On air temperature fluctuations immediately above a glacier surface

Developing remote sensing techniques for measuring meteorological parameters in surface layers of snow field

EUS-guided rendezvous technique for difficult cannulation of an intradiverticular papilla

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Spatially variable rate herbicide application on durum wheat in Sicily

Using the conventional farming system, durum wheat requires high rates of herbicide spraying. Herbicide residues can cause pollution of soil and ground water and, therefore, of the entire environment. In order to minimise the environmental impact of herbicides, a home made system for spatially variable rate crop input application was designed, developed and set up by the Department of Engineering and Technologies in Agriculture and Forestry (I.T.A.F.). This system consists of a DGPS, a portable computer, a specifically developed software and a device for applying rates proportionally related to the machine forward speed (DPA). Tests of spatially variable rate herbicide application were carried out in inland Sicily, on a field of 8.4 ha (where a three-year crop rotation, broad bean/vetch - durum wheat - durum wheat, was practised), using a sprayer modified for applying variable rates and equipped with the above mentioned system. The results are promising. The spatially variable rate herbicide application allowed an almost even grain yield over the entire field and a saving of 29% of herbicides with respect to the amounts normally used with the conventional farming system

The PML-RAR alpha transcript in long-term follow-up of acute promyelocytic leukemia patients

Background and Objectives. Detection of PML-RAR alpha transcripts by RT-PCR is now established as a rapid and sensitive method for diagnosis of acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL), Although the majority of patients in longterm clinical remission are negative by consecutive reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) assays, negative tests are still observed in patients who ultimately relapse. Conversion from negative to positive PCR has been observed after consolidation and found to be a much stronger predictor of relapse. This study reports on 47 APL patients to determine the correlation between minimal residual disease (MRD) status and clinical outcome in our cohort of patients. Design and Methods. The presence of PML-RAR alpha t transcripts was investigated in 47 APL patients (37 adults and 10 children) using a semi-nested reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction to evaluate the prognostic value of RT-PCR tests. Results. All patients achieved complete clinical remission (CCR) following induction treatment with all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA) and chemotherapy (CHT) or ATRA alone. Patients were followed up between 2 and 117.6 months (median: 37 months). Relapses occurred in 11 patients (9 adults and 2 children) between 11.4 and 19 months after diagnosis (median: 15.1 months) while 36 patients (28 adults and 8 children) remained in CCR, Seventy-five percent of patients carried the PML-RARa long isoform (bcr 1/2) which also predominated among the relapsed cases (9 of 11) but did not associate with any adverse outcome (p = 0.37), For the purpose of this analysis, minimal residual disease tests were clustered into four time-intervals: 0-2 months, 3-5 months, 5-9 months and 10-24 months. Interpretation and Conclusions. Children showed persisting disease for longer than adults during the first 2 months of treatment, At 2 months, 10 (50%) of 20 patients who remained in CCR and 4 (80%) of 5 patients who subsequently relapsed were positive. Patients who remained in CCR had repeatedly negative results beyond 5.5 months from diagnosis. A positive MRD test preceded relapse in 3 of 4 tested patients. The ability of a negative test to predict CCR (predictive negative value, PNV) was greater after 6 months (> 83%), while the ability of a positive test to predict relapse (predictive positive value, PPV) was most valuable only beyond 10 months (100%). This study (i) highlights the prognostic value of RT-PCR monitoring after treatment of APL patients but only from the end of treatment, (ii) shows an association between conversion to a positive test and relapse and (iii) suggests that PCR assessments should be carried out at 3-month intervals to provide a more accurate prediction of hematologic relapses but only after the end of treatment, (C) 2001, Ferrata Storti Foundatio

An Integrated Platform for Differential Electrochemical and ISFET Sensing

A fully-integrated differential biosensing platform on CMOS is presented for miniaturized enzyme-based electrochemical sensing. It enables sensor background current elimination and consists of a differential sensor array and a differential readout IC (DiRIC). The sensor array includes a four-electrode sensor for amperometric electrochemical sensing, as well as a differential ISFET-based pH sensor to calibrate the biosensors. The ISFET is biased in weak inversion and co-designed with DiRIC to enable pH measurements from 1 to 14 with resolution of 0.1 pH. DiRIC enables differential current measurement in the range of ¿¿100 ¿¿A with more than 120dB dynamic range

Data-driven fracture mechanics

We present a new data-driven paradigm for variational brittle fracture mechanics. The fracture-related material modeling assumptions are removed and the governing equations stemming from variational principles are combined with a set of discrete data points, leading to a model-free data-driven method of solution. The solution at a given load step is identified as the point within the data set that best satisfies either the Kuhn–Tucker conditions stemming from the variational fracture problem or global minimization of a suitable energy functional, leading to data-driven counterparts of both the local and the global minimization approaches of variational fracture mechanics. Both formulations are tested on different test configurations with and without noise and for Griffith and R-curve type fracture behavior

Impact of mapping errors on the reliability of landslide hazard maps

International audienceIdentification and mapping of landslide deposits are an intrinsically difficult and subjective operation that requires a great effort to minimise the inherent uncertainty. For the Staffora Basin, which extends for almost 300 km2 in the northern Apennines, three landslide inventory maps were independently produced by three groups of geomorphologists. In comparing each map with the others, large positional discrepancies arise (in the range of 55?65%). When all three maps are overlain, the locational mismatch of landslide deposit polygons increases to over 80%. To assess the impact of these errors on predictive models of landslide hazard, for the study area discriminant models were built up from the same set of geological-geomorphological factors as predictors, and the occurrence of landslide deposits within each terrain-unit, derived from each inventory map, as dependent variable. The comparison of these models demonstrates that statistical modelling greatly minimises the impact of input data errors which remain, however, a major limitation on the reliability of landslide hazard maps

Long term outcome and EuroSCORE II validation in native valve surgery for active infective endocarditis in a South African cohort

Objectives: To evaluate the major risk factors for adverse short and long term outcomes in patients with active native valve infective endocarditis needing cardiac surgery and to validate the EuroSCORE II in our cohort of patients.Methods: We retrospectively studied 149 patients who underwent native valve surgery for infective endocarditis in June 2000 - May 2011 at our referral centre. Ninety-six patients met the inclusion criteria for the study: 29 aortic valve replacements (AVR), 27 mitral valve replacements (MVR), 28 aortic/mitral (double) valve replacements (DVR) and 12 mitral valve repairs (MV Repair).Results: Mechanical valves were implanted in 68 patients (70.8%), bioprosthetic valves in 16 (16.7%) and mitral annuloplasty rings in 12 (12.5%). The Cox proportional hazard model showed that the most important risk factors for early 30-day mortality were: critical preoperative state, emergency surgery, EuroSCORE II >12%, low cardiac output state (LCOS), HIV positive status, preoperative embolic episodes, vegetation size >1cm and postoperative ventilation >24 hours. The EuroSCORE II underestimated early mortality for the entire cohort. The discriminatory ability was evaluated with the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve with an area under the curve of 0.796. The discriminatory ability in the subgroup analysis showed that the AUROC curve was poorer for MVR (0.696), 0.837 for DVR and better for AVR group (0.92).Conclusions: The EuroSCORE II underestimated mortality in the highest risk groups and overestimated mortality in the lowest risk groups. The discriminatory ability and model fit were evaluated to be good and a EuroSCORE II >12% predicted a signifi cantly higher early and medium term mortality

Label-free detection of hypoxia-induced extracellular vesicle secretion from MCF-7 cells

Nanoscale extracellular vesicles (EVs) including exosomes (50–150 nm membrane particles) have emerged as promising cancer biomarkers due to the carried genetic information about the parental cells. However the sensitive detection of these vesicles remains a challenge. Here we present a label-free electrochemical sensor to measure the EVs secretion levels of hypoxic and normoxic MCF-7 cells. The sensor design includes two consecutive steps; i) Au electrode surface functionalization for anti-CD81 Antibody and ii) EVs capture. The label-free detection of EVs was done via Differential Pulse Voltammetry (DPV) and Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS). The working linear range for the sensor was 102–109 EVs/ml with an LOD 77 EVs/mL and 379 EVs/ml for EIS and DPV based detection. A blood-abundant protein, RhD was used for the selectivity test. In order to assess the performance of the biosensor, the level of EVs secretion by the human breast cancer MCF-7 cell line was compared with enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISA) and Nanoparticle Tracking Analysis (NTA). Designed label-free electrochemical sensors utilized for quantification of EVs secretion enhancement due to CoCl2-induced hypoxia and 1.23 fold increase with respect to normoxic conditions was found