bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Life after Pelvic Exenteration for Rectal Cancer
Authors: Brown Kilian G. M. , White Kate , Solomon Michael J. , Sutton Paul , Ng Kheng-Seong , Steffens Daniel 
Published: January 2025

Objective:
To explore the perspectives and experiences of patients and carers living with the long-term consequences of pelvic exenteration.

Summary Background Data:
Pelvic exenteration is accepted as the standard of care for selected patients with locally advanced or recurrent rectal cancer. With contemporary 5-year survival reported at 40-60%, the number of long-term survivors is expected to increase. The long-term consequences of such radical surgery for patients and their survivorship needs are not well understood.

Methods:
This was an exploratory, qualitative study conducted at a high-volume pelvic exenteration centre. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with survivors of pelvic exenteration surgery for locally advanced or recurrent rectal cancer and their carers. Purposive sampling was used to ensure a diverse cohort. Data were thematically analysed.

Results:
Three major themes were identified: 1. The consequences of surgery are the price you pay for survival: the majority of participants accepted the sequelae of surgery as the cost of survival. 2. Our lives are changed forever: Adjusting to changes in body appearance and function was an ongoing challenge. Chronic pain, stomas, altered bowel function and mobility issues impacted work and social life. 3. The good days and bad days as a survivor: While several participants reported a more positive approach to life, many were living with a pervasive fear of recurrence and/or dying, and the ripple effect on family and friends was significant.

Conclusions:
Although survivors of pelvic exenteration accept the long-term consequences of surgery as the price of survival, these are significant, and improved access to support services in the community may better equip survivors to manage these challenges.
Perceived constraints to healthy diets: Evidence from agrifood system assessments in rural South Asia
Authors: Patwardhan Sharvari , Chakrabarti Suman , Choo Esther M. , Boncyk Morgan , Blake Christine , Kim Sunny S. ,   TAFSSA Collaborators, Scott Samuel 
Published: January 2025

ABSTRACTThe healthfulness of diets in South Asia is limited by socio-economic and public infrastructure challenges. Perceptions about food such as availability, accessibility, desirability, and convenience can impact food choice and ultimately diets. However, there are limited tools to understand consumers’ perceptions of these factors and if perceptions relate to actual food intake. Using a novel tool administered across five rural districts in Bangladesh, India, and Nepal, we quantify the association between food perceptions and food intake. A Likert scale (agree, neutral, disagree) was used to capture respondents’ perceptions about seven food choice drivers (affordability, accessibility, desirability, convenience, food quality, food safety, availability) for a list of six common foods. For each food, principal Component Analysis (PCA) was used to identify latent “drivers”. The association between these and diets (using 24-hour dietary recall data) was estimated using multivariable regression analysis. There was considerable heterogeneity across countries with respect to the relative importance of food choice drivers and diet quality. There is a need to measure and understand individual food perceptions that drive food choice to help develop policies that promote healthier food choices.
Distinct roles of cortical layer 5 subtypes in associative learning
Authors: Moberg Sara , Garibbo Michele , Mazo Camille , Gilad Ariel , Schmitz Dietmar , Costa Rui Ponte , Larkum Matthew E. , Takahashi Naoya 
Published: January 2025

SUMMARYAdaptive behavior is critically dependent on associative learning, where environmental cues are linked with subsequent positive or negative outcomes. In mammals, primary neocortical sensory areas serve as pivotal nodes in this process, processing stimuli and distributing information to cortical and subcortical networks. Layer 5 (L5) of the cortex comprises two types of pyramidal projection neurons—intratelencephalic (IT) and extratelencephalic (ET) neurons—each with distinct downstream targets. Despite the crucial function of L5 as a main output node of the cortex, the specific contributions of these L5 neuronal subtypes to associative learning remain poorly understood. In the present study, by leveraging transgenic mouse lines, we distinguished IT and ET neurons in the primary somatosensory cortex and examined their roles in a whisker-based frequency-discrimination learning task. Longitudinal two-photon calcium imaging revealed distinct response characteristics between IT and ET neurons throughout learning. Interestingly, the activity of IT neurons hardly changed over the five days of learning, while the activity of ET neurons developed robustly. Furthermore, IT neurons appeared to show stimuli encoding from the beginning, whereas the ET neurons became increasingly responsive to stimuli associated with reward. Chemogenetic silencing of either IT or ET neurons both impaired learning, but in strikingly distinct ways, each associated with a different phase of learning. By modeling the response characteristics of IT and ET neurons using a reinforcement learning framework, we show that IT neurons primarily encode sensory stimuli, and their representations are critical for forming stimulus-reward associations. ET neurons instead represent the value of the stimulus, used for refining behavior. Thus, our results delineate the distinct roles of L5 IT and ET neurons, underscoring their integral and complementary contributions to associative learning.
Human milk miRNAs respond to infections of the mother and infant during breastfeeding
Authors: Alsaweed Mohammed , Badsha Mezyndra , Lai Ching Tat , Geddes Donna T. , Kakulas Foteini 
Published: January 2025

