Outbreaks of methanol poisoning may occur in every country causing a medical and public health emergency. The most recent and severe reported outbreak in Italy occurred in 1986. Objective: To ...describe an outbreak of methanol poisoning occurring in Sicily in 2006-2007, and the role of the Poison Centre in the Rapid-Alert and syndromic-surveillance (SS) systems. Methods: All Sicilian cases of methanol poisoning referred to the Pavia Poison Centre (P-PC) in the considered period were analysed for PSS, time for analytical confirmation, treatment, outcome and influence of the alert/surveillance systems in the amelioration of identification of poisoned cases. Results: Ten cases occurred from Aug-2006 (first alert) to Oct-2007. Four additional cases from Feb-2003 to Apr-2006 were identified retrospectively. A total of fourteen cases were identified. PSS at admission was 1, 2 and 3 in 1, 1 and 12 cases respectively. The most frequent clinical features were mydriasis (14/14), metabolic acidosis (12/14), coma (11/14), shock (9/14), respiratory failure (9/14). Serum methanol was assessed in 10/11 cases, ranging from 10 to 420 mg/dL; one case had urinary confirmation. Time required for laboratory confirmation ranged from 6 to 60 hours. Supportive, antidotal and dialysis treatment was performed in 14/14, 13/14 and 11/14 patients respectively. Eleven patients died, one patient was lost at follow-up. The population involved is mainly composed of eastern European young women (8/14) living in Italy as caregivers. Nine rapid-alerts were subsequently forwarded by P-PC to all Italian PC and to National and Regional authorities: a specific SS system was implemented. Conclusions: The outbreak mortality is high, mainly because of late diagnosis and treatment. Laboratory support has been essential in identifying new cases. The alert and SS systems activated by the P-PC according to the Ministry of Health and the Regional authorities seems to ameliorate the EDs recognition of methanol intoxications. Specific preventative measures have also been activated by the Ministry of Health and the Sicilian regional authorities. The source of the methanol remains still unknown, even though the habit of adding denatured alcohol to vodka might have a role due to an erroneous use of high concentration commercial methanol products in Sicily.
Pleomorphic lipomas are rare benign tumours that can resemble a variety of malignant tissue tumour on histological examination. We describe a case of pleomorphic lipoma arising on the posterior ...aspect of the neck of a 70-year-old man, successfully treated by surgical excision. A review of the literature is presented, summarizing the principal clinical and morphological characteristics of this rare tumor.
The Legacy e-MERLIN Multi-band Imaging of Nearby Galaxies survey (LeMMINGs) is a statistically-complete census of nuclear accretion and star formation processes in the local Universe. The LeMMINGs ...observations at 1.5 and 5 GHz yield angular resolutions on 10s milliarcsecond-scales, with sensitivities of 10s \(\mu\)Jy. Awarded 810 hours of observing time, the full statistical sample (at 1.5 GHz) plus several studies of individual objects have now been published. Combined with multi-wavelength follow up observations, this survey will provide a unique legacy data set of our Galactic back yard. We present an overview of the LeMMINGs results so far, including the 1.5 GHz sample results and associated Chandra X-ray data. We describe the next steps for LeMMINGs to analyse the 5 GHz survey and produce widefield images to categories all radio sources in the LeMMINGs galaxies.
Because more than 90% of local recurrences after curative surgery for rectal cancer appear within the first 36 months after surgery, an intensive and strict follow-up program during this period could ...improve early diagnosis and, thus, prognosis of patients.
Of the 216 patients who underwent surgery for rectal cancer, 127 entered an intensive follow-up program (median follow-up: 42 months); the clinical outcome of the remaining 89 patients was reconstructed with the help of their general practitioners.
Fifty eight (26.8%) of the 216 patients who were treated with curative surgery alone developed a local recurrence; pelvic recurrences were prevalent. Eleven (30.5%) of the 36 patients who had recurrence during follow-up, and 6 of the 22 who had not undergone follow-up, had a reoperation with curative intent; the median survival was 19 months vs. 8 months, respectively (P = ns). Four (44.4%) curative reoperations were performed on the 9 asymptomatic patients and in 13 (26.5%) of the 49 cases with symptomatic local recurrences. Median survival was 15 months vs. 14 months, respectively (P = n.s). All patients except one (living after 42 months from reoperation) died within 48 months.
In our study, adherence to a strict follow-up program unfortunately proved to be ineffective for improving long-term survival for patients who underwent reoperation with curative intent.
