Search Results (627)

The proliferation of bullet comment systems on video-sharing platforms has created novel opportunities for covert communication. Recent research has demonstrated multiple bullet comment-based steganographic paradigms: time modulation, time attribute shifting, live broadcast game-based channels, and generative stegotext via frame comments. This paper presents Multi-Dimensional Behavioral Signature Analysis (MDBSA), a unified detection framework integrating seven behavioral dimensions to systematically characterize anomalies from four documented bullet comment steganographic paradigms. We construct a synthetic benchmark spanning six video categories with controlled steganographic injection; extract features capturing temporal, spatial, content, and structural patterns; and evaluate it using GroupKFold cross-validation to prevent data leakage from overlapping sliding windows. On this synthetic benchmark, MDBSA features combined with Gradient Boosting achieve 96.9% accuracy (F1 = 96.8%, AUC = 0.996), compared with 65.6% for logistic regression on the same features. Per-paradigm detection rates on the benchmark range from 98.4% to 100.0%. Full article

Background/Objectives: The period between 12 and 16 years of age coincides with peak pubertal change, declining habitual physical activity, and the consolidation of lifelong behavioral patterns, making it a critical window for understanding how fitness develops and how stable (or unstable) it is over time. This review aims to synthesize longitudinal evidence addressing how HRPF changes and tracks in adolescents aged approximately 12 to 16 years, the sex- and maturation-related modifiers of these patterns, the methodological approaches used to assess them, and the secular and behavioral context within which they occur. Methods: A structured narrative review was conducted searching four electronic databases—Google Scholar, PubMed, Web of Science, and Scopus—using terms combining concepts of adolescence, health-related physical fitness, and longitudinal study design published up to April 2026. Reference lists of retrieved systematic reviews and meta-analyses were snowball-searched. Eligible studies employed longitudinal or repeated-measures designs in samples overlapping the 12–16-year age range; no formal risk-of-bias appraisal or quantitative pooling was undertaken, consistent with the narrative-review design. Findings were synthesized narratively by HRPF component and thematic domain. Results: Cardiorespiratory fitness rises through early adolescence before plateauing or declining from approximately age 15 in one longitudinal cohort, more markedly in boys; muscular power and strength diverge increasingly by sex, a pattern consistent with androgen-mediated gains in lean mass in boys, although this mechanism was not directly tested here; flexibility remains the most stable component; and body composition acts as both an outcome and a determinant of other fitness test performance. Within-adolescence tracking is moderate-to-high for most components in the single available 3-year cohort of adolescent girls that reported component-specific tracking coefficients (e.g., lower-limb power β = 0.98, aerobic endurance β = 0.75, trunk muscular endurance β = 0.51), and substantially stronger than tracking from childhood into adolescence. Secular trends indicate population-level fitness has declined in many countries over recent decades, with adolescents showing greater decline than children. Conclusions: Early-to-mid adolescence appears to be a critical and time-limited opportunity to consider for fitness-promoting intervention: fitness rank is still somewhat malleable, but shows progressively stronger tracking with age—a pattern of rank stability that should not itself be read as evidence about responsiveness to intervention. Methodological heterogeneity in test batteries, follow-up duration, and tracking statistics limits direct comparability across studies. Future research should incorporate maturity-status indicators, multi-wave designs, and harmonized assessment protocols. Full article

