The challenge of peacebuilding during a pandemic

Peacebuilding traditionally depends on face-to-face meetings, but social distancing makes these difficult. Serena Clark (Maynooth University) and Claudio Alberti (swisspeace/Trinity College Dublin) look at what this means for the ‘localisation agenda’ and how the problems could be overcome

ANTONIO ZARATIN (1846 - 1923): RACCOGLITORE E PREPARATO RE D\u27ALGHE DELL\u27ISTRIA E DEL QUARNERO

In questa nota sono ricostruite la vita e l\u27attività di Antonio Zaratin, maestro, dirigente scolastico, "raccoglitore e preparatore di prodotti marini". Nato a Rovigno il9 aprile 1846, si spostò in varie località istriane per esigenze di lavoro, dopo aver conseguito a Capodistria l\u27abilitazione al magistero. Morì a Trieste il18 febbraio 1923. Non ha lasciato lavori scientifici ma una serie di raccolte, 10 delle quali descritte nel presente lavoro, sono state trovate nel corso delle ricerche di cui viene qui riferito; contengono quasi esclusivamente alghe marine. Viene ricordata la sua partecipazione alla Prima Esposizione Provinciale Istriana di Capodistria (1910) nella quale espose un suo algario che meritò una medaglia d\u27oro. Viene presentato pure un elenco dei 641 campioni che costituiscono le sue 10 raccolte.Antonio Zaratin zivio je obicnim zivotom ucitelja, zaljubljenika u prirodu i obozavao skupljati alge i prirodoslovne nalaze. On je i sam sebe nazivao "sakupljacem i preparatorom morskih plodova". Ovaj tekst daje kratki pregled njegove biografije i etapa njegove uciteljske karijere. Roden je u Rovinju 9. travnja 1846. Po zavrsetku studija, sto ga je zapoceo na C.K. Visoj gimnaziji u Kopru pa nastavio je skolovanje u Rovinju, poceo je predavati 1867. godine. Iste godine ozenio se rovinjkom Annom Rocchi koja mu je rodila vise djece, od kojih je troje ostalo na zivotu. 1874. godine promaknut je u zvanje ucitelja. Zbog prirode svog posla predavao je u vise istarskih mjesta: Rovinju, Buzetu, Labinu, Vodnjanu, Porecu i Opatiji. Po umirovljenju 1908. posljednje godine zivota proveo je u Voloskom, Kopru i Trstu, gdje je umro 18. veljace 1923. U ovom radu pokusava se objasniti kako se kod Zaratina rodila strast za sakupljanjem algi te od koga je nauCio kako se pripremaju u herbarije. Na temelju pronadenih dokumenata, postavljene su hipoteze kako bi se dobio odgovor na ta pitanja. Kao njegovi moguéi uCitelji navode se: Don Giuseppe Accurti (1824-1907.), nastavnik na C.K. Visoj gimnaziji u Kopru; pater Pio Titius (1801-1884.) i pater Girolamo Granié (1849-1922.) iz Franjevackog samostana Male braée u Piranu. Zaratin nije ostavio u nasljede znanstvene radove, veé zbirke algi koje je pomno sastavio i predao onima kojima su mogie koristiti; deset je zbirki - a ne mozemo iskljuCiti moguénost da ih ima i vise - pronadeno te po prvi puta opisano u ovome radu. One predstavljaju vazno svjedocanstvo za razumijevanje njegova pristupa proucavanju algi. Pored toga, za one koji bi se zeljeli podrobnije pozabaviti ovim istrazivanjem, prilaze se i popis od 641 uzorka koji saCinjavaju tih deset zbirki. U svom rodnom gradu, Rovinju, on je bio poznat kao sakupljac algi; u Kopru je dobio zlatnu medalju za jednu svoju zbirku algi izlozenu na prvoj Istarskoj regionalnoj izlozbi 1910. godine

Two patients with history of STEC-HUS, posttransplant recurrence and complement gene mutations

Hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS) is a disease of microangiopathic hemolytic anemia, thrombocytopenia and acute renal failure. About 90% of cases are secondary to infections by Escherichia coli strains producing Shiga-like toxins (STEC-HUS), while 10% are associated with mutations in genes encoding proteins of complement system (aHUS). We describe two patients with a clinical history of STEC-HUS, who developed end-stage renal disease (ESRD) soon after disease onset. They received a kidney transplant but lost the graft for HUS recurrence, a complication more commonly observed in aHUS. Before planning a second renal transplantation, the two patients underwent genetic screening for aHUS-associated mutations that revealed the presence of a heterozygous CFI mutation in patient #1 and a heterozygous MCP mutation in patient #2, and also in her mother who donated the kidney. This finding argues that the two cases originally diagnosed as STEC-HUS had indeed aHUS triggered by STEC infection on a genetic background of impaired complement regulation. Complement gene sequencing should be performed before kidney transplantation in patients who developed ESRD following STEC-HUS since they may be undiagnosed cases of aHUS, at risk of posttransplant recurrence. Furthermore, genetic analysis of donors is mandatory before living-related transplantation to exclude carriers of HUS-predisposing mutations. Two patients with a clinical history of D+ hemolytic uremic syndrome associated with Shiga-toxin-producing 0157:H7 E. coli and recurrence in the kidney graft carry heterozygous mutations in the genes encoding complement factor I (patient 1) and membrane cofactor protein (patient 2). © Copyright 2013 The American Society of Transplantation and the American Society of Transplant Surgeons

Cancer cell death induced by ferritins and the peculiar role of their labile iron pool

This research was funded by MIUR (PRIN 2012 code 2012SK7ASN). SA and SGC acknowledge the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 668119 (project “IDentIFY”), SC the postdoctoral grant by Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Firenze (n°2013.0494) provided by FiorGen.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Lossy compression of quality scores in differential gene expression: A first assessment and impact analysis

High-throughput sequencing of RNA molecules has enabled the quantitative analysis of gene expression at the expense of storage space and processing power. To alleviate these prob- lems, lossy compression methods of the quality scores associated to RNA sequencing data have recently been proposed, and the evaluation of their impact on downstream analyses is gaining attention. In this context, this work presents a first assessment of the impact of lossily compressed quality scores in RNA sequencing data on the performance of some of the most recent tools used for differential gene expression

Dataflow Program Analysis and Refactoring Techniques for Design Space Exploration: MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Decoder Implementation Case Study

This paper presents a methodology to perform design space exploration of complex signal processing systems implemented using the CAL dataflow language. In the course of space exploration, critical path in dataflow programs is first presented, and then analyzed using a new strategy for computational load reduction. These techniques, together with detecting design bottlenecks, point to the most efficient optimization directions in a complex network. Following these analysis, several new refactoring techniques are introduced and applied on the dataflow program in order to obtain feasible design points in the exploration space. For a MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 decoder software and hardware implementation, the multi-dimensional space can be explored effectively for throughput, resource, and frequency, with real-time decoding range from QCIF to HD resolutions