Quality Evaluation Research Articles

Evaluation of Drought Resistance and Quality of Different Rice Hybrid Combinations

Evaluation of Drought Resistance and Quality of Different Rice Hybrid Combinations

Quantitative surface quality evaluation for 3D-printed concrete with coarse aggregate through 3D scanning

The undulating appearance of 3D-printed concrete (3DPC) is an essential feature that impacts the integrity and stability of the multilayer structure, yet the related evaluation parameters have rarely been proposed. This study proposed a quantitative evaluation and parameters through the on-site 3D scan technology to impel a direct and precise understanding of the surface quality of 3DPC, especially concrete with coarse aggregates. Firstly, 8-layer 3DPC walls are produced at four different printer printing rates and then 3D scanned. After point cloud correction, noise reduction, and 2D processing onto acquired points cloud, the evaluation parameters for evaluating 3DPC surface characteristics are defined and calculated. Results indicate that a higher 3D printer printing rate helps reduce surface fluctuation of 3DPC multilayer structures but disfavor the vertical flatness, of which the linear relationship between the parameters and the printing speed of the printer is explored and discussed. Recommendation of 3DPC straight wall structures controlled to surface defects ratio within 2% and slope within 0.2% is suggested. These conclusions provide precise external surface quality control and treatment basements that contribute to improving the practical application of 3DPC.

Blind Quality Assessment of Dense 3D Point Clouds with Structure Guided Resampling

Objective quality assessment of three-dimensional (3D) point clouds is essential for the development of immersive multimedia systems in real-world applications. Despite the success of perceptual quality evaluation for 2D images and videos, blind/no-reference metrics are still scarce for 3D point clouds with large-scale irregularly distributed 3D points. Therefore, in this article, we propose an objective point cloud quality index with Structure Guided Resampling (SGR) to automatically evaluate the perceptually visual quality of dense 3D point clouds. The proposed SGR is a general-purpose blind quality assessment method without the assistance of any reference information. Specifically, considering that the human visual system is highly sensitive to structure information, we first exploit the unique normal vectors of point clouds to execute regional pre-processing that consists of keypoint resampling and local region construction. Then, we extract three groups of quality-related features, including (1) geometry density features, (2) color naturalness features, and (3) angular consistency features. Both the cognitive peculiarities of the human brain and naturalness regularity are involved in the designed quality-aware features that can capture the most vital aspects of distorted 3D point clouds. Extensive experiments on several publicly available subjective point cloud quality databases validate that our proposed SGR can compete with state-of-the-art full-reference, reduced-reference, and no-reference quality assessment algorithms.

Investigating the tolerance of different strawberry cultivars to Botrytis cinerea infection and its relation with fruit quality

BACKGROUND: Strawberries are a delicate, high nutritional value fruit with an extremely short shelf life and high susceptibility to tissue infection, mainly by Botrytis cinerea. Control of the disease requires an extensive amount of fungicide that is applied in varying complexes because the pathogen easily develops resistance against the active compounds. Planting tolerant cultivars seems to be a promising alternative for fruit growers, but there are currently no cultivars available combining tolerance to B. cinerea with attractive horticultural traits. OBJECTIVE: In this study, four well-defined strawberry cultivars (‘Romina’, ‘Cristina’, ‘Silvia’, and ‘Sibilla’) were selected and tested under treatment with Botrytis cinerea to determine the tolerance of each cultivar and its association with fruit quality. METHODS: Fruits were harvested and then stored for four days after inoculation (treatment) or not (control) with spores of B. cinerea; then, every day the level of decay was detected, and fruits were frozen for successive evaluation of fruit quality. RESULTS: The ‘Silvia’ cultivar is the one that demonstrated a higher level of tolerance to Botrytis infection during the treatment, and the ‘Romina’ cultivar was the cultivar most susceptible to the treatment. The results of the study also highlighted qualitative changes in all strawberry cultivars infected with Botrytis cinerea, by a decrease in the soluble solids content and an increase of acids. Generally, in all cultivars, phenolic acids, and vitamin C decreased in both control and infected but there was a strong decrease in infected fruit compared to control. Anthocyanin content increased in control fruits but strongly decreased in infected. CONCLUSION: As a preliminary outcome, a positive correlation was obtained between fruit nutritional quality and tolerance to decay, as a high amount of nutritional compound content provides lower susceptibility of fruits to Botrytis cinerea. To confirm this result more studies need to be done.

