Over the past few decades, synthetic polymer production has increased, and the production of plastics has surpassed all other man-made materials due to their versatility. Moreover, packaging plastic makes up around 40% of global plastic production. However, the excessive usage of synthetic packaging materials has led to severe environmental and health-related issues. Therefore, biobased packages are considered alternatives to substitute synthetic packaging on the market. Furthermore, the choice of packing material in the food industry is a perplexing process as it depends on various factors, such as the type of food product, its sustainability, and environmental conditions. Interestingly, due to proven gas barrier properties and biological activity, polysaccharide-based bioplastics show the potential to expand the trends in food packaging, including edible films and intelligent and active food packaging. This review discusses the structure, properties and recent developments in polysaccharide-based bioplastics as food packaging materials.

Power systems have been going through a barrage of transformations due to the recent developments in the field, such as deregulation and restructuring of the electric power supply chain, the proliferation of distributed generation (DG), and advancements in information and communications technologies. These have significantly impacted the approach to the planning, design, and operation of active distribution networks or systems. Due to this constant change, the system has become more complex to plan, maintain, and control. In this paper, the benefits, and challenges of active distribution systems relative to traditional passive and active distribution systems are evaluated and investigated while the management and operational characteristics of demand-side resources in Active Distribution Systems (ADS) are studied. In a typical ADS, there exist several vulnerabilities and threats that eventually pose a challenge in the control and automation of substations. These vulnerabilities and threats are reviewed, and potential mitigation measures are suggested. Also in this paper, the communication technologies, and their implementation in terms of control and automation capabilities in active distribution networks are also studied. From this work, it is concluded that communication technologies play an integral role in the realization of a more active distribution networks and that the internet of energy (IoE) is a major player in ADS in the reduction of faults due to human error, fast responses, and improving the stability of power supply. Cyber threats are also and will still be a continuous challenge in smart metering technologies and in substation automation systems (SAS) which will require frequent evaluation and mitigation measures so as not to prevent the power supply system from collapsing.

Recently, a paper was written to establish semi-structured complex numbers ℍ (a new number set invented to enable division by zero) as a useful mathematical tool providing novel results from its application in engineering and science. Whilst the paper was a milestone, the application of this number set to quantum and classical physics had not been fully explored. Consequently, the aim of this research was to use semi-structured complex numbers to develop a new mathematical model for the mass of an object and in course unite classical and quantum physics in a simple yet effective manner. As its major contributions this paper: (1) develops a new mathematical model for the mass of an object called the wave-mass function using De Broglie’s mass and frequency relation and semi-structured complex numbers; (2) uses the new wave-mass function to determine what happens to an object traveling at the speed of light; (3) derives a relation between Schrödinger’s wave function and the new wave-mass function; (4) derives a relation between Einstein’s Field Equation and the new wave-mass function; (5) uses the wave-mass function to combine Einstein’s Field Equation with Schrödinger’s wave function to form a new quantum gravity equation. These results and their applications provide a firm foundation to advance the number set ℍ as a useful mathematical tool.

It's a method to achieve energy savings in single-phase active power greater than that obtained with the "Fan Law" in electric machines applied to ventilation. Quantitative analysis methods were based on electrotechnical techniques, practiced with the corresponding laboratory equipment on the working materials (three prototypes of electric machines). The results obtained from experimentation on the test bench were recorded in tables that collect data of formulas, values, and physical units. The discussion provides a comprehensive comparative study, mainly between power (watts), active energy consumption (kWh), and rotational speed (revolutions per minute). The permanent magnet synchronous motor (PMSM) with the coupling of an RL circuit design does mechanical work at its maximum speed of 3000 (RPM) with only 6.3 (Watts), which is equivalent to 25.2% of the active power required by the single-phase induction asynchronous motor (or shaded pole motor), which required 25 (Watts) to rotate at 1690 (RPM). This translates to 75% lower active power with a 44% superiority in speed, resulting in a 75% savings in single-phase active energy (measured in kWh). The same occurs when comparing it to the universal AC motor (with brushes and wound rotor) to maintain a speed of 3000 (RPM); since it consumes 64.8 (Watts), which is 90.3% more single-phase active energy than that required to achieve the same rotational speed as the permanent magnet synchronous motor (PMSM). The study was conducted on all motors with the same impeller blade diameter and under identical air temperature and atmospheric pressure conditions.

Tantalum oxide thin films are deposited by DC reactive magnetron sputtering from a tantalum metallic target and oxygen as reactive gas. The reactive gas pulsing process (RGPP) is implemented to produce TaOx compounds with tunable chemical compositions. The argon mass flow rate is maintained constant whereas that of the oxygen gas is pulsed during the deposition. A constant pulsing period T = 10 s is used and the introduction time of the oxygen gas, namely the tON injection time, is systematically changed from 0 to 100 % of the pulsing period T. As the tON injection time increases, the chemical composition of as-deposited TaOx films is continuously changed from pure metallic tantalum to the over-stoichiometric Ta2O5 material. Analysis of the crystallographic structure by X-ray diffraction shows that the films adopt the body-centered cubic structure (metallic Ta) for the lowest tON injection time values (oxygen stoichiometry x < 1.0) and become amorphous for the longest tON injection times. It is shown that the tON injection time is a key parameter to produce either homogeneous tantalum oxides, or periodic Ta/TaOx multilayers with alternations close to 3 nm. Similarly, optical transmittance spectra of the film/glass substrate system are recorded in the visible region and the electrical conductivity of the films is measured vs. temperature. Both exhibit a gradual evolution from metallic (300K = 8.17105 S m-1 with a null optical transmittance in the visible range) to semi-conducting (300K = 1.97103 S m-1 with a semi-transparent behavior) and finally to dielectric properties (300K < 10-5 S m-1 for interferential films) as a function of the oxygen concentration in the films.

Sous-vide is a process in which food is vacuum-sealed and prepared in a water bath, heated to a precise temperature, and circulated in a sous-vide machine. This cooking technique is increasingly common in homes and catering establishments due to its simplicity and affordability. However, manufacturers' and chefs' recommendations for low-temperature and long-term sous-vide cooking in media raise food safety concerns, particularly when preparing beef tenderloin. In this study, Salmonella enterica was found to be inactivated by heat and sage essential oil (EO) in beef tenderloin from musculus psoas major that had undergone sous-vide processing. To determine whether heat treatment was likely to increase the sous-vide efficiency, S. enterica and sage EO were mixed. After being vacuum-packed and injected with S. enterica, the samples were cooked sous-vide for the prescribed time at 50, 55, 60, or 65 °C. On days 1, 3, and 6, the amounts of S. enterica, total bacteria, and coliform bacteria were measured in both groups of sous vide beef tenderloin. Mass spectrometry was used to identify bacterial strains on various days and categories. Each day that was measured, the test group exposed to a temperature of 50 °C for 5 minutes had a higher number of all microbiota. The most isolated microorganisms from the control and treated groups were Pseudomonas fragi, and in the treated group also S. enterica. It has been shown that adding sage essence oil (EO) in combination with the sous-vide gastronomic method leads to the stabilization and safety of beef tenderloin.

The objective of this study is to investigate the viability of employing waste derived from Syzygium cumini seeds as an environmentally sustainable antioxidant adjunct within the framework of PLA-PCL-Nanochitosan active packaging for food preservation. The method involves the manufacturing of a food packaging film by combining a PLA/PCL polymer blend with chloroform, followed by an evaporation process. This polymer blend is subsequently mixed with an extract derived from Syzygium cumini seed waste and nano chitosan. The mechanical mixing process takes 45 minutes and is carried out at a temperature of 160°C. The results of this study show that the active film has excellent mechanical properties, and an even surface texture, and was able to significantly reduce S. aureus colony counts by up to 98%. Active packaging film is also able to maintain pH and total volatile basic nitrogen (TVBN) in chicken breast.

Wheat yield plays an important role in the global economy. Changing climate conditions and increased drought negatively affect grain yield. Currently, breeding programs are aimed at improving wheat productivity. To accelerate the selection process of hybrids and parental forms for crosses, it is essential to pay attention to plants' phenotypic and genetic potential. We studied the genes of the "green revolution" group Rht and coarse-grained TaGW and TaGS to increase yields by selecting optimal parameters for wheat. We focused on short-stemmed and coarse-grained characteristics in a dry climate and conducted a correlation analysis between the genetic potential of wheat varieties and hybrids and their phenotypic manifestation in drought conditions. Rht-D1b significantly reduced the height of plants by 51.67% and reduced the coleoptile length by 30.45%. At the same time, TaGW8-B1a increased the grain width by 13.37%. However, in the presence of Rht-D1b and Rht-B1b in the genome, the 1000-kernal weight was 35.06 g (p<0.05), the Rht-B1b gene enhanced it by 9% (p<0.05), while both Rht-D1a and Rht-B1a alleles gave a 1000-kernal weight of 37.96 g (p<0.05). The Rht-D1b and Rht-B1b alleles gave 18.5 seeds per ear, while the Rht-D1a and Rht-B1a alleles gave the value of grains per ear -24.1 pcs. The data obtained indicated the relationship of phenotypic and genetic parameters in wheat between the coarse-grained and short-stemmed genes, which makes it possible to select based on the genetic parameters of varieties and hybrids, thereby speeding up the selection process.

The main objective of the paper is to provide a thorough analysis of currently used modulation control schemes for single phase bidirectional dual active bridge DC/DC converter. In this article, it will be shown that single phase shift, extended phase shift and Dual phase shift modulation schemes are special cases of triple phase shift (TPS) modulation scheme. The article aims to highlight six TPS switching modes and their complements with the operational constraints. Unlike previous studies that regarded TPS as a complex scheme, this paper simplifies the analysis of each mode and aims to standardize the understanding of TPS modulation in DAB converters. Power equations, range of power transferred and zero voltage switching (ZVS) are derived for all the modes under TPS without assuming fundamental component analysis. Additionally, a generic optimization algorithm is developed to show the advantages of TPS modulation and thus, detailed analysis presented in this paper provides valuable insights for single phase DAB converter designers in identifying a wide range of optimization algorithms to achieve higher efficiency under TPS modulation. This analysis contributes to the advancement of bidirectional DAB converter technology and facilitates its application in various power electronic systems.

When analyzing user geospatial information through deep learning methods, it is typically necessary to annotate existing geospatial data. Currently, manual annotation methods are commonly employed, suffering from issues related to low efficiency and accuracy. This design is based on the TensorFlow deep learning framework and first realizes the BiLSTM+CRF+AGG deep learning model. Among the models, AGG is the aggregation layer, which is introduced to solve the problem of solid particle size equilibrium. Secondly, based on the characteristics of original data and professional data, an automatic labeling algorithm is proposed. The algorithm first preprocesses the acquired original data set and professional data set, The most valuable unlabeled data set which can make the training model converge quickly is selected from the original data set as the target data set. Sort the target data set based on preset rules and set annotation parameters for the sorted target data set. Based on the set annotation parameters, the corpus is synthesized and used as the annotation result. Thirdly, based on the active learning strategy, a manual annotation auxiliary scheme is proposed, and an Excel generation module that is convenient for manual annotation correction is designed and developed to further improve the efficiency and quality of annotation through iterative processing. The combination of the BiLSTM+CRF+AGG deep learning model and high-quality annotation can accurately identify non-standard, incomplete, or even incorrect geographical information entities. This annotation method has found successful practical application within the context of the research project and has been granted an invention patent.

Towards better understanding of factors controlling carbon (C) exchange between inland waters and atmosphere, we addressed inorganic carbon cycle in semi-arid lakes of Central Eurasia, subjected to strong impact of on-going climate change. For this, we assessed the hydrochemical vari-ability and quantified its control on formation of authigenic carbonate minerals, occurring within the upper layer of sediments in 43 semiarid lakes located in the southwest of Western Siberia (Central Eurasia). Based on measurements of pH, total dissolved solids (TDS), cationic and anionic composition, dissolved organic and inorganic C, as well as textural and mineralogical characterization of bottom sediments using X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscopy, we demonstrate that lake water pH and TDS are primarily controlled by both lithological and climatic context of the lake watershed. We have not revealed any direct relationships between lake morphology and water chemistry. The most common authigenic carbonates scavenging atmospheric CO2 in the form of insoluble minerals in lake sediments were calcite, aragonite, Mg-calcite, dolomite and hydro-magnesite. The calcite was the most common component, aragonite mainly appears in lakes with sediments enriched in gastropod shells or artemia cysts, while hydromagnesite was most common in lakes with high Mg/Ca molar ratios, as well at high DIC concentrations. The relationships between mineral formation and water chemistry established in this study can be generalized to a wide suite of arid and semi-arid lakes in order to characterize current status of inorganic C cycle and predict its possible modification under on-going climate warming such as water temperature rise and change of hydrological connectivity, primary productivity and nutrient regime.

