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From trust who to trust what. A fresh perspective on trust in the era of blockchain
Get PDFIn the last few years, a remarkable technological revolution has been taking place around the world. Such a technological revolution is not just a means to the end of improving efficiency, but an important end of social order. In this work, I show that blockchain is one important example. I discuss that the success of a disintermediated transaction is conditioned on the level of trust in the rules-of-code. In what follows, the dissertation is organized in three studies. Study 1 is a theoretical paper where I present and discuss a model of how blockchain-like technologies can automate and algorithmically dictate the nurturing of trust. Based on study 1, study 2 is aimed to develop and validate a quantitative scale to measure each component of the proposed trust model. Lastly, study 3 is intended to investigate how telematic equipment can affect individual trusting behavior under condition of information asymmetry. The introduction of black box in the Italian automobile insurance market is the set of this study. Overall, the dissertation offers some major contributions for theory and practice about the dynamics underlying the development of trust in the rising era of blockchain transactions
Digital Forensics AI: on Practicality, Optimality, and Interpretability of Digital Evidence Mining Techniques
Get PDFDigital forensics as a field has progressed alongside technological advancements over the years, just as digital devices have gotten more robust and sophisticated. However, criminals and attackers have devised means for exploiting the vulnerabilities or sophistication of these devices to carry out malicious activities in unprecedented ways. Their belief is that electronic crimes can be committed without identities being revealed or trails being established. Several applications of artificial intelligence (AI) have demonstrated interesting and promising solutions to seemingly intractable societal challenges. This thesis aims to advance the concept of applying AI techniques in digital forensic investigation. Our approach involves experimenting with a complex case scenario in which suspects corresponded by e-mail and deleted, suspiciously, certain communications, presumably to conceal evidence. The purpose is to demonstrate the efficacy of Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) in learning and detecting communication patterns over time, and then predicting the possibility of missing communication(s) along with potential topics of discussion. To do this, we developed a novel approach and included other existing models. The accuracy of our results is evaluated, and their performance on previously unseen data is measured. Second, we proposed conceptualizing the term “Digital Forensics AI” (DFAI) to formalize the application of AI in digital forensics. The objective is to highlight the instruments that facilitate the best evidential outcomes and presentation mechanisms that are adaptable to the probabilistic output of AI models. Finally, we enhanced our notion in support of the application of AI in digital forensics by recommending methodologies and approaches for bridging trust gaps through the development of interpretable models that facilitate the admissibility of digital evidence in legal proceedings
Developing a large scale FrameNet for Italian - The IFrameNet experience
Get PDFIn this thesis we present the development and the current status of the IFrameNet project, aimed at the construction of a large-scale lexical semantic resource for the Italian language based on Frame Semantics theories. We will begin by contextualizing our work in the wider context of Frame Semantics and of the FrameNet project, which, since 1997, has attempted to apply these theories to lexicography. We will then analyse and discuss the applicability of the structure of the American resource to Italian and more specifically we will focus on the domain of fear, worry, and anxiety. We will finally propose some modifications aimed at improving this domain of the resource in relation to its coherence, its ability to accurately represent the linguistic reality and in particular in order to make it possible to apply it to Italian
Natural product chemistry and metabolomics: a roadmap through circular economy, sustainable agriculture, and biodiversity valorization
Get PDFInspired by the Sustainable Developmental Goals of the Agenda 2030, this work addressed three topics of pivotal importance in the sustainability era, namely: circular economy, sustainable agriculture, and biodiversity valorization. Natural products chemistry and metabolomics were keys to achieve the following aims: 1) the valorization of waste plant material for circular economy, 2) the achievement of deep knowledge of plant-environment interactions in view of sustainable agriculture, 3) the biodiversity valorization through the investigation of local flora.
The first aim was accomplished by analyzing the phytochemical profile and the bioactivity of neglected plants matrices. Residues of aromatic plants after distillation resulted active against a plant pathogen suggesting a potential reuse of these matrices in agriculture. In addition, by-products of chestnut cultivation proved endowed with in vitro neuroprotective properties.
The second aim was achieved by the development of two case studies. In particular, a work was carried out in field to study Sorghum bicolor subjected to several environmental and anthropic factors, and the other one in greenhouse exploring Taxus baccata responses to different LED lighting. Metabolomics proved successful to identify sorghum biomarkers for crop quality and development and allowed to monitor taxus growth providing useful insights for sustainable agriculture.
To achieve the third aim, spontaneous plants collected in Sardinia were investigated for their antiproliferative activities. Five plants resulted endowed with promising bioactivity thus their phytochemical composition was investigated through NMR spectroscopy. Finally, a focus on chemodiversity was placed by studying Solanum dulcamara chemotypes through MS metabolomics which revealed that the chemotypes differed for the leaf steroidal glycoalkaloids.
The overall thesis work underlined the importance of plant specialized metabolites in multiple fields and demonstrated that the study of these molecules aids the sustainable development, enhancing circular economy, sustainable agriculture, and biodiversity valorization. In this context, metabolomics approach resulted particularly interesting
The functional biodiversity of common wheat: an adaptation resource for cereal cropping systems with low environmental impact
Get PDFNel contesto dei cambiamenti climatici, al fine di aumentare la resilienza della coltivazione del frumento, risulta necessario comprendere le interazioni e le relazioni tra tecniche agronomiche a basso impatto ambientale e caratteristiche positive delle varietà di frumento.
L'obiettivo generale di questo studio è quello di caratterizzare e individuare le varietà di grano più adatte per ridurre l’impatto ambientale della sua coltivazione.
Il primo esperimento, di durata triennale, svoltosi presso un'azienda agricola biologica, ha permesso la caratterizzazione di 24 accessioni di grano tenero. Le analisi effettuate hanno riguardato sia gli aspetti agronomici, sia quelli nutrizionali e sia quelli nutraceutici.
Il secondo studio ha caratterizzato, da un punto di vista nutrizionale e agronomico, diversi genotipi e popolazioni evolutive di grano tenero. Alcune varietà in condizioni pedoclimatiche favorevoli hanno raggiunto valori di produzione estremamente elevati, mentre in diversi contesti, hanno registrato valori di resa bassi. Diversamente, la popolazione evolutiva Bioadapt ha registrato un'elevata stabilità, in termini di risultati produttivi raggiunti.
La terza ricerca ha studiato alcuni aspetti della fisiologia del grano tenero, per approfondire una caratteristica fisiologica delle piante, con particolare rilevanza e possibili importanti implicazioni per la coltivazione sostenibile del grano tenero.
L'obiettivo è stato quello di identificare le varietà di grano tenero con un’attività allelopatica potenziale elevata, attraverso l'analisi della crescita iniziale delle radici della pianta di grano e delle erbe infestanti circostanti. Sono state selezionate e confrontate 30 cultivar di grano tenero, mentre il loietto perenne è stato impiegato come specie infestante modello.
La capacità allelopatica non si è manifestata semplicemente come una risposta dose-dipendente delle molecole emesse nel substrato di crescita.
Le caratterizzazioni delle accessioni effettuate nel presente studio rappresentano un valido punto di partenza per futuri programmi di miglioramento genetico, al fine di ottenere varietà idonee a sistemi di produzione a basso impiego di input.In order to reduce the use of pesticides products and increase the resilience of wheat cultivation, in the context of climate change, it is necessary to fully understand the interactions and relationship between agronomic techniques with low environmental impacts and positive varieties traits.
The general aim of this study is to characterize and identify the most suitable wheat varieties to achieve low environmental impact cultivation of common wheat.
One experiment, carried out during three years at an organic farm, characterized 24 accessions of common wheat. The surveys carried out concerned both the agronomic, the nutritional, and the nutraceutical components.
Some accessions registered excellent agronomic performance.
A second study aimed to characterize, from a nutritional and agronomic point of view, different genotypes and evolutionary populations of common wheat, observing how they are influenced by different environments and meteorological trends. Some varieties in favorable pedoclimatic conditions reached extremely high production values, while in different contexts, they recorded lower values. In contrast, the evolutionary Bioadapt population registered high stability, in terms of production results achieved.
The third research studied some aspects of common wheat physiology, to understand a physiological characteristic of plants, with particular relevance and important implications for sustainable cultivation of common wheat.
The aim was to identify the common wheat varieties with a higher potential allelopathic activity, through the analysis of the initial root growth of the wheat plant and surrounding weeds. 30 cultivars of common wheat were selected and compared, while the perennial ryegrass was employed as weed model species.
The allelopathic capacity seemed to be not simply a dose-dependent response to the molecules emitted in the growing substrate.
The characterizations of the varietal resources carried out in the present study represent a valid starting point for future breeding programs, to obtain suitable varieties for low-input production systems
The political use of fiction. Fictitious letters in the Latin and Vernacular Middle Ages (12-15 C.)
Get PDFLa tesi analizza un corpus di circa quaranta epistole fittizie, alcune delle quali vengono editate in appendice. L'intento è quello di valutare la funzione politica di queste lettere, che si presentano come scritti inviati dal Diavolo, Cristo o altri personaggi ultraterreni o defunti, all'interno dei maggiori scenari di tensione politica e religiosa dei secoli presi in esame.This thesis analyses around forty exeplars of Medieval fictitious letters, some of which are edited in the appendix. The aim is to assess the political function of these letters, which present themselves as writings sent by the Devil, Christ, deceased or fictional characters, within the political and religious unrest of the chronology that is taken into accoun
Analysis of Railway Signalling Systems to Increase Line and Node Capacity
Get PDF"Europe is one of the most urbanized continents on the planet: about 75% of its population lives in urban areas” (European Enviroment Agency, 2017).
In this urban context, the car is still the widely used way of transport, while public transport manages to capture residual segments of the demand for mobility. However, in a structural framework of obvious concern and criticality for public transport, there is a component of the sector in strong expansion, that is, all rail transports. In addition, the incidence of rail transport is even more significant in large metropolitan systems where daily travel reaches its highest levels of expression.
It is known, however, that the supply of transport services is limited by the capacity of the transport system which depends on the physical size of the infrastructure, that is, the capacity of the infrastructure, the number of vehicles, the capacity of the vehicle fleet, the operating time and the traffic regime implemented
Modeling and Implementation of Digital Twins for the Analysis of Transportation Systems
Get PDFTransport engineers, authorities, companies, stakeholders, and all experts involved on transportation planning work every day to improve the trip experience of people, and to reduce the impacts on the collectivity. Traffic congestion, pollution and energy consumption are core problems for the transportation system. On the one hand a congested road causes an exponential increase in the energy consumption and waiting times, while a not-congested road can be more attractive and slowly become congested over time; on the other hand, the environmental capacity of road links is
not perceived, thus generating high emission and distribution of pollutants. In fact, the ability of transportation planners is to avoid traffic congestion but offer at the same time pleasant, accessible and sustainable trips. This may include several planning techniques which may involve traffic calming and limitations, lane reservation, changing in the road network and geometry, as well as apply new technologies, services and means of transportation. It is worth noting that trying these features directly on a city can be very expensive and produce irreparable damages to the transportation system; also, traditional transport models are not able to adeguately simulate most of these features.
Recently, it has been recently introduced the digital twin, a digital reproduction of a city to be used as a test platform for ’what if’ scenarios.
In fact, transport digital twin is not just a digital reproduction of the transportation system, but consider reaction of humans to the changes applied to the system, in order to make a comparison between different scenarios.
The present document studies large-scale digital twins, which are able to consider the spatial propagation of effects, and particularly focuses on advanced and time-dependent models able to simulate the door-to-door trip experience of all users and adequately model the transport features of the future
New catalytic strategies for the synthesis of complex (hetero)-cyclic compounds
Get PDFThe aim of this Doctoral Thesis is the development of new catalytic transformation for efficient and sustainable processes, with the main purpose of easily access the incredible diversity and complexity of bio-relevant compounds. The tuning of general synthetic strategies is a flourishing field in organic chemistry, and can rapidly give access to libraries of products with small to big modifications from a hypothetical lead compound. Whit this in mind, in the modern era of organic synthesis, many aspects are pivotal in the design of a new catalytic procedure, such as reproducibility, generality over the main functional groups, mild conditions and easily accessible starting materials and catalysts. Particularly, another
fundamental aspect is the generation of complexity in one single step, to conveniently assemble the scaffold of the class of compounds studied. During the course of my PhD, two
main strategies were analyzed to tackle these challenges, namely de-aromatization and ring construction through cyclization. These methodologies have been deeply investigated both in organo- and metal-catalyzed fashions, and conceptually new protocols have been developed. Particular attention has been devoted at the study and optimization of the reaction conditions and catalyst structure, in order to maximize yield and selectivity of the processes as well as minimizing the catalyst loading and using the mildest conditions. The substrate scope has been thoroughly investigated to demonstrate the broad applicability of the proposed transformations, as well
as the performance of synthetic elaborations illustrating the usefulness of the developed methods. Despite the conceptual diversity, the proposed protocols are connected by their potential further development into useful tools for the bio-molecule synthetic scenario
Effects of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) on BDNF pathway, HDAC epigenetic enzymes and neurofilament proteins
Get PDF3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) is a psychoactive substance used for recreational purposes. Possible clinical use of MDMA, in combination with psychotherapy, has been considered for the treatment of PTSD. However, MDMA causes neurotoxic effects and its use was associated with psychiatric symptoms, memory and cognitive deficits.
To elucidate these aspects, the first aim of this study was to investigate the effects of acute and repeated MDMA treatment on BDNF/TrkB and HDACs in animal models. According to recent evidence about HDAC inhibitors, we used sodium butyrate to investigate its ability to affect MDMA-induced molecular and behavioral alterations.
Moreover, considering that an alteration of BDNF has been reported in the brain of animals treated with psychoactive substances and in the blood of substance abusers, possible alterations of this neurotrophin levels were investigated in blood samples of MDMA users. Since different BDNF pools exist in plasma and serum, distinct determination of the neurotrophin were evaluated in both matrices.
Furthermore, recent evidence has shown that neurofilaments can represent valid biomarkers of neural damage. Given the neurotoxic effects of ecstasy, we investigated neurofilaments in serotonergic neuronal cells. Particularly, we assessed MDMA effects on neurofilament proteins in differentiated serotonergic cells and we investigated if BDNF could protect serotonergic neurons from MDMA effects.
Data showed that MDMA alters different crucial genes as well as the proteins involved in both substance use disorders and psychiatric conditions. Animal studies showed alterations both in BDNF pathways and in HDACs. Moreover, investigation in humans brought into view that peripheral BDNF could not reflect central BDNF and serum and plasma BDNF can express different types of this neurotrophin. Furthermore, data obtained in the differentiated serotonergic cell line highlight the useful role of NF-L as a biomarker of neuronal damage induced by MDMA, confirming the importance of studying NFs in the field of neuropsychiatric disorders