bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Variations in Social Europe? National political parties' positions on EU‐level social regulations
Authors: Im Zhen Jie
Published: February 2024

How do national political parties vary in their views on Social Europe? I focus on an aspect that has received less attention despite its growing prevalence—EU regulations with ambitions to diminish social inequality to encourage social convergence among Member States. Since the Juncker Commission, the European Commission has become increasingly active in pursuing this aspect of Social Europe. Thus, understanding parties' positions on this aspect of Social Europe has become more important. However, current literature lacks measures of national party stances towards Social Europe, and explanations for these stances. Here, I use data from the Chapel Hill Expert Survey (2006, 2009, 2014 and 2019) to develop an indirect measure of party positions on Social Europe. Leveraging studies in party politics and EU politics, I propose that party families and national economic conditions may affect parties' positions on Social Europe. The analyses suggest substantial variation in parties' positions on Social Europe both within and across party families. The analyses also demonstrate that socialist and green parties support Social Europe most, whereas radical right parties support it least. Lastly, I do not find systematic evidence that national economic conditions influence parties' support for this aspect of Social Europe.
No causal association between atopic dermatitis and COVID‐19 outcomes: A Mendelian randomization study
Authors: Jin Chen , Li Yuwen
Published: February 2024

Background

Frequent hand washing and disinfection during the corona virus disease (COVID‐19) pandemic may lead to skin‐related disability. The causal relationship between atopic dermatitis (AD), the most common chronic, noninfectious, inflammatory skin disease, and COVID‐19 remains unclear. We used Mendelian randomization (MR) to explore the causal inference of atopic dermatitis with COVID‐19 outcomes.

Methods

Genome‐wide association study (GWAS) data for AD, consisting of 8383 cases and 236,162 controls of European ethnicity, were provided by the FinnGen database. The GWAS outcome data were derived from the COVID‐19 Host Genetics Initiative and consisted of COVID‐19 susceptibility (122,616 cases and 2,475,240 controls), hospitalization (32,519 cases and 2,062,805 controls), and very severe respiratory disease (13,769 cases and 1,072,442 controls). The inverse variance weighted with a fixed effects model (IVW (fe)) was used as the main statistical approach to assess the causality between AD and COVID‐19 in this study. Several other analytical methods have also been used to complement or identify pleiotropy and heterogeneity.

Results

MR analysis showed no causality between AD and COVID‐19 outcomes. The odds ratios (OR) were 1.00 (95% confidence interval (CI), 0.99–1.02) for susceptibility, 1.00 (95% CI, 0.96–1.04) for hospitalization, 0.97 (95% CI, 0.92–1.03) for very severe respiratory disease by the method of IVW (fe).

Conclusion

In conclusion, we found no causal relationship between AD and COVID‐19 outcomes. This study provides additional ideas for the exploration of the risk factors for COVID‐19.
Boundary current fluctuations for the half‐space ASEP and six‐vertex model
Authors: He Jimmy
Published: February 2024

We study fluctuations of the current at the boundary for the half‐space asymmetric simple exclusion process (ASEP) and the height function of the half‐space six‐vertex model at the boundary at large times. We establish a phase transition depending on the effective density of particles at the boundary, with Gaussian symplectic ensemble (GSE) and Gaussian orthogonal ensemble (GOE) limits as well as the Baik–Rains crossover distribution near the critical point. This was previously known for half‐space last‐passage percolation, and recently established for the half‐space log‐gamma polymer and Kardar–Parisi–Zhang equation in the groundbreaking work of Imamura, Mucciconi, and Sasamoto. The proof uses the underlying algebraic structure of these models in a crucial way to obtain exact formulas. In particular, we show a relationship between the half‐space six‐vertex model and a half‐space Hall–Littlewood measure with two boundary parameters, which is then matched to a free boundary Schur process via a new identity of symmetric functions. Fredholm Pfaffian formulas are established for the half‐space ASEP and six‐vertex model, indicating a hidden free fermionic structure.
Prevalence and incidence of oral cancer and pre-cancerous lesions in indigenous populations: a systematic review protocol
Authors: Sapna Swati , Jain Praneetha , Sharma Amrit , Hora Rhythm , Sharma Harshul , Karuveettil Vineetha
Published: February 2024

Objective:

This review will determine the prevalence and incidence of oral cancer and pre-cancerous lesions in indigenous populations.

Introduction:

There are approximately 476 million indigenous individuals worldwide. Oral cancer affected over 350,000 people globally in 2018, with approximately 80% of cases occurring in the indigenous population. Moreover, the incidence of pre-cancerous lesions is high in this population, accounting for 48.3%. Limited evidence exists regarding the burden of oral cancer among indigenous populations despite research on oral health disparities in this group.

Inclusion criteria:

Inclusion criteria involve studies on the burden of oral cancer and pre-cancerous lesions in indigenous groups, considering rates, ratios (prevalence or mortality), or survival proportions. Databases will be searched from inception to the present, with no limitations on study design, language, age, gender, or geography. We will exclude studies that only identify, diagnose, or screen oral cancer and pre-cancerous lesions without mentioning prevalence and incidence.

