bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Analyzing Change in IR Theory
Authors: Friedner Parrat Charlotta
Published: April 2024

Change is often taken for granted and treated as commonsensical in international relations (IR) theory, but this treatment of change obscures the fundamentally different roles that scholars’ understandings of change play. Making the underlying ontological views of history as determined- or contingent-explicit and addressing their interaction with pessimistic or optimistic normative outlooks, four ideal-typical conceptualizations of change can be distinguished: one in which change is cyclical, one in which it is progressive, one in which it is unpredictable, and one where it is malleable. Understanding which one is being employed in any given analysis will enhance comprehension both beyond and across theoretical fault lines.

The cyclical conception of change, at the interception of a determinist view of history and normative pessimism, is the archetypical realist position, which emphasizes continuity and reproduction rather than change. The progressive conception, combining determinist history with normative optimism, is the widespread idea of change as improvement, commonly drawn on in idealism, liberalism, and some forms of constructivism. The conception of change as unpredictable, squaring a pessimistic normative outlook with a contingent view of history, is an idea of change as random, irregular, and omnipresent. This view often underlies poststructuralism, feminism, and postcolonial perspectives. Finally, the combination of a contingent view of history with an optimistic normative outlook leads to a conception of change as malleable, where change is something that can be influenced, and the world can be bettered if enough people put their minds to it. This view is typical for historical sociology and large parts of the English school.
Transnational Terrorist Attacks
Authors: Choi Seung-Whan
Published: April 2024

Since the September 11 attacks, a great number of studies have explored the causes and effects of transnational terrorist attacks which are carried out by at least two different nationals. However, discussions of whether transnational terrorist attacks are more deadly than domestic terrorist attacks are scant in the current empirical literature. This paucity of research is unfortunate given that many people believe that transnational terrorists, due to their possession of greater organizational, financial, and logistical resources than domestic terrorists, tend to incur higher death tolls. The literature indeed reveals three deficiencies: (a) a discrepancy between popular belief and scholarly work exists regarding the superior lethality of transnational terrorism, (b) very few researchers have taken a serious step toward debunking the myths of international terrorist attacks, and (c) the findings of the published studies are inconsistent. These deficiencies call for an empirical investigation of whether popular belief aligns with empirical data. A series of regression analyses after compiling a sample of 209,706 terrorist incidents spanning from 1970 to 2020 shows robust evidence supporting the popular sentiment of the superior lethality of transnational terrorist attacks over domestic ones. This finding implies that the counterterrorism community should remain committed to the Global War on Terrorism to protect innocent lives. Since terrorist threats persist and even diversify with new tactics, the counterterrorism community must strive to finish the initiative that President George W. Bush set out about 20 years ago: “our war on terror begins with al Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated.”
Paleoepidemiology
Authors: Yaussy Samantha L.
Published: April 2024

The field of paleoepidemiology utilizes epidemiological and bioarchaeological methods and theoretical frameworks to examine aggregate patterns of disease and other health outcomes in past populations. Paleoepidemiological studies most often use data gathered from the skeletal remains of deceased individuals to investigate the origin and antiquity of specific diseases in the past; explore the coevolutionary history of particular pathogens and their human hosts; and assess patterns of intra- and interpopulation variation in susceptibility to disease, risks of mortality (frailty), and the various health outcomes produced by diseases and other conditions in past human populations.

Paleoepidemiological scholarship benefits from an interdisciplinary approach to the study of health and disease in the past, applying analytical techniques common in epidemiological studies of living populations, such as hazards analysis and survival analysis, while also drawing on the theories and methods traditionally employed in bioarchaeological research. However, unlike contemporary epidemiological studies, paleoepidemiological work is also constrained by the biases and limitations of skeletal data, including issues of preservation, hidden heterogeneity in frailty, selective mortality, and the potential for skeletal indicators of stress and disease to simultaneously signal “good” and “poor” health. In spite of these limitations, the field of paleoepidemiology provides valuable insights into past pandemics of diseases like tuberculosis and plague, major epidemiologic transitions in antiquity, and the developmental origins of health and disease in past human populations. Importantly, the results and conclusions of paleoepidemiological research hold value not only for scholars interested in life and health in the past but also researchers and public health experts concerned with understanding and mitigating global health crises in the present and future.
String Field Theory
Authors: Maccaferri Carlo
Published: April 2024

After more than 50 years from the Veneziano amplitude, the fundamental formulation of string theory (ST) remains elusive. On the one hand, there is the world-sheet formulation that is truly microscopic but which is only valid for infinitesimal string coupling and is highly background dependent. On the other hand, there are other nonperturbative background independent approaches such as supergravity or other quantum theories of (super) Yang–Mills type, which however necessarily miss some of the features of the extended nature of the string (although in some cases they can be holographically equivalent to a ST).

In string field theory (SFT), it is possible to keep an exact microscopic world-sheet description together with a complete space–time framework that follows the rules of quantum field theory (QFT) and where nonperturbative contributions can be, at least in principle, coherently accounted for.

String field theory is a formulation of ST as a QFT for an infinite number of fields (the various oscillation modes of the string) in spacetime. This formulation allows to better treat some of the shortcomings of the usual on-shell formulation of ST while maintaining at the same time a full microscopic world-sheet approach. The construction of SFTs is such that ST world-sheet amplitudes are reproduced when these are well-defined. But SFT gives a more general construction of amplitudes that is well-defined even when the standard world-sheet approach gives rise to divergences. In this very general framework, all the elementary string interactions are defined so as to provide a solution to the quantum Batalin–Vilkovisky master equation, furnishing a perturbative microscopic definition of the target space path integral of ST. This construction is explicitly realized in terms of (quantum) homotopy algebras for both bosonic strings and superstrings, including Type II, Type I, and heterotic.

The construction offered by SFT allows to define the one-particle irreducible (1PI) effective action of ST and thus to give a definition of string perturbation theory where it is possible to discuss quantum effects such as vacuum shifts due to tadpoles and mass renormalization. The explicit knowledge of microscopic ultraviolet SFTs allows to construct the low-energy ST effective action as the Wilsonian action by integrating out the massive string states from the SFT path integral. This top-down construction is safe from infrared divergences and has been very useful for obtaining unambiguous results on nonperturbative contributions, such as D-instanton corrections to perturbative amplitudes and effective superpotentials.

String field theories (especially open string field theories [OSFTs]) allow to approach background independence in ST by recasting the plethora of different ST backgrounds in the form of classical solutions to the SFT equation of motion. This program has been fully realized in critical bosonic OSFT, where any D-brane system can be explicitly written as a classical solution of the OSFT on any other D-brane system.
Toledo
Authors: Messer-Kruse Timothy
Published: April 2024

Though considered a typical midwestern industrial city, Toledo, Ohio has an unusual history shaped by its unique physical environment and native resistance that delayed its development. While never meeting the wild expectations of its promoters, Toledo nevertheless emerged in the 20th century as an industrial powerhouse and center of technological and political innovation. A magnet for mass immigration from central and eastern Europe in the years before World War I, and for the northward migration of southerners in the interwar years, Toledo built a culturally diverse population that sustained an eccentric role in Ohio’s and the nation’s political life. Though considered an archetypical “rust belt” city by the 1970s, Toledo actually maintained a large manufacturing base and remains a center of automotive, solar energy, and glass production.
The Department Store
Authors: Parker Traci
Published: April 2024

Department stores were the epicenter of American consumption and modernity in the late 19th and through the 20th century. Between 1846 and 1860 store merchants and commercial impresarios remade dry goods stores and small apparel shops into department stores—downtown emporiums that departmentalized its vast inventory and offered copious services and amenities. Their ascendance corresponded with increased urbanization, immigration, industrialization, and the mass production of machine-made wares. Urbanization and industrialization also helped to birth a new White middle class who were eager to spend their money on material comforts and leisure activities. And department stores provided them with a place where they could do so. Stores sold shoppers an astounding array of high-quality, stylish merchandise including clothing, furniture, radios, sporting equipment, musical instruments, luggage, silverware, china, and books. They also provided an array of services and amenities, including public telephones, postal services, shopping assistance, free delivery, telephone-order and mail-order departments, barber shops, hair salons, hospitals and dental offices, radio departments, shoe-shining stands, wedding gift registries and wedding secretary services, tearooms, and restaurants.

Stores enthroned consumption as the route to democracy and citizenship, inviting everybody—regardless of race, gender, age, and class—to enter, browse, and purchase material goods. They were major employers of white-collar workers and functioned as a new public space for women as workers and consumers.

The 20th century brought rapid and significant changes and challenges. Department stores weathered economic crises; two world wars; new and intense competition from neighborhood, chain, and discount stores; and labor and civil rights protests that threatened to damage their image and displace them as the nation’s top retailers. They experienced cutbacks, consolidated services, and declining sales during the Great Depression, played an essential role in the war effort, and contended with the Office of Price Administration’s Emergency Price Control Act during the Second World War. In the postwar era, they opened branch locations in suburban neighborhoods where their preferred clientele—the White middle class—now resided and shaped the development and proliferation of shopping centers. They hastened the decline of downtown shopping as a result. The last three decades of the 20th century witnessed a wave of department store closures, mergers, and acquisitions because of changing consumer behaviors, shifts in the retail landscape, and evolving market dynamics. Department stores would continue to suffer into the 21st century as online retailing exploded.
Islamic Bioethics: Abortion
Authors: Shapiro Gilla K. , Crane Jonathan K.
Published: April 2024

Religion plays a significant role in the bioethical decisions of abortion, which is the procedure for terminating a pregnancy before the fetus reaches viability. The bioethical discussion of abortion in Islam has great significance for health policy, significantly affecting how women seek out abortions and the rates of unsafe abortions and national maternal mortality. Guiding texts of Islamic religious authority, the Quran and the Sunnah, do not directly address abortion, but the Quran does include the prohibition of infanticide and mistreatment of unwanted children. It details how abortions are justified on varying grounds, such as the endangerment of the woman’s life.
Islamic Bioethics: Bioethics in Malaysia
Authors: Saidun Salilah
Published: April 2024

