ADVANCES IN SURGICAL TREATMENT OF ACOUSTIC NEUROMA

Acoustic Neuroma (AN) arises from the eighth cranial nerve. It primarily involves the vestibular branch of the nerve and is therefore also called vestibular schwannoma(VS). To the date, diagnosis and surgical treatment of AN have advanced significantly. Along with advances in audiology and imaging technologies, cases of diagnosed AN have been increasing, making it a common

Hearing Preservation in Acoustic Neuroma Surgery

Objective To report the authors' experiences in hearing preservation during acoustic neuroma (AN) resection procedures. Methods Two cases of AN removal via retrosigmoid approach were reviewed. Hearing preservation was attempted in the aid of endoscopic technique along with continuous monitoring of the compound action potential (CAP) and auditory brainstem response(ABR) during the surgery. Results The tumor in Case 1 was 1.5 cm in diameter. The average pure-tone hearing threshold was 30 dB HL and ABR was normal. Waves I, III and V of ABR were present following tumor removal. At 7th month follow-up, audiometric thresholds and ABR inter-peak intervals had recovered to pre-operative levels, with normal facial nerve function. The patient in Case 2 had bilateral AN. The tumors measured 4.0 cm(left) and 5.0 cm (right) on MRI scans. The AN on the right side was removed first, followed by removal of the left AN four months later. Intraoperative CAP monitoring was employed during removal of the left AN. While efforts to preserve the cochlear nerve were not successful, CAPs were still present after tumor removal. Conclusions Intraoperatively recorded CAPs are not reliable in predicting postoperative hearing outcomes. In contrast, ABRs are an indicator of function of the peripheral auditory pathway. Presence of waves I, III and V following tumor removal may represent preservation of useful hearing.

Facial nerve preservation following microsurgical removal of large and huge acoustic neuroma

Objective To evaluate the long-term facial nerve funtion of patients following microsurgical removal of large and huge acoustic neuroma,and to indentify the factors that influence these outcomes. Methods A retrospective review was performed,which included 176 consecutive patients with a

Development and Validation of a Deep Learning Predictive Model Combining Clinical and Radiomic Features for Short-Term Postoperative Facial Nerve Function in Acoustic Neuroma Patients

Objective This study aims to construct and validate a predictable deep learning model associated with clinical data and multi-sequence magnetic resonance imaging(MRI)for short-term postoperative facial nerve function in patients with acoustic neuroma.Methods A total of 110 patients with acoustic neuroma who underwent surgery through the retrosigmoid sinus approach were included.Clinical data and raw features from four MRI sequences(T1-weighted,T2-weighted,T1-weighted contrast enhancement,and T2-weighted-Flair images)were analyzed.Spearman correlation analysis along with least absolute shrinkage and selection operator regression were used to screen combined clinical and radiomic features.Nomogram,machine learning,and convolutional neural network(CNN)models were constructed to predict the prognosis of facial nerve function on the seventh day after surgery.Receiver operating characteristic(ROC)curve and decision curve analysis(DCA)were used to evaluate model performance.A total of 1050 radiomic parameters were extracted,from which 13 radiomic and 3 clinical features were selected.Results The CNN model performed best among all prediction models in the test set with an area under the curve(AUC)of 0.89(95%CI,0.84–0.91).Conclusion CNN modeling that combines clinical and multi-sequence MRI radiomic features provides excellent performance for predicting short-term facial nerve function after surgery in patients with acoustic neuroma.As such,CNN modeling may serve as a potential decision-making tool for neurosurgery.

Evaluation of the best follow-up period and curative effect for acoustic neuroma treated with a gamma knife

Objective: To determine the best follow-up period with regard to curative effect for acoustic neuroma treated with a gamma knife. Methods: Sixty cases of acoustic neuroma were treated with a gamma knife. The follow-up period was from 3 to 102 months. Changes in the lesions and peripheral tissues and clinical symptoms were compared and the curative effectiveness of gamma knife treatment was evaluated. Results: The highest total effective rate (92.3%) was in the third period. There was a significant difference in the tumor size postoperatively. There was no edema in the peripheral tissues surrounding the tumor. It was not obvious that clinical symptoms changed. Conclusion: In this report, the best follow-up period was 24-36 months. Gamma knife treatment was still effective after 60 months post-operation.

