A 3-year follow-up study on bone structure elastic quality

Osteoporosis is called a silent disease because bone fragility manifests itself to the patient only in an advanced state, through fracture and pain. Medical and industry leaders recognize that the current golden standard diagnostic method, densitometry, or Dual Energy X-ray Absorptiometry (DEXA), may not always be sufficient to assess the patient’s real risk of fragility fracture [1]. Indeed, pathological alterations affect not only the mineral content (quantity) of the bone, but also its “quality”, which can be measured from the elastic properties of the bone internal trabecular structure by means of the Bone Elastic Structure Test, BES TEST®. In this study, the incidence of fragility fractures was assessed after a 3-year follow-up period in the women enrolled for a population study in 2015. The BES TEST® resulted an effective estimator of bone health, and can improve the assessment of the patient’s fracture risk map

Sustainable finance disclosure regulation insights: Unveiling socially responsible funds performance during COVID‐19 pandemic and Russia–Ukraine war

The transition towards a more sustainable financial market demands transparency andtrust from investors, objectives also pursued by the Sustainable Finance DisclosureRegulation (SFDR). Specifically, carefully assessing the risk-adjusted performance ofsustainable funds empowers investors to make informed decisions in alignment withtheir ethical and financial objectives. This article contributes to the debate on the per-formance of socially responsible investment (SRI) funds in times of crisis by evaluatingthe risk-adjusted performance of a sample of SRI and conventional funds, ranked inlight of the SFDR, during the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russia–Ukraine war. Usinga two-step analysis, the results of the study show that funds with clear sustainabilityobjectives, as defined by Article 9 of the SFDR, were able to outperform conventionalfunds, but only a few months after the onset of the crisis periods, thus demonstratingpoor performance persistence. At the same time, sustainable funds with a focus onfinancial materiality, as defined by Article 8, were never able to generate significantlydifferent risk-adjusted performance from conventional funds. Our results show thatthe lack of performance persistence of Article 9 funds prevents an effective hedgingrole for investment strategies that consider extra-financial criteria. They also confirmthat the classification criteria introduced by the SFDR still need to be more specificand create more transparency in financial market

A Game based Learning Model for Entrepreneurship Education

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First data on microflora of loggerhead sea turtle (Caretta caretta) nests from the coastlines of Sicily

Caretta caretta is threatened by many dangers in the Mediterranean basin, but most are human-related. The purposes of this research were: (i) to investigate microflora in samples from six loggerhead sea turtle nests located on the Sicilian coast and (ii) to understand microbial diversity associated with nests, with particular attention to bacteria and fungi involved in failed hatchings. During the 2016 and 2018 summers, 456 eggs and seven dead hatchling from six nests were collected. We performed bacteriological and mycological analyses on 88 egg samples and seven dead hatchlings, allowing us to isolate: Fusarium spp. (80.6%), Aeromonas hydrophila (55.6%), Aspergillus spp. (27.2%) and Citrobacter freundii (9%). Two Fusarium species were identified by microscopy and were confirmed by PCR and internal transcribed spacer sequencing. Statistical analyses showed significant differences between nests and the presence/absence of microflora, whereas no significant differences were observed between eggs and nests. This is the first report that catalogues microflora from C. caretta nests/eggs in the Mediterranean Sea and provides key information on potential pathogens that may affect hatching success. Moreover, our results suggest the need for wider investigations over extensive areas to identify other microflora, and to better understand hatching failures and mortality related to microbial contamination in this important turtle species

Sleep Quality, Emotion Regulation and Parenting Stress in Children with Congenital Heart Disease

