Improving Developers\u27 Understanding of Regex Denial of Service Tools through Anti-Patterns and Fix Strategies

Regular expressions are used for diverse purposes, including input validation and firewalls. Unfortunately, they can also lead to a security vulnerability called ReDoS (Regular Expression Denial of Service), caused by a super-linear worst-case execution time during regex matching. Due to the severity and prevalence of ReDoS, past work proposed automatic tools to detect and fix regexes. Although these tools were evaluated in automatic experiments, their usability has not yet been studied; usability has not been a focus of prior work. Our insight is that the usability of existing tools to detect and fix regexes will improve if we complement them with anti-patterns and fix strategies of vulnerable regexes. We developed novel anti-patterns for vulnerable regexes, and a collection of fix strategies to fix them. We derived our anti-patterns and fix strategies from a novel theory of regex infinite ambiguity—a necessary condition for regexes vulnerable to ReDoS. We proved the soundness and completeness of our theory. We evaluated the effectiveness of our anti-patterns, both in an automatic experiment and when applied manually. Then, we evaluated how much our anti-patterns and fix strategies improve developers’ understanding of the outcome of detection and fixing tools. Our evaluation found that our anti-patterns were effective over a large dataset of regexes (N=209,188): 100% precision and 99% recall, improving the state of the art 50% precision and 87% recall. Our anti-patterns were also more effective than the state of the art when applied manually (N=20): 100% developers applied them effectively vs. 50% for the state of the art. Finally, our anti-patterns and fix strategies increased developers’ understanding using automatic tools (N=9): from median “Very weakly” to median “Strongly” when detecting vulnerabilities, and from median “Very weakly” to median “Very strongly” when fixing them

Factors Determining Pakistani Medical Students\u27 Career Preference for General Practice Residency Training.

Background Few studies have explored factors affecting preference of medical students towards general practice as a career choice. We conducted a survey in Karachi across various public and private sector medical colleges to examine factors associated with students’ general practice career aspirations in Karachi, Pakistan. Methods From January to March 2018, we distributed a 21-item questionnaire to final year medical students in eight medical schools. The survey asked students about their top three career preferences from 19 specialty fields, their demographics and their career priorities. Multivariable logistic regression was used to determine the effect of each item. Results A total of 1400 responses were obtained. The top five specialty fields chosen by students with their numbers were: internal medicine, 898 (64.2%); general practice, 337 (24.1%); pediatrics, 449 (32.1%); surgery, 380 (27.2%); and emergency medicine, 243 (17.4%). The “intent to inherit existing practice” and “other academic or professional experiences prior to medical school” had a positive association with choosing general practice while “having a physician parent’’ had a negative association among the medical students demographics after adjusting for other covariates in the multivariable logistic regression. Medical students who ranked “clinical diagnostic reasoning”, “community-oriented practice”, “involvement in preventive medicine”, and “frequent patient communication” as highly important were more likely to choose general practice, whereas, “access to advanced medical fields”, “mastering advanced procedures”, and “depth rather than breadth of practice” were less likely to be associated with general practice aspiration. Conclusion The study’s results depicted limited interest of family medicine as a career option in graduating students, and pointed out the factors that likely influence the choice of general practice as a career are clinical diagnostic reasoning, community-oriented practice and preventive medicine

Impact of opioid-free analgesia on pain severity and patient satisfaction after discharge from surgery: multispecialty, prospective cohort study in 25 countries

Background: Balancing opioid stewardship and the need for adequate analgesia following discharge after surgery is challenging. This study aimed to compare the outcomes for patients discharged with opioid versus opioid-free analgesia after common surgical procedures.Methods: This international, multicentre, prospective cohort study collected data from patients undergoing common acute and elective general surgical, urological, gynaecological, and orthopaedic procedures. The primary outcomes were patient-reported time in severe pain measured on a numerical analogue scale from 0 to 100% and patient-reported satisfaction with pain relief during the first week following discharge. Data were collected by in-hospital chart review and patient telephone interview 1 week after discharge.Results: The study recruited 4273 patients from 144 centres in 25 countries; 1311 patients (30.7%) were prescribed opioid analgesia at discharge. Patients reported being in severe pain for 10 (i.q.r. 1-30)% of the first week after discharge and rated satisfaction with analgesia as 90 (i.q.r. 80-100) of 100. After adjustment for confounders, opioid analgesia on discharge was independently associated with increased pain severity (risk ratio 1.52, 95% c.i. 1.31 to 1.76; P < 0.001) and re-presentation to healthcare providers owing to side-effects of medication (OR 2.38, 95% c.i. 1.36 to 4.17; P = 0.004), but not with satisfaction with analgesia (beta coefficient 0.92, 95% c.i. -1.52 to 3.36; P = 0.468) compared with opioid-free analgesia. Although opioid prescribing varied greatly between high-income and low- and middle-income countries, patient-reported outcomes did not.Conclusion: Opioid analgesia prescription on surgical discharge is associated with a higher risk of re-presentation owing to side-effects of medication and increased patient-reported pain, but not with changes in patient-reported satisfaction. Opioid-free discharge analgesia should be adopted routinely

