Diagnostic Accuracy of Home Sleep Apnea Testing (HSAT) Based on Recording Duration

Introduction: Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA) is a chronic sleeping disorder with serious health consequences. Currently, standard diagnosis is through in-lab polysomnography; however, there has been a shift to greater use of Home Sleep Apnea Testing (HSAT) for patients with a high pre-test probability of having OSA. Objective: To investigate the minimum recording time needed during HSAT to accurately diagnose the presence and severity of OSA. Methods: A retrospective review was conducted of HSATs done from January-October 2017. Each study was divided into 1-, 2-,3-,4-,5-, 6-, and 7 hour intervals beginning at the recording start time. The respiratory event index (REI) was determined for each of these time intervals and then compared to the initial REI derived from the total monitoring time (REITMT) by a Fleiss’ κ test, a paired samples t-test, and concordance correlation coefficients (CCC). Results: Significant differences were found between the REITRT and the REI at 60 min (P \u3c 0.0001), 120 min (0.0002), 180 min (\u3c 0.0001) and 240 min (0.0002) with a lack of concordance, signifying these intervals are poor diagnostic correlates for the REITRT. REIs determined at 300, 360, and 420 min were not significantly different from the REITRT and had very significant CCCs, 0.979, 0.990, and 0.996, respectively. The Fleiss’ κ test showed almost perfect agreement between the REITRT and and the REI for 360 and 420 min. Discussion: The results suggest that at least 6 hours of monitoring time during HSAT is needed to accurrately diagnose and determine the severity of OSA

DROUGHT MITIGATION THROUGH HYDROGEL APPLICATION IN RICE (Oryza sativa L.) CULTIVATION

Sustainability in irrigation is an essential step towards responsible water consumption. In recent years, many studies have sketched climate-resilient agricultural practices to fight drought and uncertain rainfall patterns. Major rain-fed crops such as paddy and wheat require aid when there are abnormal dry spells. To mitigate the loss of crops from such events, superabsorbent polymers can be used. Soils amended with hydrogel or Superabsorbent polymer (SAP) retain moisture during drought to prevent loss of water through evaporation and percolation. This allows the crop to grow with less shock from drought. This study compares rice (Oryza sativa L.) growth rate under application (treatment groups) and non-application (control groups) of hydrogel, considering their high-water requirement. NDLR07 (recently developed) and BPT5204 (local variety) rice varieties were chosen for the current study. Randomized controlled trials were performed for each variety on a control group (NC & BC) and 3 treatment groups with 20% (NT20 & BT20), 40% (NT40 & BT40), and 60% (NT60 & BT60) deficit water supplies respectively. N, T, C refers to seed type, treatment group, control group respectively. Intermittent drought condition was imposed for 14 days to assess the resilience of crops. The water retention capacity of the sandy loam soil was better for treatment groups by 20% than control groups even at an average temperature of 40 ℃. Treatment groups continued growing through the drought phase and after, while control groups showed stagnation. Among the tested treatment groups, NT20 had the highest growth among all trials. The results of the study suggested that hydrogel application can help to combat droughts and thereby contribute to sustainable agricultural production by restricting the involvement of climate changes

In vivo electrical conductivity imaging of animal tumor model at 7T using electrical properties tomography

Ex vivo studies have shown that various diseases alter the electrical properties of tissues compared to healthy nearby tissues. Therefore, electrical conductivity can be used as a diagnostic parameter for e.g. tumor diagnosis. For in vivo measurements, magnetic resonance electrical properties tomography (MREPT) was used and electrical conductivity was reconstructed from the B1+ phase. The technique was first evaluated using homogeneous and heterogeneous phantoms. Then a mouse with a tumor was scanned and the conductivity is reconstructed from the B1+ phase map. The reconstructed conductivity in the phantom experiments was in good agreement with the target conductivity map and the conductivity map of the animal revealed good agreement with the co-axial probe measurement. Our work confirms the possibility of accurate in vivo conductivity assessment in disease

High performance non-doped green organic light emitting diode via delayed fluorescence

