Images: Combined positive air way pressure and atomoxetine-oxybutynin for the treatment of severe obstructive sleep apnea.

Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is one of the most common sleep disorders. Positive airway pressure therapy (PAP) is considered the gold standard for treating OSA. Yet, optimal therapy might not be achieved in some cases of severe OSA, despite using maximum settings.

A tale of two constructs: confirmatory factor analysis of performance and symptom validity tests.

Background: Performance validity (PV) and symptom validity (SV) tests assess biased responding that impact scores on neuropsychological tests. The extent to which PV and SV represent overlapping or unique constructs remains incompletely defined, especially among psychiatric patients in a non-forensic setting. The current study investigated this question using confirmatory factor analysis.

Peer-Driven Intervention for Care Coordination and Adherence Promotion for Obstructive Sleep Apnea: A Randomized, Parallel-Group Clinical Trial.

Rationale: Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is a common condition that is usually treated by continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) therapy, but poor adherence is common and is associated with worse patient outcomes and experiences. Patient satisfaction is increasingly adopted as a quality indicator by healthcare systems.

Objective: We tested the hypothesis that peer-driven intervention effected through interactive voice-response(PDI-IVR) system leads to better patient satisfaction (primary outcome), care-coordination, and CPAP adherence when compared to active-control.

Mapping uterine calcium dynamics during the ovulatory cycle in live mice.

Uterine contraction patterns vary during the ovulatory cycle and throughout pregnancy, but prior measurements have produced limited and conflicting information on these patterns. We combined a virally delivered genetically encoded calcium reporter (GCaMP8m) and ultra-widefield imaging in live nonpregnant mice to characterize uterine calcium dynamics at organ scale throughout the estrous cycle. Prior to ovulation (proestrus and estrus), uterine excitations primarily initiated in a region near the oviduct, but after ovulation (metestrus and diestrus), excitations initiated at loci homogeneously distributed throughout the organ.

Assessing the Capacity of High-Resolution Commercial Satellite Imagery for Grapevine Downy Mildew Detection and Surveillance in New York State.

Grapevine downy mildew (GDM), caused by the oomycete , can cause 100% yield loss and vine death under conducive conditions. High-resolution multispectral satellite platforms offer the opportunity to track rapidly spreading diseases such as GDM over large, heterogeneous fields. Here, we investigated the capacity of PlanetScope (3 m) and SkySat (50 cm) imagery for season-long GDM detection and surveillance.

Speciation and Organic Phase Structure in Nitric Acid Extraction with Trioctylamine.

Understanding chemical speciation and intermolecular interactions in multicomponent liquids is essential to understanding their phase and chemical equilibria, which underpin chemical separation processes, including solvent extraction. Here we report on the extraction of nitric acid from its aqueous solutions into organic solutions of trioctylamine (TOA) in toluene, investigated with spectroscopic, X-ray scattering, and computational tools to understand molecular speciation in the organic phase and its relationship with the nanoscale structure of the organic phase. Trends in acid and water extraction clearly show two and three regimes, respectively, indicating different stoichiometric relationships, but speciation of HNO, water, and amine in these regimes is not apparent.

Mapping uterine calcium dynamics during the ovulatory cycle in live mice.

Uterine contraction patterns vary during the ovulatory cycle and throughout pregnancy but prior measurements have produced limited and conflicting information on these patterns. We combined a virally delivered genetically encoded calcium reporter (GCaMP8m) and ultra-widefield imaging in live nonpregnant mice to characterize uterine calcium dynamics at organ scale throughout the estrous cycle. Prior to ovulation (proestrus and estrus) uterine excitations primarily initiated in a region near the oviduct, but after ovulation (metestrus and diestrus), excitations initiated at loci homogeneously distributed throughout the organ.

Use of perceptual memory as a performance validity indicator: initial validation with simulated mild traumatic brain injury.

Introduction: Many commonly employed performance validity tests (PVTs) are several decades old and vulnerable to compromise, leading to a need for novel instruments. Because implicit/non-declarative memory may be robust to brain damage, tasks that rely upon such memory may serve as an effective PVT. Using a simulation design, this experiment evaluated whether novel tasks that rely upon perceptual memory hold promise as PVTs.

Non-Destructive Monitoring of Foliar Fungicide Efficacy with Hyperspectral Sensing in Grapevine.

Frequent fungicide applications are required to manage grapevine powdery mildew (). However, this practice is costly and has led to widespread fungicide resistance. A method of monitoring in-field fungicide efficacy could help growers maximize spray-interval length, thereby reducing costs and the rate of fungicide resistance emergence.

Identification of genetic loci associated with five agronomic traits in alfalfa using multi-environment trials.

The use of multi-environment trials to test yield-related traits in a diverse alfalfa panel allowed to find multiple molecular markers associated with complex agronomic traits. Yield is one of the most important target traits in alfalfa breeding; however, yield is a complex trait affected by genetic and environmental factors. In this study, we used multi-environment trials to test yield-related traits in a diverse panel composed of 200 alfalfa accessions and varieties.

The neural correlates of value representation: From single items to bundles.

One of the core questions in Neuro-economics is to determine where value is represented. To date, most studies have focused on simple options and identified the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC) as the common value region. We report the findings of an fMRI study in which we asked participants to make pairwise comparisons involving options of varying complexity: single items (Control condition), bundles made of the same two single items (Scaling condition) and bundles made of two different single items (Bundling condition).

Effects of Nighttime Applications of Germicidal Ultraviolet Light Upon Powdery Mildew (), Downy Mildew (), and Sour Rot of Grapevine.

Nighttime applications of germicidal ultraviolet were evaluated as a means to suppress three diseases of grapevine. In laboratory studies, UV-C light (peak 254 nm, FWHM 5 nm) applied during darkness strongly inhibited the germination of conidia of , and at a dose of 200 J/m, germination was zero. Reciprocity of irradiance and duration of exposure with respect to conidial germination was confirmed for UV-C doses between 0 and 200 J/m applied at 4 or 400 s.

Deep semantic segmentation for the quantification of grape foliar diseases in the vineyard.

Plant disease evaluation is crucial to pathogen management and plant breeding. Human field scouting has been widely used to monitor disease progress and provide qualitative and quantitative evaluation, which is costly, laborious, subjective, and often imprecise. To improve disease evaluation accuracy, throughput, and objectiveness, an image-based approach with a deep learning-based analysis pipeline was developed to calculate infection severity of grape foliar diseases.

Reducing transfusion in hip arthroplasty: tranexemic acid diminishes influence of anesthesia administered.

Background: The risk of transfusion following total hip arthroplasty (THA) continues to be problematic. The best choice of anesthesia (spinal vs general) and impact of tranexamic acid (TXA) use in reducing transfusions following surgery remain unclear. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to compare rates of blood transfusion following THA via the anterior approach using three different anesthesia protocols with and without TXA.

Citizen science reveals waterfowl responses to extreme winter weather.

Global climate change is increasing the frequency and severity of extreme climatic events (ECEs) which may be especially detrimental during late-winter when many species are surviving on scarce resources. However, monitoring animal populations relative to ECEs is logistically challenging. Crowd-sourced datasets may provide opportunity to monitor species' responses to short-term chance phenomena such as ECEs.

Obstructive Sleep Apnea as a Risk Factor for COVID-19 Severity-The Gut Microbiome as a Common Player Mediating Systemic Inflammation via Gut Barrier Dysfunction.

The novel corona virus that is now known as (SARS-CoV-2) has killed more than six million people worldwide. The disease presentation varies from mild respiratory symptoms to acute respiratory distress syndrome and ultimately death. Several risk factors have been shown to worsen the severity of COVID-19 outcomes (such as age, hypertension, diabetes mellitus, and obesity).

Markers of ventricular repolarization and overall mortality in sleep disordered breathing.

Introduction: Variability and prolongation of ventricular repolarization - measured by changes in QT interval and QT variability are independently associated with ventricular arrhythmias, sudden death, and mortality but such studies did not examine the role of sleep-disordered breathing. We aimed to determine whether sleep-disordered breathing moderated the association between measures of ventricular repolarization and overall mortality.

Methods: Eight hundred participants were randomly selected from each of the following four groups in the Sleep Heart Health Study: mild, moderate, severe or no sleep disordered breathing (n = 200 each).

Reduction of silver ions in molybdates: elucidation of framework acidity as the factor controlling charge balance mechanisms in aqueous zinc-ion electrolyte.

A percolating network of high electrical conductivity needed to operate electrodes at a fast rate can be formed by reduction of Ag originating from mixed metal oxide lattices, but few studies have elucidated trends in this mechanism as a function of Ag concentration and structure. Candidates compared for the first time here are spinel AgMoO, monoclinic and triclinic AgMoO, and AgMoO·2HO, which have reduction potentials for Ag and Mo strongly decoupled by up to ∼600 mV in aqueous zinc-ion electrolyte. Under these conditions, Ag is the first reduction product and a decrease of charge transfer resistance by ∼100× is observed within 2.

Alfalfa biotypes with putative enhanced cell wall digestibility and effects on performance of growing beef steers.

Three alfalfa biotypes were chosen based on the presumption that they would be sources of alfalfa herbage that differed in lignin concentration and therefore cell wall digestibility. The hypothesis was that a lesser lignin concentration would result in greater alfalfa neutral detergent fiber (NDF) digestibility and greater beef steer growth performance. The three alfalfa biotypes were HarvXtra (Forage Genetics International), Hi-Gest 360 (Alforex Seeds), and a control alfalfa, LegenDairy XHD (Winfield Solutions LLC).

Does femoral stem choice influence fracture type or incidence for direct anterior approach total hip arthroplasty?

Introduction: Despite similar fracture rates, the incidence of intraoperative and post-operative fractures between standard (ST) length and short (SH) femoral stems remains unclear. Therefore, this study compared the incidence of intraoperative and early postoperative fractures between three ST and a single tapered-wedge SH femoral stem.

Materials And Methods: Data were retrospectively collected on 1113 patients (1306 hips) having undergone total hip arthroplasty, via the anterior approach on a fracture table, between 2014 and 2019.