Abstract: This study observes the characteristics and influencing factors of carbon fluxes of the Momoge salt marsh ecosystem over four years, which behaves as a CO2 sink. The daily, seasonal, and interannual variations of CO2 fluxes in the Momoge salt marshes were observed using the eddy covariance method and compared with various environmental factors. An overall daily “U” shaped distribution was observed, with uptake during the day (negative values) and release at night (positive values). Annually, the carbon fluxes in the study area roughly exhibit a “V” shape. Carbon fluxes during the non-growing season predominantly showed positive values, indicating the release of CO2 into the atmosphere. Photosynthetically active radiation was the primary influencing factor affecting hourly and daytime variations in net ecosystem exchange (NEE) during the growing season, while temperature was the main factor influencing nighttime NEE dynamics. Air temperature, soil temperature, photosynthetically active radiation, precipitation, and water level all had significant impacts on daily net CO2 exchange. At the monthly scale, larger values of soil temperature, air temperature, photosynthetically active radiation, and aboveground biomass correspond to a stronger carbon absorption capacity of the ecosystem. Overall, temperature remains the primary factor for carbon fluxes in the Momoge wetlands.

Monitoring snowmelt dynamics in mountains is crucial to understand water releases downstream. Sentinel-1 (S-1) synthetic aperture radar (SAR) has become one of the most widely used techniques to achieve this aim due to its high frequency of acquisitions and all-weather capability. This work aims to understand the possibilities of S-1 SAR imagery to capture snowmelt dynamics and related changes in streamflow response in semiarid mountains. The results proved that S-1 SAR imagery was able not only to capture the final spring melting but also all melting cycles that commonly appear throughout the year in these types of environments. The general change detection approach to identify wet snow was adapted for these regions using as reference the average S-1 SAR image from the previous summer, and a threshold of -3.00 dB. In addition, four different type of melting runoff onsets depending on physical snow condition were identified. When translating that at the catchment scale, distributed melting runoff onset maps were defined to better understand the spatiotemporal evolution of melting dynamics. Finally, a linear connection between melting dynamics and streamflow was found for long-lasting melting cycles, with a determination coefficient (R2) ranging from 0.62 to 0.83 and an average delay between the melting onset and streamflow peak of about 21 days.

Active transportation, such as walking, cycling, and micro-mobility modes, has received a lot of attention in recent years due to its potential benefits to urban residents, such as less traffic, better air quality, more opportunities to get exercise, and an overall higher quality of life. In this study, we used Classification and Regression Trees (CART) to compare and contrast three mobility options: shared micro-mobility, individual micro-mobility, and walking. We surveyed 219 people living in Budapest, Hungary, to learn more about their travel habits and investigate the demographic elements that influence people's mode choice, such as age, gender, ownership of micro-mobility modes, education, job, and income. Results showed that ownership of personal micro-mobility modes, and age as important predictors of active travel mode choice. Males seem to prioritize cost and weather conditions when choosing shared micromobility modes, while females value safety and weather conditions. Our findings can guide policy decisions and urban planning initiatives by identifying the most significant predictors of mode choice and evaluating the possible benefits and drawbacks of each mode.

The necessity to reduce the effect of the greenhouse phenomenon imposed the turn of the food packaging technology to the use of biobased raw materials decreasing the carbon dioxide fingerprint. In this direction alginates derived from brown algae species are of the most promising biobased biopolymers, used for development of edible active coatings, capable to protect food from oxidation/bacterial spoilage. In this study sodium alginate, which was plasticized with glycerol and mixed with a biobased thymol/natural halloysite nanohybrid, was used to develop novel edible active coatings. Active nanocomposite coatings developed by mixing of pure halloysite with sodium alginate/glycerol matrix were produced for comparison purposes. X-Ray and Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy indicated higher compatibility of thymol/halloysite nanohybrid with sodium alginate/glycerol matrix compared to the relevant of pure halloysite. This increased compatibility led to higher tensile properties, water/oxygen barrier properties, and total antioxidant activity. All coating samples were applied as edible active coatings for “tsalafouti” spreadable soft cheese, exhibited a reduction of mesophilic microbial population of more than one log10(cfu/g) unit comparing with uncoated cheese. Moreover, the reduction of mesophilic microbial population was increased by increasing halloysite and thymol content which indicates the sodium alginate/glycerol/thymol/halloysite as promising edible active coatings for “tsalafouti”.

In this paper, we present demographic, clinical, anamnestic, cognitive, and functional data, as well as haematological, haematochemical, immunological and genetic parameters of an exceptional individual: Antonino Turturici, a semi-supercentenarian who held the title of the oldest living Italian centenarian from December 28, 2020, to September 23, 2021. The purpose of this study is to offer fresh insights into extreme phenotypes, with a particular focus on immune-inflammatory parameters. To the best of our knowledge, this study represents the first phenotypic investigation of a semi-supercentenarian, illustrating both indicators of age-related immune phenotype (ARIP) recognized as significant gauges of biological ageing and INFLA-score, a metric designed to assess the cumulative impact of inflammatory markers. The aim of this study was, indeed, to advance our understanding of the role of immune-inflammatory responses in achieving extreme longevity. The results bolster the idea that the immune system can play a role in promoting extreme longevity. However, this does not exclude the involvement of other body systems or organs in achieving extreme longevity.

In the food sector, packaging is one of the important steps that ensures the safe, unspoiled, min-imum cost of storing, transporting and delivering the food that goes into production to the con-sumer. Food spoilage caused by foodborne pathogens and microorganisms is a serious problem in the food chain, reducing the shelf life of foods. Therefore, consumers' demands for more natural, disposable, biodegradable and recyclable antibacterial food packaging materials have considera-bly increased. This review covers a comprehensive current literature review of antibacterial food packaging, which includes with titles antibacterial agents, organic acids and other compounds, enzymes, bacteriocins, natural extracts, essential oils, application of encapsulation and antimi-crobial packaging. Research findings on antimicrobial food packaging used to extend the shelf life of foods were collected from online databases such as PubMed/MedLine, Wiley Online Li-brary, Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar. In this review, the activities of different bio-materials and compounds used to extend the shelf life of foods were compared

Remote sensing methods have the potential to improve lake water quality monitoring and deci-sion-making in water management. This reviews introduces novel findings in the field of opti-cally active water quality parameters using remote sensing. It summarizes existing retrieval methods (analytical, semi-analytical, empirical, semi-empirical, and artificial intelli-gence/machine learning (AI/ML)), examines measurement methods used to determine concen-tration of specific water quality parameters, summarizes satellite systems that enable temporal data for understanding the state of the lake with focus on water quality parameters, and pro-poses enhancements for future research of lake water quality using remote sensing. As part of this review, eight optically active biological and physical water quality parameters were ana-lyzed, including chlorophyll-α (chl-α), transparency (Secchi disk depth (SDD)), colored dis-solved organic matters (CDOM), turbidity (TUR), electrical conductivity (EC), surface salinity (SS), total suspended matter (TSM), and water temperature (WT). The research proposes a shift from point-based data representation to a more reliable raster representation and encourages optimizing grid selection for in situ measurements by combining hydrodynamic model with re-mote sensing methods. This review presents a comprehensive summary of the bands, band combinations, and band equations per sensor for eight optically active water quality parameters as listed in Tables A1-A8. The review’s findings indicate that use of remotely sensed data is an effective method for estimating water quality parameters in lakes, with a significant increase in global utilization. The review highlights potential solutions and limitations to the challenges of remote sensing water quality determination in lakes.

Cyclodextrin (CD) is made up of 7 glucose molecules linked in a ring, creating a cone shape. Its interior can house hydrophobic molecules while the exterior is hydrophilic enough to interact with water molecules. Until now, this feature has been used for the development of active and intelligent packaging applied to food, interacting with the product or its environment to improve one or more aspects of its quality or safety. As well, it is used to provide information on monitoring the time in which food is optimal for consumption, an aspect considered very important for the consumer and for the merchant. A known problem with some of these types of packaging is that the bioactive compounds that are housed in the CD can interact with food and can modify its taste, smell, color and/or texture. Therefore, this review will focus on discerning which packaging is most appropriate for each situation.

Motivated by assumptions that Quantum Mechanics (QM) is not the basement of reality and that additional dimensionality (XD) is required to complete and extend the Standard Models (SM) of Particle Physics and Cosmology, experimental protocols utilizing putative properties of Kaluza-Klein-like (KK) cyclicality embedded within Dirac’s electron hypertube model in conjunction with a Dirac covariant polarized vacuum is developed to produce a new type of low-energy tabletop cross section based on topological phase transitions rather than high energy collision sprays as in the LHC. The model is presented in a highly theoretical axiomatic manner utilizing off-the-shelf parameters generally marginalized by the mainstream physics community. When successful the protocol leads to obsolescence of the highly efficacious 100-year supercollider run producing a paradigm shift with an inherent new set of Unified Field (UF) transformations beyond the Galilean Lorentz-Poincaré transformations of the SM to 3rd regime natural science: Classical – Quantum - UF.

In the realm of mathematics education, self-explanation stands as a crucial learning mechanism, allowing learners to articulate their comprehension of intricate mathematical concepts and strategies. As digital learning platforms grow in prominence, there are mounting opportunities to collect and utilize mathematical self-explanations. However, these opportunities are met with challenges in automated evaluation. Automatic scoring of mathematical self-explanations is crucial for preprocessing tasks, including the categorization of learner responses, identification of common misconceptions, and the creation of tailored feedback and model solutions. Nevertheless, this task is hindered by the dearth of ample sample sets. Our research introduces a semi-supervised technique using the Language Learning Model (LLM), specifically its Japanese variant, to enrich datasets for the automated scoring of mathematical self-explanations. We rigorously evaluated the quality of self-explanations across five datasets, ranging from human-evaluated originals to ones devoid of original content. Our results show that combining LLM-based explanations with mathematical material significantly improves the model's accuracy. Interestingly, there's an optimal limit to how much synthetic self-explanation data can bene-fit the system. Exceeding this limit doesn't further improve outcomes. This study thus highlights the need for careful consideration when integrating synthetic data into solutions, especially within the mathematics discipline.

The windowpane oyster Placuna placenta, lives in brackish coastal waters and has long been economically important to the Philippines because of its durable and translucent shell, which is used as a glass substitute and material for making windowpanes and handicrafts. There has been considerable degradation of the windowpane oyster fishery in past decades. Moreover, there are waste and under-exploited by-products such as the meat, which though nutritious and edible, currently has a very low value; its use being confined to dishes consumed by families in the fishing community. Historically there are instances of excellent practice in terms of regulating the windowpane oyster fishery, while in recent times there have been local initiatives to restore this and to develop high value food products from the meat. These initiatives have, however, never been followed through at a provincial or national level. Research on other molluscs and marine organisms highlights that these also contain high value pharmaceutical products. This review compiles evidence to establish the groundwork for an essential and comprehensive multidisciplinary research program centred around the windowpane oyster, which would ensure a high value for all parts of the oyster, including those currently discarded. By fostering a sustainable and circular economy within this fishery sector and its associated industry, its economic value would be amplified. This is particularly important for oyster harvesters in the Philippines, who often find themselves at the economic ladder's lower rungs. By integrating the principles of a circular economy, this initiative would not only aim to uplift the economic prospects of these harvesters but in doing so would drive the restoration of the windowpane oyster to its former range.

A significant electromotive force is induced in the rotor circuit of a doubly fed induction generator (DFIG) due to its high vulnerability to grid faults. Therefore, the system performance must be increased with appropriate control actions that can successfully offset such abnormalities in order to provide consistent and stable operations during grid disturbances. In this regard, this paper presents a solution based on a combination of an energy storage-based crowbar and a rotor-side crowbar that makes the effective transient current and voltage suppression for wind-driven DFIG possible. The core of the solution is its ability to restrict the transient rotor and stator overcurrents and DC-link overvoltages within their prescribed limits, aiming to protect the DFIG and power converters, and consequently, improve the system’ ability to ride-through faults. Further, the capacity of an energy storage device for transient suppression is estimated. Finally, simulation results show that the proposed approach is effective in achieving transient control objectives precisely and maintaining a stable grid connection during the faults.

Minimum housing standards aim to safeguard housing rights and enhance residential conditions. Governments develop housing policies, including provision, preservation, and support for welfare programs, guided by the status of households below these standards. Growing nations commonly utilize this approach to decrease the proportion of households not meeting these criteria. In South Korea, the ratio of households below these standards was 4.5% in 2021, down from 16.6% in 2006, as indicated by the initial Korea Housing Survey. However, this downward trend has stalled over the past decade. With the 2004 and 2011 revisions, the standards have been effective for 12 years, yet no longer mirror current housing realities due to ongoing improvements. This study aimed to propose enhancements to Korea’s minimum housing standards. Through analyzing laws, prior research, present household statuses, international cases, and expert insights, recommendations emerged. Categorizing households by size, we developed precise standards covering area, facility, and location aspects. These new standards led to an 8.4% non-compliance rate in 2021. This research’s findings anticipate aiding the revision of minimum housing standards, formulating pragmatic policies for enhancing residential conditions in line with present situations.

