ORTO EXPO, un progetto… modello

Per la Smart City che Milano intende essere, l’OrtoMercato dovrà diventare un elemento fondamentale: per tutti gli eventi di EXPO 2015 la city logistic assumerà un ruolo di primo piano sia per la gestione e distribuzione dei flussi (persone e merci), sia per minimizzare tutti quegli impatti che, in assenza di un Piano specifico, saranno decisamente rilevanti

Spatial distribution and daily activity patterns of three carnivore species in temperate grasslands of southern Brazil and northern Uruguay: Distribuição espacial e padrões de atividade diária de três espécies de carnívoros em pastagens temperadas do sul do Brasil e norte do Uruguai

In the temperate grasslands of southern Brazil and northern Uruguay, three species of mesopredators have similar size, are in the same guild, and they seem to tolerate anthropogenic modifications. Sympatric species from the same trophic guild tend to divide resources both spatially and temporally to facilitate coexistence.  The aim of this study was to determine the patterns of the periods of daily activity and habitat use through different detection and occupancy models, of Cerdocyon thous (crab-eating fox), Lycalopex gymnocercus (pampas fox) and Leopardus geoffroyi (geoffroy's cat) in the mosaic of landscapes of anthropic domain in the Uruguayan Savanna ecoregion, through camera trap records. A total of 66 cameras were installed, divided into the 3 main environments, with a distance of 2 km between each camera to maintain the independence of the records, achieving a real sampling effort of 4,756 trap nights. The three mesocarnivores considered in this study were predominantly nocturnal. Cerdocyon thous presented a vesperal-nocturnal  activity pattern, being sunset the moment of highest activity, in contrast, L. gymnocercus presented highest activity at sunrise, being crepuscular-nocturnal. These opposite daily activity patterns among foxes species have not been recorded in other regions. With respect to L. geoffroyi, these specie presented a mostly nocturnal activity pattern. Regarding the use of habitats by the species after applying different models, the highest probability of detection and occupation of C. thous and L. geoffroyi was in the native forest environment and for L. gymnocercus was the natural grassland. Even the preference of L. geoffroyi for the native forest environment, these species presented a certain degree of adaptability for habitats with alterations produced by agricultural activities. The results obtained represent a very important contribution to the region in which this study was carried out, as well as allowing us to compare the results with other studies with these species in other regions

Vitamin d and the risk of non-melanoma skin cancer: A systematic literature review and meta-analysis on behalf of the italian melanoma intergroup

We aimed to provide a comprehensive overview of the link between vitamin D and non-melanoma skin cancer (NMSC). For this purpose, we conducted a systematic literature review (updated to 3 February 2021) and meta-analysis of the studies reporting on the association between vitamin D intake (from diet and supplements) and blood concentration, polymorphisms of the vitamin D receptor (VDR) and vitamin D binding protein (VDBP) genes, and the risk of NMSC. Random effects meta-analysis models were fitted to merge study-specific risk estimates into summary relative risk (SRR) and corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CI). Twenty-four studies altogether were included. There was a suggestive association between increasing serum/plasma vitamin D concentration and NMSC risk (SRR for highest vs. lowest concentration 1.67, 95%CI 0.61–4.56), although with large heterogeneity across studies (I2 = 91%). NMSC risk was associated with highest vitamin D intake in observational studies but not in clinical trials. Finally, there was no significant association between any polymorphism of the VDR and VDBP genes and NMSC risk. In conclusion, no strong relationship between vitamin D metabolism and NMSC risk appears to exist according to our systematic review and meta-analysis, although some findings are worthy of further investigation

3D Face Reconstruction from Light Field Images: A Model-free Approach

Reconstructing 3D facial geometry from a single RGB image has recently instigated wide research interest. However, it is still an ill-posed problem and most methods rely on prior models hence undermining the accuracy of the recovered 3D faces. In this paper, we exploit the Epipolar Plane Images (EPI) obtained from light field cameras and learn CNN models that recover horizontal and vertical 3D facial curves from the respective horizontal and vertical EPIs. Our 3D face reconstruction network (FaceLFnet) comprises a densely connected architecture to learn accurate 3D facial curves from low resolution EPIs. To train the proposed FaceLFnets from scratch, we synthesize photo-realistic light field images from 3D facial scans. The curve by curve 3D face estimation approach allows the networks to learn from only 14K images of 80 identities, which still comprises over 11 Million EPIs/curves. The estimated facial curves are merged into a single pointcloud to which a surface is fitted to get the final 3D face. Our method is model-free, requires only a few training samples to learn FaceLFnet and can reconstruct 3D faces with high accuracy from single light field images under varying poses, expressions and lighting conditions. Comparison on the BU-3DFE and BU-4DFE datasets show that our method reduces reconstruction errors by over 20% compared to recent state of the art

