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A Bionic Sensing Platform for Cell Separation: Simulation of a Dielectrophoretic Microfluidic Device That Leverages Dielectric Fingerprints
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The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors on request.Cancers are diseases described by the irregular spread of cells that have developed invasive features, enabling them to invade adjacent tissues. The specific diagnosis and effective management of oncological treatments depend on the timely detection of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) in a patient’s bloodstream. One of the most promising approaches to CTC separation from blood fractions involves the dielectrophoresis (DEP) technique. This research presents a new DEP-based bionic system designed for MDA-MB-231 breast cancer cell isolation from white blood cell (WBC) subtypes with a viable approach to cell viability. This work leverages the principle that every cell type possesses a unique dielectric fingerprint. This dielectrophoresis microfluidic device is designed to act as a scanner, reading these fingerprints to achieve a continuous, label-free separation of cancer cells from blood components with a high efficiency. In the proposed system that consists of three different stages, the first stage allows for separating B-lymphocytes and Monocytes from Granulocytes and MDA-MB-231 cells. The separation of B-lymphocytes from Monocytes occurs in the second step, while the last step concerns the separation of Granulocytes and MDA-MB-231 cells. In the analysis, x-y graphs of the electric potentials, velocity fields, pressure distributions, and cellular DEP forces applied to the cells, as well as the resulting particle paths, are provided. The model predicts that the system operates with a separation efficiency of nearly 92%. This work focuses on an investigation of the impact of electrode potentials, the velocity of cells, the number of electrodes, the width of the channel, and the output angles on enhancing the separation efficiency of particles.This research received no external funding
When TCFD Meets TNFD: Can It Revolutionize Corporate Sustainable Risk Management?
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There is no new data generated.Amid escalating environmental risks, this study explores the novel integration of the Task Force on Climate‐related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) and the Taskforce on Nature‐related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) as a transformative approach to corporate sustainable risk management. Firms currently grapple with fragmented ESG frameworks and overlapping disclosure mandates, which heighten reporting burdens and exacerbate information asymmetry. Through a systematic literature review and bibliometric analysis of 276 peer‐reviewed articles, this research uncovers significant redundancies in sustainability reporting and a pronounced imbalance between the established TCFD literature and the nascent TNFD scholarship. The study reveals that embedding biodiversity risks within climate disclosures enhances corporate resilience, transparency, and strategic adaptability. A critical theoretical synthesis drawing on legitimacy, stakeholder, institutional, agency, and signaling theories demonstrates that aligning TCFD and TNFD frameworks fosters coherent, credible, and cost‐effective reporting. This integration not only streamlines compliance but also strengthens investor confidence and governance quality. By mapping thematic clusters and identifying disclosure challenges, governance drivers, and adaptive strategies, the study offers a timely and original contribution to sustainability discourse. It provides actionable insights for scholars, regulators, and policymakers seeking to harmonize climate and nature‐related disclosures and advance global standards for integrated environmental risk management.Deanship of Scientific Research at Imam Mohammad Ibn Saud Islamic University (IMSIU). Grant Number: IMSIU-DDRSP250
Self-reported poliomyelitis vaccination and documentation in adults indicates high uptake: a digital German epidemic panel, December 2024
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Aggregated data is presented in the figures and tables of the manuscript. Due to data protection concerns, access to the individual-level data is restricted. Upon request anonymized data can be provided. Please contact the authors if you have any questions or require further information.Consortia:
PCR-4-ALL study group:
Xavier Casadevall i Solvas, Emine Kayahan, Mariam Mohamed Abdelsatta Bayoumi, Gregor Fritz, Zhiyuan Ma, Jeroen Lammertyn, Dragana Spasic, Lorenz Van Hileghem, Robin De Groote, Javier Martinez-Picado, Elisabet Fernández-Rosas, Sara Morón-López, Maria C. Puertas, Maria C. Garcia-Guerrero, Catia Nicodemo, Alessandro Bucciol, Stefano Landi, Chiara Leardini, Giulia Montresor, Khalidwa Shomali, Isti Rodiah, Felix Jenniches Helmholtz, Daniel Alexander Schulze & Vanessa Melhorn.
