An Unsupervised Algorithm for Change Detection in Hyperspectral Remote Sensing Data Using Synthetically Fused Images and Derivative Spectral Profiles

Multitemporal hyperspectral remote sensing data have the potential to detect altered areas on the earth’s surface. However, dissimilar radiometric and geometric properties between the multitemporal data due to the acquisition time or position of the sensors should be resolved to enable hyperspectral imagery for detecting changes in natural and human-impacted areas. In addition, data noise in the hyperspectral imagery spectrum decreases the change-detection accuracy when general change-detection algorithms are applied to hyperspectral images. To address these problems, we present an unsupervised change-detection algorithm based on statistical analyses of spectral profiles; the profiles are generated from a synthetic image fusion method for multitemporal hyperspectral images. This method aims to minimize the noise between the spectra corresponding to the locations of identical positions by increasing the change-detection rate and decreasing the false-alarm rate without reducing the dimensionality of the original hyperspectral data. Using a quantitative comparison of an actual dataset acquired by airborne hyperspectral sensors, we demonstrate that the proposed method provides superb change-detection results relative to the state-of-the-art unsupervised change-detection algorithms

Interferon-alpha treatment rapidly clears Hepatitis e virus infection in humanized mice

Antiviral treatment options for chronic Hepatitis E Virus (HEV) infections are limited and immunological determinants of viral persistence remain largely unexplored. We studied the antiviral potency of pegylated interferon-α (pegIFNα) against HEV infections in humanized mice and modelled intrahepatic interferon stimulated gene (ISG) responses. Human gene expression levels in humanized mouse livers were analyzed by qPCR and Nanostring. Human CXCL10 was measured in mouse serum. HEV genotype 3 (gt3) infections were cleared from liver and feces within 8 pegIFNα doses in all mice and relapsed after a single pegIFNα injection in only half of treated animals. Rapid viral clearance by pegIFNα was confirmed in HEV gt1, but not in Hepatitis B Virus infected animals. No ISG induction was observed in untreated HEV gt3 and gt1 infected humanized livers compared to control chimeric mice, irrespective of the human hepatocyte donor, viral isolate or HEV infection duration. Human specific ISG transcript levels in mouse liver increased significantly after pegIFNα treatment and induced high circulating human CXCL10 in mouse serum. In conclusion, HEV gt1 and gt3 infections do not elicit innate intrahepatic immune responses and remain highly sensitive to pegIFNα in immunocompromised humanized mice

OBJECT-BASED CLASSIFICATION OF AN URBAN AREA THROUGH A COMBINATION OF AERIAL IMAGE AND AIRBORNE LIDAR DATA

ABSTRACT This paper studies the effect of airborne elevation information on the classification of an aerial image in an urban area. In an urban area, it is difficult to classify buildings relying solely on the spectral information obtained from aerial images because urban buildings possess a variety of roof colors. Therefore, combining Lidar data with aerial images overcomes the difficulties encountered with regard to the heterogeneous appearance of buildings. In the first stage of this process, building information is obtained and is extracted using the normalized Digital Surface Model, return information derived from the airborne Lidar data, and vegetation information obtained through preclassification. In the second stage of this process, the aerial image is segmented into objects. It is then overlaid with building information extracted from the first step in the process. By applying the definite rule to the resulting image, it is possible to determine whether or not the object is a building. In the final stage, the aerial image is classified by using the building object as ancillary data extracted from the prior stage. This classification procedure uses elevation and intensity information obtained from the Lidar data, as well as the red, green, and blue bands obtained from the aerial image. As a result, a method using the combination of an aerial image and the airborne Lidar data shows higher accuracy and improved classification, especially with regard to building objects, than results that rely solely on an aerial image

Ethanol extract of Scutellaria baicalensis Georgi prevents oxidative damage and neuroinflammation and memorial impairments in artificial senescense mice

