1,721,386 research outputs found
Geo-climatic heterogeneity in self-reported asthma, allergic rhinitis and chronic bronchitis in Italy
No full textBackground: Several studies highlighted a great variability, both between and within countries, in the prevalence of asthma and chronic airways diseases. Aim: To evaluate if geo-climatic variations can explain the heterogeneity in the prevalence of asthma and respiratory diseases in Italy. Methods: Between 2006 and 2010, a postal screening questionnaire on respiratory health was administered to 18,357 randomly selected subjects, aged 20-44, living in 7 centers in northern, central, and southern Italy. A random-effects meta-analysis was fitted to evaluate the between-centers heterogeneity in the prevalence of asthma, asthma-like symptoms, allergic rhinitis, and chronic bronchitis (CB). A principal component analysis (PCA) was performed to synthetize the geo-climatic information (annual mean temperature, range of temperature, annual rainfalls, global solar radiations, altitude, distance from the sea) of all the 110 Italian province capital towns. The associations between these geo-climatic components obtained with PCA and the prevalence of respiratory diseases were analyzed through meta-regression models. Results: 10,464 (57%) subjects responded to the questionnaire. There was a significant between-centers heterogeneity in the prevalence of asthma (I2=59.5%, p=0.022) and CB (I2=60.5%, p=0.019), but not in that of asthma-like symptoms or allergic rhinitis. Two independent geo-climatic components explaining together about 80% of the overall geo-climatic variability were identified: the first principally summarized the climatic variables; the second the topographic ones. Variations in the prevalence of asthma across centers were significantly associated with differences in the climatic component (p=0.017), but not with differences in the topographic one. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that climate play a role in determining the between-center heterogeneity in the prevalence of asthma in Italy, with higher prevalence in dry-hot Mediterranean climates, and lower in rainy-cold northern climates. © 2015
Toward Enabled Industrial Verticals in 5G: A Survey on MEC-Based Approaches to Provisioning and Flexibility
No full textThe increasing number of heterogeneous devices connected to the Internet, together with tight 5G requirements have generated new challenges for designing network infrastructures. Industrial verticals such as automotive, smart city and eHealthcare (among others) need secure, low latency and reliable communications. To meet these stringent requirements, computing resources have to be moved closer to the user, from the core to the edge of the network. In this context, ETSI standardized Multi-Access Edge Computing (MEC). However, due to the cost of resources, MEC provisioning has to be carefully designed and evaluated. This survey firstly overviews standards, with particular emphasis on 5G and virtualization of network functions, then it addresses flexibility of MEC smart resource deployment and its migration capabilities. This survey explores how the MEC is used and how it will enable industrial verticals
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Studio Raman e SERS dei complessi metallici di Ibuprofen.
No full textL'Ibuprofen è un principio attivo del gruppo dei farmaci non steroidei dotati di proprietà anti infiammatorie, in cui il sito di interazione attraverso cui si sviluppano le proprietà farmacologiche è costituito dal gruppo carbossilato, che può anche essere disponibile per interazioni legante-metallo. L'interesse per lo studio strutturale dei complessi metallici deriva dall'osservazione che la complessazione con ioni metallici può favorire il trasporto del farmaco, rendendolo più efficace; inoltre alcuni autori riportano che i complessi di antiinfiammatori con il Cu(II) presentano un effetto anti-ulcera. Gli spettri Raman dei complessi metallici di Ibu hanno diversa struttura: il complesso Cu-Ibu presenta struttura bidentata a ponte (si osservano infatti le bande attribuite al legame Cu-O e del ponte Cu-Cu2), mentre il complesso Ibu-Zn ha una struttura bidentata 2:1 semplice. La tecnica 'Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy' (SERS), consentendo una notevole amplificazione dell'intensità degli spettri Raman, estende l'uso delle spettroscopie vibrazionali alle concentrazioni bioattive dei farmaci (ppm) in soluzione. Gli spettri SERS mostrano bande intense nella regione 1350-1600 cm-1, attribuibili ai modi vibrazionali degli anelli aromatici e del gruppo COO-. Si nota che gli spettri Raman dei solidi sono alquanto diversi da quelli SERS degli stessi composti, poiché solo le bande dovute alle vibrazioni dei gruppi direttamente interagenti con la superficie delle particelle colloidali di Ag sono amplificate e questo spiega la relativa semplicità degli spettri SERS. L'elevata amplificazione delle bande dovute allo ione carbossilato e agli anelli aromatici conferma che, per tutti i composti considerati, l'interazione con la superfìcie di Ag è dovuta alle coppie di elettroni degli atomi di ossigeno e che le molecole si chemiadsorbono sulla superficie delle particelle di colloide
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Genotypic variability in abscisic acid accumulation in vitro NaCl stressed Vitis vinifera cultivars. International Symposium on: “Irrigation and water relations in grapevine and fruit trees”
No full textThe unseen effect of pesticides: The impact on phytobiota structure and functions
Full text linkIn the last years, the diffusion and implementation of next-generation
sequencing and the reduction of costs raised the interest in phytyobiome
studies allowing to dissect the ecological interactions regulating the holobiont.
Indeed, crop plants are associated with a wide diversity of microorganisms in all
their parts. Crop microbiota influences plant phenotype, growth, yield and
quality by contributing to plant resistance toward diseases, plant adaptation to
abiotic stresses, and plant nutrition. The association between terrestrial plants
and microbes developed at least 460 million years ago, as suggested by the
fossil evidence of the earliest land plants, indicating the essential role of
microbes for plants. Recent studies indicate that plants actively recruit
beneficial microorganisms to facilitate their adaptation to environmental
conditions. Cultivation methods and disease control measures can influence
plant microbiome structure and functions. Both pesticide and biological
control agent applications may alter the biodiversity inside the phytobiota
and suppress beneficial functions. Nonetheless, to date, the effects of disease
control measures on phytobiota and their possible side consequences on plant
growth, crop productivity and quality remain a neglected field of study. The
present work summarizes the known effects on phytobiota providing evidence
about the role of plant microbial community in determining the overall efficacy
of the applied control measure and suggests that future studies on plant
disease control consider also the microbe-mediated effects on plant fitness
Edge Gaming: A Greening Perspective
No full textWe tackle the problem of how to support gaming at the edge of the cellular network. The reduced latency and higher bandwidth that the edge enjoys with respect to cloud-based solutions implies that transferring cloud-based games to the edge could be a premium service for end-users. The goal of this work is to design a scheme compatible with MEC and network slicing principles of 5G and beyond, and which maximizes the utility of a service/infrastructure provider with time-varying edge node capacities due to the access to intermittent renewable energy. We formulate a multi-dimensional integer linear programming problem, proving that it is NP-hard in the strong sense. We prove that our problem is sub-modular and propose an efficient heuristic, GREENING, which considers the allocation of gaming sessions and their migration. For the mentioned scenario, we analyze a wide variety of realistic configurations at the edge, studying how the performance depends on (i) whether the games have a static or dynamic workload, (ii) the distribution of renewable energy through nodes and time, or (iii) the topology of the edge network. Through simulations, we show that our heuristic achieves performance close to that achieved by solving the NP-hard optimization problem, except with extremely lower complexity, and performs up to 25% better than state-of-the-art algorithms
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