bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The Layerizing VoxPoint Annular Convolutional Network for 3D Shape Classification
Authors: Wang Tong , Tao Wenyuan , Own Chung‐Ming , Lou Xiantuo , Zhao Yuehua
Published: November 2020

Analyzing the geometric and semantic properties of 3D point cloud data via the deep learning networks is still challenging due to the irregularity and sparsity of samplings of their geometric structures. In our study, the authors combine the advantage of voxels and point clouds by presenting a new data form of voxel models, called Layer‐Ring data. This data type can retain the fine description of the 3D data, and keep the high efficiency of feature extraction. After that, based on the Layer‐Ring data, a modern network architecture, called VoxPoint Annular Network (VAN), works on the Layer‐Ring data for the feature extraction and object category prediction. The design idea is based on the edge‐extraction and the coordinate representation for each voxel on the separated layer With the flexible design, our proposed VAN can adapt to the layer's geometric variability and scalability Finally, the extensive experiments and comparisons demonstrate that our approach obtained the notable results with the state‐of‐the‐art methods on a variety of standard benchmark datasets (e.g., ModelNet10, ModelNet40). Moreover, the tests also proved that 3D shape features could learn efficiently and robustly. All relevant codes will be available at https://github.com/helloFionaQ/Vox‐PointNet.
Human Pose Transfer by Adaptive Hierarchical Deformation
Authors: Zhang Jinsong , Liu Xingzi , Li Kun
Published: November 2020

Human pose transfer, as a misaligned image generation task, is very challenging. Existing methods cannot effectively utilize the input information, which often fail to preserve the style and shape of hair and clothes. In this paper, we propose an adaptive human pose transfer network with two hierarchical deformation levels. The first level generates human semantic parsing aligned with the target pose, and the second level generates the final textured person image in the target pose with the semantic guidance. To avoid the drawback of vanilla convolution that treats all the pixels as valid information, we use gated convolution in both two levels to dynamically select the important features and adaptively deform the image layer by layer. Our model has very few parameters and is fast to converge. Experimental results demonstrate that our model achieves better performance with more consistent hair, face and clothes with fewer parameters than state‐of‐the‐art methods. Furthermore, our method can be applied to clothing texture transfer. The code is available for research purposes at https://github.com/Zhangjinso/PINet_PG.
Personalized Hand Modeling from Multiple Postures with Multi‐View Color Images
Authors: Wang Yangang , Rao Ruting , Zou Changqing
Published: November 2020

Personalized hand models can be utilized to synthesize high quality hand datasets, provide more possible training data for deep learning and improve the accuracy of hand pose estimation. In recent years, parameterized hand models, e.g., MANO, are widely used for obtaining personalized hand models. However, due to the low resolution of existing parameterized hand models, it is still hard to obtain high‐fidelity personalized hand models. In this paper, we propose a new method to estimate personalized hand models from multiple hand postures with multi‐view color images. The personalized hand model is represented by a personalized neutral hand, and multiple hand postures. We propose a novel optimization strategy to estimate the neutral hand from multiple hand postures. To demonstrate the performance of our method, we have built a multi‐view system and captured more than 35 people, and each of them has 30 hand postures. We hope the estimated hand models can boost the research of high‐fidelity parameterized hand modeling in the future. All the hand models are publicly available on www.yangangwang.com.
PointSkelCNN: Deep Learning‐Based 3D Human Skeleton Extraction from Point Clouds
Authors: Qin Hongxing , Zhang Songshan , Liu Qihuang , Chen Li , Chen Baoquan
Published: November 2020

A 3D human skeleton plays important roles in human shape reconstruction and human animation. Remarkable advances have been achieved recently in 3D human skeleton estimation from color and depth images via a powerful deep convolutional neural network. However, applying deep learning frameworks to 3D human skeleton extraction from point clouds remains challenging because of the sparsity of point clouds and the high nonlinearity of human skeleton regression. In this study, we develop a deep learning‐based approach for 3D human skeleton extraction from point clouds. We convert 3D human skeleton extraction into offset vector regression and human body segmentation via deep learning‐based point cloud contraction. Furthermore, a disambiguation strategy is adopted to improve the robustness of joint points regression. Experiments on the public human pose dataset UBC3V and the human point cloud skeleton dataset 3DHumanSkeleton compiled by the authors show that the proposed approach outperforms the state‐of‐the‐art methods.
Deep Separation of Direct and Global Components from a Single Photograph under Structured Lighting
Authors: Duan Z. , Bieron J. , Peers P.
Published: November 2020

We present a deep learning based solution for separating the direct and global light transport components from a single photograph captured under high frequency structured lighting with a co‐axial projector‐camera setup. We employ an architecture with one encoder and two decoders that shares information between the encoder and the decoders, as well as between both decoders to ensure a consistent decomposition between both light transport components. Furthermore, our deep learning separation approach does not require binary structured illumination, allowing us to utilize the full resolution capabilities of the projector. Consequently, our deep separation network is able to achieve high fidelity decompositions for lighting frequency sensitive features such as subsurface scattering and specular reflections. We evaluate and demonstrate our direct and global separation method on a wide variety of synthetic and captured scenes.
Pixel‐wise Dense Detector for Image Inpainting
Authors: Zhang Ruisong , Quan Weize , Wu Baoyuan , Li Zhifeng , Yan Dong‐Ming
Published: November 2020

