bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Potential interplay between tumor size and vitamin D receptor (VDR) polymorphisms in breast cancer prognosis: a prospective cohort study
Authors: Lindgren Hampus , Ademi David , Godina Christopher , Tryggvadottir Helga , Isaksson Karolin , Jernström Helena 
Published: February 2024

Abstract
Purpose
Vitamin D has some anticancer properties that may decrease breast cancer risk and improve prognosis. The aim was to investigate associations between four previously studied VDR SNPs (Taq1, Tru91, Bsm1, and Fok1) and prognosis in different groups of breast cancer patients.

Methods
VDR genotyping of 1,017 breast cancer patients included 2002–2012 in Lund, Sweden, was performed using Oncoarray. Follow-up was until June 30, 2019. Clinical data and patient information were collected from medical records and questionnaires. Cox regression was used for survival analyses.

Results
Genotype frequencies were as follows: Fok1 (AA 15.7%, AG 49.1%, GG 35.1%), Bsm1 (CC 37.2%, CT 46.1%, TT 16.7%), Tru91 (CC 77.8%, CT 20.7%, TT 1.5%), and Taq1 (AA 37.2%, AG 46.2%, GG 16.6%). During follow-up there were 195 breast cancer events. The homozygous variants of Taq1 and Bsm1 were associated with reduced risk of breast cancer events (adjusted HR = 0.59, 95% CI 0.38–0.92 for Taq1 and adjusted HR = 0.61, 95% CI 0.40–0.94 for Bsm1). The G allele of the Fok1 was associated with increased risk of breast cancer events in small tumors (pT1, adjusted HR = 1.83, 95% CI 1.04–3.23) but not in large tumors (pT2/3/4, adjusted HR = 0.80, 95% CI 0.41–1.59) with a borderline interaction (Pinteraction = 0.058). No interactions between VDR genotypes and adjuvant treatments regarding breast cancer prognosis were detected.

Conclusion
VDR genotypes were associated with breast cancer prognosis and the association might be modified by tumor size. Further research is needed to confirm the findings and elucidate their potential clinical implications.
There is no word for ‘nature’ in our language: rethinking nature-based solutions from the perspective of Indigenous Peoples located in Canada
Authors: Reed Graeme , Brunet Nicolas D. , McGregor Deborah , Scurr Curtis , Sadik Tonio , Lavigne Jamie , Longboat Sheri 
Published: February 2024

AbstractSupport for nature-based solutions (NbS) has grown significantly in the last 5 years. At the same time, recognition for the role of Indigenous Peoples in advancing ‘life-enhancing’ climate solutions has also increased. Despite this rapid growth, the exploration of the intersection of NbS and Indigenous Peoples has been much slower, as questions remain about the ability of NbS to be implemented while respecting Indigenous rights, governance, and knowledge systems, including in their conceptualizations. To address this knowledge gap, we draw on 17 conversational interviews with Indigenous leaders, including youth, women, technicians, and knowledge keepers from what is currently known as Canada to explore Indigenous conceptualizations of nature, nature-based solutions, and the joint biodiversity and climate crisis. Three drivers of the biodiversity and climate crisis were identified: structural legacy of colonization and capitalism, a problem of human values, and climate change as a cumulative impact from industrial disturbances. Building on this understanding, our findings indicate that shifting towards Indigenous conceptualizations of NbS as systems of reciprocal relationships would: challenge the dichotomization of humans and nature; emphasize the inseparability of land, water, and identity; internalize the principle of humility and responsibility; and invest in the revitalization of Indigenous knowledge systems. As the first exploration of Indigenous conceptualizations of nature within NbS literatures, we close with four reflections for academics, advocates, leaders, activists, and policymakers to uplift Indigenous climate solutions for a just, equitable, and resilient future.
Comparison of ex vivo bioluminescence imaging, Alu-qPCR and histology for the quantification of spontaneous lung and bone metastases in subcutaneous xenograft mouse models
Authors: Haider Marie-Therese , Freytag Vera , Krause Linda , Spethmann Tanja , Gosau Tobias , Beine Mia C. , Knies Christine , Schröder-Schwarz Jennifer , Horn Michael , Riecken Kristoffer , Lange Tobias 
Published: February 2024

