Implementation Challenges to the Adaptive Reuse of a Heritage Building in Tirana, Albania

The present paper focuses on the adaptive reuse of Selim Pashe Toptani Sarajev, a monumental building related to the creation history, ownership and administration of Tirana. The adaptive reuse of the buildings contributes to the sustainability of the urban generation, as it extends the life cycle of the buildings, avoids demolition waste, encourages energy efficient solutions and provides significant social and economic benefits to the society. Firstly, the study begins with an in-depth literature review of the factors that contribute to the goal of sustainable development in the conservation of built heritage. More importantly, this paper examines the challenges in incorporating a sustainability framework into adaptive reuse of the building. The authors stress that the framework for achieving sustainable, low carbon adaptive reuse should be viewed more holistically, integrating social, economic, environmental, urban and political policies

Hybrid Data Race Detection for Multicore Software

Multithreaded programs are prone to concurrency errors such as deadlocks, race conditions and atomicity violations. These errors are notoriously difficult to detect due to the non-deterministic nature of concurrent software running on multicore hardware. Data races result from the concurrent access of shared data by multiple threads and can result in unexpected program behaviors. Main dynamic data race detection techniques in the literature are happens-before and lockset algorithms which suffer from high execution time and memory overhead, miss many data races or produce a high number of false alarms. Our goal is to improve the performance of dynamic data race detection, while at the same time improving its accuracy by generating fewer false alarms. We develop a hybrid data race detection algorithm that is a combination of the happens-before and lockset algorithms in a tool. Rather than focusing on individual memory accesses by each thread, we focus on sequence of memory accesses by each thread, called a segment. This allows us to improve the performance of data race detection. We implement several optimizations on our hybrid data race detector and compare our technique with traditional happens-before and lockset detectors. The experiments are performed with C/C++ multithreaded benchmarks using Pthreads library from PARSEC suite and large applications such as Apache web server. Our experiments showed that our hybrid detector is 15 % faster than the happens-before detector and produces 50 % less potential data races than the lockset detector. Ultimately, a hybrid data race detector can improve the performance and accuracy of data race detection, enhancing its usability in practice

Water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes) and water lettuce (Pistia stratiotes) in the Great Lakes: playing with fire?

The Laurentian Great Lakes have been successfully invaded by at least 182 nonindigenous species. Here we report on two new species, water hyacinth Eichhornia crassipes and water lettuce Pistia stratiotes, that were found at a number of locations in Lake St. Clair and Detroit River during autumn 2010. Both species are commonly sold in the water garden and aquarium trade in southern Ontario and elsewhere. While it is not clear whether these species are established or can establish in the Great Lakes, the historic assumption that neither of these subtropical to tropical plants pose an invasion risk must be questioned in the light of changing environmental conditions associated with climate warming that may render Great Lakes’ habitats more suitable for these species and increase the likelihood of their successful establishment

Water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes) and water lettuce (Pistia stratiotes) in the Great Lakes: Playing with fire?

The Laurentian Great Lakes have been successfully invaded by at least 182 nonindigenous species. Here we report on two new species, water hyacinth Eichhornia crassipes and water lettuce Pistia stratiotes, that were found at a number of locations in Lake St. Clair and Detroit River during autumn 2010. Both species are commonly sold in the water garden and aquarium trade in southern Ontario and elsewhere. While it is not clear whether these species are established or can establish in the Great Lakes, the historic assumption that neither of these subtropical to tropical plants pose an invasion risk must be questioned in the light of changing environmental conditions associated with climate warming that may render Great Lakes\u27 habitats more suitable for these species and increase the likelihood of their successful establishment. © 2011 The Author(s)

Adverse effects of extra-articular corticosteroid injections: a systematic review

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>To estimate the occurrence and type of adverse effects after application of an extra-articular (soft tissue) corticosteroid injection.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A systematic review of the literature was made based on a PubMed and Embase search covering the period 1956 to January 2010. Case reports were included, as were prospective and retrospective studies that reported adverse events of corticosteroid injection. All clinical trials which used extra-articular corticosteroid injections were examined. We divided the reported adverse events into major (defined as those needing intervention or not disappearing) and minor ones (transient, not requiring intervention).</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The search yielded 87 relevant studies:44 case reports, 37 prospective studies and 6 retrospective studies. The major adverse events included osteomyelitis and protothecosis; one fatal necrotizing fasciitis; cellulitis and ecchymosis; tendon ruptures; atrophy of the plantar fat was described after injecting a neuroma; and local skin effects appeared as atrophy, hypopigmentation or as skin defect. The minor adverse events effects ranged from skin rash to flushing and disturbed menstrual pattern. Increased pain or steroid flare after injection was reported in 19 studies. After extra-articular injection, the incidence of major adverse events ranged from 0-5.8% and that of minor adverse events from 0-81%. It was not feasible to pool the risk for adverse effects due to heterogeneity of study populations and difference in interventions and variance in reporting.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>In this literature review it was difficult to accurately quantify the incidence of adverse effects after extra-articular corticosteroid injection. The reported adverse events were relatively mild, although one fatal reaction was reported.</p

A new technique of subtrochanteric shortening in total hip replacement for crowe type 3 to 4 dysplasia of the hip

PubMedID: 19577893A new technique of femoral fixation that uses a transverse osteotomy for subtrochanteric shortening and derotation in total hip arthroplasty for Crowe type 3 to 4 dysplasia of the hip is described. This series included 21 cases in 12 women and 2 men, with a mean age of 42.3 years. Follow-up averaged 41.2 months. Bone pegs prepared from the resected femoral segment were seated in the medullary canal around the stem for femoral fixation. Merle d'Aubigné scores for pain, motion, and walking improved from 2.9, 4.4, and 3.7 to 5.2, 5.4, and 5.5, respectively. Radiographic union was detected within 12 ± 3.4 (range, 6-24) weeks in all cases. Complications were early dislocation in 2 cases. This technique allows correction of anteversion, provides excellent rotational stability, and eliminates the need for additional osteosynthesis regardless of the stem design. © 2010 Elsevier Inc

Giant-cell tumor of the tendon sheath in the toe: A report of three cases [Ayak parmaginda tendon kilifi dev hücreli tümörü: Uç olgu sunumu]

Giant-cell tumor of the tendon sheath is a benign, soft-tissue tumor usually arising from synovial cells of the tendon sheaths in the hand. Involvement of the toes is quite rare. We presented three patients including two women with ages 25 and 50 years, and one man aged 21 years, who underwent surgery for mass lesions originating from tendon sheaths of the toe. All the patients presented with a slightly painful soft tissue mass in the toe. Magnetic resonance imaging was not helpful in the differential diagnosis. Diagnosis of the tumors was made by histopathologic evaluation of completely excised lesions. No local recurrences were encountered during a mean follow-up of 18 months

Bilateral dislocation of the knee with rupture of both patellar tendons. A case report

PubMedID: 16806939Knee dislocations are rare injuries caused by violent trauma. Damage to soft tissues and ligament lesions almost always accompany the injury. Vascular compromise further complicates the situation. We report a case of bilateral posterior knee dislocation with traumatic rupture of both patellar tendons. Treatment consisted of external fixation of both knees. Vascular compromise resolved with reduction and traction pins were placed on both patellae which were connected to the external fixators on following days. Primary repair of patellar tendon was undertaken after gradual distal repositioning of patella. The result is successful with full range of motion. Rupture of patellar tendon should be considered with posterior dislocation of the knee. External fixators provide quick stabilization in case of vascular compromise and can be modified to provide a traction system for distal repositioning of patella which allows primary repair of the patellar tendon. © 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved