Efficient Fine Arrhythmia Detection Based on DCG P-T Features.

Due to the high mortality associated with heart disease, there is an urgent demand for advanced detection of abnormal heart beats. The use of dynamic electrocardiogram (DCG) provides a useful indicator of heart condition from long-term monitoring techniques commonly used in the clinic. However, accurately distinguishing sparse abnormal heart beats from large DCG data sets remains difficult. Herein, we propose an efficient fine solution based on 11 geometrical features of the DCG PQRST(P-T) waves and an improved hierarchical clustering method for arrhythmia detection. Data sets selected from MIT-BIH are used to validate the effectiveness of this approach. Experimental results show that the detection procedure of arrhythmia is fast and with accurate clustering.

Comparison of the cardiovascular effects of immobilization with three different drug combinations in free-ranging African lions.

Thirty-six free-ranging lions (12 per group) were immobilized with tiletamine-zolazepam (Zoletil 0.6 mg/kg i.m.) plus medetomidine (0.036 mg/kg i.m.) (TZM), ketamine (3.0 mg/kg i.m.) plus medetomidine (0.036 mg/kg i.m.) (KM) or ketamine (1.2 mg/kg i.m.) plus butorphanol (0.24 mg/kg i.m.) plus medetomidine (0.036 mg/kg i.m.) (KBM). During immobilization cardiovascular variables were monitored at 5-minute intervals for a period of 30 minutes. Lions immobilized with all three drug combinations were severely hypertensive. Systolic arterial pressure was higher at initial sampling in lions immobilized with KM (237.3 ± 24.8 mmHg) than in those immobilized with TZM (221.0 ± 18.1 mmHg) or KBM (226.0 ± 20.6 mmHg) and decreased to 205.8 ± 19.4, 197.7 ± 23.7 and 196.3 ± 17.7 mmHg, respectively. Heart rates were within normal ranges for healthy, awake lions and decreased throughout the immobilization regardless of drug combination used. Lions immobilized with TZM had a higher occurrence (66%) of skipped heart beats than those immobilized with KBM (25%). The three drug combinations all caused negative cardiovascular effects, which were less when KBM was used, but adverse enough to warrant further investigations to determine if these effects can be reversed or prevented when these three combinations are used to immobilize free-living lions.

Effects of tritiated water on locomotion of zebrafish larvae: a new insight in tritium toxic effects on a vertebrate model species.

Tritium (3H), a radioactive isotope of hydrogen, is ubiquitously present in the environment. In a previous study, we highlighted a mis-regulation of genes involved in muscle contraction, eye transparency and response to DNA damages after exposure of zebrafish embryo-larvae from 3 hpf to 96 hpf at 0.4 and 4 mGy/h of tritiated water (HTO). The present study aimed to link this gene mis-regulation to responses observed at higher biological levels. Analyses on spontaneous tail movement, locomotor activity and heart rate were performed. Histological sections of eyes were made to evaluate the impact of HTO on eye transparency and whole embryo immunostainings were realized to assess DNA double strand breaks repair using gamma-H2AX foci. We found a decrease of basal velocity as well as a decrease of response in 96 hpf larvae exposed at 0.4 mGy/h after a tactile stimulus as compared to controls. Histological sections of larvae eyes performed after the exposure to 4 mGy/h did not show obvious differences in lens transparency or retinal development between contaminated and control organisms. Gamma-H2AX foci detection revealed no differences in the number of foci between contaminated organisms and controls, for both dose rates. Overall, results highlighted more detrimental effects of HTO exposure on locomotor behavior in 96 hpf larvae exposed at the lowest dose rate. Those results could be linked to mis-regulation of genes involved in muscle contraction found in a previous study at the same dose rate. It appears that not all effects found at the molecular scale were confirmed using higher biological scales. These results could be due to a delay between gene expression modulation and the onset of physiological disruption or homeostatic mechanisms to deal with tritium effects. However, crossing data from different scales highlighted new pathways to explore, i.e. neurotoxic pathways, for better understanding HTO effects on organisms.

Microplastics negatively impact embryogenesis and modulate the immune response of the marine medaka Oryzias melastigma.

Microplastic (MP) pollution is an emerging contaminant in aquatic environments worldwide. Nonetheless, the developmental toxicity of MPs in the early life stages of fish and the mechanisms involved are not yet fully understood. The present study investigated the effects of different concentrations of polystyrene (PS) MPs on the early development of the marine model fish the medaka Oryzias melastigma. Our results showed that waterborne exposure to PS MPs significantly delayed the hatching time, altered the heartbeat and decreased the hatching rate of embryos. Furthermore, the genes involved in cardiac development, encoding for embryo-hatching enzymes, as well as inflammatory responses were significantly upregulated. The transcriptome results showed that mainly the pathways involved in metabolism, immune response, genetic information processing and diseases were significantly enriched. These results demonstrate that PS MPs negatively impact embryogenesis and the immune response of O. melastigma.

Wireless sensing system for the welfare of sewer labourers.

There is a growing demand for the environmental pollution monitoring and control systems. In the view of ever increasing sources of toxic chemicals, these systems should have the facilities to detect and calibrate the source quickly. Toxic gases are the ones that cause health impact but humans are being exposed to it in various situations. These gases have to be monitored such that increase in the normal level of them could be known and proper precaution measures can be undertaken. So, an embedded system is designed using a microcontroller with internet of things, for the purpose of detecting and monitoring the hazardous gas leakage, which aids in the evasion of endangering of human lives. The hazardous gases can be sensed and displayed each and every second, in proximity to one more sensor for tracking heart beats which help to monitor the condition of the sewer labourers. If both the gases along with a pulse detector exceeds the normal level then an alarm is generated immediately and also an alert warning message can be sent to the authorised administrator and as well to the nearest health center to make the sewer labourers feel comfortable with necessary first aid and possibilities with the treatment in the case of emergency. Once the message is received by the health center, they enforce their team with necessary first aid to the current location to save the sewer labourer. Once this system is established for a particular user this will completely become fully automated and does not need any other additional people for monitoring and alerting purpose. It has an advantage over the manual method in offering quick response time and accurate detection of an emergency.

Videogames ativos e não ativos fisicamente causam benefícios cardiovasculares durante e após a prática? / Do active and non-active videogames promote cardiovascular benefits during and after practice?

O objetivo deste estudo foi revisar na literatura os efeitos proporcionados pelos videogames (ativos e inativos) nos aspectos cardiovasculares (pressão arterial, frequência cardíaca e duplo produto). A revisão sistemática foi realizada com estudos que analisaram as respostas cardiovasculares durante e após a prática de videogames ativos e inativos. Buscas realizadas por dois pesquisadores de forma independente nas bases de dados eletrônicas Pubmed, Scielo, Bireme (Medline). Diante disso, 375 estudos foram analisados, após os critérios de inclusão e exclusão, 15 artigos restaram, e 13 foram selecionados. Verificou-se que os videogames ativos proporcionaram maiores aumentos de FC e PA durante as sessões comparados com videogame inativo. Após as sessões com videogames ativos tais variáveis apresentaram redução comparado ao repouso de forma aguda e crônica. Ambos os videogames promovem alterações cardiovasculares agudas. Contudo, apenas os ativos alcançam intensidades moderadas a vigorosas provocando benefício cardiovascular hipotensor pós sessão. Sugere-se a troca do tempo de tela em jogos inativos por videogames ativos.

A review of the literature was undertaken to evaluate effects by videogames (active and non-active) on cardiovascular factors (arterial pressure, heat beats and double product) through studies that analyzed cardiovascular responses during and after active or non-active videogame practices. Search by two independent researchers in electronic databases Pubmed, Scielo, Bireme (Medline) revealed 375 studies. The application of inclusion and exclusion criteria resulted in 13 articles. Active videogames provides increase in HB and AP during sessions when compared to non-active videogames. After active videogame sessions, variables were reduced accordingly, when compared to acute and chronic rest. Both videogames cause acute cardiovascular changes. However, only active videogames reached moderate to vigorous intensities causing post-session hypotension cardiovascular benefits. Change of time between non-active and active videogames is recommended.