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In the United States, the official database of severe thunderstorm wind reports arguably has more serious deficiencies than those of tornadoes and hail. Roughly 90% of the thunderstorm wind reports in the Storm Events database during the period 2007-2021 are estimates without any nearby measurement, and the fact that 40% of the estimates have a value of exactly 50 knots compared to only 13% of the measurements strongly suggests that many may be overestimates since 50 knots is the minimum threshold to be considered a severe wind. The problems in the database negatively impact development of new forecasting tools and verification. We have tested six different machine learning approaches, training on roughly 20,000 measured reports during 2007-2017 to create a tool that assigns a probability that any severe thunderstorm wind report is due to winds of 50 knots or greater. Training is based on date, time, location, and episode and event narrative data from the Storm Events database along with 31 near-storm weather parameters from the Storm Prediction Center mesoanalysis output. In addition, population density and elevation are used. Land use and radar reflectivity were also tested but found to not improve the performance. The best-performing algorithm, the Stacked Generalized Linear Model has been found to show large skill with Areas Under ROC curves as high as .90 and Brier Scores around 0.1. When a supplemental sub-severe database is added for testing, reliability is shown to be good. Subjective evaluations from testing during three years of NOAA Hazardous Weather Testbed Spring Forecast Experiments have been favorable and will be discussed, along with implications for forecasters. A recent test found that the average probability for estimated 50 knot wind reports is only 57% whereas it is 81% for measured 50 knot reports, supporting the view of many forecasters that overestimates are a large problem among the estimated reports in the database.

Personalized synthetic MRI (syn-MRI) uses MR images of an individual subject acquired at a few design parameters (echo time, repetition time, flip angle) to obtain underlying parametricOur DL enhancements employ a Deep Image Prior (DIP) with a U-net type denoising architecture that includes situations with minimal training data, such as personalized syn-MRI. We provide a general workflow for syn-MRI from three or more training images. Our workflow, called DIPsyn-MRI, uses DIP to enhance training images, then obtains parametric images using LS or MLE before synthesizing images at desired design parameter settings. DIPsyn-MRI is implemented in our publicly available Python package DeepSynMRI available at: https://github.com/StatPal/DeepSynMRI.We demonstrate feasibility and improved performance of DIPsyn-MRI on 3D datasets acquired using the Brainweb interface for spin-echo and FLASH imaging sequences, at different noise levels. Our DL enhancements improve syn-MRI in the presence of different intensity nonuniformity levels of the magnetic field, for all but very low noise levels.This article provides recipes and software to realistically facilitate DL-enhanced personalized syn-MRI.

The detection of gravitational waves from GW170817 has provided a new opportunity to constrain the equation of state (EOS) of neutron stars. In this article, we investigate the possible existence of quarks inside the neutron star core in the context of GW170817. The nucleon phase is treated within the relativistic nuclear mean-field approach where we have employed a fully comprehensive set of available models, and the quark phase is described in the Bag model. We show that the nucleonic EOSs which are inconsistent with the tidal deformability bound become consistent when phase transition to quark matter via Gibbs construction is allowed. We find that several nucleonic EOSs support the presence of pure quark matter core with a small mass not more than $0.17M_\odot$ confined within a radius of 0.9 km. We also find that the strong correlation between tidal deformability and neutron star radii observed for pure nucleonic stars does persist even with a nucleon-quark phase transition and provides an upper limit on the radius of $R_{1.4} \lesssim 12.9$ km for a $1.4M_\odot$ neutron star., 13 pages, 4 figures, to appear in EPJST

Monitoring treatment efficacy early during therapy could enable a change in treatment to improve patient outcomes. We report an early assessment of response to treatment in advanced NSCLC using a plasma-only strategy to measure changes in ctDNA levels after one cycle of chemotherapy. Plasma samples were collected from 92 patients with Stage IIIB-IV NSCLC treated with first-line chemo- or chemoradiation therapies in an observational, prospective study. Retrospective ctDNA analysis was performed using next-generation sequencing with a targeted 198-kb panel designed for lung cancer surveillance and monitoring. We assessed whether changes in ctDNA levels after one or two cycles of treatment were associated with clinical outcomes. Subjects with ≤50% decrease in ctDNA level after one cycle of chemotherapy had a lower 6-month progression-free survival rate (33% vs. 58%, HR 2.3, 95% CI 1.2 to 4.2, log-rank p = 0.009) and a lower 12-month overall survival rate (25% vs. 70%, HR 4.3, 95% CI 2.2 to 9.7, log-rank p < 0.001). Subjects with ≤50% decrease in ctDNA level after two cycles of chemotherapy also had shorter survival. Using non-invasive liquid biopsies to measure early changes in ctDNA levels in response to chemotherapy may help identify non-responders before standard-of-care imaging in advanced NSCLC.

