Metaverse. Old urban issues in new virtual cities

Recent years have seen the arise of some early attempts to build virtual cities, utopias or affective dystopias in an embodied Internet, which in some respects appear to be the ultimate expression of the neoliberal city paradigma (even if virtual). Although there is an extensive disciplinary literature on the relationship between planning and virtual or augmented reality linked mainly to the gaming industry, this often avoids design and value issues. The observation of some of these early experiences - Decentraland, Minecraft, Liberland Metaverse, to name a few - poses important questions and problems that are gradually becoming inescapable for designers and urban planners, and allows us to make some partial considerations on the risks and potentialities of these early virtual cities

Producing Italy. Territori della nuova produzione

Citt\ue0 e produzione sono parole che hanno perso la chiarezza e la forza di passate stagioni. Nella seconda met\ue0 del Novecento \ue8 un tema pi\uf9 volte indagato all\u2019interno delle discipline urbane. Ricerche come La Citt\ue0 Fabbrica o quelle del Ilses o il LASET fondate sul concetto di \u201cuso capitalistico del territorio\u201d che indagavano il rapporto tra economia e territorio, narrazioni come quelle di \u201cIl caso italiano\u201d di Cavazza e Graubard o \u201cLe Tre Italie\u201d di Bagnasco e grandi immagini territoriali come Progetto \u201980 e il progetto finalizzato Cnr coordinato da Giorgio Fu\ue0, segnano i decenni \u201960 e \u201970. Nei decenni successivi, \u201980 e \u201990, l\u2019attenzione si sposta verso la citt\ue0 diffusa, verso la dispersione sul territorio di tutte le funzioni urbane, compresa la produzione. In questi anni vengono prodotti grandi quadri territoriali come It.Urb \u201980 o Itaten dove i temi della produzione sono tutt\u2019altro che marginali. Queste indagini sono state alla base della costruzione di politiche e progetti in quegli anni. Nel periodo successivo le retoriche legate da una parte alla dismissione diventano protagonista degli studi sulla citt\ue0. Ma come interpretare il rapporto tra citt\ue0 e produzione dopo pi\uf9 di dieci anni di crisi economica senza cadere nella retorica della dismissione o della \u201ctecnologia redentrice\u201d? Come la produzione - specificamente quella manifatturiera - d\ue0 forma, oggi, al territorio italiano? Che immagine emerge oggi dell\u2019Italia produttiva? All\u2019interno del settore manifatturiero si guardano le imprese del cosiddetto quarto capitalismo. Sono imprese medie, \u201cmultinazionali tascabili\u201d che dagli anni \u201990 in Italia sono state quella categoria d\u2019impresa che ha saputo meglio integrarsi alla nuova divisione internazionale del lavoro. Sono le imprese con i migliori risultati \u2013 qualsiasi parametro si osservi \u2013, quelle che pi\uf9 innovano, fortemente internazionalizzate. Le imprese del quarto capitalismo non sono imprese \u201cnuove\u201d \u2013 anzi hanno forti radicamenti territoriali \u2013 ma negli ultimi trent\u2019anni hanno vissuto un periodo di grandi cambiamenti e crescita, che fanno s\uec che possano essere descritte come il nuovo modello produttivo \u201cvincente\u201d del panorama italiano odierno. Qua si propone d\u2019indagare come questa categoria d\u2019impresa \u2013 l\u2019impresa negli ultimi anni meglio si \ue8 inserita nella nuova divisione internazionale del lavoro \u2013 si rapporta con un vasto capitale spaziale, infrastrutturale e naturale ereditato dal passato. Che adeguamenti attua. Che adeguamenti chiede all\u2019azione pubblica. Come gli urbanisti guardano a questi nuovi soggetti entro un quadro di grandi mutamenti come quello odierno. La produzione fordista come quella dei distretti industriali aveva un progetto \u2013 a volte implicito a volte esplicito \u2013 che era sociale e spaziale. Questo nuovo modello produttivo che territorio costruisce? Di che territorio ha bisogno? Questa parte della ricerca prova attraverso diversi strumenti ad aggiornare il quadro interpretativo del rapporto tra nuovi modelli produttivi e territorio oggi in Italia, interpretazione che pu\uf2 servire come base per la costruzione di nuovi progetti e nuove politiche

Influence of climate variables on resin yield and secretory structures in tapped Pinus pinaster Ait. in central Spain

The role of climate and soil water availability on resin yield was evaluated. Resin yield increased with temperature, radiation and evapotranspiration values. Resin yield and axial canal size were correlated with water deficit in spring. Above a certain threshold of cumulated water deficit, summer rainfall favored resin yield. Stand density and soil quality affected the relations between climate and resin yield

Breeding and scientific advances in the fight against Dutch elm disease - will they allow the use of elms in forest restoration?

