julilili42/papers huggingface dataset:
Differential contributions of approximate number system, number line estimation, and working memory to mathematical skills in preschool and primary school
2025-09-11

Abstract Early mathematical skills predict later mathematical skills and general school achievement. The approximate number system (ANS), number line estimation, and working memory (WM) were found to be important predictors of the development of mathematical skills. However, studies specifying contributions of ANS, number line estimation, and WM at developmental levels are scarce. Therefore, the current study aimed to evaluate differential contributions of ANS, number line estimation, and WM to mathematical skills in preschool and primary school children. German preschool ( N = 68, M = 6 years) and primary school children ( N = 66, M = 9 years 1 month) completed an age-appropriate test for mathematical skills, a non-symbolic comparison task, a number line estimation task, WM span tasks, and a nonverbal intelligence task. Results indicated that ANS accuracy, number line estimation performance, and WM capacity were significant predictors for mathematical skills in both groups when controlled for influences of sex and nonverbal intelligence. Importantly, we also observed that only number line estimation performance contributed differentially to mathematical skills as it was a significantly stronger predictor in primary school children as compared to preschool children. In sum, these results suggest that the start of formal instruction on symbolic numerical representations in primary school is reflected in the contribution of related task performance to overall mathematics. To extend current findings, future studies may focus on differentiating age groups in a more fine-grained way to evaluate developmental trajectories of specific contributions of cognitive variables.
Single-Center Study of Therapeutic Apheresis in 24 Male Patients from the MENA Region: Reduction of Lipids, Inflammatory Markers, Autoantibodies, and Implications for Fatigue, Genetics, and Aging
2025-09-11

Abstract Cardiovascular and metabolic disorders, particularly diabetes and obesity, are highly prevalent in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, exhibiting some of the highest global incidence rates. These conditions significantly increase the severity of infectious diseases, notably COVID-19, leading to a rise in long-COVID cases among affected individuals. Furthermore, the MENA region’s extreme temperatures exacerbate cardiovascular issues by elevating heart rates and blood pressure, increasing dehydration and blood viscosity. Extracorporeal therapies, such as apheresis, effectively reduces plasma lipids and inflammatory markers. Furthermore, apheresis has shown promise in reducing autoantibodies associated to long-COVID. Our previous research indicated that apheresis alleviates symptoms in patients with long-COVID and chronic fatigue syndrome. In this study, we treated 24 male patients from the MENA region suffering from chronic fatigue and/or different metabolic diseases such as diabetes, dyslipidemia, or obesity, using double filtration plasmapheresis. Comprehensive plasma analyses were performed before and after apheresis to assess lipid profiles, inflammatory markers, and autoantibodies, revealing significant changes following the procedure. Genetic analyses on a subgroup of the patients showed no mutations in the LDLR, APOB, APOE, PCSK9, LIPA, and LDLRAP1 genes known to be associated with predispositions to monogenic lipid disorders. However, all patients in this subgroup demonstrated an intermediate to high likelihood that their elevated lipid levels have a polygenic basis. These findings suggest that implementing apheresis in the MENA region could significantly improve health outcomes and life expectancy for affected individuals.
Minimizing the influence of magnetic vestibular stimulation inside MRI-scanners by adjusting head position
2025-09-11

Abstract Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) offers detailed diagnostic insights but also unintentionally induces vestibular side effects by its static magnetic field. Magnetic vestibular stimulation (MVS) may cause dizziness and confound behavioral and physiological measures in fMRI by introducing an unavoidable mixture of neural activation in vestibular projection areas, driven both by the signal of interest and by vestibular system activation. This study investigated how different head orientations within a 3T MRI scanner influence the MVS-induced vestibulo-ocular reflex (VOR) in complete darkness, with the goal of identifying a head position that minimizes or eliminates MVS effects. Results revealed a linear relationship between head pitch and the horizontal VOR (Experiment 1), as well as between head roll and the vertical VOR (Experiment 2). Across participants, the horizontal VOR was eliminated at an average forward head pitch of 24.4°, while the vertical VOR was nullified at an average roll angle of 15.9° towards the right shoulder. A head position combining this forward pitch with this rightward roll effectively minimized both horizontal and vertical VOR components across subjects (Experiment 3). The findings provide a practical solution to reduce the impact of MVS effects in MRI with important implications for improving data quality in neuroscientific fMRI studies and patient comfort during clinical imaging.
Molecular Chain Elongation Mechanism for n‐Caproate Biosynthesis by Megasphaera Hexanoica
2025-09-11

