Evaluating administrative burdens through SCM: some indications from the Italian experience

A methodology to measure administrative burdens, based on the Dutch Standard Cost Model (SCM), has been applied in a large number of European countries, coupled in most cases with the commitment to a reduction target. This paper compares the application of the method in different national context and discusses its weaknesses and strengths against more complete forms of evaluation of the adequacy of regulation. The paper also discusses some indication arisen during the measurement of administrative burdens through SCM in Italy. Our main conclusion is that the SCM is a potentially useful tool and could provide motivation for culture change in policymaking. Its major strength, which lies mainly in its pragmatic approach and the possibility of commitment on a quantitative target, may be at the same time a source of weakness and may deliver some misleading results. Also some basic concepts of the model need a more rigorous definition to be consistently applied in different countries.administrative burdens; better regulation; costs of regulation; European governance; standard cost model

Reasoning about Actions with Temporal Answer Sets

In this paper we combine Answer Set Programming (ASP) with Dynamic Linear Time Temporal Logic (DLTL) to define a temporal logic programming language for reasoning about complex actions and infinite computations. DLTL extends propositional temporal logic of linear time with regular programs of propositional dynamic logic, which are used for indexing temporal modalities. The action language allows general DLTL formulas to be included in domain descriptions to constrain the space of possible extensions. We introduce a notion of Temporal Answer Set for domain descriptions, based on the usual notion of Answer Set. Also, we provide a translation of domain descriptions into standard ASP and we use Bounded Model Checking techniques for the verification of DLTL constraints.Comment: To appear in Theory and Practice of Logic Programmin

Chapter A statistical information system in support of job policies orientation

A significant problem for labour market policies relies on the individuation of the most advisable skills to have and to enhance through focused training offers. Vocational training systems and institutions are called to answer the question posed by every person looking for a new job or professional opportunities: which are the skills-to-have to enhance the professional profile? Many efforts have been made to answer this question, mainly designing predictive models; however, these models are often limited to specific economic sectors and usually don’t adopt a country-specific perspective. This paper proposes a recommendation system oriented to specific users: once that the user has described his/her skills profile, the system suggests the skills that, once got, will fit with the most frequent job vacancies. In this proposal perspective, the skills are proposed regardless of the economic sector, and they are compatible with the characteristics of the specific country labour market. In this contribution, we will focus on the Italian market; the recommendation system is based on the job ads published by Italian companies on various websites for both 2019 and 2020 after the skills required for each job offer have been mapped to one of the skills presented in the classification of European Skills/ competence, qualifications ad Occupations (ESCO)

Chapter Big data analysis and labour market: an analysis of Italian online job vacancies data

Economists and social scientists are increasingly making use of web data to address socio-economic issues and to integrate existing sources of information. The data produced by online platforms and websites could produce a lot of useful and multidimensional information with a variety of potential applications in socio-economic analysis. In this respect, with the internet growth and knowledge, many aspects of job search have been transformed due to the availability of online tools for job searching, candidate searching and job matching. In European countries there is growing interest in designing and implementing real labour market information system applications for internet labour market data in order to support policy design and evaluation through evidence-based decision-making. The analysis of labour market web data could provide useful information for policy-makers to define labour market strategies as big data, jointly with official statistics, support policy makers in a pressing policy question namely “How to tackle the mismatch between jobs and skills?”. In this regard, the topic of skills gap, how to measure it and how to bridge it with education and continuous training have been tackled by using the big data collection, such as the Cedefop (European Center for the Development of Vocational Training) initiative and the Wollybi Project (made by Burning Glass). In this framework, this contribution focuses on the issues arising from the use (and the usefulness) of on-line job vacancy data to analyse the Italian labour market by using the Wollybi data available for the years 2019 and 2020. Furthermore, the availability of data for the year 2020, will allow us to evaluate whether there has been an impact of COVID19 in terms of needed skills and required occupations in the online job vacancies

Parametric thermal-hydraulic analysis of the EU DEMO Water-Cooled Lithium-Lead First Wall using the GETTHEM code

The system-level code GETTHEM is applied to the thermal-hydraulic analysis of an entire segment of the Water-Cooled Lithium-Lead (WCLL) First Wall (FW) of the EU DEMO reactor, parametrically varying the heat load of the FW and the coolant mass flow rate. The results show that the WCLL FW design can tolerate variations of the distribution of the heat flux with respect to the design value, without requiring modifications. The top inboard and the bottom outboard regions are identified as most critical from the point of view of the cooling of the FW. Finally, the largest possible extent of the WCLL FW surface where the peak heat load can be safely applied is identified through a parametric analysis, performed on the critical regions, to understand which is the limit of the cooling capacity of the system

