BoWFire: Detection of Fire in Still Images by Integrating Pixel Color and Texture Analysis

Emergency events involving fire are potentially harmful, demanding a fast and precise decision making. The use of crowdsourcing image and videos on crisis management systems can aid in these situations by providing more information than verbal/textual descriptions. Due to the usual high volume of data, automatic solutions need to discard non-relevant content without losing relevant information. There are several methods for fire detection on video using color-based models. However, they are not adequate for still image processing, because they can suffer on high false-positive results. These methods also suffer from parameters with little physical meaning, which makes fine tuning a difficult task. In this context, we propose a novel fire detection method for still images that uses classification based on color features combined with texture classification on superpixel regions. Our method uses a reduced number of parameters if compared to previous works, easing the process of fine tuning the method. Results show the effectiveness of our method of reducing false-positives while its precision remains compatible with the state-of-the-art methods.Comment: 8 pages, Proceedings of the 28th SIBGRAPI Conference on Graphics, Patterns and Images, IEEE Pres

Classificação de áreas de café em Minas Gerais por meio do novo algoritmo QMAS em imagem espectral Geoeye-1.

Diante do grande desafio que é classificar imagens de sensoriamento remoto de café, o objetivo deste trabalho foi aplicar o novo algoritmo QMAS para classificar áreas de café comparando os resultados com o método tradicional de Classificação Supervisionada MAXVER, em imagens Geoeye-1. Os resultados indicam que o algoritmo QMAS obteve mais êxito na classificação das áreas de café do que o MAXVER, configurando-se em uma alternativa viável a classificação de imagens de satélite.SBSR 2011

3DBGrowth: volumetric vertebrae segmentation and reconstruction in magnetic resonance imaging

Segmentation of medical images is critical for making several processes of analysis and classification more reliable. With the growing number of people presenting back pain and related problems, the semi-automatic segmentation and 3D reconstruction of vertebral bodies became even more important to support decision making. A 3D reconstruction allows a fast and objective analysis of each vertebrae condition, which may play a major role in surgical planning and evaluation of suitable treatments. In this paper, we propose 3DBGrowth, which develops a 3D reconstruction over the efficient Balanced Growth method for 2D images. We also take advantage of the slope coefficient from the annotation time to reduce the total number of annotated slices, reducing the time spent on manual annotation. We show experimental results on a representative dataset with 17 MRI exams demonstrating that our approach significantly outperforms the competitors and, on average, only 37% of the total slices with vertebral body content must be annotated without losing performance/accuracy. Compared to the state-of-the-art methods, we have achieved a Dice Score gain of over 5% with comparable processing time. Moreover, 3DBGrowth works well with imprecise seed points, which reduces the time spent on manual annotation by the specialist.Comment: This is a pre-print of an article published in Computer-Based Medical Systems. The final authenticated version is available online at: https://doi.org/10.1109/CBMS.2019.0009

SARS-COV-2 Pandemic for Patients with Chronic Obstructive Peripheral Arterial Disease: Impact of Interruption to Access According to Gender in a Single Center Experience

Background: This retrospective study aims to evaluate the impact of interrupted services for peripheral arterial disease (PAD) patients and especially women in a single north-eastern Italian center over a period of 3 months prior to the pandemic, during the first (2020) and the second (2021) wave of contagion in northern Italy. Methods: Patients with PAD at Rutherford stages 3 to 6 that required revascularization between March 2019 and March 2021 were classified into 3 groups, according to the period of treatment: the prepandemic period, the pandemic-20 period, and the pandemic-21 period. Results: Twenty-eight patients were treated in the prepandemic period, 21 in the pandemic-20 period, and 39 in the pandemic-21 period. It was observed that in the both pandemic periods patients presented with more severe stages of limb ischemia, Rutherford 5 and 6 stages. During pandemic-20, patients underwent mostly open surgery, followed by hybrid procedures. No differences were observed between the 3 groups in major amputations, length of hospital stay, type of discharge, limb salvage and mortality. During long-term follow-up, limb salvage appeared to be significantly better in the pandemic-21 group. The gender analysis revealed a significantly reduced female proportion of overall treated patients in 2020 and 2021 compared to the prepandemic period. In the pandemic-20 this difference appears even more evident since treatments on females represented 19% of the total while in the same period of the previous year the male/female percentage was comparable (54% vs. 46%). The women admitted presented higher stages of disease and tended to have a longer hospital stay than men. At 12-month follow-up, limb salvage was similar between the 2 genders but was slightly worse in women. Conclusions: An efficient reorganization of the vascular surgery services during the pandemic period guaranteed the quality and standard of treatment offered in the preceding periods. Among patients suffering from PAD the impact of the pandemic was greater for the female gender. It is therefore important that in addition to a reorganization of hospital services to provide adequate care for patients with ACOP in the pandemic period, greater information and awareness of women

