showing 36 of ~574560 from 574555 documents
Hydraulic Characterization of the Full Scale Mock-Up of the DEMO Divertor Outer Vertical Target
2021
In the frame of the pre-conceptual design activities of the DEMO work package DIV-1 “Divertor Cassette Design and Integration” of the EUROfusion program, a mock-up of the divertor outer vertical target (OVT) was built, mainly in order to: (i) demonstrate the technical feasibility of manufacturing procedures; (ii) verify the hydraulic design and its capability to ensure a uniform and proper cooling for the plasma facing units (PFUs) with an acceptable pressure drop; and (iii) experimentally validate the computational fluid-dynamic (CFD) model developed by the University of Palermo. In this context, a research campaign was jointly carried out by the University of Palermo and ENEA to experimen…
Ecosistemas locales de aprendizaje ante la globalización tecnológica. Retos de los modelos educativos digitales pospandemia
2021
La educación frente a la covid-19 ha puesto en práctica una infinidad de respuestas, todas urgentes, tentativas, generadas por ensayo y por error, y todavía pendientes de validación. Para comprender mejor el impacto de estas respuestas, el presente artículo defiende, partiendo de la teoría de los ecosistemas de aprendizaje, la necesidad de investigar cómo han influido las tecnologías de ámbito global en la construcción de experiencias locales de aprendizaje. Además, pone de manifiesto la necesidad de estudiar qué tipo de apoyo tanto teórico como práctico se requiere para reconducir los posibles efectos nocivos de la introducción de la tecnología de emergencia. A tal efecto, se describen las…
Acceptance towards digital health interventions – Model validation and further development of the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology
2021
Internet- and mobile-based interventions (IMI) offer an effective way to complement health care. Acceptance of IMI, a key facilitator of their implementation in routine care, is often low. Based on the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT), this study validates and adapts the UTAUT to digital health care. Following a systematic literature search, 10 UTAUT-grounded original studies (N = 1588) assessing patients' and health professionals' acceptance of IMI for different somatic and mental health conditions were included. All included studies assessed Performance Expectancy, Effort Expectancy, Social Influence, Facilitating Conditions and acceptance as well as age, gender,…
Proximity Effects on the Charge Density Wave Order and Superconductivity in Single-Layer NbSe2
2021
Collective electronic states such as the charge density wave (CDW) order and superconductivity (SC) respond sensitively to external perturbations. Such sensitivity is dramatically enhanced in two dimensions (2D), where 2D materials hosting such electronic states are largely exposed to the environment. In this regard, the ineludible presence of supporting substrates triggers various proximity effects on 2D materials that may ultimately compromise the stability and properties of the electronic ground state. In this work, we investigate the impact of proximity effects on the CDW and superconducting states in single-layer (SL) NbSe2 on four substrates of diverse nature, namely, bilayer graphene…
OCT-Angiography evaluation of peripapillary microvascular changes after rhegmatogenous retinal detachment repair
2021
Purpose: To evaluate the radial peripapillary capillary plexus (RPCP) vessel density (VD) and the retinal nerve fiber layer (RNFL) thickness in eyes successfully treated with pars plana vitrectomy for primary rhegmatogenous retinal detachment. Methods: In this cross-sectional multicenter clinical study, eyes with a minimum 12-month follow-up were reexamined. The RPCP VD and RNFL thickness in the rhegmatogenous retinal detachment subfields of the affected eye (study group) were compared with the corresponding areas of the healthy fellow eyes (control group). Results: Fifty-three eyes were included in the study. A significantly lower RPCP VD and RNFL thickness were observed in those subfields…
Exploring the mediator role of self-critical rumination between emotion regulation and psychopathology: A validation study of the Self-Critical Rumin…
2021
Abstract Self-critical rumination is a negative and repetitive self-thinking process related to different disorders and negative psychological outcomes such as emotion dysregulation. The objectives of this study are twofold: (a) to examine the factor structure of the Spanish version of the Self-Critical Rumination Scale (SCRS), providing further evidence on its construct validity, and (b), to explore the mediator role of self-critical rumination between emotion dysregulation and psychopathology. A sample of 431 Spanish participants were recruited and completed online questionnaires. Confirmatory factor analysis, mediation analysis, and Pearson's correlations were conducted. A single factor …
Michael Hunter. The Poetics of Early Chinese Thought: How the Shijing Shaped the Chinese Philosophical Tradition. New York: Columbia UP, 2021. Pp. 24…
2021
The review concerns Hunter's methodological approach to a classic of Chinese literature, the "Shijing", the Book of Odes.
