Search Results (167)

See-through augmented reality glasses, such as HoloLens 2, are increasingly adopted in medical settings; however, their efficacy as medical display devices remains unclear, as current evaluation protocols are designed for traditional monitors. This study examined whether the established display-evaluation techniques apply to HoloLens 2 and whether it meets standards for primary and secondary medical displays. HoloLens 2 was assessed for overall image quality, luminance, grayscale consistency, and color uniformity. Five participants rated the TG18-OIQ pattern under ambient lighting conditions of 2.4 and 138.7 lx. Minimum and maximum luminance were measured using the TG18-LN12-03 and -18 patterns, targeting ≥ 300 cd/m² and a luminance ratio ≥ 250. Grayscale conformity to the standard grayscale display function allowed deviations of 10% for primary and 20% for secondary displays. Color uniformity was measured at five screen positions for red, green, and blue, with a chromaticity limit of 0.01 for primary displays. HoloLens 2 satisfied four of the ten primary and four of the seven secondary overall-quality criteria, achieving a maximum luminance of 2366 cd/m² and a luminance ratio of 1478.75. Grayscale uniformity was within tolerance for 10 of the 15 primary and 13 of the 15 secondary measurements, while 25 of the 30 color uniformity values exceeded the threshold. The adapted evaluation methods facilitate a systematic assessment of HoloLens 2 as a medical display. Owing to inadequate grayscale and color representation, the headset is unsuitable as a primary diagnostic display; for secondary use, requirements must be assessed based on specific application requirements. Full article

Air pollution is one of the main problems facing humanity today. Megacities and large urban areas are pollution hotspots. Measuring pollutants and recording these measurements is key to developing effective strategies to reduce the pollution levels to which people are exposed. However, air quality monitoring presents significant challenges (e.g., investment costs, maintenance), which can lead to limited monitoring equipment. Despite this, Chile has an extensive air quality monitoring network, known as the National Air Quality Information System (SINCA in Spanish). This network has more than 200 monitoring stations that measure, record, and display information on pollution levels in different locations in Chile. In this study, all the information available from the SINCA network was systematized to evaluate the completeness of the records and the current trends of several pollutants in Chile. The main results show that most measurements focus on particulate matter and sulfur dioxide concentrations, and many of the measurement stations are located in the central part of the country (32° S–38° S). However, by splitting the data into five macrozones, one can see the regional air quality characteristics and changes. Furthermore, there are significant data gaps at some monitoring stations, which makes it difficult to elaborate a robust analysis. Regarding pollution levels, a significant decrease is observed for the peak Particulate Matter (PM_2.5) concentrations, with decreases of nearly 40% compared to concentrations at the beginning of the 2000s. This is consistent with the concentration trends, which show negative trends in most cases. Full article

The presented article is focused on presenting the methodology for design and content creation for presentation purposes using see-through displays which show digital information on transparent surfaces in combination with real objects. The main part of this article identifies the sequence of design and content creation for presentation purposes in the educational process, which is graphically interpreted with the addition of verbal descriptions. The described methodology is focused on the creation of digital content that will be optimally integrated into the real environment to enhance the efficiency of communication and interactivity within educational processes. The methodology also identifies options for selecting suitable technologies to ensure the creation of a visually appropriate and functional digital presentation through see-through displays. The PTC Creo Parametric program was used to create animations for the assembly of components, and the SharpDevelop integrated development environment was used to design the user interface for the visualization itself. The created methodology is also verified in a pilot case study, which focuses on the presentation of a model of a sample assembly for educational purposes. Full article

