bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Decreased Analgesic Requirements in Super Morbidly Versus Morbidly Obese Patients Undergoing Laparoscopic Sleeve Gastrectomy
Authors: Elgendy Hamed , Youssef Talha , Banjar Ahmad , Elmorsy Soha
Published: April 2020

Background

Scarce data exists about analgesic requirements in super morbidly obese (SMO) patients who underwent sleeve gastrectomy. We attempted to investigate analgesic requirements for SMO, when compared with morbidly obese (MO) individuals who underwent sleeve gastrectomy and its impact on postoperative outcome.

Methods

We studied 279 consecutive patients (183 MO, 96 SMO) who underwent bariatric surgery. Data analysis included perioperative anaesthetic management, analgesic consumptions, opioids side effects, and ICU admission.

Results

The SMO group showed higher patients with asthma, epilepsy, obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA), and ASA III percentages (P = 0.014, P = 0.016, P ˂ 0.001, and P ˂ 0.001, respectively). There were no significant differences in the total morphine consumption intraoperatively, or after 24 h. However, reduced consumption of intraoperative fentanyl and morphine in SMO when calculated per total body weight (TBW) (P = 0.004 and P = 0.001, respectively). At PACU, tramadol consumption per TBW and lean body mass (LBM) were significantly reduced in SMO (P = 0.001 and P = 0.025, respectively). Paracetamol consumption was significantly reduced in the SMO group (P = 0.04). They showed higher comorbidities (P ˂ 0.001), longer anaesthesia time (P = 0.033), and greater ICU admissions (P ˂ 0.001). Vomiting was higher in the MO group (P = 0.004). Both groups showed comparable pain scores (P = 0.558) and PACU stay time (P = 0.060).

Conclusions

Super morbidly obese patients required fewer opioids and analgesics perioperatively. They exhibited higher comorbidities with greater anaesthesia time and ICU admissions. PACU stay time and pain scores were comparable.
How to Design AI for Social Good: Seven Essential Factors
Authors: Floridi Luciano , Cowls Josh , King Thomas C. , Taddeo Mariarosaria
Published: April 2020

The idea of artificial intelligence for social good (henceforth AI4SG) is gaining traction within information societies in general and the AI community in particular. It has the potential to tackle social problems through the development of AI-based solutions. Yet, to date, there is only limited understanding of what makes AI socially good in theory, what counts as AI4SG in practice, and how to reproduce its initial successes in terms of policies. This article addresses this gap by identifying seven ethical factors that are essential for future AI4SG initiatives. The analysis is supported by 27 case examples of AI4SG projects. Some of these factors are almost entirely novel to AI, while the significance of other factors is heightened by the use of AI. From each of these factors, corresponding best practices are formulated which, subject to context and balance, may serve as preliminary guidelines to ensure that well-designed AI is more likely to serve the social good.
Geological characteristics of shale in the Silurian (Sichuan) basin and chemical reaction of its reservoir under the action of fracturing fluid
Authors: Xu Jun , Huang Qianrui
Published: April 2020

The exploitation and exploration of shale gas is of great values to solve the energy problem. Taking the shale from Silurian Longmaxi formation in Sichuan Basin as an example, its geological characteristics and reservoir chemical reaction under the action of fracturing fluid were analyzed, and moreover, a series of data determination and fracturing fluid chemical reaction experiments were carried out. The results showed that the average total organic carbon value of shale in the study area was 4.79%, the kerogen type was type I, the ratio of aliphatic structure to aromatic structure was smaller than 1, the average RO value was 2.15%, the content of clay mineral in the mineral composition was high, the average porosity was 3.16%, and the average permeability was 0.036 × 103 μm2, which was conducive to shale gas generation; under the action of fracturing fluid, the sulfate mineral in the shale dissolved, clay mineral expanded, and the pore volume and specific surface area reduced. The results verify that the research area has shale gas mining value, and this study makes some contributions to further study the optimization of fracturing fluid and improve exploitation technology.
The Utility of Choice-Enhancing Language in Emergency Preparedness Messages: An Application of Psychological Reactance Theory
Authors: Reynolds-Tylus Tobias , Martinez Gonzalez Andrea
Published: April 2020

Objective:

This study uses psychological reactance theory as a framework for designing effective emergency preparedness messages. Psychological reactance is the motivational state that occurs when individuals perceive their freedom to be threatened. From the standpoint of persuasive message design, reactance is an undesirable outcome that should be avoided whenever possible.

Methods:

Participants (N = 174) were randomly assigned to view 1 of 2 emergency preparedness messages (choice-enhancing language [“the choice is yours”] vs choice-restricting language [“you must”]) in a between-subjects-posttest-only online survey experiment.

Results:

Structural equation modeling revealed that choice-restricting language resulted in greater freedom threat and subsequent reactance. Reactance resulted in a diminished attitude and subsequent intention to prepare an emergency kit.

