bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Nomograms Predicting Long-Term Overall Survival and Cancer-Specific Survival in Metastatic Hepatocellular Carcinoma Patients
Authors: Cui Chi , Duan Yaru , Li Rui , Ye Hua , Wang Peng , Wan Didi , Shi Jianxiang , Zhang Jianying 
Published: June 2020

Abstract
Background

This study aims to evaluate the clinicopathological characteristics of metastatic hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients and develop nomograms to predict their long-term overall survival (OS) and cancer-specific survival (CSS).
Methods

Information on metastatic HCC from 2010 to 2015 was retrieved from the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) program of the National Cancer Institute. The metastatic HCC patients were divided into a long-term survival (LTS) group and a short-term survival (STS) group with 1 year selected as the cut-off value. Then, we compared the demographic and clinicopathological features between the two groups. Next, all patients were randomly divided into a training group and validation group at a 7:3 ratio. Univariate and multivariate Cox regression analyses were used to identify potential predictors for OS and CSS in the training group, and nomograms of OS and CSS were established. These predictive models were further validated in the validation group.
Results

A total of 2163 patients were included in the current study according to the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Patients with characteristics including lower T stage and N stage; treatment with surgery, radiation or chemotherapy; no lung metastasis; and AFP negative status showed better survival. The concordance index (C-index) of the OS nomogram was 0.72 based on 9 variables. The C-index of the CSS nomogram was 0.71 based on 8 variables.
Conclusions

These nomograms may help clinicians make better treatment recommendations for metastatic HCC patients.
Effect of Massa Medicata Fermentata on the Gut Microbiota of Dyspepsia Mice Based on 16s rRNA Technique
Authors: Zhang Xiaorui , Zhang Hongling , Huang Qinwan , Sun Jilin , Yao Renchuan , Wang Jin 
Published: June 2020

Abstract
Background：Massa MedicataFermentata (MMF), also known as Shenqu and Liuqu, is a traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) for treating indigestion and its related disorders.This study analyzes the effect of MMF on intestinal microorganisms in dyspepsia mice based on 16S rRNA technology. Methods: We adopt a dyspepsia model of spleen deficiency, which is caused by a high-protein, high-calorie, high-fat diet. The 60 specific-pathogen free Kunming (SPF KM) mice were randomly divided into a model group (administered saline 50 ml/kg/day, n=12), an MMF group (LSQ group, administered 4.8 g/kg/day, n=12), a Jianweixiaoshi group (JWXS group, administered 2.88 g/kg/day, n=12), a Domperidone group (DP group, administered 0.006 g/kg/day, n=12), and a blank group (administered saline 50 ml/kg/day, n=12). On the seventh day of administration, the mice were fasted and deprived of water. After 24 h, take the second feces of stress defecation in mice under strict aseptic conditions and quickly transfers them to a sterile cryotube. This study comprehensively evaluates the α-diversity, β-diversity, flora abundance and composition of each group of mice's intestinal microorganisms, and their correlation with functional dyspepsia on the base of 16S rRNA gene sequencing technology. Results: After modeling, there were some dyspepsia reactions, proximal gastric relaxation reduction, and changes in intestinal microflora. Dyspepsia mice appeared dyspepsia reactions and proximal gastric relaxation reduction, characterized by a significant decrease of contents of gastrin (P <0.01) and cholinesterase (P <0.01). MMF can improve dyspepsia symptoms and promote proximal gastric relaxation. Significant intestinal flora disorders were observed in dyspepsia mice, including down-regulation of Bacteroidetes, Lactobacillus, and Prevotellaceae, up-regulation of Proteobacteria, Verrucomicrobia, Epsilonbacteraeota, Firmicutes, Lachnospiraceae NK4A136 group, and Lachnospiraceae. MMF could alleviate intestinal microflora disturbance, and the regulation effect of MMF on Bacteroidetes, Verrucomicrobia, and Epsilonbacteraeota was more reliable than that of Jianweixiaoshi tables and Domperidone. The intestinal microflora may be correlated with the promote digestion of MMF.Conclusions: Overall this research explained the potential pharmacological mechanism of MMF and provided targets and direction for further research on Chinese fermentation medicine. Such research-based on high-throughput data sets can be used to interpret TCM theories and provide valuable research models and clinical medication references for TCM researchers and doctors.
Prevalence and Intensity of Urinary Schistosomiasis Among Selected People in Tulus Area, South Darfur State, Sudan
Authors: Maki A , Ali Gafar A , Hajissa Khalid 
Published: June 2020

Abstract
Objective: Urinary schistosomiasis is a major public health issue in Sudan. The disease is endemic in many rural communities across the country. This is a cross-sectional study conducted to determine the prevalence and intensity of urinary schistosomiasis among selected induvial in the city of Tulus, South Darfur state, Sudan. One hundred terminal urine samples were collected and examined for Schistosoma haematobium eggs using standard filtration technique.Results: A total of 100 individual were enrolled in the study with a mean (± SD) age of 17.7 ± 0.73 years. Out of them, 62 (62%) were found to be infected with Schistosoma haematobium. The statistical analysis showed significant association with gender (P = 0.043) with higher prevalence 70.9% (39/55) in female than males 51.1% (23/45). Majority of the S. haematobium infections were classified as intense infection (82%, 51/62) with egg count ≥ 50 eggs/10 ml urine, while gross haematuria was observed in 10% of urine samples. Further studies, including large sample size will be essential to assess the burden of the disease in the study area.
A Unified Gas-kinetic Scheme for Micro Flow Simulation Based on Linearized Kinetic Equation
Authors: Liu Chang , Xu Kun 
Published: June 2020

Abstract
The flow regime of micro flow varies from collisionless regime to hydrodynamic regime according to the Knudsen number. On the kinetic scale, the dynamics of micro flow can be described by the linearized kinetic equation. In the continuum regime, hydrodynamic equations such as linearized Navier-Stokes equations and Euler equations can be derived from the linearized kinetic equation by the Chapman-Enskog asymptotic analysis. In this paper, based on the linearized kinetic equation we are going to propose a unified gas kinetic scheme scheme (UGKS) for micro flow simulation, which is an effective multiscale scheme in the whole micro flow regime. The important methodology of UGKS is the following. Firstly, the evolution of microscopic distribution function is coupled with the evolution of macroscopic flow quantities. Secondly, the numerical flux of UGKS is constructed based on the integral solution of kinetic equation, which provides a genuinely multiscale and multidimensional numerical flux. The UGKS recovers the linear kinetic solution in the rarefied regime, and converges to the linear hydrodynamic solution in the continuum regime. An outstanding feature of UGKS is its capability of capturing the accurate viscous solution even when the cell size is much larger than the kinetic kinetic length scale, such as the capturing of the viscous boundary layer with a cell size ten times larger than the particle mean free path. Such a multiscale property is called unified preserving (UP) which has been studied in \cite{guo2019unified}. In this paper, we are also going to give a mathematical proof for the UP property of UGKS.
Excessive abdominal fat content indicates poor prognosis in patients with newly diagnosed multiple myeloma
Authors: Bao Li , Wang Yutong , Cheng Xiaoguang , Chu Bin , Lu Minqiu , Shi Lei , Cheng Kebin 
Published: June 2020

Abstract
Introduction: Obesity has been identified as risk factor for multiple myeloma (MM). Various indexes of body fat compartment make it difficult to assess the value of body fat compartment in predicting prognosis in MM patients.Methods: 36 newly diagnosed MM (NDMM) patients underwent abdominal CT pre-chemotherapy, and 72 matched healthy people were included. Total fat area (TFA), visceral fat area (VFA) and subcutaneous fat area (SFA) were measured from T12 to S1 and analyzed at six slices of vertebral interfaces. The level of adiponectin was also detected.Results: NDMM patients had larger TFA, VFA and SFA while significantly lower plasma adiponectin than healthy people. The percentage of bone marrow plasma cells was significantly inversely correlated with SAT, but positively correlated with VFA/SFA. A significant inverse correlation was observed between the high-risk cytogenetic abnormality gain 1q21 and VFA. SFA and VFA/SFA had a significant effect on treatment responses.Conclusions: NDMM patients had higher abdominal fat content but lower adipokine levels than healthy people. Excessive subcutaneous fat might be a predictive factor for high tumor burden and poor treatment response. Visceral fat content may be correlated with high-risk cytogenetic abnormalities. However, further investigation in larger samples is necessary to verify this association.
Res-WGAN: Image Classification for Plant Small-scale Datasets
Authors: Jiaqi Mi , xia Hao , Si Yang , Xiande Yang , Wanlin Gao , Minzan Li , Lihua Zheng , Wang Minjuan 
Published: June 2020

Abstract
Background: Artificial identification of rare plants is an important yet challenging problem in plant taxonomy. Although deep learning-based method can accurately predict rare plant category from training samples, accuracy requirements of only few experts are satisfied due to the small sample size. Thus, effective data augmentation is vital to improve the expressive power and robustness of deep learning models, especially for plant small-sample classification tasks. Different from traditional methods, a generative adversarial network (GAN) can mimic the distribution of primary data and produce similar but nonidentical samples. Data augmentation for automated classification of rare plant samples with GAN has not been studied for a long time. Result: In this study, we present a novel GAN model, referred to as residual Wasserstein GAN (Res-WGAN), for extending rare plant dataset efficiently. With a premise of minimized size of training parameters, residual block serves as elementary building block to increase the model’s expression ability. A loss function based on Wasserstein distance with gradient penalty is used to ensure diversity of output. Moreover, we draw on the super-resolution GAN (SRGAN) and consider perceptual loss into the function. Perceptual loss guarantees similarity between generated samples and original samples in high-dimensional features. Benefiting from these improvements, the expanded dataset improves the classification accuracy on the residual neural network (ResNet), a classic convolutional neural network, and restrains the overfitting phenomenon effectively by using transfer learning. More similar experiments are presented in this paper to prove the practicality of the model. Conclusions: Our proposed method produces better diversity and sharpness of generated samples and more accurate classification results than other data augmentation methods. In addition, a user study confirms that it is an ideal alternative strategy for small-scale rare plant identification. Developing a robust and effective small-scale plant classification method to replace expert testimony is highly relevant for agricultural automation development.
Association between intraoperative administration of dexamethasone and survival after curative resection for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC): A propensity score matching analysis
Authors: Yan Fang , Chen Gang , Xie Jingdun , Zhou Huaqiang , Xing Wei , Li Qiang , Zeng Weian , Chen Dongtai 
Published: June 2020

Abstract
Background: Few studies have suggested the correlation between intraoperative dexamethasone and oncological outcomes in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients with radical resection. The existing data are inconsistent and inadequate, and more evidence is needed. We therefore undertook a propensity-matched cohort study to investigate the correlation.Methods: 832 patients with stage I to IIIa NSCLC who went through lung tumor resection between January 2008 and December 2013 were enrolled in our study. Propensity-score matching analysis created a population of 260 patients in the non-DEX group and 130 patients in the DEX group. Cox regression analyses were applied to compare the disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) between patients who did not and did receive dexamethasone in the propensity score-matched cohort, as well as in the certain patients with high-risk factors of postoperative nausea and vomiting (PONV).Results: After propensity score matching, intraoperative dexamethasone was not significantly associated with DFS (HR: 0.944, 95%CI: 0.720-1.237, P = 0.655) and OS (HR: 1.210, 95%CI: 0.927-1.581, P = 0.486). Multivariable cox regression analysis revealed that intraoperative dexamethasone was not independent prognostic factor for DFS and OS in NSCLC patients undergoing surgical resection. In the subgroup analysis, including female subgroup, nonsmoking subgroup, long anesthetic time subgroup, VATS subgroup and inhaled anesthetics subgroup, intraoperative dexamethasone was not significantly associated with DFS and OS.Conclusion: There was no correlation between intraoperative administration of dexamethasone and survival in NSCLC patients after curative surgery. In the high-risk subgroups of PONV, that is, female, nonsmoking, long anesthetic time, VATS and inhaled anesthetics, patients given intraoperative dexamethasone had no better or poorer prognosis compared with patients not given intraoperative dexamethasone.
Community and Health Care Providers Perception on Quality of Private Sector Outpatient Malaria Care in North West Ethiopia: A Qualitative Study
Authors: Argaw Mesele Damte , Mavundla Thandisizwe Redford , Gidebo Kassa Daka 
Published: June 2020

Abstract
Malaria is one of the most important public health problems in Ethiopia contributing to significant patient morbidity and mortality. Prompt diagnosis and effective malaria case management-through public, private and community health facilities has been one of the key malaria prevention, control and elimination strategies. The objective of this study was to evaluate perceptions of adult malaria patients and healthcare provider on quality of malaria management at private sector outpatient facilities. An exploratory, descriptive, contextual, qualitative research methodology was conducted with 101 participants (i.e. 33 in-depth interviews and ten Focus Group Discussions with 68 discussants). All interview and Focus Group Discussions were audio recorded, transcribed verbatim and analysed using eight steps of Tesch (1990). During data analysis a single theme, two categories and six sub categories were emerged, namely (1) Perceived quality of malaria management at outpatient facilities; (a) essential resources ; (a1) safe outpatient services; (a2) antimalarial drugs and supplies; (a3) health workers; (b) factors influencing service utilization ; (b1) Physical accessibility; (b2) “Art of care’’; and (b3) efficient malaria diagnosis and treatment services. Finally, enhancing good governance and stewardship of the public sector to tap the potential of private sector, build the service providers capacity and empowering the community on seeking early medical and safety were recommended.
Increased acquired protease inhibitor drug resistance mutations in minor HIV-1 quasispecies from infected patients suspected of failing on national second-line therapy in South Africa
Authors: Obasa Adetayo Emmanuel , Ambikan Anoop T , Gupta Soham , Neogi Ujjwal , Jacobs Graeme Brendon 
Published: June 2020

Abstract
Background: HIV-1C has been shown to have a greater risk of virological failure and reduced susceptibility towards boosted protease inhibitors (bPIs), a component of second-line combination antiretroviral therapy (cART) in South Africa. This study entailed an evaluation of HIV-1 drug resistance-associated mutations (RAMs) among minor viral populations through high-throughput sequencing genotypic resistance testing (HTS-GRT) in patients suspected of failing on the South African national second-line cART regimen with bPIs.Methods: During 2017 and 2018, 67 patient samples were selected, of which 56 samples were successfully analyzed. All patients were receiving bPIs as part of their cART. Viral RNA was extracted, and complete pol genes were amplified and sequenced using Illumina HiSeq2500, followed by bioinformatics analysis to quantify the RAMs according to the Stanford HIV Drug Resistance Database.Results: Statistically significantly (p<0.001) higher PI RAMs were observed in minor viral quasispecies (25%; 14/56) compared to nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (11%; 6/56), non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (9%; 5/56) and integrase inhibitor RAM (4%; 2/56). The majority of the drug resistance mutations in the minor viral quasispecies were observed in the V82A mutation (n=13) in protease and K65R (n=5), K103N (n=7) and M184V (n=5) in reverse transcriptase.Conclusions: HTS-GRT improved the identification of PI and reverse transcriptase inhibitor (RTI) RAMs in second-line cART patients from South Africa compared to the conventional GRT with ≥20% used in Sanger-based sequencing. Several RTI RAMs, such as K65R, M184V or K103N and PI RAM V82A, were identified in <20% of the population. Deep sequencing could be of greater value in detecting acquired resistance mutations early.
Prognostic value of a five-lncRNA signature in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC)
Authors: Zhang Lan , Li Pan , Xing Chenju , Zhu Di , Zhang Jianying , Wang Weiwei , Jiang Guozhong 
Published: June 2020

Abstract
Background
The aim of this study was to identify prognostic long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) and develop a multi-lncRNA signature for suvival prediction in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC).
Methods
The clinical and gene expression data from Gene Expression Omnibus database (GSE53624, n = 119) were obtianed as training set. A total of 98 paired ESCC tumor and normal tissues were detected by RNA sequencing and used as test set. Another 84 ESCC tissues were used for real-time quantitative PCR(qRT-PCR) and as an independent validation cohort. Survival analyses, Cox regression and Kaplan–Meier analysis were performed.
Results
We screened a prognostic marker of ESCC from the GSE53624 dataset and named it as the five-lncRNA signature including AC007179.1, MORF4L2-AS1, RP11-488I20.9, RP13-30A9.2, RP4-735C1.6, which could classify patients into high- and low-risk groups with significantly different survival(median survival: 1.75 years vs. 4.01 years, log rank P < 0.05). Then test dataset and validation dataset confirmed that the five-lncRNA signature can determine the prognosis of ESCC patients. Predictive independence of the prognostic marker was proved by multivariable Cox regression analyses in the three datasets (P < 0.05). In addition, the signature was found to be better than TNM stage in terms of prognosis.
Conclusion
The five-lncRNA signature could be a good prognostic biomarker for ESCC patients and has important clinical value.
Validation of Coronal Mass Ejection Arrival-time Forecasts by Magnetohydrodynamic Simulations Based on Interplanetary Scintillation Observations
Authors: Iwai Kazumasa , Shiota Daikou , Tokumaru Munetoshi , Fujiki Ken'ichi , Den Mitsue , Kubo Yûki 
Published: June 2020

Abstract
Coronal mass ejections (CMEs) cause various disturbances of the space environment; therefore, forecasting their arrivaltime is very important.However,forecasting accuracy is hindered by limited CME observations in interplanetary space. This study investigates the accuracy of CME arrivaltimesat the Earth forecasted by three-dimensional(3D) magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations based on interplanetary scintillation (IPS) observations. In this system, CMEs are approximated as spheromakswith various initial speeds. TenMHD simulations with different CME initial speed are tested, and the density distributions derived from each simulation run are compared with IPS data observed by the Institute for Space-Earth Environmental Research (ISEE), Nagoya University.The CME arrivaltime of the simulation run that most closelyagrees with the IPS data is selected as the forecasted time. We then validate the accuracy of this forecast using 12 halo CME events. The average absolute arrival-time error of theIPS-based MHD forecast is approximately 5.0 h, which is one of the most accurate predictions that ever been validated, whereasthat of MHD simulations without IPS data, in which the initial CME speed isderived from white-light coronagraph images, is approximately6.7 h. This suggests that the assimilation of IPS data into MHD simulations can improve the accuracy of CME arrival-time forecasts. The average predicted arrivaltimes are earlier than the actual arrival times. These early predictions may be duetooverestimation of the magnetic field included in the spheromak and/or underestimation of the drag force from the background solar wind, the latter of which could be related to underestimation of CME size or background solar wind density.
Aspergillus Flavus Induced Oxidative Stress and Immunosuppressive Activity in Spodoptera Litura As Well As Safety for Mammals
Authors: Kaur Mandeep , Chadha Pooja , Kaur Sanehdeep , Kaur Amarjeet 
Published: June 2020

Abstract
In an attempt to find toxicity of Aspergillus flavus in insects, Spodoptera litura was treated with A.flavus ethyl acetate extract and toxicity was assessed by analyzing the effect of fungal extract on antioxidant and cellular immune defense. In antioxidant defense, the lipid peroxidation (Malondialdehyde content) and antioxidant enzymes activities (Catalase, Ascorbate peroxidase, Superoxide dismutase) were examined. In cellular immune defense, effect of A. flavus extract was analyzed on haemocytes using Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). Ethyl acetate extract of A. flavus was administrated to the larvae of S.litura using artificial diet method having concentration 1340.84µg/ml (LC50 of fungus). The effect was observed using haemolymph of insect larvae for different time intervals (24, 48, 72 and 96). In particular, Malondialdehyde content and antioxidant enzymes activities were found to be significantly (p≤0.05) increased in treated larvae as compared to control. A. flavus ethyl acetate extract also exhibit negative impact on haemocytes having major role in cellular immune defense. Various deformities were observed in different haemocytes like cytoplasmic leakage and surface abnormalities etc. Furthermore, mammalian toxicity was analyzed with respect to DNA damage induced in treated rat relative to control. Genotoxicity on rat was assessed using different tissues of rat (blood, liver, and kidney) by comet assay. Non-significant effect of A. flavus extract was found in all the tissues (blood, liver, and kidney). Overall the study provides important information regarding the oxidative stress causing potential and immunosuppressant nature of A. flavus against S. litura and its non toxicity to mammals (rat).