Human-Computer Interaction, including technology-aided instruction, is beginning to focus on virtual reality (VR) technology due to its ability to support immersive learning, teaching through simulation, and gamification of learning. These systems can deliver high-level multisensory learning experiences that are important in the teaching of many subjects, especially those involving abstract concepts or requiring spatial skills, such as organic chemistry. Haptic experiences with VR, however, remain a challenge. In addition, development have focused on general entertainment/gaming; VR systems in chemistry implement simulations of the chemistry laboratory and other advanced systems whereas those that support safe, game-like, immersive and multisensory learning of organic chemistry with haptics at pre-university education levels are scarce. We developed the VR Multisensory Classroom (VRMC) as an immersive learning environment within a VR head-mounted display, where learners employ hand movements to build hydrocarbon molecules and experience haptic feedback through gloves with built-in sensors and hand-tracking with the Leap Motion system. We report here the evaluation of the first prototype by learners from diverse backgrounds who reported on the ability of the VRMC to support high engagement, motivation, interest and organic chemistry learning as well as diverse learning styles. The VRMC is a novel VR classroom that supports immersive learning in molecular organic chemistry with haptics for multisensory learning.

(S)-Atenolol ((S)-2-(4-(2-Hydroxy-3-(isopropylamino)propoxy)phenyl)acetamide) has been synthesized in >99% ee with use of Candida antarctica lipase B from Syncozymes (Shanghai, China), in a kinetic resolution of the corresponding racemic chlorohydrin. Deprotonation of the starting phenol building block was base catalyzed. The enantiopurity of the chlorohydrin building block remained unchanged upon subsequent amination. All four steps in the synthesis protocol have been optimized compared to previously reported methods, which makes this new protocol more sustainable and in accordance with green chemistry principles compared to previously reported protocols.

In Pakistan, bats are one of the dominant mammals that play an important role in the ecosystem in terms of pollination, seed dispersal, and control of pest insects. Bats have also played an im-portant role in the emergence and transmission of zoonotic pathogens; however, most current studies focus on viral pathogens, not potential bacterial pathogens. This study was designed to estimate the prevalence and antibiotic profiling of Staphylococcus (S.) aureus in oral and rectal samples from bats captured in northern Pakistan and to determine the factors associated with in-fection. Two hundred individual bats of five species: Pipistrellus javanicus (n = 17), Pipistrellus pipistrellus (n = 10), Rhinopoma microphyllum (n = 48), Rousettus leschenaultii (n = 124), and Scotophilus kuhlii (n = 1) were captured for non-lethal collection of oral and rectal samples to iso-late S. aureus. Bats were sampled from three sites: a natural cave, a man-made castle, and an an-imal shed, in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab provinces. Oral (n = 200) and rectal (n = 200) swabs were collected from each individual bat using sterile cotton swabs specifically for use in bacteriological studies. Each isolate of bacteria was identified by using phenotypic tests and con-firmed as S. aureus based on PCR assay. Out of a cumulative four hundred samples, 80 swabs were positive for S. aureus including 47 rectal and 33 oral swabs. Prevalence of S. aureus infection varied significantly among species, with Rousettus leschenaultii exhibiting the highest prevalence (n = 77; 37.90%). In addition to bat species, prevalence varied significantly among habitats but not between sex, age class, or reproductive status. This study confirmed the occurrence of S. aureus in oral and rectal microbiota of bats in Pakistan. Importantly, S. aureus isolates showed resistance to tetracycline, gentamicin, and erythromycin and carried resistant genes such as TetK, TetM, Erma, and aacA-D. In this regard, efforts should be taken to educate the local communities on how to minimize exposure to an antibiotic-resistant bacterial pathogen through contact with bats while simultaneously increasing the awareness of protecting bats as a vital component of our ecosystem.

In this paper, we present a new concept of the generalized core orthogonality (called the C-S orthogonality) for two generalized core invertible matrices $A$ and $B$. $A$ is said to be C-S orthogonal to $B$ if $A^{\tiny\textcircled{S}}B=0$ and $BA^{\tiny\textcircled{S}}=0$, where $A^{\tiny\textcircled{S}}$ is the generalized core inverse of $A$. The characterizations of C-S orthogonal matries and the C-S additivity are also provided. And the connection between the C-S orthogonality and C-S partial order has been given using their canonical form. Moreover, the concept of the strongly C-S orthogonality is defined and characterized.

Euler’s product formula over the primes and Euler’s zeta function equate to enshrine the Fundamental Theorem of Arithmetic that every integer > 1 is the product of a unique set of primes. The product formula has no zero, and with a domain ≤1 Euler’s zeta diverges. Dirichlet’s eta function η(s), negates alternate terms of zeta, permitting convergence when s∈C and Re(s) < 1, and its non-trivial zeros {ρ}, have a deep relationship with the distribution of the primes. The Riemann Hypothesis is that all the non-trivial zeros have Re(ρ) = 1/2. This work examines the symmetries in a partial Euler’s zeta series with a complex domain equating it to the difference between two finite vector series whose matched terms have mirror-image arguments, but whose magnitudes differ when Re(s) ≠ 1/2. Analytical continuation generates a modified eta series η_l(s), in which every l^th term is multiplied by (1-l). If the integer l is appropriately determined by the Im(s), similar paired finite vector series have a difference that closely follows η_l (s) and their terminal vectors intersect in a unique way permitting zeros only when Re(s) = 1/2. Furthermore, those vectors tracking the derivatives of the series, have a special relationship permitting zeros of the differential only when Re(s) > 1/2.

The HSP70 and HSP90 family members belong to molecular chaperones that exhibit protective functions during the cellular response to stressful agents. We investigated whether the exposure of rats to chronic mild stress (CMS), a validated model of depression, affects the expression of HSP70 and HSP90 in the prefrontal cortex (PFC), hippocampus (HIP) and thalamus (Thal). Male Wistar rats were exposed to CMS for 3 or 8 weeks. The antidepressant imipramine (IMI, 10 mg/kg, i.p., daily) was introduced in the last five weeks of the long-term CMS procedure. Depressive-like behavior was verified by the sucrose consumption test. The expression of mRNA and protein was quantified by real-time PCR and Western blot, respectively. In the 8-week CMS model, stress alone elevated HSP72 and HSP90B mRNA expression in the HIP. HSP72 mRNA was increased in the PFC and HIP of rats not responding to IMI treatment vs. IMI responders. The CMS exposure increased HSP72 protein expression in the cytosolic fraction of the PFC and HIP, and this effect was diminished by IMI treatment. Our results suggest that elevated levels of HSP72 may serve as an important indicator of neuronal stress reactions accompanying depression pathology and could be a potential target for antidepressant strategy.

Topological indices have been used to modeling biological and chemical properties of molecules in quantitive structure property relationship studies and quantitive structure activity studies. All the degree based topological indices have been defined via classical degree concept. In this paper we define a novel degree concept for a vertex of a simple connected graph: S degree. And also we define S indices of a simple connected graph by using the S degree concept. We compute the S indices for well-known simple connected graphs such as paths, stars, complete graphs and cycles.

The implementation of management systems has become a strategic advantage in achieving business goals, especially in industrial organizations, but the implementation of social responsibility requirements is especially ethical. Large multinational companies have long been developing and, in particular, implementing their own codes of conduct, which include their suppliers, to demonstrate their commitment to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). The compliance with CSR requirements from stakeholders is thus extended or intertwined with requirements in established management systems (MSs). The objectives of the study were to (1) analyze the different approaches to CSR in internationally recognized cross-industry and industry-specific standards and codes in different industries; (2) select the most appropriate framework for assessing the degree of applicability of CSR in the selected management systems and develop a methodology for its assessment; (3) apply the proposed methodology (referred to as SRIMS) in the selected areas: automotive industry, research organization, and metallurgical industry; (4) through ANOVA, validate its use for assessing the overall level of CSR applicability in an organization's established management systems. The application of the Bonferroni method confirmed the hypotheses that the developed SRIMS model is a sufficiently appropriate tool for assessing the overall level of applicability of CSR requirements to established MSs.

Background: Only few studies have studied the link between risk perception and sleep in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. This study investigates the effect of two distinct risk appraisals—risk perception and perception of collective coordinated defense (PCCD) on Chinese adults’ sleep quality during the COVID-19 pandemic, and tested COVID-19-related fear and rumination as potential mediators of the relationships. Methods: Data were collected using a self-report online questionnaire from a sample of 224 Chinese adults during the fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in Hong Kong. Results: COVID-19 risk perception and PCCD were related to poor sleep quality. Mediation analysis showed that both fear and rumination mediated the relationship between risk perception and sleep quality, whereas only fear mediated the relationship between PCCD and sleep quality. The model showed an excellent fit to the data and accounted for 44% of the variance in sleep quality in Chinese adults. Conclusions: This study demonstrates the distinct perceptual processes—risk appraisals in particular—contributed to poor sleep quality in Chinese adults during the COVID-19 public emergencies. These findings would be helpful for policy makers to address the sleep problems induced by psychological consequences of the pandemic.

Many lifestyle and occupational habits negatively impact on physical and mental health, increasing the risk of cardiovascular and other diseases. While larger institutions fulfill occupational health requirements to ensure their employees’ wellbeing at work, smaller business workers and entrepreneurs may neglect initial signs of stress or physical decline, putting themselves at increased risk. Early detection of compromised cardiopulmonary health or fitness has the potential to flag up indications for early interventions and reduce the risk of disease onset and progression. This case study highlights the usefulness of respiratory muscle training (RMT) in improving pulmonary and cardiovascular parameters as an early countermeasure to cardiopulmonary decline. We suggest RMT as an easily accessible, cost- and time effective opportunity to support a healthy lifestyle.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the Hapo ms, a passive upper limbs exoskeleton developed to assist workers for tasks with arms in front of the body. Twelve participants had to perform a static task, a manual handling task and a load carrying task two times: with and without the exoskeleton. In all cases subjective (perceived effort in arm and back areas, comfort) and objective (muscular activity, postural balance) criteria were evaluated. Results have shown a decrease in anterior deltoid (-12 to -18% depending of the task) and in biceps brachii (-19% to -33% depending of the task) muscular activity. No significant difference was pointed out in back muscle and postural balance was not significantly perturbed due to the wear of the exoskeleton. Finally, perceived effort reduction was observed during the three tasks (except in back area for task 1). To conclude, the Hapo ms seems well adapted to assist upper arms during tasks with arms in front of the body.

This article is about a framework for determining the degree of realism of any given 1 passenger ride motion discomfort measurement formula. After providing some context and reviewing 2 evidence of deficiency in currently popular ride motion discomfort measurement formulas, the article 3 outlines the research program that needs to be carried out in order to establish such a framework. 4 The research begins with gathering recordings of uncomfortable ride motion episodes encountered in 5 a chosen type of passenger transport service. It then has test subjects compare the episodes via a ride 6 motion simulator and adjust their amplitudes pair wise until they cause equal discomfort. It explains 7 how to take the pair wise amplitude adjustments and determine amplitude adjustments that bring all 8 of the motion episode recordings to a common level of discomfort so that they form a normalized set. 9 Then, the lower the scatter of the scores assigned by any given discomfort measurement formula to 10 the members of that set, the more realistic that formula will be for the chosen service.

Despite well-documented health benefits of probiotics Saccharomyces, its application in oral health has not been comprehensively assessed. Dental caries is a transmissible disease initiated by acid production of cariogenic bacteria and yeast, such as Streptococcus mutans and Candida albicans, on tooth enamel and followed by subsequent enamel demineralization. Here, we investigated the effect of two Saccharomyces strains (Saccharomyces boulardii, Saccharomyces cerevisiae) on S. mutans-C. albicans cross-kingdom interactions using a cariogenic planktonic model. Viable cells, pH changes and gene expression were measured. S. cerevisiae and S. boulardii inhibited the growth of C. albicans either in dual-, or multi-species conditions. Saccharomyces also inhibited C. albicans hyphal formation. Furthermore, Saccharomyces reduced the acidity of the culture medium which usually plummeted below pH 5 when S. mutans and C. albicans were present in the model. The presence of Saccharomyces maintained the culture medium above 6 even after overnight incubation, demonstrating a protective potential against dental enamel demineralization. S. boulardii significantly downregulated S. mutans atpD and eno genes expression. Overall, our results shed light on a new promising candidate, Saccharomyces, for dental caries prevention due to its potential to create a less cariogenic environment marked by a neutral pH and reduced growth of C. albicans.

