bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Oncological safety of fertility preservation treatment in ovarian cancer: A Spanish multicenter study
Authors: Heras Marta , Azcona Leticia , Arencibia Octavio , Minig Lucas , Marti Lola , Hernandez Alicia , Lekuona Arantxa , Niguez Isabel , Gil‐Ibañez Blanca , Diaz‐Feijoo Berta , Ribot Laia , Cabezas Maria Nieves , Lamarca Marta , Bellon Monica , Alkourdi Amira , Cardenas Laura , Boldo Ana , Amengual Joana , Gorostidi Mikel , Zapardiel Ignacio ,   the YOC‐Care Collaborative Group
Published: November 2024

Objective

To assess the safety of fertility‐sparing treatments for early‐stage ovarian cancer in women younger than 40 years old.

Methods

We performed a retrospective multicenter study including women aged 18–40 years diagnosed with early‐stage (FIGO I–II) ovarian cancer in 55 Spanish hospitals, from January 2010 to December 2019. Benign and borderline tumors were excluded, as well as advanced stages (FIGO III–IV). All perioperative characteristics and follow‐up data were collected and analyzed. Standard staging surgery (SSS) was compared with fertility‐sparing surgery (FSS) in terms of oncological outcomes.

Results

In all, 366 women were included; 327 (89.3%) were stage I. Among all patients, 216 (59%) underwent SSS and 150 (41%) FSS. Up to 208 (56.8%) patients did not have children, but only 12 (3.2%) had oocyte preservation before treatment. Patients in the FSS group compared with the SSS group showed a non‐significant difference in recurrences (8% vs. 9.3%, respectively; P < 0.711) and deaths (1.3% vs. 4.8%, respectively; P = 0.211) during the follow‐up. No significant differences were found between epithelial and non‐epithelial ovarian cancer both in recurrences (7.1% vs. 8.8%, respectively; P = 0.771) and in deaths (1.4% vs. 1.3%, respectively; P = 1) among patients who underwent FSS.

Conclusion

FSS seems a safe option for treatment of early‐stage ovarian cancer in patients who want to preserve fertility, either for epithelial and non‐epithelial histology.
Sonography Could Predict Complete/Near‐Complete Necrosis of Thyroid Tumors After Fine‐Needle Biopsy: Necrotic Ring Sign
Authors: Ilgan Seyfettin , Bilezikçi Banu
Published: November 2024

Objective

Necrosis, a rare histologic alteration caused by the fine‐needle aspiration biopsy (FNA) of thyroid tumors, could be problematic in the clinical management of such cases due to the difficulty in making a definitive histopathologic diagnosis. The aim of this study was to define US features that may help to predict FNA‐induced necrosis which is more common in oncocytic tumors.

Materials and Methods

This cross‐sectional study consists of all patients who underwent thyroid surgery in our center between January 2011 and December 2023. All nodules, which complete/near‐complete necrosis reported on final histopathology, were included into study when full video record of preoperative US exam also available for re‐evaluation. US findings of necrotic tumors compared with control group consisting of similar histopathology without necrosis.

Results

A total of 11 patients have met the inclusion criteria during study period. Of these cases, seven were papillary thyroid carcinomas and four were follicular adenomas. Among the evaluated distinctive US features, necrotic ring offers the best accuracy (88%) and area under the curve (0.91) values in detecting necrosis after FNA and most valuable when combined with lack of intranodular vascularity.

Conclusion

In the preoperative evaluation of surgical candidates, necrotic ring, refractive edge shadowing, posterior acoustic enhancement, and lack of vascular signal may predict complete/near‐complete necrosis with great accuracy.
Total Gastrectomy for Gastric Malignancy: Trends Over 15 Years in Major Morbidity, Mortality, and Patient Selection From The National Surgical Quality Improvement Program
Authors: Kelly Nicholas J. , Shafique Neha , Tortorello Gabriella N. , Vargas Gracia , Miura John T. , Karakousis Giorgos C.
Published: November 2024

Introduction

We examined trends in major morbidity and mortality following total gastrectomy for malignancy in a national cohort.

Methods

The National Surgical Quality Improvement Program was used to identify patients who underwent total gastrectomy for malignancy from 2007 to 2021. Joinpoint regression was used to determine annual percent changes (APCs) in thirty‐day postoperative major morbidity, mortality, and length of stay (LOS). Major morbidity included deep and organ space surgical site infection, venous thromboembolism, cardiac event, pneumonia, acute renal failure, sepsis, and respiratory failure.

Results

Of 3515 patients, the median age was 65 years (IQR = 55–73), 59% were male, and 57.9% were White. Major morbidity was 23%, which did not change over time (APC = −1.4, 95% CI = −3.4 to 0.58), nor were there changes in individual morbidities with time. The most common morbidities were organ space surgical site infection (9.2%) and pneumonia (8.5%). Mortality rate in the study cohort was 2.7% and did not change (APC = −6.2, 95% CI = −13.0 to 1.1). LOS (median 9 days) also did not vary with time (APC = −2.3, 95% CI = −7.8 to 3.9). There was an increase in patients with diabetes (21.6% vs. 11.2%, p < 0.05), BMI ≥ 30 (31.1% vs. 18.2%, p < 0.05), and ASA IV–V status (11.6% vs. 3.5%, p < 0.05).

Conclusion

Morbidity and mortality following total gastrectomy for malignancy have not significantly changed over the last fifteen years. While this may in part be explained by increased patient comorbidity, efforts should be made to improve patient selection and mitigate postoperative complications to allow for timely adjuvant therapies.
Urbanization and food transition in the Brazilian Amazon: From wild to domesticated meat
Authors: Chaves Willandia A. , Valle Denis , Tavares Aline S. , Morcatty Thais Q. , Vidal Marcelo D. , Schor Tatiana , von Mühlen Eduardo M. , Wilcove David S.
Published: November 2024

Urbanization is expected to influence food transitions, resulting in a shift from wild foods to more domesticated foods. Concomitantly, food insecurity and urban demand for natural resources, including wildlife, are expected to increase overall, even when the per capita consumption is expected to decrease. These issues bring challenges to ecosystems and human well‐being.

We examined how the degree of urbanization and socioeconomic factors, such as poverty and connections to rural areas, influences the consumption of and preferences for meat from wildlife (mammals, birds and turtles), fish and domesticated animals. We administered 1367 questionnaires to randomly selected households across 10 urban areas in Amazonas state, Brazil.

We found that degree of urbanization was associated with a food transition from consuming wildlife and fish to consuming domesticated animals. Taste preference for meat from wildlife and fish decreased with the degree of urbanization. Rural connections were associated with increased consumption of and preference for wild meat (meat from wildlife) and fish. Poverty was associated with increased consumption of fish and processed meat and decreased consumption of beef and pork, with important implications for how food transitions affect households experiencing poverty.

These results highlight the spatial, social and economic heterogeneity of consumption and preference. Policy and social interventions, such as campaigns to reduce consumption of vulnerable species or targeted enforcement against poaching, will need to consider this heterogeneity to be effective and avoid unintended consequences, such as worsening food insecurity.

Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.
ISI Energy Change Due to an Edge Deletion
Authors: Bilal Ahmad , Munir Muhammad Mobeen
Published: November 2024

The problem of characterization of all graphs where the deletion of an edge results in decrease or increase in the energy is far from completion. To be more exact, we solve this problem for Inverse Sum Indeg energy. We compute the ISI energies of edge deleted graphs of , , , and star graph, finally we compare the respective energies from the original graphs. We give different graphs where both cases can happen. This serves as partial solutions of the modified version of the hard to crack problem posed by Gutman to characterize all graphs whose energy decreases after deletion of an edge.
Prediction of Molar Entropy of Gaseous Molecules for a New Pὃschl‐Teller Potential Model
Authors: Abdulameer Maryam Hussein , Ali Ali B. M. , Nemah Ahmed K. , Kanjariya Prakash , Rajiv Asha , Agarwal Mohit , Kaur Parjinder , Almehizia Abdulrahman A.
Published: November 2024

The Pὃschl–Teller potential is a molecular potential energy function that has only been reported for bound state. This Pὃschl–Teller potential is a good representation of many molecules and has not been examined for any thermodynamic property irrespective of its fitness for molecular study. In this study, the molar entropy of four molecules (Pbr, BBr, CsCl, and CsO molecules) is calculated via the molar partition function. The predicted results are compared with the experimental data recorded in the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) database. It is noted that the predicted values for the studied molecules perfectly agree with the experimental results with the following average absolute percentage deviation, PBr is 0.0158%, BBr is 0.0053%, CsCl is 0.0020%, and CsO is 0.0052%. The present model reproduces better results for CsCl and CsO molecules compared to the shifted Tietz–Wei potential and improved Tietz‐oscillator previously reported whose average absolute percentage deviation are 0.361% and 0.284% for CsCl and 0.272% and 0.228% for CsO, respectively.
Exploring the role of school‐based clinics in pre‐service teachers preparation: A mixed‐methods study of a School‐University Partnership in Australia
Authors: Morrissey Chris , Lee Moosung , Kim Eunsu , Halcrow Kate , Hills Emily
Published: November 2024

Effective school–university partnerships (SUPs) are a key policy focus in initial teacher education (ITE) in Australia and internationally. This article presents an overview of the school‐based clinical model employed in one Australian SUP and discusses the role of this model in the learning and preparation of pre‐service teachers (PSTs) within it. A pilot study with a mixed‐methods approach was conducted to determine the key differences in PSTs’ experiences between the campus‐based learning approach with traditional practicum placement and the school‐based clinic modes of learning. Informed by the qualitative findings of the pilot study, a quantitative survey was then developed to explore PSTs’ experiences of the school‐based clinic modes of learning. Using the validated survey, a follow‐up main study investigated PSTs’ experiences through a series of quantitative analyses. PSTs reported that their participation in school‐based clinics significantly contributes to their preparation for teaching, including their self‐efficacy and classroom readiness, compared to their experience of campus‐based learning models with the traditional practicum placement. Given the imperative for ITE to ensure PSTs are provided with high‐quality, authentic learning experiences that prepare them for the complexities of the teaching profession, this paper provides one way in which ITE programmes can enhance the learning experiences of their students. As the first of its kind and scale, the SUP and the school‐based clinics model within it provide a model that other providers could follow to further enhance their own students’ learning and preparation for the profession.
Multilinear regression model for predicting the ultimate load of slender circular CFDST columns subjected to concentric and eccentric loading
Authors: Amika Akuta Usongo , Haas Trevor N. , Simwanda L.
Published: November 2024

