Video didattico sull’uso interattivo del TAM-3

This booklet accompanies a video that shows how students discuss about the answers they gave to a metalinguistic test they were previously administered on individual grounds. A tutor leads the interactions between the participants in view of enhancing their awareness of structural features of language and meanings. The booklet describes the nature and the function of the video, presents the transcripts of the interactions, and highlights the turning points of the taking consciousness processes

Video didattico sull’uso interattivo del TAM-2

This booklet is an educational resource that accompanies a video where children discuss about the possible answers to a metalinguistic test, under the guidance of an adult. The booklet describes the nature and the function of the video and reports the transcripts of the interactions between children and the tutor of the focus group. Some turning points are highlighted during these interactions, where the participants evolve towards more advanced levels of metalinguistic awareness. Teachers and educators can draw on these commented interactions for creating favourable conditions to enhance metalinguistic awareness in classroom activities

Electro-membrane Processes for the Green Hydrogen Production

Since the last century, humanity has been facing challenging scenarios, like global warming, environmental pollution and the dramatic increase in energy demand. In this framework, green hydrogen has been identified as the most promising energy vector to achieve carbon neutrality. With this respect, the idea of the present work is to combine the Reverse Electrodialysis (RED) membrane process with hydrogen production. Experimental RED tests were carried out by feeding the unit with different concentrated solutions to study the process performance. Collected results suggest that this approach is a viable way to produce hydrogen with high faradic efficiencies, up to a maximum of 99 %, highlighting also the technology advantage of producing hydrogen by exploiting the salinity gradient energy, thus leading to a production with Specific Energy Consumption close to zero

Il corso di laurea interateneo Scienze e Tecniche Psicologiche di Sapienza e Unitelma Sapienza: MOODLE a supporto della partecipazione attiva e collaborativa

In questo contributo si descrive il corso di Laurea in Scienze e Tecniche Psicologiche erogato a partire dal 2017 da Sapienza e Unitelma Sapienza. Si tratta di un corso interamente online in cui si è deciso di integrare l’e-Learning classico con un approccio partecipativo e collaborativo, salvaguardando i punti di forza dell’uno e dell’altro modello. A tal fine, il modello poggia su tre pilastri fondamentali: progettazione teoricamente ancorata, team esperto di docenti e tutor, un Learning Management System flessibile e ricco come Moodle. Verrà quindi descritto ciascuno di questi aspetti, con particolare riferimento al modo in cui l’ambiente tecnologico ha reso possibile l’armonizzazione di didattica erogativa e partecipativa. Si riportano poi i principali dati riferiti al primo anno appena concluso, per sottolineare infine punti di forza e direzioni di sviluppo previste per l’anno in corso, a partire da ulteriori utilizzi delle risorse e attività che Moodle mette a disposizione per gestire flessibilmente un modello di e-learning puro ispirato ai principi del socio-costruttivismo

MOOCs e interazioni collaborative: l’esperienza in «Sapienza»

MOOCs and Collaborative Interactions: the Experience at «Sapienza» UniversityNowadays, Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are a means to reach, inform and train a large number of users. In the last few years several universities around the world have begun to provide free online courses on very different topics. «Sapienza» University has started up a collaboration with «Coursera», by delivering two MOOCs in the «Coursera» platform last year. Early educational research on this field identified two different MOOC typologies, based on the pedagogical approach adopted: connectivist versus behavioral; courses delivered by the major MOOC companies were charged to adopt a behavioral approach, considering learning as mere knowledge transmission instead of knowledge building. In this paper we wish to present the two courses delivered by «Sapienza» University, analyzing both participation and results, with particular emphasis on forum interactions and tutoring styles among teachers. Courses supposedly designed to deliver content and assess knowledge acquisition proved to be able to encourage and support students’ active and collaborative knowledge building, simply by adding forums with or without teacher management. In this way, the courses could change from being mere knowledge providers to real collaborative learning environments

Electro-membrane Processes for the Green Hydrogen Production

Since the last century, humanity has been facing challenging scenarios, like global warming, environmental pollution and the dramatic increase in energy demand. In this framework, green hydrogen has been identified as the most promising energy vector to achieve carbon neutrality. With this respect, the idea of the present work is to combine the Reverse Electrodialysis (RED) membrane process with hydrogen production. Experimental RED tests were carried out by feeding the unit with different concentrated solutions to study the process performance. Collected results suggest that this approach is a viable way to produce hydrogen with high faradic efficiencies, up to a maximum of 99 %, highlighting also the technology advantage of producing hydrogen by exploiting the salinity gradient energy, thus leading to a production with Specific Energy Consumption close to zero

