Frontiere di giustizia nell'Impero spagnolo: le avventure transatlantiche di Agostino Boasio

The essay focuses on the frontiers of justice in the Spanish Empire as seen in the ‘outsider’ career of Italian merchant Agostino Boasio. Boasio was first arrested in 1558 at Zacatecas, on the northern frontier of Mexico, for distributing heretical books and disseminating heretical ideas. He was condemned and sent to serve his sentence in Spain. However, during the sea voyage to Castile, he took advantage of a last stop in the Azores to escape. Thereafter, the Seville inquisitors pursued him relentlessly throughout Europe. In Antwerp the Boasio affair became the object of a harsh dispute between Philip II and the town authorities immediately before the 1567 revolt. He died in London in 1571. In 1569 his refusal to subscribe to the strict Confession of Faith of the French Church led to his exclusion from the community of London refugees. Boasio’s incredible, almost novelistic adventures can be reconstructed through six Inquisitorial and judicial trials and by Philip II’s numerous letters about the case

Squamous cell carcinoma of the lower lip: FAS/FASL expression, lymphocyte subtypes and outcome.

Squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) of the lip is a relatively common malignancy of the head and neck region. Tumour thickness, grading and perineural invasion are significant prognostic indicators. However, there is still the need of new reliable biological markers able to predict the prognosis of the single cases with an unfavourable biological behaviour unpredictable by the classic clinical-pathological parameters. 32 cases of (SCC) of the lower lip were analysed for their clinicopathologic features, and immunohistochemical expression of Fas/FasL in neoplastic cells and in inflammatory infiltrate. Moreover the density and phenotype of tumour-infiltrating lymphocytes (TIL) were analysed. The results were related with the follow-up of the patients ranging from 2 to 6 years. The cases with over-expression of Fas/FasL in neoplastic cells and Fas+ in T cells preferentially showed a more aggressive clinical behaviour (p<0.01). Moreover we found an alteration of the normal expression of CD4 and CD8 lymphocyte types in ten cases. This data suggest that the Fas/FasL pathway is involved in the close relation between neoplastic cells and T cells and so in the biological behaviour of these tumours

Visiones imperiales y profecía. Roma, España, Nuevo Mundo

Con autorización de la editorial para este libro.Cristóbal Colón se proclamó mensajero enviado por Dios para anunciar «el nuevo cielo e tierra que hasía Nuestro Señor escriviendo San Juan el Apocalipsis» y afirmando que más que mapas y astrolabios, le había guiado la profecía de Isaías. Entre España, el Nuevo Mundo y Roma, donde todo se jugaba, este libro reflexiona sobre la ideología profética e imperial de Fernando el Católico suscitada a partir de la conquista de Granada y del descubrimiento de las nuevas tierras americanas. Lo hace en una perspectiva global, que ensancha notablemente la geografía del profetismo renacentista, reflexionando sobre los nexos entre profetismo cristiano, judío y musulmán y poniendo en diálogo a historiadores del arte, de la literatura y de la cultura.La publicación se han realizado en el marco del proyecto financiado por el European Research Council bajo el 7º Programa Marco de la Unión Europea (FP7/2007-2013) / ERC Grant Agreement nº 323316, proyecto CORPI, «Conversion, Overlapping Religiosities, Polemics, Interaction. Early Modern Iberia and Beyond» dirigido por Mercedes García-Arenal.Peer reviewe

Prevalence and Prognostic Role of IDH Mutations in Acute Myeloid Leukemia: Results of the GIMEMA AML1516 Protocol

