Fluxonorm® is a dietary supplement that includes water-soluble extracts of Solidago virga-aurea, Phyllantus niruri, Epilobium angustifolium, Peumus boldus and Ononis spinosa. The aim of the present ...study was to evaluate the tolerability and efficacy of Fluxonorm® in improving lower urinary tract symptoms in patients with benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) in combination with standard of care.
Lower urinary tract symptoms can be improved by a marked anti-inflammatory action on the lower urinary tract (irritative symptoms) and/or by an anti-proliferative action (obstructive symptoms) on the prostate. Thirty patients were enrolled to evaluate the effect of Fluxonorm® on improving lower urinary tract symptoms. All patients complained of lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS), such as hesitancy, poor flow, intermittent flow, incomplete voiding (obstructive symptoms), as well as increased frequency, nocturia and urgency (storage symptoms). All patients were treated with one tablet of Fluxonorm® (1200 mg) daily for 30 days to corroborate the results of our observation in which the food supplement (800 µg/mL) was also studied on the human prostate cancer PC3 cell line (antiproliferative activity) and on prostaglandin (PG)E2 production (anti-inflammatory activity). In addition, the effect of this compound on cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) gene expression was investigated. Finally, a bioinformatic analysis was conducted with the aim of unravelling the mechanism of action underlying the observed bio-pharmacological effects.
As hypothesized in our preclinical research, adding Fluxonorm® to the therapy of enrolled patients improved all studied clinical parameters, including maximum flow (Qmax), after one month of treatment. In the preclinical evaluation, this formulation reduced PC3 cell viability and PGE2 production. The effects were also paralleled by reduced COX-2 gene expression and Fluxonorm®'s partly related content of catechin. While docking studies pointed out to the putative inhibition of matrix metalloproteinse-2 by gallic acid, as a further mechanism underlying the observed anti-proliferative effects, in PC3 cells exposed to Fluxonorm®.
Fluxonorm® improved the efficacy of standard therapy, in terms of antioxidant/anti-inflammatory effects, for the management of lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS). This could be related, albeit partially, to the blunting effect of this compound on PGE2 production.
This paper analyses how the existence of competitive technology markets affects firms’ technology sourcing decisions, and their propensity to enter into new product markets. While the division of ...innovative labour has received increasing attention within the economic literature, this paper focuses on its managerial implications. By means of a specialised database, we assess how patterns of technology trade influence firms’ technology and diversification strategies in the chemical industry. We find that, the larger the market for technology, the stronger the advantages to substitute internal R&D with outsourcing, and to increase the degree of product diversification.
Local Station: the data read-out basic unit for the ARGO-YBJ experiment Assiro, R.; Aloisio, A.; Catalanotti, S. ...
Nuclear instruments & methods in physics research. Section A, Accelerators, spectrometers, detectors and associated equipment,
02/2004, Letnik:
518, Številka:
1
Journal Article
Recenzirano
ARGO-YBJ is a full coverage layer of Resistive Plate Counters (RPCs) covering an area of about
5.800
m
2
to be installed at the YangBaJing Laboratory (Tibet, China) at
4.300
m
a.s.l
. The DAQ system ...is based on a Central Station which receives the detector information from distributed readout electronics. Data from each RPC are acquired from a Receiver Card which reads out and digitizes the space and time information from 10 pick-up pads and gives out the pad multiplicity for trigger purposes. The Receiver Cards are hosted in Local Stations which Group 12 RPCs. On trigger occurrence, each Local Station sends the collected data to the Central Station. Both the detector and the electronics allow 1 ns accuracy in time measurements. In this work a detailed description of the Local Station and the Trigger System are presented.
Bourgeois has shown that use of simple memory aids enhances the quality of conversation of persons with moderate Alzheimer-type dementia. We replicated Bourgeois' intervention with five people with ...severe dementia (Mini-Mental State Examination scores 0-4) and diagnoses of Alzheimer-type or vascular dementia, and evaluated the impact of the aids on the proportion of time participants spent on topic in conversation with carers. For three participants, use of the memory aid did not increase the proportion of time-spent on-topic. The remaining two participants, however, spent approximately twice as much time on-topic when using the aid as when conversing without it. Our results extend Bourgeois' work by showing that memory aids are helpful to some people with severe dementia.
