bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Rituximab Administration in Pediatric Glomerulopathies Amid Challenging Circumstances: Insights from Clinical Experience
Authors: Ivanov Dmytro , Weber Lutz T. , Lagodych Yelizaveta , Levtchenko Elena , Ivanova Mariia , Vakulenko Liudmyla , Zavalna Iryna , Boiko Ninel 
Published: February 2024

Abstract
Background: The ISN Green Nephrology Initiative, coupled with limited capacity in low-middle-income countries and the challenges posed by military conflicts, necessitates innovative solutions in pediatric nephrology for optimizing the treatment of children with kidney diseases. This study aims to assess the effectiveness and safety of Rituximab (RTX) usage in children with glomerular diseases, with an extension of clinical indications.Methods: We initiated an ongoing open-label, multicenter, randomized, patient-oriented study, termed RIME ("RTX in glomerulopathies"), focusing on children with glomerulopathies in Ukraine during martial law (enrolled 2022–2023). Inclusion criteria comprised patients with steroid-dependent (SDNS) or frequently relapsing nephrotic syndrome (FRNS) and progressive glomerulopathies, as determined by eGFR (estimated glomerular filtration rate), ACR (albumin-to-creatinine ratio), and kidney biopsy results. RTX was explored as an alternative to glucocorticoid re-administration and a potential treatment to decelerate renal function decline. The primary endpoint was eGFR and ACR up to 6 months from RTX initiation, with the secondary endpoint assessing the delayed effect at 1 year.Results: As of November 2023, results were available for 19 children, including 7 with FRNS and 12 with progressive loss of renal function and/or increased ACR. RTX use resulted in stable remission of steroid-dependent FRNS, with statistically significant urinalysis normalization and hyperfiltration by the 6th month, leading to eGFR normalization within a year. RTX demonstrated a 75% success rate in achieving a stable trend in reducing ACR and restoring eGFR in progressive glomerulopaties. In this group, stable trends did not receive statistically significant changes, which is obviously due to the small size of the sample. Tolerability was observed in 80% of patients, allowing completion of the full course of therapy.Conclusions: RTX, if tolerated, proved highly effective as a steroid-sparing agent and demonstrated efficiency in slowing the pathological process in progressive glomerulopathies, indicating the potential for ACR reduction and renal function restoration. Future studies should assess the balance between treatment cost, convenience, adherence to Green Nephrology principles, and the feasibility of a virtual nephrology approach in conflict zones.
Bioethanol production from paper sludge containing antiseptic and deinking agent by subcritical water pretreatment and semi-simultaneous saccharification and fermentation
Authors: Okajima Idzumi , Muto Masato , Morimoto Shingo , Nauchi Kazuki , Kodama Yuta , Park Enoch Y. , Sako Takeshi 
Published: February 2024

Abstract

For a long time, bioethanol production from wood-based biomass has been investigated. However, most studies face issues including high costs and technical difficulties associated with delignification and saccharification. Paper sludge (PS) from paper mills has a significant potential for bioethanol production. In this study, waste-paper-containing PS is used as the raw material for bioethanol production because the annual waste paper utilization rate has increased. Although PS does not require delignification, the antiseptics and deinking agents in PS inhibit enzymatic reactions such as saccharification and fermentation and their removal has not yet been reported. Using subcritical water pre-treatment, the selective decomposition of enzyme inhibitors in PS is examined without the generation of other enzyme inhibitors. The optimum pretreatment conditions are identified as 240°C, 3.3 MPa, 3 min, and pH 4.5. Glucose was obtained in 71% yield from pretreated 5 wt% PS using cellulase, which is 5.5 times higher than that from unpretreated PS. This is because the reactivity of the pretreated PS increases with the surface area of the cellulose fibers, and the cellulase inhibitors are decomposed by subcritical water. Next, semi-simultaneous saccharification and fermentation treatments are performed to produce bioethanol from waste-paper-containing PS. The bioethanol yield based on cellulose after 96 h is 68% for PS pretreated with subcritical water, whereas the bioethanol yield is 6% for unpretreated PS. Therefore, subcritical water pretreatment increases the bioethanol yield by 11 times. Proposed method allows large amount of PS to be used as ethanol feedstock in future.
Cultural Humility- Experience of a Nutrition Student at an African Clinic
Authors: Elshaarawi Youssef , Metersky Kateryna 
Published: February 2024

Abstract

Background Demonstrating cultural humility is crucial in healthcare as it helps build bridges between healthcare practitioners and patients receiving care to understand their needs and tailor interventions. International placements are one of the best ways to enhance cultural humility.Methods This study investigated the externship experience of one Canadian undergraduate nutrition student at a North African clinic, utilizing Narrative Inquiry. Data were collected using the Narrative Reflective Process, specifically using drawings, proverbs, and mementos to share the participant’s story of experience. The reflection process was conducted in Ontario, Canada post arrival from the externship experience that took place one summer during the COVID-19 pandemic.Results The findings depict how student gained a deeper understanding of cultural humility, became aware of their own biases, and was able to comprehend and discover different perspectives to care delivery. Furthermore, diversifying their interactions and being immersed in different cultural situations opened their perspectives and enhanced their appreciation, nurturing their personal and professional development. The two main themes that emerged were self-reflection and care delivery constituents.Conclusion The study emphasizes the benefits of international placements for future development of healthcare practitioners, particularly in cultural humility. The student was able to gain a deeper insight into what cultural humility is in a relatively short period of time through this transcultural collaboration.
The burden attributable to primary headache disorders in children and adolescents in Ethiopia: estimates from a national schools- based study
Authors: Zewde Yared Z. , Zebenigus Mehila , Belay Hanna , Tekle-Haimanot Redda , Uluduz Derya , Şaşmaz Tayyar , Bozdag Fatma , Steiner Timothy J 
Published: February 2024

Abstract
Background
We previously reported high prevalences of headache disorders among children (6–11 years) and adolescents (12–17 years) in Ethiopia. Here we provide data on headache-attributed burden collected contemporaneously from the same study participants. Part of the global schools-based programme within the Global Campaign against Headache, the study is the first to present such data from sub-Saharan Africa.
Methods
A cross-sectional survey following the generic protocol for the global study was conducted in six schools (urban and rural), in Addis Ababa city and three regions of Ethiopia. The child or adolescent versions of the Headache-Attributed Restriction, Disability, Social Handicap and Impaired Participation (HARDSHIP) structured questionnaires were self-completed under supervision by pupils in class. Headache diagnostic questions were based on ICHD-3 beta but for the inclusion of undifferentiated headache (UdH).
Results
Of 2,349 eligible participants, 2,344 completed the questionnaires (1,011 children [43.1%], 1,333 adolescents [56.9%]; 1,157 males [49.4%], 1,187 females [50.6%]; participating proportion 99.8%). Gender- and age-adjusted 1-year prevalence of headache, reported previously, was 72.8% (migraine: 38.6%; tension-type headache [TTH]: 19.9%; UdH: 12.3%; headache on ≥ 15 days/month (H15+): 1.2%). Mean headache frequency was 2.6 days/4 weeks but, with mean duration of 2.7 hours, mean proportion of time with headache was only 1.0% (migraine: 1.4%; TTH: 0.7%; H15+: 9.1%). Mean intensity was 1.8 on a scale of 1–3. Symptomatic medication was consumed on about one third of headache days across headache types. Lost school time reportedly averaged 0.7 days over the preceding 4 weeks, representing 3.5% of school time, but was 2.4 days/4 weeks (12.0%) in the important small minority with H15+. However, actual absences with headache the day before indicated averages overall of 9.7% of school time lost, and 13.3% among those with migraine. Emotional impact and quality-of-life scores reflected other measures of burden, with clear adverse impact gradients (H15 + > migraine > TTH > UdH).
Conclusions
The high prevalence of headache among children and adolescents in Ethiopia, who represent half its population, is associated with substantial burden. Lost school time is probably the most important consequence. Estimates suggest a quite deleterious effect, likely to be reflected in both individual prospects and the prosperity of society.
Investigation and analysis of current situation of rehabilitation therapists in Hunan province after the COVID-19 epidemic: a cross-sectional study
Authors: Deng Na , Yang Jiachun , Duan zhiyong , Huang Yue , Wang Jun 
Published: February 2024

