The role of the tumor peripheral microenvironment to establish prostate cancer invasiveness is gaining interest. Radiomics is a rapidly growing research field, however there are still many ...methodological challenges to guarantee robustness and reproducibility of the models. We aimed to verify the feasibility of a semi-automated segmentation strategy for periprostatic tissue on axial T2-weighted images from 30 magnetic resonance imaging scans, test stability of hand-crafted radiomics features to multiple segmentation and their potential value in identification of extracapsular tumor extension using a machine learning approach. 1274 radiomics features were extracted from each volume of interest, with less than half (40 %) resulting stable at the ICC analysis. The trained Naïve Bayesian model correctly classified 63 % of instances aggregating the cross-validation data (AUC = 0.68). Although the performance of our machine learning model did not reach optimal results, the proposed segmentation approach could represent a facilitator for future research in the field.
The present work is a first step in building a wearable system to monitor the heart functionality of a patient and assess the cardiovascular risk by means of non-invasive measurements, such as ...electrocardiogram (ECG), heart rate, blood oxygenation, and body temperature. Also clinic data obtained by means of a patient interview are taken into account. In this feasibility study, measures from a pre-existing dataset are exploited. They are processed with a machine learning algorithm. Features are first extracted from the measures collected with the wearable sensors. Then, these features are employed together with clinic data to classify the patients health status. A Random Forest classifier was employed and the algorithm was characterized considering different setups. The best accuracy resulted equal to 78.6% in distinguishing three classes of patients, namely healthy, unhealthy non-critical, and unhealthy critical patients.
In the last decades a variety of innovative craniofacial approaches has been adopted to entire skull base. The endonasal endoscopic route has emerged as a suitable methodology for several skull base ...lesions. An effective watertight closure is essential to isolate the intracranial cavity in order to restore the natural intra and extradural compartment division, necessary to prevent postoperative cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) leakage and complications such as meningitis, brain herniation, and tension pneumocephalus. The reconstruction can be performed using different materials, both autologous (autologous grafts) and non-autologous, individually or combined in a multilayer fashion. The harvesting a nasoseptal flap is one of the most effective techniques: it reinforces the skull base closure granting isolation of the surgical field. The current study was focused on the development of new advanced devices and techniques, aiding in reducing postoperative CSF leak, which is one of the most feared complication of this surgical procedure. Additive manufacturing allows to design devices with tailored structural and functional features, in order to satisfy all the requirements. On the other hand, the development of injectable semi-IPNs and composites clearly benefits from specific mechanical/rheological and injectability studies. Accordingly, starting from some basic concepts, innovative principles and strategies were also proposed towards the design of additively manufactured and injectable devices.
We studied the effects of various doses of the opiate derivative buprenorphine on serum prolactin levels and whether these effects could be counteracted by pretreatment with the opiate receptor ...blocker naloxone. The administration of increasing doses of buprenorphine exerted a dual effect on serum prolactin levels. At low doses (3, 10 and 30 micrograms/kg) this agent increased serum prolactin levels. This effect disappeared with increasing doses (100 and 300 micrograms/kg), and at the highest doses (1000 and 3000 micrograms/kg) the levels of serum prolactin decreased. Naloxone (30 mg/kg) decreased serum prolactin levels and reversed both the stimulatory and the inhibitory action of buprenorphine. These data are compatible with the hypothesis that buprenorphine could interfere with two different, but inter-dependent receptors: at low doses the oripavine derivative could act at one receptor site to cause an increase of serum prolactin, whereas at higher doses it could interact with a second site of lower affinity that is responsible for the inhibition of prolactin secretion. When buprenorphine (at high doses) activates the lower affinity site, the interaction with this receptor counteracts and reverses the effects of the high affinity site. On the basis of this hypothesis, naloxone should block both receptors.
