Design of optimal band-stop FIR filter using L1-norm based RCGA

AbstractIn this paper, an optimal design of linear phase digital finite impulse response (FIR) band stop (BS) filter using the L1-norm based real-coded genetic algorithm (L1-RCGA) is presented. Although RCGA has proved its ability to overcome the drawbacks associated with conventional gradient-based optimization methods of filter design, it is applied here with a novel fitness function based on the L1-norm. This leads to a global optimal solution along with the improvement in filter design with same specifications. The designed filter pursues a better response in terms of flat passband, high stopband attenuation and fast convergence. The simulation results justify that the proposed FIR BS filter using L1-RCGA outperforms the existing optimization techniques, the L1-method and particle swarm optimization (PSO) and the conventional methods such as least-squares (LS) approach, Kaiser window method and the Parks McClellan (PM) algorithm. A detailed analysis is performed to evaluate the performance of the designed filters

Maternal mortality in a tertiary care hospital: a five-year review

Background: This study was aimed at analyzing the maternal mortality ratio over five years, the causes leading to maternal deaths in a tertiary care hospital and factors which are preventable.Methods: The records of maternal death from August 2010 to July 2015 (5 years) were collected and analyzed. Various factors like maternal age, parity, literacy, place of residence, antenatal registration, admission-death interval, mode of delivery and causes of deaths were reviewed.Results: The mean maternal mortality ratio (MMR) was 1039. The direct causes of maternal mortality were hemorrhage (22.4%), eclampsia (21.2%), sepsis (18.78%) and amniotic fluid embolism (8.48%). Indirect obstetric deaths were due to hepatitis (10.9%), anemia (3.6%), respiratory diseases (6.06%), heart diseases (3.03%), CNS disease (5.45%).  Most of the deaths (69.7%) occurred in age group 20 and30 years. 63.6% were multigravida and 85.4% were unbooked cases.Conclusions: Antenatal care, screening and management of high risk pregnancies are most important to prevent complications and maternal deaths by timely detection and intervention

Multiple urinary bladder calculi: a rare cause of irreducible uterovaginal prolapse

A case of irreducible prolapse with multiple bladder calculi in a 65-years-old multiparous, postmenopausal woman is reported. Inability to walk, constipation and urinary incontinence were her primary complaints. Routine ultrasound of the abdomen and pelvis failed to reveal multiple vesical calculi as the prolapse was lying outside the pelvis. However, targeted plain X-ray of the prolapsed mass showed multiple vesical calculi. The patient was managed with single-stage vaginal hysterectomy and laparotomy. First vaginal hysterectomy was done then prolapsed cystocele was reduced and extraperitoneal vesicolithotomy done. Currently, the patient is relieved of all symptoms. Management of an irreducible procidentia and a hard mass in the anterior compartment, as in this case, can be challenging and requires a diligent effort to confirm the diagnosis and to execute the appropriate surgical protocol to achieve optimal outcome with minimal intra- and post-operative complications

Taguchi based Design of Sequential Convolution Neural Network for Classification of Defective Fasteners

Fasteners play a critical role in securing various parts of machinery. Deformations such as dents, cracks, and scratches on the surface of fasteners are caused by material properties and incorrect handling of equipment during production processes. As a result, quality control is required to ensure safe and reliable operations. The existing defect inspection method relies on manual examination, which consumes a significant amount of time, money, and other resources; also, accuracy cannot be guaranteed due to human error. Automatic defect detection systems have proven impactful over the manual inspection technique for defect analysis. However, computational techniques such as convolutional neural networks (CNN) and deep learning-based approaches are evolutionary methods. By carefully selecting the design parameter values, the full potential of CNN can be realised. Using Taguchi-based design of experiments and analysis, an attempt has been made to develop a robust automatic system in this study. The dataset used to train the system has been created manually for M14 size nuts having two labeled classes: Defective and Non-defective. There are a total of 264 images in the dataset. The proposed sequential CNN comes up with a 96.3% validation accuracy, 0.277 validation loss at 0.001 learning rate.Comment: 13 pages, 6 figure

The Role of the p53 Protein in the Selective Vulnerability of the Inner Retina to Transient Ischemia

PURPOSE. TO determine whether the p53 protein plays a role in the selective vulnerability of the inner retina to transient ischemia. METHODS. Transient retinal ischemia was induced using a high intraocular pressure (HIOP) model in the Sprague-Dawley rat for 60 minutes. Histopathologic outcome was determined 7 days after ischemia. In addition, analysis for evidence for apoptosis (TdT-dUTP terminal nick-end label [TUNEL] staining) and p53 protein expression (immunohistochemistry) was performed at several points during the reperfusion period. In a separate set of experiments, wild-type mice and two groups of transgenic mice, one homozygous and the other heterozygous for the p53 null gene, were also subjected to HIOP for 60 minutes, and histopathology was performed 7 days later. RESULTS. At 7 days subsequent to 60 minutes of ischemia in the rat, there was marked thinning of the inner retinal layers. There were scattered TUNEL-positive cells within the inner retina, peaking at 24 to 48 hours and persisting for at least 7 days. p53 immunochemistry demonstrated elevated protein levels within the inner retina; this finding peaked at 24 to 48 hours but was no longer present at 4 days after ischemia. TUNEL staining of the inner retina of the mouse was most prominent 24 hours subsequent to ischemia but persisted at 48 hours. Seven days subsequent to 60 minutes of ischemia in the wild-type and transgenic mice, histopathologic evaluation demonstrated preservation of the retinal histoarchitecture in the heterozygous group compared with the wildtype or homozygous animals

Antibiotics and antibiotic-resistant bacteria in waters associated with a hospital in Ujjain, India

