Education and dissemination by eukaryotic microorganisms

Microscopic life forms are everywhere on Earth, and eukaryotic microbes (mostly protists) are no exception. Indeed, they are very common in all fresh- and salt water, as well as in moist soils, and a significant number of species can be found as parasites or symbionts of several organisms. Despite their abundance, their presence in some important ecological activities, and their relevance to human and environmental health, protists are often ignored both by the educational community and the lay public. Nevertheless, in our experience, protists represent unique models to teach fundamental topics of biology, ecology, systematic and evolution, especially to undergraduate students, as they perform all life functions within the small space of a single cell. In addition, protists may help counter popular misconceptions about microbes as “inferior” and less evolved organisms. For these reasons, since several years, we have been offering theoretical and practical experiences on protists for first and secondary grade schools. In particular, we have recently been collaborating with some museums and one zoological park to install permanent "exhibitions” for the observation of some species of protists (especially ciliates) as well as educational trails. These trails will be organized with an appropriate language for the non-scientific community and may serve to show the relevance of protists in various fields, such as evolution, scientific research, and public health applications

AVIM—A contactless system for infant data acquisition and analysis: Software architecture and first results

Traditional techniques for the diagnosis of neurological disorders are recently complemented by contact-less methods that provide a semi-quantitative assessment of the patient status. In this framework, the assessment of infant's behaviour based on the analysis of audio and video recordings is appealing thanks to its unobtrusiveness and to the affordable costs of the equipment. This paper presents the architecture of a system, named AVIM, conceived for supporting clinical diagnosis in newborns with contact-less techniques. Its most innovative aspect is the ability of merging in a single tool the management of medical records and reports, audio/video data acquisition, handling and analysis, editing and filling out customized tests. Moreover, unlike other commercial or open source software tools, AVIM allows adding markers and notes while recording audio and video signals and provides detailed reports with both perceptual scores and acoustical and kinematical parameters of clinical interest computed through dedicated innovative techniques. AVIM is therefore a unique and flexible system that could successfully support the clinician during the entire process from the acquisition of the signals to the results. In addition to providing an appreciable decrease in investigation time, costs and errors, AVIM could support the diagnosis integrating clinicians’ qualitative analysis, based on subjective skills, with objective measurements. To highlight its capabilities, AVIM is applied here to the management and analysis of personal and clinical data of newborns audio/video recorded in 5 time points from 10 days to the 24th week of age, according to a specific protocol. Patient data, results of customized tests, tables and plots are provided in a user-friendly environment