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In DCNNs, the number of parameters in pointwise convolutions rapidly grows due to the multiplication of the number of filters by the number of input channels that come from the previous layer. Our proposal makes pointwise convolutions parameter efficient via grouping filters into parallel branches or groups, where each branch processes a fraction of the input channels. However, by doing so, the learning capability of the DCNN is degraded. To avoid this effect, we suggest interleaving the output of filters from different branches at intermediate layers of consecutive pointwise convolutions. We applied our improvement to the EfficientNet, DenseNet-BC L100, MobileNet and MobileNet V3 Large architectures. We trained these architectures with the CIFAR-10, CIFAR-100, Cropped-PlantDoc and The Oxford-IIIT Pet datasets. When training from scratch, we obtained similar test accuracies to the original EfficientNet and MobileNet V3 Large architectures while saving up to 90% of the parameters and 63% of the flops.

The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimated that plant diseases cost the world economy $220 billion in 2019. In this paper, we propose a lightweight Deep Convolutional Neural Network (DCNN) for automatic and reliable plant leaf diseases classification. The proposed method starts by converting input images of plant leaves from RGB to CIE LAB coordinates. Then, L and AB channels go into separate branches along with the first three layers of a modified Inception V3 architecture. This approach saves from 1/3 to 1/2 of the parameters in the separated branches. It also provides better classification reliability when perturbing the original RGB images with several types of noise (salt and pepper, blurring, motion blurring and occlusions). These types of noise simulate common image variability found in the natural environment. We hypothesize that the filters in the AB branch provide better resistance to these types of variability due to their relatively low frequency in the image-space domain.

Background Several de-escalation approaches are under investigation in patients with HER2-positive, early-stage breast cancer. We assessed early metabolic responses to neoadjuvant trashizumab and pertuzumab using F-18-fluorodeoxyglucose (F-18-FDG)-PET (F-18-FDG-PET) and the possibility of chemotherapy de-escalation using a pathological response-adapted strategy. Methods We did a multicentre, randomised, open-label, non-comparative, phase 2 trial in 45 hospitals in Spain, France, Belgium, Germany, the UK, Italy, and Portugal. Eligible participants were women aged 18 years or older with centrally confirmed, HER2-positive, stage I-IIIA, invasive, operable breast cancer (1.5 cm tumour size) with at least one breast lesion evaluable by 18 F-FDG-PET, an Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status of 0 or 1, and a baseline left ventricular ejection fraction of at least 55%. We randomly assigned participants (1:4), via an interactive response system using central block randomisation with block sizes of five, stratified by hormone receptor status, to either docetaxel (75 mg/m(2) intravenous), carboplatin (area under the concentration-time curve 6 mg/mL per min intravenous), trastuzumab (subcutaneous 600 mg fixed dose), and pertuzumab (intravenous 840 mg loading dose, 420 mg maintenance doses; group A); or trastuzumab and pertuzumab (group B). Hormone receptor-positive patients allocated to group B were additionally given letrozole if postmenopausal (2.5 mg/day orally) or tamoxifen if premenopausal (20 mg/day orally). Centrally reviewed F-18-FDG-PET scans were done before randomisation and after two treatment cycles. Patients assigned to group A completed six cycles of treatment (every 3 weeks) regardless of F-18-FDG-PET results. All patients assigned to group B initially received two cycles of trastuzumab and pertuzumab. F-18-FDG-PET responders in group B continued this treatment for six further cycles; F-18-FDG-PET non-responders in this group were switched to six cycles of docetaxel, carboplatin, trastuzumab, and pertuzumab. Surgery was done 2-6 weeks after the last dose of study treatment. Adjuvant treatment was selected according to the neoadjuvant treatment administered, pathological response, hormone receptor status, and clinical stage at diagnosis. The coprimary endpoints were the proportion of F-18-FDG-PET responders in group B with a pathological complete response in the breast and axilla (ypT0/is ypN0) as determined by a local pathologist after surgery after eight cycles of treatment, and 3-year invasive disease-free survival of patients in group B, both assessed by intention to treat. The definitive assessment of pathological complete response was done at this primary analysis; follow-up to assess invasive disease-free survival is continuing, hence these data are not included in this Article. Safety was assessed in all participants who received at least one dose of study drug. Health-related quality-of-life was assessed with EORTC QLQ-C30 and QLQ-BR23 questionnaires at baseline, after two cycles of treatment, and before surgery. This trial is registered with EudraCT (2016-002676-27) and ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT03161353), and is ongoing. Findings Between rune 26, 2017, and April 24, 2019, we randomly assigned 71 patients to group A and 285 to group B. Median follow-up was 5.7 months (IQR 5.3-6.0). 227 (80%) of 285 patients in group B were F-18-FDGPET responders, of whom 86 (37.9%, 95% CI 31.6-44-5; p