Identification of biomarkers in wastewater-based epidemiology: Main approaches and analytical methods
2021
Wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) has become popular to estimate the use of drugs of abuse and recently to establish the incidence of CoVID 19 in large cities. However, its possibilities have been expanded recently as a technique that allows to establish a fingerprint of the characteristics of a city, such as state of health/disease, healthy/unhealthy living habits, exposure to different types of contaminants, etc. with respect to other cities. This has been thanks to the identification of human biomarkers as well as to the fingerprinting and profiling of the characteristics of the wastewater catchment that determine these circumstances. The purpose of this review is to analyze the differ…
Luca Matranga e il suo tempo storico
2021
Profilo storico e biografico di Luca Matranga, primo autore in lingua arbëreshe. I dati archivistici recuperati permettono una ricostruzione accurata del profilo di questo papas di rito greco, che eseguì la traduzione nel dialetto albanese della "Piana dell'Arcivescovo" su richiesta del card. Ludovico II Torres, arcivescovo di Monreale.
“Pioggia di libri” sul terreno fertile della conoscenza
2021
La rassegna “Pioggia di libri”, il cui senso è possibile cogliere nella genesi della sua stessa idea ispiratrice, trova la sua ragion d’essere, nella parole di Massimo Mantellini presenti in un suo scritto dal titolo, "Dieci splendidi oggetti morti" là dove, nell’intermezzo della pubblicazione, l’autore parla di "Uno splendido oggetto vivo: il libro". Ed è particolarmente significativo che proprio Mantellini, uno dei maggiori esperti della rete internet italiana, ricordando un suo incontro a Milano con Umberto Eco, riconosca la «superiorità del libro cartaceo [...] rispetto ai testi elettronici». E le ragioni di questa sopravvivenza - nonostante l’imperversare consumistico dell’offerta dei …
Impact of shell evolution on Gamow-Teller β decay from a high-spin long-lived isomer in 127Ag
2021
6 pags., 4 figs., 2 tabs.
Nitrogen isotopes in tooth enamel record diet and trophic level enrichment: results from a controlled feeding experiment
2021
Nitrogen isotope ratios (δ15N) are a well-established tool for investigating the dietary and trophic behavior of animals in terrestrial and marine food webs. To date, δ15N values in fossils have primarily been measured in collagen extracted from bone or dentin, which is susceptible to degradation and rarely preserved in deep time (>100,000 years). In contrast, tooth enamel organic matter is protected from diagenetic alteration by the mineral structure of hydroxyapatite and thus is often preserved over geological time. However, due to the low nitrogen content (<0.01 %) of enamel, the measurement of its nitrogen isotopic composition has been prevented by the analytical limit…
P.0170 Distinct polygenic risk scores in clusters of psychotic subjects with different premorbid trajectories and current IQ
2021
On the Mechanistic Origins of the pH-Dependency in Au-Catalyzed Glycerol Electro-Oxidation: Insight from First Principles Calculations
2021
Electrocatalytic oxidation of glycerol (EOG) is an attractive approach to convert surplus glycerol to value-added products. Experiments have shown that EOG activity and selectivity depend on the electrocatalyst, but also on the electrode potential, the pH, and the electrolyte. For broadly employed gold (Au) electrocatalysts, experiments have demonstrated high EOG activity under alkaline conditions with glyceric acid as a primary product, whereas under acidic and neutral conditions Au is almost inactive producing only small amounts of dihydroxyacetone. In the present computational work, we have performed an extensive mechanistic study to understand the pH- and potential- dependency of Au-cat…
Isovector Axial Vector Form Factors of the Nucleon from Lattice QCD with Nf=2+1 O(a)-improved Wilson Fermions
2021
We present the analysis of isovector axial vector nucleon form factors on a set of $N_f=2+1$ CLS ensembles with $\mathcal O(a)$-improved Wilson fermions and L\"uscher-Weisz gauge action. The set of ensembles covers a pion mass range of $130-353\,$MeV with lattice spacings between $0.05\,$fm and $0.09\,$fm. In particular, the set includes a $L/a=96$ ensemble at the physical pion mass. For the purpose of the form factor extraction, we employ both the summed operator insertion method (summation method) and explicit two-state fits in order to account for excited-state contributions to the nucleon correlation functions. To describe the $Q^{2}$-behavior of the form factors, we perform $z$-expansi…
"Par un ennemi qu'on sait digne de soi": la lunga traccia delle coppie antinomiche
2021
The contribution deals with antinomic couples, actual rivalries, symbolic confrontations; it is part of a discussion among scholars about the subject, in a column edited by the author and Niccolò Scaffai
Lageveränderungen des weiblichen Genitale
2021
Die Urogynakologie befasst sich mit der Diagnostik und der Therapie von gynakologischen Erkrankungen der unteren Harnwege und des Beckenbodens. Dazu zahlen auch Lageveranderungen der weiblichen Genitalorgane.
Au/CeO2 Photocatalyst for the Selective Oxidation of Aromatic Alcohols in Water under UV, Visible and Solar Irradiation
2021
Au nanoparticles supported on CeO2 have been prepared and investigated as photocatalysts for the photocatalytic selective oxidation of benzyl alcohol and 4-methoxybenzyl alcohol to the correspondent benzaldehydes, in aqueous suspensions and room conditions under UV, visible and natural solar light irradiation. Au nanoparticles have been supported by impregnation (1 and 3 wt.%) on two types of CeO2 (i.e., a commercial one and a home prepared oxide obtained in the presence of NaOH as precipitation agent). The Au impregnated samples showed strong visible radiation absorption at 565–570 nm associated to localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR). The bare CeO2 samples are activated by UV light …
Birth weight and its association with optic nerve head morphology - results from the population-based German Gutenberg Health Study.
2021
Psychophysical burden and lack of support : Reasons for care workers’ intentions to leave their work in the Nordic countries
2021
Long-term care of older adults is currently suffering from a shortage of trained personnel and high turnover rates. Care work is poorly paid, demanding, increasingly time-bound and both mentally and physically burdensome. In this study, we examined the individual, organisational and economic factors that predict professional care workers’ intentions to leave their current employment, using the NORDCARE survey data (2015, N = 3801) collected in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. The respondents were mainly practical and assistant nurses. The analysis showed that the predictors of intentions to leave were similar in the four countries. The most consistent organisational predictors of leavin…
Repeated selection : access to a higher education diploma for vocational baccalaureate holders
2021
This thesis examines the access of vocational baccalaureate holders to higher education in light of two major recent developments: the explosion in the number of vocational baccalaureate holders, on the one hand, and the continuous increase in their enrollment rate in higher education, on the other hand. Between 2000 and 2015, the combination of these two phenomena led to an almost fourfold increase in the number of vocational baccalaureates enrolled in higher education. In this research, we explain the obstacles and levers of these new educational paths through the determinants of the successive passage through three stages of selection.First, informal selection corresponds to the influenc…
Family Council From A Cultural Approach: the case of eastern european countries
2021
The family council is a formal mechanism of the family governance in family businesses that aims to give a voice to all members of the family, and to unify the interests of all members. These interests are identified with the purpose of the family, necessary to achieve a long-term legacy, and the sustainability of the company. However, the establishment of the family council is a topic that is still at an incipient stage, both in the literature and for practitioners, so our contribution advances the understanding of family governance within the sphere of family businesses culture and context. For that purpose, we rely on two cultural indexes widely accepted in the literature. We have taken …
Citizen experts in participatory governance: Democratic and epistemic assets of service user involvement, local knowledge and citizen science
2021
Initiatives that attribute expert status to ‘ordinary citizens’ proliferate in a range of societal realms and are generally celebrated for ‘democratising expertise’. By tapping new sources of knowledge and participation simultaneously, such ‘citizen expertise’ practices seem to provide responses to the contemporary decline of trust in political elites and traditional experts that seriously challenges the legitimacy of democratic policy-making. This study distinguishes between three quintessential types of citizen expertise (‘local knowledge’, ‘service user involvement’ and ‘citizen science’) and, from an integrated perspective, critically discusses the value of citizen expertise for public…