Abstract The microbial production of medium‐chain carboxylates has attracted considerable interest owing to their potential applications in biofuels and specialty chemicals; however, the underlying biosynthetic mechanisms remain incompletely understood. The present study evaluates the medium‐chain carboxylate‐producing microbe Megaspahera hexanoica using genomic analysis, transcriptome analysis, and metabolic engineering. Additionally, the n ‐caproate synthesis pathway of M. hexanoica is characterized with fructose as an electron donor, and the substrate specificity of the respective proteins is evaluated by constructing an n ‐caproate biosynthetic pathway in Escherichia coli . Among all r‐BOX or RBO genes, thl _1583, which encodes β‐ketothiolase ( Mh THL), is identified as the most critical enzyme for the carbon chain elongation mechanism in M. hexanoica . Therefore, Mh THL is compared with other well‐studied β‐ketothiolases ( Ck THL from Clostridium kluyveri, Re BktB from Ralstonia eutropha ( Cupriavidus necator ), Ec AtoB from E. coli , and Ca THL from C. acetobutylicum ). Mh THL is found to exhibit the highest n ‐caproate production, as evidenced by the protein crystal structure of Mh THL. Structural comparisons with other thiolases show that Mh THL has a larger substrate‐binding pocket than Re BktB. Thiolase mutants generated by site‐directed mutagenesis reveal that two residues (Leu87 and Val351) are essential for determining the size of the substrate‐binding pocket.
Challenges in Replay Detection by TDLM in Post-Encoding Resting State
2025-09-11

Abstract We investigated, using temporally delayed linear modelling (TDLM) and magnetoencephalography (MEG), whether items associated with an underlying graph structure are replayed during a post-learning resting state. In these same data, we have previously provided evidence for replay during on-line (non-rest) memory retrieval. Despite successful decoding of brain activity during a localizer task, and contrary to predictions, we did not detect evidence for replay during a post-learning resting state. To better understand this, we performed a hybrid simulation analysis in which we inserted synthetic replay events into a control resting state recorded prior to the actual experiment. This simulation revealed that replay detection using our current pipeline requires extremely high replay densities to reach significance (&gt;1 replay sequence per second, with “replay” defined as a sequence of reactivations within a certain time lag). Furthermore, when scaling the number of replay events with a behavioural measure we were unable to experimentally induce a strong correlation between sequenceness and this measure. We infer that even if replay was present at plausible rates in our resting state dataset we would lack statistical power to detect it with TDLM. We discuss ways for optimizing the analysis approach and how to find boundary conditions under which TDLM can be expected to detect replay successfully. We conclude that solving these methodological constraints is likely to be crucial to optimise measuring replay non-invasively using MEG in humans.
Azapeptide-Based SARS-CoV-2 Main Protease Inhibitors: Design, Synthesis, Enzyme Inhibition, Structural Determination, and Antiviral Activity
2025-09-11

M<sup>pro</sup> of SARS-CoV-2 plays a vital role in the replication and pathogenesis of virus. Additionally, its high conservation within the <i>Coronaviridae</i> family makes it an attractive therapeutic target for developing broad-spectrum agents. This study describes the design, synthesis, and structure-activity relationships of azapeptide-based SARS-CoV-2 M<sup>pro</sup> inhibitors, leading to several compounds with nanomolar IC<sub>50</sub> values. Examples include <b>14r</b> (IC<sub>50</sub> = 13.3 nM), <b>14s</b> (IC<sub>50</sub> = 30.6 nM), <b>20a</b> (<b>TPG-20a</b>, IC<sub>50</sub> = 28.0 nM), and <b>20g</b> (IC<sub>50</sub> = 30.4 nM). Some compounds inhibit MERS-CoV and SARS-CoV-1 M<sup>pro</sup> but not the human protease cathepsin L. Several inhibitors, such as <b>20a</b> and <b>20f</b>, exhibit antiviral activity with potencies comparable to nirmatrelvir and activity against the E166V-carrying SARS-CoV-2 variant (SARS-CoV-2<sup>E166V</sup>). An M<sup>pro</sup> cocrystal structure with <b>20a</b> shows a covalent adduct with the catalytic Cys145. Overall, these new inhibitors are promising chemical tools that may contribute to the identification of future pan-anticoronaviral drugs.
Beyond Glucose—Rethinking Prediabetes for Precision Prevention
2025-09-11

Prediabetes affects more than one-third of U.S. adults, yet represents a biologically heterogeneous state that is only partly captured by traditional glycemic categories (impaired fasting glucose, impaired glucose tolerance, or borderline elevated HbA1c). Leveraging unsupervised clustering in comprehensively phenotyped cohorts has identified six reproducible prediabetes subtypes integrating insulin sensitivity, insulin secretion, visceral and hepatic fat, and genetic risk. Three high-risk subtypes (progressing prediabetes with fatty liver, progressing prediabetes with β-cell failure, and slow progressors with hyperinsulinemic insulin resistance) show distinct trajectories toward diabetes and unique complication patterns. For example, “slow progressors” develop albuminuria and face excess mortality, despite only modest glycemic deterioration over 10–15 years, showing that complications can arise before diabetes diagnosis. Recognizing these subtypes sharpens risk stratification and opens a path toward precision prevention. Intensive lifestyle modification and bariatric surgery offer the greatest glycemic benefit in the fatty liver subtype, whereas early pharmacologic β-cell protection may be required for the β-cell failure cluster. GLP-1–based therapies offer promising subtype-specific options and should be tested in randomized controlled studies. Future prediabetes intervention trials should move beyond diabetes incidence as the sole end point and systematically evaluate kidney, nerve, eye, and cardiovascular outcomes. While testing for long-term clinical end points might not be feasible in studies where individuals with prediabetes are recruited, the use of surrogate end points could facilitate the assessment of early complications. Such complication-focused, subtype-guided studies will determine whether early, tailored therapy can halt tissue damage and reduce the public health burden linked to prediabetes.
Compendium of Agrobacterium-Mediated Tissue Culture Transformation Methods of Various Solanaceae Species
2025-09-11

The routine transformation and genetic modification of many plant species other than Arabidopsis thaliana is still an arduous task. In many cases, it is necessary to use special tissues or conditions performed under sterile tissue culture conditions. Nevertheless, this approach is often the most expedient one, and streamlining protocols to maximize efficiency and minimize effort without sacrificing quality is paramount to today’s research agendas. The Solanaceae family tends to be amicable to tissue culture and relatively easy to transform. Here, we present our optimized, routine tissue culture protocols for the transformation of Nicotiana benthamiana, Nicotiana tabacum, Solanum tuberosum (potato), and Solanum lycopersicum (tomato). We highlight their commonalities and their differences, thus giving the researcher a framework for optimizing their own protocols in their laboratory if needed. Tissue culture transformation is still an important and dynamic field for the advancement of plant research in molecular genetics, physiology, and plant pathology, and will continue to be a viable and important resource into the future.
How cognitive biases affect winning probability perception in beach volleyball experts
2025-09-11

Abstract In professional beach volleyball, the belief in “never give up” is deeply ingrained, but its strategic implications remain underexplored. This study employs a mixed-methods approach, combining sport psychology and sport informatics, to assess the perception of set-winning probabilities (SWPs) in beach volleyball, as this is a crucial factor for strategic in-game decisions and improved performance. We examined cognitive biases and adaptive strategies influencing SWP estimations in scenarios of substantial trailing or leading. Forty-three members of the German beach volleyball national team estimated SWPs for 60 scores, responded to questions on game tactics, and completed questionnaires measuring optimism, pessimism, confirmation bias, and the sunk cost fallacy. Empirical SWPs were calculated from a dataset of 6,571 matches. Results revealed that participants significantly overestimated SWPs when trailing and underestimated them when leading. Optimism and confirmation bias significantly shaped these estimations. Notably, confirmation bias had a dual role: in trailing scenarios, it amplified overestimation, causing players to underestimate their disadvantage, while in leading scenarios, it improved accuracy by focusing on the likelihood of victory. Players were more likely to recall situations reinforcing the belief that “We (can still) win”. These findings highlight the psychological and strategic complexities of SWP estimations in competitive beach volleyball.
‘Football is blood money’: blowing , soccer dreams and aspirational narratives of youth in neoliberal Nigeria
2025-09-11

