bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Synthesis and characterization of nickel nanoparticles formed by solution cold plasma jet
Authors: Abdulhadi Omar O. , Rahmman Ibrahim A. AA. , Obaid A. S. 
Published: December 2021

AbstractIn this work, nickel nanoparticles were prepared from nickel chloride solution using the liquid phase plasma reduction technique. A cold plasma jet was used for this purpose. The variation of the concentrations 0.5mM, 1mM and 2 mM and was used to study optimal condition of nickel nanoparticles formation. A concentration of 1 ml was observed to be the best, by using UV-Vis spectroscopy and Field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM). The optimum concentration was used to formation nanoparticles solution with variation the exposure time of cold plasma jet at (5 min, 10 min, 15 min ) respectively. The results shown by UV-Vis spectroscopy the nanoparticle peaks produced by surface plasmon absorption were observed around 365-375 nm according the discharge time of cold plasma. The nanoparticles were spherical homogenous as observed by Field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) which also shown the average particle size about 25nm, and by dynamic light scattering (DLS) and also zeta potential (ZP) measurements were observed non-aggregated in the long term, the particles are very stable colloid, also no visible aggregation have been seen on the prepared samples in this concentration (1mM). In contrast to other concentrations which showed a nonhomogeneous morphology and aggregated. X-ray Diffraction (XRD) showed that NiNPs have a face-centered cubic (FCC) structure with a crystalline size of around 12.5 nm, and also Inductively Coupled Plasma mass Spectrometry (ICP-mass) were used to characterize the prepared samples.
Evaluation of Paromomycin Loaded Chitosan Nanoparticles and Oxidative Stress Activities against Entamoeba Histolytica
Authors: Hamad Hanaa Kamil 
Published: December 2021

Abstract
This investigation was carried out to estimate the antiparasitic potential of chitosan nanoparticles loaded with paromomycin against Entamoeba histolytica infected. After rats inoculated orally in a dose 103 viable cysts for acute infection; then treated with paromomycin, chitosan nanoparticles as a single or combined therapy given for seven days. Stool examination revealed a significant decrease in the number of Entamoeba histolytica cysts in all treated infected rats compared with infected non-treated. Combined treatment provided better results than single treatment. The best effect was observed in the group of rats treated with chitosan nanoparticles loaded with paromomycin. Also, the oxidative stress markers Glutathione (GSH) and Lipid Peroxide (Malondialdehyde) (MDA) were assessed in liver tissue homogenate. The current work is the first time of using chitosan nanoparticles loaded with paromomycin as therapeutic agents against experimental amoebiasis. It was shown that the highest degree of effectiveness attained by the synergistic action of paromomycin and chitosan nanoparticles as was indicated by lower parasite count and GSH, MDA concentration.
Green Synthesis and Characterization of Gold Nanoparticles from Malus viridisand Capsicum annuum as AnticancerAgent
Authors: Abdulwahed Sh.H. , Alias M. F. A. , MohammedHasan Z. Y. 
Published: December 2021

Abstract
Gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) were synthesied by eco friendly method (green method) through the reduction of aqueous chloroauric acid (HAuCl4.4H2O) solution using apple and pepper (Malusviridis and capsicum annuum) peels extract as a reducing and stabilizing agent. AuNPs were characterized using various instrumental techniques including energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS), Fourier transformed infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), Atomic force microscope (AFM), field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) ultraviolet-visible spectroscopy (UV-Vis), and Zeta-Potential. The synthesized AuNPs was used against breast cancer cell line MCF-7 to compare their biological effect as anticancer agent. Results showed that the AuNPs formed with both plants had a physical charastaristics differ from each other, even in their effects on cancerous cells, where the inhibition rate of AuNPs synthesized using apple (Malusviridis) peel extrac has larger values than Capsicum annuum. The AuNPs formed from synthesized using both plants showed an acceptable stability.
Study the surface morphology and the chemical composition of NiPc:NiO nanocomposite thin films
Authors: Qassim A A , Sadeq A N 
Published: December 2021

