Step-GRAND: A Low Latency Universal Soft-input Decoder

GRAND features both soft-input and hard-input variants that are well suited to efficient hardware implementations that can be characterized with achievable average and worst-case decoding latency. This paper introduces step-GRAND, a soft-input variant of GRAND that, in addition to achieving appealing average decoding latency, also reduces the worst-case decoding latency of the corresponding hardware implementation. The hardware implementation results demonstrate that the proposed step-GRAND can decode CA-polar code $(128,105+11)$ with an average information throughput of $47.7$ Gbps at the target FER of $\leq10^{-7}$. Furthermore, the proposed step-GRAND hardware is $10\times$ more area efficient than the previous soft-input ORBGRAND hardware implementation, and its worst-case latency is $\frac{1}{6.8}\times$ that of the previous ORBGRAND hardware.Comment: Submitted to 2023 IEEE Globecom Workshop

Conservative Management of a Congenital Seminal Vesicle Cyst Associated with Ipsilateral Renal Agenesis Revealed by Cystitis: One Case Report

Seminal vesicle cyst is an extremely rare disease. Its association with ipsilateral renal agenesis is even more exceptional. We present herein one case of a 16-year-old male who presented with a four-month history of lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTSs) and micturition pain. The digital rectal examination revealed a small mass arising from the prostate. The urine culture showed that E. coli is sensitive to all antibiotics tested. Transrectal ultrasound (TRUS) revealed a cystic mass in the outer prostate. Seminal vesicle cyst and left renal agenesis were confirmed by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Maximum flow (Qmax) at uroflow was greater than 15 mL/sec. We therefore decided to manage this disease conservatively with alpha blockers and antibiotics. After 6-month' followup the patient did not report any complain and the uroflow test was similar to a normal urination. From one case report and literature review, the authors suggest a diagnostic and therapeutic strategy for the management of this rare condition

ACE2 polymorphisms impact COVID-19 severity in obese patients

A strong association between obesity and COVID-19 complications and a lack of prognostic factors that explain the unpredictable severity among these patients still exist despite the various vaccination programs. The expression of angiotensin converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), the main receptor for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), is enhanced in obese individuals. The occurrence of frequent genetic single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in ACE2 is suggested to increase COVID-19 severity. Accordingly, we hypothesize that obesity-associated ACE2 polymorphisms increase the severity of COVID-19. In this study, we profiled eight frequently reported ACE2 SNPs in a cohort of lean and obese COVID-19 patients (n = 82). We highlight the significant association of rs2285666, rs2048683, rs879922, and rs4240157 with increased severity in obese COVID-19 patients as compared to lean counterparts. These co-morbid-associated SNPs tend to positively correlate, hence proposing possible functional cooperation to ACE2 regulation. In obese COVID-19 patients, rs2285666, rs879922, and rs4240157 are significantly associated with increased blood nitrogen urea and creatinine levels. In conclusion, we highlight the contribution of ACE2 SNPs in enhancing COVID-19 severity in obese individuals. The results from this study provide a basis for further investigations required to shed light on the underlying mechanisms of COVID-19 associated SNPs in COVID-19 obese patients

Nonuniform sampling of urodynamic signals: a comparison of different methods

Several different techniques for urodynamic signal compression have been proposed in the last few years. Using these techniques it is possible to reduce the requirements for digital storage or transmission. There are a number of applications where it is essential to use such techniques in diagnostic and ambulatory urodynamics. The purpose of this study is to compare different techniques of urodynamic data compression. The so-called FAN, voltage triggered, two point projection and second difference methods. The comparison between the methods is based on 65 pressure, 46 uroflow and 18 surface electromyogram signals. The reduction ratio achieved for different allowable errors between the original and compressed signals is calculated and compared for the different techniques. Results show that it is possible to store urodynamic signals accurately at a low sampling rate, where FAN and voltage triggered methods seem to be superior to the rest

Epididymal Leiomyosarcoma: One Case Report

Epididymal leiomyosarcoma is very uncommon. Only 16 cases have been reported in the literature. There has never been a reported case of a patient with an African origin with this tumor. We report the medical history of a 70-year-old man who presented an enormous mass located in his epididymis. A tricut biopsy was performed which allowed histological confirmation of epididymal leiomyosarcoma after which the patient underwent excision of the mass. The patient died after the first round of chemotherapy

Incontinence urinaire révélant une fistule vésico-utérine: à propos d’un cas

La fistule vésico-utérine (FVU) est une lésion rare et ne représente que 4% de toutes les fistules uro-génitales. Elle est le plus souvent consécutive à une césarienne et réalise une communication entre la vessie et l'utérus. Nous rapportons un cas d'une jeune patiente qui présentait une FVU suite à une césarienne. Le but de ce travail était d'analyser les aspects cliniques et thérapeutiques de cette affection

Effective high compression of ECG signals at low level distortion

An effective method for compression of ECG signals, which falls within the transform lossy compression category, is proposed. The transformation is realized by a fast wavelet transform. The effectiveness of the approach, in relation to the simplicity and speed of its implementation, is a consequence of the efficient storage of the outputs of the algorithm which is realized in compressed Hierarchical Data Format. The compression performance is tested on the MIT-BIH Arrhythmia database producing compression results which largely improve upon recently reported benchmarks on the same database. For a distortion corresponding to a percentage root-mean-square difference (PRD) of 0.53, in mean value, the achieved average compression ratio is 23.17 with quality score of 43.93. For a mean value of PRD up to 1.71 the compression ratio increases up to 62.5. The compression of a 30 min record is realized in an average time of 0.14 s. The insignificant delay for the compression process, together with the high compression ratio achieved at low level distortion and the negligible time for the signal recovery, uphold the suitability of the technique for supporting distant clinical health care