What is Python Programming Language?

Python is an interpreted, object-oriented, high-level programming language with dynamic semantics. It can be used for a wide variety of applications- back end development, software development, data science and writing system scripts.

Python was conceived in the late 1980s by Guido van Rossum at Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI) in the Netherlands as a successor to ABC programming language, which was inspired by SETL, capable of exception handling and interfacing with the Amoeba operating system. Its implementation began in December 1989.

Python is an open-source programming language and can be downloaded  for free at python.org

Example of a simple Python program

New study has scientists re-evaluating brain size and mammalian intelligence

Scientists at Stony Brook University and the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior have pieced together a timeline of how brain and body size evolved in mammals over the last 150 million years. The findings, published in Science Advances, show that brain size relative to body size -- long considered an indicator of animal intelligence --has not followed a stable scale over evolutionary time.

The team of scientists, including biologists, evolutionary statisticians and anthropologists, compared the brain mass of 1,400 living and extinct mammals. For the 107 fossils examined -- among them ancient whales and the most ancient Old World monkey skull ever found -- they used endocranial volume data from skulls instead of brain mass data. The brain measurements were then analyzed along with body size to compare the scale of brain size to body size over deep evolutionary time.

According to the U.S. National Science Foundation-funded study, "big-brained" humans, dolphins and elephants, for example, attained their proportions in different ways. Elephants increased in body size, but surprisingly, even more in brain size.

Dolphins, on the other hand, generally decreased in body size, while brain size increased. Great apes showed a wide variety of body sizes, with a general trend toward increases in brain and body size. In comparison, ancestral hominins, which represent the human line, showed a relative decrease in body size and increase in brain size compared to great apes.

The authors say that these complex patterns urge a re-evaluation of the paradigm that comparing brain size to body size for any species provides a measure of the species' intelligence.

"This study highlights the power and importance of comparative phylogenetic analyses to provide new insights into the evolution of complex traits," says Christopher Schneider, a program director in NSF’s Division of Environmental Biology. "The findings dramatically alter our understanding of how brain and body size have evolved."

Culled from National Science Foundation

Sugar-powered sensor developed to detect and prevent disease

Researchers at Washington State University have developed an implantable, biofuel-powered sensor that runs on sugar and can monitor a body's biological signals to detect, prevent and diagnose diseases.

A cross-disciplinary research team led by Subhanshu Gupta, assistant professor in WSU's School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, developed the unique sensor, which, enabled by the biofuel cell, harvests glucose from body fluids to run.

The research team has demonstrated a unique integration of the biofuel cell with electronics to process physiological and biochemical signals with high sensitivity.

Their work recently was published in the IEEE Transactions of Circuits and Systems journal.

Professors Su Ha and Alla Kostyukova from the Gene and Linda School of Chemical Engineering and Bioengineering, led design of the biofuel cell.

Many popular sensors for disease detection are either watches, which need to be recharged, or patches that are worn on the skin, which are superficial and can't be embedded. The sensor developed by the WSU team could also remove the need to prick a finger for testing of certain diseases, such as diabetes.

"The human body carries a lot of fuel in its bodily fluids through blood glucose or lactate around the skin and mouth," said Gupta. "Using a biofuel cell opens the door to using the body as potential fuel."

The electronics in the sensor use state-of-the-art design and fabrication to consume only a few microwatts of power while being highly sensitive. Coupling these electronics with the biofuel cell makes it more efficient than traditional battery-powered devices, said Gupta. Since it relies on body glucose, the sensor's electronics can be powered indefinitely. So, for instance, the sensor could run on sugar produced just under the skin.

Unlike commonly used lithium-ion batteries, the biofuel cell is also completely non-toxic, making it more promising as an implant for people, he said. It is also more stable and sensitive than conventional biofuel cells.

The researchers say their sensor could be manufactured cheaply through mass production, by leveraging economies of scale.

While the sensors have been tested in the lab, the researchers are hoping to test and demonstrate them in blood capillaries, which will require regulatory approval. The researchers are also working on further improving and increasing the power output of their biofuel cell.

"This brings together the technology for making a biofuel cell with our sophisticated electronics," said Gupta. "It's a very good marriage that could work for many future applications."

Source: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/09/180927145339.htm

A new theory for phantom limb pain points the way to more effective treatment

Dr Max Ortiz Catalan of Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden, has developed a new theory for the origin of the mysterious condition, 'phantom limb pain'. Published in the journal Frontiers in Neurology, his hypothesis builds upon his previous work on a revolutionary treatment for the condition, that uses machine learning and augmented reality.

Phantom limb pain is a poorly understood phenomenon, in which people who have lost a limb can experience severe pain, seemingly located in that missing part of the body. The condition can be seriously debilitating and can drastically reduce the sufferer's quality of life. But current ideas on its origins cannot explain clinical findings, nor provide a comprehensive theoretical framework for its study and treatment.

