bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Evaluasi Tingkat Kepatuhan Konsumsi Obat pada Pasien Hipertensi Rawat Jalan di Rumah Sakit Dewi Sri Karawang Menggunakan Metode MMAS-8
Authors: Mura Tsani Arsy , Hilmi Indah Laily , Salman Salman
Published: March 2023

Hipertensi merupakan salah satu problematika di bidang kesehatan di seluruh dunia dan menjadi faktor risiko utama penyakit kardiovaskular. Tingkat kepatuhan minum obat pada penderita hipertensi di Jawa Barat sebanyak 55,12% rutin minum obat. Tujuan penelitian ini adalah untuk mengevaluasi tingkat kepatuhan pasien hipertensi dalam mengkonsumsi obat antihipertensi di rumah sakit Dewi Sri Karawang. Penelitian ini menggunakan metode deskriptif dengan teknik sampling purposive sampling dengan pendekatan prospektif. Penelitian ini dilakukan di Rumah Sakit Dewi Sri Karawang dalam jangka waktu Februari – April 2022. Pada penelitian ini diperoleh hasil 137 sampel pasien hipertensi dengan  tiga kategori kepatuhan konsumsi obat anti hipertensi. Hasil penelitian ditemukan sebanyak 90 pasien. Karakteristik pasien yang terlibat dalam penelitian ini cenderung wanita sebanyak 54%, usia 41-50 tahun sebanyak 46,0%, dan pekerjaannya sebagai karyawan sebanyak 35%. Tingkat kepatuhan penggunaan obatnya beragam, di mana 90 pasien (65,7%) berada pada tingkat kepatuhan sedang, 40 pasien (29,2%) pada tingkat kepatuhan rendah, dan 7 pasien (5,1%) pada tingkat kepatuhan tinggi. Berdasarkan hasil penelitian dapat disimpulkan bahwa penggunaan obat antihipertensi pada pasien rawat jalan di Rumah Sakit Dewi Sri Karawang berada di kategori kepatuhan sedang. Kata Kunci: Konsumsi Obat, Hipertensi, MMAS-8, Tingkat Kepatuhan, Kardiovaskular Hypertension is a health problem worldwide and is a major risk factor for cardiovascular disease. The prevalence of hypertension continues to increase, it is estimated that people with hypertension in 2025 will reach 29% of the number of adults worldwide. In West Java, hypertension sufferers reached 39.60%, which is the province with the second largest percentage of hypertension cases, with a compliance rate of 55.12% of patients taking the medication regularly. While in Karawang itself, based on data obtained from the West Java Health Office, the number of people with hypertension for ages over 15 years in 2019 reached 606,946 people. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the compliance level of hypertensive patients in consuming antihypertensive drugs at Dewi Sri Hospital, Karawang. This study uses a descriptive-analytic method with a prospective purposive sampling technique. This research was conducted at Dewi Sri Karawang Hospital in the period from February to April 2022. In this study, the results of 137 samples of hypertensive patients were found in three categories of adherence to antihypertensive drug consumption. A total of 90 patients (65.7%) had moderate adherence, 40 (29.2%) had low adherence, and 7 patients (5.1%) had high adherence. Based on the results of the study, it can be concluded that patients at Dewi Sri Karawang Hospital are in the category of moderate compliance.
Halal industries growth in Salatiga, Central Java, Indonesia
Authors: Annisa Arna Asna
Published: March 2023

This study aims to see the growth performance of the halal industry through the perspective of business actors within the framework of tolerance and the creative economy. The city of Salatiga was chosen as the research location because it has the achievement of being the most tolerant city in Indonesia; this is a new reference base for developing the halal industry from a sociocultural perspective. Through qualitative research with a case study approach, the key person for this research is the Head of the MSMEs Division of the Cooperatives and MSMEs Office of Salatiga City and 22 MSMEs entrepreneurs who will receive free halal certification services in 2021. The data obtained in the form of primary data are analysed using the Atlas t.i application. The data is then validated through triangulation of data with secondary data. The research instrument was developed from the halal balanced scorecard theory, which has four (4) perspectives: learning and growth, internal business, customer, and financial. The results of the data analysis show that government support significantly impacts the process of growing MSMEs awareness to learn to provide halal guarantees for the products they produce. This affects their internal business, so they always evaluate critical points in their production activities. This is done because running a business on a consumer-oriented basis so that halal needs must be met to gain consumer confidence in the end financially, their income has increased. Based on these results, this research can be a recommendation for BI, KNEKS, and the Ministry of Cooperatives and MSMEs to determine the policy direction for developing MSME-based halal industries based on the approach of social and cultural values that still need to be prioritised.
Measurement and simulation of the propagation of impulsive acoustic emission sources in cylinders, with potential application to pipeline monitoring
Authors: Abolle-Okoyeagu Chika Judith , Torralba Javier Palacio , Chen Yuhang , Droubi Ghazi , Reuben Robert
Published: March 2023

