bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Design and Evaluation of the Key Units in a Rapeseed Direct Seeder Integrated with Plowing-Rotating Combined Tillage
Authors: Wei Guoliang , Zhang Qingsong , Wang Biao , Liao QingXi 
Published: December 2021

HighlightsThe seeder combined the plowing and rotating tillage to overcome the heavy soil and a large amount of straws.The plow could lift and turn the soil and straw before rotary tillage.The optimal working parameters of the seeder were obtained by orthogonal field experiments.Abstract. Rapeseed, one of the most important oil crops in China, is mainly planted in the mid-lower reaches of the Yangtze River. However, limited by the special long-term rice-rapeseed rotation, rotary tillage is applied in most of the planted areas apply instead of plow tillage, leading to a shallow arable layer. On the other hand, maintaining a high-quality seedbed for rapeseed becomes a challenge because a large amount of straw remains buried in the soil. As a solution, a rapeseed direct seeder that combines plow tillage and rotary tillage was designed. The structure of the plowing unit, whose key components were a lifting-turning plow and symmetrical plow, was analyzed based on the forming principle of the plow. Furthermore, a mechanical soil throwing model of the rotary tillage blade was built to determine the structural parameters. Then, the interaction between the rotary tillage unit and the lift-turning plow was analyzed. Finally, the performance and optimal parameters were evaluated by orthogonal field experiments. The seedbed after the operations indicated that the seeder could achieve the function of turning the soil and straw first and then rotating the soil with good passability, mixing the straw and the soil, flattening the surface of the seed bed, and stabilizing the tillage depth. Orthogonal experiments showed that the optimal working parameters of the seeder were as follows: the tillage depth was 180 mm, the equipment forward speed was 2.1 km/h, and the speed of the rotary tillage blade was 250 r/min. Under the optimal parameter combination, the power consumption of the seeder, the thickness of the tillage layer, the crop residue burial efficiency, the soil breakage efficiency, and the flatness of the seed bed surface were 30.48 kW, 231 mm, 90.88%, 93.26%, and 21.15 mm, respectively. The working performance of the seeder could meet the tillage requirements of rapeseed planting. Keywords: Direct seeder, Evaluation, Plow, Plowing-rotating combined tillage, Rapeseed.
Stage-Discharge Relationships of Drawdown Plates for Denitrifying Woodchip Bioreactors
Authors: Maxwell Bryan M. , Cooke Richard A. , Christianson Reid D. , Christianson Laura E. 
Published: December 2021

HighlightsDrawdown plates can prevent prolonged saturation in denitrifying woodchip bioreactors.Contraction coefficients for the orifice equation ranged from 0.74 to 0.76.Drawdown orifice should be sized appropriately to avoid interfering with design flow rates.Established stage-discharge relationships for drawdown orifice improve accuracy of flow monitoring.Abstract.Denitrifying woodchip bioreactors are a conservation drainage practice used to reduce nitrate loads in tile drainage water from field crops. Prolonged saturation in the woodchip media under no flow or low flow conditions can result in the production of hydrogen sulfide and methane. The US Department of Agriculture Natural Resources Conservation Service’s (NRCS) Conservation Practice Standard for denitrifying bioreactors recommends a low-level orifice at the bioreactor outlet to drain the woodchip media within 48 h to prevent prolonged stagnation. This study determined stage-discharge relationships for three drawdown configurations in an AgriDrain water level control structure (15.2 cm nominal tile size) to improve accuracy of estimating flow in field bioreactors. Tested drawdown configurations consisted of a custom-made inverted-v orifice plate currently used by the NRCS (3.6 cm2 orifice area); and a 2 and an 8 mm gap between the base of the structure and the bottom stop log (2.6 and 12.3 cm2 orifice area, respectively). The stage-discharge relationship for all three orifices was accurately described by the orifice flow equation (R2 &gt; 0.99). Stage-discharge relationship for the inverted-v drawdown plate in combination with a stainless steel-edged v-notch weir was the sum of their respective stage-discharge relationships for orifice flow and flow over the weir. Contraction coefficients for the inverted-v, 2 mm gap, and 8 mm gap configurations were 0.74, 0.74, and 0.76, respectively. The stage-discharge relationships for the inverted-v, 2 mm gap, and 8 mm gap configurations were Q = 3.26*A*h0.5, Q = 3.29*A*h0.5, and Q = 3.38*A*h0.5, respectively, where Q is in m3 s-1, A is the orifice area in m2, and h is the water head differential in meters. Keywords: Denitrifying bioreactor, Drawdown plate, Flow monitoring, NRCS, Prolonged saturation.
Efficient utilization of Hough transform and orthogonal-triangular decomposition for optical wireless modulation format recognition
Authors: Mohamed Safie El-Din Nasr , Al-Makhlasawy Rasha M. , Abdelaziz Muhammed , Khalaf Ashraf A. M. , Dessouky Moawad I. , Abd El-Samie Fathi E. 
Published: December 2021