Dynamic monitoring and analysis of ecological quality based on RSEI: A case study of Akkulam-Veli Lake Basin of Thiruvananthapuram City, Kerala, India

ABSTRACT The world today is experiencing rapid urbanization, leading to prominent urban ecological problems. Evaluating urban ecological quality is crucial for monitoring environment-centered initiatives. The Akkulam-Veli Lake Basin, in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India, is threatened by rapid urbanization. The present study proposes a comprehensive evaluation of the ecological quality by the Remote-Sensing Ecological Index (RSEI), based on the four indexes: greenness (NDVI), wetness (WET), dryness (NDSBI), and heat (LST), from 2000 to 2023. The interrelationship between RSEI and land use has been studied to properly analyze human activities’ effects on the study region’s ecological quality. Results indicated that the mean values of RSEI experienced a drastic decline from 0.733 in 2000 to 0.645 in 2015, and further declined to 0.611 in 2023, indicating an overall deterioration in the status of ecological quality in the Akkulam-Veli Lake Basin. Moreover, Moran’s I index of 0.556 in 2000, 0.554 in 2015, and 0.552 in 2023 show that the sample RSEI values have a strong positive autocorrelation with adjacent values in the study area. The study provides evidence for the need for systematic urban planning and serves as a scientific reference for policymakers to manage the ecological qulaity of urban areas effectively.

Effect of nonpharmacological interventions on nutrition status, complications and quality of life in head and neck cancer patients undergoing radiotherapy: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

To evaluate the effect of nonpharmacological therapies on nutrition status, complications and quality of life in head and neck cancer patients and to provide a basis for clinical practice. This systematic review was reported in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-analysis statement. Ten databases were systematically searched for all available articles from construction to November 2023. Two researchers independently conducted literature screening, data extraction and quality evaluation. Cochrane Review Manager 5.3 was used for meta-analysis. Finally, 27 RCT studies including 2814 patients with head and neck cancer were included. Five categories of interventions were used: nutritional support, exercise, swallowing function training, psychological intervention and low-level laser therapy. Nonpharmacological interventions can improve body weight loss in patients with HNC at the end of treatment (MD: 1.66 kg; 95% CI: 0.80 to 2.51), and subgroup analysis showed that nutritional support, psychological intervention and low-level laser therapy were effective. Nonpharmacological interventions can also ameliorate decreases in BMI (MD: 0.71; 95% CI: 0.16 to 1.26) and reduce the incidence of malnutrition (RR: 0.76; 95% CI: 0.67 to 0.86), oral mucositis (RR: 0.54; 95% CI: 0.37 to 0.80) and gastrointestinal complications (RR: 0.61; 95% CI: 0.38 to 0.96) during radiotherapy; however, no significant differences were found in other complications and quality of life. Nonpharmacological interventions can improve the nutrition status of patients with head and neck cancer and reduce the incidence of severe oral mucositis and gastrointestinal complications during radiotherapy but have no significant impact on quality of life.

New liver window width in detecting hepatocellular carcinoma on dynamic contrast-enhanced computed tomography with deep learning reconstruction.

Changing a window width (WW) alters appearance of noise and contrast of CT images. The aim of this study was to investigate the impact of adjusted WW for deep learning reconstruction (DLR) in detecting hepatocellular carcinomas (HCCs) on CT with DLR. This retrospective study included thirty-five patients who underwent abdominal dynamic contrast-enhanced CT. DLR was used to reconstruct arterial, portal, and delayed phase images. The investigation of the optimal WW involved two blinded readers. Then, five other blinded readers independently read the image sets for detection of HCCs and evaluation of image quality with optimal or conventional liver WW. The optimal WW for detection of HCC was 119 (rounded to 120 in the subsequent analyses) Hounsfield unit (HU), which was the average of adjusted WW in the arterial, portal, and delayed phases. The average figures of merit for the readers for the jackknife alternative free-response receiver operating characteristic analysis to detect HCC were 0.809 (reader 1/2/3/4/5, 0.765/0.798/0.892/0.764/0.827) in the optimal WW (120 HU) and 0.765 (reader 1/2/3/4/5, 0.707/0.769/0.838/0.720/0.791) in the conventional WW (150 HU), and statistically significant difference was observed between them (p < 0.001). Image quality in the optimal WW was superior to those in the conventional WW, and significant difference was seen for some readers (p < 0.041). The optimal WW for detection of HCC was narrower than conventional WW on dynamic contrast-enhanced CT with DLR. Compared with the conventional liver WW, optimal liver WW significantly improved detection performance of HCC.

