Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Prefrontal GABA and glutamate–glutamine levels affect sustained attention

Abstract Attention levels fluctuate during the course of daily activities. However, factors underlying sustained attention are still unknown. We investigated mechanisms of sustained attention using psychological, neuroimaging, and neurochemical approaches. Participants were scanned with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) while performing gradual-onset, continuous performance tasks (gradCPTs). In gradCPTs, narrations or visual scenes gradually changed from one to the next. Participants pressed a button for frequent Go trials as quickly as possible and withheld responses to infrequent No-go trials. Performance was better for the visual gradCPT than for the auditory gradCPT, but the 2 were correlated. The dorsal attention network was activated during intermittent responses, regardless of sensory modality. Reaction-time variability of gradCPTs was correlated with signal changes (SCs) in the left fronto-parietal regions. We also used magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) to measure levels of glutamate–glutamine (Glx) and γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) in the left prefrontal cortex (PFC). Glx levels were associated with performance under undemanding situations, whereas GABA levels were related to performance under demanding situations. Combined fMRI–MRS results demonstrated that SCs of the left PFC were positively correlated with neurometabolite levels. These findings suggest that a neural balance between excitation and inhibition is involved in attentional fluctuations and brain dynamics.
The investigation of the unseen interrelationship of grain size, ionic defects, device physics and performance of perovskite solar cells

Controlling the phenomenological morphology effects on the performance of the perovskite solar cell (PSC) is a continuing concern due to its photo-physical complexity and the existing contrary reports. Distinguishing the effect of the formed electron and hole traps in the bulk and at surface/interfaces of the perovskite layer from their impact on the performance of the device can be beneficial in optimizing fabrication methods. Here, the transient AC and steady state DC measurements, and morphology characterizations confirm the variation of performance parameters with respect to grain boundaries growth. The device physics is uncovered with respect to the grain size (GS) of the perovskite layer employing the theoretical drift-diffusion framework incorporating the electronic and ionic contributions. The increase of open circuit voltage () for devices with large GS can be associated to the density of defect states. The findings here suggest a more pronounced role of interfaces in efficiency enhancement of the PSCs with the emphasis on the impact of the hole transport layer (HTL)/perovskite layer interface which is also found to be accountable to the difference between the device internal voltage and the terminal voltage and minimizing this difference can lead to an enhancement of approximately 100 mV in . Additionally, the electron traps in the bulk of the perovskite layer play a distinguishable role in the reduction of for the device with the smallest GS. The ionic defect density is also estimated. Considering our results and previous reports, the performance of the PSC is remarkably dependent on the method of fabrication and the associated perovskite conversion mechanism, and not necessarily on GS. The results are expected to deliver important guidelines for the development of more efficient PSCs by further enhancement of the towards its thermodynamic limit of 1.32V, via creating optimal interfaces.
Nanoparticle-Epoxy Composite Molding for Undeformed Acoustic Holograms With Tailored Acoustic Properties

Acoustic hologram (AH) lenses are typically produced by high-resolution 3-D printing methods, such as stereolithography (SLA) printing. However, SLA printing of thin, plate-shaped lens structures has major limitations, including vulnerability to deformation during photocuring and limited control of acoustic impedance. To overcome these limitations, we demonstrated a nanoparticle-epoxy composite (NPEC) molding technique, and we tested its feasibility for AH lens fabrication. The characterized acoustic impedance of the 22.5% NPEC was 4.64 MRayl, which is 55% higher than the clear photopolymer (2.99 MRayl) used by SLA. Simulations demonstrated that the improved pressure transmission by the higher acoustic impedance of the NPEC resulted in 21% higher pressure amplitude in the region of interest (ROI, −6-dB pressure amplitude pixels) than the photopolymer. This improvement was experimentally demonstrated after prototyping NPEC lenses through a molding process. The NPEC lens showed no significant deformation and 72% lower thickness profile errors than the photopolymer, which otherwise experienced deformed edges due to thermal bending. Beam mapping results using the NPEC lens validated the predicted improvement, demonstrating 24% increased pressure amplitude on average and 10% improved structural similarity (SSIM) with the simulated pressure pattern compared to the photopolymer lens. This method can be used for AH lens applications with improved pressure output and accurate pressure field formation.
Intra‐nucleus mosaic pattern (InMop) and whole‐cell Haralick combined‐descriptor for identifying and characterizing acute leukemia blasts on single cell peripheral blood images

