Purpose This study aimed to explore the correlation between morphological parameters and dosimetric parameters of the heart and spinal cord in advanced-stage esophagus cancer (EPC) to provide a reference for clinical treatment. Methods A total of 105 patients with middle- and advanced-stage EPC, who received treatment in our hospital from 2019 to 2021, were included. The morphological parameters were calculated by imaging. Intensity-modulated radiation therapy plan was executed at Raystation4.7. The prescription dose of PTV-G and PTV-C was set as 60Gy/30F and 54Gy/30F, respectively. The linear regression model was used to analyze the correlation between morphologic parameters of EPC and dosimetric parameters of the heart and spinal cord. Results In 105 cases, the total lung length was correlated with the spinal cord D2. The heart Dmean and heart V40 was correlated with PTV-G volume, PTV-G length; In middle- and upper-segment EPC cases, only the total lung volume was correlated with the spinal cord Dmean, spinal cord D2, heart Dmean, and heart V40; In middle-stage EPC cases, the heart Dmean was correlated with the PTV-G volume, PTV-G length. the total lung length was correlated with the spinal cord D2; In middle- and lower-segment EPC, only the PTV-G volume and PTV-G length were correlated with the heart Dmean. All the aforementioned values were statistically significant. Conclusions Combined with the non-segmented tumor and different locations, the organ at risk dose was comprehensively considered.

Dysregulation of the autonomic nervous system (ANS) is commonly observed in different mental disorders, especially when individuals engage in prolonged cognitive-emotional tasks that necessitate an adjustment of the ANS to workload. Although understanding of the temporal dynamics of sympathetic and parasympathetic tones in obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) is limited, analyzing the ANS reactions on cognitive-emotional workload could provide a valuable insight into the underlying causes of OCD. This study investigated the temporal dynamics of the heart rate (HR) and pupil area (PA) while participants with OCD and healthy volunteers solved antisaccade tasks where affective pictures served as central fixation stimuli. The data of 31 individuals with OCD and 30 healthy volunteers were included in the study. The experiment consisted of three separate blocks, each lasting approximately 8 minutes. The results showed the increase in sympathetic tone in the OCD group. The increase in sympathetic tone of the ANS in OCD at the middle part of the block was most noticeable during presentation of unpleasant stimuli. The healthy volunteers demonstrated adaptive temporal dynamics of the HR and PA from the first block to the last block of tasks, while HR and PA in the OCD group showed less changes in time implying the reduced adaptation of the ANS sympathetic tone to cognitive-emotional workload in OCD.

Adapting to the ever-changing demands of the environment requires a complex interplay between cognitive-affective, neuronal, and autonomic processes. Vagally-mediated heart rate variability (vmHRV) is positively associated with both cognitive-affective functioning and prefrontal cortex (PFC) activity. Accordingly, the Neurovisceral Integration Model has posited a shared role of the PFC in the regulation of cognitive-affective processes and autonomic nervous system (ANS) activity. While there are numerous correlational findings in this regard, no study so far has investigated whether the manipulation of PFC activity induces changes in vmHRV and cognitive-affective processing in an inter-dependent manner. In this study, we examined the effects of continuous (cTBS) and intermittent theta-burst stimulation (iTBS) over the left dorsolateral PFC (dlPFC) on vmHRV and cognitive-affective processing within an emotional stop-signal task (ESST) in 66 participants. Our results revealed that both resting vmHRV and reactivity, at least partly, predicted cognitive-affective processing. Furthermore, we found a dampening effect of cTBS on resting vmHRV, as well as an enhancing effect of iTBS on ESST performance. Our results show no direct association between vmHRV changes and ESST performance alterations following stimulation. We interpret our results in the light of a hierarchical model of neurovisceral integration, suggesting a dynamical situation-dependent recruitment of higher-order cortical areas like the dlPFC in the regulation of the ANS. In conclusion, our results highlight the complex interplay between PFC activity, autonomic regulation, and cognitive-affective processing, emphasizing the need for further research to understand the causal dynamics of the underlying neural mechanisms.