Abstract
The synthesis of organic and inorganic thin films based on nickel phthalocyanine (NiPc) and nickel oxide NiO nanoparticles. the thin films prepared by spin coating technic. The volume of the solution dropped on each slide is 50 micro liter at room temperature. Nanocomposites thin films NiPc:NiO with different percentage 1:0 75:25, 50:50, 25:75 and 0:1 are analysed using FESEM and EDX. The study of morphology and chemical composition of the synthesized thin films revealed the formation of NiPc in the form of rods and nickel oxide similar to spherical clusters. The EDX spectra revealed the appearance of oxygen in a high percentage in some samples, perhaps as a result of the chemical and physical adsorption. This is the first study on the combination and description of NiPc:NiO nanocomposite.
Thermochromic and opacity behaviors in vanadium dioxide nanofilms: a theoretical study
Authors: Shallal Ikhlas H , Abdul-Ameer Nidhal M , Abdul-Hasan Shaymaa Q , Abdulrida Moafak C 
Published: December 2021

Abstract
Vanadium dioxide nanofilms are one of the most essential materials in electronic applications like smart windows. Therefore, studying and understanding the optical properties of such films is crucial to modify the parameters that control these properties. To this end, this work focuses on investigating the opacity as a function of the energy directed at the nanofilms with different thicknesses (1–100) nm. Effective mediator theories (EMTs), which are considered as the application of Bruggeman’s formalism and the Looyenga mixing rule, have been used to estimate the dielectric constant of VO2 nanofilms. The results show different opacity behaviors at different wavelength ranges (ultraviolet, visible, and infrared). The results depict that the highest opacity of the insulating phase is achieved at the ultraviolet region and it reduces for the metal phase. Besides, the results demonstrate that the opacity possesses a redshift during the changes at the three phases. Regarding the infrared region, the lowest opacity value is achieved at the insulator phase and it increases to the highest value at the metal phase. In the visible region, the opacity behavior remains similar in the three phases. It is worth noting that the lowest opacity is found for thinner nanofilm. Since both the refractive index and the extinction index are among the most essential optical constants, hence, both of them were compared with the experiment results, and an excellent agreement is achieved between them.
Novel use of a sequential standardized oral board exam to assess PGY1 resident progression
Authors: O’Mara Keliana , Holder Martina , Lagasse Carrie , Lemon Stephen J 
Published: December 2021

Abstract

Purpose
A standardized oral board exam was created to longitudinally assess postgraduate year 1 (PGY1) pharmacy residents in key domains.

Summary
We provide a descriptive review of a novel oral board exam administered quarterly to our PGY1 pharmacy residents. Preceptors from our core rotations (internal medicine/infectious diseases, adult critical care, oncology, pediatrics, and administration/health policy and outcomes) developed questions based on situations commonly encountered by PGY1 residents to assess residents’ communication; the content of their response, assessment, and plan; and coachability. Over the 4-year history of this assessment, scoring has matured to consider whether a resident has or has not met or has exceeded expectations for a PGY1 resident at a given stage in their training. Our comprehensive feedback and action planning approach included residents’ self-assessment, feedback from the exam committee, development and implementation of a customized training plan for execution, and dissemination to our preceptors. Systematically assessing our PGY1 residents with this innovative method provided a process for tracking their performance and served as a baseline for those who completed additional training at our institution.