Acute leukemia is usually diagnosed when a test of peripheral blood shows at least 20% of abnormal immature cells (blasts), a figure even lower in case of recurrent cytogenetic abnormalities. Blast identification is crucial for white blood cell (WBC) counting, which depends on both identifying the cell type and characterizing the cellular morphology, processes susceptible of inter‐ and intraobserver variability. The present work introduces an image combined‐descriptor to detect blasts and determine their probable lineage. This strategy uses an intra‐nucleus mosaic pattern (InMop) descriptor that captures subtle nuclei differences within WBCs, and Haralick's statistics which quantify the local structure of both nucleus and cytoplasm. The InMop captures WBC inner‐nucleus structure by applying a multiscale Shearlet decomposition over a repetitive pattern (mosaic) of automatically‐segmented nuclei. As a complement, Haralick's statistics characterize the local structure of the whole cell from an intensity co‐occurrence matrix representation. Both InMoP and Haralick‐based descriptors are calculated using the b‐channel from Lab color‐space. The combined‐descriptor is assessed by differentiating blasts from nonleukemic cells with support vector machine (SVM) classifiers and different transformation kernels, in two public and independent databases. The first database‐D1 (n = 260) is composed of healthy and acute lymphoid leukemia (ALL) single cell images, and second database‐D2 contains acute myeloid leukemia (AML) blasts (n = 3294) and nonblast (n = 15,071) cell images. In a first experiment, blasts versus nonblast differentiation is performed by training with a subset of D2 (n = 6588) and testing in D1 (n = 260), obtaining a training AUC of 0.991 ± 0.002 and AUC = 0.782 for the independent validation. A second experiment automatically differentiates AML blasts (260 images from D2) from ALL blasts (260 images from D1), with an AUC of 0.93. In a third experiment, state‐of‐the‐art strategies, VGG16 and RESNEXT convolutional neural networks (CNN), separate blast from nonblast cells in both databases. The VGG16 showed an AUC of 0.673 and the RESNEXT of 0.75. Reported metrics for all the experiments are area under the ROC curve (AUC), accuracy and F1‐score.
Real-world Accuracy of CGM in Inpatient Critical and Noncritical Care Settings at a Safety-Net Hospital

OBJECTIVE We sought to determine real-world accuracy of inpatient continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) at multiple levels of acuity in a large safety-net hospital. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS We analyzed records from hospitalized patients on Dexcom G6 CGM, including clinical, point of care (POC), and laboratory (Lab) glucose, and CGM data. POC/Lab values were matched to the closest timed CGM value. Encounters were divided into not critically ill (NCI) versus critically ill (CI). CGM accuracy was evaluated. RESULTS Paired readings (2,744 POC-CGM; 3,705 Lab-CGM) were analyzed for 233 patients with 239 encounters (83 NCI, 156 CI). POC-CGM aggregated and average mean absolute relative differences (MARD) were 15.1% and 17.1%. Lab-CGM aggregated and average MARDs were 11.4% and 12.2%. Accuracy for POC-CGM and Lab-CGM was 96.5% and 99.1% in Clarke Error Grid zones A/B. CONCLUSIONS Real-world accuracy of inpatient CGM is acceptable for NCI and CI patients. Further exploration of conditions associated with lower CGM accuracy in real-world settings is warranted.
Evaluation of the risk factors for falls in the geriatric population presenting to the emergency department