Hepatic complications in sickle cell disease

Patients with sickle cell disease may present acute or chronic hepatopathy. The acute syndrome is characterized by right upper quadrant abdominal pain and jaundice. The differential diagnoses include acute sickle hepatic crises, hepatic sequestration, sickle cell intrahepatic cholestasis, cholecystitis, choledocholithiasis and acute viral hepatitis. These alterations can be differentiated by a careful history, liver function tests and hepatobiliary imaging studies. The specific treatment must be promptly initiated. Red blood cell transfusion is essential for the treatment of the clinical syndromes caused by the sickling process such as hepatic sequestration and sickle cell intrahepatic cholestasis. Chronic liver disease is frequently caused by chronic hemolysis and multiple transfusions. In an attempt to prevent, early diagnosis and treatment of chronic liver disease, sickle cell disease patients must be routinely submitted to liver function tests, serologic tests for hepatitis B and C, serum ferritin levels and abdominal ultrasound. Liver biopsy may be indicated in patients with virus hepatitis and in patients with persistent and accentuated alterations in liver function tests, out of acute sickle cell hepatic crises.Doentes falciformes podem apresentar alterações hepáticas agudas ou crônicas. As agudas são caracterizadas por dor no quadrante superior direito e icterícia. O diagnóstico diferencial inclui crise aguda de falcização hepática, seqüestro hepático, colestase intra-hepática, colelitíase, coledocolitíase, colecistite e hepatite viral aguda. Estas complicações devem ser diagnosticadas precocemente, através de história clínica, testes de função hepática e exames radiológicos, e o tratamento deve ser prontamente iniciado. Transfusão sangüínea é essencial para o tratamento das manifestações agudas causadas pelo processo de vaso-oclusão, como seqüestro hepático e colestase intra-hepática. As alterações hepáticas crônicas são freqüentemente causadas pela hemólise crônica e múltiplas transfusões. Para prevenção, diagnóstico precoce e orientação terapêutica da alteração hepática crônica, os doentes falciformes devem ser submetidos a exames de rotina: testes de função hepática, sorologia para hepatite B e C, dosagem sérica de ferritina e ultra-sonografia de abdômen. A biópsia hepática deve ser realizada em pacientes com hepatite viral e em pacientes com alterações hepáticas crônicas acentuadas e persistentes, afora das manifestações agudas.29930

Single-photon-emitting optical centers in diamond fabricated upon Sn implantation

The fabrication of luminescent defects in single-crystal diamond upon Sn implantation and annealing is reported. The relevant spectral features of the optical centers (emission peaks at 593.5 nm, 620.3 nm, 630.7 nm and 646.7 nm) are attributed to Sn-related defects through the correlation of their photoluminescence (PL) intensity with the implantation fluence. Single Sn-related defects were identified and characterized through the acquisition of their second-order auto-correlation emission functions, by means of Hanbury-Brown-Twiss interferometry. The investigation of their single-photon emission regime as a function of excitation laser power revealed that Sn-related defects are based on three-level systems with a 6 ns radiative decay lifetime. In a fraction of the studied centers, the observation of a blinking PL emission is indicative of the existence of a dark state. Furthermore, absorption dependence from the polarization of the excitation radiation with about 45 percent contrast was measured. This work shed light on the existence of a new optical center associated with a group-IV impurity in diamond, with similar photo-physical properties to the already well-known Si-V and Ge-V emitters, thus providing results of interest from both the fundamental and applicative points of view.Comment: 10 pages, 4 figure

Quantum enhanced correlated interferometry for quantum gravity tests: the experimental set-up and the locking scheme

Abstract The search for Planck scale scale effect is one of holy grails of physics. In Fermilab a double Michelson interferometer was built for this purpose: the holometer. In this proceedings we review our effort to build a quantum enhanced holometer

Low Bone Mass Density Is Associated With Hemolysis In Brazilian Patients With Sickle Cell Disease.

To determine whether kidney disease and hemolysis are associated with bone mass density in a population of adult Brazilian patients with sickle cell disease. Bone involvement is a frequent clinical manifestation of sickle cell disease, and it has multiple causes; however, there are few consistent clinical associations between bone involvement and sickle cell disease. Patients over 20 years of age with sickle cell disease who were regularly followed at the Hematology and Hemotherapy Center of Campinas, Brazil, were sorted into three groups, including those with normal bone mass density, those with osteopenia, and those with osteoporosis, according to the World Health Organization criteria. The clinical data of the patients were compared using statistical analyses. In total, 65 patients were included in this study: 12 (18.5%) with normal bone mass density, 37 (57%) with osteopenia and 16 (24.5%) with osteoporosis. Overall, 53 patients (81.5%) had bone mass densities below normal standards. Osteopenia and osteoporosis patients had increased lactate dehydrogenase levels and reticulocyte counts compared to patients with normal bone mass density (p<0.05). Osteoporosis patients also had decreased hemoglobin levels (p<0.05). Hemolysis was significantly increased in patients with osteoporosis compared with patients with osteopenia, as indicated by increased lactate dehydrogenase levels and reticulocyte counts as well as decreased hemoglobin levels. Osteoporosis patients were older, with lower glomerular filtration rates than patients with osteopenia. There was no significant difference between the groups with regard to gender, body mass index, serum creatinine levels, estimated creatinine clearance, or microalbuminuria. A high prevalence of reduced bone mass density that was associated with hemolysis was found in this population, as indicated by the high lactate dehydrogenase levels, increased reticulocyte counts and low hemoglobin levels.66801-