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This paper proposes a novel two-stage Energy Management System (EMS) that is suitable for small-scale grid-connected electrical systems, such as smart homes and buildings, encompassing renewable generators and electrical storage. In such systems, forecast errors of renewable generation and energy demand profiles result in a significant uncertainty on the power exchanged between the end users and the utility grid. The proposed EMS reduces such demand uncertainty and the electricity bill for end users, at the same time. The main novelty of the proposed technique is that it does not require any change in pricing plans or user's habits, differently from classical Demand Side Management schemes. Moreover, thanks to the increased predictability of the exchanged power, utility providers are facilitated in managing the wholesale risk, for example by designing appropriate pricing schemes. The proposed EMS is based on an optimization algorithm. It starts from profiles of renewable generation and load demand, which are obtained by a forecasting method based on suitably chosen and trained Artificial Neural Networks. Furthermore, it has been designed to be suitable for an embedded implementation on low-performance processing platforms. The proposed EMS has been validated using datasets coming from monitoring campaigns. The considered case study is a smart home with an annual energy consumption of about 4500 kWh. It encompasses a grid-connected electrical distribution power plant with a 3 kW photovoltaic generator and a 4.6 kWh battery electrical storage system. The results obtained for a sample month demonstrate the effectiveness of the approach. As a matter of fact, the demand uncertainty is only 4.75% against a cumulative forecast error of 10.35% expressed as normalized root mean square error. At the same time, the end user's cash flow is 2.43% higher than the income obtained without an EMS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much controversy exists concerning the way calcium phosphate is linked to milk phosphoproteins including caseins. Homoionic exchange of inorganic phosphate between micellar calcium phosphates (MCP) of casein micelles and solute phosphates in cows’ milk was investigated using H32PO42− as radiotracer. Compartmental analysis and modelling revealed the presence of three MCP-related inorganic phosphate compartments each representing a separate phosphate entity. The relative phosphate quantities per compartment, i.e. the quantities of kinetically identical phosphate ions per MCP-ion cluster, and their mean residence times are 2:1:1 and 818, 0.24 and 23 h, respectively. Hence each MCP-ion cluster comprises four inorganic phosphate ions divided over three intra-MCP binding sites each characterised by a mean residence time for homomolecular phosphate exchange at solution/MCP interface. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose Gambling disorder has been recently reclassified under the category "substance-related and addictive disorders". Recent studies performed through functional MRI (fMRI) have shown that the perseverance of some behaviors can alter brain activation [1,2]. In this work we aim at investigating functional connectivity changes in pathological gamblers (PGs) in comparison to healthy controls (HCs) by means of resting state functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (rs-fMRI). Methods and materials Thirteen HCs and fourteen PGs were recruited (all right handed males; drugs free; mean age 36 ± 10 yrs). All acquisitions were performed through a 1,5 T MRI scanner using a 8-channels phased-array head coil. Multi-session temporal concatenated Independent Component Analysis (concat-ICA) was carried out to achieve activations information on functionally linked brain regions. The resulted components were then matched and compared between groups. Correction for multiple comparisons across space was applied assuming an overall significance of p < 0.05 using permutation testing and threshold-free cluster enhancement. Results Functional connectivity was found to be increased in PGs, compared to HCs, in several networks including: anterior cingulate cortex, accumbens nucleus, head of the caudate nucleus, middle left temporal gyrus, right insula, right cerebellar hemisphere cortex and cerebellar vermis. Conclusion We can conclude that an hyperconnectivity together with an overactivation of specific regions is observed in PGs. The persistent activation of specific functional networks during gambling tasks might represent the neurofunctional basis of PGs state-reduced triggering threshold to gaming underlying the clinical features of gambling disorder. These preliminary results confirms the crucial role of fMRI studies to investigate brain networks and their changes in specific clinical functional disorders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

AIM OF THE STUDY: The in vitro antiplasmodial activity and cytotoxicity of methanolic and dichloromethane extracts from five Congolese plants were evaluated. The plants were selected following an ethnobotanical survey conducted in D.R. Congo and focusing on plants used traditionally to treat malaria. The in vivo antimalarial activity of aqueous and methanolic extracts active in vitro was also determined in mice infected by Plasmodium berghei berghei. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The growth inhibition of Plasmodium falciparum strains was evaluated using the measurement of lactate dehydrogenase activity. The extracts (aqueous, CH(3)OH, EtOH and CH(2)Cl(2)) were prepared by maceration and tested in vitro against the 3D7 (chloroquine sensitive) and W2 (chloroquine resistant) strains of Plasmodium falciparum and against the human normal fetal lung fibroblasts WI-38 to determine the selectivity index. Some extracts were also used at the dose of 300 mg/kg to evaluate their activity in mice infected since 4 days by Plasmodium berghei. RESULTS: Two plants presented a very high activity (IC(50)<3 microg/ml). These plants were Strychnos icaja roots bark (MeOH and CH(2)Cl(2)) and Physalis angulata leaves (MeOH and CH(2)Cl(2)). One plant (Anisopappus chinensis whole plant, MeOH and CH(2)Cl(2)) presented a high activity (IC50<15 microg/ml). The extracts of Anisopappus chinensis and Physalis angulata showed also a good inhibition of parasitemia in vivo. Flavonoids, phenolic acids and terpenes were identified in these plants by a general phytochemical screening method. CONCLUSION: Three plants showed a very interesting antiplasmodial activity (Anisopappus chinensis, Physalis angulata and Strychnos icaja) and one of them showed a good selectivity index (>10, Anisopappus chinensis). Anisopappus chinensis and Physalis angulata were also active in vivo. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]