Prime numbers are the atoms of mathematics and mathematics is needed to make sense of the real world. Finding the Prime number structure and eventually being able to crack their code is the ultimate goal in what is called Number Theory. From the evolution of species to cryptography, Nature finds help in Prime numbers. One of the most important advances in the study of Prime numbers was the paper by Bernhard Riemann in November 1859 called “Ueber die Anzahl der Primzahlen unter einer gegebenen Grösse” (On the number of primes less than a given quantity). In that paper, Riemann gave a formula for the number of primes less than x in terms the integral of 1/log(x) and the roots (zeros) of the zeta function defined by: Where ζ(z) is a function of a complex variable z that analytically continues the Dirichlet series. Riemann also formulated a conjecture about the location of the zeros of RZF, which fall into two classes: the "trivial zeros" -2, -4, -6, etc., and those whose real part lies between 0 and 1. Riemann's conjecture Riemann hypothesis [RH] was formulated as this: [RH] The real part of every nontrivial zero z* of the RZF is 1/2. Proving the RH is, as of today, one of the most important problems in mathematics. In this paper we will provide a proof of the RH. The proof of the RH will be built following these five parts: PART 1: Description of the RZF PART 2: The C-transformation PART 3: Application of the C-transformation to in Re(z) 0 to obtain ζ(z)=X(z)-Y(z) PART 4: Analysis of the values of z such that X(z)=Y(z), and |X(z)|=|Y(z)|, that equates to ζ(z)=0 Proof that |X(z)|=|Y(z)| only if Re(z)=1/2 Conclude that ζ(z)=0 only if Re(z)=1/2 for Re(z) 0 PART 5: We will also prove that all non-trivial zeros of ζ(z) in the critical line of the form are not distributed randomly. There is a relationship between the values of those zeros and the Harmonic function that leads to an algebraic relationship between any two zeros.

A new three-dimensional numerical model of a polymer electrolyte fuel cell (PEFC) with a single straight channel has been developed to primarily investigate the important impact of the double-sided microporous layer (MPL) coating on the overall performance of the fuel cell and the distribution of the current and the oxygen concentration within the cathode gas diffusion layers (GDLs). Realistic experimentally estimated interfacial contact resistance values between the gas diffusion layer and each of the bipolar plates and the catalyst layer values were incorporated into the model, and parametric studies were performed. The results showed that the double-sided MPL coating could significantly improve the fuel cell performance by up to 30%. Also, it was shown that the neglect of the contact resistance between the MPL and the catalyst layer could overestimate the fuel cell performance by up to 6%. In addition, the results showed that the fuel cell performance and the distribution of the current and oxygen are more sensitive to the porosity of the MPL facing the bipolar plate than the porosity of the MPL facing the catalyst layer. All the above results are presented and critically discussed in detail.

We find that the standard relative entropy and the Umegaki entropy are designed for the purpose of inferentially updating probability and density matrices respectively. From the same set of inferentially guided design criteria, both of the previously stated entropies are derived in parallel. This formulates a quantum maximum entropy method for the purpose of inferring density matrices in the absence of complete information.

The COVID-19 pandemic over the past years has shown a great need for rapid, low-cost and on-site detection of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). In this paper, an aptamer-based colloidal gold nanoparticle lateral flow test strip was well developed to realize the visual detection of wild type SARS-CoV-2 spike protein (SP) and multiple variants. Under the optimal reaction conditions, a low detection limit of SARS-CoV-2 S protein of 0.68 nM was acquired, and the actual detection recovery was 83.3% to 108.8% for real world samples. This suggests a potential tool for the prompt detection of SARS-CoV-2 with good sensitivity and accuracy, and a new method for the development of alternative antibody test strips for the detection of other viral targets.

Current therapeutic strategies targeting cancer cells within solid tumors have displayed limited success owing to the presence of non-cancer components referred to as the tumor stroma within the tumor microenvironment (TM). These stromal cells, extracellular matrix and blood vessels influence cancer cell response to therapy and play key roles in tumor relapse and resistance. Of the stromal cells present in the TM, a lot of attention has been given to cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) as they are the most abundant and are important in cancer initiation, progression and therapy resistance. In this updated review I emphasize the role of CAFs in the regulation of tumor cell behaviour and reveal how CAF-derived factors and signaling influence tumor cell heterogeneity and development of novel strategies to combat cancer. To investigate the expression of CAF markers in tumor tissues versus normal tissues, transcriptomic data from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and the Gene Expression Profiling Interactive Analysis (GEPIA) databases was used. Bioinformatic analysis reveals differential expression of CAF markers in several cancer types, underscoring the need for further multiomics and biochemical studies on CAFs, CAF subsets and markers. Differences in CAF markers’ expression could be due to different cellular origins as well as the effect of cancer-specific tumor microenvironmental effect on CAFs. Lastly, I present recent advances in therapeutic targeting of CAFs and the success of such endeavours or its lack thereof. It is recommended that for patients’ outcomes to improve, cancer treatment be combinatorial in nature, targeting both cancer cells and stromal cells and interactions.

: Extra- and intra-cellular activity occurs under the direction of numerous inter-molecular interactions, and in any tissue or cell, molecules are densely packed, thus promoting those molecular interactions. Galectins and chemokines, the focus of this review, are small, protein effector molecules that mediate various cellular functions, in particular cell adhesion and migration, as well as cell signaling/activation. In the past, researchers have reported that combinations of these (and other) effector molecules act separately, yet sometimes in concert, but nevertheless physically apart and via their individual cell receptors. This view that each effector molecule functions independently of the other limits our thinking about functional versatility and cooperation, and, in turn, ignores the prospect of physiologically important inter-molecular interactions, especially when both molecules are present or co-expressed in the same cellular environment. This review is focused on such protein-protein interactions with chemokines and galectins, their homo- and hetero-oligomeric structures that they can form, and the functional consequences of those paired interactions.

Many cellular functions important for tumor initiation and progression are mediated by members of the integrin family, a diverse family of cell adhesion receptors. With recent studies emphasising on the role of the tumor microenvironment (TME) in tumor initiation and progression, it is not surprising that a lot of attention is being given to integrins. Several integrins are under trial with many demonstrating appealing activity in patients with different cancers. A deeper knowledge of the functions of integrins within the tumor microenvironment is still required, and might lead to better inhibitors being discovered. Integrin expression is commonly dysregulated in many tumors with integrins playing key roles in signaling as well as promotion of tumor cell invasion and migration. This review report new data on the differential expression of integrins within solid tumors using two publicly available resources: The Cancer Genomic Atlas (TCGA) and Gene Expression Profiling Interactive Analysis (GEPIA). In this analysis, I investigated the expression of integrin alpha 2 (ITGα2), ITGα3, ITGβ4 and ITGβ6 in tumor tissues versus adjacent normal tissues. This analysis showed that integrins were differentially expressed in cervical squamous cell carcinoma (CESC), head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSC), esophageal carcinoma (ESCA) and lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD). This analysis showed that ITGα2 and ITGβ6 expression are upregulated in CESC and ESCA, ITGα3 is upregulated in HNSC and ESCA whilst ITGβ4 is highly expressed in CESC, HNSC, ESCA and LUAD tumor tissues compared to adjacent normal tissues. Integrins also play a major role in adhesion of circulating tumor cells to new sites and the resulting formation of secondary tumors. Furthermore, integrins have demonstrated the ability to promoting stem cell-like properties in tumor cells as well as drug resistance. Anti-integrin therapies rely heavily on the doses or concentrations used as these determine whether the drugs act as antagonists or as integrin agonists. This review offers the latest synthesis in terms of current knowledge of integrins functions within the tumor microenvironment and potential targets for different cancers.

Virtual reality (VR) describes a family of technologies which immerse users in sensorily-stimulating virtual environments. Such technologies have increasingly found applications in the treatment of neurological and mental health disorders. Depression, anxiety, and other mood abnormalities are of concern in the growing elderly population – especially those who reside in long-term care facilities (LTCFs). The transition from the familiar home environment to the foreign LTCF introduces a number of stressors that can precipitate depression. However, recent studies reveal that VR therapy (VRT) can promote positive emotionality and improve cognitive abilities in the elderly, both at home and in LTCFs. VR thus holds potential in allowing elderly individuals to gradually adapt to their new environments – thereby mitigating the detrimental effects of place attachment and social exclusion. Nevertheless, while the current psychological literature is promising, the implementation of VR in LTCFs faces many challenges. LTCF residents must gain trust in VR technologies, care providers require training to maximize the positive effects of VRT, and decision makers must evaluate both the opportunities and obstacles in adopting VR. Here, we concisely review the implications of depression related to place attachment in LTCFs, and explore the potential therapeutic applications of VR.

The study evaluated the immune response to the Janssen Ad26.COV2.S COVID-19 vaccine in a Ugandan cohort, focusing on spike (S) and nucleocapsid (N) protein-directed antibodies. The aim was to assess the longevity and robustness of the elicited antibodies, aligning with breakthrough infections and prior exposure to SARS-CoV-2. The study involved 319 specimens collected over 12 months from 60 vaccinees aged 18 to 64. Binding antibodies were quantified using a validated ELISA method to measure SARS-CoV-2-specific IgG, IgM, and IgA levels against the S and N proteins. The results showed that baseline seropositivity for S-IgG was high at 67%, increasing to 98% by day 14 and consistently stayed above 95% for up to 12 months. However, S-IgM responses remained suboptimal. An increased S-IgA serpositivity rate doubled from 40% at baseline to 86% just two weeks following the initial vaccine dose, indicating sustained and robust mucosal immunity. An increase in N-IgG levels at nine months post-vaccination suggested breakthrough infections in eight cases. Baseline cross-reactivity influenced spike-directed antibody responses, with those with pre-existing S-IgG antibodies showing higher responses. The vaccine demonstrated robust and long-lasting immune responses, with significant implications for regions where administering follow-up doses is challenging.

Products derived from Cannabis sativa have gained increased interest and popularity. As these products become common amongst the public, the heath and potential therapeutic values associated with hemp have become a premier focus of research. While the psychoactive and medicinal properties of Cannabis products have been extensively highlighted in literature, the antibacterial properties of CBD have not been explored in depth. This research serves to examine the antibacterial potential of CBD against Salmonella newington and Salmonella typhimurium. In this study we observed bacterial response to CBD exposure through biological assays, bacterial kinetics, and fluorescence microscopy. Additionally, comparative studies between CBD and ampicillin were conducted against Salmonella typhimurium and Salmonella newington to determine comparative efficacy. Furthermore, we observed potential resistance development of our Salmonella spp. against CBD treatment.

Early reports demonstrated the presence of cells with stem-like properties in bone marrow, with these cells having both hematopoietic and mesenchymal lineages. Over the years, various investigations have purified and characterized mesenchymal stromal/stem cells (MSCs) from different human tissues as cells with multi-lineage differentiation potential under the appropriate conditions. Due to their appealing characteristics and potential, MSCs are leveraged in many applications including medicine, oncology, bioprinting and as recent as treatment of COVID-19. To date, reports indicate mesenchymal stromal/stem cells have varied differentiation capabilities into different cell types and demonstrate immunomodulating and anti-inflammatory properties. Reports indicate that different MSCs microenvironments or niche and the resulting heterogeneity may influence their behavior and differentiation capacity. The potential clinical applications of mesenchymal stromal/stem cells have led to an avalanche of research reports on their properties and hundreds of clinical trials being undertaken. The future looks bright and promising for mesenchymal stem cell research with many clinical trials under way to prove their utility in many applications and in the clinic. This report provides an update on the potential broader use of mesenchymal stromal/stem cells, review early observations of the presence of these cells in the bone marrow and their magnificent differentiation capabilities and immunomodulation.

This paper defines the two main causes of global warming in the UK and seeks to cut climate change using green hydrogen made from renewable electricity sources. Combustion vehicles powered by fossil gasoline and diesel emit a third of UK climate-warming CO2 while buildings heated by natural gas provide a quarter. First, current UK grid problems are defined: Electricity grid, gas grid and petroleum grid. Then experiments on the private energy community of Keele University allow electrolysis demonstrations producing green hydrogen for buildings and vehicle refueling. Next, the model supply chain is planned and tested. Finally, experiments and calculations are outlined, analyzing the optimum system design criteria proposed. We conclude that economic green hydrogen can displace diesel and gasoline in vehicle transport, while also displacing natural gas for combined heat and power in buildings. In addition, the prospect in 2023 is that profits can now be made all along the green hydrogen supply chain, such that new businesses involved in clean communities can beat the National Grid monopoly and other large dominant fossil grid companies.

Iron oxide nanozymes are a form of nanomaterial with both superparamagnetic and enzyme-mimicking properties. Given the multifunctional nature of iron oxide nanozymes, it is attractive for creating iron oxide hybrid nanozymes through biomolecular modifications to imbue with auxillary properties. Such iron oxide hybrid nanozymes can be useful for rapid and cost-effective analysis of circulating tumor nucleic acids (ctNAs) in patient liquid biopsies during minimal residual disease (MRD) monitoring of cancer recurrence. Herein, the use of streptavidin-modified iron oxide hybrid nanozymes is reported for magnetic enrichment and bioelectrocatalytic sensing of three prostate cancer (PCa) ctRNA biomarkers with high detection specificity and sensitivity (10 copies) over an ultrabroad dynamic range (five orders of magnitude). Furthermore, the feasibility of ctRNA analysis for pre- and post-cancer treatment MRD monitoring is demonstrated using PCa urinary liquid biopsy samples.