Two schemes for optical wireless modulation format recognition (MFR), based on the orthogonal-triangular decomposition (OTD) and Hough transform (HT) of the constellation diagrams, are proposed in this paper. Constellation diagrams are obtained at optical signal-to-noise ratios (OSNRs) ranging from 5 to 30 dB for seven different modulation formats (2/4/8/16—PSK and 8/16/32—QAM) as images. The first scheme depends on applying the HT of the obtained images; the second scheme is based on utilization of the decomposition of each of the obtained image matrices into an orthogonal matrix (Q) and an upper triangular matrix (R) followed by the HT. Different classifiers, including AlexNet, VGG16, and VGG19, are used for the MFR task. Model setups and results are provided to study the scheme efficiency at different levels of OSNR. The proposed schemes provide unique signatures for constellation diagrams. Moreover, it reveals that the main pattern corresponding to each constellation diagram is more distinguishable for both proposed schemes at different levels of OSNR. The obtained results achieve high accuracy at low OSNR values.
Highly efficient light trapping of clustered silicon nanowires for solar cell applications
Authors: Lan Jun , Liu Junbo , Hu Song , Yang Yong 
Published: December 2021

Due to their excellent photoelectric performance, nanostructures have attracted considerable attention in research to improve the power conversion efficiency of thin-film solar cells (TFSCs). Furthermore, cylindrical silicon nanowires (Cy-SiNWs) are regarded as promising candidates for a new generation of TFSCs. On this basis, many new nanostructures derived from conventional Cy-SiNWs have been studied extensively, but most of these structures require high manufacturing accuracy because of their complex morphology. In this paper, an ingenious design of clustered silicon nanowires (Cl-SiNWs) is introduced, whose cross section is similar to the flower shape and consists of four arcs with the same radius. Hence, it requires lower manufacturing difficulty compared with nanostructures with curvature variation of the cross-section profile (i.e., elliptic shape, crescent shape, etc.). In this study, the optical and electrical characterizations are numerically investigated using the finite-difference time-domain method. The numerical simulation shows that the optimized Cl-SiNWs achieve an optical ultimate efficiency (

η

u
l

) and circuit current density (

J

sc

) of 33.66% and

27.54

m
A

/

c
m

2

, respectively, with an enhancement of 7.3% over conventional Cy-SiNWs. Further, the

η

u
l

and

J

sc

improve to 42.20% and

34.53

m
A

/

c
m

2

by adding the silicon substrate and silver backreflector. More importantly, the

η

u
l

of Cl-SiNWs always obtained a higher value than Cy-SiNWs at a recommended diameter range of 360–560 nm. Therefore, the suggested Cl-SiNWs have exhibited tremendous potential for the future development of low-cost and highly efficient solar cells.
Diabetes mellitus and tuberculosis, a systematic review and meta-analysis with sensitivity analysis for studies comparable for confounders
Authors: Foe-Essomba Joseph Rodrigue , Kenmoe Sebastien , Tchatchouang Serges , Ebogo-Belobo Jean Thierry , Mbaga Donatien Serge , Kengne-Ndé Cyprien , Mahamat Gadji , Kame-Ngasse Ginette Irma , Noura Efietngab Atembeh , Mbongue Mikangue Chris Andre , Feudjio Alfloditte Flore , Taya-Fokou Jean Bosco , Touangnou-Chamda Sabine Aimee , Nayang-Mundo Rachel Audrey , Nyebe Inès , Magoudjou-Pekam Jeannette Nina , Yéngué Jacqueline Félicité , Djukouo Larissa Gertrude , Demeni Emoh Cynthia Paola , Tazokong Hervé Raoul , Bowo-Ngandji Arnol , Lontchi-Yimagou Eric , Kaiyven Afi Leslie , Donkeng Donfack Valerie Flore , Njouom Richard , Mbanya Jean Claude , Mbacham Wilfred Fon , Eyangoh Sara 
Published: December 2021

Introduction
Meta-analyses conducted so far on the association between diabetes mellitus (DM) and the tuberculosis (TB) development risk did not sufficiently take confounders into account in their estimates. The objective of this systematic review was to determine whether DM is associated with an increased risk of developing TB with a sensitivity analyses incorporating a wider range of confounders including age, gender, alcohol consumption, smoke exposure, and other comorbidities.