Clinical associations of corneal neuromas with ocular surface diseases

Corneal neuromas,also termed microneuromas,refer to microscopic,irregula rly-shaped enlargements of terminal subbasal nerve endings at sites of nerve damage or injury.The formation of corneal neuromas results from damage to corneal nerves,such as following corneal pathology or corneal or intraocular surge ries.Initially,denervated areas of sensory nerve fibers become invaded by sprouts of intact sensory nerve fibers,and later injured axons regenerate and new sprouts called neuromas develop.In recent years,analysis of corneal nerve abnormalities including corneal neuromas which can be identified using in vivo confocal microscopy,a non-invasive imaging technique with microscopic resolution,has been used to evaluate corneal neuropathy and ocular surface dysfunction.Corneal neuromas have been shown to be associated with clinical symptoms of discomfort and dryness of eyes,and are a promising surrogate biomarker for ocular surface diseases,such as neuropathic corneal pain,dry eye disease,diabetic corneal neuropathy,neurotrophic keratopathy,Sjogren's syndrome,bullous keratopathy,post-refra ctive surgery,and others.In this review,we have summarized the current literature on the association between these ocular surface diseases and the presentation of corneal microneuromas,as well as elaborated on their pathogenesis,visualization via in vivo confocal microscopy,and utility in monitoring treatment efficacy.As current quantitative analysis on neuromas mainly relies on manual annotation and quantification,which is user-dependent and labor-intensive,future direction includes the development of artificial intelligence software to identify and quantify these potential imaging biomarkers in a more automated and sensitive manner,allowing it to be applied in clinical settings more efficiently.Combining imaging and molecular biomarkers may also help elucidate the associations between corneal neuromas and ocular surface diseases.

Wireless Information and Power Transfer in Underwater Acoustic Sensor Networks

Wireless information and power transfer(WIPT) enables simultaneously communications and sustainable power supplement without the erection of power supply lines and the replacement operation of the batteries for the terminals. The application of WIPT to the underwater acoustic sensor networks(UWASNs) not only retains the long range communication capabilities, but also provides an auxiliary and convenient energy supplement way for the terminal sensors, and thus is a promising scheme to solve the energy-limited problem for the UWASNs. In this paper, we propose the integration of WIPT into the UWASNs and provide an overview on various enabling techniques for the WIPT based UWASNs(WIPT-UWASNs) as well as pointing out future research challenges and opportunities for WIPT-UWASNs.

Effects of Insect Acoustic and Music Acoustic Frequency on the Growth of 6 Kinds of Vegetables

[Objective] The aim was to study the effects of different acoustic frequency of insect sound （IS） and insect-music mixed sound （MS） treatment on the growth of 6 kinds of vegetables.[Method] The insect acoustic group,insect-music mixed group and normal control group were designed to determine the related indices of 6 kinds of vegetables in unified management regularly.[Result] After different acoustic frequency treatment,besides soybean plant height,dry root weight of cabbage and greengrocery,there was significant difference of plant height,fresh weight and dry weight between the other vegetables and control.Under acoustic frequency treatment,the growth situations of six kinds of vegetables were better than control.In the growth period,acoustic frequency treatment could promote height growth （except soybean） and edible part yield.[Conclusion] Both of IS and MS could promote the plant growth,but their effects had difference.

Reservoir heterogeneity analysis using multi-directional textural attributes from deep learning-based enhanced acoustic impedance inversion:A study from Poseidon,NW shelf Australia

