Limited Time Research Articles

Primary Care Providers' Experiences With an Active Elective Genetic Testing Program.

Elective genetic testing (EGT) programs that provide pharmacogenomic information to guide medication management and screen for medically actionable disease predispositions are emerging in a number of health systems. Primary care providers (PCPs) are at the forefront of test initiation, patient education, and management of EGT results. However, little research has examined the experiences of PCPs in health systems offering clinical EGT. We conducted semi-structured interviews, a sub-study of the larger mixed-methods Imagenetics Initiative, with 16 PCPs at a health system in the Midwest with a clinical EGT program supported by provider education, automated clinical decision support, and enhanced access to genetic specialists. The purpose of these interviews was to understand perceptions about the benefits and barriers of implementing EGT in clinical practice. Thematic analysis indicated that EGT is conceptualized similar to traditional diagnostic services. PCPs were generally favorable toward EGT; however, targeted education did not dispel misconceptions about the goals, results, and limitations of EGT. Most PCPs endorsed the potential utility of EGT. Pharmacogenomic profiling was seen as having more immediate impact for patients than screening for monogenic disease risks. PCPs reported that they weighed discussions about EGT against time limitations and the need to prioritize patients' existing health concerns. Regardless of their education levels and familiarity with genetics, PCPs desired additional educational resources and greater access to genetic specialists. Our study provides unique insight into PCPs' experiences with clinical EGT in health systems that have adopted EGT and highlights the practical challenges and potential opportunities of EGT integration.

Media Pembelajaran Video Simulasi Perubahan Wujud Zat dan Bentuk Energi: Penelitian dan Pengembangan

IPAS (Social and Exact Science Education) is a subject in the Kurikulum Merdeka. This subject invite student to recognize natural anomalies by facts. However, results of the researcher's observations on the interest of 4th-grade elementary school students in learning science showed that 93.75% of students experienced difficulties in learning science, especially in the matter of changes in the state of matter and energy forms. So, based on the results of the theoretical formulation and potential problems, the researcher is interested in proposing the development of a simulation video product. This type of research is Research and Development (R&D) based on 7 stages, namely, potential and problems, data collection, product design, design validation, design revision, product testing, and product revision due to limitations of materials, time, and manpower. After the prototype product is completed, the researcher validates the content, media, and language with 9 experts, with each having 3 validations: (Content validators, Media validators, Language validators) The test results show that 86% of the material validation, 92% of the media expert validation, and 96% of the language validation, it can be concluded that the simulation video product is very feasible to use with minor revisions. Furthermore, the researchers carried out a teacher and student readability test on the simulation video media. The scores obtained were 91,2% for teachers and 89,2% for students. So that simulation video products able as media supplements in learning.

Mortality of epilepsy in Chinese populations: a comprehensive review.

Premature mortality is a significant part of the epilepsy burden and may vary across populations, especially between high-income and lower- and middle-income countries. People with epilepsy in China are approximately a fifth of the global population with epilepsy. Previous studies were unlikely to represent the situation in China due to limitations in design, methods, sample size, follow-up time, and other inherent population heterogeneity. By summarising the evidence on the mortality characteristics in Chinese populations with epilepsy in the last six decades, we found a median mortality rate of 14.7 (6.8-74.4)/1000 person-years and a median standardised mortality ratio (SMR) of 4.4 (2.6-12.9) in population-based studies, and a median mortality rate of 12.3 (9.5-101.5)/1000 person-years and a median SMR of 3.0 (1.5-5.1) in hospital-based studies. Vascular diseases, complications of diabetes, and accidental injuries were the leading causes of death. Risk factors for mortality were reported as older age, male, longer duration and higher frequency of seizures. Case fatality ratios of status epilepticus (SE) in adults were higher than in children, and both increased with follow-up time. Mortality in people with symptomatic epilepsy was high and varied across different primary diseases. The highest mortality rate and sudden unexpected death in epilepsy (SUDEP) incidence were reported from the least developed areas in China. Accidental injuries were the most common causes of epilepsy-related deaths, while the incidence of SUDEP may be underestimated in Chinese populations. Further research is warranted to improve the understanding of premature mortality risk so that preventative measures can be introduced to improve the situation.

The effect of task processing management on energy consumption at the edge of Internet of things network with using reinforcement learning method

In this paper, the task processing approach at the edge of the Internet of Things (IoT) network in improving energy consumption was investigated. First, the subject of maximizing the use of energy is defined as the main problem and then based on the state of assignment of task processing from end devices at the edge of the network to smart gateways and local servers at the edge using possible low bandwidth and low battery consumption, the problem is divided into two subject which are obtained independently. After modeling by recombining these two sub-problems, the subject of maximizing the utility gain and battery life of the end devices is solved despite the limitations of processing time and energy resources.Considering that the environment of the problem and how the terminal devices are connected with the edge devices are unknown, a repetitive reinforcement learning algorithm has been used to create an optimal solution to maximize the operational benefit of the energy consumed in edge processing. The results achieved from the simulation show the increase in network load and processing overhead with the increase in the number of active devices. The suggested method, while increasing the edge processing speed, decreases the delay and maximizes the performance gain of the IOT edge system compared to the central cloud system. It should be noted that when the number of active end devices dramatically increases, the energy consumption and bandwidth at the network edge improves, and energy consumption at the network edge decreases lonely by 12.5%.

A comparison between Hankel and Fourier methods for photothermal radiometry analysis

AbstractPhotothermal radiometry has recently been investigated for use in the multidimensional thermal characterization of anisotropic samples. In application, there are two principal thermal models available for such characterization: a Cartesian model for the heat equation, which requires the application of three Fourier transforms to arrive at a solution (dubbed the Fourier technique), and a cylindrical model for the heat equation, which requires the application of a Hankel transform and a single Fourier transform (dubbed the Hankel technique). The Fourier technique allows for three‐dimensional characterization, while the Hankel technique is expected to greatly reduce the computational time required. As these models can be very computationally expensive, the potential to reduce this cost is of great interest. In this work, these multidimensional models are presented after which they are compared for accuracy, computational time, and assumption limitations. It was found that both the Fourier and Hankel techniques could accurately arrive at desired thermal properties, but that the Hankel Technique reduced the computational time by between 100× and 250× depending upon mesh spacings. Accuracy limitations were found as the eccentricity of the heating laser was increased with a less than 13% error being induced from a beam with a 3–1 axis ratio. The Hankel technique shows ideal application in computationally expensive models which employ a relatively circular beam shape.

Tourist Guide Writing Project: Assisting 4C Skills through Project-Based Learning in English for Tourism

One of the recommended teaching methods in the Indonesia’s Merdeka Belajar (Freedom to Learn) Curriculum is Project-based Learning (PjBL). This research aims to explore the implementation of PjBL in assisting the students’ 4C skills through a writing project in English for Tourism Class in Indonesia. This research employed a qualitative design to investigate the PjBL implementation by the teacher to the fifth semester students at a Tour Guiding Program. An open-ended questionnaire, interview, and teacher reflective notes were conducted to collect the data. The data analysis included data reading and categorization, data matching, data reduction, data display and interpretation, and drawing conclusions. The results showed that PjBL gave the opportunities to train the students’ 4C skills through group tasks, data collection, presentation, and the tourist spot visit. They also learned to develop an English writing text more meaningfully, and to construct knowledge about tourism from the real-world context. The challenges found were time limitation, student different characteristics, and teacher’s limited experiences. Teachers who are eager to apply PjBL may use this teaching procedure in this research with the considerations of these challenges and classroom needs. Besides, supplementing an observation method and expanding the research scope are recommended for future research

Not EF skills but play with real toys prevents screen time tantrums in children.