Methods
Pubmed, Embase, Web of Science and Global Index Medicus were queried from inception until October 2020. Without any restriction to time of study, geographical location, and DM and TB diagnosis approaches, all observational studies that presented data for associations between DM and TB were included. Studies with no abstract or complete text, duplicates, and studies with wrong designs (review, case report, case series, comment on an article, and editorial) or populations were excluded. The odds ratios (OR) and their 95% confidence intervals were estimated by a random-effect model.

Results
The electronic and manual searches yielded 12,796 articles of which 47 were used in our study (23 case control, 14 cross-sectional and 10 cohort studies) involving 503,760 cases (DM or TB patients) and 3,596,845 controls. The size of the combined effect of TB risk in the presence of DM was OR = 2.3, 95% CI = [2.0–2.7], I2 = 94.2%. This statistically significant association was maintained in cohort (OR = 2.0, CI 95% = [1.5–2.4], I2 = 94.3%), case control (OR = 2.4, CI 95% = [2.0–2.9], I2 = 93.0%) and cross-sectional studies (OR = 2.5, CI 95% = [1.8–3.5], I2 = 95.2%). The association between DM and TB was also maintained in the sensitivity analysis including only studies with similar proportions of confounders between cases and controls. The substantial heterogeneity observed was mainly explained by the differences between geographic regions.

Conclusions
DM is associated with an increased risk of developing latent and active TB. To further explore the role of DM in the development of TB, more investigations of the biological mechanisms by which DM increases the risk of TB are needed.

Review registration
PROSPERO, CRD42021216815.
Influência da inclusão, polimento e período de armazenagem, sobre a rugosidade de resinas acrílicas para próteses oculares
Authors: Goiato Marcelo Coelho , Santos Daniela Micheline dos , Barão Valentim Adelino Ricardo , Souza Josiene Firmino de , Pesqueira Aldiéris Alves , Fernandes Aline Úrsula Rocha 
Published: December 2021

A proposta desse estudo foi avaliar a rugosidade de resinas acrílicas próprias para confecção de próteses oculares, sub-metidas a dois diferentes métodos de inclusão e polimento, antes e após 60 dias de armazenagem. Foram confeccionados 24 corpos-de-prova, obtidos a partir de discos em resina acrílica incolor confeccionados em prensa semi-automática. Os discos foram incluídos em muflas próprias para microondas, utilizando dois diferentes tipos de materiais para revestimento, gesso especial e silicone de condensação. Após a presa final do gesso, as muflas foram abertas, os discos retirados e a resina prensada e polimerizada em forno microondas. Após o resfriamento natural das muflas, os corpos-de-prova foram desincluídos e submetidos ao acabamento e polimento. Dos 24 corpos-de-prova obtidos, 12 receberam polimento mecânico e restante polimento químico. Os corpos-de-prova foram submetidos ao teste de rugosidade de superfície, antes e após um período de armazenagem de 60 dias, utilizando um rugosímetro digital portátil modelo RP100 (Tonka Sul Americana Ltda, Brasil). Para cada corpo-de-prova foram realizadas 3 leituras que posteriormente foram transformadas em valores médios. Os resultados obtidos foram avaliados utilizando análise de variância seguido pelo teste de Tukey em nível de 5% de significância. Em todos os grupos houve um aumento na rugosidade superficial após 60 dias de armazenagem, porém estes valores só foram estatisticamente significantes para os corpos-de-prova polidos quimicamente. O grupo silicone proporcionou menores valores de rugosidade para os grupos quimicamente polidos. Independente do polimento empregado e do tempo de armazenagem, a inclusão com gesso proporcionou maiores valores de rugosidade superficial.
Thyrotoxicosis treatment with lithium corbanate. Cases reported
Authors: Matsueva I. A. , Dalmatova A. B. , Andreychenko T. V. , Grineva E. N. 
Published: December 2021

