Association of iron deficiency with or without anaemia and cognitive functions among primary school children in Malaysia

Iron deficiency and anaemia affect millions of children worldwide. This study aimed to investigate the effect of iron deficiency with or without anaemia on cognitive functions, specifically with short-term memory, attention and visualmotor coordination in children. A total of 173 primary school children was enrolled. Cognitive functions were assessed using the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children. Three sub-tests were selected to assess processing speed (coding test), immediate auditory memory (digit span test) and visual processing and problem solving ability (maze test). The results showed significant correlation between age and coding test (r =0.38, p<0.001), digit span test (r =0.16, p = 0.028), and maze test scores (r =0.28, p<0.001), and the total sub-test scores (r=0.43, p <.001). After age adjustment of the cognitive function tests, iron deficientchildren without anaemia scored significantly lower than the healthy children (p<0.001) on coding test, while iron deficient children with anaemia and iron deficient children without anaemia scored significantly lower (p<0.001) than the healthy counterparts on maze test. No significant differences were observed on digit-span score among the groups. This study confirms the negative effect of both iron deficiency and iron deficiency anaemia on processing speed and visualmotor coordination in children

Full-term extrauterine abdominal pregnancy: a case report

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Introduction</p> <p>Extrauterine abdominal pregnancy is extremely rare and is frequently missed during antenatal care. This is a report of a full-term extrauterine abdominal pregnancy in a primigravida who likely had a ruptured ectopic pregnancy with secondary implantation and subsequently delivered a healthy baby.</p> <p>Case presentation</p> <p>A 23-year-old, Middle Eastern, primigravida presented at 14 weeks gestation with intermittent suprapubic pain and dysuria. An abdominal ultrasound examination showed a single viable fetus with free fluid in her abdomen. A follow-up examination at term showed a breech presentation and the possibility of a bicornute uterus with the fetus present in the left horn of her uterus. Our patient underwent Cesarean delivery under general anesthesia and was found to have a small intact uterus with the fetus lying in her abdomen and surrounded by an amniotic fluid-filled sac. The baby was extracted uneventfully, but the placenta was implanted in the left broad ligament and its removal resulted in massive intraoperative bleeding that necessitated blood and blood products transfusion and the administration of Factor VII to control the bleeding. Both the mother and newborn were discharged home in good condition.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>An extrauterine abdominal pregnancy secondary to a ruptured ectopic pregnancy with secondary implantation could be missed during antenatal care and continue to term with good maternal and fetal outcome. An advanced extrauterine pregnancy should not result in the automatic termination of the pregnancy.</p

Reproducibility in Radiomics: A Comparison of Feature Extraction Methods and Two Independent Datasets

Radiomics involves the extraction of information from medical images that are not visible to the human eye. There is evidence that these features can be used for treatment stratification and outcome prediction. However, there is much discussion about the reproducibility of results between different studies. This paper studies the reproducibility of CT texture features used in radiomics, comparing two feature extraction implementations, namely the MATLAB toolkit and Pyradiomics, when applied to independent datasets of CT scans of patients: (i) the open access RIDER dataset containing a set of repeat CT scans taken 15 min apart for 31 patients (RIDER Scan 1 and Scan 2, respectively) treated for lung cancer; and (ii) the open access HN1 dataset containing 137 patients treated for head and neck cancer. Gross tumor volume (GTV), manually outlined by an experienced observer available on both datasets, was used. The 43 common radiomics features available in MATLAB and Pyradiomics were calculated using two intensity-level quantization methods with and without an intensity threshold. Cases were ranked for each feature for all combinations of quantization parameters, and the Spearman’s rank coefficient, rs, calculated. Reproducibility was defined when a highly correlated feature in the RIDER dataset also correlated highly in the HN1 dataset, and vice versa. A total of 29 out of the 43 reported stable features were found to be highly reproducible between MATLAB and Pyradiomics implementations, having a consistently high correlation in rank ordering for RIDER Scan 1 and RIDER Scan 2 (rs &gt; 0.8). 18/43 reported features were common in the RIDER and HN1 datasets, suggesting they may be agnostic to disease site. Useful radiomics features should be selected based on reproducibility. This study identified a set of features that meet this requirement and validated the methodology for evaluating reproducibility between datasets