Limiting children's screen time has become a new parenting challenge. Due to the high attractiveness of media and digital devices, many children experience painful transitions in screen time to other activities. Screen time tantrums is a new concept that describes children's negative affect screen time limits. Knowing the factors that increase children's negative reactions will be helpful in parents and educators practice to prevent screen time tantrums or enrich children's nondigital activities, making them attractive alternatives to the media. Based on theoretical insights into the coping mechanisms of frustration and anger in preschool children, this study was aimed to explore the effects of executive functions skills, family activities, and children's play behavior with real toys on screen time tantrums. Sample included 654 caregiver-child pairs (M children age = 70.3 months, SD = 4.02). Results confirmed the hypothesis that play behavior with real toys is a stronger preventor of screen time tantrum than EF skills. The findings suggest that supporting play activity in preschool children might help them to avoid strong negative affects due to screen time limitation. The results of this study may be also considered as a support for the theoretical assumptions that play can be considered as a universal way of coping with frustration and anger in childhood.

Improving stability in hybrid fire testing: Advancements in analysis method and software implementation

In large-scale structural fire resistance tests, the interaction between the individual elements and the surrounding structure causes discrepancies in behaviour compared to single-element fire tests. Large-scale tests of real structures are challenging due to financial and time limitations. To bridge this gap, the concept of “Hybrid Fire Testing (HFT)” emerges, where a portion of the structural system (i.e., physical substructure) is experimentally tested while the remaining structure (i.e., numerical substructure) is analyzed numerically. The primary challenges in HFT involve ensuring stability throughout the analysis by considering the varying stiffness of the fire-exposed element during the test and establishing a versatile communication platform between the physical substructure (PS) and numerical substructure (NS) components. This paper presents a comprehensive HFT framework, implemented within a user-friendly software interface, facilitating both virtual and experimental testing. The software incorporates a new method addressing stability concerns by predicting PS stiffness during the test, achieving convergence within a limited number of iterations. Additionally, the framework includes a communication platform utilizing internet protocols (IP) and COM ports for rapid and easy connection to diverse experimental control systems and finite element software packages. The functionality of the developed software is validated through its successful application in an HFT conducted on a 3-story steel structure within a simulated environment. Both force-controlled and displacement-controlled approaches confirm the method’s adaptivity to the employed test procedures.

Rapid Microbial Profiling through Multimodal Biosensors for Transversal Analysis.

The intricate interactions between host and microbial communities hold significant implications for biology and medicine. However, traditional microbial profiling methods face limitations in processing time, measurement of absolute abundance, detection of low biomass, discrimination between live and dead cells, and functional analysis. This study introduces a rapid multimodal microbial characterization platform, Multimodal Biosensors for Transversal Analysis (MBioTA), for capturing the taxonomy, viability, and functional genes of the microbiota. The platform incorporates single cell biosensors, scalable microwell arrays, and automated image processing for rapid transversal analysis in as few as 2 h. The multimodal biosensors simultaneously characterize the taxon, viability, and functional gene expression of individual cells. By automating the image processing workflow, the single cell analysis techniques enable the quantification of bacteria with sensitivity down to 0.0075%, showcasing its capability in detecting low biomass samples. We illustrate the applicability of the MBioTA platform through the transversal analysis of the gut microbiota composition, viability, and functionality in a familial Alzheimer's disease mouse model. The effectiveness, rapid turnaround, and scalability of the MBioTA platform will facilitate its application from basic research to clinical diagnostics, potentially revolutionizing our understanding and management of diseases associated with microbe-host interactions.

Teamwork of General and Special Education Teachers in Managing the Education of Learners with Autism

Understanding the dynamics of collaboration helps identify best practices, resolve issues, and foster smooth working relationships among general and special education teachers for students with ASD achievement. This study explored the collaboration of general and special education teachers in educating learners with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) at three (3) selected elementary schools in Chicago, Illinois, USA, during the school year 2023-2024. This is a phenomenological inquiry of the ten purposively selected participants who answered the researcher-made semi-structured questionnaire that contained four (4) open-ended questions. Findings showed that in terms of the participants' views about the various collaboration models Implemented in educating learners with autism, the following were the emerging themes: 1) Team Teaching Collaboration, 2) Support Mechanisms on Demand, and 3) Structured Consultation Session. The impact of teacher collaboration on learners with autism academic outcomes were: 1) Enhanced Communication Abilities; 2) Active School Involvement; and 3) Self-sufficiency Development. The barriers encountered to effective collaboration were 1) Challenges in Communication, 2) Support and Policy from the Administration, and 3) Scheduling and Time Limitations. Thus, the general and special education teachers should intensify their collaboration and address the identified challenges. It is further recommended that a quantitative parallel study be conducted to validate and quantify the impacts of teacher collaboration strategies on the academic outcomes of learners with ASD.

