bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Location‐dependent change of median nerve mobility in the carpal tunnel of patients with carpal tunnel syndrome
Authors: Yao Yifei , Grandy Emily , Evans Peter J. , Seitz William H. , Li Zong‐Ming 
Published: July 2020

AbstractIntroductionThe purpose of this study was to investigate in vivo median nerve longitudinal mobility in different segments of the carpal tunnel associated with active finger motion in carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) patients in a comparison with healthy controls.MethodsEleven healthy volunteers and 11 CTS patients participated in this study. Dynamic ultrasound images captured location‐dependent longitudinal median nerve mobility within the carpal tunnel during finger flexion at the metacarpophalangeal joints using a speckle cross‐correlation algorithm.ResultsMedian nerve longitudinal mobility in the carpal tunnel was significantly smaller in CTS patients (0.0037 ± 0.0011 mm/degree) compared with controls (0.0082 ± 0.0026 mm/degree) (P < .05), especially in the proximal (0.0064 vs 0.0132 mm/degree on average) and middle (0.0033 vs 0.0074 mm/degree on average) carpal tunnel sections.DiscussionMedian nerve mobility can potentially serve as a biomechanical marker when diagnosing CTS, or when assessing the effectiveness of surgical and conservative treatments.
Modeling thermal regime and evolution of the methane hydrate stability zone of the Yamal peninsula permafrost
Authors: Arzhanov Maxim M. , Malakhova Valentina V. , Mokhov Igor I. 
Published: July 2020

AbstractIn recent years, new geophysical phenomena have been observed in the high‐latitude regions of continental permafrost. Since 2014 new craters 10–20 m in diameter have been found within the Yamal Peninsula and neighboring regions. They are associated with the emissions of gases, which could have been formed during dissociation of relict gas hydrate deposits due to increases in soil temperature. This paper presents the results of numerical modeling of the thermal regime of permafrost in the north of Western Siberia with the assessment of methane hydrate stability zone under climate changes over the past 130,000 years. According to the results obtained, the upper boundary of the methane hydrate stability zone in Yamal could have reached the surface within the periods of glacial maxima (about 90,000 and 60,000 years ago). We show that at present in Yamal permafrost above the modern boundary of the stability zone, relic methane hydrates are likely to exist at depths of up to 100–150 m, they could have “survives” warming during the Holocene optimum about 6,000 years ago and remain in permafrost rocks under negative temperatures even under transgression and increased geothermal flux conditions.
Harmonic SU(3)- and $$G_2$$-Structures via Spinors
Authors: Niedziałomski Kamil 
Published: July 2020

AbstractIn this note, using the spinorial description of SU(3) and $$G_2$$

G
2

-structures obtained recently by other authors, we give necessary and sufficient conditions for harmonicity of the above mentioned structures. We describe the results on appropriate homogeneous spaces. Here, harmonicity means harmonicity of a certain unique section induced by the G-structure in consideration.
Berichterstattung zu Sicherheit und Gesundheit bei der Arbeit
Authors: Siefer Anke 
Published: July 2020