ABSTRACTmiRNAs have been recently discovered in different mammals’ milk. Specifically, human milk (HM) is highly rich in miRNAs, with differential expression amongst its fractions including cells, fat, and skim milk. Various factors, such as the stage of lactation or milk removal during breastfeeding have been shown to influence the miRNA content of HM. Here, we sought to determine the effect of maternal and/or infant infection on the miRNA profile of HM cell and fat fractions analyzed using next generation sequencing. Breastfeeding mother/infant dyads (n=18) were followed during one or more infection episodes as well as upon recovery. HM cells and fat together contained 1,780 known miRNA species, which is the highest number of known miRNAs assayed in human body fluids to date. In addition, 592 novel miRNAs were predicted, of which 95 were of high confidence. Comparisons between samples collected when the participants were healthy and when infected yielded 453 differentially expressed (p<0.05) known miRNAs. Of these, 70 were highly expressed and differentially regulated during infection, with 62 upregulated and 8 downregulated known miRNAs during infection. Most of the highly and differentially expressed miRNAs are known to play critical roles in immunity and immune system development. These findings support the use of HM miRNAs as biomarkers of the health status of the lactating breast and the breastfeeding mother/infant dyad.
Unlocking information alignment between interacting brains with EEG hyperscanning
Authors: Moerel Denise , Grootwagers Tijl , Quek Genevieve L. , Smit Sophie , Varlet Manuel 
Published: January 2025

ABSTRACTSocial interactions shape our perception of the world as the people we interact with, and groups we belong to, influence how we interpret incoming information. Alignment between interacting individuals’ sensory and cognitive processes plays a critical role in facilitating cooperation and communication in everyday joint activities. However, despite recent advances in hyperscanning techniques to measure the brain activity of multiple people simultaneously, the neural processes underlying this alignment remain unknown. Here, we leveraged Representational Similarity Analysis (RSA) with electroencephalography (EEG) hyperscanning data to measure neural representations and uncover the emergence of information alignment between interacting individuals’ brains during joint visual categorisation. We recorded EEG from 24 pairs of participants sitting back-to-back while they performed a 4-way categorisation task based on rules they first agreed upon together. The results revealed significant interbrain information alignment as early as 45 ms after stimulus presentation, lasting over hundreds of milliseconds. Importantly, early alignment between brains arose between 45 and 180 ms regardless of whether participants performed the task together or were randomly matched up a posteriori to form pseudo pairs, whereas alignment after 200 ms was only present for real pairs who previously formed the categories together. This result distinguishes alignment that was socially induced by pre-agreed and shared interpretation of the stimuli from alignment that was purely evoked by shared sensory responses due to participants seeing the same visual input. In addition, our results showed that socially induced alignment was an active and dynamic process, which strengthened over time with practice and reinforcement of shared agreements, but appeared to remain largely task specific with no transfer during passive viewing of the same stimuli. Together, these findings highlight distinct sensory evoked and socially induced processes underpinning human perception and interbrain information alignment during social interactions that can be effectively captured and disentangled with Interbrain RSA.
Artificial Intelligence in Pancreatic Intraductal Papillary Mucinous Neoplasm Imaging: A Systematic Review
Authors: Qadir Muhammad Ibtsaam , Baril Jackson A. , Yip-Schneider Michele T. , Schonlau Duane , Tran Thi Thanh Thoa , Schmidt C. Max , Kolbinger Fiona R. 
Published: January 2025

