'THE PROPER WRITING OF LIVES': BIOGRAPHY AND THE ART OF VIRGINIA WOOLF

The aim of the dissertation is to show Virginia Woolf\u2019s attachment to life, and thus to the genre of biography and life-writing, from three different perspectives. In the first place, Woolf was personally connected to literary life from her birth, being the daughter of Sir Leslie Stephen, the editor of The Dictionary of National Biography. Second, Woolf made biography the substance of her experimental fiction. Third, the genre of biography was the topic of several of her critical writings: she dealt with it when reviewing biographies, or when questioning its literary function and meaning in her essays. In the wake of these considerations, and by taking into account Woolf\u2019s life and literary achievement, my purpose is to propose a different image of Virginia Woolf, less encumbered by the orthodoxy of Modernism and deeply involved in a constant dialogue with the past. Her capability to stride over different epochs and to profit from the classical models in the genre of biography are the main evidences of my assertion. This dissertation is organized into four chapters. The first chapter focuses on the genre of biography, its metaphorical connections, and its historical development from the eighteenth to the twentieth century. The second chapter deals more in detail with modern biography, closing with a section devoted to the controversial relationship between Virginia Stephen and her father, a relevant figure both in her personal and professional experience. In the third chapter, I have considered those literary texts in Woolf\u2019s fictional work which contain valuable hints on the subject of biography. Specifically, I have analysed five works: Night and Day (1919), Jacob\u2019s Room (1922), To the Lighthouse (1927), Orlando (1928), and Flush (1933). The fourth chapter reflects on Woolf\u2019s critical contribution to a theoretical discourse about biography, focusing the attention on her most relevant reviews about biographies written by contemporary and non-contemporary writers, and examining her most outstanding essays concerning the genre. The chapter ends with the analysis of Roger Fry: A Biography (1940), Woolf\u2019s \u201cclassical\u201d biography and final achievement within the genre

Towards Recommender Systems with Community Detection and Quantum Computing

After decades of being mainly confined to theoretical research, Quantum Computing is now becoming a useful tool for solving realistic problems. This work aims to experimentally explore the feasibility of using currently available quantum computers, based on the Quantum Annealing paradigm, to build a recommender system exploiting community detection. Community detection, by partitioning users and items into densely connected clusters, can boost the accuracy of non-personalized recommendation by assuming that users within each community share similar tastes. However, community detection is a computationally expensive process. The recent availability of Quantum Annealers as cloud-based devices, constitutes a new and promising direction to explore community detection, although effectively leveraging this new technology is a long-term path that still requires advancements in both hardware and algorithms. This work aims to begin this path by assessing the quality of community detection formulated as a Quadratic Unconstrained Binary Optimization problem on a real recommendation scenario. Results on several datasets show that the quantum solver is able to detect communities of comparable quality with respect to classical solvers, but with better speedup, and the non-personalized recommendation models built on top of these communities exhibit improved recommendation quality. The takeaway is that quantum computing, although in its early stages of maturity and applicability, shows promise in its ability to support new recommendation models and to bring improved scalability as technology evolves

A bolometric measurement of the antineutrino mass

High statistics calorimetric measurements of the beta spectrum of 187Re are being performed with arrays of silver perrhenate crystals operated at low temperature. After a modification of the experimental set-up, which allowed to substantially reduce the background of spurious counts and therefore to increase the sensitivity on the electron antineutrino mass, a new measurement with 10 silver perrhenate microbolometers is running since July 2002. The crystals have masses between 250 and 350 micrograms and their average FWHM energy resolution, constantly monitored by means of fluorescence X-rays, is of 28.3 eV at the beta end-point. The Kurie plot collected during 4485 hours x mg effective running time has an end-point energy of 2466.1 +/- 0.8{stat} +/- 1.5 {syst} eV, while the half lifetime of the decay is found to be 43.2 +/- 0.2{stat} +/- 0.1{syst} Gy. These values are the most precise obtained so far for 187Re. From the fit of the Kurie plot we can deduce a value for the squared electron antineutrino mass m(nu)^2 of 147 +/- 237{stat} +/- 90{syst} eV^2. The corresponding 90% C.L. upper limit for m(nu) is 21.7 eV.Comment: 3 pages, 3 figures. Submitted to Phys. Rev. Let

Large area Si low-temperature light detectors with Neganov-Luke effect

Next generation calorimetric experiments for the search of rare events rely on the detection of tiny amounts of light (of the order of 20 optical photons) to discriminate and reduce background sources and improve sensitivity. Calorimetric detectors are the simplest solution for photon detection at cryogenic (mK) temperatures. The development of silicon based light detectors with enhanced performance thanks to the use of the Neganov-Luke effect is described. The aim of this research line is the production of high performance detectors with industrial-grade reproducibility and reliability.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figure

Monte Carlo evaluation of the external gamma, neutron and muon induced background sources in the CUORE experiment

CUORE is a 1 ton scale cryogenic experiment aiming at the measurement of the Majorana mass of the electron neutrino. The detector is an array of 988 TeO2 bolometers used for a calorimetric detection of the two electrons emitted in the BB0n of 130Te. The sensitivity of the experiment to the lowest Majorana mass is determined by the rate of background events that can mimic a BB0n. In this paper we investigate the contribution of external sources i.e. environmental gammas, neutrons and cosmic ray muons to the CUORE background and show that the shielding setup designed for CUORE guarantees a reduction of this external background down to a level <1.0E-02 c/keV/kg/y at the Q-value, as required by the physical goal of the experiment.Comment: 14 pages, 7 figure

Health related quality of life in COVID-19 survivors discharged from acute hospitals: results of a short-form 36-item survey [version 1; peer review: awaiting peer review]

Background: Health-related quality of life (HRQL) is important for evaluating the impact of a disease in the longer term across the physical and psychological domains of human functioning. The aim of this study is to evaluate HRQL in COVID-19 survivors in Italy using the short form 36-items questionnaire (SF-36). Methods: This is an observational study involving adults discharged home following a coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)-related hospital admission. Baseline demographic and clinical data including the Cumulative Illness Rating Scale (CIRS) and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) were collected. The validated Italian version of SF-36 was administered cross-sectionally. The SF-36 contains eight scales measuring limitations in physical and social functioning, the impact on roles and activities, fatigue, emotional wellbeing, pain and general health perception. Results: A total of 35 patients, with a mean age of 60 years, completed the SF-36. The results showed difficulties across the physical and psychological domains, particularly affecting the return to previous roles and activities. A higher burden of co-morbidities as well as a more severe muscle weakness was associated to a lower physical functioning. Younger age, rather than older, correlated to a perceived greater limitation in physical functioning and vitality. Conclusions: COVID-19 survivors particularly the ones of working age may need support for resuming their premorbid level of functioning and returning to work

First bolometric measurement of the two neutrino double beta decay of 100^{100}Mo with a ZnMoO4_4 crystals array

The large statistics collected during the operation of a ZnMoO$_4$ array, for a total exposure of 1.3 kg $\cdot$ day of $^{100}$Mo, allowed the first bolometric observation of the two neutrino double beta decay of $^{100}$Mo. The observed spectrum of each crystal was reconstructed taking into account the different background contributions due to environmental radioactivity and internal contamination. The analysis of coincidences between the crystals allowed the assignment of constraints to the intensity of the different background sources, resulting in a reconstruction of the measured spectrum down to an energy of $\sim$300 keV. The half-life extracted from the data is T$_{1/2}^{2\nu}$= [7.15 $\pm$ 0.37 (stat) $\pm$ 0.66 (syst)] $\cdot$ 10$^{18}$ y.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figure, Accepted for publication in Journal of Physics G: Nuclear and Particle Physic