bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
SELF-EFFICACY AMONG STUDENTS IN HIGHER EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS DURING ONLINE LEARNING SELF-EFFICACY AMONG STUDENTS IN HIGHER EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS DURING ONLINE LEARNING
Authors: Levterova-Gadjalova Dora , Tsokov Galin
Published: November 2021

Distance learning around the world has set new requirements for educational institutions and particularly for the students. Self-efficacy is one of the essential factors for success. Self-efficacy in an online learning environment is related to the confidence in one's ability to succeed, knowledge and ability to use the technology, and the casualness of success in the new education model, which is evolving rapidly from Education 2.0. to Education 4.0. A survey was conducted among 134 students from higher educational institutions (HEIs). The results of the study demonstrate that self-assessment,  emotional responses, motivation for academic success, and self-referential information of students in HEIs regarding the learning content are unstable.  A rise in the knowledge and usage of various electronic devices and electronic resources has been reported along with a rise in cognitive load. There is an effect of cognitive distortion on mastering the learning content and setting more challenging goals in terms of the transition from the traditional model of learning to distance learning and on their learning competencies .
DISTANCE FORMS OF CRISIS INTERVENTION DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC
Authors: Masariková Anna , Markovič Daniel , Šrobárová Soňa
Published: November 2021

In the current pandemic period caused by COVID-19, the availability of distance forms of social services is exceedingly important. Crisis intervention performed in a distance format helps a person experiencing an acute crisis via telephone and online form of assistance. The paper's primary aim was to find out the use of distance crisis intervention services during the COVID-19 pandemic in Slovakia, to clarify what needs are prioritized for respondents at this time, the type of social problems they turn to crisis intervention and the usability of crisis lines during the pandemic. The quantitative survey was carried out in the form of an anonymous questionnaire, which was available only in electronic form via Google forms, and the respondents were addressed on social networks. The questionnaire was filled in by 291 respondents. Based on the processed data, the distance form of assistance is a little-sought option in solving social problems related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Our recommendation is to support and promote the distance form of assistance more through advertising or financial support – especially considering that many crises could not be dealt with on the part of respondents or the helplines themselves.
TEACHING REASONING: A COGNITIVE-CULTURAL APPROACH
Authors: Vasilev Lev , Zaitseva Valentina , Belova Elena , Cherkasskaya Natalia , Sukhareva Olga
Published: November 2021

This paper describes personal reasoning peculiarities of Russian undergraduate students viewed through the prism of their culture and their psycho-typical characteristics. The experimental study showed specificity of argument formation in the students’ reasoning about their cultural values. Our experiment identified the respondents’ poles within the cognitive style ‘abstract / concrete conceptualization’ based on their verbalization of the primary values. Four levels of concept abstraction were detected and proved by the students’ verbal manifestations: the resulting students’ texts showed remarkable differences between the poles concerning preferences of argument exposition, both in its construction schemes and in the choice of components of the arguments. We thus state that the degree of variability of the students’ value assessment correlates with the degree of formation of the mechanism of differentiation in value orientations. Our recommendations for teaching reasoning concern: linguistically based principles of student cognitive differentiation which minimize distractive factors; choice of teaching tasks depending on the student specific conceptualization pole; and ways of activating differentiation and integration operations in reasoning. In a broader context of education, students’ individual peculiarities and cognitive preferences should be focused on training which stimulate the students’ learning interest.
Self-Tuning PID-Genetic Algorithm Controller for Steam Drum Boiler Water Level Control System
Authors: Hady Mohamad Abdul , Yusuf Mohamad , Fatoni Ali , Arifin Imam
Published: November 2021

A control system with uncertainty or unpredictable disturbance needs more effort to be controlled. A conventional PID Controller is the most popular method used in industries. It was tuned and adjusted by the designer, and it has fixed parameters during operation. However, the disturbance effect causes the desired system performance unreachable. By using a self-tuning controller, the problem should be tackled. In this paper, the PID-Genetic Algorithm (PID-GA) controller was proposed and tested with the steam drum water level control system of a steam power plant. Variation in power load causes noisy water level characteristics and should be maintained at + 0.4 meters from the setpoint to prevent the power plant trip. From the simulation, PID-GA can reduce disturbance of the minimum, nominal, and maximum load with perturbation peaks 0.18 m, 0.22 m, and 0.26 m respectively.Keywords: genetic algorithm, NWL, PID-GA, steam drum, steam power plant.
Obstacle Avoidance Using CTC and Virtual Structure for Leader-Follower Formation on Mobile Robot
Authors: Zulkarnain Maskhur , Agustinah Trihastuti
Published: November 2021

