Evaluation of patients with fibrotic interstitial lung disease: Preliminary results from the Turk-UIP study

OBJECTIVE: Differential diagnosis of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is important among fibrotic interstitial lung diseases (ILD). This study aimed to evaluate the rate of IPF in patients with fibrotic ILD and to determine the clinical-laboratory features of patients with and without IPF that would provide the differential diagnosis of IPF. MATERIAL AND METHODS: The study included the patients with the usual interstitial pneumonia (UIP) pattern or possible UIP pattern on thorax high-resolution computed tomography, and/or UIP pattern, probable UIP or possible UIP pattern at lung biopsy according to the 2011 ATS/ERSARS/ALAT guidelines. Demographics and clinical and radiological data of the patients were recorded. All data recorded by researchers was evaluated by radiology and the clinical decision board. RESULTS: A total of 336 patients (253 men, 83 women, age 65.8 +/- 9.0 years) were evaluated. Of the patients with sufficient data for diag-nosis (n=300), the diagnosis was IPF in 121 (40.3%), unclassified idiopathic interstitial pneumonia in 50 (16.7%), combined pulmonary fibrosis and emphysema (CPFE) in 40 (13.3%), and lung involvement of connective tissue disease (CTD) in 16 (5.3%). When 29 patients with definite IPF features were added to the patients with CPFE, the total number of IPF patients reached 150 (50%). Rate of male sex (p<0.001), smoking history (p<0.001), and the presence of clubbing (p=0.001) were significantly high in patients with IPE None of the women <50 years and none of the men <50 years of age without a smoking history were diagnosed with IPE Presence of at least 1 of the symptoms suggestive of CTD, erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), and antinuclear antibody (FANA) positivity rates were significantly higher in the non-IPF group (p<0.001, p=0.029, p=0.009, respectively). CONCLUSION: The rate of IPF among patients with fibrotic ILD was 50%. In the differential diagnosis of IPF, sex, smoking habits, and the presence of clubbing are important. The presence of symptoms related to CTD, ESR elevation, and EANA positivity reduce the likelihood of IPF

Predicting Academic Performance: A Systematic Literature Review

The ability to predict student performance in a course or program creates opportunities to improve educational outcomes. With effective performance prediction approaches, instructors can allocate resources and instruction more accurately. Research in this area seeks to identify features that can be used to make predictions, to identify algorithms that can improve predictions, and to quantify aspects of student performance. Moreover, research in predicting student performance seeks to determine interrelated features and to identify the underlying reasons why certain features work better than others. This working group report presents a systematic literature review of work in the area of predicting student performance. Our analysis shows a clearly increasing amount of research in this area, as well as an increasing variety of techniques used. At the same time, the review uncovered a number of issues with research quality that drives a need for the community to provide more detailed reporting of methods and results and to increase efforts to validate and replicate work.Peer reviewe

