High impact = high statistical standards? Not necessarily so.

What are the statistical practices of articles published in journals with a high impact factor? Are there differences compared with articles published in journals with a somewhat lower impact factor that have adopted editorial policies to reduce the impact of limitations of Null Hypothesis Significance Testing? To investigate these questions, the current study analyzed all articles related to psychological, neuropsychological and medical issues, published in 2011 in four journals with high impact factors: Science, Nature, The New England Journal of Medicine and The Lancet, and three journals with relatively lower impact factors: Neuropsychology, Journal of Experimental Psychology-Applied and the American Journal of Public Health. Results show that Null Hypothesis Significance Testing without any use of confidence intervals, effect size, prospective power and model estimation, is the prevalent statistical practice used in articles published in Nature, 89%, followed by articles published in Science, 42%. By contrast, in all other journals, both with high and lower impact factors, most articles report confidence intervals and/or effect size measures. We interpreted these differences as consequences of the editorial policies adopted by the journal editors, which are probably the most effective means to improve the statistical practices in journals with high or low impact factors

Dual band power amplifier in GaN technology

Experimental results of a simultaneous dual band high efficiency harmonic tuned power amplifier in GaN HEMT technology are presented. The amplifier has been realized in hybrid form and the measured results shown a peak of 53% and 46% of drain efficiency with 33 dBm and 32.5 dBm output power in the first (at 2.45 GHz) and second (at 3.3 GHz) bands, respectively. Moreover, a Zero transmission condition has been obtained, resulting in a measured value of S-21 lower than -15 dB at 2.8 GHz. (C) 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc

Asymmetrical Doherty power architecture with an integrated driver stage in the auxiliary branch

This contribution presents the analysis, design and characterization of a high gain Doherty power amplifier implementing an integrated Driver stage in the Auxiliary branch. Guidelines and design equations are demonstrated, fulfilling the full integration of the whole new architecture. The development of a microwave monolithic integrated circuit prototype based on TriQuint GaN technology for 7 GHz applications is reported. 10.5 dB of Gain, 38.1 dBm of saturated output power and 42% of efficiency at 7 dB of output back-off have been demonstrated by experimental results. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J RF and Microwave CAE, 2014

Il contributo delle Leiter-3 nell’assessment dell’Intelligenza fluida nei bambini con Disturbo Specifico di Linguaggio (DSL)

Introduzione Le tradizionali batterie per la valutazione dell’intelligenza, sature di fattori verbali, sono poco adatte per alcune tipologie di individui con difficoltà nella comunicazione verbale. La Leiter- 3 (2013; standardizzazione italiana di Cornoldi, Giofrè e Belacchi, 2016) contiene stimoli per quan¬to possibile non legati al linguaggio e viene somministrata in modo completamente non verbale. Alcuni studi hanno evidenziato che individui con DSL, che, per definizione, dovrebbero possedere abilità non verbali nella norma, presentano difficoltà anche in compiti non linguistici (es., Donlan, Cowan, Newton & Lloyd, 2007) e, in particolare, in un largo set di Funzioni Esecutive, anche quando corrette sulla base delle abilità verbali (Henry, Messer & Nash, 2012). Obiettivo del contributo è esaminare lo sviluppo dell’intelligenza fluida in un gruppo di bambini con DSL per mezzo della Batteria Leiter-3. Metodo A 20 bambini italiani con DSL (E. M. = 4.95 [4.50], 30% F) sono state soministrate le prove della Batteria Leiter-3, presso la struttura sanitaria presso cui sono in carico, nel corso della standardizzazione italiana. Risultati Le prestazioni del gruppo sono risultate significativamente al di sotto della nor¬ma in quasi tutti gli indici e subtest, coerentemente con i dati della letteratura (Henry, Messer e Nash, 2012), e comparabili a quelle della standardizzazione statunitense (QI non verbale = 93.3). La differenza, rispetto ai punteggi normativi, è moderata nel QI e nei subtest della batteria Cognitiva, maggiore nei subtest della batteria Attenzione e Memoria (con performance prossime o al di sotto di una deviazione standard). Conclusioni I risultati confermano la presenza in bambini con DSL di un ampia gamma di difficoltà oltre quelle peculiarmente linguistiche. Riteniamo che sia necessario indagare sulla specificita di tale compromissione in rapporto ai diversi quadri clinici del Disturbo di linguaggio, ai fini anche di un approccio riabilitativo. Bibliografia Cornoldi C., Giofrè D. e Belacchi C. (2016), LEITER-3. Leiter International Performance Scale-Tirth Edition (2013). Standardizzazione italiana, Giunti OS, Firenze Donland C., Cowan R., Newton E.J. & Lloyd D., (2007), The role of language in mathematical development: Evidence from children with specific language impairments, Cognition 103:23–33 Henry L.A., Messer D.J. & Nash G., (2012) Executive functioning in children with specific language impairment. Journal Child Psych Psychiatry, 53(1):37-45

A second harmonic tuned power amplifier in LDMOS technology

In this contribution, the design and the experimental results of a power amplifier in LDMOS technology are reported. The amplifier has been designed to operate at 2.14GHz and exploiting the output second harmonic to boost the obtainable performances. The measurement results shown an output power of 39 dBm and a drain efficiency greater than 50% at 2.1 GHz

A second harmonic tuned power amplifier in LDMOS technology

In this contribution, the design and the experimental results of a power amplifier in LDMOS technology are reported. The amplifier has been designed to operate at 2.14GHz and exploiting the output second harmonic to boost the obtainable performances. The measurement results shown an output power of 39 dBm and a drain efficiency greater than 50% at 2.1 GHz

A 6W uneven doherty power amplifier in GaN technology

In this paper the design of a 6W uneven GaN Doherty power amplifier is presented. The Doherty PA is designed to achieve high efficiency for modulated signals with high peak to average power ratio used in modern wireless communication systems. The Doherty amplifier has been designed using two equal sized GaN devices for the Main Class AB and Peaking Class C amplifiers. An uneven power divider is used at the input to deliver more input power to the Peaking amplifier than the Main amplifier. The measured maximum output power of the realised uneven Doherty is 38 dBm with 60% of peak power added efficiency (76% of drain efficiency). The power added (drain) efficiency is higher than 52% (62%) up to 6 dB of back off, or 42% (45%) up to 10 dB of back off

CHANGES OF MICROFLORA DURING STORAGE OF ‘NDUJA, A VERY TYPICAL SAUSAGE OF CALABRIA (ITALY)

The ‘nduja is one of the most typical and appreciated Calabrian raw seasoned sausages. As well as other Calabrian meat products, the ‘nduja contains a high quantity of hot red chilli pepper. The ‘nduja is a seasoned, very savoury but yet spreadable sausage; it is traditionally spread on bread or used as natural flavour enhancer of pasta, pizza and other similar kind of food. 27 samples of ‘nduja were sampled, 15 coming from artisanal production and the remaining 12 from industrial production, in order to establish if they were differences between the two kind of production from the hygienic point of view. The samples were stored up to 6 month and analyzed at 1 day of storage and then at 3 and 6 month of storage. Our results show that the ‘nduja is a meat product of good hygienic quality; the sausages made in artisanal manner showed a more variable microbial quality as the ones made in industrial factories. The microbial flora of ‘nduja is mainly composed by lactobacilli, yeasts and moulds; only in rare cases we have found quite high numbers of micrococci and/od pseudomonads. Total and faecal coliforms are in general very low, in the product ready to eat. No Salmonella enterica nor Listeria monocytogenes nor enterotoxigenic strains of S. aureus or B. cereus were found in the samples analysed