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The assessment of attention in neuropsychological patients could be performed with visual search tests. The Broken Rings enVision Search test (BReViS) here proposed represents a novel open access paper-and-pencil tool in which layout and crowding are varied among four cards. These manipulations allow the assessment of different components of attention: a selective component, the visuo-spatial orientation of attention, and the focal attention, involved in a crowding phenomenon. Our purpose was to determine the characteristics of the BReViS test, provide specific normative data, and assess these components across the lifespan. The test was administered to a sample of 550 participants aged between 20 and 79 years old and to a series of patients. Three indexes targeting different components of visuo-spatial attention (selective attention, strategic orientation of visual attention, focal attention) were obtained by combining execution times and accuracy together with the total errors. The results showed that age, education and gender influenced, in different combinations, the four indexes, for which specific norms were developed. Regression-based norms were provided in percentiles and equivalent scores. All patients showed pathological scores and specific patterns of attentional deficits. The BreViS test proved to be a free and easy valuable tool which can be used in the clinical environment to assess attentional deficits in neuropsychological patients.

Purpose: Stereopsis is a fundamental skill in human vision and visual actions. There are many ways to test and quantify stereoacuity: traditional paper and new digital applications are both valid ways to test the stereoacuity. The aim of this study is to compare the results obtained using standard tests and the new Stereoacuity Test App developed by the University of Bergamo. Methods: A group of 497 children (272 males), aged between 6 and 11 years old, were tested using different tests for the quantification of stereopsis at near. These tests were TNO, Weiss EKW, and the new developed Stereoacuity Test App. Results: A one-way repeated measure ANOVA showed that the three tests give different thresholds of stereoacuity (p < 0.0001). Post hoc analyses with Bonferroni correction showed that all tests showed different thresholds (p < 0.0001). The lower threshold was obtained by Titmus Stereo Test followed by Stereoacuity App, Weiss MKW, and TNO. Conclusion: The stereoacuity based on global stereopsis showed that the better values were obtained in order by Stereoacuity Test App, TNO, and Weiss EKW. However, the clinical significance of their values is similar. The new digital test showed a greater compliance by the child, showing itself in tune with the digital characteristics of today’s children.

Purpose: Phoria measurements form a routine part of the examination of binocular vision. Various studies have compared different methods of phoria measurement and their repeatability between sessions. However, no studies have accounted for within-session repeatability, and few norms have been available to date. Our aims were to assess the short-term within-session repeatability, the agreement and the comparisons between three phoria tests and the delineation of normative data. Method: The participants comprised 315 refractive corrected participants with a normal binocular vision, with ages between 20 and 80 years. Phoria was measured using three methods: von Graefe (VG), modified Thorington (MT) and Thorighton (TH) procedures. Each measurement was taken 3 consecutive times at far and near. Results: The repeatability between measurements was high (0.87 to 0.96), but the relationship between tests was medium (0.407 to 0.682). About the mean bias, VG show more exo values (0.02 to 0.14 at far and 0.07 to 0.14 at near) and MT and TH similar values (−0.04 to 0.08 at far and −0.1 to 0.03 at near). The best agreement between tests was for TH and MT (LoA = 2.33 at far and LoA = 4.44 at near). Normative data for non-presbyopic were provided. Conclusion: Overall, there is a high agreement between MT and TH. Conversely, VG shows more exo values at near and shows large limits of agreement. We recommend that subjective measurements of phoria can best be quantified once using the MT or TH techniques in free space and the values compared with updated norms.

The Groffman visual tracing (GVT) test is an indirect psychometric measure of oculomotor performance, used for the clinical assessment of eye movements. The test consists of two cards with five contorted lines of increasing overlap, crowding, and difficulty. The task starts from each of the letters at the top of the page, follows the line from the letter to the corresponding number at the bottom of the page, and the number is named. Although the GVT test was developed for the evaluation of children, it has also been applied to adults with visual and cognitive deficits. However, it lacks reference values. Therefore, the aim of the study was to assess oculomotor behavior across the typical human lifespan and to define normative data in an adult population. A total of 526 adults aged between 20 and 79 years, all without neurological or psychiatric deficits, were enrolled in the study. The results were analyzed by considering the accuracy and execution times separately. An influence of age, education and sex for accuracy was found, and age for the execution times was found. Norms for adults were developed considering the specific structure of the test and the accuracy and the execution time separately. The GVT test can now be applied in healthy and neurological adult populations for the evaluation of oculomotor performance.

The Groffman Visual Tracing (GVT) test is a psychometric oculomotor test comprising two cards with five contorted and intersected lines, and which is available for the clinical evaluation of ocular movements. The participant starts from the letter at the top, follows the line, and reports the corresponding number at the bottom of each line. The aim of this study is to evaluate two claims made when details of the GVT test were originally reported: whether it is a developmental test, and the feasibility of its application starting from primary school children up to adults. This was achieved by using the GVT test and a simplified version of it. In two consecutive experiments, we tested two groups of children and adults. In the first experiment, 75 children (1st, 3rd, and 5th grade) and 25 adults underwent the GVT test. In the second experiment, 115 children from 1st to 5th grade underwent a simplified version of the test. Total scoring, accuracy and time to complete the test were evaluated. In the first experiment, 24% of children in the 1st and 3rd grades did not follow any lines correctly due to the difficulty of the test. In the second experiment, all participants were able to perform the test with both cards, and the accuracy improved significantly with age (p<0.0001). The time required to follow the lines was found to decrease with age (p<0.0001), and the accuracy improves (p<0.0001) compared with the standard version. The standard version of the GVT test has proven to be too difficult for younger children and a modified version produced improved results. Children at or below the 5th grade should to be tested using the modified version. Older children and adults can be tested with the standard version. Specific norms based on execution times and accuracy should to be established.

Digital or computerised eye charts are becoming standard in the examination of visual acuity. Each instrument allows the selection of different optotypes, presentation modalities, and crowding. The aim of this study was to examine the differences in visual acuity (VA) measurement using a digital eye chart, comparing different optotypes and procedures, together with an evaluation of the repeatability of the measurement.

Eye charts are typically optimized to assess visual acuity (VA) with constant and controlled spacing, while close-to-acuity crowding limits letter identification in the normal fovea when adjacent letters are closely spaced. Here we developed a clinical tool that enables the assessment of acuity with different levels of crowding. In a cross-sectional study, we examined the developmental trajectories with our newly devised Milan Eye Chart (MEC). A total of 252 children of 1st, 3rd and 5th grade were assessed with the MEC using SLOAN letter optotypes with 100%, 50%, 25% and 12.5% inter-optotype spacing. Results show an interaction between spacing and grade. The performance to the 100% standard VA was not significantly different among grades, while the narrow spaced acuity (12.5% spacing) strongly improved with the grade. The different trajectories of acuity measured with high spaced and low spaced eye-charts suggest that the mechanisms able to reduce the crowding effects develops later than VA, and it is, at least in part, dissociated by the psychophysiological development of lower level visual mechanisms. The MEC charts are feasible and useful in assessing visual acuity with different level of crowding during the whole lifespan. The opportunity to assess crowding-limited acuity in early age is particularly relevant since it plays a significant role in amblyopia screening.

The developmental eye movement (DEM) test is a practical and simple method for assessing and quantifying ocular motor skills in children. Different studies have previously assessed the reliability of the DEM test and they have generally found high values for vertical and horizontal time, whereas those for Ratio and Errors were medium and low, respectively. In the second application of test were found an improvement in performance in all subtests. Our aim was to evaluate the reliability of the DEM test using seconds and percentile scoring and looking in depth at the improvement in performance when the test is repeated. We tested the reliability of the DEM test on a group of 115 children from the 2nd to the 5th grade using different statistical methods: correlations, ANOVA, limits of agreement for results expressed in seconds and as percentile scoring and pass-fail diagnostic classification. We found high reliability with excellent values for vertical and adjusted horizontal time, medium-to-high for ratio and medium for errors. We have re-confirmed the presence of a significant improvement of performance on the second session for vertical time, horizontal time and ratio. The stability of binary classification of Pass–Fail criteria appears to be medium. We found high reliability for the DEM test when compared with the published results of other research but the improvement of performance, the learning effect was still present, but at a lower level than previously found. With the awareness of these limitations the DEM test can be used in clinical practice in evaluating performance over time.

