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Summary: Background: Frontal fibrosing alopecia (FFA) has become one of the most common causes of cicatricial alopecia worldwide. However, there is a lack of clear aetiology and robust clinical trial evidence for the efficacy and safety of agents currently used for treatment. Objectives: To enable data to be collected worldwide on FFA using common criteria and assessment methods. Methods: A multicentre, international group of experts in hair loss was convened by email to create consensus recommendations for clinical trials. Consensus was defined at > 90% agreement on each recommended part of these guidelines. Results: Standardized diagnostic criteria, severity rating, staging, and investigator and patient assessment of scalp hair loss and other clinical features of FFA were created. Conclusions: These guidelines should allow the collection of reliable aggregate data on FFA and advance efforts in both clinical and basic research to close knowledge gaps in this condition. What is already known about this topic? Frontal fibrosing alopecia (FFA) is a common psychologically debilitating progressive type of hair loss without a clear aetiology or treatments vetted by well‐controlled clinical trials. What does this study add? This paper provides methods for collecting meaningful data on FFA in clinical trials, databases and registries across the globe.These guidelines will promote clinical and basic research on well‐defined populations of patients affected with FFA and provide the means to assess the efficacy and safety of individual treatments. Linked Comment: M. Kinoshita‐Ise. Br J Dermatol 2021; 185: 1092–1093. Plain language summary available online [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Extrahepatic portal vein thrombosis (EHPVO) is an uncommon cause of portal hypertension. In the long term, patients may develop portal cavernoma cholangiopathy (PCC). Up to 30%-40% of patients with EHPVO may not have shuntable veins and are often difficult to manage surgically. Interventional treatment including portal vein recanalisation-trans jugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (PVRecan-TIPS) has been used for patients with EHPVO. However, PV reconstruction-trans jugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (PVRecon-TIPS) and portal vein stenting are novel techniques for managing such patients with EHPVO with non-shuntable venous anatomy. In contrast to PVRecan-TIPS, PV reconstruction-TIPS (PVRecon-TIPS) is performed through intrahepatic collaterals. Here we present six cases of PCC who presented with recurrent acute variceal bleeding (AVB) and or refractory biliary stricture. They did not have any shuntable veins. PVRecon-TIPS was performed for five patients whilst PV stenting was done in one. Amongst the six patients, one died of sepsis whilst one who developed hyponatremia and hepatic encephalopathy was salvaged with conservative management. Following the procedure, they were started on anti-coagulation. Decompression of cavernoma was documented in all other patients. Biliary changes improved completely in 40% of patients., (© 2024 Indian National Association for Study of the Liver. Published by Elsevier B.V.)

To evaluate bifunctional ligand reactivity involving NH acidic sites in the secondary coordination sphere, complexes where the proton has been substituted with a methyl group (NMe) are often investigated. An alternative strategy involves substitution of the NH group for an O. This contribution considers and compares the merits of these approaches; the synthesis and characterization of cationic square-planar Rh carbonyl complexes bearing diprotic bispyrazole pyridine ligand L1, and the bis-methylated pyrazole pyridine ligand L1Me are described. The syntheses and characterization of the novel monoprotic pyrazole isoxazole pyridine ligand L2 and aprotic bisisoxazole pyridine ligand L3, and their corresponding Rh carbonyl complexes are also described. Comparison of the CO stretching frequencies of the four Rh complexes suggest that substitutions of NH with NMe, as well as with O, lead to significant electronic differences. These electronic differences result in different reactivities with respect to ligand addition/substitution of the Rh carbonyl complexes. Overall, the data suggest that electronic differences arising due to the NH substitutions can be significant and should be considered when the NH group is substituted in investigations of the participation of the NH proton in a reaction., (© 2024 The Author(s). Chemistry - A European Journal published by Wiley-VCH GmbH.)

Neurocysticercosis (NCC) is the most common parasitic infection of the central nervous system, caused by the pork tapeworm, Taenia solium Common presenting features are seizures, headaches and focal neurodeficits. The present report details the anecdote of a middle-aged Asian man, who presented with subacute onset of persistent nausea, vomiting and hiccups. Following unsuccessful trials with numerous prokinetic, antipsychotic, muscle relaxant and anticonvulsant medications, as well as an uneventful battery of gastrointestinal tests, he was referred for neurological evaluation. The constellation of symptoms was congruent with the diagnosis of area postrema syndrome. Although initial CT scan of brain was normal, MRI with contrast evaluation revealed a circumscribed, ring-enhancing lesion of the dorsal medulla oblongata, reminiscent of colloid vesicular stage of NCC. The patient was successfully treated with steroids and albendazole. The association of refractory singultus, nausea and vomiting and NCC is thus far, not reported in the literature., Competing Interests: Competing interests: None declared., (© BMJ Publishing Group Limited 2024. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.)

