L'influenza dei fattori di stress e protettivi sulle pratiche didattiche: Un'indagine sui docenti in formazione

Work-Related Stress (WRS) in the teaching profession is a focal issue in the current scientific landscape. While the main causes and consequences in terms of teachers’ mental and physical health are known, contextual causes related to organization and effects on the implementation of effective teaching practices are neglected, thus tying psychological aspects to pedagogical implications. The paper shows the results of a research conducted on a sample of 139 teachers coming out of a TFA course on ICT, aimed at investigating the main factors of SLC and its implications for the activation of inclusive teaching. The results show that the major cause of stress is the relationship with colleagues who are perceived as unsupportive. In particular, the lack of recognition of the role of support teacher prevents the implementation and testing of inclusive practices, although these are part of the teacher’s skill set.Lo Stress Lavoro Correlato (SLC) nella professione docente è un tema focale nel panorama scientifico attuale. Mentre sono note le principali cause e le conseguenze sul piano della salute mentale e fisica degli insegnanti, sono maggiormente trascurate le cause di contesto legate all’organizzazione e gli effetti sulla realizzazione di pratiche didattiche efficaci, legando così gli aspetti psicologici alle implicazioni pedagogiche. Il contributo mostra i risultati di una ricerca condotta su un campione di 139 docenti uscenti da un corso TFA sulle TIC, volta ad indagare i principali fattori di SLC e le relative implicazioni per l’attivazione di una didattica inclusiva. I risultati mostrano come la maggiore causa di stress sia la relazione con i colleghi che si percepiscono non supportivi. In particolare, il mancato riconoscimento del ruolo di docente di sostegno impedisce la realizzazione e la sperimentazione delle pratiche inclusive, benché queste facciano parte del bagaglio di competenze del docente

Traumi infantili, intelligenza emotiva e regolazione delle emozioni in un campione di autori di reati sessuali

The aim of the following study is to examine in the Italian context, the prevalence of adverse childhood experience in a sample of detainee sexual offenders, and their correlation with risk of recidivism, emotional intelligence and emotion regulation. The sample is composed by 32 inmates. For the study the following instruments were used: ACE, DERS-16, TMMS and RM2000. The results show high presence of childhood traumas between sex offenders, and a strong correlation between adverse experiences and a higher risk of recidivism, a lower emotional intelligence and more difficulties in the regulation of bad emotions. Clinical consideration about treatment of sex offender are discussed.L’obiettivo del presente studio è quello di analizzare nel contesto italiano, la prevalenza di traumi infantili in un campione di autori di reati sessuali e indagare quale relazione intercorra tra i pregressi traumi infantili, il rischio di recidiva, l’intelligenza emotiva e la regolazione delle emozioni. Il campione è costituito da 32 soggetti detenuti. Per le rilevazioni sono stati usati i seguenti strumenti: ACE, DERS-16, TMMS e RM2000. Le analisi statistiche mostrano una significativa presenza di traumi infantili e evidenziano una forte correlazione tra questi, il rischio di recidiva, l’intelligenza emotiva e la capacità di gestione delle emozioni negative. Infine, sono discusse alcune implicazioni relative al trattamento conseguenti ai risultati ottenuti

A versatile and user-friendly approach for the analysis of proteins in ancient and historical objects

Identification and characterization of ancient proteins still require technical developments towards non-invasiveness, sensitivity, versatility and ease of use of the analyses. We report that the enzyme functionalized films, described in Cicatiello et al. (2018), can be used efficiently on the surface of different objects ranging from fixative-coated paper to canvas to the coating on an albumen photograph, as well as the much harder surfaces of ivory objects and the proteinaceous binders in the decoration of a wooden Egyptian coffin. The mixture of digested peptides that are efficiently captured on the functionalized surface are also amenable to LC-MS/MS analysis, which is necessary to confidently identify chemical modifications induced upon degradation, in order to characterize the conservation state of proteins. Moreover, in a two-step procedure, we have combined the trypsin functionalized film with a PNGaseF functionalized film, which adds a deglycosylation pretreatment allowing improved detection of glycosylated proteins. SIGNIFICANCE: User friendly trypsin functionalized films were implemented to expand their potential as versatile, modular tools that can be widely exploited in the world of diagnosis of cultural heritage objects, ancient proteins, and palaeoproteomics: a procedure that could be carried out by conservators or archaeologists first on-site and later analysed with standard MS techniques

