semi automatic derivation of channel network from a high resolution dtm the example of an italian alpine region

AbstractHigh-resolution digital terrain models (HR-DTMs) of regional coverage open interesting scenarios for the analysis of landscape, including derivation and analysis of channel network. In this study, we present the derivation of the channel network from a HR-DTM for the Autonomous Province of Trento. A preliminary automatic extraction of the raw channel network was conducted using a curvature-based algorithm applied to a 4 m resolution DTM derived from an airborne LiDAR survey carried out in 2006. The raw channel network automatically extracted from the HR-DTM underwent a supervised control to check the spatial pattern of the hydrographic network. The supervised control was carried out by means of different informative layers (i.e. geomorphometric indexes, orthophoto imagery and technical cartography) resulting in an accurate and fine-scale channel network

Rapid and Affordable High Throughput Screening of SARS-CoV-2 Variants Using Denaturing High-Performance Liquid Chromatography Analysis

Mutations in the receptor binding domain (RBD) of SARS-CoV-2 alter the infectivity, pathogenicity, and transmissibility of new variants of concern (VOCs). In addition, those mutations cause immune escape, undermining the population immunity induced by ongoing mass vaccination programs. There is an urgent need for novel strategies and techniques aimed at the surveillance of the active emergence and spread of the VOCs. The aim of this study was to provide a quick, cheap and straightforward denaturing high-performance liquid chromatography (DHPLC) method for the prompt identification of the SARS-CoV-2 VOCs. Two PCRs were designed to target the RBD region, spanning residues N417 through N501 of the Spike protein. Furthermore, a DHPLC screening analysis was set up. The screening consisted of mixing the unknown sample with a standard sample of a known variant, denaturing at high temperature, renaturing at room temperature followed by a 2-minute run using the WAVE DHPLC system to detect the heteroduplexes which invariably form whenever the unknown sample has a nucleotide difference with respect to the standard used. The workflow was able to readily detect all the variants including B.1.1.7, P.1, B.1.585 B.1. 617.2 and lineages at a very affordable cost. The DHPLC analysis was robust being able to identify variants, even in the case of samples with very unbalanced target concentrations including those samples at the limit of detection. This approach has the potential of greatly expediting surveillance of the SARS-CoV-2 variants

Mast Cell: An Emerging Partner in Immune Interaction

Mast cells (MCs) are currently recognized as effector cells in many settings of the immune response, including host defense, immune regulation, allergy, chronic inflammation, and autoimmune diseases. MC pleiotropic functions reflect their ability to secrete a wide spectrum of preformed or newly synthesized biologically active products with pro-inflammatory, anti-inflammatory and/or immunosuppressive properties, in response to multiple signals. Moreover, the modulation of MC effector phenotypes relies on the interaction of a wide variety of membrane molecules involved in cell–cell or cell-extracellular-matrix interaction. The delivery of co-stimulatory signals allows MC to specifically communicate with immune cells belonging to both innate and acquired immunity, as well as with non-immune tissue-specific cell types. This article reviews and discusses the evidence that MC membrane-expressed molecules play a central role in regulating MC priming and activation and in the modulation of innate and adaptive immune response not only against host injury, but also in peripheral tolerance and tumor-surveillance or -escape. The complex expression of MC surface molecules may be regarded as a measure of connectivity, with altered patterns of cell–cell interaction representing functionally distinct MC states. We will focalize our attention on roles and functions of recently discovered molecules involved in the cross-talk of MCs with other immune partners

Hospitalized Pets as a Source of Carbapenem-Resistance

The massive and irrational use of antibiotics in livestock productions has fostered the occurrence and spread of resistance to “old class antimicrobials.” To cope with that phenomenon, some regulations have been already enforced in the member states of the European Union. However, a role of livestock animals in the relatively recent alerts on the rapid worldwide increase of resistance to last-choice antimicrobials as carbapenems is very unlikely. Conversely, these antimicrobials are increasingly administered in veterinary hospitals whose role in spreading bacteria or mobile genetic elements has not adequately been addressed so far. A cross-sectional study was carried out on 105 hospitalized and 100 non-hospitalized pets with the aim of measuring the prevalence of carbapenem-resistant Gram-negative bacteria (GNB) colonizing dogs and cats, either hospitalized or not hospitalized and estimating the relative odds. Stool samples were inoculated on MacConkey agar plates containing 1 mg/L imipenem which were then incubated aerobically at 37°C ± 1 for 48 h. Isolated bacteria were identified first by Matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry and were confirmed by 16S rRNA sequencing. The genetic basis of resistance was investigated using PCR methods, gene or whole genome sequencing (WGS). The prevalence of pets harboring carbapenem-resistant bacteria was 11.4 and 1.0% in hospitalized and not-hospitalized animals, respectively, with an odds ratio of 12.8 (p < 0.01). One pet carried two diverse isolates. Overall, 14 gram-negative non-fermenting bacteria, specifically, one Acinetobacter radioresistens, five Acinetobacter baumannii, six Pseudomonas aeruginosa and two Stenotrophomonas maltophilia were isolated. The Acinetobacter species carried acquired carbapenemases genes encoded by blaNDM-1 and blaOXA-23. In contrast, Pseudomonas phenotypic resistance was associated with the presence of mutations in the oprD gene. Notably, inherent carbapenem-resistant isolates of S. maltophilia were also resistant to the first-line recommended chemotherapeutic trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole. This study estimates the risk of colonization by carbapenem-resistant non-fermenting GNB in pets hospitalized in veterinary tertiary care centers and highlights their potential role in spreading resistance genes among the animal and human community. Public health authorities should consider extending surveillance systems and putting the release of critical antibiotics under more strict control in order to manage the infection/colonization of pets in veterinary settings

Continuous glucose monitoring in pregnant women with type 1 diabetes (CONCEPTT): a multicentre international randomised controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: Pregnant women with type 1 diabetes are a high-risk population who are recommended to strive for optimal glucose control, but neonatal outcomes attributed to maternal hyperglycaemia remain suboptimal. Our aim was to examine the effectiveness of continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) on maternal glucose control and obstetric and neonatal health outcomes. METHODS: In this multicentre, open-label, randomised controlled trial, we recruited women aged 18-40 years with type 1 diabetes for a minimum of 12 months who were receiving intensive insulin therapy. Participants were pregnant (≤13 weeks and 6 days' gestation) or planning pregnancy from 31 hospitals in Canada, England, Scotland, Spain, Italy, Ireland, and the USA. We ran two trials in parallel for pregnant participants and for participants planning pregnancy. In both trials, participants were randomly assigned to either CGM in addition to capillary glucose monitoring or capillary glucose monitoring alone. Randomisation was stratified by insulin delivery (pump or injections) and baseline glycated haemoglobin (HbA1c). The primary outcome was change in HbA1c from randomisation to 34 weeks' gestation in pregnant women and to 24 weeks or conception in women planning pregnancy, and was assessed in all randomised participants with baseline assessments. Secondary outcomes included obstetric and neonatal health outcomes, assessed with all available data without imputation. This trial is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov, number NCT01788527. FINDINGS: Between March 25, 2013, and March 22, 2016, we randomly assigned 325 women (215 pregnant, 110 planning pregnancy) to capillary glucose monitoring with CGM (108 pregnant and 53 planning pregnancy) or without (107 pregnant and 57 planning pregnancy). We found a small difference in HbA1c in pregnant women using CGM (mean difference -0·19%; 95% CI -0·34 to -0·03; p=0·0207). Pregnant CGM users spent more time in target (68% vs 61%; p=0·0034) and less time hyperglycaemic (27% vs 32%; p=0·0279) than did pregnant control participants, with comparable severe hypoglycaemia episodes (18 CGM and 21 control) and time spent hypoglycaemic (3% vs 4%; p=0·10). Neonatal health outcomes were significantly improved, with lower incidence of large for gestational age (odds ratio 0·51, 95% CI 0·28 to 0·90; p=0·0210), fewer neonatal intensive care admissions lasting more than 24 h (0·48; 0·26 to 0·86; p=0·0157), fewer incidences of neonatal hypoglycaemia (0·45; 0·22 to 0·89; p=0·0250), and 1-day shorter length of hospital stay (p=0·0091). We found no apparent benefit of CGM in women planning pregnancy. Adverse events occurred in 51 (48%) of CGM participants and 43 (40%) of control participants in the pregnancy trial, and in 12 (27%) of CGM participants and 21 (37%) of control participants in the planning pregnancy trial. Serious adverse events occurred in 13 (6%) participants in the pregnancy trial (eight [7%] CGM, five [5%] control) and in three (3%) participants in the planning pregnancy trial (two [4%] CGM and one [2%] control). The most common adverse events were skin reactions occurring in 49 (48%) of 103 CGM participants and eight (8%) of 104 control participants during pregnancy and in 23 (44%) of 52 CGM participants and five (9%) of 57 control participants in the planning pregnancy trial. The most common serious adverse events were gastrointestinal (nausea and vomiting in four participants during pregnancy and three participants planning pregnancy). INTERPRETATION: Use of CGM during pregnancy in patients with type 1 diabetes is associated with improved neonatal outcomes, which are likely to be attributed to reduced exposure to maternal hyperglycaemia. CGM should be offered to all pregnant women with type 1 diabetes using intensive insulin therapy. This study is the first to indicate potential for improvements in non-glycaemic health outcomes from CGM use. FUNDING: Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, Canadian Clinical Trials Network, and National Institute for Health Research