Background Liver cirrhosis (LC) caused by chronic hepatitis C (CHC) infection is a major global public health concern. This study will look at the risk factors for progressive fibrosis and cirrhosis in patients with persistent hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection. Methods In this cohort study, a total of 300 patients were included. We collected comprehensive diagnostic records for the entire study group of 200 people with chronic hepatitis C infection. For the comparison, 100 healthy people were recruited and assessed. FibroScan (Echosens, Paris, France) scores were used to categorize liver fibrosis stages: F0-F1 (no or mild fibrosis, <7 kPa), F2 (moderate fibrosis, 7-8.99 kPa), F3 (significant fibrosis, 9-12.49 kPa), and F4 (cirrhosis, ≥12.5 kPa). Their demographic, biochemical, and serological data were evaluated and compared. Results Most patients were males (47% females and 53% males). In the CHC group, the mean age of diagnosis was 37.68±11.57 years, whereas in the chronic hepatitis C-related liver cirrhosis (CHC-LC) group, the mean age was 48.89±12.30 years (p=0.01). Compared to normal individuals, CHC patients had higher body mass index (BMI) (22.37±1.89 versus 21.72±1.95, p=0.01), alanine aminotransferase (ALT) (36.70±7.13 versus 82.78±82.53, p=0.01), and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) (34.96±6.04 versus 80.82±91.77, p=0.01). However, compared to the patients with CHC, the patients with LC have lower platelet (PLT) count (1.51±0.78 versus 1.7±0.41, p=0.01) and higher liver enzymes (AST: 117.7±186.9 versus 80.8±91.7, p=0.01; ALT: 86.71±80.24 versus 82.78±82.53, p=0.01). On regression analysis, higher BMI, older age, low hemoglobin (Hb), and higher bilirubin, ALT, AST, and prothrombin time (PT) were associated with LC. Conclusion It is imperative to shift toward prevention and early intervention as the new approach to managing patients with HCV-related cirrhosis. Cirrhosis should be suspected in older patients with CHC who are obese and have low platelet counts with higher liver enzymes., Competing Interests: Human subjects: Consent was obtained or waived by all participants in this study. The Institutional Ethics Committee of King George's Medical University issued approval 537/Ethics/R/Cell17. Animal subjects: All authors have confirmed that this study did not involve animal subjects or tissue. Conflicts of interest: In compliance with the ICMJE uniform disclosure form, all authors declare the following: Payment/services info: All authors have declared that no financial support was received from any organization for the submitted work. Financial relationships: All authors have declared that they have no financial relationships at present or within the previous three years with any organizations that might have an interest in the submitted work. Other relationships: All authors have declared that there are no other relationships or activities that could appear to have influenced the submitted work., (Copyright © 2024, Deep et al.)