In this paper, we compare the determinants of CO₂ emissions: GDP per capita, energy production from renewable sources (EPREN), secondary school enrollment (SI) and urbanization (URB) for three groups of countries: SEE (South-Eastern European), Nordic, and Baltic countries during 1990–2022 by means of panel ARDL. The long-term analysis indicates that in SEE countries, URB significantly reduces CO₂ emissions (4.54%). In contrast, GDP (0.46%) and SI (0.54%) slightly increase CO₂ emissions. In the case of Baltic countries, GDP positively correlates with CO₂ (1.65%), while URB (29.27%), EPREN (0.03%), and SI (6.22%) negatively correlate with CO₂. In the case of Nordic countries, GDP (0.59%), EPREN (0.14%), and URB (18.02%) negatively impact CO₂ emissions. Regarding the Error Correction Term (ECT) dimension, the Nordic countries exhibit the fastest adjustment to shocks (−0.67), succeeded by the SEE countries (−0.44), while the Baltic countries display the slowest response (−0.27). This sequence indicates varying degrees of efficiency and speed at which each region can address fluctuations impacting CO₂ emissions. These differences may reflect variations in policy execution, infrastructure adaptability, and the general development of environmental governance across the three regions. Our research contributes by offering a comparative, region-specific econometric analysis of the long-run and short-run dynamics of CO₂ emissions in European subregions, revealing the nuanced roles of education, urbanization, and RES in shaping environmental outcomes and providing empirical evidence to inform targeted climate and development policies. Full article

This paper investigates the categorization of mammogram images into benign, malignant and normal categories, providing novel approaches based on Deep Convolutional Neural Networks to the early identification and classification of breast lesions. Multiple DCNN models were tested to see how well deep learning worked for difficult, multi-class categorization problems. These models were trained on pre-processed datasets with optimized hyperparameters (e.g., the batch size, learning rate, and dropout) which increased the precision of classification. Evaluation measures like confusion matrices, accuracy, and loss demonstrated their great classification efficiency with low overfitting and the validation results well aligned with the training. DenseNet-201 and MobileNet-V3 Large displayed significant generalization skills, whilst EfficientNetV2-B3 and NASNet Mobile struck the optimum mix of accuracy and efficiency, making them suitable for practical applications. The use of data augmentation also improved the management of data imbalances, resulting in more accurate large-scale detection. Unlike prior approaches, the combination of the architectures, pre-processing approaches, and data augmentation improved the system’s accuracy, indicating that these models are suitable for medical imaging tasks that require transfer learning. The results have shown precise and accurate classifications in terms of dealing with class imbalances and dataset poor quality. In particular, we have not defined a new framework for computer-aided diagnosis here, but we have reviewed a variety of promising solutions for future developments in this field. Full article

Road safety signboards are now difficult to see due to pollution and harsh weather elements such as snow and fog, which has resulted in more accidents. The problem is especially common in Western countries where snow can block these critical signs. An approach addressing this issue involves a system that uses Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) and Internet of Things (IoT). The real-time alerts that this system sends to drivers improve driver safety in complex environments. For this purpose, an RFID reader is placed in the vehicle, and passive RFID tags are attached to road safety signboards. The reader picks up the signal as a vehicle comes within range, and the warning for the vehicle is sent to the driver. It helps to reduce the number of accidents resulting from poor visibility. In addition, because its multi-lingual audio alerts the drive through speakers and visual warnings displayed on a display screen, the system is accessible to drivers from various regions. To make the system more sustainable, we added some solar panels to the system to cut costs as far as energy efficiency is concerned. The system combines GPS and GSM modules to provide the vehicle position in real time in the cloud. It gives better warnings and helps avoid accidents. In addition to improving road safety, the system offers support for the environment, by limiting emissions and waste of resources caused by accidents. Traffic patterns can thus be studied with the data, creating more efficient and ecofriendly transportation systems. This solution enables a smarter vehicle network that is safer and more sustainable with quick, accurate alerts. Full article

