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The outer solar system is theoretically predicted to harbour an undiscovered planet, often referred to as Planet Nine. Simulations suggest that its gravitational influence could explain the unusual clustering of minor bodies in the Kuiper Belt. However, no observational evidence for Planet Nine has been found so far, as its predicted orbit lies far beyond Neptune, where it reflects only a faint amount of Sunlight. This work aims to find Planet Nine candidates by taking advantage of two far-infrared all-sky surveys, which are IRAS and AKARI. The epochs of these two surveys were separated by 23 years, which is large enough to detect Planet Nine’s ∼ 3′/year orbital motion. We use a dedicated AKARI Far-Infrared point source list for the purpose of our Planet Nine search — AKARI-FIS Monthly Unconfirmed Source List (AKARI-MUSL), which includes sources detected repeatedly only in hours timescale, but not after months. AKARI-MUSL is more advantageous than the AKARI Bright Source Catalogue (AKARI-BSC) for detecting moving and faint objects like Planet Nine with a twice-deeper flux detection limit. We search for objects that moved slowly between IRAS and AKARI detections given in the catalogues. First, we estimated the expected flux and orbital motion of Planet Nine by assuming its mass, distance, and effective temperature to ensure it can be detected by IRAS and AKARI, then applied the positional and flux selection criteria to narrow down the number of sources from the catalogues. Next, we produced all possible candidate pairs including one IRAS source and one AKARI source whose angular separations were limited between 42′ and 69.6′, corresponding to the heliocentric distance range of 500 – 700 AU and the mass range of 7 – 17M⊕. There are 13 candidate pairs obtained after the selection criteria. After image inspection, we found one good candidate, of which the IRAS source is absent from the same coordinate in the AKARI image after 23 years and vice versa. However, AKARI and IRAS detections are not enough to determine the full orbit of this candidate. This issue leads to the need for follow-up observations, which will determine the Keplerian motion of our Planet Nine candidate.
An unusual orbital element clustering of Kuiper belt objects (KBOs) has been observed. The most promising dynamic solution is the presence of a giant planet in the outer Solar system, Planet Nine. However, due to its extreme distance, intensive searches in optical have not been successful. We aim to find Planet Nine in the far-infrared, where it has the peak of the black body radiation, using the most sensitive all-sky far-infrared survey to date, AKARI. In contrast to optical searches, where the energy of reflected sunlight decreases by d4, thermal radiation in the infrared decreases with the square of the heliocentric distance d2. We search for moving objects in the AKARI Single Scan Detection List. We select sources from a promising region suggested by an N-body simulation from Millholland and Laughlin 2017: 30° < R.A. < 50° and –20° < Dec. < 20°. Known sources are excluded by cross-matching AKARI sources with 9 optical and infrared catalogues. Furthermore, we select sources with small background strength to avoid sources in the cirrus. Since Planet Nine is stationary in a timescale of hours but moves on a monthly scale, our primary strategy is to select slowly moving objects that are stationary in 24 hours but not in six months, using multiple single scans by AKARI. The selected slowly moving AKARI sources are scrutinised for potential contamination from cosmic rays. Our analysis reveals two possible Planet Nine candidates whose positions and flux are within the theoretical prediction ranges. These candidates warrant further investigation through follow-up observations to confirm the existence and properties of Planet Nine.
