bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
A prospective cohort study examining the association between the periconceptual vaginal microbiota and first‐trimester miscarriage in Kenyan women
Authors: McClelland R. Scott , Lokken Erica M. , Kinuthia John , Srinivasan Sujatha , Richardson Barbra A. , Jaoko Walter , Lannon Sophia , Pulei Anne , Fiedler Tina L. , Munch Matthew M. , Proll Sean , John‐Stewart Grace , Fredricks David N. 
Published: July 2024

AbstractBackgroundStudies evaluating the association between the vaginal microbiota and miscarriage have produced variable results.ObjectiveThis study evaluated the association between periconceptual and first‐trimester vaginal microbiota and women's risk for miscarriage.MethodsAt monthly preconception visits and at 9–12 weeks gestation, women collected vaginal swabs for molecular characterisation of the vaginal microbiota. Participants who became pregnant were followed to identify miscarriage versus pregnancy continuing to at least 20 weeks gestation.ResultsForty‐five women experienced miscarriage and 144 had pregnancies continuing to ≥20 weeks. A principal component analysis of periconceptual and first‐trimester vaginal bacteria identified by 16S rRNA gene PCR with next‐generation sequencing did not identify distinct bacterial communities with miscarriage versus continuing pregnancy. Using taxon‐directed quantitative PCR assays, increasing concentrations of Megasphaera hutchinsoni, Mageeibacillus indolicus, Mobiluncus mulieris and Sneathia sanguinegens/vaginalis were not associated with miscarriage. In exploratory analyses, these data were examined as a binary exposure to allow for multivariable modelling. Detection of Mobiluncus mulieris in first‐trimester samples was associated with miscarriage (adjusted relative risk [aRR] 2.14, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.08, 4.22). Additional analyses compared women with early first‐trimester miscarriage (range 4.7–7.3 weeks) to women with continuing pregnancies. Mobiluncus mulieris was detected in all eight (100%) first‐trimester samples from women with early first‐trimester miscarriage compared to 101/192 (52.6%) samples from women with continuing pregnancy (model did not converge). Detection of Mageeibacillus indolicus in first‐trimester samples was also associated with early first‐trimester miscarriage (aRR 4.10, 95% CI 1.17, 14.31).ConclusionsThe primary analyses in this study demonstrated no association between periconceptual or first‐trimester vaginal microbiota and miscarriage. Exploratory analyses showing strong associations between first‐trimester detection of Mobiluncus mulieris and Mageeibacillus indolicus and early first‐trimester miscarriage suggest the need for future studies to determine if these findings are reproducible.
Sexual orientation disparities in gestational diabetes and hypertensive disorders of pregnancy
Authors: Chakraborty Payal , Everett Bethany G. , Reynolds Colleen A. , Hoatson Tabor , Stuart Jennifer J. , McKetta Sarah C. , Soled Kodiak R. S. , Huang Aimee K. , Chavarro Jorge E. , Eliassen A. Heather , Obedin‐Maliver Juno , Austin S. Bryn , Rich‐Edwards Janet W. , Haneuse Sebastien , Charlton Brittany M. 
Published: July 2024

AbstractBackgroundSexual minority (SM) individuals (e.g., those with same‐sex attractions/partners or who identify as lesbian/gay/bisexual) experience a host of physical and mental health disparities. However, little is known about sexual orientation‐related disparities in gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) and hypertensive disorders of pregnancy (HDP; gestational hypertension [gHTN] and preeclampsia).ObjectiveTo estimate disparities in GDM, gHTN and preeclampsia by sexual orientation.MethodsWe used data from the Nurses' Health Study II—a cohort of nurses across the US enrolled in 1989 at 25–42 years of age—restricted to those with pregnancies ≥20 weeks gestation and non‐missing sexual orientation data (63,518 participants; 146,079 pregnancies). Our primary outcomes were GDM, gHTN and preeclampsia, which participants reported for each of their pregnancies. Participants also reported their sexual orientation identity and same‐sex attractions/partners. We compared the risk of each outcome in pregnancies among heterosexual participants with no same‐sex experience (reference) to those among SM participants overall and within subgroups: (1) heterosexual with same‐sex experience, (2) mostly heterosexual, (3) bisexual and (4) lesbian/gay participants. We used modified Poisson models to estimate risk ratios (RR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI), fit via weighted generalised estimating equations, to account for multiple pregnancies per person over time and informative cluster sizes.ResultsThe overall prevalence of each outcome was ≤5%. Mostly heterosexual participants had a 31% higher risk of gHTN (RR 1.31, 95% CI 1.03, 1.66), and heterosexual participants with same‐sex experience had a 31% higher risk of GDM (RR 1.31, 95% CI 1.13, 1.50), compared to heterosexual participants with no same‐sex experience. The magnitudes of the risk ratios were high among bisexual participants for gHTN and preeclampsia and among lesbian/gay participants for gHTN.ConclusionsSome SM groups may be disparately burdened by GDM and HDP. Elucidating modifiable mechanisms (e.g., structural barriers, discrimination) for reducing adverse pregnancy outcomes among SM populations is critical.
The Historical Presidency: I like Ike: The origins of broadcast presidential campaign advertising
Authors: Endersby James W. 
Published: July 2024

