657 research outputs found
The European VLF/LF radio network: current status
For several years researches about correlation between seismicity and disturbances
in radio broadcasting are being carried out: in particular, the Japanese Pacific VLF radio
network and the European VLF–LF radio network have been developed during the last
years. The European network has been developed starting from two LF receivers located in
central Italy in 1996. Up to now, 11 receivers of a new type, able to sample the VLF and LF
intensity of ten radio signals, are being into operation in different European countries. The
daily updating of data is effective and the data bank is located at the Department of Physics
of the University of Bari (Italy) which is the central node of the network. In order to discover
anomalies, the software able to carry out automatically a daily data analysis by the Wavelet
spectra method has been planned and realized. At the moment, the software operates on four
signals (two LF and two VLF) collected by one of the receiver located in Italy. If the anomaly
is particularly strong a warning system gives an advise on the work station into operation
in the central node of the Network. In any case, before assuming an anomaly as a seismic
anomaly, geomagnetic and meteorological data must be checked as well as any possible
instrumental malfunction. At present these controls are carried out only discontinuously by
the researchers of the Bari Team
Cancer progression: a single cell perspective
Tumor tissues are constituted by a dynamic diversity of malignant and non-malignant cells, which shape a puzzling biological ecosystem affecting cancer biology and response to treatments. Over the course of the tumoral disease, cancer cells acquire genotypic and phenotypic changes, allowing them to improve cellular fitness and overcome environmental and treatment constraints. This progression is depicted by an evolutionary process in which single cells expand as a result of an interaction between single-cell changes and the lovelopments have made it possible to depict the development of cancer at the single-cell level, offering a novel method for understanding the biology of this complex disease. Here, we review those complex interactions from the perspective of single cells and introduce the concept of omics for single-cell studies. This review emphasizes the evolutionary dynamics that control cancer progression and the capacity of single cells to escape the local environment and colonize distant sites. We are assisting a rapid progression of studies carried out at the single-cell level, and we survey relevant single-cell technologies looking at multi-omics studies. These path for precision medicine in cancer
Participatory Approach to Planning Urban Resilience to Climate Change: Brescia, Genoa, and Matera—Three Case Studies from Italy Compared
Urban resilience must consider the ability of cities to cope with the effects of climate change. Community awareness raising and sustainable urban drainage systems (SUDs) are often mentioned in the literature as effective adaptation actions while the success of these solutions is highly context-dependent and improved planning procedures are urgently needed. In this framework, the URCA! project represents a good practice aiming to strengthen the resilience of urban areas by promoting the implementation of SUDs in territorial planning. The main objective of the present research deals with the role of participation in promoting the use of SUDs and their uptake in town planning and land management involving local communities, students, experts, local authorities, and enterprises. To this end, the research adopts a participatory approach to SUDs urban planning for three case studies in Italy selected under the criterion of maximum variation (Brescia, Genoa, and Matera). For the three case studies, participatory approaches are at different stages of development thus requiring appropriate ways of interacting and resulting in different impacts on decisions. Preliminary results, drivers, and barriers in the application of the participatory approach are discussed and compared in order to bring innovation into planning practices, stimulating a revision of typical governance mechanisms
A Portable Device for the Measurement of Venous Pulse Wave Velocity
Pulse wave velocity in veins (vPWV) has recently been reconsidered as a potential index of vascular filling, which may be valuable in the clinic for fluid therapy. The measurement requires that an exogenous pressure pulse is generated in the venous blood stream by external pneumatic compression. To obtain optimal measure repeatability, the compression is delivered synchronously with the heart and respiratory activity. We present a portable prototype for the assessment of vPWV based on the PC board Raspberry Pi and equipped with an A/D board. It acquires respiratory and ECG signals, and the Doppler shift from the ultrasound monitoring of blood velocity from the relevant vein, drives the pneumatic cuff inflation, and returns multiple measurements of vPWV. The device was tested on four healthy volunteers (2 males, 2 females, age 33 & PLUSMN;13 years), subjected to the passive leg raising (PLR) manoeuvre simulating a transient increase in blood volume. Measurement of vPWV in the basilic vein exhibited a low coefficient of variation (3.6 & PLUSMN;1.1%), a significant increase during PLR in all subjects, which is consistent with previous findings. This device allows for carrying out investigations in hospital wards on different patient populations as necessary to assess the actual clinical potential of vPWV
An overview on preseismic anomalies in LF radio signals revealed in Italy by wavelet analysis
Since 1996, the electric field strength of the two broadcasting stations MCO (f=216 kHz, southeast France) and
CZE (f=270 kHz, Czech Republic) has been sampled every ten minutes by a receiver (AS) located in central
Italy. Here, we review the results obtained by a detailed analysis applied to the data recorded from February
1996 up to December 2004. At first, the daytime and nighttime data were extracted and then, in the daytime data,
the data collected in winter were separated from those collected in summer. On the second step the wavelet
transform was applied. The results of this analysis are radio anomalies detected as earthquake precursors both
for MCO and CZE data. In particular, regarding the MCO data, the main result was the appearance of a very
clear anomaly during May-August 1998, at daytime and at nighttime. Such an anomaly can be considered as a
precursor of a seismic sequence started on August 15, 1998 with 17 earthquakes (M=2.2-4.6) on the Reatini
mountains, a seismogenic zone located 30 km far from the AS receiver along the path MCO-AS. As concerns
with the CZE data, the first result was obtained from the summer daytime data and it was the appearance of a
very clear anomaly during August-September 1997, that can be considered a precursor of the two earthquakes
with magnitude M=5.6 and M=5.9 that occurred on September 26 in the Umbria-Marche region (Central Italy).
