Joint Communication and Computation Design in Transmissive RMS Transceiver Enabled Multi-Tier Computing Networks

In this paper, a novel transmissive reconfigurable meta-surface (RMS) transceiver enabled multi-tier computing network architecture is proposed for improving computing capability, decreasing computing delay and reducing base station (BS) deployment cost, in which transmissive RMS equipped with a feed antenna can be regarded as a new type of multi-antenna system. We formulate a total energy consumption minimization problem by a joint optimization of subcarrier allocation, task input bits, time slot allocation, transmit power allocation and RMS transmissive coefficient while taking into account the constraints of communication resources and computing resources. This formulated problem is a non-convex optimization problem due to the high coupling of optimization variables, which is NP-hard to obtain its optimal solution. To address the above challenging problems, block coordinate descent (BCD) technique is employed to decouple the optimization variables to solve the problem. Specifically, the joint optimization problem of subcarrier allocation, task input bits, time slot allocation, transmit power allocation and RMS transmissive coefficient is divided into three subproblems to solve by applying BCD. Then, the decoupled three subproblems are optimized alternately by using successive convex approximation (SCA) and difference-convex (DC) programming until the convergence is achieved. Numerical results verify that our proposed algorithm is superior in reducing total energy consumption compared to other benchmarks

Automatic Optic Disc Abnormality Detection in Fundus Images: A Deep Learning Approach

Optic disc (OD) is a key structure in retinal images. It serves as an indicator to detect various diseases such as glaucoma and changes related to new vessel formation on the OD in diabetic retinopathy (DR) or retinal vein occlusion. OD is also essential to locate structures such as the macula and the main vascular arcade. Most existing methods for OD localization are rule-based, either exploiting the OD appearance properties or the spatial relationship between the OD and the main vascular arcade. The detection of OD abnormalities has been performed through the detection of lesions such as hemorrhaeges or through measuring cup to disc ratio. Thus these methods result in complex and inflexible image analysis algorithms limiting their applicability to large image sets obtained either in epidemiological studies or in screening for retinal or optic nerve diseases. In this paper, we propose an end-to-end supervised model for OD abnormality detection. The most informative features of the OD are learned directly from retinal images and are adapted to the dataset at hand. Our experimental results validated the effectiveness of this current approach and showed its potential application

Endothelial Cell-Specific Deletion of P2Y2 Receptor Promotes Plaque Stability in Atherosclerosis-Susceptible ApoE-Null Mice

OBJECTIVE: Nucleotide P2Y2 receptor (P2Y2R) contributes to vascular inflammation by increasing vascular cell adhesion molecule-1 expression in endothelial cells (EC), and global P2Y2R deficiency prevents fatty streak formation in apolipoprotein E null (ApoE-/-) mice. Because P2Y2R is ubiquitously expressed in vascular cells, we investigated the contribution of endothelial P2Y2R in the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis. APPROACH AND RESULTS: EC-specific P2Y2R-deficient mice were generated by breeding VEcadherin5-Cre mice with the P2Y2R floxed mice. Endothelial P2Y2R deficiency reduced endothelial nitric oxide synthase activity and significantly altered ATP- and UTP (uridine 5'-triphosphate)-induced vasorelaxation without affecting vasodilatory responses to acetylcholine. Telemetric blood pressure and echocardiography measurements indicated that EC-specific P2Y2R-deficient mice did not develop hypertension. We investigated the role of endothelial P2Y2R in the development of atherosclerotic lesions by crossing the EC-specific P2Y2R knockout mice onto an ApoE-/- background and evaluated lesion development after feeding a standard chow diet for 25 weeks. Histopathologic examination demonstrated reduced atherosclerotic lesions in the aortic sinus and entire aorta, decreased macrophage infiltration, and increased smooth muscle cell and collagen content, leading to the formation of a subendothelial fibrous cap in EC-specific P2Y2R-deficient ApoE-/- mice. Expression and proteolytic activity of matrix metalloproteinase-2 was significantly reduced in atherosclerotic lesions from EC-specific P2Y2R-deficient ApoE-/- mice. Furthermore, EC-specific P2Y2R deficiency inhibited nitric oxide production, leading to significant increase in smooth muscle cell migration out of aortic explants. CONCLUSIONS: EC-specific P2Y2R deficiency reduces atherosclerotic burden and promotes plaque stability in ApoE-/- mice through impaired macrophage infiltration acting together with reduced matrix metalloproteinase-2 activity and increased smooth muscle cell migration