Project Code Research Articles

The Dual Codes of Several Classes of BCH Codes

As a special subclass of cyclic codes, BCH codes have wide applications in communication and storage systems. A BCH code of length <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$n$ </tex-math></inline-formula> over <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\mathbb {F}_{q}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> is always relative to an <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$n$ </tex-math></inline-formula>-th primitive root of unity <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\beta $ </tex-math></inline-formula> in an extension field of <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\mathbb {F}_{q}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>, and is called a dually-BCH code if its dual is also a BCH code relative to the same <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\beta $ </tex-math></inline-formula>. The question as to whether a BCH code is a dually-BCH code is in general very hard to answer. In this paper, an answer to this question for primitive narrow-sense BCH codes and projective narrow-sense ternary BCH codes is given. Sufficient and necessary conditions in terms of the designed distances <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\delta $ </tex-math></inline-formula> will be presented to ensure that these BCH codes are dually-BCH codes. In addition, the parameters of the primitive narrow-sense BCH codes and their dual codes are investigated. Some lower bounds on minimum distances of the dual codes of primitive and projective narrow-sense BCH codes are developed. Especially for binary primitive narrow-sense BCH codes, the new bounds on the minimum distances of the dual codes improve the classical Sidel&#x2019;nikov bound, and are also better than the Carlitz and Uchiyama bound for large designed distances <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\delta $ </tex-math></inline-formula>. The question as to what subclasses of cyclic codes are BCH codes is also answered to some extent. As a byproduct, the parameters of some subclasses of cyclic codes are also investigated.

Элементы принципа законности в производстве по делам об административных правонарушениях

The content of the principle of legality forms a number of interrelated elements: the system of legislation on administrative offenses; norms of various sectoral legislation establishing rules of conduct in the administrative area, for violation of which the articles of the Special Part of the Administrative Code of the Russian Federation, laws of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation provide for administrative liability; norms of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation of a material and procedural nature; guarantees of its provision. The author points out that the presence of other public offenses in the current legislation, in addition to the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation, indicates non-compliance with the principle of legality. In the course of preparing the project Code on Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation, it is necessary to carry out a complete codification of liability for violation of regulatory requirements in the administrative area, eliminating legislative provisions establishing the possibility of bringing to “quasiadministrative” liability and applying coercive measures of an administrative nature outside the framework of the proceedings on the cases of administrative offenses.

A Simulated 3D Printer in CoppeliaSim

Purpose: Now, 3D Printer is becoming popular. Not only used for printing toys but also to print some needful items for prototyping. We go for final production after prototype approval. So the researcher needs a 3D printer for their research. A good 3D printer is not only costly but cumbersome also. Carrying a 3D printer is too much problem. We can use the simulator to continue our research work in this scenario. Here we provide the procedure for building a 3D printer in the simulator. We used Coppeliasim to make it. It is an excellent open-source simulator. It has a good user interface. Following the step, the researcher can build it quickly. All project code and simulator files are available for the researcher in Github. They can download, use and integrate into their project without any issues. Design/Methodology/Approach: In the CoppeliaSim simulator, we created a 3D printer model. We adopted the Ender 3D printer specification, a popular and economical 3D printer. After completing the model, we add the LUA script associated with the base. Some code is kept as a module inside the project folder for better understanding. After running the simulation, it will draw a square on the work area for the working demonstration. Findings/Result: We can create a virtual 3D printer through this research work. So without having an actual printer, we can test our written algorithm, try the 3D model file, and understand the functionality of the 3D Printer. It can be integrated into the researcher’s project by customizing some physical parameters or making a different 3D printer model following the procedure described here. Originality/Value: This research work may add value to the researcher’s work. We provide the information on creating a workable 3D printer as simple as possible in the CoppeliaSim robot simulator. Customizing some physical parameters can be a tool to help the research work rapidly. Paper Type: Simulation-based Research.

AM-UNet: automated mini 3D end-to-end U-net based network for brain claustrum segmentation.

Recent advances in deep learning (DL) have provided promising solutions to medical image segmentation. Among existing segmentation approaches, the U-Net-based methods have been used widely. However, very few U-Net-based studies have been conducted on automatic segmentation of the human brain claustrum (CL). The CL segmentation is challenging due to its thin, sheet-like structure, heterogeneity of its image modalities and formats, imperfect labels, and data imbalance. We propose an automatic optimized U-Net-based 3D segmentation model, called AM-UNet, designed as an end-to-end process of the pre and post-process techniques and a U-Net model for CL segmentation. It is a lightweight and scalable solution which has achieved the state-of-the-art accuracy for automatic CL segmentation on 3D magnetic resonance images (MRI). On the T1/T2 combined MRI CL dataset, AM-UNet has obtained excellent results, including Dice, Intersection over Union (IoU), and Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC) scores of 82%, 70%, and 90%, respectively. We have conducted the comparative evaluation of AM-UNet with other pre-existing models for segmentation on the MRI CL dataset. As a result, medical experts confirmed the superiority of the proposed AM-UNet model for automatic CL segmentation. The source code and model of the AM-UNet project is publicly available on GitHub: https://github.com/AhmedAlbishri/AM-UNET.

Infinite families of $ t $-designs and strongly regular graphs from punctured codes

&lt;p style='text-indent:20px;'&gt;The puncturing technique is sometimes efficient in constructing projective codes from original codes which are not projective. In this paper, several families of projective linear codes punctured from reducible cyclic codes, special linear codes or irreducible cyclic codes are investigated. The parameters and weight enumerators of the punctured codes and their duals are explicitly determined. Some of the codes are optimal and some of the codes are self-orthogonal which can be used to construct quantum codes. Several infinite families of combinatorial &lt;inline-formula&gt;&lt;tex-math id="M2"&gt;\begin{document}$ 2 $\end{document}&lt;/tex-math&gt;&lt;/inline-formula&gt;-designs and &lt;inline-formula&gt;&lt;tex-math id="M3"&gt;\begin{document}$ 3 $\end{document}&lt;/tex-math&gt;&lt;/inline-formula&gt;-designs including some families of Steiner systems are constructed from the punctured codes and their duals. Besides, infinite families of strongly regular graphs are also derived from some families of two-weight projective codes.&lt;/p&gt;

A Combinatorial Approach to the Number of Solutions of Systems of Homogeneous Polynomial Equations over Finite Fields

We give a complete conjectural formula for the number $e_r(d,m)$ of maximum possible ${\mathbb{F}}q$-rational points on a projective algebraic variety defined by $r$ linearly independent homogeneous polynomial equations of degree $d$ in $m+1$ variables with coefficients in the finite field ${\mathbb{F}}q$ with $q$ elements, when $d<q$. It is shown that this formula holds in the affirmative for several values of $r$. In the general case, we give explicit lower and upper bounds for $e_r(d,m)$ and show that they are sometimes attained. Our approach uses a relatively recent result, called the projective footprint bound, together with results from extremal combinatorics such as the Clements-Lindstrom Theorem and its variants. Applications to the problem of determining the generalized Hamming weights of projective Reed-Muller codes are also included.

A production planning and scheduling problem focused on both productivity and quality issues in tannery industries

We investigate the production planning and detailed scheduling of multiple-stage flexible flow shops, making products that require different production cycles. The production process can be configured in several ways, involving both different processing phases and times, depending on specific treatments required by the processed job. Jobs require operations on a unique raw material item and its quality features can require specific processing phases as well as lead to different processing times. We investigate, through the succession of a MILP and a CP model, the impact of quality-related aspects on processing times and hence on the overall planning and scheduling problem. An actual case from a leather tannery industry derived from the M2H – Machine To Human” (project code CBYX592), INNONETWORK 2017, Regione Puglia is investigated.