Methods:

This review will follow to the JBI methodology for systematic reviews of prevalence and incidence. Databases to be searched will include MEDLINE (Ovid), Embase (Ovid), CINAHL (EBSCOhost), Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, Scopus, and Dentistry and Oral Sciences Source (EBSCOhost). ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, OAIster, International Association for Dental Research conference abstracts, Google Scholar, government reports, and cancer registry reports will be screened for unpublished studies. Two reviewers will independently screen articles, and data will be extracted using a customized form. Narrative data synthesis will be conducted, and where appropriate, meta-analysis using JBI SUMARI. Methodological quality will be assessed using JBI’s critical appraisal tool for prevalence studies.

Review registration number:

PROSPERO CRD42023402858
Rodents’ visual gamma as a biomarker of pathological neural conditions
Authors: Meneghetti Nicolò , Vannini Eleonora , Mazzoni Alberto
Published: February 2024

Neural gamma oscillations (indicatively 30–100 Hz) are ubiquitous: they are associated with a broad range of functions in multiple cortical areas and across many animal species. Experimental and computational works established gamma rhythms as a global emergent property of neuronal networks generated by the balanced and coordinated interaction of excitation and inhibition. Coherently, gamma activity is strongly influenced by the alterations of synaptic dynamics which are often associated with pathological neural dysfunctions. We argue therefore that these oscillations are an optimal biomarker for probing the mechanism of cortical dysfunctions. Gamma oscillations are also highly sensitive to external stimuli in sensory cortices, especially the primary visual cortex (V1), where the stimulus dependence of gamma oscillations has been thoroughly investigated. Gamma manipulation by visual stimuli tuning is particularly easy in rodents, which have become a standard animal model for investigating the effects of network alterations on gamma oscillations. Overall, gamma in the rodents’ visual cortex offers an accessible probe on dysfunctional information processing in pathological conditions. Beyond vision‐related dysfunctions, alterations of gamma oscillations in rodents were indeed also reported in neural deficits such as migraine, epilepsy and neurodegenerative or neuropsychiatric conditions such as Alzheimer's, schizophrenia and autism spectrum disorders. Altogether, the connections between visual cortical gamma activity and physio‐pathological conditions in rodent models underscore the potential of gamma oscillations as markers of neuronal (dys)functioning.

image
Consumption of Iron Supplements, based on the Structures of the Health Belief Model, in Children Aged 6 to 24 Months in the Southeast of Iran
Authors: Lotfipur Rafsanjani Seyedeh Shirin , Masoomi Mahdieh , Askari Fatemeh , Abdolkarimi Mahdi
Published: February 2024

Objective: Iron deficiency is one of the common problems during infancy. The purpose of this study is to investigate the status of iron supplement consumption and the factors affecting it based on the constructs of the health belief model. Methodology: In this descriptive study, 402 mothers of children aged 6-12 months were selected using multi-stage random sampling. The status of mothers' performance regarding the provision of iron supplements and the status of health belief model constructs were evaluated using a questionnaire whose validity and reliability have been confirmed. The data were analyzed using analysis of variance, Pearson correlation coefficient and linear regression tests. Results: the present study showed that despite the state of proper awareness, the score of Consumption of iron supplements behavior was not favorable. So that 62.7% had reported a low performance. Pearson correlation test showed that only the perceived susceptibility score did not show significant relationship with the behavior (p = 0.174) The regression results showed that the variables included in the regression model,  explained a total of 24.1% of the variance of the change in the behavior score (Adjusted R2 = 0.241). Conclusion: Considering the unfavorable situation of iron supplementation behavior in infants, the use of health belief theory constructs can be effective in persuading mothers. Community health nurses can be more successful in improving this index by providing educational intervention based on the structures of this model, especially helping to remove the barriers perceived by mothers.
Experimental Investigation of Excitation Strategies for Erosion by Cavitation Histotripsy
Authors: Zhou Yufeng
Published: February 2024

Cavitation histotripsy has been applied to the disintegration on the surface of soft tissue in a well-controlled manner. Its performance was assumed to be determined by the acoustic pressure alone. Long pulse duration with low pulse repetition frequency (PRF) can also successfully generate erosion. This study was designed to investigate the excitation strategies for cavitation histotripsy-induced erosion. The erosion area and volumes produced by cavitation histotripsy on the alginate gel phantom using single-frequency, dual-frequency, and two pulsed excitations at the same power output at the PRF of 1 Hz and 200 Hz were compared. Dual-frequency excitation can improve the erosion at all PRFs, while pulsed excitations decrease it at the PRF of 200 Hz. Using both pulsed and dual-frequency excitations has more erosion areas than using single-frequency at a PRF of 1 Hz. In comparison, although the induced erosion areas using the pulsed excitations are larger than those of single-frequency at the PRF of 200 Hz, the erosion volumes are much lower than those of dual-frequency excitation. It suggests that a sufficient long pulse duration is another important factor for the performance of cavitation histotripsy. Dual-frequency excitation or amplitude modulation by the low-frequency sinusoidal envelope can achieve more erosion than that produced by single-frequency excitation at the same power output in a wide range of PRFs.
Mechanical Properties of Irradiated U-10 wt. %Mo Alloy Degraded by Porosity Development
Authors: Schulthess Jason L. , Baird Katelyn , Petersen Philip , Salvato Daniele , Ozaltun Hakan , Hanson William A. , Ullum Nicholas , Giglio Jeffrey , Cole James I.
Published: February 2024