Research on African football migration has drawn concepts from the broader social science scholarship on youth, masculinity and social becoming as well as the narrative resources of African youth to understand and explain the imaginaries and lived experiences of aspiring and migrant African footballers. In this paper, I argue for the decolonisation of African youth scholarship by providing a more detailed conceptualisation and showing the interpretive potentials of the Nigerian pidgin English term, blow, which I previously espoused as a promising concept for understanding and giving meaning to the dreams and narratives of the youth and aspiring footballers in Nigeria. I explain that the narrative of blowing has its roots in the social and economic crisis that followed the neoliberal reforms of the structural adjustment programme in the 1980s and entails experiencing fortune at an unprecedented scale, from a non-traditional career or marginal activity. Using content from interviews with two former amateur footballers, I demonstrate how the narrative of blowing offers a window into aspiring Nigerian youth and football migrants’ imagined mobility.
Singing in Heaven and Shouting on Earth: Ritual Prayer and the Mystical Voice in the Life of Pirona the Recluse
2025-09-11

This paper explores the role of voice in the fifteenth-century hagiography of the recluse Pirona, who lived a religious life while voluntarily enclosed in a dwelling attached to the church of St. Nicholas outside the city walls of Mechelen. Her hagiographer-confessor describes Pirona’s voice and foregrounds her speech throughout the text. His representations of her words and the quality of her voice illustrate Pirona’s mystical proximity to the divine and underline her connection to himself and his fellow friars. In scenes that include ritual prayers or liturgical chants, Pirona’s voice transforms her mind and body, testing the limits of her humanity and bringing her closer to the divine.
Optimized LC-MS method for simultaneous polyamine profiling and ADC/ODC activity quantification and evidence that ADCs are indispensable for flower development in tomato
2025-09-11

Introduction Polyamines (PAs) are essential for plant development and stress responses, requiring tight homeostatic regulation. As many PA enzymes are regulated post-transcriptionally, transcript-based methods cannot accurately predict protein abundance. This limitation highlights the need for alternative approaches to study PA homeostasis. Methods We optimized a liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry (LC-MS)–based method to simultaneously quantify the activities of two key PA-synthesizing enzymes—arginine decarboxylase (ADC) and ornithine decarboxylase (ODC)—from plant tissues using stable isotope substrates. Substrate concentrations were optimized to increase assay sensitivity, and the method was adapted for Nicotiana benthamiana as a heterologous expression system. Results In tomato leaf tissue, assay sensitivity improved more than tenfold. In N. benthamiana , expression of epitope-tagged ADCs revealed a direct correlation between protein abundance and enzymatic activity, indicating that ADC activity can infer native protein abundance. Proof-of-principle experiments confirmed substrate specificity of tomato ADC and ODC enzymes and identified essential catalytic residues of tomato ADCs. The protocol was further expanded to quantify 11 PA-network metabolites from the same LC-MS sample—six more than previously reported—providing a comprehensive overview of PA metabolism when visualized as a pathway heatmap. LC-MS analysis of tomato CRISPR–Cas9 mutants deficient in ADC or ODC, revealed that the adc1/adc2 double mutant had no detectable agmatine and reduced putrescine, whilst spermidine and spermine remained unaffected. Phenotypic analysis showed severe developmental defects in this mutant, including complete flower loss, underscoring the indispensable role of ADCs in flower development. Discussion Together, the optimized LC-MS method, the ability to functionally analyze recombinant ADC/ODC proteins in planta , and the use of tomato CRISPR mutants provide a versatile toolkit to dissect PA homeostasis and PA-dependent developmental processes in plants.
Atezolizumab Monotherapy Window Preceding Combined Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy and Immune Therapy in Triple-Negative Breast Cancer—The neoMono Trial
2025-09-11

