The Relationship between Extraversion/Introversion and the Use of Strategic Competence in Oral Referential Communication

This study investigates the relationship between extraversion/introversion personality dimension and the use of strategic competence (SC) in oral referential communication by Iranian EFL learners. Referential communication refers to a kind of guided communication in which the referents (or topics) are given to the speakers to convey their meanings to the listeners. 50 sophomore English students of Arak University (in Iran) were selected from among 70 ones to participate in this study. Using the Persian restandardized version of the adult EPQ (Eysenck Personality Questionnaire, 1975) the subjects were divided into two groups of extravert and introvert. The homogeneity of the participants was determined by the Michigan test (1982) at the upper-intermediate level of proficiency. Each individual in the groups was given communicativetasks to communicateorally with a partner while his/her performance was tape-recorded and transcribed for later analyses. Then, the oral performance of the extravert group was compared with that of the introvert group in using compensatory strategies (CSs) in terms of type and frequency as identified by a taxonomy. The results revealed that, as far as total performance is concerned, extravert participants used interactional strategies and a sub-type of linguistic strategies i.e. transliteration significantly more than introvert ones whereas introvert participants used conceptual strategies significantly more than extravert ones. Thus, it can be concluded that the personality trait of extraversion/introversion is associated with L2 learners’ preference in using, at least, some types of CSs in oral referential communication. The findings can have some pedagogical significance

Charging demand of Plug-in Electric Vehicles: Forecasting travel behavior based on a novel Rough Artificial Neural Network approach

The market penetration of Plug-in Electric Vehicles (PEVs) is escalating due to their energy saving and environmental benefits. In order to address PEVs impact on the electric networks, the aggregators need to accurately predict the PEV Travel Behavior (PEV-TB) since the addition of a great number of PEVs to the current distribution network poses serious challenges to the power system. Forecasting PEV-TB is critical because of the high degree of uncertainties in drivers’ behavior. Existing studies mostly simplified the PEV-TB by mapping travel behavior from conventional vehicles. This could cause bias in power estimation considering the differences in PEV-TB because of charging pattern which consequently could bungle economic analysis of aggregators. In this study, to forecast PEV-TB an artificial intelligence-based method -feedforward and recurrent Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) with Levenberg Marquardt (LM) training method based on Rough structure - is developed. The method is based on historical data including arrival time, departure time and trip length. In this study, the correlation among arrival time, departure time and trip length is also considered. The forecasted PEV-TB is then compared with Monte Carlo Simulation (MCS) which is the main benchmarking method in this field. The results comparison depicted the robustness of the proposed methodology. The proposed method reduces the aggregators’ financial loss approximately by 16 $/PEV per year compared to the conventional methods. The findings underline the importance of applying more accurate methods to forecast PEV-TB to gain the most benefit of vehicle electrification in the years to come.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Multi-core devices for safety-critical systems: a survey

Multi-core devices are envisioned to support the development of next-generation safety-critical systems, enabling the on-chip integration of functions of different criticality. This integration provides multiple system-level potential benefits such as cost, size, power, and weight reduction. However, safety certification becomes a challenge and several fundamental safety technical requirements must be addressed, such as temporal and spatial independence, reliability, and diagnostic coverage. This survey provides a categorization and overview at different device abstraction levels (nanoscale, component, and device) of selected key research contributions that support the compliance with these fundamental safety requirements.This work has been partially supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness under grant TIN2015-65316-P, Basque Government under grant KK-2019-00035 and the HiPEAC Network of Excellence. The Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness has also partially supported Jaume Abella under Ramon y Cajal postdoctoral fellowship (RYC-2013-14717).Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Clinical Significance and Different Expression of Dipeptidyl Peptidase IV and Procalcitonin in Mild and Severe COVID-19

Background: Coronavirus has become a global concern in 2019-20. The virus belongs to the coronavirus family, which has been able to infect many patients and victims around the world. The virus originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan, which eventually spread around the world and became a pandemic. Materials and Methods: A total of 60 Patients with severe (n=30) and mild (n=30) symptoms of COIVD-19 were included in this study. Peripheral blood samples were collected from the patients. Real-time PCR was used to compare the relative expression levels of Procalcitonin and dipeptidyl peptidase IV (DPPIV) in a patient with severe and mild Covid-19 infection. Results: Procalcitonin and dipeptidyl peptidase IV markers in the peripheral blood of patients with severe symptoms, were positive in 29 (96.60%) and 26 (86.60%), respectively (n=30); however, positive rates in the mild symptoms patients group were 27 (90%) and 25 (83.30%), respectively. There was a statistically significant difference between these two groups in terms of DDPIV and Procalcitonin (p<0.001). Conclusion: Procalcitonin and DPPIV increase in patients with COVID-19 infection, significantly higher in the patients with more severe clinical symptoms than those with milder ones. More studies will be needed to verify the reliability of the current findings. Keywords: Procalcitonin, DPPIV, Severe symptoms, Mild symptoms, COVID-1

Work in Progress – Establishing a Master Program in Cyber Physical Systems: Basic Findings and Future Perspectives

© 2020 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works.This paper reports on the basic findings and future perspectives of a capacity building project funded by the European Union. The International Master of Science on Cyber Physical Systems (MS@CPS) is a collaborative project that aims to establish a master program in cyber physical systems (CPS). A consortium composed of nine partners proposed the project. Three partners are European and from Germany, UK and Sweden; while the other six partners are from the South Mediterranean region and include: Palestine, Jordan and Tunisia. The consortium is led by the University of Siegen in Germany who also manages the implementation of the work packages. CPS is an emerging engineering subject with significant economic and societal implications, which motivated the consortium to propose the establishment of a master program to offer educational and training opportunities at graduate level in the fields of CPS. In this paper, CPS as a field of study is introduced with an emphasis on its importance, especially with regard to meeting local needs. A brief description of the project is presented in conjunction with the methodology for developing the courses and their learning outcomes

Prevalence and attributable health burden of chronic respiratory diseases, 1990–2017 : a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2017

Background Previous attempts to characterise the burden of chronic respiratory diseases have focused only on specific disease conditions, such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) or asthma. In this study, we aimed to characterise the burden of chronic respiratory diseases globally, providing a comprehensive and up-to-date analysis on geographical and time trends from 1990 to 2017. Methods Using data from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study (GBD) 2017, we estimated the prevalence, morbidity, and mortality attributable to chronic respiratory diseases through an analysis of deaths, disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs), and years of life lost (YLL) by GBD super-region, from 1990 to 2017, stratified by age and sex. Specific diseases analysed included asthma, COPD, interstitial lung disease and pulmonary sarcoidosis, pneumoconiosis, and other chronic respiratory diseases. We also assessed the contribution of risk factors (smoking, second-hand smoke, ambient particulate matter and ozone pollution, household air pollution from solid fuels, and occupational risks) to chronic respiratory disease-attributable DALYs. Findings In 2017, 544.9 million people (95% uncertainty interval [UI] 506.9- 584.8) worldwide had a chronic respiratory disease, representing an increase of 39.8% compared with 1990. Chronic respiratory disease prevalence showed wide variability across GBD super-regions, with the highest prevalence among both males and females in high-income regions, and the lowest prevalence in sub-Saharan Africa and south Asia. The age-sex- specific prevalence of each chronic respiratory disease in 2017 was also highly variable geographically. Chronic respiratory diseases were the third leading cause of death in 2017 (7.0% [95% UI 6.8-7 .2] of all deaths), behind cardiovascular diseases and neoplasms. Deaths due to chronic respiratory diseases numbered 3 914 196 (95% UI 3 790 578-4 044 819) in 2017, an increase of 18.0% since 1990, while total DALYs increased by 13.3%. However, when accounting for ageing and population growth, declines were observed in age-standardised prevalence (14.3% decrease), agestandardised death rates (42.6%), and age-standardised DALY rates (38.2%). In males and females, most chronic respiratory disease-attributable deaths and DALYs were due to COPD. In regional analyses, mortality rates from chronic respiratory diseases were greatest in south Asia and lowest in sub-Saharan Africa, also across both sexes. Notably, although absolute prevalence was lower in south Asia than in most other super-regions, YLLs due to chronic respiratory diseases across the subcontinent were the highest in the world. Death rates due to interstitial lung disease and pulmonary sarcoidosis were greater than those due to pneumoconiosis in all super-regions. Smoking was the leading risk factor for chronic respiratory disease-related disability across all regions for men. Among women, household air pollution from solid fuels was the predominant risk factor for chronic respiratory diseases in south Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, while ambient particulate matter represented the leading risk factor in southeast Asia, east Asia, and Oceania, and in the Middle East and north Africa super-region. Interpretation Our study shows that chronic respiratory diseases remain a leading cause of death and disability worldwide, with growth in absolute numbers but sharp declines in several age-standardised estimators since 1990. Premature mortality from chronic respiratory diseases seems to be highest in regions with less-resourced health systems on a per-capita basis

Prevalence and attributable health burden of chronic respiratory diseases, 1990–2017: A systematic analysis for the global burden of disease study 2017

© 2020 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an Open Access article under the CC BY 4.0 license Background: Previous attempts to characterise the burden of chronic respiratory diseases have focused only on specific disease conditions, such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) or asthma. In this study, we aimed to characterise the burden of chronic respiratory diseases globally, providing a comprehensive and up-to-date analysis on geographical and time trends from 1990 to 2017. Methods: Using data from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study (GBD) 2017, we estimated the prevalence, morbidity, and mortality attributable to chronic respiratory diseases through an analysis of deaths, disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs), and years of life lost (YLL) by GBD super-region, from 1990 to 2017, stratified by age and sex. Specific diseases analysed included asthma, COPD, interstitial lung disease and pulmonary sarcoidosis, pneumoconiosis, and other chronic respiratory diseases. We also assessed the contribution of risk factors (smoking, second-hand smoke, ambient particulate matter and ozone pollution, household air pollution from solid fuels, and occupational risks) to chronic respiratory disease-attributable DALYs. Findings: In 2017, 544·9 million people (95% uncertainty interval [UI] 506·9–584·8) worldwide had a chronic respiratory disease, representing an increase of 39·8% compared with 1990. Chronic respiratory disease prevalence showed wide variability across GBD super-regions, with the highest prevalence among both males and females in high-income regions, and the lowest prevalence in sub-Saharan Africa and south Asia. The age-sex-specific prevalence of each chronic respiratory disease in 2017 was also highly variable geographically. Chronic respiratory diseases were the third leading cause of death in 2017 (7·0% [95% UI 6·8–7·2] of all deaths), behind cardiovascular diseases and neoplasms. Deaths due to chronic respiratory diseases numbered 3 914 196 (95% UI 3 790 578–4 044 819) in 2017, an increase of 18·0% since 1990, while total DALYs increased by 13·3%. However, when accounting for ageing and population growth, declines were observed in age-standardised prevalence (14·3% decrease), age-standardised death rates (42·6%), and age-standardised DALY rates (38·2%). In males and females, most chronic respiratory disease-attributable deaths and DALYs were due to COPD. In regional analyses, mortality rates from chronic respiratory diseases were greatest in south Asia and lowest in sub-Saharan Africa, also across both sexes. Notably, although absolute prevalence was lower in south Asia than in most other super-regions, YLLs due to chronic respiratory diseases across the subcontinent were the highest in the world. Death rates due to interstitial lung disease and pulmonary sarcoidosis were greater than those due to pneumoconiosis in all super-regions. Smoking was the leading risk factor for chronic respiratory disease-related disability across all regions for men. Among women, household air pollution from solid fuels was the predominant risk factor for chronic respiratory diseases in south Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, while ambient particulate matter represented the leading risk factor in southeast Asia, east Asia, and Oceania, and in the Middle East and north Africa super-region. Interpretation: Our study shows that chronic respiratory diseases remain a leading cause of death and disability worldwide, with growth in absolute numbers but sharp declines in several age-standardised estimators since 1990. Premature mortality from chronic respiratory diseases seems to be highest in regions with less-resourced health systems on a per-capita basis. Funding: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Global, regional, and national cancer incidence, mortality, years of life lost, years lived with disability, and disability-Adjusted life-years for 29 cancer groups, 1990 to 2017 : A systematic analysis for the global burden of disease study

Importance: Cancer and other noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) are now widely recognized as a threat to global development. The latest United Nations high-level meeting on NCDs reaffirmed this observation and also highlighted the slow progress in meeting the 2011 Political Declaration on the Prevention and Control of Noncommunicable Diseases and the third Sustainable Development Goal. Lack of situational analyses, priority setting, and budgeting have been identified as major obstacles in achieving these goals. All of these have in common that they require information on the local cancer epidemiology. The Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study is uniquely poised to provide these crucial data. Objective: To describe cancer burden for 29 cancer groups in 195 countries from 1990 through 2017 to provide data needed for cancer control planning. Evidence Review: We used the GBD study estimation methods to describe cancer incidence, mortality, years lived with disability, years of life lost, and disability-Adjusted life-years (DALYs). Results are presented at the national level as well as by Socio-demographic Index (SDI), a composite indicator of income, educational attainment, and total fertility rate. We also analyzed the influence of the epidemiological vs the demographic transition on cancer incidence. Findings: In 2017, there were 24.5 million incident cancer cases worldwide (16.8 million without nonmelanoma skin cancer [NMSC]) and 9.6 million cancer deaths. The majority of cancer DALYs came from years of life lost (97%), and only 3% came from years lived with disability. The odds of developing cancer were the lowest in the low SDI quintile (1 in 7) and the highest in the high SDI quintile (1 in 2) for both sexes. In 2017, the most common incident cancers in men were NMSC (4.3 million incident cases); tracheal, bronchus, and lung (TBL) cancer (1.5 million incident cases); and prostate cancer (1.3 million incident cases). The most common causes of cancer deaths and DALYs for men were TBL cancer (1.3 million deaths and 28.4 million DALYs), liver cancer (572000 deaths and 15.2 million DALYs), and stomach cancer (542000 deaths and 12.2 million DALYs). For women in 2017, the most common incident cancers were NMSC (3.3 million incident cases), breast cancer (1.9 million incident cases), and colorectal cancer (819000 incident cases). The leading causes of cancer deaths and DALYs for women were breast cancer (601000 deaths and 17.4 million DALYs), TBL cancer (596000 deaths and 12.6 million DALYs), and colorectal cancer (414000 deaths and 8.3 million DALYs). Conclusions and Relevance: The national epidemiological profiles of cancer burden in the GBD study show large heterogeneities, which are a reflection of different exposures to risk factors, economic settings, lifestyles, and access to care and screening. The GBD study can be used by policy makers and other stakeholders to develop and improve national and local cancer control in order to achieve the global targets and improve equity in cancer care. © 2019 American Medical Association. All rights reserved.Peer reviewe

Prevalence of Hematuria and Proteinuria in Healthy 4 to 6 Year Old Children in Daycare Centers of Rasht (Northern Iran)

Objective: Screening of kidney diseases by urinalysis in preschool children was approved in many parts of the world with inexpensive tools such as urinary dipsticks. In this study the researchers investigate the prevalence of hematuria and proteniuria in 4 to 6-year-old children in daycare centers of Rasht (Iran). Methods: The researchers examined proteinuria and hematuria in 1520 healthy children in daycare centers of Rasht. Urine strips were employed to examine the urine which was already collected from the subjects. Another urine sample was collected from those children with abnormal findings in the first samples with dipstick of the same brand a month later. If any positive result was found again, the urine was analyzed with dipstick and microscope concurrently. Findings: In the first dipstick samples, the prevalence was 3.2% for hematuria, 5.8% for proteinuria, and 0.13% for a mixture of proteinuria and hematuria. In the second urinalysis in patients with positive findings, hematuria, proteinuria as well as mixed proteinuria and hematuria were 20.4%, 52.0%, and 2.0% correspondingly. In the third analysis of samples, the abnormal findings in all patients were 13 (0.85%) isolated hematuria, 24 (1.57%) isolated proteinuria and one (0.06 %) mixed hematuria and proteiuria. Conclusion: This study showed that the prevalence of proteinuria and hematuria during pre-school period (4 to 6 year-olds) may reveal relatively similar frequencies of some other studies