Search Results (8,213)

Background/Objectives: Zoonotic tuberculosis (TB) remains a persistent public health challenge worldwide. It is particularly common in settings with close human–livestock–environment interactions. In Tanzania, progress toward TB control is increasingly threatened by multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB), yet genomic data from regions characterized by pastoralist and mining activities remain scarce. This study employed whole-genome sequencing (WGS) to characterize M. tuberculosis complex (MTBC) strains circulating among human and cattle populations in the Manyara region of northern Tanzania, with a focus on resistance-associated mutations and phylogenetic relationships. Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted between September 2024 and February 2025. A total of 178 presumptive human TB cases provided sputum samples. From cattle, 161 samples were collected (110 milk samples and 51 lymph node aspirates), with each animal contributing only one type of sample. Specimen were analyzed using GeneXpert MTB/RIF, Lowenstein–Jensen culture, and WGS. Phylogenetic reconstruction was performed using SNP-based methods and IQ-TREE2 version 2.2.0. Results: Among human participants, 14 (7.8%) sputum samples were GeneXpert positive and were confirmed as members of MTBC by LJ culture. In cattle, one (0.62%) lymph node aspirate was positive for MTBC. Significant predictors of MTBC positivity included previous TB history, weight loss, and occupation involving mining and cattle keeping. WGS of five human isolates identified Lineages 1, 3, and 4. One isolate (Sample 98) harbored mutations associated with XDR-TB. Conclusions: WGS revealed M. tuberculosis Lineages 1, 3 and 4 circulating in the Manyara region, with diverse genetic mutations conferring with resistance to first- and second-line anti-TB drugs. These findings highlight the importance of integrated genomic surveillance to monitor drug resistance patterns in Tanzania and similar settings across human and animal populations. Full article

Population aging has increased the need for continuous, non-invasive, and context-aware monitoring systems capable of supporting autonomy, safety, and early intervention in daily living environments. Multimodal biometric sensing offers an important technical basis for this purpose, as it combines physiological, motion-related, and environmental signals to provide a more complete view of older adults’ functional and health-related conditions. However, many existing solutions remain fragmented, device-dependent, and insufficiently connected to core instrumentation requirements, including signal quality, sensor calibration, temporal synchronization, latency, energy consumption, interoperability, reliability, and data privacy. This article proposes an Edge-AI instrumentation framework for multimodal biometric sensing in active aging environments, supported by a structured analysis of recent literature on wearable, ambient, and context-aware sensing systems. The framework integrates wearable, ambient, and context-aware sensors with local processing capabilities to support signal acquisition, preprocessing, quality control, feature extraction, anomaly detection, and decision support close to the data source. By placing Edge AI within the instrumentation pipeline, the proposed framework identifies design requirements that may help reduce response time, limit unnecessary transmission of sensitive biometric data, and improve feasibility in home-based and assisted-living contexts. These expected benefits, however, require empirical testing through future prototype implementation and real-world evaluation. The article also defines a validation-oriented perspective for sensor-based active aging systems, covering technical, operational, and human-centered dimensions such as measurement accuracy, signal robustness, usability, privacy preservation, interoperability, reproducibility, energy efficiency, and system scalability. The proposed framework is intended to support the design, comparison, and validation of more reliable, interpretable, and reproducible sensor-based monitoring systems, while offering a structured basis for prototype development and future real-world evaluation in active aging environments. Full article

