Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Versatile In-Ear Biosensing System and Body-Area Network for Unobtrusive Continuous Health Monitoring

To enable continuous, mobile health monitoring, body-worn sensors need to offer comparable performance to clinical devices in a lightweight, unobtrusive package. This work presents a complete versatile wireless electrophysiology data acquisition system (weDAQ) that is demonstrated for in-ear electroencephalography (EEG) and other on-body electrophysiology with user-generic dry-contact electrodes made from standard printed circuit boards (PCBs). Each weDAQ device provides 16 recording channels, driven right leg (DRL), a 3-axis accelerometer, local data storage, and adaptable data transmission modes. The weDAQ wireless interface supports deployment of a body area network (BAN) capable of aggregating various biosignal streams over multiple worn devices simultaneously, on the 802.11n WiFi protocol. Each channel resolves biopotentials ranging over 5 orders of magnitude with a noise level of 0.52 ${\mathrm{\mu }}{\mathrm{V}}_{\! \mathrm{rms}}$ over a 1000-Hz bandwidth, and a peak SNDR of 119 dB and CMRR of 111 dB at 2 ksps. The device leverages in-band impedance scanning and an input multiplexer to dynamically select good skin contacting electrodes for reference and sensing channels. In-ear and forehead EEG measurements taken from subjects captured modulation of alpha brain activity, electrooculogram (EOG) characteristic eye movements, and electromyogram (EMG) from jaw muscles. Simultaneous ECG and EMG measurements were demonstrated on multiple, freely-moving subjects in their natural office environment during periods of rest and exercise. The small footprint, performance, and configurability of the open-source weDAQ platform and scalable PCB electrodes presented, aim to provide the biosensing community greater experimental flexibility and lower the barrier to entry for new health monitoring research.
Care after premenopausal risk‐reducing salpingo‐oophorectomy in high‐risk women: Scoping review and international consensus recommendations

Women at high inherited risk of ovarian cancer are offered risk‐reducing salpingo‐oophorectomy (RRSO) from age 35 to 45 years. Although potentially life‐saving, RRSO may induce symptoms that negatively affect quality of life and impair long‐term health. Clinical care following RRSO is often suboptimal. This scoping review describes how RRSO affects short‐ and long‐term health and provides evidence‐based international consensus recommendations for care from preoperative counselling to long‐term disease prevention. This includes the efficacy and safety of hormonal and non‐hormonal treatments for vasomotor symptoms, sleep disturbance and sexual dysfunction and effective approaches to prevent bone and cardiovascular disease.
Reply to migration is not the perfect answer: Optimized methodology to assess LCI agreement between corrected legacy multiple breath nitrogen washout data and that directly collected on updated software

Department of Respiratory Medicine, The Children's Hospital at Westmead, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia Australian Multiple Breath Washout Central Over‐Reading Centre, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia Royal Brompton and Harefield Hospitals, Guys and St Thomas’ Trust, London, UK National Heart and Lung Institute, Imperial College London, London, UK European Cystic Fibrosis Society Lung Clearance Index Core Facility, London, UK Translational Medicine, Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada Division of Respiratory Medicine, Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada Cystic Fibrosis Foundation Multiple Breath Washout National Resource Centre, Toronto, Ontario, Canada University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada Discipline of Paediatrics and Child Health, University of Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia Airway Physiology and Imaging group, Woolcock Medical Research Institute, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Dense & Attention Convolutional Neural Networks for Toe Walking Recognition

Idiopathic toe walking (ITW) is a gait disorder where children’s initial contacts show limited or no heel touch during the gait cycle. Toe walking can lead to poor balance, increased risk of falling or tripping, leg pain, and stunted growth in children. Early detection and identification can facilitate targeted interventions for children diagnosed with ITW. This study proposes a new one-dimensional (1D) Dense & Attention convolutional network architecture, which is termed as the DANet, to detect idiopathic toe walking. The dense block is integrated into the network to maximize information transfer and avoid missed features. Further, the attention modules are incorporated into the network to highlight useful features while suppressing unwanted noises. Also, the Focal Loss function is enhanced to alleviate the imbalance sample issue. The proposed approach outperforms other methods and obtains a superior performance. It achieves a test recall of 88.91% for recognizing idiopathic toe walking on the local dataset collected from real-world experimental scenarios. To ensure the scalability and generalizability of the proposed approach, the algorithm is further validated through the publicly available datasets, and the proposed approach achieves an average precision, recall, and F1-Score of 89.34%, 91.50%, and 92.04%, respectively. Experimental results present a competitive performance and demonstrate the validity and feasibility of the proposed approach.
Nonlinear quasi-sliding-mode robust control for discrete-time systems with time-delay

The robust sliding mode control is investigated for a class of discrete-time systems with time-varying delay,which is based on a novel nonlinear time-varying quasi-sliding surface design scheme.Firstly,the general form of the nonlinear switching function with time-varying feature is given,which can dynamically improve the quality of its motion.By using the free weighting matrix and linear matrix inequality technique,we propose a design method for the nonlinear quasi-sliding surface,and obtain a sufficient condition of asymptotical stability for the nonlinear sliding motion.Secondly,the quasi-sliding mode controller is designed based on the improved discrete reaching law to ensure the state of the system for reaching the quasi-sliding mode in a finite time.Thus,the quasi-sliding-mode variable-structure control(VSC) for such nonlinear system is extended to the nonlinear control with time-delay.Simulation validates that the dynamic behavior of the system is stable with rapid response,low overshoot,less settling time,when employing the proposed quasi-sliding surface and quasi-sliding mode VSC.
An Effective Three-step Search Algorithm for Motion Estimation

To reduce the computation complexity of motion estimation algorithms and improve the reliability of super-resolution reconstruction of infrared images,an effective three-step search algorithm is proposed.In the algorithm,a multi-step search strategy is adopted.According to the center offset characteristics of a motion vector and the idea of parallel processing,it makes a fine search in the region in which the best matching points exist by using a small diamond search template instead of a small square template.Thus,its search accuracy is improved.The experimental result shows that compared with other search algorithms,this search algorithm can reduce the calculation time greatly while its search accuracy is ensured.
Phototherapy: A Conventional Approach to Overcome the Barriers in Oncology Therapeutics

Cancer disease has outgrown a life-threatening disease. Having reference to preceding reports provided by the International Agency for Research on Cancer, an estimated 9.6 million deaths transpired from cancer worldwide in 2018. Similarly, about 18.1 million new cases of cancer are being reported. The rise in conventional treatments akin to surgeries, chemotherapies, and radiotherapies was enormously observed to eradicate cancer tumors. These studies have shown unfavorable side effects in clinical treatments. Drug resistivity and drug cytotoxicities are also major issues to overcome. Considering these, researchers are developing alternative methods that are robust, economical, and safe. The use of light for therapeutic purposes shows a great history in vitiligo treatment. The combination of an effective activating agent and phototherapy could result as the best alternative with a great outcome to minimize adverse effects on healthy tissues. The utilization of light in the deletion of tumors using photothermal agents, and photosensitizers, hence the phototherapies in oncology were discovered and rapidly involved in the advancement of clinical approach. Here, in this article, we tried to highlight the recent trends in phototherapy and reviewed different types of phototherapy methods in cancer treatments and their latest clinical, preclinical, and in vivo studies.
Clinical evaluation of the first semi-active total knee arthroplasty assisting robot made in China: a retrospective propensity score-matched cohort study

Objective: The precision of overall alignment and knee morphotype after robot-assisted total knee arthroplasty has been fully confirmed. This study aims to conduct a clinical evaluation of the first China-made semi-active total knee arthroplasty assisting robot. Methods: After a 1 : 2 propensity score matching, that is, a matched cohort study, patients were matched to the robot group (52 cases) and the conventional group (104 cases). The robot group received osteotomy according to preoperative planning, while the conventional group adopted preoperative planning based on the full-length radiograph and received conventional osteotomy. Perioperative clinical indicators, such as operation time, tourniquet time, hospitalization days, intraoperative bleeding, and hemoglobin level of the two groups were recorded; radiological indicators of postoperative prosthesis position, including hip-knee-ankle angle, frontal femoral component angle, frontal tibial component angle, lateral femoral component angle, and lateral tibial component angle were also recorded; deviations and outliers of the radiological indicators were calculated. Results: Compared with the conventional group, the operation time and tourniquet time of the robot group were longer, and the postoperative hemoglobin level decreased less, the differences were statistically significant; the lateral tibial component angle of the conventional group was 80.9°±3.6°, which was smaller than 86.7 °±2.3° of the robot group, the difference was statistically significant (P<0.001); except for lateral femoral component angle, the absolute deviations of the radiological indicators in the robot group were significantly smaller than that in the conventional group (P≤0.001); the outliers of the radiological indicators in the robot group were significantly smaller than that in the conventional group with a statistical difference (P<0.05). Conclusion: Compared with the conventional group, the operation time of the robot group was relatively longer, but the perioperation blood loss was less. The robot group could better control the posterior inclination of the tibial prosthesis, and the absolute deviations and outliers of the prosthesis position were relatively smaller. There was no difference in short-term clinical score between the two groups.
The prevalence of mental disorders among incarcerated adult men convicted of child sexual exploitation material offences

Abstract Objective Despite the growing body of research on individuals convicted of child sexual exploitation material (CSEM), relatively little is known about the prevalence of mental disorders in this population. The aim of the present study was to describe the prevalence of mental disorders among individuals convicted of CSEM offenses. Methods This cross-sectional study examined data from 66 individuals serving a sentence for CSEM offenses in the Austrian prison system who underwent a clinical assessment between 2002 and 2020. Diagnoses were based on the German version of the Structured Clinical Interview for Axis I and Axis II disorders. Results In the total sample, n = 53 individuals (80.3%) were diagnosed with a mental disorder. Twenty-seven individuals (40.9%) had an Axis I disorder and n = 47 (71.2%) had an Axis II disorder. More than two-thirds of the sample, n = 47 (71.2%), had a personality disorder diagnosis, with cluster B personality disorders being the most frequent mental disorders. More than half of the sample, n = 43 (65.2%), had a diagnosis of pedophilic disorder, of which n = 9 (13.6%) were of the exclusive type. Twenty-eight persons (42.4%) showed evidence of a hypersexual disorder. Conclusions In line with previous research, the present sample of convicted CSEM offenders showed a comparatively high prevalence of personality disorders and paraphilic disorders, particularly pedophilic disorders. Additionally, the rate of hypersexual disorder symptoms was considerably high. These findings should be considered for the development of successful risk management strategies for this population.
Efficacy and safety of fractional 1064‐nm picosecond laser for atrophic traumatic and surgical scars: A randomized, single‐blinded, split‐scar‐controlled study

A fractional 1064‐nm picosecond laser is an efficient and safe treatment for atrophic acne scars. However, evidence of using a picosecond laser for atrophic posttraumatic and surgical scar therapy is lacking. This study aimed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of using a 1064‐nm picosecond laser with a microlens array (MLA) for the treatment of atrophic posttraumatic and surgical scars.
Thirring combo-solitons with cubic nonlinearity and spatio-temporal dispersion

Abstract The vector-coupled nonlinear Schrödinger equation, which can be applied to describe the propagation of Thirring optical solitons in birefringent ﬁbers with Kerr law nonlinearity, detuning, intermodal dispersion and spatiotemporal dispersion, has been studied analytically. By means of the complex envelope function ansatz, exact Thirring bright-dark combosolitons are reported, and the properties of these solitons are discussed.
A deeper look at the association between childhood maltreatment and reflective functioning

ABSTRACT Childhood maltreatment is theorized as impeding the development of reflective functioning (RF; ability to perceive and interpret oneself and others in terms of mental states). However, previous research typically failed to support this association or yielded small sized and mixed associations. This study aims to provide a deeper look at the association between childhood maltreatment and RF by characterizing two non-mentalizing categories. One-hundred-and-sixteen pregnant women (mean age = 27.62, SD = 4.52) from the community (48.3% with a university degree, 96.5% in a relationship with the other parent) retrospectively reported on childhood abuse and neglect using the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire. They also participated in the Adult Attachment Interview subsequently coded using the Reflective Functioning Scale. Participants with poor to low RF were allocated to one of two groups (disavowal-distancing or distorted-inconsistent) using indicators provided in the RF Scale. No association was found between childhood maltreatment and overall RF when controlling for education level. A multinomial logistic regression revealed that childhood maltreatment was strongly predictive of a disrupted, over-analytical and inconsistent reflection about mental states but not of a tendency to discourse little about mental states. This tendency was rather only predicted by education level. Findings suggest that childhood maltreatment would lead to specific impairments in RF and that not considering how individuals fail to mentalize about attachment relationships may mask strong associations between RF and its determinants and correlates, including childhood maltreatment.
Clinical feasibility and oncological safety of non-radioactive targeted axillary dissection after neoadjuvant chemotherapy in biopsy-proven node-positive breast cancer: a prospective diagnostic and prognostic study

Background: Targeted axillary dissection (TAD) includes biopsy of clipped lymph node and sentinel lymph nodes. However, clinical evidence regarding clinical feasibility and oncological safety of non-radioactive TAD in a real-world cohort remains limited. Methods: In this prospective registry study, patients routinely underwent clip insertion into biopsy-confirmed lymph node. Eligible patients received neoadjuvant chemotherapy followed by axillary surgery. Main endpoints included the false-negative rate (FNR) of TAD and nodal recurrence rate. Results: Data from 353 eligible patients were analyzed. After completion of neoadjuvant chemotherapy, 85 patients directly proceeded to axillary lymph node dissection (ALND), furthermore, TAD with or without ALND was performed in 152 and 85 patients, respectively. Overall detection rate of clipped node was 94.9% (95% CI, 91.3–97.4%) and FNR of TAD was 12.2% (95% CI, 6.0–21.3%) in our study, with FNR decreasing to 6.0% (95% CI, 1.7–14.6%) in initially cN1 patients. During a median follow-up of 36.6 months, 3 nodal recurrences occurred (3/237 with ALND; 0/85 with TAD alone), with a 3-year freedom-from-nodal-recurrence rate of 100.0% among the TAD-only patients and 98.7% among the ALND patients with axillary pathologic complete response (P=0.29). Conclusions: TAD is feasible in initially cN1 breast cancer patients with biopsy-confirmed nodal metastases. ALND can safely be foregone in patients with negativity or a low volume of nodal positivity on TAD, with a low nodal failure rate and no compromise of 3-year recurrence-free survival.
Effects of risk factors on evoked pain patterns in rat models of experimental knee osteoarthritis

Pain experiences in patients with knee osteoarthritis (OA) may be influenced differently by OA risk factors, reducing the translatability of preclinical research into the clinic. Our objective was to contrast evoked pain patterns after exposure to different OA risk factors including acute joint trauma, chronic instability, or obesity/metabolic syndrome using rat models of experimental knee OA. We tested longitudinal patterns of evoked pain behaviors (knee pressure pain threshold and hindpaw withdrawal threshold) in young male rats exposed to different OA‐inducing risk factors including (1) nonsurgical joint trauma (impact‐induced anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) rupture); (2) surgical joint destabilization (ACL + medial meniscotibial ligament transection); and (3) high fat/sucrose (HFS) diet‐induced obesity. Histopathology for synovitis, cartilage damage, and subchondral bone morphology was performed. Pressure pain threshold was reduced (more pain) most, and earlier by joint trauma (Week 4–12) and HFS (Week 8–28) than by joint destabilization (Week 12). Hindpaw withdrawal threshold was reduced transiently after joint trauma (Week 4), with smaller and later reductions after joint destabilization (Week 12), but not with HFS. Synovial inflammation occurred at Week 4 after joint trauma and instability but only coincided with pain behaviors after joint trauma. Cartilage and bone histopathology were most severe after joint destabilization and least severe with HFS. The pattern, intensity, and timing of evoked pain behaviors varied due to OA risk factor exposure and were inconsistently associated with histopathological OA features. These findings may help to explain the challenges with translating preclinical OA pain research to multimorbid clinical OA contexts.
Bipolar cells containing protein kinase Cα mediate attentional facilitation of the avian retinal ganglion cells by the retinopetal signal

Birds have a well‐developed retinopetal system projecting from the midbrain to the contralateral retina. The signal sent to the retina through the retinopetal system facilitates visual responses of the retinal ganglion cells (RGCs), and the retinopetal signals function as attentional signals during visual search. Thus, the retinopetal signal somehow reaches and facilitates visual responses of the RGCs. However, the tertiary neuron of the retinopetal system, the isthmo‐optic target cell (IOTC), is unlikely to contact most RGCs directly, because the IOTCs form axon terminals localized in the outermost sublayer (lamina 1) of the inner plexiform layer (IPL) where few RGC dendrites terminate. Therefore, some other intrinsic retinal neurons must be involved in the centrifugal attentional enhancement of visual responses of the RGCs. We investigated connections of the target cells of the IOTCs in chicken and quail, using light and electron microscopic immunohistochemistry. We show that axon terminals of the IOTC make synaptic contacts with protein kinase Cα (PKCα)‐immunoreactive (ir) bipolar cells (PKCα‐BCs) in lamina 1 of the IPL. Furthermore, with prolonged electrical stimulation of the isthmo‐optic nucleus (ION) on one side, whose neurons send their axons to the contralateral retina and make synaptic contacts there with IOTCs, phosphorylation of cAMP response element‐binding protein was observed in the PKCα‐BCs in the contralateral retina, but not in the ipsilateral retina. This suggests that electrical stimulation of ION activated PKCα‐BCs through synapses from IOTCs to PKCα‐BCs, thus stimulating transcription in PKCα‐BCs. Thus, centrifugal attentional signals may facilitate visual responses of RGCs via the PKCα‐BCs.
Numerical Analysis of Monte Carlo Evaluation of Greeks by Finite Differences

An error analysis of approximation of deltas (derivatives of the solution to the Cauchy problem for parabolic equations) by finite differences is given, taking into account that the value of the hedging portfolio itself (the solution of the problem) is evaluated using weak-sense numerical integration of the corresponding system of stochastic differential equations together with the Monte Carlo technique. It is shown that finite differences are effective when the method of dependent realizations is exploited in the Monte Carlo simulations. Evaluation of other Greeks is also considered. Results of numerical experiments, including those with Heston stochastic volatility model, are presented.
Weak regulations threaten the safety of consumers from harmful weight-loss supplements globally: results from a pilot global policy scan

Abstract Objective: To pilot a global policy scan assessing how governments worldwide regulate weight-loss supplements (WLS). Design: Experts on WLS policies from thirty countries that varied by World Bank income classification, with five from each of the six WHO regions, completed an online survey on WLS regulation in their country. The survey covered six domains: legal frameworks; pre-market requirements; claims, labelling, and advertisements; product availability; adverse events reporting; and monitoring and enforcement. Percentages were calculated for presence or absence of a type of regulation. Setting: Experts were recruited through websites of regulatory bodies and professional LinkedIn networks and scientific article searches on Google Scholar. Participants: Thirty experts, one from each country (i.e. researchers, regulators, other experts in food and drug regulation). Results: WLS regulations varied widely across countries, and a number of gaps were identified. One country (Nigeria) has a minimum legal age to purchase WLS. Thirteen countries reported independently evaluating the safety of a new WLS product sample. Two countries have limitations on where WLS can be sold. In eleven countries, reports on adverse events related to WLS are publicly available. In eighteen countries, safety of new WLS is to be established through scientific criteria. Penalties for WLS non-compliance with pre-market regulations exist in twelve countries and labelling requirements in sixteen countries. Conclusions: Results of this pilot study document wide variability in national WLS regulations globally, exposing many gaps in important components of consumer protection regulatory frameworks for WLS, which likely put consumer health at risk.