text:
The Deadly Percheron
John Franklin Bardin
Title: The Deadly Percheron
Author: John Franklin Bardin
Written: 1946
Availability: The Deadly Percheron - US
The Deadly Percheron - UK
Das Teufelsrad - Deutschland
B+ : too much convenient amnesia and remembering, but an always gripping tale
New Republic . 22/7/1946 .
The NY Times Book Rev. . 2/6/1946 Isaac Anderson
The New Yorker . 25/5/1946 .
TLS . 24/12/1976 Patricia Highsmith
"Leprechauns yet ! And percherons ! (...) It is a story of murder and mayhem and hideous torture -- one which will hold your attention to the last, even though you cannot possibly believe that such things could happen here in little old New York." - Isaac Anderson, The New York Times Book Review
The Deadly Percheron begins with a scene that doesn't sound that unusual: psychiatrist Dr. George Matthews sees his last patient of the day, a new one named Jacob Blunt whose first words are: "Doctor, I think I'm losing my mind." Blunt -- who appears with a hibiscus in his hair -- certainly sounds slightly delusional. He tells a story of little men -- leprechauns -- who pay him to wear flowers in his hair and to give away quarters and to whistle in public places. Even Blunt thinks it's pretty unbelievable, which is why he's come to consult a psychiatrist: to see if he might not just be imagining things.
Matthews narrates the whole story, and he's a bit flummoxed by Blunt: the well-off young man seems, by and large, sane enough, but tells a story that's just too strange to be true. Blunt convinces him to come along when he's supposed to meet Eustace the leprechaun that evening, and Matthews decides to humour him. Problem is, a midget named Eustace does show up at the bar .....
Eustace has another odd job for Blunt to do: deliver a percheron (that's a horse -- "the kind they use on beer wagons") to the apartment of Frances Raye, "the most successful actress on Broadway". As Eustace explains: "We leprechauns have decided that it's about time she had a percheron". And he even has the horse waiting outside the bar.
Matthews thinks it's all a ridiculous, elaborate practical joke -- but then he gets a call the next morning and learns that Frances Raye has been murdered and Blunt arrested. Blunt goes to the police station and talks to an acquaintance there, Lieutenant Anderson, convincing him to release Blunt into his custody . Matthews goes to collect the prisoner with Blunt's gal Nancy, whom he also met the previous evening -- but the man Nancy greets as Blunt isn't the man Matthews met the day before. Instead of immediately telling the authorities, however, he decides to go along with the charade -- only to promptly feel a sharp blow to his back as they wait on the subway platform, and to black out.
Matthews wakes up to find himself in the psychopathic ward of the City Hospital, a huge scar disfiguring his face. Months have apparently passed by, and everyone believes him to be a vagrant named John Brown. Try as he might he can't convince anyone he's Dr.George Matthews -- a man who died a while back.
Matthews' memory is hazy and he has no idea what happened to him. First he has to get out of the hospital -- which he does by convincing the doctors that he really is John Brown (and not a maniac claiming to be the dead Matthews). He begins a new life as John Brown, out in Coney Island, still unclear about what happened to him all those lost months.
Slowly things come back to him -- and there are new encounters with figures from the recent past. Layer by layer Bardin strips back the covered-up past, as Matthews remembers what happened to him (and others fill in the blanks) until all the pieces slowly fall into place.
Parts of the novel stand on pretty shaky ground -- it's a complicated plan behind the murders (by the end there's more than just the one), and along the way some very fortuitous coincidences and unlikely (and unprofessional) conduct by many of the actors prevent things getting cleared up earlier. Still, it's one tight, taut thriller and it's never boring. Clinical (and then slightly confused) Matthews as narrator also effectively keeps the truly bizarre aspects of the book in check, allowing for the parade of freak show characters and incredible behaviour while still keeping things (more or less) rationally grounded.
The book isn't quite believable -- there's just a bit too much that's a bit too far-fetched -- but it's still a very enjoyable read. Bardin knows how to tell a story, and he sets a nice tone for Matthews, generally capturing the various stages the doctor goes through (bewilderment, acceptance, curiosity, a desire for revenge) very well. The explanations behind it all are a bit too convoluted to be believed (as is the fact that they weren't discovered earlier), but they're acceptable, especially given the fun and exciting ride provided along the way. Recommended.
The Deadly Percheron:
Poisoned Pen Press publicity page
Canongate publicity page
Plots with Guns (scroll down for review)
John Franklin Bardin:
John Franklin Bardin Official Home Page
Other books by John Franklin Bardin under review:
Devil Take the Blue-Tail Fly
The Last of Philip Banter
See Index of Mysteries and Thrillers under review
American author John Franklin Bardin lived 1916-1981.


On the evening of April 10, 1834, a suicidal act of arson by a desperate slave exposed the horrific crimes taking place in a mansion belonging to one of New Orleans leading families. The fire at 1140 Rue Royale has continued to enflame legends, ghost stories and historical debate ever since.
L'Immortalitè, Delphine Lalaurie and the Voodoo Queen, while fictional, is based on people, places and events torn from the chronicles of New Orleans history. Delphine Lalaurie, the insane empress of Creole high society, Doctor Louis Lalaurie, her mad scientist spouse, Voodoo Queen Marie Laveau and her snake, Zombie are all a part of New Orleans history. Other characters in the book, such as Judge Jean Canonge, Delphine Lalaurie's nephew Auguste Delassus, former mayor Augustine de Macarty, Bastien the slave and neighbor Marthe de Montreuil were actual people who witnessed the shocking events at the Lalaurie Mansion. Bishop de Neckere and Bishop Blanc both presided over St. Louis Cathedral during this period. Certainty as to the actual names of other characters has been lost to time, but the weight of evidence supports the existence of Grand-Mère Arnante, the cook, and Leah, the child slave. Even our fictional bookworm and protagonist, Philippe Bertrand, would be pleased to discover that his apartment was located, in part, on the property that later became the home of Nobel Laureate, William Faulkner.
Visit New Orleans, Louisiana to visit the locations where this story takes place. St. Louis Cathedral is larger than it was in 1833 and so is the Lalaurie Mansion. St. Louis Cemetery #1, on the other hand gave up some of its space to urban renewal. The ghosts of Marie Laveau, Madame Lalaurie and other characters named in L'Immortalite still haunt NOLA.Where in New Orleans? Take a walk down Pirates Alley, tour the Cabildo and take advantage of one of the great walking tours available in the Crescent City. The culturally complex mix of freedom and slavery, voodoo and Catholicism, Creole and American, death and a hope for an afterlife each shaped the unique history of New Orleans. L'Immortalitè strives to reflect these realities as the quests for immortality by Delphine and Louis Lalaurie, Philippe Bertrand and a runaway slave intersect at a corner in front of 1140 Royal Street.
Read L'Immortalite, Madame Lalaurie and the Voodoo Queen, then take a tour of New Orleans, Louisiana. You'll be glad you did.


Is Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey buying Bitcoin every week?
March 7, 2019, | AtoZ Markets - The CEO and co-founder of Twitter, and CEO and founder of Cash App Jack Dorsey seem to be buying a lot of Bitcoin, mentioning that he had reached his weekly Bitcoin buying limit of $10,000 on his own Cash App platform.
" I saw that on Twitter, all the screenshots, I thought that was awesome. I would have participated, but I already exceeded my 'Bitcoin buying' limit on Cash App. So, I couldn't purchase any more Bitcoin."
Also, Bent said that there's always tomorrow, to which Jack responded that tomorrow he probably can and he thinks that he always has a limit that rotates every week or so.
As reported, when support for buying and selling crypto assets launched on Cash App about a year ago, the weekly limit for Bitcoin buying is indeed $10,000. Of course, It is possible that Dorsey decided to buy the maximum amount of Bitcoin only on that particular week - or some other byzantine explanation. Because Bent and Dorsey did not elaborate, the reader must decide how likely this possibility is.
"Imagine being born this year, only knowing that the potential for a global currency e.g., Bitcoin exists. That is exciting, You kind of see this with the adoption of any critical technology e.g. You see children today going up to any screen and having an expectation that they can slide it, and touch it, and zoom, and use their fingers. And it just speaks to the impact that the iPhone and the iPad had in changing the expectation, the same will be true for Bitcoin and blockchain and digital currency."
Earlier this year, he backed a Lightning Network trust chain that saw users pass an increasing amount of satoshis between each other and has shown off he's setting up his own Bitcoin Lightning Network node.


After several weeks of keeping my big mouth and keyboard quiet, the good news is out; Google has officially acquired Zenter! We saw their product two weeks into development when the company was incorporated under another creative name, Click n' Slide. After we saw what these two rockstars had done in a few weeks, we knew the Big G would pay attention. Robbie Walker and Wayne Crosby are two fantastic guys. From the guys at Xobni, a hearty congratulations!
Why is this post called $18.53? I have a note in my wallet written a few months ago when we heard early news of acquisition talks over dinner with Robbie at Michelangelo's in North Beach. The note was an IOU for $18.53 only repayable if the Google acquisition fell through. Thanks Google.


U.S. #869 features Horace Mann, whose interest in education began with a position as secretary on the Massachusetts Board of Education in 1837. Mann visited every school in the state and wrote annual reports detailing the progress in public education. He also developed Massachusetts' "normal school" system (schools to train teachers). Mann's work at revamping Massachusetts's education influenced reform in other states, as well. He served as the first president of Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio.


NEW LONDON (CelebrityAccess MediaWire) — Steve Kaika, bassist and vocalist for the iconic Connecticut-based rock band The Reducers, died on Tuesday after a battle with cancer.
The 4-member band recorded three well-received albums in the 1980s, but never managed to break out fully into the national scene, passing on numerous deals with major record labels and instead going with their own label, Rave On Records. Over the years, the band shared stages with artists such as the Ramones and The Replacements, hit the road for several national tours and even Japan where they enjoy a strong following. The band also continued to perform regionally and meet every Friday night in New London for a rehearsal.
"I've always said, some guys play golf or have poker nights," fellow band mate Peter Detmold told the New London Day. "For us, The Reducers is our club. It just happened that the four of us found each other and it worked."
Kaika's death comes just days before a benefit concert in New London's Hygienic Art Park that had been planned to help his family with medical bills. Detmold will emcee the event, which will also feature performances by local bands Dogbite, Ken Atkins & the Honky Tonk Kind The Rivergods, the Original Sinners and special guests. Proceeds from the event will go to help Kaika's family.


text:
Q: What is the official status of C99 support in VS2013? I see that VS2013 added support for a large number of major core language features of C99. Now it supports compound literals, designated initializers, variadic macros, interleaved declarations and statements just to name a few.
This indicates that VS developers made serious steps towards C99 support in Visual Studio. Yet, some of these features are not part of C++ language, which appears to be a notable deviation from the previously announced development strategy (e.g. "VS C compiler will only support those C99 features that are also a part of C++").
So, is there any official or semi-official word on what's going on? I don't seem to be able to find anything definitive on the Net. Were these C99 features officially announced? Is there any commitment to continued C99 support in VS? Or is this just some sort of "rogue" unofficial development?

