QoSRP: A Cross-layer QoS Channel-Aware Routing Protocol for the Internet of Underwater Acoustic Sensor Networks.

Quality of service (QoS)-aware data gathering in static-channel based underwater wireless sensor networks (UWSNs) is severely limited due to location and time-dependent acoustic channel communication characteristics. This paper proposes a novel cross-layer QoS-aware multichannel routing protocol called QoSRP for the internet of UWSNs-based time-critical marine monitoring applications. The proposed QoSRP scheme considers the unique characteristics of the acoustic communication in highly dynamic network topology during gathering and relaying events data towards the sink. The proposed QoSRP scheme during the time-critical events data-gathering process employs three basic mechanisms, namely underwater channel detection (UWCD), underwater channel assignment (UWCA) and underwater packets forwarding (UWPF). The UWCD mechanism finds the vacant channels with a high probability of detection and low probability of missed detection and false alarms. The UWCA scheme assigns high data rates channels to acoustic sensor nodes (ASNs) with longer idle probability in a robust manner. Lastly, the UWPF mechanism during conveying information avoids congestion, data path loops and balances the data traffic load in UWSNs. The QoSRP scheme is validated through extensive simulations conducted by NS2 and AquaSim 2.0 in underwater environments (UWEs). The simulation results reveal that the QoSRP protocol performs better compared to existing routing schemes in UWSNs.

A Multiobjective, Lion Mating Optimization Inspired Routing Protocol for Wireless Body Area Sensor Network Based Healthcare Applications.

The importance of body area sensor networks (BASNs) is increasing day by day because of their increasing use in Internet of things (IoT)-enabled healthcare application services. They help humans in improving their quality of life by continuously monitoring various vital signs through biosensors strategically placed on the human body. However, BASNs face serious challenges, in terms of the short life span of their batteries and unreliable data transmission, because of the highly unstable and unpredictable channel conditions of tiny biosensors located on the human body. These factors may result in poor data gathering quality in BASNs. Therefore, a more reliable data transmission mechanism is greatly needed in order to gather quality data in BASN-based healthcare applications. Therefore, this study proposes a novel, multiobjective, lion mating optimization inspired routing protocol, called self-organizing multiobjective routing protocol (SARP), for BASN-based IoT healthcare applications. The proposed routing scheme significantly reduces local search problems and finds the best dynamic cluster-based routing solutions between the source and destination in BASNs. Thus, it significantly improves the overall packet delivery rate, residual energy, and throughput with reduced latency and packet error rates in BASNs. Extensive simulation results validate the performance of our proposed SARP scheme against the existing routing protocols in terms of the packet delivery ratio, latency, packet error rate, throughput, and energy efficiency for BASN-based health monitoring applications.

Big datasets of optical-wireless cyber-physical systems for optimizing manufacturing services in the internet of things-enabled industry 4.0.

The Industry 4.0 revolution is aimed to optimize the product design according to the customers' demand, quality requirements and economic feasibility. Industry 4.0 employs advanced two-way communication technologies for optimizing the manufacturing process to increase the sales of the products and revenues to cope the existing global economy issues. In Industry 4.0, big data obtained from the Internet of Things (IoT)-enabled industrial Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) plays an important role in enhancing the system service performance to boost the productivity with enhanced quality of customer experience. This paper presents the big datasets obtained from the Internet of things (IoT)-enabled Optical-Wireless Sensor Networks (OWSNs) for optimizing service systems' performance in the electronics manufacturing Industry 4.0. The updated raw and analyzed big datasets of our published work [3] contain five values namely, data delivery, latency, congestion, throughput, and packet error rate in OWSNs. The obtained dataset are useful for optimizing the service system performance in the electronics manufacturing Industry 4.0.

Bayesian auction game theory-based DBA for XG symmetrical PON.

