: In adults, epicardial adipose tissue (EAT) is associated with metabolic syndrome (MS) and coronary artery disease. EAT thickness is increased in obese youth, but total EAT volume and its correlation with cardiovascular risk factors have not been studied. : To determine EAT volume in adolescents and its association with obesity and cardiovascular risk factors.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThalassaemia, caused by over 250 mutations in the beta globin gene, changes the haematopoietic stem cell (HSC) differentiation, leading to ineffective erythropoiesis. This Wider Perspective article overlooks its underlying nature as a benign HSC disorder with a significant impact on the erythroid cell lineage. The simplicity of managing symptoms through transfusions and iron chelation therapy has shifted the focus away from the development of cell-based treatments.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe craft beer industry is becoming increasingly interested in the production of innovative beers. A novel approach, designated as "primary souring," employs diverse yeast species, including Lachancea thermotolerans, to produce sour beers. Furthermore, there is a growing interest in utilising unconventional yeasts to produce beers with distinctive flavours.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFComplex health challenges require professionals to operate across disciplines and to better connect with society. Here, we showcase a community-engaged and challenge-based educational model in which undergraduate students conduct transdisciplinary research on authentic complex biomedical problems. This concept reinforces translational medicine, human capital, and exemplifies synergy between education, research, healthcare, and society.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe evaluation of estimated GFR (eGFR) is a pivotal staging step in patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD), and renal ultrasound plays an important role in diagnosis, prognosis and progression of CKD. The interaction between histopathological diagnosis and ultrasound parameters in eGFR determination has not been fully investigated yet. The study examined the results of native kidney biopsies performed in 48 Italian centers between 2012 and 2020.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMicrobial interactions during the fermentation process influence the sensory characteristics of wines. Alongside alcoholic fermentation, malolactic fermentation also plays a crucial role in determining the aromatic traits of wines. The time (t), rate (m) and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) of malolactic fermentation are linked to the interaction between yeasts and lactic acid bacteria.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMulti-omics (genomics, transcriptomics, epigenomics, proteomics, metabolomics, etc.) research approaches are vital for understanding the hierarchical complexity of human biology and have proven to be extremely valuable in cancer research and precision medicine. Emerging scientific advances in recent years have made high-throughput genome-wide sequencing a central focus in molecular research by allowing for the collective analysis of various kinds of molecular biological data from different types of specimens in a single tissue or even at the level of a single cell.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study describes the development of a resource module that is part of a learning platform named 'NIGMS Sandbox for Cloud-based Learning' https://github.com/NIGMS/NIGMS-Sandbox. The overall genesis of the Sandbox is described in the editorial NIGMS Sandbox at the beginning of this Supplement.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Ineffective erythropoiesis and subsequent anemia as well as primary and secondary (transfusional) iron overload are key drivers for morbidity and mortality outcomes in patients with β-thalassemia.
Areas Covered: In this review, we highlight evidence from observational studies evaluating the association between measures of anemia and iron overload versus outcomes in both non-transfusion-dependent and transfusion-dependent forms of β-thalassemia.
Expert Opinion: Several prognostic thresholds have been identified with implications for patient management.
