bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
The Italian National Surveillance System for Occupational Injuries: Conceptual Framework and Fatal Outcomes, 2002–2016
Authors: Campo G , Cegolon L , De Merich D , Fedeli U , Pellicci M , Pavanello S , Guglielmi A , Mastrangelo G 
Published: June 2020

ABSTRACTBackgroundA national database of work related injuries was established in Italy since 2002, collecting information on the injured person, his/her work tasks, the workplace as well as risk factors contributing to accident dynamics, according to a model called Infor.Mo.MethodsThe present is a qualitative description of occupational fatal injuries, excluding work-related fatal traffic injuries, that occurred in Italy from 2002 to 2016 (15 years).Results4,874 victims were registered, all were males, mainly of >51 years of age (50.5%), predominantly self-employed (27.8%) or workers with non-standard contracts (25%). About 18.4% and 17.3% of fatal accidents occurred in micro-enterprises belonging to, respectively, Construction and Agriculture. A wide range of nationalities (59 countries in addition to Italy) was identified. 18.9% work related fatal injuries were due to some form of dangerous energy □ mechanical, thermal, electrical, chemical □ freely present in the workplace. Fall of workers from height (33.5%), heavy bodies falling on workers from height (16.7%) and vehicles exiting their route and overturning (15.9%) were the accidents causing the greatest proportion of occupational fatal injuries. The activity of the injured person made up 43.3% of 9,386 risk factors identified in 4,874 fatalities. Less common risk factors were related to: work equipment (20.2%); work environment (14.9%); the activity of third parties (9.8%); personal protective equipment/clothing (8.0%) and materials (3.7%). The activity of the injured person remained the most relevant contributing factor even when the accident was caused by two or more risk factors.DiscussionOccupational fatal injuries occurred mainly in small size firms. Small companies generally have less resources to catch up with the continuously evolving health and safety at work regulations; moreover, they tend to be less compliant with occupational health and safety regulations since are less likely to be inspected by occupational vigilance services. As a result, the enforcement of regulations to control the occupational risk factors of occupational injuries is seemingly costly and scarcely effective. An alternative approach that is being introduced in Italy relies on the use of economic incentives to promote safe and healthy workplaces.
National Early Warning Scores and COVID-19 deaths in care homes: a longitudinal ecological study
Authors: Stow Daniel , Barker Robert O , Matthews Fiona E , Hanratty Barbara 
Published: June 2020

AbstractObjectivesTo investigate whether patterns of National Early Warning Scores (NEWS/NEWS2) in care homes during the COVID pandemic correspond with area-level COVID-19 death registrations from care homes.Study designLongitudinal ecological study.Setting460 Care home units using the same software package to collect data on residents, from 46 local authority areas in England.Participants6,464 care home residents with at least one NEWS recording.Exposure measure29,656 anonymised person-level NEWS from 29/12/2019 to 20/05/2020 with component physiological measures: systolic blood pressure, respiratory rate, pulse rate, temperature, and oxygen saturation. Baseline values for each measure calculated using 80th and 20th centile scores before March 2020.Outcome measureTime series comparison with Office for National Statistics (ONS) weekly reported registered deaths of care home residents where COVID-19 was the underlying cause of death, and all other deaths (excluding COVID-19) up to 10/05/2020.ResultsDeaths due to COVID-19 were registered from 23/03/2020 in the study geographical areas. Between 23/03/2020 and 10/05/2020, there were 5,753 deaths (1,532 involving COVID-19 and 4,221 other causes). The proportion of above-baseline NEWS increased from 16/03/2020 and closely followed the rise and fall in COVID-19 deaths over the study period. The proportion of above-baseline oxygen saturation, respiratory rate and temperature measurements also increased approximately two weeks before peaks in care home deaths in corresponding geographical areas.ConclusionsNEWS may make a useful contribution to disease surveillance in care homes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Oxygen saturation, respiratory rate and temperature could be prioritised as they appear to signal rise in mortality almost as well as total NEWS. This study reinforces the need to collate data from care homes, to monitor and protect residents’ health. Further work using individual level outcome data is needed to evaluate the role of NEWS in the early detection of resident illness.
Prothrombotic antiphospholipid antibodies in COVID-19
Authors: Zuo Yu , Estes Shanea K. , Ali Ramadan A. , Gandhi Alex A. , Yalavarthi Srilakshmi , Shi Hui , Sule Gautam , Gockman Kelsey , Madison Jacqueline A. , Zuo Melanie , Yadav Vinita , Wang Jintao , Woodward Wrenn , Lezak Sean P. , Lugogo Njira L. , Smith Stephanie A. , Morrissey James H. , Kanthi Yogendra , Knight Jason S. 
Published: June 2020

ABSTRACTPatients with coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19) are at high risk for thrombotic arterial and venous occlusions. At the same time, lung histopathology often reveals fibrin-based occlusion in the small vessels of patients who succumb to the disease. Antiphospholipid syndrome (APS) is an acquired and potentially life-threatening thrombophilia in which patients develop pathogenic autoantibodies (aPL) targeting phospholipids and phospholipid-binding proteins. Case series have recently detected aPL in patients with COVID-19. Here, we measured eight types of aPL [anticardiolipin IgG/IgM/IgA, anti-beta-2 glycoprotein I IgG/IgM/IgA, and anti-phosphatidylserine/prothrombin (aPS/PT) IgG/IgM] in the sera of 172 patients hospitalized with COVID-19. We detected aPS/PT IgG in 24%, anticardiolipin IgM in 23%, and aPS/PT IgM in 18%. Any aPL was present in 52% of patients using the manufacturer’s threshold and in 30% using a more stringent cutoff (≥40 units). Higher levels of aPL were associated with neutrophil hyperactivity (including the release of neutrophil extracellular traps/NETs), higher platelet count, more severe respiratory disease, and lower glomerular filtration rate. Similar to patients with longstanding APS, IgG fractions isolated from patients with COVID-19 promoted NET release from control neutrophils. Furthermore, injection of these COVID-19 IgG fractions into mice accelerated venous thrombosis. Taken together, these studies suggest that a significant percentage of patients with COVID-19 become at least transiently positive for aPL and that these aPL are potentially pathogenic.
Clinical, immunological and virological characterization of COVID-19 patients that test re-positive for SARS-CoV-2 by RT-PCR
Authors: Lu Jing , Peng Jinju , Xiong Qianling , Liu Zhe , Lin Huifang , Tan Xiaohua , Kang Min , Yuan Runyu , Zeng Lilian , Zhou Pingping , Liang Chumin , Yi Lina , Plessis Louis du , Song Tie , Ma Wenjun , Sun Jiufeng , Pybus Oliver G , Ke Changwen 
Published: June 2020

AbstractBackgroundCOVID-19 pandemic is underway. Some COVID-19 cases re-tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 RNA after discharge raising the public concern on their infectivity. Characterization of re-positive cases are urgently needed for designing intervention strategies.MethodsClinical data were obtained through Guangdong COVID-19 surveillance network. Neutralization antibody titre was determined using a microneutralization assay. Potential infectivity of clinical samples was evaluated after the cell inoculation. SARS-CoV-2 RNA was detected using three different RT-PCR kits and multiplex PCR with nanopore sequencing.ResultsAmong 619 discharged COVID-19 cases, 87 were re-tested as SARS-CoV-2 positive in circumstance of social isolation. All re-positive cases had mild or moderate symptoms in initial diagnosis and a younger age distribution (mean, 30.4). Re-positive cases (n=59) exhibited similar neutralization antibodies (NAbs) titre distributions to other COVID-19 cases (n=150) parallel-tested in this study. No infective viral strain could be obtained by culture and none full-length viral genomes could be sequenced for all re-positive cases.ConclusionsRe-positive SARS-CoV-2 was not caused by the secondary infection and was identified in around 14% of discharged cases. A robust Nabs response and a potential virus genome degradation were detected from nearly all re-positive cases suggesting a lower transmission risk, especially through a respiratory route.
Can the protection be among us? Previous viral contacts and prevalent HLA alleles avoiding an even more disseminated COVID-19 pandemic
Authors: Antonio Eduardo Cheuiche , Meireles Mariana Rost , de Souza Bragatte Marcelo Alves , Vieira Gustavo Fioravanti 
Published: June 2020

AbstractCOVID-19 is bringing scenes of sci-fi movies into real life, and it seems to be far from over. Infected individuals exhibit variable severity, suggesting the involvement of the genetic constitution of populations and previous cross-reactive immune contacts in the individuals’ disease outcome. To investigate the participation of MHC alleles in COVID-19 severity, the combined use of HLA-B*07, HLA-B*44, HLA-DRB1*03, and HLA-DRB1*04 grouped affected countries presenting similar death rates, based only on their allele frequencies. To prospect T cell targets in SARS-CoV-2, we modeled 3D structures of HLA-A*02:01 complexed with immunogenic epitopes from SAR-CoV-1 and compared them with models containing the corresponding SARS-CoV-2 peptides. It reveals molecular conservation between SARS-CoV peptides, evidencing that the corresponding current sequences are putative T cell epitopes. These structures were also compared with other HCoVs sequences, and with a panel of epitopes from unrelated viruses, looking for the triggers of cross-protection in asymptomatic and uninfected individuals. 229E, OC43, and impressively, viruses involved in endemic human infections share fingerprints of immunogenicity with SARS-CoV peptides. Wide-scale HLA genotyping in COVID-19 patients shall improve prognosis prediction. Structural identification of previous triggers paves the way for herd immunity examination and wide spectrum vaccine development.
SARS-CoV-2 Community Transmission During Shelter-in-Place in San Francisco
Authors: Chamie Gabriel , Marquez Carina , Crawford Emily , Peng James , Petersen Maya , Schwab Daniel , Schwab Joshua , Martinez Jackie , Jones Diane , Black Douglas , Gandhi Monica , Kerkhoff Andrew D. , Jain Vivek , Sergi Francesco , Jacobo Jon , Rojas Susana , Tulier-Laiwa Valerie , Gallardo-Brown Tracy , Appa Ayesha , Chiu Charles , Rodgers Mary , Hackett John ,   CLIAhub Consortium, Kistler Amy , Hao Samantha , Kamm Jack , Dynerman David , Batson Joshua , Greenhouse Bryan , DeRisi Joe , Havlir Diane V. 
Published: June 2020

ABSTRACTBackgroundWe characterized SARS-CoV-2 infections in a densely-populated, majority Latinx San Francisco community six-weeks into the city’s shelter-in-place order.MethodsWe offered SARS-CoV-2 reverse transcription-PCR and antibody (Abbott ARCHITECT IgG) testing, regardless of symptoms, to all residents (>4 years) and workers in a San Francisco census tract (population: 5,174) at outdoor, community-mobilized events over four days. We estimated SARS-CoV-2 point prevalence (PCR-positive) and cumulative incidence (antibody or PCR-positive) in the census tract and evaluated risk factors for recent (PCR-positive/antibody-negative) versus prior infection (antibody-positive/PCR-negative). SARS-CoV-2 genome recovery and phylogenetics were used to measure viral strain diversity, establish viral lineages present, and estimate number of introductions.ResultsWe tested 3,953 persons: 40% Latinx; 41% White; 9% Asian/Pacific Islander; and 2% Black. Overall, 2.1% (83/3,871) tested PCR-positive: 95% were Latinx and 52% asymptomatic when tested. 1.7% of residents and 6.0% of workers (non-census tract residents) were PCR-positive. Among 2,598 census tract residents, estimated point prevalence of PCR-positives was 2.3% (95%CI: 1.2-3.8%): 3.9% (95%CI: 2.0-6.4%) among Latinx vs. 0.2% (95%CI: 0.0-0.4%) among non-Latinx persons. Estimated cumulative incidence among residents was 6.1% (95%CI: 4.0-8.6%). Prior infections were 67% Latinx, 16% White, and 17% other ethnicities. Among recent infections, 96% were Latinx. Risk factors for recent infection were Latinx ethnicity, inability to shelter-in-place and maintain income, frontline service work, unemployment, and household income <$50,000/year. Five SARS-CoV-2 phylogenetic lineages were detected.ConclusionSARS-CoV-2 infections from diverse lineages continued circulating among low-income, Latinx persons unable to work from home and maintain income during San Francisco’s shelter-in-place ordinance.
Neurocognitive consequences of hand augmentation
Authors: Kieliba Paulina , Clode Danielle , Maimon-Mor Roni O , Makin Tamar R. 
Published: June 2020

AbstractFrom hand tools to cyborgs, humans have long been fascinated by the opportunities afforded by augmenting ourselves. Here, we studied how motor augmentation with an extra robotic thumb (the Third Thumb) impacts the biological hand representation in the brains of able-bodied people. Participants were tested on a variety of behavioural and neuroimaging tests designed to interrogate the augmented hand’s representation before and after 5-days of semi-intensive training. Training improved the Thumb’s motor control, dexterity and hand-robot coordination, even when cognitive load was increased or when vision was occluded, and resulted in increased sense of embodiment over the robotic Thumb. Thumb usage also weakened natural kinematic hand synergies. Importantly, brain decoding of the augmented hand’s motor representation demonstrated mild collapsing of the canonical hand structure following training, suggesting that motor augmentation may disrupt the biological hand representation. Together, our findings unveil critical neurocognitive considerations for designing human body augmentation.
The IMEx Coronavirus interactome: an evolving map of Coronaviridae-Host molecular interactions
Authors: Perfetto L , Pastrello C , Del-Toro N , Duesbury M , Iannuccelli M , Kotlyar M , Licata L , Meldal B , Panneerselvam K , Panni S , Rahimzadeh N , Ricard-Blum S , Salwinski L , Shrivastava A , Cesareni G , Pellegrini M , Orchard S , Jurisica I , Hermjakob HH , Porras P 
Published: June 2020

AbstractThe current Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, caused by the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), has spurred a wave of research of nearly unprecedented scale. Among the different strategies that are being used to understand the disease and develop effective treatments, the study of physical molecular interactions enables studying fine-grained resolution of the mechanisms behind the virus biology and the human organism response. Here we present a curated dataset of physical molecular interactions, manually extracted by IMEx Consortium curators focused on proteins from SARS-CoV-2, SARS-CoV-1 and other members of theCoronaviridaefamily. Currently, the dataset comprises over 2,200 binarized interactions extracted from 86 publications. The dataset can be accessed in the standard formats recommended by the Proteomics Standards Initiative (HUPO-PSI) at the IntAct database website (www.ebi.ac.uk/intact), and will be continuously updated as research on COVID-19 progresses.
PRER: A Patient Representation with Pairwise Relative Expression of Proteins on Biological Networks
Authors: İbrahim Kuru Halil , Buyukozkan Mustafa , Tastan Oznur 
Published: June 2020

AbstractChanges in protein and gene expression levels are often used as features to predictive models such as survival prediction. A common strategy to aggregate information on individual proteins is to integrate the expression information with biological networks. We propose a novel patient representation in this work where we integrate proteins’ expression levels with the protein-protein interaction (PPI) networks. Patient representation with PRER (PairwiseRelativeExpressions withRandom walks) uses the neighborhood of a protein to capture the dysregulation patterns in protein abundance. Specifically, PRER computes a feature vector for a patient by comparing the source protein’s protein expression level with other proteins’ levels in its neighborhood. This neighborhood of the source protein is derived using a biased random-walk strategy on the network. We test PRER’s performance through a survival prediction task in 10 different cancers using random forest survival models. PRER representation yields a statistically significant predictive performance in 9 out of 10 cancer types when compared to a representation based on individual protein expression. We also identify important proteins that are not important in the models trained with the expression values but emerge as predictive in models trained with PRER features. The set of identified relations provides a valuable collection of biomarkers with high prognostic value. PRER representation can be used for other complex diseases and prediction tasks that use molecular expression profiles as input. PRER is freely available at:https://github.com/hikuru/PRER
Modulating Brain Rhythms of Pain using Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation (tACS)? A Sham-controlled Study in Healthy Human Participants
Authors: May Elisabeth S. , Hohn Vanessa D. , Nickel Moritz M. , Tiemann Laura , Ávila Cristina Gil , Heitmann Henrik , Sauseng Paul , Ploner Markus 
Published: June 2020

AbstractPain protects the body. However, pain can also occur for longer periods without serving protective functions. Such chronic pain conditions are difficult to treat. Thus, a better understanding of the underlying neural mechanisms and new approaches for the treatment of pain are urgently needed. Here, we investigated a causal role of oscillatory brain activity for pain and explored the potential of transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) as a new treatment approach for pain. To this end, we investigated whether tACS can modulate pain and pain-related autonomic activity in 29 healthy human participants using a tonic heat pain paradigm as an experimental model of chronic pain. In 6 recording sessions, participants received tACS over prefrontal or somatosensory cortices at alpha or gamma frequencies or sham tACS. During tACS, pain ratings and autonomic responses were collected. TACS did not modulate pain intensity, the stability of pain ratings or the translation of the noxious stimulus into pain. Likewise, tACS did not change autonomic responses. Bayesian statistics further indicated a lack of tACS effects in most conditions. The only exception was alpha tACS over somatosensory cortex where evidence for tACS effects was inconclusive. Taken together, the present study did not find significant tACS effects on tonic experimental pain in healthy human participants. However, considering the conceptual plausibility of using tACS to modulate pain and the urgent need for novel pain treatments, further tACS studies are warranted. Based on the present findings, such studies might apply refined stimulation protocols targeting alpha oscillations in somatosensory cortices.
A yeast BiFC-seq method for genome-wide interactome mapping
Authors: Shang Limin , Zhang Yuehui , Liu Yuchen , Jin Chaozhi , Yuan Yanzhi , Tian Chunyan , Ni Ming , Bo Xiaochen , Zhang Li , Li Dong , He Fuchu , Wang Jian 
Published: June 2020