Objectives/Goals: Oral health is an important and understudied part of overall health. Poor oral health is linked to many systemic conditions, but little has been done to explore these issues in large electronic health records data sources that include dental health records. Here we report on our exploration of data readiness and completeness of three of these data sources in the Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) network. Methods/Study Population: Three CTSAs from the Consortium of Rural States (CORES) with diverse geographies, demographics, and data ecosystems can integrate medical and dental records, but it is unknown if the target population having both dental and medical records have sufficient completeness and similarity to enable dental/medical health studies. Here we use descriptive analytics to characterize the demographics, and the “complete data” approach presented by Weber et al. to evaluate differences between the completeness of the general populations and the one having both dental/medical records. We accomplish this by identifying patients with dental records in commonly used research networks and performing empirical patient statistics in comparison to the entire population available at the three institutions. Results/Anticipated Results: This poster will present the results of using the Weber et al. approach to compare the completeness of records of the general patient population in the Iowa, Kentucky, and Utah medical/dental health care systems to those for which they have also dental records. The completeness of the records of these two subpopulations is also associated with different demographic characteristics, as it has been established that the populations served by the dental clinics is biased by dental insurance considerations. The work will show what retrospective studies can (or not) be done using these populations when taking into account that it is well established that studies of populations with different level of completeness can be inconsistent. Discussion/Significance of Impact: This study provides an informatics framework to assess similarity and completeness of patient records with and without dental records. Establishing the level of similarity and completeness in these patient populations is critical to justify the validity of studies that utilize a combined record.
Brown dwarfs are failed stars with very low mass (13–75 Jupiter mass) and an effective temperature lower than 2 500 K. Their mass range is between Jupiter and red dwarfs. Thus, they play a key role in understanding the gap in the mass function between stars and planets. However, due to their faint nature, previous searches are inevitably limited to the solar neighbourhood (20 pc). To improve our knowledge of the low mass part of the initial stellar mass function and the star formation history of the Milky Way, it is crucial to find more distant brown dwarfs. Using James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) COSMOS-Web data, this study seeks to enhance our comprehension of the physical characteristics of brown dwarfs situated at a distance of kpc scale. The exceptional sensitivity of the JWST enables the detection of brown dwarfs that are up to 100 times more distant than those discovered in the earlier all-sky infrared surveys. The large area coverage of the JWST COSMOS-Web survey allows us to find more distant brown dwarfs than earlier JWST studies with smaller area coverages. To capture prominent water absorption features around 2.7 ${\unicode{x03BC}}$m, we apply two colour criteria, $\text{F115W}-\text{F277W}+1\lt\text{F277W}-\text{F444W}$ and $\text{F277W}-\text{F444W}\gt\,0.9$. We then select point sources by CLASS_STAR, FLUX_RADIUS, and SPREAD_MODEL criteria. Faint sources are visually checked to exclude possibly extended sources. We conduct SED fitting and MCMC simulations to determine their physical properties and associated uncertainties. Our search reveals 25 T-dwarf candidates and 2 Y-dwarf candidates, more than any previous JWST brown dwarf searches. They are located from 0.3 to 4 kpc away from the Earth. The spatial number density of 900–1 050 K dwarf is $(2.0\pm0.9) \times10^{-6}\text{ pc}^{-3}$, 1 050–1 200 K dwarf is $(1.2\pm0.7) \times10^{-6}\text{ pc}^{-3}$, and 1 200–1 350 K dwarf is $(4.4\pm1.3) \times10^{-6}\text{ pc}^{-3}$. The cumulative number count of our brown dwarf candidates is consistent with the prediction from a standard double exponential model. Three of our brown dwarf candidates were detected by HST, with transverse velocities $12\pm5$, $12\pm4$, and $17\pm6$ km s$^{-1}$. Along with earlier studies, the JWST has opened a new window of brown dwarf research in the Milky Way thick disk and halo.
Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are millisecond-duration radio waves from the Universe. Even though more than 50 physical models have been proposed, the origin and physical mechanism of FRB emissions are still unknown. The classification of FRBs is one of the primary approaches to understanding their mechanisms, but previous studies classified conventionally using only a few observational parameters, such as fluence and duration, which might be incomplete. To overcome this problem, we use an unsupervised machine-learning model, the Uniform Manifold Approximation and Projection to handle seven parameters simultaneously, including amplitude, linear temporal drift, time duration, central frequency, bandwidth, scaled energy, and fluence. We test the method for homogeneous 977 sub-bursts of FRB 20121102A detected by the Arecibo telescope. Our machine-learning analysis identified five distinct clusters, suggesting the possible existence of multiple different physical mechanisms responsible for the observed FRBs from the FRB 20121102A source. The geometry of the emission region and the propagation effect of FRB signals could also make such distinct clusters. This research will be a benchmark for future FRB classifications when dedicated radio telescopes such as the square kilometer array or Bustling Universe Radio Survey Telescope in Taiwan discover more FRBs than before.