Point-of-care and near-patient diagnostics can shorten the time between testing and clinical or public-health action, but a technically effective test does not by itself create a sustainable diagnostic service. Evidence from diagnostic-access research, digitally connected point-of-care testing, human-centered design, and implementation science indicates that diagnostic technologies must be developed as components of wider service systems encompassing workflows, quality assurance, data governance, maintenance, supply chains, user trust, and linkage to care. Drawing on these bodies of literature, this Perspective introduces the I2Med digital infrastructure framework for point-of-care diagnostics in low-resource and infrastructure-constrained settings. These settings are defined functionally as clinical or public-health environments in which resource or infrastructure constraints can disrupt one or more stages between testing and appropriate action. The I2Med framework integrates six domains: (1) access and context of use; (2) the result-to-action diagnostic workflow; (3) digital interfaces and data governance; (4) quality, risk, usability, and design-control alignment; (5) sustainability, maintenance, and supply continuity; and (6) equity, trust, and community accountability. Operational tools—including a setting typology, a domain-to-artifact matrix, an evidence-to-scale maturity ladder, and a hypothetical application vignette—illustrate how the framework can guide development and implementation planning. The I2Med framework’s central contribution is to reposition the diagnostic device as one component of an interconnected service system and to provide academic, translational, and early-stage development teams with a common structure for identifying implementation dependencies, evidence gaps, and responsibilities. As a conceptual framework, it requires prospective application and evaluation across diverse settings before its utility and transferability can be established. Full article

Background: The global spread of antimicrobial resistance in Escherichia coli (E. coli) from food-producing animals is a critical concern within the One Health framework, particularly because of the potential transmission of clinically relevant resistance determinants across the animal–environment–human interface. Although extended-spectrum β-lactamase (ESBL)-producing E. coli strains have been widely characterized, the genomic mechanisms underlying resistance to the last-resort and critically important antimicrobials colistin and fluoroquinolones remain incompletely understood in animal-associated populations. This study characterized these resistance mechanisms in multidrug-resistant (MDR) E. coli from diseased food-producing animals. Methods: We used whole-genome sequencing (WGS) to characterize 77 MDR E. coli isolates from diseased livestock and poultry in Taiwan and analyzed the underlying resistance mechanisms and their co-occurrence. Results: Plasmid-mediated colistin resistance genes, including mcr-1.1, mcr-3.1, and mcr-3.5, were identified alongside chromosomal mutations, such as pmrB substitutions, indicating multiple evolutionary pathways to colistin resistance. Fluoroquinolone resistance was driven by both chromosomal mutations in quinolone resistance-determining regions and plasmid-mediated quinolone resistance genes, including qnr variants and aac(6′)-Ib-cr. Notably, the frequent co-occurrence of resistance determinants targeting multiple antimicrobial classes suggests the presence of mobile genetic elements facilitating horizontal gene transfer. Conclusions: Although a subset of isolates overlapped with those reported in our previous ESBL-focused study, the present work presents a comprehensive genomic dissection of resistance mechanisms beyond β-lactamases. The convergence of colistin, fluoroquinolone, and ESBL-associated resistance determinants within individual isolates highlights the potential role of food-producing animals as reservoirs of multidrug resistance, with potential implications for cross-sectoral transmission. These findings underscore the importance of integrated surveillance strategies addressing potential zoonotic transmission under the One Health framework. Full article

This article presents a systematic review of Internet of Things technology applications across the entire lifecycle of prefabricated buildings. By combining bibliometric analysis with qualitative research methods, seven key research topics in this field are identified and analyzed: integrated information management platforms, position tracking, quality checking and management, project management and cost control, carbon emissions monitoring, indoor environment monitoring, and data security and information encryption. The current research status and challenges pertaining to each of these topics are critically assessed with emphasis on the main challenges in terms of automation level and accuracy, system integration and data interoperability, and deployment economy and robustness. The findings reveal that current IoT applications in prefabricated buildings are mainly focused on data collection, data visualization, and status monitoring, and future research should further strengthen the integration of IoT with AI, big data, and other technologies to promote predictive analysis, intelligent optimization, and autonomous decision-making. Three key topics are subsequently discussed from a management perspective: collaborative carbon information flow management, human-centered health and safety management, and finally, smart operation, maintenance, and disassembly driven by a circular economy, and directions are proposed for their future integration and innovation with emerging technologies. This study provides directional recommendations and references for researchers and practitioners in related fields. The review further suggests that the future development of IoT-enabled prefabricated buildings requires not only technological breakthroughs but also the collaborative evolution of digital technologies, construction practices, and industrial systems, supported by effective management mechanisms, industry collaboration, and practical implementation strategies. Full article

