Graph Domain Adaptation for Alignment-Invariant Brain Surface Segmentation

The varying cortical geometry of the brain creates numerous challenges for its analysis. Recent developments have enabled learning surface data directly across multiple brain surfaces via graph convolutions on cortical data. However, current graph learning algorithms do fail when brain surface data are misaligned across subjects, thereby affecting their ability to deal with data from multiple domains. Adversarial training is widely used for domain adaptation to improve the segmentation performance across domains. In this paper, adversarial training is exploited to learn surface data across inconsistent graph alignments. This novel approach comprises a segmentator that uses a set of graph convolution layers to enable parcellation directly across brain surfaces in a source domain, and a discriminator that predicts a graph domain from segmentations. More precisely, the proposed adversarial network learns to generalize a parcellation across both, source and target domains. We demonstrate an 8% mean improvement in performance over a non-adversarial training strategy applied on multiple target domains extracted from MindBoggle, the largest publicly available manually-labeled brain surface dataset

Effects of exercise on physical fitness and blood factors of addicted persons who have quitted drugs for two months.

BANITALEBI, E.; FARAMARZI, M.; NURI, R.; KHOSROZADEH, J.; GHAFOORIAN, M. Effect of exercise training on health-related physical fitness factors and blood lipids profile of former addicted persons. Brazilian Journal of Biomotricity, v. 4, n. 3, p. 190-197, 2010. Dysfunctional eating patterns and excessive weight gains have been observed during recovery from drug and alcohol addictions. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of exercise training on health-related physical fitness factors and blood lipids profile of former addicted persons. Thirty seven males who were 23-49 years old, and had one-year quitting history were selected and randomized (exercise group, n= 18 and control, n= 19). Thirty eight individuals completed the entire study; 16 persons were in exercise group and 15 persons were in control group. Exercise training was consisted primarily of some game-based aerobic exercise. Exercise training duration progressed from 20 minutes at the baseline to 45 minutes at the end of weeks 12th, and intensity of exercise progressed from 50% of heart rate reserve of baseline to 70 % at 12 weeks. Weight, BMI and WHR were measured. Muscle endurance, flexibility and Vo2Peak were measured using by pull up, Sit -and -Rich test and one-mile Rockport walk test, respectively. Body composition was assessed using the sum of three skin-fold measurement specific for males (chest, abdomen, and tight). Total cholesterol (TC), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) and triglyceride (TG) were measured enzymatically using diagnostic Pars kits. All variables were measured at baseline. Data analyzed by using ANCOVA analysis. There were no significant differences in weight (p=0.208), BMI (P=0.2631), CT (P=0.428), HDL (0.833), LDL (0.396), VLDL (P=0.169), TG (P=0.283), Vo2peak (p=0.884), flexibility (P=0.923) and Pull-up (P=0.44) after 12 weeks exercise training between two groups, but there was significant difference in WHR (p=0.044). It appears that, exercise training can prevent weight gain after quitting drugs and substances

Efficiency Considering Credit Risk in Banking Industry, Using Two-stage DEA

The increased competition in the banking industry and banks' efforts to participate in new markets has affected bank performance and credit risk. Their presence in new markets and strong competition from other competitors today makes them face more uncertain situation. Given the importance of this issue, there are few studies about the efficiency calculated with regard to credit risk. Banking literature on this subject is poor. This paper introduces two-stage data envelopment analysis technique for estimation of their efficiency with regard to credit risk, its output and inputs in the first and second stage. Non-performing loans is output to proxy credit risk

The impact of credit and operational risk on islamic and conventional bank efficiency in Malaysia

In banking sector, evaluation of performance and productivity are among fundamental concepts in management to achieve firm’s goals. High levels of efficiency through performance and continuous efforts of managers are needed in order to be successful in the competitive markets. Institutions need to know their relative success according to performance in comparison with similar institutions and their performance for the past years. In this study, the economic efficiency was analyzed and compared in terms of risk factors for Islamic and conventional banks in Malaysia for the period of 2008 to 2012. The study was conducted on the banks certified by Central Bank of Malaysia (Bank Negara) which includes both Islamic and conventional branches. Data was collected from annual financial reports such as balance sheets and income statements. Data envelopment analysis (DEA) was implemented to determine and analyze the economic efficiency. Based on the intermediation approach, three inputs and two outputs were selected. Basel 2 was used to define the credit and operational risks on efficiency. In addition, DEA network model was proposed to estimate the overall efficiency (with regard to credit and operational risk) of banks and to specify the difference between Islamic and conventional banks in terms of efficiency using the nonparametric test such as Mann-Whitney and Wilcoxon. The result indicates that the credit and operational risk have significant impact on efficiency for both Islamic and conventional banking system. The non-performing loan has negative impact on efficiency in both Islamic and conventional banks which leads to undesirable output of banking system. In contrast, return on equity and return on assets show positive impact on efficiency of banks in Malaysia. The results also reveal that the efficiency of Islamic banks in Malaysia is higher than conventional and the differences are statistically significant. In addition, the efficiency is higher than the overall efficiency (efficiency with regard to credit and operational risk) of banks in Malaysia. The finding also indicates that there is no difference between overall efficiency of Islamic and conventional banks in Malaysia

Effects of β -hydroxy- β -methylbutyrate on kidney parameters and body composition in untrained males after 8 weeks combination resistance training