A plate-type nuclear fuel consisting of a solid monolithic foil of U-10 wt. %Mo is under development for use in the United States' high-performance research reactors. In support of developing this fuel, the fuel has been fabricated for the first time by a commercial fuel vendor and subsequently irradiated in a test reactor. This provides an opportunity to evaluate postirradiation mechanical properties of the commercially fabricated fuel. Four-point bend testing was conducted on the irradiated U-10Mo samples to generate the fuel material properties, including the modulus of elasticity and the bending strength. Although the material behaves in a brittle manner due to the accumulated porosity, a general trend of strength and modulus reduction was found as fission density increases. The data produced was evaluated using both Weibull statistics and a modulus degradation model with recommendations provided.
A Case Study on Digital Training: Benefits and Unexplored Opportunities
Authors: Carulli Marina , Rossoni Marco , Spadoni Elena , Dozio Nicolò , Giussani Riccardo , Ferrise Francesco , Bordegoni Monica
Published: February 2024

In an era characterized by the increasing complexity of products and the rapid turnover of the workforce across different companies, there is a growing need to invest significantly in quick and efficient training methods. Concurrently, the advancement of digitalization has rendered certain training practices anchored to paper-based materials obsolete. Numerous companies are directing their investments toward digital training, yet the optimal format to exploit the full advantages of digitalization remains unclear. This study undertakes a comparison of four distinct digital versions of the same training process with the aim of comprehending the tangible benefits. The findings indicate that to fully capitalize on the advantages of digital technology, a complete rethinking of training practices is necessary.
Novel endolithic bacteria of phylum
Chloroflexota
reveal a myriad of potential survival strategies in the Antarctic desert
Authors: Williams Timothy J. , Allen Michelle A. , Ray Angelique E. , Benaud Nicole , Chelliah Devan S. , Albanese Davide , Donati Claudio , Selbmann Laura , Coleine Claudia , Ferrari Belinda C.
Published: February 2024

The ice-free McMurdo Dry Valleys of Antarctica are dominated by nutrient-poor mineral soil and rocky outcrops. The principal habitat for microorganisms is within rocks (endolithic). In this environment, microorganisms are provided with protection against sub-zero temperatures, rapid thermal fluctuations, extreme dryness, and ultraviolet and solar radiation. Endolithic communities include lichen, algae, fungi, and a diverse array of bacteria.
Chloroflexota
is among the most abundant bacterial phyla present in these communities. Among the
Chloroflexota
are four novel classes of bacteria, here named
Candidatus
Spiritibacteria class. nov. (=UBA5177),
Candidatus
Martimicrobia class. nov. (=UBA4733),
Candidatus
Tarhunnaeia class. nov. (=UBA6077), and
Candidatus
Uliximicrobia class. nov. (=UBA2235). We retrieved 17 high-quality metagenome-assembled genomes (MAGs) that represent these four classes. Based on genome predictions, all these bacteria are inferred to be aerobic heterotrophs that encode enzymes for the catabolism of diverse sugars. These and other organic substrates are likely derived from lichen, algae, and fungi, as metabolites (including photosynthate), cell wall components, and extracellular matrix components. The majority of MAGs encode the capacity for trace gas oxidation using high-affinity uptake hydrogenases, which could provide energy and metabolic water required for survival and persistence. Furthermore, some MAGs encode the capacity to couple the energy generated from H
2
and CO oxidation to support carbon fixation (atmospheric chemosynthesis). All encode mechanisms for the detoxification and efflux of heavy metals. Certain MAGs encode features that indicate possible interactions with other organisms, such as Tc-type toxin complexes, hemolysins, and macroglobulins.

IMPORTANCE

The ice-free McMurdo Dry Valleys of Antarctica are the coldest and most hyperarid desert on Earth. It is, therefore, the closest analog to the surface of the planet Mars. Bacteria and other microorganisms survive by inhabiting airspaces within rocks (endolithic). We identify four novel classes of phylum
Chloroflexota
, and, based on interrogation of 17 metagenome-assembled genomes, we predict specific metabolic and physiological adaptations that facilitate the survival of these bacteria in this harsh environment—including oxidation of trace gases and the utilization of nutrients (including sugars) derived from lichen, algae, and fungi. We propose that such adaptations allow these endolithic bacteria to eke out an existence in this cold and extremely dry habitat.
Case with translating to multiple myeloma at 8 years after radiation therapy for extramedullary plasmacytoma of the larynx
Authors: Kusunoki Takeshi , Wada Ryo
Published: February 2024