Conclusion
A standardized quarterly oral board exam was developed to identify residents’ strengths and areas for improvement at established periods during the PGY1 residency training program. This standardized assessment, paired with individualized action plans and open communication with key stakeholders, stimulated development in residents’ performance, communication, and interpersonal skills. We aim to expand this system’s application to identify predictors of success for candidates we interview for our postgraduate training programs.
SIFLoc: a self-supervised pre-training method for enhancing the recognition of protein subcellular localization in immunofluorescence microscopic images
Authors: Tu Yanlun , Lei Houchao , Shen Hong-Bin , Yang Yang 
Published: December 2021

AbstractWith the rapid growth of high-resolution microscopy imaging data, revealing the subcellular map of human proteins has become a central task in the spatial proteome. The cell atlas of the Human Protein Atlas (HPA) provides precious resources for recognizing subcellular localization patterns at the cell level, and the large-scale annotated data enable learning via advanced deep neural networks. However, the existing predictors still suffer from the imbalanced class distribution and the lack of labeled data for minor classes. Thus, it is necessary to develop new methods for coping with these issues. We leverage the self-supervised learning protocol to address these problems. Especially, we propose a pre-training scheme to enhance the conventional supervised learning framework called SIFLoc. The pre-training is featured by a hybrid data augmentation method and a modified contrastive loss function, aiming to learn good feature representations from microscopic images. The experiments are performed on a large-scale immunofluorescence microscopic image dataset collected from the HPA database. Using the same deep neural networks as the classifier, the model pre-trained via SIFLoc not only outperforms the model without pre-training by a large margin but also shows advantages over the state-of-the-art self-supervised learning methods. Especially, SIFLoc improves the prediction accuracy for minor organelles significantly.
SPEQ: quality assessment of peptide tandem mass spectra with deep learning
Authors: Gholamizoj Soroosh , Ma Bin 
Published: December 2021

Abstract

Motivation
In proteomics, database search programs are routinely used for peptide identification from tandem mass spectrometry data. However, many low-quality spectra cannot be interpreted by any programs. Meanwhile, certain high-quality spectra may not be identified due to incompleteness of the database or failure of the software. Thus, spectrum quality (SPEQ) assessment tools are helpful programs that can eliminate poor-quality spectra before the database search and highlight the high-quality spectra that are not identified in the initial search. These spectra may be valuable candidates for further analyses.

Results
We propose SPEQ: a spectrum quality assessment tool that uses a deep neural network to classify spectra into high-quality, which are worthy candidates for interpretation, and low-quality, which lack sufficient information for identification. SPEQ was compared with a few other prediction models and demonstrated improved prediction accuracy.

Availability and implementation
Source code and scripts are freely available at github.com/sor8sh/SPEQ, implemented in Python.
Cryptic Plasmodium inui and Plasmodium fieldi Infections Among Symptomatic Malaria Patients in Thailand
Authors: Putaporntip Chaturong , Kuamsab Napaporn , Seethamchai Sunee , Pattanawong Urassaya , Rojrung Rattanaporn , Yanmanee Surasuk , Weng Cheng Chew , Jongwutiwes Somchai 
Published: December 2021

Abstract

Background
Some nonhuman primate Plasmodium species including P. knowlesi and P. cynomolgi can cross-transmit from macaque natural hosts to humans under natural infection. This study aims to retrospectively explore other simian Plasmodium species in the blood samples of symptomatic malaria patients in Thailand.

Methods
A total of 5271 blood samples from acute febrile patients from 5 malaria endemic provinces and 1015 blood samples from long-tailed and pig-tailed macaques from 3 locations were examined for Plasmodium species by microscopy and species-specific polymerase chain reaction. The Plasmodium mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase 1 (COX1) gene was analyzed by amplicon deep sequencing as well as Sanger sequencing from recombinant plasmid clones to reaffirm and characterize P. inui and P. fieldi.

Results
Besides human malaria, P. knowlesi, P. cynomolgi, P. inui and P. fieldi infections were diagnosed in 15, 21, 19, and 3 patients, respectively. Most P. inui and all P. fieldi infected patients had simultaneous infections with other Plasmodium species, and seemed to be responsive to chloroquine or artemisinin-mefloquine. P. inui was the most prevalent species among macaque populations. Phylogenetic analysis of the COX1 sequences from human and macaque isolates reveals the genetic diversity of P. inui and suggests that multiple parasite strains have been incriminated in human infections.

