Beyond the border: comparative ethnobotany in Valmalenco (SO, Italy) and Valposchiavo (Canton of Grisons, Switzerland).

Background: The ethnobotanical analysis of two bordering areas allows for the in-depth understanding of the dynamics of Local Ecological Knowledge, which mirrors the naturalistic, historical, and sociopolitical features of each area. As part of the Interreg Italy-Switzerland B-ICE&Heritage and GEMME projects, this work is an ethnobotanical comparative study of two neighboring Alpine territories: Valmalenco (Italy) and Valposchiavo (Switzerland).

Methods: A total of 471 informants were interviewed on different fields of use (medicinal, food, veterinary, etc.

Relationship between Salmonella enterica attachment and leaf hydrophobicity, roughness, and epicuticular waxes: a focus on 30 baby-leaf salads.

Background: The first step in the contamination of leafy vegetables by human pathogens is their attachment to the leaf surface. The success of this is influenced strongly by the physical and chemical characteristics of the surface itself (number and size of stomata, presence of trichomes and veins, epicuticular waxes, hydrophobicity, etc.).

From Primary Data to Ethnopharmacological Investigations on subsp. (Wulfen) I.Richardson as a Remedy against Gastric Ailments in Valmalenco (Italy).

(1) Background: Within the framework of the European Interreg Italy-Switzerland B-ICE & Heritage project (2018-2022), this study originated from a three-year ethnobotanical survey in Valmalenco (Sondrio, Italy). Following a preliminary work published by our group, this research further explored the folk therapeutic use of subsp. (Wulfen) I.

Preserving Ethnoveterinary Medicine (EVM) along the Transhumance Routes in Southwestern Angola: Synergies between International Cooperation and Academic Research.

This study delves into the ethnoveterinary medicine (EVM) practiced by pastoralists along the transhumance routes in southwestern Angola. Within the framework of three cooperation projects, we conducted 434 interviews, collecting information on 89 taxa used for treating 16 livestock diseases. The most cited species was (132 citations), followed by (59) and (49).

Correction: The fodder grass resources for ruminants: A indigenous treasure of local communities of Thal desert Punjab, Pakistan.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.

Remnants from the Past: From an 18th Century Manuscript to 21st Century Ethnobotany in Valle Imagna (Bergamo, Italy).

Background: This project originated from the study of an 18th century manuscript found in Valle Imagna (Bergamo, Italy) which contains 200 plant-based medicinal remedies. A first comparison with published books concerning 20th century folk medicine in the Valley led to the designing of an ethnobotanical investigation, aimed at making a thorough comparison between past and current phytotherapy knowledge in this territory.

Methods: The field investigation was conducted through semi-structured interviews.

Alpine Diet in Valmalenco (Lombardy, Italy): Nutritional Features of Spontaneous Plants and Traditional Dishes.

Background: Along the Alps, the Alpine diet is considered to be one of the most common nutritional models. Next to traditional animal-based products, spontaneous plants of the territory are collected and eaten.

Aim: The aim of this study is to evaluate the nutritional features of selected autochthonous plants of the territory and the typical recipe of green gnocchi.

Foliar Roughness and Water Content Impact on Attachment in Baby Leafy Greens.

Understanding the relation between the susceptibility of different leafy greens to human pathogen contamination and leaf traits can contribute to increase the food safety of the fresh vegetable industry. The aim of this research was to evaluate the susceptibility to ATCC 35218 attachment in 30 accessions of baby leaves, and to identify leaf traits potentially involved in the contamination. The accessions were surface inoculated with a bacterial suspension containing 1 × 10 cells/mL and the attachment was measured 1.

Wulfen: From Ethnobotany to Phytochemistry, Morphology, and Biological Activity.

