Dwell Time Research Articles

Young Children of Mothers with a History of Depression Show Attention Bias to Sad Faces: An Eye-tracking Study.

Maternal depression is a predictor of the emergence of depression in the offspring. Attention bias (AB) to negative emotional stimuli in children may serve as a risk factor for children of depressed parents. The present study aimed to examine the effect of maternal major depressive disorder (MDD) history on AB to emotional faces in children at age four, before the age of onset for full-blown psychiatric symptoms. The study also compared AB patterns between mothers and their offspring. Fifty-eight mothers and their four-year-old children participated in this study, of which 27 high-risk (HR) children had mothers with MDD during their children's lifetime. Attention to emotional faces was measured in both children and their mothers using an eye-tracking visual search task. HR children exhibited faster detection and longer dwell time toward the sad than happy target faces. The low-risk (LR) children also displayed a sad bias but to a lesser degree. Children across both groups showed AB towards angry target faces, likely reflecting a normative AB pattern. Our findings indicate that AB to sad faces may serve as an early marker of depression risk. However, we provided limited support for the mother-child association of AB. Future research is needed to examine the longitudinal intergenerational transmission of AB related to depression and possible mechanisms underlying the emergence of AB in offspring of depressed parents.

Femoral to abdomen tunneling at the bedside for medium/long term venous access.

Femoral to abdomen tunneling of small-bore central venous catheters is a bedside technique for patients with contraindications to a thoracic approach, or as an alternative to a lower extremity catheter exit site. A femoral to abdomen tunneling technique was implemented for patients receiving medium and long-term intravenous treatments with contraindications to the thoracic venous approach or as an alternative to a lower extremity catheter exit site. All venous access devices were inserted with ultrasound guidance under local anesthesia, and catheter tip placement assessed by post procedural radiography. In this case series, from January 2020 to January 2023, a total of eight FTA-tunneled venous access devices were inserted. There were seven ambulatory patients and one bedbound patient. The median length of the subcutaneous tunnel was 20 cm, ranging from 15 to 27 cm. The median length of the intravenous catheter to the terminal tip was 31 cm, ranging from 23 to 40 cm. Tip location was confirmed by post-procedural abdominal radiograph. The catheter tip locations were interpreted to be at the level of T8-T9 (2), T12 (1), L4 (2), L2 (2), L1(1).No insertion or post insertion related complication was reported. Six patients completed the scheduled intravenous treatment. One patient was unable to be tracked due to transfer to an outside facility. One catheter initially demonstrated to be coiled over the left common iliac vessel was repositioned using a high flow flush technique. There was one reported catheter dislodgment by the nurse providing care and maintenance. The overall implant days were 961, with a median dwell time of 125 days ranging from 20 to 399 days. Femoral to abdomen tunneling provides an alternative exit site useful in select patients with complex intravenous access. The data of this small retrospective review suggests this a safe and minimally invasive bedside procedure.

General regulatory factors exert differential effects on nucleosome sliding activity of the ISW1a complex

BackgroundChromatin dynamics is deeply involved in processes that require access to DNA, such as transcriptional regulation. Among the factors involved in chromatin dynamics at gene regulatory regions are general regulatory factors (GRFs). These factors contribute to establishment and maintenance of nucleosome-depleted regions (NDRs). These regions are populated by nucleosomes through histone deposition and nucleosome sliding, the latter catalyzed by a number of ATP-dependent chromatin remodeling complexes, including ISW1a. It has been observed that GRFs can act as barriers against nucleosome sliding towards NDRs. However, the relative ability of the different GRFs to hinder sliding activity is currently unknown.ResultsConsidering this, we performed a comparative analysis for the main GRFs, with focus in their ability to modulate nucleosome sliding mediated by ISW1a. Among the GRFs tested in nucleosome remodeling assays, Rap1 was the only factor displaying the ability to hinder the activity of ISW1a. This effect requires location of the Rap1 cognate sequence on linker that becomes entry DNA in the nucleosome remodeling process. In addition, Rap1 was able to hinder nucleosome assembly in octamer transfer assays. Concurrently, Rap1 displayed the highest affinity for and longest dwell time from its target sequence, compared to the other GRFs tested. Consistently, through bioinformatics analyses of publicly available genome-wide data, we found that nucleosome occupancy and histone deposition in vivo are inversely correlated with the affinity of Rap1 for its target sequences in the genome.ConclusionsOur findings point to DNA binding affinity, residence time and location at particular translational positions relative to the nucleosome core as the key features of GRFs underlying their roles played in nucleosome sliding and assembly.