Reservoir heterogeneities play a crucial role in governing reservoir performance and management.Traditionally,detailed and inter-well heterogeneity analyses are commonly performed by mapping seismic facies change in the seismic data,which is a time-intensive task.Many researchers have utilized a robust Grey-level co-occurrence matrix(GLCM)-based texture attributes to map reservoir heterogeneity.However,these attributes take seismic data as input and might not be sensitive to lateral lithology variation.To incorporate the lithology information,we have developed an innovative impedance-based texture approach using GLCM workflow by integrating 3D acoustic impedance volume(a rock propertybased attribute)obtained from a deep convolution network-based impedance inversion.Our proposed workflow is anticipated to be more sensitive toward mapping lateral changes than the conventional amplitude-based texture approach,wherein seismic data is used as input.To evaluate the improvement,we applied the proposed workflow to the full-stack 3D seismic data from the Poseidon field,NW-shelf,Australia.This study demonstrates that a better demarcation of reservoir gas sands with improved lateral continuity is achievable with the presented approach compared to the conventional approach.In addition,we assess the implication of multi-stage faulting on facies distribution for effective reservoir characterization.This study also suggests a well-bounded potential reservoir facies distribution along the parallel fault lines.Thus,the proposed approach provides an efficient strategy by integrating the impedance information with texture attributes to improve the inference on reservoir heterogeneity,which can serve as a promising tool for identifying potential reservoir zones for both production benefits and fluid storage.

The viscous strip approach to simplify the calculation of the surface acoustic wave generated streaming

In recent decades,the importance of surface acoustic waves,as a biocompatible tool to integrate with microfluidics,has been proven in various medical and biological applications.The numerical modeling of acoustic streaming caused by surface acoustic waves in microchannels requires the effect of viscosity to be considered in the equations which complicates the solution.In this paper,it is shown that the major contribution of viscosity and the horizontal component of actuation is concentrated in a narrow region alongside the actuation boundary.Since the inviscid equations are considerably easier to solve,a division into the viscous and inviscid domains would alleviate the computational load significantly.The particles'traces calculated by this approximation are excellently alongside their counterparts from the completely viscous model.It is also shown that the optimum thickness for the viscous strip is about 9-fold the acoustic boundary layer thickness for various flow patterns and amplitudes of actuation.

Scheme of negative acoustic radiation force based on a multiple-layered spherical structure

Acoustic radiation force(ARF), as an important particle manipulation method, has been extensively studied in recent years. With the introduction of the concept of “acoustic tweezers”, negative acoustic radiation has become a research hotspot. In this paper, a scheme of realizing negative ARF based on the multiple-layered spherical structure design is proposed. The specific structure and design idea are presented. Detailed theoretical calculation analysis is carried out.Numerical simulations have been performed to verify the correctness of this prediction. The conjecture that the suppression of backscattering can achieve negative ARF is verified concretely, which greatly expands the application prospect and design ideas of the ARF. This work has laid a theoretical foundation for realizing precise control of the structure.

Development and prospect of acoustic reflection imaging logging processing and interpretation method

Acoustic reflection imaging logging technology can detect and evaluate the development of reflection anomalies,such as fractures,caves and faults,within a range of tens of meters from the wellbore,greatly expanding the application scope of well logging technology.This article reviews the development history of the technology and focuses on introducing key methods,software,and on-site applications of acoustic reflection imaging logging technology.Based on the analyses of major challenges faced by existing technologies,and in conjunction with the practical production requirements of oilfields,the further development directions of acoustic reflection imaging logging are proposed.Following the current approach that utilizes the reflection coefficients,derived from the computation of acoustic slowness and density,to perform seismic inversion constrained by well logging,the next frontier is to directly establish the forward and inverse relationships between the downhole measured reflection waves and the surface seismic reflection waves.It is essential to advance research in imaging of fractures within shale reservoirs,the assessment of hydraulic fracturing effectiveness,the study of geosteering while drilling,and the innovation in instruments of acoustic reflection imaging logging technology.

Ion acoustic solitary waves in an adiabatic dusty plasma:Roles of superthermal electrons,ion loss and ionization

We investigate propagation of dust ion acoustic solitary wave(DIASW)in a multicomponent dusty plasma with adiabatic ions,superthermal electrons,and stationary dust.The reductive perturbation method is employed to derive the damped Korteweg-de Vries(DKdV)equation which describes DIASW.The result reveals that the adiabaticity of ions significantly modifies the basic features of the DIASW.The ionization effect makes the solitary wave grow,while collisions reduce the growth rate and even lead to the damping.With the increases in ionization cross sectionΔσ/σ_(0),ion-to-electron density ratioδ_(ie)and superthermal electrons parameterκ,the effect of ionization on DIASW enhances.

Enriched Acoustic Environment as a customized treatment for tinnitus: A non-controlled longitudinal study

Tinnitus is a heterogeneous hearing disorder with no cure at present,but some treatments,such as a combination of counselling and sound therapy,can alleviate the discomfort it causes.The sound therapy efficiency depends on both the type of sound stimulus and the time of exposure.This study describes the fundamentals of a personalized sound therapy that stimulates the auditory system with either continuous or sequential sounds whose spectra are adjusted to the hearing levels of the participants.This sound therapy is called Enriched Acoustic Environment and is assessed in a sample of 137 participants with tinnitus.Tinnitus-related distress relief was clinically relevant and statistically significant for 90%of these patients.This was quantified as a mean decrease of 24.3 points on the Tinnitus Handicap Inventory.31%of participants were treated with sequential stimuli and achieved greater relief of distress(29.4 points on their Tinnitus Handicap Inventory score)compared to those treated with continuous sound(69%).According to these results,sequential sound seems to be optimal compared to continuous sound.

Microstructure Features and the Macroscopic Acoustic Behavior of Gassy Silt in the Yellow River Delta

The morphological changes in isolated bubbles in gassy silt play a critical role in the microscopic structures between soil particles and bubbles and macroscopic physical properties.Based on X-ray CT scanning experiments under various vertical loads(four levels),self-designed acoustic macro experiments,and a series of formula revisions to the macro-air-bearing silt sound-velocity prediction model,this paper discusses the macro-and micro-scale features of gassy silts from the Yellow River Delta.The samples consisted of different proportions of silt from the Yellow River Delta and porous media,and they were used to form two types of aerosol silts with initial gas contents of 4.23%and 7.67%.The results show that the air bubble content and external load considerably affect the microstructural parameters and acoustic behavior of gassy silt in the Yellow River Delta.The macroscopic sound velocity showed a linear positive correlation with vertical load and relation to microstructural parameters in varying manners and degrees.Based on the traditional Biot-Stoll acoustic model,the gas-phase medium coefficient was introduced for the proper calculation and prediction of the sound velocity of air-bearing silt.The errors of the overall prediction varied between 5.6%and 9.6%.

Enriched Constant Elements in the Boundary Element Method for Solving 2D Acoustic Problems at Higher Frequencies

The boundary element method(BEM)is a popular method for solving acoustic wave propagation problems,especially those in exterior domains,owing to its ease in handling radiation conditions at infinity.However,BEM models must meet the requirement of 6–10 elements per wavelength,using the conventional constant,linear,or quadratic elements.Therefore,a large storage size of memory and long solution time are often needed in solving higher-frequency problems.In this work,we propose two new types of enriched elements based on conventional constant boundary elements to improve the computational efficiency of the 2D acoustic BEM.The first one uses a plane wave expansion,which can be used to model scattering problems.The second one uses a special plane wave expansion,which can be used tomodel radiation problems.Five examples are investigated to showthe advantages of the enriched elements.Compared with the conventional constant elements,the new enriched elements can deliver results with the same accuracy and in less computational time.This improvement in the computational efficiency is more evident at higher frequencies(with the nondimensional wave numbers exceeding 100).The paper concludes with the potential of our proposed enriched elements and plans for their further improvement.

Effects of confining pressure and pore pressure on multipole borehole acoustic field in fluid-saturated porous media

In-situ stress is a common stress in the exploration and development of oil reservoirs. Therefore, it is of great significance to study the propagation characteristics of borehole acoustic waves in fluid-saturated porous media under stress.Based on the acoustoelastic theory of fluid-saturated porous media, the field equation of fluid-saturated porous media under the conditions of confining pressure and pore pressure and the acoustic field formula of multipole source excitation in open hole are given. The influences of pore pressure and confining pressure on guided waves of multipole borehole acoustic field in fluid-saturated porous media are investigated. The numerical results show that the phase velocity and excitation intensity of guided wave increase significantly under the confining pressure. For a given confining pressure, the phase velocity of the guided wave decreases with pore pressure increasing. The excitation intensity of guided wave increases at low frequency and then decreases at high frequency with pore pressure increasing, except for that of Stoneley wave which decreases in the whole frequency range. These results will help us get an insight into the influences of confining pressure and pore pressure on the acoustic field of multipole source in borehole around fluid-saturated porous media.

