Tag: statistics

Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2023 Jul 7. doi: 10.1007/s11356-023-28438-4. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

The average population in sub-Saharan Africa that has access to clean fuel for cooking and technology is 23.6%. This study examines the panel data for 29 sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries for the period 2000-2018 to estimate impacts of clean energy technologies on environmental sustainability measured by load capacity factor (LCF) to capture both nature’s supply and man’s demand for the environment. The study used generalized quantile regression, which is more robust to outliers and eliminates the endogeneity of variables in the model using lagged instruments. Results show that clean energy technologies (clean fuels for cooking and renewable energy) have positive and statistically significant impacts on environmental sustainability in SSA for almost all quantiles. For robustness checks, we used Bayesian panel regression estimates and the results remained unchanged. The overall results suggest that clean energy technologies improve environmental sustainability in SSA. The result shows a U-shaped relationship between environmental quality and income and confirms the Load Capacity Curve (LCC) hypothesis in SSA, which implies that income first worsens environmental sustainability and then, after exceeding certain quantiles, improves environmental sustainability. On the other hand, the results also confirm the environmental Kuznet curve (EKC) hypothesis in SSA. The findings show the importance of using clean fuels for cooking, trade, and renewable energy consumption in improving environmental sustainability in the region. The policy implication is that governments in SSA should reduce the cost of energy services (i.e., renewable energy and clean fuels for cooking) to achieve greater environmental sustainability in the region.

PMID:37418191 | DOI:10.1007/s11356-023-28438-4

Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2023 Jul 7. doi: 10.1007/s11356-023-28394-z. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Anti-mullerian hormone (AMH) concentration is a marker of ovarian reserve that decreases with age. However, a decrease in AMH may occur more rapidly under the influence of environmental factors. The present study investigated the association between long-term exposure to ambient air pollutants with serum concentrations of AMH and the AMH rate of decline. This study included 806 women with median age of 43 years (interquartile range: 38-48) participating in the Tehran Lipid and Glucose Study (TLGS) that were followed from 2005 to 2017. The AMH concentration and the demographic, anthropometric, and personal health parameters of the study participants were obtained from the TLGS cohort database. Air pollutant data were collected from the monitoring stations and the individual exposures were estimated by previously developed land use regression (LUR) models. Multiple linear regression analysis was used to estimate linear relationships between the air pollutant exposures and serum concentration of AMH and with the AMH declination rate. The results show no statistically significant associations between exposures to any of the air pollutants (including PM₁₀, PM_2.5, SO₂, NO, NO₂, NO_X, and benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, p-xylene, m-xylene, o-xylene (BTEX), and total BTEX) with serum concentration of AMH. Compared to the first tertile, no statistically significant associations were observed between the second or third tertiles of air pollutants, with the AMH rate of decline. In this study, we did not find significant association between air pollution and AMH in middle age women in Tehran, Iran. Future work may study such associations in younger women.

PMID:37418184 | DOI:10.1007/s11356-023-28394-z

Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg. 2023 Jul 7. doi: 10.1002/ohn.420. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: Persistent asymptomatic cervical lymphadenopathy (PACL) is a common outpatient referral diagnosis for pediatric otolaryngologists. Historically, excisional biopsy under general anesthesia has been the gold standard for diagnosis but is associated with some risks. Current literature provides little guidance on less invasive monitoring. Our hypothesis is that the majority of children who present with PACL can be safely monitored with ultrasound and avoid the risks of excisional biopsy.

STUDY DESIGN: A retrospective review was performed of patients <18 years of age, referred to a tertiary care children’s hospital for PACL who also underwent at least 1 neck ultrasound from 2007 to 2021. Patients with acute neck infections, congenital masses, or known rheumatologic, immunologic, or malignant conditions were excluded. A multivariate logistic regression model was used to determine patient and nodal factors associated with the decision for operative management.

SETTING: University of California, San Francisco Pediatric Otolaryngology Department.

RESULTS: Among the 197 patients meeting inclusion criteria, 30 (15.2%) underwent surgical biopsy. Overall, 26% underwent repeat ultrasound with a mean interval of 6.6 months, and a mean decrease in nodal size of 0.34 cm. Of the 30 surgical cases, 27 (90%) patients had benign pathology. Multivariate regression analysis revealed pain (p = .04), firmness (p < .001), and lack of a normal fatty hilum on ultrasound (p = .04) as statistically significantly correlated with decisions for surgical management.

CONCLUSION: The majority of pediatric PACL is benign and does not require an excisional biopsy to rule out lymphoma. Serial clinical follow-up with neck ultrasound can be used to safely monitor patients.