Guidelines for the use and interpretation of assays for monitoring autophagy (3rd edition)

In 2008 we published the first set of guidelines for standardizing research in autophagy. Since then, research on this topic has continued to accelerate, and many new scientists have entered the field. Our knowledge base and relevant new technologies have also been expanding. Accordingly, it is important to update these guidelines for monitoring autophagy in different organisms. Various reviews have described the range of assays that have been used for this purpose. Nevertheless, there continues to be confusion regarding acceptable methods to measure autophagy, especially in multicellular eukaryotes. For example, a key point that needs to be emphasized is that there is a difference between measurements that monitor the numbers or volume of autophagic elements (e.g., autophagosomes or autolysosomes) at any stage of the autophagic process versus those that measure fl ux through the autophagy pathway (i.e., the complete process including the amount and rate of cargo sequestered and degraded). In particular, a block in macroautophagy that results in autophagosome accumulation must be differentiated from stimuli that increase autophagic activity, defi ned as increased autophagy induction coupled with increased delivery to, and degradation within, lysosomes (inmost higher eukaryotes and some protists such as Dictyostelium ) or the vacuole (in plants and fungi). In other words, it is especially important that investigators new to the fi eld understand that the appearance of more autophagosomes does not necessarily equate with more autophagy. In fact, in many cases, autophagosomes accumulate because of a block in trafficking to lysosomes without a concomitant change in autophagosome biogenesis, whereas an increase in autolysosomes may reflect a reduction in degradative activity. It is worth emphasizing here that lysosomal digestion is a stage of autophagy and evaluating its competence is a crucial part of the evaluation of autophagic flux, or complete autophagy. Here, we present a set of guidelines for the selection and interpretation of methods for use by investigators who aim to examine macroautophagy and related processes, as well as for reviewers who need to provide realistic and reasonable critiques of papers that are focused on these processes. These guidelines are not meant to be a formulaic set of rules, because the appropriate assays depend in part on the question being asked and the system being used. In addition, we emphasize that no individual assay is guaranteed to be the most appropriate one in every situation, and we strongly recommend the use of multiple assays to monitor autophagy. Along these lines, because of the potential for pleiotropic effects due to blocking autophagy through genetic manipulation it is imperative to delete or knock down more than one autophagy-related gene. In addition, some individual Atg proteins, or groups of proteins, are involved in other cellular pathways so not all Atg proteins can be used as a specific marker for an autophagic process. In these guidelines, we consider these various methods of assessing autophagy and what information can, or cannot, be obtained from them. Finally, by discussing the merits and limits of particular autophagy assays, we hope to encourage technical innovation in the field

MOOCs and collaborative interaction

MOOCs are online courses, free provided by a variety of platforms in order to disseminate content to a very wide audience; they are rapidly expanding their success, so that the most important universities of the world begun to project and deliver this type of free courses. The different courses’ design and organization, and the relative platforms that support them, have been classified into two macro categories on the basis of pedagogical approach used: literature highlights differences between connectivist MOOCs (and platforms) and behaviorists MOOCs (and platforms). This paper wants to present the work design of the first two MOOCs provided by Sapienza University, analyzing their structure and the results of collaborative interactions generated; a second aim is to understand how it can be questioned the categorization originally created between connectivist and behaviorists MOOCs and to reflect on different modalities to make MOOCs collaborativ

Il ruolo dei MOOCs come strumento per l'inclusione sociale

In un panorama in cui appare chiara l’esigenza di una profonda riprogettazione delle forme di educazione capaci di includere il numero più ampio di persone, a partire dal 2011 si sono inseriti i MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses), ultima frontiera della diffusione degli ambienti di apprendimento virtuali. Oggi sono ormai riconosciuti come un dirompente mezzo per raggiungere, informare e formare un numero elevato di utenti, tant’è che sono moltissime le università che hanno iniziato ad erogare corsi sulle più disparate materie ed argomenti. Valore principe dei MOOCs è senza dubbio quello della possibilità offerta a tutti di accedere alla conoscenza nei modi e nelle forme condivise fino ad ora solo nelle comunità accademiche. Promuovono quindi l’inclusione sociale (Conole, 2013) e una distribuzione democratica della conoscenza. Persone con disabilità, persone costrette ad una lunga ospedalizzazione, impossibilitate a spostarsi da una remota zona del mondo, persone con basso reddito: l’azione dei MOOCs per garantire l’inclusività è un aspetto fondamentale su cui orientare i prossimi lavori futuri. Nel contributo viene presentata una descrizione dei MOOCs, i principi pedagogici su cui sono costruiti e un esempio di attuazione presso Sapienza, Università di Roma