Well-being, Landscape and Sustainability of Communication

AbstractThe paper deals with the concept of well-being and its relationship with landscape and agriculture.According to the literature, well-being is a multidimensional and subjective concept, it is related to happiness but it does not depend on mere economic welfare. In fact, the bond between material wealth and well-being is not causal: GDP is not the optimum way of assessing the level of well-being.On the contrary, there is a strict relationship between well-being, agriculture and rural development. The man/farmer, transforming the rural landscape, creates modifications that reverberate first on natural landscape, then on the whole territory, and finally back to the man itself. In this context, the generative communication arises as a model that best interprets the need to represent and promote the circular nature of the relationships between man and land. By doing this, it enhances and protects cultural diversity, social and natural environment of the territory itself. Hence, it strengthens the well-being of those who work and constantly transforms this landscape.The paper closes with the analysis of two case-studies, the “Comunicazione generativa per il Programma di Sviluppo Rurale 2014-2020 della Regione Toscana” project (in english: Generative Communication for the Tuscany Rural Development Programme, RDP, 2014-2020) and the “San Casciano Smart Place” project, both developed by the Communication Strategies Lab.The methodology used for the development of the projects is the generative communication (Toschi, 2011), with its recent specification towards the concept of sustainable communication

Benessere, paesaggio e comunicazione. La comunicazione generativa nel PSR ‘14-‘20 della Regione Toscana

This essay deals with the concepts of wellness and landscape, analyzing the role of landscape in defining the life quality of rural areas inhabitants on the base of the results of the “Scientific collaboration between Communication Strategies Lab (CSL) of the University of Florence and Tuscany Region for the introduction of generative communication in the Rural Development Programme 2014-2020”. The scientific collaboration represented a valuable opportunity to study and test communication strategies in order to improve life quality in rural areas, and to confirm the generative communication paradigm (Toschi 2011) as an operative model that is able to promote circular relations between man and its territory.This essay deals with the concepts of wellness and landscape, analyzing the role of landscape in defining the life quality of rural areas inhabitants on the base of the results of the “Scientific collaboration between Communication Strategies Lab (CSL) of the University of Florence and Tuscany Region for the introduction of generative communication in the Rural Development Programme 2014-2020”. The scientific collaboration represented a valuable opportunity to study and test communication strategies in order to improve life quality in rural areas, and to confirm the generative communication paradigm (Toschi 2011) as an operative model that is able to promote circular relations between man and its territory

Un elemento di valutazione della qualità della didattica universitaria

For many years, Italian Universities have been committed to to collecting "assessment questionnaires" of the courses from their students. It is not fully clear how to manage these questionnaires, though. In the present work, we propose a method to single out significant information from the wide amount of issues raised by the students. With this work, we aim at improving the services offered by Universities. Human resources dedicated to the evaluation of teaching are definitely scarse, if not absent. Thus, we believe that coordination committees must focus on the most critical issues, rather than dispersing information.In this work, we show how an almost automatic method allows to single out a very limited fraction (about 7% in the case of our Faculty of Sciences at Sapienza University in Rome) of really critical courses. Our political objective is to give a clear and objective answer to the students' request of improving those courses. With this approach we do not consider the students' opinions as absolute. We rather aim at respecting their implicit request of verification of their opinions.Our approach also suggests some improvements in the formulation of the questions raised in the questionnaires, so as to reduce ambiguity and obtain a more accurate statistical treatment. In the example presented here, a very high appreciation of our courses emerges if we focus on the average values. However, a punctual control of opinions for a fraction of courses is indispensable. Technically, we use the so called trimming method to single out the problematic courses. This method, used in a variety of fields, helps to control for carelessness of some students who may not take the questionnaires seriously. In our case, for each course and for each question, we delete 50% of the questionnaires, namely those corresponding to 25% of the most positive and 25% of the most negative. Still, our analysis leads to very stable results, if we focus onthe most critical courses, which is the main objective of this work.Da molti anni le Università italiane hanno l'obbligo di somministrare questionari sul gradimento degli insegnamenti. Non è chiaro tuttavia come utilizzare questi questionari. In questo lavoro si propone un metodo per selezionare l'enorme informazione contenuta nei suggerimenti di studentesse e studenti. L'unico obiettivo che appare utile è migliorare i servizi offerti dall'Università. Le risorse di personale a disposizione di coloro che coordinano le attività didattiche sono inadeguate ed a volta risibili. Pertanto sembra necessario concentrare l'attenzione degli organi di coordinamento sulle maggiori ciriticità. Nel nostro lavoro dimostriamo che un metodo quasi automatico permette di isolare una porzione molto limitata (il 7% circa nel caso della Facoltà di Scienze della Sapienza) di insegnamenti drammaticamente critici. L'obiettivo politico è rispondere, con chiarezza, nella massima trasparenza, alla domanda che viene da studentesse e studenti di migliorare quei particolari insegnamenti. Non si postula un'attestazione di sacralità alle opinioni espresse, ma si vuole praticare e diffondere il rispetto assoluto della richiesta di verifica, implicita in tali opinioni. Il nostro approccio suggerisce anche in che modo sarebbe utile modificare leggermente la formulazione delle domande per rendere l'analisi statistica ancora più accurata. Nel complesso, per la realtà studiata in questo lavoro emerge un gradimento molto alto, se si guarda soltanto a valori medi. Tuttavia esiste una porzione di insegnamenti per i quali l'azione di verifica puntuale delle affermazioni contenute nei questionari appare utile e doverosa.Tecnicamente, l'uso del cosiddetto "trimming method" appare particolarmente efficace per la selezione degli insegnamenti problematici. In sostanza si tratta di un metodo, molto adoperato in situazioni molto diverse, per ripulire il campione statistico dalla possibile presenza, in questo caso, di questionari che potrebbero essere stati compilati con scarsa attenzione. Nel nostro caso, per ogni insegnamento, e per ogni singola domanda posta nei questionari, eliminiamo il 50% dei questionari. Più esattamente, un 25% è composto dalle valutazioni più favorevoli e un 25% è composto dalle valutazioni più sfavorevoli. La nostra analisi mostra una grande stabilità dei risultati se si mantiene l'obiettivo della ricerca degli insegnamenti più critici

