1,906 research outputs found
Comparing techniques to achieve high accuracy and low cost : how should we first diagnose Crohn's disease?
No full textCD is a life-llong inflammatory disease with a world-wide increasing incidence. It is frequently characterized by nonspecific symptoms which need to be differentiated from several intestinal disorders. Despite diagnostic advancements, CD diagnosis remains difficult and frequently challenging. Factors contributing to CD diagnosis delay may include improper use of diagnostic tools. Recent evidence suggests that a selection and a proper sequential use of noninvasive and low-cost diagnostic tests in specific clinical contexts may contribute to direct, speed up and increase the rate of CD diagnosis besides, more importantly, avoiding unnecessary costly investigations
Bare iron oxide nanoparticles: Surface tunability for biomedical, sensing and environmental applications
No full textSurface modification is widely assumed as a mandatory prerequisite for the real applicability of iron oxide nanoparticles. This is aimed to endow prolonged stability, electrolyte and pH tolerance as well as a desired specific surface chemistry for further functionalization to these materials. Nevertheless, coating processes have negative consequences on the sustainability of nanomaterial production contributing to high costs, heavy environmental impact and difficult scalability. In this view, bare iron oxide nanoparticles (BIONs) are arousing an increasing interest and the properties and advantages of pristine surface chemistry of iron oxide are becoming popular among the scientific community. In the authors' knowledge, rare efforts were dedicated to the use of BIONs in biomedicine, biotechnology, food industry and environmental remediation. Furthermore, literature lacks examples highlighting the potential of BIONs as platforms for the creation of more complex nanostructured architectures, and emerging properties achievable by the direct manipulation of pristine iron oxide surfaces have been little studied. Based on authors' background on BIONs, the present review is aimed at providing hints on the future expansion of these nanomaterials emphasizing the opportunities achievable by tuning their pristine surfaces
Reassembling Skins and Bones: Indigenous Posthumanism in Linda Hogan’s Solar Storms
No full textWhile posthumanism has contributed to questioning the foundations of humanism and the consequent process of exclusion it engendered of all those diverging from the universal category of ‘Man,’ numerous scholars have criticized this diverse philosophical movement from Indigenous perspectives. Multiple critics suggest a tendency within posthumanist strands of thought to oppose dualistic approaches presenting them as universal without considering the preexisting non-dualistic frameworks articulated by Indigenous scholars, while also appropriating Indigenous epistemes without acknowledging them, running the risk of becoming complicit with colonial violence and with what Rauna Kuokkanen has defined ‘epistemic ignorance.’ For this reason, projects of decolonizing posthumanist scholarship entail engaging and establishing a dialogue with Indigenous studies, fostering a ‘multiepistemic literacy.’ Acknowledging the productive potential of an alliance between Indigenous and posthumanist discourses in reorienting the conversation toward issues of settler colonialism, land sovereignty and Indigenous self-determination, this paper aims to apply an Indigenous posthumanist perspective to Chickasaw author Linda Hogan’s Solar Storms. In particular, the paper will focus, on the one hand, on representations within the novel of taxidermic practices, deeply tied to colonial violence, that transform animals into posthuman commodified objects, and, on the other, on instances of reassembling skins and bones in acts of regenerative creation, which, unlike taxidermy, acknowledge the need for reciprocity and processes of relational becoming. These new combinations of matter constitute on the part of the protagonist a way of envisioning new modes of being human, relating to the more-than-human, and affirming Indigenous self-determination
Analisi critica dei dati prescrittivi italiani.
