Membrane morphologies induced by arc-shaped scaffolds are determined by arc angle and coverage

The intricate shapes of biological membranes such as tubules and membrane stacks are induced by proteins. In this article, we systematically investigate the membrane shapes induced by arc-shaped scaffolds such as proteins and protein complexes with coarse-grained modeling and simulations. We find that arc-shaped scaffolds induce membrane tubules at membrane coverages larger than a threshold of about 40%, irrespective of their arc angle. The membrane morphologies at intermediate coverages below this tubulation threshold, in contrast, strongly depend on the arc angle. Scaffolds with arc angles of about 60 degree akin to N-BAR domains do not change the membrane shape at coverages below the tubulation threshold, while scaffolds with arc angles larger than about 120 degree induce double-membrane stacks at intermediate coverages. The scaffolds stabilize the curved membrane edges that connect the membrane stacks, as suggested for complexes of reticulon proteins. Our results provide general insights on the determinants of membrane shaping by arc-shaped scaffolds.Comment: 16 pages, 6 figures + 8 supplementary figures, to appear in Biophysical Journa

Compliance Management is Becoming a Major Issue in IS Design

This article aims at improving the information systems management support to Risk and Compliance Management process, i.e. the management of all compliance imperatives that impact an organization, including both legal and stra- tegically self-imposed imperatives. We propose a process to achieve such regula- tory compliance by aligning the Governance activities with the Risk Management ones, and we suggest Compliance should be considered as a requirement for the Risk Management platform. We will propose a framework to align law and IT compliance requirements and we will use it to underline possible directions of investigation resumed in our discussion section. This work is based on an exten- sive review of the existing literature and on the results of a four-month internship done within the IT compliance team of a major financial institution in Switzer- land, which has legal entities situated in different countries

Fragile bridges. Compliance management among co-opeting agents

This study obtains a set of guidelines with which IS designers can achieve regulatory compliance with data retention requirements. Previous work has explored how to assess compliance threats and to visualize the outcome of policies enforcement but has failed to address how regulatory compliance involves multiple agents seeking to optimize their individual payoffs. We propose a typology that acknowledges in the enterprise business model the return on investment of agents affected by the new controls. Such agents are assumed to be co-opeting, i.e. they gain by cooperating, even if they have different goals. Grounded in control theory and the technology acceptance model, our conceptual design and its implementation represent an economically viable way to align business, legal and IT requirements concerning regulatory compliance with data retention requirement

Privacy as a Tradeoff: Introducing the Notion of Privacy Calculus for Context-Aware Mobile Applications

Evidences collected from smartphones users show a growing desire of personalization offered by services for mobile devices. However, the need to accurately identify users' contexts has important implications for user's privacy and it increases the amount of trust, which users are requested to have in the service providers. In this paper, we introduce a model that describes the role of personalization and control in users' assessment of cost and benefits associated to the disclosure of private information. We present an instantiation of such model, a context-aware application for smartphones based on the Android operating system, in which users' private information are protected. Focus group interviews were conducted to examine users' privacy concerns before and after having used our application. Obtained results confirm the utility of our artifact and provide support to our theoretical model, which extends previous literature on privacy calculus and user's acceptance of context-aware technology

Compliance management among co-opeting actors

This study obtains a set of guidelines with which IS designers can achieve regulatory compliance with data retention requirements. Previous work has explored how to assess compliance threats and to visualize the outcome of policies enforcement but has failed to address how regulatory compliance involves multiple agents seeking to optimize their individual payoffs. We propose a typology that acknowledges in the enterprise business model the return on investment of agents affected by the new controls. Such agents are assumed to be co-opeting, i.e. they gain by cooperating, even if they have different goals. Grounded in control theory and the technology acceptance model, our conceptual design and its implementation represent an economically viable way to align business, legal and IT requirements concerning regulatory compliance with data retention requirements

From 'Security for Privacy' to 'Privacy for Security'

This article envisions the use of context-awareness to improve single sign-on solutions (SSO) for mobile users. The attribute-based SSO is expected to increase users' perceived ease of use of the system and service providers' authentication security of the application. From these two features we derive two value propositions for a new business model for mobile platforms. The business model can be considered as an instantiation of the privacy-friendly business model pattern presented in our previous work, reinforcing our claim that privacy-friendly value propositions are possible and can be used to obtain a competitive advantage

What Is Most Desirable for Nature? An Analysis of Azorean Pupils’ Biodiversity Perspectives When Deciding on Ecological Scenarios

Understanding pupils’ biodiversity perspectives is essential to developing educators’ sensitivity to students’ multi-faceted views of the world, thus increasing teaching effectiveness. In this study, we asked 1528 school pupils in the Azores to choose between alternative schemes in three ecological scenarios and to justify their decisions. The study’s objectives were to understand biodiversity perspectives underlying pupils’ choice of the most desirable schemes for nature and to examine whether gender and school level (middle school/high school) influenced their choices. Quantitative (frequency analysis and Chi-square statistics) and qualitative (thematic analysis) methods were applied for data analysis. The majority of pupils made appropriate choices, arguing from different biodiversity perspectives, which were classified in 10 categories and 24 subcategories. High school pupils did not exhibit significant differences among the main arguments employed, and mostly referred to ecological concepts, while middle school pupils exhibited different choices according to gender, emphasizing richness over the threats posed by introduced species. Biodiversity education should thus be strengthened, especially at the middle school level, where different complex issues would benefit from classroom discussion and systematization. The chosen methodological strategy proved to be effective in assessing pupils’ biodiversity perspectives, which may be useful to deal with other ill-structured problems.The research was financially supported by THE PORTUGUESE FOUNDATION FOR SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY (FUNDAÇÃO PARA A CIÊNCIA E A TECNOLOGIA-FCT) through the projects PTDC/CED-EDG/31182/2017, PTDC/BIA-BEC-104571/2008; IRA was funded by Portuguese funds through FCT under the Norma Transitória-DL57/2016/CP1375/CT0003.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio