group vs 1568 [29%] of 5448 patients in the usual care group; rate ratio 0·99, 95% CI 0·93–1·05; p=0·79). Interpretation: In patients hospitalised with COVID-19, high-titre convalescent plasma did not improve survival or other prespecified clinical outcomes. Funding: UK Research and Innovation (Medical Research Council) and National Institute of Health Research