Skin lesion segmentation method for dermoscopic images with convolutional neural networks and semantic segmentation

Melanoma skin cancer is one of the most dangerous forms of skin cancer because it grows fast and causes most of the skin cancer deaths. Hence, early detection is a very important task to treat melanoma. In this article, we propose a skin lesion segmentation method for dermoscopic images based on the U-Net architecture with VGG-16 encoder and the semantic segmentation. Base on the segmented skin lesion, diagnostic imaging systems can evaluate skin lesion features to classify them. The proposed method requires fewer resources for training, and it is suitable for computing systems without powerful GPUs, but the training accuracy is still high enough (above 95 %). In the experiments, we train the model on the ISIC dataset – a common dermoscopic image dataset. To assess the performance of the proposed skin lesion segmentation method, we evaluate the Sorensen-Dice and the Jaccard scores and compare to other deep learning-based skin lesion segmentation methods. Experimental results showed that skin lesion segmentation quality of the proposed method are better than ones of the compared methods.This research was funded by University of Economics Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Energy Consumption and Economic Growth: Evidence from Vietnam

The importance of non-renewable, renewable and sustainable energy sources and energy consumption in the economic development strategy of a country is undeniable. The purpose of the paper is to investigate the impacts of energy consumption on the economic growth of Vietnam during the 1980-2014 period. By applying the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) model of Pesaran et al. (2001),

Secondary somatic mutations restoring RAD51C and RAD51D associated with acquired resistance to the PARP inhibitor rucaparib in high-grade ovarian carcinoma

High-grade epithelial ovarian carcinomas (OC) containing mutated BRCA1 or BRCA2 (BRCA1/2) homologous recombination (HR) genes are sensitive to platinum-based chemotherapy and poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase inhibitors (PARPi), while restoration of HR function due to secondary mutations in BRCA1/2 has been recognized as an important resistance mechanism. We sequenced core HR pathway genes in 12 pairs of pre-treatment and post-progression tumor biopsy samples collected from patients in ARIEL2 Part 1, a phase 2 study of the PARPi rucaparib as treatment for platinum-sensitive, relapsed OC. In six of 12 pre-treatment biopsies, a truncation mutation in BRCA1, RAD51C or RAD51D was identified. In five of six paired post-progression biopsies, one or more secondary mutations restored the open reading frame. Four distinct secondary mutations and spatial heterogeneity were observed for RAD51C. In vitro complementation assays and a patient-derived xenograft (PDX), as well as predictive molecular modeling, confirmed that resistance to rucaparib was associated with secondary mutations

From Mexico to Beijing: "Women in Development" Twenty Five Years On

During the past twenty five years the Women in Development (WID)approach has become an increasingly important issue in the literature on Third World development. WID issues and related activities have now been incorporated into the aid practice of most development agencies. This paper critically analyses the diverse and conflicting ideologies that have emerged in the WID literature since the early seventies

Development of lanthanum strontium cobalt ferrite composite cathodes for intermediate- to low-temperature solid oxide fuel cells

Solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) offer high energy conversion, low noise, low pollutant emission, and low processing cost. Despite many advantages, SOFCs face a major challenge in competing with other types of fuel cells because of their high operating temperature. The necessity to reduce the operational temperature of SOFCs has led to the development of research into the materials and fabrication technology of fuel cells. The use of composite cathodes significantly reduces the cathode polarization resistance and expands the triple phase boundary area available for oxygen reduction. Powder preparation and composite cathode fabrication also affect the overall performance of composite cathodes and fuel cells. Among many types of cathode materials, lanthanum-based materials such as lanthanum strontium cobalt ferrite (La1-xSrxCo1-yFeyO3-δ) have recently been discovered to offer great compatibility with ceria-based electrolytes in performing as composite cathode materials for intermediate- to low-temperature SOFCs (IT-LTSOFCs). This paper reviews various ceria-based composite cathodes for IT-LTSOFCs and focuses on the aspects of progress and challenges in materials technology

Parallel-iterated pseudo two-step Runge-Kutta-Nyström methods for nonstiff second-order IVPs

AbstractThe aim of this paper is to consider parallel iteration schemes for a general class of pseudo two-step Runge-Kutta-Nyström (RKN) methods of arbitrary high order for solving nonstiff initial-value problems y″(t) = f(y(t)), y(t0) = y0, y′(t0) = y0 on parallel computers. Starting with an s-stage pseudo two-step RKN method of order p∗ with w implicit stages, we apply the highly parallel PC iteration process in P(EC)mE mode. The resulting PIPTRKN method (parallel-iterated pseudo two-step RKN method) uses an optimal number of processors equal to w ≤ p∗/2. By a number of numerical experiments, we show the superiority of the PIPTRKN methods proposed in this paper over both sequential and parallel methods available in the literature

Low-temperature PZT thin-film ferroelectric memories fabricated on SiO2/Si and glass substrates

In a ferroelectric-gate thin film transistor memory (FGT) type structure, the gate-insulator layer is extremely important for inducing the charge when accumulating or depleting. We concentrated on the application of low-temperature PZT films crystallized at 450, 500 and 550 °C, instead of at conventional high temperatures (≥600 °C). Investigation of the crystalline structure and electrical properties indicated that the PZT film, crystallized at 500 °C, was suitable for FGT fabrication because of a high (111) orientation, large remnant polarization of 38 μC/cm2 on SiO2/Si substrate and 17.8 μC/cm2 on glass, and low leakage current of 10−6 A/cm2. In sequence, we successfully fabricated FGT with all processes below 500 °C on a glass substrate, whose operation exhibits a memory window of 4 V, ON/OFF current ratio of 105, field-effect mobility of 0.092 cm2 V−1 s−1, and retention time of 1 h