Background Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) often coexists with hypertension, significantly increasing cardiovascular risks. Lifestyle modification counseling has shown promise in managing T2DM and its comorbidities. However, the optimal frequency and structure of counseling for blood pressure control remain uncertain. Our study examines the best approach for managing blood pressure in T2DM patients by comparing the outcomes of two counseling strategies: a single session and periodic counseling over time. Methodology A total of 110 diabetic patients were enrolled, with 52 patients in each group after loss to follow-up. A randomized controlled trial compared one-time counseling (control) to six months of periodic counseling (intervention) on lifestyle modification. A weighing machine, stadiometer, 24-hour dietary recall, food frequency questionnaire, biochemical blood sugar level analysis, and telephonic follow-up were the essential tools used. The data were analyzed using SPSS version 24.0 (IBM Corp., Armonk, NY, USA), employing descriptive statistics, including frequencies, percentages, graphs, mean, and standard deviation. Statistical significance at the 5% level was tested using probability (p) calculations. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov test confirmed normal distribution (p > 0.05). Parametric tests, specifically independent t-tests, were used for between-group comparisons of continuous variables, while categorical variables were analyzed using the chi-square test or Fisher's exact test. Intragroup comparisons over time employed repeated-measures analysis of variance for continuous variables. Changes within groups after six months were assessed using paired t-tests. All statistical analyses adhered to a significance level of p < 0.05. Results The gender distribution at baseline was similar between the control (55.8% male, 44.2% female) and intervention (46.2% male, 53.8% female) groups, with no significant differences (p = 0.327). The mean weight was 66.67 ± 11.51 kg in the control group and 67.14 ± 11.19 kg in the intervention group (p = 0.835), and the body mass index was 25.61 ± 4.09 kg/m² and 26.29 ± 6.01 kg/m², respectively (p = 0.503). Clinical parameters such as fasting blood sugar, postprandial blood sugar, glycosylated hemoglobin, and blood pressure showed no significant differences between the control and intervention groups at baseline (p > 0.05). After six months, the intervention group exhibited a trend toward lower blood pressure compared to the control group, but the differences were not statistically significant. The mean systolic blood pressure was 132.15 ± 14.867 mmHg in the control group and 129.15 ± 9.123 mmHg in the intervention group (p = 0.218). Changes in blood pressure over the six-month period showed significant decreases within the intervention group, while changes in the control group did not reach statistical significance. The mean difference in systolic blood pressure in the intervention group was 5.54 ± 9.77 mmHg (p = 0.0001), indicating a notable reduction, while the control group had a smaller and statistically insignificant increase of 2.308 ± 9.388 mmHg (p = 0.082). Conclusions This study addresses a significant gap in the literature by comparing the efficacy of one-time vs. periodic counseling in T2DM management. While periodic counseling shows promise in improving diastolic blood pressure, further research is needed to understand its nuanced effects and optimize lifestyle interventions for T2DM patients., Competing Interests: Human subjects: Consent was obtained or waived by all participants in this study. Institutional Ethics Committee, King George’s Medical University issued approval 93rd ECM II B-Ph.D/P2. Animal subjects: All authors have confirmed that this study did not involve animal subjects or tissue. Conflicts of interest: In compliance with the ICMJE uniform disclosure form, all authors declare the following: Payment/services info: All authors have declared that no financial support was received from any organization for the submitted work. Financial relationships: All authors have declared that they have no financial relationships at present or within the previous three years with any organizations that might have an interest in the submitted work. Other relationships: All authors have declared that there are no other relationships or activities that could appear to have influenced the submitted work., (Copyright © 2024, Malakar et al.)

Introduction: Renal Cell Carcinoma (RCC), which accounts for 2%-3% of all adult malignant neoplasms with a male-to-female predominance of 1.9 to 1 with typical presentation between 55 and 75 years. The phosphoinositide-3-kinase-protein kinase B/Akt (PI3KPKB/Akt) pathway is a main pathway in control of cell growth. mTOR pathway plays a key role in the pathogenesis of RCC., Material and Methods: Its a prospective observational study. Tissue samples were collected and processed and DNA isolation and sequencing was done to see for any association and expression., Results and Analysis: Polymorphism analysis of the sequence of three genes MTOR, AKT1, and PIK3CA done and found an intronic variant of the MTOR gene (rs3737611) and AKT1 gene (rs2498797) to be significantly associated with clear cell Renal Cell Carcinoma tumor samples., Discussion: This study will help to understand the pathogenesis better and the information can be used to develop new drugs and personalized treatment strategies that are tailored to an individual's genetic makeup. The study identify individuals who are at heightened risk for developing renal cancer and could benefit from targeted screening or preventative measures. Some sample size and definite geographical sample pool remains the main limitation of the study which may not be externally validate the study results., Competing Interests: Declaration of conflicting interestsThe author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Natural disasters such as earthquakes endanger human lives and infrastructure, particularly in urban areas. With the advancements in science and technology in understanding natural hazards, recent studies have attempted to mitigate them by mapping the risks using geospatial technology. In this paper, we attempt to integrate the multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) models, namely the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) and the Criteria Importance Through Inter-criteria Correlation (CRITIC), besides using the artificial neural network (ANN) to assess the seismic risk in the eastern coast of India. The AHP-CRITIC technique is used to evaluate the earthquake coping capacity and vulnerability and has been further used to generate a training base for earthquake probability mapping by ANN. The earthquake probability and spatial intensity information are used to develop the hazard map. Following that, integrating vulnerability, hazard and coping capacity spatial information assessed earthquake risk. Our results indicate that approximately 5% of the study area is at high risk, whilst more than 11% of the population is at high risk due to seismic induced hazards. The area under the curve of the receiver operating characteristic curve is 0.85, which indicates reliable results. The results of this study may help various agencies involved in planning, development and disaster mitigation to develop seismic hazard mitigation methods by better understanding their impacts on the eastern coastal region of India., (© 2024. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.)

Biosimilars are biological drugs created from living organisms or that contain living components. They share an identical amino-acid sequence and immunogenicity. These drugs are considered to be cost-effective and are utilized in the treatment of cancer and other endocrine disorders. The primary aim of biosimilars is to predict biosimilarity, efficacy, and treatment costs; they are approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and have no clinical implications. They involve analytical studies to understand the similarities and dissimilarities. A biosimilar manufacturer sets up FDA-approved reference products to evaluate biosimilarity. The contribution of next-generation sequencing is evolving to study the organ tumor and its progression with its impactful therapeutic approach on cancer patients to showcase and target rare mutations. The study shall help to understand the future perspectives of biosimilars for use in gastro-entero-logic diseases, colorectal cancer, and thyroid cancer. They also help target specific organs with essential mutational categories and drug prototypes in clinical practices with blood and liquid biopsy, cell treatment, gene therapy, recombinant therapeutic proteins, and personalized medications. Biosimilar derivatives such as monoclonal antibodies like trastuzumab and rituximab are common drugs used in cancer therapy. Escherichia coli produces more than six antibodies or antibody-derived proteins to treat cancer such as filgrastim, epoetin alfa, and so on., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest., (© 2024 The Authors. Cancer Innovation published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Tsinghua University Press.)

Background: Autoimmune hepatitis (AIH) is uncommon and predominantly affects females. Data on AIH from India are scanty. We retrospectively analyzed the spectrum and outcome of adults with AIH and compared it between male and female patients., Methods: AIH was diagnosed using a simplified AIH score. For suspected seronegative AIH, the revised score was used. Standard therapies for AIH and portal hypertension were administered and response was assessed at six months. Relapse rates and five-year mortality were also evaluated., Results: Of the 157 patients with AIH, 85 (male: female 25: 60) were included in the study. The median age at diagnosis was 46 (interquartile range (IQR) 32-55.5) years in males vs 45 (IQR 34.2-54) years in females (p=0.91). A similar proportion of male and female patients presented with cirrhosis, acute severe AIH, or AIH-related acute on chronic liver failure (ACLF); Extra-hepatic autoimmune diseases were less common in male patients (16% vs 35.5% p=0.02). Other laboratory and histological features were comparable in both groups. During the median follow-up period of 51 months (IQR 45-67 months). The biochemical and clinical response at six months were seen in 64% of male patients and 63.3% of female patients (p= 0.57). Of patients, 75% relapsed in the male AIH group (12 of 16 patients) after initial remission compared to 42% in the female group (p=0.02). Five-year mortality was 14.1%, and no patient developed hepatocellular carcinoma., Conclusion: Male and female patients with AIH have similar clinical, biochemical, and histological profiles. More male patients relapsed after an initial response to therapy., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright © 2024, Malakar et al.)

Human beings possess trillions of microbial cells in a symbiotic relationship. This relationship benefits both partners for a long time. The gut microbiota helps in many bodily functions from harvesting energy from digested food to strengthening biochemical barriers of the gut and intestine. But the changes in microbiota composition and bacteria that can enter the gastrointestinal tract can cause infection. Several approaches like culture-independent techniques such as high-throughput and meta-omics projects targeting 16S ribosomal RNA (rRNA) sequencing are popular methods to investigate the composition of the human gastrointestinal tract microbiota and taxonomically characterizing microbial communities. The microbiota conformation and diversity should be provided by whole-genome shotgun metagenomic sequencing of site-specific community DNA associating genome mapping, gene inventory, and metabolic remodelling and reformation, to ease the functional study of human microbiota. Preliminary examination of the therapeutic potency for dysbiosis-associated diseases permits investigation of pharmacokinetic-pharmacodynamic changes in microbial communities for escalation of treatment and dosage plan. Gut microbiome study is an integration of metagenomics which has influenced the field in the last two decades. And the incorporation of artificial intelligence and deep learning through "omics-based" methods and microfluidic evaluation enhanced the capability of identification of thousands of microbes., (© 2024 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

Solar energy demand is growing for future energy needs in different sectors to replace fossil fuels, which leads to a reduced carbon footprint and global warming. Evacuated tube solar collectors (ETSC) harness solar thermal energy for air heating, water heating, and drying in domestic and industrial sectors. The review paper comprises ETSC technology categorization, influencing factors like fin arrangement, integration of phase change material, tilt angle, solar radiation, and airflow rate on the performance of ETSC-based solar air heaters and dryers. The thermal performance parameters, like the collector efficiency, dryer efficiency, energy and exergy efficiency, thermal profile, zone temperature, relative humidity, heat loss during operations, etc., are reviewed. The developed ETSC-based air heating systems and solar dryers for drying agricultural products are performed effectively. However, research progress on improving the thermal performance integrated with nanofluids and phase change materials was discussed. CO 2 mitigation analysis and global standards for ETSC-based air heaters and dryers are compiled. A large scope exists by use of solar air heaters (SAH) for food commodity drying with a suitable drying chamber and improving the designs of ETSC-based solar dryers. The work accomplished by various researchers has been analyzed in this study for prospective research gaps in the context of future design and development., (© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

Objective: Holmes tremor (HT) comprises rest, postural and intention tremor subtypes, usually involving both proximal and distal musculature. Perturbations of nigro-striatal pathways might be fundamental in the pathogenesis of HT along with cerebello-thalamic connections., Methods: Nine patients with an HT phenotype secondary to thalamic stroke were included. Epidemiological and clinical records were obtained. Structural and functional brain imaging were performed with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or computed tomography (CT) and positron emission tomography (PET), respectively. Levodopa was administered in sequentially increasing dosage, with various other drugs in case of inadequate response. Longitudinal follow-up was performed for at least three months. The essential tremor rating assessment scale (TETRAS) was used for assessment., Results: The mean latency from stroke to tremor onset was 50.4 ± 30.60 days (range 21-90 days). Dystonia was the most frequently associated hyperkinetic movement (88.8%). Tremor was bilateral in 22.2% of participants. Clinical response was judged based on a reduction in the TETRAS score by a prefixed value (≥ 30%), pertaining to which 55.5% (n = 5) of subjects were classified as responders and the rest as non-responders. The responders showed improvement with significantly lower doses of levodopa than the remaining nonresponders (240 ± 54.7 mg vs. 400 ± 40.8 mg; p = 0.012)., Conclusion: Although levodopa is useful in HT, augmenting the dosage of levodopa beyond a certain point might not benefit patients clinically. Topography of vascular lesions within the thalamus might additionally influence the phenomenology of HT.

The research aims to enhance the characteristics of honey by incorporating xanthan gum (XG) and guar gum (GG) at various concentrations (0.5-2.0% w/w) and preparing a honey gel matrix (HGM) through high-shear homogenization. This approach serves as a substitute for fat-based filling materials commonly used in bakery products. The study encompassed an investigation of the rheological characteristics (steady and dynamic), total phenolic content (TPC), antioxidant activity, and baking stability of the HGMs. The concentration of the gums used significantly influenced the transformation of honey into the HGM and its stability. Notably, the XG-HGM demonstrated greater shear thinning behavior and higher consistency compared to the GG-HGM. Herschel Bulkley and power law models were found to be the best-fitted models for XG-HGM and GG-HGM, respectively. Furthermore, both XG-HGM and GG-HGM exhibited a higher viscous component ( G ″) than an elastic component ( G ') at low concentrations, up to 1% (w/w) for XG-HGM and 1.5% (w/w) for GG-HGM; however, this behavior reversed beyond those concentrations ( G ' >  G ″). The XG-HGM exhibited lower temperature sensitivity compared to GG-HGM, indicating better stability under varying heat conditions. Moreover, both TPC and antioxidant activity decreased with increasing concentrations of both gums. The XG-HGM achieved the highest baking stability index, reaching 95.23% at a 2% concentration. This modified HGM formulated with XG demonstrated superior consistency, color retention, and exceptional baking stability, making it a promising candidate for application as a filling material in the bakery sector. Its improved stability and quality can facilitate the development of a wide range of baking products in the food industry., Competing Interests: DECLARATION OF CONFLICTING INTERESTSThe authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Introduction: Steroid-refractory acute severe ulcerative colitis (ASUC) patients are at the highest risk of colectomy. Among the available options, cyclosporine and infliximab have similar efficacy but infliximab is a costly drug and cyclosporine has multiple side effects like kidney injury, neurotoxicity, and dyselectrolytemia. Surgical management is often associated with higher morbidity. Newer oral small molecules like Janus kinase inhibitors are the ideal molecules to bridge the gap. Tofacitinib has already been extensively evaluated in patients with moderate to severe UC; however, data on ASUC treated by tofacitinib are limited., Methods: We retrospectively analyzed the data of patients with ASUC who were admitted to our hospital's luminal gastroenterology unit between January 2021 and July 2023. Patients with ASUC who were managed with tofacitinib were included in the study., Results: Eight patients with ASUC were identified who did not respond to intravenous hydrocortisone and were treated with tofacitinib. The mean age was 39 ± 15 years and 87.5% were female. The median duration of illness was 24 months (interquartile range (IQR): 12-120 months). Seven of eight patients (87.5%) responded to oral tofacitinib 10 mg twice a day by the fifth day of treatment. The median follow-up period was six months (IQR: 1-12 months). One patient required colectomy and one patient had varicella zoster reactivation requiring treatment discontinuation., Conclusion: Tofacitinib is an attractive alternative to the currently available salvage therapy for steroid-refractory ASUC; however, long-term efficacy and risk remain to be explored., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright © 2023, Malakar et al.)

Herbal plants comprise potent bioactives, and they have a potential for the development of functional foods. Ultrasonication technology can be used to enhance the efficiency and quality of these bioactivities. The present review discussed the ultrasound-assisted novel extraction technologies (supercritical carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) and high pressurized liquid), including mechanistic understanding, influencing factors, extract process efficiency, and the recovery of bioactives with an industrial perspective. The strong observations of this study are the novel ultrasound-induced extraction process variables, such as ultrasound amplitude, sonication time, temperature, solid-solvent ratio, and pressure, are significantly influenced and must be optimized for maximum recovery of bioactives. The novel green technologies (ultrasound and assisted) could remarkably improve the extraction efficiency and enhance the quality of green extract. This review will support technological understanding about the impact on process parameters for the extraction of bioactives for the development of functional foods and nutraceuticals., Competing Interests: Conflict of interestThe authors declare no conflict of interest., (© The Korean Society of Food Science and Technology 2023. Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.)

Drying is an energy-intensive process that can be reduced by the application of pretreatment prior to drying to enhance mass transfer and minimize energy consumption. This review summarizes the mechanistic aspects and applications of emerging pretreatment approaches, namely ohmic heating (OH), ultrasound (US), high pressure processing (HPP), and pulsed electric field (PEF), with emphasis on the enhancement of mass transfer and quality attributes of foods. Novel pretreatments significantly improved the drying efficiency by increasing mass transfer, cavitation, and microchannel formation within the cell structure. Various processing parameters have great influence on the drying performance and quality attributes of foods. Several studies have shown that novel pretreatments (individual and combined) can significantly save energy while improving the overall drying performance and retaining the quality attributes. This work would be useful for understanding the mechanisms of novel pretreatment technologies and their applications for future commercial research and development activities., Competing Interests: Competing interestsThe authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (© The Korean Society of Food Science and Technology 2023. Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.)

The reaction of [( p -cymene)RuCl 2 ] 2 with the triphosphine ligand bis(2-di- tert -butylphosphinophenyl)phosphine ( tBu P H PP) results in an unusual exchange reaction in which a chloride ligand and a phosphorus-bound H atom are exchanged ("H-P/Ru-Cl exchange") to give the (chlorophosphine)ruthenium hydride complex ( tBu P Cl PP)RuHCl [ 1 Cl -HCl ; tBu P Cl PP = bis(2-di- tert -butylphosphinophenyl)chlorophosphine]. Density functional theory calculations indicate that the presumed initial product of metalation, ( tBu P H PP)RuCl 2 ( 1 H -Cl2 ), undergoes an H-P/Ru-Cl exchange via sequential P-to-Ru α-H migration to give the intermediate ( tBu PPP)RuHCl 2 , followed by Ru-to-P α-Cl migration to give the observed product 1 Cl -HCl (crystallographically characterized). Dehydrochlorination of 1 Cl -HCl under a H 2 atmosphere gives ( tBu P Cl PP)RuH 4 ( 1 Cl -H4 ), which then can undergo a second dehydrochlorination and addition of H 2 to give ( tBu P H PP)RuH 4 ( 1 H -H4 ). This reaction may proceed via the reverse of the intramolecular exchange by 1 H -Cl2 , i.e., loss of H 2 from 1 Cl -H4 to give 1 Cl -H2 , which could undergo Cl-P/Ru-H exchange to give ( tBu P H PP)RuHCl ( 1 H -HCl ). Accordingly, the thermodynamics of Cl-P/Ru-H exchange are found to be highly dependent on the nature of the ancillary anionic ligand (H or Cl), which is not directly involved in the exchange. The origin of this thermodynamic dependence can be explained in terms of the high stability of complexes ( R P X PP)RuHCl (X = H, Cl; R = Me, t Bu), in which the hydride is approximately trans to a vacant coordination site and the central phosphine group is approximately trans to the weak-trans-influence chloride ligand. This conclusion has general implications for five-coordinate d 6 complexes, both pincer- and nonpincer-ligated.