This paper presents a novel approach to predict the ultimate load of slender circular concrete‐filled double skin tubular (CFDST) columns subjected to concentric and eccentric loading. The proposed approach was developed using a multilinear regression model through analyzing a database containing 165 CFDST column configurations. The data set was obtained by varying the magnitude of the parameters to determine its effect on the ultimate load using FE analysis. The variables considered in the model formulation are concrete strength, steel tube strengths, tube diameters, tube thicknesses, load eccentricity, column curvature, and column length. The accuracy and efficiency of the proposed models were validated with previous experimental investigations. The results demonstrate that the proposed models provide a practical, simple, and efficient approach to predict the ultimate load of slender circular CFDST columns subjected to concentric and eccentric loading. When compared to existing experimental work on slender circular CFDST columns subjected to concentric and eccentric loading, the proposed model over predicts the ultimate load by a maximum of 6%.
Pancreatic Neuroendocrine Neoplasms: Classification and Novel Role of Endoscopic Ultrasound in Diagnosis and Treatment Personalization
Authors: Tacelli Matteo , Partelli Stefano , Falconi Massimo , Arcidiacono Paolo Giorgio , Capurso Gabriele
Published: November 2024

The incidence and prevalence of pancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms are steadily increasing. These tumors are highly heterogeneous, with treatment options ranging from observation to surgery, and various medical therapies. The choice of treatment is influenced by factors such as tumor stage, grade (proliferative activity), and the presence of hormone‐related syndromes. Endoscopic ultrasound (EUS) is becoming increasingly valuable for assessing pancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms, offering detailed morphological, vascular, and functional information through techniques such as contrast enhancement and elastography. It also allows biopsies that are useful for both histopathological and molecular analyses. These tumors are highly heterogeneous, with treatment options ranging from observation to various medical therapies and surgery. Recent data suggest that small, non‐functioning PanNENs with low proliferation rates may be safely monitored, whereas more aggressive or functioning tumors typically require surgery. EUS‐guided ablation is a promising alternative for patients with functional pancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms who are unsuitable for surgery, although randomized trials are needed. In non‐resectable pancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms, treatment options include somatostatin analogs, targeted therapies (e.g., everolimus, sunitinib), chemotherapy, and radioligand therapy. This review discusses key factors in planning personalized treatment strategies for pancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms.
M-Government Services: A Multi-country Stakeholder Analysis
Authors: Sellung Rachelle , Lampoltshammer Thomas J.
Published: November 2024

Despite the rapid advancement of digital technologies in governance, there remains a significant gap in understanding the complex interplay between various stakeholders and the actual needs of end users. This disconnect poses a challenge in designing and implementing effective, user-centric digital government services. This chapter provides an in-depth exploration of the evolving landscape of mGovernment and eGovernment, primarily through the lens of stakeholder dynamics and end-user perspectives. It situates its inquiry within the broader context of the mGov4EU project, emphasising the growing importance of digital governance in modern public administration. The core focus of this chapter is to dissect and analyse the roles, challenges, and expectations of diverse stakeholders in the mGovernment and eGovernment domains. Simultaneously, it prioritises end-user experience, stressing its vital role in the success of digital governance initiatives. Case studies from Austria, Estonia, and Germany provide practical insights into these dynamics. The key findings comprise the necessity for nuanced stakeholder analysis in digital governance projects and the imperative of a user-centric approach in service design. It reveals how stakeholder engagement and user satisfaction are pivotal for the adoption and effectiveness of mGovernment and eGovernment services. Concluding with a forward-looking perspective, the chapter advocates for continuous adaptation and innovation in digital governance. It calls for more inclusive and participatory frameworks that accommodate evolving stakeholder needs and enhance end-user experiences, thereby setting a roadmap for future research and practice in digital government.
Ethical and Data Protection Considerations in Mobile Government: An EU Perspective
Authors: Graux Hans
Published: November 2024

The European legal and policy framework in the last few years has increasingly focused on ways to empower citizens in taking control over their data. With respect to mobile eGovernment, this can be seen both in data protection law, in legislation concerning once-only information exchanges, and in the current proposals surrounding mobile identity wallets. This chapter will examine how these rules interact, what the legal and ethical implications are, and what the limitations and points of conflict might be. We will also examine how a project like mGov4EU is impacted by these rules and where the project can and has innovated or expanded on the general legal and ethical principles within the confines of the law.
Evaluating Digital Government Projects: Emphasizing Process and Relevance Through Transdisciplinary Research
Authors: Temple Lucy , Eibl Gregor
Published: November 2024

