Showing papers by "Libera! published in 2013"

Immunopositivity for Histone MacroH2A1 Isoforms Marks Steatosis-Associated Hepatocellular Carcinoma

Abstract: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is one of the most common cancers worldwide. Prevention and risk reduction are important and the identification of specific biomarkers for early diagnosis of HCC represents an active field of research. Increasing evidence indicates that fat accumulation in the liver, defined as hepatosteatosis, is an independent and strong risk factor for developing an HCC. MacroH2A1, a histone protein generally associated with the repressed regions of chromosomes, is involved in hepatic lipid metabolism and is present in two alternative spliced isoforms, macroH2A1.1 and macroH2A1.2. These isoforms have been shown to predict lung and colon cancer recurrence but to our knowledge, their role in fatty-liver associated HCC has not been investigated previously.

Isolation and Characterization of CD276+/HLA-E+ Human Subendocardial Mesenchymal Stem Cells from Chronic Heart Failure Patients: Analysis of Differentiative Potential and Immunomodulatory Markers Expression

Abstract: Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) are virtually present in all postnatal organs as well as in perinatal tissues. MSCs can be differentiated toward several mature cytotypes and interestingly hold potentially relevant immunomodulatory features. Myocardial infarction results in severe tissue damage, cardiomyocyte loss, and eventually heart failure. Cellular cardiomyoplasty represents a promising approach for myocardial repair. Clinical trials using MSCs are underway for a number of heart diseases, even if their outcomes are hampered by low long-term improvements and the possible presence of complications related to cellular therapy administration. Therefore, elucidating the presence and role of MSCs that reside in the post-infarct human heart should provide essential alternatives for therapy. In the current article we show a novel method to reproducibly isolate and culture MSCs from the subendocardial zone of human left ventricle from patients undergoing heart transplant for post-infarct chronic heart failure (H...

The heterogeneous thresholds ordered response model: identification and inference

Abstract: Summary Although surveys routinely ask respondents to evaluate various aspects of their life on an ordered scale, there is concern about interpersonal comparability of these self- assessments Statistically, the problem is one of identification in ordered response models with heterogeneous thresholds As a solution to the identification problem, King and his colleagues proposed the use of anchoring vignettes, namely brief descriptions of hypothetical people or situations that survey respondents are asked to evaluate on the same scale as they use to rate their own situation Although vignettes have been introduced in several social surveys and are increasingly employed in a variety of fields, the reliability of this approach hinges crucially on the validity of the assumptions of response consistency and vignette equivalence The paper proposes a joint test of these key assumptions based on the fact that the underlying statistical model is overidentified if the two assumptions hold Monte Carlo results show that the test proposed has good size and power properties in finite samples We apply our test to self- assessment of pain by using data from the first wave of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe We find that, when using only one of the three available vignettes, or when the test is carried out separately by subgroups of respondents, the overidentifying restrictions are less likely to be rejected

Systems and methods for finding mobile device users

Abstract: A system and method is provided for enabling mobile device users to share their respective locations and provide maps to each other's locations without requiring the use of a central server providing location services. The other user's location is provided as GPS coordinates that are attached to the communications between the parties (e.g., SMS, text, voice, etc.) and used to generate the other user's location on a map generated at the recipient's mobile device. In operation, a simple communication is provided to another user requesting his/her location and the GPS coordinates of the recipient are returned directly to the requester's mobile device for providing through an API to map or navigation or game software or hardware. The generated map is provided to the requester's mobile device, thereby bypassing the central server.

The impossible transition and the unstable new mix: Italy 1992–2012

Abstract: How can the long process of change in Italian democracy (1992–2012) be analysed and explained? Answering this question requires placing the phenomenon of macro-political change of a democracy within a theoretical framework that will give answers to other questions: How should a transition from one type of democracy to another be analysed; have there been other cases of such a transition; what happened in Italy that brought about a change from a democracy to another one? By developing a theoretical proposal and providing a set of empirical data, replies are suggested to those questions and an explanation is given.

Utility maximization with current utility on the wealth: regularity of solutions to the HJB equation

Abstract: We consider a utility maximization problem for an investment-consumption portfolio when the current utility depends also on the wealth process. Such kind of problems arise, e.g., in portfolio optimization with random horizon or with random trading times. To overcome the difficulties of the problem we use the dual approach. We define a dual problem and treat it by means of dynamic programming, showing that the viscosity solutions of the associated Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equation belong to a suitable class of smooth functions. This allows to define a smooth solution of the primal Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equation, proving that this solution is indeed unique in a suitable class and coincides with the value function of the primal problem. Some financial applications of the results are provided.