Artificial light at night (ALAN) alters natural nocturnal environments and affects ecosystems, human health, and night sky visibility, while cloud cover strongly modulates night sky brightness (NSB) by enhancing or attenuating skyglow. This study investigated the relationship between cloudiness and NSB at three locations in southern Poland representing contrasting light environments: urban Kraków, high-altitude Kasprowy Wierch, and rural Chochołów. Cloudiness was quantified using a custom binary image-processing method applied to monochrome all-sky camera images acquired under automatic exposure conditions. The procedure included exposure-time normalisation, dual-threshold segmentation with hysteresis, and site-specific histogram-based classification. Cloud-cover time series were synchronised with continuous SQM-LU night sky brightness measurements collected during moonless astronomical nights. An independent comparison was performed using a Hukseflux NR01 net radiometer and a radiative cloudiness proxy derived from surface–sky temperature differences. Increasing cloudiness was associated with brighter night skies at all sites, with the strongest effect observed in Kraków ($r=-0.97$; slope ≈−2.8 mag/arcsec²), a weaker response at Kasprowy Wierch ($r=-0.77$; slope $\approx -0.4$ mag/arcsec²), and a moderate relationship in Chochołów ($r=-0.48$; slope $\approx -0.7$ mag/arcsec²). Camera-derived cloudiness showed moderate agreement with the radiometric cloudiness proxy (robust $R^2=0.56$, $r_s=-0.79$). The proposed method proved practically useful across diverse lighting conditions, demonstrating its usefulness for long-term light pollution studies based on monochrome all-sky imagery. Full article

Physical literacy has become influential across education, sport, health, and recreation. Yet the field contains multiple definitions and distinct traditions rather than a single agreed position. One especially influential strand is the Whiteheadian account, the philosophically oriented tradition associated with the British philosopher and physical educationalist Margaret Whitehead and extended through allied writers and institutional work. Whitehead did not invent the term physical literacy, which has a longer history, but she provided its most influential contemporary philosophical reconstruction and helped shape its current international meaning. The Whiteheadian account has been important because it rejects narrow mind–body separation and offers a holistic, lifespan-oriented account of movement, meaning, and human flourishing. The argument advanced here is that the Whiteheadian account is non-dualist in declaration but not always in operation. Its explicit commitment to monism and lived embodiment is not always matched by its practical grammar, in which bodily competence, bodily participation, and visible movement often carry more pedagogical and evaluative weight than minded engagement as a process of learning. Radical embodied cognitive science, especially radical enactivism, offers additional conceptual resources for developing a more explicitly relational account of learning and physical literacy because it begins with situated organism–environment engagement rather than with the later integration of bodily and mental domains. The article concludes by proposing a more relational, process-oriented, and pedagogically robust understanding of physical literacy. Full article

Aeromonas species are among the most important Gram-negative pathogens in aquaculture and represent a One Health concern, as antibiotic-resistant strains circulate at the interface between ornamental fish, the aquatic environment and humans. This study evaluated the in vitro antibacterial activity of four commercial essential oils from tea tree (Melaleuca alternifolia), peppermint (Mentha piperita), rosemary (Rosmarinus officinalis) and lavandin (Lavandula hybrida) against sixteen oxytetracycline-resistant Aeromonas hydrophila and A. veronii isolated from moribund ornamental fish. All tested bacteria were resistant to oxytetracycline (MIC 8–16 µg/mL). Minimum inhibitory (MIC) and minimum bactericidal (MBC) concentrations were determined by broth microdilution. All EOs inhibited every isolate, but their bactericidal capacity differed markedly. Rosemary oil showed the lowest MIC and MBC ranks and the most consistent values, followed by tea tree and lavandin; all three were bactericidal. Peppermint oil, despite a low MIC, showed a high MBC and was bacteriostatic. These findings indicate that the EOs of rosemary, tea tree and lavandin are promising in vitro candidates for use against oxytetracycline-resistant Aeromonas in aquaculture, in line with the One Health approach, and warrant further evaluation. Full article

