INTEGRATED SURVEY TECHNIQUES: PRELIMINARY STUDIES FOR THE CONSERVATION OF VILLA GALVAGNINA

On May 20, 2012, an earthquake of magnitude ML&thinsp;=&thinsp;5.9 hit a vast area of the Po Valley, in the territory across Lombardia, Veneto and Emilia, with the epicentre close to Finale Emilia. The seismic event, unusually intense for the area, caused extensive damage to the built heritage, so that six years later many buildings are still waiting for the necessary restoration works. One of them is the Villa Galvagnina in Moglia, in the province of Mantua.The damages caused by the earthquake made necessary emergency strengthening works. Alongside these emergency measures, the Local Office of the Ministry of Culture considered suitable to start more detailed studies on this neglected asset.The present study is part of the Superintendence initiatives, concerning the mapping of the building materials, a survey about murals’ decay, as well as the damage and crack patterns. The aim of this data acquisition campaign is to identify the main risk factors for the preservation of the villa and to identify possible strategies for the strengthening and conservation works. The article critically presents the working method adopted for the survey setting up. The data acquisition steps, the difficulties experienced, and the choices made are fully described and some preliminary considerations are also expressed on the main damage suffered by the villa and on the ongoing deterioration.</p

PRESERVING THE VENETIAN FORTRESS OF BERGAMO: QUICK PHOTOGRAMMETRIC SURVEY FOR CONSERVATION PLANNING

The historical and cultural relevance of the City Walls built by the ‘Serenissima’ Republic of Venice in the second half of 16th century was recognized in 2017 by the insertion of Bergamo, together with other Venetian Fortresses in Italy, Croatia and Montenegro, in the World Heritage List of UNESCO as transnational site. In the framework of the nomination to the WHL, the City Council together with the University of Bergamo started a campaign of studies and surveys aimed to prepare a conservation planning. The goal of this plan is to assure a constant monitoring of this artwork, so that a strict routine of controls, cleaning and small strengthening works would prevent more relevant interventions, which could corrupt the material integrity of the building.This paper delineates the methodological and operational workflow applied to the preparation of the maintenance plan, now in progress, for the Venetian City Walls of Bergamo, where the photogrammetric survey by means of UAV plays an important role. The different working phases, the adopted instrumentation, the difficulties encountered and the choices made are described, and some case studies are also illustrated that represent well the typical problems encountered for the conservation of the Walls.</p

UAV PHOTOGRAMMETRY FOR CULTURAL HERITAGE PRESERVATION MODELING AND MAPPING VENETIAN WALLS OF BERGAMO

In July 2017, the system of Bergamo City Walls was registered in the UNESCO World Heritage List, together with other Venetian fortresses in Italy, Croatia and Montenegro. This important historical document needs continuous care and caution in order to be preserved complete, despite the continuous atmospheric and anthropic attacks, giving rise to dangerous deterioration processes on the artefact. The UAV photogrammetry is a suitable surveying method for such an extended system, able to collect all the geometrical, material and deterioration information needed for an effective maintenance program, also quick enough to allow for a repeated monitoring of the entire wall circuit. This paper presents the UAV survey campaign planned, and partially already completed, in order to test the methodological choices and solve all the operational difficulties to use drones in an urban environment, mainly because short distance shooting of nearly vertical surfaces was required

Synergistic Antitumor Effects of Novel HDAC Inhibitors and Paclitaxel In Vitro and In Vivo

Preclinical studies support the therapeutic potential of histone deacetylases inhibitors (HDACi) in combination with taxanes. The efficacy of combination has been mainly ascribed to a cooperative effect on microtubule stabilization following tubulin acetylation. In the present study we investigated the effect of paclitaxel in combination with two novel HDACi, ST2782 or ST3595, able to induce p53 and tubulin hyperacetylation. A synergistic effect of the paclitaxel/ST2782 (or ST3595) combination was found in wild-type p53 ovarian carcinoma cells, but not in a p53 mutant subline, in spite of a marked tubulin acetylation. Such a synergistic interaction was confirmed in additional human solid tumor cell lines harboring wild-type p53 but not in those expressing mutant or null p53. In addition, a synergistic cytotoxic effect was found when ST2782 was combined with the depolymerising agent vinorelbine. In contrast to SAHA, which was substantially less effective in sensitizing cells to paclitaxel-induced apoptosis, ST2782 prevented up-regulation of p21WAF1/Cip1 by paclitaxel, which has a protective role in response to taxanes, and caused p53 down-regulation, acetylation and mitochondrial localization of acetylated p53. The synergistic antitumor effects of the paclitaxel/ST3595 combination were confirmed in two tumor xenograft models. Our results support the relevance of p53 modulation as a major determinant of the synergistic interaction observed between paclitaxel and novel HDACi and emphasize the therapeutic interest of this combination

PHOTOGRAMMETRY for QUICK SURVEY in EMERGENCY CONDITIONS: The CASE of VILLA GALVAGNINA

Photogrammetry is a survey method that provides good quality results also by using basic photographic equipment and user-friendly, low-cost software. The advantages of the image-based modelling techniques compared with the traditional topographic tools are very significant in emergencies, when the time for the survey is limited and many buildings are involved, as usually happens in case of relevant seismic events. The goal of this study is to verify the quality of the models obtained from quick digital images acquisition, carried out under non-optimal lighting condition and no accessibility of the building. As case of study was chosen the main front of Villa Galvagnina in Moglia, a Renaissance hunting palace badly damaged by the earthquake of May 20, 2012. The modelling was performed using two different software, Agisoft Metashape and 3DFlow Zephyr. This paper presents a comparison between the results obtained using different datasets; the workflow, the difficulties encountered during the survey and the data processing methods are fully described and discussed. © 2019 International Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing. All rights reserved

Design, synthesis, and evaluation of biphenyl-4-yl-acrylohydroxamic acid derivatives as histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitors

A series of hydroxamic acid-based histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitors were designed on the basis of a model of the HDAC2 binding site and synthesized. They are characterized by a cinnamic spacer, capped with a substituted phenyl group. Modifications of the spacer are also reported. In an in vitro assay with the isoenzyme HDAC2, a good correlation of the activity with the docking energy was found. In human ovarian carcinoma IGROV-1 cells, selected compounds produced significant acetylation of p53 and alpha-tubulin. Most compounds showed an antiproliferative activity comparable to that of SAHA. At equitoxic concentrations, the tested compounds were more effective than SAHA in inducing apoptotic cell death. Compounds selected for in vivo evaluation exhibited a significant antitumor activity on three tumor models at well tolerated doses, thus suggesting a good therapeutic index

Homeopathy: from tradition to science?

Homeopathy is a form of therapy based on the similarity (\u201csimilia similibus curantur\u201d, like cures like), whose popularity is increasing but whose scientific basis is still under discussion. Starting from the premise that it is a \u201cholistic\u201d medicine, programmatically aimed at the whole person in its entirety and individuality, here we go through an overview of his history, basic concepts and scientific evidence. This therapy was founded by Samuel Hahnemann in the late 18th century, although similar concepts existed previously. It has spread around the world in the 19th century, in part because of its success in epidemics outbreaks, but declined during most of the 20th century. Its popularity was increased in the late 20th and early 21st century in many parts of the world and today stands the problem of its integration with conventional medicine. There are different schools of homeopathy. Homeopathy is controversial mainly because of its use of highly diluted medicines, but there is growing evidence that is not a mere placebo. There is a significant body of clinical research including randomized clinical trials suggesting that homeopathy has an effectiveness in curing many symptoms and in improving the quality of life of patients. Cohort studies, observational and economic have produced favorable results. Despite the long history of scientific controversy, homeopathy is an \u201canomaly\u201d of modern medicine that deserves further investigation for its potential scientific and ethical merits