A novel composite wound dressing hydrogel by incorporating single-walled carbon nanotubes and indocyanine green into a dual-crosslinked hydrogel through Schiff base reaction was developed. The objective was to prevent wound infection and enhance the thermal effect induced by laser energy. The hydrogel matrix was constructed using oxidized gelatin, pre-crosslinked with calcium ions, along with carboxymethyl chitosan, crosslinked via Schiff base reaction. Optimization of the blank hydrogel’s gelation time, swelling index, degradation rate, and mechanical properties was achieved by adding 0.1% SWCNT and 0.1% ICG. Among them, the SWCNT-loaded hydrogel BCG-SWCNT exhibited superior performance overall: a gelation time of 102 seconds; a swelling index above 30 after equilibrium swelling; a degradation rate of 100.5% on the seventh day; and a compressive modulus of 8.8 KPa. It displayed significant inhibition against methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus infection in wounds. When combined with laser energy usage, the composite hydrogel demonstrated excellent pro-healing activity in rats.

Neurodegenerative diseases have complex etiologies, however, neuroinflammation and oxidative stress are important markers in this pathogenesis and, in this sense, cannabinoids, especially CBD, have been identified as potential therapeutics for playing a neuroprotective role. Studies have demonstrated the neuroprotective effect of cannabinoids and derivatives of Cannabis sativa L in diseases of the central nervous system due to their interaction with the endocannabinoid system through receptors and other molecular targets. The aim of this review was to provide an overview of the endocannabinoid system and a summary of the clinical and preclinical findings of the therapeutic use of cannabinoids in epilepsy, multiple sclerosis and Parkinson’s disease, pointing out interactions with molecular targets and the potential for neuroprotection of CBD. Electronic searches were carried out in international databases, including studies that presented consistent data on this subject. Significant therapeutic effects of CBD were shown for epilepsy and Parkinson’s disease, while nabiximols contributed to the reduction of spasticity, being a frequent option for the treatment of multiple sclerosis. Although much has been projected on the therapeutic potential of cannabinoids for neurological disorders, there is a long way to go in the search for strong scientific evidence of their pharmacological effectiveness.

Aprepitant for Severe Refractory Pruritus in a Patient with Relapsed Hodgkin’s Lymphoma

Free Space Optical Communication has emerged as a promising technology for high-speed and secure data transmission between ground stations on Earth and orbiting satellites. However, this communication technology suffers from signal attenuation due to atmospheric turbulence and beam alignment precision. Low Earth Orbit satellites play a pivotal role in optical communication due to their low altitude over the Earth surface, which mitigates the atmospheric precipitation effects. This paper introduces a novel data path control law for satellite optical communication exploiting Artificial Intelligence-based predictive weather forecasting and a node selection mechanism based on Reinforcement Learning. Extensive simulations on three case studies demonstrate that the proposed control technique achieves remarkable gains in terms of link availability with respect to other state-of-the-art solutions.

Coexistence of scleroderma with multiple myeloma: a rare associationOmar Alsamarrai, M.D.1, Ghina Haidar, M.D.2, Sana Btrush, M.D.3, Ayham Alhusseini, M.D.4, Maysoun Kudsi, M.D, PhD51 Department of Neurology, Al Assad and Al Mouwasat University hospitals, Faculty of Medicine- Damascus University, Damascus, Syriaomarsamoraee@gmail.com2 Department of Rheumatology, Al Assad and Al Mouwasat University hospitals, Faculty of Medicine- Damascus University, Damascus, Syriagtghinahaidar@gmail.com3 Department of Rheumatology, Al Assad and Al Mouwasat University hospitals, Faculty of Medicine- Damascus University, Damascus, SyriaSana.btrush1996@gmail.com4 Department of Neurology, Al Assad and Al Mouwasat University hospitals, Faculty of Medicine- Damascus University, Damascus, Syria.ayham-94-h@hotmail.com5 Rheumatology professor , Faculty of Medicine- Damascus University, Damascus, Syria.maykudsi@gmail.comCorresponding Author : Omar Alsamarrai , Department of Neurology, Al Assad and Al Mouwasat University hospitals, , Faculty of Medicine- Damascus University, Almazah, Damascus, Syria. E-mail : omarsamoraee@gmail.com .Tel: + 963 988212757Consent statement : Written informed consent was obtained from the patient to publish this report in accordance with the journal’s patient consent policy