The rapid growth in plastic production and consumption has led to the widespread contamination of the environment with microplastics (MPs), raising increasing concerns about their potential impacts on human health. In recent years, advances in analytical techniques have revealed the presence of MPs in a wide range of human biological samples, suggesting that these particles can enter, circulate within, and accumulate throughout the human body. This narrative review provides a comprehensive overview of the current evidence on the occurrence and distribution of MPs in human tissues, organs, and biological fluids. MPs have been detected in blood, urine, stool, semen, breast milk, amniotic fluid, ocular fluids, and lavage fluids, as well as in several organs and tissues including the lungs, placenta, heart, kidneys, liver, vascular tissues, and reproductive organs. Among the identified polymers, polyethylene (PE), polypropylene (PP), polyethylene terephthalate (PET), polystyrene (PS), and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) are reported most frequently. This narrative review also summarizes the major analytical techniques used for MP detection and characterization, including Raman spectroscopy, μ-FTIR, LDIR spectroscopy, and Py-GC/MS, which highlight their advantages and limitations. Collectively, the available evidence demonstrates that MPs are not confined to the external environment but are now detectable in multiple compartments of the human body, including highly protected biological systems. However, important questions remain regarding their long-term persistence, transport mechanisms, biological fate, and potential health effects. Further methodological standardization and large-scale human studies are needed to better understand the extent of human exposure and the implications of MP accumulation for human health. Full article

Fertilised cropland systems are the dominant source of reactive nitrogen losses in the global environment, contributing most anthropogenic nitrous oxide emissions and driving agricultural nitrogen surplus to nearly three times the safe planetary boundary for nitrogen. This review advances a nitrogen-centred analytical framework that positions cropland nitrogen management as a greenhouse gas mitigation imperative, a planetary boundary challenge, and a cross-cutting lever for integrated Sustainable Development Goal progress. Unlike prior reviews that treat nitrous oxide emissions, nitrogen use efficiency, or Sustainable Development Goal linkages as separate concerns, this framework demonstrates that reducing reactive nitrogen losses from fertilised cropland is the single intervention space most likely to generate co-benefits across food security, clean water, climate action, life on land, and partnership goals, while helping restore the transgressed nitrogen boundary. The nitrogen cascade from fertilised croplands and associated livestock manure generates sequential damages across climate, water quality, human health, and terrestrial biodiversity that are mapped against their goal implications. Mitigation strategies including precision nitrogen management, nitrification inhibitors, biochar amendment, agroforestry, circular manure management, and emerging bio-technical innovations are evaluated against their co-benefits, adoption constraints, and potential to shift losses toward other nitrogen species. A financing gap of over one trillion dollars annually and the absence of binding global nitrogen governance are identified as the primary barriers to integrated action. Spatially explicit nitrogen redistribution and nitrogen use efficiency improvement are presented as design principles capable of reconciling planetary boundary recovery with food security equity across nitrogen surplus and nitrogen-deficit regions. Full article

