Protocol Design Research Articles

Strategies for involving patients and the public in scaling initiatives in health and social services: A scoping review.

Scaling in health and social services (HSS) aims to increase the intended impact of proven effective interventions. Patient and public involvement (PPI) is critical for ensuring that scaling beneficiaries' interests are served. We aimed to identify PPI strategies and their characteristics in the science and practice of scaling in HSS. In this scoping review, we included any scaling initiative in HSS that used PPI strategies and reported PPI methods and outcomes. We searched electronic databases (e.g., Medline) from inception to 5 February 2024, and grey literature (e.g., Google). Paired reviewers independently selected and extracted eligible reports. A narrative synthesis was performed and we used the PRISMA for Scoping Reviews and the Guidance for Reporting Involvement of Patients and the Public (GRIPP2). We included 110 unique reports out of 24,579 records. In the past 5 years, the evidence on PPI in scaling has increased faster than in any previous period. We found 236 mutually nonexclusive PPI strategies among 120 scaling initiatives. Twenty-four initiatives did not target a specific country; but most of those that did so (n = 96) occurred in higher-income countries (n = 51). Community-based primary health care was the most frequent level of care (n = 103). Mostly, patients and the public were involved throughout all scaling phases (n = 46) and throughout the continuum of collaboration (n = 45); the most frequently reported ethical lens regarding the rationale for PPI was consequentialist-utilitarian (n = 96). Few papers reported PPI recruitment processes (n = 31) or incentives used (n = 18). PPI strategies occurred mostly in direct care (n = 88). Patient and public education was the PPI strategy most reported (n = 31), followed by population consultations (n = 30). PPI in scaling is increasing in HSS. Further investigation is needed to better document the PPI experience in scaling and ensure that it occurs in a meaningful and equitable way. Two patients were involved in this review. They shared decisions on review questions, data collection instruments, protocol design, and findings dissemination. Open Science Framework on 19 August 2020 (https://osf.io/zqpx7/).

Utility of a Neuromuscular Activation Exercise Protocol on Surgeon Posture.

Surgeons are at risk for musculoskeletal disorders from ergonomic strain in the operating room. These deficits may stem from neuromuscular control deficits. Neuromuscular activation exercises (NMEs) may strengthen the brain-muscle connection. This study aimed to assess the utility of a surgeon-oriented NME protocol on posture. Surgeons, operating room staff, and medical students completed a professionally established NME routine. An electronic application, PostureScreen®, assessed participants' posture. A long-term cohort was assessed before and after a 2 to 6-week routine. A short-term cohort was assessed immediately before and after completion. All participants additionally completed a postintervention survey. After intervention, the short-term cohort (n = 47) had significantly reduced frontal and sagittal postural deviation (P < 0.05). A significant decrease in effective head weight was additionally demonstrated with decreased neck flexion and increased cerebral-cervical symmetry (P < 0.05).The long-term cohort (n = 6) showed a significant postintervention decrease in lateral and anterior shoulder translation (P < 0.05). Total anterior translational deviations demonstrated trend-level decrease (P = 0.078). This demonstrates that after intervention, participants' shoulders were more centered with the spine as opposed to shifted right or left. Survey results showed participants favored exercises that immediately brought relief of tension. A decrease in postural deviations associated with NME in both cohorts demonstrates NME as a potential mechanism to protect surgeon musculoskeletal health and improve well-being. Survey results demonstrate areas of refinement for NME protocol design.

Distribution of Roots of Quasi-Polynomials of Neutral Type and Its Application—Part II: Consensus Protocol Design of Multi-Agent Systems Using Delayed State Information

Distribution of Roots of Quasi-Polynomials of Neutral Type and Its Application—Part II: Consensus Protocol Design of Multi-Agent Systems Using Delayed State Information

Exploration and Research on Mobile Device Communication Protocols Based on Heterogeneous Networks