Effect of age on melanoma risk, prognosis and treatment response

As for all types of cancer, the incidence of melanoma increases with age. However, naevus counts (the principal risk factor for melanoma) decrease with age; hence the relationship between ageing and melanoma is complex. Subjects who maintain a high naevus count after the age of 50 years are more likely to be affected by melanoma, as their lesions do not senesce. Longer telomere length, which is strongly related to age, is linked to high naevus counts/melanoma risk; thus melanoma biology is influenced by factors that slow down ageing. Age is also an important prognostic factor in melanoma. Increasing age leads to worse survival in stages I, II and III. Sentinel lymph node (SLN) status, which is a strong predictor of melanoma survival, is also affected by age, as SLN positivity decreases with age. However, the prognostic value of SLN on survival increases with age, so, again, these relationships are complex. In patients with stage IV melanoma, age impacts on survival because it affects responses to treatment. This review examines the effects of age on melanoma risk, prognostic factors and responses to treatment

Gender-Dependent Specificities in Cutaneous Melanoma Predisposition, Risk Factors, Somatic Mutations, Prognostic and Predictive Factors: A Systematic Review.

Over the last decades, the incidence of melanoma has been steadily growing, with 4.2% of the population worldwide affected by cutaneous melanoma (CM) in 2020 and with a higher incidence and mortality in men than in women. We investigated both the risk factors for CM development and the prognostic and predictive factors for survival, stratifying for both sex and gender. We conducted a systematic review of studies indexed in PUB-MED, EMBASE, and Scopus until 4 February 2021. We included reviews, meta-analyses, and pooled analyses investigating differences between women and men in CM risk factors and in prognostic and predictive factors for CM survival. Twenty-four studies were included, and relevant data extracted. Of these, 13 studies concerned potential risk factors, six concerned predictive factors, and five addressed prognostic factors of melanoma. The systematic review revealed no significant differences in genetic predisposition to CM between males and females, while there appear to be several gender disparities regarding CM risk factors, partly attributable to different lifestyles and behavioral habits between men and women. There is currently no clear evidence of whether the mutational landscapes of CM differ by sex/gender. Prognosis is justified by a complex combination of phenotypes and immune functions, while reported differences between genders in predicting the effectiveness of new treatments are inconsistent. Overall, the results emerging from the literature reveal the importance of considering the sex/gender variable in all studies and pave the way for including it towards precision medicine. Men and women differ genetically, biologically, and by social construct. Our systematic review shows that, although fundamental, the variable sex/gender is not among the ones collected and analyzed

PKCε regulates vessel formation by peri-vascular adipose tissue (PVAT) cells

Vessel formation is crucial in tumour growth and tissue regeneration. Protein kinase C (PKC) ε has a well-known role on hematopoietic and mesenchymal progenitor cell differentiation and proliferation (Gobbi et al. 2013). Although PKCε has a demonstrated role in vascular restenosis, data on PKCε and vascular progenitor differentiation are still lacking. The aim of this work was to study the role of PKCε in vessel formation by adult adipose tissue cell progenitors. We, first, isolated the vessel progenitors from the adipose tissue localized between aortic arch and pulmonary artery of adult mice by collagenase/elastase digestion followed by magnetic immunoselection of Sca1+ cells (Passmann et al. 2008). We, then, tested their capability to form vessels in collagen gels and to differentiate to endothelial and smooth muscle lineage after treatment with PKCε specific activator and inhibitor peptides. The functional experiments showed that the pharmacological activation of endogenous PKCε abrogated tubule formation with a concomitant decrease of smooth alpha-actin (SMA) and platelet endothelial cell adhesion molecule (PECAM) together with the up-regulation of p-PAK1 expression. In vivo transient over-expression of PKCε significantly reduced SMA and PECAM expression levels in vessel wall cells. Together our data suggests that PKCε may affect vessel wall remodelling balancing the “phenotypic switching” (Salmon et al. 2013) between the proliferative and the differentiated state of smooth muscle and endothelial progenitor mesenchymal cells