We aimed to estimate the overall apparent prevalence, true prevalence, and the spatial, temporal, and test-specific burden of bovine tuberculosis in Bangladesh. PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, Google Scholar, and BanglaJOL were searched for bovine tuberculosis publications in Bangladesh from 1 January 1970 to 23 June 2023. Of 142 articles screened, systematic review and meta-analysis were performed on 22 (15.5%) articles. The apparent estimated bovine tuberculosis prevalence was 7%. The apparent Bayesian pooled mean bovine tuberculosis prevalences based on caudal fold test and single intradermal comparative tuberculin test were 7.83% and 9.89%, respectively, and the true pooled mean prevalences were 10.39% and 10.48%, respectively. Targeted interventions are recommended for districts with higher prevalence to effectively reduce the bovine tuberculosis burden in those areas. Current diagnostic practices employed in Bangladesh may not accurately reflect the bovine tuberculosis burden. Our findings highlight the need for better diagnostic tools and supplemental testing methods to ensure accurate diagnosis and surveillance. Efforts should prioritize obtaining ‘true’ prevalence estimates corrected for misclassification bias, rather than relying solely on apparent prevalence. Underestimating the bovine tuberculosis burden could result in inadequate resource allocation and hinder the implementation of effective control measures.

This systematic literature review aimed to provide an overview of the characteristics and methods used in studies applying the disability-adjusted life years (DALY) concept for infectious diseases within European Union (EU)/European Economic Area (EEA)/European Free Trade Association (EFTA) countries and the United Kingdom. Electronic databases and grey literature were searched for articles reporting the assessment of DALY and its components. We considered studies in which researchers performed DALY calculations using primary epidemiological data input sources. We screened 3053 studies of which 2948 were excluded and 105 studies met our inclusion criteria. Of these studies, 22 were multi-country and 83 were single-country studies, of which 46 were from the Netherlands. Food- and water-borne diseases were the most frequently studied infectious diseases. Between 2015 and 2022, the number of burden of infectious disease studies was 1.6 times higher compared to that published between 2000 and 2014. Almost all studies (97%) estimated DALYs based on the incidence- and pathogen-based approach and without social weighting functions; however, there was less methodological consensus with regards to the disability weights and life tables that were applied. The number of burden of infectious disease studies undertaken across Europe has increased over time. Development and use of guidelines will promote performing burden of infectious disease studies and facilitate comparability of the results.

The process of generating FMEA following document-centric approach is tedious and susceptible to human error. This paper presents preliminary methodology for robotic manufacturing process modelling in MBSE environment with a scope of automating multiple steps of the modelling process using ontology. This is followed by the reasoning towards automatic generation of process FMEA from the MBSE model. The proposed methodology allows to establish robust and self-synchronising links between process-relevant information, reduce the likelihood of human error, and scale down time expenses.

The catastrophic declines of three species of ‘Critically Endangered’ Gyps vultures in South Asia were caused by unintentional poisoning by the non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) diclofenac. Despite a ban on its veterinary use in 2006 (India, Nepal, Pakistan) and 2010 (Bangladesh), residues of diclofenac have continued to be found in cattle carcasses and in dead wild vultures. Another NSAID, meloxicam, has been shown to be safe to vultures. From 2012 to 2018, we undertook covert surveys of pharmacies in India, Nepal and Bangladesh to investigate the availability and prevalence of NSAIDs for the treatment of livestock. The purpose of the study was to establish whether diclofenac continued to be sold for veterinary use, whether the availability of meloxicam had increased and to determine which other veterinary NSAIDs were available. The availability of diclofenac declined in all three countries, virtually disappearing from pharmacies in Nepal and Bangladesh, highlighting the advances made in these two countries to reduce this threat to vultures. In India, diclofenac still accounted for 10–46% of all NSAIDs offered for sale for livestock treatment in 2017, suggesting weak enforcement of existing regulations and a continued high risk to vultures. Availability of meloxicam increased in all countries and was the most common veterinary NSAID in Nepal (89.9% in 2017). Although the most widely available NSAID in India in 2017, meloxicam accounted for only 32% of products offered for sale. In Bangladesh, meloxicam was less commonly available than the vulture-toxic NSAID ketoprofen (28% and 66%, respectively, in 2018), despite the partial government ban on ketoprofen in 2016. Eleven different NSAIDs were recorded, several of which are known or suspected to be toxic to vultures. Conservation priorities should include awareness raising, stricter implementation of current bans, bans on other vulture-toxic veterinary NSAIDs, especially aceclofenac and nimesulide, and safety-testing of other NSAIDs on Gyps vultures to identify safe and toxic drugs.

Recently we have proposed a monostable reaction-diffusion system to explain the Neolithic transition from hunter-gatherer life to farmer life in Europe. The system is described by a three-component system for the populations of hunter-gatherer (H), sedentary farmer (F1) and migratory one (F2). The conversion between F1 and F2 is specified by such a way that if the total farmers F1 + F2 are overcrowded, F1 actively changes to F2, while if it is less crowded, the situation is vice versa. In order to include this property in the system, the system incorporates a critical parameter (say F0) depending on the development of farming technology in a monotonically increasing way. It determines whether the total farmers are either over crowded (F1 + F2 >F0) or less crowded (F1 + F2 <F0) ( [9, 20]). Previous numerical studies indicate that the structure of travelling wave solutions of the system is qualitatively similar to the one of the Fisher-KPP equation, that the asymptotically expanding velocity of farmers is equal to the minimal velocity (say cm(F0)) of travelling wave solutions, and that cm(F0) is monotonically decreasing as F0 increases. The latter result suggests that the development of farming technology suppresses the expanding velocity of farmers. As a partial analytical result to this property, the purpose of this paper is to consider the two limiting cases where F0 = 0 and F0 → ∞, and to prove cm(0)>cm(∞).

Shortages of hired labour are leading to greater interest in mechanisation for crop establishment in smallholder agriculture. Due to small field sizes, mechanised planters mounted on four-wheel tractors are not a suitable technology. The Versatile Multi-crop Planter (VMP) was developed for zero tillage (ZT), strip planting (SP) or single pass shallow tillage (SPST) on flat land and for forming and planting on tops of beds, each in a single pass operation, when mounted on a two-wheel tractor (2WT). The aim of the present study was to evaluate the field performance of the VMP in comparison to conventional broadcast seeding and full rotary tillage (2 to 4 passes; called CT) for establishing chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.), jute (Corchorus olitorius L.), lentil (Lens culinaris Medikus), maize (Zea mays L.), mung bean (Vigna radiata L. R. Wilczek), rice (Oryza sativa L.) and wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) in 15 locations of Bangladesh. Plant populations emerging from all single pass operations viz. SP, ZT, and bed planting (BP) were generally satisfactory and in 12 out of 15 experiments plant populations after SP were similar to or greater than after CT. In addition, SP gave comparable or greater plant populations than SPST and BP planting methods. Overall, the SP planting achieved comparable yields and lower costs of establishment than CT. We conclude that effective and reliable planters are now available for sowing a range of crop species on small fields with minimum soil disturbance. This opens up realistic options for the development of mechanised conservation agriculture suited to small field sizes.

Are wine alcohol labels accurate? If not, why? We explore the high and rising alcohol content of wine and examine incentives for false labeling, including the roles of climate, evolving consumer preferences, and expert ratings. We draw on international time-series data from a large number of countries that experienced different patterns of climate change and influences of policy and demand shifts. We find systematic patterns that suggest that rising wine alcohol content may be a nuisance by-product of producer responses to perceived market preferences for wines having more-intense flavours, possibly in conjunction with evolving climate. (JEL Classifications: D22, L15, L66, Q18, Q54).

The current trends in stimulated Brillouin scattering and optical phase conjugation are overviewed. This report is formed by the selected papers presented in the “Fifth International Workshop on stimulated Brillouin scattering and phase conjugation 2010” in Japan. The nonlinear properties of phase conjugation based on stimulated Brillouin scattering and photo-refraction can compensate phase distortions in the high power laser systems, and they will also open up potentially novel laser technologies, e.g., phase stabilization, beam combination, pulse compression, ultrafast pulse shaping, and arbitrary waveform generation.

Factors affecting desired family size in rural Bangladesh are examined using data from contraceptive prevalence surveys conducted between 1983 and 1991. The analysis suggests that mothers having two sons and one daughter are more inclined to perceive their family as complete than those having three sons and no daughter. Logistic regression analysis indicates that important determinants of desire for more children are age of woman, current contraceptive use status, work status, and family planning worker's visit. The policy implications of these findings are discussed.

This paper examines the association between infant mortality of the first born and subsequent children using data from rural Bangladesh collected during the period 1971–82. It shows that birth spacing and age of mother at the time of the second birth are important predictors of the survival status of the first child. The findings are discussed in terms of policy implications.

The 1981 Bangladesh Contraceptive Prevalence Survey found that 55% of ever-married women had some knowledge of traditional methods of contraception and the overall level of ever use was 23%. There was a positive relationship between use and socioeconomic variables. Current use of traditional methods at 7·7% was only slightly below the figure for modern methods (10·9%). It is suggested that traditional methods still have an important role in family planning and that this should not be disregarded.