Islamic bioethics in Malaysia must be examined in terms of deliberation, legislation, and education. Shariʿah and social and economic state factors in Malaysia must be considered alongside the local and global implications of the bioethics issue. Civil and criminal law in Malaysia are under the Federal Government’s legislative authority, while Islamic affairs are under the regulation of the state governments. Several government agencies, non-governmental organizations, research institutions, and universities contribute to the development and dissemination of Islamic bioethics in Malaysia. Islamic reflection on bioethical questions in Malaysia must constantly keep up with rapidly progressing scientific developments.
Islamic Bioethics: Castration
Authors: Tolino Serena
Published: April 2024

Castration, scientifically called gonadectomy, is the action by which a man loses the use of his testicles. The prohibition of castration is included in the Qur’an, as it is considered to be mutilation and a change in God’s creation. While Muslim jurists of both the premodern period and the 21st century agree on the prohibition of castration, their specific interests changed over time. In the premodern period, historical evidence suggests that castrated men were a very important presence in Islamic courts. In the 21st century, castration is typically forbidden, and the number of castrated men has been greatly reduced. Surgical castration is forbidden in any case, and can become acceptable only for medical reasons, when it is inevitable and prevents a greater danger to the man. However, the debate on chemical castration—which has been proposed to reduce sexual harassment and pedophilia in Egypt, India, and Indonesia—is more nuanced.
Register and Enregisterment in Germanic
Authors: Spitzmüller Jürgen
Published: April 2024

Enregisterment denotes the sociolinguistic process within which specific forms of speaking, writing, or signing are subsumed by a social group into a coherent, distinctive whole (a language, a dialect, a standard, a slang etc.), which is often also given a label (such as Viennese, Spanglish, chatspeak, youth slang, officialese) and associated with specific contexts of use, media, groups of users, purposes, and ends, which are expected to be “typical” with regard to these forms. The product of such a process, an allegedly distinct set of communicative means that is associated (indexically linked) with assumed contexts and hence evokes specific expectations as far as their use is concerned, is called a register, register of discourse, or register of communication.

According to the sociolinguistic theory of enregisterment, registers are interpretive or ideological concepts rather than ontological facts; that is, there is often not much empirical evidence that these forms of communication are really used in the exact way, as distinctively, or as coherently as the register allocation would suggest, but nevertheless there is a shared belief throughout the relevant community that this is the case. Since such shared beliefs do have an impact on how people categorize the world they find themselves in, however, registers are not dismissed as “false beliefs” about language, but are rather seen as a core ingredient of the social use of language, particularly in relation to processes of social positioning, and of alienation and social discrimination, as well as the construction of social identities. Furthermore, many scholars have pointed out that enregisterment is not merely a “folk-linguistic” phenomenon (as opposed to allegedly “nonideological” forms of inquiry practiced by linguistic experts), since enregisterment processes are often propelled by linguistic scholars, and registers (such as “ethnolects” or “netspeak”) sometimes even derive from academic discourse.

Since the concept has gained great prominence in contemporary sociolinguistics, registers and enregisterment have been widely researched in Germanic languages, most notably English but also other Germanic languages such as German, Dutch, Swedish, Danish, and Norwegian. Enregisterment processes have been identified with regard to multiple historical and contemporary dimensions with which registers are being linked, among them nation states (language standardization and pluricentric standard variation), regions (regional and urban varieties), gender (e.g., “female speech,” “queer slang”), class (e.g., received pronunciation), age (e.g., “youth slang”), media (e.g., “netspeak”), profession (e.g., “officialese”), and ethnicity (e.g., “ethnolects”).
The Economic Value of Water
Authors: Hanemann Michael , Whittington Dale
Published: April 2024

In economics, the value of an item—including water—to a person is defined as the most of something else of value (typically money, but sometimes time) the person is willing to give up to obtain that item (willingness to pay) or the minimum compensation the person would want to receive in exchange for forgoing the item (willingness to accept). These are measures of gross value; they are in principle quantitative; and they are subjective and idiosyncratic to the individual and the circumstances. The economic value of an item is not measured by its price. It is likely to vary with the amount of the item and should not be taken as a constant. A core conceptual distinction is between use value and nonuse value. A person’s use value for an item is the value that she places on the item from motives connected with the use of the item by someone, whether her own use or that of someone else. Nonuse value is the value she places on an item from motives not directly connected with the use of that item by anybody in any tangible way. For example, a person may value water to drink (a use value), but he may also value having water remain in its natural state (a nonuse value). Consumptive uses are use values, but nonconsumptive uses can also be use values (e.g., swimming in a lake). Other conceptual distinctions include that between wet water and paper water (water that exists on paper but is not actually accessible or usable), and that between raw water alone versus water accompanied by the infrastructure necessary to store it and convey it so as to make it available for use.
Hendry, Charles Eric (“Chick”)
Authors: Shewell Hugh
Published: April 2024

