Improving travel time estimates from inductive loop and toll collection data with dempster-shafer data fusion

Dempster-Shafer data fusion can enhance travel time estimation for motorists and traffic managers. In this paper, travel time data from inductive loop road sensors and toll collection stations are merged through Dempster-Shafer inference to generate an improved estimate of travel time. The technique captures travel time data from the two sources and combines them by using Dempster's rule and belief values (also called probability mass) calculated from a confusion matrix. The most probable travel time over the monitored road section is selected as that with the largest belief. A case study is provided to illustrate application of the fusion technique with data gathered on winter Saturdays for 2 years: 2003 data are used to compute the confusion matrices and belief values, and 2004 data are used for validation

Travel Time Estimation on a Signalised Urban Networks using Cumulative Plots

This paper presents the development and testing of a methodology for estimation of average travel time on signalised urban networks. The methodology considers the classical analytical procedure, where average travel time on a study link is estimated as the average area between cumulative plots for the respective link. The challenge is to accurately estimate the plots based on the availability of data. The three different cases of data availability are considered: a) case-D, for only detector data; b) case- DS, for detector data and signal controller data; and c) case- DSS, for detector data, signal controller data and saturation flow rate. The performance of the methodology is evaluated under controlled environment considering different degree of saturation and different detection intervals. The performance for case-DS and for case-DSS is consistent whereas, the performance for case-D is highly sensitive to the signal phases in the detection interval

Methodology for Travel Time Estimation on a Signalised Arterial

This paper presents the development and testing of a methodology for estimation of average travel time on signalised urban networks. The methodology considers the classical analytical procedure, where average travel time on a study link is estimated as the average area between cumulative plots for the respective link. The challenge is to accurately estimate the plots based on the availability of data. The three different cases of data availability are considered: a) case-D, for only detector data; b) case-DS, for detector data and signal controller data; and c) case- DSS, for detector data, signal controller data and saturation flow rate. The performance of the methodology is evaluated under controlled environment considering different degree of saturation and different detection intervals. The performance for case-DS and for case-DSS is consistent whereas, the performance for case-D is highly sensitive to the signal phases in the detection interval

Applicability of road safety indicators to assess driving risks under Swiss road conditions

Road traffic crash is a problem in every country. According to World Health Organization, in Europe there are about 127,000 people killed and at least some 2.4 million injured each year. Incident detection algorithms to detect incidents on motorways are well developed. Their objective is to detect incidents as soon as possible so that emergency services can get to the scene of the incident as soon as possible to reduce congestion, to provide medical help if needed and to increase safety of the affected area. Some crashes are traffic related and it may be possible to detect the state of the traffic where the risk of a crash is high. Based on this, premise safety indicators have been developed by [Aron et al, 2003], [Hayward, J. C., 1972], [Lee, C. et al, 2006], and [Pande, A. et al, 2006]. The derivation of these safety indicators are data driven and may be able to forecast the potential of a crash in real time. This study aims to assess the driving risks under Swiss road conditions by using safety indicators. Real traffic data from Automatic Traffic Counts installed on motorways and crash data have been collected in Vaud canton, Switzerland. This paper also discusses the applicability of the proposed safety indicators and the issues associated with their use

Topical Insulin Accelerates Wound Healing in Diabetes by Enhancing the AKT and ERK Pathways: A Double-Blind Placebo-Controlled Clinical Trial

Background: Wound healing is impaired in diabetes mellitus, but the mechanisms involved in this process are virtually unknown. Proteins belonging to the insulin signaling pathway respond to insulin in the skin of rats. Objective: The purpose of this study was to investigate the regulation of the insulin signaling pathway in wound healing and skin repair of normal and diabetic rats, and, in parallel, the effect of a topical insulin cream on wound healing and on the activation of this pathway. Research Design and Methods: We investigated insulin signaling by immunoblotting during wound healing of control and diabetic animals with or without topical insulin. Diabetic patients with ulcers were randomized to receive topical insulin or placebo in a prospective, double-blind and placebo-controlled, randomized clinical trial (NCT 01295177) of wound healing. Results and Conclusions: Expression of IR, IRS-1, IRS-2, SHC, ERK, and AKT are increased in the tissue of healing wounds compared to intact skin, suggesting that the insulin signaling pathway may have an important role in this process. These pathways were attenuated in the wounded skin of diabetic rats, in parallel with an increase in the time of complete wound healing. Upon topical application of insulin cream, the wound healing time of diabetic animals was normalized, followed by a reversal of defective insulin signal transduction. In addition, the treatment also increased expression of other proteins, such as eNOS (also in bone marrow), VEGF, and SDF-1 alpha in wounded skin. In diabetic patients, topical insulin cream markedly improved wound healing, representing an attractive and cost-free method for treating this devastating complication of diabetes.Sao Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP)Sao Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP)National Institute of Science and Technology (INCT)National Institute of Science and Technology (INCT)National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq)National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq

Optimizing therapy to prevent avoidable hospital admissions in multimorbid older adults (OPERAM): cluster randomised controlled trial

OBJECTIVETo examine the effect of optimising drug treatment on drug related hospital admissions in older adults with multimorbidity and polypharmacy admitted to hospital.DESIGNCluster randomised controlled trial.SETTING110 clusters of inpatient wards within university based hospitals in four European countries (Switzerland, Netherlands, Belgium, and Republic of Ireland) defined by attending hospital doctors.PARTICIPANTS2008 older adults (>= 70 years) with multimorbidity (>= 3chronic conditions) and polypharmacy (>= 5 drugs used long term).INTERVENTIONClinical staff clusters were randomised to usual care or a structured pharmacotherapy optimisation intervention performed at the individual level jointly by a doctor and a pharmacist, with the support of a clinical decision software system deploying the screening tool of older person's prescriptions and screening tool to alert to the right treatment (STOPP/START) criteria to identify potentially inappropriate prescribing.MAIN OUTCOME MEASUREPrimary outcome was first drug related hospital admission within 12 months.RESULTS2008 older adults (median nine drugs) were randomised and enrolled in 54 intervention clusters (963 participants) and 56 control clusters (1045 participants) receiving usual care. In the intervention arm, 86.1% of participants (n=789) had inappropriate prescribing, with a mean of 2.75 (SD 2.24) STOPP/START recommendations for each participant. 62.2% (n=491) had >= 1 recommendation successfully implemented at two months, predominantly discontinuation of potentially inappropriate drugs. In the intervention group, 211 participants (21.9%) experienced a first drug related hospital admission compared with 234 (22.4%) in the control group. In the intention-to-treat analysis censored for death as competing event (n=375, 18.7%), the hazard ratio for first drug related hospital admission was 0.95 (95% confidence interval 0.77 to 1.17). In the per protocol analysis, the hazard ratio for a drug related hospital admission was 0.91 (0.69 to 1.19). The hazard ratio for first fall was 0.96 (0.79 to 1.15; 237 v263 first falls) and for death was 0.90 (0.71 to 1.13; 172 v 203 deaths).CONCLUSIONSInappropriate prescribing was common in older adults with multimorbidity and polypharmacy admitted to hospital and was reduced through an intervention to optimise pharmacotherapy, but without effect on drug related hospital admissions. Additional efforts are needed to identify pharmacotherapy optimisation interventions that reduce inappropriate prescribing and improve patient outcomes.Algorithms and the Foundations of Software technolog

Iron Behaving Badly: Inappropriate Iron Chelation as a Major Contributor to the Aetiology of Vascular and Other Progressive Inflammatory and Degenerative Diseases

The production of peroxide and superoxide is an inevitable consequence of aerobic metabolism, and while these particular "reactive oxygen species" (ROSs) can exhibit a number of biological effects, they are not of themselves excessively reactive and thus they are not especially damaging at physiological concentrations. However, their reactions with poorly liganded iron species can lead to the catalytic production of the very reactive and dangerous hydroxyl radical, which is exceptionally damaging, and a major cause of chronic inflammation. We review the considerable and wide-ranging evidence for the involvement of this combination of (su)peroxide and poorly liganded iron in a large number of physiological and indeed pathological processes and inflammatory disorders, especially those involving the progressive degradation of cellular and organismal performance. These diseases share a great many similarities and thus might be considered to have a common cause (i.e. iron-catalysed free radical and especially hydroxyl radical generation). The studies reviewed include those focused on a series of cardiovascular, metabolic and neurological diseases, where iron can be found at the sites of plaques and lesions, as well as studies showing the significance of iron to aging and longevity. The effective chelation of iron by natural or synthetic ligands is thus of major physiological (and potentially therapeutic) importance. As systems properties, we need to recognise that physiological observables have multiple molecular causes, and studying them in isolation leads to inconsistent patterns of apparent causality when it is the simultaneous combination of multiple factors that is responsible. This explains, for instance, the decidedly mixed effects of antioxidants that have been observed, etc...Comment: 159 pages, including 9 Figs and 2184 reference

Analytical Modelling and Sensitivity Analysis for Travel Time Estimation on Signalised Urban Network

This paper presents a model for estimation of average travel time on signalized urban lane using cumulative plots. The plots are generated based on the availability of data: a) case-D, for detector data only; b) case-DS, for detector data and signal timings; and c) case-DSS, for detector data, signal timings and saturation flow rate. The performance of the model for different degrees of saturation and different detector detection intervals is consistent for case-DSS and case-DS whereas, for case-D the performance is inconsistent. The sensitivity analysis of the model for case-D indicates that it is sensitive to detection interval and signal timings within the interval. When detection interval is integral multiple of signal cycle then it has low accuracy and low reliability. Whereas, for detection interval around 1.5 times signal cycle both accuracy and reliability are high