MuSPAD study group:
Monika Strengert, Alex Dulovic, Nicole Schneiderhan-Marra, Jana-Kristin Heise, Gérard Krause, Pilar Hernandez, Daniela Gornyk, Monike Schlüter, Tobias Kerrinnes, Gerhard Bojara, Kerstin Frank, Knut Gubbe, Torsten Tonn, Oliver Kappert, Winfried V. Kern, Thomas Illig, Norman Klopp & Gottfried Roller Michael Ziemons.Supplementary Information is available online at: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s12889-025-24865-9#Sec16 .Use of artificial intelligence tools:
We used OpenAI's ChatGPT v2 to review and refine the R code for improved structure and functionality. For clarity and precision, the English language parts of this manuscript have been edited using DeepL Pro. The authors checked the output for correctness and take responsibility for it.Background:
On 12 December 2024, the Standing Committee on Vaccination (STIKO) recommended universal polio catch-up vaccination for children and adolescents up to 16, urging parents to check their children’s immunization status following detections of vaccine-derived poliovirus in wastewater. The Robert Koch Institute (RKI) also advised healthcare professionals to ensure vaccination coverage in priority groups. Regional health authorities, called on all citizens to review their vaccination records to address any immunization gaps. We investigated vaccine uptake (documented / recalled) to improve estimates of immunity against poliovirus among the German population and gain insights into the proportion of undocumented vaccines.
Methods:
We conducted a survey in December 2024 using the eResearch System PIA (Prospective Monitoring and Management—App) to collect data on self-reported vaccine uptake among a German cohort. We calculated the frequency of vaccinations that were documented and undocumented, as well as the types of vaccines and the number of doses received. Vaccination status was classified as received ≤ 2 doses versus ≥ 3 doses of any polio-containing vaccine. We applied survey weights to calculate frequencies according the general German population (by age, sex, region) and logistic regression to examine the relationships between the vaccinations that were not documented but recalled, and the factors associated with these undocumented vaccinations.
Results:
Among 1,124 participants who completed the survey on vaccination uptake, 1,097 (96.9%) participants stated to have a vaccination record. A total of 823/1,124 (74.3%) reported having a vaccination record, where at least one poliomyelitis vaccine was documented, whereas 233 (19.0%) participants recalled at least one poliomyelitis vaccination without documentation or vaccination record. Of 1,124, 68 participants (6.7%) did not report any polio vaccination neither documented nor recalled without documentation. Among the 823 participants with documented vaccination and at least one vaccination, 592 (75.1%) received at least three doses of a poliomyelitis vaccine, with a decline in older age groups, less than three doses were reported by 164 (17.6%), and the remaining 7.3% (n = 67) did not have information on the number of doses administered. Of 2,768 documented vaccine doses, 898 (29.9%) were oral poliovirus vaccines (OPV) and 704 (26.2%) were inactivated poliovirus vaccines (IPV). In 1,166 vaccines (43.9%), the type could not be derived by the participants from the vaccination record. The odds of having a recalled vaccination (not documented) was higher in male and the older age groups compared to females and younger participants.
Discussion:
We found similar poliomyelitis vaccination uptake compared to other data sources e.g., of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI). Vaccine-derived immunity to poliomyelitis may be underestimated based on vaccination records only. There is a need to address potential gaps in health literacy and vaccination documentation. Efforts should be made to conduct continuous seroprevalence surveys in the population in response to emerging public health threats and deduce parameters to inform modelling infection dynamics in specific outbreak scenarios.