Identifying hybridization between common pathogen vectors is essential due to the major public health implications through risks associated with hybrid’s enhanced pathogen transmission potential. These hard-ticks Ixodes ricinus and Ixodes persulcatus are the two most common vectors of tick-borne pathogens that affect human and animal health in Europe. I. ricinus is a known native species in Finland with a well-known distribution. Over the past 60 years, I. persulcatus has expanded in range making the species appear in areas previously not found in Finland. Here we used double-digest restriction site-associated DNA (ddRAD) sequencing on 92 ticks (morphologically identified as 46 I. ricinus, and 46 I. persulcatus) collected across Finland to investigate whether RAD generated single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) discriminate tick species and identify hybridization events. Two different clustering methods were used to infer the specific species based on how they clustered and identified hybrids among them. We were able to discriminate between the two tick species and identified five putative hybrids with admixed genomic proportions ranging from approximately 25 to 75 percent. Four of these hybrids were morphologically identified as I. ricinus and the other as I. persulcatus. Our results suggest that RAD SNPs are robust for identifying both species of the ticks as well as their hybrid individuals. These results suggest ongoing hybridization between I. ricinus and I. persulcatus in their natural populations in Finland. This study is a significant step in understanding the formation of hybridization zones due to range expansion potentially associated with climate change. Despite our findings, our data are insufficient for resolving the factors that affect population genetic structure within species.

USE OF INTRAOPERATIVE NEUROPHYSIOLOGICAL MONITORING(IONM) IN A NEONATE WITH LIMITED DORSAL MYELOSCHISISShyam Duvuru1, Nisha B2, Vivek Sanker3, Yusra Arafeh4, Rnad Alajarmeh5, Wireko Andrew Awuah61Department of Neurosurgery, Apollo Specialty Hospitals, Tamil Nadu, IndiaEmail: drshypy@gmail.com2Neuroanaesthesia & Critical Care, Apollo Specialty Hospitals, Tamil Nadu, IndiaEmail: drnisha_b@apollohospitals.com3Research Fellow, Society of Brain Mapping and Therapeutics, CA, USAEmail: viveksanker@gmail.com4Faculty of Medicine, Jordan University of Science and Technology, Irbid, JordanEmail: theyusraarafeh@gmail.com5Department of Pediatrics and Neonatology, Istiklal Hospital, Amman, JordanEmail: renadnaser5@gmail.com6Faculty of Medicine, Sumy State University, Sumy, Ukraine, andyvans36@yahoo.com

Metazoa-level Universal Single-Copy Orthologs (mzl-USCOs) are universally applicable markers for DNA taxonomy in animals which can replace or supplement single-gene barcodes. While previously mzl-USCOs from target enrichment data were shown to reliably distinguish species, here we tested whether USCOs are an evenly distributed, representative sample of a given metazoan genome and therefore able to cope with past hybridization events and incomplete lineage sorting. This is relevant for coalescent-based species delimitation approaches, which critically depend on the assumption that the investigated loci do not exhibit autocorrelation due to physical linkage. Based on 239 assessed chromosome-level assembled genomes, we confirmed that mzl-USCOs are genetically unlinked for practical purposes and a representative sample of a genome in terms of reciprocal distances between USCOs on a chromosome and of distribution across chromosomes. We tested the suitability of mzl-USCOs extracted from genomes for species delimitation and phylogeny in four case studies: Anopheles mosquitos, Drosophila fruit flies, Heliconius butterflies, and Darwin’s finches. In almost all instances, USCOs allowed delineating species and yielded phylogenies that correspond to those generated from whole genome data. Our phylogenetic analyses demonstrate that USCOs may complement single-gene DNA barcodes and provide more accurate taxonomic inferences. Combining USCOs from sources that used different versions of ortholog reference libraries to infer marker orthology may be challenging and at times impact taxonomic conclusions. However, we expect this problem to become less severe as the rapidly growing number of reference genomes provides a better representation of the number and diversity of organismic lineages.

