Complexity in action: Untangling latent relationships between land quality, economic structures and socio-spatial patterns in Italy

Land quality, a key economic capital supporting local development, is affected by biophysical and anthropogenic factors. Taken as a relevant attribute of economic systems, land quality has shaped the territorial organization of any given region influencing localization of agriculture, industry and settlements. In regions with long-established human-landscape interactions, such as the Mediterranean basin, land quality has determined social disparities and polarization in the use of land, reflecting the action of geographical gradients based on elevation and population density. The present study investigates latent relationships within a large set of indicators profiling local communities and land quality on a fine-grained resolution scale in Italy with the aim to assess the potential impact of land quality on the regional socioeconomic structure. The importance of land quality gradients in the socioeconomic configuration of urban and rural regions was verified analyzing the distribution of 149 socioeconomic and environmental indicators organized in 5 themes and 17 research dimensions. Agriculture, income, education and labour market variables discriminate areas with high land quality from areas with low land quality. While differential land quality in peri-urban areas may reflect conflicts between competing actors, moderate (or low) quality of land in rural districts is associated with depopulation, land abandonment, subsidence agriculture, unemployment and low educational levels. We conclude that the socioeconomic profile of local communities has been influenced by land quality in a different way along urban-rural gradients. Policies integrating environmental and socioeconomic measures are required to consider land quality as a pivotal target for sustainable development. Regional planning will benefit from an in-depth understanding of place-specific relationships between local communities and the environment

Climate Aridity under Changing Conditions and Implications for the Agricultural Sector: Italy as a Case Study

A comprehensive diachronic analysis (1951–2010) of precipitation and temperature regimes has been carried out at the national and regional scale in Italy to investigate the impact of climate aridity on the agricultural system. Trends in climate aridity have been also analysed using UNEP aridity index which is the ratio between rainfall and potential evapotranspiration on a yearly basis. During the examined time period, and particularly in the most recent years, a gradual reduction in rainfall and growing temperatures have been observed which have further widened the gap between precipitation amounts and water demand in agriculture

Diffusione urbana e cambiamento climatico: percorsi di (in)sostenibilità a livello locale?

Le città sono gli insediamenti umani più vulnerabili agli impatti del clima. Nelle aree urbane il cambiamento climatico è esacerbato da regimi termometrici più netti e precipitazioni più intense rispetto ad aree rurali o extraurbane. Ciò è dovuto all’influenza che forme e strutture urbane esercitano sul clima locale, accentuando le onde di calore e modificando i regimi delle precipitazio-ni temporalesche. In particolare, i modelli insediativi della città ‘diffusa’ rendono ‘urbani’ spazi precedentemente rurali, con un elevato grado di frammentazione abitativa e infrastrutturazione del territorio. Ciò implica costi rilevanti di funzionamento relativi a consumi energetici, impermeabiliz-zazione del suolo, aumento della domanda di trasporti, inquinamento. Questo può accrescere la vul-nerabilità urbana agli impatti del cambiamento climatico. Il contributo ha lo scopo di esplorare al-cuni effetti potenziali che la crescita urbana esercita sul bilancio termico e sul clima alla scala urba-na. Lo studio si sofferma dapprima su alcuni concetti base per lo studio del clima urbano. Successi-vamente, si descrivono gli effetti potenziali della forma urbana diffusa sull’aumento di temperatura e sulle precipitazioni estreme lungo il gradiente urbano. Infine, il lavoro discute sulla necessità di utilizzare metodologie di analisi meteo-climatiche specifiche per il clima urbano e di predisporre strategie di adattamento urbano al cambiamento climatico.Among human settlements, cities are the most vulnerable to climate impacts. In urban areas, climate change is exacerbated by sharper thermal regimes and heavier rainfall compared to suburban or rural areas. This is due to the influence urban forms and structures have on local climate, aggravating the heat waves and modifying the rainfall patterns. in particular, the settlement models of the ‘sprawling’ city change into ‘urban’ some originally rural areas, with a high degree of housing and infrastructure fragmentation . This implies increasing operation costs related to energy consumption, soil sealing, arising transport demand and pollution. This can increase the urban vul-nerability to the impacts of climate change. The paper aims at exploring some of the potential ef-fects urban growth exerts on thermal balance and climate at the urban scale. Initially, the paper re-ports a few basic concepts for the study of urban climate. Then, it describes the potential effects of the sprawling urban form on temperature rise and extreme rainfall along the urban-rural gradient. Finally, it discusses the need to use techniques of weather and climate analysis specific for urban climate and to develop strategies of urban adaptation to climate change

a cost effective approach for improving the quality of soil sealing change detection from landsat imagery

The aim of this study is to develop a cost-effective approach for soil sealing change detection integrating radiometric analysis, multi-resolution segmentation and object-based classifiers in two study areas in Italy: Campania region and Veneto region. The integrated approach uses multi-temporal satellite images and CORINE Land Cover (CLC) maps. A good overall accuracy was obtained for the soil sealing maps produced. The results show an improvement in terms of size of the minimum mapping unit and of the changed object (1,44 ha in both cases) in respect to the CLC. The approach proves to be cost-effective given the data which are provided at low or no cost and as well as the level of automation achievable

Economic Convergence with Divergence in Environmental Quality? Desertification Risk and the Economic Structure of a Mediterranean Country (1960-2010)