Low-code software development (LCSD) is an emerging approach to democratize application development for software practitioners from diverse backgrounds. LCSD platforms promote rapid application development with a drag-and-drop interface and minimal programming by hand. As it is a relatively new paradigm, it is vital to study developers' difficulties when adopting LCSD platforms. Software engineers frequently use the online developer forum Stack Overflow (SO) to seek assistance with technical issues. We observe a growing body of LCSD-related posts in SO. This paper presents an empirical study of around 33K SO posts (questions + accepted answers) containing discussions of 38 popular LCSD platforms. We use Topic Modeling to determine the topics discussed in those posts. Additionally, we examine how these topics are spread across the various phases of the agile software development life cycle (SDLC) and which part of LCSD is the most popular and challenging. Our study offers several interesting findings. First, we find 40 LCSD topics that we group into five categories: Application Customization, Database and File Management, Platform Adoption, Platform Maintenance, and Third-party API Integration. Second, while the Application Customization (30%) and Data Storage (25%) topic categories are the most common, inquiries relating to several other categories (e.g., the Platform Adoption topic category) have gained considerable attention in recent years. Third, all topic categories are evolving rapidly, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic. Fourth, the How-type questions are prevalent in all topics, but the What-type and Why-type (i.e., detail information for clarification) questions are more prevalent in the Platform Adoption and Platform Maintenance category. Fifth, LCSD practitioners find topics related to Platform Query the most popular, while topics related to Message Queue and Library Dependency Management as the most difficult to get accepted answers to. Sixth, the Why-type and What-type questions and Agile Maintenance and Deployment phase are the most challenging among practitioners. The findings of this study have implications for all three LCSD stakeholders: LCSD platform vendors, LCSD developers/practitioners, Researchers, and Educators. Researchers and LCSD platform vendors can collaborate to improve different aspects of LCSD, such as better tutorial-based documentation, testing, and DevOps support., (© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2022, Springer Nature or its licensor holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.)

Competing Interests: Competing interests: None declared.

The rapid outbreak of COVID-19 has affected the lives and livelihoods of a large part of the society. Hence, to confine the rapid spread of this virus, early detection of COVID-19 is extremely important. One of the most common ways of detecting COVID-19 is by using chest X-ray images. In the literature, it is found that most of the research activities applied convolutional neural network (CNN) models where the features generated by the last convolutional layer were directly passed to the classification models. In this paper, convolutional long short-term memory (ConvLSTM) layer is used in order to encode the spatial dependency among the feature maps obtained from the last convolutional layer of the CNN and to improve the image representational capability of the model. Additionally, the squeeze-and-excitation (SE) block, a spatial attention mechanism, is used to allocate weights to important local features. These two mechanisms are employed on three popular CNN models - VGG19, InceptionV3, and MobileNet to improve their classification strength. Finally, the Sugeno fuzzy integral based ensemble method is used on these classifiers' outputs to enhance the detection accuracy further. For experiments, three chest X-ray datasets, which are very prevalent for COVID-19 detection, are considered. For all the three datasets, it is found that the results obtained by the proposed method are comparable to state-of-the-art methods. The code, along with the pre-trained models, can be found at https://github.com/colabpro123/CovidConvLSTM., Competing Interests: The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (© 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

The novel coronavirus (COVID-19), has undoubtedly imprinted our lives with its deadly impact. Early testing with isolation of the individual is the best possible way to curb the spread of this deadly virus. Computer aided diagnosis (CAD) provides an alternative and cheap option for screening of the said virus. In this paper, we propose a convolution neural network (CNN)-based CAD method for COVID-19 and pneumonia detection from chest X-ray images. We consider three input types for three identical base classifiers. To capture maximum possible complementary features, we consider the original RGB image, Red channel image and the original image stacked with Robert's edge information. After that we develop an ensemble strategy based on the technique for order preference by similarity to an ideal solution (TOPSIS) to aggregate the outcomes of base classifiers. The overall framework, called TOPCONet, is very light in comparison with standard CNN models in terms of the number of trainable parameters required. TOPCONet achieves state-of-the-art results when evaluated on the three publicly available datasets: (1) IEEE COVID-19 dataset + Kaggle Pneumonia Dataset, (2) Kaggle Radiography dataset and (3) COVIDx., (© 2022. The Author(s).)

Competing Interests: None

Molybdenum complexes supported by tridentate pincer ligands are exceptional catalysts for dinitrogen fixation using chemical reductants, but little is known about their prospects for electrochemical reduction of dinitrogen. The viability of electrochemical N 2 binding and splitting by a molybdenum(III) pincer complex, ( py PNP)MoBr 3 ( py PNP = 2,6-bis( t Bu 2 PCH 2 )-C 5 H 3 N)), is established in this work, providing a foundation for a detailed mechanistic study of electrode-driven formation of the nitride complex ( py PNP)Mo(N)Br. Electrochemical kinetic analysis, optical and vibrational spectroelectrochemical monitoring, and computational studies point to two concurrent reaction pathways: In the reaction-diffusion layer near the electrode surface, the molybdenum(III) precursor is reduced by 2e - and generates a bimetallic molybdenum(I) Mo 2 (μ-N 2 ) species capable of N-N bond scission; and in the bulk solution away from the electrode surface, over-reduced molybdenum(0) species undergo chemical redox reactions via comproportionation to generate the same bimetallic molybdenum(I) species capable of N 2 cleavage. The comproportionation reactions reveal the surprising intermediacy of dimolybdenum(0) complex trans,trans -[( py PNP)Mo(N 2 ) 2 ](μ-N 2 ) in N 2 splitting pathways. The same "over-reduced" molybdenum(0) species was also found to cleave N 2 upon addition of lutidinium, an acid frequently used in catalytic reduction of dinitrogen.

COVID-19 is a worldwide transmitted pandemic that has brought a threatening challenge to Indian society and the economy. The disease has become a public health disaster, which has no effective medication. However, proper management and planning, which includes understanding the transmitting pattern, number of containment zones, vulnerable factors, and level of risk, may break the chain of transmission and reduce the number of cases. Hence, this study has attempted to model the COVID-19 vulnerability using an integrated fuzzy multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) approach, namely fuzzy-analytical hierarchy process (AHP) and fuzzy-technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) for West Bengal, India, through geographic information system (GIS). A total of 15 parameters were utilised to model the COVID-19 vulnerability, which was further categorised into three criteria: social vulnerability, epidemiological vulnerability, and physical vulnerability. The final vulnerability mapping has been done using these three criteria through the GIS platform. This study reveals that COVID-19 infection highly threatens about 20% of the total area of West Bengal, 23.42% moderately vulnerable, and 57.03% of the area comes under low vulnerability. The highly vulnerable region includes the Kolkata, South 24 Paraganas, and North 24 Paraganas, which are considered highly populated districts of West Bengal. Therefore government agencies should be more focused and plan accordingly to safeguard the community, especially the region with very high COVID-19 vulnerability, from further spreading the infection., Competing Interests: Conflict of interestThere is no conflict of interest to declare., (© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021.)

Breast cancer, the most common invasive cancer, causes deaths of thousands of women in the world every year. Early detection of the same is a remedy to lessen the death rate. Hence, screening of breast cancer in its early stage is utmost required. However, in the developing nations not many can afford the screening and detection procedures owing to its cost. Hence, an effective and less expensive way of detecting breast cancer is performed using thermography which, unlike other methods, can be used on women of various ages. To this end, we propose a computer aided breast cancer detection system that accepts thermal breast images to detect the same. Here, we use the pre-trained DenseNet121 model as a feature extractor to build a classifier for the said purpose. Before extracting features, we work on the original thermal breast images to get outputs using two edge detectors - Prewitt and Roberts. These two edge-maps along with the original image make the input to the DenseNet121 model as a 3-channel image. The thermal breast image dataset namely, Database for Mastology Research (DMR-IR) is used to evaluate performance of our model. We achieve the highest classification accuracy of 98.80% on the said database, which outperforms many state-of-the-art methods, thereby confirming the superiority of the proposed model. Source code of this work is available here: https://github.com/subro608/thermogram&#95;breast&#95;cancer., Competing Interests: Conflict of InterestAuthors declare that there is no conflict of interest., (© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2021.)

Disease prediction from diagnostic reports and pathological images using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) is one of the fastest emerging applications in recent days. Researchers are striving to achieve near-perfect results using advanced hardware technologies in amalgamation with AI and ML based approaches. As a result, a large number of AI and ML based methods are found in the literature. A systematic survey describing the state-of-the-art disease prediction methods, specifically chronic disease prediction algorithms, will provide a clear idea about the recent models developed in this field. This will also help the researchers to identify the research gaps present there. To this end, this paper looks over the approaches in the literature designed for predicting chronic diseases like Breast Cancer, Lung Cancer, Leukemia, Heart Disease, Diabetes, Chronic Kidney Disease and Liver Disease. The advantages and disadvantages of various techniques are thoroughly explained. This paper also presents a detailed performance comparison of different methods. Finally, it concludes the survey by highlighting some future research directions in this field that can be addressed through the forthcoming research attempts., Competing Interests: Conflict of interestAll the authors declare that they have no conflict of interest or competing interests, (© The Author(s) under exclusive licence to International Center for Numerical Methods in Engineering (CIMNE) 2022.)