Disorders of Arousal: A Chronobiological Perspective

: Non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep parasomnias are characterized by motor and emotional behaviors emerging from incomplete arousals from NREM sleep and they are currently referred to as disorders of arousal (DoA). Three main clinical entities are recognized, namely confusional arousal, sleep terror and sleepwalking. DoA are largely present in pediatric populations, an age in which they are considered as transitory, unhabitual physiological events. The literature background in the last twenty years has extensively shown that DoA can persist in adulthood in predisposed individuals or even appear de novo in some cases. Even though some episodes may arise from stage 2 of sleep, most DoA occur during slow wave sleep (SWS), and particularly during the first two sleep cycles. The reasons for this timing are linked to the intrinsic structure of SWS and with the possible influence on this sleep phase of predisposing, priming and precipitating factors for DoA episodes. The objective of this paper is to review the intrinsic sleep-related features and chronobiological aspects affecting SWS, responsible for the occurrence of the majority of DoA episodes during the first part of the night

On Credentials

Credentials play an important role in all modern societies, but the analysis of their nature and function has thus far been neglected by social philosophers. We present a view according to which the function of credentials is certify the identity and the institutional status (including the rights) of individuals. More importantly, credentials enable rights-holders to exercise their rights, so that for a particular right to be exercisable the right-holder should possess, carry and sometimes show to an authority (or QR code scanner) a document of a specific kind. Driving licenses, identity cards, passports, boarding passes, library passes, credit cards, ATM cards, health insurance cards are all examples of credentials in this sense. Credentials have in every case a bearer, and the bearer should be able to carry them easily on his or her person. Credentials should also be inspectable – not least because credentials can be forged. The authors analyse several historical and contemporary examples of credentials, focusing on the credentials carried by the pilgrims of the Way of Saint James

Regulatory artifacts: prescribing, constituting, steering

Generally, when thinking of artifacts, one imagines “technical artifacts”. Technical artifacts are those artifacts that perform a mere causal function. They aim to instrumentally help and support behaviour, not to change it. However, technical artifacts do not exhaust the set of artifacts. Alongside technical artifacts there are also artifacts that we can call “cognitive artifacts”. Cognitive artifacts are all those artifacts that operate upon information in order to improve human cognitive performances. Moreover, there is also a third kind of artifacts that we may call “regulatory artifacts”; that is, material artifacts devised and made to regulate behaviour. Think of a roundabout, a traffic light or a speed bump. These artifacts do not make us stronger, faster, or more intelligent. They are placed on the road surface to regulate traffic. This article aims to investigate this third kind of artifacts and, especially, the functions that these artifacts perform

Intersemiotic translation of contracts into digital environments

An intersemiotic translation is any form of translation that involves at least two different semiotic codes; for example, the translation from words to images, to numerical code, or to non-verbal sounds. One of the most widespread examples of intersemiotic translation in the contemporary world is transposing natural language into machine language in digital environments. In this case, if the source text is a legal text, we encounter a particular type of intersemiotic translation, namely an intersemiotic legal translation in a digital environment. This paper will focus on the intersemiotic legal translation of contracts in digital environments, and is divided into two parts. In the first part (Section Ways of intersemiotically translating a contract using digital tools), we will analyze four possible uses of the intersemiotic translation of contracts in a digital context. In particular, we will highlight the technical characteristics of intersemiotic translation, its limitations, and its potential in different phases of contract management, namely the drafting of the document, the agreement, the archiving of the document, and the execution of contractual clauses. We will examine different digital tools that exploit intersemiotic translation, such as contract drafting tools and online platforms that allow for the conclusion of electronic contracts, document archiving in blockchains, and building smart contracts. When analyzing these uses of intersemiotic translation in the digital environment, we will highlight four types of output that can represent the product of intersemiotic translation in the digital environment: epistemic effects, legal effects, digital effects, and economic effects. In the second part (Section A tool for translating the contract intersemiotically), we will describe a hypothetical prototype that, in light of the four potential uses of intersemiotic translation, could represent a support tool to simplify the communication between professionals and clients through the drafting of legal documents with the aid of dynamic forms and, eventually, with the help of artificial intelligence (AI). Beyond facilitating the dialogue between legal professionals and their clients, we use interfaces to allow clients to create their own drafts of their documents and the lawyer to work on the drafts drawn up by the customer, correct them, and structure them in order to guarantee the validity of the document. The system can also be designed to archive legal documents and private deeds securely and entrust them to a professional by using blockchain technology and automating the execution of some contractual clauses via smart contract protocols