Charles “Chick” Hendry (1903–1979), professor, humanitarian, erstwhile poet, and Director of the School of Social Work (now the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work), University of Toronto, was a leader in Canadian social work education during the mid-20th century. His own education and decades-long career in youth leadership, administration, and postsecondary education began in Canada in the 1920s, followed by some 20 years in the United States, before his return to Canada and the University of Toronto from 1946 until his retirement in 1969.
Asaga, Fusa
Authors: Nakatani Yomei
Published: April 2024

Fusa Asaga (1894–1986) was a hospital social work pioneer in Japan. After finishing an MSW program in the United States, she returned to Japan and worked as a social worker in a hospital in Tokyo city. After World War II, she served as an officer of the Japanese government to develop a new child welfare system. She then took a teaching job as a social work professor. She also had been engaged in a variety of social action such as Japanese women’s suffrage and opposition to nuclear testing throughout her life.
Prognostic Effect of Masked Morning Hypertension in Chinese Inpatients With Non-dialysis Chronic Kidney Disease: A Multicenter Retrospective Study
Authors: Lin Lin , Jiang Xinying , Liu Lingling , Wu Jingcan , Yu Tiantian , Wei Yuting , Li Man , Peng Hui , Wang Cheng
Published: April 2024

BACKGROUND

This study aimed to elucidate the prognostic role of Masked Morning Hypertension (MMH) in non-dialysis-dependent chronic kidney disease (NDD-CKD).

METHODS

2,130 NDD-CKD patients of the inpatient department were categorized into four blood pressure (BP) groups: clinical normotension (CH−), clinical hypertension (CH+) with morning hypertension (MH+), and without MH+ (MH−) respectively. The correlation between these four BP types and the primary (all-cause mortality) and secondary endpoints (cardio-cerebrovascular disease [CVD] and end-stage kidney disease [ESKD]) was analyzed.

RESULTS

The prevalence of MH and MMH were 47.4% and 14.98%, respectively. Morning hypertension independently increased the risk of all-cause mortality (P = 0.004) and CVD (P < 0.001) but not ESKD (P = 0.092). Masked morning hypertension was associated with heightened all-cause mortality (HR = 4.22, 95% CI = 1.31–13.59; P = 0.02) and CVD events (HR = 5.14, 95% CI = 1.37–19.23; P = 0.02), with no significant association with ESKD (HR = 1.18, 95% CI = 0.65–2.15; P = 0.60). When considering non-CVD deaths as a competing risk factor, a high cumulative incidence of CVD events was observed in the MMH group (HR = 5.16, 95% CI = 1.39–19.08).

CONCLUSIONS

MMH is an independent risk factor for all-cause mortality and combined cardiovascular and cerebrovascular events in NDD-CKD patients, underscoring its prognostic significance. This highlights the need for comprehensive management of MH in this population.
Correlation Between Medically Diagnosed Anxiety and Depression Disorder and Self-Reported Breast Implant Illness
Authors: Bresnick Stephen , Lagman Carlito , Morris Susie , Bresnick Shayna , Robbins Matthew
Published: April 2024

Background

Anxiety disorders, both with and without comorbid depression, are widespread globally. In this study we investigate the intersection of anxiety, depression, and self-reported breast implant illness (BII) in females undergoing aesthetic breast surgery.

Objectives

The objective of our research was to enhance understanding about mental health history, psychotropic medication use, and its relation to BII symptoms.

Methods

A cohort of 240 consecutive female patients undergoing elective breast surgery was studied. In the study we categorized patients by groups based on the presence of self-reported BII symptoms and the type of breast surgery performed. Mental health history, psychotropic medication use, and time spent in treatment for mental illness were scrutinized. Statistical analyses were conducted, including multiple regression analysis.

Results

Results revealed that patients with self-reported BII symptoms often had a preexisting anxiety/depression disorder treated medically before obtaining breast implants, and this disorder predicted the occurrence of BII symptoms. These patients tended to be diagnosed with anxiety and depression at a younger age, initiate medication therapy earlier, take more medications for their condition, and spend more time in therapy compared with others undergoing elective breast surgery.

Conclusions

Implications of this study highlight the need for comprehensive counseling between plastic surgeons and patients with self-reported BII symptoms. Understanding the role of anxiety/depression in the pathogenesis of self-reported BII is crucial, and collaboration with psychiatrists and other mental health professionals can ensure improved supportive care. The findings contribute to a better understanding of the psychological aspects surrounding breast implant surgery and self-reported BII and emphasize the importance of preoperative mental health assessments in appropriate patient selection for elective breast surgery.

