Design Challenges in Creative Systems. Theories, Methods, and Practices for Sustainability and Inclusion.

This volume focuses on the dynamic systems of creativity and culture within the diverse fields of design, merging theoretical reflections, case studies, methodologies, technologies, tools, and original practices. The twelve essays adopt different viewpoints to consider the critical role of design in addressing sustainability and social inclusion in creative and cultural industries, positioning them as vital components of a broader design process that fosters local growth, revitalizes communities, and co-creates cultural, economic, and social values. In today's evolving global society, crises in productive cycles, amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic, have accelerated the need for change and influenced behaviors. Digital technologies have transformed the creative arts and media landscape, bridging the gap between designers and consumers and expanding possibilities in both real and virtual domains. Audience engagement is central to this reflection, aiming to increase interest in cultural heritage, promote innovative cultural experiences, and reach underrepresented groups, ensuring accessibility to a diverse audience. As a new era emerges with evolving forms of society, culture, economy, and politics, the book revisits concepts like 'sustainable culture,' 'inclusive sociality,' and 'participation' in cultural heritage as a common good. Proposing a long-term, holistic approach to the challenges of the Anthropocene Age, it highlights the importance of creative and cultural industries in local development and community engagement. It envisions new models of sociality and community concepts, seeing design, creativity, and culture as catalysts for continuous change and interaction. By adopting multidisciplinary approaches and innovative practices, the volume seeks to inspire new models for cultural engagement and community development, contributing to a more inclusive and sustainable future. It redefines issues like accessibility, multiculturalism, and inclusion, reshaping the social and political positioning of the current cultural system

Modelling the spatial interactions between workplace and residential location

The use of Multinomial Logit (MNL) models specification for the simulation of residential location have been often criticised due to the Independence of Irrelevant Alternatives hypothesis (IIA) which does not allow for the existence of spatial correlation between residential zones. Moreover, it is not clear when and to what extent the influence of the workplace zone and accessibility to employment affect the residential location choices made by households; in other word, whether the residing choice is conditional to the workplace, or vice versa; or if such choices (residence and work place) are joint. In this paper, Nested Logit (NL) and Cross-Nested Logit models of residential location choice are specified and compared to MNL, to investigate the existence of spatial correlation between different locations. Furthermore, different assumptions are tested, considering the choice of residential zone and the joint choice of residential zone and work place zone. The models were estimated for the urban area of Santander (Spain). The results indicate that the inclusion in the model specification, of the spatial correlation between zones fit the data significantly better. Home-work journey times were a statistically significant factor in household location choice, whereas accessibility to employment had the correct sign but it was not statistically significant

Modelling transport and real-estate values interactions in urban systems

This article presents hedonic Multiple Linear Regression models (MLR), Spatial Auto-Regressive hedonic models (SAR), Spatial autoregressive hedonic in the Error term Models (SEM) and spatial Durbin hedonic Models (SDM) to estimate houses price variations in metropolitan areas as a result of changing environmental and accessibility conditions. The goodness of fit of the different models has been compared along with a series of hypotheses about the performance of the specifications considering spatial relationships between observations. The case study for such analysis was the urban area of Santander (Spain). It has been observed the models which considered spatial dependence between observations offered a greater degree of fit in a scenario showing strong spatial correlation in MLR residuals. The SEM model combined with a Queen-Contiguity matrix provided a good fit to the data and at the same time presented significant parameters with theoretically coherent signs. This model estimated increases of 1.8% for each additional transit line present in the areas of housing, as well as a reduction of 1.1% in their prices for each additional minute in travelling time to the Central Business District. Closeness to the train stations, however, implied reductions in house prices

An Extracellular Domain of the Insulin Receptor β-Subunit with Regulatory Function on Protein-Tyrosine Kinase