A: There are a few public official discussions of this from Microsoft developers, the C++ Conformance Roadmap which says:

Herb also announced that, in response to customer requests, the RTM
  version will also include a few tactical C99 language extensions when
  compiling C code, so that some popular community libraries (including
  FFmpeg) will now be able to compile with Visual C++ 2013.

So this has official support but is strategic, from what I can tell form the following articles more support will have to compete with other priorities.
We have the C++11/14 STL Features, Fixes, And Breaking Changes In VS 2013 Blog entry by STL:

Additionally, some C99 Core Language features will be implemented in
  2013 RTM:

*

*C99 _Bool

*C99 compound literals

*C99 designated initializers

*C99 variable declarations

and C99 library support in Visual Studio 2013 blog entry by Pat Brenner which opens with:

In this blog post I want to share some information about the C99
  support added to the C run-time library in Visual Studio 2013.

and ends with:

We know that this is not complete support for the C99 library
  functions. To the best of our understanding, the missing pieces are
  these:

*

*The tgmath.h header is missing. C compiler support is needed for this header.
      Note that the ctgmath header was added—this is possible because that header does not require the tgmath.h header—only the
  ccomplex and cmath headers.

*The uchar.h header is missing. This is from the C Unicode TR.
  Several format specifiers in the printf family are not yet supported.

*The snprintf and snwprintf functions are missing from stdio.h and wchar.h.

which is somewhat more interesting since STL actively addresses comments to the blog and they are hard to summarize but we can see future additions will depend on competing priorities.
Thanks to cremno for pointing out another blog post C Runtime (CRT) Features, Fixes, and Breaking Changes in Visual Studio 14 CTP1 which says:

In the Visual Studio "14" CTP we have fully implemented the C99
  Standard Library, with the exception of any library features that
  depend on compiler features not yet supported by the Visual C++
  compiler (notably, <tgmath.h> is not implemented). There are
  undoubtedly some remaining conformance issues--we know of a few,
  including that _Exit is missing and wcstok has the wrong signature,
  and we are working to fix these. If you find a bug or a missing
  feature, please do report it on Microsoft Connect. If you report bugs
  now, there is a very good chance that we'll be able to fix them before
  RTM.

and has a lot of details that can not be easily summarized.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


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text:
Israelis are dressing up as Muslims to enter Al-Aqsa complex
December 14, 2021 at 3:57 pm | Published in: Israel, Middle East, News, Palestine
Muslims prayer at Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem on 7 May 2021 [Mostafa Alkharouf/Anadolu Agency]
Jewish Israelis are disguising themselves as Muslims to sneak into the Al-Aqsa Mosque complex in occupied East Jerusalem, Israel's Channel 13 news reported.
The extreme Israeli organisation Returning to the Mount, that promotes Jewish entry to and prayer in the compound, is fuelling concerns among security officials, who warn that their actions could spark violence at the Muslim holy site.
Al-Aqsa Mosque is the world's third holiest site for Muslims. Jews call the area the "Temple Mount", claiming it was the site of two Jewish temples in ancient times.
Raphael Morris, head of the Returning to the Mount group, told Channel 13, the group stresses on appearing like Arabs so as not to raise the suspicions of Al-Aqsa Mosque guards or the Jordan-run Islamic Waqf Department, which oversees holy sites in Jerusalem.
Yisrael, an instructor, was shown in footage broadcast by Channel 13 teaching the extreme members of the group how to carry out Islamic positions of prayer while discreetly reciting Jewish liturgy.
"Our vision is to be able to go to the Temple Mount at all hours of the day, and eventually to also succeed in building the Temple and restore the sacrificial services," said Morris. Insisting that he acts "openly" and that his actions are legal, Morris said: "The fact that the country doesn't like it doesn't mean that it is illegal."
READ: Israel's destruction of historic cemeteries threatens a fragile calm
Since 2003, Israel has allowed settlers into the compound almost on a daily basis. Scores of Jewish Israelis storm the courtyards of Al-Aqsa Mosque from the Mughrabi Gate every day, under the protection of the Israeli occupation police, and carry out provocative tours, as well as performing Talmudic prayers.
Israel occupied East Jerusalem, where Al-Aqsa is located, during the 1967 Arab-Israeli War.
It annexed the entire city in 1980, a move never recognised by the international community.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Easy fluffy vegan pancakes that taste nice!
I've tried a few vegan pancake recipes and found most of them wanting (ie throwing in the bin). I've finally hit on a winning combo of fluffiness and taste. It's also passed the ultimate test and is child-approved.
They're a cross between a buttermilk/fluffy pancake and a traditional thin one. Lovely with fruit and coconut yogurt as well as the usual syrupy stuff.


text:
\section{Introduction}
\label{sec:intro}
\vspace{-2mm}
Most interesting signals are \textit{structured}. This is what distinguishes them from mere random noise. This structure can often be expressed in terms of \textit{sparsity} in a particular basis. More precisely, if $\Ymat=[\yvect_1,\dots,\yvect_T]$ represents $T$ signal examples, there must exist a set of $K$ atoms or a \textit{dictionary} $\Dmat=[\dvect_1,\dots,\dvect_K]$ such that each signal is a linear combination of only a few atoms, \textit{i.e.}, $\Ymat\approx\Dmat\Xmat$ where $\Xmat$ is sparse. Estimating $\Dmat$ and $\Xmat$ from $\Ymat$ is a sparse instance of \textit{matrix factorization}. In audio signal processing, it is natural to seek such a factorization in the non-negative \textit{power spectral density} (PSD) domain, since the magnitude spectra of natural sounds such as speech often feature redundancy and sparsity. This approach gave rise to a large number of methods for audio signal representation and extraction within the framework of \textit{non-negative matrix factorization} \cite{schmidt2007wind,wilson2008regularized,ozerov2010multichannel,sawada2013multichannel}. In contrast, complex spectra are usually considered uninformative and therefore not investigated.

While single-channel signals are well represented by their PSD only, disregarding the phase comes with a substantial loss of information in multichannel signals. Indeed, phase differences carry important spatial cues. For this reason, nearly all existing NMF-based methods are limited to monaural sound processing, although recent multichannel extensions of NMF have been proposed for music signal separation\cite{ozerov2010multichannel,sawada2013multichannel}. These method do not rely on sparsity and must be tuned to a known, relatively small number of target sources.

In this paper, we propose a new sparse representation for multichannel signals in the complex Fourier domain. The key novelty is to \textit{estimate} the instantaneous phases of all involved signal spectra instead of ignoring them. The proposed decomposition may be viewed as blindly unmixing a mixture of $K\gg M$ sources where $M$ is the number of microphones. The fundamental assumption is here that each source contributes a specific complex-valued spectral component to the observation, and that the gain and the activation of each source is sparse along the time axis. We first derive a phase-optimized generalization of the well-known \textit{orthogonal matching pursuit} (OMP) method \cite{pati1993orthogonal,tropp2007signal}. This generalization allows sparse coding of a multichannel signal $\yvect_t$ given a dictionary $\Dmat$, independently of instantaneous source phases. Moreover, we show that an optimal dictionary $\Dmat$ as well as all instantaneous source phases and sparse activations can be blindly estimated from a set of signal examples $\Ymat$ only. This is achieved by deriving a phase-optimized generalization of the popular K-SVD algorithm\cite{aharon2006svd}.

The proposed representation is applied to noise reduction in the context of a humanoid robot producing self-noise ('\textit{ego-noise}') when performing motor actions \cite{loellmann2014challenges}. This problem is extremely challenging for two reasons: First, the noise signal is highly non-stationary due to fast and irregular motions and collisions. This rules out the use of conventional spectral-subtraction methods such as \cite{martin1994spectral}. Second, ego-noise signals exhibit nonzero spatial coherence between microphones \cite{loellmann2014challenges}. However, they cannot be modeled by a single point source, nor even by a small set of point sources. In the case of a walking robot, clicks generated by collisions with the floor as well as full body and microphone movements are producing sounds arriving at the microphones from many directions with unknown transfer functions. This seriously limits the usefulness of spatial filtering methods such as beamforming \cite{herbordt2003adaptive} or blind source separation \cite{buchner2004trinicon,mandel2010model}.

On the positive side, motor noise signals are strongly structured. This has been exploited using noise template databases \cite{ince2009ego,ince2011assessment}. These approaches are based on vector quantization, which can be seen as a particular instance of K-SVD\cite{aharon2006svd}. Some approaches estimate the instantaneous noise PSD using Gaussian process models \cite{furukawa2013noise} or neural networks \cite{ince2009ego}. These methods rely on synchronized motor state information, which may not be reliably available in practice.

\section{Phase-Optimized Dictionary Learning}
\label{sec:method}
\vspace{-2mm}
\subsection{Modeling Large and Sparse Multichannel Mixtures}
\label{subsec:model}
Let $\Ymat=[\yvect_1,\dots,\yvect_T]\in\mathbb{C}^{MF\times T}$ be an observed $M-$channel spectrogram with $F$ frequency bins and $T$ time frames. We use the decomposition $\yvect_t=[\yvect\tp_{1t},\dots,\yvect\tp_{Ft}]\tp$ where $\yvect_{ft}\in\mathbb{C}^M$ is the captured $M$-channel signal at $(f,t)$. We assume that $\Ymat$ is the recording of a finite but potentially large mixture of $K$ sound sources, each emitting a specific spectral shape. One intuitive interpretation of this model in the target application of a robot recording its own noise is that the sources correspond to all possible sounds that can be emitted from the various mechanical parts of the moving robot, effectively forming a signal with an intricate spatial distribution. We denote by $\avect_{fk}\in\mathbb{C}^M$ the transfer function from source $k$ to the $M$ microphones at frequency $f$. We denote by $\phi_{ft,k}\in\mathbb{C}$ with $|\phi_{ft,k}|=1$ the instantaneous phase of source $k$ at $(f,t)$. At time $t$, we assume that each source $k$ emits a fixed magnitude spectrum $\pvect_k=[p\tp_{1k},\dots,p\tp_{Fk}]\tp\in\mathbb{R}^{+F}$ multiplied by an \textit{activation factor} (gain) $x_{kt}\ge0$.
A central assumption of our model is that the activation vector $\xvect_t=[x_{1t}\tp,\dots,x_{Kt}\tp]\tp$ is \textit{sparse}, \textit{i.e.}, only a small number $S_{\textrm{max}}\ll K$ of sources is active at time $t$, and $\xvect_t$ has at most $S_{\textrm{max}}$ nonzero elements ($\|\xvect_t\|_0\le S_{\textrm{max}}$).
For all $f$ and $t$, the mixing model reads:
\begin{equation}
\label{eq:mixing_model}
 \yvect_{ft} = \textstyle\sum_{k=1}^K \phi_{ft,k}p_{fk}\avect_{fk}x_{kt} + \evect_{ft},
\end{equation}
where $\evect_{ft}\in\mathbb{C}^M$ represents some residual noise at $(f,t)$. To simplify this expression, the transfer function and the magnitude spectrum of source $k$ at frequency $f$ are combined into a single vector $\dvect_{fk}=p_{fk}\avect_{fk}\in\mathbb{C}^M$. We denote by $\Dmat\in\mathbb{C}^{MF\times K}$ the signal's \textit{dictionary} whose columns or \textit{atoms} are the vectors $\dvect_{k}=[\dvect\tp_{1k},\dots,\dvect\tp_{Fk}]\tp\in\mathbb{C}^{MF}$. In practice, each atom $k$ can be normalized so that $\|\dvect_{k}\|_2=1$ and that each entry of $\dvect_k$ associated to the first channel is real-valued and positive.  This comes without loss of generality because the source activations and instantaneous phases compensate this normalization in equation (\ref{eq:mixing_model}).