AbstractBioluminescence imaging (BLI) is a non-invasive state-of-the-art-method for longitudinal tracking of tumor cells in mice. The technique is commonly used to determine bone metastatic burden in vivo and also suitable ex vivo to detect even smallest bone micro-metastases in spontaneous metastasis xenograft models. However, it is unclear to which extent ex vivo BLI correlates with alternative methods for metastasis quantification. Here, we compared ex vivo BLI, human DNA-based Alu-qPCR, and histology for the quantification of bone vs. lung metastases, which are amongst the most common sites of metastasis in prostate cancer (PCa) patients and spontaneous PCa xenograft models. Data from 93 immunodeficient mice were considered, each of which were subcutaneously injected with luciferase/RGB-labeled human PCa PC-3 cells. The primary tumors were resected at ~ 0.75 cm³ and mice were sacrificed ~ 3 weeks after surgery and immediately examined by ex vivo BLI. Afterwards, the right lungs and hind limbs with the higher BLI signal (BLIHi bone) were processed for histology, whereas the left lung lobes and hind limbs with the lower BLI signal (BLILo bone) were prepared for Alu-qPCR. Our data demonstrate remarkable differences in the correlation coefficients of the different methods for lung metastasis detection (r ~ 0.8) vs. bone metastasis detection (r ~ 0.4). However, the BLI values of the BLIHi and BLILo bones correlated very strongly (r ~ 0.9), indicating that the method per se was reliable under identical limitations; the overall level of metastasis to contralateral bones was astonishingly similar. Instead, the level of lung metastasis only weakly to moderately correlated with the level of bone metastasis formation. Summarized, we observed a considerable discrepancy between ex vivo BLI and histology/Alu-qPCR in the quantification of bone metastases, which was not observed in the case of lung metastases. Future studies using ex vivo BLI for bone metastasis quantification should combine multiple methods to accurately determine metastatic load in bone samples.
The effects of cities on quail (Coturnix coturnix) migration: a disturbing story of population connectivity, health, and ecography
Authors: Nadal Jesús , Sáez David , Volponi Stefano , Serra Lorenzo , Spina Fernando , Margalida Antoni 
Published: February 2024

AbstractThe increasing impact of human activities on ecosystems is provoking a profound and dangerous effect, particularly in wildlife. Examining the historical migration patterns of quail (Coturnix coturnix) offers a compelling case study to demonstrate the repercussions of human actions on biodiversity. Urbanization trends, where people gravitate toward mega-urban areas, amplify this effect. The proliferation of artificial urban ecosystems extends its influence across every biome, as human reliance on infrastructure and food sources alters ecological dynamics extensively. We examine European quail migrations pre- and post-World War II and in the present day. Our study concentrates on the Italian peninsula, investigating the historical and contemporary recovery of ringed quail populations. To comprehend changes in quail migration, we utilize trajectory analysis, open statistical data, and linear generalized models. We found that while human population and economic growth have shown a linear increase, quail recovery rates exhibit a U-shaped trajectory, and cereal and legume production displays an inverse U-shaped pattern. Generalized linear models have unveiled the significant influence of several key factors—time periods, cereal and legume production, and human demographics—on quail recovery rates. These factors closely correlate with the levels of urbanization observed across these timeframes. These insights underscore the profound impact of expanding human populations and the rise of mega-urbanization on ecosystem dynamics and services. As our planet becomes more urbanized, the pressure on ecosystems intensifies, highlighting the urgent need for concerted efforts directed toward conserving and revitalizing ecosystem integrity. Simultaneously, manage the needs and demands of burgeoning mega-urban areas. Achieving this balance is pivotal to ensuring sustainable coexistence between urban improvement and the preservation of our natural environment.
Potential impacts of climate change on renewable energy in Egypt
Authors: Hassaan Mahmoud Adel , Abdrabo Mohamed Abdel Karim Aly , Hussein Hadeer Ahmed , Ghanem Azza Abdallah Abdelhamid , Abdel-Latif Hany 
Published: February 2024

AbstractThe need for renewable energy sources is recently necessitated by attaining sustainability and climate change mitigation. Accordingly, the use of renewable energy sources has been growing rapidly during the last two decades. Yet, the potentials of renewable energy sources are generally influenced by several climatic factors that either determine the source of energy such as wind speed in the case of wind power or affect the performance of system such as the reduction in solar PV power production due to temperature increase. This highlights the need for assessing climate change impacts on renewable energy sources in the future to ensure their reliability and sustainability.This paper is intended to assess impacts of climate change on wind and solar potential energy in Egypt by the year 2065 under RCP 8.5 scenario. For this purpose, a GIS-based methodology of three main steps was applied. The results revealed that solar energy potential in Egypt is expected to be relatively less vulnerable to climate change compared to wind energy. In this respect, it was found that while wind energy potential was estimated to range ± 12%. By the year 2065 under RCP 8.5 scenario, PV module power is expected to decrease by about 1.3% on average. Such assessment can assist in developing more sustainable and flexible renewable energy policy in Egypt.
AI for crisis decisions
Authors: Comes Tina 
Published: February 2024

AbstractIncreasingly, our cities are confronted with crises. Fuelled by climate change and a loss of biodiversity, increasing inequalities and fragmentation, challenges range from social unrest and outbursts of violence to heatwaves, torrential rainfall, or epidemics. As crises require rapid interventions that overwhelm human decision-making capacity, AI has been portrayed as a potential avenue to support or even automate decision-making. In this paper, I analyse the specific challenges of AI in urban crisis management as an example and test case for many super wicked decision problems. These super wicked problems are characterised by a coincidence of great complexity and urgency. I will argue that from this combination, specific challenges arise that are only partially covered in the current guidelines and standards around trustworthy or human-centered AI. By following a decision-centric perspective, I argue that to solve urgent crisis problems, the context, capacities, and networks need to be addressed. AI for crisis response needs to follow dedicated design principles that ensure (i) human control in complex social networks, where many humans interact with AI; (ii) principled design that considers core principles of crisis response such as solidarity and humanity; (iii) designing for the most vulnerable. As such this paper is meant to inspire researchers, AI developers and practitioners in the space of AI for (urban) crisis response – and other urgent and complex problems that urban planners are confronted with.
Design culture for Sustainable urban artificial intelligence: Bruno Latour and the search for a different AI urbanism
Authors: Palmini Otello , Cugurullo Federico 
Published: February 2024

AbstractThe aim of this paper is to investigate the relationship between AI urbanism and sustainability by drawing upon some key concepts of Bruno Latour’s philosophy. The idea of a sustainable AI urbanism - often understood as the juxtaposition of smart and eco urbanism - is here critiqued through a reconstruction of the conceptual sources of these two urban paradigms. Some key ideas of smart and eco urbanism are indicated as incompatible and therefore the fusion of these two paradigms is assessed as an unstable basis for shaping sustainable AI urbanism. The concepts in question - modernity, science and nature – are subsequently redefined following Latour’s philosophical perspective, in an attempt to define a different theoretical basis for a sustainable AI urbanism in the Anthropocene. Finally, the principles of a design philosophy shaped by Latour are used to change the design culture that informs AI urbanism towards a more sustainable practice. This paper constructs and promotes a dialogue between the disciplines of philosophy and urban theory with urban design in the conviction that the principles produced by the former and the practices carried out by the latter must start a biunivocal relationship. The paper reveals that in order to change design culture in the field of AI urbanism, it is necessary to rethink some of the key ideas that inform the Western and modern worldview through novel philosophical reflections.
Broad-scale genetic population connectivity in the Moreton Bay Bug (Thenus australiensis) on Australia’s east coast
Authors: McMillan Matthew N. , Brunjes Naomi , Williams Samuel M. , Holmes Bonnie J. 
Published: February 2024

