bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
A comparison of machine learning methods to predict survival times for cancer patients: Incorporating time-varying covariates
Authors: Cygu Steve , Seow Hsien , Dushoff Jonathan , Bolker Benjamin M. 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
The Cox proportional hazard model is commonly used in evaluating risk factors in cancer survival data. The model assumes an additive, linear relationship between the risk factors and the log hazard. However, this assumption may be too simplistic. Further, failure to take time-varying covariates into account, if present, may lower prediction accuracy. In this retrospective, population-based, prognostic study of data from patients diagnosed with cancer from 2008 to 2015 in Ontario, Canada, we applied machine learning-based time-to-event prediction methods and compared their predictive performance in two sets of analyses: 1) yearly-cohort-based time-invariant and 2) fully time-varying covariates analysis. Machine learning-based methods — gradient boosting model (gbm), random survival forest (rsf), elastic net (enet), lasso, ridge, and deepsurv neural network (nnet) — were compared to the traditional Cox proportional hazard (coxph) model and the prior study which used the yearly-cohort-based time-invariant analysis. Using Harrell's C index as our primary measure, we found that using both machine-learning techniques and incorporating time-dependent covariates can improve predictive performance. Gradient boosting machine showed the best performance on test data in both time-invariant and time-varying covariates analysis.
A novel method for analyzing the performance of free space optical communication in WDM using EDFA
Authors: Periyasamy Karupasamy , Rathinam Vinoth , Ganesan Karthikeyan , Muthusamy Suresh , Ramachandran Meenakumari , Lamba Ravita , Panchal Hitesh , Shanmugam Maheswaran , Jalajakumari Suji Prasad Sudarsanan Nair , Kottapalli Rajyalakshmi 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
This paper intends to design anartificial model of WDM Optical Network in respect of length, pump power and simple free space optical link which is designed and analysis of several FSO (Free-space optical communication) factors such as Bit Error Rate (BER), Q factor and received power have been measured with regard to the variants in the beam divergence and attenuation. The Simulation process of the System has been done using Optic simulation software to achieve gain enhancement and decrease noise factor of Erbium Doped Fiber Amplifier (EDFA) through optimized fiber length and pump power. This workfocused to construct artificial design and analyses of 16 channels WDM system using EDFA and the influence of irregular atmospheric Motions on the link performance has been inspected by fluctuating beam divergence, atmospheric disturbances and modulation format at the bit rate of 10 Gb/s. As slicing in WDM schemes, in the transmitter channel with the frequency of 1558nm and chip spacing 0.4nm, power value is equal to + 23.5dBm, whereas the optical power meter plus can be used to predict the output power in the form of NRZ modulation, while the input power is produced with a help of CW laser, the gain level has been enriched from 1564nm to 1558nm wavelength band with bit rate of 10GbpS.This system is prepared by using Optic simulation software version 7.
Nanoplasmonic amplification in microfluidics enables minute-scale colorimetric quantification of nucleic acid biomarkers
Authors: AbdElFatah Tamer , Jalali Mahsa , Yedire Sripadh , Hosseini Imman Isaac , Mata Carolina Del Real , Khan Haleema , Hamidi Seyed , Jeanne Olivia , Moakhar Roozbeh Siavash , McLean Myles , Patel Dhanesh , Wang Zhen , Yousefi Mitra , Vidal Silvia , Liang Chen , Mahshid Sara 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
The authors have requested that this preprint be removed from Research Square.