Government organizations worldwide focus on digital solutions to improve public services and enhance citizen experience. These initiatives continue to receive significant resource allocation. There exists the need for a thorough evaluation to ensure that these projects deliver the intended benefits and address citizen needs. Currently, the absence of a single suitable evaluation method poses a challenge. The complexity of these projects demands a dynamic evaluation environment to understand societal impact and relevance. Relevance implies assessing to what extent a project aligns with the stakeholders’ goals, needs, and desires, mainly government organizations and citizens or businesses. This chapter explores the importance of relevance in evaluating such projects and highlights the reasons for adopting a transdisciplinary research approach. Unlike traditional disciplinary-focused approaches, transdisciplinary research focuses on real-world context and interdisciplinarity, goes beyond just science, and promotes interaction and integration among involved parties to produce high relevance. By focusing on project outcomes and processes, this research aims to propose relevant metrics for evaluating digital government projects and their relevance in a real-world context. To do so, a series of European research and development projects focusing on digital government will be analyzed using the proposed transdisciplinary evaluation framework to understand if outcomes and processes promote project relevance. This research will help enhance current evaluation approaches for digital government projects. The findings of this study will contribute to the widening of evaluation frameworks for digital government initiatives.
Ensuring Security in Development-Oriented Collaborative Research Projects
Authors: Zefferer Thomas , Prünster Bernd , Czerny Roland , Podgorelec Blaž
Published: November 2024

Security is of paramount importance in collaborative research projects, particularly those focusing on software development. The security of data processed by project-developed software relies on early consideration of security aspects during the software’s design and development process. Unfortunately, the unique characteristics of collaborative research projects often impede the seamless integration of security aspects, posing a risk of producing solutions with inadequate security properties. To tackle this challenge, this chapter introduces a generic method designed to seamlessly incorporate security aspects in development-oriented research projects. With an emphasis on broad applicability across diverse projects, the method maintains intentional generality. Through its application to the H2020 project mGov4EU, the chapter demonstrates the method’s practical effectiveness, highlighting its adaptability and utility in a concrete project scenario. This proposed method serves as a valuable tool for researchers and practitioners aiming to seamlessly integrate security within collaborative research projects, addressing potential vulnerabilities early and ensuring the development of more secure software solutions.
Voluntary Childlessness in the Spanish Graphic Novel: Irene Olmo’s No quiero ser mamá (2020)
Authors: Carbayo-Abengózar Mercedes
Published: November 2024

In recent years, graphic narratives about journeys into motherhood and the maternal experience have populated the Spanish market. These narratives appear alongside other forms of creative exploration of motherhood like mom blogs, maternal chronicles, novels, and films. However, the issue of non-motherhood is still under-explored across all genres. No quiero ser mamá is a graphic novel that explores the process of deciding not to be a mother. The novel is innovative in the way that it presents the process as a subjective experience, drawing attention to the specific conjunctions of visual and verbal texts in autobiography and visually arranging the relationships of the protagonist with other people in social situations and spatial environments. Through these visual relationships, we see how Irene Olmo conveys her struggle to conform to societal expectations of women and mothers highlighting the perceived gap between the protagonist’s femininity and motherhood norms. Olmo uses her graphic novel as a feminist tool to explore the choice of a voluntary childfree life as a response to social attitudes towards non-motherhood that have emerged from culturally sanctified religious ideologies. No quiero ser mamá creates a new discursive space in which the naturalisation of motherhood can be challenged, the silence surrounding this experience can be broken, and non-motherhood can be imbued with the potential for enlightenment, community, self-realisation, and exceptionality.
Adapting (to) Non-Motherhood: Ulrike Kofler’s Film What We Wanted (2020)
Authors: Heffernan Valerie
Published: November 2024

Austria’s entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 2020 Academy Awards was a drama by director Ulrike Kofler called Was Wir Wollten (What We Wanted, 2020). Kofler’s film tells the story of a childless couple, Alice and Niklas, who decided to take a holiday to recover from yet another failed attempt to conceive via IVF. However, their plans for a restful break are disrupted by the family next door, whose beautiful children serve as a constant reminder of what is lacking in their life. The film is based on a short story by Swiss writer Peter Stamm, and this chapter focuses on how that written text was adapted for the big screen. In particular, it considers how Alice’s ambivalent stance towards motherhood, which is already present in Stamm’s narrative, is expressed in visual and cinematic form in Kofler’s film. This chapter argues that both the film and its narrative source text offer a more nuanced view of the story of childlessness and non-motherhood than that which is often presented in the media and society.
Reclaiming Non-Motherhood: Abjection, Laughter and Failure in Twenty-First-Century Swedish Narratives of Childlessness
Authors: Björklund Jenny
Published: November 2024

