Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
NOS3 rs1799983 and rs2070744 polymorphisms and their association with advanced chronic kidney disease and coronary heart disease in Canarian population with type 2 diabetes.

Context Different polymorphisms of the endothelial nitric oxide synthase gene (NOS3) have been related to diabetic kidney disease. Objective To evaluate the association between advanced diabetic chronic kidney disease (ACKD) and the rs1799983 and rs2070744 poymorphisms of NOS3 in a population from the Gran Canaria island. Design Cross-sectional case-control study. Subjects and methods Polymorphisms were genotyped in 152 subjects with ACKD secondary to type 2 diabetes [estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) <30 mL/min/1.73 m2], 110 subjects with type 2 diabetes for 20 or more years since diagnosis without ACKD (eGFR ≥45 mL/min/1.73m2 and albumin/creatinine ratio <300 mg/g and/or 24-h urinary albumin excretion <300 mg) and 292 healthy controls. Association between both polymorphisms and established coronary heart disease (CHD) was also analyzed in both groups with diabetes. Results A greater proportion of homozygous individuals for the risk allele C of rs2070744 was found among subjects with ACKD. Association between ACKD and rs2070744 was observed in a recessive genetic model, both for comparison to subjects with diabetes but no ACKD [OR 2.17 (95% CI: 1.17-4.00), p=0.014] and for comparison to healthy controls [OR 1.61 (1.03-2.52), p=0.036]. The frequency of the C allele was significantly higher among subjects with CHD, but only in the group with ACKD. No associations were found for rs1799983. Conclusions NOS3 rs2070744 is associated with ACKD in population with type 2 diabetes from Gran Canaria. A link between this genetic variant and CHD in Canarian subjects with type 2 diabetes could be restricted to cases with ACKD.
Bioinspired Hydrogels as Platforms for Life-Science Applications: Challenges and Opportunities

Hydrogels, as interconnected networks (polymer mesh; physically, chemically, or dynamic crosslinked networks) incorporating a high amount of water, present structural characteristics similar to soft natural tissue. They enable the diffusion of different molecules (ions, drugs, and grow factors) and have the ability to take over the action of external factors. Their nature provides a wide variety of raw materials and inspiration for functional soft matter obtained by complex mechanisms and hierarchical self-assembly. Over the last decade, many studies focused on developing innovative and high-performance materials, with new or improved functions, by mimicking biological structures at different length scales. Hydrogels with natural or synthetic origin can be engineered as bulk materials, micro- or nanoparticles, patches, membranes, supramolecular pathways, bio-inks, etc. The specific features of hydrogels make them suitable for a wide variety of applications, including tissue engineering scaffolds (repair/regeneration), wound healing, drug delivery carriers, bio-inks, soft robotics, sensors, actuators, catalysis, food safety, and hygiene products. This review is focused on recent advances in the field of bioinspired hydrogels that can serve as platforms for life-science applications. A brief outlook on the actual trends and future directions is also presented.
Fusion of Low-Cost UAV Point Cloud with TLS Point Cloud for Complete 3D Visualisation of a Building

3D modelling of buildings is an important task for getting geometrical knowledge of the building as well as for planning and monitoring purposes. The use of low-cost UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) derived point cloud is becoming a popular way for 3D model creation. To enhance the accuracy of such models generally researchers employ GCP’s(Ground Control Points), based on GNSS survey to georeference the point cloud. But using GCP’s has limitations like object’s accessibility & also it is time consuming. Another way to increase the accuracy of such point clouds is merging them with TLS(Terrestrial Laser Scanner) point cloud which is georeferenced using a geodetic GNSS. The research here is trying to achieve the same by fusing point clouds derived from low-cost UAV (Phantom 4 pro v.2) and TLS. This is achieved in 3 steps a) Metric based comparison b) C2C(Cloud to Cloud) & M3C2 (Multi scale Model to Model Cloud Comparison) algorithm-based comparison c) running linear regression for selected points on both the point clouds. An RMS(Root Mean Square) of 0.125 is achieved for Phantom pro metric-based comparison. The C2C & M3C2 algorithm-based comparison shows that most points in the facade of the building have almost zero error i.e., the point clouds are totally identical in these areas. Also, linear regression comparison gives very high R-squared value affirming the fact that point clouds obtained from UAV highly correlate to that obtained from TLS. Thus, based on above 3 comparison methods, it can be concluded that a UAV point cloud could be fused with a single view GNSS referenced TLS point cloud to obtain a complete 3D visualization of building.
On the Inertia of Future More-Electronics Power Systems

