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The Eritrean-Italian Archaeological Project in the ancient town of Adulis started in 2011 in collaboration with the Local Authorities, under the direction and coordination of the National Museum of Eritrea, the Museum of Massawa and the Research Center on Eastern Desert (Ce.R.D.O.)., and in collaboration with the Università degli studi “L’Orientale” of Naples, the Politecnico of Milan, the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan. The project aims at the rediscovery, study and valorisation of the archaeological remains of the town, also with the intent to create the first archaeological park in sub-Saharan Africa, for the touristic development of the region. The wide research themes inherent to an area that in antiquity represented a crucial point within the net of cultural contacts and exchanges between Mediterranean, Africa and Orient, the complex issues regarding the site conservation and fruition, represent an important opportunity to improve the interdisciplinary contributions of the traditional research areas of the different Universities involved and of the Eritrean team of archaeologists, in a perspective of public archaeology. In the conference the results of the first five fieldworks, concerning different excavation areas of the ancient Adulis, will be presented. Sector 1, Sector 3 and Sector 5, investigated by the Università degli Studi “L’Orientale”of Naples, with evidences related to the domestic settlement from the 1st- 2nd to the early 7th century AD. The religious buildings in Sector 2 and Sector 4: the church in the central northern sector of the town – the so called ‘Altar of the Sun’ – and the church located at its eastern border, the excavation of which is entrusted to the Catholic University of Milan. The operations of conservation and programmed maintenance, conducted by the Politecnico of Milan, which represent an important part of the project.

To assess Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS) incidence we relied on the Italian Network for the study of GBS (ITANG) established in 2010 in 7 Italian regions to analyse the association between influenza vaccination and GBS. Methods: All individuals aged ≥18 years, presenting with clinical manifestations that suggested GBS according to the universally accepted Asbury's diagnostic criteria (1990) were prospectively notified to a centralised database by ITANG neurologists over the period October 1, 2010-September 30, 2011. Through a telephone survey, 9 trained interviewers followed up the cases to diagnosis and then for 1 year since hospital discharge. Validation of case reporting was performed with the support of administrative data in 5 regions. Results: We found 365 cases fulfilling the definition for GBS or one of its variants over 19,846,068 population ≥18 years of age, yielding an annual incidence rate of 1.84 per 100,000 (95% CI 1.65-2.03), 2.30 (95% CI 1.99-2.60) in men and 1.41 (95% CI 1.18-1.64) in women. A highly significant peak of incidence was observed in February 2011 as compared to reference month (September 2011, rate ratio 3.3:1, p < 0.01). Conclusions: In Italy, GBS incidence was among the highest reported in Europe and higher than previously observed in Italian studies.

The Angera stone is a sedimentary Triassic dolostone mainly composed of dolomite, which was widely employed in the Lombard architecture. In the present work, the study of the Angera stone of the 'Cortile del Richini', a masterpiece of the Lombard baroque, is discussed as an example of a particularly challenging conservation issue. The courtyard suffered from a particularly troubled conservative history and the highly polluted urban environment of Milan provided very favourable conditions for the decay of such a delicate stone type. The last extensive conservative intervention was performed during the nineties due to massive black crust formation and granular disintegration of the stone. Almost 20 years later, a thorough study of the stone has been aimed at the definition of a long-term maintenance project. The Angera stone has been investigated in order to define an updated version of its state of conservation, as well as to track any changes in the degradation mechanisms due to the environmental variations of the Milan city centre. In particular, the soluble salts' content of the stone substrate has been evaluated as an indicator of the damage level. The results highlighted that the stone is currently in critical condition: An extensive sulphation process is taking place, leading to the chemical transformation of the dolomitic substrate into gypsum. Moreover, the powder deposits affecting the stone surfaces have a similar composition to those generally found in the black crusts growing in urban environment. Therefore, they can be considered as precursor of this particularly dangerous decay mechanism. © 2012 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.

Using an in vivo arterio-venous loop-containing tissue-engineering chamber, we have created a variety of vascularized tissue blocks, including functional myocardium. The viability of the transplanted cells is limited by the rate of neovascularization in the chamber. A Nox2-containing nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADPH) oxidase is thought to have a critical role in ischaemic angiogenesis. In this study we investigated whether NADPH oxidase is involved in the neovascularization process in the tissue-engineering chamber. New blood vessels originating from the venous and the arterial ends of the loop could be identified after 3 days, and the vessel density (by lectin staining) peaked after 7 days and was maintained for at least 14 days. This was accompanied by granulation tissue formation and concomitant increase in the mRNA level of Nox4 NADPH oxidase. Although the total level of Nox2 mRNA in the chamber tissue decreased from day 3 to day 7, immunohistochemistry identified a strong expression of Nox2 in the endothelial cells of the new vessels. In human microvascular endothelial cells, the NADPH oxidase inhibitor apocynin reduced NADPH oxidase activity and inhibited the angiogenic responses in vitro. Local treatment with the NADPH oxidase inhibitors apocynin or gp91ds-tat peptide significantly suppressed the vessel growth in the chamber. In conclusion, NADPH oxidase-dependent redox signalling is important for neovascularization in this novel tissue-engineering chamber in vivo, and boosting this signalling might be a new approach to extending vascularization and tissue growth.