Increasing frailty is associated with higher prevalence and reduced recognition of delirium in older hospitalised inpatients: results of a multi-centre study

Purpose: Delirium is a neuropsychiatric disorder delineated by an acute change in cognition, attention, and consciousness. It is common, particularly in older adults, but poorly recognised. Frailty is the accumulation of deficits conferring an increased risk of adverse outcomes. We set out to determine how severity of frailty, as measured using the CFS, affected delirium rates, and recognition in hospitalised older people in the United Kingdom. Methods: Adults over 65 years were included in an observational multi-centre audit across UK hospitals, two prospective rounds, and one retrospective note review. Clinical Frailty Scale (CFS), delirium status, and 30-day outcomes were recorded. Results: The overall prevalence of delirium was 16.3% (483). Patients with delirium were more frail than patients without delirium (median CFS 6 vs 4). The risk of delirium was greater with increasing frailty [OR 2.9 (1.8–4.6) in CFS 4 vs 1–3; OR 12.4 (6.2–24.5) in CFS 8 vs 1–3]. Higher CFS was associated with reduced recognition of delirium (OR of 0.7 (0.3–1.9) in CFS 4 compared to 0.2 (0.1–0.7) in CFS 8). These risks were both independent of age and dementia. Conclusion: We have demonstrated an incremental increase in risk of delirium with increasing frailty. This has important clinical implications, suggesting that frailty may provide a more nuanced measure of vulnerability to delirium and poor outcomes. However, the most frail patients are least likely to have their delirium diagnosed and there is a significant lack of research into the underlying pathophysiology of both of these common geriatric syndromes

Physico-Chemical and Organoleptic Perspectives of Ginger Marmalade

International audienc

Antifungal activity in the methanolic, aqueous and hexane extracts of

The use of plants to cure specific ailments is as antique as human civilization. These days, in the modern era, there is a growing concern by public opinion regarding the use of synthetic medicine due to their side effects and cost. These facts led to the discovery of some economical and alternative drugs with fewer side-effects. In this study, methanolic, hexane and aqueous extracts of Capparis deciduas have been evaluated for their antifungal activity against medically important fungal strains – Candida albicans and Aspergillus niger using disc diffusion method at a dose of 1.8, 2.9, 6.5, 12.6, 25, 50 and 75 (µg/mL). Zone of inhibition for antifungal activity of these extracts was compared with that of a standard drug like fluconazole. The methanolic extracts of C. decidua showed significant activity against C. albicans (minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC): 1.8 µg/mL), for hexane extracts the MIC was 2.9 µg/mL and for aqueous extracts, no MIC can be observed. C. decidua did not show significant activity against A. niger . Our finding showed that C. decidua has antifungal activity and further phytochemical analyses of these plants should be carried out to determine the bioactive ingredients that may serve as a lead in the progress of novel research activities in the pharmaceuticals industry

Comparison and HPLC quantification of antioxidant profiling of ginger rhizome, leaves and flower extracts

International audienceAbstract Background In the present era, the attention of nutritionist diverted towards the bioactive entities present in natural sources owing to the presence of health boosting perspectives against lifestyle related disarrays. Methods In this context, different parts of ginger crop i.e. rhizome, leaves and flower of variety Suravi (ID no. 008) were used for the preparation of ginger extracts with 50% methanol, 50% ethanol and water via rotatory shaker for 45 min. After that, different phytochemical analysis and in vitro analyses were carried out to determine the antioxidant potential of these extracts. Lastly, the best selected extracts from each part was quantified through HPLC. Results The results of current investigated indicated that ethanol extract proved to have maximum quantity of phytoceutics as compared to methanol and water. The maximum TPC, flavonoids, flavonols, DPPH assay, antioxidant activity, FRAP assay, ABTS assay and metal chelating potential was observed in ginger leaves as 780.56 ± 32.78 GAE/100 g, 253.56 ± 10.65 mg/100 g, 49.54 ± 1.74 mg/100 g, 75.54 ± 3.17%, 77.88 ± 3.27%, 105.72 ± 4.44 μmole TE/g, 118.43 ± 4.97 μmole TE/g and 35.16 ± 1.48%, respectively followed by ginger flowers and ginger rhizome. The lowest antioxidant activity was estimated in ginger rhizome. On the basis of phytochemical profiling and in vitro analyses, ethanol extracts of ginger flowers, leaves and rhizome were selected for the quantification through HPLC. Conclusion The findings proved that maximum 6-gingerol was present in ginger leaves (4.9 mg/g) tackled by ginger flowers (2.87 mg/g) and ginger rhizome (1.03 mg/g)

Characterization of Genomic Diversity among Carbapenem-Resistant Escherichia coli Clinical Isolates and Antibacterial Efficacy of Silver Nanoparticles from Pakistan

The emergence of carbapenem-resistant Escherichia coli (E. coli) is considered an important threat to public health resulting in resistance accumulation due to antibiotics misuse and selection pressure. This warrants periodic efforts to investigate and develop strategies for infection control. A total of 184 carbapenem-resistant clinical strains of E. coli were characterized for resistance pattern, resistance genes, plasmids, sequence types and in vitro efficacy of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs). Carbapenem resistance was prevalent in E. coli isolated from female patients (64.7%), urine samples (40.8%) and surgical wards (32.1%). Polymyxin-B showed higher susceptibility. ESBLs and carbapenemases were produced in 179 and 119 isolates, respectively. Carbapenemase-encoding genes were observed among 104 strains with blaNDM-1 (45.1%), blaOXA-48 (27%), blaNDM-7 (3.8%), blaNDM-1/blaOXA-48 (15.4%), blaNDM-7/blaOXA-48 (2.9%), blaOXA-48/blaVIM (3.8%) and blaNDM-1/blaVIM (2%). ESBL resistance genes were detected in 147 isolates, namely blaSHV (24.9%), blaCTX-M (17.7%), blaTEM (4.8%), blaSHV/blaCTX-M (29.2%), blaSHV/blaTEM (15%) and blaCTX-M/blaTEM (8.8%). ST405 (44.4%) and ST131 (29.2%) were more frequent sequence types with ST101 (9.7%), ST10 (9.7%) and ST648 (7%). The replicon types IncFII, IncFIIK, IncA/C, IncN and IncL/M were detected. The combination of MEM/AgNPs remained effective against carbapenemase-positive E. coli. We reported genetically diverse E. coli strains coharboring carbapenemases/ESBLs from Pakistan. Moreover, this study highlights the enhanced antibacterial activity of MEM/AgNPs and may be used to manage bacterial infections

Classification, benefits, and applications of various anti-nutritional factors present in edible crops

Edible crops are composed of macronutrients, micronutrients, and anti-nutritional factors. Anti-nutritional factors can interact with nutrients, resulting in a reduction in the bioavailability of these nutrients. Several methods can be employed to decrease the presence of antinutrient elements, including processing processes like autoclaving, debranding, fermentation, soaking, and germination. The integration of various methodologies has the potential to reduce the presence of antinutrients in food items. Numerous botanical species possess bioactive chemicals that have medicinal properties and serve various additional purposes. Tannins are a class of anti-nutritional compounds that are present in a variety of fruits, vegetables, and tea. The substance possesses a distinctly acrid flavor and can be employed for food preservation, leather production, and as a natural coloring agent. Phytic acid possesses various applications within the realm of the food sector. Further investigation is required to comprehensively comprehend the intricate health implications of ANFs, as well as to devise innovative strategies for mitigating their adverse consequences while preserving their advantageous attributes. The research conducted by ANF exhibits considerable promise and is seeing notable growth, thereby aiding scientists in improving the nutritional value of food and discovering innovative therapeutic solutions

Sex disparity in left ventricular hypertrophy in South Asians with hypertension: Influence of central obesity and high blood pressure

Women have been reported to be at greater risk of left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) than men in South Asia, but whether the sex disparity is affected by central obesity and blood pressure has not been well studied. We examined prospectively the interaction of sex with waist circumference and systolic blood pressure at baseline on LVH measured after a median of 8-year follow-up among 539 individuals with hypertension in Karachi, Pakistan, and found that the risk of LVH for women vs men increased with higher baseline waist circumference and systolic blood pressure. Our results underscore the urgency for public health programs to prevent obesity and control hypertension in women in South Asi