Helicobacter pylori infection is a major cause of gastric cancer, and eradication before advanced precancerous gastric changes develop provides a biologically plausible opportunity for primary prevention. Adolescence represents a strategically favorable, although not universally established, window for intervention in Japan because persistent childhood-acquired infection can be identified before extensive mucosal damage while school-based programs provide organized access to defined birth cohorts. This narrative review evaluates the evidence supporting population-based adolescent H. pylori screening, its potential harms and uncertainties, and the lessons derived from Japanese implementation. Representative programs demonstrate that organized screening is feasible but show substantial heterogeneity in participation, diagnostic pathways, antimicrobial resistance, eradication outcomes, and retention across the care cascade. Direct evidence that adolescent screening reduces future gastric cancer incidence or mortality is not yet available. As H. pylori prevalence declines, the balance among screening yield, diagnostic performance, antimicrobial exposure, cost, and equity will continue to change. International experience further indicates that prevention strategies should be matched to local epidemiology and healthcare systems. Adolescent screening should therefore be viewed as an adaptive prevention strategy whose target population, diagnostic pathway, and treatment approach require periodic reassessment. Full article

Background: Adolescence represents a pivotal, yet understudied, developmental window in which maturation of the gut microbiome, neural circuits, endocrine systems, and behavioral processes converge. Although early-life microbiota–gut–brain interactions are well established, emerging evidence demonstrates that adolescence constitutes a “second sensitive period” during which microbial composition, metabolic output, and immune function undergo substantial restructuring. These microbial transitions parallel key neurodevelopmental events, including synaptic pruning, dopaminergic refinement, and heightened neuroendocrine activity, suggesting a coordinated microbiome–gut–brain developmental program. Cross-species comparisons reveal broad alignment between rodent and human adolescent milestones, though inconsistencies in development staging present challenges for translational interpretation. Environmental influences—such as diet, stress, antibiotics, and physical activity—further modulate microbial and neural maturation during this period, with potential long-term consequences for cognition, emotion, and stress responsivity. Mechanistically, microbial metabolites, vagal pathways, immune mediators, and steroid hormone interactions constitute key interfaces linking the gut microbiome to adolescent brain function. Recognizing adolescence as a mechanistically rich and plastic phase of gut–brain co-development underscores the need for harmonized methodological approaches and developmental alignment frameworks. Methods-Results: This review synthesizes ontogenetic, mechanistic, and translational evidence to highlight conserved microbiome–gut–brain pathways and identifies opportunities for targeted interventions during this critical developmental stage. Full article

In seasonally arid systems, where water is a key limiting resource, unseasonal precipitation events may promote landscape greening. Because herbivores track spatial variation in fresh plant growth, dry-season precipitation could be an important catalyst of out-of-season foraging opportunities in seasonal arid environments. The eastern escarpment of California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains in the western United States features an intense ecoclimatic gradient from the Owens Valley’s cold desert to the High Sierra’s alpine tundra, in which patterns of temperature and precipitation vary seasonally and elevationally, and along which critically endangered Sierra Nevada bighorn sheep (“Sierra bighorn”) migrate seasonally. Immediately preceding the unusually warm 2021–2022 winter, the eastern Sierra experienced an historic autumn precipitation event, presenting an opportunity to investigate how unseasonal weather events shape patterns of plant green-up, and whether these conditions stand to impact herbivore space use. Here, we report on landscape greenness, indexed using the green chromatic coordinate, measured from 26,222 images collected by an in situ array of 20 time-lapse cameras deployed across the desert–alpine gradient of the eastern Sierra, over 5 years centered on the 2021–2022 fall-winter season. We compare greenness trends between time windows following rainfall and random timepoints to identify how unseasonal precipitation impacts plant greening using hierarchical linear models with a continuous first-order autocorrelation structure. Greenness trends were significantly more positive after rain than at random timepoints for low-elevation perennial grasses (p < 0.001), indicating that these plants readily uptake moisture regardless of the season. We additionally compare in situ greenness measurements with NDVI derived from satellite instrumentation to examine whether fine-scale patterns of green-up following unseasonal rains are detectable from space. Although in situ camera greenness and satellite NDVI were positively correlated, unseasonal species-specific greening was not detectable at the comparatively coarse scale of satellite analysis. Finally, we use GPS collar data from a population of Sierra bighorn to explore whether migratory behaviors could be associated with unseasonal landscape greening. Together, this work reveals that dry-season precipitation coupled with cold-season warm spells can lead to unseasonal landscape greenness and suggests that this process may facilitate herbivore access to high-quality forage during a normally barren time of year. Full article

