La crisi dell’Europa. La “distruzione creativa” e le nuove solidarietà sociali

This article deals with the problem of the social foundations of social solidarity in the context of today’s European crisis. One of the main hypothesis is that the crisis is not only a factor of disintegration but also of "creative destruction", followed by an accelerated change and social mobilization. The crisis is also a phase in which social imagination and creativity are liberated, and new conditions arise for social solidarity. The first part of this article analyzes the relationship between European crisis, social solidarity, Europeanization and cosmopolitanism. In the second part, it highlights the rise of new forms of “cosmopolitan social solidarities” in Europe, referring to some key concept – social and geographical imagination, capacity to aspire and social acts – as useful tools for the empirical analysis

Allergic bronchopulmonary aspergillosis: diagnostic and treatment challenges

Allergic bronchopulmonary aspergillosis (ABPA) is a pulmonary disorder, occurring mostly in asthmatic and cystic fibrosis patients, caused by an abnormal T-helper 2 lymphocyte response of the host to Aspergillus fumigatus antigens. ABPA diagnosis is defined by clinical, laboratory and radiological criteria including active asthma, immediate skin reactivity to A. fumigatus antigens, total serum IgE levels>1000 IU/mL, fleeting pulmonary parenchymal opacities and central bronchiectases that represent an irreversible complication of ABPA. Despite advances in our understanding of the role of the allergic response in the pathophysiology of ABPA, pathogenesis of the disease is still not completely clear. In addition, the absence of consensus regarding its prevalence, diagnostic criteria and staging limits the possibility of diagnosing the disease at early stages. This may delay the administration of a therapy that can potentially prevent permanent lung damage. Long-term management is still poorly studied. Present primary therapies, based on clinical experience, are not yet standardized. These consist in oral corticosteroids, which control acute symptoms by mitigating the allergic inflammatory response, azoles and, more recently, anti-IgE antibodies. The latter two are used as a steroid-sparing agent to prolong the remission stage of the disease. Anti-IgE antibodies also have immunomodulatory properties. At present, the only way to bypass these limits and allow for an early diagnosis, is to assume ABPA in all patients with difficult-to-control asthma or cystic fibrosis. They should then be screened for sensitization to A. fumigatus antigens and, if positive, monitored more closely. Future controlled studies are needed to standardize present therapy, standardize cut-off values of various investigations, define the role of different novel immunomodulatory therapies, define the role of novel assays (such as recombinant A. fumigatus antigens and CCL17) and confirm new diagnostic and staging criteria

Ultrastructural Alterations in Lepocinclis acus (Euglenophyta) Induced by Medium with High Organic Matter Content

Ultrastructural changes induced by exposure to excess of organic matter were studied in Lepocinclis acus (ex Euglena acus). The cells isolated from the Matanza River, Buenos Aires, Argentina, were grown in soil water medium (SWM). When transferred to medium enriched with Bacteriological Peptone OXOID®, marked body deformation and a significant shortening and widening of the cells was observed. These changes were unexpected in a species with quite rigid cells, a condition previously shown in studies of the pellicle fine structure. Transmission electron microscopy observations suggest that cellular deformation might be facilitated by an increase in strip number, whereas in the original strips normal ultrastructure was maintained. An increase in number and volume of paramylon grains and vacuoles, as well as the presence of membrane whorls in vacuoles was observed. The fine structure of organisms grown in medium with and without organic matter enrichment was compared, and the systematic and ecological importance of morphological changes triggered by cell deformation was discussed.Fil: Conforti, Visitacion Teresa D.. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Departamento de Biodiversidad y Biología Experimental; ArgentinaFil: Ruiz, Laura Beatriz. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Departamento de Biodiversidad y Biología Experimental; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Leonardi, Patricia Ines. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Bahía Blanca. Centro de Recursos Naturales Renovables de la Zona Semiárida. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Centro de Recursos Naturales Renovables de la Zona Semiárida; Argentina. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Departamento de Biología, Bioquímica y Farmacia; Argentin

Re-embedding European Social Citizenship through Cosmopolitanism

This article tackles the issue of social citizenship in Europe, beyond its legal and political defini-tion, as the result of social mechanisms and practices, and it assumes the cosmopolitan perspective as a conceptual tool for the interpretation of changes in its principles and structure as related to Europeaniza-tion and globalisation. It starts from the heuristic value of the concept, grounded in modern industrial so-cieties and built on its institutions and forms of social solidarity. Then it draws on the debate about the challenges of the welfare state and capitalism’s transformations, as well as on the impact on social citizen-ship of the European integration process. It proposes cosmopolitanism as a lens for catching cosmopolitan ideas, narratives and values that contribute to creating new practices of solidarity and mutual recognition, which are the basis for the construction of new kinds of sustainable social citizenship in Europe. The Euro-pean social forum of 2012 has been considered a significant case study for an empirical exploration of the cosmopolitan imagination as a factual process. A cosmopolitan epistemology takes shape, based on the values of commons and global public goods. Meanings, actions and practices enhanced by social actors, building solidarity in diversity and following global-local logics, show forms of recognition of otherness and of sharing global responsibilities representing a tendency towards a new conception of European social citizenship. Social rights and recognition beyond territorial boundaries are at the core of the construction of a cosmopolitan citizenship in Europe

Multi-layer model for the web graph

This paper studies stochastic graph models of the WebGraph. We present a new model that describes the WebGraph as an ensemble of different regions generated by independent stochastic processes (in the spirit of a recent paper by Dill et al. [VLDB 2001]). Models such as the Copying Model [17] and Evolving Networks Model [3] are simulated and compared on several relevant measures such as degree and clique distribution