LA SCRITTURA CRITICA DI ANNA MARIA FUNDARÒ: RADICI E IDENTITÀ DEL DISEGNO INDUSTRIALE IN SICILIA

Questa microstoria prende in analisi gli scritti di Anna Maria Fundarò, architetto e professore di disegno industriale a Palermo dal 1972 al 1999. Custodita nello studio-archivio Damiani-Fundarò di Palermo, la sua ampia produzione scientifica permette di ricostruire il pensiero dell’autrice, maturato nel ventennio 1970-90, sui temi del progetto e del suo ruolo nel contesto siciliano anomalo, perché arretrato e periferico rispetto ai centri della produzione industriale e del dibattito sulla contemporaneità. L’articolo presenta la figura della Fundarò, abbozzandone una prima biografia intellettuale e ricompone in quattro diverse tipologie di scritti la sua ricca produzione. Dall’analisi dei testi emerge una scrittura critica che costituisce il manifesto della sua azione quotidiana di docente di progetto e il suo impegno sui temi della politica urbana a Palermo. Al contempo, si evidenzia come il suo pensiero sul design, finora molto poco studiato, costituisca un contributo rilevante a livello nazionale e una pietra miliare nel contesto siciliano

What ECB speeches tell us about the battle of ideas during the Eurozone crisis

A battle of ideas dominated the academic debate on the Eurozone crisis. One view stressed the importance of fiscal discipline, while the other highlighted the systemic roots of financial turmoil. Drawing on a new study based on a quantitative text analysis of ECB Executive Board members’ speeches, Federico Maria Ferrara shows how the ECB progressively moved from a fiscal to systemic narrative of the Eurozone crisis. The findings indicate that this shift anticipated and accompanied ECB President Mario Draghi’s “whatever it takes” pledge in summer 2012, and that the ECB’s ideational turn was incremental and driven by policy learning dynamics

New Cities Subway, Virtuous Trials or "Routes Tortuous"?

The enunciation of the concept of metropolitan city has been fed by a series of contributions and debates, not only from architects, but also from jurists, and experienced of territorial planning, which in the processes of depth change of the metropolitan phenomenon they have determined considerable transformations becoming motor of new organizations and setting different problems of management, as well as baiting renewed dynamics among political and social strengths. The urbanization of large urban areas, affecting rural depopulation and the sub explosion. urban. Large metropolitan areas are composed of: - high concentration areas; - large centers; - the bleak suburbs; - low-density areas; - densely populated urban environments that coexist in a sub dominance condition between them, in which the conditions of life appear to be extremely uncomfortable. When experience these conditions we see, not only the immigration process of rural areas to the city, but the immigration of masses of people who every day have to face the city, this involves economic, social and cultural rights in many civilizations and historical periods have occurred and have been a key feature in modern society unprecedented. These migrations are in the "metropolis" the focal point, in the sub urban fringe (with populations residing outside the administrative border spread like wildfire) where the attraction of the city center with degrades degrade the environment for the urbanization great masses. Big cities do not limit its effect modifiers within their administrative boundaries traced by politics, they shall obtain zoning and economic forces work of integration, in whole or in part, in economic, social and cultural system and have their focal point in metropolis. The densification in the administrative boundaries of the city until the collapse of urbanization in large areas, are processes that have taken significant pace in the big cities, in commercial ports and in the capitals. The phenomenon has brought with it an extensive transformation of urban centers, the protagonists of a poorly controlled development, which led to growing problems of public services, traffic, transport, housing and pollution. No wonder that the first proposals that have contributed to the emergence of metropolitan areas come from one of the countries that experienced the first industrial revolution, namely the United Kingdom. Scholars agree that the phenomenon has also spread to many European cities, which turn out to be more modest size compared to cities in the United States, Japan and other countries, distinguishing itself in the inequality of the size ranking of cities. In the Mediterranean countries, urbanization has been more delayed and based on industrial bases in most popular way, especially on the tertiary development

Cost optimal nZEBs in future climate scenarios

The key-concepts of nearly Zero Energy Building (nZEB) and cost optimality have driven many research activities across Europe in recent years. Considering the ongoing global changes, it is necessary to study and guarantee the resilience of the nZEB design to the variations of the boundary conditions in which the cost optimal calculation is performed. We present the analysis of the variation of the cost-optimal design of a single-family house in a continental climate (Paris) in different climate change scenarios in the short-medium term (2026-2045). The main finding from the results analysis is that the higher the energy performance, the higher is the resilience to the variation of weather conditions

Does clarity make central banks more engaging? Lessons from ECB communications

Despite increasing communication efforts, it may be difficult for central banks to engage the public, as their language is often too difficult to understand for most citizens. Focusing on the case of the European Central Bank (ECB), we hypothesise that greater communication clarity is conducive to stronger engagement. We rely on readability metrics to measure the clarity of ECB communications. We show that communication clarity is a significant and robust predictor of the media engagement generated by the ECB with its speeches, press conferences and tweets. Our findings are validated by a placebo test and have significant policy implications for central bank communication

Propranolol as first-line treatment for life-threatening diffuse infantile hepatic hemangioma: a case report

[No abstract available

Cost-Optimal Analysis for nearly Zero Energy Buildings design and optimization: A critical review

Since the introduction of the recast of the EPBD European Directive 2010/31/EU, many studies on the cost-effective feasibility of nearly zero-energy buildings (NZEBs) were carried out either by academic research bodies and by national bodies. In particular, the introduction of the cost-optimal methodology has given a strong impulse to research in this field. This paper presents a comprehensive and significant review on scientific works based on the application of cost-optimal analysis applications in Europe since the EPBD recast entered into force, pointing out the differences in the analyzed studies and comparing their outcomes before the new recast of EPBD enters into force in 2018. The analysis is conducted with special regard to the methods used for the energy performance assessment, the global cost calculation, and for the selection of the energy efficiency measures leading to design optimization. A critical discussion about the assumptions on which the studies are based and the resulting gaps between the resulting cost-optimal performance and the zero energy target is provided together with a summary of the resulting cost-optimal set of technologies to be used for cost-optimal NZEB design in different contexts. It is shown that the cost-optimal approach results as an effective method for delineating the future of NZEB design throughout Europe while emerging criticalities and open research issues are presented