We report a case of extramedullary plasmacytoma of the larynx that was eradicated by radiotherapy; however, 8 years later, the disease had progressed to multiple myeloma. A mid -60s Japanese woman presented with a right-sided arytenoid mass in the larynx who underwent biopsy at another hospital. Based on the biopsy results, the patient was diagnosed with extramedullary plasma cell tumour and was referred to the Department of Otorhinolaryngology at our hospital. She received radiotherapy (50.4 Gy) and the laryngeal tumour was eradicated. Positron emission tomography/CT (PET-CT) revealed no abnormal accumulation in the larynx or whole body. After radiotherapy, the department of otorhinolaryngology, in consultation with Ddepartment of haematology performed follow-ups using laryngoscope, blood examination and PET-CT. Five years after the end of radiotherapy, the patient had no local recurrence or transition to multiple myeloma. However, 8 years later, blood examination and PET-CT revealed multiple myeloma. Laryngoscopy did not reveal any recurrent laryngeal tumour. Therefore, chemotherapy for multiple myeloma was administered at the department of haematology. Three months after the initiation of chemotherapy, the accumulation had disappeared in PET-CT. Three years have passed since chemotherapy initiation. At present, no recurrence or metastasis was observed in the larynx or whole body.
Predictors of increased affective symptoms and suicidal ideation during the COVID-19 pandemic: results from a large-scale study of 14 271 Thai adults
Authors: Supasitthumrong Thitiporn , Maes Michael , Tunvirachaisakul Chavit , Rungnirundorn Teerayuth , Zhou Bo , Li Jing , Wainipitapong Sorawit , Ratanajaruraks Anchalita , Nimnuan Chaichana , Kanchanatawan Buranee , Thompson Trevor , Solmi Marco , Correll Christoph
Published: February 2024

Background

Increasing data suggest emergent affective symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Objectives

To study the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on affective symptoms and suicidal ideation in Thai adults.

Methods

The Collaborative Outcomes Study on Health and Functioning during Infection Times uses non-probability sampling (chain referring and voluntary response sampling) and stratified probability sampling to identify risk factors of mental health problems and potential treatment targets to improve mental health outcomes during pandemics.

Findings

Analysing 14 271 adult survey participants across all four waves of the COVID-19 pandemic in Thailand, covering all 77 provinces from 1 June 2020 to 30 April 2022, affective symptoms and suicidality increased during COVID-19 pandemic. Affective symptoms were strongly predicted by pandemic (feelings of isolation, fear of COVID-19, loss of social support, financial loss, lack of protective devices) and non-pandemic (female sex, non-binary individuals, adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), negative life events, student status, multiple mental health and medical conditions, physical pain) risk factors. ACEs, prior mental health conditions and physical pain were the top three risk factors associated with both increased affective symptoms and suicidal ideation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Partial least squares analysis showed that ACEs were the most important risk factor as they impacted most pandemic and non-pandemic risk factors.

Clinical implications

Rational policymaking during a pandemic should aim to identify the groups at highest risk (those with ACEs, psychiatric and medical disease, women, non-binary individuals) and implement both immediate and long-term strategies to mitigate the impact of ACEs, while effectively addressing associated psychiatric and medical conditions.
Relation between a history of glaucoma and subjective happiness: the JPHC-Next study
Authors: Yamanishi Ryutaro , Yotsukura Erisa , Hanyuda Akiko , Uchino Miki , Yuki Kenya , Negishi Kazuno , Yasuda Nobufumi , Saito Isao , Kato Tadahiro , Arima Kazuhiko , Aoyagi Kiyoshi , Tanno Kozo , Yamagishi Kazumasa , Muraki Isao , Yamaji Taiki , Iwasaki Motoki , Inoue Manami , Tsugane Shoichiro , Sawada Norie
Published: February 2024

Objective

This population-based, cross-sectional study was performed to investigate the relationship between a history of glaucoma and subjective happiness.

Methods and analysis

We conducted a cross-sectional questionnaire-based survey of 92 397 Japanese men and women aged 40–74 who participated in the Japan Public Health Center-based Prospective Study for the Next Generation study. A multivariable logistic regression model was used to estimate the ORs of glaucoma associated with subjective happiness and their two-sided 95% CIs.

Results

Among 40 727 men and 51 670 women, 1733 participants (635 men, 1098 women) had a history of glaucoma. The odds of unhappiness in male participants with a history of glaucoma were higher (OR 1.26; 95% CI 1.05 to 1.51) than in female participants (OR 1.05; 95% CI 0.90 to 1.23). In a subgroup analysis stratified by age, among participants with a history of glaucoma, males in the younger group (40–59 years) showed the most robust association with unhappiness (OR 1.40; 95% CI 1.04 to 1.88).