With the widespread adoption of mobile devices and the rapid development of network technology, heterogeneous networks have become a vital component of modern communication systems. This paper aims to explore and research communication protocols for mobile devices based on heterogeneous networks to enhance communication efficiency and user experience. Initially, the paper outlines the composition, characteristics, and key technologies of heterogeneous networks, analyzing the classification, advantages, disadvantages, and development trends of existing mobile device communication protocols. On this basis, a new communication protocol design scheme is proposed, considering the characteristics of heterogeneous networks, aiming to achieve efficient and reliable communication. Through the construction of an evaluation index system and the setup of a simulation environment, comprehensive tests and analyses of the new protocol's performance are conducted. Case studies further validate the effectiveness of the protocol in real-world applications. The research results indicate that the proposed communication protocol can significantly enhance the communication performance of mobile devices in heterogeneous network environments. The findings of this study hold significant theoretical and practical implications for advancing communication technology in heterogeneous networks.

Enhancing diverse representation in clinical studies: Recommendations from external subject matter experts (SMEs) and patients to optimize protocols, informed consent and study designs.

e23004 Background: Well-characterized disparities in clinical research have disproportionately affected patients of color, particularly in underserved communities. To tackle these barriers, the Roche-Genentech U.S. Advancing Inclusive Research Site Alliance solicited feedback from external SMEs about recommendations for strategies and tactics to increase Black, Hispanic/Latinx and older adult patient clinical research participation. Methods: Feedback was received virtually and via 1:1 interviews from 13 external SMEs defined as investigators, study coordinators or other clinical research roles that engage directly with patients regarding a Phase III small-cell lung cancer protocol as a use case. Two patients provided recommendations for future clinical study protocols and designs. Additionally, multiple healthcare providers from International Society of Geriatric Oncology provided recommendations for the inclusion of older adults in study protocols. A cross-functional, pan-Roche-Genentech team reviewed the feedback and finalized all materials. Results: Six key themes emerged: (a) use lay terms and humanizing language in patient materials; (b) integrate patient lifestyle realities by allowing flexibility in protocol inclusion/exclusion criteria; (c) improve the ease of patient participation and seek only what is clinically necessary for study assessment; (d) incorporate options for sites to enable them to make the right, and fastest, decision(s) for patients without sacrificing safety or data quality; (e) show commitment to diversity in words and actions such as including target enrollment goals in protocols and incorporating patient input on protocols before protocol finalization; (f) include older patients &gt; 70 years. Patient feedback reinforced the SME themes, except for inclusion of older patients. Patients suggested efficiency, clarity and local community realities be factored into future study designs. Some examples are fewer clinic visits, remote visit options, providing patient transportation and food support in connection with protocol-required visits. Patients also highlighted the importance of explaining the probability of side-effects, clinics being present in the community and the need for greater education and awareness regarding barriers to clinical trial enrollment. One patient relayed the importance of early trial education through general physician offices before a trial is actually needed for a given patient. Conclusions: These SME recommendations provide actionable insights to inform protocol design and patient recruitment strategy and tactics to enhance future protocols from an inclusivity-specific lens. Study teams can use these recommendations to address barriers that make enrollment/retention by underrepresented patient populations difficult.

GEMINI-Hepatobiliary: A phase 2 study of novel first-line immuno-oncology-based treatments in patients with advanced hepatobiliary cancers.

TPS4187 Background: Although targeted therapies and immuno-oncology (IO)-based regimens have improved overall survival (OS) in advanced hepatobiliary carcinomas, long-term survival rates remain unsatisfactory. Early-phase studies have demonstrated the efficacy of volrustomig (volru; anti-PD-1/CTLA-4 bispecific humanized IgG1 monoclonal antibody [mAb]) in patients (pts) with non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and renal cell carcinoma, and of rilvegostomig (rilve; anti-PD-1/TIGIT bispecific humanized IgG1 mAb) in pts with NSCLC, along with manageable safety profiles. GEMINI-Hepatobiliary (NCT05775159) is a phase 2, open-label, multidrug, multicenter, master protocol study designed to evaluate the preliminary efficacy and safety of novel IO bispecific mAbs as monotherapy or in combination with standard of care anticancer agents in pts with advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and biliary tract cancer (BTC). Methods: The GEMINI-Hepatobiliary platform design permits separate independent substudies (Table). Substudy 1 includes treatment-naïve adults (≥18 years) with histologically confirmed advanced HCC not eligible for locoregional therapy, Barcelona Clinic Liver Cancer Stage B/C, Child-Pugh class A 5–6, and an ECOG performance status (PS) of 0–1. Pts will be treated with volru as monotherapy or in combination with bevacizumab or lenvatinib. Primary endpoints for Substudy 1 are safety and objective response rate (ORR) per RECIST v1.1 by investigator’s assessment. Substudy 2 includes treatment-naïve adults with locally advanced or metastatic, histologically confirmed BTC and an ECOG PS of 0–1. Pts will be treated with gemcitabine + cisplatin with either rilve or volru. Primary endpoints for Substudy 2 are safety and progression-free survival (PFS) per RECIST v1.1 by investigator’s assessment. Secondary endpoints for both substudies include duration of response, disease control rate, ORR, PFS, OS, pharmacokinetics, and immunogenicity. While there are no formal statistical comparisons or hypothesis testing, sample sizes were selected to provide adequate precision for the primary endpoints. The study is currently recruiting at sites in the US, Asia, and Europe. GEMINI-Hepatobiliary master protocol design. Clinical trial information: NCT05775159 . [Table: see text]

Treatment rationale and protocol design: an investigator-initiated phase II study of combination treatment of nivolumab and TM5614, a PAI-1 inhibitor for previously treated patients with non-small cell lung cancer.

There is no established standard 3rd line treatment for patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Although cytotoxic chemotherapeutic agents that are not used as 1st or 2nd line treatment are administrated as 3rd line treatment, their anti-tumor efficacy is insufficient. Anti-programmed death ligand-1 (PD-L1)/programmed death-1 (PD1) treatment is more effective and less toxic than chemotherapy in anti-PD-L1/PD-1 treatment-naïve patients with NSCLC. Therefore, anti-PD-L1/PD-1 therapy is considered an appropriate 3rd line treatment. However, the anti-tumor efficacy is limited in patients previously treated with anti-PD-L1/PD-1 antibody. Today, new drugs are needed to increase the efficacy of anti-PD-L1/PD-1 antibodies. This open-label, single-arm, investigator-initiated phase II study is designed to evaluate combination treatment of nivolumab and TM5614, a plasminogen activator inhibitor (PAI-1) inhibitor as 3rd or more line treatment in NSCLC patients who underwent standard treatment. The primary endpoint is the objective response rate and the secondary endpoints are progression-free survival (PFS), overall survival (OS), duration of response (DOR) and safety. Recruitment began in September 2023 and is expected to continue for approximately three years. Currently, there is no standard 3rd line treatment for advanced NSCLC, and we hope that the findings of this study will facilitate more effective treatments in this setting. Ethics and dissemination: the study protocol conformed to the ethical principles outlined in the Declaration of Helsinki. All patients will provide written informed consent prior to enrollment. Results will be published in a peer-reviewed publication. This study is registered to Japan Registry of Clinical Trials with number: jRCT2061230039 (19/July/2023).

Limits of pressure-based ice detection during isochoric vitrification

Vitrification under isochoric (constant-volume or volumetrically confined) conditions has emerged as an intriguing new cryopreservation modality, but the physical complexities of the process confound straight-forward interpretation of experimental results. In particular, the signature pressure-based ice detection used in many isochoric techniques becomes paradoxical during vitrification, wherein the emergence of a sharp increase in pressure reliably indicates the presence of ice, but avoidance of this increase does not necessarily indicate its absence. This phenomenon arises from the rich interplay between thermochemical and thermovolumetric effects in isochoric systems, and muddies efforts to confirm the degree to which a sample has vitrified. In this work, we seek to aid interpretation of isochoric vitrification experiments by calculating thermodynamic limits on the maximum amount of ice that may form without being detected by pressure, and by clarifying the myriad physical processes at play. Neglecting kinetic effects, we develop a simplified thermodynamic model accounting for thermal contraction, cavity formation, ice growth, solute ripening, and glass formation, we evaluate it for a range of chamber materials and solution compositions, and we validate against the acutely limited data available. Our results provide both counter-intuitive insights— lower-concentration solutions may contract less while producing more pressure-undetectable ice growth for example— and a general phenomenological framework by which to evaluate the process of vitrification in isochoric systems. We anticipate that the model herein will enable design of future isochoric protocols with minimized risk of pressure-undetectable ice formation, and provide a thermodynamic foundation from which to build an increasingly rigorous multi-physics understanding of isochoric vitrification.

DSME-FOTA: Firmware over-the-air update framework for IEEE 802.15.4 DSME MAC to enable large-scale multi-hop industrial IoT networks

The Internet of Things (IoT) is rapidly expanding in applications ranging from smart homes and smart cities to various other domains, including agriculture, transportation, industrial automation, and environmental monitoring. Regardless of the application domain, firmware update over-the-air (FOTA) capability is critical for any IoT network, and its importance is particularly evident in the field of industrial IoT. This paper presents a comprehensive solution designed for large-scale industrial IoT networks, with a special focus on Deterministic Synchronous Multi-channel Extension (DSME)-based multi-hop networks, called DSME-FOTA. The paper provides a detailed FOTA protocol design, a numerical analysis, and proof-of-concept experiments. The analytical and experimental results show that the total firmware update time of DSME-FOTA exhibits a first-order dependence on both the number of hops and the firmware binary size.

Design and Development of UART Protocol Using Verilog with UVM Testbench

This paper's primary goal is to use Verilog (V) to design and validate a full duplex UART module. The Universal Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter, or UART, is a two-way transmission channel that not only significantly increases the efficiency of information transfer between computers and external devices but also guarantees information accuracy and consistency through the use of baud rate settings, the elimination of metastable state, and other techniques. In this work, the definition and operation of UART are well understood, and the UART is constructed using the Verilog HDL language, EDA simulation, picture, and data. The findings of the experiment demonstrate that this module's sending and receiving module functions well and satisfies the specifications of full-duplex serial communication equipment. Without a doubt, the layout of this paper has made the fundamental working concept of UART more clearly explained, which will aid in its future. Key Words:- UART, EDA , BRG, IC, DUT, UVM

Fidelity-aware large-scale distributed network emulation

The design and development of new network protocols, architectures, and technologies requires an evaluation phase where the researcher must provide empirical evidence for the performance of their contributions, potentially in comparison to existing solutions. In this context, network emulation has proven to be an attractive approach as it offers more flexibility compared to traditional testing platforms, and more realism compared to simulation. Network emulators provide contained, customisable, and scalable testing environments both for researchers to evaluate their contributions and for the community to reproduce their results. However, two limitations to network emulation have been identified and well documented in the literature: its scalability limits and its accuracy issues. This paper11This journal paper is an extension of a shorter paper (Elbouanani et al., 2023 [1]) previously presented in the TASIR (Testbeds for Advanced Systems Implementation and Research) workshop of Comsnets 2023 conference, and published in its proceedings. documents our attempts to address these concerns. Our findings are distilled into Hifinet: a lightweight scalable and fidelity-aware distributed network emulator. We particularly show how Hifinet outperforms its state-of-the-art counterparts in terms of scalability and efficiency by working around the flaws of their design principles and the technological limitations of the tools they rely on. Hifinet is also fidelity-enhanced, in that it implements a well-theorised fidelity monitoring framework, which passively monitors emulated packet delays to evaluate realism of network emulation and accuracy of results. Another asset of Hifinet is its ability to infer underlying causes in case of erroneous emulation and guide the user through fixing them. This is achieved by using delay tomography algorithms and heuristics.

A Review on Energy and Latency Efficient Routing Protocol Design for Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) have been utilized by various industries, such as disaster management, the chemical and heavy industries, marine research, and space exploration. One of the primary challenges faced by wireless sensor networks is their limited network lifetime. Several techniques have been devised to extend the duration of network operation. This proposed method introduces a threshold-based algorithm to minimize the amount of data that needs to be transferred. In this approach, the selection of cluster heads and their sizes is not fixed. Instead, they are dynamically determined at the beginning of each iteration. The design of routing algorithms for wireless sensor networks faces three main challenges: lowering the rate at which the average node energy declines, minimizing the number of dead nodes, and eventually prolonging the network's lifetime. This paper provides a thorough examination of efficient routing protocols for wireless sensor networks with the goal of improving network longevity. Keywords: Efficient Routing, WSN Clustering, Network Latency, Network Lifetime.

A State-Interactive MAC Layer TDMA Protocol Based on Smart Antennas

Mobile ad hoc networks are self-organizing networks that do not rely on fixed infrastructure. Smart antennas employ advanced beamforming technology, enabling ultra-long-range directional transmission in wireless networks, which leads to lower power consumption and better utilization of spatial resources. The media access control (MAC) protocol design using smart antennas can lead to efficient usage of channel resources. However, during ultra-long-distance transmissions, there may be significant transport delays. In addition, when using the time division multiple access (TDMA) schemes, it can be difficult to manage conflicts arising from adjacent time slot advancement caused by latency compensation in ultra-long-range propagation. Directional transmission and reception can also cause interference between links that reuse the same time slot. This paper proposes a new distributed dynamic TDMA protocol called State Interaction-based Slot Allocation Protocol (SISAP) to address these issues. This protocol is based on slot states and includes TDMA frame structure, slot allocation process, interference self-avoidance strategy, and slot allocation algorithms. According to the simulation results, the MAC layer design scheme suggested in this paper can achieve ultra-long-distance transmission without conflicts. Additionally, it can reduce the interference between links while space multiplexing. Furthermore, the system exhibits remarkable performance in various network aspects, such as throughput and link delay.

Impact of breath sample collection method and length of storage of breath samples in Tedlar bags on the level of selected volatiles assessed using gas chromatography-ion mobility spectrometry (GC-IMS)

The analysis of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in exhaled air has attracted the interest of the scientific community because it provides the possibility of monitoring physiological and metabolic processes and non-invasive diagnostics of various diseases. However, this method remains underused in clinical practice as well as in research because of the lack of standardized procedures for the collection, storage and transport of breath samples, which would guarantee good reproducibility and comparability of results. The method of sampling, as well as the storage time of the breath samples in the polymer bags used for sample storage and transport, affect the composition and concentration of VOCs present in the breath samples. The aim of our study was to compare breath samples obtained using two methods with fully disposable equipment: a Haldane sampling tube intended for direct breath collection and breath samples exhaled into a transparent Tedlar bag. The second task was to monitor the stability of selected compounds of real breath samples stored in a Tedlar bag for 6 h. Gas chromatography coupled with ion mobility spectrometry (GC-IMS) implemented in the BreathSpec® device was used to analyse exhaled breath. Our results showed a significant difference in the signal intensity of some volatiles when taking a breath sample with a Haldane tube and a Tedlar bag. Due to its endogenous origin, acetone levels were significantly higher when the Haldane tube sampler was used while elevated levels of 2-propanol and unidentified VOC (designated as VOC 3) in the Tedlar bag samples likely originated from contamination of the Tedlar bags. The VOC stability study revealed compound-specific signal intensity changes of the selected VOCs with storage time in the Tedlar bags, with some volatiles showing increasing signal intensity during storage in Tedlar bags. This limits the use of Tedlar bags only for very limited time and carefully selected purpose. Our results highlight the importance of careful design and implementation of experiments and clinical protocols to obtain relevant and reliable results.

Using Multi-dimensional Quorums for Optimal Resilience in Multi-resource Blockchains

Permissionless blockchains commonly use resource challenges to defend against sybil attacks. For example, popular resource challenge designs include Proof-of-Work and Proof-of-Stake. It is well-known that simultaneously exploiting multiple resources can help make a permissionless blockchain more robust. For example, combining PoW and PoS can help to keep a blockchain secure, even when the attacker controls more than 50% of the computational power in the system. While there have been existing efforts for combining multiple resources in blockchains, they only provide partial solutions. Specifically, it is currently still unclear how to combine PoW and PoS, or multiple resources in general, to achieve optimal resilience . Here by optimal resilience , we mean that the blockchain can tolerate every security region , unless that security region is proven to be impossible to tolerate. Existing designs are not able to achieve such optimal resilience. As our central contribution, this work proposes the novel design and formal security analysis of a blockchain protocol that combines PoS and PoW, which can be further generalized to multiple resources. Our blockchain is the very first blockchain that can achieve optimal resilience . Our design also overcomes a common tricky issue of PoW difficulty adjustment in previous designs. We have further implemented a research prototype of our blockchain design, and experimentally demonstrated its good end-to-end performance.

