Lithobiontic recolonization following cleaning and preservative treatments on the rock engravings of Valle Camonica, Italy: A 54-months monitoring

: Both the indirect control of microclimate conditions and the direct application of preservative products to contrast stone bioreceptivity may contribute to limit lithobiontic recolonization of cultural heritage surfaces after cleaning interventions. However, the priority deserved by these different preventive approaches has still been poorly evaluated, particularly in outdoor environments. This work dealt with the engraved sandstone surfaces of the National Park of Rock Engravings of Naquane (Italy, UNESCO WHS), widely colonized by lichens, mosses and a dark cyanobacterial biofilm, and thus requiring frequent cleaning interventions to preserve their legibility for visitors and scholars. In particular, post-cleaning recolonization by the different lithobionts was seasonally monitored along 54 months in different zones of an engraved outcrop, primarily differing in levels of shading, on parcels exposed to nine different conservative treatments. These included (or not) a pre-cleaning devitalization of lithobionts and the post-cleaning application of biocidal (benzalkonium chloride, plant essential oils, usnic acid) and other restoration products (nanocrystalline anatase, polysiloxane-based water repellent, ethyl-silicate-based consolidant). The combination of surface image analyses, fluorimetric and colorimetric measurements showed that mosses and the cyanobacterial biofilm rapidly recolonized all the parcels in the more shaded zone, irrespective of conservative treatments. In the other areas, recolonization significantly differed depending on the treatment. The post-cleaning application of biocides determined the best results through two vegetative seasons, but only nanocrystalline anatase and the polysiloxane-based water repellent maintained the surfaces lighter than uncleaned controls along the whole monitoring period. Recolonization primarily proceeded by the uncleaned surfaces surrounding the parcels and, at least in the examined case of lichens, did not show substantial shifts in community composition, although some nitrophytic species increased their frequency. In conclusion, the effectiveness of preservative treatments to prevent a rapid recolonization of heritage stone surfaces appeared subordinate to the presence of microenvironmental conditions less favourable to lithobionts

Groundwater monitoring in the archaeological site of Ostia Antica (Rome, Italy): first results

The archaeological site of Ostia Antica hosts the ruins of the ancient roman city called Ostia founded in the VII century B.C. near the mouth of Tiber River. The area was strategically important for Rome, not only for the control of the river, but also for some salt marshes (Ostia Pound). During the XIX century, the whole area was reclaimed and the salt production stopped. Nowadays drainage canals and pumps avoid the flood of zones placed below sea level, keeping dewatering below the ground surface. In February 2014, the site was largely flooded after an exceptional rainfall event and the Superintendence for Archaeological Heritage of Rome ordered the closure for 15 days. Few months later (July 2014) a groundwater monitoring project started with the aim of studying the aquifer response to local rainfall and prevent future damage and groundwater flooding. The activity consisted in water-table monitoring, groundwater electrical conductivity (EC) and temperature continuous measurements, coupled with chemical analysis of major ions. Preliminary results shows the link between water table fluctuations and rainfall distributions. The average elevation of the archaeological area is about 2,5 m a.s.l. and the local water-table depth is of about 0,5 m a.s.l.; groundwater flows from the Tiber River to the reclaimed area according to regional flowpath. Groundwater sampled from three wells is Ca-HCO3 freshwater (600 - 1000 μS/cm), while the sample collected from a well located close to ancient salt storage warehouse (now Ostia Antica museum), is Na-Cl brackish water (about 4000 μS/cm). The chemical evolution of groundwater from summer to winter suggested a possible lateral inflow from the Tiber River, affected by salt-wedge intrusion. The inflow of Ca-Cl, SO4 Tiber's water with an intermediate salinity could determine salinization of Ca-HCO3 freshwaters and refreshing of Na-Cl brackish water

Human Endogenous Retroviruses in Autism Spectrum Disorders: Recent Advances and New Perspectives at the Gene-Environment Interface

