This paper introduces a robust and secure data hiding scheme to transmit grayscale image in encryption-then-compression domain. First, host image is transformed using lifting wavelet transform, ...Hessenberg decomposition and redundant singular value decomposition. Then, we use appropriate scaling factor to invisibly embed the singular value of watermark data into the lower frequency sub-band of the host image. We also use suitable encryption-then-compression scheme to improve the security of the image. Additionally, de-noising convolutional neural network is performed at extracted mark data to enhance the robustness of the scheme. Experimental results verify the effectiveness of our scheme, including embedding capacity, robustness, invisibility, and security. Further, it is established that our scheme has a better ability to recover concealed mark than conventional ones at low cost.
The purpose of this article is to delineate the role of epistemic emotions in personal epistemology and self-regulated learning (SRL). We first review important tenets of personal epistemology and ...SRL and then present a model of SRL that situates personal epistemology within that model. We then define epistemic emotions, describe under what conditions epistemic emotions arise, and delineate how these emotions may facilitate or constrain learning processes and learning outcomes. Specifically, we present five antecedents to epistemic emotions and five consequences of those emotions during learning. The five antecedents are control, value, novelty, complexity, and achievement or impasses of epistemic aims. The five consequences are effects on planning and goal setting, motivation, cognitive and metacognitive strategies, learning outcomes, and revisions to antecedents. We end with a discussion of educational implications and future directions for research.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
BFBNIB, DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
CONTEXT Total knee arthroplasty (TKA) is one of the most common and costly surgical procedures performed in the United States. OBJECTIVE To examine longitudinal trends in volume, utilization, and ...outcomes for primary and revision TKA between 1991 and 2010 in the US Medicare population. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS Observational cohort of 3 271 851 patients (aged ≥65 years) who underwent primary TKA and 318 563 who underwent revision TKA identified in Medicare Part A data files. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES We examined changes in primary and revision TKA volume, per capita utilization, hospital length of stay (LOS), readmission rates, and adverse outcomes. RESULTS Between 1991 and 2010 annual primary TKA volume increased 161.5% from 93 230 to 243 802 while per capita utilization increased 99.2% (from 31.2 procedures per 10 000 Medicare enrollees in 1991 to 62.1 procedures per 10 000 in 2010). Revision TKA volume increased 105.9% from 9650 to 19 871 while per capita utilization increased 59.4% (from 3.2 procedures per 10 000 Medicare enrollees in 1991 to 5.1 procedures per 10 000 in 2010). For primary TKA, LOS decreased from 7.9 days (95% CI, 7.8-7.9) in 1991-1994 to 3.5 days (95% CI, 3.5-3.5) in 2007-2010 (P < .001). For primary TKA, rates of adverse outcomes resulting in readmission remained stable between 1991-2010, but rates of all-cause 30-day readmission increased from 4.2% (95% CI, 4.1%-4.2%) to 5.0% (95% CI, 4.9%-5.0%) (P < .001). For revision TKA, the decrease in hospital LOS was accompanied by an increase in all-cause 30-day readmission from 6.1% (95% CI, 5.9%-6.4%) to 8.9% (95% CI, 8.7%-9.2%) (P < .001) and an increase in readmission for wound infection from 1.4% (95% CI, 1.3%-1.5%) to 3.0% (95% CI, 2.9%-3.1%) (P < .001). CONCLUSIONS Increases in TKA volume have been driven by both increases in the number of Medicare enrollees and in per capita utilization. We also observed decreases in hospital LOS that were accompanied by increases in hospital readmission rates.
•We evaluated best management practices to improve crop productivity.•Zero-till based cropping most energy efficient and water saving.•Substituting wheat with maize-potato in winter more productive ...and remunerative.•Higher cropping intensity with diversification is important for sustainability.