Let $\Phimat_t=[\phivect_{t,1},\dots,\phivect_{t,K}]\in\mathbb{C}^{F\times K}$ denote the matrix of all source phases at frame $t$.
We define the \textit{phase-corrected dictionary} at frame $t$ by:
\begin{equation}
 \label{eq:POdico}
 \Dmat\{\Phimat_t\} = \left[
 \begin{array}{ccc}
  \phi_{1t,1}\dvect_{11} & \hspace{-3mm}\dots &\hspace{-3mm} \phi_{1t,K}\dvect_{1K} \\
  \vdots                 &                    &\vdots                 \\
  \phi_{Ft,1}\dvect_{F1} & \hspace{-3mm}\dots &\hspace{-3mm} \phi_{Ft,K}\dvect_{FK} \\
 \end{array}
 \right]\in\mathbb{C}^{MF\times K}.
\end{equation}
The model (\ref{eq:mixing_model}) can now be rewritten as
$\yvect_t = \Dmat\{\Phimat_t\}\xvect_t + \evect_t$
where $\xvect_t$ is a sparse vector. If $\Dmat\{\Phimat_t\}$ is known, estimating $\xvect_t$ in order to minimize $\evect_t$ given $\yvect_t$ is known as a \textit{sparse coding} problem \cite{aharon2006svd,tropp2007signal}. However in the considered case of a multichannel sound mixture, this would require the prior knowledge of not only the $K$ sources' transfer functions and magnitude spectra contained in $\Dmat$, but also their instantaneous phases contained in $\Phimat_t$. The latter randomly varies over time, is hard to predict, and should therefore be estimated from the signal. This yields the following novel optimization problem, which will be referred to as \textit{phase-optimized sparse coding}:
\begin{align}
 \label{eq:PO_SC}
 &\operatorname*{argmin}_{\Phimat_t,\xvect_t} \|\yvect_t - \Dmat\{\Phimat_t\}\xvect_t\|_2 \hspace{3mm} \textrm{subject to: } \nonumber \\
 &\|\xvect_t\|_0  \le S_{\textrm{max}} \hspace{1mm} \textrm{and} \hspace{2mm}
  \forall \hspace{1mm} f,k, x_{kt}  \ge 0 \hspace{2mm}, |\phi_{ft,k}| = 1.
\end{align}
Note that due to the sparsity of $\xvect_t$, only those $\phi_{ft,k}$ for which $x_{kt}>0$ intervene in the target function. The others can be ignored, leading to a sparse matrix $\Phimat_t$. Moreover, the non-negativity constraint on $x_{kt}$ is not necessary, since for any complex pair $(x_{kt},\phivect_{t,k})$, the pair $(|x_{kt}|,\frac{x_{kt}}{|x_{kt}|}\phivect_{t,k})$ leaves the cost function unchanged. This constraint is thus relaxed in the remainder of the paper.
\vspace{-4mm}
\subsection{Phase-Optimized Orthogonal Matching-Pursuit}
\label{subsec:phiOMP}
\vspace{-2mm}
Although finding an exact solution to sparse coding was proven to be NP-hard \cite{davis1997adaptive}, a number of efficient approximate methods have been proposed \cite{pati1993orthogonal,tropp2007signal,chen1998atomic,hoyer2002non}, among which \textit{orthogonal matching pursuit} (OMP) \cite{pati1993orthogonal,tropp2007signal} is one of the most widely used due to its simplicity and high practical efficiency. In this section, we propose an algorithm inspired by OMP that addresses the phase-optimized sparse coding problem (\ref{eq:PO_SC}). This is referred to as \textit{phase-optimized orthogonal matching pursuit} (PO-OMP) and summarized in Alg.~\ref{alg:po-omp}.

\setlength{\textfloatsep}{0pt}

\begin{algorithm}[t!]
\caption{PO-OMP}
\label{alg:po-omp}
\textbf{Input:} Signal $\yvect_t\in\mathbb{C}^{MF}$, dictionary $\Dmat\in\mathbb{C}^{MF\times K}$, sparsity number $S_\textrm{max}$ and reconstruction threshold $\tau$.\\
\textbf{Output:} Sparse activation vector $\xvect_t\in\mathbb{R}^{+K}$ and sparse phase corrections $\Phimat_t\in\mathbb{C}^{F\times K}$ so that $\yvect_t\approx\Dmat\{\Phimat_t\}\xvect_t$.\\
\hrule
\begin{algorithmic}[1]
\STATE $\widetilde{\xvect}_t^{(0)}:=[\;]$; $\widetilde{\Phimat}_t^{(0)}:=[\;]$; $\widetilde{\Dmat}^{(0)}:=[\;]$; $\rvect_t^{(0)}:=\yvect_t$; $i:=0$;
\WHILE{$i \le S_\textrm{max}$ and $\|\rvect_t^{(i)}\|_2>\tau$}
\STATE $i := i + 1$;
\STATE $\forall f,k,\; b_{fk}:= \langle\rvect^{(i-1)}_{ft}|\dvect_{fk}\rangle$; \label{ln:po_omp_part1a}
\STATE $\forall k,\; c_k := |\sum_{f=1}^Fb_{fk}|b_{fk}|^{-1}|$;
\STATE $k(i) := \operatorname*{argmax}_{k} (c_k)$;
\STATE $\widetilde{\xvect}_t^{(i)}  := [\widetilde{\xvect}_t^{(i-1)\top}, c_{k(i)}]\tp$;
\STATE $\forall f,\; \widetilde{\phivect}_{ft}^{(i)} := [\widetilde{\phivect}_{ft}^{(i-1)} , b_{fk(i)}|b_{fk(i)}|^{-1}]$; \label{ln:po_omp_part1b}
\STATE $\widetilde{\Dmat}^{(i)}:=[\widetilde{\Dmat}^{(i-1)}, \dvect_{k(i)}]$;
\REPEAT
\STATE $\widetilde{\xvect}_t^{(i)} := (\widetilde{\Dmat}^{(i)}\{\widetilde{\Phimat}^{(i)}_t\})^{\dag}\yvect_t$; \hspace{2mm}\textit{// (${}^{\dag} = $ pseudo-inverse)} \label{ln:po_omp_part2a}
\STATE $\rvect_t^{(i)} := \yvect_t-\widetilde{\Dmat}^{(i)}\{\widetilde{\Phimat}^{(i)}_t\}\widetilde{\xvect}^{(i)}_t$;
\STATE $\forall j, f,\; \widetilde{\phi}^{(i)}_{ft,j} := \frac{\displaystyle \langle\rvect^{(i)}_{ft}|\dvect_{fk(j)}\rangle + \widetilde{\phi}^{(i)}_{ft,j}\widetilde{x}^{(i)}_{jt}}
                                                              {\displaystyle|\langle\rvect^{(i)}_{ft}|\dvect_{fk(j)}\rangle + \widetilde{\phi}^{(i)}_{ft,j}\widetilde{x}^{(i)}_{jt}|}$; \label{ln:po_omp_part2b}
\UNTIL{$\Delta(\|\rvect_t^{(i)}\|_2)<\epsilon$}
\ENDWHILE
\RETURN sparse $\xvect_t$ and $\Phimat_t$ obtained from $\widetilde{\xvect}_t^{(i)}$ and $\widetilde{\Phimat}_{t}^{(i)}$.
\end{algorithmic}
\end{algorithm}

Similarly to OMP, PO-OMP is a greedy algorithm that selects the best matching dictionary atom, indexed by $k(i)$, at each iteration $i$. This is repeated either until $i$ reaches a maximum desired sparsity number $S_\textrm{max}$ or when the cost function (\ref{eq:PO_SC}) falls below a desired reconstruction threshold $\tau$. To avoid carrying large sparse matrices, we use the variables $\widetilde{\xvect}_t^{(i)}\in\mathbb{C}^{i}$, $\widetilde{\Phimat}_{t}^{(i)}\in\mathbb{C}^{F\times i}$ and $\widetilde{\Dmat}^{(i)}\in\mathbb{C}^{MF \times i}$. They respectively correspond to $\xvect_t$, $\Phimat_{t}$ and $\Dmat$ in which only rows or columns indexed by $k(1)\dots k(i)$ are kept.
Let $\rvect_t^{(i)}=[\rvect^{(i)\top}_{1t},\dots,\rvect^{(i)\top}_{Ft}]\tp\in\mathbb{C}^{MF}$ be the residual vector at iteration $i$, \textit{i.e.}, $\rvect_t^{(i)} = \yvect_t-\widetilde{\Dmat}^{(i)}\{\widetilde{\Phimat}^{(i)}_t\}\widetilde{\xvect}^{(i)}_t$ and $\rvect_t^{(0)}=\yvect_t$.
As in OMP, each iteration of PO-OMP consists of two steps. In the first step, the dictionary atom that best approximates the current residual is found.
This requires to solve:
\begin{equation}
\label{eq:phiOMP1}
\operatorname*{argmin}_{\displaystyle k,\phivect_{t,k},x_{kt}} \|\rvect_t^{(i-1)}-\dvect_k\{\phivect_{t,k}\}x_{kt}\|_2 \hspace{1mm} \textrm{s.t.} \hspace{1mm} \forall f,\; |\phi_{ft,k}| = 1
\end{equation}
where $\dvect_k\{\phivect_{t,k}\}$ denotes the $k$-th column of $\Dmat\{\Phimat_t\}$.
Using the Lagrange multiplier method to enforce the constraints on $\phivect_{t,k}$, the solution of (\ref{eq:phiOMP1}) is obtained through lines~\ref{ln:po_omp_part1a}-\ref{ln:po_omp_part1b} of Alg.~\ref{alg:po-omp}.
In the second step, all values in $\widetilde{\xvect}_t^{(i)}$ and $\widetilde{\Phimat}_{t}^{(i)}$, including values found in previous iterations, are optimized according to the $i$ atoms selected so far. This requires to solve:

