Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Factors Influencing Lateral Distance and Speed of Motorized Vehicles Overtaking Bicycles

This research analyzed the factors influencing lateral distance and speed of motorized vehicles overtaking cyclists. The measurement apparatus consisted of an instrumented bicycle equipped with an ultrasonic sensor, a speed radar, GPS devices and a GoPro camera. The experiment was carried out along a predetermined route in the urban area of Londrina, in the state of Paraná, Brazil. A total of 36 tours were performed, wherein 2032 overtaking maneuvers were identified. Several factors were regressed on two dependent variables, namely the overtaking speed and the lateral distance, within a path analysis modeling framework to assess their contributions to the cyclist safety. The presence of painted bike lanes was shown to be the most important aspect, as lateral clearance increased by an average 31 cm compared with that for streets without this intervention. It should be noted though that this effect is higher for lanes with larger widths, with practically no influence on narrower lanes. Larger lateral distances were found in wider streets, whereas heavier vehicles and higher speed limits were associated with faster overtaking maneuvers. The most critical factor was related to cycling in commercial city zones where the combined effects posed a greater risk to cycling (i.e., higher overtaking speeds with shorter lateral distances). These findings shed light on relevant policies to promote cyclist safety and cycling attractiveness, such as expanding cycling infrastructure, decreasing street speed limits and informing citizens about the safest cycling routes in their urban environment.
The sFlt-1/PlGF Ratio in Pregnant Patients Affected by COVID-19

COVID-19 in pregnant women increases the risk of adverse pregnancy outcomes, including preeclampsia. This meta-analysis aimed to examine the effect of SARS-CoV-2 infection on sFlt-1/PIGF ratio during pregnancy. The study was designed as a systematic review and meta-analysis. PubMed, Web of Science, Embase and Cochrane Library were searched for relevant studies reporting the sFlt-1/PlGF ratio in pregnant women with COVID-19. Results were compared using meta-analysis by the Mantel–Haenszel method. A total of 7 studies were included in the analysis. sFlt-1/PlGF ratios between COVID-19 positive vs. negative women were 45.8 ± 50.3 vs. 37.4 ± 22.5, respectively (SMD = 1.76; 95% CI: 0.43 to 3.09; p = 0.01). sFlt-1/PlGF ratios between asymptomatic vs. symptomatic patients were 49.3 ± 35.7 vs. 37.1 ± 25.6 (SMD = 0.30; 95% CI: −0.35 to 0.95; p = 0.36). sFlt-1/PlGF ratio in non-severe group was 30.7 ± 56.5, compared to 64.7 ± 53.5 for severe patients (SMD = −1.88; 95% CI: −3.77 to 0.01; p = 0.05). sFlt-1/PlGF ratios in COVID-19 patients, with and without hypertensive disease of pregnancy, were 187.0 ± 121.8 vs. 21.6 ± 8.6, respectively (SMD = 2.46; 95% CI: 0.99 to 3.93; p = 0.001). Conclusions: Patients with COVID-19, as compared to patients without COVID-19, were characterized by higher sFlt-1/PlGF ratio. Moreover, severe COVID-19 and SARS-CoV-2 infection in hypertensive pregnant women was related to significantly higher sFlt-1/PlGF ratio.
MOEA/D with Feasibility-based Weight Adjustment for Constrained Optimization

Although metaheuristics are mainly focused on unconstrained optimization, real-world applications require its extension to constrained optimization by maintaining and utilizing direct search and multi-point search. Constraint handling techniques for metaheuristics are known to use constraint violation as an additional objective function, but in general, they utilize Pareto ranking, which leaves issues of feasibility and convergence of the obtained solution. To address this issue, this paper extends MOEA/D, a multi-objective optimization method using a scalarization framework, to constrained optimization and proposes an adaptive weight adjustment method suitable for constrained optimization. Finally, we verify the usefulness of the proposed method through numerical experiments.
Thrombosis Models: An Overview of Common In Vivo and In Vitro Models of Thrombosis