Using and comparing kinetic theory and second-order Chapman-Enskog hydrodynamics, we study the non-conformal dynamics of a system undergoing Bjorken expansion. We use the concept of `free-streaming fixed lines' for scaled shear and bulk stresses in non-conformal kinetic theory and hydrodynamics, and show that these `fixed lines' behave as early-time attractors and repellors of the evolution. In the conformal limit, the free-streaming fixed lines reduce to the well-known fixed points of conformal Bjorken dynamics. A new fixed point in the free streaming regime is identified which lies at the intersection of these fixed lines. Contrary to the conformal scenario, both kinetic theory and hydrodynamics predict the absence of attractor behavior in the normalised shear stress channel. In kinetic theory a far-off-equilibrium attractor is found for the normalised effective longitudinal pressure, driven by rapid longitudinal expansion. Second-order viscous hydrodynamics fails to accurately describe this attractor. From a thorough analysis of the free-streaming dynamics in Chapman-Enskog hydrodynamics we conclude that this failure results from an inaccurate approximation of the fixed lines and a related incorrect description of the nature of the fixed point. A modified anisotropic hydrodynamic description is presented that provides excellent agreement with kinetic theory results and reproduces the far-from-equilibrium attractor for the scaled longitudinal pressure., 28 pages, 22 figures

Poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA)–ZnS composite films were prepared by varying the composition of PVA ranging from 1–5 wt % through a simple solvent casting method. The photocatalytic enactment of the composites was evaluated along with the investigations of their photoluminescence (PL), optical transparency, morphology, and thermal properties. The firm interaction between the ZnS and PVA was confirmed by Fourier transform infrared, UV–vis, and PL spectroscopies. PVA–ZnS composites showed enhanced luminescence property than PVA. The composites exhibited very good optical transparency regardless of the amount of PVA addition. The thermogravimetric analysis data indeed exhibited better thermal stability of the composites. The glass transition temperature (Tg), melting temperature (Tm), enthalpy of melting (ΔHm), and crystallinity were evaluated for such composites. The composites demonstrated morphological variations depending on the amount of PVA addition, although the particle size of ZnS remained similar in the nanometer range (50–120 nm) for all composite samples. The prepared composite films exhibited superior photocatalytic performance in the degradation of methylene blue compared with the bare ZnS and PVA. This study may give a new insight into the fabrication of PVA–ZnS photocatalysts for the treatment of organic pollutants.

Background: Minor salivary gland tumors (MSGTs) are less common than major salivary glands and involve only 15–20% of all salivary gland tumors. Most of the cases originate at intra- and peri-oral region. Minor salivary gland lesion cytology has been studied rarely in India. Aims: This present study was performed to evaluate the role of fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) in diagnosis of MSGTs and to explore the cases of cytohistological discrepancies in the study. Materials and Methods: This retrospective study was conducted over a 5-year period on 42 cases of MSGTs. In all the cases, cytology was correlated with histology and cytohistological discrepancies were searched. Sensitivity, specificity, and diagnostic efficacy were calculated using histopathology as gold standard. Results: We diagnosed 27 malignant (64.28%) and 15 benign (35.71%) MSGTs in cytological evaluation. We found two false negative and one false positive case in cytology. Sensitivity, specificity, and diagnostic accuracy of the study were 92.59%, 93.33%, and 92.85%, respectively. Conclusion: FNAC is a minimally invasive and cost-effective procedure with high accuracy (92.85%) in the assessment of MSGTs and helps in the management of benign and malignant tumors.

Divergence measures have a long association with statistical inference, machine learning and information theory. The density power divergence and related measures have produced many useful (and popular) statistical procedures, which provide a good balance between model efficiency on one hand and outlier stability or robustness on the other. The logarithmic density power divergence, a particular logarithmic transform of the density power divergence, has also been very successful in producing efficient and stable inference procedures; in addition it has also led to significant demonstrated applications in information theory. The success of the minimum divergence procedures based on the density power divergence and the logarithmic density power divergence (which also go by the names $\beta$-divergence and $\gamma$-divergence, respectively) make it imperative and meaningful to look for other, similar divergences which may be obtained as transforms of the density power divergence in the same spirit. With this motivation we search for such transforms of the density power divergence, referred to herein as the functional density power divergence class. The present article characterizes this functional density power divergence class, and thus identifies the available divergence measures within this construct that may be explored further for possible applications in statistical inference, machine learning and information theory., Comment: This new version greatly improves the scope of the characterization presented in the previous version while dropping smoothness assumptions on the concerned function

Macromolecular structures form the basis of molecular structural biology. The three main experimental techniques that are used to derive atomic-scale structural information on the biological macromolecules are X-ray crystallography, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, and cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM). This chapter has explained the basic physical principles underlying each of these techniques. Furthermore, the data generated by these techniques provide significant insight into the three-dimensional structure of a molecule. However, the data can be efficiently used to understand and address relevant biological questions only through informative visual representation. The present chapter has also illustrated the basic approaches to visual representation of macromolecular structures. Advances in the tools and techniques of macromolecular structure analysis and representation have transformed molecular biology from a descriptive study of the basic genetic phenomena to a more mechanistic investigation based on considerable structural insight, as has been elucidated in latter chapters.

Physics has been the chief agent in transforming molecular biology into molecular structural biology. This chapter gives an overview of different areas of physics as a minimum requirement for the experimental and theoretical understanding of biomolecular interactions and dynamics. The layout of the topics is somewhat similar to one that would appear in an exclusive textbook on basic physics—classical mechanics, wave motion, kinetic theory and thermodynamics, and quantum and statistical physics; nevertheless, the presentation here is purely introductory. In each of the topics, mathematical expressions and equations have been judiciously used to deliver some quantitative sense. All such is expected to facilitate meaningful deliberations in the subsequent chapters.

This chapter has discussed the structural bases of cell signaling, immune response, and systems biology. Often in a signal transduction pathway, two proteins interact in such a manner that one modifies another, which then modifies a third, and so on, leading to signal “amplification.” A majority of signaling pathways in a cell are dependent on protein phosphorylation-dephosphorylation. Antibody molecules, containing constant and variable domains, are all structurally similar, yet they exhibit remarkable diversity in their antigen-binding potentials. Systems biology explores the relationships between all the components in an organism considered together. Through detailed analyses of protein-protein, protein-metabolite, and protein-nucleic acid interactions, it aims to understand the metabolic and signaling pathways and gene-regulatory networks. Interactomes of several organisms, represented as “node-and-edge” network maps, are in the process of rapid development. These are expected to provide a complete set of macromolecular complexes and interactions in an organism. Incorporation of three-dimensional structural details into the interactomes will make them ever more useful.

DNA synthesis is required by the cell for the processes of replication, repair, and lesion bypass. The present chapter looks into the structural-functional features of the molecular machinery, in the form of an enzyme complex called DNA polymerase, involved in DNA synthesis. In spite of their structural diversity, the DNA polymerases belonging to different families share a common architectural framework and adopt a common strategy for nucleotide incorporation. The structural basis for interactions between the DNA, the polymerase, and nucleotides has been elucidated. Special attention has been given to the initiation step where the polymerase is aided by the replicator and initiator. Furthermore, the example of Escherichia coli replicase has been elaborated to appreciate the remarkable processivity and fidelity of the DNA synthesizing machinery. Finally, the chapter explains how, in contrast to bacterial DNA replication where a single DNA polymerase is at work, eukaryotic DNA replication is undertaken by the coordinated action of three different polymerases.

We study the dissipative evolution of (0+1)-dimensionally expanding media with Bjorken symmetry using the Boltzmann equation for massive particles in relaxation-time approximation. Breaking conformal symmetry by a mass induces a non-zero bulk viscous pressure in the medium. It is shown that even a small mass (in units of the local temperature) drastically modifies the well-known attractor for the shear Reynolds number previously observed in massless systems. For generic nonzero particle mass, neither the shear nor the bulk viscous pressure relax quickly to a non-equilibrium attractor; they approach the hydrodynamic limit only late, at small values of the inverse Reynolds numbers. Only the longitudinal pressure, which is a combination of thermal, shear and bulk viscous pressures, continues to show early approach to a far-off-equilibrium attractor, driven by the rapid longitudinal expansion at early times. Second-order dissipative hydrodynamics based on a gradient expansion around locally isotropic thermal equilibrium fails to reproduce this attractor., Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures

Cavernous haemangioma of uterine cervix is a very rare lesion. It is clinically significant due to its presentation of pervaginal bleeding mimicking many other neoplastic lesions. Occasionally it may leads to massive haemorrhage complicating to hypovolemic shock. Here we are presenting a rare case of cavernous haemangiomatous polyp of endocervix presented with postcoital bleeding in a 32 years old lady. Surgical removal is curable and also has been proved to control post-coital bleeding successfully in our case. Bangladesh Journal of Medical Science Vol.18(1) 2019 p.153-155

Placental mesenchymal dysplasia (PMD) is a rare benign placental abnormality. It is characterized by hydropic degeneration of stem villi, placentomegaly, and increased maternal serum alpha-fetoprotein (AFP). It can be associated with different congenital abnormalities, karyotype abnormalities, and feto-maternal morbidities. It is difficult to differentiate PMDfrom partial mole, complete mole with twin pregnancy in ultrasound, and in macroscopic examination. The current paper presentsa rare case of placental mesenchymal dysplasia in a young primigravida mother who delivered a normal fetus withnormal karyotype.

Primary mucinous eccrine carcinoma is a rare malignant adnexal tumor of older patients. The histopathological features of this tumor are well-established but the cytomorphology of this neoplasm has only been documented in a few cases. The cytology and histology of this tumor may mimic metastatic mucinous carcinoma and may cause a diagnostic dilemma, especially when the tumor is located at axilla. A correct diagnosis is important because the prognosis is better than that of a metastatic mucinous carcinoma. Here we report the cytological and histological features of a case of primary cutaneous mucinous carcinoma of axilla in an elderly male patient.

Well-differentiated papillary mesothelioma is a rare tumor occurring predominantly in the peritoneum of young women, a few with history of asbestos exposure. A 28-year-old woman presented with ascites and pain abdomen. Ultrasonography and computed tomography scan of the abdomen revealed a mass in the retroperitoneum measuring 15 cm × 12 cm. Histopathological examination along with immunohistochemistry (IHC) confirmed it to be a papillary mesothelioma in the peritoneum. It is difficult to differentiate from more common malignant mesothelioma and papillary adenocarcinoma, which also have poorer prognosis. The difficulty can be resolved by clinico-radiological correlation along with histopathological examination and IHC.

Myeloid sarcoma is a neoplasm of myeloid cells that can arise before or concurrent with or may follow acute myeloid leukemia. Very rarely, it can present as an isolated breast lump. We have diagnosed a case of myeloid sarcoma by fine-needle aspiration cytology (FNAC), in a 52-year-old woman who presented with the right-sided breast lump. FNAC showed hypercellular smears with immature myeloid cells few neutrophils and many large round cells with high nuclear-cytoplasmic ratio, prominent nucleoli and a moderate amount of granular cytoplasm. The blast cells were myeloperoxidase positive and complete blood count, and peripheral blood examination were normal. We report this case for its rarity and as a note of caution to a pathologist to consider myeloid sarcoma in the differential diagnosis of breast lump to provide the correct diagnosis and avoid incorrect treatment of a curable disease.

Basal cell adenoma is a rare type of monomorphic salivary adenoma most commonly involving the parotid gland. Cytology of basal cell adenoma closely mimics many other benign and malignant basaloid neoplasms. Cytological features of membranous basal cell adenoma simulate adenoid cystic carcinoma in fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) smears. Here, we are presenting a rare case of cytodiagnosis of membranous basal cell adenoma of parotid gland in an elderly lady, which mimicked adenoid cystic carcinoma on FNAC. We discuss the cytomorphology of this rare case with an emphasis on cytological difference between membranous basal cell carcinoma and adenoid cystic carcinoma as well as other basaloid neoplasms.

The first detection of gravitational waves from the binary neutron star merger event GW170817 has started to provide important new constraints on the nuclear equation of state at high density. The tidal deformability bound of GW170817 combined with the observed two solar mass neutron star poses a serious challenge to theoretical formulations of realistic equations of state. We analyze a fully comprehensive set of relativistic nuclear mean-field theories by confronting them with the observational bounds and the measured neutron-skin thickness. We find that only a few models can withstand these bounds which predict a stiff overall equation of state but with a soft neutron-proton symmetry energy. Two possible indications are proposed: Circumstantial evidence of hadron-quark phase transition inside the star and new parametrizations that are consistent with ground state properties of finite nuclei and observational bounds. Based on extensive analysis of these sets, an upper limit on the radius of a $1.4M_\odot$ neutron star of $R_{1.4}\lesssim 12.9$ km is deduced., Matches with the published version

We consider causal higher order theories of relativistic viscous hydrodynamics in the limit of one-dimensional boost-invariant expansion and study the associated dynamical attractor. We obtain evolution equations for the inverse Reynolds number as a function of Knudsen number. The solutions of these equations exhibit attractor behavior which we analyze in terms of Lyapunov exponents using several different techniques. We compare the attractors of the second-order M\"uller-Israel-Stewart (MIS), transient DNMR, and third-order theories with the exact solution of the Boltzmann equation in the relaxation-time approximation. It is shown that for Bjorken flow the third-order theory provides a better approximation to the exact kinetic theory attractor than both MIS and DNMR theories. For three different choices of the time dependence of the shear relaxation rate we find analytical solutions for the energy density and shear stress and use these to study the attractors analytically. By studying these analytical solutions at both small and large Knudsen numbers we characterize and uniquely determine the attractors and Lyapunov exponents. While for small Knudsen numbers the approach to the attractor is exponential, strong power-law decay of deviations from the attractor and rapid loss of initial state memory is found even for large Knudsen numbers. Implications for the applicability of hydrodynamics in far-off-equilibrium situations are discussed., Comment: 16 pages, 6 figures. Final version as appeared in Phys. Rev. C

In this article, there are 18 sections discussing various current topics in the field of relativistic heavy-ion collisions and related phenomena, which will serve as a snapshot of the current state of the art. Section 1 reviews experimental results of some recent light-flavored particle production data from ALICE collaboration. Other sections are mostly theoretical in nature. Very strong but transient magnetic field created in relativistic heavy-ion collisions could have important observational consequences. This has generated a lot of theoretical activity in the last decade. Sections 2, 7, 9, 10 and 11 deal with the effects of the magnetic field on the properties of the QCD matter. There are several unanswered questions about the QCD phase diagram. Sections 3, 11 and 18 discuss various aspects of the QCD phase diagram and phase transitions. Recent years have witnessed interesting developments in foundational aspects of hydrodynamics and their application to heavy-ion collisions. Sections 12, 15, 16 and 17 of this article probe some aspects of this exciting field. Transport coefficients together with their temperature- and density-dependence, are essential inputs in hydrodynamical calculations. Sections 5, 8 and 14 deal with calculation/estimation of various transport coefficients (shear and bulk viscosity, thermal conductivity, relaxation times, etc.) of quark matter and hadronic matter. Sections 4, 6 and 13 deals with interesting new developments in the field. Section 4 discusses color dipole gluon distribution function at small transverse momentum in the form of a series of Bells polynomials. Section 6 discusses the properties of Higgs boson in the quark gluon plasma using Higgs-quark interaction. Section 13 discusses modification of coalescence model to incorporate viscous corrections and application of this model., Comment: 109 pages, 49 captioned figures, compilation of the contributions as presented in the `Workshop on Dynamics of QCD Matter', 15th to 17th August 2019, NISER Bhubaneswar, India, published version

Introduction : Anaemia in pregnancy is still a major concern in reducing maternal morbidity and mortality in India particularly in rural population. Haemoglobinopathies are important contributors to anaemia in pregnancy in rural India particularly in tribal population. Beta thalassemia is the commonest type of haemoglobinopathy all over the world. Thalassemia and other haemoglobinopathies are highly prevalent among the tribal communities in West Bengal. Bankura is one of the districts of West Bengal where more tribal population are present. So detection and prevention of thalassemias is one of the major public health problems in this part of the state of West Bengal. Study done by Manna et al 4 showed that about 10% of the population is carrier of haemoglobin disorder. This study was taken up to document the recent prevalence status of hemoglobinopathies particularly Thalassemias and coexistence of iron deficiency anaemias Objective : To find out prevalence of haemoglobinopathies and to compare the prevalence of different types of Thalassemias among the antenatal mothers. Materials and Methods : This study was carried out in Bankura Sammilani Medical College (BSMC), Bankura West Bengal among 3500 tribal and non-tribal antenatal mothers. Cation exchange-high performance liquid chromatography (CE-HPLC) is being used for investigation for hemoglobinopathies and thalassemias. Together with a complete blood count, the CE-HPLC is effective in categorizing hemoglobinopathies as traits, homozygous disorders and compound heterozygous disorders. Results : In our study 275 mothers had haemoglobinopathy. The commonest disorder we encountered was Beta Thalassemia trait (57.5%), followed by HbE carrier (36%), homozygous HbE disease (1%), HbS carrier (4%), HbE Beta Thalassemia (1.5%). Bangladesh Journal of Medical Science Vol.15(1) 2016 p.90-94