Türkiye’de yönetim kültürü ve mahalli idarelerin gelişimine etkisi

06.03.2018 tarihli ve 30352 sayılı Resmi Gazetede yayımlanan “Yükseköğretim Kanunu İle Bazı Kanun Ve Kanun Hükmünde Kararnamelerde Değişiklik Yapılması Hakkında Kanun” ile 18.06.2018 tarihli “Lisansüstü Tezlerin Elektronik Ortamda Toplanması, Düzenlenmesi ve Erişime Açılmasına İlişkin Yönerge” gereğince tam metin erişime açılmıştır.Kültürel unsurlar ve yapılar, etkileşimli olarak birbirini zamanla dönüştürebilen görünümündedir. Bu dönüşüm sürecinde her aşamanın kendine özgü ayırdedici nitelikleri bulunmaktadır. Türkiye'de yönetim kültürünün gelişme sürecinde Osmanlı devleti, toplumsal gereksinmeleri karşılamaya yönelik işlevlerini yerine getirirken, yönetme tarza ve örgütlenme biçimi ile genel yönetsel karakterim ortaya koymuştur. Tanzimat'tan önceki yönetsel karakter, devletin merkezî birliği anlayışına dayanmaktadır. Bunun görünümü olarak adem-i merkeziyete (decentralization) yol ayan gelişmelere merkezin gücünde bir zaaf olarak bakılmıştır. Adem-i merkeziyete yönelik uygulamalardan merkezi güçlendirmek ivin yararlanılmıştır. Yerel yönetimlerin yasallaşarak resmi bir statüye sahip Olabilmeleri Tanzimat' döneminde mümkün olabilmiştir. Bu dönemde; dış dünyaya açılrna, malî merkeziyetçiliğin'' yerleştir ilmesi gereği, dış devletlerin yaptıkları baskılar ve ayrıca girişilen reformların halka benimsetilmesi ihtiyacı yerel yönetim kurumlarının oluşturulmasının altında yatan nedenlerdir; Tanzimat dönemi, modem anlamda merkeziyetçiliğin esas alındığı ve kuramlarının oluşturulduğu bunun yanında modern yerel yönetim kurumlarının da tohumlarının atıldığı bir dönem olarak târihe geçmiştir. Türkiye Cumhuriyetine de bu anlayış miras kalmıştır. Devletin örgütlenmesi ve ideolojik karakterinde merkeziyetçilik görülmektedir. Ekonomik ve sosyal icraatlardaki merkeziyetçi anlayışta, hizmetlerin iyi işlemesine yönelik teknik nedenlerden çok, siyasal nedenler etkili olmuştur. Yerel yönetimlerin güçlendirilmesine, sivil oluşumlara ve yetki devrine sıcak bakılmamıştır.In historical process, applications about administration follows a process which has affected one subsequent stage, but every stage has subjective discriminated attribute. Because, cultural factor and structure can transform into each other, as interaction, with time. In developing process of administration cultural of Turkey, Ottoman Empire has took on functions, as aimed to serving social needs. While it made these functions, administrative style and formed organization style also put them general administrative character. In the period Tanzimat, administrative character relied on the unity understanding of state So general power had looked developments, which lead local government, as weakness. Consequently, It benefited from applications, which seemed as local government's, for strengthening central government. It was possible that local governments had formal status in Tanzimat period. In this period, opening external world, feeling need to put fiscal centralization and especially press on Ottoman government by external states, efforts saving this condition owing to success of made reforms basing on people were reasons which underline forming local governments. Tanzimat period, in modern sense, relied on centralism and constructed its institutions on centralism. Nevertheless, institutions of modern local government was fertilized in this period, too. Republic of Turkey took over this understanding from this period. In character of state's organization and its ideological, above-mentioned centralism has been seen. In centralism comprehension related to activities of economic and social, improving services better is more effective in technical reasons than politic reasons. In this period, it didn't appropriate sttengthening local government, civil formation and authority turn.

Neural network consistent empirical physical formula construction for DFT based nonlinear vibrational spectra intensities of N-(2-methylphenyl) and N-(3-methylphenyl) methanesulfonamides

WOS: 000299148200089Vibrational intensities are both experimentally measured and theoretically estimated important physical quantities which are directly related to distributions of the electric charges in a molecule. In this paper, as a novel approach, by a layered feedforward neural network (LFNN), empirical physical formulas (EPFs) were constructed for density functional theory (DFT) vibrational spectra intensities of N-(2-methylphenyl) and N-(3-methylphenyl) methanesulfonamides. The spectral data was obtained from our previous study. Although the DFT spectral data was inherently extremely difficult-to-fit (sparse frequency intervals, highly nonlinear and sharply fluctuating intensities), still the optimally constructed LFFN-EPFs succeeded in fitting this data to medium and higher level of satisfaction. Moreover, LFNN-EPFs test set (i.e. yet-to-be measured experimental data) intensity predictions were also moderate to higher level. This briefly means that the general tendency of the intensity data was consistently estimated by the LFNN to an acceptable degree. In conclusion, provided that vibrational spectral data measured over sufficiently dense frequency intervals are available for any unknown molecule of significant complexity, suitable LFNN-EFFs can be constructed. Then, by various mathematical tools such as differentiation, integration, minimization, these vibrational LFNN-EFFs can be used to estimate the electronic charge distributions of the molecule. Moreover, these estimations can be compared and combined with those of theoretical DFT atomic polar tensor calculations to contribute to the identification of the molecule. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved

Wind turbine speed control of a contactless piezoelectric wind energy harvester

Ozturk, Nihat/0000-0002-0607-1868; KURT, EROL/0000-0002-3615-6926WOS: 000476210700001Wind turbine control is an important task to make the electricity generation secure in terms of energy demand and machine safety. It also yields to control the desired power level and optimized energy because of the assignment of turbine speed. The contactless piezoelectric wind energy harvester (CPWEH) used in this study has three piezoelectric layers located around the shaft with 120 degrees apart and they are buckled by the magnetic force without any physical contact. The superiority of this device is to generate energy for low wind speeds such as 1.5 m/s. However, for high speeds, high total harmonic distortions (THDs) govern the waveforms, thus controlling the turbine speed becomes necessary for optimizing the output power. Encouraged by this, a small low inertia dc generator is coupled with the wind turbine, and the generator terminals are connected to a resistor through a power switch to generate a braking torque that opposes to wind speed direction. By controlling the switch properly, turbine speed is ensured to remain within a certain band, which accordingly prevents the turbine from rotating very fast at damaging wind speeds. Several experiments are performed on the developed CPWEH with/without the presented control scheme which prove the existence of promising performance of our proposal

