bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
El paisaje artificial en Japón.
Authors: Ruiz de la Puerta Félix
Published: October 2023

Lo inestable y lo transitorio del espacio construido en la ciudad japonesa actual refleja la sistemática desacralización de los ámbitos de la tradicional cultura japonesa. Esta ruptura con la tradición espacial japonesa construye paisajes artificiales, ambiguos e ilusorios, donde se pierde la referencia a la naturaleza y la propia realidad.
Back to basics: Remembering your own physical health as well as that of the children
Authors: Callard Mary
Published: October 2023

Mary Callard, retired NNEB learning mentor HLTA, highlights the importance of staff remembering their own physical health in early years settings, to prevent problems like back issues developing in future years.
New realities, spaces and times for play and learning: The integration of the internet of toys in early childhood education
Authors: Palaiologou Ioanna , Kewalramani Sarika , Dardanou Maria
Published: October 2023

As technology continues to become more ubiquitous in our lives, the internet of toys (IoToys) is providing new opportunities in education. Dr. Ioanna Palaiologou, Sarika Kewalramani and Maria Dardanou, explain more about the IoToys and how this can be incorporated into early years settings in a constructive and beneficial way, while still keeping the individual child at the forefront.
PROFESSIONAL BOOK REVIEWS
Authors: Barclay Meg
Published: October 2023

Meg Barclay, educational consultant and early years reviewer for the School Library Association, reviews a book which explains how practitioners can help support young children who have experienced trauma, and how to use play to allow them to process and recover from their experiences. The beautiful autumnal picture books this month explore the changing of the seasons as time passes, as well as loss, folklore and being resilient in the face of adversity. The information book introduces children to different kinds of food, how they can be used and where they come from. All lovely additions to a setting!
Understanding obesity
Authors: Greener Mark
Published: October 2023

Mark Greener looks at the latest research on obesity and its causes
Open Educational Resources: Collaboration between Community College Librarians and Faculty
Authors: Smith Amy , Workman Jamie L. , Hartsell Taralynn , Hill D. Laverne
Published: October 2023

Open educational resources (OER) provide college students with course materials on the first day of class, ensuring an equitable learning experience for all. Faculty are the driving force behind OER but need more support to understand, locate, and evaluate resources. Faculty and librarian collaboration can bridge together ideas and resources to benefit students. The researchers used a qualitative case study to understand how faculty and librarians collaborated at a community college to adopt OER. The primary researcher interviewed librarians and faculty to understand their experiences of working together to promote and adopt OER at their campus. The researchers analyzed data from the participants which revealed seven primary themes consisting of communication, student benefits, faculty hesitancies, departmental and administrative decisions, librarian partnerships, and campus repository building. Findings revealed how the collaborative efforts of librarians and faculty helped move OER initiatives forward.
 
OER Discovery: Ensuring that OER Rise to the Top
Authors: Burnett Beth , Cannon-Rech Nikki , Hunnicutt Rebecca , Mortimore Jeffrey
Published: October 2023

This paper discusses the challenges of ensuring discoverability of Open Educational Resources (OER) in the absence of clear standards for sharing them. Despite the efforts of librarians and instructors to create a wealth of OER, discoverability remains limited and often relegated to a list of links on a LibGuide. The authors address this challenge by highlighting technical and descriptive barriers to OER discoverability. The authors then describe the development of a hybrid metadata standard for OER and its deployment through the institutional repository. Although provisional, this approach ensures that OER records can be adapted to future metadata standards and exported to third-party repositories. This paper underscores the importance of developing an effective metadata standard for OER to ensure their discoverability for learners and educators.
Neuroprotective Action of Polyphenols and Phenolic Compounds: An Overview
Authors: J. Khairnar Shubham , B. Jadhav Ghanshyam
Published: October 2023

A central or peripheral somatosensory nervous system lesion or illness is a common cause of neuropathic pain. In this study, we address the most recent information on neuropathy, as well as the causes, symptoms, and treatments of neurodegenerative illnesses like Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, Huntington's, and Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis. While, in recent years, phenolic acid supplementation has been associated to enhanced cognitive function and the prevention of cognitive deterioration. The pharmacological effects of phenolic acid are discussed in this review. And gives the overview of role of Reactive oxygen Species (ROS), oxidative stress and antioxidants in neuropathy, and stated the strong relation between stress, tension, hectic lifestyle and neurodegenerative diseases.
Seed Priming to Improve Tomato Productivity in Salinity Stressed Environments: A Review
Authors: Seth Rupali
Published: October 2023

Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) berries are in great demand across the globe for their nutritive and therapeutic properties. As agriculture land and fresh water resources are limited, the possibility of increasing the production of tomato is either by utilizing unproductive salt affected land for cultivation or unportable water high in salts for irrigation. Tomato is relatively susceptible to salinity during seed germination and seedling establishment phase. However, rapid and synchronized seed germination is essential for proper stand establishment in tomato for increasing its production in salinity stressed environments. Seed priming, a simple and lucrative approach for easing salt stress during the germination phase, is gaining popularity in tomato. Priming improves germination response and brings about certain biochemical changes that help primed tomato seeds to survive and grow under harsh conditions of salinity. This review discusses some of the seed priming methods such as hydropriming, osmopriming, solid matrix priming, hormonal priming, chemical priming, biopriming and physical priming that successfully mitigated the harmful effects of salt stress in tomatoes. Seed priming thus paves the way for utilization of saline land for growing tomato resulting in increased productivity and an improvement in tomato supply chain amidst rising demands.
Silver Nanoparticles and Its Invitro Cytotoxic Behaviour- A Fungi Aided Synthesis
Authors: Janakiraman Vardhana , Govindarajan Kathiravan , Thenmozhi Thenmozhi
Published: October 2023

Nanotechnology is concerned with the creation and stabilisation of nanoparticles. The biological method necessitates the creation of nanoparticles that are eaten by microorganisms capable of digesting nanoparticles in various forms. The fungus Pestaloptiopsis breviseta is used in this study to demonstrate the extracellular production of stable silver nanoparticles. The fungal culture was isolated from a stable Catharanthus roseus (L) G.don leaf sample, a common therapeutic plant. They were produced after the AgNO3 solution was employed to treat the cell filtrate and the fungal mat at room temperature and in the dark. (1 mM). The cell filtrate made silver nanoparticles that were between 171-378 nm in size, whereas the fungal biomass was between 140-280 nm in size. The cell lines MCF-7 and A549 were likewise treated with the silver nanoparticles made by the fungi. GraphPad Prism 5 software was used to track the percentage of living cells for 24 and 48 hours at different concentrations of the MCF-7 and A549 cell lines based on the IC50 value.
A Study on Ichthyofaunal Diversity and Fishing Gears Used in the Wetlands Areas Nearby Nimati Ghat, Jorhat, Assam
Authors: Borah Gayotree Agni , Nasreen Somim , Dutta Prasanna Kumar
Published: October 2023

The North East of India is rich in biodiversity. There are various species of fish found in the rivers, lakes and ponds of the region. Different ethnic groups from this region use different types of techniques to catch these fish. To study different aspects of fish, the study of fishing gears is prerequisite. People of Assam use different types of indigenous fishing gears to catch fish. Most of these fishing gears are made of bamboo. In the current study, attempts were made to analyse the ichthyofaunal biodiversity along with indigenous tools used to catch fish in the wetlands areas nearby Nimati Ghat in Jorhat. A study was conducted to record the traditional fishing techniques used in these places, and it had been discovered that there were ten various kinds of traps, nets, and hooks used for fishing. Many synthetic nets replace the traditional fishing gears. During the study, different kinds of fish were recorded from the study areas.
Posterior Spinal Hemi- Anaesthesia for Tendon Transfer in Patient with Foot Drop- Case Report
Authors:   Department of Anaesthesia, JNUIMSRC, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India., Singhal Geetanjali , Sharma S P ,   Department of Anaesthesia, JNUIMSRC, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India., Mohanty Satyabrata ,   Department of Plastic Surgery, JNUIMSRC, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India.
Published: October 2023

In surgery for foot drop, regional anaesthesia, with selective sensory block and preserved motor function, can be of immense benefit to the surgeon. It allows patient to move foot on command, thus helping in identifying functional tendons, and determine the efficacy of transplanted tendon intraoperatively. We describe a simple and effective technique to achieve this, using hypobaric local anaesthetic drug for spinal anaesthesia and keeping the patient prone in jack-knife position for 15 minutes This allows only sensory posterior nerve roots to be blocked, sparing the motor anterior nerve-roots. Keywords: Levobupivacaine, Baricity, Anaesthetic local, Density, Motor sparing block, Tendon transfer, Spinal anaesthesia
Intra-Operative Supplementary Motor Area Aphosia During Awake Craniotomy a Case Report
Authors:   Department of Anaesthesia, Fortis Hospital, Mulund, Maharastra, India., Kulkarni Amruta M , Shetty Vijay L ,   Department of Anaesthesia, Fortis Hospital, Mulund, Maharastra, India., Sawhney Gurneet Singh ,   Department of Neurosurgery, Fortis Hospital, Mulund, Maharastra, India.
Published: October 2023

Introduction: Language function is complex, involving association between Broca’s motor speech area, Wernicke’s sensory speech area and various interconnected cortical and sub-cortical regions. For lesions in eloquent areas, awake craniotomy with intra-operative neurological monitoring of motor and language function, aids in maximal safe resection of lesion with minimal neurological deficit. Case presentation: We present a case of 40-year-old patient with left frontal lobe lesion involving motor and speech area who underwent awake craniotomy under scalp block and titrated sedation. Though resection was in safe zone as marked both by neuro-navigation and direct electrical stimulation, patient developed aphasia intra-operatively. The aphasia resolved post-operatively with speech therapy over two weeks. Resection in Supplementary motor area (SMA) in the dominant hemisphere may be the likely cause of aphasia in this patient, resulting in reversible SMA syndrome. Conclusion: SMA syndrome must be considered as differential diagnosis of deficit during awake craniotomy when resection is in SMA. Keywords: Aphasia, Supplementary motor area, Awake craniotomy, Eloquent areas
Prevention of Pernicious Vascular Event: Acetabular Component Screw Impinging on External Iliac Vessels – A Unique Case Report
Authors:   Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Bumin Hospital, Busan, South Korea., Shon Won Yong , Gupta Nirav Rajesh ,   Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Bumin Hospital, Busan, South Korea., Deshmukh Shobit Nitin ,   Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Bumin Hospital, Busan, South Korea., Garud Amit B ,   Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Bumin Hospital, Busan, South Korea., Theeppainthan Pradeepkumar ,   Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Bumin Hospital, Busan, South Korea., Lee Kwang Suk ,   Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Bumin Hospital, Busan, South Korea.
Published: October 2023