\begin{align}
\operatorname*{argmin}_{\displaystyle\widetilde{\xvect}_t^{(i)}, \widetilde{\Phimat}_{t}^{(i)}} \|\yvect_t-\widetilde{\Dmat}^{(i)}\{\widetilde{\Phimat}_{t}^{(i)}\}\widetilde{\xvect}_t^{(i)}\|_2
\hspace{1mm}\textrm{s.t.} \hspace{1mm} \forall f,j,\; |\widetilde{\phi}^{(i)}_{ft,j}| = 1. \nonumber
\end{align}
We could not find a general closed-form solution to this problem. However, it can be solved iteratively by sequentially minimizing the objective function with respect to $\widetilde{\xvect}_t^{(i)}$ and each column of $\widetilde{\Phimat}_{t}^{(i)}$ separately. Convergence is considered reached when the relative variation of the residual error $\Delta(\|\rvect_t^{(i)}\|_2)$ falls below a preset threshold $\epsilon$, \textit{e.g.}, less than $0.1\%$. The values of $\widetilde{\xvect}_t^{(i)}$ and $\widetilde{\Phimat}_{t}^{(i)}$ found in previous iterations provide a good initialization for this procedure. Closed form solutions for this sequential minimization are given in lines~\ref{ln:po_omp_part2a}-\ref{ln:po_omp_part2b} of Alg.~\ref{alg:po-omp}. In practice, the residual vector $\rvect_t^{(i)}$ is reupdated after each new estimation of $\widetilde{\phivect}^{(i)}_{t,j}$ in order to improve convergence. The overall algorithm is guaranteed to decrease the residual error $\|\rvect_t^{(i)}\|_2$ at each step. As in OMP, a local minimum may be reached due to the non-convexity of the problem. However, OMP is known to perform well if $S_\textrm{max}\ll K$, and the same was observed with PO-OMP.

\vspace{-4mm}
\subsection{Phase-Optimized K-SVD}
\label{subsec:phiKSVD}
\vspace{-2mm}
PO-OMP requires a known dictionary $\Dmat$, capturing the spectral shapes and transfer functions of the $K$ sources in the mixture. This may not be available in practice. This section addresses the challenging problem of \textit{training} such a dictionary, based on a set of examples $\Ymat=[\yvect_1,\dots,\yvect_T]\in\mathbb{C}^{MF\times T}$. More formally, we seek a solution to:
\begin{align}
 \label{eq:PO-DD}
 &\operatorname*{argmin}_{\Xmat,\Dmat,\Phimat_1,\dots,\Phimat_T} \textstyle\sum_{t=1}^T \|\yvect_t - \Dmat\{\Phimat_t\}\xvect_t\|_2^2 \hspace{3mm} \textrm{subject to: } \nonumber \\
 &\|\xvect_t\|_0  \le S_{\textrm{max}} \hspace{1mm} \textrm{and} \hspace{2mm}
 \forall \hspace{1mm} f,k, |\phi_{ft,k}| = 1.
\end{align}
This is reminiscent of a sparse dictionary learning problem \cite{elad2010sparse}, except that $\Dmat$ is corrected by $\Phimat_t$ at each $t$. Dictionary learning has been widely investigated, and the most popular method is probably K-SVD \cite{aharon2006svd}, due to its simplicity and high efficiency. Following these lines, we propose a method that solves for (\ref{eq:PO-DD}), referred to as \textit{phase-optimized K-SVD} (PO-KSVD). The corresponding algorithm is summarized in Alg.~\ref{alg:po-ksvd}.

\setlength{\textfloatsep}{1\baselineskip}
\begin{algorithm}[t!]
\caption{PO-KSVD}
\label{alg:po-ksvd}
\textbf{Input:} Signal examples $\Ymat\in\mathbb{C}^{MF\times T}$, sparsity number $S_\textrm{max}$ and reconstruction threshold $\tau$.\\
\textbf{Output:} Matrices $\Dmat\in\mathbb{C}^{MF\times K}$, $\Xmat\in\mathbb{R}^{+K\times T}$ (sparse) and $\Phimat_1,\dots,\Phimat_t\in\mathbb{C}^{F\times K}$ (sparse) so that $\yvect_t\approx\Dmat\{\Phimat_t\}\xvect_t\;\forall t$.\\
\hrule
\begin{algorithmic}[1]
\STATE Initialize $\Dmat$ with $K$ normalized, random columns of $\Ymat$;
\REPEAT
\STATE $\forall t,\; [\xvect_t,\Phimat_t] = \operatorname{po\_omp}(\yvect_t,\Dmat,S_\textrm{max},\tau)$;
\STATE $\forall k,\; \svect_*^k=\operatorname{sparse}(\xvect_*^k)$; \textit{// Non-zero indicator of $\xvect_*^k$}
\FOR{$k = 1 \to K$}
\REPEAT
\STATE Compute $\Emat_k$; \textit{// Large-bracketed term in (\ref{PO-ksvd1})}
\STATE Obtain $\dvect_k$ and $\xvect_*^k$ from $\operatorname{svd}(\Emat_k\{\bar{\Phimat}^k_*\}_{/\{\svect_*^k\}})$;
\STATE $\forall f,t,\; \phi_{ft,k}=\frac{\displaystyle\langle\evect_{ft,k}|\dvect_{fk} x_{kt}\rangle}{\displaystyle|\langle\evect_{ft,k}|\dvect_{fk}x_{kt}\rangle|}$; \label{ln:po_ksvd1}
\UNTIL{$\Delta(\|\Emat_k\|_F)<\epsilon$}
\ENDFOR
\UNTIL{$\Delta(\Sigma_{t=1}^T\|\yvect_t-\Dmat\{\Phimat_t\}\xvect_t\|^2_2)<\epsilon$}
\RETURN matrices $\Dmat$, $\Xmat$ and $\Phimat_1,\dots,\Phimat_t$ .
\end{algorithmic}
\end{algorithm}

\begin{table*}
\centering
   \begin{tabular}{|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|}
      \cline{2-11}
      \multicolumn{1}{l|}{}  & \multicolumn{4}{c|}{Waving noise} & \multicolumn{4}{c|}{Walking noise} & \multicolumn{2}{c|}{CTS}\\
      \hline
      \multicolumn{1}{|c|}{Method used}     & SDR (dB) & SIR (dB) & PESQ & CKR & SDR (dB)& SIR (dB) & PESQ & CKR & train & test\\
      \hline
      PO-KSVD+    & {\bf2.31$\pm$4.2} & {\bf22.5$\pm$2.8} & {\bf2.09$\pm$0.3} & {\bf82.9}
                  & {\bf1.83$\pm$4.5} & {\bf22.3$\pm$3.2} & {\bf2.00$\pm$0.2} & {\bf88.4} & 9.99 & 0.59 \\
      PO-KSVD     & 1.38$\pm$3.9 & 14.4$\pm$3.5 & 2.06$\pm$0.4 & 81.1
                  & 1.45$\pm$4.3 & 19.8$\pm$3.6 & 1.80$\pm$0.2 & 87.8 & 9.99 & 0.59 \\
      NMF   	  & 0.07$\pm$2.6 & 7.01$\pm$4.8 & 1.38$\pm$0.2 & 50.6
                  & 1.62$\pm$3.2 & 17.9$\pm$3.1 & 1.51$\pm$0.2 & 65.2 & 4.13 & 0.01 \\
      K-SVD       & -3.91$\pm$3.6 & -1.31$\pm$4.2 & 1.46$\pm$0.3 & 45.7
                  & 1.10$\pm$4.4 & 6.08$\pm$2.4 & 1.38$\pm$0.1 & 70.1 & 0.22 & 0.04 \\
      mixture     & -5.37$\pm$4.0 & -3.87$\pm$4.8 & 1.42$\pm$0.3 & 43.9
                  & 0.76$\pm$4.2 & 4.78$\pm$2.4 & 1.33$\pm$0.1 & 67.1 & - & - \\
      \hline
   \end{tabular}
   \vspace*{-1mm}
   \caption {\label{tab:results} {\small\hspace{-1mm}Average and standard deviations (Avg$\pm$Std) of the signal-to-distortion-ratios (SDR), signal-to-interfer-ratios (SIR), PESQ measures and correct keyword recognition rates in $\%$ (CKR) over 82 target speech signals, for waving and walking noises. The last columns show the average computation times (in secs) per second of signal (CTS) for training and testing the methods using MATLAB on a conventional PC.}}
   \vspace*{-3mm}
\end{table*}

Similarly to K-SVD, PO-KSVD alternates between a sparse-coding step, \textit{i.e.}, (\ref{eq:PO_SC}) and a \textit{dictionary update} step. Since the former is solved by PO-OMP, we now focus on the latter. The key idea responsible for the efficiency of K-SVD is to sequentially update each atom and associated activations, while preserving the non-zero support of $\Xmat$ found during the sparse-coding step. Let $\xvect_*^k$ denote the $k$-th row vector of $\Xmat$ and $\svect_*^k=\operatorname{sparse}(\xvect_*^k)\in\{0;1\}^{1\times T}$ denote the binary row vector indicating the non-zero elements of $\xvect_*^k$ after PO-OMP. Let $\Phimat^k_*=\{\phi_{ft,k}\}_{f=1,t=1}^{F,T}\in\mathbb{C}^{F\times T}$ denote the sparse matrix of source $k$'s instantaneous phases. For each atom $k$, the associated optimization problem can be written:
\begin{align}
 &\operatorname*{argmin}_{\displaystyle\dvect_k,\xvect_*^k,\Phimat^k_*} \left\|
   \left(
     \Ymat - \sum_{j\ne k}(\dvect_j\xvect_*^j)\{\Phimat^j_*\}
   \right) - (\dvect_k\xvect_*^k)\{\Phimat^k_*\}
 \right\|_F \nonumber \\
 \label{PO-ksvd1}
 &\textrm{s.t.:} \hspace{3mm} \operatorname{sparse}(\xvect_*^k)=\svect_*^k \hspace{2mm} \textrm{and}  \hspace{2mm} \forall \hspace{1mm} f,t,\; |\phi_{ft,k}| = 1.
\end{align}
Here, $\|.\|_F$ denotes the Frobenius norm. If $\Emat_k$ denotes the matrix between large brackets, the above cost function is equal to $\|\Emat_k\{\bar{\Phimat}^k_*\} - \dvect_k\xvect_*^k\|_F$
where $\bar{\Phimat}^k_*$ denotes the complex conjugate of $\Phimat^k_*$, and $\dvect_k\xvect_*^k$ is an $MF\times T$ rank-$1$ matrix. For fixed phases $\Phimat^k_*$, the solution of $\dvect_k$ and $\xvect_*^k$ is obtained via singular value decomposition (SVD) of $\Emat_k\{\bar{\Phimat}^k_*\}_{/\{\svect_*^k\}}$ where $/\{\svect_*^k\}$ means that columns corresponding to $s_{kt}=0$ have been removed (more details in \cite{aharon2006svd}). For fixed $\dvect_k$ and $\xvect_*^k$ , the update of $\Phimat^k_*$ is closed-form, and provided at line~\ref{ln:po_ksvd1} of Alg.~\ref{alg:po-ksvd}. This sequential minimization is iterated until convergence of $\|\Emat_k\|_F$, similarly to Alg.~\ref{alg:po-omp}. As in K-SVD, the convergence of PO-KSVD relies on the ability of PO-OMP to decrease the residual error with respect to the dictionary update solution. While this is not guaranteed, it can be solved by \textit{external inference}, \textit{i.e.}, for each $t$, the output of PO-OMP is only kept if it improves the reconstruction of $\yvect_t$. Convergence is then guaranteed.

