bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Perceived Access to HIV Prevention Services Amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic Among Men Who Have Sex with Men (MSM) and MSM Sex Workers in France, Russia, and Türkiye
Authors: Jackson Kristopher J. , Sullivan Tadhg , Howell Sean , Garner Alex , Santos Glenn-Milo 
Published: November 2024

Abstract
This study examined the association between self-identification as a sex worker (SW) and perceived access to pharmacologic and non-pharmacologic HIV prevention methods among MSM in France, Russia, and Türkiye amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. Globally, 17,250 MSM recruited through a geosocial networking smartphone application completed the COVID-19 disparities survey, which was administered between October and November 2020. Approximately 38% of survey respondents were identified as living in France (n = 1269), Russia (n = 3882), and Türkiye (n = 3141) at the time of survey completion. Given the diverse sociodemographic factors and attitudes toward both MSM behavior and commercial sex work in these countries, we conducted a secondary analysis of survey data exploring the relationship between SW status and perceived access to pharmacologic and non-pharmacologic HIV prevention methods during the COVID-19 pandemic. Among respondents in Russia and France, MSM SW status was associated with a reduction in perceived access to condoms/lubricants (p = .001 in Russia, p < .001 in France). MSM SW in France were less likely to report never using PrEP as compared to non-SW peers (RR = 0.40, p = .005). Our findings highlight the disparities in access to HIV prevention for MSM SW living in these three countries during the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on our findings, COVID-19 may have exacerbated pre-existing inequities in HIV prevention among populations experiencing intersecting stigmas.
Disparities in quantification of mitral valve regurgitation between cardiovascular magnetic resonance imaging and trans-thoracic echocardiography: a systematic review
Authors: el Mathari Sulayman , Bhoera Rahul A. , Hopman Luuk H. G. A. , Heidendael Josephine , Malekzadeh Arjan , Nederveen Aart , van Ooij Pim , Götte Marco J. W. , Kluin Jolanda 
Published: November 2024

AbstractPrimary mitral regurgitation (MR) is a prevalent valvular heart disease. Therapy stratification for MR depends on accurate assessment of MR severity and left ventricular (LV) dimensions. While trans-thoracic echocardiography (TTE) has been the standard/preferred assessment method, cardiovascular magnetic resonance imaging (CMR) has gained recognition for its superior assessment of LV dimensions and MR severity. Both imaging modalities have their own advantages and limitation for therapy guidance. However, the differences between the two modalities for assessing/grade severity and clinical impact of MR remains unclear. This systematic review aims to evaluate the differences between TTE and CMR in quantifying MR severity and LV dimensions, providing insights for optimal clinical management. A literature search was performed from inception up to March 21st 2023. This resulted in 2,728 articles. After screening, 22 articles were deemed eligible for inclusion in the meta-analysis. The included study variables were, mitral valve regurgitation volume (MRVOL), regurgitation fraction (MRFRAC), LV end-diastolic volume (LVEDV), LV end-systolic volume (LVESV), LV stroke volume (LVSV), and LV ejection fraction (LVEF). TTE showed a significant higher MRVOL (10.4 ml, I2 = 88%, p = 0.002) and MRFRAC (6.3%, I2 = 51%, p = 0.05) compared to CMR, while CMR demonstrated a higher LVEDV (21.9 ml, I2 = 66%, p =  < 0.001) and LVESV (16.8 ml, I2 = 0%, p =  < 0.001) compared to TTE. Our findings demonstrate substantial disparities in TTE and CMR derived measurements for parameters that play a pivotal role in the clinical stratification guidelines. This discrepancy prompts a critical question regarding the prognostic value of both imaging modalities, which warrants future research.
Graphical abstract
Integration of indigenous knowledge systems (IKS) into climate change mitigation and adaptation endeavours: milestones and gaps in South Africa and Zimbabwe’s climate policy frameworks
Authors: Nyahunda Louis 
Published: November 2024