Cognitive Strategies of Second Language Vocabulary Inferencing: An Eye Tracking Study

In contextual vocabulary acquisition, second language learners address both morphological and contextual cues to infer the meanings of novel words. The study investigated cognitive strategies and their eye movement correlates in contextual vocabulary inferencing task. A sample of 30 healthy participants with normal or corrected to normal vision read an Intermediate-level text in English, aiming to define the meaning of 10 low-frequency words embedded in the text. Based on both unstructured and structured post-hoc reports, we attributed the inferencing process either to word-level processing, context-level processing, or discourse-level processing strategy. Eye movements were recorded on the target word and on the target word clause areas of interest. Inferencing success was associated with increased first fixation duration on the target word both for word- and context-level processing strategy, and increased dwell time on the target word clause for context-level processing strategy. Our findings emphasize the role of both morphological and contextual processing in vocabulary inferencing task.

Sodium removal per ultrafiltration volume in automated peritoneal dialysis in pediatric patients.

The standard rate of sodium removal in adult anuric patients on continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis (CAPD) is 7.5g/L of ultrafiltration volume (UFV). Although automated PD (APD) is widely used in pediatric patients, no attempt has yet been made to estimate sodium removal in APD. The present, retrospective cohort study included pediatric patients with APD who were managed at Tokyo Metropolitan Children's Medical Center between July 2010 and November 2017. The patients underwent a peritoneal equilibrium test (PET) at our hospital. Sodium removal per UFV was calculated by peritoneal function and dwell time using samples from patients on APD with 1- and 2-h dwell effluent within three months of PET and 4- and 10-h dwell effluent at PET. In total, 217 samples from 18 patients were included, with 63, 81, and 73 of the samples corresponding to the High [H], High-average [HA], and Low-average [LA] PET category, respectively. Sodium removal per UFV (g/L in salt equivalent) for dwell times of one, two, four, and ten hours was 5.2, 8.8, 8.0, and 11.5 for PET [H], 5.3, 5.8, 5.6, and 8.1 for PET [HA], and 4.6, 5.1, 5.1, and 7.1 for PET [LA], respectively. Sodium removal per UFV in pediatric APD was less than the standard adult CAPD and tended to be lower with shorter dwell times, leading to sodium accumulation. Therefore, salt intake should be restricted in combination with one or more long daytime dwells, especially in anuric patients.

Fabrication of CZTS Thin Film on Flexible Cu-Foil Substrate by Two-Stage Process

In this research, CZTS thin films grown on flexible Cu-foil with varying sulfurization times. Various characterization methods were employed, including X-ray diffraction (XRD), Raman spectroscopy, energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), optical transmission, and photoluminescence (PL) measurements. Distinctive diffraction peaks characteristic of the kesterite CZTS phase were observed in the XRD analysis, occurring around at 2θ= 28.45° (112), 47° (220/204), and 56° (312/116). Additionally, some secondary phases such as Cu2S and SnS were identified. Raman spectroscopy confirmed the presence of the kesterite phase, with a prominent peak detected at approximately ~336 cm-1, attributed to sulfur atom vibrations within the kesterite structure. Apart from CZTS structure, minor peaks suggesting the presence of the Cu2SnS3 (CTS) phase was detected. EDX analysis revealed compositions with Cu-poor content and Zn-rich content across all samples, with slight variations in sulfurization dwell times affecting the chemical composition. SEM imaging at different magnifications showed alterations in surface morphology and grain structures. Films sulfurized for 30 s and 60 s displayed a granular structure morphology, while extending the dwell time to 120 s resulted in a more compact surface morphology. Optical band gap values ranged between 1.57 and 1.60 eV. PL measurements consistently exhibited strong PL emission around 1.25 eV for all samples, attributed to various transitions within the CZTS structure. The absence of observable band-to-band transitions in the PL measurements indicated the presence of intrinsic defect levels and recombination centers within CZTS. Overall, it was demonstrated in this study that CZTS thin films can be produced on flexible Cu-foils with short sulfurization times, thereby expanding the application areas of CZTS thin-film solar cells.

Passivity-Based Stabilization for Switched Stochastic Nonlinear Systems

This paper addresses the passivity-based mean square exponential stabilization problem for switched stochastic nonlinear systems. A concept of generalized small-time normobservability is presented and an appropriate test condition is also provided. For pre-given passivity rate and average dwell time, a set of feedback controllers is designed by use of the passivity property. Then, combining with generalized small-time norm-observability, a sufficient condition to guarantee mean square exponential stabilization of a switched stochastic nonlinear system is given. As a special case, the switched stochastic linear system is also discussed. Finally, a numeral example shows the effectiveness of the proposed method.

Reconfigurations of Dynamic Functional Network Connectivity in Large-scale Brain Network after Prolonged Abstinence in Heroin Users.

Brain recovery phenomenon after long-term abstinence had been reported in substance use disorders. Yet, few longitudinal studies have been conducted to observe the abnormal dynamic functional connectivity (dFNC) of large-scale brain networks and recovery after prolonged abstinence in heroin users. The current study will explore the brain network dynamic connection reconfigurations after prolonged abstinence in heroin users (HUs). The 10-month longitudinal design was carried out for 40 HUs. The 40 healthy controls (HCs) were also enrolled. Group independent component analysis (GICA) and dFNC analysis were employed to detect the different dFNC patterns of addiction-related ICNs between HUs and HCs. The temporal properties and the graph-theoretical properties were calculated. Whether the abnormalities would be reconfigured in HUs after prolonged abstinence was then investigated. Based on eight functional networks extracted from GICA, four states were identified by the dFNC analysis. Lower mean dwell time and fraction rate in state4 were found for HUs, which were increased toward HCs after prolonged abstinence. In this state, HUs at baseline showed higher dFNC of RECN-aSN, aSN- aSN and dDMN-pSN, which decreased after protracted abstinence. A similar recovery phenomenon was found for the global efficiency and path length in abstinence HUs. Mean while, the abnormal dFNC strength was correlated with craving both at baseline and after abstinence. Our longitudinal study observed the large-scale brain network reconfiguration from the dynamic perspective in HUs after prolonged abstinence and improved the understanding of the neurobiology of prolonged abstinence in HUs.

Quantifying dwell time with location-based augmented reality: Dynamic AOI analysis on mobile eye tracking data with vision transformer

Mobile eye tracking captures egocentric vision and is well-suited for naturalistic studies. However, its data is noisy, especially when acquired outdoor with multiple participants over several sessions. Area of interest analysis on moving targets is difficult because A) camera and objects move nonlinearly and may disappear/reappear from the scene; and B) off-the-shelf analysis tools are limited to linearly moving objects. As a result, researchers resort to time-consuming manual annotation, which limits the use of mobile eye tracking in naturalistic studies. We introduce a method based on a fine-tuned Vision Transformer (ViT) model for classifying frames with overlaying gaze markers. After fine-tuning a model on a manually labelled training set made of 1.98% (=7845 frames) of our entire data for three epochs, our model reached 99.34% accuracy as evaluated on hold-out data. We used the method to quantify participants’ dwell time on a tablet during the outdoor user test of a mobile augmented reality application for biodiversity education. We discuss the benefits and limitations of our approach and its potential to be applied to other contexts.

Resting-state functional connectivity in children cooled for neonatal encephalopathy

Abstract Therapeutic hypothermia improves outcomes following neonatal hypoxic-ischaemic encephalopathy, reducing cases of death and severe disability such as cerebral palsy compared to normothermia management. However, when cooled children reach early school-age they have cognitive and motor impairments which are associated with underlying alterations to brain structure and white matter connectivity. It is unknown whether these differences in structural connectivity are associated with differences in functional connectivity between cooled children and healthy controls. Resting-state functional MRI has been used to characterise static and dynamic functional connectivity in children, both with typical development and those with neurodevelopmental disorders. Previous studies of resting-state brain networks in children with hypoxic-ischaemic (HIE) encephalopathy have focussed on the neonatal period. In this study, we used resting-state fMRI to investigate static and dynamic functional connectivity in children aged 6-8 years who were cooled for neonatal HIE without cerebral palsy (n = 22, median age [interquartile range] 7.08 [6.85-7.52] years), and healthy controls matched for age, sex and socioeconomic status (n = 20, median age [interquartile range] 6.75 [6.48-7.25] years). Using group independent component analysis, we identified 31 intrinsic functional connectivity networks consistent with those previously reported in children and adults. We found no case-control differences in the spatial maps of these intrinsic connectivity networks. We constructed subject-specific static functional connectivity networks by measuring pairwise Pearson correlations between component time courses, and found no case-control differences in functional connectivity after false-discovery rate correction. To study the time-varying organisation of resting-state networks, we used sliding-window correlations and deep clustering to investigate dynamic functional connectivity characteristics. We found k = 4 repetitively occurring functional connectivity states, which exhibited no case-control differences in dwell time, fractional occupancy, or state functional connectivity matrices. In this small cohort, the spatiotemporal characteristics of resting-state brain networks in cooled children without severe disability were too subtle to be differentiated from healthy controls at early school-age, despite underlying differences in brain structure and white matter connectivity, possibly reflecting a level of recovery of healthy resting-state brain function. To our knowledge, this is the first study to investigate resting-state functional connectivity in children with hypoxic-ischaemic encephalopathy beyond the neonatal period, and the first to investigate dynamic functional connectivity in any children with hypoxic-ischaemic encephalopathy.

Leads with the Cut Proximal Ends Migrated into the Heart and Vasculature: A Rare Phenomenon among 3847 Lead Extraction Procedures

Background: The study aimed to describe the phenomenon of leads migrated (MPLE) into the cardiovascular system (CVS). Methods: Retrospective analysis of 3847 transvenous lead extractions (TLE). Results: Over a 17-year period, 72 (1.87%) MPLEs (median dwell time 137.5 months) were extracted, which included mainly ventricular leads (56.94%). Overall, 68.06% of MPLEs had their cut proximal ends in the venous system. Most of them were pacing (95.83%) and passive fixation (98.61%) leads. Independent risk factors for MPLE included abandoned leads (OR = 8.473; p < 0.001) and leads located on both sides of the chest (2.981; p = 0.045). The higher NYHA class lowered the probability of MPLE (OR = 0.380; p < 0.001). Procedure complexity was higher in the MPLE group (procedure duration, unexpected procedure difficulties, use of additional (advanced) tools and alternative venous approach). There were no more major complications in the MPLE group, but the rate of procedural success was lower due to more frequent retention of non-removable lead fragments. Extraction of MPLEs did not influence long-term survival. Conclusions: 1. Extraction of leads with MPLE is rare among other TLE procedures (1.9%), 2. risk factors include abandoned leads and presence of leads on both sides of the chest but a higher NYHA class lowers the probability of MPLE, 3. complexity of MPLE extraction is higher regarding procedure duration, unexpected procedure difficulties, use of advanced tools and techniques but rates of major complications are comparable, and 4. extraction of MPLEs did not influence long-term survival.

Penalty weight tuning in high dose rate brachytherapy using multi-objective Bayesian optimization.

Treatment plan optimization in high dose rate (HDR) brachytherapy often requires manual fine-tuning of penalty weights for each objective, which can be time-consuming and dependent on the planner's experience. To automate this process, this study used a multi-criteria approach called multi-objective Bayesian optimization with q-noisy expected hypervolume improvement as its acquisition function (MOBO-qNEHVI).

Approach: The treatment plans of 13 prostate cancer patients were retrospectively imported to a research treatment planning system, RapidBrachyMTPS, where fast mixed integer optimization (FMIO) performs dwell time optimization given a set of penalty weights to deliver 15 Gy to the target volume. MOBO-qNEHVI was used to find patient-specific Pareto optimal penalty weight vectors that yield clinically acceptable dose volume histogram metrics. The relationship between the number of MOBO-qNEHVI iterations and the number of clinically acceptable plans per patient (acceptance rate) was investigated. The performance time was obtained for various parameter configurations.

Main results: MOBO-qNEHVI found clinically acceptable treatment plans for all patients. With increasing the number of MOBO-qNEHVI iterations, the acceptance rate grew logarithmically while the performance time grew exponentially. Fixing the penalty weight of the tumour volume to maximum value, adding the target dose as a parameter, initiating MOBO-qNEHVI with 25 parallel sampling of FMIO, and running 6 MOBO-qNEHVI iterations found solutions that delivered 15 Gy to the hottest 95% of the clinical target volume while respecting the dose constraints to the organs at risk. The average acceptance rate for each patient was 89.74% ± 8.11%, and performance time was 66.6 ± 12.6 seconds. The initiation took 22.47 ± 7.57 s, and each iteration took 7.35 ± 2.45 s to find one Pareto solution.

Significance: MOBO-qNEHVI can automatically explore the trade-offs between treatment plan objectives in a patient-specific manner within a minute. This approach can reduce the dependency of plan quality on planner's experience.

Aperiodic sampled‐data stabilization of switched singular systems with asynchronous switching: A hybrid control approach

AbstractThis article investigates the sampled‐data stabilization problem for a class of switched singular systems with aperiodic sampling. The asynchronous switching between the plant and the switched controller caused by sampling is considered. Unlike normal systems, the conventional zero‐order hold type sampled‐data control law may be inapplicable to singular systems. This is because under that control law, the algebraic equations of singular systems may have no solutions at sampling instants. To cope with this problem, a new hybrid control law composed of a mode‐dependent impulsive controller and a mode‐dependent sampled‐data state feedback controller is devised. The impulsive controller adjusts the values of differential substate at sampling instants so that the algebraic equations are solvable. Then, by constructing a novel piecewise sampling‐time‐dependent Lyapunov function and using the average dwell time method as well as convex technique, a sampling‐range‐dependent sufficient condition for exponential stability of the resulting closed‐loop system is established. Moreover, an optimization‐based method is proposed to solve the hybrid controller gains. Simulation results on two examples including a mechanical arm system show the effectiveness of the proposed control method.

Pharmacokinetics of intravenous piperacillin/tazobactam among patients with peritoneal dialysis-associated peritonitis.

Currently, pharmacokinetic information on intravenous (IV) piperacillin/tazobactam in patients with peritoneal dialysis-associated peritonitis (PD peritonitis) is limited. This study employed a prospective single-dose pharmacokinetic design to assess the pharmacokinetics of IV piperacillin/tazobactam in these patients. Four patients with PD peritonitis who received an IV loading dose of 4000 mg/500 mg piperacillin/tazobactam were enrolled in this study. The concentrations of piperacillin and tazobactam in plasma, peritoneal dialysis fluid (PDF) and urine were determined by high-performance liquid chromatography. Non-compartmental methods were used for pharmacokinetic analysis. During a 6-h dwell time for chronic ambulatory peritoneal dialysis (CAPD), 9.23 ± 4.01% of the piperacillin was recovered in the PDF. This result is greater than that observed in patients without peritonitis in prior research. Piperacillin's PD clearance (CLPD), steady-state volume of distribution (Vss) and terminal half-life (t 1/2) were 5.79 ± 2.55 mL/min, 24.35 ± 11.26 L and 5.74 ± 1.53 h, respectively. These values are also higher than those of patients without peritonitis in a prior study. Eight hours following the loading dosage, the plasma and PDF piperacillin concentrations of all patients (98.25 ± 26.03 and 52.70 ± 22.99 mg/L, respectively) surpassed the Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Enterobacterales Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute susceptible breakpoints. In summary, the CLPD, Vss and t 1/2 for piperacillin were found to be greater in patients with PD peritonitis than in CAPD patients without peritonitis when compared with the results of a previous study. The IV loading dose of 4000 mg/500 mg piperacillin/tazobactam is sufficient to treat peritonitis caused by susceptible P. aeruginosa and Enterobacterales. The multiple-dose pharmacokinetics of IV piperacillin and tazobactam in this specific patient group should be further investigated.

Impact of Station Design and Passengers Flow on Urban Rail Dwell Time: A Systemwide Analysis Using APC and AVL Data

In this paper, we investigated the impact on dwell time of station design, train load, and passenger flow, considering boarding fraction. We employed system-wide automated data sources including automatic passenger counting and automatic vehicle location data in the rail transit system in Calgary, Canada. Regression analyses were conducted to achieve accurate dwell time estimation by calculating passenger load per car, boarding, and alighting passengers per door, and also identifying the critical door with the highest demand. Observations for each critical door were divided based on the fraction of boarding passengers with respect to the sum of boarding and alighting. Six stations with distinct geometric designs were selected for comparison to assess their impact on dwell time. The results indicate that, for dominant boarding or alighting, a longer time is needed per passenger to alight or board, respectively. Our findings indicate that a station with a middle platform and two entrances positioned in the middle performed better in terms of dwell time in the case of alighting-dominant and mixed passenger flow. For stations experiencing boarding-dominant passenger flows, side platforms with multiple entrances at the ends and middle outperformed. Narrower platforms experienced significantly longer dwell times than other selected stations under similar demand. While the conclusion about the station design may not be generic, the proposed model provides a consistent and adaptable approach to study the impact of station design and passenger flows on urban rail dwell times, facilitating better-informed decision-making for station design or modification and enhancement of the overall rail system performance.

Altered patterns of dynamic functional connectivity of brain networks in deficit and non-deficit schizophrenia.

This study aims to investigate the altered patterns of dynamic functional network connectivity (dFNC) between deficit schizophrenia (DS) and non-deficit schizophrenia (NDS), and further explore the associations with cognitive impairments. 70 DS, 91 NDS, and 120 matched healthy controls (HCs) were enrolled. The independent component analysis was used to segment the whole brain. The fMRI brain atlas was used to identify functional networks, and the dynamic functional connectivity (FC) of each network was detected. Correlation analysis was used to explore the associations between altered dFNC and cognitive functions. Four dynamic states were identified. Compared to NDS, DS showed increased FC between sensorimotor network and default mode network in state 1 and decreased FC within auditory network in state 4. Additionally, DS had a longer mean dwell time of state 2 and a shorter one in state 3 compared to NDS. Correlation analysis showed that fraction time and mean dwell time of states were correlated with cognitive impairments in DS. This study demonstrates the distinctive altered patterns of dFNC between DS and NDS patients. The associations with impaired cognition provide specific neuroimaging evidence for the pathogenesis of DS.

Spark plasma sintering and mechanical properties of tantalum carbonitrides Ta2CxNy

Dense tantalum-based carbonitride materials featuring >95 % relative density, TaC, Ta2C1.5N0.5, Ta2CN, Ta2C0.5N1.5 and TaN, were prepared by Spark Plasma Sintering (SPS) at 1873 K with a dwell time of 10 min and a pressure of 50 MPa. Despite the presence of an oxide phase (i.e. 5 vol%) and some W inclusions (i.e. 1 vol%), the mechanical properties of such ultra-high temperature ceramics (UHTC) show promising values. Indeed, the Young's moduli measured by nano-indentation were approx. 600–700 GPa, which is higher than literature values reported for similar UHTC. The hardness values increased from 16.4 ± 0.8 GPa for TaC to 27.9 ± 1.3 GPa for TaN, with an approximately linear trend for the carbonitride samples while the ratio of plastic deformation work over the total indentation work followed the opposite trend.

