Surgery for primary hyperparathyroidism 1962-1996: indications and outcomes

Twenty-two cases of ameloblastoma and ten cases of adenomatoid odontogenic tumour (AOT) were analyzed comparatively by the AgNOR technique. Ameloblastomas were distributed into three groups according to their clinical behaviour: primary lesions without recurrences (PLWTR), 5 cases; primary lesions with recurrences (PLWR), 4 cases; and recurrences, 13 cases. The cases were also regrouped according to their histological pattern: follicular (9 cases), plexiform (7 cases), acanthomatous (4 cases) and unicystic (2 cases). Considering histological patterns, there was a significant statistical difference only between follicular and plexiform types. There were no significant differences between the group of ameloblastomas and the group of AOTs or between the three groups of ameloblastomas with different clinical behaviour. Our results strongly suggest that the distinct clinical behaviour of ameloblastomas and AOT is not correlated with their cellular proliferation ratio. Thus, the infiltrative ability of the ameloblastomas is probably not related to the cellular proliferation index of these tumours.     

Applications,databases and open computer vision research from drone videos and images: a survey

Analyzing videos and images captured by unmanned aerial vehicles or aerial drones is an emerging application attracting significant attention from researchers in various areas of computer vision. Currently, the major challenge is the development of autonomous operations to complete missions and replace human operators. In this paper, based on the type of analyzing videos and images captured by drones in computer vision, we have reviewed these applications by categorizing them into three groups. The first group is related to remote sensing with challenges such as camera calibration, image matching, and aerial triangulation. The second group is related to drone-autonomous navigation, in which computer vision methods are designed to explore challenges such as flight control, visual localization and mapping, and target tracking and obstacle detection. The third group is dedicated to using images and videos captured by drones in various applications, such as surveillance, agriculture and forestry, animal detection, disaster detection, and face recognition. Since most of the computer vision methods related to the three categories have been designed for real-world conditions, providing real conditions based on drones is impossible. We aim to explore papers that provide a database for these purposes. In the first two groups, some survey papers presented are current. However, the surveys have not been aimed at exploring any databases. This paper presents a complete review of databases in the first two groups and works that used the databases to apply their methods. Vision-based intelligent applications and their databases are explored in the third group, and we discuss open problems and avenues for future research.

     

Finite-time coordination in multiagent systems using sliding mode control approach

Finite-time stability in dynamical systems theory involves systems whose trajectories converge to an equilibrium state in finite time. In this paper, we use the notion of finite-time stability to apply it to the problem of coordinated motion in multiagent systems. Specifically, we consider a group of agents described by fully actuated Euler–Lagrange dynamics along with a leader agent with an objective to reach and maintain a desired formation characterized by steady-state distances between the neighboring agents in finite time. We use graph theoretic notions to characterize communication topology in the network determined by the information flow directions and captured by the graph Laplacian matrix. Furthermore, using sliding mode control approach, we design decentralized control inputs for individual agents that use only data from the neighboring agents which directly communicate their state information to the current agent in order to drive the current agent to the desired steady state. Sliding mode control is known to drive the system states to the sliding surface in finite time. The key feature of our approach is in the design of non-smooth sliding surfaces such that, while on the sliding surface, the error states converge to the origin in finite time, thus ensuring finite-time coordination among the agents in the network. In addition, we discuss the case of switching communication topologies in multiagent systems. Finally, we show the efficacy of our theoretical results using an example of a multiagent system involving planar double integrator agents.     

Accelerated iterative methods for finding solutions of nonlinear equations and their dynamical behavior

In this paper, we present a family of optimal, in the sense of Kung–Traub’s conjecture, iterative methods for solving nonlinear equations with eighth-order convergence. Our methods are based on Chun’s fourth-order method. We use the Ostrowski’s efficiency index and several numerical tests in order to compare the new methods with other known eighth-order ones. We also extend this comparison to the dynamical study of the different methods.     

