bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Breaking Scaling Relations for Highly Efficient Electroreduction of CO2 to CO on Atomically Dispersed Heteronuclear Dual‐Atom Catalyst
Authors: Lu Song , Mazur Michal , Guo Kun , Stoian Dragos Constantin , Gu Minfen , Tucho Wakshum Mekonnen , Yu Zhixin 
Published: November 2023

AbstractConversion of CO2 into value‐added products by electrocatalysis provides a promising way to mitigate energy and environmental problems. However, it is greatly limited by the scaling relationship between the adsorption strength of intermediates. Herein, Mn and Ni single‐atom catalysts, homonuclear dual‐atom catalysts (DACs), and heteronuclear DACs are synthesized. Aberration‐corrected annular dark‐field scanning transmission electron microscopy (ADF‐STEM) and X‐ray absorption spectroscopy characterization uncovered the existence of the Mn─Ni pair in Mn─Ni DAC. X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy and X‐ray absorption near‐edge spectroscopy reveal that Mn donated electrons to Ni atoms in Mn─Ni DAC. Consequently, Mn─Ni DAC displays the highest CO Faradaic efficiency of 98.7% at −0.7 V versus reversible hydrogen electrode (vs RHE) with CO partial current density of 16.8 mA cm−2. Density functional theory calculations disclose that the scaling relationship between the binding strength of intermediates is broken, resulting in superior performance for ECR to CO over Mn─Ni─NC catalyst.
Acid Hydrolyzed Pearl Millet Starch Nanoparticles: Synthesis and Characterization
Authors: Chavan Prafull , Sinhmar Archana , Thory Rahul , Sharma Somesh , Sukhija Sakshi , Singh Gurvendra Pal , Aayush Krishna , Singh Jay , Kumar Deepak 
Published: November 2023

AbstractThe amylose content in native starch is reduced through hydrolysis, impacting its physicochemical properties. Starch nanoparticles exhibit enhanced water and oil absorption capacities, attributed to increased hydrolysis and subsequently higher solubility. Moreover, the swelling power of starch nanoparticles is notably higher, indicating improved functionality. Pasting properties are altered, with reduced peak viscosity, breakdown viscosity, and setback viscosity in modified starches. Dynamic light scattering reveals a significant reduction in particle size for starch nanoparticles compared to native starch. Morphological analysis using field emission‐scanning electron microscopy (FE‐SEM) highlights distinct granule shapes and surfaces between the two starch types. The X‐ray diffraction patterns confirm an A‐type crystalline structure in both native and modified starches. Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy verifies no significant difference in functional groups due to extraction or hydrolysis methods. This comprehensive investigation provides valuable insights into the chemical modification of pearl millet starch, shedding light on its potential applications in various industries, including food and pharmaceuticals.
Investigating science teacher educator identity through the politics of domestication and critical positional praxis
Authors: Rodriguez Alberto J. , Tolbert Sara , Mark Sheron L. 
Published: November 2023

AbstractThe focus on identity in the field of teaching and learning continues to grow, especially when it concerns equitable outcomes for students. While most attention is placed on students' identities and increasingly those of teachers, lesser addressed are the identities of the teacher educators and researchers broaching the issue of identity. Additionally, identity research is not often linked to relationships between self, others, and transformative action. We recognize these as gaps to be addressed and offer critical positional praxis (CPP) as a response. CPP is the public manifestation of the insights gained through our sense of identity and reflexivity. More specifically, CPP is the actions (or inactions) that express who we are in response to an event in any given social context—especially oppressive ones. In this article, we draw from our own critical autoethnographies, as a context for putting CPP into practice in identity research. Our collective analysis of these critical autoethnographies revealed how our identity development was inseparable from the ways in which we have each resisted the politics of domestication. Our autoethnographies further point to the role of dissent as central to our experiences of becoming critical science teacher educators committed to equity, diversity, and anti‐racism in education. We draw from this analysis to offer recommendations for how identity and positionality can move beyond theoretical constructs toward transformative personal and collective change in science education.
To push or to pull? A clinical audit on the efficacy and safety of the pull and push percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy techniques in oncological patients
Authors: Kucha Piotr , Zorniak Michal , Szmit Mateusz , Lipczynski Rafal , Wieszczy‐Szczepanik Paulina , Kapala Aleksandra , Wojciechowska Urszula , Didkowska Joanna , Rupinski Maciej , Olesinski Tomasz , Maj Tomasz , Regula Jaroslaw , Kaminski Michal F. , Januszewicz Wladyslaw 
Published: November 2023