Electro-mechanical braking(EMB) which represents development direction of autonomous and intelligent braking plays very useful role on enhancing the braking response performance and intelligence level for mine underground electric trackless rubber-tired vehicle (ETRV). However,there is no Electro-Mechanical Brake system applied practically in coal mine UTRV until now.The accurate control of braking clamping force can determine the length and precision of braking distance of mine ETRV.In addition,because of poor working conditions in underground coal mine tunnel ,braking clamping force sensor may be easy to occur failure,which may cause vital accident.Therefore,A cascaded three-closed-loop EMB system with a positive clamping force sensor or force estimator built for ETRV is established to achieve autonomous elimination and reset of braking clearance and reliable braking force tracking ability via utilizing the electro motor rotor angle displacement and hysteresis effect of mechanical components in this EMB.The results of simulation and experiment indicate that clamping force response is faster than traditional hydraulic disk braking system and proposed force estimator presents good fault-tolerant ability when sensor is fault.This EMB can replace the current hydraulic brake system to enhance automation level of braking control for ETRVs and braking force response performance, reduce oil pollution and cost of maintenance, which is also key technology support for really precise motion control of mine autonomous driving vehicles.

Unfortunately in recent years, the global healthcare system has noted a notable increase in the prevalence of obesity and its associated health complications. What is more, one of the significant phenomena is the increasing demand for bariatric procedures among individuals of working age. This trend is pronounced in Poland., due to the increasing number of patients meeting the qualifying criteria for surgery among the group of professionally active and as well as unactive patients. The aim of the study is to characterize alarmingly increasing number of candidates for bariatric procedures among professionally active Poles, who underwent occupational medicine examinations in Poland in 2016-2022 and its strong relationship with cardiovascular co-morbidities (POL-O-CARIA 2022 study). In total, the results of 2,056,861 initial, control and periodic visits as part of the occupational medicine certificate were analyzed. Statistical calculations were performed with the use of IBM SPSS Statistics 25. It was noticed that, there was a consistent rise in the proportion of individuals classified as candidates for bariatric procedures ( increase of 0.3%) alongside a notable decrease in the percentage of individuals maintaining a healthy body weight Moreover, it is imperative to conduct yearly evaluations of the prevalence of obesity and its associated health conditions. This proactive approach is essential in order to adequately equip the healthcare system for addressing the increasing population of obese individuals who are actively engaged in their professions. By doing so, we can strategically implement the most efficient interventions to counteract this trend and ensure optimal health outcomes.

Covariant integral quantization with rotational symmetry SO(3) is established for the quantum motion on this group manifold, or, alternatively, for Gabor signal analysis on this group. We revisit the action of the related (non-unitary) Weyl-Gabor operator on the Hilbert space of square integrable functions on SO(3) and disclose a set of various properties. By selecting weight functions on the corresponding discrete-continuous phase space, one derives related coherent states and Wigner transform.

The present study investigates the relationship between the local structure, photocatalytic ability, and cathode performances in sodium-ion batteries (SIBs) and lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) using Ni-substituted goethite nanoparticles (Ni_xFe_1-xOOH NPs) with a range of 'x' values from 0 to 0.5. The structural characterization was performed applying various techniques, including X-ray diffractometry (XRD), Thermogravimetry differential thermal analysis (TG-DTA), Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FT-IR), X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XANES/EXAFS), both measured at room temperature (RT), and ⁵⁷Fe Mössbauer spectroscopy recorded at RT and at low temperatures (LT) from 20 K to 300 K, Brunauer-Emmett-Teller surface area measurement (BET), and diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS). In addition, the electrical properties of Ni_xFe_1-xOOH NPs were evaluated by impedance spectroscopy. XRD showed the presence of goethite as the only crystalline phase in prepared samples with x ≤ 0.20, and goethite and α-Ni(OH)₂ in the samples with x > 0.20. Sample with x = 0.10 (Ni10) showed the highest photo-Fenton ability with a first-order rate constant value (k) of 15.8×10^-3 min^-1. The ⁵⁷Fe Mössbauer spectrum of Ni0, measured at RT, displayed a sextet corresponding to goethite, with an isomer shift (δ) of 0.36 mm s^-1 and a hyperfine magnetic distribution (B_hf) of 32.95 T. Moreover, the DC conductivity decreased from 5.52×10^-10 to 5.30×10^-12 (Ω.cm)^–1 with 'x' increasing from 0.10 to 0.50. Ni20 showed the highest initial discharge capacity of 223 mAh g^-1, attributed to its largest specific surface area of 174.0 m² g^-1. In conclusion, Ni_xFe_1-xOOH NPs can be effectively utilized as visible-light-activated catalysts and active cathode materials in secondary batteries.

Influence of reaction time on silver nanoparticles-catalyzed oxidation of 3,3’,5,5’-tetramethylbenzidine (TMB) was evaluated via probing the oxidation process by recording the UV-Visible absorbance of the resulting colored products of TMB oxidation by hydrogen peroxide in the presence of silver nanoparticles as peroxides mimics. The time curve of the oxidation process was constructed, revealed that the concentration of the oxidation product was increased by increasing the reaction time and then levled off because the nanozyme active nodes were saturated after a certain reaction time and consequently the steady-state condition can be observed. The maximal activity of the silver nanozymes was achieved after a very short reaction time as short as 3.0 min and after this time, the color intensity of the oxidation products remained constant, revealing saturation of active nodes of nanoparticles with nanozyme-substrate.

This paper presents a numerical study on the vertical (axial) and lateral (flexure) behavior of CFST (Concrete-Filled Steel Tube) columns with active hoop prestress; this transverse prestressing effect is achieved by bolting together two steel half-tubes. This study refers to new construction only (i.e., no retrofit). 12 prototype CFST column specimens (segments) are analyzed. These specimens differ in the prestressing force (3 levels) and in the gravity loading ratio (4 levels); they are selected to represent typical ground columns of mid-rise buildings. The structural behavior of these column specimens is simulated with a nonlinear model implemented in Abaqus; the concrete and steel behavior are described with a damage-plasticity and a plasticity model, respectively. Finally, the interface concrete-steel interaction is represented by a hard (compression-only) surface-to-surface contact model. The calculations involve three consecutive loading steps: (i) transverse prestress, (ii) axial force, and (iii) lateral loading (shear force and bending moment). The structural behavior of the CFST columns is deeply examined and discussed; the results show that their axial-flexural capacity is adequate. Noticeably, it is concluded that the overall benefits of prestressing the columns are only modest. Preliminary studies on the aforementioned mid-rise buildings equipped with the CFST columns show that their gravity and wind capacities are largely enough; conversely, their seismic capacity is sufficient for moderate seismic ground motions only.

Recently, new advanced techniques have been proposed to improve the quality of smart grids that use intermittent renewable energy sources. One of the most effective techniques is active filtering, which utilizes a power electronic converter in the smart load. This technique has the potential to enhance the power quality of the supply voltage by minimizing current harmonics, which is crucial. In this article, we propose a new command intelligence system based on Fuzzy PI fractional (fuzzy FOPI) and GA to control the harmonic currents generated by an active filter powered by a wind system.

The aim of this work is to broaden the theory of computation by making use of fuzzy sets and multisets, which are generalization of ordinary sets. We study fuzzy multiset finite automata (FMFA), which are characterized by the incorporation of vagueness when it comes to the choice of the next state and multiple occurrences of the same input symbol. The resulting automaton is a genaralization of both classical automata and fuzzy automata. We discuss the algebraic characteristics of FMFA sub-automata—separatedness, strongly connectedness, cyclic, directable, and triangular FMFA in terms of equivalence classes induced by an equivalence relation defined on state set of FMFA. Intrestingly, for a given FMFA, a new FMFA can be constructed that is a homomorphic image of the original FMFA. We define different posets structures that can be associated with a given FMFA and show that some of them are upper semilattices and discuss the inter-relationship of a given poset, a finite upper semilattice (FUSL), a FMFA and a posets/FUSL associated with a given FMFA. Finally, we introduce the concept of decomposition of a FMFA in two different ways and characterize the strongly connected, triangular and directable FMFA.

This paper proposes a novel symmetrical active-switched coupled-inductor high-step-up DC/DC converter. A new active-switched coupled inductor is used to allow much higher voltage gain of the proposed converter. The symmetrical circuit structure of the proposed converter evenly divides large input currents and reduce input current ripple by operating in interleaved mode so power density is increased. The switches also have low voltage stress. The operating principle and design considerations for the converter topology are described. The proposed converter with an input voltage of 40 V, an output voltage of 400 V and an output of 1000 W at a switching frequency of 50 kHz is implemented. The simulations and experimental results are thus depicted to verify the theoretical analysis. The highest efficiency is 95.5% at 200 W measured by using a HIOKI 3390. Consequently, the proposed converter is suitable for renewable energy generation systems that require high power, high voltage gain and high efficiency.

Keywords: glycerin; Ni-based catalyst; lanthanum; semi-industrial scale; hydrogen production; biorefinery; monitoring.

Semi-supervised consensus clustering is a promising strategy to compensate for the subjectivity of clustering and its sensitivity to design factors, with various techniques being recently proposed to integrate domain knowledge and multiple clustering partitions. In this article we present a new approach that makes double use of domain knowledge, namely to build the initial partitions as well as to combine them. In particular, we show how to model and integrate must-link and cannot-link constraints into the objective function of a generic consensus clustering (??) framework that maximizes the similarity between the consensus partition and the input partitions, which have, in turn, been enriched with the same constraints. In addition, borrowing from the theory of functional dependencies, the integrated framework exploits the notions of deductive closure and minimal cover to take full advantage of the logical implication between constraints. Using standard UCI benchmarks, we found that the resulting algorithm, termed ??? (double-Constrained Consensus Clustering), was more effective than plain ?? at combining base constrained partitions. We then argue that ??? is especially well-suited to profiling counterfeit e-commerce websites, because constraints can be acquired by leveraging specific domain features, and demonstrate its potential for detecting affiliate marketing programs. Taken together, our experiments suggest that ??? makes the process of clustering more robust and able to withstand changes in clustering algorithms, datasets, and features, with a remarkable improvement of average performance.

The positional deviation of the Automatic Emergency Call System (AECS) under collision conditions brings difficulties for post-rescue operations. Currently, there is a lack of analysis on the system operating conditions during collisions in the reliability assessment methods for the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) deployed in AECS. Therefore, this paper establishes an in-vehicle collision environment simulation model for emergency calls to explore the influence of parameters such as temperature and vibration on the data deviation of the simulated GNSS system. We also propose environmental limits applicable to comprehensive AECS tests, which can objec-tively evaluate the reliability of AECS and provide data support for AECS bench test. Through the satellite signal-based semi-physical simulation, AECS is subjected to bench test under different operating conditions. The findings of this study demonstrate that the occurrence of random vibra-tion and impact stress, induced by vibration, exerts considerable disruptive effects on positional signal data during collisions. Consequently, it leads to substantial interference with the accurate detection of post-collision satellite positioning information. When the simulation operates under a 2.4gRMS vibration condition, the maximum phase noise error in the positioning system is 8.95%, which does not meet the AECS test accuracy requirements. On the other hand, the semi-simulation system is less affected by temperature changes, and at the maximum allowable temperature dif-ference of the equipment, the maximum phase noise error in the simulated signal is 2.12%. Therefore, based on the influence of phase noise variation on the accuracy of satellite signal simulation, nec-essary environmental conditions for AECS test are obtained, including the temperature consistent with the maximum operating temperature of the vector generator and the vibration Power Spectral Density (PSD) lower than 1.2gRMS.

Mobility is a vital welfare indicator which may influence broilers’ daily activities. Classical broiler mobility assessment methods are laborious and cannot provide timely insights into their conditions. Here, we proposed a semi-supervised Deep Learning (DL) model, YOLOv5, combined with Deep Sort algorithm conjoined with our newly proposed algorithm, Neo-Deep Sort, for individual broiler mobility tracking. Initially, 1,650 labeled images from five days were employed to train the YOLOv5 model. Through semi-supervised learning (SSL), this narrowly trained model was then used for pseudo-labeling 2,160 images, of which 2,153 were successfully labeled. Thereafter, the YOLOv5 model was fine-tuned on the newly labeled images. Lastly, the trained YOLOv5 and the Neo-Deep Sort algorithm were applied to detect and track 28 broilers in two pens and categorized them in terms of hourly and daily traveled distances and speeds. SSL helped in increasing the YOLOv5 model’s mean Average Precision (mAP), in detecting birds, from 81% to 98%. As compared with the manually measured covered distances of broilers, the combined model provided individual broiler's hourly moved distances with a validation accuracy of about 80%. Eventually, individual and flock level mobilities were quantified while overcoming the occlusion, false and miss detection issues.

In this paper, we describe the surface modification of Polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) through plasma treatment process. Several parameters including different active gases; RF power; dis-tance between the plasma source and sample; and plasma duration were optimized to reduce the hydrophobic nature of PTFE. Three different active gases were used [i.e., N2, O2 and (Ar+H2)], in which N2 was effective to reduce the hydrophobicity of PTFE within shorter plasma duration of 2 minutes. Several surface characterizations including ATR-FTIR, water contact angle, FE-SEM and XPS were utilized to verify the neat and modified PTFE surface after plasma treatment. The plasma treatment using N2 as an active gas improved the wettability of PTFE membrane, show-ing a water contact angle of 108° when compared with the neat PTFE (140°). The SEM images of plasma treated PTFE shows greater modifications on the surface indicating non-uniform fiber alignment and torn fibers at several places. The obtained results confirm the fact that plasma treatment is an effective way to modify the PTFE surface without altering its bulk property.