Erratum: “Computational Study of 16 KWth Furnace Cofired Using Pulverized Bituminous Coal and Liquified Petroleum Gas Operated in Un-Staged and Air-Staged Conditions” [ASME J. Energy Resour. Technol., 143(8), p. 082102; DOI: 10.1115/1.4048868

In the original publication, the Acknowledgment section was excluded from the article and should have been added after the Conclusion section. The following is the Acknowledgment section for the published article.The present work is funded by the Science and Engineering Research Board, India, under project code ECR/2018/001465 (Funder ID: 10.13039/501100001843) and is supported by the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, India.

Using finite-state machines to automatically scan Ancient Greek hexameter

Abstract This article presents a fully automatic approach to the scansion of Ancient Greek hexameter verse. In particular, the article describes an algorithm that uses deterministic finite-state automata and local linguistic rules to implement a targeted search for valid spondeus patterns and, in addition, a weighted finite-state transducer to correct and complete partial analyses and to reject invalid candidates. The article also details the results of an empirical evaluation of the annotation quality resulting from this approach on hand-annotated data. It is shown that a finite-state approach provides quick and linguistically sound analyses of hexameter verses as well as an efficient formalization of linguistic knowledge. The project code is available online.1

On the talent training mode of “new engineering” in local undergraduate colleges

Funding source: Research on talent training mode of "new engineering" in local undergraduate colleges and universities (project code: 2019SJA2197) Abstract: With the development of China's new economy and emerging industries, new engineering construction comes into being. Facing the construction of new engineering, local undergraduate colleges and universities should deeply understand their own development trend, clarify the training mode of new engineering talents, and take the adjustment of specialty setting guided by regional industrial demand, the innovation of talent training mode based on the consensus of coordinated development, and the improvement of talent training quality as the main measures for local undergraduate colleges and universities to cultivate new engineering talents Key words: local; New engineering; Talent training mode DOI: 10.7176/JEP/12-33-15 Publication date: November 30 th 2021

Certain Types of Linear Codes over the Finite Field of Order Twenty-Five

The aim of the paper is to compute projective maximum distance separable codes, -MDS of two and three dimensions with certain lengths and Hamming weight distribution from the arcs in the projective line and plane over the finite field of order twenty-five. Also, the linear codes generated by an incidence matrix of points and lines of were studied over different finite fields.

Identifying Consumption Trends of University Students in Hanoi and Proposing Policies on Soft Skills Education in the Mainstream Program for Students

Young people have the need to spend for themselves, have the desire to self-express, enjoy the new experience and trend, including the consumption trend. This study contributes to the theoretical basis for changing educational policies and appropriate implementation solutions, in order to meet the needs of the comprehensive development of learners, contributes to socio-economic development, towards improving the quality of individuals’ life in sustainable social development. The article focuses on analyzing the main trends in consumption behavior of universities’ students in Hanoi today: online consumption, brand consumption, consumption domestic goods, consumption imported goods and environmentally friendly consumption. From that, the article proposes to add soft skills related to conscious consumption in the context of industry 4.0 era for students in the mainstream training program. This research is based on the data collected from a questionaire of 400 students and from 20 in-depth interviews. This study was funded by Hanoi National University in the project code QG.18.44.&#x0D; Keywords&#x0D; Consumption trends, soft skills, policies, university students.

