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The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted a debate about whether marginalized communities suffered the disproportionate brunt of the pandemic's mortality. Empirical studies addressing this question typically suffer from statistical uncertainties and potential biases associated with uneven and incomplete reporting. We use geo-coded micro-level data for the entire population of Sweden to analyze how local neighborhood characteristics affect the likelihood of dying with COVID-19 at individual level, given the individual's overall risk of death. We control for several individual and regional characteristics to compare the results in specific communities to overall death patterns in Sweden during 2020. When accounting for the probability to die of any cause, we find that individuals residing in socioeconomically disadvantaged neighborhoods were not more likely to die with COVID-19 than individuals residing elsewhere. Importantly, we do find that individuals show a generally higher probability of death in these neighborhoods. Nevertheless, ethnicity is an important explanatory factor for COVID-19 deaths for foreign-born individuals, especially from East Africa, who are more likely to pass away regardless of residential neighborhood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted a debate about whether marginalized communities suffered the disproportionate brunt of the pandemic's mortality. Empirical studies addressing this question typically suffer from statistical uncertainties and potential biases associated with uneven and incomplete reporting. We use geo-coded micro-level data for the entire population of Sweden to analyze how local neighborhood characteristics affect the likelihood of dying with COVID-19 at individual level, given the individual's overall risk of death. We control for several individual and regional characteristics to compare the results in specific communities to overall death patterns in Sweden during 2020. When accounting for the probability to die of any cause, we find that individuals residing in socioeconomically disadvantaged neighborhoods were not more likely to die with COVID-19 than individuals residing elsewhere. Importantly, we do find that individuals show a generally higher probability of death in these neighborhoods. Nevertheless, ethnicity is an important explanatory factor for COVID-19 deaths for foreign-born individuals, especially from East Africa, who are more likely to pass away regardless of residential neighborhood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate whether an individual's information milieu―an individual's residential neighborhood and co-workers―affects the decision to get a COVID-19 vaccine. The decision to accept or refuse a vaccine is intensely personal and involves the processing of information about phenomena likely to be unfamiliar to most individuals. One can thus expect an interplay between an individual's level of education and skills and the information processing of others whom with whom she can interact and whose decision she can probe and observe. Using individual-level data for adults in Sweden, we can identify the proportion of an individual's neighborhood and workplace who are unvaccinated as indicators of possible peer effects. We find that individuals with low levels of educational attainment and occupational skills are more likely to be unvaccinated when exposed to other unvaccinated individuals at work and in the residential neighborhood. The peer effects in each of these information milieus further increases the likelihood of not getting vaccinated—with the two acting as information channels that reinforce one another. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban adaptation to climate change is a global challenge requiring a broad response that can be informed by how urban societies in the past responded to environmental shocks. Yet, interdisciplinary efforts to leverage insights from the urban past have been stymied by disciplinary silos and entrenched misconceptions regarding the nature and diversity of premodern human settlements and institutions, especially in the case of prehispanic Mesoamerica. Long recognized as a distinct cultural region, prehispanic Mesoamerica was the setting for one of the world's original urbanization episodes despite the impediments to communication and resource extraction due to the lack of beasts of burden and wheeled transport, and the limited and relatively late use of metal implements. Our knowledge of prehispanic urbanism in Mesoamerica has been significantly enhanced over the past two decades due to significant advances in excavating, analyzing, and contextualizing archaeological materials. We now understand that Mesoamerican urbanism was as much a story about resilience and adaptation to environmental change as it was about collapse. Here we call for a dialogue among Mesoamerican urban archaeologists, sustainability scientists, and researchers interested in urban adaptation to climate change through a synthetic perspective on the organizational diversity of urbanism. Such a dialogue, seeking insights into what facilitates and hinders urban adaptation to environmental change, can be animated by shifting the long-held emphasis on failure and collapse to a more empirically grounded account of resilience and the factors that fostered adaptation and sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension (CTEPH) is a long-term sequel to pulmonary embolism (PE) whose incidence varies according to different published studies. We have carried out this study to determine its incidence within 2 years after index pulmonary embolism and to study limitations to an early diagnosis. OSIRIS is a multicentre, longitudinal cohort study. Patients were followed for 3, 6, 12, and 24 months after pulmonary embolism using a structured three-step algorithm. A physician-centered questionnaire at least one positive response in a screening proceeded to the second step, transthoracic echocardiography. The third step consisted of ventilation/perfusion lung scintigraphy and right heart catheterisation. A transthoracic echocardiography was performed in patients without positive response in the screening questionnaire after 2 years. CTEPH diagnosis required haemodynamic confirmation by right heart catheterisation and mismatched perfusion defects on lung scintigraphy. A total of 1191 patients were enrolled in 18 Spanish hospitals. Cumulative CTEPH incidence after 2-years PE was: 2.49 % (95 % CI: 1.68–3.56) and the incidence rate of CTEPH was 1.1 cases per 1000 person-months (95 % CI: 0.725; 1.60). The CTEPH algorithm presented a lack of adherence of 29 %; patient and physician preferences posed barriers to the triage algorithm The screening questionnaire, in patients who completed the follow-up, shows a specificity of 91.3 % (89.0–93.2 %) and negative predictive value of 99.4 % (98.4–99.8 %).. OSIRIS provides practiced clinical based data on the chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension incidence and identified barriers to the implementation of a 3-step triage algorithm for its detection. clinicaltrials.gov identifier: NCT03134898. [Display omitted] • Two-year cumulative incidence of Chronic Thromboembolic Pulmonary Hypertension (CTEPH) after pulmonary embolism (PE) was 2.49% (95% CI: 1.68-3.56) • A structured three-step diagnostic algorithm based on clinical assessment starting with a screening questionnaire showed limited feasibility, but a high negative predictive value • Observed barriers from patients and physicians to the implementation of a screening-based CTEPH diagnostic algorithm may support the planning of future studies and help to address training gaps [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A critique of tension problems between ethics and digital media is elaborated. It focuses on the automation of human referents, subjected to digital control through big data algorithms, accentuating historical data as distinctions that modify reality. This ranges from the robbery of leisure time, to exhausting material resistance, mixing the imperative of innovation, efficiency and excellence in a constant torrent of notifications, reminders and interrelationships. This forges anxieties