Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Gender Inequality as a Barrier to Utilization of Services in Mother to Child Transmission of HIV/AIDS in Pakistan

This study examines gender inequality as a barrier to utilization of services in mother to child transmission of HIV/AIDS in Pakistan. The study uses a feminist approach to explore the barriers related to gender inequality during the uptake of HIV treatment. The data was collected from 26 medical practitioners and 10 HIV positive mothers through in-depth interviews. HIV positive mothers were found to have experienced discrimination in their treatment, difficulty in traveling from far off areas to the special clinics, and they expressed having the least family support as HIV patients.They also experienced inequality in terms of the use of ARV prophylaxis, autonomy in reproductive choices, sexual priorities, disclosure, stigma, agency and intimate partner violence. Furthermore, they emphasized the need for sensitization and counseling of male spouses. The study concludes that the gender inequality grossly affects the uptake of HIV treatment among HIV positive mothers. It is thus recommended that there is a need to incorporate gender inclusive policy and practice to eliminate the vertical transmission of HIV in Pakistan.
Active Transposition of Insertion Sequences in Prokaryotes: Insights from the Response of Deinococcus geothermalis to Oxidative Stress

Bacterial genomes contain numerous insertion sequences (ISs) as transposable elements involved in actions such as the sequestration, transmission, mutation and activation of genes that can influence the responsive capacity of the organism to environmental challenges. To date, at least 30 IS families have been identified. In this review, we describe how certain ISs are transposed to carotenoid biosynthesis genes, such as phytoene synthase and phytoene desaturase, when radiation-resistant Deinococcus geothermalis with a redox imbalance and a targeted gene disruption mutation is exposed to oxidative stressors, such as gamma-irradiation, dielectric bilayer discharge plasma and hydrogen peroxide. We also explain the genetic features of IS elements, spontaneous mutation and various stress responses, including nutrient limitation, and physicochemical and oxidative stress, associated with the active transposition of bacterial ISs. Based on the current knowledge, we posit that the redox signalling mechanism inducing IS transposition involves redox sensing and redox switching for the activation of transposase expression and its activity.
The Neurotoxicity of Vesicles Secreted by ALS Patient Myotubes Is Specific to Exosome-Like and Not Larger Subtypes

Extracellular vesicles can mediate communication between tissues, affecting the physiological conditions of recipient cells. They are increasingly investigated in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, the most common form of Motor Neurone Disease, as transporters of misfolded proteins including SOD1, FUS, TDP43, or other neurotoxic elements, such as the dipeptide repeats resulting from C9orf72 expansions. EVs are classified based on their biogenesis and size and can be separated by differential centrifugation. They include exosomes, released by the fusion of multivesicular bodies with the plasma membrane, and ectosomes, also known as microvesicles or microparticles, resulting from budding or pinching of the plasma membrane. In the current study, EVs were obtained from the myotube cell culture medium of ALS patients or healthy controls. EVs of two different sizes, separating at 20,000 or 100,000 g, were then compared in terms of their effects on recipient motor neurons, astrocytes, and myotubes. Compared to untreated cells, the smaller, exosome-like vesicles of ALS patients reduced the survival of motor neurons by 31% and of myotubes by 18%, decreased neurite length and branching, and increased the proportion of stellate astrocytes, whereas neither those of healthy subjects, nor larger EVs of ALS or healthy subjects, had such effects.
SMC Development Guidelines for Axial Flux PM Machines Employing Coreless Rotor Structure for Enhancing Efficiency Based on Experimental Results

In recent years, there has been growing demand for flat electrical machines in order to minimize system size while also maintaining high efficiency. In general, axial flux machines (AFMs) are more suitable for flat form than radial flux machines (RFMs). AFMs usually employ a soft magnetic composite (SMC) for the stator core, and their efficiency can be improved by employing an SMC that has low iron loss. However, this reduces the average torque because there is generally a tradeoff relationship between iron loss and magnetic permeability in SMCs. This article, therefore, proposes an AFM with a coreless rotor structure in which the torque performance is not easily affected by the permeability of the SMC. This article aims to reveal the ideal SMC characteristics for high efficiency in AFMs. First, many virtual SMC materials with different iron loss and permeability are used for simulations of AFMs in order to investigate sensitivity to material properties. The simulations by virtual SMCs take into account the experimental increase in the iron loss. As a result, guidelines for developing SMCs are constructed based on the experimental results. Finally, prototype AFMs employing new SMCs developed by following the guidelines are shown, and it is found that they offer higher efficiency in all operating area than conventional AFMs. In particular, one prototype achieves an extremely high efficiency of over 96% at 6000 r/min, 0.8 Nm in experiments.
A decade of delay in ratification of the ballast water management convention and further underlying problems

Ballast water is a major transport mechanism responsible for the introduction of invasive aquatic species to marine ecosystems around the world. The threat posed by ballast water for future spread of aquatic organisms has been a concern for the international community since the early 1990s. The International Maritime Organisation introduced the Ballast Water Management Convention in 2004. Global enforcement of this Convention will occur after ratification by at least 30 countries representing not less than 35% of the gross tonnage of the world’s merchant shipping. However, after over a decade the tonnage requirement has not been reached and the Convention has not yet entered into force. The unfamiliarity of stakeholders with multi-dimensional issues of Ballast Water and the lack of technological knowledge has created resistance to ratifying the Convention and hence a delay of over a decade. Collecting representative samples and developing reliable detection tools has been identified as causing delay to the implementation of the BW Convention. However, solutions have been sought for many of the initial Ballast Water issues but not all. This paper discusses three main issues in greater detail: 1. treatment systems, 2. sample size and 3. sample analysis, describing and highlighting the importance of certain underlying problems that still exist and may continue even after implementation of the Convention.
Accurate and Reliable Service Recommendation Based on Bilateral Perception in Multi-Access Edge Computing

Multi-access edge computing (MEC) is an emerging computing paradigm that brings services from the centralized cloud to nearby network edge to improve users’ Quality of Experience (QoE). As massive services with dynamic Quality of Service (QoS) are available in MEC, it becomes challenging for users to find reliable services that satisfy their needs. Therefore, service recommendation technology is urgently needed in MEC. Although existing service recommendation methods work well on recommending popular services that users might be interested in, they fail to recommend services with reliable QoS in the MEC environment. To tackle this issue, an accurate and reliable service recommendation (ARSR) approach based on bilateral perception is proposed, which aims to proactively recommend reliable services by perceiving both users’ service demands and multi-QoS of candidate services. ARSR consists of three main steps. First, a user's service demand is estimated by a context-aware service demand prediction method based on an improved online deep learning model. Then, multiple QoS attributes of candidate services are forecasted by a multidimensional contexts-aware QoS prediction method based on an improved multi-task deep neural network. Finally, the optimal service is recommended to the user based on the predicted QoS. Extensive experiments have been carried out to verify the proposed approach and to prove its performance superiority.
Will Minimal Group Membership Affect Individuals of Different Ages’ Tendency to Obey Instructions to Act Negatively Towards a Target (Who is in a Novel Ingroup versus Outgroup)?

Stanley Milgram’s experiment on obedience to authority in 1961 aimed to investigate the reasons behind acts of genocide and war. Taking inspiration from this experiment, the paper’s literature review synthesises research from Stanley Milgrim, Yarrow Dunham, Judith Smetana and many other researchers to present an in-depth acknowledgement of ingroup favouritism, obedience, and the variations in behaviour between different age groups and circumstances. Then, the research proposal aims to investigate the two following questions: will minimal group membership affect individuals’ tendency to obey instructions to act negatively towards a target (who is in a novel ingroup versus outgroup)? Does the level of obedience differ between adults and teenagers?
Reflecting on research produced after more than 60 years of exclosures in the Kruger National Park

Herbivores are a main driver of ecosystem patterns and processes in semi-arid savannas, with their effects clearly observed when they are excluded from landscapes. Starting in the 1960s, various herbivore exclosures have been erected in the Kruger National Park (KNP), for research and management purposes. These exclosures vary from very small (1 m2) to relatively large (almost 900 ha), from short-term (single growing season) to long-term (e.g. some of the exclosures were erected more than 60 years ago), and are located on different geologies and across a rainfall gradient. We provide a summary of the history and specifications of various exclosures. This is followed by a systematic overview of mostly peer-reviewed literature resulting from using KNP exclosures as research sites. These 75 articles cover research on soils, vegetation dynamics, herbivore exclusion on other faunal groups and disease. We provide general patterns and mechanisms in a synthesis section, and end with recommendations to increase research outputs and productivity for future exclosure experiments. Conservation Implications: Herbivore exclosures in the KNP have become global research platforms, that have helped in the training of ecologists, veterinarians and field biologists, and have provided valuable insights into savanna dynamics that would otherwise have been hard to gain. In an age of dwindling conservation funding, we make the case for the value added by exclosures and make recommendations for their continued use as learning tools in complex African savannas.
Non-Invasive Systems and Methods Patents Review Based on Electrocardiogram for Diagnosis of Cardiovascular Diseases

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is a global public health problem. It is a disease of multifactorial origin, and with this characteristic, having an accurate diagnosis of its incidence is a problem that health personnel face every day. That is why having all the indispensable tools to achieve optimal results is of utmost importance. Time is an essential factor when identifying heart problems, specialists look for and develop options to improve this aspect, which requires a thorough analysis of the patient, electrocardiograms being the factor standard for diagnosis and monitoring of patients. In this paper, we review patents and combined systems for the analysis of existing electrocardiogram signals, specific to cardiovascular diseases. All these methods and equipment have the purpose of giving an accurate diagnosis and a prediction of the presence of CVD in patients with positive risk factors. These are considered as the first diagnostic option, based on the guidelines already established in the field of preventive cardiology. The methodology consists of the searching of specific electrocardiography and cardiovascular disease subjects, taking as a reference the use of various patent databases. A total of 2634 patents were obtained in the consulted databases. Of that total, only 30 patents that met all the previous criteria were considered; furthermore, a second in-depth review of their information was conducted. It is expected that studying and reviewing these patents will allow us to know the variety of tools available for the different pathologies that make up CVD, not only for its immediate diagnosis because, as mentioned, the time factor is decisive for the best forecast but also to allow us to follow up on all the cases that arise, being able to provide a better quality of life to patients with CVD or even being able to lead them to a full recovery.
In-Depth Reform and Practice of Theory-Practice Integration in Core Curriculum of Electrical Majors in New Engineering and Technical Disciplines

By studying the international mainstream advanced engineering education concepts and modes for the undergraduate training of top talents, this article explores and proposes a research teaching reform that integrates theory and practice in the core course of electrical majors. Relying on the course of "Analog Electronic Technology Fundamentals", a research-based project-driven class teaching integrated with training and competition was carried out. Through 7 rounds of teaching for 5 years, positive results have been achieved, verifying its radiation and promotion effects in terms of teaching mode and implementation measures.
Analysis of Environmental Emission Neat Diesel-Biodiesel–Algae Oil-Nanometal Additives in Compression Ignition Engines

The production of biodiesel as an alternative fuel and its use as a mixture and other additives are presented. In the present research work, additive blends with diesel biodiesel from algae oil are physically characterised and an analysis of pollutant emissions is carried out when used in an ignition engine by compression. The measurement of pollutant emissions is carried out through a combined emission analyzer adapted to a system of valves attached to the experimental facility. The properties of each mixture with the polluting emissions are compared with that of the reference diesel. It was found that each of the properties improves compared to that of diesel, reducing most emissions in the use of mixtures with biodiesel.
Chemical Variability and Pharmacological Potential of Propolis as a Source for the Development of New Pharmaceutical Products

This review aims to analyze propolis as a potential raw material for the development and manufacture of new health-promoting products. Many scientific publications were retrieved from the Scopus, PubMed, and Google Scholar databases via searching the word "propolis". The different extraction procedures, key biologically active compounds, biological properties, and therapeutic potential of propolis were analyzed. It was concluded that propolis possesses a variety of biological properties because of a very complex chemical composition that mainly depends on the plant species visited by bees and species of bees. Numerous studies found versatile pharmacological activities of propolis: antimicrobial, antifungal, antiviral, antioxidant, anticancer, anti-inflammatory, immunomodulatory, etc. In this review, the composition and biological activities of propolis are presented from a point of view of the origin and standardization of propolis for the purpose of the development of new pharmaceutical products on its base. It was revealed that some types of propolis, especially European propolis, contain flavonoids and phenolic acids, which could be markers for the standardization and quality evaluation of propolis and its preparations. One more focus of this paper was the overview of microorganisms’ sensitivity to propolis for further development of antimicrobial and antioxidant products for the treatment of various infectious diseases with an emphasis on the illnesses of the oral cavity. It was established that the antimicrobial activity of different types of propolis is quite significant, especially to Gram-negative bacteria and lipophilic viruses. The present study could be also of interest to the pharmaceutical industry as a review for the appropriate design of standardized propolis preparations such as mouthwashes, toothpastes, oral drops, sprays, creams, ointments, suppositories, tablets, and capsules, etc. Moreover, propolis could be regarded as a source for the isolation of biologically active substances. Furthermore, this review can facilitate partially overcoming the problem of the standardization of propolis preparations, which is a principal obstacle to the broader use of propolis in the pharmaceutical industry. Finally, this study could be of interest in the area of the food industry for the development of nutritionally well-balanced products. The results of this review indicate that propolis deserves to be better studied for its promising therapeutic effects from the point of view of the connection of its chemical composition with the locality of its collection, vegetation, appropriate extraction methods, and standardization.
Performance of Link Adaptation in Narrow Band Internet of Things

In present paper was aimed to study performance of link adaptation in NBIOT, which introduced by 3GPP in release 13 to function in mobile communications. The fundamental features of NB-IoT are its enlarged coverage, data rate, latency and battery lifetime compared to other cellular technologies. These features of NB-IoT manages it very beneficial in the IoT manufacturing, letting the technology to be hired in a vast domain of implementations, like health, smart cities, agriculture, WSNs. The main target of this study is to determine the performance of distinct characteristics of NB-IoT network with reasonable error rates in the uplink and the downlink connections. The performance of the several ways examined to decide their efficiency in relation to the requirements of the IoT industry. Software simulations were used to compare the distinct criteria settings to inspect which choices give better efficiency and cost trade-offs for constructing an NB-IoT network. The results show that data transmitted in smaller Transport Block Size (TBS) has fewer errors than if it has transmitted in greater blocks. Furthermore, the results offer that the error rate gets higher as the Doppler frequency increases in the propagation channel model. The results also show that the error rate gets higher as the modulation and coding scheme field (IMCS) increase.
Fresh Phyllanthus emblica (Amla) Fruit Supplementation Enhances Milk Fatty Acid Profiles and the Antioxidant Capacities of Milk and Blood in Dairy Cows

The objective of this study was to investigate the effect of a diet supplemented with fresh amla fruit as a natural feed additive on blood metabolic parameters, milk antioxidant capacity, and milk fatty acid (FA) proportions in lactating dairy cows. Eight ruminally cannulated mid-lactation dairy cows were used in a repeated crossover design. The first group of four cows received total mixed ration (TMR) feed without fresh amla fruit (control group). The remaining four cows sequentially supplemented fresh amla fruit (FAF) at three levels (200, 400, then 600 g/d) (treatment group) at 14-day intervals. In second period, control and treatment groups were exchanged. The first ten days were adjusted to diet adaptation for each sub-period, and the last four days for sampling milk and blood. A total of 514 metabolites were detected from FAF using UPLC-ESI-MS/MS. The five main metabolites in FAF were phenolic acids (22%), flavonoids (20%), lipids (20%), amino acids and derivatives (9%), and tannins (7%). Amla fruit supplementation reduced total saturated fatty acid and the omega-6/omega-3 ratio at 200 or 400 g/d FAF dose compared to controls. In addition, amla fruit increased unsaturated FA, such as C20:5 (Eicosapentaenoic acid, EPA) and C22:6 (docosahexaenoic acid, DHA), and branched-chain FA in a dose-dependent manner at 200 or 400 g/d compared to controls. In addition, amla fruit increased the antioxidant capacity biomarkers in the blood, such as superoxide dismutase (SOD) and albumin; this confirms that amla fruit is an excellent antioxidant, inhibiting reactive oxygen species’ (ROS) metabolism, and can thereby protect cells from oxidative stress. Moreover, the most remarkable improvement of ferric reducing-antioxidant power (FRAP) and total antioxidant capacity (TAC) in milk was recorded at 400 g/d FAF doses compared to controls. Therefore, fresh amla fruit doses for lactating cows at 400 g/d on an as-fed basis can be used as an alternative additive feed in dairy cow diets to improve antioxidant capacity, protein efficiency, butter quality, and to produce more desirable milk fatty acid profiles for human consumption.
Balancing Damage via Non-Photochemical Quenching, Phenolic Compounds and Photorespiration in Ulva prolifera Induced by Low-Dose and Short-Term UV-B Radiation

The Yellow Sea green tide (YSGT) is the world’s largest transregional macroalgal blooms, and the causative species Ulva prolifera (U. prolifera) suffers from ultraviolet-b radiation (UVBR) during the floating migration process. Previous study confirmed that U. prolifera displayed a wide variety of physiological responses characterized as acclimation to UVBR, while the response mechanisms against low-dose and short-term radiation (LDSTR) are not clear. A study with photosynthetically active radiation (PAR) and UVBR was designed: normal light (NL: 72 μmol photons m−2 s−1), NL+0.3 (UVBR: 0.3 W·m−2), and NL+1.6 (UVBR: 1.6 W·m−2). The results showed that high-dose UVBR inhibited photosynthesis in thalli, especially under long-term exposure, while a variety of physiological responses were observed under LDSTR. The inhibition of photosynthesis appeared to be ameliorated by the algae under LDSTR. Further analysis showed that U. prolifera achieved balancing damage by means of non-photochemical quenching (NPQ), accumulation of phenolic compounds coupled with the ASA-GSH cycle involved in the antioxidant process and enhanced photorespiratory metabolism under LDSTR. This study provides new insights into the balancing damage mechanisms of U. prolifera under LDSTR, enabling the thalli to adapt to the light conditions during the long duration and distance involved in floating migration.