Improving Detection of Dim Targets: Optimization of a Moment-based Detection Algorithm

Wide area motion imagery (WAMI) sensor technology is advancing rapidly. Increases in frame rates and detector array sizes have led to a dramatic increase in the volume of data that can be acquired. Without a corresponding increase in analytical manpower, much of these data remain underutilized. This creates a need for fast, automated, and robust methods for detecting dim, moving signals of interest. Current approaches fall into two categories: detect-before-track (DBT) and track-before-detect (TBD) methods. The DBT methods use thresholding to reduce the quantity of data to be processed, making real time implementation practical but at the cost of the ability to detect low signal to noise ratio (SNR) targets without acceptance of a high false alarm rate. TBD methods exploit both the temporal and spatial information simultaneously to make detection of low SNR targets possible, but at the cost of computation time. This research seeks to contribute to the near real time detection of low SNR, unresolved moving targets through an extension of earlier work on higher order moments anomaly detection, a method that exploits both spatial and temporal information but is still computationally efficient and massively parallellizable. The MBD algorithm was found to detect targets comparably with leading TBD methods in 1000th the time

Promoting healthy eating among college women: Effectiveness of an intuitive eating intervention

This is the first experimental study to test the effectiveness of an intuitive eating intervention designed to increase adaptive eating practices and reduce eating disorder risk factors. Participants were 72 non-clinical, female college students from a large Midwestern university who were randomly assigned to either the experimental intervention or the control group (survey completion only). Participants were assessed prior to the intervention, post-intervention, and again at 1-week and 2-week follow-up periods on intuitive eating practices, dieting, body image effects, and disordered eating attitudes. Eating self-efficacy and emotional awareness were also examined as potential moderators of the intuitive eating intervention. Survey data was analyzed using a mixed ANOVA model to test the intervention and moderation effects across time. As hypothesized, after the intervention, the experimental group demonstrated significantly greater adherence to intuitive eating practices and significantly less dieting attitudes and practices relative to the control group. However, the groups did not significantly differ on the body image effects and disordered eating attitudes outcomes. In addition, emotional awareness was supported as a significant moderator of the intuitive eating, dieting, and disordered eating attitudes outcomes. Although different than the hypothesized effects, these results imply that participants with higher and lower emotional awareness both showed benefits from the intuitive eating intervention. Similarly, eating self-efficacy was supported as a significant moderator of the intuitive eating and body image effects variables, even after controlling for general self-efficacy. Overall these results present empirical evidence that the intuitive eating model can be a promising approach to disordered eating prevention in a variety of service delivery modalities

Gender Bias in the Young Adult Publishing Industry: Too Many "Girly" Books?

This study describes a content analysis of the cover art of 175 young adult books published within the last four years. The study was done to determine whether or not there is a gender bias in favor of girls in the young adult publishing industry. Educators across the English-speaking world are beginning to notice that teen boys are falling behind their female counterparts in reading, and some claim that this gap is due to lack of reading material for boys. This sample shows that there is a slight bias in favor of girls in young adult publishing, but the difference is not significant enough to support such claims.Master of Science in Library Scienc

Implementing a Fitness and Nutrition Program for Special Olympics Athletes

Introduction: Only 17-30% of individuals with ID meet the recommendations for daily exercise Populations of individuals with ID have higher BMI, lower cardiovascular fitness and lower muscle strength compared to the general population Individuals with ID also have many dietary challenges necessitating nutritional education and interventions One study following four athletes with ID, showed that pairing athletes with and without (unified sports) resulted in a positive change in social self-concept for athletes with ID Given the above, we: Created a 6-week pilot training and nutrition program for Special Olympics Vermont (SOVT). Paired athletes with ID with college athletes without ID to promote wellness during the athlete’s off season.https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/comphp_gallery/1229/thumbnail.jp

Implementing the PIE (Person, Interaction and Environment) programme to improve person-centred care for people with dementia admitted to hospital wards: a qualitative evaluation

