Aby Warburg: His Aims and Methods

In this issue of Engramma: Giulia Zanon’s "Zooming Mnemosyne" deals with the use of details in Warburg’s Bilderatlas, Monica Centanni’s "Collateral effects of the “visibile parlare” (Dante, Pg. X, v. 95)" reconstructs the hypothesis of a visual model for the legend of Trajan’s Justice, according to Warburg intuition about it; this contribution is connected of the paper by Filippo Perfetti’s "Dante, Botticelli, and Trajan. An Open Note" where the author investigates how Botticelli could have come to know that the bas-relief of the Arch of Constantine liberatori urbis was related to an episode in Trajan's life”. The focus of this issue is then extended to Warburg's cultural environment. Matilde Sergio’s "Aby Warburg, Walter Benjaming, and the Memory of Images" investigates the influence of Warburg's essay about Luther, on Benjamin's thought, while Dorothee Gelhard’s "Gertrud Bing’s Scientific Beginnings" reconstructs the intellectual history of Bing's doctoral thesis and its influences on Warburgian work. The theme of Warburg’s Denkraum is the focal point of Salvatore Settis’ "Anselm Kiefer's Logic of Inversion": a fundamental overview of Kiefer's Questi scritti, quando verranno bruciati, daranno finalmente un po’ di luce (Andrea Emo) on display at Sala dello Scrutinio in Palazzo Ducale, Venezia from March to October 2022. The third section of the issue is dedicated to new publications and exhibitions. Echoing Settis’ reflection on Denkraum, we present Clio Nicastro’s "La Dialettica del Denkraum in Aby Warburg", published this year for Palermo University Press; an introduction to "Cultural Memories": a series published by Peter Lang and edited by Katia Pizzi. Giacomo Calandra di Roccolino with "Mary Hertz Warburg: Free and Unconventional" reviews the exhibition of the artist Mary Hertz Warburg. The issue closes with the important "Choral Reading of "Il metodo di Aby Warburg" by Kurt W. Forster. L’antico dei gesti. Il futuro della memoria", where Barbara Baert, Victoria Cirlot, Georges Didi-Huberman, Michael Diers, Andrea Pinotti and Ianick Takaes offer us their personal reading of Warburg’s life and thought as they are presented by Forster’s newly translated book, edited by Ronzani editore

Il progetto di formazione docenti "Non Da Soli - La Scuola Di Fronte All'Emergenza: La Didattica a Distanza". Il tutoraggio come strategie di accompagnamento professionale

This contribution, through the presentation of the results of the assessment process of the project “Non Da Soli-La Scuola Di Fronte All’emergenza: La Didattica A Distanza” promoted by Save the Children and supervised by the University of Milano-Bicocca, aims to outline the training process in order to define the educational role of the tutor, here defined as a figure who offers professional accompaniment to in-service teachers. This project was intended to provide through a tutoring program professional support to about 850 teachers from 70 schools distributed across 13 regions. Tutoring was provided remotely. The aim of the research is to describe the main features of the tutoring process taking into consideration the point of view of the participants -- teachers and tutors -- regarding the training methodologies adopted, educational functions enabled by tutors and the learning outcomes perceived by participants. Data was collected in July and December 2020 by way of questionnaires completed by the teachers and tutors. Descriptive uni-variate analysis and reflexive thematic analysis was applied to the data. Results indicate three main aspects of the tutoring process distributed across the following areas: a) the value of contextualizing and person-alizing the training program to meet the educational needs of the teacher; b) the value of collaboration between tutors and teachers and among teachers themselves; c) the challenge teachers faced in reconciling theory with practice. The discussion of the results draws attention to a need for continued exploration of tutoring as a training methodology for professional accompaniment of in-service teachers.Il contributo si propone di caratterizzare il tutoraggio come dispositivo formativo volto all’accompagna-mento professionale dei docenti in servizio mediante la presentazione dei risultati del processo di valuta-zione del progetto “Non Da Soli-La Scuola Di Fronte All’emergenza: La Didattica A Distanza”, realizzato da Save The Children con la supervisione scientifica dell’Università degli Studi Di Milano-Bicocca. Tale progetto ha inteso fornire un supporto professionale a distanza a circa 850 insegnanti di 70 scuole distribuite in 13 regioni attraverso percorsi di tutoraggio realizzati mediante piattaforme digitali di videoconferenza. Obiet-tivo della ricerca è delineare le caratteristiche principali del dispositivo formativo di tutoraggio attraverso la considerazione del punto di vista dei soggetti coinvolti – docenti e tutor – sulle metodologie formative adot-tate, sulle funzioni formative messe in atto e sugli apprendimenti percepiti dai docenti. I dati sono stati rac-colti a Luglio 2020 e Dicembre 2020 mediante la somministrazione di un questionario a insegnanti e tutor-formatori. Su tali dati è stata condotta un’analisi descrittiva di tipo univariato e un’analisi tematica ri-flessiva. I risultati mostrano che gli elementi maggiormente caratterizzanti il percorso di tutoraggio riguar-dano tre ambiti principali: a) l’utilità della contestualizzazione dell’intervento di accompagnamento e della sua individualizzazione rispetto ai bisogni formativi dei docenti; b) il valore della collaborazione tra tutor e insegnanti e tra insegnanti stessi; c) le difficoltà dei tutor nel facilitare processi di ricorsività tra teoria e pra-tica. La discussione dei risultati evidenzia la necessità di proseguire la linea di indagine sul tutoraggio come forma di accompagnamento professionale dei docenti in servizio

Type IIB von Willebrand Disease: Role of Qualitative Defects in Atherosclerosis and Endothelial Dysfunction

