BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES Pathogenic strains of Escherichia coli are a common cause of acute infectious diarrhea. The aim of this study was to investigate the frequency, virulence markers and antibiotic resistance patterns of diarrheagenic E. coli (DEC) isolated from adolescents and adults in Hamadan, west of Iran. MATERIALS AND METHODS A total of 187 stool samples were collected from adults ...

The World Health Organization has called for an effort to eliminate Lymphatic Filariasis (LF) around the world. In regions where the disease is endemic, local production and distribution of medicated salt dosed with diethylcarbamazine (DEC) has been an effective method for eradicating LF. A partner of the Notre Dame Haiti program, Group SPES in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, produces a medicated salt c...

This chapter presents an overview of the decentralized POMDP (Dec-POMDP) framework. In a Dec-POMDP, a team of agents collaborates to maximize a global reward based on local information only. This means that agents do not observe a Markovian signal during execution and therefore the agents’ individual policies map from histories to actions. Searching for an optimal joint policy is an extremely h...

C R I a h p a m m b c c Background: There is interest from the community in the use of self-help and complementary therapies for depression. This review examined the currently available evidence supporting the use of acupuncture to treat depression. Objectives: To examine the effectiveness and adverse effects of acupuncture in the treatment for depression. Search Strategy: The following databas...

The endocytotic c-type lectin receptor DEC-205 is highly expressed on immature dendritic cells. In previous studies, it was shown that antigen-targeting to DEC-205 is a useful tool for the induction of antigen-specific Foxp3(+) regulatory T cells and thereby can prevent inflammatory processes. However, whether this approach is sufficient to mediate tolerance in mucosal tissues like the gut is u...

The emergence and persistence of multidrug-resistant (MDR) diarrheagenic Escherichia coli (DEC) causing acute diarrhea is a major public health challenge in developing countries. The aim of this study was to evaluate the resistance phenotypes of DEC isolated from stool samples collected from children less than 5 years of age with acute diarrhea living in Ouagadougou/Burkina Faso. From August 20...

Decentralized partially observable Markov decision processes (DEC-POMDPs) are used to plan policies for multiple agents that must maximize a joint reward function but do not communicate with each other. The agents act under uncertainty about each other and the environment. This planning task arises in optimization of wireless networks, and other scenarios where communication between agents is r...

We have developed an adaptive handwriting recognizer for isolated Latin characters in which the adaptive behavior is based on the Dynamically Expanding Context (DEC) algorithm. In our current system, the outputs of a set of static classifiers are combined in a committee machine, whose rules are adapted. Every misclassified character gives rise to adding a new DEC rule to the rule set of the com...

A sensitive and selective liquid chromatographic method using mass spectrometric detection was developed for the determination of diethylcarbamazine (DEC) in human plasma. DEC and its stable isotope internal standard d3-DEC were extracted from 0.25mL of human plasma using solid phase extraction. Chromatography was performed using a Phenomenex Synergi 4μ Fusion-RP column (2mm×250mm) with gradien...

This paper introduces a human-derived humanoid control concept that allows voluntary movements with automatic posture control. The concept consists of a modular control architecture, where each DOF is served by one control module. The control modules are based on the DEC model (DEC, Disturbance Estimation and Compensation). The DEC model combines sensory-derived disturbance estimates for re-act...