Introduction: Revision total hip arthroplasty requires meticulous planning and execution to achieve the desired outcome. Pelvic vessel injury following total hip arthroplasty is rare, but a well-known and serious complication, having a very high morbidity (15%) and mortality (7%). This case demonstrates the rare occurrence of acetabular screw abutment to the external iliac vessels, which if removed during revision hip surgery without releasing the adhesions around it, will lead to avulsion injury of the vessels and a catastrophic event. Case Report: We present this challenging and unique case of a 64-year-old female patient where the acetabular component screw was found to be adherent to the external iliac vessels, with vascular injury imminent. During revision surgery, the iliac vessels were first released free of all adhesions with the intrapelvis screw using an ilioinguinal incision and retroperitoneal approach. The prosthesis was removed using a posterior approach to the hip joint. Definitive surgery was performed after 2 weeks. Conclusion: Surgeons should be cognizant of the possibility of an avulsion vascular injury in revision cases having intrapelvic screws or implants. The proximity of such an implant with the intrapelvic vasculature must be confirmed preoperatively. Management should be individualized. Dual approach and staged procedure help in a favorable outcome. Keywords: Vascular injury, revision total hip arthroplasty, screw abutting iliac vessel, external iliac vessel, computed tomographic angiography
Distributed interferometric fiber tip biosensors for a multi-channel and label-free biomolecular interaction analysis
Authors: Chirvi Sajal , Davé Digant P.
Published: October 2023

This paper describes fabrication and implementation of distributed optical fiber tip biosensor probes for simultaneously measuring label-free biomolecular interactions at multiple locations. Biosensor probes at the tip of a single-mode fiber are Fabry–Perot etalons that are functionalized with a capture layer for a specific biomolecule. A coherence multiplexing method is implemented to separate data collected from distributed biosensors in a single data stream. Multiplexing is achieved by using fiber tip biosensors of varying etalon lengths with the same or different capture layers for each biosensing channel. Experiments demonstrating simultaneous multi-channel recording of protein-to-protein interaction sensorgrams with fiber tip biosensor probes are presented.
Topology optimization framework for designing efficient thermo-optical phase shifters
Authors: Martinez de Aguirre Jokisch Beñat , Christiansen Rasmus Ellebæk , Sigmund Ole
Published: October 2023

Thermo-optical phase shifters (TOPSs) have emerged as an important building block in silicon photonics platforms due to their ability to dynamically control the optical phase of light. To enable wide-scale adoption in practical applications, it is paramount that TOPSs are optimized for low power consumption, low optical loss, small footprint, small thermal time constant, and easy fabrication, among other ideal characteristics. In the last decades, multiple designs have emerged from intuition and trial-and-error-based processes to match these objectives. In this work, we propose a topology optimization-based multiphysics inverse design framework for designing cross-sectionally compact low-optical-loss TOPS devices that can accommodate fabrication constraints. Results demonstrate the capability of tailoring novel designs with losses up to 33% lower than previously proposed designs.
Detection and classification of radial carpet beams propagating through an underwater medium
Authors: Khodadadi Karahroudi Mahdi , JafarFard Mohammad Reza
Published: October 2023

A radial carpet (RC) optical beam is a type of structured light beam that is classified as a subfamily of combined half-integer Bessel-like beams. Coherent detection of such structured modes can be difficult given their structural complexity and the deterioration of the quality of modes during propagation in turbulent environments. In this paper, we first study the detection of RC modes by using fork-shaped diffraction gratings and then propose an incoherent detection approach to classify 16 classes of RC modes based on training a convolutional neural network model using DenseNet-201 architecture. The dataset comprises recorded images of RC modes after a 120 cm propagation length in a turbulent underwater environment. As the evaluations indicate, the classifier has an accuracy of 98% in identifying RC modes measured in moderate turbulence with a strength level of C
n
2∼10−12m−2/3. This method eliminates the difficulties caused by the use of multiple optical elements in coherent detection techniques such as diffraction gratings. Besides simplifying the optical system settings, it also reduces the volume and cost of implementation, especially in optical communication applications.
Laser-induced damage growth of fused silica optics near growth threshold at 351 nm
Authors: Grosjean Sylvain , Cormier Martin , Gleyze Jean-François , Hallo Guillaume , Lacombe Chloé , Roquin Nadja , Natoli Jean-Yves , Lamaignère Laurent
Published: October 2023

