Search

The heart valve design is optimally adapted to their physiological function, i.e., the uniform distribution of blood flow in the heart chambers, so even small changes in the structural components of the valves, which are initially functionally compensated, play a significant role in the development of heart disease in the later stages of a patient's life. The study aimed to determine the effect of chronic haemodynamic trauma on the structural reorganisation of human heart valves. A total of 1377 human heart valves were evaluated, which were obtained during valve prosthetics at the Amosov National Institute of Cardiovascular Surgery from 2010 to 2022. The study identified a full range of macro- and microscopic changes in morphological structures that are characteristic of rheumatic heart disease, infective endocarditis, dysplastic and destructive changes in heart valves. The set of all morphological features was combined into the algorithm “Morphological manifestations of acquired heart disease of different genesis”. It has been established that changes in the mitral valve architecture can cause the transformation of its structural components, which causes a violation of the valve's functional capabilities. The study demonstrated that persistent changes associated with chronic haemodynamic injury reduce the mechanical strength of the valve, despite the compensatory mechanism of subendothelial smooth muscle fibre hyperplasia in the heart valve leaflets. Subsequently, these damages can, on the one hand, be complicated by fibrosis, fatty degeneration and calcification, and on the other hand, compensatory mechanisms are involved in the process, namely hyperplasia of subendothelial muscle cells, which often form continuous layers that should strengthen and strengthen the mechanical strength and thus the functional competence of the valves. Mitral valve dysplasia can develop secondary infective endocarditis, rheumatism, and degenerative valve disease. The algorithm for determining the patterns of morphological changes in the valvular apparatus of the heart in various variants of acquired defects of inflammatory and non-inflammatory genesis can be used to improve the etiopathogenetic drug treatment of patients with acquired heart disease, as well as a theoretical basis for the development of new types of valve-preserving operations

У більшості випадків очищення вихідного продукту процесу виробництва оцтової кислоти здійснюється шляхом ректифікації. Оскільки процес ректифікації полягає в розділенні сумішей на фази по температурі кипіння, то стає зрозуміло, що досить важливим технологічним параметром є температура та концентрація суміші, що обробляється. Зазвичай, дані технологічні параметри задаються кип’ятильником при ректифікаційній колоні, який ще зветься кубом колони. Саме тому існує потреба у якісному та ефективному керуванні кип’ятильником, як одним із важливих технологічних об’єктів. У роботі розроблена та проаналізована система керування кип’ятильником на базі MPC-регулятора. Робота MPC-регулятора базується на визначенні поведінки об’єкта та прогнозування майбутньої поведінки, після чого за рахунок оптимізації керування на певному проміжку часу здійснюється виведення його на бажану траєкторію. Проміжок часу на якому здійснюється розрахунок оптимальної траєкторії ще називається горизонтом. Визначення горизонту впливає на характер здійснюваного керування, тому його вибір повинен бути обраний виходячи з характеру динамічних властивостей об’єкту керування. Саме тому при розробці даних регуляторів потрібно досліджувати характер впливу даних параметрів на перебіг процесу. В результаті дослідження було отримано стратегії керування для різних значень горизонтів прогнозування та керування. Проаналізувавши результати роботи регулятора при різних налаштуваннях горизонтів прогнозування та керування можна дійти висновку, що при збільшенні горизонту прогнозування збільшується час перехідної характеристика, але також зменшується перерегулювання. Тому при виборі оптимального значення потрібно керуватися впливом перерегулювань на процес.

The purpose of this study is to ground the causality, its character, and power between economic growth and housing spending within government social protection to strengthen poverty reduction. The study is conducted on a sample of 27 EU countries for 2012–2021 according to the following indicators: government expenditure on housing within social protection, government expenditure on housing development, and GDP per capita growth. Correlation analysis revealed the relationship between the variables. The paper employed time lags with the most significance based on Pearson and Spearman correlation coefficients depending on normal data (Shapiro-Wilk test). The causal analysis determined which of the studied indicators is the cause and consequence of established dependence based on the results of the Granger test. Calculations are made in STATA software. It is confirmed that government expenditure on housing within social protection influences GDP per capita growth in 14 countries (the highest impact is in Greece and Spain) and government expenditure on housing development – in 17 countries (the biggest influence is in Romania, the Slovak Republic, Ireland, and Lithuania). It is also emphasized that government expenditure on housing development influences economic growth more significantly and with higher strength than government expenditure on housing within social protection. The obtained results can be useful in further research and government decision-making in social and economic policy, particularly regarding the expediency of increasing government spending for affordable housing and its development according to social protection programs, poverty reduction, and inclusive economic growth. Acknowledgments The study is funded by the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine (No. 0122U000781) and the Vega Agency (No. 1/0638/23).