AbstractBackgroundThe peroral “pull” technique and the direct “push” procedure are the two main methods for percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy (PEG) placement. Although pull‐PEG is generally recommended as the first‐line modality, many oncological patients require a push‐PEG approach to prevent tumor seeding or overcome tumor‐related obstruction.ObjectiveWe aimed to compare the efficacy and safety of both PEG procedures in cancer patients.MethodsWe retrospectively analyzed all consecutive PEG procedures within a tertiary oncological center. Patients were followed up with the hospital databases and National Cancer Registry to assess the technical success rate for PEG placement, the rate of minor and major adverse events (AEs), and 30‐day mortality rates. We compared those outcomes between the two PEG techniques. Finally, risk factors for PEG‐related adverse events were analyzed using a multivariable Cox proportional‐hazard regression model adjusted for patients' sex, age, performance status (ECOG), Body Mass Index (BMI), diabetes, chemoradiotherapy (CRT) status (pre‐/current‐/post‐treatment), and type of PEG.ResultsWe included 1055 PEG procedures (58.7% push‐PEG/41.4% pull‐PEG) performed in 994 patients between 2014 and 2021 (mean age 62.0 [±10.7] yrs.; 70.2% males; indication: head‐and‐neck cancer 75.9%/other cancer 24.1%). The overall technical success for PEG placement was 96.5%. Although the “push” technique had a higher rate of all AEs (21.4% vs. 7.1%, Hazard Ratio [HR] = 2.9; 95% CI = 1.9–4.3, p < 0.001), most of these constituted minor AEs (71.9%), such as tube dislodgement. The methods had no significant difference regarding major AEs and 30‐day mortality rates. Previous CRT was associated with an increased risk of major AEs (hazard ratio = 2.7, 95% CI = 1.0–7.2, p = 0.042).ConclusionThe risk of major AEs was comparable between the push‐ and pull‐PEG techniques in cancer patients. Due to frequent tube dislodgement in push‐PEG, the pull technique may be more suitable for long‐term feeding. Previous CRT increases the risk of major AEs, favoring early (“prophylactic”) PEG placement when such treatment is expected.
A review of Monte Carlo and quasi‐Monte Carlo sampling techniques
Authors: Hung Ying‐Chao 
Published: November 2023

AbstractThis article presents a comprehensive review and comparison of the Monte Carlo and quasi‐Monte Carlo sampling techniques, which are widely used in numerical integration, simulation, and optimization. Monte Carlo sampling involves the generation of pseudorandom numbers or vectors to estimate unknown quantities of interest. In contrast, quasi‐Monte Carlo sampling is specialized for situations where uniformity and reduced variance are important. It generates a deterministic low‐discrepancy sequence that spans the entire sampling space. This review aims to analyze the strengths and distinctions of these two sampling methodologies, offering valuable insights to researchers in search of sampling techniques aligned with their specific research objectives and needs. Furthermore, it seeks to equip practitioners with efficient algorithms for practical implementations.This article is categorized under:
Statistical and Graphical Methods of Data Analysis > Monte Carlo Methods
Algorithms and Computational Methods > Numerical Methods
Statistical and Graphical Methods of Data Analysis > Sampling
Endocrine Disruptors, Epigenetic Changes, and Transgenerational Transmission
Authors: Rizzo Roberta , Bortolotti Daria , Rizzo Sabrina , Schiuma Giovanna 
Published: November 2023