Revisión de los avances científicos y de producción de planta con fin de evaluar el potencial en la recuperación del olmo común

Learning Criteria and Evaluation Metrics for Textual Transfer between Non-Parallel Corpora

We consider the problem of automatically generating textual paraphrases with modified attributes or stylistic properties, focusing on the setting without parallel data (Hu et al., 2017; Shen et al., 2017). This setting poses challenges for learning and evaluation. We show that the metric of post-transfer classification accuracy is insufficient on its own, and propose additional metrics based on semantic content preservation and fluency. For reliable evaluation, all three metric categories must be taken into account. We contribute new loss functions and training strategies to address the new metrics. Semantic preservation is addressed by adding a cyclic consistency loss and a loss based on paraphrase pairs, while fluency is improved by integrating losses based on style-specific language models. Automatic and manual evaluation show large improvements over the baseline method of Shen et al. (2017). Our hope is that these losses and metrics can be general and useful tools for a range of textual transfer settings without parallel corpora

Efecto de 2 y 4 meses de práctica de fútbol en el desarrollo osteogénico de niños prepuberales

Football for children and young people has been used as a tool to improve health and prevent future diseases. The aim of this study was to investigate, the effect of 2- and 4-month participation in an osteogenic sport such as football on the variables of bone mineral content and bone mineral density in pre-pubertal children. Twenty under-10 children (9.5 ± 1.4 years old) who were doing football training 3 hours a week and were at the Tanner I stage were included. Bone mineral density and bone mineral content values were measured using a dual energy X-ray absorber. The results showed an increase in the values of bone mineral content and total bone mineral density after two months of practice (p<0.05; TE: 0.11 and TE: 0.27 respectively), significantly higher values after four months of practice compared to the initial value and the value after two months (p<0.05; TE: 0.40 and TE: 0.13 respectively). Significant increase in bone mineral content and bone mineral density in the legs after two and four months of practice (p<0.05; TE: 0.43 and TE: 0.40 respectively). Our data suggest that a 2- and 4-month recreational football training programme is beneficial for the osteogenic development and health of children during the pre-pubertal stage.El fútbol en edad infantil o juvenil se ha utilizado como una herramienta para mejorar la salud y prevenir futuras enfermedades. El objetivo de este estudio fue investigar) el efecto de la participación de 2 y 4 meses en un deporte osteogénico como el fútbol en las variables de contenido mineral óseo y densidad mineral ósea en niños prepuberales. Se incluyeron 20 niños de categoría sub-10 (9,5 ± 1,4 años) que realizaban entrenamiento de fútbol 3 horas a la semana y se encontraban en la etapa de Tanner I. Los valores de densidad mineral ósea y contenido mineral óseo se midieron mediante un absorciómetro de rayos X de doble energía. Los resultados mostraron un incremento de los valores de contenido mineral óseo y densidad mineral ósea total tras los dos meses de práctica (p<0,05; TE: 0,11 y TE: 0,27 respectivamente), valores significativamente mayores tras cuatro meses de práctica en comparación con el valor inicial y el valor tras dos meses (p<0,05; TE: 0,40 y TE: 0,13 respectivamente). Aumento significativo de contenido mineral óseo y densidad mineral ósea en las piernas a los dos y cuatro meses de práctica (p<0,05; TE: 0,43 y TE: 0,40 respectivamente). Los datos sugieren que un programa de entrenamiento de fútbol recreativo de 2 y 4 meses es beneficioso para el desarrollo osteogénico y la salud de los niños durante la etapa prepuberal

Genetic variation and heritability estimates of Ulmus minor and Ulmus pumila hybrids for budburst, growth and tolerance to Ophiostoma novo-ulmi

Seedlings obtained by crossing Ulmus minor and U. minor × U. pumila clones were assessed for flowering, bark beetle damage, vegetative budburst, height growth and resistance to Ophiostoma novo-ulmi. Ramets and open pollinated seedlings obtained from the parent trees were assessed for the same traits. Most progenies had similar traits to their parents, but some presented heterosis in annual growth or resistance to O. novo-ulmi. Leaf wilting was significantly lower in progenies with U. minor × U. pumila rather than U. minor as female parent (21.5 and 30.6%, respectively; P<0.05). Resistance to O. novoulmi increased significantly as a function of increased amounts of U. pumila germplasm from the female parent, suggesting that resistance to Dutch elm disease is primarily transmitted from the mother. Budburst occurred earlier in seedlings with low rather than high growth rates (P=0.0007) and percentage of wilting was negatively related to early budburst (P<0.0001). Other phenotypic relations included percentage of flowering trees and annual height growth (rp=0.44; P=0.0042), percentage of flowering trees and vegetative budburst (rp=-0.53; P=0.0004) and percentage of beetle-affected trees and annual height growth (rp=0.60; P<0.0001). Heritability estimates obtained from the regression and variance components methods ranged from 0.06 ± 0.04 to 0.64 ± 0.18, 0.10 ± 0.05 to 0.69 ± 0.17, and 0.13 ± 0.32 to 0.71 ± 0.22 for budburst, growth and tolerance to O. novo-ulmi, respectively. Broad- and narrowsense heritability values were higher when estimated 60 days post inoculation (dpi) than 15, 30 or 120 dpi. Heritability estimates and genetic gains reported indicate a high degree of additive genetic control and show the effectiveness of selection for Dutch elm disease resistance and rapid tree growth

Dissecting the molecular responses potentially involved in the tolerance of two Ulmus minor

Experimento molecular que sugiere que la tolerancia de Ulmus minor a la grafiosis está relacionada a la expresión diferencial de algunos genes como aquellos relacionados con GO:000960

Life + Olmos vivos. Un nuevo impulso a los olmos... o cuando las amistades se vuelven peligrosas: la grafiosis del olmo

Divulgación del proyecto europeo Life + sobre la propagación de olmos resistentes en España como medida de recuperación de la especie