The next-generation passive optical networks (NG-PONs) (i.e., 50G-PON and Time-division-multiplexing/Wavelength-division-multiplexing, TWDM-PON) offer very high bandwidth with improved quality of service. In these PONs, the role of efficient Dynamic bandwidth allocation (DBA) becomes even more important in reducing the upstream delays, bandwidth waste and reducing the upstream delays and delay variance. These qualities of service metrics lead to improved Quality of Experience (QoE) for the end-users in addition to increased revenue for the service providers. This study introduces the game theory concept in the bandwidth distribution process in PON. Specifically, the Bayesian auction game theory (BAGT) process is used in the DBA process to address the unfair and inefficient distribution of upstream bandwidth to the optical network units (ONUs) in XG symmetrical PON(XGs-PON). The proposed BAGT scheme allocates the excess bandwidth to the entire ONUs in proportion to their demands reported via the bidding process. To validate the performance of the BAGT scheme, we also compare it with other existing DBA schemes namely; proportional allocation schemes (PAS), improved bandwidth utilization (IBU), and optimized round-robin (ORR) methods. The simulation results show that the proposed scheme results in higher system throughput and lower upstream delays than the other schemes. BAGT DBA also improves the bandwidth utilization by up to 38% to 50% compared to IBU, ORR, and PAS schemes and exhibits the minimum frame loss ratio.

Hemoglobin A1c and Fructosamine Evaluated in Patients with Type 2 Diabetes Receiving Peritoneal Dialysis Using Long-Term Continuous Glucose Monitoring.

INTRODUCTION: Shortened erythrocyte life span and erythropoietin-stimulating agents may affect hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) levels in patients receiving peritoneal dialysis (PD). We compared HbA1c with interstitial glucose measured by continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) in patients with type 2 diabetes receiving PD. METHODS: Fourteen days of CGM (Ipro2, Medtronic) were performed in 23 patients with type 2 diabetes receiving PD and in 23 controls with type 2 diabetes and an estimated glomerular filtration rate over 60 mL/min/1.73 m2. Patients were matched on gender and age (±5 years). HbA1c (mmol/mol), its derived estimate of mean plasma glucose (eMPGA1c) (mmol/L), and fructosamine (µmol/L) were measured at the end of the CGM period and compared with the mean sensor glucose (mmol/L) from CGM. RESULTS: In the PD group, mean sensor glucose was 0.98 (95% con-fidence interval (CI): 0.43-1.54) mmol/L higher than the eMPGA1c compared with the control group (p = 0.002) where glucose levels were nearly identical (-0.05 (95% CI: -0.35-0.25) mmol/L). A significant association was found between fructosamine and mean sensor glucose using linear regression with no difference between slopes (p = 0.89) or y-intercepts (p = 0.28). DISCUSSION/CONCLUSION: HbA1c underestimates mean plasma glucose levels in patients with type 2 diabetes receiving PD. However, the clinical significance of this finding is undetermined. Fructosamine seems to more accurately reflect glycemic status. CGM or fructosamine could complement HbA1c to increase the accuracy of glycemic monitoring in the PD population.

Sleep-aware wavelength and bandwidth assignment scheme for TWDM PON.

The energy efficiency and delay performance of PON are two inversely related phenomena. Higher sleep time of the Optical Network Units (ONUs) results in higher upstream (US) delays due to increased traffic queues during the ONU Asleep state. Although an efficient dynamic bandwidth and wavelength assignment (DWBA) scheme can decrease US delays by minimizing the bandwidth waste and improving the fairness of bandwidth distribution among the ONUs. However, the conventional DWBA schemes are not designed to work with cyclic sleep mode (CSM) and they keep on assigning bandwidth to ONUs even if the ONU is in Asleep state leading to wastage of bandwidth and degraded CSM performance. Therefore, in this work a sleep aware DWBA scheme for TWDM PON is presented to coordinate with CSM mode. It only assign bandwidth to Active ONUs during the guaranteed phase, surplus phase and excess phase allocation phases which minimizes the bandwidth waste and the bandwidth lost at the ONU end. The wavelength switching process is also improved by only considering the Active state ONUs to balance the traffic load on all the wavelengths. The simulation results support our claim as the SA-DWBA scheme on average achieves DWBA schemes due to up to 50% to 65% higher energy savings compared to other due to longer ONU Asleep times. However, the increased upstream delays of all the traffic classes in SA-DWBA scheme remain within the set delay limit of 50 ms.

Randomized Trial of Acute Changes in Plasma Phosphate After Phosphorus-Standardized Meals in Peritoneal Dialysis.

INTRODUCTION: Hyperphosphatemia is associated with increased morbidity and mortality in patients with chronic kidney disease. The aim of this study was to assess whether a meal with high phosphorus content would affect plasma phosphate in the hours that follow among subjects with end-stage kidney disease on peritoneal dialysis. METHODS: This was a single-blinded randomized cross-over trial of 12 subjects on maintenance peritoneal dialysis, in which subjects were randomized to consume a meal with either high or low phosphorus content on 2 separate trial days. On each trial day, plasma phosphate was measured immediately before consumption of the standardized meal and after 1, 2, 3, and 5 hours. RESULTS: The mean fasting plasma phosphate at baseline was 1.69 ± 0.22 mmol/l. Plasma phosphate was similar between the 2 meals at baseline, as well as at 1, 2, 3, and 5 hours after consumption. The largest observed difference in plasma phosphate between the 2 meals was 0.15 mmol/l, which occurred 5 hours after consumption (high-phosphorus meal 1.75 ± 0.32 mmol/l vs. low-phosphorus meal 1.60 ± 0.14 mmol/l (P = 0.06)). Using summary analyses for repeated measures, we observed a significant difference in the plasma phosphate between the 2 meals (P = 0.03). CONCLUSION: Our results show that in subjects with end-stage kidney disease, a meal with high phosphorus content has only a negligible effect on plasma phosphate compared to a meal with low phosphorus content. Thus, large increases in plasma phosphate cannot be accounted for by a high intake of phosphorus in the hours before blood sampling.

Big Data acquired by Internet of Things-enabled industrial multichannel wireless sensors networks for active monitoring and control in the smart grid Industry 4.0.

Smart Grid Industry 4.0 (SGI4.0) defines a new paradigm to provide high-quality electricity at a low cost by reacting quickly and effectively to changing energy demands in the highly volatile global markets. However, in SGI4.0, the reliable and efficient gathering and transmission of the observed information from the Internet of Things (IoT)-enabled Cyber-physical systems, such as sensors located in remote places to the control center is the biggest challenge for the Industrial Multichannel Wireless Sensors Networks (IMWSNs). This is due to the harsh nature of the smart grid environment that causes high noise, signal fading, multipath effects, heat, and electromagnetic interference, which reduces the transmission quality and trigger errors in the IMWSNs. Thus, an efficient monitoring and real-time control of unexpected changes in the power generation and distribution processes is essential to guarantee the quality of service (QoS) requirements in the smart grid. In this context, this paper describes the dataset contains measurements acquired by the IMWSNs during events monitoring and control in the smart grid. This work provides an updated detail comparison of our proposed work, including channel detection, channel assignment, and packets forwarding algorithms, collectively called CARP [1] with existing G-RPL [2] and EQSHC [3] schemes in the smart grid. The experimental outcomes show that the dataset and is useful for the design, development, testing, and validation of algorithms for real-time events monitoring and control applications in the smart grid.

Jugular foramen schwannoma--a very rare entity.

Jugular foramen schwannoma is a very rare tumour and very few cases have been reported in the literature. Usually it is misdiagnosed as acoustic neuroma and the diagnosis is made peroperatively. It has significant neurological morbidity and mortality. In addition to the experience and expertise of the surgeon, introduction of better anaesthesia and microsurgical techniques have significantly reduced the morbidity and mortality. We present a case of jugular foramen schwannoma who was operated by the senior author. The outcome was very good and the patient recovered without any permanent deficits. The epidemiology, pathophysiology, clinical features, radiographic findings and treatment of this rare entity are reviewed.

Clipping of intracranial aneurysms--3 years study.

BACKGROUND: Subarachnoid haemorrhage is a fairly common condition and a neurosurgical emergency. The commonest cause of subarachnoid haemorrhage is a ruptured intracranial aneurysm. Less common causes include an arteriovenous malformation, and occasionally a tumour, bleeding diathesis or anticoagulant therapy. METHODS: This was an analytical, retrospective study and conducted at the department of neurosurgery unit-I, Lahore General Hospital, Lahore. The study period was from January 2003 to December 2005. It included all patients who were operated for clipping of intracranial aneurysms during the study period. The total number of patients included was 75. Four patients were found to have double aneurysms. So a total of 79 aneurysms were clipped in 75 patients. RESULTS: About half of the patients (49.3%) were between 40-60 years of age. The commonest site of the aneurysm was anterior communicating artery (53%) followed by middle cerebral artery (25.3%) and posterior cerebral artery (12.6%). Four (5.3%) patients had double aneurysms. Almost all the patients (97.3%) underwent a pterional craniotomy. CONCLUSION: We conclude that the commonest age of presentation of aneurysmal subarachnoid haemorrhage in our population is 40-60 years and the commonest site of intracranial aneurysm is the anterior communicating artery.