Abstract Anti-insulin receptor monoclonal antibody MA-10 inhibits insulin receptor autophosphorylation of purified rat liver insulin receptors without affecting insulin binding (Cordera, R., Andraghetti, G., Gherzi, R., Adezati, L., Montemurro, A., Lauro, R., Goldfine, I. D., and De Pirro, R. (1987) Endocrinology 121, 2007-2010). The effect of MA-10 on insulin receptor autophosphorylation and on two insulin actions (thymidine incorporation into DNA and receptor down-regulation) was investigated in rat hepatoma Fao cells. MA-10 inhibits insulin-stimulated receptor autophosphorylation, thymidine incorporation into DNA, and insulin-induced receptor down-regulation without affecting insulin receptor binding. We show that MA-10 binds to a site of rat insulin receptors different from the insulin binding site in intact Fao cells. Insulin does not inhibit MA-10 binding, and MA-10 does not inhibit insulin binding to rat Fao cells. Moreover, MA-10 binding to down-regulated cells is reduced to the same extent as insulin binding. In rat insulin receptors the MA-10 binding site has been tentatively localized in the extracellular part of the insulin receptor beta-subunit based on the following evidence: (i) MA-10 binds to insulin receptor in intact rat cells; (ii) MA-10 immunoprecipitates isolated insulin receptor beta-subunits labeled with both [35S]methionine and 32P; (iii) MA-10 reacts with rat insulin receptor beta-subunits by the method of immunoblotting, similar to an antipeptide antibody directed against the carboxyl terminus of the insulin receptor beta-subunit. Moreover, MA-10 inhibits autophosphorylation and protein-tyrosine kinase activity of reduced and purified insulin receptor beta-subunits. The finding that MA-10 inhibits insulin-stimulated receptor autophosphorylation and reduces insulin-stimulated thymidine incorporation into DNA and receptor down-regulation suggests that the extracellular part of the insulin receptor beta-subunit plays a role in the regulation of insulin receptor protein-tyrosine kinase activity

Universal versus risk factor screening for gestational diabetes mellitus

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Advanced Glycation End-Products and Hyperglycemia Increase Angiopoietin-2 Production by Impairing Angiopoietin-1-Tie-2 System

The angiopoietin-Tie-2 system plays a crucial role in the maintenance of endothelial integrity. Hyperglycemia and advanced glycation end-products (AGEs) are involved in endothelial cell dysfunction responsible of the pathogenesis of microvascular complications of diabetes. Here, we investigated whether glycated serum (GS) or hyperglycemia (HG) affect the angiopoietin-Tie-2 system in the microvascular endothelial cells HMEC-1. We found that culture for 5 days in the presence of AGEs and HG (alone or in combination) decreased cell proliferation, increased reactive oxygen species (ROS) production, and reduced ratio between the oxidized and the reduced form of glutathione. Since angiopoietin-1 (Ang-1) signaling regulates angiopoietin-2 (Ang-2) expression through inactivation of the forkhead transcription factor FoxO1, we investigated intracellular signaling of Ang-1 and expression of Ang-2. HG and AGEs reduced phosphorylation of Akt and abrogated phosphorylation of FoxO1 induced by Ang-1 without affecting neither Tie-2 expression nor its activation. Furthermore, AGEs and/or HG induced nuclear translocation of FoxO1 and increased Ang-2 production. In conclusion, we demonstrated that both hyperglycemia and AGEs affect the angiopoietin-Tie-2 system by impairing Ang-1/Tie-2 signaling and by increasing Ang-2 expression. These results suggest that therapeutic strategies useful in preventing or delaying the onset of diabetic vascular complications should be aimed to preserve Ang-1 signaling

Spatial scales of COVID-19 transmission in Mexico

During outbreaks of emerging infectious diseases, internationally connected cities often experience large and early outbreaks, while rural regions follow after some delay. This hierarchical structure of disease spread is influenced primarily by the multiscale structure of human mobility. However, during the COVID-19 epidemic, public health responses typically did not take into consideration the explicit spatial structure of human mobility when designing nonpharmaceutical interventions (NPIs). NPIs were applied primarily at national or regional scales. Here, we use weekly anonymized and aggregated human mobility data and spatially highly resolved data on COVID-19 cases at the municipality level in Mexico to investigate how behavioral changes in response to the pandemic have altered the spatial scales of transmission and interventions during its first wave (March–June 2020). We find that the epidemic dynamics in Mexico were initially driven by exports of COVID-19 cases from Mexico State and Mexico City, where early outbreaks occurred. The mobility network shifted after the implementation of interventions in late March 2020, and the mobility network communities became more disjointed while epidemics in these communities became increasingly synchronized. Our results provide dynamic insights into how to use network science and epidemiological modeling to inform the spatial scale at which interventions are most impactful in mitigating the spread of COVID-19 and infectious diseases in general