ZusammenfassungDie Berichterstattung zu Sicherheit und Gesundheit bei der Arbeit in Deutschland hat eine lange Tradition, wobei im ersten „Unfallverhütungsbericht Arbeit“ aus den 1960er-Jahren diese zunächst auf Arbeitsunfälle und Berufskrankheiten fokussierte. Die im Arbeitsschutz geltende Maxime der menschengerechten Arbeitsgestaltung und der Wandel der Arbeitswelt forderten in der Vergangenheit und fordern in Gegenwart und Zukunft aber verschiedene inhaltliche Erweiterungen und Veränderungen. Nicht zuletzt, um diesen Anforderungen nachkommen zu können, werden neben den verfügbaren amtlichen und Prozessdaten inzwischen auch verstärkt Befragungen von Erwerbstätigen berücksichtigt, die Einblicke in die individuellen Arbeitstätigkeiten und Befindlichkeiten erlauben.Bei der Berichterstattung zu Sicherheit und Gesundheit und der Gesundheitsberichterstattung gibt es einige Überschneidungen, z. B. nutzen sie zum Teil die gleichen Daten, aber auch substanzielle Unterschiede. Neben Unterschieden in der Berichterstattung liegt die wohl größte Differenz in der zu betrachtenden Gruppe, die in der Gesundheitsberichterstattung deutlich vielfältiger ist.Die größte Herausforderung für die Arbeitsweltberichterstattung liegt im (stetigen) Wandel der Arbeitswelt, der durch technische Entwicklungen auch strukturelle Veränderungen in der betrieblichen Zusammenarbeit bewirken kann. So kann z. B. orts- und zeitflexibles Arbeiten dafür sorgen, dass nicht nur die Zusammenarbeit mit Kolleginnen und Kollegen virtuell stattfinden muss, sondern auch die Anforderungen an Führungskräfte sich fundamental verändern. Erhebungsmethoden und Berichterstattungen müssen sich hier den Gegebenheiten anpassen.
Wer schützt Österreichs Kinder und Jugendliche vor Tabakindustrie und -handel?
Authors: Berger J. , Neuberger M. 
Published: July 2020

ZusammenfassungZum Weltnichtrauchertag 2020 ruft die WHO dazu auf, die Jugend vor der Manipulation durch die Tabak- bzw. Nikotinindustrie zu schützen. Bei der Tabakprävention haben Mittel- und Osteuropa Nachholbedarf. In Österreich wurde das Schutzalter erst 2019 auf 18 Jahre angehoben. Danach erhoben wir bei 13- bis 16-jährigen Schülern in 5 Bundesländern (Burgenland, Kärnten, Niederösterreich, Steiermark, Wien) Konsum und Bezugsquellen von Tabak- und Nikotinprodukten. Von 95 % der Stichprobe erhielten wir auswertbare Antworten. Von 1029 Jugendliche gaben 38,4 % zu, schon mit Rauchwaren Erfahrung zu haben (41,6 % der Mädchen und 34,9 % der Jungen), wobei Tabakzigaretten am häufigsten konsumiert wurden, gefolgt von Shisha und E‑Zigaretten. Bezugsquellen sind meist Freunde, aber Mädchen benutzen häufiger auch Automaten (11,6 %), meist zum Bezug normaler Zigaretten, während Jungen verschiedene Tabak- und Nikotinprodukte und das zu 30,2 % in der Trafik kaufen. Im Vergleich zu früheren Studien ist der Anteil täglicher Raucher zwar auf 3,3 % (2,4–4,3 %) gesunken, aber der Anteil der Gelegenheitsraucher ist auf 10,1 % (8,4–12,0 %) gestiegen. Die Raucherprävalenz bei Jugendlichen liegt in Österreich noch immer über dem EU-Schnitt. Dringend nötig wären Testkäufe zur Alterskontrolle in Trafiken, die Abschaffung der Zigarettenautomaten und die Förderung des Nichtrauchens.
Spectral Analysis of Ultrasonic and Photo Acoustic Signals Generated by a Prototypal Fiber Microprobe for Media Characterization
Authors: Granchi Simona , Vannacci Enrico , Miris Lorenzo , Onofri Luca , Zingoni Duccio , Biagi Elena 
Published: July 2020

AbstractCombination of photoacoustics and ultrasound can provide complemental features and mutual benefits, useful for a complete tissue characterization and consequently for early diagnosis or therapy monitoring. Furthermore, minimally invasive techniques are required both to reach organs or tissue not accessible and to reduce patient discomfort and costs. This work has tested a prototypal microprobe for media characterization analysing their optical and mechanical features. Two different transmitters compose the miniaturized probe: one for large bandwidth ultrasonic signals generation and one for guiding the laser light into tissue to photogenerate ultrasound. The aim is to evaluate the possibility of employing in the future this new type of microprobe to characterize internal tissue, combining ultrasound and photoacoustic investigations. A calibrated commercial hydrophone has been used to detect generated signals, with the aim to provide repeatable and reliable results. Dedicated test objects have been realized by using solutions of corn starch flour and of Chinese ink with different and calibrated dilutions. The spectral algorithm HyperSPACE (Hyper SPectral Analysis for Characterization in Echography), applied on ultrasonic and photoacoustic signals has allowed differentiating scatterers’ concentration and distribution.
Mapping Large LSTMs to FPGAs with Weight Reuse
Authors: Que Zhiqiang , Zhu Yongxin , Fan Hongxiang , Meng Jiuxi , Niu Xinyu , Luk Wayne 
Published: July 2020