Level of Evidence: 3
scPRAM accurately predicts single-cell gene expression perturbation response based on attention mechanism
Authors: Jiang Qun , Chen Shengquan , Chen Xiaoyang , Jiang Rui
Published: April 2024

Motivation

With the rapid advancement of single-cell sequencing technology, it becomes gradually possible to delve into the cellular responses to various external perturbations at the gene expression level. However, obtaining perturbed samples in certain scenarios may be considerably challenging, and the substantial costs associated with sequencing also curtail the feasibility of large-scale experimentation. A repertoire of methodologies has been employed for forecasting perturbative responses in single-cell gene expression. However, existing methods primarily focus on the average response of a specific cell type to perturbation, overlooking the single-cell specificity of perturbation responses and a more comprehensive prediction of the entire perturbation response distribution.

Results

Here, we present scPRAM, a method for predicting perturbation responses in single-cell gene expression based on attention mechanisms. Leveraging variational autoencoders and optimal transport, scPRAM aligns cell states before and after perturbation, followed by accurate prediction of gene expression responses to perturbations for unseen cell types through attention mechanisms. Experiments on multiple real perturbation datasets involving drug treatments and bacterial infections demonstrate that scPRAM attains heightened accuracy in perturbation prediction across cell types, species, and individuals, surpassing existing methodologies. Furthermore, scPRAM demonstrates outstanding capability in identifying differentially expressed genes under perturbation, capturing heterogeneity in perturbation responses across species, and maintaining stability in the presence of data noise and sample size variations.

Availability and implementation

https://github.com/jiang-q19/scPRAM and https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.10935038.
Topological benchmarking of algorithms to infer gene regulatory networks from single-cell RNA-seq data
Authors: Stock Marco , Popp Niclas , Fiorentino Jonathan , Scialdone Antonio
Published: April 2024

Motivation

In recent years, many algorithms for inferring gene regulatory networks from single-cell transcriptomic data have been published. Several studies have evaluated their accuracy in estimating the presence of an interaction between pairs of genes. However, these benchmarking analyses do not quantify the algorithms’ ability to capture structural properties of networks, which are fundamental, e.g., for studying the robustness of a gene network to external perturbations. Here, we devise a three-step benchmarking pipeline called STREAMLINE that quantifies the ability of algorithms to capture topological properties of networks and identify hubs.

Results

To this aim, we use data simulated from different types of networks as well as experimental data from three different organisms. We apply our benchmarking pipeline to four inference algorithms and provide guidance on which algorithm should be used depending on the global network property of interest.

Availability and implementation

STREAMLINE is available at https://github.com/ScialdoneLab/STREAMLINE. The data generated in this study are available at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.10710444.
Disinhibition in dementia related to reduced morphometric similarity of cognitive control network
Authors: Jenkins Lisanne M , Heywood Ashley , Gupta Sonya , Kouchakidivkolaei Maryam , Sridhar Jaiashre , Rogalski Emily , Weintraub Sandra , Popuri Karteek , Rosen Howard , Wang Lei ,   Frontotemporal Lobar Degeneration Neuroimaging Initiative, Rosen Howard , Dickerson Bradford C , Domoto-Reilly Kimoko , Knopman David , Boeve Bradley F , Boxer Adam L , Kornak John , Miller Bruce L , Seeley William W , Gorno-Tempini Maria-Luisa , McGinnis Scott , Mandelli Maria Luisa
Published: April 2024

Disinhibition is one of the most distressing and difficult to treat neuropsychiatric symptoms of dementia. It involves socially inappropriate behaviours, such as hypersexual comments, inappropriate approaching of strangers and excessive jocularity. Disinhibition occurs in multiple dementia syndromes, including behavioural variant frontotemporal dementia, and dementia of the Alzheimer’s type. Morphometric similarity networks are a relatively new method for examining brain structure and can be used to calculate measures of network integrity on large scale brain networks and subnetworks such as the salience network and cognitive control network.

In a cross-sectional study, we calculated morphometric similarity networks to determine whether disinhibition in behavioural variant frontotemporal dementia (n = 75) and dementia of the Alzheimer’s type (n = 111) was associated with reduced integrity of these networks independent of diagnosis.

We found that presence of disinhibition, measured by the Neuropsychiatric Inventory Questionnaire, was associated with reduced global efficiency of the cognitive control network in both dementia of the Alzheimer’s type and behavioural variant frontotemporal dementia.

Future research should replicate this transdiagnostic finding in other dementia diagnoses and imaging modalities, and investigate the potential for intervention at the level of the cognitive control network to target disinhibition.
CSF neurofilament light chain profiling and quantitation in neurological diseases
Authors: Leckey Claire A , Coulton John B , Giovannucci Tatiana A , He Yingxin , Aslanyan Aram , Laban Rhiannon , Heslegrave Amanda , Doykov Ivan , Ammoscato Francesca , Chataway Jeremy , De Angelis Floriana , Gnanapavan Sharmilee , Byrne Lauren M , Schott Jonathan M , Wild Edward J , Barthelémy Nicolas R , Zetterberg Henrik , Wray Selina , Bateman Randall J , Mills Kevin , Paterson Ross W
Published: April 2024

