Lack Of Universality Research Articles

Efficacy of the novel, innovative, single-use grasper integrated flexible cystoscope for ureteral stent removal: a systematic review.

We aimed to define the published impact, efficacy, cost-effectiveness and precise role of the Isiris-α device: the world's first sterile, single-use grasper integrated flexible cystoscope (SUGIFC) for ureteral stent removal. After PROSPERO registration (CRD42021228755), the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines were utilized. The search terms "Grasper Integrated Flexible Cystoscope," and "Isiris," within the following databases: PubMed, Scopus, Cochrane Library, Web of Science and EMBASE were searched. In this review, a cumulative total experience (10 publications) included 970 "SUGIFC" procedures (755 patients). However, only 366/970 procedures were actually used for "ureteral stent removal," with the remainder being surveillance cystoscopy only (603/970) or foreign body retrieval (1/970). Procedure-related and device failures in planned "removal of ureteral stents," was reported in 8/366 (346 patients) and 1/366 (346 patients), respectively. The cost-benefit utilizing the SUGIFC device is advantageous compared to "in-theatre" stent removals and favours less busy centres where maintenance, repair and replacement costs are more relevant. Other listed benefits include shorter stent indwelling times, shorter procedure duration, lower rates of bacteriuria and urinary tract infections, fewer emergency department visits and lower readmission rates. Technical limitations include the absence of an independent working channel, a narrower visual field and the lack of image universality since the monitor is device-specific. The SUGIFC device needs to be outweighed against local costs and individual health systems. Its application in ambulatory ureteral stent removal may become significant due to the accessibility and convenience that it offers the attending urologist.

Mitochondrial substitution rates estimation for divergence time analyses in modern birds based on full mitochondrial genomes

Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is a popular resource used for the study of evolutionary processes in birds, especially to infer divergence times between lineages. In many cases, due to the scarcity of fossils with which to constrain the age of nodes on a phylogenetic topology, dating relies on mtDNA substitution rates that, ideally, are specific to the taxa being studied. As such values are often unavailable, many studies use fixed‐rate values from other studies, such as the ‘standard molecular clock’. The validity of this universal rate across all bird lineages and for the different mtDNA loci has been questioned by multiple authors. We here performed the most comprehensive calibration of the mtDNA molecular clock in birds, with the inclusion of complete mitochondrial genomes for 622 bird species and 25 reliable fossil calibrations. The results show variation in the rates among lineages and among markers, confirming the lack of universality of the standard molecular clock. Moreover, we provide specific rates for every mtDNA marker (except D‐loop) in each of the sampled avian orders, a valuable tool for molecular clock analyses in the absence of fossil calibrations.

The Reception of Droit de Suite in International Law: Diagnosis and Remedy

Droit de suite, the right for artists to receive an interest in each resale of their original artworks, commemorates one century of existence this year but remains highly hypothetical for many artists worldwide. This article addresses the reasons for this situation and proposes possible solutions by using a comparative law approach. An analysis of international (Berne Convention) and national regulations (Australia and Brazil) shows that the lack of universality and operationality of the resale royalty right is a consequence of choices made by the Berne Union in 1948. Mainly, the absence of obligation for Member States to implement it and the broad margin left to them that fosters the multiplication of national peculiarities. An amendment of article 14ter of the Berne Convention seems necessary. The World Intellectual Property Organization-WIPO may refer to national and regional experiences, as well as existing researches, to speed up the pace of the current discussions on the topic and ensure that artists finally benefit in a homogeneous way from a right to the value created around their work.

МЕТОДОЛОГИЧЕСКИЕ ПРОБЛЕМЫ ИССЛЕДОВАНИЯ САМОСОЗНАНИЯ В ОТЕЧЕСТВЕННОЙ ПСИХОЛОГИИ

The article identifies methodological problems of self-awareness research in Russian psychology. The relationship between the definitions of consciousness and self-consciousness is considered. It is established that self-consciousness is a more complex psychological formation in relation to consciousness. It occurs in the process of human ontogenesis. This methodological approach raises the problem of finding the determinants of the development of self-consciousness in the basis of consciousness. The concept and structure of self-consciousness in the works of Soviet and Russian psychologists are analyzed. There is a variety of ideas about this psychological education in Russian science. Each author's concept seeks to introduce new elements into the content of self-consciousness by using additional psychological tools. The lack of universality in the definition and structure of self-consciousness leads to a methodological problem of its research. This situation is due to the fact that the authors of concepts, in different ways, determine the content of this complex phenomenon of the psyche, based on their life experience and theoretical preferences. The experimental methods used by researchers in the study of this psychological education are defined. In Russian psychology, the most common standardized and non-standardized self-reports, as well as psychosemantic methods. The absolute advantage of these methods is a large variety of responses of subjects about their own "I". However, when describing themselves, subjects sometimes try to demonstrate socially desirable qualities, which creates a problem of reliability of the results obtained. The main principles of self-awareness research in Russian psychology are described: the principle of consciousness and activity, the principle of development, the principle of personal approach, and the cultural and historical principle. Their role in overcoming the methodological difficulties of its study is established. Promising ways of self-awareness research and methodological problems that may arise on the way to their implementation are outlined.

Online monitoring of structural materials integrity in process industry for I4.0: A focus on material loss through erosion and corrosion sensing

This paper presents a critical review of the main sensing techniques considered for online monitoring of the integrity of alloys steel-made equipment used in process industry. This includes pipelines, tanks, electrical transformers and other metallic structures used in construction of buildings and bridges. Radio frequency (RF), Magnetic flux leak (MFL), ultrasonic-acoustic, fiber brag grating (FBG), thin layer strips, and photoacoustic sensors remain the main sensing techniques used or suggested for this purpose. However, despite lot of research works to improve their sensitivity and accuracy, further efforts are required to have them readily operational in the field especially for covering large volumes. This can be facilitated by the significant development carried out in various areas related to information technology (IT) and instrumentation, such as optical fiber sensors and self-powered wireless sensors under I4.0 paradigm. While optical fiber sensors, particularly FBG sensors, have the advantage to be scalable to cover wide areas with a few number of wires, they encounter the challenge of being not highly sensitive, especially for detecting degradations e.g. corrosion and erosion occurring at the opposite side of the steel structure. In addition, for such types of degradations, the fiber needs to be permanently and tightly connected to the structure, which is difficult to sustain. In addition, their proportional cost to the target sensitivity and resolution remains expensive. Wireless sensors equipped with ultrasonic sensors remain another tangible potential alternative for detecting internal corrosion and erosion of the structures if some pending issues relevant to power supply, using for instance energy harvesting, are sorted out. Overall, the existing technologies still suffer from a lack of sensitivity, accuracy, universality and/or cost effectiveness which justifies that more development efforts need to be done.

Scaling characteristics of modelled tropical oceanic rain clusters

AbstractThe scaling exponents of the distributions of cluster rain amount, R, and cluster size, A, for oceanic rain clusters over the Indian and Pacific warm pools, and the intertropical convergence zones over the eastern Pacific and the tropical Atlantic, were obtained from a set of regional climate model downscaling products. The main aim of the investigation is to compare the model cluster's scaling characteristics with those obtained from observations that have been reported previously. The scaling exponents for the model were found to be different across the ocean basins indicating the lack of universality in the modelled rain cluster distributions. The scaling exponent for the conditional mean of R given A = a, E(R|a), was found to be the same across the different ocean basins, and the estimated value of the exponent agrees with that obtained from satellite‐observed rain clusters. However, no crossover in the scaling of E(R|a) in the model for cluster size larger than mesoscale was seen, unlike those reported elsewhere based on observations. The implication is that in the model the intensification of rain with cluster size continues up to synoptic scale. Through simple scaling arguments it is believed that before the break in scaling that has been identified from an observational study elsewhere, the model simulates the fundamental mesoscale dynamics well and thus estimated the E(R|a) in agreement with observations. Whether such a difference in transition of scaling between the modelled and observed rain cluster scaling behaviour depends on the model details, for example the convection parametrization, needs further clarification.

Expectativas e percepções da qualidade dos serviços de transporte privado de passageiros solicitado por aplicativos: evidências do Brasil

O serviço de transporte privado solicitado por aplicativos de mobilidade surgiu em um contexto de ineficiência dos serviços de transporte público e da falta de universalidade na abrangência dos táxis, impulsionado também pela utilização cada vez mais crescente da tecnologia digital. Considerando que, no Brasil, pesquisas demonstram que os consumidores utilizam transportes por aplicativos de maneira crescente, o presente estudo objetiva verificar qual é a percepção dos passageiros em relação aos atributos envolvidos na satisfação com o serviço de transporte terrestre de passageiros oferecido por aplicativos. Os atributos foram definidos a partir de uma revisão de literatura e foram aplicados questionários on-line à 417 respondentes para averiguar como esses aspectos são avaliados pelos consumidores. Os resultados obtidos foram tratados por análise estatística da escala SERVQUAL, que possibilitou identificar a existência de uma lacuna negativa entre a expectativa dos consumidores e o desempenho real do serviço prestado para todos os itens avaliados. A partir desses resultados, as empresas de aplicativos de transporte podem trabalhar em melhorar a experiência que desejam proporcionar em sua prestação de serviço, na concepção de seu preço e de suas promoções, entre outros aspectos.

Studying working process of shifting the gear in electromechanical mechanism of gearbox control

Problem. The article is devoted to improvement of operational parameters of electromechanical automated drive of gear shift of heavy trucks and buses, improvement of the design of the actuator of the gearbox drive gear control, optimizing operation of the algorithm of controlling the automated electromechanical drive of gear shift. Goal. By analyzing information sources, requirements are set for the automated gearbox drive. On the basis of the analysis of existing designs of the gearshift drives in the mechanical transmission boxes, it was concluded that it is expedient to further improve the electromechanical drive of the gear shift with the actuators on the basis of DC motors, as the most current for use in transmission of heavy trucks and buses. Methodology. The main disadvantage of such structures at the moment is seen in the lack of universality of the analogues considered, concerning their use in gearboxes of different production. This, in turn, negatively affects the cost and reliability of the drive. Results. The dynamical processes taking place in the automated switching mechanism are considered, the mathematical model of the electric motor is investigated and the parameters are determined which influence the work process, the types of electric motors used in the technique, the equations used in mathematical modeling are described, the prospects of rational gearbox control are considered. According to the results of the analysis of the obtained results for further improvement, the design of the actuating mechanism of gear shift with two electric motors of direct current of own design is proposed. It is determined that the proposed new interconnections between the structural elements of the gearshift mechanism allow simultaneously obtaining the required speed of the drive, high accuracy of the adjustment, and provide the necessary effort on the synchronizer. A mathematical description of the working process of transmission switching on by automated electromechanical drive of gear shift is executed. Practical value. The mathematical model of the executive mechanism of the electromechanical drive gearbox transmission includes: differential equations that describe the operation of the electric motor of the direct current, as well as the equation of connection.

The institutionalisation of a new social policy in the Portuguese Estado Novo. The struggle for a corporatist welfare (1933-1945)

Este artículo debate sobre los objetivos de la política social y de las instituciones de los regímenes fascistas. Considerando el concepto de fascismo de forma más amplia y no basado exclusivamente en la experiencia fascista italiana, este análisis se centra en el régimen corporativista del Estado Nuevo portugués. Teniendo en cuenta que en el contexto de entreguerras el corporativismo era una forma de construir políticas sociales específicas y autoritarias, este artículo expone las estructuras institucionales portuguesas para el bienestar y analiza sus objetivos instrumentales. Comparando la experiencia portuguesa con otros sistemas corporativistas, ¿hubo un welfare corporativista? ¿Fue esta una nueva política social conectada a la modernización económica y capaz de competir con el Estado de bienestar democrático? Estas preguntas clave se responden mediante el análisis de las contradicciones del sistema social corporativo portugués de Salazar, su falta de universalidad y su desconexión con los derechos sociales.

Methodology for determining coefficients of turbulent mixing model

Abstract

Human Rights Universalism in Practice: What the Iranian Women’s Rights Movement Can Teach Us

Abstract Does practice demonstrate the legitimacy of international human rights law? This article explores this question via a case study of the women’s rights movement in Iran. Current human rights sceptics question the system’s legitimacy because of a lack of universality and an excessive top-down approach. However, the Islamic Republic of Iran has a remarkable community of grassroots activists. The bottom-up women’s rights initiative of the One Million Signatures Campaign utilised human rights discourse in combination with local, indigenous values in pursuit of gender equality. The article argues—via the case study of this movement—that there is practical evidence to support a theory of human rights universalism, as positive human rights law empowers the existing subjectivity of individuals. The universal legitimacy of international human rights law does not primarily come from a global network dictating common values, but from members of civil society mobilising their status as rights holders.

Tumor Cell-Intrinsic Immunometabolism and Precision Nutrition in Cancer Immunotherapy.

One of the greatest challenges in the cancer immunotherapy field is the need to biologically rationalize and broaden the clinical utility of immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs). The balance between metabolism and immune response has critical implications for overcoming the major weaknesses of ICIs, including their lack of universality and durability. The last decade has seen tremendous advances in understanding how the immune system’s ability to kill tumor cells requires the conspicuous metabolic specialization of T-cells. We have learned that cancer cell-associated metabolic activities trigger shifts in the abundance of some metabolites with immunosuppressory roles in the tumor microenvironment. Yet very little is known about the tumor cell-intrinsic metabolic traits that control the immune checkpoint contexture in cancer cells. Likewise, we lack a comprehensive understanding of how systemic metabolic perturbations in response to dietary interventions can reprogram the immune checkpoint landscape of tumor cells. We here review state-of-the-art molecular- and functional-level interrogation approaches to uncover how cell-autonomous metabolic traits and diet-mediated changes in nutrient availability and utilization might delineate new cancer cell-intrinsic metabolic dependencies of tumor immunogenicity. We propose that clinical monitoring and in-depth molecular evaluation of the cancer cell-intrinsic metabolic traits involved in primary, adaptive, and acquired resistance to cancer immunotherapy can provide the basis for improvements in therapeutic responses to ICIs. Overall, these approaches might guide the use of metabolic therapeutics and dietary approaches as novel strategies to broaden the spectrum of cancer patients and indications that can be effectively treated with ICI-based cancer immunotherapy.

Using electronegativity and hardness to test density functionals.

Density functional theory (DFT) is used in thousands of papers each year, yet lack of universality reduces DFT's predictive capacity, and functionals may produce energy-density imbalances. The absolute electronegativity (χ) and hardness (η) directly reflect the energy-density relationship via the chemical potential ∂E/∂N and we thus hypothesized that they probe universality. We studied χ and η for atoms Z = 1-36 using 50 diverse functionals covering all major classes. Very few functionals describe both χ and η well. η benefits from error cancellation, whereas χ is marred by error propagation from IP and EA; thus, almost all standard GGA and hybrid functionals display a plateau in the MAE at ∼0.2 eV-0.3 eV for η. In contrast, variable performance for χ indicates problems in describing the chemical potential by DFT. The accuracy and precision of a functional is far from linearly related, yet for a universal functional, we expect linearity. Popular functionals such as B3LYP, PBE, and revPBE perform poorly for both properties. Density sensitivity calculations indicate large density-derived errors as occupation of degenerate p- and d-orbitals causes "non-universality" and large dependency on exact exchange. Thus, we argue that performance for χ for the same systems is a hallmark of an important aspect of universality by probing ∂E/∂N. With this metric, B98, B97-1, PW6B95D3, MN-15, rev-TPSS, HSE06, and APFD are the most "universal" among the tested functionals. B98 and B97-1 are accurate for very diverse metal-ligand bonds, supporting that a balanced description of ∂E/∂N and ∂E2/∂N2, via χ and η, is probably a first simple probe of universality.

Spinning Bar and a Star-formation Inefficient Repertoire: Turbulence in Hickson Compact Group NGC 7674

Abstract The physics regulating star formation (SF) in Hickson Compact Groups (HCG) has thus far been difficult to describe, due to their unique kinematic properties. In this study, we expand upon previous works to devise a more physically meaningful SF relation able to better encompass the physics of these unique systems. We combine CO(1–0) data from the Combined Array from Research in Millimeter Astronomy to trace the column density of molecular gas and deep Hα imaging taken on the Southern Astrophysical Research Telescope tracing to investigate SF efficiency across face-on HCG, NGC 7674. We find a lack of universality in SF, with two distinct sequences present in the – plane; one for inside and one for outside the nucleus. We devise an SF relation based on the multi-freefall nature of gas and the critical density, which itself is dependent on the virial parameter , the ratio of turbulent to gravitational energy. We find that our modified SF relation fits the data and describes the physics of this system well with the introduction of a virial parameter of about 5–10 across the galaxy. This leads to an order-of-magnitude reduction in SFR compared to systems.

TraG: A Trajectory Generation Technique for Simulating Urban Crowd Mobility

Mobility models, which reproduce traces with basic crowd mobility patterns, are crucial for realistic mobile network simulation and performance evaluation of the planning strategies used for urban networks (such as transit network, communication network, and crowdsensing network). However, trajectories generated by traditional models are often perceived as not realistic for urban context or lack of scalability and universality. This article presents a data-driven trajectory generating technique, named as TraG, that produces synthetic trajectories with the help of some real-world trajectories. Our technique can automatically extract the context features and statistical mobility features, which characterize the mobility of a specific urban crowd from the input empirical traces and, then, regenerate more trajectories based on demand. Moreover, we also summarize the power-law scale correlation of crowd mobility based on four real-world open datasets, including public bicycle traces in New York City and Washington, D.C., taxicab traces in San Francisco and Shenzhen. Finally, we validate the proposed TraG model via the continuous San Francisco taxicab traces, and the result demonstrates that the trajectories simulated by TraG not only inherit the fundamental statistical features of crowd mobility from real traces, but also reflect the features of urban context.

Deep learning based drought assessment and prediction framework

Natural calamities like drought cause misery to human lives as well as environment in a variety of ways. The huge adverse consequences and globally predicted climate change accentuate the importance of an effective drought assessment and management system. Lack of universality of available drought indices emphasize the need of an automated system that works globally. Internet of Things (IoT) is highly appropriated for ubiquitous monitoring, acquisition and evaluation of causing parameters for reliable prediction of drought situations. The framework includes dimensionality reduction algorithm at Fog layer through which only variance rich data passes. This data is evaluated at the Cloud layer to determine the drought severity level employing Artificial Neural Network (ANN), ANN optimized with Genetic Algorithm (ANN-GA), DNN (Deep Neural Network) and their performance is compared. Support Vector Regression (SVR) method predicts the drought conditions for three different climate blocks and three different time frames. Experimentation reveals that DNN outperformed with high accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, precision, f-measure with values 95.361%, 91.584%, 96.834%, 91.857%, 91.72% respectively and with effective execution time.

