Breast Cancer Subtypes Can Be Determinant in The Decision Making Process to Avoid Surgical Axillary Staging: A retrospective cohort study

Purpose: The need for performing axillary lymph-node dissection in early breast cancer when the sentinel lymph node (SLN) is positive has been questioned in recent years. The purpose of this study was to identify a lowrisk subgroup of early breast cancer patients in whom surgical axillary staging could be avoided, and to assess the probability of having a positive lymph-node (LN). Methods: We retrospectively evaluated 612 consecutive women affected by early breast cancer. We considered age, tumour size, histological grade, vascular invasion, lymphatic invasion and cancer subtype (Luminal A, Luminal B HER-2+, Luminal B HER-2-, HER-2+, and Triple Negative) as variables for univariate and multivariate analyses to assess probability of there being a positive SLN o non-sentinel lymph node (NSLN). Chi-square, Fisher’s Exact test and Student’s t tests were used to investigate the relationship between variables; whereas logit models were used to estimate and quantify the strength of the relationship among some covariates and SLN or the number of metastases. Results: A significant positive effect of vascular invasion and lymphatic invasion, and a negative effect of TN were noted. With respect to positive NSLN, size alone has a significant (positive) effect on tumour presence, but focusing on the number of metastases, also age has a (negative) significant effect. Conclusion: This work shows correlation between subtypes and the probability of having positive SLN. Patients not expressing vascular invasion, lymphatic invasion and, moreover, a triple-negative tumor subtype may be good candidates for breast conservative surgery without axillary su

Photoluminescence dispersion as a probe of structural inhomogeneity in silica

We report time-resolved photoluminescence spectra of point defects in amorphous silicon dioxide (silica), in particular the decay kinetics of the emission signals of extrinsic Oxygen Deficient Centres of the second type from singlet and directly-excited triplet states are measured and used as a probe of structural inhomogeneity. Luminescence activity in sapphire ($\alpha$-Al$_2$O$_3$) is studied as well and used as a model system to compare the optical properties of defects in silica with those of defects embedded in a crystalline matrix. Only for defects in silica, we observe a variation of the decay lifetimes with emission energy and a time dependence of the first moment of the emission bands. These features are analyzed within a theoretical model with explicit hypothesis about the effect introduced by the disorder of vitreous systems. Separate estimations of the homogenous and inhomogeneous contributions to the measured emission linewidth are obtained: it is found that inhomogeneous effects strongly condition both the triplet and singlet luminescence activities of oxygen deficient centres in silica, although the degree of inhomogeneity of the triplet emission turns out to be lower than that of the singlet emission. Inhomogeneous effects appear to be negligible in sapphire

Effects of fermentation and rye flour on microstructure and volatile compounds of chestnut flour based sourdoughs

The study is aimed at developing a new cereal-based product, with increased nutritional quality, by using natural fermentation of blends of chestnut and rye flour. In spite of the remarkable similarity, the technological potential of combinations of both flours has never been explored before. Three spontaneous chestnut/rye sourdough fermentations were performed over a period of twelve days with daily back-slopping. Samples taken at all refreshment steps were used for culture-dependent and culture-independent evaluation of the microbiota present. Dominant species basically overlapped to those associated to sourdoughs strengthened with chestnut flour, such as Pediococcus pentosaceus or Weissella paramesenteroides. Microstructures, evaluated by means of Scanning Electron Microscopy, revealed the presence in chestnut sourdoughs of a distinguishable network surrounding starch granules, while rye flour-added sourdoughs showed a less structured matrix. By gas chromatography coupled to mass spectrometry, 51 volatile organic compounds were identified at 24 h and after prolonged fermentation. Within volatile organic compounds, alcohols, esters, acids, aldehydes and ketones, all well-known flavour compounds in sourdough fermentation, appeared as dominant. The PCA discriminated the sourdoughs into three distinct clusters and highlighted a clear influence of fermentation time on the volatile composition of sourdoughs. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

Influence of fluorine on the fiber performance studied through the NBOHC-related 1.9 eV microluminescence

The distribution of Non Bridging Oxygen Hole Centers (NBOHC) in Fluorine doped optical fibers was investigated by confocal microluminescence spectroscopy monitoring the characteristic 1.9 eV luminescence band. The results show that these defects are generated by the fiber drawing and their concentration further increases after \u3b3 irradiation. The NBOHC profile along the fiber is anticorrelated to the fluorine content. This finding agrees with the role of fluorine in the fiber toughness and is discussed from the microscopic point of view on the basis of previous works

Duchenne's muscular dystrophy involves a defective transsulfuration pathway activity

Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is the most frequent X chromosome-linked disease caused by mutations in the gene encoding for dystrophin, leading to progressive and unstoppable degeneration of skeletal muscle tissues. Despite recent advances in the understanding of the molecular processes involved in the pathogenesis of DMD, there is still no cure. In this study, we aim at investigating the potential involvement of the transsulfuration pathway (TSP), and its by-end product namely hydrogen sulfide (H2S), in primary human myoblasts isolated from DMD donors and skeletal muscles of dystrophic (mdx) mice. In myoblasts of DMD donors, we demonstrate that the expression of key genes regulating the H2S production and TSP activity, including cystathionine γ lyase (CSE), cystathionine beta-synthase (CBS), 3 mercaptopyruvate sulfurtransferase (3-MST), cysteine dioxygenase (CDO), cysteine sulfonic acid decarboxylase (CSAD), glutathione synthase (GS) and γ -glutamylcysteine synthetase (γ-GCS) is reduced. Starting from these findings, using Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) and quantitative Polymerase Chain Reaction (qPCR) we show that the levels of TSP-related metabolites such as methionine, glycine, glutathione, glutamate and taurine, as well as the expression levels of the aforementioned TSP related genes, are significantly reduced in skeletal muscles of mdx mice compared to healthy controls, at both an early (7 weeks) and overt (17 weeks) stage of the disease. Importantly, the treatment with sodium hydrosulfide (NaHS), a commonly used H2S donor, fully recovers the impaired locomotor activity in both 7 and 17 old mdx mice. This is an effect attributable to the reduced expression of pro-inflammatory markers and restoration of autophagy in skeletal muscle tissues. In conclusion, our study uncovers a defective TSP pathway activity in DMD and highlights the role of H2S-donors for novel and safe adjuvant therapy to treat symptoms of DMD

Radiation hardening techniques for rare-earth based optical fibers and amplifiers

Er/Yb doped fibers and amplifiers have been shown to be very radiation sensitive, limiting their integration in space. We present an approach including successive hardening techniques to enhance their radiation tolerance. The efficiency of our approach is demonstrated by comparing the radiation responses of optical amplifiers made with same lengths of different rare-earth doped fibers and exposed to gamma-rays. Previous studies indicated that such amplifiers suffered significant degradation for doses exceeding 10 krad. Applying our techniques significantly enhances the amplifier radiation resistance, resulting in a very limited degradation up to 50 krad. Our optimization techniques concern the fiber composition, some possible pre-treatments and the interest of simulation tools used to harden by design the amplifiers. We showed that adding cerium inside the fiber phosphosilicate-based core strongly decreases the fiber radiation sensitivity compared to the standard fiber. For both fibers, a pre-treatment with hydrogen permits to enhance again the fiber resistance. Furthermore, simulations tools can also be used to improve the tolerance of the fiber amplifier by helping identifying the best amplifier configuration for operation in the radiative environment

Portuguese cacholeira blood sausage: A first taste of its microbiota and volatile organic compounds

Among typical Portuguese sausages, the cacholeira blood sausage undoubtedly represents one of the most popular preparations. To the authors’ knowledge, a lack of information on both the microbiota and the volatile organic compounds (VOCs) of this blood-containing sausage emerges from the available scientific literature. This study represents the first characterization of physico-chemical, microbiological and volatile traits of Portuguese cacholeira blood sausage. To this end, ready-to-eat cacholeira blood sausages were collected from two production batches manufactured in summer (batch 1) and autumn (batch 2). Viable counts showed active microbial communities mainly composed by lactic acid bacteria, coagulase negative cocci, enterococci and eumycetes. The metataxonomic approach showed a simple bacterial composition, which was dominated by Lactobacillus sakei in both the analyzed batches (1 and 2) considered. Carnobacterium, Enterococcus, Kluyvera, Lactococcus and Serratia were found as minor genera. The mycobiota varied according to the production season. Batch 1 was dominated by Starmerella apicola, Debaryomyces hansenii and Candida tropicalis, whereas batch 2 was dominated by D. hansenii. Moreover, Aspergillus spp., Kurtzmaniella zeylanoides, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Kurtzmaniella santamariae, Brettanomyces bruxellensis and Pichia kluyveri were detected in both the batches as minority species. Seventy-two volatile compounds were identified, including esters, phenols, terpenoids, acids, alcohols, ketones, aldehydes, lactones, furans, sulphur and nitrogen compounds. Significant differences were seen in the amount of some compounds, as a feasible consequence of differences in the raw materials, artisan production and seasonality

Structural relaxation of E' gamma centers in amorphous silica

We report experimental evidence of the existence of two variants of the E' gamma centers induced in silica by gamma rays at room temperature. The two variants are distinguishable by the fine features of their line shapes in paramagnetic resonance spectra. These features suggest that the two E' gamma differ for their topology. We find a thermally induced interconversion between the centers with an activation energy of about 34 meV. Hints are also found for the existence of a structural configuration of minimum energy and of a metastable state.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev. Let

CZT-Based Harmonic Analysis in Smart Grid Using Low-Cost Electronic Measurement Boards

This paper validates the use of a harmonic analysis algorithm on a microcontroller to perform measurements of non-stationary signals in the context of smart grids. The increasing presence of electronic devices such as inverters of distributed generators (DG), power converters of charging stations for electric vehicles, etc. can drain non-stationary currents during their operation. A classical fast Fourier transform (FFT) algorithm may not have sufficient spectral resolution for the evaluation of harmonics and inter-harmonics. Thus, in this paper, the implementation of a chirp-Z transform (CZT) algorithm is suggested, which has a spectral resolution independent from the observation window. The CZT is implemented on a low-cost commercial microcontroller, and the absolute error is evaluated with respect to the same algorithm implemented in the LabVIEW environment. The results of the tests show that the CZT implementation on a low-cost microcontroller allows for accurate measurement results, demonstrating the feasibility of reliable harmonic analysis measurements even in non-stationary conditions on smart grids

Poorly differentiated neuroendocrine larynx carcinoma: Clinical features and mirnas signature—a new goal for early diagnosis and therapy?

Laryngeal neuroendocrine carcinomas (LNECs) are rare and highly heterogeneous malignancies presenting a wide range of pathological and clinical manifestations. Herein, we retrospectively characterize ten patients diagnosticated with LNEC, five of which were defined as well‐moderately differentiated neuroendocrine carcinomas, and five that were defined as poorly differentiated neuroendocrine carcinomas, according to the latest WHO classification. Clinical features were analyzed and compared between the two subgroups together with a microRNA study which evidenced a peculiar signature likely related to poorly differentiated larynx neuroendocrine carcinomas. These findings may offer new useful insights for clinicians to improve diagnosis efficiency, therapy response, and patients’ outcome for this aggressive neoplasm