Architecture for privacy-preserving brokerage of analytics using Multi Party Computation, Self Sovereign Identity and Blockchain

In our increasingly digitized world, the value of data is clear and proved, and many solutions and businesses have been developed to harness it. In particular, personal data (such as health-related data) is highly valuable, but it is also sensitive and could harm the owners if misused. In this context, data marketplaces could enhance the circulation of data and enable new businesses and solutions. However, in the case of personal data, marketplaces would necessarily have to comply with existing regulations, and they would also need to make users privacy protection a priority. In particular, privacy protection has been only partially accomplished by existing datamarkets, as they themselves can gather information about the individuals connected with the datasets they handle. In this thesis is presented an architecture proposal for KRAKEN, a new datamarket that provides privacy guarantees at every step in the data exchange and analytics pipeline. This is accomplished through the use of multi-party computation, blockchain and self-sovereign identity technologies. In addition to that, the thesis presents also a privacy analysis of the entire system. The analysis indicated that KRAKEN is safe from possible data disclosures to the buyers. On the other hand, some potential threats regarding the disclosure of data to the datamarket itself were identified, although posing a low-priority risk, given their rare chance of occurrence. Moreover the author of this thesis elaborated remarks on the decentralisation of the architecture and possible improvements to increase the security. These improvements are accompanied by the solutions identified in the paper that proposes the adoption of a trust measure for the MPC nodes. The work on the paper and the thesis contributed to the personal growth of the author, specifically improving his knowledge of cryptography by learning new schemes such as group signatures, zero knowledge proof of knowledge and multi-party computation. He improved his skills in writing academic papers and in working in a team of researchers leading a research area

PM 10 Time Series Analysis Through Geostatistical Techniques

Particulate matter (PM) is an air pollutant comes from vehicular traffic, industrial activities and street dust, or from the atmosphere, by transformation of the gaseous emissions. In recent years the interest in the health effects of this pollutant have increased, since high concentration levels in urban area have been measured. Several studies suggest an association between fine particulate air pollution and the increase of the mortality rate. In particular, PM up to 10 micrometers in size (PM10) could cause negative health effects such as respiratory illness or cardiovascular problems. Hence, the analysis of temporal evolution of this pollutant could be useful in decision-making process for environmental policy. Typically, in time series analysis, the Box-Jenkins methodology is widely applied and the autocorrelation function (ACF) is used as a standard exploratory tool to identify the model structure . In this context, the use of geostatistical techniques could also be convenient, nevertheless these techniques are usually applied to analyze, through the variogram, spatial relationships among sample data measured at some locations in a domain and to predict the corresponding spatial phenomena

Santa Maria di Agnano (Ostuni, Puglia)

La frequentazione neolitica esterna e le testimonianze rituali ellenistiche nell’area H-I-P-Q(Donato Coppola, Nicola de Pinto, Michele Pellegrino) La frequentazione neolitica esterna Le indagini archeologiche del 2015 a Santa Maria di Agnano ad Ostuni hanno interessato le aree di scavo già esplorate nel 2011 : l’estensione dello scavo del muro di recinzione e l’esplorazione dei livelli olocenici e pleistocenici sottostanti la parete rocciosa del riparo nell’Area H-I-P-Q ; i settori identifica..

Novelette, a Usable Visual Storytelling Digital Learning Environment

Educational digital storytelling is widely recognised as a powerful approach in developing literary skills, experiencing problem-solving and computational thinking, information and knowledge visualisation, building creativity and divergent thinking supported by technological solutions. However, educators feel that they miss opportunities, skills, and tools to support pupils developing creativity. Hence, we proposed a digital learning environment, named Novelette, to support both educators and learners in performing visual storytelling by scaffolding them in inventing and authoring stories. The main novelty of our approach lies in embedding literary artifices widely explored in learning settings into a digital learning environment, such as the opportunity to continue someone else’s story and the suggestion mechanism to explore analogies or synonyms starting from a word of interest. Novelette has been ideated not only as a learning environment for educators, but with educators, as it results from a user-centered and participatory design methodology to involve them in the entire design and development process actively. This paper focuses on the assessment of Novelette usability according to both educators and pupils. As a conclusive step of the co-design approach, developers tested the resulting usability according to educators in a controlled environment. Moreover, it reports usability according to learners in real settings at school. Results demonstrate that Novelette is considered usable by both target groups, and it is perceived as a powerful approach in developing creativity both according to quantitative insight offered by the System Usability Scale, a.k.a., SUS, and qualitative interpretations enabled with direct observations and structured after scenario questionnaires. We can conclude that Novelette is a pleasant and usable tool to invent and author stories and seems to be a promising approach to develop creativity

Santa Maria di Agnano (Ostuni, Puglia)

Nel 2016 le ricerche archeologiche nel sito di Santa Maria di Agnano ad Ostuni-Brindisi sono proseguite nelle aree già indagate nel 2015 con l’estensione dello scavo del muro di recinzione ellenistico, l’esplorazione dei livelli olocenici e pleistocenici sottostanti la parete rocciosa occidentale del riparo nell’Area H-I-P-Q (fig. 1), la prosecuzione nei settori identificati come « Scavo esterno » riferibile alle stratificazioni paleolitiche, le Aree dei quadrati L-M, pertinenti alla terrazza..