AbstractThis article was poised to unravel the merits of integrating IKS and the demerits of its exclusion in climate change programmes and policies. The harrowing impacts of climate change in Sub-Saharan Africa make adaptation and mitigation unescapable discourses. As such, climate change policies demonstrate governments’ commitment to fostering adaptation and mitigating climate change impacts evident in every sector of society. The effectiveness of climate policies is measured by their responsiveness to the different needs, aspirations and circumstances of populations plagued by climate change. In the absence of technoscience-based adaptation and mitigation mechanisms, African communities still rely on the repository of indigenous knowledge systems as a source of information, decision-making, and prediction tools for predicting weather changes. For this reason, in formulating climate change mitigation and adaptation endeavours at policy level, it is critical to identify specific strategies where IKS has been used as a warrant towards its usage. This study was qualitative and operated within the traditional descriptive, analytical and interpretive approaches. It relied on a desktop review of journal articles on climate change and IKS, and climate change policies of South Africa and Zimbabwe. These were purposively sampled based on their relevance to the aim of the study. The Discourse Content Analysis was utilised to analyse data from which the findings were derived. The article established that despite the wide recognition of the role played by IKS in climate change adaptation, mitigation and disaster risk reduction, IKS has not featured predominantly South Africa’s climate change policies as compared to Zimbabwe’s climate policies. Notably, disregarding IKS in climate change policies makes them bereft of effectiveness in vulnerability reduction, fostering adaptation and resilience building for African communities that rely on IKS, among other capitals essential in fostering mitigation and adaptation in the face of climate change.
Towards GPU-enabled serverless cloud edge platforms for accelerating HEVC video coding
Authors: Salcedo-Navarro Andoni , Peña-Ortiz Raúl , Claver Jose M. , Garcia-Pineda Miguel , Gutiérrez-Aguado Juan 
Published: November 2024

AbstractMultimedia streaming has become integral to modern living, reshaping entertainment consumption, information access, and global engagement. The ascent of cloud computing, particularly serverless architectures, plays a pivotal role in this transformation, offering dynamic resource allocation, parallel execution, and automatic scaling-especially beneficial in HTTP Adaptive Streaming (HAS) applications. This study presents an event-driven serverless cloud edge platform with graphics processing units (GPUs), managed by Knative, tailored for video encoding. Two implementations of the High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) codec have been encapsulated in the functions: HEVC NVENC (Nvidia Encoder), that uses GPU acceleration, and x265 that only uses CPUs. Experiments focused on measuring the impact of replica requested resources on cold start, scalability and resource consumption with different allocated resources on slim and fat virtual machines (VMs). The best results are obtained when four slim replicas of the functions are deployed on a fat VM with a 8.4% reduction in encoding time for x265 and a 15.2% improvement for HEVC NVENC compared with other deployment scenarios. Comparatively, HEVC NVENC encoding is 8.3 times faster than x265. In multiresolution scenarios, GPU encoding drastically reduces segment encoding time by a factor of 12.4 between non-GPU and GPU-accelerated. These findings are important for live streaming applications where low latency is critical at all stages of the streaming process.
An efficient deep reinforcement learning based task scheduler in cloud-fog environment
Authors: Choppara Prashanth , Mangalampalli Sudheer 
Published: November 2024