AbstractThe first televised presidential campaign commercials ran in the 1952 electoral contest between Dwight Eisenhower and Adlai Stevenson, specifically as part of the effort to draft and then elect General Eisenhower. These first spot ads were developed not by political parties or the candidates but by an independent citizens group, Citizens for Eisenhower. The group developed two distinct styles of television advertising. The best known of these stemmed from the hard‐sell Madison Avenue tradition of public relations and its advertising innovator, Rosser Reeves, who produced the “Eisenhower Answers America” campaign. Less well known is an ad created by volunteer workers from the Disney Corporation, who produced an animated, musical rendition promising that “We'll Take Ike to Washington.” Unlike Reeves's more substantive ads that focused on issues, the Disney ads emphasized the image and character of the candidate. Using archival sources, this article shows that the televised marketing of the presidency stemmed not only from the public relations experts and Madison Avenue advertisers like Reeves but also from those connected to the entertainment industry who sought to manipulate the public through character appeals.
Beyond racial resentment: Systemic racism beliefs and public attitudes toward criminal justice institutions and reforms
Authors: Silver Eric , Iceland John , Goff Kerby 
Published: July 2024

AbstractIntroductionSystemic racism theory has become a central part of academic and public discussions about criminal justice institutions and reforms. Little, however, is known about the association between people's belief in the ubiquity of systemic racism and their attitudes toward criminal justice institutions and reforms.MethodsTo fill this gap, we examine the association between systemic racism beliefs and support for police, police reform, and the BLM movement using a national YouGov sample of 1125 U.S. adults.ResultsSystemic racism beliefs are associated with Americans’ attitudes toward all three outcomes, net of a wide range of controls, including negative experiences with police, political ideology, and most notably, racial resentment.ConclusionOur study provides compelling evidence that belief in systemic racism is an important driver of Americans’ support for police, police reforms, and BLM.
An empirical study on sample size for the central limit theorem using Japanese firm data
Authors: Fukuda Kosei 
Published: July 2024

AbstractIn statistics classes, the central limit theorem has been demonstrated using simulation‐based illustrations. Known population distributions such as a uniform or exponential distribution are often used to consider the behavior of the sample mean in simulated samples. Unlike such simulations, a number of real‐data‐based simulations are here implemented in which the populations are empirical distributions of data selected from Japanese firms. The dataset chosen contains 38 variables familiar to business students, such as sales and assets. The maximum population size of the variables is 2243. One thousand samples with replacement are selected for specific variable–sample size combinations. Hypothesis testing results indicate that the normality hypothesis for the sample mean is rejected for 31 variables at the 0.1% level even with a sample size of 500. It is emphasized that the data for these variables indicate that this should not be a surprise, and emphasize the importance of looking at data.
Automatic delineation of rational service areas and health professional shortage areas in GIS based on human movements and health resources
Authors: Liang Yunlei , Gao Song 
Published: July 2024

