bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Nitrofurantoin for the treatment of uncomplicated urinary tract infection in female patients: the impact of dosing regimen, age, and renal function on drug exposure
Authors: van Driel A. A. , Muller A. E. , Wijma R. A. , Stobberingh E. E. , Verbon A. , Koch B. C. P. 
Published: June 2023

Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this study is to determine nitrofurantoin exposure in female patients with different age and renal function with complaints of an uncomplicated UTI. Also the nitrofurantoin exposure in relation to the dosage regimen will be studied.

Methods
Eight general practitioners (GP) participated in the study and included 38 patients with symptoms of an uncomplicated UTI, treated either with a dose of 50 mg q6h or 100 mg q12h, upon the discretion of the GP. Nitrofurantoin exposure was quantified in the patient’s 24-h urine samples by UHPLC-UV and the area under the curve was calculated.

Results
The 38 patients provided a range of 2–17 urine samples. The urine nitrofurantoin exposure was 1028 mg h/L for the patients receiving 50 mg q6h and 1036 mg h/L for those treated with 100 mg q12h (p = 0.97) and was not affected by age and eGFR (p = 0.64 and p = 0.34, respectively).

Conclusion
The data obtained do not support the discouragement of nitrofurantoin use in the elderly and in patients with impaired renal function. Since only a small number of patients were included, a larger study with more patients is warranted to evaluate nitrofurantoin exposure and adverse effects.
Highly efficient ultraviolet photodetector based on molybdenum-doped nanostructured NiO/ITO thin film
Authors: Abdelhalium Hasnaa H. , Abdel-wahab Mohamed Sh. , Tamm M. T. , Tawfik Wael Z. 
Published: June 2023

AbstractNanostructured pure and molybdenum (Mo)-doped nickel oxide (NiO) thin films with various concentrations of Mo dopants were successfully sputtered on indium-doped tin oxide (ITO) substrates to apply in the ultraviolet (UV) photodetector sensors. The influence of Mo concentration on the thin films' structural, morphological, and optical properties was studied using X-ray diffraction (XRD), field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM) equipped with energy-dispersive X-ray, and UV–Vis spectrophotometer. The XRD studies confirm that all the prepared films are polycrystalline and possess a cubic phase structure. The FE-SEM images suggest that the distribution of the prepared samples on the substrate is homogeneous and free from any cracks. Spectrophotometry studies reveal the decrement of the optical band gap with the increase of Mo concentration in NiO thin films. All thin-film current–voltage curves measured under dark conditions and UV illumination of 390 nm showed Ohmic contacts. A noticeable improvement in the responsivity and external quantum efficiency (EQE) with the increased Mo concentration was detected. The metal–semiconductor–metal (MSM) employed in NiO thin films showed maximum responsivity and EQE of 539 mA/W and 171.4% at 390 nm, respectively, for the sample with 1.73 at% Mo doping.
Effect of 1-year daily protein supplementation and physical exercise on muscle protein synthesis rate and muscle metabolome in healthy older Danes: a randomized controlled trial
Authors: Bülow Jacob , Khakimov Bekzod , Reitelseder Søren , Bechshøft Rasmus , Jensen Mikkel , van Hall Gerrit , Engelsen Søren Balling , Holm Lars 
Published: June 2023

Abstract
Background
The skeletal muscle mass decreases with age and the responsiveness of aging muscles’ protein synthesis rate (MPS) to protein intake seems to deteriorate.

Objective
This study investigated the impact of 12 months of protein supplementation with or without physical exercise training on the basal and postprandial MPS and the skeletal muscle metabolome of healthy older Danes (> 65 years, 29 females/37 males).

Methods
Subjects were randomized to follow one of five intervention groups: (1) carbohydrate, (2) collagen protein, (3) whey protein, (4) home-based light resistance training with whey protein, and (5) center-based heavy-load resistance training with whey protein. Before and after the intervention, a tracer infusion trial was conducted to measure basal and postprandial MPS in response to intake of a cocktail consisting of 20 g whey hydrolysate + 10 g glucose. In addition, the skeletal muscle metabolome was measured using gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS) at basal state and 4 h after the intake of the cocktail.