AbstractEfficient task scheduling in cloud and fog computing environments remains a significant challenge due to the diverse nature and critical processing requirements of tasks originating from heterogeneous devices. Traditional scheduling methods often struggle with high latency and inadequate processing times, especially in applications demanding strict computational efficiency. To address these challenges, this paper proposes an advanced fog-cloud integration approach utilizing a deep reinforcement learning-based task scheduler, DRLMOTS (Deep Reinforcement Learning based Multi Objective Task Scheduler in Cloud Fog Environment). This novel scheduler intelligently evaluates task characteristics, such as length and processing capacity, to dynamically allocate computation to either fog nodes or cloud resources. The methodology leverages a Deep Q-Learning Network model and includes extensive simulations using both randomized workloads and real-world Google Jobs Workloads. Comparative analysis demonstrates that DRLMOTS significantly outperforms existing baseline algorithms such as CNN, LSTM, and GGCN, achieving a substantial reduction in makespan by up to 26.80%, 18.84, and 13.83% and decreasing energy consumption by up to 39.60%, 30.29%, and 27.11%. Additionally, the proposed scheduler enhances fault tolerance, showcasing improvements of up to 221.89%, 17.05%, and 11.05% over conventional methods. These results validate the efficiency and robustness of DRLMOTS in optimizing task scheduling in fog-cloud environments.
Modifications of the respiratory chain of Bacillus licheniformis as an alkalophilic and cyanide-degrading microorganism
Authors: Uribe-Ramírez Daniel , Romero-Aguilar Lucero , Vázquez-Meza Héctor , Cristiani-Urbina Eliseo , Pardo Juan Pablo 
Published: November 2024

AbstractBacillus licheniformis can use cyanide as a nitrogen source for its growth. However, it can also carry out aerobic respiration in the presence of this compound, a classic inhibitor of mammalian cytochrome c oxidase, indicating that B. licheniformis has a branched respiratory chain with various terminal oxidases. Here, we studied the modifications in the respiratory chain of B. licheniformis when cells were cultured in Nutrient Broth, an alkaline medium with ammonium, or an alkaline medium with cyanide. Then, we measured oxygen consumption in intact cells and membranes, enzyme activities, carried out 1D and 2D-BN-PAGE, followed by mass spectrometry analysis of BN-PAGE bands associated with NADH, NADPH, and succinate dehydrogenase activities. We found that cell growth was favored in a nutrient medium than in an alkaline medium with cyanide. In parallel, respiratory activity progressively decreased in cells cultured in the rich medium, alkaline medium with ammonium, and the lowest activity was in the cells growing in the alkaline medium with cyanide. B. licheniformis membranes contain NADH, NADPH, and succinate dehydrogenases, and the proteomic analysis detected the nitrate reductase and the bc, caa3, aa3, and bd complexes. The succinate dehydrogenase migrated with a molecular mass of 375 kDa, indicating its association with the nitrate reductase (115 kDa + 241 kDa, respectively). The NADH dehydrogenase of B. licheniformis forms aggregates of different molecular mass.
Spirituality in Professional Patient-Centered Care for Adults with Primary Brain Tumors: An Exploratory Scoping Review
Authors: Grabenweger Reinhard , Völz Daniela , Weck Christiane , Hau Peter , Paal Piret , Bumes Elisabeth 
Published: November 2024

AbstractPeople with primary brain tumors face spiritual challenges due to neuro-cognitive disturbances such as aphasia and rapid neurological deterioration. This scoping review aimed to map the evidence regarding professional spiritual care in this neuro-oncological population. The literature search was conducted utilizing two databases (PubMed, CINAHL) and two peer-reviewed journals (‘Spiritual Care’, ‘Journal of Religion and Health’). In total, 27 studies were analyzed, and five thematic categories were identified: (1) spiritual needs, (2) integrating the spiritual dimension in care, (3) spiritual care generalist interventions, (4) spiritual care specialist interventions, (5) assessments. Early integration of spiritual care and specific training are important.
The influence of impurities on the evaporation behavior of Po from liquid Pb–Bi eutectic at high temperatures
Authors: Zivadinovic Ivan , Neuhausen Jörg , Ivan Ana Maria , Dressler Rugard , Steinegger Patrick 
Published: November 2024