Independent battery energy storage systems (BESSs) can contribute to time-of-use arbitrage, ancillary services, capacity value compensation, capacity leasing, and demand response. Their multi-service value, however, depends on how power, energy, state-of-charge (SOC), and service windows are occupied or reserved across services. This paper develops a mechanism-oriented framework linking candidate-service identification, capacity-occupation modelling, revenue-activation assessment, and interpretation-boundary clarification. A 100 MW/200 MWh independent BESS is evaluated using four comparative typical-day portfolios under common technical and economic settings. Arbitrage provides CNY 0.280 million/day in all cases. Cases 2 and 3 reach CNY 0.330 million/day, with the declared midday charging-service capacity reaching 100 MW. In Case 4, a specified 100 MWh demand-response event is included; arbitrage, the midday charging service, capacity value compensation, and demand response generate positive revenue, while frequency regulation and capacity leasing remain at 0 MW. Net daily revenue reaches CNY 0.375 million/day. The results distinguish endogenous capacity-allocation outcomes from exogenous scenario commitments: regulation and leasing are screened by opportunity-cost competition; midday charging is subject to scenario-defined inclusion and timing but an endogenous declared capacity, whereas demand response is specified exogenously. The framework therefore supports transparent interpretation of positive and zero-capacity outcomes without extending station-level evidence to unsupported grid-level benefits. Full article

The quasielastic neutron scattering technique is an indispensable tool for probing microscopic dynamics in condensed matter at the nanoscale. However, the lack of a high-resolution spectrometer has restricted comprehensive studies of dynamics in China. To address this gap, a new time-of-flight neutron backscattering spectrometer, NuBS, is currently under construction at the China Spallation Neutron Source. This review systematically introduces basic principles, instrumental design, and scientific opportunities of NuBS. NuBS is engineered to deliver high energy resolution with a broad dynamic range, based on the moderator pulse structure. Given the wide time window of NuBS, we highlight its research prospects in frontier areas, including energy storage materials and heterogeneous catalysis. NuBS is expected to provide new opportunities for studies of complex molecular dynamics and in situ investigations, significantly elevating the capabilities of the quasielastic neutron scattering community upon its scheduled completion. Full article

Alternative pre-mRNA splicing is a central layer of gene regulation that enables a limited number of genes to generate a far larger and more context-dependent transcriptome and proteome. In cancer, splicing is disrupted by mutations in cis-regulatory sequences, recurrent lesions in spliceosome components, altered abundance or activity of RNA-binding proteins, and changes in transcription, chromatin, RNA modification, metabolism and stress signalling. These alterations are not merely by-products of malignant transformation. They can create oncogenic protein isoforms, eliminate tumour-suppressive products, remodel cellular identity, promote metastasis and drug resistance, and generate tumour-restricted peptides that are visible to the immune system. Large pan-cancer datasets, long-read sequencing, single-cell isoform profiling, proteogenomics and functional perturbation screens are now resolving this complexity at unprecedented scale. In parallel, multiple therapeutic strategies are advancing, including modulators of the SF3B complex, molecular glues that degrade RBM39, inhibitors of protein arginine methyltransferases and splicing kinases, splice-switching oligonucleotides, programmable RNA-targeting systems, and vaccines or T-cell receptors directed against splicing-derived neoantigens. This review integrates the molecular logic of splice-site selection with the cancer-specific mechanisms that perturb it, summarizes representative isoform switches across the hallmarks of cancer, evaluates emerging technologies and clinical biomarkers, and discusses the opportunities and constraints of translating splicing biology into precision oncology. Particular emphasis is placed on tumour specificity, intratumoural heterogeneity, proteomic validation, therapeutic windows and rational combination strategies. Full article

