Socio-Economic Factors of Empowerment in Developing Countries

The study is carried to identify the main socio economic cultural and political view determinants of women empowerment in the developing countries. The highest determination of the study is to analyze and identify the variables through which the process of women empowerment can be measured. This study is based on secondary data and reported to analyze the empowerment factor of women in 124 developing countries, the data was ordinal in nature and randomly selected from the population. The main investigation of this research study to analyzed the relationship of women fertility, socio-economic and political factor on the women empowerment. After conducting a cross sectional study for the most recent period, the findings of study show that the main deterrents towards women disempowerment are attributed as high fertility rates, high maternal mortality, gender inequality, lack of female’s access towards education, health and economic opportunities, lack of leadership and decision making qualities. It is found that a patriarchal culture is equally responsible for women in sufferings and disempowerment. However, democracy and democratic culture can contribute well in upgrading the process of women empowerment in developing countries

Explaining variations in semiconductor catch-up strategies in China, Korea, Malaysia and Taiwan

Presented at the GLOBELICS 6th International Conference 2008 22-24 September, Mexico City, Mexico

Transmission infrared micro-spectroscopic study of individual human hair

Understanding the optical transmission property of human hair, especially in the infrared regime, is vital in physical, clinical, and biomedical research. However, the majority of infrared spectroscopy on human hair is performed in the reflection mode, which only probes the absorptance of the surface layer. The direct transmission spectrum of individual hair without horizontal cut offers a rapid and non-destructive test of the hair cortex but is less investigated experimentally due to the small size and strong absorption of the hair. In this work, we conduct transmission infrared micro-spectroscopic study on individual human hair. By utilizing direct measurements of the transmission spectrum using a Fourier-transform infrared microscope, the human hair is found to display prominent band filtering behavior. The high spatial resolution of infrared micro-spectroscopy further allows the comparison among different regions of hair. In a case study of adult-onset Still's disease, the corresponding infrared transmission exhibits systematic variations of spectral weight as the disease evolves. The geometry effect of the internal hair structure is further quantified using the finite-element simulation. The results imply that the variation of spectral weight may relate to the disordered microscopic structure variation of the hair cortex during the inflammatory attack. Our work reveals the potential of hair infrared transmission spectrum in tracing the variation of hair cortex retrospectively

Efficacy and safety of traditional Chinese medicine adjuvant therapy for severe pneumonia: evidence mapping of the randomized controlled trials, systematic reviews, and meta-analyses