Laser-induced damage growth on the exit surface of fused silica optics triggered by nanosecond pulses at 351 nm is widely described with exponential dynamics. In this Letter, a particular experimental setup allowed us to study damage growth with a large beam and fluences near damage growth threshold for a high number of shots. This allowed us to observe and characterize a regime with a slow and linear growth dynamic not documented in the literature and yet fundamental for the operation of high-power laser installations.
Continuous-wave terahertz in-line holographic diffraction tomography with the scattering fields reconstructed by a physics-enhanced deep neural network
Authors: Jin Xiaoyu , Zhao Jie , Wang Dayong , Healy John J. , Rong Lu , Wang Yunxin , Lin Shufeng
Published: October 2023

Diffraction tomography is a promising, quantitative, and nondestructive three-dimensional (3D) imaging method that enables us to obtain the complex refractive index distribution of a sample. The acquisition of the scattered fields under the different illumination angles is a key issue, where the complex scattered fields need to be retrieved. Presently, in order to develop terahertz (THz) diffraction tomography, the advanced acquisition of the scattered fields is desired. In this paper, a THz in-line digital holographic diffraction tomography (THz-IDHDT) is proposed with an extremely compact optical configuration and implemented for the first time, to the best of our knowledge. A learning-based phase retrieval algorithm by combining the physical model and the convolution neural networks, named the physics-enhanced deep neural network (PhysenNet), is applied to reconstruct the THz in-line digital hologram, and obtain the complex amplitude distribution of the sample with high fidelity. The advantages of the PhysenNet are that there is no need for pretraining by using a large set of labeled data, and it can also work for thick samples. Experimentally with a continuous-wave THz laser, the PhysenNet is first demonstrated by using the thin samples and exhibits superiority in terms of imaging quality. More importantly, with regard to the thick samples, PhysenNet still works well, and can offer 2D complex scattered fields for diffraction tomography. Furthermore, the 3D refractive index maps of two types of foam sphere samples are successfully reconstructed by the proposed method. For a single foam sphere, the relative error of the average refractive index value is only 0.17%, compared to the commercial THz time-domain spectroscopy system. This demonstrates the feasibility and high accuracy of the THz-IDHDT, and the idea can be applied to other wavebands as well.
Fano resonance-enhanced Si/MoS2 photodetector
Authors: Gong Tianxun , Yan Boyuan , Zhang Taiping , Huang Wen , He Yuhao , Xu Xiaoyu , Sun Song , Zhang Xiaosheng
Published: October 2023

In this work, a Si/MoS2 heterojunction photodetector enhanced by hot electron injection through Fano resonance is developed. By preparing Au oligomers using capillary-assisted particle assembly (CAPA) on the silicon substrate with a nanohole array and covering few-layer MoS2 with Au electrodes on top of the oligomer structures, the Fano resonance couples with a Si/MoS2 heterojunction. With on-resonance excitation, Fano resonance generated many hot electrons on the surface of oligomers, and the hot electrons were injected into MoS2, providing an increased current in the photodetector under a bias voltage. The photodetectors exhibited a broadband photoresponse ranging from 450 to 1064 nm, and a large responsivity up to 52 A/W at a wavelength of 785 nm under a bias voltage of 3 V. The demonstrated Fano resonance-enhanced Si/MoS2 heterojunction photodetector provides a strategy to improve the photoresponsivity of two-dimensional materials-based photodetectors for optoelectronic applications in the field of visible and near-infrared detection.
Pleiotropic hubs drive bacterial surface competition through parallel changes in colony composition and expansion
Authors: van Gestel Jordi , Wagner Andreas , Ackermann Martin
Published: October 2023

Bacteria commonly adhere to surfaces where they compete for both space and resources. Despite the importance of surface growth, it remains largely elusive how bacteria evolve on surfaces. We previously performed an evolution experiment where we evolved distinct Bacilli populations under a selective regime that favored colony spreading. In just a few weeks, colonies of Bacillus subtilis showed strongly advanced expansion rates, increasing their radius 2.5-fold relative to that of the ancestor. Here, we investigate what drives their rapid evolution by performing a uniquely detailed analysis of the evolutionary changes in colony development. We find mutations in diverse global regulators, RicT, RNAse Y, and LexA, with strikingly similar pleiotropic effects: They lower the rate of sporulation and simultaneously facilitate colony expansion by either reducing extracellular polysaccharide production or by promoting filamentous growth. Combining both high-throughput flow cytometry and gene expression profiling, we show that regulatory mutations lead to highly reproducible and parallel changes in global gene expression, affecting approximately 45% of all genes. This parallelism results from the coordinated manner by which regulators change activity both during colony development—in the transition from vegetative growth to dormancy—and over evolutionary time. This coordinated activity can however also break down, leading to evolutionary divergence. Altogether, we show how global regulators function as major pleiotropic hubs that drive rapid surface adaptation by mediating parallel changes in both colony composition and expansion, thereby massively reshaping gene expression.
Rational social distancing policy during epidemics with limited healthcare capacity
Authors: Schnyder Simon K. , Molina John J. , Yamamoto Ryoichi , Turner Matthew S.
Published: October 2023

Epidemics of infectious diseases posing a serious risk to human health have occurred throughout history. During recent epidemics there has been much debate about policy, including how and when to impose restrictions on behaviour. Policymakers must balance a complex spectrum of objectives, suggesting a need for quantitative tools. Whether health services might be ‘overwhelmed’ has emerged as a key consideration. Here we show how costly interventions, such as taxes or subsidies on behaviour, can be used to exactly align individuals’ decision making with government preferences even when these are not aligned. In order to achieve this, we develop a nested optimisation algorithm of both the government intervention strategy and the resulting equilibrium behaviour of individuals. We focus on a situation in which the capacity of the healthcare system to treat patients is limited and identify conditions under which the disease dynamics respect the capacity limit. We find an extremely sharp drop in peak infections at a critical maximum infection cost in the government’s objective function. This is in marked contrast to the gradual reduction of infections if individuals make decisions without government intervention. We find optimal interventions vary less strongly in time when interventions are costly to the government and that the critical cost of the policy switch depends on how costly interventions are.
Schistosoma haematobium infection and morbidity risk factors for pre-school age children in western Angola: A knowledge, attitudes and practices survey
Authors: Sánchez-Marqués Raquel , Salvador Fernando , Bocanegra Cristina , Nindia Arlette , Pintar Zeferino , Martínez Joan , Aixut Sandra , Pessela Agostinho , Ramírez-Arroyo Sheila , Farrés Aina , Chopo María , Izquierdo Silvia , Mas-Coma Santiago , Bargues María Dolores , Molina Israel
Published: October 2023

Background

Urogenital schistosomiasis is one of the most prevalent parasitic diseases in sub-Saharan Africa. It is a poverty-related disease conditioned by behavioural practices.

Methods

Our objective is to evaluate the awareness, mindset and habits about urogenital schistosomiasis in the community of Cubal (Angola), as well as its association with infection and urinary tract morbidity in pre-school age children. A cross-sectional study of knowledge, attitudes and practices at home was conducted between February and May 2022 with 250 participants.

Results

Overall, 93.6% of those surveyed had some prior knowledge about schistosomiasis and, among all the symptoms associated with this disease, blood in the urine was the best known (54.4%). Nevertheless, 57.6% obtained a medium knowledge score. Regarding attitude, the majority of respondents had a high attitude score (79.2%) with 96.0% willing to participate in mass drug administration campaigns. Laundry in the river was the most common risk practice (61.2%) and 55.2% out of the total were classified with a low practice score.

Conclusion

Low knowledge about symptoms and transmission by caregivers was the outstanding risk factor for infection in pre-school age children (OR = 16.93, 95%CI: 3.93–72.82), and lack of knowledge that avoiding entering the river prevents schistosomiasis was the main risk factor for morbidity in PSAC (OR = 8.14, 95%CI: 1.14–58.25).
Discounting of delayed rewards: Missing data imputation for the 21- and 27-item monetary choice questionnaires
Authors: Yeh Yu-Hua , Tegge Allison N. , Freitas-Lemos Roberta , Myerson Joel , Green Leonard , Bickel Warren K.
Published: October 2023

The Monetary Choice Questionnaire (MCQ) is a widely used behavioral task that measures the rate of delay discounting (i.e., k), the degree to which a delayed reward loses its present value as a function of the time to its receipt. Both 21- and 27-item MCQs have been extensively validated and proven valuable in research. Different methods have been developed to streamline MCQ scoring. However, existing scoring methods have yet to tackle the issue of missing responses or provide clear guidance on imputing such data. Due to this lack of knowledge, the present study developed and compared three imputation approaches that leverage the MCQ’s structure and prioritize ease of implementation. Additionally, their performance was compared with mode imputation. A Monte Carlo simulation was conducted to evaluate the performance of these approaches in handling various missing responses in each observation across two datasets from prior studies that employed the 21- and 27-item MCQs. One of the three approaches consistently outperformed mode imputation across all performance measures. This approach involves imputing missing values using congruent non-missing responses to the items corresponding to the same k value or introducing random responses when congruent answers are unavailable. This investigation unveils a straightforward method for imputing missing data in the MCQ while ensuring unbiased estimates. Along with the investigation, an R tool was developed for researchers to implement this strategy while streamlining the MCQ scoring process.
Competing-risks model for predicting the prognostic value of lymph nodes in medullary thyroid carcinoma
Authors: Shang Fangjian , Liu Xiaodan , Ren Xin , Li Yanlin , Cai Lei , Sun Yujia , Wen Jian , Zhai Xiaodan
Published: October 2023

Background

Medullary thyroid carcinoma (MTC) is an infrequent form malignant tumor with a poor prognosis. Because of the influence of competitive risk, there may suffer from bias in the analysis of prognostic factors of MTC.

Methods

By extracting the data of patients diagnosed with MTC registered in the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database from 1998 to 2016, we established the Cox proportional-hazards and competing-risks model to retrospectively analyze the impact of related factors on lymph nodes statistically.

Results

A total of 2,435 patients were included in the analysis, of which 198 died of MTC. The results of the multifactor competing-risk model showed that the number of total lymph nodes (19–89), positive lymph nodes (1–10,11–75) and positive lymph node ratio (25%-53%,>54%), age (46–60,>61), chemotherapy, mode of radiotherapy (others), tumor size(2-4cm,>4cm), number of lesions greater than 1 were poor prognostic factors for MTC. For the number of total lymph nodes, unlike the multivariate Cox proportional-hazards model results, we found that it became an independent risk factor after excluding competitive risk factors. Competitive risk factors have little effect on the number of positive lymph nodes. For the proportion of positive lymph nodes, we found that after excluding competitive risk factors, the Cox proportional-hazards model overestimates its impact on prognosis. The competitive risk model is often more accurate in analyzing the effects of prognostic factors.

Conclusions

After excluding the competitive risk, the number of lymph nodes, the number of positive and the positive proportion are the poor prognostic factors of medullary thyroid cancer, which can help clinicians more accurately evaluate the prognosis of patients with medullary thyroid cancer and provide a reference for treatment decision-making.
A dual-channel secondary closed-loop supply chain considering retail groups and fairness concerns
Authors: Tan Yue , Guo Chunxiang
Published: October 2023

The rise of retail groups has strengthened their voice in the supply chain, drawing more attention from supply chain members to the issue of profit fairness. To explore the influence of fairness concerns on operational decisions in closed-loop supply chains after the formation of retail groups. In this paper, we first construct a secondary dual-channel closed-loop supply chain led by a retail group and followed by a manufacturer. Next, the corresponding game models are constructed under three scenarios, namely, fairness neutrality (FN), fairness concerns of the retail groups (FR), and fairness concerns of the manufacturer (FM), respectively. Finally, the game models are solved and analyzed. It turns out that it is easier for the manufacturer to satisfy its demands for fairness by adjusting the wholesale price. Furthermore, we find that fairness concerns do not enhance the recycling rate of used products and the greenness of remanufacturing. For retail groups, fairness concerns can hurt their profits, but appropriate fairness concerns can contribute to profitable growth in their retail business. Interestingly, the manufacturer’s fairness concerns do not affect the total profitability of the supply chain system, but the retail group’s fairness concerns do. This paper identifies dual changes in the scope of operations and power structure of retail groups in closed-loop supply chains, as well as analyzes the fairness concerns raised by these changes, which will lead to new recommendations for operational decision-making in firms.
Characterization of spatiotemporal dynamics of binary and graded tonic pain in humans using intracranial recordings
Authors: Caston Rose M. , Smith Elliot H. , Davis Tyler S. , Singh Hargunbir , Rahimpour Shervin , Rolston John D.
Published: October 2023

Pain is a complex experience involving sensory, emotional, and cognitive aspects, and multiple networks manage its processing in the brain. Examining how pain transforms into a behavioral response can shed light on the networks’ relationships and facilitate interventions to treat chronic pain. However, studies using high spatial and temporal resolution methods to investigate the neural encoding of pain and its psychophysical correlates have been limited. We recorded from intracranial stereo-EEG (sEEG) electrodes implanted in sixteen different brain regions of twenty patients who underwent psychophysical pain testing consisting of a tonic thermal stimulus to the hand. Broadband high-frequency local field potential amplitude (HFA; 70–150 Hz) was isolated to investigate the relationship between the ongoing neural activity and the resulting psychophysical pain evaluations. Two different generalized linear mixed-effects models (GLME) were employed to assess the neural representations underlying binary and graded pain psychophysics. The first model examined the relationship between HFA and whether the patient responded "yes" or "no" to whether the trial was painful. The second model investigated the relationship between HFA and how painful the stimulus was rated on a visual analog scale. GLMEs revealed that HFA in the inferior temporal gyrus (ITG), superior frontal gyrus (SFG), and superior temporal gyrus (STG) predicted painful responses at stimulus onset. An increase in HFA in the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), SFG, and striatum predicted pain responses at stimulus offset. Numerous regions, including the anterior cingulate cortex, hippocampus, IFG, MTG, OFC, and striatum, predicted the pain rating at stimulus onset. However, only the amygdala and fusiform gyrus predicted increased pain ratings at stimulus offset. We characterized the spatiotemporal representations of binary and graded painful responses during tonic pain stimuli. Our study provides evidence from intracranial recordings that the neural encoding of psychophysical pain changes over time during a tonic thermal stimulus, with different brain regions being predictive of pain at the beginning and end of the stimulus.
Client experiences using a new supervised consumption service in Sudbury, Ontario: A qualitative study
Authors: Ali Farihah , Russell Cayley , Kaura Ashima , Leslie Peter , Bayoumi Ahmed M. , Hopkins Shaun , Wells Samantha
Published: October 2023

