Testing of new stormwater pollution build-up algorithms informed by a genetic programming approach.

Pollution build-up and wash-off processes are often included in urban stormwater quality models. However, these models are often unreliable and have poor performance at large scales and in complicated catchments. This study tried to improve stormwater quality models by adopting the genetic programming (GP) approach to generate new build-up algorithms for three different pollutants (total suspend solids - TSS, total phosphorus - TP and total nitrogen - TN).

Transurethral resection of bladder tumours: established and new methods of tumour visualisation.

Transurethral resection (TUR) of bladder tumours does not only serve diagnostic purposes by securing histological proof of the disease but might also resemble the final therapy. During recent years, technical innovations improved the intraoperative detection and visibility of tumourous lesions during TUR. The most important techniques, which have individually found their way into international guidelines, are photodynamic imaging (PDI) and narrowband imaging (NBI).

Microstructural White Matter Alterations in Men With Alcohol Use Disorder and Rats With Excessive Alcohol Consumption During Early Abstinence.

Importance: Although the detrimental effects of alcohol on the brain are widely acknowledged, observed structural changes are highly heterogeneous, and diagnostic markers for characterizing alcohol-induced brain damage, especially in early abstinence, are lacking. This heterogeneity, likely contributed to by comorbidity factors in patients with alcohol use disorder (AUD), challenges a direct link of brain alterations to the pathophysiology of alcohol misuse. Translational studies in animal models may help bridge this causal gap.

Using Nominal Group Technique to Identify Key Attributes of Oncology Treatments for a Discrete Choice Experiment.

Responding to rising oncology therapy costs, multiple value frameworks are emerging. However, input from economists in their design and conceptualization has been limited, and no existing framework has been developed using preference weightings as legitimate indicators of value. This article outlines use of the nominal group technique to identify valued treatment attributes (such as treatment inconvenience) and contextual considerations (such as current life expectancy) to inform the design of a discrete choice experiment to develop a preference weighted value framework for future decision makers.

Spontaneous Vicarious Perception of the Content of Another's Visual Perspective.

Visual perspective taking (VPT) is a core process of social cognition, providing humans with insights into what the environment looks like from another's point of view [1-4]. While VPT is often described as a quasi-perceptual phenomenon [5, 6], evidence for this proposal has been lacking. Here, we provide direct evidence that another's perspective can "stand in" for one's own sensory input during perceptual decision making.

Gods associated with male fertility and virility.

Background: Human fertility has always been a topic of curiosity and devotion. Many cultures consider fertility to be a necessity for the survival and perpetuation of mankind and since early times, myths were created to explain this fabulous process. Fertility gods were ubiquitous in numerous ancient human cultures and were used both to understand fertility and to cope with infertility by means of rituals and offerings.

Incubation of neural alcohol cue reactivity after withdrawal and its blockade by naltrexone.

During the first weeks of abstinence, alcohol craving in patients may increase or "incubate." We hypothesize that Naltrexone (NTX) blocks this incubation effect. Here, we compared NTX effects on neural alcohol cue reactivity (CR) over the first weeks of abstinence and on long-term clinical outcomes to standard treatment.

Initiation and Rapid Titration of Methadone in an Acute Care Setting for the Treatment of Opioid Use Disorder: A Case Report.

Background: Although methadone is an effective treatment for opioid use disorder, its initiation requires prescribing at a subtherapeutic dose with subsequent titration to a therapeutic dose over many weeks. Accordingly, the methadone induction period can be a challenging one for individuals and can be associated with an increased risk for ongoing illicit drug use and consequently overdose. Given its capacity for regular clinical assessments, acute care settings may offer a unique opportunity to reduce the duration of the induction period for methadone maintenance therapy.

Methadone Matters: What the United States Can Learn from the Global Effort to Treat Opioid Addiction.

In the midst of an opioid epidemic, mortality related to opioid overdose continues to rise in the US. Medications to treat opioid use disorder, including methadone and buprenorphine, are highly effective in reducing the morbidity and mortality related to illicit opioid use. Despite the efficacy of these life-saving medications, the majority of people with an opioid use disorder lack access to treatment.

Identifying Cancer-Directed Surgeries in Medicare Claims: A Validation Study Using SEER-Medicare Data.

Purpose: Medicare claims provide a rich data source for large-scale quality assessment because data are available for all beneficiaries nationally. For cancer surgery, the absence of information regarding site of cancer and date of diagnosis on an administrative claim necessitates testing to ensure accurate quality assessment and public reporting.

Methods: Using the SEER Medicare-linked database as the gold standard, we developed and tested an approach to identify cancer-directed surgeries from Medicare fee-for-service claims alone.

Practice Patterns for Older Adult Patients With Advanced Cancer: Physician Office Versus Hospital Outpatient Setting.

Purpose: A shift in outpatient oncology care from the physician's office to hospital outpatient settings has generated interest in the effect of practice setting on outcomes. Our objective was to examine whether medical oncologists' prescribing of drugs and services for older adult patients with advanced cancer is used more in physicians' offices compared with hospital outpatient departments.

Methods: This was a retrospective comparative study.

Effects of social exclusion and physical pain in chronic opioid maintenance treatment: fMRI correlates.

Opioids interact with systems processing pain and social stimuli. Both systems are crucial for responding to strains of everyday life and both are linked to relapse risk in opioid-dependent patients. The investigation of those systems seems essential to better understand opioid addiction as a whole.

Effects of leptin and ghrelin on neural cue-reactivity in alcohol addiction: Two streams merge to one river?

Leptin and ghrelin and a "cross-talk" between both hormones were implicated in the pathophysiology of alcohol dependence, both modulating alcohol craving and drug-seeking. To date, the neurobiological mechanisms underlying those effects are still little-known. We thus investigated the effect of leptin and ghrelin on alcohol cue-induced brain response, alcohol craving and relapse risk in alcohol-dependent subjects.

Toothed whale and shark depredation indicators: A case study from the Reunion Island and Seychelles pelagic longline fisheries.

Depredation in marine ecosystems is defined as the damage or removal of fish or bait from fishing gear by predators. Depredation raises concerns about the conservation of species involved, fisheries yield and profitability, and reference points based on stock assessment of depredated species. Therefore, the development of accurate indicators to assess the impact of depredation is needed.

Perceptual teleology: expectations of action efficiency bias social perception.

Primates interpret conspecific behaviour as goal-directed and expect others to achieve goals by the most efficient means possible. While this teleological stance is prominent in evolutionary and developmental theories of social cognition, little is known about the underlying mechanisms. In predictive models of social cognition, a perceptual prediction of an ideal efficient trajectory would be generated from prior knowledge against which the observed action is evaluated, distorting the perception of unexpected inefficient actions.