Inertia plays a vital role in maintaining the frequency stability of power systems. However, the increase of power electronics-based renewable generation can dramatically reduce the inertia levels of modern power systems. This issue has already challenged the control and stability of small-scale power systems. It will soon be faced by larger power systems as the trend of large-scale renewable integration continues. In view of the urgent demand for addressing the inertia concern, this paper presents a comprehensive review of inertia enhancement methods covering both proven techniques and emerging ones and also studies the effect of inertia on frequency control. Among those proven techniques, the inertia emulation by wind turbines has successfully demonstrated its effectiveness and will receive widespread adoptions. For the emerging techniques, the virtual inertia generated by the dc-link capacitors of power converters has a great potential due to its low cost. The same concept of inertia emulation can also be applied to ultracapacitors. In addition, batteries will serve as an alternative inertia supplier, and the relevant technical challenges as well as the solutions are discussed in this paper. In future power systems where most of the generators and loads are connected via power electronics, virtual synchronous machines will gradually take over the responsibility of inertia support. In general, it is concluded that advances in semiconductors and control promise to make power electronics an enabling technology for inertia control in future power systems.
What We Talk about When We Talk about Soil Health

Despite nationwide emphasis on soil health in the USA, current measurements lack consistency. A meta‐analysis showed 8 of 42 soil health indicators reported >20% of time. Only 13 indicators showed short‐term (1–3 yr timescale) responses to cover cropping. Wide variation in soil sampling protocols suggests standardization is needed. Translating soil health research across systems requires a common framework.
Determination of Carbapenem-Resistant Enterobacteriaceae from Chicken Meat by Advanced Modified ISO 21528-1:2017 Method

Antibiotic resistance is critical today, and carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE) are the current reflection of this threat in terms of public health. Our study aimed to investigate the effectiveness of a known ISO method used to detect of CREs in chicken meat sold in the Aksaray Region. A total of 150 chicken samples (50 drumsticks, 50 breasts, and 50 wings) were analyzed in terms of CRE by modifying the ISO 21528-1:2017 method. For this purpose, meropenem and ertapenem powders were added into buffered peptone water and Violet Red Bile Glucose Agar at the resistance levels determined in EUCAST. At the same time, target DNA extraction was performed from all samples with a tissue isolation kit (Hybrigen) and stored for PCR to support and strengthen our results to compare the cultural method's results. According to the results of the cultural procedure, the existing flora of chicken meats was suppressed by antibiotic supplements, and no suspicious colonies were detected. Likewise, CRE was not detected in DNA samples obtained from 150 chicken meat samples. Carbapenem resistance, described as the last fortress, is today's significant public health problem. According to our results, CRE was not isolated in 150 chicken meat samples offered for sale in our region.
Where Are All the Generalists?