Micro-combs [1-4] - optical frequency combs generated by integrated micro-cavity resonators – offer the full potential of their bulk counterparts [5,6], but in an integrated footprint. The discovery of temporal soliton states (DKS – dissipative Kerr solitons) [4,7-11] as a means of mode-locking micro-combs has enabled breakthroughs in many fields including spectroscopy [12,13], microwave photonics [14], frequency synthesis [15], optical ranging [16,17], quantum sources [18,19], metrology [20,21] and more. One of their most promising applications has been optical fibre communications where they have enabled massively parallel ultrahigh capacity multiplexed data transmission [22,23]. Here, by using a new and powerful class of micro-comb called “soliton crystals” [11], we achieve unprecedented data transmission over standard optical fibre using a single integrated chip source. We demonstrate a line rate of 44.2 Terabits per second (Tb/s) using the telecommunications C-band at 1550nm with a spectral efficiency – a critically important performance metric - of 10.4 bits/s/Hz. Soliton crystals exhibit robust and stable generation and operation as well as a high intrinsic efficiency that, together with a low soliton micro-comb spacing of 48.9 GHz enable the use of a very high coherent data modulation format of 64 QAM (quadrature amplitude modulated). We demonstrate error free transmission over 75 km of standard optical fibre in the laboratory as well as in a field trial over an installed metropolitan optical fibre network. These experiments were greatly aided by the ability of the soliton crystals to operate without stabilization or feedback control. This work demonstrates the capability of optical soliton crystal micro-combs to perform in demanding and practical optical communications networks.

Wastewater-Based Epidemiology (WBE) is currently used to monitor not only the spread of the pandemic virus SARS-CoV-2 but also for other viruses in endemic conditions, particularly in the absence of syndromic surveillance. Continuous monitoring of sewage requires high costs and significant time investment, highlighting the need for standardized methods and structured monitoring strategies. In this context, we conducted weekly wastewater monitoring in northwestern Italy, targeting Human Adenovirus (HAdV), Norovirus Genogroup II (NoVggII), Enterovirus (EV), and SARS-CoV-2. Samples collected at the entrance of treatment plants were concentrated using PEG/NaCl precipitation and viral nucleic acids were extracted and detected by real-time (RT-)qPCR. NoVggII resulted the most identified target (84.4%), followed by HAdV, SARS-CoV-2, and EV. Only HAdV and EV exhibited seasonal peaks in spring and summer. SARS-CoV-2 results compared with data previously collected in the same study area (February 2021 to September 2021) revealed a shift from an epidemic to a pandemic status, likely due to the evolution of variants. In conclusion, WBE, using standardized methods and an efficient monitoring strategy, proves valuable for virus surveillance in pandemic and epidemic scenarios, enabling the identification of temporal-local distribution patterns that are useful for making informed public health decision.

Nowadays, the identification and characterization of grapevine cultivars resilient to climate and water stress while preserving quality traits is crucial for the wine industry. Therefore, the objective of this work was to characterize according to their aromatic potential 9 white and 6 red minority cultivars recently recovered from Castilla-La Mancha region (Spain), subjected at two different water deficit regimes: rainfed, with subsistence irrigation, and irrigated. For this, the varietal aromatic potential index (IPAv) and the detailed aromatic composition were analyzed by HS-SBSE-GC/MS, in extracts of two different ph. For IPAv values, red varieties did not show a clear trend with respect to irrigation. However, in white minority varieties, higher values were obtained under irrigation conditions. Thus, a clear differentiation of the minority varieties in comparison to the references was observed, primarily attributed to the content of esters and acids, in both white and red varieties. A notable contrast was observed at different pH, indicating a greater extractability of certain compounds like linalool, under more acidic conditions. This suggests that some recovered minority cultivars could be promising for cultivation in semi-arid regions with limited water, contributing to the wine sector sustainability in the future.

The vulnerability of alpine environments to climate change presses an urgent need to accurately model and understand these ecosystems. Popularity in use of digital elevation models (DEMs) to derive proxy environmental variables has increased over the past decade, particularly as DEMs are relatively cheaply acquired at very high resolutions (VHR; <1m spatial resolution). Here, we implement a multiscale framework and compare DEM-derived variables produced by Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) and stereo-photogrammetry (PHOTO) methods, with the aims of assessing their relevance and utility in species distribution modelling (SDM). Using a case study on the arctic-alpine plant Arabis alpina in two valleys in the western Swiss Alps, we show that both LiDAR and PHOTO technologies can be relevant for producing DEM-derived variables for use in SDMs. We demonstrate that PHOTO DEMs rivalled the accuracy of LiDAR, putting the current paradigm of LiDAR being the more accurate of the two methods into question. We obtained DEMs at spatial resolutions of 6.25cm-8m for PHOTO and 50cm-32m for LiDAR, where we determined that the optimal spatial resolutions of DEM-derived variables in SDM were between 1 and 32m, depending on the variable and site characteristics. We found that the reduced extent of PHOTO DEMs altered the calculations of all derived variables, which had particular consequences on their relevance at the site with heterogenous terrain. However, for the homogenous site, we found that SDMs based on PHOTO-derived variables generally had higher predictive powers than those derived from LiDAR at matching resolutions. From our results, we recommend carefully considering the required DEM extent to produce relevant derived variables. We also advocate implementing a multiscale framework to appropriately assess the ecological relevance of derived variables, where we caution against the use of VHR-DEMs finer than 50cm in such studies.

We examine the relation between environmental, social, and governance commitment levels (ESG) and firm dividend payer status. Given that larger and more profitable firms are positively associated with both payer status and ESG, it could be that ESG and dividends are complements. However, given that both dividends and ESG relate to firm spending decisions, it may be that the choice is “either/or” and that ESG and dividends are substitutes. We document a positive relation between ESG and dividend payer status in U.S. firms over the period 1991-2016. In particular we find that the proportion of dividend payers is roughly 13% higher for firms with positive ESG compared to those with negative ESG. Including ESG in the models used to predict payer status provides, on average, a nearly 26% improvement in relative forecast accuracy. Our results are robust to estimation techniques and the inclusion of variables known to be determinants of payer status.

We have carried out a systematic review of the scientific literature published on PM and, more specifically, on its presence in fish and seafood of interest to the population from Mediterranean area. Given its preference and wide acceptability in the scientific community, we followed the PRISMA. The potential functional and clinical toxicity in humans due to MP in fish must be considered by the chemical composition of the microplastics the presence of PM and its additives, associated contaminants and pathogens in fish and shellfish, as well as the possible effects on human health, requires improving legislation on evaluation and providing a basis for consumer protection.

Firebrands are an important agent of wildfire spread and structure fire ignitions at the wildland urban interface. Bark flake morphology has been highlighted as an important, yet poorly characterized factor in firebrand generation, transport, deposition, and ignition of unburned material. Using pine species where bark flakes are the documented source of embers, we conducted experiments to investigate how bark structure changes in response to diurnal drying. Over a 3-day period in a longleaf pine (Pinus palustris Mill.) stand in Florida, we recorded changes in temperature, moisture content and structure of bark across different facing aspects of mature pine trees to examine the effects of varying solar exposure on bark moisture. We further compared results to bark drying in a pitch pine (Pinus rigida Mill.) plantation in New Jersey. Under all conditions, bark peeled and lifted away from the tree trunk over the study periods. Tree bole aspect and the time of day interacted to significantly affect bark peeling. General temperature increases and moisture content decreases were significantly different between east and west aspects in pitch pine, and with time of day and aspect in longleaf pine. These results illustrate that bark moisture and flakiness is highly dynamic on short time scales, driven largely by solar exposure. These diurnal changes likely influence the probability of firebrand production during fire events via controls on moisture (ignition) and peeling (lofting).

The theories of quantum mechanics and relativity dramatically altered our understanding of the universe ushering in the era of modern physics. Quantum theory deals with objects probabilistically at small scales, whereas relativity deals classically with motion in space and time. We show here that the mathematical structures of quantum theory and of relativity follow together from pure thought, defined and uniquely constrained by the same elementary ``combining and sequencing'' symmetries that underlie standard arithmetic and probability. The key is uncertainty, which inevitably accompanies observation of quantity and imposes the use of pairs of numbers. The symmetries then lead directly to the use of complex \sqrt{-1} arithmetic, the standard calculus of quantum mechanics, and the Lorentz transformations of relativistic spacetime. One dimension of time and three dimensions of space are thus derived as the profound and inevitable framework of physics.

The extracellular matrix (ECM) is a ubiquitous member of the body and is key to the maintenance of tissues and organs integrity. Initially thought to be a by-stander in many cellular processes, the extracellular matrix has been shown to have diverse components that regulate and activate many cellular processes and ultimately influence cell phenotype. Importantly, the ECM composition, architecture, and stiffness/elasticity influence cellular phenotypes. Under normal conditions and during development, the synthesized ECM is constantly undergoing degradation and remodeling processes via the action of matrix proteases that maintain tissue homeostasis. In many pathological conditions including fibrosis and cancer, the ECM synthesis, remodeling, and degradation is dysregulated causing its integrity to be altered. Both physical and chemical cues from the ECM are sensed via receptors including integrins and play key roles in driving cellular proliferation and differentiation and in various disease progression such as cancers. Advances in ‘omics’ technologies have seen an increase in studies focussing on bi-directional cell-matrix interactions and here we highlight emerging knowledge on the role played by the ECM during normal development and in pathological conditions. This review summarizes current ECM-targeted-therapies that can modify tumor ECM to overcome drug resistance and better cancer treatment.

More people around the world now have obesity than suffer from starvation thanks to our modern food system. Agriculture was transformed over the 20^th century by a variety of technological advancements that relied heavily on fossil fuels. In the United States of America, government policies and economic incentives led to surplus production of cheap inputs to processed food industries that produced a wide variety of heavily marketed, convenient, rewarding, timesaving, and relatively inexpensive ultra-processed foods. The energy available in the United States food supply increased much more than population needs, albeit with large inequities in food distribution and nutrition security. While most of the rise in per capita food availability during the late 20^th and early 21^st centuries in the United States resulted in increased food waste, a variety of mechanisms have been proposed by which changes in the increasingly ultra-processed food environment resulted in excess energy intake disproportionately in people genetically susceptible to obesity. As populations continue to grow, substantial investments in coordinated nutrition and agricultural research are needed to transform our current food system to one that relies less on fossil fuels, preserves biodiversity, ensures environmental health, and provides equitable access to affordable, safe, and nutritious food that reduces the prevalence of chronic diseases like obesity.

Vertically aligned Fe, S, and Fe-S doped anatase TiO₂ nanotube arrays are prepared by electrochemical anodization process using an organic electrolyte in which lactic acid is added as an additive. In the electrolyte, nanotube layers of greater length (12 μm) and high order with inner diameter of approx. 90 nm and outer diameter of approx. 170 nm are achieved. Doping of Fe, S, and Fe-S via simple wet impregnation method substituted Ti and O sites with Fe and S, which leads to enhance the rate performance at high discharge current densities. Discharge capacities of TiO₂ tubes increased from 82 mAh g-1 (bare) to 165 mAh g-1 for Fe-S doped TiO₂ at high current densities of 0.3 mAcm-2 after 100 cycles with exceptional capacity retention of 85% after 100 cycles. Owing to the enhancement of thermodynamic and kinetic properties by doping of Fe-S, Li-diffusion increas2ed resulting in remarkable discharge capacities of 143 mAh g-1 and 89 mAh g-1 at a current density of 7.4 mA cm-2 and 19 mA cm-2, respectively.

Planning and implementation of construction projects are difficult processes and are burdened with many risk elements. The budget spread over time, which is developed on the basis of the schedule, presents the expected distribution of costs throughout the duration of the works, which during the implementation of the project is subject to constant changes resulting from time, cost and organizational factors. Managing construction contracts requires managers to be able to analyze on an ongoing basis the variances of production costs - from the values calculated in the offer cost estimate and assumed in the Budgeted Cost of Work Scheduled. The article attempts to analyze the emerging time and cost variances using proprietary C-S and S-C monitoring, based on simple indicators of the EVM method. An example of construction of a multi-family housing development was used to study the variances of planned and incurred costs.