An Image Quality Evaluation and Masking Algorithm Based On Pretrained Deep Neural Networks

With the growing amount of astronomical data, there is an increasing need for automated data processing pipelines, which can extract scientific information from observation data without human interventions. A critical aspect of these pipelines is the image quality evaluation and masking algorithm, which evaluate image qualities based on various factors such as cloud coverage, sky brightness, scattering light from the optical system, point-spread-function size and shape, and read-out noise. Occasionally, the algorithm requires masking of areas severely affected by noise. However, the algorithm often necessitates significant human interventions, reducing data processing efficiency. In this study, we present a deep-learning-based image quality evaluation algorithm that uses an autoencoder to learn features of high quality astronomical images. The trained autoencoder enables automatic evaluation of image quality and masking of noise affected areas. We have evaluated the performance of our algorithm using two test cases: images with point spread functions of varying full width half magnitude, and images with complex backgrounds. In the first scenario, our algorithm could effectively identify variations of the point spread functions, which can provide valuable reference information for photometry. In the second scenario, our method could successfully mask regions affected by complex regions, which could significantly increase the photometry accuracy. Our algorithm can be employed to automatically evaluate image quality obtained by different sky surveying projects, further increasing the speed and robustness of data processing pipelines.

Synthesizing Lithuanian voice replacement for laryngeal cancer patients with Pareto-optimized flow-based generative synthesis network

This study presents a Pareto optimized flow-based generative network for speech synthesis - the P-GLOW model in Lithuanian speech synthesis for substituting original voices affected by cancer-related pathologies. Comparing this pure Lithuanian model with an English model trained on Lithuanian phonemes, the study emphasizes the impact of language-specific characteristics on performance, illustrating the advantages of tailored, language-specific models for speech substitution for impaired persons. Our methodology integrates generative models with an architecture based on 12 coupling layers, 1x1 invertible convolutions, and dilated convolutions with gated hyperbolic tangent activation functions. This design facilitates the effective transformation of waveform inputs into Mel spectrograms, enabling the synthesis of high-quality speech audio. The proposed, Pareto optimized, native Lithuanian model achieved a MOS of 4.2 ± 0.1 and an SMOS of 3.9 ± 0.2, while the baseline model (English language model trained on top with Lithuanian phonemes) scored lower with a MOS of 3.8 ± 0.2 and an SMOS of 3.4 ± 0.3. In terms of the Mel Cepstral Distortion (MCD), Voiced/Unvoiced Decision Error (VDE), Glottal-to-Noise Excitation Ratio (GPE), and Frame Fidelity Error (FFE) scores, the proposed method achieved an MCD of 3.2 dB ± 0.2, a VDE of 5.6% ± 1.0, a GPE of 7.9% ± 1.4, and an FFE of 9.7% ± 2.0, outperforming the baseline method which scored higher with an MCD of 4.6 dB ± 0.3, a VDE of 10.8% ± 1.9, a GPE of 14.5% ± 2.4, and an FFE of 18.7% ± 2.8. Log Likelihood Ratio (LLR), Weighted Spectral Slope (WSS), and Perceptual Evaluation of Speech Quality (PESQ) scores also showed strong improvement. The proposed method achieved an LLR of 0.5 ± 0.05, a WSS of 0.3 ± 0.03, and a PESQ of 4.2 ± 0.1, while the baseline method scored lower with an LLR of 0.8 ± 0.08, a WSS of 0.5 ± 0.05, and a PESQ of 3.6 ± 0.2. The Speech Intelligibility Index (SII) and Short-Time Objective Intelligibility (STOI) metrics for restored alaryngeal speech were also high. The proposed method achieved an SII of 0.75 ± 0.05 and an STOI of 0.85 ± 0.03, while the baseline method scored lower with an SII of 0.65 ± 0.05 and an STOI of 0.75 ± 0.04. The evaluation results demonstrate that our approach was able to effectively synthesize high-quality Lithuanian speech audio restoring the input signal from distorted alaryngeal speech.

An Android Sensors-Based Portable Road Health Monitoring System Utilizing Measurement Uncertainty Analysis

Abstract Road health monitoring systems aim to obtain the technical indexes of roads, and then analyze the usage and the degree of damage of the roads, which can provide an important basis for road construction, maintenance, and management. Road roughness is one of the main technical indexes for road quality evaluation and road health monitoring. This study built a system and implemented it as an application to measure and analyze road longitudinal profiles simply and conveniently using the sensors in a mobile phone. The application uses the accelerometer sensor and the gravity sensor to obtain vertical acceleration by a projection method, then denoises through empirical mode decompositions and a Butterworth filter, which has a repeated measurement error of 11%. Different filters were compared and the repeatability, accuracy, robustness, and effectiveness of the system were analyzed. An index to evaluated road longitudinal profiles is given, so that the results can be analyzed and viewed interactively in the application, and a series of cases are given in this paper.

Quality Evaluation of Guidelines for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Liver Failure.

This study aimed to systematically assess the methodological quality and key recommendations of the guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of liver failure (LF), furnishing constructive insights for guideline developers and equipping clinicians with evidence-based information to facilitate informed decision-making. Electronic databases and manual searches from January 2011 to August 2023. Two reviewers independently screened titles and abstracts, then full texts for eligibility. Fourteen guidelines were included. Two reviewers extracted data and checked by two others. Methodological quality of the guidelines was appraised using the Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation II tool. Of the 14 guidelines, only the guidelines established by the Society of Critical Care Medicine and the American College of Gastroenterology (2023) achieved an aggregate quality score exceeding 60%, thereby meriting clinical recommendations. It emerged that there remains ample room for enhancement in the quality of the guidelines, particularly within the domains of stakeholder engagement, rigor, and applicability. Furthermore, an in-depth scrutiny of common recommendations and supporting evidence drawn from the 10 adult LF guidelines unveiled several key issues: controversy exists in the recommendation, the absence of supporting evidence and confusing use of evidence for recommendations, and a preference in evidence selection. There are high differences in methodological quality and recommendations among LF guidelines. Improving these existing problems and controversies will benefit existing clinical practice and will be an effective way for developers to upgrade the guidelines.

On the Necessity of Implementing the Quality and Effectiveness Evaluation of Third-party Court Cases

The third-party court case quality and effectiveness evaluation has theoretical rationality different from the court 's internal self-quality and effectiveness evaluation in the court case quality and effectiveness evaluation, and has unique subject value attributes; however, the current internal self-evaluation system of the court has limitations in terms of evaluation elements such as subject, content, method, purpose and effectiveness, and cannot fully realize the functional requirements of the quality and effectiveness evaluation of court cases. The implementation of the third-party court case quality and effectiveness evaluation is not only in line with the value of judicial operation, but also has the value of the rule of law practice different from the self-quality and effectiveness evaluation within the court. Therefore, the implementation of the third-party court case quality and effectiveness evaluation has the necessity of theory and practice, and is an important part of the court case quality and effectiveness evaluation.

Investigating key factors of feeding intolerance in severe acute pancreatitis: A scoping review.

The complexity of severe acute pancreatitis (SAP) and the stress caused by the disease is associated with a high incidence of feeding intolerance. However, the factors influencing feeding incontinence in patients with SAP are diverse. To systematically analyse relevant studies that investigate the occurrence of feeding intolerance in patients with SAP, identify the relevant factors of feeding intolerance in such patients and provide a reference for nursing staff to develop relevant intervention measures. This scoping review followed the approach proposed by Arksey and O'Malley. Seven electronic databases were searched from their establishment until August 2023. This included research on the factors influencing feeding intolerance in patients with SAP, determining research questions, completing literature screening and quality evaluation, extracting data and summarizing and analysing the data. The PRISMA extension for scoping reviews (PRISMA-ScR)statement has also been included. A total of 23 articles were included. The factors influencing feeding intolerance in patients with SAP included the patient's condition, disease, treatment, feeding management and follow-up care. The factors affecting feeding intolerance in patients with SAP are multifaceted. A personalized nursing care plan should be developed based on relevant risk factors to improve feeding tolerance and comfort in patients with SAP and shorten hospitalization time. Intensive care nurses should identify the risk factors for feeding intolerance in patients with SAP and implement appropriate interventions. To identify the risk factors, nurses must be updated with courses and training. Moreover, a systematic feeding intolerance prediction program can help intensive care nurses effectively identify the risk factors for feeding.