Background and Objective: Severe pneumonia is a critical respiratory disease with high mortality. There is insufficient evidence on the efficacy and safety of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) adjuvant therapy for severe pneumonia. This study aims to identify, describe, assess, and summarize the currently available high-quality design evidence on TCM adjuvant therapy for severe pneumonia to identify evidence gaps using the evidence mapping approach.Methods: Systematic searches were performed on English and Chinese online databases (PubMed, EMBASE, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, CNKI, WanFang Data, CQVIP, and SinoMed) to identify papers from inception until August 2023 for inclusion into the review. Randomized controlled trials (RCTs), systematic reviews (SRs), and meta-analyses concerning TCM adjuvant therapy for severe pneumonia or its complications in adults were included. The risk of bias in RCTs was evaluated by using the Cochrane Handbook ROB tool. The Assessment of Multiple Systematic Reviews 2 (AMSTAR-2), the Risk of Bias in Systematic Review (ROBIS) tool, and the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) system were used to assess the methodological quality, risk of bias, and evidence quality of SRs or meta-analyses, respectively. Then, a bubble plot was designed to visually display information in four dimensions.Results: A total of 354 RCTs and 17 SRs or meta-analyses met the inclusion criteria. The published RCTs had several flaws, such as unreasonable design, limited sample size, insufficient attention to non-drug therapy studies and syndrome differentiation, improper selection or use of outcome indicators, and failure to provide high-quality evidence. Sixteen SRs or meta-analyses of methodological quality scored “Critically Low” confidence. Twelve SRs or meta-analyses were rated as “High Risk.” Most outcomes were rated as “Low” evidence quality. We found that TCM combined with conventional treatment could improve the clinical total effective rate and the TCM syndromes efficacy. The combined approach could also shorten mechanical ventilation time, infection control time, and length of hospital and ICU stay; significantly reduce temperature, respiratory rate, heart rate, white blood cell counts, levels of C-reactive protein, procalcitonin, blood inflammatory factors, bacteriological response, and D-dimer; decrease CPIS, APACHE II score, and PSI score; improve pulmonary imaging features, arterial blood gas indicators (including arterial oxygen pressure, arterial oxygen saturation, and oxygen index), and lung function (including forced vital capacity and forced expiratory volume in the first second) for severe pneumonia compared with conventional treatment only (p < 0.05). There was no significant difference in adverse reactions and incidence of adverse events (p > 0.05). In addition, compared with conventional treatment only, most SRs or meta-analyses concluded that TCM combined with conventional treatment was “Beneficial” or “Probably beneficial.”Conclusion: TCM combined with conventional treatment had advantages in efficacy, clinical signs, laboratory results, and life quality outcomes of severe pneumonia, with no difference in safety outcomes compared with conventional treatment only. QingJin Huatan decoction is the most promising target, and Xuanbai Chengqi decoction has a “Probably beneficial” conclusion. XueBiJing injection and TanReQing injection are two commonly used Chinese herbal injections for treating severe pneumonia, and both are “Probably beneficial.” However, there was a need for multicenter RCTs with large sample sizes and high methodological quality in the future. In addition, the methodological design and quality of SRs or meta-analyses should be improved to form high-quality, evidence-based medical evidence and provide evidence for the effectiveness and safety of TCM adjuvant therapy for severe pneumonia

A Marr's Three‐Level Analytical Framework for Neuromorphic Electronic Systems

Neuromorphic electronics, an emerging field that aims for building electronic mimics of the biological brain, holds promise for reshaping the frontiers of information technology and enabling a more intelligent and efficient computing paradigm. As their biological brain counterpart, the neuromorphic electronic systems are complex, having multiple levels of organization. Inspired by David Marr's famous three-level analytical framework developed for neuroscience, the advances in neuromorphic electronic systems are selectively surveyed and given significance to these research endeavors as appropriate from the computational level, algorithmic level, or implementation level. Under this framework, the problem of how to build a neuromorphic electronic system is defined in a tractable way. In conclusion, the development of neuromorphic electronic systems confronts a similar challenge to the one neuroscience confronts, that is, the limited constructability of the low-level knowledge (implementations and algorithms) to achieve high-level brain-like (human-level) computational functions. An opportunity arises from the communication among different levels and their codesign. Neuroscience lab-on-neuromorphic chip platforms offer additional opportunity for mutual benefit between the two disciplines

Kininogen Level in the Cerebrospinal Fluid May Be a Potential Biomarker for Predicting Epileptogenesis

Purpose: Epilepsy is a highly disabling neurological disorder. Brain insult is the most critical cause of epilepsy in adults. This study aimed to find reliable and efficient biomarkers for predicting secondary epilepsy.Materials and methods: The LiCl-pilocarpine (LiCl-Pilo) chronic epilepsy rat model was used, and rat cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) was collected 5 days after status epilepticus (SE). The CSF was analyzed using the label-free LC-ESI-Q-TOF-MS/MS. Differential expression of proteins was confirmed using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and Western blotting. The corresponding protein level in the CSF of patients with encephalitis in the postacute phase was determined using ELISA and compared between patients with and without symptomatic epilepsy after encephalitis during a 2-year follow-up.Results: The proteomics and ELISA results showed that the protein level of kininogen (KNG) was obviously elevated in both CSF and hippocampus, but not in serum, 5 days after the onset of SE in LiCl-Pilo chronic epilepsy model rats. In patients with encephalitis, the protein level of KNG in the CSF in the postacute phase was significantly elevated in patients with a recurrent epileptic seizure during a 2-year follow-up than in patients without a recurrent seizure.Conclusion: KNG in the CSF may serve as a potential biomarker for predicting epileptogenesis in patients with encephalitis