Abstract
Background
This study aims to comprehend the prevailing circumstances of rehabilitation therapists in the aftermath of the COVID-19 outbreak and to analysis the variables that affect the job satisfaction of these therapists who volunteered to take part in this study. In total, 769 rehabilitation were enrolled in the study.
Method
Based on the experts' discussions and revisions at the Xiangya Boai Rehabilitation Hospital, this questionnaire was subsequently distributed to rehabilitation therapists via WeChat. rehabilitation were sampled using a cross-sectional approach on Wenjuanxing through the WeChat APP.
Results
Based on an analysis of data distribution and composition ratio, it is evident that there have been significant transformations in multiple data dimensions between pre-pandemic therapy and the current era. Comparative analyses revealed statistically significant differences in age (H = 32.90, P < 0.001), years of working experience (H = 32.14, P < 0.001), job title (H = 29.93, P < 0.001), and monthly salary level (H = 114.81, P < 0.001). Further analyses using multiple factor regression indicated that monthly income significantly influenced the outcome measure. Participants with a monthly income below 3,000 yuan had a significantly higher Odds Ratio (OR) of 17.9 (OR = 17.95, 95%CI 8.49–38.29, P < 0.001) for experiencing job dissatisfaction compared to those with a monthly income exceeding 10,000 yuan. Similarly, therapists earning between 3,000 and 5,000 yuan monthly had an OR of 5.3 (OR = 5.32, 95%CI 2.91–9.83, P < 0.001) for job dissatisfaction, while those in the 5,001–7,000 yuan income range had an OR of 2.46 (OR = 2.46, 95%CI 1.36–4.49, P < 0.05).
Conclusion
After the epidemic, the distribution of age, gender, hospital type, and job title among rehabilitation therapists has changed. The job classification of therapists has become more refined, and the monthly income level has become an important factor affecting job satisfaction. The forefront of this academic endeavor lies in carefully investigate the existing landscape that defines rehabilitation therapists in Hunan, which will provide a deeper insight into whole China's community of therapists.
AFIRE: Adaptive FusionNet for Illumination-Robust Feature Extraction in Heterogeneous Imaging Environments
Authors: Yu Mingxin , Miao Xufan , Sun Yichen , Bai Yuchen 
Published: February 2024

Abstract
The fusion of infrared and visible images aims to synthesize a fused image that incorporates richer information by leveraging the distinct characteristics of each modality. However, the disparate quality of input images in terms of infrared and visible light significantly impacts fusion performance. Addressing this issue, we propose a deep adaptive fusion method in this paper, termed Adaptive FusionNet for Illumination-Robust Feature Extraction (AFIRE), which involves interactive processing of two input features and dynamically adjusts fusion weights under varying illumination conditions. Specifically, we introduce a novel interactive extraction structure during the feature extraction stage for both infrared and visible light, enabling the capture of more complementary information. Additionally, we design a Deep Adaptive Fusion module to assess the quality of input features and perform weighted fusion through a channel attention mechanism. Finally, a new loss function is formulated by incorporating the entropy and median of input images to guide the training of the fusion network. Extensive experiments demonstrate that AFIRE outperforms state-of-the-art methods in preserving pixel intensity distribution and texture details. Source code is available in GitHub https://github.com/ISCLab-Bistu/AFIRE.
Comparative Analysis of Whole Chloroplast Genomes of Three Common Species of Nekemias from Vine Tea
Authors: Yang Feng , Wu Shaoxiong , Yu Zhengwen 
Published: February 2024

