25 research outputs found
Bus Frequency Optimization: When Waiting Time Matters in User Satisfaction
Reorganizing bus frequency to cater for the actual travel demand can save the
cost of the public transport system significantly. Many, if not all, existing
studies formulate this as a bus frequency optimization problem which tries to
minimize passengers' average waiting time. However, many investigations have
confirmed that the user satisfaction drops faster as the waiting time
increases. Consequently, this paper studies the bus frequency optimization
problem considering the user satisfaction. Specifically, for the first time to
our best knowledge, we study how to schedule the buses such that the total
number of passengers who could receive their bus services within the waiting
time threshold is maximized. We prove that this problem is NP-hard, and present
an index-based algorithm with approximation ratio. By exploiting the
locality property of routes in a bus network, we propose a partition-based
greedy method which achieves a approximation ratio. Then we
propose a progressive partition-based greedy method to further improve the
efficiency while achieving a approximation ratio.
Experiments on a real city-wide bus dataset in Singapore verify the efficiency,
effectiveness, and scalability of our methods
Subcortical amyloid load is associated with shape and volume in cognitively normal individuals
Amyloid-beta (Aβ) deposition is one of the main hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease. The
study assessed the associations between cortical and subcortical 11C-Pittsburgh Compound
B retention, namely in the hippocampus, amygdala, putamen, caudate, pallidum, and
thalamus, and subcortical morphology in cognitively normal individuals. We recruited 104
cognitive normal individuals who underwent extensive neuropsychological assessment,
PiB-positron emission tomography (PET) scan and 3-tesla magnetic resonance imaging
(MRI) acquisition of T1-weighted images. Global, cortical, and subcortical regional PiB
retention values were derived from each scan and subcortical morphology analyses were
performed to investigate vertex-wise local surface and global volumes, including the
hippocampal subfields volumes. We found that subcortical regional Aβ was associated
with the surface of the hippocampus, thalamus, and pallidum, with changes being due to
volume and shape. Hippocampal Aβ was marginally associated with volume of the whole
hippocampus as well as with the CA1 subfield, subiculum, and molecular layer.
Participants showing higher subcortical Aβ also showed worse cognitive performance and
smaller hippocampal volumes. In contrast, global and cortical PiB uptake did not associate
with any subcortical metrics. This study shows that subcortical Aβ is associated with
subcortical surface morphology in cognitively normal individuals. This study highlights
the importance of quantifying subcortical regional PiB retention values in these
individuals
Amyloid-β aggregates activate peripheral monocytes in mild cognitive impairment
\ua9 The Author(s) 2024. The peripheral immune system is important in neurodegenerative diseases, both in protecting and inflaming the brain, but the underlying mechanisms remain elusive. Alzheimer’s Disease is commonly preceded by a prodromal period. Here, we report the presence of large Aβ aggregates in plasma from patients with mild cognitive impairment (n = 38). The aggregates are associated with low level Alzheimer’s Disease-like brain pathology as observed by 11C-PiB PET and 18F-FTP PET and lowered CD18-rich monocytes. We characterize complement receptor 4 as a strong binder of amyloids and show Aβ aggregates are preferentially phagocytosed and stimulate lysosomal activity through this receptor in stem cell-derived microglia. KIM127 integrin activation in monocytes promotes size selective phagocytosis of Aβ. Hydrodynamic calculations suggest Aβ aggregates associate with vessel walls of the cortical capillaries. In turn, we hypothesize aggregates may provide an adhesion substrate for recruiting CD18-rich monocytes into the cortex. Our results support a role for complement receptor 4 in regulating amyloid homeostasis
The Effect of 40-Hz Light Therapy on Amyloid Load in Patients with Prodromal and Clinical Alzheimer’s Disease
Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder. AD pathology is characterized by abnormal aggregation of the proteins amyloid-β (Aβ) and hyperphosphorylated tau. No effective disease modifying therapies are currently available. A short-duration intervention with 40 Hz light flicker has been shown to reduce brain Aβ load in transgenic mice. We aimed to test the effect of a similar short-duration 40 Hz light flicker regime in human AD patients. We utilized a Light Emitting Diode (LED) light bulb with a 40 Hz flicker. Six Aβ positive patients received 10 days of light therapy, had 2 hours of daily exposure, and underwent a postintervention PiB PET on day 11. After 10 days of light therapy, no significant decrease of PiB SUVR values was detected in any volumes of interest tested (primary visual cortex, visual association cortex, lateral parietal cortex, precuneus, and posterior cingulate) or in the total motor cortex, and longer treatments may be necessary to induce amyloid removal in humans
MainTrain: A Serious Game on the Complexities of Rail Maintenance
Commuters who travel by train often feel annoyed due to misunderstanding the causes of delays in train traffic. They oftentimes are unaware of the necessity of performing maintenance to stations, tracks, and trains. MainTrain is a serious game developed to teach commuters about rail-maintenance while simulating the difficulty of keeping passengers happy. It is a fast-paced strategy game with a top-down view in which a player can perform maintenance actions on stations, tracks, and trains. By using commuter happiness as a base metric, MainTrain attempts to elicit empathy from players dissatisfied with scheduled maintenance so that they gain a better appreciation of the need for scheduled maintenance. This is coupled with the need to schedule maintenance for several components of a rail network, encumbering a player while teaching them about different aspects of rail maintenance. To examine the effectiveness of the game, the results of a user study are presented.Green Open Access added to TU Delft Institutional Repository ‘You share, we take care!’ – Taverne project https://www.openaccess.nl/en/you-share-we-take-care Otherwise as indicated in the copyright section: the publisher is the copyright holder of this work and the author uses the Dutch legislation to make this work public.Design InformaticsComp Graphics & Visualisatio
A victim of its own success: Internationalization, neoliberalism, and organizational involution at the Business Council of Australia
The focus of this article is on the Business Council of Australia (BCA), an association of the CEOs of the 100 or so largest companies operating in Australia. Since its inception the BCA has been an influential supporter of largely successful efforts to neoliberalize and internationalize the Australian economy. Running in parallel with these developments, however, the BCA has moved from being a "somewhat strong" to a relatively weak policy organization. This article argues these two trends are causally related. Neoliberal-inspired economic restructuring and economic internationalization have weakened the "logic of membership" and the "logic of influence" of the BCA, leading to a process of organizational involution. Furthermore, potential offsets to what I describe as the organizational predations of neoliberalism and internationalization - especially via a willingness or capacity to forge supportive or mutualistic relations with the state - have not been realized
Bus frequency optimization: When waiting time matters in user satisfaction
Reorganizing bus frequency to cater for the actual travel demand can save the
cost of the public transport system significantly. Many, if not all, existing
studies formulate this as a bus frequency optimization problem which tries to
minimize passengers' average waiting time. However, many investigations have
confirmed that the user satisfaction drops faster as the waiting time
increases. Consequently, this paper studies the bus frequency optimization
problem considering the user satisfaction. Specifically, for the first time to
our best knowledge, we study how to schedule the buses such that the total
number of passengers who could receive their bus services within the waiting
time threshold is maximized. We prove that this problem is NP-hard, and present
an index-based algorithm with approximation ratio. By exploiting the
locality property of routes in a bus network, we propose a partition-based
greedy method which achieves a approximation ratio. Then we
propose a progressive partition-based greedy method to further improve the
efficiency while achieving a approximation ratio.
Experiments on a real city-wide bus dataset in Singapore verify the efficiency,
effectiveness, and scalability of our methods