showing 36 of ~574560 from 574555 documents
Gamma-Ray-Induced Structural Transformation of GQDs towards the Improvement of Their Optical Properties, Monitoring of Selected Toxic Compounds, and …
2022
Structural modification of different carbon-based nanomaterials is often necessary to improve their morphology and optical properties, particularly the incorporation of N-atoms in graphene quantum dots (GQDs). Here, a clean, simple, one-step, and eco-friendly method for N-doping of GQDs using gamma irradiation is reported. GQDs were irradiated in the presence of the different ethylenediamine (EDA) amounts (1 g, 5 g, and 10 g) and the highest % of N was detected in the presence of 10 g. N-doped GQDs emitted strong, blue photoluminescence (PL). Photoluminescence quantum yield was increased from 1.45, as obtained for non-irradiated dots, to 7.24% for those irradiated in the presence of 1 g of …
Challenges in Image Matching for Cultural Heritage: An Overview and Perspective
2022
Image matching, as the task of finding correspondences in images, is the upstream component of vision and photogrammetric applications aiming at the reconstruction of 3D scenes, their understanding and comparison. Such applications are of special importance in the context of cultural heritage, as they can support archaeologists to digitally preserve, restore and analyze antiquities, but also to compare their changes over time. The success of deep learning, now firmly established, paired with the evolution of computer hardware, has led to many advances in image processing, including image matching. Despite this progress, image matching still offers challenges, in terms of the matching proces…
Trajectory-based and Sound-based Medical Data Clustering
2022
Challenges in medicine are often faced as interdisciplinary endeav- ors. In such an interdisciplinary view, sonification of medical data provides an additional sensory dimension to highlight often hard- to-find information and details. Some examples of sonification of medical data include Covid genome mapping [5], auditory repre- sentations of tridimensional objects as the brain [4], enhancement of medical imagery through the use of sound [1]. Here, we focus on kidney filtering-efficiency time-evolution data. We consider the estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR), the main indicator of kidney efficiency in diabetic kidney disease patients.1 We propose a technique to sonify the eGFR tra…
Plasma proteome profiling of healthy individuals across the life span in a Sicilian cohort with long‐lived individuals
2022
The study of healthy human aging is important for shedding light on the molecular mechanisms behind aging to promote well-being and to possibly predict and/or avoid the development of age-related disorders such as atherosclerosis and diabetes. Herein, we have employed an untargeted mass spectrometry-based approach to study age-related protein changes in a healthy Sicilian plasma cohort including long-lived individuals. This approach confirmed some of the previously known proteins correlated with age including fibulin-1, dystroglycan, and gamma-glutamyl hydrolase. Furthermore, our findings include novel proteins that correlate with age and/or with location and uric acid, which could represen…
Effect of alginate-based coating charged with hydroxyapatite and quercetin on colour, firmness, sugars and volatile compounds of fresh cut papaya dur…
2022
AbstractActive alginate-based coatings with quercetin glycoside and complexes of hydroxyapatite/quercetin-glycoside were used to study the shelf life of fresh cut papaya stored at 6 °C. Hydroxyapatite was used as a carrier for the release of the bioactive compound. The parameters considered affecting the quality of the fruit during storage were weight loss, color, texture, sugars and volatile compounds. Active coatings with hydroxyapatite and quercetin glycoside proved a higher capacity to slow down the degradation phenomena studied, showing less weight loss, a lower reduction in glucose and fructose, as well as better firmness, than the other samples after 14 days of cold storage. Benzyl i…
The SIMI Gender '5 Ws' Rule for the integration of sex and gender-related variables in clinical studies towards internal medicine equitable research
2022
AbstractBiological sex and sociocultural gender matter when it comes to health and diseases. They have been both proposed as the undeniable gateways towards a personalized approach in care delivery. The Gender Working Group of the Italian Society of Internal Medicine (SIMI) was funded in 2019 with the aim of promoting good practice in the integration of sex and gender domains in clinical studies. Starting from a narrative literature review and based on regular meetings which led to a shared virtual discussion during the national SIMI congress in 2021, the members of the WG provided a core operational framework to be applied by internal medicine (IM) specialists to understand and implement t…
The Role of Physicians' Digital Tools in Pharmacological Management of Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus
2022
