BACKGROUND To prevent and control infectious diseases, it is important to understand how sex and age influence morbidity rates, but consistent clear descriptions of differences in the reported incidence of infectious diseases in terms of sex and age are sparse. METHODS AND FINDINGS Data from the Japanese surveillance system for infectious diseases from 2000 to 2009 were used in the analysis o...

OBJECTIVES To study the responsiveness (sensitivity to change) of the Motor Function Measure (MFM) in detecting change in neuromuscular disease patients with the intent of using this measure in future clinical trials. DESIGN Prospective cohort observational study. SETTING Inpatient and outpatient facilities for follow-up and treatment of neuromuscular diseases. PARTICIPANTS Patients (N=15...

The characterization of the complex diffusion signal arising from the brain remains an open problem. Many representations focus on characterizing the global shape of the diffusion profile at each voxel and are limited to the assessment of connectivity. In contrast, Multiple Fascicle Models (MFM) seek to represent the contribution from each white matter fascicle and may be useful in the investig...

Subjective kinematic motion analysis done by a trained physical therapist using standard assessment such as the Fugl-Meyer assessment (FM) and/or the Wolf Motor Function test (Wolf), have a limited ability to objectively characterize post stroke movement of subjects with a hemiparetic limb or demonstrate fine change over time. The goal of the research was to take the characterized synergies lin...

During nuclear waste disposal process, radioactive iodine as a fission product can be released. The widespread implementation of sustainable nuclear energy thus requires the development of efficient iodine stores that have simultaneously high capacity, stability and more importantly, storage density (and hence minimized system volume). Here, we report high I2 adsorption in a series of robust po...

We consider a system consisting of n particles, moving forward in jumps on the real line. System state is empirical distribution particle locations. Each “jumps forward” at some time points, with instantaneous rate given by decreasing function particle’s location quantile within current (empirical distribution). Previous work this model established, under certain conditions, convergence, as [Fo...

Human error is a common source of accidents in complex plants. We believe that many human errors really are caused by lack of intelligence in the instrumentation and control systems, putting the operators in situations, which humans realistically cannot be expected to cope with. Through history, several computer-based algorithms have been proposed and used for automated sensor fault detection, ...

ZnO nanorods (NRs) arrays doped with a large concentration of Mn synthesized by aqueous chemical growth and were characterized by SEM, photoluminescence, Raman scattering, magnetic force microscopy (MFM). By comparison of spectra taken on pure and Mn-doped ZnO NRs, a few new Raman impurity-related phonon modes, resulting from the presence of Mn in the investigated samples. We also present a vib...