Food waste disposal to landfills practice contributes to greenhouse problem due to the emission of gases such as methane to the atmosphere. Shelf-life extension of food products and further valorization of food wastes such as the conversion to activated carbon are tested nowadays as alternative techniques. The development and use of biobased active coatings against food oxidation/bacterial deterioration is an environmentally friendly technique. In this study, a novel food active coating was successfully developed based on a chitosan (CS)/poly-vinyl alcohol (PVOH) matrix activated with a nanohybrid of natural thymol (TO) adsorbed in activated carbon (AC) derived from spent coffee. The results shown that, compared to the pure CS/PVOH polymeric matrix, the coating with 15% wt. TO@AC nanohybrid concentration achieved +23.5 % Young’s modulus value, +20.1% ultimate strength value, increased barrier of +50.2% for water and +74.0 % for oxygen, +69.0% antioxidant activity, increased antibacterial activity of +5.5% against Escherichia coli, +17.8% against Salmonella enterica, +42.5% against Staphylococcus aureus, and +2.5% against Listeria monocytogenes. A visual evaluation of this coating shown a delay to fresh bananas enzymatic browning and significantly decrease their weight loss. This indicates that it could be potentially used to extend the shelf-life of fresh fruits.

Bioactive fractions were isolated from the leaves extract of Kalanchoe pinnata and subjected to scrutiny for their prospective anti-obesity properties. An array of in vitro phytochemical, antioxidant, and enzyme inhibition assays were executed, which dis-cerned fractions F1 and F2 as the most effective fractions. These fractions were sub-sequently studied through in vivo experiments, affirming that F2 as the most potent fraction. Further characterization of F2 was conducted via HPTLC MS-MSn tech-niques. The outcomes demonstrated that F2 produced a notable anti-obesity effect in obese mice, reducing their body weight and lipid metrics, and leading to advanta-geous changes in their organs. An analytical examination of F2 revealed the existence of four principal compounds, which were subsequently subjected to in silco molecular docking and dynamic analysis, confirming their aptitude for binding to selected pro-teins. These findings imply that the utilization of Kalanchoe pinnata leaves could pro-vide a promising therapeutic strategy for the treatment of obesity.

Reconfigurable chiral metasurfaces with dynamic polarization manipulation capability are highly required in optical integrated systems. In this paper, we simultaneously realized giant and large-range switchable asymmetric transmission (AT) and circular conversion dichroism (CCD) in a vanadium dioxide (VO2) based metasurface. The AT and CCD of the insulator VO2 based metasurface reach 0.95 and 0.92, respectively. Utilizing the insulator-to-metallic phase transition of VO2, the AT and CCD could be continuously switched to near zero. Furthermore, the physics mechanism of the giant and switchable AT and CCD are analyzed. The proposed metasurface with large-range switchable AT and CCD is promising in the applications of biochemistry detection, chiral imaging and biosensing.

In this research, the antioxidant and antibacterial activities of active films based on potato starch containing Viola odorata extract (VOE) were investigated both in vitro and in chicken fillets. The VOE was added to the starch film formulation at 0, 1, 2, and 3% (w/v). The results showed that by increasing the extract level, the total phenol content and antioxidant and antibacterial activity of the films against Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, and Salmonella typhimurium improved remarkability. The results of meat tests indicated significant antioxidant and antimicrobial activity of active films containing different levels of VOE in chicken fillets, and a direct relationship was observed between the concentration of the extract and the functional activity of the films, so with the increase in the concentration of the extract in the films, the rate of lipid oxidation and growth of microorganisms in chicken fillets decreased significantly during the storage period, and less volatile nitrogen bases, metmyoglobin, and oxidation products were produced in the fillets. In general, the results of this research demonstrated that active film based on potato starch containing VOE (especially 2 and 3% levels) has the ability to extend the oxidative and microbiological shelf life of chicken fillets during cold storage for at least eight days.

In the past decade, considerable efforts have been devoted to the development of semitransparent organic solar cells. Numerous materials and architectures have been proposed for the future commercialization of these devices. Among these, the use of ternary active layers demonstrated a great promise for the development of efficient semi-transparent organic solar cells with the potential for future applications including self-powered greenhouses and powered windows. Researchers seek alternative solutions to the trade-off between device power conversion efficiency (PCE) and average visible transmittance (AVT), with photoactive materials being the key parameters that govern both (PCE) and (AVT) as well as device stability. Several new organic materials, including polymers and small molecules, were synthesized, and used in conjunction with a variety of techniques to achieve semitransparent conditions. In this review paper, we will look at the working principle and key parameters of semi-transparent organic solar cells, as well as the methods that have been used to improve the performance of ternary-based semi-transparent organic solar cells. The main approaches were concluded to be spectral enhancement and transparency increment of the active layer through bandgap tuning, utilizing novel organic semiconductors, and design architecture of the active layers.

Caries are lesions caused by acidic compounds derived from the metabolism of bacteria such as streptococci. It is not merely the presence of acidogenic bacteria that causes caries but an imbalance in the oral biofilm microhabitat and its behavior. One factor underlying biofilm formation is quorum sensing (QS), that in gram-positives relies on peptidic molecules, whereas in gram-negatives is driven by small diffusible signals. Strategies based on QS inhibition have been proposed as alter-natives to antimicrobial therapies. Here, we investigate the antibiofilm potential of the lactonase enzyme Aii20J, previously reported as effective against biofilms of periodontal disease origin. We generated in vitro polymicrobial biofilms dominated by gram-positive taxa using supragingival samples from caries-free and caries-active children. The effect of Aii20J on the biofilms was evalu-ated regarding its biomass-reducing ability, as assessed with crystal violet assay, and its effects on the bacterial composition of the polymicrobial biofilms, as assessed by 16S community profiling. We describe significant biomass reductions upon Aii20J exposure without significant changes in bac-terial composition at the genus level. Our results support the use of Aii20J to prevent oral biofilm formation while highlighting the influence of the polymicrobial environment on bacterial commu-nities and their response to antibiofilm treatments.

Some key issues in AGN and galaxy formation are discussed. Very successful Unified Models explain much of the variety of AGN with orientation effects; ingredients are shadowing by a dusty “torus" and relativistic beaming. A spinoff result is described which is important for the formation of massive elliptical galaxies. It’s the most spectacular and unequivocal AGN feedback phenomenon known. This is the so-called “alignment effect" in powerful radio galaxies at z > 1. One of them is a BAL radio galaxy! I explain a very robust derivation of the reddening law for nuclear dust, which reveals a dearth of small grains. Then the quasistatic thin accretion disk model, thought by many to explain the energetically dominant optical/UV continuum, is thoroughly debunked. Much of this was known when the model was proposed 35 years ago. A new argument is given that trivially falsifies a huge superset of such models. It’s possible to see the central engine spectrum with the atomic and dust emission surgically removed! Few noticed this breakthrough work. The far IR dust emission in Cygnus A is 10% polarized, and so far high nuclear dust polarization is seen in all radio loud objects, but no radio quiet ones.

Deploying UAVs as aerial base stations is an exceptional approach to reinforce terrestrial infrastructure owing to their remarkable flexibility and superior agility. However, it is essential to design their flight trajectory effectively to make the most of UAV-assisted wireless communications. This paper presents a novel method for improving wireless connectivity between UAVs and terrestrial users through effective path planning. This is achieved by developing a goal-directed trajectory planning method using active inference. First, we create a global dictionary using TSPWP instances executed on various training examples. This dictionary contains letters representing available hotspots, tokens representing local paths, and words depicting complete trajectories and hotspot order. By using this world model, the UAV can understand the TSPWP’s decision-making grammar and how to use the available letters to form tokens and words at various levels of abstraction and time scales. With this knowledge, the UAV can assess encountered situations and deduce optimal routes based on the belief encoded in the world model. Our proposed method outperforms traditional Q-learning by providing fast, stable, and reliable solutions with good generalization ability.

Deep learning has been widely used in various tasks such as computer vision, natural language processing, and predictive analysis, recommendation systems in the past decade. However, practical scenarios often lack labeled data, posing challenges for traditional supervised methods. Semi-supervised classification methods address this by leveraging both labeled and unlabeled data to enhance model performance, but they face challenges in effectively utilizing unlabeled data and distinguishing reliable information from unreliable sources. This paper introduces ReliaMatch, a semi-supervised classification method that addresses these challenges by using a confidence threshold. It incorporates a curriculum learning stage, feature filtering, and pseudo-label filtering to improve classification accuracy and reliability. The feature filtering module eliminates ambiguous semantic features by comparing labeled and unlabeled data in the feature space. The pseudo-label filtering module removes unreliable pseudo-labels with low confidence, enhancing algorithm reliability. ReliaMatch employs a curriculum learning training mode, gradually increasing training dataset difficulty by combining selected samples and pseudo-labels with labeled data. This supervised approach enhances classification performance. Experimental results show that ReliaMatch effectively overcomes challenges associated with the underutilization of unlabeled data and the introduction of error information, outperforming the pseudo-label strategy in semi-supervised classification.

Micromobility has gained attention from policymakers, industry stakeholders, and academia; however, a comprehensive conceptualization of micromobility is still missing. Existing definitions are largely vehicle-centric: either listing modes or detailing vehicle characteristics. This paper addresses this gap by developing a ‘beyond vehicles’, multi-dimensional conceptualization of micromobility, accompanied by a novel socio-technical definition. Through a review of related concepts, combined with an analysis of the use and definitions of the term micromobility in publications, this study establishes a new conceptualization of micromobility. It incorporates human, social, and cultural dimensions, considers environmental, economic, infrastructure, vehicle technology, regulatory and policy aspects, and considerations for public health. Our definition of micromobility encompasses a wide range of mobility options typically used for shorter trips and manoeuvrable by an individual without motor assistance, at least for short distances. These modes are characterized by their ‘micro’ attributes, including low energy demand, environmental impact, and road space use relative to automobility. The conceptualization incorporates a range of micromobility modes, including fully human-powered (including walking), partially motor-assisted, and fully powered options. These modes typically operate at speeds not exceeding 25 to 32 kilometres per hour (or 45 km/h for faster options), weigh (typically substantially) below 350 kilograms and often yield significant (public) health benefits. Trip length is generally less than 15 kilometres, and daily distances under 80 kilometres. Importantly, our definition includes the practices, policies, cultures, and infrastructures that emerge around the use of micromobility options and shape their uptake. This proposed conceptualization significantly broadens the prevailing vehicle-focus in micromobility debates towards a socio-technical perspective. Embracing a widely accepted conceptualisation of micromobility would offer several advantages, including robust design standards, legislation, and evaluation metrics and methods. Additionally, this paper highlights the pivotal role micromobilities can play in transcending the limitations of automobility, towards more sustainable and equitable mobility futures.

Bhutan located in the Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region consists of several glaciers and glacial lakes at higher elevations.  With the rapid change in global temperature, glaciers are found to melt at an accelerated rate. This rapid melt of glaciers gets accumulated in weak moraine walls forming a glacial lake, posing a major threat to the downstream communities. As per the Bhutan Glacial Lake Inventory 2021, Bhutan has 567 glacial lakes. Furthermore, the Phochhu basin has the maximum glacial lakes (0.05%) and of which 9 are PDGL. Hence a need for a time monitoring system is imminent. With the availability of free High-resolution Satellite Imageries and Advanced Remote Sensing tools, it has been a sine qua no for monitoring glacial lakes in high areas. Therefore, using the Google Earth Engine and Qgis Platform a semi-automated technique was used to generate glacial lake inventories for Phochhu Sub-basin for the year 2021.  We found out that there are 166 glacial lakes covering an area of 24.051 km2.

The free energy principle (FEP) is a mathematical and scientific principle that describes the relationship between the physical behavior of a dynamical system and the interpretation of such behavior as carrying out inference. It blurs the boundary between the ontological mode of the system of interest and the epistemological significance it acquires through its dynamic interaction with the environment. New materialism (or neo-materialism), despite lacking a single definition, refers to a range of emerging perspectives that attempt to dismantle the long-held divisions between ontology, epistemology, and even ethics, with the aim of achieving a comprehensive transformation of naturalized thinking. In this context, new materialism provides powerful tools to reframe some of the conceptual foundations of the FEP. This paper is the first in a series that aims to systematically construct a neo-materialistic perspective for the FEP, exploring its wide-ranging implications. It serves as an introduction to the series, arguing for the justification of deploying new materialism to reframe the FEP and introducing some essential concepts to be utilized in developing a neo-materialistic account of the FEP.

Alginate films (2% w·v-1) were prepared with varying concentrations (5-20% w/w) of citric acid and aqueous grape seed extract (GSE) filtrate (11.66 ± 1.32 g GAE/L) by the solvent-evaporation method. Crosslinking alginate via ester bonds (FTIR analysis) with citric acid up to 10% (w/w) led to a 33% increase in tensile strength, a 34% reduction in water vapor transmission rate (WVTR), and had no impact on elongation at break. Crosslinking alginate with citric acid in presence of GSE increased the tensile strength by 17%, decreased WVTR by 21%, and significantly improved DPPH scavenging activity. Moreover, after incubation for 24 h at 37°C, the film-forming solutions exhibited increased antimicrobial activity, resulting in 0.5 and 2.5-log reductions for Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus, respectively, compared to the values obtained without the addition of GSE. The stronger inhibitory effect observed against Gram-positive bacteria can be attributed to the unique composition and structure of their cell walls, which create a barrier that restricts the penetration of polyphenols into the cells. pH adjustment of the GSE film-forming solution from 2.0 to 10.0 shifted the UV/VIS absorption spectra, resulting in a colour change from yellow to red. The findings of this study have showcased the potential of combining GSE and citric acid to enhance the functionality and bioactivity of alginate films for applications in smart food packaging.

