Effects of 92% oxygen administration on cognitive performance and physiological changes of intellectually and developmentally disabled people

Background: The present study addressed how 92% oxygen administration affects cognitive performance, blood oxygen saturation (SpO(2)), and heart rate (HR) of intellectually and developmentally disabled people. Methods: Seven males (28.9 +/- 1.8 years) and seven females (34.4 +/- 8.3 years) with intellectual and developmental disabilities (disabled level 2.1 +/- 0.5) completed an experiment consisting a 0-back task with normal air (21% oxygen) administered in one run and hyperoxic air (92% oxygen) administered in the other run. The experimental sequence in each run consisted of a 1-min adaptation phase, 2-min control phase, and 2-min 0-back task phase, where SpO(2) and HR were gauged for each phase. Results: The administration of 92% oxygen increased 0-back task performance of intellectually and developmentally disabled people, in association with increased SpO(2) and decreased HR. Our results demonstrate that sufficient oxygen supply subserving cognitive functions, even as a short-term effect, could increase cognitive ability for the intellectually and developmentally disabled people. Conclusions: It is concluded that enriched oxygen can positively affect, at least in the short-term, the working memory of those with intellectual and developmental disabilityopen0

Assessment of the Efficacy of Reducing Peginterferon Alfa-2a and Ribavirin Dose on Virologic Response in Koreans with Chronic Hepatitis C

BACKGROUND/AIMS: The virologic response of Koreans to combination therapy for chronic hepatitis C is similar to westerns; however, dose modification occurs more frequently in Koreans. We evaluated the rates of peginterferon alpha-2a and ribavirin dose modifications and their effect on the virologic response in Koreans. METHODS: Patients with detectable HCV RNA and enrolled from multicenters were treated with peginterferon alpha-2a (180 microgram/week) and ribavirin (800 mg/day) for 24 weeks (genotype non-1, n=37) or peginterferon alpha-2a (180 microgram/week) and ribavirin (1,000-1,200 mg/day) for 48 weeks (genotype 1, n=55). RESULTS: Early virologic response (EVR) and sustained virologic response (SVR) were 77.2% (genotype 1, 75%; non-1, 81%) and 66.3% (genotype 1, 56%; non-1, 81%), respectively. The frequency of dose modification was 32.6% within the first 12 weeks and 52.2% during the entire treatment period. No difference was found in SVR regardless of dose modification. However, the SVR for patients using > or =80% of the peginterferon dose was significantly higher than for those using <80% (81.3 vs. 50.0%, p=0.007), despite varying ribavirin doses. No difference was found in SVR regardless of whether the ribavirin dose was <80% or not. These results did not change based on genotype. CONCLUSIONS: We suggest that using at least 80% of the peginterferon alpha-2a dose in Koreans not only maintains SVR but also reduces drug side effects during the entire treatment period. A lower dose of ribavirin may be as efficacious as a standard doseope

High effectiveness of peginterferon alfa-2a plus ribavirin therapy in Korean patients with chronic hepatitis C in clinical practice

Background/AimsIdentifying the impact of a patient's ethnicity on treatment responses in clinical practice may assist in providing individualized treatment regimens for chronic hepatitis C (CHC). The effectiveness of standard peginterferon plus ribavirin therapy and the need for triple combination therapy with protease inhibitors in Koreans remain matters of debate. These issues were investigated in the present study.MethodsThe clinical data of 272 treatment-naïve Korean CHC patients who were treated in a community-based clinical trial (Clinical Trial group; n=51) and in clinical practice (Cohort group; n=221), were analyzed and compared. All were treated with standard protocols of peginterferon alfa-2a plus ribavirin therapy.ResultsFor patients with hepatitis C virus (HCV) genotype 1, the sustained virological response (SVR) rates in the Clinical Trial and Cohort groups were 81% (21/26) and 55% (58/106), respectively, by intention-to-treat (ITT) analysis (P=0.02), and 100% (13/13) and 80% (32/40), respectively, in treatment-adherent patients (P=0.18). For patients with HCV genotype 2, the SVR rates in these two groups were 96% (24/25) and 88% (101/115), respectively, by ITT analysis (P=0.31). Adherence and treatment duration were independent predictors of SVR for genotypes 1 and 2, respectively (P<0.01 for each). Korean patients with CHC achieved high SVR rates with peginterferon alfa-2a plus ribavirin in both the clinical trial and clinical practice settings.ConclusionsMeasures to raise adherence to standard therapy in clinical practice may improve the SVR rates in these patients as effectively as adding protease inhibitors, thus obviating the need for the latter

