We present a hand-and-foot-based multimodal interaction approach for handheld devices. Our method combines input modalities (i.e., hand and foot) and provides a coordinated output to both modalities ...along with audio and video. Human foot gesture is detected and tracked using contour-based template detection (CTD) and Tracking-Learning-Detection (TLD) algorithm. 3D foot pose is estimated from passive homography matrix of the camera. 3D stereoscopic and vibrotactile are used to enhance the immersive feeling. We developed a multimodal football game based on the multimodal approach as a proof-of-concept. We confirm our systems user satisfaction through a user study.
The aim of the present study was to examine the factor structure and psychometric properties of the 8-item short version of the Center for Epidemiologic Studies-Depression Scale (CES-D) in a large ...sample of European older adults. Data from The European Social Survey (ESS Round 6 Edition 1.1) provided the basis for this study (5,774 Males and 7,258 Females). Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses provided support for a single factor structure. The results from multi-group confirmatory factor analyses revealed that the factor structure of the CES-D 8 is invariant across sexes, including invariance of item intercepts, item residuals, and item factor loadings. Moreover, the results provided support for the nomological validity of the scale. These results suggest that the shorter 8-item CES-D scale is a valid and reliable instrument of depression and extends the list of available instruments for screening depression among older adults.
, once considered a low-category pathogen, has emerged as an obstinate infectious agent. The scientific community is paying more attention to this pathogen due to its stubbornness to last resort ...antimicrobials, including carbapenems, colistin, and tigecycline, its high prevalence of infections in the hospital setting, and significantly increased rate of community-acquired infections by this organism over the past decade. It has given the fear of pre-antibiotic era to the world. To further enhance our understanding about this pathogen, in this review, we discuss its taxonomy, pathogenesis, current treatment options, global resistance rates, mechanisms of its resistance against various groups of antimicrobials, and future therapeutics.
There is an increasing interest in creating pervasive games based on emerging interaction technologies. In order to develop touch-less, interactive and augmented reality games on vision-based ...wearable device, a touch-less motion interaction technology is designed and evaluated in this work. Users interact with the augmented reality games with dynamic hands/feet gestures in front of the camera, which triggers the interaction event to interact with the virtual object in the scene. Three primitive augmented reality games with eleven dynamic gestures are developed based on the proposed touch-less interaction technology as proof. At last, a comparing evaluation is proposed to demonstrate the social acceptability and usability of the touch-less approach, running on a hybrid wearable framework or with Google Glass, as well as workload assessment, user’s emotions and satisfaction.
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•Impedance matching has a key role in strong microwave absorption.•To enhance impedance matching, MoS2 related materials are highly essential.•Hydrothermal method was used to prepare ...pristine MoS2 and its related composites.•The prepared rGO@Ni-doped-MoS2 achieved maximum microwave absorption of -40 dB at 2 mm thickness.
Impedance matching has a key role in strong microwave absorption. To achieve the perfect impedance matching and enhanced interface dielectric relaxation, nickel-doped rGO@MoS2 composite has been prepared. The complex permittivity and complex permeability of rGO@Ni-MoS2 show significant improvement by the combination of the high magnetocrystalline anisotropy of Ni metal with highly conductive reduced graphene oxide, leading to remarkable microwave absorption. The prepared rGO@Ni-MoS2 achieved maximum microwave absorption of −40 dB at 2 mm thickness. The control samples of MoS2, Ni-MoS2 and rGO@MoS2 indicate that micro-cluster of MoS2 and Ni doping is indeed helpful to improve the performance of rGO@Ni-MoS2. The study provides a pathway for practical applications of microwave absorption materials in terms of impedance matching.
BackgroundLiver surgery is a major and challenging procedure for the surgeon, the anesthetist, and the patient. The objective of this study was to evaluate the postoperative nonhepatic complications ...of patients undergoing liver resection surgery with perioperative factors.MethodsWe retrospectively analyzed 79 patients who underwent liver resection surgeries at the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital and Research Centre in Lahore, Pakistan, from July 2015 to December 2022.ResultsThe mean age at the time of surgery was 53 years (range: 3-77 years), and the mean BMI was 26.43 (range: 15.72-38.0 kg/m2). Of the total patients, 44.3 % (n = 35) had no comorbidities, 26.6% (n=21) had one comorbidity, and 29.1% (n=23) had two or more comorbidities. Patients in whom the blood loss was more than 375 ml required postoperative oxygen inhalation with a significant relative risk of 2.6 (p=0.0392) and an odds ratio of 3.5 (p=0.0327). Similarly, patients who had a surgery time of more than five hours stayed in the hospital for more than seven days, with a statistically significant relative risk of 2.7 (p=0.0003) and odds ratio of 7.64 (p=0.0001). The duration of surgery was also linked with the possibility of requiring respiratory support, with a relative risk of 5.0 (p=0.0134) and odds ratio of 5.73 (p=0.1190).ConclusionPatients in our cohort who had a prolonged duration of surgery received an increased amount of fluids, and a large volume of blood loss was associated with prolonged stay in the ICU (>2 days), hospital admission (>7 days), ICU readmission, and increased incidence of cardiorespiratory, neurological, and renal disturbances postoperatively.
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•This work produces porous and ultralong Pt-In2O3 porous nanofibers using electrospinning and chemical soaking firstly.•The well-distributed Pt NPs can maintain the ultrasmall size in ...the surface of In2O3 PNTs without any protection.•The Pt-In2O3 PNTs sensor shows excellent acetone sensing properties compared to the pristine In2O3 PNTs.•The as-prepared sensor exhibits excellent gas sensing properties than other sensors based on In2O3 in previous reports.
