LA PERCEZIONE DEL RISCHIO AMBIENTALE NEI CONTESTI DI VALUTAZIONE IPOTETICA. IL CASO DELLE INFRASTRUTTURE URBANE PER LO SMALTIMENTO DEI RIFIUTI

This work highlights how, within the context of contingent valuation, supporting the assessment of monetary measures of mitigation of environmental damages, has not been sufficiently clarified the role played by the perception of environmental risk, particularly in an ex ante context, where the effect of psychological anchoring to the status quo and the amount / type of available information have an important role driving the individual preferences. The contribution to experimental economics - of which the contingent valuation takes share - of the theory of choice under uncertainty and of behavioural economics is briefly traced and, in order to provide empirical evidence, the results of a choice experiment implemented in Turin, in order to assess the effect of the disamenity due to the location of solid waste infrastructure, are showin

La Conjoint Analysis nelle valutazioni immobiliari

Conjoint Analysis (CA) is probably the most known and widely used tool in marketing research and demand forecasting. The premise of CA is that every product, or service, has multiple attributes, each with a different utility value for the consumer and that individual utilities can be quantified and assessed in a market simulation perspective. In spite of its popularity and wide diffusion, there has been little systematic research relating to the specific market – like the real estate market. Our work starts from this lack and it is organised in three sections: the first introduces a short history of CA and compares the performances of different interview designs: Adaptive Conjoint Analysis (ACA) and Choice Based Conjoint (CBC). The second section presents the case-study – the housing market of Turin – and shows the results of a research experiment. We compare ACA and CBC designs and discuss about the best when the goal is valuation – in other hands, the price is present between the attributes. The third section concludes and focuses on the problem of real estate market simulation and demand forecasting

Normality and smoothness of simple linear group compactifications

If G is a complex semisimple algebraic group, we characterize the normality and the smoothness of its simple linear compactifications, namely those equivariant GxG-compactifications which possess a unique closed orbit and which arise in a projective space of the shape P(End(V)), where V is finite dimensional rational G-module. Both the characterizations are purely combinatorial and are expressed in terms of the highest weights of V. In particular, we show that Sp(2r) (with r > 0) is the unique non-adjoint simple group which admits a simple smooth compactification.Comment: v2: minor changes, final version. To appear in Math.

Primer genoma mitocondrial en restos humanos de la Costa de Santa Cruz, Argentina

En este trabajo se presenta la secuencia completa de ADN mitocondrial, obtenida a partir de restos óseos de un hombre adulto, hallado en el sitio Cañadón Misioneros (provincia de Santa Cruz, Argentina), con una antigüedad de 70 ± 30 años antes del presente. La secuencia corresponde al haplogrupo (hg) D4h3a5, nativo de América y exclusivo del sur de Patagonia, donde ha sido descripto tanto en muestras antiguas como actuales. Esta secuencia constituye el primer dato de ADN mitocondrial en la costa atlántica de Patagonia con la resolución suficiente para definir a nivel de subhaplogrupo. Se discuten las implicancias en cuanto a los vínculos biológicos de las poblaciones que habitaron esa porción del espacio patagónico en el marco de la información genética y arqueológica disponible.We describe the complete mitochondrial genome sequence of an adult male skeleton, discovered at Cañadón Misioneros (Santa Cruz Province, Argentina), and dated 70 ± 30 years before present. The DNA sequence corresponded to haplogroup D4h3a5, native to the Americas and exclusive to the south of Patagonia, where it has been observed both in ancient and present-day individuals. This is the first mitochondrial DNA data of the Atlantic coast of Patagonia of sufficient resolution to permit classification at the subhaplogroup level. The implications for the genetic affinities of populations of this region of Patagonia will be discussed in the context of available genetic and archaeological information

Intrinsic surface depression of the order parameter under mixed (s+id)-wave pair symmetry and its effect on the critical current of high-Tc SIS Josephson junctions

An intrinsic gap depression at the Superconductor-Insulator interface due to the very short value of the coherence length in High-Tc Superconductors [HTSs] is considered, in the framework of a mixed (s+id)-wave pair symmetry for the order parameter ranging from pure s to pure d-wave. This gap depression acts as the main physical agent causing the relevant reduction of IcRn(T) values with respect to BCS expectations in HTS SIS Josephson junctions. Good agreement with various experimental data is obtained with both pure s-wave and pure d-wave symmetries of the order parameter, but with amounts of gap depression depending on the pair symmetry adopted. Regardless of the pair symmetry considered, these results prove the importance of the surface order-parameter depression in the correct interpretation of the Ic(T)Rn(T) data in HTS SIS junctions. In a case of planar YBCO-based junction the use of the de Gennes condition allowed us to tentatively obtain an upper limit for the amount of d-wave present in the order parameter of YBCO.Comment: 11 pages REVTeX file, 6 PostScript figures, to be published in J. Superconductivit

