Love and limblessness: male heterosexuality, disability, and the Great War

Tens of thousands of British men were permanently wounded as a result of war service. Their return home sparked debates about the wounded male body, female accountability for war-injuries, and the ideology, performance, and practice of masculinity. Other historians have shown how ‘broken heroes’ from the First World War were constituted into ‘men’ in four contexts: physical appearance, occupation, sport, and Britishness. This article explores a fifth dimension: sexuality. It explores debates about the need for war-disabled men to establish stable marital relationships and investigates some attempts to encourage this, including encouraging women to take the initiative in proposing marriage and the establishment of The League for the Marrying of Broken Heroes

Case Study: LifeWatch Italy Phytoplankton VRE

LifeWatch Italy, the Italian node of LifeWatch ERIC, has promoted and stimulated the debate on the use of semantics in biodiversity data management. Actually, biodiversity and ecosystems data are very heterogeneous and need to be better managed to improve the actual scientific knowledge extracted, as well as to address the urgent societal challenges concerning environmental issues. LifeWatch Italy has realized the Phytoplankton Virtual Research Environment (hereafter Phytoplankton VRE), a collaborative working environment supporting researchers to address basic and applied studies on phytoplankton ecology. The Phytoplankton VRE provides the IT infrastructure to enable researchers to obtain, share and analyse phytoplankton data at a level of resolution from individual cells to whole assemblages. A semantic approach has been used to address data harmonisation, integration and discovery: an interdisciplinary team has developed a thesaurus on phytoplankton functional traits and linked its concepts to other existing conceptual schemas related to the specific domain

Patterns of Lymph Node Metastasis in Differentiated Thyroid Cancer; Clinical Implications with Particular Emphasis on the Emerging Role of Compartment-Oriented Lymph Node Dissection

Recent advances in modern imaging allow an accurate identification of involved or suspicious lymph nodes within the nodal compartments of the neck. Careful ultrasonographic lymphatic mapping of the neck by an experienced radiologist allows a targeted, compartment-oriented (or selective) lymph node dissection to be performed instead of the more extensive modified radical lymph node dissection. Compartment-oriented lymph node dissection necessitates the close cooperation of an experienced radiologist with a particular interest in thyroid and neck ultrasonography. There is emerging evidence that this more conservative strategy allows local control of the disease while at the same time morbidity is minimized and a better cosmetic result is achieved. Further investigation is needed to establish the precise role of this interesting surgical approach. © 2019 S. Karger AG, Basel

Comparison of targeted and untargeted approaches in breath analysis for the discrimination of lung cancer from benign pulmonary diseases and healthy persons

The aim of the present study was to compare the efficiency of targeted and untargeted breath analysis in the discrimination of lung cancer (Ca+) patients from healthy people (HC) and patients with benign pulmonary diseases (Ca−). Exhaled breath samples from 49 Ca+ patients, 36 Ca− patients and 52 healthy controls (HC) were analyzed by an SPME–GC–MS method. Untargeted treatment of the acquired data was performed with the use of the web-based platform XCMS Online combined with manual reprocessing of raw chromatographic data. Machine learning methods were applied to estimate the efficiency of breath analysis in the classification of the participants. Results: Untargeted analysis revealed 29 informative VOCs, from which 17 were identified by mass spectra and retention time/retention index evaluation. The untargeted analysis yielded slightly better results in discriminating Ca+ patients from HC (accuracy: 91.0%, AUC: 0.96 and accuracy 89.1%, AUC: 0.97 for untargeted and targeted analysis, respectively) but significantly improved the efficiency of discrimination between Ca+ and Ca− patients, increasing the accuracy of the classification from 52.9 to 75.3% and the AUC from 0.55 to 0.82. Conclusions: The untargeted breath analysis through the inclusion and utilization of newly identified compounds that were not considered in targeted analysis allowed the discrimination of the Ca+ from Ca− patients, which was not achieved by the targeted approach. © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland

Immunohistochemical expression of p53 protein and proliferating cell nuclear antigen in hepatocellular carcinoma

There is an increased prevalence of p53 mutations in hepatocellular carcinomas (HCCs). A total of 62 HCC samples with adjacent liver tissue were analyzed immunohistochemically for the presence of p53 by two different commercial sources of Pab 1801. Polyclonal antibodies anti-HbsAg and anti-HbcAg were employed for the detection of HBV in the adjacent tissue and PC-10 for the defection of proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA). Positive staining for p53 runs identified In 42% and 55% of the HCC cases using each monoclonal antibody. p53 teas found in 42% of the low grade and 43% of the high grade HCC. In 32% of the HCC cases, p53 was found in the adjacent liver tissue. In 52.6% of the cases with evidence of HBV infection, p53 positive expression was observed. PCNA was detected in 56% of the HCC cases (69% low grade, 57% high grade HCC). Eighty-one percent of the p53 positive tumours expressed PCNA, mostly with a high index. p53 and PCNA were not related to histologic grade. A trend for positive correlation was observed between p53 expression and HBV infection. The defection of p53 in non neoplastic tissue and the absence of a significant correlation between p53 expression and degree of differentiation support the hypothesis that the p53 gene mutation is involved in early stages of hepatocellular carcinogenesis

Relationship between the paraoxonase 1 (PON1) M55L and Q192R polymorphisms and lymphohaematopoietic cancers in a Greek agricultural population

The aim of this study was to investigate the association between Paraoxonase 1 (PON1) gene polymorphisms (M55L and Q192R) and lymphohaematopoietic cancers (LHC) in an agricultural region of Greece. A hospital-based case-control study was conducted. A structured questionnaire including information on demographics, residence, occupation, agricultural practices, pesticide exposure, family history, smoking, alcohol consumption and medical history, was used. Genotyping of 316 cases of LHC and 351 healthy controls by using standard laboratory methods was performed. To control for confounders, Binary and Multinomial Logistic Regression analyses were used. Possession of QQ genotype or presence of the Q allele were associated with increased risk of developing LHC (OR 1.94, 95% Cl 1.42-2.66 and OR 1.72, 95% Cl 1.33-2.23 respectively). The QQ genotype in the recessive model was independently associated with LHC (OR 1.92, 95% Cl 1.40-2.65), leukaemia (OR 1.99, 95% CI 1.13-3.49), lymphoma (OR 2.17, 95% CI 1.21-3.90) and plasmacell disease (OR 1.92, 95% Cl 1.40-2.65) even after controlling for age, sex, pesticide exposure, smoking and family history (cancers, LHC and immunological disorders) as confounders. Possession of QQ genotype was found to have a stronger association with LHC in the high and medium pesticide exposed groups(OR 2.15, 95% CI 1.35-3.40, P-value 0.001 and OR 2.25,95% CI 1.21-4.19, P-value 0.010 respectively), compared with the Low/No exposed group where the association was not statistically significant (OR 1.51,95% CI 0.76-3.00, P-value 0.224). We found no association between M55L polymorphism and LHC. PON1 polymorphisms may influence the risk for LHC in our agricultural area. The results encourage further investigation on the PON1 polymorphisms and their importance on the individual's susceptibility especially when exposure to pesticides occurs. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved