The Subsurface Geology and Landscape Evolution of the Volturno Coastal Plain, Italy: Interplay between Tectonics and Sea-Level Changes during the Quaternary

The Volturno alluvial-coastal plain is a relevant feature of the Tyrrhenian side of southern Italy. Its plan-view squared shape is due to Pliocene-Quaternary block-faulting of the western flank of the south-Apennines chain. On the basis of the stratigraphic analysis of almost 700 borehole logs and new geomorphological survey, an accurate paleoenvironmental reconstruction before and after the Campania Ignimbrite (CI; about 40 ky B.P.) eruption is here presented. Tectonics and eustatic forcing have been both taken into account to completely picture the evolution of the coastal plain during Late Quaternary times. The upper Pleistocene-Holocene infill of the Volturno plain has been here re-organized in a new stratigraphic framework, which includes seven depositional units. Structural analysis showed that two sets of faults displaced the CI, so accounting for recent tectonic activity. Yet Late Quaternary tectonics is rather mild, as evidenced by the decametric vertical separations operated by those faults. The average slip rate, which would represent the tectonic subsidence rate of the plain, is about 0.5 mm/yr. A grid of cross sections shows the stratigraphic architecture which resulted from interactions among eustatic changes, tectonics and sedimentary input variations. On the basis of boreholes analysis, the trend of the CI roof was reconstructed. An asymmetrical shape of its ancient morphology—with a steeper slope toward the north-west border—and the lack of coincidence between the present course of the Volturno River and the main buried bedrock incision, are significant achievements of this study. Finally, the morpho-evolutionary path of the Volturno plain has been discussed

Crowd Detection in Aerial Images Using Spatial Graphs and Fully-Convolutional Neural Networks

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La Candelaria Ridge (NW Argentina) as a natural lab for the exploration of the geothermal system of Rosario de La Frontera: Methods and preliminary results

Within the scientific framework recently proposed by C.U.I.A. (Consorzio Universitario Italiano per l’Argentina) for the development of applied researches on the Argentina territory, several research groups, belonging to selected Italian and Argentina Universities, converged in the last year on the research line devoted to the “Sustainable development of future towns”. This contribution focuses on the preliminary results achieved by this collaboration among the Universities of Camerino, Jujuy, Roma Tre, Salta, Sapienza. The project focuses on the application of robust methodologies and the development of new ones to explore the geothermal potential of the area of Rosario de La Frontera (NW Argentina) located at the northern edge of La Candelaria Ridge, one of positively inverted structures cropping out between the provinces of Salta and Tucuman. It belongs to the Santa Barbara System of the Andes retro-wedge...Fil: Maffucci, R.. Università Roma Tre III; ItaliaFil: Caffe, Pablo Jorge. Universidad Nacional de Jujuy. Instituto de Geología Minera; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Salta; ArgentinaFil: Corrado, Sveva. Università Roma Tre III; ItaliaFil: Invernizzi, Ciro. Università degli Studi di Camerino; ItaliaFil: Giordano, G.. Università Roma Tre III; ItaliaFil: Pierantoni, Pablo. Università degli Studi di Camerino; ItaliaFil: Viramonte, Jose Maria. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Salta; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Salta. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales. Instituto Geonorte; Argentin

La Candelaria Ridge (NW Argentina) as a natural lab for the exploration of the geothermal system of Rosario de La Frontera: Methods and preliminary results

Within the scientific framework recently proposed by C.U.I.A. (Consorzio Universitario Italiano per l’Argentina) for the development of applied researches on the Argentina territory, several research groups, belonging to selected Italian and Argentina Universities, converged in the last year on the research line devoted to the “Sustainable development of future towns”. This contribution focuses on the preliminary results achieved by this collaboration among the Universities of Camerino, Jujuy, Roma Tre, Salta, Sapienza. The project focuses on the application of robust methodologies and the development of new ones to explore the geothermal potential of the area of Rosario de La Frontera (NW Argentina) located at the northern edge of La Candelaria Ridge, one of positively inverted structures cropping out between the provinces of Salta and Tucuman. It belongs to the Santa Barbara System of the Andes retro-wedge...Fil: Maffucci, R.. Università Roma Tre III; ItaliaFil: Caffe, Pablo Jorge. Universidad Nacional de Jujuy. Instituto de Geología Minera; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Salta; ArgentinaFil: Corrado, Sveva. Università Roma Tre III; ItaliaFil: Invernizzi, Ciro. Università degli Studi di Camerino; ItaliaFil: Giordano, G.. Università Roma Tre III; ItaliaFil: Pierantoni, Pablo. Università degli Studi di Camerino; ItaliaFil: Viramonte, Jose Maria. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Salta; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Salta. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales. Instituto Geonorte; Argentin

A novel NF1 mutation in a pediatric patient with renal artery aneurysm

Background: Neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1) is a neurocutaneous syndrome, due to heterozygous pathogenic variants in NF1 gene. The main clinical manifestations are multiple café au lait spots, axillary and inguinal freckling, cutaneous and plexiform neurofibromas, optic glioma, Lisch nodules and osseous lesions, such as sphenoid and tibial dysplasia. Vasculopathy is another feature of NF1; it consists of stenosis, aneurysms, and arteriovenous malformations, frequently involving renal arteries. Case presentation: We report on a 9-year-old girl with a novel mutation in NF1 gene and renal artery aneurysm, treated by coil embolization and complicated with hypertension. Conclusion: Vasculopathy is a complication of NF1, affecting from 0.4 to 6.4% of patients with NF1. Among the vascular abnormalities, renal artery aneurysm is a rare manifestation, with only a few cases regarding adult patients and no pediatric reports described in current literature. The finding of a vascular abnormality in a specific site requires the evaluation of the entire vascular system because multiple vessels could be involved at the same time

Novelty in hypertension in children and adolescents: Focus on hypertension during the first year of life, use and interpretation of ambulatory blood pressure monitoring, role of physical activity in prevention and treatment, simple carbohydrates and uric acid as risk factors

The present article intends to provide an update of the article "Focus on prevention, diagnosis and treatment of hypertension in children and adolescents" published in 2013 (Spagnolo et al., Ital J Pediatr 39:20, 2013) in this journal. This revision is justified by the fact that during the last years there have been several new scientific contributions to the problem of hypertension in pediatric age and during adolescence. Nevertheless, for what regards some aspects of the previous article, the newly acquired information did not require substantial changes to what was already published, both from a cultural and from a clinical point of view. We felt, however, the necessity to rewrite and/or to extend other parts in the light of the most recent scientific publications. More specifically, we updated and extended the chapters on the diagnosis and management of hypertension in newborns and unweaned babies, on the use and interpretation of ambulatory blood pressure monitoring, and on the usefulness of and indications for physical activity. Furthermore, we added an entirely new section on the role that simple carbohydrates (fructose in particular) and uric acid may play in the pathogenesis of hypertension in pediatric age

A multicenter randomized phase 4 trial comparing sodium picosulphate plus magnesium citrate vs. polyethylene glycol plus ascorbic acid for bowel preparation before colonoscopy. The PRECOL trial

Background: Adequate bowel preparation before colonoscopy is crucial. Unfortunately, 25% of colonoscopies have inadequate bowel cleansing. From a patient perspective, bowel preparation is the main obstacle to colonoscopy. Several low-volume bowel preparations have been formulated to provide more tolerable purgative solutions without loss of efficacy. Objectives: Investigate efficacy, safety, and tolerability of Sodium Picosulphate plus Magnesium Citrate (SPMC) vs. Polyethylene Glycol plus Ascorbic Acid (PEG-ASC) solutions in patients undergoing diagnostic colonoscopy. Materials and methods: In this phase 4, randomized, multicenter, twoarm trial, adult outpatients received either SPMC or PEG-ASC for bowel preparation before colonoscopy. The primary aims were quality of bowel cleansing (primary endpoint scored according to Boston Bowel Preparation Scale) and patient acceptance (measured with six visual analogue scales). The study was open for treatment assignment and blinded for primary endpoint assessment. This was done independently with videotaped colonoscopies reviewed by two endoscopists unaware of study arms. A sample size of 525 patients was calculated to recognize a difference of 10% in the proportion of successes between the arms with a two-sided alpha error of 0.05 and 90% statistical power. Results: Overall 550 subjects (279 assigned to PEG-ASC and 271 assigned to SPMC) represented the analysis population. There was no statistically significant difference in success rate according to BBPS: 94.4% with PEG-ASC and 95.7% with SPMC (P = 0.49). Acceptance and willing to repeat colonoscopy were significantly better for SPMC with all the scales. Compliance was less than full in 6.6 and 9.9% of cases with PEG-ASC and SPMC, respectively (P = 0.17). Nausea and meteorism were significantly more bothersome with PEG-ASC than SPMC. There were no serious adverse events in either group. Conclusion: SPMC and PEG-ASC are not different in terms of efficacy, but SPMC is better tolerated than PEG-ASC. SPMC could be an alternative to lowvolume PEG based purgative solutions for bowel preparation

Early social distancing policies in Europe, changes in mobility & COVID-19 case trajectories: insights from Spring 2020

Background Social distancing have been widely used to mitigate community spread of SARS-CoV-2. We sought to quantify the impact of COVID-19 social distancing policies across 27 European counties in spring 2020 on population mobility and the subsequent trajectory of disease. Methods We obtained data on national social distancing policies from the Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker and aggregated and anonymized mobility data from Google. We used a pre-post comparison and two linear mixed-effects models to first assess the relationship between implementation of national policies and observed changes in mobility, and then to assess the relationship between changes in mobility and rates of COVID-19 infections in subsequent weeks. Results Compared to a pre-COVID baseline, Spain saw the largest decrease in aggregate population mobility (~70%), as measured by the time spent away from residence, while Sweden saw the smallest decrease (~20%). The largest declines in mobility were associated with mandatory stay-at-home orders, followed by mandatory workplace closures, school closures, and non-mandatory workplace closures. While mandatory shelter-in-place orders were associated with 16.7% less mobility (95% CI: -23.7% to -9.7%), non-mandatory orders were only associated with an 8.4% decrease (95% CI: -14.9% to -1.8%). Large-gathering bans were associated with the smallest change in mobility compared with other policy types. Changes in mobility were in turn associated with changes in COVID-19 case growth. For example, a 10% decrease in time spent away from places of residence was associated with 11.8% (95% CI: 3.8%, 19.1%) fewer new COVID-19 cases. Discussion This comprehensive evaluation across Europe suggests that mandatory stay-at-home orders and workplace closures had the largest impacts on population mobility and subsequent COVID-19 cases at the onset of the pandemic. With a better understanding of policies’ relative performance, countries can more effectively invest in, and target, early nonpharmacological interventions