Modification of Irind Mine Pumice Surface

In the last decade, a continuous increasing research activity is focused on the surface modification of natural porous materials for the efficient removal of oil contaminants from water. A continuous in-situ oil/water separation technique for oil spill cleanup had been designed using surface modified Irind mine pumice as a sorbent. Irind mine pumice is an aluminosilicate rock, with well-developed porosity, mechanical strength, high buoyancy, chemically inert and eco-friendly, therefore it must exhibit certain water-and oil absorption capacities. The modified pumice absorbs a broad variety of oils and organic solvents with high oil absorption capacity and negligible water take-up at both static and dynamic conditions. Irind mine pumice have been used with grain sizes ranging from 2.5 ... 5.0 mm. Oligomethylhydride siloxane is used as a modifier.

DIAGNOSIS WITH THE HACKATHON ECOSYSTEM OF THE UNIVERSITY OF THE READINESS OF STUDENTS FOR RESEARCH ACTIVITIES

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES. The changes in society associated with the country's transition to an innovative way of development radically change the nature and goals of labor activity. Profession under such conditions is considered by a person as a source of material well-being and gaining the desired social status. Professional self-determination occurs too late or is realized as forced, so the lack of opportunity to realize one's professional preferences has a negative impact on the individual and on society as a whole. As a result, in recent decades there has been a significant increase in the requirements of modern employers to the professional training of graduates of educational institutions. A young specialist must improve in the profession, be ready to change professional activity, i.e. be socially and professionally mobile, scientifically established, which can be realized with the help of Hackathon-ecosystem.METHODS. Collection of information, survey of students and teachers were carried out using a systematic approach on the basis of the Hackathon ecosystem. Processing of the obtained information, definition of scientific statements, generation of conclusions and practical recommendations were carried out with the help of the software product "Methodology of studying students' adaptation to dual education in higher education".FINDINGS. It is proved that the research activity of students is a necessary condition for their professional self-determination, acts as part of a holistic, long-term, dynamic process of entry into the profession and as a result of the choice and design of their future professional activity. Students' involvement in research activity largely determines the effectiveness of their social and professional development.CONCLUSION. Research activity of university students is an effective means of forming knowledge, abilities and skills necessary for personal and professional self-determination. It not only stimulates and motivates personal and intellectual development, contributes to the continuation of education, proves the degree of its readiness and acts as one of the guarantors of the success of the process of professional self-determination in general.

Mapping Nefarious Social Media Actors to Speed-up Covid-19 Fact-checking

This report presents the outcomes of a project aimed at developing and testing a prototype tool that supports and speeds-up the work of fact-checkers and de-bunkers by surfacing and ranking potentially problematic information circulated on social media with a content-agnostic approach. The tool itself is the result of a multi-year research activity carried on within the Mapping Italian News Research Program of the University of Urbino Carlo Bo to study the strategies, tactics and goals of information operations aimed at manipulating the Italian public opinion by exploiting the vulnerabilities of the contemporary media ecosystem. This research activity led to developing original studies, public reports, new methods, maps and tools employed to study the activity of Italian nefarious social media actors aimed at amplifying the reach and impact of problematic information by coordinating their efforts. Tracking these actors proved instrumental to observe the “infodemic” unraveling during the early days of COVID-19 outbreak in Italy. Combining this existing knowledge with a range of original tools and data sources provided by Meta’s Facebook Open Research Initiative (Fort) and by The International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN) at Poynter, the report: documents those early days by highlighting a list of widely viewed and interacted links circulated on Facebook; traces the establishment, growth and evolution of Italian covid-skeptic coordinated networks on Facebook; presents a comprehensive and updated map of the activities performed by these networks of nefarious social media actors; unveils a set of original tactics and strategies employed by these actors to adjust their operations to the mitigation efforts adopted by social media platforms to reduce the spread of problematic information; describes the circulation of three specific piece of problematic information; provides an overview of the outcomes of the testing phase (carried out in collaboration with Facta.news) of a prototype tool that surfaces and ranks potentially problematic information circulated on social media with a content-agnostic approach.

Global cervical cancer research: A scientometric density equalizing mapping and socioeconomic analysis

Cervical cancer has caused substantial morbidity and mortality for millions of women over the past decades. While enormous progress has been made in diagnosis, prevention and therapy, the disease is still fatal for many women—especially in low-income countries. Since no detailed studies are available on the worldwide research landscape, we here investigated the global scientific output related to this cancer type by an established protocol. The “New Quality and Quantity Indices in Science” platform assessed all relevant cervical cancer research published in the Web of Science since 1900. A detailed analysis was conducted including country-specific research productivity, indicators for scientific quality, and relation of research activity to socioeconomic and epidemiologic figures. Visualization of data was generated by the use of density equalizing map projections. Our approach identified 22,185 articles specifically related to cervical cancer. From a global viewpoint, the United States of America was the dominating country in absolute numbers, being followed by China and Japan. By contrast, the European countries Sweden, Austria, and Norway were positioned first when the research activity was related to the population number. When the scientific productivity was related to annual cervical cancer cases, Scandinavian countries (Finland #1, Sweden #4, Norway #5, Denmark #7), the Alpine countries Austria (#2) and Switzerland (#6), and the Netherlands (#3) were leading the field. Density equalizing mapping visualized that large parts of Africa and South America were almost invisible regarding the global participation in cervical cancer research. Our data documented that worldwide cervical cancer research activity is continuously increasing but is imbalanced from a global viewpoint. Also, the study indicated that global and public health aspects should be strengthened in cervical carcinoma research in order to empower more countries to take part in international research activities.

Bibliometrics, a useful tool within the field of research

The activity in scientific research has been able to be studied, measured, compared, analyzed and objectified through Scientometrics, discipline that applies to all the literature of scientific character, mathematical and statistical methods, thus achieving, that social aspects of science can be quantified. From the scientific literature, scientific publications (tangible products of the research) are derived, which are specifically studied by the bibliometrics. This last one, is a branch of the Scientometrics, that is guided under the assumption that the scientific discoveries and the research results are published in scientific journals, so its unit of analysis is the scientific article. The word bibliometrics was defined for first time by Alan Pritchard in 1969, and since then, multiple concepts of this term have been developed. However, it has reached to the consensus that this methodological tool allows to know the scientific production (in quantity, quality and impact) on various topics, journals, authors and countries, among others. Its main research lines are the methodology for bibliometrics, the scientific disciplines and the health management and policies. Likewise, it has descriptive, evaluation and supervision/monitoring functions of the research activity, on which its classification into levels (micro, meso and maso) will depend directly. Because it has components from various sciences, among them the mathematics, its methodology and theory are based on mathematical models, from which the bibliometric indicators are derived. Although there are other types of research such as systematic reviews and meta-analyzes, these, require a better management in the field of research and of the statistical measurement, as well as more resources. On the other hand, a bibliometric study owns the nobility of being within the reach of students and researchers due to its methodology, practicality, relevance, resource saving, potential to extend to most of the scientific areas, multiple applications and favoring the fact of not committing ethical misconduct related to research. Finally, although bibliometrics is often underestimated, its power and importance as a tool to manage evidence-based knowledge and to serve as a basis for other types of studies such as systematic reviews must be emphasized.

Scoping review of existing funding sources for DCM research: opportunities and challenges for targeting the AO Spine RECODE-DCM research priorities (Preprint)

BACKGROUND Degenerative Cervical Myelopathy (DCM) is a common, disabling condition of symptomatic cervical spinal cord compression that requires significant research advances to improve patient outcomes. AO Spine RECODE-DCM recently identified the top research priorities for DCM. To effectively address these priorities, appropriate funding of DCM research is essential. OBJECTIVE This review characterises current funding in DCM research to consider its significance and highlight future opportunities. METHODS A systematic review of Web of Science for “cervical” AND “myelopathy” was conducted. Papers exclusively studying DCM, with declared funding, and published between January 1, 1995 and March 21, 2020 were considered eligible. Funding sources were classified by country of origin and organisation type. A grant search was also conducted using Dimensions.ai (Digital Science Ltd, London, United Kingdom). RESULTS A total of 621 papers were included, with 300 unique funding bodies. The top funders were AO Spine (n=87), National Institutes of Health, USA (n=63) and National Natural Science Foundation, China (n=63). The USA (n=242) funded the most DCM research, followed by China (n=209) and Japan (n=116). Funding in the USA was primarily provided by corporate or non-profit organisations (60.3%); in China, by institutions (99.5%). Dimensions.ai data showed 180 DCM research grants explicitly awarded, with a total value of US$45.6 million since 1996. CONCLUSIONS DCM funding appears to be predominantly from USA, China and Japan, aligning with areas of high DCM research activity and underpinning the importance of funding to increasing research capacity. The existing funding sources differ from medical research in general, representing opportunities for future investment in DCM.

Three-dimensional numerical modeling of flow upstream of a symmetric streamlined body mounted over a flat plate with tip gap

In this research activity numerical simulations are carried out to investigate the flow field upstream of a symmetric streamlined body mounted perpendicular to a flat plate with and without clearance gap between the tip of the streamlined body and the flat plate with laminar boundary layer. The developed numerical model successfully predicted the three-dimensional horseshoe vortex system upstream of the streamlined body with and without the tip gap. The resulting vortex system for the configuration with tip gap contains multiple vortices with characteristics similar to that of end-wall-flows of surface-mounted obstacles. The effects of varying tip gap clearance for various values of free stream Reynolds number are also investigated. It was found that the introduction of a gap between the streamlined body tip and flat surface caused shifting of the vortex structure system in the upstream direction. Moreover, it is observed that the free stream Reynolds number and the tip gap between the streamlined body and the flat plate substantially influences the unsteady character of the flow field and the vortex system structure. Results obtained from the numerical simulations are compared with experimental measurements of a blunt body configuration and have been found in good agreement.

Burden of COVID-19 and Vaccination Coverage in the Italian Population as of October 2021

Following the pandemic scenario, researchers from all over the world, including Italians, have undertaken fervent research activity using the epidemiological data available on the sites of government and national and international research institutes. The objectives of our study were: (1) to analyze the load and trend of the COVID-19 pandemic in Italy, from the beginning to October 2021; (2) to analyze vaccination coverage by age groups and types of vaccines administered and check how the vaccination campaign has influenced the course of the disease and deaths; (3) to evaluate the Italian situation in the European context, comparing the incidence and mortality of Italy with respect to European countries; (4) finally, to evaluate how much vaccination coverage may have had an effect on mortality in the various European countries. Databases were structured to archive Italian and European COVID-19 data provided by Our World in Data, and data came from the Ministry of Health, to evaluate percentage of vaccines administered. The monthly trend of the cumulative incidence per 100,000 inhabitants in the period January 2020–October 2021 was evaluated. It is important to underline 3 peaks of incidence and mortality rates that occurred during the three waves of COVID-19: March–April–May 2020, October–November–December 2020, and March–April–May 2021. There is a slight increase in incidence in August 2021 and in mortality in September 2021. The three mortality rate peaks, related to the three waves of COVID-19, are always higher in Italy than in Europe, particularly in April 2020, December 2020, and March 2021. From May 2021 to October 2021, the mortality trend reversed, and it turned out to be higher in Europe than in Italy. Regarding vaccination, Italy currently has an important coverage, not only in the most fragile population, where it exceeds 90%, but also in the 12–19 age group, with percentages above 65%. The Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine was used widely in all age groups (first and second dose), with highest administration in 12–19 age groups and 80+, while the lowest was recorded in the 70–79 age group. In conclusion, these data confirm the importance of vaccination in the management of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Soil-transmitted helminth (STH) infections in Malaysia : A scoping review protocol (Preprint)

BACKGROUND Soil-transmitted helminth (STH) infection is one of the 13 notable Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) according to the CDC and WHO. In 2010, it is estimated that 1.73 billion people are infected with STH globally of which 70% of cases occur in Asia. To date, there is a dearth of published literature on the prevalence of STH infection throughout Malaysia. OBJECTIVE The objectives of this study are to review research activity on STH infection in Malaysia, to estimate the prevalence of STH infection among Malaysian, and to identify significant risk factors associated with the infection. METHODS We will conduct a scoping review based on the 6-stages structured framework of Arksey and O’Malley’s (2005) methodology. A comprehensive search strategy focusing on STH infection will be executed using electronic databases (Scopus, PubMed, Web of Science and EMBASE). A systematic approach to searching, screening, reviewing and data extraction will be applied based on Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses for Scoping Review (PRISMA-ScR). Mendeley software and Microsoft Excel programmes will be used to manage the references and to remove duplicates. Relevant data from selected articles will be extracted using a standardized data extraction form using the Google Form application. Results will be summarized descriptively in tabular form including types of interventions, study design, settings, tools used, and the outcomes of each study. RESULTS We would like to provide further evidence on the prevalence of STH in terms of parasite species that predominately cause the infection and the intensity of the infection. Finally, we will present the significant risk factors that contribute to STH infection and discuss prevention taken by considering the government or private sectors involvement towards curbing this issue. CONCLUSIONS We hope that the findings of this scoping review will provide information for policymakers and strengthen policy guidelines to eradicate STH infection, and for researchers to further study and investigate any STH-related issue in Malaysia.

Potential of peat carbon storage in natural forests Tripa Peat Swamp at Aceh Barat Daya District

Carbon storage is the total weight of carbon stored in the ecosystem at a certain time, especially in natural forests in the Tripa peat swamp area of Aceh Barat Daya. Peatlands are wetland ecosystems that are formed by the accumulation of organic matter on the forest floor from weathering of the vegetation on it over a long period of time. The research objectives were 1) to calculate peat soil carbon storage and 2) to measure the depth of peat soil in natural forest in the Tripa peat swamp area, Aceh Barat Daya Regency. The research activity was carried out from February to March 2021, in a natural forest in the Tripa Aceh Barat peat swamp area, divided into three stations and at each station, three sampling plots were made. Data collection using purposive sampling technique, Analysis of carbon stock was analyzed using the formula for calculating carbon stock by entering data on the percentage of soil organic carbon in the laboratory, and data on peat depth in a descriptive analysis. The results showed that the amount of peat soil carbon storage, especially in natural forest in the Tripa Aceh Barat Daya peat swamp area, was 2.556 tons/ha and the peat depth range was fibric with a depth of 0-95 cm, hemic 96-292 cm, and substance 293-310.