AbstractHow people travel to receive health services is essential for understanding healthcare shortages. The rational service areas (RSAs) are defined to represent local healthcare markets and used as the basic units to evaluate whether people have access to health resources. Therefore, finding an appropriate way to develop RSAs is important for understanding the utilization of health resources and supporting accurate resource allocation to the health professional shortage areas (HPSAs). Existing RSAs are usually developed based on the local knowledge of public health needs and are created through time‐intensive manual work by health service officials. In this research, a travel data‐driven and spatially constrained community detection method based on human mobility flow is proposed to automate the process of establishing the statewide RSAs and further identifying HPSAs based on healthcare criteria in a geographic information system (GIS) software. The proposed method considers the difference between rural and urban populations by assigning different parameters and delineates RSAs with the goal of reducing health resource inequalities faced by rural areas. Using the data in the State of Wisconsin, our experiment shows that the proposed RSA delineation method outperforms other baselines including the traditional Dartmouth method in the aspects of RSA compactness, region size balances, and health shortage scores. Furthermore, the whole process of delineating RSAs and identifying HPSAs is automated using Python toolboxes in ArcGIS to support future analyses and practices in a timely and repeatable manner.
Evolving trends in immunosuppression use and cytomegalovirus infection risk over the past decade in kidney transplantation
Authors: Soliman Karim , Calimlim Isabel K. , Perry Amy , Andrade Erika , Overstreet Morgan , Patel Neha , Bartlett Felicia , Taber David J. 
Published: July 2024

AbstractBackgroundThe goal was to determine trends in immunosuppression use and its impact on cytomegalovirus (CMV) outcomes over the past 10 years.MethodsThis was a single‐center longitudinal cohort study of adult kidney recipients transplanted between Jan 2012 and June 2021. Baseline and follow‐up data were gathered via chart abstraction and analyzed using univariate and multivariate analyses.ResultsOf 2392 kidney transplants conducted, 131 patients did not meet inclusion criteria. The mean age was 52 years, 41% were female, 57% were black, and 19% were CMV high‐risk. The use of rabbit anti‐thymocyte globulin (RATG) induction (odds ratio [OR] 1.6, 1.3–2.1), tacrolimus (FK) level >8 ng/mL (OR 1.1, 1.09–1.11), CMV D+/R‐ rates (OR 1.06, 1.02–1.10), white blood cell count <3000 (OR 1.22, 1.18–1.26) and valganciclovir prophylaxis (OR 1.7, 1.6–1.9) have significantly increased over the past 10 years. Rejection rates (OR 0.86, 0.82–0.91) and BK viremia >2000 (OR 0.91, 0.91–0.98) have decreased. RATG induction (adjusted hazard ratio [aHR] 1.35, 1.2–1.5), FK >8 ng/mL (aHR 3.5, 3.2–3.9), Belatacept conversion (aHR 2.5, 2.1–3.1), and rejection (aHR 1.8, 1.6–2.0) were significant risk factors for developing CMV infection, while mycophenolate mofetil <1500 mg (aHR 0.52, 0.47–0.59), mammalian target of rapamycin inhibitor (mTORi) conversion (0.77, 0.56–0.89), cyclosporine‐A conversion (aHR 0.68, 0.56–0.84) were associated with lower risk of CMV infection.ConclusionIncreasing use of potent immunosuppression coupled with higher CMV D+/R‐ F rates may be driving higher rates of CMV infection. Cyclosporine and mTORi conversion appears to be protective against CMV. A more individualized immunosuppression regimen based on infection risk merits consideration.
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The performance of bronchoalveolar lavage Aspergillus PCR testing in solid organ transplant recipients with invasive pulmonary aspergillosis
Authors: Mutcali Sibel Islak , Hussain Nadeem , Nematollahi Saman , Lainhart William , Zangeneh Tirdad T. , Al‐Obaidi Mohanad M. 
Published: July 2024

AbstractBackgroundInvasive aspergillosis affects solid organ transplant (SOT) recipients, carrying a high risk of mortality and morbidity in this population. Rapid and accurate diagnosis is essential to ensure the initiation of correct antifungal therapy. We aimed to evaluate the performance of the bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) Eurofins Viracor Aspergillus PCR (AspPCR) in diagnosing invasive pulmonary aspergillosis (IPA) in SOT recipients.MethodsWe conducted a multicenter retrospective study of SOT recipients in Arizona from February 2019 to December 2022 who had AspPCR done at the time of the clinical encounter. Probable IPA was defined as a positive BAL culture with Aspergillus spp. with clinical and imaging findings of IPA per EORTC/MSGERC criteria.ResultsNinety‐nine SOT recipients with 131 encounters with BAL AspPCR testing were included. The median age was 66, the majority were White, non‐Hispanics (60%), and males (66%). Among the participants, 93 lung transplant recipients with 87 of the encounters received antifungal prophylaxis active against Aspergillus spp. Sixty‐four encounters had BAL galactomannan (GM), all of which had BAL GM <1 OD, and one case had a serum GM of 10 OD. Nine cases met the definition of IPA. The sensitivity of the BAL AspPCR was 67% (95% CI 30%–93%), and the specificity was 98% (95% CI 93%–99%).ConclusionBAL AspPCR had moderate sensitivity and high specificity in identifying IPA in our cohort of SOT recipients. Further studies in populations with a higher prevalence of IPA are needed to evaluate the performance of this test.
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Isocitrate lyase promotes Puccinia striiformis f. sp. tritici susceptibility in wheat (Triticum aestivum) by suppressing accumulation of glyoxylate cycle intermediates
Authors: Ibe Carol N. , Bailey Sarah L. , Korolev Andrey V. , Brett Paul , Saunders Diane G. O. 
Published: July 2024

SUMMARYPlant fungal parasites manipulate host metabolism to support their own survival. Among the many central metabolic pathways altered during infection, the glyoxylate cycle is frequently upregulated in both fungi and their host plants. Here, we examined the response of the glyoxylate cycle in bread wheat (Triticum aestivum) to infection by the obligate biotrophic fungal pathogen Puccinia striiformis f. sp. tritici (Pst). Gene expression analysis revealed that wheat genes encoding the two unique enzymes of the glyoxylate cycle, isocitrate lyase (TaICL) and malate synthase, diverged in their expression between susceptible and resistant Pst interactions. Focusing on TaICL, we determined that the TaICL B homoeolog is specifically upregulated during early stages of a successful Pst infection. Furthermore, disruption of the B homoeolog alone was sufficient to significantly perturb Pst disease progression. Indeed, Pst infection of the TaICL‐B disruption mutant (TaICL‐BY400*) was inhibited early during initial penetration, with the TaICL‐BY400* line also accumulating high levels of malic acid, citric acid, and aconitic acid. Exogenous application of malic acid or aconitic acid also suppressed Pst infection, with trans‐aconitic acid treatment having the most pronounced effect by decreasing fungal biomass 15‐fold. Thus, enhanced TaICL‐B expression during Pst infection may lower accumulation of malic acid and aconitic acid to promote Pst proliferation. As exogenous application of aconitic acid and malic acid has previously been shown to inhibit other critical pests and pathogens, we propose TaICL as a potential target for disruption in resistance breeding that could have wide‐reaching protective benefits for wheat and beyond.
Radiographic characterization of the maxillary septum and septal bullae in horses: An ex vivo study
Authors: Lima Aymara Eduarda de , Piñeros Diego Darley Velasquez , Alibrando Bruno Braghetta , Bittar Mauricio José , de Souza Anderson Fernando , Mendes Rubens Peres , de Freitas Silvio Henrique , Bernardino Thiago , Corrêa Rodrigo Romero 
Published: July 2024

AbstractThe anatomical variations of the maxillary septum and the septal bullae can generate challenges during the interpretation of radiographs of the horses’ heads and make it difficult to accurately identify the sites affected in sinus disorders. The description of the radiographic appearance of these structures is currently scarce in the scientific literature. This work aims to describe the anatomical and radiographic characteristics of the maxillary septum and maxillary septal bullae in horses. Six chemically preserved equine cadaver heads were used which, after being submitted to the maxillary osseous flap, the maxillary septum and its respective bullae were identified. Radiographic examinations before and after contrast impregnation on these structures were performed. The positioning of the maxillary septum varied between the anatomical specimens and between the sides of the same specimen. The 30° oblique dorsoventral lateral and lateral projections allowed the identification of the maxillary septum and septal bullae. However, the bullae remained superimposed on the dental arches in the dorsoventral projections with the mandible in a neutral position or with the mandible displaced. The oblique offset radiographic positioning was suggested and proved effective for the examination of the maxillary septal bullae, where the mandible was displaced to the side of the bullae to be examined, and the radiographic beam inclined in the same direction. The maxillary septum and its bullae could be properly identified in a macroscopic way after the osseous flap and the contrasted radiographic examination allowed its adequate interpretation. Variations in size and position are considered normal for the equine species.
Performance Analysis of Forest Canopy Height Model Generated from UAV and InSAR
Authors: Shin Alvin Lau Meng , Chen Wenxi , Okuda Toshinori , Sim Hui Lin , Tam T. H. , Chew W. C. 
Published: July 2024

