The impact of risk and protective factors on online teaching experience in high school Italian teachers during the COVID-19 pandemic

The lockdown due to COVID-19 in Italy resulted in the sudden closure of schools, with a shift from traditional teaching to the online one. Through an online questionnaire, this survey explores teachers' experience of online teaching, the level of risk factors (e.g., stress) and protective factors (e.g., locus of control) and their impact on satisfaction levels during the social distancing. One hundred seven high school teachers from Lombardy, an Italian region very affected by the COVID-19 outbreak, participated. Results show that depression and stress are the main predictors of satisfaction levels for online teaching. In addition, coping, locus of control and self-efficacy emerge as important protective factors. Finally, although there is great satisfaction with the online teaching experience, critical elements emerged. This study is relevant because it describes the critical elements of the online teaching experience, and identifies some protective factors and the main risk factors in teachers operating in an area strongly marked by social restrictions imposed by the pandemic. High school teachers emerge as a sub-group of the general population with specific psychological reactions. Considering the results, it is possible to suggest providing high-quality educational support and crisis-psychological oriented services to teachers, and help to maintain the psychological well-being.     

Evolutionary Generalized Radial Basis Function neural networks for improving prediction accuracy in gene classification using feature selection

Radial Basis Function Neural Networks (RBFNNs) have been successfully employed in several function approximation and pattern recognition problems. The use of different RBFs in RBFNN has been reported in the literature and here the study centres on the use of the Generalized Radial Basis Function Neural Networks (GRBFNNs). An interesting property of the GRBF is that it can continuously and smoothly reproduce different RBFs by changing a real parameter τ. In addition, the mixed use of different RBF shapes in only one RBFNN is allowed. Generalized Radial Basis Function (GRBF) is based on Generalized Gaussian Distribution (GGD), which adds a shape parameter, τ, to standard Gaussian Distribution. Moreover, this paper describes a hybrid approach, Hybrid Algorithm (HA), which combines evolutionary and gradient-based learning methods to estimate the architecture, weights and node topology of GRBFNN classifiers. The feasibility and benefits of the approach are demonstrated by means of six gene microarray classification problems taken from bioinformatic and biomedical domains. Three filters were applied: Fast Correlation-Based Filter (FCBF), Best Incremental Ranked Subset (BIRS), and Best Agglomerative Ranked Subset (BARS); this was done in order to identify salient expression genes from among the thousands of genes in microarray data that can directly contribute to determining the class membership of each pattern. After different gene subsets were obtained, the proposed methodology was performed using the selected gene subsets as new input variables. The results confirm that the GRBFNN classifier leads to a promising improvement in accuracy.     

Complementary Effects of Carbamylated and Citrullinated LL37 in Autoimmunity and Inflammation in Systemic Lupus Erythematosus

LL37 acts as T-cell/B-cell autoantigen in Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and psoriatic disease. Moreover, when bound to “self” nucleic acids, LL37 acts as “danger signal,” leading to type I interferon (IFN-I)/pro-inflammatory factors production. T-cell epitopes derived from citrullinated-LL37 act as better antigens than unmodified LL37 epitopes in SLE, at least in selected HLA-backgrounds, included the SLE-associated HLA-DRB1*1501/HLA-DRB5*0101 backgrounds. Remarkably, while “fully-citrullinated” LL37 acts as better T-cell-stimulator, it loses DNA-binding ability and the associated “adjuvant-like” properties. Since LL37 undergoes a further irreversible post-translational modification, carbamylation and antibodies to carbamylated self-proteins other than LL37 are present in SLE, here we addressed the involvement of carbamylated-LL37 in autoimmunity and inflammation in SLE. We detected carbamylated-LL37 in SLE-affected tissues. Most importantly, carbamylated-LL37-specific antibodies and CD4 T-cells circulate in SLE and both correlate with disease activity. In contrast to “fully citrullinated-LL37,” “fully carbamylated-LL37” maintains both innate and adaptive immune-cells’ stimulatory abilities: in complex with DNA, carbamylated-LL37 stimulates plasmacytoid dendritic cell IFN-α production and B-cell maturation into plasma cells. Thus, we report a further example of how different post-translational modifications of a self-antigen exert complementary effects that sustain autoimmunity and inflammation, respectively. These data also show that T/B-cell responses to carbamylated-LL37 represent novel SLE disease biomarkers.     

Confocal Blood Flow Videomicroscopy of Thrombus Formation over Human Arteries and Local Targeting of P2X7

Atherothrombosis exposes vascular components to blood. Currently, new antithrombotic therapies are emerging. Herein we investigated thrombogenesis of human arteries with/without atherosclerosis, and the interaction of coagulation and vascular components, we and explored the anti-thrombogenic efficacy of blockade of the P2X purinoceptor 7 (P2X7). A confocal blood flow videomicroscopy system was performed on cryosections of internal mammary artery (IMA) or carotid plaque (CPL) determining/localizing platelets and fibrin. Blood from healthy donors elicited thrombi over arterial layers. Confocal microscopy associated thrombus with tissue presence of collagen type I, laminin, fibrin(ogen) and tissue factor (TF). The addition of antibodies blocking TF (aTF) or factor XI (aFXI) to blood significantly reduced fibrin deposition, variable platelet aggregation and aTF + aFXI almost abolished thrombus formation, showing synergy between coagulation pathways. A scarce effect of aTF over sub-endothelial regions, more abundant in tissue TF and bundles of laminin and collagen type I than deep intima, may suggest tissue thrombogenicity as molecular structure-related. Consistently with TF-related vascular function and expression of P2X7, the sections from CPL but not IMA tissue cultures pre-treated with the P2X7 antagonist A740003 demonstrated poor thrombogenesis in flow experiments. These data hint to local targeting studies on P2X7 modulation for atherothrombosis prevention/therapy.     

Silicon Nitride Derived from an Organometallic Polymeric Precursor: Preparation and Characterization

Partially crystalline Si₃N₄, with nanosized crystals and a specific surface area greater than 200 m²/g, is obtained by pyrolysis of a commercially available vinylic polysilane in a stream of anhydrous NH₃ to 1000°C. This polymer does not contain N initially. Crystallization to high-purity α-Si₃N₄ proceeds with additional heating above 1400°C under N₂. The changes in crystallinity, powder morphology, infrared spectra, and elemental compositions, for samples annealed from 1000° to 1600°C under N₂, are consistent with an amorphous-to-crystalline transformation. Although macroscopic consolidation and local densification occur at 1400°C, volatilization and accompanying weight loss limit bulk densification. The effect of temperature on specific surface area is examined and related to the sintering process. These results are applicable to pyrolysis, decomposition, and crystallization studies of ceramics synthesized by polymeric precursor routes.     

Styrene-butadiene branched star-shaped asphalt modifiers: Synthesis and mechanical characterization

Abstract

The synthesis and the corresponding characterization of styrene-butadiene (SB), branched, star-shaped copolymers was investigated as part of a research project on asphalt modification using polymers with precise molecular structures. The method of anionic polymerization was followed to prepare samples of block copolymers of SB, a synthesis method that controls chain-architecture, molecular weight distribution, monomer distribution, and the average molecular weight. The research studies are the synthesis of block copolymers including linear, three- and four-arms constructs, depending on the coupling agent used. The techniques of nuclear magnetic resonance (1NMR), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), gel permeation chromatography (GPC), and rheology were carried out to characterize the copolymers. From the results of the 1NMR, DSC, and GPC analyses, all star-shaped copolymers investigated showed a similar block copolymer composition. Furthermore, the rheological behavior of one of the synthesized star-shaped copolymers was nearly the same as a four-branched commercial copolymer. Rheologically, the four-arm block copolymer sample had the largest storage modulus (G′) among the branched copolymers synthetized, indicating that such architecture produces a highly structured material. In regard to polymer-modified asphalt formulations, the three-branched copolymer architecture yielded better elastic behavior than the four-branch version. In summary, the findings of this investigation provide new insight about a polymer system that may offer advantages in industrial asphalt paving applications.     

Resolution proof transformation for compression and interpolation

Verification methods based on SAT, SMT, and theorem proving often rely on proofs of unsatisfiability as a powerful tool to extract information in order to reduce the overall effort. For example a proof may be traversed to identify a minimal reason that led to unsatisfiability, for computing abstractions, or for deriving Craig interpolants. In this paper we focus on two important aspects that concern efficient handling of proofs of unsatisfiability: compression and manipulation. First of all, since the proof size can be very large in general (exponential in the size of the input problem), it is indeed beneficial to adopt techniques to compress it for further processing. Secondly, proofs can be manipulated as a flexible preprocessing step in preparation for interpolant computation. Both these techniques are implemented in a framework that makes use of local rewriting rules to transform the proofs. We show that a careful use of the rules, combined with existing algorithms, can result in an effective simplification of the original proofs. We have evaluated several heuristics on a wide range of unsatisfiable problems deriving from SAT and SMT test cases.     

Catalytic hydrogenation of nitrile rubber using palladium and ruthenium complexes

The catalytic hydrogenation of acrylonitrile‐butadiene copolymer (nitrile rubber, NBR) using Pd(OAc)₂ or RuCl₂(PPh₃)₃ catalysts has been investigated in order to produce a totally saturated nitrile rubber. The hydrogenation of NBR is effective with both catalysts and achieved total conversion under the appropriate reaction conditions. In the case of palladium the effects of reaction parameters such as reaction temperature, pressure, time, catalyst concentration, and NBR concentration have been investigated. Even though both ruthenium‐ and palladium‐based catalysts are effective in the production of HNBR, the former requires harsh reaction conditions and has the drawback of gel formation under high conversion, motivating the migration to RuCl₂ (PPh₃)₃ as an alternative catalyst. The degree of hydrogenation was determined by IR and NMR spectroscopy. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci, 2007     

Effects of preparation conditions on the surface modification and performance of polyethersulfone ultrafiltration membranes

The impact that some membrane preparation steps had on ultrafiltration (UF) membrane characteristics and performance was studied. Polyethersulfone (PES) was employed as base polymer, while N‐methyl pyrrolidone (NMP) was used as a solvent, and polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) was used as a nonsolvent pore‐forming additive. The manufacturing variables studied were solvent evaporation time and membrane surface modification, using a fluorine‐based copolymer referred to as surface‐modifying macromolecule (SMM). The flat sheet membranes, prepared via phase inversion, were characterized using solute transport data, X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), and contact angle measurements. Membrane performance was evaluated via filtration test protocol that included a 6‐day filtration of concentrated river water. The flux reduction with time was modeled using single and dual mechanisms of fouling. The pore blockage/cake filtration model described better the behavior of the permeation rate along the experiments. Increasing the solvent evaporation time decreased the size of the pores and the permeation rate. However, it did not significantly affect the removal of the organic compounds naturally present in the river water used as feed. XPS and contact angle measurements proved that the short evaporation periods did not allow enough SMM migration to the surface to provoke a significant effect on the membrane performance. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci, 2006