A global analysis of the impact of COVID-19 stay-at-home restrictions on crime

The implementation of COVID-19 stay-at-home policies was associated with a considerable drop in urban crime in 27 cities across 23 countries. More stringent restrictions over movement in public space were predictive of larger declines in crime. The stay-at-home restrictions to control the spread of COVID-19 led to unparalleled sudden change in daily life, but it is unclear how they affected urban crime globally. We collected data on daily counts of crime in 27 cities across 23 countries in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East and Asia. We conducted interrupted time series analyses to assess the impact of stay-at-home restrictions on different types of crime in each city. Our findings show that the stay-at-home policies were associated with a considerable drop in urban crime, but with substantial variation across cities and types of crime. Meta-regression results showed that more stringent restrictions over movement in public space were predictive of larger declines in crime.Peer reviewe

Generalized Upper Bound of Agreement Probability for Extracting Common Random Bits From Correlated Sources

Suppose that both Alice and Bob receive independent random bits without any bias, which are influenced by an independent noise. From the received random bits, Alice and Bob are willing to extract common randomness, without any communication. The extracted common randomness can be used for authentication or secrets. Recently, Bogdanov and Mossel derived an upper bound of the agreement probability, based on the min-entropy of outputs. In this paper, we derive a generalized upper bound of the probability of extracting common random bits from correlated sources, using the R`enyi entropy of order 1/(1−e ), where e is the error probability of the binary symmetric noise. It is shown that the generalized upper bound is always less than or equal to the previous bound

Generalized Upper Bound of Agreement Probability for Extracting Common Random Bits From Correlated Sources

Abstract: Suppose that both Alice and Bob receive independent random bits without any bias, which are influenced by an independent noise. From the received random bits, Alice and Bob are willing to extract common randomness, without any communication. The extracted common randomness can be used for authentication or secrets. Recently, Bogdanov and Mossel derived an upper bound of the agreement probability, based on the min-entropy of outputs. In this paper, we derive a generalized upper bound of the probability of extracting common random bits from correlated sources, using the Rènyi entropy of order 1/(1−ε), where ε is the error probability of the binary symmetric noise. It is shown that the generalized upper bound is always less than or equal to the previous bound

New Reversible Data Hiding Scheme for Encrypted Images using Lattices

Reversible data hiding is a technique to hide arbitrary data, without influencing the original images. In 2011, Zhang proposed a reversible data hiding scheme for encrypted images, by using a spatial correlation of the decrypted original image. Later, Hong et al. proposed an improved scheme by using side-match techniques, and modifying the correlation calculation function. In this paper, we propose an improved reversible data hiding scheme for encrypted images with lower bit error rates with the same PSNR (Peak Signalto- Noise Ratio), by introducing a lattice pattern to confine pixels to be used for embedding, and modifying the correlation calculation function, which extracts more information from neighbor pixels. In the proposed scheme, it is possible to hide more data, because the error probability becomes zero for smaller block sizes, than with previous schemes

Intrusion Detection System CAN-Bus In-Vehicle Networks Based on the Statistical Characteristics of Attacks

For in-vehicle network communication, the controller area network (CAN) broadcasts to all connected nodes without address validation. Therefore, it is highly vulnerable to all sorts of attack scenarios. This research proposes a novel intrusion detection system (IDS) for CAN to identify in-vehicle network anomalies. The statistical characteristics of attacks provide valuable information about the inherent intrusion patterns and behaviors. We employed two real-world attack scenarios from publicly available datasets to record a real-time response against intrusions with increased precision for in-vehicle network environments. Our proposed IDS can exploit malicious patterns by calculating thresholds and using the statistical properties of attacks, making attack detection more efficient. The optimized threshold value is calculated using brute-force optimization for various window sizes to minimize the total error. The reference values of normality require a few legitimate data frames for effective intrusion detection. The experimental findings validate that our suggested method can efficiently detect fuzzy, merge, and denial-of-service (DoS) attacks with low false-positive rates. It is also demonstrated that the total error decreases with an increasing attack rate for varying window sizes. The results indicate that our proposed IDS minimizes the misclassification rate and is hence better suited for in-vehicle networks