Results
One year of daily protein or carbohydrate supplementation did not alter the basal and protein-stimulated postprandial muscle protein synthesis rate or the muscle metabolome of healthy older Danes. Basal MPS (%/h) at baseline for all subjects were 0.0034 ± 0,011 (mean ± SD). In contrast to previous studies, no difference was observed in basal MPS between males and females (p = 0.75). With the developed untargeted GC–MS methodology, it was possible to detect and tentatively annotate > 70 metabolites from the human skeletal muscle samples.

Conclusion
One year of protein supplementation in comparison to an isocaloric-control supplement seems to affect neither the MPS at basal or postprandial state nor the skeletal muscle metabolome.

Clinical trial registry
Number: NCT02115698, clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT02115698.
Without a pinch of salt: effect of low salinity on eggs and nauplii of the salmon louse (Lepeophtheirus salmonis)
Authors: Borchel Andreas , Heggland Erna Irene , Nilsen Frank 
Published: June 2023

AbstractThe salmon louse is an economically important parasite on Atlantic salmon and poses a major threat to aquaculture. Several treatment methods have lost their effect due to resistance development in the lice. A rather new method for combatting sea lice is freshwater treatment where the various life stages of lice are differently affected by this treatment. In this study, we analyzed the effect of freshwater on the egg strings. A 3-h treatment with freshwater had a detrimental effect on the egg strings. First, the water penetrated the string, widening it, then entering the eggs and enlarging them. Finally, the ordered structure of the egg strings collapsed, and no alive animals hatched. Shorter treatments had a lower effectivity, and treatments with brackish water also showed milder effects. The egg strings were found to have a protective effect against low salinities, as hatched nauplii died rapidly under conditions that embryos survived. We also found that embryos react to low salinity on a molecular level by changing gene expression of several genes, when incubated in brackish water. Additionally, the hatching of embryos treated with brackish water was delayed in comparison to seawater controls.
Opioid prescriptions at the point of surgery, bone metastasis, or death among patients with breast cancer in Japanese acute care hospitals: a claims-based, retrospective, longitudinal study
Authors: Yoshida Manami , Iwasaki Kosuke , Miyashita Mitsunori , Saeki Toshiaki , Morioka Yasuhide , Hiroi Shinzo , Shimizu Eiko 
Published: June 2023

Abstract
Purpose
Breast cancer is the most common cancer among Japanese women and often yields a better prognosis than other cancers. However, few studies have been conducted on pain control using opioids in Japan. In this study, we aimed to examine actual opioid use among breast cancer patients.

Methods
Breast cancer patients were defined as female patients with a first breast cancer diagnosis during the observational period in an acute care hospital database (April 2008 − February 2020). We examined the percentage of patients prescribed opioids, the opioid amount per patient, and the opioid dosage per day around surgery, bone metastasis diagnosis, or death.

Results
Overall, 217,722 breast cancer patients were identified. The percentage of patients prescribed opioids and the average amount of opioids per patient were highest in the month of surgery, 78% and 27 morphine milligram equivalents (MMEs), respectively. The average opioid dosage increased with time after surgery from 19 to 28 MMEs. Around bone metastasis, the percentage of patients prescribed opioids and the average opioid amount per patient peaked one month after the diagnosis, 31% and 371 MMEs, respectively. The average opioid dosage gradually increased from 22 to 35 MMEs in succeeding days after a bone metastasis diagnosis. The percentage of patients prescribed opioids and the average opioid amount per patient increased as the month of death approached.

