Explore the vast range of titles available.

The New York Heart Association (NYHA) functional class is a subjective estimate of a patient's functional ability based on symptoms that do not always correlate with the objective estimate of functional capacity, peak oxygen consumption (peak V o 2). In addition, relationships between these 2 measurements have not been examined in the current medical era when patients are using β-blockers, aldosterone antagonists, and cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT). Using baseline data from the HF-ACTION (Heart Failure and A Controlled Trial Investigating Outcomes of Exercise TraiNing) study, we examined this relationship. One thousand seven hundred fifty-eight patients underwent a symptom-limited metabolic stress test and stopped exercise due to dyspnea or fatigue. The relationship between NYHA functional class and peak V o 2 was examined. In addition, the effects of β-blockers, aldosterone antagonists, and CRT therapy on these relationships were compared. The NYHA II patients have a significantly higher peak V o 2 (16.1 ± 4.6 vs 13.0 ± 4.2 mL/kg per minute), a lower ventilation (Ve)/V co 2 slope (32.8 ± 7.7 vs 36.8 ± 10.4), and a longer duration of exercise (11.0 ± 3.9 vs 8.0 ± 3.4 minutes) than NYHA III/IV patients. Within each functional class, there was no difference in any of the exercise parameters between patients on or off of β-blockers, aldosterone antagonists, or CRT therapy. Finally, with increasing age, a significant difference in peak V o 2, Ve/V co 2 slope, and exercise time was found. For patients being treated with current medical therapy, there still is a difference in true functional capacity between NYHA functional class II and III/IV patients. However, within each NYHA functional class, the presence or absence or contemporary heart failure therapies does not alter exercise parameters.

The Henry Ford Hospital (HFH) regadenoson (REG) registry includes patients with a variety of comorbidities allowing for the evaluation of outcomes in a large, unselected population. Using a database of electronic medical records and nuclear cardiology reports, patients aged > 18 years who underwent REG-facilitated single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) testing at HFH between January 2009 and August 2012 were identified. The primary objective was to describe the clinical and demographic characteristics of patients who had undergone REG only vs REG WALK (REG + low-level exercise) SPECT. A total of 2104 patients were included in the analysis (mean age 65.3 years; 50% women; 51% African American, 43% Caucasian). For the REG only (n = 1318) and REG WALK (n = 786) cohorts, SPECT was abnormal in 37% of patients (REG only, 39%; REG WALK, 34%; P < 0.01). No differences in diagnostic modalities or interventions in 90 days after SPECT were observed. Immediate safety analysis showed no deaths 48 h after REG SPECT testing. Although they guide invasive therapy, abnormal scans do not automatically lead to invasive testing. This demonstrates the focus on initial medical management, which reflects the existing evidence of initial goal-directed medical management of stable coronary disease.

Optical cross-correlation is a technique that can achieve both high specificity and high sensitivity when deployed as the basis for a sensing technology. Offering significant gains in cost, size and complexity, it can also deliver significantly higher signal-to-noise ratios than traditional approaches such as absorption methodologies. In this paper, we present an optical cross-correlation technology constructed around a bespoke customised Fiber Bragg Grating (FBG). Exploiting the remarkable flexibility in design enabled by multiple aperiodic Bragg gratings, optical filters are devised that exactly mimic the absorption features of a target gas species (for this paper, acetylene C 2 H 2 ) over some waveband of interest. This grating forms the heart of the sensor architecture described here that employs modulated optical cross-correlation for gas detection. An experimental demonstration of this approach is presented, and shown to be capable of differentiating between different concentrations of the C 2 H 2 target gas. Furthermore these measurements are shown to be robust against interloper species, with minimal impact on the detection signal-to-noise arising from the introduction of contaminant gases. This represents is a significant step toward the use of customised FBGs as low-cost, compact, and highly customisable photonic devices for deployment in gas detection.

We present the first major release of data from the SAMI Galaxy Survey. This data release focuses on the emission-line physics of galaxies. Data Release One includes data for 772 galaxies, about 20% of the full survey. Galaxies included have the redshift range 0.004 < z < 0.092, a large mass range (7.6 < log(Mstellar/M\\(_\\odot\\)) < 11.6), and star-formation rates of 10^-4 to 10^1\\ M\\(_\\odot\\)/yr. For each galaxy, we include two spectral cubes and a set of spatially resolved 2D maps: single- and multi-component emission-line fits (with dust extinction corrections for strong lines), local dust extinction and star-formation rate. Calibration of the fibre throughputs, fluxes and differential-atmospheric-refraction has been improved over the Early Data Release. The data have average spatial resolution of 2.16 arcsec (FWHM) over the 15~arcsec diameter field of view and spectral (kinematic) resolution R=4263 (sigma=30km/s) around Halpha. The relative flux calibration is better than 5\\% and absolute flux calibration better than \\(\\pm0.22\\)~mag, with the latter estimate limited by galaxy photometry. The data are presented online through the Australian Astronomical Observatory's Data Central.

Astrophotonics is the application of versatile photonic technologies to channel, manipulate, and disperse guided light from one or more telescopes to achieve scientific objectives in astronomy in an efficient and cost-effective way. The developments and demands from the telecommunication industry have driven a major boost in photonic technology and vice versa in the last 40 years. The photonic platform of guided light in fibers and waveguides has opened the doors to next-generation instrumentation for both ground- and space-based telescopes in optical and near/mid-IR bands, particularly for the upcoming extremely large telescopes (ELTs). The large telescopes are pushing the limits of adaptive optics to reach close to a near-diffraction-limited performance. The photonic devices are ideally suited for capturing this AO-corrected light and enabling new and exciting science such as characterizing exoplanet atmospheres. The purpose of this white paper is to summarize the current landscape of astrophotonic devices and their scientific impact, highlight the key issues, and outline specific technological and organizational approaches to address these issues in the coming decade and thereby enable new discoveries as we embark on the era of extremely large telescopes.

GNOSIS is a prototype astrophotonic instrument that utilizes OH suppression fibres consisting of fibre Bragg gratings and photonic lanterns to suppress the 103 brightest atmospheric emission doublets between 1.47-1.7 microns. GNOSIS was commissioned at the 3.9-meter Anglo-Australian Telescope with the IRIS2 spectrograph to demonstrate the potential of OH suppression fibres, but may be potentially used with any telescope and spectrograph combination. Unlike previous atmospheric suppression techniques GNOSIS suppresses the lines before dispersion and in a manner that depends purely on wavelength. We present the instrument design and report the results of laboratory and on-sky tests from commissioning. While these tests demonstrated high throughput and excellent suppression of the skylines by the OH suppression fibres, surprisingly GNOSIS produced no significant reduction in the interline background and the sensitivity of GNOSIS and IRIS2 is about the same as IRIS2. It is unclear whether the lack of reduction in the interline background is due to physical sources or systematic errors as the observations are detector noise-dominated. OH suppression fibres could potentially impact ground-based astronomy at the level of adaptive optics or greater. However, until a clear reduction in the interline background and the corresponding increasing in sensitivity is demonstrated optimized OH suppression fibres paired with a fibre-fed spectrograph will at least provide a real benefits at low resolving powers.

We present the first scientific results from the Sydney-AAO Multi-Object IFS (SAMI) at the Anglo-Australian Telescope. This unique instrument deploys 13 fused fibre bundles (hexabundles) across a one-degree field of view allowing simultaneous spatially-resolved spectroscopy of 13 galaxies. During the first SAMI commissioning run, targeting a single galaxy field, one object (ESO 185-G031) was found to have extended minor axis emission with ionisation and kinematic properties consistent with a large-scale galactic wind. The importance of this result is two-fold: (i) fibre bundle spectrographs are able to identify low-surface brightness emission arising from extranuclear activity; (ii) such activity may be more common than presently assumed because conventional multi-object spectrographs use single-aperture fibres and spectra from these are nearly always dominated by nuclear emission. These early results demonstrate the extraordinary potential of multi-object hexabundle spectroscopy in future galaxy surveys.

We demonstrate a novel technology that combines the power of the multi-object spectrograph with the spatial multiplex advantage of an integral field spectrograph (IFS). The Sydney-AAO Multi-object IFS (SAMI) is a prototype wide-field system at the Anglo-Australian Telescope (AAT) that allows 13 imaging fibre bundles (\"hexabundles\") to be deployed over a 1-degree diameter field of view. Each hexabundle comprises 61 lightly-fused multimode fibres with reduced cladding and yields a 75 percent filling factor. Each fibre core diameter subtends 1.6 arcseconds on the sky and each hexabundle has a field of view of 15 arcseconds diameter. The fibres are fed to the flexible AAOmega double-beam spectrograph, which can be used at a range of spectral resolutions (R=lambda/delta(lambda) ~ 1700-13000) over the optical spectrum (3700-9500A). We present the first spectroscopic results obtained with SAMI for a sample of galaxies at z~0.05. We discuss the prospects of implementing hexabundles at a much higher multiplex over wider fields of view in order to carry out spatially--resolved spectroscopic surveys of 10^4 to 10^5 galaxies.

Sean Baker and Chris Bergoch Set in a welfare motel outside Disney World in Orlando, Fla., during summer break, Baker and Bergoch's screenplay captures the stark juxtaposition between the theme park touted as \"the happiest place on earth\" and Florida's forgotten poor, living from paycheck to paycheck and sometimes resorting to illegal means in order to take care of their young children, who spend their days on their own.The story about a three dysfunctional adult siblings living in the shadow of their difficult artist father opened at Cannes Film Festival and was released on Netflix to strong critical praise.Primed for a Dec. 4 release and featuring Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep, \"The Post\" is setting itself up for awards show contention in a number of categories.