Design and development of a multipurpose, boresighted star tracker

Design and development of boresighted star tracke

Quantum spin Hall effect in bound states in continuum

Moving the polarization of the incident wave along a meridian of the Poincaré sphere, experimentally we show that the coupling with the fundamental Bloch's surface waves of the mode, provide a spatially coherent, macroscopic spinmomentum locked propagation along the symmetry axes of the PhCM. This novel mechanism of light-spin manipulation enables a versatile implementation of spin-optical structures that may pave the way to novel strategies for light spin technology and photonic multiplatform implementations

Effects of Alzheimer’s Disease on Visual Target Detection: A “Peripheral Bias”

Visual exploration is an omnipresent activity in everyday life, and might represent an important determinant of visual attention deficits in patients with Alzheimer’s Disease (AD). The present study aimed at investigating visual search performance in AD patients, in particular target detection in the far periphery, in daily living scenes. Eighteen AD patients and 20 healthy controls participated in the study. They were asked to freely explore a hemispherical screen, covering ±90°, and to respond to targets presented at 10°, 30°, and 50° eccentricity, while their eye movements were recorded. Compared to healthy controls, AD patients recognized less targets appearing in the center. No difference was found in target detection in the periphery. This pattern was confirmed by the fixation distribution analysis. These results show a neglect for the central part of the visual field for AD patients and provide new insights by mean of a search task involving a larger field of view

BRSMG 780Frr: cultivar de soja transgênica.

A brsmg 780rr é sua nova opção em soja transgênica para o manejo da ferrugem asiática. Alta produtividade e resistência moderada à ferrugem asiática. Grupo de maturidade. Regiões edafoclimáticas de adaptação (REC 303 - MG Triângulo Mineiro e Alto Paranaíba). Reação a doenças. Características médias. População de plantas e ciclo em solos férteis. Manejo da ferrugem asiática.bitstream/item/57490/1/BRSMG780Frr.pdf1 folder

MULTIPLE PLURIPOTENT STEM CELL MARKERS IN HUMAN ANAPLASTIC THYROID CANCER: THE PUTATIVE UPSTREAM ROLE OF SOX-2

Background: Anaplastic Thyroid Carcinoma (ATC) is a rare and aggressive endocrine tumor, with highly undifferentiated morphology. It has been suggested that cancer stem cells (CSCs) might play a central role in ATC. The objectives of this study were the following: 1) to characterize CSCs from ex vivo ATC specimens by investigating the expression of several pluripotent stem cell markers; 2) to evaluate in vitro drug resistance modifications after specific CSC transcription factor switch off. Methods: Ex vivo: eight formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded ATC specimens were analyzed by RT and qRT-PCR and immunohistochemistry. In vitro: in ATC SW1736 cells the expression levels of OCT-4, NANOG and ABCG2 and the sensitivity to either cisplatin or doxorubicin were evaluated after silencing. Results: OCT-4, KLF4 and SOX2 transcription factors and C-KIT and THY-1 stem surface antigens showed variable up-regulation in all ATC cases. The SW1736 cell line was characterized by a high percentage of stem population (10.4 \ub1 2.1 % of cells were aldehyde dehydrogenase positive) and a high expression of several CSC markers (SOX2, OCT4, NANOG, C-MYC, SSEA4). SOX2 silencing down-regulated OCT-4, NANOG and ABCG2. SOX2 silencing sensitized SW1736 cells, causing a significant cell death increase (1.8 fold) in comparison to control cells with 10 \ub5M cisplatin (93.9\ub13.4% vs. 52.6\ub19.4%, p<0.01) and 2.7 fold with 0.5\ub5M doxorubicin (45.8\ub19.9% vs. 17.1\ub13.4% p<0.01). ABCG2 silencing caused increased cell death with both cisplatin (74.9\ub11.4%) and doxorubicin treatment (74.1\ub10.1%) vs. no-target-treated cells (respectively, 45.8\ub11.0% and 48.6\ub11.0%, p<0.001). Conclusions: The characterization of CSCs in ATC through the analysis of multiple pluripotent stem cell markers might be useful in identifying cells with a stem-like phenotype capable of resisting conventional chemotherapy. In addition, our data demonstrate that SOX2 switch-off through ABCG2 transporter down-regulation has a major role in overcoming CSC chemotherapy resistance

Wellbeing in Workers during COVID-19 Pandemic: The Mediating Role of Self-Compassion in the Relationship between Personal Resources and Exhaustion

Italy was the second country to be affected by COVID-19 in early 2020, after China. The confrontation with the pandemic led to great changes in the world of work and, consequently, to the personal world of workers. In such a challenging situation, it is essential to be able to rely on resources that facilitate individual coping. The aim of this study was to understand the association between personal resources (optimism and humor) and exhaustion, and the role of self-compassion in this relationship. A structural equation model (SEM) was used to test the hypotheses on a heterogeneous sample of 422 Italian workers during the first lockdown in April–May 2020. The results revealed that optimism and humor were positively associated with self-compassion; optimism and humor also had a negative association with exhaustion; and self-compassion had a mediating role between the two personal resources and exhaustion. These results confirmed the importance of personal resources in maintaining workers’ wellbeing during a challenging period such as the pan-demic. The present study also contributes to the body of knowledge on self-compassion, a relatively new construct that has been little studied in the organizational field

Lanthanide Identity Governs Guest-Induced Dimerization in LnIII[15-MCCuIIN(L-pheHA)-5])3+ Metallacrowns

Series of lanthanide-containing metallic coordination complexes are frequently presented as structurally analogous, due to the similar chemical and coordinative properties of the lanthanides. In the case of chiral (LnIII[15-MC (Formula presented.) N(L-pheHA)-5])3+ metallacrowns (MCs), which are well established supramolecular hosts, the formation of dimers templated by a dicarboxylate guest (muconate) in solution of neutral pH is herein shown to have a unique dependence on the identity of the MC's central lanthanide. Calorimetric data and nuclear magnetic resonance diffusion studies demonstrate that MCs containing larger or smaller lanthanides as the central metal only form monomeric host-guest complexes whereas analogues with intermediate lanthanides (for example, Eu, Gd, Dy) participate in formation of dimeric host-guest-host compartments. The driving force for the dimerization event across the series is thought to be a competition between formation of highly stable MCs (larger lanthanides) and optimally linked bridging guests (smaller lanthanides)

A new paradigm of effective communication based on voice shapes

A new relational paradigm is proposed that is based on voice shapes, which represent the speech style used to establish an effective communication. The functional voice shapes are: "rounded", which means that a colloquial and empath communication is established; "triangular", which means transmitting energy, joy and interest; "squared", which highlights competence and solidity. The dysfunctional shapes are: "flat", a monotone style that does not capture the listener attention; "spiky", which is an aggressive style that transmits anger or blame towards the listener. An attempt has been made to match the voice shapes to acoustic features of the vocal signal, starting from parameters extracted from the recordings of 12 actors that have reproduced the voice shapes. Preliminary results allowed a subset of the estimated parameters to be identified that have shown good capabilities in discriminating the voice shapes. These parameters are related to distributions of voicing and silence periods, pitch and Cepstral Peak Prominence Smoothed. A web campaign has been also launched asking untrained subjects to "give their voice to the research". Even though only two voice shapes have been identified in this data set, a comparison with the parameters extracted from the trained subjects has shown a good agreement