Floods are an increasingly frequent phenomenon with catastrophic consequences for citizens and cities. Virtual reality (VR) has become a valuable training tool, simulating inaccessible or hazardous situations like emergencies and risk environments. This study evaluates a designed virtual training simulating a riverbank flood scenario. Beyond imparting factual knowledge, this environment aims to facilitate experiential learning by enabling users to repeatedly practice correct behaviors safely. We investigate the impact that different tutorials have on the ability of users to comprehend and retain the knowledge conveyed during the VR experience. To achieve this, three training experiences with different levels of contextualization and interaction tutorials were compared in a between-participant design. Data collection involved both self-reported measures (e.g., questionnaire) and objective measures (e.g., behavioral data). The results demonstrate the effectiveness of the virtual environment in acquiring knowledge of flood contents, particularly when the tutorial offers high levels of interaction, thereby reducing cognitive load. Furthermore, we observed that a lower level of contextualization in the tutorial phase enhances user efficiency in acquainting themselves with the virtual environment. This study emphasizes the potential of virtual training in augmenting preparedness, providing a valuable framework for the development of experiential learning tools in flood emergencies.

This review is intended to provide an up‐to‐date overview of sensory marketing research exploiting virtual and augmented reality technologies in the retail scenario. The five senses play a fundamental role in the purchasing experience, and the lack of multisensorial interaction with the product is one of the factors that prevent e‐commerce from becoming the first choice of customers, especially for certain categories of products. Virtual and augmented reality have been proposed as a means to compensate for the lack of sensorial involvement, thanks to features such as immersion, interactivity, and augmentation. We conducted a systematic literature review according to the PRISMA guidelines. Relevant studies published up to November 2024 were identified via Scopus, IEEE Xplore, ACM Digital Library, and Medline databases. Two main research trends emerged: the study of customers’ behavioral response to purposeful sensory‐enriched shopping digital environments, and the investigation of customers’ behavior when the lack of sensorial stimulation, especially of touch, is compensated through the virtual augmentation of the product. Despite the potential implications of using virtual and augmented reality to improve the sensorial experience during e‐shopping, this research field is still in its infancy. The limitations of the current studies are discussed, and a research agenda is proposed.

There has been a fast progress in clinical use of antibody-based immunotherapy, given the superior efficacy commonly achieved in clinic and the limited toxicity. However, personalization of treatment remains of major importance, both to achieve better clinical performance for monotherapy and to identify the best combinations on a patient-by-patient basis. Predicting patient's response is complex due to the need to characterize both tumor response and immunologic mechanisms possibly activated by the therapy, including antibody dependent cellular cytotoxicity (ADCC). We present the Inter-Cell Networking Profiling (ICNP), a novel analytical method enabling a comprehensive and precise characterization of the modulatory effect of immunotherapies on immune-tumor cell interactions. ICNP works on the Open Microwell (OMW) microfluidic system which recreates 20,000 unique cell clusters from ex-vivo patient samples and exposes them to anticancer drugs. We validated the ICNP using multiple myeloma (MM) patient samples to characterize the efficacy of Daratumumab, an anti-CD38 antibody (Ab). Bone marrow samples in EDTA were collected from 11 MM patients. 8 samples were processed by Ficoll-Paque, preserving the original composition of effector (E) and target (T) cells, i.e. NK and plasma cells respectively. 3 samples were processed to obtain co-cultures of WBC depleted of plasma cells (which include NK cells) and U-266 MM cell line. NK and plasma cells were stained with anti-CD16/CD56 and anti-CD138 fluorescently-labeled Abs, respectively. Propidium Iodide (PI) was used as death marker. A statistical model was created to project the optimal experimental setup (E:T ratio, cell concentration) to maximize the co-localization of E/T cells in the 20,000 microwells of the OMW platform. After seeding, cells were incubated with Daratumumab 10µg/mL or no drug and analyzed through fluorescence time lapse microscopy for up to 12 hours. ICNP analysis first separates microwells with both E/T cells in close proximity from those not featuring both cell types (Fig 1A). Then, anti-CD38 efficacy is evaluated in microwells with E/T co-localization, thus implementing a miniaturized ADCC assay (Fig 1B). At the same time, spontaneous NK activity is measured in microwells with E/T co-localization and no drug, while direct effect of the drug on target cells can be measured in microwells with T but not E cells. We first validated our statistical model of co-localization in microwells against the actual number of wells with E/T co-localization (correlation R²: 0.79-0.97, n=5). Then, we characterized the immune composition of 8 MM patients samples with the OMW, finding that E/T cell fractions were in the ranges 5-21% (E) and 1-28% (T). Interestingly, according to our statistical model, co-localization occurs in at least 1% of microwells for all the 8 samples, making ICNP applicable with good statistical significance in the OMW system on ex-vivo clinical samples without any pre-enrichment. Finally, ICNP was evaluated on 4 cases (3 obtained by mixing patient's WBC with U-266 MM cell line and 1 complete MM patient sample). We measured the effect of anti-CD38 Ab using i) the standard approach, considering all microwells regardless of the co-presence of E and T; ii) ICNP approach, considering only microwells featuring E/T co-localization. Results show that drug effect is much evident with ICNP in all the 4 cases with an average increase in target cell death of 40%, indicating a higher sensitivity of this approach than the averaged analysis (Fig 1C, right). Importantly, in one case, the standard analysis did not identify significant differences between anti-CD38 treated and control cells, that could instead be observed with ICNP (p<0.0001, 89% cell death) (Fig 1C, left). These results demonstrate that ICNP can determine the efficacy of the therapy taking into account the fitness of single NK cells that is commonly lost in averaged measurements. ICNP proved to enable a comprehensive profiling of the immune system by evaluating in one test the immune composition and the fitness of immune cells, both native and drug-treated. These results open the opportunity to develop functional precision medicine approaches for predicting patient's response to drugs with immune-mediated mechanisms of action. AB and RR equally contributed