AbstractRecent discoveries in the field of molecular biology are focused on phenomena like chromatin condensation, histone (H) modification, and deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) methylation, as well as the action of small non-coding ribonucleic acid (RNA), which together belong to the branch of epigenetics. The term “epigenetics” was coined in 1940 by Conrad Waddington [1] who described it as “the branch of biology which studies the causal interactions between genes and their product which bring phenotypes into being.” In fact, epigenetics includes all those mechanisms that are able to regulate DNA expression without modifying nucleotide sequence.
Introduction to Environmental Pollutants and Human Reproduction
Authors: Marci Roberto , Buzzaccarini Giovanni , Wenger Jean Marie , Vitagliano Amerigo 
Published: November 2023

AbstractEnvironmental pollution is a global issue caused by the introduction of chemical, biological, and physical substances in the environment. The short- and long-term effects of these substances on human reproduction are a present matter of concern, especially in the developed countries. Several mechanisms may be involved in reproductive damage caused by environmental pollutants including hormone-mediated effects, oxidative stress, and direct genetic damage. In recent times, big efforts have been made for the identification of the harmful pollutants, their mechanism of interaction with human fertility, tolerable limits, and possible solutions to minimize the human exposure. In this chapter, we summarize the current knowledge on the impact of environmental pollutants on human reproduction, with a special focus on their mechanisms of action.
“Organization”: Its Conceptual History and Its Relationship to Other Fundamental Biological Concepts
Authors: Toepfer Georg 
Published: November 2023

AbstractThe conceptual history of the term “organization” begins in Medieval times with the reception and transformation of Aristotle’s philosophy of life. It designates the corporeal structure and conditions of identity of natural “organic bodies,” a term that had been used to refer to living beings since antiquity. The term played an important role in specifying the ontological status of living beings. At the same time, it offered a basis for their mechanistic understanding. Starting with mechanistic models of life in the second half of the seventeenth century, “organization” and “life” were increasingly used interchangeably. This conjunction of meaning transformed “living beings” into “organisms.” Within physiological accounts of the eighteenth century, the living organization was compared to a causal cycle of interdependency. Philosophically, this conjunction was adapted at the end of the century in Kant’s philosophy of “organized beings of nature” in which he located the idea of causal cyclicity within a teleological framework and specified an “organized being” in causal terms as a system of interacting and interdependent parts characterized by functional closure. Thus, “organization” refers to the constitution of living beings as a particular kind of causal system. In the nineteenth century, the term achieves the status of a signal word for the life sciences and starts being applied in a wide variety of contexts, from comparative anatomy to physiology and ecology. It was supplemented by two other fundamental notions, namely, “regulation” and “evolution,” the first referring to the stabilization and the second to the long-term transformation of natural organizations. The twentieth century saw a further intensification of the complementarity of the perspectives associated with these three terms. Finally, in recent years, a substantial improvement in understanding the causal structure of “organization” was achieved by analyzing it in terms of the “closure of constraints.”
Varieties of Organicism: A Critical Analysis
Authors: Wolfe Charles T. 
Published: November 2023

AbstractIn earlier work I wrestled with the question of the “ontological status” of organisms. It proved difficult to come to a clear decision, because there are many candidates for what such a status is or would be and of course many definitions of what organisms are. But what happens when we turn to theoretical projects “about” organisms that fall under the heading “organicist”? I first suggest that organicist projects have a problem: a combination of invoking Kant, or at least a Kantian “regulative ideal,” usually presented as the epistemological component (or alternately, the complete overall vision) of a vision of organism – as instantiating natural purposes, as a type of “whole” distinct from a merely mechanistically specifiable set of parts, etc. – and a more ontological statement about the inherent or essential features of organisms, typically presented according to a combination of a “list of heroes” or “laundry list” of properties of organisms. This amounts to a category mistake. Other problems concern the too-strict oppositions between mechanism and organi(ci)sm, and symmetrical tendencies to “ontologize” (thus objectifying) properties of organisms and to “subjectify” them (turning them into philosophies of subjectivity). I don’t mean to suggest that no one should be an organicist or that Kant is a name that should be banished from civilized society. Rather, to borrow awkwardly from Sade, “organicists, one more effort!” if one wants a naturalistic, non-foundationalist concept of organicism, which is indeed quite active in recent theoretical biology, and which arguably was already alive in the organismic and even vitalist theories of thinkers like Goldstein and Canguilhem.
On the Organizational Roots of Bio-cognition
Authors: Hooker Cliff 
Published: November 2023