High-throughput analysis of the RNA-induced silencing complex in myotonic dystrophy type 1 patients identifies the dysregulation of miR-29c and its target ASB2

Myotonic dystrophy type 1 (DM1) is a multi-systemic disorder caused by abnormally expanded stretches of CTG DNA triplets in the DMPK gene, leading to mutated-transcript RNA-toxicity. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are short non-coding RNAs that, after maturation, are loaded onto the RISC effector complex that destabilizes target mRNAs and represses their translation. In DM1 muscle biopsies not only the expression, but also the intracellular localization of specific miRNAs is disrupted, leading to the dysregulation of the relevant mRNA targets. To investigate the functional alterations of the miRNA/target interactions in DM1, we analyzed by RNA-sequencing the RISC-associated RNAs in skeletal muscle biopsies derived from DM1 patients and matched controls. The mRNAs found deregulated in DM1 biopsies were involved in pathways and functions relevant for the disease, such as energetic metabolism, calcium signaling, muscle contraction and p53-dependent apoptosis. Bioinformatic analysis of the miRNA/mRNA interactions based on the RISC enrichment profiles, identified 24 miRNA/mRNA correlations. Following validation in 21 independent samples, we focused on the couple miR-29c/ASB2 because of the role of miR-29c in fibrosis (a feature of late-stage DM1 patients) and of ASB2 in the regulation of muscle mass. Luciferase reporter assay confirmed the direct interaction between miR-29c and ASB2. Moreover, decreased miR-29c and increased ASB2 levels were verified also in immortalized myogenic cells and primary fibroblasts, derived from biopsies of DM1 patients and controls. CRISPR/Cas9-mediated deletion of CTG expansions rescued normal miR-29c and ASB2 levels, indicating a direct link between the mutant repeats and the miRNA/target expression. In conclusion, functionally relevant miRNA/mRNA interactions were identified in skeletal muscles of DM1 patients, highlighting the dysfunction of miR-29c and ASB2

Study of optimal measurement conditions for time-domain diffuse optics systems

Light is a powerful non-invasive tool that can be exploited to probe highly scattering media like biological tissues for different purposes, from the detection of brain activity to the characterization of cancer lesions. In the last decade, timedomain diffuse optics (TDDO) systems demonstrated improved sensitivity when using time-gated acquisition chains and short source-detector separations (ρ), both theoretically and experimentally. However, the sensitivity to localized absorption changes buried inside a diffusive medium strongly depends on many parameters such as: SDS, laser power, delay and width of the gating window, absorption and scattering properties of the medium, instrument response function (IRF) shape, etc. In particular, relevant effects due to slow tails in the IRF were noticed, with detrimental effects on performances. We present simulated experimental results based on the diffusion approximation of the Radiative Transfer Equation and the perturbation theory subjected to the Born approximation. To quantify the system sensitivity to deep (few cm) and localized absorption perturbations, we exploited contrast and contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR), which are internationally agreed on standardized figures of merit. The purpose of this study is to determine which parameters have the greatest impact on these figures of merit, thus also providing a range of best operative conditions. The study is composed by two main stages: the former is a comparison between simulations and measurements on tissue-mimicking phantom, while the latter is a broad simulation study in which all relevant parameters are tuned to determine optimal measurement conditions. This study essentially demonstrates that under the influence of the slow tails in the IRF, the use of a small SDS no longer corresponds to optimal contrast and CNR. This work sets the ground for future studies with next-generation of TDDO components, presently under development, providing useful hints on relevant features to which one should take care when designing TDDO components

Instrumental, optical and geometrical parameters affecting time-gated diffuse optical measurements: a systematic study

In time-domain diffuse optics the sensitivity to localized absorption changes buried inside a diffusive medium depends strongly on the interplay between instrumental, optical and geometrical parameters, which can hinder the theoretical advantages of novel measurement strategies like the short source-detector distance approach. Here, we present a study based on experimental measurements and simulations to comprehensively evaluate the effect of all different parameters. Results are evaluated exploiting standardized figures of merit, like contrast and contrast-to-noise ratio, to quantify the system sensitivity to deep localized absorption perturbations. Key findings show that the most critical hardware parameter is the memory effect which ultimately limits the dynamic range. Further, a choice of the source-detector distance around 10 mm seems to be a good compromise to compensate non-idealities in practical systems still preserving the advantages of short distances. This work provides both indications for users about the best measurement conditions and strategies, and for technology developers to identify the most crucial hardware features in view of next generation diffuse optics systems