Treatment of thyrotoxicosis caused by Graves’ disease or multinodular toxic goiter, is not difficult, in most cases, since the prescription of thionamides allows to normalize the level of thyroid hormones quickly and safety. But in a number of cases this therapy might be associated with serious side effects (agranulocytosis, toxic hepatitis, cholestasis), severe allergic reactions and also individual intolerance on thionamides. In such cases lithium carbonate is used, especially in severe thyrotoxic syndrome. It is known, that lithium can accumulate in the thyroid gland at a concentration 3–4 times higher than in the plasma. Perhaps, lithium uses Na+/I- ions. It can inhibit the synthesis and secretion thyroid hormones of thyroid gland. The article presents the cases reported the use of lithium carbonate in thyrotoxicosis treatment before thyroidectomy. Administering low doses of carbonate lithium (900 mg/ per day) renders significant decrease or normalization of thyroid hormones concentration within 7–14 days, thus it let perform thyroidectomy on the patients. No side effects have been identified with such a short course of lithium carbonate treatment.
THE EFFECTIVENESS OF CORK FISH (Channa Striatus) AND EGG WHITE SNACK TO IMPROVE BLOOD ALBUMIN LEVEL AND BODY WEIGHT IN TUBERCULOSIS PATIENTS
Authors: Fadhilah Tri Marta , Sari Elfira Maya 
Published: December 2021

Background: The tuberculosis morbidity rate in Bekasi area based on data from the Republic of Indonesia Ministry of Health has reached 101 people per 100,000 population in 2012. Indonesia’s Ministry of Health showed that tuberculosis patients have less economic status poor nutritional status. Patients with tuberculosis need foods that contain lots of protein and albumin such as cork fish and chicken egg white without yolk to speed up the repair of cells and tissues damaged by Mycobacterium Tuberculosis bacteria. Objective: The study was conducted to determine the increase in blood albumin levels and body weight in patients with tuberculosis by giving cork fish and egg white snacks. Methods: Analysis of the data used was a paired t-test for increases in blood albumin levels and bodyweight of the treatment group before and after giving snacks and an unpaired t-test for increases in blood albumin levels and bodyweight of tuberculosis patients between the treatment and the control group. Results: The study showed the most characteristics of tuberculosis patients ismale, age range 26-30 years, elementary-junior high school education level, labor work, income <Rp. 1,500,000,00, and the number of dependents of families consist of 4-6 people. Data analysis of blood albumin levels in the control group was significantly different from the treatment group before and after with a value of P = 0.002 which means that there was an increase in blood albumin levels and in the results of weight gain the control group was significantly different from the treatment groups before and after with a value of P = 0.004 means there is a significant increase in body weight for 15 days after being given snack. Conclusion: There was an increase in blood albumin levels and body weight in patients with tuberculosis after treatment for 15 days.
HUBUNGAN CAKUPAN IMUNISASI DASAR DAN ASI EKSKLUSIF DENGAN STATUS GIZI BALITA DI INDONESIA (ANALISIS DATA RISKESDAS 2018)
Authors: Sari Ami Monika , Simbolon Demsa , Wahyu Tetes 
Published: December 2021

Background: The direct causes of nutritional status problems are infectious diseases and inadequate intake. The prevalence of infectious diseases can be caused by children not getting complete basic immunization and not getting exclusive breastfeeding. Objective: The study aims to determine the relationship between complete basic immunization and exclusive breastfeeding with the nutritional status of underfive children in Indonesia. Methods: This study uses secondary data from Primary health research of Indonesia (Riskesdas 2018). It is an analytical study using a cross sectional study design. The sample in this study is toddlers spread across 34 provinces of Indonesia. The sampling technique in this study is the total population. The independent variables were complete basic immunization coverage and exclusive breastfeeding coverage. The dependent variable is the prevalence of nutritional status based on the index of Weight by age, body length according to age and body weight by length.Results: The results of the analysis found that the complete basic immunization coverage for underfive children in Indonesia was 56.18%, exclusive breastfeeding coverage was 39.59%, and the prevalence of underweight and severely underweight children under five (WHZ) was 16.67%, the prevalence of short and very short toddlers short (WHZ 29.68% and the prevalence of malnutrition and very poor (HAZ) 12.44%. using correlation test and linear regression with a significance degree of p≤0.05. Complete basic immunization coverage was associated with the prevalence of very underweight and underweight (p=0.005), short and very short (p=0.043), very undernourished and undernourished (p=0.000). Conclusion: There is a significant relationship between complete basic immunization and the nutritional status of children under five in Indonesia. There is no significant relationship between exclusive breastfeeding and the nutritional status of children under five in Indonesia.Key words: Complete basic Immunization; Exclusive breastfeeding; Nutritional status; Underfive years old
Reducing the manual length setting error of a passive Gough-Stewart platform for surgical template fabrication using a digital measurement system
Authors: Kilian Julia , Blum Tobias , Laves Max-Heinrich , Ortmaier Tobias , Lenarz Thomas , Rau Thomas S. 
Published: December 2021

