889 research outputs found
Massive COVIDā19 infections in foreign workers dormitories: The dog that did not bark in Singaporeās fight against the COVIDā19 pandemic
Faith, freedom, and US foreign policy: Avoiding the proverbial clash of civilizations in East and Southeast Asia
Pancreatic cancer cachexia: a review of mechanisms and therapeutics.
Over the last decade, we have gained new insight into the pathophysiology of cachexia associated with pancreatic cancer. Unfortunately, its treatment is complex and remains a challenge. Pancreatic cancer cachexia is a multifactorial syndrome characterized by uncompensated adipose tissue and skeletal muscle loss in the setting of anorexia that leads to progressive functional impairment. This paper will review the current concepts of pancreatic cancer cachexia, its assessment and pathophysiology as well as current and future treatments. The successful management of pancreatic cancer cachexia will likely require a multimodal approach that includes nutritional support and combination pharmaceutical interventions
Soft computing applications in dynamic model identification of polymer extrusion process
This paper proposes the application of soft computing to deal with the constraints in conventional modelling techniques of the dynamic extrusion process. The proposed technique increases the efficiency in utilising the available information during the model identification. The resultant model can be classified as a āgrey-box modelā or has been termed as a āsemi-physical modelā in the context. The extrusion process contains a number of parameters that are sensitive to the operating environment. Fuzzy ruled-based system is introduced into the analytical model of the extrusion by means of sub-models to approximate those operational-sensitive parameters. In drawing the optimal structure for the sub-models, a hybrid algorithm of genetic algorithm with fuzzy system (GA-Fuzzy) has been implemented. The sub-models obtained show advantages such as linguistic interpretability, simpler rule-base and less membership functions. The developed model is adaptive with its learning ability through the steepest decent error back-propagation algorithm. This ability might help to minimise the deviation of the model prediction when the operational-sensitive parameters adapt to the changing operating environment in the real situation. The model is first evaluated through simulations on the consistency of model prediction to the theoretical analysis. Then, the effectiveness of adaptive sub-models in approximating the operational-sensitive parameters during the operation is further investigated
Division of labor, skill complementarity, and heterophily in socioeconomic networks
Constituents of complex systems interact with each other and self-organize to
form complex networks. Empirical results show that the link formation process
of many real networks follows either the global principle of popularity or the
local principle of similarity or a tradeoff between the two. In particular, it
has been shown that in social networks individuals exhibit significant
homophily when choosing their collaborators. We demonstrate, however, that in
populations in which there is a division of labor, skill complementarity is an
important factor in the formation of socioeconomic networks and an individual's
choice of collaborators is strongly affected by heterophily. We analyze 124
evolving virtual worlds of a popular "massively multiplayer online role-playing
game" (MMORPG) in which people belong to three different professions and are
allowed to work and interact with each other in a somewhat realistic manner. We
find evidence of heterophily in the formation of collaboration networks, where
people prefer to forge social ties with people who have professions different
from their own. We then construct an economic model to quantify the heterophily
by assuming that individuals in socioeconomic systems choose collaborators that
are of maximum utility. The results of model calibration confirm the presence
of heterophily. Both empirical analysis and model calibration show that the
heterophilous feature is persistent along the evolution of virtual worlds. We
also find that the degree of complementarity in virtual societies is positively
correlated with their economic output. Our work sheds new light on the
scientific research utility of virtual worlds for studying human behaviors in
complex socioeconomic systems.Comment: 14 Latex pages + 3 figure
The effects of primary bile acids on the hepatic synthesis of cholesterol in the female rat /
Erratum to: Comparative Studies of the Growth and Characterization of Germanium Epitaxial Film on Silicon (001) with 0Ā° and 6Ā° Offcut
In the original article we presented results that show that the strain in germanium (Ge) epitaxial films grown directly on a silicon (Si) (001) with 6Ā° offcut has a tensile strain of 0.6%. This strain value is much higher than the typical tensile strain value of 0.2% reported for Ge/Si. This discrepancy is due unintentional omission of the Si offcut angle and azimuth angle (Ļ) of the sample during high-resolution x-ray diffraction (HRXRD) measurement, and it has unfortunately resulted in a misleading result
- ā¦