Isolated hepatic tuberculosis mimicking liver tumors in a dialysis patient

Cases of isolated hepatic tuberculosis (TB) are rare. The diagnosis is often delayed or missed because of nonspecific symptoms and laboratory findings. Besides, the disease is extremely rare even in a country where TB is an alarming public health problem. This report demonstrates the difficulty in correctly diagnosing local hepatic TB. We report the case of a 62‐year‐old male patient with end‐stage renal disease treated with hemodialysis, who developed 2 months of abdominal distension and general anorexia, with hyperechoic hepatic lesions on ultrasound. Computed tomography suspected multiple liver tumors. The liver biopsy finally led to the diagnosis of TB of the liver without other involvements. We conclude that isolated hepatic TB is one of the rare forms of extrapulmonary TB in dialysis patients. A greater awareness of this rare clinical entity may prevent needless surgical interventions.     

Algorithmic Fairness in Mortgage Lending: from Absolute Conditions to Relational Trade-offs

Minds and Machines - To address the rising concern that algorithmic decision-making may reinforce discriminatory biases, researchers have proposed many notions of fairness and corresponding...     

A dual-mode bandpass filter with enhanced capacitive perturbation

A dual-mode ring bandpass filter with two pairs of capacitors has been designed. The capacitors are used to control the location of the even- and odd-mode frequencies independently, allowing weak coupling for narrow-band filter design with realizable capacitance values. Theoretical expressions have been derived for these frequencies. A 4% bandwidth bandpass filter centered at 1.9 GHz was designed and tested with good agreement between theoretical and measured results.     

Equivalent circuit model of on-wafer CMOS interconnects for RFICs

This paper investigates the properties of the on-wafer interconnects built in a 0.18-/spl mu/m CMOS technology for RF applications. A scalable equivalent circuit model is developed. The model parameters are extracted directly from the on-wafer measurements and formulated into empirical expressions. The expressions are in functions of the length and the width of the interconnects. The proposed model can be easily implemented into commercial RF circuit simulators. It provides a novel solution to include the frequency-variant characteristics into a circuit simulation. The silicon-verified accuracy is proved to be up to 25 GHz with an average error less than 2%. Additionally, equivalent circuit model for longer wires can be obtained by cascading smaller subsections together. The scalability of the propose model is demonstrated.     

Big-Fish--Little-Pond effect on academic self-concept: A cross-cultural (26-country) test of the negative effects of academically selective schools.

Academically selective schools are intended to affect academic self-concept positively, but theoretical and empirical research demonstrates that the effects are negative. The big-fish--little-pond effect (BFLPE), an application of social comparison theory to educational settings, posits that a student will have a lower academic self-concept in an academically selective school than in a nonselective school. This study, the largest cross-cultural study of the BFLPE ever undertaken, tested theoretical predictions for nationally representative samples of approximately 4,000 15-year-olds from each of 26 countries (N=103,558) who completed the same self-concept instrument and achievement tests. Consistent with the BFLPE, the effects of school-average achievement were negative in all 26 countries (M beta=-.20, SD=.08), demonstrating the BFLPE's cross-cultural generalizability. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

On inversive maximal period polynomials over finite fields

Over finite field GF(q) withq a power of an odd primep, we characterize inversive maximal period polynomials in terms of polynomials of orderq + 1, and then we study some properties of polynomials of orderq + 1.This paper was written while the author was visiting the Institute of Information Processing, Austrian Academy of Sciences, AustriaThe author would like to thank the Institute of Information Processing, Austrian Academy of Sciences, Austria, for its hospitality and for using its facilities     

Effect of leukocyte depletion on preservation of erythrocyte and platelet concentrates

PURPOSE: To determine the efficacy, dose-response relationship, and safety of 30, 60, and 90 mg of a single intravenous dose of an aminobisphosphonate, pamidronate (APD), for the treatment of moderate to severe hypercalcemia of malignancy. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Patients with histologically proven cancer and a corrected serum calcium level of at least 12.0 mg/dL after 48 hours of normal saline hydration were enrolled in a double-blind, multicenter, randomized clinical trial. Pamidronate in 30-, 60-, or 90-mg doses was administered as a single 24-hour infusion. Serum calcium corrected for albumin, urine hydroxyproline, and calcium excretion, and serum parathyroid hormone (PTH) (1-84) were determined before and after pamidronate therapy. RESULTS: Thirty-two men and 18 women entered the study. A dose-response relationship for normalization of corrected serum calcium was seen after pamidronate administration. Corrected serum calcium normalized in 40% of patients who received 30 mg, in 61% of patients who received 60 mg, and in 100% of patients who received 90 mg of pamidronate. The decline in the serum calcium level was associated with decreased osteoclastic skeletal resorption evidenced by a decrease in urine calcium and hydroxyproline excretion. Among those with a normalized corrected serum calcium level, the mean (median) duration of normalization of the corrected serum calcium value was 9.2 (4), 13.3 (5), and 10.8 (6) days in the 30-, 60-, and 90-mg treatment groups, respectively. The response of hypercalcemia to pamidronate was not significantly influenced by the presence of skeletal metastases. PTH 1-84, suppressed in patients on entry into this study, increased to a greater extent in those patients with osteolytic skeletal metastases compared with those with humoral hypercalcemia of malignancy. Clinical improvement, including improved mental status and decreased anorexia, accompanied the decline in the corrected serum calcium level in all three treatment groups. Side effects included low-grade fever, asymptomatic hypocalcemia, hypomagnesemia, and hypophosphatemia. CONCLUSIONS: A single-dose infusion of 60 to 90 mg of pamidronate was highly effective and well tolerated and normalized corrected serum calcium in nearly all patients (61% to 100%) with hypercalcemia of malignancy.     

Mathematical model and optimization of drying process for a through-circulation dryer

A mathematical model of a through-circulation dryer is proposed. This model approximates the drying time of constantrate drying and fallingrate drying processes. Based on the proposed model, the optimal drying conditions of maximizing the drying production rate in a continuous through-circulation dryer are obtained. The drying production rate, in terms of the independent operating variables, is a nonlinear objective function, and is optimized under the nonlinear inequality constraint functions by a differential algorithm.     

Surface reconstruction techniques: a review

Surface reconstruction means that retrieve the data by scanning an object using a device such as laser scanner and construct it using the computer to gain back the soft copy of data on that particular object. It is a reverse process and is very useful especially when that particular object original data is missing without doing any backup. Hence, by doing so, the data can be recollected and can be stored for future purposes. The type of data can be in the form of structure or unstructured points. The accuracy of the reconstructed result should be concerned because if the result is incorrect, hence it will not exactly same like the original shape of the object. Therefore, suitable methods should be chosen based on the data used. Soft computing methods also have been used in the reconstruction field. This papers highlights the previous researches and methods that has been used in the surface reconstruction field.