Supporting System for Detecting Pathologies

Arrays CGH make possible the realization of tests on patients for the detection of mutations in chromosomal regions. Detecting these mutations allows to carry out diagnoses and to complete studies of sequencing in relevant regions of the DNA. The analysis process of arrays CGH requires the use of mechanisms that facilitate the data processing by specialized personnel since traditionally, a segmentation process is needed and starting from the segmented data, a visual analysis of the information is carried out for the selection of relevant segments. In this study a CBR system is presented as a supporting system for the extraction of relevant information in arrays CGH that facilitates the process of analysis and its interpretation

ANGELAH: A Framework for Assisting Elders At Home

The ever growing percentage of elderly people within modern societies poses welfare systems under relevant stress. In fact, partial and progressive loss of motor, sensorial, and/or cognitive skills renders elders unable to live autonomously, eventually leading to their hospitalization. This results in both relevant emotional and economic costs. Ubiquitous computing technologies can offer interesting opportunities for in-house safety and autonomy. However, existing systems partially address in-house safety requirements and typically focus on only elder monitoring and emergency detection. The paper presents ANGELAH, a middleware-level solution integrating both ”elder monitoring and emergency detection” solutions and networking solutions. ANGELAH has two main features: i) it enables efficient integration between a variety of sensors and actuators deployed at home for emergency detection and ii) provides a solid framework for creating and managing rescue teams composed of individuals willing to promptly assist elders in case of emergency situations. A prototype of ANGELAH, designed for a case study for helping elders with vision impairments, is developed and interesting results are obtained from both computer simulations and a real-network testbed

Application of the Sensory Contact Model for Pharmacological Studies under Simulated Clinical Conditions

The sensory contact model allows forming different psycho-pathological states (anxious depression, catalepsy, social withdrawal, pathological aggression, cognition disturbances, anhedonia, addictive states etc.) produced by repeated agonistic interactions in male mice and investigating the therapeutic and preventive properties of any drug as well as its efficiency under simulated clinical conditions. This approach can be useful for a better understanding of the drugs’ action in different stages of disease development in individuals. It is suggested that this behavioral approach and pharmacological designs may be applied for the screening of novel psychotropic drugs. 
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Ground-penetrating radar evaluation of the ancient Mycenaean monument Tholos Acharnon tomb

The assessment of cultural heritage requires high-resolution and non-destructive methodologies. Ground-penetrating radar is widely applied in the inspection of historical buildings. However, some structures with curved surfaces make the radar data acquisition process difficult and consequently the following data interpretation. This paper describes a case study concerning a circular and buried Greek monument. This monument is a magnificent tomb buried with irregular stones. However, its structure and the internal stones arrangement are unknown. Therefore, a radar survey was carried out to achieve two main objectives: (i) identification of hidden elements and arrangement of the stones and (ii) detection of specific zones where further restoration and maintenance should be recommended. The methodology for the radar data acquisition involves the use of a laser scan in order to define accurately each radar line, covering all the internal surface of the tomb. Radar data processing was developed by converting Cartesian coordinates into polar coordinates. This procedure allows defining better the internal anomalies, improving the radar data interpretation. The main results of the survey were three: (i) the presence of a hidden target buried in the corridor access to the tomb; (ii) the description of the internal structure of the walls of the tomb, defining the stones arrangement and the position and depth to the keystone; and (iii) the existence of delimited zones where the signal is highly attenuated, probably due to a high salt content.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Accuracy of magnetic resonance studies in the detection of chondral and labral lesions in femoroacetabular impingement : systematic review and meta-analysis

Background: Several types of Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) are commonly used in imaging of femoroacetabular impingement (FAI), however till now there are no clear protocols and recommendations for each type. The aim of this meta-analysis is to detect the accuracy of conventional magnetic resonance imaging (cMRI), direct magnetic resonance arthrography (dMRA) and indirect magnetic resonance arthrography (iMRA) in the diagnosis of chondral and labral lesions in femoroacetabular impingement (FAI). Methods: A literature search was finalized on the 17th of May 2016 to collect all studies identifying the accuracy of cMRI, dMRA and iMRA in diagnosing chondral and labral lesions associated with FAI using surgical results (arthroscopic or open) as a reference test. Pooled sensitivity and specificity with 95% confidence intervals using a random-effects meta-analysis for MRI, dMRA and iMRA were calculated also area under receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve (AUC) was retrieved whenever possible where AUC is equivocal to diagnostic accuracy. Results: The search yielded 192 publications which were reviewed according inclusion and exclusion criteria then 21 studies fulfilled the eligibility criteria for the qualitative analysis with a total number of 828 cases, lastly 12 studies were included in the quantitative meta-analysis. Meta-analysis showed that as regard labral lesions the pooled sensitivity, specificity and AUC for cMRI were 0.864, 0.833 and 0.88 and for dMRA were 0.91, 0.58 and 0.92. While in chondral lesions the pooled sensitivity, specificity and AUC for cMRI were 0.76, 0.72 and 0.75 and for dMRA were 0.75, 0.79 and 0.83, while for iMRA were sensitivity of 0.722 and specificity of 0.917. Conclusions: The present meta-analysis showed that the diagnostic test accuracy was superior for dMRA when compared with cMRI for detection of labral and chondral lesions. The diagnostic test accuracy was superior for labral lesions when compared with chondral lesions in both cMRI and dMRA. Promising results are obtained concerning iMRA but further studies still needed to fully assess its diagnostic accuracy

Condotte compulsive in paziente con sindrome di Aicardi. agenesia del corpo calloso

The corpus callosum, which is the largest white matter structure in the brain of all placental mammals, connects the left and right cerebral hemispheres. An alteration in its morphology, hypoconnectivity or hyperconnectivity is a common marker of various neuropsychiatric pathologies. One of these is Aicardi syndrome, which is characterized by a triad of callosal agenesis, infantile spasms and chorioretinal lacunae. Patients affected by Aicardi syndrome frequently display other malformations together with congenital defects of the eyes, ribs and vertebrae. Based on the current clinical knowledge, this syndrome is now recognized as a complex neurodevelopmental disorder that includes neurological and constitutional symptoms. However, literature data have not yet defined the presence of a particular set of symptoms in psychiatric patients with this condition. The present case is the first report in which an on-going compulsive behaviour focused on the insistence to order objects has been observed in Aicardi syndrom

Aided diagnosis of structural pathologies with an expert system

Sustainability and safety are social demands for long-life buildings. Suitable inspection and maintenance tasks on structural elements are needed for keeping buildings safely in service. Any malfunction that causes structural damage could be called pathology by analogy between structural engineering and medicine. Even the easiest evaluation tasks require expensive training periods that may be shortened with a suitable tool. This work presents an expert system (called Doctor House or DH) for diagnosing pathologies of structural elements in buildings. DH differs from other expert systems when it deals with uncertainty in a far easier but still useful way and it is capable of aiding during the initial survey 'in situ', when damage should be detected at a glance. DH is a powerful tool that represents complex knowledge gathered from bibliography and experts. Knowledge codification and uncertainty treatment are the main achievements presented. Finally, DH was tested and validated during real surveys.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Novel application assigned to toluquinol: inhibition of lymphangiogenesis by interfering with VEGF-C/VEGFR-3 signalling pathway

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Lymphangiogenesis is an important biological process associated with the pathogenesis of several diseases, including metastatic dissemination, graft rejection, lymphoedema and other inflammatory disorders. The development of new drugs that block lymphangiogenesis has become a promising therapeutic strategy. In this study, we investigated the ability of toluquinol, a 2-methyl-hydroquinone isolated from the culture broth of the marine fungus Penicillium sp. HL-85-ALS5-R004, to inhibit lymphangiogenesis in vitro, ex vivo and in vivo. EXPERIMENTAL APPROACH We used human lymphatic endothelial cells (LECs) to analyse the effect of toluquinol in 2D and 3D in vitro cultures and in the ex vivo mouse lymphatic ring assay. For in vivo approaches, the transgenic Fli1:eGFPy1 zebrafish, mouse ear sponges and cornea models were used. Western blotting and apoptosis analyses were carried out to search for drug targets. KEY RESULTS Toluquinol inhibited LEC proliferation,migration, tubulogenesis and sprouting of new lymphatic vessels. Furthermore, toluquinol induced apoptosis of LECs after 14 h of treatment in vitro, blocked the development of the thoracic duct in zebrafish and reduced the VEGF-C-induced lymphatic vessel formation and corneal neovascularization in mice. Mechanistically, we demonstrated that this drug attenuates VEGF-C-induced VEGFR-3 phosphorylation in a dose-dependentmanner and suppresses the phosphorylation of Akt and ERK1/2. CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS Based on these findings, we propose toluquinol as a new candidate with pharmacological potential for the treatment of lymphangiogenesis-related pathologies. Notably, its ability to suppress corneal neovascularization paves the way for applications in vascular ocular pathologies.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech. This work has been supported by personal funding by FP7-PEOPLE-2013-IEF Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship (MGC). Acknowledged are the supporting grants from the Action de Recherche Concertée (ARC) (Université de Liège), the Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique-FNRS (F.R.S.-FNRS), the Foundation Against Cancer (foundation of public interest), the Centre Anticancéreux près l’Université de Liège, the Fonds Léon Fredericq (University of Liège), the Interuniversity Attraction Poles Programme-Belgian Science Policy (all from Belgium) and the Plan National Cancer (« Service Public Federal » from Belgium). Research in the lab of A.R.Q. and M.A.M. was supported by grants BIO2014-56092-R (MINECO and FEDER) and P12-CTS-1507 (Andalusian Government and FEDER)

Comments on the compatibility of thermodynamic equilibrium conditions with lattice propagators

In this paper the compatibility is analyzed of the non-perturbative equations of state of quarks and gluons arising from the lattice with some natural requirements for self-gravitating objects at equilibrium: the existence of an equation of state (namely, the possibility to define the pressure as a function of the energy density), the absence of superluminal propagation and Le Chatelier's principle. It is discussed under which conditions it is possible to extract an equation of state (in the above sense) from the non-perturbative propagators arising from the fits of the latest lattice data. In the quark case, there is a small but non-vanishing range of temperatures in which it is not possible to define a single-valued functional relation between density and pressure. Interestingly enough, a small change of the parameters appearing in the fit of the lattice quark propagator (of around 10~\%) could guarantee the fulfillment of all the three conditions (keeping alive, at the same time, the violation of positivity of the spectral representation, which is the expected signal of confinement). As far as gluons are concerned, the analysis shows very similar results. Whether or not the non-perturbative quark and gluon propagators satisfy these conditions can have a strong impact on the estimate of the maximal mass of quark stars.Comment: 24 pages; 12 figures. Title slightly changed and improved discussion. Version accepted for publication on European Physical Journal