A Drone-Assisted Anonymous Authentication and Key Agreement Protocol with Access Control for Accident Rescue in the Internet of Vehicles

The drone-assisted Internet of Vehicles (DIoV) displays great potential in the punctual provision of rescue services without geographical limitations. To ensure data security in accident response and rescue services, authentication schemes with access control are employed. These schemes ensure that only specific rescue vehicle operators acting within a valid period can achieve mutual authentication from a designated processor, while access for mismatched, revoked, or expired users is denied. However, the current alternatives fail to ensure session key forward secrecy, entities’ mutual authentication, and user anonymity, thereby compromising users’ privacy and the security of communications. Moreover, executing too many time-consuming operations on vehicles’ resource-constrained devices inevitably degrades the performance of the authentication protocol. Balancing security and performance in the design of an authentication protocol with access control presents a significant challenge. To address this, a more efficient and robust authentication with access control has been designed. The proposed protocol ensures user anonymity through dynamic pseudonym allocation, achieves forward secrecy by excluding the long-term key from session key generation, and obtains mutual authentication by verifying the integrity of the messages exchanged. According to the security and performance analysis, it is demonstrated that the proposal is a robust, efficient, and cost-effective solution. In particular, the proposal can reduce the computational overhead by 66% compared to recent alternatives.

Identification of constitutive materials of bi-layer soft tissues from multimodal indentations

The personalisation of finite element models is an important problem in the biomechanical fields where subject-specific analyses are fundamental, particularly in studying soft tissue mechanics. The personalisation includes the choice of the constitutive law of the model's material, as well as the choice of the material parameters. In vivo identification of the material properties of soft tissues is challenging considering the complex behaviour of soft tissues that are, among other things, non-linear hyperelastic and heterogeneous. Hybrid experimental-numerical methods combining in vivo indentations and inverse finite element analyses are common to identify these material parameters. Yet, the uniqueness and the uncertainty of the multi-material hyperelastic model have not been evaluated. This study presents a sensitivity analysis performed on synthetic indentation data to investigate the identification uncertainties of the material parameters in a bi-material thigh phantom. Synthetic numerical data, used to replace experimental measurements, considered several measurement modalities: indenter force and displacement, stereo-camera 3D digital image correlation of the indented surface, and ultrasound B-mode images. A finite element model of the indentation was designed with either Ogden-Moerman or Mooney-Rivlin constitutive laws for both materials. The parameters' identifiability (i.e. the possibility of converging to a unique parameter set within an acceptable margin of error) was assessed with various cost functions formulated using the different synthetic data sets. The results underline the need for multiple experimental modalities to reduce the uncertainty of the identified parameters. Additionally, the experimental error can impede the identification of a unique parameter set, and the cost function depends on the constitutive law. This study highlights the need for sensitivity analyses before the design of the experimental protocol. Such studies can also be used to define the acceptable range of errors in the experimental measurement. Eventually, the impact of the evaluated uncertainty of the identified parameters should be further investigated according to the purpose of the finite element modelling.