Occlusions in the blood vessels caused by blood clots, referred to as thrombosis, and the subsequent outcomes are leading causes of morbidity and mortality worldwide. In vitro and in vivo models of thrombosis have advanced our understanding of the complex pathways involved in its development and allowed the evaluation of different therapeutic approaches for its management. This review summarizes different commonly used approaches to induce thrombosis in vivo and in vitro, without detailing the protocols for each technique or the mechanism of thrombus development. For ease of flow, a schematic illustration of the models mentioned in the review is shown below. Considering the number of available approaches, we emphasize the importance of standardizing thrombosis models in research per study aim and application, as different pathophysiological mechanisms are involved in each model, and they exert varying responses to the same carried tests. For the time being, the selection of the appropriate model depends on several factors, including the available settings and research facilities, the aim of the research and its application, and the researchers’ experience and ability to perform surgical interventions if needed.
Angiotensin Receptor Blocker Associated with a Decreased Risk of Lung Cancer: An Updated Meta-Analysis

Introduction: There have been disputes in the association between angiotensin receptor blockers (ARB) and the incidence of lung cancer. Our meta-analysis reevaluated this problem from the perspectives of race, age, drug type, comparison objects and smoking. Method: We used the following databases to carry out our literature search: Pubmed, Medline, Cochrane Library, and Ovid (From 1 January 2020 to 28 November 2021). The correlation between ARBs and the incidence rate of lung cancer was calculated by risk ratios (RRs). Confidence intervals were selected with 95% confidence intervals. Results: A total of 10 randomized controlled trials (RCTs), 18 retrospective studies and 3 case-control studies were found to satisfy the inclusion criteria. The use of ARB drugs reduced the incidence of lung cancer. The pooled results of 10 retrospective studies revealed a decreased lung cancer incidence in patients treated with ARBs, especially in patients using Valsartan. A significantly lower lung cancer incidence was found in the ARB drugs than in calcium channel blockers (CCBs) and angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors (ACEIs). Lung cancer occurrence was lower in Asian-based studies, especially in Mongolian-dominated and Caucasian-dominated patient populations. No significant decrease in lung cancer occurrence was found in RCTs or in patients receiving telmisartan, losartan, candesartan, irbesartan, or other placebo or in American and European-dominated patient populations. Conclusion: Compared with ACEIs and CCBs, ARBs significantly reduce the risk of lung cancer, especially in Asian and Mongolian populations. Valsartan has the best effect in reducing the risk of lung cancer in ARB drugs.
A vowel synthesizer based on formant sinusoids modulated by fundamental frequency

A vowel synthesis algorithm was developed resembling parallel formant synthesizers. However, the formants are computed as amplitude-and phase-modulated sinusoids instead of being represented by recursive filters or resonators. The fundamental frequency is imposed on the signal in the following way: Each pitch period exhibits an initial rise of a duration of π/2 of the first formant frequency; at the end of this ramp period all formants start as sinusoids at predefined phase angles and amplitudes, and successively undergo linear attenuation toward zero amplitude at the end of each pitch period. Adjacent pitch periods, thus, do not influence each other. In principle, the signals produced by this algorithm are similar to the output of parallel formant synthesizers [e.g., D. H. Klatt, J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 67, 971–995 (1980)]. However, by incremental sample-by-sample computation of the formants’ phase angles, formant frequencies are allowed to continuously change within single pitch periods. This new algorithm .
A Duplex Dual Bands Circularly Polarized Patch Antenna for Satellite Internet

This paper proposes a duplex dual circularly polarized (CP) antenna for satellites communication. The downlink operates in 11.3 - 12.3 GHz with right-hand circular polarization (RHCP), and the uplink operates in 14 - 14.5 GHz with left-hand circular polarization (LHCP). The sequential rotation(SR) technique is used to achieve the circular polarization, and the CP axial ratio (AR) of operating bands are below 3 dB. The elevation angle of the 3-dB AR of the center frequency in uplink is larger than ±45°, and in downlink is larger than ±48°. This structure also uses an electromagnetic band gap (EBG) structure for decoupling and achieves an isolation more than -36.16 dB in the uplink. Finally, By calculating the beam direction patterns of 16 ×16 array with HFSS array factor calculation, the scan angle is larger than 23° when inputting 90° phase difference in phi=0° direction.
Design Science Research towards ECHO Governance and Management Information System