A multidisciplinary investigation on Wulfen (Asteraceae) is outlined herein. This work, part of the European Interreg Italy-Switzerland project, originated from an ethnobotanical survey performed in Chiesa in Valmalenco (Sondrio, Lombardy, Northern Italy) in 2019-2021 which highlighted this species' relevance of use in folk medicine to treat gastrointestinal diseases. In addition, this contribution included analyses of the: (a) phytochemical profile of the aqueous and methanolic extracts of the dried flower heads using LC-MS/MS; (b) morpho-anatomy and histochemistry of the vegetative and reproductive organs through Light, Fluorescence, and Scanning Electron Microscopy; (c) biological activity of the aqueous extract concerning the antioxidant and anti-inflammatory potential through cell-based in vitro models.

Terpene Profiles Composition and Micromorphological Analysis on Two Wild Populations of spp. from the Tuscan Archipelago (Central Italy).

Two wild populations of (Mill.) located at Elba Island (Tuscan Archipelago, Central Italy) were morphologically and phytochemically analyzed to taxonomically identify (population A) and subsp. (population B).

The Renaissance of Wild Food Plants: Insights from Tuscany (Italy).

This paper provides an overview of wild food plants traditionally used in the gastronomy of Tuscany, an Italian region with high biological diversity and whose cultural heritage is well known. Forty-nine bibliographic sources, including five unpublished studies, were reviewed. A list of species with ecological characteristics, plant parts used, use category (food, liquor, or seasoning), methods of preparation (raw or cooked), and recipes is presented.

Design of a Capacitance-to-Digital Converter Based on Iterative Delay-Chain Discharge in 180 nm CMOS Technology.

The design of advanced miniaturized ultra-low power interfaces for sensors is extremely important for energy-constrained monitoring applications, such as wearable, ingestible and implantable devices used in the health and medical field. Capacitive sensors, together with their correspondent digital-output readout interfaces, make no exception. Here, we analyse and design a capacitance-to-digital converter, based on the recently introduced iterative delay-chain discharge architecture, showing the circuit inner operating principles and the correspondent design trade-offs.

Using Medicinal Plants in Valmalenco (Italian Alps): From Tradition to Scientific Approaches.

This ethnobotanical survey was carried out in Caspoggio (Valmalenco, SO, Italy) with the purpose of investigating the traditional uses of medicinal plants. Moreover, a bibliographic research meant to validate or refute the uses, focusing on the potentially responsible compounds, was performed. Fifty-nine species, attributable to 30 families (Asteraceae, Pinaceae, Malvaceae, and Lamiaceae the most cited), were mentioned.

Experimental Evaluation of a 3D-Printed Fluidic System for a Directional Anemometer.

An evolution of a previously proposed anemometer capable of detecting both the magnitude and the direction of the wind on a plane is proposed. The device is based on a recently formalized principle, consisting of combining the differential pressures measured across distinct diameters of a cylinder to estimate the wind velocity and incidence angle. Differently from previous sensors based on the same principle, the proposed anemometers use 3D printing to fabricate the channel structure that calculates the pressure combination in the fluidic domain.

The fodder grass resources for ruminants: A indigenous treasure of local communities of Thal desert Punjab, Pakistan.

Indigenous people have been using local grasses for rearing their animals for centuries. The present study is the first record of traditional knowledge of grasses and livestock feeding system from the Thal desert in Pakistan. A snowball sampling method was used to identify key participants.

Antioxidant and Mineral Composition of Three Wild Leafy Species: A Comparison Between Microgreens and Baby Greens.

Wild plants may play an important role in human nutrition and health and, among them, many are the leafy species. We hypothesized that the wild greens could be profitably grown as microgreens and baby greens, specialty products whose market is increasing. We compared three wild leafy species ( Scop.

History vs. legend: Retracing invasion and spread of Oxalis pes-caprae L. in Europe and the Mediterranean area.

Oxalis pes-caprae L. is a South African geophyte that behaves as an invasive in the eurimediterranean area. According to a long-established hypothesis, O.

Precise Measurement of Gas Volumes by Means of Low-Offset MEMS Flow Sensors with μL/min Resolution.

Experiments devoted to evaluate the performance of a MEMS thermal flow sensor in measuring gas volumes are described. The sensor is a single-chip platform, including several sensing structures and a low-offset, low-noise readout interface. A recently proposed offset compensation approach is implemented obtaining low temperature drift and excellent long time stability.

