Oxidation of allylic and benzylic alcohols to aldehydes and carboxylic acids

An oxidation of allylic and benzylic alcohols to the corresponding carboxylic acids is effected by merging a Cu-catalyzed oxidation using O2 as a terminal oxidant with a subsequent chlorite oxidation (Lindgren oxidation). The protocol was optimized to obtain pure products without chromatography or crystallization. Interception at the aldehyde stage allowed for Z/E-isomerization, thus rendering the oxidation stereoconvergent with respect to the configuration of the starting material

Evaluation of moisture sources for the Central European summer flood of May/June 2013 based on regional climate model simulations

Heavy precipitation affected Central Europe in May/June 2013, triggering damaging floods both on the Danube and the Elbe rivers. Based on a modelling approach with COSMO-CLM, moisture fluxes, backward trajectories, cyclone tracks and precipitation fields are evaluated for the relevant time period 30 May–2 June 2013. We identify potential moisture sources and quantify their contribution to the flood event focusing on the Danube basin through sensitivity experiments: Control simulations are performed with undisturbed ERA-Interim boundary conditions, while multiple sensitivity experiments are driven with modified evaporation characteristics over selected marine and land areas. Two relevant cyclones are identified both in reanalysis and in our simulations, which moved counter-clockwise in a retrograde path from Southeastern Europe over Eastern Europe towards the northern slopes of the Alps. The control simulations represent the synoptic evolution of the event reasonably well. The evolution of the precipitation event in the control simulations shows some differences in terms of its spatial and temporal characteristics compared to observations. The main precipitation event can be separated into two phases concerning the moisture sources. Our modelling results provide evidence that the two main sources contributing to the event were the continental evapotranspiration (moisture recycling; both phases) and the North Atlantic Ocean (first phase only). The Mediterranean Sea played only a minor role as a moisture source. This study confirms the importance of continental moisture recycling for heavy precipitation events over Central Europe during the summer half year

Trading between perceived risks and benefits related to biosimilar biological treatment in Crohn’s disease; discrete choice experiment among gastroenterologists

Objective: The objective of the study is to explore preferences of gastroenterologists for biosimilar drugs in Crohn’s Disease and reveal trade-offs between the perceived risks and benefits related to biosimilar drugs. Method: Discrete choice experiment was carried out involving 51 Hungarian gastroenterologists in May, 2014. The following attributes were used to describe hypothetical choice sets: 1) type of the treatment (biosimilar/originator) 2) severity of disease 3) availability of continuous medicine supply 4) frequency of the efficacy check-ups. Multinomial logit model was used to differentiate between three attitude types: 1) always opting for the originator 2) willing to consider biosimilar for biological-naïve patients only 3) willing to consider biosimilar treatment for both types of patients. Conditional logit model was used to estimate the probabilities of choosing a given profile. Results: Men, senior consultants, working in IBD center and treating more patients are more likely to willing to consider biosimilar for biological-naïve patients only. Treatment type (originator/biosimilar) was the most important determinant of choice for patients already treated with biologicals, and the availability of continuous medicine supply in the case biological-naïve patients. The probabilities of choosing the biosimilar with all the benefits offered over the originator under current reimbursement conditions are 89% vs 11% for new patients, and 44% vs 56% for patients already treated with biological. Conclusions: Gastroenterologists were willing to trade between perceived risks and benefits of biosimilars. The continuous medical supply would be one of the major benefits of biosimilars. However, benefits offered in the scenarios do not compensate for the change from the originator to the biosimilar treatment of patients already treated with biologicals

Selection of features based on electric power quantities for non-intrusive load monitoring

Non-intrusive load monitoring (NILM) is a process of determining the operating states and the energy consumption of single electric devices using a single energy meter providing aggregate load measurements. Due to the large spread of power electronic-based and nonlinear devices connected to the network, the time signals of both voltage and current are typically non-sinusoidal. The effectiveness of a NILM algorithm strongly depends on determining a set of discriminative features. In this paper, voltage and current signals were combined to define, according to the definitions provided in Standard IEEE 1459, different power quantities, that can be used to distinguish different types of appliance. Multi-layer perceptron (MLP) classifiers were trained to solve the appliance detection problem as a multi-class event classification problem, varying the electric features in input. This allowed to select an optimal set of features guarantying good classification performance in identifying typical electric loads

Reconfigurable Adaptive Multiple Transform Hardware Solutions for Versatile Video Coding

Computer aided design is nowadays a must to quickly provide optimized circuits, to cope with stringent time to market constraints, and to be able to guarantee colliding constrained requirements. Design automation is exploited, whenever possible, to speed up the design process and relieve the developers from error prone customization, optimization and tuning phases. In this work we study the possibility of adopting automated algorithms for the optimization of reconfigurable multiple constant multiplication circuits. In particular, an exploration of novel reconfigurable Adaptive Multiple Transform circuital solutions adoptable in video coding applications has been conducted. These solutions have also been compared with the unique similar work at the state of the art, revealing to be beneficial under certain constraints. Moreover, the proposed approach has been generalized with some guidelines helpful to designers facing similar problems

Stem/progenitor cells in fetuses and newborns: overview of immunohistochemical markers

Microanatomy of the vast majority of human organs at birth is characterized by marked differences as compared to adult organs, regarding their architecture and the cell types detectable at histology. In preterm neonates, these differences are even more evident, due to the lower level of organ maturation and to ongoing cell differentiation. One of the most remarkable finding in preterm tissues is the presence of huge amounts of stem/progenitor cells in multiple organs, including kidney, brain, heart, adrenals, and lungs. In other organs, such as liver, the completely different burden of cell types in preterm infants is mainly related to the different function of the liver during gestation, mainly focused on hematopoiesis, a function that is taken by bone marrow after birth. Our preliminary studies showed that the antigens expressed by stem/progenitors differ significantly from one organ to the next. Moreover, within each developing human tissue, reactivity for different stem cell markers also changes during gestation, according with the multiple differentiation steps encountered by each progenitor during development. A better knowledge of stem/progenitor cells of preterms will allow neonatologists to boost preterm organ maturation, favoring the differentiation of the multiple cells types that characterize each organ in at term neonates