This research examined the development of the combination of virtual structure and leader-follower as an obstacle avoidance method in the formation control of a mobile robot. The formation of the robots are designed with the Separation Bearing Control (SBC) approach between the leader robot (RL) and the virtual robot (RV). The virtual robot is used as a virtual follower and a reference trajectory for the follower  robot (RF). When the follower robot detects an obstacle, the follower robot trajectory is adjusted using a trajectory planner for obstacle avoidance. After passing the obstacle, the follower robot will track its position back in formation using virtual robot position and heading as reference. Leader robot and follower are perturbed by disturbances. In order to ensure the achievement of small error tracking, a controller is designed using the integration of kinematic and dynamics controllers with disturbance observer. The kinematic and dynamics controllers are designed using input-output linearisation (IOL) method and computed torque control (CTC). The effectiveness of the proposed method is verified by the simulation result.Keywords: CTC, leader follower, obstacle avoidance, SBC, virtual structure.
Recent progress in digital holography with dynamic diffractive phase apertures [Invited]
Authors: Rosen Joseph , Hai Nathaniel , Rai Mani Ratnam
Published: November 2021

Digital holography with diffractive phase apertures is a hologram recording technique in which at least one of the interfering waves is modulated by a phase mask. In this review, we survey several main milestones on digital holography with dynamic diffractive phase apertures. We begin with Fresnel incoherent correlation holography (FINCH), a hologram recorder with an aperture of a diffractive lens. FINCH has been used for many applications such as 3D imaging, fluorescence microscopy, superresolution, image processing, and imaging with sectioning ability. FINCH has played an important role by inspiring other digital holography systems based on diffractive phase aperture, such as Fourier incoherent single-channel holography and coded aperture correlation holography, which also are described in this review.
Polyvinyl alcohol microlens array obtained by solvent evaporation from
a confined droplet array
Authors: Yuan Ye , Xu Miao , Wang Xiahui , Lu Hongbo , Qiu Longzhen
Published: November 2021

In this study, polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) microlens arrays (MLAs) were
prepared, and the dynamics of contact lines and contact angles during
confined PVA solution droplet evaporation were investigated by in situ optical microscopy. First, hydrophobic
layers patterned with hydrophilic microholes array modified substrates
were prepared by photolithography and coating methods. The flowing of
PVA solution on the substrates formed droplets in each microhole
self-assembly. The substrate was then heated to allow evaporation of
the solvent. The results showed the contact line of confined droplets
pinned at the junction between the hydrophilic and hydrophobic areas
during the whole evaporation process. The apparent contact angle
decreased nonlinearly during evaporation. The evaporation of PVA
solution droplet in each microhole followed a constant contact radius
mode, meaning constant contact area and declined contact angle during
evaporation. After complete solvent evaporation, PVA formed a convex
shape with convergent lens character in each microhole. In sum, the
obtained PVA convex arrays with uniform sizes and good focusing
properties would have potential applications in wavefront sensing,
infrared focal plane detection or CCD array light accumulation, laser
array scanning, laser display, optical fiber coupling, and many other
optical systems.
Wind lidar signal denoising method based on singular value decomposition and variational mode decomposition
Authors: Dai Huixing , Gao Chunqing , Lin Zhifeng , Wang Kaixin , Zhang Xu
Published: November 2021

A denoising method based on singular value decomposition (SVD) and variational mode decomposition (VMD) is proposed for wind lidar. Utilizing the covariance matrix based lidar signal simulation model, the performance of VMD, SVD, and VMD-SVD is evaluated. The results show that the VMD-SVD method is of better performance, and the output signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) is about 12 dB at the input SNR of

−

9

d
B

. The actual lidar signals processing is performed with this combined denoising method, and the detection range and wind speed at pulse accumulation numbers of 50,100, and 300 are compared. We set the wind speed resulting from noisy signal with pulse accumulation number of 300 as the reference wind speed, and the mean value and standard deviation of wind differences are analyzed. The results show that the denoising method can not only increase the detection range while ensuring the accuracy of wind speed estimation but also achieve the same detection distance with fewer pulse accumulations, thereby improving the temporal resolution. For the pulse accumulation number of 50, the detection range is extended to 24 km from 18.45 km, and the standard deviation of speed difference is 0.88 m/s; for the same detection range, the temporal resolution is increased by about 6 times.
Detection model of copper based on polarization degree induced by low-energy density laser
Authors: Wang Xiao , Yao Mingyin , Zeng Min , Xu Jiang
Published: November 2021

In order to analyze the mechanism of plasma polarization characteristics and the improvement effect of spectral signal-to-back ratio, the intensity formulas of continuous spectrum and discrete spectrum were derived by exploring the path of the radiation spectrum. At the Brewster angle, the model of polarization degree was established based on the measured spectral data to identify the radiation intensity of plasma. The experimental results showed that the polarization characteristics of the background and discrete spectrum were both observed in the plasma spectrum of a copper element, and there were obvious differences in polarization degree and vibration direction. Moreover, cadmium and chromium were used to verify the detection model. It was found that the characteristic signals of the polarization spectrum were more than the effective peaks in laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy, and the variation trend was relatively gentle. The model retained the effective information in the continuum spectrum and fully explored the basic polarization mechanism of plasma. The measured data were not only convenient to observe the characteristic signal peaks of elements, but also greatly improved the recognition effect. This method could extract effective information of illumination plasma under the condition of low incident light intensity and reduce the damage of medium surface, which is a more effective nondestructive testing technology.
Compact passively Q-switched single-frequency distributed Bragg reflector fiber laser at 2.0  µm
Authors: Fang Siyuan , Zhou Bilei , Guan Zhe , Yang Changsheng , Zhao Qilai , Lin Wei , Feng Zhouming , Xu Shanhui
Published: November 2021

