Aggregating Centrality Rankings: A Novel Approach to Detect Critical Infrastructure Vulnerabilities

Assessing critical infrastructure vulnerabilities is paramount to arrange efficient plans for their protection. Critical infrastructures are network-based systems hence, they are composed of nodes and edges. The literature shows that node criticality, which is the focus of this paper, can be addressed from different metric-based perspectives (e.g., degree, maximal flow, shortest path). However, each metric provides a specific insight while neglecting others. This paper attempts to overcome this pitfall through a methodology based on ranking aggregation. Specifically, we consider several numerical topological descriptors of the nodes’ importance (e.g., degree, betweenness, closeness, etc.) and we convert such descriptors into ratio matrices; then, we extend the Analytic Hierarchy Process problem to the case of multiple ratio matrices and we resort to a Logarithmic Least Squares formulation to identify an aggregated metric that represents a good tradeoff among the different topological descriptors. The procedure is validated considering the Central London Tube network as a case study

Global, regional, and national incidence, prevalence, and years lived with disability for 310 diseases and injuries, 1990-2015:a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2015

Background Non-fatal outcomes of disease and injury increasingly detract from the ability of the world's population to live in full health, a trend largely attributable to an epidemiological transition in many countries from causes affecting children, to non-communicable diseases (NCDs) more common in adults. For the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2015 (GBD 2015), we estimated the incidence, prevalence, and years lived with disability for diseases and injuries at the global, regional, and national scale over the period of 1990 to 2015.Methods We estimated incidence and prevalence by age, sex, cause, year, and geography with a wide range of updated and standardised analytical procedures. Improvements from GBD 2013 included the addition of new data sources, updates to literature reviews for 85 causes, and the identification and inclusion of additional studies published up to November, 2015, to expand the database used for estimation of non-fatal outcomes to 60 900 unique data sources. Prevalence and incidence by cause and sequelae were determined with DisMod-MR 2.1, an improved version of the DisMod-MR Bayesian meta-regression tool first developed for GBD 2010 and GBD 2013. For some causes, we used alternative modelling strategies where the complexity of the disease was not suited to DisMod-MR 2.1 or where incidence and prevalence needed to be determined from other data. For GBD 2015 we created a summary indicator that combines measures of income per capita, educational attainment, and fertility (the Socio-demographic Index [SDI]) and used it to compare observed patterns of health loss to the expected pattern for countries or locations with similar SDI scores.Findings We generated 9.3 billion estimates from the various combinations of prevalence, incidence, and YLDs for causes, sequelae, and impairments by age, sex, geography, and year. In 2015, two causes had acute incidences in excess of 1 billion: upper respiratory infections (17.2 billion, 95% uncertainty interval [UI] 15.4-19.2 billion) and diarrhoeal diseases (2.39 billion, 2.30-2.50 billion). Eight causes of chronic disease and injury each affected more than 10% of the world's population in 2015: permanent caries, tension-type headache, iron-deficiency anaemia, age-related and other hearing loss, migraine, genital herpes, refraction and accommodation disorders, and ascariasis. The impairment that affected the greatest number of people in 2015 was anaemia, with 2.36 billion (2.35-2.37 billion) individuals affected. The second and third leading impairments by number of individuals affected were hearing loss and vision loss, respectively. Between 2005 and 2015, there was little change in the leading causes of years lived with disability (YLDs) on a global basis. NCDs accounted for 18 of the leading 20 causes of age-standardised YLDs on a global scale. Where rates were decreasing, the rate of decrease for YLDs was slower than that of years of life lost (YLLs) for nearly every cause included in our analysis. For low SDI geographies, Group 1 causes typically accounted for 20-30% of total disability, largely attributable to nutritional deficiencies, malaria, neglected tropical diseases, HIV/AIDS, and tuberculosis. Lower back and neck pain was the leading global cause of disability in 2015 in most countries. The leading cause was sense organ disorders in 22 countries in Asia and Africa and one in central Latin America; diabetes in four countries in Oceania; HIV/AIDS in three southern sub-Saharan African countries; collective violence and legal intervention in two north African and Middle Eastern countries; iron-deficiency anaemia in Somalia and Venezuela; depression in Uganda; onchoceriasis in Liberia; and other neglected tropical diseases in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.Interpretation Ageing of the world's population is increasing the number of people living with sequelae of diseases and injuries. Shifts in the epidemiological profile driven by socioeconomic change also contribute to the continued increase in years lived with disability (YLDs) as well as the rate of increase in YLDs. Despite limitations imposed by gaps in data availability and the variable quality of the data available, the standardised and comprehensive approach of the GBD study provides opportunities to examine broad trends, compare those trends between countries or subnational geographies, benchmark against locations at similar stages of development, and gauge the strength or weakness of the estimates available. Copyright (C) The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.</p

Striae Distensae ietekme uz dzīves kvalitāti un ārstēšanas veidiem

Ievads: Striae distensae (SD) ir ādas bojājumi, kurus novēro liela daļa cilvēku. To cēloņi var būt fizioloģiski un patoloģiski. Ir apspriests, ka tie izraisa pašapziņas samazināšanos, tomēr standartizēta novērtēšanas metode medicīnā nav izmantota. Mērķis: Šī pētījuma mērķis ir noskaidrot, cik daudz SD ietekmē dzīves kvalitāti (QoL); vai SD raksturlielumi korelē ar QoL un citiem respondenta faktoriem. Papildus tiks analizēta SD profilakse un ārstēšana respondentu vidū. Materiāli un metodes: Laikā no 2021. gada janvāra līdz februārim, izmantojot Google veidlapas, tika izveidota anonīma aptauja, kas tika kopīgota ar repondentu sociālo mediju kanāliem. Demogrāfiskie dati, SD raksturlielumi, to novēršana un ārstēšana tika apkopoti, un QoL novērtēšanai tika izmantota Dermatology Life Quality Index skalas anketa. Rezultāti: Visbiežākais SD cēlonis bija straujš svara pieaugums, un SD visbiežāk atradās augšstilbu rajonā. 26,6% respondentu izmantoja profilaktiskas metodes, 20% mēģināja ārstēt jau esošo SD. Ar Pīrsona korelāciju tika konstatēts, ka pastāv korelācija starp augstāku ādas pakāpi Ficpatrika skalā un SD garumu, un starp ķermeņa reģionu skaitu ar SD un ĶMI. 30,7% respondentu SD negatīvi ietekmē viņu dzīves kvalitāti. Ar Spīrmena korelāciju tika konstatēts, ka pastāv korelācija starp ķermeņa reģionu skaitu ar SD un augstāku QoL traucējumu. Secinājumi: Straujš svara pieaugums izraisa SD veidošanās apburto loku. Īpaši augstāks ĶMI, kas veicina SD attīstību vairākos ķermeņa reģionos. Tas savukārt rada lielāku negatīvo ietekmi uz QoL. Būtu jāizmanto standartizēts dzīves kvalitātes novērtēšanas protokols, lai noteiktu SD tiem, kam skarti vairāki ķermeņa reģioni, un kuru QoL ir zems, un ieteiktu veidus, kā samazināt SD, lai palielinātu QoL. Jāizpēta SD veidošanās mehānismi dažādiem ādas tipiem un kādus aizsargmehānismus veidus izmantot tumšākiem ādas tipiem, lai radītu labākas SD profilakses metodes visiem ādas tipiem.Background: Striae distensae (SD) are skin lesions, that are seen in a big proportion of people. Their causes can be physiological and pathological. It has been debated that they cause decrease in self-confidence, yet a standardized evaluation method to evaluate it, has not been applied in medicine. Objectives: The aim of this study is to find how much do SD affect quality of life (QoL); if SD characteristics correlate with QoL and other factors of the respondent. Additionally prevention and treatment of SD among respondents will be analysed. Materials and Methods: An anonymous survey was created using Google Forms and shared via authors social media channels between January till February 2021. Demographic data, SD characteristics, their prevention and treatment, was collected and Dermatology Life Quality Index scale questionnaire used for QoL evaluation. Results: Most common cause of SD was rapid weight gain and SD were located most commonly on thigh region. 26,6% of respondents used preventive methods against SD, 20% have tried to combat the already existing SD. With Pearson correlation it was found, that there is a correlation between higher rank of skin on Fitzpatrick scale and length of SD and between number of body regions with SD and BMI. 30.7% of respondents have a negative effect of SD on their QoL. With Spearman correlation it was found that there is a correlation between number of body regions with SD and higher impairment of QoL. Conclusion: Rapid weight gain causes a vicious cycle of SD formation. Especially higher BMI, contributing to higher number of multiple body regions with SD. This in turn causing a higher negative effect on QoL. A standardized life quality evaluation protocol should be used, to pin out the ones, with SD on multiple body regions, whose QoL suffers and recommend ways on how to minimize SD, in order to increase the QoL. Mechanisms of SD formation on different skin types should be studied and ways to utilize the protective mechanisms in darker skin types, to achieve better SD prevention methods in all skin types

Effects of cannabinoids and related fatty acids upon the viability of P19 embryonal carcinoma cells

Compounds acting on the cannabinoid (CB) receptors are involved in the control of cell fate, and there is an emerging consensus that CBs have anticancer effects. However, the CB-mediated effects are contradictory since some studies suggest stimulatory effects on cancer cell proliferation, and CBs have been shown to stimulate both proliferation and differentiation of other mitotic cells such as stem and progenitor cells. In this study, the concentration-dependent effects of synthetic and endogenous CBs on the viability of mouse P19 embryonal carcinoma (EC) cells have been examined by using fluorescence assays of cell membrane integrity, cell proliferation, oxidative stress, and detection of apoptosis and necrosis. All compounds examined produced a concentration-dependent decrease in cell viability in the micromolar range, with the potent CB receptor agonist HU 210 and the enantiomer HU 211(with no CB receptor activity) being the most potent compounds examined with apparent IC50 values of 1 µM and 0.6 µM, respectively. The endogenous CB anandamide showed similar potency and efficacy as structurally related polyunsaturated fatty acids with no reported activity at the CB receptors. The rapid (within hours) decrease in cell viability induced by the examined CBs suggests cytocidal rather than antiproliferative effects, and is dependent on the plating cell population density with the highest toxicity around 100 cells/mm2. The CB-induced cytotoxicity, that appears to involve CB receptors and the sphingomyelin-ceramide pathway, is a mixture of both apoptosis and necrosis that can be blocked by the antioxidants α-tocopherol and N-acetylcysteine. In conclusion, both synthetic and endogenous CBs, produce seemingly unspecific cytotoxic effects in the P19 EC cells