Cogging Torque Minimization Using Skewed and Separated Magnet Geometries

KURT, EROL/0000-0002-3615-6926WOS: 000506639500027In the study, analytical design, analysis and optimization of a 2.5 kW 14-pole, 84-slot permanent magnet synchronous generator (PMSG) have been performed. The performance characteristics of this PMSG such as efficiency, torque, cogging torque and magnetic flux density are assessed. Then, 3D model of the respective generator is acquired to examine the effect of magnet geometry on the cogging torque produced. In that context, the effects of splitted and skewed magnet structures are examined. In the first design, the magnet is modelled with one piece and the rms value of the cogging torque is found as 436.75 mNm. In the second case, a certain skewed slit is made alongside the magnet and that yields a slightly reduced cogging torque of 434.58 mNm. In the other design, the magnet of the first design is divided into two sub-parts, which are then combined together in a skewed fashion. Thus, the value of cogging torque is found as 159.60 mNm. Eventually, by making two certain slits on the last model, cogging torque is further depressed down to 89.95mNm. It is concluded from the obtained results that the last design contributes an improvement in the value of cogging torque up to 80% compared to the initial design.Scientific Research Project Unit of the Bandirma Onyedi Eylul University [BAP-18-MF-1009-065]This study was supported by Scientific Research Project Unit of the Bandirma Onyedi Eylul University under Project No: BAP-18-MF-1009-065

Aortik elastisite ve aortik elastisitenin sol ventrikül dolum ve diyastolik parametreleri ile ilişkisinin transtorasik ve transözofajiyal ekokardiyografi değerlendirilmesi

Amaç: Aort boyutlar ve elastik özelliklerini transtorasik ekokardiyografi (TTE) ve transözofageal ekokardiyografi (TEE) ile karşılaştıran sınırlı veri vardır. Bu nedenle, TTE ve TEE elde edilen aort boyutlar ve aortik elastik indekslerinin karşılaştırmanın yanı sıra bunların sol ventrikül (LV) dolum ve diyastolik parametreleri ile ilişkisini araştırmayı amaçladık. Yöntem: Çalışmaya kırk iki hasta dahil edildi. Tüm hastaların TTE ve TEE kayıtlarından aort boyutları ve ilgili elastikiyet parametreleri, sol ventrikül dolum ve diyastolik parametreleri, sol atriyal volüm indeksi (LAVİ), sol ventrikül kütle i n- deksi hesaplandı. TTE ve TEE elde edilen aort elastikiyeti indeksleri ve sol ventrikül dolum ve diyastolik parametreleri için korelasyon analizi yapıldı. Bulgular: TTE ve TEE ile elde edilen aort boyutları ve elastikiyeti indeksleri arasında anlamlı bir fark yoktu. Korelasyon analizinde yaş, E / A, E / E`ve LAVİ hem TTE hem de TEE ile edilen aort elastikiyeti indeksleri ile anlamlı derecede ilişkili iken, sol ventrikül kitle indeksi sadece TEE ile elde edilen aort elastikiyeti indeksleri ile ilişkili saptandı. Sonuç: TTE ile karşılaştırıldığında, TEE elde edilen aortik elastik özellikleri sol ventrikül dolum ve diyastolik parame treleri ile daha yakından ilişkili bulunmuştur. Buna ek olarak, TEE ve TTE ile elde edilen aort fonksiyon indeksleri iyi gözlemci içi ve gözlemciler arası değişkenliği ile benzerdir.Background: There are limited data comparing aortic d imensions and elastic properties between transthoracic echocardiography (TTE) and transesophage al echocardiography (TEE). Therefore, we aimed to investigate aortic d imensions and indices of aortic elastic properties as well as their relation with left ventricular (LV) filling and diastolic parameters obtained from TTE and TEE. Method: Forty two patients were included in the study. Aortic dimensions and related elasticity parameters, LV filling and diastolic parameters, left atrial volume index (LAVi), LV mass index were calculated from TTE and TEE recordings in all patients. The correlation analyses were performed for aortic elasticity indices and LV filling and diastolic parameters obtained from TTE and TEE. Results: There were no significant differences in aortic d imensions and elasticity indexes obtained from TTE and TEE. The correlation analysis r evealed that while age E/A, E/E` and LAVi were significantly correlated with aortic elasticity indexes obtained from both TTE and TEE, LV mass index was significantly correlated with only TEE aortic elasticity indices. Conclusion: When compared to TTE, aortic elastic properties obtained from TEE were more closely related with LV filling and diastolic parameters. In addition, the indexes of aortic function were comparable between TEE and TTE with good intra and interobserver variability