Adolescence is a period marked by highest vulnerability to the onset of depression, with profound implications for adult health. Neuroimaging studies have revealed considerable atrophy in brain structure in these patients with depression. Of particular importance are regions responsible for cognitive control, reward, and self-referential processing. However, the causal structural networks underpinning brain region atrophies in adolescents with depression remain unclear.
Objectives
This study aimed to investigate the temporal course and causal relationships of gray matter atrophy within the brains of adolescents with depression.
Methods
We analyzed T1-weighted structural images using voxel-based morphometry in first-episode adolescent patients with depression (n=80, 22 males; age = 15.57±1.78) and age, gender matched healthy controls (n=82, 25 males; age = 16.11±2.76) to identify the disease stage-specific gray matter abnormalities. Then, with granger causality analysis, we arranged the patients’ illness duration chronologically to construct the causal structural covariance networks that investigated the causal relationships of those atypical structures.
Results
Compared to controls, smaller volumes in ventral medial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC), middle cingulate cortex (MCC) and insula areas were identified in patients with less than 1 year illness duration, and further progressed to the subgenual ACC, regions of default, frontoparietal networks in longer duration. Causal network results revealed that dACC, vmPFC, MCC and insula were prominent nodes projecting exerted positive causal effects to regions of the default mode and frontoparietal networks. The dACC, vmPFC and insula also had positive projections to the reward network, which included mainly the thalamus, caudate and putamen, while MCC also exerted a positive causal effect on the insula and thalamus.
Conclusions
These findings revealed the progression of structural atrophy in adolescent patients with depression and demonstrated the causal relationships between regions involving cognitive control, reward and self-referential processes.
Folic acid (FA) and iodine supplements are recommended by the Ministry of Health (MOH) for pregnant and/or lactating women in New Zealand (NZ)(1). Evidence suggests that many NZ women are not just taking FA and iodine in the form of a single-nutrient supplement (SNS) but are taking FA and iodine as part of a multivitamin supplement (MVS) which may or may not contain the recommended doses, and some are using a combination of both(2). No NZ study has examined the daily dose taken from both SNS and MVS for both FA and iodine across all time periods (2, 3). The aim of this study was to investigate what nutritional supplements containing FA and iodine were taken by postpartum NZ women, preconception, during the three trimesters of pregnancy and post-partum, and examine how well the women’s supplement use aligned with the NZ MOH recommendations. This cross-sectional observational study utilised data gathered on FA and iodine supplement use from an anonymous survey between February and August 2022. Descriptive statistics including frequency and percentages were reported. Folic acid and iodine weekly intakes from SNS and MVS were calculated by multiplying the amount of nutrient in each supplement, with the number of times per day taken, and the average number of days taken per week reported. A total of 584 women were included in the analysis. In addition to the SNS for FA (0.8mg and 5mg) and iodine (150 ug), women took 28 different MVS. Fifty-eight percent (preconception; 30% from SNS, 18% from MVS, and 10% from both) and 96% (1st trimester pregnancy; 61% from SNS, 17% from MVS, and 19% from both) of women took FA containing supplements. More than 75% of women reported taking iodine containing supplements during pregnancy (1st and 2nd trimesters: 93%, 3rd trimester: 89%) and postpartum (76%).Approximately 60% took SNS, 18% took only MVS and 14% took both. Based on the MOH recommendations, only 30% (preconception) and 62% (1st trimester) achieved sufficiency of FA supplementation at 0.8mg/day; 35% (preconception) and 69% (1st trimester) achieved sufficiency of FA at 5mg/day; around 50% women achieved sufficiency of iodine supplementation at 150 µg/day during pregnancy while only 37% during postpartum. The balance either took none, an insufficient dose or a dose that exceeded the recommended dose and many took them during non-recommended periods (FA after the 1st trimester; iodine preconception). Most women reported taking FA and/or iodine containing supplements at some point before, during and after their pregnancy. However, it is concerning that a large number of women do not seem to be adhering to the MOH recommendations for FA and iodine supplementation.