The paper proves a theorem about the structure of the distribution function on which the extremum of fractionally linear functional is reached in the presence of an uncountable number of linear constraints. The problem of finding an extremal distribution function arises when determining the optimal control strategy in a class of Markov homogeneous randomized control strategies. The structure of extremal functions is described by a finite number of parameters, hence the problem is greatly simplified since it is reduced to the search for an extremum of some function.

Blazars are a subclass of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) having relativistic jets aligned within a few degrees of our line-of-sight and form the majority of the AGN detected in the TeV regime. The Fermi-Large Area Telescope (LAT) is a pair-conversion telescope, sensitive to photons having energies between 20 MeV-2 TeV, and is capable of scanning the entire gamma-ray sky every three hours. Despite the remarkable success of the Fermi mission, many questions still remain unanswered, such as the site of gamma-ray production and the emission mechanisms involved. The Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) is a high cadence all sky survey system optimized to be efficient for finding potentially dangerous asteroids, as well as in tracking and searching for highly variable and transient sources, such as AGN. In this study, we investigate possible correlations between the \textit{Fermi}-LAT observations in the 100 MeV-300 GeV energy band and the ATLAS optical data in the R-band, centered at 679 nm, for a sample of 18 TeV-detected northern blazars over 8 years of observations between 2015-2022. Under the assumption that the optical and gamma-ray flares are produced by the same outburst propagating down the jet, the strong correlations found for some sources suggest a single-zone leptonic model of emission.

Food saving and further valorization is of major interest in our days. Worldwide, scientists intensify their efforts to increase shelf life of products due to the global danger of coming food crisis. Even though many chemicals could achieve such target, the circular economy spirit and the global trend against the greenhouse effects impose the turn of research activities using environmentally friendly biomass materials, biowastes, and biodegradable materials. In this study, the promising biopolymer chitosan incorporated with the promising biodegradable polymer poly-vinyl-alcohol to produce a biopolymeric matrix. This biodegradable biopolymer was further mixed homogeneously with 15% thymol/nano-zeolite nanohybrid material and the final developed film was extremely improved compared to the relevant of chitosan/poly-vinyl-alcohol film. Mechanical properties were increased significantly i.e., 34% for Young Modulus and 46,5% for ultimate tensile strength, while the antioxidant activity increased by 53,4%. The antibacterial activity increased by 134% for Ecoli, 87,5% for Saureus, 32% for Lmonocytogenes, and 9% for Senterica. The water-vapor diffusion coefficient and the oxygen permeability coefficient decreased down to -51% and -74% respectively, and thus the water-vapor and oxygen barrier increased. In-vivo experiments on strawberries show an extension of 233% for shelf-life duration which resulted from the modified atmosphere by the control-released thymol.

Due to the accelerated development of the offshore method of oil production in recent decades, especially in the Arctic region, the risks of crude oil pollution of the waters of the World Ocean are inevitably increasing. These oil spills during the exploitation of shelf deposits, transportation of oil from production sites and other anthropogenic impacts have a devastating impact on the marine biosphere, economy and life of coastal regions. For operative monitoring of water surface and fixation of oil spills it is necessary to use modern, effective and reliable methods, remote monitoring tools. One of such methods is radar. This article deals with increasing the efficiency of the radar method of water surface monitoring by means of constructive modification of the radar antenna array and changing the shape of the radio signal. As a result of the literature review, theoretical analysis of radar and conducted mathematical modeling it is substantiated the increase of radar monitoring efficiency by using phased active antenna array and construction of the cosecant-squared pattern diagram of the radio signal.

In this paper, the Phase-Scheduled-Command FXLMS algorithm with the phase error between the disturbance and command signal is analyzed in detail. The influence of the phase error on the convergence time constant, convergence rate, and performance of convergence is explained for both stationary and nonstationary disturbance signals case. For stationary disturbance, the phase error slightly increases the convergence rate but heavily increases the distance of the optimum vector from the initial value, leading to poor convergence time constant performance. For nonstationary disturbance, the existence of phase error leads to poor convergence performance in every step, resulting in poor sound profiling performance. And the estimation of the phase error influence is developed in the closed form. Simulations are performed to demonstrate the validity of the analysis results.

Nowadays, bioeconomy and nanotechnology trends push food packaging sector in the re-placement of food additives by biobased antioxidant/antibacterial compounds and their inclusion in nanocarriers to control their release. Herein by following this trend, a rich in thymol-(TO) activated carbon (AC) nanostructure (TO@AC) was prepared and physiochemically characterized with various technics. This TO@AC nanostructure as well as pure AC were extruded with low density polyethylene (LDPE) to develop novel active packaging LDPE/TO@AC and LDPE/AC films. X-ray diffractometry, Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy and Scanning Electron Microscopy measuraments shown high dispersity and capability of both AC and TO@AC in LDPE matrix which was resulted in enhanced tensile and water/oxygen barrier properties of obtained LDPE/AC and LDPE/TO@AC films. LDPE/TO@AC films shown higher elongation at break values and water/oxygen barrier than LDPE/AC films and significant antioxidant activity. TO release kinetics studies shown that by increasing TO@AC content the total TO amount released increased and the constant release rate decreased. Pork fillets wrapped with the optimum active film containing 15 wt.% TO@AC and succeed to prevent lipid oxidation and heme iron loss during storage. Estimation of microbial population of pork fillets shown that this active film could ex-tend the microbiological shelf-life of pork fillets by 2 days

Environmental psychology plays an important role in the overall development of human mental health. Student activism and health concerns also arose about the human health costs associated with a healthy built environment. This research focuses on recent design "trends", active design, and their relationship to environmental psychology and campus health. This study investigates how an active design approach can improve the environmental psychology of universities to achieve a healthy campus for students to be healthy. The total student participants are 428, 176 male (41.2%) and 251 female (58.8%), from ten university campuses. The methodology is a questionnaire survey including an active design approach based on physical activity categories with SPSS analyses. The results of this study revealed that only 19.7% of students were active on campus, 74.6% active off campus, and 5.7% active on and off campus. Students are more interested in social activity than in mental and physical activity. In addition, the ob-stacles to students' physical inactivity are lack of time, opportunities on campus and the psychological feeling of anxiety, depression and tension due to social activity and work performance in universities. In conclusion, a model is designed to demonstrate the relationship between environmental psychology and active design variables

Recently, there is a growing need for sensors that can operate autonomously, without the need for an external power source. This is especially important in applications where conventional power sources, such as batteries, are impractical or difficult to replace. Self-powered sensors have emerged as a promising solution to this challenge, offering a range of benefits such as low cost, high stability, and environmental friendliness. One of the most promising self-powered sensor technologies is L-S TENG, which stands for the liquid-solid triboelectric nanogenerator. This technology works by harnessing the mechanical energy generated by external stimuli such as pressure, touch, or vibration, and converting it into electrical energy that can be used to power sensors and other electronic devices. Therefore, self-powered based on L-S TENG, which provides numerous benefits such as rapidly responding, portability, cost-effectiveness, and miniaturization, is critical for increasing living standards and optimizing industrial processes. In this review paper, the working principle with three basic modes has been briefly introduced firstly. After that, affecting parameters to L-S TENG are reviewed based on the properties of the liquid and solid phases. With different working principles, L-S TENG has designed a lot of structure that works as a self-powered sensor for pressure/force change, liquid flow motion, concentration, and chemical detection or biochemical sensing. Moreover, the continuous output signal of TENG plays an important role in a real-time sensor that is vital to the growth of the Internet of Things.

The present article describes a one-pot and cascade mode process using biocompatible/biodegradable reagents, for directly and simply obtaining surfactant compositions of mixtures of D-mannuronic acid and L-guluronic acid directly from oligoalginates or semi-refined alginates (mixtures of alginate, cellulose, hemicellulose, laminaran and fucan). Simple treatments of partial purification of the reaction crudes (elimination of the salts and/or the residual fatty alcohols) or isolation of the surfactant compositions result in derived compounds and in compositions having performance levels appropriate to applications in detergency. In addition, the challenging extension of this cascading one-pot synthesis technology to crude milled brown seaweeds was successfully carried out to provide promising surface-active compositions made up of alkyl uronate and alkyl glycoside monosaccharides.

FACTS devices provide significance to enhance the functioning of both static and dynamic power systems. The type, size, and location of FACTS devices determine how well they achieve the goals of enhancing voltage stability, loadability, and loss minimization simultaneously. The aim of the function in this study includes voltage stability, line loadings, and loss minimization, which are expected to obtain the most benefits from their installation and other weights allocated to them. It has been determined how installing TCSC, and SVC will improve loadability under situations of continuously increasing load. In this study, a novel optimization technique known as differential evolution invasive weed optimization (DEIWO) is utilized to locate the optimal location for FACTS devices within the IEEE 14 bus system by considering valve point effects. DEIWO was a recently developed, dominant, and simple metaheuristic algorithm for genuine parameter optimization. DEIWO was inspired by the natural process of weed colonization and dissemination, and it is highly effective at addressing broad multi-dimensional, linear and nonlinear optimization problems. The proposed method was implemented in the IEEE 14 bus testing system. Different methods from the research papers have been used to compare and analyze the results. The results demonstrate the DEIWO algorithm's capability and show how it may be used in practice to locate FACTS devices in deregulated electricity networks in the most advantageous place. A comparison of the proposed process to existing algorithms found in the literature and implemented using traditional techniques reveals that it performs better in terms of precision and convergence

We present a crack-free optically active SiO2 glass-composite material containing YAG:Ce synthesized by a modified sol-gel technique. A glass-composite material consisting of yttrium aluminum garnet doped with Ce3+ (YAG:Ce) entrapped into a SiO2 xerogel. This composite material has been prepared by sol–gel technique with modified gelation and drying process to obtain crack-free optically active SiO2 glass. The concentration of the YAG:Ce was from 0.5 to 2.0 wt%. All synthesized samples were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscope (SEM) techniques. The luminescence properties of the obtained materials were studied.

In permafrost regions, ground surface deformations induced by freezing and thawing threaten the integrity of the built environment. Mapping the frost susceptibility of the ground at a high spatial resolution is of practical importance for the construction and planning sectors. We processed Sentinel-1 Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) data from thawing seasons 2015 to 2019, acquired over the area of Ilulissat, West Greenland. We used a least-squares inversion scheme to retrieve the average seasonal displacement (S) and long-term deformation rate (R). We secondly investigated two different methods to extrapolate active layer thickness (ALT) measurements, based on their statistical relationship with remotely-sensed surface characteristics. A Generalized Linear Model (GLM) was first implemented, but the model was not able to fit the data and represent the ALT spatial variability over the entire study domain. ALT were alternatively averaged per vegetation class, using a land cover map derived by supervised classification of Sentinel-2 images. We finally estimated the active layer ice content and used it as a proxy to map the frost susceptibility of the ground at the community scale. Fine-grained sedimentary basins in Ilulissat were typically frost susceptible and subject to average seasonal downward displacements of 3 to 8 cm. Areas following a subsiding trend of up to 2.6 cm/yr were likely affected by permafrost degradation and melting of ground ice below the permafrost table. Our approach enabled us to identify frost-susceptible areas subject to severe seasonal deformations, and/or long-term subsidence induced by degrading permafrost. Used in combination with traditional site investigations, InSAR maps provide valuable information for risk management and community planning in the Arctic.

The third trimester of pregnancy is the most critical period for human brain development, during which significant changes occur in the morphology of the brain. The development of sulci and gyri allows considerable increase of the brain surface. In premature childrens, these alterations take place outside the womb that may cause a disruption of the normal brain maturation process. We hypothesize that a normalized atlas of brain maturation with cerebral ultrasound images from birth to term equivalent age will help clinicians assess these changes. This work proposes a semi-automatic GUI platform for segmenting the main cerebral sulci in the clinical setting from ultrasound images. This platform has been obtained from images of a cerebral ultrasound neonatal database images provided by two clinical researchers from the Hospital Sant Joan de Déu in Barcelona, Spain. The primary objective is to provide a user-friendly design platform for clinicians, for running and visualizing an atlas of images validated by medical experts. This GUI offers different segmentation approaches, pre-processing tools, and is friendly designed for running, visualizing images, and segmenting the principal sulci. The presented results are discussed in detail in this paper, providing an exhaustive analysis of the proposed approach’s effectiveness.