Exploration of ethno-medicinal knowledge among rural communities of Pearl Valley; Rawalakot, District Poonch Azad Jammu and Kashmir.

Background: Medicinal plants are the basic source of health care in the Pearl Valley District Poonch, Azad Jammu, and Kashmir. The basic aim of present study was to record information about the use of plants in herbal preparation and quantification of recorded data.

Materials And Methods: The research was conducted with the null hypothesis that there was no differential distribution of knowledge among the communities between genders and among different age groups in the study area and across cultural medicinal uses of the plants are similar.

Is there nothing new under the sun? The influence of herbals and pharmacopoeias on ethnobotanical traditions in Albacete (Spain).

Ethnopharmacological Relevance: This paper has two overarching aims: (1) presenting the results of studying the Albacete tariff of medicines of 1526 and (2) broadly analyzing the origin and influences of medicinal traditional knowledge in the region of Albacete, Spain. We use historical and modern literature that may have influenced this knowledge. Our primary goal was to determine the ingredients used in the pharmacy in the 16th century CE in Albacete through the analysis of the tariff, and our secondary goal was to investigate until when ingredients and uses present in pharmacy and herbals persisted in later periods.

Traditional alcoholic beverages and their value in the local culture of the Alta Valle del Reno, a mountain borderland between Tuscany and Emilia-Romagna (Italy).

Background: Traditional alcoholic beverages (TABs) have only received marginal attention from researchers and ethnobotanists so far, especially in Italy. This work is focused on plant-based TABs in the Alta Valle del Reno, a mountainous area on the border between Tuscany and Emilia-Romagna regions. The aims of our study were to document local knowledge about TABs and to analyze and discuss the distribution of related knowledge within the investigated communities.

An improved neutron autoradiography set-up for (10)B concentration measurements in biological samples.

Aim: Boron Neutron Capture Therapy (BNCT) is a binary hadrontherapy which exploits the neutron capture reaction in boron, together with a selective uptake of boronated substances by the neoplastic tissue. There is increasing evidence that future improvements in clinical BNCT will be triggered by the discovery of new boronated compounds, with higher selectivity for the tumor with respect to clinically used sodium borocaptate (BSH) and boronophenylalanine (BPA).

Background: Therefore, a (10)B quantification technique for biological samples is needed in order to evaluate the performance of new boronated formulations.

Wild medicinal and food plants used by communities living in Mopane woodlands of southern Angola: Results of an ethnobotanical field investigation.

Ethnopharmacological Relevance: Mopane woodlands play an important role in the livelihood strategies of local populations; however, they have been scarcely investigated by ethnobiologists and very little is currently known about plants traditionally used by local communities, especially about medicinal plants.

Aim Of The Study: Our investigation was aimed to document ethnobotanical knowledge in seven communities living in conditions of extreme poverty in a Mopane area of southern Angola (Namibe province). We focused on plants used as medicines and/or food, in order to highlight the role of wild plants in the livelihood of local communities, and possibly to find out plants with potential pharmacological interest.

Spirits and liqueurs in European traditional medicine: Their history and ethnobotany in Tuscany and Bologna (Italy).

Ethnopharmacological Relevance And Background: Fermented drinks, often alcoholic, are relevant in many nutritional, medicinal, social, ritual and religious aspects of numerous traditional societies. The use of alcoholic drinks of herbal extracts is documented in classical pharmacy since the 1st century CE and it is often recorded in ethnobotanical studies in Europe, particularly in Italy, where are used for a wide range of medicinal purposes. Formulations and uses represent a singular tradition which responds to a wide range of environmental and cultural factors.

Evaluation of the dose enhancement of combined ¹⁰B + ¹⁵⁷Gd neutron capture therapy (NCT).

An innovative molecule, GdBLDL, for boron neutron capture therapy (BNCT) has been developed and its effectiveness as a BNCT carrier is currently under evaluation using in vivo experiments on small animal tumour models. The molecule contains both (10)B (the most commonly used NCT agent) and (157)Gd nuclei. (157)Gd is the second most studied element to perform NCT, mainly thanks to its high cross section for the capture of low-energy neutrons.