Detecting Small Anatomical Structures in 3D Knee MRI Segmentation by Fully Convolutional Networks

Accurately identifying the pixels of small organs or lesions from magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has a critical impact on clinical diagnosis. U-net is the most well-known and commonly used neural network for image segmentation. However, the small anatomical structures in medical images cannot be well recognised by U-net. This paper explores the performance of the U-net architectures in knee MRI segmentation to find a relative structure that can obtain high accuracies for both small and large anatomical structures. To maximise the utilities of U-net architecture, we apply three types of components, residual blocks, squeeze-and-excitation (SE) blocks, and dense blocks, to construct four variants of U-net, namely U-net variants. Among these variants, our experiments show that SE blocks can improve the segmentation accuracies of small labels. We adopt DeepLabv3plus architecture for 3D medical image segmentation by equipping SE blocks based on this discovery. The experimental results show that U-net with SE block achieves higher accuracy in parts of small anatomical structures. In contrast, DeepLabv3plus with SE block performs better on the average dice coefficient of small and large labels.

Innovative Look at the ‘General Method’ of Assessing Buckling Resistance of Steel Structures

Stability checking is an essential element of the dimensioning of steel frame structures. One of the stability checking methods allowed by EN 1993-1-1 is the so-called general method of assessing structural stability, based on buckling curves and relative structure slenderness λ ¯ op {\bar \lambda _{op}} usually determined through numerical analyses. But this method is not widely used because of the limited computing capabilities of the engineering programs dedicated to static load analyses and difficulties in interpreting the results of the computations. The commonly used computer programs enable one to determine the shape of buckling and critical load amplifier αcr , from which one cannot directly determine the risk of buckling of a real structure. This paper presents a modified and innovative approach to the general method of assessing structural stability, which uses only three parameters, that is, the type of cross section, cross-section strength utilisation and αcr , to determine a member’s/structure’s bearing capacity mobilisation from the stability condition. The problem solution is presented in the form of simple formulas and legible diagrams. Finally, synthetic conclusions are formulated.

Assessing Customer Satisfaction: A Case in Logistics Service Company

This study aims to assess customer satisfaction of a logistics service company in Indonesia. Several researches employed the classical importance-performance analysis (IPA) to accomplish the objective; instead, this research used importance performance competitor analysis (IPCA). IPCA is considered as a remedy for IPA since the later has been criticized for several reasons, e.g., the relative structure of IPA and its lack of competitors’ consideration. A case study has been conducted to show the applicability of IPCA. Result shows that several service attributes have to be improved since they have lower performance than the competitor. Recommendations that can be done as a part to continuous improvement were provided. Finally, we also show that using IPA—without considering the competitor—would bring the management to a misleading interpretation. Keywords—Customer satisfaction; importance performance competitor analysis; logistics service

Isolation and structural elucidation of novel fusicoccan dehydroxypericonicin A from Roussoella sp.

A potent antifungal fusicoccane dehydroxypericonicin A (1) was isolated from Roussoella sp. along with known allantofuranone (2). The relative structure of 1 was fully elucidated by NMR spectroscopic manner. The suggested relative structure was confirmed by DFT (density functional theory)-based 13C NMR chemical shift calculations. The absolute configuration was investigated by a spectral comparison of the experimental ECD (electronic circular dichroism) spectrum with that based on the DFT calculations.

Deep Segmentation of Point Clouds of Wheat

The 3D analysis of plants has become increasingly effective in modeling the relative structure of organs and other traits of interest. In this paper, we introduce a novel pattern-based deep neural network, Pattern-Net, for segmentation of point clouds of wheat. This study is the first to segment the point clouds of wheat into defined organs and to analyse their traits directly in 3D space. Point clouds have no regular grid and thus their segmentation is challenging. Pattern-Net creates a dynamic link among neighbors to seek stable patterns from a 3D point set across several levels of abstraction using the K-nearest neighbor algorithm. To this end, different layers are connected to each other to create complex patterns from the simple ones, strengthen dynamic link propagation, alleviate the vanishing-gradient problem, encourage link reuse and substantially reduce the number of parameters. The proposed deep network is capable of analysing and decomposing unstructured complex point clouds into semantically meaningful parts. Experiments on a wheat dataset verify the effectiveness of our approach for segmentation of wheat in 3D space.

