Mobility deficit – Rehabilitate, an opportunity for functionality

There are many pathological conditions that cause mobility deficits and that ultimately influence someone’s autonomy.Aims: to evaluate patients with mobility deficits functional status; to implement a Rehabilitation Nursing intervention plan; to monitor health gains through mobility deficits rehabilitation.Conclusion: Early intervention and the implementation of a nursing rehabilitation intervention plan results in health gains (direct or indirect), decreases the risk of developing Pressure Ulcers (PU) and the risk of developing a situation of immobility that affects patients’ autonomy and quality of life

Progress on lead-free metal halide perovskites for photovoltaic applications: a review

ABSTRACT: Metal halide perovskites have revolutionized the field of solution-processable photovoltaics. Within just a few years, the power conversion efficiencies of perovskite-based solar cells have been improved significantly to over 20%, which makes them now already comparably efficient to silicon-based photovoltaics. This breakthrough in solution-based photovoltaics, however, has the drawback that these high efficiencies can only be obtained with lead-based perovskites and this will arguably be a substantial hurdle for various applications of perovskite-based photovoltaics and their acceptance in society, even though the amounts of lead in the solar cells are low. This fact opened up a new research field on lead-free metal halide perovskites, which is currently remarkably vivid. We took this as incentive to review this emerging research field and discuss possible alternative elements to replace lead in metal halide perovskites and the properties of the corresponding perovskite materials based on recent theoretical and experimental studies. Up to now, tin-based perovskites turned out to be most promising in terms of power conversion efficiency; however, also the toxicity of these tin-based perovskites is argued. In the focus of the research community are other elements as well including germanium, copper, antimony, or bismuth, and the corresponding perovskite compounds are already showing promising properties. GRAPHICAL ABSTRACT: [Image: see text

A novel chemotaxis assay in 3-d collagen gels by time-lapse microscopy

Contains fulltext : 111018.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)The directional cell response to chemical gradients, referred to as chemotaxis, plays an important role in physiological and pathological processes including development, immune response and tumor cell invasion. Despite such implications, chemotaxis remains a challenging process to study under physiologically-relevant conditions in-vitro, mainly due to difficulties in generating a well characterized and sustained gradient in substrata mimicking the in-vivo environment while allowing dynamic cell imaging. Here, we describe a novel chemotaxis assay in 3D collagen gels, based on a reusable direct-viewing chamber in which a chemoattractant gradient is generated by diffusion through a porous membrane. The diffusion process has been analysed by monitoring the concentration of FITC-labelled dextran through epifluorescence microscopy and by comparing experimental data with theoretical and numerical predictions based on Fick's law. Cell migration towards chemoattractant gradients has been followed by time-lapse microscopy and quantified by cell tracking based on image analysis techniques. The results are expressed in terms of chemotactic index (I) and average cell velocity. The assay has been tested by comparing the migration of human neutrophils in isotropic conditions and in the presence of an Interleukin-8 (IL-8) gradient. In the absence of IL-8 stimulation, 80% of the cells showed a velocity ranging from 0 to 1 microm/min. However, in the presence of an IL-8 gradient, 60% of the cells showed an increase in velocity reaching values between 2 and 7 microm/min. Furthermore, after IL-8 addition, I increased from 0 to 0.25 and 0.25 to 0.5, respectively, for the two donors examined. These data indicate a pronounced directional migration of neutrophils towards the IL-8 gradient in 3D collagen matrix. The chemotaxis assay described here can be adapted to other cell types and may serve as a physiologically relevant method to study the directed locomotion of cells in a 3D environment in response to different chemoattractants