Recent GAN‐based image inpainting approaches adopt an average strategy to discriminate the generated image and output a scalar, which inevitably lose the position information of visual artifacts. Moreover, the adversarial loss and reconstruction loss (e.g., ℓ1loss) are combined with tradeoff weights, which are also difficult to tune. In this paper, we propose a novel detection‐based generative framework for image inpainting, which adopts the min‐max strategy in an adversarial process. The generator follows an encoder‐decoder architecture to fill the missing regions, and the detector using weakly supervised learning localizes the position of artifacts in a pixel‐wise manner. Such position information makes the generator pay attention to artifacts and further enhance them. More importantly, we explicitly insert the output of the detector into the reconstruction loss with a weighting criterion, which balances the weight of the adversarial loss and reconstruction loss automatically rather than manual operation. Experiments on multiple public datasets show the superior performance of the proposed framework. The source code is available at https://github.com/Evergrow/GDN_Inpainting.
Diversifying Semantic Image Synthesis and Editing via Class‐ and Layer‐wise VAEs
Authors: Endo Y. , Kanamori Y.
Published: November 2020

Semantic image synthesis is a process for generating photorealistic images from a single semantic mask. To enrich the diversity of multimodal image synthesis, previous methods have controlled the global appearance of an output image by learning a single latent space. However, a single latent code is often insufficient for capturing various object styles because object appearance depends on multiple factors. To handle individual factors that determine object styles, we propose a class‐ and layer‐wise extension to the variational autoencoder (VAE) framework that allows flexible control over each object class at the local to global levels by learning multiple latent spaces. Furthermore, we demonstrate that our method generates images that are both plausible and more diverse compared to state‐of‐the‐art methods via extensive experiments with real and synthetic datasets in three different domains. We also show that our method enables a wide range of applications in image synthesis and editing tasks.
Interactive Design and Preview of Colored Snapshots of Indoor Scenes
Authors: Fu Qiang , Yan Hai , Fu Hongbo , Li Xueming
Published: November 2020

This paper presents an interactive system for quickly designing and previewing colored snapshots of indoor scenes. Different from high‐quality 3D indoor scene rendering, which often takes several minutes to render a moderately complicated scene under a specific color theme with high‐performance computing devices, our system aims at improving the effectiveness of color theme design of indoor scenes and employs an image colorization approach to efficiently obtain high‐resolution snapshots with editable colors. Given several pre‐rendered, multi‐layer, gray images of the same indoor scene snapshot, our system is designed to colorize and merge them into a single colored snapshot. Our system also assists users in assigning colors to certain objects/components and infers more harmonious colors for the unassigned objects based on pre‐collected priors to guide the colorization. The quickly generated snapshots of indoor scenes provide previews of interior design schemes with different color themes, making it easy to determine the personalized design of indoor scenes. To demonstrate the usability and effectiveness of this system, we present a series of experimental results on indoor scenes of different types, and compare our method with a state‐of‐the‐art method for indoor scene material and color suggestion and offline/online rendering software packages.
Multi‐scale Information Assembly for Image Matting
Authors: Qiao Yu , Liu Yuhao , Zhu Qiang , Yang Xin , Wang Yuxin , Zhang Qiang , Wei Xiaopeng
Published: November 2020

Image matting is a long‐standing problem in computer graphics and vision, mostly identified as the accurate estimation of the foreground in input images. We argue that the foreground objects can be represented by different‐level information, including the central bodies, large‐grained boundaries, refined details, etc. Based on this observation, in this paper, we propose a multi‐scale information assembly framework (MSIA‐matte) to pull out high‐quality alpha mattes from single RGB images. Technically speaking, given an input image, we extract advanced semantics as our subject content and retain initial CNN features to encode different‐level foreground expression, then combine them by our well‐designed information assembly strategy. Extensive experiments can prove the effectiveness of the proposed MSIA‐matte, and we can achieve state‐of‐the‐art performance compared to most existing matting networks.
Classifying and clustering malicious advertisement uniform resource locators using deep learning
Authors: Zhang Xichen , Habibi Lashkari Arash , Ghorbani Ali A.
Published: November 2020

Malicious online advertisement detection has attracted increasing attention in recent years in both academia and industry. The existing advertising blocking systems are vulnerable to the evolution of new attacks and can cause time latency issues by analyzing web content or querying remote servers. This article proposes a lightweight detection system for advertisement Uniform resource locators (URLs) detection, depending only on lexical‐based features. Deep learning algorithms are used for online advertising classification. After optimizing the deep neural network architecture, our proposed approach can achieve satisfactory results with false negative rate as low as 1.31%. We also design a novel unsupervised method for data clustering. With the implementation of AutoEncoder for feature preprocessing and t‐distributed stochastic neighbor embedding for clustering and visualization, our model outperforms other dimensionality reduction algorithms by generating clear clusterings for different URL families.
Prioritizing human safety and multispecies connectivity across a regional road network
Authors: Lee Tracy S. , Creech Tyler G. , Martinson Adam , Nielsen Scott E. , Jakes Andrew F. , Jones Paul F. , Sanderson Ken , Ford Adam T.
Published: November 2020

