The increase in urinary serotonin and decrease in salivary cortisol concentrations following direct inhalations of concentrated essential oils is not induced by non-specific effects

Objectives. The effectiveness of exogenously triggered serotonin (e.g., dietary supplements, drugs) increase is varied. However, since urinary serotonin concentrations were found to correlate with those in the cerebrospinal fluid, the olfactory system might be an efficient and testable pathway to quickly elevate serotonin levels due to its fast-acting central neurophysiological and peripheral pathways. However, little research has been devoted to investigate this assumption. This paper extends previous findings of parasympathetic activation of a specially designed essential oil inhaler (AromaStick® Balance) by experimentally testing its impact on urine serotonin and saliva cortisol excretion. Method. Two experiments involving healthy individuals were conducted to test the efficacy of essential oil application to the nose by employing different inhalation protocols and control conditions. Results. In the pilot study (n=8), serotonin urine excretion was increased after six inhalations (effect size Cohen’s d=0.7). In the second experiment (n=80), inhalations proved superior to both the natural control condition and the pseudo placebo condition after three and six inhalation cycles (0.6<d<1.8). In addition, there was a large reduction of cortisol saliva levels after three inhalations (d=0.9). Conclusion. Short and deep inhalations of essential oil scents directly delivered to the olfac-tory system appear to result in an enhanced serotonin and a reduced cortisol release in healthy individuals of both sexes.

REVIEW ON DEEP LEARNING APPROACHES TO THE CONTROL OF PROSTHETIC HANDS WITH ELECTROMYOGRAPHY SIGNALS

Natural control methods based on surface electromyography (sEMG) and pattern recognition are promising for hand prosthetics. Several efforts have been carried out to enhance dexterous hand prosthesis control by impaired individuals. However, the control robustness offered by scientic research is still not sufcient for many real life applications, and commercial prostheses are capable of offering natural control for only a few movements. This paper reviews various papers on deep learning approaches to the control of prosthetic hands with EMG signals and made a comparison on their accuracy.

Gesture Recognition Using Surface Electromyography and Deep Learning for Prostheses Hand: State-of-the-Art, Challenges, and Future

Amputation of the upper limb brings heavy burden to amputees, reduces their quality of life, and limits their performance in activities of daily life. The realization of natural control for prosthetic hands is crucial to improving the quality of life of amputees. Surface electromyography (sEMG) signal is one of the most widely used biological signals for the prediction of upper limb motor intention, which is an essential element of the control systems of prosthetic hands. The conversion of sEMG signals into effective control signals often requires a lot of computational power and complex process. Existing commercial prosthetic hands can only provide natural control for very few active degrees of freedom. Deep learning (DL) has performed surprisingly well in the development of intelligent systems in recent years. The significant improvement of hardware equipment and the continuous emergence of large data sets of sEMG have also boosted the DL research in sEMG signal processing. DL can effectively improve the accuracy of sEMG pattern recognition and reduce the influence of interference factors. This paper analyzes the applicability and efficiency of DL in sEMG-based gesture recognition and reviews the key techniques of DL-based sEMG pattern recognition for the prosthetic hand, including signal acquisition, signal preprocessing, feature extraction, classification of patterns, post-processing, and performance evaluation. Finally, the current challenges and future prospects in clinical application of these techniques are outlined and discussed.

Erionota acroleucus (palm redeye).

Although E. acroleucus has been found to be a relatively common minor pest on rattan palms (Steiner, 2001b), and is reported from a variety of crop and ornamental palms (Cock, 2015), no economic impact has been reported. It is likely that this is a species that is kept under control by its indigenous natural enemies, but could become an outbreak pest if this natural control were disrupted, e.g. by the use of insecticides, or if it were introduced into new areas and thereby freed of its natural enemies.

Modelling the spatiotemporal complexity of interactions between pathogenic bacteria and a phage with a temperature-dependent life cycle switch

We apply mathematical modelling to explore bacteria-phage interaction mediated by condition-dependent lysogeny, where the type of the phage infection cycle (lytic or lysogenic) is determined by the ambient temperature. In a natural environment, daily and seasonal variations of the temperature cause a frequent switch between the two infection scenarios, making the bacteria-phage interaction with condition-dependent lysogeny highly complex. As a case study, we explore the natural control of the pathogenic bacteria Burkholderia pseudomallei by its dominant phage. B. pseudomallei is the causative agent of melioidosis, which is among the most fatal diseases in Southeast Asia and across the world. We assess the spatial aspect of B. pseudomallei-phage interactions in soil, which has been so far overlooked in the literature, using the reaction-diffusion PDE-based framework with external forcing through daily and seasonal parameter variation. Through extensive computer simulations for realistic biological parameters, we obtain results suggesting that phages may regulate B. pseudomallei numbers across seasons in endemic areas, and that the abundance of highly pathogenic phage-free bacteria shows a clear annual cycle. The model predicts particularly dangerous soil layers characterised by high pathogen densities. Our findings can potentially help refine melioidosis prevention and monitoring practices.

A review of usage of wastewater sludge and its environmental impacts

Sludge is an unavoidable side-effect coming about because of wastewater treatment. Dewatered sludge is ordinarily arranged off by spreading on the land or via landfilling. For urbanized zones, sludge removal via landfilling isn't exceptionally functional because of land constraints and the ecological concerns included. Accordingly, severe natural control guidelines and the expanded sludge creation rates have likewise brought about restrictions on many removal choices. Consequently, there is creating interest in removal by burning and open removal. Burning debris will be delivered and should be discarded by different methods, open removal might prompt eutrophication and inebriation of water bodies. The removal difficulties can be quickly diminished if sludge is being reused into building and development materials. This paper suggests the use of sludge and sludge debris as new and non-customary development materials as an option of arranging in landfills. The utilization of sewage muck in building materials saves us from a portion of the pricy and energy requesting phases of usage, and the result gained is generally constant and safe. The motivation behind the article is to introduce the various methods of utilizing sewage muck in development materials.

Hyperparasitoids (Hymenoptera: Encyrtidae and Signiphoridae) of Hypogeococcus spp. mealybugs (Hemiptera: Pseudococcidae) in Argentina and Paraguay

Identified and reviewed taxonomically are the hyperparasitoids (Hymenoptera: Chalcidoidea) in Argentina and Paraguay associated with Hypogeococcus spp. (Hemiptera: Pseudococcidae), mealybugs that feed on various native cacti (Cactaceae) as well as some Amaranthaceae and Portulacaceae. The following genera and species were collected and reared in the course of surveys conducted in Argentina during 2010–2019 and in Paraguay during 2016–2019: Chartocerus argentinus (Brèthes) stat. rev. [reinstated as a valid species from the previous synonymy with Chartocerus niger (Ashmead)] and Chartocerus axillaris De Santis from Argentina (Signiphoridae), an undescribed Cheiloneurus sp. from Paraguay and Prochiloneurus argentinensis (De Santis) from Argentina (Encyrtidae). These are secondary parasitoids via Encyrtidae primary parasitoids of Hypogeococcus sp., candidate biological control agents against a Hypogeococcus sp. (commonly called the Harrisia cactus mealybug) that is devastating the native columnar cacti in Puerto Rico. The previously unknown male of Chartocerus argentinus is described, and a lectotype is designated for Signiphora argentina Brèthes. Taxonomic notes are provided for Ablerus platensis (Brèthes) (Hymenoptera:Azotidae), for which a lectotype is designated (for Dimacrocerus platensis Brèthes); it is newly recorded from Paraguay. Hyperparasitoids can be detrimental to biological control programs, but their impact has often been unknown or underestimated. Taxonomic identification of the hyperparasitoids is the first step in assessing the potential negative impact to the natural control of Hypogeococcus spp. in South America.

Biodiversity enhances the multitrophic control of arthropod herbivory

Arthropod herbivores cause substantial economic costs that drive an increasing need to develop environmentally sustainable approaches to herbivore control. Increasing plant diversity is expected to limit herbivory by altering plant-herbivore and predator-herbivore interactions, but the simultaneous influence of these interactions on herbivore impacts remains unexplored. We compiled 487 arthropod food webs in two long-running grassland biodiversity experiments in Europe and North America to investigate whether and how increasing plant diversity can reduce the impacts of herbivores on plants. We show that plants lose just under half as much energy to arthropod herbivores when in high-diversity mixtures versus monocultures and reveal that plant diversity decreases effects of herbivores on plants by simultaneously benefiting predators and reducing average herbivore food quality. These findings demonstrate that conserving plant diversity is crucial for maintaining interactions in food webs that provide natural control of herbivore pests.