Based on its large surface area and covering the whole human body, the skin body’s largest organ and its main function is protection. Injuries and wound healing involving the skin offer valuable lessons shared with and of relevance to other organ systems and the diseases that impact them. Arguably the most complex human body process, wound healing is a multifaceted process that involves multiple cells and the extracellular matrix (ECM), with each component playing a specific role in the different stages of the healing process. Importantly, studies indicate that cells with stem cell-like properties are present within many of the human tissues and play key roles in case of tissue and cellular injury. Cell-to-cell and cell-to-ECM interactions are salient in wound healing subsequent to an injury. Microenvironment related factors and the variations therein including hypoxia or the abundance of oxygen, the presence/absence of growth factors and cytokines add to the complexity of the wound healing process and impact cell function and result in compromised or enhanced wound healing. This expert review critically examines the advances in biochemical and analytical tools that are enable the analysis of numerous cells and molecules within the wound microenvironment, revealing great cellular heterogeneity as well as novel molecular targets of importance to enhance wound healing. In a broader angle, we emphasize the ways in which wound healing is significant in the search for perfect skin after injury and in many common complex human diseases including cancer. In all, wound healing is a centrepiece of integrative biology research and applications in medicine as well as dermatology as discussed in this review.

Celecoxib as adjuvant therapy has been shown in a small randomized trial for Covid-19 to prevent clinical deterioration and rapidly improve thoracic computerized axial tomography (CT-chest)¹. Multiple descriptive trials of high dose famotidine (both inpatient and outpatient) have demonstrated clinical response^2,3,4. We describe the rapid clinical responses after increasing the celecoxib dosage to 400mg bid with high dose famotidine 80mg qid in both a critical inpatient who on baseline required 40 liters per minute high flow nasal insufflation and an outpatient who declined admission but had critical Covid-19 biomarkers.

This study tests the utilization of Bluetooth noise-canceling headphones in improving the quality of eye exams in patients with hearing loss. University of Texas Medical Branch patients above 55 years of age were screened for hearing loss using SoundCheck audiometry. All 29 subjects (18 red-zone and 11 yellow-zone) answered pre-recorded Amsler grid and patient education questions that solicited precise responses. As controls, subjects were randomly administered half of the questions via headphones and half via a smartphone at normal speech volume (60 decibels). Points were awarded for responses demonstrating comprehension, and a post-exam survey was collected. Collectively, the mean score was 1.79 with headphones versus 0.96 with control on the Amsler grid segment and 1.90 with headphones versus 0.97 with control on education questions (p=0.001). Between the red and yellow zone hearing loss patients, the red-zone group answered significantly better in both Amsler (1.78 versus 0.50; p=0.0003) and education questions (1.88 versus 0.44; p&lt;0.0001) with headphones. The yellow zone group answered better with headphones overall but failed to reach significance. Post-exam survey indicated that 28 of 29 patients (97%) preferred the headphones during ophthalmic exams. Patients with severe hearing loss demonstrated better comprehension with the noise-canceling headphones; thus these devices show great promise in improving effective, compassionate communication between providers and hearing-loss patients.

The ability to detect the presence as well as classify the activities of individuals behind visually obscuring structures is of significant benefit to police, security and emergency services in many situations. This paper presents the analysis from a series of experimental results generated using a through-the-wall (TTW) Frequency Modulated Continuous Wave (FMCW) C-Band radar system named Soprano. The objective of this analysis was to classify whether an individual was carrying an item in both hands or not using micro-Doppler information from a FMCW sensor. The radar was deployed at a standoff distance, of approximately 0.5 m, outside a residential building and used to detect multiple people walking within a room. Through the application of digital filtering, it was shown that significant suppression of the primary wall reflection is possible, significantly enhancing the target signal to clutter ratio. Singular Value Decomposition (SVD) signal processing techniques were then applied to the micro-Doppler signatures from different individuals. Features from the SVD information have been used to classify whether the person was carrying an item or walking free handed. Excellent performance of the classifier was achieved in this challenging scenario with accuracies up to 94%, suggesting that future through wall radar sensors may have the ability to reliably recognize many different types of activities in TTW scenarios using these techniques.

The aim of this work was to classify the business incubators in Spain according to the four phases of startups incubation. Taking into account that the graduation rate implies greater survival and business success of the incubated companies, they have been identified at each stage of the incubation (spread of entrepreneurship, pre-incubation, advanced incubation, and graduation). The activities that present higher impacts on the success of the incubated companies and the activities carried out by the incubator that have a greater relevance on the graduation of the companies have concretely been considered. Principal component (PC) cluster analysis have been applied. All the incubation variables were used simultaneously, reducing their number, and grouping them into factors, finally the cases were grouped according to these latent variables. Principal components analysis reduced dimensionality to 8 factors with a 74 % of explained variance. Factor 1 was positively related to pre-incubation variables, factor 2 was linked to training and collaboration variables within the entrepreneurship diffusion phase. Factor 3 called activity monitoring and control and was related to phase 3 or basic incubation variables. Clusters analysis facilitates the grouping of incubators into three clusters: Group 1 (16 % of the total), incubators with strong deficits in incubation phases 1, 2 and 3. They are small Business Incubators, often located in rural areas or cities and low graduation rate. Group 2 (30 %), business incubators with very high graduation rate, and strongly positive values in factor 1 and 2. Factor 3 although positive is susceptible to improvement. They are the largest incubators and usually located in industrial and technological parks. Group 3 (54 %) is the majority, with values close to cluster 2 and 3.

Fractional differential equations have become a fundamental modelling approach for understanding and simulating the many aspects of nonlocality and spatial heterogeneity of complex materials and systems. Yet, while real-order fractional operators are nowadays widely adopted, little progress has been made in extending such operators to complex-order counterparts. In this work, we introduce new definitions for the complex-order fractional Laplacian, fully consistent with the theory of averaging of smooth functions over fractal sets, and present tailored spectral methods for their numerical treatment. The proposed complex-order operators exhibit a dual particle-wave behaviour, with solutions manifesting wave-like features depending on the magnitude of the imaginary part of the fractional order. Reaction-diffusion systems driven by the complex-order fractional Laplacian exhibit unique spatio-temporal dynamics, such as equilibrium of diffusion in random materials by interference of scattered waves, conduction block and highly fractionated propagation, or the generation of completely novel Turing patterns. Taken together, our results support that the proposed complex-order operators hold unparalleled capabilities to advance the description of multiscale transport phenomena in physical and biological processes highly influenced by the heterogeneity of complex media.

10% copper substituted (BiCUVOX/Bi₂V_0.9Cu_0.1O_5.5−δ) and 5% copper/titanium double-substituted bismuth vanadate (BiCUTIVOX/Bi₂V_0.9(Cu_0.05Ti_0.05)O_5.5−δ) platelets were formed by molten salt synthesis (MSS) using a eutectic KCl/NaCl salt mixture. The product was phase pure within the limits of X-ray diffraction. The size and form of the platelets could be controlled by changing the heating temperature and time. The crystallite growth rate at a synthesis temperature of 650 °C, and activation energy for grain growth were determined for BICUTIVOX, which experienced inhibited growth compared to BICUVOX. Quasi-equilibrium, multi-foil shapes consisting of lobes around the perimeter of the platelets were observed and explained in the context of relative two-dimensional nucleation and edge growth rates.

We report on the occurrence of natural Magnesium Alumina Silicate Hydrate (M-(A)-S-H) cement at Feragen and Leka in eastern and western Trøndelag Norway, respectively. Both occurrences are located in the sub-arctic climate zone and form in glacial till and moraine material deposited on ultramafic rock during the Weichselian glaciation. Weathering of serpentinized peridotite dissolve brucite and result in a relative high pH alkaline fluid that subsequently reacts with the felsic minerals of the till (quartz, plagioclase, K-feldspar) to form a cement consisting of an amorphous material or a mixture of nanocrystalline Mg-rich phyllosilicates, including illite. The presence of plagioclase in the till results in the enrichment of alumina in the cement, i.e., forms M-A-S-H instead of the M-S-H cement. Dissolution of quartz results in numerous etch-pits and negative quartz crystals filled with M-A-S-H cement. Where the quartz dissolution is faster that the cement precipitation, a honeycomb-like texture is formed. Compositionally the cemented till (tillite) contains more MgO and has a higher loss of ignition than the till, suggesting that the cement is formed by a MgO fluid that previously reacted with the peridotite. The M-(A)-S-H cemented till represent a new type of duricrust, coined magsilcrete. The study of natural Mg-cement provides information on peridotites as a Mg-source for Mg-cement and as a feedstock for CO2 sequestration.

Climate warming is expected to have pronounced effects on Arctic and Subarctic ecosystems, especially regions underlain by discontinuous and relatively warm permafrost. The main goal of this research is to evaluate the vulnerability and dynamics of permafrost under climate warming across the various ecotypes in respect of ecosystem stability, socioeconomic impact, and for better understanding possible future environmental changes. We suggested the new version of the spatially distributed permafrost dynamics model (GIPL2-MPI), which is developed in the Geophysical Institute, University of Alaska Fairbanks. This model is based on the ecosystem approach to simulate the permafrost dynamics, which we are discussing in this paper. We combined ground-based observations and numerical freeze/thaw modeling using climate-ecosystem-permafrost interactions to understand the physical processes and mechanisms controlling permafrost physical state. We predict the changes in permafrost conditions using output from two GCMs (NCAR-CCSM4 and GFDL-CM3) and Five-Model Average Ensemble for the RCP-4.5 and RCP-8.5 scaled down to 1 by 1 km spatial resolution (https://uaf-snap.org/) across entire Alaska. Our result shows that by the end of the current century widespread near-surface permafrost degradation could begin everywhere in Alaska southward of the Brooks Range as well as across some spots at the North Slope Alaska.

This note first summarizes the history of the manuscript "On a Continuum Model for Avalanche Flow and Its Simplified Variants" by Grigorian and Ostroumov―published in the Special Issue on snow avalanche dynamics of Geosciences―since the early 1990s and explains the guiding principles in editing it for publication. The changes are then detailed and some explanatory notes given for the benefit of readers who are not familiar with the early Russian work on snow avalanche dynamics. Finally, the editor's personal views as to why he still considers this paper of relevance for avalanche dynamics research today are presented in brief essays on key aspects of the paper, namely the role of simple and complex models in avalanche research and mitigation work, the status and possible applications of Grigorian's stress-limited friction law, and non-monotonicity of the dynamics of the Grigorian–Ostroumov model in the friction coefficient. A comparison of the erosion model proposed by those authors with two other models suggests to enhance it with an additional equation for the balance of tangential momentum across the shock front. A preliminary analysis indicates that continuous scouring entrainment is possible only in a restricted parameter range and that there is a second erosion regime with delayed entrainment.

‘‘Sustainable Supply Chain Management’’ (SSCM) has become a hot topic on which eminent researchers are working on every day. However, it is clear that we still observe in this field of research, an artistic vagueness on the fundamental differences between Sustainable Supply Chain Management and Green Supply Chain Management (GSCM) Moreover, it is regrettable to note that previous researchers haven't yet thought about having a specific theory which can be applied to SSCM, the use of macro theories still being observed. In addition, we observe a lack of research in the oil and gas industry especially in Developing Countries when we know that this industry is the most lucrative and polluting. Therefore, this paper’s purpose consists to make a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) of 38 papers published from 2005 to 2023 especially in oil and gas industry and in Developing Countries, in order to make a clear distinction between SSCM and GSCM while highlighting the practices related to them and at the same time, generating a united theory which will bring together the triple bottom line of the SSCM. As findings, the authors built a Conceptual Framework that applies the triple bottom line of the SSCM in oil and gas industry by demonstrating that GSCM which is more related to environmental issues and is a part of the SSCM. Therefore, in order to be more efficient and to have a great impact on their performances, Oil and gas companies should apply SSCM practices rather than GSCM practices which are very different from what is applied in Developed Countries because of certain barriers and pressures.

One of the most used markers of cancer stem cells in several cancers, including colorectal cancer and breast cancer, is CD44. CD44 is a glycoprotein that traverses the cell membrane and binds to many ligands including hyaluronan resulting in activation of signaling cascades. Several reports have shown conflicting data on the expression of CD44 and that the expression depends on modes of investigations and subtypes of cancers. In addition, the correlation between CD44 expression and drug resistance, immune infiltration, EMT, metastasis and patients prognosis in several cancer types remains unclear. This study investigated CD44 expression in several cancers and explored its relationship with tumorigenesis using various publicly available databases, including The Cancer Genome Atlas, GEPIA, Oncomine, Genomics of Drug Sensitivity in Cancer and Tumor Immune Estimation Resource. Our analysis reveals that CD44 is differentially expressed in different cancers. CD44 expression is significantly associated with cancer patients’ survival in gastric, pancreatic and colorectal cancers. In addition, CD44 expression is closely linked with immune infiltration and immune suppressive features in pancreatic, colon adenocarcinoma and stomach cancer. High CD44 expression was significantly correlated with the expression of drug resistance-, EMT- and metastasis- linked genes. Tumors expressing high CD44 have higher mutation burden and afflict older patients than tumors expressing low CD44. Cell lines expressing high CD44 are more resistant to anti-cancer drugs compared to those expressing low CD44. Protein-protein interaction investigations and functional enrichment analysis showed that CD44 interacts with gene products related to cell-substrate adhesion, migration, platelet activation, and cellular response to stress. KEGG pathway analysis revealed that these genes play key roles in biological adhesion, cell component organization, locomotion, G-α-signaling and the response to stimulus. Overall, this investigation reveals that CD44 play significant roles in tumorigenesis, can be used as a prognostic biomarker in several cancers and can be therapeutically targeted in cancer therapy.

