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The decoding multivariate Temporal Response Function (decoder) or speech envelope reconstruction approach is a well-known tool for assessing the cortical tracking of speech envelope. It is used to analyse the correlation between the speech stimulus and the neural response. It is known that auditory late responses are enhanced with longer gaps between stimuli, but it is not clear if this applies to the decoder, and whether the addition of gaps/pauses in continuous speech could be used to increase the envelope reconstruction accuracy. We investigated this in normal hearing participants who listened to continuous speech with no added pauses (natural speech), and then with short (250 ms) or long (500 ms) silent pauses inserted between each word. The total duration for continuous speech stimulus with no, short, and long pauses were approximately, 10 minutes, 16 minutes, and 21 minutes, respectively. EEG and speech envelope were simultaneously acquired and then filtered into delta (1–4 Hz) and theta (4–8 Hz) frequency bands. In addition to analysing responses to the whole speech envelope, speech envelope was also segmented to focus response analysis on onset and non-onset regions of speech separately. Our results show that continuous speech with additional pauses inserted between words significantly increases the speech envelope reconstruction correlations compared to using natural speech, in both the delta and theta frequency bands. It also appears that these increase in speech envelope reconstruction are dominated by the onset regions in the speech envelope. Introducing pauses in speech stimuli has potential clinical benefit for increasing auditory evoked response detectability, though with the disadvantage of speech sounding less natural. The strong effect of pauses and onsets on the decoder should be considered when comparing results from different speech corpora. Whether the increased cortical response, when longer pauses are introduced, reflect improved intelligibility requires further investigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effect of microporous surfaces on the secondary instabilities in a supersonic boundary layer was investigated using linear stability theory and nonlinear parabolized stability equations. The linear stability results indicate that the porous surface significantly enlarges the growth rate of the first mode disturbance and advances the transition. A two-dimensional disturbance is more sensitive to the porous surface than is an oblique disturbance. Nonlinear stability analysis suggested that the two classical secondary instabilities, namely the fundamental and subharmonic resonances, lead to transitions when the disturbance amplitude is high. The subharmonic resonance is stronger than the fundamental resonance. A porous surface enlarges the growth rates of the primary and secondary instabilities and promotes the transition. As the porosity coefficient or pore radius increases, the transition onset position gradually moves upstream. However, the fundamental resonance is more sensitive to the porous wall than is the subharmonic resonance, and the porous surface affects the secondary instabilities in different ways. For the fundamental resonance, the porous surface not only enlarges the amplitude of the primary mode, but also directly destabilizes the fundamental disturbance. These two effects cause the fundamental-type breakdown to occur much earlier. For the subharmonic resonance, the destabilization of the primary mode is dominant, and the subharmonic disturbance is not sensitive to the porous wall boundary conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

(1) Background: At present, the efficacy and safety of thoracic radiotherapy (TRT) after chemo-immunotherapy (CT-IT) in patients with extensive-stage small-cell lung cancer (ES-SCLC) still remain unclear. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the role of TRT after CT-IT in patients with ES-SCLC. (2) Methods: From January 2020 to October 2021, patients with ES-SCLC treated with first-line anti-PD-L1 antibody plus platinum-etoposide chemotherapy were enrolled retrospectively. The survival data and adverse events data of patients treated with or without TRT after CT-IT were collected for analysis. (3) Results: A total of 118 patients with ES-SCLC treated with first-line CT-IT were retrospectively enrolled, with 45 patients with TRT and 73 patients without TRT after CT-IT. The median PFS and OS in the CT-IT + TRT group and CT-IT only group were 8.0 months versus 5.9 months (HR = 0.64, p = 0.025) and 22.7 months versus 14.7 months (HR = 0.52, p = 0.015), respectively. The median PFS and OS in all 118 patients treated with first-line CT-IT were 7.2 and 19.8 months with an ORR of 72.0%. In multivariate analyses, liver metastasis and response to CT-IT were shown to be independent prognostic factors of PFS (p < 0.05), while liver metastasis and bone metastasis were independent predictive factors of OS (p < 0.05). Although TRT was significantly associated with better PFS and OS in univariate analysis, the association of TRT and OS failed to reach statistical significance (HR = 0.564, p = 0.052) in multivariate analysis. There was no significant difference in adverse events (AEs) between two treatment groups (p = 0.58). (4) Conclusions: ES-SCLC patients treated with TRT after first-line CT-IT had prolonged PFS and OS with an acceptable safety profile. Further prospective randomized studies are necessary to explore the efficacy and safety of this treatment modality for ES-SCLC in future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The compositions of the microbial community in fermented grains of Sauce-flavor baijiu produced in different regions have diverse characteristics; however, the reasons for this remain unclear. The present study investigated the contributions of environmental microorganisms to the microbial community as well as the volatile compounds in the fermented grains of Sauce-flavor baijiu produced in the Beijing region using high-throughput sequencing combined with sourcetracker analysis, and compared the differences of environmental microorganism and their roles in the production process of Sauce-flavor baijiu from different regions.The results showed that the environmental microorganisms in the tools were the main contributors of the bacterial and fungal communities in fermented grains during heap fermentation and at the beginning of pit fermentation. At the end of pit fermentation, pit mud was the main environmental source of bacterial community in fermented grains, while tools and Daqu were the main environmental sources of fungal community in fermented grains.Environmental microorganisms thrived on the functional microorganisms in the fermented grains of Sauce-flavor baijiu produced in the Beijing region and thus shaped the profiles of volatile compounds. Environmental microorganisms of Sauce-flavor baijiu in the Guizhou province and the Beijing region differed significantly, which is partially responsible for the distinctive characteristics in the microbial community structure of Sauce-flavor baijiu-fermented grains from different regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nurses face a greater risk of needle stick and sharp injuries (NSIs) because they do most of the injections and procedures with sharp instruments. The current study tested a program to improve nurses' knowledge, attitudes and practices on NSIs, three phases were included: Developing the Hospital Practice Standard, implementing a series of measures and implementing of quality supervision phases. It consisted of a bundle of interventions based on Knowledge-Attitudes-Belief-Practice (KAP-KABP) Model with a pretest-posttest design. We obtained a total of 656 (88.53%) completed pre-intervention questionnaires and 674 (92.97%) post-intervention ones. The number of trained participants on NSIs increased from 615 (93.7%) to 666 (98.8%), and reported of NSIs within 3 months decreased from 42 to 15 (2.2%) after the intervention. The total score of Knowledge of NSIs improved from 19.18 (SD = 1.31) to 19.42 (SD = 0.93) after training (Z = −4.025, P < 0.001), the Attitude was raised from 54.21 (SD = 4.09) to 55.24 (SD = 3.59) (Z = −5.261, P < 0.001), and the Practice increased from 89.28 (SD = 7.22) to 92.74 (SD = 7.22), with a P Value<0.05. The findings indicated the program can improve the nurses' knowledge and attitudes towards NSIs prevention. There is a statistically significant increase in the practice score and decrease in the incidence rate of NSIs after the intervention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]