Traditional Italian Food Products on the Chinese Market: Best Practices for Italian Small and Medium Enterprises.

This work focuses attention on the area of a specific sector consisting of Italian small and medium enterprises that market traditional Italian products. A questionnaire submitted to a group of Chinese consumers provides their definition of a traditional product and, in particular, gives their positive opinion on traditional Italian food products, whose “reliability” and “health” content they acknowledge as fundamental attribute perceptions, together with the importance of an agreeable “taste”. The study stresses the strategic importance for small and medium Italian enterprises offering traditional Italian food products to adopt more appropriate marketing techniques and practices which take into account the indications emerging from the survey for developing the Chinese market

Metyrapone modulation of tyrosine aminotransferase induction by dexamethasone in cultured hepatocytes.

Metyrapone, an inhibitor of cytochrome P-450-dependent monooxygenases, enhanced the induction of tyrosine aminotransferase by dexamethasone in primary cultures of hepatocytes, while it had no effect on the basal level of the enzyme activity in the absence of the hormone. The amplification of the hormonal induction of tyrosine aminotransferase activity was strictly correlated with the concentration and with the inhibitory action of the compound on cytochrome P-450. The phenomenon occurred even at the maximally effective concentrations of dexamethasone, thus showing that metyrapone is a 'Glucocorticoid Potency Amplifier'. The dexamethasone activity amplification by metyrapone could be the consequence of a modulation of the glucocorticoid biotransformations due to the cytochrome P-450 inhibitor

Selective colocalization of lipid peroxidation and protein thiol loss in chemically induced hepatic preneoplastic lesions: the role of gamma-glutamyltranspeptidase activity.

A number of studies indicate that cell proliferation can be modulated by changes in the redox balance of (soluble and protein) cellular thiols. Free radical processes, including lipid peroxidation (LPO), can affect such a balance, and a role for LPO in multistage carcinogenesis has been envisaged. The present study was aimed to assess the relationships between the protein thiol redox status and the LPO process in chemically induced preneoplastic tissue. The Solt-Farber's initiation-promotion model of chemical carcinogenesis in the rat liver was used. In fresh cryostat sections, preneoplastic lesions were identified by the reexpression of gamma-glutamyltranspeptidase (GGT) activity. In serial sections, different classes of protein thiols were stained; in additional sections, LPO was elicited by various prooxidant mixtures and determined thereafter by the hydroxynaphthoic hydrazide-Fast Blue B procedure. The incubation of sections in the presence of chelated iron plus substrates for GGT activity leads to the development of LPO in selected section areas closely corresponding to GGT-positive lesions, indicating the ability of GGT activity to initiate LPO. Protein-reactive thiols, as well as total protein sulfur, were decreased by 20-25% in cells belonging to GGT-positive preneoplastic nodules, suggesting the occurrence of oxidative conditions in vivo. The incubation of additional adjacent sections with the prooxidant mixture H2O2 plus iron(II), in order to induce the complete oxidation of lipid present in the section, showed a decreased basal concentration of oxidizable lipid substrate in GGT-rich areas. The decreased levels of both protein thiols and lipid-oxidizable substrate in GGT-positive nodules suggest that the observed GGT-dependent pathway of LPO initiation can be chronically operative in vivo during early stages of chemical carcinogenesis, in cells expressing GGT as part of their transformed phenotype

Method and System for Downlink Transmission Scheduling in Multi-carrier Networks

A method of scheduling transmissions in a multi-carrier transmission system, includes, for each downlink transmission frame: partitioning the downlink transmission frame into a plurality of data regions each including an equal number of slots, each data region corresponding to a respective logical band; for a currently active connection: a) creating a first set of logical bands not fully occupied for transmission and having a minimum boosting level making the transmission receivable by a receiving terminal; b) extracting from the first set, a second set of logical bands available for allocating a maximum number of slots for downlink transmission to the active connection; and c) selecting the logical band for downlink transmission to the active connection from the second set as the logical band that, after allocating the slots to the considered connection, leaves a residual number of slots equal to or smaller than a predetermined minimum residual in the logical band, e.g., the smallest residual number of slots