The intersection of wildlife and people on roads raises two critical issues: the barrier and mortality effects of roads on wildlife and risks to people from animal‐vehicle collisions (AVCs). Road mitigation decisions are typically made at the discretion of transportation departments that are mandated to primarily address motorist safety. Therefore, prioritization of road sections for mitigation currently focuses on identification of spatial clusters of AVCs. We sought to understand if AVC clusters align with multispecies connectivity across roads to accurately identify multipurpose mitigation hotspots. We developed a decision‐support tool based on weighted priorities for mitigation planning across 7,900 km of roads over an 84,000‐km2 area of southern Alberta, Canada. To assess alignment, we built functional connectivity models for four focal species (prairie rattlesnake, grizzly bear, mule deer, and pronghorn) and a species‐neutral structural connectivity model. We integrated AVC risk and wildlife connectivity indices into Mitigation Priority Indices that varied the weighting of individual indices. Our results demonstrated poor spatial alignment between road sections of high motorist safety risk and those of high value for wildlife connectivity. Transportation planning would benefit from integrating motorist safety risk and wildlife management needs to prioritize mitigation neighborhoods along roadways.
Endpoint marking during peroral endoscopic myotomy: Indocyanine green injection combined with infrared imaging
Authors: Kurumi Hiroki , Isomoto Hajime , Ikebuchi Yuichiro
Published: November 2020

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Evaluation of the SPECTRUM training programme for real‐time continuous glucose monitoring: A real‐world multicentre prospective study in 120 adults with type 1 diabetes
Authors: Schlüter Sandra , Freckmann Guido , Heinemann Lutz , Wintergerst Peter , Lange Karin
Published: November 2020

Aims

Comprehensive knowledge, specific skills and data‐analysis competences are prerequisites for the successful use of continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) systems. SPECTRUM is a structured training programme for real‐time CGM (rtCGM) consisting of a web‐based introduction and six group sessions of 90 min each. The ‘CGM‐TRAIN study’ evaluated the efficacy and acceptance of SPECTRUM and rtCGM systems among adults with insulin therapy.

Methods

Participants (n = 120) were recruited from 10 German diabetes centres in which they were treated under usual care conditions. Outcome measures were rtCGM knowledge, practical skills, satisfaction with the training programme, satisfaction and acceptance of rtCGM system and glycaemic control. Data were collected at study entry, after training completion and at 6‐month follow‐up.

Results

All participants were diagnosed with type 1 diabetes (56% women, mean age 42.4 ± 13.4 years, diabetes duration 21.6 ± 11.6 years), 110 participants completed the course. After training completion, rtCGM‐specific knowledge had improved by 43% (scale: 0–40 points) from 21.2 ± 7.6 to 30.4 ± 4.5 points; p < 0.001. The knowledge‐level persisted until follow‐up (29.4 ± 4.5). Participants were able to master nearly all the practical requirements of the technology. In addition, rtCGM was highly accepted, and participants were motivated to use their systems continuously. HbA1c improved slightly from 61 ± 14 mmol/mol (7.7 ± 1.3%) before training to 60 ± 14 mmol/mol (7.6 ± 1.3%) at follow‐up (p = 0.04). The training programme itself was favourably rated by participants.

Conclusions

Under usual out‐patient daily care conditions, the training programme SPECTRUM improved knowledge and skills about rtCGM in adults with type 1 diabetes. This was associated with a reduced HbA1c, high satisfaction and acceptance of rtCGM (Clinical Trials Registry no.: DRKS00014380).
Embedding environmental sustainability within the modern dental curriculum— Exploring current practice and developing a shared understanding
Authors: Duane Brett , Dixon Jonathan , Ambibola Giwa , Aldana Clara , Couglan James , Henao Daniel , Daniela Timus , Veiga Nélio , Martin Nicolas , Darragh Jáuregui‐Hogan , Ramasubbu Darshini , Perez Francesc , Schwendicke Falk , Correia Maria , Quinteros Maria , Van Harten Maria , Paganelli Corrado , Vos Peter , Moreno Lopez Rosa , Field James
Published: November 2020

Introduction

Evidence concerning the interactions between human health and planetary health has grown extensively in recent years. In turn, the perceived importance of environmental sustainability within higher education is growing at a rapid rate. This paper provides a summary of key elements as they apply to dentistry, and provides an introduction to the reader of an early consensus of how sustainability could be included as part of the dental curriculum.

Methods

The consensus opinion within this paper largely centres around discussion at the ADEE sustainability workshop at the annual conference in Berlin (August 2019). In order to help inform discussions at the workshop, a brief scoping questionnaire was circulated to potential participants regarding their understanding and current teaching practices in sustainability. An infographic was designed to help delegates remember the important elements of sustainable dentistry. Delegates discussed the concept of sustainability alongside the infographic, and how they could link these with the Graduating European Dentist (GED) curriculum.