ABSTRACTBackgroundBased on the Fukuoka and Kyoto international consensus guidelines, the current clinical management of intraductal papillary mucinous neoplasm (IPMN) largely depends on imaging features. While these criteria are highly sensitive in detecting high-risk IPMN, they lack specificity, resulting in surgical overtreatment. Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based medical image analysis has the potential to augment the clinical management of IPMNs by improving diagnostic accuracy.MethodsBased on a systematic review of the academic literature on AI in IPMN imaging, 1041 publications were identified of which 25 published studies were included in the analysis. The studies were stratified based on prediction target, underlying data type and imaging modality, patient cohort size, and stage of clinical translation and were subsequently analyzed to identify trends and gaps in the field.ResultsResearch on AI in IPMN imaging has been increasing in recent years. The majority of studies utilized CT imaging to train computational models. Most studies presented computational models developed on single-center datasets (n=11,44%) and included less than 250 patients (n=18,72%). Methodologically, convolutional neural network (CNN)-based algorithms were most commonly used. Thematically, most studies reported models augmenting differential diagnosis (n=9,36%) or risk stratification (n=10,40%) rather than IPMN detection (n=5,20%) or IPMN segmentation (n=2,8%).ConclusionThis systematic review provides a comprehensive overview of the research landscape of AI in IPMN imaging. Computational models have potential to enhance the accurate and precise stratification of patients with IPMN. Multicenter collaboration and datasets comprising various modalities are necessary to fully utilize this potential, alongside concerted efforts towards clinical translation.Graphical AbstractHighlightsArtificial Intelligence holds promise in the field of IPMN by augmenting IPMN detection, differentiation of different types of pancreatic cysts, stratifying malignant progression risk, and automating the analysis of IPMN imaging through computational cyst segmentation.The majority of studies related to AI-based analysis of IPMN imaging use single-center patient cohorts of less than 250 patients to develop and validate computational models and consider imaging as the only data modality.Reporting transparency of existing studies on AI in IPMN imaging is limited and there remains a scarcity of comprehensive, multimodal approaches as well as clinical translation.
Cardiometabolic Indicators of Cognitive Impairment in The Cameron County Hispanic Cohort
Authors: Musfee Fadi I. , Agarwal Seema , Maroufy Vahed , McCormick Joseph , Fisher-Hoch Susan , Savitz Sean I. 
Published: January 2025

AbstractIntroductionCognitive impairment (CI) and its related risk factors (e.g., diabetes and stroke) are highly prevalent among Hispanic/Latinos (H/L); however, prior research in H/L focused on aging individuals (≥65 years of age). We conducted a prospective study in a younger cohort of H/L (majority <65 years old) from the Cameron County Hispanic Cohort (CCHC) to comprehensively assess the associations between a wide-range of cardiometabolic health indicators with CI.MethodsWe identified a total of 1240 CCHC subjects with complete Mini-mental status exam (MMSE) data at study baseline and at 5-year follow-up. The outcome (i.e., CI) was based on MMSE scores of less than 24. We conducted univariate associations for multiple cardiometabolic indicators with CI; and mixed logistic regression models to estimate odds ratios for the associations between cardiometabolic indicators and CI adjusted for age, education, prior stroke, andAPOEgene.ResultsThe majority (89.9%) of the participants were <65 years old. A total of 117 subjects had CI at baseline (9.4%). Baseline study cohort showed that Individuals with CI were older with a lower education performance, and were more likely to be diabetic with lower mean levels of Low-density Lipoprotein, and a higher mean systolic blood pressure. Diabetes significantly increased the odds for CI (OR:2.11, 95%CI:1.26-3.52) from the adjusted multivariate mixed logistic models.ConclusionsThis analysis showed that diabetes was an important indicator for CI regardless of age, education, orAPOEgene status. These findings highlight the higher burden of cardiometabolic risk factors on CI in the CCHC cohort.
Measuring plasma volume in women of reproductive age – a comparison study of hydroxyethyl starch to other methods
Authors: Martin Leigh A. , Gallagher Kelly , Arcot Amrita , Barberio Matthew , Smith Emily R. , Gernand Alison D. 
Published: January 2025

AbstractMethods for measuring plasma volume (PV) have rarely been validated or compared, and some are unsafe in certain populations (e.g., pregnancy). We aimed to develop and evaluate a PV method using hydroxyethyl starch (HES) that is safe in women of reproductive age and could be used in pregnancy. A convenience sample of healthy nonpregnant women (n=12) of reproductive age participated in a comparison study using two indicator dilution methods – HES and indocyanine green (ICG), and three estimations - Kaplan, Hurley, and Nadler equations. Baseline blood samples were collected; we injected ICG and HES separately, each followed by post-injection sampling. We compared HES PV to the other methods using Bland-Altman analysis. Participants had mean ± SD age of 25.8±7.5 years and mean BMI of 21.7±1.7 kg/m2. Mean PV estimations for HES, ICG, Kaplan, Hurley, and Nadler methods were 2,046±392 mL, 2,765±820 mL, 2,443±464 mL, 2,407±301mL, and 2,373±406 mL, respectively. In each analysis, differences for 11/12 participants were within the Bland-Altman limits of agreement, ±2 SD from each mean difference. In conclusion, PV measured by HES was >300 mL lower than other estimates, but had a narrow distribution within the expected range. Future studies should validate methods for PV measurement across populations, including pregnancy.HighlightsWhat is the central question of this study?How does plasma volume (PV) estimated using hydroxyethyl starch (HES) compare to estimates using other methods in healthy women of reproductive age?What is the main finding and its importance?In this comparison study of PV methods (HES, indocyanine green, and estimation equations), PV measured by HES was >300 mL lower than other estimates, but had a narrow distribution that was within the expected range. Future work is still needed to validate the HES method across populations.
A prospective exposed-unexposed cohort study comparing time-to-pregnancy in patients with previous breast cancer and controls from a collaborative research network: results after three years of follow-up
Authors: Hamy Anne-Sophie , Chabassier Agathe , Sebbag Clara , Rousset-Jablonski Christine , Berkach Clémentine , Ray-Coquard Isabelle , Sablone Laura , Darrigues Lauren , Dumas Elise , Bobrie Angélique , Jacot William , Espié Marc , Giacchetti Sylvie , Jochum Floriane , Toussaint Aullène , Plu-Bureau Geneviève , Maitrot-Mantelet Lorraine , Gompel Anne , Gougis Paul , Bas Raphaëlle , Decanter Christine , Asselain Bernard , Coutant Charles , Sohn Lili , Jacob Guillemette , Coussy Florence , Reyal Fabien ,   on the behalf of the Seintinelles Research Network
Published: January 2025