ABSTRACT BACKGROUND: We evaluated risk factors and frailty assessments to identify fall-prone geriatric patients in the emergency department (ED). METHODS: This prospective study included 264 consecutive patients aged ≥65 years who presented to the ED. The participants were divided into those who had fallen or not. The patient groups were compared in terms of age, sex, presenting complaints (falls vs. others), comorbidities, medications, frailty assessment tools, and orthostatic hypotension (OH). RESULTS: In total, 264 patients were included: 129 (48.8%) patients who had fallen and 135 (51.2%) who hadn’t fallen. The mean ages of patients who had fallen and those who had not fallen were 80.48±8.38 and 79.42±7.94 years, respectively. In addition, 62.01% (n=80) and 51.85% (n=70) of patients were females. There were no statistically significant differences between the groups in terms of age or sex (P=0.290 and P=0.096, respectively). In total, 89.92% (n=116) of patients who had fallen had at least one chronic medical condition. There was a significant difference in the proportion of patients with OH between the groups. Frailty scores such as the Edmonton Frail Scale, Frail Non-Disabled Questionnaire, PRISMA-7 questionnaire, Identification of Seniors at Risk test, and Rockwood Clinical Frailty Scale scores were also significantly different between the groups. A higher PRISMA-7 score at admission was found to be an independent predictor of fall risk. CONCLUSION: Falls occur more frequently in the older population and in females. In addition, the frailty assessment scores, except for the FRESH Frailty Scale, were associated with falls in geriatric patients. After elimination of non-significant variables in multivariate analysis, a high PRISMA-7 questionnaire score at admission was identified as an independent predictor of fall risk.
The W-subtype active contact binary PZ UMa with a possible more massive tertiary component

Two sets of multiple-color ($B, V, R_c, I_c$) light curves of PZ UMa were observed in dependently with the 2.4 meter telescope at the Thai National Observatory and the 1 meter telescope at Yunnan Observatories. The light curves were analyzed with the Wilson-Devinney program and the two sets of light curves produced consistent results, which show that PZ UMa is a W-subtype contact binary with an extreme mass ratio ($M_{1}/M_{2} = 0.18)$. The basic physical parameters of PZ UMa were determined to be $M_{2} = 0.77(2)M_\odot$, $M_{1} = 0.14(1)M_\odot$, $R_{2} = 0.92(1)R_\odot$, $R_{1} = 0.43(1)R_\odot$, $L_{2} = 0.46(2)L_\odot$ and $L_{1} = 0.15(3)L_\odot$. The orbital period analysis of PZ UMa revealed a 13.22 year periodicity, which implies that there may be a tertiary component orbiting around the binary system. The mass and orbital radius of the tertiary component were calculated to be $M_{3} = 0.88 M_\odot$ and $a_{3} = 3.67 AU$, if the orbit was coplanar with the central binary system. It is interesting that the minimum mass of the tertiary was calculated to be $M_{3min} = 0.84 M_\odot$, which means the tertiary component is even larger than the primary star and the secondary one of PZ UMa. PZ UMa is a late-type contact binary with stellar activity. The O'Connell effect appeared on its light curves when it was observed on April 2016. However, the O'Connell effect reversed when the target was observed again on December 2016. The changes of the O'Connell effect in such a short time-scale strongly support the occurrence of rapidly changing magnetic activity on this W UMa binary.
Tetramorium exasperatum Emery, 1891 in Iberian Peninsula (Hymenoptera: Formicidae)

Tetramorium exasperatum EmEry, 1891 described from Tunisia is recorded from Spain (S Andalusia) for the first time. Tetramorium parvioculum GuiLLEm & BEnSuSan, 2009 described from Gibraltar and Tetramorium exasperatum acutiseta SantSchi, 1921 described from Morocco are synonymized with Tetramorium exasperatum EmEry, 1891.
Physics of “Cold” Disk Accretion onto Black Holes Driven by Magnetized Winds