Molecular Mediators of RNA Loading into Extracellular Vesicles
2021
In the last decade, an increasing number of studies have demonstrated that non-coding RNA (ncRNAs) cooperate in the gene regulatory networks with other biomolecules, including coding RNAs, DNAs and proteins. Among them, microRNAs (miRNAs), long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) and circular RNAs (circRNAs) are involved in transcriptional and translation regulation at different levels. Intriguingly, ncRNAs can be packed in vesicles, released in the extracellular space, and finally internalized by receiving cells, thus affecting gene expression also at distance. This review focuses on the mechanisms through which the ncRNAs can be selectively packaged into extracellular vesicles (EVs).
Imaging-guided interventions modulating portal venous flow: Evidence and controversies
2021
Portal hypertension is defined by an increase in the portosystemic venous gradient. In most cases, increased resistance to portal blood flow is the initial cause of elevated portal pressure. More than 90% of cases of portal hypertension are estimated to be due to advanced chronic liver disease or cirrhosis. Transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunts, a non-pharmacological treatment for portal hypertension, involve the placement of a stent between the portal vein and the hepatic vein or inferior vena cava which helps bypass hepatic resistance. Portal hypertension may also be a result of extrahepatic portal vein thrombosis or compression. In these cases, percutaneous portal vein recanalis…
Exploring network distances for movies comparison
2021
International audience
Charge radii, moments, and masses of mercury isotopes across the N=126 shell closure
2021
Combining laser spectroscopy in a Versatile Arc Discharge and Laser Ion Source, with Penning-trap mass spectrometry at the CERN-ISOLDE facility, this work reports on mean-square charge radii of neutron-rich mercury isotopes across the $N = 126$ shell closure, the electromagnetic moments of $^{207}$Hg and more precise mass values of $^{206-208}$Hg. The odd-even staggering (OES) of the mean square charge radii and the kink at $N = 126$ are analyzed within the framework of covariant density functional theory (CDFT), with comparisons between different functionals to investigate the dependence of the results on the underlying single-particle structure. The observed features are defined predomina…
The Endometrial Microbiome and Its Impact on Human Conception
2021
Changes in the female genital tract microbiome are consistently correlated to gynecological and obstetrical pathologies, and tract dysbiosis can impact reproductive outcomes during fertility treatment. Nonetheless, a consensus regarding the physiological microbiome core inside the uterine cavity has not been reached due to a myriad of study limitations, such as sample size and experimental design variations, and the influence of endometrial bacterial communities on human reproduction remains debated. Understanding the healthy endometrial microbiota and how changes in its composition affect fertility would potentially allow personalized treatment through microbiome management during assisted…
Student teachers and their attitudes towards ICT: Lessons learned from three different countries
2021
This paper explores the attitudes that student teachers in Malta, Norway, and Spain convey to digital technologies in formal educational settings as they start the 1st semester. A number of studies look at educational inclinations and employment of digital technologies (Granić & Marangunić, 2019; Ritter, 2017; Scherer & Teo, 2019). We have chosen to examine student teachers’ attitudes towards the professional use of digital technologies within a pedagogical framework. In this respect, a comparative qualitative analysis of one open-ended question that forms part of a more extensive questionnaire distributed to all participants is considered. The employed analytical lens subsequently …
Corruption and Organised Crime Signalling Indicators for Foreign Investors as Applied to Eastern European Countries
2021
