bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Protection from Lethal Clostridioides difficile Infection via Intraspecies Competition for Cogerminant
Authors: Leslie Jhansi L. , Jenior Matthew L. , Vendrov Kimberly C. , Standke Alexandra K. , Barron Madeline R. , O’Brien Tricia J. , Unverdorben Lavinia , Thaprawat Pariyamon , Bergin Ingrid L. , Schloss Patrick D. , Young Vincent B.
Published: March 2021

Antibiotic-associated colitis is often caused by infection with the bacterium
Clostridioides difficile
. In this study, we found that reduction of the amino acid glycine by precolonization with a less virulent strain of
C. difficile
is sufficient to decrease germination of a second strain.
Representative Diatom and Coccolithophore Species Exhibit Divergent Responses throughout Simulated Upwelling Cycles
Authors: Lampe Robert H. , Hernandez Gustavo , Lin Yuan Yu , Marchetti Adrian
Published: March 2021

Coastal upwelling regions are among the most biologically productive ecosystems. During upwelling events, nutrient-rich water is delivered from depth resulting in intense phytoplankton blooms typically dominated by diatoms.
Brachial plexopathy as a complication of COVID-19
Authors: Han Catherine Young , Tarr Andrew M , Gewirtz Alexandra N , Kaunzner Ulrike W , Roy-Burman Paula , Cutler Todd S , MacGowan Daniel JL
Published: March 2021

COVID-19 affects a wide spectrum of organ systems. We report a 52-year-old man with hypertension and newly diagnosed diabetes mellitus who presented with hypoxic respiratory failure due to COVID-19 and developed severe brachial plexopathy. He was not treated with prone positioning respiratory therapy. Associated with the flaccid, painfully numb left upper extremity was a livedoid, purpuric rash on his left hand and forearm consistent with COVID-19-induced microangiopathy. Neuroimaging and electrophysiological data were consistent with near diffuse left brachial plexitis with selective sparing of axillary, suprascapular and pectoral fascicles. Given his microangiopathic rash, elevated D-dimers and paucifascicular plexopathy, we postulate a patchy microvascular thrombotic plexopathy. Providers should be aware of this significant and potentially under-recognised neurologic complication of COVID-19.
Predictors of progression in untreated keratoconus: a Save Sight Keratoconus Registry study
Authors: Ferdi Alex , Nguyen Vuong , Kandel Himal , Tan Jeremy C K , Arnalich-Montiel Francisco , Abbondanza Marco , Watson Stephanie
Published: March 2021

Aims

We set out to identify risk factors for progression in untreated keratoconus patients from 34 centres across Australia, New Zealand, Spain and Italy.

Methods

Patients were divided into ‘progressors’ and ‘stable’ patients for each clinical parameter: visual acuity (VA), steepest keratometry (maximum keratometry (Max-K)) and thinnest corneal thickness (TCT). Primary outcomes were the proportion of eyes with sustained progression in VA, Max-K or TCT within 3 years. Secondary outcomes included predictors of progression.

Results

There were 3994 untreated eyes from 2283 patients. The proportion of eyes with VA, Max-K and TCT progression at 1 year were 3.2%, 6.6% and 3.1% respectively. Factors associated with VA loss were higher baseline VA (HR 1.15 per logMAR line increase in VA; p<0.001) and steeper baseline Max-K (HR 1.07 per 1D increase; p<0.001). Younger baseline age was associated with Max-K steepening (HR 0.96 per year older; p=0.001). Thicker baseline TCT, steeper baseline Max-K and younger baseline age were associated with TCT thinning: (HR 1.08 per 10 µm increase in TCT; p<0.001), (HR 1.03 per 1D increase; p=0.02) and (HR 0.98 per year younger; p=0.01), respectively.

Conclusions

Steeper Max-K and younger age were the most clinically useful baseline predictors of progression as they were associated with worsening of two clinical parameters. Every 1D steeper Max-K was associated with a 7% and 3% greater risk of worsening VA and thinning TCT, respectively. Each 1 year younger was associated with a 4% and 2% greater risk of steepening Max-K and thinning TCT, respectively.
Transparency of results reporting for depression treatment studies in ClinicalTrials.gov: a cross-sectional study
Authors: Schmaling Karen B , Landon Hailey S , Nguyen Tiffany B , Kaplan Robert M
Published: March 2021

Objectives

Depression affects an estimated 7% of the adult population at an estimated cost of over US$200 billion/year in the USA. Complete, transparent reporting of clinical trial data facilitates valid estimates of treatment efficacy. In the USA, ClinicalTrials.gov increases transparency through mandatory prospective trial registration and outcome reporting. We examined characteristics of the transparent reporting of depression treatment studies registered in ClinicalTrials.gov.

Design

Cross sectional.

Setting and participants

US-based studies identified in a search of ClinicalTrials.gov with depression as the condition, enrolling ages 18 and older, and completed between 1 January 2008 and 1 May 2019.

Interventions

All interventions were included.

Main outcomes and measures

The main outcome was whether any results were reported prior to 1 May 2020. Data were extracted regarding inclusion and exclusion criteria, publications related to the study and specification of hypotheses.