AbstractThe theme of this book is the place of organization in the life sciences, especially biology. In that context, this essay is concerned with the place of organization within mind and the place of mind within the life sciences, especially biology. There are many possibilities for theories of mind, ranging from noumenal to neural to nihilist (behaviorist), and for most of these, the question of the role for organization therein makes no sense; further, they escape, or are opposed to, any deep tie to biology. Even when some link to biology is acknowledged, as for physicalisms, no inherent notion of organization appears in their development. But this chapter will present a thoroughly organizational conception of mind-as-cognition, anchored in a supportive conception of biology.
The System of Local Government in Italy: A Stress-Test to Traditional Paradigms?
Authors: Valdesalici Alice , Trettel Martina 
Published: November 2023

AbstractIn 2001 a constitutional reform was approved with the aim to considerably increase the powers and the political autonomy of the Italian Regions. In championing the federalisation of the country, the relations between State and Regions were reshaped. Despite the presence of many typical federal traits, many other essential federal features are missing. The system of local autonomies is one of the most emblematic elements that distinguishes Italy’s decentralised model from traditional federations. According to the theorical approaches to federalism, federations usually adhere to a common paradigm when it comes to local entities: local governments are creatures of the subnational units, whereas non-federal countries follow a different path, in which local entities depend on the central State. Against this background, the chapter explores the hybrid nature of the Italian paradigm, i.e., a system in which relations with local governments cannot be situated in neither of these two groups. In addressing this fuzziness, the chapter gives evidence of the main characteristics of mixed paradigms by emphasizing the components that in the Italian case show significant deviations from the abovementioned dichotomy.
Word Segmentation of Hiragana Sentences Using Hiragana BERT
Authors: Izutsu Jun , Komiya Kanako , Shinnou Hiroyuki 
Published: November 2023

AbstractUnlike Western languages, word segmentation is necessary for Japanese sentences because they do not have word boundaries. The performances of existing morphological analyzers for Japanese sentences are very high. However, it is difficult to segment sentences mostly written in Hiragana, which is a Japanese writing system simpler than Kanji, because clues to segment the sentences decrease. In this study, we created a word segmentation model of Hiragana sentences using two types of BERT: unigram and bigram BERT models. We pre-trained the BERT models with Wikipedia and fine-tuned them with the core data of the Balanced Corpus of Contemporary Written Japanese for word segmentation. In addition to the two types of BERT-based word segmentation systems, we developed a word segmentation system for Hiragana sentences using KyTea, a toolkit developed for analyzing text, with a focus on languages requiring word segmentation. We compared them in word segmentation of Hiragana sentences. The experiments revealed that the unigram BERT-based word segmentation system outperformed the bigram BERT-based word segmentation system and the KyTea-based word segmentation system.
Higgs probes of axion-like particles
Authors: Aiko Masashi , Endo Motoi 
Published: November 2023

Abstract
We study axion-like particle contributions to the Higgs boson decays. The particle is assumed to couple with the standard model electroweak gauge bosons. Although direct productions of axion-like particles have often been discussed, we investigate indirect contributions to the Higgs boson decays into fermions, photons, W, and Z bosons at the one-loop level. It is found that the corrections to the fermions are suppressed, whereas precise measurements of the di-photon channel of the Higgs boson decay can provide a significant probe of the model especially when the axion-like particle is heavy and its coupling to di-photon is suppressed.
Generalization of instanton-induced inflation and dynamical compactification
Authors: Ho Jeongwon , Kim Kyung Kiu , Koh Seoktae , Yang Hyun Seok 
Published: November 2023