Future Large Scale Structure surveys are expected to improve over current bounds on primordial non-Gaussianity (PNG), with a significant impact on our understanding of early Universe physics. The ...level of such improvements will however strongly depend on the extent to which late time non-linearities erase the PNG signal on small scales. In this work, we show how much primordial information remains in the bispectrum of the non-linear dark matter density field by implementing a new, simulation-based, methodology for joint estimation of PNG amplitudes (\(f_{\rm NL}\)) and standard \(\Lambda\)CDM parameters. The estimator is based on optimally compressed statistics, which, for a given input density field, combine power spectrum and modal bispectrum measurements, and numerically evaluate their covariance and their response to changes in cosmological parameters. We train and validate the estimator using a large suite of N-body simulations (QUIJOTE-PNG), including different types of PNG (local, equilateral, orthogonal). We explicitly test the estimator's unbiasedness, optimality and stability with respect to changes in the total number of input realizations. While the dark matter power spectrum itself contains negligible PNG information, as expected, including it as an ancillary statistic increases the PNG information content extracted from the bispectrum by a factor of order \(2\). As a result, we prove the capability of our approach to optimally extract PNG information on non-linear scales beyond the perturbative regime, up to \(k_{\rm max} = 0.5~h\,{\rm Mpc}^{-1}\), obtaining marginalized \(1\)-\(\sigma\) bounds of \(\Delta f_{\rm NL}^{\rm local} \sim 16\), \(\Delta f_{\rm NL}^{\rm equil} \sim 77\) and \(\Delta f_{\rm NL}^{\rm ortho} \sim 40\) on a cubic volume of \(1~(\mathrm{Gpc}/h)^3\) at \(z=1\). At the same time, we discuss the significant information on cosmological parameters contained on these scales.
Ester conjugates of indole-3-acetic acid are hydrolyzed easily in basic solutions; however, quantitative data have not been available on the relationship between pH and rate of hydrolysis of the ...known ester conjugates. The use of basic conditions during extraction or purification of IAA by several laboratories suggested that a more systematic analysis of this process was needed. In this report we present data indicating: (a) that measurable hydrolysis of IAA-glucose (from standard solutions) and IAA-esters (from maize kernel extracts) occurs with only a few hours of treatment at pH 9 or above; (b) that the lability of some ester conjugates is even greater than that of IAA-glucose; and (c) that ester hydrolysis of standard compounds, IAA-glucose and IAA-p-nitrophenol, occurs in the 'three phase extraction system' proposed by Liu and Tillberg (1983 Physiol Plant 57:441-447). These data indicate the the potential for problems with inadvertent hydrolysis of ester conjugates of IAA exists even at moderate pH values and in the multiphase system where exposure to basic conditions was thought to be limited
Interconnection parasitic effects are one of the factors that limit the performances of deep sub-micron VLSI designs, since parasitic capacitance increases with decreasing geometrical dimensions, ...becoming the dominating delay contributor. Technology alone cannot offer a satisfying solution, because new materials offer only a limited reduction in parasitic effects, while introducing new reliability and manufacturability concerns. The problem must be managed at the design level, by adopting proper design and verification methodologies. However, the introduction of delay verification after layout is not enough, since, with increasing design complexity, no guarantee exists that the procedure of delay verification and layout correction will converge. Ways must be found to take care of interconnections at an early design stage, achieving a delay aware floor planning. A further source of problems, which is starting to play a significant role, is the delay introduced by cross-talk effects, which are essentially dynamic in nature. Cross-talk Aware Static Timing Analysis techniques must be introduced to identify, in a fast way, critical nets, limiting the required corrections to a small subset of the total design.
A retinoblastoma-related human gene, referred to as RB2, has been cloned based on sequence homology of the E1A-binding domain of the retinoblastoma gene. Structural homology with the retinoblastoma ...gene suggests a possible function of RB2 as a tumor suppressor gene. In this study, we have mapped this gene to human chromosome 16q12.2 and rat chromosome 19, using fluorescence in situ hybridization and somatic hybrid cell analysis, respectively. Based on known syntenic relationships among human, rat and mouse, the data suggest that the mouse homolog resides on chromosome 8. Deletions of chromosome 16q have been found in several human neoplasias (including breast, ovarian, hepatic, and prostatic cancers) which is in support of an involvement of RB2 in human cancer as a tumor suppressor gene.
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