Results

The discussions within the workshop largely centred around 4 main themes: Disease prevention and health promotion, Patient education and empowerment, Lean service delivery and Preferential use of strategies with lower environmental impact.

Discussion

It is apparent that there is a widespread need for teaching materials relating to environmental sustainability; this includes specific learning outcomes relating to the 4 educational domains of the Graduating European Dentist curriculum, and methods for teaching and assessing these outcomes.

Conclusion

This paper reports consensus on the first phase of a pan‐European working group on Sustainability in dental education.
Early effects of COVID‐19 on US fisheries and seafood consumption
Authors: White Easton R. , Froehlich Halley E. , Gephart Jessica A. , Cottrell Richard S. , Branch Trevor A. , Agrawal Bejarano Rahul , Baum Julia K.
Published: November 2020

The US seafood sector is susceptible to shocks, both because of the seasonal nature of many of its domestic fisheries and its global position as a top importer and exporter of seafood. However, many data sets that could inform science and policy during an emerging event do not exist or are only released months or years later. Here, we synthesize multiple data sources from across the seafood supply chain, including unconventional real‐time data sets, to show the relative initial responses and indicators of recovery during the COVID‐19 pandemic. We synthesized news articles from January to September 2020 that reported effects of COVID‐19 on the US seafood sector, including processor closures, shortened fishing seasons and loss of revenue. Concerning production and distribution, we assessed past and present landings and trade data and found substantial declines in fresh seafood catches (−40%), imports (−37%) and exports (−43%) relative to the previous year, while frozen seafood products were generally less affected. Google search trends and seafood market foot traffic data suggest consumer demand for seafood from restaurants dropped by upwards of 70% during lockdowns, with recovery varying by state. However, these declines were partially offset by an increase (270%) in delivery and takeout service searches. Our synthesis of open‐access data sets and media reports shows widespread, but heterogeneous, ramifications of COVID‐19 across the seafood sector, implying that policymakers should focus support on states and sub‐sectors most affected by the pandemic: fishery‐dependent communities, processors, and fisheries and aquaculture that focus on fresh products.
Sildenafil beyond erectile dysfunction and pulmonary arterial hypertension: Thinking about new indications
Authors: Ala Moein , Mohammad Jafari Razieh , Dehpour Ahmad Reza
Published: November 2020

Sildenafil, approved two decades ago, is the inhibitor of phosphodiesterase 5 (PDE5). First of all, it was designated for angina pectoris, but soon it showed a wonderful efficacy in erectile dysfunction (ED) and then pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH). Due to the distribution of phosphodiesterase (PDE) in almost all organs, maybe it effects other diseases. Hence, a great number of investigations began to understand the role of PDEi in different organs. Preliminary research on sildenafil in cell culture and animal models has yielded promising results. Soon, a greater number of animal researches and clinical trials joined them. The results disclosed sildenafil can have beneficial effects in each organ such as heart, liver, kidney, brain, and intestines. Furthermore, it has significantly improved the prognosis of organ ischemia in various animal models. Clinical trials in several diseases, such as recurrent spontaneous miscarriage, fatty liver disease, bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD), heart failure, and premature ejaculation (PE) brought promising results. Although some clinical trials are available on the effects of sildenafil on various diseases, further studies on humans are needed to consolidate the ultimate effects of sildenafil. The aim of this review was to describe the effects of sildenafil on each organ and explain its mechanisms of action. Further, other PDE inhibitors such as tadalafil and vardenafil have been briefly discussed in parts of this review.
A global analysis of enemy release and its variation with latitude
Authors: Xu Meng , Mu Xidong , Zhang Shuang , Dick Jaimie T. A. , Zhu Bingtao , Gu Dangen , Yang Yexin , Luo Du , Hu Yinchang
Published: November 2020

Aim

The enemy release hypothesis (ERH) posits that exotic species suffer less enemy damage than natives, which promotes their successful invasion. However, the generality of less damage for exotics remains widely debated. A recent view proposes that enemy release (ER) could change systematically with latitude, potentially helping to explain these inconsistencies. Here, we test whether exotic plant species suffer consistently lower herbivore damage relative to natives and whether ER varies with latitude.

Location

Global.

Time period

1960–2018.

Major taxa studied

Plants.

Methods

Using leaf herbivory data for 1,098 plant species, we compared the herbivory rate between exotic and native plants across all taxa, between the introduced and native range of exotic species and between exotic and native species co‐occurring in the same community. We tested the interaction effect between origin (exotic versus native) and latitude to assess variation in ER with latitude. We also examined whether the effect of origin and its interaction with latitude changed with plant growth form (woody versus non‐woody). Finally, based on two ER effect‐size datasets, two meta‐regressions were performed to demonstrate the relationship between ER and latitude.

Results

Leaf herbivory rates were commonly lower for exotics than for natives. However, this differential herbivory rate was significant only for woody plants. No significant interactions were found between origin and latitude, indicating that ER did not change with latitude. The meta‐regressions also demonstrated that ER was not significantly correlated with latitude.

