Delocalized, asynchronous, closed-loop discovery of organic laser emitters.

Contemporary materials discovery requires intricate sequences of synthesis, formulation, and characterization that often span multiple locations with specialized expertise or instrumentation. To accelerate these workflows, we present a cloud-based strategy that enabled delocalized and asynchronous design-make-test-analyze cycles. We showcased this approach through the exploration of molecular gain materials for organic solid-state lasers as a frontier application in molecular optoelectronics.

Objective Assessment of Binaural Benefit from Acoustical Treatment in Real Primary School Classrooms.

Providing students with an adequate acoustic environment is crucial for ensuring speech intelligibility in primary school classrooms. Two main approaches to control acoustics in educational facilities consist of reducing background noise and late reverberation. Prediction models for speech intelligibility have been developed and implemented to evaluate the effects of these approaches.

Telomere loss is accompanied by decreased pool of shelterin proteins TRF2 and RAP1, elevated levels of TERRA and enhanced glycolysis in imatinib-resistant CML cells.

Telomere length may be maintained by telomerase nucleoprotein complex and shelterin complex, namely TRF1, TRF2, TIN2, TPP1, POT1 and RAP1 proteins and modulated by TERRA expression. Telomere loss is observed during progression of chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) from the chronic phase (CML-CP) to the blastic phase (CML-BP). The introduction of tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs), such as imatinib (IM), has changed outcome for majority of patients, however, a number of patients treated with TKIs may develop drug resistance.

Spatio-temporal Integration of Speech Reflections in Hearing-Impaired Listeners.

Speech recognition in rooms requires the temporal integration of reflections which arrive with a certain delay after the direct sound. It is commonly assumed that there is a certain temporal window of about 50-100 ms, during which reflections can be integrated with the direct sound, while later reflections are detrimental to speech intelligibility. This concept was challenged in a recent study by employing binaural room impulse responses (RIRs) with systematically varied interaural phase differences (IPDs) and amplitude of the direct sound and a variable number of reflections delayed by up to 200 ms.

Development and evaluation of the Cantonese matrix sentence test.

Objective: To develop the Cantonese matrix (YUEmatrix) test according to the international standard procedure and examine possible different outcomes in another tonal language.

Design: A 50-word Cantonese base-matrix was established. Word-specific speech recognition functions, speech recognition thresholds (SRT), and slopes were obtained.

Inference of the distortion component of hearing impairment from speech recognition by predicting the effect of the attenuation component.

Objective: A model-based determination of the average supra-threshold ("distortion") component of hearing impairment which limits the benefit of hearing aid amplification.

Design: Published speech recognition thresholds (SRTs) were predicted with the framework for auditory discrimination experiments (FADE), which simulates recognition processes, the speech intelligibility index (SII), which exploits frequency-dependent signal-to-noise ratios (SNR), and a modified SII with a hearing-loss-dependent band importance function (PAV). Their attenuation-component-based prediction errors were interpreted as estimates of the distortion component.

Evaluation of Italian Simplified Matrix Test for Speech-Recognition Measurements in Noise.

This study aimed at the evaluation of a simplified Italian matrix test (SiIMax) for speech-recognition measurements in noise for adults and children. Speech-recognition measurements with adults and children were conducted to examine the training effect and to establish reference speech-recognition thresholds of 50% (SRT50) and 80% (SRT80) correct responses. Test-list equivalency was evaluated only with adults.

Sensitivity and specificity of automatic audiological classification using expert-labelled audiological data and Common Audiological Functional Parameters.

Objective: As a step towards the development of an audiological diagnostic supporting tool employing machine learning methods, this article aims at evaluating the classification performance of different audiological measures as well as Common Audiological Functional Parameters (CAFPAs). CAFPAs are designed to integrate different clinical databases and provide abstract representations of measures.

Design: Classification and evaluation of classification performance in terms of sensitivity and specificity are performed on a data set from a previous study, where statistical models of diagnostic cases were estimated from expert-labelled data.

Individual Aided Speech-Recognition Performance and Predictions of Benefit for Listeners With Impaired Hearing Employing FADE.

