Deformacja wzdłużna stentu uwalniającego lek Synergy w trakcie wyjmowania balonu tnącego

Contemporary stent platforms have reduced strut thickness and fewer connectors. This improves deliverability and conformability, at the expense of reduction in strength. Recently longitudinal shortening has been reported, often associated with adjunctive devices after stent deployment. We present an unusual, impressive case of longitudinal shortening of a previously implanted Synergy stent (Boston Scientific, MA USA), within the proximal left anterior descending artery (LAD). The patient subsequently represented with restenosis of a further stent in the mid LAD. On withdrawal of a Flextome cutting balloon catheter (Boston Scientific), this device snared and dramatically shortened the Synergy. This was successfully treated with progressive dilatation using a series of enlarging balloons and subsequent implantation of another stent (Xience Xpedition, Abbott, CA USA). This case illustrates, that despite having additional connectors to enhance longitudinal strength, Synergy is not immune from compression. Furthermore, it is imperative, that stents are sized and post-dilated appropriately to ensure complete expansion.Rusztowania nowoczesnych stentów cechują się zmniejszoną grubością rozpórek i mniejszą liczbą łączników. To powoduje, że łatwiej je wprowadzić do naczynia i odpowiednio dopasować, jednak zmniejsza ich wytrzymałość. W ostatnim czasie opisywano wiele przypadków skrócenia stentu, często związanych ze stosowaniem dodatkowych narzędzi po implantacji stentu. W niniejszej pracy przedstawiono rzadki, ciekawy przypadek skrócenia wszczepionego wcześniej stenu Synergy (BostonScientific, USA), znajdującego się w proksymalnym odcinku gałęzi międzykomorowej przedniej (LAD). W następstwieu chorego wystąpiła restenoza w dalszej części stentu w środkowym odcinku LAD. W trakcie wyjmowania cewnika z balonem tnącym Flextome (Boston Scientific) urządzenie zaczepiło o stent Synergy i spowodowało jego znaczne skrócenie. Udało się poprawić drożność naczynia przez stopniowe rozszerzanie stenu za pomocą coraz większych balonów oraz wszczepienia kolejnego stentu (Xience Xpedition, Abbott, USA). Opisany przypadek ukazuje, że mimo zastosowania dodatkowych łączników służących wzmocnieniu wytrzymałości stentSynergy nie jest odporny na kompresję. Ponadto należy się zawsze upewnić, że stent został odpowiednio dobrany podwzględem rozmiaru i odpowiednio rozszerzony, aby zapewnić jego całkowite rozprężenie

The effect of nitrogen on biogas flame propagation characteristic in premix combustion

Biogas is one of alternative energy and categorized as renewable energy. The main sources of biogas come from animal waste, garbage, and household waste that are organic waste. Primarily, over 50% of this energy contains methane (CH4). The other substances or inhibitors are nitrogen and carbon dioxide. Previously, carbon dioxide effect on biogas combustion is already experimented. The result shows that carbon dioxide reduces the flame propagation speed of biogas combustion. Then, nitrogen as an inhibitor obviously also brings some effects to the biogas combustion, flame propagation speed, and flame characteristics. Spark ignited cylinder is used for the premixed biogas combustion research. An acrylic glass is used as the material of this transparent cylinder chamber. The cylinder is filled with methane (CH4), oxygen (O2), and nitrogen (N2) with particular percentage. In this experiment, the nitrogen composition are set to 0%, 5%, 10%, 20%, 30%, 40%, and 50%. The result shows that the flame propagation speed is reduced in regard to the increased level of nitrogen. It can also be implied that nitrogen can decrease the biogas combustion rate

GUM industries (1985) Sdn. Bhd.- the Totoya crisis

This case on strategy presents an opportunity for post-graduate and final year undergraduate students to try their hands at crisis management. It provides critical information on the organization’s internal and external environment and highlights issues that require their immediate attention. To emulate reality, a sense of urgency has been written into the case. This case has a moderate level of difficulty. The case may also be used to teach marketing, especially in terms of value creation along the supply chain, from suppliers to end consumers