Background/Objectives: Codon usage bias affects gene expression and translation efficiency across species. The effective number of codons (ENC) and GC content influence codon preference, often displaying unimodal or bimodal distributions. This study investigates the correlation between ENC and GC rankings across species and how their relationship affects codon usage distributions. Methods: I analyzed nuclear-encoded genes from 17 species representing six kingdoms: one bacteria (Escherichia coli), three fungi (Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Neurospora crassa, and Schizosaccharomyces pombe), one archaea (Methanococcus aeolicus), three protists (Rickettsia hoogstraalii, Dictyostelium discoideum, and Plasmodium falciparum),), three plants (Musa acuminata, Oryza sativa, and Arabidopsis thaliana), and six animals (Anopheles gambiae, Apis mellifera, Polistes canadensis, Mus musculus, Homo sapiens, and Takifugu rubripes). Genes in all 17 species were ranked by GC content and ENC, and correlations were assessed. I examined how adding or subtracting these rankings influenced their overall distribution in a new method that I call Two-Rank Order Normalization or TRON. The equation, TRON = SUM(ABS((GC rank₁:GC rank_N) − (ENC rank₁:ENC rank_N))/(N²/3), where (GC rank₁:GC rank_N) is a rank-order series of GC rank, (ENC rank₁:ENC rank_N) is a rank-order series ENC rank, sorted by the rank-order series GC rank. The denominator of TRON, N²/3, is the normalization factor because it is the expected value of the sum of the absolute value of GC rank–ENC rank for all genes if GC rank and ENC rank are not correlated. Results: ENC and GC rankings are positively correlated (i.e., ENC increases as GC increases) in AT-rich species such as honeybees (R² = 0.60, slope = 0.78) and wasps (R² = 0.52, slope = 0.72) and negatively correlated (i.e., ENC decreases as GC increases) in GC-rich species such as humans (R² = 0.38, slope = −0.61) and rice (R² = 0.59, slope = −0.77). Second, the GC rank–ENC rank distributions change from unimodal to bimodal as GC content increases in the 17 species. Third, the GC rank+ENC rank distributions change from bimodal to unimodal as GC content increases in the 17 species. Fourth, the slopes of the correlations (GC versus ENC) in all 17 species are negatively correlated with TRON (R² = 0.98) (see Graphic Abstract). Conclusions: The correlation between ENC rank and GC rank differs among species, shaping codon usage distributions in opposite ways depending on whether a species’ nuclear-encoded genes are AT-rich or GC-rich. Understanding these patterns might provide insights into translation efficiency, epigenetics mediated by CpG DNA methylation, epitranscriptomics of RNA modifications, RNA secondary structures, evolutionary pressures, and potential applications in genetic engineering and biotechnology. Full article

In 2023, the EU set the target to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 55% until 2030 compared to 1990. The European Transport Policy sees battery–electric vehicles as a key technology to decarbonize the transport sector, so governments support the adoption through dedicated funding programs. Battery–electric trucks hold great potential to decarbonize the transport sector, especially for high-impact, heavy-duty trucks. Theoretical life-cycle assessments (LCA) predict a lower CO₂e emission impact from battery–electric trucks compared to conventional diesel trucks. Yet, one concern repeatedly mentioned by potential users is the doubt about the ecological advantage of battery–electric vehicles. This is rooted in the problem of a much higher CO₂e impact of the lithium-ion batteries production process. As heavy-duty trucks have a much larger battery, the hypothec in the construction phase of the vehicle is significantly higher, which must be regained during the use phase. Although theoretical assessments exist, CO₂e evaluations using real-world application data are almost nonexistent, as the technology is at the very start of the adoption curve. Exemplary is the fact that there were only 72 registered battery–electric heavy-duty tractor trucks throughout the whole of Germany at the start of 2023. This paper aims to deliver one of the first real-world quantifications using operational data for the actual reduction impact of battery–electric heavy-duty trucks compared to diesel trucks. This study uses the methodology of the life-cycle assessment approach according to ISO 14040/14044 to gain a systematic and holistic technology comparison. For this LCA, the system boundaries are considered from cradle to cradle. This includes the production of raw materials and energy, the manufacturing of the trucks, the use phase, and the recycling afterward. The research objects of this study are battery–electric and diesel Volvo FM trucks, which have been in use by the German freight company Nord-Spedition GmbH since May 2023. The GREET^® database is used to assess the emission impact of the material production and manufacturing process. The Volvo tractor trucks resemble a critical case, as the vehicles have a battery size of 540 kWh—around 11 times larger than a usual passenger car. The operation data is directly provided by the logistics company to observe fuel/electricity consumption. Other factors are assessed through company interviews as well as a wide literature research. Finally, a large question mark concerning total emissions lies in the cradle-to-cradle capabilities of large-scale lithium-ion batteries and the electricity grid mix. Different scenarios are being considered to assess potential disposal or recycling paths as well as different electricity grid developments and their impact on the overall balance. The findings estimate the total emissions reduction potential to range between 34% and 69%, varying with assumptions on the electricity grid transition and recycling opportunities. This study displays one of the first successful early-stage integrations of battery–electric heavy-duty trucks into the daily operation of a freight company and can be used to showcase the ecological advantage of the technology. Full article