AbstractLong-Short Term Memory (LSTM) can retain memory and learn from data sequences. It gives state-of-the-art accuracy in many applications such as speech recognition, natural language processing and video classifications. Field-Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) have been used to speed up the inference of LSTMs, but FPGA-based LSTM accelerators are limited by the size of on-chip memory and the bandwidth of external memory on FPGA boards. We propose a novel hardware architecture to overcome data dependency and a new blocking-batching strategy to reuse the LSTM weights fetched from external memory to optimize the performance of systems with size-limited on-chip memory for large machine learning models. Evaluation results show that our architecture can achieve 20.8 GOPS/W, which is among the highest for the FPGA-based LSTM designs storing weights in off-chip memory. Our design achieves 1.65 times higher performance-per-watt efficiency and 2.48 times higher performance-per-DSP efficiency when compared with the current state-of-the-art designs of LSTM using weights stored in off-chip memory. Compared with CPU and GPU implementations, our FPGA implementation is 23.7 and 1.3 times faster while consuming 208 and 19.2 times lower energy respectively, which shows that our approach enables large LSTM systems to be processed efficiently on FPGAs with high performance and low power consumption.
Using Transposition to Efficiently Solve Constant Matrix-Vector Multiplication and Sum of Product Problems
Authors: Sarband Narges Mohammadi , Gustafsson Oscar , Garrido Mario 
Published: July 2020

AbstractIn this work, we present an approach to alleviate the potential benefit of adder graph algorithms by solving the transposed form of the problem and then transposing the solution. The key contribution is a systematic way to obtain the transposed realization with a minimum number of cascaded adders subject to the input realization. In this way, wide and low constant matrix multiplication problems, with sum of products as a special case, which are normally exceptionally time consuming to solve using adder graph algorithms, can be solved by first transposing the matrix and then transposing the solution. Examples show that while the relation between the adder depth of the solution to the transposed problem and the original problem is not straightforward, there are many cases where the reduction in adder cost will more than compensate for the potential increase in adder depth and result in implementations with reduced power consumption compared to using sub-expression sharing algorithms, which can both solve the original problem directly in reasonable time and guarantee a minimum adder depth.
Subthalamic Deep Brain Stimulation Affects Plasma Corticosterone Concentration and Peripheral Immunity Changes in Rat Model of Parkinson’s Disease
Authors: Grembecka Beata , Glac Wojciech , Listowska Magdalena , Jerzemowska Grażyna , Plucińska Karolina , Majkutewicz Irena , Badtke Piotr , Wrona Danuta 
Published: July 2020

AbstractDeep brain stimulation of the subthalamic nucleus (DBS-STN) is an effective treatment for advanced motor symptoms of Parkinson’s disease (PD). Recently, a connection between the limbic part of the STN and side effects of DBS-STN has been increasingly recognized. Animal studies have shown that DBS-STN influences behavior and provokes neurochemical changes in regions of the limbic system. Some of these regions, which are activated during DBS-STN, are involved in neuroimmunomodulation. The therapeutic effects of DBS-STN in PD treatment are clear, but the influence of DBS-STN on peripheral immunity has not been reported so far. In this study, we examined the effects of unilateral DBS-STN applied in male Wistar rats with 6-hydroxydopamine PD model (DBS-6OHDA) and rats without nigral dopamine depletion (DBS) on corticosterone (CORT) plasma concentration, blood natural killer cell cytotoxicity (NKCC), leukocyte numbers, lymphocyte population and apoptosis numbers, plasma interferon gamma (IFN-γ), interleukin 6 (IL-6), and tumor necrosis factor (TNF-α) concentration. The same peripheral immune parameters we measured also in non-stimulated rats with PD model (6OHDA). We observed peripheral immunity changes related to PD model. The NKCC and percentage of T cytotoxic lymphocytes were enhanced, while the level of lymphocyte apoptosis was down regulated in 6OHDA and DBS-6OHDA groups. After DBS-STN (DBS-6OHDA and DBS groups), the plasma CORT and TNF-α were elevated, the number of NK cells and percentage of apoptosis were increased, while the number of B lymphocytes was decreased. We also found, changes in plasma IFN-γ and IL-6 levels in all the groups. These results suggest potential peripheral immunomodulative effects of DBS-STN in the rat model of PD. However, further studies are necessary to explain these findings and their clinical implication.
On the convergence rate of the Halpern-iteration
Authors: Lieder Felix 
Published: July 2020