R ecently, I celebrated my 30th anniversary in the field of environmental engineering and drinking water. As part of this personal milestone, I spent some time reflecting on my career, on some of the many people whose paths I have crossed, and on where I believe the water industry is headed. From a public health perspective, things in North America appear to be in good shape. While there are still outbreaks of waterborne disease, they tend to be smaller in scale than in the past. Further, today’s outbreaks are more commonly associated with Legionella, and such events are probably not associated with breakdowns in centralized treatment processes as was the case with the Cryptosporidium outbreak that occurred in Milwaukee, Wis. , in 1993. Since the 1980s, the annual number of disease outbreaks associated with drinking water has decreased by more than 50% (Beer et al. 2015). In reviewing my career, one notable anecdote I thought of occurred 15 years ago when a friend asked me how best to sell new products into the water treatment market. One approach I recommended was to try to convince key players at engineering firms of the advantages of a new product, and those experts would subsequently use the product in their designs of water treatment facilities. My friend then asked for a list of such people, so I pulled together the names of some thought leaders, most of them process engineers who understood how the introduction of new processes or chemicals into a treatment train could interact with other processes. What surprised me was the difficulty I had in coming up with a list of generalist experts, and in the end, I could think of only 15 people. I circulated my list to another friend, but he could only add a couple of additional names. While I don’t claim to know everyone in the water field, it was surprising to me then how few experts we could think of; since that time, many of those experts have retired without heirs apparent to take their place. This is a gap that really must be filled before so many years of collective experience and practical expertise are lost with senior staff retirements. The water industry is not alone in facing an aging workforce, but as it does so, it must also address issues with aging infrastructure. In the developed world, it seems that very few new water treatment plants (WTPs) are being constructed; most existing Lyout im aery by S hutteock.copm /Ligtspring Schneider Researcher to Researcher ORREN SCHNEIDER
Convolutional Neural Network Based Approach Towards Motor Imagery Tasks EEG Signals Classification

This paper introduces a methodology based on deep convolutional neural networks (DCNN) for motor imagery (MI) tasks recognition in the brain-computer interface (BCI) system. More specifically, the DCNN is used for classification of the right hand and right foot MI-tasks based electroencephalogram (EEG) signals. The proposed method first transforms the input EEG signals into images by applying the time-frequency (T-F) approaches. The used T-F approaches are short-time-Fourier-transform (STFT) and continuous-wavelet-transform (CWT). After T-F transformation the images of MI-tasks EEG signals are applied to the DCNN stage. The pre-trained DCNN model, AlexNet is explored for classification. The efficiency of the proposed method is evaluated on IVa dataset of BCI competition-III. The evaluation metrics such as accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, F1-score, and kappa value are used for measuring the proposed method results quantitatively. The obtained results show that the CWT approach yields better results than the STFT approach. In addition, the proposed method obtained 99.35% accuracy score is the best one among the existing methods accuracy scores.
Improving the Risk Assessment of Pesticides through the Integration of Human Biomonitoring and Food Monitoring Data: A Case Study for Chlorpyrifos

The risk assessment of pesticide residues in food is a key priority in the area of food safety. Most jurisdictions have implemented pre-marketing authorization processes, which are supported by prospective risk assessments. These prospective assessments estimate the expected residue levels in food combining results from residue trials, resembling the pesticide use patterns, with food consumption patterns, according to internationally agreed procedures. In addition, jurisdictions such as the European Union (EU) have implemented large monitoring programs, measuring actual pesticide residue levels in food, and are supporting large-scale human biomonitoring programs for confirming the actual exposure levels and potential risk for consumers. The organophosphate insecticide chlorpyrifos offers an interesting case study, as in the last decade, its acceptable daily intake (ADI) has been reduced several times following risk assessments by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). This process has been linked to significant reductions in the use authorized in the EU, reducing consumers’ exposure progressively, until the final ban in 2020, accompanied by setting all EU maximum residue levels (MRL) in food at the default value of 0.01 mg/kg. We present a comparison of estimates of the consumer’s internal exposure to chlorpyrifos based on the urinary marker 3,5,6-trichloro-2-pyridinol (TCPy), using two sources of monitoring data: monitoring of the food chain from the EU program and biomonitoring of European citizens from the HB4EU project, supported by a literature search. Both methods confirmed a drastic reduction in exposure levels from 2016 onwards. The margin of exposure approach is then used for conducting retrospective risk assessments at different time points, considering the evolution of our understanding of chlorpyrifos toxicity, as well as of exposure levels in EU consumers following the regulatory decisions. Concerns are presented using a color code, and have been identified for almost all studies, particularly for the highest exposed group, but at different levels, reaching the maximum level, red code, for children in Cyprus and Israel. The assessment uncertainties are highlighted and integrated in the identification of levels of concern.
A Novel Non-Contact Drunkenness Monitoring Technique Based on A 24-GHz Interferometric Radar System