Results

725 studies involving 156 634 patients met inclusion criteria. 416 (57.4%) of the studies posted some results. However, statistical test results were not included in 230 studies (55.3%). Most studies had data that could have been analysed and reported. Compared with studies without results, studies with any results were more likely to have hypotheses, include drug treatment conditions, and to have publications related to the study.

Conclusions

Required study registration does not always result in transparent outcome reporting. Better compliance with mandated reporting and improved reporting standards would facilitate a more comprehensive representation of depression treatment research.
Civil–military cooperation in the early response to the COVID-19 pandemic in six European countries
Authors: Gad Mohamed , Kazibwe J , Quirk E , Gheorghe A , Homan Z , Bricknell M
Published: March 2021

Background

The COVID-19 pandemic has presented many countries with significant health system and economic challenges. The role of civil–military cooperation in a health crisis of the magnitude presented by COVID-19 remains virtually unexplored. This review aims to detect and identify typologies, if any, of associations between security or military systems and the national response measures during the COVID-19, as adopted by six European countries during the early phase of the outbreak (January to March 2020).

Methods

We designed a structured qualitative literature review (qualitative evidence synthesis), primarily targeting open-source grey literature using a customised Google web search. Our target countries were UK, France, Spain, Italy, Belgium and Sweden. We employed a ‘best fit’ framework synthesis approach in qualitative analysis of the result records.

Results

A total of 277 result records were included in our qualitative synthesis, with an overall search relevance yield of 46%. We identified 19 distinct descriptive categories of civil–military cooperation extending across seven analytical themes. Most prominent themes included how military support was incorporated in the national COVID-19 response, including support to national health systems, military repatriation and evacuation, and support to wider public systems.

Conclusion

Findings of this review show the significance of military systems in supporting an expansive response during the COVID-19 pandemic, and our proposed methodological approach for capturing military health data in a reproducible manner and providing a comparative view on common types of interventions provided by civil–military cooperation to inform lessons from the use of military capacities during current COVID-19 outbreak.
Quality improvement report: setting up a hospital at night service, limitations of bleep filtering and using an electronic task management system
Authors: Saqib Aaisha , Cairney Kevin , Mcintyre Karen , Coutts Emma , Stephens Tamara , Roberts Lesley , Banerjee Sandip
Published: March 2021

The ‘hospital at night’ concept was developed at a joint conference of the London Deanery and Clinical Staff in 2002, as an issue for education and service provision. At the start of the project, our trust had issues with both the structure of the hospital at night handover and the working practices overnight. The vision was to improve team working out of hours, expedite review of sick patients and reorganise care to seek a reduction in bleeps to medical junior doctors overnight in a way that all patients had access to the right person with the right skills for their needs at the right time. The hospital at night project at our hospital was started in 2019 by a multidisciplinary working group. We tried bleep filtering for 4 months and this was later followed on by the development of an electronic out of hour’s task list as part of our hospital at night set-up. The bleep analysis data showed an improved distribution of workload but the process was dependent on individuals. The electronic task management system was built in pre-existing online software. The system helped prioritise and review tasks requested by nurses on medical wards. But it was not without its limitations. We worked with the local information technology (IT) team to improve speed and proposed developing an IT solution that is fast and not desktop based to ensure tasks can be assigned and viewed while on the go. The project was overall a success as it demonstrated positive feedback from junior doctors, improved perception of teamwork and ability to take rest breaks. It also demonstrated a drop in ward-based cardiac arrest rates. The hospital at night project at our trust remains a work in progress, but a lot of positive changes have been delivered.
Prevalence of depression and anxiety in people with inflammatory bowel disease and associated healthcare use: population-based cohort study
Authors: Irving Peter , Barrett Kevin , Nijher Monica , de Lusignan Simon
Published: March 2021

Background

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) has a significant impact on quality of life for many people.

Objective

To assess the prevalence of common mental health conditions in IBD and the combined impact of IBD and mental health conditions on healthcare use and time off work.

Methods

A UK population-based primary care database (Royal College of General Practitioners Research and Surveillance Centre) was used to identify adults with IBD (n=19 011) (Crohn’s disease (CD) or ulcerative colitis (UC)), and matched controls (n=76 044). Prevalences of anxiety, depressive episodes and depressive disorder recorded in primary care were assessed between 2016 and 2018. Outcomes comprised of rates of primary care visits, emergency secondary care visits, certificates for time off work, antidepressant and anxiolytic prescriptions.

Findings

Mental health conditions were more common in people with CD than controls: anxiety episodes (3.5% vs 3.0%; p=0.02), depressive episodes (5.7% vs 4.1%; p<0.001) and depressive disorder (17.5% vs 12.9%; p<0.001), and people with UC versus controls: depressive episodes (4.4% vs 3.6%; p<0.001) and depressive disorder (14.2% vs 12.4%; p<0.001). Healthcare utilisation rates were higher in people with IBD than controls (primary care visits incidence rate ratio 1.47 (95% CI 1.43 to 1.51); emergency secondary care visits 1.87 (1.79 to 1.95); fitness for work certificates 1.53 (1.44 to 1.62); antidepressant use 1.22 (1.13 to 1.32); anxiolytic use 1.20 (1.01 to 1.41)). In people with IBD, mental health conditions were associated with additional increases in healthcare use and time off work.

