LFS-GAN: Lifelong Few-Shot Image Generation

We address a challenging lifelong few-shot image generation task for the first time. In this situation, a generative model learns a sequence of tasks using only a few samples per task. Consequently, the learned model encounters both catastrophic forgetting and overfitting problems at a time. Existing studies on lifelong GANs have proposed modulation-based methods to prevent catastrophic forgetting. However, they require considerable additional parameters and cannot generate high-fidelity and diverse images from limited data. On the other hand, the existing few-shot GANs suffer from severe catastrophic forgetting when learning multiple tasks. To alleviate these issues, we propose a framework called Lifelong Few-Shot GAN (LFS-GAN) that can generate high-quality and diverse images in lifelong few-shot image generation task. Our proposed framework learns each task using an efficient task-specific modulator - Learnable Factorized Tensor (LeFT). LeFT is rank-constrained and has a rich representation ability due to its unique reconstruction technique. Furthermore, we propose a novel mode seeking loss to improve the diversity of our model in low-data circumstances. Extensive experiments demonstrate that the proposed LFS-GAN can generate high-fidelity and diverse images without any forgetting and mode collapse in various domains, achieving state-of-the-art in lifelong few-shot image generation task. Surprisingly, we find that our LFS-GAN even outperforms the existing few-shot GANs in the few-shot image generation task. The code is available at Github.Comment: 20 pages, 19 figures, 14 tables, ICCV 2023 Poste

Efficacy evaluation of combination vaccine of recombinant C-terminal fragments of ApxIA, ApxIIA and ApxIIIA in piglets

The efficacy of the combination vaccine of the individual C-terminal fragments of ApxIA, ApxIIA and ApxIIIA of Actinobacillus pleuropneumoniae (APP) was evaluated in piglets. Twenty piglets were divided equally into 2 groups (n=10). All piglets were intramuscularly primed at 4 week-of-age (0 week post prime inoculation (WPPI)) and were intramuscularly boosted at 6 week-of-age (2 WPPI). Group A piglets were inoculated with sterile PBS and group B piglets were inoculated with the combination vaccine. Concentrations of each of the C-terminal fragment-specific IgG as determined by ELISA were significantly higher in group B than in group A from 2 WPPI until the end of this study. Clinical signs were observed from only 10% of group B piglets after the challenge with the mixture of APP serotypes 1, 2 and 5 at 4 WPPI, while 50% of group A piglets were protected against APP infections. Overall, intramuscular inoculation with the vaccine candidate can efficiently protect piglets against APP infection

Anti-malarial activity of 6-(8'Z-pentadecenyl)-salicylic acid from Viola websteri in mice

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Petroleum ether extracts of <it>Viola websteri </it>Hemsl (Violaceae) were reported to have anti-plasmodial activity against <it>Plasmodium falciparum in vitro</it>, with this activity being largely attributable to 6-(8'Z-pentadecenyl)-salicylic acid (6-SA).</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The schizontocidal activity of 6-SA on early <it>Plasmodium berghei </it>infections was evaluated in a four-day test. The possible 'repository' activity of 6-SA was assessed using the method described by Peters. The median lethal dose (LD₅₀) of 6-SA, when given intraperitoneally, was also determined using uninfected ICR mice and the method of Lorke.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>In the present study, 6-SA was found to have anti-malarial activity <it>in vivo</it>, when tested against <it>P. berghei </it>in mice. 6-SA at 5, 10 and 25 mg/kg·day exhibited a significant blood schizontocidal activity in four-day early infections, repository evaluations and established infections with a significant mean survival time comparable to that of the standard drug, chloroquine (5 mg/kg·day).</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>6-SA possesses a moderate anti-malarial activity that could be exploited for malaria therapy.</p

A Study of Solids and Gas Mixing in a Partitioned Fluidized Bed

A partitioned fluidized bed gasifier has been developed for improving coal gasification performance. The basic concept is to divide a fluidized bed into two parts, a gasifier and a combustor, by a partition. Char is burnt in the combustor and generated heat is supplied to the gasifier by solid mixing. Therefore, solid mixing should be maximized whereas gas mixing between syngas and the combusted gas should be minimized. In this study, gas and solid mixing behaviors were verified in cold model acrylic beds. For monitoring solid mixing behavior, transient temperature trends in the beds were analyzed. A heat source and a heat sink were installed in each bed. Dozens of thermocouples were used to monitor temperature distribution

Unilateral Biportal Endoscopic Translaminar Keyhole Approach to Treat High-grade Up-migrated Lumbar Disc Herniation: Technical Note

The incidence of lumbar disc fragment migration is approximately 35%–72% of which 34% are high-grade up-migrated discs. Translaminar keyhole approach is a minimally invasive and true tissue sparing technique which has been applied to approach migrated disc herniation. The unilateral biportal endoscopic approach is an emerging technique among endoscopic spine surgery that combines the advantages of microscopic surgery with endoscopic surgery. In this technical report we demonstrate the surgical technique of performing the translaminar keyhole approach with unilateral biportal endoscopic spine surgery to treat high-grade up-migrated discs. As far as we know, this is the first technical report of unilateral biportal endoscopy with translaminar keyhole approach to treat high-grade up migrated lumbar disc herniation

The determination of dark adaptation time using electroretinography in conscious Miniature Schnauzer dogs

