Full Characterization of the First 1 Inch Industrial Prototype of a New Concept Photodetector

The VSiPMT (Vacuum Silicon PhotoMultiplier Tube) is an original design for an innovative light detector we proposed with the aim to create new scientific instrumentation for industrial applications and physics research. The idea behind this device is to replace the classical dynode chain of a photomultiplier tube with a silicon photomultiplier, the latter acting as an electron detector and amplifier. The VSiPMT offers very attractive features and unprecedented performance, definitely superior to every other photodetector with comparable sensitive surface, such as: negligible power cosumption, excellent photon counting, easy low-voltage-based stabilization and very good time performance. After the feasibility test of the idea, Hamamatsu Photonics realized for our research group two VSiPMT industrial prototypes, that have been fully characterized. The results of the full characterization of the 1-inch industrial prototype are presented in this work.Comment: 11 pages, 14 figure

Direct effects of fermented cow's milk product with Lactobacillus paracasei CBA L74 on human enterocytes

Cow's milk fermented with Lactobacillus paracasei CBA L74 (FM-CBAL74) exerts a preventive effect against infectious diseases in children. We evaluated if this effect is at least in part related to a direct modulation of non-immune and immune defence mechanisms in human enterocytes. Human enterocytes (Caco-2) were stimulated for 48 h with FM-CBAL74 at different concentrations. Cell growth was assessed by colorimetric assay; cell differentiation (assessed by lactase expression), tight junction proteins (zonula occludens1 and occludin), mucin 2, and toll-like receptor (TRL) pathways were analysed by real-time PCR; innate immunity peptide synthesis, beta-defensin-2 (HBD-2) and cathelicidin (LL-37) were evaluated by ELISA. Mucus layer thickness was analysed by histochemistry. FMCBA L74 stimulated cell growth and differentiation, tight junction proteins and mucin 2 expression, and mucus layer thickness in a dose-dependent fashion. A significant stimulation of HBD-2 and LL-37 synthesis, associated with a modulation of TLR pathway, was also observed. FM-CBAL74 regulates non-immune and immune defence mechanisms through a direct interaction with the enterocytes. These effects could be involved in the preventive action against infectious diseases demonstrated by this fermented product in children

Promotion of E-bikes for delivery of goods in European urban areas: an Italian case study

The paper presents the first results of some tasks of Pro-E-Bike, an Intelligent Energy Europe (IEE) funded project, started on March 2013 ending in February 2016. Pro-E-Bike promotes clean and energy efficient vehicles, analyses the performance of electric bicycles and electric scooters (Light Electric Vehicle, LEV) for the delivering of goods in urban areas and tests the use of these vehicles in seven European countries with twenty five companies, both delivering ones and companies that deliver their own products. Pilots will enable the demonstration of measurable effects in terms of reduction of CO2 emissions and energy savings in urban transport: related data about environmental, economic and social effects resulted by the introduction of e-bikes and e-scooters in the pilot cities will be collected. The paper will give an overlooks of the Italian pilot, that will take place in Genova, describing the subjects involved and the expected results

Tiagabine in glial tumors.

Preliminary reports have suggested a possible 'aetiology-specific' efficacy of tiagabine (TGB) in patients with drug-resistant partial epilepsy (DRPE) related to cerebral glial tumors (GTs). This efficacy should be related to selective blocking of GAT-1 transporter by TGB. We presented our open-label, add-on TGB experience in a group of patients with GTs, compared with other symptomatic DRPEs of different aetiology.eleven patients with DRPE related to oligodendroglioma (six cases), astrocytoma (4) or multiform gliobastoma (1); 12 patients with DRPE related to a miscellanea of CNS lesions. TGB was added to previous AEDs, at dosage of 20-60 mg per die. Responders are defined by seizure frequency reduction >50\% compared with baseline.Seven patients are responders with three seizure-free (SF) in GTs group, a rate of efficacy much higher than in matching group (63.6 vs. 16.6\%). Adverse events have been observed only rarely, not leading to discontinuation, in GTs group.This preliminary observation seems to confirm the high efficacy and tolerability of TGB in DRPE related to GTs

Low-dose sirolimus in two cousins with autoimmune lymphoproliferative syndrome-associated infection

Autoimmune lymphoproliferative syndrome (ALPS) is characterized by non-malignant lymphoproliferation and autoimmunity, with a wide spectrum of clinical manifestations (OMIM 601859). Typical features include enlarged spleen and lymph nodes and autoimmune cytopenia. We describe a family with ALPS in which two cousins independently presented to their physicians with infection and discuss the therapeutic potential of sirolimus

Efficacy of a partially hydrolyzed whey formula on infant colic: a randomized controlled trial

Background: Infant colic (IC) affects up to 20% of infants in the first 4 months of life. Although IC is a benign affection that spontaneously resolves after the first 3-4 months of life, it is often a stressful problem for parents. Methods: Babies, aged ≤ 3 months, observed at family pediatrician office because a suspect of IC, were randomized in two groups of 3-week dietary intervention: Group 1, receiving non-analgesic, non-nutritive soothing maneuvers, continuing a standard formula; Group 2, receiving a partially hydrolyzed whey formula (w-pHF), containing GOS (0.5g/100ml), low content of lactose (2.5g/100ml) and low osmolarity (185 mOsm). All infants performed clinical examinations at enrollment and after 7, 14 and 21 days. Number of colic episodes, and the number and consistency of fecal outputs were recorded daily. Results: Fifty infants with IC were enrolled and randomized: 25 in Group 1 and 25 in Group 2. The rate of infants with IC in Group 2 decreased significantly within 14 days compared to Group 1 and the number of bowel movements increased significantly within 7 days in Group 2 compared to Group 1. Stool consistency significantly improved in Group 2 within 7 days. Conclusion: The studied formula could represent a useful approach in infants with IC reducing pharmacological treatments

Proteomic and immunological characterization of a new food allergen from hazelnut (Corylus avellana).

Hazelnuts (Corylus avellana) are one of the most common sources of life-long IgE-mediated food allergies. In this study, we investigated the IgE-reactivity pattern of children with hazelnut allergy (N=15) from Regione Campania, located in Southern Italy, and addressed proteomic strategies for characterizing IgE-binding proteins. For all of the patients (15/15), the predominant IgE-reactive component was a minor ~55kDa protein not previously described. Similar to the hazelnut 11S globulin Cor a 9 allergen, the immunoreactive protein consisted of two subunits linked via a disulfide bridge. In contrast to Cor a 9, only the 20.7kDa alkaline subunit exhibited IgE-affinity. The immunogenic subunit was purified by a two-step chromatographic procedure, but peptide mass fingerprinting was unsuccessful in identifying it, due to the incompleteness of the annotated hazelnut genome. Several tryptic peptides were de novo sequenced by tandem mass spectrometry and showed a high degree of homology with the 11S globulin storage proteins from other seeds, some of which have already been reported as food allergens. The structural characterization suggests that the new putative allergen is a divergent isoform of the hazelnut 11S globulin. These results provide a new platform for developing innovative diagnostic and therapeutic intervention plans. BIOLOGICAL SIGNIFICANCE:Over the years, at least five proteins have been reported as potential food hazelnut allergens. The predominance of specific allergens appears to be strictly related to the geographical origin of the allergic subjects. The complex patterns of the IgE-reactivity of hazelnut storage proteins result in a poor diagnostic and prognostic accuracy. In the perspective of a component-resolved "molecular approach" to the hazelnut allergy we investigated the immune-reactivity patterns to hazelnuts of 15 patients (14 in the pediatric age range) from Region Campania, located in Southern Italy. For all the patients the predominant IgE-reactive component was a minor ~55kDa protein not previously annotated in either protein or genomic databases. The putative allergen was isolated, partially characterized by MS/MS de novo sequencing and appears to be an isoallergen of the hazelnut 11S globulin Cor a 9. Like this latter, the immunoreactive protein consisted of two subunits linked via a disulfide. In contrast to Cor a 9, only the 20.7kDa alkaline subunit exhibited IgE-affinity, in analogy to 11S allergens from other seeds (pistachio, cashew, soybean). We believe that the application of combined immunochemical and proteomic strategies to characterize the new food allergen could be of interest for the readers of Journal of Proteomics. In addition, the results of this study have functional worth in providing a new platform to plan innovative diagnostic and therapeutic intervention approaches to treat hazelnut allergy

Predicting the Next Best View for 3D Mesh Refinement

3D reconstruction is a core task in many applications such as robot navigation or sites inspections. Finding the best poses to capture part of the scene is one of the most challenging topic that goes under the name of Next Best View. Recently, many volumetric methods have been proposed; they choose the Next Best View by reasoning over a 3D voxelized space and by finding which pose minimizes the uncertainty decoded into the voxels. Such methods are effective, but they do not scale well since the underlaying representation requires a huge amount of memory. In this paper we propose a novel mesh-based approach which focuses on the worst reconstructed region of the environment mesh. We define a photo-consistent index to evaluate the 3D mesh accuracy, and an energy function over the worst regions of the mesh which takes into account the mutual parallax with respect to the previous cameras, the angle of incidence of the viewing ray to the surface and the visibility of the region. We test our approach over a well known dataset and achieve state-of-the-art results.Comment: 13 pages, 5 figures, to be published in IAS-1

Integration of solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) and chemical looping combustion (CLC) for ultra-high efficiency power generation and CO2 production

This work presents a thermodynamic analysis of the integration of solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) with chemical looping combustion (CLC) in natural gas power plants. The fundamental idea of the proposed process integration is to use a dual fluidized-bed CLC process to complete the oxidation of the H2-CO-rich anode exhausts from the SOFC in the CLC fuel reactor while preheating the air stream to the cathode inlet temperature in the CLC air reactor. Thus, fuel oxidation can be completed in N2-free environment without the high energy and economic costs associated to O2 production, avoiding at the same time the high temperature and high cost heat exchanger needed in conventional SOFC plants for air preheating. In the proposed configurations, the CLC plant is operated at mild conditions (atmospheric pressure and temperature in the range of 700–800 °C), already demonstrated in several pilot plants. Two different scenarios have been investigated: in the first one, the SOFC is designed for large-scale power generation (100 MWLHV of heat input), featuring a heat recovery steam cycle and CO2 capture for subsequent storage. In the second scenario, the system is designed for a small-scale plant, producing 145 kg/h of pure CO2 for industrial utilization, as a possible early market application. The main parameters affecting the plant performance, i.e. SOFC voltage (V) and S/C ratio at SOFC inlet, have been varied in a sensitivity analysis. Three different materials (Ni, Fe and Cu-based) are also compared as oxygen carriers (OCs) in the CLC unit. The integrated plant shows very high electric efficiency, exceeding 66%LHV at both small and large scale with a carbon capture ratio (CCR) of nearly 100%. It was found that, except for the cell voltage, the other operating parameters do not affect significantly the efficiency of the plant. Compared to the benchmark SOFC-based hybrid cycles using conventional CO2 capture technologies, the SOFC-CLC power plant showed an electric efficiency ∼2 percentage points higher, without requiring high temperature heat exchangers and with a simplified process configuration