PMID:37418178 | DOI:10.1002/ohn.420

J Biomol Struct Dyn. 2023 Jul 7:1-10. doi: 10.1080/07391102.2023.2233028. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

The functional domains of BARD1, comprise the Ankyrin Repeat Domain (ARD), C-Terminal domains (BRCTs), and a linker between ARD and the BRCTs, which are known to bind to Cleavage stimulation Factor complex-subunit of 50 kDa (CstF-50). The pathogenic mutation Q564H in the BARD1 ARD-linker-BRCT region has been reported to abrogate the binding between BARD1 and CstF-50. Intermediate penetrance variants of BARD1 are associated with the occurrence of breast cancer. Therefore, seven missense variants of unknown significance (VUS), L447V, P454L, N470S, V507M, I509T, C557S, and Q564H of BARD1, reported in the ARD domain and the linker region were evaluated via molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. The mutants revealed statistically significantly different distributions of RMSD (root mean square deviation), residuewise RMSF (root mean square fluctuation), R_g (radius of gyration), SASA (solvent accessible surface area), and COM (centre of mass)-to-COM distance between the ARD and the BRCT repeat, between the wild type and each mutant. The secondary structural composition of the mutants was slightly altered relative to that of the wild type. However, the reported in-silico based prediction require further validation using in-vitro, biophysical and structure-based approachCommunicated by Ramaswamy H. Sarma.

PMID:37418175 | DOI:10.1080/07391102.2023.2233028

Sports Med Arthrosc Rev. 2023 Jun 1;31(2):41-48. doi: 10.1097/JSA.0000000000000367. Epub 2023 Jul 5.

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of virtual reality (VR) in balance training for the prevention of falls in older adults.

METHODS: We included studies with experimental designs, cohort studies, and quasi-experimental studies of older adults who underwent balance training associated with the use of VR for the prevention of falls. The comparison of control and intervention groups in the studies reported statistically significant improvements in terms of balance for VR.

RESULTS: The effects and benefits from the use of VR were seen by the fourth week of intervention, with significant improvements in balance and lower fall rates, the improvements became greater for groups using VR.

CONCLUSIONS: The benefits presented by the studies were related not only to balance but also to fear of falling, reaction time, gait, physical fitness, independence in activities of daily living, muscle strength, and even quality of life.

PMID:37418173 | DOI:10.1097/JSA.0000000000000367

Mol Divers. 2023 Jul 7. doi: 10.1007/s11030-023-10690-y. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

The role of NLRP3 inflammasome in innate immunity is newly recognized. The NLRP3 protein is a family of nucleotide-binding and oligomerization domain-like receptors as well as a pyrin domain-containing protein. It has been shown that NLRP3 may contribute to the development and progression of a variety of diseases, such as multiple sclerosis, metabolic disorders, inflammatory bowel disease, and other auto-immune and auto-inflammatory conditions. The use of machine learning methods in pharmaceutical research has been widespread for several decades. An important objective of this study is to apply machine learning approaches for the multinomial classification of NLRP3 inhibitors. However, data imbalances can affect machine learning. Therefore, a synthetic minority oversampling technique (SMOTE) has been developed to increase the sensitivity of classifiers to minority groups. The QSAR modelling was performed using 154 molecules retrieved from the ChEMBL database (version 29). The accuracy of the multiclass classification top six models was found to fall within ranges of 0.99 to 0.86, and log loss ranges of 0.2 to 2.3, respectively. The results showed that the receiver operating characteristic curve (ROC) plot values significantly improved when tuning parameters were adjusted and imbalanced data was handled. Moreover, the results demonstrated that SMOTE offers a significant advantage in handling imbalanced datasets as well as substantial improvements in overall accuracy of machine learning models. The top models were then used to predict data from unseen datasets. In summary, these QSAR classification models exhibited robust statistical results and were interpretable, which strongly supported their use for rapid screening of NLRP3 inhibitors.

PMID:37418166 | DOI:10.1007/s11030-023-10690-y

Appl Biochem Biotechnol. 2023 Jul 7. doi: 10.1007/s12010-023-04618-3. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Lyophilized human amniotic membrane (HAM) and silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) have multispectral applications as a biological dressing. The present study focuses on the safety aspects of HAM coated with colistin and AgNPs (HACoN) dressing in relation to its structural and hematological changes. Four dressing groups were designed for the study, HAM, HAM coated with colistin (HACo), HAM coated with AgNPs (HAN), and HAM coated with colistin (HACo) and HACoN. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) were utilized for constitutional analysis. Biological safety was checked by applying HAM of all groups on open excisional burn wounds on Sprague-Dawley rats for 21 days. The skin, kidneys, liver, and spleen were removed, and histological analysis was performed for detailed structural analysis. Oxidative stress was assessed using homogenate from newly generated skin. No structural or biochemical change was observed in any of the study groups as observed by SEM and FTIR. After 21 days of grafting, wounds were healed properly with normal skin, and no anomaly was observed in related to kidneys, spleen, and liver. Some of antioxidant enzymes were increased, while malondialdehyde which is a reactive oxygen species was reduced in the skin tissue homogenate of HACoN group. Impregnation of colistin and AgNPs in combination on HAM has no effects on hematological and structural constitution of HAM. It leaves no obvious change in vital organs of rats and improves oxidative stress and inflammation. Hence, it can be claimed that HACoN is a biologically safe antibacterial dressing.