The worldwide population is undergoing a fundamental change in its age structure, which challenges the health and social services system. The need to migrate towards a more person-centered and coordinated model of care that supports the optimization of abilities and capacities for older people has to be matched. In this sense, eHealth technologies can play a fundamental role. In this paper, through a questionnaire-based data collection on 30 primary (older people) and 32 secondary (informal caregivers) end-users, we share the sustainable way to develop a product optimizing the user experience and ensuring adoption. Both older adults and caregivers consider the use of smartphone and smartwatch to be very important, but also the use of digital devices for healthcare can be helpful. Seniors care about self-monitoring of health parameters using wearable devices, regardless of their health status, and would like to be included in the process of making good health decisions, because they need to feel in control of their healthcare process. Digital solutions in health and care can support the wellbeing of older adults in many areas of their daily lives at home and in their communities, but only if such innovation is designed around the natural voice of the intended target.

Future climate change is expected to affect components of the hydrological cycle. However geologic factors can sometimes be more important than the climate with regarding to change hydrological processes. The Keriya River is a large glacier-fed river in the western Tibet Plateau, its upper reaches flow across active fault zones, which have experienced four medium-sized earthquakes within four months 1974. These active faults have made difficult to identify normal meltwater changes using a snow-ice melt model. Because of the seismic events, the river has experienced substantial changes in their drainage systems and complex hydrological processes. Both the Mann-Kendall trend test and a correlation analysis were applied to detect the monthly patterns of stream flows, the change points and the correlations among both summer discharge and air temperature before and after seismic events. We found significant correlations between monthly air temperature and meltwater flow in the summer June during the pre-earthquake of 1958-1974, but none in July and August in the post-earthquake of 1975-1980, and we found no correlation following the earthquake. The correlations were the inverse by losing the former and setting up the latter alternately since the multiple earthquakes. Clearly, the earthquakes and changes in the faults can greatly induce hydrological processes.

The objective of this pilot study was to compare glucose concentrations in capillary blood (CB) samples analysed in a laboratory by a validated method and glucose concentrations measured in the interstitial fluid (ISF) by continuous glucose monitoring under different physical activity levels in a postprandial state in healthy and active subjects without diabetes. Ten healthy, active subjects (26±4 years, 67±11 kg bodyweight (BW), 11±3 h) were included in the study. Within 14 days, they underwent six tests consisting of a) resting fasted (R/Fast), b) resting after intake of 1 g glucose/kg BW (R/Glc) and c) running for 60 minutes at moderate (65/Glc) and d) high (85/Glc) intensity after intake of 1 g glucose/kg BW. Data were collected in the morning, following a standardised dinner before test day. Sensor-based glucose concentrations were compared to simultaneous capillary blood glucose concentrations. Pearson’s r correlation coefficient was highest for R/Glc (.92, p<.001) compared to R/Fast (.45, p<.001), 65/Glc (.60, p<.001) and 85/Glc (.70, p<.001). Mean absolute relative deviation (MARD) and standard deviation (SD) was smallest for resting fasted and similar between all other conditions (R/Fast: 8±6%, R/Glc: 17±12%, 65/Glc: 22 ± 24%, 85/Glc: 18±17%). However, Bland-Altman plot analysis showed a higher range between lower and upper limits of agreement (95% confidence interval) of paired data under exercising compared to resting conditions. Under resting fasted conditions, both methods produce similar outcomes. Under resting postprandial and exercising conditions, respectively, there are differences between both methods. However, further data in healthy subjects need to be gathered considering physical activity and nutrition status.

In eutrophic waters, such as Mikawa Bay, Japan, anoxic bottom water develops in summer. This causes sulfide release into seawater by sulfate reduction in the sediment, leading to environmental problems. The addition of iron to sediments is a method used to improve the sediment environment, which was devised from a natural phenomenon. However, this method has not yet been quantitatively evaluated. In this study, we aim to quantitatively evaluate the suppressive effect of iron on sulfide release. First, we develop a sediment model that focuses on S and Fe. We then attempted to reproduce the observations and experiments on sulfide dynamics using the model. Consequently, the proposed model was able to reproduce field sulfur and Fe dynamics in sediments. Additionally, the model described the characteristics of sulfide release considering the effects of additive iron materials. Finally, we conducted predictive calculations and quantitatively evaluated the effects of adding iron materials to the sediments in terms of sulfur and iron cycles.

A printed Vivaldi antenna that is optically transparent, ultra-wideband (UWB), and reconfigurable has been developed, fabricated, and tested at millimeter wave frequencies. It covers a broad frequency range of 20-30 GHz by using three PIN diodes. The diodes control the current flow to direct the beam of the antenna. The results of numerical simulations and measurements match at millimeter wave frequencies. The design of this antenna is unique as it allows for a reduction in size and ease of integration while also providing the ability to change the radiation pattern by up to 300 degrees, making it suitable for 5G and 6G communications. Additionally, this antenna can also be useful for RF applications that require dynamic switching of radiation patterns and cognitive radio.

A class of nearly Sasakian manifolds is considered. We discussion geometric effects of some symmetries on such manifolds, and show, under a certain condition, that the class of Ricci-symmetric nearly Sasakian manifolds is a subclass of Einstein manifolds. We prove that a nearly Sasakian space form with Ricci tensor satisfying the Codazzi equation is either a Sasakian manifold with a constant $\phi$-holomorphic sectional curvature $\mathcal{H}=1$ or a $5$-dimensional proper nearly Sasakian manifold with a constant $\phi$-holomorphic sectional curvature $\mathcal{H}>1$. We also prove that the spectrum of the operator $H^{2}$ generated by the nearly Sasakian manifold is a set of simple eigenvalue $0$ and an eigenvalue of multiplicity $4$. We show that there exist integrable distributions on the same manifolds with totally geodesic leaves, and prove that there are no proper nearly Sasakian space forms with constant sectional curvature.

In this paper, we have constructed a WKB approximation for graphene having a Y-shaped Kekul\'e lattice distortion and a special folding of the $\mbox{\boldmath$K$}$ and $\mbox{\boldmath$K$}^\prime$ valleys, which leads to very specific linear energy dispersions with two non-equivalent pairs of subbands. These obtained semi-classical results, which include the action, electron momentum and wave functions, are utilized to analyze the dynamics of electron tunneling through non-square potential barriers. In particular, we explore resonant scattering of an electron by a potential barrier built on Kekul\'e-distorted graphene. Mathematically, a group of consecutive equations for a semi-classical action have been solved by following a perturbation approach under the condition of small strain-induced coupling parameter $\Delta_0 \ll 1$ (a good fit to its actual value $\Delta_0 \backsim 0.1$). Specifically, we consider a generalized model for Kek-Y graphene with two arbitrary Fermi velocities. The dependence of the electron transmission amplitude on the potential profile $V(x)$ and band parameters of Kekul\'e-patterned graphene has been explored and analyzed in details.

As semi-airborne mineral exploration has limited budgets, it is critical to design experimental procedures that generate data maximizing the desired information We investigate the effects of transmitter-receiver geometries for a variety of anomalies and semi-airborne layouts. Our simulations indicate that 200 m flight line spacing and 100 m point distance are the optimal trade-off between coverage and survey progress for various targets. Based on the target size and distance between the transmitter and the target, the transmitter length should be at least equal to the length of the target and for more than 1 km, at least two or three times the target size. Likewise important are the location and direction of the transmitter cables, which can have great impact on the result of inversion and should be parallel to the target strike. By using more than one transmitter, better results are obtained. If the strike of the target is known, transmitters should be parallel to each other and if not, it is better to use perpendicular transmitters. Results showed that the optimal distance between transmitters is 3 km. Our simulations show that it is even possible to recover targets just below the transmitter in corresponding areas of masked data.

Essential oils have demonstrated antiviral activity, but their toxicity can hinder their use as therapeutic agents. Recently, some essential oil components have been used within safe levels of acceptable daily intake limits without causing toxicity. The "ImmunoDefender," a novel antiviral compound made from a well-known mixture of essential oils, is considered highly effective in treating SARS-CoV-2 infections. The components and doses were chosen based on existing information about their structure and toxicity. Blocking the Main Protease (Mpro) of SARS-CoV-2 with high affinity and capacity is critical for inhibiting the virus's pathogenesis and transmission. In-silico studies were conducted to examine the molecular interactions between the main essential oil components in "ImmunoDefender" and SARS-CoV-2 Mpro. The screening results showed that six key components of ImmunoDefender formed stable complexes with Mpro via its active catalytic site with binding energies ranging from -8.75 to -10.30 kcal/mol, respectively for Cinnamtannin B1, Cinnamtannin B2, Pavetannin C1, Syzyginin B, Procyanidin C1, and Tenuifolin. Furthermore, three essential oil bioactive inhibitors, Cinnamtannin B1, Cinnamtannin B2, and Pavetannin C, have a significant ability to bind to the allosteric site of the main protease with binding energies of -11.12, -10.74, and -10.79 kcal/mol, These results suggest that these essential oil bioactive compounds may play a role in preventing the attachment of the translated polyprotein to Mpro, inhibiting the virus's pathogenesis and transmission. These components also had drug-like characteristics similar to approved and effective drugs, suggesting further pre-clinical and clinical studies are needed to confirm the generated in-silico outcomes.

Women have been leading organizations and communities for centuries, but their journeys in leadership have sometimes been challenging. This paper aims to reflect on women's positive and negative experiences in leadership roles and understand the factors contributing to their successes and challenges.To explore these issues, we will draw on various academic literature, including studies on gender and leadership and case studies of women in leadership positions. We will also examine the cultural and social factors that affect women's experiences in leadership, including bias and discrimination, societal expectations, and work-life balance challenges.One key theme from this analysis is the importance of role models and support networks in helping women succeed in leadership roles. Women with access to mentorship, sponsorship, and peer networks are more likely to thrive in their roles and overcome the challenges they may face. However, lacking female role models and mentors can make it difficult for women to advance in their careers and contribute to feelings of isolation and imposter syndrome.Another important theme is the need for organizations and society to address systemic biases and discrimination that prevent women from reaching their full potential. This can include initiatives such as unconscious bias training, flexible work arrangements, and policies that support gender diversity and inclusion.In conclusion, this paper highlights women's positive and negative experiences in leadership roles and emphasizes the need for ongoing efforts to support and empower women in leadership. By addressing the challenges women face and building a culture of inclusion and support, organizations and society can help unlock the full potential of women leaders and create a more equitable and just world.

This research paper aimed to explore the impact of childhood and adolescent experiences on the leadership development of Emirati women in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Using a qualitative research methodology, the study utilized in-depth narrative semi-structured interviews, document analysis, and diary writing to understand the complex issue of leadership development. Findings indicate that childhood and adolescent experiences, including family upbringing, education, culture, and societal expectations, have significant impacts on the leadership development of Emirati women. Specifically, family upbringing and cultural values shape Emirati women's leadership aspirations and behaviors, while education and societal expectations provide opportunities and barriers for women's leadership development. The implications of these findings for policymakers and practitioners seeking to promote women's leadership development in the UAE are discussed.

The availability of sufficient amounts of form I of benzocaine has led to the investigation of its phase relationships with the other two existing forms II and III using adiabatic calorimetry, powder X-ray diffraction, and high-pressure differential thermal analysis. The latter two forms were known to have an enantiotropic phase relationship with form III stable at low-temperature and high-pressure, while form II is stable at room temperature. Using adiabatic calorimetry data, it can be concluded, that form I is the stable low-temperature, high-pressure form, which also happens to be stable at room temperature; however, form II, due to its persistence at room temperature, is still the most convenient polymorph to use in formulations. Form III presents a case of overall monotropy and does not possess any stability domain in the pressure-temperature phase diagram. Heat capacity data for benzocaine have been obtained by adiabatic calorimetry from 11 K up to 369 K above its melting point, which can be used to compare to results from in-silico crystal structure prediction.

Semi-structured complex numbers H was a number set developed to enable division by zero in ordinary algebraic equations. Its utility has been shown in mathematics and engineering. However, very little has been done to show its usefulness in computer science. Consequently, the aim of this paper was to show the utility of semi-structured complex numbers in computer science by developing a division by zero calculator. First two computer programs were written, one for a standard (STD) calculator and the other for a division by zero (DBZ) calculator. The programs were fed 20000 randomly generated arithmetic equations of varying lengths and the space and time complexity associated with processing these equations were measured and compared to determine the efficiency of each calculator. In the process, three major contributions were made: (1) A representation for semi-structured complex numbers that enables it to be easily used by a computer was developed; (2) It was demonstrated that the DBZ calculator outperforms the STD calculator in terms of efficiency; and, (3) It was shown that the number set H reduced the amount of error handling required to run a computer program. These results provide a firm foundation to advance the number set as a useful tool in computer science.