\section{Experimental Results}
\label{sec:results}
The commercial robot NAO of Aldebaran Robotics \cite{gouaillier2008nao} was used to gather 4-channel recordings downsampled to 16 kHz in a real room with moderate reverberation level (T60$\approx$200ms). Two one-minute recordings of NAO walking on place or repeatedly waving the right arm were used for training.
The fan of the robot was on, resulting in additional stationary ego-noise which was reduced using multichannel Wiener filtering, as described in \cite{loellmann2014challenges}. For testing, 82 recordings lasting approximately 1s each of a loudspeaker emitting speech utterances from the GRID corpus \cite{cooke2006audio} were made with the fan turned off. The loudspeaker was placed 1 meter away in front of the robot, at null elevation. These speech recordings were summed with out-of-training waving or walking sequences to generate test mixtures. Spectrograms were computed using $64$ms Hamming windows with $50\%$ overlap.

PO-KSVD was used to learn a dictionary for each of the two training signals, using several values of $K\in[5,100]$ and $S_{\textrm{max}}\in[1,5]$. Best performances were obtained with $K=40$, $S_{\textrm{max}}=3$ for waving, $K=10$, $S_{\textrm{max}}=2$ for walking. The reconstruction threshold was fixed to a low value $\tau=10^{-4}$. Once ego-noise dictionaries were trained, the ego-noise signals were estimated from test mixtures using PO-OMP. The residuals were used as desired speech output. To further improve output signals, time-frequency points for which the residual PSD was less than the estimated ego-noise PSD were set to the average background noise magnitude, while preserving the phase. This masking technique is referred to as PO-KSVD+.

PO-KSVD was compared to conventional K-SVD \cite{aharon2006svd} using the same protocol and parameters. We also compared it to NMF using the versatile implementation provided by \cite{li2013versatile}. As suggested in \cite{schmidt2007wind}, the magnitude spectra of the left microphone signal raised to the power $0.7$ were used as input. The term $\lambda\|\Xmat\|_1$ was added to the conventional NMF cost function to enforce sparsity. Several values of $\lambda\in[0,4]$ and dictionary sizes $K\in[5,40]$ were tested, and best results were obtained with $\lambda=2, K=20$ for waving and $\lambda=1, K=40$ for walking. Once a non-negative dictionary is trained, a single NMF multiplicative update can be used to estimate the ego-noise PSD from a test signal. The residuals are then used as desired magnitude spectra, while the mixture phases are preserved.

Table \ref{tab:results} summarizes the signal-to-distortion and signal-to-interfer ratios SDR and SIR \cite{vincent2006performance}, as well as the PESQ measure \cite{rix2001perceptual}, the correct keyword recognition rate\footnote{The speech recognizer \textit{pocketsphinx} \cite{huggins2006pocketsphinx} was used to recognize the keywords in the GRID corpus \cite{cooke2006audio}, as defined by the CHiME challenge \cite{vincent2013second}.} (CKR) and computational times for all methods.
Scores obtained from the unprocessed mixtures are given in the last row. PO-KSVD and PO-KSVD+ significantly outperforms conventional factorization methods in terms of all the metrics used. Sound excerpts and spectrograms are provided at \url{robot-ears.eu/po_ksvd/}.

\vspace{-4mm}
\section{Conclusion}
\label{sec:conclusion}
\vspace{-3mm}
To the best of the authors' knowledge, PO-KSVD is the first method that combines sparse factorization with instantaneous phase estimation in the complex Fourier domain. This paves the road to numerous applications in multichannel audio signal processing and beyond. Compared to traditional monaural approaches, this methods preserves and exploits spatial cues. In the future, we plan to further investigate this by adding spatial constraints to the dictionary in order to achieve underdetermined blind source separation and localization.

\bibliographystyle{IEEEbib}
\small

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaArXiv


Ridehesten.com writes about the top horse by the competition Vallensbæk.
Lykke's De Niro by De Nior and his rider Carina Nevermann Torup took the victory by the Yongster Cup. Saturday the combination won MA1 with 70.19% and repeated the success Sunday in Prix St. George with 70.445%. Lykke's De Niro is a 7 year old gelding by De Noir / Sidney, which is bred by Leif Lykke Hansen. Lykke's De Niro made ??his debut in Prix St. George in September, where he started to win the third leg of the young riders ECCO Cup.
We are looking forward to hearing more from Lykke´s De Niro and Carina Nevermann Torup. A very interesting combination to follow in the future.
Congratulations to rider, owner and breeder.


text:
package com.ansorgit.plugins.bash.lang.psi.impl.heredoc;

import com.ansorgit.plugins.bash.lang.psi.BashVisitor;
import com.ansorgit.plugins.bash.lang.psi.api.command.BashComposedCommand;
import com.ansorgit.plugins.bash.lang.psi.api.heredoc.BashHereDocEndMarker;
import com.ansorgit.plugins.bash.lang.psi.api.heredoc.BashHereDocMarker;
import com.ansorgit.plugins.bash.lang.psi.api.heredoc.BashHereDocStartMarker;
import com.ansorgit.plugins.bash.lang.psi.util.BashPsiElementFactory;
import com.ansorgit.plugins.bash.lang.psi.util.BashPsiUtils;
import com.ansorgit.plugins.bash.lang.util.HeredocSharedImpl;
import com.google.common.collect.Lists;
import com.intellij.lang.ASTNode;
import com.intellij.psi.PsiElement;
import com.intellij.psi.PsiElementVisitor;
import org.jetbrains.annotations.NotNull;
import org.jetbrains.annotations.Nullable;

import java.util.List;

public class BashHereDocStartMarkerImpl extends AbstractHeredocMarker implements BashHereDocStartMarker {
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text:
A 11042 Ernstweber (ideiglenes jelöléssel 1989 VD1) a Naprendszer kisbolygóövében található aszteroida. Eric Walter Elst fedezte fel 1989. november 3-án.

Nevét Ernst Heinrich Weber (1795 – 1878) német orvos után kapta.

Kapcsolódó szócikkek
 Kisbolygók listája (11001–11500)

Jegyzetek

A Naprendszer kisbolygói

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Predictive maintenance (PdM) attempts to assess the equipment circumstance by performing continuous (online) or intermittent equipment keeping track of.
Thermography has started to become one of the hottest (pun intended) predictive routine maintenance technologies attainable.
The eventual goal about PdM is definitely maintenance overall performance, at a predetermined point in time in the event the maintenance activity is most economical, and before the equipment a loss its general performance within a limit.
Heat is frequently, an early warning of equipment deterioration or breakdown, making it a crucial monitored effectiveness criteria inside PdM services.
An infrared camera (also known as a winter imager) can quickly measure as well as evaluate heat signatures for each of the equipments on the four route, with no upsetting every operations.
It again thus gives you, huge profits to agencies by decreasing downtime, bettering reliability associated with processes, decreasing spend on gear repairs together with reactive care and, providing the life life long a machines and increasing the people safety.
For top level results, most of maintenance technological innovation should be built in onto the identical computer, to have access to similar lists with equipments, reputations, work purchases and reports.
It is rather indicative from the above mentioned specifics, that PdM programs should be used in a machine of industries like development, utilities, program companies, electrical contracting, and so on They, together with an incredibly adaptable infrared thermography, just need to take sync with ever-evolving industrial sectors.


Whether Australia has five teams or four, Wallabies coach Michael Cheika expects the same form from any prospective Test players.
SANZAAR's executive, including ARU CEO Bill Pulver and deputy chairman Brett Robinson, is set to meet this Friday (AEDT) in London to vote on the proposals for Super Rugby's format, but Cheika said he simply had to prepare for any situation.
While one of the arguments for the potential axing of an Australian team is that the country's talent is currently spread too thin, Cheika said it wouldn't change his Wallabies approach.
"Is the picture of rugby in our country going to be hugely different whether we have four teams or five teams? I don't know," he said.
"For the Super Rugby teams it would be definitely (different), because there's going to be a concentration of players into those teams, it's going to be a massively different result for them.
"I can understand why they're trying to make changes to the competition, but it has no effect on how good any one Wallaby candidate needs to play.
Cheika said he was loath to lean on a flawed format as an excuse for mediocre Test results, instead making plans for his side based on every possibility.
"There's no doubt that with the current structure, interest is being eroded," he said.
"That doesn't mean, though, that we can't have a more interesting structure with five teams. We did before (with the Super 15).
"One thing that I can't start doing is saying, 'I want this competition, I want this type of thing'.
"What I need to concentrate on is whatever competition is set up, whatever is out there that's running, that we still do our best to prepare the best possible players and the best possible team that runs out in the gold jersey every week.
"I haven't looked at it (Super Rugby change) like that, because then I'm looking for an excuse (by saying), 'Oh, we could better, if our competition was set up better, or if this was going on'.
Whatever the outcome of this week's SANZAAR meetings, Australian rugby still has some ground to make up on their Kiwi neighbours if the opening fortnight is anything to go boy.
The Rebels are the only Australian team to have played two New Zealand teams in 2017 and they conceded 127 points in the process.
The Brumbies are the only other team to have played a trans-Tasman rival, going down by four points to the Crusaders.
Cheika admitted a gulf was still existed between Australia and New Zealand in some areas, but is adamant a new training strategy and more collaboration between the Wallabies and franchises would begin to solve it.
"We've had a different focus on how we want to, not just (approach training for) the short-term results but also how we want to start coaching our players to play footy as a whole," he said.
"We are trying to have good collaboration with the states as best we can so those principles, at least the ideas or the philosophies, are going down into there, so we can have some of that development going on.
"We're definitely behind on that (skills), there's no doubt about that, but we can catch up quickly once we all commit that this is the way we've got to go and also that we just stick at it.
"Just because we don't get a result in year one or in year two (doesn't mean we should stop).