A Safety Study for Long-Time Use of a Novel Pain Management Device, AT-04

Abstract Fibromyalgia is a common chronic pain disorder characterized by widespread pain and tenderness in mostly tendon attachments with unknown etiology. Treatment of fibromyalgia is mainly drug and other treatments, especially cognitive behavioral therapy and exercise therapy combined. However, drugs for fibromyalgia have, in general, broad adverse effects. Thus, an unmet medical need remains for effective therapeutic modalities for fibromyalgia. We have recently developed a new magnetic medical device (project code “AT”) that has alternating magnetic fields and stimulates the affected area for pain relief. In the pilot study, AT treatment (twice daily for 10 min) tended to reduce the mean NRS (Numerical Rating Scale) pain score. Moreover, we demonstrated long treatment (30 min) suppressed LPS-induced (Lipopolysaccharide-induced) mRNA IL-6 expression compared with 10-min treatment in vitro. These results assumed that long treatment has high efficiency. To evaluate the safety of long time (120 min/day) AT treatment for 12 weeks. Single center, prospective, open-label, single-arm, intervention study to demonstrate the safety of long-time use of AT in 5 healthy Japanese volunteers to 12 weeks. During the intervention period, all of the adverse events were measured. The represents of AT treatment was 99.8 % in 5 subjects. The average and median exposure time of the study device was 135 min per day and 132 min per day, respectively. There were 3 nonserious adverse events and no serious adverse events during this study. This study tested long-time use of AT among 5 healthy subjects in Japan and showed that it did not pose any significant safety concerns. Because there are in-house in vitro data suggesting that the longer exposure of AT achieves a greater effect, the result of this study may allow us to conduct further studies to confirm more effectiveness and safety of long-time use of AT in a larger scale of clinical trial.

Parameters and characterizations of hulls of some projective narrow-sense BCH codes

Parameters and characterizations of hulls of some projective narrow-sense BCH codes

Prognostic significance of novel serum biomarkers in patients with acute coronary syndrome

Abstract Background As oxygen and nutrient supply to the myocardium significantly decrease during ischemic periods, important changes occur regarding myocardial intermediary energy metabolism and metabolomic biomarkers. Purpose To identify patients at high risk for adverse cardiovascular (CV) events based on their metabolic signatures through combining clinical characteristics with established and novel biomarkers. Hence, we investigated the prognostic significance of protein biomarkers associated with CAD, namely Galectin-3, Adiponectin, Neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin (NGAL) and Apolipoprotein B and A-1 (ApoB and A-1). Methods We conducted a sub-analysis of the Corlipid trial (NCT04580173) including patients who underwent coronary angiography in the cardiac catheterization laboratory of an academic tertiary hospital. Venous fasting blood samples were collected prior to coronary angiography and patients were followed-up for 12 months to record the occurrence of major adverse CV events. Galectin-3, adiponectin, NGAL and ApoB/A-1 ratio were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) in patients' venous blood samples. Serum concentrations were compared among CAD patient subgroups to assess the prognostic significance of these novel protein biomarkers in terms of cardiovascular mortality. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were also performed to calculate the corresponding area under the curve (AUC) for each biomarker and define their prognostic validity for patients with CAD. Results Out of 1140 total participants of the CorLipid trial, 534 patients with acute coronary syndrome (ACS) were finally included in the present analysis. Of them, 222 suffered from STEMI, 170 from NSTEMI and 141 from unstable angina. Higher ApoB/ApoA-1 and Galectin-3 serum concentrations were significantly linked with higher incidence of CV death in patients with NSTEMI during the one-year study follow up (p=0.049 and 0.027, respectively). Generated AUC of 0.713 (p=0.047) and 0.775 (p=0.002) indicate a potential utility in the quantification of those proteins as predictors of CV death in patients with NSTEMI. Analysis of serum adiponectin values did not yield any significant outcome (p&amp;gt;0.05). Lower NGAL concentrations were significantly correlated with CV death in patients with STEMI (p&amp;lt;0.001). The corresponding AUC of 0.824 (p=0.003) demonstrated that NGAL could be a prognostic biomarker of great sensitivity and specificity, potently capable to identify STEMI patients with increased risk of CV mortality. Conclusion(s) In patients with ACS, higher values of serum ApoB/ApoA-I and Galectin-3, as well as low NGAL concentrations were associated with higher prevalence of CV death in specific patient subgroups. Therefore, these serum biomarkers could be utilized for early risk-stratification and a more individualized approach in patients with ACS. Larger trials are warranted to confirm and bolster the significance and generalizability of our findings. Funding Acknowledgement Type of funding sources: Public grant(s) – EU funding. Main funding source(s): The specific project has been co-financed through the call for Proposals for the Action “Competitiveness, entrepreneurship &amp; innovation” in the framework of the Operational Programme “Research, Create, Innovate” (project code: T1EDK-04005) of the Partnership Agreement for the Development Programme 2014-2020 by the European Social Fund (ESF) and Greek National funds. The project has undergone peer review and has been approved for funding, being awarded a grant of €873,821.00. The funder had no role in the design or conduct of the study, preparation, review or approval of the manuscript and decision to submit the manuscript for publication.

