bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Modelling the joint effects of body size and microclimate on heat budgets and foraging opportunities of ectotherms
Authors: Kearney Michael R. , Porter Warren P. , Huey Raymond B. 
Published: November 2020

Abstract

Body size affects the body temperature of an ectotherm by altering both heating rates and the microclimate experienced. These joint effects are rarely considered in the analyses of climatic constraints on ectotherms but nonetheless influence body temperatures and thus activity periods and foraging opportunities.

Here we develop and test transient heat‐budget models that use height‐specific microclimatic forcing to compute the dynamics of size‐dependent body temperatures of ectotherms in sun and in shade. We incorporate a model of behavioural thermoregulation and use it to compute potential body temperatures and then to map these to ecologically relevant indices, including foraging opportunities and thermal constraints. To illustrate potential applications, we combine a microclimate model driven by a global climate database with the transient behavioural algorithm developed for lizards to explore how body size (10 and 1,000 g) and size‐specific microclimate (at natural heights of 1 and 7.5 cm, respectively) interactively influence body temperatures and ecological indices at a warm, arid location in Australia in both spring and summer. To explore microclimatic effects, we contrast temperatures and indices for animals positioned at their natural versus reciprocal heights above the ground.

Our simulations show that the behavioural and ecological consequences of size can be strongly biased when joint effects of body size and size‐imposed microclimate are ignored. For example, the two body sizes did not differ in total foraging time when compared at their natural heights, but did differ if compared at the same height, the direction of this difference reversing with the height at which they were compared. We show how computed foraging times can be translated to potential foraging radii from a central place (burrow or shade‐providing bush), thereby illustrating how body size can be physiologically translated into habitat connectivity as a function of different shade configurations, for example, as modified by fire regimes or shrub dieback.

All functions are now integrated into the biophysical modelling r package NicheMapR and as a Shiny app, which should provide new insights and avenues for investigation into functional interactions between body size and habitat structure for ectotherms.
ABO blood group is related to bleeding in cardiac surgery
Authors: Hansen Søren Mose , Sprogøe Ulrik , Möller Sören , Andersen Claus 
Published: November 2020

AbstractBackgroundIncreased bleeding and blood product transfusions during cardiac surgery are associated with poor outcomes. The patient's ABO blood group is related to hemostatic balance, although it is unclear whether this influences bleeding during cardiac surgery. This study aimed to evaluate whether ABO blood group is related to bleeding during cardiac surgery.MethodsThis retrospective study evaluated data from 17,058 cardiac surgical procedures that were performed in four Danish cardiosurgical centers. Data regarding chest tube drainage and transfusion volumes were retrieved from a clinical database and combined with information regarding ABO group. The primary outcome was chest tube drainage volume and the secondary outcomes were transfused volumes of various blood products.ResultsBlood group O had the largest chest tube drainage volume (mean: 745 mL, 95% CI: 720‐771 mL) and blood group AB had the smallest volume (mean: 664 mL, 95% CI: 598‐731 mL). The inter‐group difference in the mean drainage volume was 81 mL (95% CI: 8‐154 mL, P < .05). Patients with blood group A or blood group B had mean drainage volumes that were between the volumes for groups AB and O. Relative to group O, group AB received smaller mean volumes of all blood products. The most pronounced difference was in platelet concentrates, with mean values of 170 mL for group O (95% CI: 157‐184 mL) and 63 mL for group AB (95% CI: 34‐92 mL).ConclusionThe patient's ABO group appears to be related to volumes of chest tube drainage and transfused blood products during cardiac surgery.
Chronic alcohol exposure differentially modulates structural and functional properties of amygdala: A cross‐sectional study
Authors: Orban Csaba , McGonigle John , Flechais Remy S.A. , Paterson Louise M. , Elliott Rebecca , Erritzoe David , Ersche Karen D. , Murphy Anna , Nestor Liam J. , Passetti Filippo , Reed Laurence J. , Ribeiro Andre S. , Smith Dana G. , Suckling John , Taylor Eleanor M. , Waldman Adam D. , Wing Victoria C. , Deakin J.F. William , Robbins Trevor W. , Nutt David J. , Lingford‐Hughes Anne R. ,   ICCAM Platform
Published: November 2020