The risk stratification of adverse neonatal outcomes in women with gestational diabetes (STRONG) study

Aims: To assess the risk of adverse neonatal outcomes in women with gestational diabetes (GDM) by identifying subgroups of women at higher risk to recognize the characteristics most associated with an excess of risk. Methods: Observational, retrospective, multicenter study involving consecutive women with GDM. To identify distinct and homogeneous subgroups of women at a higher risk, the RECursive Partitioning and AMalgamation (RECPAM) method was used. Overall, 2736 pregnancies complicated by GDM were analyzed. The main outcome measure was the occurrence of adverse neonatal outcomes in pregnancies complicated by GDM. Results: Among study participants (median age 36.8 years, pre-gestational BMI 24.8 kg/m2), six miscarriages, one neonatal death, but no maternal death was recorded. The occurrence of the cumulative adverse outcome (OR 2.48, 95% CI 1.59–3.87), large for gestational age (OR 3.99, 95% CI 2.40–6.63), fetal malformation (OR 2.66, 95% CI 1.00–7.18), and respiratory distress (OR 4.33, 95% CI 1.33–14.12) was associated with previous macrosomia. Large for gestational age was also associated with obesity (OR 1.46, 95% CI 1.00–2.15). Small for gestational age was associated with first trimester glucose levels (OR 1.96, 95% CI 1.04–3.69). Neonatal hypoglycemia was associated with overweight (OR 1.52, 95% CI 1.02–2.27) and obesity (OR 1.62, 95% CI 1.04–2.51). The RECPAM analysis identified high-risk subgroups mainly characterized by high pre-pregnancy BMI (OR 1.68, 95% CI 1.21–2.33 for obese; OR 1.38 95% CI 1.03–1.87 for overweight). Conclusions: A deep investigation on the factors associated with adverse neonatal outcomes requires a risk stratification. In particular, great attention must be paid to the prevention and treatment of obesity

Association of Genetic Markers with CSF Oligoclonal Bands in Multiple Sclerosis Patients

Objective:to explore the association between genetic markers and Oligoclonal Bands (OCB) in the Cerebro Spinal Fluid (CSF) of Italian Multiple Sclerosis patients.Methods:We genotyped 1115 Italian patients for HLA-DRB1*15 and HLA-A*02. In a subset of 925 patients we tested association with 52 non-HLA SNPs associated with MS susceptibility and we calculated a weighted Genetic Risk Score. Finally, we performed a Genome Wide Association Study (GWAS) with OCB status on a subset of 562 patients. The best associated SNPs of the Italian GWAS were replicated in silico in Scandinavian and Belgian populations, and meta-analyzed.Results:HLA-DRB1*15 is associated with OCB+: p = 0.03, Odds Ratio (OR) = 1.6, 95% Confidence Limits (CL) = 1.1-2.4. None of the 52 non-HLA MS susceptibility loci was associated with OCB, except one SNP (rs2546890) near IL12B gene (OR: 1.45; 1.09-1.92). The weighted Genetic Risk Score mean was significantly (p = 0.0008) higher in OCB+ (7.668) than in OCB- (7.412) patients. After meta-analysis on the three datasets (Italian, Scandinavian and Belgian) for the best associated signals resulted from the Italian GWAS, the strongest signal was a SNP (rs9320598) on chromosome 6q (p = 9.4×10-7) outside the HLA region (65 Mb).Discussion:genetic factors predispose to the development of OCB

Demand for environmentally friendly vehicles: A review and new evidence

Although the need for more environmentally friendly vehicles was recognized some decades ago, this new market has not yet established itself. Consumer behavior needs to be studied to ascertain when people will decide to purchase hybrid or electric vehicles rather than conventional ones. An in-depth review of the state-of-the-art has identified existing deficiencies and these are addressed in this paper, proposing a new approach that is applied to the case of Santander in Spain. Emphasis is placed on the role of citizens in researching the local market and their requirements with respect to such vehicles; our model assumes variability in user preferences, an utmost requirement as concluded from the literature review. Results suggest that the highest demand for cleaner vehicles would be achieved in two ways: firstly, by penalizing conventional vehicles in terms of costs/km; secondly, by providing incentives directed at lowering the purchasing price of hybrid and electric vehicles. Finally, as demand becomes more elastic, the preferred strategy should initially focus on hybrid vehicles