Theoretically Principled Federated Learning for Balancing Privacy and Utility

We propose a general learning framework for the protection mechanisms that protects privacy via distorting model parameters, which facilitates the trade-off between privacy and utility. The algorithm is applicable to arbitrary privacy measurements that maps from the distortion to a real value. It can achieve personalized utility-privacy trade-off for each model parameter, on each client, at each communication round in federated learning. Such adaptive and fine-grained protection can improve the effectiveness of privacy-preserved federated learning. Theoretically, we show that gap between the utility loss of the protection hyperparameter output by our algorithm and that of the optimal protection hyperparameter is sub-linear in the total number of iterations. The sublinearity of our algorithm indicates that the average gap between the performance of our algorithm and that of the optimal performance goes to zero when the number of iterations goes to infinity. Further, we provide the convergence rate of our proposed algorithm. We conduct empirical results on benchmark datasets to verify that our method achieves better utility than the baseline methods under the same privacy budget

Two surgical treatment methods for open angle glaucoma and cataract

AIM: To compare the curative effects of two surgical treatment methods for open angle glaucoma and cataract patients.<p>METHODS: Totally 69 patients with primary open angle glaucoma and cataract were divided into two groups: group A and group B. Thirty-four patients(34 eyes)in group A underwent small incision non-phacoemulsification cataract surgery combined with trabeculectomy, just combined operations, 35 patients(35 eyes)in group B underwent small incision non-phacoemulsification cataract surgery beyond 6mo after trabeculectomy, just two stage operations. Postoperative intraocular pressure at 1wk and 3mo, postoperative corrected visual acuity and filtering bleb at 3mo were observed, and intraoperative and postoperative complications were compared. All the patients were followed up for 3-6mo.<p>RESULTS: All the visual acuity were increased compared with that before surgery in two groups, the difference was not statistically significant. All the intraocular pressure was controlled in two groups, the difference was not statistically significant, and the difference about the filtering bleb was neither statistically significant(<i>P</i>>0.05). There were no serious intraoperative and postoperative complications in two groups.<p>CONCLUSION: The two stage operations and the combined operations both can control theintraocular pressure and improved visual acuity of open angle glaucoma and cataract. The two stage operations may prevent a second operation for post trabeculectomy cataract, allowing earlier visual rehabilitation

Eggs from Blue Peafowl and Hen

Abstract The study was undertaken to compare the quality and nutritional components of eggs from blue peafowl and Jingbai hen. The results showed that the average egg weight, eggshell thickness and egg yolk relative weight of blue peafowl eggs were significantly bigger than those of hen eggs (p &lt; 0.01). Blue peafowl eggs contained significantly higher protein (p &lt; 0.01), higher carbohydrate (p &lt; 0.01), total amino acid and essential amino acid (p &lt; 0.01), Zn (p &lt; 0.01), Ca (p &lt; 0.05) but lower fat (p &lt; 0.01) and water (p &lt; 0.05) than those in hen eggs. Amino acid content of blue peafowl eggs was in accordance with the ideals of the FAO mode. Blue peafowl eggs contained significantly higher V C and V B2 (p &lt; 0.01) but lower V A and V E (p &lt; 0.01) than hen eggs. 47 volatile compounds were found in raw blue peafowl eggs while only 30 in raw hen eggs; 60 volatile compounds were found in cooked blue peafowl eggs while only 41 in cooked hen eggs. Overall, most indices of qualities and nutrient components of blue peafowl eggs were not inferior to hen eggs

Vortex Dynamics in Rotating Rayleigh-B\'enard Convection

We investigate the spatial distribution and dynamics of the vortices in rotating Rayleigh-B\'enard convection in a reduced Rayleigh-number range $1.3{\le}Ra/Ra_{c}{\le}166$. Under slow rotations ($Ra{\gtrsim}10Ra_{c}$), the vortices are randomly distributed. The size-distribution of the Voronoi cells of the vortex centers is well described by the standard $\Gamma$ distribution. In this flow regime the vortices exhibit Brownian-type horizontal motion. The probability density functions of the vortex displacements are, however, non-Gaussian at short time scales. At modest rotating rates ($4Ra_{c}{\le}Ra{\lesssim}10Ra_{c}$) the centrifugal force leads to radial vortex motions, i.e., warm cyclones (cold anticyclones) moving towards (outward from) the rotation axis. The mean-square-displacements of the vortices increase faster than linearly at large time. This super-diffusive behavior can be satisfactorily explained by a Langevin model incorporating the centrifugal force. In the rapidly rotating regime ($1.6Ra_{c}{\le}Ra{\le}4Ra_{c}$) the vortices are densely distributed, with the size-distribution of their Voronoi cells differing significantly from the standard $\Gamma$ distribution. The hydrodynamic interaction of neighboring vortices results in formation of vortex clusters. Inside clusters the correlation of the vortex velocity fluctuations is scale free, with the correlation length being approximately $30\%$ of the cluster length. We examine the influence of cluster forming on the dynamics of individual vortex. Within clusters, cyclones exhibit inverse-centrifugal motion as they submit to the motion of strong anticyclones, while the velocity for outward motion of the anticyclones is increased. Our analysis show that the mobility of isolated vortices, scaled by their vorticity strength, is a simple power function of the Froude number