Biology, Injury, and Control of the European Needle-bending Midge (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae) on Scotch Pine in Michigan

Contarinia baeri is univoltine in Michigan. Adults emerge in spring, and females deposit eggs in small clusters in the sheaths of new-growth pine needles. Larvae hatch shortly thereafter and there are three larval instars. Larval feeding causes the needles to at first droop, discolor, and eventually drop, reducing the quality of Christmas trees and occasionally killing shoots. Larvae overwinter on the ground in cocoons, and pupate in spring. Adults were suppressed (\u3e 75% control) with formulations of Pydrin® (fenvalerate) and Tempo® (cyfluthrin) applied within a week after adult emergence

Vanillin prevents doxorubicin-induced apoptosis and oxidative stress in rat H9c2 cardiomyocytes

Doxorubicin (doxo) is an effective anticancer compound in several tumor types. However, as a consequence of oxidative stress induction and ROS overproduction, its high cardiotoxicity demands urgent attention. Vanillin possesses antioxidant, antiproliferative, antidepressant and anti-glycating properties. Therefore, we investigated the potential vanillin protective effects against doxo-induced cardiotoxicity in H9c2 cells. Using multiparametric approach, we demonstrated that vanillin restored both cell viability and damage in response to doxo exposure. Contextually, vanillin decreased sub-G1 appearance and caspase-3 and PARP1 activation, reducing the doxo-related apoptosis induction. From a mechanistic point of view, vanillin hindered doxo-induced ROS accumulation and impaired the ERK phosphorylation. Notably, besides the cardioprotective effects, vanillin did not counteract the doxo effectiveness in osteosarcoma cells. Taken together, our results suggest that vanillin ameliorates doxo-induced toxicity in H9c2 cells, opening new avenues for developing alternative therapeutic approaches to prevent the anthracycline-related cardiotoxicity and to improve the long-term outcome of antineoplastic treatment

CUSTOMIZED WEBGIS SOLUTIONS FOR EXPOSOMICS

Abstract. Exposomics is a science aiming at quantifying the effects on human health of all the factors influencing it, but genetic ones. They include environment, food, mobility habits and cultural factors. The percentage of the world's population living in the urban areas is projected to increase in the next decades. Rising industrialization, urbanization and heterogeneity are leading to new challenges for public health and quality of life in the population. The prevalence of conditions such as asthma and cardiovascular diseases is increasing due to a change in lifestyle and air quality. This enlightens the necessity of targeted interventions to increase citizens' quality of life and decrease their health risks. Within the EU H2020 PULSE project, a multi-technological system to assist the population in the prevention and treatment of asthma and type 2 diabetes has been developed. The system created in PULSE features several parts, such as a personal App for the citizens, a set of air quality sensors, a WebGIS and dashboards for the public health operators. Citizens are directly involved in an exchange paradigm in which they send their own data and receive feedbacks and suggestions about their health in return. The WebGIS is a very distinguishing element of the PULSE technology and the paper illustrates its main functionalities focusing on the distinguishing and innovative features developed

The Galileo for Science (G4S 2.0) project: Measurement of the Gravitational Redshift with the Galileo satellites DORESA and MILENA

TheG4S2.0project represents an important opportunity to perform fundamental physics measurements with the two Galileo-FOC satellites DORESA and MILENA in elliptic orbits. In this paper, we discuss the possibility to improve the current constraints on local position invariance via a new measurement of the gravitational redshift, taking into account both a new model of the satellites and more in-depth considerations on non-gravitational perturbations

Learning from Nature: Pregnancy Changes the Expression of Inflammation-Related Genes in Patients with Multiple Sclerosis

Pregnancy is associated with reduced activity of multiple sclerosis (MS). However, the biological mechanisms underlying this pregnancy-related decrease in disease activity are poorly understood

Association of Genetic Markers with CSF Oligoclonal Bands in Multiple Sclerosis Patients

Objective:to explore the association between genetic markers and Oligoclonal Bands (OCB) in the Cerebro Spinal Fluid (CSF) of Italian Multiple Sclerosis patients.Methods:We genotyped 1115 Italian patients for HLA-DRB1*15 and HLA-A*02. In a subset of 925 patients we tested association with 52 non-HLA SNPs associated with MS susceptibility and we calculated a weighted Genetic Risk Score. Finally, we performed a Genome Wide Association Study (GWAS) with OCB status on a subset of 562 patients. The best associated SNPs of the Italian GWAS were replicated in silico in Scandinavian and Belgian populations, and meta-analyzed.Results:HLA-DRB1*15 is associated with OCB+: p = 0.03, Odds Ratio (OR) = 1.6, 95% Confidence Limits (CL) = 1.1-2.4. None of the 52 non-HLA MS susceptibility loci was associated with OCB, except one SNP (rs2546890) near IL12B gene (OR: 1.45; 1.09-1.92). The weighted Genetic Risk Score mean was significantly (p = 0.0008) higher in OCB+ (7.668) than in OCB- (7.412) patients. After meta-analysis on the three datasets (Italian, Scandinavian and Belgian) for the best associated signals resulted from the Italian GWAS, the strongest signal was a SNP (rs9320598) on chromosome 6q (p = 9.4×10-7) outside the HLA region (65 Mb).Discussion:genetic factors predispose to the development of OCB

A Novel Method for Learning Policies from Variable Constraint Data

Many everyday human skills can be framed in terms of performing some task subject to constraints imposed by the environment. Constraints are usually unobservable and frequently change between contexts. In this paper, we present a novel approach for learning (unconstrained) control policies from movement data, where observations come from movements under different constraints. As a key ingredient, we introduce a small but highly effective modification to the standard risk functional, allowing us to make a meaningful comparison between the estimated policy and constrained observations. We demonstrate our approach on systems of varying complexity, including kinematic data from the ASIMO humanoid robot with 27 degrees of freedom, and present results for learning from human demonstration