AbstractThis study presents an in-depth analysis of the polonium evaporation from high-energy and high-intensity proton-irradiated liquid lead-bismuth eutectic. The applied experimental conditions closely mimic those encountered within an accelerator-driven nuclear reactor, particularly focusing on the interaction of other impurities with polonium. Utilizing proton-irradiated lead-bismuth eutectic with an impurity spectrum similar to that of a real reactor, this research establishes reliable data for the polonium evaporation in the presence of said impurities, employing the transpiration method. The results agree well with those of prior model experiments using pure lead-bismuth eutectic. This indicates that the other coexisting impurities have a negligible impact on the polonium evaporation. The good agreement of the experimental values with literature data emphasizes the reliability of the applied methods and the robustness of the current understanding. These findings have significant implications for the operation and safety assessment of heavy metal-cooled nuclear reactors and support the advancement of Generation IV accelerator-driven systems.
Habitat use by nomadic ibis and spoonbills post-dispersal from breeding sites
Authors: McGinness Heather M. , Lloyd-Jones Luke R. , Robinson Freya , Langston Art , O’Neill Louis G. , Rapley Shoshana , Jackson Micha V. , Hodgson Jessica , Piper Melissa , Davies Micah , Martin John M. , Kingsford Richard , Brandis Kate , Doerr Veronica , Mac Nally Ralph 
Published: November 2024

Abstract
Context
Nomadic waterbirds are highly mobile across a range of spatial and temporal scales, which makes it difficult to monitor, quantify, and predict their habitat use with traditional methods, especially between breeding events when individuals and flocks can move over vast areas.

Objectives
This study aimed to provide accurate information on habitat use to improve strategic conservation management of these species, particularly the provisioning of environmental water.

Methods
To overcome the challenges of distance and remoteness, we analysed a 7-year GPS satellite telemetry dataset from 141 individuals. We quantified habitat selection post-dispersal from breeding sites, and predicted habitat preference for two wading waterbird species of the Threskiornithidae family that frequently nest together at the same sites: straw-necked ibis (Threskiornis spinicollis) and royal spoonbill (Platalea regia).

Results
Both long-term and short-term landscape-scale habitat associations differed between species. Royal spoonbills used fewer and more restricted habitat types than straw-necked ibis. Spoonbills displayed strong preferences for reservoirs, marshes and permanent wetlands, while ibis used both aquatic and terrestrial habitat, including areas of intensive animal production, modified pasture, and woodlands. Analysis of nocturnal versus diurnal space use showed that roosting and foraging habitat requirements for both species are distinct.

Conclusions
Analysing over 1 million telemetry points revealed species-level variability in habitat use, informing resource allocation for environmental water management. Royal spoonbills are more vulnerable to habitat change due to water regime alterations, highlighting the need for focused conservation management. Differences in day and night habitat use indicate the necessity of considering roosting habitats alongside foraging habitats for effective conservation. This comprehensive understanding of waterbirds' spatiotemporal interactions with their environment is crucial for long-term management aimed at increasing waterbird numbers and maintaining diversity.
Exergetic port-Hamiltonian systems for multibody dynamics
Authors: Lohmayer Markus , Capobianco Giuseppe , Leyendecker Sigrid 
Published: November 2024

AbstractMultibody dynamics simulation plays an important role in various fields, including mechanical engineering, robotics, and biomechanics. Setting up computational models however becomes increasingly challenging as systems grow in size and complexity. Especially the consistent combination of models across different physical domains still requires significant effort. This motivates the study of formal languages that enable a compositional approach to modeling multiphysical systems with basic guarantees. The paper shows how multibody systems, or more precisely assemblies of rigid bodies connected by lower kinematic pairs, can be described as Exergetic Port-Hamiltonian Systems (EPHS). The EPHS modeling language features a straightforward graphical syntax for expressing the energy-based interconnection of hierarchically nested subsystems. This reduces cognitive load and facilitates clearer communication among experts, nonexperts, and computational tools. Hierarchical nesting of systems enables abstraction of lower-level details and promotes the reuse of models at different levels of complexity. At the lowest level, there are three basic kinds of systems, representing energy storage and reversible/irreversible energy exchange. The structured approach guarantees fundamental properties of macroscopic systems, such as conservation of energy and nonnegative entropy production. In combination with the compositional syntax, this makes building and modifying models simpler and less error-prone.
Quantum Cournot model based on general entanglement operator
Authors: Bolonek-Lasoń Katarzyna 
Published: November 2024

