Mobile citizenship, states of exception and (non)border regimes in the pandemic and post-Covid19 Cyprus

This study examined the impact of the emergency measures on community relations, fundamental rights, and mobility rights during the Covid19 pandemic in de facto divided Cyprus. It explored states of exception, as well as solidarity aiming to counter those restrictions. Internal and external borders were mobilised to separate ‘us’ from ‘them’, shaped by the pandemic policies and media discourses via a hygiene emergency with suspension of rights, hitting severely the most vulnerable, often migrants and asylum-seekers. The hostile and securitised climate was generated by the political elites and the media and was built on the ‘Cypriot states of exception’ and colonial laws by extending old and generating new bordering processes. An illiberal policy frame towards migrants and asylum-seekers was manifested in form of a state exception of immobility, which affects the relations between the two communities, the division of Cyprus, peace-keeping and peace-making. Contra this hostile environment and given the welfare state crisis, acts for citizenship have generated praxis-based solidarity. Via digital networking, we observed processes of reorganisation of activism. This is prefiguring a potential for reassembling socialities, paving ways for social imaginaries of a mobile citizenship transcending old and new divisions of Cyprus and the world

Venetian Walls of Nicosia: Between Kyrenia Gate - Barbaro Bastion

[EN] icosia today has the characteristics of being the only divided city in Europe. By examining the inside of the walls, one observes that the structure of the city is determined by the circular plan of the walls that were constructed during the Venetian period. There are 11 bastions on the walls and three Venetian gates, namely Kyrenia Gate, Famagusta Gate and Paphos Gate, were originally designed to allow entrance to the city that is encircled by the walls. Nicosia continued to be the islands capital which has fallen under Ottoman rule in between 1571-1878. In the period of British occupation 1878-1960, as a result of the increasing population, the city of Nicosia overflew the walls and developed by spreading beyond the city walls and 8 new passages were opened. The organic fabric of the walled city, with the establishment of buffer zones after the peace operation of 1974, resulted in the division of the island that divided the capital city into two. In 1931, because of the increased vehicle needs through the north side, the walls around the Kyrenia Gate (Porta del Proveditore) were trimmed and designed as a single monumental building. Between Kyrenia Gate and Barbaro bastion wall height is lower than the existing. Public lavatory and 9 small shops were inserted. Sitting steps were designed on the walls and two stairs were constructed to reach these area. To give an access from the moat to the inner city there is a passage. In this context, identifying changes of the Kyrenia Gate-Barbaro bastion site, during this historic period, is the main goal of this study. Decisions with regard to these walls and observations to be made on right places to determine the changes are main focuses of the study.Öngül, Z. (2020). Venetian Walls of Nicosia: Between Kyrenia Gate - Barbaro Bastion. Editorial Universitat Politècnica de València. 713-720. https://doi.org/10.4995/FORTMED2020.2020.1141771372

Energy renovation of an existing building in Nicosia Cyprus and investigation of the passive contribution of a BIPV/T double façade system: A case-study

Abstract The European regulatory shift towards energy-efficient buildings and nearly zero energy buildings (NZEB) leads architects and engineers to the need for investigation of new innovative design methodologies. The reduction of the energy demand for cooling, heating and artificial lighting is now mandatory for new buildings and for large renovations of existing buildings, in order to comply with these new regulations. This is a challenge since the majority of the current building stock is consisted by over than 25-year-old existing buildings, which are inefficient in terms of energy needs. The aim of this study is to completely renovate an existing building in the centre of Nicosia, Cyprus, by applying a novel double facade system. This is consisted by a combination of a novel Building Integrated Photovoltaic/Thermal system (BIPV/T) and a Corridor Type Double facade system, which acts autonomously in every floor. The proposed research starts with an analysis of building and site geometry and moves through a literature review, along with the presentation of case studies where active solar energy systems are integrated on double building facades. Digital energy simulations are performed where the proposed double facade's passive contribution is investigated. At the same time, these simulations aim to analyse whether the system can cover the energy needs of the aforementioned building. The investigation focuses into calculating the facade's electricity production potential, whilst its passive contribution is recorded through the reduction potential of the building's energy needs for heating, cooling and artificial lighting. Through a 3D simulations modelling, the existing energy needs are recorded and then compared to the calculated needs of the renovated building. The ultimate aim of this research is to determine whether the use of BIPV/T double facade solutions for the refurbishment of existing buildings consist an environmental viable solution

Industrial Heritage Buildings in Cyprus; Spatial Experience of the Nicosia Municipal Arts Centre