Recursive evidence fusion gives an intrusion detection system temporal memory, but it also gives unreliable windows and erroneous review outcomes a path to influence later diagnoses. Existing drift-handling, open-set, conformal, continual-learning, and human-in-the-loop methods provide useful signals or update classifiers and memories; they do not, by themselves, specify when a post-classification evidential state may be written or replaced. We present RTEF-IDS, a protocol that separates current action, model-evidence admission, reviewed-feedback admission, and history replacement. The protocol retains the history-relative reliability principle from our previous work, instantiates it for singleton-plus-ignorance IDS evidence, and assigns operation-specific credentials. Reviewed windows make no base-state change, mapped-known feedback may be appended, and replacement requires persistent confirmation. On 33,384 frozen windows, 30% retrospective admission excludes 26.3% of held-out-or-misclassified mass while retaining 94.8% of known-correct evidence. Under paired imperfect feedback, retrospective replacement increases one-window future history-state agreement by 0.107 in the primary block and 0.129 in IoT-23 leave-scenario-out replay. Under a past-only rolling-budget gate within externally supplied frozen partitions, the corresponding increments are 0.001 and 0.000, indicating that the tested gate exposes few qualifying replacement opportunities; bounded external short streams show the same opportunity constraint. Independent second review reduces false authorization from 5.66 to 0.124 per 1000 first-stage reviewed windows under independent errors and from 34.27 to 0.181 under five-window correlated errors, with a corresponding increase in review demand and a reduction in admitted corrective feedback. A shared systematic label alias remains unresolved by the tested review arms. These results support explicit, auditable state-mutation control while identifying the causal-opportunity and feedback-provenance conditions under which it operates. Full article

Sepsis-associated acute lung injury (SALI) is characterized by disruption of the alveolar–capillary barrier, uncontrolled inflammation, oxidative stress, and impaired tissue repair. Ferroptosis and cellular senescence have emerged as potentially interacting stress-response programs that may jointly shape the progression of septic lung injury. Ferroptosis promotes epithelial and endothelial damage through iron-dependent lipid peroxidation, glutathione depletion, and impaired GPX4-mediated lipid repair. In parallel, senescence-associated remodeling may contribute to persistent cell-cycle arrest, senescence-associated secretory phenotype (SASP) production, endothelial dysfunction, and defective regenerative capacity. This review summarizes current evidence on the molecular and cellular crosstalk between ferroptosis and cellular senescence in SALI. Candidate regulatory intersections include context-dependent mitochondrial dysfunction, reactive oxygen species accumulation, iron dyshomeostasis, metabolic reprogramming, lysosomal dysfunction, DNA-damage responses, and stress-responsive pathways involving p53, NRF2, ATF4, STAT3, and FOXO1. Direct SALI evidence is currently strongest for ferroptosis-induced senescence-associated remodeling in pulmonary endothelial cells, whereas senescence-associated ferroptosis resistance is supported mainly by non-pulmonary models. Likewise, SASP-mediated paracrine ferroptosis in neighboring pulmonary cells remains insufficiently validated. We therefore propose an evidence-informed, temporally and cell-type-dependent ferroptosis–senescence framework in SALI, in which acute senescence-associated responses may coexist with ferroptotic injury, whereas persistent senescence-associated remodeling may contribute to defective repair and microenvironmental injury amplification. Targeting this axis through ferroptosis inhibition, restoration of endogenous antioxidant defenses, senotherapeutic modulation, and regenerative strategies may offer stage-informed therapeutic opportunities. Further time-resolved and cell-specific studies are required to define causal relationships and clinically actionable therapeutic windows. Full article