Forest canopy height is a crucial parameter in ecosystem process modelling, yet research on generating canopy height models (CHMs) using photogrammetry method from UAV data remains limited compared to methods such as light detection and ranging (LiDAR). This study investigates the performance of accuracy and effectiveness of CHM generated from low-cost Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) via the photogrammetry method together with the well-known long-established Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR). Leveraging advancements in UAV technology for three-dimensional land surface modelling, this research focuses on the Pasoh Research Station (nearby the Arboretum area) of Pasoh Forest Reserve in Negeri Sembilan, Malaysia. A series of images were captured at ten different UAV flying altitudes ranging from 120m to 500m above the mean sea level. Subsequently, CHMs were derived from both UAV and InSAR data, and compared against field measurements of tree height. The results indicate that UAV with a flying height below 200m can generate much more accurate results (with average height difference less than 10m) than InSAR (average height difference of 10.532m). It is noticeable that when comparing the InSAR-generated CHM to field measurements at lower altitudes (below 150m), the canopy height obtained from InSAR data is less accurate (more than 10m difference with field measurement) than the CHM obtained via UAV photogrammetry processing (only 5.353 m difference with field measurement). However, when UAV flying height is above 200m, InSAR data is performed more reliably. A 120m UAV flying height has a good potential to generate canopy height that is closer to the field measurement.
Spectral large deviations of sparse random matrices
Authors: Ganguly Shirshendu , Hiesmayr Ella , Nam Kyeongsik 
Published: July 2024

AbstractEigenvalues of Wigner matrices has been a major topic of investigation. A particularly important subclass of such random matrices, useful in many applications, are what are known as sparse or diluted random matrices, where each entry in a Wigner matrix is multiplied by an independent Bernoulli random variable with mean . Alternatively, such a matrix can be viewed as the adjacency matrix of an Erdős–Rényi graph equipped with independent and identically distributed (i.i.d.) edge‐weights. An observable of particular interest is the largest eigenvalue. In this paper, we study the large deviations behavior of the largest eigenvalue of such matrices, a topic that has received considerable attention over the years. While certain techniques have been devised for the case when is fixed or perhaps going to zero not too fast with the matrix size, we focus on the case , that is, constant average degree regime of sparsity, which is a central example due to its connections to many models in statistical mechanics and other applications. Most known techniques break down in this regime and even the typical behavior of the spectrum of such random matrices is not very well understood. So far, results were known only for the Erdős–Rényi graph without edge‐weights and with Gaussian edge‐weights. In the present article, we consider the effect of general weight distributions. More specifically, we consider entry distributions whose tail probabilities decay at rate with , where the regimes and correspond to tails heavier and lighter than the Gaussian tail, respectively. While in many natural settings the large deviations behavior is expected to depend crucially on the entry distribution, we establish a surprising and rare universal behavior showing that this is not the case when . In contrast, in the case, the large deviation rate function is no longer universal and is given by the solution to a variational problem, the description of which involves a generalization of the Motzkin–Straus theorem, a classical result from spectral graph theory. As a byproduct of our large deviation results, we also establish the law of large numbers behavior for the largest eigenvalue, which also seems to be new and difficult to obtain using existing methods. In particular, we show that the typical value of the largest eigenvalue exhibits a phase transition at , that is, corresponding to the Gaussian distribution.
Large convex sets in difference sets
Authors: Bhowmick Krishnendu , Lund Ben , Roche‐Newton Oliver 
Published: July 2024

AbstractWe give a construction of a convex set with cardinality such that contains a convex subset with cardinality . We also consider the following variant of this problem: given a convex set , what is the size of the largest matching such that the set
is convex? We prove that there always exists such an with , and that this lower bound is best possible, up to a multiplicative constant.
A lower bound on the mean value of the Erdős–Hooley Delta function
Authors: Ford Kevin , Koukoulopoulos Dimitris , Tao Terence 
Published: July 2024

AbstractWe give an improved lower bound for the average of the Erdős–Hooley function , namely for all and any fixed , where is an exponent previously appearing in work of Green and the first two authors. This improves on a previous lower bound of of Hall and Tenenbaum, and can be compared to the recent upper bound of of the second and third authors.