Homogeneous, Urban Heterogeneous, or both? External Economies and Regional Manufacturing Productivity in Europe

The objective of this paper is to analyse theoretically and empirically the effects of sectoral homogeneity and urban heterogeneity on regional manufacturing “pure” productivity differentials. Hypotheses of the existence and co-existence of the two types of external effects are formulated and tested for the regions of 13 Western EU countries by means of panel data spatial econometric techniques. The outcomes clearly support our conjectures and also reveal how a simply strong manufacturing sector, i.e., not accounting for internal specialisation, may be harmful to productivity. This result, and the existence of heterogeneous externalities, are confirmed for a sample of regions extended to Eastern European countries.homogeneous and urban heterogeneous external economies, manufacturing productivity, EU regions

Anopheline salivary protein genes and gene families: an evolutionary overview after the whole genome sequence of sixteen Anopheles species

Background: Mosquito saliva is a complex cocktail whose pharmacological properties play an essential role in blood feeding by counteracting host physiological response to tissue injury. Moreover, vector borne pathogens are transmitted to vertebrates and exposed to their immune system in the context of mosquito saliva which, in virtue of its immunomodulatory properties, can modify the local environment at the feeding site and eventually affect pathogen transmission. In addition, the host antibody response to salivary proteins may be used to assess human exposure to mosquito vectors. Even though the role of quite a few mosquito salivary proteins has been clarified in the last decade, we still completely ignore the physiological role of many of them as well as the extent of their involvement in the complex interactions taking place between the mosquito vectors, the pathogens they transmit and the vertebrate host. The recent release of the genomes of 16 Anopheles species offered the opportunity to get insights into function and evolution of salivary protein families in anopheline mosquitoes. Results: Orthologues of fifty three Anopheles gambiae salivary proteins were retrieved and annotated from 18 additional anopheline species belonging to the three subgenera Cellia, Anopheles, and Nyssorhynchus. Our analysis included 824 full-length salivary proteins from 24 different families and allowed the identification of 79 novel salivary genes and re-annotation of 379 wrong predictions. The comparative, structural and phylogenetic analyses yielded an unprecedented view of the anopheline salivary repertoires and of their evolution over 100 million years of anopheline radiation shedding light on mechanisms and evolutionary forces that contributed shaping the anopheline sialomes. Conclusions: We provide here a comprehensive description, classification and evolutionary overview of the main anopheline salivary protein families and identify two novel candidate markers of human exposure to malaria vectors worldwide. This anopheline sialome catalogue, which is easily accessible as hyperlinked spreadsheet, is expected to be useful to the vector biology community and to improve the capacity to gain a deeper understanding of mosquito salivary proteins facilitating their possible exploitation for epidemiological and/or pathogen-vector-host interaction studies

Mucosa-Environment Interactions in the Pathogenesis of Rheumatoid Arthritis

Mucosal surfaces play a central role in the pathogenesis of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Several risk factors, such as cigarette smoking, environmental pollution, and periodontitis interact with the host at the mucosal level, triggering immune system activation. Moreover, the alteration of microbiota homeostasis is gaining increased attention for its involvement in the disease pathogenesis, modulating the immune cell response at a local and subsequently at a systemic level. Currently, the onset of the clinical manifest arthritis is thought to be the last step of a series of pathogenic events lasting years. The positivity for anti-citrullinated protein antibodies (ACPAs) and rheumatoid factor (RF), in absence of symptoms, characterizes a preclinical phase of RA namely systemic autoimmune phase- which is at high risk for disease progression. Several immune abnormalities, such as local ACPA production, increased T cell polarization towards a pro-inflammatory phenotype, and innate immune cell activation can be documented in at-risk subjects. Many of these abnormalities are direct consequences of the interaction between the environment and the host, which takes place at the mucosal level. The purpose of this review is to describe the humoral and cellular immune abnormalities detected in subjects at risk of RA, highlighting their origin from the mucosa environment interaction

Antigeni salivari quali strumenti epidemiologici per la valutazione dell'esposizione umana ad Aedes albopictus

Hematophagous arthropods during feeding inject into their hosts a cocktail of salivary proteins whose main role is to allow for an effective blood meal by counteracting host hemostasis, inflammation and immunity. However, saliva of blood feeders also evokes in vertebrates an antibody response that can be used to evaluate exposure to disease vectors. Salivary transcriptome studies carried out in different hematophagous species in the last fifteen years clarified the complexity of the salivary repertoires of blood feeding arthropods, pointing out that salivary proteins evolve at a fast evolutionary rate and highlighting the existence of family-, genus- and sometime even species-specific salivary proteins. Focusing on mosquitoes of the genera Anopheles and Aedes, which are important vectors of the human malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum and of several arboviruses, we summarize here recent efforts to exploit genus-specific salivary proteins as biomarkers of human exposure to these vectors of large relevance for public health

Prospects in MPGDs development for neutron detection

Compared to Multi Wires Proportional Chambers (MWPC), Micro-Pattern Gas Detectors (MPGD) used in HEP to detect MIPs offer better spatial resolution, counting rate capability, and radiation hardness; their fabrication is also more reproducible. Provided similar advantages are applicable to detect neutrons, MPGDs might contribute significantly to the development of neutron scientific instrumentation. In order to evaluate the prospects of neutron MPGDs, it is worth knowing the applications which would benefit from a gain in performance, and if they offer a competitive alternative to conventional 3He detectors. These questions have been at the focus of the workshop "Neutron Detection with Micro-Pattern Gaseous Detectors" organized by RD51 in collaboration with HEPTech, which took place at CERN on October 14-15, 2013. The goal of this workshop was to help disseminating MPGD technologies beyond High Energy Physics, and to give the possibility to academic institutions, potential users and industry to meet together. This summary article starts with a short summary of the state of the art of MPGD techniques for HEP; then specificities in the design of neutron detector are described; the consequence of the 3He shortage are briefly discussed; requirements for neutron scattering science at current facilities and at the future ESS are described; finally, we give some recommendations about possible directions where we believe the development of neutron MPGDs is of particular interest for possible use on neutron scattering instruments.Comment: Summary based on presentations during RD51 Academia-Industry Matching Event, CERN October 14-15, 201

MicroRNAs from saliva of anopheline mosquitoes mimic human endogenous miRNAs and may contribute to vector-host-pathogen interactions

During blood feeding haematophagous arthropods inject into their hosts a cocktail of salivary proteins whose main role is to counteract host haemostasis, inflammation and immunity. However, animal body fluids are known to also carry miRNAs. To get insights into saliva and salivary gland miRNA repertoires of the African malaria vector Anopheles coluzzii we used small RNA-Seq and identified 214 miRNAs, including tissue-enriched, sex-biased and putative novel anopheline miRNAs. Noteworthy, miRNAs were asymmetrically distributed between saliva and salivary glands, suggesting that selected miRNAs may be preferentially directed toward mosquito saliva. The evolutionary conservation of a subset of saliva miRNAs in Anopheles and Aedes mosquitoes, and in the tick Ixodes ricinus, supports the idea of a non-random occurrence pointing to their possible physiological role in blood feeding by arthropods. Strikingly, eleven of the most abundant An. coluzzi saliva miRNAs mimicked human miRNAs. Prediction analysis and search for experimentally validated targets indicated that miRNAs from An. coluzzii saliva may act on host mRNAs involved in immune and inflammatory responses. Overall, this study raises the intriguing hypothesis that miRNAs injected into vertebrates with vector saliva may contribute to host manipulation with possible implication for vector-host interaction and pathogen transmission

Component-wise modeling of articulated objects

We introduce a novel framework for modeling articulated objects based on the aspects of their components. By decomposing the object into components, we divide the problem in smaller modeling tasks. After obtaining 3D models for each component aspect by employing a shape deformation paradigm, we merge them together, forming the object components. The final model is obtained by assembling the components using an optimization scheme which fits the respective 3D models to the corresponding apparent contours in a reference pose. The results suggest that our approach can produce realistic 3D models of articulated objects in reasonable time

Wireless Sensing Based on RFID and Capacitive Technologies for Safety in Marble Industry Process Control

This paper presents wireless sensing systems to increase safety and robustness in industrial process control, particularly in industrial machines for marble slab working. The process is performed by abrasive or cutting heads activated independently by the machine controller when the slab, transported on a conveyer belt, is under them. Current slab detection systems are based on electromechanical or optical devices at the machine entrance stage, suffering from deterioration and from the harsh environment. Slab displacement or break inside the machine due to the working stress may result in safety issues and damages to the conveyer belt due to incorrect driving of the working tools. The experimented contactless sensing techniques are based on four RFID and two capacitive sensing technologies and on customized hardware/software. The proposed solutions aim at overcoming some limitations of current state-of-the-art detection systems, allowing for reliable slab detection, outside and/or inside the machine, while maintaining low complexity and at the same time robustness to industrial harsh conditions. The proposed sensing devices may implement a wireless or wired sensor network feeding detection data to the machine controller. Data integrity check and process control algorithms have to be implemented for the safety and reliability of the overall industrial process

OSSERVATORIO SULLA DINAMICA ECONOMICO-FINANZIARIA DELLE IMPRESE DELLA FILIERA DELL’AUTO IN PIEMONTE.SECONDO RAPPORTO 1999-2002

Pubblicazione promossa dalla Regione Piemonte, Direzione Industria, Settore Osservatorio Settori Produttivi Industriali e redatta dal Ceris-Cnr.

Loss of brain inter-frequency hubs in Alzheimer's disease

Alzheimer's disease (AD) causes alterations of brain network structure and function. The latter consists of connectivity changes between oscillatory processes at different frequency channels. We proposed a multi-layer network approach to analyze multiple-frequency brain networks inferred from magnetoencephalographic recordings during resting-states in AD subjects and age-matched controls. Main results showed that brain networks tend to facilitate information propagation across different frequencies, as measured by the multi-participation coefficient (MPC). However, regional connectivity in AD subjects was abnormally distributed across frequency bands as compared to controls, causing significant decreases of MPC. This effect was mainly localized in association areas and in the cingulate cortex, which acted, in the healthy group, as a true inter-frequency hub. MPC values significantly correlated with memory impairment of AD subjects, as measured by the total recall score. Most predictive regions belonged to components of the default-mode network that are typically affected by atrophy, metabolism disruption and amyloid-beta deposition. We evaluated the diagnostic power of the MPC and we showed that it led to increased classification accuracy (78.39%) and sensitivity (91.11%). These findings shed new light on the brain functional alterations underlying AD and provide analytical tools for identifying multi-frequency neural mechanisms of brain diseases.Comment: 27 pages, 6 figures, 3 tables, 3 supplementary figure