Conclusion:

Public health practitioners would benefit from the inclusion of choice-enhancing language in their public communications, alongside the exclusion of choice-restricting language. Pretesting of messages is recommended to avoid eliciting reactance and subsequent boomerang effects.
THE IMPACT OF MUNICIPAL MERGERS ON LOCAL PUBLIC SPENDING: EVIDENCE FROM REMOTE-SENSING DATA
Authors: Pickering Steve , Tanaka Seiki , Yamada Kyohei
Published: April 2020

How are resources distributed when administrative units merge? We take advantage of recent, large-scale municipal mergers in Japan to systematically study the impact of municipal mergerswithinmerged municipalities and, in particular, what politicians do when their districts and constituencies suddenly change. We argue that when rural and sparsely populated municipalities merge with more urban and densely populated municipalities, residents of the former are likely to see a reduced share of public spending because they lost political leverage through the merger. Our empirical analyses detect changes in public spending before and after the municipal mergers with remote sensing data, which allows for flexible units of analysis and enables us to proxy for spendingwithinmerged municipalities. Overall, our results show that politicians tend to reduce benefits allocated to areas where there are a small number of voters, while increasing the allocation to more populous areas. The micro-foundation of our argument is also corroborated by survey data. The finding suggests that, all things being equal, the quantity rather than quality of electorates matters for politicians immediately after political units change.
High-resolution distributed vertical strain and velocity from repeat borehole logging by optical televiewer: Derwael Ice Rise, Antarctica
Authors: Hubbard Bryn , Philippe Morgane , Pattyn Frank , Drews Reinhard , Young Tun Jan , Bruyninx Carine , Bergeot Nicolas , Fjøsne Karen , Tison Jean-Louis
Published: April 2020

Direct measurements of spatially distributed vertical strain within ice masses are scientifically valuable but challenging to acquire. We use manual marker tracking and automatic cross correlation between two repeat optical televiewer (OPTV) images of an ~100 m-long borehole at Derwael Ice Rise (DIR), Antarctica, to reconstruct discretised, vertical strain rate and velocity at millimetre resolution. The resulting profiles decay with depth, from −0.07 a−1at the surface to ~−0.002 a−1towards the base in strain and from −1.3 m a−1at the surface to ~−0.5 m a−1towards the base in velocity. Both profiles also show substantial local variability. Three coffee-can markers installed at different depths into adjacent boreholes record consistent strain rates and velocities, although averaged over longer depth ranges and subject to greater uncertainty. Measured strain-rate profiles generally compare closely with output from a 2-D ice-flow model, while the former additionally reveal substantial high-resolution variability. We conclude that repeat OPTV borehole logging represents an effective means of measuring distributed vertical strain at millimetre scale, revealing high-resolution variability along the uppermost ~100 m of DIR, Antarctica.
Isolation of male and female gametes, zygotes and proembryos of leek (Allium tuberosum Roxb)
Authors: Lin Yi Hua , Lin Mei Zhen , Chen Yu Qing , Tian Hui Qiao
Published: April 2020

The isolation of male and female gametes is an effective method to study the fertilization mechanisms of higher plants. An osmotic shock method was used to rupture pollen grains of Allium tuberosum Roxb and release the pollen contents, including generative cells, which were mass collected. The pollinated styles were cut following 3 h of in vivo growth, and cultured in medium for 6–8 h, during which time pollen tubes grew out of the cut end of the style. After pollen tubes were transferred into a solution containing 6% mannitol, tubes burst and released pairs of sperm cells. Ovules of A. tuberosum were incubated in an enzyme solution for 30 min, and then dissected to remove the integuments. Following transfer to a dissecting solution free of enzymes, each nucellus was cut in the middle, and squeezed gently on the micropylar end, resulting in the liberation of the egg, zygote and proembryo from ovules at selected stages. These cells can be used to explore fertilization and embryonic development using molecular biological methods for each cell type and development stage.
Faecal calprotectin concentrations in neonates with CHD: pilot study
Authors: O’Connor Graeme , Brown Katherine L. , Taylor Andrew M.
Published: April 2020

Neonates with CHD are at increased risk of developing necrotising enterocolitis due to mesenteric hypoperfusion. Necrotising enterocolitis results in repeated feed interruptions contributing to poor growth during the early post-operative phase. Poor weight gain and longer hospital stay are risk factors for death in neonates with CHD. Abdominal radiography is used as a diagnostic tool for necrotising enterocolitis; however, its utility is limited in the early stages of necrotising enterocolitis when pneumatosis intestinalis is absent. Calprotectin is a neutrophil activation biomarker, and elevated levels are evident in inflammatory diseases such as necrotising enterocolitis. The aim of this study was to determine whether there is a correlation between faecal calprotectin concentration and gut inflammation in neonates with CHD. This prospective single-centre study recruited newly diagnosed term patients with duct-dependent CHD between March 2018 and March 2019. Faecal calprotectin concentrations were measured in post-surgical patients using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay methods. A total of 30 patients were included in the analysis. Calprotectin concentration for patients who developed necrotising enterocolitis was 3528 µg/g compared with 390 µg/g without, compared with 1339 µg/g in patients with suspected necrotising enterocolitis (p = 0.0001). Patients with suspected necrotising enterocolitis had a significantly longer length of hospital stay, on average 18 days longer compared to patients without necrotising enterocolitis (p = 0.03). Faecal calprotectin concentrations may reflect severity of gut inflammation in neonates with CHD. Suspected necrotising enterocolitis contributes to longer days nil by mouth and an increase in length of hospital stay.
Sustainable water management in slaughterhouses by cleaner production methods—a review
Authors: Bailone Ricardo , Roça Roberto , Fukushima Hirla , de Aguiar Luis Kluwe
Published: April 2020

The demand for water is high in the food industry, particularly during the processing of animal product origin. A more sustainable approach to the use of the water resource is needed to reduce its waste. A systematic literature review was carried out from publications identified according to relevance and timeliness. The aim was to find alternative food processing production methods that considered both recycling and reuse of water in different slaughtering of animals such as cattle, swine, poultry, goat, sheep and fish. Articles which addressed cleaner production methods were selected because of special relevance in water resource management, Poultry processing was considered a special case regarding the recycling and reuse of water. That was due to the volume of water used as well as the level of likely contamination it might pose if reused. Wastewater can be largely reduced by adopting changes in practices, such as plant layout; materials used; drainage systems using dedicated separation of effluents and shaded area at reception with ventilation and sprinkles.
Können Medien krank machen?
Authors: Büsch Andreas
Published: April 2020

Zusammenfassung. Medien, insbesondere digitalen Medien, wird gerne unterstellt, dass sie krank machen oder die Entwicklung beeinträchtigen. Dazu bedarf es gar nicht der bekannten populistischen Unheilspropheten; auch eine nüchterne Betrachtung kann Risikofaktoren im Kontext des Umgangs mit Apps, Spielen und sozialen Netzwerken nicht ignorieren. Drei Herausforderungen – Exzessive Nutzung bzw. Sucht, dysfunktionale Kommunikation und Fake News – werden hier exemplarisch näher betrachtet.
Recovery of fen peatland microbiomes and predicted functional profiles after rewetting
Authors: Emsens Willem-Jan , van Diggelen Rudy , Aggenbach Camiel J S , Cajthaml Tomáš , Frouz Jan , Klimkowska Agata , Kotowski Wiktor , Kozub Lukasz , Liczner Yvonne , Seeber Elke , Silvennoinen Hanna , Tanneberger Franziska , Vicena Jakub , Wilk Mateusz , Verbruggen Erik
Published: April 2020

Many of the world’s peatlands have been affected by water table drawdown and subsequent loss of organic matter. Rewetting has been proposed as a measure to restore peatland functioning and to halt carbon loss, but its effectiveness is subject to debate. An important prerequisite for peatland recovery is a return of typical microbial communities, which drive key processes. To evaluate the effect of rewetting, we investigated 13 fen peatland areas across a wide (>1500 km) longitudinal gradient in Europe, in which we compared microbial communities between drained, undrained, and rewetted sites. There was a clear difference in microbial communities between drained and undrained fens, regardless of location. Community recovery upon rewetting was substantial in the majority of sites, and predictive functional profiling suggested a concomitant recovery of biogeochemical peatland functioning. However, communities in rewetted sites were only similar to those of undrained sites when soil organic matter quality (as expressed by cellulose fractions) and quantity were still sufficiently high. We estimate that a minimum organic matter content of ca. 70% is required to enable microbial recovery. We conclude that peatland recovery after rewetting is conditional on the level of drainage-induced degradation: severely altered physicochemical peat properties may preclude complete recovery for decades.
Correction: Bacterial vitamin B12 production enhances nematode predatory behavior
Authors: Akduman Nermin , Lightfoot James W , Röseler Waltraud , Witte Hanh , Lo Wen-Sui , Rödelsperger Christian , Sommer Ralf J
Published: April 2020

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper.
Synthetic mycobacterial molecular patterns partially complete Freund’s adjuvant
Authors: Dubé Jean-Yves , McIntosh Fiona , Zarruk Juan G. , David Samuel , Nigou Jérôme , Behr Marcel A.
Published: April 2020

Complete Freund’s adjuvant (CFA) has historically been one of the most useful tools of immunologists. Essentially comprised of dead mycobacteria and mineral oil, we asked ourselves what is special about the mycobacterial part of this adjuvant, and could it be recapitulated synthetically? Here, we demonstrate the essentiality of N-glycolylated peptidoglycan plus trehalose dimycolate (both unique in mycobacteria) for the complete adjuvant effect using knockouts and chemical complementation. A combination of synthetic N-glycolyl muramyl dipeptide and minimal trehalose dimycolate motif GlcC14C18 was able to upregulate dendritic cell effectors, plus induce experimental autoimmunity qualitatively similar but quantitatively milder compared to CFA. This research outlines how to substitute CFA with a consistent, molecularly-defined adjuvant which may inform the design of immunotherapeutic agents and vaccines benefitting from cell-mediated immunity. We also anticipate using synthetic microbe-associated molecular patterns (MAMPs) to study mycobacterial immunity and immunopathogenesis.
High thresholds encouraging the evolution of cooperation in threshold public-good games
Authors: De Jaegher Kris
Published: April 2020

For a well-mixed population, we consider a threshold public good game where group members only obtain benefits from a public good if a sufficiently large number of them cooperates. We investigate the effect of an increase in the threshold on the level of cooperation that evolves. It is shown that for sufficiently large participation costs, the level of cooperation is higher for low and for high thresholds, than it is for intermediate thresholds – where in the latter case cooperation may not evolve at all. The counterintuitive effect where an increase in the threshold from an intermediate to a high one decreases the probability of cooperation, is related to the so-called common-enemy hypothesis of the evolution of cooperation. We further apply our analysis to assess the relative weight of different game types across the parameter space, and show that game types where either a small, or a large fraction of the population evolves as cooperators, receive more weight compared to game types where an intermediate fraction of cooperators evolves.
Exploratory study on classification of lung cancer subtypes through a combined K-nearest neighbor classifier in breathomics
Authors: Wang Chunyan , Long Yijing , Li Wenwen , Dai Wei , Xie Shaohua , Liu Yuanling , Zhang Yinchenxi , Liu Mingxin , Tian Yonghui , Li Qiang , Duan Yixiang
Published: April 2020

Accurate classification of adenocarcinoma (AC) and squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) in lung cancer is critical to physicians’ clinical decision-making. Exhaled breath analysis provides a tremendous potential approach in non-invasive diagnosis of lung cancer but was rarely reported for lung cancer subtypes classification. In this paper, we firstly proposed a combined method, integrating K-nearest neighbor classifier (KNN), borderline2-synthetic minority over-sampling technique (borderlin2-SMOTE), and feature reduction methods, to investigate the ability of exhaled breath to distinguish AC from SCC patients. The classification performance of the proposed method was compared with the results of four classification algorithms under different combinations of borderline2-SMOTE and feature reduction methods. The result indicated that the KNN classifier combining borderline2-SMOTE and feature reduction methods was the most promising method to discriminate AC from SCC patients and obtained the highest mean area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (0.63) and mean geometric mean (58.50) when compared to others classifiers. The result revealed that the combined algorithm could improve the classification performance of lung cancer subtypes in breathomics and suggested that combining non-invasive exhaled breath analysis with multivariate analysis is a promising screening method for informing treatment options and facilitating individualized treatment of lung cancer subtypes patients.
Early growth phase and caffeine content response to recent and projected increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide in coffee (Coffea arabica and C. canephora)
Authors: Vega Fernando E. , Ziska Lewis H. , Simpkins Ann , Infante Francisco , Davis Aaron P. , Rivera Joseph A. , Barnaby Jinyoung Y. , Wolf Julie
Published: April 2020

While [CO2] effects on growth and secondary chemistry are well characterized for annual plant species, little is known about perennials. Among perennials, production of Coffea arabica and C. canephora (robusta) have enormous economic importance worldwide. Three Arabica cultivars (Bourbon, Catimor, Typica) and robusta coffee were grown from germination to ca. 12 months at four CO2 concentrations: 300, 400, 500 or 600 ppm. There were significant increases in all leaf area and biomass markers in response to [CO2] with significant [CO2] by taxa differences beginning at 122–124 days after sowing (DAS). At 366–368 DAS, CO2 by cultivar variation in growth and biomass response among Arabica cultivars was not significant; however, significant trends in leaf area, branch number and total above-ground biomass were observed between Arabica and robusta. For caffeine concentration, there were significant differences in [CO2] response between Arabica and robusta. A reduction in caffeine in coffee leaves and seeds might result in decreased ability against deterrence, and consequently, an increase in pest pressure. We suggest that the interspecific differences observed (robusta vs. Arabica) may be due to differences in ploidy level (2n = 22 vs. 2n = 4x = 44). Differential quantitative and qualitative responses during early growth and development of Arabica and robusta may have already occurred with recent [CO2] increases, and such differences may be exacerbated, with production and quality consequences, as [CO2] continues to increase.
Krill vs salps: dominance shift from krill to salps is associated with higher dissolved N:P ratios
Authors: Plum Christoph , Hillebrand Helmut , Moorthi Stefanie
Published: April 2020

Pronounced atmospheric and oceanic warming along the West Antarctic Peninsula (WAP) has resulted in abundance shifts in populations of Antarctic krill andSalpa thompsonidetermined by changes in the timing of sea-ice advance, the duration of sea-ice cover and food availability. Krill and salps represent the most important macrozooplankton grazers at the WAP, but differ profoundly in their feeding biology, population dynamics and stoichiometry of excretion products with potential consequences for the relative availability of dissolved nitrogen and phosphorus. Alternation of the dissolved nutrient pool due to shifts in krill and salp densities have been hypothesized but never explicitly tested by using observational data. We therefore used the Palmer LTER dataset in order to investigate whether the dominance of either grazer is related with the observed dissolved nitrogen:phosphorus (N:P) ratios at the WAP. Across the whole sampling grid, the dominance of salps over krill was significantly correlated to higher concentrations of both N and P as well as a higher N:P ratios. Using actual long-term data, our study shows for the first time that changes in key grazer dominance may have consequences for the dynamics of dissolved nitrogen and phosphorus at the WAP.
Free-energy landscapes of membrane co-translocational protein unfolding
Authors: Rosen Christian Bech , Bayley Hagan , Rodriguez-Larrea David
Published: April 2020

Protein post-translational translocation is found at the plasma membrane of prokaryotes and protein import into organellae. Translocon structures are becoming available, however the dynamics of proteins during membrane translocation remain largely obscure. Here we study, at the single-molecule level, the folding landscape of a model protein while forced to translocate a transmembrane pore. We use a DNA tag to drive the protein into the α-hemolysin pore under a quantifiable force produced by an applied electric potential. Using a voltage-quench approach we find that the protein fluctuates between the native state and an intermediate in the translocation process at estimated forces as low as 1.9 pN. The fluctuation kinetics provide the free energy landscape as a function of force. We show that our stable, ≈15 kBT, substrate can be unfolded and translocated with physiological membrane potentials and that selective divalent cation binding may have a profound effect on the translocation kinetics.
Miro2 tethers the ER to mitochondria to promote mitochondrial fusion in tobacco leaf epidermal cells
Authors: White Rhiannon R. , Lin Congping , Leaves Ian , Castro Inês G. , Metz Jeremy , Bateman Benji C. , Botchway Stanley W. , Ward Andrew D. , Ashwin Peter , Sparkes Imogen
Published: April 2020

Mitochondria are highly pleomorphic, undergoing rounds of fission and fusion. Mitochondria are essential for energy conversion, with fusion favouring higher energy demand. Unlike fission, the molecular components involved in mitochondrial fusion in plants are unknown. Here, we show a role for the GTPase Miro2 in mitochondria interaction with the ER and its impacts on mitochondria fusion and motility. Mutations in AtMiro2’s GTPase domain indicate that the active variant results in larger, fewer mitochondria which are attached more readily to the ER when compared with the inactive variant. These results are contrary to those in metazoans where Miro predominantly controls mitochondrial motility, with additional GTPases affecting fusion. Synthetically controlling mitochondrial fusion rates could fundamentally change plant physiology by altering the energy status of the cell. Furthermore, altering tethering to the ER could have profound effects on subcellular communication through altering the exchange required for pathogen defence.
Nickel-catalyzed enantioselective reductive carbo-acylation of alkenes
Authors: Lan Yun , Wang Chuan
Published: April 2020

Recently, transition-metal-catalyzed asymmetric dicarbofunctionalization of tethered alkenes has emerged as a powerful method for construction of chiral cyclic carbo- and heterocycles. However, all these reactions rely on facially selective arylmetalation of the pendant olefinic unit. Here, we successfully apply acylnickelation as the enantiodetermining step in the asymmetric nickel-catalyzed reductive carbo-acylation of aryl carbamic chloride-tethered alkenes with primary and secondary alkyl iodides as well as benzyl chlorides as the coupling partners, using manganese as a reducing agent. By circumventing the use of pre-generated organometallics, this reductive strategy enables the synthesis of diverse enantioenriched oxindoles bearing a quaternary stereogenic center under mild reaction conditions with high tolerance of a broad range of functional moieties.
A phase diagram for bacterial swarming
Authors: Be’er Avraham , Ilkanaiv Bella , Gross Renan , Kearns Daniel B. , Heidenreich Sebastian , Bär Markus , Ariel Gil
Published: April 2020

Bacterial swarming is a rapid mass-migration, in which thousands of cells spread collectively to colonize surfaces. Physically, swarming is a natural example for active particles that use energy to generate motion. Accordingly, understanding the constraints physics imposes on these dynamics is essential for understanding the mechanisms underlying swarming. We present new experiments of swarming Bacillus subtilis mutants with different aspect ratios and at different densities; two physical quantities known to be associated with collective behavior. Analyzing the dynamics reveals a rich phase diagram of qualitatively distinct swarming regimes, describing how cell shape and population density govern the dynamical characteristics of the swarm. In particular, we show that under standard conditions, bacteria inhabit a region of phase space that is associated with rapid mixing and robust dynamics, with homogeneous density and no preferred direction of motion. The results suggest that bacteria have adapted their physical properties to optimize the principle functions assumed for swarming.
Prediction of ternary fluorooxoborates with coplanar triangular units [BOxF3−x]x− from first-principles
Authors: Wei Zhonglei , Zhang Wenyao , Zeng Hao , Li Hao , Yang Zhihua , Pan Shilie
Published: April 2020

From first-principles prediction, we got all the basic structural units of fluorooxoborates, namely, tetrahedral elements [BOxF4−x] (x = 1,2,3) like [BO4] and triangular elements [BOxF3−x] (x = 1,2) like [BO3].
Coordination chemistry of [Y(pypa)]− and comparison immuno-PET imaging of [44Sc]Sc- and [86Y]Y-pypa-phenyl-TRC105
Authors: Li Lily , de Guadalupe Jaraquemada-Peláez María , Aluicio-Sarduy Eduardo , Wang Xiaozhu , Barnhart Todd E. , Cai Weibo , Radchenko Valery , Schaffer Paul , Engle Jonathan W. , Orvig Chris
Published: April 2020

H4pypa was conjugated to an antibody via a newly synthesized H4pypa-phenyl-NCS; promising immuno-PET imaging with 44Sc was demonstrated.
Efficient CO2 electroreduction to CO at low overpotentials using a surface-reconstructed and N-coordinated Zn electrocatalyst
Authors: Deng Wanan , Min Shixiong , Wang Fang , Zhang Zhengguo , Kong Chao
Published: April 2020

A surface-reconstructed and N-coordinated Zn electrocatalyst exhibits enhanced activity and selectivity for CO2 electroreduction to CO at reduced overpotentials.
Structural and metal–halogen exchange reactivity studies of sodium magnesiate biphenolate complexes
Authors: Yeardley Callum , Kennedy Alan R. , Gros Philippe C. , Touchet Sabrina , Fairley Michael , McLellan Ross , Martínez-Martínez Antonio J. , O'Hara Charles T.
Published: April 2020

Sodium magnesiates incorporating the (rac)-BIPHEN ligand have been prepared and characterised and subsequently used in metal–halogen exchange reactions.
Deformation of raspberry-like polymer composite particles by colloidal fusion
Authors: Zhai Shuxia , Sun Hao , Qiu Biwei , Zou Hua
Published: April 2020

Raspberry-like polymer composite particles with polymer coronas were deformed to core–shell particles through the colloidal fusion method.
A quantum thermometric sensing and analysis system using fluorescent nanodiamonds for the evaluation of living stem cell functions according to intracellular temperature
Authors: Yukawa Hiroshi , Fujiwara Masazumi , Kobayashi Kaori , Kumon Yuka , Miyaji Kazu , Nishimura Yushi , Oshimi Keisuke , Umehara Yumi , Teki Yoshio , Iwasaki Takayuki , Hatano Mutsuko , Hashimoto Hideki , Baba Yoshinobu
Published: April 2020

Intracellular thermometry techniques play an important role in elucidating the relationship between the intracellular temperature and stem cell functions.
Parent Education in Studies With Nonverbal and Minimally Verbal Participants With Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Systematic Review
Authors: Koegel Lynn Kern , Bryan Katherine M. , Su Pumpki Lei , Vaidya Mohini , Camarata Stephen
Published: April 2020

Purpose

The purpose of this systematic review was to identify parent education procedures implemented in intervention studies focused on expressive verbal communication for nonverbal (NV) or minimally verbal (MV) children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Parent education has been shown to be an essential component in the habilitation of individuals with ASD. Parents of individuals with ASD who are NV or MV may particularly benefit from parent education in order to provide opportunities for communication and to support their children across the life span.

Method

ProQuest databases were searched between the years of 1960 and 2018 to identify articles that targeted verbal communication in MV and NV individuals with ASD. A total of 1,231 were evaluated to assess whether parent education was implemented. We found 36 studies that included a parent education component. These were reviewed with regard to (a) the number of participants and participants' ages, (b) the parent education program provided, (c) the format of the parent education, (d) the duration of the parent education, (e) the measurement of parent education, and (f) the parent fidelity of implementation scores.

Results

The results of this analysis showed that very few studies have included a parent education component, descriptions of the parent education programs are unclear in most studies, and few studies have scored the parents' implementation of the intervention.

Conclusions

Currently, there is great variability in parent education programs in regard to participant age, hours provided, fidelity of implementation, format of parent education, and type of treatment used. Suggestions are made to provide both a more comprehensive description and consistent measurement of parent education programs.
Deadlock‐free adaptive 3D network‐on‐chips routing algorithm with repetitive turn concept
Authors: Cai Yuan , Xiang Dong , Ji Xiang
Published: April 2020

With the emergence of a large number of multi‐core systems, many 3D routing schemes have been developed for network‐on‐chips (NoCs) in order to obtain low overhead and high‐performance. Nevertheless, it is difficult to possess these characteristics for contemporary 3D routing algorithms. This study presents a new routing algorithm for 3D stacked NoCs based on the repetitive turn concept. The authors propose the high‐performance minimum pressure turn model (MPTM) routing algorithm that can be applied to a 3D case. Repetitive prohibited turns are spread in the row and column of the planes and vertical direction in the MPTM routing algorithm with no virtual channels. Besides, the MPTM routing algorithm has minimum routing pressure by exploring the whole 3D space. Considering network average latency and throughput, the results acquired show that the MPTM scheme improves performance over existing work.
UAV‐enabled computation migration for complex missions: A reinforcement learning approach
Authors: Zhu Shichao , Gui Lin , Cheng Nan , Zhang Qi , Sun Fei , Lang Xiupu
Published: April 2020

The implementationof computation offloading is a challenging issue in the remote areas where traditional edge infrastructures are sparsely deployed. In this study, the authors propose a unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)‐enabled edge computing framework, where a group of UAVs fly around to provide the near‐users edge computing service. They study the computation migration problem for the complex missions, which can be decomposed as some typical task‐flows considering the inter‐dependency of tasks. Each time a task appears, it should be allocated to a proper UAV for execution, which is defined as the computation migration or task migration. Since the UAV‐ground communication data rate is strongly associated with the UAV location, selecting a proper UAV to execute each task will largely benefit the missions response time. They formulate the computation migration decision making problem as a Markov decision process, in which the state contains the extracted observations from the environment. To cope with the dynamics of the environment, they propose an advantage actor–critic reinforcement learning approach to learn the near‐optimal policy on‐the‐fly. Simulation results show that the proposed approach has a desirable convergence property, and can significantly reduce the average response time of missions compared with the benchmark greedy method.
Stability analysis of linear systems with time‐varying delay via a quadratic function negative‐definiteness determination method
Authors: Long Fei , Lin Wen‐Juan , He Yong , Jiang Lin , Wu Min
Published: April 2020

This study aims to carry out the stability analysis of linear systems with a time‐varying delay. It is known that the negative‐definite condition of the derivative of a Lyapunov–Krasovskii functional (LKF) can be determined using the convex combination method if the convexity requirement is satisfied by the derivative of the LKF. However, this method is not feasible in cases where the LKF's derivative is a quadratic function. To address this problem, this study proposes a novel negative‐definiteness determination lemma that encompasses the previous lemmas as its special cases and shows less conservatism. Then, this lemma is employed to derive a stability criterion, and its superiority is demonstrated using three examples.
Synchronisation for multi‐network with two types of inter‐network coupling faults: pinning control effects
Authors: Ren Tao , Sun Shixiang , YanJie Xu , Zhe Li , Wang Ranran , Cheng Xiaoyan , Dimirovski Georgi Marko
Published: April 2020

Investigation of simultaneous occurrence of permanent and/or recoverable faults of coupled nodes within different networks in a larger network structure is an appealing timely research topic. For the modelling of such a multi‐network structure, the coupling terms in the same network and the coupling terms among different networks are described separately in order to explain clearly the multi‐network feature here. The dimension‐transformation matrix is used to deal with the mismatched dimensions of nodes in the different networks. Then a synchronisation controller is designed from the underlying theory of pinning control schemes. Furthermore, following the ideas of Lyapunov stability theory, a sufficient stability condition under the pinning control is derived which guarantees nodes in the same network synchronisation. Computer simulation results for a numerical case study of three coupled networks with nodes that possess rather complex non‐linear dynamics demonstrate that the proposed controllers can enforce synchronisation despite different types of faults being occurred in the multi‐network. It is also shown that the specific pinning control scheme is more effective than the random pinning.
Observer‐based fault reconstructions and fault‐tolerant control designs for uncertain switched systems with both actuator and sensor faults
Authors: Zhu Fanglai , Shan Yu , Zhang Jiancheng , Wang Fengning
Published: April 2020

This study considers the problems of the simultaneous estimations of the states, actuator and sensor faults and the design of observer‐based fault‐tolerant control (FTC) for a class of uncertain switched systems. First, by treating the system state, actuator fault and sensor fault as an augmented state vector, a descriptor system is constructed, where the output equation contains no faults in form. Second, the relationships between the preconditions of the original system and the descriptor system are investigated in detail, under which a reduced‐order observer, which can estimate the original system states, actuator faults and sensor faults simultaneously without suffering from the influence of the disturbance, is developed. Third, based on the state estimations given by the reduced‐order observer, a state‐fault feedback fault‐tolerant controller is designed based on an optimising performance index and the gains are computed by linear matrix inequalities (LMIs). Finally, an electrical circuit example is given to show the effectiveness of the proposed methods.
Practical model‐free robust estimation and control design for an underwater soft IPMC actuator
Authors: Khawwaf Jasim , Zheng Jinchuan , Wang Hai , Man Zhihong
Published: April 2020

In the trend of the recent development of soft actuators, ionic polymer metal composite (IPMC) is considered as one of the new and innovative soft materials. The IPMC is suited to be utilised in medical micro robots and bio‐inspired aquatic robotics. It is distinguished by nimble, soft, silent, flexible and lightweight properties. In fact, for the IPMC actuator, hysteresis and creep non‐linearities are inevitable; and it is a great challenge to handle them and to achieve high‐precision tracking in the control design, especially when the internal system morphology is complex and not fully understood. This study proposes a new model‐free control approach for an underwater IPMC actuator to overcome the lack of its exact model and to achieve accurate trajectory tracking. This approach is synthesised based on a non‐linear extended state observer technique to estimate lumped uncertainties and disturbances. Furthermore, a sliding mode controller is added as an extra input to deal with the estimation error and to assure the tracking robustness. Finally, the proposed control is experimentally verified to show its effectiveness in comparison with a non‐singular terminal sliding mode controller. The experimental results indicate that the proposed controller is capable of delivering good tracking accuracy with strong robustness.
Adaptive colour‐guided non‐local means algorithm for compound noise reduction of depth maps
Authors: Ibrahim Mostafa M. , Liu Qiong , Yang You
Published: April 2020

Depth maps are used to describe object positioning information in three‐dimensional (3D) space, and they are crucial for RGB‐D data representation, which is useful for numerous interactive visual applications. In practice, depth maps are often contaminated by compound noise, including intrinsic noise and missing regions owing to active illumination shadows. As existing noise models cannot describe the above‐mentioned compound noise effectively, the subsequent filter design is a challenging task. In this study, an adaptive colour‐guided non‐local mean (NLM) filter is proposed to address such compound noise. First, the authors classify the depth map into hole and non‐hole pixels. Then, the proposed filter is designed on the basis of the NLM framework, where the colour image is used as a guide prior for hole‐artifact removal. Finally, the authors use a shock filter to effectively address the non‐regularisation of the restored depth map edges and remove the remaining noise. Experiments show that the proposed filter qualitatively and quantitatively outperforms existing colour‐guided and unguided filters. Moreover, the authors verify the superiority of the proposed filter through virtual view synthesis and 3D scene reconstruction applications.
SODNet: small object detection using deconvolutional neural network
Authors: Zhang Xinpeng , Wu Jigang , Peng Zhihao , Meng Min
Published: April 2020