Frequent, complex and vivid dream-like/hallucinatory experiences during NREM sleep parasomnia episodes

No abstract availabl

Non-permanent GPS data for regional-scale kinematics: reliable deformation rate before the 6 April, 2009, earthquake in the L'Aquila area

A GPS-based geodetic study at a regional scale requires the availability of a dense network that is characterized by 10 km to 30 km spacing, typically followed in a few continuous GPS stations (CGPSs) and several non-permanent GPS stations (NPSs). As short observation times do not allow adequate noise modeling, NPS data need specific processing where the main differences between NPSs and CGPSs are taken into account: primarily time-series length and antenna repositioning error. The GPS data collected in the 1999-2007 time-span from non-permanent measurement campaigns in the central Apennine area (Italy) that was recently hit by the Mw 6.3 L'Aquila earthquake (April 6, 2009) are here further analyzed to compute a reliable strain-rate field at a regional scale. Moreover, areas characterized by different kinematics are recognized, and a complete characterization of the regional-scale kinematics is attempted. These new data can be interpreted as indicators from the viewpoint of seismic risk assessment

Disorders of Arousal in adults: new diagnostic tools for clinical practice

Abstract Disorders of Arousal (DOA) are mental and motor behaviors arising from NREM sleep. They comprise a spectrum of manifestations of increasing intensity from confusional arousals to sleep terrors to sleepwalking. Although DOA in childhood are usually harmless, in adulthood they are often associated with injurious or violent behaviors to the patient or others. Driving motor vehicles, suspected suicide, and even homicide or attempted homicide have been described during sleepwalking in adults. Furthermore, adult DOA need to be differentiated from other sleep disorders such as Sleep-related Hypermotor Epilepsy or REM Sleep Behavior Disorder. Although many aspects of DOA have been clarified in the last two decades there is still a lack of objective and quantitative diagnostic criteria for DOA. Recent advances in EEG analysis and in the semiological characterization of DOA motor patterns have provided a better definition of DOA diagnosis. Our article focuses on the DOA diagnostic process describing accurately the newest DOA clinical, EEG and video-polysomnographic tools in order to aid clinicians in DOA assessment

Nature of Interactions at the Interface of Two Water-Saturated Commercial TiO2 Polymorphs

Two commercial TiO2 samples, a 100% anatase and a 100% rutile, were used for the fast field cycling NMR experiments. The results showed a different behavior between the different samples. In particular, water molecules were unbonded to the solid surface for the rutile sample, whereas they appeared to chemically interact with the surface through H-bond formation with the anatase sample. The above findings accord with the generally lower activity of rutile with respect to anatase reported in literature for photocatalytic oxidation reactions in water. The difficulty of water to interact with rutile surface, indeed, could hinder the formation of OH radicals, which are the most important oxidant species

Sintesi e valutazione biologica di nuovi "lead compounds" per la terapia antitubercolare. Derivati del 2-(benzotriazol-1(2)-il)-3- acrilonitrile e delle chinossaline 1,4-diossido

L'insorgenza sempre più elevata di ceppi di M. tuberculosis chemioresistenti ai farmaci abitualmente impiegati in terapia (MDR) ha spronato la ricerca di nuovi "lead compounds" per lo sviluppo di molecole che, agendo con meccanismo diverso da quello dei farmaci attualmente impiegati in terapia, possano contribuire a superare il problema della farmacoresistenza. In quest'ambito le nostre ricerche si sono orientate verso due differenti direzioni. La prima prende lo spunto dai risultati ottenuti in passato da vari gruppi di ricerca con alcuni derivati di sintesi di sistemi eterociclici aromatici quali benzimidazolo, benzotiazolo, benzoisotiazolo e benzofurano, che avevano dimostrato attività  antimicobatterica in vitro soprattutto nei confronti di ceppi MDR. La seconda linea di ricerca si è basata sulla nota attività  antibatterica e soprattutto antimicotica della chinossalina 1,4-diossido, con la consapevolezza che spesso l'attività  antimicobatterica è associata a quella antifungina

Imidazolo [1,2-a] e 1,2,4-triazolo[4,3-a] chinossaline analoghe degli antifolici metotrexato e trimetrexato

Abbiamo progettato una nuova serie di chinossaline, nelle quali l’anello pirrolico è stato sostituito con un’anello imidazolico o con uno triazolico lasciando nelle posizioni 2, 5, 6, 7 e 8 dell’anello chinossalinico gli stessi sostituenti precedentemente esaminati. Di questi composti verranno descritti la sintesi e i risultati farmacologici relativi alla loro attività