Abstract
Nekemias grossedentata is a plant species that has been utilized for centuries as both a traditional medicine and food source due to its high levels of bioactive compounds. Specifically, the plant's young stems and leaves are used to make vine tea, which has been used to treat various ailments. While Nekemias cantoniensis and Nekemias megalophylla are also utilized for similar purposes in various regions, limited research on their chloroplast genomes and chromatography has significantly hindered the study of their evolutionary and phylogenetic relationships, as well as the market supply of these materials. In order to address these gaps in knowledge, this study used the Illumina sequencing platform to sequence the complete chloroplast (cp) genomes of three Nekemias species, which were then compared to that of Nekemias grossedentata. Additionally, high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) was utilized to construct chromatographic fingerprints of the three plants. The annotation results demonstrated that the three chloroplast genomes were typical quadripartite structures, with lengths of 162,147 bp (N. grossedentata), 161,981 bp (N. megalophylla), and 162,500 bp (N. cantoniensis), respectively. A total of 89 (N. grossedentata)/86 (N. megalophylla,N. cantoniensis) protein-coding genes, 37 tRNA genes, and 8 rRNA genes were annotated. The IR/SC boundary regions were relatively conserved across the three species, although three regions (rps19-rpl2, rpl32-trnL-UAG, ccsA-ndhD) exhibited nucleotide diversity values (Pi) of variable sites higher than 1%. Phylogenetic analysis indicated that N. grossedentata had a closer genetic relationship with N. megalophylla than N. cantoniensis. Moreover, the chromatographic fingerprints revealed that the functional components were highly similar to the genetic relatedness of the species. Overall, this study provides valuable information for species identification, phylogeny, quality assessment, and rational use of three medicinal plants of the genus Nekemias. Furthermore, the findings of this study will contribute to the standardization of vine tea raw materials and the optimization of product efficacy.
Influence of Covid 19 on the Level of Internet Addiction and its Impacts Among High School Students in a Selected School at Kottayam District
Authors: Abraham Jessy , Therese Maria 
Published: February 2024

Abstract
Background: Internet addiction is the term used to describe the obsessive need to spend a lot of time online. Internet addiction has become a widespread issue in the twenty-first century, affecting people of all ages and in all sectors, in particular after the COVID-19 outbreak. Addiction of this type causes numerous mental and physical health issues. This study aims to assess the level of internet addiction and its impacts among high school students.
Methods: A convenient sampling technique used to select 60 high school students. Internet addiction questionnaire and a rating scale to assess the impacts of internet addiction were used collect the data. The results were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics.
Results: Showed that 45% of the students have moderate level of internet addiction and 1.6% of them have severe addiction. There is a moderate positive co-relation exists between the level of internet addiction and its impacts. There was no association found between internet addiction and baseline variables of students.
Conclusion: Internet adaptability has become a crucial tool in these modern times due to the advantages associated with internet usage, such as access to timely and necessary information, international access to news, events, and interpersonal connection through email. Scholars are concerned about the risks associated with excessive internet use, despite the internet's phenomenal growth and usage. It is advised that the administration of the school increase awareness of internet addiction and the risks that it poses to students. Support programs for the students could be incorporated into the curriculum.
Research on Business English Translation Teaching in the Context of Economic Integration
Authors: Bian Ruirui 
Published: February 2024

Abstract
In the stage of business English translation teaching, the lack of integration of objective needs leads to the difficulty in achieving the ideal teaching effect. Therefore, the research on business English translation teaching under the situation of economic integration is proposed. For the teaching preparation, the requirements of the actual situation of business English translation for specific translation and the way of creating the situation are fully considered in the form of economic integration. The situational construction of the teaching process is realized from the perspectives of teachers' ideology and classroom situation materials; For the links in the teaching course, the situational teaching method with the attribute of "knowledge and action interaction" is constructed. By guiding students to gradually participate in the real situational activities with the characteristics of economic integration, the progressive teaching method from the periphery to the core is designed according to the three measures of new course introduction, active atmosphere and cognitive strengthening. In the test results, students' academic level and learning investment are at a high level, and good teaching results have been achieved.
Algorithmic trading on financial time series using Deep Reinforcement Learning
Authors: Asghari Alireza , Mozayani Nasser 
Published: February 2024

