Students' University Identification: An Exploratory Study in the United States and Italy

Students’ identification with schools or universities predicts many positive aspects such as cooperation and completion of studies. Two hundred and eleven Italian students and 226 U.S. students wrote responses to open-ended questions about a time that they either felt connected (identified) or disconnected to (not identified) with their university. In Italy, students prompted to identify with the university mainly focused their descriptions on didactical aspects such as academic training experiences. Italian students prompted not to identify with the university mainly described their experiences with the university’s organizational and administrative aspects. U.S. students prompted to identify or not with the university mainly focused on the social aspects of their university experience such as their involvement with fraternities and sororities. In both nations, students rarely mentioned instrumental aspects of their university experience such as the evaluation of how much the university matters for professional training. These qualitative results help to fully understand the contents of the experience of university students. Understanding students’ identification can be vital in order to improve the quality of university teaching and to support professors in developing their roles

The pseudo-symmetric n-benzyl hydroxyethylamine core in a new series of heteroarylcarboxyamide hiv-1 pr inhibitors: Synthesis, molecular modeling and biological evaluation

Here, we report the synthesis, enzyme inhibition and structure–activity relationship studies of a new potent class of HIV-1 protease inhibitors, which contain a pseudo-symmetric hydroxyethylamine core and heteroarylcarboxyamide moieties. The simple synthetic pathway furnished nine compounds in a few steps with high yields. The compounds were designed taking into account our previous results on other series of inhibitors with different substituents at P’ and P” and different ways of linking them to the inhibitor core. Potent inhibitory activity was obtained with nanomolar IC50 values measured with a standard fluorimetric test in 100 mM MES buffer, pH 5.5, containing 400 mM NaCl, 1 mM EDTA, 1 mM DTT and 1 mg/mL BSA. Compounds 9a–c, containing the indole ring in P1, exhibited an HIV-1 protease inhibitory activity more powerful than darunavir in the same assay. To obtain molecular insight into the binding properties of these compounds, docking analysis was performed, and their binding properties were also compare

Biginelli Reaction and \u3b2-Secretase Inhibition: A Multicomponent Reaction as a Friendly Educational Approach to Bioactive Compounds

Multicomponent reactions (MCRs) represent very interesting tools to reach eco-friendly and sustainable transformations in organic chemistry. In particular, the Biginelli reaction furnishes a very easy approach to the synthesis of a library of biological active compounds in an academic course. Here we describe the realization of several experiments involving the synthesis of potential inhibitors of \u3b2-secretase by the Biginelli reaction. All of the obtained compounds were tested with a FRET fluorimetric assay. The experiments were proposed to students either at entry level or during advanced laboratory courses of organic and bioorganic chemistry. The learning objectives at the advanced level were to introduce the students to the practice of combinatorial synthesis and to the evaluation of biological activity of combinatorial libraries by enzyme inhibition assays. The meeting of the learning objectives was probed first by analyzing their daily performance in the laboratory and their increasing proactive attitude, and the contents of their final presentations. The resulting marks obtained by the students were compared with the average evaluation of their career. Second, the students were asked to evaluate the course and their own experience, and the outcome of their evaluation was compared with that of the teachers

New heteroaryl carbamates: synthesis and biological screening in vitro and in mammalian cells of wild-type and mutant HIV-protease inhibitors

New heteroaryl HIV-protease inhibitors bearing a carbamoyl spacer were synthesized in few steps and high yield, from commercially available homochiral epoxides. Different substitution patterns were introduced onto a given isopropanoyl-sulfonamide core that can have either H or benzyl group. The in vitro inhibition activity against recombinant protease showed a general beneficial effect of both carbamoyl moiety and the benzyl group, ranging the IC50 values between 11 and 0.6 nM. In particular, benzofuryl and indolyl derivatives showed IC50 values among the best for such structurally simple inhibitors. Docking analysis allowed to identify the favorable situation of such derivatives in terms of number of interactions in the active site, supporting the experimental results. The inhibition activity was also confirmed in HEK293 mammalian cells and was maintained against protease mutants. Furthermore, the metabolic stability was comparable with that of the commercially available inhibitors

Correction to: The role of molecular imaging in the frame of the revised dementia with Lewy body criteria

In the article mentioned above all authors were assigned affiliation 14, which is wrong. Affiliation 14 belongs only to author Agostino Chiaravalloti

Primary Diffuse Large B Cell Lymphoma Mimicking Hyperplastic Reactive Lesion (Lymphoma of the Oral Cavity)

Objective. To report a case of a challenging oral diagnosis involving a primary diffuse large B cell lymphoma of the oral cavity mimicking a hyperplastic reactive lesion. Case Report. A 72-year-old male patient was referred to the Department of Stomatology presenting a proliferative nodular lesion in the anterior region of the mandible involving the anterior teeth. The clinical examination revealed anterior teeth affected by periodontal disease, suggesting the nodular cession hyperplastic reaction. Incisional biopsy was performed under local anesthesia. The histopathological examination revealed a diffuse proliferation of atypical large lymphoid cells. The tumor cells showed immunopositivity for CD20 and Ki67 (100%) and negativity for CD3, CD30, and CD15. The diagnosis of diffuse large B cell lymphoma was established. The patient underwent chemotherapy and progressed to death after nine months. Conclusion. Lymphomas of the oral cavity are rare and may have nonspecific clinical features, mimicking inflammatory and reactive lesions. Therefore, a detailed clinical evaluation associated with histopathological and immunohistochemical analysis should be performed to enable early and accurate diagnoses in suspected oral lesions

Disease management in diabetes care: when involving GPs improves patient compliance and health outcomes

Although the study of the association between interventions in primary care and health outcomes continues to produce mixed findings, programs designed to promote the greater compliance of General Practitioners and their diabetic patients with treatment guidelines have been increasingly introduced worldwide, in an attempt to achieve better quality diabetes care through the enhanced standardisation of patient supervision. In this study we use clinical data taken from the Diabetes Register of one Local Health Authority (LHAs) in Italy’s Emilia-Romagna Region for the period 2014-2015. Firstly, we test to see whether the monitoring activities prescribed for diabetics by regional diabetes guidelines, actually have a positive impact on patients’ health outcomes and increase appropriateness in health care utilization. Secondly, we investigate whether GPs’ participation in the local Diabetes Management Program (DMP) leads to improved patient compliance with regional guidelines. Our results show that such a program, which aims to increase GPs’ involvement and cooperation in following regional guidelines for best practices, achieves its goal of improved patient compliance with the prescribed actions. In turn, through the implementation of the DMP and the greater involvement of physicians, regional policies have succeeded in promoting better health outcomes and the improved appropriateness of health care utilization