Symbiotic artificial immune system

Artificial Immune System algorithms use antibodies that fully specify the solution of an optimization, learning, or pattern recognition problem. By being restricted to fully specified antibodies, an AIS algorithm cannot make use of schemata or classes of partial solutions, while sub solutions can help a lot in faster emergence of a totally good solution in many problems. To exploit schemata in artificial immune systems, this paper presents a novel algorithm that combines traditional artificial immune systems and symbiotic combination operator. The algorithm starts searching with partially specified antibodies and gradually builds more and more specified solutions till it finds complete answers. The algorithm is compared with CLONALG algorithm on several multimodal function optimization and combinatorial optimization problems and it is shown that it is faster than CLONALG on most problems and can find solutions in problems that CLONALG totally fails.     

Effect of Ag‐NPs synthesised by Chamaemelum nobile extract on the inflammation and oxidative stress induced by carrageenan in mice paw

An environmentally friendly and rapid procedure was developed to synthesise silver nanoparticles (Ag‐NPs) by Chamaemelum nobile extract and to evaluate its in vivo anti‐inflammatory and antioxidant activities. The ultraviolet–visible absorption spectrum of the synthesised Ag‐NPs showed an absorbance peak at 422. The average size of spherical nanoparticles was 24 nm as revealed by transmission electron microscopy. Fourier transform infra‐red spectroscopy analysis supported the presence of biological active compounds involved in the reduction of Ag ion and X‐ray diffraction confirmed the crystalline structure of the metallic Ag. The anti‐inflammatory and antioxidant activity of the Ag‐NPs was investigated against carrageenan‐induced paw oedema in mice. The levels of malondialdehyde (MDA) and antioxidant enzymes superoxide dismutase, catalase, glutathione peroxidase and inflammatory cytokines tumour necrosis factor (TNF‐α), interferon gamma and interleukin (IL)‐6, IL‐1β were assessed in this respect. The results demonstrated that anti‐inflammatory activity of the Ag‐NPs might be due to the ability of the nanoparticles to reduce IL‐1β, IL‐6 and TNF‐α. Moreover, reduction of antioxidant enzymes along with an increase in MDA level shows that the anti‐inflammatory activity of the synthesised Ag‐NPs by C. nobile is attributed to its ameliorating effect on the oxidative damage.Inspec keywords: silver, nanoparticles, nanofabrication, ultraviolet spectra, visible spectra, particle size, transmission electron microscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectra, X‐ray diffraction, crystal structure, enzymes, molecular biophysics, tumours, biomedical materials, nanomedicineOther keywords: Chamaemelum nobile extract, oxidative stress, mice paw, silver nanoparticles, antiinflammatory activity, antioxidant activity, ultraviolet‐visible absorption spectrum, spherical nanoparticle size, transmission electron microscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, biological active compounds, X‐ray diffraction, crystalline structure, carrageenan‐induced paw oedema, malondialdehyde, antioxidant enzymes, superoxide dismutase, catalase, glutathione peroxidase, inflammatory cytokines, tumour necrosis factor, interferon gamma, interleukin, IL‐1β, IL‐6, TNF‐α, MDA level, Ag     

EEG‐based brain source localization using visual stimuli

Electroencephalography (EEG) is widely used in variety of research and clinical applications which includes the localization of active brain sources. Brain source localization provides useful information to understand the brain's behavior and cognitive analysis. Various source localization algorithms have been developed to determine the exact locations of the active brain sources due to which electromagnetic activity is generated in brain. These algorithms are based on digital filtering, 3D imaging, array signal processing and Bayesian approaches. According to the spatial resolution provided, the algorithms are categorized as either low resolution methods or high resolution methods. In this research study, EEG data is collected by providing visual stimulus to healthy subjects. FDM is used for head modelling to solve forward problem. The low‐resolution brain electromagnetic tomography (LORETA) and standardized LORETA (sLORETA) have been used as inverse modelling methods to localize the active regions in the brain during the stimulus provided. The results are produced in the form of MRI images. The tables are also provided to describe the intensity levels for estimated current level for the inverse methods used. The higher current value or intensity level shows the higher electromagnetic activity for a particular source at certain time instant. Thus, the results obtained demonstrate that standardized method which is based on second order Laplacian (sLORETA) in conjunction with finite difference method (FDM) as head modelling technique outperforms other methods in terms of source estimation as it has higher current level and thus, current density (J) for an area as compared to others.     

A short note on the effect of sample size on the estimation error in Cp

Process capability indices such as C_p are used extensively in manufacturing industries to assess processes in order to decide about purchasing. In practice, the parameter for calculating C_p is rarely known and is frequently replaced with estimates from an in-control reference sample. This article explores the optimal sample size required to achieve a desired error of estimation using absolute percentage error of different C_p estimates. Moreover, some practical tools are created to allow practitioners to find sample size in different situations.     