Convolution neural network (CNN) is an efficient technique to detect objects in various kinds of images, especially for microaneurysm (MA) of diabetic retinopathy in retinal fundus image. This study proposes a deconvolutional neural network to accurately discriminate MA from non‐MA. The deconvolution, instead of pooling operation, is embedded into the CNN to recover the erased details of feature maps of convolutional layers. Three types of images are collected for training and predicting. Furthermore, the extracted features are fed into the fully‐connected layers to classify using a softmax layer. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method can achieve significant sensitivity and accuracy on multiple public datasets, in comparison to the state‐of‐the‐art. For Retinopathy Online Challenge dataset, the sensitivity and accuracy are improved up to 0.798 and 0.986, respectively.
Segmentation method of multiple sclerosis lesions based on 3D‐CNN networks
Authors: Xiang Yan , Liu Han , Wang Shuo , Ma Lei , Xiong Xin , Xu Chunrong , Shao Dangguo
Published: April 2020

Histopathology image segmentation is an important area in the field of computer aided diagnosis using image processing. The segmentation of Multiple sclerosis (MS) lesions from MR images can establish the basis for subsequent lesion reconstruction, volume estimation, and course evaluation. This study proposes a method for automatically segmenting MS lesions based on 3D convolutional neural network (CNN). The method is divided into two stages, each of which includes two convolution layers and two pooling layers. The alternative lesion voxels are selected in the first stage, while in the second stage, the final lesion voxels are segmented from the lesion voxels which are obtained in the first stage by restricting the conditions. The method has been tested on the MICCAI 2008 and 2016 datasets and compared to the other baseline methods. The experiment results show that the method has better performance than the other baseline methods on different evaluation indicators, including dice similarity coefficient, absolute difference in lesion volume, true positive rate, false positive rate, and predictive positivity value.
Fully‐automatic raw G‐band chromosome image segmentation
Authors: Altinsoy Emrecan , Yang Jie , Yilmaz Can
Published: April 2020

Analysis of the chromosome images plays an important role in discovering one's genetic information and possible genetic disorders. Segmentation has a very substantial place in the chromosome analysis and without an automatic solution, it is a time‐consuming and error‐prone procedure. Many researchers tried to automate the segmentation process. However, background noise, objects other than chromosomes in the image, touching and overlapped chromosomes are still current issues. To address these issues, the authors proposed fully‐automatic raw G‐band chromosome image segmentation, which aims to segment every single chromosome with a minimal error. The proposed algorithm contains the following steps: clearing the background noise, eliminating the objects other than chromosomes, distinguishing single chromosomes and chromosome clusters, separating touching and overlapping chromosomes. The proposed algorithm is tested on 508 raw images and achieved an accuracy of 94.7% for touching chromosome separation, 96.3% for overlapped chromosome separation, and 98.94% for segmentation of all chromosomes. The whole segmentation process takes 2–7 s for one image, depending on the number of touching and overlapping chromosomes. The segmentation results showed that compared to the previously proposed methods, their algorithm achieved better accuracy.
1D representation of Laplacian eigenmaps and dual k‐nearest neighbours for unified video coding
Authors: Li Honggui
Published: April 2020

This study proposes a framework of video coding based on Laplacian eigenmaps (LEM) and its related embedding and reconstruction algorithm (ERA). Firstly, a one‐dimensional (1D) representation of LEM is adopted to achieve an extremely low bit per pixel (BPP). Secondly, dual k‐nearest neighbours, which keeps neighbour relationships both in high‐dimensional data space and low‐dimensional representation space and overcomes the disadvantage of classical non‐linear dimensionality reduction methods which cannot preserve the neighbour properties in both of the spaces, based ERA of LEM is employed to gain extraordinarily high peak‐signal‐to‐noise ratio (PSNR). Thirdly, a unified framework of video coding is fit for intra‐frame, inter‐frame and multi‐view video coding. Finally, it is evaluated by simulation experiments that, in the situation of low bitrate transmission, the proposed method can attain better performance of BPP and PSNR than that of the state‐of‐the‐art methods, such as highly efficient video coding.
Pain intensity recognition via multi‐scale deep network
Authors: Peng Xianlin , Huang Dong , Zhang Haixi
Published: April 2020

Similar to the basic facial expression recognition, one challenge for pain intensity recognition is some individual characteristics, e.g. face shapes, may cause great diversities in the same emotion. So it is usually very difficult to distinguish two adjacent intensity levels of pain expression as each intensity has a large variation. In this study, a coarse‐to‐fine combination method is proposed for pain intensity recognition. The results of multi‐scale outputs from multiple base deep network are combined in a probabilistic way for improving the discrimination between visually similar adjacent levels. A two‐layer tree classifier is proposed in a multi‐task framework for pain intensity recognition as well as face shape recognition, replacing the planar Softmax classifier in each base deep network. In the first layer of tree classifier, multi‐scale classifiers are constructed for recognizing facial pain intensities and the conventional classifiers are constructed for face shape recognition in the second layer. Finally, the tree classifier including multi‐scale classifiers and conventional classifiers is jointly optimised during the training phase and only high level classifiers are used for recognising pain intensities in the test phase. The extensive experiments on UNBC shoulder pain dataset show the proposed method gets promising results in pain intensity recognition.