Not Available

Not AvailableArunachal Pradesh, the largest mountainous state of India, is situated in the northeastern part of the Himalayan region and characterized by high annual rainfall, forest vegetation and diversity in soils. Information on the soils of the state is essential for scientific land use planning and sustainable production. A soil resource inventory and subsequent database creation for thematic mapping using a Geographical Information System (GIS) is presented in this paper. Physiographically, Arunachal Pradesh can be divided into four distinct zones: snow-capped mountains (5500 m amsl); lower Himalayan ranges (3500 m amsl); the sub-Himalayan Siwalik hills (700 m amsl); and the eastern Assam plains. Soils occurring in these physiographic zones are lnceptisols (37 percent), Entisols (35 per- cent), Ultisols (14 percent) and Alfisols (0.5 percent). The remaining soils can be classed as miscellaneous. Soil resource inventory studies show that the soils of the warm perhumid eastern Himalayan ecosystem, with a ‘thermic’ temperature regime, are lnceptisols and Entisols; and that they are highly acidic in nature. Soils of the warm perhumid Siwalik hill ecosystem, with a ‘hyperthermic’ temperature regime, are also Entisols and lnceptisols with a high to moderate acidic condition. The dominant soils of the northeastern Purvachal hill ecosystem, with ‘hyperthermic’ and ‘thermic’ temperature regimes, are Ultisols and Inceptisols. lnceptisols and Entisols are the dominant soils in the hot and humid plain ecosystem. Steeply sloping landform and high rainfall are mainly responsible for a high erosion hazard in the state. The soil erosion map indicates that very severe (20 percent of TGA) to severe (25 percent of TGA) soil erosion takes place in the warm per-humid zone, whereas, moderate erosion takes place in the Siwalik hills and hot, humid plain areas. This is evident from the soil depth class distribution of Arunachal Pradesh, which shows that shallow soils cover 20 percent of the TGA of the state. Most of the the state is covered by hills and agri- cultural practices are limited to valley regions, However, the soils of other physiographic zones (lower altitudinal, moderately hilly terrain) provide scope for plantations, such as orange, banana and tea plantations.Not Availabl

MUSiC : a model-unspecific search for new physics in proton-proton collisions at root s=13TeV

Results of the Model Unspecific Search in CMS (MUSiC), using proton-proton collision data recorded at the LHC at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 35.9 fb(-1), are presented. The MUSiC analysis searches for anomalies that could be signatures of physics beyond the standard model. The analysis is based on the comparison of observed data with the standard model prediction, as determined from simulation, in several hundred final states and multiple kinematic distributions. Events containing at least one electron or muon are classified based on their final state topology, and an automated search algorithm surveys the observed data for deviations from the prediction. The sensitivity of the search is validated using multiple methods. No significant deviations from the predictions have been observed. For a wide range of final state topologies, agreement is found between the data and the standard model simulation. This analysis complements dedicated search analyses by significantly expanding the range of final states covered using a model independent approach with the largest data set to date to probe phase space regions beyond the reach of previous general searches.Peer reviewe

Measurement of prompt open-charm production cross sections in proton-proton collisions at root s=13 TeV

The production cross sections for prompt open-charm mesons in proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13TeV are reported. The measurement is performed using a data sample collected by the CMS experiment corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 29 nb(-1). The differential production cross sections of the D*(+/-), D-+/-, and D-0 ((D) over bar (0)) mesons are presented in ranges of transverse momentum and pseudorapidity 4 < p(T) < 100 GeV and vertical bar eta vertical bar < 2.1, respectively. The results are compared to several theoretical calculations and to previous measurements.Peer reviewe

Combined searches for the production of supersymmetric top quark partners in proton-proton collisions at root s=13 TeV

A combination of searches for top squark pair production using proton-proton collision data at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV at the CERN LHC, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 137 fb(-1) collected by the CMS experiment, is presented. Signatures with at least 2 jets and large missing transverse momentum are categorized into events with 0, 1, or 2 leptons. New results for regions of parameter space where the kinematical properties of top squark pair production and top quark pair production are very similar are presented. Depending on themodel, the combined result excludes a top squarkmass up to 1325 GeV for amassless neutralino, and a neutralinomass up to 700 GeV for a top squarkmass of 1150 GeV. Top squarks with masses from 145 to 295 GeV, for neutralino masses from 0 to 100 GeV, with a mass difference between the top squark and the neutralino in a window of 30 GeV around the mass of the top quark, are excluded for the first time with CMS data. The results of theses searches are also interpreted in an alternative signal model of dark matter production via a spin-0 mediator in association with a top quark pair. Upper limits are set on the cross section for mediator particle masses of up to 420 GeV

Development and validation of HERWIG 7 tunes from CMS underlying-event measurements

This paper presents new sets of parameters (“tunes”) for the underlying-event model of the HERWIG7 event generator. These parameters control the description of multiple-parton interactions (MPI) and colour reconnection in HERWIG7, and are obtained from a fit to minimum-bias data collected by the CMS experiment at s=0.9, 7, and 13Te. The tunes are based on the NNPDF 3.1 next-to-next-to-leading-order parton distribution function (PDF) set for the parton shower, and either a leading-order or next-to-next-to-leading-order PDF set for the simulation of MPI and the beam remnants. Predictions utilizing the tunes are produced for event shape observables in electron-positron collisions, and for minimum-bias, inclusive jet, top quark pair, and Z and W boson events in proton-proton collisions, and are compared with data. Each of the new tunes describes the data at a reasonable level, and the tunes using a leading-order PDF for the simulation of MPI provide the best description of the dat

Measurement of B-c(2S)(+) and B-c*(2S)(+) cross section ratios in proton-proton collisions at root s=13 TeV

Peer reviewe