The present Feature Paper highlights the application of bacterial surface (S-) layer proteins as versatile components for the fabrication of biosensors. One technologically relevant feature of S‑layer proteins is their ability to self-assemble on many surfaces and interfaces to form a crystalline 2D protein lattice. The S-layer lattice on the surface of a biosensor becomes part of the interface architecture, linking the bioreceptor to the transducer interface, which may cause signal amplification. The S-layer lattice as ultrathin, highly porous structure with functional groups in a well-defined special distribution and orientation and an overall anti-fouling characteristics can significantly raise the limit in terms of variety and ease of bioreceptor immobilization, compactness of bioreceptor molecule arrangement, sensitivity, specificity, and detection limit for many types of biosensors. The present paper discusses and summarizes examples for the successful implementation of S-layer lattices on biosensor surfaces in order to give a comprehensive overview on the application potential of these bioinspired S-layer protein-based biosensors.

Hybrid Renewable Energy Systems (HRES) integrate renewable sources, storage, and optionally conventional energies, offering an eco-friendly solution to fossil fuels. Microgrids (MGs) bolster HRES integration, enhancing energy management, resilience, and reliability at various levels. This study, emphasizing the need for refined optimization methods, investigates three themes: renewable energy, microgrid, and multiobjective optimization (MOO), through a bibliometric analysis of 470 Scopus documents from 2010-2023, analyzed with SciMAT software. It segments the research into two periods, 2010-2019 and 2020-2023, revealing a surge in MOO focus, especially in the latter period, with a 35% increase in MOO-related research. This indicates a shift towards com-prehensive energy ecosystem management that balances environmental, technical, and economic elements. The initial focus on MOO, genetic algorithms, and energy management systems has expanded to include smart grids and electric power systems, with MOO remaining a primary theme in the second period. The increased application of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in optimizing HMGS within the MOO framework signals a move towards more sustainable, intelligent energy solutions. Despite progress, challenges remain, including high battery costs, the need for reliable MOO data, the intermittency of renewable energy sources, and HMGS network scalability issues, highlighting directions for future research.

The study addresses the urgent environmental issue of climate change, focusing specifically on the role of local food, which is produced and consumed locally, helps reduce carbon emissions by eliminating the need for long-distance transportation. Through quantitative analysis, this study elucidates the potential benefits in environmental impact achieved through the consumption of local food: the significant reduction in carbon emissions. Specifically, the consumption of local food is found to yield an annual decrease of 2,421,296 tCO2 emissions, representing 2.5% of South Korea’s total greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector. This reduction further translates into an estimated economic value of USD 54.23 million (KRW 70.5 billion). This study underscores the potential of local food consumption as a tangible strategy to overcome environmental problems. Moreover, its academic contribution lies in its comprehensive analysis of the economic and empirical impacts of local food consumption on environment. Moving forward, we propose policies such as supporting local food distribution networks, providing public education on local food, fostering the local food industry, and providing incentives to revitalize local food consumption.

The construction industry has a notable negative impact on the environment; thus, the promotion of the use of timber structures is an alternative to mitigate its effects. The research develops an artificial intelligence-based decision approach in the calculation of timber structures focused on the enhancement of the sustainability of roof structures. Based on the optimization carried out through genetic algorithms and the framework established in Eurocode 5, a general set of equations has been proposed for a laminated timber roof structure. The tool, which determines the most suitable roof structure for each strength class of laminated timber, allows for the determination of the dimensions of beams and purlins and their respective separations in order to minimize wood consumption. The ultimate goal is to offer multiple solutions regarding strength classes and structural designs in order to foster informed sustainable choices that promote efficient use of resources in construction.

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA); is a chronic systemic autoimmune disease which causes loss of joint function and significantly reduces quality of life. Plasma metabolite concentrations of disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs (DMARDs) can influence treatment efficacy and toxicity. This study explored the relationship between DMARD metabolising gene variants and plasma metabolite levels in RA patients. DMARD metabolite concentrations were determined by tandem mass-spectrometry in plasma samples from 100 RA patients with actively flaring disease, collected at two intervals. Taqman-probes were used to discriminate single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) genotypes in cohort genomic DNA: rs246240 (ABCC1), rs1476413 (MTHFR), rs2231142 (ABCG2), rs3740065 (ABCC2), rs4149081 (SLCO1B1), rs4846051 (MTHFR), rs10280623 (ABCB1), rs16853826 (ATIC), rs17421511 (MTHFR) and rs717620 (ABCC2). Mean plasma concentrations of methotrexate (MTX) and MTX-7-OH metabolites were higher (p<0.05, C.I. 95%) at baseline in rs4149081 GA genotype patients. Patients with rs1476413 SNP TT or CT alleles in the have significantly higher (p<0.001, 95% C.I) plasma poly-glutamate metabolites at both study time points and correspondingly elevated disease activity scores. Patients with the rs17421511 SNP AA allele reported significantly lower pain scores (p<0.05, 95% C.I.) at both study intervals. Genotyping strategies could help prioritise treatments to RA patients most likely to gain clinical benefit, whilst minimizing toxicity.

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a heterogeneous malignancy with complex carcinogenesis. Although there has been significant progress in the treatment of HCC over the past decades, drug resistance to chemotherapy remains a major obstacle in its successful management. In this study we were able to reduce chemoresistance in cisplatin-resistant HepG2 cells by either silencing the expression of transglutaminase type 2 (TG2) using siRNA or by pre-treatment of cells with the TG2 enzyme inhibitor cystamine. Further analysis revealed that, whereas the full-length TG2 isoform (TG2-L) was almost completely cytoplasmic in its distribution, the majority of the short TG2 isoform (TG2-S) was membrane-associated in both parental and chemoresistant HepG2 cells. Following induction of cisplatin toxicity in non-chemoresistant parental cells, TG2-S together with cisplatin quickly relocated to the cytosolic fraction. Conversely, no cytosolic relocalisation of TG2-S or nuclear accumulation cisplatin was observed following identical treatment of chemoresistant cells, where TG2-S remained predominantly membrane-associated. This suggests that deficient subcellular relocalisation of TG2-S from membranous structures into the cytoplasm may limit the apoptic response to cisplatin toxicity in chemoresistant cells. Structural analysis of TG2 revealed the presence of binding motifs for interaction of TG-S with the membrane scaffold protein LC3/LC3 homologue that could contribute to a novel mechanism of chemotherapeutic resistance in HepG2 cells.

The reckless use of non-replenishable fuels by the growing population for energy and the resultant incessant emission of hazardous gases and waste products into the atmosphere insisted scientists to fabricate materials capable of managing these global threats at once. In recent studies, photo-catalysis employed focus on utilizing renewable solar energy to initiate chemical processes with the aid of semiconductors and highly selective catalysts. A wide range of nanoparticles have showcased promising photocatalytic properties. Ultrasmall metal nanoclusters (MNCs) with sizes below 2 nm, stabilized by ligands shows discrete energy levels, exhibits unique optoelectronic properties which are vital to photocatalysis. In this review, we intend to compile information on varying photocatalytic efficiency of metal NCs with respect to changes in their properties. Review discusses about the photocatalytic activity of atomically precise ligand-protected MNCs and its hybrids in the domain of in energy conversion processes like photodegradation of dyes, Oxygen Evolution Reaction (ORR), Hydrogen Evolution Reaction (HER) and CO2 Reduction Reaction (CO2RR), and photosensitizer in solar cell.

Translation of basic animal research to find effective methods of diagnosing and treating human neurological disorders requires parallel analysis infrastructures. Small animals such as mice provide exploratory animal disease models. However, many interventions developed using small animal models fail to translate to human use due to physical or biological differences. Recently, large-animal minipigs have emerged in neuroscience due to both brain similarity and economic advantages. Medical image processing is a crucial part of research as it allows researchers to monitor their experiments and understand disease development. However, although many algorithms are created and optimized for MR analysis of human data, those tools are not directly applicable or sufficiently sensitive to measure minipig data. In this work, we propose PigSNIPE - a pipeline for the automated handling, processing, and analyzing of large-scale data sets of minipig MR images. The pipeline allows for image registration, AC-PC alignment, landmark detection, skull stripping, brainmasks and intracranial volume segmentation (DICE 0.98), tissue segmentation (DICE 0.82), and caudate-putamen brain segmentation (DICE 0.8) in under two minutes. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first automated pipeline tool aimed at large animal images.

We prove an analog of the removable singularity theorem for bounded harmonic functions on stratified sets. The harmonic functions are understood in the sense of the soft Laplacian. The result can become one of the main technical components for extending the well-known Poincaré–Perron’s method of proving the solvability of the Dirichlet problem for the soft Laplacian.

In the present manuscript, we report new insights into the concept of (a)synchronicity in Diels-Alder (DA) reactions in the framework of the reaction force analysis, in conjunction with natural population calculations and atomic resolution of energy derivatives along the intrinsic reaction coordinate (IRC) path. Our findings suggest that the DA reaction transitions between a preferentially concerted mechanism to a stepwise one in a 0.10 Å window of synchronicity indices, ranging from 0.90 to 1.00 Å. We have also shown that the relative position of the global minimum of the reaction force constant with respect to the TS is an alternative and quantifiable indicator of the (a)synchronicity in DA reactions. Moreover, the atomic resolution of energy derivatives reveals that the mechanism of the DA reaction involves two inner elementary processes associated with the formation of each of the two C-C bonds. This resolution goes on to indicate that, in asynchronous reactions, the driving and retarding components of the reaction force are mostly due the fast and slow-forming C-C bonds (elementary process) respectively, while in synchronous ones both elementary processes retard and drive the process concomitantly and equivalently.

In polymer-based dental composites, wear is a three-body wear system mainly abrasive, because of the food particles and wear products suspended in the oral cavity, which are transferred to the microcavities of the surface of the replacements. Due to this fact, the incorporation of nanodiamond as reinforcement in these polymer matrix composites, which promotes the creation of a solid lubricant tribofilm surface could be advantageous. When nanodiamond is added in contents of 0.8, 1.6 and 3.2 wt %, an increase in microhardness from 95 up to 420 %, compared to the one of neat BisGMA/TEGDMA, is observed. Additionally, the incorporation of a content of 1.6 wt % is enough to cause a diminution of ~78 % in the friction coefficient and a reduction of the specific wear rate and Archard’s coefficient of ~50 %. Nevertheless, the addition of relatively high contents reduces the effectiveness of photoinitiation and UV-curing, which is related to the scattering and absorption of UV radiation by ND.

The agronomic characteristics of Cenchrus purpureus were assessed through a randomized block experimental design with seven accessions (Taiwan grass, King grass, Elephant grass, Merkeron, CT-115, Purpule grass and Maralfalfa) as treatments and four replications research was carried out at the Instituto Tecnológico Superior de Tantoyuca, in 2019 and 2020, under rainfed conditions. Sowing density was established at 36 tillers in 25 m2. Green and dry matter yield, daily rates of dry matter accumulation in leaves, leaf/stem ratio, height, leaf area index and cutting frequency were assessed. Rainfall amount, temperature, relative humidity and global radiation levels were recorded to assess their effect on the evaluated variables. One-way ANOVA and multivariate analysis techniques, such as multiple linear regression (MLR), Clustering, and Principal component analysis (PCA) with the Statistica V7 software, were used. The leaf area index was greatest (p &lt; 0.05) on the dry season. Green and dry matter yield were greatest in Maralfalfa (p &lt; 0.05). Variation in the results is attributed to weather phenomena; nonetheless, Elephant grass and Maralfalfa showed the highest yields. Quality parameters must be evaluated to identify those grasses with the best attributes.

Let R be a commutative graded ring with unity, S be a multiplicative subset of homogeneous elements of R and P be a graded ideal of R such that P\bigcap S=\emptyset In this article, we introduce several results concerning graded S-prime ideals. Then we introduce the concept of graded weakly S-prime ideals which is a generalization of graded weakly prime ideals. We say that P is a graded weakly S-prime ideal of R if there exists s\in S such that for all x, y\in h(R), if 0\neq xy\in P, then sx\in P or sy\in P. We show that graded weakly S-prime ideals have many acquaintance properties to these of graded weakly prime ideals.