No full textIl capitolo descrive e commenta i dati prescrittivi italiani relativi ai farmaci oppioidi confrontandoli con i dati di altri Paesi europei e non. I dati, ricavati prevalentemente dall'OSMED mostrano come ancora oggi la prescrizione degli oppioidi sia più bassa in Italia rispetto ai principali paesi del mondo. In altri paesi esiste un problema di iper-prescrizione o per meglio dire di prescrizione non appropriata che sta portando a fenomeni di abuso, mentre nel nostro paese permane una situazione, ormai storica, di ipo-prescrizione. Questo fenomeno, che pone l'Italia in fondo alle classifiche per quanto attiene il trattamento del dolore cronico, è determinato da retaggi del passato da una scarsa conoscenza sui profili rischi/beneficio degli analgesici oppioidi. Permangono così timori ingiustificati che necessitano di essere fugati attraverso adeguati processi formativi
Has something changed in the smoking attitudes of parents in the household in the last 15 years? Epidemiological survey among the students of the city of Agrigento [È cambiato qualcosa nelle abitudini dei genitori fumatori in ambito domestico negli ultimi 15 anni? Indagine epidemiologica tra gli alunni della città di Agrigento]
No full textBACKGROUND:
Exposure of children to passive tobacco smoking in the household setting has been demonstrated to cause respiratory diseases. Early atherosclerosis has also been demonstrated in young people previously exposed to passive tobacco smoking. Functional damage can initiate at the fetal age due to maternal smoking, with a tendency towards over-time progress. To date only scant data are available about indoor parental smoking attitudes and their changes after campaigns against smoke and risk factors in exposed youths. Questionnaires are useful tools in order to search for information on cigarette smoking and parental household lifestyle. In this study, we asked pupils of primary schools for providing information on their relatives' every 5 years throughout the period 1994-2009.
METHODS:
A multiple-choice answer questionnaire about sharing household parental smoking was administered to all primary school children (mean age 10.5 ± 0.5 years) of the city of Agrigento (Sicily, Italy).
RESULTS:
A total of 2221 questionnaires were collected from 637 children in 1994, 687 in 1999, 516 in 2004, and 381 in 2009. Important findings show a significant reduction in both smoking parents and exposure to passive tobacco smoking (from 64% in 1994 to 45% in 2009, p<0.00001). In 2009, 22% of mothers and 39% of fathers resulted to be smokers in the household setting yet.
CONCLUSIONS:
In agreement with the 2011 Italian DOXA survey on the general population, the present study demonstrates a negative trend in the prevalence of household smoker parents (predominantly mothers) and exposure of children to passive tobacco smoking. These results likely reflect such a greater awareness about smoke-related risks in children, and the effectiveness of medical campaigns against cardiovascular risk factors as well
Disegni botanici di Angelina Damiani Lanza (1879 - 1936)
No full textBotanical drawings of Angelina Damiani Lanza (1879 - 1936). The drawings of Sicilian plants made by Ange- lina Damiani are reported and commented. After a brief presentation of the author’s personality, the technique used in the drawings is examined, together with the relevant value from the artistic and botanical point of view. This material, mainly consisting of pencil drawings gathered in an album recently donated to the Director of the Palermo Botanical Garden, sin- ce 2006 is exhibited in the small historical museum set up in one of the halls of the monumental Gymnasium of the same Botanical Garden. Most of the drawings done by Angelina Damiani for the studies of her husband, the Sicilian botanist Domenico Lanza, mainly concern various species and varieties of Calendula.This hard genus of the Asteraceae family was indeed covered by the special interest of Domenico Lanza, on which he carried out a valuable botanical monographic work
Toward the specificity of bare nanomaterial surfaces for protein corona formation
No full textAiming at creating smart nanomaterials for biomedical applications, nanotechnology aspires to develop a new generation of nanomaterials with the ability to recognize different biological components in a complex environment. It is common opinion that nanomaterials must be coated with organic or inorganic layers as a mandatory prerequisite for applications in biological systems. Thus, it is the nanomaterial surface coating that predominantly controls the nanomaterial fate in the biological environment. In the last decades, interdisciplinary studies involving not only life sciences, but all branches of scientific research, provided hints for obtaining uncoated inorganic materials able to interact with biological systems with high complexity and selectivity. Herein, the fragmentary literature on the interactions between bare abiotic materials and biological components is reviewed. Moreover, the most relevant examples of selective binding and the conceptualization of the general principles behind recognition mechanisms were provided. Nanoparticle features, such as crystalline facets, density and distribution of surface chemical groups, and surface roughness and topography were encompassed for deepening the comprehension of the general concept of recognition patterns
- …