Conclusions
Both P. inui and P. fieldi could establish infection in humans under natural transmission. Despite occurring at a low prevalence and mostly co-existing with other Plasmodium species, P. inui infections in humans have a wide distribution in Thailand.
Evaluation of Sperm DNA Integrity by Mean Number of Sperm DNA Breaks Rather Than Sperm DNA Fragmentation Index
Authors: Yan Bei , Ye Weicong , Wang Juan , Jia Shaotong , Gu Xiuli , Hu Hao , Xiang Wenpei , Wu Tongbo , Xiao Xianjin 
Published: December 2021

AbstractBackgroundSperm DNA integrity is crucial for normal fertilization, implantation, and embryo development. Several assays are available to assess sperm DNA fragmentation but are limited by high price, complicated processes, and low accuracy.MethodsWe developed a secondary amplification detection system based on terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase and endonuclease IV, which could efficiently measure the number of 3'-OH (equivalent to the number of breakpoints). We applied this detection system in single stranded DNA with standard concentrations to obtain the standard curve. We then broke the double stranded genomic DNA by ultrasound and enzyme digestion and used the detection system to monitor the increase of DNA breakpoints. Finally, we used this method to measure the mean number of sperm DNA breakpoints (MDB) in 80 sperm samples.ResultsWe successfully measured the number of 3'-OH in single stranded DNA with standard concentration and obtained the standard curve. The linear range for the number of DNA breakpoints was from 0.1 nM to 15 nM. The detection method was successfully validated on λ DNA and 80 human sperm samples. The results of real clinical samples revealed that the mean number of DNA breakpoints (MDB) had a stronger relevance with the sperm motility and clinical pregnancy outcomes than the commonly used parameter of DNA fragmentation index (DFI).ConclusionWe have developed a straight-forward method for direct measurement of the mean number of DNA breakpoints in sperms. The method has advantages of short time-consumption, simple operation, high analytical sensitivity, and low requirement for instrumentation, which makes it conducive to clinical application. The proposed new parameter (MDB) could be a more direct, accurate and clinically significant indicator for evaluating the sperm DNA integrity.
Information Operations Increase Civilian Security Cooperation
Authors: Sonin Konstantin , Wright Austin L 
Published: December 2021

Abstract
Information operations are considered a central element of modern warfare and counter-insurgency, yet there remains little systematic evidence of their effectiveness. Using a geographic quasi-experiment conducted during Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan, we demonstrate that civilians exposed to the government’s information campaign resulted in more civilian security cooperation, which in turn increased bomb neutralisations. These results are robust to a number of alternative model specifications that account for troop presence, patrol-based operations, and local military aid allocation. The paper demonstrates that information campaigns can lead to substantive attitudinal and behavioural changes in an adversarial environment and substantially improve battlefield outcomes.
Posterior mediastinal arteriovenous haemangioma
Authors: Feng Qianqian , He Xiaopeng 
Published: December 2021

Abstract
Mediastinal arterio-venous haemangiomas are rare benign vascular tumours. To the best of our knowledge, very few cases of mediastinal arterio-venous haemangiomas have ever been reported. Herein, we report about a 55-year-old woman who presented to our hospital with a mass in the right posterior mediastinum. The tumour was successfully resected via video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery, and further pathological analysis confirmed the mass to be an arterio-venous haemangioma. The patient made a full recovery without any postoperative complications.
A non-cephalometric two-dimensional appraisal of soft tissue changes by functional therapy in Class II patients: a systematic review and meta-analysis
Authors: Luyten Jonathan , Vierendeel Michiel , De Roo Noëmi M C , Temmerman Liesbeth , De Pauw Guy A M 
Published: December 2021

Summary

Background
Facial attractiveness has social, psychological, and economic repercussions. Class II malocclusions are associated with a retroposition of the mandible, facial convexity, protruded upper lip, retruded lower lip, and pronounced mentolabial fold. Functional appliances (FA) try to increase mandibular length and normalize lip position, thereby decreasing the facial profile convexity and aesthetics.