The study presents the results of the correlation between students’ predictive competence and their personal characteristics. The relevance and novelty of the research results are attributed to the specification of the problematic issue connected with predictive competence. The latter is determined through the students’ subjective characteristics which are associated with self-assessment of academic achievements in the examination situation. The developed predictive competence is one of the acmeological invariants of professionalism and a resource that increases stress resistance. The aim of the research is to study the correlation between personality traits of students of the youth age period and the adequacy of their self-assessment of the academic achievements in a stressful examination situation. The study hypothesizes that personal characteristics of students determine the adequacy level of their self-assessment of the academic results and reduce the level of examination stress. The sample of the study comprises 287 first- and second-year students of the youth age period, majoring in natural sciences and socio-economic educational areas and specialties of Udmurt State Agrarian University (Izhevsk) (their average age is 18.5; 45% are girls, 55% are boys). The methods (tools) of the research are as follows: in order to fix the components of self-assessment of academic achievements and the level of mental tension of young people in the examination situation, the authors used the Dembo – Rubinstein technique (in the original modification); to determine the features of predictive skills, the “Anticipatory Consistency Test” developed by V. D. Mendelevich (ACT) was used; to measure the manifestations of anxiety as a personal quality that affects the stress level during examinations, the “The Taylor Manifest Anxiety Scale” was applied (adapted by T. A. Nemchin, V. G. Noskaridze), to measure the level of the control locus the “Rotter’s Locus of Control Scale” (adapted by E. F. Bazhin, E. A. Golynkina, A. M. Etkind) was used. The study results. Positive correlation between the locus of control and personal anxiety and negative cor- relation between the predictive competence and situational tension are characteristic of students with an adequate self-assessment of academic achievements. Developed predictive competence reduces the exam stress. The conclusion. Adequate self-assessment of academic achievements in a stressful situation contributes to the management of one’s own activities and to a better manifestation of competencies while performing intellectual tests. The obtained results are used to improve the personality-oriented program for the development of adequate self-assessment of academic achievements which serves as a stress resistance resource of students of the youth age period.

One of the modern problems in the field of ecology is the creation of environmentally friendly equipment for monitoring and maintaining trees in parks and forests. The traditional use of forest machines and self-propelled tractors with internal combustion engines has a negative impact on the environment as a result of pollutant emissions, i.e., combustion products and fuel residues. An alternative to this tradition can be the use of mobile robots with remote control of their electric drives when performing such technological operations as pruning bacterial growths of trees and diagnosing the state of tree massifs. The article proposes a fundamentally new mobile robot design for monitoring park trees. The main differences between the robot are the new designs of the body and the walking mechanisms of the mobile robot. These design differences provide the robot with high maneuverability when choosing the path of movement along the tree trunk and reliable holding of the robot body on the tree at a sufficient movement speed to perform diagnostics of the state of tree massifs. The article also describes the dynamic models of the movement of a mobile robot along a tree trunk. It presents the simulation results in the form of graph-analytical dependencies of the robot parameters, which constitutes the scientific aspect of the problem. The main motivation of the conducted research is the creation of environmentally friendly equipment in the form of a mobile robot with a reliable system of retention on the surface moving and sufficient performance to perform park tree monitoring operations.