Extraction of reflected waves from acoustic logging data using variation mode decomposition and curvelet transform

Remote reflection waves, essential for acquiring high-resolution images of geological structures beyond boreholes, often suffer contamination from strong direct mode waves propagating along the borehole.Consequently, the extraction of weak reflected waves becomes pivotal for optimizing migration image quality. This paper introduces a novel approach to extracting reflected waves by sequentially operating in the spatial frequency and curvelet domains. Using variation mode decomposition(VMD), single-channel spatial domain signals within the common offset gather are iteratively decomposed into high-wavenumber and low-wavenumber intrinsic mode functions(IMFs). The low-wavenumber IMF is then subtracted from the overall waveform to attenuate direct mode waves. Subsequently, the curvelet transform is employed to segregate upgoing and downgoing reflected waves within the filtered curvelet domain. As a result, direct mode waves are substantially suppressed, while the integrity of reflected waves is fully preserved. The efficacy of this approach is validated through processing synthetic and field data, underscoring its potential as a robust extraction technique.

High-order Bragg forward scattering and frequency shift of low-frequency underwater acoustic field by moving rough sea surface

Acoustic scattering modulation caused by an undulating sea surface on the space-time dimension seriously affects underwater detection and target recognition.Herein,underwater acoustic scattering modulation from a moving rough sea surface is studied based on integral equation and parabolic equation.And with the principles of grating and constructive interference,the mechanism of this acoustic scattering modulation is explained.The periodicity of the interference of moving rough sea surface will lead to the interference of the scattering field at a series of discrete angles,which will form comb-like and frequency-shift characteristics on the intensity and the frequency spectrum of the acoustic scattering field,respectively,which is a high-order Bragg scattering phenomenon.Unlike the conventional Doppler effect,the frequency shifts of the Bragg scattering phenomenon are multiples of the undulating sea surface frequency and are independent of the incident sound wave frequency.Therefore,even if a low-frequency underwater acoustic field is incident,it will produce obvious frequency shifts.Moreover,under the action of ideal sinusoidal waves,swells,fully grown wind waves,unsteady wind waves,or mixed waves,different moving rough sea surfaces create different acoustic scattering processes and possess different frequency shift characteristics.For the swell wave,which tends to be a single harmonic wave,the moving rough sea surface produces more obvious high-order scattering and frequency shifts.The same phenomena are observed on the sea surface under fully grown wind waves,however,the frequency shift slightly offsets the multiple peak frequencies of the wind wave spectrum.Comparing with the swell and fully-grown wind waves,the acoustic scattering and frequency shift are not obvious for the sea surface under unsteady wind waves.

Fine Sand and Clay Sediment Acoustic Properties of the Novel Sediment Sample from the Arabian Sea:Experimental Investigations and Biot−Stoll Model Validation

The present study explores the physical and acoustic characteristics of fine sand and clay in novel seabed marine sediments from of Pakistan coastline of the Arabian Sea.The measured physical parameters included mean grain size,mass density,bulk density,salinity,porosity,permeability,pore size and mineralogical composition.Acoustic properties,including sound speed and attenuation,in the high frequency range of 90-170 kHz were analyzed.A controlled laboratory setup with the acoustic transmission method and Fourier transform techniques was utilized to examine the sound propagation and absorption of novel seabed sediments.The standard deviation of mean sound speed in fresh water was 0.75 m/s,and attenuation was observed in the range of 0.43 to 0.61 dB/m.The mean sound velocity in sand and clay varied from 1706 to 1709 m/s and 1602 to 1608 m/s,respectively.Corresponding average attenuation was observed at 80 to 93 dB/m in sandy sediments and from 31.8 to 38.6 dB/m in clayey sediments.Sound velocity variation within sandy sediment is low,consistent with expected results,and smaller than the predicted uncertainty.However,clay sediment exhibited a positive linear correlation and low sound speed variation.Attenuation increased linearly with frequency for both sediments.Finally,the laboratory results were validated by using the Biot−Stoll model.The dispersion of sound speed in sandy and clayey sediments was consistent with the predictions of the Biot−Stoll model.Measured attenuation aligned more with Biot−Stoll model predictions due to improved permeability,tortuosity and pore size parameter fitting.