Deep Burst Denoising

Noise is an inherent issue of low-light image capture, one which is exacerbated on mobile devices due to their narrow apertures and small sensors. One strategy for mitigating noise in a low-light situation is to increase the shutter time of the camera, thus allowing each photosite to integrate more light and decrease noise variance. However, there are two downsides of long exposures: (a) bright regions can exceed the sensor range, and (b) camera and scene motion will result in blurred images. Another way of gathering more light is to capture multiple short (thus noisy) frames in a "burst" and intelligently integrate the content, thus avoiding the above downsides. In this paper, we use the burst-capture strategy and implement the intelligent integration via a recurrent fully convolutional deep neural net (CNN). We build our novel, multiframe architecture to be a simple addition to any single frame denoising model, and design to handle an arbitrary number of noisy input frames. We show that it achieves state of the art denoising results on our burst dataset, improving on the best published multi-frame techniques, such as VBM4D and FlexISP. Finally, we explore other applications of image enhancement by integrating content from multiple frames and demonstrate that our DNN architecture generalizes well to image super-resolution

In Vivo Time- Resolved Microtomography Reveals the Mechanics of the Blowfly Flight Motor

Dipteran flies are amongst the smallest and most agile of flying animals. Their wings are driven indirectly by large power muscles, which cause cyclical deformations of the thorax that are amplified through the intricate wing hinge. Asymmetric flight manoeuvres are controlled by 13 pairs of steering muscles acting directly on the wing articulations. Collectively the steering muscles account for <3% of total flight muscle mass, raising the question of how they can modulate the vastly greater output of the power muscles during manoeuvres. Here we present the results of a synchrotron-based study performing micrometre-resolution, time-resolved microtomography on the 145 Hz wingbeat of blowflies. These data represent the first four-dimensional visualizations of an organism's internal movements on sub-millisecond and micrometre scales. This technique allows us to visualize and measure the three-dimensional movements of five of the largest steering muscles, and to place these in the context of the deforming thoracic mechanism that the muscles actuate. Our visualizations show that the steering muscles operate through a diverse range of nonlinear mechanisms, revealing several unexpected features that could not have been identified using any other technique. The tendons of some steering muscles buckle on every wingbeat to accommodate high amplitude movements of the wing hinge. Other steering muscles absorb kinetic energy from an oscillating control linkage, which rotates at low wingbeat amplitude but translates at high wingbeat amplitude. Kinetic energy is distributed differently in these two modes of oscillation, which may play a role in asymmetric power management during flight control. Structural flexibility is known to be important to the aerodynamic efficiency of insect wings, and to the function of their indirect power muscles. We show that it is integral also to the operation of the steering muscles, and so to the functional flexibility of the insect flight motor

TOMOBFLOW: feature-preserving noise filtering for electron tomography

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Noise filtering techniques are needed in electron tomography to allow proper interpretation of datasets. The standard linear filtering techniques are characterized by a tradeoff between the amount of reduced noise and the blurring of the features of interest. On the other hand, sophisticated anisotropic nonlinear filtering techniques allow noise reduction with good preservation of structures. However, these techniques are computationally intensive and are difficult to be tuned to the problem at hand.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>TOMOBFLOW is a program for noise filtering with capabilities of preservation of biologically relevant information. It is an efficient implementation of the Beltrami flow, a nonlinear filtering method that locally tunes the strength of the smoothing according to an edge indicator based on geometry properties. The fact that this method does not have free parameters hard to be tuned makes TOMOBFLOW a user-friendly filtering program equipped with the power of diffusion-based filtering methods. Furthermore, TOMOBFLOW is provided with abilities to deal with different types and formats of images in order to make it useful for electron tomography in particular and bioimaging in general.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>TOMOBFLOW allows efficient noise filtering of bioimaging datasets with preservation of the features of interest, thereby yielding data better suited for post-processing, visualization and interpretation. It is available at the web site <url>http://www.ual.es/%7ejjfdez/SW/tomobflow.html</url>.</p

Physicians' experiences with end-of-life decision-making: Survey in 6 European countries and Australia

Background: In this study we investigated (a) to what extent physicians have experience with performing a range of end-of-life decisions (ELDs), (b) if they have no experience with performing an ELD, would they be willing to do so under certain conditions and (c) which background characteristics are associated with having experience with/or being willing to make such ELDs. Methods: An anonymous questionnaire was sent to 16,486 physicians from specialities in which death is common: Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden and Switzerland. Results: The response rate differed between countries (39–68%). The experience of foregoing life-sustaining treatment ranged between 37% and 86%: intensifying the alleviation of pain or other symptoms while taking into account possible hastening of death between 57% and 95%, and experience with deep sedation until death between 12% and 46%. Receiving a request for hastening death differed between 34% and 71%, and intentionally hastening death on the explicit request of a patient between 1% and 56%. Conclusion: There are differences between countries in experiences with ELDs, in willingness to perform ELDs and in receiving requests for euthanasia or physician-assisted suicide. Foregoing treatment and intensifying alleviation of pain and symptoms are practiced and accepted by most physicians in all countries. Physicians with training in palliative care are more inclined to perform ELDs, as are those who attend to higher numbers of terminal patients. Thus, this seems not to be only a matter of opportunity, but also a matter of attitude

Sharp upturn of life expectancy in the Netherlands: effect of more health care for the elderly?

