Logical Link Research Articles

Influences of tea consumption on self-rated health and life satisfaction among older adults: Evidence from the CLHLS.

The benefits of tea consumption as a special diet for health and life satisfaction have attracted considerable attention; however, it is not clear whether the effect of tea consumption on self-rated health (SRH) and self-rated life satisfaction (SRL) is equal among all types of tea, and it is unclear whether these associations are impacted by gender and age in older adults. This study aimed to examine the associations between tea consumption, SRH and SRL in older adults and to explore the role of gender and age. Participants aged 65-105 (N = 78,345) were interviewed in the years 2002, 2005, 2008, 2011, 2014 and 2018 in the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Study (CLHLS). Generalized estimation equations (GEE) with the identity link function were adopted to estimate the cross-sectional associations of tea consumption with SRH and SRL. GEE with the logic link function were used to explore the longitudinal associations of tea consumption with SRH decline and SRL decline. Drinking tea at present, especially scented tea, was significantly associated with better SRH and SRL for older adults. Male participants benefited more from tea consumption than females, and the protective effect of green tea consumption on improving SRH and SRL in males was evident. Older adults aged 90-105 with current tea consumption daily had better SRH and reduced risk of SRL decline.

Trade Credit and Firm Value: Evidence from Listed SMEs

There is limited past literature on the impact of trade credit on firm value. This study uses a cross-regional sample of listed small and medium-sized enterprises in China, Eurozone and US between 2011 and 2021 to investigate regional differences of trade credit policies and their influence on firm valuation. Using accounts receivables, accounts payables andthe net trade credit position, our empirical study sheds light on the different valuation environments of stock markets in Asia, Europe and North America with the particular regard of trade credit through our definition of inclusive and egoistic firms. Moreover, the internal logical link between the stakeholder value creation behind trade credit and the holistic concept of firm value enriches contemporary debates around shareholder value maximization theory.

Fill in the Blank, MIMIC the Procedure: Tracking Patient Record for Medical Data Reconstruction.

This study addresses the missing data problem in the large-scale medical dataset MIMIC-IV, especially in situations where intubation-extubation events are paired. We employed a strategy involving patient scenario works that checked the temporal order and logical links of intubation/extubation data, and seven reconstruction rules for handling missing values. Through this, we reduced the overall loss rate from 36.89% (3321 records) to 13.37% (1204 records) and achieved a 37.26% data increase (+2117 records) compared to before reconstruction(6582).

Mucosal Cancers Arising in Potentially Malignant Lesions of the Oral Mucosa Are Marjolin Ulcers: New Insights Into Old Concepts.

Several disparate mucocutaneous diseases present oral mucosal lesions that have been classically labeled as "pre-cancerous", "pre-malignant", or "potentially malignant". These include oral lichen planus, dyskeratosis congenita, tertiary syphilitic glossitis chronic graft-versus-host-disease, and oral discoid lupus erythematosus. There is much confusion in literature regarding the real malignant potential of these oral lesions in relation to the incidence of squamous cell carcinoma. We tried to unify the occurrence of squamous cell carcinoma in some oral mucosal diseases into the classic concept of "Marjolin ulcer". We analyzed the most relevant published evidence of the occurrence of squamous cell carcinoma arising in oral lichen planus, dyskeratosis congenita, tertiary syphilitic glossitis chronic graft-versus-host-disease, and oral discoid lupus erythematosus, and tried to establish a logical link between them. Reported cases of squamous cell carcinoma occurring in oral lesions of these diseases seem to appear in old standing, scarring lesions. Oral lichen planus, dyskeratosis congenita, tertiary syphilitic glossitis, chronic graft-versushost-disease, and oral discoid lupus erythematosus are not "pre-malignant diseases", their long-lasting mucosal scars are prone to the development of squamous cell carcinomas. In this sense, this tumor can be considered a mucosal type of Marjolin ulcer.