The ECHO (European network of Cybersecurity centers and competence Hub for innovation and Operations) CNO (collaborative network organization) is supposed to start operating in early 2023. The management of the information flows is important for the successful governance of the CNO. For the needs of the future organization, this design science research (DSR) develops a Governance and Management Information System (GMIS), which will be a communication-driven decision-making system with a common space for a document database and tools for communication and teamwork. The paper describes five design cycles and their results: (1) ECHO GMIS high-level functions, (2) process support functions, (3) information-sharing functions, (4) platform planning, and (5) implementation plan. The follow-up studies are presented in three different timeframes: what can be done before the CNO starts operating, what can be done immediately after the CNO starts operating, and a medium-term plan. Finally, the research is evaluated using the DSR framework.
Discovery of Polyphenolic Natural Products as SARS-CoV-2 Mpro Inhibitors for COVID-19

The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has forced the development of direct-acting antiviral drugs due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. The main protease of SARS-CoV-2 is a crucial enzyme that breaks down polyproteins synthesized from the viral RNA, making it a validated target for the development of SARS-CoV-2 therapeutics. New chemical phenotypes are frequently discovered in natural goods. In the current study, we used a fluorogenic assay to test a variety of natural products for their ability to inhibit SARS-CoV-2 Mpro. Several compounds were discovered to inhibit Mpro at low micromolar concentrations. It was possible to crystallize robinetin together with SARS-CoV-2 Mpro, and the X-ray structure revealed covalent interaction with the protease’s catalytic Cys145 site. Selected potent molecules also exhibited antiviral properties without cytotoxicity. Some of these powerful inhibitors might be utilized as lead compounds for future COVID-19 research.
Feature difference and feature correlation learning mechanism for skeleton-based action recognition

Abstract. In recent years, skeleton-based action recognition has become increasingly popular in the field of human action recognition, and graph convolutional networks (GCNs) have shown better advantages in this task. Many GCN-based methods are insufficient in the latent relationship between features, which affects the discriminability of features being not rich enough. These potential feature relationships can manifest as feature differences that change due to actions and feature correlations that interact with each other. Therefore, we propose a feature difference and feature correlation learning mechanism to learn discriminative augmentation features, including feature differences in actions and feature correlations between joints. First, we propose a temporal feature difference and correlation learning module (FDCL) (TFDCL). In adjacent temporal frames, we extract feature correlations between related parts. Feature differences are captured through changes in joints over the overall long-term timeline. Second, we propose a channel FDCL module. Different channels contain different types of features for actions. We use convolution operations to interact between channels, continuously extracting the strongest features to obtain feature maps. Third, we propose a temporal channel context topology (TCCT) module to dynamically learn global contextual features of all joints during motion. Finally, experiments are conducted on the NTU-RGBD 60 dataset and the kinetics-skeleton 400 dataset to verify the effectiveness of the network.
A Circularly Polarized Multi-beam Antenna Based on SIW Pillbox Beamforming Network

This paper proposed a circularly polarized multi-beam antenna. This antenna is based on a substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) pillbox beamforming network (BFN). The proposed antenna is composed of a SIW pillbox fabricated by dual-layered printed circuit broad (PCB) and a circular polarizer fabricated by computer numerical control (CNC) technology. Five SIW horns are placed at the focal plane of the pillbox BFN. The horns can generate the output signals with different phase gradients when they placed at the different position of the focal plane, which can realize the multi-beams in different directions by switching the feeding ports. The CNC circular polarizer is loaded at the end of the pillbox ports to realize circular polarizations. The antenna is designed at the frequency of 10 GHz, and the simulated results prove that the proposed structure can realize a ±24 deg beam scanning range with the maximum gain of 15.25 dBi. This antenna has advantages in circularly polarized radiation and low-cost passive beam scanning capability, making it suitable for radar and wireless communication systems.
Climate‐based identification of suitable cropping areas for giant reed and reed canary grass on marginal land in Central and Southern Europe under climate change

Giant reed (GR) and reed canary grass (RCG) have emerged as promising perennial industrial crops for providing sustainable bioenergy from marginal land. However, there is great uncertainty among farmers and researchers about where these crops can be grown in the future due to climate change, which complicates a timely transition to a bioeconomy. Therefore, this study quantifies marginal land and suitable cropping areas for GR and RCG in Europe, as well as their overlap. To derive these areas, the present (1991–2020) and future (2071–2100, RCP8.5) growing degree days, growing season length, annual precipitation, and aridity index were analyzed using the E‐OBS observational dataset and EURO‐CORDEX regional climate simulations. The study concludes that while marginal land will decrease by ~18%, GR and RCG will profit from the changing European climate, increasing by ~24% and ~13%, respectively. Looking at regions of overlap between marginal land and the selected crops, a decrease of ~87% and an increase of ~462% is projected for RCG and GR, respectively. This is due to marginal land shifting southward, benefitting the warm‐season grass GR, while RCG prefers cooler climates.
Marangoni effects of adsorption—desorption controlled surfactants on the leading end of an infinitely long bubble in a capillary

The leading end of an infinitely long gas bubble which displaces a viscous surfactant solution in a capillary tube is studied. The surfactant is present at elevated concentration and has sorption controlled mass transfer. The displaced fluid wets the wall, forming a continuous liquid film between the bubble and the capillary wall. Both the thickness of this film and the additional pressure required to aspirate the bubble depend upon the Marangoni stresses caused by non-uniform surfactant adsorption along the interface. The equations governing this flow are solved at asymptotically small capillary number for the case where the balances of momentum and mass transfer are coupled to leading order. As the Marangoni effect is increased over several orders of magnitude, the additional pressure and the wetting-layer thickness increase above the stress-free interface values found by Bretherton (1961) and approach an upper bound of 42/3 times the Bretherton values. Accompanying changes in the surface tension, Marangoni stress and surface velocity profiles as this upper bound is approached are described. Finally, surface viscosities that are intrinsic to the interfacial region are incorporated in the analysis. When small departures from surface equilibrium states are considered, the terms representing surface viscous effects have the same functional form as the Marangoni stresses and result in thicker films and higher additional pressures.
Femtosecond laser based in-fiber long period grating fabrication for improved solution sensing

This work reports femtosecond laser based fabrication of long period fiber gratings (LPFG). Index modulation in the core of single mode fiber (SMF) is written employing femtosecond pulse filamentation technique. Highly repeatable filamentary voids written in line-by-line femtosecond laser inscription technique enables steady and noise free growth of LPFGs. The sharp transmission valley (with a narrow full width at half maximum of 5 nm) of long period grating offers better resolution for refractive index (RI) measurement of a solution. The LPFGs inscribed by femtosecond laser radiation show RI sensing sensitivity of 29.199 nm/RIU which is three times higher than the sensitivity of LPFGs written by UV radiation (sensitivity: 11.179 nm/RIU). The position of transmission dip of a grating can be tailored relatively easily simply by varying the period of index modulation.
Hole and electron trapping in ion implanted thermal oxides and SIMOX

Optically assisted methods of injecting either electrons or holes into SiO/sub 2/ layers were used to determine the effect of ion implantation on charge trapping in oxides. Dry-grown thermal oxides and the buried oxides of material grown by the SIMOX (separation by implantation of oxygen) process were studied. Al, Si, and P ions were implanted into the oxides at doses of 1/spl times/10/sup 13/ to 1/spl times/10/sup 16/ and the oxides were annealed at 700, 900, or 1050/spl deg/C after implantation. High dose implantations were found to create electron traps having high capture cross sections, the density of which depends on the implant species, suggesting that electron trapping is related to chemical aspects of the implanted ion. This was supported by measurements on an oxide implanted with a large dose of Ar, which showed no increase in electron trapping. It was found that the shift in the flatband voltage resulting from hole trapping could be reduced by high dose implantations, and that this effect is only weakly dependent on implant species. The hole trapping results are explained in terms of the effect of implantation on the oxide structure.
A New Approach to Noninvasive-Prolonged Fatigue Identification Based on Surface EMG Time-Frequency and Wavelet Features