Based mainly on the distributed Bragg reflector (DBR) short linear cavity with a 1.6-cm-long heavily

T
m

3
+

-doped germanate glass fiber and semiconductor saturable absorber mirror (SESAM), a compact passively

Q

-switched single-frequency fiber laser at around 1950 nm is demonstrated experimentally. By comparing pulse characters of

Q

-switched operations fulfilled via SESAMs with different parameters, a stable output pulse is optimized to deliver a maximum average power of 22.2 mW, a peak power of 0.67 W, and an optical signal-to-noise ratio over 61 dB. Moreover, the repetition rate of the output pulse can be tuned from 92 to 520 kHz with a narrowest pulse width of 64 ns. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time a 2.0 µm passively

Q

-switched single-frequency DBR

T
m

3
+

-doped fiber laser has been realized, and it shows great potential application in remote sensing, biomedical science, and nonlinear optics.
Aberration measurement and correction on a large field of view in fluorescence microscopy
Authors: Furieri T. , Ancora D. , Calisesi G. , Morara S. , Bassi A. , Bonora S.
Published: November 2021

The aberrations induced by the sample and/or by the sample holder limit the resolution of optical microscopes. Wavefront correction can be achieved using a deformable mirror with wavefront sensorless optimization algorithms but, despite the complexity of these systems, the level of correction is often limited to a small area in the field of view of the microscope. In this work, we present a plug and play module for aberration measurement and correction. The wavefront correction is performed through direct wavefront reconstruction using the spinning-pupil aberration measurement and controlling a deformable lens in closed loop. The lens corrects the aberrations in the center of the field of view, leaving residual aberrations at the margins, that are removed by anisoplanatic deconvolution. We present experimental results obtained in fluorescence microscopy, with a wide field and a light sheet fluorescence microscope. These results indicate that detection and correction over the full field of view can be achieved with a compact transmissive module placed in the detection path of the fluorescence microscope.
On the validity domain of maximum likelihood estimators for depth-of-field extension in single-molecule localization microscopy
Authors: Lévêque Olivier , Kulcsár Caroline , Lee Antony , Bon Pierre , Cognet Laurent , Goudail François
Published: November 2021

Localization microscopy approaches with enhanced depth-of-field (EDoF) are commonly optimized using the Cramér–Rao bound (CRB) as a criterion. It is widely believed that the CRB can be attained in practice by using the maximum-likelihood estimator (MLE). This is, however, an approximation, of which we define in this paper the precise domain of validity. Exploring a wide range of settings and noise levels, we show that the MLE is efficient when the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) is such that the localization standard deviation of a single molecule is less than 20 nm. Thus, our results provide an explicit and quantitative validity boundary for the use of the MLE in EDoF localization microscopy setups optimized with the CRB.
History and metrology applications of a game-changing technology: digital holography [Invited]
Authors: Trolinger James D. , Mansoor Mohammad M.
Published: November 2021

In digital holography (DH), information in the hologram is recorded and stored in digital format in discrete bits. Like its parent, holography, DH evolved over many years with periods of dormancy and revival. Almost abandoned, multiple times, unanticipated events or developments in separate industries revived it with explosive, quantum jumps, making it useful and popular to a wide audience. Although its history has been treated in many papers and books, the field is dynamic and constantly providing new opportunities. Having been born long before low-cost, fast, powerful digital computers and digital detectors were available, DH was confined to the academic world, where practical applications and commercial opportunities were few if any. Consumer demand that led to low-cost personal computers, high-resolution digital cameras, supporting software, and related products changed the situation drastically by providing every potential researcher affordable, powerful hardware and software needed to apply image processing algorithms and move DH to new practical application levels. In this paper, as part of the sixtieth anniversary of off-axis holography, we include a brief introduction to the fundamentals of DH and examine the history and evolution of DH during its periods of rise and fall. We summarize many new emerging techniques, applications, and potential future applications along with additional details for metrological examples from the authors’ research.
Correlation between the optical absorption and twisted angle of bilayer graphene observed by high-resolution reflectance confocal laser microscopy
Authors: Chan Ming-Che , Chen Yen-Chun , Shiue Bai-Heng , Tsai Tzi-I , Chen Chii-Dong , Tseng Wei-Shiuan
Published: November 2021