Sex-based Differences in Fatty Acids and Macro Elements Composition in Garfish, European Barracuda and Anglerfish from Aegean Sea, Türkiye

Background: Fish, owing to its nutritional attributes, serves as a pivotal component of a wholesome diet. The constituents found in fish, specifically macroelements and polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA), play a crucial role in promoting human health. This study investigates the fatty acid profiles and macro element contents of economically significant fish species, including garfish (Belone belone), European barracuda (Sphyraena sphyraena) and anglerfish (Lophius piscatorius), with a specific focus on gender-based differences. The research addresses a notable gap in existing literature, providing a comprehensive evaluation of the nutritional quality of these species. Methods: In February 2023, marine fish species, were obtained from the Aegean Sea located between the western and southwestern shores of Türkiye and the eastern shores of Greece. A total of fifteen samples, representing each fish species and gender within the sampling area, were collected for the analysis of fatty acids and macro elements. Result: The findings of this study indicate that, regardless of fish species and gender, the major fatty acids in the SFAs, MUFAs and PUFAs classes were palmitic (C16:0), oleic (C18:1n-9) and DHA (C22:6n-3), respectively. The examined species in this study exhibit average macro element levels. While PUFA, EPA and DHA values meet target levels of content for human health and quality food consumption, achieving these levels minimally implies that the studied species lack a rich fatty acid profile compared to those in prior research. Nonetheless, it is concluded that monitoring seasonal variations is essential for a comprehensive understanding of their fatty acid composition.

Primary and Secondary Stability Assessments of Dental Implants According to Their Macro-Design, Length, Width, Location, and Bone Quality

Some evidence supports the influence of implant macro-design on primary stability. Additionally, tactile perception can be used to assess implant stability when placing the implant. This research aimed to quantify the primary and secondary stability of three implant systems with two different macro geometries (cylindrical and conical) determined based on the insertion torque and the implant stability quotient (ISQ) at the moment of implant placement as a function of implant-related factors (length, width, dental arch, and implant location in the arch), intraoperative factors (bone density determined subjectively by the clinician’s tactile perception), and patient-related factors (age, gender, and bone density determined objectively based on cone beam computed tomography (CBCT). Methods: 102 implants from three implant systems with two different macro geometries (conical and cylindrical) were placed in 53 patients. The insertion torque, the ISQ at the implant placement (ISQ0), and the bone quality according to the clinician’s tactile sensation were recorded on the day of the surgery. After a three-month healing period, the ISQ was re-evaluated (ISQ3). Results: The cylindrical implants exhibited significantly higher insertion torque and ISQ values at the moment of the surgery and after three months compared to the conical implants. The cylindrical implants also showed significantly lower indices of tactile evaluation of bone quality during the implant placement surgery. However, no differences were demonstrated in the bone density measured objectively using CBCT. (4) Conclusions: The cylindrical implants achieved the highest values for primary stability (Newtons × centimeter (Ncm) and ISQ) and secondary stability (ISQ after three months). The insertion torque was the variable that most influenced the ISQ on the day of the surgery. The implant location (incisors–canines, bicuspids–molars) and the implant macro geometry were the variables that most influenced the secondary stability (ISQ at three months).

The Role of L1PA in Patient Reported Outcomes in Patients Undergoing Single Level Lumbar Fusion for Degenerative Spondylolisthesis.