Adaptive output-feedback control for switched nonlinear systems with measurement sensitivity based on double-side event-triggering mechanisms

This article concentrates on the problem of adaptive event-triggered control with double-side event-triggering mechanisms for a family of switched nonlinear systems with measurement sensitivity. In order to circumvent the negative effect of intermittent transmission and sensor measurement sensitivity on the output, an extended system is constructed by introducing a first-order output filter. Then, an input-driven neural switched observer is designed to estimate unmeasurable system states. To deal with the mutual interaction between the triggering and the switching mechanisms and their negative effect on the positive lower bound of inter-execution intervals, an incremental compensation is incorporated in the event-triggering mechanism (ETM) at the output sensor side. At last, a novel event-triggered control scheme built on both sides of the controller and output is proposed, which exhibits superior efficacy compared to the one-side event-triggered control scheme. By using the methods of the average dwell time (ADT) and the backstepping design, it is guaranteed that all signals of the switched closed-loop system are semiglobally uniformly ultimately bounded (SGUUB), and the Zeno phenomenon is excluded. The efficacy of the proposed methodology is validated by using a numerical simulation and a one-link robot system.

Detection of ribonucleotides embedded in DNA by Nanopore sequencing

Ribonucleotides represent the most common non-canonical nucleotides found in eukaryotic genomes. The sources of chromosome-embedded ribonucleotides and the mechanisms by which unrepaired rNMPs trigger genome instability and human pathologies are not fully understood. The available sequencing technologies only allow to indirectly deduce the genomic location of rNMPs. Oxford Nanopore Technologies (ONT) may overcome such limitation, revealing the sites of rNMPs incorporation in genomic DNA directly from raw sequencing signals. We synthesized two types of DNA molecules containing rNMPs at known or random positions and we developed data analysis pipelines for DNA-embedded ribonucleotides detection by ONT. We report that ONT can identify all four ribonucleotides incorporated in DNA by capturing rNMPs-specific alterations in nucleotide alignment features, current intensity, and dwell time. We propose that ONT may be successfully employed to directly map rNMPs in genomic DNA and we suggest a strategy to build an ad hoc basecaller to analyse native genomes.

Subjective vs. objective assessment of the economic impacts of light rail transit: The case of G:Link in Gold Coast, Australia

While the current discourse surrounding the economic impacts of light rail transit (LRT) predominantly leans on objective metrics, emerging signs point to a possible disparity between subjective perceptions and these objective evaluations. This study endeavours to fill this void by scrutinizing the impacts of the G:Link in Gold Coast, Australia on local businesses, prompted by anecdotal commentary of adverse effects. Conducting 23 interviews with businesses in Surfers Paradise, located within the G:Link's influential zone, helped identify thematic economic effects. Subsequently, Difference-in-Difference and time-series regression models were estimated to objectively validate four of the identified thematic effects: changes in travel behaviour, business performance, customer base, and tourism activity. While businesses perceived the G:Link as ineffective in promoting public transport and blamed it for their economic downturns, objective data countered these perceptions. It revealed that the G:Link contributed to a 3.6% rise in public transport usage to Surfers Paradise. The economic downturn experienced by businesses cannot be linked to the LRT; rather, it mirrors a broader citywide temporal effect. Furthermore, in contrast to prevailing beliefs, there was a notable increase in both customer volumes and their dwell times. The findings offer nuanced insights into LRT's effects on individual businesses and aggregated impacts, highlighting prevalent misperceptions that could undermine public support, investment opportunities, and sustainable transport choices. Addressing these misunderstandings necessitates robust education and communication strategies.