We report a systematic study of the optical absorption of twisted bilayer graphene (tBLG) across a large range of twist angles from 0° to 30° using a high-resolution reflectance confocal laser microscopy (RCLM) system. The high-quality single crystalline tBLG was synthesized via the efficient plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition techniques without the need of active heating. The sensitivity of acquired images from the RCLM were better than conventional optical microscopes. Although the highest spatial resolution of RCLM is still lower than scanning electron microscopes, it possesses the advantages of beam-damage and vacuum free. Moreover, the high intensity-resolution (sensitivity) images firstly allowed us to distinguish the slight absorption differences and analyze the correlation between the optical absorption and twisted angle of tBLG after data processing procedures. A maximum absorption (minimum transmission) was observed at the stacking angle of tBLG from 10° to 20°, indicating the interplay between the laser and the electron/hole van-Hove singularities when tBLG oriented around the critical angle (θ
c
∼13°). The twisted angle correlated optical absorption paves an alternative way not only to visibly identify the interlayer orientation of tBLG but also to reflect the characterization of the interlayer coupling via its band structure.
Ultra-compact 3D-printed wide-angle cameras realized by multi-aperture freeform optical design
Authors: Toulouse Andrea , Drozella Johannes , Motzfeld Pascal , Fahrbach Nils , Aslani Valese , Thiele Simon , Giessen Harald , Herkommer Alois M.
Published: November 2021

Simultaneous realization of ultra-large field of view (FOV), large lateral image size, and a small form factor is one of the challenges in imaging lens design and fabrication. All combined this yields an extensive flow of information while conserving ease of integration where space is limited. Here, we present concepts, correction methods and realizations towards freeform multi-aperture wide-angle cameras fabricated by femtosecond direct laser writing (fsDLW). The 3D printing process gives us the design freedom to create 180° × 360° cameras with a flat form factor in the micrometer range by splitting the FOV into several apertures. Highly tilted and decentered non-rotational lens shapes as well as catadioptric elements are used in the optical design to map the FOV onto a flat surface in a Scheimpflug manner. We present methods to measure and correct freeform surfaces with up to 180° surface normals by confocal measurements, and iterative fabrication via fsDLW. Finally, approaches for digital distortion correction and image stitching are demonstrated and two realizations of freeform multi-aperture wide-angle cameras are presented.
Two-round quasi-whispering gallery mode exciton polaritons with large Rabi splitting in a GaN microrod
Authors: Yu Guo , Li Junchao , Zong Hua , Lei Menglai , Chen Huanqing , Lang Rui , Li Shukun , Akbar Khan Muhammad Saddique , Hu Xiaodong
Published: November 2021

We investigate the exciton polaritons and their corresponding optical modes in a hexagonal GaN microrod at room temperature. The dispersion curves are measured by the angle-resolved micro-photoluminescence spectrometer, and two types of exciton polaritons are identified with the help of the finite-difference time-domain simulation. By changing the pump position, the photon part of the exciton polaritons is found to switch between the quasi-whispering gallery modes and the two-round quasi-whispering gallery modes. The exciton polaritons formed by the latter are observed and distinguished for the first time, with a giant Rabi splitting as large as 2Ω = 230.3 meV.
Modelltheoretischer Vergleich zwischen der Immobilienbesteuerung im Privatvermögen und in einer vermögensverwaltenden Kapitalgesellschaft
Authors: Bachmann Carmen , Ertl Julia , Gebhardt Johannes , Seifert Christopher
Published: November 2021

Das deutsche Steuerrecht bietet für private Immobilieninvestoren zwei grundsätzliche Optionen der Vermögenszuordnung: Die Investition kann dem Privatvermögen zugeordnet oder über eine (im Privatvermögen gehaltene) vermögensverwaltende Personen- oder Kapitalgesellschaft organisiert werden. Mit den Alternativen sind jeweils unterschiedliche steuerliche Konsequenzen verbunden. Bei der Zuordnung zum Privatvermögen kann der Steuerpflichtige nach Ablauf einer Haltefrist von einer nicht steuerbaren Veräußerung profitieren. Der Vorteil einer vermögensverwaltenden Immobiliengesellschaft liegt dagegen in einer begünstigten Besteuerung der laufenden Einkünfte, da hier unter bestimmten Voraussetzungen eine vollständige Freistellung von der Gewerbesteuer beantragt werden kann. Der vorliegende Beitrag analysiert anhand einer modelltheoretischen Untersuchung die Vorteilhaftigkeit der Investitionsformen im Hinblick auf die ertragsteuerliche Gesamtbelastung. Hierzu werden die beiden Investitionsformen in Abhängigkeit von unterschiedlichen Parametern (Investitionszeitraum, Finanzierungsform, Wertsteigerung, Mietrendite etc.) mit Hilfe der Kapitalwertmethode gegenübergestellt. Der Aufsatz dient so als Entscheidungshilfe bei privaten Immobilieninvestitionen.
Current Perspectives on the Immunosuppressive Niche and Role of Fibrosis in Hepatocellular Carcinoma and the Development of Antitumor Immunity
Authors: Aoki Tomoko , Nishida Naoshi , Kudo Masatoshi
Published: November 2021