We present a modified version of the Szilard Engine, demonstrating that an explicit measurement procedure is entirely unnecessary for its operation. By considering our modified engine, we are able to provide a new interpretation of Landauer’s original argument for the cost of erasure. From this view, we demonstrate that a reset operation is strictly impossible in a dynamical system with only conservative forces. Then, we prove that to approach a reset yields an unavoidable instability at the reset point. Finally, we present an original proof of Landauer’s principle that is completely independent from the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

In the U.S. 44% of low-income households struggle to pay their utility bills, affecting their ability to afford necessities such as food and health expenses. Several government and utility funded energy efficiency programs exist to assist those experiencing energy insecurity. In Salt Lake City, Utah, there is a high demand for, but low availability of, energy efficiency services in underserved neighborhoods creating an opportunity for creative community-based programs to fill this inherent gap. This pilot project, involving the exchanging of LED bulbs in Salt Lake City, highlights the development of a community-based energy efficiency program that aims to bring energy savings to a uniquely targeted portion of the city and determines its feasibility in addressing energy insecurity at a larger scale. Through the 8-month project duration, 1,432 bulbs were exchanged at 23 events reaching 181 households in low-income areas. Through a year of use, these bulbs are estimated to save residents approximately 18,219 USD in electricity bills and reduce CO2 emissions from power plants by 122.23 metric tons, in addition to a savings of 4,400 USD in social cost of carbon as defined by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Since this pilot reached less than 1% of households, we extrapolated a reach of 2%, 5%, and 7.5% and found substantial potential decreases in power plant emissions and financial savings. As this project is ongoing and being expanded, we discuss relevant findings that will help shape future community-based models so that they are appropriately deployed and more effective in alleviating local energy insecurity.

Tumorigenesis is a complex and dynamic process involving cell-cell and cell-extracellular matrix (ECM) interactions that allow tumor cell growth, drug resistance and metastasis. This review provides an updated summary of the role played by the tumor microenvironment (TME) components and hypoxia in tumorigenesis and highlight various ways through which tumor cells reprogram normal cells including into phenotypes that are pro-tumorigenic including cancer associated- fibroblasts, -macrophages and -endothelial cells. Tumor cells secrete numerous factors leading to transformation of a previously anti-tumorigenic environment into a pro-tumorigenic environment. Once formed, solid tumors continue to interact with various stromal cells including local and infiltrating fibroblasts, macrophages, mesenchymal stem cells, endothelial cells, pericytes, and secreted factors and the ECM within the tumor microenvironment (TME). The TME is key to tumorigenesis, drug response and treatment outcome. Importantly, stromal cells and secreted factors can initially be anti-tumorigenic but over time promote tumorigenesis and induce therapy resistance. To counter hypoxia, increased angiogenesis leads to formation of new vascular networks in order to actively promote and sustain tumor growth via supply of oxygen and nutrients whilst removing metabolic waste. Angiogenic vascular network formation aid in tumor cell metastatic dissemination. Successful tumor treatment and novel drug development require the identification and therapeutic targeting of pro-tumorigenic components of the TME including cancer-associated- fibroblasts (CAFs) and -macrophages (CAMs), hypoxia, blocking ECM-receptor interactions, in addition to targeting of tumor cells. Re-programming of stromal cells and the immune response to be anti-tumorigenic is key to therapeutic success. Lastly, this review highlights potential TME- and hypoxia-centred therapies under investigations.

In the course of our ongoing research targeting the identification of potential biocontrol agents from entomopathogenic fungi (EPF), we explored a solid-state rice fungal extract of Blackwellomyces roseostromatus BCC56290 derived from infected lepidopteran larvae. Chemical and biological prospections afforded four unprecedently reported natural products differentiated into one dimeric naphthopyran bioxanthracene ES-242 derivative (1) and three cyclodepsipeptides (2-4) in addition to two known cyclodepsipeptides, cardinalisamides B (5) and C (6). Chemical structures of the isolated compounds were elucidated through comprehensive 1D/2D NMR and HR-ESI-MS data together with comparisons to the reported literature. The absolute configuration of the isolated cyclodepsipeptide was determined using Marfey’s method. All isolated compounds were assessed for their antimicrobial, cytotoxic and nematicidal activities with some compounds revealed significant activities.

This paper analyses the application of deep learning techniques for predicting wave overtopping events in port environments using sea state and weather forecasts as inputs. The study was conducted in the outer port of Punta Langosteira, A Coruña, Spain. A video recording infrastructure was installed to monitor overtopping events from 2015 to 2022, identifying 3709 overtopping events. The data collected was merged with actual and predicted data for the sea state and weather conditions during the overtopping events, creating three datasets. We used these datasets to create several machine learning models to predict whether an overtopping event would occur based on sea state and weather conditions. The final models achieved a high accuracy level during the training and testing stages: 0.81, 0.73, and 0.84 average accuracy during training and 0.67, 0.48, and 0.86 average accuracy during testing, respectively. The results of this study have significant implications for port safety and efficiency, as wave overtopping events can cause disruptions and potential damage. Using deep learning techniques for overtopping prediction can help port managers take preventative measures and optimize operations, ultimately improving safety and helping to minimize the economic impact that overtopping events have on the port's activities.

This investigation mainly focused on the microstructural analysis of Al based hybrid metal matrix composites. Aluminium as base metal and reinforced with 2% B4 C, ZrO2 (2%,4%,6%), SiC (4%,8%,12%). Specimens were manufactured by using conventional stir casting technique. Hybrid metal matrix composites were examined by using Scanning electron microscope. This research explained XRD, EDS and Fractography analysis. This investigation shows the reinforced material has given better results in all aspects than pure Al6061 alloy and homogeneous dispersion of particles inside the matrix. Porosity, delamination, cracks, particle distributions were observed through microstructural analysis. Additionally determined the crystal size of pure Aluminium 6061 alloy and hybrid composites.

Three-dimensional (3D) printing technology, also known as additive manufacturing (AM), has emerged as an attractive state-of-the-art tool for precisely fabricating functional materials with complex geometries, championing several advancements in tissue engineering, regenerative medicine, and therapeutics. However, this technology has an untapped potential for biotechnological applications, such as sensor and biosensor development. By exploring these avenues, the scope of 3D printing technology can be expanded and pave the way for groundbreaking innovations in the biotechnology field. Indeed, new printing materials and printers would offer new possibilities for seamlessly incorporating biological functionalities within the growing 3D scaffolds. Herein, we review the extrusion-based 3D printing modalities emphasizing biosensor applications. We highlighted the application of natural, synthetic, and composite biomaterials as 3D-printed soft hydrogels. Emphasis was placed on the approach by which the sensing molecules were introduced during the fabrication process. Finally, the future perspective was provided.

Text fields in electronic medical records (EMR) contain information on important factors that influence health outcomes, however, they are underutilized in clinical decision making due to their unstructured nature. We analyzed 6,497 inpatient surgical cases with 719,308 free text notes from Le Bonheur Children’s Hospital EMR. We used a text mining approach on preoperative notes to obtain the text-based risk score algorithm as predictive of death within 30 days of surgery. We studied the additional performance obtained by including text-based risk score as a predictor of death along with other structured data based clinical risk factors. The C-statistic of a logistic regression model with 5-fold cross-validation significantly improved from 0.76 to 0.92 when text-based risk scores were included in addition to structured data. We conclude that preoperative free text notes in EMR include significant information that can predict adverse surgery outcomes.

The COVID-19 pandemic crisis has brought about unprecedented economic and social consequences worldwide. The implementation of isolation measures, including national and international travel restrictions, significantly affected contact-intensive sectors such as tourism. During this lockdown period, Information and Communication Technology (ICT) was crucial in maintaining connectivity and enabling remote activities. Governments across the world implemented discretionary measures to mitigate the crisis's adverse effects on economic activity. This paper aims to analyze whether the level of ICT adoption and the importance of tourism influence the fiscal policy efforts pursued by governments. Based on the results of a linear regression analysis for 154 countries, the findings suggest that in countries with higher international tourism receipts, the governments had to promote higher fiscal stimulus. At the same time, ICT development diminished the efforts of the fiscal policy response to the crisis since it facilitated economic resilience. The findings of this study can contribute to understanding how governments responded to the pandemic crisis and the factors that influenced their fiscal policy decisions.

Consumer preference not only dictates what food is consumed but how that food is produced. Ingredients in livestock feed that are not antibiotics, not genetically modified, not of animal origin, and that are nutrient-like, tend to be more acceptable to consumers, retailers, and producers. Mono- and diglycerides (MDG) fit these criteria, are commonly used in food, and are generally recognized as safe. But beyond being emulsifiers and a source of energy, MDG are also known to have antimicrobial, immune and microbiome modulation, and angiogenic activity. MDG in broiler diets have been shown to impact a variety of immune-related functions such as regulation of circulating antibodies, as well as decreased gene expression or protein concentration of pro-inflammatory cytokines like TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-6, and IFN-γ. In addition, MDG can affect metabolic function and intestinal integrity. Results of this review show that MDG can serve as antimicrobial and growth-supporting alternatives for reducing poultry production losses, improving resource utilization, and meeting consumer demand for sustainably produced and safe animal protein.

Fractional calculus gained a lot of attention in the last couple of years. Researchers discovered that processes in various fields follow rather fractional dynamics than ordinary integer-ordered dynamics, meaning the corresponding differential equations feature non-integer valued derivatives. There are several arguments for why this is the case, one of them being that fractional derivatives’ inherit spatiotemporal memory and/or the ability to express complex naturally occurring phenomena. Another popular topic nowadays is machine learning, i.e., learning behavior and patterns from historical data. In our ever-changing world with ever-increasing amounts of data, machine learning is a powerful tool for data analysis, problem-solving, modeling, and prediction. It further provides many insights and discoveries in various scientific disciplines. As these two modern-day topics provide a lot of potential for combined approaches to describe complex dynamics, this article reviews combined approaches of fractional derivatives and machine learning from the past, puts them into context, and thus provides a list of possible combined approaches and the corresponding techniques. Note, however, that this article does not deal with neural networks, as there already is profound literature on neural networks and fractional calculus. We sorted past combined approaches from the literature into three categories, i.e., preprocessing, machine learning &amp; fractional dynamics, and optimization. The contributions of fractional derivatives to machine learning are manifold as they provide powerful preprocessing and feature augmentation techniques, can improve physically informed machine learning, and are capable of improving hyperparameter optimization. Thus, this article serves to motivate researchers dealing with data-based problems, to be specific machine learning practitioners, to adopt new tools and enhance their existing approaches.

The increasing spatial and spectral resolution of hyperspectral imagers yields detailed spectroscopy measurements from both space-based and airborne platforms. Machine learning algorithms have achieved state-of-the-art material classification performance on benchmark hyperspectral data sets; however, these techniques often do not consider varying atmospheric conditions experienced in a real-world detection scenario. To reduce the impact of atmospheric effects in the at-sensor signal, atmospheric compensation must be performed. Radiative Transfer (RT) modeling can generate high-fidelity atmospheric estimates at detailed spectral resolutions, but is often too time-consuming for real-time detection scenarios. This research utilizes machine learning methods to perform dimension reduction on the transmittance, upwelling radiance, and downwelling radiance (TUD) data to create high accuracy atmospheric estimates with lower computational cost than RT modeling. The utility of this approach is investigated using the instrument line shape for the Mako long-wave infrared hyperspectral sensor. This study employs physics-based metrics and loss functions to identify promising dimension reduction techniques. As a result, TUD vectors can be produced in real-time allowing for atmospheric compensation across diverse remote sensing scenarios.

Astrocytes perform a wide variety of essential functions defining normal operation of the nervous system, and are active contributors to the pathogenesis of neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer among others. Recent data provide compelling evidence that distinct reactive astrocyte states are associated with specific stages of Alzheimer´s disease. The advent of transcriptomics technologies enables rapid progress in the characterisation of such pathological astrocyte states. In this review, we provide an overview of the origin, main functions, molecular and morphological features of astrocytes in physiological as well as pathological conditions related to Alzheimer´s disease. We will also explore the main roles of astrocytes in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer´s disease and summarize main transcriptional changes and altered molecular pathways observed in astrocytes during the course of the disease.

Crowdsourced Data (CSD) generated by citizens is becoming more popular as its potential utilisation in many applications is increasing due to its currency and availability. However, the quality of CSD, including its relevance, is often questioned as the data is not generated by professionals nor follows standard data collection procedures. The quality of CSD can be assessed according to a range of attributes including its relevance. Information relevance has been explored through using in Geographic Information Retrieval (GIR) techniques to identify relevant information. This research tested a relevance assessment approach for CSD by adapting relevance assessment techniques available in the GIR domain. The thematic and geographic relevance were assessed using the Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency (TF-IDF), Vector Space Model (VSM) and Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques. The thematic and geographic specificities of the queries were calculated as 0.44 and 0.67 respectively, which indicates the queries used were more geographically specific than thematically specific. The Spearman's rho value of 0.62 indicated that the final ranked relevance lists showed reasonable agreement with a manually classified list and confirmed the potential of the approach for CSD relevance assessment for other possible crowdsourced data analysis.

