bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Selecting recombinants to stack high protein with high oleic acid and low linoleic acid in soybean (Glycine max)
Authors: McDonald Samuel C. , Bilyeu Kristin , Koebernick Jenny , Buckley Blair , Fallen Benjamin , Mian M. A. Rouf , Li Zenglu
Published: May 2023

Soybean accounts for over a quarter of the world's oilseed consumption and over 70% of the world's protein meal consumption. The separate development of high oleic, low linolenic acid (HOLL) soybean and high‐protein (HP) soybean means that no soybean cultivar on the market has an optimal fatty acid profile and increased protein. The objective of this study was to develop and evaluate high protein, high oleic acid, and low linolenic acid (HP‐HOLL) soybean. A five‐gene stack was created using a two‐phase forward breeding scheme and marker‐assisted selection method. Forty‐six HP‐HOLL lines from three genetic backgrounds were grown in six environments in the Southeast United States. Although genotype‐by‐environment interaction was significant for seed composition traits, lines met the >75% and <3% cutoffs for oleic acid and linolenic acid, respectively, and met or exceeded the protein concentration of the HP parent. No negative interaction could be detected between the HP and HOLL traits. Additionally, yield testing in four environments indicated yield parity for some lines, suggesting HP and HOLL soybean cultivars with high yield could be selected.
Directional assessment of the skin barrier function in vivo
Authors: Alsamad Fanny , Stamatas Georgios N.
Published: May 2023

Introduction

The fundamental function of the epidermis is to provide an inside‐out barrier to water loss and an outside‐in barrier to penetration of external irritants. Transepidermal water loss (TEWL) has been extensively used as a method of estimating the skin barrier quality, typically without any consideration of directionality. The validity of TEWL as an estimate of skin permeability to external substances has been controversial in vitro and in vivo. The aim of this work was to assess the relationship between TEWL and the penetration of a topically applied external marker (caffeine) in healthy skin in vivo before and following a challenge to the barrier.

Methods

The skin barrier was challenged by application of aqueous solutions of mild cleanser products under occlusion for 3 h on the forearms of nine human participants. Skin barrier quality was evaluated before and after the challenge by measuring the TEWL rate and the permeated amount of topically applied caffeine using in vivo confocal Raman microspectroscopy.

Results

No skin irritation was observed following the skin barrier challenge. TEWL rates and the caffeine penetrated amount in thestratum corneumafter the challenge were not correlated. A weak correlation was observed when the changes were corrected to water‐only treatment. TEWL values can be influenced by environmental conditions as well as the skin temperature and water content.

Conclusions

Measuring TEWL rates is not always representative of the outside‐in barrier. TEWL may be useful in differentiating large changes in skin barrier function (e.g., between healthy and compromised skin) but is less sensitive to small variations following topical application of mild cleansers.
A micro‐CT investigation of densification in pressboard due to compression
Authors: Afshar R. , Stjärnesund J. , Gamstedt E. K. , Girlanda O. , Sahlén F. , Tjahjanto D.
Published: May 2023

As a non‐destructive inspection method, micro‐computed tomography has been employed for determining local properties of a cellulose‐based product, specifically pressboard. Furthermore, by utilizing the determined properties in a detailed numerical model, by means of a finite element analysis, we demonstrate a continuum anisotropic viscoelastic‐viscoplastic model. Through such a combination of non‐invasive experiments with accurate computations in mechanics, we attain a better understanding of materials and its structural integrity at a pre‐production stage increasing the success of the first prototype. In detail, this combination of micro‐computed tomography and finite element analysis improves accuracy in predicting materials response by taking into account the local material variations. Specifically, we have performed indentation tests and scanned the internal structure of the specimen for analysing the densification patterns within the material. Subsequently, we have used a developed material model for predicting the response of material to indentation. We have computed the indentation test itself by simulating the mechanical response of high‐density cellulose‐based materials. In the end, we have observed that pressboard, having initially a heterogeneous density distribution through the thickness, shows a shift in the densification to the more porous part after indentation. The densification maps of the simulated results are presented by comparing with the experimental results. A reasonable agreement is observed between the experimental and the simulated densifications patterns, which suggests that the proposed methodology can be used to predict densification also for other fibre‐based materials during manufacturing or in service loading.
Mechanical behaviour and fracture evolution of coal specimens containing an over‐excavated hole: Experimental study and numerical modelling
Authors: Zhongyi Man , Chun Liu , Mingyao Wei , Yonglong Wang
Published: May 2023

Utilising a series of mechanically over‐excavated cavities along borehole is a novel technique for enhancing the permeability of soft coal seams and, consequently, gas drainage. The evolution of cracks induced by a wide range of pressure‐relief around an over‐excavated hole is intrinsically complex. In this study, the mechanical behaviour and crack evolution of the specimens containing an over‐excavated hole under uniaxial compression loading were studied by experimental and 3D numerical simulation. The results indicated that the peak strength and elastic modulus of the specimens gradually decrease with increasing cavity diameter and length, which is also verified by the numerical simulation. The inclusion of cylindrical cavities in over‐excavated holes results in reduced crack initiation stress and a greater degradation of peak stress and elastic modulus, despite having an equivalent volume to the ellipsoidal cavity. This is likely attributed to the difference in stress concentration between the cylindrical and ellipsoidal cavities. The crack propagation process can be classified into four stages based on the acoustic emission (AE) event counts, initial crack compaction, stable crack propagation, unstable crack propagation and post‐peak failure stage. The two AE indices, rise angle and average frequency value, demonstrated that the failure is dominated by tensile crack and gradually transformed to shear crack. Stress redistribution is essential in the initiation and propagation of cracks. Tensile stress concentration leads to cracks forming at the top and bottom of the hole, which propagate in the direction of loading. Compressive stress concentration results in shear cracks forming at the left and right sides of the hole, which propagate diagonally. The failure pattern of the specimen is ultimately determined by a combination of tensile and mixed crack propagation. The experimental and numerical results contribute to a deeper understanding of the crack evolution mechanism of coal seams with over‐excavated holes.
Drought stress‐mediated differences in phyllosphere microbiome and associated pathogen resistance between male and female poplars
Authors: Lin Tiantian , Tang Jiayao , Li Shuying , Li Shujiang , Han Shan , Liu Yinggao , Yang Chunlin , Chen Gang , Chen Lianghua , Zhu Tianhui
Published: May 2023

Phyllosphere‐associated microbes play a crucial role in plant–pathogen interactions while their composition and diversity are strongly influenced by drought stress. As dioecious plant species exhibited secondary dimorphism between the two sexes in response to drought stress, whether such difference will lead to sex‐specific differences in phyllosphere microbiome and associated pathogen resistance between male and female conspecifics is still unknown. In this study, we subjected female and male full siblings of a dioecious poplar species to a short period of drought treatment followed by artificial infection of a leaf pathogenic fungus. Our results showed that male plants grew better than females with or without drought stress. Female control plants had more leaf lesion area than males after pathogen infection, whereas drought stress reversed such a difference. Further correlation and in vitro toxicity tests suggested that drought‐mediated sexual differences in pathogen resistance between the two plant sexes could be attributed to the shifts in structure and function of phyllosphere‐associated microbiome rather than the amount of leaf main defensive chemicals contained in plant leaves. Supportively, the microbiome analysis through high‐throughput sequencing indicated that female phyllosphere enriched a higher abundance of ecologically beneficial microbes that serve as biological plant protectants, while males harbored abundant phytopathogens under drought‐stressed conditions. The results could provide potential implications for the selection of suitable poplar sex to plants in drought or semi‐drought habitats.
Multi-Physical Modeling of Launcher Electromechanical Actuators Accounting for Production Variability and Thermal Effects
Authors: Wauthion Benjamin , Telteu-Nedelcu Dan , Alexandre Paul , Kinnaert Michel
Published: May 2023

With the trend toward reusable launchers, there is a need to develop health monitoring systems for electromechanical actuators (EMAs) performing nozzle orientation. To tune such a health monitoring system, data sets reproducing EMA operation in healthy and faulty modes are needed. Besides, effect of production variability and thermal dependency should also be accounted for. In this paper, a systematic approach to determine an EMA model from which appropriate data sets can be generated is presented. The focus is on mechanical faults such as high friction level that may lead to jamming and excessive backlash. From available experimental data sets recorded on a fleet of EMA, gray box identification is used to estimate the friction parameters including their confidence level for the different EMAs. Production variability is then characterized by showing that each parameter estimate is represented by a Gaussian distribution at a given temperature. Next thermal effects are accounted for through a Gaussian process characterizing parameter variability with respect to temperature. Validation of the model is finally performed with EMA healthy operation data.
Contacting Micro Asperity of a Deformable Surface
Authors: Liu Shuangbiao , Dorcy Nicole , Jane Wang Q. , Chung Yip-Wah , Berkebile Stephen
Published: May 2023

Deterministic contact modeling based on half-space theories has satisfied a wide range of applications. However, the half-space theories themselves do not involve shape effects of roughness on Green’s functions/influence coefficients; in deterministic rough-surface contact analyses, the roughness is considered in gap function. This approach can be called the “roughness simplification.” One needs to answer two questions about the validity of the roughness simplification: How appropriate is the roughness simplification in modeling rough-surface contacts? How accurately can the commonly included contact-plasticity behavior be captured under the roughness simplification? This work utilized a double-scale representation of an asperity—a microscopic deformable asperity stacked on a deformable half-space, to obtain their combined contact responses in both elastic and plastic regimes. The deformation and contact behaviors of asperities thus configured were obtained with finite element analysis (FEA) and rough-surface half-space contact solvers. Three stages of asperity contact were discovered: the Hertzian stage, the single-region elastoplastic stage, and the two-region elastoplastic stage where the surrounding base material also takes part in the contact. The comparisons of contact deformation and pressure results from both the finite element analysis and half-space contact solvers support the validity of the half-space theories with the roughness simplification for various ellipsoid-shape asperities with circular-bases in both elastic and elastoplastic rough-surface asperity modeling. The research also reveals that when significant plastic deformations occur, asperities with different aspect ratios can bear different maximum elastoplastic contact pressures.
A Synthetic Cumate-Inducible Promoter for Graded and Homogenous Gene Expression in Pseudomonas aeruginosa
Authors: Klotz Alexander , Kaczmarczyk Andreas , Jenal Urs
Published: May 2023