Tree-Based Genetic Algorithm with Binary Encoding for QoS Routing

Abstract: Mobile ad Hoc Networks (MANETs) are one of the most important technologies supporting Ubiquitous and Pervasive Computing (UPC). As many UPC applications pose Quality of Service (QoS) constraints, their implementation in MANETs becomes dependent on the MANET algorithms for QoS routing. In this paper Genetic Algorithms (GAs) for QoS routing in MANETs are considered. GAs can solve the NP search of QoS routes with multiple constraints, and then address the UPC QoS requirements. The focus is on tree-based GAs, which represent the set of paths from source to destination as a tree and encode them through the crossed junctions. They encode single paths in the chromosome. We investigate on the effects of binary encoding schema on tree-based GAs. To this purpose we design a GA with binary encoding that maps classes of paths in single chromosomes. These classes are both collectively exhaustive and mutually exclusive. The GA with binary encoding uses an adaptive mutation probability for deeper exploration of the search space, and local search on classes of paths. Simulation results compare the GA with binary encoding with two applications of GAMAN, the main existing tree-based GA. They show that the binary encoding allows the GA to converge faster although it introduces additional computational costs.

CSP control system implementation on embedded board

Abstract: Renewable power generation can help countries meet their sustainable development goals through provision of access to clean, secure, reliable and affordable energy. Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) is a power generation technology that uses mirrors or lenses to concentrate the sun's rays and, in most of today's CSP systems, to heat a fluid and produce steam. CSP technologies are not currently widely deployed. This paper present a possible solution for the implementation of the electronic control board for a CSP system.

A queen without a sceptre: public opinion and the political-constitutional debate in Italy in the first fifty years of national unification

Abstract: Italy's intellectual debate over the concept of ‘public opinion’ in the first fifty years after unification can be better understood if one starts from an analysis of the constitutional framework. The definition of the rights and duties of rulers and ruled was the most pressing concern for the liberal ruling class. It should be noted that a strong paternalistic element was always present in the Italian intellectual debate. This paternalistic approach emerges clearly in the official Catholic culture. The main difference between Catholic intellectuals and liberals was over the ‘public sphere’. Liberalism mistrusted the masses because they were prone to insubordination and easily manipulated by demagogy, but it also believed the masses could elevate themselves. The ruling class's culture was essentially a synthesis between ‘moderatismo’ and that section of Catholicism that was less closed to modernity. Public opinion was considered by many as ‘queen of the world’, but according to the Albertine constitutiona...

Robustness for path-dependent volatility models

Abstract: In this paper, we consider a generalisation of the Hobson–Rogers model proposed by Foschi and Pascucci (Decis Eocon Finance 31(1):1–20, 2008) for financial markets where the evolution of the prices of the assets depends not only on the current value but also on past values. Using differentiability of stochastic processes with respect to the initial condition, we analyse the robustness of such a model with respect to the so-called offset function, which generally depends on the entire past of the risky asset and is thus not fully observable. In doing this, we extend previous results of Blaka Hallulli and Vargiolu (2007) to contingent claims, which are globally Lipschitz with respect to the price of the underlying asset, and we improve the dependence of the necessary observation window on the maturity of the contingent claim, which now becomes of linear type, while in Blaka Hallulli and Vargiolu (2007), it was quadratic. Finally, in this framework, we give a characterisation of the stationarity assumption used in Blaka Hallulli and Vargiolu (2007), and prove that this model is stationary if and only if it is reduced to the original Hobson–Rogers model. We conclude by calibrating the model to the prices of two indexes using two different volatility shapes.

'Conquered' vs. 'Octroyée' Ownership: Police Reform and Conditionality in the EU's Peace/Statebuilding of Bosnia and Herzegovina

Abstract: In 2004, police reform was identified as a key prerequisite for progress in the European Union (EU) accession process of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Three years later, that conditionality sparked one of the most severe crises in the country’s post-Dayton history. At that time, analysts focused mostly on the technical and security-related aspects of this reform. This article instead analyses the political developments that accompanied the reform, specifically the difficult confrontation between the EU and local elites. The paper posits that the failure of conditionality induced the EU to accept a more flexible and domestically-owned reform agenda. With the credibility of the whole European integration project for Bosnia and Herzegovina at risk, the EU refrained from further confrontation and softened its most critical demands, thus enabling local politicians to perform a ‘conquest’ of the reform agenda.