AbstractAnimal models have shown that chronic alcohol exposure is associated with persistent neuroadaptations in amygdala synaptic function, whereas human studies have consistently reported amygdala grey‐matter volume (GMV) reductions in alcohol dependent patients (ADP). We hypothesised that chronic alcohol use associated with neuroadaptations may entail a reconfiguration of the amygdala's functional interactions and that these mechanisms may be affected by structural atrophy. We compared amygdala resting state functional connectivity (RSFC) using a whole brain seed‐based approach and amygdala GMV in abstinent ADP (n = 20) and healthy controls (HC; n = 39), balanced for age, gender and levels of head motion. The potential moderating influence of age, cumulative alcohol exposure, abstinence length and head motion was further examined in the two groups separately using correlational analyses. We found increased amygdala RSFC with substantia nigra/ventral tegmental area (SN/VTA) in ADP compared with HC. As expected, amygdala GMV was lower in ADP. Multiple regression analyses of the ADP group showed that amygdala‐SN/VTA RSFC increases were primarily associated with cumulative alcohol exposure rather than age, whereas amygdala GMV reductions were primarily associated with age rather than cumulative alcohol exposure. The same association between age and amygdala GMV was not observed amongst HC. Importantly, amygdala GMV and amygdala‐SN/VTA RSFC were uncorrelated in ADP, and neither measure was correlated with abstinence length. These results suggest that chronic alcohol exposure is associated with persistent elevations in amygdala‐SN/VTA RSFC and accelerated age‐related grey‐matter atrophy through potentially distinct mechanisms.
Roles of roadside vegetation in insect conservation in Australia
Authors: New Timothy R , Sands Don P A , Taylor Gary S 
Published: November 2020

AbstractThe extent and variety of roadside environments in Australia in largely anthropogenic landscapes render them substantial remnant habitats for insect biodiversity. The importance of these areas for insect biodiversity conservation and the key threats they face are discussed, as well as the needs for their protection and conservation management. Many rural roadsides harbour significant patches of native vegetation, including rare and threatened flora now scarce elsewhere. Other values of roadside vegetation include habitat remnants, seasonal refuges, corridors and shelters for insect movements and population connectivity. Examples are given of the importance of roadsides for individual threatened insect species. Roadside environments are under substantial threat from clearing, development and unintentional degradation through a variety of activities. The diverse responsibilities of roadside management, increasingly to harmonise human safety and amenity needs with biodiversity conservation, can readily incorporate considerations of insect diversity and occurrence of notable individual species. The conservation of remnant vegetation and ecological restoration of roadside corridors are highlighted as paramount for maintaining biodiversity and connectivity under increased human activity and environmental extremes.
Characterization of farmer‐based cooperative societies in the upper west region of Ghana
Authors: Dary Stanley Kojo , Grashuis Jasper 
Published: November 2020

AbstractThe study describes the ownership and governance characteristics and the challenges of farmer‐based cooperative societies from three districts in the Upper West Region of Ghana. Primary data were obtained from 59 active and 14 inactive cooperatives in the selected districts. The study concludes that Ghanaian cooperatives in the sample bear much resemblance to the traditional form which emerged in Europe and North America in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Generally, such cooperatives have relatively small memberships from local communities who use a democratic governance system and do not delegate control to outsiders. While the cost of owning and transacting is limited with such characteristics, many traditional cooperatives lack the specific knowledge, economic efficiency, and resource endowment necessary to become or remain competitive. Indeed, the active cooperatives listed finance, access to inputs, tractor services and poor leadership as key challenges, while inactive cooperatives blamed poor member commitment as the primary culprit for their inactivity. Efforts aimed at promoting and supporting farmer cooperatives should focus on addressing these key challenges. Also, financial and technical support should probably be conditional on group performance and not group formation itself.
Nonlinear mediation analysis with high‐dimensional mediators whose causal structure is unknown
Authors: Loh Wen Wei , Moerkerke Beatrijs , Loeys Tom , Vansteelandt Stijn 
Published: November 2020