Conventional intoxication detection is based on Blood Alcohol Concentration (BAC), which is assessed by techniques including blood sample analysis and breathalyzers. To address the drawbacks of existing detection methods such as intrusive contact and requiring subjects' cooperation, this paper proposes a novel drunkenness monitoring approach based on a custom-designed K-band 24-GHz interferometric radar system and Heart Rate Variability (HRV) extraction algorithm. Experiments were conducted on subjects before and after alcohol intake to demonstrate the feasibility of the HRV frequency domain analysis technique to detect intoxication. The combination of an interferometric radar system and HRV analysis has the potential for continuous, non-contact, and non-sensory drunk driving monitoring.
How the social robot Sophia is mediated by a YouTube video

In robotics, a field of research still populated by prototypes, much of the research is made through videos and pictures of robots. We study how the highly human-like robot Sophia is perceived through a YouTube video. Often researchers take for granted in their experiments that people perceive humanoids as such. With this study we wanted to understand to what extent a convenience sample of university students perceive Sophia’s human-likeness; second, we investigated which mental capabilities and emotions they attribute to her; and third, we explored the possible uses of Sophia they imagine. Our findings suggest that the morphological human-likeness of Sophia, through the video, is not salient in the Sophia’s representations of these participants. Only some mental functions are attributed to Sophia and no emotions. Finally, uses of Sophia turned out to be connected to the gender stereotypes that characterize stereotyped women’s professions and occupations but not completely.
Balanced Microstrip Filtering Phase Shifter Using Three-end Folded Coupled Lines

A balanced microstrip filtering phase shifter using 2 three-end folded coupled lines and 3 transmission lines is proposed. With such structure, multiple differential-mode (DM) transmission zeros (TZs) or common-mode (CM) TZs can be obtained so that good frequency selectivity or wideband CM suppression can be achieved. The phase shift covers the DM performance. Compared with the reported design, the proposed design has wider CM suppression and better frequency selectivity. One 45° prototype is demonstrated. The measured phase shift FBW(45° ± 2.3°) is 43%, 20-dB CM suppression FBW is better than 140%, and 3-dB FBW is 39.4%.
Design, modelling, and implementation of a modified double‐switch flyback‐forward converter for low power applications

This study proposes a modified double-switch flyback-forward (DSFF) converter for low-power applications with a reduced number of windings in its transformer. This circuit has resulted from the combination of the two-switch flyback and two-switch forward converters. It includes a simple transformer with one set of secondary side windings, and it is not necessary to design two separate sets of windings for the desired output voltage which is the main problem of other flyback-forward converters. An auxiliary winding has been designed for self-biasing, and consequently, it improves the overall efficiency in the no-load condition. Due to the modifications on the previously presented two-switch flyback-forward converter, the circuit model has changed. This study, first, analyses the operation of the proposed converter in detail, then it explains a method to design this converter in continuous inductor current mode. Also, a start-up voltage regulator circuit and a modified bootstrap gate driver will be investigated, and the DC and AC model of the converter will be presented. Experimental results validate the proposed DSFF converter. The tested circuit includes a DSFF converter, a pulse generator circuit, a start-up voltage regulator, and a modified bootstrap gate driver.
Modular Multi-Port Ultra-High Power Level Power Converter Integrated with Energy Storage for High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC) Transmission