Retrospective cohort study. To determine whether the L1 pelvic angle (L1PA) can be used to predict quality of life outcomes for adults one year after L4-L5 fusion to treat degenerative spondylolisthesis. L1PA is beneficial in the evaluation of pre and postoperative quality of life outcomes in patients undergoing surgery for spinal deformity. No studies have examined its utility in surgical patients with degenerative spinal disease. Patients undergoing L4-L5 posterolateral decompression and fusion or transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion for degenerative lumbar spondylolisthesis were grouped by preoperative and postoperative L1PA, and further stratified by cut offs of>7.2° and <7.2° based on previous literature. We also stratified patients by presence of an ideal calculated L1PA, defined as (0.5xPelvic Incidence)-21 +/- 5°, as proposed by prior literature. Preoperative, one year postoperative and Δ (postoperative minus preoperative) patient reported outcome measures (PROMs) and radiographic measurements were collected. Twenty-four patients were identified with preoperative L1PAs <7.2° and 132 with L1PAs>7.2°. Eighteen patients were identified with postoperative L1PAs <7.2° and 138 with L1PAs>7.2°. Sixty-five and fifty-seven patients were identified as having ideal calculated pre and postoperative L1PAs, respectively. When using absolute cutoffs, L1PA correlated with pelvic tilt, pelvic incidence, and pelvic incidence-lumbar lordosis mismatch (PI-LL). When using calculated L1PAs, L1PA correlated with lumbar lordosis, PI-LL, pelvic tilt and sacral slope. With respect to PROMs, no statistically significant differences existed between cohorts both preoperatively and at 1 year postoperatively on either univariate and multivariate analyses. L1PA may be a helpful radiographic consideration that translates to clinically relevant outcomes in spinal deformity. However, it does not appear as predictive of patient outcomes after single level fusion for patients with L4-L5 degenerative spondylolisthesis. Further studies are warranted to investigate the role of L1PA in degenerative spine patients.

Comprehensive Evaluation of the ‘Shixia’ Longan Quality under Postharvest Ambient Storage: The Volatile Compounds Played a Critical Part

Longan fruit generally undergoes rapid quality deterioration during the postharvest stage, with the manifestation of flavor loss as well as pronounced off-odor production. Nevertheless, the unapparent aroma makes people ignore the odor change in postharvest longan. Sensory analysis serves as an indispensable method combining instrumental detection and the perceptibility of human sensation in a comprehensive evaluation of quality during production and consumption. In this study, we established the evaluating data of the appearance, flavor, taste substances, volatile profiles, and deterioration of ‘Shixia’ longan throughout room-temperature storage using instrument assessment and descriptive measurements. Our results indicated that both the appearance state and the taste condition notably engendered confusion or trouble for consumers to judge under the quality transition period. Conversely, the development of odor was highly consistent with that of quality deterioration. Some unpleasant volatile substances including alcohol (ethanol), acid (acetic acid), and esters (acetic acid methyl ester and ethyl acetate) were probably the cause of off-odor during the storage. The result of the sensory evaluation also presents a more significant relevance between the overall quality and the odor. Generally, the work paved the way to reveal the importance of odor profiles for assessing the comprehensive quality condition of postharvest room-temperature stored longan.

Three-Dimensional Profile Reconstruction and Internal Defect Detection of Silicon Wafers Using Cascaded Fiber Optic Fabry–Pérot Interferometer and Leaky Field Detection Technologies

Abstract Wafer quality control is one of the important processes to improve the yield rate of semiconductor products. Profile quality and defects in the wafer are two key factors that should be taken into consideration. In this research, we introduce a method that measures the profile of the upper surface and the thickness of the wafer at the same time using an optical fiber cascaded Fabry–Pérot interferometer working at wavelength of 1550 nm. Therefore, the 3D profile of the wafer can be reconstructed directly. Testing results show that both accuracy and precision of the Fabry–Pérot interferometer are within a nanometer scale. Defects, especially those embedded inside the wafer, will be detected by monitoring the leaky field with treating wafers as slab waveguides. With the leaky field detection, defects on the lower surface of the wafer were successfully detected by monitoring the leaky field above the upper surface of the wafer. Compared with traditional methods such as radiographic testing or computed tomography testing, the proposed methods provide a cost-effective alternative for wafer quality evaluation.