IDH1/2 mutations are common in acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and represent a therapeutic target. The GIMEMA AML1516 observational protocol was designed to study the prevalence of IDH1/2 mutations and associations with clinico-biological parameters in a cohort of Italian AML patients. We analyzed a cohort of 284 AML consecutive patients at diagnosis, 139 females and 145 males, of a median age of 65 years (range: 19–86). Of these, 38 (14%) harbored IDH1 and 51 (18%) IDH2 mutations. IDH1/2 mutations were significantly associated with WHO PS &gt;2 (p &lt; 0.001) and non-complex karyotype (p = 0.021) when compared to IDH1/2-WT. Furthermore, patients with IDH1 mutations were more frequently NPM1-mutated (p = 0.007) and had a higher platelet count (p = 0.036). At relapse, IDH1/2 mutations were detected in 6 (25%) patients. As per the outcome, 60.5% of IDH1/2-mutated patients achieved complete remission; overall survival and event-free survival at 2 years were 44.5% and 36.1%, respectively: these rates were similar to IDH1/2-WT. In IDH1/2-mutated patients, high WBC proved to be an independent prognostic factor for survival. In conclusion, the GIMEMA AML1516 confirms that IDH1/2 mutations are frequently detected at diagnosis and underlines the importance of recognizing IDH1/2-mutated cases up-front to offer the most appropriate therapeutic strategy, given the availability of IDH1/2 inhibitors

Sudden Unexpected Deaths and Vaccinations during the First Two Years of Life in Italy: A Case Series Study

Background The signal of an association between vaccination in the second year of life with a hexavalent vaccine and sudden unexpected deaths (SUD) in the two days following vaccination was reported in Germany in 2003. A study to establish whether the immunisation with hexavalent vaccines increased the short term risk of SUD in infants was conducted in Italy. Methodology/Principal Findings The reference population comprises around 3 million infants vaccinated in Italy in the study period 1999–2004 (1.5 million received hexavalent vaccines). Events of SUD in infants aged 1–23 months were identified through the death certificates. Vaccination history was retrieved from immunisation registries. Association between immunisation and death was assessed adopting a case series design focusing on the risk periods 0–1, 0–7, and 0–14 days after immunisation. Among the 604 infants who died of SUD, 244 (40%) had received at least one vaccination. Four deaths occurred within two days from vaccination with the hexavalent vaccines (RR = 1.5; 95% CI 0.6 to 4.2). The RRs for the risk periods 0–7 and 0–14 were 2.0 (95% CI 1.2 to 3.5) and 1.5 (95% CI 0.9 to 2.4). The increased risk was limited to the first dose (RR = 2.2; 95% CI 1.1 to 4.4), whereas no increase was observed for the second and third doses combined. Conclusions The RRs of SUD for any vaccines and any risk periods, even when greater than 1, were almost an order of magnitude lower than the estimates in Germany. The limited increase in RRs found in Italy appears confined to the first dose and may be partly explained by a residual uncontrolled confounding effect of age

Risk factors for death from invasive pneumococcal disease, europe, 2010

We studied the possible association between patient age and sex, clinical presentation, Streptococcus pneumoniae serotype, antimicrobial resistance, and death in invasive pneumococcal disease cases reported by 17 European countries during 2010. The study sample comprised 2,921 patients, of whom 56.8% were men and 38.2% were >65 years of age. Meningitis occurred in 18.5% of cases. Death was reported in 264 (9.0%) cases. Older age, meningitis, and nonsusceptibility to penicillin were signifcantly asso ciated with death. Non-pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV) serotypes among children 65 years of age, risk did not differ by serotype. These fndings highlight differences in case-fatality rates between sero types and age; thus, continued epidemiologic surveillance across all ages is crucial to monitor the long-term effects of PCVs

De sangre y leche: Raza y religión en el mundo ibérico moderno

Sangre y leche fueron símbolos omnipresentes en los territorios de la «Monarquía Católica», en España y su Imperio colonial. Situados a medio camino entre la naturaleza y la cultura, a lo largo de las edades Media y Moderna, la sangre y la leche tejieron una poderosa analogía entre la reproducción fisiológica y la reproducción cultural. Como exploran los artículos de este libro, estos símbolos desempeñaron un papel determinante en los procesos de ordenación, jerarquización, y por supuesto también, de exclusión social dentro de la monarquía. Partiendo de perspectivas tan diversas como la religiosa, la social, la jurídica o la antropológica, los autores de este libro analizan esta privilegiada encrucijada simbólica para interrogarse sobre el origen y desarrollo del discurso de la «raza» en la España altomoderna.Índice: Introducción, por Mercedes García-Arenal y Felipe Pereda. SANGRE. LA POLÍTICA DEL LINAJE Y LA SANGRE. -Genealogía, linaje e identidad etnocultural en la Granada nazarí, por Mohamad Ballan. -Religión y raza en la Edad Media cristiana e islámica, por David Nirenberg. -Linaje, conversión y naturalezas inestables en el Atlántico ibérico: comparación entre la incorporación y la exclusión de los moriscos y de los pueblos indígenas, por Karoline P. Cook. -Limpieza de sangre: la batalla por la reforma desde Salucio hasta Quevedo, por Francisco Bethencourt. LA SANGRE, VEHÍCULO DE LA NATURALEZA INMUTABLE. -Sangre de mi sangre: lo que no se podía adquirir, o casi no, por Jean-Frédéric Schaub. -Demonios, estrellas e imaginación. El cuerpo a principios de la modernidad en los trópicos, por Jorge Cañizares-Esguerra. -«Sua malicia vem-se a conaturizar»: Sangre, color de piel y conversión en el mundo ibérico moderno, por Giuseppe Marcocci. -Los «judíos menstruantes». Sangre, bautismo y la retórica de la evidencia en un tratado de Juan de Quiñones (1632), por Stefania Pastore. SANGRE & LECHE. EL DISCURSO SIMBÓLICO DE LOS FLUIDOS SACROS .-Líquidos sagrados y la formación de protestantes (españoles), por James S. Amelang. -Divinos pechos, como cántaros: estética, política y género de las imágenes del Barroco español, por Felipe Pereda. -La puesta en escena de la limpieza de sangre en la España del siglo XVII, por Rachel Burk. REPRESENTACIONES Y FICCIONES. -Saberes médicos e ideología esencialista: sangre, esperma, leche y construcción del ser, por Christine Orobitg. -Ficciones genealógicas. El morisco Román Ramírez y los libros de caballerías, por Miguel Martínez. -Del morisco real al imaginado. Construcciones de la alteridad en la Península Ibérica moderna, por Francisco J. Moreno Díaz del Campo y Borja Franco Llopis. A MODO DE COLOFÓN. -De sangre y leche: debates y categorías sobre racialización. Una lectura retrospectiva, por Max S. Hering Torres. -¿Eran racistas los europeos de la modernidad temprana?, por Joan Pau Rubiès.Peer reviewe

Inhibition of inflammatory and proliferative responses of human keratinocytes exposed to the sesquiterpene lactones dehydrocostuslactone and costunolide

The imbalance of the intracellular redox state and, in particular, of the glutathione (GSH)/GSH disulfide couple homeostasis, is involved in the pathogenesis of a number of diseases. In many skin diseases, including psoriasis, oxidative stress plays an important role, as demonstrated by the observation that treatments leading to increase of the local levels of oxidant species ameliorates the disease. Recently, dehydrocostuslactone (DCE) and custonolide (CS), two terpenes naturally occurring in many plants, have been found to exert various anti-inflammatory and pro-apoptotic effects on different human cell types. These compounds decrease the level of the intracellular GSH by direct interaction with it, and, therefore, can alter cellular redox state. DCE and CS can trigger S-glutathionylation of various substrates, including the transcription factor STAT3 and JAK1/2 proteins. In the present study, we investigated on the potential role of DCE and CS in regulating inflammatory and proliferative responses of human keratinocytes to cytokines. We demonstrated that DCE and CS decreased intracellular GSH levels in human keratinocytes, as well as inhibited STAT3 and STAT1 phosphorylation and activation triggered by IL-22 or IFN-\u3b3, respectively. Consequently, DCE and CS decreased the IL-22- and IFN-\u3b3-induced expression of inflammatory and regulatory genes in keratinocytes, including CCL2, CXCL10, ICAM-1 and SOCS3. DCE and CS also inhibited proliferation and cell-cycle progression-related gene expression, as well as they promoted cell cycle arrest and apoptosis. In parallel, DCE and CS activated the anti-inflammatory EGFR and ERK1/2 molecules in keratinocytes, and, thus, wound healing in an in vitro injury model. Taken together, our findings encourage the employment of DCE and CS in psoriasis, as they could efficiently counteract the pro-inflammatory effects of IFN-\u3b3 and IL-22 on keratinocytes, revert the apoptosis-resistant phenotype, as well as inhibit hyperproliferation in the psoriatic epidermis