Publications by authors named "Carta S"

Background: Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infection increases the risk of having multiple sclerosis (MS). Data on adults with myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein antibody-associated disease (MOGAD) are lacking.

Objective: To compare EBV serological status in MOGAD versus MS.

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Hearing impairment alters the sound input received by the human auditory system, reducing speech comprehension in noisy multi-talker auditory scenes. Despite such difficulties, neural signals were shown to encode the attended speech envelope more reliably than the envelope of ignored sounds, reflecting the intention of listeners with hearing impairment (HI). This result raises an important question: What speech-processing stage could reflect the difficulty in attentional selection, if not envelope tracking? Here, we use scalp electroencephalography (EEG) to test the hypothesis that the neural encoding of phonological information (i.

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Cancer growth requires high amount of nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADPH) to feed the anabolic reactions and preserve the redox balance. NADPH level is largely preserved by the oxidative arm of the pentose phosphate pathway (PPP). Here, we show that prolonged glucose deprivation of triple negative breast cancer MDA-MB-231 cells decreases proliferation rate, promotes hexose funneling to glycolysis hampering the PPP.

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  • The study applied the 2022 international consensus criteria for optic neuritis (ICON) to 160 patients with acute optic neuritis to assess its effectiveness in classification.
  • About 50% of the patients were classified as definite optic neuritis, while 43% were not classified as having ON, mainly due to the absence of critical symptoms like relative afferent pupillary defect (RAPD) and dyschromatopsia.
  • The adjusted criteria led to a higher classification of 79% of patients as having optic neuritis, highlighting the importance of thorough examinations for accurate diagnosis.*
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Background: Selective deprivation of glutamine has been shown to accelerate the generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and to impair the activity of a specific pentose phosphate pathway (PPP) located within the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). The consequent oxidative damage suggests that glucose flux through this reticular pathway might contribute to the redox stress of breast cancer cells. We thus evaluated whether this response is reproduced when the glutamine shortage is coupled with the glucose deprivation.

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Cutaneous melanoma is the most dangerous and deadly form of human skin malignancy. Despite its rarity, it accounts for a staggering 80% of deaths attributed to cutaneous cancers overall. Moreover, its final stages often exhibit resistance to drug treatments, resulting in unfavorable outcomes.

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In recent years, the concept of smart cities has garnered increasing attention as urban areas grapple with the challenges of population growth, resource management, and infrastructure optimization [...

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In his book Aion, Jung describes something like a quasi-Hegelian progressive historical realization of the Self in a perspective similar to Fernand Braudel's longue durée history. This article deals with a similar perspective, as it tries to focus on what we may call a "cultural complex" yet within its unfolding in historical time and belonging not to just one specific cultural group, but to a large cultural basin, which we may indicate as the "West". This complex marks the birth and development of modernity.

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  • Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) can lead to autoimmune neurological issues, including movement disorders (MD), which are rare but potentially serious side effects of cancer treatment.
  • A study reviewed 26 articles involving 28 patients who experienced MDs as immune-related adverse events (irAEs) after receiving ICIs, revealing varied clinical presentations and often occurring alongside other irAEs.
  • Most cases showed signs of inflammation in cerebrospinal fluid, and treatment with steroids or stopping ICIs generally helped, though some patients faced relapses or severe outcomes.
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Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) is a disease of the elderly, often presenting comorbidities like osteoporosis and requiring, in a relevant proportion of cases, treatment with bisphosphonates (BPs). This class of drugs was shown in preclinical investigations to also possess anticancer properties. We started an in vitro study of the effects of BPs on CLL B cells activated by microenvironment-mimicking stimuli and observed that, depending on drug concentration, hormetic effects were induced on the leukemic cells.

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Aim of this study was to analyse the genetic background of milk Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectra in dairy sheep. Individual milk FTIR spectra, with 1060 wavenumbers each, were available for 793 adult Sarda breed ewes genotyped at 45,813 SNP. The absorbance values of each wavenumber was analysed using a linear mixed model that included dim class, parity and lambing month as fixed effects and flock-test date and animal as random effects.

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Background And Objectives: Glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) and neurofilament light chain (NfL) serum levels are useful to define disease activity in different neurologic conditions. These biomarkers are increased in patients with aquaporin-4 antibody-positive NMOSD (AQP4+NMOSD) during clinical attacks suggesting a concomitant axonal and glial damage. However, there are contradictory results in double seronegative NMOSD (DS-NMOSD).

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Anthracyclines' cardiotoxicity involves an accelerated generation of reactive oxygen species. This oxidative damage has been found to accelerate the expression of hexose-6P-dehydrogenase (H6PD), that channels glucose-6-phosphate (G6P) through the pentose phosphate pathway (PPP) confined within the endoplasmic/sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR). To verify the role of SR-PPP in the defense mechanisms activated by doxorubicin (DXR) in cardiomyocytes, we tested the effect of this drug in H6PD knockout mice (H6PD).

