Search Results (781)

The world of Star Wars may seem far removed from Renaissance England, but through an examination of the regnal aspects of Henry VIII and (Emperor) Sheev Palpatine (Darth Sidious), it is evident that their ruling styles, concerns, and personal characteristics are quite similar. Specifically, they share (1) a connection to the arts through visual, architectural, and political themes, making them ‘Renaissance men’; (2) a fixation with male (Force-sensitive) bloodlines, whether through biological children or Sith Apprentices; and (3) a legacy of having their most powerful and ‘best’ heirs being women—Elizabeth I (r. 1558–1603) and Rey (Palpatine/Skywalker). Hence, these case studies, which rely on the trait approach of leadership, demonstrate the utility of comparing leaders from different times, cultures, and realities in an effort to understand not only good and bad leadership elements, but also the nature of leaders’ downfalls. Full article

This paper explores the intersection of embodied trauma, resilience, and healing as represented in contemporary art, focusing on a case study analysis of the autoethnographic practice as a reflexive methodology that integrates personal lived experience with cultural, political, and artistic analysis of the works of Zlatar. Central to this study is examining the notion of rematriation, which calls for the reclamation of women’s histories and the restoration of knowledge passed down through generations. Through a series of her paintings, including works from her series A Serbian Renaissance, Refuge For the Oppressed Body, and The Minotaur Came and I Surrendered, Zlatar interrogates the transmission of trauma across generations of women, from Balkan origins, focusing on issues such as gender-based violence, displacement, and identity formation. These works challenge dominant narratives by centring women’s experiences not through externalized indicators or representations of healing, but mediating how mind–body relationships have dialogue, and her art employs this concept as spaces for memory, survival, and meaning-making. Drawing on feminist philosophy, artwork analysis and trauma studies, this paper situates Zlatar’s art to address historical inequities in women’s healing and the ongoing struggle for women’s agency and safety in contemporary society. Full article

This study evaluated the fermentative potential of eight industrial strains of Saccharomyces cerevisiae for producing mead from honeys originating from the Caatinga Biome in the semi-arid region of Pernambuco, Brazil. Despite presenting similar ethanol yields around 0.38 g/g, the strains differed in fermentation rate, residual sugar profile, and metabolic composition of the final products. Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains Renaissance TR313 and Fermol Distiller JP1 were selected for more detailed analyses, with JP1 standing out for its higher volumetric productivity (0.23 g/L/h) and shorter fermentation time of 20 days. Further fermentations demonstrated that increasing biomass, supplementing with the inorganic nitrogen source ammonium sulphate, or cell immobilization accelerates fermentation without compromising yield. Thus, the JP1 strain shows promise as a ferment for producing regionally identified mead from honeys typical of the Caatinga biome of the semi-arid Northeast of Brazil. The use of this strain with the honey of the Sertão can characterize the regional product and increase its value. Full article

This article provides a new interpretation of Giulio Campagnola’s 1509 engraving, The Astrologer, by situating its innovative punteggiato technique and enigmatic iconography within the precise astrological and political climate of Renaissance Venice. By identifying the numerical data on the astrologer’s disc as a reference to the lunar eclipse of 2 June 1509, the author argues that the composition—featuring a scholar, a monstrous reptile, and a distant city—represents a visual projection of the eclipse’s predicted impact. Framed by the political crisis following the Battle of Agnadello, the engraving emerges as a prophetic defense of Venetian resilience, a message further reinforced by a comparative analysis of a recently rediscovered astrological sonnet attributed to Campagnola. Full article

This paper examines the iconography of the Mother of God holding a book in Early Christian and Medieval art, focusing on representations in which a book or scroll functions as an attribute of the Virgin Mary. Particular attention is given to scenes depicting Mary in relation to the Christ Child, Christ Pantocrator, and the Magnificat. The study explores the symbolic significance of the book and scroll through the textual tradition of the Church Fathers. Adopting the methodological approach to the iconographical structure developed by André Grabar, the paper centers on three interconnected case studies. First, it offers a close re-examination of a Marian scene on the ivory relief of the Werden casket (9th c.) of which the meaning is hard to understand. Second, it analyzes the depiction of the Mother of God in the vault of the crypt of Epiphanius at San Vincenzo al Volturno (9th c.), with particular emphasis on motifs that associate the image with the theme of Mary’s Triumph. Finally, it considers a fresco of Mary and Christ enthroned from the Egyptian monastery of Deir al-Suryan (10th c.), treating these works as semantically and conceptually related. Through this comparative analysis, the paper advances several interpretations of the Magnificat as articulated in Early Christian visual culture and developed in later periods with the contribution of the Byzantine theology. Given the well-established influence of Early Christian art on both the Carolingian Renaissance in the West and the Byzantine East, the shared iconographical details identified here—both formal and conceptual—are understood as deriving from a common visual tradition rooted in Antiquity. Full article

In this experiment, we used a late 17th century embalming protocol for the long-term preservation (7.2 years) of an infant-sized piglet in order to evaluate the success of this technique over a period of several years. According to the description of the French anatomist Penicher (published in 1699), an 8.8 kg female piglet corpse was treated with a broad spectrum of herbs, seeds, leaves, flowers and dried berries, along with an alcohol-based fluid following subtotal exenteration and a reduction in peripheral muscle mass. The further process of this dry embalming technique was monitored by visual, tactile and olfactory evaluation of the embalmed body, along with a record of the body weight. Repeatedly taking samples from the skin and soft tissues provided insight into eventual changes on a histomorphological level and two whole-body CT scans complemented the evaluation of the internal changes within the corpse, which was eventually examined at autopsy. On the macroscopic level, we recorded slight signs of autolysis and very mild putrefaction within the first few weeks and a very well preserved and stable body over the subsequent years of evaluation. In parallel, we noted a gradual loss of fluid, as shown by a reduction in the body weight. This occurred faster in the first year (reduction in body weight by ca. 25%) than in the following ca. 4 years (with another ca. 25% loss of body weight). The CT scans showed stable osseous and soft tissue structures, while the few remaining internal organs that had been left inside the body after initial evisceration (such as kidneys and internal genitalia) had already completely disappeared after approx. 1 year. On the histological level, the histoanatomy of skin, subcutis and muscle remained intact over the entire observation period. A loss of epidermal cell nuclei was not noted before day 1772 and there were only slight signs of adipocire formation of fat tissue at the end point of observation (day 2634). In summary, we can confirm that excellent body preservation of external skin and soft tissue was maintained over a considerably long period (in this case, 7.2 years) using the applied protocol of dry embalming, but a complete loss of residual internal organs/structures beyond skin, subcutaneous fat tissue and muscle. Previous observations of the excellent preservation of an infant mummy that underwent the dry embalming procedure are very plausible. Full article

Background/Objectives. Abdominal computed tomography (CT) radiology reports contain critical information for abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) management, including aneurysm presence, size, rupture status, and prior repair. However, this information is often embedded within lengthy, heterogeneous reports, making manual extraction inefficient. We evaluated the performance of multiple large language models (LLMs) for automated extraction of AAA-related findings from radiology reports. Methods. We retrospectively analyzed 500 abdominal CT reports mentioning AAA from an urban academic health system (2020–2024). Ground truth labels were established by manual review. Four open-source LLMs (Qwen2.5-7B-Instruct, Llama3-Med42-8B, GPT-OSS-20B, and MedGemma-27B-text-it) were evaluated for extraction of aneurysm presence, size, morphology, rupture status, impending rupture, and prior aortic repair. Model outputs were compared with ground truth using exact-match accuracy, and inter-model agreement was assessed using Fleiss’ kappa. Reasoning traces were examined to characterize correct and incorrect model behavior. Results. Accuracy for identifying AAA presence ranged from 0.90 to 0.95 (κ = 0.851), and prior aortic repair from 0.90 to 0.97 (κ = 0.793). Accuracy for aneurysm size ranged from 0.67 to 0.88 (κ = 0.340), with low κ’s due to class imbalance or dimension misselection. Rupture and impending rupture were identified with accuracies exceeding 0.90 across models, though agreement was lower (κ = 0.485 and 0.589), reflecting low event prevalence. Larger models (GPT-OSS-20B, MedGemma-27B) generally outperformed smaller models. Reasoning analysis revealed strengths in measurement prioritization but recurrent errors, including dimension misselection, over-inference of prior repair, and conservative classification of rupture-related findings. Conclusions. LLMs can accurately extract clinically relevant AAA information from radiology reports with interpretable reasoning, with larger and medically trained models outperforming smaller or general-purpose models. Performance varies by task and model, underscoring the need for careful validation and human-in-the-loop deployment in clinical settings. Full article

