Hybrid Multi-Level Detection and Mitigation of Clone Attacks in Mobile Wireless Sensor Network (MWSN).

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are often deployed in hostile environments, where an adversary can physically capture some of the sensor nodes. The adversary collects all the nodes' important credentials and subsequently replicate the nodes, which may expose the network to a number of other security attacks, and eventually compromise the entire network. This harmful attack where a single or more nodes illegitimately claims an identity as replicas is known as the node replication attack. The problem of node replication attack can be further aggravated due to the mobile nature in WSN. In this paper, we propose an extended version of multi-level replica detection technique built on Danger Theory (DT), which utilizes a hybrid approach (centralized and distributed) to shield the mobile wireless sensor networks (MWSNs) from clone attacks. The danger theory concept depends on a multi-level of detections; first stage (highlights the danger zone (DZ) by checking the abnormal behavior of mobile nodes), second stage (battery check and random number) and third stage (inform about replica to other networks). The DT method performance is highlighted through security parameters such as false negative, energy, detection time, communication overhead and delay in detection. The proposed approach also demonstrates that the hybrid DT method is capable and successful in detecting and mitigating any malicious activities initiated by the replica. Nowadays, crimes are vastly increasing and it is crucial to modify the systems accordingly. Indeed, it is understood that the communication needs to be secured by keen observation at each level of detection. The simulation results show that the proposed approach overcomes the weaknesses of the previous and existing centralized and distributed approaches and enhances the performance of MWSN in terms of communication and memory overhead

The geometric role of symmetry breaking in gravity

In gravity, breaking symmetry from a group G to a group H plays the role of describing geometry in relation to the geometry the homogeneous space G/H. The deep reason for this is Cartan's "method of equivalence," giving, in particular, an exact correspondence between metrics and Cartan connections. I argue that broken symmetry is thus implicit in any gravity theory, for purely geometric reasons. As an application, I explain how this kind of thinking gives a new approach to Hamiltonian gravity in which an observer field spontaneously breaks Lorentz symmetry and gives a Cartan connection on space.Comment: 4 pages. Contribution written for proceedings of the conference "Loops 11" (Madrid, May 2011

ICONE10-22395 SEISMIC BEHAVIOR OF SPENT FUEL DRY CASK STORAGE SYSTEMS

ABSTRACT The U. S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is conducting a research program to investigate technical issues concerning the dry cask storage systems of spent nuclear fuel by conducting confirmatory research for establishing criteria and review guidelines for the seismic behavior of these systems. The program focuses on developing 3-D finite element analysis models that address the dynamic coupling of a module/cask, a flexible concrete pad, and an underlying soil/rock foundation, in particular, the soil-structure-interaction. Parametric analyses of the coupled models are performed to include variations in module/cask geometry, site seismicity, underlying soil properties, and cask/pad interface friction. The analyses performed include

Frequency of color blindness in pre-employment screening in a tertiary health care center in Pakistan

Abstract OBJECTIVE: To describe the frequency of color vision deficiency among Pakistani adults presenting for pre-employment health screening in a tertiary care hospital. METHODS: The cross-sectional study was carried out at the Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi, and the data was collected for color vision deficiency, age, gender, and job applied for from pre-employment examination during 2013-2014. IBM SPSS 20 was used for statistical analysis. RESULTS: Three thousand four hundred and thirty seven persons underwent pre-employment screening during 2013 and 2014; 1837 (53.44%) were males and 1600 (46.65%) females. The mean age was 29.01 (±6.53) years. A total of 0.9% (32/3437) persons had color vision deficiency with male being 1.4% and female 0.4%. CONCLUSION: Color vision deficiency was observed in 0.9% of candidates screened for pre-employment health check up in a tertiary care hospital. The color vision deficiency was predominantly present in male individuals

Association between perioperative hypothermia and surgical site infection after elective abdominal surgery: A prospective cohort study

Introduction: Surgical site infections (SSIs) account for 14-16% of nosocomial infections and are one of the major causes of increased morbidity, hospital stay, cost of care, and even mortality. Hypothermia as a risk factor for SSI is debated but there is lack of conclusive evidence. The present study explores the association of hypothermia with SSI.Methodology: This is a prospective cohort study conducted on adult patients who underwent elective laparotomy. Patients were divided into two cohorts, the Hypothermia Cohort and the Normothermia Cohort, based upon episodes of hypothermia of \u3c360C in the perioperative period. SSI was diagnosed based upon criteria defined by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Postoperative follow-up to detect SSI was done until 30 days after the operation.Results: A total of 183 patients met the selection criteria and were included in the study. Ninety patients (49%) had perioperative hypothermia and were followed in the Hypothermia Cohort, while 93 patients (51%) who remained normothermic in the perioperative period were followed in the Normothermia Cohort. Mean age of the patients was 49.77 +/- 14.82 years. Almost two-thirds of the participants were females (63.9%). Patients who developed hypothermia were significantly older and had lower BMI. Also the proportion of female patients was significantly higher in the Normothermic Cohort.Rate of SSI was similar in both groups (10% versus 10.8%) with p-value of 0.867. Multivariable regression analysis also failed to show any significant association between hypothermia and SSI.Conclusion: Our study failed to show any statistically significant association between hypothermia and surgical site infection

Impact of proctoring on success rates for percutaneous revascularisation of coronary chronic total occlusions.