A practical approach for multiagent manufacturing system based on agent computing nodes

With the increasing requirement for personalized customization service, discrete manufacturing workshop, as the parts processing unit in manufacturing system, is expected for more agile and fast adaptation to environment changes, dynamically handling production tasks according to resource conditions. Simultaneously, distributed artificial intelligence system (e.g. multiagent manufacturing system and the holonic manufacturing system) has been considered as an important approach for developing industrial applications to solve the problems of complexity, uncertainty, and dynamic in the modern manufacturing environment. But the lack of universality and the difficulty in deployment have restricted the use of distributed artificial intelligence in actual industrial sites. For this issue, a new concept of agent computing node is proposed in this paper to enable the realization of multiagent manufacturing system. Adaptation layer, information development layer, and intelligent analysis layer are investigated for standardizing the configuration mode of agent computing node. Cooperating agent computing node with the radio frequency identification-based dynamic recognition technology for workpiece machining process is presented in this paper, and a practical approach for multiagent manufacturing system is considered, which can apply the functions regarding to deployment of dynamic scheduling and plug-and-play. A laboratory discrete manufacturing workshop system is used as a case study to prove the feasibility of this approach. In addition, a verification in industry is carried out, and the result proves the universality of this approach.

Due and specific performance of contractual obligations under Russian law

The article examines the due and specific performance of contractual obligations under Russian law in addition to determining the ratio of these categories among themselves. The relevance of this article stems from the evolution of the market economy and the concomitant increase of the role of contractual performance, which mediates the movement of benefits between the parties of a business transaction. The effectiveness of this process, contributing to the economic growth of the state, is possible if the obligations are duly performed. The aim of the work is to examine the nature and structure of due and specific performance in order to identify their interrelation and value in the course of contractual performance. The research material consisted of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation, Russian jurisprudence, and Russian authors’ scientific papers in the field of civil law. The methodological basis involved general scientific (analysis, synthesis, and analogy) and special legal methods (comparativelegal, formal-logical, systemic, structural-functional methods, and method of interpretation). The allocation of the principle of due contractual performance under Russian law is justified. Herewith, due and specific performance are not just closely interrelated, but they are related overall and as components. It seems appropriate to consider specific performance as an element of the above-mentioned principle. However, specific performance is not a principle due to its lack of universality caused by certain restrictions and conditions for its implementation, taking into account the existing legal regulation and current practice. At the same time, specific performance continues to play an important role in the course of primarily long-term contractual performance and the performance of obligations arising from contracts involving monopolistic companies.

Participant Observation and the Ethics of Social Research

The major thrust of this study is to resolve the ethical controversies surrounding informed consent and identity of the researchers in the conduct of research through participant observation as well as ethical standards in social science research. It recommends that research ethical standards should include concealment of researcher's identity when doing otherwise would endanger his/her life in the research process. It also canvases the legitimization of “deception” when the well-being of the entire society is involved particularly in the study of deviants with a view to formulating public policies drawing the strength of the argument from lack of absoluteness and universality in the conceptualization of ethics and ethical standards that are basically structured on morality within and outside the social science professional community.

Research progress on three-dimensional pattern in landscape ecology

The close interactions between abiotic and biotic components create a variety of three-dimensional (3-D) landscape patterns. Landscape ecology, as a discipline of studying patterns and ecological processes, has made rapid progress in the exploration of 3-D space with the improvement of data acquirement ability, such as lidar technology. The real surface landscape can be described considering 3-D data, which improves the consistency between landscape indices and ecological process, and has overcome the shortage of ecological meanings of traditional researches. However, the lack of universality of methods and conclusions still exist due to different study backgrounds. The sensitivities of research results will increase with the expansion from two-dimensional to 3-D scale because of the increasing data quantity and accuracy. How to select and process the suitable scaled data to get more scientific conclusions need to be discussed in the future. The integration of multi-scale, multi-source and a long time series data will be the study trend with data acquisition becoming more convenient. In addition to the dynamic monitoring and prediction studies, the sustainable and ecological restoration application combined with landscape planning and design will be an important research direction.