Nowadays, the growing computational capabilities of Cloud systems rely on the reduction of the consumed power of their data centers to make them sustainable and economically profitable. The efficient ...management of computing resources is at the heart of any energy-aware data center and of special relevance is the adaptation of its performance to workload. Intensive computing applications in diverse areas of science generate complex workload called workflows, whose successful management in terms of energy saving is still at its beginning. WorkflowSim is currently one of the most advanced simulators for research on workflows processing, offering advanced features such as task clustering and failure policies. In this work, an expected power-aware extension of WorkflowSim is presented. This new tool integrates a power model based on a computing-plus-communication design to allow the optimization of new management strategies in energy saving considering computing, reconfiguration and networks costs as well as quality of service, and it incorporates the preeminent strategy for on host energy saving: Dynamic Voltage Frequency Scaling (DVFS). The simulator is designed to be consistent in different real scenarios and to include a wide repertory of DVFS governors. Results showing the validity of the simulator in terms of resources utilization, frequency and voltage scaling, power, energy and time saving are presented. Also, results achieved by the intra-host DVFS strategy with different governors are compared to those of the data center using a recent and successful DVFS-based inter-host scheduling strategy as overlapped mechanism to the DVFS intra-host technique.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Docker containers are the lightweight-virtualization technology prevailing today for the provision of microservices. This work raises and discusses two main challenges in Docker containers' ...scheduling in cloud-fog-internet of things (IoT) networks. First, the convenience to integrate intelligent containers' schedulers based on soft-computing in the dominant open-source containers' management platforms: Docker Swarm, Google Kubernetes and Apache Mesos. Secondly, the need for specific intelligent containers' schedulers for the different interfaces in cloud-fog-IoT networks: cloud-to-fog, fog-to-IoT and cloud-to-fog. The goal of this work is to support the optimal allocation of microservices provided by the main cloud service providers today and used by millions of users worldwide in applications such as smart health, content delivery networks, smart health, etc. Particularly, the improvement is studied in terms of quality of service (QoS) parameters such as latency, load balance, energy consumption and runtime, based on the analysis of previous works and implementations. Moreover, the scientific-technical impact of smart containers' scheduling in the market is also discussed, showing the possible repercussion of the raised opportunities in the research line.
Histologic chorioamnionitis (HCA) is a placental inflammatory condition associated with adverse perinatal outcomes (APOs). This historical cohort study explores the risk of APOs in pregnant women ...with HCA and compares the impact of clinical chorioamnionitis (CCA) with subclinical chorioamnionitis (SCCA).
Placentas were evaluated by a perinatal pathologist tand all women with HCA were included. Two groups were integrated: (1) women with clinical chorioamnionitis (CCA) and (2) women with subclinical chorioamnionitis (SCCA). Additionally, we conducted a secondary analysis to compare the prevalence of APOs among stage 1, 2 and 3 of HCA and the risk of APOs between grades 1 and 2 of HCA. The APOs analyzed were preterm birth, stillbirth, neonatal weight < 1,500 g, neonatal sepsis. Relative risk with 95% confidence interval was calculated.
The study included 41 cases of CCA and 270 cases of SCCA. The mean gestational age at diagnosis and birth was 30.2 ± 5.4 weeks and 32.5 ± 5.1 weeks, for group 1 and 2, respectively. The study also found that women with HCA stage 3 and grade 2 had a higher prevalence and risk of adverse perinatal outcomes.
The findings of this study suggest the importance of placental histological study to excluded SCCA, which represents a significant risk to both maternal and neonatal health, contributing to high morbidity and mortality.
Worldwide, diabetes mellitus represents a growing health problem. If it occurs during pregnancy, it can increase the risk of various abnormalities in early and advanced life stages of exposed ...individuals due to fetal programming occurring in utero. Studies have determined that maternal conditions interfere with the genotypes and phenotypes of offspring. Researchers are now uncovering the mechanisms by which epigenetic alterations caused by diabetes affect the expression of genes and, therefore, the development of various diseases. Among the numerous possible epigenetic changes in this regard, the most studied to date are DNA methylation and hydroxymethylation, as well as histone acetylation and methylation. This review article addresses critical findings in epigenetic studies involving diabetes mellitus, including variations reported in the expression of specific genes and their transgenerational effects.
Introduction and Objective: The weight gained during pregnancy could determine the immediate and future health of the mother-child dyad. Excessive gestational weight gain (EGWG) due to abnormal ...adipose tissue (AT) accumulation is strongly associated with adverse perinatal outcomes as gestational diabetes, macrosomia, obesity, and hypertension further in life. Dysregulation of adipokine, AT dysfunction, and an imbalance in the prooxidant-antioxidant systems are critical features in altered AT accumulation. This study was aimed to investigate the association between adipokines and oxidative stress markers in pregnant women and the influence of the GWG on this association. Methods: Maternal blood samples were obtained in the third trimester of pregnancy (n = 74) and serum adipokines (adiponectin, leptin, and resistin), oxidative damage markers: 8-oxo-2′-deoxyguanosine (8-oxodG), lipohydroperoxides (LOOH), malondialdehyde (MDA), and carbonylated proteins (CP), and glucose a metabolic marker were measured. Results: Women with EGWG had low adiponectin levels than women with adequate weight gain (AWG) or insufficient weight gain (IWG). Multiple linear regression models revealed a positive association between adiponectin and 8-oxodG in women with AWG (B = 1.09, 95% CI: 164–222, p = 0.027) and IWG (B = 0.860, 95% CI: 0.199–1.52, p = 0.013) but not in women with EGWG. In women with EGWG, leptin was positively associated with LOOH (p = 0.018), MDA (p = 0.005), and CP (p = 0.010) oxidative markers. Conclusion: Our findings suggest that concurrent mechanisms regulate adipokine production and oxidative stress in pregnant women and that this regulation is influenced by GWG, probably due to an excessive AT accumulation.