Now, Max Ortiz Catalan, Associate Professor at Chalmers University of Technology, has published a paper that offers up a promising new theory -- one that he terms 'stochastic entanglement'.

He proposes that after an amputation, neural circuitry related to the missing limb loses its role and becomes susceptible to entanglement with other neural networks -- in this case, the network responsible for pain perception.

"Imagine you lose your hand. That leaves a big chunk of 'real estate' in your brain, and in your nervous system as a whole, without a job. It stops processing any sensory input, it stops producing any motor output to move the hand. It goes idle -- but not silent," explains Max Ortiz Catalan.

Neurons are never completely silent. When not processing a particular job, they might fire at random. This may result in coincidental firing of neurons in that part of the sensorimotor network, at the same time as from the network of pain perception. When they fire together, that will create the experience of pain in that part of the body.

"Normally, sporadic synchronised firing wouldn't be a big deal, because it's just part of the background noise, and it won't stand out," continues Max Ortiz Catalan. "But in patients with a missing limb, such event could stand out when little else is going on at the same time. This can result in a surprising, emotionally charged experience -- to feel pain in a part of the body you don't have. Such a remarkable sensation could reinforce a neural connection, make it stick out, and help establish an undesirable link."

Through a principle known as 'Hebb's Law' -- 'neurons that fire together, wire together' -- neurons in the sensorimotor and pain perception networks become entangled, resulting in phantom limb pain. The new theory also explains why not all amputees suffer from the condition- the randomness, or stochasticity, means that simultaneous firing may not occur, and become linked, in all patients.

In the new paper, Max Ortiz Catalan goes on to examine how this theory can explain the effectiveness of Phantom Motor Execution (PME), the novel treatment method he previously developed. During PME treatment, electrodes attached to the patient's residual limb pick up electrical signals intended for the missing limb, which are then translated through AI algorithms, into movements of a virtual limb in real time. The patients see themselves on a screen, with a digitally rendered limb in place of their missing one, and can then control it just as if it were their own biological limb . This allows the patient to stimulate and reactivate those dormant areas of the brain.

"The patients can start reusing those areas of brain that had gone idle. Making use of that circuitry helps to weaken and disconnect the entanglement to the pain network. It's a kind of 'inverse Hebb's law' -- the more those neurons fire apart, the weaker their connection. Or, it can be used preventatively, to protect against the formation of those links in the first place," he says.

The PME treatment method has been previously shown to help patients for whom other therapies have failed. Understanding exactly how and why it can help is crucial to ensuring it is administered correctly and in the most effective manner. Max Ortiz Catalan's new theory could help unravel some of the mysteries surrounding phantom limb pain, and offer relief for some of the most affected sufferers.

Source: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/09/180906082022.htm

New Blood Pressure App

Michigan State University has invented a proof-of-concept blood pressure app that can give accurate readings using an iPhone -- with no special equipment.

The discovery, featured in the current issue of Scientific Reports, was made by a team of scientists led by Ramakrishna Mukkamala, MSU electrical and computer engineering professor.

"By leveraging optical and force sensors already in smartphones for taking 'selfies' and employing 'peek and pop,' we've invented a practical tool to keep tabs on blood pressure," he said. "Such ubiquitous blood pressure monitoring may improve hypertension awareness and control rates, and thereby help reduce the incidence of cardiovascular disease and mortality."

In a publication in Science Translational Medicine earlier this year, Mukkamala's team had proposed the concept with the invention of a blood pressure app and hardware. With the combination of a smartphone and add-on optical and force sensors, the team produced a device that rivaled arm-cuff readings, the standard in most medical settings.

With advances in smartphones, the add-on optical and force sensors may no longer be needed. Peek and pop, available to users looking to open functions and apps with a simple push of their finger, is now standard on many iPhones and included in some Android models.

If things keep moving along at the current pace, an app could be available in late 2019, Mukkamala added.

"Like our original device, the application still needs to be validated in a standard regulatory test," he said. "But because no additional hardware is needed, we believe that the app could reach society faster."

Internationally, this app could be a game-changer. While high blood pressure is treatable with lifestyle changes and medication, only around 20 percent of people with hypertension have their condition under control. This invention gives patients a convenient option and keeping a log of daily measurements would produce an accurate average, Mukkamala added.

Anand Chandrasekhar, Keerthana Natarajan, Mohammad Yavarimanesh -- all electrical and computer engineering doctoral candidates -- contributed to this research.

This research was funded in part by the National Institutes of Health.

Source: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/09/180907135920.htm

Artificial intelligence platform screens for acute neurological illnesses

An artificial intelligence platform designed to identify a broad range of acute neurological illnesses, such as stroke, hemorrhage, and hydrocephalus, was shown to identify disease in CT scans in 1.2 seconds, faster than human diagnosis, according to a study conducted at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and published in the journal Nature Medicine.

"With a total processing and interpretation time of 1.2 seconds, such a triage system can alert physicians to a critical finding that may otherwise remain in a queue for minutes to hours," says senior author Eric Oermann, MD, Instructor in the Department of Neurosurgery at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. "We're executing on the vision to develop artificial intelligence in medicine that will solve clinical problems and improve patient care."

