When 3D Bounding-Box Meets SAM: Point Cloud Instance Segmentation with Weak-and-Noisy Supervision

Learning from bounding-boxes annotations has shown great potential in weakly-supervised 3D point cloud instance segmentation. However, we observed that existing methods would suffer severe performance degradation with perturbed bounding box annotations. To tackle this issue, we propose a complementary image prompt-induced weakly-supervised point cloud instance segmentation (CIP-WPIS) method. CIP-WPIS leverages pretrained knowledge embedded in the 2D foundation model SAM and 3D geometric prior to achieve accurate point-wise instance labels from the bounding box annotations. Specifically, CP-WPIS first selects image views in which 3D candidate points of an instance are fully visible. Then, we generate complementary background and foreground prompts from projections to obtain SAM 2D instance mask predictions. According to these, we assign the confidence values to points indicating the likelihood of points belonging to the instance. Furthermore, we utilize 3D geometric homogeneity provided by superpoints to decide the final instance label assignments. In this fashion, we achieve high-quality 3D point-wise instance labels. Extensive experiments on both Scannet-v2 and S3DIS benchmarks demonstrate that our method is robust against noisy 3D bounding-box annotations and achieves state-of-the-art performance

Recurrent Temporal Revision Graph Networks

Temporal graphs offer more accurate modeling of many real-world scenarios than static graphs. However, neighbor aggregation, a critical building block of graph networks, for temporal graphs, is currently straightforwardly extended from that of static graphs. It can be computationally expensive when involving all historical neighbors during such aggregation. In practice, typically only a subset of the most recent neighbors are involved. However, such subsampling leads to incomplete and biased neighbor information. To address this limitation, we propose a novel framework for temporal neighbor aggregation that uses the recurrent neural network with node-wise hidden states to integrate information from all historical neighbors for each node to acquire the complete neighbor information. We demonstrate the superior theoretical expressiveness of the proposed framework as well as its state-of-the-art performance in real-world applications. Notably, it achieves a significant +9.6% improvement on averaged precision in a real-world Ecommerce dataset over existing methods on 2-layer models

P-bRS: A Physarum-Based Routing Scheme for Wireless Sensor Networks

Routing in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) is an extremely challenging issue due to the features of WSNs. Inspired by the large and single-celled amoeboid organism, slime mold Physarum polycephalum, we establish a novel selecting next hop model (SNH). Based on this model, we present a novel Physarum-based routing scheme (P-bRS) for WSNs to balance routing efficiency and energy equilibrium. In P-bRS, a sensor node can choose the proper next hop by using SNH which comprehensively considers the distance, energy residue, and location of the next hop. The simulation results show how P-bRS can achieve the effective trade-off between routing efficiency and energy equilibrium compared to two famous algorithms

The impact of type 2 diabetes and its management on the prognosis of patients with severe COVID‐19

Background Although type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) develop a more severe condition compared to those without diabetes, the mechanisms for this are unknown. Moreover, the impact of treatment with antihyperglycemic drugs and glucocorticoids is unclear. Methods From 1584 COVID‐19 patients, 364 severe/critical COVID‐19 patients with clinical outcome were enrolled for the final analysis, and patients without preexisting T2DM but elevated glucose levels were excluded. Epidemiological data were obtained and clinical status evaluation carried out to assess the impact of T2DM and its management on clinical outcomes. Results Of 364 enrolled severe COVID‐19 inpatients, 114 (31.3%) had a history of T2DM. Twenty‐seven (23.7%) T2DM patients died, who had more severe inflammation, coagulation activation, myocardia injury, hepatic injury, and kidney injury compared with non‐DM patients. In severe COVID‐19 patients with T2DM, we demonstrated a higher risk of all‐cause fatality with glucocorticoid treatment (adjusted hazard ratio [HR], 3.61; 95% CI, 1.14‐11.46; P = .029) and severe hyperglycemia (fasting plasma glucose ≥11.1 mmol/L; adjusted HR, 11.86; 95% CI, 1.21‐116.44; P = .034). Conclusions T2DM status aggravated the clinical condition of COVID‐19 patients and increased their critical illness risk. Poor fasting blood glucose (≥ 11.1 mmol/L) and glucocorticoid treatment are associated with poor prognosis for T2DM patients with severe COVID‐19

Rescue intracranial stenting for acute ischemic stroke after the failure of mechanical thrombectomy: A systematic review, meta-analysis, and trial sequential analysis