Main conclusions

The widespread lower herbivory rate for exotic compared with native woody plant species supports the ERH for exotic woody plants. Consistent ER with latitude indicates that ER should play a similar role regardless of latitude. One future challenge is to assess the extent to which ER in woody exotic plants translates to performance advantages and thereby influences their invasion success.
“Toleranz – du nervst mich so”: Reinventing Lessing's Nathan der Weise for the Contemporary German Stage
Authors: Murnane Barry
Published: November 2020

Nathan der Weise is frequently used as a vehicle in contemporary German theatre to engage with the geopolitical ramifications of globalization such as inter‐faith conflict and violence. Despite this continuing popularity, the optimistic Enlightenment message of tolerance and toleration in Lessing's play is often criticized as inadequate in an age in which cosmopolitanism and transnational movement of people are seen as the source of rather than remedy to identity political tensions. This essay discusses two recent innovative responses to Lessing—Elfriede Jelinek's Abraumhalde (2009) and Emre Koyuncuoğlu's Nathan schweigt (2010)—and argues that contemporary female writers in particular have transformed Lessing's play to engage with questions of the patriarchal and economic power structures lurking behind his concept of tolerance, enabling a forceful critique of contemporary neoliberal identity politics.
Negotiating the Dichotomies of Memory Culture in a Post‐Unification Graphic Narrative about the GDR: Simon Schwartz'sDrüben!
Authors: Kavaloski Joshua
Published: November 2020

Two distinguishing features of the graphic narrative as a medium—its use of frames and its hybrid combination of words with images—inform a reading of Simon Schwartz's 2009Drüben!, a work that thematizes his family's experiences in the German Democratic Republic. In popular culture, the memory of the GDR tends to be structured around binary oppositions; characters, for instance, are regularly depicted as either perpetrators or victims while the historical period as a whole is often approached either nostalgically or critically. While binary categories may bring clarity to complicated phenomena, they also discount marginal voices and discourses. The dichotomies of GDR memory culture are unsettled by Schwartz's graphic narrative, whose formal features help readers to reconsider the lived experiences of people then and fraught choices that they faced.
Rhythm, Form, Critique: Kathrin Röggla's wir schlafen nicht (2004)
Authors: Balint Lilla
Published: November 2020

For Kathrin Röggla, the period between the fall of the Berlin Wall and the financial crisis in 2008 was marked by an ideological, political, and cultural inertia. Taking Röggla's remarks on the (im)possibility of narrative action under these conditions of stasis as its starting point, this article explores narrative motion in her experimental documentary novel wir schlafen nicht (2004). Commonly read as a text about managerial discourse, what the book calls “bwler‐deutsch,” this article exposes a hitherto unexamined aspect and argues that wir schlafen nicht renders the new economy as two contrastive motional forces on the rhythmic level: while the fast speech of the protagonists performs their restlessness (echoing economic productivity), the characters themselves remain stuck in the ever‐same patterns of thought and speech. Moreover, the article contends that wir schlafen nicht also reflects on and negotiates the place of literature vis‐à‐vis the economization of language and the social.
In Pursuit of Happiness: Gay Intimacy and Relationships in Peter Rehberg's “American” novels Play, Fag Love, and Boy Men
Authors: Gratzke Michael
Published: November 2020

Peter Rehberg's novels Play (2002), Fag Love (2005), and Boy Men (2011) map out the fictional relationship history of a gay man from his late twenties to his fortieth birthday. There is no single main character, but the main characters at different points in their biographies follow each other chronologically and conceptually. Reading the books as a set also allows us to trace Rehberg's sustained engagement with US‐American gay culture from the 1990s onwards. This article combines close readings of the three novels with an exploration of the tension between the concept of Queer Time and patterns of gay men's lives approaching middle age. In Rehberg's fictional world gay characters approach their middle years in ways which differ significantly from straight men's life trajectories. His novels challenge heteronormative as well as emerging homonormative expectations towards aging, but they do not conceal the psychological burden of Queer Time.
“Brazil cannot stop”: Meritocratic ideology in an unequal country
Authors: Mesquita Juliana Schneider , Bezerra Marcos Sales
Published: November 2020

This essay reflects on the measures adopted by the Brazilian government in the scope of education amid the COVID‐19 pandemic. This reflection is necessary for the field of organizational studies, as such administrative actions in view of the pandemic can interfere directly in the formation of young Brazilians and their allocation in different positions in the labor market. One must think critically about the impacts that exclusionary, low‐quality education can have on the exclusion of certain groups and their precarious access to job opportunities. We believe that the measures adopted by the Brazilian government reflect the society's structural racism and that institutional racism practiced by the Ministry of Education and Culture. Government actions based on meritocratic discourses during a pandemic contribute to the maintenance of group privileges and dominance, the marginalization of subordinated groups, and the aggravation of social and racial inequalities.
Upregulation of ATIC in multiple myeloma tissues based on tissue microarray and gene microarrays
Authors: Li Ruolin , Chen Gang , Dang Yiwu , He Rongquan , Liu Angui , Ma Jie , Wang Chengbin
Published: November 2020

Purpose

Multiple myeloma (MM) is characterized by the malignant proliferation of plasma cells, which produce a monoclonal immunoglobulin protein. The role of 5‐aminoimidazole‐4‐carboxamide ribonucleotide formyltransferase/IMP cyclohydrolase (ATIC) has not yet been well studied in the area of MM. Thus, in the current study, we sought to examine the expression levels, including mRNA and protein levels of ATIC in MM.

Methods

Multiple myeloma microarray and RNA‐seq data were screened from the SRA, GEO, ArrayExpress, and Oncomine databases. The mRNA level of ATIC was extracted from the high throughput data, and the prognostic value was studied. The protein level of ATIC was also detected by in‐house immunohistochemistry on a tissue microarray. Potential signaling pathways were enriched with ATIC‐related genes in MM.

Results

Both the mRNA and protein levels of ATIC were significantly upregulated in MM samples as compared to normal samples. Furthermore, the summarized Standardized Mean Difference was 1.66 with 674 cases of MM based on 10 independent studies including the in‐house tissue microarray. The overall hazard ratio of ATIC in MM was 1.7 with 1631 cases of MM based on five microarrays. In the KEGG pathway analysis, the ATIC‐related genes were mainly enriched in the pathway of complement and coagulation cascades.

Conclusion

We provided the first evidence supporting the upregulation of ATIC may play an essential part in the tumorigenesis and development of MM. The promoting cancer capacity may be related to the pathway of complement and coagulation cascades.
Suprapubic‐assisted laparoendoscopic single‐site surgery versus standard laparoscopic nephrectomy: A propensity score‐based analysis
Authors: Zhang Guoxi , Zou Xiaofeng , Liu Quanliang , Xie Tianpeng , He Zhihua , Yuan Yuanhu , Xiao Rihai , Xu Hui , Li Yanmin , Zou Yuhua , Chen Hanmin , Zhang Zhaolin , Guo Guijun , Yang Zengxiang , Liu Linwei
Published: November 2020

Objectives

To compare suprapubic‐assisted laparoendoscopic single‐site surgery nephrectomy with standard laparoscopic nephrectomy.

Methods

A retrospective case–control study comparing three surgeons’ experience with 122 suprapubic‐assisted laparoendoscopic single‐site surgery nephrectomy and 107 standard laparoscopic nephrectomy was carried out. Operative time, estimated blood loss, intraoperative complications, intraoperative conversion, postoperative bowel recovery, postoperative analgesics, postoperative visual analog pain scale score, postoperative length of stay, days before going back to work, postoperative complications and Patient Scar Assessment Questionnaire were compared after propensity score matching.

Results

A total of 97 matched pairs were obtained after propensity score matching. There were no statistically significant differences between the suprapubic‐assisted laparoendoscopic single‐site surgery nephrectomy and standard laparoscopic nephrectomy groups with respect to operative time, estimated blood loss, intraoperative complications, intraoperative conversion, postoperative bowel recovery, length of stay and postoperative complications. Suprapubic‐assisted laparoendoscopic single‐site surgery nephrectomy group had decreased postoperative analgesics (20.9 vs 23.5, P = 0.04), visual analog pain scale score at 24 h (4.28 vs 5.28, P = 0.000), visual analog pain scale score at discharge (1.01 vs 1.47, P = 0.000), days before going back to work (28.4 vs 31.9, P = 0.000) and Patient Scar Assessment Questionnaire score (34.0 vs 42.0, P = 0.000), compared with the standard laparoscopic nephrectomy group.

Conclusions

Suprapubic‐assisted laparoendoscopic single‐site surgery nephrectomy and standard laparoscopic nephrectomy are equivalent in terms of the safety and efficacy. However, suprapubic‐assisted laparoendoscopic single‐site surgery nephrectomy confers less postoperative pain, fewer days before going back to work and better cosmetic result when compared with standard laparoscopic nephrectomy.
Impact of public health education on undue fear of COVID‐19 among nurses: The mediating role of psychological capital
Authors: Mubarak Namra , Safdar Samyia , Faiz Shazia , Khan Jabran , Jaafar Mastura
Published: November 2020

This study looked into the mechanism through which health education can reduce the fear of being infected with COVID‐19 because health education helps individuals to improve their knowledge and attitudes towards a disease. The spread of COVID‐19 has escalated the level of fear among public and nurses. Nevertheless, the mechanism that contributes to minimize the fear towards this pandemic remains unexplored. A cross‐sectional survey was adopted to test the relationships among public health education, psychological capital, and fear of COVID‐19. In total, 243 responses were obtained via online survey from nurses. The results revealed that public health education can reduce one’s fear of COVID‐19. Psychological capital emerged as a strong explanatory mechanism for the phenomenon. Drawing on spillover theory, public health education seems to reduce fear of COVID‐19 with the mediating role of psychological capital. Limitations and future directions are at the end of this paper. The study outcomes revealed that organizations should focus on educating nursing staff to overcome fear of COVID‐19. One way to induce positivity among nursing staff is by holding trainings.
Generating row–column field experimental designs with good neighbour balance and even distribution of treatment replications
Authors: Piepho Hans‐Peter , Williams Emlyn R. , Michel Volker
Published: November 2020

