Continuity and Variation across Translations: Phraseology in the "Pavia Corpus of Film Dialogue"

The present paper describes the phraseology of original American and British filmic speech by relating it to issues of translation - dubbing - into Italian. In so doing, it brings together stances from audiovisual translation research, theory of phraseology, as developed by corpus linguists both with reference to monolingual analysis and in relation to the translation process, and corpus-based translation studies

One-dimensional von K\'arm\'an models for elastic ribbons

By means of a variational approach we rigorously deduce three one-dimensional models for elastic ribbons from the theory of von K\'arm\'an plates, passing to the limit as the width of the plate goes to zero. The one-dimensional model found starting from the "linearized" von K\'arm\'an energy corresponds to that of a linearly elastic beam that can twist but can deform in just one plane; while the model found from the von K\'arm\'an energy is a non-linear model that comprises stretching, bendings, and twisting. The "constrained" von K\'arm\'an energy, instead, leads to a new Sadowsky type of model

A variational model for anisotropic and naturally twisted ribbons

We consider thin plates whose energy density is a quadratic function of the difference between the second fundamental form of the deformed configuration and a "natural" curvature tensor. This tensor either denotes the second fundamental form of the stress-free configuration, if it exists, or a target curvature tensor. In the latter case, residual stress arises from the geometrical frustration involved in the attempt to achieve the target curvature: as a result, the plate is naturally twisted, even in the absence of external forces or prescribed boundary conditions. Here, starting from this kind of plate energies, we derive a new variational one-dimensional model for naturally twisted ribbons by means of Gamma-convergence. Our result generalizes, and corrects, the classical Sadowsky energy to geometrically frustrated anisotropic ribbons with a narrow, possibly curved, reference configuration

BLURRING THE LINES BETWEEN GENRES AND AUDIENCES: INTERACTION IN SCIENCE BLOGS

Science blogs have been attracting the attention of linguists, rhetoricians and communications scholars alike as the discourse of science becomes more and more influenced by new digital media and more scientists engage in the practice of blogging for the purposes of knowledge dissemination and public engagement. The paper analyses writer-reader interaction in a corpus of blogs maintained by individual scientists, considering both posts and comments. The analysis is corpus-driven to the extent that it harnesses corpus linguistic tools for frequency observations to detect language patterns of interaction, but tries to interpret frequency in light of linguistic and rhetorical models of audience engagement in science popularization. The findings confirm a tendency of blogs to exploit all of the linguistic strategies of audience involvement already found in the literature, reader pronouns, questions and the conversational style typical of spoken science communication, testifying to the blurring of genres and audiences

Do People Avoid Morally Relevant Information? Evidence from the Refugee Crisis

Combining click data from a Swedish newspaper and administrative data on asylum seekers in Sweden, I examine whether a larger presence of refugees in a municipality induces people to avoid news that may encourage welcoming the newcomers. Exploiting the unexpected inflow of refugees to Sweden during 2015 and their exogenous allocation across Swedish municipalities, I find that people living in municipalities where the relative number of refugees has been larger read fewer articles about asylum seekers. I then identify articles that may raise feelings of compassion towards the refugees. The decrease in information acquisition is 36 larger for such empathic articles

The glutaminase-dependent acid resistance system. Qualitative and quantitative assays and analysis of its distribution in enteric bacteria

Neutralophilic bacteria have developed several strategies to overcome the deleterious effects of acid stress. In particular, the amino acid-dependent systems are widespread, with their activities overlapping, covering a rather large pH range, from 6 to <2. Recent reports showed that an acid resistance (AR) system relying on the amino acid glutamine (AR2_Q), the most readily available amino acid in the free form, is operative in Escherichia coli, Lactobacillus reuteri and some Brucella species. This system requires a glutaminase active at acidic pH and the antiporter GadC to import L-glutamine and export either glutamate (the glutamine deamination product) or GABA. The latter occurs when the deamination of glutamine to glutamate, via acid-glutaminase (YbaS/GlsA), is coupled to the decarboxylation of glutamate to GABA, via glutamate decarboxylase (GadB), a structural component of the glutamate-dependent AR (AR2) system, together with GadC. Taking into account that AR2_Q could be widespread in bacteria and that until now assays based on ammonium ion detection were typically employed, this work was undertaken with the aim to develop assays that allow a straightforward identification of the acid-glutaminase activity in permeabilised bacterial cells (qualitative assay) as well as a sensitive method (quantitative assay) to monitor in the pH range 2.5-4.0 the transport of the relevant amino acids in vivo. The qualitative assay is colorimetric, rapid and reliable and provides several additional information, such as co-occurrence of AR2 and AR2_Q in the same bacterial species and assessment of the growth conditions that support maximal expression of glutaminase at acidic pH. The quantitative assay is HPLC-based and allows to concomitantly measure the uptake of glutamine and the export of glutamate and/or GABA via GadC in vivo and depending on the external pH. Finally, an extensive bioinformatic genome analysis shows that the gene encoding the glutaminase involved in AR2_Q is often nearby or in operon arrangement with the genes coding for GadC and GadB. Overall, our results indicate that AR2_Q is likely to be of prominent importance in the AR of enteric bacteria and that it modulates the enzymatic as well as antiport activities depending on the imposed acidic stress

Design and realization of a swivelling seat for a Paralympic racing boat

In the past few decades, an increased interest in physical disability studies has developed. However, there is a lack of devices and innovations that allow disabled athletes to properly participate in Paralympic sports. In this work, a new, ergonomic swiveling seat used for Paralympic sailing boats has been developed and is compared to the traditional seating system. To increase the performance of the improved seat during a regatta race, a variety of innovative modifications have been introduced; the structural seat design has been developed through 3D simulation; a FEM (finite element method) analysis has also been presented to calculate the real stress and deformation ranges on the structure. Results show significant reduction in the weight of the seating structure, as well as an increase in the seat’s movement accuracy, in relation to the design and selection of the actuator. Furthermore, structural modifications make the swiveling system more ergonomic for most disabled users during sailing.Peer Reviewe