BACKGROUND: Water and sanitation access are known to be related to newborn, child, and maternal health. Our study attempts to quantify these relationships globally using country-level data: How much does improving access to water and sanitation influence infant, child, and maternal mortality? METHODS: Data for 193 countries were abstracted from global databases (World Bank, WHO, and UNICEF). Linear regression was used for the outcomes of under-five mortality rate and infant mortality rate (IMR). These results are presented as events per 1000 live births. Ordinal logistic regression was used to compute odds ratios for the outcome of maternal mortality ratio (MMR). RESULTS: Under-five mortality rate decreased by 1.17 (95%CI 1.08-1.26) deaths per 1000, p < 0.001, for every quartile increase in population water access after adjustments for confounders. There was a similar relationship between quartile increase of sanitation access and under-five mortality rate, with a decrease of 1.66 (95%CI 1.11-1.32) deaths per 1000, p < 0.001. Improved water access was also related to IMR, with the IMR decreasing by 1.14 (95%CI 1.05-1.23) deaths per 1000, p < 0.001, with increasing quartile of access to improved water source. The significance of this relationship was retained with quartile improvement in sanitation access, where the decrease in IMR was 1.66 (95%CI 1.11-1.32) deaths per 1000, p < 0.001. The estimated odds ratio that increased quartile of water access was significantly associated with increased quartile of MMR was 0.58 (95%CI 0.39-0.86), p = 0.008. The corresponding odds ratio for sanitation was 0.52 (95%CI 0.32-0.85), p = 0.009, both suggesting that better water and sanitation were associated with decreased MMR. CONCLUSIONS: Our analyses suggest that access to water and sanitation independently contribute to child and maternal mortality outcomes. If the world is to seriously address the Millennium Development Goals of reducing child and maternal mortality, then improved water and sanitation accesses are key strategies.


1. BOTOX Cosmetic costs too much. I can't afford it.
Per day, the cost is no more than a cup of Starbucks coffee.
Prevention is a lot more cost effective than correction.
As Dr. Bonnett is doing the treatment, these treatments can be tax deductible.
Starting with one area can also minimize overall cost.
2. I don't want to look unnatural. What about aging gracefully?
The point of the treatment is not to look 20 years younger but to decrease the signs of aging.
It is not a drastic change like plastic surgery but it will create a vibrant, more youthful appearance.
BOTOX Cosmetic will slow down the aging process.
3. Why should I choose BOTOX instead of a dermal filler like Juvederm?
Botox Cosmetic is used for expression lines (cause of lines) where fillers like Juvederm are for lines at rest (effect of cause) or are used to volumize and enhance areas like lips.
Ultimately, you don't have to choose. BOTOX Cosmetic and fillers work very well together and will give you great, natural looking results.
4. I've tried BOTOX before. It didn't get rid of all my wrinkles and it didn't last.
BOTOX Cosmetic lasts for 3-4 months and will improve lines initially but may not get rid of them on the first treatment. With repeated use, BOTOX Cosmetic will continue to soften unwanted lines in treated areas.
5. I just bought a cream that promises to eliminate my fine lines and wrinkles. Why would I pay so much more to get an injection that does the same thing?
Cream is topical and BOTOX treats the muscle. No cream can possibly treat the muscle.
Cream would actually cost more as you need to continuously purchase it over the same time frame in which BOTOX works.
Patients could have allergies/sensitivities to ingredients in creams. There are no reported allergies to BOTOX.
Studies prove that BOTOX works where most creams do not have any long-term studies.
Why do we all have so many creams in our bathrooms? Creams are great for the surface of our skin but you need BOTOX to target the muscle causing the unwanted movement.
6. What about people who can't stop using BOTOX Cosmetic? I don't want tobecome addicted.
There are no addictive qualities to BOTOX Cosmetic.
Lots of people get BOTOX injected for a special occasion.
Patients are not addicted to the product; they are just very satisfied with theirresults.
You will be so happy with your results that this will become something you willwant to maintain.
7. What happens if I decide to stop getting treatments? I heard that all of your wrinkles suddenly come back a lot worse.
Your wrinkles will gradually come back over time but will not be any worse.
Wrinkles will be much improved following treatment since you are not using the underlying muscle.
While the BOTOX is working, you are preventing the unwanted line from getting any worse so you will be better off.
You will be so happy with your results that you will want to continue your treatments.
8. Didn't someone get Botulism from a BOTOX injection? It hasn't been around that long…how do I know it's safe?
Botox has been approved for use in Canada for 20 years.
Botox has many medical uses (ex. Cerebral Palsy).
BOTOX Cosmetic is derived from a naturally occurring bacteria and made into a medication.
With 20 years of use, there has never been a reported case of botulism.
As with penicillin, which is derived from mold that is naturally occurring, BOTOX is also derived from something naturally occurring – bacteria.
With over 20 years of use, there has never been a reported allergy to BOTOX.
9. If I have to keep getting repeat treatments of BOTOX, why wouldn't I pay a bit more and get something permanent done?
BOTOX offers minimal 'downtime' as opposed to many weeks following surgery.
BOTOX is temporary; permanent options or solutions can lead to permanent problems.
10. I don't want my friends and family to know that I have had anything done.
We pride ourselves on patient confidentiality.
Your results will be very natural and there is no reason to tell! Your friends will tell you that you look better rested.
There is no downtime. No one will suspect you have had the treatments.
The solution is not to overdo the treatment but to give you enough BOTOX to achieve success.


text:
While I was out....
I spent most of this week promoting the book and doing other stuff, so I have neglected this blog! While I was away:
More hedge fund lunacy
The New York Times told the story of a small college in Ohio that has gone completely ga-ga over hedge funds. The College of Wooster puts "nearly 80 percent" of its endowment in hedge funds. This has resulted in -- surprise surprise -- "rich rewards."
One of these days, I'd like to read about an endowment or hedge fund that has not generated "rich rewards." Since hedgies don't have to report their returns, and endowments don't publicize their journeys into the Horse Latitudes, we never hear about those. I'd also like to read a story like this that actually names the hedge funds in which an endowment invests and -- if that info is not available -- says so.
In this case, apart from a reference to "14 long-short managers," we just don't know. As I described in Wall Street Versus America, college endowments are one of the last bastions of opacity in the investment world, and that picture gets murkier when hedge funds are involved. The media could help a little by at least saying that this picture is murky.
The Sound of One Soba Noodle Slapping
On May 10, the SEC settled charges with Morgan Stanley that it held back "tens of thousands" of emails from regulators investigating the IPO and analyst scandals. The agreed-upon penalty was fifteen cents -- sorry, typographical error. Make that read "$15 million or the equivalent of 15 cents to you and I."
The Overstock Hubris Watch
Overstock.com, staunch standard-bearer of the anti-naked-shorting Baloney Brigade, announced on Tuesday that it was getting a wide-ranging subpoena from the SEC. With typical arrogance, it said it "celebrated" the subpoena. On Wednesday, the company announced it was withdrawing a stock offering, obviously because of the subpoena. (See this story, subscription required.)
Meanwhile, the head of the anti-shorting campaign, the bravely pseudonymous crackpot "Bob O'Brien" (outed by the New York Post as used medical equipment salesman Phil Saunders) was spinning the withdrawal on Yahoo message boards in posts like this one -- intimating that Overtstock had engaged in this stock sale in the first place for reasons other than the obvious one of raising cash.
The SEC should take a hard look at "O'Brien's" financing and his relationship to Overstock and its CEO Patrick Byrne. Byrne has promoted the former's website on CNBC, and has released transcripts of interviews with reporters on "O'Brien's" website. "O'Brien," meanwhile, has viciously attacked real and perceived "enemies" of Overstock and Byrne on his website and on the Internet.
The last thing this already overhyped stock market needs is "third party" websites and "independent" stock promoters, shilling companies and performing PR for CEOs with no transparency, and not even their names disclosed. "Swift Boat Vets for Truth"-type organizations might make sense in politics, but in the markets they are just another hustle.
Wall Street Versus America was published by Penguin USA on April 6.
Click here for its Amazon.com listing and here for more information on the book, from my web site.
Labels: college endowments, hedge funds, Media, naked short-selling, Overstock.com, Patrick Byrne, Phil Saunders aka Bob OBrien, SEC, smears, subpoenas
Are Regulators Coming to Their Senses?
It's Nice to Have Friends
What's Wrong With Business Journalism
The SEC Fouls Up (Again) on Naked Shorting
An Offer He Can Refuse
Turning the Tables on Scam Artists
It's 10 p.m. Do You Know Where Your CEO Is?
The Smear du jour (redux)
Two Ways to Fight the Shorts
Nut Season Has Begun