Objective. To verify whether a hereditary bleeding tendency, such as von Willebrand disease (vWD) type IIB, protects against the onset of atherosclerosis. Participants and Methods. Twenty-four patients with vWD type IIB and 24 healthy controls, matched for common atherosclerotic risk factors. All patients were evaluated by color Doppler ultrasound of the common carotid, carotid bifurcation, common femoral artery, brachial artery, and abdominal aorta, investigating intima-media thickness (IMT) and presence of plaques in each arterial district. Flow mediated dilation (FMD) of the brachial artery was used to test endothelial function. Results. vWD type IIB patients presented no significant difference in IMT in any arterial district. FMD showed no differences between the 2 groups. Conclusions. The quantitative clotting defect characteristic of vWD type IIB does not seem to protect against atherosclerosis

Update on the Effects of Antioxidants on Diabetic Retinopathy: In Vitro Experiments, Animal Studies and Clinical Trials

Current therapies for diabetic retinopathy (DR) incorporate blood glucose and blood pressure control, vitrectomy, photocoagulation, and intravitreal injections of anti-vascular endothelial growth factors or corticosteroids. Nonetheless, these techniques have not been demonstrated to completely stop the evolution of this disorder. The pathophysiology of DR is not fully known, but there is more and more evidence indicating that oxidative stress is an important mechanism in the progression of DR. In this sense, antioxidants have been suggested as a possible therapy to reduce the complications of DR. In this review we aim to assemble updated information in relation to in vitro experiments, animal studies and clinical trials dealing with the effect of the antioxidants on DR

Setting new priorities for nursing research: The updated Swiss Nursing Research Agenda—a systematic, participative approach

Aim To identify current key areas for nursing research in Switzerland, we revised the Swiss Research Agenda for Nursing (SRAN) initially published in 2008. Background By developing a research agenda, nursing researchers internationally prioritize and cluster relevant topics within the research community. The process should be collaborative and systematic to provide credible information for decisionmakers in health care research, policy, and practice. Sources of Evidence After a participative, systematic, and critical evaluation within and outside of the Swiss Association for Nursing Science, the updated SRAN 2019–2029 defines four research priorities (new models of care, nursing care interventions, work and care environment, and quality of care and patient safety) and four transversal themes (organization of research, research methodologies, research in health care policy and public health perspectives). Conclusion Adding to other national nursing research agendas, the categories are organized in a framework of key research priorities and transversal themes. They relate to the importance of global and local foci of research as well as challenges in health care services and policy systems. The agenda is an important prerequisite for enhancing the influence of nursing research in Switzerland and provides guidance for the next decade.Implications for Nursing PracticeThe revised agenda ensures that research projects target key knowledge gaps and the discipline's core questions in respective countries.Implications for Health PolicyNursing research should inform and influence health policy on all institutional and political levels. Therefore, the integration of public health perspectives in research is one of the most important new aspects of SRAN 2019–2029

Two subsets of stem-like CD8+ memory T cell progenitors with distinct fate commitments in humans

T cell memory relies on the generation of antigen-specific progenitors with stem-like properties. However, the identity of these progenitors has remained unclear, precluding a full understanding of the differentiation trajectories that underpin the heterogeneity of antigen-experienced T cells. We used a systematic approach guided by single-cell RNA-sequencing data to map the organizational structure of the human CD8+ memory T cell pool under physiological conditions. We identified two previously unrecognized subsets of clonally, epigenetically, functionally, phenotypically and transcriptionally distinct stem-like CD8+ memory T cells. Progenitors lacking the inhibitory receptors programmed death-1 (PD-1) and T cell immunoreceptor with Ig and ITIM domains (TIGIT) were committed to a functional lineage, whereas progenitors expressing PD-1 and TIGIT were committed to a dysfunctional, exhausted-like lineage. Collectively, these data reveal the existence of parallel differentiation programs in the human CD8+ memory T cell pool, with potentially broad implications for the development of immunotherapies and vaccines

Spread of COVID-19 Infection in Long-Term Care Facilities of Trieste (Italy) during the Pre-Vaccination Era. Integrating Findings of 41 Forensic Autopsies with Geriatric Comorbidity Index as a Valid Option for the Assessment of Strength of Causation

Background: in 2020 a new form of coronavirus spread around the world starting from China. The older people were the population most affected by the virus worldwide, in particular in Ita-ly where more than 90% of deaths were people over 65 years. In these people, the definition of the cause of death is tricky due to the presence of numerous comorbidities. Objective: to deter-mine whether Covid-19 was the cause of death in a series of older adults residents of nursing care homes. Methods: 41 autopsies were performed from May to June 2020. External examina-tion, swabs, macroscopic and microscopic examination were performed. Results: the case series consisted of nursing home guests; 15 men and 26 women, with a mean age of 87 years. The av-erage number of comorbidities was 4. Based only on the autopsy results the defined cause of death was in 8% of the cases respiratory failure in subjects with histological signs of diffuse al-veolar damageCovid-19 in 8% of the cases, 31% died of acute respiratory failure due to bron-chopneumonia, 37% died of acute cardiac failure with one or more positive swabs for Covid-19SARS-CoV-2, 10% died of acute cardiac failure in patients without signs of SARS-CoV-2 infectionCovid-19, 3 cases of septic shock, 2 cases from malignant neoplastic disease and 1 case of massive digestive bleeding. Conclusions: The combined evaluation of the Geriatric Index of Comorbidity, swab result and autopsy results showed that only in 5 cases death was due to Covid-19, in the remaining 36 cases Covid-19 was not acknowledged as cause of deat