A comparison of the effectiveness of malignancy detection in body fluid examination by the cytopathology and hematology laboratories

BACKGROUND: Body fluid specimens in many institutions are submitted for cytologic examination as well as for examination in a clinical microscopy or hematology laboratory. The cytology laboratory is generally seen as the standard for detection of malignancy, whereas the clinical microscopy laboratory is often depended on predominantly for cell counting and categorization. METHODS: To analyze the effectiveness of the hematology laboratory at detecting malignant fluids, this study retrospectively analyzed reports on 397 body fluid specimens (cerebrospinal, pericardial, peritoneal, and pleural) that were concurrently submitted over a 12-month period to both the cytopathology laboratory and the hematology laboratory. RESULTS: Thirty-seven (9.3%) of the cases were diagnosed as malignant by at least one of the two examinations. The cytopathology examination reported 27 (73%) of the 37 malignant cases as malignant and 30 (81.1%) as at least atypical (27 malignant and 3 inconclusive), and the hematology examination reported 34 (91.9%) as malignant and 36 (97.3%) as at least atypical. A concordant malignant diagnosis was given by both laboratories in 24 (64.9%) of the 37 cases. CONCLUSIONS: These results show that examination of specimens by the hematology laboratory can provide a highly sensitive diagnostic evaluation in addition to its more customary role of providing timely cell counts.     

Estimation of monthly averaged direct normal solar radiation using elevation angle for any location

Light concentrators used in solar photovoltaic and solar thermal applications, and concentrates light by a factor of 10 or more, use only direct normal solar radiation, I_N. A new method, called elevation angle constant (EAC) method, is developed to determine the resource potential of I_N for different locations. This method is applicable to estimate the I_N at any location in the world. The EAC method is based on empirical relations. The method calculates the elevation angle constant (ε) for a given location and time. It uses readily available daily global and diffuse global radiation data to estimate the I_N. This is different from existing methods which invariably uses hourly global and diffuse radiation. The values of I_N are estimated for 12 locations across the world. The values of I_N obtained using the EAC method have been compared with values obtained using the model-based approach (Appendix-1). The comparison is also done with the measured values for some stations. Ninety percent of the estimated values of I_N using the EAC method for the stations like Angola, Egypt, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Brussels, Stuttgart, Ottawa, Birmingham, Los Angeles, Wellington, Perth and New Delhi are within ±5% of the values estimated by the model-based approach (Appendix-1).     

Heavy Water Additive in Formamidinium: A Novel Approach to Enhance Perovskite Solar Cell Efficiency

Heavy water or deuterium oxide (D₂O) comprises deuterium, a hydrogen isotope twice the mass of hydrogen. Contrary to the disadvantages of deuterated perovskites, such as shorter recombination lifetimes and lower/invariant efficiencies, the serendipitous effect of D₂O as a beneficial solvent additive for enhancing the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of triple-A cation (cesium (Cs)/methylammonium (MA)/formaminidium (FA)) perovskite solar cells from ≈19.2% (reference) to 20.8% (using 1 vol% D₂O) with higher stability is reported. Ultrafast optical spectroscopy confirms passivation of trap states, increased carrier recombination lifetimes, and enhanced charge carrier diffusion lengths in the deuterated samples. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and solid-state NMR spectroscopy validate the N–H₂ group as the preferential isotope exchange site. Furthermore, the NMR results reveal the induced alteration of the FA to MA ratio due to deuteration causes a widespread alteration to several dynamic processes that influence the photophysical properties. First-principles density functional theory calculations reveal a decrease in PbI₆ phonon frequencies in the deuterated perovskite lattice. This stabilizes the PbI₆ structures and weakens the electron–LO phonon (Fröhlich) coupling, yielding higher electron mobility. Importantly, these findings demonstrate that selective isotope exchange potentially opens new opportunities for tuning perovskite optoelectronic properties.     

Voltage assisted control of spin-transfer nano-oscillators

The spin-transfer nano-oscillator(STNO) has recently acquired a huge amount of research interest, due to its promising easy tunability along with the miniature size. The output frequency control of an STNO through magnetic field and current has been examined almost to its full extent; however, there are issues that still need to be addressed. Here, we propose a novel way of voltage control of the output frequency of an STNO, and alongside reducing its power requirement.     

PEC behaviour of mixed single crystals of tungsten sulphoselenide grown by a CVT technique

Photoelectrochemical (PEC) solar cells have been fabricated with single crystals of WS_xSe_2−x (0x2) grown by chemical vapour transport (CVT) technique. Energy band location and redox analysis of the material have been done using Mott–Schottky plots. These studies justify the selection of appropriate electrolyte for the PEC work. Various solar cells with single crystals of WSe₂, WS_0.5Se_1.5, WSSe, WS_1.5Se_0.5 and WS₂ as photoelectrodes have been prepared. The solar cell parameters e.g. the fill factor (FF), open circuit voltage (V_oc), short circuit current (I_sc) and efficiency (η) for all the different cells have been determined. In order to see the effect of increasing the concentration of selenium on the photoresponse, the electrolyte and the intensity of illumination was kept constant and all the samples of WS_xSe_2−x were prepared from crystals showing absolutely plane faces. The results have been thoroughly described and the implications have been discussed.     