The sophisticated relationship between the intake of dietary carbohydrates and host immunity is mediated in large part by the gut microbiota. This comprehensive review explores the multifaceted connections linking human gut microbiota with nondigestible carbohydrate metabolism and immune responses, highlighting the critical importance of this symbiotic relationship in maintaining overall host health. Understanding the mechanisms by which gut microbiota act as a bridge between carbohydrate intake and host immunity has significant implications for precision nutrition strategies and the development of therapeutic interventions.
The effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of early intervention for psychosis (EIP) services are well established in high-income countries but not in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Despite the scarcity of local evidence, several EIP services have been implemented in LMICs. Local evaluations are warranted before adopting speciality models of care in LMICs. We aimed to estimate the cost-effectiveness of implementing EIP services in Brazil.
Methods
A model-based economic evaluation of EIP services was conducted from the Brazilian healthcare system perspective. A Markov model was developed using a cohort study conducted in São Paulo. Cost data were retrieved from local sources. The outcome of interest was the incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) measured as the incremental costs over the incremental quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs). Sensitivity analyses were performed to test the robustness of the results.
Results
The study included 357 participants (38% female), with a mean (SD) age of 26 (7.38) years. According to the model, implementing EIP services in Brazil would result in a mean incremental cost of 4,478 Brazilian reals (R$) and a mean incremental benefit of 0.29 QALYs. The resulting ICER of R$ 15,495 (US dollar [USD] 7,640 adjusted for purchase power parity [PPP]) per QALY can be considered cost-effective at a willingness-to-pay threshold of 1 Gross domestic product (GDP) per capita (R$ 18,254; USD 9,000 PPP adjusted). The model results were robust to sensitivity analyses.
Conclusions
This study supports the economic advantages of implementing EIP services in Brazil. Although cultural adaptations are required, these data suggest EIP services might be cost-effective even in less-resourced countries.
Collisionless charged particle motion and its transport in the two-wire model (TWM) with no axial magnetic fields is investigated numerically. The TWM configuration contains a magnetic X-point, and single particle motions in such a field have two conserved quantities: the total kinetic energy and the base field line value which is a quantity derived from the axial canonical momentum. As gyrating particles travel along the field lines, they may reach near the X-point region where the magnetic moment, the first adiabatic invariant, can be occasionally shifted due to a large gradient of the field. When the magnetic moment becomes large, resulting in a large Larmor radius, particles probabilistically cross the X-point to migrate to the opposite side of the TWM configuration. These phenomena are investigated with single particle simulations. We find that the statistical behaviour of the seemingly chaotic magnetic moment shifts are completely determined by the two aforementioned conserved quantities, and also that there exists a threshold energy, determined by the base field line value, allowing only particles with a higher energy to cross the separatrix and migrate. It is found that the crossing time is distributed exponentially, and that the migration confinement time, which is the average crossing time, is shorter for particles with a base field line closer to the separatrix and a higher energy. We provide an empirical expression, derived with the simulations, for estimating the collisionless migration confinement time.
Echinococcosis poses a significant threat to public health. The Chinese government has implemented prevention and control measures to mitigate the impact of the disease. By analyzing data from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention and the State Council of the People’s Republic of China, we found that implementation of these measures has reduced the infection rate by nearly 50% between 2004 to 2022 (from 0.3975 to 0.1944 per 100,000 person-years). Nonetheless, some regions still bear a significant disease burden, and lack of detailed information limites further evaluation of the effects on both alveolar and cystic echinococcosis. Our analysis supports the continuing implementation of these measures and suggests that enhanced wildlife management, case-based strategies, and surveillance systems will facilitate disease control.
