A new dosage regimen for topical application of ciprofloxacin in the management of chronic suppurative otitis media

The clinical and bacteriologic efficacy of topically applied ciprofloxacin was studied in 60 patients with chronic suppurative otitis media. Two hundred fifty and 125 microg/ml concentrations of ciprofloxacin solutions were given to two groups of patients. The duration of therapy was determined according to the clinical cure at follow-up. More than 21 days of therapy was not needed in any patient. The clinical cure rate with 250 microg/ml ciprofloxacin was 78.1% at 14 days and with 125 microg/ml it was 83.3%. However, a 100% clinical cure rate and complete bacteriologic eradication was obtained in 21 days in both groups. In each group only one patient had otomycosis by the fourteenth day of therapy, although ear discharge had ceased. It was concluded that 125 microg/ml ciprofloxacin could be applied as successfully as 250 microg/ml, and the duration of therapy had to be at least 14 days. This new dosage regimen can be adopted as an optimal dosage for ototopical application of ciprofloxacin in chronic suppurative otitis media. It will also obviously decrease the expense of therapy.     

Normalized Efficient Routing Protocol for WSN

WSNs （wireless sensor networks） consist of thousands of tiny nodes having the capability of sensing, computation, and wireless communications. Unfortunately these devices are limited energy devices, that is means we must save energy as much as possible, to increase network life time as long as possible. In this paper we introduce NEER--normalized energy efficient routing protocol that increases network life time through switching between AODV protocol that depends on request-reply routing, and MRPC that depends on residual battery in routing.     

UV-visible technique for studying powder coatings and their dissolution

UV-Visible (UVV) technique used to monitor powder coating and its dissolution processes from hard latex particles. Three sets of latex coatings were prepared from poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) particles. The first set of coatings was annealed at elevated temperatures in various time intervals during which reflected photon intensity, I_rf, was measured. The second set of coatings was annealed at various temperatures in 10 min time intervals during which transmitted intensity, I_tr, was measured. I_rf first decreased and then increased as the annealing temperature was increased. Decrease in I_rf was explained with the void closure mechanism due to viscous flow. Increase in I_tr and I_rf against time and temperature were attributed to an increase in crossing density at the junction surface. The activation energy of viscous flow, ΔH, was measured and found to be around 8 kcal/mol and the back and forth activation energies (ΔE_rf and ΔE_tr) were measured and found to be around 49 and 53 kcal/mol for a reptating polymer chain across the junction surface. Diffusion of solvent molecules (chloroform) into the annealed latex coatings was followed by desorption of PMMA chains for the third set of films. Desorption of pyrene, P, labeled PMMA chains was monitored in real-time by the absorbance change of pyrene in the polymer-solvent mixture. A diffusion model with a moving boundary was employed to quantify real-time UVV data. Diffusion coefficients of desorbed PMMA chains were measured and found to be between 2 and 0.6 × 10⁻¹¹ cm² s⁻¹ in the 100 and 275°C temperature range. Presented at the 2000 Spring Meeting of the PMSE Div. of the American Chemical Society, March 26–30, 2000, San Francisco, CA. Dept. of Physics, Maslak 80626 Istanbul, Turkey. Dept. of Physics, 22030 Edirne, Turkey.     

Synthesis and Characterization of Poly(vinyl alcohol)/Poly(vinyl pyrrolidone)-Iodine Nanofibers with Poloxamer 188 and Chitosan

This study focuses on the fabrication of poly(vinyl alcohol)/ poly(vinyl pyrrolidone)-Iodine nanofibers via electrospinning. Electrospun fibers were characterized by FT-IR, DSC and SEM techniques. DSC results indicated that the thermal stability of nanofibers were improved after the addition of chitosan and poloxamer 188. SEM images showed that the spongiform structure is much more compact and fibrous in the case of added chitosan, with an average fiber diameter of 374 nm, whereas the addition of poloxamer 188 resulted in a more porous and beaded composition, with average fiber diameter of 489 nm.     

Some Surface Properties of Polysorbates and Cetyl Trimethyl Ammonium Bromine Mixed Systems

Mixed surfactant solutions consisting of cationic/nonionic surfactants were prepared in different compositions of the components in aqueous solution in order to determine the surface properties. The critical micelle concentration (CMC) of aqueous solutions of the individual surfactants cetyl trimethyl ammonium bromide (CTAB) and polysorbate nonionics, and their mixtures are determined at different proportions. The results show that there is synergistic behavior in mixtures at higher mole fraction of nonionic surfactant. The effect of the alkyl chain on the CMC is also determined.     

Multiplierless Realization of Linear DSP Transforms by Using Common Two-Term Expressions

Recently, most DSP systems have used multirate signal processing techniques or transforms for reducing computational complexity without compromising the system quality. In these techniques, realizing each constant separately is a redundant process as some constants appear more than once, and increases area and power consumption of the system. This paper introduces the concept of handling all coefficients in the system at the same time. To do this, the two-term expressions of constants in a system for adder and shifter minimization is presented.     

Hierarchical finite state machines for autonomous mobile systems

This paper proposes a system architecture, related design approaches for autonomous mobile systems and guidelines for self-sufficient autonomy. Development of a tiered layout for a hybrid-state control in a series of stages as well as the integration of such a controller in the overall autonomy structure are proposed and demonstrated as part of multiple examples, including The Ohio State University participation in DARPA Urban Challenge 2007. The hierarchical layout and the iterative design methodology enable a certain level of design flexibility for the overall system and preparation for various contingencies, as illustrated on specific development cycles.     

Complementary techniques for the characterization of thin film Ti/Nb multilayers

An aberration corrector on the probe-forming lens of a scanning TEM (STEM) equipped with an electron energy-loss spectrometer (EELS) and X-ray energy-dispersive spectrometer (XEDS) has been employed to investigate the compositional variations as a function of length scale in nanoscale Ti/Nb metallic multilayers. The composition profiles of EELS and XEDS were compared with the profiles obtained from the complementary technique of 3D atom probe tomography. At large layer widths (h≥7 nm, where h is the layer width) of Ti and Nb, XEDS composition profiles of Ti/Nb metallic multilayers are in good agreement with the EELS results. However, at reduced layer widths (h≈2 nm), profiles of EELS and atom probe exhibited similar compositional variations, whereas XEDS results have shown a marked difference. This difference in the composition profiling of the layers has been addressed with reference to the effects of beam broadening and the origin of the signals collected in these techniques. The advantage of using EELS over XEDS for these nanoscaled multilayered materials is demonstrated.     

Numerical simulation of solidification kinetics in A356/SiCp composites for assessment of as-cast particle distribution

The present work is aimed at studying the effect of solidification rate on reinforcement clustering in particle reinforced metal matrix composites (PMMCs) through numerical simulations and experimental studies. A macrotransport-solidification kinetics (MTSK) model was used to simulate the solidification kinetics of the PMMCs. The experimental validation of the numerical model was achieved through the Newtonian and Fourier thermal analysis methods. Results reveal that the MTSK model can be successfully used to predict the local microstructural scales and to evaluate the risk of cluster formation in cast particle reinforced composites.