Who Contributes? A Strategic Approach to a European Immigration Policy

According to the Lisbon Treaty the increasing cost of enforcing the European border against immigration shall be shared among the EU members. Nonetheless, the Treaty is rather vague with respect to the "appropriate measures" to adopt in order to distribute the financial burden. Members who do not share their borders with source countries have an incentive to free ride on the other countries. We study a contribution game where a northern government and a southern government minimize a loss function with respect to their national immigration target. We consider both sequential and simultaneous decisions and we show that the contribution of both governments is positive when their immigration targets are not too different. We show that total contribution is higher when decisions are simultaneous, but the conditions for both contributions to be positive are less restrictive in the sequential framework.Policy making, Government expenditures, Local government expenditures, Federalism

Unraveling and overcoming hurdles in direct neuronal reprogramming

Discovering new approaches to replace lost neurons following brain damage, as for traumatic injury, is one of the major goals in the field of regenerative medicine. Direct neuronal conversion of glial cells into neurons is emerging as a powerful strategy to achieve neuronal replacement. Despite large progress in the field, major limitations still exist before bringing this approach toward clinical translation. Major hurdles encompass epigenetic, metabolic and environmental barriers, which impede the newly generated neurons to properly integrate into the injured brain parenchyma, to substitute the lost neuronal networks and to fully replace the endogenous neuronal counterpart. The pathological process includes a cascade of fast-occurring events, such as metabolic impairment, reactive oxygen species and inflammatory molecules production, cell death, reactive gliosis and recruitment of inflammatory cells, which can have devastating consequences for the survival of the endogenous and reprogrammed neurons. Thus, a deeper understanding of the interplay between these mechanisms and how key players in the injury environment regulate processes of cell fate decision is needed. An important aspect fundamental to functional glia-to-neuron conversion in the injured brain is the viral vector used, especially in regard to the inflammatory reaction elicited in the tissue. Indeed we could observe that different viral vectors, routinely used in neuronal reprogramming studies, could induce diverse responses in the environment, independently from the transgene expressed. In particular, we noticed that retrovirus and lentivirus-mediated reprogramming elicited a strong inflammatory reaction, characterized by microglia and astrocyte reactivity, and massive immune cells infiltration, still persisting at the time when neurons start appearing. Conversely, adeno-associated virus (AAV)-mediated neuronal conversion had much a milder impact on the activation of the glial cells, with minimal immune cells recruitment. As using AAV greatly improved the rate of neuronal conversion, specification, integration and survival, compared to retroviral approaches, the environment plays a critical role in this successful reprogramming. A secondary mechanism also associated with inflammation is reactive oxygen species (ROS) production. Indeed, astrocytes transitioning into neurons face a burst of ROS, which lead to drastic cell death by ferroptosis if not properly counteracted. Consequently, buffering ROS with scavengers and pro-survival genes could greatly ameliorate the conversion efficiency in vitro as well as in vivo. As ROS production is mostly related to functional metabolic changes, we investigated this so far neglected aspect of direct neuronal reprogramming. I first demonstrated that a metabolic switch from glycolysis to oxidative phosphorylation is an essential requirement for a successful conversion to occur, as inhibiting the function of the electron transport chain did not improve the process despite the decrease in ROS, but actually entirely blocked the conversion of glia into neurons. As we were further interested in understanding the roles played by the metabolism in the reprogramming paradigm, we decided to characterize the mitochondria proteome of astrocytes and neurons, to identify differences in the mito-proteome between these cell types. We identified proteins enriched to each cell type, highlighting metabolic pathways relevant for their specific physiological functions. Interestingly, some of the specific mitochondrial proteins analyzed were correctly up-regulated or down-regulated during the transition from astrocytes to neurons, but at a relatively late stage in the reprogramming process. This finding further confirmed that a remodeling in mitochondrial proteins, and consequently metabolic pathways, occurs during the reprogramming process, even if partial and temporally delayed compared to the burst of ROS which converting neurons face. Early dCas9-mediated overexpression of anti-oxidant proteins in converting astrocytes, specific to the neuronal mitochondria proteome, could greatly improve the speed and efficiency of astrocyte-to- neuron conversion. Thus, understanding how to properly modify converting glial cells into neurons, not only from an epigenetic, genetic and morphological point of view, is necessary. In fact evaluating the impact on direct neuronal reprogramming of extrinsic factors, such as viral vectors and the environmental inflammatory reaction, as well as intrinsic constraints, such as mitochondria remodeling, ROS production and metabolic switch, could greatly improve the quality of reprogrammed neurons. The aim of my thesis is thus to unravel mechanisms involving inflammation, mitochondria and metabolic remodeling, which could increase our understanding of the glia-to-neuron conversion process, overall improving direct neuronal reprogramming

Quantitative risk assessment on a hydrogen refuelling station

The Directive 2014/94/UE (DAFI, Alternative Fuel Initiative Directive) on the deployment of alternative fuels (i.e. hydrogen) infrastructures has been recently transposed into national law in Italy. Consequently, the technical regulation on fire prevention for H2fuelling stations has been updated, in order to consider the current maximum delivery pressure (700 bar) of gaseous hydrogen for road vehicles. This technical regulation establishes the prescriptive safety distance from a piece of equipment. In the case of a new station, an assessment of the frequency of the event and its potential consequences is necessary. This is to understand which risk can reasonably be mitigated by a safety distance or whether additional mitigation or prevention measures should be taken. This paper presents the quantitative risk assessment (QRA) study on a hydrogen station planned to be installed, study which aims at determining the safety distances. Such study utilizes the Sandia-developed QRA tool, Hydrogen Risk Analysis Model (HyRAM), to calculate risk values when developing risk-equivalent plans. HyRAM combines reduced order deterministic models that characterize hydrogen release and flame behavior with probabilistic risk models to quantify risk values. Thanks to HyRAM tool it is possible to estimate physical effects and consequences on people and structures and plants, related to risk scenarios, by means of a damage model library. Use of risk assessment may allow station owners and designers to flexibly define station-specific mitigations, with the purpose of achieving equal or better levels of safety with respect to prescriptive recommendation levels, as suggested by ISO19880-1 (2018)

