Railway freight transport and logistics: Methods for relief, algorithms for verification and proposals for the adjustment of tunnel inner surfaces

In Europe, the attention to efficiency and safety of international railway freight transport has grown in recent years and this has drawn attention to the importance of verifying the clearance between vehicle and lining, mostly when different and variable rolling stock types are expected. This work consists of defining an innovative methodology, with the objective of surveying the tunnel structures, verifying the clearance conditions, and designing a retrofitting work if necessary. The method provides for the use of laser scanner, thermocameras, and ground penetrating radar to survey the geometrical and structural conditions of the tunnel; an algorithm written by the authors permits to verify the clearances. Two different types of works are possible if the inner tunnel surfaces interfere with the profile of the rolling stock passing through: modification of the railroad track or modification of the tunnel intrados by mean milling of its lining. The presented case study demonstrates that the proposed methodology is useful for verifying compatibility between the design vehicle gauge and the existing tunnel intrados, and to investigate the chance to admit rolling stocks from different states. Consequently, the results give the railway management body a chance to perform appropriate measurements in those cases where the minimum clearance requirements are not achieved

Sustainability Indicators and Guidelines for the Territorial Ordering of Mar del Plata Peri-urban

Las ciudades latinoamericanas están sujetas a procesos de crecimiento sin planificación que se traducen en conflictos sociales y territoriales, especialmente manifiestos en las áreas periurbanas. Este hecho se verifica en la ciudad de Mar del Plata, cuyo crecimiento “espontáneo" demanda estrategias para el ordenamiento territorial. En este marco, el presente trabajo propone: analizar los procesos de expansión, consolidación y densificación entre los noventa y la actualidad en cinco sectores que configuran el periurbano de Mar del Plata; definir indicadores que permitan interpretar dichos procesos en términos de sustentabilidad urbana; y aportar lineamientos para el ordenamiento territorial del periurbano. Para ello, se recurrió a informaciones y estudios antecedentes, trabajo de campo y se construyó una base georreferenciada. Los resultados obtenidos indican que la expansión urbana no fue acompañada por la consolidación y que la densificación en los últimos diez años se asocia fundamentalmente con el crecimiento de asentamientos de carácter precario. Los indicadores utilizados revelan que los procesos de crecimiento alejan al periurbano de las condiciones de sustentabilidad esperadas. En consecuencia, se formularon lineamientos para avanzar con propuestas de ordenamiento territorial que contemplen la heterogeneidad implícita en el periurbano, respondiendo a las demandas específicas de cada uno de los sectores.Latin-American cities are subject to unplanned growth processes that translate into social and territorial conflicts, and especially manifest themselves in peri-urban areas. This fact is verified in Mar del Plata city, whose “spontaneous" growth demands strategies for the territorial ordering. In this context, this paper aims to: analyze expansion, consolidation and densification processes between the 1990s and the present in five areas that form Mar del Plata peri- urban; define indicators that enable an interpretation of those processes in terms of urban sustainability; and provide guidelines for the territorial ordering of the peri-urban. To this aim, prior information and studies, as well as field work were resorted to and a geo- referenced database was created. The results obtained indicate that urban expansion was not accompanied by consolidations and that densification in the past ten years is associated mainly to the growth of precarious settlements. The indicators used reveal that growth processes separate the peri-urban from the sustainability conditions expected. In consequence, guidelines were formulated in order to progress with territorial ordering proposals that consider the implied heterogeneity in the peri-urban and thus meet the specific demands of each area.Fil: Zulaica, Laura . Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y TécnicasFil: Ferraro, Rosana. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnica

Songs of Passage and Sacrifice: Gabriella Ghermandi’s Stories in Performance

In this time and on this page, Spivak\u27s island seems an apt place to begin a discussion about storytelling, resistance, and belonging. This chapter documents a conversation originating from two disciplinary perspectives-literature (Ferraro) and music (Dolp). We explore how spoken-word performance in a global context can facilitate social empowerment, craft a cultural past, and invigorate political consciousness. Although our analytical strategies and some of our conclusions differ, we share the assertion that the notion of artistic citizenship as it is defined elsewhere in this collection is considerably complicated, and even requires redefinition, in the context of non-Western cultures. Our present subject is one such case. In the creative work of Gabriella Ghermandi, an author, musician, and performer of the spoken word with roots in the Horn of Africa and Italy, acts of storytelling and music making are synonymous with empowerment, the preservation of living memory, and exposure of political injustices. We are suspicious of the kinds of false assumptions that could accompany the concept of artistic citizenship and its framing of Ghermandi\u27s work-a concept born out of anxieties related to the Western dichotomy between intrinsic value or art for art\u27s sake and extrinsic value or art for people\u27s and society\u27s sake. To apply this concept without giving painstaking care to its meanings would be to easily colonize the very agent seeking decolonization. At the very least, the word citizenship in English is fraught with its own technical connotations. At both the technical and deeply symbolic level, Ghermandi\u27s artistic practice in Italy is informed by a legal context that does not grant citizenship to the children of foreign migrants until they are adults. For Ghermandi\u27s audience, citizenship certainly has other connotations, but its legal reality does not necessarily frame artistic practice such as hers, which is the sole focus of our present conversation. Our solution is to adopt the notion of artistic citizenship as a quality of belonging and a mechanism whereby artists reconfigure culture for the sake of communal interests in a global present. In that context, Ghermandi\u27s example provides a crucial and specific lesson on the agencies of art in the revision of an Italian-Ethiopian past, within an increasingly multiethnic Italian society

Casting Sound: Modality and Poetics in Gabriella Ghermandi’s Regina di fiori e di perle

This article investigates Gabriella Ghermandi’s novel Regina di fiori e di perle (2007) through two disciplinary perspectives: the first considers music as a historical and social practice through historical observation of Ghermandi’s characters who reference Ethiopian oral traditions; the second explores the contemporary dynamics of migration and transnational identity through textual analysis that critiques how storytelling practices are carried into an Italian context. We argue that the novel reflects a dissemination of oral memory across generations and gender and into a postcolonial setting, and that its characters reflect adaptations to institutional and twentieth-century technological change. Crucially, and more specifically, the fate of singing and storytelling in Ghermandi’s fictional world mirrors the author’s experience of moving between orality and recorded and written forms, not as an evolutionary process but as a reciprocal process. Her fictional tradition bearers (Aron, Yacob, and Mahlet) embody these malleable modes of transmission, reconfiguring stories for a new generation of Ethiopians and Italians

Linhas para o ordenamento do periurbano da cidade de Mar del Plata (Argentina), a partir da definição de sistemas territoriais

El modelo tradicional de oposición campo-ciudad no alcanza para explicar los procesos que se dan en las áreas periurbanas caracterizadas por presentar alto dinamismo, gran complejidad y problemas socio-ambientales relevantes. Dichas áreas pueden estudiarse desde el enfoque teóricometodológico de los sistemas complejos. En este sentido, el concepto de territorio ofrece una perspectiva interesante para el estudio empírico del periurbano desde el abordaje de los sistemas complejos. El crecimiento de la ciudad de Mar del Plata (partido de General Pueyrredon, Argentina), se ha dado de manera desordenada originando un territorio periurbano fragmentado, en el que es posible identificar sectores con características diferenciales que pueden interpretarse como sistemas territoriales. En esta línea, el presente trabajo propone realizar un diagnóstico integrado del periurbano marplatense a partir de la definición de sistemas territoriales y generar lineamientos para su ordenamiento. Se identificaron dieciséis sistemas territoriales de los cuales cinco se clasificaron como de interés ecológico, cuatro de interés productivo y los siete restantes de interés urbano-turístico. Posteriormente, se establecieron ocho principales líneas de intervención tendientes al ordenamiento del periurbano. Se espera que los resultados obtenidos permitan generar estrategias para dar respuesta a los problemas periurbanos, considerando la heterogeneidad socio-ambiental implícita en los sistemas identificadosO tradicional modelo de oposição campo-cidade não basta para explicar os processos das áreas periurbanas caraterizadas por alto dinamismo, grande complexidade e problemas socioambientais relevantes. É possível estudar essas áreas a partir do enfoque teórico-metodológico dos sistemas complexos. Nesse sentido, o conceito de território oferece uma perspectiva interessante para o estudo empírico do periurbano desde a abordagem dos sistemas complexos. O crescimento da cidade de Mar del Plata (Partido de General Pueyrredon, Argentina) tem acontecido de forma desordenada, originando assim um território periurbano fragmentado, no qual são identificados setores com caraterísticas diferenciais que podem ser interpretados como sistemas territoriais. Nessa direção, nosso trabalho propõe realizar um diagnóstico integrado do periurbano de Mar del Plata a partir da definição de sistemas territoriais, e gerar, a sua vez, linhas para seu ordenamento. Foram identificados dezesseis sistemas territoriais; cinco deles classificados como de interesse ecológico, quatro de interesse produtivo e os outros sete de interesse urbano-turístico. Logo, foram estabelecidas oito linhas principais de intervenção que visam ao ordenamento do periurbano. Espera-se que os resultados obtidos permitam gerar estratégias para dar resposta aos problemas periurbanos, considerando a heterogeneidade socioambiental implícita nos sistemas identificadosFil: Zulaica, Maria Laura. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. Facultad de Arquitectura, Urbanismo y Diseño. Instituto de Habitat y Medio Ambiente; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Ferraro, Rosana Fatima. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. Facultad de Arquitectura, Urbanismo y Diseño. Instituto de Habitat y Medio Ambiente; Argentin