Distributed service function chaining in NFV-enabled networks: A game-theoretic learning approach

In network function virtualization (NFV), Service Function Chaining (SFC) provides an ordered sequence of virtual network functions (VNFs) and subsequent steering of traffic flows through them to cater to end-to-end services. This paper addresses the NP-hard problem of minimum cost SFC deployment to support customer services that access the carrier network’s NFV infrastructure (NFVI) through some edge routers. To determine the mappings of VNFs to physical servers, a challenging aspect would be the inter-server latencies that may fluctuate over time because of the sharing nature of cloud data centers. To construct the SFC, we come up with three different formulations, each corresponding to a different informational assumption about the link latencies: First, a centralized integer linear programming (ILP) formulation is given under the assumption of the non-causal availability of exact and instantaneous inter-server latencies. The solution to this ILP can serve as a lower bound to benchmark more scalable and realistic schemes. Next, we give a distributed game-theoretic formulation (with service broker agents as players) which only requires the statistical knowledge of link latency fluctuations. The game provably admits a pure Nash equilibrium (NE) and can be solved iteratively through the well-known best response dynamics (BRD) algorithm. Our main novelty lies in the third formulation in which each service broker has neither instantaneous nor statistical knowledge of the latencies. Instead, it relies on a game-theoretic learning algorithm to compose its VNF chain only based on its own history of adopted decisions and experienced delays on each logical link. We prove that the proposed learning algorithm asymptotically converges to NE and evaluate its performance through simulations in terms of convergence and the impact of network parameters.

Software-Defined Radio Implementation of a LoRa Transceiver.

The number of applications of low-power wide-area networks (LPWANs) has been growing quite considerably in the past few years and so has the number of protocol stacks. Despite this fact, there is still no fully open LPWAN protocol stack available to the public, which limits the flexibility and ease of integration of the existing ones. The closest to being fully open is LoRa; however, only its medium access control (MAC) layer, known as LoRaWAN, is open and its physical and logical link control layers, also known as LoRa PHY, are still only partially understood. In this paper, the essential missing aspects of LoRa PHY are not only reverse engineered, but also, a new design of the transceiver and its sub-components are proposed and implemented in a modular and flexible way using GNU Radio. Finally, some examples of applications of both the transceiver and its components, which are made to be run in a simple setup by using cheap and widely available off-the-shelf hardware, are given to show how the library can be used and extended.

“The Knight in the Panther’s Skin” by Shota Rustaveli: Salutogenic Aspects

The article provides a discussion of the specific salutogenic aspects of medical knowledge in Shota Rustaveli’s “The Knight in the Panther’s Skin” – a distinguished piece of Georgian literature. Consideration of specific passages from the poem and corresponding commentary demonstrates the author’s medical knowledge, as he stresses the significance of positive emotions, a healthy environment, and mood on human health, thus having a therapeutic effect.. Regarding the knowledge reflected in similar scientific literature, which is significant for the history of Georgian medicine, the work offers a more specific and, in some cases, newer vision of the salutogenic aspects in “The Knight in the Panther’s Skin”. Along with the author’s knowledge, we emphasise the fact that during that period, there was a logical link between the medical-biological thinking of the era known as the “Golden Age”. This connection represents a natural expression of the level of the scientific sphere, simultaneously with cultural and political progress in the country. In addition to providing an overview of specific medical areas in “The Knight in the Panther’s Skin”, the article will explore the scientific and other literature of the era and a later period, where similar approaches are described. The issues discussed in the article, regarding their nature and different aspects, could be of interest for studying the history of medicine of that specific era.

Optimal key forwarding strategy in QKD behaviours

Nowadays QKD plays a critical role in unconditionally-secure and quantum-safe key distribution. Commercially available QKD devices are getting more popular for institutional and governmental national and international networks, but are expensive and offer limited key rates. We provide a formalization of QKD-generated key forwarding and redistribution at the KMS level by extending the network graph of physical QKD links to the complete graph with logical links, and we investigate its application on three practical scalable scenarios (all-to-all, one-to-all, one-to-one). We define a maximization goal for each scenario, and provide a linear programming problem statement to compute the optimal redistribution. We perform an extensive analysis of the algorithm in terms of forwarding results and key consumption on simulated QKD networks and discuss the implications of network size and graph topology on the algorithm’s performance and complexity.

