95 research outputs found
Fenomeno Caulerpa 2010-2013. Rapporto sull'evoluzione delle specie aliene nel Canale di Sicilia
Gli studi effettuati da ARPA-Sicilia, ISPRA e CNR-IAMC hanno perseguito l’obiettivo principale
di monitorare e valutare l’impatto della diffusione delle alghe indagate, attraverso
l’analisi dell’evoluzione spazio-temporale del fenomeno e la caratterizzazione eco-tossicologica
delle aree di pesca maggiormente interessate dalla presenza delle caulerpe.
In particolare
Le ricerche di ARPA-Sicilia sono state mirate a:
- Definire le aree di studio principalmente interessate dal fenomeno di diffusione delle
due alghe aliene;
- Caratterizzare da un punto di vista ambientale le aree oggetto d’indagine;
- Valutare le pressioni antropiche che insistono lungo le coste delle aree indagate;
- Stimare l’influenza che le pressioni antropiche possono esercitare sulla diffusione della
Caulerpa;
- Indagare l’andamento spazio-temporale della distribuzione di Caulerpa in specifiche
aree di indagine.
Gli studi condotti da ISPRA hanno puntato a:
- Valutare possibili interferenze dell’alga con le attività di pesca, l’intasamento delle reti
e la riduzione della pescabilità dell’attrezzo;
- Rilevare l’eventuale diversità tra aree con insediamento e prive di insediamento;
- Avviare l’introduzione di buone pratiche per evitare che la pesca possa rappresentare
un ulteriore vettore di invasioni secondarie attraverso disseminazione dei frammenti e
propaguli dell’alga;
- Definire comportamenti alieutici nel tempo utili alla mitigazione del potenziale impatto
della pesca sulle risorse nelle aree colpite;
- Istituire in tutta l’area di studio e, in particolare, nell’arcipelago delle Pelagie, un “Osservatorio
delle Specie Aliene” per svolgere attività di monitoraggio sulla diffusione delle
specie aliene, al fine di formulare proposte gestionali mirate alla salvaguardia degli ecosistemi
e delle attivitĂ economiche di pesca.
Le indagini realizzate dal CNR-IAMC hanno avuto come obiettivi principali:
- Confrontare le caratteristiche dei popolamenti bentonici associati a praterie di Posidonia
oceanica della Sicilia meridionale interessate dall’invasione di Caulerpa taxifolia var.
distichophylla con quelle di popolamenti associati a posidonieti di localitĂ limitrofe non
colpite dal fenomeno;
- Confrontare la struttura trofica della comunitĂ bentonica associata a matte di Posidonia
oceanica in localitĂ invase e non invase da alghe aliene del genere Caulerpa della Sicilia
meridionale;
- Valutare gli effetti dell’invasione di Caulerpa racemosa var. cylindracea sulla struttura
e sulla funzione di popolamenti macrobentonici sessili di fondo duro dell’infralitorale
Artificial intelligence in biological activity prediction
Artificial intelligence has become an indispensable resource in chemoinformatics. Numerous machine learning algorithms for activity prediction recently emerged, becoming an indispensable approach to mine chemical information from large compound datasets. These approaches enable the automation of compound discovery to find biologically active molecules with important properties. Here, we present a review of some of the main machine learning studies in biological activity prediction of compounds, in particular for sweetness prediction. We discuss some of the most used compound featurization techniques and the major databases of chemical compounds relevant to these tasks.This study was supported by the European Commission through project SHIKIFACTORY100 - Modular cell factories for the production of 100 compounds from the shikimate pathway (Reference 814408), and by the Portuguese FCT under the scope of the strategic funding of UID/BIO/04469/2019 unit and BioTecNorte operation (NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000004) funded by the European Regional Development Fund under the scope of Norte2020.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Genetic and environmental variation in educational attainment: an individual-based analysis of 28 twin cohorts
We investigated the heritability of educational attainment and how it differed between birth cohorts and cultural-geographic regions. A classical twin design was applied to pooled data from 28 cohorts representing 16 countries and including 193,518 twins with information on educational attainment at 25 years of age or older. Genetic factors explained the major part of individual differences in educational attainment (heritability: a2 = 0.43; 0.41-0.44), but also environmental variation shared by co-twins was substantial (c2 = 0.31; 0.30-0.33). The proportions of educational variation explained by genetic and shared environmental factors did not differ between Europe, North America and Australia, and East Asia. When restricted to twins 30 years or older to confirm finalized education, the heritability was higher in the older cohorts born in 1900-1949 (a2 = 0.44; 0.41-0.46) than in the later cohorts born in 1950-1989 (a2 = 0.38; 0.36-0.40), with a corresponding lower influence of common environmental factors (c2 = 0.31; 0.29-0.33 and c2 = 0.34; 0.32-0.36, respectively). In conclusion, both genetic and environmental factors shared by co-twins have an important influence on individual differences in educational attainment. The effect of genetic factors on educational attainment has decreased from the cohorts born before to those born after the 1950s
The CODATwins Project : The Current Status and Recent Findings of COllaborative Project of Development of Anthropometrical Measures in Twins
The COllaborative project of Development of Anthropometrical measures in Twins (CODATwins) project is a large international collaborative effort to analyze individual-level phenotype data from twins in multiple cohorts from different environments. The main objective is to study factors that modify genetic and environmental variation of height, body mass index (BMI, kg/m(2)) and size at birth, and additionally to address other research questions such as long-term consequences of birth size. The project started in 2013 and is open to all twin projects in the world having height and weight measures on twins with information on zygosity. Thus far, 54 twin projects from 24 countries have provided individual-level data. The CODATwins database includes 489,981 twin individuals (228,635 complete twin pairs). Since many twin cohorts have collected longitudinal data, there is a total of 1,049,785 height and weight observations. For many cohorts, we also have information on birth weight and length, own smoking behavior and own or parental education. We found that the heritability estimates of height and BMI systematically changed from infancy to old age. Remarkably, only minor differences in the heritability estimates were found across cultural-geographic regions, measurement time and birth cohort for height and BMI. In addition to genetic epidemiological studies, we looked at associations of height and BMI with education, birth weight and smoking status. Within-family analyses examined differences within same-sex and opposite-sex dizygotic twins in birth size and later development. The CODATwins project demonstrates the feasibility and value of international collaboration to address gene-by-exposure interactions that require large sample sizes and address the effects of different exposures across time, geographical regions and socioeconomic status.Peer reviewe
An effective multisource informed consent procedure for research and clinical practice: an observational study of patient understanding and awareness of their roles as research stakeholders in a cancer biobank
In vitro mesenchymal stem cell response to a CO2 laser modified polymeric material
With an ageing world population it is becoming significantly apparent that there is a need to produce implants and platforms to manipulate stem cell growth on a pharmaceutical scale. This is needed to meet the socio-economic demands of many countries worldwide. This paper details one of the first ever studies in to the manipulation of stem cell growth on CO2 laser surface treated nylon 6,6 highlighting its potential as an inexpensive platform to manipulate stem cell growth on a pharmaceutical scale. Through CO2 laser surface treatment discrete changes to the surfaces were made. That is, the surface roughness of the nylon 6,6 was increased by up to 4.3 µm, the contact angle was modulated by up to 5° and the surface oxygen content increased by up to 1 atom%. Following mesenchymal stem cell growth on the laser treated samples, it was identified that CO2 laser surface treatment gave rise to an enhanced response with an increase in viable cell count of up to 60,000 cells/ml when compared to the as-received sample. The effect of surface parameters modified by the CO2 laser surface treatment on the mesenchymal stem cell response is also discussed along with potential trends that could be identified to govern the mesenchymal stem cell response
Genetic and environmental variation in educational attainment : an individual-based analysis of 28 twin cohorts
We investigated the heritability of educational attainment and how it differed between birth cohorts and cultural-geographic regions. A classical twin design was applied to pooled data from 28 cohorts representing 16 countries and including 193,518 twins with information on educational attainment at 25 years of age or older. Genetic factors explained the major part of individual differences in educational attainment (heritability: a(2)=0.43; 0.41-0.44), but also environmental variation shared by co-twins was substantial (c(2)=0.31; 0.30-0.33). The proportions of educational variation explained by genetic and shared environmental factors did not differ between Europe, North America and Australia, and East Asia. When restricted to twins 30 years or older to confirm finalized education, the heritability was higher in the older cohorts born in 1900-1949 (a(2)=0.44; 0.41-0.46) than in the later cohorts born in 1950-1989 (a(2)=0.38; 0.36-0.40), with a corresponding lower influence of common environmental factors (c(2)=0.31; 0.29-0.33 and c(2)=0.34; 0.32-0.36, respectively). In conclusion, both genetic and environmental factors shared by co-twins have an important influence on individual differences in educational attainment. The effect of genetic factors on educational attainment has decreased from the cohorts born before to those born after the 1950s.Peer reviewe
Educational attainment of same-sex and opposite-sex dizygotic twins: An individual-level pooled study of 19 twin cohorts.
Comparing twins from same- and opposite-sex pairs can provide information on potential sex differences in a variety of outcomes, including socioeconomic-related outcomes such as educational attainment. It has been suggested that this design can be applied to examine the putative role of intrauterine exposure to testosterone for educational attainment, but the evidence is still disputed. Thus, we established an international database of twin data from 11 countries with 88,290 individual dizygotic twins born over 100 years and tested for differences between twins from same- and opposite-sex dizygotic pairs in educational attainment. Effect sizes with 95% confidence intervals (CI) were estimated by linear regression models after adjusting for birth year and twin study cohort. In contrast to the hypothesis, no difference was found in women (β = -0.05 educational years, 95% CI -0.11, 0.02). However, men with a same-sex co-twin were slightly more educated than men having an opposite-sex co-twin (β = 0.14 educational years, 95% CI 0.07, 0.21). No consistent differences in effect sizes were found between individual twin study cohorts representing Europe, the USA, and Australia or over the cohorts born during the 20th century, during which period the sex differences in education reversed favoring women in the latest birth cohorts. Further, no interaction was found with maternal or paternal education. Our results contradict the hypothesis that there would be differences in the intrauterine testosterone levels between same-sex and opposite-sex female twins affecting education. Our findings in men may point to social dynamics within same-sex twin pairs that may benefit men in their educational careers
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