The importance of the tumor microenvironment to understand tumor origin, evolution, and treatment response

During the second half of the twentieth century, oncology adopted a tumor-centric approach to cancer treatment, focusing primarily on the tumor cell to identify new therapeutic targets. However, since the 2000s, we have seen a gradual shift in this paradigm with numerous studies highlighting the importance of the tumor microenvironment in tumor progression, patient prognosis, and therapy response. Solid tumors are highly complex systems where numerous cell types and microenvironmental factors are intertwined, potentially affecting tumor evolution, treatment response, and patient outcome. Stromal cells such as fibroblasts and immune cells can stimulate or suppress tumor growth and are currently being used as therapeutic targets in numerous studies and clinical trials..

Experimental assessment of a wireless communications platform for the built and natural heritage

Wireless sensor networks have become extremely popular in a number of fields in recent years, the cultural heritage among them. To date, however, communications quality has not been technically validated in any of the various built (churches, museums, archaeological sites) or natural (caves, lava tubes) heritage scenarios. The present study establishes methodology for assessing the quality of wireless communications and validating the network used, both of which are essential to guaranteeing accurate long-term monitoring in heritage scenarios. Parameters such as signal strength, link quality, range and success rate were analysed with a view to preventing transmission failure and ensuring reliable monitoring for the preventive conservation of the cultural heritage.The present study was funded under projects CGL2011-27902, GEOMATERIALES 2 (S2013/MIT-2914).Peer reviewe

On the body-mind nexus in chronic musculoskeletal pain: A scoping review

Background and objective: Bodily experience disturbances are frequent among chronic musculoskeletal pain patients and associated with important pain-related psychosocial outcomes (e.g., disability, quality of life). However, the relationship between bodily experience and the psychological dimensions of chronic pain (e.g., affective, cognitive) has only recently garnered attention. This scoping review aimed to identify trends and gaps in research on the nexus between body awareness, body image, and body schema, and psychological processes/outcomes in adults with chronic musculoskeletal pain to inform future directions for research and practice. Databases and data treatment: This study was guided by Arksey and O’Malley's guidelines and PRISMA-ScR recommendations. Keywords related to body awareness/body image/body schema and pain were searched on PsycInfo and PubMed from database inception until 16 February 2021; 2045 articles were screened, and 41 met the inclusion criteria (i.e., primary quantitative studies investigating body awareness/body image/body schema in relation to pain-related psychological outcomes/processes in chronic musculoskeletal pain). Results: The referred bodily experience constructs have been inconsistently defined. Body awareness was the most investigated construct, with consistent operationalization strategies. The links between body schema/body image and pain-related psychological processes/outcomes are still under-investigated. Most studies examined the role of bodily experience as a correlate/predictor of psychological outcomes/processes; overall, a better relationship with one's own body was associated with better pain-related psychological outcomes/processes. Conclusions: Our findings emphasize the relevance of further investigating body-mind relations in musculoskeletal pain and the development of therapies designed to improve the bodily experience within multidisciplinary treatment programmes. Suggestions for future research are discussed. Significance: This scoping review identifies trends/gaps in current research on the relationship between body awareness/body image/body schema and pain-related psychological processes/outcomes in adults with musculoskeletal pain. Overall, findings suggest that better bodily experiences are associated to lower fear-avoidance beliefs, better self-regulation strategies and better chronic pain adjustment, being important targets in pain management interventions. Nonetheless, the results also emphasize the need to further investigate the causal relationships and other outcomes related to psychological resilience, as well as to develop gold standard treatments focused on bodily experience.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

A Study of Two-Temperature Non-Equilibrium Ising Models: Critical Behavior and Universality

We study a class of 2D non-equilibrium Ising models based on competing dynamics induced by contact with heat-baths at two different temperatures. We make a comparative study of the non-equilibrium versions of Metropolis, heat bath/Glauber and Swendsen-Wang dynamics and focus on their critical behavior in order to understand their universality classes. We present strong evidence that some of these dynamics have the same critical exponents and belong to the same universality class as the equilibrium 2D Ising model. We show that the bond version of the Swendsen-Wang update algorithm can be mapped into an equilibrium model at an effective temperature.Comment: 12 pages of LaTeX plus 18 pages of postscript figures in a uuencoded file (608k

Luxación acromio-clavicular posterior con fractura clavicular asociada

Se presenta un caso infrecuente de luxación acromio- clavicular posterior asociada a una fractura de tercio medio clavicular ipsilateral en un varón de 17 años. El diagnóstico se basa en la sospecha clínica y en las pruebas de imagen, siendo la TAC de particular utilidad. La reducción abierta y fijación coraco-clavicular con resección del extremo distal clavicular dio excelentes resultados. Se compara el tratamiento realizado con otros publicados, realizando una revisión de la literatura al respecto.An unusual case of combined posterior acromioclavicular joint dislocation and an ipsilateral fracture of the middle third of the clavicle in a 17-year-old male is presented. Diagnosis is based on clinical suspicion and imaging test, being CT scan particularly useful. Open reduction and coracoclavicular fixation with excision of the distal clavicle led to successful results. Treatment is compared with previous reports. A review of the literature is made

Absence of a Finite-Temperature Melting Transition in the Classical Two-Dimensional One-Component Plasma

Vortices in thin-film superconductors are often modelled as a system of particles interacting via a repulsive logarithmic potential. Arguments are presented to show that the hypothetical (Abrikosov) crystalline state for such particles is unstable at any finite temperature against proliferation of screened disclinations. The correlation length of crystalline order is predicted to grow as $\sqrt{1/T}$ as the temperature $T$ is reduced to zero, in excellent agreement with our simulations of this two-dimensional system.Comment: 3 figure

Molecular Dynamics Simulation of Solvent-Polymer Interdiffusion. I. Fickian diffusion

The interdiffusion of a solvent into a polymer melt has been studied using large scale molecular dynamics and Monte Carlo simulation techniques. The solvent concentration profile and weight gain by the polymer have been measured as a function of time. The weight gain is found to scale as t^{1/2}, which is expected for Fickian type of diffusion. The concentration profiles are fit very well assuming Fick's second law with a constant diffusivity. The diffusivity found from fitting Fick's second law is found to be independent of time and equal to the self diffusion constant in the dilute solvent limit. We separately calculated the diffusivity as a function of concentration using the Darken equation and found that the diffusivity is essentially constant for the concentration range relevant for interdiffusion.Comment: 17 pages and 7 figure