Recurrent Painful Ophthalmoplegic Neuropathy: A case report with atypical features and a review of the literature

Introduction: Recurrent Painful Ophthalmoplegic Neuropathy, previously known as Ophthalmoplegic Migraine, is a poorly characterized disorder mainly because there are few cases described. We report a new case of Recurrent Painful Ophthalmoplegic Neuropathy and a review of the literature to contribute to increasing the knowledge of the clinical features of this disorder. Case report and review of literature: A 45-year-old woman presented with adult-onset recurrent attacks of abducens and oculomotor palsy associated with diplopia followed by headache. Most notably, pain always presented many days after oculomotor impairment, a feature never described in the literature. A diagnosis of possible Recurrent Painful Ophthalmoplegic Neuropathy was made after excluding other possible mimicking disorders. Symptoms usually resolved gradually with corticosteroid therapy, albeit without a clear-cut benefit.Clinical data collected from 1989 to 2022 showed that adult onset in Recurrent Painful Ophthalmoplegic Neuropathy is not uncommon. While III cranial nerve palsy is typical, VI and IV nerve palsy have also been described. Pathophysiology and diagnosis: Several hypotheses have been proposed, including nerve compression, ischemia or inflammation/demyelination, but none has been completely accepted.Diagnosis remains of exclusion; magnetic resonance imaging and blood exams are key in differential diagnosis. Conclusions: Our case gives us the possibility to expand the clinical features of Recurrent Painful Ophthalmoplegic Neuropathy, also contributing to updating the pathophysiological hypotheses

Software customization to provide digital oscilloscope with enhanced period-measurement features

This paper tackles the problem of signal period measurements by means of oscilloscopes. First, the performance of two last-generation scopes, implementing a zero-crossing algorithm, is evaluated. Then, after a brief resume of alternative measurement techniques, a solution to enhance the period-measurement capability of scopes is proposed and implemented in the LeCroy WaveMaster 8620A software. Finally, the results of the tests carried out on different signal waveforms are reported and analyzed

Smart Devices and Services for Smart City

Citizen quality of life can be improved through facilities and services that have been thought to ease citizen interaction with municipal authorities, offices and structures. All technologies and devices, used for developing these facilities, are the pillars of the Smart City idea: a City that adapts itself, at least in part, to citizens’ needs. Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) could become the backbone of all the smart city projects. Other public services can be loaded on AMI’s to be smart and thus helping to find the affordability of investments. The paper deals with this topic by describing devices and results of a pilot project, which has been carried out in an Italian middle city (Salerno), to experience the use of RF 169MHz wM-bus based AMI. Experimental results regarding a set of about 2500 installed devices for gas and water metering, car parking management and elder tele-assistance, will be reported in detail to show convenience and problems of this approach

Integrated geomorphological mapping in the north-western sector of Agrigento (Italy)

The geomorphologicalmap is an essential tool to performa proper urban planning inmountainous or hilly areas. In this paper amultidisciplinary approach to derive a 1:2000 geomorphologicalmap is described.The proposedmethodology consists of the integration between aerial photographs, acquired in 2003, and four datasets of Persistent Scatterer Interferometry (PSI) measures to update a pre-existing landslide inventory. The integrated data were used to achieve a validated geomorphological map by means of a geomorphological survey. The study area is located in southern Italy (Agrigento, Sicily). The city of Agrigento, included in the World Heritage List of UNESCO in 1997, is located on the Girgenti hill which is exposed on its northern side, to several landslide phenomena. The top of the hill is characterized by the presence of part of the cultural heritage of the city and is affected by rockfalls, rock topples and shallow-seated landslides, representing a serious risk for important historical buildings. The results demonstrate the validity of this method to achieve a suitable tool in landscape and cultural heritage management. © 2012 Journal of Maps

Mixed Graph of Terms: Beyond the bags of words representation of a text

The main purpose of text mining techniques is to identify common patterns through the observation of vectors of features and then to use such patterns to make predictions. Vectors of features are usually made up of weighted words, as well as those used in the text retrieval field, which are obtained thanks to the assumption that considers a document as a "bag of words". However, in this paper we demonstrate that, to obtain more accuracy in the analysis and revelation of common patterns, we could employ (observe) more complex features than simple weighted words. The proposed vector of features considers a hierarchical structure, named a mixed Graph of Terms, composed of a directed and an undirected sub-graph of words, that can be automatically constructed from a small set of documents through the probabilistic Topic Model. The graph has demonstrated its efficiency in a classic "ad-hoc" text retrieval problem. Here we consider expanding the initial query with this new structured vector of features