The article studies the features of film tourism as an innovative form of cultural and educational tourism. The relationship between the development of the global film industry and this type of tourism is analysed. The different types of impact of film tourism on tourist destinations and countries in general are characterised. The methodology is based on general scientific and special research methods, including: analysis, synthesis, generalisation, retrospective analysis and geographical research methods. Scientific novelty is a comprehensive study of film tourism as an innovative direction of development of world tourism and its impact on various aspects of life in the settlements where it has developed. The authors of the article present their vision of the impact of film tourism on the surrounding anthropogenic and natural environment. The peculiarities of the development of film tourism in Ukraine are examined. Conclusions. Film tourism is an innovative and promising area of global tourism development. It has a strong base for development in many countries of the world, both natural and artificially created, and its undoubted advantage is that the list of film attractions and destinations is expanding with every successful film premiere. Cinema tourism can be attractive to different age groups of tourists, but they are all united by a generally high level of education, relatively high incomes and a penchant for cultural leisure. The development of film tourism has a positive impact on both tourist destinations and countries.

This paper is devoted to providing affordable housing as a significant factor in public health management, inclusive growth, and SDG. The purpose is to empirically prove changes in the system of country’s population health care depending on the level of providing affordable housing. The empirical base includes time series and panel data for 27 EU countries during 2011–2019. Due to correlation analysis (Shapiro-Wilk testing, Spearman or Pearson correlation, lags in time), regression analysis, and building a dynamic panel estimation model with Sargan testing in STATA, the study empirically confirmed and formalized the impact of affordable housing funding on changes in the system of country’s population health care. In particular, the study found the dependence between overcrowding level and the share of homeowners with mortgages (a decrease of overcrowding level by an average of 0.61% with a time lag of 2 years due to an increase by 1%); the share of tenants on concessional terms/free (0.41% with a time lag of 3 years); and the share of public spending on housing development (0.25% with a time lag of 3 years). The direct relationship between the overcrowding and mortality from dangerous diseases (tuberculosis, AIDS, viral hepatitis, mental and behavioral disorders, diabetes, pneumonia) was also revealed. Public spending on housing under social protection programs (subsidies, etc.) proved to be the least effective. Preference should be given to the development of affordable mortgage lending (faster and greater effect). Generally, it impacts public management decisions in the health care system, social, and housing spheres. AcknowledgmentsThe study was funded by the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine and performed the results of the project “Economic and mathematical modeling and forecasting, development of methodological and methodological foundations for creating a roadmap for reforming the health care system in Ukraine, taking into account behavioral, social, economic and legal determinants” (Agreement БФ / 24-2021).This study received funding under the research subsidy of the Department of Applied Social Sciences of the Faculty of Organization and Management of the Silesian University of Technology for the year 2022 (13/020/BK_22/0072).

Hypophosphatasia (HPP) is a rare inherited disorder characterized by the decreased activity of tissue-nonspecific alkaline phosphatase (TNSALP), caused by mutations in the ALPL gene. The aim of this study was to conduct differential diagnostics in HPP patients using whole-exome sequencing (WES). The medical records of HPP patients and the genetic testing of the ALPL gene were reviewed. Seven patients were recruited and underwent WES using the Illumina or MGI sequencing platforms. All of the exome samples were matched onto a GRCh38.p13 reference genome assembly by using the Genome Analysis ToolKit (GATK) and the BWA MEM read aligner. We present the clinical and molecular findings of the seven patients referred for genetic analyses due to a clinical and biochemical suspicion of HPP. In two patients out of three (with identified heterozygous variants in the ALPL gene), we also identified c.682T>A in exon 3 of the WNT10A gene and c.3470del in exon 23 of the SMC1A gene variants for the first time. In four patients, variants in the ALPL gene were not detected, but WES allowed us to identify for the first time rare variants (c.5651A>C in exon 36 of the TRIO gene, c.880T>G in exon 6 of the TRPV4 gene, c.32078-1G>T in intron 159 of the TTN gene, c.47720_47721del in exon 235 of the TTN gene, and c.1946G>A in exon 15 of the SLC5A1 gene) and to conduct differential diagnostics with HPP. Using WES, for the first time, we demonstrate the possibility of early differential diagnostics in HPP patients with other rare genetic diseases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Flax (Linum usitatissimum L.) products are used in the food, pharmaceutical, textile, polymer, medical, and other industries. The creation of a pan-genome will be an important advance in flax research and breeding. The selection of flax genotypes that sufficiently cover the species diversity is a crucial step for the pan-genomic study. For this purpose, we have adapted a method based on Illumina sequencing of transcriptome libraries prepared using the Tn5 transposase (tagmentase). This approach reduces the cost of sample preparation compared to commercial kits and allows the generation of a large number of cDNA libraries in a short time. RNA-seq data were obtained for 192 flax plants (3–6 individual plants from 44 flax accessions of different morphology and geographical origin). Evaluation of the genetic relationship between flax plants based on the sequencing data revealed incorrect species identification for five accessions. Therefore, these accessions were excluded from the sample set for the pan-genomic study. For the remaining samples, typical genotypes were selected to provide the most comprehensive genetic diversity of flax for pan-genome construction. Thus, high-throughput sequencing of tagmentation-based transcriptome libraries showed high efficiency in assessing the genetic relationship of flax samples and allowed us to select genotypes for the flax pan-genomic analysis.

The aim of the research was to study the response of various flax genotypes to the treatment of plants with a sulfonylurea herbicide – Magnum (active ingredient is metsulfuron-methyl) and to identify resistant forms for use in breeding programs for herbicide resistance. In 2018-2020 an assessment of 24 varieties and promising lines of fiber flax of domestic and foreign selection for resistance to this herbicide was carried out, the treatment of crops with the preparation was carried out at the recommended consumption rate of 0.01 kg/ha in the “herringbone” phase. It has been proved that the use of this herbicide leads to uneven plant growth during the “herringbone – flowering” period, which negatively affects the yield and quality of flax fiber. The decrease in the main indicators of the productivity and quality of the fiber in the variant with the use of the herbicide in comparison with the control, depending on the genotype was: in plant height – up to 44.4 %, in the weight of the technical part – 71.1 %, in the fiber mass – 74.8 %, in «myklost» (the ratio of the technical length of stem to its diameter)– 46.3 %, in the length of the elementary fiber – 27.7 %. A high level of resistance (over 80 %) to the herbicide Magnum for all analyzed traits was shown by the varieties Atlant (Russia) and Mogilevsky (Belarus). It was shown that when treating fiber flax plants with the herbicide, as a rule, an increase in inflorescence occurs due to a decrease in the technical length of the stem. It results in rise of the main indicators of seed productivity in most of genotypes under the influence of the Magnum preparation – the number of bolls and seeds per plant (up to 3.2 times). The exception was the variety Vega 2 (Lithuania), which had a decrease in the number of bolls per plant in the variant with herbicide treatment compared with the control by 1.8 times, and in the number of seeds by 5.3 times. This varietywasalso the most sensitive to the effect of Magnum in all parameters of productivity and fiber quality. The results are consistent with the data obtained whentreating various collection samples of fiber flax with a tank mixture Magnum + Herbitox L + Miura at the recommended consumption rates (0.007 + 0.6 + 1.0 kg(l)/ha).

The paper presents the result of assessing the antiradical status of consumers (in the context of Russia) in connection with their well-being. This approach is based on a multistage study, in which the results of sociological surveys were applied, as well as estimates of the antiradical potential (ARP) of diets obtained using neural networks, bootstrapping the chemical composition of diets, and calculating reference values using mathematical models. The paper presents data collected from residents living in the territories of at least 21 regions and cities of Russia: Magadan, Saint Petersburg, Moscow, Krasnodar, Lipetsk, Vladivostok, Novosibirsk, Omsk, Voronezh, etc. A total of 1001 people were interviewed, which, according to our calculations, gives a margin of error in value of approximately 3.1%. To calculate the lack of vitamins in the diets of residents of the Russian Federation, data on the chemical composition of food products from the FNDDS database were used. The assessment of dietary habits showed a lack of vitamins below the recommended level in 73% of Russians for vitamin D, 59% for retinol, 38% for β-carotenes, 13% for vitamin E, and 6% for ascorbic acid. The study showed that at least 36% of the Russian population has a low antiradical status, while it was found that “poor” consumers are more likely to consume economically more expensive foods (in terms of their nutritional value). The “poor” segments of the population consume 180–305% more canned food and 38–68% more sweet carbonated drinks than other social groups, but their consumption of vegetables is 23–48% lower. On the contrary, “wealthy” consumers consume 17–25% more complex (varied) dishes, 10–68% more fresh vegetables, and 8–39% more fish. From the obtained values it follows that consumers with low levels of ARP in their diets are in a group with an increased probability of a number of “excess” diseases (diseases of the cardiovascular system, obesity, etc.). In general, the ARP values of food consumed for low-income segments of the population were 2.3 times lower (the ratio was calculated as the percentage of consumers below the level of 11,067 equivalents necessary for the disposal of free radicals generated in the human body per day) than for those who can afford expensive food (consumers with high income). A simple increase in consumption of unbalanced foods, in our opinion, will only contribute to the entry of these consumers into the “average diet trap”. All this makes it imperative to develop comprehensive measures to create a new concept of public catering; otherwise, we can expect a reduction in both the health of the population and the performance of the economy of the whole country.

The object of this study is a mathematical model of a synchronous electric motor, obtained on the basis of experimental data, which takes into account the temperature mode and uses artificial features to increase the accuracy of its operation. A characteristic feature of this work is that the model takes into account the temperature mode as a component of the technical-operational state of the object. The resulting mathematical model could make it possible to synthesize an optimal automatic control system in terms of the operational state of the object. The problem addressed was to increase the accuracy of the identified mathematical models by applying the approach of feature engineering. The results showed that the identification of mathematical models by the initial data leads to a low level of accuracy of the obtained models, namely 65–70 % for the first output channel, 80–85 % for the second, and 75–80 % for the third, fourth, and fifth output channels. Accordingly, building models with a higher threshold of accuracy requires the use of other, more significant data for identification. This paper reports a method for reformatting the original data into artificial features and provides results of their effectiveness in relation to the original channels. The resulting artificial features and the original features were used for further identification; the resulting mathematical model has on average higher accuracy thresholds, namely 82 %, 93 %, 88 %, 85 % for the corresponding output channels. The results prove the effectiveness of applying the principle of feature engineering since the accuracy of the resulting model is 5–10 % higher compared to the baseline. The scope of practical application of the results includes the synthesis of automatic control systems based on mathematical models of control objects obtained as a result of identification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The absorption of Si films covered with an array of elliptical metal nanoparticles (NPs) of identical orientation and shape is investigated theoretically. We consider silicon films with thickness in the range of 80–200 nm. The symmetry axis of the NPs is taken perpendicular to the surface of silicon surface and their short axis has a radius of 10 nm in the plane of the Si film. A 10-nm-thick SiO2 layer separates the submonolayer NP coverage from the silicon film. The spectral properties of the considered hybrid system are studied in terms of its effective susceptibility. Specifically, the dependence of light absorption by the NPs covering the ultrathin Si film on their morphology and material composition is established. For chromium and silver NPs, the appearance of collective absorption modes in the hybrid structures is predicted.

Lake Baikal phage communities are important for lake ecosystem functioning. Here we describe the diversity of T4-bacteriophage associated with the bacterial fraction of filtered water samples collected from the pelagic zone, coastal zone and shallow bays. Although the study of the diversity of phages for the g23 gene has been carried out at Lake Baikal for more than ten years, shallow bays that comprise a significant part of the lake’s area have been neglected, and this gene has not previously been studied in the bacterial fraction. Phage communities were probed using amplicon sequencing methods targeting the gene of major capsid protein (g23) and compared phylogenetically across sample locations and with sequences previously retrieved from non-bacterial fractions (