Conclusion
We investigated opioid prescription trends around clinical events in breast cancer patients on a large scale in Japan. These results may be useful to control cancer pain among breast cancer patients.
Explicit Renormalization of Nuclear Chiral EFT and Nonperturbative Effects
Authors: Gasparyan A. M. , Epelbaum E. 
Published: June 2023

AbstractNucleon-nucleon interaction is studied within chiral effective field theory at next-to-leading order in the chiral expansion. The leading order interaction is resummed nonperturbatively, whereas the next-to-leading-order terms are taken into account in a perturbative manner. Explicit renormalizability of such a scheme is analyzed in several important cases. The possibility to absorb the power-counting breaking terms originating from the integration regions with large momenta is studied for both perturbative and nonperturbative regimes. A comparison of the schemes with a finite and an infinite cutoff is performed.
Zinc, carbon, and oxygen isotopic variations associated with the Marinoan deglaciation
Authors: Thiemens Maxwell M. , Shaheen Robina , Gerritzen Carina T. , Gyollai Ildiko , Chong Kenneth , Popp Friedrich , Koeberl Christian , Thiemens Mark H. , Moynier Frédéric 
Published: June 2023

AbstractThe "Snowball Earths" were cataclysmic events during the late Neoproterozoic's Cryogenian period (720-635 Ma) in which most, if not all, of Earth’s surface was covered in ice. Paleoenvironmental reconstructions of these events utilize isotopic systems, such as Δ17O and barium isotopes of barites. Other isotopic systems, such as zinc (Zn), can reflect seawater composition or environmental conditions (e.g., temperature changes) and biological productivity. We report here a multi-isotopic C, O, and Zn data set for carbonates deposited immediately after the Marinoan glaciation (635 Ma) from the Otavi Group in northern Namibia. In this study, we chemically separated calcite and non-calcitic carbonate phases, finding isotopically distinct carbon and oxygen isotopes. These could reflect changes in the source seawater composition and conditions during carbonate formation. Our key finding is largescale Zn isotopic variations over the oldest parts of the distal foreslope cap carbonate sections. The magnitude of variation is larger than any found throughout post-snowball cap carbonates to date, and in a far shorter sequence. This shows a heretofore undiscovered difficulty for Zn isotopic interpretations. The primary Zn sources are likely to be aeolian or alluvial, associated with the massive deglaciation related run-off from the thawing continent and a greater exposed surface for atmospheric aerosol entrainment. The samples with the lightest Zn isotopic compositions (δ66Zn < 0.3 ‰) potentially reflect hydrothermally sourced Zn dominating the carbonates’ Zn budget. This finding is likely unique to the oldest carbonates, when the meltwater lid was thinnest and surface waters most prone to upwelling of hydrothermally dominated Snowball Earth brine. On the other hand, local variations could be related to bioproductivity affecting the Zn isotopic composition of the seawater. Similarly, fluctuations in sea-level could bring the depositional site below and above a redoxcline, causing isotopic variations. These variations in Zn isotope ratios preclude the estimation of a global Zn isotopic signature, potentially indicating localized resumption of export production.
An AI-Based Image Quality Control Framework for Knee Radiographs
Authors: Sun Hongbiao , Wang Wenwen , He Fujin , Wang Duanrui , Liu Xiaoqing , Xu Shaochun , Zhao Baolian , Li Qingchu , Wang Xiang , Jiang Qinling , Zhang Rong , Liu Shiyuan , Xiao Yi 
Published: June 2023

