Exploring an athletic talent development environment in China: A case study of a sport-friendly high school.

This case study utilized the holistic ecological approach (HEA) to explore a successful athletic talent development environment (ATDE) in China. As a case, we selected a basketball team in one Shanghai sport-friendly high school with outstanding individual and team achievements and aimed at (a) describing the ATDE, and (b) identifying environmental success factors (ESF). Using participant observations, document analysis, informal talks, and formal interviews with key stakeholders, including coaches, teachers, athletes, and administrators from sports and education departments, we derived the ATDE and ESF empirical models. The findings showed that (a) the ATDE demonstrated effective interactions between macro- and micro-levels, and (b) the experienced head coach, dedicated assistant coach, and support from athletes' parents contributed to overcoming barriers of preconditions (e.g., limited financial and human resources) within the environment. Further, a coherent and robust cultural paradigm led by the head coach helped the environment maintain its success for a long period. Although some features are similar to successful ATDEs in other countries, unique characteristics (e.g., not prioritizing athletes' autonomy) specific to this ATDE within the Chinese cultural context have been identified. Our findings supplement current studies on ATDEs using the HEA and reflect the environment within Chinese context, offering insights for researchers and practitioners.

Oblique conformal anastomosis decreased the risks of cervical anastomotic leakage after totally minimally invasive esophagectomy.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effectiveness of the original oblique conformal anastomosis presented in this research in reducing the incidence of cervical anastomotic leak after performing totally minimally invasive esophagectomy (TMIE). METHODS: The esophagus and stomach of 27 fresh pigs, termed the esophagogastric model, were used to simulate human esophagogastric organs for this study's in vitro experimental objectives. Nine esophagogastric models of similar weight were divided into three groups. Esophagogastrostomy with circular-stapled end-to-side anastomosis was performed. A tension gauge was used to pull the anastomosis, and the tension at which anastomotic leakage occurred was recorded. Furthermore, a retrospective assessment of 539 patients who underwent TMIE was conducted to analyze the influencing factors of cervical anastomotic leakage. RESULTS: Experiments on the esophagogastric models showed a higher fracture strength of oblique conformal anastomosis than that of conventional anastomosis (F2,18 = 40.86, P < 0.05), which was associated with a lower incidence of cervical anastomotic leakage (X2 = 9.0260, P = 0.0027). Retrospective analysis of 539 esophageal cancer patients who underwent TMIE showed that in contrast to conventional anastomosis, oblique conformal anastomosis was an independent protective factor against cervical anastomotic leakage (P = 0.0462, OR = 0.5872, 95% CI = 0.3497-0.9993). CONCLUSION: Oblique conformation anastomosis was stronger and involved a more prominent reduced risk of cervical anastomotic leakage than conventional anastomosis after TMIE.

Global Trends and Hotspots of Minimally Invasive Surgery in Lumbar Spinal Stenosis: A Bibliometric Analysis.

Objective: The popularity of minimally invasive surgery for lumbar spinal stenosis (LSS) has been steadily increasing worldwide. This study aims to conduct a comprehensive bibliometric analysis to identify global trends and hotspots in the research related to this surgical approach. Methods: Select articles related to the field that were retrieved from the Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC) between January 1, 1993 and December 31, 2022. Visualization of networks and in-depth bibliometric analyses, including the number of publications, countries/regions, institutions, journals, authors, keywords, and references, were conducted using VOSviewer and CiteSpace software. Results: A total of 1197 papers were identified over a three-decade period, with the highest production year being 2022, which saw 171 papers published. The most prolific countries/regions were the United States (279) and Harvard Medical School (59). Among journals, Spine (3289 citations) was the most cited, while World Neurosurgery (98 publications) had the highest number of publications. Lewandrowski, Kai-Uwe (29 publications) wrote the most articles, and Ahn, Y (239 citations) ranked first among cited authors. The most frequently used keyword was "discectomy", but recent years have shown a strong emergence of keywords such as "microendoscopic decompressive laminotomy", "foraminotomy" and "classification". Conclusion: The United States and China have emerged as leaders in the field of minimally invasive surgery for LSS. Endoscopic spinal surgery is recognized as a critical approach, with ongoing research focused on indications, potential complications, minimally invasive anatomical approaches, and outcomes. Furthermore, there is a strong emphasis on optimizing the surgical process, which has become a trending and hot spot in current research. The improvement of surgical techniques is at the forefront of advancements in this field.

Efficient dual-wavelength metasurface for second-order differential edge detection in the ultraviolet.