BACKGROUND/PURPOSE: The main indication of covered stents (CS) is coronary artery perforation (CAP), but, they have been increasingly used in other scenarios. Data on the long-term follow-up of CS is limited, and no studies have been conducted specifically using new-generation polyurethane-covered cobalt-chromium Papyrus CS. PURPOSE: to evaluate the clinical outcomes after hospital discharge of Papyrus CS and to compare their outcome after implantation in CAP or coronary artery aneurysms (CAA). METHODS/MATERIALS: We evaluated the baseline clinical characteristics, lesion subsets, procedural features and the outcomes after initial discharge of Papyrus CS implanted in 17 high-PCI-volume centers. RESULTS: 127 Papyrus CS were implanted in 108 patients (68?±?1?years; 82.8% male) admitted for stable coronary disease (32.3%), NSTEMI (42.4%) or STEMI (25.3%). The number of CS per patient was 1.2?±?0.6 (diameter: 3.5?±?1.7?mm; length: 18.5?±?3.7?mm). Angiographic success rate was 96%. CS diameter was larger in CAA (CAP:3.04?±?0.5?mm vs CAA:4.1?±?2.7?mm; p?=?.022). Intracoronary imaging techniques were used more frequently in CAA (p?.0001). After a mean follow-up of 22?±?16?months, the major cardiovascular adverse events (MACE) rate was 7.1% [cardiac death: 2%, Myocardial infarction: 5%, Target Lesion Revascularization: 5% and Stent Thrombosis (ST): 3%]. MACE rate was similar in CAP (7.7%) and CAA (7.1%) (p?=?.9). However, CAA showed a higher ST rate (CAP: 0% vs CA: 7.1%; p?=?.04). CONCLUSION: After hospital discharge, clinical outcomes after Papyrus CS implantation are acceptable (considering the clinical scenario and compared with other treatment alternatives) with no significant differences in the MACE rate between those implanted in CAA or in CAP. However, CAA group showed a higher ST rate.

Simple Summary Considering the favorable overall safety profile of trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1), the low expected rate of cardiotoxicity, and the synergistic effect of anthracyclines with Human Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor 2 (HER2)-targeting agents, it is hypothesized that T-DM1 may be safely combined with non-pegylated liposomal doxorubicin (NPLD). In the THELMA trial, the effect of adding NPLD to T-DM1 was evaluated with the aim of enhancing T-DM1 efficacy using an extensive cardiological assessment in trastuzumab- and taxane-pretreated patients with HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer. Despite an unlikely drug synergism, this combination was generally well tolerated without clinically relevant worsening of cardiac function. No relationship was identified between early predictors of heart failure and left ventricular ejection fraction changes. Thus, the combination of T-DM1 plus NPLD is safe, but this regimen does not seem to improve T-DM1 antitumor activity in this setting. The paper assesses the dose-limiting toxicities and the maximum tolerated dose (MTD) of trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1) combined with non-pegylated liposomal doxorubicin (NPLD) in HER2-positive (HER2+) metastatic breast cancer (MBC). This single-arm, open-label, phase Ib trial (NCT02562378) enrolled anthracycline-naive HER2+ MBC patients who had progressed on trastuzumab and taxanes. Patients received a maximum of 6 cycles of NPLD intravenously (IV) at various dose levels (45, 50, and 60 mg/m(2)) in the "3 plus 3" dose-escalation part. During expansion, they received 60 mg/m(2) of NPLD every 3 weeks (Q3W) plus standard doses of T-DM1. The MTD was T-DM1 3.6 mg/kg plus NPLD 60 mg/m(2) administered IV Q3W. No clinically relevant worsening of cardiac function was observed. Among all evaluable patients, the overall response rate was 40.0% (95%CI, 16.3-67.7) with a median duration of response of 6.9 months (95%CI, 4.8-9.1). Clinical benefit rate was 66.7% (95%CI, 38.4-88.2) and median progression-free survival was 7.2 months (95%CI, 4.5-9.6). No significant influence of NPLD on T-DM1 pharmacokinetics was observed. The addition of NPLD to T-DM1 is feasible but does not seem to improve the antitumor efficacy of T-DM1 in HER2+ MBC patients.

© 2018 The authors and IOS Press. Breast density is a crucial factor to follow-up the relapse of breast cancer in mammograms and the risk of local recurrence after conservative surgery and/or radiotherapy. Accurate breast density estimation with visual assessment is still a challenge due to faint contrast and significant variations in background fatty tissues in mammograms. The important key of breast density estimation is to properly detect the dense tissues in a mammographic image. Thus, this paper presents an automatic deep breast density segmentation using conditional Generative Adversarial Networks (cGAN) that consist of two successive deep networks: generator and discriminator. The generator network learns the mapping from the input mammogram to the output binary mask detection the area of the dense tissues. In turn, the discriminator learns a loss function to train this mapping by comparing the ground-truth and the predicted mask under observing the input mammogram as a condition. The performance of the proposed model was evaluated on the public INbreast mammographic datasets. The proposed model can segment the dense regions with overall recall, precision and F-score about 95%, 92%, and 93%, respectively, outperforming state-of-the-art of breast density segmentation. The proposed model can segment more than 40 images with a size of 512×512 per second on a recent GPU.

© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2018. This paper proposes a novel approach based on conditional Generative Adversarial Networks (cGAN) for breast mass segmentation in mammography. We hypothesized that the cGAN structure is well-suited to accurately outline the mass area, especially when the training data is limited. The generative network learns intrinsic features of tumors while the adversarial network enforces segmentations to be similar to the ground truth. Experiments performed on dozens of malignant tumors extracted from the public DDSM dataset and from our in-house private dataset confirm our hypothesis with very high Dice coefficient and Jaccard index (>94% and >89%, respectively) outperforming the scores obtained by other state-of-the-art approaches. Furthermore, in order to detect portray significant morphological features of the segmented tumor, a specific Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) have also been designed for classifying the segmented tumor areas into four types (irregular, lobular, oval and round), which provides an overall accuracy about 72% with the DDSM dataset.

© 2018 The authors and IOS Press. This paper proposed a retinal image segmentation method based on conditional Generative Adversarial Network (cGAN) to segment optic disc. The proposed model consists of two successive networks: generator and discriminator. The generator learns to map information from the observing input (i.e., retinal fundus color image), to the output (i.e., binary mask). Then, the discriminator learns as a loss function to train this mapping by comparing the ground-truth and the predicted output with observing the input image as a condition. Experiments were performed on two publicly available dataset; DRISHTI GS1 and RIM-ONE. The proposed model outperformed state-of-the-art-methods by achieving around 0.96 and 0.98 of Jaccard and Dice coefficients, respectively. Moreover, an image segmentation is performed in less than a second on recent GPU.

© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2018. Skin lesion segmentation (SLS) in dermoscopic images is a crucial task for automated diagnosis of melanoma. In this paper, we present a robust deep learning SLS model represented as an encoder-decoder network. The encoder network is constructed by dilated residual layers, in turn, a pyramid pooling network followed by three convolution layers is used for the decoder. Unlike the traditional methods employing a cross-entropy loss, we formulated a new loss function by combining both Negative Log Likelihood (NLL) and End Point Error (EPE) to accurately segment the boundaries of melanoma regions. The robustness of the proposed model was evaluated on two public databases: ISBI 2016 and 2017 for skin lesion analysis towards melanoma detection challenge. The proposed model outperforms the state-of-the-art methods in terms of the segmentation accuracy. Moreover, it is capable of segmenting about 100 images of a 384 × 384 size per second on a recent GPU.

A retrospective cohort study was performed, using administrative database of the Local Health Unit Roma-A (LHU RM-A). The included subjects were residing in one of the four districts and were hospitalized for COPD exacerbation in healthcare facilities of the LHU during years 2010-2012.The aim of the present study is to evaluate the impact of comorbidities, length and costs of hospital stay in patients with COPD exacerbations. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is often associated with other diseases (cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, metabolic syndrome, chronic renal failure, depression) that can increase risk of mortality and hospitalization.A total of 1890 COPD patients are included in the study. The mean length of hospitalization is 12.25 days (SD ± 10.91), 11.63 days (SD ± 9.76) and 11.91 days (SD ± 9.69) with a mean cost of hospitalization amounting to euro 3683.48 (SD ± 2037.12), 3356.82 (SD ± 1674.86) and 3706.81 (SD ± 2087.72) in 2010, 2011 and 2012 respectively. The presence and number of comorbidities are positively and significantly associated to the length and cost of hospitalization. In particular, patients with cardiovascular diseases or diabetes mellitus associated with other comorbidities present the highest values of hospital stay and cost. The cost and the length of hospitalization were significantly linked to the number of comorbidities.Comorbidities play an important role in the hospital management of COPD exacerbation, increasing health care costs related to this disease.

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) has been associated with a high frequency of arrhythmias. Atrial fibrillation (AF) is one of the most common arrhythmias and causes substantial morbidity and mortality. Emerging risk factors for the development of AF include a variety of breathing disorders like COPD. Few studies have analyzed the role of reduced lung function and respiratory acidosis in predicting AF. Aim of the current study was to investigate the role of hypercapnia, pulmonary systolic hypertension and lung function impairment in COPD patients, as risk factors for atrial fibrillation development.We evaluated a population of individuals consecutively hospitalized for COPD exacerbation and hypercapnic respiratory failure between January 2012 and January 2013; among them we selected a subgroup of patients presenting a paroxysmal episode of atrial fibrillation. All patients underwent pulmonary function tests, haemogasanalysis, electrocardiogram and transthoracic echocardiography.Among the 193 subjects evaluated, 35 individuals with AF and COPD were enrolled in the study. Risk of new AF was higher in those subjects with lower FEV1 and higher PaCO2 values, also there was a significantly increased prevalence of AF in patients with higher value of Pulmonary Artery Systolic Pressure (PASP), obtained by transthoracic echocardiography. Linear correlation between variables revealed a direct relationships between hypercapnia and PASP and left and right atrial areas.Impaired pulmonary function, hypercapnia and high values of PASP are independent predictors of incident AF.

In a recent experiment, functional magnetic resonance imaging blood oxygen level-dependent (fMRI BOLD) signals were compared in different cortical areas (primary-visual and associative), when subjects were required covertly to name images in two protocols: sequences of images, with and without intervening delays. The amplitude of the BOLD signal in protocols with delay was found to be closer to that without delays in associative areas than in primary areas. The present study provides an exploratory proposal for the identification of the neural activity substrate of the BOLD signal in quasi-realistic networks of spiking neurons, in networks sustaining selective delay activity (associative) and in networks responsive to stimuli, but whose unique stationary state is one of spontaneous activity (primary). A variety of observables are 'recorded' in the network simulations, applying the experimental stimulation protocol. The ratios of the candidate BOLD signals, in the two protocols, are compared in networks with and without delay activity. There are several options for recovering the experimental result in the model networks. One common conclusion is that the distinguishing factor is the presence of delay activity. The effect of NMDAr is marginal. The ultimate quantitative agreement with the experiment results depends on a distinction of the baseline signal level from its value in delay-period spontaneous activity. This may be attributable to the subjects' attention. Modifying the baseline results in a quantitative agreement for the ratios, and provided a definite choice of the candidate signals. The proposed framework produces predictions for the BOLD signal in fMRI experiments, upon modification of the protocol presentation rate and the form of the response function.

Mean-Field theory is extended to recurrent networks of spiking neurons endowed with short-term depression (STD) of synaptic transmission. The extension involves the use of the distribution of interspike intervals of an integrate-and-fire neuron receiving a Gaussian current, with a given mean and variance, in input. This, in turn, is used to obtain an accurate estimate of the resulting postsynaptic current in presence of STD. The stationary states of the network are obtained requiring self-consistency for the currents-those driving the emission processes and those generated by the emitted spikes. The model network stores in the distribution of two-state efficacies of excitatory-to-excitatory synapses, a randomly composed set of external stimuli. The resulting synaptic structure allows the network to exhibit selective persistent activity for each stimulus in the set. Theory predicts the onset of selective persistent, or working memory (WM) activity upon varying the constitutive parameters (e.g. potentiated/depressed long-term efficacy ratio, parameters associated with STD), and provides the average emission rates in the various steady states. Theoretical estimates are in remarkably good agreement with data 'recorded' in computer simulations of the microscopic model.

Cancer patients often show an imbalance condition between coagulation system and fibrinolysis which causes a prothrombotic state. Different molecular factors like von Willebrand factor (vWf), presenting higher plasmatic rates in these patients, play an important role in this situation. During active angiogenesis taking place in tumor growth, the vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and the fibroblast growth factor (FGF-2) contribute to the proliferation and differentiation of endothelial tissue, the main vWf producer, promoting increased rates of vWf in the serum of neoplastic patients. Recently vWf's contribution to tumor cells and platelet adhesion has been described. In this process, the discovery of platelet, endothelial and tumor cell membrane integrins and their implication in cellular adhesion has represented a major step in demonstrating how blood clotting and platelet aggregation are mediated by tumor cell and platelet linkage. Migration properties acquired by tumor cells as a result of this binding have been also pointed out. Clinical trials show higher rates of plasmatic vWf in cancer patients the more advanced clinical and radiological stage they present (metastasic versus localized). Moreover, higher pre-surgical serum vWf rates in patients can be used to predict poorer survival after resection surgery. vWf high molecular weight multimers have been also related to a cleavage protease deficiency in the serum of the oncologic population. The promising results of antiaggregation/anticoagulation therapies in these patients permit us to envisage new therapeutic targets

En este trabajo se presentan un conjunto de prácticas diseñadas para que el alumno alcance un buen conocimiento del nivel de L.M. y entienda como se ejecuta un programa escrito en un lenguaje de alto nivel en un ordenador. En estas prácticas el alumno debe implementar un programa en L.M. a partir de un algoritmo dado. La principal novedad que se presentan es la metodología, que se basa en: 1) cada ejercicio se realiza en una sesión de 2 horas; 2) al principio de cada sesión, el profesor de prácticas repasa (en 30 minutos) los conceptos teóricos que se aplican en el ejercicio; 3) cada ejercicio se puede realizar independientemente de los anteriores.

The aim of this study was to compare some physico-chemical properties (weight loss, pH, Haugh unit, gel hardenss and foam drainage) of non packed eggs and eggs packed in high barrier plastic pouches with three atmospheres (air, 100% N-2, 100% CO2) during 28 days of storage at 25 degrees C. MAP permitted a strong reduction of the weight loss from the product. While the greatest quality decline was observed for the control, eggs packed in CO2 maintained the initial values of Haugh unit during storage and the albumen pH was about 2 points lower than the control. Gel hardness showed a strict correlation with raw albumen pH and CO2 MAP caused the formation of a soft and puffy coagulum. In terms of liquid drainage, foam stability decreased during storage for all samples but eggs packed in 100% CO2 showed a more stable foam compared with fresh eggs until the fourth day. These findings suggest that the exposition of fresh eggs to CO2 enriched atmospheres could be apply as a natural method to modulate albumen pH and indirectly the rheological properties of coagulated albumen and foam.

Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is a slowly progressive airways disorder characterized by not fully reversible airflow obstruction, often presenting exacerbations of respiratory symptoms requiring hospitalization. Non-Invasive Ventilation (NIV) has been shown to be an effective adjunct to standard medical therapy in the treatment of acute respiratory failure. Secondary pulmonary hypertension leads to a rapid progression of the disease.To evaluate the effect of NIV treatment in patients with acute exacerbation of COPD, with or without respiratory acidosis, and its effect in patients with pulmonary hypertension.We enrolled 61 consecutive subjects (M 41; F 20) with COPD admitted to our respiratory ward for acute respiratory exacerbation. Patients were divided into two groups on the basis of arterial pH (group A: 26 individuals with pH7.35; group B: 35 with pHor =7.35) and treated with optimal medical therapy (oxygen-therapy, systemic corticosteroids, bronchodilators, antibiotics) and NIV. Moreover, we evaluated functional autonomy thought Six Minute Walking Test (6 mWT), and pulmonary arterial pressure (by transthoracic echocardiography).In group A NIV treatment was associated to a total regression of uncompensated respiratory acidosis (pH 7.36 vs. 7.29). In both groups we observed a significant reduction of PaCO2 (group A: 77.14 +/- 10.4 vs. 45.1 +/- 2.8 mmHg; group B: 70.1 vs. 44 +/- 3.9 mmHg) and an improvement in PaO2 (group A: 51.2 +/- 10.3 vs 84.2 mmHg; group B: 59 +/- vs. 87 +/- 3.3 mmHg). Total average duration of NIV administration was longer in Group A than in Group B (81.14 hours vs 55.83 hours). At the end of NIV treatment, we observed improvement in the autonomy of walking (175.1 meters vs 118.4 meters) in both groups. Patients with severe pulmonary hypertension (PASPor =55 mmHg) showed a lower reduction of PaCO2 (47.8 vs. 43.7 mmHg) and a minor improvement of arterial pH (7.37 vs. 7.41) compared to patients with a lower value of pulmonary hypertension.In this study we showed that NIV is useful in patients with or without uncompensated respiratory acidosis, through the improvement of symptoms, blood gases parameters, and walking autonomy. Patients with severe pulmonary hypertension are associated with poorer response to NIV treatment.