Heavy metal accumulation in soils used for agricultural purposes is a major issue as it can affect the growth of plants and contain health risks as plants containing heavy metals are taken as food. This study provided the potential of three Bacillus pumilus strains (C-2PMW-8, C-1 SSK-8, and C-1PWK-7) for mitigation of the health factors related to heavy metals on lettuce (Lactuca sativa) grown in chromium contaminated soil from activities related to mining. Lettuce seeds inoculated with B. pumilus strains were grown in pots with garden soil amended with varying amount of chromite mine soil (2.27%, 4.65%, 7.14%). Growth indicators like days to germination, percentage of germination, leaf weight, leaf area and rate of survival decreased with incremental soil chromium levels but improved highly with inoculation of B. pumilus compared to uninoculated controls. When B. pumilus strains were provided, there was also a decreased level in the buildup of chromium in soil as well as lettuce shoots. The results explains that plant growth-promoting B. pumilus strains may be able to lower down the detrimental effects of chromium on lettuce development, hence increment in the effectiveness of phytoremediation.

We provide quantitative results from GIS-based modelling of urban emission functions for a range of representative low- and mid-rise locations, ranging from individual streets to residential communities within cities as well as entire towns and city regions with the aim of whether lantern photometry or built environment has the dominant effect on light pollution. We demonstrate the scalability of our work by providing results for the largest urban area modelled to date, comprising the central 117 km2 area of Dublin City and containing nearly 42,000 public lights. Our results show a general similarity in the shape of the azimuthally-averaged emission function for all areas examined, with differences in total light output distribution depending primarily on the nature of the lighting and, to a smaller extent, on the obscuring environment including seasonal foliage effects. A comparison with global satellite observations shows that they are consistent with the deduced angular emission function for other low-rise areas worldwide. We further validate our approach by comparing results for a range of urban locations by the close agreement observed in a detailed comparison of with calibrated imagery from the International Space Station. To our knowledge, this is the first such detailed quantitative verification of light loss calculations.

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of death worldwide. Cardiac rehabilitation (CR) has proven to be effective in reducing the rate of recurrence and disease as secondary prevention (evidence-based intervention) in patients who have suffered from myocardial infarction (MI). CR is a multidisciplinary path in which the patient is followed pharmacologically, from a psychological, nutritional, nursing and physiotherapy point of view. Post-MI patients present a reduction in the performance of the diaphragm muscle, the main inspiratory muscle, and this condition can become a risk factor for further relapses or for the onset of heart failure. Despite the solidity of the international guidelines for CR, the latter are lacking in specifically indicating an evaluation and training path regarding the inspiratory muscles in post-MI patients who have not undergone cardiac surgery. The article reviews the information on the adaptation of the diaphragm post-MI and highlights the need for clearer indications for a rehabilitation process that gives importance to the diaphragm.

Dementia education and training for workforce development is becoming increasingly important in bridging knowledge gaps among health and social care practitioners in the UK and internationally. Dementia Education for Workforce Excellence (DEWE) was developed during the COVID-19 pandemic blending both synchronous and asynchronous instruction and delivered across three different contexts: care homes, home care, and nurse education within the UK and India. This study aimed to evaluate DEWE using mixed methods with online survey data analyzed descriptively and interview data analyzed thematically. Integration of survey and interview data aimed toward a comprehensive evaluation of this novel approach for dementia workforce development. Thirty-four social care practitioners and nurse educators completed the online survey demonstrating high-level learner satisfaction; learning gains; behavioral change, and motivation to share new knowledge. Four key themes developed from the analysis of interviews (n=9) around participants’ pursuit of new knowledge; delivery modes in DEWE; learning gains and impact of DEWE; and adaptations for future program implementation. Findings suggest DEWE is an innovative resource that promotes person- and relationship-centered dementia care across all stages of one’s dementia journey. Cultural adaptations are recommended for international delivery to ensure contextual alignment and maximum impact.

The terms 'open' and 'openness' are widely used across the current higher education environment particularly in the areas of repository services and scholarly communications. Open-access licensing and open-source licensing are two prevalent manifestations of open culture within higher education research environments. As theoretical ideals, open-licensing models aim at openness and academic freedom. But operating as they do within the context of global neoliberalism, to what extent are these models constructed by, sustained by, and co-opted by neoliberalism? In this paper, we interrogate the use of open-licensing within scholarly communications and within the larger societal context of neoliberalism. Through synthesis of various sources, we will examine how open access licensing models have been constrained by neoliberal or otherwise corporate agendas, how open access and open scholarship have been reframed within discourses of compliance, how open-source software models and software are co-opted by politico-economic forces, and how the language of 'openness' is widely misused in higher education and repository services circles to drive agendas that run counter to actually increasing openness. We will finish by suggesting ways to resist this trend and use open-licensing models to resist neoliberal agendas in open scholarship.

In the power plant industry, the turbine inlet temperature (TIT) plays a key role in the efficiency of the gas turbine and, therefore, the overall—in most cases combined—thermal power cycle efficiency. Gas turbine efficiency increases by increasing TIT. However, an increase of TIT would increase the turbine component temperature which can be critical (e.g., hot gas attack). Thermal barrier coatings (TBCs)—porous media coatings—can avoid this case and protect the surface of the turbine blade. This combination of TBC and film cooling produces a better cooling performance than conventional cooling processes. The effective thermal conductivity of this composite is highly important in design and other thermal/structural assessments. In this article, the effective thermal conductivity of a simplified model of TBC is evaluated. This work details a numerical study on the steady-state thermal response of two-phase porous media in two dimensions using personal finite element analysis (FEA) code. Specifically, the system response quantity (SRQ) under investigation is the dimensionless effective thermal conductivity of the domain. A thermally conductive matrix domain is modeled with a thermally conductive circular pore arranged in a uniform packing configuration. Both the pore size and the pore thermal conductivity are varied over a range of values to investigate the relative effects on the SRQ. In this investigation, an emphasis is placed on using code and solution verification techniques to evaluate the obtained results. The method of manufactured solutions (MMS) was used to perform code verification for the study, showing the FEA code to be second-order accurate. Solution verification was performed using the grid convergence index (GCI) approach with the global deviation uncertainty estimator on a series of five systematically refined meshes for each porosity and thermal conductivity model configuration. A comparison of the SRQs across all domain configurations is made, including uncertainty derived through the GCI analysis.

Objectives Asylum seekers in Germany represent a highly vulnerable group from a health perspective due to a variety of risk factors. At the same time their access to healthcare is restricted. While the introduction of the Electronic Health Insurance Card (EHIC) for asylum seekers instead of healthcare-vouchers is discussed controversially using politico-economic reasons, there is hardly any empirical evidence on its actual impact on the use of medical services Study design Thus, the aim of this study is to examine the influence of the possession of the EHIC on the use of medical services by asylum seekers as measured by their consultation rate of ambulant physicians (CR). For this purpose, a standardized survey was carried out to 260 asylum seekers in different municipalities of which some have introduced the EHIC for asylum seekers, while others have not. Methods Various CR were differentiated considering possible third variables as well as confounding factors. The period prevalence was compared between the groups "with EHIC" and "without EHIC" using a two-sided t-test. Multivariate analysis was done using a linear OLS regression model. Results Asylum seekers who are in possession of the EHIC are significantly more likely to seek ambulant medical care than those receiving healthcare-vouchers. Their CR, however, does not differ significantly from the age-corrected CR of the autochtonous population. Taking into account relevant covariables, the possession of the EHIC can be viewed as an independent influencing factor on the asylum seekers' use of medical care. Conclusions The results of this study suggest that having to ask for healthcare-vouchers at the social security office could be a relevant barrier for asylum seekers. Nevertheless, the ownership of the EHIC does not seem to lead to an overuse of medical services.

In this project, four of fibers Bragg gratings were fabricated by injecting different volumes of liquids (star line Glass Mechanix optical adhesive material, olive oil diluted with ethanol) into the hollow core fiber. The amplitude splitting interferometric technique with a high resolution specially designed translation stage was used for the fabrication process. The fabrication was done using ultraviolet laser operated at wavelength 405nm. The fabricated Bragg length of the four fibers is equal to 3.8 cm. The results presented fiber Bragg grating (FBG) with successful fabrication at 653.3 nm Bragg reflected wavelength.

This study compared the efficacy of alfaxalone and propofol to induce anesthesia in bitches undergoing an ovariohysterectomy or cesarean sections. 34 healthy and pyometra-affected females were induced with IV propofol administration, 35 healthy and pyometra-affected bitches were induced with the IV administration of alfaxalone. For the cesarean sections, females were induced with propofol (n=14) or alfaxalone (n=14). Maternal physiological parameters (heart rate, blood pressure, temperature) were recorded throughout surgeries; the viability and a modified Apgar score was recorded in the neonates at 5, 60 and 120 minutes after delivery. The use of propofol and alfaxalone did not show relevant differences over parameters assessed, when ovariohysterectomy was performed in healthy bitches or females with pyometra, as well as when cesarean sections were compared; only, a transient tachycardia appeared after alfaxalone administration. However, a higher percentage of bitches needed extra-doses of propofol. Neonatal mortality was similar between both groups, but when alfaxalone was used a higher neonatal viability was observed. Propofol and alfaxalone showed similar efficacy to perform the ovariohysterectomy in all bitches. Both protocols were optimal for cesarean sections, but alfaxalone was associated with a higher neonatal viability and a higher neonatal survival rate.

In the last two decades, the discovery of various pathways involved in renal cell carcinoma (RCC) have led to the development of biologically-driven targeted therapies. Hypoxia inducible factors (HIFs), angiogenic growth factors, von Hippel-Lindau (VHL) gene mutations and oncogenic miRNAs play essential roles in the pathogenesis and drug resistance of clear cell renal cell carcinoma. These insights have led to the development of VEGF inhibitors, mTOR inhibitors and immunotherapeutic agents which have significantly improved outcomes of patients with advanced RCC. HIF inhibitors will be a valuable asset in the growing therapeutic armamentarium of RCC. Various histone deacetylase (HDAC)inhibitors, including selenium and agents such as PT2385 and PT2977, are being explored in various clinical trials as potential HIF inhibitors to ameliorate the outcomes of RCC patients. In this article, we will review the current treatment options and highlight the potential role of selenium in the modulation of drug resistance biomarkers expressed in ccRCC tumors.

In this article, we investigate the applicability of quantum machine learning for classification tasks using two quantum classifiers from the Qiskit Python environment: the Variational Quantum Classifier (VQC) and the Quantum Kernel Estimator (QKE). We evaluate the performance of these classifiers on six widely known and publicly available benchmark datasets and analyze how their performance varies with the number of samples on two artificially generated test classification datasets. As quantum machine learning is based on unitary transformations, this paper explores data structures and application fields that could be particularly suitable for quantum advantages. Hereby, we developed a data set based on concepts from quantum mechanics using the exponential map of a Lie algebra. This dataset will be made publicly available and contributes a novel contribution to the empirical evaluation of quantum supremacy. We further compared the performance of VQC and QKE on six widely applicable datasets to contextualize our results.\\ Our results demonstrate that the VQC and QKE perform better than basic machine learning algorithms such as advanced linear regression models (Ridge and Lasso). They do not match the accuracy and runtime performance of sophisticated modern boosting classifiers like XGBoost, LightGBM, or CatBoost. Therefore, we conclude that while quantum machine learning algorithms have the potential to surpass classical machine learning methods in the future, especially when physical quantum infrastructure becomes widely available, they currently lag behind classical approaches. Our investigations also show that classical machine learning approaches have superior performance classifying datasets based on group structures, compared to quantum approaches that particularly use unitary processes.\\ Furthermore, our findings highlight the significant impact of different quantum simulators, feature maps, and quantum circuits on the performance of the employed quantum estimators. This observation emphasizes the need for researchers to provide detailed explanations of their hyperparameter choices for quantum machine learning algorithms, as this aspect is currently overlooked in many studies within the field.\\ To facilitate further research in this area and ensure the transparency of our study, we have made the complete code available in a linked GitHub repository.

We developed a temporal population receptive field model to differentiate the functional and hemodynamic responses in the human LGN. The hemodynamic response of the human LGN is dominated by the richly vascularized hilum, a structure that serves as a point of entry for blood vessels entering the LGN and supplying the substrates of central vision. The location of the hilum along the ventral surface of the LGN and the resulting gradient in the amplitude of the hemodynamic response across the extent of the LGN has made it difficult to segment the human LGN into its more interesting magnocellular and parvocellular regions that represent two distinct visual processing streams. Here, we show that an intrinsic clustering of the LGN responses to a variety of visual input reveals the hilum, and further that this clustering is dominated by the amplitude of the hemodynamic response. We introduce a temporal population receptive field model that includes both a sustained and transient temporal impulse response. When we account for the hemodynamic amplitude, we demonstrate that this temporal response model is able to functionally segregate the residual responses according to their temporal properties.