Automatic characterization of stroke patients’ posturography based on probability density analysis
Authors: Wang Ying , Hu Zhen , Chen Kai , Yang Ying 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
Objective The probability density analysis was applied to automatically characterize the center of pressure (COP) data for evaluation of the stroke patients’ balance ability. Methods The real-time COP coordinates of 38 stroke patients with eyes open and close during quiet standing were obtained respectively from a precision force platform. The COP data was analyzed and characterized by the commonly used parameters: total sway length (SL), sway radius (SR), envelope sway area (EA), and the probability density analysis based parameters: projection area (PA), skewness (SK) and kurtosis (KT), and their statistical correlations were analyzed. The differences of both conventional parameters and probability density parameters under the conditions of eyes open (EO) and eyes closed (EC) were compared.Results The PA from probability density analysis is strongly correlated with SL and SR. Both the traditional parameters and probability density parameters in the EC state are significantly different from those in the EO state. The obtained different statokinesigrams were calculated and categorized into typical sway types through probability density function for clinical evaluation of the balance ability of stroke patients. Conclusions The probability density analysis of COP data can be used to characterize the posturography for evaluation of the balance ability of stroke patients.
Quality of life of patients with functional bowel disorders
Authors: zaimi yosra , Trabelsi Ghassen , Shimi Maha , MW Dougaz , ayadi shema 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
Functional bowel disorders are among the most common digestive disorders. Although not life-threatening, they have a repercussions on the quality of life of patients. The score averages for the quality of life of our patients were lower than those of general population. Certain factors associated to a worse quality of life are modifiable
Car enthusiasm during the second and fourth waves of COVID-19 pandemic
Authors: Szmelter-Jarosz Agnieszka , Suchanek Michał 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
This paper investigates the car enthusiasm of Polish residents during the second and fourth waves of the pandemic. We try to answer if the car enthusiasm has changed between October 2020 and October 2021. Furthermore, we looked into the attitudes and beliefs of respondents about the transport modes and their use, their perceived quality of life and their opinions about sustainability and ecological lifestyle. We use a CAWI survey in two rounds (October 2020 and October 2021. For data analysis, a SEM model was proposed. We observe important changes in car enthusiasm between those two waves of the pandemic. Firstly, car enthusiasm was higher in 2021 than in 2020. Secondly, it was positively correlated with the ecological orientation of respondents. Thirdly, Y generation respondents were less car enthusiastic. Fourthly, the influence of life quality on the car enthusiasm was stronger in the fourth pandemic wave than during the second one.
Sub-Domain Method for Brushless Double-Rotor Flux-Switching Permanent Magnet Machines with Yokeless Stator
Authors: Shirzad Ehsan , pirouz Hassan Mohammai , Shirzad Mohammad taghi 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
his paper presents a two-dimensional analytical model for brushless double-rotor flux-switching permanent magnet machines (BDRPFSPMM) with yokeless stator recognized as a type of partitioned-structure flux switching permanent magnet that is an appropriate machine to be employed as the electric motor in industry. The most salient advantages of proposed machine are low iron loss due to volume of iron in stator and high space of stator slot for winding. The radial and tangential components of the magnetic flux density due to permanent magnets and armature currents in each active domain of the machine, electromagnetic torque, self and mutual inductance, unbalanced magnetic force (UMF) and local traction are calculated based on the subdomain method. Teethes on both rotor and stator structures are effective on magnetic quantities so, interactions of rotor-and stator-saliency are considered. The method is general for the magnetic field calculation with any combination of rotor-and stator-pole number. To validate the proposed model, the analytical outputs are compared with those obtained from the finite element method (FEM).
