66 research outputs found
A lower bound for the dimension of the base locus of the generalized theta divisor
We produce a lower bound for the dimension of the base locus of the
generalized theta divisor on the moduli space SU_C(r) of semistable vector
bundles of rank r and trivial determinant on a smooth curve C of genus g > 1.Comment: 4 page
MMP-2, MMP-9 and activin A blood levels in patients with breast cancer or prostate cancer metastatic to the bone.
Background: The clinical significance of the
circulating levels of activin A and matrix metalloproteinase-2
(MMP-2) and -9 (MMP-9) was investigated in patients with
breast cancer (BC) or prostate cancer (PC) with (M1) or
without (M0) bone metastasis. Patients and Methods: MMP-2,
MMP-9 and activin A blood concentrations were measured by
enzyme immunoassays in 79 cancer patients and in 57 healthy
blood donors (HS) who served as a control group. The
diagnostic accuracy of these molecules to discriminate between
M0 and M1 patients was evaluated by the receiver operating
characteristic curve (ROC) and compared to that of tumor
markers CA15.3 or prostate-specific antigen (PSA). Results:
Activin A and MMP-2 were significantly increased in BC and
PC patients as compared to sex-matched HS while MMP-9
levels were more elevated only in the PC patients. Interestingly,
in the PC patients, activin A levels were significantly higher than
those measured in the BC patients. In this latter group, activin A
and CA15.3 but not MMP-2 or MMP-9 were increased in the
M1 patients as compared to M0 patients. Furthermore, a
significant relationship was also highlighted between activin A
concentration and the number of bone metastases and tumor
grade, between MMP-9 and tumor grade, and between MMP-2
and CA15.3. ROC curve analysis showed a good diagnostic
accuracy for activin A and CA15.3 but a poor accuracy for
MMP-2 and MMP-9 in discriminating between M0 and M1
patients. However, CA15.3 retained the best diagnostic accuracy
in this respect. In the PC group, only activin A and PSA levels
were significantly increased in the M1 patients as compared to
the M0 patients. A similar although not statistically significant
trend was noted for MMP-9. Interestingly, a significant correlation
was observed between PSA and activin A and MMP-9, and
between Activin A and Gleason score and the number of
skeletal metastases. ROC curve analysis showed a good
diagnostic accuracy for activin A, MMP-9 and PSA and a poor
diagnostic accuracy for MMP-2 in detecting M1 patients.
However, PSA showed the highest diagnostic accuracy.
Conclusion: Activin A, MMP-2 and MMP-9 may be regarded as
possible therapeutic targets in the treatment of metastatic bone
disease. However, their usefulness as additional markers of bone
metastasis remains to be better define
Prediction of rehabilitation induced motor recovery after stroke using a multi-dimensional and multi-modal approach
Background: Stroke is a debilitating disease affecting millions of people worldwide. Despite the survival rate has significantly increased over the years, many stroke survivors are left with severe impairments impacting their quality of life. Rehabilitation programs have proved to be successful in improving the recovery process. However, a reliable model of sensorimotor recovery and a clear identification of predictive markers of rehabilitation-induced recovery are still needed. This article introduces the cross-modality protocols designed to investigate the rehabilitation treatment’s effect in a group of stroke survivors. Methods/design: A total of 75 stroke patients, admitted at the IRCCS San Camillo rehabilitation Hospital in Venice (Italy), will be included in this study. Here, we describe the rehabilitation programs, clinical, neuropsychological, and physiological/imaging [including electroencephalography (EEG), transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques] protocols set up for this study. Blood collection for the characterization of predictive biological biomarkers will also be taken. Measures derived from data acquired will be used as candidate predictors of motor recovery. Discussion/summary: The integration of cutting-edge physiological and imaging techniques, with clinical and cognitive assessment, dose of rehabilitation and biological variables will provide a unique opportunity to define a predictive model of recovery in stroke patients. Taken together, the data acquired in this project will help to define a model of rehabilitation induced sensorimotor recovery, with the final aim of developing personalized treatments promoting the greatest chance of recovery of the compromised functions
Nef divisors for moduli spaces of complexes with compact support
In [BM14b], the first author and Macr\`i constructed a family of nef divisors
on any moduli space of Bridgeland-stable objects on a smooth projective variety
X. In this article, we extend this construction to the setting of any separated
scheme Y of finite type over a field, where we consider moduli spaces of
Bridgeland-stable objects on Y with compact support. We also show that the nef
divisor is compatible with the polarising ample line bundle coming from the GIT
construction of the moduli space in the special case when Y admits a tilting
bundle and the stability condition arises from a \theta-stability condition for
the endomorphism algebra.
Our main tool generalises the work of Abramovich--Polishchuk [AP06] and
Polishchuk [Pol07]: given a t-structure on the derived category D_c(Y) on Y of
objects with compact support and a base scheme S, we construct a constant
family of t-structures on a category of objects on YxS with compact support
relative to S.Comment: 36 pages. In memory of Johan Louis Dupont. V2: updated following
comments from the referee and from Joe Karmazyn who gave a counterexample to
a false claim in version 1. To appear in Selecta Mat
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