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Argyll and Bute Health and Social Care partnership has been holding a series of quality improvement workshops for care home staff, in collaboration with Scottish Care. I went along to one of their workshops with care home staff in Dunoon on 10th May to find out more about the work that the partnership is doing with care homes.
All 20 care homes in Argyll and Bute are signed up to a quality improvement project to reduce falls. Funded by the Integrated Care Fund, and supported by health professionals in each locality, the project aims to support care home staff to address falls risks in their care home. A particular emphasis is on improving physical activity for health and wellbeing.
Dr Christine McArthur, NHS Highland Coordinator Prevention and Management of Falls, Jane Howe, Quality Improvement Manager, and Kirsty Brown, Assistant Practitioner (Physiotherapy), facilitated the workshops. The team worked collaboratively with Scottish Care to develop events which met the needs of care home staff. The care homes requested a series of smaller local workshops, rather than one big event, as some staff do not drive and it was easier them to attend local events.
The team held workshops in Bute, Oban, Campbeltown, Dunoon and Helensburgh. Having dedicated events for care home staff and small group sizes ensured that all participants were able to contribute to discussions and ask the team for advice.
Staff from Struan Lodge, Invereck, Ashgrove and Beechwood care homes all attended the workshop in Dunoon. The team asked them to record their thoughts before the session on post-its. Participants were keen to see how they could prevent falls and keep residents safe, and whether the work will help to improve practice. They were also hoping to gain an increased understanding of the falls prevention tool, learn about risk assessment and see how they could develop a more standardised approach to falls prevention.
Christine McArthur gave an overview of Up and About in Care Homes, a national improvement programme based on the Managing Falls and Fractures in Care Homes for Older People good practice resource. She highlighted the success of the collaborative in reducing falls. The presentation included a digital story from Margaret Kelly, which described her involvement in the collaborative and the improvements that it led to in Lancraigs Care Home in West Dunbartonshire.
The team urged workshop participants to learn from good practice in other care homes and see what ideas they could 'steal' to improve care.
Jane Howe introduced the Highland Quality Approach and the Institute for Health Improvement Model for Improvement. She gave an overview of Plan Do Study Act (PDSA) cycles, a tool for documenting and recording tests of change.
Jane emphasised the importance of testing change to determine whether a proposed change will work in your context and minimise resistance on implementation. She also stressed the need to set out a clear aim which is safe, effective, person-centred, timely, efficient and equitable.
Care home teams were asked to present theories of what would happen when they attempted to assemble Mr Potato Head, and to record the time that was taken to put him together, and the quality rating that they received for each attempt.
This was then used to create basic run charts to illustrate trends. In most instances there was an upward trend in quality and a downward trend in assembly time as the teams' Mr Potato Head assembly skills improved with practice!
While run charts can be useful for understanding the direction of improvement, Jane warned the care home teams not to be disheartened by early failure: it may take some time to see the impact of any changes that have been made, and there could be an increase in falls as people get better at recording them. What is important is that care home staff understand their data, and the measures that have been put in place to address any issues which have been identified.
Ensuring that all staff follow the pathway for assessing injury to minimise variation.
Staff from one care home noted that they had been making a number of changes, such as fitting new carpets, but that they hadn't always been measuring these changes to assess whether they had led to improvements in care.
The care home teams agreed that the PDSA cycle is a tool that they can use in the future, and that it is a useful tool for testing change. Post-session feedback also highlighted that staff felt more confident about using the falls management tool, and that they thought that they could learn a lot by sharing resources and ideas from other homes.
The care home teams will now be working to progress the PDSA cycles that they identified, and Kirsty will be spending time with staff from the different care homes to support them in using the Care Inspectorate data collection tool.
It was great to see the high levels of commitment that staff had to reducing falls and improving care for residents, and it will be interesting to see how the work progresses.
For more information on the project, contact Dr Christine McArthur: christinemcarthur@nhs.net.
To find out more about the Care Inspectorate data recording sheet, contact Edith Macintosh: edith.macintosh@careinspectorate.com.
Information on the Up and About programme and falls prevention resources can be found on the Falls and Bone Health community site.


Eastenders had the most liked content!
With tips you get are you a taxi driver or a waiter in a restaurant ?
On free play so knowone is actually gambling lol ?
Hello all just found out theres a albert square 3D classic layout but ive not played it yet and really need it on disk rather than a download , I have a touch screen monitor and would prefer it touch screen enabled , could someone please put it on disk for me and I pay you and you send it out to me please ? Also if thats been done it really makes sence for someone to take a photo on the machine then we wi have the graphics , im not good at any of this so really need help on getting it done by someone , you anyone on here cant find a photo I will try to find one , dont you agree it should be done ?
How long do you play your machines for per day ? How long do you have them turned on ? Do you have a break or do you play everyday ? Do you play games like £10 challenges put £10 in to see how much you can win ?


This joint event of the Campus-Community Partnership and the Education for Social Justice Program and the Unit for Social Involvement of the Kibbutzim College of Education, marked the opening of the academic year – aiming to expose students to the actions and dilemmas of one of the groups making up the widespread social justice protest which developed this past summer.
The event centered on a panel entitled "The Social Periphery's Protest: Distinctiveness and Dilemmas". Participants in the panel were Attorney Sameh Iraqi, deputy mayor of Tira, and member of Mossawa Center; Yael Ben-Yefet, director of the Mizrahi Democratic Rainbow; and Dr. Hani Zubeida, of the Political Science Department, Yezreel Valley Academic College – all members of the Social Periphery Forum, a forum incorporating representatives from the tent encampments that were set up in underprivileged neighborhoods, villages and towns throughout the social peripheries of Israel this past summer.
The panel addressed the position of the social periphery's protest within the widespread social justice protest. The speakers related to the Social Periphery Forum's objectives, its distinctiveness, and the role of the media in representing its struggle.
Yael Ben-Yefet related to the disappointment from how the protest, that asked to raise the flag of social justice and change, eventually reproduced the familiar social and institutional processes. According to Ben-Yefet, the leaders of the social justice protest come from an ethnically characterized social group and cannot truly represent the periphery's demands. The Social Periphery Forum was initiated in order to allow groups from the periphery to express their demands independently, directly. Relating to the media's role in the protest struggle Ben-Yefet said that the media allocates roles in a superficial manner. For example, when preparing a news item on a poor individual it will always want to shoot that individual's refrigerator (presumably empty). Ben-Yefet added that the fact that the protest's leaders are not able to represent the periphery's problems emanates from an innocent position, as well as from unawareness and even ignorance.
Attorney Sameh Iraqi claimed that the fact that the widespread social justice protest grew out of the middle class is completely natural. This class has convenient access to the media and to the public institutions, since it is part of them, and therefore holds the power to advance change. The periphery's struggle did not begin this summer, but the movement of the middle class became an opportunity. The problem is that the middle class, despite its call in the name of the people, did not succeed in representing the real distress of the majority – of the poor Jewish and Arab neighborhoods and towns. The underprivileged communities, Jewish and Arab, were intentionally divided and disconnected by the public institutions, and the Social Periphery Forum asks to link them into one struggle. The real struggle, asserted Iraqi, is always surrounding land and housing, and a true social process could take place only while addressing these problems. The media, naturally, represents the middle class. For the Social Periphery Forum it is harder to penetrate the media's consciousness, but this is something that needs to be fought over. The entire society needs to be recruited to join the struggle of the periphery and to create true solidarity.
Dr. Hani Zubeida talked about how as a researcher of social movements and social protest, the events of this past summer pleased him, but, he added, the periphery must be represented in the widespread protest. Society is a pyramid whose base is the periphery, and that is why it is important to secure the periphery's rights and care for its representation in order to lead toward real change – if we will remove the base the pyramid will collapse. The Social Periphery Forum's role is to represent. The representation of the different populations in the Knesset, and in the judicial system, for example, must be according to their percentage in the population, as opposed to the current situation. Relating to the media, Dr. Zubeida mentioned that the media's role is to sell, and therefore it does not represent the periphery – poverty does not sell.
Following the panel, participants broke down into two discussion circles, which continued the discussion of the panel, and addressed different issues relating to the social periphery's struggle. One circle focused on the needs of those who are still in the tent encampments, and the different ways in which students can become involved or initiate actions that will answer the direct needs of the residents of the remaining encampments. The second circle discussed the manner in which the Social Periphery Forum constitutes a connection between different social groups, and particularly between Jews and Arabs in Israel.


Skin and soft tissue infections are increasingly prevalent clinical problems, and it is important for health care practitioners to be well trained in how to treat skin abscesses. A realistic model of abscess incision and drainage will allow trainees to learn and practice this basic physician procedure.
We developed a realistic model of skin abscess formation to demonstrate the technique of incision and drainage for educational purposes. The creation of this model is described in detail in this report.
This model has been successfully used to develop and disseminate a multimedia video production for teaching this medical procedure. Clinical faculty and resident physicians find this model to be a realistic method for demonstrating abscess incision and drainage.
This manuscript provides a detailed description of our model of abscess incision and drainage for medical education. Clinical educators can incorporate this model into skills labs or demonstrations for teaching this basic procedure.
Our abscess model was developed in the human anatomy lab at our medical school using a donated human cadaver. The use of fresh cadaveric specimens without traditional preservatives allowed manipulation of dermal structures in a life-like fashion. Areas of erythema on the skin were often already present but were also simulated by application of a lipstick moulage.
Tapioca pudding was diluted 30% with water to simulate purulent material for the abscess contents. Tapioca pudding was the appropriate consistency and color with individual particles to accurately simulate purulent abscess contents. Initial attempts to create a subcutaneous abscess with this simulated purulent material were unsuccessful as intradermal or subcutaneous injections rapidly diffused under the skin and did not create localized collections to correctly simulate an abscess.
A Word catheter (a product typically used in the treatment of Bartholin abscesses) , was ideal for creating a contained collection that accurately represented an abscess. The Word catheter was over-filled with about 10 mL of simulated purulent material to represent a contained abscess. When incised with a scalpel, the synthetic material of the Word catheter mimicked the tactile sensation of incising the wall of an abscess. Maintaining constant pressure on an attached syringe filled with additional simulated purulence allowed for a continuous effluent of purulent material when the simulated abscess ruptured upon incision.
This filled catheter was surgically implanted into the cadaveric skin in situ using subcutaneous tunneling from a distant incision site [see Figure 1, Panel A]. A scalpel was used to make a skin incision and a tunnel was created under the skin by blunt dissection with hemostats to accept the empty Word catheter [see Figure 1, Panel B]. This allowed the skin overlying the simulated abscess site to remain intact. After placement, the catheter was filled with simulated purulent material using a syringe as described above [see Figure 2]. Filling the Word catheter after placement allowed for realistic displacement and distention of the overlying tissues.
Initiating the Abscess Model. A simulated abscess is created on the lateral leg of a fresh cadaveric specimen. A) A scalpel is used to make a skin incision and a subcutaneous tunnel to begin the creation of the abscess model. B) A Word catheter is inserted into the subcutaneous tissues.
Injection of Simulated Abscess Material. The simulated abscess material is manually injected using a hand-held syringe. A) After the Word catheter is completely under the skin, a syringe containing the simulated purulent material is connected. B) Filling of the Word catheter creates a life-like subcutaneous abscess of the abdominal wall in a cadaveric specimen. C) Increasing the quantity and filling pressure allows the operator to create abscesses of various sizes, demonstrated here on the lateral abdominal wall.
The size and firmness of the abscess was varied by changing the amount of simulated purulent material that was injected into the catheter, and this created a realistic model ready for an incision and drainage procedure. Draping of the area allowed for concealment of the incision site and the terminal end of the Word catheter to enhance the realistic appearance of the model, and the model was then used to practice incision and drainage [see Figure 3]. The operator was able to adjust the degree of tension of the simulated abscess by altering the force with which the material was injected into the Word catheter. Independent evaluation of the site by visualization and palpation verified the appropriate representation of an abscess.
Using the Abscess Model for Incision and Drainage. The completed abscess model is ready for incision and drainage. A) A scalpel is used to incise the simulated abscess of the abdominal wall, which leads to realistic drainage of the abscess contents. B) Hemostats and a culture swab are used to sample the interior of the abscess cavity. C) A simulated abscess cavity of the lower leg is filled with wound packing material to complete the incision and drainage procedure.
Digital video and still photography was used to demonstrate appropriate techniques for the incision and drainage procedure [see Figure 3]. Simulated abscesses were created on the abdomen, leg, and arm of the cadaveric specimen with good results. Figures 1 and 2 contain representative photographs illustrating the creation of the abscess model. Incision of the simulated abscess with a scalpel allowed realistic drainage of the abscess contents [see Figure 3, Panel A). Using culture swabs to obtain a sample of the interior of the abscess [see Figure 3, Panel B] was demonstrated, and the abscess cavity was packed using wound packing material to complete the procedure [see Figure 3, Panel B].
The effectiveness of this model as a realistic way to demonstrate key components of the incision and drainage procedure was evaluated by creating a multimedia video presentation using this model. This video is being used for clinical instruction and has been peer-reviewed and published, and is available on-line to individual subscribers, institutional subscribers, or for free trial subscribers. Feedback obtained from 11 faculty physicians and 12 resident physicians experiencing this model in person and/or video found that all 23 physicians felt it was a realistic way to demonstrate incision and drainage techniques.
This project developed a model for incision and drainage of skin abscesses to teach clinicians this important clinical procedure. This model is realistic, which is demonstrated by physician review and the use of this technique to create a peer-reviewed and published teaching video. Teaching models like this one are important for educating clinicians without placing real patients at risk for complications of an invasive procedure. A search of the Medline database revealed one other published model which used white glue injected under chicken skin without detailed instructions or associated photographic or video imagery to allow readers to evaluate its fidelity in representing actual skin abscesses. Our own trials demonstrated that injection of simulated abscess material under the skin without containment in the Word catheter was not realistic.
While the realism of our model is evident in the video and still photographs that have been produced using these methods, use of this model as an educational tool has yet to be directly compared to bedside teaching on a live patient. Its use in hands-on teaching sessions will allow further evaluation of whether similar positive results can be achieved for learners when compared to bedside teaching involving real abscesses and live patients. Cadaveric donations could be less available in some areas or the cost of using them may exceed that of other less realistic options for teaching this procedure. However, models such as this one have the added benefit of improving patient safety by providing educational opportunities for medical students, resident physicians, mid-level providers, and practicing physicians before performing incision and drainage on patients presenting with skin abscesses.
Dr. Fitch received faculty funding support from the Brooks Scholars Program in Academic Medicine at the Wake Forest University School of Medicine. Thank you to Dr. James E. Johnson, Director of the Anatomical Bequeathal Program and the Anatomical Resource Clinical Training Center, for his assistance in making this educational project possible.
All authors participated in the conception, design, and implementation of the abscess model. MTF drafted the manuscript and all authors participated in the writing and revising of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.