Mediterranean diet and outcomes of assisted reproduction: an Italian cohort study

Background: Detrimental lifestyle habits have been indicated as potential causes of reduced fertility. Recently studies have suggested an association between healthy diets and increased live birth rates after assisted reproduction techniques. However, the issue remains under debate, and evidence is still accumulating. Objective: The objective of the study was to study the relationship between a Mediterranean diet and outcomes of assisted reproduction techniques in subfertile couples in an Italian population. Study Design: This was a prospective cohort study, conducted in an Italian fertility clinic. Couples undergoing in vitro fertilization were interviewed on the day of oocyte retrieval to obtain information on personal and health history, lifestyle habits, and diet. Adherence to a Mediterranean diet was evaluated using a Mediterranean diet score. Relative risks and 95% confidence intervals for embryo transfer, clinical pregnancy, and live birth were calculated. Potential confounders were included in the equation model. Results: Among 474 women (mean age, 36.6 years, range, 27\u201345), 414 (87.3%) performed embryo transfer, 150 (31.6%) had clinical pregnancies, and 117 (24.7%) had live births. In a model including the potential confounders (age, leisure physical activity, body mass index, smoking, daily calorie intake, and previous failed in vitro fertilization cycles), findings showed that the Mediterranean diet score was not significantly associated with in vitro fertilization outcomes. Adjusted analyses were performed in strata of age, previous assisted reproduction technique cycles, and reasons for infertility, with consistent findings. The only exception was observed in women >35 years old with an intermediate Mediterranean diet score, who showed a lower risk of not achieving clinical pregnancy (adjusted relative risk, 0.84, 95% confidence interval, 0.71\u20131.00, P = .049). Conclusion: No clear association was observed between adherence to a Mediterranean diet and successful in vitro fertilization

Health effects of living near an incinerator: A systematic review of epidemiological studies, with focus on last generation plants

Huge reductions in incinerators' emissions occurred over time, and results of older studies cannot be directly generalized to modern plants. We conducted a systematic review of the epidemiologic evidence of the health effects of incinerators, classifying plants in three generations, according to emission limits. A systematic search identified 63 epidemiologic studies, published in English, investigating health effects of incinerators on humans. We focused on cancer, cardio-cerebrovascular diseases (CVD) and respiratory diseases, pregnancy outcomes and congenital anomalies. Only six studies in the general population were on third generation incinerators providing data on pregnancy outcomes and congenital anomalies. Given the heterogeneity of methods, the abundance of ecological/semi-ecological studies and the lack of reliable quantitative measures of exposure in several studies we did not perform any meta-analysis. No excesses emerged concerning all cancers and lung cancer. An excess of non-Hodgkin lymphoma was reported in some earlier studies, but not for second generation plants. Possible excesses of soft tissue sarcomas were confined to earlier incinerators and the areas closer to the plants. No clear association emerged for CVD and diseases of the respiratory system. Several different pregnancy outcomes were considered, and no consistent association emerged, in spite of a few positive results. Studies were negative for congenital anomalies as a whole. Sporadic excesses were reported in a few studies for specific types of anomalies, but no consistent pattern emerged. Evaluation of the evidence was hindered by heterogeneity in reporting and classification of outcomes across studies. Direct evidence from third generation plants is scarce. Methodological issues in study design (mainly related to exposure assessment, confounding and ecological design) and analysis make interpretation of results complex. In spite of this, the overall evidence suggests that, if there were any excesses at all for older incinerators, they were modest at most. Additional monitoring of third generation plants needs to overcome methodological weakness

Inferring hidden states in Langevin dynamics on large networks: Average case performance

We present average performance results for dynamical inference problems in large networks, where a set of nodes is hidden while the time trajectories of the others are observed. Examples of this scenario can occur in signal transduction and gene regulation networks. We focus on the linear stochastic dynamics of continuous variables interacting via random Gaussian couplings of generic symmetry. We analyze the inference error, given by the variance of the posterior distribution over hidden paths, in the thermodynamic limit and as a function of the system parameters and the ratio {\alpha} between the number of hidden and observed nodes. By applying Kalman filter recursions we find that the posterior dynamics is governed by an "effective" drift that incorporates the effect of the observations. We present two approaches for characterizing the posterior variance that allow us to tackle, respectively, equilibrium and nonequilibrium dynamics. The first appeals to Random Matrix Theory and reveals average spectral properties of the inference error and typical posterior relaxation times, the second is based on dynamical functionals and yields the inference error as the solution of an algebraic equation.Comment: 20 pages, 5 figure