Search

BackgroundThe scale and quality of the global scientific response to the COVID-19 pandemic have unquestionably saved lives. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has also triggered an unprecedented “infodemic”; the velocity and volume of data production have overwhelmed many key stakeholders such as clinicians and policy makers, as they have been unable to process structured and unstructured data for evidence-based decision making. Solutions that aim to alleviate this data synthesis–related challenge are unable to capture heterogeneous web data in real time for the production of concomitant answers and are not based on the high-quality information in responses to a free-text query. ObjectiveThe main objective of this project is to build a generic, real-time, continuously updating curation platform that can support the data synthesis and analysis of a scientific literature framework. Our secondary objective is to validate this platform and the curation methodology for COVID-19–related medical literature by expanding the COVID-19 Open Research Dataset via the addition of new, unstructured data. MethodsTo create an infrastructure that addresses our objectives, the PanSurg Collaborative at Imperial College London has developed a unique data pipeline based on a web crawler extraction methodology. This data pipeline uses a novel curation methodology that adopts a human-in-the-loop approach for the characterization of quality, relevance, and key evidence across a range of scientific literature sources. ResultsREDASA (Realtime Data Synthesis and Analysis) is now one of the world’s largest and most up-to-date sources of COVID-19–related evidence; it consists of 104,000 documents. By capturing curators’ critical appraisal methodologies through the discrete labeling and rating of information, REDASA rapidly developed a foundational, pooled, data science data set of over 1400 articles in under 2 weeks. These articles provide COVID-19–related information and represent around 10% of all papers about COVID-19. ConclusionsThis data set can act as ground truth for the future implementation of a live, automated systematic review. The three benefits of REDASA’s design are as follows: (1) it adopts a user-friendly, human-in-the-loop methodology by embedding an efficient, user-friendly curation platform into a natural language processing search engine; (2) it provides a curated data set in the JavaScript Object Notation format for experienced academic reviewers’ critical appraisal choices and decision-making methodologies; and (3) due to the wide scope and depth of its web crawling method, REDASA has already captured one of the world’s largest COVID-19–related data corpora for searches and curation.

Hückel molecular orbital (HMO) theory provides a semi-empirical treatment of the electronic structure in conjugated π-electronic systems. A scalable system-agnostic execution of HMO theory on a quantum computer is reported here based on a variational quantum deflation (VQD) algorithm for excited state quantum simulation. A compact encoding scheme is proposed here that provides an exponential advantage over the direct mapping and allows for quantum simulation of the HMO model for systems with up to 2n conjugated centers with n qubits. The transformation of the Hückel Hamiltonian to qubit space is achieved by two different strategies: an iterative refinement transformation and the Frobenius-inner-product-based transformation. These methods are tested on a series of linear, cyclic, and hetero-nuclear conjugated π-electronic systems. The molecular orbital energy levels and wavefunctions from the quantum simulation are in excellent agreement with the exact classical results. However, the higher excited states of large systems are found to suffer from error accumulation in the VQD simulation. This is mitigated by formulating a variant of VQD that exploits the symmetry of the Hamiltonian. This strategy has been successfully demonstrated for the quantum simulation of C60 fullerene containing 680 Pauli strings encoded on six qubits. The methods developed in this work are easily adaptable to similar problems of different complexity in other fields of research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Classical optimizers play a crucial role in determining the accuracy and convergence of variational quantum algorithms; leading algorithms use a near-term quantum computer to solve the ground state properties of molecules, simulate dynamics of different quantum systems, and so on. In the literature, many optimizers, each having its own architecture, have been employed expediently for different applications. In this work, we consider a few popular and efficacious optimizers and assess their performance in variational quantum algorithms for applications in quantum chemistry in a realistic noisy setting. We benchmark the optimizers with critical analysis based on quantum simulations of simple molecules, such as hydrogen, lithium hydride, beryllium hydride, water, and hydrogen fluoride. The errors in the ground state energy, dissociation energy, and dipole moment are the parameters used as yardsticks. All the