AbstractIn this work, we give a tight estimate of the rate of convergence for the Halpern-iteration for approximating a fixed point of a nonexpansive mapping in a Hilbert space. Specifically, using semidefinite programming and duality we prove that the norm of the residuals is upper bounded by the distance of the initial iterate to the closest fixed point divided by the number of iterations plus one.
Update on DNA-Double Strand Break Repair Defects in Combined Primary Immunodeficiency
Authors: Slatter Mary A. , Gennery Andrew R. 
Published: July 2020

AbstractPurpose of ReviewThe most serious DNA damage, DNA double strand breaks (DNA-dsb), leads to mutagenesis, carcinogenesis or apoptosis if left unrepaired. Non-homologous end joining (NHEJ) is the principle repair pathway employed by mammalian cells to repair DNA-dsb. Several proteins are involved in this pathway, defects in which can lead to human disease. This review updates on the most recent information available for the specific diseases associated with the pathway.Recent FindingsA new member of the NHEJ pathway, PAXX, has been identified, although no human disease has been associated with it. The clinical phenotypes of Artemis, DNA ligase 4, Cernunnos-XLF and DNA-PKcs deficiency have been extended. The role of haematopoietic stem cell transplantation, following reduced intensity conditioning chemotherapy, for many of these diseases is being advanced.SummaryIn the era of newborn screening, urgent genetic diagnosis is necessary to correctly target appropriate treatment for patients with DNA-dsb repair disorders.
Heart Failure with Preserved Ejection Fraction—a Concise Review
Authors: Adamczak Daria M. , Oduah Mary-Tiffany , Kiebalo Thomas , Nartowicz Sonia , Bęben Marcin , Pochylski Mateusz , Ciepłucha Aleksandra , Gwizdała Adrian , Lesiak Maciej , Straburzyńska-Migaj Ewa 
Published: July 2020

Abstract
Purpose of Review
Heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF) is a relatively new disease entity used in medical terminology; however, both the number of patients and its clinical significance are growing. HFpEF used to be seen as a mild condition; however, the symptoms and quality of life of the patients are comparable to those with reduced ejection fraction. The disease is much more complex than previously thought. In this article, information surrounding the etiology, diagnosis, prognosis, and possible therapeutic options of HFpEF are reviewed and summarized.

Recent Findings
It has recently been proposed that heart failure (HF) is rather a heterogeneous syndrome with a spectrum of overlapping and distinct characteristics. HFpEF itself can be distilled into different phenotypes based on the underlying biology. The etiological factors of HFpEF are unclear; however, systemic low-grade inflammation and microvascular damage as a consequence of comorbidities associated with endothelial dysfunction, oxidative stress, myocardial remodeling, and fibrosis are considered to play a crucial role in the pathogenesis of a disease. The H2FPEF score and the HFpEF nomogram are recently validated highly sensitive tools employed for risk assessment of subclinical heart failure.

