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19,808 real negative results, null findings, and replication failures · Negative / Null Result Report. Search the index →

WASTE indexes published research — it does not host or republish full papers. Each entry is a metadata record compiled from open scholarly databases; the abstract is shown in full only where the paper is openly licensed, otherwise a short excerpt under fair use. Classifications are automated and approximate.

Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessMedicine

Human metapneumovirus infection of organoid-derived human bronchial epithelium represents cell tropism and cytopathology as observed in in vivo models

Pau Ribó-Molina, Stefan van Nieuwkoop, Anna Z. Mykytyn et al. · 2024 · mSphere

ABSTRACT Human metapneumovirus (HMPV), a member of the Pneumoviridae family, causes upper and lower respiratory tract infections in humans. In vitro studies with HMPV have mostly been performed in monolayers of undifferentiated epithelial cells. In vivo studies in cynomolgus macaques and cotton rats have shown that ciliated epithelial cells are the main target of HMPV infection, but these observations cannot be studied in monolayer systems. Here, we established an organoid-derived bronchial culture model that allows physiologically relevant studies on HMPV. Inoculation with multiple prototype

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessMedicine

Mutations in the Neuraminidase-Like Protein of Bat Influenza H18N11 Virus Enhance Virus Replication in Mammalian Cells, Mice, and Ferrets

Gongxun Zhong, Shufang Fan, Masato Hatta et al. · 2019 · Journal of Virology

Bats are reservoirs for several severe zoonotic pathogens. The genomes of influenza A viruses of the H17N10 and H18N11 subtypes have been identified in bats, but no live virus has been isolated. The characterization of artificially…

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessSocial Sciences

Fighting the spread of COVID-19 misinformation in Kyrgyzstan, India, and the United States: How replicable are accuracy nudge interventions?

Lyndsay Gavin, Jenna McChesney, Anson Tong et al. · 2022 · Technology Mind and Behavior

The spread of misinformation has generated confusion and uncertainty about how to behave with respect to protective actions during the COVID-19 pandemic, such as social distancing and getting vaccinated. garnered significant press…

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessBiochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology

Chronological age, biological age, and individual variation in the stress response in the European starling: a follow-up study

Annie Gott, Clare Andrews, María Larriva et al. · 2018 · PeerJ

) found that a marker of biological age predicted the strength of the stress response even in individuals of the same chronological age. Specifically, birds that had experienced greater developmental telomere attrition (DTA) showed a lower peak corticosterone (CORT) response to an acute stressor, and more rapid recovery of CORT levels towards baseline. Here, we performed a follow-up study using the same capture-handling-restraint stressor in a separate cohort of starlings that had been subjected to a developmental manipulation of food availability and begging effort. We measured the CORT respo

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessMedicine

Orally active prostacyclin analogue beraprost sodium in patients with chronic kidney disease: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, phase II dose finding trial

Akio Kôyama, Toshiro Fujita, Fumitake Gejyo et al. · 2015 · BMC Nephrology

BACKGROUND: Evidence increasingly points to the importance of chronic hypoxia in the tubulointerstitium as a final common pathway to end-stage renal disease (ESRD). Beraprost sodium (BPS) is an orally active prostacyclin (PGI2) analogue demonstrating prevention of the progression of chronic kidney disease (CKD) in various animal models by maintaining renal blood flow and attenuating renal ischemic condition. METHODS: This multicenter, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, phase II trial was designed to determine the recommended dose of the sustained-release form of BPS (TRK-100STP 120

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Negative / Null Result ReportBusiness, Management and Accounting

Multiple measures of US entrepreneurial activity and classical liberal institutions

Noel D. Campbell, David Mitchell, Tammy M. Rogers · 2013 · Journal of Entrepreneurship and Public Policy

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to provide a robustness check of the relationship between entrepreneurial activity and economic freedom. As a deliberate “robustness check,” the authors estimated various spatial measures of…

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessEnvironmental Science

The dimensionality reductions of environmental variables have a significant effect on the performance of species distribution models

Haotian Zhang, Wen‐Yong Guo, Wenting Wang · 2023 · Ecology and Evolution

How to effectively obtain species-related low-dimensional data from massive environmental variables has become an urgent problem for species distribution models (SDMs). In this study, we will explore whether dimensionality reduction on environmental variables can improve the predictive performance of SDMs. We first used two linear (i.e., principal component analysis (PCA) and independent components analysis) and two nonlinear (i.e., kernel principal component analysis (KPCA) and uniform manifold approximation and projection) dimensionality reduction techniques (DRTs) to reduce the dimensionali

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessNeuroscience

Anodal transcranial direct current stimulation of the right anterior temporal lobe did not significantly affect verbal insight

Takatsugu Aihara, Takeshi OGAWA, Takeaki Shimokawa et al. · 2017 · PLoS ONE

Humans often utilize past experience to solve difficult problems. However, if past experience is insufficient to solve a problem, solvers may reach an impasse. Insight can be valuable for breaking an impasse, enabling the reinterpretation or re-representation of a problem. Previous studies using between-subjects designs have revealed a causal relationship between the anterior temporal lobes (ATLs) and non-verbal insight, by enhancing the right ATL while inhibiting the left ATL using transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS). In addition, neuroimaging studies have reported a correlation be

