Probability of discoveries between research fields to explain scientific and technological change

Surface Coatings of Dental Implants: A Review

Replacement of missing teeth is possible using biocompatible devices such as endosseous implants. This study aims to analyze and recognize the best characteristics of different implant surfaces that ensure good peri-implant tissue healing and thus clinical success over time. The present review was performed on the recent literature concerning endosseous implants made of titanium, a material most frequently used because of its mechanical, physical, and chemical characteristics. Thanks to its low bioactivity, titanium exhibits slow osseointegration. Implant surfaces are treated so that cells do not reject the surface as a foreign material and accept it as fully biocompatible. Analysis of different types of implant surface coatings was performed in order to identify ideal surfaces that improve osseointegration, epithelial attachment to the implant site, and overall peri-implant health. This study shows that the implant surface, with different adhesion, proliferation, and spreading capabilities of osteoblastic and epithelial cells, influences the cells involved in anchorage. Implant surfaces must have antibacterial capabilities to prevent peri-implant disease. Research still needs to improve implant material to minimize clinical failure.

Nobel laureates in Physics, Chemistry and Medicine: relation between research funding and citations.. [DOI: 10.21203/rs.3.rs-2907940/v1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0]

One of the vital problems in scientometrics is to explore the factors that affect the growth of citations in publications and in general the diffusion of knowledge in science and society. The goal of this study is to analyze the relation between funded and unfunded papers and citations of Nobel Laureates in physics, chemistry and medicine over 2019-2020 period and the same relation in these research fields as a whole to clarify the scientific development. Original results here reveal that in chemistry and medicine, funded papers of Nobel Laureates have higher citations than unfunded papers, vice versa in physics that has high citations in unfunded papers. Instead, when overall research fields of physics, chemistry and medicine are analyzed, funded papers have a higher level of citations than unfunded, with a higher scaling factor in chemistry and medicine. General properties of this study are that: a) funded articles receive more citations than unfunded papers in research fields of physics, chemistry and medicine, generating a high Matthew effect given by a higher accumulation and growth of citations with the growth of papers, b) funding increases the citations of articles in fields oriented to applied research (such as, chemistry and medicine) more than fields oriented to basic research (physics). Overall, then, results here can explain some characteristics of scientific dynamics, showing the critical role of funding to foster citations and diffusion of knowledge, also having potential commercial implications in applied research. Results here can be provide useful information to understand drivers of the scientific development in basic and applied research fields to better allocate financial resources in research fields directed to support a positive scientific and societal impact.

High potential of technology to face new respiratory viruses: mechanical ventilation devices for effective healthcare to next pandemic emergencies

Some countries in the presence of unforeseen Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), have experienced lower total deaths, though higher numbers of COVID-19 related infections. Results here suggest that one of the explanations is the critical role of ventilator technology in clinical health environment to cope with the initial stage of COVID-19 pandemic crisis. Statistical evidence shows that a large number of ventilators or breathing devices in countries (26.76 units per 100,000 inhabitants) is associated with a fatality rate of 1.44% (December 2020), whereas a higher fatality rate given by 2.46% is in nations with lower numbers of ventilator devices (10.38 average units per 100,000 people). These findings suggest that a large number of medical ventilators in clinical setting has a high potential for more efficient healthcare and improves the effective preparedness of crisis management to cope with new respiratory pandemic diseases in society. Hence, a forward-thinking and technology-oriented strategy in healthcare sector, based on investments in high-tech ventilator devices and other new medical technologies, can help clinicians deliver effective care and reduce negative effects of present and future respiratory infectious diseases, in particular when new drugs and appropriate treatments are missing in clinical environment to face unknown respiratory viral agents .

Effects of strict containment policies on COVID-19 pandemic crisis: lessons to cope with next pandemic impacts

The goal of the study here is to analyze and assess whether strict containment policies to cope with Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic crisis are effective interventions to reduce high numbers of infections and deaths. A homogenous sample of 31 countries is categorized in two sets: countries with high or low strictness of public policy to cope with COVID-19 pandemic crisis. The findings here suggest that countries with a low intensity of strictness have average confirmed cases and fatality rates related to COVID-19 lower than countries with high strictness in containment policies (confirmed cases are 24.69% vs. 26.06% and fatality rates are 74.33% vs. 76.38%, respectively, in countries with low and high strictness of COVID-19 public policies of containment). What this study adds is that high levels of strict restriction policies may not be useful measures of control in containing the spread and negative impact of pandemics similar to COVID-19 and additionally a high strictness in containment policies generates substantial social and economic costs. These findings can be explained with manifold socioeconomic and environmental factors that support transmission dynamics and circulation of COVID-19 pandemic. Hence, high levels of strictness in public policy (and also a high share of administering new vaccines) seem to have low effectiveness to stop pandemics similar to COVID-19 driven by mutant viral agents. These results here suggest that the design of effective health policies for prevention and preparedness of future pandemics should be underpinned in a good governance of countries and adoption of new technology, rather than strict and generalized health polices having ambiguous effects of containment in society.

Evolution of Sensor Research for Clarifying the Dynamics and Properties of Future Directions

The principal goal of this study is to analyze the evolution of sensor research and technologies from 1990 to 2020 to clarify outlook and future directions. This paper applies network analysis to a large dataset of publications concerning sensor research covering a 30-year period. Results show that the evolution of sensors is based on growing scientific interactions within networks, between different research fields that generate co-evolutionary pathways directed to develop general-purpose and/or specialized technologies, such as wireless sensors, biosensors, fiber-optic, and optical sensors, having manifold applications in industries. These results show new directions of sensor research that can drive R&D investments toward promising technological trajectories of sensors, exhibiting a high potential of growth to support scientific, technological, industrial, and socioeconomic development.

Improving preparedness for next pandemics: Max level of COVID-19 vaccinations without social impositions to design effective health policy and avoid flawed democracies

In the presence of pandemic threats, such as Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) crisis, vaccination is one of the fundamental strategies to cope with negative effects of new viral agents in society. The rollout of vast vaccination campaigns also generates the main issue of hesitancy and resistance to vaccines in a share of people. Many studies have investigated how to reduce the social resistance to vaccinations, however the maximum level of vaccinable people against COVID-19 (and in general against pandemic diseases), without coercion in countries, is unknown. The goal of this study is to solve the problem here by developing an empirical analysis, based on global data, to estimate the max share of people vaccinable in relation to socioeconomic wellbeing of nations. Results, based on 150 countries, reveal that vaccinations increase with the income per capita, achieving the maximum share of about 70% of total population, without coercion. This information can provide new knowledge to establish the appropriate goal of vaccination campaigns and in general of health policies to cope with next pandemic impacts, without restrictions that create socioeconomic problems. Overall, then, nations have a natural level of max vaccinable people (70% of population), but strict policies and mandates to achieve 90% of vaccinated population can reduce the quality of democracy and generate socioeconomic issues higher than (pandemic) crisis.

Meta-analysis to explain unknown causes of the origins of SARS-COV-2

New Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) causes the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), an infectious illness that has generated a pandemic crisis worldwide. One of the fundamental questions in science and society is how SARS-CoV-2 has been originated to design best practices directed to prevent and/or to cope with future hazardous pathogens. The study confronts this question here developing a meta-analysis, which endeavors to explain, whenever possible, unknown sources of the SARS-CoV-2. Findings suggest that the natural spillover of novel viral agents that generate more than 6.00 M deaths worldwide in about two years (such as, SARS-CoV-2 from February 2020 to March 2022) has a remote probability of occurrence (using an analogy with the probability of natural disasters generating a lot of fatalities), whereas science advances on hazardous viral agents and consequential lab accident have a (higher) probability of occurrence (about 13-20% like in manifold lab accidents). The findings of this meta-analysis suggest the vital role of improving the technical guidelines of biosafety at all levels in laboratories during the development of scientific research of experimental virology on hazardous pathogens to minimize risks of pandemic threats in environment and human society.

Multi-Intensity Optimization-Based CT and Cone Beam CT Image Registration

Cancer is a highly lethal disease that is mainly treated by image-guided radiotherapy. Because the low dose of cone beam CT is less harmful to patients, cone beam CT images are often used for target delineation in image-guided radiotherapy of various cancers, especially in breast and lung cancer. However, breathing and heartbeat can cause position errors in images taken during different periods, and the low dose of cone beam CT also results in insufficient imaging clarity, rendering existing registration methods unable to meet the CT and cone beam CT registration tasks. In this paper, we propose a novel multi-intensity optimization-based CT and cone beam CT registration method. First, we use a multi-weighted mean curvature filtering algorithm to preserve the multi-intensity details of the input image pairs. Then, the strong edge retention results are registered using and intensity-based method to obtain the multi-intensity registration results. Next, a novel evaluation method called intersection mutual information is proposed to evaluate the registration accuracy of the different multi-intensity registration results. Finally, we determine the optimal registration transformation by intersection mutual information and apply it to the input image pairs to obtain the final registration results. The experimental results demonstrate the excellent performance of the proposed method, meeting the requirements of image-guided radiotherapy.

Scientific laws of research funding to support citations and diffusion of knowledge in life science

One of the main problems in scientometrics is to explore the factors that affect the growth of citations in publications to identify best practices of research policy to increase the diffusion of scientific research and knowledge in science and society. The principal purpose of this study is to analyze how research funding affects the citation-based performance of scientific output in vital research fields of life science, which is a critical province (area of knowledge) in science to improve the wellbeing of people. This study uses data from the Scopus database in 2015 (to assess the impact on citations in 2021, after more than 5 years) concerning different disciplines of life science, given by “agricultural and biological sciences”, “biochemistry, genetics, and molecular biology”, “Immunology and microbiology”, “neuroscience” and “pharmacology, toxicology and pharmaceutics”. Results demonstrate that although journals publish un-funded articles more than funded publications in all disciplines of life science, the fraction of total citations in funded papers is higher than the share in the total number of publications. In short, funded documents receive more citations than un-funded papers in all research fields of life science under study. Findings also support that citations of total (funded + un-funded), funded, and un-funded published papers have a power-law distribution in all five research fields of life science. Original results here reveal a general property in scientific development: funded research has a higher scaling potential than un-funded publications. Critical implications of research policy, systematized in a decision-making matrix, suggest that R&D investments in “Neuroscience” can generate a positive impact of scientific results in science and society-in terms of citations-higher than other research fields in medicine. Overall, then, results here can explain some characteristics driving scientific change and help policymakers and scholars to allocate resources towards research fields that facilitate the development and diffusion of scientific research and knowledge in life science for positive societal impact.