Sesquiterpene lactones (STLs) are a large group of terpenoids most commonly found in plants of the Asteraceae family, e. g. in chicory plants, displaying a wide range of interesting biological activities. However, further studies on the biological potential of chicory derived STLs and analogues are challenging as only four of these molecules are commercially available (as analytical standards), and to date there are no published or patented simple extraction-purification processes capable of large scale STLs isolation. In this work we describe a novel three-step large scale extraction and purification method for the simultaneous purification of 11,13-dihydrolactucin (DHLc) and lactucin (Lc) starting from a chicory genotype rich in these STLs and in the corresponding glycosyl and oxalyl conjugated forms. After a small-scale screening on 100 mg of freeze-dried chicory root powder, the best results were achieved with a 17 h water maceration at 30°C. With these conditions we managed to increase the content of DHLc and Lc, at the same time favouring the hydrolysis of their conjugated forms. On a larger scale, the extraction of 750 g of freeze-dried chicory root powder, followed by a liquid-liquid extraction step and a reversed-phase chromatography, allowed the recovery of 642.3 ± 76.3 mg of DHLc and 175.3 ± 32.9 mg of Lc. The two pure STLs were subsequently used in the context of semi-synthesis to generate analogues for biological evaluation as antibacterial agents. In addition, other described chicory STLs that are not commercially available were also synthesized or extracted to serve as analytical standards for the study. In particular, lactucin-oxalate and 11,13-dihydrolactucin-oxalate were synthesized in two steps starting from Lc and DHLc, respectively. On the other hand, 11β,13-dihydrolactucin-glycoside was obtained after a MeOH/H₂O (70/30) extraction, followed by a liquid-liquid extraction step and a reversed-phase chromatography. Together, this work will help facilitate the evaluation of the biological potential of chicory derived STLs and their semisynthetic analogues.

Abstract Introduction: The mHealth active participant centred (MAPC) adverse events following immunisation (AEFI) surveillance is a promising area for early AEFI detection resulting in risk minimisation. Passive (spontaneous) AEFI surveillance is the backbone for vaccine pharmacovigilance, but has inherent drawbacks of under reporting, and requires strengthening with active surveillance methods. The Zimbabwe stimulated telephone assisted rapid safety surveillance (Zm-STARSS) randomized controlled trial (RCT) sought to evaluate the efficacy and feasibility of AEFI detection using a short message service (SMS) and computer assisted telephone interview (CATI) approach. Method: A multicentre Zm-STARSS RCT enrolled consented adult vaccinees or parents or guardians of children receiving vaccines, including COVID-19 vaccines, at study vaccination clinics. At enrolment study participants were randomised to either SMS-CATI group or control group. SMS prompts were sent on days 0-2 and 14 post-vaccination to SMS-CATI group to ascertain if a medical event following immunisation (MEFI) had occurred. However, no SMSs were sent to the control group. SMS-CATI group who responded “Yes” to SMS prompts were interviewed by research healthcare workers (RHCWs) who completed a CATI to determine if an MEFI/AEFI had occurred whilst an AEFI in control group was determined from passive AEFI reporting channels. The primary study outcome was the AEFI detection rate in the SMS-CATI group compared to the control group. Results: A total of 704 (31%) participants responded to the SMS prompts, with 75% (528/704) indicating “No” and 25% (176/704) "Yes” to experiencing a MEFI. However, 31% (55/176) who responded “Yes” did not complete a CATI survey, but 69% (121/176) did; and 64% (77/121) of these indicated negative to AEFI experience whilst 36% (44/121) were affirmative. There were no AEFI reported in control group participants. Zm-STARSS showed promising results in that the AEFI detection rate using SMS-CATI was 2% (44/2280) on an intention to treat cohort. Conclusion: Despite the low SMS response and CATI completion rate, we demonstrated that Zm-STARSS SMS system improves AEFI detection compared to passive AEFI surveillance. We recommend cost-effective multi-channel digital approaches for holistic pharmacovigilance to improve AEFI detection in LMICs for all vaccines.

A new low-pass filter (LPF) circuit with independent adjustment of various, incl. digitally controlled, pole frequency resistors, pole quality factor and transmission coefficient. The proposed low-pass filter is based on the use of the properties of a multi-differential operational amplifier that performs the functions of a signal adder. The peculiarity of the filter is that it has three inputs, with respect to which different transmission coefficients are implemented, incl. inverting (-1) and non-inverting (+1). To check these properties of a low-pass filter in the Micro-Cap environment, computer simulation of a specific circuit was performed on a multi-differential operational amplifier AD 8130. Mathematical expressions are given for the main parameters of the proposed low-pass filter, which allow parametric synthesis of elements of a specific circuit under given restrictions on the used element base.

A new circuit of a low-pass filter (LPF) is considered, which is switched on at the input of analog-to-digital converters to limit the spectrum of input signals. The peculiarity of the proposed low-pass filter is the independent adjustment of the pole frequency, the quality factor of the pole and the transmission coefficient by different resistors. Computer simulation performed in the Micro-Cap environment confirms these properties of the LPF. The basic mathematical expressions are obtained, which make it possible to carry out the parametric synthesis of the LPF circuit. It is shown that the sensitivity of the LPF transmission coefficient to changes in the parameters of the frequency-setting elements of the circuit is close to zero and depends only on the ratio of the resistances of the two resistors in the feedback circuit.

Recently, a paper was written to reformulate and strengthen the theory of semi-structured complex numbers H (a new number set invented to enable division by zero). Whilst the paper had profound results, the application of this number set in many areas of engineering and science has not been fully explored. Consequently, the aim of this paper was to establish the number set H as a useful mathematical tool by providing an amalgam of results arising from its application in several areas of engineering and science. In the process, this paper makes four major contributions: these are (1) determining the product of the gradients of a horizontal and vertical line; (2) developing new Euler formulas relating exponential, trigonometric and hyperbolic functions in the 3D semi-structured complex number Euclidean space; (3) establishing semi-structured complex numbers as a better extension of the complex number set than quaternions; (4) resolving singularities that may arise in engineering and science equations (because of division by zero) to develop reasonable conclusions in the absence of experimental data. These results and their applications provide a firm foundation to advance the number set H as a useful mathematical tool.

Reservoir in the Central Structural Zone of the Xihu Sag is the Huagang Formation, dominated by natural gas reservoirs, and the reservoir in the Western Slope Zone is the Pinghu Formation, dominated by light oil and wet gas. In this paper, the Gas Drive Water Displacement- Magnetic Resonance Imaging (GWD-MRI) experiments are used to simulate the charging characteristics of the sandstone migration layer. The centrifugal- Magnetic Resonance (Cen-NMR) experiments simulate the short-term fast trap charging process, and the Semi-Permeable Baffle (SPB) charging experiment simulates the slow trap accumulation process. Studies have shown that there is a start-up pressure for the migration layer charging, and the start-up pressure of the core with a permeability of 0.3mD is about 0.6MPa. Experimental simulations have confirmed that there is a front zone with changed water saturation, with a width of about 1-1.5cm. The migration layer charging mainly has two actions, drive effect and carry effect. The drive effect reduces the water saturation to 70%-80%, and the carry effect can still reduce the water saturation by 5%-10%. The water saturation of rapid charging is mainly affected by the petro-physical. The porosity is high, the water saturation is low. The water saturation decreased significantly with the increase of centrifugal force when the centrifugal force is smaller. If the centrifugal force is greater than 0.8 MPa, the water saturation decreases slowly. The water saturation of the trap slowly charging is basically maintained at 40%-50%, which matches the water saturation of the airtight coring from 40%-55%, the petro-physical do not affect the final water saturation.

In order to reduce the influence of ground vibration generated by tractor during driving and operation on driving stability and driver ride comfort, this paper proposes a control method of tractor active seat suspension based on model predictive control. By establishing a 3-degree of freedom tractor active seat suspension model and a ground excitation input model, a new model predictive controller for the active seat suspension system is designed. The vertical acceleration of the seat center of mass, the seat suspension stroke and the tire dynamic displacement are optimized by limiting the dynamic deflection of the seat suspension and the active force output of the actuator. The control model of MPC tractor active seat suspension system is built and its performance is simulated and verified. The results show that compared with the passive seat suspension and the PID seat suspension, the tractor active seat suspension based on model predictive control (MPC) has better damping characteristics and improves ride comfort.

Research and development on innovative packaging materials have advanced significantly to safeguard packaged food against microbial contamination and oxidation. To combat demanding issues, active packaging has evolved as a viable method for minimizing oxidation/microbial growth in packaged goods, extending their shelf life, and ensuring the consumer's safety. Active food packaging includes O2, CO2 scavengers, moisture absorbers, U.V. barriers, and carriers of antioxidant and antimicrobial agents. Various antimicrobial agents are carried and/or incorporated into food packaging formulations. Consumers demand natural antimicrobials over chemical/synthetic ones, such as bacteriocins, bacteriophages, and essential oils. Bacteriophages (viruses) have emerged as a feasible option for decontaminating and eliminating infections from food sources. These viruses can target specific food-borne pathogens without impairing beneficial bacteria and, most critically, without causing disease in humans or animals. Fortifying bacteriophages into food packaging films will not only kill specific food microorganisms but has evolved as a new weapon to combat antimicrobial-resistant (AMR) issues. The present review summarises recent developments in active antimicrobial packaging focused particularly on bacteriophage-food packaging applications and advantages, drawbacks, and future trends for active food packaging.

The emergence of various electronic devices and equipment such as electric vehicles and drones requires higher energy density energy storage devices. Lithium-sulfur batteries (LSBs) are considered as the most promising new generation energy storage system owing to high theoretical specific capacity and energy density. However, the severe shuttle behaviors of soluble lithium polysulfides (LiPSs) and the slow redox kinetics lead to low sulfur utilization and poor cycling stability, which seriously hinder the commercial application of LSBs. Therefore, various catalytic materials have been employed to solve these troublesome problems. High entropy materials (HEMs), as advanced materials, can provide unique surface and electronic structures that expose plentiful catalytic active sites, which opens new ideas for the regulation of LiPSs redox kinetics. Notwithstanding many instructive reviews in the land of LSBs, while this review aims to offer a complete and shrewd summary of the current progresses in HEMs-based LSBs, including in-depth interpretation of design principles and mechanistic electrocatalysis functions as well as pragmatic perspectives.

This study focuses on land cover and land management changes in relation to food security and environmental services in a semi-arid area of East Nusa Tenggara (ENT) – Indonesia. The study was conducted in Central Sumba District of ENT Province. Classification and regression tree (CART) for land cover classification has been analyzed using machine learning techniques using Google Earth Engine. A survey with Focus Group Discussion (FGD) and followed with in-depth interviews were conducted for primary data collection involving a total of 871 respondents. The Socio-economic data analyzed statistics descriptively and non-parametric tests. The study showed that: 1). There has been a substantial land use change during the devo-lution era that has both positive and negative implications for food security and envi-ronmental services. 2). There has been population pressure in the fertile or agricultur-al land as the direct impact of the development of city infrastructures; and 3). Nation-al intervention through the Food Estate program has fostered and shaped land use change and land management in Central Sumba District. The study highlights the importance that the devolution spirit should help to well manage the limited ara-ble/agricultural land in dominated semi-arid to ensure food security and environment services.

Solar cosmic rays (SCR) are generated during the primordial energy release in solar flares. This explosive process takes place in the solar corona above the active region. It represents fast release of the magnetic field energy of the current sheet, which is formed near a singular magnetic field line. Solar cosmic rays appear as a result of acceleration of charged particles, mainly protons, by an inductive electric field in the current sheet, equal to the field E=V´B/c near the current sheet. To study the mechanism of solar flares and obtain conditions for stydy SCR acceleration it is necessary to carry out magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulation of a flare situation in the solar corona above a real active region. The methods of stabilization were developed which made it possible to solve partially the problem of numerical instabilities. MHD simulations showed complicated configuration near the singular line. Comparison of the results of MHD simulations with observations showed a general agreement of the positions of the current sheets with regions of intense flare radiation. However, there are some problems with the details of such coincidences. The results show the possibility of improving the methods of MHD simulation in order to solve the arisen problems.

In this paper, in order to provide proper parameters for the preparation of semi-solid billets, the semi-solid annealing of hot-rolled 2A14 Al alloy was investigated. The microstructure was characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscope (SEM) with X-ray energy dispersive spectrometer (EDS) and electron backscattered diffraction (EBSD), scanning transmission electron microscope (STEM). XRD results show that with the increase of temperature, equilibrium θ-Al2Cu gradually dissolved in the matrix. The EDS results of SEM and STEM show that there were coarse θ-Al2Cu phase, ultra-fine precipitate Al(MnFeSi) or (Mn, Fe)Al6 phase and atomic clusters in the microstructure. EBSD results show that the recrystallization mechanism was dominated by continuous static recrystallization (CSRX), the homogeneous nucleation occurred when the sample was heated to near solidus temperature, and CSRX happened in the semi-solid temperature. In the process of recrystallization, the micro-texture changed from preferred orientation to random orientation. A variety of experimental results show that static recrystallization (SRX) occurred at semi-solid temperature due to the blocking effect of atomic clusters on dislocation slip and the Zener drag effect of fine precipitates on low angle grain boundaries (LAGBs) disappeared with melting at semi-solid temperature.

A cloud of relativistic material particles is considered, for which the distortions of length and time caused by the presence of the Lorentz factor an order of magnitude greater than curvature of space-time by gravity. The gravitational mass of the cloud is found in the region where its size is insignificant. It is established that the coefficient of dependence of the cloud mass on the total rest mass of its particles includes a complete elliptic integral of the 2nd kind.

