Reduction of left ventricular ejection fraction after 12-month follow-up in hemodialysis patients.

INTRODUCTION Cardiovascular disease is the most common cause of morbidity and mortality in hemodialysis patients. OBJECTIVES The aim of this study was to detect echocardiographic abnormality in the beginning and after 12-month follow-up in the hemodialysis patients. PATIENTS AND METHODS In a cross-sectional study, 60 hemodialysis patients older than 18 years and the dialysis duration longer than three months were enrolled. At the beginning of the study, echocardiography was done and after 12 months was repeated in all of the patients by the same cardiologist. At the end of the study, data were analyzed using SPSS software (version 19). RESULTS From the total of cases 37 were male and 23 female. At the beginning of the study, mitral regurgitation, tricuspid regurgitation and aortic insufficiency were found in 54, 47 and 11 patients respectively. After 12 months left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) decreased significantly, however there was no significant difference between other echocardiographic findings at the beginning and after 12 months. CONCLUSION Decrease in LVEF over time in hemodialysis patients may be due to negative effect of uremia on cardiac function, so it seems that periodical cardiac evaluation of these patients is essential and beneficial

General methods for designing single-mode planar photonic crystal waveguides in hexagonal lattice structures

We systematically investigate and compare general methods of designing single mode photonic crystal waveguides in a two-dimensional hexagonal lattice of air holes in a dielectric material. We apply the rather general methods to dielectric-core hexagonal lattice photonic crystals since they have not been widely explored before. We show that it is possible to obtain single mode guiding in a limited portion of the photonic bandgap of hexagonal lattice structures. We also compare the potentials of different photonic crystal lattices for designing single-mode waveguides and conclude that triangular lattice structures are the best choice

Investigation of physical mechanisms in coupling photonic crystal waveguiding structures

We explain the fundamental physical mechanisms involved in coupling triangular lattice photonic crystal waveguides to conventional dielectric slab waveguides. We show that the two waveguides can be efficiently coupled outside the mode gap frequencies. We especially focus on the coupling of the two structures within the mode gap frequencies and show for the first time that the diffraction from the main photonic crystal structure plays an important role on the reflection of power back into the slab waveguide. The practical importance of this effect and possible strategies to modify it are also discussed

Entropic corrections to Newton's law

In this short letter we calculate separately the generalized uncertainty principle (GUP) and self gravitational corrections to the Newton's gravitational formula. We show that for a complete description of the GUP and self-gravity effects, both temperature and the entropy must be modified.Comment: 4 pages, Accepted for publication in "Physica Scripta",Title changed, Major revisio

Improved battery life for context awareness application in smart-phones

The new smart-phones with new operating system and portable sensors support the basis for context awareness systems and applications for handling user activity and user privacy. Nowadays, individuals need new services and real time information anywhere and anytime. Context awareness is an emerging service, which could be able to improve the user experiences in current situation. Context awareness can be considered as location, calendar, user activity and etc. The review of the literature proves that context awareness in mobile phone can be useful and studied as unavoidable service in next generation of smart-phone applications. In this paper, a short review about context awareness in mobile phone is studied, furthermore, we critically analyzed related works of context awareness in smart-phones. The review shows that the most important context in mobile phone is location, which is mostly obtained by using Global Positioning System (GPS) sensor in mobile phones but GPS can significantly increases battery consumption in mobile phones. In this regard, a framework as Improved Battery life in Context Awareness System (IBCS) is proposed to improve battery life and reduce cost of using GPS in context awareness applications based on smart-phones. The review argues the weakness and strength of these studies, and aims to (a) indicate the most important context in mobile phone, (b) reduce the battery consumption of GPS sensor in mobile phone

Induced vertical disparity effects on local and global stereopsis

Purpose: Although significant amounts of vertical misalignment could have a noticeable effect on visual performance, there is no conclusive evidence about the effect of very small amount of vertical disparity on stereopsis and binocular vision. Hence, the aim of this study was to investigate the effects of induced vertical disparity on local and global stereopsis at near. Materials and Methods: Ninety participants wearing best-corrected refraction had local and global stereopsis tested with 0.5 and 1.0 prism diopter (Δ) vertical prism in front of their dominant and non-dominant eye in turn. This was compared to local and global stereopsis in the same subjects without vertical prism. Data were analyzed in SPSS.17 software using the independent samples T and the repeated measures ANOVA tests. Results: Induced vertical disparity decreases local and global stereopsis. This reduction is greater when vertical disparity is induced in front of the non-dominant eye and affects global more than local stereopsis. Repeated measures ANOVA showed differences in the mean stereopsis between the different measured states for local and global values. Local stereopsis thresholds were reduced by 10s of arc or less on average with 1.0Δ of induced vertical prism in front of either eye. However, global stereopsis thresholds were reduced by over 100s of arc by the same 1.0Δ of induced vertical prism. Conclusion: Induced vertical disparity affects global stereopsis thresholds by an order of magnitude (or a factor of 10) more than local stereopsis. Hence, using a test that measures global stereopsis such as the TNO is more sensitive to vertical misalignment than a test such as the Stereofly that measures local stereopsis. © 2014 Informa Healthcare USA, Inc. All rights reserved: reproduction in whole or part not permitted

Stochastic Analysis of Tsunami Hazard of the 1945 Makran Subduction Zone Mw 8.1–8.3 Earthquakes

© 2020 by the authors. Historical records of major earthquakes in the northwestern Indian Ocean along the Makran Subduction Zone (MSZ) indicate high potential tsunami hazards for coastal regions of Pakistan, Iran, Oman, and western India. There are fast-growing and populous cities and ports that are economically important, such as Chabahar (Iran), Gwadar (Pakistan), Muscat (Oman), and Mumbai (India). In this study, we assess the tsunami hazard of the 1945 MSZ event (fatalities ≈300 people) using stochastic earthquake rupture models of Mw 8.1–8.3 by considering uncertainties related to rupture geometry and slip heterogeneity. To quantify the uncertainty of earthquake source characteristics in tsunami hazard analysis, 1000 stochastic tsunami scenarios are generated via a stochastic source modeling approach. There are main objectives of this study: (1) developing stochastic earthquake slip models for the MSZ, (2) comparing results of the simulation with the existing observations of the 1945 event, and (3) evaluating the effect of uncertain fault geometry and earthquake slip based on simulated near-shore wave profiles. The 1945 Makran earthquake is focused upon by comparing model predictions with existing observations, consisting of far-field tsunami waveforms recorded on tide gauges in Karachi and Mumbai and coseismic deformation along the Pakistani coast. The results identify the source model that matches the existing observations of the 1945 Makran event best among the stochastic sources. The length, width, mean slip, and maximum slip of the identified source model are 270 km, 130 km, 2.9 m, and 19.3 m, respectively. Moreover, the sensitivity of the maximum tsunami heights along the coastline to the location of a large-slip area is highlighted. The maximum heights of the tsunami and coseismic deformation results at Ormara are in the range of 0.3–7.0 m and −2.7 to 1.1 m, respectively, for the 1000 stochastic source models.Canada Research Chair program (950-232015) ; the NSERC Discovery Grant; the Royal Society (UK) gran