Le imprese femminili in Italia: i risultati di un'indagine esplorativa

Entrepreneurship has usually been considered a male-dominated activity. In 2012, however, 224mout of 400mentrepreneurs worldwide were women (GEM 2012).Female entrepreneurship therefore clearly represents an important component of the business sector at global level. To date, however, the scope of research on such a relevant topic is still confined to the US and Anglo-Saxon countries. Also, academic research on Italian female entrepreneurship is very limited, despite Italy has the highest number of female-owned firms in Europe (Eurostat, 2013). This paper thus contributes to fill this research gap by investigating the characteristics, the main problems and motivations of 310 Italian female-owned firms

Normal form decomposition for Gaussian-to-Gaussian superoperators

In this paper we explore the set of linear maps sending the set of quantum Gaussian states into itself. These maps are in general not positive, a feature which can be exploited as a test to check whether a given quantum state belongs to the convex hull of Gaussian states (if one of the considered maps sends it into a non positive operator, the above state is certified not to belong to the set). Generalizing a result known to be valid under the assumption of complete positivity, we provide a characterization of these Gaussian-to-Gaussian (not necessarily positive) superoperators in terms of their action on the characteristic function of the inputs. For the special case of one-mode mappings we also show that any Gaussian-to-Gaussian superoperator can be expressed as a concatenation of a phase-space dilatation, followed by the action of a completely positive Gaussian channel, possibly composed with a transposition. While a similar decomposition is shown to fail in the multi-mode scenario, we prove that it still holds at least under the further hypothesis of homogeneous action on the covariance matrix

Study of the performance of standard RPC chambers as a function of bakelite temperature

A systematic study of the performance of the Resistive Plate Chambers as a function of the bakelite temperature is presented. The current, the rate and the efficiency were measured in the temperature range 22-40degreesC. The values of the relative humidity during the data taking were in the range 40-60%. Measurements show a strong dependence of the efficiency on bakelite temperature. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved

Effects of dissipation in an adiabatic quantum search algorithm

We consider the effect of two different environments on the performance of the quantum adiabatic search algorithm, a thermal bath at finite temperature, and a structured environment similar to the one encountered in systems coupled to the electromagnetic field that exists within a photonic crystal. While for all the parameter regimes explored here, the algorithm performance is worsened by the contact with a thermal environment, the picture appears to be different when considering a structured environment. In this case we show that, by tuning the environment parameters to certain regimes, the algorithm performance can actually be improved with respect to the closed system case. Additionally, the relevance of considering the dissipation rates as complex quantities is discussed in both cases. More particularly, we find that the imaginary part of the rates can not be neglected with the usual argument that it simply amounts to an energy shift, and in fact influences crucially the system dynamics.Comment: 18 pages, 9 figure

UAVs for Vegetation Monitoring: Overview and Recent Scientific Contributions

This paper reviewed a set of twenty-one original and innovative papers included in a special issue on UAVs for vegetation monitoring, which proposed new methods and techniques applied to diverse agricultural and forestry scenarios. Three general categories were considered: (1) sensors and vegetation indices used, (2) technological goals pursued, and (3) agroforestry applications. Some investigations focused on issues related to UAV flight operations, spatial resolution requirements, and computation and data analytics, while others studied the ability of UAVs for characterizing relevant vegetation features (mainly canopy cover and crop height) or for detecting different plant/crop stressors, such as nutrient content/deficiencies, water needs, weeds, and diseases. The general goal was proposing UAV-based technological solutions for a better use of agricultural and forestry resources and more efficient production with relevant economic and environmental benefits

Steps Before Syntax: Helping Novice Programmers Solve Problems using the PCDIT Framework

Novice programmers often struggle with problem solving due to the high cognitive loads they face. Furthermore, many introductory programming courses do not explicitly teach it, assuming that problem solving skills are acquired along the way. In this paper, we present 'PCDIT', a non-linear problem solving framework that provides scaffolding to guide novice programmers through the process of transforming a problem specification into an implemented and tested solution for an imperative programming language. A key distinction of PCDIT is its focus on developing concrete cases for the problem early without actually writing test code: students are instead encouraged to think about the abstract steps from inputs to outputs before mapping anything down to syntax. We reflect on our experience of teaching an introductory programming course using PCDIT, and report the results of a survey that suggests it helped students to break down challenging problems, organise their thoughts, and reach working solutions

Impact of aging on the sintering behavior of bioactive-glass powder

Bioactive glasses (BGs) have been successfully used for several years as bone graft substitutes to fill defects and augment bone structures in orthopedic and dental procedures. Despite recent advances in the fabrication of reliable 3D scaffolds based on BG, the reproducibility of fabrication has only been marginally addressed and remains a challenge for their application. Recent studies have shown that BGs can react with moisture and atmospheric CO2 to form carbonates, affecting the properties and structure of the final product. In this study, factors that can affect the sintering behavior of BG powders were identified and investigated. A statistical analysis was then performed to optimize the BG sintering process, which revealed the possibility of obtaining BG scaffolds with reproducible density by acting on controllable factors such as aging and drying. In practice, this can be achieved by controlling the atmosphere during processing, handling, and storage of the material