In Sweden in the twenty-first century, childlessness has emerged as a topic in literature across genres. These narratives take stories about non-motherhood, which are often invisible and abjected from mainstream society, and tell them in new and defiant ways. Moreover, this body of literature depicts a variety of ways of being a non-mother: through involuntary childlessness and infertility, through childlessness by choice and through childlessness by circumstance. This chapter explores a range of literary representations of women without children in twenty-first-century Swedish literature. This chapter discusses fiction, autofiction and personal essays that deal with childlessness and analyses how these representations reclaim the position of non-motherhood in various ways: by telling stories of failed fertility treatments, by embracing the abjected position of non-motherhood and claiming it as a liveable life, and by using laughter and failure to turn things around and propose alternative ways of living. The chapter brings together theories of abjection, laughter and failure to analyse stories that are usually expulsed from the public domain in order to uphold the fertility norm. It shows how abjection, laughter and failure are employed in these narratives to reclaim the position of non-motherhood, to criticise dominant discourses and to imagine different futures.
Non-Motherhood and the Narrative of the Self in Nuria Labari’s The Best Mother of the World
Authors: Kuzminskaitė Dovilė
Published: November 2024

In her novel The Best Mother in the World (La mejor madre del mundo, 2019) contemporary Spanish writer and journalist Nuria Labari presents both an intimate and a panoramic view of infertility, assisted reproduction, motherhood, and abortion. Her protagonist, a young middle-class woman living in Barcelona, narrates her story of becoming a mother in the first person, starting from an initial lack of desire to become a mother to a newly discovered longing to become one and, finally, the decision to abort her third, unexpected pregnancy. TheBest Mother in the World presents a socio-political and critical reading of non-motherhood: it discusses the economic aspects of becoming a mother, the societal pressure, and the hypocrisy of medical discourse. Labari conceptualizes motherhood as a void that every woman must negotiate at some point in her life and which impacts her identity. The author challenges established discourses surrounding motherhood and non-motherhood by emphasizing the closeness of these two experiences. Therefore, motherhood and non-motherhood are portrayed as complex, dynamic, and ever-evolving phenomena rather than pre-conceptualized experiences.
Een dubbel J-katheter zonder aanvullende interventie als definitieve behandeling van acute symptomatische kleine ureterstenen: ervaringen uit het Catharina Ziekenhuis in Eindhoven
Authors: Schoofs Esther H. M. , Bos Mathilde W. , Koldewijn Evert L. , de Jongh Rik
Published: November 2024

Samenvatting

In een acute setting wordt vaak een dubbel J‑katheter (DJ) geplaatst voor symptomatische obstructieve ureterstenen. Meestal wordt in tweede instantie gekozen voor een definitieve behandeling met ureterorenoscopie (URS) of extracorporeal shock wave lithotripsy (ESWL). Het doel van dit retrospectieve onderzoek is nagaan of een DJ een effectieve en veilige definitieve behandeloptie kan zijn bij kleine ureterstenen. Drieëntwintig patiënten van het Catharina Ziekenhuis in Eindhoven werden geïncludeerd. Spontane steenlozing vond plaats bij alle patiënten, bij 43% met de DJ in situ en 57% na DJ-verwijdering. De gemiddelde maximale steendiameter was 3,23 mm. Bij één patiënt was heropname nodig na verwijdering van de DJ wegens oncontroleerbare pijn. Verder werden er geen significante complicaties geregistreerd. Dit onderzoek toont aan dat een DJ geplaatst in een acute setting voor kleine symptomatische ureterstenen een veilige en effectieve definitieve behandeloptie kan zijn, zonder aanvullende interventie.
Prediction of crippling load of I-shaped steel columns by using soft computing techniques
Authors: Mustafa Rashid
Published: November 2024

This study is primarily aimed at creating three machine learning models: artificial neural network (ANN), random forest (RF), and k-nearest neighbour (KNN), so as to predict the crippling load (CL) of I-shaped steel columns. Five input parameters, namely length of column (L), width of flange (bf), flange thickness (tf), web thickness (tw) and height of column (H), are used to compute the crippling load (CL). A range of performance indicators, including the coefficient of determination (R2), variance account factor (VAF), a-10 index, root mean square error (RMSE), mean absolute error (MAE) and mean absolute deviation (MAD), are used to assess the effectiveness of the established machine learning models. The results show that all of the three ML (machine learning) models can accurately predict the crippling load, but the performance of ANN is superior: it delivers the highest value of R2 = 0.998 and the lowest value of RMSE = 0.008 in the training phase, as well as the highest value of R2 = 0.996 and the smaller value of RMSE = 0.012 in the testing phase. Additional methods, including rank analysis, reliability analysis, regression plot, Taylor diagram and error matrix plot, are employed to assess the models’ performance. The reliability index (β) of the models is calculated by using the first-order second moment (FOSM) technique, and the result is compared with the actual value. Additionally, sensitivity analysis is performed to check the impact of the input variables on the output (CL), finding that bf has the greatest impact on the crippling load, followed by tf, tw, H and L, in that order. This study demonstrates that ML techniques are useful for developing a reliable numerical tool for measuring the crippling load of I-shaped steel columns. It is found that the proposed techniques can also be used to predict other kinds of failures as well as different kinds of perforated columns.
Sustainable development goals in Africa: perspective from U.S. aid
Authors: Yan Jiale
Published: November 2024

Since the end of the Second World War, many countries have provided external assistance for Africa's growth and development. The impact of these funds on the achievement of the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals(SDGs) by African countries is not yet clear. This paper try to fill this gap by analyzing the impact of US aid on sustainable development goals in Africa. Based on data from 47 African countries for 2015 to 2020, this paper used fixed effect and ordered probit models to examine the impact of US aid on the achievement of Africa's SDGs. The results are as follows. First, United States aid to Africa is beneficial to improving the overall SDG scores of African countries. Second, United States aid to Africa contributes to the achievement of some of the SDGs in the social and economic and environmental dimensions. This is reflected in the positive impact on the scores of SDG 1 (No Poverty), SDG 2 (Zero Hunger), SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-Being), SDG 6 (Clean Water and Sanitation), SDG 7 (Affordable and Clean Energy), SDG 15 (Life on Land). Third, United States aid to Africa has been instrumental in increasing the pace of achievement of some of the SDGs. This is reflected on the trend of changes in the scores for SDG 7 (Affordable and Clean Energy), SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth), SDG 9 (Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure), SDG l0 (Reduced Inequalities), SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities) and SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production). Fourth, this paper further classify the forms of funding and find that the United States should increase funding for project support aid. Therefore, increasing aid for environmental protection and project support would be conducive to advancing the SDGs of African countries.
Biometrics in extended reality: a review
Authors: Agarwal Ayush , Ramachandra Raghavendra , Venkatesh Sushma , Prasanna S. R. Mahadeva
Published: November 2024

In the domain of Extended Reality (XR), particularly Virtual Reality (VR), extensive research has been devoted to harnessing this transformative technology in various real-world applications. However, a critical challenge that must be addressed before unleashing the full potential of XR in practical scenarios is to ensure robust security and safeguard user privacy. This paper presents a systematic survey of the utility of biometric characteristics applied in the XR environment. To this end, we present a comprehensive overview of the different types of biometric modalities used for authentication and representation of users in a virtual environment. We discuss different biometric vulnerability gateways in general XR systems for the first time in the literature along with taxonomy. A comprehensive discussion on generating and authenticating biometric-based photorealistic avatars in XR environments is presented with a stringent taxonomy. We also discuss the availability of different datasets that are widely employed in evaluating biometric authentication in XR environments together with performance evaluation metrics. Finally, we discuss the open challenges and potential future work that need to be addressed in the field of biometrics in XR.
The role and impact of new technologies on healthcare systems
Authors: Sinha Raj
Published: November 2024

The integration of new technologies into healthcare systems is revolutionizing the industry by significantly enhancing the capabilities of healthcare providers, improving patient outcomes, and optimizing administrative operations. This comprehensive examination critically assesses the impact of these technologies on various stakeholders within the healthcare ecosystem, highlighting both the benefits and challenges. Emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), which refers to the simulation of human intelligence by machines, the Internet of Things (IoT), which involves interconnected devices that collect and exchange health-related data in real time, Blockchain, which is a decentralized and tamper-proof ledger technology used to securely manage patient data, and wearable devices are explored for their potential applications in diagnostics, treatment, and patient monitoring. Despite their transformative potential, these technologies also bring forth a range of limitations and challenges, including ethical concerns regarding patient privacy, legal implications of data security, and technical hurdles related to interoperability and implementation. By addressing these issues, the healthcare industry can better navigate the complexities of technological advancement, ensuring that innovation contributes positively to patient care and operational efficiency.
Effect of different treatment strategies on modified Glasgow Prognostic Score (mGPS) in patients with breast cancer
Authors: Nawaz Haseena , Fatima Sadia , Ali Asif , Mir Awal , Aleem Benish , Rafiq Sobia , Alorini Mohammed
Published: November 2024

Background

There are various treatment options for breast cancer, but a delayed diagnosis at an advanced stage negatively affects overall survival. Our objective is to investigate the prognostic significance of the modified Glasgow Prognostic Score (mGPS) with different treatment modalities.

Materials and methods

The study was a longitudinal cohort conducted in the Biochemistry laboratory of the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences at Khyber Medical University. Enrolling 121 patients with invasive breast carcinoma from November 2018 to February 2021, blood samples were collected at various stages. Data analysis utilized SPSS® version 22, employing the Kaplan–Meier method for overall survival (OS) calculation. The log-rank test assessed P-values for OS, and the chi-square test analyzed the association of modified Glasgow Prognostic Score (mGPS) with different treatments. Statistical significance was considered for results with a P-value (p < 0.05).

Results

The study results indicated that mGPS 2 was linked to lower overall survival, while mGPS 0 and 1 were associated with good overall survival. Chemo-endocrine therapy exhibited the highest median survival of 40.9 months compared to other treatment options. Conversely, chemoradiotherapy combined with targeted therapy demonstrated the lowest overall median survival of 22.5 months.

