New insight into the Pleistocene deposits of Monte delle Piche, Rome, and remarks on the biochronology of Hippopotamus (Mammalia, Hippopotamidae) and Stephanorhinus etruscus (Mammalia, Rhinocerotidae) in Italy

Several large mammal assemblages have been collected in the Roman basin since the XIX century, but they usually lack any stratigraphic datum or details about the fossiliferous localities. In this work, the stratigraphic provenance of large mammal remains discovered at Monte delle Piche (Rome) is investigated. The systematic revision of these specimens allows the recording of the presence of Hippopotamus sp., Stephanorhinus sp. and Stephanorhinus etruscus. On the basis of micropalaeontological analysis performed on sediment sampled from the studied specimens and considering the stratigraphy of the area, two fossiliferous levels are recognised at Monte delle Piche. The remain of the hippopotamus was collected in fluvial gravels and sand deposits, in which the presence of Cyprideis is also recorded. This deposit is chronologically related to the latest Early-early Middle Pleistocene. Hippopotamus was present in Italy and Western Europe from the latest Villafranchian to MIS 4/3. The mandible of S. etruscus was collected in marine deposits along with abundant foraminifera and ostracods, which correlate with the late Early Pleistocene. Stephanorhinus etruscus occurred in Western Europe at the beginning of the Villafranchian, and it was documented until the end of the Villafranchian in Italy and until the Early-Middle Pleistocene transition in the Iberian Peninsula

A Novel Ultrasound-based Measure of the Liver among Diabetes Mellitus Type II Patients

Diabetes mellitus type II (DM II) or adult onset diabetes is due to the inefficient use of insulin, which affects various organs and tissues. Patients with DM II are at risk of suffering non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) that can later develop into more life threating forms such as hepatomegaly, cirrhosis or liver cancer. Following the logic of the non-inferiority trial test, we aim to establish a more accurate anatomical measure of the right liver lobe (RLL) to facilitate close monitoring of liver size with ultrasound (US). We hypothesize that US is not unacceptably worse than computed tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to accurately and reliably measure the size of the RLL when the measure is taken in the midaxillary line and craniocaudal plane (MAL-CC). Therefore, the objective of this study is to conduct a non-inferiority trial to test our novel MAL-CC measure. To meet this aim, US measure of the RLL was taken from DM II (n=7) and non-DM II (n=5) patients, whom were recruited from 2 endocrinology clinics at SoM-UPR. Preliminary data shows that MAL-CC measure of the RLL from non-DM II patients is 13.99 + 2.53 cm whereas the same measurement among DM II patients is 15.25 + 3.25 cm (Mann-Whitney U test, p= 0.42). It is concluded that there is a non-significant trend for large RLL sizes among DM II patients. Future work aims to increase sample size and to validate our novel measurement with MRI

The effect of primordial non-Gaussianity on the skeleton of cosmic shear maps

(abridged) We explore the imprints of deviations from Gaussian primordial density fluctuations on the skeleton of the large-scale matter distribution as mapped through cosmological weak lensing. We computed the skeleton length of simulated effective convergence maps covering $\sim 35$ sq. deg each, extracted from a suite of cosmological $n-$body runs with different levels of local primordial non-Gaussianity. The latter is expected to alter the structure formation process with respect to the fiducial Gaussian scenario, and thus to leave a signature on the cosmic web. We found that alterations of the initial conditions consistently modify both the cumulative and the differential skeleton length, although the effect is generically smaller than the cosmic variance and depends on the smoothing of the map prior to the skeleton computation. Nevertheless, the qualitative shape of these deviations is rather similar to their primordial counterparts, implying that skeleton statistics retain good memory of the initial conditions. We performed a statistical analysis in order to find out at what Confidence Level primordial non-Gaussianity could be constrained by the skeleton test on cosmic shear maps of the size we adopted. At 68.3% Confidence Level we found an error on the measured level of primordial non-Gaussianity of $\Delta f_\mathrm{NL}\sim 300$, while at 90% Confidence Level it is of $\Delta f_\mathrm{NL}\sim 500$. While these values by themselves are not competitive with the current constraints, weak lensing maps larger than those used here would have a smaller field-to-field variance, and thus would likely lead to tighter constraints. A rough estimate indicates $\Delta f_\mathrm{NL} \sim$ a few tens at 68.3% Confidence Level for an all-sky weak lensing survey.Comment: 11 pages, 9 figures. Accepted for publication on MNRA

Comparison of energy fluxes at the land surface-atmosphere interface in an Alpine valley as simulated with different models

International audienceWithin the framework of a research project coupling meteorological and hydrological models in mountainous areas a distributed Snow-Soil-Vegetation-Atmosphere Transfer model was developed and applied to simulate the energy fluxes at the land surface ? atmosphere interface in an Alpine valley (Toce Valley - North Italy) during selected flood events in the last decade. Energy fluxes simulated by the distributed energy transfer model were compared with those simulated by a limited area meteorological model for the event of June 1997 and the differences in the spatial and temporal distribution. The Snow/Soil-Vegetation-Atmosphere Transfer model was also applied to simulate the energy fluxes at the land surface-atmosphere interface for a single cell, assumed to be representative of the Siberia site (Toce Valley), where a micro-meteorological station was installed and operated for 2.5 months in autumn 1999. The Siberia site is very close to the Nosere site, where a standard meteorological station was measuring precipitation, air temperature and humidity, global and net radiation and wind speed during the same special observing period. Data recorded by the standard meteorological station were used to force the energy transfer model and simulate the point energy fluxes at the Siberia site, while turbulent fluxes observed at the Siberia site were used to derive the latent heat flux from the energy balance equation. Finally, the hourly evapotranspiration flux computed by this procedure was compared to the evapotranspiration flux simulated by the energy transfer model

Reconstitution of recombination-associated DNA synthesis with human proteins.

The repair of DNA breaks by homologous recombination is a high-fidelity process, necessary for the maintenance of genome integrity. Thus, DNA synthesis associated with recombinational repair must be largely error-free. In this report, we show that human DNA polymerase delta (δ) is capable of robust DNA synthesis at RAD51-mediated recombination intermediates dependent on the processivity clamp PCNA. Translesion synthesis polymerase eta (η) also extends these substrates, albeit far less processively. The single-stranded DNA binding protein RPA facilitates recombination-mediated DNA synthesis by increasing the efficiency of primer utilization, preventing polymerase stalling at specific sequence contexts, and overcoming polymerase stalling caused by topological constraint allowing the transition to a migrating D-loop. Our results support a model whereby the high-fidelity replicative DNA polymerase δ performs recombination-associated DNA synthesis, with translesion synthesis polymerases providing a supportive role as in normal replication

A numerical study of the effects of primordial non-Gaussianities on weak lensing statistics

While usually cosmological initial conditions are assumed to be Gaussian, inflationary theories can predict a certain amount of primordial non-Gaussianity which can have an impact on the statistical properties of the lensing observables. In order to evaluate this effect, we build a large set of realistic maps of different lensing quantities starting from light-cones extracted from large dark-matter only N-body simulations with initial conditions corresponding to different levels of primordial local non-Gaussianity strength $f_{\rm NL}$. Considering various statistical quantities (PDF, power spectrum, shear in aperture, skewness and bispectrum) we find that the effect produced by the presence of primordial non-Gaussianity is relatively small, being of the order of few per cent for values of $|f_{\rm NL}|$ compatible with the present CMB constraints and reaching at most 10-15 per cent for the most extreme cases with $|f_{\rm NL}|=1000$. We also discuss the degeneracy of this effect with the uncertainties due to the power spectrum normalization $\sigma_8$ and matter density parameter $\Omega_{\rm m}$, finding that an error in the determination of $\sigma_8$ ($\Omega_{\rm m}$) of about 3 (10) per cent gives differences comparable with non-Gaussian models having $f_{\rm NL}=\pm 1000$. These results suggest that the possible presence of an amount of primordial non-Gaussianity corresponding to $|f_{\rm NL}|=100$ is not hampering a robust determination of the main cosmological parameters in present and future weak lensing surveys, while a positive detection of deviations from the Gaussian hypothesis is possible only breaking the degeneracy with other cosmological parameters and using data from deep surveys covering a large fraction of the sky.Comment: accepted by MNRA

Impaired Conscious Recognition of Negative Facial Expressions in Patients with Locked-in Syndrome

The involvement of facial mimicry in different aspects of human emotional processing is widely debated. However, little is known about relationships between voluntary activation of facial musculature and conscious recognition of facial expressions. To address this issue, we assessed severely motor-disabled patients with complete paralysis of voluntary facial movements due to lesions of the ventral pons [locked-in syndrome (LIS)]. Patients were required to recognize others’ facial expressions and to rate their own emotional responses to presentation of affective scenes.LISpatientswere selectivelyimpairedin recognition of negativefacial expressions,thusdemonstratingthatthe voluntary activation of mimicry represents a high-level simulation mechanism crucially involved in explicit attribution of emotions

Training-induced inversion of spontaneous exchange bias field on La1.5Ca0.5CoMnO6

In this work we report the synthesis and structural, electronic and magnetic properties of La1.5Ca0.5CoMnO6 double-perovskite. This is a re-entrant spin cluster material which exhibits a non-negligible negative exchange bias effect when it is cooled in zero magnetic field from an unmagnetized state down to low temperature. X-ray powder diffraction, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and magnetometry results indicate mixed valence state at Co site, leading to competing magnetic phases and uncompensated spins at the magnetic interfaces. We compare the results for this Ca-doped material with those reported for the resemblant compound La1.5Sr0.5CoMnO6, and discuss the much smaller spontaneous exchange bias effect observed for the former in terms of its structural and magnetic particularities. For La1.5Ca0.5CoMnO6, when successive magnetization loops are carried, the spontaneous exchange bias field inverts its sign from negative to positive from the first to the second measurement. We discuss this behavior based on the disorder at the magnetic interfaces, related to the presence of a glassy phase. This compound also exhibits a large conventional exchange bias, for which there is no sign inversion of the exchange bias field for consecutive cycles

Study on the association between sleep disorders versus oral health related variables

To study the association between sleep quality and oral health related variables, which still have conflicts in the literature. This was a population-based case-control study between subjects with versus without sleep disorders from the Brazilian Public Health System (SUS), city of Maringá (N=1,643). Subjects answered self-reported questionnaires: a) Research Diagnostic Criteria for Temporomandibular Disorders (RDC/TMD), b) Sleep Assessment Questionnaire (SAQ) and c) North York Dental Health Survey (NYDHS). No significant difference was found for gender, marital status, or income; however, non-Caucasians, people with lower levels of education, and those between 20 to 50 years old had worse scores of sleep disorders in the SAQ. Self-perceived oral health, masticatory capacity to eat foods, and gingival bleeding was significantly worse among subjects with self-reported sleep disorders. Self-reported tooth loss, edentulism and use of removable partial dentures (with clasps) or complete dentures showed no significant difference between groups. Self-reported sleep disorder subjects presented significantly higher prevalence of both self-reported tooth and TMJ pain. It can be concluded that individuals with self-reported sleep disorders presented worse self-perceived oral health for most studied variables