Abstract Purpose: Exploratory data suggest a benefit of an immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI) monotherapy window in early triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC). The neoMono trial prospectively investigated whether the addition of an atezolizumab monotherapy window before neoadjuvant atezolizumab and chemotherapy improves pathologic complete remission (pCR) rates in early TNBC. Patients and Methods: neoMono is a phase 2 randomized multicenter trial that recruited patients with primary TNBC larger than 10 mm. Neoadjuvant treatment in both arms consisted of neoadjuvant atezolizumab and chemotherapy, with treatment in arm A preceded by atezolizumab monotherapy 2 weeks before combination therapy. This study used a Bayesian trial design. Results: A total of 359 patients were included. Overall, pCR rates in study arms A and B were similar (intention-to-treat population: 65.7% and 69.0%, respectively). In an exploratory analysis, pCR rates in PD-L1–positive tumors were 91.5% in arm A and 82.2% in arm B. The corresponding pCR rates in the PD-L1–negative group were 56.1% in arm A and 64.5% in arm B. In patients with low-risk TNBC (cT1c and cN0), pCR rates in the PD-L1–positive group were 100.0% in arm A and 90.0% in arm B, and the corresponding pCR rates in the PD-L1 (immune cell)–negative group were 65.9% and 76.3%, respectively. Conclusions: The neoMono trial demonstrated the highest pCR rates reported in a phase II/III trial in TNBC, particularly in the case of PD-L1 positivity. Although no significant impact of an ICI monotherapy window on the pCR rate in the unselected intention-to-treat population could be demonstrated, our data reinforce the use of combinations of neoadjuvant chemotherapy and ICI in this indication.
Biochar acidification increased sorption and reduced leaching of nitrate
2025-09-11

Biochar can reduce nitrate (NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup>) leaching from soil, yet typically only at high, uneconomic application rates. Therefore, biochar should be produced and modified to achieve high sorption capacity. Increased NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup> sorption at acidic pH has been reported. However, the sorption mechanisms and potential of biochar acidification to reduce nitrate leaching remain unexplored. Here, NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup> sorption was quantified at soil-relevant pH of 5 and 7 on woody biochars produced at highest treatment temperatures (HTT) of 400-900 °C. Sorption capacities ranged between 700 and 6200 mg NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup>-N kg<sup>-1</sup> at pH 5 and between 200 and 2500 mg NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup>-N kg<sup>-1</sup> at pH 7. Thus, NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup> sorption to biochar might be higher in acidic compared to neutral soils and can be maximized by producing biochars at HTT ≥750 °C. Correlation of sorption data with content of surface functional groups and proxies for biochar aromaticity suggest that NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup> is sorbed to protonated aromatic structures in biochars produced at >500 °C, while NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup> might sorb to protonated functional groups in biochar produced at 400 °C. Further, biochar acidification under NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup> enrichment was tested to reduce NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup> leaching. Both in aqueous suspension and in soil columns, full NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup> release from KNO<sub>3</sub>-enriched industrial biochar was prevented by biochar acidification, i.e., combined HNO<sub>3</sub>+KNO<sub>3</sub> enrichment. In soil with pH 5.7 or pH 7.4, only acidified biochar reduced NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup> leaching by up to 23 % and 12 %, respectively, compared to the soil-only control. Thus, acidification could be an interesting approach to produce biochar-based fertilizers with controlled NO<sub>3</sub><sup>-</sup> release.
Angular coefficients of the Drell-Yan process across different rapidity and kinematical ranges
2025-09-12

We present a comprehensive analysis of the angular structure of the Drell-Yan process at different rapidity and kinematical ranges using predictions of theoretical approaches (collinear perturbative QCD and the geometrical method) at next-to-leading order and data of ATLAS, LHCb, and CMS Collaborations at the CERN LHC.