Sustainability of Artificial Intelligence: Reconciling human rights with legal rights of robots

With the advancement of artificial intelligence and humanoid robotics and an ongoing debate between human rights and rule of law, moral philosophers, legal and political scientists are facing difficulties to answer the questions like, “Do humanoid robots have same rights as of humans and if these rights are superior to human rights or not and why?” This paper argues that the sustainability of human rights will be under question because, in near future the scientists (considerably the most rational people) will be the biggest critics of the human rights. Whereas to make artificial intelligence sustainable, it is very important to reconcile it with human rights. Above all, there is a need to find a consensus between human rights and robotics rights in the framework of our established legal systems

Problems in Physician-Patient Communication: What do our Students See and Hear? A Qualitative Study with a Pragmatic Approach

Background: Efficient communication with patients is an indispensable necessity for physicians of the 21st century. Over the past decades, much work has been done nationally and internationally to instill this essential skill in undergraduate students and medical graduates are now formally trained to become better communicators. However, deficiencies persist and medical students of today still observe various issues when they observe physician-patient communication interactions in their training.Objective: To understand perceptions of undergraduate medical students about the difficulties in Physician-Patient communication (PPC) & take suggestions on how to overcome them.Methods: A qualitative study design was employed, with data collection through three focus group discussions with medical students studying in Wah medical college, Pakistan in October 2019. Thematic data analysis was done using Atlas-ti 8 software. A pragmatic approach was used to understand student perceptions about difficulties in PPC.Results: After open and selective coding of data, six major themes were identified. Five of these were in relation to students' perceptions about major difficulties with PPC. These included gap between teaching & practice; doctor patient ratio; lack of counselling; lack of empathy and no informational care. The last theme, Effective teaching of behavioral sciences was related to student suggestions for overcoming problems in PPC.Conclusion: The various issues regarding the problems in physician patient communication portray a realistic picture of our current communication practices. Various factors have been identified in this study and, the most practical solution to these problems lies in the effective teaching of behavioral sciences

Comprehensive Account of Inoculation and Coinoculation in Soybean

This chapter elaborates dependency of leguminous plants on rhizobia to carry out dynamic process of nitrogen fixation. Soybean, an extensively grown leguminous crop with 30% share in world’s vegetable oil, is taken into account to understand its symbiotic relationship with plant growth-promoting rhizobacteria (PGPRs). This chapter narrates colonization of PGPRs on soybean roots and single and mixed inoculation and coinoculation of certain strains of specialized bacteria with rhizobia. PGPRs’ coinoculation seemed more effective than mono-inoculation and is discussed in Ref. to nodulation rate. Moreover, dynamic linear models for quantification of leguminous biological nitrogen fixation (BNF) are reviewed. This chapter further uncoils the relevance of foliar application to the release of phytohormones by PGPRs, resulting in situ biosynthesis of active metabolites in phyllosphere. Inoculation of phytohormones is compared to their exogenous application for nodule organogenesis. Finally, the influence of coinoculation on enhanced micronutrient bioavailability is relayed. The chapter is concluded with technical and economic aspects of coinoculation in soybean

Bioinoculants in Technological Alleviation of Climatic Stress in Plants

Global climate change is leading to a series of frequent onset of environmental stresses such as prolonged drought periods, dynamic precipitation patterns, heat stress, and cold stress on plants and commercial crops. The increasing severity of such stresses is not only making agriculture and related economic sector vulnerable but also negatively influences plant diversity patterns. The global temperature of planet Earth has risen to 1.1°C since the last 19th century. An increase in surface temperature leads to an increase in soil temperature which ultimately reduces water content in the soil, thereby, reducing crop growth and yield. Moreover, this situation is becoming more intense for agricultural practices in arid and semi-arid regions. To overcome climatically induced stresses, acclimatization of plant species via bioinoculation with Plant Growth Promoting Rhizobacteria (PGPR) is becoming an effective approach. The PGPR are capable of colonizing rhizosphere (exophytes) as well as plant organs (endophytes), where they trigger an accumulation of osmolytes for osmoregulation or improving gene expression of heat or cold stress proteins, or by signaling the synthesis of phytohormones, metabolites, proteins, and antioxidants to scavenge reactive oxygen species. Thus, PGPR exhibiting multiple plant growth-promoting traits can be employed via bioinoculants to improve the plant’s tolerance against unfavorable stress conditions