Currently, emerging pharmaceutical contaminants (EPCs) pose a significant risk to aquatic biodiversity on both a global and regional scale. Their accumulation in the environment presents several challenges to both human health and ecological integrity. Among EPCs, cyclophosphamide (COP), a widely used alkylating cytotoxic and immunosuppressive drug in human and veterinary oncology, has become one of the most frequently detected environmental contaminants. It has been reported to impair the immune system, induce oxidative stress, and exhibit genotoxic and cytotoxic effects in various fish species. However, limited research has evaluated its toxicity in the Siamese fighting fish (Betta splendens), an endemic significant aquatic species in Thailand. This study evaluated the acute toxicity of COP in Betta splendens by assessing systemic oxidative stress responses, alterations in gene expression, and localized histopathological changes within both hepatic and renal tissues. The 96 h of median lethal concentration (LC₅₀) value for COP in Betta splendens was determined to be 793.4 mg/L. High-concentration exposure (800 mg/L) induced severe systemic oxidative stress, evidenced by a significant reduction in superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity and a marked elevation in malondialdehyde (MDA) levels across both liver and kidney. At the transcriptomic level, acute COP exposure significantly upregulated pro-inflammatory (interleukin-1β, IL-1β and tumor necrosis factor, TNF-α), cellular stress (heat shock protein 70, HSP70), and apoptotic (caspase-3, Casp3) genes. Semi-quantitative histopathological evaluation revealed severe concentration-dependent structural damage. Hepatic lesions peaked at 800 mg/L characterized by diffuse vacuolation, vascular congestion, and extensive necrosis. Similarly, severe renal damage occurred at 800 mg/L, featuring marked vascular congestion, melanomacrophage aggregation, and widespread tubular necrosis. Overall, these findings demonstrate that acute waterborne COP exposure induces severe hepatotoxicity and nephrotoxicity in Betta splendens driven by oxidative stress, pro-inflammatory signaling, and apoptotic pathways. This study provides essential baseline toxicity thresholds and highlights the physiological risks COP spills pose to tropical freshwater labyrinth fish. Full article

Rapid and reliable crack-based visual damage detection after earthquakes is crucial for safe and effective disaster response. Manual inspections are often slow and hazardous for engineers in unstable structures. This study proposes a quadrupedal robotic inspection system for rapid post-earthquake crack-based visual damage detection in reinforced concrete structures. A Unitree Go2 robot equipped with an Intel RealSense D435i RGB-D camera collected a dataset of 3255 annotated crack images from both field and public sources. The YOLOv8n model, trained and deployed on an NVIDIA Jetson AGX Xavier, demonstrated high detection performance in laboratory tests on reinforced concrete specimens, with precision, recall, and mAP@50 values all exceeding 85%. The system provides fast, accurate, and automated structural health assessments, reducing human risk and improving inspection efficiency in hazardous post-disaster environments. Future work will focus on expanding damage detection capabilities and real-world deployment. Full article

Crimean–Congo hemorrhagic fever (CCHF) is a severe tick-borne zoonotic disease associated with high case fatality rates in humans and represents a significant public health threat in endemic areas of Kosovo. However, data on viral circulation in ticks in non-endemic regions remain limited. CCHF is caused by Orthonairovirus haemorrhagiae, formerly known as the Crimean–Congo hemorrhagic fever virus (CCHFV). In the present study, 745 ticks were collected from domestic animals and the environment throughout the years 2017–2019 in seven locations of non-endemic regions in the eastern part of Kosovo, respectively Prishtina, Gjilan and Kamenica municipalities. The ticks after species identification were analyzed using RT-PCR for detection of viral RNA of CCHFV. Seven ticks (0.94%) tested positive, including six Rhipicephalus bursa ticks, three of them collected from grazing cattle and sheep in the village Hajvali (Prishtina municipality) and three others in the village Busavat (Kamenica municipality) from grazing cattle, while one positive sample was detected in a Hyalomma marginatum tick collected from a grazing dairy cow in Bresalc village (Gjilan municipality). The virus detected in Rh. bursa is considered to be consistent with the Aigia virus, formerly classified as CCHFV Clade VI/Europe 2 or the AP92-like lineage, which has generally been associated with a lower pathogenic potential and the absence of reported human cases in these areas. The first reported human CCHF case in a non-endemic area occurred in the Bresalc locality (Gjilan Municipality) in June 2018 in a dairy farmer. This occurrence coincided with the detection of Orthonairovirus haemorrhagiae RNA in one Hyalomma marginatum tick among 36 sampled ticks collected from the same farm, following clinical and laboratory confirmation of CCHF in infected patients. Consequently, this finding indicated the circulation of CCHFV in this area. These results demonstrated active circulation of CCHFV in tick populations in regions previously considered non-endemic and highlighted a potential public health risk associated with pathogenic strains. Genomic and tick surveillance, combined with targeted vector control measures and public awareness, are essential for reducing CCHFV transmission and preventing human infections. Full article

