Introduction to the proceedings of the Piccola Impresa/Small Business 5th Workshop: “Beyond the crisis: what is the future for small businesses? Challenges, opportunities and lessons learned”

In this volume, we are pleased to present the proceedings of the 5th Workshop organised by the journal Piccola Impresa/Small Business in collaboration with the Association for the study of small enterprises (ASPI), the Research Center on Entrepreneurship and Small-medium firms (CRIMPI), the Italian Academy of Business Economics (AIDEA) and the European Council for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (ECSB). The workshop title was “Beyond the crisis: what is the future for small businesses? Challenges, opportunities and lessons learned”, and it took place online on December 4-5, 2021. The aim of the conference was to bring together scholars of entrepreneurship and small and medium-sized enterprises, to discuss the emerging issues following the Covid-19 pandemic. As we have highlighted in the call for papers of the workshop and a previous editorial published in the journal mentioned above (Pencarelli et al. 2021), the COVID-19 pandemic has triggered the largest public health crisis in living memory, with serious—and still unpredictable—consequences for the global economy. Available data clearly shows that SMEs have particularly suffered from economic downturn: their inherent weaknesses have amplified and accelerated the effects of the crisis compared to larger firms (Cowling et al., 2020; OECD, 2020). Notably, in Italy, the Covid-19 outbreak has challenged SMEs’ survival after a decade of a slow and incomplete recovery (CERVED, 2020, 2021)

Photoidentification catalog of Cuvier's beaked whale (Ziphius cavirostris) in the Ligurian Sea

A photo-ID catalog of Cuvier's beaked whales was compiled by analyzing data collected in the Ligurian Sea from 1998 to 2007. Data were collected during dedicated surveys for beaked whales, opportunistic whale watching cruises, and during several tagging efforts. A total of 2,300 photographs was collected and referenced to time and GPS position. Of these photographs, 650 were of sufficient quality to use for photo-identification. Photographs were divided into four categories, based on scarring and pigmentation patterns: very distinctive (heavily scarred and/or bold pigmentation), distinctive (many distinct scars and/or bold pigmentation), slightly distinctive (few scars and lack of bold pigmentation), and not distinctive (no scars and solid brown animal). 127 individual whales were identified, of which 10 were classified as adult males, 3 as adult females, 3 as calves, and 27 as immature whales, based on the above criteria. An additional 26 whales were classified as possible males, and 28 as possible females. During the 9 year study period, 34 whales were resighted, and the longest time between resights was 7 years

Effectiveness of cardiac resynchronization therapy in heart failure patients with valvular heart disease: comparison with patients affected by ischaemic heart disease or dilated cardiomyopathy. The InSync/InSync ICD Italian Registry

AimsTo analyse the effectiveness of cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) in patients with valvular heart disease (a subset not specifically investigated in randomized controlled trials) in comparison with ischaemic heart disease or dilated cardiomyopathy patients.Methods and resultsPatients enrolled in a national registry were evaluated during a median follow-up of 16 months after CRT implant. Patients with valvular heart disease treated with CRT (n = 108) in comparison with ischaemic heart disease (n = 737) and dilated cardiomyopathy (n = 635) patients presented: (i) a higher prevalence of chronic atrial fibrillation, with atrioventricular node ablation performed in around half of the cases; (ii) a similar clinical and echocardiographic profile at baseline; (iii) a similar improvement of LVEF and a similar reduction in ventricular volumes at 6-12 months; (iv) a favourable clinical response at 12 months with an improvement of the clinical composite score similar to that occurring in patients with dilated cardiomyopathy and more pronounced than that observed in patients with ischaemic heart disease; (v) a long-term outcome, in term of freedom from death or heart transplantation, similar to patients affected by ischaemic heart disease and basically more severe than that of patients affected by dilated cardiomyopathy.ConclusionIn 'real world' clinical practice, CRT appears to be effective also in patients with valvular heart disease. However, in this group of patients the outcome after CRT does not precisely overlap any of the two other groups of patients, for which much more data are currently available

Atlantic Long-Term Oceanographic Mooring (ALTOMOOR)

The Atlantic Long-Term Oceanogrphic Mooring (ALTOMOOR) has been maintained offshore Bermuda since 1993 as a testbed for the evaluation of new data telemetry technologies and new oceanographic instrumentation. It is currently a joint project between the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and the University of Southern California This report documents the WHOI contributions which have focused on the development of new data telemetry methods and new mooring technology. Details of the instrumentation evaluations will be published separately. A new inductively-coupled telemetry technology for ocean moorings has been developed and tested on ALTOMOOR. The inductive link uses standard, plastic-jacketed mooring wire as the transmission path for data generated at the individual instruments installed on the mooring. The signals are inductively linked to the mooring wire via toroids clamped around the wire, thus avoiding the need for multiconductor electromechanical cables terminated at each instrument. Seawater provides the electrical return path. The inductive modems send and receive data at 1200b/s. A controller in the surface buoy collects data from each of the subsurface instruments and forwards the data to shore by traditional satellite telemetry (Argos) and by short range radio using a nearby ship as a store and forward node. The buoy-to-ship link operates over about 2 km at 10kBytes/sec. When the ship docks, data are offloaded automatically to a computer on shore which can be accessed via the Internet.Funding was provided by the Office of Naval Research through Contract Nos. N000-14-94-10346 and N000-14-90-J-1719

Clicking for calamari : toothed whales can echolocate squid Loligo pealeii

Author Posting. © Inter-Research, 2007. This article is posted here by permission of Inter-Research for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Aquatic Biology 1 (2007): 141-150, doi:10.3354/ab00014.Squid play an important role in biomass turnover in marine ecosystems and constitute a food source for ~90% of all echolocating toothed whale species. Nonetheless, it has been hypothesized that the soft bodies of squid provide echoes too weak to be detected by toothed whale biosonars, and that only the few hard parts of the squid body may generate significant backscatter. We measured the acoustic backscatter from the common squid Loligo pealeii for signals similar to toothed whale echolocation clicks using an energy detector to mimic the mammalian auditory system. We show that the dorsal target strengths of L. pealeii with mantle lengths between 23 and 26 cm fall in the range from –38 to –44 dB, and that the pen, beak and lenses do not contribute significantly to the backscatter. Thus, the muscular mantle and fins of L. pealeii constitute a sufficient sonar target for individual biosonar detection by toothed whales at ranges between 25 and 325 m, depending on squid size, noise levels, click source levels, and orientation of the ensonified squid. While epipelagic squid must be fast and muscular to catch prey and avoid visual predators, it is hypothesized that some deep-water squid may have adopted passive acoustic crypsis, with a body of low muscle mass and low metabolism that will render them less conspicuous to echolocating predators.This study was funded by the Oticon Foundation with additional support from Reson, and a Steno scholarship to P.T.M. from the Danish Natural Science Research Council. M.W. was funded by a PhD scholarship from the Faculty of Natural Sciences at Aarhus University and the PhD School SOAS. R.T.H. acknowledges partial funding from NOAA/NURP grant UAF-05-0133

Strategic planning model to increase the profitability of an HR outsourcing SME through digital transformation

El texto completo de este trabajo no está disponible en el Repositorio Académico UPC por restricciones de la casa editorial donde ha sido publicado.The Human Resources (HR) outsourcing market in Peru is growing; however, it is dominated by large companies in this area, which prevents the development of new organizations or small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The latter, in spite of providing the same services, fail to reach the expected sales volume, thus reporting low profitability. This article analyzes the different factors that impede the growth of SMEs through a fishbone (Ishikawa) diagram and the assessment of initial indicators. It also proposes a model that is based on the three pillars of Digital Transformation and the importance of their alignment in its implementation. A pilot model has been conducted for validation in an SME that provides HR outsourcing services. The research results denote an increase in the company’s profitability and capacity

Dronedarone: Una reale innovazione o solo una valida seconda scelta? Come districarsi tra linee guida, agenzie regolatorie e pratica clinica quotidiana

Dronedarone is the antiarrhythmic drug with the most complete and wide literature preceding its marketing. Most of these studies showed a good efficacy along with an excellent risk profile, especially in low- and medium-risk patients. Recently, updates of European, American and even Italian guidelines gave dronedarone its own spot into the antiarrhythmic armamentarium, recommending its use both for rhythm control and rate control in non-permanent atrial fibrillation. In Italy, however, dronedarone prescription is still possible only when amiodarone is not tolerated, making dronedarone a mere second choice of its older "relative". Moreover, patients taking dronedarone must undergo a strict alanine aminotransferase and bilirubin follow-up, which usefulness in predicting drug-induced liver damage (probably idiosyncratic in nature and therefore unpredictable) is far from demonstrated. The aim of this review is to sum up actual evidences on dronedarone, describe how these evidences had been differently transposed by panel of experts and drug agencies into guidelines and recommendations, and define the current difficulties encountered by the cardiologist in the correct use of this new antiarrhythmic agent in clinical practi