MBE-Grown Two-Dimensional Transition Metal Dichalcogenides for Magnetic and Optical Applications

Two-dimensional transition metal dichalcogenides (2D TMDs) are a class of van der Waals (vdW) materials that have gained significant popularity in recent years due to their unique structural, optical, and electronic properties that are very relevant for applications like ultra-scaled transistors, magnetic memories, light absorbers, and monolithic 3D integrated devices. This research focuses on exploring the potential of 2D TMDs through molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) synthesis, targeting two specific applications: (1) magnetic impurity doped monolayers to create above-room-temperature ferromagnets, and (2) TMD based heterostructures for near-unity light absorbers. Guided by theoretical support, the first part of this research investigates substitutional doping of magnetic impurities in monolayer TMDs to create above room temperature 2D ferromagnets. Through careful selection of the substrates, optimization of the flux ratios of the source materials and using smart growth strategies, up to 35% doping of iron and vanadium in a monolayer of tungsten diselenide (WSe2) has been demonstrated and the resulting physical, chemical, and magnetic properties of the films have been studied. It has been found that these single-phase monolayers with minimal point defects show no ferromagnetism. The suppression of the theoretically predicted ferromagnetic order is due to clustering of the dopants which has been observed and quantified from transmission electron microscopy (TEM). Room-temperature ferromagnetism is observed when these doped monolayers contain a significant concentration of selenium vacancies (Sevac). These vacancies were intentionally created via a post-growth annealing process, and magnetism was seen to scale with heating time/vacancy concentration. Interestingly, even undoped WSe2 showed similar ferromagnetism for Sevac > 1E14 cm-2. These findings address the inconsistencies in the existing research on 2D ferromagnets and explain how ferromagnetism arises in TMD monolayers. The second part of this research is focused on MBE-grown TMD heterostructures to achieve near-perfect light absorption (NPLA) for optoelectronics and special-purpose defense applications. Different from previous approaches that rely on patterned meta-surfaces or plasmonic structures, our much simpler approach takes advantage of the strong band nesting in TMDs to harness NPLA without requiring any complex lithography or surface engineering. It has been shown that inserting a buffer layer in-between a bilayer TMD can be a feasible route to reduce the strong interlayer coupling that exists between the 2D layers and deteriorates its absorption response. By utilizing the digital thickness control capability of MBE, a variety of TMD/buffer layer/TMD tri-layer heterostructures were grown and later integrated with an optical cavity to demonstrate near the theoretically maximum light absorption in an active material just three atomic layers thin

Entrustment in physician-patient communication: a modified Delphi study using the EPA approach

BackgroundCompetency based curricula across the globe stress on the importance of effective physician patient communication. A variety of courses have been used to train physicians for this purpose. However, few of them link competencies with practice resulting in confusions in implementation and assessment. This issue can be resolved by treating certain specific patient communication related tasks as acts of entrustment or entrustable professional activities (EPAs). In this study, we aimed to define a competency-based framework for assessing patient physician communication using the language of EPAs.MethodsA modified Delphi study was conducted in three stages. The first stage was an extensive literature review to identify and elaborate communication related tasks which could be treated as EPAs. The second stage was content validation by medical education experts for clarity and representativeness. The third stage was three iterative rounds of modified Delphi with predefined consensus levels. The McNemar test was used to check response stability in the Delphi Rounds.ResultsExpert consensus resulted in development of 4 specific EPAs focused on physician-patient communication with their competencies and respective assessment strategies all aiming for level 5 of unsupervised practice. These include Providing information to the patient or their family about diagnosis or prognosis; Breaking Bad news to the patient or their family; Counseling a patient regarding their disease or illness; Resolving conflicts with patients or their families.ConclusionsThe EPAs for Physician-patient communication are a step toward an integrative, all-inclusive competency-based assessment framework for patient-centered care. They are meant to improve the quality of physician patient interaction by standardizing communication as a decision of entrustment. The EPAs can be linked to competency frameworks around the world and provide a useful assessment framework for effective training in patient communication. They can be integrated into any post graduate curriculum and can also serve as a self-assessment tool for postgraduate training programs across the globe to improve their patient communication curricula