Disk accretion onto black holes is accompanied by collimated outflows (jets). In active galactic nuclei (AGN), the kinetic energy flux of the jet (jet power or kinetic luminosity) may exceed the bolometric luminosity of the disk by a few orders of magnitude. This may be explained in the framework of the so called “cold” disk accretion. In this regime of accretion, the disk is radiatively inefficient because practically all the energy released at the accretion is carried out by the magnetized wind. This wind also provides efficient loss of the angular momentum by the matter in the disk. In this review, the physics of the accretion driven by the wind is considered from first principles. It is shown that the magnetized wind can efficiently carry out angular momentum and energy of the matter of the disk. The conditions when this process dominates conventional loss of the angular momentum due to turbulent viscosity are discussed. The “cold” accretion occurs when the viscous stresses in the disk can be neglected in comparison with impact of the wind on the accretion. Two problems crucial for survival of the model of “cold” accretion are considered. The first one is existence of the magnetohydrodynamical solutions for disk accretion purely due to the angular momentum loss by the wind. Another problem is the ability of the model to reproduce observations which demonstrate existence of the sources with kinetic power of jets 2–3 orders of magnitude exceeding the bolometric luminosity of disks. The solutions of the problem in similar prescriptions and numerical solutions without such an assumption are discussed. Calculations of the “unavoidable” radiation from the “cold” disk and the ratio of the jet power of the SMBH to the bolometric luminosity of the accretion disk around a super massive black hole are given in the framework of the Shakura and Sunyaev paradigm of an optically thick α -disk. The exploration of the Fundamental Plane of Black Holes allows us to obtain semi empirical equations that determine the bolometric luminosity and the ratio of the luminosities as functions of the black hole mass and accretion rate.
Increased membrane Ca2+ permeability drives astrocytic Ca2+ dynamics during neuronal stimulation at excitatory synapses

Astrocytes are intricately involved in the activity of neural circuits; however, their basic physiology of interacting with nearby neurons is not well established. Using two‐photon imaging of neurons and astrocytes during higher frequency stimulation of hippocampal CA3‐CA1 Schaffer collateral (Scc) excitatory synapses, we could show that increasing levels of released glutamate accelerated local astrocytic Ca2+ elevation. However, blockage of glutamate transporters did not abolish this astrocytic Ca2+ response, suggesting that astrocytic Ca2+ elevation is indirectly associated with an uptake of extracellular glutamate. However, during the astrocytic glutamate uptake, the Na+/Ca2+ exchanger (NCX) reverse mode was activated, and mediated extracellular Ca2+ entry, thereby triggering the internal release of Ca2+. In addition, extracellular Ca2+ entry via membrane P2X receptors further facilitated astrocytic Ca2+ elevation via ATP binding. These findings suggest a novel mechanism of activity induced Ca2+ permeability increases of astrocytic membranes, which drives astrocytic responses during neuronal stimulation of CA3‐CA1 Scc excitatory synapses.
Temporal event clustering for digital photo collections

Organizing digital photograph collections according to events such as holiday gatherings or vacations is a common practice among photographers. To support photographers in this task, we present similarity-based methods to cluster digital photos by time and image content. The approach is general and unsupervised, and makes minimal assumptions regarding the structure or statistics of the photo collection. We present several variants of an automatic unsupervised algorithm to partition a collection of digital photographs based either on temporal similarity alone, or on temporal and content-based similarity. First, interphoto similarity is quantified at multiple temporal scales to identify likely event clusters. Second, the final clusters are determined according to one of three clustering goodness criteria. The clustering criteria trade off computational complexity and performance. We also describe a supervised clustering method based on learning vector quantization. Finally, we review the results of an experimental evaluation of the proposed algorithms and existing approaches on two test collections.
Research on hard points height prediction method based on BP neural network

The magnetic levitation track uses the contact rail and the collector shoe to form a loop to provide power to the car. When there are hard points on the contact rail, they will affect the power supply process. In order to effectively supervise the height of the contact rail hard points and carry out railway maintenance in a timely manner, the effective prediction of the contact rail hard points height are achieved by constructing a BP neural network dual-channel regression model. According to the signal characteristics, determine the parameters design the parameters of the BP neural network model. Reasonably divide it into training, verification and testing data sets. Finally complete the prediction of the hard points height based on the trained model. The results show that the proposed method for predicting the height of the hard points of the contact rail based on BP neural network can realize the quantitative detection of the height of the hard points under different working conditions.
Bagasse dust exposure and chronic respiratory symptoms among workers in the Metehara and Wonji sugar factories in Ethiopia: a longitudinal study design