Celocentesis is a new sampling tool for prenatal diagnosis available from 7 weeks in case of couples at risk for genetic diseases. In this study, we reported the feasibility of earlier prenatal diagnosis by celocentesis in four cases of cystic fibrosis and one case of cystic fibrosis and β-thalassemia co-inherited in the same fetus. Celomic fluids were aspired from the celomic cavity between 8 and 9 weeks of gestation and fetal cells were picked up by micromanipulator.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe aim of this study deals with characterize the volatile profiles of gluten free flours and bakery products. An appropriate HS-SPME/GC-MS methods for the quantification analyses was performed and corn starch solid as standards was used. 34 different samples were analysed, and 127 compounds distributed in 4 classes (alcohols, aldehydes and ketones, heterocyclic compounds, and terpenes), that make up the aroma of these gluten free, were identified.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis research introduces an extensive dataset of unprocessed aerial RGB images and orthomosaics of Brassica oleracea crops, captured via a DJI Phantom 4. The dataset, publicly accessible, comprises 244 raw RGB images, acquired over six distinct dates in October and November of 2020 as well as 6 orthomosaics from an experimental farm located in Portici, Italy. The images, uniformly distributed across crop spaces, have undergone both manual and automatic annotations, to facilitate the detection, segmentation, and growth modelling of crops.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe two stresses of weed competition and salt salinity lead to crop yield losses and decline in the productivity of agricultural land. These constraints threaten the future of food production because weeds are more salt stress tolerant than most crops. Climate change will lead to an increase of soil salinity worldwide, and possibly exacerbate the competition between weeds and crops.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn this review, we provide a summary of evidence on iron overload in young children with transfusion-dependent β-thalassemia (TDT) and explore the ideal timing for intervention. Key data from clinical trials and observational studies of the three available iron chelators deferoxamine, deferiprone, and deferasirox are also evaluated for inclusion of subsets of young children, especially those less than 6 years of age. Evidence on the efficacy and safety of iron chelation therapy for children ≥2 years of age with transfusional iron overload is widely available.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe rationale for this data article is to provide resources which could facilitate the studies focussed over weed detection and segmentation in precision farming using computer vision. We have curated Multispectral (MS) images over crop fields of containing heterogenous mix of r in both uniform and random crop spacing. This dataset is designed to facilitate weed detection and segmentation based on manual and automatically annotated r, commonly known as wild radish.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBiostimulants (Bio-effectors, BEs) comprise plant growth-promoting microorganisms and active natural substances that promote plant nutrient-acquisition, stress resilience, growth, crop quality and yield. Unfortunately, the effectiveness of BEs, particularly under field conditions, appears highly variable and poorly quantified. Using random model meta-analyses tools, we summarize the effects of 107 BE treatments on the performance of major crops, mainly conducted within the EU-funded project BIOFECTOR with a focus on phosphorus (P) nutrition, over five years.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAltered cholesterol, oxysterol, sphingolipid, and fatty acid concentrations are reported in blood, cerebrospinal fluid, and brain tissue of people with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (RRMS) and are linked to disease progression and treatment responses. CD4 + T cells are pathogenic in RRMS, and defective T-cell function could be mediated in part by liver X receptors (LXRs)-nuclear receptors that regulate lipid homeostasis and immunity. RNA-sequencing and pathway analysis identified that genes within the 'lipid metabolism' and 'signalling of nuclear receptors' pathways were dysregulated in CD4 + T cells isolated from RRMS patients compared with healthy donors.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe antitumor activity of different -kaurane diterpenes has been extensively studied. Several investigations have demonstrated the excellent antitumor activity of synthetic derivatives of the diterpene atractyligenin. In this research, a series of new synthetic amides and their 15,19-di-oxo analogues obtained from atractyligenin by modifying the C-2, C-15, and C-19 positions were designed in order to dispose of a set of derivatives with different substitutions at the amidic nitrogen.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: We prospectively evaluated the predictive value of multiparametric cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) for cardiovascular complications in non-transfusion-dependent β-thalassemia (β-NTDT) patients who started regular transfusions in late childhood/adulthood (neo β-TDT).
Methods: We considered 180 patients (38.25 ± 11.
This article is focused on the comprehensive evaluation of alleyways to scale-invariant feature transform (SIFT) and random sample consensus (RANSAC) based multispectral (MS) image registration. In this paper, the idea is to extensively evaluate three such SIFT- and RANSAC-based registration approaches over a heterogenous mix containing crop and weed. The first method is based on the application of a homography matrix, derived during the registration of MS images on spatial coordinates of individual annotations to achieve spatial realignment.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground And Purpose: Given the substantial lack of knowledge, we aimed to assess clinical/dosimetry predictors of late hematological toxicity on patients undergoing pelvic-nodes irradiation (PNI) for prostate cancer (PCa) within a prospective multi-institute study.
Materials And Methods: Clinical/dosimetry/blood test data were prospectively collected including lymphocytes count (ALC) at baseline, mid/end-PNI, 3/6 months and every 6 months up to 5-year after PNI. DVHs of the Body, ileum (BMILEUM), lumbosacral spine (BMLS), lower pelvis (BMPELVIS), and whole pelvis (BMTOT) were extracted.