The architectural and environmental retrofitting of public social housing as a resource for contemporary cities. The redesign of building envelopes

The current focus on the transformation of Western cities puts forward, in a shared and far-reaching manner, ‘degrowth’ as an opportunity to renew and update the perspective of sustainability, not only from an environmental point of view, but from a social and economic point of view as well. The most modern updated legislation is also headed in this direction: considering building stock as a resource for renovation, adopting policies and strategies aimed at reducing land and energy consumption, reusing and recycling building stock. Nowadays, the interpretation of the terms Reduce, Reuse, Recycle in relation to urban devel-opment offers the opportunity to create a new generation of spaces and architectures that sees buildings – dilapidated, neglected, worn out or abandoned – as a real resource and, hence, value. Renovations concern new programmes and projects for rethinking the uses, meanings and the values contained in existing construction (from individual buildings to whole neigh-bourhoods) and which can change. Within this scenario, suburbs are now considered part of the contemporary city and they are becoming the object of particular attention from those who are involved in urban planning and managing urban developments. Among the resources that have already been built, social hous-ing stock is a wide field of investigation, from different points of view. This built heritage can involve different levels of building and space transformation and defines various design approaches: the overall architectural quality is to be acknowledged. These design approaches reinterpret regeneration activities and are not just limited to the ‘technical’ renovation of buildings: they also take into account the consequent urban, social and economic implications

AGN Obscuration and the Unified Model

Unification Models of Active Galactic Nuclei postulate that all the observed differences between Type 1 and Type 2 objects are due to orientation effects with respect to the line-of-sight to the observer. The key ingredient of these models is the obscuring medium, historically envisaged as a toroidal structure on a parsec scale. However, many results obtained in the last few years are clearly showing the need for a more complex geometrical distribution of the absorbing media. In this paper we review the various pieces of evidence for obscuring media on different scales, from the vicinity of the black hole to the host galaxy, in order to picture an updated unification scenario explaining the complex observed phenomenology. We conclude by mentioning some of the open issues.Comment: 14 pages, 8 figures, review article accepted for publication on the special issue of Advances in Astronomy "Seeking for the Leading Actor on the Cosmic Stage: Galaxies versus Supermassive Black Holes

Galaxy evolution in nearby galaxy groups. III. A GALEX view of NGC 5846, the largest group in the local universe

We explore the co-evolution of galaxies in nearby groups (V < 3000 km/s) with a multi-wavelength approach. We analyze GALEX far-UV (FUV) and near-UV (NUV) imaging and SDSS u,g,r,i,z data of groups spanning a large range of dynamical phases. We characterize the photometric properties of spectroscopically-confirmed galaxy members and investigate the global properties of the groups through a dynamical analysis. Here we focus on NGC 5846, the third most massive association of Early-Type Galaxies (ETG) after the Virgo and Fornax clusters. The group, composed of 90 members, is dominated by ETGs (about 80 per cent), and among ETGs about 40\% are dwarfs. Results are compared with those obtained for three groups in the LeoII cloud, which are radically different both in member-galaxy population and dynamical properties. The FUV-NUV cumulative colour distribution and the normalized UV luminosity function (LF) significantly differ due to the different fraction of late-type galaxy population. The UV LF of NGC 5846 resembles that of the Virgo cluster, however our analysis suggests that star-formation episodes are still occurring in most of the group galaxies, including ETGs. The NUV-i colour distribution, the optical-UV colour-colour diagram, and NUV-r vs. Mr colour-magnitude relation suggest that the gas contribution cannot be neglected in the evolution of ETG-type group members. Our analysis highlights that NGC~5846 is still in an active phase of its evolution, notwithstanding the dominance of dwarf and bright ETGs and its virialized configuration.Comment: 26 pages, 13 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA

Re-thinking Re-construction New Design Strategies for the Reconstruction after Natural Disasters. A Local Research Experience for a Global Topic

The paper presents the ongoing results of a design research carried out at the School ofArchitectureandDesign” EduardoVittoria”of Ascoli Piceno(SAAD)of the university of Camerino. Thespecificobjectiveoftheresearchistodevelopaninnovativeandreplicabledesign methodology, and to experiment new design strategies devoted to the sustainable, compatible and innovative-construction after natural disasters in rural areas and low-density urban systems. The research is based on a “local-to-global” approach: it refers to Italy as a case study but it aims to achieve general results applicable in different geographical contexts. Thespecificcasestudyrelatestotheearthquakethatin2016/2017affectedasignificant area of Central Italy and that strongly hit a large part of the so called “Italian village system”, i.e. a peculiar environmental and productive urban system that is still now in real emergency. As in most of the international reconstruction experiences, this reconstruction will certainly require along process which,still today,is full of unknowns. The massive damage caused by this disastrous event, the constraints imposed by regulations and the need for and adaptation of the buildings stock to the current housing standards, exclude the possibility of applying design strategies focused on a “where it was/as it was” model. This awareness, which increases the uncertainty about the future of the ”earthquake” communities, requires an innovative approach in relation to apparently incompatible aspects: the preservation of the identity of lost places and the upgrade of building performance often explicitly required by the population and however connected to a new housing demand. In relation to worldwide territories with a high level of disaster risk, this scenario can nowadays be considered a global issue which concerns both cultural and technical aspects. The design methodology pursued is based on a scientific approach to re-construction that focuses on a “systemic” and “design to build” approach that concerns also productive and technological aspects in relation to purposes of low-cost performance, constructive simplicity, cost-effectiveness of the interventions. This approach aims also at the introduction of the lightweight building system in contexts of traditional and massive construction, according to an idea of a construction site as an “assembly point” of prefabricated parts, light and modular, with a controlled life-cycle