Reverse genetics is a powerful approach to study bacterial physiology and behavior by relying on well-developed genetic tools, such as inducible promoters. For the human pathogen
Pseudomonas aeruginosa
, well-characterized inducible promoters are scarce.
16 Poor availability of age-appropriate drug formulations in DR Congo: a barrier to switch from intravenous to oral antibiotics in children admitted to Kisantu hospital
Authors: Tack Bieke , Emmanuel Daniel , Vita Japhet , Ngina Ntangu , Lunguya Octavie , Vangeluwe Dina , Allegaert Karel , Ravinetto Rafaella
Published: May 2023

In children with severe bacterial infection in low-resource settings, switch from intravenous to oral antibiotics is important to reduce nosocomial infections and costs. We report barriers to reliable oral antibiotic administration in children under five admitted to Kisantu hospital (DR Congo) with bloodstream infection. Qualitative observations were compiled during field studies (DeNTS/TreNTS study:NCT04473768/04850677). Antibiotics were procured by the hospital pharmacy and part of routine care.Oral switch mostly relied on Watch antibiotics (ciprofloxacin/azithromycin) due to predomination of multiresistant Salmonella bloodstream infections. Available oral formulations were conventional tablets and powders/granules for reconstitution. Water for reconstitution was rarely sterile and volumes were not exactly measured. Instructions on reconstitution and/or a volume mark on the bottle were missing for some in-country produced antibiotics. Accurate oral dosing was impeded by complex dose calculations and absence of dosing devices. Vomiting after administration suggested poor palatability. Bottle antisepsis was endangered by use of the cap for administration. Treatment compliance suffered from non-affordability.Insufficient availability of age-appropriate antibiotic formulations is a biohazard and driver of inappropriate antibiotic use, fuelling antimicrobial resistance. WHO should integrate antibiotics in pediatric drug optimization and medicine prequalification. National regulatory authorities should adopt stringent specifications for formulations and dosing devices when granting marketing authorizations. To enable safe and effective oral switch in low-resource settings, solid flexible dosing formulations based on age/weight bands of Watch antibiotics are needed
Acute haemorrhage from a large renal epithelioid angiomyolipoma: diagnostic and management considerations in a teenage patient with a rare cancer
Authors: Conroy Samantha , Griffin Jon , Cumberbatch Marcus , Pathak Sanjeev
Published: May 2023

Acute renal haemorrhage is a life-threatening condition that is complicated in the context of renal malignancy. Here, we present the case of a teenage male presenting acutely with a large, bleeding renal epithelioid angiomyolipoma (EAML) of the kidney—a rare cancer, which is part of the perivascular epithelioid cell tumour family. The patient was managed acutely with prompt resuscitation, transfer to a centre of expertise and haemorrhagic control using radiologically guided endovascular techniques; this subsequently permitted an oncologically sound procedure (radical nephrectomy, inferior vena cava thrombectomy and lymphadenectomy) to be performed within 24 hours. The description and discussion around this unique case summarises the patient’s clinical journey, while exploring the current literature surrounding diagnosis and outcomes of patients with renal EAMLs.
SARS-CoV2 in public spaces in West London, UK during COVID-19 pandemic
Authors: Abubakar-Waziri Hisham , Kalaiarasan Gopinath , Wawman Rebecca , Hobbs Faye , Adcock Ian , Dilliway Claire , Fang Fangxin , Pain Christopher , Porter Alexandra , Bhavsar Pankaj K , Ransome Emma , Savolainen Vincent , Kumar Prashant , Chung Kian Fan
Published: May 2023

Background

Spread of SARS-CoV2 by aerosol is considered an important mode of transmission over distances >2 m, particularly indoors.

Objectives

We determined whether SARS-CoV2 could be detected in the air of enclosed/semi-enclosed public spaces.

Methods and analysis

Between March 2021 and December 2021 during the easing of COVID-19 pandemic restrictions after a period of lockdown, we used total suspended and size-segregated particulate matter (PM) samplers for the detection of SARS-CoV2 in hospitals wards and waiting areas, on public transport, in a university campus and in a primary school in West London.

Results

We collected 207 samples, of which 20 (9.7%) were positive for SARS-CoV2 using quantitative PCR. Positive samples were collected from hospital patient waiting areas, from hospital wards treating patients with COVID-19 using stationary samplers and from train carriages in London underground using personal samplers. Mean virus concentrations varied between 429 500 copies/m3in the hospital emergency waiting area and the more frequent 164 000 copies/m3found in other areas. There were more frequent positive samples from PM samplers in the PM2.5 fractions compared with PM10 and PM1. Culture on Vero cells of all collected samples gave negative results.

Conclusion

During a period of partial opening during the COVID-19 pandemic in London, we detected SARS-CoV2 RNA in the air of hospital waiting areas and wards and of London Underground train carriage. More research is needed to determine the transmission potential of SARS-CoV2 detected in the air.
Two-Degree of Freedom-Based Control Model for Active Suspension System to Mitigate the Nonlinear Disturbance
Authors: Rana Ravindra S , Adhyaru Dipak M
Published: May 2023

Comfort is an important consideration in passenger vehicles provided by a suspension system. The suspension system must be associated with the vehicle body to improve comfort for the passenger. The active suspension system (ASS) has been introduced to perform this task. Moreover, the sliding mode controller (SMC) is well known for its continuous control signals. This paper proposes the Bayesian-based proportional resonant sliding mode controller (B-PRSMC) and two degrees of the freedom-proportional resonant controller (2d-f-PR) to stabilize passenger and ride comfort. The B-PRSMC is used for examining system states under varying road disturbances based on the Bayesian theorem. After examining the system state, the system performance is controlled by the 2d-f-PR controller. The proposed method is performed on Matlab, and the results are taken regarding body acceleration, body travel and suspension deflection. The mastery of proposed method is estimated under different road profiles. The comparative analysis demonstrates that the suggested controller enhances ride and passenger comfort in varied road profiles due to the combination of B-PRSMC and 2d-f-PR controllers.
TBNet: Stereo Image Super-Resolution with Multi-Scale Attention
Authors: Zhu Jiyang , Han Xue
Published: May 2023

With 3D products being widely applied, more attention has focused on studying stereo image super-resolution (SR). Current stereo image SR studies mainly aim to improve the performance by the additional information from a pair of low-resolution stereo images. However, it is challenging for stereo image SR to fully exploit self-similarity information from its own image and parallax information between stereo image pairs. In line with these challenges, this paper presents a Two-Branch Network (TBNet) to integrate self-similarity information and parallax information for SR. In the TBnet, a stereo parallax transfer module with an encoder–decoder structure was first proposed to sufficiently transfer multi-scale parallax information and preserve the stereo consistency between stereo images. This paper further presented a residual pyramid self-attention module to employ self-similarity information to take advantage of self-predictive power. Finally, extensive experiments demonstrate the superiority of our model over the state-of-the-art performance in terms of objective and perceptual quality and the accuracy of disparity estimation.
GROWTH AND PROPERTIES OF SPIN-COATED TRANSPARENT SN AND AL-DOPED ZNO THIN FILMS
Authors: BAKHOUCHE AMEL , BOUAFIA MOHAMED
Published: May 2023

In this work, Zinc Oxide (ZnO) thin films doped and undoped with Sn and Al were grown on ITO substrates by the sol–gel spin coating technique, where the Sn/Zn and Al/Zn atomic ratios were, respectively, 5% and 7% in the solution. SZO and AZO structures were examined using XRD, AFM, SEM, UV–vis spectroscopy, and photoluminescence (PL) to investigate the morphology, structural, and optical characteristics. According to XRD analysis, all of the produced films have a hexagonal wurtzite structure with a polycrystalline nature oriented along the (1 0 0) direction. The crystallite size was calculated using the well-known Scherrer’s formula and found to be in the range of 23–40 nm. Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) results revealed that Sn and Al low doping had an impact on the morphological surface of the films. The measurements from the UV-Visible Spectrophotometer (U–Vis) showed that undoped ZnO film has a high optical transparency in the visible region (over [Formula: see text]%), and then the optical band gap of thin films was calculated. PL is observed for ZnO thin films doped and undoped with Sn and Al.
Almost sharp weighted Sobolev trace inequalities in the unit ball under constraints
Authors: An Jiaxing , Dou Jingbo , Han Yazhou
Published: May 2023

In this paper, we establish some improved weighted Sobolev trace inequalities [Formula: see text] under the zero higher order moments constraint via the concentration compactness principle, where [Formula: see text] is a defining function of [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text]. This relates to the fractional (conformal) Laplacians and related problems in conformal geometry. We construct some test functions and show that the inequality is almost optimal when [Formula: see text].
Derivations and root closures of graded ideals
Authors: Ciupercă Cătălin , Forsman Joey , Marmorstein Michael
Published: May 2023

We show that the graded structure of an ideal is preserved under root closures. As an application, for a locally nilpotent derivation [Formula: see text] on a Noetherian integral domain [Formula: see text] containing a field of characteristic zero, we show that if [Formula: see text] is [Formula: see text]-invariant, then so are its root closures.
NUMERICAL MODELING OF WEAR DISTRIBUTION ON THE TIBIAL INSERT
Authors: FEKETE G.
Published: May 2023

Wear is one of the main mechanical factors that limits the lifetime duration of total knee replacements (TKRs) and it is known to be highly dependent on the local kinematics of the knee joint. In this study, a novel hybrid wear model is introduced to model the wear distribution between the lateral and medial side of any commercially available TKRs. The major aim is to be able to rate TKRs, based on their wear properties that are obtained from numerical simulations, whether in long term they are able to maintain a modest and closely equal wear propagation on both of the tibial compartments. For the simulations, three TKR geometries were used with the augmented Archard’s law which involves the effect of slide-roll under squat motion. Squat was chosen due to its importance both in sport and everyday life. By this model, it is demonstrated on different TKRs how wear is built up on both sides of the tibial tray from 20 to 120 degree of flexion angle.
New traversable wormhole solutions in Einstein Gauss–Bonnet gravity
Authors: Zubair M. , Farooq Mushayydha , Gudekli Ertan , Kausar Hafiza Rizwana , Yildiz G. D. Acan
Published: May 2023

