Haemolymphatic cancer among children in Sardinia, Italy: 1974-2003 incidence

Objectives To explore the time trend and geographical distribution of childhood leukaemia incidence over the territory of the Italian region of Sardinia. Setting All hospitals departments, diagnostic centres and social security agencies in Sardinia were regularly screened in 1974-2003 to identify, register and review the diagnoses of incident cases of haematological malignancies (HM). Participants The whole child population aged 0-14 resident in Sardinia. Primary and secondary outcome measures Incidence and time trend of childhood HM and childhood acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) over the study period, and use of Bayesian methods to plot the probability of areas with excess incidence on the regional map. Results Overall, 675 HM cases, including 378 ALL cases, occurred among children aged 0-14 years resident in Sardinia in 1974-2003, with an incidence rate of 6.97×10-5 (95% CI 6.47 to 7.51) and 3.85×10-5 (95% CI 3.48 to 4.26), respectively. Incidence of HM and ALL showed an upward trend along the study period especially among females. Three communes out of the 356 existing in 1974, namely Ittiri, Villa San Pietro and Carbonia, stand out as areas with excess incidence of HM and ALL in particular and another, Carloforte, for ALL only. Conclusions Our results might serve as convincing arguments for extending the coverage of routine cancer registration over the whole Sardinian population, while prompting further research on the genetic and environmental determinants in the areas at risk

TGS1 mediates 2,2,7-trimethyl guanosine capping of the human telomerase RNA to direct telomerase dependent telomere maintenance

Pathways that direct the selection of the telomerase-dependent or recombination-based, alternative lengthening of telomere (ALT) maintenance pathway in cancer cells are poorly understood. Using human lung cancer cells and tumor organoids we show that formation of the 2,2,7-trimethylguanosine (TMG) cap structure at the human telomerase RNA 5′ end by the Trimethylguanosine Synthase 1 (TGS1) is central for recruiting telomerase to telomeres and engaging Cajal bodies in telomere maintenance. TGS1 depletion or inhibition by the natural nucleoside sinefungin impairs telomerase recruitment to telomeres leading to Exonuclease 1 mediated generation of telomere 3′ end protrusions that engage in RAD51-dependent, homology directed recombination and the activation of key features of the ALT pathway. This indicates a critical role for 2,2,7-TMG capping of the RNA component of human telomerase (hTR) in enforcing telomerase-dependent telomere maintenance to restrict the formation of telomeric substrates conductive to ALT. Our work introduces a targetable pathway of telomere maintenance that holds relevance for telomere-related diseases such as cancer and aging

Gestural interaction for robot motion control

Recent advances in gesture recognition made the problem of controlling a humanoid robot in the most natural possible way an interesting challenge. Learning from Demonstration field takes strong advantage from this kind of interaction since users who have no robotics knowledge are allowed to teach new tasks to robots easier than ever before. In this work we present a cheap and easy way to implement humanoid robot along with a visual interaction interface allowing users to control it. The visual system is based on the Microsoft Kinect's RGB-D camera. Users can deal with the robot just by standing in front of the depth camera and mimicking a particular task they want to be performed by the robot. Our framework is cheap, easy to reproduce, and does not strictly depend on the particular underlying sensor or gesture recognition system

Formal modeling and analysis of safety-critical human multitasking

When a person is concurrently interacting with different systems, the amount of cognitive resources required (cognitive load) could be too high and might prevent some tasks from being completed. When such human multitasking involves safety-critical tasks, such as in an airplane, a spacecraft, or a car, failure to devote sufficient attention to the different tasks could have serious consequences. For example, using a GPS with high cognitive load while driving might take the attention away for too long from the safety-critical task of driving the car. To study this problem, we define an executable formal model of human attention and multitasking in Real-Time Maude. It includes a description of the human working memory and the cognitive processes involved in the interaction with a device. Our framework enables us to analyze human multitasking through simulation, reachability analysis, and LTL and timed CTL model checking, and we show how a number of prototypical multitasking problems can be analyzed in Real-Time Maude. We illustrate our modeling and analysis framework by studying: (i) the interaction with a GPS navigation system while driving, (ii) some typical scenarios involving human errors in air traffic control (ATC), and (iii) a medical operator setting multiple infusion pumps simultaneously. We apply model checking to show that in some cases the cognitive load of the navigation system could cause the driver to keep the focus away from driving for too long, and that working memory overload and distraction may cause an air traffic controller or a medical operator to make critical mistakes