simulations were carried out with an ideal quantum circuit simulator, a noisy quantum circuit simulator, and finally a noisy simulator with noise embedded from the IBM Cairo quantum device to understand the performance of the classical optimizers in ideal and realistic quantum environments. We used the standard unitary coupled cluster ansatz for simulations, and the number of qubits varied from two starting from the hydrogen molecule to ten qubits in hydrogen fluoride. Based on the performance of these optimizers in the ideal quantum circuits, the conjugate gradient, limited-memory Broyden—Fletcher—Goldfarb—Shanno bound, and sequential least squares programming optimizers are found to be the best-performing gradient-based optimizers. While constrained optimization by linear approximation (COBYLA) and Powell's conjugate direction algorithm for unconstrained optimization (POWELL) perform most efficiently among the gradient-free methods, in noisy quantum circuit conditions, simultaneous perturbation stochastic approximation, POWELL, and COBYLA are among the best-performing optimizers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Seasonal freeze–thaw (F–T) cycles significantly affect the mechanical properties of soils and the behavior of pile foundations in soils subjected to F–T cycles under different loading conditions. Soils exposed to F–T cycles can impact the performance of pile foundations. Consequently, the effects of F–T cycles should be taken into account when designing piles, particularly in cold regions such as Canada. In recent years, climatic conditions in Canada have changed due to global warming, increasing the number of F–T cycles in many regions each year. This study aimed to investigate the influence of different numbers of F–T cycles on the behavior of piles in sandy soils. Laboratory experiments were conducted on physical models of piles subjected to axial (uplift) and lateral loads combined with F–T cycles. The model was scaled using standard scaling principles, and the test apparatus was equipped with various sensors to measure temperatures, forces, and displacements. The results showed that as the number of F–T cycles increased, the lateral capacities of the piles under individual and combined loads increased steadily. The lateral load capacity increased from 350 to 430 N after five F–T cycles under individual loading and from 225 to 455 N after five F–T cycles under combined loading. However, the pile's uplift load capacity remained constant under individual and combined loads and there was no change due to F–T cycles. The results of this experimental study will be useful for understanding the behavior of piles subjected to seasonal F–T cycles and for improving the design of pile foundations in cold regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: To evaluate the association between obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) and thyroid eye disease (TED) and its effect on disease activity. Methods: A prospective case–control study was conducted from January 2020 to March 2022. All TED patients (group A) were clinically evaluated. The activity of thyroid eye disease was calculated based on the clinical activity score (CAS), and grading of severity was done according to the EUGOGO classification. All TED patients (group A) were screened for OSA using the Snoring Tired Observed Pressure (STOP)-Bang survey. Age- and gender-matched control group patients (group B) without TED were screened for OSA. Results: One hundred TED patients and 138 control patients without TED were included in the respective groups. Sixty-two (62%) patients in group A and 48 (34.78%) patients in group B were having high risk of OSA, and this difference was statistically significant (P = 0.001). Further, in group A patients, on univariate analysis, TED activity was significantly associated with a high risk of OSA (P = 0.009). On multivariate logistic regression analysis, OSA also showed significant association with TED activity (odds ratio [OR]: 4.14, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.11-18.85 at 10% level; P = 0.05). Conclusion: Our study showed that OSA is significantly associated with TED disease and its activity. However, no significant association was found between OSA and severity of the disease. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Boolean functions are fundamental bricks in the development of various applications in Cryptography and Coding theory by making benefit from the weights of related Boolean functions (Walsh spectrum). Towards this, the discrete Fourier transform (Walsh–Hadamard) plays a pivotal tool. The work in this paper is dedicated towards the algebraic and numerical degrees, together with the relationship between weights of Boolean function and their Walsh transforms. We introduce Walsh matrices and generalize them to any arbitrary Boolean function. This improves the complexity in computation of Walsh–Hadamard and Fourier transform in certain cases. We also discuss some useful results related to the degree of the algebraic normal form using Walsh–Hadamard transform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wireless technology