This paper explores the existence of static wormholes in 4-Dimensional Einstein Gauss–Bonnet (4D EGB) gravity. We discuss some possibilities for constructing radial-dependent shape functions via different strategies to develop some non-conventional wormhole geometries by considering anisotropic matter sources. In this regard, we assume a specific form of the equation of state and investigate its effects on Gauss–Bonnet (GB) coupling parameter. Next, we impose a traceless condition on the anisotropic fluid distribution as well as radial-dependent energy density profile to explore wormhole geometries as separate cases. It is seen that the obtained results can be reduced into Morris–Throne wormholes for the zero value of GB-coupled parameter for anisotropic fluid distribution. Furthermore, we scrutinize flaring-out conditions and examine asymptotically flatness constraints for the existence of wormholes. Our analysis shows that the weak energy condition (WEC) is satisfied for a particular range by constraining GB-coupled parameter. We study the dynamics of GB-coupled parameter for both cases [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text]. It is concluded that wormhole solutions are possible for [Formula: see text] and, in some cases, [Formula: see text]. The active gravitational mass of developed wormholes is calculated and plotted graphically. The wormhole geometry is discussed by plotting 2D and 3D embedding diagrams. In order to analyze the complexity of the system, we have plotted the complexity factor for each wormhole.
Bardeen Tolman–Kuchowicz spheres in logarithmic-corrected R2 gravity
Authors: Shamir M. Farasat , Usman Ammara , Naz Tayyaba , Alkhaldi Ali H. , Ali Akram
Published: May 2023

This study enlightens the effect of electric charge in the context of Logarithmic-corrected [Formula: see text] gravity model by assuming the specific form of metric potentials [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text], known as Tolman–Kuchowicz spacetime. The key feature of our study is to assume the Bardeen model to narrate the nature of exterior geometry. This discussion enhances the analysis as the Bardeen black hole solution can be formulated as a gravitationally collapsed magnetic monopole which arises from some particular case of nonlinear electrodynamics. Further, the modified matching conditions, designed for [Formula: see text] gravity, have been imposed to compute all the unknown constants involved in metric potentials for the qualitative evaluation of the study. For this purpose, we have studied all the mandatory characteristics of stellar structures like energy density, pressure components, energy bonds, equilibrium condition, stability constraints, mass–radius relation. A comprehensive graphical analysis to ensure the credibility of the [Formula: see text] gravity model has been presented. It is worth indicating that our obtained charged anisotropic outcomes are physically well-fitted with the best degree of accuracy.
Black holes in R2-dRGT massive gravity
Authors: Akbarieh Amin Rezaei , Ilkhchi Pouneh Safarzadeh , Izadi Yousef , Khoshrangbaf Minou
Published: May 2023

Massive gravity offers an interesting modification of general relativity by considering a nonzero mass for the graviton. We present a de Rham, Gabadadze and Tolley (dRGT) massive gravity model in the presence of higher order curvature gravity. We obtain a spherical solution for the field equations in this theory. The spherical solution possesses an electric charge and a cosmological constant, and it reduces to the Schwarzschild solution in the limit of a negligible graviton mass and the absence of the higher order term. We study the thermodynamics of this black hole and find that the mass of the graviton and the higher order term of gravity have a significant effect on the thermodynamic properties of the black hole. We also show the entropy of a black hole is independent of the mass of the graviton. Using the observational constraints on the coefficient of the higher order term, we determine an upper limit for the graviton mass. We compute the other thermodynamic quantities, such as heat capacity and Helmholtz free energy. Assuming that the spherical solutions are the modified Schwarzschild, we consider the relativistic thin accretion disk and study the effects of higher order term on thermal properties of the disk at the infrared limit in an asymptotic safety scenario.
The failure of Wigner function negativity to detect quantum dissonance in an open bipartite system
Authors: Siyouri Fatima-Zahra , Hassouni Yassine
Published: May 2023

We study the dynamics of Wigner function, quantum discord, entanglement and quantum dissonance for bipartite Bell-diagonal states independently interacting with dephasing reservoirs. We analyze comparatively their behavior under the decoherence effect. Our main goal is to test the ability of Wigner function negativity to measure all kinds of quantum correlations in such system. Particularly, we find that this negativity can only capture entanglement and discord. Of course it succeeded in predicting the behavior of quantum dissonance, but nevertheless, it failed to detect its presence. As a matter of fact, we conclude that Wigner function negativity cannot be used as measure of quantum dissonance in the two qubit open system.
Development of water-soluble AIE-based wash-free Aβ probes superior to commercial ThT
Authors: Hou Ting-Ting , Tang Ying-Hao , Zhang Zhen-Yu , Li Ze-Jun , Wang Ya-Long
Published: May 2023