A systems approach to understanding the perspectives in the changing landscape of responsible business in Scotland

The purpose of this paper is to present an application of community O.R. (COR), using soft system methodology (SSM) to help a grant-maker to understand how to unlock and release more resources into communities. The problem area under investigation is a perceived lack of connectivity and alignment between and within the public, private and third sectors in Scotland to address the challenges being faced by communities, articulated by third sector organisations. This is of value as the private sector (we focus on "for-profit businesses") hold the majority of these resources (e.g. people, assets and money). The paper argues that a conduit to business and the third sector can support the allocation of business resources into communities and evaluating outcomes as part their responsible business practice. The 'connect' model is proposed and refined to achieve the client's goal and to address a range of stakeholder issues/challenges. Data was collected in 17 workshops with the client, stakeholder groups and a continuous diaological process with 16 key stakeholders and critical friends. Early on in the SSM study, the 'investing in social capital' relevant system was deemed a necessary early intervention, to bring together actors in a 'open system' that addresses the 'whole problem' area (launched as the 'Responsible Business Forum'). Two additional concepts emerge from the study that help refine the 'connect' model and have implications for theory and practice: the co-creation of business-community value, facilitated by a conduit that unlocks a 'shared space' based on a match of shared aspirations and goals

Static response on lime column and geotextile encapsulated lime column (GELC) stabilised marine clay under vertical load

Marine clay, which is widely encountered in coastal area in Malaysia, is a problematic base material. Previous researchers reported that deep lime stabilisation can significantly improve clay. However, insufficient confining pressure from surrounding soil normally lead to the inferior performance on the upper part of column such as column head crushing and larger deformation on the surrounding soil at top part of column. Therefore, geotextile encapsulation was proposed for lime column in this study. Static response and stress distribution are essential in the understanding on behaviour of columnar stabilised soil under vertical load. Multi stages loading tests were conducted on Pontian marine clay, with and without geotextile encapsulation. Stress concentration ratio (smid/ ssoil) was examined in each loading stage, where it is defined as stress on column (smid) divided by stress on surrounding soil (ssoil). The samples were cured for 14, 28 and 56 days before tested. It was found that stress concentration ratio was dependent on column materials strength properties and applied loading. Geotextile encapsulation increased the stress concentration ratio on lime column. Stress concentration increment effect by geotextile encapsulation was further enhanced by the confining pressure of surrounding soil; however, the effect reduced with increase of applied loading. Higher stress concentration ratio indicated lesser load on surrounding soil and therefore the soil settlement could be reduced

Emotional Voice Puppetry

The paper presents emotional voice puppetry, an audio-based facial animation approach to portray characters with vivid emotional changes. The lips motion and the surrounding facial areas are controlled by the contents of the audio, and the facial dynamics are established by category of the emotion and the intensity. Our approach is exclusive because it takes account of perceptual validity and geometry instead of pure geometric processes. Another highlight of our approach is the generalizability to multiple characters. The findings showed that training new secondary characters when the rig parameters are categorized as eye, eyebrows, nose, mouth, and signature wrinkles is significant in achieving better generalization results compared to joint training. User studies demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach both qualitatively and quantitatively. Our approach can be applicable in AR/VR and 3DUI, namely, virtual reality avatars/self-avatars, teleconferencing and in-game dialogue

HOP Queue: Hyperspectral Onboard Processing Queue Demonstration

The HOP Queue (Hyperspectral Onboard Processing Queue) demonstration leverages emerging COTS AI accelerators and GPUs to perform on-board processing of hyperspectral imagery data, with the aim of providing near- real time conservation-oriented data and metrics from Low Earth Orbit (LEO). These include forest health, fire detection, and coastal water health. Phase 1 of this project is currently underway, including a completed lab demonstration of this technology and ongoing flight testing. The data from this mission will support Northrop Grumman’s enterprise “Technology for Conservation” campaign and will be provided to NASA’s Surface Biology and Geology (SBG) organization, as well as other conservation efforts