Identifying, restoring, and remastering of the Sarinah relief sculpture in Jakarta of Indonesia: the limitations of time, space, and technology

The Sarinah historic building transformation project in Jakarta, Indonesia (2020–2022) is an adaptive reuse of the original building formed through a scientific conservation process. Therefore, this research identified, restored, and remastered the Sarinah relief sculpture of alto-relievo (high relief) and mezzo-relievo (medium relief). The invasive demolition method was used to form an atrium space to show the reappearance of the artwork by dismantling two layers of building floors above where the relief was found. The non-invasive method was implemented (a) by identifying damaged mapping artifacts, (b) by restoring, cleaning, and repairing the broken artifacts, and (c) by remastering the 3D model. All activities were supported by digital applications such as the Cartesian diagram coordinates, AutoCAD, Adobe Photoshop, Zbrush software, and close-range photogrammetry. The case study's contribution to heritage science showed the process used to restore alto-relievo and mezzo-relief within time, space, and technology limitations.

Brief transition-focused education for families of autistic youth: preliminary mixed-methods investigation

Purpose The transition to adulthood is one of the most challenging and complex processes for autistic youth and their families. Few evidence-based transition support programs exist, and those that have garnered support require long-term commitments and resources that may prohibit participation by families with financial and time limitations. The current study investigated the feasibility and initial promise of a brief, caregiver-focused educational transition program for families of autistic youth delivered in the community over a single day. Methods Quantitative informant-report and qualitative interview data were collected from 12 caregivers of autistic youth before and after program participation. Using a partially mixed sequential equal status design, quantitative and qualitative data were integrated to evaluate change in caregiver transition knowledge and empowerment, as well as caregivers’ perceptions of program feasibility, acceptability, and usefulness. Results Caregivers reported significant increases in knowledge of transition-related topics and sense of empowerment regarding their family life. Caregiver perceptions of the intervention suggest they found it feasible, acceptable, and useful. Conclusions Short-term transition programming may be a helpful option for caregivers who seek transition supports for autistic youth.

Utilizing global-local neural networks for the analysis of non-linear aerodynamics

In addressing the computational challenges pervasive in engineering where time and cost limitations are key concerns, particularly within the Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) domain, Reduced Order Models (ROMs) have emerged as instrumental tools. Focused on reducing computational complexity without intrusively modifying the computational model, this study centres on the strategic application of aerodynamic ROMs, which provide efficient computation of distributed quantities and aerodynamic forces. This work presents ROMs for non-linear aerodynamic applications, integrating principal component analysis (PCA) with Global Local Neural Networks (GLNN). The effectiveness of the proposed methodology is demonstrated by leveraging dependency on the parameter space created with non-linear high-fidelity CFD data, incorporating viscous simulation for a comprehensive approach. Results are first presented for a two-dimensional airfoil case and then for a three-dimensional test case featuring a transonic wing-body-tail transport aircraft configuration (NASA Common Research Model). In transonic flows, the proposed ROMs demonstrate the ability to accurately capture both the location and strength of shocks, as well as forces and moments for unseen prediction points. This highlights the efficiency of the proposed method in navigating complex aerodynamic scenarios, achieving comparable accuracy to full-order modelling but at orders of magnitude less computational time, for unseen parameters outside the ROM training set within the parameter space.