El respeto al otro y el derecho a la educación

Este trabajo se enmarca dentro de una capacitación pensada para el Instituto de Formación docente de San Luis titulado “El otro en la enseñanza" (Resolución ME SL Nº 146 SPES 2016). El mismo tiene como objetivo desnaturalizar ciertas prácticas docentes que todavía reproducen modelos de enseñanza asentados en el normalismo y se transforman, de ese modo, en una más de las variables de inclusión excluyente planteada por Pablo Gentili (2011). A través del análisis de discursos narrativos y sociales se pretende increpar el habitus de los educadores (Bourdieu, 1999) con el fin de poner en cuestión prácticas pedagógicas “bancarias" y debatir un nuevo sujeto educativo, rescatando “la dialógica…un quehacer problematizante de los hombres – mundo o de los hombres en sus relaciones con el mundo y con los hombres", en este proceso de humanización que intenta poner en escena “la dualidad que se instala en la interioridad" de todo educador (Freire, 1970). Retomando los postulados de Gentili, se espera reconstruir la relación pedagógica desde el derecho a la educación, entendiendo al conocimiento como el elemento central de acceso a determinados espacios de la sociedad, así como un bien público. Además, se intenta reinscribir la escuela como ámbito público y escenario democrático “poniendo en la mesa" la diversidad social, ideológica, religiosa, entre otras. La mirada “manchada" (Skliar, 2009) sobre el otro inscribe a ese sujeto determinados usos del derecho a la educación que acaban reproduciendo las desigualdades sociales, excluyéndolo incluso de sus derechos ciudadanos.Fil: César, Ana Laura . Universidad Nacional de San Luis.Fil: Ferraro, Paula Daniela . Universidad Nacional de San Luis

Contributions to the Calculation of the Carbon Footprint in the Great Urban Settlements in Argentina