Background Improving person-centred care for people with dementia in hospitals is a UK policy priority. The PIE (Person, Interaction, Environment) programme comprises cycles of observations of care by staff, identification of areas for improvement and plans for practice change and evaluation. The aim of the research reported here was to describe and evaluate PIE implementation in three UK NHS regions. Methods A qualitative design was adopted in ten case study sites (wards). Site selection was based on readiness for change criteria. Following a training workshop, PIE cycles were introduced into each ward. Data collection comprised observation, interviews, documentary analysis and an events log. Normalisation Process Theory provided a guiding framework for analysis. Results PIE was fully adopted in two study wards over 18 months, which resulted in sustained practice change and increased awareness of person-centredness. Partial implementation of PIE took place in a further two wards but progress stalled before significant action. The remaining six wards failed to implement PIE. Factors influencing implementation were: salience of PIE, collective team involvement, fit with strategic priorities, adequate resources, effective clinical leadership, good facilitation and organisational stability. Conclusions PIE has the potential to help staff improve person-centred care for people with dementia admitted to hospital wards. However, the evidence is limited to ten wards of which only two fully implemented the programme. Implications for practice • A programme for improving person-centred care for people with dementia in acute hospital wards requires sustained commitment from both the organisation and the ward. • Successful practice change depends on multiple key factors, including effective clinical leadership and good facilitation. • Contextual factors at various levels of an organisation need to be considered. • Use of the PIE tool has the potential to enable staff’s attention to focus on person centred care for older people with dementia in acute settings

Invariances of Frame Sequences under Perturbations

This paper determines the exact relationships that hold among the major Paley–Wiener perturbation theorems for frame sequences. It is shown that major properties of a frame sequence such as excess, deficit, and rank remain invariant under Paley–Wiener perturbations, but need not be preserved by compact perturbations. For localized frames, which are frames with additional structure, it is shown that the frame measure function is also preserved by Paley–Wiener perturbations

Field plate optimization in low-power high-gain source-gated transistors

Source-gated transistors (SGTs) have potentially very high output impedance and low saturation voltages, which make them ideal as building blocks for high-performance analog circuits fabricated in thin-film technologies. The quality of saturation is greatly influenced by the design of the field-relief structure incorporated into the source electrode. Starting from measurements on self-aligned polysilicon structures, we show through numerical simulations how the field plate (FP) design can be improved. A simple source FP around 1 μm long situated several tens of nanometers above the semiconductor can increase the low-voltage intrinsic gain by more than two orders of magnitude and offers adequate tolerance to process variations in a moderately scaled thin-film SGT. © 2012 IEEE

Meeting the need for regenerative therapies I: Target-based incidence and its relationship to U.S spending, productivity, and innovation

Regenerative therapies possess high theoretical potential for medical advance yet their success as commercial therapeutics is still open to debate. Appropriate data on target opportunities that provide perspective and enable strategic decision making is necessary for both efficient and effective translation. Up until now, this data have been out of reach to research scientists and many start-up companies—the very groups currently looked to for the critical advance of these therapies. The target-based estimate of opportunity presented in this report demonstrates its importance in evaluating medical need and technology feasibility. In addition, analysis of U.S. research spending, productivity, and innovation reveals that U.S. basic research in this field would benefit from greater interdisciplinarity. Overcoming the barriers that currently prevent translation into high value therapies that are quickly clinically adopted requires simultaneous integration of engineering, science, business, and clinical practice. Achieving this integration is nontrivial

A Case of Metastatic Atypical Neuroendocrine Tumor with ALK Translocation and Diffuse Brain Metastases.

A challenge in precision medicine requires identification of actionable driver mutations. Critical to such effort is the deployment of sensitive and well-validated assays for mutation detection. Although identification of such alterations within the tumor tissue remains the gold standard, many advanced non-small cell lung cancer cases have only limited tissue samples, derived from small biopsies or fine-needle aspirates, available for testing. More recently, noninvasive methods using either circulating tumor cells or tumor DNA (ctDNA) have become an alternative method for identifying molecular biomarkers and screening patients eligible for targeted therapies. In this article, we present a case of a 52-year-old never-smoking male who presented with widely metastatic atypical neuroendocrine tumor to the bones and the brain. Molecular genotyping using DNA harvested from a bone metastasis was unsuccessful due to limited material. Subsequent ctDNA analysis revealed an ALK translocation. The clinical significance of the mutation in this particular cancer type and therapeutic strategies are discussed.Key pointsTo our knowledge, this index case represents the first reported ALK translocation identified in an atypical carcinoid tumor.Liquid biopsy such as circulating tumor DNA is a feasible alternative platform for identifying sensitizing genomic alterations.Second-generation ALK inhibitors represent a new paradigm for treating ALK-positive patients with brain metastases