Neurofilament light chain is an established marker of neuroaxonal injury that is elevated in CSF and blood across various neurological diseases. It is increasingly used in clinical practice to aid diagnosis and monitor progression and as an outcome measure to assess safety and efficacy of disease-modifying therapies across the clinical translational neuroscience field. Quantitative methods for neurofilament light chain in human biofluids have relied on immunoassays, which have limited capacity to describe the structure of the protein in CSF and how this might vary in different neurodegenerative diseases. In this study, we characterized and quantified neurofilament light chain species in CSF across neurodegenerative and neuroinflammatory diseases and healthy controls using targeted mass spectrometry. We show that the quantitative immunoprecipitation–tandem mass spectrometry method developed in this study strongly correlates to single-molecule array measurements in CSF across the broad spectrum of neurodegenerative diseases and was replicable across mass spectrometry methods and centres. In summary, we have created an accurate and cost-effective assay for measuring a key biomarker in translational neuroscience research and clinical practice, which can be easily multiplexed and translated into clinical laboratories for the screening and monitoring of neurodegenerative disease or acute brain injury.
Comment on ‘A positive HIV result in a routine dermatology clinic systemics screening’
Authors: Altunisik Toplu Sibel , Altunisik Nihal
Published: April 2024

We were intrigued by the correspondence of Baptista Gonçalves et al., ‘A positive HIV result in a routine dermatology clinic systemics screening’, published recently in Clinical and Experimental Dermatology.
Waning Interest in Infectious Diseases Among Trainees: Is Medicine Pulling the Goalie?
Authors: Sakoulas George
Published: April 2024

Relatively low salaries in infectious diseases (ID) compared to other medical specialties, in a world where cost of living is skyrocketing, are an easy explanation for unmet needs of ID training programs to fill their positions. However, the interest in ID falling short of expectations may reflect that some features of the ID specialty are counter to select pervasive tendencies of modern culture, including (1) slow uptake of innovation into daily routines of ID practitioners, (2) the emphasis of clinical mastery of ID practitioners in an environment of medical corporatization and increased focus on revenue generation, and (3) the fact that ID practice takes societal interests into consideration (eg, prevention of antibiotic resistance) in a world dominated by rights of individuals, frequently at the expense of the common good. This article reflects on these possibilities to determine what steps can be taken to resurrect interest in our specialty.
The Challenges of Designing Sexual Assault Law
Authors: Hörnle Tatjana
Published: April 2024

The paper compares and evaluates newer laws on sexual assault in Germany (2016), Sweden (2018) and Spain (2022). It focuses on the main challenge for law reform in this field: the complexity of consent-based rules. Before drafting new offence descriptions, the variety of models of consent should be analysed and their advantages and disadvantages considered. Lawmakers should also pay attention to situations that either make consent impossible or endanger the validity of factual consent.
Museum genomics approach to study the taxonomy and evolution of Woolly-necked storks using historic specimens
Authors: Ghimire Prashant , Palacios Catalina , Trimble Jeremiah , Lamichhaney Sangeet
Published: April 2024

The accessibility of genomic tools in evolutionary biology has allowed for a thorough exploration of various evolutionary processes associated with adaptation and speciation. However, genomic studies in natural systems present numerous challenges, reflecting the inherent complexities of studying organisms in their native habitats. The utilization of museum specimens for genomics research has received increased attention in recent times, facilitated by advancements in ancient DNA techniques. In this study, we have utilized a museum genomics approach to analyze historic specimens of Woolly-necked storks (Ciconia spp.) and examine their genetic composition and taxonomic status and explore the evolutionary and adaptive trajectories of populations over the years. The Woolly-necked storks are distributed in Asia and Africa with a taxonomic classification that has been a matter of ambiguity. Asian and African Woollynecks were recently recognized as different species based on their morphological differences; however, their genomic validation was lacking. In this study, we have used ∼70-year-old museum samples for whole-genome population-scale sequencing. Our study has revealed that Asian and African Woollynecks are genetically distinct, consistent with the current taxonomic classification based on morphological features. However, we also found a high genetic divergence between the Asian subspecies Ciconia episcopus neglecta and Ciconia episcopus episcopus, suggesting this classification requires a detailed examination to explore processes of ongoing speciation. Because taxonomic classification directly impacts conservation efforts, and there is evidence of declining populations of Asian Woollynecks in Southeast Asia, our results highlight that population-scale studies are urgent to determine the genetic, ecological, and phylogenetic diversity of these birds.
Harnessing the power of new genetic tools to illuminate Giardia biology and pathogenesis
Authors: Hagen Kari D , Hart Christopher J S , McInally Shane G , Dawson Scott C
Published: April 2024