Conclusion

Depression and anxiety are more common in people with IBD than matched controls. Healthcare utilisation and prescribing of psychotropic medications are also higher in people with IBD. Mental health conditions in people with IBD are associated with additional healthcare use and time off work.

Clinical implications

Evidence-based mental health support programmes, including psychological treatments, are needed for people with IBD.
Impact of Coexisting Pneumonia in the Patients Admitted with Clostridium Difficile Infection: A Retrospective Study From a National Inpatient Database
Authors: Kichloo Asim , El-Amir Zain , Dahiya Dushyant Singh , Singh Jagmeet , Solanki Dhanshree , Wani Farah , Shaka Hafeez
Published: March 2021

Clostridium difficile is a gram-positive anaerobic spore forming bacillus that can cause infection in a setting of antibiotic use. Pneumonia is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in an inpatient setting and is frequently associated with significant antibiotic administration. This study aims to compare the outcomes of C. difficile infection (CDI) with and without pneumonia to determine the impact of pneumonia in hospitalized patients with CDI. This population-based retrospective observational propensity matched analysis study uses data from the National Inpatient Sample database for the years 2016 and 2017. The primary outcomes were in-hospital mortality, total hospital charges, and mean length of stay. Secondary outcomes were the rates of sepsis, septic shock, non-ST elevation myocardial infarction (NSTEMI), acute renal failure, deep vein thrombosis, and pulmonary embolism. In-hospital mortality was noted to be higher in patients with pneumonia than those without (6.5% vs 1.2%, adjusted OR (aOR) 3.85; 95% CI 2.90 to 5.11, p<0.001). The following outcomes were more prevalent in patients with pneumonia compared with those without pneumonia: sepsis (9.8% vs 1.8%, aOR 4.69, 95% CI 3.73 to 5.87, p<0.001), septic shock (4.0% vs 0.5%, aOR 6.32, 95% CI 4.43 to 9.03, p<0.001), NSTEMI (1.9% vs 0.5%, aOR 2.95, 95% CI 1.85 to 4.71, p<0.001), and acute renal failure (31.5% vs 23.1%, aOR 1.23, 95% CI 1.07 to 1.40, p=0.003). In conclusion, patients with pneumonia were associated with significantly higher rates of system-based complications and higher in-hospital mortality rates.
Grey matter abnormality in progressive multifocal leucoencephalopathy
Authors: Itoh Christopher Yuki , Lee Han Sung , Yee Alan Howe
Published: March 2021

Progressive multifocal leucoencephalopathy (PML) is a demyelinating white matter disease that most often affects immunocompromised people infected by JC virus. The diagnostic gold standard is demonstrable viral DNA or protein from histopathological tissue. However, there are few detailed descriptions of cortical grey matter involvement on neuroimaging. Here we describe the histopathological correlate of cerebral grey matter involvement and radiological accompaniment in a patient with biopsy proven PML.
Home video EEG telemetry
Authors: Kaundal Amardeep , Hegde V , Khan H , Allroggen Holger
Published: March 2021

Long-term electroencephalogram monitoring is often used to help distinguish epileptic from dissociative (non-epileptic) seizures. Home video telemetry now offers many of the benefits in diagnosis previously available only with inpatient video telemetry, which is usually regarded as the ‘gold standard’. Here, we describe recent developments in home video telemetry and how we undertake this procedure in our unit.
Large-size sub-keV sensitive germanium detectors for the CONUS experiment
Authors: Bonet H. , Bonhomme A. , Buck C. , Fülber K. , Hakenmüller J. , Heusser G. , Hugle T. , Legras J. B. , Lindner M. , Maneschg W. , Marian V. , Rink T. , Schröder T. , Strecker H. , Wink R.
Published: March 2021

Intense fluxes of reactor antineutrinos offer a unique possibility to probe the fully coherent character of elastic neutrino scattering off atomic nuclei. In this regard, detectors face the challenge to register tiny recoil energies of a few keV at the maximum. TheConusexperiment was installed in 17.1 m distance from the reactor core of the nuclear power plant in Brokdorf, Germany, and was designed to detect this neutrino interaction channel by using four 1 kg-sized point contact germanium detectors with sub-keV energy thresholds. This report describes the unique specifications addressed to the design, the research and development, and the final production of these detectors. It demonstrates their excellent electronic performance obtained during commissioning under laboratory conditions as well as during the first 2 years of operation at the reactor site which started on April 1, 2018. It highlights the long-term stability of different detector parameters and the achieved background levels of the germanium detectors inside theConusshield setup.
Chapter 7.5 Active subglacial volcanism in West Antarctica
Authors: Quartini Enrica , Blankenship Donald D. , Young Duncan A.
Published: March 2021

A combination of aerogeophysics, seismic observations and direct observation from ice cores, and subglacial sampling, has revealed at least 21 sites under the West Antarctic Ice Sheet consistent with active volcanism (where active is defined as volcanism that has interacted with the current manifestation of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet). Coverage of these datasets is heterogeneous, potentially biasing the apparent distribution of these features. Also, the products of volcanic activity under thinner ice characterized by relatively fast flow are more prone to erosion and removal by the ice sheet, and therefore potentially under-represented. Unsurprisingly, the sites of active subglacial volcanism that we have identified often overlap with areas of relatively thick ice and slow ice surface flow, both of which are critical conditions for the preservation of volcanic records. Overall, we find the majority of active subglacial volcanic sites in West Antarctica concentrate strongly along the crustal-thickness gradients bounding the central West Antarctic Rift System, complemented by intra-rift sites associated with the Amundsen Sea–Siple Coast lithospheric transition.
Task Planning Considering Location Familiarity in Spatial Crowdsourcing
Authors: Peng Chaoqun , Zhang Xinglin , Ou Zhaojing , Zhang Junna
Published: March 2021

Spatial crowdsourcing (SC) is a popular distributed problem-solving paradigm that harnesses the power of mobile workers (e.g., smartphone users) to perform location-based tasks (e.g., checking product placement or taking landmark photos). Typically, a worker needs to travel physically to the target location to finish the assigned task. Hence, the worker’s familiarity level on the target location directly influences the completion quality of the task. In addition, from the perspective of the SC server, it is desirable to finish all tasks with a low recruitment cost. Combining these issues, we propose a Bi-Objective Task Planning (BOTP) problem in SC, where the server makes a task assignment and schedule for the workers to jointly optimize the workers’ familiarity levels on the locations of assigned tasks and the total cost of worker recruitment. The BOTP problem is proved to be NP-hard and thus intractable. To solve this challenging problem, we propose two algorithms: a divide-and-conquer algorithm based on the constraint method and a heuristic algorithm based on the multi-objective simulated annealing algorithm. The extensive evaluations on a real-world dataset demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithms.
SoundLip
Authors: Zhang Qian , Wang Dong , Zhao Run , Yu Yinggang
Published: March 2021

As a natural and convenient interaction modality, voice input has now become indispensable to smart devices (e.g. mobile phones and smart appliances). However, voice input is strongly constrained by surroundings and may raise privacy leakage in public areas. In this paper, we present SoundLip, an end-to-end interaction system enabling users to interact with smart devices via silent voice input. The key insight is to use inaudible acoustic signals to capture the lip movements of users when they issue commands. Previous works have considered lip reading as a naive classification task and thus can only recognize individual words. In contrast, our proposed system enables lip reading at both word and sentence levels, which are more suitable for daily-life use. We exploit the built-in speakers and microphones of smart devices to emit acoustic signals and listen to their reflections, respectively. In order to better abstract representations from multi-frequency and multi-modality acoustic signals, we elaborate a hierarchical convolutional neural network (HCNN) to serve as the front-end as well as recognize individual word commands. Then, for the sentence-level recognition, we exploit a multi-task encoder-decoder network to get around temporal segmentation and output sentences in an end-to-end way. We evaluate SoundLip on 20 individual words and 70 sentences from 12 participants. Our system achieves an accuracy of 91.2% at word-level and a word error rate of 7.1% at sentence-level in both user-independent and environment-independent settings. Given its innovative solution and promising performance, we believe that SoundLip has made a significant contribution to the advancement of silent voice input technology.
Modelling Memory for Individual Re-identification in Decentralised Mobile Contact Tracing Applications
Authors: Bedogni Luca , Rumi Shakila Khan , Salim Flora D.
Published: March 2021

In 2020 the coronavirus outbreak changed the lives of people worldwide. After an initial time period in which it was unclear how to battle the virus, social distancing has been recognised globally as an effective method to mitigate the disease spread. This called for technological tools such as Mobile Contact Tracing Applications (MCTA), which are used to digitally trace contacts among people, and in case a positive case is found, people with the application installed which had been in contact will be notified. De-centralised MCTA may suffer from a novel kind of privacy attack, based on the memory of the human beings, which upon notification of the application can identify who is the positive individual responsible for the notification. Our results show that it is indeed possible to identify positive people among the group of contacts of a human being, and this is even easier when the sociability of the positive individual is low. In practice, our simulation results show that identification can be made with an accuracy of more than 90% depending on the scenario. We also provide three mitigation strategies which can be implemented in de-centralised MCTA and analyse which of the three are more effective in limiting this novel kind of attack.
Full-Dimension Relative Positioning for RFID-Enabled Self-Checkout Services
Authors: Duan Chunhui , Liu Jiajun , Ding Xuan , Li Zhenhua , Liu Yunhao
Published: March 2021