Large research teams and consortia present challenges for authorship. The number of disciplines involved in the research can further complicate approaches to manuscript development and leadership. The CHARM team, representing a multi-disciplinary, multi-institutional genomics implementation study, participated in facilitated discussions inspired by team science methodologies. The discussions were centered on team members’ past experiences with authorship and perspectives on authorship in a large research team context. Team members identified challenges and opportunities that were used to create guidelines and administrative tools to support manuscript development. The guidelines were organized by the three values of equity, inclusion, and efficiency and included eight principles. A visual dashboard was created to allow all team members to see who was leading or involved in each paper. Additional tools to promote equity, inclusion, and efficiency included providing standardized project management for each manuscript and making “concept sheets” for each manuscript accessible to all team members. The process used in CHARM can be used by other large research teams and consortia to equitably distribute lead authorship opportunities, foster coauthor inclusion, and efficiently work with large authorship groups.
Efficient extraction of oxygen from ambient waters played a critical role in the development of early arthropods. Maximizing gill surface area enhanced oxygen uptake ability but, with gills necessarily exposed to the external environment, also presented the issue of gill contamination. Here we document setae inserted on the dorsal surface of walking legs of the benthic-dwelling middle Cambrian Olenoides serratus and on the gill shaft of the Late Ordovician Triarthrus eatoni. Based on their physical positions relative to gill filaments, we interpret these setae to have been used to groom the gills, removing particles trapped among the filaments. The coordination between setae and gill filaments is comparable to that seen among modern crustaceans, which use a diverse set of setae-bearing appendages to penetrate between gill filaments when grooming. Grooming is known relatively early in trilobite evolutionary history and would have enhanced gill efficiency by maximizing the surface area for oxygen uptake.
This study aimed to analyse the temporal and spatial trends in the burden of anxiety disorders and major depressive disorder related to bullying victimisation on global, regional and country scales.
Methods
Data were from the 2019 Global Burden of Disease (GBD) Study. We assessed the global disability-adjusted life years (DALYs, per 100 000 population) of anxiety disorders and major depressive disorder attributable to bullying victimisation by age, sex and geographical location. The percentage changes in age-standardised rates of DALYs were used to quantify temporal trends, and the annual rate changes across 204 countries and territories were used to present spatial trends. Furthermore, we examined the relationship between the sociodemographic index (SDI) and the burden of anxiety disorders as well as major depressive disorder attributable to bullying victimisation and its spatial and temporal characteristics globally.
Results
From 1990 to 2019, the global DALY rates of anxiety disorders and major depressive disorder attributable to bullying victimisation increased by 23.31 and 26.60%, respectively, with 27.27 and 29.07% for females and 18.88 and 23.84% for males. Across the 21 GBD regions, the highest age-standardised rates of bullying victimisation-related DALYs for anxiety disorders were in North Africa and the Middle East and for major depressive disorder in High-income North America. From 1990 to 2019, the region with the largest percentage increase in the rates of DALYs was High-income North America (54.66% for anxiety disorders and 105.88% for major depressive disorder), whereas the region with the slowest growth rate or largest percentage decline was East Asia (1.71% for anxiety disorders and −25.37% for major depressive disorder). In terms of SDI, this study found overall upward trends of bullying-related mental disorders in areas regardless of the SDI levels, although there were temporary downward trends in some stages of certain areas.
Conclusions
The number and rates of DALYs of anxiety disorders and major depressive disorder attributable to bullying victimisation increased from 1990 to 2019. Effective strategies to eliminate bullying victimisation in children and adolescents are needed to reduce the burden of anxiety disorders and major depressive disorder. Considering the large variations in the burden by SDI and geographic location, future protective actions should be developed based on the specific cultural contexts, development status and regional characteristics of each country.
Let
$E/\mathbb {Q}$
be an elliptic curve. For a prime p of good reduction, let
$r(E,p)$
be the smallest non-negative integer that gives the x-coordinate of a point of maximal order in the group
$E(\mathbb {F}_p)$
. We prove unconditionally that
$r(E,p)> 0.72\log \log p$
for infinitely many p, and
$r(E,p)> 0.36 \log p$
under the assumption of the Generalized Riemann Hypothesis. These can be viewed as elliptic curve analogues of classical lower bounds on the least primitive root of a prime.
Introduction. Smoking prevalence is disproportionately high among Asian American immigrant men with limited English proficiency. Understanding the role of family support may provide insights into culturally acceptable strategies to promote smoking cessation. Aims. This study examined how family support was associated with readiness to consider smoking cessation among Chinese and Vietnamese American male daily smokers. Methods. We analyzed baseline data (N = 340) from a cluster randomized trial of a family-based healthy lifestyle intervention. We assessed the frequency of receiving family support in various forms (encouraging use of cessation resources, praising efforts, checking in, and reminding of familial role). Multiple regression analysis was used to determine associations between family support areas and readiness to consider smoking cessation, controlling for covariates. Results/Findings. Reporting a higher frequency of receiving praise and encouragement for one’s efforts to quit was positively associated with readiness to consider cessation. Other areas of family support were not significant. Conclusions. These findings provide evidence to explore specific areas of family support in enhancing Asian American smokers’ readiness to consider cessation. As there is high interest from Asian American family members to support their smokers for quitting, culturally specific and acceptable strategies are needed to promote smoking cessation among Asian Americans.
Laboratory experiments are conducted to investigate the mechanism controlling the formation of stable and unstable acoustic fountains at the free surface of a quiescent body of water. Fountains are induced by focused ultrasonic, a new modality that allows for better spatiotemporal control of water flow. Particle image velocimetry was used to characterize the induced flow field in the vicinity of the ultrasonic focal spot. We used two types of ultrasonic transducers with distinct wave frequencies. We examined three fountain formation regimes by varying the pressure level of the transducers, namely weak, intermediate (stable) and highly forced fountains (explosive). Between different regimes, the fountain height underwent a step-change in response to the increase in acoustic pressure. A force estimation obtained from the flow field shows that the magnitude of axial momentum flux is orders of magnitude lower than that of gravity and surface tension, indicating that the dominant driving force for the fountain generation is the acoustic radiation force (Nightingale et al., Ultrasound Med. Biol., vol. 28, 2002, pp. 227–235). We propose a simple model to estimate the shape of a stable fountain; it accounts for the applied acoustic pressure, gravity, surface tension and axial momentum. The model neglects viscous force, which precludes capturing the intermediate fountain surface curvature. However, the model successfully predicts the geometry of the weak and intermediate fountains.
In order to maximize the utility of future studies of trilobite ontogeny, we propose a set of standard practices that relate to the collection, nomenclature, description, depiction, and interpretation of ontogenetic series inferred from articulated specimens belonging to individual species. In some cases, these suggestions may also apply to ontogenetic studies of other fossilized taxa.
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has led to significant strain on front-line healthcare workers.
Aims
In this multicentre study, we compared the psychological outcomes during the COVID-19 pandemic in various countries in the Asia-Pacific region and identified factors associated with adverse psychological outcomes.
Method
From 29 April to 4 June 2020, the study recruited healthcare workers from major healthcare institutions in five countries in the Asia-Pacific region. A self-administrated survey that collected information on prior medical conditions, presence of symptoms, and scores on the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales and the Impact of Events Scale-Revised were used. The prevalence of depression, anxiety, stress and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) relating to COVID-19 was compared, and multivariable logistic regression identified independent factors associated with adverse psychological outcomes within each country.
Results
A total of 1146 participants from India, Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia and Vietnam were studied. Despite having the lowest volume of cases, Vietnam displayed the highest prevalence of PTSD. In contrast, Singapore reported the highest case volume, but had a lower prevalence of depression and anxiety. In the multivariable analysis, we found that non-medically trained personnel, the presence of physical symptoms and presence of prior medical conditions were independent predictors across the participating countries.
Conclusions
This study highlights that the varied prevalence of psychological adversity among healthcare workers is independent of the burden of COVID-19 cases within each country. Early psychological interventions may be beneficial for the vulnerable groups of healthcare workers with presence of physical symptoms, prior medical conditions and those who are not medically trained.