The artificial lighting demand of buildings is a controllable sustainability lever, whereas metalized food-packaging waste (i.e., multilayer polymer-aluminum films used for barrier protection) is difficult to recycle and routinely landfilled or incinerated, representing an underexplored circular-economy opportunity. This simulation-based feasibility study connected both objectives by investigating whether metalized snack-packaging waste can function as a daylight-redirecting surface on a faceted interior light shelf. Five configurations were simulated in VELUX Daylight Visualizer 3 using Ankara’s EnergyPlus Weather climate file (39.93° N): a no-shelf baseline (S1), white (ρ = 0.80) and metalized (ρ = 0.80–0.88) flat shelves (S2, S3), and faceted equivalents (S4, S5). None of the five scenarios met the EN 17037:2018 sufficiency threshold (DA300 ≥ 50%); the best configuration, S5 (faceted, metalized), reached DA300 = 40.23%. Within this limitation, S5 outperformed all comparators, averaging 3116 lux (9.6× baseline) and achieving a uniformity ratio of 0.823. Faceted geometry increased illuminance by 1.74–1.78× over an equivalent flat metalized shelf; metalized flat shelves outperformed the white ones by 1.44–1.54×, except in September, when high solar altitude caused a 0.83–0.89× reversal, eliminated by faceting. S5 reduced artificial lighting dependency from 78.42% to 59.77% of occupied hours (~101 kWh/yr, first-year estimate) and nearly halved critical daylighting-deficit hours (49%). However, it exceeded the 2000 lux useful-daylight ceiling in ~55% of occupied hours, indicating that glare mitigation is necessary for deployment. These preliminary results warrant further experimental and life-cycle work before the sustainability benefits of the circular economy pathway can be established. A sensitivity analysis confirms that S5’s daylighting advantage persists, though at reduced magnitude, under both a conservative reflectance assumption (ρ = 0.80) and a more energy-representative window-to-wall ratio (47.5%). Full article

Design studio education requires sustained attention and prolonged occupancy of a shared workspace, making environmental opportunities for brief recovery potentially relevant to students’ well-being. This exploratory study used affordance theory as an interpretive lens to examine the environmental modifications students proposed from their assigned desk positions and the extent to which sketch content was associated with academic year, studio location, and desk-level window view access. The dataset comprised 71 structured sketches, geometric view metrics for 85 workstations that were linked to the 71 sketch participants for inferential analyses, and a nonmatched lighting survey administered to the same cohorts one year later (n = 57). Sketches were coded into 17 modification categories. Water and Collaborative/Social Space were retained descriptively but excluded from inferential interpretation because of quasi-complete separation. Fifteen ordinary logistic regression models were evaluated with Benjamini–Hochberg false-discovery-rate correction, together with a complementary specification omitting studio location. Plants (73.2%), natural shapes/patterns (52.1%), and electric light quality (52.1%) were the most frequent modifications. In the primary models, Technology (q = 0.033) and Plants (q = 0.047) retained FDR-supported omnibus fit; only the academic-year coefficient for Technology retained FDR support (OR = 0.17, 95% CI [0.06, 0.50], q = 0.021). The study identifies environmental preferences and hypotheses for future intervention in restorative learning environments research. Full article

Urban low-altitude bus operations require coordinated eVTOL route decisions under station time windows, dynamic passenger boarding and alighting, load-dependent energy consumption, opportunity charging, and battery safety requirements. We formulate a mixed-integer programming model for reservation-based shared services that lexicographically minimizes the number of deployed aircraft first and total flight distance second while enforcing passenger-capacity, time-window, charging, and battery-safety constraints. To solve large instances efficiently, an Elite-Pool guided Load-Coupled Energy-aware Adaptive Large Neighborhood Search algorithm (EP-LCE-ALNS) is developed by combining forward load-energy-coupled decoding, multi-start construction, elite-route guidance, and adaptive neighborhood search. Benchmark comparisons show that EP-LCE-ALNS consistently achieves strong solution quality across instances of different scales and outperforms the comparison algorithms on large-scale problems. Sensitivity analyses further show that increasing passenger capacity reduces fleet requirements and flight distance, whereas a larger battery safety margin increases both, providing decision support for fleet configuration, route organization, and safety settings. Full article

