Motion Control of Wearable Walking Support System with Accelerometer Considering Swing Phase Support

Proceedings of the 17th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, Technische Universität München, Munich, Germany, August 1-3, 200

Assessment of macular choroidal thickness by optical coherence tomography and angiographic changes in central serous chorioretinopathy.

[Objective]: To investigate the relationship between macular choroidal thickness measured by highpenetrating swept-source optical coherence tomography (SS-OCT) and angiographic findings in central serous chorioretinopathy (CSC). [Design]: Prospective cross-sectional case series. [Participants and Controls]: Thirty-four patients with CSC (44 eyes) and 17 volunteer subjects (17 normal eyes). [Methods]: All subjects underwent a comprehensive ophthalmologic and SS-OCT prototype examination. All patients with CSC also underwent simultaneous fluorescein angiography (FA) and indocyanine green angiography (IA). Mean regional choroidal thickness measurements on the Early Treatment Diabetic Retinopathy Study (ETDRS) layout and squared sector grids were obtained by 3-dimensional raster scanning using SS-OCT. [Main Outcome Measures]: Macular choroidal thickness and angiographic abnormalities. [Results]: Mean whole macular choroidal thickness in eyes with CSC (total, 329.3_83.0 _m; classic CSC, 326.9_83.1 _m; chronic CSC, 325.4_93.3 _m; and multifocal posterior pigment epitheliopathy, 359.0_15.5 _m) was greater than that in normal eyes (233.0_67.0_m) (P_ 0.001). In unilateral cases, mean whole macular choroidal thickness was greater in eyes with unilateral CSC than in unaffected fellow eyes (P_0.021). There was no significant difference in choroidal thickness between active eyes and resolved eyes in any of the ETDRS sectors. Mean choroidal thickness was greater in areas with leakage on FA than in areas without leakage (P_0.001). Mean choroidal thickness was greater in areas with choroidal vascular hyperpermeability and in areas with punctate hyperfluorescent spots on IA than in unaffected areas (P_0.001 for both). [Conclusions]: Increased choroidal thickness was observed in the whole macular area of eyes with any of the CSC subtypes. Choroidal thickness was related to leakage from the retinal pigment epithelium, choroidal vascular hyperpermeability, and punctate hyperfluorescent lesions. These findings provide evidence that CSC may be caused by focally increased hydrostatic pressure in the choroid. [Financial Disclosure(s)]: Proprietary or commercial disclosure may be found after the references

A Bezoar Composed of Bilirubin Calcium, Calcium Carbonate, and Fatty Acid Calcium

A 68-year-old Japanese man was diagnosed with bezoar in the stomach, which was endoscopically retrieved. The bezoar was composed of bilirubin calcium, calcium carbonate, and fatty acid calcium. Due to the presence of bilirubin calcium in the bezoar, we performed imaging studies of the bile duct; gallstones and common bile duct stones were identified. Although bezoar with components similar to bile is infrequently encountered, our findings suggest that a bezoar originating from bile should be considered among the differential diagnoses in patients without a recent consumption history of persimmons who demonstrate a mass in the digestive tract. This case highlights the importance of component analysis of gastric bezoars because its findings may alter the treatment plan

Large scale genotyping study for asthma in the Japanese population

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Asthma is a complex phenotype that is influenced by both genetic and environmental factors. Genome-wide linkage and association studies have been performed to identify susceptibility genes for asthma. These studies identified new genes and pathways implicated in this disease, many of which were previously unknown.</p> <p>Objective</p> <p>To perform a large-scale genotyping study to identify asthma-susceptibility genes in the Japanese population.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We performed a large-scale, three-stage association study on 288 atopic asthmatics and 1032 controls, by using multiplex PCR-Invader assay methods at 82,935 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) (1^ststage). SNPs that were strongly associated with asthma were further genotyped in samples from asthmatic families (216 families, 762 members, 2^ndstage), 541 independent patients, and 744 controls (3^rdstage).</p> <p>Results</p> <p>SNPs located in the 5' region of <it>PEX19 </it>(rs2820421) were significantly associated with <it>P </it>< 0.05 through the 1^stto the 3^rdstage analyses; however, the <it>P </it>values did not reach statistically significant levels (combined, <it>P </it>= 3.8 × 10^-5; statistically significant levels with Bonferroni correction, <it>P </it>= 6.57 × 10^-7). SNPs on <it>HPCAL1 </it>(rs3771140) and on <it>IL18R1 </it>(rs3213733) were associated with asthma in the 1^stand 2^ndstage analyses, but the associations were not observed in the 3^rdstage analysis.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>No association attained genome-wide significance, but several loci for possible association emerged. Future studies are required to validate these results for the prevention and treatment of asthma.</p

Clinical significance of gastrointestinal bleeding history in patients who undergo left atrial appendage closure