Acoustic Emission (AE) monitoring of processes, machines and structures consists of using one or more surface-mounted sensor to listen for sources, which could come from structural degradation, process conditions or machine operation. Since real AE sources have a temporal structure, often over the millisecond range or longer, it is of general interest to examine what can be recovered of this temporal structure using an array of sensors of known positions relative to each other. Experiments and simulations were carried out with impulsive sources (pencil-lead breaks) and the propagating AE resulting from these sources was recorded over a period of around 2 seconds for both experiments and simulations. Two test objects were used; a solid steel cylinder to provide a relatively simple and well-studied platform to examine a number of essential principles, and a 2m length of pipe to provide some conclusions relevant to impact monitoring of pipelines. Comparison of the simulated and experimental results indicates that the frequency content of the resulting wave is not very sensitive to unloading rate at the source, although the amplitude of the simulated signal is. Comparison of the first few tens of microseconds of the simulated and experimental waveforms suggests that the first arrival is consistent with a wave speed of around 5000ms− 1. In addition, both simulations and experiments indicate that, in the sizes of the objects examined, reflections at interfaces quickly introduce interference, so the nature of the impulsive part of the source can only reasonably be preserved in the fastest-moving components of the propagating wave and before arrival of any reflections from interfaces.
The efficacy of sodium bicarbonated Ringer’s solution versus lactated Ringer's solution for goal-directed fluid therapy in elderly patients undergoing gastrointestinal surgery: a prospective randomized controlled trial
Authors: Liu Jia , Gao Yang , He Ziqing , Zhang Hao , Wu Hao , Ning Meng , Chen Lijian
Published: March 2023

Background

Sodium bicarbonated Ringer’s solution (BRS) has been gradually applied to clinic in recent years, while few clinical studies focused on the efficacy of BRS among elderly patients undergoing major surgery until now. This randomized controlled trial investigated the lactate metabolism and clinical outcomes of sodium bicarbonate Ringer's solution vs. sodium lactated Ringer’s solution (LRS) in elderly patients undergoing gastrointestinal surgery.

Methods

Sixty-two elderly patients undergoing gastrointestinal surgery were enrolled in this prospective, randomized controlled study. The enrolled participants were assigned into the sodium bicarbonated Ringer’s solution group (BRS group) or lactated Ringer's solution group (LRS group) randomly, which received goal-directed fluid therapy with sodium bicarbonated Ringer’s solution or sodium lactated Ringer’s solution, respectively. The primary outcome was the lactate level at the end of the surgery. Secondary outcomes included pH, bicarbonate, BE, hemodynamics, plasma biochemistry, recovery of gastrointestinal function and postoperative complications within 30 days after surgery.

Results

Sixty patients completed the trial and were analyzed finally. At the end of surgery, the level of lactate was significantly lower in BRS group than that in the LRS group (1.00 vs. 1.89, p < 0.001), and the probability of hyperlactacemia was lower (3.3% vs. 40.0%, p = 0.002). PH, bicarbonate, BE, hemodynamics, plasma biochemical alterations and postoperative gastrointestinal function recovery were not significant different between the two groups (p > 0.05). However, compared to the LRS group, the BRS group had a lower risk of wound bleeding (10.0% vs. 36.7%, p = 0.033) and newly impaired liver function (16.7% vs. 50.0%, p = 0.006), lower red blood cells infusion (0 vs. 0, p = 0.021), lower albumin infusion (10 vs. 35, p = 0.040), and shorter length of postoperative hospital stay (9 vs. 11.5, p = 0.012).

Conclusions

Sodium bicarbonated Ringer’s solution is more effective for elderly patients undergoing gastrointestinal surgery compared with sodium lactated Ringer’s solution through reducing the lactate levels, reducing the risk of wound bleeding and impaired liver function, red blood cells and albumin infusion, and decreasing the length of hospital stay.
Trial registration: This randomized trial was approved by the Clinical Medical Research Ethics Committee of the First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University, China (PJ2020-15-21) and registered at the Chinese Clinical Trial Center (http://www.chictr.org.cn/index.aspx, identifier: ChiCTR2000039406,date: 26/10/2020).
Prediction of Co2 Brazilian Emissions with Scenario Analysis Based on Energy and Environmental Indicators
Authors: Brito Marcos Lapa , Pires Carlos Augusto de Moraes , Santos Luis Carlos Lobato , Simonelli George
Published: March 2023

Brazil is a developing country that emits high amounts of CO2 per year. Therefore, controlling these emissions is essential to achieving sustainable development. In this paper, we modeled an Artificial Neural Network capable of quantitatively relating CO2 emissions, energy matrix, and burning in Brazilian biomes, such as the Amazon Forest. The literature still does not have studies that quanti- tatively demonstrate the impact that changes in the Brazilian energy matrix have on CO2 emissions in the country. In addition, there are also no studies that use fires in Brazilian biomes as input in predictive models for emissions. Our results showed that Brazilian CO2 emissions will increase in the coming years. However, partially replacing fossil energy resources with renewables associated with reducing fires in Brazilian biomes could significantly reduce these emissions. In our first scenario, with a partial replacement of 30% of fossil resources by renewable resources and a 70% reduction in the burning of Brazilian biomes, CO2 emissions decreased by 13.58% for the year 2030. In the second scenario analyzed, we replaced fossil fuels by 90% with renewable ones, while the burning in Brazilian biomes was reduced by 90%. We observed a 28.45% reduction in Brazilian CO2 emissions in this situation. Thus, the model developed here can help Brazil to predict and control its CO2 emissions from changes in its energy and environmental indicators to find a balance between development and sustainability. Other developing countries can also use our model. For this, the indicators must be adapted to the reality of the country studied.
Efficacy and Safety of Pentoxifylline on Patients with Non-Alcoholic Steatohepatitis; Randomized Controlled Trial
Authors: Abomandour Ahmed , Bakr Adel G. , ElGhandour Ahmed Mohamed , Elewa Hosny Ahmed , Rhman Maha Abdel , Zalat Zeinab Al Kasaby
Published: March 2023

Background: Actually, no specific treatment has been endorsed by FDA for non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH). The present research aimed to evaluate the efficacy of PTX on NASH patients for 6 months compared to NASH patients who received regular treatment.
Methods: We assigned a 6-month, open-labeled, randomized study to 50 NASH participants who were allocated into 2 groups; firstly, the control group, patients administered regular therapy. Secondly, in the treated group, patients received regular treatment plus pentoxifylline (PTX) at 400 mg thrice daily. To achieve this goal, liver aminotransferases tests, hematological biomarkers, lipid profile, fatty liver index (FLI), fibrosis-4 (FIB-4) index, aspartate aminotransferase to platelet ratio index (APRI) and NAFLD fibrosis score (NFS) were measured before and after 6-month of PTX-treatment.
Results: The present study showed that PTX-treated patients significantly decreased hepatic levels of aminotransferase enzymes and non-invasive scores. Besides, after 6 months of treatment, PTX revealed improvement in hepatic fibrosis through a marked reduction in aspartate aminotransferase to platelet ratio (APRI) index, fibrosis-4 (FIB‐4) index, and NAFLD fibrosis score (NFS). Conversely, other biochemical markers showed a slightly significant change after PTX therapy. Moreover, PTX administration showed non-significant safety problems in these participants.
Conclusions: Patients treated with PTX revealed safety and efficacy in improving liver enzymes, lipid panel, and non-invasive fibrosis scores in NASH patients. In addition, our results indicated that PTX showed improvement in hepatic fibrosis scores, which reflected its anti-fibrotic activity.
Phase I Clinical Trial. Safety of Baricitinib to prevent respiratory insufficiency in oncohematological patients affected by Coronavirus Disease-19: BARCOVID19 study
Authors: Sanz-Linares Gabriela , Mussetti Alberto , Albasanz-Puig Adaia , Salvador Iñaki , Sureda Anna , Gudiol Carlota , Salazar Ramon , Marin Mar , García Margarita , Navarro Valentin , Haba Irma De la , Coma Eva , Dura Xavier , Fontanals Sandra , Serrano Gala , Cruz Claudia , Mañez Rafael , Moreno-González Gabriel
Published: March 2023

Background

Oncohematological patients, due to their secondary immunodeficiency, are at a higher risk of mortality related to COVID-19 infection. Baricitinib, a JAK2 inhibitor, has a dual effect in this context, reducing the inflammatory response to the virus and diminishing virus endocytosis.

Methods

This phase I safety run-in cohort study aimed to determine the dose-limiting toxicity of baricitinib in terms of the rate of serious events in oncohematological patients with COVID-19. The drug was administered on an inpatient basis at an oral dose of 4 mg daily for 5 to 7 days, associated with the institutional standard of care (SOC).

Results

Six patients with solid tumors or hematological malignancies were enrolled in the study. Sixty percent of the patients received active anticancer treatment at the time of inclusion. Lymphopenia and elevation of acute-phase reactants were the most frequent laboratory findings that improved during the treatment course. All patients received corticosteroids, but only 3 of them received remdesivir as the SOC. The most common adverse events were bacterial infections, including pneumonia, urinary tract infections, and bacteremia. The mortality rate due to disease progression and respiratory insufficiency is 33%. The severe adverse event rate was less than 33%, with no adverse events or mortality caused by baricitinib.

Conclusions

The results of the present study demonstrate that baricitinib is a safe treatment for patients with oncohematological diseases and COVID-19. However, its efficacy and superiority to standard treatment will require further testing in phases 2 and 3 trials.

Trial registration:

AEMPs: 20–0356 EudraCT: 2020-001789-12
Age and Sex-Related Comparison of Telemedicine Service Utilization During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Retrospective Analysis
Authors: Wong Hubert , Razvi Yasmeen , Hamid Muhammad Akhter , Mistry Niraj , Filler Guido
Published: March 2023