Personal protective equipment, workspaces and safety systems are engineered around assumptions about the bodies and behaviour of their users. In the maritime workforce those assumptions have historically been male: women make up fewer than two per cent of the world’s 1.9 million seafarers, and the shipboard environment they work in, including its protective equipment, machinery, accommodation and emergency systems, was overwhelmingly designed for a male population. This paper treats the resulting disadvantages as an applied human-factors and occupational-safety problem, asking how a male-default design baseline translates into measurable safety, health and equipment gaps, and how engineering methods can close them. Following the PRISMA 2020 guideline, we searched Scopus, Web of Science and PubMed, screened 516 records, and synthesised 50 sources. Five engineering-relevant clusters emerged: (i) protective equipment sized to male anthropometry; (ii) workspace and accommodation design that embeds gendered reach, force and privacy penalties; (iii) a high and persistent burden of harassment, bullying and sexual misconduct, with reported prevalence exceeding 50 per cent among women; (iv) under-addressed occupational and reproductive-health exposures; and (v) weak, non-anonymous reporting and redress systems. Across clusters the evidence is dominated by qualitative and survey research with heterogeneous, non-standardised definitions and almost no engineering-grade quantification of risk. We argue that several of these gaps are tractable design problems, namely anthropometry-driven protective-equipment specification, inclusive ergonomic standards in equipment and safety-system design, and tamper-evident digital reporting tools, and we set out a structured, engineering-oriented research agenda. Framed as an applied human-factors and safety-engineering question rather than solely a policy concern, accommodating the full user population emerges as a precondition for a safe, inclusive and resilient workforce. Full article

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a major One Health challenge driven by antimicrobial misuse in human medicine, veterinary practice, animal production, and polluted environments. Migratory birds move among wetlands, farms, wastewater-affected habitats, landfills, and coastal ecosystems and may acquire and redistribute antimicrobial-resistant bacteria (ARB) and antimicrobial resistance genes (ARGs) across ecological and political boundaries. This perspective synthesizes evidence on exposure sources, bacterial reservoirs, resistance determinants, cross-species interfaces, and surveillance priorities while explicitly distinguishing four claims: detection or carriage, persistence in individual birds, redistribution along migratory routes, and onward transmission to recipient hosts or environments. Published studies report multidrug-resistant Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Salmonella spp., Enterococcus spp., and Campylobacter spp., with determinants including blaCTX-M, blaTEM, blaNDM, mcr, tet, sul, and qnr genes. The eight evidence groups summarized here constitute an illustrative, non-comprehensive selection; they are predominantly observational surveys or screenings, and none reconstructs a complete source–bird–destination–recipient transmission chain. Taxon-specific ecology modifies exposure: gulls and storks frequently exploit refuse and wastewater, waterfowl and shorebirds connect aquatic habitats, whereas passerines often reflect more local point-source contamination. Current evidence therefore supports migratory birds primarily as mobile sentinels and opportunistic carriers of anthropogenic AMR, while acknowledging possible natural or ancestral resistance in avian-associated microbiota. Future surveillance should combine longitudinal sampling, baseline cohorts such as pre-migratory nestlings, paired bird–water–soil–sediment sampling, whole-genome sequencing, plasmid profiling, telemetry, environmental DNA, wastewater-based epidemiology, and interoperable veterinary reporting. Practical mitigation requires antimicrobial stewardship, wastewater and landfill control, farm biosecurity, and coordinated veterinary, environmental, and public-health action. Full article