Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Exploring the role of hub and network dysfunction in brain connectomes of schizophrenia using functional magnetic resonance imaging

Introduction Pathophysiological etiology of schizophrenia remains unclear due to the heterogeneous nature of its biological and clinical manifestations. Dysfunctional communication among large-scale brain networks and hub nodes have been reported. In this study, an exploratory approach was adopted to evaluate the dysfunctional connectome of brain in schizophrenia. Methods Two hundred adult individuals with schizophrenia and 200 healthy controls were recruited from Taipei Veterans General Hospital. All subjects received functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanning. Functional connectivity (FC) between parcellated brain regions were obtained. Pair-wise brain regions with significantly different functional connectivity among the two groups were identified and further analyzed for their concurrent ratio of connectomic differences with another solitary brain region (single-FC dysfunction) or dynamically interconnected brain network (network-FC dysfunction). Results The right thalamus had the highest number of significantly different pair-wise functional connectivity between schizophrenia and control groups, followed by the left thalamus and the right middle frontal gyrus. For individual brain regions, dysfunctional single-FCs and network-FCs could be found concurrently. Dysfunctional single-FCs distributed extensively in the whole brain of schizophrenia patients, but overlapped in similar groups of brain nodes. A dysfunctional module could be formed, with thalamus being the key dysfunctional hub. Discussion The thalamus can be a critical hub in the brain that its dysfunctional connectome with other brain regions is significant in schizophrenia patients. Interconnections between dysfunctional FCs for individual brain regions may provide future guide to identify critical brain pathology associated with schizophrenia.
Tracing outsideness : young women's institutional journeys and the geographies of closed space

Understanding confinement and its complex workings between individuals and society has been the stated aim of carceral geography and wider studies on detention. This project contributes ethnographic insights from multiple sites of incarceration, working with an under-researched group within confined populations. Focussing on young female detainees in Scotland, this project seeks to understand their experiences of different types of ‘closed’ space. Secure care, prison and closed psychiatric facilities all impact on the complex geographies of these young women’s lives. The fluid but always situated relations of control and care provide the backdrop for their journeys in/out and beyond institutional spaces. Understanding institutional journeys with reference to age and gender allows an insight into the highly mobile, often precarious, and unfamiliar lives of these young women who live on the margins. This thesis employs a mixed-method qualitative approach and explores what Goffman calls the ‘tissue and fabric’ of detention as a complex multi-institutional practice. In order to be able to understand the young women’s gendered, emotional and often repetitive experiences of confinement, analysis of the constitution of ‘closed space’ represents a first step for inquiry. The underlying nature of inner regimes, rules and discipline in closed spaces, provide the background on which confinement is lived, perceived and processed. The second part of the analysis is the exploration of individual experiences ‘on the inside’, ranging from young women’s views on entering a closed institution, the ways in which they adapt or resist the regime, and how they cope with embodied aspects of detention. The third and final step considers the wider context of incarceration by recovering the young women’s journeys through different types of institutional spaces and beyond. The exploration of these journeys challenges and re-develops understandings of mobility and inertia by engaging the relative power of carceral archipelagos and the figure of femina sacra. This project sits comfortably within the field of carceral geography while also pushing at its boundaries. On a conceptual level, a re-engagement with Goffman’s micro-analysis challenges current carceral-geographic theory development. Perhaps more importantly, this project pushes for an engagement with different institutions under the umbrella of carceral geography, thus creating new dialogues on issues like ‘care’ and ‘control’. Finally, an engagement with young women addresses an under-represented population within carceral geography in ways that raise distinctly problematic concerns for academic research and penal policy. Overall, this project aims to show the value of fine grained micro-level research in institutional geographies for extending thinking and understanding about society’s responses to a group of people who live on the margins of social and legal norms.
Detection of Ridge Damages in Fingerprint Recognition Caused by Skin Diseases

This article describes research on the topic of the influence of skin diseases on fingerprint recognition, particularly the actual detection of fingerprint areas negatively influenced by skin diseases. It introduces a number of skin diseases, describes their influence on fingerprint images according to a diseased fingerprint database, explains methods used for the detection and finally presents results of this research
Determination of Phenylethanolamine A Residues in Milk by Solid Phase Extraction-Liquid Chromatography Tandem Mass Spectrometry

