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A dangerous side effect of diabetes that can significantly lower quality of life and raise the death rate of diabetic individuals is diabetic autonomic neuropathy. It is essential to identify and anticipate this disease early on for prompt intervention and care. This study aims to predict this diabetic complication using Sudoscan and artificial intelligence. In this study, 172 individuals with type 1 or type 2 diabetes mellitus provided clinical and demographic information. Sudoscan was used to evaluate the subjects' sudomotor dysfunction. Statistical methods were used to link various electrochemical skin conductance values with risk factors for neuropathy such as age, BMI, age of diabetes, or biochemical values such as cholesterol and triglycerides. Different machine-learning algorithms were used to predict the risk of diabetic autonomic neuropathy based on the collected data. The accuracy achieved with Logistic Regression is 92.6%, and with the Random Forest model is 96.3%. Lazzy Classifiers also show that six classifiers have a high performance of 97%. Thus, the use of machine learning algorithms in this field of metabolic diseases offers new perceptions for diagnosis, treatment, and prevention, and improves the quality of life of diabetic patients by reducing the incidence of complications related to this disease. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused by SARS-CoV-2 has been defined as the greatest global health and socioeconomic crisis of modern times. While most people recover after being infected with the virus, a significant proportion of them continue to experience health issues weeks, months and even years after acute infection with SARS-CoV-2. This persistence of clinical symptoms in infected individuals for at least three months after the onset of the disease or the emergence of new symptoms lasting more than two months, without any other explanation and alternative diagnosis have been named long COVID, long-haul COVID, post-COVID-19 conditions, chronic COVID, or post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 (PASC). Long COVID has been characterized as a constellation of symptoms and disorders that vary widely in their manifestations. Further, the mechanisms underlying long COVID are not fully understood, which hamper efficient treatment options. This review describes predictors and the most common symptoms related to long COVID’s effects on the central and peripheral nervous system and other organs and tissues. Furthermore, the transcriptional markers, molecular signaling pathways and risk factors for long COVID, such as sex, age, pre-existing condition, hospitalization during acute phase of COVID-19, vaccination, and lifestyle are presented. Finally, recommendations for patient rehabilitation and disease management, as well as alternative therapeutical approaches to long COVID sequelae are discussed. Understanding the complexity of this disease, its symptoms across multiple organ systems and overlapping pathologies and its possible mechanisms are paramount in developing diagnostic tools and treatments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Long COVID, also known as post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 infection (PASC), has emerged as a significant health concern following the COVID-19 pandemic. Molecular mechanisms underlying the occurrence and progression of long COVID include viral persistence, immune dysregulation, endothelial dysfunction, and neurological involvement, and highlight the need for further research to develop targeted therapies for this condition. While a clearer picture of the clinical symptomatology is shaping, many molecular mechanisms are yet to be unraveled, given their complexity and high level of interaction with other metabolic pathways. This review summarizes some of the most important symptoms and associated molecular mechanisms that occur in long COVID, as well as the most relevant molecular techniques that can be used in understanding the viral pathogen, its affinity towards the host, and the possible outcomes of host-pathogen interaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Severe visual impairment and blindness significantly affect a person's quality of life, leading sometimes to social anxiety. Nevertheless, instead of concentrating on a person's inability, we could focus on their capacities and on their other senses, which in many cases are more developed. On the other hand, the technical evolution that we are witnessing is able to provide practical means that can reduce the effects that blindness and severe visual impairment have on a person's life. In this context, this article proposes a novel wearable solution that has the potential to significantly improve blind person's quality of life by providing personal assistance with the help of Visible Light Communications (VLC) technology. To prevent the wearable device from drawing attention and to not further emphasize the user's deficiency, the prototype has been integrated into a smart backpack that has multiple functions, from localization to obstacle detection. To demonstrate the viability of the concept, the prototype has been evaluated in a complex scenario where it is used to receive the location of a certain object and to safely travel towards it. The experimental results have: i. confirmed the prototype's ability to receive data at a Bit-Error Rate (BER) lower than 10−7; ii. established the prototype's ability to provide support for a 3 m radius around a standard 65 × 65 cm luminaire; iii. demonstrated the concept's compatibility with light dimming in the 1–99% interval while maintaining the low BER; and, most importantly, iv. proved that the use of the concept can enable a person to obtain information and guidance, enabling safer and faster way of traveling to a certain unknown location. As far as we know, this work is the first one to report the implementation and the experimental evaluation of such a concept. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As seen in earlier and present pandemics, monitoring pathogens in the environment can offer multiple insights on their spread, evolution, and even future outbreaks. The present paper assesses the opportunity to detect microbial pathogens and associated antibiotic resistance genes, in relation to specific pathogen sources, by using nanopore sequencing in municipal waters and wastewaters in Romania. The main results indicated that waters collecting effluents from a meat processing facility exhibit altered communities' diversity and abundance, with reduced values (101–108 and 0.86–0.91) of Chao1 and, respectively, Simpson diversity indices and Campylobacterales as main order, compared with other types of municipal waters where the same diversity index had much higher values of 172–214 and 0.97–0.98, and Burkholderiaceae and Pseudomonadaceae were the most abundant families. Moreover, the incidence and type of antibiotic resistance genes were significantly influenced by the proximity of antibiotic sources, with either tetracycline (up to 45% of total reads) or neomycin, streptomycin and tobramycin (up to 3.8% total reads) resistance incidence being shaped by the sampling site. As such, nanopore sequencing proves to be an easy-to-use, accessible molecular technique for environmental pathogen surveillance and associated antibiotic resistance genes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Modern biomedical sensing techniques have significantly increased in precision and accuracy due to new technologies that enable speed and that can be tailored to be highly specific for markers of a particular disease. Diagnosing early-stage conditions is paramount to treating serious diseases. Usually, in the early stages of the disease, the number of specific biomarkers is very low and sometimes difficult to detect using classical diagnostic methods. Among detection methods, biosensors are currently attracting significant interest in medicine, for advantages such as easy operation, speed, and portability, with additional benefits of low costs and repeated reliable results. Single-molecule sensors such as nanopores that can detect biomolecules at low concentrations have the potential to become clinically relevant. As such, several applications have been introduced in this field for the detection of blood markers, nucleic acids, or proteins. The use of nanopores has yet to reach maturity for standardization as diagnostic techniques, however, they promise enormous potential, as progress is made into stabilizing nanopore structures, enhancing chemistries, and improving data collection and bioinformatic analysis. This review offers a new perspective on current biomolecule sensing techniques, based on various types of nanopores, challenges, and approaches toward implementation in clinical settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transportation is currently facing significant challenges from a variety of factors including growing populations and number of vehicles, rising urbanization, negligent driving, and environmental issues. An interdisciplinary approach is needed [...]

Due to its unique advantages, the integration of Visible Light Communications (VLC) in vehicle safety applications has become a major research topic. Nevertheless, as this is an emergent technology, several challenges must be addressed. One of the most important of these challenges is oriented toward increasing vehicular VLC systems' communication range. In this context, this article proposes a novel approach that provides a significant communication distance enhancement. Different from most existing works on this topic, which are based on refining the VLC receiver, this new article is focused on improving the VLC system based on the benefits that can be achieved through the VLC transmitter. The concept is based on Light-Emitting Diode (LED) current overdriving and a modified Variable Pulse Position Modulation (VPPM). Therefore, LED current overdriving provides the VLC receiver higher instantaneous received optical power and improved Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR), whereas the use of the VPPM ensures that the VLC transmitter respects eye regulation norms and offers LED protection against overheating. The concept has been experimentally tested in laboratory conditions. The experimental results confirmed the viability of the concept, showing an increase of the communication range by up to 370%, while maintaining the same overall optical irradiance at the VLC transmitter level. Therefore, this new approach has the potential to enable vehicular VLC ranges that cover the requirements of communication-based vehicle safety applications. To the best of our knowledge, this concept has not been previously exploited in vehicular VLC applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our choice was justified by the fact that between the two countries exist some features that make them interesting to study from the employment point of view. Thus, both countries are Latin and this is why we consider they are comparable, because employment means people, more precisely mentalities and attitudes to work. We considered that it is interesting to see how the labour market from the east Latin Europe has evolved, in a comparable, crucial period, with its counterpart from west Latin Europe. First of all, we would like to point out the fact that our intention is to analyse the periods which from the economic history point of view have influenced in a decisive manner the present evolution of the two countries. The Portugal labour market is a subject of real scientific interest (we would like to mention that even Michael Porter was interested by this topic). Our paper tries to emphasize the common and different features of the two labour markets, in order to facilitate an experience sharing process on this topic. To achieve the paper’s objectives statistical and cluster analysis have been used. This is one of the best ways to capture the influence of determinant factors on labour market performance. The degree of originality is given by the assumed objectives, namely studying some very up-to-date problems from an interconnected perspective (historical similarities, structural changes, labour market performance) and analyzing the Romanian situation compared to other EU countries, i.e. Portugal. The main impact of the paper will be on the practical level through the model outcomes and conclusions. One of the objectives is to look for solutions to the problems identified and to persuade policy makers to give them a greater importance. Our main contribution is represented by the fact that we have approached this topic from an economic and historical perspective, trying to find explanations for the present situation in the modern past of the two nations.