The aim of this study is to evaluate parental perceptions of parent-infant bedtime interactions and quality of sleep, after hospital discharge, in a group of children diagnosed at birth with congenital heart disease (CHD), as compared with the perceptions of parents in a control group of children who were healthy at birth. More specifically, we evaluated the associations between parental stress, parental perceptions of infant emotion regulation, and infants’ bedtime and sleep routines in each of the two groups. Fifty Italian intact two-parent families (23 boys) of toddlers ageing from 11 to 36 months (M= 23.42, SD=7.10) were recruited. 20 families of CHD children group were recruited from the Department of Cardiology at the Bambino Gesù Children’s Hospital in Rome, Italy; 30 families of the healthy children group were recruited from two childcare units. Parents completed Emotion Regulation Checklist (Shields Cicchetti, 1997), Parent-Child Sleep Interaction Scale (PSIS; Alfano et al., 2013), Parent-Stress Index-Short Form (PSI-SF; Abidin, 1990) and ad-hoc semi-structured interview on child’s sleep quality. The independent-samples t-test evidenced that parents of healthy children reported significantly higher scores on children's emotion regulation compared with the CHD group Specifically CHD children and healthy children's emotion regulation reported both by mothers (respectively CHD children’s mothers: M= 26.11, SD= 2.9; healthy children’s mothers: M= 28.85, SD= 2.71; t(37) = 3.10, p= .004) and fathers (respectively CHD children’s fathers: M=25.76, SD= 2.79; healthy children’s fathers: M= 27.37, SD= 2.02; t(31)= 2.71, p= .010). Main correlational findings showed in the CHD children’s group that parenting stress total scores were positive related to difficult parent-infant bedtime interactions both for mothers (r=.58, p .01) and fathers (r= .70, p .01). Results show significant differences in emotion regulation between the two groups. The results of this research will show to the clinicians the aspects of parent-infant bedtime interactions to be addressed in parents of children with CHD

Of detectability and camouflage: evaluating Pollard Walk rules using a common, cryptic butterfly

Abstract Estimating distribution and abundance of species depends on the probability at which individuals are detected. Butterflies are of conservation interest worldwide, but data collected with Pollard walks—the standard for national monitoring schemes—are often analyzed assuming that changes in detectability are negligible within recommended sampling criteria. The implications of this practice remain poorly understood. Here, we evaluated the effects of sampling conditions on butterfly counts from Pollard walks using the Arctic fritillary, a common but cryptic butterfly in boreal forests of Alberta, Canada. We used an open population binomial N‐mixture model to disentangle the effects of habitat suitability and phenology on abundance of Arctic fritillaries, and its detectability by sampling different conditions of temperature, wind, cloud cover, and hour of the day. Detectability varied by one order of magnitude within the criteria recommended for Pollard walks (P varying between 0.04 and 0.45), and simulations show how sampling in suboptimal conditions increases substantially the risk of false‐absence records (e.g., false‐absences are twice as likely than true‐presences when sampling 10 Arctic fritillaries at P = 0.04). Our results suggest that the risk of false‐absences is highest for species that are poorly detectable, low in abundance, and with short flight periods. Analysis with open population binomial N‐mixture models could improve estimates of abundance and distribution for rare species of conservation interest, while providing a powerful method for assessing butterfly phenology, abundance, and behavior using counts from Pollard walks, but require more intensive sampling than conventional monitoring schemes

Predicting Dihydropyrimidine Dehydrogenase Deficiency and Related 5-Fluorouracil Toxicity. Opportunities and Challenges of DPYD Exon Sequencing and the Role of Phenotyping Assays

Deficiency of dihydropyrimidine dehydrogenase (DPD), encoded by the DPYD gene, is associated with severe toxicity induced by the anti-cancer drug 5-Fluorouracil (5-FU). DPYD genotyping of four recommended polymorphisms is widely used to predict toxicity, yet their prediction power is limited. Increasing availability of next generation sequencing (NGS) will allow us to screen rare variants, predicting a larger fraction of DPD deficiencies. Genotype−phenotype correlations were investigated by performing DPYD exon sequencing in 94 patients assessed for DPD deficiency by the 5-FU degradation rate (5-FUDR) assay. Association of common variants with 5-FUDR was analyzed with the SNPStats software. Functional interpretation of rare variants was performed by in-silico analysis (using the HSF system and PredictSNP) and literature review. A total of 23 rare variants and 8 common variants were detected. Among common variants, a significant association was found between homozygosity for the rs72728438 (c.1974+75A>G) and decreased 5-FUDR. Haplotype analysis did not detect significant associations with 5-FUDR. Overall, in our sample cohort, NGS exon sequencing allowed us to explain 42.5% of the total DPD deficiencies. NGS sharply improves prediction of DPD deficiencies, yet a broader collection of genotype−phenotype association data is needed to enable the clinical use of sequencing data