Human endogenous retroviruses (HERVs) are genetic elements, derived from their exogenous retroviral counterpart by a process of germline infection and proliferation within the human genome, and their integration as proviruses led to the fixation and the vertical transmission, following Mendelian laws. HERVs currently make up ~8% of the genetic material, and some of them have been cooped for physiological functions. Otherwise, their activation in response to environmental factors has been associated with human pathological conditions. In the setting of neurodevelopmental disorders, HERVs have been proposed as contributing factors involved in Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD), spanning the bridge between genetic susceptibility, environmental risk factors and immune response. We described a distinct expression profile of some HERV families and cytokines in lymphocytes from autistic children and in their mothers suggesting a close mother-child association in ASD. Moreover, in vitro treatment with an antiretroviral drug was able to restore the expression level of HERVs and cytokines providing new insights into the potential role of HERVs as biomarkers of ASD and raising the possibility of using HERVs expression as a therapeutic target for a tailored approach to patient care

Immunotherapy with internally inactivated virus loaded dendritic cells boosts cellular immunity but does not affect feline immunodeficiency virus infection course

Immunotherapy of feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV)-infected cats with monocyte-derived dendritic cells (MDCs) loaded with aldrithiol-2 (AT2)-inactivated homologous FIV was performed. Although FIV-specific lymphoproliferative responses were markedly increased, viral loads and CD4+ T cell depletion were unaffected, thus indicating that boosting antiviral cell-mediated immunity may not suffice to modify infection course appreciably

[18F]Choline PET/CT and stereotactic body radiotherapy on treatment decision making of oligometastatic prostate cancer patients: Preliminary results

Background: A new entity of patients with recurrent prostate cancer limited to a small number of active metastatic lesions is having growing interest: the oligometastatic patients. Patients with oligometastatic disease could eventually be managed by treating all the active lesions with local therapy, i.e. either surgery or ablative stereotactic body radiotherapy. This study aims to assess the impact of [18F]Choline ([18F]FMCH) PET/CT and the use stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) in patients (pts) with oligometastatic prostate cancer (PCa). Methods: Twenty-nine pts with oligometastatic PCa (≤3 synchronous active lesions detected with [18F]FMCHPET/CT) were treated with repeated salvage SBRT until disease progression (development of > three active synchronous metastases). Primary endpoint was systemic therapy-free survival measured from the baseline [18F]FMCHPET/CT. Results: A total of 45 lesions were treated with SBRT. After a median follow-up of 11.5 months (range 3-40 months), 20 pts were still in the study and did not receive any systemic therapy. Nine pts started systemic therapy, and the median time of the primary endpoint was 39.7 months (CI 12.20-62.14 months). No grade 3 or 4 toxicity was recorded. Conclusions: Repeated salvage [18F]FMCHPET/CT-guided SBRT is well tolerated and could defer the beginning of systemic therapy in selected patients with oligometastatic PCa

Human Endogenous Retrovirus K in the Crosstalk Between Cancer Cells Microenvironment and Plasticity: A New Perspective for Combination Therapy

Abnormal activation of human endogenous retroviruses (HERVs) has been associated with several diseases such as cancer, autoimmunity, and neurological disorders. In particular, in cancer HERV activity and expression have been specifically associated with tumor aggressiveness and patient outcomes. Cancer cell aggressiveness is intimately linked to the acquisition of peculiar plasticity and heterogeneity based on cell stemness features, as well as on the crosstalk between cancer cells and the microenvironment. The latter is a driving factor in the acquisition of aggressive phenotypes, associated with metastasis and resistance to conventional cancer therapies. Remarkably, in different cell types and stages of development, HERV expression is mainly regulated by epigenetic mechanisms and is subjected to a very precise temporal and spatial regulation according to the surrounding microenvironment. Focusing on our research experience with HERV-K involvement in the aggressiveness and plasticity of melanoma cells, this perspective aims to highlight the role of HERV-K in the crosstalk between cancer cells and the tumor microenvironment. The implications for a combination therapy targeted at HERVs with standard approaches are discussed

Reasoning about and Harmonizing the Interaction Behavior of Networked Systems at Application- and Middleware- Layer

The CONNECT Integrated Project aims at enabling continuous composition of networked systems to respond to the evolution of functionalities provided to and required from the networked environment. CONNECT aims at dropping the interoperability barrier by adopting a revolutionary approach to the seamless networking of digital systems, that is, synthesizing on-the-fly the connectors via which networked systems communicate. The resulting emergent connectors are effectively synthesized according to the behavioral semantics of application- down to middleware-layer protocols run by the interacting parties. The role of work package WP3 is to devise automated and compositional approaches to connector synthesis, which can be performed at run-time. Given the respective interaction behavior of networked systems, we want to synthesize the behavior of the connector(s) needed for them to interact. These connectors serve as mediators of the networked systems' interaction at both application and middleware layers. During the project's first year, the work of WP3 led us to achieve the following preliminary results: the formalization of matching and mapping relationships for application-layer interaction protocols; the definition of the corresponding mediator generation algorithm; the analysis of the interoperability problems, and related solutions, that can occur at middleware-layer; and a model-driven approach to the automated elicitation of application-layer protocols from software implementations. All these achievements have been reported in Deliverable D3.1: "Modeling of application- and middleware-layer interaction protocols". In this deliverable, we go a step forward with respect to some of the previous achievements by delivering a unified process, and related artefacts, for the automated synthesis of mediators at both application and middleware layers, code-generation techniques to generate the actual code that implements a synthesized mediator, and a preliminary integration of QoS management in the synthesis process. During year 2, all the work has been validated through its application to several scenarios, in particular as part of WP1 and WP6. By selecting one of them as common scenario, in this deliverable, we also show the different methods/techniques at work on the scenario. All the steps of the devised synthesis process are described in detail and applied to the selected common scenario

Evolution of the Population of Very Strong MgII Absorbers

We present a study of the evolution of several classes of MgII absorbers, and their corresponding FeII absorption, over a large fraction of cosmic history: 2.3 to 8.7 Gyrs from the Big Bang. Our sample consists of 87 strong (Wr(MgII)>0.3 A) MgII absorbers, with redshifts 0.2<z<2.5, measured in 81 quasar spectra obtained from the Very Large Telescope(VLT)/Ultraviolet and Visual Echelle Spectrograph(UVES) archives of high-resolution spectra (R \sim 45,000). No evolutionary trend in Wr(FeII)/Wr(MgII) is found for moderately strong MgII absorbers (0.3<Wr(MgII)<1.0 A). However, at lower z we find an absence of very strong MgII absorbers (those with Wr(MgII)>1 A) with small ratios of equivalent widths of FeII to MgII. At high z, very strong MgII absorbers with both small and large Wr(FeII)/Wr(MgII) values are present. We compare our findings to a sample of 100 weak MgII absorbers (Wr(MgII)<0.3 A) found in the same quasar spectra by Narayanan et al. (2007). The main effect driving the evolution of very strong MgII systems is the difference between the kinematic profiles at low and high redshifts. At high z, we observe that, among the very strong MgII absorbers, all of the systems with small ratios of Wr(FeII)/Wr(MgII) have relatively large velocity spreads, resulting in less saturated profiles. At low z, such kinematically spread systems are absent, and both FeII and MgII are saturated, leading to Wr(FeII)/Wr(MgII) values that are all close to 1. The high redshift, small Wr(FeII)/Wr(MgII) systems could correspond to sub-DLA systems, many of which have large velocity spreads and are possibly linked to superwinds in star forming galaxies. In addition to the change in saturation due to kinematic evolution, the smaller Wr(FeII)/Wr(MgII) values could be due to a lower abundance of Fe at high z, which would indicate relatively early stages of star formation in those environments.Comment: 20 pages, 14 figures (figure 1 is a set of 87 figures, which is available on the online version), accepted for publication in the MNRA