Background
The COVID-19 pandemic has led to increased utilization of telemedicine services.
Methods
A retrospective analysis of all non-hospital-based medical healthcare services in Ontario from November 2019 to June 2021 was collected from the Ontario Health Insurance Plan (OHIP) billing database. Only fee-for-service billings were included in the present analysis. Coincident COVID-19 cases were obtained from Public Health Ontario. Comparisons were made based on age bracket, sex, telemedicine and in-person care.
Results
Billings for telemedicine services in Ontario increased from $1.7 million in November 2019 to $64 million in April 2020 and the proportions reached a mean peak of 72% in April 2020 and declined to 46% in June 2021. A positive correlation was found between the use of telemedicine and COVID-19 cases (p = 0.05). The age group with the highest proportion of telemedicine use was the 10–20-year-olds, followed by the 20–50-year-olds (61 ± 9.0%, 55 ± 7.3%, p = 0.01). Both age groups remained above 50% telemedicine services at the end of the study period. There is a persistent sex preference for females to adopt telemedicine (females 54.2 ± 8.0%, males 47.9 ± 7.7%, ANCOVA p = 0.05)
Conclusions
The use of telemedicine services remains at a high level across groups, particularly the 10–50-year-olds. There are clear age and sex preferences for using telemedicine. Studying these differences may provide insights into how the delivery of non-hospital-based medicine has changed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
A BERT-Based model: Improving Crime News Documents Classification through Adopting Pre-trained Language Models
Authors: Ali Ashour , Noah Shahrul Azman Mohd , Zakaria Lailatul Qadri
Published: March 2023

Text classification has played a key role in various fields, such as news classification, spam detection, and sentiment analysis. However, the classification of crime news continues to pose challenges, including low efficiency, low precision, and the scarcity of high-quality annotated data on a large scale. Using pre-trained language models, such as Bidirectional Encoder Representation from Transformers (BERT), has reduced the need for extensive amounts of labelled data in the categorization process. BERT boasts strong abilities in contextual representation and excels in text classification tasks, particularly when limited labelled data is present. A BERT-based pre-trained language model was applied to categorize crimes using information gathered from Malaysian online newspapers to overcome the shortage of high-quality, large-scale crime-related labelled data. The crime-related labelled dataset used for training this model was compiled from BERNAMA (Malaysian National News Agency) and manually labelled by crime investigation experts into 12 categories, including a non-crime class. The experiment results showed that the BERT-based model outperformed previous models and achieved the highest performance with an accuracy of 99.45%. This highlights the efficacy of BERT in classifying crime news, even with a small dataset.
Development of Inclined Applicators for Flattened Beam Intraoperative Radiotherapy
Authors: Kim Jeong Heon , Ahn Sohyun , Park Kwangwoo , Lee Rena , Kim Jin Sung
Published: March 2023

Purpose: We introduce a 3D-printed applicator for Intraoperative Radiation Therapy (IORT) using the INTRABEAM system. The applicator is designed to spare normal tissue, increase indications, and evaluate its clinical use in various intraoperative cases.
Methods: We designed and fabricated inclined applicators at 0° and 45° to generate flattened and unflattened beams and shield leakage dose to non-target regions. We evaluated the characteristics of the applicator, including dose uniformity, percentage depth dose, leakage, and dose rate of the beam.
Results: The uniformity of developed applicators at depths of 0, 2, 5, and 15 mm were as follows: 1.23, 1.28, 1.30, and 1.22 for a flattened beam, and 1.29, 1.32, 1.27, and 1.25 for an unflattened beam, respectively. No leakage dose was measured at a distance of 1 mm from the surface, and the measured dose rates after 3 min of irradiation for the flattened and unflattened beams of the 0° and 45° applicators were 51.0 and 52.9 cGy and 48.5 and 54.8 cGy, respectively.
Conclusions: The developed applicator demonstrated a uniform beam and leakage shielding to minimize radiation exposure to normal tissue. Customized applicators facilitated IORT treatment of chest and abdominal lesions near or on critical organs. The proposed method has been dose calibrated, and we proceeded with clinical application.
Suppressive action of nesfatin-1 and nesfatin-1-like peptide on cortisol synthesis in adrenal cortex cells
Authors: Nasri Atefeh , Sands Jade , Unniappan Suraj
Published: March 2023

Nucleobindin-derived peptides, nesfatin-1 [NESF-1] and nesfatin-1-like-peptide [NLP] have diverse roles in endocrine and metabolic regulation. While both peptides showed a stimulatory effect on the synthesis of POMC, the ACTH precursor in mouse corticotrophs, whether NESF-1 and NLP have any direct effect on glucocorticoid [GC] synthesis in the adrenal cortex remains unknown. The main aim of this study was to determine if NESF-1 and/or NLP act directly on adrenal cortex cells to regulate cortisol synthesis in vitro. Whether NLP injection affects stress-hormone gene expression in the adrenal gland and pituitary in vivo in mice was also assessed. In addition, cortisol synthetic pathway in Nucb1 knockout [KO] mice was studied. Human adrenal cortical [H295R] cells showed immunoreactivity for both NUCB1/NLP and NUCB2/NESF-1 using immunohistochemistry. NLP and NESF-1 decreased the expression of steroidogenic enzymes, cortisol synthesis and release through the AC/PKA/CREB pathway in H295R cells. Similarly, intraperitoneal injection of NLP in mice decreased the expression of enzymes involved in GC synthesis in the adrenal gland while increasing the expression of Pomc, Pcsk1 and Crhr1 in the pituitary. Moreover, the Mc2r mRNA level was enhanced in the adrenal gland samples of NLP injected mice. However, the global genetic disruption in Nucb1 did not affect most steroidogenic enzyme mRNAs, and Pomc, Pcsk2 and Crhr1 mRNAs in mice adrenal gland and pituitary gland, respectively. Collectively, these data provide the first evidence that NLP and NESF-1 directly decreased cortisol synthesis and secretion in vitro. NUCB peptides still might play its stimulatory effect on GC synthesis and secretion through their positive effects on ACTH-MC2R pathway in the pituitary.
Breast cancer and breast cancer screening use - beliefs and behaviours in a nationwide study in Malaysia
Authors: Tan Min Min , Jamil Aminatul Saadiah Abdul , Ismail Roshidi , Donnelly Michael , Su Tin Tin
Published: March 2023