Characterization of a surface-active protein extracted from a marine strain of penicillium chrysogenum

Marine microorganisms represent a reservoir of new promising secondary metabolites. Surface-active proteins with good emulsification activity can be isolated from fungal species that inhabit the marine environment and can be promising candidates for different biotechnological applications. In this study a novel surface-active protein, named Sap-Pc, was purified from a marine strain of Penicillium chrysogenum. The effect of salt concentration and temperature on protein production was analyzed, and a purification method was set up. The purified protein, identified as Pc13g06930, was annotated as a hypothetical protein. It was able to form emulsions, which were stable for at least one month, with an emulsification index comparable to that of other known surface-active proteins. The surface tension reduction was analyzed as function of protein concentration and a critical micellar concentration of 2 M was determined. At neutral or alkaline pH, secondary structure changes were monitored over time, concurrently with the appearance of protein precipitation. Formation of amyloid-like fibrils of SAP-Pc was demonstrated by spectroscopic and microscopic analyses. Moreover, the effect of protein concentration, a parameter affecting kinetics of fibril formation, was investigated and an on-pathway involvement of micellar aggregates during the fibril formation process was suggested

HDV can constrain HBV genetic evolution in hbsag: Implications for the identification of innovative pharmacological targets

Chronic HBV + HDV infection is associated with greater risk of liver fibrosis, earlier hepatic decompensation, and liver cirrhosis hepatocellular carcinoma compared to HBV mono-infection. However, to-date no direct anti-HDV drugs are available in clinical practice. Here, we identified conserved and variable regions in HBsAg and HDAg domains in HBV + HDV infection, a critical finding for the design of innovative therapeutic agents. The extent of amino-acid variability was measured by Shannon-Entropy (Sn) in HBsAg genotype-D sequences from 31 HBV + HDV infected and 62 HBV mono-infected patients (comparable for demographics and virological-parameters), and in 47 HDAg genotype-1 sequences. Positions with Sn = 0 were defined as conserved. The percentage of conserved HBsAg-positions was significantly higher in HBV + HDV infection than HBV mono-infection (p = 0.001). Results were confirmed after stratification for HBeAg-status and patients’ age. A Sn = 0 at specific positions in the C-terminus HBsAg were correlated with higher HDV-RNA, suggesting that conservation of these positions can preserve HDV-fitness. Conversely, HDAg was characterized by a lower percentage of conserved-residues than HBsAg (p < 0.001), indicating higher functional plasticity. Furthermore, specific HDAg-mutations were significantly correlated with higher HDV-RNA, suggesting a role in conferring HDV replicative-advantage. Among HDAg-domains, only the virus-assembly signal exhibited a high genetic conservation (75% of conserved-residues). In conclusion, HDV can constrain HBsAg genetic evolution to preserve its fitness. The identification of conserved regions in HDAg poses the basis for designing innovative targets against HDV-infection

brainlife.io: A decentralized and open source cloud platform to support neuroscience research

Neuroscience research has expanded dramatically over the past 30 years by advancing standardization and tool development to support rigor and transparency. Consequently, the complexity of the data pipeline has also increased, hindering access to FAIR data analysis to portions of the worldwide research community. brainlife.io was developed to reduce these burdens and democratize modern neuroscience research across institutions and career levels. Using community software and hardware infrastructure, the platform provides open-source data standardization, management, visualization, and processing and simplifies the data pipeline. brainlife.io automatically tracks the provenance history of thousands of data objects, supporting simplicity, efficiency, and transparency in neuroscience research. Here brainlife.io's technology and data services are described and evaluated for validity, reliability, reproducibility, replicability, and scientific utility. Using data from 4 modalities and 3,200 participants, we demonstrate that brainlife.io's services produce outputs that adhere to best practices in modern neuroscience research

brainlife.io: a decentralized and open-source cloud platform to support neuroscience research

