Precision medicine and artificial intelligence : a pilot study on deep learning for hypoglycemic events detection based on ECG

Tracking the fluctuations in blood glucose levels is important for healthy subjects and crucial diabetic patients. Tight glucose monitoring reduces the risk of hypoglycemia, which can result in a series of complications, especially in diabetic patients, such as confusion, irritability, seizure and can even be fatal in specific conditions. Hypoglycemia affects the electrophysiology of the heart. However, due to strong inter-subject heterogeneity, previous studies based on a cohort of subjects failed to deploy electrocardiogram (ECG)-based hypoglycemic detection systems reliably. The current study used personalised medicine approach and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to automatically detect nocturnal hypoglycemia using a few heartbeats of raw ECG signal recorded with non-invasive, wearable devices, in healthy individuals, monitored 24 hours for 14 consecutive days. Additionally, we present a visualisation method enabling clinicians to visualise which part of the ECG signal (e.g., T-wave, ST-interval) is significantly associated with the hypoglycemic event in each subject, overcoming the intelligibility problem of deep-learning methods. These results advance the feasibility of a real-time, non-invasive hypoglycemia alarming system using short excerpts of ECG signal

Precision medicine and artificial intelligence : a pilot study on deep learning for hypoglycemic events detection based on ECG

Tracking the fluctuations in blood glucose levels is important for healthy subjects and crucial diabetic patients. Tight glucose monitoring reduces the risk of hypoglycemia, which can result in a series of complications, especially in diabetic patients, such as confusion, irritability, seizure and can even be fatal in specific conditions. Hypoglycemia affects the electrophysiology of the heart. However, due to strong inter-subject heterogeneity, previous studies based on a cohort of subjects failed to deploy electrocardiogram (ECG)-based hypoglycemic detection systems reliably. The current study used personalised medicine approach and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to automatically detect nocturnal hypoglycemia using a few heartbeats of raw ECG signal recorded with non-invasive, wearable devices, in healthy individuals, monitored 24 hours for 14 consecutive days. Additionally, we present a visualisation method enabling clinicians to visualise which part of the ECG signal (e.g., T-wave, ST-interval) is significantly associated with the hypoglycemic event in each subject, overcoming the intelligibility problem of deep-learning methods. These results advance the feasibility of a real-time, non-invasive hypoglycemia alarming system using short excerpts of ECG signal

An Analysis of Teachers’ Judgements of Executive Capacities Between Male and Female Students

School systems function in a way determining that all students are expected to perform at a certain level based on the grade that they are in. Academic tasks involve many executive skills to be used at any given time, making it sometimes difficult to differentiate between specific executive strengths and weaknesses. Understanding a student’s challenges with executive control can lead to an understanding of places where additional help and support could be beneficial. The purpose of the present study is to examine gender differences in children’s and adolescents’ executive capacities, based on teachers’ ratings collected during the standardization of the MEFS-TR. The data used in this study were the teacher ratings of female and male students in the standardization sample that were used to create the MEFS-TR norm tables (n = 1,000). Teacher ratings reflected teacher perceptions of the frequency and effectiveness of students’ performances of behaviors that reflected the degree of use or disuse of executive capacities. This study compared the pattern of executive function deficits (EFDs) and executive skill deficits (ESDs) between males and females. Analyses examined teacher responses to all of the items of the 7 Self-Regulation Clusters and all of the items of the Self-Realization and Self- Determination Clusters of the MEFS. Results provide evidence that executive capacities differ among items within all 7 self-regulation clusters do indicate statistically significant differences in teacher ratings of male and female students, wherein male students were rated as exhibiting more executive function deficits and more executive skill deficits than female students. Additionally, even for items where differences were not statistically significant, larger percentages of male students were rated more frequently by teachers as having EFDs or ESDs than female students

Measurements of ionization cross sections by molecular beam experiments: information content on the imaginary part of the optical potential

In this work, we present and analyze in detail new and recent ionization cross section and mass spectrum determinations, collected in the case of He*, Ne*-H2O, -H2S, and -NH3 ionizing collisions. These sets of data, obtained under the same experimental conditions, are relevant to identify differences in the autoionization stereodynamics of the three hydrogenated molecules and on the selective role of the imaginary part of the optical potential. We demonstrate that in these autoionization processes hydrogen and halogen bonds are competing because they are controlling both real and imaginary components of the optical potential that drives the complete reaction dynamics. In particular, we found that both components critically depend on the angular and radial approach between the reagent partners in determining the collision dynamics

Blind equalization and fading channel signal recovery of OFDM modulation

Algorithms for blind equalization and data recovery of orthogonal frequency-division multiplexed (OFDM) signals transmitted through fading channels are implemented and simulated in this thesis. The channel is estimated without knowledge of the transmitted sequence (i.e., blindly) using a least mean squares (LMS) adaptive filter and filter bank precoders. This method was used to estimate channel characteristics using both binary and quadrature phase-shift keying signals. Additionally, the method was analyzed for robustness with a poor initial estimate of channel characteristics, with the addition of white Gaussian noise to the signal, and with non-stationary channel conditions. In addition, it is shown that the proposed method is particularly suited in situations with deep fading channels, where some of the subcarriers have a very low SNR. Simulations for both aspects of this thesis were conducted using MATLAB, and the results are presented.http://archive.org/details/blindequalizatio109455740Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited

Morbidity from diarrhoea, cough and fever among young children in Nigeria

Diarrhoea, cough and fever are the leading causes of childhood morbidity and mortality in sub-Saharan Africa. Despite it being a determinant of mortality in many developing countries, geographical location has seldom been considered as an explanatory factor for the large regional variations seen in the childhood morbidity attributed to these causes in this area. The relevant data collected in two Nigerian Demographic and Health Surveys, one in 1999 and the other in 2003, have now therefore been analysed and compared. The aim was to reveal and explore inequalities in the health of Nigerian children by mapping the spatial distribution of childhood morbidity associated with recent diarrhoea, cough and fever and accounting for important risk factors, using a Bayesian geo-additive model based on Markov-chain–Monte-Carlo techniques. Although the overall prevalences of recent diarrhoea, cough and fever recorded in 1999 (among children aged ,3 years) were similar to those seen in 2003 (among children aged ,5 years), the mapping of residual spatial effects indicated that, in each survey, the morbidity attributable to each of these causes varied, differently, at state level. Place of birth (hospital v. other), type of feeding (breastfed only v. other), parental education, maternal visits to antenatal clinics, household economic status, marital status of mother and place of residence were each significantly associated with the childhood morbidity investigated. In both surveys, children from urban areas were found to have a significantly lower risk of fever than their rural counterparts. Most other factors affecting diarrhoea, cough and fever differed in the two surveys. The risk of developing each of these three conditions increased in the first 6–8 months after birth but then gradually declined. The analysis explained a significant share of the pronounced residual spatial effects. Maps showing the prevalences of diarrhoea, cough and fever in young children across Nigeria were generated during this study. Such maps should facilitate the development of policies to fulfil the Millennium Development Goals in Nigeria and throughout sub-Saharan Africa

Studies In Small Scale Thermal Convection

The effect of non-Fourier heat transfer and partial-slip boundary conditions in Rayleigh-Bénard are analyzed theoretically. Non-Fourier fluids possess a relaxation time that reflects the delay in the response of the heat flux to a change in the temperature gradient while the partial slip boundary condition assumes that the fluid velocity and temperature are not equal to that of the wall. Both non-Fourier and partial-slip effects become important when small-scale heat transfer applications are investigated such as convection around micro- and nano-devices as suggested by the extended heat transport equations from kinetic theory. Other applications are also known to exhibit one or both of these effects such as low-temperature liquids, nanofluids, granular flows, rarefied gases and polymer flows. Small scale effects are measured by the Knudsen number. From this, non-Fourier effects can be estimated, measured non-dimensionally by the Cattaneo number and modelled using the frame indifferent Cattaneo-Vernotte equation which is derived from Oldroyd’s upper-convected derivative. Linear stability of non-Fourier fluids shows that the neutral stability curve possesses a stationary Fourier branch and an oscillatory branch intersecting at some wave number, where for small relaxation time, no change in stability is expected from that of a Fourier fluid. As the relaxation time increases to a critical value, both stationary and oscillatory convection become equally probable. Past this value, oscillatory instability is expected to occur at a smaller Rayleigh number and larger wave number than for a Fourier fluid. Non-linear analysis of weakly non-Fourier fluids shows that near the onset of convection, the convective roll intensity is stronger than for a Fourier fluid. The bifurcation to convection changes from subcritical to supercritical as the Cattaneo number increases and the instability of the convection state for a non-Fourier fluid is shown to occur via a Hopf bifurcation at lower Rayleigh number and higher Nusselt number than for a Fourier fluid. When hydrodynamic slip and temperature jump boundary conditions are considered, a significant reduction in the minimum critical Rayleigh number and corresponding wave number are found. Depending on the sign used for second-order coefficients, critical conditions can be greater than or less than that for first-order boundary conditions

Spatial analysis of risk factors for childhood morbidity in Nigeria

Recent Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) from Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) indicate a decline in childhood vaccination coverage but a high prevalence of childhood diarrhea, cough, and fever. We used Nigerian DHS data to investigate the impact of geographical factors and other important risk factors on diarrhea, cough, and fever using geoadditive Bayesian semiparametric models. A higher prevalence of childhood diarrhea, cough, and fever is observed in the northern and eastern states, while lower disease prevalence is observed in the western and southern states. In addition, children from mothers with higher levels of education and those from poor households had a significantly lower association with diarrhea; children delivered in hospitals, living in urban areas, or from mothers having received prenatal visits had a significantly lower association with fever. Our maps are a novel and relevant tool to help local governments to improve health-care interventions and achieve Millennium Development Goals (MDG4)

Cultural Values and Decision to Work of Immigrant Women in Italy

We investigate the role of culture in explaining economic outcomes at individual level analyzing how cultural values from the home country affect the decision to work of immigrants in Italy, using the National Survey of Households with Immigrants. Following the epidemiological approach, we relate the probability of being employed in Italy for immigrant women with the female labor force participation (LFP) in their country of origin, taken as a proxy of cultural heritage and gender role model. Controlling for a number of individual and household characteristics, we show that participation in the labor market is affected both by the culture of females' and by their husband's origin countries. We also show that the relationship between own decisions in the host country and home country LFP cannot be attributed to human capital quality or discrimination and it turns out to be stronger for immigrants that maintained more intense ties with their origin countries. Finally, we investigate to what extent cultural influence is driven by religious beliefs: we find that religion is a key determinant of differences in female labor decisions, but, besides religion, other cultural values exert additional influence