Conclusions

These findings suggest that a history of glaucoma is related with subjective unhappiness, especially in men.
Macroscopy of specimens from the genitourinary system
Authors: Varma Murali , Dormer John
Published: February 2024

Macroscopic specimen examination is often critical for accurate histopathology reporting but has generally received insufficient attention and may be delegated to inexperienced staff with limited guidance and supervision. This review discusses issues around macroscopic examination of some common urological specimens; highlighting findings that are critical for patient management and others that are clinically irrelevant. Macroscopic findings are of limited value in completely submitted radical prostatectomy specimens but may be critical in orchidectomy specimens where identification of focal non-seminomatous components can significantly impact patient management. The maximum tumour dimension is often an important prognostic indicator, but specimen dimensions are generally of little clinical utility. Specimens should be carefully examined and judiciously sampled to identify clinically important focal abnormalities such as sarcomatoid change in a renal cell carcinoma and a minor non-seminomatous component in a predominant testicular seminoma. Meticulous macroscopic examination is key as less than 0.2% of the specimen (or macroscopically abnormal area) would be histologically examined even if the entire specimen/abnormal area is submitted for microscopic examination. Retroperitoneal pelvic lymph node dissection specimens for testicular cancer must be handled very differently from other lymph nodal block dissections. Current sampling protocols for transurethral resection of prostate specimens that are based on pre-MRI era data need to be reconsidered because they were specifically designed to detect occult prostate cancer, which would amount to histological cancer screening. Prostatic sampling of cystoprostatectomy specimens should be directed at accurately staging the known bladder cancer rather than detection of incidental prostate cancer.
Macroscopic examination of gynaecological specimens: a critial and often underemphasised aspect of pathological reporting
Authors: Talia Karen L , Parra-Herran Carlos , McCluggage W Glenn
Published: February 2024

Pathological examination of surgical specimens and compilation of a surgical pathology report comprises a series of events which includes macroscopic examination and tissue sampling, either complete or selected. This step is critical but often overlooked in the literature and not given the attention it deserves. In this review, we discuss the macroscopic examination and grossing of gynaecological pathology specimens, with reference to national and international protocols. We provide guidance as to the degree of sampling necessary in different scenarios and stress that a common-sense approach is necessary with flexibility in the degree of sampling depending on a variety of factors.
Pragmatic guide to the macroscopic evaluation of breast specimens
Authors: Guzmán-Arocho Yaileen D , Collins Laura C
Published: February 2024

The pathological assessment of a breast surgical specimen starts with macroscopic evaluation, arguably one of the most critical steps, as only a small percentage of the tissue is examined microscopically. To properly evaluate and select tissue sections from breast specimens, it is essential to correlate radiological findings, prior biopsies, procedures and treatment with the gross findings. Owing to its fatty nature, breast tissue requires special attention for proper fixation to ensure appropriate microscopic evaluation and performance of ancillary studies. In addition, knowledge of the information necessary for patient management will ensure that these data are collected during the macroscopic evaluation, and appropriate sections are taken to obtain the information needed from the microscopic evaluation. Herein, we present a review of the macroscopic evaluation of different breast specimen types, including processing requirements, challenges and recommendations.
Local electroneutrality breakdown for electrolytes within varying-section nanopores
Authors: Malgaretti Paolo , Pagonabarraga Ignacio , Harting Jens
Published: February 2024

We determine the local charge dynamics of a $$z-z$$

z
-
z

electrolyte embedded in a varying-section channel. By means of an expansion based on the length scale separation between the axial and transverse direction of the channel, we derive closed formulas for the local excess charge for both, dielectric and conducting walls, in 2D (planar geometry) as well as in 3D (cylindrical geometry). Our results show that, even at equilibrium, the local charge electroneutrality is broken whenever the section of the channel is not homogeneous for both dielectric and conducting walls as well as for 2D and 3D channels. Interestingly, even within our expansion, the local excess charge in the fluid can be comparable to the net charge on the walls. We critically discuss the onset of such local electroneutrality breakdown in particular with respect to the correction that it induces on the effective free energy profile experienced by tracer ions.

Graphical abstract
Mbit/s-range alkali vapour spin noise quantum random number generators
Authors: Koterle Matija , Beguš Samo , Pirman Jure , Mežnaršič Tadej , Gosar Katja , Zupanič Erik , Žitko Rok , Jeglič Peter
Published: February 2024

Spin noise based quantum random number generators first appeared in 2008 and have since then garnered little further interest, in part because their bit rate is limited by the transverse relaxation time $T_{2}$

T
2

which for coated alkali vapour cells is typically in the kbit/s range. Here we present two advances. The first is an improved bit generation protocol that allows generating bits at rates exceeding $1/T_{2}$
1
/

T
2

with only a minor increase of serial correlations. The second is a significant reduction of the time $T_{2}$

