Educazione sanitaria sugli effetti della guerra: progetto pilota di comunicazione scientifica nelle scuole

Deaths and injuries are the most immediate effects of war, but war also causes living conditions to fall below minimum levels, favours the spread of disease and makes health interventions difficult. Thus the first victims of modern war are civilians. A communication project aimed at raising awareness among youth on the effects of conflicts on the health conditions of the population has been developed. Three case studies have been identified: acute emergency (Darfur), chronic conflict (Palestine), historic conflict (Vietnam) - collecting scientific documentation on the health effects of war in these countries. Three school modules have been developed, providing the students with extracurricular scientific tools for dealing with the subject "war and health". This document describes the implementation of the modules on a class of secondary school and offers suggestions for further implementations by epidemiologists and teachers

Pulsed laser deposition of a dense and uniform Au nanoparticles layer for surface plasmon enhanced efficiency hybrid solar cells

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Graded vertical phase separation of donor/acceptor species for polymer solar cells

The donor/acceptor inter-mixing in bulk heterojunction (BHJ) solar cells is a critical parameter, often leading to irreproducible performance of the finished device. An alternative solution-processed device fabrication strategy towards a better control of the micro/nano-structured morphology consists of a sequential coating of the donor (e.g., poly-(3-hexylthiophene), P3HT) and the acceptor (e.g., [6,6]-phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester, PCBM) from orthogonal solvents. We demonstrate that, in spite of the solvent orthogonality, this technique does not lead to a well-defined bilayer with a sharp interface, but it rather results in a graded vertical phase-separated junction, resulting from the diffusion of the PCBM in the P3HT bottom layer. We are able to control the diffusion of PCBM, which occurs preferentially in the amorphous P3HT domains, by easily varying the ratio between crystalline/amorphous domains in the P3HT. Such a ratio can be simply modified by changing the solvent for P3HT. We show that the donor–acceptor diffused bilayer (DB) junction is an intermediate structure which combines both advantages of the well-defined bilayer and conventional BHJ configurations. Indeed, the DB device geometry ensures the good reproducibility and charge percolation, like the well-defined bilayer, while preserving the interpenetration of the donor and acceptor species, resulting in an efficient charge separation, characteristic of the BHJ. Overall the annealed DB device geometry can be assimilated to a graded BHJ with an improved reproducibility and mean power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 3.45%, higher than that of the standard BHJ devices of 3.07%. Furthermore, we demonstrate the highest performance for the as-cast DB device with a PCE of 2.58%. It is worthy to note that our DB device exhibits improved open circuit voltage, fill factor, series and shunt resistances, which denote that the vertically phase separated DB junction ensures improved charge percolation

Synthesis and Photovoltaic Properties of Regioregular Head-to-Head Substituted Thiophene Hexadecamers

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Characteristics of people living in Italy after a cancer diagnosis in 2010 and projections to 2020

BACKGROUND: Estimates of cancer prevalence are widely based on limited duration, often including patients living after a cancer diagnosis made in the previous 5 years and less frequently on complete prevalence (i.e., including all patients regardless of the time elapsed since diagnosis). This study aims to provide estimates of complete cancer prevalence in Italy by sex, age, and time since diagnosis for all cancers combined, and for selected cancer types. Projections were made up to 2020, overall and by time since diagnosis. METHODS: Data were from 27 Italian population-based cancer registries, covering 32% of the Italian population, able to provide at least 7 years of registration as of December 2009 and follow-up of vital status as of December 2013. The data were used to compute the limited-duration prevalence, in order to estimate the complete prevalence by means of the COMPREV software. RESULTS: In 2010, 2,637,975 persons were estimated to live in Italy after a cancer diagnosis, 1.2 million men and 1.4 million women, or 4.6% of the Italian population. A quarter of male prevalent cases had prostate cancer (n\u2009=\u2009305,044), while 42% of prevalent women had breast cancer (n\u2009=\u2009604,841). More than 1.5 million people (2.7% of Italians) were alive since 5 or more years after diagnosis and 20% since 6515 years. It is projected that, in 2020 in Italy, there will be 3.6 million prevalent cancer cases (+\u200937% vs 2010). The largest 10-year increases are foreseen for prostate (+\u200985%) and for thyroid cancers (+\u200979%), and for long-term survivors diagnosed since 20 or more years (+\u200945%). Among the population aged 6575 years, 22% will have had a previous cancer diagnosis. CONCLUSIONS: The number of persons living after a cancer diagnosis is estimated to rise of approximately 3% per year in Italy. The availability of detailed estimates and projections of the complete prevalence are intended to help the implementation of guidelines aimed to enhance the long-term follow-up of cancer survivors and to contribute their rehabilitation need

Improved Photovoltaic Performance of Heterostructured Tetrapod-Shaped CdSe/CdTe Nanocrystals Using C60 Interlayer

[*] Prof. G. Gigli, Dr. Y. Q. Li, R. Mastria, A. Fiore, Dr. C. Nobile, Dr. L. X. Yin, Dr. M. Biasiucci, Dr. G. Cheng, Prof. R. Cingolani, Dr. L. Manna National Nanotechnology Lab of CNR-INFM (NNL) University of Salento Via Arnesano, 73100 Lecce (Italy) E-mail: [email protected] Dr. M. Biasiucci, Prof. A. M. Cucolo Physical Department ''E. R. Caianiello'' University of Salerno Via S. Allende, 84081 Baronissi (SA) (Italy

Engineering Dion-Jacobson Perovskites in Polariton Waveguides

Hybrid two-dimensional perovskites hold considerable promise as semiconductors for a wide range of optoelectronic applications. Many efforts are addressed to exploit the potential of these materials by tailoring their characteristics. In this work, the optical properties and electronic band structure in three new Dion-Jacobson (DJ) perovskites (PVKs) are engineered by modulating their structural distortion. Two different interlayer cations: 1-6, Hexamethylendiammonium, HE, and 3-(Dimethylamino)-1-propylammonium, DMPA, have been selected to investigate the role of the cation length and the ammonium binding group on the crystalline structure. This study provides new insights into the understanding of the structure-property relationship in DJ perovskites and demonstrates that exciton characteristics can be easily modulated with the judicious design of the organic cations. DJ PVKs developed in this work were also grown as size-controlled single crystal microwires through a microfluidic-assisted synthesis technique and integrated in a nanophotonic device. The DJ PVK microwire acts as a waveguide exhibiting strong light-matter coupling between the crystal optical modes and DJ PVK exciton. Through the investigation of these polariton waveguides, the nature of the double peak emission, which is often observed in these materials and whose nature is largely debated in the literature, is demonstrated originating from the hybrid polariton state