Blocking is a standard strategy for improving the precision of randomized experimental designs. In field trials, it is usually beneficial to impose blocks in both row and column directions. A common problem with classical randomized row–column designs is that replications of a treatment may be clustered and that some pairs of treatments appear next to each other rather more often than others. Such patterns adversely affect certain design properties which we refer to as neighbour balance (NB) and evenness of distribution (ED), and they may be particularly harmful if some of the treatments are very susceptible to environmental stresses. Here, we consider an experimental design strategy for blocked experiments that achieves good NB&ED properties. The approach is exemplified using five examples, spanning non‐resolvable and resolvable replicated designs as well as partially replicated designs.
External use of Mirabilite combined with Lactulose improves postoperative gastrointestinal mobility among older patients undergoing abdominal surgery
Authors: Pan Wenyan , Cai Shining , Latour Jos M. , Zhong Ming , Lv Minzhi , Li Jingjing , Zhang Xiaomin , Zhang Yuxia
Published: November 2020

Aims

To evaluate the feasibility and efficacy of Mirabilite combined with Lactulose in older patients after abdominal surgery.

Design

It is a retrospective observational cohort study with a pre and post intervention group.

Methods

Medical records were retrospectively reviewed of postoperative Intensive Care patients with postoperative gastrointestinal tract dysfunction (aged >60 years) in the Surgical Intensive Care Unit from January 2017–December 2018.

Results

One hundred and sixty‐seven post‐surgical Intensive Care patients with postoperative gastrointestinal tract dysfunction were analysed; 74 patients received Mirabilite + Lactulose treatment and 93 patients received Lactulose treatment. The recovery rate of bowel sounds was better in the Mirabilite + Lactulose group (62.16%) compared with the Lactulose group (37.63%) after 3‐day treatment (p = 0.002) and the relative risk (RR) was 1.65 (95% CI, 1.20, 2.27). Moreover 70.27% patients in the Mirabilite + Lactulose group finally had flatus or defecation compared with 46.24% patients in Lactulose group (p = 0.003) and the RR was 1.52 (1.17, 1.98). The abdominal girth and Inter Abdominal Pressure in Mirabilite + Lactulose group showed significantly greater decrease over a 3‐day period compared with Lactulose group (4.86 vs. 3.46 cm, p = 0.027; 4.80 vs. 3.11 mmHg, p = 0.002 respectively). The pain score had greater decrease from the baseline in Mirabilite + Lactulose group than in Lactulose group (2.40 vs. 1.11; p < 0.01). Patients in the Mirabilite + Lactulose group had shorter hospital stay than the Lactulose group 12.5 (SD 3.51) versus 13.9 (SD 5.14), p = 0.05.

Conclusions

This study demonstrated that external use of Mirabilite combined with Lactulose can be considered as an easy intervention to improve postoperative gastrointestinal mobility in older intensive care patients who suffer from postoperative gastrointestinal tract dysfunction after surgery.

Impact

Our results provide a great option to alleviate the sufferings of postoperative patients. The externally use Mirabilite is a painless and safe interventions that is easy to implement by ICU nurses.
Nursing home residents with cognitive impairment can participate in advance care planning: A qualitative study
Authors: Sævareid Trygve J. L. , Pedersen Reidar , Thoresen Lisbeth
Published: November 2020

Aims

To describe advance care planning in nursing homes when residents with cognitive impairment and/or their next of kin participated and identify associated challenges.

Design

A qualitative study of nine advance care planning conversations in four Norwegian nursing home wards. During the implementation of advance care planning, we purposively sampled residents with cognitive impairment, their next of kin and healthcare personnel. The implementation followed a “whole‐ward” approach aimed at involving the whole ward in fostering an inclusive, holistic advance care planning discussion. Involving as many residents as possible, preferably together with their next of kin, were central.

Methods

From observed and audio‐recorded advance care planning conversations that took place from November 2015 to June 2016, we conducted a thematic analysis of the transcripts and field notes. Reporting adhered to the COREQ guidelines.

Results

Residents actively relayed their preferences regarding healthcare and end‐of‐life issues, despite the cognitive impairment. Next of kin provided constructive support and conversations were largely resident‐focused. However, involving residents was also challenging, findings included: residents’ preferences were often vague, relevant medical information from healthcare personnel lacked and the next of kin were sometimes unaware of the resident's previously held preferences. Moreover, residents tended to focus more on the past and present than the future end‐of‐life care.

Conclusions

Residents with cognitive impairment can participate actively and meaningfully in advance care planning, if the healthcare personnel actively listens. However, several challenges can arise. Supported decision‐making can improve communication and resident involvement, reinforcing a relational understanding of autonomy.