T
2

itself by removing the coating, increasing the vapour temperature and introducing a magnetic-field gradient. In this way we managed to increase the bit generation rate to 1.04 Mbit/s. We analyse the quality of the generated random bits using entropy estimation and we discuss the extraction methods to obtain high-entropy bitstreams. We accurately predict the entropy output of the device backed with a stochastic model and numerical simulations.
A CLUSTERED FRACTAL DISCRETE FRACTURE NETWORK MODEL FOR FRACTURED COAL
Authors: LIANG XIN , HOU PENG , LIU GUANNAN , XUE YI , LIU JIA , GAO FENG , ZHANG ZHIZHEN
Published: February 2024

The fracture network in fractured coal is the main channel of coal seam gas flow. Not only the geometric topology properties (such as fractal characteristics) of a single fracture but also the connection topology properties (interconnection characteristics between fractures) of the fracture network have an important impact on the fluid flow in fracture networks. In this study, the connection topology properties of the fracture network in the fractured coal are explored based on the complex network theory for the first time. The property parameters such as the fracture node degree, the clustering coefficient, and the average path length are analyzed. It shows that the average clustering coefficient of the fracture network in fractured coal is larger, and the average path length is smaller. The connection property of the fracture network in the fractured coal presents a typical “small-world” clustering model. Further, by considering the fractal characteristics of the single fracture and the clustering characteristics of the fracture network, an improved clustered fractal discrete fracture network (DFN) model is developed. Then, based on the lattice Boltzmann method, the permeability properties of the generated clustered fractal DFNs are analyzed. The results show that the permeability of DFNs is positively correlated with the average clustering coefficient of fracture network, and negatively correlated with the fractal dimension of fracture. Therefore, the topological clustering characteristics of fracture networks and the fractal characteristics of fractures cannot be ignored in describing the fluid flow in the fracture network, and our clustered fractal DFN model provides a new idea for guiding the optimization design in DFN engineering.
Combinatorial aspects of weighted free Poisson random variables
Authors: Asai Nobuhiro , Yoshida Hiroaki
Published: February 2024

This paper will be devoted to the study of weighted (deformed) free Poisson random variables from the viewpoint of orthogonal polynomials and statistics of non-crossing partitions. A family of weighted (deformed) free Poisson random variables will be defined in a sense by the sum of weighted (deformed) free creation, annihilation, scalar, and intermediate operators with certain parameters on a weighted (deformed) free Fock space together with the vacuum expectation. We shall provide a combinatorial moment formula of non-commutative Poisson random variables. This formula gives us a very nice combinatorial interpretation to two parameters of weights. One can see that the deformation treated in this paper interpolates free and boolean Poisson random variables, their distributions and moments, and yields some conditionally free Poisson distribution by taking limit of the parameter.
Interplay Multifractal Dynamics Among Carbon Trading Market, Geopolitical Risk and Economic Policy Uncertainty
Authors: Feng You-Shuai , Ling Mei-Jun , Gao Jing
Published: February 2024

This paper explores the variations in cross-correlations among the carbon trading market, geopolitical risk (GPR) and economic policy uncertainty (EPU), focusing on their multifractality and asymmetric properties. Therefore, the study employs the multifractal detrended cross-correlation analysis (MF-DCCA) and multifractal asymmetric detrended cross-correlation analysis (MF-ADCCA) approaches to examine these relationships from a three-dimensional perspective. Also, the study looks into cross-correlations at different phases of carbon trading. Our findings reveal that the multifractal cross-correlations between the carbon trading market and GPR or EPU exhibit anti-persistence and asymmetry. The anti-persistent cross-correlations are notably stronger when GPR experiences a downtrend or when EPU undergoes an uptrend. Furthermore, distinct fluctuation patterns emerge across various trends and scales on Hurst surfaces. In the short term, the carbon trading market exhibits heightened sensitivity to changes in GPR or EPU when they rise or fall. The cross-correlations remain multifractal, anti-persistent and asymmetric across different stages of carbon trading. Notably, the multifractality of cross-correlations is most pronounced for the series pair EUA/GPR in Phase II and for the series pair EUA/UK EPU in Phase III and Phase IV. Except for the series pair EUA/UK EPU in Phase II, the anti-persistent cross-correlations are more pronounced during uptrend than downtrend for the other series pairs. Moreover, the series pair EUA/UK EPU exhibits the highest degree of asymmetry at all stages.
Practical applications of quality assurance and quality control in mineral exploration, resource estimation and mining programmes: a review of recommended international practices
Authors: Smee Barry W. , Bloom Lynda , Arne Dennis , Heberlein David
Published: February 2024

Independent quality assurance and quality control (QA/QC) programmes are required by reporting codes for publicly listed companies and are necessary to optimize data quality at all stages of the sampling, preparation and analytical processes involved in mineral exploration, resource estimation and mining grade control. QA/QC programmes should be adjusted over time to meet changing requirements in data quality at different stages of mineral resource development and exploitation. Certified reference materials are used to monitor accuracy and bias at the project laboratory relative to consensus values for the material from round-robin certification analyses. They are also used to monitor drift over time within an individual laboratory and to identify significant failures in QC at the analytical batch level caused by abrupt changes in concentration related to re-calibration of instruments or procedural changes at the laboratory. Duplicate analyses of sample material are generated at key stages of sampling and preparation to estimate the precision of data generated at each stage. Invariably, the largest source of uncertainty occurs during the initial sampling. Coarse blanks are used to monitor cross-contamination between samples or from sample preparation equipment. Furthermore, each of these QC sample types can be used to discover possible sample mix-ups.

