Comment on "Are periodic solar wind number density structures formed in the solar corona?" by N. M. Viall et al., 2009, Geophys. Res. Lett., 36, L23102, doi:10.1029/2009GL041191

Location of formation of periodic solar wind number density structures is discussed. Observation of proton and alpha anticorrelation in these structures [Viall et al., 2009] indicates that taking into account that bulk velocity of aplha-particles is higher than that of proton the place of formation for these structures should be located at distance less 0.002 AU from place of observation.Comment: 6 pages, submitted in GR

The Far-Infrared Spectral Energy Distributions of X-ray-selected Active Galaxies

[Abridged] We present ISO far-infrared (IR) observations of 21 hard X-ray selected AGN from the HEAO-1 A2 sample. We compare the far-IR to X-ray spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of this sample with various radio and optically selected AGN samples. The hard-X-ray selected sample shows a wider range of optical/UV shapes extending to redder near-IR colors. The bluer objects are Seyfert 1s, while the redder AGN are mostly intermediate or type 2 Seyferts. This is consistent with a modified unification model in which the amount of obscuring material increases with viewing angle and may be clumpy. Such a scenario, already suggested by differing optical/near-IR spectroscopic and X-ray AGN classifications, allows for different amounts of obscuration of the continuum emission in different wavebands and of the broad emission line region which results in a mixture of behaviors for AGN with similar optical emission line classifications. The resulting limits on the column density of obscuring material through which we are viewing the redder AGN are 100 times lower than for the standard optically thick torus models. The resulting decrease in optical depth of the obscuring material allows the AGN to heat more dust at larger radial distances. We show that an AGN-heated, flared, dusty disk with mass 10^9 solar and size of few hundred pc is able to generate optical-far-IR SEDs which reproduce the wide range of SEDs present in our sample with no need for an additional starburst component to generate the long-wavelength, cooler part of the IR continuum.Comment: 40 pages, 14 figures, accepted for publication in Astrophysical Journal, V. 590, June 10, 200

Patient-centered rehabilitation, three years of gait recovery in a child affected by hemiplegia: case report

The aim of this report was to illustrate and to discuss a method capable of improving the person-oriented decision-making process during three years of gait rehabilitation based on the integration of: 1) the fundamental principles of motor learning and 2) the outcomes made available by both clinical standardized assessment tools (SAT) and measures made available by a gait analysis system (GA). The subject studied was a six-year-old child affected by hemiplegia after arterial ischemic stroke (AIS) who had limited upper and lower right-limb function but unaffected sensory and cognitive skills. Four different rehabilitative treatments were chosen when the child was inpatient or outpatient. Measurements of gait performance before and after selected treatments were evaluated using PEDI and GMFM (i.e., SAT) and kinematic and kinetic parameters (i.e., GA). Gait pattern and inter- and intralimb-joint coordination changed over time during the three examined years. However, after the first eight months of recovery, gait pattern modifications were detected by GA measures but not by SAT. The integration of SAT and GA findings, during the examined recovery evolution, resulted effective in the decision-making process for a person-oriented rehabilitative treatment

Psychopathological problems in children affected by tic disorders. Study on a large Italian population.

In Tourette syndrome (TS) as a neurodevelopmental disorder not only the tics but also the comorbid conditions change with increasing age. ADHD is highly comorbid with TS and usually impairs psychosocial functioning more than the tics. Its impact on further comorbidity during development is important for clinical practice and still a matter of debate. Method Aspects of developmental psychopathology considering the impact of ADHD were examined by logistic regression (year wisely) in a cross-sectional sample of children and adolescents (n = 5060) from the TIC database. Results In TS+ADHD (compared to TS)ADHD) higher rates of comorbid conditions like OCD, anxiety disorders, CD/ODD and mood disorders were found in children (5– 10 years). In adolescents (11– 17 years) higher comorbidity rates in TS+ADHD remained only for CD/ODD and mood disorders. Accordingly, for OCD and anxiety disorders there was a steeper year wise increase of these comorbidities in TS)ADHD while it was a similar for CD/ODD and mood disorders in TS)ADHD as well as TS+ADHD. Conclusion Children with TS+ADHD have more comorbidities than the TS)ADHD group, whereas in both adolescent groups this did no longer hold for OCD and anxiety disorders. These findings indicate that in TS comorbid ADHD is associated with high rates of externalizing and internalizing problems, whereas TS without ADHD is associated only with internalizing problems in adolescence