Avionics System Design using MBSE Methodology

Abstract: The West Air Sweden Flight 294 serves as a reminder of tragic crashes of aircraftdue to Avionics System failure. Due to malfunction of the Inertial Reference Unit (IRU), the aircraft lost its control resulting in tragic loss of life of the peopleon board. The Avionics System is a complex set of instruments, logical and physical links which must comply with the guidelines of Dob178c. The design of the system is complicated. This paper aims to understand the behavior of the Avionics System using the state-of-the-art Model Based System Engineering (MBSE) technology. This includes the two widely used tools – Capella and Simulink. We aim to understand the dynamic nature of avionics through these tools. Model Based System Engineering can be specifically beneficial because it will help the engineers to detect the flaws in the avionics system much earlier. This will potentially contribute to helping to prevent aircraft crashes due to avionics system failure. The idea of model-based system engineering includes the concept of taking a model as a reference to systematically solve the complex designs of any engineering stage. Before the concept of Model Based Systems Engineering came to be, Documents Based Systems Engineering was the trend in the system engineering department. However, it would take a lot of time, effort and accuracy to correctly pinpoint the information and accordingly design the system from a bunch of documents. MBSE, however, eases such kind of trouble by providing a model as a reference for the systems design

Perception of Violence in Multimodal Text: Cross-Disciplinary Approach

The article deals with the linguistic and psychological concepts explaining the perception of multimodal texts that imply information about violence. The importance of the subject is verified by the task of countering the spread of ideologies of violence, extremism, and terrorism in Internet communication. The multimodal text is considered a popular means of propagating radical ideas relating to incitement to social discord. The absence of complex models explaining the transmission of violence through multimodal texts is observed. It is shown that linguistic and psychological concepts can be relevant resources for building such a model. The purpose of the article is to generalize concepts in the form of intra- and extralinguistic factors that determine the perception of information about violence in a multimodal text. The generalization of cognitive linguistic theories into the group of intralinguistic factors is complemented by the conclusion that the semantic structure of a multimodal text is formed by visual, sign, and verbal coding systems; the perception of information about violence is determined by the typicality of linguistic means and the presence of logical and semantic links between the elements of a multimodal text. The conclusion is made about the influence of aggressiveness, personal attitude toward violence, and the experience of using violence on the perception of multimodal information about violence by the reader. The article may be interesting to linguists, psychologists, and a wide range of researchers in the field of humanities and humanities-related social sciences.

The Effects of Digitalization on the Sustainability of Small Farms

Digitalization of agriculture is one of the priorities of the EU’s rural development strategy “From Field to Table”, which promotes the creation of more added value and climate change mitigation in agriculture. A growing body of the literature argues that digitalization enables better information management, reduces production costs, and increases the potential for farm income growth, but only a few papers provide empirical studies on how digitalization improves the performance of small farms. To fill this gap in the literature, this paper presents a case study as empirical evidence of the impact of digital innovation on smallholder performance through a sustainable development lens. This paper reports research based on a pilot digitalization project implemented on a small organic farm. It examines the identification of logical links between the digitalization processes introduced and the impact of digitalization on the economic, social, and environmental performance of the small farm. The case study data were collected through semi-structured interviews and based on the results of a pilot project. The findings of this study provide evidence that the introduction of digital technologies has improved the economic performance of the farm, including a reduction in labor costs, improved customer relations, improvements in farmers’ investment planning, and process redesign. Based on this study, recommendations are made to policymakers on how to promote the uptake of digital technologies in smallholder farming.

Pricing in the medical sector: Theoretical foundations and practical aspects

Pricing is one of the components of ensuring competitive conditions in the market: it has its own specificity in the healthcare market, which is characterized by various forms of operation of enterprises, access to goods and services. The purpose of the study was to investigate the methods and approaches to this process in Ukraine, taking into account the peculiarities of the country’s development related to the full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation. The methods used in the study were formal and legal (to form logical links between individual regulatory documents) and comparison (to assess the specifics of pricing in the medical sector in different countries). The study assessed the pricing process as such and described the factors that influence it in practice in general and in the medical sector. It was also concluded that understanding the role of this process for both the state and potential clients is important, as it affects economic stability, quality of medical services, social justice. Particular attention was paid to such approaches as “cost+markup” and “market-based”. Based on the models built in this paper, it was concluded that these approaches should be used in symbiosis (to focus on both market conditions and the company’s goals for forming a margin). Attention was also paid to the Value-Based Pricing approach: it was concluded that it is inherently different from the other two approaches, as it requires much more complex estimates, since it is based on the expected utility of the created product. The study also highlighted the problem of non-transparent pricing as one of the main ones that prevents the formation of effective market conditions. The results obtained in the study can be used both to formulate public policy and to create strategies for individual companies in the Ukrainian market of medical goods and services