AbstractImage quality control (QC) is crucial for the accurate diagnosis of knee diseases using radiographs. However, the manual QC process is subjective, labor intensive, and time-consuming. In this study, we aimed to develop an artificial intelligence (AI) model to automate the QC procedure typically performed by clinicians. We proposed an AI-based fully automatic QC model for knee radiographs using high-resolution net (HR-Net) to identify predefined key points in images. We then performed geometric calculations to transform the identified key points into three QC criteria, namely, anteroposterior (AP)/lateral (LAT) overlap ratios and LAT flexion angle. The proposed model was trained and validated using 2212 knee plain radiographs from 1208 patients and an additional 1572 knee radiographs from 753 patients collected from six external centers for further external validation. For the internal validation cohort, the proposed AI model and clinicians showed high intraclass consistency coefficients (ICCs) for AP/LAT fibular head overlap and LAT knee flexion angle of 0.952, 0.895, and 0.993, respectively. For the external validation cohort, the ICCs were also high, with values of 0.934, 0.856, and 0.991, respectively. There were no significant differences between the AI model and clinicians in any of the three QC criteria, and the AI model required significantly less measurement time than clinicians. The experimental results demonstrated that the AI model performed comparably to clinicians and required less time. Therefore, the proposed AI-based model has great potential as a convenient tool for clinical practice by automating the QC procedure for knee radiographs.
Compliance checking on first-order knowledge with conflicting and compensatory norms: a comparison among currently available technologies
Authors: Robaldo Livio , Batsakis Sotiris , Calegari Roberta , Calimeri Francesco , Fujita Megumi , Governatori Guido , Morelli Maria Concetta , Pacenza Francesco , Pisano Giuseppe , Satoh Ken , Tachmazidis Ilias , Zangari Jessica 
Published: June 2023

AbstractThis paper analyses and compares some of the automated reasoners that have been used in recent research for compliance checking. Although the list of the considered reasoners is not exhaustive, we believe that our analysis is representative enough to take stock of the current state of the art in the topic. We are interested here in formalizations at the first-order level. Past literature on normative reasoning mostly focuses on the propositional level. However, the propositional level is of little usefulness for concrete LegalTech applications, in which compliance checking must be enforced on (large) sets of individuals. Furthermore, we are interested in technologies that are freely available and that can be further investigated and compared by the scientific community. In other words, this paper does not consider technologies only employed in industry and/or whose source code is non-accessible. This paper formalizes a selected use case in the considered reasoners and compares the implementations, also in terms of simulations with respect to shared synthetic datasets. The comparison will highlight that lot of further research still needs to be done to integrate the benefits featured by the different reasoners into a single standardized first-order framework, suitable for LegalTech applications. All source codes are freely available at https://github.com/liviorobaldo/compliancecheckers, together with instructions to locally reproduce the simulations.
Portable and integrated microfluidic flow control system using off-the-shelf components towards organs-on-chip applications
Authors: Zhu Haoyu , Özkayar Gürhan , Lötters Joost , Tichem Marcel , Ghatkesar Murali Krishna 
Published: June 2023

AbstractOrgan-on-a-chip (OoC) devices require the precise control of various media. This is mostly done using several fluid control components, which are much larger than the typical OoC device and connected through fluidic tubing, i.e., the fluidic system is not integrated, which inhibits the system’s portability. Here, we explore the limits of fluidic system integration using off-the-shelf fluidic control components. A flow control configuration is proposed that uses a vacuum to generate a fluctuation-free flow and minimizes the number of components used in the system. 3D printing is used to fabricate a custom-designed platform box for mounting the chosen smallest footprint components. It provides flexibility in arranging the various components to create experiment-specific systems. A demonstrator system is realized for lung-on-a-chip experiments. The 3D-printed platform box is 290 mm long, 240 mm wide and 37 mm tall. After integrating all the components, it weighs 4.8 kg. The system comprises of a switch valve, flow and pressure controllers, and a vacuum pump to control the diverse media flows. The system generates liquid flow rates ranging from 1.5 $$\upmu$$
μ
Lmin$$^{-1}$$

-
1

to 68 $$\upmu$$
μ
Lmin$$^{-1}$$

-
1

in the cell chambers, and a cyclic vacuum of 280 mbar below atmospheric pressure with 0.5 Hz frequency in the side channels to induce mechanical strain on the cells-substrate. The components are modular for easy exchange. The battery operated platform box can be mounted on either upright or inverted microscopes and fits in a standard incubator. Overall, it is shown that a compact integrated and portable fluidic system for OoC experiments can be constructed using off-the-shelf components. For further down-scaling, the fluidic control components, like the pump, switch valves, and flow controllers, require significant miniaturization while having a wide flow rate range with high resolution.
The Relationship of Aversive and Appetitive Appearance-Related Comparisons with Depression, Well-Being, and Self-esteem: A Response Surface Analysis
Authors: Schlechter Pascal , Katenhusen Sarah , Morina Nexhmedin 
Published: June 2023