and wears out of an intense longing, causing a sense of constant accomplishment: being a consultant and entrepreneur is the goal of freedom as self-sacrifice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ethical risks in digital behaviour. Politics, democracy and citizenship Deliberative democracy deployed from phenomenology, from which it wants to return to things themselves as Martin Heidegger affirms is "to allow to see what is shown, as it is shown by itself, effectively by itself" (Heidegger, 2009, p. 45) we will find worlds where digital behaviour stimulates the ethical risks that affect politics, democracy and citizenship; and its implications in the mediations of citizens according to different understandings of the world of social networks with their contributions and effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Sensitive skin is characterized by self‐reported sensory perceptions in response to stimuli that should not provoke unpleasant sensations. Cosmetic products for sensitive skin are designed to minimize these symptoms. This study aimed to unveil the most used active ingredients for sensitive skin in facial care products from the pharmacy and parapharmacy channel. Methods: A pool of products from the pharmacy and parapharmacy channel whose label included the expressions 'sensitive skin', 'reactive skin' or 'intolerant skin' were analysed. The active ingredients were identified from product compositions and ranked in descending order of occurrence. The scientific evidence regarding the mechanism of action and efficacy of each ingredient was also compiled. Results: Eighty‐eight products from 19 multinational brands were included. Niacinamide leads the top, followed by Avena sativa, allantoin, glycyrrhetinic acid and derivatives and Laminaria ochroleuca. Ingredients that can reduce skin inflammation and act on the skin barrier were used in more than half of the products analysed. The clinical studies regarding the active ingredients used in these products remain sparse and lack methodological quality. Among the top ingredients, niacinamide, panthenol and acetyl dipeptide‐1 cetyl ester were the only ones studied on volunteers having sensitive skin, while acetyl dipeptide‐1 cetyl ester and palmitoyl tripeptide‐8 were designed to act on the molecular targets involved in this condition. Conclusion: This study reveals the most used active ingredients in cosmetic products for sensitive skin, as well as the scientific evidence supporting their efficacy and the mechanisms of action. This insight is meaningful for dermatologists and other health professionals to provide customized advice based on the symptomatology of individuals with sensitive skin, and for the formulation of cosmetic products and design of new active ingredients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the most common tendencies of human settlements is for larger settlements to display higher population densities. Work in urban science and archaeology suggests that this densification pattern reflects an emergent spatial equilibrium where individuals balance movement costs with social interaction benefits, leading to increases in aggregate productivity and social interdependence. The temporary camps created by hunters and gatherers exhibit a tendency to become less dense with their population size. The different manner in which hunter-gatherer groups express their sociality in residential space suggests that they typically lack the social structures and material technologies necessary for humans to live at greater spatial densities in permanent settlements. Here we examine why this difference occurs and consider conditions under which hunter-gatherer groups may transition to sedentism and densification. We investigate the relationship between population and area in hunter-gatherer camps using a data set representing a large cross-cultural sample derived from the ethnographic literature. We present a model based on the interplay between social interactions and scalar stress that describes the observed patterns among mobile hunter-gatherers. We find that the transition to a densification scheme does not necessary involve domestic food production, only surpluses and storable resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ethical risks in digital behaviour. Politics, democracy and citizenship Deliberative democracy deployed from phenomenology, from which it wants to return to things themselves as Martin Heidegger affirms is "to allow to see what is shown, as it is shown by itself, effectively by itself" (Heidegger, 2009, p. 45) we will find worlds where digital behaviour stimulates the ethical risks that affect politics, democracy and citizenship; and its implications in the mediations of citizens according to different understandings of the world of social networks with their contributions and effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a dedicated research effort on the determinants of settlement persistence in the ancient world, with the potential to significantly advance the scientific understanding of urban sustainability today. Settlements (cities, towns, villages) are locations with two key attributes: They frame human interactions and activities in space, and they are where people dwell or live. Sustainability, in this case, focuses on the capacity of structures and functions of a settlement system (geography, demography, institutions) to provide for continuity of safe habitation. The 7,000-y-old experience of urbanism, as revealed by archaeology and history, includes many instances of settlements and settlement systems enduring, adapting to, or generating environmental, institutional, and technological changes. The field of urban sustainability lacks a firm scientific foundation for understanding the long dure' e, relying instead on narratives of collapse informed by limited case studies. We argue for the development of a new interdisciplinary research effort to establish scientific understanding of settlement and settlement system persistence. Such an effort would build upon the many fields that study human settlements to develop new theories and databases from the extensive documentation of ancient and premodern urban systems. A scientific foundation will generate novel insights to advance the field of urban sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent decades researchers in a variety of disciplines have developed a new "urban science," the central goal of which is to build general theory regarding the social processes underlying urbanization. Much work in urban science is animated by the notion that cities are complex systems. What does it mean to make this claim? Here we adopt the view that complex systems entail both variation and structure, and that their properties vary with system size and with respect to where and how they are measured. Given this, a general framework regarding the social processes behind urbanization needs to account for empirical regularities that are common to both contemporary cities and past settlements known through archaeology and history. Only by adopting an explicitly historical perspective can such fundamental structure be revealed. The identification of shared properties in past and present systems has been facilitated by research traditions that define cities (and settlements more broadly) as networks of social interaction embedded in physical space. Settlement Scaling Theory (SST) builds from these insights to generate predictions regarding how measurable properties of cities and settlements are related to their population size. Here, we focus on relationships between population and area across past settlement systems and present-day world cities. We show that both patterns and variations in these measures are explicable in terms of SST, and that the framework identifies baseline infrastructural area as an important system-level property of urban systems that warrants further study. We also show that predictive theory is helpful even in cases where the data do not conform to model predictions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate if there are positive economic effects for individuals residing in ethnic neighborhoods, in particular if the likelihood of labor market participation among foreign-born is affected by residentially aggregating with other people from one's same native region. We also examine to what extent the income level among foreign-born who have a job is affected by the extent to which they congregate in ethnic enclaves. We use Swedish micro-level data for the time period 2007 to 2015 and run a Heckman estimation for four distinct immigration groups: those from (a) the Middle East; poor and middle-income countries in (b) Africa and (c) Asia; and (d) and those from the former Yugoslavia. We control for personal and neighborhood characteristics as well as workplace characteristics. The results suggest that, in some cases, there may be positive effects from ethnic concentration, but even more from living with first- and second-generation immigrants in general. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban agglomeration economies make cities central to theories of modern economic growth. There is historical evidence for the presence of Smithian growth and agglomeration effects in English towns c.1450-1670, but seminal assessments deny the presence of agglomeration effects and productivity gains to Early Modern English towns. This study evaluates the presence of increasing returns to scale (IRS) in aggregate urban economic outputs—the empirical signature of feedbacks between Smithian growth and agglomeration effects—among the towns of 16th century England. To do so, we test a model from settlement scaling theory against the 1524/5 Lay Subsidy returns. Analysis of these data indicates that Tudor towns exhibited IRS—a finding that is robust to alternative interpretations of the data. IRS holds even for the smallest towns in our sample, suggesting the absence of town size thresholds for the emergence of agglomeration effects. Spatial patterning of scaling residuals further suggests regional demand-side interactions with Smithian-agglomeration feedbacks. These findings suggest the presence of agglomeration effects and Smithian growth in pre-industrial English towns. This begs us to reconsider the economic performance of Early Modern English towns, and suggests that the qualitative economic dynamics of contemporary cities may be applicable to premodern settlements in general. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a study that economic growth as a manifestation of a general process of development involving improvement in material well-being. It mentions the results of a study reveal agglomeration-driven or Smithian growth as the factor behind improvements in the material conditions of life over time in this society.

Highlights • Several new biosimilar medicines are continuously been introduced in the market. • Current oncologic biosimilars are epoetins, filgrastim, and monoclonal antibodies. • Cancer therapy is the major clinical application of biosimilars. • Pharmacovigilance is monitoring the safety and efficacy of approved biosimilars. This article provides an updated review of the biosimilar medicines approved for cancer therapy in the European Union (EU). First we discuss the most relevant aspects for the development and approval of biosimilar medicines. We then present the oncological biosimilar drugs currently used, which include epoetins (alpha and zeta), filgrastim, and monoclonal antibodies (rituximab, trastuzumab and bevacizumab). Among the clinical applications of biosimilar medicines, cancer therapy remains the main target area and more approved biosimilars are expected over the next few years, providing cost-effective drugs to more patients. Furthermore, comprehensive pharmacovigilance studies are going on, monitoring the marketed biosimilars, and providing more feasible information to clinicians regarding the safety and efficacy of these medications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the present work we will deal with the meaning of the word, poetizing and interpreting in Martin Heidegger and Hans-Georg Gadamer. This work is complex but open to the debate of the ideas of two major referents of contemporary philosophy, his philosophical reflections themed from different configurations, although the influence of Heidegger's philosophy is predominant in Gadamer as teacher and student. The work is divided into three parts, the first deals with the relationship between poetry in Hölderlin and Heidegger, the second approaches the relationship between man, language and being in Heidegger and the last part delves into language, poetizing and interpreting in Gadamer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This document provides insights into lipid-based nanosystems and their potential therapeutic applications. Lipid-based nanosystems, such as solid lipid nanoparticles (SLN), nanostructured lipid carriers (NLC), liposomes, and others, have been extensively studied for their ability to improve drug transport and efficacy through various routes of administration. The document highlights 16 research articles published in a special issue on lipid-based nanosystems, covering topics such as breast cancer treatment, anti-tumor efficacy, antidepressant activity, and ocular drug delivery. The most investigated diseases include cancer, brain diseases, ocular diseases, skin diseases, microbial infections, and metabolic diseases. The authors express their gratitude to the contributors and reviewers of the special issue for their valuable contributions. [Extracted from the article]

Urban economies are composed of diverse activities, embodied in labor occupations, which depend on one another to produce goods and services. Yet little is known about how the nature and intensity of these interdependences change as cities increase in population size and economic complexity. Understanding the relationship between occupational interdependencies and the number of occupations defining an urban economy is relevant because interdependence within a networked system has implications for system resilience and for how easily can the structure of the network be modified. Here, we represent the interdependencies among occupations in a city as a non-spatial information network, where the strengths of interdependence between pairs of occupations determine the strengths of the links in the network. Using those quantified link strengths we calculate a single metric of interdependence–or connectedness–which is equivalent to the density of a city’s weighted occupational network. We then examine urban systems in six industrialized countries, analyzing how the density of urban occupational networks changes with network size, measured as the number of unique occupations present in an urban workforce. We find that in all six countries, density, or economic interdependence, increases superlinearly with the number of distinct occupations. Because connections among occupations represent flows of information, we provide evidence that connectivity scales superlinearly with network size in information networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rapid worldwide urbanization is at once the main cause and, potentially, the main solution to global sustainable development challenges. The growth of cities is typically associated with increases in socioeconomic productivity, but it also creates strong inequalities. Despite a growing body of evidence characterizing these heterogeneities in developed urban areas, not much is known systematically about their most extreme forms in developing cities and their consequences for sustainability. Here, we characterize the general patterns of income and access to services in a large number of developing cities, with an emphasis on an extensive, high-resolution analysis of the urban areas of Brazil and South Africa. We use detailed census data to construct sustainable development indices in hundreds of thousands of neighborhoods and show that their statistics are scale-dependent and point to the critical role of large cities in creating higher average incomes and greater access to services within their national context. We then quantify the general statistical trajectory toward universal basic service provision at different scales to show that it is characterized by varying levels of inequality, with initial increases in access being typically accompanied by growing disparities over characteristic spatial scales. These results