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a typical neurodegenerative disease. [Formula: see text]-amyloid (A[Formula: see text] plaque is the most prominent pathological biomarker associated with the progression of AD. Conventional A[Formula: see text] probes, including commercial probe ThT, usually suffer from tedious washing procedures. Herein, novel AIE-active A[Formula: see text] probes with excellent water solubility, named DE-V1-PYC3 and DE-V1-PYOH, were developed for the detection and image of A[Formula: see text] without tedious washing procedures. Compared with commercial probe ThT, the AIE-active A[Formula: see text] probes exhibited better sensitivity and affinity to A[Formula: see text] aggregates. Moreover, for ThT, the washing procedures are essential to obtain high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) images of A[Formula: see text] plaques in AD brain tissue slices. DE-V1-PYC3 and DE-V1-PYOH can label A[Formula: see text] plaques in AD brain tissue slices with high SNR even without tedious washing procedures.
Motor network reorganization in stroke patients with dyskinesias during a shoulder-touching task: A fNIRS study
Authors: Zhang Yizheng , Wang Dan , Wang Dongyang , Yan Kecheng , Yi Li , Lin Shuoshu , Shao Guangjian , Shao Zhiyong , Sun Jinyan , Yang Aoran
Published: May 2023

Hemiplegia after stroke has become a major cause of the world’s high disabilities, and it is vital to enhance our understanding of post-stroke neuroplasticity to develop efficient rehabilitation programs. This study aimed to explore the brain activation and network reorganization of the motor cortex (MC) with functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). The MC hemodynamic signals were gained from 22 stroke patients and 14 healthy subjects during a shoulder-touching task with the right hand. The MC activation pattern and network attributes analyzed with the graph theory were compared between the two groups. The results revealed that healthy controls presented dominant activation in the left MC while stroke patients exhibited dominant activation in the bilateral hemispheres MC. The MC networks for the two groups had small-world properties. Compared with healthy controls, patients had higher transitivity and lower global efficiency (GE), mean connectivity, and long connections (LCs) in the left MC. In addition, both MC activation and network attributes were correlated with patient’s upper limb motor function. The results showed the stronger compensation of the unaffected motor area, the better recovery of the upper limb motor function for patients. Moreover, the MC network possessed high clustering and relatively sparse inter-regional connections during recovery for patients. Our results promote the understanding of MC reorganization during recovery and indicate that MC activation and network could provide clinical assessment significance in stroke patients. Given the advantages of fNIRS, it shows great application potential in the assessment and rehabilitation of motor function after stroke.
Open mapping theorem for nonlinear operators
Authors: Haddadi Mohammad Reza , Labbaf Ghasemi Mohammad Hussein
Published: May 2023

Many authors gave definitions of a new kind of derivative and integral, moving the roles of subtraction and addition to division and multiplication, and thus established a new calculus, called multiplicative calculus. In this paper, our aim is to bring up this calculus to the attention of researchers and demonstrate its usefulness. We first discussed multiplicative normed spaces by giving some topological properties of the relevant multiplicative normed spaces. Also, we give a generalization of the open mapping theorem and the uniform boundedness principle for nonlinear operators with a number of important examples.
On the genus of strong annihilating-ideal graph of commutative rings
Authors: Nazim Mohd , ur Rehman Nadeem , Selvakumar K.
Published: May 2023

Let [Formula: see text] be a commutative ring with unity and [Formula: see text] be the set of annihilating-ideals of [Formula: see text]. The strong annihilating-ideal graph of [Formula: see text], denoted by [Formula: see text], is an undirected graph with vertex set [Formula: see text] and two vertices [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] are adjacent if and only if [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text]. In this paper, first we characterize commutative Artinian rings whose strong annihilating-ideal graph is isomorphic to some well-known graphs and then we classify commutative Artinian rings whose strong annihilating-ideal graph is planar, toroidal or projective.
Upgradation of AIMPOL Instrument on the 104-cm Sampurnanand Telescope of ARIES
Authors: Pandey Jeewan C. , Singh Sadhana , Yadav R. K. S. , Nanjappa Nandish , Pant Jayshreekar , Kumar Mukesh , Sahu Sanjit
Published: May 2023

We present a recent upgradation of the ARIES IMaging POLarimeter (AIMPOL) mounted on the 104[Formula: see text]cm Sampurnanand telescope of ARIES, Nainital since 2004. AIMPOL is upgraded by replacing the older detector with a new CCD, Pylon 1300B and the older sliding filter assembly with an automatic wheel filter assembly. A characterization of this CCD is performed and several CCD parameters like gain, read-out noise, dark current, and linearity are verified. The average value of the bias offset is measured to be ∼600 ADU whereas the dark current is measured to be 0.2[Formula: see text]e−/pixel/h at [Formula: see text]C. The CCD can be operated safely between [Formula: see text] C to [Formula: see text]C due to the almost constant dark current in this temperature range. The nonlinearity of the CCD is measured to be ∼2%, which is suitable for scientific observations. A few polarimetric observations are also taken using the upgraded AIMPOL. The degree of polarization and position angle of a few standard polarized stars are found to be similar to their standard and previously observed values.
Tendon Transfer versus Nerve Transfer for the Reconstruction of Key Pinch and Grip Strength in Isolated High Traumatic Injuries of the Ulnar Nerve: A Systematic Review
Authors: PARYLO Jacek , HODGSON Samuel , CHAUDHRY Tahseen
Published: May 2023