Background
Many upper-middle-income countries (UMICs), including Malaysia, continue to face low breast cancer (BC) screening rates and patients with delayed presentation of BC. This study investigated the role of beliefs about BC and use of screening (e.g. beliefs about whether or not screening reduced the possibility of dying from BC).
Methods
A nationwide cross-sectional study was conducted in which a total of 813 women (aged ≥ 40 years old) were randomly selected and surveyed using the validated Awareness and Beliefs about Cancer (ABC) measure. The association between BC screening use, sociodemographic characteristics, and negative beliefs about BC screening were analysed using stepwise Poisson regressions.
Results
Seven out of ten Malaysian women believed that BC screening was necessary only if and when they started experiencing cancer symptoms. Women > 50 years and from households with more than one car or motorcycle were 1.6 times more likely to attend a mammogram or a clinical breast examination (mammogram: PR = 1.60, 95% CI = 1.19–2.14, CBE: PR = 1.61, 95%CI 1.29–1.99). Approximately one quarter of women (23%) reported anticipated anxiety about attending BC screening to the extent that they would avoid undergoing the procedure. Women who held negative beliefs about BC screening were 37% less likely to attend a mammogram (PR = 0.63, 95% CI = 0.42–0.94) and 24% less likely to seek a CBE (PR = 0.75, 95% CI = 0.60–0.95).
Conclusions
There is a need for public health strategies designed to change beliefs about BC screening among Malaysian women as a way of increasing uptake and impacting on late presentation and advanced cancer. The results provide insights about targeting of public health strategies – women with BC screening uptake-inhibiting beliefs tend to be under 50 years, in the lower income group (that do not own a car or a motorcycle) and more likely to be ethnic Malay or Indian (compared to Chinese-Malay).
Leishmania donovani persistence and transmission causing cutaneous leishmaniasis in unusual-foci of Nepal
Authors: Rai Tinmaya , Shrestha Srijan , Prajapati Sabita , Bastola Anup , Parajuli Niraj , Ghimire Pragya Gautam , Bhandari Parmananda , Pandey Kishor , Jain Manju , Matlashewski Greg , Goncalves Rachel Bras , Manandhar Krishna Das
Published: March 2023

Cutaneous leishmaniasis cases have increased dramatically in recent years in Nepal. The study offers molecular identification of the Leishmaniaspecies using 40 patient's aspiration biopsy samples, targeting markers kinetoplast minicircle DNA (kDNA) and internal transcribed spacer-1 (ITS1). Among molecularly diagnosed 22 cutaneous leishmaniasis cases, L. donovani complex was identified in 13 instances and L. major in 9 cases. The ITS1 PCR was positive in 12 of the positive nested- kDNA PCR cases (12/22), confirming L. donovani complex in seven of the cases and L. major in five of the cases. In addition, the study conclude that concurrent occurrence of atypical cutaneous infections caused by L. donovani parasite in 59.1% of cases and typical cutaneous infections caused by L. major parasite in 40.9% of cases. The detected L. donovani species present null genetic distances from seven references of L. donovani, but slight differences between ITS1 sequences and not grouped into a significant monophyletic cluster indicating the possibility of new variant of or hybrid circulating in the country.
Performance Analysis of Hybrid Underwater Wireless System for Shallow Sea Monitoring.
Authors: Bhatnagar Romya , Garg Parul
Published: March 2023

This paper investigates the performance of hybrid dual hop underwater system which has been proposed for monitoring vast region under shallow sea environment. This hybrid underwater opto-acoustic sensor network (UOASN) is designed to provide higher data rates and less propagation delay with respect to traditional acoustic underwater systems, by including optical carrier. An acoustic sensor and an optical sensor are mounted on shallow water floor at different locations that acquire the surrounding information and transmit it continuously to the underwater vehicle based on round-robin scheduling. Such vehicle is comprised of decode-and-forward relaying mechanism. The underwater acoustic link is determined by alpha-F fading distribution and underwater optical link follows the mixture Exponential-Generalized Gamma (EGG) model to characterize channel irradiance fluctuations. The novel closed form expressions for various end to end (E2E) signal to noise ratio (SNR) statistics such as equivalent probability density function (PDF), cumulative distribution function (CDF) and moments have been derived. The analytical expressions are also obtained for outage probability, average bit error rate, ergodic capacity and outage capacity. Besides, the closed form asymptotic expressions for outage probability and average bit error rate are derived.
Fabrication of g-C3N4 nanosheet on stainless steel mesh for effective separation of oil from water
Authors: Al-Kindi Nada Saeed , Marzouqi Faisal Al , Khraisheh Majeda , Kim Younghun , Selvaraj Rengaraj
Published: March 2023

