Distributed Optimal Rate-Reliability-Lifetime Tradeoff in Wireless Sensor Networks

The transmission rate, delivery reliability and network lifetime are three fundamental but conflicting design objectives in energy-constrained wireless sensor networks. In this paper, we address the optimal rate-reliability-lifetime tradeoff with link capacity constraint, reliability constraint and energy constraint. By introducing the weight parameters, we combine the objectives at rate, reliability, and lifetime into a single objective to characterize the tradeoff among them. However, the optimization formulation of the rate-reliability-reliability tradeoff is neither separable nor convex. Through a series of transformations, a separable and convex problem is derived, and an efficient distributed Subgradient Dual Decomposition algorithm (SDD) is proposed. Numerical examples confirm its convergence. Also, numerical examples investigate the impact of weight parameters on the rate utility, reliability utility and network lifetime, which provide a guidance to properly set the value of weight parameters for a desired performance of WSNs according to the realistic application's requirements.Comment: 27 pages, 10 figure

Influence of impact energy on work hardening ability of austenitic manganese steel and its mechanism

To further understand the hardening mechanism of austenitic manganese steel under actual working conditions, the work hardening ability was studied and the microstructures of austenitic manganese steel were observed under different impact energies. The work hardening mechanism was also analyzed. The results show that the best strain hardening effect could be received only when the impact energy reaches or exceeds the critical impact energy. The microstructural observations reveal that dislocations, stacking faults and twins increase with raising impact energy of the tested specimens. The hardening mechanism changes at different hardening degrees. It is mainly dislocation and slip hardening below the critical impact energy, but it changes to the twinning hardening mechanism when the impact energy is above the critical impact energy

Alleviation of cadmium toxicity in cucumber (Cucumis sativus) seedlings by the application of selenium

In the present study, the role of selenium in cadmium toxicity was investigated in cucumber seedlings by hydroponic experiments. The application of Se for cucumber exposed to Cd significantly reduced Cd accumulation in all tissues, elevated Cd-depressed chlorophyll content, and improved photosynthetic performance. External Se significantly reduced ·OH, H2O2 and malondialdehyde content. Exogenous Se balanced Cd-depressed elements (e.g., Se enhanced Cd-induced decreases in root Zn, leaf/stem/root Mn concentrations) and carbohydrate contents. External Se also significantly decreased the Cd-induced increases in Na+K+-, Ca2+Mg2+- and total ATPase activities, which recovered almost to control level. Results indicate that application of Se can alleviate Cd toxicity in cucumber seedlings by reducing Cd uptake and reactive oxygen species (ROS) accumulation, moreover protecting photosynthetic machinery from damaging, balancing elements and carbohydrate contents, and improving ATPase activities in cucumber

Efficacy of traditional Chinese herbal medicine in the treatment of gastrointestinal polyps and chronic gastritis: A case report

Background: The rate of gastrointestinal adenomatous polyps, often regarded as precancerous lesions, developing into cancer is 40 – 70 %. Endoscopic resection has been the preferred method for treating gastric polyps since the late 1960s. Surgical removal of polyps continues to play an important role in the treatment of polyps; however, the efficacy of such treatment cannot be guaranteed, and polyps may recur.Case presentation: Here, we report a 44-year-old man suffering from gastrointestinal polyps who refused surgical treatment and instead was treated with traditional Chinese herbal medicine (TCHM) for approximately 1 year. The patient was diagnosed with “qi deficiency and dampness syndrome” based on traditional Chinese medicine theory and was treated with the TCHM “strengthen qi and remove dampness formula”, referred to as the shen-ling-bai-zhu powder/decoction.Conclusion: This case suggests that TCHM may play an important role in the treatment of gastrointestinal polyps. Relevant data are, however, limited and a randomized controlled trial is needed to confirm TCHM efficacy in a larger population.Keywords: Case study, Gastrointestinal polyps, Traditional Chinese herbal medicine, Shen-ling-bai-zhu powde

Digital Human Interactive Recommendation Decision-Making Based on Reinforcement Learning

Digital human recommendation system has been developed to help customers find their favorite products and is playing an active role in various recommendation contexts. How to timely catch and learn the dynamics of the preferences of the customers, while meeting their exact requirements, becomes crucial in the digital human recommendation domain. We design a novel practical digital human interactive recommendation agent framework based on Reinforcement Learning(RL) to improve the efficiency of the interactive recommendation decision-making by leveraging both the digital human features and the superior flexibility of RL. Our proposed framework learns through real-time interactions between the digital human and customers dynamically through the state-of-art RL algorithms, combined with multimodal embedding and graph embedding, to improve the accuracy of personalization and thus enable the digital human agent to timely catch the attention of the customer. Experiments on real business data demonstrate that our framework can provide better personalized customer engagement and better customer experiences.Comment: 9 pages, 1 figure, 1 table, the paper has been accepted and this is the final camera-ready for NeurIPS 2022 Workshop on Human in the Loop Learning, https://neurips-hill.github.io

Impossible Differential Cryptanalysis of Pelican, MT-MAC-AES and PC-MAC-AES

In this paper, the impossible differential cryptanalysis is extended to MAC algorithms \textsc{Pelican}, MT-MAC and PC-MAC based on AES and 4-round AES. First, we collect message pairs that produce the inner near-collision with some specific differences by the birthday attack. Then the impossible differential attack on 4-round AES is implemented using a 3-round impossible differential property. For \textsc{Pelican}, our attack can recover the internal state, which is an equivalent subkey. For MT-MAC-AES, the attack turns out to be a subkey recovery attack directly. The data complexity of the two attacks is $2^{85.5}$ chosen messages, and the time complexity is about $2^{85.5}$ queries. For PC-MAC-AES, we can recover the 256-bit key with $2^{85.5}$ chosen messages and $2^{128}$ queries

Association between Metformin Use and Cancer Stage at Diagnosis among Elderly Medicare Beneficiaries with Preexisting Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus and Incident Prostate Cancer

Objective. To examine the association between metformin use and cancer stage at diagnosis among elderly men with preexisting diabetes mellitus and incident prostate cancer. Methods. This study used a population-based observational cohort of elderly men (≥66 years) with preexisting diabetes and incident prostate cancer between 2008 and 2009 ( = 2, 652). Cancer stage at diagnosis (localized versus advanced) was based on the American Joint Cancer Committee classification. Metformin use and other independent variables were measured during the one year before cancer diagnosis. Logistic regressions with inverse probability treatment weights were used to control for the observed selection bias. Results. A significantly lower percentage of metformin users were diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer as compared to nonusers (4.7% versus 6.7%, \u3c 0.03). After adjusting for the observed selection bias and other independent variables, metformin use was associated with a 32% reduction in the risk of advanced prostate cancer (adjusted odds ratio, AOR: 0.68, 95% confidence interval, CI: 0.48, 0.97). Conclusions. This is the first epidemiological study to support the role of metformin in reducing the risk of advanced prostate cancer. Randomized clinical trials are needed to confirm the causal link between metformin use and prostate cancer diagnosis stage