BackgroundIntracranial rescue stenting (RS) might be an option for acute ischemic stroke after the failure of mechanical thrombectomy (MT). However, the findings were not consistent in previous systematic reviews, and whether the conclusion was supported by sufficient statistical power is unknown.AimTo examine the effect of RS on acute ischemic stroke after the failure of MT with a systematic review, meta-analysis, and trial sequential analysis (TSA).MethodsWe searched Ovid Medline, Embase, and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL) from inception to 15 June 2022, without any language restriction. Studies assessing the effect of RS for acute ischemia stroke after MT failure were included. Two reviewers independently screened the retrieved articles, extracted data, and evaluated the quality of the included studies through the New Ottawa Scale (NOS). The primary outcome was the recanalization rate after RS. Secondary outcomes included modified Rankin Scale (mRS) at 3 months after stroke, symptomatic intracranial hemorrhage (sICH), and mortality rate. We synthesized the data through a random-effects model and performed a TSA analysis.ResultsWe included 15 studies (containing 1,595 participants) after screening 3,934 records. The pooled recanalization rate for rescue stenting was 82% (95% CI 77–87%). Compared with non-stenting, rescue stenting was associated with a higher proportion of patients with 0–2 mRS score (OR 3.96, 95% CI 2.69–5.84, p < 0.001) and a lower 90-day mortality rate (OR 0.46, 95% CI 0.32–0.65, p < 0.001), and stenting did not increase sICH rate (OR 0.63, 95% CI 0.39–1.04, p = 0.075). The TSA analysis showed that the meta-analysis of the mRS score had a sufficient sample size and statistical power.ConclusionsOur study showed that rescue stenting was effective and safe for patients with acute ischemia stroke who also had a failed MT, and this result was confirmed in a TSA analysis

Single-cell profiling reveals distinct immune response landscapes in tuberculous pleural effusion and non-TPE

BackgroundTuberculosis (TB) is caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) and remains a major health threat worldwide. However, a detailed understanding of the immune cells and inflammatory mediators in Mtb-infected tissues is still lacking. Tuberculous pleural effusion (TPE), which is characterized by an influx of immune cells to the pleural space, is thus a suitable platform for dissecting complex tissue responses to Mtb infection.MethodsWe employed singe-cell RNA sequencing to 10 pleural fluid (PF) samples from 6 patients with TPE and 4 non-TPEs including 2 samples from patients with TSPE (transudative pleural effusion) and 2 samples with MPE (malignant pleural effusion).ResultCompared to TSPE and MPE, TPE displayed obvious difference in the abundance of major cell types (e.g., NK, CD4+T, Macrophages), which showed notable associations with disease type. Further analyses revealed that the CD4 lymphocyte population in TPE favored a Th1 and Th17 response. Tumor necrosis factors (TNF)-, and XIAP related factor 1 (XAF1)-pathways induced T cell apoptosis in patients with TPE. Immune exhaustion in NK cells was an important feature in TPE. Myeloid cells in TPE displayed stronger functional capacity for phagocytosis, antigen presentation and IFN-γ response, than TSPE and MPE. Systemic elevation of inflammatory response genes and pro-inflammatory cytokines were mainly driven by macrophages in patients with TPE.ConclusionWe provide a tissue immune landscape of PF immune cells, and revealed a distinct local immune response in TPE and non-TPE (TSPE and MPE). These findings will improve our understanding of local TB immunopathogenesis and provide potential targets for TB therapy

Association between transabdominal uterine artery Doppler and small-for-gestational-age: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Abstract Background The association between uterine artery Doppler (UtA) measurements and small for gestational age (SGA) has not been quantitatively analyzed throughout the whole pregnancy. This systematic review and meta-analysis aims to comprehensively explore the association between UtA measurements and SGA in the first, second, and third trimesters. Methods Studies were searched from Pubmed, Embase, Cochrane Library, and Web of Science. Weighted mean difference (WMD), odds ratio (OR), and relative risk (RR) with 95% confidence interval (CI) were used as the effect size. Heterogeneity of all effect sizes was tested and quantified using I2 statistics. Sensitivity analysis was conducted for all outcomes, and publication bias was evaluated using Begg’s test. Results A total of 41 studies were finally included in our meta-analysis. In the first trimester, mean PI was significantly higher in the SGA group than the non-SGA group (WMD: 0.31, 95%CI: 0.19–0.44). In the second trimester, odds of notch presence (OR: 2.54, 95%CI: 2.10–3.08), mean PI (WMD: 0.21, 95%CI: 0.12–0.30), and mean RI (WMD: 0.05, 95%CI: 0.05–0.06) were higher in the SGA group. Also, abnormal UtA measurements were associated with the increased odds of SGA (all P  95% (OR: 6.03, 95%CI: 3.24–11.24). Conclusions Abnormal UtA measurements were associated with high odds of SGA, suggesting that UtA might be an adjunctive screening method for SGA in the whole pregnancy

A prediction method of ground volume loss variation with depth induced by tunnel excavation

A new concept called the transmission ratio of ground volume loss (TRGVL) is proposed to describe the variation law of ground volume loss with depth above the tunnel. Based on the developed Gaussian function, the formula for TRGVL is deduced. Further, the first-order derivative of TRGVL is presented to evaluate the dilation and compression degree of the soil at any depth above the tunnel. A total of 15 cases, involving eight field project cases and seven model test cases, are investigated to validate rationality of the proposed formula. The results of field projects and model test cases indicate variation in TRGVL presents four forms. By analysing the volumetric deformation of the soil above the tunnel, formation mechanism of the each form of TRGVL is revealed. Finally, the evolution of the four forms of TRGVL is used to evaluate the disturbance degree of the soil above the tunnel