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The RETRACE-3D project (centRal italy EarThquakes integRAted Crustal model) focused on the revision of all the available geological and geophysical data in the area interested by the 2016-2018 seismic sequence of central Italy, with the final aim to reconstruct a reliable and consistent 3D geological model of that area. It is based on a collaboration, which was framed into a formal agreement, between Dipartimento della Protezione Civile (the Italian Civil Protection Department), Istituto di Geologia Ambientale e Geoingegneria, and Istituto per il Rilevamento Elettromagnetico of the Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia, and Istituto Superiore per la Protezione e la Ricerca Ambientale. The agreement purpose was to develop a project aimed at the geological and seismotectonic characterisation of the crustal volume hosting that seismic sequence. We present and discuss the approach, methodology and results of the project. The 3D geological model of the study area is developed in detail down to a depth of about 12 km, and extended to the Moho based on available regional-scale information. The model is available on the RETRACE-3D project website (www.retrace3d.it).

We analyzed the spread of the COVID-19 epidemic in 6 metropolitan regions with similar demographic characteristics, daytime commuting population and business activities: the New York metropolitan area, the Île-de-France region, the Greater London county, Bruxelles-Capital, the Community of Madrid and the Lombardy region. The highest mortality rates 30-days after the onset of the epidemic were recorded in New York (81.2 x 100,000) and Madrid (77.1 x 100,000). Lombardy mortality rate is below average (41.4 per 100,000), and it is the only situation in which the capital of the region (Milan) has not been heavily impacted by the epidemic wave. Our study analyzed the role played by containment measures and the positive contribution offered by the hospital care system. (www.actabiomedica.it).

We analyzed the spread of the COVID-19 epidemic in 9 metropolitan regions of the world with similar socio-demographic characteristics, daytime commuting population and business activities: the New York State, Bruxelles-Capital, the Community of Madrid, Catalonia, the Île-de-France Region, the Greater London county, Stockholms län, Hovedstaden (Copenhagen) and the Lombardy Region. The Lombardy region reported the highest COVID-19 crude mortality rate (141.0 x 100,000) 70-days after the onset of the epidemic, followed by the Community of Madrid (132.8 x 100,000) New York State (120.7 x 100,000). The large variation in COVID-19 mortality and case-fatality rates for COVID-19 in different age strata suggested a more accurate analysis and interpretation of the epidemic dynamics after standardization of the rates by age. The share of elder populations (>70 years) over total population varies widely in the considered study settings, ranging from 6.9% in Catalonia to 17.0% in Lombardy. When taking age distribution into consideration the highest standardized mortality rate was observed in the State of New York (257.9 x 100,000); with figures in most of the European regions concentrated between 123.3 x 100,000 in Greater London and 177.7 x 100,000 in Bruxelles-Capital, lower in French and Danish regions. We also report and critical appraise, when available, COVID-19 mortality figures in capital cities, nursing homes, as well as excess mortality at country level. Our data raise awareness on the need for a more in-depth epidemiological analysis of the current COVID-19 public health emergency that further explores COVID-19 mortality determinants associated with health services delivery, community-level healthcare, testing approaches and characteristics of surveillance systems, including classification of COVID-19 deaths. (www.actabiomedica.it).

Background and aim of the work: To reflect on content, trends and quality of scientific publishing on COVID-19. In particular, to report on the systematic screening, quantitative assessment and critical appraisal of the first 10,000 scientific papers published on COVID-19 and to compare how scientific outputs matched identified research priorities and public health needs. Methods: A comprehensive research strategy was developed to systematically retrieve on a daily basis all studies published on COVID-19. From included studies we extracted: bibliometric parameters, country of studies’ implementation and study design. We assigned papers to 25 a priori defined COVID-19-related topics and we described scientific outputs in relation to countries’ academic publishing ranking, as well as COVID-19 burden. Results: 10,000 scientific articles were published on COVID-19 between 20th January and 7th May 2020, accounting for 2.3% of total scientific production over the study period. One third (33%) focused on COVID-19 clinical management, with little adherence to identified research priorities. Over sixty per cent of papers were opinion pieces not reporting original data. Papers were published on 1881 different journals but with half of scientific production included in 8% of journals. The US accounted for one fourth of total scientific production, followed by China (22.2%) and Italy (9%). Conclusions: Never before in the history of academic publishing such a great volume of research focused on a single topic, this being likely to introduce major changes in the way science is produced and communicated, at the risk of bringing it far from its ultimate aim: informing clinical and public health practice and decision making. (www.actabiomedica.it)