Background: Primary repair for traumatic injuries to the ulnar nerve alone does not always restore satisfactory hand function, particularly in injuries above the elbow where the long distances for regeneration limit motor reinnervation. Reductions in key pinch and grip strength are some of the main complaints. Tendon transfers have traditionally been used to improve key pinch and grip strength as a late salvage where primary nerve regeneration has run its course. Nerve transfers have been proposed as an alternative procedure and may be offered early to augment recovery, lengthen the window for reinnervation or provide motor reinnervation where the results of nerve repair are expected to be poor. This review sought to identify whether one type of procedure was superior to the other for reconstructing key pinch and grip strength.

Methods: Medline, Embase and Cochrane Library were searched to identify articles that concerned nerve or tendon transfer following isolated traumatic injury to the ulnar nerve. Articles were excluded if patients had polytrauma or degenerative diseases of the peripheral nerves.

Results: A total of 179 articles were screened for inclusion. And 35 full-text articles were read and assessed for eligibility, of which seven articles were eligible. Following citation search, two additional articles were included. Five tendon transfer articles and four nerve transfer articles were included. Key pinch and grip strength outcomes for both procedures were roughly similar, though tendon transfers carried a much higher risk of complications.

Conclusions: Based on the key pinch and grip strength outcomes, tendon transfer and nerve transfer restore a similar degree of function following traumatic ulnar injury. Reported nerve transfer outcomes for grip strength were slightly better. Return to useful function was faster following tendon transfers. Preoperative data and more patient-reported outcome measures should be recorded in future studies to provide more context for each procedure type.

Level of Evidence: Level III (Therapeutic)
Factors Associated with Change in Diagnosis of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome after Electrodiagnostic Studies
Authors: MATSUO Tomoki , KIMURA Hiroo , FURUHATA Ryogo , SUZUKI Taku , MATSUMURA Noboru , IWAMOTO Takuji
Published: May 2023

Background: Hand surgeons sometimes place more weight on clinical findings and may not always consider the results of electrodiagnostic studies (EDX) in the diagnosis of carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS). The aim of this study is to determine factors associated with a change in diagnosis of CTS after EDX.

Methods: This is a retrospective study of all patients with an initial clinical diagnosis of CTS who underwent EDX at our hospital. We identified patients whose diagnosis changed from CTS to non-CTS after EDX and used univariate and multivariate analysis to determine if age, sex, hand dominance, unilateral symptoms, history of diabetes mellitus, rheumatoid arthritis, haemodialysis, cerebral lesion, cervical lesion, mental disorder, initial diagnosis by a non-hand surgeon, the number of examined items in CTS-6 and a CTS-negative EDX result were associated with a change in diagnosis after EDX.

Results: A total of 479 hands with a clinical diagnosis of CTS underwent EDX. The diagnosis was changed to non-CTS in 61 hands (13%) after EDX. Univariate analysis demonstrated that unilateral symptoms, cervical lesion, mental disorder, initial diagnosis by a non-hand surgeon, the number of examined items and a CTS-negative EDX result were significantly associated with a change in diagnosis. In the multivariate analysis, only the number of examined items was significantly associated with a change in diagnosis.

Conclusions: EDX results were particularly valued in hands where the initial diagnosis was uncertain for CTS. In hands with an initial diagnosis of CTS, the performance of sufficient history-taking and physical examination was more valued at the final diagnosis than EDX results or other aspects of the patient’s background. The process of confirming a clear initial clinical diagnosis of CTS using EDX may be of little value for decision-making at the final diagnosis.

Level of Evidence: Level III (Therapeutic)
EVALUATION OF SDSM MODELS FOR CLIMATE PREDICTIONS IN BANGLADESH
Authors: HAN YUE , YANG JIAXIN , DAS LIPON CHANDRA
Published: May 2023

As one of the poorest countries in the world, agriculture is Bangladesh’s economic pillar, leading to Bangladesh’s economy becoming vulnerable to global warming. The generation of high-resolution climate predictions in Bangladesh can help to reduce the huge damage and losses inflicted by disasters linked to climate. The statistical downscaling model (SDSM) is the most widely used software on robust climate downscaling and prediction analysis. In this study, by using the SDSM model, we established the statistical relationship between observed climate data in Bangladesh and the large-scale low-resolution NCEP data and used three statistical indicators to evaluate the prediction performance of the SDSM software. Our results show that the SDSM software is more suitable for forecasting humidity/temperature in Bangladesh than rainfall.
Can Global Mean Temperatures be Held to 1.5∘C or Less without Major Efforts in Carbon Removal/Geoengineering?
Authors: Wuebbles Donald J.
Published: May 2023

