The functions of social interaction in the knowledge-creative economy: between co-presence and ICT-mediated social relations

This article investigates the role and functions of interaction among knowledge-creative workers in Milan. While a large body of literature supports the relevance of co-presence for the building of social capital in creative scenes, a growing body of empirical and theoretical research shows in fact that, under certain circumstances, social relations mediated by digital tools are equally important. The extent to which professionals in these industries are embedded in \u201cspaces\u201d which are physical as well as digital, and how these have come to be so, remains nevertheless an under-explored research question. Building on findings from two distinct qualitative researches on knowledge-creative workers in Milan, undertaken in 2008 and 2011-2013, it is here argued that knowledge-creative professionals are embedded in a wider \u201cspace\u201d of relations where exchanges mediated via ICTs productively intertwine with face-to-face interaction to determine new ways of searching for jobs and practicing work. The paper highlights what changes when proximity becomes physical and digital as a mixture of face-to-face and ICT-mediated interaction, and discusses contradictions and implications of their blending, showing the necessity to overcome the rigid distinction between face-to-face and digital interaction that still characterises the empirical study of knowledge-creative economies

Testicular cancer and sperm DNA damage: short- and long-term effects of antineoplastic treatment

The aim of this study was to investigate sperm DNA damage induced by chemo- and radiotherapy in patients with testicular cancer to provide data on the extent and persistence of nuclear damage that might affect individual reproductive potential. We evaluated pre- and post-antineoplastic treatment sperm DNA integrity, expressed as DNA Fragmentation Index (DFI), in a large caseload of testicular cancer patients by sperm chromatin structure assay. The mean total DFI for all patients at T0 was 18.0 ± 12.5%. Sperm chromatin profile was markedly impaired at T3 (27.7 ± 17.4%) and T6 (23.2 ± 15.3%), improving considerably at T12 and T24 (14.0 ± 8.9% and 14.4 ± 10.3%). After chemotherapy, we found a marked increase in DFI at T3 and T6 and a significant reduction at T12 and T24 in comparison with the baseline. In contrast, DFI increased at T3 and T6 after radiotherapy but the subsequent reduction was far less marked, reaching baseline values at T12 and T24. Finally, post-treatment DNA damage was not age or histotype dependent, but was more marked in the advanced stage of cancer. In this study, we showed that the chromatin profile may be affected in the months immediately following the end of the treatment, improving after 12-24 months. Our results thus indicate that post-treatment DNA damage is influenced both by the type and intensity of the therapy and by the pathological and clinical stage of the disease. © 2014 American Society of Andrology and European Academy of Andrology

Robust Control Architecture for Waste Heat Harvesting with Non-Inverting Buck-Boost Converter

Thermoelectric generators (TEG) can be used to harvest wasted heat. TEGs are characterized by a wide output voltage range and a considerable output resistance leading to a maximum power point dependent on the working temperature. Non-Inverting Buck-Boost converter is used to manage, from one side, the wide voltage range, and from the other a battery. This article investigates a robust control architecture to recover the maximum energy from the exhaust's heat avoiding instability issues and maximizing converter efficiency

Exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls and hexachlorobenzene, semen quality and testicular cancer risk

PURPOSE: We carried out a case-control study to investigate the possible role of occupational and environmental exposure to endocrine disruptors in the onset of testicular cancer (TC). METHODS: We evaluated 125 TC patients and 103 controls. Seminal fluid examination and organochlorine analysis were performed in all subjects. Cases and controls were also interviewed using a structured questionnaire to collect demographic information, residence, andrological medical history and dietary information. RESULTS: We found that a higher level of reproductive tract birth defects was associated with a higher risk of TC. With regard to diet, cases reported a higher consumption of milk and dairy products than controls. Overall, there was a statistically significant increase in TC risk in cases with detectable values of total polychlorinated organic compounds against controls (14.4 vs. 1.0 %; p < 0.001). TC patients with detectable levels of organochlorines had lower mean semen parameters than those with undetectable levels, although this difference was not statistically significant. CONCLUSION: The International Agency for Research on Cancer recently included dioxin-like polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in Group 1 of known human carcinogens. Our study confirmed and identified various risk factors for testicular cancer: cryptorchidism, consumption of milk and dairy products, parents' occupation and serum concentration of hexachlorobenzene and PCBs and, for the first time, we showed the correlation between semen quality and the serum concentration of these pollutants