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Examining the intermittency in the swing equation
Full text linkStudying the nonlinear dynamical systems and their stability is important for various engineering applications, especially with power systems. While previous studies have examined primary, subharmonic resonances and quasiperiodicity in nonlinear systems, the phenomena of intermittency remain unfamiliar. This study analyses intermittency in the swing equation, which is a second-order differential equation that characterises the dynamic behaviour in power systems. Intermittency, modelled by sudden bursts within periodic regions, plays a vital role in the transition from stability to chaos. It also identifies the conditions under which intermittency occurs, mainly when varying the inertia and voltage of the machine. Numerical simulations, bifurcation diagrams, Poincaré maps, heat maps and Lyapunov exponents are used to determine intermittency. Findings show that intermittency happens as a precursor to chaos, affecting the stability of the system. Results also indicate small disturbances can induce instability, thereby providing insights into the control aspect. It contributes to a broader understanding of the swing equation and highlights the importance of identifying the precursors to chaos to mitigate the adverse effects
Factors influencing self-help education during public emergencies among older migrants: a cross-sectional study in China’s mainland
Full text linkBackground
The number of older adult migrants in China continues to grow. As a unique population characterized by both “mobility” and “aging,” they face heightened risks during public emergencies.
Objective
This study investigated the current acceptance rate among these older adult migrants with respect to education for self-help in a public emergency (ESHPE) and analyzed influencing factors.
Study design
A cross-sectional study.
Methods
This study’s data were derived from the 2018 National Migrant Population Dynamic Monitoring Survey, conducted by the National Health Commission of China; overall, 5840 migrants were included in this study. SPSS 25.0 and RStudio 4.3.2 were utilized to analyze the selected sample, while Chi-square tests were conducted to perform univariate analysis on the acceptance rate of ESHPE among older adult migrants. A combination of the Random Forest model and binary logistic regression analysis was employed to assess the importance of statistically significant variables.
Results
Overall, 1162 older adult migrants received ESHPE, representing an acceptance rate of 19.90 %. The acceptance rate was lower among those aged over 75 (Odds Ratio [OR] : 0.637, 95 % Confidence Interval [CI] : 0.454–0.893); residing in rural villages (OR : 0.757, 95 % CI : 0.616–0.931); with a migration duration of 11–15 years (OR : 0.679, 95 % CI : 0.540–0.853), 16–20 years (OR : 0.725, 95 % CI : 0.547–0.961), or over 20 years (OR : 0.708, 95 % CI : 0.531–0.943); who had migrated for family (OR : 0.646, 95 % CI : 0.544–0.768), social (OR : 0.559, 95 % CI : 0.434–0.718), or other reasons (OR : 0.364, 95 % CI : 0.191–0.691); and who had not established resident health records (OR : 0.693, 95 % CI : 0.582–0.825) or were unaware of or unclear about such records (OR : 0.494, 95 % CI : 0.388–0.630).
Conclusions
The acceptance rate of ESHPE in this cohort remains relatively low. Therefore, targeted intervention measures tailored to their specific needs must be developed, and more focused educational resources for public emergencies must be created. Online interactive platforms should be established to enhance the self-help education content and strategies. Such measures should help improve the acceptance rate of ESHPE among older adult migrants
The art of social media influencers : exploring women’s healthcare marketing journey to prescription drug abuse and treatment engagement.
No full textPurpose: This study seeks to examine the stressors experienced by female students and teachers in universities, the impact of prescription drug abuse in this context and the role of social media influencers as mitigating reasons in this techno-ecosystem. The data for the present study was acquired through a survey performed among females from two cities in Pakistan, Rawalpindi and Islamabad. Design/methodology/approach: A nonprobability self-selection sampling technique and PLS-SEM technique were utilized for data collection and analysis. Findings: This study reveals that low self-esteem and self-actualization cause women to become self-stigmatized. A stigmatized woman is either more inclined toward pharmaceutical drug abuse or social media influencer therapy. Women seeking social media influencer therapy engage in treatment more as compared to those who indulge in pharmaceutical drug abuse. Originality/value: This study highlights that treatment engagement is enhanced when social media influencers are active and minimize the chance of drug abuse. To the best of the author’s knowledge, this study is one of the first to empirically test the approaches in the education sector and especially women contributing to United Nations Sustainable Development Goals i.e. SDG-3; SDG-4; SDG-5; SDG-8; and SDG-11
Factors associated with life satisfaction of older adults in Almaty, Kazakhstan.
