Publications by authors named "Berenguer R"

Purpose: To evaluate the impact of sustained hypogonadism after androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) associated with radiotherapy in prostate cancer (PCa) patients with biochemical relapse-free survival (bRFS).

Methods: A retrospective cohort analysis of 213 consecutive PCa patients referred for radiotherapy plus ADT was carried out. Follow-up times including time to testosterone recovery (TTR) and bRFS were calculated from the end of ADT.

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Expanded graphite (EG) electrodes gather several advantages for their utilization in microbial electrochemical technologies (MET). Unfortunately, the low microbial electroactivity makes them non-practical for implementing them as electrodes. The objective of this work is to explore the enhancement of microbial electroactivity of expanded graphite (commercial PV15) through the generation of nanopores by CO treatment.

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The development of non-expensive and efficient technologies for the elimination of Glyphosate (GLP) in water is of great interest for society today. Here we explore novel electrocatalytic effects to boost the anodic oxidation of GLP on Pt-doped (3-13met%) SnO-Sb electrodes. The study reveals the formation of well disperse Pt nanophases in SnO-Sb that electrocatalyze GLP elimination.

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Since the Bosniak cysts classification is highly reader-dependent, automated tools based on radiomics could help in the diagnosis of the lesion. This study is an initial step in the search for radiomic features that may be good classifiers of benign-malignant Bosniak cysts in machine learning models. A CCR phantom was used through five CT scanners.

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This work describes an energy-efficient monolithic Power Management Unit (PMU) that includes a charge pump adapted to photovoltaic cells with the capability of charging a large supply capacitor and managing the stored energy efficiently to provide the required supply voltage and power to low energy consumption wireless sensor nodes such as RFID sensor tags. The proposed system starts-up self-sufficiently with a light source luminosity equal to or higher than 500 lux using only a 1.42 cm solar cell and integrating an energy monitor that gives the ability to supply autonomous sensor nodes with discontinuous operation modes.

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Purpose: The use of MRI for radiotherapy planning purposes is growing but image acquisition using radiotherapy set-ups has impaired image quality. Whether differences in image acquisition set-up could modify organ contouring has not been evaluated. Therefore, we aimed to evaluate differences in contouring between paired of image sets that were acquired in the same scanning session using different parameters.

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A catalytic and enantioselective preparation of the ()-4-methyleneproline scaffold is described. The key reaction is a one-pot double allylic alkylation of an imine analogue of glycine in the presence of a chinchonidine-derived catalyst under phase transfer conditions. These 4-methylene substituted proline derivatives are versatile starting materials often used in medicinal chemistry.

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In this paper, a novel Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID) tag for "pick to light" applications is presented. The proposed tag architecture shows the implementation of a novel voltage limiter and a supply voltage (VDD) monitoring circuit to guarantee a correct operation between the tag and the reader for the "pick to light" application. The feasibility to power the tag with different photovoltaic cells is also analyzed, showing the influence of the illuminance level (lx), type of source light (fluorescent, LED or halogen) and type of photovoltaic cell (photodiode or solar cell) on the amount of harvested energy.

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•Experimental Set-up allows to polarize several working electrodes at the same time.•Chronoamperometry can be performed simultaneously with a potentiostat.•The physicochemical and biological conditions in each working electrode will be exactly the same.

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Electrochemical polymerization is known to be a suitable route to obtain conducting polymer-carbon composites uniformly covering the carbon support. In this work, we report the application of a filter-press electrochemical cell to polymerize polyaniline (PAni) on the surface of large-sized activated carbon cloth (ACC) by simple galvanostatic electropolymerization of an aniline-containing HSO electrolyte. Flexible composites with different PAni loadings were synthesized by controlling the treatment time and characterized by means of Scanning Electron microscopy (SEM), X-Ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS), physical adsorption of gases, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), cyclic voltammetry and direct current (DC) conductivity measurements.

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Purpose: To quantitatively and qualitatively evaluate and compare MR images acquired from the usual diagnostic set-up with images acquired in a radiotherapy set-up.

Materials And Methods: MR images of a phantom and 18 prostate cancer patients imaging using the usual diagnostic set-up with a curved tabletop (DX-set-up) and using a radiotherapy set-up (RT-set-up) with a flat tabletop, were analysed retrospectively. Quantitative assessments were made by measuring signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and contrast to noise ratio (CNR).

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Endometrial cancer is the most common gynecological cancer in developed countries. Postoperative irradiation has been shown to lower locoregional relapses among high-intermediate risk endometrial cancer patients. In addition, vaginal cuff brachytherapy has demonstrated similar control to external beam radiotherapy but with lower toxicity.

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Purpose To identify the reproducible and nonredundant radiomics features (RFs) for computed tomography (CT). Materials and Methods Two phantoms were used to test RF reproducibility by using test-retest analysis, by changing the CT acquisition parameters (hereafter, intra-CT analysis), and by comparing five different scanners with the same CT parameters (hereafter, inter-CT analysis). Reproducible RFs were selected by using the concordance correlation coefficient (as a measure of the agreement between variables) and the coefficient of variation (defined as the ratio of the standard deviation to the mean).