Objectives: To define the pathogenic cause of pedigree and provide precise genetic counseling for the pregnant woman, we retrospectively reviewed a pedigree with developmental retardation due to paternal 8q/18q translocation at The Affiliated Taizhou People’s Hospital of Nanjing Medical University. Materials and methods: Karyotype analysis and CMA detection were carried out

Title: Orphan peptide and G protein-coupled receptor signalling in alcohol use disorderRoberta Goncalves Anversa1,2*, Xavier J Maddern1,2*, Andrew J Lawrence1,2and Leigh C Walker1,2*Contributed equally1Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health, VIC 3052 Australia2Florey Department of Neuroscience and Mental Health, University of Melbourne, VIC 3052 Australia

In 2019, the Louisiana Department of Health reported an early influenza B/Victoria (B/VIC) virus outbreak. As it was an atypically large outbreak, we deployed to Louisiana to investigate it using genomics and a triplex real-time RT-PCR assay to detect three antigenically distinct B/VIC lineage variant viruses. The investigation indicated that B/VIC V1A.3 subclade, containing a three amino acid deletion in the hemagglutinin and known to be antigenically distinct to the B/Colorado/06/2017 vaccine virus, was the most prevalent circulating virus within the specimens tested. This work underscores the value of portable diagnostics and sequencing platforms for rapid, onsite pathogen characterization.

In the environmental security monitoring of smart cities, the infrared and visible image fusion method deployed on intelligent systems based on cloud and fog computing plays an vital role in providing enhanced images for target detection systems. However, the fusion quality can be significantly influenced by the illumination of the monitoring scenario in visible images. Therefore, conventional methods typically suffer a severe performance drop under the condition of insufficient illumination. To tackle this issue, we propose an illumination enhancement and target-aware fusion method (IETAFusion) based on artificial intelligence, which breaks the boundaries between the task of illumination enhancement and image fusion and provide a fusion result with better visual perception in nighttime scene. Specifically, we use a light-weight contrast enhancement module (CEM) restore the brightness of the visble image. Moreover, a Swin Transformer-based backbone network (STBNet) is utilized to facilitate information exchangement between the source images and enhance the capabilities of target awareness. Finally, the fused images are reconstructed by the contrast-texture retention module (CTRM) and reconstructor. The extensive experiments indicates that the proposed approach achieves improved performance both in human perception and quantitative analysis compared with the state-of-the-art (SOTA) methods.

ABSTRACTA 24-year-old man was being followed for dilated cardiomyopathy. He presented with bipolar aphthosis and a painless pulsatile abdominal mass. A CT scan showed abdominal aortic and superior mesenteric artery aneurysms and pulmonary embolism. The diagnosis of Behçet’s disease was accepted. The initial course was favorable under corticosteroid therapy.

We conducted a multicentre hospital-based test-negative case–control study to measure vaccine effectiveness (VE) against PCR-confirmed influenza in adult patients with severe acute respiratory infection (SARI) during the 2022/23 influenza season in Europe. Among 5547 SARI patients ≥18 years, 2963 (53%) were vaccinated against influenza. Overall VE against influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 was 11% (95%CI: -23–36); 20% (95%CI: -4–39) against A(H3N2) and 56% (95%CI: 22–75) against B. During the 2022/23 season, while VE against hospitalisation with influenza B was >55%, it was ≤20% for influenza A subtypes. While influenza vaccination should be a priority for the upcoming season, improved vaccines against influenza are needed.

Influenza A(H3N2) viruses dominated early in the 2022–23 influenza season in Europe, followed by higher circulation of influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 and B viruses. The VEBIS primary care network estimated the influenza vaccine effectiveness (VE) using a multicentre test-negative study. Primary care practitioners collected information and specimens from patients consulting with acute respiratory infection. We measured VE against any influenza, influenza (sub)type and clade, by age group, by influenza vaccine target group and by time since vaccination, using logistic regression. We included 38,058 patients, of which 3,786 were influenza A(H3N2), 1,548 influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 and 3,275 influenza B cases. Against influenza A(H3N2), VE was 36% (95%CI: 25–45) among all ages, ranged between 30% and 52% by age group and target group. VE against influenza A(H3N2) clade 2b was 38% (95% CI: 25–49). Overall, VE against influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 was 46% (95%CI: 35–56) and ranged between 29% and 59% by age group and target group. VE against influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 clade 5a.2a was 56% (95% CI: 46–65) and 79% (95% CI: 64–88) against clade 5a.2a.1. VE against influenza B was 76% (95%CI: 70–81), overall; 84%, 72% and 71% among 0–14-year-olds 15–64-year-olds and those in the influenza vaccination target group, respectively. VE against influenza B with a position 197-mutation of the hemagglutinin (HA) gene was 79% (95% CI: 73–85) and 90% (95% CI: 85–94) without this mutation. The 2022–23 end-of-season results from the VEBIS network at primary care level showed high VE among children and against influenza B, with lower VE against influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 and A(H3N2).