Giardia is a prevalent single-celled microaerophilic intestinal parasite causing diarrheal disease and significantly impacting global health. Double diploid (essentially tetraploid) Giardia trophozoites have presented a formidable challenge to the development of molecular genetic tools to interrogate gene function. High sequence divergence and the high percentage of hypothetical proteins lacking homology to proteins in other eukaryotes have limited our understanding of Giardia protein function, slowing drug target validation and development. For more than 25 years, Giardia A and B assemblages have been readily amenable to transfection with plasmids or linear DNA templates. Here, we highlight the utility and power of genetic approaches developed to assess protein function in Giardia, with particular emphasis on the more recent clustered regularly interspaced palindromic repeats/Cas9-based methods for knockdowns and knockouts. Robust and reliable molecular genetic approaches are fundamental toward the interrogation of Giardia protein function and evaluation of druggable targets. New genetic approaches tailored for the double diploid Giardia are imperative for understanding Giardia's unique biology and pathogenesis.
Identification of factors limiting the allotopic production of the Cox2 subunit of yeast cytochrome c oxidase
Authors: Nieto-Panqueva Felipe , Vázquez-Acevedo Miriam , Hamel Patrice P , González-Halphen Diego
Published: April 2024

Mitochondrial genes can be artificially relocalized in the nuclear genome in a process known as allotopic expression, such is the case of the mitochondrial cox2 gene, encoding subunit II of cytochrome c oxidase (CcO). In yeast, cox2 can be allotopically expressed and is able to restore respiratory growth of a cox2-null mutant if the Cox2 subunit carries the W56R substitution within the first transmembrane stretch. However, the COX2W56R strain exhibits reduced growth rates and lower steady-state CcO levels when compared to wild-type yeast. Here, we investigated the impact of overexpressing selected candidate genes predicted to enhance internalization of the allotopic Cox2W56R precursor into mitochondria. The overproduction of Cox20, Oxa1, and Pse1 facilitated Cox2W56R precursor internalization, improving the respiratory growth of the COX2W56R strain. Overproducing TIM22 components had a limited effect on Cox2W56R import, while overproducing TIM23-related components showed a negative effect. We further explored the role of the Mgr2 subunit within the TIM23 translocator in the import process by deleting and overexpressing the MGR2 gene. Our findings indicate that Mgr2 is instrumental in modulating the TIM23 translocon to correctly sort Cox2W56R. We propose a biogenesis pathway followed by the allotopically produced Cox2 subunit based on the participation of the 2 different structural/functional forms of the TIM23 translocon, TIM23MOTOR and TIM23SORT, that must follow a concerted and sequential mode of action to insert Cox2W56R into the inner mitochondrial membrane in the correct Nout–Cout topology.
Korea4K: whole genome sequences of 4,157 Koreans with 107 phenotypes derived from extensive health check-ups
Authors: Jeon Sungwon , Choi Hansol , Jeon Yeonsu , Choi Whan-Hyuk , Choi Hyunjoo , An Kyungwhan , Ryu Hyojung , Bhak Jihun , Lee Hyeonjae , Kwon Yoonsung , Ha Sukyeon , Kim Yeo Jin , Blazyte Asta , Kim Changjae , Kim Yeonkyung , Kang Younghui , Woo Yeong Ju , Lee Chanyoung , Seo Jeongwoo , Yoon Changhan , Bolser Dan , Biro Orsolya , Shin Eun-Seok , Kim Byung Chul , Kim Seon-Young , Park Ji-Hwan , Jeon Jongbum , Jung Dooyoung , Lee Semin , Bhak Jong
Published: April 2024

Background

Phenome-wide association studies (PheWASs) have been conducted on Asian populations, including Koreans, but many were based on chip or exome genotyping data. Such studies have limitations regarding whole genome–wide association analysis, making it crucial to have genome-to-phenome association information with the largest possible whole genome and matched phenome data to conduct further population-genome studies and develop health care services based on population genomics.

Results

Here, we present 4,157 whole genome sequences (Korea4K) coupled with 107 health check-up parameters as the largest genomic resource of the Korean Genome Project. It encompasses most of the variants with allele frequency >0.001 in Koreans, indicating that it sufficiently covered most of the common and rare genetic variants with commonly measured phenotypes for Koreans. Korea4K provides 45,537,252 variants, and half of them were not present in Korea1K (1,094 samples). We also identified 1,356 new genotype–phenotype associations that were not found by the Korea1K dataset. Phenomics analyses further revealed 24 significant genetic correlations, 14 pleiotropic associations, and 127 causal relationships based on Mendelian randomization among 37 traits. In addition, the Korea4K imputation reference panel, the largest Korean variants reference to date, showed a superior imputation performance to Korea1K across all allele frequency categories.

Conclusions

Collectively, Korea4K provides not only the largest Korean genome data but also corresponding health check-up parameters and novel genome–phenome associations. The large-scale pathological whole genome–wide omics data will become a powerful set for genome–phenome level association studies to discover causal markers for the prediction and diagnosis of health conditions in future studies.
Patient safety culture in African health facilities: a systematic review and meta-analysis
Authors: Muhammed Oumer Sada , Fenta Teferi Gedif
Published: April 2024

Background

The risk of a patient being harmed in a hospital is high in low- and middle-income countries, with the risk of healthcare-associated infection being up to 20 times higher than in developed countries. The purpose of this review was to assess the current patient safety culture (PSC) and provide insight into areas of strength and areas for improvement in terms of PSC.

Method

English-language articles were selected by consulting PubMed databases, African Journals Online, and Google Scholar data sources from 2012 to 2022. Medcalc software was used for all calculations. The random-effects model was used. The presence of heterogeneity and publication bias was assessed.

