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In this systematic evaluation of intervention research for transition-age autistic youth, we examined quality indicators in 193 group and single-case design intervention studies, which tested effects on 1258 outcomes. Behaviorally based interventions were the most common intervention type. We found significant threats to internal validity for the majority of studies, including inadequate randomization, unmasked assessors, and too few data points to infer functional relations. The majority of outcomes were measured in contexts similar to the intervention and were conceptualized as behaviors directly addressed by intervention procedures. As such, they are of unclear long-term utility for autistic people entering adulthood. Adverse events were rarely reported. We suggest several avenues for improving intervention research for this age group.

BackgroundViral tracers are important tools for mapping brain connectomes. The feature of predominant anterograde transneuronal transmission offers herpes simplex virus-1 (HSV-1) strain H129 (HSV1-H129) as a promising candidate to be developed as anterograde viral tracers. In our earlier studies, we developed H129-derived anterograde polysynaptic tracers and TK deficient (H129-dTK) monosynaptic tracers. However, their broad application is limited by some intrinsic drawbacks of the H129-dTK tracers, such as low labeling intensity due to TK deficiency and potential retrograde labeling caused by axon terminal invasion. The glycoprotein K (gK) of HSV-1 plays important roles in virus entry, egress, and virus-induced cell fusion. Its deficiency severely disables virus egress and spread, while only slightly limits viral genome replication and expression of viral proteins. Therefore, we created a novel H129-derived anterograde monosynaptic tracer (H129-dgK) by targeting gK, which overcomes the limitations of H129-dTK.MethodsUsing our established platform and pipeline for developing viral tracers, we generated a novel tracer by deleting the gK gene from the H129-G4. The gK-deleted virus (H129-dgK-G4) was reconstituted and propagated in the Vero cell expressing wildtype H129 gK (gKwt) or the mutant gK (gKmut, A40V, C82S, M223I, L224V, V309M), respectively. Then the obtained viral tracers of gKmut pseudotyped and gKwt coated H129-dgK-G4 were tested in vitro and in vivo to characterize their tracing properties.ResultsH129-dgK-G4 expresses high levels of fluorescent proteins, eliminating the requirement of immunostaining for imaging detection. Compared to the TK deficient monosynaptic tracer H129-dTK-G4, H129-dgK-G4 labeled neurons with 1.76-fold stronger fluorescence intensity, and visualized 2.00-fold more postsynaptic neurons in the downstream brain regions. gKmut pseudotyping leads to a 77% decrease in retrograde labeling by reducing axon terminal invasion, and thus dramatically improves the anterograde-specific tracing of H129-dgK-G4. In addition, assisted by the AAV helper trans-complementarily expressing gKwt, H129-dgK-G4 allows for mapping monosynaptic connections and quantifying the circuit connectivity difference in the Alzheimer's disease and control mouse brains.ConclusionsgKmut pseudotyped H129-dgK-G4, a novel anterograde monosynaptic tracer, overcomes the limitations of H129-dTK tracers, and demonstrates desirable features of strong labeling intensity, high tracing efficiency, and improved anterograde specificity.

The drying time was decreasedby concentrating T. Fuciformis soup before drying. Effects of removing moisture content (10%~50%) on the quality of the instant T. Fuciformis soup was explored. Compared with the samples without pretreatment, when the water content of the soup was removed within 40%, rehydration capacity, rheological properties and tribology properties of instant T. Fuciformis soup showed no significant difference. In addition, drying time could be reduced by up to 9.5 h per batch. When 50% of the water in the soup was removed, the tremella pieces were seriously agglomerated during the initial rehydration time, the water absorption rate and the rehydration rate of the product were slow. The rehydration capacity decreased significantly compared with other samples. Therefore, drying time of instant T. Fuciformis soup could be reduced by removing less than 40% of the water in the soup through pretreatment.

Thousands of educational apps are available to students, teachers, and parents, yet research on their effectiveness is limited. This meta-analysis synthesized findings from 36 intervention studies and 285 effect sizes evaluating the effectiveness of educational apps for preschool to Grade 3 children and the moderating role of methodological, participant, and intervention characteristics. Using random effects meta-regression with robust variance estimation, we summarized the overall impact of educational apps and examined potential moderator effects. First, results from rigorous experimental and quasi-experimental studies yielded a mean weighted effect size of +0.31 standard deviations on overall achievement and comparable effects in both math and literacy. Second, the positive overall effect masks substantial variability in app effectiveness, as meta-regression analyses revealed three significant moderators of treatment effects. Treatment effects were larger for studies involving preschool rather than K-3 students, for studies using researcher-developed rather than standardized outcomes, and for studies measuring constrained rather than unconstrained skills.