Background Ethiopia’s sugar factories are growing by creating job opportunities for thousands of workers with varying educational, professional and socioeconomic backgrounds. These sugar factories are a source of several hazards that severely harm the workers’ health. In this context, there is inconclusive evidence on the level of bagasse dust exposure and chronic respiratory health symptoms. This study aimed to assess the degree of bagasse dust exposure and chronic respiratory health symptoms. Methods In this longitudinal study, five workstations were selected for dust sampling. A stratified random sampling technique was used to select 1043 participants. We measured the dust intensity using a calibrated handheld real-time dust monitor once a month for 5 months, totalling 50 dust samples. Chronic respiratory symptoms were assessed using the American Thoracic Society’s respiratory symptoms questionnaire. Results A 1 hour time-weighted average of bagasse dust intensity in the boiler, power turbine and evaporation plant was 8.93 mg/m3, 8.88 mg/m3 and 8.68 mg/m3, respectively. This corresponded to an exposure level to bagasse dust of 85.52% (95% CI 83.2% to 87.6%). The level of chronic respiratory health symptoms was 60.6% (95% CI 59.2% to 61.9%). The most common respiratory symptoms were wheezing (96.8%), coughing (89.7%) and breathlessness (80.9%). The identified risk factors were lack of dust control technology (β= 0.64, 95% CI 0.53 to 0.75), not practising wet spray (β = 0.27, 95% CI 0.21 to 0.41) and not wearing proper respiratory protection devices (β = 0.12, 95% CI 0.30 to 0.56). Conclusions Bagasse dust exposure and respiratory health abnormalities were worrying concerns. The absence of dust control technologies and no practice of wet spraying elevated the level of exposure. Not wearing proper respiratory protection gear increased the odds of having respiratory abnormalities. Hence, the use of mechanical solutions to stop dust emissions at their sources and the wearing of proper respiratory protection gear are highly advised.
Does medical education reform change who is selected? A national cross-sectional survey from China

Objectives Approximately 10 years ago, China introduced an education plan to improve the overall quality of medical education and to better serve the population’s health needs. Many medical schools were then recognised and financed by China’s Ministry of Education to develop and operationalise new pilot programmes (PPs) aligned with this plan. These ran in parallel with the traditional programmes (TPs). One way to achieve the plan’s first aim, improving the quality of medical education, is to select academically stronger candidates. We, thus, examined and compared who were selected into PPs and TPs. Design Cross-sectional study. Setting Data were collected from 123 medical schools across China via the 2021 China Medical Student Survey. Participants Participants were undergraduate clinical medicine students across all year groups. Primary and secondary outcome measures Medical school selection was via the National College Entrance Examination (NCEE). Medical students’ NCEE performance and their sociodemographics were used as the primary and secondary outcome measures. Mann-Whitney or χ2 tests were used to compare the means between educational programmes (PPs vs TPs) and various selection outcomes. Multilevel mixed-effects regressions were employed to account for school idiosyncratic selection results. Results Of the 204 817 respondents, 194 163 (94.8%) were in a TP and 10 654 (5.2%) a PP. PP respondents (median=75.2, IQR=69.5–78.8) had significantly higher NCEE scores than their TP counterparts (median=73.9, IQR=68.5–78.7). Holding constant their NCEE score, PP respondents were significantly more likely to come from urban areas, not be first-generation college students, and have parents with higher occupational status and income. Conclusions Assuming quality can be indicated by prior academic achievement at the point of selection, PPs achieved this mission. However, doing so limited medical students’ diversity. This may be unhelpful in achieving the Education Plan’s goal to better serve China’s health needs.
Rational general solutions of algebraic ordinary differential equations

We give a necessary and sufficient condition for an algebraic ODE to have a rational type general solution. For an autonomous first order ODE, we give an algorithm to compute a rational general solution if it exists. The algorithm is based on the relation between rational solutions of the first order ODE and rational parametrizations of the plane algebraic curve defined by the first order ODE and Padé approximants.