Evaluation of Soil Quality of Pingliang City Based on Fuzzy Mathematics and Cluster Analysis

Pingliang City has a complex topography and diverse soil types. To realize the improvement of soil according to local conditions and the reasonable and sustainable use of soil resources, an evaluation of soil quality in Pingliang City was carried out, based on the soil distribution situation in Pingliang City, adopting a method combining fuzzy mathematics and cluster analysis of the main evaluation factors, such as soil organic matter, topsoil depth, soil erosion intensity, soil moisture regime, effective soil thickness, soil texture, soil profile structure, soil nutrient status and topographical parts, to carry out a comprehensive evaluation. A comprehensive evaluation of soil quality was conducted in seven counties under the jurisdiction of Pingliang City, and the evaluation results were compared and analyzed against the national standard, “Cultivated land quality grade”, to provide a basis for the selection of scientific soil improvement methods. The results of the arable land quality grades indicate that the quality of farmland in Pingliang City is divided into three to ten grades, and the average quality grade of farmland is 6.83, which is in the middle–lower level, and the overall grade distribution shows the characteristics of low in the middle and high in the east and west. The results of fuzzy mathematics combined with cluster analysis indicated the following trends in soil quality for the 12 soil genera: Chuan black gunny soil &gt; yellow moist soil &gt; sandy soil &gt; silt soil &gt; mulching helilu soil&gt; loessal soil&gt; loamy soil &gt; slope loessal soil &gt; arenosol &gt; tillage leaching gray cinnamon soil &gt; calcareous gray cinnamon soil &gt; red clay soil. The results of the combination of fuzzy mathematics and clustering were significantly correlated with the results of the evaluation of the soil quality of arable land; the correlation coefficient was 0.884. This indicates that the method can accurately and objectively review the advantages and disadvantages of arable land soil and can be effectively applied to the evaluation of the soil quality of agricultural soils in other regions. It is a complement to the existing evaluation of the soil quality of arable land and at the same time provides a reference for the improvement of soil quality in agricultural regions.

Computational investigation of Y. aloifolia variegate as anti-Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) targeting HIV-1 protease: A multiscale in-silico exploration

IntroductionHuman Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) is a global challenge for the health sector due to the absence of a definitive cure. More than 38 million people are affected by the disease worldwide, with approximately 1.5 million new cases reported annually. This situation has spurred continued efforts in searching for drug candidates. Meanwhile, rutin, luteolin, and quercetin are compounds known for efficacy in treating infectious diseases. The compounds have also been detected in Yucca aloifolia (絲蘭) variegate L. Therefore, this study aimed to conduct a computational investigation utilizing multiscale in silico exploration to assess the potential of Y. aloifolia as an anti-HIV agent targeting HIV-1 Protease (H1P). MethodsFor the in silico study, the three-dimensional structure of H1P (PDB: 5V4Y) was retrieved and prepared using YASARA Structure. The binding pockets were identified using Cavity Plus server, and ligands were obtained from Y. aloifolia leaves alcohol extract. Furthermore, molecular docking was conducted with YASARA Structure to predict binding energies, followed by QSAR analysis for activity prediction. Density Functional Theory (DFT) analysis was performed to assess stability and reactivity, while toxicity was evaluated using ProTox 3.0. Molecular dynamics (MD) simulation and Molecular Mechanics Poisson–Boltzmann Surface Area (MM-PBSA) calculation were also conducted for further analysis. ResultsThe results showed that Ramachandran plot analysis indicated favorable residue distribution based on the evaluation of enzyme preparation quality. Cavity Plus identified potential binding sites, with cavity no.2 showing the highest druggability. Molecular docking showed rutin and isorhamnetin-3-O-rutinoside as top binders to H1P, with favorable binding energies. Moreover, post-docking analysis produced specific interactions between ligands and the receptor. PASS prediction indicated the potential of rutin and isorhamnetin-3-O-rutinoside (narcissin) as H1P inhibitors. DFT analysis assessed stability, showing comparable values for the investigated compounds. Toxicity analysis suggested both compounds to be non-toxic. Finally, MD simulation demonstrated the superior stability and binding affinity of rutin compared to isorhamnetin-3-O-rutinoside and the control drug, grl-09510. DiscussionRutin, hecogenin, and isorhamnetin-3-O-rutinoside from Y. aloifolia (絲蘭) leaves showed potential as H1P inhibitors through in silico study. Docking simulations indicated that rutin had the most favorable binding interactions, while MD simulation showed only the rutin-H1P complex to be stable, signifying the potential for further drug development. Rutin was identified as a promising lead for H1P inhibition due to its strong binding, stability, and predicted safety properties, underscoring the need for wet lab validation.