Aging is a progressive process related to the accumulation of oxidative damage and neuroinflammation. We tried to find the anti-amnesic effect of the Scutellaria baicalens Georgia (SBG) ethanol extract and its major ingredients. The antioxidative effect of SBG on the mice model with memory impairment induced by chronic injection of D-galactose and sodium nitrate was studied. The Y-maze test was used to evaluate the learning and memory function of mice. The activities of superoxide dismutase, catalase and the content of malondialdehyde in brain tissue were used for the antioxidation activities. Neuropathological alteration and expression of bcl-2 protein were investigated in the hippocampus by immunohistochemical staining. ROS, neuroinflammation and apoptosis related molecules expression such as Cox-2, iNOS, procaspase-3, cleaved caspase-3, 8 and 9, bcl-2 and bax protein and the products of iNOS and Cox-2, NO, PGE2, were studied using LPS-activated Raw 264.7 cells and microglia BV2 cells. The cognition of mice was significantly improved by the treatment of baicalein and 50 and 100 mg/kg of SBG in Y-maze test. Both SBG groups showed strong antioxidation, antiinflammation effects with significantly decreased iNOS and Cox-2 expression, NO and PGE2 production, increased bcl-2 and decreased bax and cleaved caspase-3 protein expression in LPS induced Raw 264.7 and BV2 cells. We also found that apoptotic pathway was caused by the intrinsic mitochondrial pathway with the decreased cleaved caspase-9 and unchanged cleaved caspase-8 expression. These findings suggest that SBG, especially high dose, 100 mg/kg, improved the memory impairments significantly and showed antioxidation, antiinflammation and intrinsic caspase-mediated apoptosis effects

Change Detection in Hyperspectral Images Using Recurrent 3D Fully Convolutional Networks

Hyperspectral change detection (CD) can be effectively performed using deep-learning networks. Although these approaches require qualified training samples, it is difficult to obtain ground-truth data in the real world. Preserving spatial information during training is difficult due to structural limitations. To solve such problems, our study proposed a novel CD method for hyperspectral images (HSIs), including sample generation and a deep-learning network, called the recurrent three-dimensional (3D) fully convolutional network (Re3FCN), which merged the advantages of a 3D fully convolutional network (FCN) and a convolutional long short-term memory (ConvLSTM). Principal component analysis (PCA) and the spectral correlation angle (SCA) were used to generate training samples with high probabilities of being changed or unchanged. The strategy assisted in training fewer samples of representative feature expression. The Re3FCN was mainly comprised of spectral⁻spatial and temporal modules. Particularly, a spectral⁻spatial module with a 3D convolutional layer extracts the spectral⁻spatial features from the HSIs simultaneously, whilst a temporal module with ConvLSTM records and analyzes the multi-temporal HSI change information. The study first proposed a simple and effective method to generate samples for network training. This method can be applied effectively to cases with no training samples. Re3FCN can perform end-to-end detection for binary and multiple changes. Moreover, Re3FCN can receive multi-temporal HSIs directly as input without learning the characteristics of multiple changes. Finally, the network could extract joint spectral⁻spatial⁻temporal features and it preserved the spatial structure during the learning process through the fully convolutional structure. This study was the first to use a 3D FCN and a ConvLSTM for the remote-sensing CD. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed CD method, we performed binary and multi-class CD experiments. Results revealed that the Re3FCN outperformed the other conventional methods, such as change vector analysis, iteratively reweighted multivariate alteration detection, PCA-SCA, FCN, and the combination of 2D convolutional layers-fully connected LSTM

Kinetics of miR-122 Expression in the Liver during Acute HCV Infection

The relationships among micro RNA-122 (miR-122) expression in the liver, hepatitis C virus (HCV) replication and hepatic damage were analyzed in three chimpanzees observed for 180 days after inoculation with HCV genotype 1a. Levels of miR-122 in the liver and serum were measured by real-time RT PCR in serial liver biopsies and serum samples. Hepatic miR-122 levels were normalized separately for each of three chimpanzees with small RNAs and microRNAs that are endogenous to the liver and are stably expressed. Two-to 4-fold rise in hepatic miR-122 levels was observed at the onset of HCV infection (the first 4 weeks) when HCV titers in the liver and serum increased rapidly in all three chimpanzees in concordance with in vitro data indicating the miR-122 significance for HCV replication. Between 10 to 14 weeks after inoculation, when hepatic and serum HCV RNA titers exceeded 3 logs and alanine aminotransferase (ALT) activity was elevated, hepatic miR-122 levels were in decline. Cumulative data derived from all three chimpanzees from 180 days of observation documented an inverse (negative) correlation between hepatic miR-122 and HCV RNA in the liver and serum and positive correlation between level of serum miR-122 and HCV replication. Subsequent rise of miR-122 level during HCV clearance and ALT normalization suggested a tri-phasic occurrence of the relationship among hepatic miR-122 expression, HCV replication and hepatic destruction, which was the most apparent in one chimpanzee but less evident in two other animals. In vivo kinetics of hepatic and serum miR-122, HCV replication and hepatic destruction reflects complexities of the virus-host interaction during the acute phase of HCV infection