Robust Fault Diagnosis for Quadrotor UAVs Using Adaptive Thau Observer

A robust Fault Diagnosis (FD) scheme for a real quadrotor Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) is proposed in this paper. Firstly, a novel Adaptive Thau observer (ATO) is developed to estimate the quadrotor system states and build a set of offset residuals to indicate actuators’ faults. Based on these residuals, some rules of Fault Diagnosis (FD) are designed to detect and isolate the faults as well as estimate the fault offset parameters. Secondly, a synthetic robust optimization scheme is presented to improve Fault Estimation (FE) accuracies, three key issues include modeling uncertainties, and magnitude order unbalances as well as noises are addressed. Finally, a typical fault of rotors is simulated and injected into one of four rotors of the quadrotor, and experiments for the FD scheme have been carried out. Unlike former research works on the FD schemes for quadrotors, our proposed FD scheme based on the ATO can not only detect and isolate the failed actuators, but also estimate the fault severities. Regardless of roughness of the real flying data, the FD results still have sufficient FE accuracies.     

Synthesis and characterization of hydrophilic nanocomposite coating on glass substrate

Hydrophilic coatings based on 3‐glicidoxy propyl trimethoxy silane (GPTMS) and polyethylene glycol (PEG) were prepared with the incorporation of tetramethoxysilane (TMOS) and silica nanoparticle colloidal suspension by a sol–gel process. Characterization of the coatings has been performed by Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) and Attenuated Total Reflectance Infrared (ATR‐IR) techniques. Morphological properties were characterized by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). The distribution of Si atoms in the hybrid system was obtained by Si mapping. The particle size in sol solution of the coating was measured by light scattering analyzer. Optical properties were characterized by using UV–vis spectrophotometer. The hydrophilicity of the coating was determined by contact angle measurements, and also the results have been confirmed by surface energy and water uptake investigations. The obtained results indicate that the surfactants affected the contact angles remarkably but did not change the transparency. It has been found that applying silica nano particles leads to coatings with different properties than those using TMOS, while siloxane contents were the same in these two set of coatings. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 102: 5322–5329, 2006     

Analysis of two authorization protocols using Colored Petri Nets

To prevent unauthorized access to protected trusted platform module (TPM) objects, authorization protocols, such as the object-specific authorization protocol (OSAP), have been introduced by the trusted computing group (TCG). By using OSAP, processes trying to gain access to the protected TPM objects need to prove their knowledge of relevant authorization data before access to the objects can be granted. Chen and Ryan’s 2009 analysis has demonstrated OSAP’s authentication vulnerability in sessions with shared authorization data. They also proposed the Session Key Authorization Protocol (SKAP) with fewer stages as an alternative to OSAP. Chen and Ryan’s analysis of SKAP using ProVerif proves the authentication property. The purpose of this paper was to examine the usefulness of Colored Petri Nets (CPN) and CPN Tools for security analysis. Using OSAP and SKAP as case studies, we construct intruder and authentication property models in CPN. CPN Tools is used to verify the authentication property using a Dolev–Yao-based model. Verification of the authentication property in both models using the state space tool produces results consistent with those of Chen and Ryan.     

Amplitudes distribution over two copies of small quantum subsystems

We propose a new formulation of quantum algorithm which allows to distribute amplitudes over two copies of small quantum subsystems. The new method gives a fixed number of copies and applied to the control of multi-qubit system. The analysis for the amount of error due to the distribution process has been presented for a system of 10 qubits with a small quantum subsystems to be copied. The present scheme provides a new way to distribute amplitudes over small quantum subsystems.     

Homotopy perturbation method for motion of a spherical solid particle in plane couette fluid flow

He’s homotopy perturbation method is applied to obtain exact analytical solutions for the motion of a spherical particle in a plane couette flow. It is demonstrated that the applied analytical method is very straightforward in comparison with existing techniques. Furthermore, it is decidedly effectual in terms of accuracy and rapid convergence. The formulation of the problem is presented in the text as well as the analytical and numerical procedures. The current results can be used in different areas of particulate flows.