Consideration of Raft and Soil Interaction in Piled-Rafts Design

Based on the analysis of the piled-raft foundations, as well as experimental investigations of the geotechnical engineers, it is stated that the load of a piled-raft foundation is transferred both to a raft and a pile. When a piled-raft foundation design, the account of this factor allows the significant decrease of the foundation cost. To work out the method of a piled-raft foundation design, the experimental and numerical investigations have been carried out.The paper gives some results of the experimental and numerical investigations of piled-raft foundations. A method of the evaluation of a load part transferred to a raft and the piles is suggested. The conditions of the load transfer to a raft when a foundation loading are determined

Facilitation of epileptic activity during sleep is mediated by high amplitude slow waves

Epileptic discharges in focal epilepsy are frequently activated during non-rapid eye movement sleep. Sleep slow waves are present during this stage and have been shown to include a deactivated ('down', hyperpolarized) and an activated state ('up', depolarized). The 'up' state enhances physiological rhythms, and we hypothesize that sleep slow waves and particularly the 'up' state are the specific components of non-rapid eye movement sleep that mediate the activation of epileptic activity. We investigated eight patients with pharmaco-resistant focal epilepsies who underwent combined scalp-intracerebral electroencephalography for diagnostic evaluation. We analysed 259 frontal electroencephalographic channels, and manually marked 442 epileptic spikes and 8487 high frequency oscillations during high amplitude widespread slow waves, and during matched control segments with low amplitude widespread slow waves, non-widespread slow waves or no slow waves selected during the same sleep stages (total duration of slow wave and control segments: 49 min each). During the slow waves, spikes and high frequency oscillations were more frequent than during control segments (79% of spikes during slow waves and 65% of high frequency oscillations, both P ~ 0). The spike and high frequency oscillation density also increased for higher amplitude slow waves. We compared the density of spikes and high frequency oscillations between the 'up' and 'down' states. Spike and high frequency oscillation density was highest during the transition from the 'up' to the 'down' state. Interestingly, high frequency oscillations in channels with normal activity expressed a different peak at the transition from the 'down' to the 'up' state. These results show that the apparent activation of epileptic discharges by non-rapid eye movement sleep is not a state-dependent phenomenon but is predominantly associated with specific events, the high amplitude widespread slow waves that are frequent, but not continuous, during this state of sleep. Both epileptic spikes and high frequency oscillations do not predominate, like physiological activity, during the 'up' state but during the transition from the 'up' to the 'down' state of the slow wave, a period of high synchronization. Epileptic discharges appear therefore more associated with synchronization than with excitability. Furthermore, high frequency oscillations in channels devoid of epileptic activity peak differently during the slow wave cycle from those in channels with epileptic activity. This property may allow differentiating physiological from pathological high frequency oscillations, a problem that is unresolved until now

Regional cerebral blood flow changes as a function of delta and spindle activity during slow wave sleep in humans

In the present study, we investigated changes in regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) in humans during the progression from relaxed wakefulness through slow wave sleep (SWS). These changes were examined as a function of spindle (12-15 Hz) and delta (1.5-4.0 Hz) electroencephalographic (EEG) activity of SWS. rCBF was studied with positron emission tomography (PET) using the H215O bolus method. A maximum of six 60 sec scans were performed per subject during periods of wakefulness and stages 1-4 of SWS, as determined by on-line EEG monitoring. Spectral analysis was performed off-line on the EEG epochs corresponding to the scans for computation of activity in specific frequency bands. The relationship between EEG frequency band activity and normalized rCBF was determined by means of a voxel-by-voxel analysis of covariance. delta activity covaried negatively with rCBF most markedly in the thalamus and also in the brainstem reticular formation, cerebellum, anterior cingulate, and orbitofrontal cortex. After the effect of delta was removed, a significant negative covariation between spindle activity and the residual rCBF was evident in the medial thalamus. These negative covariations may reflect the disfacilitation and active inhibition of thalamocortical relay neurons in association with delta and spindles, as well as the neural substrates underlying the progressive attenuation of sensory awareness, motor responsiveness, and arousal that occur during SWS. delta activity covaried positively with rCBF in the visual and auditory cortex, possibly reflecting processes of dream-like mentation purported to occur during SW

Controversies in epilepsy: Debates held during the Fourth International Workshop on Seizure Prediction

Debates on six controversial topics were held during the Fourth International Workshop on Seizure Prediction (IWSP4) convened in Kansas City, KS, USA, July 4–7, 2009. The topics were (1) Ictogenesis: Focus versus Network? (2) Spikes and Seizures: Step-relatives or Siblings? (3) Ictogenesis: A Result of Hyposynchrony? (4) Can Focal Seizures Be Caused by Excessive Inhibition? (5) Do High-Frequency Oscillations Provide Relevant Independent Information? (6) Phase Synchronization: Is It Worthwhile as Measured? This article, written by the IWSP4 organizing committee and the debaters, summarizes the arguments presented during the debates

An observation of the f0(1710)f_0(1710) meson in the ωϕ\omega\phi system in the Pion-BeBe Interaction at Momentum of 29 GeV

The charge-exchange reaction $\pi^-p \rightarrow n\,\omega(783)\phi(1020)$, $\omega \rightarrow \pi^+\pi^-\pi^0$, $\phi \rightarrow K^+K^-$ is studied with the upgraded VES facility (U-70, Protvino) in the interaction of a 29 GeV pion beam with a beryllium target. The distribution over the invariant mass of the system $M_{\omega\phi}$ shows a near-threshold signal. A partial wave analysis reveals that the scalar state ($J^{PC}=0^{++}$) dominates in this mass region. The observed signal can be described with a contribution of the known resonance $f_0(1710)$. Using OPE approximation for the reaction $\pi^-p \rightarrow n\, f_0(1710)$ the product of branching fractions is found to be: $Br(f_0(1710)\rightarrow \pi\pi)\cdot Br(f_0(1710)\rightarrow \omega\phi) = (4.8 \pm 1.2) \cdot 10^{-3}$