AbstractWith multiple possible mediators on the causal pathway from a treatment to an outcome, we consider the problem of decomposing the effects along multiple possible causal path(s) through each distinct mediator. Under a path‐specific effects framework, such fine‐grained decompositions necessitate stringent assumptions, such as correctly specifying the causal structure among the mediators, and no unobserved confounding among the mediators. In contrast, interventional direct and indirect effects for multiple mediators can be identified under much weaker conditions, while providing scientifically relevant causal interpretations. Nonetheless, current estimation approaches require (correctly) specifying a model for the joint mediator distribution, which can be difficult when there is a high‐dimensional set of possibly continuous and noncontinuous mediators. In this article, we avoid the need to model this distribution, by developing a definition of interventional effects previously suggested for longitudinal mediation. We propose a novel estimation strategy that uses nonparametric estimates of the (counterfactual) mediator distributions. Noncontinuous outcomes can be accommodated using nonlinear outcome models. Estimation proceeds via Monte Carlo integration. The procedure is illustrated using publicly available genomic data to assess the causal effect of a microRNA expression on the 3‐month mortality of brain cancer patients that is potentially mediated by expression values of multiple genes.
Simultaneous spatial smoothing and outlier detection using penalized regression, with application to childhood obesity surveillance from electronic health records
Authors: Choi Young‐Geun , Hanrahan Lawrence P. , Norton Derek , Zhao Ying‐Qi 
Published: November 2020

AbstractElectronic health records (EHRs) have become a platform for data‐driven granular‐level surveillance in recent years. In this paper, we make use of EHRs for early prevention of childhood obesity. The proposed method simultaneously provides smooth disease mapping and outlier information for obesity prevalence that are useful for raising public awareness and facilitating targeted intervention. More precisely, we consider a penalized multilevel generalized linear model. We decompose regional contribution into smooth and sparse signals, which are automatically identified by a combination of fusion and sparse penalties imposed on the likelihood function. In addition, we weigh the proposed likelihood to account for the missingness and potential nonrepresentativeness arising from the EHR data. We develop a novel alternating minimization algorithm, which is computationally efficient, easy to implement, and guarantees convergence. Simulation studies demonstrate superior performance of the proposed method. Finally, we apply our method to the University of Wisconsin Population Health Information Exchange database.
Estimating the optimal individualized treatment rule from a cost‐effectiveness perspective
Authors: Xu Yizhe , Greene Tom H. , Bress Adam P. , Sauer Brian C. , Bellows Brandon K. , Zhang Yue , Weintraub William S. , Moran Andrew E. , Shen Jincheng 
Published: November 2020

AbstractOptimal individualized treatment rules (ITRs) provide customized treatment recommendations based on subject characteristics to maximize clinical benefit in accordance with the objectives in precision medicine. As a result, there is growing interest in developing statistical tools for estimating optimal ITRs in evidence‐based research. In health economic perspectives, policy makers consider the tradeoff between health gains and incremental costs of interventions to set priorities and allocate resources. However, most work on ITRs has focused on maximizing the effectiveness of treatment without considering costs. In this paper, we jointly consider the impact of effectiveness and cost on treatment decisions and define ITRs under a composite‐outcome setting, so that we identify the most cost‐effective ITR that accounts for individual‐level heterogeneity through direct optimization. In particular, we propose a decision‐tree–based statistical learning algorithm that uses a net‐monetary‐benefit–based reward to provide nonparametric estimations of the optimal ITR. We provide several approaches to estimating the reward underlying the ITR as a function of subject characteristics. We present the strengths and weaknesses of each approach and provide practical guidelines by comparing their performance in simulation studies. We illustrate the top‐performing approach from our simulations by evaluating the projected 15‐year personalized cost‐effectiveness of the intensive blood pressure control of the Systolic Blood Pressure Intervention Trial (SPRINT) study.
Speeding up Monte Carlo simulations for the adaptive sum of powered score test with importance sampling
Authors: Deng Yangqing , He Yinqiu , Xu Gongjun , Pan Wei 
Published: November 2020

