The Role of Mindfulness in Positive Reappraisal

Mindfulness meditation is increasingly well known for therapeutic efficacy in a variety of illnesses and conditions, but its mechanism of action is still under debate in scientific circles. In this paper we propose a hypothetical causal model that argues for the role of mindfulness in positive reappraisal coping. Positive reappraisal is a critical component of meaning-based coping that enables individuals to adapt successfully to stressful life events. Mindfulness, as a metacognitive form of awareness, involves the process of decentering, a shifting of cognitive sets that enables alternate appraisals of life events. We review the concept of positive reappraisal in transactional stress and coping theory; then describe research and traditional literature related to mindfulness and cognitive reappraisal, and detail the central role of mindfulness in the reappraisal process. With this understanding, we present a causal model explicating the proposed mechanism. The discussion has implications for clinical practice, suggesting how mindfulness-based integrative medicine interventions can be designed to support adaptive coping processes

Towards a proposal for assessment of blinding success in clinical trials: up-to-date review

The CONSORT statement recommended that investigators should clearly report which key trial persons were blinded to treatment allocation and test for the success of blinding. Clinical researchers, however, more often than not overlook the assessment of the success of blinding. The severe under-reporting on the success of blinding may improve with awareness of existing quantitative methods. The two statistical methods, James' blinding index (BI) and Bang's BI, are currently available. Subjects could be asked to guess their treatment assignment, possibly with an option to express the degree of certainty. Assessments of blinding at various points may serve different purposes, i.e. to evaluate comparability between experimental versus control treatments before the trial by the third party; to examine further comparability and credibility of the control treatment and patients' expectation about treatment received in early stage of the trial, and to summarize the overall maintenance of the blinding success at the end of the trial. In this article, we review BIs and how to use these methods along with discussion of other issues in blinding assessment and reporting. We contend the two BIs that were independently developed but carry complementary properties would characterize blinding behaviours in clinical trials qualitatively as well as quantitatively, and may also shed some lights on the interpretation of the study findings. Finally we urge the Item 11b of the CONSORT statement to be revised to require the assessment/reporting of blinding success for all trials that adopt blinding schemes

Painlev\'{e} analysis of the coupled nonlinear Schr\"{o}dinger equation for polarized optical waves in an isotropic medium

Using the Painlev\'{e} analysis, we investigate the integrability properties of a system of two coupled nonlinear Schr\"{o}dinger equations that describe the propagation of orthogonally polarized optical waves in an isotropic medium. Besides the well-known integrable vector nonlinear Schr\"{o}dinger equation, we show that there exist a new set of equations passing the Painlev\'{e} test where the self and cross phase modulational terms are of different magnitude. We introduce the Hirota bilinearization and the B\"{a}cklund transformation to obtain soliton solutions and prove integrability by making a change of variables. The conditions on the third-order susceptibility tensor $\chi^{(3)}$ imposed by these new integrable equations are explained

The major chemical constituents of PM2.5 and airborne bacterial community phyla in Beijing, Seoul, and Nagasaki

Ambient particle (PM2.5) samples were collected in three East Asian cities (Beijing, China; Seoul, South Korea; Nagasaki, Japan) from December 2014 to November 2015 to quantitatively investigate airborne bacteria at the phylum level. Proteobacteria, Firmicutes, Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, and Cyanobacteria represented the top five airborne bacterial phyla in all three cities. The most dominant airborne phylum, Proteobacteria, was more prevalent during the winter (at rates of 67.2%, 79.9%, and 87.0% for Beijing, Seoul, and Nagasaki, respectively). Correlations among airborne bacteria and environmental factors including PM2.5, its major chemical constituents, and meteorological factors were calculated. Temperature correlated negatively with Proteobacteria but positively with Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes. The abundance of Cyanobacteria correlated positively with particulate NO3(-) and SO4(2-) levels in Beijing (R = 0.46 and R = 0.35 for NO3- and SO42-, respectively) but negatively in Seoul (R = -0.14 and R = -0.19 for NO3- and SO42-, respectively) and Nagasaki (R = -0.05 and R = -0.03 for NO3- and SO42-, respectively). Backward trajectory analysis was applied for 72 h and three clusters were classified in each city. Five dominant bacteria and other bacterial groups showed significant differences (p < 0.05) in local clustering, as compared to the long-range transport clusters from Beijing. The proportions of the five bacterial phyla in Seoul were significantly different in each cluster. A local cluster in Nagasaki had higher ratios of all major airborne bacterial phyla, except Proteobacteria. (C) 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.N

Blinding Measured: A Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials of Acupuncture

Background. There is no agreement among researchers on viable controls for acupuncture treatment, and the assessment of the effectiveness of blinding and its interpretation is rare. Purpose. To systematically assess the effectiveness of blinding (EOB) in reported acupuncture trials; to explore results of RCTs using a quantitative measure of EOB. Data Sources. A systematic review of published sham RCTs that assessed blinding. Study Selection. Five hundred and ninety studies were reviewed, and 54 studies (4783 subjects) were included. Data Extraction. The number of patients who guessed their treatment identity was extracted from each study. Variables with possible influence on blinding were identified. Data Synthesis. The blinding index was calculated for each study. Based on blinding indexes, studies were congregated into one of the nine blinding scenarios. Individual study characteristics were explored for potential association with EOB. Limitations. There is a possibility of publication or reporting bias. Conclusions. The most common scenario was that the subjects believed they received verum acupuncture regardless of the actual treatment received, and overall the subject blinding in the acupuncture studies was satisfactory, with 61% of study participants maintaining ideal blinding. Objectively calculated blinding data may offer meaningful and systematic ways to further interpret the findings of RCTs

From Peripheral to Central: The Role of ERK Signaling Pathway in Acupuncture Analgesia

Despite accumulating evidence of the clinical effectiveness of acupuncture, its mechanism remains largely unclear. We assume that molecular signaling around the acupuncture needled area is essential for initiating the effect of acupuncture. To determine possible bio-candidates involved in the mechanisms of acupuncture and investigate the role of such bio-candidates in the analgesic effects of acupuncture, we conducted 2 stepwise experiments. First, a genome-wide microarray of the isolated skin layer at the GB34-equivalent acupoint of C57BL/6 mice 1 hour after acupuncture found that a total of 236 genes had changed and that extracellular signal–regulated kinase (ERK) activation was the most prominent bio-candidate. Second, in mouse pain models using formalin and complete Freund adjuvant, we found that acupuncture attenuated the nociceptive behavior and the mechanical allodynia; these effects were blocked when ERK cascade was interrupted by the mitogen-activated protein kinase kinase (MEK)/mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) inhibitor U0126 (.8 μg/μL). Based on these results, we suggest that ERK phosphorylation following acupuncture needling is a biochemical hallmark initiating the effect of acupuncture including analgesia

The Scalable Modeling of Multi-layer Embedded Capacitor based on LTCC Substrate

Abstract Low temperature co-fired ceramic (LTCC) technology is the preferred platform for integrating multi-layer capacitors due to excellent high frequency performance and low-loss dielectric properties. This letter describes a novel approach to perform modeling of multi-layer capacitors in LTCC technology. This hybrid approach combines both analytical modeling and numerical modeling to provide a scalable circuit model predicting the self-resonance frequency of the multiple dielectric and electrode layers. Good correlation between the simulation results and network analyzer measurements has been also achieved. Introduction Recently, as an alternative solution for the low cost and highly integrated system with multiple functionalities, System-on-Package (SoP) technology has emerged [1] [2]. The SoP brings multiple semiconductor dies of various semiconductor processes and materials, and passive devices such as termination resistors, decoupling capacitors, inductors, waveguide, filters, and antennas into a threedimensional package, to create highly integrated products with optimized cost, size and performance. Markets for the SoP solution include wireless communication, networking, computing, and sensor and storage system applications. To integrate these multiple dies and passive devices into a tiny 3-D SoP, adoption of high-density multilayer substrate design is a common approach to mount the multiple dies on a substrate with the embedded passives, which are laterally or vertically integrated onto the package substrate. Low temperature cofired ceramic (LTCC) technology is the preferred platform for integrating multi-layer passives due to excellent high frequency performance and low-loss dielectric properties In this paper, we propose a scalable modeling method for multi-layer embedded capacitor. Even if many papers have published to accurately model capacitors and their model are quite accurate, none of them has considered the scalability of the model for the multi-layer capacito

Combined treatment with acupuncture reduces effective dose and alleviates adverse effect of l-dopa by normalizing Parkinson's disease-induced neurochemical imbalance

This study first showed the behavioural benefits of novel combination therapy of l-dopa with acupuncture on Parkinson’s disease, and its underlying mechanisms within basal ganglia. The previous study reported that acupuncture may improve the motor function of a Parkinson’s disease (PD) mouse model by increasing the dopamine efflux and turnover ratio of dopamine. Hence, we hypothesised that combining l-dopa with acupuncture would have a behavioural benefit for those with PD. We performed unilateral injections of 6-OHDA into the striatum of C57Bl/6 mice to model hemi-Parkinsonian attributes. To test motor function and dyskinetic anomalies, we examined cylinder behaviour and abnormal involuntary movement (AIM), respectively. We found that (1) a 50% reduced dose of l-dopa (7.5 mg/kg) combined with acupuncture showed an improvement in motor function that was comparable to mice given the standard dose of l-dopa treatment (15 mg/kg) only, and that (2) the combination treatment (l-dopa +acupuncture) was significantly superior in reducing AIM scores when equivalent doses of l-dopa were used. The combination treatment also significantly reduces the abnormal increase of GABA contents in the substantia nigra compared to the standard l-dopa treatment. Furthermore, abnormal expression of FosB, the immediate early gene of l-dopa induced dyskinesia (LID), was mitigated in the striatum by the combination treatment. All of these results indicate that acupuncture enhances the benefits of l-dopa on motor function with reduced dose of l-dopa and alleviating LID by normalising neurochemical imbalance within the basal ganglia

Conservation Laws in Higher-Order Nonlinear Optical Effects

Conservation laws of the nonlinear Schr\"{o}dinger equation are studied in the presence of higher-order nonlinear optical effects including the third-order dispersion and the self-steepening. In a context of group theory, we derive a general expression for infinitely many conserved currents and charges of the coupled higher-order nonlinear Schr\"{o}dinger equation. The first few currents and charges are also presented explicitly. Due to the higher-order effects, conservation laws of the nonlinear Schr\"{o}dinger equation are violated in general. The differences between the types of the conserved currents for the Hirota and the Sasa-Satsuma equations imply that the higher-order terms determine the inherent types of conserved quantities for each integrable cases of the higher-order nonlinear Schr\"{o}dinger equation