Optimal trade-off between boosted tolerance and growth fitness during adaptive evolution of yeast to ethanol shocks

BackgroundThe selection of Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains with higher alcohol tolerance can potentially increase the industrial production of ethanol fuel. However, the design of selection protocols to obtain bioethanol yeasts with higher alcohol tolerance poses the challenge of improving industrial strains that are already robust to high ethanol levels. Furthermore, yeasts subjected to mutagenesis and selection, or laboratory evolution, often present adaptation trade-offs wherein higher stress tolerance is attained at the expense of growth and fermentation performance. Although these undesirable side effects are often associated with acute selection regimes, the utility of using harsh ethanol treatments to obtain robust ethanologenic yeasts still has not been fully investigated.ResultsWe conducted an adaptive laboratory evolution by challenging four populations (P1–P4) of the Brazilian bioethanol yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae PE-2_H4, through 68–82 cycles of 2-h ethanol shocks (19–30% v/v) and outgrowths. Colonies isolated from the final evolved populations (P1c–P4c) were subjected to whole-genome sequencing, revealing mutations in genes enriched for the cAMP/PKA and trehalose degradation pathways. Fitness analyses of the isolated clones P1c–P3c and reverse-engineered strains demonstrated that mutations were primarily selected for cell viability under ethanol stress, at the cost of decreased growth rates in cultures with or without ethanol. Under this selection regime for stress survival, the population P4 evolved a protective snowflake phenotype resulting from BUD3 disruption. Despite marked adaptation trade-offs, the combination of reverse-engineered mutations cyr1A1474T/usv1Δ conferred 5.46% higher fitness than the parental PE-2_H4 for propagation in 8% (v/v) ethanol, with only a 1.07% fitness cost in a culture medium without alcohol. The cyr1A1474T/usv1Δ strain and evolved P1c displayed robust fermentations of sugarcane molasses using cell recycling and sulfuric acid treatments, mimicking Brazilian bioethanol production.ConclusionsOur study combined genomic, mutational, and fitness analyses to understand the genetic underpinnings of yeast evolution to ethanol shocks. Although fitness analyses revealed that most evolved mutations impose a cost for cell propagation, combination of key mutations cyr1A1474T/usv1Δ endowed yeasts with higher tolerance for growth in the presence of ethanol. Moreover, alleles selected for acute stress survival comprising the P1c genotype conferred stress tolerance and optimal performance under conditions simulating the Brazilian industrial ethanol production.

Secure Key Exchange in Tropical Cryptography: Leveraging Efficiency with Advanced Block Matrix Protocols

In the quest for robust and efficient digital communication, this paper introduces cutting-edge key exchange protocols leveraging the computational prowess of tropical semirings and the structural resilience of block matrices. Moving away from the conventional use of finite fields, these protocols deliver markedly faster processing speeds and heightened security. We present two implementations of our concept, each utilizing a different platform for the set of commuting matrices: one employing tropical polynomials of matrices and the other employing Linde–de la Puente matrices. The inherent simplicity of tropical semirings leads to a decrease in operational complexity, while using block matrices enhances our protocols’ security profile. The security of these protocols relies on the Matrix Decomposition Problem. In addition, we provide a comparative analysis of our protocols against existing matrix block-based protocols in finite fields. This research marks a significant shift in cryptographic protocol design, is specifically tailored for demanding engineering applications, and sets a new standard in secure and efficient digital communication.

Security Analysis of the Consumer Remote SIM Provisioning Protocol

Remote SIM provisioning (RSP) for consumer devices is the protocol specified by the GSM Association for downloading SIM profiles into a secure element in a mobile device. The process is commonly known as eSIM, and it is expected to replace removable SIM cards. The security of the protocol is critical because the profile includes the credentials with which the mobile device will authenticate to the mobile network. In this paper, we present a formal security analysis of the consumer RSP protocol. We model the multi-party protocol in applied pi calculus, define formal security goals, and verify them in ProVerif. The analysis shows that the consumer RSP protocol protects against a network adversary when all the intended participants are honest. However, we also model the protocol in realistic partial compromise scenarios where the adversary controls a legitimate participant or communication channel. The security failures in the partial compromise scenarios reveal weaknesses in the protocol design. The most important observation is that the security of RSP depends unnecessarily on it being encapsulated in a TLS tunnel. Also, the lack of pre-established identifiers means that a compromised download server anywhere in the world or a compromised secure element can be used for attacks against RSP between honest participants. Additionally, the lack of reliable methods for verifying user intent can lead to serious security failures. Based on the findings, we recommend practical improvements to RSP implementations, future versions of the specification, and mobile operator processes to increase the robustness of eSIM security.