Background and Aim: Anticoagulant users with nonvalvular atrial fibrillation (NVAF) sometimes suffer from gastrointestinal bleeding (GIB) and have difficulty continuing the medication. Left atrial appendage closure (LAAC) has been developed for such situations. We aimed to clarify the clinical significance of a history of GIB in comparison to other factors in patients who had undergone LAAC. Methods: From October 2019 to September 2023, patients with NVAF who underwent LAAC at our hospital were enrolled. We investigated the percentage of patients with a history of GIB who underwent LAAC and compared the incidence of post-LAAC bleeding in these patients compared to those with other factors. Results: A total of 45 patients were included. There were 19 patients (42%) with a history of GIB who underwent LAAC. In a Kaplan–Meier analysis, the cumulative incidence of bleeding complications after LAAC was significantly higher in patients with a history of GIB in comparison to patients with other factors. There were eight cases of post-LAAC bleeding in total, and seven cases had GIB. Conclusions: We need to recognize that GIB is a significant complication in patients who undergo LAAC. The management of GIB by gastroenterologists is essential to the success of LAAC

Aberrant Cerebellar–Cerebral Functional Connectivity in Children and Adolescents With Autism Spectrum Disorder

The cerebellum, which forms widespread functional networks with many areas in the cerebral cortices and subcortical structures, is one of the brain regions most consistently reported to exhibit neuropathological features in patients with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, cerebellar functional connectivity (FC) studies in patients with ASD have been very sparse. Using resting state functional connectivity (rsFC) analysis, we investigated the FC of the hemispheric/vermal subregions and the dentate nucleus of the cerebellum with the cerebral regions in 36 children and adolescents [16 participants with ASD, 20 typically developing (TD) participants, age: 6–15 years]. Furthermore, an independent larger sample population (42 participants with ASD, 88 TD participants, age: 6–15 years), extracted from the Autism Brain Imaging Data Exchange (ABIDE) II, was included for replication. The ASD group showed significantly increased or decreased FC between “hubs” in the cerebellum and cerebral cortices, when compared with the TD group. Findings of aberrant FCs converged on the posterior hemisphere, right dentate nucleus, and posterior inferior vermis of the cerebellum. Furthermore, these aberrant FCs were found to be related to motor, executive, and socio-communicative functions in children and adolescents with ASD when we examined correlations between FC and behavioral measurements. Results from the original dataset were partially replicated in the independent larger sample population. Our findings suggest that aberrant cerebellar–cerebral FC is associated with motor, socio-communicative, and executive functions in children and adolescents with ASD. These observations improve the current knowledge regarding the neural substrates that underlie the symptoms of ASD

Simulating image coaddition with the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope: I. Simulation methodology and general results

The upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will carry out a wide-area survey in the near infrared. A key science objective is the measurement of cosmic structure via weak gravitational lensing. Roman data will be undersampled, which introduces new challenges in the measurement of source galaxy shapes; a potential solution is to use linear algebra-based coaddition techniques such as Imcom that combine multiple undersampled images to produce a single oversampled output mosaic with a desired "target" point spread function (PSF). We present here an initial application of Imcom to 0.64 square degrees of simulated Roman data, based on the Roman branch of the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) Dark Energy Science Collaboration (DESC) Data Challenge 2 (DC2) simulation. We show that Imcom runs successfully on simulated data that includes features such as plate scale distortions, chip gaps, detector defects, and cosmic ray masks. We simultaneously propagate grids of injected sources and simulated noise fields as well as the full simulation. We quantify the residual deviations of the PSF from the target (the "leakage"), as well as noise properties of the output images; we discuss how the overall tiling pattern as well as Moir\'e patterns appear in the final leakage and noise maps. We include appendices on interpolation algorithms and the interaction of undersampling with image processing operations that may be of broader applicability. The companion paper ("Paper II") explores the implications for weak lensing analyses.Comment: 28 pages, 19 figures, matches version accepted by MNRA

Simulating image coaddition with the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope: II. Analysis of the simulated images and implications for weak lensing

One challenge for applying current weak lensing analysis tools to the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is that individual images will be undersampled. Our companion paper presented an initial application of Imcom - an algorithm that builds an optimal mapping from input to output pixels to reconstruct a fully sampled combined image - on the Roman image simulations. In this paper, we measure the output noise power spectra, identify the sources of the major features in the power spectra, and show that simple analytic models that ignore sampling effects underestimate the power spectra of the coadded noise images. We compute the moments of both idealized injected stars and fully simulated stars in the coadded images, and their 1- and 2-point statistics. We show that the idealized injected stars have root-mean-square ellipticity errors (1 - 6) x 10-4 per component depending on the band; the correlation functions are >= 2 orders of magnitude below requirements, indicating that the image combination step itself is using a small fraction of the overall Roman 2nd moment error budget, although the 4th moments are larger and warrant further investigation. The stars in the simulated sky images, which include blending and chromaticity effects, have correlation functions near the requirement level (and below the requirement level in a wide-band image constructed by stacking all 4 filters). We evaluate the noise-induced biases in the ellipticities of injected stars, and explain the resulting trends with an analytical model. We conclude by enumerating the next steps in developing an image coaddition pipeline for Roman.Comment: 25 pages, 20 figures. Submitted to MNRA