This is the first study to utilize artificial intelligence for detecting a wide range of acute neurologic events and to demonstrate a direct clinical application. Researchers used 37,236 head CT scans to train a deep neural network to identify whether an image contained critical or non-critical findings. The platform was then tested in a blinded, randomized controlled trial in a simulated clinical environment where it triaged head CT scans based on severity. The computer software was tested for how quickly it could recognize and provide notification versus the time it took a radiologist to notice a disease. The average time for the computer algorithm to preprocess an image, run its inference method, and, if necessary, raise an alarm was 150 times shorter than for physicians to read the image.

This study used "weakly supervised learning approaches," which built on the research team's expertise in natural language processing and the Mount Sinai Health System's large clinical datasets. Dr. Oermann says the next phase of this research will entail enhanced computer labeling of CT scans and a shift to "strongly supervised learning approaches" and novel techniques for increasing data efficiency. Researchers estimate the goal of re-engineering the system with these changes will be accomplished within the next two years.

"The expression 'time is brain' signifies that rapid response is critical in the treatment of acute neurological illnesses, so any tools that decrease time to diagnosis may lead to improved patient outcomes," says study co-author Joshua Bederson, MD, Professor and System Chair for the Department of Neurosurgery at Mount Sinai Health System and Clinical Director of the Neurosurgery Simulation Core.

"The application of deep learning and computer vision techniques to radiological imaging is a clear imperative for 21st century medical care," says study author Burton Drayer, MD, the Charles M. and Marilyn Newman Professor and System Chair of the Department of Radiology for the Mount Sinai Health System, CEO of the Mount Sinai Doctors Faculty Practice, and Dean for Clinical Affairs of the Icahn School of Medicine.

This study was performed by the Mount Sinai AI Consortium, known as "AISINAI" -- a group of scientists, physicians, and researchers dedicated to developing artificial intelligence in medicine that will improve patient care and help doctors accurately diagnose disease.

Source: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/08/180813113315.htm

Fungi-produced pigment shows promise as semiconductor material

Researchers at Oregon State University are looking at a highly durable organic pigment, used by humans in artwork for hundreds of years, as a promising possibility as a semiconductor material.

Findings suggest it could become a sustainable, low-cost, easily fabricated alternative to silicon in electronic or optoelectronic applications where the high-performance capabilities of silicon aren't required.

Optoelectronics is technology working with the combined use of light and electronics, such as solar cells, and the pigment being studied is xylindein.

"Xylindein is pretty, but can it also be useful? How much can we squeeze out of it?" said Oregon State University physicist Oksana Ostroverkhova. "It functions as an electronic material but not a great one, but there's optimism we can make it better."

Xylindien is secreted by two wood-eating fungi in the Chlorociboria genus. Any wood that's infected by the fungi is stained a blue-green color, and artisans have prized xylindein-affected wood for centuries.

The pigment is so stable that decorative products made half a millennium ago still exhibit its distinctive hue. It holds up against prolonged exposure to heat, ultraviolet light and electrical stress.

"If we can learn the secret for why those fungi-produced pigments are so stable, we could solve a problem that exists with organic electronics," Ostroverkhova said. "Also, many organic electronic materials are too expensive to produce, so we're looking to do something inexpensively in an ecologically friendly way that's good for the economy."

With current fabrication techniques, xylindein tends to form non-uniform films with a porous, irregular, "rocky" structure.

"There's a lot of performance variation," she said. "You can tinker with it in the lab, but you can't really make a technologically relevant device out of it on a large scale. But we found a way to make it more easily processed and to get a decent film quality."

Ostroverkhova and collaborators in OSU's colleges of Science and Forestry blended xylindein with a transparent, non-conductive polymer, poly(methyl methacrylate), abbreviated to PMMA and sometimes known as acrylic glass. They drop-cast solutions both of pristine xylindein and a xlyindein-PMMA blend onto electrodes on a glass substrate for testing.

They found the non-conducting polymer greatly improved the film structure without a detrimental effect on xylindein's electrical properties. And the blended films actually showed better photosensitivity.

"Exactly why that happened, and its potential value in solar cells, is something we'll be investigating in future research," Ostroverkhova said. "We'll also look into replacing the polymer with a natural product -- something sustainable made from cellulose. We could grow the pigment from the cellulose and be able to make a device that's all ready to go.

"Xylindein will never beat silicon, but for many applications, it doesn't need to beat silicon," she said. "It could work well for depositing onto large, flexible substrates, like for making wearable electronics."

This research, whose findings were recently published in MRS Advances, represents the first use of a fungus-produced material in a thin-film electrical device.

"And there are a lot more of the materials," Ostroverkhova said. "This is just first one we've explored. It could be the beginning of a whole new class of organic electronic materials."

The National Science Foundation supported this research.

Source: sciencedaily.com