Stereotactic radiosurgery for vestibular schwannomas.

Stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) maintains an important role in managing vestibular schwannoma (VS). Long-term clinical data have clearly established the safety and efficacy of the procedure for managing Koos low grade to intermediate grade VS. Historically, the procedure was developed via a multidisciplinary approach that involves physicians (eg, neurosurgeons and radiation oncologists) as well as clinical specialists (eg, radiation physicists). In this paper, we have reviewed current technical and clinical practices of SRS for VS from a procedural specialist's perspective and from a clinician's perspective

Tuning Optical Properties of Transparent Conducting Barium Stannate by Dimensional Reduction

We report calculations of the electronic structure and optical properties of doped $n$-type perovskite BaSnO3 and layered perovskites. While doped BaSnO$_3$ retains its transparency for energies below the valence to conduction band onset, the doped layered compounds exhibit below band edge optical conductivity due to transitions from the lowest conduction band. This gives absorption in the visible for Ba2SnO4. Thus it is important to minimize this phase in transparent conducting oxide (TCO) films. Ba3Sn2O7 and Ba4Sn3O10 have strong transitions only in the red and infrared, respectively. Thus there may be opportunities for using these as wavelength filtering TCO

A Comparative Study of Physicochemical, Dielectric and Thermal Properties of Pressboard Insulation Impregnated with Natural Ester and Mineral Oil

Natural ester is considered to be a substitute of mineral oil in the future. To apply natural ester in large transformers safely, natural ester impregnated solid insulation should be proved to have comparable dielectric strength and thermal stability to mineral oil impregnated solid insulation. This paper mainly focuses on a comparative study of physicochemical, ac breakdown strength and thermal stability behavior of BIOTEMP natural ester/pressboard insulation and Karamay 25# naphthenic mineral oil/pressboard insulation after long term thermal ageing. The physicochemical and dielectric parameters including moisture, acids and the ac breakdown strength of these two oil/pressboard insulation systems at different ageing status were compared. The permittivity and ac breakdown strength of these two oil/pressboard insulation systems at different temperatures were also investigated. And a comparative result of the thermal stability behavior of these two oil/pressboard insulation systems with different ageing status was provided at last. Results show that though natural ester has higher absolute humidity and acidity during the long ageing period, the lower relative humidity of natural ester helps to keep its ac breakdown strength higher than mineral oil. The pressboard aged in natural ester also has higher ac breakdown strength than that aged in mineral oil. The lower relative permittivity ratio of natural ester impregnated paper to natural ester is beneficial to its dielectric strength. Using natural ester in transformer, the resistance to thermal decomposition of the oil/pressboard insulation system could be also effectively improved

Primary Care Asthma Attack Prediction Models for Adults:A Systematic Review of Reported Methodologies and Outcomes

Prognostic models hold great potential for predicting asthma exacerbations, providing opportunities for early intervention, and are a popular area of current research. However, it is unclear how models should be compared and contrasted, given their differences in both design and performance, particularly with a view to potential implementation in routine practice. This systematic review aimed to identify novel predictive models of asthma attacks in adults, and compare differences in construction related to populations, outcome definitions, prediction time horizons, algorithms, validation, and performance estimation. 25 studies were identified for comparison, with varying definitions of asthma attacks and prediction event time horizons ranging from 15 days to 30 months. The most commonly used algorithm was logistic regression (20/25 studies), however none of the six which tested multiple algorithms identified it as highest performing algorithm. The effect of various study design characteristics on performance was evaluated in order to provide context to the limitations of highly performing models. Models used a variety of constructs, which affected both their performance and their viability for implementation in routine practice. Consultation with stakeholders is necessary to identify priorities for model refinement and to create a benchmark of acceptable performance for implementation in clinical practice