Trial registration:
The PCR-4-ALL cohort was registered in the German Clinical Trials Register on the 3rd of September 2024 (DRKS00034763).Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL. Funded by the European Union. The PCR-4-ALL project has received funding under the Horizon Europe research and innovation programme ( grant agreement No 101095606). Additional funding has been provided by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) via RESPINOW (grant number 031L0298A) as well as by intramural HZI funds which supported this work as well as the initial funding for the MuSPAD Study from the Initiative and Networking Fund of the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres (grant number SO-096)
A novel peer-to-peer energy trading strategy for multi-microgrid loads scheduling based on chance-constrained
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• Optimizing solar self-consumption, the proposed decentralized energy management system (EMS) accounts for load shifting and battery deterioration. It does this by combining a hierarchical management framework, an optimization-based real-time interactive algorithm, and an integrated P2P energy trading mechanism.
• The suggested EMS is unique in that it differs from past research that describe peer-to-peer energy exchange in that:
○ Because distributed controllers are deployed in each microgrid to optimize the performance of the HBSS and the shiftable appliances located inside each microgrid, the suggested EMS is computationally efficient. As a result, although the approach in Naji Alhasnawi et al. (2024) cannot be applied to large-scale communities, the system can.
○ The proposed method synchronizes the day-ahead scheduling with the operating phases to appropriately accommodate the unpredictability of demand and the influence of renewable energy sources.
○ The proposed EMS's decentralized architecture guarantees excellent reliability; in the event of a malfunction or maintenance stoppage, the remaining part of the system can keep running without affecting the system's overall performance (a limitation of Belgioioso et al. (2020)).
○ Regarding handling changes in the energy system configuration, such as newly installed microgrids, DERs, increased loads, topology, etc., the suggested EMS does not require changing the network architecture or starting from scratch (a downside of Huang et al. (2023)).
• The community's microgrids may trade energy more easily amongst themselves while accounting for the movement of money and energy between them thanks to the proposed EMS. Additionally, it ensures that the revenue generated by energy trading among microgrids is increased. The hierarchical EMS also has the advantage of precisely tracking and managing the energy and financial flows between microgrids, enabling the microgrids to exchange energy for a charge. This improves system efficiency by enabling the system to monitor and take into consideration the power losses related to the shared energy.
• The sensitivity analysis provided for the peer-to-peer (P2P) operation of microgrids in the community is distinctive in that it looks at how changing certain parameters affects the percentage drop in the microgrids' annual energy costs (AEC) and how this change affects the other microgrids in the community.
• A unique DR program under the TOU pricing and an P2P program under the direct load control are suggested in order to decrease electricity demand, slash rates, and benefit the community MG in order to save money. Every program stage participant will get a minimum incentive.
• Simulations are conducted both with and without the use of the Improved Sparrow search algorithm (ISSA) in order to demonstrate the effectiveness of the suggested Improved Elephant Herding Optimization (IEHO) with regard to goals like energy cost, carbon emission, and PAR.Data availability:
The data used for this research and preparation of this article can be accessed from Brunel University of London repository at: https://doi.org/10.17633/rd.brunel.25713888.v1.Supplementary materials are available online at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2772427125001767?via%3Dihub#sec0031 .Facilitating producer-consumer P2P energy exchange is a viable paradigm in the era of decentralized energy. Energy trading requires the development of a fair pricing mechanism, but when numerous energy systems are involved in the transaction, the problem can get complicated. Through the decentralized coordination of distributed microgrid energy systems and shiftable microgrid appliances, this article introduces a decentralized EMS that facilitates P2P energy trading among prosumers in community. This lowers the energy costs per microgrid compared to operating each microgrid separately. A Chance-Constrained cooperative model connecting manufacturing, commercial, and residential prosumers with guaranteed trade fairness serves as foundation for suggested approach. The model is expanded to take into account several demand-side management strategies and widely utilized energy supply systems. This study offers a more succinct method for figuring out fair prices for multi-energy trading than earlier research. A comparison between chance-constrained optimization outcomes obtained results is implemented utilizing Improved Sparrow Search Algorithm (ISSA), and without optimization techniques. The results show that recommended strategy for microgrid demand control is appropriate and workable. Fair electricity pricing practices are used to minimize energy costs for prosumers in residential, commercial, and industrial sectors. The suggested solution improves overall electricity bills for the home, company, and factory by 80.34%, 61.429%, and 54.069%, respectively.The financial support of the project "Application of dynamic system models for ensuring power substation systems cyber security", n. TS01020105, granted by the Technology Agency of the Czech Republic within the Theta programme, is gratefully acknowledged