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Concerns have been raised about the public health implications of the presence of antibiotic residues in the aquatic environment and their effect on the development of bacterial resistance. While there is information on antibiotic residue levels in hospital effluent from some other countries, information on antibiotic residue levels in effluent from Indian hospitals is not available. Also, concurrent studies on antibiotic prescription quantity in a hospital and antibiotic residue levels and resistant bacteria in the effluent of the same hospital are few. Therefore, we quantified antibiotic residues in waters associated with a hospital in India and assessed their association, if any, with quantities of antibiotic prescribed in the hospital and the susceptibility of <it>Escherichia coli </it>found in the hospital effluent.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>This cross-sectional study was conducted in a teaching hospital outside the city of Ujjain in India. Seven antibiotics - amoxicillin, ceftriaxone, amikacin, ofloxacin, ciprofloxacin, norfloxacin and levofloxacin - were selected. Prescribed quantities were obtained from hospital records. The samples of the hospital associated water were analysed for the above mentioned antibiotics using well developed and validated liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry technique after selectively isolating the analytes from the matrix using solid phase extraction. <it>Escherichia coli </it>isolates from these waters were tested for antibiotic susceptibility, by standard Kirby Bauer disc diffusion method using Clinical and Laboratory Standard Institute breakpoints.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Ciprofloxacin was the highest prescribed antibiotic in the hospital and its residue levels in the hospital wastewater were also the highest. In samples of the municipal water supply and the groundwater, no antibiotics were detected. There was a positive correlation between the quantity of antibiotics prescribed in the hospital and antibiotic residue levels in the hospital wastewater. Wastewater samples collected in the afternoon contained both a higher number and higher levels of antibiotics compared to samples collected in the morning hours. No amikacin was found in the wastewater, but <it>E.coli </it>isolates from all wastewater samples were resistant to amikacin. Although ciprofloxacin was the most prevalent antibiotic detected in the wastewater, <it>E.coli </it>was not resistant to it.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Antibiotics are entering the aquatic environment of countries like India through hospital effluent. In-depth studies are needed to establish the correlation, if any, between the quantities of antibiotics prescribed in hospitals and the levels of antibiotic residues found in hospital effluent. Further, the effect of this on the development of bacterial resistance in the environment and its subsequent public health impact need thorough assessment.</p

Design of optimal band-stop FIR filter using L1-norm based RCGA

In this paper, an optimal design of linear phase digital finite impulse response (FIR) band stop (BS) filter using the L1-norm based real-coded genetic algorithm (L1-RCGA) is presented. Although RCGA has proved its ability to overcome the drawbacks associated with conventional gradient-based optimization methods of filter design, it is applied here with a novel fitness function based on the L1-norm. This leads to a global optimal solution along with the improvement in filter design with same specifications. The designed filter pursues a better response in terms of flat passband, high stopband attenuation and fast convergence. The simulation results justify that the proposed FIR BS filter using L1-RCGA outperforms the existing optimization techniques, the L1-method and particle swarm optimization (PSO) and the conventional methods such as least-squares (LS) approach, Kaiser window method and the Parks McClellan (PM) algorithm. A detailed analysis is performed to evaluate the performance of the designed filters

Optimal design of FIR high pass filter based on L1 error approximation using real coded genetic algorithm

In this paper, an optimal design of linear phase digital finite impulse response (FIR) highpass (HP) filter using the L1-norm based real-coded genetic algorithm (RCGA) is investigated. A novel fitness function based on L1 norm is adopted to enhance the design accuracy. Optimized filter coefficients are obtained by defining the filter objective function in L1 sense using RCGA. Simulation analysis unveils that the performance of the RCGA adopting this fitness function is better in terms of signal attenuation ability of the filter, flatter passband and the convergence rate. Observations are made on the percentage improvement of this algorithm over the gradient-based L1 optimization approach on various factors by a large amount. It is concluded that RCGA leads to the best solution under specified parameters for the FIR filter design on account of slight unnoticeable higher transition width

Simultaneous Determination by Gas Chromatography of Lindane and Carbaryl in Combined Formulations

A gas chromatographic method developed and validated for simultaneous determination of lindane and carbaryl for quality evaluation of lindane-carbaryl granule, using a glass capillary HP5 column (30 m x 0.32 mm; 0.25 μm), temperature programming with flame ionization detector and dibutylphthalate as an internal standard. The calibration graphs were found linear in the concentration range of 1 μg/mL to 1000 μg/mL for both lindane and carbaryl with correlation coefficient of 0.999 and 0.999 respectively and co-efficient of variation for intra-day and inter-day repeatability studies at different concentration levels was found to be less than 2%. The accuracy of method ranges between 98.5% to 100.8%. Specificity and robustness were also within the acceptable range. The method is highly sensitive with LOD and LOQ as 0.5 and 2 μg/mL for lindane and carbaryl respectively. The method has been tried on several formulations of lindane-carbaryl granules for quality control and has been found to be applicable

Electron beam irradiation of maltodextrin and cinnamyl alcohol mixtures: Influence of glycerol on cross-linking

International audienceThe influence of glycerol on the electron beam-induced changes in maltodextrins–cinnamyl alcohol (CA) blends is examined with respect to its influence on the degree of chain scission, grafting, and cross-linking. The study is relevant to radiation-induced polysaccharide modification, specifically in the perspective of using blended starch as a thermoplastic material, where glycerol is commonly used as a plasticizer. In the absence of CA, glycerol protects maltodextrin from chromophore formation onto the main chain, but also induces more chain scission. The presence of CA provides efficient radiation-protection against scission. Glycerol is shown to affect the interaction between maltodextrin and CA, most likely in the form of an inclusion complex when glycerol is absent. The global behavior under radiation is therefore governed by the physical interactions between the blend constituents rather than on the role of glycerol role as a plasticizer, or as an OH radical scavenger