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Innovation Award Rhineland-Palatinate: DBK David + Baader GmbH receives recognition
The DBK David + Baader GmbH, a company from the southern palatine region, has been awarded at the 2019 Rhineland Palatine Innovation Award Ceremony. The award in the category "industry" was presented by Minister of Economics Volker Wissing for a "low pressure loss PTC Air Heater" - one of many innovative solutions of the past years.
"At DBK, we promote innovation by giving our employees the space and freedom they need to develop new and creative ideas." said Head of Division Dr. Ing. Jürgen Prokop. "With innovative solutions, such as the awarded product, we solve the challenges of our worldwide customers. Our vision is to become the solution provider that continuously sets new standards for its customers." said Dr. Andreas Stratmann, CTO of DBK. This recognition is another step towards implementing that vision.
The awarded product is a PTC Air Heater with minimum pressure loss at high performance. It has been developed to meet the HVAC industry's high requirements and to offer a solution for ventilation system manufacturers. The air heater is already part of many HVAC systems in new residential buildings. DBK is currently developing further solutions, including retrofitting options.
Whitepaper ITM: Failsafe Air Heating
PTC finned resistor air heater designed for the fail-safe air heating in ventilation systems at low pressure loss
The growing use of electrical energy in air duct heating applications poses new challenges to manufacturers of electrical heating systems – as many customers ask for example for space-saving designs and low pressure loss solutions for their systems. As of today, resistive type heating systems are in common use. Now, the PTC (Positive Temperature Coefficient) heating technology offers a new and safe alternative that combines high efficiency with of low pressure loss...
Download whitepaper to read the full article!
Dual Executive leads DBK Group into the future
(Rülzheim, 1st of June 2017). DBK David + Baader Group announces the appointment of Mr. Ralph Hock as CFO and Dr. Andreas Stratmann as CTO of the company. This new dual leadership team follows Norbert Reiling, who decided to leave as of 1 June 2017 at his own request, after 8 years as CEO of the company.
Reiling, however, is looking for a new professional challenge: "After eight years of strategic restructuring and reorientation of the group, it is time for both sides to give new impulses. DBK is on an excellent path and I am proud to have contributed my part," the 55-year-old said. Under the aegis of the graduate engineer, the company moved its headquarters from Kandel to Rülzheim in 2012 and more than doubled its turnover. The acquisition and integration of a German EMS service provider, which expanded the group's strategic market position with its current ten subsidiaries, thereby contributing to the company's future viability also counts to his merits. "With his leadership and expertise, he has successfully developed DBK-Group and made it fit for the future," chairman Prof. Dr. Harald J. Schäfer of the Supervisory Board stated, praising Reiling´s work.
With the new management structure the company is responding to the increasing demands in the areas of digitization, networking and electrification and the progressive internationalization of its activities. It thus supports the implemented growth and innovation course and the legal independence of its various business activities. "With Ralph Hock as a good connoisseur of the company and the experienced manager and technical expert Dr. Andreas Stratmann, we have set the course for a successful future for the DBK-Group," said chairman of the Supervisory Board Prof. Dr. Harald J. Schäfer. "We are delighted to have won the two men for this responsible task."
Ralph Hock (50), the former Commercial Director of the parent company, moves into the executive management and will be responsible for the commercial and administrative areas of the business. The graduate economist is a true "product of DBK" and has been part of the company since 2000. After passing through management positions in the areas of controlling and finance, Hock joined the management team in 2009 and was co-responsible in this function for the reorientation of DBK-Group over the past eight years. "With my appointment, DBK-Group emphasizes the continuity of its long-term corporate strategy and shows the employees the possibilities for development within the company," stated Hock on the occasion of the presentation of the new senior management team.
Dr. Andreas Stratmann (49) takes on the responsibility for the technical and sales departments. He studied electrical engineering at the Ruhr University in Bochum. After his doctorate in 1998, he held various management positions in the field of automotive electronics at Robert Bosch GmbH. In the years 2008 to 2010 he was the personal assistant to the vice-chairman of the Bosch-Group, until he founded a subsidiary in 2011, and led it as managing director. In 2014, Dr. Stratmann joined a medium-sized, private corporation, as Chief Technology Officer for whom he was also the spokesman.
"I look forward to working together with my colleague and all DBK employees to meet the great opportunities in a rapidly changing market environment," said Dr. Stratmann on the occasion of his appointment as CTO.


Chicago Tango Fest will seduce its way into your hearts for the sixth year in a row now through August 28 at the Old Town School of Folk Music. The American Tango Institute (ATI) in collaboration with the Old Town School of Folk Music presents Tango on the Town where everyone can enjoy workshops for all levels of tango dancers and performances by award-winning couples Guillermo Merlo and Fernanda Ghi and Luciano Brigante and Alejandra Orozco. The fest workshops are divided into four skill levels: Fast Track Tango for Novices, Basics and Fundamentals Development, Intermediate and Advanced. All workshops will be held at the Old Town School of Folk Music, 4544 N. Lincoln Av. All Milongas will be held at the ATI, 325 N. Hoyne Ave. For more information, visit www.chiagotangofest.com or www.oldtownschool.org.


Our client comes from a legacy of fine jewellery with a who's who celebrity client list that values craft, tradition, design and architecture.
Our client has an amazing opportunity for a highly skilled unique individual to join their London based team as a Senior Sales Executive. This individual will come with a vivacious cosmopolitan personality that is well versed in the world of luxury travel, retail, design, motorsports and megastars. This role requires an individual with a warmth and confidence to deliver a seamless luxury customer service to an enviable existing client base while building new business by nurturing their client contacts. This role is about personalised service delivered with impeccable style and communication skills to build brand loyalty.
Nurture existing client base with discerning taste in the world of fine jewellery, travel, architecture and design with a relaxed confidence towards brand product range.
Proven work experience delivering high quality customer service to a global luxury standard.
Background must be customer focussed but not necessarily retail. Candidates from the world of travel, automotive, finance and fashion also welcome to apply.
Confident, approachable, communicative with strong leadership qualities to exercise good judgment.
Someone who is coachable and open to feedback is a must.
Energetic and proactive, the ideal candidate will take ownership of this role with their entrepreneurial spirit and make it their own to drive, maintain and exceed sales targets.
Globally minded and open to clear communication from a variety of cultures.
A solution-based mindset that can exercise logic through analysis.
The ability to work under pressure to robust business demands and maintain a positive attitude, cool composure and be an excellent team player.
A connector and someone who brings a strong network that is brand aligned to build the business with authenticity to match an elite world class clientele.
Well presented, the candidate understands and embodies a personal code of conduct that honours confidentiality and discretion at every customer touchpoint.
Honest and accountable for high stakes and bespoke orders with demanding details.
Fluent in English a must with other languages a bonus but not essential.
An interest in a long-term opportunity exercise expertise the current role and grow with the business as it evolves in Europe via the London flagship.
Confident and warm demeanour comfortable with dealing with world renown celebrities and everyday clients while not skipping a beat delivering a personalised luxury customer experience.
Please note this is a highly specialised role. Serious enquiries only. All candidates must have the ability to prove their eligibility to live and work in the UK. No sponsorship requests will be accepted.


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Ward Janssens, geboren als Eduard Janssens (18 januari 1946), is een voormalig Belgisch wielrenner.

Levensloop en carrière
Janssens werd prof in 1968. In dat jaar won hij een etappe in de Ronde van Oostenrijk. In 1971 won hij de GP Briek Schotte en in 1975 de Leeuwse Pijl. In de Ronde van Frankrijk eindigde hij tweemaal in de top tien.

Resultaten in voornaamste wedstrijden

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Ploegen
 1969: Mercier - BP - Hutchinson
 1970: Fagor Mercier
 1971: Flandria-Mars
 1972: Van Cauter - Magniflex - de Gribaldy
 1973-1976: Molteni
 1977: Fiat France
 1978: C&A
 1979: Flandria - Ca-Va Seul - Sunair

Belgisch wielrenner