Apelin protects auditory cells from cisplatin-induced toxicity in vitro by inhibiting ROS and apoptosis

Apelin, a specific endogenous ligand of the G protein-coupled receptor APJ, suppresses oxidative stress and apoptosis in vitro and in vivo. The current study explored whether Apelin protects against toxicity induced by the anticancer drug cisplatin in vitro, and the possible mechanisms that underlie this protective effect. The results showed that Apelin was expressed in the mouse auditory cell line HEI-OC1 and in cochlear hair cells (HCs) and was significantly downregulated by cisplatin, whereas pre-treatment with exogenous Apelin significantly reduced cisplatin-induced apoptosis, and thus protected HEI-OC1 cells and cochlear HCs from cisplatin-induced injury. Furthermore, Apelin reduced reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation, rescued mitochondrial membrane potential disruption, inhibited JNK signaling and attenuated the expression of pro-apoptotic factors in HEI-OC1 cells and in cochlear explants treated with cisplatin. Our findings suggest that Apelin could be used as an otoprotective agent for the prevention of cisplatin-induced ototoxicity

A study of factors influencing long-term glycemic variability in patients with type 2 diabetes: a structural equation modeling approach

AimThe present study aims to utilize structural equation modeling (SEM) to investigate the factors impacting long-term glycemic variability among patients afflicted with type 2 diabetes.MethodThe present investigation is a retrospective cohort study that involved the collection of data on patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus who received care at a hospital located in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, over a period spanning from January 1, 2013, to October 30, 2022. Inclusion criteria required patients to have had at least three laboratory test results available. Pertinent patient-related information encompassing general demographic characteristics and biochemical indicators was gathered. Variability in the dataset was defined by standard deviation (SD) and coefficient of variation (CV), with glycosylated hemoglobin variation also considering variability score (HVS). Linear regression analysis was employed to establish the structural equation models for statistically significant influences on long-term glycemic variability. Structural equation modeling was employed to analyze effects and pathways.ResultsDiabetes outpatient special disease management, uric acid variability, mean triglyceride levels, mean total cholesterol levels, total cholesterol variability, LDL variability, baseline glycated hemoglobin, and recent glycated hemoglobin were identified as significant factors influencing long-term glycemic variability. The overall fit of the structural equation model was found to be satisfactory and it was able to capture the relationship between outpatient special disease management, biochemical indicators, and glycated hemoglobin variability. According to the total effect statistics, baseline glycated hemoglobin and total cholesterol levels exhibited the strongest impact on glycated hemoglobin variability.ConclusionThe factors that have a significant impact on the variation of glycosylated hemoglobin include glycosylated hemoglobin itself, lipids, uric acid, and outpatient special disease management for diabetes. The identification and management of these associated factors can potentially mitigate long-term glycemic variability, thereby delaying the onset of complications and enhancing patients’ quality of life

An evaluation of the lighting environment in the public space of shopping centres

Interior lighting quality influences people's visual comfort and satisfaction with a space. Based on a field study about the effects of lighting environments on occupancies in eight shopping malls with three different latitudes and a wide range of size from 30,000 to 210,000 m2 all over China, this study investigates the differences in subjective evaluations, the correlations between the lighting environments of public spaces and people's evaluations, and the regressions of scene mean luminance. A questionnaire survey and HDR-image techniques have been used to gather subjective feedback and collect physical lighting data. The results show that the subjective evaluations among different groups (gender, age, education background, and duration of stay in the shopping malls) are similar. The existence of daylighting plays an important role in subjective satisfaction, but not crucial enough to their brightness perception. The mean luminance values of these scenes are closely correlated to the diversity of the subjective evaluations. For shopping centres, the optimal Lmean value is 1000 cd/m2 for a mixed daylighting and artificial lighting environment, and 75 cd/m2 as the recommended Lmean value for an artificial lighting environment