The construction of the wooden roof: the case study of the reconstruction of the Old Castle in Stuttgart by P. Schmitthenner. Elements, language, form.

In 1931 a fire destroyed the old Castle of Stuttgart. Following a series of debates on the restoration of the castle and in particular on the tall sloping roof, a poor reconstruction of which would have rendered the image of the city “gray and expressionless”. In 1932 Paul Schmitthenner (1884-1972) published one of his projects for the reconstruction the castle. After the fire only the external walls where left intact, their ability to support a load, however, was compromised. In his project Schmitthenner decided to demolish the external walls and to rebuild them with the old stones and supporting pillars from the inside part. Also the tall roof was to be freed from the additions made without planning over the centuries. In the regional competition Schmitthenner proposed his project and won. The compositional principle was the reconstruction of a basilical space with three aisles. This room was realized as a complex construction in wood. The walls of the room, set all under a single great trussed roof, were realized in half-timber structure with unplastered brick infill. To capture light from the sides, he built three of his signature high wall-dormers. Masterly handcrafted, the raw materiality of the wood and the brick, the light that penetrates the room, all the elements underlined the sacredness proper to this internal space. The reconstruction was finished in 1937, but did not last for a long because in 1944 the castle was destroyed by bombing. The intention of this research is to produce the three-dimensional reconstruction of the wooden roof, in order to understand the structural rules of the elements and the measure of the parts which compose the section, and finally to investigate the language of the traditional halftimber system developed in modern solutions and the meaning of form or, in Schmitthenner’s words, the ‘constructed form’ (Gebaute Form)

Considerazioni sull’esposizione al rischio in democrazia

Il rischio fa parte della nostra vita quotidiana. Quello derivante dagli impianti di produzione di energia elettrica che utilizzano reattori nucleari dovrebbe essere condiviso con consapevolezza dai cittadini siano essi residenti negli Stati che ospitano queste centrali o in quelli che potrebbero risultare coinvolti dai danni derivanti da un possibile incidente. Le attuali forme di democrazia non si conciliano con i diritti di tutti i possibili stakeholder

The Kleinstadt as a Model for the Modern City. The Case Study of Saraçoğlu Residential area of P. Bonatz in Ankara

Ankara is located in Anatolian plateau of Turkey, marked by the river of the Su il Enguri and an uninterrupted stretch of steppe. The Ottoman fabric clings on a rocky hill and the city at the beginning of the twentieth century was dispersed at his feet without identity. Here in 1944 P. Bonatz (1877-1956) builds Saraçoğlu residential area in the southern suburbs. Bonatz perfected with the forms of architecture a sense of space related to the german idea of Kleinstadt, in which the small city establishing a new relationship with the existing city and the characters of nature. The area is articulated by double architectural principles. On the one hand recognize and give value to the orographic structure of the horizontal plane on the east side and of the slope hill on the west, according the architecture to the beauty of the landscape. On the other hand determine the relations between the facades of the houses on the streets and courts, to define the sense of domesticity and community through the search of a language refunds techniques and forms of housing tradition. The district consists of 75 buildings and 435 apartments built with load-bearing structures in concrete and wall in local stone, in addition to a school and a ministry building. The houses are aligned along three axes in north-south direction and set the polarity of the system in the square on the hill. The language relies by two aspects of Turkish culture as the roofs protruding from the wide eaves, wooden balconies and narrow windows high on a wall simply worked in plaster. The closed form of the residential area offer a settlement model that moves from the idea of the garden city, present in the plan of Ankara by H. Jansen, to face the problems of the modern metropolis

New high-performance liquid chromatography-dad method for analytical determination of arbutin and hydroquinone in rat plasma

Natural substances present in herbal preparations should be carefully used because they can give toxic or therapeutic effects despite of their amount or the way of administration. The safety of products of vegetable origin must be assessed before commercialisation by monitoring the active ingredients and their metabolites. This study was therefore designed to identify and quantify arbutin and its metabolite hydroquinone, naturally present in Arctostaphylos uva-ursi (L.) Spreng plant in rat plasma, after an acute and subacute administration of aqueous arbutin solution in Wistar rats. For this purpose a reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography coupled with photodiode array detection was developed to assess the pharmacokinetic of arbutin and hydroquinone in plasma of female rats treated with aqueous arbutin solutions. The detection (arbutin: 0.0617 µg/ml and hydroquinone 0.0120 µg/ml) and quantification (arbutin: 0.2060 µg/ml and hydroquinone: 0.0400 µg/ml) limits were determined. At the arbutin concentration level of 10.7 µg/ml repeatability was 13.33% and its recovery 93.4±6.93%, while at the hydroquinone concentration level of 10.6 µg/ml repeatability was 11.66% and its recovery 92.9±7.75%. Furthermore the method was fully validated and the obtained data indicate that the new method provides good performances

Pre-existence and prefabrication. Lacaton & Vassal: methodologies for social housing renovation

«Our approach is to give more to do better. In France, between 2006 and 2015, 125,000 dwellings were demolished and 100,000 rebuilt. The cost of demolition and reconstruction of one dwelling amounted to 165,000 euros. Our alternative approach showed that it is possible to significantly transform a dwelling for the cost of 55,000 euros. Transformation means openness, extension, more space, more light, more freedom of use» (Lacaton, 2020). This article discusses the methodologies developed by  Lacaton & Vassal for social housing in French suburbs and examines their “alternative approach” from a constructional and bioclimatic standpoint. Two emblematic cases are taken as an example: the transformation of the Bois-le-Prêtre in Paris and the renovation of three residential blocks in the Grand Parc of Bordeaux

Cerebellum in timing control: Evidence from contingent negative variation after cerebellar tDCS

Background and aims Timing control is defined as the ability to quantify time. The temporal estimation of supra-seconds range is generally seen as a conscious cognitive process, while the sub-seconds range is a more automatic cognitive process. It is accepted that cerebellum contributes to temporal processing, but its function is still debated. The aim of this research was to better explore the role of cerebellum in timing control. We transitorily inhibited cerebellar activity and studied the effects on CNV components in healthy subjects. Methods Sixteen healthy subjects underwent a S1-S2 duration discrimination motor task, prior and after cathodal and sham cerebellar tDCS, in two separate sessions. In S1-S2 task they had to judge whether the duration of a probe interval trial was shorter (Short-ISI-trial:800 ms), longer (long-ISI-trail:1600 ms), or equal to the Target interval of 1200 ms. For each interval trial for both tDCS sessions, we measured: total and W2-CNV areas, the RTs of correct responses and the absolute number of errors prior and after tDCS. Results After cathodal tDCS a significant reduction in total-CNV and W2-CNV amplitudes selectively emerged for Short (p < 0.001; p = 0.003 respectively) and Target-ISI-trial (total-CNV: p < 0.001; W2-CNV:p = 0.003); similarly, a significant higher number of errors emerged for Short (p = 0.004) and Target-ISI-trial (p = 0.07) alone. No differences were detected for Longer-ISI-trials and after sham stimulation. Conclusions These data indicate that cerebellar inhibition selectively altered the ability to make time estimations for second and sub-second intervals. We speculate that cerebellum regulates the attentional mechanisms of automatic timing control by making predictions of interval timing