This paper reports an expansion of the English as a second language (L2) component of the Multilingual Eye Movement Corpus (MECO L2), an international database of eye movements during text reading. While the previous Wave 1 of the MECO project (Kuperman et al., 2023) contained English as a L2 reading data from readers with 12 different first language (L1) backgrounds, the newly collected dataset adds eye-tracking data on English text reading from 13 distinct L1 backgrounds (N = 660) as well as participants’ scores on component skills of English proficiency and information about their demographics and language background and use. The paper reports reliability estimates, descriptive statistics, and correlational analyses as means to validate the expansion dataset. Consistent with prior literature and the MECO Wave 1, trends in the MECO Wave 2 data include a weak correlation between reading comprehension and oculomotor measures of reading fluency and a greater L1-L2 contrast in reading fluency than reading comprehension. Jointly with Wave 1, the MECO project includes English reading data from more than 1,200 readers representing a diversity of native writing systems (logographic, abjad, abugida, and alphabetic) and 19 distinct L1 backgrounds. We provide multiple pointers to new venues of how L2 reading researchers can mine this rich publicly available dataset.

Increasing evidence indicates that (poly)phenol consumption can have beneficial effects in human brain function(1). The overall aim of this project is to investigate whether consumption of a (poly)phenol rich cranberry drink improve mental health and cognitive function in university students via the gut-brain axis.

A parallel randomised controlled trial was conducted in 72 young healthy final year university students assigned to consume 236 mL cranberry drink (442 mg polyphenols) or nutrient matched placebo, daily for 12 weeks. The primary outcome was mood, measured as Total Mood Disturbance (TMD), using the Profile of Mood States (POMS) questionnaire. Secondary outcomes included stress, anxiety and depression levels, measured using the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), and the Hospital Anxiety Depression Scale (HADS) questionnaire, salivary cortisol levels and cognitive function measured using the Online General Cognitive Assessment Battery (CogniFit). All of these questionnaires were measured every 4 weeks. Blood and urine samples were collected to measure inflammatory markers, gut-brain-axis metabolites, short chain fatty acids (SCFA), and cranberry polyphenols metabolites. Faecal samples were also collected for measuring gut microbiome diversity and composition and faecal metabolomics. Diet was assessed using food frequency questionnaires (FFQ), 7-day food diaries (EPIC) and 24 h online dietary recalls (intake 24) during the study. Linear mixed-effect model (LMM) and ANCOVA were used to investigate the relationship between the 2 trial arms.

No significant differences were found between treatments for mood, stress levels, anxiety, depression, circulating short chain fatty acids or inflammatory markers, however a significantly lower diurnal area under the curve of salivary cortisol (p = 0.010) and significantly higher short-term memory (Z-score: p = 0.024; Raw-score: p = 0.034) was found at 12 weeks in the cranberry group compared with the placebo. Besides, significant differences between interventions were found in plasma gut-brain axis metabolites, including the kynurenine and bile acids pathway which were kynurenine (p = 0.023), kynurenic (p = 0.032), quinolinic (p = 0.018), and glycolithocholic acid (p = 0.04) as well as several plasma and urinary cranberry (poly)phenol metabolites were modulated by cranberry consumption.

In conclusion, daily cranberry (poly)phenol supplementation for 12 week did not improve mood, stress, anxiety, and depression symptoms in healthy university students, however it may modulate cortisol levels and some aspects of cognitive function via the gut-brain axis.

The status of the genera Euparagonimus Chen, 1963 and Pagumogonimus Chen, 1963 relative to Paragonimus Braun, 1899 was investigated using DNA sequences from the mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (CO1) gene (partial) and the nuclear ribosomal DNA second internal transcribed spacer (ITS2). In the phylogenetic trees constructed, the genus Pagumogonimus is clearly not monophyletic and therefore not a natural taxon. Indeed, the type species of Pagumogonimus,P. skrjabini from China, is very closely related to Paragonimus miyazakii from Japan. The status of Euparagonimus is less obvious. Euparagonimus cenocopiosus lies distant from other lungflukes included in the analysis. It can be placed as sister to Paragonimus in some analyses and falls within the genus in others. A recently published morphological study placed E. cenocopiosus within the genus Paragonimus and probably this is where it should remain.