Here, we demonstrate a facile design and simple fabrication of acetone gas sensors based on one-dimensional (1D) porous platinum (Pt)-doped In2O3 nanofiber structure. Be first to try to immerse electrospun polystyrene (PS) nanofibers (NFs) into a precursor solution followed by an annealing process, the as-prepared composite NFs can readily turn into Pt-In2O3 porous NFs. The obtained Pt-In2O3 porous NFs exhibit the mesoporous size of 4–6 nm and high specific surface area of 212.3 m2 g-1. We observed that the spillover effect of Pt nanoparticles and the large-surface-area of the porous structure can effectively enhance catalytic sensing response to acetone with a lower limit of 10 part-per-billion (ppb) at a low working temperature of 180 °C. More importantly, the proposed NFs-based sensor shows rapid response and recovery time (6/9 s), higher selectivity toward acetone against other interfering gases, reversibility and time stability (50 days) compared to its counterparts. In addition, the proposed sensor shows a fast response and recovery time, maintaining 70% of the initial response even in 85% relative humidity (RH) environment. These results demonstrate the potential feasibility that the Pt-In2O3 porous NFs act as a promising sensing platform for monitoring acetone at ppb levels in human breath.
As non-renewable energy sources become depleted, the world is transitioning toward renewable energy sources (RERs), which entail several significant advantages, including cost savings, large-scale ...availability, and minimal losses. Pakistan is sixth among the countries most affected by global warming and abrupt climatic changes. Severe floods, catastrophic rains, and wind gusts have created new challenges in the country regarding resilient and reliable power supply. Due to harsh weather conditions, the power shut down, blackouts, and prolonged fault in the transmission systems are common and cause millions of dollars in economic losses annually. The main challenge of providing a reliable power supply while satisfying the climatic conditions to use renewable energy resources has a global significance. This article aims to develop a hybrid power network (PV/Battery/Grid) for King Abdullah Campus, The University of Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Muzaffarabad, Pakistan. The results for the proposed system are compared with the existing system while they are supplying the same power to the load. The cost of energy (COE) from the existing on- grid Hybrid system is Rs.27.32/kWh. It can be seen that energy cost is minimized by up to Rs.0.251/kWh by the effective use of solar energy. Optimization results conclude that the on- grid hybrid (PV/Battery/Convertor/Grid) is more efficient than all other configurations. Therefore, it is concluded that the proposed hybrid power system for grid-connected sites is most efficient, stable, cost-effective, and environmentally friendly. The ultimate goal was to design an economically feasible hybrid power system and analyze the techno-socio impacts of the PV hybrid system for the campus. Data were initially collected for the desired site and then simulated via the HOMER simulation tool, which determined the net load and feasibility of the proposed system. This techno-economic analysis of the PV hybrid system will enhance the utilization of solar power in other educational or commercial facilities in the region may follow the path in the future.
Enterobacter cloacae (E. cloacae) is an emerging nosocomial pathogen that had acquired antibiotic resistance against multiple classes of antibiotics. The current study was aimed to isolate and ...characterize lytic bacteriophage against E. cloacae. The bacteriophage EBP was isolated from a sewage water sample using E. cloacae as a host strain by double‐layer agar technique. EBP was found stabile at a wide range of temperatures (25, 37, 60, and 80°C) and pH (5, 6, 7, 8, and 9) with antibacterial activity up to 24 h of infection. The latent period of EBP was 20 min with a burst size of 252 phages per cell. It showed a narrow host range and infected 12/21 (57%) isolates of E. cloacae tested. It has helical symmetry with a head size of 105 and 120 nm long tail with contractile sheath. The EBP has 179.1 kb long double‐stranded DNA genome with 44.8% GC content. Majority of identified ORFs (187/281) were encoding putative proteins with unknown function. Necessary replication enzymes, structural proteins, and lytic enzymes were detected in the genome of EBP. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that EBP closely resembles with Coronobacter phage vB_CsaM_IeN, vB_CsaM_IeE, vB_CsaM_IeB, and Citrobacter phage Margaery. Based on electron microscopy and molecular characterization, EBP was classified as a Myoviridae phage.
Pesticides are highly toxic substances. Their toxicity may not be absolutely specific to the target organisms but can adversely affect different processes in the non-target host plants. In the ...present study, the effect of over application of four commonly used pesticides (emamectin benzoate, alpha-cypermethrin, lambda-cyhalothrin and imidacloprid) was evaluated on the germination, seedling vigor and photosynthetic pigments in tomato. The obtained results revealed that seed germination was decreased by the pesticides and this effect was more prominent at early stages of exposure. All the tested pesticides reduced the growth of tomato when applied in higher concentration than the recommended dose, but at lower doses the pesticides had some stimulatory effects on growth as compared to the control. A similar effect of pesticides was observed on the photosynthetic pigments, i.e. a decrease in pigments concentrations was caused at higher doses but an increase was observed at lower doses of pesticides. The calculation of EC₅₀ values for different parameters revealed the lowest EC₅₀ values for emamectin (ranged as 51–181 mg/L) followed by alpha-cypermethrin (191.74–374.39), lambda-cyhalothrin (102.43–354.28) and imidacloprid (430.29–1979.66 mg/L). A comparison of the obtained EC₅₀ values for different parameters of tomato with the recommended doses revealed that over application of these pesticides can be harmful to tomato crop. In a few cases these pesticides were found toxic even at the recommended doses. However, a field based study in this regard should be conducted to further verify these results.
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