Immune checkpoint inhibitors have become the mainstay of treatment for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). However, they are ineffective in some cases. Previous studies have reported that genetic alterations in oncogenic pathways such as Wnt/β-catenin are the important triggers in HCC for primary refractoriness. T-cell exhaustion has been reported in various tumors and is likely to play a prominent role in the emergence of HCC due to chronic inflammation and cirrhosis-associated immune dysfunction. Immunosuppressive cells including regulatory T-cells and tumor-associated macrophages infiltrating the tumor are associated with hyperprogressive disease in the early stages of immune checkpoint inhibitor treatment. In addition, stellate cells and tumor-associated fibroblasts create an abundant desmoplastic environment by producing extracellular matrix. This strongly contributes to epithelial to mesenchymal transition via signaling activities including transforming growth factor beta, Wnt/β-catenin, and Hippo pathway. The abundant desmoplastic environment has been demonstrated in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma and cholangiocarcinoma to suppress cytotoxic T-cell infiltration, PD-L1 expression, and neoantigen expression, resulting in a highly immunosuppressive niche. It is possible that a similar immunosuppressive environment is created in HCC with advanced fibrosis in the background liver. Although sufficient understanding is required for the establishment of immune therapies of HCC, further investigations are still required in this field:
Evolution of phenotypic fluctuation under host-parasite interactions
Authors: Nishiura Naoto , Kaneko Kunihiko
Published: November 2021

Robustness and plasticity are essential features that allow biological systems to cope with complex and variable environments. In a constant environment, robustness, i.e., insensitivity of phenotypes, is expected to increase, whereas plasticity, i.e., the changeability of phenotypes, tends to diminish. Under a variable environment, existence of plasticity will be relevant. The robustness and plasticity, on the other hand, are related to phenotypic variances. As phenotypic variances decrease with the increase in robustness to perturbations, they are expected to decrease through the evolution. However, in nature, phenotypic fluctuation is preserved to a certain degree. One possible cause for this is environmental variation, where one of the most important “environmental” factors will be inter-species interactions. As a first step toward investigating phenotypic fluctuation in response to an inter-species interaction, we present the study of a simple two-species system that comprises hosts and parasites. Hosts are expected to evolve to achieve a phenotype that optimizes fitness. Then, the robustness of the corresponding phenotype will be increased by reducing phenotypic fluctuations. Conversely, plasticity tends to evolve to avoid certain phenotypes that are attacked by parasites. By using a dynamic model of gene expression for the host, we investigate the evolution of the genotype-phenotype map and of phenotypic variances. If the host–parasite interaction is weak, the fittest phenotype of the host evolves to reduce phenotypic variances. In contrast, if there exists a sufficient degree of interaction, the phenotypic variances of hosts increase to escape parasite attacks. For the latter case, we found two strategies: if the noise in the stochastic gene expression is below a certain threshold, the phenotypic variance increases via genetic diversification, whereas above this threshold, it is increased mediated by noise-induced phenotypic fluctuation. We examine how the increase in the phenotypic variances caused by parasite interactions influences the growth rate of a single host, and observed a trade-off between the two. Our results help elucidate the roles played by noise and genetic mutations in the evolution of phenotypic fluctuation and robustness in response to host–parasite interactions.
Approximate distance correlation for selecting highly interrelated genes across datasets
Authors: Shen Qunlun , Zhang Shihua
Published: November 2021

With the rapid accumulation of biological omics datasets, decoding the underlying relationships of cross-dataset genes becomes an important issue. Previous studies have attempted to identify differentially expressed genes across datasets. However, it is hard for them to detect interrelated ones. Moreover, existing correlation-based algorithms can only measure the relationship between genes within a single dataset or two multi-modal datasets from the same samples. It is still unclear how to quantify the strength of association of the same gene across two biological datasets with different samples. To this end, we proposeApproximateDistanceCorrelation (ADC) to select interrelated genes with statistical significance across two different biological datasets. ADC first obtains thekmost correlated genes for each target gene as its approximate observations, and then calculates the distance correlation (DC) for the target gene across two datasets. ADC repeats this process for all genes and then performs the Benjamini-Hochberg adjustment to control the false discovery rate. We demonstrate the effectiveness of ADC with simulation data and four real applications to select highly interrelated genes across two datasets. These four applications including 21 cancer RNA-seq datasets of different tissues; six single-cell RNA-seq (scRNA-seq) datasets of mouse hematopoietic cells across six different cell types along the hematopoietic cell lineage; five scRNA-seq datasets of pancreatic islet cells across five different technologies; coupled single-cell ATAC-seq (scATAC-seq) and scRNA-seq data of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC). Extensive results demonstrate that ADC is a powerful tool to uncover interrelated genes with strong biological implications and is scalable to large-scale datasets. Moreover, the number of such genes can serve as a metric to measure the similarity between two datasets, which could characterize the relative difference of diverse cell types and technologies.
Repeated measures ASCA+ for analysis of longitudinal intervention studies with multivariate outcome data
Authors: Madssen Torfinn S. , Giskeødegård Guro F. , Smilde Age K. , Westerhuis Johan A.
Published: November 2021