Metasurfaces for edge detection through spatial analog calculations have attracted much attention due to advantages such as a flexible design and small footprint. Up until now, most studies have focused on single-wavelength operation in the near-infrared or visible regions, while little work has been done in the ultraviolet band. It is of significance to explore metasurfaces for edge detection in the ultraviolet band for their great potential in high-resolution imaging and lithography. Here, we propose a dual-wavelength H f O 2 metasurface for edge detection working at 273 nm and 293 nm, with 25% and 72% efficiency, respectively, controlled by the linear polarization of the incident light. The efficient dual-wavelength second-order differential calculation in the ultraviolet band of the metasurface has been confirmed by 1D signal and 2D image processing. It may find applications in the fields of computer vision and bioimaging.

Corrigendum: The effect of temperature on dengue virus transmission by Aedes mosquitoes.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.3389/fcimb.2023.1242173.].

The effect of temperature on dengue virus transmission by Aedes mosquitoes.

Dengue is prevalent in tropical and subtropical regions. As an arbovirus disease, it is mainly transmitted by Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus. According to the previous studies, temperature is closely related to the survival of Aedes mosquitoes, the proliferation of dengue virus (DENV) and the vector competence of Aedes to transmit DENV. This review describes the correlations between temperature and dengue epidemics, and explores the potential reasons including the distribution and development of Aedes mosquitoes, the structure of DENV, and the vector competence of Aedes mosquitoes. In addition, the immune and metabolic mechanism are discussed on how temperature affects the vector competence of Aedes mosquitoes to transmit DENV.

Multidimensional Pruning and Its Extension: A Unified Framework for Model Compression.

Observing that the existing model compression approaches only focus on reducing the redundancies in convolutional neural networks (CNNs) along one particular dimension (e.g., the channel or spatial or temporal dimension), in this work, we propose our multidimensional pruning (MDP) framework, which can compress both 2-D CNNs and 3-D CNNs along multiple dimensions in an end-to-end fashion. Specifically, MDP indicates the simultaneous reduction of channels and more redundancy on other additional dimensions. The redundancy of additional dimensions depends on the input data, i.e., spatial dimension for 2-D CNNs when using images as the input data, and spatial and temporal dimensions for 3-D CNNs when using videos as the input data. We further extend our MDP framework to the MDP-Point approach for compressing point cloud neural networks (PCNNs) whose inputs are irregular point clouds (e.g., PointNet). In this case, the redundancy along the additional dimension indicates the point dimension (i.e., the number of points). Comprehensive experiments on six benchmark datasets demonstrate the effectiveness of our MDP framework and its extended version MDP-Point for compressing CNNs and PCNNs, respectively.

Screening the Impact of Surfactants and Reaction Conditions on the De-Inkability of Different Printing Ink Systems for Plastic Packaging.

One of the major applications (40% in Europe) of plastic is packaging, which is often printed to display required information and to deliver an attractive aesthetic for marketing purposes. However, printing ink can cause contamination in the mechanical recycling process. To mitigate this issue, the use of surfactants in an alkaline washing process, known as de-inking, has been employed to remove printing ink and improve the quality of recyclates. Despite the existence of this technology, there are currently no data linking the de-inking efficiency with typical printing ink compositions. Additionally, it is necessary to investigate the de-inking process under the process parameters of existing recycling plants, including temperature, NaOH concentration, and retention time. This study aims to evaluate the performance of commonly used printing inks with different compositions under various washing scenarios for plastic recycling in conjunction with different de-inking detergents containing surfactants or mixtures of surfactants. The results indicate that the pigments applied to the ink have no significant effect on the de-inking process, except for carbon black (PBk 7). Nitrocellulose (NC) binder systems exhibit high de-inkability (over 95%) under the condition of 55 °C and 1 wt.% NaOH. However, crosslinked binder systems can impede the de-inking effect, whether used as a binder system or as an overprint varnish (OPV). The de-inking process requires heating to 55 °C with 1 wt.% NaOH to achieve a substantial effect. Based on the findings in this work, breaking the Van der Waals forces, hydrogen bonds, and covalent bonds between the printing ink and plastic film is an essential step to achieve the de-inking effect. Further research is needed to understand the interaction between surfactants and printing inks, enabling the development of de-inkable printing inks and high-performance surfactants that allow for de-inking with less energy consumption. The surfactant and NaOH have a synergistic effect in cleaning the printing ink. NaOH provides a negative surface charge for the adsorption of the cationic head of the surfactant and can hydrolyze the covalent bonds at higher concentrations (>2 wt.%).

CBANet: Toward Complexity and Bitrate Adaptive Deep Image Compression Using a Single Network.

In this work, we propose a new deep image compression framework called Complexity and Bitrate Adaptive Network (CBANet) that aims to learn one single network to support variable bitrate coding under various computational complexity levels. In contrast to the existing state-of-the-art learning-based image compression frameworks that only consider the rate-distortion trade-off without introducing any constraint related to the computational complexity, our CBANet considers the complex rate-distortion-complexity trade-off when learning a single network to support multiple computational complexity levels and variable bitrates. Since it is a non-trivial task to solve such a rate-distortion-complexity related optimization problem, we propose a two-step approach to decouple this complex optimization task into a complexity-distortion optimization sub-task and a rate-distortion optimization sub-task, and additionally propose a new network design strategy by introducing a Complexity Adaptive Module (CAM) and a Bitrate Adaptive Module (BAM) to respectively achieve the complexity-distortion and rate-distortion trade-offs. As a general approach, our network design strategy can be readily incorporated into different deep image compression methods to achieve complexity and bitrate adaptive image compression by using a single network. Comprehensive experiments on two benchmark datasets demonstrate the effectiveness of our CBANet for deep image compression. Code is released at https://github.com/JinyangGuo/CBANet-release.

APSNet: Toward Adaptive Point Sampling for Efficient 3D Action Recognition.

Observing that it is still a challenging task to deploy 3D action recognition methods in real-world scenarios, in this work, we investigate the accuracy-efficiency trade-off for 3D action recognition. We first introduce a simple and efficient backbone network structure for 3D action recognition, in which we directly extract the geometry and motion representations from the raw point cloud videos through a set of simple operations (i.e., coordinate offset generation and mini-PoinNet). Based on the backbone network, we propose an end-to-end optimized network called adaptive point sampling network (APSNet) to achieve the accuracy-efficiency trade-off, which mainly consists of three stages: the coarse feature extraction stage, the decision making stage, and the fine feature extraction stage. In APSNet, we adaptively decide the optimal resolutions (i.e., the optimal number of points) for each pair of frames based on any input point cloud video under the given computational complexity constraint. Comprehensive experiments on multiple benchmark datasets demonstrate the effectiveness and efficiency of our newly proposed APSNet for 3D action recognition.

Effectiveness of the world anti-doping agency's e-learning programme for anti-doping education on knowledge of, explicit and implicit attitudes towards, and likelihood of doping among Chinese college athletes and non-athletes.

BACKGROUND: This study aimed to evaluate the effects of the World Anti-Doping Agency's e-learning programme for anti-doping education on knowledge of, explicit and implicit attitudes towards, and likelihood of doping among Chinese college athletes and non-athletes. METHOD: Thirty-two young adults (including 16 college athletes) were recruited to receive the Athlete Learning Program about Health and Anti-Doping (ALPHA) intervention (Zh-hans version). Another 32 young adults were recruited for no-treatment control purposes. Before and immediately after the intervention, the ALPHA test, performance enhancement attitude scale, doping likelihood scale, and brief implicit association test (BIAT) were performed. Cortical activity during the BIAT test was monitored using a functional near-infrared spectroscopy instrument. RESULTS: Significant intervention effects were observed for knowledge (p < 0.01, η2 = 0.21) and explicit attitude (p < 0.05, η2 = 0.12) but not for doping likelihood (p > 0.05; benefit situation: η2 = 0.04; cost situation: η2 = 0.02). Compared with the non-athletes, the college athletes reported lower doping likelihood scores in benefit situations (e.g., financial gain, p < 0.05, η2 = 0.10). Regarding the BIAT task, the experimental effect was successfully induced by different semantic associations between the concepts and the attitude (doping + like vs. doping + dislike). The mean reaction times (p < 0.01, η2 = 0.36) and error rate (p < 0.01, η2 = 0.34) in the doping-like block were higher than those in the doping-dislike block. Moreover, oxygenated haemoglobin (oxy-Hb) in response to BIAT interference in the temporoparietal junction-related channels was increased during the post-intervention test (p < 0.05, η2 varied from 0.09 to 0.16). CONCLUSIONS: The findings suggest that the online anti-doping education programme is partially effective among Chinese college athletes and non-athletes. Furthermore, our findings reflect enhanced cognitive control after the education intervention to suppress a prepotent implicit attitude towards doping.

A Supplementary Approach for Effective Anti-Doping Education: A Pilot Study Applying Refutation Texts to Modify Misperception of the Whereabouts System.

BACKGROUND: Over the past twenty years, a multifaceted anti-doping system was established to detect, deter, and prevent doping among athletes. However, perception of the whereabouts system has been a controversial issue. This pilot study aimed to evaluate the effects of refutation text intervention on the perception of the whereabouts system. METHODS: In two studies, we tested whether (1) detailed refutation texts are perceived as more effective than simply refuting with a true or false claim among 132 athletes (47.73% female, mean age = 20.99 ± 2.11), and if (2) refutation text intervention can alter the perception of the whereabouts system among 177 athletes (53.11% female, mean age = 21.17 ± 2.27). Descriptive statistics were calculated, followed by a one-sample T-test, independent T-test, chi-square test, and a repeated-measures analysis of variance. RESULTS: The results demonstrate that five true/false statements were developed as refutation texts, and the mean accuracy of the true/false test is less than the probability of guess (p < 0.05, d = -0.18). In addition, detailed refutation texts evoked significantly greater perceived effectiveness than the simple refutation texts (p < 0.01, d = 0.66). Furthermore, the refutation text intervention enhanced the positive perception of the whereabouts system (p < 0.01, η2 = 0.15). CONCLUSIONS: Our findings support the efficacy of refutation texts to improve the misperception of anti-doping regimes among athletes and have implications for future education prevention initiatives.

Is Sedentary Behavior Associated With Executive Function in Children and Adolescents? A Systematic Review.

BACKGROUND: Prolonged time on sedentary behavior, especially screen-based sitting time, is associated with unfavorable health indicators in children and adolescents. However, the effects of sedentary behavior on cognitive function remain to be elucidated. OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this systematic review was to synthesize the evidence on the associations of sedentary behavior with executive function in children and adolescents. METHODS: Four electronic databases (i.e., PubMed, Web of Science, PsycINFO, and SPORTDiscus) were searched for studies examining the associations between sedentary behavior and executive function in children and adolescents. Study quality was assessed by the NIH Quality Assessment Tool for Observational Cohort and Cross-Sectional Studies. RESULTS: A total of 1,151 records were initially identified through database searches and other searches. Twelve cross-sectional and four longitudinal studies met the inclusion criteria. Of the 16 studies, seven studies found significant negative associations between sedentary behavior and executive function, and two studies presented positive associations. Eight studies measured sedentary time using accelerometers and showed varied associations between objectively measured sedentary time and executive function. Nine studies measured screen-based sedentary behavior, of which five studies found negative associations of sedentary time with executive function. CONCLUSION: The available evidence on the associations between sedentary behavior and executive function is not conclusive in children and adolescents. However, screen-based sedentary behavior may be negatively associated with executive function.

Municipal Solid Waste Management through Sustainable Landfilling: In View of the Situation in Karachi, Pakistan.

Open disposal is the most common technique used for municipal solid waste (MSW) management due to the absence of sanitary landfills in Pakistan. The major cities and small towns in Pakistan have become a showcase of negligence and mismanagement of MSW, which results in deterioration of the environmental and social-life quality. Moreover, research has proved that inefficient handling (disposal) of MSW results in uncontrolled emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs), mainly methane, and adds a significant share in global climate change. This study aims to estimate methane emissions from MSW disposed of at dumpsites and compare the GHG mitigation potential of different landfill strategies in specific climate and waste compositions in Karachi. The GHG estimations are based on lab-scale investigations conducted by simulating landfill conditions through the landfill simulation reactor (LSR) experiment. The synthetic MSW sample representing the composition of MSW generated in Karachi was used in the LSR experiment. Environmental sustainability and GHG mitigation potential of different landfilling strategies was evaluated by analyzing gas formation potential (GP21) and respiration activity (RI4) at the end of the experiment. This study revealed that the quantity of solid waste annually disposed of at dumpsites in Karachi possesses the potential to release about 3.9 Mt CO2-eq. methane (with specific methane potential of 1.8 tCO2-eq./tonne DM disposed) due to the biological decomposition of the organic fraction. Results show that the fresh waste disposed of at landfill sites in Karachi possesses about 92% and 94% higher GP21 and RI4, respectively, than the German allocated criteria for mechanically and biologically treated (MBT) waste for landfills Furthermore, sanitary landfills with post-aeration conditions showed higher GHG mitigation potential and low biological activity in the waste. The second highest GHG mitigation potential and lowest biological activity of the waste was noticed from bioreactor landfills with post-aeration conditions. The third number in GHG mitigation and reduced waste activity was noticed in the waste sampled from bioreactors without aftercare approach. The least GHG mitigation potential was noticed from the uncontrolled waste dumping (existing) approach with high residual gas potential and respiration index level. This lab-scale landfill simulation study can provide baseline data for further research and planning the development of new sustainable landfills in Karachi, Pakistan and in the region.

A plasmonic colorimetric strategy for visual miRNA detection based on hybridization chain reaction.

In this work, a novel colorimetric strategy for miRNA analysis is proposed based on hybridization chain reaction (HCR)-mediated localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) variation of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs). miRNA in the sample to be tested is able to release HCR initiator from a solid interface to AgNPs colloid system by toehold exchange-mediated strand displacement, which then triggers the consumption of fuel strands with single-stranded tails for HCR. The final produced long nicked double-stranded DNA loses the ability to protect AgNPs from salt-induced aggregation. The stability variation of the colloid system can then be monitored by recording corresponding UV-vis spectrum and initial miRNA level is thus determined. This sensing system involves only four DNA strands which is quite simple. The practical utility is confirmed to be excellent by employing different biological samples.