P. G. thanks the Science & Engineering Research Board (SERB), India, for the Start-up Research Grant (SRG) (Grant No: SRG/2020/000161). E.Z-C. thanks the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) EP/P010482/1 for support. P. R. thanks the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) for generous financial support and the Science & Engineering Research Board (SERB), India, for the SERB-Power Grant (SPG) (Grant No: SPG/2020/000107). B.S. thank IISc for the C. V. Raman Fellowship under the Institute of Eminence (IoE).Non-doped, delayed fluorescence organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) provide a route to high performance devices and simplified device fabrication. Here, two ambipolar anthracene derivatives containing a hole-transporting di-p-tolylamine and a carbazole and an electron-transporting phosphine oxide moiety are rationally designed and synthesized. The thermal and optoelectronic properties were investigated and the neat films of these compounds show high photoluminescence quantum yields of 84–87%. Non-doped OLEDs with these luminogens exhibit green emission at ∼545 nm and an EQEmax of over 7.2% due to the delayed fluorescence resulting from triplet–triplet annihilation (TTA). The devices show a high luminance of over 104 400 cd m−2. Power efficiency and current efficiency maxima are up to 23.0 lm W−1 and 28.3 cd A−1, respectively. Moreover, the devices show very low efficiency roll-off and retain 90% of the maximum efficiency even at 20 000 cd m−2. When combined with a thermally activated delayed fluorescent (TADF) assistant dopant, the green-emitting OLEDs show a high EQEmax of 17.8%.PostprintPeer reviewe

Group Fuzzy Languages and its Generalizations

In fuzzy language theory, every monoid is the syntactic monoid of some fuzzy language. By using this result the properties of fuzzy language can be studied by the algebraic properties of the syntactic monoids. There are so many methods for studying fuzzy languages. We adopt the above method to analyze different class of fuzzy languages and also characterize certain varieties of fuzzy languages. In this paper we give the variety description of group fuzzy languages and also provide the Eilenberg variety theorem for the class of group fuzzy languages. Moreover we described a fuzzy language whose syntactic monoid is isomorphic to the group Zn

Circularly Polarised Hexagonal Patch Antenna With Polygonal Slot for RFID Applications

A compact single feed circularly polarized microstrip patch antenna for RFID applications is proposed. Antenna geometry includes a regular hexagon shaped patch with a polygonal slot embedded at the centre. The slot accounts for circular polarization and an area reduction of 22.5 %. It is fabricated on FR4 substrate with dielectric constant 4.4 and size 50 mm x 50 mm x 1.6 mm. The measured results include 10dB impedance bandwidth of 5.5 % at the center frequency of 2.42 GHz, a return loss of 32 dB, minimum axial ratio of 1.82 dB, axial ratio bandwidth of 7.5%, gain of 4.9 dBi with a broadside radiation characteristic for the RHCP antenna. These results are well in tune with the simulated results and the proposed design is suitable for RFID reader antenna applications

Design and calibration of a mm-wave personal exposure meter for 5G exposure assessment in indoor diffuse environments

For the first time, a mm-wave personal exposure meter (mm-PEM) for the 5th generation of mobile networks (5G) exposure assessment in indoor diffuse fields is presented. The design is based on simulations and on-phantom calibration measurements in a mm-wave reverberation chamber (RC) at 60 GHz. The mm-PEM consists of an array of nine antennas on the body. Using the mm-PEM, the incident power density (IPD) is measured in the unloaded RC, for the antenna(s) on the phantom and RC loaded with phantom. The uncertainty of the mm-PEM is then determined in terms of its response, which is defined as the ratio of antenna aperture for the above measurement scenarios. Using nine antennas, the designed meter has a response of 1.043 (0.17 dB) at 60 GHz, which is very close to 1 (0 dB), the desired ideal response value. The mm-PEM measured an IPD of 96.6 W m(-2) at 60 GHz in the RC, for an input power of 1 W. In addition, the average absorption cross-section of the phantom is determined as 225 cm(2), which is an excellent agreement with its physical dimensions

Mitigation of quorum sensing mediated virulence factors of Pseudomonas aeruginosa: the role of Meldrum’s acid activated furan

The rapid emergence of drug resistant pathogens is a major threat which has warranted the development of alternative strategies to combat infectious diseases. In this work, we have tested the anti-virulent activity of Meldrum’s acid activated furan (MAF) and 1,3-dimethyl barbituric acid activated furan (BAF) against Chromobacterium violaceum and Pseudomonas aeruginosa. It was found that MAF significantly reduced the violacein production and biofilm formation of C. violaceum at sub-inhibitory concentrations. The quorum sensing (QS) regulated virulence factors of P. aeruginosa including biofilm formation, motility, pigment production, and elastase activity were also found to be reduced considerably at sub-inhibitory concentrations of MAF. Additionally, MAF downregulated the expression of genes in the QS circuitry of P. aeruginosa, demonstrating the potential of MAF in lowering the pathogenicity of P. aeruginosa. In silico studies demonstrated the potential of MAF to compete with the signaling molecules of C. violaceum and P. aeruginosa for the QS receptor interaction. In vivo studies using Caenorhabditis elegans demonstrated the anti-pathogenicity of MAF by enhancing the survival of P. aeruginosa-infected C. elegans. These results suggest that activated furan compounds could be potential inhibitors of QS-mediated virulence factors in C. violaceum and P. aeruginosa, encouraging their use in combating multidrug-resistant pathogens