Objectives The aim of our study was to investigate the benefit of antiarrhythmic drugs (AAD) - beta-blockers, sotalol or amiodarone - in a cohort of Arrhythmogenic Right Ventricular Cardiomyopathy (ARVC) patients with long-term longitudinal follow up. Background AAD are prescribed in ARVC to prevent ventricular arrhythmias and control symptoms. However, there are no controlled clinical trials and knowledges regarding the efficacy of AAD in ARVC are limited. Methods The study population included 123 patients with definite diagnosis of ARVC and ≥ 2 clinical evaluations. The primary outcome was a composite of sudden cardiac death (SCD)/recurrent major ventricular arrythmias (MVA): sudden cardiac arrest, sustained ventricular tachycardia (VT) and appropriate implantable cardioverter defibrillator interventions, including recurrent events in patients with >1 MVA. Time to first event (SCD or MVA) was considered as secondary composite endpoint. Results Sixteen patients were taking AAD at baseline and 75 started at least one AAD during a median follow-up of 132 months [61–255]. A total of 37 patients experienced ≥1 MVA with a total count of 83 recurrent MVA. After adoption of a propensity score analysis, no AAD were associated with lower risk of recurrent MVA. However, if dosage of AAD was considered, beta-blockers at >50% target dose were associated with a significant reduction in the risk of MVA compared to patients not taking beta-blockers (HR 0.10, 95% CI 0.02–0.46, p = 0.004). Conclusions In a large cohort of ARVC patients with a long-term follow-up, only beta-blockers administrated at >50% target dose were associated with lower risk of SCD/recurrent MVA.

Aims Arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy (ARVC) is associated with a high risk of sudden cardiac death. Three different prediction models for the indication of implanted cardioverter defibrillator (ICD) are now available: the 5 year ARVC risk score, the International Task Force Consensus (ITFC) criteria, and the Heart Rhythm Society (HRS) criteria. We compared these three prediction models in a validation cohort of patients with definite ARVC. Methods and results In a cohort of 140 patients with definite ARVC, the 5 year ARVC risk score and the ITFC and HRS criteria were compared for the prediction of a major combined endpoint of sudden cardiac death, appropriate ICD intervention, resuscitated cardiac arrest, and sustained ventricular tachycardia. During the follow‐up, 65 major events occurred. The 5 year ARVC risk score with a threshold >10%, derived from the maximally selected rank statistic, predicted 62 (95%) events [odds ratio (OR) 9.1, 95% confidence interval (CI) 2.6–32, P = 0.0006], the ITFC criteria 53 (81%, OR 4.8, 95% CI 2.2–10.3, P = 0.0001), and the HRS criteria 29 (45%, OR 4.2, 95% CI 1.9–9.3, P = 0.0003). At the analysis of decision curve for ICD implantation, a 5 year ARVC risk score >10% showed a greater net benefit than the ITFC and HRS criteria over a wide range of threshold probability of events. Finally, at multivariate analysis, the 5 year ARVC risk score >10% was the only independent predictor of major events. Conclusions The 5 year score with a threshold of >10% was more effective for predicting events than the ITFC and HRS criteria.

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of different type of leavening agents (ammonium bicarbonate—A, cream of tartar—B, grape-based leavening agent—C, baking powder—D) on the structural (also after soaking), physico-chemical and other quality characteristics of biscuits made with the same formulation. The major changes observed between samples were related to their textural properties, volatile profile and sensory characteristics. The presence of ammonium bicarbonate in sample A, gave arise to a biscuit with the most homogeneous surface appearance, the less hard structure and highest fracturability and spread, that promoted their greater milk uptake during soaking. The B and C biscuits, made with baking powder having tartaric acid, were characterized by a crisper texture and lower sensory overall acceptability. The presence in formulation of baking powders made with cream of tartar (B) and ammonium bicarbonate (A) mostly influenced the biscuit volatile profiles. Biscuit sample obtained with the most common baking powder (diphosphates powder) showed in general intermediate characteristics between A and B–C samples. Results obtained in this study demonstrate that a lot of final properties of biscuits can be strongly influenced by the type of leavening agents used in formulation. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s13197-020-04418-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

