Fundus image analysis has emerged as a very useful tool to analyze the structure of retina for detection of different eye-related abnormalities. The detection of these abnormalities requires the segmentation of basic retinal struc‐ tures including blood vessels and optic disk. The optic disk segmentation becomes a challenging task when the optic disk boundary is degraded due to some devia‐ tion...

The potential for the use of the disk diffusion method to accurately predict penicillin MICs for Streptococcus pneumoniae was investigated with penicillin (6 microg), methicillin (5 microg), and oxacillin (1 microg) disks. A total of 183 S. pneumoniae isolates were tested by three MIC procedures (agar dilution, microdilution, and E-test). Regression analyses of the geometric mean of the three M...

I present a new method of deriving the shape of the dark matter (DM) halos of spiral galaxies. The method relies on the comparison of model predictions with high spectral and spatial resolution HI observations of the gas layer. So far, determinations of the flaring of the gas layer (i.e. the increase of the thickness with galactocentric radius) have been used to determine the mass-to-light rati...

Three readback signal detection methods are inyestgated for real-time flying height or head disk spacing variation measurement under vibration conditions. This is carried out by theoretical analysis, numerical simulation, and experimental study. The first method (amplitude detection) provides a simple way to study the head disk spacing change. The second method ( PW50 parameter estimation) can ...

We present a novel slanted faces of thin-disk composite Yb:YAG YAG laser which is side-pumped by four non-symmetric hollow- ducts. The pump light distribution in the disk is modeled by using Monte-Carlo ray tracing method. The temperature distribution inside the crystal is calculated by taking into account either the concentration of Yb+3 ion or the different transmission of laser output coupl...

Tests were performed with 104 anaerobic microorganisms to evaluate the thioglycolate disk elution technique for the detection of resistance to cefoperazone and cefoperazone-sulbactam. An unacceptably high false-resistance rate and a poor reproducibility record make the disk elution procedure unsatisfactory for routine testing of this drug or combination of drugs.

One hundred four Enterobacter isolates were tested by standard CLSI disk diffusion methods for detecting extended-spectrum beta-lactamases (ESBLs) and with cefepime-clavulanate disk combinations. SHV-12 was produced by 8.7% of isolates. The cefepime-clavulanate combination provided 88% sensitivity and 91% specificity for the detection of SHV-12 ESBL.

It is impossible to test accurately bacterial susceptibility to the trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole combination co-trimoxazole with a single combined susceptibility disk. However, a variety of factors still affect the result even when separate trimethoprim and sulfamethoxazole disks are used. Experiments with separate disks showed that the optimum conditions for testing the susceptibilities of en...

We read with interest the article by Chopra et al. (1) suggesting that empirical therapy with cefepime for bloodstream infections due to extended-spectrum-lactamase (ESBL)-producing Enterobacteriaceae is associated with excess mortality. The effectiveness of cefepime would be compromised by ESBL production, resulting in higher MICs (2, 3). Several beta-lactamase inhibitors (including clavulanat...