The second result was the appearance of an anomaly during February-March 1998, at daytime and at nighttime, that can be related to the preparatory phase of the strong (M=5.1-6.0) Slovenia seismic sequence that occurred in a zone lying in the middle of the CZE-AS path
Anomalies Observed in VLF and LF Radio Signals on the Occasion of the Western Turkey Earthquake (Mw = 5.7) on May 19, 2011
VLF radio signals lie in the 10 - 60 kHz frequency band. These radio signals are used for worldwide navigation support, time signals and for military purposes. They are propagated in the earth-ionosphere wave-guide mode along great circle propagation paths. So, their propaga-tion is strongly affected by the ionosphere conditions. LF signals lie in 150 - 300 kHz frequency band. They are used for long way broadcasting by the few (this type of broadcasting is going into disuse) transmitters located in the world. These radio signals are characterized by the ground wave and the sky wave propagation modes [1]. The first generates a stable signal that propagates in the channel Earth-troposphere and is affected by the surface ground and troposphere condition. The second instead gives rise to a signal which varies greatly between day and night, and between summer and winter, and which propagates using the lower ionosphere as a reflector; its propagation is mainly affected by the ionosphere condi-tion, particularly in the zone located in the middle of the transmitter-receiver path. The propagation of the VLF/LF radio signals is affected by different factors such as the meteorological condition, the solar bursts and the geo-magnetic activity. At the same time, variations of some parameters in the ground, in the atmosphere and in the ionosphere occurring during the preparatory phase of earthquakes can produce disturbances in the above men-tioned signals. As already reported by many previous studies [2-18] the disturbances are classified as anoma-lies and different methods of analysis as the residual dA/ dP [15], the terminator time TT [9], the Wavelet spectra and the Principal Component Analysis have been used [6,7].
Here the analysis carried out on LF and VLF radio signals using three different methods on the occasion of a strong earthquake occurred recently in Turkey is pre-sented
Wavelet analysis of the LF radio signals collected by the European VLF/LF network from July 2009 to April 2011
In 2008, a radio receiver that works in very low frequency (VLF; 20-60 kHz) and LF (150-300 kHz) bands was developed by an Italian factory. The
receiver can monitor 10 frequencies distributed in these bands, with the measurement for each of them of the electric field intensity. Since 2009, to
date, six of these radio receivers have been installed throughout Europe to establish a ‘European VLF/LF Network’. At present, two of these are into
operation in Italy, and the remaining four are located in Greece, Turkey, Portugal and Romania. For the present study, the LF radio data collected
over about two years were analysed. At first, the day-time data and the night-time data were separated for each radio signal. Taking into account
that the LF signals are characterized by ground-wave and sky-wave propagation modes, the day-time data are related to the ground wave and
the night-time data to the sky wave. In this framework, the effects of solar activity and storm activity were defined in the different trends. Then, the
earthquakes with M ≥5.0 that occurred over the same period were selected, as those located in a 300-km radius around each receiver/transmitter and
within the 5th Fresnel zone related to each transmitter-receiver path. Where possible, the wavelet analysis was applied on the time series of the radio
signal intensity, and some anomalies related to previous earthquakes were revealed. Except for some doubt in one case, success appears to have been obtained in all of the cases related to the 300 km circles in for the ground waves and the sky waves. For the Fresnel cases, success in two cases and one
failure were seen in analysing the sky waves. The failure occurred in August/September, and might be related to the disturbed conditions of the ionosphere in summer
Ceramide-induced BOK promotes mitochondrial fission in preeclampsia
Mitochondria are in a constant balance of fusing and dividing in response to cellular cues. Fusion creates healthy mitochondria, whereas fission results in removal of non-functional organelles. Changes in mitochondrial dynamics typify several human diseases. However, the contribution of mitochondrial dynamics to preeclampsia, a hypertensive disorder of pregnancy characterized by placental cell autophagy and death, remains unknown. Herein, we show that the mitochondrial dynamic balance in preeclamptic placentae is tilted toward fission (increased DRP1 expression/activation and decreased OPA1 expression). Increased phosphorylation of DRP1 (p-DRP1) in mitochondrial isolates from preeclamptic placentae and transmission electron microscopy corroborated augmented mitochondrial fragmentation in cytotrophoblast cells of PE placentae. Increased fission was accompanied by build-up of ceramides (CERs) in mitochondria from preeclamptic placentae relative to controls. Treatment of human choriocarcinoma JEG3 cells and primary isolated cytrophoblast cells with CER 16:0 enhanced mitochondrial fission. Loss- and gain-of-function experiments showed that Bcl-2 member BOK, whose expression is increased by CER, positively regulated p-DRP1/DRP1 and MFN2 expression, and localized mitochondrial fission events to the ER/MAM compartments. We also identified that the BH3 and transmembrane domains of BOK were vital for BOK regulation of fission. Moreover, we found that full-length PTEN-induced putative kinase 1 (PINK1) and Parkin, were elevated in mitochondria from PE placentae, implicating mitophagy as the process that degrades excess mitochondria fragments produced from CER/BOK-induced fission in preeclampsia. In summary, our study uncovered a novel CER/BOK-induced regulation of mitochondrial fission and its functional consequence for heightened trophoblast cell autophagy in preeclampsia
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