AbstractUnderstanding population connectivity helps inform resource and conservation managers about appropriate boundaries for management units. However, for many species facing recent increases in fishing or environmental pressure, accurate information on population structure is lacking. Reef Bugs (Thenus australiensis), commonly known as Moreton Bay Bugs, are iconic shovel-nosed lobsters in northern Australia and an increasingly important fisheries resource. Around 80% of landings occur in the Queensland East Coast Otter Trawl Fishery (ECOTF) where the first stock assessment of the species is underway. However, knowledge about population structure to inform stock assessment is lacking. We used genome complexity reduction-based sequencing to characterise high-quality Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms (SNPs) used to evaluate population structure among three management zones of the ECOTF. Post-filtering, a total of 3,031 SNPs were used to infer no genetic differences among locations indicating strong genetic population connectivity. The presence of a single panmictic population was further supported by cluster and kinship analyses. Broad-scale genetic connectivity likely results from pelagic larval dispersal due to limited adult movements. Findings of high gene flow among connected populations indicate a single biological stock of T. australiensis on Australia’s east coast and will inform future fisheries management initiatives.
Visual performance and patient preference with bilateral implantation of an extended depth of focus or combined implantation of an extended depth of focus/trifocal intraocular lens
Authors: Moore Jonathan , Østergaard Jens , Kretz Florian 
Published: February 2024

Abstract
Purpose
Evaluate postoperative visual performance in patients with bilaterally implanted AT LARA or AT LARA/AT LISA tri (Carl Zeiss AG, Jena, Germany) intraocular lenses.

Methods
Multicentered, comparative, open-label, retrospective/prospective study. Post-IOL implantation, patients were prospectively enrolled into this study; preoperative patient data were collected retrospectively. Follow-up was at 2–4 and 5–8 months post-surgery. The primary endpoint was binocular best corrected distance visual acuity (CDVA). The study was retrospectively registered on clinicaltrials.gov (#NCT05462067).

Results
Seventy-one patients (142 eyes) were enrolled; 67 patients (134 eyes) have 5–8 months data. The mean binocular CDVA at 2–4 months was -0.10 ± 0.06 logMAR in the bilateral AT LARA group (“bilateral”) and -0.11 ± 0.09 logMAR in the combined implantation AT LARA/ AT LISA tri group (“combined implantation”); (P = 0.4856). At 5–8 months, mean binocular CDVA was -0.13 ± 0.06 logMAR in the bilateral group and -0.11 ± 0.09 in the combined implantation group (P = 0.4003). At 5–8 months, more eyes in the bilateral group attained 0.2 logMAR or better binocular uncorrected intermediate VA (UIVA; 67 cm) than those in the combined implantation group (100% vs. 94%, respectively). The bilateral group achieved a mean of 0.24 ± 0.11 logMAR in uncorrected near VA (UCNVA), compared to a mean of 0.16 ± 0.12 logMAR in the combined implantation group at 5–8 months (P = 0.0041).