Knowledge, Practices, and Barriers of Communication Skills among a Group of Primary Health-care Physicians in Baghdad 2023

Abstract Background: Communication skills are essential for health professionals to achieve a positive relationship with patients, improving their health and quality of life. Communication is the foundation for obtaining medical history and conveying a diagnosis and treatment plan. Objectives: To assess the knowledge, practice of communication skills among primary care physicians, to find out any barriers related to the communication skills, and the association between the studied variables with knowledge and practice of communication skills. Methodology: A cross-sectional study with analytic component conducted in 40 Primary Health Care Centers in Baghdad, with data collection during a period of 4 months from March 1, 2023 to June 30, 2023. Data had been collected in a questionnaire by direct interview with the participants done by the researcher and including three parts: (participants’ sociodemographic characteristics, knowledge, practice toward communication skills, and the barriers to successful communication). Results: The total number of the participants was 126. The level of knowledge of the participants about physician-patient communication skills was fair in 74 (58.7%) of them, poor in 35 (27.8%). The highest prevalence of poor level of knowledge was seen in participants with specialties other than family medicine and in those with more than 20 years of experience. Level of practice of the participants toward physician-patient communication skills was good in 63 (50%) of them and 63 (50%) had moderate level of practice. The highest prevalence of moderate level of practice was seen in elderly age participants. The most common barrier as mentioned by the participants was time limitation. Conclusion: The majority of primary health-care physicians in this study have fair levels of knowledge, with moderate to good level of practice about communication skills. Family physicians and those who had experience between 10 and 19 years had better knowledge about communication skills. Time limitations are perceived as the biggest hindrance to communication followed by the presentation with multiple complains.

Boosting task completion rate for time-sensitive MCS system

In Mobile Crowdsensing system, many sensing tasks are time-sensitive, hence, time validity is essential cause data outside the time frame is useless which will not only increase requesters’ costs but also damage requesters’ efficiency and utilities. Therefore, it is crucial to design an incentive mechanism to increase system’s task completion rate within time limitations. A dilemma arises between requesters and the MCS system due to the trad-off between requester’s goal to maximize its own utilities and the MCS system’s purpose to increase the whole system’s task completion rate. To solve the dilemma, we come up with a dynamic coopetition (competition and cooperation) incentive mechanism where in every stage there are competition to assure requesters’ utilities and cooperation to reallocate data to advance the system’s task completion rate. During competition, a matching algorithm with budget constraints is presented to derive the optimal matching strategies for requesters and participants without exceeding requesters’ budgets while maximizing utilities. After competing, the centralized MCS platform would reallocate requesters’ excessive data to those who failed to get enough data on time through a data reallocation algorithm. By simulations, we compare the performance of the coopetition incentive mechanism with different orders and parameters. Regardless of parameters or orders, our algorithm can promise a minimum task completion rate of 94% compared with less than 32% task completion rate with only competition. Among all three orders, emergency degree has the best performance with task completion rate up to 99%.

A Parkinson's Auxiliary Diagnosis Algorithm Based on a Hyperparameter Optimization Method of Deep Learning.

Parkinson's disease is a common mental disease in the world, especially in the middle-aged and elderly groups. Today, clinical diagnosis is the main diagnostic method of Parkinson's disease, but the diagnosis results are not ideal, especially in the early stage of the disease. In this paper, a Parkinson's auxiliary diagnosis algorithm based on a hyperparameter optimization method of deep learning is proposed for the Parkinson's diagnosis. The diagnosis system uses ResNet50 to achieve feature extraction and Parkinson's classification, mainly including speech signal processing part, algorithm improvement part based on Artificial Bee Colony algorithm (ABC) and optimizing the hyperparameters of ResNet50 part. The improved algorithm is called Gbest Dimension Artificial Bee Colony algorithm (GDABC), proposing "Range pruning strategy" which aims at narrowing the scope of search and "Dimension adjustment strategy" which is to adjust gbest dimension by dimension. The accuracy of the diagnosis system in the verification set of Mobile Device Voice Recordings at King's College London (MDVR-CKL) dataset can reach more than 96%. Compared with current Parkinson's sound diagnosis methods and other optimization algorithms, our auxiliary diagnosis system shows better classification performance on the dataset within limited time and resources.