Cereal production systems in the Eastern Indo-Gangetic Plains (E-IGP) are traditional, with low yield and low farm income, and they have largely missed out on the benefits of the Green Revolution. To enhance productivity, alleviate environmental and management constraints, and enhance farmers’ income in the rice–wheat cropping system of the E-IGP, new approaches that are more productive and sustainable need to be developed. Conservation agriculture (CA) together with best management practices (BMP) used in other parts of the IGP offer potential to be extended in the E-IGP. A study was conducted during 2009–2011 with the objective of evaluating a range of approaches for enhancing the productivity and economic returns of rice-wheat-based cropping systems in the E-IGP. Four scenarios (S) involving a range of crop and resource management practices with crop rotations (including legumesθ) were compared with one another, of which Scenario 1 represented farmers practice. The lowest yields of wheat (2.78–3.07tha−1) and rice (4.38–6.52tha−1) were recorded with the current farmers’ practices (S1), consisting of intensive tillage (wet tillage or puddling in rice and dry tillage in wheat) followed by inefficient crop establishment practices (transplanting in rice and broadcasting in wheat) with complete removal of crop residues. Avoiding tillage in wheat (S2) and including mungbean increased the yields of wheat and the succeeding rice crop by 21–31% and 5–10%, respectively. The yields of wheat and rice increased further by 46–54% and by 10–24%, respectively, with the inclusion of more CA components (S3). In S4, which was designed to include higher cropping intensity and diversification (potato and maize–rice–cowpea rotation) with CA components, 144–163% higher rice equivalent system productivity was attained. Irrigation water productivity in the winter season increased by 39–48% in S2, by 72–84% in S3, and by 137–138% in S4 when compared to S1 while in the rainy season it increased by 14–18% in S2, by 46–56% in S3, and by 71–88% in S4. S4 had the highest net returns ($2855–4193ha−1), followed by S3 ($1883–3246ha−1). However, the system’s highest benefit–cost ratio was recorded with S3 due to its lower cost of crop cultivation. The results of this study showed that there is enormous untapped potential to improve overall system performance through the adoption of CA in integration with BMP in the intensive system of the E-IGP of India.
For multimedia analysis of electronic disguised method is a speech editing process in which the characteristics of voice have been changed. Frequency spectrum characteristics of the speech signal ...during electronic disguised have also changed. In this paper proposed a method for deriving an algorithm for extracted the efficiency of disguised voice from its normal voice. By using practical approaches for disguising the voice by a different semitone. Mel-frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCC), delta Mel-frequency cepstral coefficients (ΔMFCC), double delta Mel-frequency cepstral coefficients (ΔΔMFCC) based feature extraction techniques compute the acoustic feature and its statistical moments mean and correlation coefficient. Acoustic feature and its statistical moments passed through the different types of the algorithm-based classifier. By using different classifier find the efficiency of disguised voice.
This work analyzes the propagation of BG wave in a layered model composed of a piezo-flexo-magnetic (PFM) layer of finite width imperfectly bonded to a PFM half-space with consideration of impedance ...boundary at the free surface of layer. The flexo-magnetic phenomenon introduces loss which results in attenuation of propagating BG wave. Using suitable surface and interface conditions, a complex frequency equation is obtained, which relates real wave number with a complex form of wave velocity with the help of material, interface, impedance, and flexo-magnetic parameters. The dispersion and attenuation relations of BG waves are derived from separating this frequency relation into real and imaginary parts. These dispersion and attenuation equations relate wave number with phase and damp velocities, respectively. With the help of these relations, the phase/damp velocities are plotted against wave number illustrating the influence of interface imperfection parameter, the flexo-magnetic parameter corresponding to layer and half-space, impedance parameter, & layer width in magnetically short (MS) and magnetically open (MO) conditions. The impact of varying damp velocity on phase velocity and vice-versa is also portrayed in MS and MO cases. Some validation with previously existing literature is also provided.
Summary
Allergic disorders encompass skin, food and respiratory allergies. Sensitization to a normally harmless allergen results in the immune system being biased to a predominant T‐helper type 2 ...response. Re‐exposure to the same allergen leads to a robust secretion of allergy‐related mediators that eventually triggers symptoms. Our understanding of these disorders has enabled the search of therapeutic approaches that can either modulate the sensitization process or impact on allergic mediators, thus helping manage allergic symptoms. Polyphenols are one such class of compounds that are found in foods and plant sources and have been investigated for their anti‐allergic effect in different disease models and in human clinical trials. Their anti‐inflammatory profile is known to impact on the recruitment of immune cells to the skin and in preventing the development of secondary infections following disruption of the skin barrier. The interaction of polyphenols with proteins can modulate the process of allergic sensitization and their direct effect on allergic effector cells such as mast cells inhibit mediator release, resulting in the alleviation of symptoms. In addition, their endogenous anti‐oxidant ability limits the extent of cellular injury from free radicals during the allergic insult. Overall, polyphenols hold promise as anti‐allergy agents capable of influencing multiple biological pathways and immune cell functions in the allergic immune response and deserve further investigation. The objective of the current review is to summarize the key findings and progress made in studying polyphenols as anti‐allergic ingredients. Special emphasis is placed in this review to highlight key physiological, cellular and signalling pathways implicated in the mechanism of action of different polyphenols in the context of allergic disorders and their manifestations.