This paper analyses and discusses the patenting activity of Public Research Organizations (PROs) in Southern European countries. Despite the importance of the topic, studies about the European ...experience are rare. By using an original database of "American" (USPTO) and "European" (EPO) patents held by PROs in Portugal, Spain, France, Italy and Greece, we observe that the number of university patents in these countries has not increased dramatically during the last years, despite a growing interest at both European and national level during the same period. However, differences do exist among countries in terms of number of granted patents and regulative frameworks. With regard to PROs patenting strategies, we argue that PROs should be progressively able to adopt a "balanced" approach, in order to achieve co-existence between the traditional mechanisms of the so-called "open research system" and the more recent concerns about intellectual property protection, technology transfer and regional development.
The lifetime of the tau lepton is measured using data collected in 1994 by the L3 detector at LEP. The precise track position information of the Silicon Microvertex Detector is exploited. The tau ...lepton lifetime is determined from the signed impact parameter distribution for 30 322 tau decays into one charged particle and from the decay length distribution for 3891 tau decays into three charged particles. Combining the two methods we obtain $\tau_{\tau}$ = 290.1 $\pm$ 4.0 fs.
The issue of corporate R&D management has become particularly relevant during the last decade, since many industrial sectors experienced growing complexity in their research areas and increasing ...constraints in budgets devoted to R&D activities. This paper discusses the cases of the ICT and automotive sectors, exploring the changes in managerial procedures and strategies that two of the largest corporate research centres in Italy (Telecom Italia Lab and Centro Ricerche Fiat) adopted during a delicate phase of transition.
Both cases are characterized by a growing pressure towards the effective integration of short‐term and long‐term perspectives, i.e. towards a balance between valorization of research results and competencies, and exploration of new technological trajectories. The solutions adopted by the two organizations are explored and discussed. Specifically, while TiLab focused on the promotion of controlled spin‐off companies, CRF has been very active in local technology transfer, especially in favour of SMFs.
The reaction e+e- -> e+e- gamma* gamma* -> e+e- hadrons for quasi-real photons is studied using data from root(s) = 183 GeV up to 202 GeV. Results on the total cross sections sigma(e+e- -> e+e- ...hadrons) and sigma(+e- gamma* gamma* -> e+e- hadrons) are given for the two-photon centre-of-mass energies 5 GeV Wgammagamma 185 GeV. The total cross section of two real photons is described by a Regge parametrisation. We observe a steeper rise with the two-photon centre-of-mass energy as compared to the hadron-hadron and the photon-proton cross sections. The data are also compared to the expectations of different theoretical models.
The ARGO-YBJ detector and high energy GRBs Bacci, C.; Bao, K. Z.; Barone, F. ...
Astronomy & astrophysics. Supplement series,
09/1999, Letnik:
138, Številka:
3
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
ARGO-YBJ (Astrophysical Radiation with Ground-based Observatory at YangBaJing) is a detector optimized to study small size air showers. It consists of a layer of Resistive Plate Counters (RPCs) ...covering an area of ~ 6500 m2 and will be located in the Yangbajing Laboratory (Tibet, China) at 4300 m a.s.l. ARGO-YBJ will be devoted to a wide range of fundamental issues in cosmic rays and astroparticle physics, including in particular gamma-ray astronomy and gamma-ray bursts physics in the range $10~{\rm GeV} \div 500~{\rm TeV}$. The sensitivity of ARGO-YBJ to detect high energy GRBs is presented.
Measurements of the two-photon interaction e+e- --> e+e- hadrons at sqrt(s) = 91 GeV and sqrt(s) = 183 GeV are presented. The double-tag events, collected with the L3 detector, correspond to ...integrated luminosities of 140 pb-1 at 91 GeV and 52 pb-1 at 183 GeV. The cross-section of gamma*gamma* collisions has been measured at Q^2 = 3.5 GeV^2 and Q^2 = 14 GeV^2. The data agree well with predictions based on perturbative QCD, while the Quark Parton Model alone is insufficient to describe the data.
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