Cloud-enabled NGN architecture with discovery of end-to-end QoS resources

Abstract: Cloud computing offers remote resources on top of which users can deploy their own services, as well as ready to use services. Computing resources located in different sites and belonging to multiple providers can be used for a service. One requirement for the user to get access to cloud services is being connected with the remote computing resources. Similarly, interworking between computing resources located in different sites requires network resources connecting them. Therefore, cloud services can be thought as composed of computing and network resources. Quality of service (QoS) constraints can be posed on both of them. This is motivating a request for cloud architectures able to discover remote computing and QoS network resources. Design of such architecture is still an open issue. In this paper, we provide a proposal for it. We leverage on the existing Next Generation Network architecture, which was designed for IP services, and propose extensions to address the cloud provisioning requirements. The proposed extensions are about control and transport layer functions for automatic discovery of computing and QoS networking resources, respectively. Simulation results show the scalability of the discovery model in networks with increasing size and number of cloud providers.

‘Ijtihad’ and ‘Relevance of Sharia’ to Contextualize Universal Human Rights Discourse

Abstract: 1 ) This article provides a useful paradigm to re-conceptualize the debate on global justice in terms of a dialogue between a universal notion of human rights and the particularity of Islamic societies. It shows that Sharia can be adapted to modern societies, but also that, because Muslims comply with a distinct source of moral justification and plural sources of legality, this process can be accepted by part of the Islamic community and refused by another – or even rejected by one and the same community. As the author suggests, Sharia norms reflect an ongoing process of interpretation of the Quran, which started in the 8th and 9th centuries CE. Scholars developed a methodology (usul al-fiqh) for the classification of sources and the derivation of specific rules from general principles that did not change the basic structure of Sharia for 1000 years. Some aspects of the historical Sharia can therefore be reconsidered through the application of a similar process of interpersonal, unofficial reinterpretation, which is human and not sacred, of its norms in the light of modernity. This clearly applies to those social and political aspects of Sharia (muamalat) that can change over time, without questioning matters of faith (‘aqida) and worship practices (ibadat). A first consideration concerns the role of the state and the relationship between Sharia norms and state authority. An-Na’im argues that the application of Sharia norms in the settlement of disputes was voluntary and community-based, in a context where Sharia norms and state regulations were relatively independent of each other. However, I would recall that Sharia was interpreted and applied by independent scholars, in an age when states did not comply with the model of a modern nation state as they are today. Furthermore, in the 20 century Muhammad ‘Abdu emphasized the necessity to open the gate to ‘ijtihad’, promoting a process of reform and reinterpretation of Sharia in the light of modernity. Among his several reforms, he promoted the creation of the first modern bank in the Islamic world, which allowed and regulated interest charges on loans (forbidden by the Quran) in such a way as to manage not to create a strong opposition. In spite of this promising theoretical background, the acceptance and implementation of the human rights regime in Islamic societies is still controversial. One major issue in both the conceptualization and the practice of human rights in Islamic countries is surely related to the tension between the alleged universal validity of these standards and the limits of internal state sovereignty. For the author this paradox may be avoided by educating people to adhere to human rights values from within their tradition. He proposes to reframe the notion of universality into a more fluid and dynamic conception that incorporates the ‘contextual’ and ‘particular’ even while accepting the moral universal validity of these rights. The author proposes a peculiar strategy to reconcile or ‘mediate’ between the context and the universal, which configures a possible role of Sharia in the public discourse on legal norms. Sharia can be ‘irrelevant’ to this process when a specific Sharia norm is implemented by the state as a legal obligation that is valid for all within the state boundaries. Sharia norms enforced by the state cease in fact to be religious in nature. On the other hand, he argues that Sharia is ‘relevant’ because it ‘influence(s) the legitimacy and practical efficacy of the protection and implementation of human rights norms in Islamic societies and communities’. This perspective shows that the religious doctrine can indeed change, as it did under the Ottoman 2 Empire and during the Nahda in the 20 century. Similarly, I believe that some elements can be improved according to the urgency of a global and inclusive framework of justice. The problem remains how to develop a democratic debate between the supporters of this possibility and its opponents, who consider Sharia as a ‘divine and eternal’ doctrine. An-Na’im, A. (2013) ‘Human Rights, Universality and Sovereignty: the Irrelevance and Relevance of Sharia’, Global Policy, Vol. X, No. X, pp. xx–xxx. DOI: XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Arte e ospedali: evidenze scientifiche del ruolo terapeutico della cultura

Abstract: Il cultural welfare e un approccio innovativo ai servizi sociali che riflette sui benefici che il consumo attivo e passivo di cultura sarebbe in grado di generare se integrato in determinate dinamiche e politiche di gestione.