To explore the prevalence of gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM), defined by the previous criteria of the American Diabetes Association (ADA), as well as the criteria suggested by the International ...Association of Diabetes and Pregnancy Study Groups (IADPSG), in an unselected group of urban Mexican pregnant women and to analyze the frequency of large for gestational age (LGA) newborns in this same group of women with use of both diagnostic criteria.
A cross-sectional study included 803 consecutive Mexican urban women with a singleton pregnancy, without concomitant diseases and no prior history of GDM, who underwent a 2-step screening protocol for diagnosis of GDM at admission to prenatal care.
The ADA criteria identified 83 women (10.3%) whereas the IADPSG criteria diagnosed 242 women (30.1%) having GDM (P = .0001). Fasting glucose concentrations during the 100-g 3-hour oral glucose tolerance test were abnormal in 116 women (14.4%) and in 160 women (19.9%) on the basis of ADA and IADPSG criteria, respectively (P = .004). The frequency of LGA newborns was 7.4% based on IADPSG criteria and 6.0% based on ADA criteria-no significant difference (P = .64).
With use of the IADPSG criteria, the prevalence of GDM increased almost 3-fold in comparison with that for the ADA criteria. Nevertheless, no significant difference was found in the prevalence of LGA newborns.
Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) affects 6–10% of women and could be considered one of the most common endocrine alterations in women of reproductive age. The syndrome is characterized by several ...hormonal and metabolic alterations, including insulin resistance and hyperandrogenism, which play a severe detrimental role in the patient’s fertility. We aimed to offer an overview about drug metabolism in the PCOS population. Nevertheless, we did not find any study that directly compared drug metabolism between PCOS and healthy women. We therefore decided to summarize briefly how hormonal and insulin sensitizer drugs act differently in healthy and PCOS women, who show altered steroidogenesis by theca cells and metabolic imbalance, focusing especially on assisted reproductive techniques. To date, data about drug metabolism in the PCOS population appears to be extremely limited. This important gap could have significant implications for therapeutic approaches and future perspectives: the dosage of drugs commonly used for the treatment of PCOS women should be tailored according to each patient’s characteristics; we should implement new clinical trials in order to identify the best pharmacologic strategy for PCOS patients undergoing in vitro fertilization (IVF); it would be advisable to create an international expert panel to investigate the drug metabolism in the PCOS population.
We consider the problem of particle tunneling through a periodically driven ferromagnetic quantum barrier connected to two leads. The barrier is modeled by an impurity site representing a ...ferromagnetic layer or a quantum dot in a tight-binding Hamiltonian with a local magnetic field and an ac-driven potential, which is solved using the Floquet formalism. The repulsive interactions in the quantum barrier are also taken into account. Our results show that the time-periodic potential causes sharp resonances of perfect transmission and reflection, which can be tuned by the frequency, the driving strength, and the magnetic field. We demonstrate that a device based on this configuration could act as a highly tunable spin valve for spintronic applications.
In the reproductive phase, women experience cyclic changes in the ovaries and uterus, and hormones regulate these changes. Menopause is the permanent loss of menstruation after 12 months of ...amenorrhea. Menopause is also linked to a decrease in estrogen production, causing an imbalance in oxidative stress. We aimed to compare the three stages of lipid peroxidation, protein oxidative damage, and total antioxidant capacity (TAC) between reproductive-aged women (RAW) and postmenopausal women (PMW) in Mexico. We carried out a cross-sectional study with 84 women from Mexico City, including 40 RAW and 44 PMW. To determine the oxidative stress of the participants, several markers of lipid damage were measured: dienes conjugates (DC), lipohydroperoxides (LHP), and malondialdehyde (MDA); exposure to protein carbonyl is indicative of oxidative modified proteins, and TAC is indicative of the antioxidant defense system. Biomarkers of oxidative stress were significantly lower in RAW vs. PMW. DC were 1.31 ± 0.65 vs. 1.7 ± 0.51 pmol DC/mg dry weight (
= 0.0032); LHP were 4.95 ± 2.20 vs. 11.30 ± 4.24 pmol LHP/mg dry weight (
< 0.0001); malondialdehyde was 20.37 ± 8.20 vs. 26.10 ± 8.71 pmol MDA/mg dry weight (
= 0.0030); exposure of protein carbonyl was 3954 ± 884 vs. 4552 ± 1445 pmol PC/mg protein (
= 0.042); and TAC was 7244 ± 1512 vs. 8099 ± 1931 pmol Trolox equivalent/mg protein (
= 0.027). PMW display significantly higher oxidative stress markers compared to RAW; likewise, PMW show a higher TAC.
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