Lessons learned and implications of early therapies for coronavirus disease in a territorial service center in the Calabria region
Authors: Scaglione Vincenzo , Rotundo Salvatore , Marascio Nadia , De Marco Carmela , Lionello Rosaria , Veneziano Claudia , Berardelli Lavinia , Quirino Angela , Olivadese Vincenzo , Serapide Francesca , Tassone Bruno , Morrone Helen Linda , Davoli Chiara , Gamba Valentina La , Bruni Andrea , Cesana Bruno Mario , Matera Giovanni , Russo Alessandro , Costanzo Francesco Saverio , Viglietto Giuseppe , Trecarichi Enrico Maria , Torti Carlo 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
Background: Monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) and antivirals have been approved for early therapy of coronavirus disease (COVID-19), however, in the real-life setting, there are difficulties to prescribe these therapies within few days from symptom onset as recommended, and effectiveness of combined use of these drugs have been hypothesized in most-at-risk patients (such as those immonocompromised) but there are no data supporting this strategy.Methods: We describe the real-life experience of SARS-CoV-2 antivirals and/or monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) and focus on the hospitalization rate due to the progression of COVID-19. Clinical results obtained through our risk-stratification algorithm and benefits obtained through a strategic proximity territorial center are provided. We also report a case series with an in-depth evaluation of SARS-CoV-2 genome in relationship with treatment strategy and clinical evolution of patients.Results: Two hundred eighty-eight patients were analyzed; 94/288 (32.6%) patients were treated with mAb monotherapy, 171/288 (59.4%) patients were treated with antivirals, and 23/288 (8%) patients received both mAbs and one antiviral drug. Hematological malignancies were more frequent in patients treated with combination therapy than in the other groups (p=0.0003). There was a substantial increase in the number of treated patients since the opening of the center dedicated to early therapies for COVID-19. The provided disease-management and treatment appeared to be effective since 98.6% patients recovered without hospital admission. Moreover, combination therapy with mAbs and antivirals seemed successful because all patients admitted to the hospital for COVID-19 did not receive such therapies, while none of the most-at-risk patients treated with combination therapy were hospitalized or reported adverse events. By contrast, emergence and accumulation of possible relevant mutations in the SARS-CoV-2 genome were observed in cases not treated with early combination therapy.Conclusions: A low rate of COVID-19 progression requiring hospital admission was observed in patients included in this study. The dedicated COVID-19 proximity territorial service significantly strengthened the regional sanitary system, providing a strong benefit in terms of prescriptions and quality of care and avoiding the overwhelming of other services. Importantly, our results also support early combination therapy in immunocompromised patients to avoid clinical worsening, onset of mutations, and resistance to anti-SARS-CoV-2 agents.
Initial levels of β-amyloid and tau deposition have distinct effects on longitudinal tau accumulation in Alzheimer’s disease
Authors: Cai Yue , Du Jing , Li Anqi , Zhu Yalin , Xu Linsen , Sun Kun , Ma Shaohua , Guo Tengfei 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
Background
Clarifying the relative roles of β-amyloid (Aβ) plaques and tau tangles in longitudinal tau replication and propagation inside and outside the medial temporal lobe (MTL) as well as how age, sex, APOE-4, and Klotho-VS heterozygosity (KL-VShet) modulate their relationships in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) may help with designing therapeutic clinical trials for AD and aid in our understanding of the disease’s symptoms.
Methods
We divided the 325 Aβ PET positive (A+) participants in this study into two groups, A+/T- (143) and A+/T+ (182), based on the threshold (1.25) of the Temporal-metaROI 18F-flortaucipir (FTP) standardized uptake value ratio (SUVR). We compared the baseline and slopes of A+/T- and A+/T + individuals’ Aβ plaques and Temporal-metaROI tau tangles with those of 162 A-/T- cognitively normal individuals without neurodegeneration. We also looked into how baseline Aβ and tau predict longitudinal tau increases and how age, sex, APOE-4, and KL-VShet affect these associations.
Results
In entorhinal, amygdala, and parahippocampal (early tau-affected regions of Temporal-metaROI), we found baseline Aβ and tau deposition were positively linked with more rapid tau increases in A+/T- participants. However, in A+/T + individuals, the longitudinal tau propagation of the fusiform, inferior temporal, and middle temporal cortices (late tau-affected regions of Temporal-metaROI) was primarily fueled by the presence of tau tangles rather than Aβ plaques. Furthermore, compared to older people (age≥65), younger individuals (age≤65) had faster Aβ-dependent but slower tau-related tau accumulation. Additionally, compared to the KL-VShet− group, KL-VShet+ carriers showed significantly less longitudinal tau accumulation associated with baseline entorhinal tau in the fusiform and inferior temporal regions.