Abstract
As recently demonstrated, a passive Gough-Stewart platform (a.k.a. hexapod) can be used to create a personalized surgical template to achieve minimally invasive access to the cochlea. The legs of the hexapod are manually adjusted to the desired length, which must be read off an analog scale. Previous experiments have shown that manual length setting of the hexapod’s legs is error-prone because of the imprecise readability of the analog scale. The objective of this study is to determine if integration of a linear encoder and digitally displaying the measured length help reduce the length setting error. Two experiments were conducted where users set the leg length manually. In both experiments, the users were asked to set the leg length to 20 nominal values using the whole setting range from 0 mm to 10 mm. In the first experiment, users had to rely only on the analog scale; in the second experiment, the electronic display additionally showed the user the actual leg length. Results show that the mean length setting error without using the digital display and only relying on the analog scale was (0.036 ± 0.020) mm (max: 0.107 mm) in contrast to (0.001 ± 0.000) mm (max: 0.002 mm) for the experiment with the integrated digital measurement system. The results support integration of digital length measurement systems as a promising tool to increase the accuracy of surgical template fabrication and thereby patients’ safety. Future studies must be conducted to evaluate if integration of a linear encoder in each of the six legs is feasible.
Automated vessel centerline extraction and diameter measurement in OCT Angiography
Authors: Viertel Bernhard K. J. , Naber Ady , Hoffmann Simon , Berwanger Daniel , Kessler Lucy , Khoramnia Ramin , Nahm Werner 
Published: December 2021

Abstract
Optical Coherence Tomography Angiography (OCTA) is a non-invasive imaging technique that enables the visualization of perfused vasculature in vivo. In ophthalmology, it allows the physician to monitor diseases affecting the vascular networks of the retina such as agerelated macular degeneration or diabetic retinopathy. Due to the complexity of the vasculature in the retina, it is of interest to automatically extract vascular parameters which describe the condition of the vessels. Suitable parameters could improve the diagnosis and the treatment during the course of therapy. We present an automated algorithm to compute the diameters of the vessels in en face OCTA images. After segmenting the images, the vessel centerline was computed using a thinning algorithm. The centerline was refined by detecting invalid pixels such as spurs and by continuing the centerline until the ends of the vessels. Lastly, the diameter was computed by dilating a discrete circle at the position of the centerline or by measuring the distance between both borders of the vessels. The developed algorithms were applied to in vivo images of human eyes. Certainly, no ground truth was available. Hence, a plausibility check was performed by comparing the measured diameters of two different layers of the retina (Superficial Vascular Complex (SVC) and Deep Vascular Complex (DVC)). Each layer exhibits a different characteristic vasculature. The algorithm clearly reflected the differences from both retinal layers. The measured diameters demonstrate that the DVC consists of more capillaries and considerably smaller vessels compared to the SVC. The presented method enables automated analysis of the retinal vasculature and forms thereby the basis for monitoring diseases influencing the vasculature of the retina. The validation of the method using an artificial ground truth is still needed.
Cardiopulmonary coupling analysis using smart wearables and mobile computing
Authors: Schüler Willi , Spicher Nicolai , Deserno Thomas M. 
Published: December 2021

Abstract
Cardiopulmonary coupling (CPC) analysis links heart and respiration rates to assess sleep-related parameters. Typically, the CPC is measured using multi-lead electrocardiography (ECG) and ECG-derived respiration (EDR). Novel textile shirts with embedded ECG sensors offer convenient and continuously monitored sleep at home. We investigate the feasibility of a shirt with textile sensors (Pro- Kit, Hexoskin, Quebec, Canada) for CPC analysis by mobile computing. ECG data is continuously transmitted from the shirt to a smartphone via Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE). We customize a CPC algorithm and use twelve whole-night recordings from four volunteers to perform qualitative and quantitative analysis. We compare EDR with respiratory inductive plethysmography (RIP). In average, EDR and RIP differ 17.22%. After one night, the batteries are reduced to approx. 70% (shirt) and 90% (smartphone). The run time for CPC processing is approx. 3 min. Hence, smart wearables in combination with mobile computing show technical feasibility for CPC analysis. Eventually, this could yield a useful solution for sleep analysis of non-expert users in a private environment.