Recent publications
High-pressure compressed gases, such as nitrogen (N2) and helium (He), are critical for propelling micron-sized particles onto a substrate during the cold spray (CS) process. The propellant molecular weight and specific heat ratio affect the gas speed of sound, allowing for distinct flow acceleration and injected particle momentum transfer during CS for a set operating pressure and temperature. Since higher particle impact velocities can improve the overall CS deposit quality/efficiency, the present work focuses on investigating the effect of N2 and He as process gases on the deposition of mechanically alloyed AlCoCrFeNi high-entropy alloy (HEA) particles with diameters ranging between 5 and 100 µm onto high-strength low-alloy steel substrates. Moreover, this research examines the influence of various properties of both particle and substrate, such as density and dynamic yield strength, on the effective particle bonding, demonstrated by particle flattening ratio and critical bonding velocity. Based on the findings, the particle velocities ranged from 502 to 868 m/s for coatings obtained with N2 gas, compared to 717 m/s to 1797 m/s for those sprayed with He gas, resulting in more effective deposition of the latter. The evaluated critical velocity for AlCoCrFeNi particles onto low-alloy steel substrate is > 1400 m/s which delineates the onset of successful mechanical and metallurgical bonding. Deviations from the optimal deposition window may prompt particle rebounding and empty crater formation, particularly when employing N2 as the propelling medium.
Background
The COVID-19 pandemic has widened inequities, affecting migrant and refugee populations in vulnerable situations, who may face elevated risks of infection, constrained healthcare access and discrimination. Inclusive vaccination campaigns are recommended, but barriers persist. This study aimed to identify barriers and facilitators and estimate vaccination coverage among refugees and migrants in low- and middle-income countries, emphasising inclusive policies for effective rollout.
Methods
A mixed-method study was conducted in two phases in Ecuador, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines and Rwanda. Phase 1 (March–May 2022) included policy analysis, in-depth interviews and focus-group discussions with 52 key informants analysed with thematic and grounded theory approaches using hybrid coding. Phase 2 (June–August 2022) included a cross-sectional study among refugees and migrants in regular (MIRS) and irregular situations (MIIS) and used descriptive analysis and a COVID-19 Vaccine Equity Index (CVEI).
Results
A total of 1378 individuals responded to the survey (43.8% MIRS, 31.2% MIIS and 25% refugees). 87% reported receiving at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. The CVEI at the global level (0.824) suggested differences in complete vaccination between migrants and other residents in most of the study countries (refugees reported more access to vaccines than MIRS and MIIS). However, the qualitative phase reported delays and inequities in the early stage of the vaccination process in all countries. Overall, 64.2% of respondents perceived that government’ campaigns were successful. Both the qualitative and quantitative phases identified several barriers and facilitators. The main barriers included a lack of trust in authorities, extended waiting times and distance to vaccination centres, discrimination and xenophobia, lack of identity documentation, and adverse reaction concerns. On the other hand, the primary facilitators were the widespread distribution of vaccination centres, sources and provision of information, specific campaigns for refugees and migrants, free vaccination and the motivation to protect others’ health.
Conclusions
Despite the high coverage of COVID-19 vaccines among refugees and migrants in the study countries, the process had significant barriers. Simple vaccination registration procedures, targeted campaigns, mobile vaccination teams for hard-to-reach and vulnerable groups, and building trust in the host country authorities are pivotal for future and inclusive vaccine deployments.
Corals associate with a diverse community of prokaryotic symbionts that provide nutrition, antioxidants and other protective compounds to their host. However, the influence of microbes on coral thermotolerance remains understudied. Here, we examined the prokaryotic microbial communities associated with colonies of Acropora cf. tenuis that exhibit high or low thermotolerance upon exposure to 33°C (heated) relative to 29°C (control). Using 16S rRNA sequencing, we show that the microbial community structure of all A. cf. tenuis colonies was similar to each other at control temperature. Thermotolerant colonies, however, had relatively greater abundance of Endozoicomonas , Arcobacter , Bifidobacterium and Lactobacillus . At elevated temperature, only thermosensitive colonies showed a distinct shift in their microbiome, with an increase in Flavobacteriales, Rhodobacteraceae and Vibrio , accompanying a marked bleaching response. Functional prediction indicated that prokaryotic communities associated with thermotolerant corals were enriched for genes related to metabolism, while microbiomes of thermosensitive colonies were enriched for cell motility and antibiotic compound synthesis. These differences may contribute to the variable performance of thermotolerant and thermosensitive corals under thermal stress. Identification of microbial taxa correlated with thermotolerance provides insights into beneficial bacterial groups that could be used for microbiome engineering to support reef health in a changing climate.
