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Screening for breast cancer and cervical cancer in the newly independent states of the former Soviet Union is largely opportunistic, and countries in the region have among the highest cervical cancer incidence in the WHO European Region. We aimed to compare the stage-specific distributions and changes over time in breast cancer and cervical cancer incidence in the newly independent states of the former Soviet Union. We collected breast cancer and cervical cancer incidence data from official statistics from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Republic of Moldova, Russian Federation, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan for the years 2008–17 by tumour, node, metastasis (TNM) stage, and by age where population-based cancer registry data were available. We used log-linear regression to quantify the changes over time in age-standardised rates. During the period 2013–17, more than 50% of breast cancer cases across the analysed countries, and more than 75% of breast cancer cases in Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine, were registered at stages I–II. The proportion of stage I breast cancer cases was highest in the screening age group (50–69 years) compared with other ages in Moldova and the Russian registries, but was highest in those aged 15–49 years in Georgia and Ukraine. Breast cancer stage-specific incidence rates increased over time, most prominently for stage I cancers. For cervical cancer, the proportions of cancers diagnosed at a late stage (stages III and IV) were high, particularly in Moldova and Armenia (>50%). The proportion of stage I cervical cancer cases decreased with age in all countries, whereas the proportions of late stage cancers increased with age. Stage-specific incidence rates of cervical cancer generally increased over the period 2008–17. Our results suggest modest progress in early detection of breast cancer in the newly independent states of the former Soviet Union. The high proportions of early-stage disease in the absence of mammography screening (eg, in Belarus) provide a benchmark for what is achievable with rapid diagnosis. For cervical cancer, there is a need to tackle the high burden and unfavourable stage-specific changes over time in the region. A radical shift in national policies away from opportunistic screening toward organised, population-based, quality-assured human papillomavirus vaccination and screening programmes is urgently needed. Union for International Cancer Control, WHO Regional Office for Europe, and Ministry of Health of Ukraine.

In this research, renewable biobased nanocomposites based on poly(3-hydroxybutyrate- co-3-hydroxyvalerate) and cellulose nanowhiskers were prepared by solution casting. Nanocomposite structure and property investigations were characterized to understand the reinforcing mechanism of CNWs in PHBV and establish longstanding goal of predicting structure–property relationships for material design and optimization. The CNW concentration strongly influenced the extent of nanowhiskers dispersion and level of property enhancement, as determined by structural, mechanical, thermal, dielectric and rheological characterizations. CNW content of 2.3 wt% indicated significant property transitions for all the investigated properties except for rheological ones. The change was believed to be due to the transition from homogeneous CNW dispersion to agglomeration. High CNW content led to CNW agglomerations and reduced nanocomposite moduli, yield strengths and real permittivity. DSC and POM analyses showed that CNWs could alter the nucleation and growth under both non-isothermal and isothermal crystallization conditions. Although the effect of CNW on nucleation ability and degree of crystallinity of PHBV was significant and could contribute to the mechanical properties improvement, the results of this study confirmed that primarily CNW homogeneous distribution and interconnected 3-D structure governed E' enhancement. Oriented PHBV/CNW composites were fabricated in-situ under electric field. CNW were oriented along the direction of applied filed. Image analysis revealed that degree of order and orientation distribution was mainly influenced by CNW content. TEM, DMA and XRD analysis showed that low CNW concentrations resulted in higher degree of anisotropy. Furthermore, for CNW content above 5 wt% the electric field was not sufficient to align CNW given the increased viscosity of PHBV/CNW solutions, hence, restricted mobility of CNW. The superior properties observed in both randomly oriented and aligned cellulosic nanocomposites may be explained by conventional ideas of reinforcement as predicted by micromechanics theories like Halpin-Tsai, Voigt-Reuss and Cox “shear lag” models. In latter model, the distribution of orientation angle was taken into account and the predictions were consistent with experimental values. Based on good agreement between experimental nanocomposite moduli and Cox model predictions, especially at low concentrations, it was clear that superior reinforcement arises mainly from the high modulus and aspect ratio of CNWs at these concentrations. Furthermore, the critical concentration corresponding to the formation of percolated CNW structure was modeled based on excluded volume theory. The simulation was in good agreement for randomly oriented nanocomposites. From individual micromechanical properties of the nanofibers and matrix, aspect ratio, orientation and volume fraction of nanofibers, it has been demonstrated that the effective storage moduli can be simulated to obtain properties of random and aligned composite lamina.

