Relative Decompression Risks of Spacecraft Cabin Atmospheres - Comparision of Gases Using Miniature Pigs Final Report

Using miniature pigs for analysis of altitude decompression sickness and relative decompression hazards of various cabin atmospheres of inert gase

Genetic Variation in 11β-Hydroxysteroid Dehydrogenase Type 1 Predicts Adrenal Hyperandrogenism among Lean Women with Polycystic Ovary Syndrome

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Un impianto innovativo nella filiera del recupero della scoria da forno elettrico

Nel presente lavoro viene presentato il sistema Slag-Rec per il trattamento della scoria EAF, che è statorealizzato presso MFL, Liezen (Austria) ed è attualmente in fase di installazione ed avviamento presso laacciaieria ASO, Ospitaletto (Brescia). Il sistema permette di realizzare la granulazione a secco della scoria,eliminando il contatto della stessa con acqua di raffreddamento, attuando allo stesso tempo unraffreddamento controllato e ripetibile in funzione del tipo di scoria da trattare

The ACTIVE (Acute Cholecystitis Trial Invasive Versus Endoscopic) study: Multicenter randomized, double-blind, controlled trial of laparoscopic (LC) versus open (LTC) surgery for acute cholecystitis (AC) in adults

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>In some randomized trials successful laparoscopic cholecystectomy for cholecystitis is associated with an earlier recovery and shorter hospital stay when compared with open cholecystectomy. Other studies did not confirm these results and showed that the potential advantages of laparoscopic cholecystectomy for cholecystitis can be offset by a high conversion rate to open surgery. Moreover in these studies a similar postoperative programme to optimize recovery comparing laparoscopic and open approaches was not standardized. These studies also do not report all eligible patients and are not double blinded.</p> <p>Design</p> <p>The present study project is a prospective, randomized investigation. The study will be performed in the Department of General, Emergency and Transplant Surgery St Orsola-Malpighi University Hospital (Bologna, Italy), a large teaching institutions, with the participation of all surgeons who accept to be involved in (and together with other selected centers). The patients will be divided in two groups: in the first group the patient will be submitted to laparoscopic cholecystectomy within 72 hours after the diagnosis while in the second group will be submitted to laparotomic cholecystectomy within 72 hours after the diagnosis.</p> <p>Trial Registration</p> <p>TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER ISRCTN27929536 – The ACTIVE (Acute Cholecystitis Trial Invasive Versus Endoscopic) study. A multicentre randomised, double-blind, controlled trial of laparoscopic versus open surgery for acute cholecystitis in adults.</p

Balancing selection is common in the extended MHC region but most alleles with opposite risk profile for autoimmune diseases are neutrally evolving

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Several susceptibility genetic variants for autoimmune diseases have been identified. A subset of these polymorphisms displays an opposite risk profile in different autoimmune conditions. This observation open interesting questions on the evolutionary forces shaping the frequency of these alleles in human populations.</p> <p>We aimed at testing the hypothesis whereby balancing selection has shaped the frequency of opposite risk alleles.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Since balancing selection signatures are expected to extend over short genomic portions, we focused our analyses on 11 regions carrying putative functional polymorphisms that may represent the disease variants (and the selection targets). No exceptional nucleotide diversity was observed for <it>ZSCAN23</it>, <it>HLA-DMB</it>, <it>VARS2</it>, <it>PTPN22</it>, <it>BAT3</it>, <it>C6orf47</it>, and <it>IL10</it>; summary statistics were consistent with evolutionary neutrality for these gene regions. Conversely, <it>CDSN/PSORS1C1</it>, <it>TRIM10/TRIM40</it>, <it>BTNL2</it>, and <it>TAP2 </it>showed extremely high nucleotide diversity and most tests rejected neutrality, suggesting the action of balancing selection. For <it>TAP2 </it>and <it>BTNL2 </it>these signatures are not secondary to linkage disequilibrium with HLA class II genes. Nonetheless, with the exception of variants in <it>TRIM40 </it>and <it>CDSN</it>, our data suggest that opposite risk SNPs are not selection targets but rather have accumulated as neutral variants.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Data herein indicate that balancing selection is common within the extended MHC region and involves several non-HLA loci. Yet, the evolutionary history of most SNPs with an opposite effect for autoimmune diseases is consistent with evolutionary neutrality. We suggest that variants with an opposite effect on autoimmune diseases should not be considered a distinct class of disease alleles from the evolutionary perspective and, in a few cases, the opposite effect on distinct diseases may derive from complex haplotype structures in regions with high genetic diversity.</p

Signatures of Environmental Genetic Adaptation Pinpoint Pathogens as the Main Selective Pressure through Human Evolution

Previous genome-wide scans of positive natural selection in humans have identified a number of non-neutrally evolving genes that play important roles in skin pigmentation, metabolism, or immune function. Recent studies have also shown that a genome-wide pattern of local adaptation can be detected by identifying correlations between patterns of allele frequencies and environmental variables. Despite these observations, the degree to which natural selection is primarily driven by adaptation to local environments, and the role of pathogens or other ecological factors as selective agents, is still under debate. To address this issue, we correlated the spatial allele frequency distribution of a large sample of SNPs from 55 distinct human populations to a set of environmental factors that describe local geographical features such as climate, diet regimes, and pathogen loads. In concordance with previous studies, we detected a significant enrichment of genic SNPs, and particularly non-synonymous SNPs associated with local adaptation. Furthermore, we show that the diversity of the local pathogenic environment is the predominant driver of local adaptation, and that climate, at least as measured here, only plays a relatively minor role. While background demography by far makes the strongest contribution in explaining the genetic variance among populations, we detected about 100 genes which show an unexpectedly strong correlation between allele frequencies and pathogenic environment, after correcting for demography. Conversely, for diet regimes and climatic conditions, no genes show a similar correlation between the environmental factor and allele frequencies. This result is validated using low-coverage sequencing data for multiple populations. Among the loci targeted by pathogen-driven selection, we found an enrichment of genes associated to autoimmune diseases, such as celiac disease, type 1 diabetes, and multiples sclerosis, which lends credence to the hypothesis that some susceptibility alleles for autoimmune diseases may be maintained in human population due to past selective processes

Genome-Wide Identification of Susceptibility Alleles for Viral Infections through a Population Genetics Approach

Viruses have exerted a constant and potent selective pressure on human genes throughout evolution. We utilized the marks left by selection on allele frequency to identify viral infection-associated allelic variants. Virus diversity (the number of different viruses in a geographic region) was used to measure virus-driven selective pressure. Results showed an excess of variants correlated with virus diversity in genes involved in immune response and in the biosynthesis of glycan structures functioning as viral receptors; a significantly higher than expected number of variants was also seen in genes encoding proteins that directly interact with viral components. Genome-wide analyses identified 441 variants significantly associated with virus-diversity; these are more frequently located within gene regions than expected, and they map to 139 human genes. Analysis of functional relationships among genes subjected to virus-driven selective pressure identified a complex network enriched in viral products-interacting proteins. The novel approach to the study of infectious disease epidemiology presented herein may represent an alternative to classic genome-wide association studies and provides a large set of candidate susceptibility variants for viral infections