Introduction to Cancer Concepts: A Guidebook for the Non-Oncologist

This chapter in Cancer Concepts: A Guidebook for the Non-Oncologist presents an introduction to the Guidebook, which developed from the Cancer Concepts course at the University of Massachusetts Medical School.https://escholarship.umassmed.edu/cancer_concepts/1011/thumbnail.jp

Multiple Object Tracking in Urban Traffic Scenes with a Multiclass Object Detector

Multiple object tracking (MOT) in urban traffic aims to produce the trajectories of the different road users that move across the field of view with different directions and speeds and that can have varying appearances and sizes. Occlusions and interactions among the different objects are expected and common due to the nature of urban road traffic. In this work, a tracking framework employing classification label information from a deep learning detection approach is used for associating the different objects, in addition to object position and appearances. We want to investigate the performance of a modern multiclass object detector for the MOT task in traffic scenes. Results show that the object labels improve tracking performance, but that the output of object detectors are not always reliable.Comment: 13th International Symposium on Visual Computing (ISVC

Supporting Cancer Knowledge Needs Using Online Information

Information is exploding at an exponential rate. Because there is a flood of medical information on the Internet, it can be difficult to wade through the many resources to determine what information is best to use in practice. The intent of this chapter in Cancer Concepts: A Guidebook for the Non-Oncologist is to help the health care provider find reliable online cancer information. To help inform clinical decision making, health science librarians continue to address this rapidly growing body of literature by analyzing resources and identifying the highest quality information available on the Internet. The concept of Evidence-Based Medicine (EBM) is important to understand, as well as the process needed to find literature supporting EBM. Why EBM? EBM is the conscientious, explicit, and judicious use of current best evidence in making decisions about the care of individual patients. Making evidence-based clinical decisions is not about intuition, but finding reliable, up-to-date literature and using it in combination with clinical expertise and patient choice. Once a source for free online quality literature is located, a health care provider can consider the best current evidence to thoroughly answer clinical questions.https://escholarship.umassmed.edu/cancer_concepts/1026/thumbnail.jp

Bonding mechanism from the impact of thermally sprayed solid particles

Power particles are mainly in solid state prior to impact on substrates from high velocity oxy-fuel (HVOF) thermal spraying. The bonding between particles and substrates is critical to ensure the quality of coating. Finite element analysis (FEA) models are developed to simulate the impingement process of solid particle impact on substrates. This numerical study examines the bonding mechanism between particles and substrates and establishes the critical particle impact parameters for bonding. Considering the morphology of particles, the shear-instability–based method is applied to all the particles, and the energy-based method is employed only for spherical particles. The particles are given the properties of widely used WC-Co powder for HVOF thermally sprayed coatings. The numerical results confirm that in the HVOF process, the kinetic energy of the particle prior to impact plays the most dominant role in particle stress localization and melting of the interfacial contact region. The critical impact parameters, such as particle velocity and temperature, are shown to be affected by the shape of particles, while higher impact velocity is required for highly nonspherical powder

The impact of protocol assignment for older adolescents with Hodgkin lymphoma

Background and Purpose: Hodgkin lymphoma (HL) treatment has evolved to reduce or avoid radiotherapy (RT) dose and volume and minimize the potential for late effects. Some older adolescents are treated on adult protocols. The purpose of this study is to examine the protocol assignment of older adolescents and its impact on radiation dose to relevant thoracic structures. Materials and Methods: Cooperative group data were reviewed and 12 adolescents were randomly selected from a pediatric HL protocol. Treatment plans were generated per one pediatric and two adult protocols. Dose volume histograms for heart, lung, and breast allowed comparison of radiation dose to these sites across these three protocols. Results: A total of 15.2% of adolescents were treated on adult HL protocols and received significantly higher radiation dosage to heart and lung compared to pediatric HL protocols. Adolescents treated on either pediatric or adult protocols received similar RT dose to breast. Conclusion: Older adolescents treated on adult HL protocols received higher RT dose to thoracic structures except breast. Level of nodal involvement may impact overall RT dose to breast. The impact of varying field design and RT dose on survival, local, and late effects needs further study for this vulnerable age group

Augmented Reality Smart Glasses: Societal Benefits and Risks

Poster-Design ohne Abstrac

Are Wearables Good or Bad for Society? An Exploration of Societal Benefits, Risks and Consequences of Augmented Reality Smart Glasses.

Recent market research forecasts predict that a new form of wearable devices will soon influence the media landscape: Augmented Reality Smart Glasses. While prior research highlights numerous potentials in personal and professional settings of smart glasses, this technology has also triggered several controversies in public discussions, for example, the risk of violating privacy and copyright laws. Yet, little research addresses the questions of whether smart glasses are good or bad for societies, and if yes, why. This study conducts exploratory research to contribute to narrowing this gap. Based on a survey among consumers, we identify several societal benefits and risks that determine consumers’ evaluation of the anticipated and desired success of smart glasses. These findings lead to numerous important implications for consumers, scholars, managers, and policy makers

Future vision for the quality assurance of oncology clinical trials

The National Cancer Institute clinical cooperative groups have been instrumental over the past 50 years in developing clinical trials and evidence-based process improvements for clinical oncology patient care. The cooperative groups are undergoing a transformation process as we further integrate molecular biology into personalized patient care and move to incorporate international partners in clinical trials. To support this vision, data acquisition and data management informatics tools must become both nimble and robust to support transformational research at an enterprise level. Information, including imaging, pathology, molecular biology, radiation oncology, surgery, systemic therapy, and patient outcome data needs to be integrated into the clinical trial charter using adaptive clinical trial mechanisms for design of the trial. This information needs to be made available to investigators using digital processes for real-time data analysis. Future clinical trials will need to be designed and completed in a timely manner facilitated by nimble informatics processes for data management. This paper discusses both past experience and future vision for clinical trials as we move to develop data management and quality assurance processes to meet the needs of the modern trial

Lung function associated gene Integrator Complex subunit 12 regulates protein synthesis pathways

Background: Genetic studies of human lung function and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease have identified a highly significant and reproducible signal on 4q24. It remains unclear which of the two candidate genes within this locus may regulate lung function: GSTCD, a gene with unknown function, and/or INTS12, a member of the Integrator Complex which is currently thought to mediate 3'end processing of small nuclear RNAs.Results: We found that, in lung tissue, 4q24 polymorphisms associated with lung function correlate with INTS12 but not neighbouring GSTCD expression. In contrast to the previous reports in other species, we only observed a minor alteration of snRNA processing following INTS12 depletion. RNAseq analysis of knockdown cells instead revealed dysregulation of a core subset of genes relevant to airway biology and a robust downregulation of protein synthesis pathways. Consistent with this, protein translation was decreased in INTS12 knockdown cells. In addition, ChIPseq experiments demonstrated INTS12 binding throughout the genome, which was enriched in transcriptionally active regions. Finally, we defined the INTS12 regulome which includes genes belonging to the protein synthesis pathways.Conclusion: INTS12 has functions beyond the canonical snRNA processing. We show that it regulates translation by regulating the expression of genes belonging to protein synthesis pathways. This study provides a detailed analysis of INTS12 activities on a genome-wide scale and contributes to the biology behind the genetic association for lung function at 4q24.</p