AbstractGenome-wide physical protein-protein interaction (PPI) mapping remains a major challenge for current technologies. Here, we report a high-efficiency yeast bimolecular fluorescence complementation method coupled with next-generation DNA sequencing (BiFC-seq) for interactome mapping. We applied this technology to systematically investigate an intraviral network of Ebola virus (EBOV). Two-thirds (9/13) of known interactions of EBOV were recaptured and five novel interactions were discovered. Next, we used BiFC-seq method to map the interactome of the tumor protein p53. We identified 97 interactors of p53 with more than three quarters are novel. Furthermore, in more complex background, we screened potential interactors by pooling two BiFC-libraries together, and revealing a network of 229 interactions among 205 proteins. These results show that BiFC-seq is a highly sensitive, rapid and economical method in genome-wide interactome mapping.
The neurophysiological basis of short- and long-term ventriloquism aftereffects
Authors: Park Hame , Kayser Christoph 
Published: June 2020

ABSTRACTOur senses often receive conflicting multisensory information, which our brain reconciles by adaptive recalibration. A classic example is the ventriloquist aftereffect, which emerges following both long-term and trial-wise exposure to spatially discrepant multisensory stimuli. Still, it remains debated whether the behavioral biases observed following short- and long-term exposure arise from largely the same or rather distinct neural origins, and hence reflect the same or distinct mechanisms. We address this question by probing EEG recordings for physiological processes predictive of the single-trial ventriloquism biases following the exposure to spatially offset audio-visual stimuli. Our results support the hypothesis that both short- and long-term aftereffects are mediated by common neurophysiological correlates, which likely arise from sensory and parietal regions involved in multisensory inference and memory, while prolonged exposure to consistent discrepancies additionally recruits prefrontal regions. These results posit a central role of parietal regions in mediating multisensory spatial recalibration and suggest that frontal regions contribute to increasing the behavioral bias when the perceived sensory discrepancy is consistent and persistent over time.
CYCLODEXTRIN DERIVATIVE ENHANCES THE OPHTHALMIC DELIVERY OF POORLY SOLUBLE AZITHROMYCIN
Authors: Thakur Anil , Jain Sourabh , Pant Anjali , Sharma Akanksha , Kumar Rajiv , Sharma Gajanand , Singla Neha , Suttee Ashish , Kumar Santosh , Barnwal Ravi Pratap , Katare O.P. , Singh Gurpal 
Published: June 2020

AbstractAzithromycin (AZM), a macrolide antibiotic used for the treatment of Chlamydial conjunctivitis, is less effective for the treatment of this disease due to its poor bioavailability (38%). Various alternatives have been developed for improving the physico-chemical properties (i.e., solubility) of the AZM without much success. To overcome the problems associated with AZM, an inclusion complex employing a modified cyclodextrin i.e., sulfobutylether-β-cyclodextrin (SBE-β-CD) was prepared and characterized by phase solubility studies, pXRD and FTIR techniques. The results portrayed the formation of the inclusion complex of AZM with sulfobutylether β-cyclodextrin (SBE-β-CD) in 1:2 molar stoichiometric ratios. This inclusion complex was later incorporated into a polymer matrix to prepare anin situgel. Various combinations of carbopol 934P and hydroxypropyl methylcellulose (HPMC K4M) polymers were used and evaluated by rheological andin vitrodrug release studies. The optimized formulation (F4), containing carbopol 934P 0.2% (w/v) and HPMC K4M 0.2% (w/v), was evaluated for clarity, pH, gelling capacity, drug content, rheological properties,in vitrodrug release pattern, ocular irritation test and antimicrobial efficacy. Finally, owing to the improved antimicrobial efficacy and increased residence time, AZM:SBE-β-CDin situgel was found to be a promising formulation for the efficient treatment of bacterial ocular disease.