Browse Articles

Development and validation of an interpretable machine learning model for predicting in-hospital mortality among critically ill patients with liver cirrhosis

Extropy analysis of the inactivity times of the failed components in coherent systems with applications to estimation and image processing

TVET teachers’ perceptions of ICT integration in resource-constrained teaching contexts: a qualitative thematic analysis of interviews from Hebei, China

Synthesis of methyldopa-copper nanoparticles with laccase mimics activity for colorimetric detection of norepinephrine

Abstract Copper-based nanozymes are increasingly used as artificial laccases, yet most rely on simple catechol ligands such as dopamine or gallic acid which provide limited control over metal coordination geometry and stability. In this work, we introduce methyldopa as a biomimetic bidentate ligand whose dual catechol-amine functionality closely reproduces the coordination environment of natural multicopper oxidases. This molecular design enables electronic tuning of the Cu(I)/Cu(II) redox cycle resulting in enhanced substrate affinity and exceptional thermal resilience. The prepared polymethyldopa-Cu nanoparticles (PMD-Cu NPs) exhibit robust laccase-like activity under near-physiological conditions catalyzing the oxidation of norepinephrine without additional oxidants. Beyond catalysis, the oxidation process provides an intrinsic colorimetric signal allowing simultaneous quantification and degradation of catecholamine pollutants as pyrogallol. Kinetic analysis ( K m = 45 µM; V max = 5.0 µM/ min) demonstrates excellent catalytic performance and favorable substrate affinity compared with previously reported Cu-catechol nanozymes. By coupling strong Cu-ligand chelation with redox-active molecular design, methyldopa permits the construction of durable multifunctional nanozymes. This approach establishes a pathway toward tunable laccase mimics for biosensing, green chemistry, and environmental remediation. In addition, the sustainability and analytical efficiency of the developed platform were evaluated using the newly introduced EPPI metric alongside BAGI tool confirming its eco-friendly nature, practical applicability, and strong analytical performance.

Application of machine learning decision tree based power switching control for a standalone PV system with grid support

Effectiveness of an educational intervention based on the health belief model on eco-driving behaviors among taxi drivers in Tehran

Inhibitory effects of 2′-nitroflavone and apigenin on EGFR signaling in breast cancer cells

The distribution and association of parasitic infections among human blood group in selected health facilities in Amhara National Regional State, Ethiopia: cross-sectional study, 2025

Germany’s youth city versus rural dwellers engage in more moderate-to-vigorous physical activity

Abstract Rapid urbanization poses the question how city living impacts human physical activity, especially in the population of vulnerable youth. This study aimed to examine urban–rural differences in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) among children and adolescents in Germany in a large German national study, across two independent samples (Discovery study: N  = 2734; Replication study: N  = 1196) of children and adolescents (6–17 years), with accelerometer-assessed MVPA, and across two different urbanicity assessments. In both studies, city youth engaged in more total MVPA than rural youth and were more likely to comply with the physical activity guidelines of the World Health Organization. While city living and total MVPA were independent of age and gender, age groups differed regarding physical activity guideline compliance. These results point towards a potential positive implication of urbanization for physical activity and suggest actions to target rural areas for physical activity promotion, if findings are validated towards causality in future studies.

Patient satisfaction with long-term cosmetic outcomes of transumbilical vs. periumbilical incisions in laparoscopic cholecystectomy

Association between handgrip strength and risk of all-cause mortality in peritoneal dialysis patients: a prospective cohort study

Cell wall stress delays yeast cell separation by altering septin dynamics and chitinase localization via the cell wall integrity pathway

Abstract The Cell Wall Integrity (CWI) MAPK pathway in Saccharomyces cerevisiae is crucial for coordinating adaptive responses to cell wall stress. We investigated the effects of zymolyase (ZY), a cell wall-perturbing agent, on cell morphology and cell separation. Our findings reveal that sublethal ZY treatment transiently delays mother-daughter cell separation, leading to multibudded cell clusters. This phenotype, which is accompanied by initiation of a new budding cycle before cell separation is complete, was observed with cell wall perturbations but not with osmotic, oxidative, or ER stress. Genetic and molecular analyses indicate that this cell separation defect depends on phosphorylation-dependent activation of Slt2, the MAP kinase of the CWI pathway. The phenotype is not fully mediated by the primary transcriptional regulator of the pathway, Rlm1, suggesting that Slt2-dependent outputs beyond canonical Rlm1 transcription contribute to the response. We also show that ZY treatment is associated with altered spatiotemporal localization and dynamics of septin rings, as well as changes in the intracellular trafficking of key septal proteins. Notably, delivery of the endochitinase Cts1 to the bud neck is delayed, and the residence time of the exocyst subunit Exo84 and the myosin Myo2 at the septum is reduced. Despite altered protein trafficking, the transcriptional program governed by the daughter-specific transcription factor Ace2 remains largely unaffected. Our data are consistent with a cell-separation delay resulting from a coordinated response involving the CWI pathway, which correlates with changes in septin dynamics and cytokinetic protein trafficking. These findings, which suggest a mechanism that transiently halts cell separation when cell wall integrity is compromised, highlight a link between cell wall homeostasis and the regulation of cell division in yeast.

Triglyceride-rich lipoprotein cholesterol is elevated in liver transplant recipients and associated with post-transplant diabetes

Walking stability prediction for pedestrians using gait energy images and hybrid deep and few-shot learning models

Abstract The prediction and recognition of unstable human walking patterns are of high importance for active video surveillance, smart environments, and assistive healthcare, particularly for fall detection in the elderly. This research investigates the utility of Gait Energy Images (GEIs) combined with deep learning, vision transformers, and few-shot learning architectures to enhance the classification of stable and unstable pedestrian walking patterns. We evaluate and compare twelve methodologies: six classical or feature-based machine learning models (Linear SVM, HOG + SVM, LBP + RBF-SVM, Random Forest, XGBoost, and an adapted GaitSet baseline), three deep learning models (MobileNet, Vision Transformer (ViT), and YOLOv8-cls), and three episodic few-shot learning techniques (Prototypical, Matching, and Relation Networks) under data-scarcity regimes. To facilitate this evaluation, we introduce the Unstable and Stable Walking Pedestrian (USWP) dataset, constructed by fusing and harmonizing sequences from seven public action recognition databases, containing 3250 unique GEIs with a subject-independent evaluation protocol to prevent identity-based domain leakage. Our experiments demonstrate that the YOLOv8-cls model achieves an overall accuracy of 96.92% (97.14% on Loss-of-Balance anomalies and 94.67% on Active Motion anomalies), significantly outperforming the conventional Linear SVM baseline (75.38%) and MobileNet (91.08%). Conversely, Relation Networks exhibit lower few-shot performance (71.08%) due to optimization complexities in learning similarity metrics from sparse data. Leave-One-Dataset-Out (LODO) cross-validation reveals an average generalization accuracy of 83.28%, indicating significant domain bias across source databases and underscoring that within-dataset evaluations overestimate real-world generalization. Computational complexity analysis shows that MobileNet provides an optimal trade-off for real-time edge deployment (4.2 ms latency), while preprocessing ablation studies demonstrate that integrating the Segment Anything Model (SAM) with MediaPipe-derived Regions of Interest (ROIs) yields a 12.50% absolute improvement in accuracy by eliminating background noise.

Injury and illness in non-football collegiate athletics: a single university, 8-year descriptive retrospective analysis

Abstract This study examines injury and illness incidence across all collegiate sports at a single institution to identify patterns and inform targeted future interventions. Reports from 23 teams from 2012 to 2013 to 2019–2020 were stratified by gender, sport, and anatomic location. A total of 1854 athletes sustained 4937 injuries, with 2444 (49.5%) in female athletes and 2493 (50.5%) in male athletes. Across all sports, injury rates were between 0.50 and 1.65 injuries per athlete per year. When comparing injuries in each body region by gender, women had an 8.76% higher incidence of lower extremity injuries compared with men ( p  < 0.001). Across all sports, injuries peaked near the beginning of the season, with each week having a 4.3% lower injury rate compared with the previous. Injury severity was not available in these analyses and should be considered when interpreting these data. In summary, injury rates varied significantly between sports but were largely comparable between genders when accounting for sport, body region, and year. The only observed gender difference was the 8.76% higher incidence of lower extremity injuries in women, highlighting the need for continued research in this area. Interestingly, the elevated injury rates at the start of training and competition seasons underscore the need to understand the balance between early-season training workloads and injury risk.

Influence of wheat flour refinement on oxidative modifications and pro‑inflammatory properties of amylase‑trypsin inhibitors

Abstract Amylase/trypsin inhibitors (ATIs), cereal proteins that confer natural resistance against pest and pathogen digestive enzymes, have been implicated in TLR4-mediated innate immune activation and wheat-related intolerances in vitro, though their causal role and genetic susceptibility factors in non-coeliac wheat sensitivity remains unclear. Given the established influence of the oxidation state of triggering proteins on TLR4 binding and activation, this study investigated how common industrial milling methods (roller versus stone milling) affect the proinflammatory potential of ATIs from a single commercial wheat variety. Integrated immunometric and targeted proteomic analyses showed that milling technology and processing parameters are critical determinants of the inflammatory potential of wheat flour, as they shape ATI redox status; notably, proinflammatory cytokine secretion paralleled oxidative modification rather than ATI abundance.

Keypoint detection and functional evaluation of human lower limbs based on YOLOv8 and HRNet

Ethnicity, geographic, and gender trends in hospitalizations due to diabetes mellitus in Brazil (2010–2024)

An adaptive client selection method for long tailed scene classification in autonomous driving

Parkinson’s disease and awareness of the passage of time: Perceived health, emotion, and self-transcendence

This study examined passage-of-time judgments in patients with Parkinson’s disease, compared to age-matched healthy controls. The aim was to determine whether these temporal judgments are influenced by affects or by psychological representations of the self, which may differ between these populations. The self has indeed been identified as a potential factor shaping time cognition, either through the minimal self, rooted in emotional and bodily sensations, or through cognitive self-representations. We used self-reported scales to measure participants’ passage-of-time judgments across two distinct dimensions: (1) for distant life periods (e.g., now compared to 5 years ago), and (2) for shorter and more recent time periods (e.g., day, week). Participants also completed questionnaires assessing emotional states (e.g., perceived health, well-being, happiness). To more specifically explore self-representation, we measured levels of self-transcendence, defined as the pursuit of meaning that extends beyond oneself and one’s own needs or interests, to examine whether individuals viewed themselves in a self-centered way or held a more open and interconnected sense of self. The results did not show that Parkinson’s disease alter passage-of-time judgments, whether related to recent or distant past periods. However, the findings confirmed that judgments about the distant past and recent experiences reflect two distinct forms of temporal judgment. The former was associated with self-consciousness and the projection of the self across the lifespan, whereas the latter is more closely linked to emotional and bodily state representations, shaped by perceived health, emotional condition, and overall well-being.