The paper’s topic is focused on the Romanian labour market prospects, which is going to be affected by two main threats: aging and population decline. These two factors are supposed to dramatically change Romania’s economic structure. It is therefore necessary to know how they will evolve in the next decades, facts which represent the main objective of our article. These topics are debated at large scale at the European and national level, because they describe a process which implies European Union as a whole. The methodology used in order to quantify this phenomenon includes statistical methods (correlation analysis and descriptive statistics). We have used data available at national and European level in order to build a proper argumentation. The results obtained are worrying because there is a high risk to assist at an accelerated aging of the Romanian people, doubled by a very low birth rate. This might create huge problems in the economic and social system due to productivity decrease and the pressures on the pension’s funds. The paper offers scientific arguments for developing macroeconomic policies in order to prevent the negative situation in which we could be within less than 40 years. As a comparison term we brought into attention the Germany situation, country which offers economic equilibrium to the EU, but is also affected by aging. The manner in which this problem has been approached is an original one because we tried to put Romania’s situation into the context of the European Union general situation, the threat being emphasised by the fact that it is going to be a trend for the whole continent. Actually, if it is not taken adequate measures, we will be confronted with a demographic crisis, much worse than the current financial one, because the effort of the country to reverse a birth rate decreasing trend with an aged population will take decades.

Into the actual social and economic context, characterised by the challenges of the globalisation process, the need of redefining the state role in the economy, the switch to the knowledge based economy, the problem of increasing the national and regional

Visible light communications emerges as a promising wireless communication technology that has been found suitable for numerous indoor and outdoor applications. In this article, a new in-vehicle VLC system is designed, implemented, and experimentally evaluated. The purpose of this new system is to provide car passengers with optical wireless communications. The proposed system consists of a VLC emitter integrated into the vehicle's ambient lighting system and a mobile VLC receiver. Unlike any previous works, this article proposes a VLC emitter in which the light from a 3 W LED is distributed on a 2 square meter surface using 500 optical fibers whose main purpose is a decorative one. The proposed prototype has been implemented on a car and evaluated in relevant working conditions. The experimental evaluation of the proposed system has demonstrated the viability of the proposed concept and showed a data rate of 250 kb/s while providing a BER lower than 10−7. As far as we know, the proposed concept is totally new in the VLC literature, opening a new area of utilization for VLC technology: using VLC with optical fiber distributed light. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In urban areas, pedestrians are the road users category that is the most exposed to road accident fatalities. In this context, the present article proposes a totally new architecture, which aims to increase the safety of pedestrians on the crosswalk. The first component of the design is a pedestrian detection system, which identifies the user's presence in the region of the crosswalk and determines the future street crossing action possibility or the presence of a pedestrian engaged in street crossing. The second component of the system is the visible light communications part, which is used to transmit this information toward the approaching vehicles. The proposed architecture has been implemented at a regular scale and experimentally evaluated in outdoor conditions. The experimental results showed a 100% overall pedestrian detection rate. On the other hand, the VLC system showed a communication distance between 5 and 40 m when using a standard LED light crosswalk sign as a VLC emitter, while maintaining a bit error ratio between 10−7 and 10−5. These results demonstrate the fact that the VLC technology is now able to be used in real applications, making the transition from a high potential technology to a confirmed technology. As far as we know, this is the first article presenting such a pedestrian street crossing assistance system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Beginning in December 2019, the world faced a critical new public health stressor with the emergence of SARS-CoV-2. Its spread was extraordinarily rapid, and in a matter of weeks countries across the world were affected, notably in their ability to manage health care needs. While many sectors of public structures were impacted by the pandemic, it particularly highlighted shortcomings in medical care infrastructures around the world that underscored the need to reorganize medical systems, as they were vastly unprepared and ill-equipped to manage a pandemic and simultaneously provide general and specialized medical care. This paper presents modalities in approaches to the pandemic by various countries, and the triaged reorganization of medical sections not considered first-line in the pandemic that was in many cases transformed into wards for treating COVID-19 cases. As new viruses and structural variants emerge, it is important to find solutions to streamline medical care in hospitals, which includes the expansion of digital network medicine (i.e., telemedicine and mobile health apps) for patients to continue to receive appropriate care without risking exposure to contagions. Mobile health app development continues to evolve with specialized diagnostics capabilities via external attachments that can provide rapid information sharing between patients and care providers while eliminating the need for office visits. Telemedicine, still in the early stages of adoption, especially in the developing world, can ensure access to medical information and contact with care providers, with the potential to release emergency rooms from excessive cases, and offer multidisciplinary access for patients and care providers that can also be a means to avoid contact during a pandemic. As this pandemic illustrated, an overhaul to streamline health care is essential, and a move towards greater use of mobile health and telemedicine will greatly benefit public health to control the spread of new variants and future outbreaks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Humans are facing a devastating epidemic of metabolic syndrome that is linked to the worldwide dramatic increase in obesity and diabetes. Significant evidence suggests that the intestinal microbiota plays a major role in the pathogenesis of metabolic diseases. Due to the gut–brain axis link, dysbiosis in the gut microbiota have been demonstrated in both metabolic and neurological disease. Increasing evidence suggests that the gut microbiota is very important in maintaining health and changes in its composition may contribute to psychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders. It is also in research that changes in microbiota composition profile due to diabetes are modulated by the vagus nerve. Therefore, it is plausible that disruptions in the gut microbiota may be captured through electroencephalography signaling. Several studies which used standard methods of signal processing have highlighted some changes in electroencephalographic rhythms on patients with diabetes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Romania officially declared its first Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) case on February 26, 2020. The first and largest coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak in Romania was recorded in Suceava, North-East region of the country, and originated at the Suceava regional county hospital. Following sheltering-in-place measures, infection rates decreased, only to rise again after relaxation of measures. This study describes the spread of SARS-CoV-2 in Suceava and other parts of Romania and analyses the mutations and their association with clinical manifestation of the disease during the period of COVID-19 outbreak. Sixty-two samples were sequenced via high-throughput platform and screened for variants. For selected mutations, putative biological significance was assessed, and their effects on disease severity. Phylogenetic analysis was conducted on Romanian genomes (n = 112) and on sequences originating from Europe, United Kingdom, Africa, Asia, South, and North America (n = 876). The results indicated multiple introduction events for SARS-CoV-2 in Suceava, mainly from Italy, Spain, United Kingdom, and Russia although some sequences were also related to those from the Czechia, Belgium, and France. Most Suceava genomes contained mutations common to European lineages, such as A20268G, however, approximately 10% of samples were missing such mutations, indicating a possible different arrival route. While overall genome regions ORF1ab, S, and ORF7 were subject to most mutations, several recurring mutations such as A105V were identified, and these were mainly present in severe forms of the disease. Non-synonymous mutations, such as T987N (Thr987Asn in NSP3a domain), associated with changes in a protein responsible for decreasing viral tethering in human host were also present. Patients with diabetes and hypertension exhibited higher risk ratios (RR) of acquiring severe forms of the disease and these were mainly related to A105V mutation. This study identified the arrival routes of SARS-CoV-2 in Romania and revealed potential associations between the SARS-CoV-2 genomic organization circulating in the country and the clinical manifestation of COVID-19 disease. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The analytical approach for analyzing noise passage through hysteretic system is based on embedding the non-Markovian output processes in multidimensional Markovian processes defined on graph, while the experimental setup has involved Hameg 8131-2 noise generators and Schimidt triggers as hysteretic rectangular loops operators. The general features of noise passage through elementary hysteretic systems and their dependence of various parameters are discussed.

An approach to the quantitative characterization of the in-plane anisotropy of the garnet films by using vectorial measurements performed on a vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM) is discussed. It has also been shown that this method can be also used to compute the critical curve and the anisotropy field.

As the demand for wireless communication technologies is exponentially increasing, using the visible light electromagnetic spectral region is a logical option. This article provides a general analysis of the IEEE 802.15.7 standard for optical communications using visible light, focusing on the PHY I, intended for outdoor applications. Moreover, the article discusses how the standard's specifications apply to visible light communication use in vehicular networking applications. The article concentrates on the standard's applicability in this domain, and points out the fact that it has not been widely accepted, as most of the VLC developers are focused on decreasing system complexity and implementation costs, rather than complying with the standard's requirements. Furthermore, the article points out the necessity of a novel vehicular applications VLC specific standard, which should focus on the requirements imposed in this specific area. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Since more and more vehicles are using the transportation infrastructure, the safety and the efficiency of roads are of absolute importance. A solution to enhance the security of road transportation is by enabling wireless communications between vehicles and also with the traffic infrastructures (e.g., traffic lights, street lighting, or traffic signs). In this area, visible light communications (VLC) is considered of great perspective. A fundamental problematic in vehicular VLC is the design of a proper sensor capable to support long distance communications in dynamic traffic situations and in unfriendly atmospheric conditions. Therefore, this paper is focused on the design of the VLC sensors intended for vehicular communication applications, offering a review of the solutions found to mitigate the effect of the problematic conditions. Furthermore, this paper summarizes these solutions and proposes an environmental adaptive VLC receiver that would be capable to optimally adjust its settings in order to maximize the communication efficiency, but without affecting the communication robustness to noise. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper presents an easy-to-use sensor aimed for traffic safety applications using visible light communications. A central problem in this area is the design of a suitable sensor able to enhance the conditioning of the signal and to avoid disturbances due to the environmental conditions. The visible light communication sensor proposed in this paper addresses these issues and enables a robust communication for short to medium distances. The presentation is focused on hardware aspects and low-level coding techniques. The experimental validation of the proposed sensor has been conducted by analyzing communication performances between a commercial traffic light and the sensor, for distances up to 50 m. The measurements exhibit bit error ratio lower than 10^-7 in an outdoor configuration , using two well-known codes (Manchester and Miller) without any error-correcting codes or complex signal processing. The prototype is aimed for automotive applications but other outdoor configurations can also be addressed by slight changes in the system design. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper presents a novel visible light communication receiver architecture, designed for automotive applications. A crucial problematic in this area is the design of a suitable receiver able to face the problems caused by the dynamic situations, by the long distances and also by the environmental conditions. In such circumstances, a solution would be to adapt the communication’s data rate to channel conditions, meaning that the communication would take place using different data rates, depending on the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and the message priority. Considering the digital filtering a better performance, the proposed architecture considers the usage of digital signal processing as an alternative to the analog signal treatment. The visible light communication receiver proposed in this paper addresses the above-mentioned issues and enables a robust communication even at low SNR. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

We have analyzed the hysteretic properties of thermal and pressure induced low spin (LS) $\leftrightarrow $ high spin (HS) phase transition of a 3-D spin crossover (SCO) nanostructure when the cluster architecture is progressively changed from a cubic to a thin film. For solving the 3-D Ising-like Hamiltonian, the Monte Carlo metropolis technique is used, with the edge molecules trapped in HS state. The role of short- and long-range interactions on the SCO cooperativity has been investigated as well. The obtained results show that the cooperativity of a 3-D SCO system, characterized by the same number of molecules and the same interactions strength are strongly affected when going from a cubic 3-D to thin-film architecture. These results are discussed in terms of surface effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We have applied a phenomenological two-level Ising-like model to study the case of 3D coordination polymers showing strongly cooperative but incomplete spin-transition behaviour. Our numerical results focus on nanoparticles of the cyanide-bridged 3D network Fe(pyrazine)[Pt(CN)4], considering several factors (i.e. temperature, pressure), the role of short- and long-range interactions and the system size. To be consistent with the experimental studies on a nanometric scale, we used a semiexact method (Monte Carlo entropic sampling) to solve a system that contains molecules on each surface in the high-spin state (edge atoms). A preliminary analysis of the short-range antiferromagnetic case has been carried out to illustrate the three-step transition case. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]