Comparative study of the bioactive compounds of olive products on cardioprotection from ischemia-reperfusion injury in mice with metabolic syndrome

Abstract Background/Introduction The main bioactive compounds of olive products, oleuropein (OL), hydroxytyrosol (HT), oleocanthal (OC) and oleanolic Acid (OA) exert multiple benefits in cardiovascular diseases. However, their potential cardioprotective effect after chronic administration at a nutritional dose has not been studied in metabolic syndrome (MS). Purpose We evaluated and compared possible cardioprotective effects of chronic oral treatment with OL, HT, OC and OA in a mouse model of diet-induced MS. Methods We initially explored if OL, HT, OC, OA exert cardioprotection against ischemia-reperfusion (I/R) injury after chronic administration in healthy animals. The nutritional dose was selected as the equivalent to the estimated daily phenolic intake in humans following the Mediterranean diet. C57Bl6 mice were randomized into 5 groups and treated daily for 6 weeks as followed: i) DMSO 5%, ii) OL (20.6 mg/kg), iii) HT (5.9 mg/kg), iv) OC (11.6 mg/kg), v) OA (17.4 mg/kg). All animals were then subjected to I/R (30/120 min) and infarct size (IS) was determined. In a second cohort, C57Bl6 mice were fed with western diet for 14 weeks to induce MS. At 8th week, mice were randomized into 6 groups: i) Normal Saline (NS), ii) OL, iii) HT, iv) DMSO 5%, v) OC, vi) OA and treated daily with the assigned compound/vehicle for the last 6 weeks. At baseline, 8th and 14th week, body weight, mean arterial blood pressure (MAP) and fasting glucose levels were evaluated. Blood samples were collected at baseline and 14th week for the determination of the lipid profile and the mice were subjected to IR (30/120 min). Results OL, OC and OA reduced IS in healthy animals (p&amp;lt;0.05 vs. DMSO). Similarly, the IS was significantly reduced in MS mice after OL (19.4±2,6% vs. NS 34.7±1.6%, p&amp;lt;0.01), OC and OA (12.3±2.9% and 18.3±0.4% vs. DMSO 35.6±4.9%, p&amp;lt;0.0001 and p&amp;lt;0.001). HT failed to reduce the IS in both cohorts. Body weight, glucose, cholesterol and LDL levels were significantly elevated in the control groups, whereas MAP did not change. OL was the only compound that reduced fasting glucose and LDL levels, while OA reduced total cholesterol and LDL levels (p&amp;lt;0.01). OC and HT did not alter the lipidemic parameters. None of the bioactive compounds affected the body weight, MPA and triglyceride levels. Conclusion(s) Chronic treatment with nutritional doses of OL, OC and OA reduce IS in mice with MS; OC displays the most potent cardioprotective effect. OL ameliorates hyperglycemia and decreases LDL, while OA lowers both total cholesterol and LDL. Investigation of the underlying mechanisms and combined treatment with these compounds could emerge novel molecular cardioprotective approaches explaining possible additive beneficial effects in patients with MS. Funding Acknowledgement Type of funding sources: Public grant(s) – National budget only. Main funding source(s): Operational Program “Competitiveness, Entrepreneurship and Innovation”, under the call “RESEARCH – CREATE – INNOVATE” (project code: 5048539).