Conclusion
These findings offer novel perspectives on developing AD treatment plans and aid in understanding tau replication and propagation inside and outside MTL in AD. In particular, decreasing Aβ plaques might be adequate for A+/T- persons but may not be sufficient for A+/T + individuals in preventing tau propagation and subsequent downstream effects connected to tau.
Clinico-radiological features of aspiration-related lung disease: a retrospective observational clinical study
Authors: Wang Lina , Ma Shuai , Qiu Jianxing , Xiong Yan , Shi Mingwei , Lin Lianjun , Liu Xinmin 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
Background
Aspiration-related lung disease may mimick a variety of pulmonary disorders. Complex clinical presentations, non-specific radiologic characteristics, lack of aspiration history and difficulties in obtaining lung biopsy make diagnosis challenging.
Methods
This retrospective observational study reviewed all patients of aspiration pneumonia identified on lung pathology in Peking university first hospital from January 1, 2010 to December 31, 2021.Clinical information including risk factors, symptoms, bronchoscopic examinations, chest imaging findings and outcomes on discharge were analyzed.
Results
A total of 20 inpatients with aspiration-related lung disease were included. Median age was 64 years (interquartile range: 55 to 67.75) and 14 (70%) were male patients. Aspiration-related lung disease was confirmed by lung biopsy (histologic presence of foreign body or other particulate matter) or cytologic pathology in BALF. Of these,19(95%) lung specimens included 6 (30%) surgical biopsy, 12 (60%) bronchoscopic biopsy and 1 CT-guided lung aspiration biopsy. One patient was identified by cytologic examination of BAL fluid. Recurrent cough was the most common symptom (70%). Four patients (20%) were asymptomatic and were discovered pulmonary nodules incidentally. Fourteen patients (70%) had one or more risk factors for aspiration, with dysphagia or choking the most common one (10 cases, 50%). Only 7 patients (35%) were clinically suspected of aspiration prior to biopsy. Twelve patients (66.7%) showed at least 2 lung lobes involved. Chest CT imaging revealed a variety of abnormalities, including mass in 9 patients (50%), ground glass opacity in 8 patients (44.4%), consolidation in 7 patients (38.9%), bronchiolitis in 5 patients (27.8%). The proportion of neutrophils in BALF cytological classification increased significantly during all 7 patients who underwent bronchoalveolar lavage. Five patients occurred respiratory failure and one patient needed endotracheal intubation for auxiliary ventilation.
Conclusions
Our study confirmed the atypical clinical manifestations of aspiration-related disease, which should be considered in the differentiation of pulmonary lesions even without risk factors or respiratory symptoms.
Word Relation-based Graph Neural Network for Short Text Similarity Measurement
Authors: Shen Hechuan , Wang Xu , Li Xuedong , Peng Dezhong , Huang Haixiao 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
Short text similarity measurement is an important task, which is broadly applied to many fields. Due to the lack of contextual information, it is not easy to accurately compare the similarity between short texts. The relations between words are used to enhance the information. Since Graph Neural Networks (GNN) perform well in handling data with complex relations, the potential of GNN in this task has been explored recently. Unfortunately, the relationship between words is not adequately acquired by existing GNN-based methods. Furthermore, they ignore the deep relationships between words and do not take them into account. Typically, these methods use a fixed graph structure for a sentence and do not update the graph structure in the network. Based on the situation, we explore utilizing the deeper relations between words to improve the applicability of GNN for this task. In this letter, we present a framework called Word Relation-based Graph Neural Network (WRGNN). WRGNN can automatically discover and construct relations between words and reconstruct those relations in the processing. Two benchmark datasets are evaluated extensively, with WRGNN obtaining an average of 71.2 \% on STS-B and 82.9 \% on SICK.
