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How News May Affect Markets’ Complex Structure: The Case of Cambridge Analytica
No full textThe claim of Cambridge Analytica, a political consulting firm, that it was possible to influence voting behavior by using data mined from the social platform Facebook created a sudden fear in its users of being manipulated; consequently, even the market price of the social platform was shocked.We propose a case study analyzing the effect of this data scandal not only on Facebook stock price, but also on the whole stock market. To such a scope, we consider 15-minutes prices and returns of the set of the NASDAQ-100 components before and after the Cambridge Analytica case. We analyze correlations and Mutual Information among components finding that assets become more correlated and their Mutual Information grows higher. We also observe that correlation and Mutual Information are mutually increasing and seem to follow a master curve. Hence, the market appears more fragile after the Cambridge Analytica event. In fact, as it is well-known in finance, an increase in the average value of correlations augments the systemic risk (i.e., all the market can collapse as a whole) and decreases the possibility of allocating a safe investment portfolio
Modalità plurale del sacro tra uno e multiplo nel Mediterraneo antico: i sacra peregrina
No full textthe aim of this research in fieri is to approach the pluralism of religions in ancient Mediterranean
Ecological civilisation for China’s urban sustainability. A review of normative criteria.
No full textIn the last decade, the concept of ecological civilisation (shengtai wenming, 生态文明) has become common currency in China’s debate on sustainable urbanization. Conceptually, ecological civilisation calls for a renewed harmony between human and nature and for the embracement of a new development model, one that does not entail the disruption of the natural environment in favour of economic growth. However, the extent to which ecological civilisation can reshape the norms of urban development is still debated upon. In order to shed light on this issue, we conducted a systematic review of 24 assessment systems inspired by ecological civilisation. The review shows a novel emphasis on the social dimension of sustainability, whereby ‘soft’ themes informed by humans’ relations with their living environment complement traditional categories of social sustainability−welfare, education, labour. Assessment systems inspired by ecological civilization also appear to reflect a stronger nexus between knowledge and policy, by focusing on issues such as environmental and ecological awareness, and public participation. The adoption of ecological civilisation does therefore appear to be consistent with the establishment of a more comprehensive notion of urban sustainability. The extent to which such norms will be translated into practice will depend upon wider institutional and political processes governing China’s urban development and therefore needs to be further ascertained
Soft Organizations, Hard Powers: The FATF and the FSB as Standard-Setting Bodies
No full textThe purpose of this contribution is to analyze two major standard setting bodies, namely the Financial Action Task Force on money laundering and the Financial Stability Board from an international law perspective. It will be demonstrated that they are “soft organizations”, which, despite their loose structure, can exercise “hard powers” in inducing States to comply with their standards
Role of Ag multimers as broadband sensitizers in Tb3+/Yb3+co-doped glass-ceramics
No full textRare earth ions (RE3+) have typical photoluminescence emissions due to internal 4f orbital transitions. These emissions are narrow, with long excited state lifetimes and have the capability of spectral manipulation like wavelength shifting, down-conversion or up-conversion processes. Therefore, RE-doped materials are widely used for optical applications. However, the narrow absorption bandwidths and the small excitation cross sections for their optical transitions are major limiting factors for the full exploitation of their potentials. In this work, we show that the addition of metal nanoaggregates as broadband and efficient sensitizers can be a viable strategy to overcome these limits. Silica-zirconia (70% SiO2- 30% ZrO2) glass-ceramic films doped by Tb3+/Yb3+ions and an additional 5 mol.% of Na2O were prepared by sol-gel synthesis followed by a thermal annealing at 1000°C. Ag introduction was then obtained by ion-exchange in a molten salt bath and the samples were subsequently annealed in air at 380°C or 430°C to induce the migration and aggregation of the metal. The structural, compositional and optical properties of the materials were investigated, providing evidence for efficient broadband sensitization of the rare earth ions by energy transfer from Ag-dimers or multimers, which could have applications for increasing the efficiency of silicon solar cells
Essere comunità nelle istruzioni ai rettori veneziani in Istria e Dalmazia (secoli XIII-XV).
No full textLe istruzioni per i rettori veneziani erano raccolte nelle commissioni affidate
agli inviati responsabili dell’amministrazione periferica. I testi stilati per i distretti
istriani e dalmati fra XIII e XV secolo − mentre si assestava la presenza di Venezia
in una regione strategica per la sua stessa sopravvivenza −, evidenziano un’attinenza
con i relativi documenti pattizi. Le commissioni, allora, avrebbero funto da ‘strumenti
attuativi’ di quanto concordato fra la capitale e le comunità del dominio.
L’aggiornamento delle istruzioni, inoltre, poteva realizzarsi su sollecitazione delle
comunità stesse. Le commissioni, perciò, pur essendo state messe a punto dal centro,
avrebbero potuto riproporre nel contempo i presupposti e le regole fondamentali
su cui si fondava la permanenza nello stato veneziano, diventando anche testi
rappresentativi dell’essere comunità soggetta a Venezia.The instructions for the Venetian rectors were collected into the commissions
entrusted to the envoys responsible for the peripheral administration. The papers drawn up for the Istrian and Dalmatian districts between the thirteenth and fifteenth
centuries − as Venice asserted its presence in a region strategic for its own survival
− show a relationship to the relative pactional documents. The commissions,
then, would have functioned as ‘executive instruments’ of what had been agreed
between the capital and the governed communities. The updating of the instructions,
moreover, could be done at the request of the communities themselves. So
although having been drafted by the centre, the commissions would have been
able to represent in the meantime the premisses and fundamental rules on which
the permanence of the Venetian state was based, also becoming representative texts
of the communities subject to Venice
Impedimetric sensing of the immuno-enzymatic reaction of gliadin with a collagen-modified electrode
No full textThis paper presents a previously unexplored biosensing strategy for detecting gliadin which exploits the crosslinking of gliadin with collagen, catalyzed by transglutaminase at the interfacial electron transfer rate, on a modified electrode. The process is monitored by electrochemical impedance spectroscopy using a glassy carbon electrode coated with a collagen layer. To validate the specificity of the response as well as to eliminate possible interferences from other proteins, such as soy protein or casein, the captured gliadin is further reacted with a specific anti-gliadin antibody. Changes in charge transfer resistance, measured from the Nyquist plots, scale linearly with the gliadin concentration in the range 5–20 mg/L, a range suitable for testing the gliadin concentration in gluten-free food commodities