AbstractPurposeAversive appearance-related comparisons (i.e., threatening one’s own motives) show stronger associations with depression, psychological well-being, and self-esteem than appetitive comparisons (i.e., consonant with or challenging one’s motives). However, the relevance of their congruent (i.e., equal) and incongruent (i.e., unequal) presence remains unknown.MethodsBy using response surface analysis, we investigated differential associations of congruent high levels of aversive and appetitive comparisons with depression, well-being, and self-esteem relative to incongruent high levels of aversive (or appetitive) comparisons. Participants (N = 1112) responded to measures of depression, psychological well-being, self-esteem, and the Comparison Standards Scale for Appearance. The latter assesses aversive and appetitive social, temporal, counterfactual, criteria-based, and dimensional comparisons regarding their frequency, discrepancy to the standard, and affective impact.ResultsResults confirmed our preregistered hypotheses. First, higher levels of congruent frequency, discrepancy, or affective impact were associated with higher depression, and lower well-being and self-esteem. Second, a greater predominance of aversive over appetitive comparisons was associated with higher depression, and lower well-being and self-esteem. Third, a predominance of appetitive over aversive comparison was associated with lower depression, and higher well-being and self-esteem.ConclusionsThe distinct patterns of the (in-)congruence of aversive and appetitive comparisons have important research and clinical implications.
Evacuation of Vessels in Dockyards: A Model Validation Study
Authors: Cuesta Arturo , Balboa Adriana , González-Villa Javier , Alvear Daniel 
Published: June 2023

AbstractEvacuation modelling is continuously open to new scenarios and applications. This study examines the possibility to simulate and predict the evacuation of workers aboard vessels in dockyards. First, we provide new data for a better understanding and quantification of workers’ evacuation performance. Second, we use an existing model (STEPS) and apply a validation protocol from the observed evacuation of 150 workers during an unannounced evacuation drill of a Ro-Pax ferry during the repair period in a dry dock. Despite the uncertainty of initial conditions to configure the scenario, the model accurately represents the observed evacuation (e.g. functional analysis ERD = 0.08; EPC = 1; SC = 0.89) suggesting that current agent-based evacuation models, with appropriate inputs and small adaptations, could be applied to these new challenging scenarios. Overall, this study provides evidence for this new application opportunity to model developers, model users and the research community and promotes the use of evacuation modelling for assessing fire safety in shipyards.
Teaching the Use of Gamification in Elementary School: A Case in Spanish Formal Education
Authors: Sáez-López José-Manuel , Grimaldo-Santamaría Rolando-Óscar , Quicios-García Mª-Pilar , Vázquez-Cano Esteban 
Published: June 2023

AbstractGamification is an educational methodology and tool that offers benefits through mechanics and dynamics. It brings motivating experiences and benefits to the instructional design approach. Several studies highlight that this methodology fosters contributions in commitment, fun, enthusiasm, motivation, satisfaction, and interaction in pedagogical contexts. The sample of 308 teachers was obtained after the mass delivery of the instrument to educational centers in Spain. The sample is nonprobabilistic, and the study participants voluntarily answered the survey. Of the participants, 69.8% were women and 30.2% were men; this proportion is representative of the population of teachers. A descriptive analysis is based on three dimensions: most used programs, devices used, and didactic functionality. These data are triangulated with an analysis through the HJ-Biplot method, which is presented as a multivariate graphical representation of the data from an Xnxp matrix. This analysis details findings on the determining role played by the teacher and the relationship between years of experience, age, devices used, and resources used, detected with descriptive and bivariate analyses. Among the conclusions are that the subjects positively value training in digital teaching competence in terms of gamification, although in real daily practice only 30% of teachers claim to use gamified tools. Gamification provides collaborative and innovative benefits in relation to its didactic functionality.