Glucosylation of Sucrose Laurate with Cyclodextrin Glucanotransferase

Sucrose monolauroyl esters were found to serve as substrates for cyclodextrin glucanotransferase (CGTase)-catalyzed transglucosidation reactions, affording new sucrose esters that have an additional 1-3 glucose residues on the pyranose ring of the sucrose moiety in the ester

Evaluating practical negotiating agents: Results and analysis of the 2011 international competition

This paper presents an in-depth analysis and the key insights gained from the Second International Automated Negotiating Agents Competition (ANAC 2011). ANAC is an international competition that challenges researchers to develop successful automated negotiation agents for scenarios where there is no information about the strategies and preferences of the opponents. The key objectives of this competition are to advance the state-of-the-art in the area of practical bilateral multi-issue negotiations, and to encourage the design of agents that are able to operate effectively across a variety of scenarios. Eighteen teams from seven different institutes competed. This paper describes these agents, the setup of the tournament, including the negotiation scenarios used, and the results of both the qualifying and final rounds of the tournament. We then go on to analyse the different strategies and techniques employed by the participants using two methods: (i) we classify the agents with respect to their concession behaviour against a set of standard benchmark strategies and (ii) we employ empirical game theory (EGT) to investigate the robustness of the strategies. Our analysis of the competition results allows us to highlight several interesting insights for the broader automated negotiation community. In particular, we show that the most adaptive negotiation strategies, while robu

Challenges and Main Results of the Automated Negotiating Agents Competition (ANAC) 2019

The Automated Negotiating Agents Competition (ANAC) is a yearly-organized international contest in which participants from all over the world develop intelligent negotiating agents for a variety of negotiation problems. To facilitate the research on agent-based negotiation, the organizers introduce new research challenges every year. ANAC 2019 posed five negotiation challenges: automated negotiation with partial preferences, repeated human-agent negotiation, negotiation in supply-chain management, negotiating in the strategic game of Diplomacy, and in the Werewolf game. This paper introduces the challenges and discusses the main findings and lessons learnt per league

Parametric x radiation from thick crystals

The parametric x radiation from thick Si single crystals with 0.5–5 mm thickness was investigated at an electron energy of 900 MeV. As the crystal thickness increased, both intensity and angular spread reached a plateau after their increase in the thin crystal region, resulting in more brilliant x rays than Feranchuk and Ivashin's prediction [J. Phys. (Paris) 46, 1981 (1985)] for thick crystals. This behavior is consistent with the incoherent model proposed in our previous paper [Phys. Rev. Lett. 70, 3247 (1993)]

Durable Mechanical Circulatory Support in Adult Congenital Heart Disease: Reviewing Clinical Considerations and Experience

Adults with congenital heart disease (ACHD) patients are one of the fastest growing populations in cardiology, and heart failure (HF) is the most common cause of morbidity and mortality amongst them. The need for advanced HF therapies in ACHD patients stands to grow substantially. The anatomic considerations for placing durable mechanical circulatory support (MCS) devices in ACHD patients often require specialized approaches. Despite this, increasing evidence suggests that durable MCS can be implanted safely with favorable outcomes in ACHD patients. Expansion of MCS use in ACHD patients is imperative to improve their clinical outcomes. Knowledge of ACHD-specific anatomic and physiologic considerations is crucial to HF programs’ success as they work to provide care to this growing population

Worldwide Experience of a Durable Centrifugal Flow Pump in Pediatric Patients

The primary objectives of this study were to describe the characteristics and survival outcomes for children supported with the HeartWare HVAD® system from the global community. This was a retrospective survey of patients <18 years of age with an HVAD® system. Questionnaires were sent to sites worldwide in April 2015 and collected between May 2015 and 2016. Information on 205 patients was collected. The median age at implantation was 13.1 years (interquartile range [IQR] 9.8-15.8 years) and the weight was 42 kg (IQR 28-60 kg). Over half of the implants occurred in males (61%), with the most common diagnosis being cardiomyopathy (n = 168, 82%). The majority of HVAD® systems implanted were left ventricular assist device (n = 189, 92.2%). Temporary right ventricular support was utilized in 24 patients (12%) with a median duration of 12 days (6-32 days). Fifty-five percent (n = 111) of the patients were discharged home after implantation after a median (IQR) duration of hospital stay of 40 days (28-71 days). By 12 months, the proportion of patients who underwent heart transplant was 65.4%, 10.7% had died, 3.2% were explanted for recovery, and 20.8% remained on the device. Death on the device on multivariable analysis was associated with the need for temporary RV support (hazard ratio [HR] 10.65 (95% CI 12.53-44.81), P = 0.001) and pump exchange (HR 7.9 (95% CI 1.8-34.2], P = 0.006). The use of the HeartWare HVAD system in the pediatric population is associated with mortality with the majority of patients supported to heart transplant by 1 year post implant. These positive results are independent of geographic location. The need for a temporary right heart support and pump exchange is associated with a higher risk of poor outcomes, and further work is required to predict these patients to allow for optimization. Although survival results are promising, further studies are needed to delineate the associated morbidities with this technology in the pediatric population