Time-extended inductive tokamak discharges with differentially-tilted toroidal field coils

The strong toroidal magnetic field required for plasma confinement in tokamaks is generated by a set of D-shaped coils lying equidistant on meridian planes toroidally located around the central axis of the device. A major technological challenge tied to this configuration is represented by the large Lorentz force acting on the coils and arising from the interaction of the coils’ currents with the magnetic field generated by the coil system itself. As this force is given by the cross product of the coil current and the magnetic field, various kinds of coil geometry modification have been proposed to alleviate this problem, from an inclination of the entire coil in order to maintain its planarity, to azimuthal tilting of all, or parts of, the coil profile. When the inner legs of the coils are tilted, apart from a reduction of the electromagnetic forces, a solenoid-like structure is formed which introduces additional magnetic flux linked to the plasma. Considering compact, high field devices, it is shown that when this additional flux is exploited, totally or in part, to ramp up the plasma current, the discharge time can be extended by a significant amount without resorting to noninductive current drive systems. Operational scenarios with inner-leg-tilted toroidal field coils are presented

Coronary angioscopy

Coronary angioscopy will not replace angiography as the gold standard for imaging atherosclerotic coronary arteries. However, there may well be a clinical niche for a technology that gives accurate information regarding a specific lesion, if that information can be used to improve the acute or chronic outcome of an interventional procedure. Our experience demonstrates that angioscopy indeed provides this information. Using angioscopy, we now have access to information regarding arterial wall disease that heretofore has been available only at necropsy. In addition, whereas angiography has provided only a 2-dimensional, gray-scale image of the coronary vessels, angioscopy offers a full-color, 3-dimensional perspective of the intracoronary surface morphology. These important lesion-specific details, not reliably available from angiography alone, may ultimately be used to improve patient outcome and to assess risk

Hyaluronic Acid Injections in the Treatment of Osteoarthritis Secondary to Primary Inflammatory Rheumatic Diseases: A Systematic Review and Qualitative Synthesis

The purpose of this study is to review the current literature on the use of hyaluronic acid (HA) specifically applied to the treatment of osteoarthritis (OA) secondary to primary inflammatory rheumatic diseases. Osteoarthritis should be carefully considered because it has potentially devastating effects on health-related quality of life. Locally injected HA seems to be an effective treatment for OA but it is not clear how to place this treatment in the context of inflammatory rheumatic disorders. To retrieve relevant articles, we conducted the search through MEDLINE, EMBASE and Cochrane Databases performing the PICO strategy. We finally selected four randomized clinical trials and six observational studies and grouped them in accordance with its main objective within three focuses: the clinical effect of HA therapy in joints without any signs of inflammation, the clinical effects of HA therapy in joints with active synovitis, and the involvement and changes of synovial fluid in the treatment of secondary OA. Our qualitative analysis clearly showed that the current literature is marked by high levels of heterogeneity and therefore difficult to interpret. Therefore, our hypothesis that viscosupplementation should be considered as a treatment for chronic moderate symptomatic OA secondary to inflammatory rheumatic diseases, and not for flares with joint swelling, cannot be definitely supported. Well-designed studies are necessary to definitively clarify the range of application of intra-articular HA injections in the treatment of inflammatory rheumatic disorders

Translation and cross-cultural adaptation into italian of the self-administered FLARE-RA questionnaire for rheumatoid arthritis

The aim was to provide a translation into Italian with cross-cultural adaptation of the French FLARE-Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) questionnaire, and to test its acceptability, feasibility, reliability and construct validity in a single-centre cohort study. The French version of the FLARE-RA questionnaire was cross-culturally adapted and translated into Italian following an established forward\u2013backward translation procedure, with independent translations and backtranslations. To validate the Italian version we tested the internal validity with Cronbach\u2019s alpha, test-retest reliability with the intraclass correlation coefficient, agreement between assessments with Bland-Altman plots and construct validity with Spearman\u2019s correlation coefficients. The questionnaire was tested on 283 consecutive RA outpatients (mean age 56.1\ub1}13.9 years, 226/283 females, median disease duration 12.6 years ranging from 0.2 to 70.6). For the global score (11 items) the Cronbach\u2019s alpha coefficient was 0.94. The intraclass correlation coefficient was 0.87 (95% CI, 0.76-0.96). The correlation of FLARE-RA global score was 0.59 (95% CI, 0.50-0.66) with the Disease Activity Score on 28 joints, 0.63 (95% CI, 0.55-0.71) with the Simplified Disease Activity Index, 0.77 (95% CI, 0.71-0.83) with the RA Impact of Disease and 0.67 (95% CI, 0.59-0.73) with the Health Assessment Questionnaire. The Italian version of the FLARE-RA is feasible, brief and easy to administer. The translated and cross-cultural adapted showed accordingly to be valid and reliable. This questionnaire has some practical advantages, such as clarity, comprehensiveness, simplicity, and a minimum filling time. The development of cross-cultural adapted questionnaires in different languages is of pivotal importance to obtain standardized and comparable data across countries