Initial Results From a New Model of Posterior Chamber Implantable Phakic Contact Lens: IPCL V2.0.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the corneal safety, intraocular pressure (IOP), vault and refractive efficiency of the new implantable phakic contact lens, IPCL V2.0 (Care Group, India). A prospective case series study was performed to evaluate 100 consecutive surgeries with IPCL V2.0 (spherical and toric models). Refractive results, corneal endothelial cell density (CD) and central corneal thickness (CCT) were measured at baseline and 6 months after surgery. Intraocular pressure was measured at baseline, 1 day and 6 months, and vault, 3 and 6 months after surgery. Surgical complications and cataract development were also evaluated. The mean corneal endothelial CD decreased by 2.9% with a statistically significance difference (p: 0.03). The mean CCT decreased by 0.87% at 6 months postoperative, without a statistical significance difference (p: 0.35). The mean ± standard deviation (SD) of IOP at baseline was 13.72 ±1.4 mm Hg, at 1 day postoperative was 13.88 ±1.2 mm Hg, and at 6 months was 13.62 ±1.3 mm Hg. These differences were not statistically significant (p: 0.37). The difference in vault between 3 and 6 months after surgery was not statistically significant (p: 0.97). The coefficient of correlation between the attempted versus achieved spherical equivalent (SE) change was R2: 0.958. Postoperative SE was between -0.50 D to 0.50 D in 52% of cases. The remaining of the eyes had SE values ranging from -1.5 D to +1.35 D. No intra or postoperative complications occurred and specifically cataract was not developed. The corneal endothelial CD, CCT, vault and IOP remained stable 6 months after surgery. Refraction was improved and the IPCL V 2.0 was implanted safely

An optical reaction micro-turbine

To any energy flow there is an associated flow of momentum, so that recoil forces arise every time an object absorbs or deflects incoming energy. This same principle governs the operation of macroscopic turbines as well as that of microscopic turbines that use light as the working fluid. However, a controlled and precise redistribution of optical energy is not easy to achieve at the micron scale resulting in a low efficiency of power to torque conversion. Here we use direct laser writing to fabricate 3D light guiding structures, shaped as a garden sprinkler, that can precisely reroute input optical power into multiple output channels. The shape parameters are derived from a detailed theoretical analysis of losses in curved microfibers. These optical reaction micro-turbines can maximally exploit light’s momentum to generate a strong, uniform and controllable torque

Ri-abitare il moderno. Il progetto per il rinnovo dell’housing

Il testo si propone di affrontare il tema di ‘cosa fare’ del grande patrimonio di edilizia residenziale pubblica realizzato nella seconda metà del secolo scorso. Questo patrimonio di case popolari costituisce quella periferia moderna che è una parte significative delle nostre città e che la maggior parte di noi percepisce come problematica, sia brutta, sbagliata, luogo di degrado sociale fisico e ambientale. Questa enorme eredità edilizia residenziale formale, a partire dal secondo dopoguerra, costituisce oramai per quantità, una parte rilevante delle nostre città, soprattutto quando pur non essendo pubblica, ne ha però imitato i modi e le forme. Il testo indaga, attraverso un inquadramento del tema nel quadro internazionale, una rassegna di buone pratiche e sperimentazioni, metodi e strategie progettuali per il rinnovo di questo patrimonio edilizio, che rappresenta una risorsa su cui innescare urgenti processi di trasformazione, forse gli unici sostenibili dal punto di vista economico sociale e ambientale.The text aims focuses the theme of 'what to do' of the large public housing heritage achieved in the second half of the last century. This built heritage constitutes a a significant part of our cities - our suburbs- and that most of us perceive as problematic, both ugly, wrong, a place of physical and environmental social degradation. This huge formal residential building heritage, starting from the post-World War II period, now constitutes a relevant amount of our cities, especially when not being public, but has imitated the ways and forms. The text investigates, through a classification of the theme in the international context, a review of good practices and experiments, methods and design strategies for the renewal of this building heritage, which is a resource to be main object by urgent processes of transformation, perhaps the only sustainable from social and environmental point of view