AbstractImportanceData on fertility after breast cancer (BC) relative to the general population are lacking.ObjectiveTo compare the time-to-pregnancy between women with and without prior BC seeking to become pregnant.DesignProspective exposed-unexposed cohort study. Women were included from March 13, 2018 to June 27, 2019. Data were collected every six months via online questionnaires for up to three years.SettingParticipants were recruited through the French collaborative network for cancer research Seintinelles*.ParticipantsExposed women (cases) were women aged 18-43 years with a history of localized BC who had completed treatment, without relapse. Unexposed women (controls) were women of the same age group with no history of BC.Exposure(s)The exposure of interest was a prior history of BC.Main Outcome(s) and Measure(s)The primary endpoint was time-to-pregnancy. The hypothesis tested was formulated before data collection. Secondary endpoints included the use of ART, including the use of cryopreserved material, factors associated with time-to-pregnancy, and pregnancy and neonatal outcomes. Statistical analysis was based on Kaplan-Meier survival analysis and multivariate Cox proportional-hazards models with adjustment for confounding factors by inverse probability of treatment weighting (IPTW).ResultsWe enrolled 4351 women in this study. Follow-up data were available for 642 women (76 cases, 566 controls) who sought to become pregnant during the study period. Median time-to-pregnancy was 5 months (95% CI: 3 months to 7 months) for cases and 3 months (95% CI: 2 months to 5 months) for adjusted controls, with no significant difference between the groups (p=0.34). Cases were more likely to resort to the use of ART than controls (RR=13.9, 95% CI [2.2- 154.6]), but time-to-pregnancy was similar in cases and controls, with and without ART use. Time-to-pregnancy was influenced by factors such as age, parity, menstrual cycle regularity, BMI, and ART, but not by prior BC. Pregnancy and neonatal outcomes did not differ significantly between cases and controls.Conclusions and RelevanceTime-to-pregnancy, in women seeking to become pregnant, was similar for women with and without a history of BC, raising hopes for women with BC wishing to have children.
Sex differences in the association between age-related decline in blood pressure and decline in cognition: A prospective cohort study
Authors: Baumgartner Nicholas W. , Capuano Ana W. , Barnes Lisa L. , Bennett David A. , Arvanitakis Zoe 
Published: January 2025

AbstractBackgroundBoth high and declining blood pressure (BP) are associated with cognitive decline risk in older adults. In late-life, women have higher rates of hypertension, experience faster cognitive decline, and represent two-thirds of individuals with Alzheimer’s disease dementia. However, sex differences in the association between BP decline and cognitive decline are unknown.MethodsData were analyzed from 4719 older adults without known baseline dementia (mean age = 76.7 [SD = 7.7] years; 74% women) enrolled in one of five US-based prospective community-based cohort studies, followed annually for up to 31 years (mean = 8.7 [SD = 5.7] years). A 19-test cognitive battery, yielding composite global and five domain-specific scores, and BP were assessed annually. Bivariate mixed-effects models simultaneously estimated change in BP and cognition, for the total group and by sex.FindingsSystolic BP, diastolic BP, and cognition all declined over time (ps <0.01). Bivariate mixed-effect models revealed a sex difference in the correlation of decline in systolic BP and decline in global cognition (women: r = 0.26, 95%CI: 0.17 - 0.37; men: r = 0.01, 95%CI: -0.13 - 0.11), such that women exhibited a stronger correlation than men. Decline in systolic BP was related to decline in global and all five cognitive domains in women but none in men, with another sex difference identified in the working memory domain. An increase of diastolic BP was related to decline in working memory in men, and no other associations with diastolic BP were significant for either sex.InterpretationSystolic BP decline in late-life is related to decline in global and domain-specific cognition in women but not men, with sex differences in global cognition and the working memory domain. These findings suggest that in older women, declining systolic BP – a routinely-used clinical measure – may be an important marker of concurrent cognitive decline.