Impact

Persons with cognitive impairment should be invited to participate in advance care planning. Their participation may make its benefits and more person‐centred care attainable to persons that are often not involved. Successful involvement of persons with cognitive impairment in advance care planning may rely on robust implementation.
The development of a behaviour questionnaire for stoma self‐management for persons with bladder cancer and an ileal conduit
Authors: Wang Wei , Ding Yanming , Lu Qian , Qi Jianing , Zhang Shuying
Published: November 2020

Aims

To develop and preliminarily test the reliability and validity of a behaviour questionnaire for stoma self‐management for patients with bladder cancer after radical cystectomy and ileal conduit.

Design

A psychometric instrument validation study conducted in two phases.

Methods

The initial version of behaviour questionnaire was developed based on guidelines for people living with a stoma. Five experts validated the content of the preliminary 29‐item questionnaire. A cross‐sectional survey was then conducted in Beijing for preliminary reliability and validity tests between 4 December 2017‐28 April 2018. A total of 151 participants in the survey, 147 of whom completed the study and 16 completed a 2‐week test–retest reliability test.

Results

The content validity indices were satisfied. A principal component analysis with direct oblimin rotation was performed. Sixteen items were retained, and three factors were identified, namely, pouching system change, emotional management, and role management. The 16‐item questionnaire showed acceptable internal consistency and test–retest reliability. The mediational effect of self‐management behaviour on the relationship between self‐efficacy and stoma quality of life was confirmed via convergent validity testing.

Conclusion

The behaviour questionnaire for stoma self‐management appears to have adequate initial reliability and validity. More observational and interventional studies need to be conducted for further evaluation of its psychometric properties.

Impact

This study developed a reliable instrument to measure self‐management behaviours for persons living with a stoma after radical cystectomy and ileal conduit. The questionnaire has practical value for both healthcare providers and researchers working in this field. The 16‐item questionnaire can be administered quickly in clinical practice. Based on the questionnaire and the elicited mediational model, psycho‐education programs tailored to improve self‐management should be designed, implemented, and re‐inspected regarding their effectiveness for the target population in China.
The costs of using night roosts for migrating whimbrels
Authors: Watts Bryan D. , Smith Fletcher M. , Hines Chance , Duval Laura , Hamilton Diana J. , Keyes Tim , Paquet Julie , Pirie‐Dominix Lisa , Rausch Jennie , Truitt Barry , Winn Brad , Woodard Paul
Published: November 2020

Migrant shorebirds operate within a series of landscapes and must adjust their daily activities to achieve seasonal time and energy objectives. Night roosts are essential landscape elements that provide safety from predators for many shorebird species. What costs migrants incur to use night roosts and how these costs vary across staging sites are poorly understood. We tracked 42 adult whimbrels Numenius phaeopus with satellite transmitters and used night locations to delineate 39 night roosts during spring and fall migration. We used daytime locations to measure round‐trip commuting distances between night roosts and foraging areas and estimated daily commuting costs including distance, time and metabolic energy expenditure. We identified night roosts on offshore islands (n = 20) and onshore locations including along habitat edges (n = 13) and on topographic highs within extensive marshes (n = 6). Mean daily commuting costs varied between roosts. Whimbrels took 3.9–52.1 min (median = 15.2) to fly 3.1–42.2 km (median = 12.3) which costs 6.1–82.4 kj (median = 22.3) in lean mass energy expenditure and 8.1–109.2 kj (median = 31.5) in leaving mass energy. Birds using offshore roosts had twice the commuting distance and associated costs compared to those using onshore roosts. The contribution of commuting costs to the premigratory energy budget ranged from 1.5 to 18.8% with costs for nearly 30% of roosts exceeding 10%. Commuting costs to and from night roosts appear to be biologically relevant within some staging sites and should be considered among other constraints faced by migrants during stopover periods when food or time is limiting.
Investigation of hub genes and immune status in heart transplant rejection using endomyocardial biopsies
Authors: Xiu Meng‐xi , Liu Yuan‐meng , Wang Wen‐jun
Published: November 2020

T cell‒mediated rejection (TCMR) and antibody‐mediated rejection (ABMR) are severe post‐transplantation complications for heart transplantation (HTx), whose molecular and immunological pathogenesis remains unclear. In the present study, the mRNA microarray data set GSE124897 containing 645 stable, 52 TCMR and 144 ABMR endomyocardial biopsies was obtained to screen for differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between rejected and stable HTx samples and to investigate immune cell infiltration. Functional enrichment analyses indicated roles of the DEGs primarily in immune‐related mechanisms. Protein‐protein interaction networks were then constructed, and ICAM1, CD44, HLA‐A and HLA‐B were identified as hub genes using the maximal clique centrality method. Immune cell infiltration analysis revealed differences in adaptive and innate immune cell populations between TCMR, ABMR and stable HTx samples. Additionally, hub gene expression levels significantly correlated with the degree and composition of immune cell infiltration in HTx rejection samples. Furthermore, drug‐gene interactions were constructed, and 12 FDA‐approved drugs were predicted to target hub genes. Finally, an external GSE2596 data set was used to validate the expression of the hub genes, and ROC curves indicated all four hub genes had promising diagnostic value for HTx rejection. This study provides a comprehensive perspective of molecular and immunological regulatory mechanisms underlying HTx rejection.