To connect renewable energy sources (RESs) with a unity-grid, energy storage (ES) systems are essential to eliminate the weather fluctuation effect, and high voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission is preferred for large-scale RESs power plants due to the merits of low cost and high efficiency. This paper proposes a multi-port bidirectional DC/DC converter consisting of multiple modules that can integrate ES system and HVDC transmission. Thanks to the adoption of three-port converters as submodules (SMs), ES devices, for example, batteries, can be decentralized into SMs and controlled directly by the SMs. Additionally, SMs are connected in a scalable matrix topology, presenting the advantages of flexible power flows, high voltage step-up ratios and low voltage/current ratings of components to satisfy the requirements of HVDC transmission. Furthermore, the control flexibility and fault tolerance capability are increased due to the matrix topology. In this paper, the analysis of the novel modular multi-port converter is introduced, and its functions are verified by the simulation results in PSIM.
Broadband Compact Single-Layer Magic-T Junction with Separation of DC Signals between All Ports

A novel structure for a four-port microstrip magic-T junction is presented. The device is composed of microstrip and slotline circuits etched onto two sides of a dielectric substrate. The device is extremely compact and occupies an area more than three times smaller than similar structures recently reported in the literature. The novelty of the device lies in the use of microstrip/slotline transitions for both input ports: summation (in-phase) port and difference (out-of-phase) port. This ensures electrical separation for DC signals between all four ports, a wide operation band and a very small size for the device. The fabricated prototype operates in a 95% fractional bandwidth with return losses better than 10 dB and isolation between input ports better than 35 dB. The insertion losses for the excitation at the summation port are about 0.8 dB and for the excitation at the difference port are about 1.4 dB. In the operation band of the device, the maximum amplitude imbalance is equal to ±0.3 dB, whereas the maximum phase imbalance is equal to ±4◦.
Neuropathy in Human Immunodeficiency Virus: A Review of the Underlying Pathogenesis and Treatment

This article explores the various causes of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), and its associated neuropathy, including the effects of HIV on the nervous system and the long-standing therapy that is often provided to patients with HIV. Several studies regarding the neurotoxic effects of combined antiretroviral therapy (cART) and HIV were reviewed and various hypotheses were discussed. Furthermore, we present the nature of HIV-sensory neuropathy (HIV-SN) among different demographic populations and their subsequent risk factors predisposing them to this condition. It was observed that the incidence of the disease increases in increased survival of the patients as well as in males. Finally, the current approach to HIV-SN and its overlapping features with other causes of peripheral neuropathy have been discussed which demonstrates that a clinical examination is the most important clue for a healthcare professional to suspect the disease. Our main aim was to study the current perspectives and guidelines for diagnosing and managing a patient with HIV-SN to reduce disease prevalence and bring about a more aware frame of mind when following up with an HIV patient.
Dual-Temperature Evaluation of a High-Temperature Insulation System for Liquid-Immersed Transformer

A high-temperature oil–paper insulation system offers an opportunity to improve the overloading capability of distribution transformers facing seasonal load variation. A high-temperature electrical insulation system (EIS) was chosen due to thermal calculation based on a typical loading curve on the China Southern Power Grid. In order to evaluate candidate high-temperature insulation systems, Nomex® T910 (aramid-enhanced cellulose) immersed in FR3 (natural ester) was investigated by a dual-temperature thermal aging test compared with a conventional insulation system, Kraft paper impregnated with mineral oil. Throughout the thermal aging test, mechanical, chemical, and dielectric parameters of both paper and insulating oil were investigated in each aging cycle. The thermal aging results determined that the thermal class of the FR3-T910 insulation system meets the request of overloading transformer needs.
Large scalable and compact hybrid plasmonic nanoantenna array

Abstract. We propose a scheme for a large scalable and compact antenna array with subwavelength antenna spacing. In this scheme, the array consists of a series of hybrid plasmonic nanoantennas, which operate at 1550 nm and have a subwavelength footprint. In a wide bandwidth, the nanoantenna is highly compatible with a low-loss silicon waveguide, which feeds light from the bottom of the nanoantenna. Based on the proposed nanoantenna, two silicon photonic antenna arrays (1 × 8 and 8 × 8) are designed and investigated in detail. Both the one- and two-dimensional arrays can realize wide steering without grating lobes. For the 8 × 8 array, a high gain of 24.2 dB and wide steering range of 88.0 deg × 90.0 deg are achieved.