SETD2 Loss of Function Is a Recurrent Event in Advanced-Phase Chronic Myeloid Leukemia

Abstract In recent years, deregulation of epigenetic modifiers has turned out to be a recurrent event in cancer evolution. The SETD2 tumor suppressor gene encodes a histone methyltransferase that catalyzes the trimethylation of lysine 36 on histone H3 (H3K36Me3), the major chromatin mark associated with active transcription and alternative splicing. Recent studies have also implicated SETD2 in homologous recombination repair, mismatch repair, mitosis and cytokinesis. SETD2 loss of function was initially uncovered in clear cell renal cell carcinomas and was subsequently found in many other solid tumors. More recently, it has also been reported in a variety of hematologic myeloid and lymphoid malignancies, including acute lymphoblastic leukemia,acute myeloid leukemia, chronic lymphocytic leukemia, T-cell lymphoma, systemic mastocytosis and myeloproliferative neoplasms. We thus wondered whether advanced-phase chronic myeloid leukemia (CML), that shareS similarities with acute leukemias including a high level of genetic instability, may also exhibit SETD2 loss of function. To this purpose, we studied a relatively large cohort of 69 advanced phase CML patients (pts), including pts with accelerated phase (AP; n=15), myeloid blast crisis (my-BC; n=30), and lymphoid blast crisis (ly-BC; n=15) and pts with tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI)-resistant chronic phase harboring 2 or more BCR-ABL kinase domain mutations (mut-CP; n=9). Samples collected at diagnosis from CP pts (n=8) who achieved optimal response to therapy were also studied for comparison. A recent study in advanced systemic mastocytosis has demonstrated that SETD2 loss of function may result not only from genomic disruption but also from post-translational events, suggesting that the frequency of SETD2 involvement in solid tumors or hematologic malignancies might be higher than sequencing and copy number data alone would suggest. We thus decided to use a Western Blotting (WB) approach to assess H3K36Me3 levels as a surrogate marker of SETD2 loss of function and to screen for the expression of SETD2 full-length vs truncated protein isoforms, that are the most frequent result of inactivating nonsense or frameshift mutations. Reduced or null H3K36Me3 (as compared to a pool of healthy donors) was detected in the great majority of pts with advanced-phase CML (58/69, 84.1%; 12/15 AP, 24/30 my-BC, 12/15 ly-BC, 8/9 mut-CP). In contrast, CP pts at diagnosis showed H3K36Me3 levels superimposable to those of healthy donors. In some of them, however, the CD34+ cell fraction was available and reduced H3K36Me3 levels were detected in all cases. No evidence of abnormal SETD2 protein isoforms was detected, but pts with no H3K36Me3 also had no detectable SETD2 protein and pts with reduced H3K36Me3 had similarly reduced levels of full-length SETD2 protein as assessed by densitometric analysis of WB (Spearman R=0.95, p To rule out the possibility that SETD2 loss of function might be another age-associated alteration in an epigenetic regulator, we collected a series of 80 healthy individuals with an age ranging from 65 to 95 years. In this cohort, we checked for SETD2 mutations by sequencing and for SETD2 and H3K36 trimethylation levels by WB. No mutations were detected and protein levels were not significantly lower in older adults than in a pool of younger adults. Advanced-phase CML is characterized by a profound genetic heterogeneity. We here show the first evidence for a novel, nearly unifying alteration. However, SETD2 downmodulation and, consequently, H3K36Me3 deficiency seem to be most frequently accomplished at the post-translational level rather than being the results of genetic/genomic hits or transcriptional repression. Further studies aimed to assess whether H3K36Me3 loss might contribute to the genetic instability that is the hallmark of advanced-phase CML are warranted. Restoring physiological H3K36Me3 levels may help improve the outcome of this critical subset of pts. Supported by AIL and AIRC (project code 16996) Disclosures Castagnetti: Incyte: Consultancy, Honoraria; Pfizer: Consultancy, Honoraria; Novartis: Consultancy, Honoraria; Bristol Myers Squibb: Consultancy, Honoraria. Gugliotta: Incyte: Consultancy, Honoraria; Bristol Myers Squibb: Consultancy, Honoraria; Novartis: Consultancy, Honoraria. Rosti: Incyte: Research Funding, Speakers Bureau; Pfizer: Research Funding, Speakers Bureau; Bristol Myers Squibb: Research Funding, Speakers Bureau; Novartis: Research Funding, Speakers Bureau. Iurlo: Bristol Myers Squibb: Consultancy, Honoraria; Novartis: Consultancy, Honoraria; Pfizer: Consultancy, Honoraria. Abruzzese: Novartis: Consultancy; Pfizer: Consultancy; Incyte: Consultancy; BMS: Consultancy. Crugnola: BMS: Honoraria; Celgene: Honoraria; Novartis: Honoraria. Bonifacio: Bristol-Myers Squibb: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees; Incyte: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees; Pfizer: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees; Novartis: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees, Research Funding. Tiribelli: Novartis: Consultancy, Honoraria; Incyte: Consultancy, Honoraria; Bristol Myers Squibb: Consultancy, Honoraria. Galimberti: Bristol-Myers Squibb: Speakers Bureau; Incyte: Speakers Bureau; Novartis: Speakers Bureau; Pfizer: Speakers Bureau. Baccarani: Incyte ARIAD: Consultancy, Honoraria, Speakers Bureau; Bristol-Myers Squibb: Honoraria, Speakers Bureau; Pfizer: Honoraria, Speakers Bureau; Novartis: Consultancy, Honoraria, Speakers Bureau. Martinelli: Celgene: Consultancy; Amgen: Consultancy; JohnsonJ Pfizer: Consultancy; Ariad/Incyte: Consultancy; Roche: Consultancy. Soverini: Bristol-Myers Squibb: Consultancy; Incyte Biosciences: Consultancy; Novartis: Consultancy.