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Purpose: To analyse the influence of the image registration method on the adaptive radiotherapy of an IMRT prostate treatment, and to compare the dose accumulation according to 3 different image registration methods with the planned dose.

Material And Methods: The IMRT prostate patient was CT imaged 3 times throughout his treatment. The prostate, PTV, rectum and bladder were segmented on each CT.

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This study aimed to investigate the effect of body habitus on supraclavicular (SC) dose-volume histogram (DVH) parameters among breast cancer patients according to 3 different techniques. Three SC irradiation plans were generated for 24 postoperative breast cancer patients: (1) direct antero-posterior field only (1fieldP), with dose prescribed to a 3-cm depth; (2) 3-cm depth plan (3cmP) using an antero-posterior field plus a posterior boost with the dose prescription defined to 3 cm; and (3) optimized plan (OptP) similar to 3cmP, with dose prescribed depending on the anatomy. The OptP plans had the least variation in DVH parameters with body habitus; 3cmP plans were the most varied.

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Tailoring the morphological, chemical, and physical properties of vanadium oxides (VOx) is crucial to optimize their performance in current and future applications. The present contribution proposes a new route to obtain VOx nanofibers with different V/V ratios and crystallinity. The method involves the exclusive electrospinning of water-free NHVO-saturated solutions including a reductant.

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Endometrial cancer (EC) is one of the most common gynecological cancers among women in the developed countries. Vaginal cuff is the main location of relapses after a curative surgical procedure and postoperative radiation therapy have proven to diminish it. Nevertheless, these results have not translated into better survival results.

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Purpose: To evaluate the effects of rectal enemas on rectal doses during radical high-dose-rate (HDR) intracavitary cervical brachytherapy (BT).

Material And Methods: Twenty patients suffering from cervical cancer and treated with external beam radiotherapy and HDR-BT were included in a prospective trial. The first brachytherapy fraction was considered the basal status, and patients were instructed to self-administer two rectal cleansing enemas before the second fraction.

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Aim: Our aim was to analyse the feasibility of integrating an MRI acquired in a non-radiotherapy set-up into the prostate cancer radiotherapy workflow.

Material And Methods: The MRIs of 15 prostate cancer patients, acquired with a flat table-top (MRI-flat), and with a curved tabletop (MRI-curve) were analysed. MRIs were rigidly (RIR) and non-rigidly registered (DIR) with CT images.

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Purpose: To evaluate the effects of rectal enemas on rectal doses during postoperative high-dose-rate (HDR) vaginal cuff brachytherapy (VCB).

Patients And Methods: This prospective trial included 59 patients. Two rectal cleansing enemas were self-administered before the second fraction, and fraction 1 was considered the basal status.

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Purpose: To evaluate the impact of rectal dose on rectal contrast use during vaginal cuff brachytherapy (VCB).

Methods And Materials: A retrospective review of gynecology patients who received some brachytherapy fractions with and without rectal contrast was carried out. Rectal contrast was instilled at the clinician's discretion to increase rectal visibility.

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This paper presents an ultra low-power and low-voltage pulse-width modulation based ratiometric capacitive sensor interface. The interface was designed and fabricated in a standard 90 nm CMOS 1P9M technology. The measurements show an effective resolution of 10 bits using 0.

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Aim: To evaluates the effectiveness and safety of the first generation, NS3/4A protease inhibitors (PIs) in clinical practice against chronic C virus, especially in patients with advanced fibrosis.

Methods: Prospective study and non-experimental analysis of a multicentre cohort of 38 Spanish hospitals that includes patients with chronic hepatitis C genotype 1, treatment-naïve (TN) or treatment-experienced (TE), who underwent triple therapy with the first generation NS3/4A protease inhibitors, boceprevir (BOC) and telaprevir (TVR), in combination with pegylated interferon and ribavirin. The patients were treatment in routine practice settings.

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Purpose: Several studies have analyzed the effect of bladder filling during vaginal cuff brachytherapy (VCB), but the effect of rectum filling has not been studied. We sought to evaluate the effects of rectal volume on rectal doses during postoperative VCB.

Methods And Materials: Brachytherapy planning CT scans (334 sets) obtained from 92 consecutive patients treated with VCB were resegmented (bladder and rectum) and replanned retrospectively using the same parameters to homogenize data and improve analysis.

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Purpose: Association between body mass index (BMI) and doses in organs at risk during postoperative vaginal cuff brachytherapy (VCB) treatment has not been evaluated. The aim of this study was to analyse the impact of BMI on the dose delivered to bladder and rectum during high-dose-rate VCB using computed tomography (CT) scans at every fraction.

Materials And Methods: A retrospective analysis of 220 planning CT sets derived from 59 patients was conducted.

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