Nowadays, most of the industries depend mainly on oil and oil-based processes, which resulted in producing large volumes of oily wastewater. One of the most common methods used for the treatment of oily contaminated water is the filtration method by modified surfaces. In this research g-C3N4 nanostructured material was prepared via thermal condensation method. g-C3N4 were crystallized in tri-s-triazine phases and their mean crystalline sizes of these nanostructures were 12.17 nm. The high-magnification microscopy images show that the morphology of g-C3N4 were nanosheets. A stainless-steel meshes were modified and coated with the prepared g-C3N4 nanostructured materials to be used for the separation of oil and water mixture. Due to the hydrophobic nature of the modified meshes, oil drops spread over the mesh surface and the water drops form spherical shapes. The most efficient coating among all the modified meshes was g-C3N4, which was functionalized using silane moiety. The separation efficiency of this coated mesh reached 74.87% and it resulted to fast separation. This mesh can separate different types of oil from the oil/water mixture such as toluene, mineral oil, 2-ethyl-1-hexanol, and n-pentane with good efficiency. In addition, the modified mesh can be used up to 40 times and still gives good separation efficiency.
A combination of urinary antibiotics as a new potential biomarker for adolescent depression
Authors: Jin Yaling , Jin Xia , Ge Zhenhua , Zhang Jianbiao , Ding Yaqin , Wang Peijuan , Qiu Jiancheng , Liu Chao , Yi Zhenghui , Zhao Ningwei , Shen Ning , Wu Xuming , Yan Qi
Published: March 2023

Background: By exposing to various sources of antibiotics, such as medication, meat and contaminated water, the accumulation of antibiotics is considered a pathogenic factor in the mental disorders of adolescents. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between urinary antibiotics and adolescent depression.
Methods: 62 participants were divided into two groups according to their diagnosis: 32 healthy control group and 30 adolescent depression group. All the urine samples were collected in the morning and subjected to the analysis of urinary antibiotics by liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS). This study detected the urinary levels of four commonly used antibiotics azithromycin, sulfadimidine, ofloxacin and ampicillin.
Results: Urinary levels of azithromycin, sulfadimidine, ofloxacin and ampicillin were significantly higher in the depression patients group compared to the control group. All the antibiotics were positively correlated with the HAMA score. Binary logistic analysis showed azithromycin (OR=1.05, P=0.002), sulfadimidine (OR=1.22, P<0.001), ofloxacin (OR=3.79, P<0.001), ampicillin (OR=352.57, P<0.001) were risk factors for adolescent depression. The ROC curve showed each of the four urinary antibiotics had a good potential to predict the adolescent depression (azithromycin (AUC=0.778, P<0.001), sulfadimidine (AUC=0.741, P=0.001), ofloxacin (AUC=0.772, P<0.001) and ampicillin(AUC=0.810, P<0.001)), while the combination of all the four urinary antibiotics showed the best prediction accuracy for the diagnosis of the adolescent depression (AUC=0.814, P<0.001).
Limitation: Due to the cross-sectional study design, the result cannot demonstrate causality.
Conclusion: Our study revealed the novel possibility of urinary antibiotics as a potential external exposure biomarker for the early diagnosis of adolescent depression.
Fire safety prediction for polypropylene composites in flammable environments
Authors: Dong Xinxin , Zhang Daniel Xiaotian , Liu Jian , Dong Fanfei , Sun Jun , Gu Xiaoyu , Zhang Sheng
Published: March 2023

The modeling of polymer combustion is a big challenge due to the fast speed and complexity of various reactions during the flammable environments. Limiting oxygen index (LOI), heat release rate (HRR), and total heat release (THR) are three key parameters to evaluate the flammability of polymeric composites. In this work, cubic interpolation and Lagrange interpolation methods are used to simulate the data and predict the flammability of PP containing different loads of aluminum hydroxide (ATH). Simple formulations containing ATH were designed to avoid the influence of other fillers on the combustion process. The LOI, HRR, and THR are simulated and verified by the experimental data. The advantages and disadvantages of the two modeling methods in predicting the combustion data are compared. It was demonstrated that the cubic method was more precise than the Lagrange method in predicting the LOI value of PP composite. Both methods were suitable for predicting HRR and THR values of PP composites containing low amount of ATH (less than 35%). This work has important reference significance in predicting the fire performance of polymers containing inorganic additives.
Membranes prime the RapGEF EPAC1 to transduce cAMP signaling
Authors: Cherfils Jacqueline , Sartre Candice , Ferrandez Yann , Peurois François , Ley Marie , Zhang Wenhua , Kryszke Marie-Hélène , Courilleau Delphine , Fischmeister Rodolphe P. , Ambroise Yves , Zeghouf Mahel , Cianferani Sarah , Peyroche Gérald
Published: March 2023