Cite this as: A. Singh, S. Holvoet and A. Mercenier, Clinical & Experimental Allergy, 2011 (41) 1346–1359.
PurposeRecent years have seen an increased demand for healthcare services, presenting a need to improve service quality through the deployment of sustainable Lean Six Sigma (LSS). This study aims to ...identify critical success factors (CSFs) of sustainable LSS and prioritize them based on their intensity of importance for the effective implementation of sustainable LSS in the healthcare environment.Design/methodology/approachThe present study identified 33 leading CSFs through a comprehensive literature review and expert experience and classified them into six major categories based on organizational functions. The primacy of these CSFs is established using the best-worst-method (BWM) approach. The significant advantage of this approach is that the decision-maker identifies both the best and worst criteria among alternatives prior to pairwise comparisons, leading to fewer pairwise comparisons and saving time, energy and resources. It also provides more reliable and consistent rankings.FindingsThe findings of the present study highlight the economic and managerial (E&M) CSFs as the most significant CSFs among the major category criteria of sustainable LSS-CSFs, followed by organizational (O), knowledge and learning (K&L), technological (T), social and environmental (S&E), and external factors (EF). Similarly, management involvement and leadership to implement sustainable LSS (E&M1), structured LSS deployment training and education (K&L2), and availability of required resources and their efficient utilization (O2) are ranked as the topmost CSFs among sub-category criteria of sustainable LSS-CSFs.Practical implicationsThe prioritization of sustainable LSS-CSFs determined in this study can provide healthcare managers, researchers and decision-makers with a better understanding of the influence on effective deployment of sustainable LSS, resulting in improved service quality in hospitals.Originality/valueThis paper is an original contribution to the analysis of CSFs in an Indian healthcare institute, utilizing the BMW method for ranking the sustainable LSS-CSFs. The advantage of utilizing and distinguishing the performance of this approach compared to other MCDA approaches in terms of (1) least pairwise comparison and violation, (2) consistency (3) slightest deviation and (4) conformity.
The issue of heavy metal pollution is very much concerned because of their toxicity for plant, animal and human beings and their lack of biodegradability. Excess concentrations of heavy metals have ...adverse effects on plant metabolic activities hence affect the food production, quantitatively and qualitatively. Heavy metal when reaches human tissues through various absorption pathways such as direct ingestion, dermal contact, diet through the soil–food chain, inhalation and oral intake may seriously affect their health. Therefore, several management practices are being applied to minimize metal toxicity by attenuating the availability of metal to the plants. Some of the traditional methods are either extremely costly or they are simply applied to isolate contaminated site. The biology-based technology like use of hypermetal accumulator plants occurring naturally or created by transgenic technology, in recent years draws great attention to remediate heavy metal contamination. Recently, applications of nanoparticle for metal remediation are also attracting great research interest due to their exceptional adsorption and mechanical properties and unique electrical property, highly chemical stability, and large specific surface area. Thus, the present review deals with different management approaches to reduce level of metal contamination in soil and finally to the food chain.
Cancer metastasis is a multistep process in which a cancer cell spreads from the site of the primary lesion, passes through the circulatory system, and establishes a secondary tumor at a new ...nonadjacent organ or part. Inhibition of cancer progression by dietary phytochemicals (DPs) offers significant promise for reducing the incidence and mortality of cancer. Consumption of DPs in the diet has been linked to a decrease in the rate of metastatic cancer in a number of preclinical animal models and human epidemiological studies. DPs have been reported to modulate the numerous biological events including epigenetic events (noncoding micro-RNAs, histone modification, and DNA methylation) and multiple signaling transduction pathways (Wnt/beta-catenin, Notch, Sonic hedgehog, COX-2, EGFR, MAPK-ERK, JAK-STAT, Akt/PI3K/mTOR, NF-kappaB, AP-1, etc.), which can play a key role in regulation of metastasis cascade. Extensive studies have also been performed to determine the molecular mechanisms underlying antimetastatic activity of DPs, with results indicating that these DPs have significant inhibitory activity at nearly every step of the metastatic cascade. DPs have anticancer effects by inducing apoptosis and by inhibiting cell growth, migration, invasion, and angiogenesis. Growing evidence has also shown that these natural agents potentiate the efficacy of chemotherapy and radiotherapy through the regulation of multiple signaling pathways. In this review, we discuss the variety of molecular mechanisms by which DPs regulate metastatic cascade and highlight the potentials of these DPs as promising therapeutic inhibitors of cancer.
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