Il DEM è un test visuo verbale che consente una valutazione quantitativa dei movimenti oculari in una condizione che simula la lettura. Nella valutazione dei tempi di denominazione, solo per la condizione orizzontale ma non per la verticale, è richiesto di correggere il tempo in base agli errori di omissione o addizione commessi. Scopo della presente ricerca è di verificare le differenze tra i tempi verticali corretti e non corretti. Allo scopo sono stati esaminati 288 bambini con un’età compresa tra i 6 e i 14 anni, somministrando il DEM test e registrando tutte le tipologie di errore anche per la condizione verticale. I risultati mostrano nel sub test verticale una maggiore prevalenza di errori di addizione mentre nell’orizzontale sono prevalenti gli errori di omissione. I tempi sono risultati essere significativamente diversi, in relazione alla correzione degli errori, solo nei bambini di 6 anni di età; anche la ratio è risultata diversa. In conclusione, è stato trovato un valore diverso, dopo aver effettuato la correzione dei tempi in funzione degli errori, solo nei bambini più piccoli. In considerazione del fatto che sia il manuale di Richman e Garzia (1987), sia i valori normativi italiani (Facchin, Maffioletti, Carnevali, 2012) sono espressi considerando il valore lordo, non corretto in funzione degli errori, è opportuno continuare ad attenersi alla medesima metodologia e seguire tale consuetudine.

The SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics (www.isb-sib.ch) provides world-class bioinformatics databases, software tools, services and training to the international life science community in academia and industry. These solutions allow life scientists to turn the exponentially growing amount of data into knowledge. Here, we provide an overview of SIB's resources and competence areas, with a strong focus on curated databases and SIB's most popular and widely used resources. In particular, SIB's Bioinformatics resource portal ExPASy features over 150 resources, including UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot, ENZYME, PROSITE, neXtProt, STRING, UniCarbKB, SugarBindDB, SwissRegulon, EPD, arrayMap, Bgee, SWISS-MODEL Repository, OMA, OrthoDB and other databases, which are briefly described in this article.

Il volume analizza il ruolo della visione nel processo di apprendimento del bambino. Attraverso la graduale e piena maturazione della visione, vengono acquisite un insieme di abilità visive di base che consentono di leggere, scrivere e compiere un normale percorso scolastico. Ogni alterazione della visione va riconosciuta e trattata tempestivamente per consentirne il pieno ed efficiente utilizzo. Nel manuale vengono presentate, descritte e valutate tutte le abilità visive di base, che costituiscono il fondamento sul quale i bambini costruiscono la lettura e la scrittura. Viene quindi affrontato, in maniera accurata ma al tempo stesso accessibile anche ai non specialisti, il ruolo della visione nell'ambito della lettura, della scrittura e dell'apprendimento scolastico. La finalità primaria del testo è fornire punti di riferimento e linee guida pratiche a chi si occupa della visione e degli aspetti funzionali della letto-scrittura, indicando i problemi visivi che possono impedire o rallentare il corretto apprendimento scolastico da parte del bambino. L'approccio multidisciplinare, la descrizione di test, protocolli e procedure tratte dalla pratica professionale più recente, la presenza di esempi e l'aggiornata bibliografia fanno del testo un riferimento agile, scientifico e operativo non solo per i professionisti della visione e gli operatori che si occupano di psicopatologia dell'apprendimento, ma anche per gli insegnanti e i genitori che vogliano capire e valutare con chiarezza il funzionamento della visione e la sua rilevanza nel bambino che, a scuola, si applica per imparare.

One of the important questions in biological evolution is to know if certain changes along protein coding genes have contributed to the adaptation of species. This problem is known to be biologically complex and computationally very expensive. It, therefore, requires efficient Grid or cluster solutions to overcome the computational challenge. We have developed a Grid-enabled tool (gcodeml) that relies on the PAML (codeml) package to help analyse large phylogenetic datasets on both Grids and computational clusters. Although we report on results for gcodeml, our approach is applicable and customisable to related problems in biology or other scientific domains.

Two experimental spectroscopic methods for the determination of the content of hyaluronic acid in solution are provided based on the formation of complexes between the hyaluronic acid and cationic dyes with sensitivity down to concentrations of either 0.25 or 2.5 microg/ml. These techniques were applied to commercial hydrophilic contact lenses and allowed (i) distinguishing among contact lenses either loaded or non-loaded with hyaluronic acid, (ii) determining, for the loaded ones, the content of hyaluronic acid, (iii) evaluating the release of hyaluronic acid by the lens in solution, and (iv) determining the role of the hyaluronic acid in preventing the adsorption and the successive release by the contact lens of other components which can be present, for example, in the conservation solutions and/or in the blisters of the lenses. The results represent new physical chemistry insights for the field of contact lenses with impact on the advancement of current technology.