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This study investigated the role of a pattern of microRNA (miRNA) as possible mediators of celecoxib and prescription-grade glucosamine sulfate (GS) effects in human osteoarthritis (OA) chondrocytes. Chondrocytes were treated with celecoxib (1.85 µM) and GS (9 µM), alone or in combination, for 24 h, with or without interleukin (IL)-1β (10 ng/mL).

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Cashew nut shell extract (CNSE) is a byproduct of the cashew nut industry, containing bioactive compounds that alter rumen fermentation patterns. Therefore, study objectives were to evaluate the effects of CNSE (59% anacardic acid and 18% cardol) on production, rumen fermentation variables, metabolism, and inflammation in transition dairy cows. A total of 51 multiparous Holstein cows were used in a randomized design and assigned to treatment based on their previous 305-d mature equivalent milk and parity.

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  • Sepsis is a severe condition caused by an uncontrolled immune response to infection, which often leads to high mortality and limited treatment options beyond antibiotics.
  • Recent research indicates that high doses of proton pump inhibitors like esomeprazole could potentially help regulate immune reactions in sepsis patients, improving their clinical outcomes.
  • The PPI-SEPSIS trial will test this hypothesis by comparing high-dose esomeprazole to a placebo in 300 critically ill patients, focusing on its effect on organ dysfunction and other health metrics over 10 days.
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  • Autoinflammatory diseases are inherited and multifactorial disorders marked by excessive innate immune response, mainly due to the hyperactivity of the NLRP3 inflammasome and increased IL-1β secretion.
  • Researching these diseases is challenging due to their rarity, the young age of patients, and issues with modifying gene expression in primary immune cells.
  • Studying freshly drawn blood monocytes from patients with IL-1-mediated diseases helps ensure that findings are relevant to the disease's development and not affected by long-term cell culture or gene manipulation methods.
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The purpose of this quantitative review is to highlight the effects of feeding strategies using some mineral, vitamin, marine oil, and vegetable essential oil supplements and some agri-food by-products to reduce SCCs in the milk of sheep and goats. According to the results, only specific dietary factors at specific doses could reduce SCCs in the milk of dairy sheep and goats. The combination of Se and vitamin E in the diet was more effective in sheep than in goats, while the inclusion of polyphenols, which are also present in food matrices such as agro-industrial by-products, led to better results.

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Background: Previous studies reported mitochondrial and endoplasmic reticulum redox stress in peripheral blood mononucleated cells (PBMCs) of treatment-naïve Hodgkin lymphoma (HL) patients. Here, we assessed whether this response also applies to non-HL (NHL) patients, and whether the oxidative damage is a selective feature of PBMCs or, rather, also affects tissues not directly involved in the inflammatory response.

Methods: Isolated PBMCs of 28 HL, 9 diffuse large B cell lymphoma, 8 less aggressive-NHL, and 45 controls underwent flow cytometry to evaluate redox stress and uptake of the glucose analogue 2-NBDG.

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  • Differentiating neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder (NMOSD) from similar conditions is essential to prevent misdiagnosis, particularly without the presence of aquaporin-4-IgG.* -
  • A systematic review of 68 cases identified various non-demyelinating disorders that were misdiagnosed as NMOSD, with 82% of patients not meeting the 2015 diagnostic criteria; common symptoms included myelopathy and optic neuropathy.* -
  • Key red flags for misdiagnosis included absence of cerebrospinal fluid pleocytosis, lack of response to immunotherapy, progressive disease course, and no gadolinium enhancement in MRI scans.*
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  • The study investigates the relationship between myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein antibody associated disease (MOGAD) and tumors, finding only 1% of MOGAD patients had a neoplasm within 2 years of disease onset.
  • It reports on a total of 17 cases (including two from their cohort and 15 from literature), highlighting that most patients are around 39 years old with varied clinical presentations (like ADEM and optic neuritis).
  • The findings suggest MOG antibodies have a low association with paraneoplastic neurological syndromes, with a wide range of tumor types observed and a high rate of treatment improvement in patients.
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The increase of meat production in dairy sheep farms, has been evaluated by the extension of the suckling period from the traditional 28 days to 75 days to obtain a new product, the heavy suckling lamb. Nineteen single-born Sarda (S) lambs (10 male, 9 female) and 20 single-born Dorper x Sarda (DS) lambs (9 male, 11 female), randomly selected from autumn lambing season, were fed exclusively with maternal milk until slaughtering at 20 ± 0.28 kg of body weight (BW, mean ± standard deviation, SD) and approximately 11 weeks of age.

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Background And Purpose: Longitudinally extensive transverse myelitis (LETM) associated with aquaporin-4 autoantibodies (AQP4-IgG) can cause severe disability. Early diagnosis and prompt treatment are critical to prevent relapses. A novel score is described based on clinical and neuroimaging characteristics that predicts AQP4-IgG positivity in patients with LETM.

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