Safety and Efficacy of Subcutaneous Rituximab in Previously Untreated Patients with CD20+ Diffuse Large B-Cell Lymphoma or Follicular Lymphoma: Results from an Italian Phase IIIb Study

Subcutaneous (SC) rituximab may be beneficial in terms of convenience and tolerability, with potentially fewer and less severe administration-related reactions (ARRs) compared to the intravenous (IV) form. This report presents the results of a phase IIIb study conducted in Italy. The study included adult patients with CD20+ DLBCL or FL having received at least one full dose of IV RTX 375 mg/m2 during induction or maintenance. Patients on induction received ≥4 cycles of RTX SC 1400 mg plus standard chemotherapy and FL patients on maintenance received ≥6 cycles of RTX SC. Overall, 159 patients (73 DLBCL, 86 FL) were enrolled: 103 (54 DLBCL, 49 FL) completed induction and 42 patients with FL completed 12 maintenance cycles. ARRs were reported in 10 patients (6.3%), 3 (4.2%) with DLBCL and 7 (8.1%) with FL, all of mild severity, and resolved without dose delay/discontinuation. Treatment-emergent adverse events (TEAEs) and serious adverse events occurred in 41 (25.9%) and 14 patients (8.9%), respectively. Two patients with DLBCL had fatal events: Klebsiella infection (related to rituximab) and septic shock (related to chemotherapy). Neutropenia (14 patients, 8.9%) was the most common treatment-related TEAE. Two patients with DLBCL (2.8%) and 6 with FL (7.0%) discontinued rituximab due to TEAEs. 65.2% and 69.7% of patients with DLBCL and 67.9% and 73.6% of patients with FL had complete response (CR) and CR unconfirmed, respectively. The median time to events (EFS, PFS, and OS) was not estimable due to the low rate of events. At a median follow-up of 29.5 and 47.8 months in patients with DLBCL and FL, respectively, EFS, PFS, and OS were 70.8%, 70.8%, and 80.6% in patients with DLBCL and 77.9%, 77.9%, and 95.3% in patients with FL, respectively. The switch from IV to SC rituximab in patients with DLBCL and FL was associated with low risk of ARRs and satisfactory response in both groups. This trial was registered with NCT01987505

Characteristics and patterns of care of endometrial cancer before and during COVID-19 pandemic

Objective: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak has correlated with the disruption of screening activities and diagnostic assessments. Endometrial cancer (EC) is one of the most common gynecological malignancies and it is often detected at an early stage, because it frequently produces symptoms. Here, we aim to investigate the impact of COVID-19 outbreak on patterns of presentation and treatment of EC patients. Methods: This is a retrospective study involving 54 centers in Italy. We evaluated patterns of presentation and treatment of EC patients before (period 1: March 1, 2019 to February 29, 2020) and during (period 2: April 1, 2020 to March 31, 2021) the COVID-19 outbreak. Results: Medical records of 5,164 EC patients have been retrieved: 2,718 and 2,446 women treated in period 1 and period 2, respectively. Surgery was the mainstay of treatment in both periods (p=0.356). Nodal assessment was omitted in 689 (27.3%) and 484 (21.2%) patients treated in period 1 and 2, respectively (p<0.001). While, the prevalence of patients undergoing sentinel node mapping (with or without backup lymphadenectomy) has increased during the COVID-19 pandemic (46.7% in period 1 vs. 52.8% in period 2; p<0.001). Overall, 1,280 (50.4%) and 1,021 (44.7%) patients had no adjuvant therapy in period 1 and 2, respectively (p<0.001). Adjuvant therapy use has increased during COVID-19 pandemic (p<0.001). Conclusion: Our data suggest that the COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact on the characteristics and patterns of care of EC patients. These findings highlight the need to implement healthcare services during the pandemic

Practice patterns and 90-day treatment-related morbidity in early-stage cervical cancer

To evaluate the impact of the Laparoscopic Approach to Cervical Cancer (LACC) Trial on patterns of care and surgery-related morbidity in early-stage cervical cancer