AbstractThe properties of the Cournot model based on the most general entanglement operator containing quadratic expressions which is symmetric with respect to the exchange of players are considered. The degree of entanglement of games dependent on one and two squeezing parameters and their payoff values in Nash equilibrium are compared. The analysis showed that the relationship between the degree of entanglement of the initial state of the game and the payoff values in Nash equilibrium is ambiguous. The phase values included in the entanglement operator have a strong influence on the final outcome of the game. In a quantum duopoly based on the initial state of a game that depends on one squeezing parameter, the maximum possible payoff in Nash equilibrium cannot be reached when the value of the phase parameter is greater than zero, in contrast with a game that depends on two parameters.
Connection beyond borders: exploring sense of belonging across urban satellites conurbed by a medium-sized Mexican city
Authors: Lemoine-Rodríguez Richard , Vieyra Antonio , MacGregor-Fors Ian 
Published: November 2024

Abstract
Urbanization influences the social dynamics of periurban settlements, altering the sense of belonging among residents in areas conurbed by expanding cities. However, the role of the conurbing decade and settlement type in this process remains largely unexplored within the Latin American context. In this study, we analyzed the urban expansion and resulting conurbing of the urban satellites of Morelia, a medium-sized Mexican city, during the 1970–2010s. Furthermore, we conducted 120 in-person, on-site surveys in settlement types such as colonias, pueblos and fraccionamientos conurbed by the city, focusing on residents who had lived in these areas prior to their integration into the city. We employed generalized linear models to identify the relationship between the sense of belonging and the decade when the settlements were conurbed by the city, the settlement type, and repondents’ sex, age, and length of residence in the settlement. During 1990–2010s, Morelia conurbed 20 colonias, 8 fraccionamientos, and 13 pueblos. Our results show that the conurbing decade, settlement type, and length of residence were the main determinants of the sense of belonging. The inhabitants of settlements conurbed longer time ago and with a larger length of residence showed the strongest sense of belonging. This might be related to the higher number of traditions and festivities which are preserved in pueblos, which promotes local identity and social cohesion. Our findings highlight the varied levels of sense of belonging that exist within cities and emphasize how settlement type continues to shape social bonds even after having been incorporated into a larger urban conglomerate.
Interpretable gradient boosting based ensemble learning and African vultures optimization algorithm optimization for estimating deflection induced by excavation
Authors: Liang Zenglong , Lin Shan , Dong Miao , Cao Xitailang , Guo Hongwei , Zheng Hong 
Published: November 2024

AbstractIntelligent construction has become an inevitable trend in the development of the construction industry. In the excavation project, using machine learning methods for early warning can improve construction efficiency and quality and reduce the chances of damage in the excavation process. An interpretable gradient boosting based ensemble learning framework enhanced by the African Vultures Optimization Algorithm (AVOA) was proposed and evaluated in estimating the diaphragm wall deflections induced by excavation. We investigated and compared the performance of machine learning models in predicting deflections induced by excavation based on a database generated by finite element simulations. First, we exploratively analyzed these data to discover the relationship between features. We used several state-of-the-art intelligent models based on gradient boosting and several simple models for model selection. The hyperparameters for all models in evaluation are optimized using AVOA, and then the optimized models are assembled into a unified framework for fairness assessment. The comprehensive evaluation results show that the AVOA-CatBoost built in this paper performs well (RMSE = 1.84, MAE = 1.18, R2 = 0.9993) and cross-validation (RMSE = 2.65 ± 1.54, MAE = 1.17 ± 0.23, R2 = 0.998 ± 0.002). In the end, in order to improve the transparency and usefulness of the model, we constructed an interpretable model from both global and local perspectives.