Flax (Linum usitatissimum L.) is attacked by numerous devastating fungal pathogens, including Colletotrichum lini, Aureobasidium pullulans, and Fusarium verticillioides (Fusarium moniliforme). The effective control of flax diseases follows the paradigm of extensive molecular research on pathogenicity. However, such studies require quality genome sequences of the studied organisms. This article reports on the approaches to assembling a high-quality fungal genome from the Oxford Nanopore Technologies data. We sequenced the genomes of C. lini, A. pullulans, and F. verticillioides (F. moniliforme) and received different volumes of sequencing data: 1.7 Gb, 3.9 Gb, and 11.1 Gb, respectively. To obtain the optimal genome sequences, we studied the effect of input data quality and genome coverage on assembly statistics and tested the performance of different assembling and polishing software. For C. lini, the most contiguous and complete assembly was obtained by the Flye assembler and the Homopolish polisher. The genome coverage had more effect than data quality on assembly statistics, likely due to the relatively low amount of sequencing data obtained for C. lini. The final assembly was 53.4 Mb long and 96.4% complete (according to the glomerellales_odb10 BUSCO dataset), consisted of 42 contigs, and had an N50 of 4.4 Mb. For A. pullulans and F. verticillioides (F. moniliforme), the best assemblies were produced by Canu–Medaka and Canu–Homopolish, respectively. The final assembly of A. pullulans had a length of 29.5 Mb, 99.4% completeness (dothideomycetes_odb10), an N50 of 2.4 Mb and consisted of 32 contigs. F. verticillioides (F. moniliforme) assembly was 44.1 Mb long, 97.8% complete (hypocreales_odb10), consisted of 54 contigs, and had an N50 of 4.4 Mb. The obtained results can serve as a guideline for assembling a de novo genome of a fungus. In addition, our data can be used in genomic studies of fungal pathogens or plant–pathogen interactions and assist in the management of flax diseases.

The article presents an overview of the urban development situation in the city of Tyumen over a century of Soviet and post-Soviet construction. The city with a fairly impressive number of objects to be proud of, and with a historical layout that is of special interest, has developed a number of problems, particularly in its transport infrastructure, which must be addressed as soon as possible. The authors offer several options for solving the acute urban planning issues by changing the transport situation both on a city-wide scale and on the example of two iconic urban areas.

Flax is grown worldwide for seed and fiber production. Linseed varieties differ in their oil composition and are used in pharmaceutical, food, feed, and industrial production. The field of application primarily depends on the content of linolenic (LIN) and linoleic (LIO) fatty acids. Inactivating mutations in the FAD3A and FAD3B genes lead to a decrease in the LIN content and an increase in the LIO content. For the identification of the three most common low-LIN mutations in flax varieties (G-to-A in exon 1 of FAD3A substituting tryptophan with a stop codon, C-to-T in exon 5 of FAD3A leading to arginine to a stop codon substitution, and C-to-T in exon 2 of FAD3B resulting in histidine to tyrosine substitution), three approaches were proposed: (1) targeted deep sequencing, (2) high resolution melting (HRM) analysis, (3) cleaved amplified polymorphic sequences (CAPS) markers. They were tested on more than a thousand flax samples of various types and showed promising results. The proposed approaches can be used in marker-assisted selection to choose parent pairs for crosses, separate heterogeneous varieties into biotypes, and select genotypes with desired homozygous alleles of the FAD3A and FAD3B genes at the early stages of breeding for the effective development of varieties with a particular LIN and LIO content, as well as in basic studies of the molecular mechanisms of fatty acid synthesis in flax seeds to select genotypes adequate to the tasks.

The paper provides an overview of current methods for recognizing and classifying visual images in static images or video stream. The paper will discuss various approaches, including machine learning, current problems of these methods and possible improvements. The biggest challenges of the visual image retrieval and classification task are discussed. The main emphasis is placed on the review of such promising algorithms as SSD, YOLO, R-CNN, an overview of the principles of these methods, network architectures. Objective. The aim of the work is to analyze existing studies and find the best algorithm for recognizing and classifying visual images for further activities. Method. Primary method is to compare different factors of algorithms in order to select the most perspective one. There are different marks to compare, like image processing speed, accuracy. There are a number of studies and publications that propose methods and algorithms for solving the problem of finding and classifying images in an image [3–6]. It should be noted that most promising approaches are based on machine learning methods. It is worth noting that the proposed methods have drawbacks due to the imperfect implementation of the Faster R-CNN, YOLO, SSD algorithms for working with streaming video. The impact of these drawbacks can be significantly reduced by applying the following solutions: development of combined identification methods, processing of edge cases – tracking the position of identified objects, using the difference between video frames, additional preliminary preparation of input data. Another major area for improvement is the optimization of methods to work with real-time video data, as most current methods focus on images. Results. As an outcome of the current research we have found an optimal algorithm for further researches and optimizations. Conclusions. Analysis of existent papers and researches has demonstrated the most promising algorithm for further optimizations and experiments. Also current approaches still have some space for further. The next step is to take the chosen algorithm and investigate possibilities to enhance it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]