The 2015 international Paris Agreement called for pursuing efforts to limit the changes in climate to 1.5∘C above pre-industrial levels. This study uses two approaches to re-examine this feasibility more fully. The observed trends in the temperature record provide one means to estimate when 1.5∘C will be reached. Examination of the remaining allowed carbon emissions provides another approach. The temperature record and the observed trends in temperature over recent decades suggest that 1.5∘C will be reached by 2032–2042. Consideration of the equivalent amount of CO2 reveals the ranges of 266, 366 and 531 GtCO2-eq still allowed for 67%, 50% and 33% probabilities, respectively, of staying within the temperature limit. At the current rate of emissions, the 50% limit would be reached in eight years. If an emissions reduction of 4% per year beginning in January 2023 is considered, the 67% likelihood for staying within the 1.5∘C limit is passed in 2030 and the 50% likelihood is passed in 2035. As a result, humanity is very unlikely to meet the identified targets needed to keep the global temperature change to 1.5∘C and the SSP1-1.9 scenario assumptions for future emissions toward enabling a limit of 1.5∘C are also extremely unlikely.
Competition Dynamics in the Meme Ecosystem
Authors: Ford Trenton W. , Krohn Rachel , Weninger Tim
Published: May 2023

Creating and sharing memes is a common modality of online social interaction. Because of the prevalence of memes, an abundance of research focuses on understanding how memes are shared and perceived within their online social environment and in what ways they differ from other modalities of online communication. In the present work, we present findings that suggest a relationship between how memes are introduced, shared, and diminish in online social systems and the behavior of biological species within an ecosystem. Framed by this perspective, we borrow ecological methodologies and concepts like resource availability, speciation, and competition to study human attention, creativity, and sharing dynamics (respectively) over a large collection of memes shared on Reddit. Specifically, we find that the population of memes has scaled almost exactly with the total amount of content created over the past decade. We find a consequence of limited human attention in the face of a growing number of memes is that the diversity of memes has decreased at the community level, albeit slightly, in the same period. A further consequence is that the average life span of memes has decreased dramatically, which is further evidence of an increase in competition and a decrease in a meme species’ primary resource: human attention. From this work, we have found reasonable preliminary support for linking memes to species and, thus, meme research to ecological research. We believe that future research should work to strengthen this relationship and transfer more methodologies to meme and information research from ecology.
A Systematic Literature Review on the Code Smells Datasets and Validation Mechanisms
Authors: Zakeri-Nasrabadi Morteza , Parsa Saeed , Esmaili Ehsan , Palomba Fabio
Published: May 2023

The accuracy reported for code smell-detecting tools varies depending on the dataset used to evaluate the tools. Our survey of 45 existing datasets reveals that the adequacy of a dataset for detecting smells highly depends on relevant properties such as the size, severity level, project types, number of each type of smell, number of smells, and the ratio of smelly to non-smelly samples in the dataset. Most existing datasets support God Class, Long Method, and Feature Envy, while six smells in Fowler and Beck's catalog are not supported by any datasets. We conclude that existing datasets suffer from imbalanced samples, lack of supporting severity level, and restriction to Java language.
Rise of Distributed Deep Learning Training in the Big Model Era: From a Software Engineering Perspective
Authors: Liu Xuanzhe , Gu Diandian , Chen Zhenpeng , Wen Jinfeng , Zhang Zili , Ma Yun , Wang Haoyu , Jin Xin
Published: May 2023

Deep learning (DL)
has become a key component of modern software. In the “
big model
” era, the rich features of DL-based software (i.e., DL software) substantially rely on powerful DL models, e.g., BERT, GPT-3, and the recently emerging GPT-4, which are trained on the powerful cloud with large datasets. Hence, training effective DL models has become a vital stage in the whole software lifecycle. When training deep learning models, especially those big models, developers need to parallelize and distribute the computation and memory resources amongst multiple devices (e.g., a cluster of GPUs) in the training process, which is known as
distributed deep learning training
, or

distributed training

for short. However, the unique challenges that developers encounter in distributed training process have not been studied in the software engineering community. Given the increasingly heavy dependence of current DL-based software on distributed training, this paper aims to fill in the knowledge gap and presents the first comprehensive study on developers’ issues in distributed training. To this end, we focus on popular DL frameworks that support distributed training (including TensorFlow, PyTorch, Keras, and Horovod) and analyze 1,131 real-world developers’ issues about using these frameworks reported on Stack Overflow and GitHub. We construct a fine-grained taxonomy consisting of 30 categories regarding the fault symptoms and summarize common fix patterns for different symptoms. We find that: (1) many distributed-specific faults and non-distributed-specific faults inherently share the same fault symptoms, making it challenging to debug; (2) most of the fault symptoms have frequent fix patterns; (3) about half of the faults are related to system-level configurations. Based on the results, we suggest actionable implications on research avenues that can potentially facilitate the distributed training to develop DL-based software, such as focusing on the frequent and common fix patterns when designing testing or debugging tools, developing efficient testing and debugging techniques for communication configuration along with the synthesis of network configuration analysis, designing new multi-device checkpoint-and-replay techniques to help reproduction, and designing serverless APIs for cloud platforms.