Supplementary material:
An Excel spreadsheet for the calculation of the average coefficient of variation (CV
AVE
) (Appendix C) is available at
https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.7070137

Thematic collection:
This article is part of the Reviews in Exploration Geochemistry collection available at:
https://www.lyellcollection.org/topic/collections/reviews-in-exploration-geochemistry
Interpretable Trend Analysis Neural Networks for Longitudinal Data Analysis
Authors: Yao Zhenjie , Chen Yixin , Wang Jinwei , Li Junjuan , Chen Shuohua , Wu Shouling , Tu Yanhui , Zhao Ming-Hui , Zhang Luxia
Published: February 2024

Cohort study is one of the most commonly used study methods in medical and public health researches, which result in longitudinal data. Conventional statistical models and machine learning methods are not capable of modeling the evolution trend of the variables in longitudinal data. In this article, we propose a Trend Analysis Neural Networks (TANN), which models the evolution trend of the variables by adaptive feature learning. TANN was tested on dataset of Kaiuan research. The task was to predict occurrence of cardiovascular events within 2 and 5 years, with three repeated medical examinations during 2008 and 2013. For 2-year prediction, The AUC of the TANN is 0.7378, which is a significant improvement than that of conventional methods, while that of TRNS, RNN, DNN, GBDT, RF, and LR are 0.7222, 0.7034, 0.7054, 0.7136, 0.7160, and 0.7024, respectively. For 5-year prediction, TANN also shows improvement. The experimental results show that the proposed TANN achieves better prediction performance on cardiovascular events prediction than conventional models. Furthermore, by analyzing the weights of TANN, we could find out important trends of the indicators, which are ignored by conventional machine learning models. The trend discovery mechanism interprets the model well. TANN is an appropriate balance between high performance and interpretability.
DATRA-MIV: Decoder-Adaptive Tiling and Rate Allocation for MPEG Immersive Video
Authors: Jeong Jong-Beom , Lee Soonbin , Ryu Eun-Seok
Published: February 2024

The emerging immersive video coding standard moving picture experts group (MPEG) immersive video (MIV), which is ongoing standardization by MPEG-Immersive (MPEG-I) group, enables six degrees of freedom in a virtual reality environment that represents both natural and computer-generated scenes using multi-view video compression. The MIV eliminates the redundancy between multi-view videos and merges the residuals into multiple pictures, called an atlas. Thus, bitstreams with encoded atlases are generated and corresponding number of decoders are needed, which is challenging for the lightweight device with a single decoder. This article proposes a decoder-adaptive tiling and rate allocation method for MIV to overcome the challenge. First, the proposed method divides atlases into subpictures considering two aspects: (i) subpicture bitstream extracting and merging into one bitstream to use a single decoder and (ii) separation of each source view from the atlases for rate allocation. Second, the atlases are encoded by versatile video coding (VVC), using an extractable subpicture to divide the atlases into subpictures. Third, each subpicture bitstream is extracted, and asymmetric quality allocation for each subpictures is conducted by considering the residuals in the subpicture. Fourth, mixed-quality subpictures were merged by using the proposed bitstream merger. Fifth, the merged bitstream is decoded by using a single decoder. Finally, the viewing area of the user is synthesized by using the reconstructed atlases. Experimental results with the VVC test model (VTM) show that the proposed method achieves a 21.37% Bjøntegaard delta rate saving for immersive video peak signal-to-noise ratio and a 26.76% decoding runtime saving compared to the VTM anchor configuration. Moreover, it supports bitstreams for multiple decoders and single decoder without re-encoding, transcoding, or a substantial increase of the server-side storage.
An Axiomatic Theory for Reversible Computation
Authors: Lanese Ivan , Phillips Iain , Ulidowski Irek
Published: February 2024

Undoing computations of a concurrent system is beneficial in many situations, such as in reversible debugging of multi-threaded programs and in recovery from errors due to optimistic execution in parallel discrete event simulation. A number of approaches have been proposed for how to reverse formal models of concurrent computation, including process calculi such as CCS, languages like Erlang, and abstract models such as prime event structures and occurrence nets. However, it has not been settled as to what properties a reversible system should enjoy, nor how the various properties that have been suggested, such as the parabolic lemma and the causal-consistency property, are related. We contribute to a solution to these issues by using a generic labelled transition system equipped with a relation capturing whether transitions are independent to explore the implications between various reversibility properties. In particular, we show how all properties we consider are derivable from a set of axioms. Our intention is that when establishing properties of some formalism, it will be easier to verify the axioms rather than proving properties such as the parabolic lemma directly. We also introduce two new properties related to causal-consistent reversibility, namely causal liveness and causal safety, stating, respectively, that an action can be undone if (causal liveness) and only if (causal safety) it is independent from all of the following actions. These properties come in three flavours: defined in terms of independent transitions, independent events, or via an ordering on events. Both causal liveness and causal safety are derivable from our axioms.
F
rugal
L
ight
: Symmetry-Aware Cyclic Heterogeneous Intersection Control using Deep Reinforcement Learning with Model Compression, Distillation and Domain Knowledge
Authors: Chauhan Sachin Kumar , Sen Rijurekha
Published: February 2024