Association of Serum Bilirubin Level with Metabolic Syndrome and Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease: A Cross-Sectional Study of 1672 Obese Children

As in adults, obesity also plays a central role in the development of metabolic syndrome (MS) in children. Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is considered a manifestation of MS. Not only MS but also NAFLD seem to be inversely associated with serum bilirubin concentrations, an important endogenous tissue protector when only mild elevated. The aim of the study was to evaluate the association between serum bilirubin levels and the prevalence of MS and NAFLD in Italian obese children and adolescents. A retrospective cross-sectional study was performed in 1672 patients aged from 5 to 18 years. Clinical and laboratory parameters were assessed. NAFLD was measured by liver ultrasonography. The study was approved by the Ethical Committee of the Istituto Auxologico Italiano (research project code 1C021_2020, acronym BILOB). MS was present in 24% and fatty liver (FL) in 38% of this population. Bilirubin was not associated with FL and MS as a whole, but it was inversely associated only with selected components of MS, i.e., large WC, high blood pressure and high triglycerides. Our data suggest that bilirubin is not protective against MS and NAFLD in the presence of severe obesity.

Counting plane cubic curves over finite fields with a prescribed number of rational intersection points

For each integer $k \in [0,9]$, we count the number of plane cubic curves defined over a finite field $\mathbb{F}_q$ that do not share a common component and intersect in exactly $k\ \mathbb{F}_q$-rational points. We set this up as a problem about a weight enumerator of a certain projective Reed-Muller code. The main inputs to the proof include counting pairs of cubic curves that do share a common component, counting configurations of points that fail to impose independent conditions on cubics, and a variation of the MacWilliams theorem from coding theory.

A family of projective two-weight linear codes

Projective two-weight linear codes are closely related to finite projective spaces and strongly regular graphs. In this paper, a family of q-ary two-weight linear codes including two subfamilies of projective codes is presented, where q is a prime power. The parameters of both the codes and their duals are excellent. As applications, the codes are used to derive strongly regular graphs with new parameters and secret sharing schemes with interesting access structures.