Neuroscience is advancing standardization and tool development to support rigor and transparency. Consequently, data pipeline complexity has increased, hindering FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable) access. brainlife.io was developed to democratize neuroimaging research. The platform provides data standardization, management, visualization and processing and automatically tracks the provenance history of thousands of data objects. Here, brainlife.io is described and evaluated for validity, reliability, reproducibility, replicability and scientific utility using four data modalities and 3,200 participants

FUNGAL PROTEIC BIOSURFACTANTS FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF BIOSENSING PLATFORMS

Protein biosurfatants produced by marine and terrestrial filamentous fungi represent the best example of biomolecules that can be widely used as a replacement of their synthetic counterparts, thanks to their low toxicity and biodegradability. Among them, hydrophobins and ceratoplatanins are proteins able to self-assemble at hydrophobic/hydrophilic interfaces forming amphiphilic layers. It is well known that the hydrophobins are involved in the fungal growth thanks to their capability to reduce the surface tension of the air/water interface, instead, while the ceratoplatanins can act both as virulence factor and as elicitors. Moreover, the amphiphilic nature of both classes of proteins makes them of great interest in many fields. For this reason, one of the purposes of the present PhD project is the isolation and characterization of protein biosurfactants from marine fungal strains. The isolated protein from Penicillium chrysogenum has been characterized both as biosurfactant and bioemulsifier, indeed its capabilities to stabilize emulsion and to reduce the surface tension have been verified. Moreover, it has been proved that two marine fungi, Paradendryphiela salina and Talaromyces pinophilus grown on seaweed wastes, are able to produce both cerato-platantins and hydrophobins. Another hydrophobin deeply characterized and exploited in my research group, is Vmh2, produced by the edible fungus P. ostreatus. This protein can form protein layers on several surfaces changing their physical-chemical properties and allowing the attachment of other biomolecules in their active form. Thus, the exploitation of Vmh2 in the diagnosis of cultural heritage and in biosensing field has been under investigation in this PhD project. The functionalization of cellulose acetate sheets with Vmh2 has been employed to immobilize proteolytic enzymes, trypsin and PNGaseF, developing a portable, easy-to-use and non-invasive kit for the identification of ancient proteins on cultural heritage objects. Furthermore, in biosensing field the same hydrophobin has been genetically fused to two Single chain Fragment variables of two antibodies able to bind algal marine neurotoxins, and to a laccase enzyme that can oxidize aromatic and phenolic compounds. The recognition ability of chimeric proteins has been coupled with the interesting characteristics of nanomaterials, such as graphene, carbon nanotubes and magnetic beads. The functionalized 2D-materials with both chimeric proteins have been exploited to develop electrochemical and optical biosensors for the detection of the analytes mentioned above

Carbon-nanotube-supported POXA1b laccase and its hydrophobin chimera for oxygen reduction and picomolar phenol biosensing

The immobilization of POXA1b laccase and its hydrophobin-fused chimera was performed at pristine Multiwalled Carbon Nanotube (MWCNT) and MWCNT-modified electrodes by electrografting of a 2-diazoniumanthraquinone salt. The influence of the hydrophobin domain and the MWCNT functionalization with anthraquinone groups towards immobilization of laccase was compared by direct electrochemistry under O2 and electrochemical biosensing of phenols. The hydrophobin domain affords the stable dispersion of MWCNT in water/ethanol, while being detrimental to the direct electron transfer between POXA1b and the electrode. On the contrary, the stronger hydrophobic interactions between anthraquinone and laccase affords direct electrochemistry of POXA1b and enabled the design of a highly sensitive phenol biosensor, reaching a limit-of-detection (LOD) of 2 pM and sensitivity of 23,600 mA L mmol−1 cm−2 for catechol, and a LOD of 15 nM and sensitivity of 0.053 mA L mmol−1 cm−2 for dopamine

From Graphite to Laccase Biofunctionalized Few-Layer Graphene: A “One Pot” Approach Using a Chimeric Enzyme

International audienc