has brought many changes in the way of communication in modern days. With the increased world wide employment of wireless technology, there is raising concern about the security standards of the technology. Many encryptions and decryption techniques have been implemented today to transmit data over the networks. Despite that, many authentication methods have also been applied. However, such methods must be validated to ensure the security of wireless networks. [1] Penetration testing is the one which can be used to identify the unknown void in the network. This makes pen test crucial to validate the security mechanisms of the system and outcomes of penetration testing could be used to secure the network. This paper will present an overview of penetration testing and tools. For this purpose, this paper will review the previous work done on the security of wireless networks using penetration testing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: The aim of this study was to evaluate and compare the antibacterial action of QMix and MTAD with Sodium hypochlorite against Enterococcus faecalis and Porphyromonas endodontalis by PCR and culture technique. Materials and Methods: For this in-vivo study sixty patients were selected and were divided into three equal groups according to the endodontic irrigating solutions (Sodium hypochlorite, Q Mix and MTAD) used for the study. After the access opening of the infected teeth, the samples from the root canal were obtained with the help of paper points and sent for microbiological analysis. The samples were processed aerobically and anaerobically using the culture technique for the detection of Enterococcus faecalis and Porphyromonas endodontalis. The samples were also put to PCR analysis for the detection of these microorganisms. The number of positive samples obtained by either technique was then recorded and the results were statistically analyzed. Results: In the present study, the rate of detection of the microorganisms under study was higher by PCR technique than culture. When used as an endodontic irrigant against the target bacteria, BioPure MTAD proved to be better than 5.25% sodium hypochlorite and Q Mix though the results were statistically insignificant (P< 0.05). Conclusion: BioPure MTAD was seen to have a higher antibacterial effect against the bacteria than NaOCl and Q Mix and this finding was better supported by the PCR analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Let F q denote the finite field of order q , let m 1 , m 2 , ⋯ , m ℓ be positive integers satisfying gcd ⁡ ( m i , q ) = 1 for 1 ≤ i ≤ ℓ , and let n = m 1 + m 2 + ⋯ + m ℓ . Let Λ = ( λ 1 , λ 2 , ⋯ , λ ℓ ) be fixed, where λ 1 , λ 2 , ⋯ , λ ℓ are non-zero elements of F q . In this paper, we study the algebraic structure of Λ-multi-twisted codes of length n over F q and their dual codes with respect to the standard inner product on F q n . We provide necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of a self-dual Λ-multi-twisted code of length n over F q , and obtain enumeration formulae for all self-dual and self-orthogonal Λ-multi-twisted codes of length n over F q . We also derive some sufficient conditions under which a Λ-multi-twisted code is linear with complementary dual (LCD). We determine the parity-check polynomial of all Λ-multi-twisted codes of length n over F q and obtain a BCH type bound on their minimum Hamming distances. We also determine generating sets of dual codes of some Λ-multi-twisted codes of length n over F q from the generating sets of the codes. Besides this, we provide a trace description for all Λ-multi-twisted codes of length n over F q by viewing these codes as direct sums of certain concatenated codes, which leads to a method to construct these codes. We also obtain a lower bound on their minimum Hamming distances using their multilevel concatenated structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is noticeable how the novel coronavirus has spread from the Wuhan region of China to the whole world, devastating the lives of people worldwide. All the data related to the precautionary measures, diagnosis, treatment, and even the epidemiological data are being made freely accessible and reachable in a very little time as well as being rapidly published to save humankind from this pandemic. There might be neurological complications of COVID-19 and patients suffering from neurodegenerative conditions like Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease might have repercussions as a result of the pandemic. In this review article, we have discussed the effect of SARS-CoV-2 viral infection on the people affected with neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. It primarily emphasizes two issues, i.e., vulnerability to infection and modifications of course of the disease concerning the clinical neurological manifestations, the advancement of the disease and novel approaches to support health care professionals in disease management, the susceptibility to these diseases, and impact on the severity of disease and management., (Copyright© Bentham Science Publishers; For any queries, please email at epub@benthamscience.net.)