Self-checkout services in today's retail stores are well received as they set free the labor force of cashiers and shorten conventional checkout lines. However, existing self-checkout options either require customers to scan items one by one, which is troublesome and inefficient, or rely on deployments of massive sensors and cameras together with complex tracking algorithms. On the other hand, RFID-based item-level tagging in retail offers an extraordinary opportunity to enhance current checkout experiences. In this work, we propose Taggo, a lightweight and efficient self-checkout schema utilizing well-deployed RFIDs. Taggo attaches a few anchor tags on the four upper edges of each shopping cart, so as to figure out which cart each item belongs to, through relative positioning among the tagged items and anchor tags without knowing their absolute positions. Specifically, a full-dimension ordering technique is devised to accurately determine the order of tags in each dimension, as well as to address the negative impacts from imperfect measurements in indoor surroundings. Besides, we design a holistic classifying solution based on probabilistic modeling to map each item to the correct cart that carries it. We have implemented Taggo with commercial RFID devices and evaluated it extensively in our lab environment. On average, Taggo achieves 90% ordering accuracy in real-time, eventually producing 95% classifying accuracy.
User Expectations and Mental Models for Communicating Emotions through Compressive & Warm Affective Garment Actuation
Authors: Foo Esther W. , Dunne Lucy E. , Holschuh Brad
Published: March 2021

Wearable haptic garments for communicating emotions have great potential in various applications, including supporting social interactions, improving immersive experiences in entertainment, or simply as a research tool. Shape-memory alloys (SMAs) are an emerging and interesting actuation scheme for affective haptic garments since they provide coupled warmth and compressive sensations in a single actuation---potentially acting as a proxy for human touch. However, SMAs are underutilized in current research and there are many unknowns regarding their design/use. The goal of this work is to map the design space for SMA-based garment-mediated emotional communication through warm, compressive actuation (termed 'warm touch'). Two online surveys were deployed to gather user expectations in using varying 'warm touch' parameters (body location, intensity, pattern) to communicate 7 distinct emotions. Further, we also investigated mental models used by participants during the haptic strategy selection process. The findings show 5 major categories of mental models, including representation of body sensations, replication of typical social touch strategies, metaphorical representation of emotions, symbolic representation of physical actions, and mimicry of objects or tasks; the frequency of use of each of these mental frameworks in relation to the selected 'warm touch' parameters in the communication of emotions are presented. These gathered insights can inform more intuitive and consistent haptic garment design approaches for emotional communication.
PREFER
Authors: Guo Yeting , Liu Fang , Cai Zhiping , Zeng Hui , Chen Li , Zhou Tongqing , Xiao Nong
Published: March 2021

Point-of-Interest (POI) recommendation is significant in location-based social networks to help users discover new locations of interest. Previous studies on such recommendation mainly adopted a centralized learning framework where check-in data were uploaded, trained and predicted centrally in the cloud. However, such a framework suffers from privacy risks caused by check-in data exposure and fails to meet real-time recommendation needs when the data volume is huge and communication is blocked in crowded places. In this paper, we propose PREFER, an edge-accelerated federated learning framework for POI recommendation. It decouples the recommendation into two parts. Firstly, to protect privacy, users train local recommendation models and share multi-dimensional user-independent parameters instead of check-in data. Secondly, to improve recommendation efficiency, we aggregate these distributed parameters on edge servers in proximity to users (such as base stations) instead of remote cloud servers. We implement the PREFER prototype and evaluate its performance using two real-world datasets and two POI recommendation models. Extensive experiments demonstrate that PREFER strengthens privacy protection and improves efficiency with little sacrifice to recommendation quality compared to centralized learning. It achieves the best quality and efficiency and is more compatible with increasingly sophisticated POI recommendation models compared to other state-of-the-art privacy-preserving baselines.
RF-Identity
Authors: Feng Chao , Xiong Jie , Chang Liqiong , Wang Fuwei , Wang Ju , Fang Dingyi
Published: March 2021

Person identification plays a critical role in a large range of applications. Recently, RF based person identification becomes a hot research topic due to the contact-free nature of RF sensing that is particularly appealing in current COVID-19 pandemic. However, existing systems still have multiple limitations: i) heavily rely on the gait patterns of users for identification; ii) require a large amount of data to train the model and also extensive retraining for new users and iii) require a large frequency bandwidth which is not available on most commodity RF devices for static person identification. This paper proposes RF-Identity, an RFID-based identification system to address the above limitations and the contribution is threefold. First, by integrating walking pattern features with unique body shape features (e.g., height), RF-Identity achieves a high accuracy in person identification. Second, RF-Identity develops a data augmentation scheme to expand the size of the training data set, thus reducing the human effort in data collection. Third, RF-Identity utilizes the tag diversity in spatial domain to identify static users without a need of large frequency bandwidth. Extensive experiments show an identification accuracy of 94.2% and 95.9% for 50 dynamic and static users, respectively.
The Design and Evaluation of a Mobile System for Rapid Diagnostic Test Interpretation
Authors: Park Chunjong , Ngo Hung , Lavitt Libby Rose , Karuri Vincent , Bhatt Shiven , Lubell-Doughtie Peter , Shankar Anuraj H. , Ndwiga Leonard , Osoti Victor , Wambua Juliana K. , Bejon Philip , Ochola-Oyier Lynette Isabella , Chilver Monique , Stocks Nigel , Lyon Victoria , Lutz Barry R. , Thompson Matthew , Mariakakis Alex , Patel Shwetak
Published: March 2021

Rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs) provide point-of-care medical screening without the need for expensive laboratory equipment. RDTs are theoretically straightforward to use, yet their analog colorimetric output leaves room for diagnostic uncertainty and error. Furthermore, RDT results within a community are kept isolated unless they are aggregated by healthcare workers, limiting the potential that RDTs can have in supporting public health efforts. In light of these issues, we present a system called RDTScan for detecting and interpreting lateral flow RDTs with a smartphone. RDTScan provides real-time guidance for clear RDT image capture and automatic interpretation for accurate diagnostic decisions. RDTScan is structured to be quickly configurable to new RDT designs by requiring only a template image and some metadata about how the RDT is supposed to be read, making it easier to extend than a data-driven approach. Through a controlled lab study, we demonstrate that RDTScan's limit-of-detection can match, and even exceed, the performance of expert readers who are interpreting the physical RDTs themselves. We then present two field evaluations of smartphone apps built on the RDTScan system: (1) at-home influenza testing in Australia and (2) malaria testing by community healthcare workers in Kenya. RDTScan achieved 97.5% and 96.3% accuracy compared to RDT interpretation by experts in the Australia Flu Study and the Kenya Malaria Study, respectively.
Objective Measures of Cognitive Load Using Deep Multi-Modal Learning
Authors: Wilson Justin C. , Nair Suku , Scielzo Sandro , Larson Eric C.
Published: March 2021

The capability of measuring human performance objectively is hard to overstate, especially in the context of the instructor and student relationship within the process of learning. In this work, we investigate the automated classification of cognitive load leveraging the aviation domain as a surrogate for complex task workload induction. We use a mixed virtual and physical flight environment, given a suite of biometric sensors utilizing the HTC Vive Pro Eye and the E4 Empatica. We create and evaluate multiple models. And we have taken advantage of advancements in deep learning such as generative learning, multi-modal learning, multi-task learning, and x-vector architectures to classify multiple tasks across 40 subjects inclusive of three subject types --- pilots, operators, and novices. Our cognitive load model can automate the evaluation of cognitive load agnostic to subject, subject type, and flight maneuver (task) with an accuracy of over 80%. Further, this approach is validated with real-flight data from five test pilots collected over two test and evaluation flights on a C-17 aircraft.
Voice In Ear
Authors: Gao Yang , Jin Yincheng , Chauhan Jagmohan , Choi Seokmin , Li Jiyang , Jin Zhanpeng
Published: March 2021

With the rapid growth of wearable computing and increasing demand for mobile authentication scenarios, voiceprint-based authentication has become one of the prevalent technologies and has already presented tremendous potentials to the public. However, it is vulnerable to voice spoofing attacks (e.g., replay attacks and synthetic voice attacks). To address this threat, we propose a new biometric authentication approach, named EarPrint, which aims to extend voiceprint and build a hidden and secure user authentication scheme on earphones. EarPrint builds on the speaking-induced body sound transmission from the throat to the ear canal, i.e., different users will have different body sound conduction patterns on both sides of ears. As the first exploratory study, extensive experiments on 23 subjects show the EarPrint is robust against ambient noises and body motions. EarPrint achieves an Equal Error Rate (EER) of 3.64% with 75 seconds enrollment data. We also evaluate the resilience of EarPrint against replay attacks. A major contribution of EarPrint is that it leverages two-level uniqueness, including the body sound conduction from the throat to the ear canal and the body asymmetry between the left and the right ears, taking advantage of earphones' paring form-factor. Compared with other mobile and wearable biometric modalities, EarPrint is a low-cost, accurate, and secure authentication solution for earphone users.
The Roots of Genetic Coding in Aminoacyl-tRNA Synthetase Duality
Authors: Carter Charles W. , Wills Peter R.
Published: March 2021

Codon-dependent translation underlies genetics and phylogenetic inferences, but its origins pose two challenges. Prevailing narratives cannot account for the fact that aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases (aaRSs), which translate the genetic code, must collectively enforce the rules used to assemble themselves. Nor can they explain how specific assignments arose from rudimentary differentiation between ancestral aaRSs and corresponding transfer RNAs (tRNAs). Experimental deconstruction of the two aaRS superfamilies created new experimental tools with which to analyze the emergence of the code. Amino acid and tRNA substrate recognition are linked to phase transfer free energies of amino acids and arise largely from aaRS class-specific differences in secondary structure. Sensitivity to protein folding rules endowed ancestral aaRS–tRNA pairs with the feedback necessary to rapidly compare alternative genetic codes and coding sequences. These and other experimental data suggest that the aaRS bidirectional genetic ancestry stabilized the differentiation and interdependence required to initiate and elaborate the genetic coding table.
Analysis of Dynamic Characteristics of Pressure-Regulating and Pressure-Limiting Combined Relief Valve
Authors: Shi Rui , Wang Chuanli , He Tao , Xie Tian
Published: March 2021