Longitudinal intervention studies with repeated measurements over time are an important type of experimental design in biomedical research. Due to the advent of “omics”-sciences (genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, metabolomics), longitudinal studies generate increasingly multivariate outcome data. Analysis of such data must take both the longitudinal intervention structure and multivariate nature of the data into account. The ASCA+-framework combines general linear models with principal component analysis and can be used to separate and visualize the multivariate effect of different experimental factors. However, this methodology has not yet been developed for the more complex designs often found in longitudinal intervention studies, which may be unbalanced, involve randomized interventions, and have substantial missing data. Here we describe a new methodology, repeated measures ASCA+ (RM-ASCA+), and show how it can be used to model metabolic changes over time, and compare metabolic changes between groups, in both randomized and non-randomized intervention studies. Tools for both visualization and model validation are discussed. This approach can facilitate easier interpretation of data from longitudinal clinical trials with multivariate outcomes.
Neural network features distinguish chemosensory stimuli in Caenorhabditis elegans
Authors: How Javier J. , Navlakha Saket , Chalasani Sreekanth H.
Published: November 2021

Nervous systems extract and process information from the environment to alter animal behavior and physiology. Despite progress in understanding how different stimuli are represented by changes in neuronal activity, less is known about how they affect broader neural network properties. We developed a framework for using graph-theoretic features of neural network activity to predict ecologically relevant stimulus properties, in particular stimulus identity. We used the transparent nematode, Caenorhabditis elegans, with its small nervous system to define neural network features associated with various chemosensory stimuli. We first immobilized animals using a microfluidic device and exposed their noses to chemical stimuli while monitoring changes in neural activity of more than 50 neurons in the head region. We found that graph-theoretic features, which capture patterns of interactions between neurons, are modulated by stimulus identity. Further, we show that a simple machine learning classifier trained using graph-theoretic features alone, or in combination with neural activity features, can accurately predict salt stimulus. Moreover, by focusing on putative causal interactions between neurons, the graph-theoretic features were almost twice as predictive as the neural activity features. These results reveal that stimulus identity modulates the broad, network-level organization of the nervous system, and that graph theory can be used to characterize these changes.
Relationship between psychological capital and quality of life among seniors working after retirement: The mediating role of hope of success
Authors: Jurek Krzysztof , Niewiadomska Iwona
Published: November 2021

Introduction

As a result of the increasing average human life expectancy and the related population growth in many countries, research on factors increasing seniors’ quality of life is becoming particularly important. An event critical for seniors’ functioning is retirement. A concept reflecting the dynamics of seniors’ personality associated with the changes taking place in their life situation is psychological capital. This concept was identified as a factor that is constituted by four personality variables changing because of experiences: self-efficacy, optimism, psychological resilience, and hope of success. An interesting issue is the relationship between psychological capital and quality of life in seniors working after retirement.

Aim

The aim of this paper was to analyze the relationship between psychological capital (self-efficacy, dispositional optimism, psychological resilience) and quality of life in seniors working after retirement, as well as the mediating role of hope of success in this relationship.

Methods

A total of 304 seniors—103 women and 201 men—participated in the study. The mean age was 65.24. The Quality-of-Life Scale (CASP-19), the Polish adaptation of Life Orientation Test (LOT-R), the Generalized Self-Efficacy Scale (GSES), the Hope of Success Questionnaire (KNS), and polish adaptation of the Resilience Assessment Scale (SPP-25) were employed in the research. A mediation model was applied to explore the pathway from psychological capital via hope of success to quality of life.

Results

The tested components of psychological capital correlate positively with working senior citizens’ quality of life. The mediating role of hope of success between psychological capital and quality of life was confirmed. The study presented three mechanisms in which hope of success strengthens the relationships between the components of psychological capital and working senior citizens’ quality of life.

Conclusions

The mediating role of hope of success between the remaining components of psychological capital and quality of life confirms pattern posited in the COR theory, namely, that increasing one resource leads to the activation of others, which results in a spiral of personal resources being generated. One the one hand, people who have greater resources have a greater capacity for generating spirals of gains. One the other hand, individuals who lack personal resources are both more exposed to losing them and less capable of starting a spiral of gains in resources.
Prioritizing supports and services to help older adults age in place: A Delphi study comparing the perspectives of family/friend care partners and healthcare stakeholders
Authors: Campbell Megan , Stewart Tara , Brunkert Thekla , Campbell-Enns Heather , Gruneir Andrea , Halas Gayle , Hoben Matthias , Scott Erin , Wagg Adrian , Doupe Malcolm
Published: November 2021

Background

Aging in place (AIP) is a policy strategy designed to help older adults remain in their community. While planners internationally have modified aspects of the older adult care continuum (e.g., home care, assisted living, nursing homes) to facilitate AIP, further improvements to community-based supports and services are also required. This study compared and constrasted the community-based factors (e.g., supports, services and personal strategies or characteristics) that family/friend care partners and healthcare stakeholders (i.e., planners/providers) view as most important to help older adults successfully AIP.