Since the realization that global sustainability depends on renewable sources of materials and energy, there has been an ever-increasing need to develop bio-based polymers that are able to replace petroleum-based polymers. Research in this field has shown strong potential in generating high-performance functionalized polymers from plant biomass. With the anticipated large-scale production of lignocellulosic biomass, lignin, cellulose and hemicellulosic polysaccharides will be abundantly available renewable feedstocks for biopolymers and biocomposites with physico-chemical properties that match or exceed those of petroleum-based compounds. This review examines the state of the art regarding advances and challenges in synthesis and applications of specialty polymers and composites derived from cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin, ending with a brief assessment of genetic modification as a route to tailor crop plants for specific applications.

Serpulid polychaetes are a unique and highly specialised group of marine segmented worms that have adapted to inhabiting self-secreted calcareous tubes attached to a wide range of hard substrates. These animals are found across all depths and habitats of the world's oceans, and some form mutually beneficial associations with live corals. The genus Hydroides is of special concern and importance, as it is not only the largest, but also one of the most ecologically and economically important groups of marine invertebrates because it includes notorious biofoulers and common bioinvaders that travel around the world hitchhiking on ships' hulls.This is the first fully illustrated guide to this notorious serpulid genus of calcareous tubeworms, providing a comprehensive diagnostic treatment of all known species of the genus Hydroides. This important reference provides reliable identification tools to distinguish Australian tubeworms from potential alien invaders that constantly arrive from overseas and threaten Australia's maritime transport, trade and mariculture.

In urban areas, hydrological processes are characterized by high variability in space and time, making them sensitive to small-scale temporal and spatial rainfall variability. In the last decades new instruments, techniques, and methods have been developed to capture rainfall and hydrological processes at high resolution. Weather radars have been introduced to estimate high spatial and temporal rainfall variability. At the same time, new models have been proposed to reproduce hydrological response, based on small-scale representation of urban catchment spatial variability. Despite these efforts, interactions between rainfall variability, catchment heterogeneity, and hydrological response remain poorly understood. This paper presents a review of our current understanding of hydrological processes in urban environments as reported in the literature, focusing on their spatial and temporal variability aspects. We review recent findings on the effects of rainfall variability on hydrological response and identify gaps where knowledge needs to be further developed to improve our understanding of and capability to predict urban hydrological response.

Immunotherapy has become an important part of the oncotherapy arsenal. Its applicability in various cancer types is impressive, as well as its use of endogenous mechanisms to achieve desired ends. However, off-target or on-target-off-tumor toxicity, limited activity, lack of control in combination treatments and, especially for solid tumors, low local accumulation, have collectively limited clinical use thereof. These limitations are partially alleviated by delivery systems. Lipid-based nanoparticles (NPs) have emerged as revolutionary carriers due to favorable physicochemical characteristics, with specific applications and strengths particularly useful in immunotherapeutic agent delivery. The aim of this review is to highlight the challenges faced by immunotherapy and how lipid-based NPs have been, and may be further utilized to address such challenges. We discuss recent fundamental and clinical applications of NPs in a range of areas and provide a detailed discussion of the main obstacles in immune checkpoint inhibition therapies, adoptive cellular therapies, and cytokine therapies. We highlight how lipid-based nanosystems could address these through either delivery, direct modulation of the immune system, or targeting of the immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment. We explore advanced and emerging liposomal and lipid nanoparticle (LNP) systems for nucleic acid delivery, intrinsic and extrinsic stimulus-responsive formulations, and biomimetic lipid-based nanosystems in immunotherapy. Finally, we discuss the key challenges relating to the clinical use of lipid-based NP immunotherapies, suggesting future research directions for the near term to realize the potential of these innovative lipid-based nanosystems, as they become the crucial steppingstone towards the necessary enhancement of the efficacy of immunotherapy. Graphical abstract