It is widely known that acrylamide, present in some different heat-treated foods, is an important toxic compound to humans. Coffee beverage is one of the most important sources of acrylamide, because the raw bean contains the reaction substrates and it is processed at very high temperature during roasting. Due to its high consumption all over the world, it is necessary to find applicable solutions to decrease the concentration of this undesired Maillard reaction product. The present review summarizes the advance made in understanding the acrylamide formation and describes the potential acrylamide reduction strategies along all coffee production steps, from raw material to coffee brew preparation with a dominant focus on roasting stage. Currently, it is quite established that the selection of the highest quality Arabica green coffee variety, high roasting thermal input and shortest brewing techniques lead to low final acrylamide levels. There are also few innovative interventions proposed for acrylamide control in coffee such as enzymatic treatments of raw material, vacuum or steam roasting, roasted beans supercritical fluid extraction, final beverage treatments like yeast fermentation and amino acids/additive additions. However, for these strategies the impact on the desired sensorial and nutritional coffee brew properties must be evaluated and some proposed procedures are still difficult to be applied at real industrial scale. Furthermore, in-depth studies are needed in order to find appropriate and practical solutions for acrylamide mitigation in coffee with a holistic risk/benefit approach.

[EN] Wheat flour replacement by rice flour is a key strategy in gluten-free batter production. Rice flour needs hydrocolloids to offset the development of the network of the mix. In this context, the aim of this work was to analyze the influence of chitosan (0-1 g/100 g of batter) addition on the microstructural, rheological and thermal properties of wheat:rice flours batters (100:0; 70:30, 30:70 and 0:100 (g/g)). Results showed that increasing replacement of wheat flour by rice one decreased the consistency (K) and the yield stress (To), and increased the flow behavior index (n) because of the absence or lower gluten content. However, the addition of only 0.25 g/100 g chitosan to rice flour formulation (0:100 (g/g)) increased its viscosity (from 371 to 1006 mPa s), exhibiting a rheological behavior similar to wheat flour formulation (100:0 (g/g) (1050 mPa s)). Chitosan enhanced consistency and structural agglomeration, and the interaction among ingredients, especially in batters with high content of rice flour (30:70 and 0:100 (g/g)). Lastly, chitosan incorporation did not significantly modify thermal properties, excepting in rice-flour batters (0:100 (g/g)), reducing T-m, Delta H-m, and thus, increasing the bound water content (from 17 to 32 g/100 g). (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved., The authors want to acknowledge the financial support of Universitat Politecnica de Valencia for the scholarship to support Mariola Sansano Tomas' PhD studies and the mobility grant to University of Bologna (Italy).

The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of the coffee roasting process on both toxic and some beneficial antioxidant compounds, applying a systematic and broad approach. Arabica and Robusta green coffee beans were roasted in a lab-scale roaster for different times in order to achieve five roasting degrees (from light to dark) and to assess the evolution of acrylamide (AA), trigonelline, nicotinic acid and caffeoylquinic acids contents (determined by HPLC) as well as antioxidant activity (evaluated by Folin-Ciocalteu, FRAP, DPPH, ABTS assays). The results confirmed that the AA levels and antioxidant activity reached a maximum in the first coffee roasting degrees and then decreased prolonging the heating process, both in Arabica and Robusta samples. Nevertheless, the thermal reduction observed was greater for AA compared to antioxidant activity, which was only slightly reduced due to the balance between the degradation and the neoformation of antioxidant compounds.

People undertake various brand-related activities on social media that differ in levels of engagement. Companies, however, want to know how to motivate consumers to become involved in the relatively more engaging activities, as such activities are more likely to lead to increased sales. In this article, we focus on activities that are highly engaging (such as writing product reviews) or moderately engaging (such as rating products). Based on self-determination theory, the present research identifies different motivations for engaging in different brand-related activities on social media. We provide evidence indicating that the motivations of self-expression and socializing play primary roles in leading people to participate in highly engaging activities (i.e. creating one's own content online) and in moderately engaging activities (i.e. collaborating with others to contribute to content). These findings have implications for both theory and practice insofar as they specify how to stimulate consumers to perform relatively more engaging brand-related activities on social media. An overarching framework explains which motivations affect brand-related activities.The framework is tested by a survey and an experimental study.Specific motivations drive activities that entail different levels of engagement.Expressing oneself motivates people to generate online content.Socializing with others motivates people to contribute content.