During the 1980s and 1990s life expectancy at birth has risen only slowly in the Netherlands. In 2002, however, the rise in life expectancy suddenly accelerated. We studied the possible causes of this remarkable development. Mortality data by age, gender and cause of death were analyzed using life table methods and age-period-cohort modeling. Trends in determinants of mortality (including health care delivery) were compared with trends in mortality. Two-thirds of the increase in life expectancy at birth since 2002 were due to declines in mortality among those aged 65 and over. Declines in mortality reflected a period rather than a cohort effect, and were seen for a wide range of causes of death. Favorable changes in mortality determinants coinciding with the acceleration of mortality decline were mainly seen within the health care system. Health care expenditure rose rapidly after 2001, and was accompanied by a sharp rise of specialist visits, drug prescriptions, hospital admissions and surgical procedures among the elderly. A decline of deaths following non-treatment decisions suggests a change towards more active treatment of elderly patients. Our findings are consistent with the idea that the sharp upturn of life expectancy in the Netherlands was at least partly due to a sharp increase in health care for the elderly, and has been facilitated by a relaxation of budgetary constraints in the health care system

Antenatal and postnatal corticosteroid and resuscitation induced lung injury in preterm sheep

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Initiation of ventilation using high tidal volumes in preterm lambs causes lung injury and inflammation. Antenatal corticosteroids mature the lungs of preterm infants and postnatal corticosteroids are used to treat bronchopulmonary dysplasia.</p> <p>Objective</p> <p>To test if antenatal or postnatal corticosteroids would decrease resuscitation induced lung injury.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>129 d gestational age lambs (n = 5-8/gp; term = 150 d) were operatively delivered and ventilated after exposure to either 1) no medication, 2) antenatal maternal IM Betamethasone 0.5 mg/kg 24 h prior to delivery, 3) 0.5 mg/kg Dexamethasone IV at delivery or 4) Cortisol 2 mg/kg IV at delivery. Lambs then were ventilated with no PEEP and escalating tidal volumes (<it>V</it>_T) to 15 mL/kg for 15 min and then given surfactant. The lambs were ventilated with <it>V</it>_T8 mL/kg and PEEP 5 cmH₂0 for 2 h 45 min.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>High V_Tventilation caused a deterioration of lung physiology, lung inflammation and injury. Antenatal betamethasone improved ventilation, decreased inflammatory cytokine mRNA expression and alveolar protein leak, but did not prevent neutrophil influx. Postnatal dexamethasone decreased pro-inflammatory cytokine expression, but had no beneficial effect on ventilation, and postnatal cortisol had no effect. Ventilation increased liver serum amyloid mRNA expression, which was unaffected by corticosteroids.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Antenatal betamethasone decreased lung injury without decreasing lung inflammatory cells or systemic acute phase responses. Postnatal dexamethasone or cortisol, at the doses tested, did not have important effects on lung function or injury, suggesting that corticosteroids given at birth will not decrease resuscitation mediated injury.</p

Network capitalism and the role of strategy, contracts and performance expectations for Asia-Pacific innovation partnerships

© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2018. With the growth of emerging economies in Asia-Pacific over the last three decades collaboration with the aim of innovation between firms within and with partners outside the region have developed substantially. Not always have such partnerships fulfilled their anticipated strategic objectives. The literature suggests that the nature of market arrangements and the role of government within that system play a role, but also innate contracting practices and governance of innovation partnerships are related. Yet, our understanding about the specific relationships between these factors and the emerging partnership innovation culture that facilitates joint business activities in an Asia-Pacific context remains vague. In this conceptual chapter we suggest how characteristics of so called network capitalism in conjunction with the nature of contractual agreements between partners, the alignment of their innovation objectives and the ambiguity inherent in their mutual contributions to the partnership can be interpreted as indicators of joint innovation culture. However, while innovation partnerships generally may result to be bureaucratic, market, clan, or adhocracy, we discuss how in an Asia Pacific context, innovation partnerships are limited by the extent of codification and diffusion of information and the social embeddedness of economic transactions

Protein Profile Changes during Porcine Oocyte Aging and Effects of Caffeine on Protein Expression Patterns

It has been shown that oocyte aging critically affects reproduction and development. By using proteomic tools, in the present study, changes in protein profiles during porcine oocyte aging and effects of caffeine on oocyte aging were investigated. By comparing control MII oocytes with aging MII oocytes, we identified 23 proteins that were up-regulated and 3 proteins that were down-regulated during the aging process. In caffeine-treated oocytes, 6 proteins were identified as up-regulated and 12 proteins were identified as down-regulated. A total of 38 differentially expressed proteins grouped into 5 regulation patterns were determined to relate to the aging and anti-aging process. By using the Gene Ontology system, we found that numerous functional gene products involved in metabolism, stress response, reactive oxygen species and cell cycle regulation were differentially expressed during the oocyte aging process, and most of these proteins are for the first time reported in our study, including 2 novel proteins. In addition, several proteins were found to be modified during oocyte aging. These data contribute new information that may be useful for future research on cellular aging and for improvement of oocyte quality