Quantum topology and modularity

Mathematics is an extremely powerful tool in physics. The effectiveness of mathematics in physics has driven vivid discussions on whether mathematics is just a tool in physical research or if there is something fundamentally mathematical about Nature itself. This thesis presents advances made towards various mathematical problems following a paradigm inversion between physics and mathematics: one where physics is used as a tool for mathematical research.The central object of discussion is the Ẑ-invariant, a quantum invariant for 3-manifolds which is physically constructed as the half-index of a 3D reduction of a 6D N=(2,0) M-theory. The Ẑ-invariant provides bridges connecting physics to disparate disciplines of otherwise disconnected disciplines of mathematics, including Low dimensional and Quantum Topology, Modularity and Vertex Operator algebras. Following an introduction and a background chapter, where all the necessary prerequisites for the remaining chapters are presented, this thesis presents advances made towards the elucidation of the structures inherent in these connections. Chapter 3 focusses on the connections between the Ẑ-invariant and log-VOAs. It is found that Ẑ-invariants for certain families of 3-manifolds may be regarded as linear combinations of characters of log-VOAs. Chapter 4 generalizes the known modular properties of Ẑ-invariants. It is shown that classes of Ẑ-invariants for certain families of 3-manifolds are higher rank quantum modular forms. In Chapter 5 defect Ẑ-invariant are introduced as well as it discusses their modular properties. Moreover, previously unknown Ẑ-invariants are proposed which are shown to relate to characters of cone-VOAs

La importancia del laboratorio específico en el diagnóstico de Leptospirosis humana

En medicina moderna son imprescindibles las pruebas de laboratorio para confirmar el diagnóstico clínico de diferentes enfermedades infecciosas. Entre ellas la leptospirosis es una de las que necesita de mayor ayuda de laboratorios especializados de diagnóstico para su confirmación. Causada por pequeñas espiroquetas, bastante exigentes en cuanto a sus necesidades de cultivo y sumamente sensibles a las variaciones ambientales. Es una enfermedad reemergente, en expansión y que se presenta con mayor virulencia en los últimos años en nuestra región. Una combinación de manifestaciones clínicas inespecíficas que varían en tipo y gravedad, sumado a valores de laboratorio general alterados, y la correspondiente indagación epidemiológica, generan por parte de los profesionales intervinientes, la demanda al laboratorio de Leptospirosis del análisis específico con el objetivo de confirmar el caso.Mesa: Leptospirosis.Facultad de Ciencias Veterinaria

La importancia del laboratorio específico en el diagnóstico de Leptospirosis humana

En medicina moderna son imprescindibles las pruebas de laboratorio para confirmar el diagnóstico clínico de diferentes enfermedades infecciosas. Entre ellas la leptospirosis es una de las que necesita de mayor ayuda de laboratorios especializados de diagnóstico para su confirmación. Causada por pequeñas espiroquetas, bastante exigentes en cuanto a sus necesidades de cultivo y sumamente sensibles a las variaciones ambientales. Es una enfermedad reemergente, en expansión y que se presenta con mayor virulencia en los últimos años en nuestra región. Una combinación de manifestaciones clínicas inespecíficas que varían en tipo y gravedad, sumado a valores de laboratorio general alterados, y la correspondiente indagación epidemiológica, generan por parte de los profesionales intervinientes, la demanda al laboratorio de Leptospirosis del análisis específico con el objetivo de confirmar el caso.Mesa: Leptospirosis.Facultad de Ciencias Veterinaria

La importancia del laboratorio específico en el diagnóstico de Leptospirosis humana

En medicina moderna son imprescindibles las pruebas de laboratorio para confirmar el diagnóstico clínico de diferentes enfermedades infecciosas. Entre ellas la leptospirosis es una de las que necesita de mayor ayuda de laboratorios especializados de diagnóstico para su confirmación. Causada por pequeñas espiroquetas, bastante exigentes en cuanto a sus necesidades de cultivo y sumamente sensibles a las variaciones ambientales. Es una enfermedad reemergente, en expansión y que se presenta con mayor virulencia en los últimos años en nuestra región. Una combinación de manifestaciones clínicas inespecíficas que varían en tipo y gravedad, sumado a valores de laboratorio general alterados, y la correspondiente indagación epidemiológica, generan por parte de los profesionales intervinientes, la demanda al laboratorio de Leptospirosis del análisis específico con el objetivo de confirmar el caso.Mesa: Leptospirosis.Facultad de Ciencias Veterinaria

Reducing Aversive Interactions with Troubled Students

This paper is about the impact of staff in-service education on the quality of interactions between staff and students at an educational facility for at-risk youth operated by the Orange County Department of Education. Data on the use of punitive behavior management techniques was gathered before, during, and after staff training in the use of more positive approaches to responding to disruptive behavior. Staff members use of punitive techniques as physical restraint and suspensions was greatly reduced following the training

Bioengineering of Humanized Bone Marrow Microenvironments in Mouse and Their Visualization by Live Imaging

Human hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) reside in the bone marrow (BM) niche, an intricate, multifactorial network of components producing cytokines, growth factors, and extracellular matrix. The ability of HSCs to remain quiescent, self-renew or differentiate, and acquire mutations and become malignant depends upon the complex interactions they establish with different stromal components. To observe the crosstalk between human HSCs and the human BM niche in physiological and pathological conditions, we designed a protocol to ectopically model and image a humanized BM niche in immunodeficient mice. We show that the use of different cellular components allows for the formation of humanized structures and the opportunity to sustain long-term human hematopoietic engraftment. Using two-photon microscopy, we can live-image these structures in situ at the single-cell resolution, providing a powerful new tool for the functional characterization of the human BM microenvironment and its role in regulating normal and malignant hematopoiesis

EVALITA 2020: Overview of the 7th evaluation campaign of natural language processing and speech tools for Italian

The Evaluation Campaign of Natural Language Processing and Speech Tools for Italian (EVALITA) is the biennial initiative aimed at promoting the development of language and speech technologies for the Italian language. EVALITA is promoted by the Italian Association of Computational Linguistics (AILC) and it is endorsed by the Italian Association for Artificial Intelligence (AIxIA) and the Italian Association for Speech Sciences (AISV). EVALITA provides a shared framework where different systems and approaches can be scientifically evaluated and compared with each other with respect to a large variety of tasks, suggested and organized by the Italian research community. The proposed tasks represent scientific challenges where methods, resources, and systems can be tested against shared benchmarks representing linguistic open issues or real world applications, possibly in a multilingual and/or multi-modal perspective. The collected data sets provide big opportunities for scientists to explore old and new problems concerning NLP in Italian as well as to develop solutions and to discuss the NLP-related issues within the community. Some tasks are traditionally present in the evaluation campaign, while others are completely new. This paper introduces the tasks proposed at EVALITA 2020 and provides an overview to the participants and systems whose descriptions and obtained results are reported in these Proceedings

Modeling the human bone marrow niche in mice: From host bone marrow engraftment to bioengineering approaches

Xenotransplantation of patient-derived samples in mouse models has been instrumental in depicting the role of hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells in the establishment as well as progression of hematological malignancies. The foundations for this field of research have been based on the development of immunodeficient mouse models, which provide normal and malignant human hematopoietic cells with a supportive microenvironment. Immunosuppressed and genetically modified mice expressing human growth factors were key milestones in patient-derived xenograft (PDX) models, highlighting the importance of developing humanized microenvironments. The latest major improvement has been the use of human bone marrow (BM) niche-forming cells to generate human-mouse chimeric BM tissues in PDXs, which can shed light on the interactions between human stroma and hematopoietic cells. Here, we summarize the methods used for human hematopoietic cell xenotransplantation and their milestones and review the latest approaches in generating humanized BM tissues in mice to study human normal and malignant hematopoiesis

Single-mode regime in large-mode-area rare-earth-doped rod-type PCFs

In this paper, large-mode-area, double-cladding, rare-earth-doped photonic crystal fibers are investigated in order to understand how the refractive index distribution and the mode competition given by the amplification can assure singlemode propagation. Fibers with different core diameters, i.e., 35,60, and 100 μm, are considered. The analysis of the mode effective index, overlap, effective area, gain, and power evolution along the doped fiber provides clear guidelines on the fiber physical characteristics to be matched in the fabrication process to obtain a truly or effectively single-mode output beam