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessAgricultural and Biological Sciences

Intercropping changed the soil microbial community composition but no significant effect on alpha diversity

Jiaying Liu, Weixi Zhang, Chao Teng et al. · 2024 · Frontiers in Microbiology

Introduction: Enhancing the planning of the forest-agricultural composite model and increasing the efficiency with which forest land is utilized could benefit from a thorough understanding of the impacts of intercropping between forests and agriculture on soil physicochemical properties and microbial communities. Methods: intercrop soils, along with their corresponding monocrops, were used in this study's llumina high-throughput sequencing analysis to determine the composition and diversity of soil bacterial and fungal communities. Results: The findings indicated that intercropping considerabl

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessMedicine

ACE inhibition and cardiometabolic risk factors, lung ACE2 and TMPRSS2 gene expression, and plasma ACE2 levels: a Mendelian randomization study

Dipender Gill, Marios Arvanitis, Paul Carter et al. · 2020 · Royal Society Open Science

Angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) and serine protease TMPRSS2 have been implicated in cell entry for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus responsible for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). The expression of ACE2 and TMPRSS2 in the lung epithelium might have implications for the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection and severity of COVID-19. We use human genetic variants that proxy angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitor drug effects and cardiovascular risk factors to investigate whether these exposures affect lung ACE2 and TMPRSS2 gene expression and circ

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Negative / Null Result ReportSocial Sciences

DOES TRUST PROMOTE ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN A DEVELOPING COUNTRY?

Kitae Sohn, Illoong Kwon · 2016 · The Singapore Economic Review

Trust was found to promote entrepreneurship in the US. We investigated whether this was true in a developing country, Indonesia. We failed to replicate this; this failure was true whether trust was estimated at the individual or community…

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessPsychology

The influence of income and testosterone on the validity of facial width-to-height ratio as a biomarker for dominance

Emilou Noser, Jessica Schoch, Ulrike Ehlert · 2018 · PLoS ONE

Research has indicated that men's facial width-to-height ratio (fWHR) is part of an evolved system of social dominance, aggression, and power. fWHR has been linked to antisocial behavior, measured by self-reported aggression, but recent studies have failed to replicate this finding. To overcome these inconsistencies, influencing factors such as social status have to be taken into account in order to explain the relationship between fWHR and aggression. In particular, income has been shown to be an important influencing factor in this relationship. Furthermore, previous findings suggested that

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessPhysics and Astronomy

The COLIBRE project: cosmological hydrodynamical simulations of galaxy formation and evolution

Joop Schaye, Evgenii Chaikin, Matthieu Schaller et al. · 2026 · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

ABSTRACT We present the COLIBRE galaxy formation model and the COLIBRE suite of cosmological hydrodynamical simulations. COLIBRE includes new models for radiative cooling, dust grains, star formation, stellar mass loss, turbulent diffusion, pre-supernova stellar feedback, supernova feedback, supermassive black holes, and active galactic nucleus (AGN) feedback. The multiphase interstellar medium is explicitly modelled without a pressure floor. Hydrogen and helium are tracked in non-equilibrium, with their contributions to the free electron density included in metal-line cooling calculations. Th

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessPsychology

Motivational Computing: Transformer-Based Automation of Implicit Motive Coding

Joyce S. Pang, Hiram Ring, Kate Y Huang et al. · 2026 · Journal of Personality Assessment

Implicit motives have a clear relation to observed behavior but are time-consuming to measure. Automating the content coding of implicit motives has been a pursuit since the 1960s, but has not been widely adopted due to limitations with…

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessSocial Sciences

Could Alcohol Abuse Drive Intimate Partner Violence Perpetrators’ Psychophysiological Response to Acute Stress?

Sara Vitoria-Estruch, Ángel Romero‐Martínez, Marisol Lila et al. · 2018 · International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health

Proactively aggressive individuals have been shown to present a different pattern of autonomic nervous system (ANS) dysregulation from that of individuals characterized by reactive violence. Although attempts have been made to classify intimate partner violence (IPV) perpetrators based on ANS reactivity to acute stress, subsequent studies have failed to replicate this classification. Notably, the proposed classification neglected the role of chronic alcohol abuse in ANS dysregulation and the fact that this dysregulation entails an abnormal stress response. The aim of the present study was to a

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessMedicine

Obeticholic Acid and Other Farnesoid-X-Receptor (FXR) Agonists in the Treatment of Liver Disorders

Stefano Fiorucci, Ginevra Urbani, Eleonora Distrutti et al. · 2025 · Pharmaceuticals

The Farnesoid-X-receptor (FXR) is a bile sensor involved in the regulation of bile acid homeostasis, fibrosis, inflammation, and metabolism. Obeticholic acid (OCA), a semisynthetic derivative of chenodeoxycholic acid (CDCA), initially named 6-ethyl-CDCA or INT-747, is the first in a class of FXR ligands that have been approved for clinical use for the treatment of patients with primary biliary cholangitis (PBC) who are unresponsive or intolerant to ursodeoxycholic acid. In this narrative review, we will examine the current status and future perspective of clinical use of OCA. Based on results

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessPsychology

Human brain changes after first psilocybin use

Terence J. Lyons, Merle Spriggs, Leevi Kerkelä et al. · 2026 · Nature Communications

Psychedelics have robust effects on acute brain function and long-term behavior but whether they also cause enduring functional and anatomical brain changes is largely unknown. In an exploratory, placebo-controlled, within-subjects, electroencephalography (EEG), and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) study in 28 healthy, entirely psychedelic-naive participants, anatomical and functional brain changes are detected from one-hour to one-month after a single high-dose (25 mg) of psilocybin. Increases in cognitive flexibility, psychological insight, and well-being are seen at one-month. Diffusion ten

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessMedicine

Generative AI in Academic Writing: A Comparison of DeepSeek, Qwen, ChatGPT, Gemini, Llama, Mistral, and Gemma

Ömer Aydın, Enis Karaarslan, Fatih Safa Erenay et al. · 2026 · Turkish Journal of Engineering

DeepSeek v3, developed in China, was released in December 2024, followed by Alibaba’s Qwen 2.5 Max in January 2025 and Qwen3 235B in April 2025. These free and open-source models offer significant potential for academic writing and content…

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessBiochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology

Medium-sized protein language models perform well at transfer learning on realistic datasets

Luiz Carlos Vieira, Morgan L. Handojo, Claus O. Wilke · 2025 · Scientific Reports

Protein language models (pLMs) can offer deep insights into evolutionary and structural properties of proteins. While larger models, such as the 15 billion parameter model ESM-2, promise to capture more complex patterns in sequence space, they also present practical challenges due to their high dimensionality and high computational cost. We systematically evaluated the performance of various ESM-style models across multiple biological datasets to assess the impact of model size on transfer learning via feature extraction. Surprisingly, we found that larger models do not necessarily outperform

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessSocial Sciences

No Significant Difference - Unless you are a Jumper

Richard Fendler, Craig Ruff, Milind Shrikhande · 2018 · Online Learning

Much of the e-education literature suggests that there is no significant difference in aggregate student learning outcomes between online and face-to-face instruction. In this study, we develop a model that forecasts the grade that individual students would have most likely earned in the alternate class setting. Students for whom the difference between the actual grade received in one class format (for example, online) and the forecasted grade in the other class setting (for example, face-to-face) is one full letter grade or higher are called “jumpers.” Our findings indicate that jumpers are n

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessEconomics, Econometrics and Finance

The Role of Economic and Environmental Variables in Green Growth: Evidence from Saudi Arabia

Ihsen Abid · 2025 · Engineering Technology & Applied Science Research

Saudi Arabia, as one of the world’s leading oil producers, faces critical challenges in transitioning to sustainable economic growth. The heavy reliance on oil exports, coupled with rapid urbanization and environmental degradation, underscores the urgent need for green growth strategies tailored to the Kingdom’s unique socioeconomic and environmental context. This study aims to investigate the factors influencing the Green Growth Index (GGI), which measures sustainable economic growth, and analyze the short-term and long-term relationships between key variables such as environmental technology

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessComputer Science

Advanced IDS: a comparative study of datasets and machine learning algorithms for network flow-based intrusion detection systems

Julio Cesar Munguía Mondragón, Paula Branco, Guy-Vincent Jourdan et al. · 2025 · Applied Intelligence

Globally, cyberattacks are growing and mutating each month. Intelligent Intrusion Network Detection Systems are developed to analyze and detect anomalous traffic to face these threats. A way to address this is by using network flows, an…

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessPhysics and Astronomy

X-point radiation: From discovery to potential application in a future reactor

M. Bernert, T.O.S.J. Bosman, T. Lunt et al. · 2025 · Nuclear Materials and Energy

Power exhaust is a crucial issue for future fusion reactors. Divertor detachment and the required power dissipation fractions of about 95% are foreseen to be achieved by impurity seeding. In a tokamak, at high seeding levels the radiation often concentrates in a small region inside the confined plasma near the X-point. In early observations the so-called X-point radiator (XPR) often led to back-transitions to L-mode or disruptions. In metal tokamaks or with higher available heating power, these regimes can be stabilized and are now established on AUG, JET, TCV, KSTAR and WEST. The XPR is a col

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Negative / Null Result ReportOpen accessImmunology and Microbiology

Shaping Neonatal Immunization by Tuning the Delivery of Synergistic Adjuvants via Nanocarriers

Soumik Barman, Francesco Borriello, Byron Brook et al. · 2022 · ACS Chemical Biology

) cells, and germinal center (GC) B cells along with the IgG2c-skewed humoral response in vivo. Dual-loaded cGAMP/CL075-PSs did not outperform admixed cGAMP-PS and CL075-PS in vivo. These data validate an optimally designed adjuvantation…

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