demonstrate how extensions of these methods to other goals and data can be used over time and space to produce a simple but general quantitative assessment of progress toward internationally agreed sustainable development goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Creative (knowledge-intensive) occupations are now widely seen as a basis for urban economic prosperity. Yet the transitional pathways from a city’s current economy to a more creative economy are often difficult to discern or to navigate. Here we use a network perspective of occupational interdependencies to address questions of urban transitions to a creative economy. This perspective allows us to assess alternative pathways and to compare cities with regard to their progress along these pathways. We find that US urban areas follow a general trajectory towards a creative economy that requires them to increasingly specialise, not only in creative occupations, but also in non-creative ones – presumably because certain non-creative occupations complement the tasks performed by related creative occupations. This creates a pull towards non-creative occupations that becomes ever stronger as a city moves more towards a creative economy. All in all, cities with the most creative economies must undergo an overall diversification of specialised occupations, with a greater diversification rate for creative occupations, and maintain those creative specialisations despite the pull towards a non-creative economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Medieval European urbanization presents a line of continuity between earlier cities and modern European urban systems. Yet, many of the spatial, political and economic features of medieval European cities were particular to the Middle Ages, and subsequently changed over the Early Modern Period and Industrial Revolution. There is a long tradition of demographic studies estimating the population sizes of medieval European cities, and comparative analyses of these data have shed much light on the long-term evolution of urban systems. However, the next step—to systematically relate the population size of these cities to their spatial and socioeconomic characteristics—has seldom been taken. This raises a series of interesting questions, as both modern and ancient cities have been observed to obey area-population relationships predicted by settlement scaling theory. To address these questions, we analyze a new dataset for the settled area and population of 173 European cities from the early fourteenth century to determine the relationship between population and settled area. To interpret this data, we develop two related models that lead to differing predictions regarding the quantitative form of the population-area relationship, depending on the level of social mixing present in these cities. Our empirical estimates of model parameters show a strong densification of cities with city population size, consistent with patterns in contemporary cities. Although social life in medieval Europe was orchestrated by hierarchical institutions (e.g., guilds, church, municipal organizations), our results show no statistically significant influence of these institutions on agglomeration effects. The similarities between the empirical patterns of settlement relating area to population observed here support the hypothesis that cities throughout history share common principles of organization that self-consistently relate their socioeconomic networks to structured urban spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much research has suggested that night-time light (NTL) can be used as a proxy for a number of variables, including urbanization, density, and economic growth. As governments around the world either collect census data infrequently or are scaling back the amount of detail collected, alternate sources of population and economic information like NTL are being considered. But, just how close is the statistical relationship between NTL and economic activity at a fine-grained geographical level? This paper uses a combination of correlation analysis and geographically weighted regressions in order to examine if light can function as a proxy for economic activities at a finer level. We use a fine-grained geo-coded residential and industrial full sample micro-data set for Sweden, and match it with both radiance and saturated light emissions. We find that the correlation between NTL and economic activity is strong enough to make it a relatively good proxy for population and establishment density, but the correlation is weaker in relation to wages. In general, we find a stronger relation between light and density values, than with light and total values. We also find a closer connection between radiance light and economic activity, than with saturated light. Further, we find the link between light and economic activity, especially estimated by wages, to be slightly overestimated in large urban areas and underestimated in rural areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The skin is the largest organ of the human body and has several functions such as barrier against external agents, the maintenance of temperature and homeostatic functions. Skin ageing is a natural process that can be influenced by environmental factors, intrinsic skin factors and lifestyle. UV light plays an important role in skin ageing and can cause spots, requiring the use of depigmenting agents. Nowadays, there is a great demand for ingredients that prevent skin ageing, with natural agents occupying a promising position. Among the natural agents, polyphenols, such as resveratrol and piceatannol, found in grapes, passion fruits and other fruits, have a huge relevance. Great benefits of piceatannol have been reported, so thus, this work focuses specifically on a review of the literature regarding the application of this polyphenol in skin care products. This polyphenol can be used in a wound‐healing, or as anti‐ageing, antioxidant, anti‐acne and skin whitening, among other effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background In patients with acute pulmonary embolism (PE), rapid and accurate risk assessment is paramount in selecting the appropriate treatment strategy. The prognostic value of right ventricular dysfunction (RVD) assessed by multidetector CT (MDCT) in normotensive patients with PE has lacked adequate validation. Methods The study defined MDCT-assessed RVD as a ratio of the RV to the left ventricle short axis diameter greater than 0.9. Outcomes assessed through 30 days after the diagnosis of PE included all-cause mortality and 'complicated course', which consisted of death from any cause, haemodynamic collapse or recurrent PE. Results MDCT detected RVD in 533 (63%) of the 848 enrolled patients. Those with RVD on MDCT more frequently had echocardiographic RVD (31%) than those without RVD on MDCT (9.2%) (p<0.001). Patients with RVD on MDCT had significantly higher brain natriuretic peptide (269±447 vs 180±457 pg/ml, p<0.001) and troponin (0.10±0.43 vs 0.03±0.24 ng/ml, p=0.001) levels in comparison with those without RVD on MDCT. During follow-up, death occurred in 25 patients with and in 13 patients without RVD on MDCT (4.7% vs 4.3%; p=0.93). Those with and those without RVD on MDCT had a similar frequency of complicated course (3.9% vs 2.3%; p=0.30). Conclusions The PROgnosTic valuE of CT study showed a relationship between RVD assessed by MDCT and other markers of cardiac dysfunction around the time of PE diagnosis, but did not demonstrate an association between MDCT-RVD and prognosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much of the socioeconomic life in the United States occurs in its urban areas. While an urban economy is defined to a large extent by its network of occupational specializations, an examination of this important network is absent from the considerable body of work on the determinants of urban economic performance. Here we develop a structure-based analysis addressing how the network of interdependencies among occupational specializations affects the ease with which urban economies can transform themselves. While most occupational specializations exhibit positive relationships between one another, many exhibit negative ones, and the balance between the two