Convergence of Communicative Components in Infographics

The purpose of the research is to establish the presence or absence of the phenomenon of convergence between visual components formed based on different ways of encoding information in infographic messages. Particular attention is focused on those cases when the above-mentioned differently coded elements can provide a synergistic effect or supplement and enrich the content through the interaction of different meanings, each of which is presented in the most optimal way that does not imitate the other. Research methods are analytical, logical-evaluative, systematic approach and method of structural-compositional analysis. The scientific novelty consists in proving the presence of the effect of convergence of meanings in infographics formed based on different codes and different communicative elements. It was revealed that infographic messages can use up to seven different ways of visual presentation of information differing in stylistic and technical-graphic properties. At the same time, it has been proved that minimising the number of different style components leads to the formation of the most effective visual messages. Such messages are better remembered and remain in the minds of recipients longer. Conclusions. The use of communicative elements with different technical, graphic and stylistic properties outside infographic messages, in most cases, leads to the destruction of meaningful unity and loss of consumer interest in the content of the message. On the contrary, in infographics, the structural organisation of information, compositional zoning, and the logical links’ presence between different groups of visual-symbolic forms ensure the integrity of information impact. However, it has been proved that such integrity requires either the preservation of a single optical centre of content or well-defined levels of content with accentuated visual transitions between them.

To the discussion about legal means of ensuring secret in operational-search activities

This article examines the demand for additional legal instruments to ensure operational secrecy in law enforcement agencies. It identifies certain inconsistencies and gaps in the current regulatory framework, calling for improvements to consolidate both public and intra-departmental instruments into a unified legal framework. The study aims to confirm the hypothesis that enhancing the legal provisions governing operational secrecy will contribute to the effectiveness of law enforcement operations.The research employs a comprehensive analysis of existing laws, regulations, and practices related to operational activities. It explores the concept of operational secrecy and highlights the need for a coherent understanding of this legal category. Furthermore, it emphasizes the significance of confidentiality in operational activities and the associated challenges of regulating specific methods and techniques, considering their unique and dynamic nature.The findings reveal two key directions for the further development of operational secrecy instruments. Firstly, the article argues that publicly disclosing detailed information regarding the essence, specific instruments, and methods employed in operational activities would be counterproductive and undermine operational effectiveness. However, it also recognizes the necessity of harmonizing the understanding and application of operational secrecy by providing a clear legal definition within the legislation governing operational and investigative activities. Therefore, it proposes amending the relevant provisions of the Law “On Operational and Investigative Activities” to encompass a comprehensive legal framework for operational secrecy.Secondly, the research highlights that information regarding overt operational and investigative measures and their contents may indirectly or directly expose the interests of law enforcement agencies, reveal their tactics for gathering information, and compromise the effectiveness of their efforts to detect, prevent, and deter criminal activities and threats to national security. While administrative liability currently applies to breaches of emerging “operational secrecy”, violations of the “secrecy of investigation” fall under criminal liability, including imprisonment. Moreover, in certain cases, criminal liability exists for breaches of information protection rules even in the civil domain. Consequently, the article suggests exploring the balance between the level of responsibility and the potential damage caused to societal interests when imposing liability for breaches of operational secrecy.To address the identified challenges, one potential solution could be the codification of operational and investigative norms. Such an approach would not only provide a systematic and structured presentation of laws governing operational activities but also facilitate logical and consistent links between the discussed legal framework and related branches of law.In conclusion, this study underscores the importance of additional legal instruments to safeguard operational secrecy in law enforcement agencies. It calls for improvements in the current legal framework, emphasizing the need for a unified and comprehensive legal approach. By confirming the research hypothesis, this article provides valuable insights into enhancing operational secrecy and its implications for the effectiveness of law enforcement operations.

