The Accessible Underwater Cultural Heritage Sites (AUCHS) as a sustainable tourism development opportunity in the Mediterranean Region

This article is about the multi-dimensional value of the Accessible Underwater Cultural Heritage Sites (AUCHS) for coastal areas and islands in the Mediterranean Region, especially as an opportunity for sustainable blue growth. It is an attempt to underline the need for the broad promotion of Underwater Cultural Heritage (UCH) and to highlight the contribution of innovative technologies for direct and indirect accessibility to underwater cultural heritage remains. The paper further demonstrates how the AUCHS can become niches of touristic development for an area whilst offering multifaceted socioeconomic benefits to the local communities

Assessing the macroeconomic effect of gas pipeline projects: the case of Trans-Adriatic Pipeline on Greece

This paper presents a framework for analyzing in quantitative and monetary terms the macroeconomic effects associated with the construction and operation of large energy investments, including the impact on Gross Domestic Product (GDP), employment and public revenues, by sector of economic activity. The proposed framework has been implemented for analyzing the macroeconomic implications associated with the construction and operation of the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) project in Greece. To this end, the input-output methodological framework has been used for estimating the macroeconomic implications of the project under consideration in conjunction with the adjusted earnings gain approach for monetizing the resulting employment effects. The results of the analysis clearly show that the construction activities will create significant direct, indirect and induced benefits to the Greek economy, growing the GDP by €931 million, creating employment benefits amounted to €197 million and contributing €359 million to the treasury. Furthermore, it was estimated that ongoing operation of the pipeline could increase the national GDP at about €17 million, the employment benefits of about €4.7 million and the tax revenues of approximately €6.8 million, on an annual basis and for a period of 50 years

Apolipoprotein E gene polymorphism in Greek children with nephrotic syndrome

Apolipoprotein E (ApoE) genotypes were determined for children with nephrotic syndrome (NS) (study group, N=17) and control group (N=31). In controls, ε3/ε3 was prominent. In study group, ε2 allele was present in contrast to con­trols. Hypercholesterolemia seems related to apoE genes polymorphism. Genotyping could predict the clinical course of NS

Transcatheter Bioprosthetic Aortic Valve Durability: Where do we Stand?

Transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) was initially reserved for inoperable or high surgical risk patients with severe symptomatic aortic valve stenosis, but after the recent publication of randomized studies comparing TAVI to surgical aortic valve replacement (AVR) among intermediate risk (PARTNER 2 and SURTAVI) and low risk patients (PARTNER 3 and Evolut Low Risk), the momentum for further expansion of TAVI at the expense of AVR seems irreversible. The main obstacle before the wider application of TAVI for intermediate and lower risk patients is the uncertainty regarding bioprosthetic valve durability and the potential for structural deterioration and dysfunction over time. A concise overview regarding bioprosthetic valve durability issues, the relevant current scientific data and their importance for TAVI patient selection and management is herein presented. Rhythmos 2020;15(1):72-76

Objective Definition of Rosette Shape Variation Using a Combined Computer Vision and Data Mining Approach

Computer-vision based measurements of phenotypic variation have implications for crop improvement and food security because they are intrinsically objective. It should be possible therefore to use such approaches to select robust genotypes. However, plants are morphologically complex and identification of meaningful traits from automatically acquired image data is not straightforward. Bespoke algorithms can be designed to capture and/or quantitate specific features but this approach is inflexible and is not generally applicable to a wide range of traits. In this paper, we have used industry-standard computer vision techniques to extract a wide range of features from images of genetically diverse Arabidopsis rosettes growing under non-stimulated conditions, and then used statistical analysis to identify those features that provide good discrimination between ecotypes. This analysis indicates that almost all the observed shape variation can be described by 5 principal components. We describe an easily implemented pipeline including image segmentation, feature extraction and statistical analysis. This pipeline provides a cost-effective and inherently scalable method to parameterise and analyse variation in rosette shape. The acquisition of images does not require any specialised equipment and the computer routines for image processing and data analysis have been implemented using open source software. Source code for data analysis is written using the R package. The equations to calculate image descriptors have been also provided