AbstractA central but challenging problem in genetic studies is to test for (usually weak) associations between a complex trait (e.g., a disease status) and sets of multiple genetic variants. Due to the lack of a uniformly most powerful test, data‐adaptive tests, such as the adaptive sum of powered score (aSPU) test, are advantageous in maintaining high power against a wide range of alternatives. However, there is often no closed‐form to accurately and analytically calculate the p‐values of many adaptive tests like aSPU, thus Monte Carlo (MC) simulations are often used, which can be time consuming to achieve a stringent significance level (e.g., 5e‐8) used in genome‐wide association studies (GWAS). To estimate such a small p‐value, we need a huge number of MC simulations (e.g., 1e+10). As an alternative, we propose using importance sampling to speed up such calculations. We develop some theory to motivate a proposed algorithm for the aSPU test, and show that the proposed method is computationally more efficient than the standard MC simulations. Using both simulated and real data, we demonstrate the superior performance of the new method over the standard MC simulations.
Divergent shrub‐cover responses driven by climate, wildfire, and permafrost interactions in Arctic tundra ecosystems
Authors: Chen Yaping , Hu Feng Sheng , Lara Mark J. 
Published: November 2020

AbstractThe expansion of shrubs across the Arctic tundra may fundamentally modify land–atmosphere interactions. However, it remains unclear how shrub expansion pattern is linked with key environmental drivers, such as climate change and fire disturbance. Here we used 40+ years of high‐resolution (~1.0 m) aerial and satellite imagery to estimate shrub‐cover change in 114 study sites across four burned and unburned upland (ice‐poor) and lowland (ice‐rich) tundra ecosystems in northern Alaska. Validated with data from four additional upland and lowland tundra fires, our results reveal that summer precipitation was the most important climatic driver (r = 0.67, p < 0.001), responsible for 30.8% of shrub expansion in the upland tundra between 1971 and 2016. Shrub expansion in the uplands was largely enhanced by wildfire (p < 0.001) and it exhibited positive correlation with fire severity (r = 0.83, p < 0.001). Three decades after fire disturbance, the upland shrub cover increased by 1077.2 ± 83.6 m2 ha−1, ~7 times the amount identified in adjacent unburned upland tundra (155.1 ± 55.4 m2 ha−1). In contrast, shrub cover markedly decreased in lowland tundra after fire disturbance, which triggered thermokarst‐associated water impounding and resulted in 52.4% loss of shrub cover over three decades. No correlation was found between lowland shrub cover with fire severity (r = 0.01). Mean summer air temperature (MSAT) was the principal factor driving lowland shrub‐cover dynamics between 1951 and 2007. Warmer MSAT facilitated shrub expansion in unburned lowlands (r = 0.78, p < 0.001), but accelerated shrub‐cover losses in burned lowlands (r = −0.82, p < 0.001). These results highlight divergent pathways of shrub‐cover responses to fire disturbance and climate change, depending on near‐surface permafrost and drainage conditions. Our study offers new insights into the land–atmosphere interactions as climate warming and burning intensify in high latitudes.
Global patterns of rainfall partitioning by invasive woody plants
Authors: Whitworth‐Hulse Juan I. , Magliano Patricio N. , Zeballos Sebastián R. , Aguiar Sebastián , Baldi Germán 
Published: November 2020