Aiming at the problem of the lack of a cooperation mechanism of combined relief valves, this paper proposes a new pressure-regulating and pressure-limiting combined relief valve. Combined with the ordinary relief valve dynamic characteristic analysis method, the dynamic model of the combined relief valve under normal working conditions was established, and its dynamic characteristics were simulated using Simulink. The results showed that the multi-pressure stabilization design of the combined relief valve improves its usability and stability. Under the same structural parameters, the overshoot of the combined relief valve was 5.7%, and the response time was 12 ms, which is better than the ordinary relief valve. Besides, it effectively improves the instability problems, such as the vibration and the large pressure fluctuation of the ordinary relief valve under high pressure and large flow conditions. When the sum of the effective force area on the upper side of the flange of the pressure-regulating valve core and the area of the tail vertebra is equal to the effective force area of the lower side of the flange of the pressure-regulating valve core, the dynamic performance of the relief valve is optimal. For example, if the effective force area under the flange is 1.8 cm2, then the inlet pressure overshoot is 2.8%, and the response time is 10 ms. An appropriate volume of the sensitive cavity, the quality of the valve core, and the fluid resistance of the pressure relief valve are factors that can effectively improve the dynamic performance of the pressure-regulating and pressure-limiting combined relief valve.
Research on MAC Protocols in Cluster‐Based Ad Hoc Networks
Authors: Liu Yutao , Li Yue , Zhao Yimeng , Zhang Chunhui
Published: March 2021

Mobile ad hoc networks can be widely used in many scenes, for example, military communication, emergency communication, and 5G wide area coverage as well as ultradense network scenes. A cluster‐based network can decrease network overhead effectively and then constitute a large‐scale network through extending network scale by clustering and cascading. In view of multiservice simultaneous transmission demand for small‐scale dense networking scene and large‐scale extended networking scene, a MAC protocol based on scheduling of cluster head is proposed, which can avoid collision and retransmission between nodes effectively, and then the network synchronizing in intercluster and intracluster as well as the time‐slot scheduling is solved fast and efficiently. A network synchronization algorithm based on clock spread of the sponsorship node is proposed to achieve network self‐synchronizing, and a modified schedule‐tree algorithm based on cluster head and exactly sponsorship node is proposed to decrease network overhead and to increase network fairness, then MAC protocol based on scheduling of cluster head is verified by simulated analysis. Finally, a dynamic gateway selection algorithm based on link stability is proposed in this paper to decrease intercluster communication control overhead and improve intercluster communication reliability.
An Early Risk Warning of Cross-Border E-Commerce Using BP Neural Network
Authors: Deng Zhichao , Yan Meiji , Xiao Xu
Published: March 2021

In this paper, we propose an early warning model of credit risk for cross-border e-commerce. Our proposed model, i.e., KPCA-MPSO-BP, is constructed using kernel principal component analysis (KPCA), improved particle swarm optimization (IPSO), and BP neural network. Initially, we use KPCA to reduce the credit risk index for cross-border e-commerce. Next, the inertia weight and threshold of BP neural network are searched using MPSO. Finally, BP neural network is used for training the data of 13 different enterprises of cross-border e-commerce’s credit risk. To analyze the efficiency of our proposed approach, we use the data of five different enterprises for testing and evaluation. The experimental results show that the mean absolute error (MAE) and root mean square error (RMSE) of our model are the lowest in comparison to the existing models and have much better efficiency.
Severe Pulmonary Hypertension in a Patient with Scurvy: Can a Vitamin Reverse It?
Authors: Shah Vandan , Shah Ruchit N. , Greene Lauren , DiMarino Lauren M.
Published: March 2021

Introduction. Pulmonary hypertension secondary to scurvy is a rare manifestation that historically has not been well studied and is only described in a handful of case reports. Case. Our case is about a 35-year-old female with a history significant for drug and tobacco abuse, obesity, poor diet, anxiety, and major depressive disorder who was found to have severe pulmonary hypertension in the setting of vitamin C deficiency (<0.01 mg/L). Conclusion. We present a case that shows pulmonary hypertension can be associated with scurvy and reversed rapidly with adequate vitamin C supplementation.
Compact Sine Cosine Algorithm with Multigroup and Multistrategy for Dispatching System of Public Transit Vehicles
Authors: Zhu Minghui , Chu Shu-Chuan , Yang Qingyong , Li Wei , Pan Jeng-Shyang
Published: March 2021

This paper studies the problem of intelligence optimization, a fundamental problem in analyzing the optimal solution in a wide spectrum of applications such as transportation and wireless sensor network (WSN). To achieve better optimization capability, we propose a multigroup Multistrategy Compact Sine Cosine Algorithm (MCSCA) by using the compact strategy and grouping strategy, which makes the initialized randomly generated value no longer an individual in the population and avoids falling into the local optimum. New evolution formulas are proposed for the intergroup communication strategy. Performance studies on the CEC2013 benchmark demonstrate the effectiveness of our new approach regarding convergence speed and accuracy. Finally, we apply MCSCA to solve the dispatch system of public transit vehicles. Experimental results show that MCSCA can achieve better optimization.
Quercetin Improves Cardiomyocyte Vulnerability to Hypoxia by Regulating SIRT1/TMBIM6‐Related Mitophagy and Endoplasmic Reticulum Stress
Authors: Chang Xing , Zhang Tian , Meng Qingyan , ShiyuanWang  , Yan Peizheng , Wang Xue , Luo Duosheng , Zhou XiuTeng , Ji Ruifeng
Published: March 2021