Summary
Despite numerous studies, there is still no evidence-based pharmacotherapy for HFpEF and the mortality and morbidity associated with HFpEF remain high. A better understanding of the etiological factors, the impact of comorbidities, the phenotypes of the disease, and implementation of machine learning algorithms may play a key role in the development of future therapeutic strategies.
A global Newton-type scheme based on a simplified Newton-type approach
Authors: Amrein Mario 
Published: July 2020

AbstractGlobalization concepts for Newton-type iteration schemes are widely used when solving nonlinear problems numerically. Most of these schemes are based on a predictor/corrector step size methodology with the aim of steering an initial guess to a zero of f without switching between different attractors. In doing so, one is typically able to reduce the chaotic behavior of the classical Newton-type iteration scheme. In this note we propose a globalization methodology for general Newton-type iteration concepts which changes into a simplified Newton iteration as soon as the transformed residual of the underlying function is small enough. Based on Banach’s fixed-point theorem, we show that there exists a neighborhood around a suitable iterate $$x_{n}$$

x
n

such that we can steer the iterates—without any adaptive step size control but using a simplified Newton-type iteration within this neighborhood—arbitrarily close to an exact zero of f. We further exemplify the theoretical result within a global Newton-type iteration procedure and discuss further an algorithmic realization. Our proposed scheme will be demonstrated on a low-dimensional example thereby emphasizing the advantage of this new solution procedure.
“Let me explain!”: exploring the potential of virtual agents in explainable AI interaction design
Authors: Weitz Katharina , Schiller Dominik , Schlagowski Ruben , Huber Tobias , André Elisabeth 
Published: July 2020

AbstractWhile the research area of artificial intelligence benefited from increasingly sophisticated machine learning techniques in recent years, the resulting systems suffer from a loss of transparency and comprehensibility, especially for end-users. In this paper, we explore the effects of incorporating virtual agents into explainable artificial intelligence (XAI) designs on the perceived trust of end-users. For this purpose, we conducted a user study based on a simple speech recognition system for keyword classification. As a result of this experiment, we found that the integration of virtual agents leads to increased user trust in the XAI system. Furthermore, we found that the user’s trust significantly depends on the modalities that are used within the user-agent interface design. The results of our study show a linear trend where the visual presence of an agent combined with a voice output resulted in greater trust than the output of text or the voice output alone. Additionally, we analysed the participants’ feedback regarding the presented XAI visualisations. We found that increased human-likeness of and interaction with the virtual agent are the two most common mention points on how to improve the proposed XAI interaction design. Based on these results, we discuss current limitations and interesting topics for further research in the field of XAI. Moreover, we present design recommendations for virtual agents in XAI systems for future projects.
Reptile responses to vegetation structure in a grassland restored for an endangered snake
Authors: Mizsei Edvárd , Fejes Zsófia , Malatinszky Ákos , Lengyel Szabolcs , Vadász Csaba 
Published: July 2020

AbstractGrassland ecosystems are among the most threatened biomes, and their restoration has become common in nature conservation. Yet restoration is rarely applied specifically for reptiles, which are among the most threatened vertebrates. The Meadow Viper (Vipera ursinii) has become extinct in most of lowland Europe, and an endangered subspecies (Vipera ursinii rakosiensis) has been a target of habitat restoration and captive breeding in Hungary since 2004. We quantified vegetation properties and the density of reptiles that either spontaneously colonised (three species) or were reintroduced (V. ursinii) in a grassland restored specifically for this purpose. We used a fine-scale survey to estimate the cover, and compositional and vertical diversity of the vegetation. We characterised sampling units along three habitat gradients: wetness, openness and grass tussock size. Model selection based on data from replicated counts showed that Green Lizards (Lacerta viridis) responded positively to vegetation cover and negatively to tussock area and height, and number of burrows. The Sand Lizard (Lacerta agilis) responded positively to vegetation cover, vertical diversity and wetness, and negatively to openness. The Balkan Wall Lizard (Podarcis tauricus) responded positively to tussock height and negatively to vegetation cover. Finally, V. ursinii responded positively to vegetation cover and tussock height, and negatively to compositional diversity. Our results show the general importance of structural and compositional diversity of vegetation to reptiles. These results suggest that adaptive management should focus on increasing the total cover (for lizards) and the structural diversity of vegetation (for each species) to benefit reptiles in restored grasslands.