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Introduction: Idiopathic granulomatous mastitis (MGI) is a rare chronic inflammatory disease of unknown etiology. Its diagnosis is one of exclusion, it requires a histological sample that confirms the presence of granulomas, and specific cultures that rule out other causes of granulomatous disease. The initial mismanagement of these patients due to the lack of sampling for histological study and cultures, leads to a delay in diagnosis. There is no established treatment for this pathology, with surgical treatment and medical treatment with corticosteroids being the most used, either individually or in combination. Objectives: To determine the incidence of MGI in those patients who consulted for inflammatory lesions of the breast and its incidence in those who finally underwent surgical treatment. Identify clinical characteristics that allow an initial diagnostic suspicion, and establish guidelines for surgical management that allow an early diagnosis. Material and Methods: A retrospective, cross-sectional and descriptive work was carried out. The medical records of all patients undergoing surgical treatment of the breast for inflammatory lesions in the period from February 2018 to February 2020 were evaluated at the Gynecology and Obstetrics Service of the Sanatorio Güemes of Buenos Aires. Its clinicopathological characteristics, type of surgery performed and whether it required subsequent corticosteroid treatment were analyzed. Results: In the period of time analyzed, 410 patients consulted for an inflammatory breast process, where only 10 of them (2.44%) had a diagnosis of MGI. If we consider those with surgical indication, the incidence of MGI amounts to 32.25% (31 patients). Ten patients had at least 2 previous consultations with a presumptive diagnosis of acute mastitis treated with different antibiotic regimens prior to the definitive diagnosis. Half of the patients required 2 surgical interventions prior to diagnosis. The average time interval elapsed between the first consultation and the definitive diagnosis was 4 months. Conclusion: Patients with inflammatory breast disease with surgical indication, the differential diagnosis between abscessed acute mastitis and MGI should be considered, especially in the subpopulation of patients between 30-40 years of age, multiparous, and with multiple previous consultations for breast inflammatory processes refractory to antibiotic treatments. The surgical approach must include biopsy and specific cultures.

Large-size Resistive Micromegas have been chosen for the upgrade of the forward muon spectrometer of the ATLAS experiment, the New Small Wheel project. These chambers, together with small-strip Thin Gap Chambers (sTGC), allow reconstruction of high-momentum muon tracks in a high-radiation environment and provide a robust low-threshold single-muon trigger. A collaboration of seven INFN units built 32 SM1 type chambers, corresponding to one fourth of the total number needed for this upgrade. Each SM1 chamber has a surface of approximately 2 m2 and four sensitive layers. The production was shared among five INFN construction sites and it was completed in fall 2020. The construction methods, as well as the results of the quality tests done on components of the detector and on the assembled chambers, are reported in the present paper.

Water-in-salt systems, i.e., super-concentrated aqueous electrolytes, such as lithium bis(trifluoromethanesulfonyl)imide (21 mol/kgwater), have been recently discovered to exhibit unexpectedly large electrochemical windows and high lithium transference numbers, thus paving the way to safe and sustainable charge storage devices. The peculiar transport features in these electrolytes are influenced by their intrinsically nanoseparated morphology, stemming from the anion hydrophobic nature and manifesting as nanosegregation between anions and water domains. The underlying mechanism behind this structure-dynamics correlation is, however, still a matter of strong debate. Here, we enhance the apolar nature of the anions, exploring the properties of the aqueous electrolytes of lithium salts with a strongly asymmetric anion, namely, (trifluoromethylsulfonyl)(nonafluorobutylsulfonyl) imide. Using a synergy of experimental and computational tools, we detect a remarkable level of structural heterogeneity at a mesoscopic level between anion-rich and water-rich domains. Such a ubiquitous sponge-like, bicontinuous morphology develops across the whole concentration range, evolving from large fluorinated globules at high dilution to a percolating fluorous matrix intercalated by water nanowires at super-concentrated regimes. Even at extremely concentrated conditions, a large population of fully hydrated lithium ions, with no anion coordination, is detected. One can then derive that the concomitant coexistence of (i) a mesoscopically segregated structure and (ii) fully hydrated lithium clusters disentangled from anion coordination enables the peculiar lithium diffusion features that characterize water-in-salt systems.