OBJECTIVE: To assess the impact of proctoring for chronic total occlusion (CTO) percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) in six UK centres. METHODS: We retrospectively analysed 587 CTO procedures from six UK centres and compared success rates of operators who had received proctorship with success rates of the same operators before proctorship (pre-proctored) and operators in the same institutions who had not been proctored (non-proctored). There were 232 patients in the pre-proctored/non-proctored group and 355 patients in the post-proctored group. Complexity was assessed by calculating the Japanese CTO (JCTO) score for each case. RESULTS: CTO PCI success was greater in the post-proctored compared with the pre-proctored/non-proctored group (77.5% vs 62.1%, p<0.0001). In more complex cases where JCTO≥2, the difference in success was greater (70.7% vs 49.5%, p=0.0003). After proctoring, there was an increase in CTO PCI activity in centres from 2.5% to 3.5%, p<0.0001 (as a proportion of total PCI), and the proportion of very difficult cases with JCTO score ≥3 increased from 15.3% (35/229) to 29.7% (105/354), p<0.0001. CONCLUSIONS: Proctoring resulted in an increase in procedural success for CTO PCI, an increase in complex CTO PCI and an increase in total CTO PCI activity. Proctoring may be a valuable way to improve access to CTO PCI and the likelihood of procedural success

A comparative analysis of active learning for biomedical text mining

Data Availability Statement: The code and data are available from https://github.com/usmaann (accessed on 14 March 2021).Copyright © 2021 by the authors. An enormous amount of clinical free-text information, such as pathology reports, progress reports, clinical notes and discharge summaries have been collected at hospitals and medical care clinics. These data provide an opportunity of developing many useful machine learning applications if the data could be transferred into a learn-able structure with appropriate labels for supervised learning. The annotation of this data has to be performed by qualified clinical experts, hence, limiting the use of this data due to the high cost of annotation. An underutilised technique of machine learning that can label new data called active learning (AL) is a promising candidate to address the high cost of the label the data. AL has been successfully applied to labelling speech recognition and text classification, however, there is a lack of literature investigating its use for clinical purposes. We performed a comparative investigation of various AL techniques using ML and deep learning (DL)-based strategies on three unique biomedical datasets. We investigated random sampling (RS), least confidence (LC), informative diversity and density (IDD), margin and maximum representativeness-diversity (MRD) AL query strategies. Our experiments show that AL has the potential to significantly reducing the cost of manual labelling. Furthermore, pre-labelling performed using AL expediates the labelling process by reducing the time required for labelling.This research received no external funding

Fractional flow reserve vs. angiography in guiding management to optimize outcomes in non-ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction: the British Heart Foundation FAMOUS-NSTEMI randomized trial

Aim: We assessed the management and outcomes of non-ST segment elevation myocardial infarction (NSTEMI) patients randomly assigned to fractional flow reserve (FFR)-guided management or angiography-guided standard care. Methods and results: We conducted a prospective, multicentre, parallel group, 1 : 1 randomized, controlled trial in 350 NSTEMI patients with &#8805; coronary stenosis &#8805;30% of the lumen diameter assessed visually (threshold for FFR measurement) (NCT01764334). Enrolment took place in six UK hospitals from October 2011 to May 2013. Fractional flow reserve was disclosed to the operator in the FFR-guided group (n = 176). Fractional flow reserve was measured but not disclosed in the angiography-guided group (n = 174). Fractional flow reserve &#8804;0.80 was an indication for revascularization by percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) or coronary artery bypass surgery (CABG). The median (IQR) time from the index episode of myocardial ischaemia to angiography was 3 (2, 5) days. For the primary outcome, the proportion of patients treated initially by medical therapy was higher in the FFR-guided group than in the angiography-guided group [40 (22.7%) vs. 23 (13.2%), difference 95% (95% CI: 1.4%, 17.7%), P = 0.022]. Fractional flow reserve disclosure resulted in a change in treatment between medical therapy, PCI or CABG in 38 (21.6%) patients. At 12 months, revascularization remained lower in the FFR-guided group [79.0 vs. 86.8%, difference 7.8% (−0.2%, 15.8%), P = 0.054]. There were no statistically significant differences in health outcomes and quality of life between the groups. Conclusion: In NSTEMI patients, angiography-guided management was associated with higher rates of coronary revascularization compared with FFR-guided management. A larger trial is necessary to assess health outcomes and cost-effectiveness