The Mildly Elevated Serum Bilirubin Level is Negatively Associated with the Incidence of End Stage Renal Disease in Patients with IgA Nephropathy

Oxidative stress plays various roles in the development and progression of IgA nephropathy, while bilirubin is known as a potent antioxidant. We therefore hypothesized that serum bilirubin would be associated with renal prognosis in IgA nephropathy. The study subjects comprised 1,458 adult patients with primary IgA nephropathy in Korea. We grouped patients according to the following quartile levels of bilirubin: <0.4 mg/dL (Q1), 0.4-0.5 mg/dL (Q2), 0.6-0.7 mg/dL (Q3), and >0.8 mg/dL (Q4). The outcome data were obtained from the Korean Registry of end-stage renal disease (ESRD). Eighty patients (5.5%) contracted ESRD during a mean follow-up period of 44.9 months. The ESRD incidences were 10.7% in Q1, 8.2% in Q2, 2.8% in Q3, and 2.8% in Q4 (p<0.001). The relative risk of ESRD compared to that in Q1 was 0.307 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.126-0.751) in Q3 and 0.315 (95% CI, 0.130-0.765) in Q4. The differences of ESRD incidence were greater in subgroups of males and of patients aged 35 yr or more, with serum albumin 4.0 g/dL or more, with normotension, with eGFR 60 mL/min/1.73 m2 or more, and with proteinuria less then 3+ by dipstick test. In conclusion, higher bilirubin level was negatively associated with ESRD incidence in IgA nephropathy

User Experience of a Digital Fashion Show: Exploring the Effectiveness of Interactivity in Virtual Reality

A virtual reality (VR) environment is different from the generally produced video-based experience, as it creates an interactive user experience (UX) by allowing the users to respond to operations or commands using various input devices. In particular, as existing analog-type fashion shows that have limitations in space and time have evolved into digital fashion shows that include interaction, the importance of the naturalness of interaction and visual expression is being emphasized in UX research. However, study cases that maximize user immersion through the interaction of visual changes in the stage and clothes of a digital fashion show are scarce. As such, this study introduces an interactive VR fashion show to analyze the impact of interaction on the UX in a VR environment. In the design of the interactive VR fashion show, various interaction elements that affect the UX are selected and the scope of UX application is suggested. In addition, by utilizing a commercial game engine, the production process necessary to simulate an existing fashion show is shown step-by-step. The user test in this study is examined in-depth by dividing the evaluation of the user into a two-step survey, and the results are objectively verified through a statistical analysis

Filtering of Discrete-Time Switched Neural Networks Ensuring Exponential Dissipative and l2l₂-l∞l∞ Performances

This paper studies delay-dependent exponential dissipative and l₂-l∞ filtering problems for discrete-time switched neural networks (DSNNs) including time-delayed states. By introducing a novel discrete-time inequality, which is a discrete-time version of the continuous-time Wirtinger-type inequality, we establish new sets of linear matrix inequality (LMI) criteria such that discrete-time filtering error systems are exponentially stable with guaranteed performances in the exponential dissipative and l₂-l∞ senses. The design of the desired exponential dissipative and l₂-l∞ filters for DSNNs can be achieved by solving the proposed sets of LMI conditions. Via numerical simulation results, we show the validity of the desired discrete-time filter design approach

Photochemical Hydrogen Doping Induced Embedded Two-Dimensional Metallic Channel Formation in InGaZnO at Room Temperature

The photochemical tunability of the charge-transport mechanism in metal-oxide semiconductors is of great interest since it may offer a facile but effective semiconductor-to-metal transition, which results from photochemically modified electronic structures for various oxide-based device applications. This might provide a feasible hydrogen (H)-radical doping to realize the effectively H-doped metal oxides, which has not been achieved by thermal and ion-implantation technique in a reliable and controllable way. In this study, we report a photochemical conversion of InGaZnO (IGZO) semiconductor to a transparent conductor via hydrogen doping to the local nanocrystallites formed at the IGZO/glass interface at room temperature. In contrast to thermal or ionic hydrogen doping, ultraviolet exposure of the IGZO surface promotes a photochemical reaction with H radical incorporation to surface metal–OH layer formation and bulk H-doping which acts as a tunable and stable highly doped n-type doping channel and turns IGZO to a transparent conductor. This results in the total conversion of carrier conduction property to the level of metallic conduction with sheet resistance of ∼16 Ω/□, room temperature Hall mobility of 11.8 cm² V^–1 sec^–1, the carrier concentration at ∼10²⁰ cm^–3 without any loss of optical transparency. We demonstrated successful applications of photochemically highly n-doped metal oxide via optical dose control to transparent conductor with excellent chemical and optical doping stability