Conclusion

The findings of the current research suggested that mGPS could be used as a prognostic screening tool in patients with breast cancers receiving different therapeutic modalities.
Modern Rwanda
Authors: Reyntjens Filip
Published: November 2024

Rwanda has been the subject of much research following the genocide against the Tutsi ethnic group in 1994. Moving beyond recent histories which examine Rwanda's past predominantly through the lens of this tragic event, Filip Reyntjens utilises a longue durée framework to provide new insights into historical developments over the last hundred and fifty years. Tracking the foundations of modern Rwanda from the mid-nineteenth century to the present day, this study offers the first comprehensive examination of both the political continuities and ruptures which have shaped the country. Reyntjens examines the 19th century precolonial polity, colonisation from the end of the 19th century; the revolution of 1959-1961 followed by independence in 1962; and the 1994 genocide followed by the seizure of power by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). Across these periods of dramatic transition this study demonstrates the role of both political constancy and change, allowing readers to reshape their understanding of Rwanda's political history.
Homelessness, Liberty and Property
Authors: Skolnik Terry
Published: November 2024

In Homelessness, Liberty and Property, Terry Skolnik establishes a novel theory about the government's duties to end homelessness, maintain public property's value, and legitimize laws that regulate public space. In doing so, Skolnik provides new insight into how the property law system and the regulation of public space limit unhoused persons' freedom and political equality. The book deepens our understanding of how various areas of law, such as constitutional law, legal philosophy, criminal law, and property law, approach the reality of homelessness and advances original arguments to provide new justifications for the right to housing. Skolnik concludes by offering a set of concrete proposals for how the government can reduce the incidence of homelessness and treat unhoused persons with greater concern and respect. This title is part of the Flip it Open Programme and may also be available open access. Check our website Cambridge Core for details.
Liturgy, Ritual, and Secularization in Nineteenth-Century British Literature
Authors: McQueen Joseph
Published: November 2024

Simultaneously spiritual and material, liturgy incarnates unseen realities in concrete forms – bread, wine, water, the architectural arrangement of churches and temples. Nineteenth-century writers were fascinated with liturgy. In this book Joseph McQueen shows the ways in which Romantic and Victorian writers, from Wordsworth to Wilde, regardless of their own personal beliefs, made use of the power of the liturgy in their work. In modernity, according to recent theories of secularization, the natural opposes the supernatural, reason (or science) opposes faith, and the material opposes the spiritual. Yet many nineteenth-century writers are manifestly fascinated by how liturgy and ritual undo these typically modern divides in order to reinvest material reality with spiritual meaning, reimagine the human as malleable rather than mechanical, and enflesh otherwise abstract ethical commitments. McQueen upends the dominant view of this period as one of scepticism and secularisation, paving the way for surprising new avenues of research.
Nations before the Nation-State
Authors: Schön Anna Marisa
Published: November 2024

Throughout Antiquity and the Middle Ages, thinkers understood nations as communities defined by common language, culture, and descent, and sharing strong bonds of belonging and solidarity. Even so, they did not assume that nations would also be appropriate units of government. The recovery of this historical understanding, in turn, yields valuable insights for contemporary political dilemmas. Nations Before the Nation-State offers the first extended study of the idea of the nation in ancient and medieval political thought. It recovers a pre-modern conception of the nation as a cultural and linguistic community, rather than a political association, and examines better means for thinking about nationhood. Offering a historic perspective from which to address challenges of nationalism, this book engages with debates on multiculturalism, liberal nationalism, and constitutional patriotism and argues that contemporary political dilemmas can be resolved more organically by recovering modes of thinking that have resolved similar tensions for centuries.
Bringing War Back In
Authors: Schenoni Luis L.
Published: November 2024

Bringing War Back In provides a fresh theory connecting war and state formation that incorporates the contingency of warfare and the effects of war outcomes in the long run. The book demonstrates that international wars in nineteenth-century Latin America triggered state-building, that the outcomes of those wars affected the legitimacy and continuity of such efforts, and that the relative capacity of states in this region today continues to reflect those distant processes. Combining comparative historical analysis with cutting edge social science methods, the book provides a comprehensive picture of state formation in nineteenth-century Latin America that is compelling for readers across disciplines, breathes new life into bellicist approaches to state formation, and offers a novel framework to explain variation in state capacity across Latin America and the world.
Introduction to Supergravity and its Applications
Authors: Nastase Horatiu
Published: November 2024

This graduate textbook covers the basic formalism of supergravity, as well as its modern applications, suitable for a focused first course. Assuming a working knowledge of quantum field theory, Part I gives the basic formalism, including on- and off-shell supergravity, the covariant formulation, superspace and coset formulations, coupling to matter, higher dimensions and extended supersymmetry. A wide range of modern applications are introduced in Part II, including string theoretical (T- and U-duality, AdS/CFT, susy and sugra on the worldsheet, superembeddings), gravitational (p-brane solutions and their susy, attractor mechanism, Witten's positive energy theorem) and phenomenological (inflation in supergravity, supergravity no-go theorems, string theory constructions at low energies, minimal supergravity and its susy-breaking). The broader emphasis on applications than competing texts gives Ph.D. students the tools they need to do research that uses supergravity and benefits researchers already working in areas related to supergravity.
Milton's Ireland
Authors: Morrissey Lee
Published: November 2024

In this first book devoted to Milton's engagement with Ireland, Lee Morrissey takes an archipelagic approach to his subject. The study focuses on the period before the Cromwellian Conquest, explaining Milton's emergence as a public figure because of Ireland and tracing the paradoxical resonances of Milton's republicanism in Ireland to this day. Informed by developments in Irish history but foregrounding a lucid discussion of Milton's governmental prose works, Morrissey explores the tension between Milton's long-established image as a proto-Enlightenment, democratic figure, and the historical reality of his association with a Protestant invading force. Milton's Ireland incisively negotiates this complex subject, addressing clear absences in Milton scholarship, in the history of Ireland, and in the fraught relationship between Ireland and England.
From Colonial Cuba to Madrid
Authors: Díaz María Elena
Published: November 2024

From Colonial Cuba to Madrid examines the largest and most complex freedom suit litigated in the highest court of the Spanish empire at the end of the eighteenth century. Filed by hundreds of re-enslaved Afro descendant people who had lived in quasi-freedom in eastern Cuba for more than a century, this action drew on local customary practices and broader cultural, political, and legal discourses rooted in the Spanish Atlantic world to put forward novel claims to collective freedom and native based rights at a time when questions of slavery, freedom, and citizenship were igniting in many parts of the Atlantic world. Intersecting law, society studies, and the history of slavery, María Elena Díaz offers a carefully researched study of one of the few communities of Afro descendants that managed to secure freedom and political and legal recognition from the Spanish crown during the colonial period.
Peace Leadership
Authors: Amaladas Stan
Published: November 2024

Peace dwelling is formulated as a reciprocal relationship among four interrelated ways of 'Being': Being a Guardian, Being a Curator, Being a Welcoming Presence, and Being a Neighbour. These ways of 'Being' are connected to a systemic reconstruction of Burns' formulation of the essential task of leadership, which encompasses the interconnectedness among the affairs of the Head (consciousness raising because values exist only where there is consciousness), the Heart (feeling the need to meaningfully define values, because where nothing is felt, nothing matters), the Hands (purposeful action) and the Holy (treating persons like persons as a non-negotiable and sacred practice, while believing that all persons can be lifted into their better selves). Corresponding to the four ways of Being, Peace Leadership is interpreted as the art of learning how to properly integrate the affairs of 4-Hs into our own shared lived existence for the sake of dwelling in peace.
Recognizing asymptomatic bacteriuria in the surveillance of catheter-associated urinary tract infections—beyond fever and positive urine culture
Authors: Mitaka Hayato , Bryson-Cahn Chloe , Estebane Jorge O. , Makarewicz Vanessa A. , Lynch John B. , Chan Jeannie D.
Published: November 2024

Among 143 cases of National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN) catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTI), 40% were considered catheter-associated asymptomatic bacteriuria (CA-ASB), and 18% clinical CAUTI. An alternative source of fever was present in 70% of CA-ASB. NHSN CAUTI may not be an effective metric for tracking hospital-level infection prevention efforts.
Regulatory Reform: Results and Challenges
Authors: Dudley Susan E. , Ellig Jerry
Published: November 2024

Over the last century, the United States has witnessed three approaches to achieving better regulatory outcomes: the removal of “economic” regulations in certain sectors; regulatory impact analysis (RIA) of new “social” regulations; and retrospective analysis of existing regulations. This article reviews the rationale for each approach, the results to date, and the remaining challenges. It finds that both institutional and technical factors influence the success of reform efforts.
Designing for replicability: a qualitative empirical study on the replication of open-source machine tools
Authors: Omer Mohammed , Kaiser Melina , Buxbaum-Conradi Sonja , Moritz Manuel , Redlich Tobias
Published: November 2024

By making building instructions freely accessible to everyone, open-source machine tools (OSMTs) promise to democratize manufacturing by enabling users in marginalized settings to build machines tools by themselves. There is, however, a lack of empirical evidence of the replicability of OSMT designs in low-resource contexts. This article explores OSMT replicability through qualitative and empirical methods to answer the central research question: Are designs that are fully open source also globally replicable? A comparative experiment was carried out by replicating an open-source 3D printer in two different locations: in Germany (resource-rich) and in Oman (resource-poor). The experiment aimed to determine the barriers faced with the replication in each location. It was significantly more challenging to replicate the 3D printer in Oman, primarily due to difficulties in sourcing and manufacturing, necessitating extensive modifications, which demanded greater skills and dexterity from users compared to those in Germany. Qualitative interviews found that limited digital literacy posed a significant barrier for microenterprise owners in replicating OSMT. Finally, design guidelines were proposed to enhance the global replicability of contextualized OSMT designs.