Structure-activity relationship studies on new DABOS: effect of substitutions at pyrimidine C-5 and C-6 positions on anti-HIV-1 activity.

Several 5-alkyl, 5-alkenyl, 5-iso-alkyl, 5-halo, 5-aminomethyl and 5-carboxy derivatives of S-DABOs (dihydro-alkyl (or cyclo-alkyl)thio-benzyloxopyrimidines), DATNOs (dihydro-alkylthionaphthylmethyl-oxopyrimidines) and F2-S-DABOs (dihydro-alkyl (or cyclo-alkyl)thio-2,6-difluorobenzyl-oxopyrimidines) have been prepared and tested as anti-HIV-1 agents. S-DABO derivatives bearing at C-6 position monosubstituted phenylmethyl or heteroarylmethyl units have also been synthesized. 2-Alkylthio-3,4-dihydropyrimidin-4(3 H)-one derivatives of F2- S-DABO series bearing small alkyl groups at C-5 proved to be potent inhibitors of HIV-1 replication in vitro with selectivity indexes ranging from 250 to <2500

Modulation of the activity of histone acetyltransferases by long chain alkylidenemalonates (LoCAMs)

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Citicoline in Ophthalmological Neurodegenerative Disease: A Comprehensive Review

Cytidine 5'-diphosphocholine has been widely studied in systemic neurodegenerative diseases, like Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, and brain ischemia. The rationale for the use of citicoline in ophthalmological neurodegenerative diseases, including glaucoma, anterior ischemic optic neuropathy, and diabetic retinopathy, is founded on its multifactorial mechanism of action and the involvement in several metabolic pathways, including phospholipid homeostasis, mitochondrial dynamics, as well as cholinergic and dopaminergic transmission, all being involved in the complexity of the visual transmission. This narrative review is aimed at reporting both pre-clinical data regarding the involvement of citicoline in such metabolic pathways (including new insights about its role in the intracellular proteostasis through an interaction with the proteasome) and its effects on clinical psychophysical, electrophysiological, and morphological outcomes following its use in ophthalmological neurodegenerative diseases (including the results of the most recent prospective randomized clinical trials)

p300/CBP-associated factor selectively regulates the extinction of conditioned fear

It is well established that the activity of chromatin-modifying enzymes is crucial for regulating gene expression associated with hippocampal-dependent memories. However, very little is known about how these epigenetic mechanisms influence the formation of cortically dependent memory, particularly when there is competition between opposing memory traces, such as that which occurs during the acquisition and extinction of conditioned fear. Here we demonstrate, in C57BL/6mice, that the activityofp300/CBP-associated factor (PCAF) within the infralimbic prefrontal cortex is required for long-term potentiation and is necessary for the formation of memory associated with fear extinction, but not for fear acquisition. Further, systemic administration of the PCAF activator SPV106 enhances memory for fear extinction and prevents fear renewal. The selective influence of PCAF on fear extinction is mediated, in part, by a transient recruitment of the repressive transcription factor ATF4tothe promoter of the immediate early genezif268, which competitively inhibits its expression. Thus, within the context of fear extinction, PCAF functions as a transcriptional coactivator, which may facilitate the formation of memory for fear extinction by interfering with reconsolidation of the original memory trace

Synthetic Methods in Drug Discovery, Volumes 1+2. Edited by David C. Blakemore, Paul M. Doyle and Yvette M. Fobian

RSC, Cambridge 2016. Vol. 1: 455 pp., hardcover, £179.00.—ISBN 978‐1‐849‐73803‐3. Vol. 2: 517 pp., hardcover, £179.00.—ISBN 978‐1‐782‐62786‐