Persistent atrial fibrillation (AF) is associated with complex structural, electrical, and functional myocardial remodeling that contributes to impaired cardiac performance, symptom burden, and adverse cardiovascular outcomes. Although restoration of sinus rhythm through electrical cardioversion remains a cornerstone of rhythm-control therapy, treatment success is traditionally defined by rhythm maintenance and recurrence rates, while myocardial functional recovery receives substantially less attention. This review aims to summarize current evidence regarding myocardial dysfunction in persistent AF, evaluate available approaches for assessing myocardial recovery after cardioversion, and explore future directions for function-guided rhythm-control strategies. A narrative review of contemporary literature was performed, focusing on studies published in major cardiovascular journals and current international guidelines. Evidence regarding myocardial remodeling, reverse remodeling after restoration of sinus rhythm, echocardiographic assessment, myocardial strain imaging, biomarker dynamics, and post-cardioversion management strategies was synthesized and critically evaluated. Persistent AF induces multidimensional myocardial dysfunction through tachycardia-mediated injury, structural remodeling, neurohormonal activation, inflammation, and fibrosis. Emerging evidence suggests that restoration of sinus rhythm may initiate a process of reverse remodeling characterized by improvements in left ventricular systolic function, global longitudinal strain, atrial mechanical performance, and biomarker profiles. Advanced echocardiographic techniques and serial biomarker assessment provide valuable opportunities to quantify myocardial recovery beyond conventional rhythm-based endpoints. However, current clinical practice and guideline-directed management remain predominantly focused on rhythm outcomes, while functional recovery is not routinely incorporated into therapeutic decision-making. Based on available evidence, a conceptual framework termed the “Post-Cardioversion Functional Window” is proposed to describe a period of potentially enhanced myocardial recovery during which systematic functional assessment may facilitate individualized management and future risk stratification. Myocardial recovery after restoration of sinus rhythm represents an underrecognized component of contemporary AF management. Integration of echocardiographic, biomarker-based, and clinical functional assessment may improve understanding of post-cardioversion remodeling and support the development of personalized rhythm-control strategies. Future prospective studies are needed to validate myocardial recovery endpoints and determine their role in guiding therapeutic decisions after cardioversion. Full article

Fossil human footprints provide direct evidence of past presence and behaviour, yet the processes governing their preservation remain poorly understood. In particular, it remains unclear whether repeated footprint-bearing surfaces reflect population abundance and occupation continuity, or instead arise through environmental and taphonomic filtering. This study addresses the problem using an agent-based model (ABM) of footprint formation and preservation within a dynamic lake-margin environment. The model simulates interactions between human activity, basin morphology, and time-varying hydrological conditions under contrasting climate forcing regimes and occupation structures. Preservation is treated as a probabilistic process occurring when wetting events coincide with sufficient footprint availability, allowing analysis within an environmental–behavioural state space. Results show that the footprint record is highly sensitive to the temporal organisation of climate variability, with different forcing regimes producing distinct preservation architectures even under comparable mean environmental conditions. Basin geometry exerts a fundamental control, with basins that are not too steep or shallow maximising shoreline mobility and preservation potential, while behavioural organisation shapes how footprints are distributed relative to preservation windows. In contrast, population size alone exerts comparatively limited influence. Comparison with artefact accumulation highlights a key contrast: artefacts integrate behaviour across time, whereas footprints are preserved episodically, capturing short-lived snapshots of activity. Footprint-bearing surfaces should therefore not be interpreted as direct proxies for population size or occupation continuity, but as discrete sampling events generated through the intersection of human activity and transient preservation opportunity. More broadly, the model suggests that fossil footprint assemblages are emergent products of coupled behavioural, geomorphic, and environmental systems, providing a framework for more robust interpretation of the human footprint record. Full article