Can Functional Tests Predict Throwing Velocity or Batting-Exit Velocity in Division III Collegiate Baseball: A Predictive Validity Investigation

Understanding the relationships between functional performance tests and actual sport performance is important for sport coaches and trainers. The purpose of this study is twofold: (1) Do relationships exist between upper body, lower body or whole-body tests of strength and power with throwing or batting velocity (2) Which variable or group of variables best predict the sport-specific tasks of throwing and batting velocity

LRRK2 and neuroinflammation: Partners in crime in Parkinson's disease?

3noopenopenRusso, Isabella*; Bubacco, Luigi; Greggio, ElisaRusso, Isabella; Bubacco, Luigi; Greggio, Elis

Il debito commerciale in Italia: quanto contano le motivazioni finanziarie?

Trade credit arises from delayed payments between firms. It is not easy to identify its determinants since they are connected to organisational,technical, commercial and financial factors.In this paper we empirically examine the determinants of the usage of trade credit by Italian industrial firms. We use an original database that contains detailed information from an ad hoc survey of Bank of Italy on trade credit, from Italian Central Credit Register on banking relations and from firmsÂ’ balance sheet.The focus of the paper concerns the role of financial reasons among the determinants of trade credit demand. The Bank of Italy survey shows that financial motives are less frequent than transactive ones; nevertheless we find a positive correlation between financial reasons and the amount of accounts payable, while the opposite occurs for firms that delay the payments to their suppliers in order to control the quality of purchased goods. The main findings of our empirical analysis are: i) financial determinants of trade credit demand are more frequent among firms in financial distress (rationed firms, firms with lower unused lines of credit and firms with a higher cost of credit); ii) firms in financial distress and firms in trouble have more accounts payable; iii) finally, these firms do not obtain from their suppliers a higher amount of accounts payable (or more delayed payments) but they are able to increase their usage of trade credit by paying over the due date.trade credit,corporate finance,credit rationing

Combined ND techniques for structural assessment: the case of historic Nepali constructions after the 2015 Gorkha earthquake

Combined non-destructive in situ techniques—namely sonic tests and ambient vibration measurements—are applied on two Nepali Pagoda temples damaged by the 2015 Gorkha earthquake, providing the dynamic elastic modulus of masonry and the buildings' frequencie

La direttiva 2019/633, i criteri di delega legislativa e l’art. 62, d.l. n. 1/2012

Oggetto del presente lavoro è la verifica di come il legislatore italiano ha provveduto a adattare il nostro ordinamento alle disposizioni della direttiva UE n. 2019/633 sul contrasto alle pratiche commerciali sleali nei contratti della filiera agroalimentare. La necessità di attuazione della direttiva ha portato, infatti, all’adozione dei principi e dei criteri direttivi per la sua attuazione, di cui all’art. 7 della legge n. 53 del 2021 (legge di delegazione europea 2019/20). Sulla base della legge delega è stato, infine, adottato il d. lgs. n. 198 del 5 novembre 2021, che ha, ad un tempo, dato concreta attuazione alla direttiva 2019/633 e provveduto ad abrogare le norme previgenti in materia, tra cui lo stesso art. 62, d.l. n. 1/2012, (con l’eccezione dell’art. 78, d.l. 18/2020) introducendo, altresì, nuove fattispecie vietate. Nel lavoro vengono dapprima esaminati i 19 criteri direttivi, rubricati con le lettere da a) ad u), di cui all’art. 7, della legge di delegazione europea n. 53/2021 e vengono, in seguito, evidenziati gli aspetti di maggior rilievo del d. lgs. attuativo n. 198/2021, al fine di accertare quale sia il rapporto tra la disciplina recata dal nuovo decreto rispetto a quella previgente: e se, in particolare, il nuovo e ora vigente assetto normativo costituisca o meno un rafforzamento delle tutele in favore della parte debole dei contratti della filiera agroalimentare.The purpose of this paper is to verify how the Italian legislator has adapted its legal system to the provisions of EU Directive no. 2019/633 on combating unfair commercial practices in contracts in the agri-food chain. The need to implement the directive has led, in fact, to the adoption of the principles and guidelines for its implementation, set out in Article 7 of Law No. 53 of 2021 (European Delegation Act 2019/20). On the basis of the delegated law, finally, Legislative Decree no. 198 of 5 November 2021 was adopted, which, at the same time, gave concrete implementation to Directive 2019/633 and repealed the pre-existing rules on the subject, including the same Article 62, Law Decree no. 1/2012, (with the exception of Article 78, Law Decree 18/2020) also introducing new prohibited cases. The work first examines the 19 guiding criteria, under the headings from a) to u), set out in Article 7 of the European delegation law no. 53/2021. The main aspects of the implementing legislative decree No 198/2021 are then highlighted, in order to ascertain the relationship between the rules set out in the new decree and those previously in force: and whether, in particular, the new and now current regulatory framework constitutes a strengthening of the protection in favour of the weaker party in contracts in the agri-food chain