Volume 6 (2022): Edizione 4 (October 2022)

Background: Prior to 1970, women authored or co-authored a variety of eponymously named psychometric tests predominately in children and young adults with developmental and behavioral disorders. Gaps remain in understanding and appreciating the extent of their contributions to these psychometric tests.

Methods: Two authors adjudicated psychometric tests in the text, Tests in Print, to identify those eponymously named after women. To be eligible for this study, the psychometric test title must contain the name of a woman and be published prior to 1970. If a woman published more than one eponymously named test, the earliest one, if available, was chosen to be included in this study. A search for individual and a combination of related Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) keywords of the “name of the women author” and “name of the test” was performed using the Google web browser, PubMed, APA PsycNet, and APA PsycInfo from inception to August 1, 2021. Further papers were identified using bibliographic search from source papers and reference books.

Results: Three hundred eighty-six eponymously named psychometric tests were identified, with 124 (32%) of them named in whole or in part by or for a woman. Of these 124 psychometric tests, 93 represent unique women’s names. Before 1970, there were twenty-three (19%) eponymously named psychometric tests with women, with twenty-one (17%) representing unique women’s names.

Conclusion: These tests were published by women whereby they served either as a single author or in collaboration with others or their spouse. In the latter case, the woman’s name universally appeared after their husband’s name. In only a few cases, are these women’s names well-referenced in biographical source materials. These women made essential contributions to the development and revision of psychometric tests and the field of psychology in general.

Introduction: The biocompatibility of nitinol in the human body has extensively been demonstrated. Although nitinol is already being used for intraocular surgeries such as lens fragmentation and foreign body extraction, little is known about its intracapsular, long-term behavior. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the long-term uveal and capsular biocompatibility of a nitinol CTR placed in the capsular bag after cataract surgery in an animal model.

Method: After approval of the study by the Institutional Animal Care and the Ethics Committee, bilateral phacoemulsification was performed in 6 rabbits; 1 eye received a nitinol CTR and the other a control polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) open-ended ring. Ophthalmic evaluation for the presence of infections in all 12 eyes was performed after 7 days, 4 weeks, 3 months, and 6 months follow-up period. After a follow-up period of 6 months, the eyes were enucleated, and a histopathologic evaluation was performed.

Results: Neither of the groups showed any clinical signs of posterior capsule opacification (PCO) or inflammation. The nitinol group showed slightly less inflammation during histopathologic examination compared to the PMMA group.

No biocompatibility issues have been observed in this animal study.

Conclusions: There were no histological differences between eyes implanted with nitinol and eyes implanted with PMMA rings. Nitinol has proven to show high biocompatibility when implanted in the capsular bag of the rabbit eye.

Background: Climate change affects every region across the globe with heterogeneous effects on local temperatures and precipitation patterns. In plants, sessile organisms, climate change imposes more drastic effects leading to loss of yield or even death. However, plants establish mutualistic interactions with microorganisms that boost plant tolerance against abiotic stresses or strengthen the plant immune system against pathogens, thus, enhancing their survival and fitness. Moreover, in the wild, microbial endophytes provide important ecosystem services.

Purpose and scope: Little we know about the mechanisms of response against the adverse effects of climate change on natural populations of wild plants and even less about the potential role played by microbial biostimulants. In this article, we review the effects of biostimulants on plant responses against abiotic stresses, with a particular focus on the role of mycorrhizas and leaf endophytes.

Results: We have reviewed the effects of the main abiotic stresses in plants, the mechanisms that plants use to face these abiotic challenges, and the interaction plant-biostimulant-abiotic stress, highlighting the primary responses and parameters to evaluate different plant responses.

Conclusion: Abiotic stresses can check the phenotypic plasticity of plants and also trigger a complex and heterogeneous array of responses to face different abiotic stresses, and beneficial microorganisms do play an essential role in enhancing such responses. Our laboratory has initiated a project to characterise microbial populations associated with plants from wild areas and analyse their potential role in aiding the plants to cope with abiotic stresses.