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) has been linked to impaired physical function, which in turn predicts falls, morbidity, and mortality. However, few studies have used objective measures such as handgrip strength to assess physical function. In this cross-sectional study, we investigated associations of average PTSD symptom severity and symptom domain severity with measures of maximum handgrip strength and handgrip asymmetry from 11/2021–12/2023, among 381 male firefighters and emergency medical responders who responded to the World Trade Center disaster, using covariate-adjusted linear regression models. PTSD was diagnosed using the Structured Clinical Interview for the DSM-5 in 17% of responders. Greater overall PTSD average symptom severity was associated with weaker maximum handgrip strength (β = −4.43 lbs; 95%; CI: −8.77, −0.09; p = 0.045). Higher re-experiencing symptom severity was associated with weaker maximum handgrip strength (β = −4.17 lbs; 95% CI: −8.13, −0.22; p = 0.039). Avoidance symptoms were associated with weaker handgrip strength in adjusted models (β = −4.14 lbs; 95% CI: −7.56, −0.73; p = 0.018), and associated with a larger negative difference assessing for hand asymmetry (β = −2.20 lbs; 95% CI: −4.18, −0.22; p = 0.029). Findings suggest that PTSD may contribute to long-term physical decline, even in populations with high baseline fitness. Full article

The clinical renaissance of psychedelic medicine has highlighted the therapeutic potential of rapid-acting neuroplastogens, or “psychoplastogens,” for psychiatric disorders. However, the widespread application of classical psychedelics—such as psilocybin and LSD—and the atypical dissociative ibogaine is severely limited by their hallucinogenic properties and, particularly in the case of ibogaine, life-threatening cardiotoxicity. Addressing these limitations, Tabernanthalog (TBG) has emerged as a frontrunner in the field. This non-hallucinogenic analog of ibogaine was rationally designed to eliminate interactions with the human ether-à-go-go-related gene (hERG, KCNH2) potassium channel, thereby mitigating cardiotoxic risks. While initially characterized for its anti-addictive and antidepressant-like properties, recent data from 2024–2025 have significantly expanded its therapeutic horizon. TBG demonstrates robust efficacy in preclinical models of neuropathic and visceral pain, as well as in the rescue of cognitive deficits associated with cancer-related cognitive impairment (CRCI). TBG has shown efficacy in reversing cognitive impairments induced directly by the presence of a tumor in preclinical models, rather than by chemotherapy-specific neurotoxicity. Crucially, emerging evidence suggests that TBG’s mechanism extends beyond simple 5-HT2A receptor agonism. New findings point to a multi-target profile involving the inhibition of nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs), positive modulation of NMDA receptors, and functional crosstalk with mGlu2 receptors. Furthermore, TBG appears to induce structural neuroplasticity without the widespread induction of immediate early genes (IEGs) seen with classical hallucinogens, suggesting a decoupling of therapeutic rewiring from the subjective psychedelic experience. This review synthesizes current preclinical evidence to discuss TBG as a promising chemical scaffold for next-generation neurotherapeutics targeting the intersection of psychiatry and neurology. Full article

There is no consensus among historians when it comes to the importance of Vincenzo Galilei’s role in the history of music and science, especially when it comes to his contribution to the birth of modern experimentalism. Galilei’s written works, even those left in manuscript form, most of which have now been transcribed and published, do not provide a clear picture of his contribution. Moreover, there is a lack of private documents, such as letters, which informally describe his approach, working hypotheses, and doubts. Nevertheless, his writings enable us to conclude two things with certainty: he believed that reason-mediated experimentation was the only reliable source of knowledge, and he engaged in an intense and interesting experimental activity. Full article

Mohammed Abed Al-Jabri (d. 2010) is one of the most important and stimulating contemporary Arabic philosophers. He is well-known for his project Critique of Arab Reason (Naqd al-ʿaql al-ʿArabī), in which he deconstructs the Arabic philosophical and cultural tradition, revitalizing the rationalist legacy of the classical period, mainly, the philosophical ideas of Ibn Rushd (Averroes). According to Al-Jabri, the renewal of Arab thought requires a non-traditionalist understanding of tradition. In this paper, I shall critically examine Al-Jabri’s “contextualist” methodology. I first provide some historical background for understanding Al-Jabri’s concern with fostering a critique of Arab reason. Secondly, I discuss the way Al-Jabri reinterprets Islamic intellectual history, emphasizing his attempt to overcome the idiosyncratic approaches to Arab culture, namely, religious Salafists, Orientalists, and left nationalists. Thirdly, I discuss the extent to which his renewal of classical intellectual tradition, mainly his approach to Ibn Rushd, allows for the socio-political and cultural reformation of an Arab identity through his idea of “understanding oneself through the other.” Finally, I highlight some successful aspects of Al-Jabri’s epistemic project and its potential relevance for the present. Full article

Pareidolia is often framed as a viewer-side illusion: a tendency to perceive meaningful forms—especially faces—in ambiguous inputs. This Concept Paper argues that pareidolia can also be deliberately engineered and therefore provides a tractable entry point into the neurophysiology of visual creativity. We propose a unifying construct in which engineered pareidolia functions as externally scaffolded mental imagery: minimal visual constraints recruit internally generated templates and top-down inference while remaining anchored to sensory input. To strengthen theoretical rigor, we define necessary and sufficient features that distinguish this construct from adjacent accounts (scaffolded cognition; perceptual scaffolding; bistable perception). Using Arcimboldo’s composite portraits and Dürer’s embedded face in View of the Arco Valley, plus a canonical Renaissance example (Leonardo’s Bacchus/Saint John the Baptist), we outline distinct “design regimes” that modulate cue validity, attentional release, and interpretive switching. We then connect engineered pareidolia to creativity research by linking pareidolia design and detection to measurable constructs in divergent/creative perception, including but not limited to Torrance-style domains, and we propose feasible behavioral and neurophysiological paradigms that control for artistic skill and clinical status. Finally, we distinguish benign pareidolia from hallucination, discuss clinical resonance in dementia with Lewy bodies where pareidolia can be quantified, and outline an empirically testable research program that reframes pareidolia as a bridge between imagination, perception, and creativity. Full article

Background: Preterm birth is a leading cause of neonatal mortality and long-term disability worldwide. Injury in premature infants is demonstrated by disrupted organ development from inflammation, oxidative stress, hypoxia, and impaired vascular maturation. Current therapies largely provide supportive care and do not directly promote tissue regeneration. Mesenchymal stem cell (MSC)-based therapies have emerged as a potential strategy to enhance endogenous repair across organ systems commonly affected by prematurity. Results: Evidence indicates that MSCs exert therapeutic effects primarily through transient paracrine signaling rather than long-term engraftment. Following administration, MSCs release cytokines, growth factors, and extracellular vesicles that reduce inflammation, promote angiogenesis, and support tissue repair. In preclinical models of neonatal brain injury, MSC therapy has been associated with improved oligodendrocyte maturation and reduced white matter injury. Early clinical trials in neonatal encephalopathy demonstrate feasibility and short-term safety of both autologous and allogeneic cell products. However, studies remain limited by small sample sizes and short follow-up. Cell-free approaches using MSC-derived extracellular vesicles may offer similar biological benefits with potentially lower safety and regulatory concerns. Conclusions: MSC-based therapies represent a promising regenerative approach for complications of prematurity. Rigorous, large-scale trials with standardized protocols and long-term follow-up are necessary to clarify efficacy, optimize delivery strategies, and define safety in this vulnerable population. Full article