El cambio climático y su efecto más inmediato, el calentamiento global, plantean desafíos para la gestión ambiental de las ciudades. Uno de ellos es estimar su huella de carbono con la finalidad de morigerar los potenciales impactos. El presente trabajo propone calcular las emisiones de CO2 producidas por las actividades antrópicas de los 15 asentamientos urbanos de Argentina de más de 300.000 habitantes. Para ello se analizaron por localidad los consumos de energía eléctrica y se calcularon las emisiones de CO2 por sector de demanda eléctrica. Los resultados muestran que Argentina, en general, y los grandes asentamientos, en particular, tienen una baja contribución de emisiones de CO2, que se asocian en orden decreciente con la actividad industrial, residencial y comercial.Climate change and its most immediate effect, global warming, pose challenges for urban environmental management, such as the calculation of the carbon footprint in order to moderate potential impacts. The objective of this project was to calculate CO2 emissions produced by anthropic activities in 15 urban settlements with over 300,000 inhabitants in Argentina. For this purpose, electricity consumption was analyzed in each city and CO2 emissions were calculated by area according to the demand for electricity. The results reveal that Argentina, in general, and the great urban settlements, in particular, have low CO2 emissions associated, in decreasing order, with industrial, residential, and commercial activities.A mudança climática e seu efeito mais imediato, o aquecimento global, apresentam desafios para a gestão ambiental das cidades. Um deles é estimar sua pegada de carbono com a finalidade de diminuir os potencias impactos. O presente trabalho propõe calcular as emissões de CO2 produzidas pelas atividades humanas dos 15 assentamentos urbanos da Argentina de mais de 300.000 habitantes. Para isso analisaram-se por localidade os consumos de energia elétrica e calcularam-se as emissões de CO2 por setor de demanda elétrica. Os resultados mostram que a Argentina, em geral, e os grandes assentamentos, em particular, têm uma baixa contribuição de emissões de CO2, que se associam em ordem decrescente com atividade industrial, residencial e comercial.Fil: Ferraro, Rosana Fatima. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Gareis, María Cecilia. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Zulaica, Maria Laura. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentin

PREMORBID ADJUSTMENT AND CANNABIS USE IN FIRST-EPISODE-PSYCHOSIS PATIENTS. A CROSS-EUROPEAN CASE-CONTROL STUDY

The harmful effects of cannabis use and possible neuropsychological impairment associated with its use are a contentious topic of debate in both research and public health,as is thefact that cannabis use has been repeatedly shown to be a risk factor for the development of psychosis. Surprisingly, three different meta-analyses on cognition and cannabis, among schizophrenic patients, found better cognitive performance in patients with a lifetime use of cannabis (Potvin, Joyal, Pelletier, & Stip, 2008; Rabin, Zakzanis, & George, 2011; Yücel et al., 2012). This counterintuitive finding, coupled with the fact that most psychotic patients suffer from cognitive impairment (Reichenberg et al., 2009) make it more difficult to understand the relationship between these two risk factors. Two different explanations have been advanced for this counterintuitive finding: a) a “premorbid-driven hypothesis” and b) a “neuroprotective-derived hypothesis”. The latter explanation has gained greater support from the evidence that the CBD component has been useful as part of the treatment in several neurological disorders. Cognition has been established as a predictor of real world community functioning in schizophrenia. However, studies on the relationship between cannabis use and neurocognitive functioning in psychosis, which have controlled for the potential bias of premorbid functioning, are rarely represented in this context and often inconclusive. The main objective of the work presented in this Thesis was to explore this association in an epidemiologically-derived case-control study in a sample derivedfrom TheEuropean Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI) in order to test the first of these two hypotheses, with the aim of exploring IQ and premorbid conditions and how they are related to cannabis use in patients at their first episode of psychosis (FEP), by comparing those cannabis using patients to non-users and to their respective healthy controls. The final aim of this work was to identify the relationship between IQ, premorbid social and academic adjustment with cannabis use in psychotic patients, compared to healthy controls, in order to be able to explain in which cases you can expect a better IQ and a better premorbid adjustment and why, by clustering the sample, first according to cannabis use and, secondly, to frequency of cannabis use. I hypothesize the existence of a subgroup of patients with a recreational use of cannabis, who are less cognitively impaired at the onset and less socially withdrawn in the premorbid period than other patients. The final sample of the present study included 1,895 subjects (834 cases and 1,061 controls), with complete information about cannabis use (CEQ) and premorbid adjustment (PAS) at least. 1,739 subjects in total had also complete information on their IQ (derived from WAIS-short version). The study confirmed that patients who used cannabis in their lifetime with a recreational pattern of cannabis use have higher IQ scores and a better and more stable premorbid adjustment than other patients. The study also suggested that the better premorbid social adjustment of patients with cannabis-use might be responsible for the contact with the substance and that cannabis use increased the risk of psychosis in a subgroup of patients with less neurodevelopmental vulnerability. Taken together, these results are able to rule out the alternative explanation of a neuroprotective role of cannabis use on cognition, in favour of the hypothesis of a complex relationship between premorbid predisposition and different pattern of cannabis use in determining this paradoxical result