PMID:37418129 | DOI:10.1007/s12010-023-04618-3

Cancer Causes Control. 2023 Jul 7. doi: 10.1007/s10552-023-01748-1. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

PURPOSE: Some pesticides may increase the risk of certain lymphoid malignancies, but few studies have examined Hodgkin lymphoma (HL). In this exploratory study, we examined associations between agricultural use of 22 individual active ingredients and 13 chemical groups and HL incidence.

METHODS: We used data from three agricultural cohorts participating in the AGRICOH consortium: the French Agriculture and Cancer Cohort (2005-2009), Cancer in the Norwegian Agricultural Population (1993-2011), and the US Agricultural Health Study (1993-2011). Lifetime pesticide use was estimated from crop-exposure matrices or self-report. Cohort-specific covariate-adjusted overall and age-specific (< 40 or ≥ 40 years) hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were estimated using Cox regression and combined using random effects meta-analysis.

RESULTS: Among 316 270 farmers (75% male) accumulating 3 574 815 person-years at risk, 91 incident cases of HL occurred. We did not observe statistically significant associations for any of the active ingredients or chemical groups studied. The highest risks of HL overall were observed for the pyrethroids deltamethrin (meta-HR = 1.86, 95% CI 0.76-4.52) and esfenvalerate (1.86, 0.78-4.43), and inverse associations of similar magnitude were observed for parathion and glyphosate. Risk of HL at ≥ 40 years of age was highest for ever-use of dicamba (2.04, 0.93-4.50) and lowest for glyphosate (0.46, 0.20-1.07).

CONCLUSION: We report the largest prospective investigation of these associations. Nonetheless, low statistical power, a mixture of histological subtypes and a lack of information on tumour EBV status complicate the interpretability of the results. Most HL cases occurred at older ages, thus we could not explore associations with adolescent or young adult HL. Furthermore, estimates may be attenuated due to non-differential exposure misclassification. Future work should aim to extend follow-up and refine both exposure and outcome classification.

PMID:37418114 | DOI:10.1007/s10552-023-01748-1

J Gastrointest Cancer. 2023 Jul 7. doi: 10.1007/s12029-023-00956-x. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION: Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the second leading cause of cancer-related deaths in the United States (US), however racial disparities in outcomes persist. We sought to assess the correlation of availability of primary care physicians (PCPs) and racial disparities in CRC-related mortality.

METHODS: We studied the correlation between age-adjusted incidence and mortality rates of CRC among all 50 states and the District of Columbia (D.C.) from the Center for Disease Control (CDC) Wide-Ranging Online Data for Epidemiologic Research (WONDER) with the number of actively practicing PCPs in all 50 states and D.C. from the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) State Physician Workforce Data Report. Pearson’s coefficient was used to study correlations and the two-sample t test was used for comparing state-level PCP/CRC ratios between the two groups. Statistical analysis was performed using VassarStats.

RESULTS: The mean AAMR per 100,000 population for CRC was significantly higher among AA versus White populations (t = 5.79, p < 0.001). Higher state-wide PCP per CRC case ratio correlated with lower state-wide CRCrelated mortality (r = -0.36, p = 0.011). The mean PCP per CRC case ratio was significantly lower among AA compared to White populations (t = -15.95, p < 0.0001). Higher PCP per CRC case ratio correlated with lower CRC-related mortality among both White (r = -0.64, p < 0.0001) and AA (r = -0.57, p = 0.0002) populations.

CONCLUSIONS: These findings suggest that racial disparities in CRC-related mortality may at least in part be related to lower availability of PCPs. Efforts focused on the development of strategies focused on improving access to primary care may help bridge racial disparities in CRC-related outcomes.

PMID:37418113 | DOI:10.1007/s12029-023-00956-x

Braz J Microbiol. 2023 Jul 7. doi: 10.1007/s42770-023-01033-y. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Recently, an increasing number of multi drug resistant Salmonella species have been emerged due to overuse of antibiotics in veterinary and human medicine which has adverse consequences on public health. The present study was conducted with the aim of investigating the prevalence of Salmonella infection in village chickens in Sistan region and determining the prevalence of the antibiotic resistance genes in Salmonella isolated from these birds. In this study, 100 chickens were randomly selected from five counties of Sistan region. A cloacal swab sample was taken from each bird and also information about age, gender, breed, proximity with other birds, proximity with waterfowl, proximity with livestock, and receiving different antibiotics especially tetracycline were obtained using a questionnaire. Conventional culture methods used for Salmonella detection and isolation. Then, amplification of invA gene by PCR was used to confirm Salmonella colonies. Finally, 27 samples were confirmed to be infected with Salmonella by both culture and PCR methods. Disk diffusion method was used to determine the sensitivity to 4 antibiotics including; tetracycline, gentamicin, cefepime, and difloxacin. The results of the present study showed that proximity to waterfowl (OR = 0.273) significantly mitigates the risk of Salmonella infection. For the isolates, the highest resistance was recorded against cefepime and the highest susceptibility was to difloxacin. The presence proportion of tetA and tetB in tetracycline resistant isolates was higher than that in susceptible ones but this difference was not statistically significant.

PMID:37418110 | DOI:10.1007/s42770-023-01033-y