BackgroundThe differential diagnosis of frontotemporal dementia (FTD) and Alzheimer's disease (AD) is difficult due to the overlaps of clinical symptoms. Structural magnetic resonance imaging (sMRI) presents distinct brain atrophy and potentially helps in their differentiation. In this study, we aim at deriving a novel integrated index by leveraging the volumetric measures in brain regions with significant difference between AD and FTD and developing an MRI-based strategy for the differentiation of FTD and AD.MethodsIn this study, the data were acquired from three different databases, including 47 subjects with FTD, 47 subjects with AD, and 47 normal controls in the NACC database; 50 subjects with AD in the ADNI database; and 50 subjects with FTD in the FTLDNI database. The MR images of all subjects were automatically segmented, and the brain atrophy, including the AD resemblance atrophy index (AD-RAI), was quantified using AccuBrain®. A novel MRI index, named the frontotemporal dementia index (FTDI), was derived as the ratio between the weighted sum of the volumetric indexes in "FTD dominant" structures over that obtained from "AD dominant" structures. The weights and the identification of "FTD/AD dominant" structures were acquired from the statistical analysis of NACC data. The differentiation performance of FTDI was validated using independent data from ADNI and FTLDNI databases.ResultsAD-RAI is a proven imaging biomarker to identify AD and FTD from NC with significantly higher values (p

The mine power grid operating environment is poor. When a short circuit fault occurs in the underground power supply system, the use of complex anti-skip trip protection device will reduce the reliability of the entire power grid and increase the cost. The mine power grid needs to ensure that the current quick-break protection can act instantaneously to remove the short circuit fault, especially at the line outlet. The current mine power grid protection scheme of the anti-skip trip can not take into account the protection quick-action, power supply reliability and equipment economy. In order to solve the above problems, according to the minimum principle that short-circuit accident in the mine power grid can not skip to the ground, a setting strategy of instantaneous current quick-breaking protection for mine power grid based on the overall optimal principle is proposed. The relationship between the short-circuit current value and the location of short-circuit point and the distribution characteristics of short-circuit current at the beginning and end of the line are analyzed. The shortcomings of the traditional single-setting method are compared and studied. Three indexes are defined, which are minimum-maximum system impedance ratio, maximum system impedance and line impedance ratio, and adjacent line impedance ratio. The indexes are used to represent characteristic relational expressions of different short-circuit current distribution scenarios and conditions for each setting method to meet the requirements. The setting methods applicable to instantaneous current quick-breaking protection under different short-circuit current distribution scenarios are determined. The corresponding optimal setting strategy flow is proposed. Taking a typical mine power supply line as an example, according to the proposed setting strategy, the setting calculation of the protection switch at all levels is carried out. The results show that the setting strategy is used to set five protection switches with the risk of the skip trip in the mine power grid model. The protection range of four protection switches can be controlled within the two-level line. The times of skip trip accidents are reduced. The probability of underground short-circuit faults extending to the surface of the mine power grid is reduced.

Nowadays, eucheumatoids lead the rankings in globally cultivated seaweed production, including the seaweeds Kappaphycus alvarezii and Kappaphycus striatus. Eucheumatoids have declined in biomass over recent years, and climate change is regarded as one of the important factors. Thus, it is urgent to investigate the range dynamics of Kappaphycus under climate change. Considering its high practical relevance for conserving biodiversity, the niche conservatism hypothesis was tested between the two species through ecological niche modeling (ENM), ordination, and hypervolume approach which quantify the extent of niche overlap. In this study, we sifted the best-performing algorithm - Maxent and tuned parameters for fitting the distribution of both Kappaphycus species, compared their geographical distribution patterns, and predicted their range dynamics under climate change. All three methodological approaches indicated significant niche differences in both geographical and environmental space between the two Kappaphycus species. Our models predicted that range shifts mainly induced by rising sea surface temperature are likely to differ between two Kappaphycus species, with K. striatus suffering much range contraction (359,448 km2 in 2100s RCP8.5). By the year 2100, both Kappaphycus species are forecast to lose suitable habitats along most of the coastline of Southeast Asia under the RCP8.5 scenario. K. alvarezii is predicted to expand its distributions (96,429 km2) under the RCP2.6 scenario by the year 2100, suggesting resilience to mild global warming. Our study enhances the understanding of Kappaphycus aquaculture, and is conducive to the sustainable development of tropical seaweed by stressing the importance of conservation and investigation under climate change.