Overdoses are increasing in the province of Ontario, Canada, where northern communities such as Sudbury have witnessed disproportionately elevated rates, with opioid-related deaths double that of the provincial average. To address this issue, governments have implemented supervised consumption services (SCS) where people who use drugs (PWUD) can use their pre-obtained substances onsite under trained supervision. In September 2022, the city of Sudbury opened its first SCS, ‘The Spot’, but the site’s sustainability is contingent on demonstrating benefit to PWUD and the neighboring community. We undertook a qualitative study exploring experiences among clients who used the consumption service inside The Spot. In December 2022, clients of The Spot were invited to participate in a brief survey which collected socio-demographic information and substance use profiles, followed by an in-person semi-structured qualitative interview. Participant survey and interview data were combined with administrative site utilization data provided by site staff of all clients who accessed the consumption service from September 2022 to August 2023 to examine overall service utilization and uptake. Qualitative data were analyzed using iterative thematic analysis techniques, and results were informed by common responses to research questions. The responses were narratively presented. Administrative site utilization data highlighted a relatively stable increase in uptake and utilization of the site since its inception. A total of 20 clients participated in the survey and semi-structured interviews. Participants described the importance of the site in preventing and responding to overdoses, providing a safe and comfortable environment to consume their drugs, and decreasing public drug use, which they suggested may potentially reduce stigmatization in the community. However, clients also suggested challenges, including issues regarding site operational policies that hindered consumption room utilization. Service suggestions made by clients to improve site utilization include the addition of inhalation services, relocating the site to a location in downtown Sudbury where PWUD commonly congregate, and extending operational hours. Positive impacts and recommendations can be drawn on and considered by other northern or rural communities interested in implementing similar harm reduction services.
On the effectiveness of a contrastive cascade graph learning framework: The power of synthetic cascade data
Authors: Suzuki Daiki , Tsugawa Sho , Tsukamoto Keiichiro , Igari Shintaro
Published: October 2023

Analyzing the dynamics of information diffusion cascades and accurately predicting their behavior holds significant importance in various applications. In this paper, we concentrate specifically on a recently introduced contrastive cascade graph learning framework, for the task of predicting cascade popularity. This framework follows a pre-training and fine-tuning paradigm to address cascade prediction tasks. In a previous study, the transferability of pre-trained models within the contrastive cascade graph learning framework was examined solely between two social media datasets. However, in our present study, we comprehensively evaluate the transferability of pre-trained models across 13 real datasets and six synthetic datasets. We construct several pre-trained models using real cascades and synthetic cascades generated by the independent cascade model and the Profile model. Then, we fine-tune these pre-trained models on real cascade datasets and evaluate their prediction accuracy based on the mean squared logarithmic error. The main findings derived from our results are as follows. (1) The pre-trained models exhibit transferability across diverse types of real datasets in different domains, encompassing different languages, social media platforms, and diffusion time scales. (2) Synthetic cascade data prove effective for pre-training purposes. The pre-trained models constructed with synthetic cascade data demonstrate comparable effectiveness to those constructed using real data. (3) Synthetic cascade data prove beneficial for fine-tuning the contrastive cascade graph learning models and training other state-of-the-art popularity prediction models. Models trained using a combination of real and synthetic cascades yield significantly lower mean squared logarithmic error compared to those trained solely on real cascades. Our findings affirm the effectiveness of synthetic cascade data in enhancing the accuracy of cascade popularity prediction.
Can the archive restore you? A study of three works: Mpho Khwezi’s A Piece of Paper (2020), Abri de Swardt’s Ridder Thirst (2018) and Eva Knopf’s Majubs Reise (2013)
Authors: Kros Cynthia
Published: October 2023

The article is intended to contribute to a growing debate about how to approach and interact with problematic archives. The article examines three works made by a photographer and two filmmakers, respectively, based on their artistic interactions with their respective archives. Their works were brought to annual workshops in 2019 and 2020 organized by Reframing Africa, co-hosted by the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) and the Market Photo Workshop in Johannesburg. The central objective of Reframing Africa continues to be lobbying for the preservation, restoration and repatriation of films made by African filmmakers on the continent and in the diaspora. But there has also been growing interest among participants in the colonial and other racially inflected archives of the moving/still image. The main title of the article, ‘Can the archive restore you?’, is intended to echo that of Nigerian filmmaker Onyeka Igwe’s short film No Archive Can Restore You (). The article argues that the engagement by the authors of the three works with deeply problematic visual archives has produced significant insights into their construction and the ways in which they represent ‘reality’ and ‘truth’. Each of the three artistic interventions does suggest how even the bleakest archival materials, however, can be used as the basis for activating the restorative potential of the archive. The works discussed are Mpho Khwezi’s A Piece of Paper, Abri de Swardt’s Ridder Thirst and Eva Knopf’s Majubs Reise.
Una aproximación a la perspectiva ecofeminista en Dune (1965) de Frank Herbert: naturaleza, sujeto nómade y concienciación medioambiental
Authors: Pardo Prado Sara
Published: October 2023