Methods

An initial list of factors shown to influence AIP was created from the academic literature. These factors were used to develop a Delphi survey implemented separately on care partners and healthcare stakeholders. Respondents rated the importance of each factor using a 10-point Likert Scale (1 = not important; 10 = absolutely critical). Consensus in each group was defined when at least 80% of participants scored a factor ≥8 (“very important”), with an interquartile range ≤2. Respondents suggested additional factors during Delphi round one.

Results

Care partners (N = 25) and healthcare stakeholders (N = 36) completed two and three Delphi rounds, respectively. These groups independently agreed that the following 3 (out of 27) factors were very important to help older adults age in place: keeping one’s home safe, maintaining strong inter-personal relationships, and coordinating care across formal providers. While healthcare stakeholders did not reach consensus on other factors, care partners agreed that 7 additional factors (e.g., access to affordable housing, having mental health programs) were important for AIP.

Conclusions

Compared to healthcare stakeholders, care partners felt that more and diverse community-based factors are important to support older adults to successfully AIP. Future research should replicate these findings in other jurisdictions, examine the availability and accessibility of the priority factors, and develop sustainable solutions to enhance their effectiveness.
A mixed-methods systematic review of post-viral fatigue interventions: Are there lessons for long Covid?
Authors: Fowler-Davis Sally , Platts Katharine , Thelwell Michael , Woodward Amie , Harrop Deborah
Published: November 2021

Objectives

Fatigue syndromes have been widely observed following post-viral infection and are being recognised because of Covid19. Interventions used to treat and manage fatigue have been widely researched and this study aims to synthesise the literature associated with fatigue interventions to investigate the outcomes that may be applicable to ‘long Covid’.

Method

The study was registered with PROSPERO (CRD42020214209) in October 2020 and five electronic databases were searched. Papers were screened, critically appraised and data extracted from studies that reported outcomes of fatigue interventions for post-viral syndromes. The narrative synthesis includes statistical analysis associated with effectiveness and then identifies the characteristics of the interventions, including identification of transferable learning for the treatment of fatigue in long Covid. An expert panel supported critical appraisal and data synthesis.

Results

Over 7,000 research papers revealed a diverse range of interventions and fatigue outcome measures. Forty papers were selected for data extraction after final screening. The effectiveness of all interventions was assessed according to mean differences (MD) in measured fatigue severity between each experimental group and a control following the intervention, as well as standardised mean differences as an overall measure of effect size. Analyses identified a range of effects–from most effective MD -39.0 [95% CI -51.8 to -26.2] to least effective MD 42.28 [95% CI 33.23 to 51.34]–across a range of interventions implemented with people suffering varying levels of fatigue severity. Interventions were multimodal with a range of supportive therapeutic methods and varied in intensity and requirements of the participants. Those in western medical systems tended to be based on self- management and education principles (i.e., group cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT).

Conclusion

Findings suggest that the research is highly focussed on a narrow participant demographic and relatively few methods are effective in managing fatigue symptoms. Selected literature reported complex interventions using self-rating fatigue scales that report effect. Synthesis suggests that long Covid fatigue management may be beneficial when a) physical and psychological support, is delivered in groups where people can plan their functional response to fatigue; and b) where strengthening rather than endurance is used to prevent deconditioning; and c) where fatigue is regarded in the context of an individual’s lifestyle and home-based activities are used.
Gendered health, economic, social and safety impact of COVID-19 on adolescents and young adults in Nairobi, Kenya
Authors: Decker Michele R. , Wood Shannon N. , Thiongo Mary , Byrne Meagan E. , Devoto Bianca , Morgan Rosemary , Bevilacqua Kristin , Williams Anaise , Stuart H. Colleen , Wamue- Ngare Grace , Heise Lori , Glass Nancy , Anglewicz Philip , Gummerson Elizabeth , Gichangi Peter
Published: November 2021

Background

Infectious disease outbreaks like COVID-19 and their mitigation measures can exacerbate underlying gender disparities, particularly among adolescents and young adults in densely populated urban settings.

Methods

An existing cohort of youth ages 16–26 in Nairobi, Kenya completed a phone-based survey in August-October 2020 (n = 1217), supplemented by virtual focus group discussions and interviews with youth and stakeholders, to examine economic, health, social, and safety experiences during COVID-19, and gender disparities therein.

Results

COVID-19 risk perception was high with a gender differential favoring young women (95.5% vs. 84.2%; p<0.001); youth described mixed concern and challenges to prevention. During COVID-19, gender symmetry was observed in constrained access to contraception among contraceptive users (40.4% men; 34.6% women) and depressive symptoms (21.8% men; 24.3% women). Gender disparities rendered young women disproportionately unable to meet basic economic needs (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] = 1.21; p<0.05) and in need of healthcare during the pandemic (aOR = 1.59; p<0.001). At a bivariate level, women had lower full decisional control to leave the house (40.0% vs. 53.2%) and less consistent access to safe, private internet (26.1% vs. 40.2%), while men disproportionately experienced police interactions (60.1%, 55.2% of which included extortion). Gender-specific concerns for women included menstrual hygiene access challenges (52.0%), increased reliance on transactional partnerships, and gender-based violence, with 17.3% reporting past-year partner violence and 3.0% non-partner sexual violence. Qualitative results contextualize the mental health impact of economic disruption and isolation, and, among young women, privacy constraints.