Experience of 170 cases of ductal carcinoma in ' (DCIS)

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Varietalidad y etiquetado: Porcentaje mínimo de cortes de vinos wine varietals and labelling

Se evaluaron 95 vinos experimentales, cosecha 2016, tanto en su estado puro (100%) como a distintos porcentajes de combinación (90; 85; 80; 75; 60%), con el fin determinar el porcentaje mínimo de una variedad que debe tenerse en cuenta en un corte de vino etiquetado como “variedad única”. Los respectivos cortes de las variedades bajo estudio (Malbec, Cabernet Sauvignon, Bonarda, Syrah, Merlot, Tempranillo, y Aspirant Bouchet) fueron supeditados al Análisis Descriptivo Cualitativo (se evaluaron 6 atributos olfativos/gustativos), y al Análisis Discriminativo Comparativo (2 repeticiones y 14 determinaciones), contando con un panel de expertos de tipo descriptivo (N = 7). Finalmente los datos sensoriales fueron analizados a través de la Prueba del Signo con diseño de muestras apareadas, a través del cual, la mayoría de los cortes de vinos por debajo del 85% mostraron diferencias significativas (P < 0.05) con respecto al vino patrón (100%). Esto es, se identifica organolépticamente aquella variedad que se encuentra en mayor proporción, cuando el vino está constituido con un mínimo de 85% de dicha variedad

Hsa-miR-210-3p expression in breast cancer and its putative association with worse outcome in patients treated with Docetaxel

MicroRNA-210-3p is the most prominent hypoxia regulated microRNA, and it has been found significantly overexpressed in different human cancers. We performed the expression analysis of miR-210-3p in a retrospective cohort of breast cancer patients with a median follow-up of 76 months (n = 283). An association between higher levels of miR-210-3p and risk of disease progression (HR: 2.13, 95%CI: 1.33-3.39, P = 0.002) was found in the subgroup of patients treated with Epirubicin and Cyclophosphamide followed by Docetaxel. Moreover, a cut off value of 20.966 established by ROC curve analyses allowed to discriminate patients who developed distant metastases with an accuracy of 85% at 3- (AUC: 0.870, 95%CI: 0.690-1.000) and 83% at 5-years follow up (AUC: 0.832, 95%CI: 0.656-1.000). Whereas the accuracy in discriminating patients who died for the disease was of 79.6% at both 5- (AUC: 0.804, 95%CI: 0.517-1.000) and 10-years (AUC: 0.804. 95%CI: 0.517-1.000) follow-up. In silico analysis of miR-210-3p and Docetaxel targets provided evidence for a putative molecular cross-talk involving microtubule regulation, drug efflux metabolism and oxidative stress response. Overall, our data point to the miR-210-3p involvement in the response to therapeutic regimens including Docetaxel in sequential therapy with anthracyclines, suggesting it may represent a predictive biomarker in breast cancer patients

Simultaneous determination of wave speed and arrival time of reflected waves using the pressure-velocity loop

This is the post print version of the article. The official published version can be found at the link below.In a previous paper we demonstrated that the linear portion of the pressure–velocity loop (PU-loop) corresponding to early systole could be used to calculate the local wave speed. In this paper we extend this work to show that determination of the time at which the PU-loop first deviates from linearity provides a convenient way to determine the arrival time of reflected waves (Tr). We also present a new technique using the PU-loop that allows for the determination of wave speed and Tr simultaneously. We measured pressure and flow in elastic tubes of different diameters, where a strong reflection site existed at known distances away form the measurement site. We also measured pressure and flow in the ascending aorta of 11 anaesthetised dogs where a strong reflection site was produced through total arterial occlusion at four different sites. Wave speed was determined from the initial slope of the PU-loop and Tr was determined using a new algorithm that detects the sampling point at which the initial linear part of the PU-loop deviates from linearity. The results of the new technique for detecting Tr were comparable to those determined using the foot-to-foot and wave intensity analysis methods. In elastic tubes Tr detected using the new algorithm was almost identical to that detected using wave intensity analysis and foot-to-foot methods with a maximum difference of 2%. Tr detected using the PU-loop in vivo highly correlated with that detected using wave intensity analysis (r 2 = 0.83, P < 0.001). We conclude that the new technique described in this paper offers a convenient and objective method for detecting Tr, and allows for the dynamic determination of wave speed and Tr, simultaneously