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A new method for early selection of wild cherry clones for resistance to Phytophthora sp. is presented. Four Phytophthora species (P. cinnamomi, P. citrophthora, P. megasperma, P. alni) were tested in vitro on four micropropagated cherry (Prunus avium) clones, obtaining reliable and reproducible results. Variability in clones susceptibilities and in parasite virulence has been evidenced. Phytophthora citrophthora is confirmed to be a dangerous parasite, due to its capability to produce symptoms rapidly and its fitness to Mediterranean environments. On the contrary P. alni does not seem a dangerous parasite for wild cherry.

Despite the negative externalities on the environment and human health, today's economies still produce excessive carbon dioxide emissions. As a result, governments are trying to shift production and consumption to more sustainable models that reduce the environmental impact of carbon dioxide emissions. The European Union, in particular, has implemented an innovative policy to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by creating a market for emission rights, the emissions trading system. The objective of this paper is to perform a counterfactual analysis to measure the impact of the emissions trading system on the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions. For this purpose, a recently-developed statistical machine learning method called matrix completion with fixed effects estimation is used and compared to traditional econometric techniques. We apply matrix completion with fixed effects estimation to the prediction of missing counterfactual entries of a carbon dioxide emissions matrix whose elements (indexed row-wise by country and column-wise by year) represent emissions without the emissions trading system for country-year pairs. The results obtained, confirmed by robust diagnostic tests, show a significant effect of the emissions trading system on the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions: the majority of European Union countries included in our analysis reduced their total carbon dioxide emissions (associated with selected industries) by about 15.4% during the emissions trading system treatment period 2005-2020, compared to the total carbon dioxide emissions (associated with the same industries) that would have been achieved in the absence of the emissions trading system policy. Finally, several managerial/practical implications of the study are discussed, together with its possible extensions., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

In the era of personalised medicine, testing for an increasing number of predictive biomarkers is becoming a priority. However, tissue biopsies from these patients are oftentimes insufficient for conventional approaches, a common issue that deprives them of the clinical benefits of biomarker-directed treatments. To tackle this problem, many clinical laboratories are resorting to circulating tumour DNA (ctDNA), which is becoming increasingly appreciated as a valuable source for biomarker testing. In this context, next-generation sequencing (NGS) has become essential. Indeed, different NGS systems are able to detect several clinically relevant low-frequency hot-spot mutations simultaneously in a single run. However, their reproducibility in the analysis of ctDNA has not yet been investigated. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the reproducibility of using Illumina MiSeq and Thermo Fisher Ion S5 Plus platforms to assess pathogenic alterations in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) liquid biopsy specimens. Using the in vitro diagnostic (IVD) NGS panel Myriapod NGS Cancer panel DNA (Diatech Pharmacogenetics) on MiSeq platform (Illumina), we reanalysed ctDNA extracted from a retrospective series of n=40 patients with advanced NSCLC previously tested with a custom NGS panel (SiRe) on Thermo Fisher Ion S5 Plus system. Overall, 13 out of 40 (32.5%) ctDNA samples displayed pathogenic alterations in at least two genes, namely, EGFR and KRAS A concordance rate of 100% was identified between the two methodologies in terms of sample mutational status and total number of detected variables. All NGS platforms featured a high degree of concordance., Competing Interests: Competing interests: PP received personal fees as a speaker bureau of Novartis, unrelated to the current work. GT reported personal fees (as member of the speaker bureau or advisor) from Roche, MSD, Pfizer, Boehringer Ingelheim, Eli Lilly, BMS, GSK, Menarini, AstraZeneca, Amgen and Bayer, unrelated to the current work. UM received personal fees (as consultant and/or speaker bureau) from Boehringer Ingelheim, Roche, MSD, Amgen, Thermo Fisher Scientifics, Eli Lilly, Diaceutics, GSK, Merck and AstraZeneca, Janssen, Diatech, Novartis and Hedera, unrelated to the current work., (© Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2023. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.)

This paper analyzes the impact of the Italian Start Up Act which entered into force in October 2012. This public policy provides a unique bundle of benefits, such as tax incentives, public loan guarantees, and a more flexible labor law, for firms registered as "innovative startups" in Italy. This legislation has been implemented by the Italian government to increase innovativeness of small and young enterprises by facilitating access to (external) capital and (high-skilled) labor. Consequently, the goal of our evaluation is to assess the impact of the policy on equity, debt, and employment. Using various conditional difference-in-difference models, we find that the Italian innovative startup policy has met its primary objectives. The econometric results strongly suggest that Italian innovative startups are more successful in obtaining equity and debt capital and they also hire more employees because of the program participation., (© The Author(s) 2021.)

Summary: Many studies have confirmed the existence of a close relationship between job satisfaction and health. The Siena University Hospital introduced the Lean approach to support personnel development/empowerment and promote a constant improvement in work organization, with the aim of creating value for patients, professionals and the whole organization. The purpose of this study was to examine whether the introduction and the development of this improvement approach in healthcare could contribute to the enhancement of psychological wellbeing and employee satisfaction, with a positive value in preventing related stress work. The Lyne and Barrett Employee Wellbeing Questionnaire (EWQ) was administered to employees involved in selected Lean projects carried out at the Siena University Hospital. The EWQ is composed of 59 items and it is structured in three areas: organizational wellbeing, working satisfaction and workload. The analysis of the results showed significant evidence of the impact of improvement activities on the working satisfaction and the workload., Competing Interests: The authors of this article have no conflict of interests to disclose., (Copyright© by GIMLE.)