EPAC1, a cAMP-activated GEF for Rap GTPases, is a major physiological transducer of cAMP signaling and a therapeutic target in cardiac diseases. The recent discovery that cAMP is compartmentalized in membrane-proximal nanodomains challenged the current model of EPAC1 activation in the cytosol. Here, we discover that anionic membranes are a major component of EPAC1 activation. We find that anionic membranes activate EPAC1 in the absence of cAMP, that they increase its affinity for cAMP by 2 orders of magnitude, and that they synergize with cAMP to yield maximal GEF activity. Thus, EPAC1 has four states that differ in their affinity for cAMP and GEF efficiency. In the cell cytosol, where cAMP is low, EPAC1 must thus be primed by membranes to bind cAMP. Examination of the cardiomyocyte-active chemical CE3F4 in this new framework further reveals that inhibition affects only membrane- and cAMP-activated EPAC1. Together, our findings reformulate previous concepts of cAMP signaling to include a hitherto overlooked role of membranes through EPAC proteins, with important implications for drug discovery.
WITHDRAWN: Generalized translation operator and Heat equation for the generalized canonical Fourier Bessel transform
Authors: SADIK Zakaria , AKHLIDJ Abdellatif
Published: March 2023

Note: Please see pdf for full abstract with equations.
The aim of this paper is to introduce a translation operator associated to the generalized linear canonical Fourier Bessel transform Fmα,n and study some of the important properties, and we derive a convolution product for this transform and as application we study the heat equation and the heat semigroup related to the conjugate of the generalized Bessel operator Δmα,n.
MSC Classification: 33D15; 47A05; 47B90
Impact of Corona virus disease 2019 on antenatal care services in rural western Uganda; a retrospective study
Authors: Abeza Diana , Tayebwa Beckson , Muhumuza Joshua , Nabakka Majoreen , Ngonzi Joseph
Published: March 2023

Introduction: The Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak poses an important threat to public health but also unique challenges to healthcare workers. The pandemic has resulted into redirection of funds and attention by governments, donors, and stakeholders towards COVID-19 containment efforts, thereby diverting focus from other important issues including sexual and reproductive health. This study was aimed at determining the impact of Covid-19 on antenatal care services at Kampala international university teaching hospital (KIU-TH) between March and May 2020.
Methods: This was a retrospective study in which we reviewed records of mothers who attended antenatal care clinic at KIU-TH for the months of March, April and May in both 2019 and 2020. The health workers attached to the antenatal care clinic during the periods filled a questionnaire to report on challenges faced. The data obtained was analyzed using SPSS version 22.
Results: Data for 2,379 clients was analyzed in total. The percentage reduction in antenatal care attendance was 7.1% in the year 2020. The services that were significantly affected were fetal heart listening and administration of intermittent preventive treatment (IPT) for malaria prophylaxis. The main challenges reported were lack of transport means, excessive work and exhaustion plus fear of contracting COVID-19 infection.
Conclusion: COVID-19 pandemic significantly reduced antenatal care service provision. Measures should be put in place to ensure that antenatal services can be offered appropriately and safely without compromising the clients nor the health care workers during outbreaks.
Spatiotemporal Variability of the Relationship Between Seasonal Temperatures and Precipitation in the Iberian Peninsula, 1951-2019
Authors: Rodrigo F. S.
Published: March 2023

This paper studies the spatiotemporal variability of the IRt index (defined as the difference between the percentage of precipitation corresponding to warm days and cold days in year t) calculated at 35 stations in the Iberian Peninsula during 1951-2019. Spatial variability is estimated using cluster analysis (Euclidean distance, Ward's method), which allows regionalization of the data set for each year's season. For each cluster, the  index is defined as the average of the indexes corresponding to each cluster element. The temporal evolution of the  indices is analyzed by studying the appearance of trends using the Mann-Kendall test and the possible existence of various subperiods using the cumulative sum of deviations and the t-test for the difference between the means. The role of EA, EA/WR, NAO, SCAN and WeMO teleconnection patterns in modulating the relationship between temperature and precipitation is analyzed by applying multiple regression analysis. The results show a trend towards positive (or less negative) values in the relationship between temperatures and precipitation (of varying magnitude depending on the region and season) and the contribution of atmospheric dynamics to these changes.
Efficient Deep Learning based Code Retrieval using Unified Graph Structure and Semantic Graph Matching Encoder
Authors: Bashir Shariq , Rahman Hanif Abdul
Published: March 2023

Computer programmers frequently use code retrieval systems to reuse existing code snippets from open-source repositories. These systems search a large collection of code snippets to retrieve the most relevant ones based on a text query. However, capturing semantic information between user queries and code snippets presents a key challenge in this task. Previous works have primarily used natural language processing (NLP) approaches to calculate relevance, but these approaches cannot capture deep structural and semantic dependencies between queries and snippets. In this study, we proposed a novel approach called Deep Graph-Based Semantic Representation and Matching (DeepGSR) for code retrieval. Our approach transforms queries and code snippets into a unified graph-structure representation and then retrieves relevant code snippets using a novel graph matching and retrieval approach. DeepGSR learns fine-grained relevance between queries and code snippets using cross-attention-based semantic matching operators, in addition to extracting structural information. We evaluated our approach using two publicly available code retrieval datasets, and the experiments demonstrate that DeepGSR efficiently retrieves relevant code snippets for a given query and significantly outperforms existing code retrieval approaches.
A predictive model for vascular complications of free flap transplantation based on machine learning
Authors: YANG Jijin , Liang Yan , WANG Xiaohua , LONG Wenyan , WEI Zhengang , Liqin LU , LI Wen
Published: March 2023