This article argues that a focus on the day excursion as a particular form of journey, with its inherent limits in relation to scale, distance, and duration, enables us to bring recent critical thinking on microtravel as a form with “foundations in the depth or intensity of description” into dialogue with scholarship that has given sustained attention to modes of descriptive practice that were specific to eighteenth-century British literature and the narrative representation of interior domestic space. The three English travellers under consideration are John Loveday (1711–1789), Dorothy Richardson (1748–1819), and Caroline Lybbe Powys (1738–1817). All made numerous home tour journeys of different kinds but never published their records of their travelling in their lifetimes. All displayed sustained interest in interior description, whether that was for the purpose of antiquarian research, as was the case with Loveday, and to some extent, Richardson, or as a means of collecting, arranging, and performing domestic aesthetic sensibility, as in the writing of both Richardson and Powys. The small local journeys analysed here speak of privileged leisure: the accounts offer experimentation in the narration of journeys made within limits, but those limits are rarely of opportunity. Yet these young travellers still negotiate authority: in the practice of day excursioning, and in writing up those experiences, we see each traveller utilising this compact form to find opportunities for self-assertion, employing the formulaic structures of antiquarian record and country house catalogue in order to articulate an independent curatorial voice. Full article

Each year, the Department of Entomology at Virginia Tech hosts an entomology-themed outreach event known as Hokie BugFest. This on-campus, festival-sized experience aims to educate the public about insects and other arthropods through hands-on activities, games, displays, and live arthropods. In 2021, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Hokie BugFest and similar large public events were cancelled. In response, the department launched Hokie BugFest on the Go, which offered smaller-scale, in-person learning opportunities during these closures. Instead of hosting the community on campus, Virginia Tech’s Department of Entomology brought live arthropods, university experts, and the exciting science of entomology directly into schools, fostering small-group, hands-on learning experiences. In 2022, a playful assessment was added to the traveling outreach program to measure changes in student attitudes and perceptions of insects and other arthropods before and after the program. The assessment also gauged students’ favorite arthropods after seeing, and in some cases handling, them live during the program. Assessment results revealed valuable insights into how hands-on, applied learning experiences can shift children’s attitudes toward arthropods. Results showed that even after expressing trepidation and fears, students’ knowledge and comfort levels with insects and other arthropods increased as they interacted and learned throughout the program. These findings underscore the value of using engaging, hands-on, small-group approaches when designing entomology-themed outreach events for young audiences and offer guidance for future programs. Full article

In Measure for Measure Shakespeare addresses a question that is both straightforward and hard to answer: how do we make people obey the law? Over the course of the play, this simple question gives way to a complex set of problems about human will, political legitimacy, and the origins of sovereign power. Measure for Measure is concerned with illicit activity and ineffective government. But in this comedy—this “problem play”—Shakespeare is especially interested in the political mechanism by which authority and obedience are restored. How is a delinquent population, used to license, brought under control? Shakespeare examines one strategy in this play, one he has seemingly adapted from the Florentine political theorist Niccolò Machiavelli. Multiple critics have recognized that the story of Duke Vincentio and his deviant deputy, Lord Angelo, bear a striking resemblance to the story Machiavelli tells about Cesare Borgia and Remirro de Orco in Chapter 7 of The Prince. Here, I build upon these analyses to offer a new account of Shakespeare’s relationship to Machiavelli and political realism more generally. The Cesare story provides Shakespeare with an opportunity to explore how spectacle and theatricality can be used—not only to subdue an unruly population but to legitimate sovereign authority. However, Shakespeare delves deeper than Machiavelli into the mechanism whereby political authority is reestablished, first by considering the psychological conditions of the Duke’s subjects (both before and during his spectacular display of power), and second, by emphasizing the need for individual citizens to will sovereign authority into being. As we will see, in Shakespeare’s Vienna, order can only be restored once the delinquent people beg to be governed. Full article

Pancreatic adenocarcinoma is one of the most aggressive types of cancer. Among different mechanisms generally believed to be important for the development of cancer, aberrant regulation of the p53 protein is a well-known and common feature for many cancer entities. Our work aims to analyze the impact of p53 deregulation and proteins encoded by p53 target genes on the survival of patients suffering from pancreatic adenocarcinoma. We, therefore, focused on the analysis of the selected collective for the TP53 mutation status, the p53 protein level, their correlation, and possible impacts on the prognosis/survival. We compared and analyzed a set of 123 patients. We have extracted information regarding the TP53 mutation status, p53 protein levels, the level of proteins encoded by prominent p53 target genes, and information on the overall survival. Survival analyses were displayed by Kaplan–Meier plots, using the log-rank test, in order to check for statistical significance. Protein levels were compared using the Mann–Whitney Test. We did not find any statistically significant correlation between the TP53 mutation status and the survival of the patients. Moreover, we have not found any significant correlation between the protein amount of prominent p53 target genes and the patients’ survival. However, we see a significant correlation between the p53 protein level in cancer samples and the overall survival of pancreatic adenocarcinoma patients: patients having tumors with a p53 protein level within the upper quartile of all measured cases show a significantly reduced survival compared to the rest of the patients. Thus, in pancreatic adenocarcinoma, the p53 protein level is a relevant marker for prognosis, and cancers having a high p53 protein amount show a shortened patients’ survival. In contrast, for this cancer entity, the TP53 mutation status or the protein amount of prominent p53 target genes on their own seems not to have a significant impact on survival. Full article

Fe–Ni–Co–Al-based systems have attracted a lot of interest due to their large recoverable strain. In this study, the microstructure and thermal cycling behaviors of Fe₄₁Ni₂₈Co₁₇Al_11.5Ti_1.25Nb_1.25 (at.%) 98.5% cold-rolled alloys after annealing treatment at 1277 °C for 1 h, followed by aging for 48 h at 600 °C, were investigated. From the electron backscatter diffraction results, we see that the texture intensity increased from 9.4 to 16.5 mud and the average grain size increased from 300 to 400 μm as the annealing time increased from 0.5 h to 1 h. The hardness results for different aging heat treatment conditions show the maximum value was reached for samples aged at 600 °C for 48 h (peak aging condition). The orientation distribution functions (ODFs) displayed by Goss, brass, and copper were the main textural features in the FeNiCoAlTiNb cold-rolled alloy. After annealing, strong Goss and brass textures were formed. The transmission electron microscopy (TEM) results show that the precipitate size was ~10 nm. The X-ray diffraction (XRD) results show a strong peak in the (111) and (200) planes of the austenite (⁠⁠γ, FCC) structure for the annealed sample. After aging, a new peak in the (111) plane of the precipitate (⁠⁠γ′, L12) structure emerged, and the peak intensity of austenite (⁠⁠γ, FCC) decreased. The magnetization–temperature curves of the aged sample show that both the magnetization and transformation temperature increased with the increasing magnetic fields. The shape memory properties show a fully recoverable strain of up to 2% at 400 MPa stress produced in the three-point bending test. However, the experimental recoverable strain values were lower than the theoretical values, possibly due to the fact that the volume fraction of the low-angle grain boundary (LABs) was small compared to the reported values (60%), and it was insufficient to suppress the beta phases. The beta phases made the grain boundaries brittle and deteriorated the ductility. On the fracture surface of samples after the three-point bending test, the fracture spread along the grain boundary, and the cross-section microstructural results show that the faces of the grain boundary were smooth, indicating that the grain boundary was brittle with an intergranular fracture. Full article

