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  1. Proteins are essential macronutrients that support the growth, development, and maintenance of tissues in children. Nutrient requirements vary with age, weight, and physiological needs, making age-specific dietary planning critical. Adequate protein intake promotes both physical growth and cognitive development, while diverse sources such as lean meats, dairy, legumes, and nuts help meet varying nutritional needs and encourage lifelong healthy eating habits. This study analyzed a nutritional dataset of 244 baby foods using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to assess protein content, categorizing items into three groups based on protein content: low (0.0–5.9 g/day), moderate (6.0– 10.9 g/day), and high (11.0–15.0 g/day). The majority (n = 202) fell into the low-protein range, followed by 22 in the moderate range and 20 in the high range. Age-specific protein requirements, expressed in grams per kilogram of body weight (g/kg), were assessed for four age groups: 0– 6 months (1.52 g/kg; 12.6–15.8 g/day; 5.5–6.0 kg), 7–9 months (1.20 g/kg; 9.0–10.2 g/day; 7.5–8.5 kg), 10–12 months (1.00 g/kg; 8.5–9.5 g/day; 8.5–9.5 kg), and 1–3 years (1.05 g/kg; 12.6–15.8 g/day; 12.0–15.0 kg). Low-protein foods may be insufficient for infants with reduced breastmilk or formula intake, while high-protein foods often rich in meat, dairy, or fortified products can help meet upper-range requirements. These findings underscore the need for careful alignment of complementary food protein levels with age-specific nutritional guidelines to support optimal growth and development in early childhood. 
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    Free, publicly-accessible full text available August 29, 2026
  2. Free, publicly-accessible full text available May 28, 2026
  3. Introduction: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has had a profound impact globally, causing the death of millions of people and deeply affecting socio-psychological, human health, and economic systems, with some nations bearing a disproportionate burden. Despite obesity having been established as one of the major risk factors of COVID-19 severity and other degenerative diseases, the effects that dietary pattern intake plays in COVID-19 outcomes remain poorly understood. The goal of this study is to look into the connection between eating habits, the number of non-obese and obese people, and COVID-19 outcomes in countries with populations exhibiting normal Body Mass Index (BMI), which is an indicator of obesity. Methods: The analysis includes data from 170 countries. From the 170 countries, we focused on 53 nations where the average, BMI falls within the normal range (18.5 to 24.9). A subset of 20 nations was selected for a more detailed examination, comprising 10 nations with the lowest BMI values within the normal range (18.5-19.8) and 10 nations with the highest BMI values within the normal range (23.5-24.9). We used Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) applications to evaluate key metrics, including dietary patterns (sugar and vegetable intake), obesity prevalence, incidence rate, mortality rate, and Case Fatality Rate (CFR). Results: The results demonstrate a significant correlation between higher obesity prevalence and increased COVID-19 severity, evidenced by elevated incidence, mortality, and CFRs in countries like North Macedonia and Italy. In contrast, nations such as Iceland and New Zealand with well-established healthcare systems revealed low mortality rate and case fatality rate despite variations in dietary habits. The study also revealed that vegetable consumption appears to provide a slight to significant protective effects, suggesting that dietary patters alone do not consistently predict COVID-19 Outcomes. Conclusion: Data generated from this study showed the crucial role of healthcare infrastructure along with the testing capacity and data reporting in influencing the success of pandemic responses. It also highlights the need of integrating public health strategies, which focus on obesity management and improvement of healthcare preparedness. In addition, AI-driven predictive modeling offers valuable insights that may guide pandemic response efforts in the future, thereby enhancing global health crisis management and mitigating the impact of future health emergencies. Keywords: COVID-19; Dietary patterns; Obesity; Artificial intelligence; Machine learning; Public health; Health care systems 
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    Free, publicly-accessible full text available April 9, 2026
  4. Artificial intelligence (AI) leverages mathematical algorithms to emulate human cognitive abilities, leading to a transformative impact on the education sector. Educators are at the front lines of implementing AI in the classroom. Recent scientific studies demonstrate the capacity of AI, particularly generative models like ChatGPT, to reshape various aspects of education. In a recent study, we showcased that the integration of both artificial intelligence, specifically ChatGPT, and interactive learning activities significantly enhances the engagement levels of STEM students enrolled in a General Biology course. Furthermore, this combined approach not only boosts student engagement but also demonstrates an improvement in their overall performance within the course. Building on preliminary studies, the objective of this review article is to delineate the diverse applications of generative AI in education. To achieve this objective, we conducted a thorough search across scientific databases, including Google Scholar, Science Direct, government websites, and other resources, to collect relevant papers. Our findings underscore the contributions of generative AI, exemplified by ChatGPT, in enabling students to generate innovative text for written assignments, providing personalized feedback, facilitating adaptive learning, enhancing accessibility to education by eliminating barriers for individuals with disabilities, and supporting research endeavors. 
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  5. Brozel, Volker (Ed.)
    Microorganisms encode proteins that function in the transformations of useful and harmful nitrogenous compounds in the global nitrogen cycle. The major transformations in the nitrogen cycle are nitrogen fixation, nitrification, denitrification, anaerobic ammonium oxidation, and ammonification. The focus of this report is the complex biogeochemical process of denitrification, which, in the complete form, consists of a series of four enzyme-catalyzed reduction reactions that transforms nitrate to nitrogen gas. Denitrification is a microbial strain-level ecological trait (characteristic), and denitrification potential (functional performance) can be inferred from trait rules that rely on the presence or absence of genes for denitrifying enzymes in microbial genomes. Despite the global significance of denitrification and associated large-scale genomic and scholarly data sources, there is lack of datasets and interactive computational tools for investigating microbial genomes according to denitrification trait rules. Therefore, our goal is to categorize archaeal and bacterial genomes by denitrification potential based on denitrification traits defined by rules of enzyme involvement in the denitrification reduction steps. We report the integration of datasets on genome, taxonomic lineage, ecosystem, and denitrifying enzymes to provide data investigations context for the denitrification potential of microbial strains. We constructed an ecosystem and taxonomic annotated denitrification potential dataset of 62,624 microbial genomes (866 archaea and 61,758 bacteria) that encode at least one of the twelve denitrifying enzymes in the four-step canonical denitrification pathway. Our four-digit binary-coding scheme categorized the microbial genomes to one of sixteen denitrification traits including complete denitrification traits assigned to 3280 genomes from 260 bacteria genera. The bacterial strains with complete denitrification potential pattern included Arcobacteraceae strains isolated or detected in diverse ecosystems including aquatic, human, plant, and Mollusca (shellfish). The dataset on microbial denitrification potential and associated interactive data investigations tools can serve as research resources for understanding the biochemical, molecular, and physiological aspects of microbial denitrification, among others. The microbial denitrification data resources produced in our research can also be useful for identifying microbial strains for synthetic denitrifying communities. 
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  6. COVID-19, known as Coronavirus Disease 2019, is a major health issue resulting from novel severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection. Its emergence has posed a significant menace to the global medical community and healthcare system across the world. Notably, on December 12, 2020, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the utilization of the Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines. As of July 31, 2022, the United Stated has witnessed over 91.3 million cases of COVID-19 and nearly 1.03 million fatalities. An intriguing observation is the recent reduction in the mortality rate of COVID-19, attributed to an augmented focus on early detection, comprehensive screening, and widespread vaccination. Despite this positive trend in some demographics, it is noteworthy that the overall incidence rates of COVID-19 among African American and Hispanic populations have continued to escalate, even as mortality rates have decreased. Therefore, the objective of this research study is to present an overview of COVID-19, spotlighting the disparities among different racial and ethnic groups. It also delves into the management of COVID-19 within the minority populations. To reach our research objective, we used a publicly available COVID-19 dataset from kaggle: https://www.kaggle.com/datasets/paultimothymooney/covid19-casesand- deaths-by-race. In addition, we obtained COVID-19 datasets from 10 different states with the highest proportion of African American populations. Many considerable strikes have been made in COVID-19. However, success rate of treatment in the African American population remains relatively limited when compared to other ethnic groups. Hence, there arises a pressing need for novel strategies and innovative approaches to not only encourage prevention measures against COVID-19, but also to increase survival rates, diminish mortality rates, and ultimately improve the health outcomes of ethnic and racial minorities. 
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  7. Diabetes mellitus (DM) is a serious chronic metabolic disease that is associated with hyperglycemia and several complications including cardiovascular disease and chronic kidney disease. DM is caused by high levels of blood sugar in the body associated with the disruption of insulin metabolism and homeostasis. Over time, DM can induce life-threatening health problems such as blindness, heart disease, kidney damage, and stroke. Although the cure of DM has improved over the past decades, its morbidity and mortality rates remain high. Hence, new therapeutic strategies are needed to overcome the burden of this disease. One such prevention and treatment strategy that is easily accessible to diabetic patients at low cost is the use of medicinal plants, vitamins, and essential elements. The research objective of this review article is to study DM and explore its treatment modalities based on medicinal plants and vitamins. To achieve our objective, we searched scientific databases of ongoing trials in PubMed Central, Medline databases, and Google Scholar websites. We also searched databases on World Health Organization International Clinical Trials Registry Platform to collect relevant papers. Results of numerous scientific investigations revealed that phytochemicals present in medicinal plants (Allium sativum, Momordica charantia, Hibiscus sabdariffa L., and Zingiber officinale) possess anti-hypoglycemic activities and show promise for the prevention and/or control of DM. Results also revealed that intake of vitamins C, D, E, or their combination improves the health of diabetes patients by reducing blood glucose, inflammation, lipid peroxidation, and blood pressure levels. However, very limited studies have addressed the health benefits of medicinal plants and vitamins as chemo-therapeutic/preventive agents for the management of DM. This review paper aims at addressing this knowledge gap by studying DM and highlighting the biomedical significance of the most potent medicinal plants and vitamins with hypoglycemic properties that show a great potential to prevent and/or treat DM. 
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