Public Narrative Leadership in Community Sport: Enabling Social Change in Health and Wellbeing Through Storytelling, Relationship Building and Collective Action
No full text......Sport England/National Lottery fundin
Market and Production Management of Air Bearings using Ontology-based Knowledge Graph and NLP
Get PDFThis research presents an ontology-based framework designed to enhance market and production management for specialized Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) in the precision manufacturing sector, using air bearings as a case study. The framework was validated through real-world applications in a precision manufacturing SME and features a knowledge graph that was used for staff education and improved operational efficiency. Our approach integrates expert-driven ontology modeling with a modular web crawler and advanced Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques, specifically the BERT-based ELECTRA model, for entity recognition and relationship extraction. This enables the framework to identify potential customers and competitors from unstructured online data, improving strategic decision-making. Key outcomes include enhanced supply chain transparency, more accurate market positioning, and better identification of long-tail demand patterns. The study demonstrates the practical value of combining knowledge graphs with NLP in industrial applications and suggests future extensions such as integration with large language models and the development of a domain-specific search engine.This work was partially supported by the Suzhou Mu-nicipal Key Laboratory for Intelligent Virtual Engineering (SZS2022004)
Reinsuring Export Credit Agencies: What Drives Demand?
Get PDFIn this study, we assess factors influencing the demand for private reinsurance by public export credit agencies and export-import banks (ECAs), focusing on their specific characteristics. ECAs play a crucial role in bridging market gaps by offering trade credit insurance and investment guarantees, as well as equity and export financing. Together with private actors they were supporting more than USD 2.5 trillion of payment risk protection for trade and foreign direct investment (FDI) in 2023. Our findings show a strong relationship between reinsurance demand and the intervention principle, full faith and credit, managerial discretion, services of risk transfer and business diversification. The influence of regulation and financial strength is less clear. Our findings lead to the development of a framework outlining the contextual factors affecting the demand for reinsurance of public export credit agencies. This exploratory study contributes to existing theories of reinsurance demand and integrates practical feedback into the theoretical framework. Furthermore, it provides important recommendations for policymakers, public financial institutions and private actors supporting global trade and FDI
Navigating stigma while balancing between the social and the commercial: An account of Clarity & Co
Get PDFThis study focuses on Clarity & Co., one of the UK’s oldest social enterprises (SEs), and offers insights into social entrepreneurship through historically analysing its 166-year effort in de-stigmatisation (1854–2020). Specifically, the study examines social entrepreneurship as a dynamic process through which SEs manage stigma over time to pursue both their social mission and economic self-sufficiency. Our findings contribute to social entrepreneurship theory by reframing de-stigmatisation as a strategic organisational resource that fundamentally shapes how SEs navigate their dual social and commercial objectives. We also demonstrate that stigma in SEs is not merely a barrier to overcome but can also be strategically harnessed as a source of organisational strength and differentiation. Importantly, our historical perspective advances the understanding of social entrepreneurship by highlighting that SEs must confront stigma as a systemic phenomenon, requiring the co-creation of participatory architectures and the mobilisation of diverse social actors for broader and sustained transformation
Country governance of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) surveillance: observations on global progress and aid programme effectiveness using data from the Tracking AMR Country Self-Assessment Survey (TrACSS)
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Data and software used for this study have been made available through an Open Science Framework repository: https://osf.io/yp79a/?view_only=78066d971314454793219e983693efe8.Electronic supplementary material is available online at: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s12992-025-01179-4#Sec1011 .Background:
AMR is an important global public health challenge, but there is a lack of good data on response progress. This study addresses country governance of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) surveillance, considering changes in responses to the Tracking Antimicrobial Resistance Country Self-Assessment Survey (TrACSS) between 2019 and 2024. Its first objective is to describe progress under the global action agenda on AMR. Its second objective is to assess the effectiveness of a major development aid intervention to encourage action against AMR, the United Kingdom (UK)-funded Fleming Fund (FF). The study applies a pragmatic approach to analysis, involving descriptive exploration and difference-in-differences methodology.
Results:
Governance of AMR surveillance in low- and middle-income countries generally strengthened over the five years to 2024, converging with high-income countries (HIC). South-East Asian countries reported relatively strong gains, a striking exception to limited global progress. Globally, over fifteen indicators, clear progress was only reported in four: two on strengthening underlying AMR surveillance systems, in both human health (HH) and animal health (AH); and two on regulatory frameworks in AH. FF-supported countries reported strengthening HH surveillance systems more than comparable countries, even accounting for income-group differences. The standardised change score for the ‘national surveillance system for AMR in humans’ was 0.11 higher in FF-supported than in other Official Development Assistance (ODA)-eligible countries (95% confidence level, p = 0.046). FF-supported countries also reported greater progress on other topics, such as use of surveillance data for decision-making in AH. FF-supported countries were approximately a quarter (25%) more likely to respond ‘yes’ on this topic. Additional reflections on the strengths and weaknesses of TrACSS data are discussed in detail.
Conclusion:
Our study adds empirical observations about country governance systems as they relate to AMR surveillance efforts. The idea of progressive global momentum, with South-East Asia playing a key role, disrupts established perceptions of European leadership and obstacles to change. From an aid effectiveness perspective, this study indicates that FF strengthened country HH and AH surveillance systems. It also points to institutional changes in how data are used in administrative decision-making processes and, potentially, in the translation of evidence into policy, programmes and regulation.
Clinical trial number:
Not applicable.Analysis set out in this study was partly funded by the UK Department of Health and Social CareDHSC through Itad Ltd for the purposes of the independent evaluation of the UK Fleming Fund.
AGW is supported by the UK National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) (305136), and in part by the NIHR Imperial Biomedical Research Centre (BRC) and NIHR HealthTech Research Centre in In Vitro Diagnostics
Characterising anticipatory postural adjustments in turning a comparison between older adults and people with Parkinson’s disease
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The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.Anticipatory postural adjustments (APAs) are crucial for maintaining postural stability during voluntary movements such as gait initiation. While APAs have been extensively studied in forward stepping, little is known about their characteristics during turning initiation. This study aimed to identify the characteristics of (i) APAs and subsequent first steps during turning in older adults (OA) and (ii) compare them to people with Parkinson’s disease (pwP). Twenty-two pwP (tested on medication) and 17 OA performed self-paced 360˚ turns which were embedded in a complex walking task. APAs and first step characteristics were recorded using motion capture and force plate data. For pwP, APAs in turning (unloading phase) were found to be primarily mediolateral, and of significantly reduced amplitude (median = 2.5, 95% CI[0.0053; 0.0089]) in comparison to OA (median = 5.0, 95% CI[0.0073; 0.0181]). Unlike OA there was no significant association between APAs and step characteristics. These findings suggest that APAs during turning are significantly impaired in pwP, even when tested ON medication, and that this impairment may contribute to the turning difficulties often experienced by this population. Overall, these results have potential implications for clinical assessments and rehabilitation interventions, emphasising the need to tailor strategies to address turning challenges pwP face in their daily life.This work was funded by Parkinson’s UK (G-2007) and was supported by the National Institute for Health and Care Research Exeter Biomedical Research Centre. The views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the NIHR or the Department of Health and Social Care
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