Background and Objectives: The constantly increasing prevalence of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) and the advent of new treatment options have made management of T2DM patients more demanding. We aimed to (a) estimate the familiarity of general practitioners with novel T2DM treatment options, (b) determine whether a digital tool can aid in their treatment decisions and (c) demonstrate that an evidence-based digital clinical support tool can be made using an existing digital platform. Materials and methods: This proof-of-concept study consisted of two parts: We first conducted a simple online survey among general practitioners of three European countries to estimate their familiarity with no…
Physical activity measured by accelerometry among adolescents participating in sports clubs and non-participating peers
2022
The purpose of this descriptive cross-sectional study is to describe the amount and intensity of physical activity (PA) measured by accelerometry among adolescents participating in organized sports (SCP) and age-matched non-participating peers (NP). SCPs (332) and NPs (139) wore an accelerometer on the hip for seven days. PA was reported using the 1-min exponential moving average. The current moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) recommendation of at least an average of 60 min of MVPA daily was reached by 85% of SCPs and 45% of NPs (p < .001). During training days, the MVPA times among SCPs ranged from 153 ± 39 min in males and 109 ± 35 min in females participating in basketball to …
Interplay between Intestinal Bacterial Communities and Unicellular Parasites in a Morbidly Obese Population: A Neglected Trinomial
2022
Obesity is an epidemic causing a metabolic health crisis. Herein, the interactions between the gut prokaryotic and eukaryotic communities, metabolic comorbidities and diet were studied. Stool samples from 56 subjects, 47 with type III obesity and 9 with type II obesity and cardiovascular risk or metabolic disease, were assessed for the richness, diversity and ecology of the bacterial gut community through metagenomics, together with the study of the presence of common unicellular eukaryote parasites (Blastocystis sp., Dientamoeba fragilis and Giardia intestinalis) by qPCR. Clinical information regarding metabolic comorbidities and non-alcoholic hepatic fatty liver disease was gathered. To a…
Biosimilar and generic formulations of novel antidiabetic drugs: the role of liraglutide in clinical pharmacology of type 2 diabetes.
2022
Palladium-Based Metal Organic Frameworks as Heterogeneous Catalysts for C-C Couplings
2022
Among the various cross coupling reactions, C−C cross coupling reaction has attracted many researchers to investigate in the last four decades. The continuous, constant, and consistent progress in this field fetched a Noble prize in 2010, showing the importance of this reaction in diversified fields. Among the various transition metals studied for this reaction, Pd is one of the metals that has exhibited the highest activity due to its unique features and reactivity. Although Pd-based homogeneous catalyst was the preferred choice for many researchers, the field slowly diverted towards the development of Pd-based heterogeneous catalysts for C−C coupling reactions. This is obviously due to th…
Economic and Environmental Assessment of Biomass Power Plants in Southern Italy
2022
In 2019, Europe adopted the New Green Deal as a strategic plan to become a competitive, resource-efficient, and driven economy by reducing its gas emissions and carbon footprint. Due the COVID-19 pandemic, this strategic plan was recently updated to expedite the green transition of European industries. Therefore, the present paper deals with the problem of deciding an appropriate size for a biomass plant that directly produces electric energy by means of two different conversion processes: combustion and gasification. After an initial estimation of the energy potential in western Sicily, GIS data of biomass growth were used to identify the appropriate size for the power plants under investi…
Total Pain and Illness Acceptance in Pelvic Cancer Patients: Exploring Self-Efficacy and Stress in a Moderated Mediation Model.
2022
Cancer patients experience pain not only in its physical dimension, but also in a broader context that includes psychological, social, and spiritual aspects due to a higher level of anxiety and stress. The present prospective, longitudinal study examined the relationship between total pain and illness acceptance among pelvic cancer patients, taking into consideration the moderated mediation effects of self-efficacy and stress. The study involved a sample of pelvic cancer patients receiving radiotherapy treatment. Assessments were completed at T1 (before radiotherapy), T2 (after 3–4 weeks), and T3 (after radiotherapy) to assess the psychosocial dynamics of illness acceptance (N = 267). The m…
Study of very forward energy and its correlation with particle production at midrapidity in pp and p-Pb collisions at the LHC
2022
Journal of high energy physics 08(8), 86 (2022). doi:10.1007/JHEP08(2022)086
The Role of Novel Bladder Cancer Diagnostic and Surveillance Biomarkers—What Should a Urologist Really Know?
2022
The aim of this review is to analyze and describe the current landscape of bladder cancer diagnostic and surveillance biomarkers. We researched the literature from 2016 to November 2021 to find the most promising new molecules and divided them into seven different subgroups based on their function and location in the cell. Although cystoscopy and cytology are still the gold standard for diagnosis and surveillance when it comes to bladder cancer (BCa), their cost is quite a burden for national health systems worldwide. Currently, the research is focused on finding a biomarker that has high negative predictive value (NPV) and can exclude with a certainty the presence of the tumor, considering…
Phytochemical characterization and antioxidant activity of the aerial part extracts from two species of Matthiola wild in Sicily: Matthiola sinuata a…
2022
As part of a project aimed at investigating the specific and intraspecific taxa of Matthiola which grow spontaneously in Sicily (Italy), in this work our research has been focused on Matthiola tricuspidata and Matthiola sinuata. The phenolic and volatile compounds of the hydroalcoholic extracts from the aerial parts of the selected species have been characterized by HPLC-PDA/ESI-MS and SPME-GC/MS analyses. Moreover, the antioxidant capacity in vitro (1,1-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazil (DPPH), reducing power and Fe2+ chelating activity assays) and the toxicity (Artemia salina lethality bioassay) of the extracts were investigated. The phytochemical analyses highlighted quite different phenolic and…
Insight into mechanisms of creatinine optical sensing using fluorescein-gold complex
2022
Abstract Creatinine level in biological fluids is a clinically relevant parameter to monitor vital functions and it is well assessed that measuring creatinine levels in the human body can be of great utility to evaluate renal, muscular, or thyroid dysfunctions. The accurate detection of creatinine levels may have a critical role in providing information on health status and represents a tool for the early diagnosis of severe pathologies. Among different methods for creatinine detection that have been introduced and that are evolving with increasing speed, fluorescence-based and colorimetric sensors represent one of the best alternatives, thanks to their affordability, sensitivity and easy r…
Familial Mediterranean Fever and Diet: A Narrative Review of the Scientific Literature
2022
Background: Familial Mediterranean fever (FMF) is an inherited autoinflammatory disease characterized by short acute attacks, with an as yet unknown cause. Several authors have investigated the role of some foods as potential triggers. This narrative review aims to analyze the correlation between diet and FMF clinical outcomes. Methods: The review was carried out following PRISMA statement guidelines, including all cross-sectional, case-crossover, and trial studies written in English and conducted between 1974 and 2022. Results: Overall, 642 records were identified through PubMed/MEDLINE (292) and Scopus (350), and seven studies were included: three out of seven (43%) studies evaluated FMF …
Quality of life improving after propranolol treatment in patients with Infantile Hemangiomas
2022
AbstractInfantile hemangiomas may affect the quality of life (QoL) of patients and their family members, as anxiety and worry may commonly occur in parents, also linked to the social adversion they experience. We underline the beneficial impact of oral propranolol therapy on QoL of patients with infantile hemangiomas (IH) and of their relatives. A specific questionnaire measuring QoL was administered to parents of IH patients at beginning and end of a treatment with oral propranolol. Different aspects were investigated: site of the lesion, age of patients at starting therapy, length of treatment, occurrence of adverse effects and persistence/recurrence of the vascular anomaly. In all cases …
Bidirectional Control between Cholesterol Shuttle and Purine Signal at the Central Nervous System.
2022
Recent studies have highlighted the mechanisms controlling the formation of cerebral cholesterol, which is synthesized in situ primarily by astrocytes, where it is loaded onto apolipoproteins and delivered to neurons and oligodendrocytes through interactions with specific lipoprotein receptors. The “cholesterol shuttle” is influenced by numerous proteins or carbohydrates, which mainly modulate the lipoprotein receptor activity, function and signaling. These molecules, provided with enzymatic/proteolytic activity leading to the formation of peptide fragments of different sizes and specific sequences, could be also responsible for machinery malfunctions, which are associated with neurological…
A Case Study on Vestibular Sensations in Driving Simulators.
2022
Motion platforms have been used in simulators of all types for several decades. Since it is impossible to reproduce the accelerations of a vehicle without limitations through a physically limited system (platform), it is common to use washout filters and motion cueing algorithms (MCA) to select which accelerations are reproduced and which are not. Despite the time that has passed since their development, most of these algorithms still use the classical washout algorithm. In the use of these MCAs, there is always information that is lost and, if that information is important for the purpose of the simulator (the training simulators), the result obtained by the users of that simulator will no…
The clinical impact of an extra virgin olive oil enriched mediterranean diet on metabolic syndrome: Lights and shadows of a nutraceutical approach
2022
For years it has been established that the only truly effective treatment of metabolic syndrome (MS) is lifestyle modification to prevent its cardiovascular (e.g., coronary artery disease and atherosclerosis), metabolic (e.g., diabetes mellitus), and hepatic (e.g., steatosis and non-alcoholic steatohepatitis) complications. The focal points of this approach are to increase physical activity and intake of a diet characterized by high quantities of fruits, vegetables, grains, fish, and low-fat dairy products, the so called mediterranean diet (MD); however, the added value of MD is the presence of extra virgin olive oil (EVOO), a healthy food with a high content of monounsaturated fatty acids,…
The Phantasmatic Core of Fascism: Psychoanalytic Theories of Antisemitism and Group Aggression Amongst the ‘Political Freudians’
2022
The period predating and overlapping with World War II saw psychoanalytic authors respond to the authoritarian and fascist developments in Europe through scholarly and analytical writings. These authors, sometimes referenced as ‘political Freudians’, were interested in bringing psychoanalysis in a dialogue with progressive social and pedagogical movements of their times, focusing their critique on the persecutory, eliminatory and purificatory fantasies, which they saw as animating the fascistic movements in Europe. This article analyses selected texts by Otto Fenichel, Ernst Simmel and Rudolf Loewenstein and argues that these authors asked about the political and ethical stakes of the fasci…
Ab Initio Phase Diagram of Chromium to 2.5 TPa
2022
Chromium possesses remarkable physical properties such as hardness and corrosion resistance. Chromium is also a very important geophysical material as it is assumed that lighter Cr isotopes were dissolved in the Earth’s molten core during the planet’s formation, which makes Cr one of the main constituents of the Earth’s core. Unfortunately, Cr has remained one of the least studied 3d transition metals. In a very recent combined experimental and theoretical study (Anzellini et al., Scientific Reports, 2022), the equation of state and melting curve of chromium were studied to 150 GPa, and it was determined that the ambient body-centered cubic (bcc) phase of crystalline Cr re…
Precision Medicine for Chronic Diseases: Focus on Lifestyle Changes
2022
Virtually all chronic diseases are sustained by lifestyle factors [...]
Contractile Reserve in Heart Failure with Preserved Ejection Fraction.
2022
Background: Diastolic stress echocardiography (SE) is useful for confirming the diagnosis of heart failure with preserved left ventricular ejection fraction (HFpEF) when it is uncertain. The aim of this study was to assess the value of new echocardiographic parameters during diastolic SE in patients with dyspnea and suspected HFpEF. Methods: Sixty-two patients with exertional dyspnea and inconclusive rest echocardiography for a diagnosis of HFpEF were enrolled. Exercise SE was performed in all patients. Contractile reserve (LVCR) was assessed by measuring: 1. changes in the left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) between rest and peak stress; 2. stress-to-rest ratio of force (force was de…
Time- and angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy of strong-field light-dressed solids: prevalence of the adiabatic band picture
2022
In recent years, strong-field physics in condensed-matter was pioneered as a novel approach for controlling material properties through laser-dressing, as well as for ultrafast spectroscopy via nonlinear light-matter interactions (e.g. harmonic generation). A potential controversy arising from these advancements is that it is sometimes vague which band-picture should be used to interpret strong-field experiments: the field-free bands, the adiabatic (instantaneous) field-dressed bands, Floquet bands, or some other intermediate picture. We here try to resolve this issue by performing 'theoretical experiments' of time- and angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy (Tr-ARPES) for a strong-field…
Enlightened Female Networks: Gendered Ways of Producing Knowledge (1720-1830)
2022
This special issue investigates women's scientific networks in Europe roughly between 1720 and 1830, an interesting period from a gender point of view. The articles analyse the role that networks played in enabling, shaping and circumscribing women in their intellectual pursuits, social aspirations and ideals. They also focus on the nature of the members' relationships, how women negotiated their scientific identities and how often women could use their femininity to create new social spaces for themselves and their families. We traced different types of networks such as ‘paper’, ‘technical’, ‘distant’ (in its special and temporal sense), ‘moral’ and ‘mixed’, as well as how many of these ne…
The Habitual ‘Saber + Infinitive’ in South American Spanish
2022
The present paper aims to describe both synchronic and diachronic distributions of the habitual aspectual periphrasis ‘saber + infinitive’ in the varieties of Spanish spoken in the South American continent. The data used for the present analysis come from the Corpus de Referencia del Español Actual and the Corpus del Español del Siglo XXI.
Calcification response of reef corals to seasonal upwelling in the northern Arabian Sea (Masirah Island, Oman)
2022
Tropical shallow-water reefs are the most diverse ecosystems in the ocean. Their persistence rests upon adequate calcification rates of the reef building biota, such as reef corals. Coral calcification is favoured in oligotrophic environments with high seawater saturation states of aragonite (Ωsw), which leads to an increased vulnerability to anthropogenic ocean acidification and eutrophication. Here we present Porites calcification records from the northern Arabian Sea upwelling zone and investigate the coral calcification response to low Ωsw and high nutrient concentrations due to seasonal upwelling. The calcification rate was determined from the product of skeletal extension rate and bul…
The “Diabetes Comorbidome”: A Different Way for Health Professionals to Approach the Comorbidity Burden of Diabetes
2022
(1) Background: The disease burden related to diabetes is increasing greatly, particularly in older subjects. A more comprehensive approach towards the assessment and management of diabetes’ comorbidities is necessary. The aim of this study was to implement our previous data identifying and representing the prevalence of the comorbidities, their association with mortality, and the strength of their relationship in hospitalized elderly patients with diabetes, developing, at the same time, a new graphic representation model of the comorbidome called “Diabetes Comorbidome”. (2) Methods: Data were collected from the RePoSi register. Comorbidities, socio-demographic data, severity and comorbidit…
Betalains: colours for human health.
2022
In the last years, the use of natural phytochemical compounds as protective agents in the prevention and treatment of obesity and the related-metabolic syndrome has gained much attention worldwide. Different studies have shown health benefits for many vegetables such Opuntia ficus-indica and Beta vulgaris and their pigments collectively referred as betalains. Betalains exert antioxidative, anti-inflammation, lipid lowering, antidiabetic and anti-obesity effects. This review summarizes findings in the literature and highlights the therapeutic potential of betalains and their natural source as valid alternative for supplementation in obesity-related disorders treatment. Further research is ne…
It runs in the family?
2022
AbstractFamily background has been shown to be a strong determinant of educational attainment, yet relatively little is known about the role that family background plays in PhD attainment or in the selection into academic careers. In this study, we estimate sibling correlations from Finnish full population register data to comprehensively assess the importance of family background in selection into academia. Our results show that family background accounts for over a third of the overall variation in becoming a PhD and subsequently an academic — a share which is up to four times as large as implied by conventional comparisons by parental education. However, we did not find evidence that fam…
Suitability of the VOF Approach to Model an Electrogenerated Bubble with Marangoni Micro-Convection Flow
2022
When a hydrogen or oxygen bubble is created on the surface of an electrode, a micro-convective vortex flow due to the Marangoni effect is generated at the bottom of the bubble in contact with the electrode. In order to study such a phenomenon numerically, it is necessary to be able to simulate the surface tension variations along with a liquid-gas interface, to integrate the mass transfer across the interface from the dissolved species present in the electrolyte to the gas phase, and to take into account the moving contact line. Eulerian methods seem to have the potential to solve this modeling. However, the use of the continuous surface force (CSF) model in the volume of fluid (VOF) framew…
Wildfire Monitoring Based on Energy Efficient Clustering Approach for FANETS
2022
Forest fires are a significant threat to the ecological system’s stability. Several attempts have been made to detect forest fires using a variety of approaches, including optical fire sensors, and satellite-based technologies, all of which have been unsuccessful. In today’s world, research on flying ad hoc networks (FANETs) is a thriving field and can be used successfully. This paper describes a unique clustering approach that identifies the presence of a fire zone in a forest and transfers all sensed data to a base station as soon as feasible via wireless communication. The fire department takes the required steps to prevent the spread of the fire. It is proposed in this study…
Real-Time Assembly Support System with Hidden Markov Model and Hybrid Extensions
2022
This paper presents a context-aware adaptive assembly assistance system meant to support factory workers by embedding predictive capabilities. The research is focused on the predictor which suggests the next assembly step. Hidden Markov models are analyzed for this purpose. Several prediction methods have been previously evaluated and the prediction by partial matching, which was the most efficient, is considered in this work as a component of a hybrid model together with an optimally configured hidden Markov model. The experimental results show that the hidden Markov model is a viable choice to predict the next assembly step, whereas the hybrid predictor is even better, outperforming in so…