The relationship between Satisfaction and Interest related to the Aesthetic Judgment in Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Aesthetic Judgment

This article aims to present a reading of the first paragraphs of Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Aesthetic Judgment and the conceptualization about the beauty, pleasurable and good, and the relation there is between satisfaction and interest in the judgment of taste. Its motivation is due to the philosophical relevance that both the author and the topic represent in the framework of the philosophical renewal of his time and nowadays. With this central intention, this work seeks to disclose, in an explanatory way, all logical chains of the proposed Kantian thinking, to facilitate its understanding. The content was exposed based on a hermeneutic analysis of the book Critique of the Power of Judgment. As a result of the research, an excellent logical link was observed in the author's argument, defending the thinking about the judgment of taste and an expert work of conceptualization regarding beauty, pleasant and good. This research concludes by revealing that many of the aesthetic relations presented can be associated to both the faculty of thinking and the feeling developed between object and subject; thus, making it possible the advance of the research to a more comprehensive topic.

Forging a sustainable path: improving India’s (Bharat’s) coal mining operations for a better tomorrow

PurposeSustainability is a major challenge for India’s (Bharat’s) coal mining industry. The government has prioritized sustainable growth in the coal mining industry. It is putting forth multifaceted economic, environmental and social efforts to accomplish the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This research aims to identify the factors for sustainable improvements in coal mining operations. Secondly, this study examines the intensity of causal relations among the factors. Thirdly, this study examines whether causal relations exist among the factors to be considered for sustainable improvement in coal mining operations. Lastly, the study aims to understand how the factors ensure sustainable improvement in coal mining operations.Design/methodology/approachAn integrated three-phase methodology was applied to identify the critical factors related to coal mining and explore the contextual relationships among the identified factors. Fifteen critical factors were selected based on the Delphi technique. Subsequently, the fifteen factors were analyzed to determine the contextual and causal relationships using the total interpretive structural modelling (TISM) and DEMATEL methods.FindingsThe study identified “Extraction of Coal and Overburden” as the leading factor for sustainable improvement in coal mining operations, because it directly or indirectly influences the overall mining operation, environmental impact and resource utilization. Hence, strict control measures are necessary in “Extraction of Coal and Overburden” to ensure sustainable coal mining. Conversely, “Health Impact” is the lagging factor as it has very low or no impact on the system. Therefore, it requires fewer control mechanisms. Nevertheless, control measures for the remaining factors must be decided on a priority basis.Practical implicationsThe proposed structural model can serve as a framework for enhancing sustainability in India’s (Bharat’s) coal mining operations. This framework can also be applied to other developing nations with similar sustainability concerns, providing valuable guidance for sustainable operations.Originality/valueThe current study highlights the significance of logical links and dependencies between several parameters essential to coal mining sustainability. Furthermore, it leads to the development of a well-defined control sequence that identifies the causal linkages between numerous components needed to achieve real progress towards sustainability.

Study on the logic and effectiveness of crisis learning in the promotion policy adjustment: an observation based on the adjustment of COVID-19 prevention policy in China.

As the impact of COVID-19 on normal production and living conditions diminishes, this serious emergency is come to an end. China's policy framework has facilitated positive adjustment over the past 3 years by timely modifying its emergency response to changes in viruses and epidemics. This paper aims to explore the logic of China's policy framework that promoted policy adjustment through crisis learning during COVID-19. By gathering and classifying China's epidemic prevention policies throughout the past 3 years, integrating policy texts, and analyzing key events, this article examines the process of supporting policy adjustment through crisis learning in the policy system during COVID-19. The Chinese government's COVID-19 policy adjustment process can be divided into four stages, namely 'The period of stress response', 'The period of COVID-19 prevention and control', 'The period of regular prevention and control', and 'The period of overall adjustment'. The policy adjustments in each stage demonstrate the logic and effectiveness of crisis learning in the promotion policy adjustment. The study has determined that the motivational logic comprises three crucial elements: security requirements, accountability pressure, and reputation management. The institutional logic encompasses both the organizational and resourceful environments, and the institutional and cultural environment. Additionally, the behavioral logic of policy adaptation aligns with the strategy of crisis learning. Meanwhile, the logical framework of 'crisis learning-policy adjustment' can be verified using the Chinese government's policy adjustment in COVID-19 as an example. Establishing an effective post-crisis learning system is crucial to improving the effectiveness of crisis response. There is a logical link between crisis learning and policy adjustment. The implementation of policy adjustment needs to be based on the results of crisis learning. Government departments are essential for crisis learning and policy adjustment.