The benefit in speech-recognition performance due to the compensation of a hearing loss can vary between listeners, even if unaided performance and hearing thresholds are similar. To accurately predict the individual performance benefit due to a specific hearing device, a prediction model is proposed which takes into account hearing thresholds and a frequency-dependent suprathreshold component of impaired hearing. To test the model, the German matrix sentence test was performed in unaided and individually aided conditions in quiet and in noise by 18 listeners with different degrees of hearing loss.

Clinical validation of the Russian Matrix test - effect of hearing loss, age, and noise level.

Objective: To validate the Russian matrix sentence test (RUMatrix) for the assessment of speech recognition in quiet and in noise in clinical praxis. The effect of hearing impairment, age, and masking-noise level on speech recognition was examined.

Design: All participants underwent pure tone audiometry, a monosyllabic speech test in quiet, and speech recognition measurements with RUMatrix in quiet (SRT) and in noise (SRT).

Simulations with FADE of the effect of impaired hearing on speech recognition performance cast doubt on the role of spectral resolution.

Listeners with hearing impairment show sub-optimal processing of acoustic signals which affects their ability to recognize speech. In this contribution, three effective signal processing deficits are proposed to simulate sensorineural hearing impairment and their effect on simulated speech recognition performance is studied. Psychoacoustic and speech recognition experiments were simulated with the framework for auditory discrimination experiments (FADE).

[Application of the matrix sentence test Russian version in children].

Unlabelled: The Russian version of the matrix sentence test (RUMatrix test) has been shown to be suitable for accurate assessment of speech intelligibility in adults.

Aim: To approve the RUMatrix for measurements in children and to evaluate its simplified version (Simplified RUMatrix).

Material And Methods: 20 normal-hearing adults and 81 normal-hearing children aged from 5 to 10 years were involved into the study.

Common Audiological Functional Parameters (CAFPAs) for single patient cases: deriving statistical models from an expert-labelled data set.

Statistical knowledge about many patients could be exploited using machine learning to provide supporting information to otolaryngologists and other hearing health care professionals, but needs to be made accessible. The Common Audiological Functional Parameters (CAFPAs) were recently introduced for the purpose of integrating data from different databases by providing an abstract representation of audiological measurements. This paper aims at collecting expert labels for a sample database and to determine statistical models from the labelled data set.

Towards Age-Related Anti-Inflammatory Therapy: Klotho Suppresses Activation of ER and Golgi Stress Response in Senescent Monocytes.

Immunosenescence in monocytes has been shown to be associated with several biochemical and functional changes, including development of senescence-associated secretory phenotype (SASP), which may be inhibited by klotho protein. To date, it was believed that SASP activation is associated with accumulating DNA damage. However, some literature data suggest that endoplasmic reticulum and Golgi stress pathways may be involved in SASP development.

Klotho-mediated changes in the expression of Atg13 alter formation of ULK1 complex and thus initiation of ER- and Golgi-stress response mediated autophagy.

In the previous paper of our group, we have demonstrated that one of the crucial factors involved in the crosstalk between autophagy and apoptosis is klotho protein. We have shown that klotho silencing in normal human fibroblasts intensifies lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced p-eIF2a-mediated stress of endoplasmic reticulum and thus leads to retardation of prosurvival autophagy and induction of apoptotic cell death. In this study, we have performed a detailed step-by-step analysis of autophagy flux-related genes' expression and endoplasmic reticulum and Golgi stress related pathways in order to determine the exact mechanistic event when autophagy is inhibited in klotho-deficient cells on account of apoptosis initiation.

Measurement and Prediction of Binaural-Temporal Integration of Speech Reflections.

For speech intelligibility in rooms, the temporal integration of speech reflections is typically modeled by separating the room impulse response (RIR) into an early (assumed beneficial for speech intelligibility) and a late part (assumed detrimental). This concept was challenged in this study by employing binaural RIRs with systematically varied interaural phase differences (IPDs) and amplitude of the direct sound and a variable number of reflections delayed by up to 200 ms. Speech recognition thresholds in stationary noise were measured in normal-hearing listeners for 86 conditions.

Common Audiological Functional Parameters (CAFPAs): statistical and compact representation of rehabilitative audiological classification based on expert knowledge.

Objective: As a step towards objectifying audiological rehabilitation and providing comparability between different test batteries and clinics, the Common Audiological Functional Parameters (CAFPAs) were introduced as a common and abstract representation of audiological knowledge obtained from diagnostic tests.