Compliance with standard precautions and associated factors among undergraduate nursing students at governmental universities of Amhara region, Northwest Ethiopia, 2021
Authors: Getachew Desalegn , Baye Zewdu , Gizaw Negesu , Worku Ashenafi 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
Background: Standard precautions are minimum infection control practices used to prevent the transmission of diseases and apply to all patient care. Nursing students are at high risk of exposure to occupational biologic hazards because they are obligated to provide care to patients admitted with unknown infection statuses. compliance with standard precautions is an effective and efficient means of infection prevention. However, their compliance with standard precautions among nursing students is not known in Ethiopia. therefore, this study aimed to assess compliance with standard precautions and associated factors among undergraduate BSc nursing students at governmental universities in the Amhara region, northwest Ethiopia, 2021.Methods: Institutional-based cross-sectional study was conducted among undergraduate BSc nursing students at the governmental universities of Amhara region, northwest Ethiopia from April 15 to May 15, 2021. A simple random sampling technique was used to select 423 samples. Then data were entered into Epi-info version 7 and exported to SPSS version 25.0 for analysis and descriptive statistics were presented in text, tables, and charts. Bivariable and multivariable logistic regression was computed and P-value < 0.05 was considered to identify statistically significant factors.Result: The response rate of the study was 97.9 % (414). Good compliance of nursing students towards standard precautions was 56.3% with (95%CI =51.4 - 60.9), which is significantly associated with good knowledge (AOR =2.519, 95 % CI =1.609-3.943)), perceived safe workplace climate (AOR = 2.147, 95 % CI= 1.242-3.7121) and training or seminar related to standard precautions in the last six months (AOR = 1.518, 95 % CI= 1.008-2.288). Conclusion: The overall compliance of nursing students with standard precautions was low. The major factors associated with good compliance were good knowledge, a perceived safe workplace, and having seminars or training in the last six months. Training, enhancing knowledge, and creating a safe hospital environment are recommended to improve nursing students’ compliance with standard precautions.
pTERT C250T mutation: a potential biomarker of poor prognosis in metastatic melanoma
Authors: García Leyla Blanco , Domínguez Yolanda Ruano , Martínez-Illescas Raquel Blanco , Martínez Rocío Cubo , Sánchez Paula Jiménez , Lobo Víctor Sánchez-Arévalo , Falkenbach Erica Riveiro , Ortiz-Romero Pablo , Garrido María , Rodriguez-Peralto Jose 
Published: August 2022

Abstract
Background
Melanoma is the most aggressive form of skin cancer and the leading cause of death from cutaneous tumors. Several studies have associated alterations in the TERT promoter region (pTERT) with gene overexpression, aggressiveness and poor prognosis of the disease. The aim of this study was to clarify the role of pTERT molecular status in paired samples of primary melanoma and metastasis using tissue and plasma to establish a correlation with disease progression and survival.
Methods
A total of 88 FFPE tissue samples from 53 patients with advanced melanoma were analyzed. Of these, 35 had paired samples. We also examined cfDNA samples from plasma of 25 patients. pTERT mutational status was analyzed using pyrosequencing and digital droplet PCR (ddPCR). pTERT methylation status was evaluated by methylation-specific PCR (MS-PCR), while TERT mRNA expression levels were measured using reverse transcription quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR).
Results and discussion
We detected a good correlation between primary tumors and metastases in pTERT mutation and methylation status. We were also able to detect pTERT mutations in plasma samples. Interestingly, the C250T mutation was associated with worse survival and higher TERT mRNA expression, compared to the other most common mutation: C228T. In addition, hyper-methylation of the promoter region seems to be related to the progression of pTERT WT patients. These results suggest that TERT gene alterations plays an important role during tumor progression, with the detection of the C250T mutation in tissue and plasma as a potential biomarker of poor prognosis in patients with advanced melanoma.