Philip Roth, Novels 2001-2007 - The Dying Animal, The Plot Against America, Exit Ghost

Abstract: Review of Roth, Philip. Novels 2001-2007 – The Dying Animal, The Plot Against America, Exit Ghost. Ed. Ross Miller. New York: The Library of America, 2013. Print.

Teoria della complessità applicata all’interazione tra cultura e salute

Abstract: La medicina rappresenta la disciplina nella quale il concetto di complessita e all’ordine del giorno. Molte delle malattie croniche degenerative che sono prevalenti nel-I’eta avanzata presentano caratteristiche particolari, tali da renderle definibili appunto “complesse”. Molto complessa e anche la relazione tra salute e cultura. Ma cosa vuole dire complesso? E quali implicazioni filosofiche questo concetto introduce?

Stili di vita, salute, cultura e ambiente nel determinismo del benessere psicologico soggettivo: uno studio di popolazione nella città di Milano

Abstract: Il benessere psicologico (psychological well- being) e un sentimento soggettivo estremamente complesso per la cui realizzazione intervengono, mediante interazioni multiple, numerosi fattori: stato di salute fisica e mentale, eta, reddito, tipo di professione, istruzione, stili di vita, interessi culturali, condizioni di lavoro e molte altre componenti.

Cultura: significato, evoluzione e domini operativi secondo l’UNESCO

Abstract: Un quadro, un sito archeologico, un canto popolare, sono cultura? E una partita di calcio, la lingua nella quale ci esprimiamo, lo sono? Quando parliamo di cultura, a cosa facciamo riferimento? Nel lessico generale, si e soliti impiegare il termine cultura per chiamare in causa le arti e l’apprendimento, mentre dal punto di vista sociologico ci riferiamo alla cultura per designare le norme, i valori, le credenze e i simboli che incontriamo nella vita di ogni giorno e che ci permettono di dare un senso a quello che ci circonda. E come possiamo misurare questi aspetti quotidiani? Cercheremo di far luce su questi elementi approfondendo il dibattito sul significato della parola cultura, la definizione istituzionale e i metodi convenzionali rintracciati dall’UNESCO per misurare la partecipazione culturale.

Studi internazionali su cultura e salute: revisione della letteratura

Abstract: Le evidenze sul ruolo della cultura nella promozione della salute sono basate essenzialmente su studi osservazionali.

Progetto cultura e benessere sul territorio italiano: interazione tra cultura, salute e benessere

Abstract: Nel 2008, un consorzio di Enti promotori (Universita IUAV di Venezia, Facolta di Arti e Design Industriale, Dipartimento di Arti e Design e Industriale — Centro EPOCA — Economia e Politiche Culturali Avanzate; Libera Universita di Bolzano, Facolta di Scienze della Formazione; Ripartizione Italiana Cultura Provincia Autonoma di Bolzano; Fondazione Garrone; Bracco Spa) hanno dato il via a un’inedita indagine che ha interessato 1500 cittadini selezionati da Doxa per essere rappresentativi della popolazione italiana, gettando le basi per una piccola rivoluzione concettuale sul ruolo della cultura nei confronti del benessere psicologico.

Distretto Culturale e capitale culturale: aspetti socioeconomici

Abstract: Nel corso dell’ultimo decennio del secolo scorso, e emerso con sempre maggiore insistenza un particolare interesse da parte sia di esperti che di policy- makers nei confronti della cultura. Il termine cultura e stato nel corso del tempo declinato rispetto a differenti discipline, e ancora oggi e per molti un concetto sfumato ed estremamente complesso, al quale sono legate svariate definizioni che rispondono in maniera non esaustiva alla fondamentale domanda di cosa questa risorsa rappresenti per il genere umano. Se dal punto di vista umanistico la cultura e un sinonimo di “erudizione” [1], dal punto di vista antropologico e invece considerata come un insieme complesso che include qualsiasi capacita e abitudine acquisita dall’uomo in quanto membro di una societa [2]. La sociologia la considera come un “patrimonio di conoscenze sociali tramandato ed acquisito passivamente” e ancora come “I’insieme delle attivita coscienti e deliberate dell’uomo come essere razionale e come membro di una societa” [3, 4].

Invecchiamento, declino cognitivo, Alzheimer; ruolo della cultura nella prevenzione della demenza

Abstract: Un giorno ci si sveglia e davanti allo specchio si vede un’altra persona. Piu stanca e grigia. Oppure, magari in coincidenza con la primavera, ci si sente all’improvviso piu energici, piu vitali. Insomma, piu giovani. E un grande mistero, l’eta. Un mistero che coinvolge tutti ogni giorno: un mistero legato al matematico trascorrere del tempo ma anche scandito dal naturale, e inevitabile, processo di invecchiamento.