CURE: A Hierarchical Framework for Multi-Robot Autonomous Exploration Inspired by Centroids of Unknown Regions

In this paper, a novel multi-robot autonomous exploration approach CURE is proposed based on dynamic Voronoi diagrams and centroids of unknown connected regions. Compared with existing approaches, the novelty of this work is twofold: 1) Dynamic Voronoi diagram is used for partition of the space being explored to improve the efficiency of multi-robot exploration, and then a new parameter-insensitive utility function is elaborately designed to evaluate the information of centroids, which helps guide the robot to explore unknown regions. 2) A hierarchical framework consisting of global and local exploration windows for detecting centroids is designed, wherein the global exploration window is activated to find centroids to guide the robot exploration when there are no centroids in any one local exploration window. We validate the feasibility and exploration efficiency of the proposed approach in various complex simulation scenarios and challenging real-world tasks. All test results show that the exploration time consumption and path cost are reduced by up to 50.7% and 34.4%, respectively, compared with an advanced RRT-based multi-robot exploration approach. (Supplementary video link: https://youtu.be/P5jXKlGQOec) <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">Note to Practitioners</i> —This paper is motivated by the efficient multi-robot autonomous exploration problem. In some applications such as target search and disaster rescue, the information about the environment is totally unknown to the robots, and thus they are required to explore unknown environments autonomously. In this case, it is necessary to improve the efficiency of multi-robot exploration due to the time limitation of the task and the battery capacity. In this paper, a hierarchical framework is proposed to improve the efficiency of multi-robot autonomous exploration. Each robot only needs to explore the Voronoi partition it is responsible for and is guided to the unknown region by the centroid detected in the global and local exploration windows. Overall, the proposed approach can dramatically reduce the exploration time and path cost.

EQUILIBRIUM IN TECHNICAL WRITING: HARMONIZING OBJECTIVITY WITH ADVOCACY

The task of editing is strenuous, and the most challenging one is to reach the target goals within the time limitation. Equilibrium is the stage of finding a balance between two opposite things. In this research piece, the standpoint of an editor will be analyzed from the perspective of objectivity and advocacy. The fact cannot be denied that editors (many of them) spend an extensive time only to rectify the issues related to lexicon. However, painfully true, many of them overlook the rhythm of balancing act, and only for that lethargic activity, they face a challenging situation to reach the laudable phase. The goal of this research task is to help the future editors and the technical writers to connect the eclectic issues related to the balancing act.

Developing Integrative Communicative Skills in the English Language through Video Project

One of the biggest challenges in the organization of the educational process in English is overcoming the limitations of time and space to develop communicative skills in the target language. This paper introduces vlogging as an instructional strategy and measures its effectiveness through the opinion of third and fourth-year students who participated first in a directed vlogging task and then in a focus interview. The interviewed students were a total of 60 from B1 – B2 level of English from the 3rd and 4th year of the NUPCHE undergraduate program at Plovdiv University “Paisi Hilendarski”. The assignment was accompanied by an analytical type of rubric that clearly marked the assessment criteria by levels of performance. The results of the interview revealed the advantages of vlogging as an additional opportunity to develop integrated communicative skills in a foreign language outside the classroom. Most of the participants perceived vlogging as a positive experience with benefits mainly in the direction of productive skills and developing creativity and confidence in the language being studied.

Analysis and Criticism of Mind Transfer

In this article, I examine a futuristic but not unimaginable optional opportunity of immortality – mind transfer – which has a strong connection with neuroscience, computer science, cognitive research, artificial intelligence and finally philosophy. I analyse this promising procedure from different points of view, such as regarding the potential difficulties of human transformation and the confusing issue of consciousness. The methodologies of mapping and scanning the human brain demonstrate contemporary technologies’ capabilities, but their limitations are apparent, too. I find that using mind transfer to ensureor give humans the opportunity to extend their lifespan is not possible with the current level of knowledge and technology. I prove this through an analysis of a thought experiment and examine the differences between the person and the uploaded copy of it, making clear why mind transfer seems to be an impossible challenge right now. Although the use of AI provides great opportunities to support and improve humanity, we can conclude that its usage within present methodologies and technologies is neither sufficient to achieve eternal life nor remove the limitations of time. With the mind transfer procedure, we can preserve information only about humanity and not the essence that makes it unique.