Design: Relationships between CAFPAs as an intermediate representation between diagnostic tests and audiological findings, diagnoses and treatment recommendations (summarised as "diagnostic cases") were established by means of an expert survey. Expert knowledge was collected for 14 given categories covering different diagnostic cases.

Construction and evaluation of the Mandarin Chinese matrix (CMNmatrix) sentence test for the assessment of speech recognition in noise.

Objective: Development of the Mandarin Chinese matrix (CMNmatrix) sentence test for speech intelligibility measurements in noise according to the international standard procedure.

Design: A 50-word base matrix representing the distribution of phonemes and lexical tones of spoken Mandarin was established. Hundred sentences capturing all the co-articulations of two consecutive words were recorded.

[The application of the screening questionnaires for the diagnostics of the central auditory processing disorders in the pediatric practice].

Identification and diagnostics of auditory processing disorders (APD) in the children continues to be a challenge. Screening tools help to decide the need for evaluation. However, none of them are used routinely in Russia, nor are there thus far auditory checklist questionnaires in the Russian language.

Objective Prediction of Hearing Aid Benefit Across Listener Groups Using Machine Learning: Speech Recognition Performance With Binaural Noise-Reduction Algorithms.

The simulation framework for auditory discrimination experiments (FADE) was adopted and validated to predict the individual speech-in-noise recognition performance of listeners with normal and impaired hearing with and without a given hearing-aid algorithm. FADE uses a simple automatic speech recognizer (ASR) to estimate the lowest achievable speech reception thresholds (SRTs) from simulated speech recognition experiments in an objective way, independent from any empirical reference data. Empirical data from the literature were used to evaluate the model in terms of predicted SRTs and benefits in SRT with the German matrix sentence recognition test when using eight single- and multichannel binaural noise-reduction algorithms.

[The speech audiometry using the matrix sentence test].

The matrix sentence test in which the five-word semantically unpredictable sentences presented under the background noise conditions are used as the speech material was designed and validated for many languages. The objective of the present study was to evaluate the Russian version of the matrix sentence test (RuMatrix test) in the listeners of different ages with normal hearing. At the first stage of the study, 35 listeners at the age from 18 to 33 year were examined.

Sentence Recognition Prediction for Hearing-impaired Listeners in Stationary and Fluctuation Noise With FADE: Empowering the Attenuation and Distortion Concept by Plomp With a Quantitative Processing Model.

To characterize the individual patient's hearing impairment as obtained with the matrix sentence recognition test, a simulation Framework for Auditory Discrimination Experiments (FADE) is extended here using the Attenuation and Distortion (A+D) approach by Plomp as a blueprint for setting the individual processing parameters. FADE has been shown to predict the outcome of both speech recognition tests and psychoacoustic experiments based on simulations using an automatic speech recognition system requiring only few assumptions. It builds on the closed-set matrix sentence recognition test which is advantageous for testing individual speech recognition in a way comparable across languages.

Age-Related Differences in Lexical Access Relate to Speech Recognition in Noise.

Vocabulary size has been suggested as a useful measure of "verbal abilities" that correlates with speech recognition scores. Knowing more words is linked to better speech recognition. How vocabulary knowledge translates to general speech recognition mechanisms, how these mechanisms relate to offline speech recognition scores, and how they may be modulated by acoustical distortion or age, is less clear.

Genes Encoding Cucumber Full-Size ABCG Proteins Show Different Responses to Plant Growth Regulators and Sclareolide.

Full-size members of the ABCG (ATP-binding cassette, subfamily G) subfamily of ABC transporters have been found only in plants and fungi. The plant genes encoding full-size ABCGs identified so far appeared to be differentially regulated under various environmental constraints, plant growth regulators, and microbial elicitors, indicating a broad functional role of these proteins in plant responses to abiotic and biotic stress. Nevertheless, the structure and physiological function of full-size ABCGs in many plant species are still unknown.

A simulation framework for auditory discrimination experiments: Revealing the importance of across-frequency processing in speech perception.

A framework for simulating auditory discrimination experiments, based on an approach from Schädler, Warzybok, Hochmuth, and Kollmeier [(2015). Int. J.