Implications

Youth and young adults face gendered impacts of COVID-19, reflecting both underlying disparities and the pandemic’s economic and social shock. Economic, health and technology-based supports must ensure equitable access for young women. Gender-responsive recovery efforts are necessary and must address the unique needs of youth.
Computer-assisted instruction versus inquiry-based learning: The importance of working memory capacity
Authors: Chevalère Johann , Cazenave Loreleï , Berthon Mickaël , Martinez Ruben , Mazenod Vincent , Borion Marie-Claude , Pailler Delphine , Rocher Nicolas , Cadet Rémi , Lenne Catherine , Maïonchi-Pino Norbert , Huguet Pascal
Published: November 2021

The Covid-19 pandemic has led millions of students worldwide to intensify their use of digital education. This massive change is not reflected by the scant scientific research on the effectiveness of methods relying on digital learning compared to other innovative and more popular methods involving face-to-face interactions. Here, we tested the effectiveness of computer-assisted instruction (CAI) in Science and Technology compared to inquiry-based learning (IBL), another modern method which, however, requires students to interact with each other in the classroom. Our research also considered socio-cognitive factors–working memory (WM), socioeconomic status (SES), and academic self-concept (ASC)–known to predict academic performance but usually ignored in research on IBL and CAI. Five hundred and nine middle-school students, a fairly high sample size compared with relevant studies, received either IBL or CAI for a period varying from four to ten weeks prior to the Covid-19 events. After controlling for students’ prior knowledge and socio-cognitive factors, multilevel modelling showed that CAI was more effective than IBL. Although CAI-related benefits were stable across students’ SES and ASC, they were particularly pronounced for those with higher WM capacity. While indicating the need to adapt CAI for students with poorer WM, these findings further justify the use of CAI both in normal times (without excluding other methods) and during pandemic episodes.
Outcome of induction and associated factors among induced labours in public Hospitals of Harari Regional State, Eastern Ethiopia: A two years’ retrospective analysis
Authors: Beshir Yimer Mohammed , Kure Mohammed Abdurke , Egata Gudina , Roba Kedir Teji
Published: November 2021

Background

Induction of labor (IOL) is an essential intervention to reduce adverse maternal and neonatal outcomes. It is also improved pregnancy outcomes, especially in resource-limited countries, where maternal and perinatal mortality is unacceptably high. However, there is a scarcity of evidence regarding the outcome of induction of labor and its predictors in low-income countries like Sub-Saharan Africa. Therefore, this study was aimed at assessing the outcome of induction of labor and associated factors among mothers who underwent labor induction in public Hospitals of Harari Regional State, Estern Ethiopia.

Methods

A facility-based cross-sectional study was conducted from 1 to 30 March, 2019 in Harari Regional State, Eastern Ethiopia. A total of 717 mothers who underwent induction of labor in public Hospitals of Harari Regional State, Eastern Ethiopia from January 2017 to December 2018 were enrolled in the study. Data were collected using a pretested structured questionnaire. The collected data were entered into Epi-data version 3.1 and exported to SPSS version 24 (IBM SPSS Statistics, 2016) for further analysis. A multivariable logistic regression analysis was performed to estimate the effects of each predictor variable on the outcome of induction of labor after controlling for potential confounders. Statistical significance was declared at p-value <0.05.

Results

Overall, the prevalence of success of induction of labor was 65% [95% CI (61.5, 68.5)]. Pre-eclampsia/eclampsia was found to be the most common indication for induction of labor (46.70%) followed by pre-labor rupture of fetal membrane (33.5%). In the final model of multivariable analysis, predictors such as: maternal age < 24 years old [AOR = 1.93, 95%CI(1.14, 3.26)], nulliparity[AOR = 0.34, 95%CI(0.19, 0.59)], unfavorable Bishop score [AOR = 0.06, 95%CI(0.03, 0.12)], intermediate Bishop score [AOR = 0.08, 95%CI(0.04, 0.14)], misoprostol only method [AOR = 2.29, 95%CI(1.01, 5.19)], nonreassuring fetal heart beat pattern [AOR = 0.14, 95%CI (0.07, 0.25)] and Birth weight 3500 grams and above[AOR = 0.32, 95% CI (0.17, 0.59)] were statistically associated with the successful outcome of induction of labor.

Conclusion

The prevalence of successful of induction of labor was relatively low in this study area because only two-thirds of the mothers who underwent induction of labor had a successful of induction. Therefore, this result calls for all stakeholders to give more emphasis on locally available induction protocols and guidelines. In addition, pre-induction conditions must be taken into consideration to avoid unwanted effect of failed induction of labour.