This paper proposes an Integrated Fire Management (IFM) framework that can be used to support communities and resource managers in finding effective and efficient approaches to prevent damaging fires, as well as maintain desirable fire regimes in Kenya. Designing and implementing an IFM approach in Kenya calls for a systematic understanding of the various uses of fire and the underlying perceptions and traditional ecological knowledge of the local people. The here proposed IFM framework allows an evaluation of the risks posed by fires, while balancing them with their beneficial ecological and economic effects, and thus developing effective fire management approaches. A case study of the proposed IFM framework was conducted in Gathiuru Forest that is part of the larger Mt. Kenya Forest Ecosystem. Focus group discussions were held with key resource persons, primary and secondary data on socio-economic activities were studied, fire and weather records were analyzed and the current fire management plans were consulted. Questionnaires were used to assess how the IFM is implemented in the Gathiuru Forest Station. The results show that the proposed IFM framework is scalable and can be applied in places with fire-dependent ecosystems as well as in places with fire-sensitive ecosystems in Kenya. The effectiveness is dependent on the active participation, formulation and implementation of the IFM activities by the main stakeholder groups (Kenya Forest Service (KFS), Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS), and the Community Forest Associations (CFA)). The proposed IFM framework helps in implementing cost-effective approaches to prevent damaging fires and maintain desirable fire regimes in Kenya.

This article explores the enduring mysteries of consciousness and the afterlife, two enigmatic topics that have fascinated humanity for ages. Despite extensive scientific efforts, the existence of an afterlife remains unproven, and understanding consciousness remains a significant challenge. The research introduces innovative hypotheses through simple thought experiments with empirical evidence and robust theoretical foundations. It delves into the complexities of consciousness, its relationship with the brain, and the need for interdisciplinary approaches encompassing physics, psychology, and philosophy. Boldly contemplating the probability of a continuous consciousness after death, the study argues that existing evidence strongly supports this idea. Beyond theoretical implications, it envisions practical outcomes, suggesting that insights into these mysteries could enhance human well-being and contribute to a more harmonious world. In summary, this article embarks on a quest to shed light on age-old questions about consciousness and the afterlife. Through fresh methodologies, it aims to provide new perspectives that could reshape our understanding of existence and inspire intellectuals to positive individual and societal advancements including psychological well-being and intelligence.

Symmetry concepts in parametrized dynamical systems may reduce the number of external parameters by a suitable normalization prescription. If, under the action of a symmetry group G, parameter space A becomes a (locally) trivial principal bundle, A ~ A/G x G, then the normalized dynamics only depends on the quotient A/G. In this way, the dynamics of fractional variables in homogeneous epidemic SI(R)S models, with standard incidence, absence of R-susceptibility and compartment independent birth and death rates, turns out to be isomorphic to (a marginally extended version of) Hethcote's classic endemic model, first presented in 1973. The paper studies a 10-parameter master model with constant and I -linear vaccination rates, vertical transmission and a vaccination rate for susceptible newborns. As recently shown by the author, all demographic parameters are redundant. After adjusting time scale, the remaining 5-parameter model admits a 3-dimensional abelian scaling symmetry. By normalization we end up with Hethcote's extended 2-parameter model. Thus, in view of symmetry concepts, reproving theorems on endemic bifurcation and stability in such models becomes needless.

This paper presents a new methodology that provides the analysis of surface texture changes in areas adjacent to the volcano and its impact product of volcanic activity. To do this, algorithms from digital image processing such as the co-occurrence matrix and the wavelet transform are used. These methods are working on images taken by the Landsat satellite platform sensor 5 TM and Landsat 7 ETM + sensor, and implemented with the purpose of evaluating superficial changes that can warn of surface movements of the volcano. The results were evaluated by similarity metrics for grayscale images, and validated in two different scenarios that have the same type of eruption, but differ, essentially, in climate and vegetation. Finally, the proposed algorithm is presented, setting the parameters and constraints for implementation and use.

There are frequently interactions between active folds and major rivers (mean annual water discharges > 70 m³s^-1). The major river may incise across the fold, to produce a water gap across the fold, or a bevelling (or lateral planation) of the top of the fold. Alternatively, the major river may be defeated to produce a diversion of the river around the fold, with wind gaps forming across the fold in some cases, or ponding of the river behind the fold. Why a river incises or diverts is often unclear, though influential characteristics and processes have been identified. A new scheme for investigating fold-river interactions has been devised, involving a short description of the major river, climate, and structural geology, and 13 characteristics of river and fold geomorphology: 1) Channel width at location of fold axis, w, 2) Channel-belt width at location of fold axis, cbw, 3) Floodplain width at location of fold axis, fpw, 4) Channel sinuosity, Sc, 5) Braiding index, BI, 6) General river course direction, RCD, 7) Distance from fold core to location of river crossing, C-RC, 8) Distance from fold core to river basin margin, C-BM, 9) Width of geological structure at location of river crossing, Wgs, 10) Estimate of erosion resistance of surface sediments/rocks and deeper sediments/rocks in fold, ERs, ERd, 11) Channel water surface slope at location of fold axis, s, 12) Average channel migration rate, Rm, 13) Estimate of fold total uplift rate, TUR. The first 10 geomorphological characteristics should be readily determinable for nearly all major rivers using widely available satellite imagery and fine scale geological maps. The last 3 characteristics should be determinable for most major rivers where other data sources are available. This study demonstrates the methodology of this scheme, using the example of the major rivers Karun and Dez interacting with active folds in the foreland basin tectonic setting of lowland south-west Iran. For the rivers Karun and Dez (mean annual water discharges 575 m³s^-1 and 230 m³s^-1, respectively), it was found that geomorphological characteristics Nos. 2, 3 and 7 had statistically significant differences (p-value ≤ 0.05) between the categories of river incision across a fold and river diversion around a fold. For river incision, at the fold axis, channel-belt width was always < 2.7 km, and floodplain width was generally (80 % of cases) < 5.7 km; whereas for river diversion, at the projection of the fold axis, these two characteristics had a wide range of values. For river incision, the distance from the fold core to the location where the river channel crossed the fold axis, was generally (80 % of cases) ≤ 8.5 km; whereas for river diversion, this distance was always > 22 km. Since it is highly likely that different characteristics will be important for other major rivers interacting with other folds, it is recommended that this scheme is now used to investigate a variety of major rivers from across the globe. By comparing the same parameters for different major rivers, a better understanding of fold-river interactions should be achieved.

Rapid screening of botanical extracts for the discovery of bioactive natural products was performed using a fractionation approach in conjunction with flow-injection high-resolution mass spectrometry for obtaining chemical fingerprints of each fraction, enabling the correlation of the relative abundance of molecular features (representing individual phytochemicals) with the read-outs of bioassays. We applied this strategy for discovering and identifying constituents of Centella asiatica (C. asiatica) that protect against Aβ cytotoxicity in vitro. C. asiatica has been associated with improving mental health and cognitive function, with potential use in Alzheimer’s disease. Human neuroblastoma MC65 cells were exposed to subfractions of an aqueous extract of C. asiatica to evaluate the protective benefit derived from these subfractions against amyloid β-cytotoxicity. The % viability score of the cells exposed to each subfraction was used in conjunction with the intensity of the molecular features in two computational models, namely Elastic Net and selectivity ratio, to determine the relationship of the peak intensity of molecular features and % viability. Finally, the correlation of mass spectral features with MC65 protection and their abundance in different sub-fractions were visualized using GNPS molecular networking. Both computational methods unequivocally identified dicaffeoylquinic acids as providing strong protection against Aβ-toxicity in MC65 cells, in agreement with the protective effects observed for these compounds in previous preclinical model studies.

Data creation is often the only way for researchers to produce basic geospatial information for the pursuit of more complex tasks and procedures such as those that lead to the production of new data for studies concerning river basins, slope morphodynamics, applied geomorphology and geology, urban and territorial planning, detailed studies, for example, in architecture and civil engineering, among others. This exercise results from a reflection where specific data processing tasks executed in Google Sketchup (Pro version, 2018) can be used in a context of interoperability with Geographical Information Systems (GIS) software. The focus is based on the production of contour lines and Digital Elevation Models (DEM) using an innovative sequence of tasks and procedures in both environments (GS and GIS). It starts in Google Sketchup (GS) graphic interface, with the selection of a satellite image referring to the study area—which can be anywhere on Earth's surface; subsequent processing steps lead to the production of elevation data at the selected scale and equidistance. This new data must be exported to GIS software in vector formats such as Autodesk Design Web format—DWG or Autodesk Drawing Exchange format—DXF. In this essay the option for the use of GIS Open Source Software (gvSIG and QGIS) was made. Correcting the original SHP by removing “data noise” that resulted from DXF file conversion permits the author to create new clean vector data in SHP format and, at a later stage, generate DEM data. This means that new elevation data becomes available, using simple but intuitive and interoperable procedures and techniques which confgures a costless work flow.

With advances in Building Information Modeling (BIM), Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) technologies have many potential applications in the Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) industry. However, the AEC industry, relative to other industries, has been slow in adopting AR/VR technologies, partly due to lack of feasibility studies examining the actual cost of implementation versus an increase in profit. The main objectives of this paper are to understand the industry trends in adopting AR/VR technologies and identifying gaps within the industry. The identified gaps can lead to opportunities for developing new tools and finding new use cases. To achieve these goals, two rounds of a survey at two different time periods (a year apart) were conducted. Responses from 158 industry experts and researchers were analyzed to assess the current state, growth, and saving opportunities for AR/VR technologies for the AEC industry. The findings demonstrate that older generations are significantly more confident about the future of AR/VR technologies and they see more benefits in AR/VR utilization. Furthermore, the research results indicate that Residential and commercial sectors have adopted these tools the most, compared to other sectors and institutional and transportation sectors had the highest growth from 2017 to 2018. Industry experts anticipated a solid growth in the use of AR/VR technologies in 5 to 10 years, with the highest expectations towards healthcare. Ultimately, the findings show a significant increase in AR/VR utilization in the AEC industry from 2017 to 2018.

Cancer patients and their family caregivers experience various losses when patients become terminally ill, yet little is known about the grief experienced by patients and caregivers and factors that influence grief as patients approach death. Additionally, few, if any, studies have explored associations between advance care planning (ACP) and grief resolution among cancer patients and caregivers. To fill this knowledge gap, the current study examined changes in grief over time in patients and their family caregivers and whether changes in patient grief are associated with changes in caregiver grief. We also sought to determine how grief changed following completion of advance directives. The sample included advanced cancer patients and caregivers (n=98 dyads) from Coping with Cancer III, a federally funded, multi-site prospective longitudinal study of end-stage cancer care. Participants were interviewed at baseline and at follow-up roughly 2 months later. Results suggest synchrony, whereby changes in patient grief were associated with changes in caregiver grief. We also found that patients who completed a living will (LW) experienced increases in grief, while caregivers of patients who completed a do-not-resuscitate (DNR) order experienced reductions in grief, suggesting that ACP may prompt “grief work” in patients while promoting grief resolution in caregivers.

Alphaviruses are positive-sense RNA arboviruses that are capable of causing severe disease in otherwise healthy individuals. There are many aspects of viral infection that determine pathogenesis and major efforts regarding the identification and characterization of virulence determinants have largely focused on the roles of the nonstructural and structural proteins. Nonetheless, the viral RNAs of the alphaviruses themselves play important roles in regard to virulence and pathogenesis. In particular, many sequences and secondary structures within the viral RNAs play an important part in the development of disease and may be considered important determinants of virulence. In this review article, we summarize the known RNA-based virulence traits and host:RNA interactions that influence alphaviral pathogenesis for each of the viral RNA species produced during infection. Overall, the viral RNAs produced during infection are important contributors to alphaviral pathogenesis and more research is needed to fully understand how each RNA species impacts the host response to infection as well as the development of disease.

NIRS uses the relative absorption of light at 850nm and 760nm, to determine skeletal muscle oxygen saturation. Previous studies have used the ratio of both signals to report muscle oxygen saturation. Purpose: To evaluate the different approaches used to represent muscle oxygen saturation, and to evaluate the pulsations of the O₂heme and Heme signal. Method: Twelve participants, ages 20-29years were tested on the forearm flexor muscles using continuous wave NIRS at rest. Measurements were taken during 2-3mins rest, during physiological calibration (5-minuts Ischemia) and during reperfusion. Results: There was a significant difference in pulse size between O₂heme and Heme signal at the three locations (p < 0.05). Resting oxygen saturation was 58.8+9.2%, 69.6+3.9%, and 89.2+6.9% when calibrated using O₂heme, TSI, and Heme, respectively. Conclusion: The difference in magnitude of O₂heme and Heme pulse with each heartbeat might suggest different anatomical locations of these signals, which propose calibrating with just one of the signals instead of the ratio of both. Calculations of physiological calibration must account for increased blood volume in the tissue, because of the changes in blood volume which appear to be primarily from the O₂heme signal. Resting oxygen levels calibrated with Heme agrees with theoretical oxygen saturation.