The Sicilian Jews in the Maritime Trade in the Second Half of the 15th Century

Evidences of Jewish settlements in Sicily date back to the late antique period and this varied and industrious minority has been present, without interruption, until the last decade of the 15th century. The Sicilian Jews lived closely linked to the majority around them, they settled in the three “valli” in which the island was parcelled out and especially in the main coastal cities. Many communities, indeed, grouped around big urban centres and only few of them were situated in suburban areas, even if they were not completely isolated, and many inland communities settled along the main communications lines. The Sicilian Jews devoted themselves to diversified professions; they were physicians, silk weavers, blacksmiths, small artisans, shopkeepers and merchants of several items: cloths, silk, spices, metals and metallurgic products, sugar, slaves and so on

A proposito di Donatella Calabi, Venezia e il Ghetto. Cinquecento anni nel «recinto degli ebrei»

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RAPPORTI ECONOMICI DEGLI EBREI MESSINESI CON PALERMO NEL XV SECOLO

L’analisi delle fonti notarili palermitane permette la ricostruzione degli interessi economici degli ebrei messinesi nella città di Palermo nel corso del XV secolo, in particolar modo i rapporti commerciali intercorsi con i loro correligionari palermitani, i cristiani locali e i mercanti stranieri, e di proporre un definitivo insediamento di alcuni di questi ebrei nella città. The analysis of the notarial records of Palermo allows the reconstruction of the economic interests of the Jews of Messina in the city of Palermo during the fifteenth century, especially the trade relations with their coreligionists in Palermo, local Christians and foreign merchants, and to propose a definitive settlement of some of those in the city

Excellent intra and inter-observer reproducibility of wrist circumference measurements in obese children and adolescents

In a previous study, we found that wrist circumference, in particular its bone component,was associated with insulin resistance in a population of overweight/obese children. Theaim of the present study was to evaluate the intra- and inter-operator variability in wrist cir-cumference measurement in a population of obese children and adolescents. One hundredand two (54 male and 48 female) obese children and adolescents were consecutivelyenrolled. In all subjects wrist circumferences were measured by two different operators twotimes to assess intra- and inter-operator variability. Statistical analysis was performed usingSAS v.9.4 and JMP v.12. Measurements of wrist circumference showed excellent inter-operator reliability with Intra class Correlation Coefficients (ICC) of 0.96 and ICC of 0.97 forthe first and the second measurement, respectively. The intra-operator reliability was, also,very strong with a Concordance Correlation Coefficient (CCC) of 0.98 for both operators.The high reproducibility demonstrated in our results suggests that wrist circumference mea-surement, being safe, non-invasive and repeatable can be easily used in out-patient set-tings to identify youths with increased risk of insulin-resistance. This can avoid testing theentire population of overweight/obese children for insulin resistance parameter

Near Field Communication: Technology and Market Trends

Among the different hi-tech content domains, the telecommunications industry is one of the most relevant, in particular for the Italian economy. Moreover, Near Field Communication (NFC) represents an example of innovative production and a technological introduction in the telecommunications context. It has a threefold function: card emulator, peer-to-peer communication and digital content access, and it could be pervasively integrated in many different domains, especially in the mobile payment one. The increasing attention on NFC technology from the academic community has improved an analysis on the changes and the development perspective about mobile payments. It has considered the work done by the GSMA (Global System for Mobile Communications Association) and the NFC Forum in recent years. This study starts from an analysis of the scientific contributions to Near Field Communication and how the main researches on this topic were conceived. Our focus is on the diffusion rates, the adoption rates and the technology life cycle. After that, we analyze the technical-economical elements of NFC. Finally, this work presents the state of art of the improvements to this technology with a deeper focus on NFC technologies applied to the tourism industry. In this way, we have done a case analysis that shows some of the NFC existent applications linked to each stage of the tourism value chain

A dynamic Bayesian network model for predicting organ failure associations without predefining outcomes

Critical care medicine has been a field for Bayesian networks (BNs) application for investigating relationships among failing organs. Criticisms have been raised on using mortality as the only outcome to determine the treatment efficacy. We aimed to develop a dynamic BN model for detecting interrelationships among failing organs and their progression, not predefining outcomes and omitting hierarchization of organ interactions. We collected data from 850 critically ill patients from the national database used in many intensive care units. We considered as nodes the organ failure assessed by a score as recorded daily. We tested several possible DBNs and used the best bootstrapping results for calculating the strength of arcs and directions. The network structure was learned using a hill climbing method. The parameters of the local distributions were fitted with a maximum of the likelihood algorithm. The network that best satisfied the accuracy requirements included 15 nodes, corresponding to 5 variables measured at three times: ICU admission, second and seventh day of ICU stay. From our findings some organ associations had probabilities higher than 50% to arise at ICU admittance or in the following days persisting over time. Our study provided a network model predicting organ failure associations and their evolution over time. This approach has the potential advantage of detecting and comparing the effects of treatments on organ function

the archaeological map for the reconstruction of the ancient topography of the greek and roman city of taormina

TResearch is aimed at the production of a tool that could be useful both for the reconstruction of the ancient urban planning and its development during the Greek, Roman and Medieval ages, and for the management and preservation of the archaeological heritage of Taormina; in fact, the new archaeological map could be included in policies aimed at an urban development that respects the existing ancient remains and promotes their enhancement of value. The paper concerns the research project started in 2009 and aimed at the production of the archaeological map of Tauromenion/Tauromenium, on which the modern Taormina lies. The project is carried out by the Department of Ancient and Modern Cultures of the University of Messina and the Institute for Archaeological and Monumental Heritage of the Italian National Research Council, with the cooperation of the Archaeological Superintendence of the Province of Messina and the Archaeological Park of Giardini Naxos. The research project involves a context characterised by a long continuity of life during centuries and it is based on: 1) archaeological and topographical surveys using a differential GPS system and a total station; 2) systematic study and analysis of archival documentation, previous bibliographies and historical cartographies; 3) interpretation of aerial photos, in particular those taken between the years 1920s and 1940s, when some sectors of the ancient city and necropolises were not still covered by the extension of the modern town. All the collected data were georeferenced in a digital archaeological map, where all the ancient monuments and structures, both still visible and those re-buried after small-scale excavations, are integrated on a up-to-date large-scale vector cartography. The map is integrated in a web-oriented GIS platform developed using open source software and cloud computing solutions; it is aimed at the data management and sharing between the different institutions involved in the project. Therefore, the research is aimed at the production of a tool that could be useful both for the reconstruction of the ancient urban planning and its development during the Greek, Roman and Medieval ages, and for the management and preservation of the archaeological heritage of Taormina; in fact, the new archaeological map could be included in policies aimed at an urban development that respects the existing ancient remains and promotes their enhancement of value

The video endoscopy inguinal lymphadenectomy for vulvar cancer: A pilot study

Abstract Objective This prospective pilot study aims to validate feasibility, efficacy and safeness of the innovative technique of video endoscopy inguinal lymphadenectomy (VEIL) and compare it to open inguinal lymphadenectomy (OIL) in the staging and treatment of vulvar cancer (VC). Material and methods All patients affected by VC suitable for bilateral inguinal-femoral lymphadenectomy were prospectively enrolled and submitted to VEIL on one side and OIL contralaterally, sparing the saphenous vein. The surgical and post-surgical data were collected. Univariate analysis included chi square analysis or Fisher's exact test, when appropriate for categorical variables, and the Student t test and Mann–Whitney test when appropriate for continuous variables. Results Between October 2014 and June 2015 fifteen patients were valuable for the study. Although nodal retrieval was comparable for both procedures, operative time was higher after VEIL. No intraoperative complications were observed in both techniques. Postoperative complications were observed in 3 and 2 cases for OIL and VEIL respectively. One patient needed reoperation after OIL for wound necrosis and infection. According to Campisi's stage, lymphedema resulted significantly to be lower after VEIL (p = 0.024). Conclusions Waiting for larger series and longer follow-up data, the VEIL seems to be feasible allowing a radical removal of inguinal lymph nodes as well as OIL with lower morbidity

Probiotic Supplementation in Trained Trotter Horses: Effect on Blood Clinical Pathology Data and Urine Metabolomic Assessed in Field

The attention of sports community towards probiotic supplementation as a way to promote exercise and training performance, together with good health, has increased in recent years. This has applied also to horses, with promising results. Here, for the first time, we tested a probiotic mix of several strains of live bacteria typically employed for humans to improve the training performance of Standardbred horses in athletic activity. To evaluate its effects on the horse performance, we measured lactate concentration in blood, a translational outcome largely employed for the purpose, combined with the study of hematological and biochemical parameters, together with urine from a metabolomics perspective. The results showed that the probiotic supplementation reduced significantly post exercise blood lactate concentration. The hematological and biochemical parameters, together with urine molecular profile, suggested that a likely mechanism underlying this positive effect was connected to a switch of energy source in muscle from carbohydrates to SCFAs. Three sulfur-containing molecules differently concentrated in urines in connection to probiotics administration suggested that such switch was linked to sulfur metabolism

GADA titer-related risk for organ-specific autoimmunity in LADA subjects subdivided according to gender (NIRAD study 6).

CONTEXT: Latent autoimmune diabetes in adults (LADA) includes a heterogeneous population wherein, based on glutamic acid decarboxylase antibody (GADA) titer, different subgroups of subjects can be identified. OBJECTIVE: The aim of the present study was to evaluate GADA titer-related risk for β-cell and other organ-specific autoimmunity in LADA subjects. METHODS: Adult-onset autoimmune diabetes subjects (n=236) and type 2 diabetes (T2DM) subjects (n=450) were characterized for protein tyrosine phosphatase (IA-2IC and IA-2(256-760)), zinc transporter 8 (ZnT8), thyroid peroxidase, (TPO), steroid 21-hydroxylase (21-OH), tissue transglutaminase (tTG), and antiparietal cell (APC) antibodies. RESULTS: High GADA titer compared to low GADA titer showed a significantly higher prevalence of IA-2IC, IA-2(256-760), ZnT8, TPO, and APC antibodies (P≤0.04 for all comparison). 21-OH antibodies were detected in 3.4% of high GADA titer. A significant decreasing trend was observed from high GADA to low GADA and to T2DM subjects for IA-2(256-760), ZnT8, TPO, tTG, and APC antibodies (P for trend≤0.001). TPO was the only antibody showing a different prevalence between gender; low GADA titer and T2DM female patients had a higher frequency of TPO antibody compared to males (P=0.0004 and P=0.0006, respectively), where the presence of high GADA titer conferred an odds ratio of 8.6 for TPO compared to low GADA titer. After subdividing high and low GADA titer subjects according to the number of antibodies, we observed that 73.3% of high GADA titer subjects were positive for at least one or more antibodies, compared to 38.3% of low GADA titer (P<0.0001). CONCLUSIONS: In LADA subjects, high GADA titer was associated with a profile of more severe autoimmunity and, in male gender, specifically predisposed to thyroid autoimmunity. A regular screening for other antibodies is recommended in LADA patients according to GADA titer and gender