The purpose of this article is to show the mediastinal dissection method used during the stage performed by a group of students from the Univrersity of palermo that, during the sumer of 2017, had the opportunity to spend a period of 4 weeks at the Department of Anatomy of The University of malta. The students were guided to practice dissection of some corpes to study various mediastinal organs. This experience permitted to the students to verify practically what they lernt in the books, and reperesented a unique opportunity for them to perform practice with cadavers, that is actually very difficult to do in italian universities.

Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) has been irradiated by a ns pulsed IR laser in vacuum and the radiation effects induced by the coherent radiation, above a threshold fluence, produce a non-equilibrium plasma and material ablation. The laser absorption can be enhanced using gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) embedded in the polymer. The laser-generated plasma has been characterized, whereas the ion emission from both the virgin PDMS and the PDMS + AuNPs sheets has been analysed both in mass and energy. Morphological investigations, optical spectroscopy and compositional analyses have been performed. The adopted laser treatment can be employed to modify the properties of PDMS with and without AuNPs inducing a local enrichment of microcrystalline silicon in both cases.

A full scale prototype of a Micromegas precision tracking chamber for the upgrade of the ATLAS detector at the LHC Collider has been built between October 2015 and April 2016. This paper describes in detail the procedures used in constructing the single modules of the chamber in various INFN laboratories and the final assembly at the Frascati National Laboratories (LNF). Results of the chamber exposure to the CERN H8 beam line in June 2016 are also presented. The performances achieved in the construction and the results of the test beam are compared with the requirements, which are imposed by the severe environment during the data-taking of the LHC foreseen for the next years.

Playing with the field polarization permits to gain important insight on the near-field interaction between molecules and nanoantennas, as well as to develop new concepts of broadband plasmonic sensors (Fazio B. et al. ACS Nano 5(7):5945-59562, 2011; D'Andrea C. et al. J Phys Chem C 118(16):8571-8580, 2014; D'Andrea C. et al. ACS Nano 7(4):3522-3531, 2013; Foti A. et al. Nanospectroscopy 1:26-32, 2015). By studying the polarization state of the Surface Enhanced Raman Scattering it is, in particular, possible to better understand the re-radiation effects in linear nanoantennas featuring spectrally distinct localized plasmon resonances (LSPR). Here we show that, through the selective excitation of the short- or the long- axis LSPR, it is possible to control and totally rotate (90°) the polarization of the SERS photons of randomly oriented molecules adsorbed on linear nanoantennas. By a proper design of the nanoantenna, this can be accomplished switching the excitation wavelength from the visible to the NIR, while using orthogonal fields polarizations, so to match the two distinct LSPRs. Modeling the nanoantenna enhancement with wavelength-dependent field enhancement tensors we recover the relations ruling the parallel-polarized and unpolarized- SERS intensity dependence found experimentally when selectively driving the two LSPRs. Our results support a physical picture in which the strongly coupled molecule-nanoantenna system behaves as an hybrid structure whose energy levels are determined by the molecule while the far-field radiation properties are determined by the antenna modes.

Multifunctional nanoplatforms employed for active and passive tumor targeting represent important devices to overcome some of the critical issues related to the cancer therapy, such as the inherent limitations of drugs to cross anatomical and patho-physiological barriers, and to improve the specific drug delivery to tumor tissues. Graphene (G) and its multifunctional derivatives may offer passive targeting toward tumor sites, whereas hyaluronic acid (HA), that counts several specific receptors typically over-expressed on the surface membranes of various tumor cells, is the ideal component of multifunctional platforms for active targeting. Herein, we report the conjugation of Silibinin (Sil), the most active component of a complex of flavonoids contained into silymarin employed mainly as hepatoprotective agent but with application that goes beyond liver diseases and expands to cancer, to G-based and HA-based materials (Fig. 1). The biocompatibility of new platforms has been evaluated on Human Mesenchymal Stem cells and their anticancer effects have been studied on Human Osteosarcoma and Human Breast Cancer cell lines.