In sports, fatigue management is vital as adequate rest builds strength and enhances performance, whereas inadequate rest exposes the body to prolonged fatigue (PF) or also known as overtraining. This paper presents PF identification and classification based on surface electromyography (EMG) signals. An experiment was performed on twenty participants to investigate the behaviour of surface EMG during the inception of PF. PF symptoms were induced in accord with a five-day Bruce Protocol treadmill test on four lower extremity muscles: the biceps femoris (BF), rectus femoris (RF), vastus medialis (VM), and vastus lateralis (VL). The results demonstrate that the experiment successfully induces soreness, unexplained lethargy, and performance decrement and also indicate that the progression of PF can be observed based on changes in frequency features (ΔFmed and ΔFmean) and time features (ΔRMS and ΔMAV) of surface EMG. This study also demonstrates the ability of wavelet index features in PF identification. Using a naïve Bayes (NB) classifier exhibits the highest accuracy based on time and frequency features with 98% in distinguishing PF on RF, 94% on BF, 9% on VL, and 97% on VM. Thus, this study has positively indicated that surface EMG can be used in identifying the inception of PF. The implication of the findings is significant in sports to prevent a greater risk of PF.
Improved Attention-based AE-LSTM for Short-term Power Load Forecasting

Power load forecasting, which can increase system stability, is a more crucial link in the planning of the power system and the construction of sectors associated to power. Random feature changes in short-term load forecasting make the forecasting process more difficult. A more advanced attention-based AE-LSTM (Auto Encoder-Long Short-Term Memory) is a multivariate prediction model that aims to address the drawbacks of feature extraction of various information in numerous time steps and the substantial amount of computing in the training process. AE can obtain different kinds of temporal features to obtain related feature vectors. Since AE-LSTM has limitations in paying dynamic degrees of attention to sub-window characteristics over multi-time step. Through the idea of competitive random search, an improved attention learning algorithm is introduced to optimize AE-LSTM. Using attention sampling to mine relevant information in temporal features, and striving for random search, the model can reduce the phenomenon of local optimization. The experimental results verified the effectiveness of the proposed prediction model.
Initial In-Hospital Visit-to-Visit Heart Rate Variability Is Associated with Higher Risk of Atrial Fibrillation in Patients with Acute Ischemic Stroke

Background: To evaluate the association between the visit-to-visit heart rate variability and the risk of atrial fibrillation (AF) in acute ischemic stroke (AIS). Methods: We analyzed the data of 8179 patients with AIS. Patients without AF on 12-lead electrocardiography underwent further 24 h Holter monitoring. They were categorized into four subgroups according to the visit-to-visit heart rate variability expressed as the coefficient of variation in heart rate (HR-CV). Odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were estimated using the HR-CV < 0.08 subgroup as a reference. Results: The adjusted OR of paroxysmal AF was 1.866 (95% CI = 1.205–2.889) for the HR-CV ≥ 0.08 and <0.10 subgroup, 1.889 (95% CI = 1.174–3.038) for the HR-CV ≥ 0.10 and <0.12 subgroup, and 5.564 (95% CI = 3.847–8.047) for the HR-CV ≥ 0.12 subgroup. The adjusted OR of persistent AF was 2.425 (95% CI = 1.921–3.062) for the HR-CV ≥ 0.08 and <0.10 subgroup, 4.312 (95% CI = 3.415–5.446) for the HR-CV ≥ 0.10 and <0.12 subgroup, and 5.651 (95% CI = 4.586–6.964) for the HR-CV ≥ 0.12 subgroup. Conclusions: HR-CV can facilitate the identification of patients with AIS at a high risk of paroxysmal AF.