Result

The systematic review and meta-analysis result showed that the overall pooled result of PSC status was 51.6% with 95% confidence interval (43.364 to 59.773). The results of Cochran’s Q test and I2 statistics showed substantial heterogeneity among the included studies (Q = 119.1617, df = 16, P < 0.0001 and I2 = 86.57%), and thus random-effects model was used for meta-analysis.

Non-punitive response to errors and staffing were the dimensions with the lowest positive response rate, whereas teamwork within units and supervisor expectation were the areas with good positive response rate.

Conclusion

The studies indicated a predominance of hospital organizational cultures that were immature or weak in terms of patient safety. For them to be effective, safety culture evaluation should be linked to hospital-wide safety culture development strategies.
Changes in stillbirths and child and youth mortality in 2020 and 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic
Authors: Acosta Enrique , Hug Lucia , Cruz-Castanheira Helena , Sharrow David , Monteiro da Silva José Henrique , You Danzhen
Published: April 2024

Background

The COVID-19 pandemic has been extensively studied for its impact on mortality, particularly in older age groups. However, the pandemic effects on stillbirths and mortality rates in neonates, infants, children and youth remain poorly understood. This study comprehensively analyses the pandemic influence on young mortality and stillbirths across 112 countries and territories in 2020 and 104 in 2021.

Methods

Using data from civil registers and vital statistics systems (CRVS) and the Health Management Information System (HMIS), we estimate expected mortality levels in a non-pandemic setting and relative mortality changes (p-scores) through generalized linear models. The analysis focuses on the distribution of country-specific mortality changes and the proportion of countries experiencing deficits, no changes and excess mortality in each age group.

Results

Results show that stillbirths and under-25 mortality were as expected in most countries during 2020 and 2021. However, among countries with changes, more experienced deficits than excess mortality, except for stillbirths, neonates and those aged 10–24 in 2021, where, despite the predominance of no changes, excess mortality prevailed. Notably, a fifth of examined countries saw increases in stillbirths and a quarter in young adult mortality (20–24) in 2021. Our findings are highly consistent between females and males and similar across income levels.

Conclusion

Despite global disruptions to essential services, stillbirths and youth mortality were as expected in most observed countries, challenging initial hypotheses. However, the study suggests the possibility of delayed adverse effects that require more time to manifest at the population level. Understanding the lasting impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic requires ongoing, long-term monitoring of health and deaths among children and youth, particularly in low- and lower-middle-income countries.
In the Eyes of the Beholders: The Legitimacy of Global Governance Institutions under Multipolarity
Authors: Chu Sinan , Holbig Heike , Narlikar Amrita , Plagemann Johannes
Published: April 2024

Multipolarity has ambiguous implications for the legitimacy of global governance institutions (GGIs). Rising powers’ capacity to contest established powers’ agendas prima facie increases the GGIs’ legitimacy by reducing power asymmetries between the North and South. However, according to some, the rise of new powers has contributed to the GGIs’ poor performance and inadequate representativeness. We investigate how global publics evaluate the legitimacy of two GGIs—the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the Group of Twenty (G20)—and multipolarity’s role in those evaluations. Drawing on an original dataset of 3,584 newspaper articles sampled from rising and established powers, mid-ranking developing, and least developed countries between 2008 and 2019, our qualitative content analysis found an intensification of legitimacy deficits over time. Regularly accredited to a new global power configuration, the inability to find consensus severely harmed both institutions’ legitimacy. We also see the resilience of GGIs’ legitimacy in the face of gridlocks and institutional fragmentation. Replacing inclusive multilateral agreements with bilateral or inter-regional ones was widely seen as an undesired outcome of major power tensions. Finally, our data revealed a deep-seated mistrust of great power politics and nostalgia for meaningful multilateral institutions as a potential antidote.
Constructing synthetic datasets with generative artificial intelligence to train large language models to classify acute renal failure from clinical notes
Authors: Litake Onkar , Park Brian H , Tully Jeffrey L , Gabriel Rodney A
Published: April 2024

Objectives

To compare performances of a classifier that leverages language models when trained on synthetic versus authentic clinical notes.

Materials and Methods

A classifier using language models was developed to identify acute renal failure. Four types of training data were compared: (1) notes from MIMIC-III; and (2, 3, and 4) synthetic notes generated by ChatGPT of varied text lengths of 15 (GPT-15 sentences), 30 (GPT-30 sentences), and 45 (GPT-45 sentences) sentences, respectively. The area under the receiver operating characteristics curve (AUC) was calculated from a test set from MIMIC-III.

Results

With RoBERTa, the AUCs were 0.84, 0.80, 0.84, and 0.76 for the MIMIC-III, GPT-15, GPT-30- and GPT-45 sentences training sets, respectively.

Discussion

Training language models to detect acute renal failure from clinical notes resulted in similar performances when using synthetic versus authentic training data.

Conclusion

The use of training data derived from protected health information may not be needed.