Objectives
The aim of this review and meta-analysis is to investigate the effects of FA on the soft tissues in a non-cephalometric two-dimensional manner.

Search methods
Medline (via PubMed), Embase (via Ovid), Web of Science, and Cochrane Central were used to identify studies describing the soft tissue results of FA in a non-cephalometric way. The search was conducted up to July 2021.

Selection criteria
Prospective and retrospective studies investigating the effects of FA appliances on the soft tissues, with non-ionizing, two-dimensional imaging, including an attractiveness assessment based on Visual Analogue Scale or Likert scale, were considered eligible.

Data collection and analysis
Data extraction was performed separately by two authors. Risk of bias was assessed using the ROBINS-I tool.

Results
From the eight eligible studies, four were included in the meta-analysis to investigate the influence of assessors on facial attractiveness scores. Age range of the included studies varied from 8 to 21 years old including 313 Caucasian patients whereof 64% females. Six out of eight studies used growing patients as treatment group and only two studies reported follow-up after the end of treatment. Overall facial attractiveness increased after treatment with FA, resulting from a decrease in facial convexity and a normalization of the lip relationship. Orthodontists score higher aesthetic improvements after FA treatment as compared to laypeople.

Conclusions
Current evidence suggests the positive effects of FA on the facial attractiveness in growing and non-growing patients. FA normalize the lip relationship. Furthermore, they tend to decrease facial convexity and advance the chin point. More pleasing results can be expected in growing patients. Orthodontists are more generous when assessing treatment changes as compared to laypeople.

Registration
PROSPERO registration (CRD42021254835).
Burden of cardiovascular diseases attributable to risk factors in Brazil: data from the Global Burden of Disease 2019 study
Authors: Brant L C , Nascimento B R , Veloso G A , Gomes C S , Polanczyk C , Oliveira G M M , Ribeiro A L P , Malta D C 
Published: December 2021

Abstract

Introduction
Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) continue to be the main cause of death in Brazil, a middle-income country. As such, it is essential to understand the trends of risk factors (RFs) for CVDs in order to implement effective and tailored public policies.

Purpose
The present study sought to analyze the trend of RF for CVD and the disease burden attributable to these from 1990 to 2019, in Brazil and its states, based on estimates from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019 (2019 GBD).

Methods
To estimate RF exposure, the Summary Exposure Value (SEV) (risk-weighted prevalence) was used, whereas for disease burden attributed to RFs, mortality and Disability-adjusted life-years (DALY) by CVD were used. For comparisons over time and between states, the age-standardized rates were considered. The sociodemographic index (SDI) was used as a marker of socioeconomic conditions.

Results
In 2019, 82% of CVD mortality in Brazil was attributable to RFs. For SEV, there was a reduction in smoking and environmental RFs, as well as an increase in metabolic RFs. High systolic blood pressure and dietary risks continue to be the main RFs for CVD mortality and DALY (Figure 1). While there was a decline in age-standardized mortality rates attributable to the evaluated RFs, there was also a stability or increase in crude mortality rates, with the exception of smoking. It is important to highlight the increase in the risk of death attributable to a high body mass index (BMI) (35 to 46/100,000 in habitants in 1990 and 2019). Regarding the analysis per state, SEVs and mortality attributable to RF were higher in those states with lower SDIs.

Conclusion
Despite the reduction in CVD mortality and DALY rates attributable to RF, the stability or increase in crude rates attributable to metabolic RFs is worrisome, requiring investments and a renewal of health policies.

Funding Acknowledgement
Type of funding sources: Public grant(s) – National budget only. Main funding source(s): Health Surveillance Secretariat, Brazilian Ministry of Health Figure 1