Cardiomyocyte apoptosis is an important pathological mechanism underlying cardiovascular diseases and is commonly caused by hypoxia. Moreover, hypoxic injury occurs not only in common cardiovascular diseases but also following various treatments of heart‐related conditions. One of the major mechanisms underlying hypoxic injury is oxidative stress. Quercetin has been shown to exert antioxidant stress and vascular protective effects, making it a promising candidate for treating cardiovascular diseases. Therefore, we examined the protective effect of quercetin on human cardiomyocytes subjected to hypoxia‐induced oxidative stress damage and its underlying mechanism. Human cardiomyocytes were subjected to hypoxia/reoxygenation (H/R) in vitro with or without quercetin pretreatment; thereafter, flow cytometry, Cell Counting Kit‐8 assay, laser scanning confocal microscopy, quantitative PCR, western blotting, and enzyme‐linked immunosorbent assay were performed to analyze the effects of quercetin on cardiomyocytes. We found that H/R induced reactive oxygen species overproduction and endoplasmic reticulum stress, as well as inhibited the function of the mitochondria/endoplasmic reticulum and mitophagy, eventually leading to apoptosis and decreasing the viability of human cardiomyocytes. Quercetin pretreatment inhibited H/R‐mediated overproduction of reactive oxygen species and damage caused by oxidative stress, increased mitophagy, regulated mRNA and protein expression of transmembrane BAX inhibitor‐1 motif‐containing 6 (TMBIM6), regulated endoplasmic reticulum stress, and improved the vulnerability of human cardiomyocytes to H/R. Furthermore, transfection with short interfering RNA against silent information regulator protein 1 (SIRT1) counteracted the protective effects of quercetin on cardiomyocytes. Thus, quercetin was predicted to regulate mitophagy and endoplasmic reticulum stress through SIRT1/TMBIM6 and inhibit H/R‐induced oxidative stress damage. These findings may be useful for developing treatments for hypoxic injury‐induced cardiovascular diseases and further highlight the potential of quercetin for regulating mitochondrial quality control and endoplasmic reticulum function.
Integral Superposition-Type Operators on Some Analytic Function Spaces
Authors: Ahmed A. El-Sayed , Omran S.
Published: March 2021

All entire functions which transform a class of holomorphic Zygmund-type spaces into weighted analytic Bloch space using the so-called

n

-generalized superposition operator are characterized in this paper. Moreover, certain specific properties such as boundedness and compactness of the newly defined class of generalized integral superposition operators are discussed and established by using the concerned entire functions.
Instability Analysis and Reinforcement Support Technology of Coal‐Rock Interbed Roadway in Gaojiazhuang Coal Mine
Authors: Liu Chaolin , Zhang Guohua
Published: March 2021

In order to effectively solve a series of problems such as the difficulty of coal and rock interbed roadway support in Gaojiazhuang Coal Mine and get a scientific and reasonable optimization scheme of surrounding rock support, theoretical analysis, numerical simulation, ultrasonic detection, field‐effect test, and other means are adopted to analyze the instability of coal and rock interbed roadway. The results show that the interbedded roadway has weak interbedded cementation, and its ore pressure is more intense due to the influence of its interbedded weak structural plane. Based on Mohr’s strength envelope principle, it is proposed that horizontal stress is the main factor that causes a wide range of shear displacement, penetration crack, and surrounding rock failure of the roof of this kind of roadway. Through the finite element numerical simulation analysis, the deformation and failure law, stress distribution characteristics, and failure area distribution characteristics of coal and rock interbedding roadway surrounding rock are theoretically revealed, and the control effect of different support schemes on roadway surrounding rock deformation is greatly different. Based on the ultrasonic detection technology, it is proved that the roadway side failure has strong zoning characteristics, and the failure range and stress distribution range of the surrounding rock of the belt roadway in the 2103 working face of Gaojiazhuang Coal Mine are detected. Finally, the coupling strengthening support scheme combining prestressed anchor cable and bolt is proposed. The engineering application and the observation of surrounding rock deformation show that the reinforced support technology can effectively enhance the stability of the surrounding rock of the interbed roadway in Gaojiazhuang Coal Mine, and it has a good reference for the surrounding rock conditions of this kind of roadway.
Study on Key Parameters of Directional Long Borehole Layout in High‐Gas Working Face
Authors: Yan Zhenguo , Wang Yanping , Fan Jingdao , Huang Yuxin , He Yanpeng
Published: March 2021

This research aims to obtain a new way based on the directional long borehole layout to investigate the gas migration behavior of coal bed methane. In view of the study of the oil‐type gas reservoir and the influence range of mining on the working face in the surrounding rock, the paper puts forward the optimization method of the directional long borehole layout of the surrounding rock and the method of the borehole layout with comprehensive consideration of the influence of mining on the failure of the roof and floor and the distribution of surrounding rock gas‐bearing reservoirs. The test results showed that the layout horizon of the directional long boreholes is determined, and the layout was within the height range of 20–40 meters, clarified the relationship between the drainage data and the exposure level of the borehole and the layout of the borehole, compared the gas concentration in the upper corner of the working face before and after the drainage, and constructed a three‐dimensional comprehensive drainage mode for the high‐gassy working face, which provided a worth‐promoting method that supports surrounding rock oil‐type gas and gas treatment in the high‐gas mining area.