Objective: Exploring the risk factors for vascular complications after free flap transplantation and establishing a clinical auxiliary assessment tool for vascular complications in patients undergoing free flap transplantation based on machine learning methods.
Methods:Collecting patients who underwent free flap transplantation at a tertiary hospital in Guizhou Province from January 1, 2019 to December 31, 2021, using synthetic minority oversampling technique to oversample the training set, and constructing Logistic regression model, random forest model and neural network model three machine learning models and verifying them using the sampled data. Using the test set to evaluate the performance of the model through the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC), accuracy, sensitivity and specificity indices.
Results: A total of 570 patients who underwent free flap transplantation were included in this study, of which 46 patients developed postoperative vascular complications. The neural network model performed best in the test set, with an AUC of 0.828. Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that preoperative hemoglobin, preoperative fibrinogen, operation time, smoking history, number of anastomoses, and peripheral vascular injury were statistically significant independent risk factors for vascular complications after free flap transplantation. The top five predictive factors in the neural network were fibrinogen content, operation time, donor site, BMI, and platelet count.
Conclusion: The predictive model for vascular complications of free flap transplantation constructed in this study has good predictive ability, which can provide reference for medical personnel to take preventive measures to prevent vascular complications in high-risk patients undergoing free flap transplantation.
Magnetic resonance imaging-based radiomics assesses the level of immune cell infiltration in the breast cancer tumor microenvironment
Authors: Qian Hua , Ren Xiaojing , Xu Maosheng , Fang Zhen , Zhang Ruixin , Bu Yangyang , Zhou Changyu
Published: March 2023

Purpose The tumor immune microenvironment provides information regarding prognosis and prediction. To screen the immune cells associated with the prognosis of breast cancer (BRCA) patients from the Cancer Genetic Atlas (TCGA) and establish an MRI-based radiomics model for evaluating the level of immune cell infiltration in breast cancer patients.
MethodsCIBERSORT was used to assess the level of infiltration of 22 immune cell types from retrospective data of 1096 breast cancer patients from the TCGA database, and univariate and multivariate Cox regressions were applied to assess the prognostic value of the level of immune cell infiltration in BRCA patients to obtain independent prognostic factors for BRCA patients. We extracted imaging features from the Cancer Imaging Archive (TCIA) database for 73 patients with preoperative MRI data. The best imaging features were selected using the Least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) to establish an MRI-based radiomics model for evaluating the level of immune cell infiltration in breast cancer patients.
Results M2 macrophages were found to be an independent prognostic factor for BRCA patients based on the results of Cox regression analysis (HR=32.288, 95% CI: 3.100-357.478). A total of nine important features were selected for calculating radscore, A intratumoral model was established with AUCs (95% CI) of 0.662 (0.495-0.802) and 0.678 (0.438-0.901) in the training and testing cohorts, respectively. A peritumoral model was established with AUCs (95% CI) of 0.826 (0.710-0.924) and 0.752 (0.525-0.957). A combined model was established with AUCs (95% CI) of 0.843 (0.723-0.938) and 0.744 (0.491-0.965). The peritumoral model had the highest diagnostic efficacy, with accuracy, sensitivity and specificity of 0.773, 0.727 and 0.818 respectively in its testing cohort.
ConclusionMRI-based radiomics model may evaluate the level of immune cell infiltration in breast cancer and might provide a non-invasive imaging biomarker for the assessment of the tumor microenvironment in breast cancer.
Basic physical properties and potential application of graphene oxide fibers synthesized from rice husk
Authors: Castro-Ladino J. R. , Cuy-Hoyos C. A. , Prías-Barragán J. J.
Published: March 2023

The synthesis method and correlation between compositional, vibrational, and electrical properties in graphene oxide fibers (GOF) are presented and discussed here, and a potential application through the development of a heater device based on GOF. The GOF samples were synthesized from rice husk (RH), via a thermal decomposition method, employing an automated pyrolysis system with a controlled nitrogen atmosphere, varying carbonization temperature (TCA) from 773 to 1273 K. The compositional analysis shows peaks in XPS spectrum associated with C1s and O1s, with presence of hydroxyl and epoxy bridges; the oxide concentration (OC) of samples varied from 0.21 to 0.28, influenced by TCA. The GOF samples exhibits morphology of fibers, vibrational characteristics, typical of graphene oxide multilayers and electrical behavior that scale with OC. The electrical response shows that OC decreases and increases electrical conductivity at the polycrystalline phase, possibly attributed to the desorption of some oxides and organic compounds. Likewise, the physical correlations between OC and vibrational response, revealed that decreased OC and increases in boundary defects density and decreased crystal size, as a consequence of thermal decomposition processes. The correlation between OC and physical properties suggests that by controlling the OC in GOF, it was possible to modify vibrational and electrical properties of great interest in fabrication of advanced electronics; consequently, we show a potential application of GOF samples developing an electrically controlled heater device.