No full textIn social gerontology, understanding the life satisfaction of older adults is important for capturing details about their overall health and wellbeing. However, life satisfaction may vary over time and place and can diversify depending on the socio-economic and cultural characteristics of respondents in a particular geographical region. More cross-cultural research is needed to better understand the association between life satisfaction and an individual’s situation to enable effective policy making. Relatively little is known about the lives of older adults and their health and wellbeing in central Asia. Kazakhstan has the second largest population in this region. In order to explore the association between socio-economic, demographic and cultural circumstances and life satisfaction of older adults (aged 60 years and over), this study focuses on Almaty, Kazakhstan, the former capital. Using a quantitative questionnaire, data was collected during March – April 2024 from 491 older adults living in Almaty. The results show that most older adults were satisfied with their lives, although the level of such satisfaction varied by age and gender with men reporting a higher degree of satisfaction than women. Divorced individuals reported lower life satisfaction, while those who were widowed or actively engaged in social and neighbourhood activities showed higher levels
Odorgenetics with 2-pentanone: a novel cell manipulation technique.
Full text linkAs a means of safely and efficiently managing brain functional diseases, neuromodulation technology has become one of the fastest developing fields in medicine,1 with its type and scope of application constantly changing, and many patients with brain functional disorders worldwide have benefited from it. Despite the emergence of new technologies, the neuromodulation technique that can achieve high spatiotemporal precision and is easy to use clinically is still lacking. Therefore, developing fast, controllable, and easy-to-use innovative neuromodulation technology is highly important for both basic research in the brain neuroscience field and the clinical treatment of functional brain diseases
Optimizing UAV-Assisted Vehicular Edge Computing with Age of Information: A SAC-Based Solution
Full text linkEdge computing improves the Internet of Vehicles (IoV) by offloading heavy computations from in-vehicle devices to high-capacity edge servers, typically roadside units (RSUs), to ensure rapid response times for intensive and latency-sensitive tasks. However, maintaining quality of service (QoS) remains challenging in dense urban settings and remote areas with limited infrastructure. To address this, we propose an SDN-driven model for UAV-assisted vehicular edge computing (VEC), integrating RSUs and UAVs to provide computing services and gather global network data via an SDN controller. UAVs serve as adaptable platforms for mobile edge computing (MEC), filling gaps left by traditional MEC frameworks in areas with high vehicle density or sparse network resources. An optimal offloading mechanism,
designed to minimize the age of information (AoI) while balancing energy consumption and rental costs, is implemented through a soft actor-critic (SAC)-based algorithm that jointly optimizes
UAV trajectory, user association, and offloading decisions. Exper�imental results demonstrate the model’s superior performance, achieving up to 87.2% energy savings in energy-limited settings and a 50% reduction in time-sensitive scenarios, consistently
outperforming traditional strategies across various task sizes
Histidine Tag-Specific PEGylation Improves the Circulating Half-Life of TIMP2
No full textAn overarching limitation of therapeutic biologics is the limited half-life these proteins often exhibit once in circulation. PEGylation, the chemical conjugation of proteins to poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG), is a common strategy to improve protein pharmacokinetics (PK) by enhancing stability, reducing immunogenicity, and decreasing renal clearance. Tissue Inhibitor of Metalloproteinases
2 (TIMP2) is a 22 kDa matrisome protein that exhibits therapeutic potential across a range of human disease models yet possesses a short serum halflife.
To advance the therapeutic development of recombinant His-tagged TIMP2(TIMP2), we utilized primary amine conjugation (1 kDa) and site-specific histidine conjugation (10 kDa) to improve its circulating half-life. Primary amine conjugation of PEG molecules to TIMP2 (TIMP2-a-PEG(n)) is efficient, yet it produces multiple positional isomers that are difficult to purify. Furthermore, high levels of conjugation can affect the MMP-inhibitory activity of TIMP2. Despite this, TIMP2-a-PEG(n) displays a significant improvement (11.5-fold) in serum half-life versus unconjugated TIMP2. In contrast, site-specific histidine conjugation targets the
histidine tag, enabling the purification of mono-PEGylated (TIMP2-H-PEG(1)) and di-PEGylated (TIMP2-H-PEG(2)) forms. Our findings demonstrate that TIMP2-H-PEG(1) exhibits improved PK with enhanced stability and a 6.2-fold increase in circulating halflife while maintaining MMP-inhibitory activity. These results suggest that site-specific PEGylation at a C-terminal His6 tag is a promising approach for further preclinical development of TIMP2 as a therapeutic biologi
A Transformer-Based Multimodal Object Detection System for Real-World Applications
Full text linkObstacle detection is a critical task for visually impaired individuals to ensure safe navigation and hazard avoidance. This study presents FusionSight, an innovative multimodal fusion model that integrates radar and image data to address challenges in real-time object classification for dynamic environments. The system leverages an Arduino Uni microcontroller for data acquisition and transmission, enabling seamless communication between radar and image datasets and the cloud environment. For image data, the Vision Transformer (ViT) was employed to extract high-level features, capturing fine details and long-range dependencies essential for accurate object recognition. Concurrently. Radar data was processed using a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) to extract spatial and temporal features such as distance, speed and velocity critically for understanding object dynamics. To unify these diverse modalities, a Feature Fusion Multimodal Transformer (FFMA) was utilized, facilitating the integration of complementary features into a comprehensive representation. This fusion mechanism enables the model to effectively handle challenges such as occlusion, overlapping objects and varying lighting conditions. The unified features were classified into four categories “close, far, moving and fast-moving” using a Feed-Forward Neural Network (FFN). The classification results were then converted into actionable audible feedback, providing real-time navigation assistance to visually impaired users. The FusionSight model set a benchmark in multimodal data fusion, achieving an impressive classification accuracy of 99% when using static dataset and 98% accuracy with real-time dataset. This study demonstrates the practical implementation navigation for visually impaired individuals and other use cases involving dynamic and complex environments
Examining the prevalence and impact of parental alienating behaviours (PABs) in separated parents in the United Kingdom
No full textPurpose: There is limited research on the prevalence of parental alienating behaviors (PABs), with previous studies limited to the United States and Canada. It is critical that such research is conducted in and expanded to various countries and jurisdictions to further support the identification of alienating behaviors as a serious form of domestic abuse that is experienced by a significant proportion of separated or divorced parents.
Methods: Using a sample of 1005 separated or divorced parents in the United Kingdom, this study examined the prevalence of PABs, the manifestation of behaviors in children and their contact refusal (as measured by the five-factor model), and the relationship between PABs and mental health and other forms of abuse.
Results: Results showed that, depending on how they were asked, between 39 and 59% of the sample had experienced PABs, with 36.5% identified as non-reciprocal targeted parents. This percentage dropped to 3.5% when assessed in the context of other factors (i.e., prior good relationship). Nearly all (96.7%) of participants reported manifestations of alienation in their children, but this again dropped (to 2.9%) when taking other factors into account. Finally, parents reporting higher levels of PABs also reported greater mental health issues (i.e., depression, PTSD, suicide ideation) and higher levels of other forms of abuse.
Conclusions: It is argued that these results add to a growing body of evidence suggesting that PABs are a form of abuse and a significant public health emergency, but that further debate on how alienation is measured in relation to the process (i.e., PABs) versus the outcome (i.e., contact rejection)
Mortality and its predictors among people with dementia receiving psychiatric in-patient care.
Full text linkBackground
Although dementia is a terminal condition, palliation can be a challenge for clinical services. As dementia progresses, people frequently develop behavioural and psychological symptoms, sometimes so severe they require care in specialist dementia mental health wards. Although these are often a marker of late disease, there has been little research on the mortality of people admitted to these wards.
Aims
We sought to describe the mortality of this group, both on-ward and after discharge, and to investigate clinical features predicting 1-year mortality.
Method
First, we conducted a retrospective analysis of 576 people with dementia admitted to the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough National Health Service (NHS) Foundation Trust dementia wards over an 8-year period. We attempted to identify predictors of mortality and build predictive machine learning models. To investigate deaths occurring during admission, we conducted a second analysis as a retrospective service evaluation involving mental health wards for people with dementia at four NHS trusts, including 1976 admissions over 7 years.
Results
Survival following admission showed high variability, with a median of 1201 days (3.3 years). We were not able to accurately predict those at high risk of death from clinical data. We found that on-ward mortality remains rare but had increased from 3 deaths per year in 2013 to 13 in 2019.
Conclusions
We suggest that arrangements to ensure effective palliation are available on all such wards. It is not clear where discussions around end-of-life care are best placed in the dementia pathway, but we suggest it should be considered at admission