Reduced/deficient expression of Protein Kinase C (PKC)ζ in Cord blood (CB) T cells is associated with allergy development in children and a propensity to maintain an immature T-helper (Th)2 cytokine profile. In addition, other PKC isozymes are also low in CBTCs. Since previous studies have reported that cord blood/neonatal monocyte and neutrophil functions are significantly lower than cells from adults, it was of interest to see if the CBTC PKC levels were reflected in CB monocytes and neutrophils. Compared to adult blood, CB expresses low levels of PKCα, β2, ε, θ, μ, ζ and λ/ι in monocytes and PKCα, β2, η, θ, μ, ζ and λ/ι in neutrophils. The T-cell PKCζ levels were positively correlated with levels in CB monocytes but not in neutrophils. However, neither the monocytes nor the neutrophil PKCζ were associated with T-cell development towards a Th1 or Th2 cytokine propensity, based on the production of interferon-gamma and interleukin-4 in response to phytohemagglutinin and phorbol myristate acetate. The results demonstrate that some newborn babies display a deficiency in PKC isozymes in monocytes and neutrophils, as reported for T cells. However, unlike T cells, the PKCζ levels of the phagocytes did not correlate with regulation of development towards a Th1 or Th2 cytokine phenotype. Full article

Cooling water towers are commonly used in industrial and commercial applications. Industrial sites frequently have harsh environments, with certain characteristics such as poor air quality, close proximity to the ocean, large quantities of dust, or water supplies with a high mineral content. In such environments, the quality of electrical conductivity in the cooling water towers can be significantly negatively affected. Once minerals (e.g., calcium and magnesium) form in the water, conductivity becomes too high, and cooling water towers can become easily clogged in a short time; this leads to a situation in which the cooling water host cannot be cooled, causing it to crash. This is a serious situation because manufacturing processes are then completely shut down, and production yield is thus severely reduced. To solve these problems, in this study, we develop a practical designation for a photovoltaic industry company called Company-L. Three control methods are proposed: the motor control method, the PID control method, and the fuzzy PID control method. These approaches are proposed as solutions for successfully controlling the forced replenishment and drainage of cooling water towers and controlling the opening of proportional control valves for water release; this will further dilute the electrical conductivity and control it, bringing it to 300 µS/cm. In the experimental processes, we first used practical data from Company-L for our case study. Second, from the experimental results of the proposed model for the motor control method, we can see that if electrical conductivity is out of control and the conductivity value exceeds 1000 µS/cm, the communication software LINE v8.5.0 (accessible via smartphone) displays a notification that the water quality of the cooling water towers requires attention. Third, although the PID control method is shown to have errors within an acceptable range, the proportional (P) controller must be precisely controlled; this control method has not yet reached this precise control in the present study. Finally, the fuzzy PID control method was found to have the greatest effect, with the lowest level of errors and the most accurate control. In conclusion, the present study proposes solutions to reduce the risk of ice-water host machines crashing; the solutions use fuzzy logic and can be used to ensure the smooth operation of manufacturing processes in industries. Practically, this study contributes an applicable technical innovation: the use of the fuzzy PID control model to control cooling water towers in industrial applications. Concurrently, we present a three-tier monitoring checkpoint that contributes to the PID control method. Full article