Sofia University

The primary research question guiding this study was: In what ways do self-transcendent emotion-experiences (awe, gratitude, compassion, and forgiveness) correlate with interoceptive awareness? Two studies were implemented in 2024 to conduct the inquiry. The first was a correlational study involving a measure of interoceptive awareness and assessments of awe, gratitude, compassion, and forgiveness. We recruited two diverse demographic samples of survey respondents (n = 441 and n = 443) to determine what correlations might generalize to a broad population. Bivariate correlational analysis revealed strong correlations among total scores and specific subscales of interoception and self-transcendent emotion-experience. In a second study, an informed grounded theory approach explored what theories might explain the correlation. We conducted 45 interviews, each exploring the somatic felt sense of a profound experience of awe, compassion, gratitude, or forgiveness. The resulting analysis elicited themes of attuning, witnessing, and reorientation associated with a greatly expanded sense of self. Results revealed transcendent emotions to be a profoundly embodied experience correlating with high levels of interoceptive awareness.

Written as a commentary on an article penned by Durganand Sinha (1965) for the Journal of Humanistic Psychology, this article of mine shows that he was a true visionary in proposing the integration of Indian psychological thought with modern psychology—the credit for which is almost non-existent in the mainstream psychological literature. Post the publication of his article, there have been certain developments in the West in the growth of the discipline of consciousness studies, which explicitly bear the mark of his contentions. As far as India is concerned, he most certainly influenced the growth of Indian psychology, which this article elucidates by going into its history. Finally, my own publications in the field of Indian psychology show an inadvertent connection with a couple of his enunciations, which allows me to argue and explicate that the legacy that he has left behind lingers on.

Finding analytic functions capable of representing various potential curves for diatomic molecules is one of the important problems in spectroscopy. The ability to properly represent the form of the potential curve at large internuclear distances is particularly valuable. In this paper, we study the extrapolation properties of the Chebyshev polynomial expansion, reported by V.V. Meshkov and co-authors in J. Chem. Phys. 140, 064315 (2014). Among its many useful features, this potential form has a built-in asymptote, U∞-C6/R6-C8/R8-..., so it is plausible to expect that the dispersion coefficients can be obtained by fitting the Chebyshev polynomial expansion form to the experimental data.

We have found long-living periodic solutions of the complex cubic-quintic Ginzburg-Landau equation (CCQGLE) perturbed with intrapulse Raman scattering. To achieve this we have applied a model system of ordinary differential equations (SODE). A set of the fixed points of the system has been described. A complete phase portrait as well as phase portraits near the fixed points have been built for a proper choice of parameters. The behavior of the model system near the fixed points has been determined. We have presented a detailed description of the subcritical Poincaré-Andronov-Hopf bifurcation due to the intrapulse Raman scattering that appears at one of the fixed points. We have established that there appears an unstable limit cycle in the SODE. To check the validity of the obtained results from the model system we have compared them with the results of the numerical solution of the CCQGLE perturbed with intrapulse Raman scattering. There has been found a remarkable correspondence between the obtained numerical results for the amplitude and frequency of the soliton pulses and the results for these parameters of the bifurcation theory. We have observed that the numerical characteristics of the propagating solitonlike pulses—amplitude, frequency, width, and position—periodically change if we change the distance with a period determined by the bifurcation analysis.

Carbapenem-resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae (CR-Kp) is currently a serious global concern. Antimicrobial stewardship programs (ASPs) are one of the key strategies to overcome this resistance. However, evidence about the long-term clinical and ecological impacts of ASPs is scarce. A multidisciplinary team conducted a multifaceted intervention in a CR-Kp endemic hospital over a 6-year period. We assessed the monthly long-term impacts of ASPs on carbapenem use, incidence density (ID), and crude death rates of hospital-acquired CR-Kp infections. Other variables potentially related to CR-Kp incidence and healthcare activity indicators were monitored. Carbapenem use showed a sustained reduction over the long term, with a difference of −66.19% (95% CI −87.03 to −45.34) between the expected pre-intervention trend consumption value and that obtained six years after starting the program. The ID of CR-Kp also decreased significantly and was maintained over the long term, with a relative reduction of −88.14% (95% CI; −100.4 to −75.85) at the end of the study period. The crude death rate of CR-Kp at 14 and 28 days decreased significantly after the intervention and remained steady after six years. Infection control indicator trends remained stable. This mixed ASP contributed to reducing the high incidence of infections and mortality rates of CR-Kp, achieving a sustained ecological and clinical effect.

A new ant-attended species, Balcanocerus agapetomyrmices sp. nov. (Hemiptera: Cicadellidae: Eurymelinae), is described from Bulgaria. The only known host plant is Pyrus amygdaliformis Villars, 1807 (Rosaceae). Both the adults and the nymphs often form small aggregations of 4–6 individuals that are frequently visited by Lasius bombycina Seifert & Galkowski, 2016 (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) that feed on the excreted honeydew. The new species is close to B. balcanicus (Horváth, 1903), but differs in colouration, and male and female genitalia. A short overview of all Balcanocerus species with comments on their distribution and host plants and a key to the European species are provided.

The main result of this paper is that for any norm on a complex or real n-dimensional linear space, every extremal basis satisfies inverted triangle inequality with scaling factor 2n-1$2^n-1$. Furthermore, the constant 2n-1$2^n-1$ is tight. We also prove that the norms of any two extremal bases are comparable with a factor of 2n-1$2^n-1$, which, intuitively, means that any two extremal bases are quantitatively equivalent with the stated tolerance.

We introduce a method to enhance the precision and accuracy of Quantum Process Tomography (QPT) by mitigating the errors caused by state preparation and measurement (SPAM), readout and shot noise. Instead of performing QPT solely on a single gate, we propose performing QPT on a sequence of multiple applications of the same gate. The method involves the measurement of the Pauli transfer matrix (PTM) by standard QPT of the multipass process, and then deduce the single-process PTM by two alternative approaches: an iterative approach which in theory delivers the exact result for small errors, and a linearized approach based on solving the Sylvester equation. We examine the efficiency of these two approaches through simulations on IBM Quantum using ibmq_qasm_simulator. Compared to the Randomized Benchmarking type of methods, the proposed method delivers the entire PTM rather than a single number (fidelity). Compared to standard QPT, our method delivers PTM with much higher accuracy and precision because it greatly reduces the SPAM, readout and shot noise errors. We use the proposed method to experimentally determine the PTM and the fidelity of the CNOT gate on the quantum processor ibmq_manila (Falcon r5.11L).

The orthopedic manipulation of bone drilling is performed during the osteosynthesis of bone fractures. It is characterized by a set of input and output parameters. The temperature in the tool-bone interaction zone is one of the most important output parameters of the drilling process. The increase in temperature above a certain threshold causes thermal osteonecrosis of bone cells and all the resulting negative consequences. This work presents a way of drill-bit upper limit temperature calculation during robotized bone drilling process. The temperature estimation and temperature calculation methodology is based on the energy conversion in the bone-robot system, preserving the overall energy balance according to the universal energy conservation law. The bone drilling is performed by using of robot ODRO. Fresh porcine femur bones are used as specimens in the experiments which validate the theoretical results. The real time temperature data during drilling are obtained using a non-contact temperature sensor. A computational approach is developed for estimating the temperature in the drilling zone on the base of the obtained data.The temperature estimation data can be used to control of the cutting condition during a robotic bone drilling process in order to obtain an optimal outcome.

We report a two-step growth process of MoS2 nanoflakes using a low-pressure chemical vapor deposition technique. In the first step, a MoS2 layer was synthesized on a c-plane sapphire substrate. This layer was subsequently re-evaporated at a higher temperature to form mono- or few-layer MoS2 flakes. As a result, the close proximity re-evaporation enabled the growth of pristine MoS2 nanoflakes. Atomic force microscopy analysis confirmed the synthesis of nanoclusters/nanoflakes with lateral dimensions of over 10 μm and a flake height of approximately 1.3 nm, demonstrating bi-layer MoS2, whereas transmission electron microscopy analysis revealed triangular MoS2 nanoflakes, with a diffraction pattern proving the presence of single crystalline hexagonal MoS2. Raman data revealed the typical modes of high-quality MoS2 nanoflakes. Finally, we presented the photocurrent dependence of a MoS2-based photoresist under illumination with light-emitting diode of 405 nm wavelength. The measured current–voltage dependence across various luminous flux outlined the sensitivity of MoS2 to polarized light and thus opens further opportunities for applications in high-performance photodetectors with polarization sensitivity.

Background Type 2 diabetes (T2D) patients have an increased risk of heart failure (HF). There are limited data on the association between HF and T2D in specific healthcare settings. This study sought to analyse the prevalence and incidence of HF in a contemporary cohort of T2D patients attending cardiology and endocrinology outpatient clinics. Methods We conducted an observational multicentre prospective study (DIABET-IC) that enrolled patients with a T2D diagnosis attending cardiology and endocrinology outpatient clinics in 30 centres in Spain between 2018 and 2019. The prevalence at the start of the study and the incidence of HF after a 3 year follow-up were calculated. HF was defined as the presence of typical symptoms and either: a) LVEF < 40%; or b) LVEF ≥ 40% with elevated natriuretic peptides and echocardiographic abnormalities. Results A total of 1249 T2D patients were included in the present analysis (67.6 ± 10.1 years, 31.7% female). HF was present in 490 participants at baseline (prevalence 39.2%), 150 (30.6%) of whom had a preserved ejection fraction. The presence of adverse social determinants and chronic conditions such as chronic kidney disease and atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease were more frequent in HF patients. During the study period, there were 58 new diagnoses of HF (incidence 7.6%) among those without baseline HF. The incidence rate was 3.0 per 100 person-years. Independent predictors of incident HF were smoking, left ventricular ejection fraction, NT-ProBNP, history of tachyarrhythmia and treatment with pioglitazone, oral anticoagulants, or diuretics. Despite an average suboptimal glycaemic control, the use of antidiabetic drugs with cardiovascular benefits was low (30.4% for sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors and 12.5% for glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists). Conclusions In this contemporary cohort of T2D patients attending cardiology and endocrinology outpatient clinics, the prevalence and incidence of HF were high, comorbidities were frequent, and the use of antidiabetic agents with cardiovascular benefit was low. Outpatient care seems to be a unique opportunity for a comprehensive T2D approach that encompasses HF prevention, diagnosis, and treatment. Graphical Abstract

Objective This paper summarizes the research progress into stimulation methods used in rehabilitation equipment for pediatric cerebral palsy (CP) for the past 20 years from 2003 to 2023. We also provide ideas for innovative research and development of artificial intelligence-based rehabilitation equipment. Methods Through a certain search strategy, Keywords are searched in the China National Knowledge Network Database (CNKI), the Wanfang Database knowledge service platform, the Chongqing VIP information service, PubMed, Web of Science, Cochrane, ScienceDirect, Medline, Embase, and IEEE database. A total of 3,049 relevant articles were retrieved, and 49 articles were included that mentioned research and development of rehabilitation equipment. We excluded articles that were not specific to children with CP, were duplicated or irrelevant literature, were missing data, the full article was not available, the article did not describe the method of stimulation used with the rehabilitation equipment on children with CP, were not Chinese and English, and were the types of reviews and commentaries. Results Physical stimulation is the main stimulation method of rehabilitation equipment for children with CP. Force stimulation is the main mode of physical stimulation, and there are 17 articles that have verified the clinical efficacy of force stimulation-based equipment. Conclusion Research on the stimulation mode of pediatric cerebral palsy rehabilitation equipment is likely to focus on simulating the force of the Chinese medicine called “tuina manipulation.” When this method is combined with artificial intelligence and personalized direction we believe this will lay the foundation for future development of a novel therapy for children with CP.

This study aims at the identification and characterization of five actinobacterial strains with presumed belonging to the species Curtobacterium flaccumfaciens isolated from tomato and pepper plants, and establishing the potential role of both plants as natural reservoirs of this phytopathogen. Species identification was performed via MALDI-ToF MS, 16S rDNA sequencing and PCR. The strains were Gram-positive with a coryneform cell shape having yellow/orange-pigmented colonies; positive for catalase and esculin, and starch and casein hydrolysis; oxidase-, urease-, indole- and nitrate-reduction-negative and were strictly aerobic. All isolates produced antimicrobial substances against various phytopathogenic bacteria. Tomato and pepper plants were artificially infected with newly isolated strains in order to establish their role as natural reservoirs of the bacteria. Morphological alterations were observed only in the tomato plants, with defoliation of the first two to four leaves at the 28th day. Then, viable coryneform bacterial isolates (n = 73) were successfully re-isolated only from the stems of the infected plants. The similarity between the re-isolates and the respective initial isolates was confirmed phenotypically and genotypically by RAPD-PCR, confirming that solanaceous vegetables can act as reservoirs of C. flaccumfaciens. This is the first report of C. flaccumfaciens in Bulgaria.

Air bubbles in pure water appear to coalesce much faster compared to oil emulsion droplets at the same water solution conditions. The main factors explaining this difference in coalescence times could be interface mobility and/or pH-dependent surface charge at the water interface. To quantify the relative importance of these effects, we use high-speed imaging to monitor the coalescence of free-rising air bubbles with the water–air interface as well as free-falling fluorocarbon-oil emulsion droplets with a water–oil interface. We measure the coalescence times of such bubbles and droplets over a range of different water pH values (3.0, 5.6, 11.0). In the case of bubbles, a very fast coalescence (milliseconds) is observed for the entire pH range in pure water, consistent with the hydrodynamics of fully mobile interfaces. However, when the water–air interface is immobilized by the deposition of a monolayer of arachidic acid, the coalescence is significantly delayed. Furthermore, the coalescence times increase with increasing pH. In the case of fluorocarbon-oil droplets, the coalescence is always much slower (seconds) and consistent with immobile interface coalescence. The fluorocarbon droplet’s coalescence time is also pH-dependent, with a complete stabilization (no coalescence) observed at pH 11. In the high electrolyte concentration, a 0.6 M NaCl water solution, bubbles, and droplets have similar coalescence times, which could be related to the bubble interface immobilization at the late stage of the coalescence process. Numerical simulations are used to evaluate the time scale of mobile and immobile interface film drainage.

The invidious relationship between the colonizer and colonized is locked in a dialectical and reciprocal relationship. The history of colonization of non-European people by the Europeans reveals that the colonizer created a mythical representation of the colonized surrounding savagery, barbarity, uncouthness, and uncivilization to show themselves as civilized, noble, and refined. The intellectuals of the colonizing empire participated in the construction of this discourse, which essentially is racist. Francophone postcolonial thinkers like Aimé Césaire, Franz Fanon, and Albert Memmi have systematically unfolded the colonizer-colonized relationship. This chapter, beginning with their biographies, discusses their contentions to create a framework in which James Mill’s History of British India is critically evaluated in the subsequent two chapters.