NeSyKHG: Neuro-Symbolic Knowledge Hypergraphs

In the rapidly evolving landscape of artificial intelligence, there is an escalating demand for enhanced reasoning capabilities and robust representation of higher-order relationships. Despite their prowess in pattern identification and generalization, Neural networks often grapple with challenges linked to interpretability and the absence of explicit relational reasoning. Symbolic logic, on the other hand, excels in formal knowledge representation and inference yet remains limited in deriving knowledge directly from data. We introduce the Neuro-Symbolic Knowledge Hypergraphs (NeSyKHG) framework to bridge this gap. This innovative model synergistically merges the strengths of neural networks and symbolic logic, offering an optimized representation and reasoning system for higher-order relationships using knowledge hypergraphs. Our empirical evaluations on the Chinese Medical High-order Relational (CMHR) dataset revealed that NeSyKHG significantly outperforms several established baseline models. Specifically, when compared to models such as Hypergraph Neural Networks (HGNN), Hypergraph Convolutional Networks (HyperGCN), Logical Hypergraph Link Prediction (LHP), and Universal Graph Convolutional Networks (UniGCN), NeSyKHG achieved an F1-score of 0.845, an accuracy (ACC) of 0.947, and an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.965. These metrics underscore NeSyKHG's exceptional ability in higher-order relational learning and reasoning.

Determination of uncertainties of geomechanical parameters of metamorphic rocks using petrographic analyses

Geomechanical parameters of intact metamorphic rocks determined from laboratory testing remain highly uncertain because of the great intrinsic variability associated with the degrees of metamorphism. The aim of this paper is to develop a proper methodology to analyze the uncertainties of geomechanical characteristics by focusing on three domains, i.e. data treatment process, schistosity angle, and mineralogy. First, the variabilities of the geomechanical laboratory data of Westwood Mine (Quebec, Canada) were examined statistically by applying different data treatment techniques, through which the most suitable outlier methods were selected for each parameter using multiple decision-making criteria and engineering judgment. Results indicated that some methods exhibited better performance in identifying the possible outliers, although several others were unsuccessful because of their limitation in large sample size. The well-known boxplot method might not be the best outlier method for most geomechanical parameters because its calculated confidence range was not acceptable according to engineering judgment. However, several approaches, including adjusted boxplot, 2MADe, and 2SD, worked very well in the detection of true outliers. Also, the statistical tests indicate that the best-fitting probability distribution function for geomechanical intact parameters might not be the normal distribution, unlike what is assumed in most geomechanical studies. Moreover, the negative effects of schistosity angle on the uniaxial compressive strength (UCS) variabilities were reduced by excluding the samples within a specific angle range where the UCS data present the highest variation. Finally, a petrographic analysis was conducted to assess the associated uncertainties such that a logical link was found between the dispersion and the variabilities of hard and soft minerals.

Особенности синтаксиса немецких фронтовых (архивных) документов

The aim of the study is to identify the syntactic characteristics of the structure of German frontline texts as a separate kind of military discourse with its specificity of expression of logical categories associated with them. The paper examines military frontline texts from the perspective of their functional purpose (orders, reports, summary messages, etc.) and also identifies and describes the syntactic means that form the structure of discourse types of speech, i.e., narration, description, reasoning. Frontline texts make up a significant part of the materials in numerous archives and museums in Germany and Russia, but their role and status in military discourse remain open. The study is novel in that it substantiates the identification of a special type functioning on the basis of written communication during hostilities within the framework of military discourse, as opposed to the status discourse form (orders, formal regulations, codes, etc.) and the personal discourse form (communication through field mail) by conducting a comprehensive analysis of the syntactic structure of frontline texts. As a result of the study, it has been found that the texts of frontline discourse are characterized by the following logical links: attribution, conjunction, implication, which possess the appropriate syntactic means of expression. The analysis of the functional and semantic organization of German military frontline documents has shown that syntax can be considered as the basis of the structural organization of both military discourse as a whole and its varieties in the form of frontline texts.