Multi-objective optimization of vehicle crashworthiness using a new particle swarm based approach

Vehicle crashworthiness is an important issue to ensure passengers safety and reduce vehicle costs in the early design stage of vehicle design. The aim of the crashworthiness design is to provide an optimized structure that can absorb the crash energy by controlled vehicle deformations while maintaining enough space of the passenger compartment. Meta-modeling and optimization techniques have been used to reduce the vehicle design cycle. In this paper, a new particle swarm-based optimization method is presented for multi-objective optimization of vehicle crashworthiness. The proposed optimization method is first validated with a multi-objective disk brake problem taken from literature. Finally, it is applied to multi-objective crashworthiness optimization of a full vehicle model and milling optimization problems to demonstrate its effectiveness and validity.     

A comprehensive review on solar assisted cooling system

Due to increase in global warming, it is very essential to use the non-conventional source of energy in place of conventional sources of energy. Cooling is one of the most critical requirements for humankind. It also requires the traditional source. Hence there should be alternative is necessary to reduce it. Present review paper shows the comprehensive review of the solar assisted cooling system. It includes various research work done by researchers from all around the world on Solar Assisted cooling system. From the comprehensive review, it has been found that the solar assisted cooling system is essential in today’s world.     

Intercalibration of SUMER and CDS on SOHO. II. SUMER Detectors A and B and CDS NIS

Results of an intercalibration between the extreme-ultraviolet spectrometers Coronal Diagnostic Spectrometer (CDS) and Solar Ultraviolet Measurements of Emitted Radiation (SUMER) on board the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) are reported. The results of the joint observing program Intercal_01 are described, and intercalibration results up to July 2000 of both SUMER detectors A and B and of the CDS Normal Incidence Spectrometer (NIS) are presented. The instruments simultaneously observed radiance of emission lines at the center of the Sun, and three lines have been chosen for intercomparison: He i 584 A, Mg x 609 A, and Mg x 624 A. Initially the same area was observed by both instruments, but, after restrictions were imposed by the scanning mechanism of SUMER in November 1996, the instruments viewed areas of different sizes. Nevertheless, the temporal correlation between the two instruments remained good through June 1998, when contact with the SOHO spacecraft was lost. Until then the CDS instrument measured (33 ? 5)% and (38 ? 7)% (?1varsigma) higher intensity than SUMER in the He i 584-A line on average for detectors A and B, respectively. Data from SUMER detector B agreed well for Mg x 609 A and Mg x 624 A with the CDS intensities, showing offsets of (2 ? 10)% and (9 ? 15)%, much less than the data of detector A with offsets of (7 ? 8)% and (16 ? 7)% for the two lines, respectively, relative to CDS. Finally, the intercalibration measurements after the loss and recovery of the SOHO spacecraft are analyzed. The data for observations from November 1998 to July 2000 are compared, and it is shown that, although the responses of the instruments have changed, the CDS and the SUMER still perform well, and their temporal correlation is good.     

Anisotropic thermal expansion of stoichiometric lithium niobate crystals grown along the normal direction of facets

In this paper, a stoichiometric lithium niobate (SLN) crystal with the size up to 20 × 20 × 18 mm³ was grown along the normal direction of the (0 1 2) facet from the 16 mol% K₂O fluxed melt by the top-seeded solution growth method. The anisotropic thermal expansion of the SLN crystal and congruent lithium niobate (CLN) crystal was measured along different directions by using a Shimadzu thermomechanical analyzer. As compared with CLN, the SLN crystal exhibited slightly larger thermal expansion along the Z-axis and slightly smaller expansion along the X-axis. Both the SLN and CLN crystals showed strong anisotropy in the thermal expansion. The thermal expansion coefficient of SLN along the X-axis (16.7 × 10⁻⁶ °C⁻¹ at 300 °C) is much larger than that along the Z-axis (2.5 × 10⁻⁶ °C⁻¹ at 300 °C). Based on the experimental data and polynomial fitting results, we calculated the thermal expansion coefficients for different directions. In the case of growing the SLN crystal along the normal direction of (0 1 2) facet, we studied the radial anisotropic thermal expansion and discussed the cracking problem of the crystal according to its actual growth morphology. It is found that the cracks of SLN can be suppressed by growing the crystal along the W-axis due to its reduced radial anisotropy in the thermal expansion.