Intravitreal injections (IVI) of therapeutic substances are one of the most common procedures in ophthalmology and, for sure, the most feared complication of them is endophthalmitis. Nowadays, a ...precise prophylactic protocol does not exist to avoid these infections, and the role of new antiseptic drops is an interesting field of research in this regard. In this article we are going to discuss the tolerability and the efficacy of a new antiseptic drop based on a solution of hexamidine diisethionate 0.05% (Keratosept®; Bruschettini Srl, Genoa, Italy).
This was a single-center, case-control study, comparing the in vivo effect of hexamidine diisethionate 0.05% with povidone iodine 0.6% solution during IVI program. Ocular bacterial flora composition was analyzed with a conjunctival swab on day 0. After injection patients underwent antibacterial prophylaxis with Keratosept for 3 days or povidone iodine 0.6%. A second conjunctival swab was collected on day 4 and patients were asked to fulfill a questionnaire based on the OSDi model, to investigate the ocular tolerability of the drug administered.
Efficacy was tested on 50 patients, 25 of whom received hexamidine diisethionate 0.05% drops and the other 25 received povidone iodine 0.6% solution drops, 100 total conjunctival swabs, 18 positive swabs before and 9 after treatment for the first group and 13 before and 5 after for the second one. Tolerability was tested on 104 patients, 55 underwent Keratosept therapy and 49 povidone iodine one.
Keratosept demonstrated a good efficacy profile with better tolerability against povidone iodine in the analyzed sample.
Fluocinolone acetonide is a valid alternative treatment for patients with chronic diabetic macular edema (DME) with poor response to anti-vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) therapy. The ...purpose of this study is to report the efficacy and safety of ILUVIEN® implant in pseudophakic eyes with persistent DME.
This is a single-centre pilot-study of 8 patients with persistent DME treated with the ILUVIEN implant, despite previous anti-vascular endothelial growth factor and/or steroid treatment. Best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA), optical coherence tomography (OCT) central retinal thickness, intraocular pressure (IOP) and microperimetric data were evaluated at baseline and month 1, 3 and 6 post treatment.
All data are presented as mean and standard deviation. At baseline, 1, 3 and 6 months, we had BCVA of 0.26±0.22, 0.38±0.27, 0.48±0.27 and 0.46±0.24; IOP of 15.00±2.67, 15.50±3.16, 14.88±2.42 and 15.63±2.67 mmHg; macular thickness of 652±231, 487±278, 475±287 and 413±211 µm; macular sensitivity of 6.83±4.20, 6.13±3.72, 7.68±3.40 and 7.71±3.33 dB; bivariate contour elliptic area (BCEA) 95.4% 3.8±3.42, 6.06±10.06, 3.05±2.46 and 2.59±2.19°2.
According to the results of our study, fluocinolone acetonide (FAc) is a valid therapy option despite some limitations. It has been evidenced that FAc is more effective in patients with mild central macular thickening, while in those with modest to severe central macular thickness (CMT), different therapy strategies should be considered.
A measurement of the $ZZ$ production in the $\ell^{-}\ell^{+}\ell^{\prime -}\ell^{\prime +}$ and $\ell^{-}\ell^{+}\nu\bar{\nu}$ channels $(\ell = e, \mu)$ in proton--proton collisions at $\sqrt{s} = ...8$ TeV at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 20.3 fb$^{-1}$ collected by the ATLAS experiment in 2012 is presented. The fiducial cross sections for $ZZ\to\ell^{-}\ell^{+}\ell^{\prime -}\ell^{\prime +}$ and $ZZ\to \ell^{-}\ell^{+}\nu\bar{\nu}$ are measured in selected phase-space regions. The total cross section for $ZZ$ events produced with both $Z$ bosons in the mass range 66 to 116 GeV is measured from the combination of the two channels to be $7.3\pm0.4\textrm{(stat)}\pm0.3\textrm{(syst)}\pm0.2\textrm{(lumi)}$ pb, which is consistent with the Standard Model prediction of $6.6^{+0.7}_{-0.6}$ pb. The differential cross sections in bins of various kinematic variables are presented. The differential event yield as a function of the transverse momentum of the leading $Z$ boson is used to set limits on anomalous neutral triple gauge boson couplings in $ZZ$ production.
The top quark mass is measured in the $t\bar{t}\to$ dilepton channel (lepton $= e, \mu$) using ATLAS data recorded in the year 2012 at the LHC. The data were taken at a proton--proton centre-of-mass ...energy of $\sqrt{s}=$ 8 TeV and correspond to an integrated luminosity of about 20.2 fb$^{-1}$. Exploiting the template method, and using the distribution of invariant masses of lepton--b-jet pairs, the top quark mass is measured to be $m_{top} =$ 172.99 $\pm$ 0.41 (stat) $\pm$ 0.74 (syst) GeV, with a total uncertainty of 0.84 GeV. Finally, a combination with previous ATLAS $m_{top}$ measurements from $\sqrt{s}=$7 TeV data in the $t\bar{t}\to$ dilepton and $t\bar{t}\to$ lepton+jets channels results in $m_{top} =$ 172.84 $\pm$ 0.34 (stat) $\pm$ 0.61 (syst) GeV, with a total uncertainty of 0.70 GeV.
Two searches for new phenomena in final states containing a same-flavour opposite-lepton (electron or muon) pair, jets, and large missing transverse momentum are presented. These searches make use of ...proton--proton collision data, collected during 2015 and 2016 at a centre-of-mass energy $\sqrt{s}=13$ TeV by the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider, which correspond to an integrated luminosity of 14.7 fb$^{-1}$. Both searches target the pair production of supersymmetric particles, squarks or gluinos, which decay to final states containing a same-flavour opposite-sign lepton pair via one of two mechanisms: a leptonically decaying Z boson in the final state, leading to a peak in the dilepton invariant-mass distribution around the Z boson mass; and decays of neutralinos (e.g. $\tilde{\chi}_2^0 \rightarrow \ell^+\ell^- \tilde{\chi}_1^0$), yielding a kinematic endpoint in the dilepton invariant-mass spectrum. The data are found to be consistent with the Standard Model expectation. Results are interpreted in simplified models of gluino-pair (squark-pair) production, and provide sensitivity to gluinos (squarks) with masses as large as 1.70 TeV (980 GeV).
This paper describes a measurement of the inclusive top quark pair production cross-section ($\sigma_{t\bar{t}}$) with a data sample of 3.2 fb$^{-1}$ of proton--proton collisions at a centre-of-mass ...energy of $\sqrt{s}$=13 TeV, collected in 2015 by the ATLAS detector at the LHC. This measurement uses events with an opposite-charge electron--muon pair in the final state. Jets containing $b$-quarks are tagged using an algorithm based on track impact parameters and reconstructed secondary vertices. The numbers of events with exactly one and exactly two $b$-tagged jets are counted and used to determine simultaneously $\sigma_{t\bar{t}}$ and the efficiency to reconstruct and $b$-tag a jet from a top quark decay, thereby minimising the associated systematic uncertainties. The cross-section is measured to be: $\sigma_{t\bar{t}}$= 818 $\pm$ 8 (stat) $\pm$ 27 (syst) $\pm$ 19 (lumi) $\pm$ 12 (beam) pb, where the four uncertainties arise from data statistics, experimental and theoretical systematic effects, the integrated luminosity and the LHC beam energy, giving a total relative uncertainty of 4.4%. The result is consistent with theoretical QCD calculations at next-to-next-to-leading order. A fiducial measurement corresponding to the experimental acceptance of the leptons is also presented.
A study of the decays B0→μ+μ− and B0s→μ+μ− has been performed using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 25 fb−1 of 7 TeV and 8 TeV proton--proton collisions collected with the ATLAS ...detector during the LHC Run 1. For B0, an upper limit on the branching fraction is set at B(B0→μ+μ−)<4.2×10−10 at 95% confidence level. For B0s, the branching fraction B(B0s→μ+μ−)=(0.9+1.1−0.8)×10−9 is measured. The results are consistent with the Standard Model expectation with a p-value of 4.8%, corresponding to 2.0 standard deviations.
A search is performed for an excited muon in the channel pp→μμ∗→μμ jet jet, assuming both the production and decay occur via a contact interaction. The analysis is based on 20.3 fb−1 of pp collision ...data at a centre-of-mass energy of s√ = 8 TeV taken with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. No evidence of excited muons is found, and limits are set at the 95% confidence level on the cross section times branching ratio as a function of the excited-muon mass mμ∗. For mμ∗ between 1.3 TeV and 3.0 TeV, the upper limit on σB(μ∗→μqq¯) is between 0.6 and 1 fb. Limits on σB are converted to lower bounds on the compositeness scale Λ. In the limiting case Λ=mμ∗, excited muons with a mass below 2.8 TeV are excluded. With the same model assumptions, these limits at larger μ∗ masses improve upon previous limits from searches based on the decay μ∗→μγ.
We present the performance of a novel InGaAs/InP single-photon avalanche diode (SPAD) with high detection efficiency and low noise thanks to the improvement of Zinc diffusion conditions and the ...optimization of the vertical structure. The 25-μm active-area diameter detector, operated in gated-mode with ON time of tens of nanoseconds, shows very low dark count rate (few kilo-counts per second at 225 K and 5 V of excess bias), 30% photon detection efficiency at 1550 nm, low afterpulsing, and a timing response with less than 90-ps full-width at half maximum and very fast exponential tail (time constant ~ 60 ps). Therefore, this InGaAs/InP SPAD is among the best ones ever reported in the literature.
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