Surface characterization and biological properties of regular dentin,demineralized dentin,and deproteinized dentin

Bone autografts are often used for reconstruction of bone defects; however, due to the limitations of autografts, researchers have been in search of bone substitutes. Dentin is of particular interest for this purpose due to high similarity to bone. This in vitro study sought to assess the surface characteristics and biological properties of dentin samples prepared with different treatments. This study was conducted on regular (RD), demineralized (DemD), and deproteinized (DepD) dentin samples. X-ray diffraction and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy were used for surface characterization. Samples were immersed in simulated body fluid, and their bioactivity was evaluated under a scanning electron microscope. The methyl thiazol tetrazolium assay, scanning electron microscope analysis and quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction were performed, respectively to assess viability/proliferation, adhesion/morphology and osteoblast differentiation of cultured human dental pulp stem cells on dentin powders. Of the three dentin samples, DepD showed the highest and RD showed the lowest rate of formation and deposition of hydroxyapatite crystals. Although, the difference in superficial apatite was not significant among samples, functional groups on the surface, however, were more distinct on DepD. At four weeks, hydroxyapatite deposits were noted as needle-shaped accumulations on DemD sample and numerous hexagonal HA deposit masses were seen, covering the surface of DepD. The methyl thiazol tetrazolium, scanning electron microscope, and quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction analyses during the 10-day cell culture on dentin powders showed the highest cell adhesion and viability and rapid differentiation in DepD. Based on the parameters evaluated in this in vitro study, DepD showed high rate of formation/deposition of hydroxyapatite crystals and adhesion/viability/osteogenic differentiation of human dental pulp stem cells, which may support its osteoinductive/osteoconductive potential for bone regeneration.     

Intelligent Firefly Algorithm Deep Transfer Learning Based COVID-19 Monitoring System

With the increasing and rapid growth rate of COVID-19 cases, the healthcare scheme of several developed countries have reached the point of collapse. An important and critical steps in fighting against COVID-19 is powerful screening of diseased patients, in such a way that positive patient can be treated and isolated. A chest radiology image-based diagnosis scheme might have several benefits over traditional approach. The accomplishment of artificial intelligence (AI) based techniques in automated diagnoses in the healthcare sector and rapid increase in COVID-19 cases have demanded the requirement of AI based automated diagnosis and recognition systems. This study develops an Intelligent Firefly Algorithm Deep Transfer Learning Based COVID-19 Monitoring System (IFFA-DTLMS). The proposed IFFA-DTLMS model majorly aims at identifying and categorizing the occurrence of COVID19 on chest radiographs. To attain this, the presented IFFA-DTLMS model primarily applies densely connected networks (DenseNet121) model to generate a collection of feature vectors. In addition, the firefly algorithm (FFA) is applied for the hyper parameter optimization of DenseNet121 model. Moreover, autoencoder-long short term memory (AE-LSTM) model is exploited for the classification and identification of COVID19. For ensuring the enhanced performance of the IFFA-DTLMS model, a wide-ranging experiments were performed and the results are reviewed under distinctive aspects. The experimental value reports the betterment of IFFA-DTLMS model over recent approaches.     

Infrared Spectroscopy-Based Chemometric Analysis for Lard Differentiation in Meat Samples

One of the most pressing concerns for the consumer market is the detection of adulteration in meat products due to their preciousness. The rapid and accurate identification mechanism for lard adulteration in meat products is highly necessary, for developing a mechanism trusted by consumers and that can be used to make a definitive diagnosis. Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) is used in this work to identify lard adulteration in cow, lamb, and chicken samples. A simplified extraction method was implied to obtain the lipids from pure and adulterated meat. Adulterated samples were obtained by mixing lard with chicken, lamb, and beef with different concentrations (10%–50% v/v). Principal component analysis (PCA) and partial least square (PLS) were used to develop a calibration model at 800–3500 cm⁻¹. Three-dimension PCA was successfully used by dividing the spectrum in three regions to classify lard meat adulteration in chicken, lamb, and beef samples. The corresponding FTIR peaks for the lard have been observed at 1159.6, 1743.4, 2853.1, and 2922.5 cm⁻¹, which differentiate chicken, lamb, and beef samples. The wavenumbers offer the highest determination coefficient R² value of 0.846 and lowest root mean square error of calibration (RMSEC) and root mean square error prediction (RMSEP) with an accuracy of 84.6%. Even the tiniest fat adulteration up to 10% can be reliably discovered using this methodology.