زمینه و هدف: مطالعات علمی دقیق در مورد بی خطر بودن بتاهیدروکسی بتامتیلبوتیرات (HMB) در انسان تاکنون انجام نشده است و تنها مطالعات اندکی در مورد تاثیر این مکمل بر شاخص های مرتبط با سلامت در حیوانات انجام شده است. این مطالعه با هدف بررسی تاثیر 8 هفته تمرین مقاومتی به همراه مصرف مکمل بتا- هیدروکسی بتا- متیل بوتیرات (HMB) بر شاخص های کارکرد کلیوی و ترکیب بدنی مردان غیر ورزشکار انجام شد. روش بررسی: در این کارآزمایی بالینی 24 دانشجوی پسر غیر ورزشکار انتخاب و به صورت تصادفی به دو گروه کنترل (دارو نما، 14نفر) و تجربی (مکمل، 10 نفر) تقسیم شدند. هر دو گروه 8 هفته تمرین مقاومتی را به صورت 3 جلسه در هفته، اجرا کردند. از آزمودنی ها یک روز قبل و 2 روز بعد از برنامه تمرینی، نمونه خون و ادرار در حالت ناشتا گرفته شد و برای تمام نمونه ها اوره و کراتینین اندازه گیری و میزان فیلتراسیون گلومرولی نیز محاسبه گردید. ترکیب بدنی، وزن آزمودنی ها و قدرت بالا تنه و پایین تنه اندازه گیری شد. تجزیه و تحلیل داده ها با استفاده از آزمون های آماری t زوجی و t مستقل انجام گرفت. یافته ها: گروه مکمل افزایش معنادار در توده خالص بدنی (002/0P=) و کاهش معناداری در توده چربی بدن (006/0P=) داشت. همچنین، مکمل سبب کاهش معنادار غلظت ازت اوره ادرار (036/0P=) شد ولی تاثیر معناداری بر غلظت ازت اوره خون، کراتینین خون، کراتینین ادرار و میزان فیلتراسیون گلومرولی نداشت. نتیجه گیری: مصرف مکمل بتا- هیدروکسی بتا- متیل بوتیرات باعث افزایش توده خالص بدنی و قدرت یک تکرار بیشینه و کاهش چربی بدن در افراد غیر ورزشکار می شود. ولی تاثیر زیان آوری بر عملکرد کلیوی در مدت مصرف شده در این مطالعه ندارد

A Survey on Deep Learning in Medical Image Analysis

Deep learning algorithms, in particular convolutional networks, have rapidly become a methodology of choice for analyzing medical images. This paper reviews the major deep learning concepts pertinent to medical image analysis and summarizes over 300 contributions to the field, most of which appeared in the last year. We survey the use of deep learning for image classification, object detection, segmentation, registration, and other tasks and provide concise overviews of studies per application area. Open challenges and directions for future research are discussed.Comment: Revised survey includes expanded discussion section and reworked introductory section on common deep architectures. Added missed papers from before Feb 1st 201

Identifying Common Elements of Evidence – Based Psychological Treatments for Females with Extramarital Experience

Introduction: The therapeutic consequences of extramarital relationships is a difficult issue amongtherapists, so majority of clinicians are faced with several challenges. Although, they are not able toconceptualize and modify these issues with a suitable and recognized approach, the purpose of thisstudy was to identify common elements of psychological evidence-based therapies in order todevelop multi-dimensional intervention for females involved in extramarital relationships.Method: This study was conducted in two phases. The first phase was a qualitative content analysisto identify factors influencing the extramarital relations in three steps. The second phase aimed todesign and develop multi-dimensional treatments using common elements identified in the firststudy. This procedure conducted according to Garland et al., method.Result: Sixty-four effective factors identified in four categories: individual’s personality, familyeducational, cultural-social and religious-beliefs. In the second phase , 13 effective therapeuticapproaches in the treatment of extramarital relationships were selected. Finally, 10 commontherapeutic elements were developed to design a protocol for extramarital relationships involvedfemales.Conclusion: This treatment emphasized on helping women with the experience of extramaritalrelationship who want to save their marital commitment and family.Declaration of Interest: Non

Evaluation of the diagnostic value of a Modified Liquid-Based Cytology using OralCDx Brush in early detection of oral potentially malignant lesions and oral cancer

Objectives: To determine diagnostic value of modified Liquid Based Brush Biopsy technique. Study design: 26 oral premalignant and malignant lesions in 25 patients (12 females; 54.23±19.77 years and 13 males; 53.77±15.43 years) underwent Modified (Liquid Based) Brush Biopsy and scalpel biopsy simultaneously from the same area. Results: There were 16 positive and 10 negative brush biopsy results, with no inadequate readings. Histological findings were compatible with oral leukoplakia(n=5)with dysplasia, Oral lichen planus and lichenoid reaction(n=7) (with or without dysplasia)oral squamous cell carcinoma(n=11),verrucous carcinoma(n=1) and granular cell tumors( n=2). Sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value, positive diagnostic likelihood ratio(LR+) and negative diagnostic likelihood ratio(LR-) were 88.8%,100%,100% , 80%, infinity and 0.11 respectively(no false positive results). Conclusion: It is the first attempt to do LBC (liquid based cytology) with a specialized oral brush. Our results show that modified technique is a useful tool for screening of oral premalignant and malignant lesions