Interictal Spiking Increases with Sleep Depth in Temporal Lobe Epilepsy

Purpose : To test the hypothesis that deepening sleep activates focal interictal epileptiform discharges (IEDs), we performed EEG-polysomnography in 21 subjects with medically refractory temporal lobe epilepsy. Methods: At the time of study, subjects were seizure-free for 224 h and were taking stable doses of antiepileptic medications (AEDs). Sleep depth was measured by log delta power (LDP). Visual sleep scoring and visual detection of IEDs also were performed. Logistic-regression analyses of IED occurrence in relation to LDP were carried out for two groups of subjects, nine with frequent IEDs (group 1) and 12 with rare IEDs (group 2). Results: The LDP differentiated visually scored non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep stages (p = 0.0001). The IEDs were most frequent in NREM stages 3/4 and least frequent in REM sleep. Within NREM sleep, in both groups, IEDs were more frequent at higher levels of LDP (p < 0.05). In group 1, after accounting for the level of LDP, IEDs were more frequent (a) on the ascending limb of LDP and with more rapid increases in LDP (p = 0.007), (b) in NREM than in REM sleep (p = 0.002), and (c) closer to sleep onset (p < 0.0001). Fewer than 1% of IEDs occurred within 10 s of an EEG arousal. Conclusions: Processes underlying the deepening of NREM sleep, including progressive hyperpolarization in thalamocortical projection neurons, may contribute to IED activation in partial epilepsy. Time from sleep onset and NREM versus REM sleep also influence IED occurrence.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/65422/1/j.1528-1157.1998.tb01329.x.pd

Cerebellum Abnormalities in Idiopathic Generalized Epilepsy with Generalized Tonic-Clonic Seizures Revealed by Diffusion Tensor Imaging

Although there is increasing evidence suggesting that there may be subtle abnormalities in idiopathic generalized epilepsy (IGE) patients using modern neuroimaging techniques, most of these previous studies focused on the brain grey matter, leaving the underlying white matter abnormalities in IGE largely unknown, which baffles the treatment as well as the understanding of IGE. In this work, we adopted multiple methods from different levels based on diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) to analyze the white matter abnormalities in 14 young male IGE patients with generalized tonic-clonic seizures (GTCS) only, comparing with 29 age-matched male healthy controls. First, we performed a voxel-based analysis (VBA) of the fractional anisotropy (FA) images derived from DTI. Second, we used a tract-based spatial statistics (TBSS) method to explore the alterations within the white matter skeleton of the patients. Third, we adopted region-of-interest (ROI) analyses based on the findings of VBA and TBSS to further confirm abnormal brain regions in the patients. At last, considering the convergent evidences we found by VBA, TBSS and ROI analyses, a subsequent probabilistic fiber tractography study was performed to investigate the abnormal white matter connectivity in the patients. Significantly decreased FA values were consistently observed in the cerebellum of patients, providing fresh evidence and new clues for the important role of cerebellum in IGE with GTCS

Anaerobic bacteria cultured from cystic fibrosis airways correlate to milder disease: A multisite study

Anaerobic and aerobic bacteria were quantitated in respiratory samples across three cystic fibrosis (CF) centres using extended culture methods. Subjects aged 1–69 years who were clinically stable provided sputum (n=200) or bronchoalveolar lavage (n=55). 18 anaerobic and 39 aerobic genera were cultured from 59% and 95% of samples, respectively; 16 out of 57 genera had a 5% prevalence across centres. Analyses of microbial communities using co-occurrence networks in sputum samples showed groupings of oral, including anaerobic, bacteria, whereas typical CF pathogens formed distinct entities. Pseudomonas was associated with worse nutrition and F508del genotype, whereas anaerobe prevalence was positively associated with pancreatic sufficiency, better nutrition and better lung function. A higher total anaerobe/ total aerobe CFU ratio was associated with pancreatic sufficiency and better nutrition. Subjects grouped by factor analysis who had relative dominance of anaerobes over aerobes had milder disease compared with a Pseudomonas-dominated group with similar proportions of subjects that were homozygous for F508del. In summary, anaerobic bacteria occurred at an early age. In sputum-producing subjects anaerobic bacteria were associated with milder disease, suggesting that targeted eradication of anaerobes may not be warranted in sputum-producing CF subjects

Spike pattern recognition by supervised classification in low dimensional embedding space

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0, (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Epileptiform discharges in interictal electroencephalography (EEG) form the mainstay of epilepsy diagnosis and localization of seizure onset. Visual analysis is rater-dependent and time consuming, especially for long-term recordings, while computerized methods can provide efficiency in reviewing long EEG recordings. This paper presents a machine learning approach for automated detection of epileptiform discharges (spikes). The proposed method first detects spike patterns by calculating similarity to a coarse shape model of a spike waveform and then refines the results by identifying subtle differences between actual spikes and false detections. Pattern classification is performed using support vector machines in a low dimensional space on which the original waveforms are embedded by locality preserving projections. The automatic detection results are compared to experts’ manual annotations (101 spikes) on a whole-night sleep EEG recording. The high sensitivity (97 %) and the low false positive rate (0.1 min−1), calculated by intra-patient cross-validation, highlight the potential of the method for automated interictal EEG assessment.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio