The relation among achievement goals and academic achievement in statistics: the mediating role of statistics anxiety and statistics self-efficacy

AbstractIn order to predict student's academic achievement in statistics in terms of achievement goals, statistics anxiety and statistics selfefficacy, 323 participants from Fars Peyame Noor Universities were selected via multi- stage cluster sampling and then were asked to fill in a set of questionnaires, consisted of achievement goals, statistics anxiety and statistics self-efficacy scales. Results of path analysis generally showed that achievement goals indirectly and through statistics anxiety and statistics self-efficacy affect students’ achievement in statistics. Moreover, results showed that unlike avoidance-performance goals, the indirect effect of mastery goals on statistical achievement is positive

Blood Pressure Estimation from Electrocardiogram and Photoplethysmography Signals Using Continuous Wavelet Transform and Convolutional Neural Network

Cuff-less and continuous blood pressure (BP) measurement has recently become an active research area in the field of remote healthcare monitoring. There is a growing demand for automated BP estimation and monitoring for various long-term and chronic conditions. Automated BP monitoring can produce a good amount of rich health data, which increases the chance of early diagnosis and treatments that are critical for a long-term condition such as hypertension and Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs). However, mining and processing this vast amount of data is challenging, which is aimed to address in this research. We employed a continuous wavelet transform (CWT) and a deep convolutional neural network (CNN) to estimate the BP. The electrocardiogram (ECG), photoplethysmography (PPG) and arterial blood pressure (ABP) signals were extracted from the online Medical Information Mart for Intensive Care (MIMIC III) database. The scalogram of each signal was created and used for training and testing our proposed CNN model that can implicitly learn to extract the descriptive features from the training data. This study achieved a promising BP estimation approach has been achieved without employing engineered feature extraction that is comparable with previous works. Experimental results demonstrated a low root mean squere error (RMSE) rate of 3.36 mmHg and a high accuracy of 86.3% for BP estimations. The proposed CNN-based model can be considered as a reliable and feasible approach to estimate BP for continuous remote healthcare monitoring

Use of NH4Cl for activation of carbon xerogel to prepare a novel efficacious adsorbent for benzene removal from contaminated air streams in a fixed-bed column

Background: Ammonium chloride as an explosive salt has proved to be a prominent activation agent for adsorbents and increase the specific surface area and volume of cavities. In this work, the ability of this substance was scrutinized for activation of carbon aerogel to prepare an efficient adsorbent for benzene removal from air streams. Methods: A carbon xerogel was fabricated from Novallac polymer and activated by ammonium chloride.The changes in structure and morphology were considered via Brunauer�Emmett�Teller (BET), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Fourier transform infrared (FTIR), Barrett-Joyner-Halenda (BJH), and energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) analyses. Also, comprehensive studies were conducted to vouchsafe the properties of the new adsorbent for benzene removal, using a fixed-bed column mode. Results: The results showed both the successful synthesis and the suitability of the activation process. ACX possessed a higher specific surface area (1008 g/m3), compared to the parent carbon xerogel (CX; 543.7 g/m3) and organic xerogel (OX; 47 g/m3), as well as a higher adsorption capacity. Conclusion: NH4CL is a very beneficial for modifying the structure and morphology of carbon aerogel, and the dynamic behavior of the column with respect inlet benzene concentration can be explained by Yan-Nelson model. © 2020, The Author(s)

Streptozotocin induced oxidative stress, innate immune system responses and behavioral abnormalities in male mice

Recent evidence indicates the involvement of inflammatory factors and mitochondrial dysfunction in the etiology of psychiatric disorders such as anxiety and depression. To investigate the possible role of mitochondrial-induced sterile inflammation in the co-occurrence of anxiety and depression, in this study, we treated adult male mice with the intracerebroventricular (i.c.v.) infusion of a single low dose of streptozotocin (STZ, 0.2 mg/mouse). Using valid and qualified behavioral tests for the assessment of depressive and anxiety-like behaviors, we showed that STZ-treated mice exhibited behaviors relevant to anxiety and depression 24 h following STZ treatment. We observed that the co-occurrence of anxiety and depressive-like behaviors in animals were associated with abnormal mitochondrial function, nitric oxide overproduction and, the increased activity of cytosolic phospholipase A2 (cPLA2) in the hippocampus. Further, STZ-treated mice had a significant upregulation of genes associated with the innate immune system such as toll-like receptors 2 and 4. Pathological evaluations showed no sign of neurodegeneration in the hippocampus of STZ-treated mice. Results of this study revealed that behavioral abnormalities provoked by STZ, as a cytotoxic agent that targets mitochondria and energy metabolism, are associated with abnormal mitochondrial activity and, consequently the initiation of innate-inflammatory responses in the hippocampus. Our findings highlight the role of mitochondria and innate immunity in the formation of sterile inflammation and behaviors relevant to anxiety and depression. Also, we have shown that STZ injection (i.c.v.) might be an animal model for depression and anxiety disorders based on sterile inflammation

Oxytocin mitigated the depressive-like behaviors of maternal separation stress through modulating mitochondrial function and neuroinflammation

Mother-infant contact has a critical role on brain development and behavior. Experiencing early-life adversities (such as maternal separation stress or MS in rodents) results in adaptations of neurotransmission systems, which may subsequently increase the risk of depression symptoms later in life. In this study, we show that Oxytocin (OT) exerted antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. Previous studies indicate that neuroinflammation and mitochondrial dysfunction are associated with the pathophysiology of depression. To investigate the antidepressant-like effects of OT, we applied MS paradigm (as a valid animal model of depression) to male mice at postnatal day (PND) 2 to PND 14 (3 h daily, 9 AM to 12 AM) and investigated the depressive-like behaviors of these animals at PND 60 in different groups. Animals in this work were divided into 4 experimental groups: 1) saline-treated, 2) OT-treated, 3) atosiban (OT antagonist)-treated and, 4) OT + atosiban-treated mice. We used forced swimming test (FST), splash test, sucrose preference test (SPT) and open field test (OFT) for behavioral assessment. Additionally, we used another set of animals to investigate the effects of MS and different treatments on mitochondrial function and the expression of the relevant genes for neuroinflammation. Our results showed that MS provoked depressive- like behaviors in the FST, SPT and splash test. In addition, our molecular findings revealed that MS is capable of inducing abnormal mitochondrial function and immune-inflammatory response in the hippocampus. Further, we observed that treating stressed animals with OT (intracerebroventricular, i.c.v. injection) attenuated the MS-induced depressive-like behaviors through improving mitochondrial function and decreasing the hippocampal expression of immune-inflammatory genes. In conclusion, we showed that MS-induced depressive-like behaviors in adult male mice are associated with abnormal mitochondrial function and immune-inflammatory responses in the hippocampus, and activation of OTergic system has protective effects against negative effects of MS on brain and behavior of animals

Attenuation of oxidative and nitrosative stress in cortical area associates with antidepressant-like effects of tropisetron in male mice following social isolation stress.

Tropisetron, a 5-HT3 receptor antagonist widely used as an antiemetic, has been reported to have positive effects on mood disorders. Adolescence is a critical period during the development of brain, where exposure to chronic stress during this time is highly associated with the development of depression. In this study, we showed that 4 weeks of juvenile social isolation stress (SIS) provoked depressive-like behaviors in male mice, which was associated with disruption of mitochondrial function and nitric oxide overproduction in the cortical areas. In this study, tropisetron (5 mg/kg) reversed the negative behavioral effects of SIS in male mice. We found that the effects of tropisetron were mediated through mitigating the negative activity of inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) on mitochondrial activity. Administration of aminoguanidine (specific iNOS inhibitor, 20 mg/kg) augmented the protective effects of tropisetron (1 mg/kg) on SIS. Furthermore, l-arginine (nitric oxide precursor, 100 mg/kg) abolished the positive effects of tropisetron. These results have increased our knowledge on the pivotal role of mitochondrial function in the pathophysiology of depression, and highlighted the role of 5-HT3 receptors in psychosocial stress response during adolescence. Finally, we observed that tropisetron alleviated the mitochondrial dysfunction through decreased nitrergic system activity in the cerebral corte

Global, regional, and national burden of colorectal cancer and its risk factors, 1990–2019: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019

Funding: F Carvalho and E Fernandes acknowledge support from Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I.P. (FCT), in the scope of the project UIDP/04378/2020 and UIDB/04378/2020 of the Research Unit on Applied Molecular Biosciences UCIBIO and the project LA/P/0140/2020 of the Associate Laboratory Institute for Health and Bioeconomy i4HB; FCT/MCTES through the project UIDB/50006/2020. J Conde acknowledges the European Research Council Starting Grant (ERC-StG-2019-848325). V M Costa acknowledges the grant SFRH/BHD/110001/2015, received by Portuguese national funds through Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT), IP, under the Norma Transitória DL57/2016/CP1334/CT0006.proofepub_ahead_of_prin