The Depiction of Al-Bukhārī’s travels in classical Islamic literature

Travel (riḥla) after the death of the Prophet Muḥammad, and the geographically disparate locations of his companions made travelling for the acquisition of knowledge, and for the attainment of reliable ḥadīṯh an absolute necessity and it was regarded as a key component in the acquisition of this sacred knowledge. The present paper thus, investigates al-Bukhārī as a major figure in ḥadīṯh compilation. Furthermore, it discusses more specifically how he is perceived and exemplified in biographical literature (ṭabaqāt/tarājim). It subsequently, analyses the historical references (kutub al-tārīkh), in search of any possible subsidiary details.  Finally, by providing a chronological listing of these sources and looking at the included and excluded details, also the possible and acceptable explanations of any incongruities befallen, the present paper will determine whether the information provided is consistent or if it is the subject of embellishment.Keywords: Riḥla, ḥadīṯh, al-Jāmi‘ al-Ṣaḥīḥ, ṭabaqāt, tarāji

A Feasibility Investigation of Modular Portable “Chelson Shelters” Micro-Homes to Alleviate Housing Deficiencies: A Case Study in Mithi, Tharpakar, Pakistan

Many people in Mithi, Tharparkar do not have proper housing, face an unhygienic water supply, and have no sanitation facilities. These factors contribute to disease, suffering and the inability to rise above their destitute existence. The idea for building portable houses for the people of Mithi is presented to provide them with better living conditions and where they can feel a sense of security, ownership and sanitation. Research on existing building systems and materials showed that the most feasible structure for the desert environment is modular panels attached to a core unit that contains all the basic plumbing and electrical fixtures. The unit can be expanded based on family needs. Discussion with government officials showed that these could be used for the immediate needs of the people who have been suffering more acutely the last several years due to a drought. They could also be a permanent solution to the housing crisis if the Chelson Shelter communities worked well for ten years. The infrastructure in the Tharparker Desert is inadequate to support typical housing. These shelters have low environmental impact, use little water and electricity and would be a good solution to make a community of people that can support each other and provide security

Spontaneous Lung Herniation Leading to Extensive Subcutaneous Emphysema, Pneumothorax, Pneumomediastinum, and Pneumopericardium.

Spontaneous lung herniation is a rare phenomenon in which the lung parenchyma along with the pleural membranes protrudes outside their usual boundaries and can lead to a wide variety of complications. We are reporting a case of a middle-aged male who presented with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) exacerbation with severe bouts of cough. Initial computed tomography (CT) chest was unrevealing, but two days later, he developed spontaneous lung herniation, which was initially managed conservatively, but later it progressed to pneumothorax, pneumomediastinum, with striking CT scan images showing extensive subcutaneous emphysema. Blowhole incisions were done on the anterior chest wall which led to ultimate recovery

PEMANFAATAN REAKSI ELEKTROKIMIA AIR GAMBUT SEBAGAI ENERGI ALTERNATIF

Pemanfaatan sumber energi listrik baru terbarukan masih sangat minim sekali, terlebih lagi air gambut yang banyak digunakan sebagai sumber air bagi sebagian orang di Indonesia khususnya di Kalimantan. Namun pemanfaatan air gambut sebagai sumber air bersih masih kurang optimal mengingat sifat air gambut yang berwarna kecoklatan hingga ber-pH asam membuat air gambut tidak dapat dikonsumsi sebagai air minum. Pada penelitian ini dilakukan percobaan untuk bisa memanfaatkan sifat asam dari air gambut tersebut menjadi energi listrik. Percobaan ini disebut dengan sel elektrokimia air gambut, yang cara kerjanya mirip seperti reaksi sel volta. Dengan menggunakan elektroda karbon (C), seng (Zn), dan tembaga (Cu) yang dimasukkan ke dalam suatu wadah yang berisi air gambut, kita dapat mengukur tegangan dan arus pada sel air gambut tersebut Dari hasil tegangan dan arus yang diukur menggunakan alat multimeter, kita dapat menghitung tegangan, arus, tahanan dalam sel, daya, dan energi yang dihasilkan. Selain mengukur tegangan dengan multimeter, dilakukan juga perhitungan dengan teori Nernst untuk mengetahui tegangan yang bisa dihasilkan oleh sebuah sel. Tegangan listrik yang terukur bervariasi, mulai dari yang terkecil 0,029 V pada elektroda karbon-tembaga, dan yang terbesar 1,007 V pada elektroda karbon-seng untuk pengukuran tanpa beban. Sedangkan untuk arus hubung singkat yang dihasilkan sangat kecil, mulai dari yang terkecil 0,016 mA pada elektroda karbon-tembaga, dan yang terbesar 0,242 mA pada elektroda tembaga-seng untuk sebuah sel. Untuk tahanan dalam sel nilainya bervariasi tergantung dengan pH air gambut dan elektroda yang digunakan. Tahanan dalam terkecil sebesar 1.850 Ω pada elektroda karbon-tembaga dan yang terbesar yaitu 7.168 Ω pada elektroda karbon seng. Untuk daya listrik, sebuah sel elektroda tembaga-seng menghasilkan daya sebesar 0,00797193 Watt, elektroda karbon-tembaga sebesar 0,00003535577 Watt, dan elektroda karbon-seng 0,0067266112 Watt. Sedangkan energi yang dihasilkan oleh 4 buah sel elektrokimia adalah sebesar 0,22321404 Wh untuk elektroda tembaga-seng dan 0,143478617 Wh untuk karbon-seng. Dari hasil penelitian dan perhitungan yang diperoleh, elektroda tembaga-seng adalah yang paling baik dalam hal tegangan, daya dan energi yang dihasilkan. Hasil ini juga menunjukkan bahwa air gambut dapat dimanfaatkan menjadi sumber energi listrik baru terbarukan mengingat sumber dayanya yang cukup banyak. Namun, perlu adanya penelitian lanjutan agar hasil yang diperoleh dapat lebih optimal