CONCEPTT : Continuous Glucose Monitoring in Women with Type 1 Diabetes in Pregnancy Trial: A multi-center, multi-national, randomized controlled trial - Study protocol

Women with type 1 diabetes strive for optimal glycemic control before and during pregnancy to avoid adverse obstetric and perinatal outcomes. For most women, optimal glycemic control is challenging to achieve and maintain. The aim of this study is to determine whether the use of real-time continuous glucose monitoring (RT-CGM) will improve glycemic control in women with type 1 diabetes who are pregnant or planning pregnancy. A multi-center, open label, randomized, controlled trial of women with type 1 diabetes who are either planning pregnancy with an HbA1c of 7.0 % to ≤10.0 % (53 to ≤ 86 mmol/mol) or are in early pregnancy (<13 weeks 6 days) with an HbA1c of 6.5 % to ≤10.0 % (48 to ≤ 86 mmol/mol). Participants will be randomized to either RT-CGM alongside conventional intermittent home glucose monitoring (HGM), or HGM alone. Eligible women will wear a CGM which does not display the glucose result for 6 days during the run-in phase. To be eligible for randomization, a minimum of 4 HGM measurements per day and a minimum of 96 hours total with 24 hours overnight (11 pm-7 am) of CGM glucose values are required. Those meeting these criteria are randomized to RT- CGM or HGM. A total of 324 women will be recruited (110 planning pregnancy, 214 pregnant). This takes into account 15 and 20 % attrition rates for the planning pregnancy and pregnant cohorts and will detect a clinically relevant 0.5 % difference between groups at 90 % power with 5 % significance. Randomization will stratify for type of insulin treatment (pump or multiple daily injections) and baseline HbA1c. Analyses will be performed according to intention to treat. The primary outcome is the change in glycemic control as measured by HbA1c from baseline to 24 weeks or conception in women planning pregnancy, and from baseline to 34 weeks gestation during pregnancy. Secondary outcomes include maternal hypoglycemia, CGM time in, above and below target (3.5-7.8 mmol/l), glucose variability measures, maternal and neonatal outcomes. This will be the first international multicenter randomized controlled trial to evaluate the impact of RT- CGM before and during pregnancy in women with type 1 diabetes. NCT01788527 December 19, 2012

Enaction and Enactive Interfaces: A Handbook of Terms

International audienceEnaction is a recent approach in psychology and in cognitive sciences and it remains not easy to understand and to situate. Its introduction in the field of Computer Technology and Multimodal Interfaces has been initiated explicitly in the FP6 Enactive Interfaces Network ofExcellence. It is nothing less than a conceptual revolution, an important paradigm shift.This leads to necessary confrontations between several disciplines in order to bridge gaps, understand different ways of thinking, plunge within unfamiliar definitions, rub up with different schools, and work to extend each domain by new concepts, methods and results. Enaction and Enactive Interfaces: an handbook of Terms aims at overcoming the interdisciplinary gap inherent to this new paradigm. It has been designed as a tool to constitute a common vision on Enaction, Enactive Interaction, Enaction Knowledge and Enactive systems, allowing students and researchers to reach, at a glance, a sufficient interdisciplinary level, in order to tackle efficiently the new question of « Enaction and Technology ».Through a wide panel of words, terms, expressions, presented in a synthetic form, shorter than scientific papers or disciplinary books, it aims at creating a global understanding of the Enactive paysage, and stimulating new researches at the cross-point of disciplines, and ultimately at fostering a new generation of young researchers on Enaction and Enactive Systems.Differently from dictionaries, the handbook includes debates, theoretical problems, controversies, expressions of complementary irreducible approaches. Terms are related to research in progress, addressing debates or schools differentiations, addressing other unfamiliar frameworks for laypersons of other disciplines.Differently from several on-line encyclopaedia, it includes the names of the authors and contributors; the contents are certified by experts through consensus meetings, and they refer explicitly to their scientific context with a minimal set of sufficient references. And finally, relations with the field of Enaction are discussed.In order to guaranty an optimal exploration of the Lexicon and to avoid the reader to be trapped within a sub-domain of expertise, the technique of related items has been used to stimulate interdisciplinary exploration with a sufficient internal connectivity.The Handbook comprises about 200 terms covering the different fields necessary to explore the landscape of enaction and technologies: sensory-motor theories of interaction, multimodal integration, haptic and multimodal interfaces, instrumental interaction, virtual reality, design, human-computer interfaces, paradigms in cognitive sciences, robotics and teleoperation. Mostof them have been written in collaboration by authors from different disciplines.By nature of the contents closely linked to researches in progress, the process followed was original. It was an iterative process that accompanied the progress of the researches all along the Enactive Interfaces project. A restricted core group proposed a first list of terms from the initial expertise of the members of the Enactive network. The list was improved bit by bit from research documents provided within the Enactive network. Most of them are available on the website of the Enactive project. Most of the researchers of the Enactive network, seniors as well as young researchers, were involved actively in the process, exchanging and debating through web dedicated facilities. When scientific materials attained a certain amount, stabilized items have been improved, by merging, renaming, splitting, extending operations, leading to reach the expected level of convergence and balance between disciplines and approaches.Among the chosen terms, some had already a long history. The text does not only provide a definition, but revisits the term in depth, emphasizing how its meaning and usages are questioned, transformed, or nourished, under the light of Enaction and Enactive Interfaces.Other terms are fully novel, in which case the text allows introducing the new concepts at hand. Some of them led to multiple definitions, whether because they represent stabilized different definitions in different disciplines whether because they underlie non-reducible schools and approaches. We respected these differences as representative of the vividness of the domain