Abstract
The use of technology in financial markets has led to extensive changes in conventional trading structures.Today, most orders that reach exchanges are created by algorithmic trading agents.
Today, machine learning-based methods play an important role in building automated trading systems. The increasing complexity and dynamism of financial markets are among the key challenges of these methods. The most widely used machine learning approach is supervised learning, but in interactive environments, the use of supervised learning alone has limitations such as difficulty in defining appropriate labels and lack of modeling of the dynamic nature of the market. Due to the good performance of deep reinforcement learning-based approaches, we will use these approaches to solve the mentioned problems.
In this paper, we presented a deep reinforcement learning framework for trading in the financial market, a set of input features and indicators selected and tailored to the purpose of the problem, reward function, appropriate models based on fully connected, convolutional and hybrid networks. The proposed top models traded under real market conditions such as transaction costs and then were evaluated. In addition to outperforming the buy and hold strategy, these models achieved excellent cumulative returns while having appropriate risk metrics.
My-This-Your-That - Interpretable Identification of Systematic Bias in Federated Learning for Biomedical Images
Authors: Hartley Mary-Anne , Naumova Klavdiia , Devos Arnout , Karimireddy Sai , Jaggi Martin 
Published: February 2024

Abstract

Deep learning has the potential to improve and even automate the interpretation of biomedical images, making it more accessible, particularly in low-resource settings where human experts are often lacking. The privacy concerns of these images necessitate innovative approaches to model building, such as DIStributed COllaborative learning (DISCO), which allows several data owners (clients) to learn a joint model without sharing the original images. However, this black-box data can conceal systematic bias, compromising model performance and fairness. This work adapts an interpretable prototypical part learning network to a DISCO setting enabling each client to visualize the differences in features learned by other clients on its own image: comparing one client’s 'This' with others’ 'That'. We present a setting where four clients collaborate to train two diagnostic classifiers on a benchmark chest X-ray dataset. In an unbiased setting, the global model reaches 74.14 % balanced accuracy for cardiomegaly and 74.08 % for pleural effusion. We then compare performance under the strain of systematic visual bias, where a confounding feature is associated with the label in one client. In this setting, global models drop to near-random when used on unbiased data. We demonstrate how differences between local and global prototypes can indicate the presence of bias and allow it to be visualized on each client's data without compromising privacy. We further show how these differences can guide model personalization.
Stool as a novel biomarker for arsenic exposure through diet: a case-control study in a West Bengal population
Authors: Ghosh Soma , Chakraborty Arijit , Bhowmick Subhamoy , Joardar Madhurima , Das Antara , Roychowdhury Tarit , Bhunia Sangita , Majumdar Kunal Kanti , Pramanik Sreemanta 
Published: February 2024

Abstract

Geogenic groundwater arsenic (As) contamination is a persistent health threat in the district of Nadia, West Bengal India. Despite provision of safe piped water, local populations in these areas are still exposed to As through diet as the cultivation is majorly dependent on As contaminated shallow groundwater causing significant As accumulation in agricultural foodstuffs. Although urine is an established biomarker for As exposure through drinking water yet, it does not reflect the actual exposure through diet. Hence, stool-As concentration of exposed population should be evaluated to assess the true exposure through diet. The present case-control study evaluates As concentration in stool samples of exposed (n = 24) and unexposed (n = 36) populations. Average stool-As concentration found was 234 ± 207 µg/kg in exposed population while only 66 ± 22 µg/kg in control samples; comparable to those of urine samples of case and control; respectively. Positive Pearson correlation and a significant difference of variance through ANOVA (p = 0.01; Fcrit= 1.65) among stool-As, urine-As, groundwater-As, age and BMI found for case samples indicate that stool also presents comparable and measurable As concentrations upon exposure. Mann-Whitney U test confirms that random values of stool-As in case samples varied significantly (p < 0.001) than those of control samples. Besides, multi-metal analysis of stool digest indicated that stool-As correlated negatively with most of the metals in case and positively with control samples. These observations along with ease of collection and detection due to higher concentration in the matrix, suggest that stool may act as a decisive biomarker of As exposure through diet. To the best of our knowledge, this is a pioneering study to establish stool as a reliable and significant biomarker for assessing As exposure as limited investigations exist focused on human faecal samples on long term naturally exposed adult human population.