The present study investigates the relationship between land vulnerability to desertification and the evolution of the productive structure in Italy during the last fifty years (1960-2010). The objectives of the study are two-fold: (i) to present and discuss an original analysis of the income-environment relationship in an economic-convergent and environmental-divergent country and (ii) to evaluate the impact of the (changing) productive structure and selected socio-demographic characteristics on the level of land vulnerability. The econometric analysis indicates that the relationship between per capita GDP and land vulnerability across Italian provinces is completely reverted once we move from a cross section analysis to panel estimates. While economic and environmental disparities between provinces go in the same direction, with richer provinces having a better land, over time the growth process increases the desertification risk, with the economic structure acting as a significant variable

Climate Aridity under Changing Conditions and Implications for the Agricultural Sector: Italy as a Case Study

A comprehensive diachronic analysis (1951–2010) of precipitation and temperature regimes has been carried out at the national and regional scale in Italy to investigate the impact of climate aridity on the agricultural system. Trends in climate aridity have been also analysed using UNEP aridity index which is the ratio between rainfall and potential evapotranspiration on a yearly basis. During the examined time period, and particularly in the most recent years, a gradual reduction in rainfall and growing temperatures have been observed which have further widened the gap between precipitation amounts and water demand in agriculture

Exploring forest infrastructures equipment through multivariate analysis: complementarities, gaps and overlaps in the Mediterranean basin

The countries of the Mediterranean basin face several challenges regarding the sustainability of forest ecosystems and the delivery of crucial goods and services that they provide in a context of rapid global changes. Advancing scientific knowledge and foresting innovation is essential to ensure the sustainable management of Mediterranean forests and maximize the potential role of their unique goods and services in building a knowledge-based bioeconomy in the region. In this context, the European project FORESTERRA ("Enhancing FOrest RESearch in the MediTERRAnean through improved coordination and integration”) aims at reinforcing the scientific cooperation on Mediterranean forests through an ambitious transnational framework in order to reduce the existing research fragmentation and maximize the effectiveness of forest research activities. Within the FORESTERRA project framework, this work analyzed the infrastructures equipment of the Mediterranean countries belonging to the project Consortium. According to the European Commission, research infrastructures are facilities, resources and services that are used by the scientific communities to conduct research and foster innovation. To the best of our knowledge, the equipment and availability of infrastructures, in terms of experimental sites, research facilities and databases, have only rarely been explored. The aim of this paper was hence to identify complementarities, gaps and overlaps among the different forest research institutes in order to create a scientific network, optimize the resources and trigger collaborations

Cardiac resynchronization therapy-defibrillator improves long-term survival compared with cardiac resynchronization therapy-pacemaker in patients with a class IA indication for cardiac resynchronization therapy: Data from the Contak Italian Registry

Aims In candidates for cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT), the choice between pacemaker (CRT-P) and defibrillator (CRT-D) implantation is still debated. We compared the long-term prognosis of patients who received CRT-D or CRT-P according to class IA recommendations of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) and who were enrolled in a multicentre prospective registry. Methods and results A total of 620 heart failure patients underwent successful implantation of a CRT device and were enrolled in the Contak Italian Registry. This analysis included 266 patients who received a CRT-D and 108 who received a CRT-P according to class IA ESC indications. Their survival status was verified after a median follow-up of 55 months. During follow-up, 73 CRT-D and 44 CRT-P patients died (rate 6.6 vs. 10.4%/year; log-rank test, P = 0.020). Patients receiving CRT-P were predominantly older, female, had no history of life-threatening ventricular arrhythmias, and more frequently presented non-ischaemic aetiology of heart failure, longer QRS durations, and worse renal function. However, the only independent predictor of death from any cause was the use of CRT-P (hazard ratio, 1.97; 95% confidence interval, 1.21–3.16; P = 0.007). Conclusion The implantation of CRT-D, rather than CRT-P, may be preferable in patients presenting with current class IA ESC indications for CRT. Indeed, CRT-D resulted in greater long-term survival and was independently associated with a better prognosis

Phosphocaveolin-1 enforces tumor growth and chemoresistance in rhabdomyosarcoma

Caveolin-1 (Cav-1) can ambiguously behave as either tumor suppressor or oncogene depending on its phosphorylation state and the type of cancer. In this study we show that Cav-1 was phosphorylated on tyrosine 14 (pCav-1) by Src-kinase family members in various human cell lines and primary mouse cultures of rhabdomyosarcoma (RMS), the most frequent soft-tissue sarcoma affecting childhood. Cav-1 overexpression in the human embryonal RD or alveolar RH30 cells yielded increased pCav-1 levels and reinforced the phosphorylation state of either ERK or AKT kinase, respectively, in turn enhancing in vitro cell proliferation, migration, invasiveness and chemoresistance. In contrast, reducing the pCav-1 levels by administration of a Src-kinase inhibitor or through targeted Cav-1 silencing counteracted the malignant in vitro phenotype of RMS cells. Consistent with these results, xenotransplantation of Cav-1 overexpressing RD cells into nude mice resulted in substantial tumor growth in comparison to control cells. Taken together, these data point to pCav-1 as an important and therapeutically valuable target for overcoming the progression and multidrug resistance of RMS