Enaction and Enactive Interfaces: A Handbook of Terms

International audienceEnaction is a recent approach in psychology and in cognitive sciences and it remains not easy to understand and to situate. Its introduction in the field of Computer Technology and Multimodal Interfaces has been initiated explicitly in the FP6 Enactive Interfaces Network ofExcellence. It is nothing less than a conceptual revolution, an important paradigm shift.This leads to necessary confrontations between several disciplines in order to bridge gaps, understand different ways of thinking, plunge within unfamiliar definitions, rub up with different schools, and work to extend each domain by new concepts, methods and results. Enaction and Enactive Interfaces: an handbook of Terms aims at overcoming the interdisciplinary gap inherent to this new paradigm. It has been designed as a tool to constitute a common vision on Enaction, Enactive Interaction, Enaction Knowledge and Enactive systems, allowing students and researchers to reach, at a glance, a sufficient interdisciplinary level, in order to tackle efficiently the new question of « Enaction and Technology ».Through a wide panel of words, terms, expressions, presented in a synthetic form, shorter than scientific papers or disciplinary books, it aims at creating a global understanding of the Enactive paysage, and stimulating new researches at the cross-point of disciplines, and ultimately at fostering a new generation of young researchers on Enaction and Enactive Systems.Differently from dictionaries, the handbook includes debates, theoretical problems, controversies, expressions of complementary irreducible approaches. Terms are related to research in progress, addressing debates or schools differentiations, addressing other unfamiliar frameworks for laypersons of other disciplines.Differently from several on-line encyclopaedia, it includes the names of the authors and contributors; the contents are certified by experts through consensus meetings, and they refer explicitly to their scientific context with a minimal set of sufficient references. And finally, relations with the field of Enaction are discussed.In order to guaranty an optimal exploration of the Lexicon and to avoid the reader to be trapped within a sub-domain of expertise, the technique of related items has been used to stimulate interdisciplinary exploration with a sufficient internal connectivity.The Handbook comprises about 200 terms covering the different fields necessary to explore the landscape of enaction and technologies: sensory-motor theories of interaction, multimodal integration, haptic and multimodal interfaces, instrumental interaction, virtual reality, design, human-computer interfaces, paradigms in cognitive sciences, robotics and teleoperation. Mostof them have been written in collaboration by authors from different disciplines.By nature of the contents closely linked to researches in progress, the process followed was original. It was an iterative process that accompanied the progress of the researches all along the Enactive Interfaces project. A restricted core group proposed a first list of terms from the initial expertise of the members of the Enactive network. The list was improved bit by bit from research documents provided within the Enactive network. Most of them are available on the website of the Enactive project. Most of the researchers of the Enactive network, seniors as well as young researchers, were involved actively in the process, exchanging and debating through web dedicated facilities. When scientific materials attained a certain amount, stabilized items have been improved, by merging, renaming, splitting, extending operations, leading to reach the expected level of convergence and balance between disciplines and approaches.Among the chosen terms, some had already a long history. The text does not only provide a definition, but revisits the term in depth, emphasizing how its meaning and usages are questioned, transformed, or nourished, under the light of Enaction and Enactive Interfaces.Other terms are fully novel, in which case the text allows introducing the new concepts at hand. Some of them led to multiple definitions, whether because they represent stabilized different definitions in different disciplines whether because they underlie non-reducible schools and approaches. We respected these differences as representative of the vividness of the domain