The former communist countries in Central and Eastern Europe and, implicitly, their economies, went through specific and sometimes asymmetric developments since the fall of the “iron curtain” at the end of the 1980s. During those years, they faced many challenges to create a secure and predictable economic environment for individuals and businesses, local or foreign. We propose a framework that considers legal, social, and economic indicators which can be used by foreign investors to make wise and efficient business decisions. Our main purpose is to expand the traditional economic analysis framework and enrich it with new institutional and societal indicators from the social, quality of lif…
The Application of Active Biomonitoring with the Use of Mosses to Identify Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons in an Atmospheric Aerosol
2021
The use of biological indicators of environmental quality is an alternative method of monitoring ecosystem pollution. Various groups of contaminants, including organic ones, can be measured in environmental samples. Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) have not yet been determined by the moss bag technique. This technique uses several moss species simultaneously in urban areas to select the best biomonitoring of these compounds, which are dangerous to humans and the environment. In this research, a gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry was used for the determination of selected PAHs in three species of mosses: Pleurozium schreberi, Sphagnum fallax and Dicranum polysetum (acti…
Glioblastoma: development of new diagnostic tools based on EV-associated proteins
2021
Glioblastomas multiforme (GBM) are the most common malignant primary brain tumors in adults. They are highly aggressive and have an overall survival of <15 months despite maximal surgical resection and chemoradiation (Ostrom, 2019). GBMs are typically heterogeneous with a wide range of genetic and epigenetic variations among tumor cells. Extracellular vesicles (EVs) represent one of the plausible ways through which can be obtained a better understanding of the heterogeneous subpopulations of GBM / molecular signatures. EVs hold promise for the discovery of potential tumours biomarkers useful in clinical managment for GBM patient diagnosis and follow-up. Isolating EVs from body fluids and sc…
Performance Assessment of Basalt FRCM for the Confinement of Clay Brick Masonry Cylinders
2021
Fibre Reinforced Cementitious Matrix (FRCM) composites have been proved to be a suitable strengthening material for masonry structures in the last years. Moreover, basalt fibres are increasingly used as reinforcement of composites as a more sustainable alternative to glass fibres. The goal of this work is to investigate the effectiveness of basalt FRCM to confine masonry circular columns. A total of eighteen clay brick masonry cylinders were tested in compression. The specimens were cored from two different masonry assemblies and wrapped with one or two layers of BFRCM composite. The stress-strain curves and the gains of strength and strain capacity of confined cylinders compared to the con…
Obvietats (o quasi). Filosofia necessària, per Tobies Grimaltos
2021
The role of post-transcriptional modulators of metalloproteins in response to metal deficiencies
2021
Copper and iron proteins play a wide range of functions in living organisms. Metal assembly into metalloproteins is a complex process, where mismetalation is detrimental and energy-consuming to cells. Under metal deficiency, metal distribution is expected to reach a metalation ranking, prioritizing essential versus dispensable metalloproteins, while avoiding interferences with other metals and protecting metal-sensitive processes. In this review, we propose that posttranscriptional Modulators of Metalloprotein messenger RNA (ModMeR) are good candidates in metal prioritization under metal-limited conditions. ModMeR target high quota or redundant metalloproteins and, by adjusting their synthe…
“I do those things to pass the time.”: Active ageing during fourth age
2021
Active ageing is a dominant but disputed discourse in the field of ageing. Since it is usually associated with the third age, this article will focus on the active ageing of older adults who need care and services, who are known as the fourth agers. Our data consists of interviews collected from 16 older adults. We analysed the data through content analysis that was guided by the Active Ageing Index (AAI) that is a measuring tool concerning active ageing. According to our results, active ageing during the fourth age can be understood through the lens of small actions and precarity. Although some actions had to be given up or modified, participants were active in various ways, and help from …