22 research outputs found

    Radiative impact of Etna volcanic aerosols over south eastern Italy on 3 December 2015

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    Irradiance and LiDAR measurements at the surface combined with satellite products from SEVIRI (Spinning Enhanced Visible and InfraRed Imager) and MODIS (MODerate resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) were used to detect and characterize the Etna volcano (Italy) plume that crossed southeastern Italy on 3 December 2015, from about 10:00 up to 11:30 UTC, and estimate its radiative impact. The volcanic plume was delivered by a violent and short paroxysmal eruption that occurred from 02:30 to 03:10 UTC of 3 December 2015, about 400 km away from the monitoring site. Measurements from the LiDAR combined with model results showed that the aerosol optical depth of the volcanic plume, located from about 11 to 13 km above sea level (asl), was equal to 0.80 ± 0.07 at 532 nm. A low tropospheric aerosol load, located up to about 7 km asl, with optical depth equal to 0.19 ± 0.01 at 532 nm was also revealed by the LiDAR measurements. Short-Wave (SW) downward and upward irradiance measurements revealed that the instantaneous SW direct radiative forcing at the surface (DRFsurf) decreased to −146 ± 16 W m−2 at 10:50 UTC because of the volcanic plume passage. A Two-Stream radiative transfer model integrated with experimental measurements, which took into account the volcanic plume and the low tropospheric aerosol properties, was used to reproduce the SW radiative flux measurements at the surface and estimate the aerosol DRF both at the top of the atmosphere (TOA) and at the surface, in addition to the aerosol heating rate vertical profile. We found that the clear-sky, instantaneous, SW DRF at the TOA and the atmospheric forcing were equal to −112 and 33 W m-2, respectively, at 10:50 UTC that represented the time at which the volcanic plume radiative impact was the highest. The SW aerosol heating rate reached the peak value of 1.24 K day−1 at 12 km asl and decreased to −0.06 K day−1 at 11 km asl, at 10:50 UTC. The role of the aerosol load located up to about 7 km asl and the corresponding radiative impact has also been evaluated. © 2018 Elsevier Lt

    Is routine axillary lymph node dissection needed to tailor systemic treatments for breast cancer patients in the era of molecular oncology? A position paper of the Italian National Association of Breast Surgeons (ANISC)

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    Background: De-escalation of axillary surgery in breast cancer (BC) management began when sentinel lymph node biopsy (SLNB) replaced axillary lymph node dissection (ALND) as standard of care in patients with node-negative BC. The second step consolidated ALND omission in selected subgroups of BC patients with up to two macrometastases and recognized BC molecular and genomic implication in predicting prognosis and planning adjuvant treatment. Outcomes from the recent RxPONDER and monarchE trials have come to challenge the previous cut-off of two SLN in order to inform decisions on systemic therapies for hormone receptor-positive (HR+), human epidermal growth factor receptor type-2 (HER2) negative BC, as the criteria included a cut-off of respectively three and four SLNs. In view of the controversy that this may lift in surgical practice, the Italian National Association of Breast Surgeons (Associazione Nazionale Italiana Senologi Chirurghi, ANISC) reviewed data regarding the latest trials on this topic and proposes an implementation in clinical practice. Material and methods: We reviewed the available literature offering data on the pathological nodal status of cN0 breast cancer patients. Results: The rates of pN2 status in cN0 patients ranges from 3.5 % to 16 %; pre-surgical diagnostic definition of axillary lymph node status in cN0 patients by ultrasound could be useful to inform about a possible involvement of ≥4 lymph nodes in this specific sub-groups of women. Conclusions: The Italian National Association of Breast Surgeons (ANISC) considers that for HR + HER2-/cN0-pN1(sn) BC patients undergoing breast conserving treatment the preoperative workup should be optimized for a more detailed assessment of the axilla and the technique of SLNB should be optimized, if considered appropriate by the surgeon, not considering routine ALND always indicated to determine treatment recommendations according to criteria of eligibility to RxPONDER and monarch-E trials

    Spatio-temporal monitoring by ground-based and air- and space-borne lidars of a moderate Saharan dust event affecting southern Europe in June 2013 in the framework of the ADRIMED/ChArMEx campaign

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    The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11869-016-0447-7During the ADRIMED (Aerosol Direct Radiative Impact on the regional climate in the Mediterranean region) special observation period (SOP-1a), conducted in June 2013 in the framework of the ChArMEx (Chemistry-Aerosol Mediterranean Experiment) project, a moderate Saharan dust event swept the Western and Central Mediterranean Basin (WCMB) from west to east during a 9-day period between 16 and 24 June. This event was monitored from the ground by six EARLINET/ACTRIS (European Aerosol Research Lidar Network/Aerosols, Clouds, and Trace gases Research Infrastructure Network) lidar stations (Granada, Barcelona, Naples, Potenza, Lecce and Serra la Nave) and two ADRIMED/ChArMEx lidar stations specially deployed for the field campaign in Cap d’en Font and Ersa, in Minorca and Corsica Islands, respectively. The first part of the study shows the spatio-temporal monitoring of the dust event during its transport over the WCMB with ground-based lidar and co-located AERONET (Aerosol Robotic Network) Sun-photometer measurements. Dust layer optical depths, Ångström exponents, coarse mode fractions, linear particle depolarization ratios (LPDRs), dust layer heights and the dust radiative forcing estimated in the shortwave (SW) and longwave (LW) spectral ranges at the bottom of the atmosphere (BOA) and at the top of the atmosphere (TOA) with the Global Atmospheric Model (GAME), have been used to characterize the dust event. Peak values of the AERONET aerosol optical depth (AOD) at 440 nm ranged between 0.16 in Potenza and 0.37 in Cap d’en Font. The associated Ångström exponent and coarse mode fraction mean values ranged from 0.43 to 1.26 and from 0.25 to 0.51, respectively. The mineral dust produced a negative SW direct radiative forcing at the BOA ranging from -56.9 to -3.5 W m-2. The LW radiative forcing at the BOA was positive, ranging between +0.3 and +17.7 W m-2. The BOA radiative forcing estimates agree with the ones reported in the literature. At the TOA, the SW forcing varied between -34.5 and +7.5 W m-2. In seven cases, the forcing at the TOA resulted positive because of the aerosol strong absorbing properties (0.83 < single-scattering albedo (SSA) < 0.96). The multi-intrusion aspect of the event is examined by means of air- and space-borne lidar measurements, satellite images and back trajectories. The analysis reported in this paper underline the arrival of a second different intrusion of mineral dust observed over southern Italy at the end of the considered period which probably results in the observed heterogeneity in the dust properties.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version
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