partially explains the productivity of an urban economy. The current set of occupational specializations of an urban economy and its location in the occupation space constrain its future development paths. Important tradeoffs exist between different alternatives for altering an occupational specialization pattern, both at a single occupation and an entire occupational portfolio levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban areas consume more than 66% of the world’s energy and generate more than 70% of global greenhouse gas emissions. With the world’s population expected to reach 10 billion by 2100, nearly 90% of whom will live in urban areas, a critical question for planetary sustainability is how the size of cities affects energy use and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. Are larger cities more energy and emissions efficient than smaller ones? Do larger cities exhibit gains from economies of scale with regard to emissions? Here we examine the relationship between city size and CO2 emissions for U.S. metropolitan areas using a production accounting allocation of emissions. We find that for the time period of 1999–2008, CO2 emissions scale proportionally with urban population size. Contrary to theoretical expectations, larger cities are not more emissions efficient than smaller ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The factors that account for the differences in the economic productivity of urban areas have remained difficult to measure and identify unambiguously. Here we show that a microscopic derivation of urban scaling relations for economic quantities vs. population, obtained from the consideration of social and infrastructural properties common to all cities, implies an effective model of economic output in the form of a Cobb-Douglas type production function. As a result we derive a new expression for the Total Factor Productivity (TFP) of urban areas, which is the standard measure of economic productivity per unit of aggregate production factors (labor and capital). Using these results we empirically demonstrate that there is a systematic dependence of urban productivity on city population size, resulting from the mismatch between the size dependence of wages and labor, so that in contemporary US cities productivity increases by about 11% with each doubling of their population. Moreover, deviations from the average scale dependence of economic output, capturing the effect of local factors, including history and other local contingencies, also manifest surprising regularities. Although, productivity is maximized by the combination of high wages and low labor input, high productivity cities show invariably high wages and high levels of employment relative to their size expectation. Conversely, low productivity cities show both low wages and employment. These results shed new light on the microscopic processes that underlie urban economic productivity, explain the emergence of effective aggregate urban economic output models in terms of labor and capital inputs and may inform the development of economic theory related to growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives Patients with Parkinson's disease can benefit from controlled released levodopa dosage forms since there is a clear clinical advantage in obtaining sustained plasma concentrations. The purpose of this study was to obtain a tablet that prolonged the release of levodopa. Methods A novel bilayer tablet, consisting of an immediate release layer containing nebicapone (100 mg) and an erosion-matrix type prolonged release layer containing levodopa (100 mg) and carbidopa (25 mg) was developed (LCN PR). A pharmacokinetic study in Göttingen minipigs was performed to evaluate this formulation. Key findings LCN PR tablets prolonged the in-vitro release of levodopa in HCl 0.1 m for more than 3 h. In-vivo plasma levodopa levels peaked at a later time point with LCN PR tablets as compared with that obtained with Sinemet 100/25 (2.7 vs 0.5 h). Nebicapone increased the maximum plasma concentration and area under the plasma concentration-time curve values for levodopa. Conclusions The results obtained suggested that LCN PR tablets may have decreased the number of tablets and daily intake in the treatment of patients with Parkinson's disease. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With urban population increasing dramatically worldwide, cities are playing an increasingly critical role in human societies and the sustainability of the planet. An obstacle to effective policy is the lack of meaningful urban metrics based on a quantitative understanding of cities. Typically, linear per capita indicators are used to characterize and rank cities. However, these implicitly ignore the fundamental role of nonlinear agglomeration integral to the life history of cities. As such, per capita indicators conflate general nonlinear effects, common to all cities, with local dynamics, specific to each city, failing to provide direct measures of the impact of local events and policy. Agglomeration nonlinearities are explicitly manifested by the superlinear power law scaling of most urban socioeconomic indicators with population size, all with similar exponents (∼1.15). As a result larger cities are disproportionally the centers of innovation, wealth and crime, all to approximately the same degree. We use these general urban laws to develop new urban metrics that disentangle dynamics at different scales and provide true measures of local urban performance. New rankings of cities and a novel and simpler perspective on urban systems emerge. We find that local urban dynamics display long-term memory, so cities under or outperforming their size expectation maintain such (dis)advantage for decades. Spatiotemporal correlation analyses reveal a novel functional taxonomy of U.S. metropolitan areas that is generally not organized geographically but based instead on common local economic models, innovation strategies and patterns of crime. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Humanity has just crossed a major landmark in its history with the majority of people now living in cities. Cities have long been known to be society's predominant engine of innovation and wealth creation, yet they are also its main source of crime, pollution, and disease. The inexorable trend toward urbanization world- wide presents an urgent challenge for developing a predictive, quantitative theory of urban organization and sustainable development. Here we present empirical evidence indicating that the processes relating urbanization to economic development and knowledge creation are very general, being shared by all cities belonging to the same urban system and sustained across different nations and times. Many diverse properties of cities from patent production and personal income to electrical cable length are shown to be power law functions of population size with scaling exponents, β, that fall into distinct universality classes. Quantities reflecting wealth creation and innovation have β ≈1.2 > 1 (increasing returns), whereas those accounting for infrastructure display β ≈0.8 <1 (economies of scale). We predict that the pace of social life in the city increases with population size, in quantitative agreement with data, and we discuss how cities are similar to, and differ from, biological organisms, for which β<1. Finally, we explore possible consequences of these scaling relations by deriving growth equations, which quantify the dramatic difference between growth fueled by innovation versus that driven by economies of scale. This difference suggests that, as population grows, major innovation cycles must be generated at a continually accelerating rate to sustain growth and avoid stagnation or collapse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the study regarding influence of the clinical syndromes and clinical outcome in patients with pulmonary embolism. The study employed patients with acute pulmonary embolism without pre-existing cardiac or pulmonary disease who were registered at the Registro Informatizado de la Enfermedad TromboEmbólica. It was found that patients with pulmonary embolism and pulmonary infarction had a considerably lower mortality rate during initial therapy and after discharge.

Abstract: Compressed mini-tablets systems are presented as a biphasic delivery system designed for zero-order sustained drug release. The outer layer that fills the void spaces between the mini-tablets was formulated to release the drug in a very short time (fast release), while the mini-tablets provided a prolonged release. Different composition (HPMC or EC) and number (10 or 21) of mini-tablets were used to obtain different drug release rates. The in vitro performance of these systems showed the desired biphasic behaviour: the drug contained in the fast releasing phase (powder enrobing the mini-tablets) dissolved within the first 2min, whereas the drug contained in the mini-tablets was released at different rates, depending up on formulation. Based on the release kinetic parameters calculated, it can be concluded that mini-tablets containing HPMC were particularly suitable approaching to zero-order (constant) release over 8h time periods. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper explores the dynamics of how the human capital embodied in metropolitan populations might impact metropolitan productivity. Three aspects of human capital are examined: the average aggregate level of human capital, stratification according to human capital and spatial segregation according to human capital. These are measured for the 100 largest metropolitan areas in the US for 1970, 1980 and 1990, and then tested as explanatory variables of metropolitan productivity. Econometric analysis confirms a strong relationship between higher average levels of human capital and higher productivity and growth. Stratification appears negatively correlated with productivity in 1970 and 1980, but positively correlated in 1990. Segregation appears negatively correlated with productivity in the 1970s, and in 1990 when controlling for stratification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract. This article analyzes the extent to which human capital differences can explain the differences in gross state product (GSP) per capita levels between the richer and poorer states of the US. It uses 1990 Census and Bureau of Economic Analysis data on educational attainment, wage levels of different segments of the labor force, and GSP to compare New York -- our representative rich state -- with the poorest third of the states. The findings indicate that human capital differences explain at least 49% of the observed difference in GSP per capita between New York and each of the poor states. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The use of lipid-based nanosystems, including lipid nanoparticles (solid lipid nanoparticles - SLN, and nanostructured lipid carriers - NLC), nanoemulsions, and liposomes, among others, is widespread. 32806740 12 Almasri R., Joyce P., Schultz H.B., Thomas N., Bremmell K.E., Prestidge C.A. Porous Nanostructure, Lipid Composition, and Degree of Drug Supersaturation Modulate In Vitro Fenofibrate Solubilization in Silica-Lipid Hybrids. In addition, the results of the ex vivo permeation studies and in vivo pharmacokinetics studies showed a greater efficacy of the optimized clarithromycin-loaded SLN compared to a drug solution, suggesting that the developed formulation may be a viable drug delivery approach for treating endophthalmitis. C.A. Prestidge et al. [[12]] studied the impact of the main characteristics of a nanostructured matrix obtained by silica-lipid hybrids in the construction of optimized solid-state lipid-based formulations for the oral delivery of poorly water-soluble drugs. [Extracted from the article]

A dominant view in economic anthropology is that farmers must overcome decreasing marginal returns in the process of intensification. However, it is difficult to reconcile this view with the emergence of urban systems, which require substantial increases in labor productivity to support a growing non-farming population. This quandary is starkly posed by the rise of Angkor (Cambodia, 9th–fourteenth centuries CE), one of the most extensive preindustrial cities yet documented through archaeology. Here, we leverage extensive documentation of the Greater Angkor Region to illustrate how the social and spatial organization of agricultural production contributed to its food system. First, we find evidence for supra-household-level organization that generated increasing returns to farming labor. Second, we find spatial patterns which indicate that land-use choices took transportation costs to the urban core into account. These patterns suggest agricultural production at Angkor was organized in ways that are more similar to other forms of urban production than to a smallholder system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Syncope has been shown to be a risk factor of bleeding in patients receiving thrombolytic therapy for acute pulmonary embolism (PE). Whether syncope predicts bleeding in a broader population of patients with PE remains unknown. Methods: We used the RIETE registry data to assess whether initial presentation with syncope could predict bleeding in PE patients receiving anticoagulant therapy, and to explore the association between presence of syncope and timing and site of major bleeding events. Results: Among 45,765 patients with acute PE from March 2001 to January 2021, 6760 (14.8%) had syncope. Patients with syncope were older and more likely to have hypotension, tachycardia, hypoxaemia or elevated troponin levels than those without syncope. They also were more likely to receive thrombolytics. During the first 90 days, 1097 patients (2.4%) suffered major bleeding (gastrointestinal 335, hematoma 271 and intracranial 163) and 3611 died (158 had fatal bleeding). Patients with syncope had a higher rate of major bleeding (odds ratio [OR]: 1.63; 95% CI: 1.41–1.89) and a nonsignificantly higher rate of fatal bleeding (OR: 1.47; 95% CI: 0.99–2.17) than those without syncope. Multivariable analysis confirmed that patients with syncope were at increased risk for major bleeding (adjusted hazard ratio [aHR]: 1.34; 95% CI: 1.15–1.55). On sensitivity analysis, the increased risk for major bleeding was confirmed in patients initially receiving anticoagulant therapy without thrombolytics at 7 days (aHR: 1.47; 95% CI: 1.13–1.91) and 90 days (aHR: 1.33; 95%CI: 1.13–1.56). Discussion: Syncope is a predictor of major bleeding events in patients with PE, even among those receiving anticoagulation monotherapy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The photoprotective skincare segment is in high demand to meet consumer concerns on UV-induced skin damage, with a recent trend towards sunscreen alternatives with a natural origin. In this study, the use of natural ingredients, either from terrestrial or marine origin, in a panel of 444 sunscreen commercial formulations (2021) was analyzed. Ingredients from terrestrial organisms represent the large majority found in the analyzed sunscreen formulations (48%), whereas marine ingredients are present only in 13% of the analyzed products. A deeper analysis regarding the most prevalent families of ingredients from terrestrial and marine organisms used as top ingredients is also presented, as well as their mechanisms of action. This study provides an up-to-date overview of the sunscreen market regarding the use of natural ingredients, which is of relevance for scientists involved in the development of new sunscreens to identify opportunities for innovation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• DFT method was used to study the adsorption of pollutant gases by SWZNT. • SWZNT electrical conductivity is improved by CFCl 3 adsorption. • CFCl 3 adsorption by BNNT is more favorable than CO 2 and CH 4 molecules. • SWZNT can be a new gas sensor for CFCl 3 gas detection and its derivatives. Herein, density functional theory was used to investigate the zirconium oxide nanotube (SWZNT-c(1 1 1)) as a possible candidate for detection of greenhouse gases such as CFCl 3 , CO 2 and CH 4. The results indicate that SWZNT-c(1 1 1) has an energy gap selectivity for the CFCl 3 molecule, increasing its electrical conductivity by ~16.17%. This interaction causes a displacement of LUMO energy, causing the SWZNT-c (1 1 1)/CFCl 3 hardness (η) complex to have the greatest decrease, proving the greatest reactivity of CFCl 3. Therefore, based in these favorable properties and the lowest adsorption energy imply that the SWZNT-c(111 can be used as a promising CFCl 3 sensor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The Portuguese Pharmaceutical Society (PPS) implemented a system of Continuous Professional Development (CPD) for pharmacists in 2004. This system has evolved throughout the years, and currently all active pharmacists in Portugal are required to participate in the CPD program. Each CPD cycle takes 5 years. In each cycle, pharmacists must collect 15 CPD points, through participation in educational activities. The PPS accreditation process is managed via an online platform, where education/training providers, as well as pharmacists themselves, can submit educational activities for accreditation. Pharmacists may access their CPD status and assess their development at any point. The objective of this study was to analyze and review the educational activities submitted by providers over a 11-year period (2009-2019).Methods: Data from activities were retrieved from the PPS CPD online platform. All educational activities were labeled according to the area of pharmaceutical professional focus, type of promoter, and activity type.Results: During the study 3685 activities were analyzed. Over the last decade, submitted activities for accreditation increased in 52.6%. A significantly high proportion (98.9%) of these activities has been accredited. Promoters of activities were mostly pharmacies sectoral associations (29.6%), consultancy/training companies (19.6%), the PPS (18.5%), pharmaceutical industry (17.7%) and wholesalers' consortia (9.0%). Academia represented only 2.3% of the total amount of educational activities. The most frequent topics were related to "pharmacology & pharmacotherapy" (9.9%), followed by "counselling" (9.8%) and "management & administration" (7.2%). The most accredited type of activities was face-to-face (68.9%) and e-learning trainings (13.1%).Conclusions: This study shows increasing interest in submitting CPD activities for accreditation between 2009 and 2019, but it also demonstrates that Academia could play a more interventive role in the lifelong learning education of Portuguese pharmacists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effect of supplemental oxygen therapy in patients with intermediate-risk pulmonary embolism (PE) who do not have hypoxemia at baseline is uncertain. Does supplemental oxygen improve echocardiographic parameters in nonhypoxemic patients with intermediate-risk PE? This pilot trial randomly assigned nonhypoxemic patients with stable PE and echocardiographic right ventricle (RV) enlargement to receive anticoagulation plus supplemental oxygen for the first 48 h vs anticoagulation alone. The primary outcome was normal echocardiographic RV size 48 h after randomization. Secondary efficacy outcomes were the numerical change in the RV to left ventricle (LV) diameter ratio measured 48 h and 7 days after randomization with respect to the baseline ratio measured at inclusion. The study was stopped prematurely because of the COVID-19 pandemic after recruiting 70 patients (mean ± SD age, 67.3 ± 16.1 years; 36 female [51.4%]) with primary outcome data. Forty-eight h after randomization, normalization of the RV size occurred in 14 of the 33 patients (42.4%) assigned to oxygen and in eight of the 37 patients (21.6%) assigned to ambient air (P =.08). In the oxygen group, the mean RV to LV ratio was reduced from 1.28 ± 0.28 at baseline to 1.01 ± 0.16 at 48 h (P <.001); in the ambient air group, mean RV to LV ratios were 1.21 ± 0.18 at baseline and 1.08 ± 0.19 at 48 h (P <.01). At 90 days, one major bleeding event and one death (both in the ambient air group) had occurred. In analyses limited by a small number of enrollees, compared with ambient air, supplemental oxygen did not significantly increase the proportion of patients with nonhypoxemic intermediate-risk PE whose RV to LV ratio normalized after 48 h of treatment. This pilot trial showed improvement in some ancillary efficacy outcomes and provides support for a definitive clinical outcomes trial. ClinicalTrials.gov; No.: NCT04003116; URL: www.clinicaltrials.gov [Display omitted] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reductions in the cost of transporting manufactured goods have been an important element in economic development in the recent past, and previous research suggests that the Roman period in Britain also saw substantial reductions in such costs. The authors investigate how far it is possible to measure changes in transport costs by considering the spatial distributions of pottery from known Roman production locations over time. Their analysis of an extensive database of pottery assemblages is designed to evaluate a series of expectations concerning how reductions in transport costs may have affected such assemblages and their distribution. Results suggest that costs were reduced by a factor of about two, leading to related changes in pottery production, distribution, and consumption over time. The ability to quantify changes in transport costs opens new perspectives for investigating the general determinants of economic development using archaeological data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A letter to the editor is presented regarding the value of the consideration of the urban life as a way to live with others.

The peoples of southern Mesoamerica, including the Classic period Maya, are often claimed to exhibit a distinct type of spatial organization relative to contemporary urban systems. Here, we use the settlement scaling framework and properties of settlements recorded in systematic, full-coverage surveys to examine ways in which southern Mesoamerican settlement systems were both similar to and different from contemporary systems. We find that the population-area relationship in these settlements differs greatly from that reported for other agrarian settlement systems, but that more typical patterns emerge when one considers a site epicenter as the relevant social interaction area, and the population administered from a given center as the relevant interacting population. Our results imply that southern Mesoamerican populations mixed socially at a slower temporal rhythm than is typical of contemporary systems. Residential locations reflected the need to balance energetic and transport costs of farming with lower-frequency costs of commuting to central places. Nevertheless, increasing returns in activities such as civic construction were still realized through lower-frequency social mixing. These findings suggest that the primary difference between low-density urbanism and contemporary urban systems lies in the spatial and temporal rhythms of social mixing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chemo and targeted anticancer therapies present significant skin adverse reactions, which impair the patients' quality of life. Cutaneous toxicities lead to poor treatment adherence, drug cessation, and psychosocial distress. This review aims to summarize the current knowledge concerning the prevention and management of skin toxicity arising from these therapies. A systematic literature search on online databases was conducted. The categorization of the main preventive and treatment measures was performed according to the level of evidence. Management of skin adverse reactions of oncology treatments is very heterogeneous, which can be explained by the lack of sound evidence-based treatments. The most studied adverse effects are papulopustular eruption, xerosis, and hand–foot syndrome. Prevention of xerosis stands out as the strategy most supported by level II studies. With respect to treatment, the use of antibiotics in papulopustular eruption resulting from anti-epidermal growth factor receptor agents is the most evidence-based approach. In general, the number of studies published in the literature classified with a level II of evidence (52%) is similar to the ones classified as level IV (33%), making clear the need of more randomized controlled trials regarding the effectiveness of preventive and treatment measures of skin adverse reactions of chemo and targeted anticancer therapies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present quantitative data on population size and plaza area in three groups of ancient Mesoamerican settlements: a sample of 30 Late Postclassic cities and towns from throughout Mesoamerica and two regional settlement systems from the Classic period, including south-central Veracruz (the Mixtequilla) and the Palenque region. Plaza size scales with population in a sublinear relationship in all three groups, meaning that larger settlements had considerably less plaza area per capita than smaller settlements. These results suggest that the currently popular interpretation drawn from Classic Maya archaeology that plazas were places designed to hold the entire urban population for passive viewing of spectacles may be incomplete. We argue that the observed quantitative relationships between population and plaza area support the notion that plazas were designed to be used for a variety of purposes—including several types of ceremonies and marketplaces—held at different times following a regular schedule. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The intranasal route has been suggested as a promising alternative to improve the direct transport of molecules to the brain, avoiding the need to cross the blood–brain barrier (BBB). In this area, the use of lipid nanoparticles, namely solid lipid nanoparticles (SLN) and nanostructured lipid carriers (NLC), has been highlighted as a promising strategy to improve the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases. In this work, formulations containing SLN and NLC that were loaded with astaxanthin that was obtained from different sources (astaxanthin extract (AE) from the algae Haematococcus pluvialis and pure astaxanthin (PA) from the fungi Blakeslea trispora) were prepared for nose-to-brain administration, and comparative in vitro experiments were performed to evaluate the biocompatibility of the formulations with nasal (RPMI 2650) and neuronal (SH-SY5Y) cells. Afterwards, the antioxidant activity of the formulations was evaluated for its potential neuroprotective effects, using different chemical aggressors. Finally, the cellular uptake of the astaxanthin was evaluated for the formulations that showed the greatest neuroprotection of the neuronal cells against chemical-induced damage. On the production day, all the formulations showed a particle size, a high encapsulation efficiency (EE), the presence of nanoparticles with a typical spherical shape, and a polydispersity index (PDI) and zeta potential (ZP) that are suitable for nose-to-brain administration. After three months of storage at room temperature, no significant changes were observed in the characterization parameters, predicting a good long-term stability. Furthermore, these formulations were shown to be safe with concentrations of up to 100 µg/mL in differentiated SH-SY5Y and RPMI 2650 cells. Regarding neuroprotection studies, the PA-loaded SLN and NLC formulations showed an ability to counteract some mechanisms of neurodegeneration, including oxidative stress. Moreover, when compared with the PA-loaded SLN, the PA-loaded NLC showed greater neuroprotective effects against the cytotoxicity induced by aggressors. In contrast, the AE-loaded SLN and NLC formulations showed no significant neuroprotective effects. Although further studies are needed to confirm these neuroprotective effects, the results of this study suggest that the intranasal administration of PA-loaded NLC may be a promising alternative to improve the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]