Intellectual Capital and Sustainability Management

"The study concerns a company operating in the field of Electronics and Defense, which has. developed a model of Intellectual Capital management coherent with a sustainability. framework. This paper highlights the process leading to the preparation of an integrated. reporting document. The theoretical paradigm underlying our research is interpretivism. In. particular, this study is conducted in light of “action research” perspective. Data have been. gathered by in-depth interviews with managers and from group discussions. The framework. elaborated by the research group was successfully applied to a set of specific initiatives to be. implemented in 2013, aiming to foster the sustainability management philosophy within the. company. Each aforementioned project set up by the company is subject to measurement,. evaluation and reporting. This model aims to be an effective support to general management,. providing a link between intangible assets and capabilities that create value within a. sustainability framework.

p53 codon 72 alleles influence the response to anticancer drugs in cells from aged people by regulating the cell cycle inhibitor p21WAF1.

A common polymorphism at codon 72 in p53 gene leads to an arginine to proline aminoacidic substitution which affects in an age-dependent manner the susceptibility of cells to undergo apoptosis after oxidative stress. Here we report that dermal fibroblasts from Proline allele carriers (Pro+) display a higher expression of p21WAF1 gene, in both basal conditions and after treatment with doxorubicin and camptothecin. This phenomenon is accompanied by a lower susceptibility of Pro+ cells to undergo apoptosis, a lower capability to over cross G1-S transition and an increased propensity to express markers of cell senescence, with respect to fibroblasts from Arginine homozygotes (Pro-). All these phenomena are particularly evident in cells from centenarians. We conclude that the functional difference between the two p53 codon 72 alleles exerts a broadimpact on the capability of cell from aged people to respond to stressors such as cytotoxic drugs

p53 codon 72 alleles influence the response to anticancer drugs in cells from aged people by regulating the cell cycle inhibitor p21WAF1

A common polymorphism at codon 72 in p53 gene leads to an arginine to proline aminoacidic substitution which affects in an age-dependent manner the susceptibility of cells to undergo apoptosis after oxidative stress. Here we report that dermal fibroblasts from Proline allele carriers (Pro+) display a higher expression of p21 WAF1 gene, in both basal conditions and after treatment with doxorubicin or camptothecin. This phenomenon is accompanied by a lower susceptibility of Pro+ cells to undergo apoptosis, a lower capability to over cross G1-S transition and an increased propensity to express markers of cell senescence, with respect to fibroblasts from Arginine homozygotes (Pro-). All these phenomena are particularly evident in cells from centenarians. We conclude that the functional difference between the two p53 codon 72 alleles exerts a broad impact on the capability of cell from aged people to respond to stressors such as cytotoxic drugs. ©2005 Landes Bioscience.SCOPUS: ar.jinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishe

Opposite role of changes in mitochondrial membrane potential in different apoptotic processes

AbstractWe have studied the role of changes in mitochondrial membrane potential (ΔΨ) in two widely-used models of apoptosis, such as dexamethasone-treated rat thymocytes and U937 human cells treated with tumor necrosis factor-α and cycloheximide. To dissipate ΔΨ, we used low concentrations of valinomycin, unable per se to induce apoptosis, and demonstrated that the decline in ΔΨ exerts opposite effects in the two models. Indeed, in U937 cells, depolarization of mitochondria increased apoptosis, which decreased in rat thymocytes. This leads to the suggestion that disruption of ΔΨ plays opposite roles depending on the experimental model. In U937 cells, the drop of ΔΨ is a possible contributory cause for the apoptotic process; in rat thymocytes, it could be a limiting factor. We propose that these opposite effects could be due to the different ATP requirement of each apoptotic pathway

Morphological description and morphometric analyses of the Upper Palaeolithic human remains from Dzudzuana and Satsurblia caves, western Georgia

While paleoanthropologists and archaeologists agree thatwestern Georgia was used as a thoroughfare of human movements to and from the Caucasus (Pinhasi et al., 2012, 2014), the paleoanthropological fossil record of the local Middle and Upper Palaeolithic in this key region is currently limited to scant human remains. For the Late Pleistocene, the Middle Palaeolithic (MP) Georgian human fossil record consists of a partial maxilla from the site of Sakajia and some isolated teeth from the sites of Bronze Cave, Djruchula, Ortvala and Ortvale Klde, which were all classified as Neandertals (Pinhasi et al., 2012). The Upper Palaeolithic (UP) fossil record consists of a modern human tooth from Bondi cave (Tushabramishvili et al., 2012), recently dated between 39,000 and 35,800 cal. BP (calibrated years before present; Pleurdeau et al., 2016), and cranial fragments from Sakajia, dated between 12,000 and 10,000 cal. BP (Nioradze and Otte, 2000) (Supplementary Online Material [SOM] Fig. S1). Therefore, even though some authors suggest that the Caucasus represents a sort of cul de sac for Neandertal survival, and that modern humans arrived in this area much later compared to other regions (Bar-Yosef and Pilbeam, 2000), the paucity of human remains prevents any conclusive assessment. Here we report additional Upper Palaeolithic human remains from the Imereti region, western Georgia (SOM Fig. S1): two isolated teeth from Dzudzuana cave, Dzu 1 and Dzu 2 (both deciduous; Bar-Yosef et al., 2011), and one isolated tooth (SATP5-2, deciduous) and a hemi-mandible (SATP5) bearing permanent and deciduous teeth (SATP5-3 e SATP5-7) from Satsurblia cave (Pinhasi et al., 2014). In particular, the human remains from Dzudzuana cave, dated between 27,000 and 24,000 cal. BP, fill a huge gap in the Upper Palaeolithic Georgian fossil record and play an important role in the debate about modern human peopling of the Caucasus

p53 Codon 72 Polymorphism and Longevity: Additional Data on Centenarians from Continental Italy and Sardinia

In a previous letter (Bonafè et al. 1999) we tested the hypothesis that polymorphic variants of p53 have an impact on human longevity, by comparing p53 codon 72 allelic and genotypic frequency distributions between young people and centenarians. A nonsignificant difference emerged between the groups, and several explanations were offered. Following the reply letter of Sun et al. (in this issue), we would like to argue with some of their comments and to provide new data regarding centenarians from continental Italy and Sardinia