Effects of a novel ultrasound contrast agent with long persistence on right ventricular pressure: Comparison with SonoVue

This work investigated the effect of infusion of a self-made ultrasound contrast agent with long persistence (named ZHIFUXIAN) on rat right ventricular pressure and made a preliminary evaluation on the relative safety of the novel microbubbles. Normal saline, SonoVue and ZHIFUXIAN were injected through caudal vein at the total volume of 0.5 ml for each injection. The right ventricular systolic pressure (RVSP) and end-diastolic pressure (RVEDP) were monitored and the changes of the pressure were compared with baseline readings. RVSP increased when saline, SonoVue or ZHIFUXIAN were injected, the greatest change being after SonoVue (about 2 mm Hg), but there was no statistical significance compared with baseline (P > 0.05). There was no significant difference in RVSP between saline, SonoVue and ZHIFUXIAN at any time point. Also, there was no significant difference in RVEDP between groups at each time point and between different time points in each group. The results indicate that the self-made microbubbles effect on right ventricular hemodynamics is equivalent to that of normal saline at the same volume needed for effective enhanced imaging, demonstrating that it does not produce changes in right ventricular blood pressure under the study conditions. Pathological examination also showed it had no obvious influence on lung, liver and kidney.     

Restrictions of an invertible chaotic operator to its invariant subspaces

Let M$M$ be a closed subspace of a separable, infinite dimensional Hilbert space H$H$ with dim(H/M)=∞$dim(H/M)=\infty$. We show that a bounded linear operator A:M→M$A:M\to M$ has an invertible chaotic extension T:H→H$T:H\to H$ if and only if A$A$ is bounded below. Motivated by our result, we further show that A:M→M$A:M\to M$ has a chaotic Fredholm extension T:H→H$T:H\to H$ if and only if A$A$ is left semi-Fredholm.     

Strong limit theorems for oscillation moduli of PL-process and cumulative hazard process under truncation and censorship with applications

In this paper we obtain exact rates of uniform convergence for oscillation moduli and Lipschitz-1/2 moduli of PL-process and cumulative hazard process when the data are subject to left truncation and right censorship. Based on these results, the exact rates of uniform convergence for various types of density and hazard function estimators are derived. Research supported by the Postdoctoral Programme Foundation and the National Natural Science Foundation of China     

Presmoothing the transition probabilities in the illness-death model

One major goal in clinical applications of multi-state models is the estimation of transition probabilities. In a recent paper, Meira-Machado et al. (2006) introduce a substitute for the Aalen-Johansen estimator in the case of a non-Markov illness-death model. The idea behind their estimator is to weight the data by the Kaplan-Meier weights pertaining to the distribution of the total survival time of the process. In this paper we propose a modification of Meira-Machado et al. (2006) estimator based on presmoothing. Consistency is established. We investigate the finite sample performance of the new estimator through simulations. Data from a study on colon cancer are used for illustration purposes.     

电视摄象机测量误差探讨

本文简述了用电视摄象机进行工业尺寸测量的微分法与拟合法的基本原理,同时详细的讨论了各自所能达到的精度极限。本文用实验验证了理论计算的结果,最后对二维工件测量时,如何根据工件的不同形状与位置以及光学系统的特点,提出了在测量时工件的放置应该注意的问题以及对工件拐角处如何进行处理的方法。     

Estimating a survival function with incomplete cause-of-death data

We propose a random censorship model which permits uncertainty in the cause of death assessments for a subset of the subjects in a survival experiment. A nonparametric maximum likelihood approach and a “self-consistency” approach are considered. The solution sets corresponding to both approaches are found. They are infinite and identical. Only some of the solutions are consistent; i.e., the MLEs and self-consistent estimators are not consistent in general. Two estimates are thus proposed and their asymptotic properties are studied. It is shown that both estimates are strongly consistent and converge to Gaussian processes. The covariance structures of these Gaussian processes are derived.     

Lorenz Curve for Truncated and Censored Data

In this paper, we consider a nonparametric estimator of the Lorenz curve and Gini index when the data are subjected to random left truncation and right censorship. Strong Gaussian approximations for the associated Lorenz process are established under appropriate assumptions. A law of the iterated logarithm for the Lorenz curve is also derived. Lastly, we obtain a central limit theorem for the corresponding Gini index.     

Quantile process for left truncated and right censored data

In this paper, we consider the product-limit quantile estimator of an unknown quantile function when the data are subject to random left truncation and right censorship. This is a parallel problem to the estimation of the unknown distribution function by the product-limit estimator under the same model. Simultaneous strong Gaussian approximations of the product-limit process and product-limit quantile process are constructed with rate . A functional law of the iterated logarithm for the maximal deviation of the estimator from the estimand is derived from the construction. Work partially supported by NSC Grant 89-2118-M-259-011.     

Experimental evaluation of dual acceptance window weighting function for right coronary MR angiography at 3.0T

To shorten scanning time and increase the feasibility of experimental results, we performed right coronary artery magnetic resonance angiography (CMRA) at 3.0 T using dual acceptance window weighting function in 25 normal subjects. We examined these subjects using conventional navigator with fixed gating window and 6 dual acceptance window weighted gating (DAWG) sequences with different central weighted ratio (CWR). Compared with the conventional navigator sequence, DAWG sequences with CWRs of 20% and 25% increased the scanning efficiency by 30% and 26% respectively (P<.05), while maintaining good image quality; further the corresponding scanning time decreased from 2.12–1.64 and 1.69 min, respectively (P<.05). However, CWRs less than 15% caused image degradation to some extent. The coronary artery lengths and diameters did not show statistically significant differences between the two techniques (P>.05). Briefly, to avoid the problems caused by low navigator efficiency and to maintain comparable image quality, the weighted gating parameters of 3 mm width central acceptance window and 15 mm width outer acceptance window with CWR between 20% and 25% are recommended for right CMRA at 3 T.     

Positive Solutions for Semipositone ( p,n − p ) Right Focal Boundary Value Problems

We consider the ( p , n m p ) right focal boundary value problem: $${\matrix{{(- 1)^{n - p} u^{(n)} \! = \lambda \;f(t, u), } \hfill & \ {{\rm for }\ 0 \lt t \lt 1, } \hfill \cr \quad \quad \,{u^{(i)} (0) = 0, } \hfill & {0 \le i \le p - 1, } \hfill \cr \quad \quad \,{u^{(i)} (1) = 0, } \hfill & {p \le i \le n - 1, } \hfill \cr}} $$ where 1 h p h n m 1 is fixed and u > 0. Using a fixed point theorem for operators on a cone, we develop criteria for the existence of positive solutions of the boundary value problem for u on a suitable interval.