Developing countries need to better manage fast increasing traffic flows, owing to rapid urbanization. Else, increasing traffic congestion would increase fatalities due to reckless driving, as well as keep vehicular emissions and air pollution critically high in cities like New Delhi. State-of-the-art traffic signal control methods in developed countries, however, use expensive sensing, computation, and communication resources. How far can control algorithms go, under resource constraints, is explored through the design and evaluation of
FrugalLight
(FL) in this article. We also captured and processed a real traffic dataset at a busy intersection in New Delhi, India, using efficient techniques on low cost embedded devices. This dataset (
https://delhi-trafficdensity-dataset.github.io
) contains traffic density information at fine time granularity of one measurement every second, from all approaches of the intersection for 40 days.
FrugalLight
(
https://github.com/sachin-iitd/FrugalLight
) is evaluated on the collected traffic dataset from New Delhi and another open source traffic dataset from New York.
FrugalLight
matches the performance of state-of-the-art Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) based sensing and Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL) based control algorithms, while utilizing resources less by an order of magnitude. We further explore improvements using a careful combination of knowledge distillation and domain knowledge based DRL model compression, with employing Model-Agnostic Meta-Learning to quickly adapt to traffic at new intersections. The collected real dataset and
FrugalLight
therefore opens up opportunities for resource efficient RL based intersection control design for the ML research community, where the controller should have limited carbon footprint. Such intelligent, green, intersection controllers can help reduce traffic congestion and associated vehicular emissions, even if compute and communication infrastructure is limited in low resource regions. This is a critical step toward achieving two of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), namely sustainable cities and communities and climate action.
MultiMatch: Multi-task Learning for Semi-supervised Domain Generalization
Authors: Qi Lei , Yang Hongpeng , Shi Yinghuan , Geng Xin
Published: February 2024

Domain generalization (DG) aims at learning a model on source domains to well generalize on the unseen target domain. Although it has achieved great success, most of the existing methods require the label information for all training samples in source domains, which is time-consuming and expensive in the real-world application. In this article, we resort to solving the semi-supervised domain generalization (SSDG) task, where there are a few label information in each source domain. To address the task, we first analyze the theory of multi-domain learning, which highlights that (1) mitigating the impact of domain gap and (2) exploiting all samples to train the model can effectively reduce the generalization error in each source domain so as to improve the quality of pseudo-labels. According to the analysis, we propose MultiMatch, i.e., extending FixMatch to the multi-task learning framework, producing the high-quality pseudo-label for SSDG. To be specific, we consider each training domain as a single task (i.e., local task) and combine all training domains together (i.e., global task) to train an extra task for the unseen test domain. In the multi-task framework, we utilize the independent batch normalization and classifier for each task, which can effectively alleviate the interference from different domains during pseudo-labeling. Also, most of the parameters in the framework are shared, which can be trained by all training samples sufficiently. Moreover, to further boost the pseudo-label accuracy and the model’s generalization, we fuse the predictions from the global task and local task during training and testing, respectively. A series of experiments validate the effectiveness of the proposed method, and it outperforms the existing semi-supervised methods and the SSDG method on several benchmark DG datasets.
Meetor: A Human-Centered Automatic Video Editing System for Meeting Recordings
Authors: Duan Haihan , Liao Junhua , Lin Lehao , El Saddik Abdulmotaleb , Cai Wei
Published: February 2024

Widely adopted digital cameras and smartphones have generated a large number of videos, which have brought a tremendous workload to video editors. Recently, a variety of automatic/semi-automatic video editing methods have been proposed to tackle these issues in some specific areas. However, for the production of meeting recordings, the existing studies highly depend on extra equipment in the conference venues, such as the infrared camera or special microphone, which are not practical. In this article, we design and implement Meetor, a human-centered automatic video editing system for meeting recordings. The Meetor mainly contains three parts: an audio-based video synchronization algorithm, human-centered video content flaw detection algorithms, and an automatic video editing algorithm. Two main experiments are conducted from both objective and subjective aspects to evaluate the performance of the Meetor. The experimental results on a testbed illustrate that the proposed algorithms could achieve state-of-the-art (SOTA) performance in video content flaw detection. However, the conducted user study demonstrates that Meetor could generate meeting recordings with a satisfactory quality compared with professional video editors. Moreover, we also present a practical application of the Meetor in a university campus prototype, in which the Meetor is applied in the automatic editing of lecture recordings. All in all, the proposed Meetor can be utilized in practical applications to release the workload of professional video editors.