Overwintering Honey Bee Colonies: Effect of Worker Age and Climate on the Hindgut Microbiota

Honey bee overwintering health is essential to meet the demands of spring pollination. Managed honey bee colonies are overwintered in a variety of climates, and increasing rates of winter colony loss have prompted investigations into overwintering management, including indoor climate controlled overwintering. Central to colony health, the worker hindgut gut microbiota has been largely ignored in this context. We sequenced the hindgut microbiota of overwintering workers from both a warm southern climate and controlled indoor cold climate. Congruently, we sampled a cohort of known chronological age to estimate worker longevity in southern climates, and assess age-associated changes in the core hindgut microbiota. We found that worker longevity over winter in southern climates was much lower than that recorded for northern climates. Workers showed decreased bacterial and fungal load with age, but the relative structure of the core hindgut microbiome remained stable. Compared to cold indoor wintering, collective microbiota changes in the southern outdoor climate suggest compromised host physiology. Fungal abundance increased by two orders of magnitude in southern climate hindguts and was positively correlated with non-core, likely opportunistic bacteria. Our results contribute to understanding overwintering honey bee biology and microbial ecology and provide insight into overwintering strategies.

Headless Relative Clauses in Ch'ol

This chapter surveys headless relative clauses in Ch’ol, a Mayan language spoken in the state of Chiapas in southern Mexico. Ch’ol is rare among Mayan languages in possessing a special morpheme found with relativized nouns, the second position clitic = bä. While this morpheme is required for relativized argument nouns, it is not present in free relatives, which suggests a different derivation for this class of construction. Maximal (definite) and existential (indefinite) free relatives are described. They both make use of a fronted wh-expression and lack the morpheme = bä. Maximal and existential free relatives in Ch’ol appear identical to one another in structure. Following existing studies on other languages, it is argued that the different interpretations of these clauses are a result of the environments in which they appear. Finally, Ch’ol has two different types of constructions in which a determiner element is followed by a headless relative: one corresponding to the = bä structure and one corresponding to the free relative structure. The former is proposed to be a regular headed relative clause with an unpronounced head, as has elsewhere been argued for Yucatec. The latter, on the other hand, corresponds to a free relative structure with an added determiner element.

Charts for the mining-induced deflection of buildings

This study investigates the flexural deformations of buildings induced by mining-related subsidence. A two-stage solution (previously applied to the tunnelling problem) is used. Buildings are modelled as a beam founded on an elastic continuum that is subjected to ground subsidence. A tensionless soil–structure interface is employed. The effects of both building stiffness and self-weight on the building deflection are considered. The proposed formulation is compared with analytical solutions and empirical envelopes from previous research. A parametric study is conducted for both perfect soil–foundation bond and gap formation to relate deflection ratio modification factors and the limit radius of the greenfield settlement curve (associated with the gap formation) to relative structure–soil stiffness, building weight, foundation shape, and greenfield ground curvature (hogging or sagging) by means of dimensionless groups. Finally, a simple case study is used to demonstrate the proposed procedure. The given framework is more comprehensive than design charts provided by previous mining-related works and can be used for rapid preliminary risk assessment.

Isolation of Lasiodiplodin and Evaluation of some Biological Activities of the Stem Barks of Phyllanthus Albizzioides (Kurz) Hook.f.

A large number of the plants are claimed to possess the antibiotic properties in the traditional system and are also used extensively by the tribal people throughout the world. It is now mostly thought that nature has given the cure of every disease in one form or another. Plants have been known to cure people from various diseases in Ayurveda. This research focused on the screening of phytochemicals and some biological activities of Phyllanthus albizzioides. The research showed that the ethanol extracts were found to be greater chemical constituents than watery extracts. Among the chemical constituents, steroid compounds were observed in highest amount in ethanol extract and the second highest in flavonoid compounds followed by tannin compounds and pheolic compounds. Furthermore, the ethanol extracts were more effective than the watery extracts in all tested biological activities such as antioxidant, anti-diabetic, cytotoxicity, antimicrobial, antitumor and NO inhibition activities. A cyclohexanone compound was isolated from the chloroform extract of the stem bark of P. albizzioides. The relative structure was determined to be 4,5-dihydroxy-3-methyl-cyclohex-2-enone on the basic of HRESIMS, 1H NMR and 13C NMR spectroscopic analyses, including 2D NMR experiments.