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A Survey of Wearable Biometric Recognition Systems
The growing popularity of wearable devices is leading to new ways to interact with the environment, with other smart devices, and with other people. Wearables equipped with an array of sensors are able to capture the owner’s physiological and behavioural traits, thus are well suited for biometric authentication to control other devices or access digital services. However, wearable biometrics have substantial differences from traditional biometrics for computer systems, such as fingerprints, eye features, or voice. In this article, we discuss these differences and analyse how researchers are approaching the wearable biometrics field. We review and provide a categorization of wearable sensors useful for capturing biometric signals. We analyse the computational cost of the different signal processing techniques, an important practical factor in constrained devices such as wearables. Finally, we review and classify the most recent proposals in the field of wearable biometrics in terms of the structure of the biometric system proposed, their experimental setup, and their results. We also present a critique of experimental issues such as evaluation and feasibility aspects, and offer some final thoughts on research directions that need attention in future work
A system architecture, processor, and communication protocol for secure implants
Secure and energy-efficient communication between Implantable Medical Devices (IMDs) and authorized external users is attracting increasing attention these days. However, there currently exists no systematic approach to the problem, while solutions from neighboring fields, such as wireless sensor networks, are not directly transferable due to the peculiarities of the IMD domain. This work describes an original, efficient solution for secure IMD communication. A new implant system architecture is proposed, where security and main-implant functionality are made completely decoupled by running the tasks onto two separate cores. Wireless communication goes through a custom security ASIP, called SISC (Smart-Implant Security Core), which runs an energy-efficient security protocol. The security core is powered by RF-harvested energy until it performs external-reader authentication, providing an elegant defense mechanism agai
Produzione, mercato e consumi della cerasicoltura spagnola
La crisi di sovrapproduzione di alcune specie tradizionali sta favorendo la crescita del ciliegio, che mostra
un costante incremento delle superfici, favorito dal rinnovamento varietale, dall’aumento dei consumi, dal
miglioramento delle tecnologie di produzione e dalla precocità di maturazione. Tutti fattori che
garantiscono alla Spagna elevata competitività nelle esportazioni verso i Paesi dell’Ue.Colaboración en el blog: Rivista di frutticoltura e di ortofloricoltura. Disponible: http://www.rivistafrutticoltura.it
IgTM: An algorithm to predict transmembrane domains and topology in proteins
<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Due to their role of receptors or transporters, membrane proteins play a key role in many important biological functions. In our work we used Grammatical Inference (GI) to localize transmembrane segments. Our GI process is based specifically on the inference of Even Linear Languages.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We obtained values close to 80% in both specificity and sensitivity. Six datasets have been used for the experiments, considering different encodings for the input sequences. An encoding that includes the topology changes in the sequence (from inside and outside the membrane to it and vice versa) allowed us to obtain the best results. This software is publicly available at: <url>http://www.dsic.upv.es/users/tlcc/bio/bio.html</url></p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>We compared our results with other well-known methods, that obtain a slightly better precision. However, this work shows that it is possible to apply Grammatical Inference techniques in an effective way to bioinformatics problems.</p
FCNC Top Quark Decays in Extra Dimensions
The flavor changing neutral top quark decay t -> c X is computed, where X is
a neutral standard model particle, in a extended model with a single extra
dimension. The cases for the photon, X= \gammaR_\xi gauge. We find that
the branching ratios can be enhanced by the dynamics originated in the extra
dimension. In the limit where 1/R >> ->, we have found Br(t -> c \gamma) \simeq
10^{-10} for 1/R = 0.5 TeV. For the decay t -> c H, we have found Br(t -> cH)
\simeq 10^{-10} for a low Higgs mass value. The branching ratios go to zero
when 1/R -> \infty.Comment: Accepted to be published in the Europ. Phys. Jour. C; 16 pages, 2
figure
Characterization of Patients with Chronic Diseases and Complex Care Needs: A New High-Risk Emergent Population
Background: To analyze the prevalence and main epidemiological, clinical and outcome features of in-Patients with Complex Chronic conditions (PCC) in internal medicine areas, using a pragmatic working definition.
Methods: Prospective study in 17 centers from Spain, with 97 in-hospital, monthly prevalence cuts. A PCC was considered when criteria of polypathological patient (two or more major chronic diseases) were met, or when a patient suffered one major chronic disease plus one or more of nine predefined complexity criteria like socio-familial risk, alcoholism or malnutrition among others (PCC without polypathology). A complete set of baseline features as well as 12-months survival were collected. Then, we compared clinical, outcome variables, and PROFUND index accuracy between polypathological patients and PCC without polypathology.
Results: The global prevalence of PCC was 61% (40% of them were polypathological patients, and 21% PCC withouth polypathology) out of the 2178 evaluated patients. Their median age was 82 (59.5% men), suffered 2.3 ± 1.1 major diseases (heart diseases (70.5%), neurologic (41.5%), renal (36%), and lung diseases (26%)), 5.5 ± 2.5 other chronic conditions, met 2.5 ± 1.5 complexity criteria, and presented functional decline (Barthel index 55 (25-90)). Compared to polypathological patients, the subgroup of PCC without polypathology were younger, with a different pattern of major diseases and comorbidities, a better functional status, and lower 12-months mortality rates ((36.2% vs 46.8%; p = .003; OR 0.7(0.48-0.86). The PROFUND index obtained adequate calibration and discrimination power (AUC-ROC 0.67 (0.63-0.69)) in predicting 12-month mortality of PCC.
Conclusion: Patients with complex chronic conditions are highly prevalent in internal medicine areas; their clinical pattern has changed in parallel to socio-epidemiological modifications, but their death-risk is still adequately predicted by PROFUND index
Muon anomalous magnetic moment in the standard model with two Higgs doublets
The muon anomalous magnetic moment is investigated in the standard model with
two Higgs doublets (S2HDM) motivated from spontaneous CP violation. Thus all
the effective Yukawa couplings become complex. As a consequence of the non-zero
phase in the couplings, the one loop contribution from the neutral scalar
bosons could be positive and negative relying on the CP phases. The
interference between one and two loop diagrams can be constructive in a large
parameter space of CP-phases. This will result in a significant contribution to
muon anomalous magnetic moment even in the flavor conserving process with a
heavy neutral scalar boson ( 200 GeV) once the effective muon Yukawa
coupling is large (). In general, the one loop contributions
from lepton flavor changing scalar interactions become more important. In
particular, when all contributions are positive in a reasonable parameter space
of CP phases, the recently reported 2.6 sigma experiment vs. theory deviation
can be easily explained even for a heavy scalar boson with a relative small
Yukawa coupling in the S2HDM.Comment: 8 pages, RevTex file, 5 figures, published version Phys. Rev. D 54
(2001) 11501
The Muon Anomalous Magnetic Moment: A Harbinger For "New Physics"
QED, Hadronic, and Electroweak Standard Model contributions to the muon
anomalous magnetic moment, a_mu = (g_mu-2)/2, and their theoretical
uncertainties are scrutinized. The status and implications of the recently
reported 2.6 sigma experiment vs.theory deviation a_mu^{exp}-a_mu^{SM} =
426(165) times 10^{-11} are discussed. Possible explanations due to
supersymmetric loop effects with m_{SUSY} \simeq 55 sqrt{tan beta} GeV,
radiative mass mechanisms at the 1--2 TeV scale and other ``New Physics''
scenarios are examined.Comment: 24 page
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