This study focuses on the Nicosia Municipal Arts Centre [NiMAC] in Nicosia, one of the prominent historical industrial buildings in Cyprus, which has been re-functionalized as an art centre. The overall goal of this study is to examine and clarify the human experience of the NiMAC building as part of one’s lifeworld. The main argument of the research is that proposing an effective research design for examining how a person distinguishes the components of a re-used building is possible by human responses to architecture rather than focusing on the physical aesthetics of it. Hence, the purpose of the study is to make a multi-sensory analysis to grasp how a person develops an emotional attitude in the re-functioned space which can be the core assessment of the adaptive re-use purposes. In this context, this research basically explores the main research question which is about what spatial experiences the NiMAC building is offering to people after it is re-functioned when space is experienced in a multisensory approach. Methodologically, this research design is basically created by the hybrid use of first-person, existential, and hermeneutic tactics of the phenomenological approach

Governing displaced migration in Europe : housing and the role of the “local”

The underlying research funding for this article comes from the Joint Programming Initiative Urban Europe, with support from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under grant agreement No 693443.This article will explore the extent to which a focus on the ‘local’ can tell us something meaningful about recent developments in the governance of displaced migrants and refugees. Taking a multi-sited approach spanning cases in the south and north of Europe, we consider how the challenge of housing and accommodation in particular, a core sector of migrant reception and integration, can shed light on the ways local and city level approaches may negotiate, and sometimes diverge from, national level policy and rhetoric. While it can be said that despite variation, local authorities are by definition ultimately ‘always subordinate’ (Emilsson, Comparative Migration Studies, 3: 1-17, 2015: 4), they can also show evidence of ‘decoupling’ across geographies of policy delivery (Pope and Meyer, European Journal of Cultural and Political Sociology, 3: 280–305, 2016: 290). This article traces how possible local variations in different European cases are patterned by ground-level politics, local strategic networks, and pre-existing economic resources in a manner that is empirically detailed through the study of housing.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

PROMOTING INTERACTIVITY AND CREATIVITY IN A SCIENCE COURSE

Young people entering the working force are nowadays required to compete not only on skills and education but also on creative thinking. This is because creativity and innovation are a must for businesses and nations which, today more than ever, are required to compete on the creative use of the scarce resources and the identification of new ones. Thus, promoting creative thinking among students, individually and collectively, is an educator’s challenge. This paper presents the efforts made to promote creative thinking in a Human Computer Interaction course and the students’ evaluation of these efforts

The contribution of condensation-corrosion in the morphological evolution of caves in semi-arid regions: preliminary investigations in the Kyrenia Range, Cyprus

The condensation-corrosion process occurs when airflow cools at the contact with colder cave walls. Condensed water becomes aggressive for soluble rocks and corrodes the walls. This process is particularly active close to cave entrances in high thermal gradient zones where external air enters caves. Condensation appears to be important where bat colonies are also present. Bat metabolism and guano decomposition release heat, vapour, and acids. Hence, bat colonies contribute to the increase of condensation- corrosion, especially by providing permanent moisture and chemical aggressiveness. Corrosive air convections produce rounded morphologies, such as ceiling channels, cupolas, and corroded older flowstones. This process has been overlooked in previous research, since related morphologies were often confused with those produced by early phreatic flow. Kyrenia Range in Cyprus has a semi-arid climate. All the studied caves developed along open-fractures. They are located both in recrystallized carbonates (limestone and dolostone, such as Smoky and Pigeons Caves), or in gypsum (First Day and Angry Bat Caves). We also studied a maze cave that acted as a spring in gypsum that initially developed under phreatic conditions, followed by an epiphreatic phase that allowed the development of notches (Fig Tree Cave, also named İncirli Show Cave). Due to the semi-arid climate, external air is very dry in summer, thus condensation seems to occur mainly in winter, when cave atmosphere instability allows large air exchanges between caves and surface atmosphere. In summer, evaporation prevails, allowing the development of popcorn lines in carbonate caves and massive gypsum crusts, stalagmites, and sidewalk rims in gypsum caves. However, the presence of a bat colony in a semi-confined chamber in Smoky Cave is probably the origin of the permanent moisture, also during the dry season, leading to a strong development of condensation-corrosion features such as ceiling cupolas, and possibly to the permanent activity of flowstones. In addition, we detected high concentrations of sulphur dioxide (SO2) and radon (Rn) in Fig Tree Cave, possibly related to the activity of the neighbouring overthrust. Based on the five studied caves in the Kyrenia Range and surroundings, the open-fracture caves in carbonates and gypsum have not undergone the typical initial phreatic stage, but have formed in a short time during Pleistocene as a result of the fast uplift of the range and were later reshaped by condensation-corrosion morphologies. Some gypsum caves may have formed entirely by this latter process, after initial minor fracture development. Cyprus is an outstanding area for studying the condensation-corrosion in caves, since a phreatic origin can be ruled out for most of the rounded morphologies. Prispevek kondenzacijske korozije pri razvoju jam v polsuhih območjih: predhodni rezultati v jamah Kirenijskega gorovja, CiperKondenzacijska korozija se pojavi ob stiku vlažnega zračnega toka s hladnimi jamskimi stenami. Pri tem na jamsko steno iz zraka kondenzira film vode, ki kemično korodira vodotopno kamnino. Proces je najbolj izrazit v bližini jamskih vhodov, kjer ob visokem temperaturnem gradientu zunanji zrak vstopa v jamo. Kondenzacijo in kondenzacijsko korozijo lahko pomembno povečajo kolonije netopirjev. Metabolizem netopirjev in razpadanje gvana sproščata toploto, vlago in kisline. Kondenzacijska korozija iz konvekcijskih tokov vlažnega zraka ustvarja zaobljene skalne oblike, kot so kupole, stropni kanali in korodirana siga. Kirenijsko gorovje na Cipru ima polsuho podnebje. Večina jam v tej raziskavi so odprte razpoke v prekristaljenem karbonatu (apnenec in dolomit) ali v sadri. Poleg teh obravnavamo tudi blodnjake v sadri, ki so se oblikovali v freatični coni in so v preteklosti delovali kot izviri. V njih najdemo stenske zajede, ki so nastale v epifreatični fazi. Ker je zrak poleti zelo suh, je kondenzacija omejena na zimski čas, ko se intenzivno izmenjuje zrak med jamsko in zunanjo atmosfero. Poleti prevladuje izhlapevanje, kar omogoča razvoj cvetačastih oblik v karbonatnih jamah ter sadrinih skorij, stalagmitov in stranskih obrob v jamah v sadri. Kolonija netopirjev v eni od polzaprtih dvoran v jami Smoky Cave verjetno vzdržuje visoko vlago tudi poleti. Posledica so močno izražene oblike kondenzacijske korozije (kupole) in stalna aktivna rast sige. V eni od jam smo izmerili visoko vsebnost SO2 in radona, ki je verjetno povezana z aktivno narivno tektoniko. Pet obravnavanih jam je tektonskega izvora in so verjetno nastale v kratkem obdobju hitrega dvigovanja v pleistocenu ter bile kasneje preoblikovane s kondenzacijsko korozijo. Nekatere jame v sadri so nastale skoraj izključno s kondenzacijsko korozijo, ki je preoblikovala prvotne majhne razpoke. Ciper je izjemno območje za podobne študije, saj lahko zaradi odsotnosti freatične faze večino zaobljenih jamskih oblik pripišemo kondenzacijski koroziji.Ključne besede: Vzhodno Sredozemlje, kondenzacijska korozija, gvano, Kirenijsko gorovje, jame v odprtih razpokah, hitri tektonski dvig, sadra, jamska mikroklima, pleistocen

Social activism and the city: cultural sociology and radical politics in 21st century Cyprus

This article discusses alternative cultural communication processes in the context of urban activism in inner Nicosia, as manifested in the last two decades. It examines a variety of cultural and social practices and their political implications in terms of their interaction with the surrounding space and wider society. The city’s division, the growth of the immigrant population and the attempted regeneration of inner Nicosia set the context for a variety of practices of contestation of nationalist and commercialist cultures, challenging them in the fields of culture and lifestyle. Through an overview of the key dimensions of activist interventions in the public space in the last two decades, the article argues that there are both elements of connection across issues, movements and processes as well as continuity across time. By examining practices rooted in social dynamics and expressing dissenting political and cultural worldviews, a more nuanced cultural sociology of the Greek Cypriot community may be constructed which goes beyond generalist images emanating from the mainstream public sphere. Through their diversion from mainstream ideas, politics and everyday life, the urban movements presented here engaged in redefining the meaning of the inner city and the life in it and registering it for more than a decade as an alternative place

Casirivimab/İmdevimab: Evcil Hayvanlarda COVID-19 Tedavisi İçin Olası Bir Aday: Geleneksel Derleme

The coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19), over the last 3 years has globally resulted in catastrophic widespread losses. Prevention and control of this disease has become a global priority for researchers and medical professionals due to high mortality rates, treatment costs and various losses (economic and fatalities). In recent times, the fact that cats and dogs living in households which are being affected by the disease has caused panic among pet owners and animal lovers. Studies have shown that cats, especially young cats, are the group of animals which are most affected. Therefore, the treatment of COVID-19 in animals is an important topic for veterinary medicine. Monoclonal antibodies have also been considered a possible treatment modality due to the use of various agents to treat COVID-19 and the lack of clear demonstration of their efficacy. Casirivimab/imdevimab (CAS/IMD) is a monoclonal antibody cocktail approved for treating COVID-19. There was a high expectation that CAS/IMD combination directly affects the angiotensin converting enzyme-2 receptors, which plays an important role in the pathogenesis of the virus. Experimental and clinical studies have shown that CAS/IMD combination positively affects the prognosis of patients suffering from COVID-19, speeds up the recovery process and increases survival. We suggest that CAS/IMD can be considered protective in COVID-19 positive dogs and cats. The aim of this article is to review the studies related to the beneficial effects of CAS/IMD and its possible effectiveness in animals with COVID-19 to promote their research in future studies.Koronavirüs hastalığı-2019 [coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID- 19)], son 3 yılda küresel olarak trajik yaygın kayıplara neden oldu. Bu hastalığın önlenmesi ve kontrolü; yüksek ölüm oranları, tedavi maliyetleri ve diğer çeşitli kayıplar (ekonomik ve ölümler) nedeniyle araştırmacılar ve medikal uzmanları için küresel bir öncelik hâline gelmiştir. Son zamanlarda hastalıktan etkilenen hanelerde yaşayan kedi ve köpeklerin olması, evcil hayvan sahipleri ve hayvanseverler arasında da paniğe neden oldu. Araştırmalar, kedilerin, özellikle genç kedilerin, en çok etkilenen hayvan grubu olduğunu göstermiştir. Bu nedenle hayvanlarda COVID-19 tedavisi veteriner hekimliği için önemli bir konudur. Monoklonal antikorlar, COVID-19’u tedavi etmek için çeşitli ajanların kullanılması ve etkinliklerinin net bir şekilde gösterilmemesi nedeniyle olası bir tedavi yöntemi olarak kabul edilmiştir. Casirivimab/imdevimab (CAS/IMD), COVID-19 tedavisi için onaylanmış bir monoklonal antikor kokteylidir. CAS/IMD kombinasyonunun, virüsün patogenezinde önemli bir rol oynayan anjiyotensin dönüştürücü enzim-2 reseptörlerini doğrudan etkilediği yönünde yüksek bir beklenti vardı. Deneysel ve klinik çalışmalar, CAS/IMD kombinasyonunun, COVID-19’dan muzdarip hastaların prognozunu olumlu yönde etkilediğini, iyileşme sürecini hızlandırdığını ve sağkalım oranını artırdığını göstermiştir. Dolayısıyla CAS/IMD’nin COVID-19 pozitif köpek ve kedilerde koruyucu olarak kabul edilebileceğini öneriyoruz. Bu derlemenin amacı, CAS/IMD’nin faydalı etkileri ile ilgili çalışmaları ve gelecekteki araştırmaları teşvik etmek için COVID-19’lu hayvanlarda CAS/IMD’nin olası etkinliğinin gözden geçirilmesidir

Dismantling Detention: International Alternatives to Detaining Immigrants

As the harmful effects of immigration detention become more widely known and the appropriateness of detaining migrants is increasingly questioned, governments are looking at alternatives to detention as more humane and rights-respecting approaches to addressing the management of migrants and asylum seekers with unsettled legal status. This report examines alternatives to immigration detention in six countries: Bulgaria, Canada, Republic of Cyprus, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States to highlight viable, successful alternatives that countries should implement before resorting to detention. While the report provides an analysis of specific alternatives to detention (often referred to as ATDs) in each country, it is not intended to provide a comprehensive overview of all alternative programs available.Each country featured in this report has taken a different approach to alternatives to detention. Some focus more heavily on surveillance and others on a more person-centered, holistic approach. Ultimately, this report finds alternatives that place the basic needs and dignity of migrants at the forefront of policy, such as community-based case management programs, offer a rights-respecting alternative to detention while simultaneously furthering governments' legitimate immigration enforcement aims