El presente artículo analiza los distintos y variados elementos que hacen de la novela de Frank Herbert Dune (1965) no solo la primera novela de ciencia ficción ecológica, sino una obra clave en seno de los environmental studies y la ecología en la década de 1960 en Estados Unidos. Bajo este parámetro, este artículo académico aborda su reconceptualización en clave ecofeminista a través del tropo del desierto y los elementos naturales del agua y la especia como símbolos que critican el comportamiento antropocentrista del ser humano sobre el medio y fomentan la concienciación medioambiental en la población. Para este desarrollo, serán claves el estudio sobre el desierto de Catrin Gersdorf y las consideraciones sobre el agua de Gaston Bachelard y Vandana Shiva, abogando por la creación de una política de acción-reflexión a través del compromiso ético, la solidaridad con el medio y la conservación de los diferentes sistemas y ciclos naturales. En última instancia, la metodología empleada pretende hallar un punto de encuentro en el análisis filosófico de Gilles Deleuze y Félix Guattari sobre el sujeto nómade como forma de resistencia a la dominación socioeconómica y agente activo y reactivo con el territorio a través del segundo volumen de su obra colaborativa Capitalismo y esquizofrenia (1972). De esta forma, se busca reformular este pensamiento a la luz de la teoría ecofeminista contemporánea llevada a cabo por Rosi Braidotti y Carolina Meloni, con el objetivo de rescatar la corriente de pensamiento deleuze-guattariana hacia una nueva teoría nómada feminista aplicada al espacio fronterizo, desarrollando así una concienciación política, ética y ecológica sostenible e inclusiva para todo grupo social y especie.
Clientelist Mobilization and Political Participation Outside of the Electoral Arena
Authors: Holzner Claudio A.
Published: October 2023

Scholarship on clientelist mobilization has focused almost exclusively on electoral clientelism, that is efforts by patrons and brokers to encourage turnout and participation in campaign rallies. What is less well understood is the impact of clientelist mobilization on other modes of political participation, like protest activity and citizen claim making. To fill this gap, I use LAPOP survey data from 2010 and 2014 to explore the relationship between vote-buying and nonelectoral forms of political activity. Despite the expectation by many that collective action and clientelist mobilization are incompatible, this study finds a strong relationship between vote-buying efforts and participation in protests in most of Latin America. Similarly, people who receive vote-buying offers are much more likely to engage in claim-making activities. I explore the mechanisms through which clientelism encourages political activism, highlighting ways that clientelist networks work through civic organizations and foster stronger partisan identities and greater political engagement.
Vezetési stílusok hatása a digitális transzformációra
Authors: Dióssy Kitti , Losonci Dávid István , Városiné Demeter Krisztina
Published: October 2023

A legújabb ipari forradalom jelentősen átalakítja az üzleti világot és sok vállalatot digitális transzformációra ösztönöz. A digitális transzformáció során a vállalat a szervezeti működés több területén (pl. stratégia, szervezet, technológia) változtat azért, hogy azok a digitális megoldások vállalati intézményesítését támogassák. A szakirodalom alapján kijelenthető, hogy a vezetői stílus kulcsfontosságú tényező a vállalatok transzformációs törekvéseiben. A szerzők kutatásukban azt vizsgálják, hogy a vezetői stílusok milyen hatással vannak a digitális transzformációra. Elemzésükhöz 94 feldolgozóipari vállalat adatait használták fel, amelyek a Versenyképesség Kutató Központ kérdőíves felméréséből származnak. A feladatorientált és kapcsolatorientált vezetői stílusok jellemzői keverten jelennek meg: az egyik feltárt stílus a célokra és megvalósításra fókuszál, a másik a teljesítményre és emberre. A digitális transzformáció szintén két pillérre épül: a digitális transzformációs stratégia mellett a digitális transzformációs tevékenységekre. Fő megállapításuk, hogy a digitális transzformációs stratégiára mindkét vezetői stílus szignifikáns pozitív hatással van. A digitális transzformációs tevékenységekre azonban csak a célokra és megvalósításra fókuszáló stílus hat pozitívan.
A magyar kis-és középvállalkozások digitális érettsége – A Digiméter index: az eredmények ismertetése
Authors: Pintér Róbert
Published: October 2023

A cikk egy két részes cikksorozat második darabja, amely a KKV-digitalizációt kutató Digiméter kutatássorozat módszertanát és főbb eredményeit ismerteti (az első rész az elméleti alapokat mutatta be). A Digiméter kutatássorozat célja a KKV-digitalizáció rendszeres mérése Magyarországon hat dimenzióban: digitális jelenlét, digitális mindennapok, vállalkozásvezetés, értékesítés és marketing, pénzügyek, informatikai biztonság. A mérések alapján a fő index értékében 2020 és 2022 között nem volt érdemi elmozdulás. Az informatikai eszközöket a KKV-k azok lehetséges potenciálja alatt használják ki Magyarországon. A Digiméter kutatássorozat előnye, hogy ugyanazzal a módszertannal elérhetők az adatok és a feltett kérdések objektívek, nem a felkészültség szubjektív megítélésén alapulnak. A kutatássorozat korlátja, hogy az egységes módszertan miatt az egyes gazdasági ágazatok egyedi digitalizációs eltéréseit nem méri. A Digiméter távlati célja annak azonosítása, hogy mi tehetné hatékonyabbá a magyar KKV-k digitalizációját.