Conclusions
A combined implantation approach (AT LARA in the distance dominant eye/AT LISA tri in the non-dominant eye) produced similar CDVA outcomes but better UCNVA as bilateral implantation with the AT LARA. UIVA was comparable between groups. No new safety concerns were reported.
Long-Term Urban and Population Trends in the Southern Mesopotamian Floodplains
Authors: Marchetti Nicolò , Bortolini Eugenio , Menghi Sartorio Jessica Cristina , Orrù Valentina , Zaina Federico 
Published: February 2024

Abstract
The processes of long-term urbanization in southern Mesopotamia are still insufficiently investigated, even though recent studies using large datasets and focusing on neighboring regions have paved the way to understanding the critical role of multiple variables in the shaping of settlement strategies by ancient human societies, among which climate change played an important role. In this paper, we tackle these issues by analyzing, within the new FloodPlains Web GIS project, a conspicuous amount of archaeological evidence collected over the past decades at approximately 5000 sites in southern Mesopotamia. We have measured modifications over time in a variety of demographic proxies generated through probabilistic approaches: our results show that the rapid climate changes, especially those that occurred around 5.2, 4.2, and 3.2 ka BP, may have contributed—in addition to other socioeconomic factors—to triggering the main urban and demographic cycles in southern Mesopotamia and that each cycle is characterized by specific settlement strategies in terms of the distribution and the dimension of the urban centers.
Identification-robust methods for comparing inequality with an application to regional disparities
Authors: Dufour Jean-Marie , Flachaire Emmanuel , Khalaf Lynda , Zalghout Abdallah 
Published: February 2024

AbstractWe propose Fieller-type methods for inference on generalized entropy inequality indices in the context of the two-sample problem which covers testing the statistical significance of the difference in indices, and the construction of a confidence set for this difference. In addition to irregularities arising from thick distributional tails, standard inference procedures are prone to identification problems because of the ratio transformation that defines the considered indices. Simulation results show that our proposed method outperforms existing counterparts including simulation-based permutation methods and results are robust to different assumptions about the shape of the null distributions. Improvements are most notable for indices that put more weight on the right tail of the distribution and for sample sizes that match macroeconomic type inequality analysis. While irregularities arising from the right tail have long been documented, we find that left tail irregularities are equally important in explaining the failure of standard inference methods. We apply our proposed method to analyze income per-capita inequality across U.S. states and non-OECD countries. Empirical results illustrate how Fieller-based confidence sets can: (i) differ consequentially from available ones leading to conflicts in test decisions, and (ii) reveal prohibitive estimation uncertainty in the form of unbounded outcomes which serve as proper warning against flawed interpretations of statistical tests.
Cultivation and dynamic cropping processes impart land-cover heterogeneity within agroecosystems: a metrics-based case study in the Yazoo-Mississippi Delta (USA)
Authors: Heintzman Lucas J. , McIntyre Nancy E. , Langendoen Eddy J. , Read Quentin D. 
Published: February 2024

Abstract
Context
Cultivation and crop rotation, influenced by federal policy, prices, and precipitation, are significant sources of land-cover heterogeneity. Characterization of heterogeneity is required to identify areas and trends of stability or change.

Objectives
We analyzed a land-cover time series within a prominent agroecosystem in the US, the Yazoo-Mississippi Delta (the Delta), as a case study of which metrics capture dynamics of landscape composition, configuration, connectivity, and context.

Methods
An assessment of land cover- from 2008 to 2021- was conducted and analyzed for potential differences among three Farm Bill eras. Twelve out of 23 metrics (including three new ones presented herein) examined were useful in characterizing land-cover heterogeneity.

Results
Although there was no increase in cultivated land, > 72% of the Delta experienced changes in land-cover type, and ~ 3% of the Delta was stable monoculture. Configurational metrics varied across years for soybeans, cotton, and rice, indicating prevalence of field-level changes in composition; connectivity metrics revealed isolation of upland forest and rice. The amount of corn was positively associated with the previous year’s commodity prices and negatively with precipitation whereas soybean acreage was lower in high-precipitation years and more dependent on commodity prices. Farm Bill effects were mixed among categories, whereas CRP generally declined.

Conclusions
The Delta experienced land-cover change with no net loss or gain of cultivated lands. Using 12 metrics that captured temporal shifts in spatial patterns, we characterized this agroecosystem as a shifting mosaic. Our approach may be useful for identifying areas of spatio-temporal heterogeneity or stability, with implications on resource management.