This study investigates the power production and blade fatigue of a three-turbine array subjected to active yaw control (AYC) in full-wake and partial-wake configurations. A framework of two-way coupled large-eddy simulation (LES) and aeroelastic blade simulation is applied to simulate the atmospheric boundary-layer (ABL) flow through the turbine array and the structural responses of the turbine blades. Mean power outputs and blade fatigue loads are extracted from the simulation results. By exploring the feasible AYC decision space, we find that (a) in the full-wake configuration, the local power-optimal AYC strategy with positive yaw angles endures less flapwise blade fatigue and more edgewise blade fatigue than the global power-optimal strategy; (b) in the partial-wake configuration, applying positive AYC in certain inflow wind directions achieves higher optimal power gains than that in the full-wake scenario and reduces the blade fatigue from the non-yawed benchmark. Through a theoretical analysis based on the blade element momentum theory, we reveal that the aforementioned differences in flapwise blade fatigue between the positively and negatively yawed turbine are due to the differences in the azimuthal distributions of the local relative velocity on blade sections, resulting from the combined effects of vertical wind shear and blade rotation. Furthermore, the difference in the blade force between the positively and negatively yawed front-row turbine induces different wake velocity and turbulence distributions, causing different fatigue loads on the downwind turbine exposed to the wake.

The local and global order in dense packings of linear, semi-flexible polymers of tangent hard spheres are studied by employing extensive Monte Carlo simulations at increasing volume fractions. Chain stiffness is controlled by a tunable harmonic potential for the bending angle whose intensity dictates the rigidity of the polymer backbone as a function of the bending constant and equilibrium angle. The studied angles range from acute to obtuse ones, reaching the limit of rod-like polymers. We analyze how packing density and chain stiffness affect the ability of chains to self-organize at the local and global levels. The former corresponds to crystallinity as quantified by the Characteristic Crystallographic Element (CCE) norm descriptor, while the latter is computed through the scalar orientational order parameter. In all cases, we identify the critical volume fraction for the phase transition and gauge the established crystal morphologies, developing a complete phase diagram as a function of packing density and equilibrium bending angle. A plethora of structures is obtained, ranging from random hexagonal closed packed morphologies of mixed character and almost perfect face centered cubic (FCC) and hexagonal close-packed (HCP) crystals at the level of monomers, to nematic mesophases, with prolate and oblate mesogens at the level of chains. For rod-like chains, hysteresis is observed between the establishment of long-range nematic order and crystallization, while for right-angle chains both transitions are synchronized. A comparison is also provided against the analogous packings of monomeric and fully flexible chains of hard spheres.

This paper proposes how to reduce the consumption of active electrical energy (kwh) by 90.3% while maintaining the same mechanical work speed (RPM) at variable torque loads (fans or air-fluid blowers, centrifugal pumps are not included). of water and similar fluids), by using the “Fan Law” in an innovative way in PMSM-type synchronous motors (a comparative study never before carried out on the Fan Law). The work is carried out comparatively between brushless a-synchronous motors with starting loop (or motor with a short-circuited loop) versus brushed a-synchronous motors and PMSM-type synchronous motors without the need to use VDF (variable frequency drives), simplifying technology (electronics) and saving costs in an innovative way (R+D+i). The case study was developed on a design applied to a centrifugal air extractor/blower with PMSM/IPM type synchronous motor. Applying one of the fan affinity laws –with the impeller diameter 10.5 (mm) constant- the electrical power absorbed by the blower motor is proportional to the cube of the shaft speed: . Being “P” power (Watts) and “N” speed (RPM). Carrying out a comparative study between power (watts), active energy consumption (kwh) and rotational speed (RPM). This has a direct impact on the costs of residential and commercial single-phase active electrical energy consumption, measured in kilowatt-hours (kwh). Carrying out a comparative study between three (3) types of alternating current (AC) electrical machines, according to the NEMA (National Electrical Manufacturers Association); AC motors fall into three (3) categories. One (1), synchronous motors (Syncrhonous Motor) of three types: (1a) excitation by DC (DC Excited Motor), (1b) permanent magnet (Permanent Magnet Motor) and (1c) reluctance motor (Reluctance Motor) or motor Step by Step. Two (2), asynchronous induction motors of two types: (2a) Squirrel-Cage Induction Motor and (2b) Wound-Rotor Induction Motor. Three (3) series-wound motor (Series-Wound Motor) also called universal motor (they have carbons).

As an effective active remote sensing (ARS) technology for shallow underground targets, ground penetrating radar (GPR) is a detection method to obtain the characteristic information of underground targets by transmitting electromagnetic wave from the antenna and analyzing the propagation law of the electromagnetic wave underground. Due to the high frequency(1MHz-3GHz) of GPR, the depth of geological exploration is shallow(0.1m-30m). In order to remote sensing the deep earth, it is necessary to increase the size of the radiation source in order to reduce the radiation frequency. At the same time, for most separated GPRs, a single dipole antenna (SD) is used as the radiation source and another antenna device placed along the electromagnetic wave propagation direction in the far field as a remote sensing sensor (RSS), both of which are horizontally linearly polarized (LP) antennas. In some cases, such a design is apt to cause problems such as multipath effect (ME) and polarization mismatch (PM). When GPR in ARS of deep earth is performed, it often results in increased errors, signal attenuation during data reception and processing. In contrast, at the radiation source, with the use of large aperture multiple-dipole antennas (MD) and multi-channel sequential rotational excitation, the electromagnetic wave can radiate outward in the form of circular polarization at a low frequency. At the RSS, the trouble caused by ME and PM can be reduced even if the LP antennas are used. A novel sequential rotationally excited (SRE) circularly polarized (CP) MD array for separated GPR in ARS of deep earth is proposed in this paper, which uses a large aperture CP MD array instead of a small size LP SD. The analysis and simulation results demonstrate that under the premise of the same transmitting power, comparing circular polarization and linear polarization, by using SRE CP MD antennas array radiation source, a significant enhancement (about 7dB) of the Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) will occur by collecting the radiant energy at the RSS. More importantly, by reducing the exploration frequency to 10KHz, the exploration depth will also be greatly increased by about 10 times.

Personal Mobility Vehicle (PMV) which has an inward tilting angle turns with the lateral force due to large camber angle, so it is necessary to consider the lateral movement of the tire vertical load axis during turning. Although the steering torque mechanism are very different from those of automobiles, there are not many examples which studied the steering torque mechanism of PMV. In this paper, based on the effects of six components force acting on the tires, a method for setting the steering axis specifications is derived, including the geometrical minimization of steering moment disturbance due to the vertical load reaction force during turning. Although, automobile tires have a significant ground camber angle when traveling on rutted roads, they do not have it on slant roads because the vehicle body tilts along the road surface. On the other hand, in PMV, the vehicle body always keeps upright when traveling both on slanted roads and on rutted roads. Therefore, the tires have ground camber angles on both types of road surface. We study the straight running ability under such road surface disturbances based on the geometrical minimization of steering moment disturbance due to the vertical load reaction force during turning. This straight running ability can be a remarkable strong point of PMV with an inward tilt mechanism.

Structure–function relationships in proteins have been one of the crucial scientific topics. Heme proteins have diverse and pivotal biological functions. Therefore, clarifying their structure–function correlation is significant to understand their functional mechanism and is informative for various fields of science. In this study, we constructed convolutional neural network models for predicting protein functions from the tertiary structures of heme-binding sites (active sites) of heme proteins to examine the structure–function correlation. As a result, we succeeded in the classification of oxygen-binding protein (OB), oxidoreductase (OR), proteins with both functions (OB–OR), and electron transport protein (ET) with high accuracy. Although the misclassification rate for OR and ET was high, the rates between OB and ET and between OB and OR were almost zero, indicating that the prediction model works well between protein groups with very different functions. However, predicting the function of proteins modified with amino acid mutation(s) remains a challenge. Our findings indicate a structure–function correlation in the active site of heme proteins. This study is expected to be applied to the prediction of more detailed protein functions such as catalytic reactions.

This article describes the transition of an undirected active network, used for numerical and logical analysis, and made up of communicating operators and nodes, and being self-extensible, into a network of semantic structures, and the extensions necessary to handle language. The network, called Active Structure, was infused with knowledge in the form of tens of thousands of definitions taken from a human-readable dictionary. Where the dictionary fell short, from circularity, lack of a hierarchical form for its senses and sub senses, or inadequate detail around verbs, the entries were extensively curated. The result is a machine which has access to every meaning of every word in its vocabulary, and needs to manage the right meaning for every use of a word, a task that our unconscious minds now handle. To demonstrate that such a network can aspire to human-level tasks, we have begun loading an Anti-Money Laundering Act so that the machine can devise and test strategies against money launderers. There is a higher goal being aimed at, the breaking of the Four Pieces Limit. That is, the network is not intended to save money on human cognitive labor, but to raise an absurdly low limit on it.

Ion-complementary self-assembling peptides have been studied in many fields for their distinct advantages mainly due to their self-assembly properties. However, their shortcomings, such as insufficient specific activity and poor mechanical properties, also limited their application. For better and wider application of this kind of promising biomaterials, ion-complementary self-assembling peptides can be modified with their self-assembly properties not being destroyed to the greatest extent. The modification strategies were reviewed by taking RADA16-Ⅰ as an example. For the insufficient specific activity, RADA16-Ⅰ can be structurally modified with active motifs derived from the active domain of the extracellular matrix or other related active factors. For weak mechanical properties, materials with strong mechanical properties or materials that can undergo chemical crosslinking were used to mix with RADA16-Ⅰto enhance the mechanical properties of RADA16-Ⅰ. To improve the performance of RADA16-Ⅰ as drug carriers, appropriate adjustment of the RADA16-Ⅰ sequence and/ or modification of the RADA16-Ⅰ-related delivery system with polymer materials or specific molecules can be considered to achieve sustained and controlled release of specific drugs or active factors. The modification strategies reviewed in this paper may provide some references for the further basic research and clinical application of ion-complementary self-assembling peptides and their derivatives.

About a decade ago, active optical crop canopy sensors are being used to manage in-season variable nitrogen (N) fertilization in cornfields to match the plant demand that occurs mid season, increasing the efficiency compared to broadcast N applications. There were also initiatives of using ultrasonic sensors to measure plant height on-the-go for N application and crop water demand estimation, but no studies have integrated the optical, ultrasonic and canopy temperature for crop water stress assessment. The objective of this chapter is to evaluate the crop water status using infrared thermometry integrated with optical and ultrasonic sensors. Specifics objectives are: (i) evaluate the corn canopy temperature under different previous crop, N rates and irrigation levels; (ii) test a procedure for water stress assessment in commercial cornfields using the integration of sensors, (iii) correlate plant based sensor measurements (N status, plant height and canopy temperature) with grain yield, soil attributes and detailed topographical features, and (iv) study the spatial dependence of canopy temperature. This study was conducted in one small plot study area and on three producer’s fields in 2010. The small plot experiment consisted of two irrigation levels (70 and 100% of evapotranspiration – ET), two previous crop schemes (corn after corn – CC and corn after soybeans – CS), and four N rates (0, 75, 150, 225 kg N ha^-1). Canopy temperature, optical reflectance and plant height was measured from R2 until R6 in the small plots. At the producer’s fields, three long strips across center pivots were used to have a non-limited N and water crop and then continuous georeferenced sensors measurements were taken during side-dress (V11 growth stage) in about 10 hectares in each field. In the small plot study the crop canopy temperature was influenced by the irrigation levels and N rates. The procedure proposed could be used to identify zones in the producer’s field where water stress can be a yield limiting factor other than N derived. Inside the zones considered that water stress played a major whole, there were low correlations between plant height, plant N status and canopy temperature, indicating that the canopy temperature had more influence from water stress than vegetation cover. Concave and lower elevation areas had higher yields compared to convex and high elevation, showing that the detailed elevation mapping can be beneficial to delineate stables zones that possibly could be used in variable irrigation systems. The spatial dependence of canopy temperature was over 65 meters across producers’ sites, showing that the commercial high clearance applicator’s swath width was adequate to obtain accurate maps. The integration of plant N status, plant height and canopy temperature was beneficial to detect water stressed zones in the field. Opportunities can be foresee also for on-the-go N fertilization using integration of these sensors because is likely that water stress can be confounded with different N supply during the growing season and in different zones in the field.

(1)Aims of the study: calculating the underreporting ratio for two different medications, a fixed combination of 0.5% timolol + 0.2% brimonidine + 2.0% dorzolamide (antiglaucoma) and a fixed combination of sodium hyaluronate 0.1% + chondroitin sulfate 0.18% (artificial tear) and characterizing the features influencing the reporting of adverse drug reactions (ADRs) in spontaneous reporting; (2) Methods: the underreporting ratio was calculated by comparing the adverse drug reactions reported in the spontaneous reporting database for every 10,000 defined daily doses marketed and the adverse drug reactions from an active surveillance study for every 10,000 defined daily doses used for different drugs (antiglaucoma and artificial tear). The factors related to the report in spontaneous reporting through statistical tests were also determined; (3) Results: The underreporting ratio of spontaneous reporting was 0.006029% for antiglaucoma and 0.003552% for artificial tear; additionally, statistically significant differences were found for severity, unexpected adverse drug reactions, and incidence of adverse drug reactions in females; (4) Conclusions: The underreporting ratio of ADRs related to ophthalmic medications indicates worry since the cornerstone of pharmacovigilance focuses on spontaneous reporting. Besides, since underreporting seems to be selective, the role of certain aspects like gender, seriousness, severity, and unexpected ADRs, must be considered in future research.