A method was established for the determination of phenethanolamine A residue in milk by solid phase extraction, liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry. The samples were extracted with ammonium acetate buffer solution under the condition of enzymatic hydrolysis and purified by MCX solid phase extraction column. The eluent was blown dry with nitrogen at 45℃ and dissolved with 1.0 mL 0.1% formic acid solution. The samples were isolated by Poroshell 120EC-C18, 100 mm ×3.0 mm (i.d.), 2.7 μm column, and then determined by mass spectrometry in multiple reaction monitoring mode, and quantified by internal standard method. The results showed that phenethanolamine A had good linear relationship in the concentration range of 0.5-50.0 μg/L, the correlation coefficient r=0.9984, the limit of detection was 0.17 μg/kg, and the limit of quantitation was 0.57 μg/kg. The average recovery was 98.3-108.7% and the precision was 2.4-3.7% at different supplemental levels. The established method can purify the samples effectively, improve the detection efficiency, and is suitable for the detection of phenethanolamine A residue in milk.
Sweat Rate, Sweat Sodium Losses, and Body Composition in Professional Male Soccer Players in Southwest Colombia

Background and Objective: Dehydration and hyperhydration impact athletes’ performance. Exploring the fluid balance concerning body composition might help estimate individual hydration requirements. This area of research, particularly regarding sodium losses, has been relatively understudied. We evaluated the sweat rate (SR), sweat sodium losses, and their relationship with body composition in professional soccer players in Cali, Colombia. Materials and Methods: Thirty-two male players, aged 24.3 (±5.2) years, from the Colombian main soccer league, underwent high-intensity training at 32 °C (with a relative humidity of 79%). The outcome variables included SR, calculated using weight loss and fluid intake; forearm sweat sodium concentration (FSCC), measured through the direct ion-selective electrode method; and estimated the predicted whole sweat sodium loss (PWSSL) in mmol. Predictor variables (body mass, fat, and muscle masses) were estimated using the Deborah Kerr anthropometry method. The association between predictors and outcomes was assessed using linear regression. Results: The mean FSCC, PWSSL, and SR were 26.7 ± 11.3 mmol/L, 43 ± 15.9 mmol/L, and 1.7 ± 0.5 L/h, respectively. Body mass positively predicted FSCC in unadjusted and age/fat-mass-adjusted models [Beta 1.28, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.39–2.18, p = 0.006], and continued related to FSCC after adjustment for muscle mass with marginal significance [Beta 0.85, 95% CI −0.02 to 1.73, p = 0.056]. Muscle mass was associated with the PWSSL in unadjusted and age/fat-mass-adjusted models [Beta 2.42, 95% CI 0.58–4.26, p = 0.012] and sustained an association with marginal statistical significance after adjustment for body mass [Beta 1.86, 95% CI −0.35 to 4.09, p = 0.097]. Conclusions: Under hot tropical weather conditions, FSCC was relatively low among the players. Body mass was better associated with the FSSC, and muscle mass better related to the PWSSL. Body and muscle masses could be regarded as potential factors to be explored in the estimation of individual sodium needs. However, further studies are required to validate and contrast our findings.
The Information Propagation Method for Efficient Network Reliability Analysis

In this paper, we present an ordered message-passing algorithm for propagating information related to system component conditions and dependency between nodes in the target graph network. This tool, called Information Propagation Method, exploits the structure of Directed Acyclic Graphs to assess the reliability of a network. The key advantage of this analytical approach is the computation efficiency obtained by maintaining a priority set of nodes to be updated in each step, every node in the graph is processed as infrequently as possible. Whilst the algorithm converges to an exact solution in simpler graph structures, the solution in more complex graphs is approximated due to the presence of the so-called diamond subgraphs. Diamond subgraphs are identifying solved and recursively decomposed by the algorithm allowing the exploration of complex component dynamics as well as system redundancy strategies. The algorithm is verified against the solution obtained via Monte Carlo simulation. Finally, we discuss a case study example showing the applicability and advantages of the proposed algorithm.
Randomizing Set-Associative Caches Against Conflict-Based Cache Side-Channel Attacks

Conflict-based cache side-channel attacks against the last-level cache (LLC) is a widely exploited method for information leaking. Cache randomization has recently been accepted as a promising defense. Most of recent designs randomize skewed caches rather than classic set-associative caches; however, skewed caches incur substantial performance overhead both in area and runtime. We cautiously argue that randomized set-associative caches can be sufficiently strengthened and possess a better chance to be adopted in the near future. For the first time, a dynamically randomized set-associative cache has been implemented in the LLC of a Linux capable multicore processor. A single-cycle hash logic is designed for randomizing the cache set indices. A multi-step relocation scheme is used to reduce the cost in remapping the cache layout. The randomized cache layout is remapped periodically for limiting the time window available to attackers. An attack detector is implemented to catch attacks in action and consequently trigger extra remaps. The evaluation results show that the randomized LLC has been sufficiently strengthened to thwart all existing fast algorithms for searching eviction sets with only marginal runtime overhead, and small area and power overhead.
Efficient Method of Firing Angle Calculation for Multiple Launch Rocket System Based on Polynomial Response Surface and Kriging Metamodels

Aiming at solving the problem of firing angle calculation for the multiple launch rocket system (MLRS) under both standard and actual atmospheric conditions, an efficient method based on large sample data and metamodel is proposed. The polynomial response surface, Kriging, and the ensemble of metamodels are used to establish the functional relations between the firing angle, the maximum range angle, the maximum range, and various influencing factors under standard atmospheric conditions, and related processes are described in detail. On this basis, the initial values for the first two iterations are determined with the meteorological data being made full use of in the six degrees of freedom trajectory simulation, and then the firing angle corresponding to a specific range is automatically and iteratively calculated. The efficient method of firing angle calculation for the typical MLRS has been extensively tested with three cases. The results show that the high-order polynomial response surface, the Kriging predictors with Cubic, Gauss, and Spline correlation functions, and the ensemble of above four individual metamodels have better performances for predicting the firing angle under standard atmospheric conditions compared with those of other metamodels under identical conditions, and execution times of the above four individual metamodels with a training sample size of 9000 are all less than 0.9ms, which verifies the effectiveness and feasibility of the proposed method for calculating the firing angle under standard atmospheric conditions. Moreover, the number of iterations is effectively reduced by using the proposed iterative search approach under actual atmospheric conditions. This research can provide guidance for designing the fire control and command control system of the MLRS.
Pest Identification Based on Fusion of Self-Attention With ResNet

Pest identification is a challenging task in the agricultural sector, as accurate and timely detection of pests is essential for effective pest control and crop protection. Conventional approaches to pest detection, such as entomological knowledge and manual examination, take a lot of time and are prone to human mistakes. The advent of Deep Learning (DL) techniques has revolutionized the field of computer vision, enabling automated and efficient pest recognition systems.In this research, we compared the effectiveness of many deep learning models and suggested an enhanced approach for more effective feature extraction. In the proposed approach, we have incorporated two parallel attention mechanisms in ResNet architectures and it has a significant improvement in performance. Experimental result shows that the performance accuracy obtained in ResNet50-SA, ResNet101-SA, and ResNet152-SA is 99.80%, 88.48% and 96.68%, respectively. The performance of ResNet50-SA outperforms the other state of art deep learning by a large margin. The result shows that ResNet with self-attention (SA) has a better ability to extract features and focus on the important features which increases the performance.
Advancing precision medicine: the potential of nanoparticle drug carriers

Due to its outstanding characteristics and crucial significance in the field of nano-drug delivery, nanotechnology has garnered an incredible deal of research interest from the academic community in the past decade. The use of nanoparticles to carry or encapsulate drugs to reach the affected area for targeted therapy is one of the hot research directions. These nanoparticles come from a wide variety of sources, including metals, biomass, and other materials. In this paper, a series of different types of nanoparticles are listed in detail as the relevant means of drug delivery, and the corresponding research results are presented. These include metallic nanoparticles (copper, zinc), biomass polymeric nanoparticles (cellulose, chitosan) as well as micelles and liposomes. Considering the lack of clinical data in the field of nano drug delivery, this paper also provides some potential factors that should be taken into consideration for future clinical applications of nano drug transport, such as sustainability, safety, and commercialization. This paper aims to provide some research ideas and insights for future researchers in this field.
Comparative pharmacoeconomic analysis of rituximab and traditional tacrolimus regimens in membranous nephropathy in China

Background: Rituximab (RTX) is a monoclonal antibody that selectively targets CD20 and is frequently used in the treatment of membranous nephropathy (MN). Analysis of the therapeutic efficacy and safety of RTX in treating MN in practice and a comparative pharmacoeconomic analysis of the RTX and traditional tacrolimus (TAC) regimens can provide valuable insights to aid decision-making by the government and relevant medical insurance departments. Methods: We conducted a statistical analysis of medical records from patients diagnosed with MN who underwent RTX treatment between 1 January 2019 and 1 January 2023. The TAC data were obtained from the clinical literature. The efficacy rates and incidence of adverse effects (AEs) were calculated to compare the efficacy and safety of RTX and TAC. Based on the patient’s disease status, we developed a Markov model to compare the total cost, remission rate, and incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) of the two regimens. Both univariate and probability sensitivity analyses were performed to validate the stability of the developed model. Results: The RTX group enrolled 53 patients with MN, and the 12-month overall efficacy rate was not significantly different from that of the TAC group with 35 patients (86.79% vs. 71.4%, p = 0.0131); however, the relapse rate was significantly lower in the RTX group (3.77% vs. 22.8%, p = 0.016). The RTX group demonstrated no severe AEs (SAEs), while the TAC group demonstrated six cases of SAEs, including 4 cases of severe pneumonia, 1 case of lung abscess and 1 case of interstitial lung disease, accounting for 7.89% of traditional tacrolimus-treated patients. The baseline analysis results revealed that over a 5-year post-treatment period, RTX increased quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) by 0.058 and costs by ¥7,341. Assuming three times the 2022 domestic gross domestic product as the willingness-to-pay (WTP) threshold per QALY, the ICER of RTX compared to TAC was ¥124,631.14/QALY, which is less than the WTP threshold of ¥257,094/QALY, indicating that RTX treatment is approximately two times more cost-effective compared to TAC. Conclusion: The current analysis indicates that despite the expensive unit price of RTX, it remains a cost-effective treatment option for MN compared to TAC.
Left Atrial Stiffness Increases after Trans-Catheter Atrial Septal Closure

Background: Transcatheter atrial septal closures for secundum atrial septal defects (ASD) have demonstrated favorable clinical outcomes. However, the impact of device implantation on the stiffness of the left atrium remains unclear. Method: Patients with secundum ASD undergoing transcatheter closure and follow-up right heart catheterization at six months were included. We investigated the relationship between post-procedural (E/e’ ratio)/(LAs strain) ratio, an index of left atrial stiffness, and baseline characteristics, including echocardiographic and hemodynamic parameters. Results: Forty patients were included (median 69 (56, 75) years, 12 men, and pulmonary systemic flow ratio 2.27 (1.96, 2.86)). Trans-catheter ASD closure was successfully performed without any major complications, accompanying a significant reduction in right ventricular to left ventricular size ratio from 1.04 (0.87, 1.13) to 0.74 (0.66, 0.86) (p < 0.01). The (E/e’ ratio)/(LAs strain) ratio was markedly elevated the day after the procedure and was further increased 6 months later (before: 0.25 (0.17, 0.34), 1 day later: 0.34 (0.27, 0.50), 6 months later: 0.43 (0.27, 0.76), p < 0.01). The groups with higher (E/e’ ratio)/(LAs strain) ratios at 6 months had significantly more severe heart failure conditions including lower cardiac output and higher plasma B-type natriuretic peptides. Conclusions: Patients undergoing transcatheter ASD closure experienced improvement in hemodynamics and clinical symptoms but an elevation in left atrial stiffness post-procedure. The clinical ramifications of this finding, particularly during the longer-term observation period subsequent to ASD closure, warrant further investigation.
Primary magmas and mantle temperatures through time

Chemical composition of mafic magmas is a critical indicator of physicochemical conditions, such as pressure, temperature, and fluid availability, accompanying melt production in the mantle and its evolution in the continental or oceanic lithosphere. Recovering this information has fundamental implications in constraining the thermal state of the mantle and the physics of mantle convection throughout the Earth's history. Here a statistical approach is applied to a geochemical database of about 22,000 samples from the mafic magma record. Potential temperatures (Tps) of the mantle derived from this database, assuming melting by adiabatic decompression and a Ti‐dependent (Fe2O3/TiO2 = 0.5) or constant redox condition (Fe2+/∑Fe = 0.9 or 0.8) in the magmatic source, are thought to be representative of different thermal “horizons” (or thermal heterogeneities) in the ambient mantle, ranging in depth from a shallow sublithospheric mantle (Tp minima) to a lower thermal boundary layer (Tp maxima). The difference of temperature (ΔTp) observed between Tp maxima and minima did not change significantly with time (∼170°C). Conversely, a progressive but limited cooling of ∼150°C is proposed since ∼2.5 Gyr for the Earth's ambient mantle, which falls in the lower limit proposed by Herzberg et al. [2010] (∼150–250°C hotter than today). Cooling of the ambient mantle after 2.5 Ga is preceded by a high‐temperature plateau evolution and a transition from dominant plumes to a plate tectonics geodynamic regime, suggesting that subductions stabilized temperatures in the Archaean mantle that was in warming mode at that time.
Effect of Septum Deviation on the Airflow Distribution for a Patient Specific Model using Numerical Methods

Septal deviation (SD) in nasal cavity plays a crucial role in symptoms related to nasal obstruction, aesthetic appearance of the nose, and increase in nasal resistance, and may induce snoring. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the significance of SD on the air flow behaviour and compare its deviation with a healthy nasal cavity by using CFD. A 3D CAD model of subject specific nasal cavity was generated from CT images of patient with septal deviation. The variation of maximum WSS observed in the present study was higher when compared with that of normal subjects. In contrast to the healthy subject, the airflow in the septal deviation models showed asymmetry in bilateral nasal cavities. The maximum velocity inside the nasal cavity exceeded the value that was usually found at the nasal valve region. The findings from this study help understand the basic aerodynamics in a severely deviated septum.