A new type of environmental chamber for X-ray diffraction was designed that could sustain elevated, internal pressures of nitrogen or any other gas under oxygen-free conditions and that allowed the positions of the specimen and edge aperture to be adjusted by remote control. It was used to determine the values of the interlayer spacing, λ, of nontronite from Garfield, Washington, in different stages of reduction at different values of Π, the swelling pressure of the nontronite. At equilibrium, Π was equal to the pressure under which water was expressed from the clay. Both partially and fully expanded layers were found to exist in the reduced nontronite, the fraction of partially expanded layers increasing with increasing Π and Fe2+/Fe3+, the ratio of Fe2+ to Fe3+ in octahedral sites. Also, λ for the partially expanded layers was found to depend on Fe2+/Fe3+ but not on Π, and λ for the fully expanded layers was found to depend on Π but not on Fe2+/Fe3+. These findings were interpreted to mean that the reduction of Fe affected the short-range interlayer forces, but not the long-range ones.

Suspensions were produced by mixing Na-saturated, Upton montmorillonite with aqueous solutions containing different concentrations of 1,4-dioxane. Each suspension was deposited on a porous ceramic filter in an environmental chamber, and the solution was expressed from it by admitting gaseous helium to the chamber at a slightly elevated pressure. The chamber was fitted 1) with beryllium windows so that X-rays could be transmitted into and out of it and 2) with a drain so that the expressed solution could be conducted to the outside atmosphere. Once a filter cake had formed on the filter, the pressure of the gaseous helium was raised in successive increments and, after each increment, the c-axis layer spacing(s) was determined by X-ray diffraction. Increasing the concentration of 1,4-dioxane caused some of the fully expanded layers to collapse to the partially expanded state (c-axis spacing = 15 Å) and appeared to cause the remaining fully expanded layers to move farther apart, especially at the higher pressures. Alternative explanations were given for these apparently contradictory results.

The success of the insect sterile technique (IST) in managing insect pests raised the hypothesis that a similar approach could be employed to control weed populations. Here, we investigated the feasibility of employing irradiated sterile pollen as a means to disrupt seed production in dioecious weeds, specifically focusing on Palmer amaranth (Amaranthus palmeri S. Watson). Our goal was to determine the optimal irradiation dose that strikes a balance between inducing sterility and preserving competitiveness, as excessive doses could result in pollen mortality, while low doses may retain fertility. Plants were grown in a greenhouse during the summer of 2020 and spring of 2021. Once they reached the flowering stage, male and female individuals were isolated. Mature pollen samples were collected and exposed to varying dosages (0, 100, 200, 300, 400, and 500 Gy) of gamma rays. These irradiated and non-irradiated pollen samples were used in pollen viability assessments and hand-pollination experiments. In the hand-pollination study conducted in 2020, we employed six pollination treatments using different irradiation doses. The results showed that 300 Gy was the most effective dose, resulting in a maximum reduction of 30% in seed set compared with open pollination when irradiated pollen had prior access to the stigma through artificial pollination before open pollination. In 2021, to simulate real field conditions, three additional treatments were introduced into the study, further confirming the effectiveness of the optimal 300 Gy dose. Our findings indicate that the sterile pollen technique (SPT) using irradiated pollen can be a valuable approach for reducing weed seed production. SPT also holds potential for broad-spectrum weed control by mixing sterile pollen from multiple weed species in a single application. Additionally, it could aid in managing herbicide-resistant weeds that have survived in-season control efforts. This research contributes to the development of novel and sustainable weed management strategies.

In this paper, we consider reaction-diffusion epidemic models with mass action or standard incidence mechanism and study the impact of limiting population movement on disease transmissions. We set either the dispersal rate of the susceptible or infected people to zero and study the corresponding degenerate reaction-diffusion model. Our main approach to study the global dynamics of these models is to construct delicate Lyapunov functions. Our results show that the consequences of limiting the movement of susceptible or infected people depend on transmission mechanisms, model parameters and population size.

Knowledge graphs have become a common approach for knowledge representation. Yet, the application of graph methodology is elusive due to the sheer number and complexity of knowledge sources. In addition, semantic incompatibilities hinder efforts to harmonize and integrate across these diverse sources. As part of The Biomedical Translator Consortium, we have developed a knowledge graph–based question-answering system designed to augment human reasoning and accelerate translational scientific discovery: the Translator system. We have applied the Translator system to answer biomedical questions in the context of a broad array of diseases and syndromes, including Fanconi anemia, primary ciliary dyskinesia, multiple sclerosis, and others. A variety of collaborative approaches have been used to research and develop the Translator system. One recent approach involved the establishment of a monthly “Question-of-the-Month (QotM) Challenge” series. Herein, we describe the structure of the QotM Challenge; the six challenges that have been conducted to date on drug-induced liver injury, cannabidiol toxicity, coronavirus infection, diabetes, psoriatic arthritis, and ATP1A3-related phenotypes; the scientific insights that have been gleaned during the challenges; and the technical issues that were identified over the course of the challenges and that can now be addressed to foster further development of the prototype Translator system. We close with a discussion on Large Language Models such as ChatGPT and highlight differences between those models and the Translator system.

In a recent study, visual signals were recorded for the first time in starburst amacrine cells of the macaque retina, and, as for mouse and rabbit, a directional bias observed in calcium signals was recorded from near the dendritic tips. Stimulus motion from the soma toward the tip generated a larger calcium signal than motion from the tip toward the soma. Two mechanisms affecting the spatiotemporal summation of excitatory postsynaptic currents have been proposed to contribute to directional signaling at the dendritic tips of starbursts: (1) a “morphological” mechanism in which electrotonic propagation of excitatory synaptic currents along a dendrite sums bipolar cell inputs at the dendritic tip preferentially for stimulus motion in the centrifugal direction; (2) a “space–time” mechanism that relies on differences in the time-courses of proximal and distal bipolar cell inputs to favor centrifugal stimulus motion. To explore the contributions of these two mechanisms in the primate, we developed a realistic computational model based on connectomic reconstruction of a macaque starburst cell and the distribution of its synaptic inputs from sustained and transient bipolar cell types. Our model suggests that both mechanisms can initiate direction selectivity in starburst dendrites, but their contributions differ depending on the spatiotemporal properties of the stimulus. Specifically, the morphological mechanism dominates when small visual objects are moving at high velocities, and the space–time mechanism contributes most for large visual objects moving at low velocities.

An emergent volume electron microscopy technique called cryogenic serial plasma focused ion beam milling scanning electron microscopy (pFIB/SEM) can decipher complex biological structures by building a three-dimensional picture of biological samples at mesoscale resolution. This is achieved by collecting consecutive SEM images after successive rounds of FIB milling that expose a new surface after each milling step. Due to instrumental limitations, some image processing is necessary before 3D visualization and analysis of the data is possible. SEM images are affected by noise, drift, and charging effects, that can make precise 3D reconstruction of biological features difficult. This article presents Okapi-EM, an open-source napari plugin developed to process and analyze cryogenic serial pFIB/SEM images. Okapi-EM enables automated image registration of slices, evaluation of image quality metrics specific to pFIB-SEM imaging, and mitigation of charging artifacts. Implementation of Okapi-EM within the napari framework ensures that the tools are both user- and developer-friendly, through provision of a graphical user interface and access to Python programming.

The shape of emission lines in the optical spectra of star-forming galaxies reveals the kinematics of the diffuse gaseous component. We analyse the shape of prominent emission lines in a sample of $\sim$ 53000 star-forming galaxies from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, focusing on departures from gaussianity. Departures from a single gaussian profile allow us to probe the motion of gas and to assess the role of outflows. The sample is divided into groups according to their stellar velocity dispersion and star formation rate (SFR). The spectra within each group are stacked to improve the signal-to-noise ratio of the emission lines, to remove individual signatures, and to enhance the effect of SFR on the shapes of the emission lines. The moments of the emission lines, including kurtosis and skewness, are determined. We find that most of the emission lines in strong star-forming systems unequivocally feature negative kurtosis. This signature is present in $\mathrm{H}\unicode{x03B2}$ , $\mathrm{H}\unicode{x03B1}$ , [N ii], and [S ii] in massive galaxies with high SFRs. We attribute it as evidence of radial outflows of ionised gas driven by the star formation of the galaxies. Also, most of the emission lines in low-mass systems with high SFRs feature negative skewness, and we interpret it as evidence of dust obscuration in the galactic disk. These signatures are however absent in the [O iii] line, which is believed to trace a different gas component. The observed trend is significantly stronger in face-on galaxies, indicating that star formation drives the outflows along the galactic rotation axis, presumably the path of least resistance. The data suggest that outflows driven by star formation exert accumulated impacts on the interstellar medium, and the outflow signature is more evident in older galaxies as they have experienced a longer total duration of star formation.

We find that organization capital is negatively related to the cost of bank loans. This finding is robust to additional analyses including those that address omitted variable bias and reverse causality. In addition, we find that organization capital reduces all-in-spread-undrawn. When we decompose the bank loan cost, we find that organization capital increases facility fees due to its risk-engendering characteristics. Finally, we find that organization capital is positively associated with a high likelihood of the presence of inventors and innovation output, consistent with the argument that organization capital is embedded in the key talent within a firm.

Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, the World Health Organization stressed the importance of daily clinical assessments of infected patients, yet current approaches frequently consider cross-sectional timepoints, cumulative summary measures, or time-to-event analyses. Statistical methods are available that make use of the rich information content of longitudinal assessments. We demonstrate the use of a multistate transition model to assess the dynamic nature of COVID-19-associated critical illness using daily evaluations of COVID-19 patients from 9 academic hospitals. We describe the accessibility and utility of methods that consider the clinical trajectory of critically ill COVID-19 patients.

Ice breaking has become one of the main problems faced by ships and other equipment operating in an ice-covered water region. New methods are always being pursued and studied to improve ice-breaking capabilities and efficiencies. Based on the strong damage capability, a high-speed water jet impact is proposed to be used to break an ice plate in contact with water. A series of experiments of water jet impacting ice were performed in a transparent water tank, where the water jets at tens of metres per second were generated by a home-made device and circular ice plates of various thicknesses and scales were produced in a cold room. The entire evolution of the water jet and ice was recorded by two high-speed cameras from the top and front views simultaneously. The focus was the responses of the ice plate, such as crack development and breakup, under the high-speed water jet loads, which involved compressible pressure ${P_1}$ and incompressible pressure ${P_2}$. According to the main cause and crack development sequence, it was found that the damage of the ice could be roughly divided into five patterns. On this basis, the effects of water jet strength, ice thickness, ice plate size and boundary conditions were also investigated. Experiments validated the ice-breaking capability of the high-speed water jet, which could be a new auxiliary ice-breaking method in the future.

Background: Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is a severe progressive neuromuscular disease. This study aimed to estimate the prevalence, healthcare resource utilization (HRU), and medical costs of DMD in Alberta. Methods: This retrospective study linked provincial healthcare administrative data to identify patients with DMD utilizing a modified diagnostic code algorithm, including males <30 years of age. Five-year (April 2012 to March 2017) prevalence estimates were calculated and all-cause direct HRU and costs were examined in the first-year post-diagnosis. Results: Overall, 111 patients (median age: 12.0 years (IQR 4.7-18.3)) with DMD were identified. The estimated five-year period prevalence was 35.72 (95% CI 31.88-39.91) per 100,000 persons. All-cause HRU in the first-year post-diagnosis included a mean (SD) of 0.48 (1.19) hospitalizations (length of stay: 9.37 days (36.47)), 3.96 (6.16) general practitioner visits, 28.52 (62.98) specialist visits, and 20.14 (16.49) ambulatory care visits. Mean (SD) all-cause direct costs were $18,868 ($29,206) CAD in the first-year post-diagnosis. Conclusions: Patients with DMD had multiple interactions with the healthcare system in the year following diagnosis, resulting in substantial direct medical costs. More effective treatment strategies are needed to improve health outcomes and reduce the burden of DMD.