The optimal dark adaptation time of electroretinograms (ERG's) performed on conscious dogs were determined using a commercially available ERG unit with a contact lens electrode and a built-in light source (LED-electrode). The ERG recordings were performed on nine healthy Miniature Schnauzer dogs. The bilateral ERG's at seven different dark adaptation times at an intensity of 2.5 cd·s/m2 was performed. Signal averaging (4 flashes of light stimuli) was adopted to reduce electrophysiologic noise. As the dark adaptation time increased, a significant increase in the mean a-wave amplitudes was observed in comparison to base-line levels up to 10 min (p < 0.05). Thereafter, no significant differences in amplitude occured over the dark adaptation time. Moreover, at this time the mean amplitude was 60.30 ± 18.47 µV. However, no significant changes were observed for the implicit times of the a-wave. The implicit times and amplitude of the b-wave increased significantly up to 20 min of dark adaptation (p < 0.05). Beyond this time, the mean b-wave amplitudes was 132.92 ± 17.79 µV. The results of the present study demonstrate that, the optimal dark adaptation time when performing ERG's, should be at least 20 min in conscious Miniature Schnauzer dogs

Close Correlation of Monoamine Oxidase Activity with Progress of Alzheimer’s Disease in Mice, Observed by in Vivo Two-Photon Imaging

Monoamine oxidases (MAOs) play an important role in Alzheimer&apos;s disease (AD) pathology. We report in vivo comonitoring of MAO activity and amyloid-beta (A beta) plaques dependent on the aging of live mice with AD, using a two-photon fluorescence probe. The probe under the catalytic action of MAO produces a dipolar fluorophore that senses A beta plaques, a general AD biomarker, enabling us to comonitor the enzyme activity and the progress of AD indicated by A beta plaques. The results show that the progress of AD has a close correlation with MAO activity, which can be categorized into three stages: slow initiation stage up to three months, an aggressive stage, and a saturation stage from nine months. Histological analysis also reveals elevation of MAO activity around A beta plaques in aged mice. The close correlation between the MAO activity and AD progress observed by in vivo monitoring for the first time prompts us to investigate the enzyme as a potential biomarker of AD.1195Ysciescopu

Cellular abundance-based prognostic model associated with deregulated gene expression of leukemic stem cells in acute myeloid leukemia

Background: Previous studies have reported that genes highly expressed in leukemic stem cells (LSC) may dictate the survival probability of patients and expression-based cellular deconvolution may be informative in forecasting prognosis. However, whether the prognosis of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) can be predicted using gene expression and deconvoluted cellular abundances is debatable.Methods: Nine different cell-type abundances of a training set composed of the AML samples of 422 patients, were used to build a model for predicting prognosis by least absolute shrinkage and selection operator Cox regression. This model was validated in two different validation sets, TCGA-LAML and Beat AML (n = 179 and 451, respectively).Results: We introduce a new prognosis predicting model for AML called the LSC activity (LSCA) score, which incorporates the abundance of 5 cell types, granulocyte-monocyte progenitors, common myeloid progenitors, CD45RA + cells, megakaryocyte-erythrocyte progenitors, and multipotent progenitors. Overall survival probabilities between the high and low LSCA score groups were significantly different in TCGA-LAML and Beat AML cohorts (log-rank p-value = 3.3×10−4 and 4.3×10−3, respectively). Also, multivariate Cox regression analysis on these two validation sets shows that LSCA score is independent prognostic factor when considering age, sex, and cytogenetic risk (hazard ratio, HR = 2.17; 95% CI 1.40–3.34; p &lt; 0.001 and HR = 1.20; 95% CI 1.02–1.43; p &lt; 0.03, respectively). The performance of the LSCA score was comparable to other prognostic models, LSC17, APS, and CTC scores, as indicated by the area under the curve. Gene set variation analysis with six LSC-related functional gene sets indicated that high and low LSCA scores are associated with upregulated and downregulated genes in LSCs.Conclusion: We have developed a new prognosis prediction scoring system for AML patients, the LSCA score, which uses deconvoluted cell-type abundance only

Prostate Specific Membrane Antigen mRNA in Blood as a Potential Predictor of Biochemical Recurrence after Radical Prostatectomy

We investigated whether the detection of prostate specific membrane antigen (PSMA) in blood preoperatively has predictive value for biochemical recurrence (BCR) after radical prostatectomy in patients with prostate cancer. All 134 patients scheduled to receive radical prostatectomy for prostate cancer were prospectively enrolled. The authors used nested reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) assay to detect PSMA mRNA-bearing cells in peripheral blood, and analyzed the ability of PSMA mRNA positivity to predict BCR after surgery. PSMA-mRNA was detected in 24 (17.9%) patients by RT-PCR. Over a median follow-up of 20 months (range, 3 to 46 months), BCR developed in 15 patients (11.2%) and median time to BCR was 7 months (range, 3 to 25 months). Kaplan-Meier analysis revealed a significant difference between those positive or negative for PSMA in terms of recurrence-free actuarial probability (log rank P=0.0039). Multivariate analysis showed that positivity for PSMA mRNA (HR: 3.697, 95% CI 1.285-10.634, P=0.015) and a biopsy Gleason score of ≥7 (HR: 4.500, 95% CI 1.419-14.274, P=0.011) were independent preoperative predictors of BCR. The presence of PSMA mRNA in peripheral blood can be used to predict BCR after radical prostatectomy