AbstractAimInvasive species have the potential to alter hydrological processes by changing the local water balance. However, general patterns of how rainfall is partitioned into interception, throughfall and stemflow for invasive species worldwide have been seldom explored. We (a) describe the percentage of interception, throughfall and stemflow for invasive woody plant species; (b) analyse the influence of morphological attributes (i.e. life‐form, bark roughness, leaf type, leaf phenology and leaf area index) of invasive species on rainfall partitioning; and (c) compare the rainfall partitioning fluxes for co‐occurring invasive and native species, testing whether the variation in these fluxes depends on water availability of the study location.LocationGlobal.Time periodPresent.Major taxa studiedPlants.MethodsWe compiled data of 100 studies that assessed rainfall partitioning by invasive species (n = 67) and registered their morphological attributes. By means of a meta‐analysis we compared the rainfall partitioning by native and invasive species (n = 47 comparisons) and assessed how their fluxes were affected by water availability.ResultsInterception, throughfall and stemflow ranged from 1.6–59.5, 39.1–92.7 and 0.1–31.6% of total rainfall, respectively. The bark roughness and leaf type were the most important attributes driving rainfall partitioning fluxes. While rough‐barked species constrain rainfall inputs by promoting higher losses due to interception, smooth‐barked species with broad leaves enhance the amount of rainwater reaching the soil by maximizing stemflow. For pairwise comparisons, invasive species have higher stemflow values than native species for both drylands and humid areas, and higher throughfall in drylands, but less in humid areas.Main conclusionsOur findings suggest that specific morphological attributes of invasive species determine higher localized water inputs, which may represent an ecohydrological advantage, particularly in water‐limited ecosystems. These insights also suggest that the ecological role of stemflow, throughfall and interception should be considered in future plant invasions research.
Changes in public perceptions and experiences of the Australian health‐care system: A decade of change
Authors: Ellis Louise A. , Pomare Chiara , Gillespie James A. , Root Jo , Ansell James , Holt Joanna , Wells Leanne , Tran Yvonne , Braithwaite Jeffrey , Zurynski Yvonne 
Published: November 2020

AbstractBackgroundThe views and experiences of the Australian public are an important barometer of the health system. This study provides key findings about the changing views held by Australians over time regarding their individual experiences and perceptions of the overall performance of the health system.MethodsA population‐based online survey was conducted in 2018 (N = 1024). Participants were recruited through market research panels. The results were compared with previous Australian population survey data sets from 2008 (N = 1146), 2010 (N = 1201) and 2012 (N = 1200), each of which used different population samples. The survey included questions consistent with previous surveys regarding self‐reported health status, and questions about use, opinions and experiences of the health system.ResultsOverall, there has been a shift in views from 2008 to 2018, with a higher proportion of respondents now viewing the Australian health‐care system more positively (X2 (2, N = 4543) = 96.59, P < .001). In 2018, areas for attention continued to include the following: the need for more doctors, nurses and other health workers (29.0%); lower costs for care or Orion medicines (27.8%); more access to care (13.1%); and enhancements in residential aged care (17.3% rated these services as ‘bad’ or ‘very bad’).ConclusionsThis research suggests that Australians’ perceptions of their health‐care system have significantly improved over the last decade; however, concerns have emerged over access to medicines, inadequate workforce capacity and the quality of aged care facilities. Our study highlights the value of periodically conducting public sentiment surveys to identify potential emerging health system problems.
Midland non‐invasive ventilation score: a tool to predict non‐invasive ventilation failure in people with acute hypercapnic respiratory failure
Authors: Quigley David , Jones Simon , Piccolo Francesco , Huseini Taha , Manners David 
Published: November 2020

AbstractUse of non‐invasive ventilation (NIV) in patients with hypercapnic respiratory failure has clear benefits over invasive ventilation. Existing risk prediction models are complex and difficult to apply in the acute setting. We developed the Midland NIV score comprising only five parameters for use to predict NIV failure (in‐hospital death or intubation) at initiation. Individuals with Midland NIV score of ≤11 (average 13% NIV failure) may be suitable for general ward care, compared to intensive care for those with Midland NIV score ≥12 (average 66% NIV failure rate). Prospective external validation is required.