In this study, we identified features with the largest contributions and property trends in predicting the adsorption energies of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen adsorbates on transition metal (TM) surfaces by performing Density Functional Theory (DFT)‐based calculations and Machine Learning (ML) regression models. From 26 monometallic and 400 bimetallic fcc(111) TM surfaces obtained from Catalysis‐hub.org, three datasets consisting of fourteen elemental, electronic, and structural properties were generated using DFT calculations, site calculations, and online databases. The number of features was reduced using feature selection and then finely‐tuned random forest regression (RFR), gaussian process regression (GPR), and artificial neural network (ANN) algorithms were implemented for adsorption energy prediction. Finally, model‐agnostic interpretation methods such as permutation feature importance (PFI) and shapely additive explanations (SHAP) provided rankings of feature contributions and directional trends. For all datasets, RFR and GPR demonstrated the highest prediction accuracies. In addition, interpretation methods demonstrated that the largest contributing features and directional trends in the regression models were consistent with structure‐property‐performance relationships of TMs like the d‐band model, the Friedel model, and higher‐fold adsorption sites. Overall, this interpretable ML–DFT approach can be applied to TMs and their derivatives for atomic adsorption energy prediction and model explainability.
Common methods used for topic modeling have generally suffered problems of overfitting, leading to diminished predictive performance, as well as a weakness towards reconstructing sparse topic structures that involve only a few critical words to aid in interpretation. Considering the text typically contained in customer feedback, this paper proposes a semiparametric topic model utilizing a two-step approach: (1) makes use of nonnegative matrix factorization to recover topic distributions based on word co-occurrences and; (2) use semiparametric regression to identify factors driving the expression of particular topics in the documents given additional auxiliary information such as location, time of writing, and other features of the author. This approach provides a generative model that can be useful for predicting topics in new documents based on these auxiliary variables, and is demonstrated to accurately identify topics even for documents limited in length or size of vocabulary. In an application to real customer feedback, the topics provided by our model are shown to be as interpretable and useful for downstream analysis tasks as with those produced by current legacy methods.
Microbial eukaryotes are vital to global microbial diversity, but there is limited information about their composition and sources in contaminated surface waters. This study examined the pathogens and potential sources of microbial eukaryotic communities in polluted sink environments using the 18S rDNA amplicon sequencing combined with the fast expectation–maximization for microbial source tracking (FEAST) program. Six sampling sites were selected along the Pasig–Marikina–San Juan (PAMARISAN) River System, representing different locations within the waterway and classified as sinks (n = 12), whereas animal fecal samples collected from various farms were classified as sources (n = 29). Taxonomic composition revealed Stramenopila, Alveolata, Rhizaria (SAR), Archaeplastida, and Excavata in the rivers, accounting for 85.1%, 13.2%, and 0.36% mean abundance of microbial sink communities, respectively. Clinically relevant human pathogens were also observed in sink environments. The correlation test demonstrated that dissolved oxygen, total suspended solids, pH, temperature, fecal coliform count, and phosphates were important environmental factors driving community variations. Moreover, FEAST results indicated that sewage (19.6%) was the primary source of microbial eukaryotes, followed by duck (0.644%) and cow (0.566%) feces. Spatio-seasonal variations showed higher contributions at downstream stations and during the wet season, highlighting the role of rainfall in enhancing microbial dispersal. Results from community-based microbial source tracking can be used to explore factors shaping microbial eukaryotes in freshwater environments, assess potential pathogen-related hazards, and inform river conservation and management strategies. Furthermore, this also serves as preliminary data for microbial eukaryotic source tracking in the Philippines, laying groundwork for future research.
Background
This study aimed to determine the effects of primary care interventions on healthcare utilisation and estimated out-of-pocket (OOP) expenses in selected urban, rural and remote settings in the Philippines.
Methodology
Context-specific measures relating to expanding healthcare provider networks, augmenting the health human workforce and subsidising transportation costs were implemented to strengthen primary care systems. In this study, two key outcomes were monitored: (1) monthly healthcare utilisation measured by the total number of outpatient consultations per site and (2) change in OOP expenses from baseline to endline within a 1 year study period.
Results
All sites had a positive trend in monthly outpatient consultations in healthcare utilisation over 1 year. The remote site had the steepest increase in outpatient consultations, with a 401% increase compared with the baseline during the peak of consultations at month 7. The urban site had a 62% increase in outpatient consultations from baseline to month 6, while the rural site had a 251% increase from baseline to month 11, which corresponded to the peak month in terms of the number of outpatient consultations. The rural site had the largest decrease in estimated OOP expenses (50.3% reduction, 95% CI −88 to –13), followed by the remote site (33.2% reduction, 95% CI −67,+1) and the urban site (16.0% reduction, 95% CI −65,+33).
Conclusion
The rural site showed a significant reduction in estimated OOP expenses and an increase in healthcare utilisation. The remote site had the steepest increase in utilisation, but the reduction in estimated OOP expenses was not statistically significant. The urban site experienced the lowest increase in utilisation, and the smallest reduction in estimated OOP expenses, which was also not statistically significant. Implementing primary care benefits will necessitate contextualised approaches to avoid the inadvertent aggravation of inequities in healthcare.
Changes in levels of multiple time series based on their common components helps characterize the shared behavior of the data generating process with known events causing perturbations in their movements. However, changes in variance of the error structure leads to misspecification of models that complicates statistical inference. Volatility structures may incorporate variance into the time series models, but these can easily lead to overparameterization in multiple time series. A model with inherent changes in variance structure is used to develop a bootstrap-based test for presence of changes in variance of multiple time series. Simulation studies shows that the test is correctly-sized and powerful compared to CUSUM-based test in a wide range of scenarios. The test is advantageous specially in the presence of strong autocorrelations and even in unbalanced data. Using global stock prices with the onset of lockdowns against the COVID19 pandemic as the stimulus of the changepoint, the test was able to detect significant changes in error variance before and during the pandemic. While CUSUM-based test also recognized the significant changes in multiple time series, linear trend was misconstrued as evidence of the presence of change in variance in stock prices.
Background
Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) presents with progressive ascending weakness, but it can also present with dysautonomia such as tachycardia, blood pressure fluctuations, diaphoresis, ileus, and urinary retention. GBS patients with dysautonomia was observed to have longer hospital stays and higher mortality rates than those without dysautonomia. We aimed to determine the risk factors for dysautonomia and its manifestations among patients with GBS and compared their features to those without dysautonomia.
Methods
We conducted a 10 year-retrospective review of GBS patients admitted at the Philippine General Hospital. The patient demographics, comorbidities, GBS disability status scale (GBS-DS), GBS variants, parameters of dysautonomia, treatment, and outcome were recorded and analyzed. Simple and multiple logistic regression analysis were conducted to determine the factors associated with dysautonomia and the relationships were expressed using odds ratio.
Results
71 patients were included, and 49% developed dysautonomia. Hypertension and tachycardia were the most prominent manifestations. There was an increase in the odds of developing dysautonomia in a one-year increase in age (OR: 1.11, p = 0.001) and a point increase in GBS-DS (OR:1.65, p = 0.037) during admission. Pre-morbid hypertension (OR:0.13, p = 0.028) and alcoholism (OR: 0.17, p = 0.037) are shown to decrease the odds of developing dysautonomia. Although GBS patients with dysautonomia had longer hospital stay (12.33 days), it only predicts 5.5% of the variability.
Discussions
The prevalence of cardiovascular manifestations was postulated from cardiosympathetic hyperactivity between arterial baroreceptors, cardiac parasympathetic fibers, and preganglionic sympathetic vasomotor fibers. The protective mechanism of premorbid hypertension could be attributed to the prior intake of antihypertensive medications, which mitigate cardiosympathetic fluctuations, while the protective effect of alcoholism needs to be further studied.
Conclusion
Patients who are older and with a high GBS-DS on admission, prompt close monitoring for the development of dysautonomia. The protective effects of premorbid hypertension and alcoholism needs further evaluation. The odds of developing pneumonia and being on a mechanical ventilator, while not statistically significant, could contribute to longer hospital stay of patients with dysautonomia. A larger prospective study is warranted to confirm these results.
The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030 (SFDRR) has been a guide for disaster risk governance globally. With the popularization of the vulnerability paradigm, gender has been established as one of the social determinants of disaster risk. However, it is often used interchangeably with “women” based on the binary categorization of gender identity that dominates, including in the Western world, reducing it to a demographic variable denied of any voice, context, or history. This article explores gender beyond the binary in the SFDRR, disaster risk reduction (DRR), and the broader risk governance mechanisms through examples of hijras from India and baklas from the Philippines. It delves into a discussion on the influence of dominant Western discourses in the creation of gender categories and their non-Western realities through a post-colonial lens. The article deals with questions on hybridity of identities, power, control, resistance, leverage, and the unique capacities of gender diverse groups at the time of disasters and beyond, while investigating the space of such groups within global frameworks like the SFDRR.
The individual, interpersonal, and relational roles of mobile phones for gaming and how these roles interrelate with the development of young individuals need to be studied using local insights. This research examines and understands how Asian youth, particularly Filipinos, utilize mobile media, specifically in mobile gaming, and its potential and consequences on their identities and relationships. This research analyzed the meaning-making processes and narratives among Filipinos aged 15–18. The narratives of the youth underwent thematic analysis, where data were organized, described, coded, and thematized to surface motivations and patterns of mobile media and gaming use among select youth. For young Filipino gamers, mobile media has become integral to their daily lives, interactions, community building, and negotiations in virtual and physical spaces. Mobile media use is considered a double-edged sword: on the one hand, it positively influences well-being and connectivity, and on the other hand, adverse effects such as frustrations, problematic sense of autonomy, and incompetence are causes of concern. This research also found that mobile media is ubiquitous in shaping the youth’s identity as it is present in their interactions and relationships. Indeed, the potentialities and pitfalls of mobile gaming media in shaping the youth should be underscored as young adults continue to construct themselves in digital spaces.
This study is an exploration of friendship navigation in-between and through overlapping worlds—online and offline—that have transformed from the pre-social-media boom and the pre-COVID19 pandemic. It focuses on friendship navigations of those born after the year 2000 (i.e., Gen Z and Alpha Gen). Using an exploratory interpretivist approach to communication research and using focus interviews and focus group discussions, this paper examines the adolescents’ accounts of and reflections on the changes and adjustments in their connections with their peers and friends prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, during the period of COVID-19 lockdowns and quarantine protocols, and after the protocols have been relaxed. Using typical case sampling, 19 Filipino adolescents, 11–19 years old, from Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao, the three main regions of the Philippines, were tapped as informants. Although the primary concepts that this research explored were mediated and non-mediated navigations of friendships, data surfaced the informants’ grasp of self-as-third-person or a conscious awareness of being young in today’s world. This complexity in self-awareness is further demonstrated by the findings on the distinct boundary-setting among adolescents. The adolescents’ conscious awareness is not just about navigating friendships per se, but of navigating friendships through mediated communication and the dynamic bridge between offline and online encounters. There is a pronounced ability among the informants not just to adjust and compromise, but also the aptitude to take in different perspectives, the cultivation of provisional explanations to communication gaps, and the proactive creation of contingencies. The paper argues that this consciousness merits further study, and that the circumstances surrounding the pandemic lockdowns and thereafter are fundamental to this expansion of inquiry.
Science is crucial for evidence-based decision-making. Public trust in scientists can help decision makers act on the basis of the best available evidence, especially during crises. However, in recent years the epistemic authority of science has been challenged, causing concerns about low public trust in scientists. We interrogated these concerns with a preregistered 68-country survey of 71,922 respondents and found that in most countries, most people trust scientists and agree that scientists should engage more in society and policymaking. We found variations between and within countries, which we explain with individual- and country-level variables, including political orientation. While there is no widespread lack of trust in scientists, we cannot discount the concern that lack of trust in scientists by even a small minority may affect considerations of scientific evidence in policymaking. These findings have implications for scientists and policymakers seeking to maintain and increase trust in scientists.
This Element provides a transregional overview of Pride in Asia, exploring the multifaceted nature of Pride in contemporary LGBTQIA+ events in Thailand, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. This collaborative research that combines individual studies draws on linguistic landscapes as an analytical and methodological approach. Each section examines the different manifestations of Pride as a discourse and the ways in which affordances and limitations of how discourse facilitates social, political, and cultural projects of LGBTQIA+ people in Asia, illustrating both commonalities and specificities in Asian Pride movements. Analyzing a variety of materials such as protest signs, t-shirts, and media reports, each section illustrates how modes of semiosis, through practice, intersect notions of gender and sexuality with broader social and political formations. The authors thus emphasize the need to view Pride not as a uniform global phenomenon but as a dynamic, locally shaped expression of LGBTQIA+ solidarity.
This study examines the impact of mothers’ labor force participation (MLFP) on child time allocation to explore the associating factors with boys’ disengagement from education in developing regions. Using original time-use data from the rural Philippines and employing exogenous institutional changes in the regional labor market, the study finds that MLFP widens the gender gap in child time-allocation patterns, with daughters dedicating more time to educational activities than sons. This effect is particularly pronounced when formal working and self-employed mothers are compared, suggesting that daughters respond to their parents as role models in terms of occupational stability, which requires educational attainment. For boys, the study explores the mechanism behind the effect by comparing the extended family setting with other scenarios to determine whether diminished maternal opportunities to monitor children affect sons’ educational engagement. Overall, these findings contribute to an understanding of the complex dynamics between maternal employment and gender gaps in children’s human capital formation in conditions of poverty.
This study investigates gray areas of contemporary political campaigning from a political economy perspective. Using qualitative field and digital methods, computational methods, and economic modeling, it analyzes the scope, scale, and cost of commissioning social media influencers in the 2022 Philippine Elections across Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and TikTok. The researchers find that there is a high demand for influencers to campaign for candidates, characterized by premium and dynamic incentives under informal and obscure arrangements. We identified 1425 influencer accounts across the four social media platforms that engage in covert political campaigning and categorized them into seven types. The cost of these influencer-led campaigns is estimated to range from USD 27M following a pay-per-post compensation model, to USD 10.9M using a retainer model. This article serves as a model for both election research and election policy by providing a modular framework that addresses knowledge gaps in various country contexts.
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