The NEAM Tsunami Hazard Model 2018 (NEAMTHM18) is a probabilistic hazard model for tsunamis generated by earthquakes. It covers the coastlines of the North-eastern Atlantic, the Mediterranean, and connected seas (NEAM). NEAMTHM18 was designed as a three-phase project. The first two phases were dedicated to the model development and hazard calculations, following a formalized decision-making process based on a multiple-expert protocol. The third phase was dedicated to documentation and dissemination. The hazard assessment workflow was structured in Steps and Levels. There are four Steps: Step-1) probabilistic earthquake model; Step-2) tsunami generation and modeling in deep water; Step-3) shoaling and inundation; Step-4) hazard aggregation and uncertainty quantification. Each Step includes a different number of Levels. Level-0 always describes the input data; the other Levels describe the intermediate results needed to proceed from one Step to another. Alternative datasets and models were considered in the implementation. The epistemic hazard uncertainty was quantified through an ensemble modeling technique accounting for alternative models’ weights and yielding a distribution of hazard curves represented by the mean and various percentiles. Hazard curves were calculated at 2,343 Points of Interest (POI) distributed at an average spacing of ∼20 km. Precalculated probability maps for five maximum inundation heights (MIH) and hazard intensity maps for five average return periods (ARP) were produced from hazard curves. In the entire NEAM Region, MIHs of several meters are rare but not impossible. Considering a 2% probability of exceedance in 50 years (ARP≈2,475 years), the POIs with MIH >5 m are fewer than 1% and are all in the Mediterranean on Libya, Egypt, Cyprus, and Greece coasts. In the North-East Atlantic, POIs with MIH >3 m are on the coasts of Mauritania and Gulf of Cadiz. Overall, 30% of the POIs have MIH >1 m. NEAMTHM18 results and documentation are available through the TSUMAPS-NEAM project website (http://www.tsumaps-neam.eu/), featuring an interactive web mapper. Although the NEAMTHM18 cannot substitute in-depth analyses at local scales, it represents the first action to start local and more detailed hazard and risk assessments and contributes to designing evacuation maps for tsunami early warning. © Copyright © 2021 Basili, Brizuela, Herrero, Iqbal, Lorito, Maesano, Murphy, Perfetti, Romano, Scala, Selva, Taroni, Tiberti, Thio, Tonini, Volpe, Glimsdal, Harbitz, Løvholt, Baptista, Carrilho, Matias, Omira, Babeyko, Hoechner, Gürbüz, Pekcan, Yalçıner, Canals, Lastras, Agalos, Papadopoulos, Triantafyllou, Benchekroun, Agrebi Jaouadi, Ben Abdallah, Bouallegue, Hamdi, Oueslati, Amato, Armigliato, Behrens, Davies, Di Bucci, Dolce, Geist, Gonzalez Vida, González, Macías Sánchez, Meletti, Ozer Sozdinler, Pagani, Parsons, Polet, Power, Sørensen and Zaytsev.

Early-life stress involved in the programming of stress-related illnesses can have a toxic influence on the functioning of the nigrostriatal motor system during aging. We examined the effects of perinatal stress (PRS) on the neurochemical, electrophysiological, histological, neuroimaging, and behavioral correlates of striatal motor function in adult (4 months of age) and old (21 months of age) male rats. Adult PRS offspring rats showed reduced dopamine (DA) release in the striatum associated with reductions in tyrosine hydroxylase-positive (TH+) cells and DA transporter (DAT) levels, with no loss of striatal dopaminergic terminals as assessed by positron emission tomography analysis with fluorine-18-l-dihydroxyphenylalanine. Striatal levels of DA and its metabolites were increased in PRS rats. In contrast, D2 DA receptor signaling was reduced and A2A adenosine receptor signaling was increased in the striatum of adult PRS rats. This indicated enhanced activity of the indirect pathway of the basal ganglia motor circuit. Adult PRS rats also showed poorer performance in the grip strength test and motor learning tasks. The aged PRS rats also showed a persistent reduction in striatal DA release and defective motor skills in the pasta matrix and ladder rung walking tests. In addition, the old rats showed large increases in the levels of SNAP-25 and synaptophysin, which are synaptic vesicle-related proteins in the striatum, and in the PRS group only, reductions in Syntaxin-1 and Rab3a protein levels were observed. Our findings indicated that the age-dependent threshold for motor dysfunction was lowered in PRS rats. This area of research is underdeveloped, and our study suggests that early-life stress can contribute to an increased understanding of how aging diseases are programmed in early-life.

The SPOT Project (potentially triggerable offshore seismicity and tsunamis) is aimed at helping Italian authorities to comply with the application of the Safety of Offshore Oil and Gas Operations European Directive (2013/30/EU) and the ensuing Italian codes. An extensive reconstruction of offshore geological structures is being implemented in order to assess the existence of potentially seismogenic faults in the surroundings of offshore oil and gas platforms, as a propaedeutic step for the assessment of potentially triggered seismicity connected with operations on such platforms. The descriptive parameters of the identified faults will be used to estimate their natural earthquake rates. The impact of these natural earthquakes along the coasts will then be modeled in terms of expected ground shaking and tsunamis. In turn, these models will be used to estimate potential human and economic losses in a multi-hazard approach to risk assessment. Wherever the combined earthquake and tsunami modeling indicates a relevant impact along the coasts, a more detailed analysis will be carried out, also involving the operators of the related platforms, to perform specific models which also take into account production data. The project has been conceived and funded by the Italian Ministry of Economic Development, with the technical support of the National Department of Civil Protection. The involved research institutes are the Institute of Marine Sciences of the National Research Council (ISMAR), the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV), the European Centre for Training and Research in Earthquake Engineering (EUCENTRE), and the Laboratories University Network of Seismic Engineering (ReLUIS).