Abstract
It was shown that Yang-Mills instantons on an internal space can trigger the expansion of our four-dimensional universe as well as the dynamical compactification of the internal space. We generalize the instanton-induced inflation and dynamical compactification to general Einstein manifolds with positive curvature and also to the FLRW metric with spatial curvature. We explicitly construct Yang-Mills instantons on all Einstein manifolds under consideration and find that the homogeneous and isotropic universe is allowed only if the internal space is homogeneous. We then consider the FLRW metric with spatial curvature as a solution of the eight-dimensional Einstein-Yang-Mills theory. We find that open universe (k = −1) admits bouncing solutions unlike the other cases (k = 0, +1).
Anomalous dimensions in hypercubic theories
Authors: Bednyakov Alexander , Henriksson Johan , Kousvos Stefanos R. 
Published: November 2023

Abstract
We perform a comprehensive perturbative study of the operator spectrum in multi-scalar theories with hypercubic global symmetry. This includes working out symmetry representations and their corresponding tensor structures. These structures are then used to compute the anomalous dimensions of scalar operators with up to four fields and arbitrary representations to six-loop order. Moreover, we determine one-loop anomalous dimensions for a large number of low-lying operators in the spectrum which include more powers of the fundamental field and/or insertions of derivatives. As an aside we show how projectors used in the conformal bootstrap can be conveniently reused in computations of anomalous dimensions. The results of our study are of use to the conformal bootstrap. They also illuminate features of conformal perturbation theory and the large n expansion. Our results may be of interest for various crossover phenomena in statistical field theory. In total, we compute the scaling dimension of more than 300 operators, of which 16 are computed to six-loops. Our analysis is exhaustive with respect to group theory up to rank 4 for any number of flavours n, and also exhaustive with respect to which representations exist for n ⩽ 4.
Radiation therapy of breast cancer in the Nahe Breast Center: first results of an analysis in the context of health services research
Authors: Mücke Ralph , Heim Gabor , Gosenheimer Robert , Schmitz Volker , Schulz Christoph , Knoeß Per , Fakhrian Khashayar , Harvey Christina , Mücke Christiane , Lochhas Gabriele , Metzmann Ute , Bussmann Matthias , Paschold Markus 
Published: November 2023

Abstract
Background
The first evaluation of radiotherapy results in patients with breast cancer treated as part of a multimodal oncologic therapy in the Nahe Breast Center is presented. Analysis of the results was performed using an in-practice registry.

Patients and methods
From September 2016 to December 2017, 138 patients (median age 62.5 years; range 36–94 years) with breast cancer (right side, n = 67; left side, n = 71) received adjuvant radiation therapy. Of these, 103 patients received gyneco-oncologic care at the Nahe Breast Center, and 35 were referred from outside breast centers. The distribution into stages was as follows: stage I, n = 48; stage II, n = 68; stage III, n = 19; stage IV, n = 3. Neoadjuvant chemotherapy was given to 19 and adjuvant chemotherapy to 50 patients. Endocrine treatment was given to 120 patients. Both 3D conformal (n = 103) and intensity-modulated (n = 35) radiotherapy were performed with a modern linear accelerator.

Results
With a median follow-up of 60 months (1–67), local recurrence occurred in 4/138 (2.9%) and distant metastasis in 8/138 (5.8%) patients; 7/138 (5.1%) patients died of their tumors during the follow-up period. The actuarial 5‑year local recurrence-free survival of all patients was 97.1%, and the actuarial 5‑year overall survival of all patients was 94.9%. We observed no grade 3 or 4 radiogenic side effects.

Conclusion
The results of radiotherapy for breast carcinoma at the Nahe Breast Center are comparable to published national and international results. In particular, the local recurrence rates in our study, determined absolutely and actuarially, are excellent, and demonstrate the usefulness of radiotherapy.