Non-Linear Adapted Spatio-Temporal Filter for Single-Trial Identification of Movement-Related Cortical Potential

The execution or imagination of a movement is reflected by a cortical potential that can be recorded by electroencephalography (EEG) as Movement-Related Cortical Potentials (MRCPs). The identification of MRCP from a single trial is a challenging possibility to get a natural control of a Brain–Computer Interface (BCI). We propose a novel method for MRCP detection based on optimal non-linear filters, processing different channels of EEG including delayed samples (getting a spatio-temporal filter). Different outputs can be obtained by changing the order of the temporal filter and of the non-linear processing of the input data. The classification performances of these filters are assessed by cross-validation on a training set, selecting the best ones (adapted to the user) and performing a majority voting from the best three to get an output using test data. The method is compared to another state-of-the-art filter recently introduced by our group when applied to EEG data recorded from 16 healthy subjects either executing or imagining 50 self-paced upper-limb palmar grasps. The new approach has a median accuracy on the overall dataset of 80%, which is significantly better than that of the previous filter (i.e., 63%). It is feasible for online BCI system design with asynchronous, self-paced applications

Dendritic spine shape analysis based on two-photon microscopy images

Neuronal morphology and function are highly coupled. In particular, dendritic spine morphology is strongly governed by the incoming neuronal activity. Previously, volumes of dendritic spines have been considered as a primary parameter to study spine morphology and gain insight into structure-function coupling. However, this reductionist approach fails to incorporate the broad spine structure repertoire. First step towards integrating the rich spine morphology information into functional coupling is to classify spine shapes into main spine types suggested in the literature. Due to the lack of reliable automated analysis tools, classification is currently performed manually, which is a time-intensive task and prone to subjectivity. Availability of automated spine shape analysis tools can accelerate this process and help neuroscientists understand underlying structure and function relationship. Several studies on spine shape classification have been reported in the literature, however, there is an on-going debate on whether distinct spine shape classes exist or whether spines should be modeled through a continuum of shape variations. Another challenge is the subjectivity and bias that is introduced due to the supervised nature of classification approaches. This thesis focuses on morphological, shape, and appearance features based methods to perform dendritic spine shape analysis using both clustering and classification approaches. We apply manifold learning methods for dendritic spine classification and observe that ISOMAP implicitly computes prominent features suitable for classification purposes. We also apply linear representation based approach for spine classification and conclude that sparse representation provides slightly better classification performance. We propose 2D and 3D morphological features based approach for spine shape analysis and demonstrate the advantage of 3D morphological features. We also use a deep learning based approach for spine classification and show that mid-level features extracted from Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) perform as well as hand-crafted features. We propose a kernel density estimation (KDE) based framework for dendritic spine classification. We evaluate our proposed approaches by comparing labels assigned by a neuroscience expert. Our KDE based framework also enables neuroscientists to analyze separability of spine shape classes in the likelihood ratio space, which leads to further insights about the nature of the spine shape analysis problem. Furthermore, we also propose a methodology for unsupervised learning and clustering of spine shapes. In particular, we use x-means to perform cluster analysis that selects the number of clusters automatically using the Bayesian information criterion (BIC). The objective of clustering in this context is two-fold: confirm the hypothesis of some distinct shape classes and discover new natural groups. We observe that although there are many spines which easily fit into the definition of standard shape types (confirming the hypothesis), there are also a significant number of others which do not comply with standard shape types and demonstrate intermediate properties

Posterior reversible encephalopathy syndrome (PRES) after bevacizumab therapy for metastatic colorectal cancer.

Posterior reversible encephalopathy syndrome (PRES) is an increasingly recognizable neuro-clinical syndrome. Clinical and neurological manifestations of PRES include hypertension, headache, encephalopathy, seizures, and symmetrical white matter changes on brain MRI. Most common precipitants of PRES are acute medical illness, hypertensive crisis, eclampsia, immunosuppressive therapy, and chemotherapy. Bevacizumab is a monoclonal antibody that halts angiogenesis by inhibiting vascular endothelial growth factor. It has gained widespread popularity in oncology world especially for metastatic and recurrent cancers due to its inherent ability to stop angiogenesis; a vital step for tumor growth. Bevacizumab has also been implicated as the cause of PRES due to dysregulation of the blood-brain barrier. We are reporting a case of PRES induced by Bevacizumab in a patient of colorectal cancer