1,720,965 research outputs found
Three essays on Inequality and Climate Change reduction in a Degrowth scenario
No full textQuesto lavoro esplora le potenzialità dell'adozione di un approccio alternativo e sostenibile per affrontare il cambiamento climatico, rispetto alle politiche tradizionali che spesso privilegiano la crescita economica e approcci basati sul mercato. L'alternativa proposta è la decrescita economica sostenibile, intesa come una riduzione volontaria e graduale dei consumi pro capite e delle ore lavorate, accompagnata da politiche di riqualificazione ambientale.
Nel primo capitolo vengono utilizzate tecniche di elaborazione del linguaggio naturale (Natural Language Processing, NLP), per analizzare l'evoluzione del dibattito accademico sulle questioni ambientali, con particolare attenzione al concetto di decrescita.
Il secondo capitolo adotta un modello Quantile Vettoriale Autoregressivo (QVAR) per stimare gli effetti di contagio tra la riduzione delle ore lavorate e dei consumi, disuguaglianze di reddito, l'Impronta Ecologica e l'Impronta Carbonica, con focus sui quantili estremi delle distribuzioni. L'approccio permette di comprendere la risposta dei sistemi economici in scenari di stress ambientale.
Il terzo capitolo propone un indicatore di entropia come proxy per quantificare l'incertezza climatica, valutando l'impatto dei fattori demografici, economici e produttivi su tale incertezza attraverso un modello di regressione su popolazione, ricchezza e tecnologia (Stochastic Impacts by Regression on Population, Affluence, and Technology, STIRPAT).
Complessivamente, la tesi offre una valutazione integrata degli impatti ambientali e sociali di un cambio di paradigma così radicale, fornendo spunti preziosi per i decisori politici per progettare strategie in grado di ridurre il danno ambientale senza compromettere il benessere socio-economico delle popolazioni.This work explores the potential of adopting an alternative, sustainable approach to addressing climate change, as opposed to traditional policies that often prioritize economic growth and a market-based approach. The proposed alternative is sustainable economic degrowth, understood as a voluntary and gradual reduction in per capita consumption and hours worked, accompanied by environmental regeneration policies.
In the first chapter, Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques are used to analyse the evolution of the academic debate on environmental issues, with a particular focus on the concept of degrowth.
The second chapter employs a Quantile Vector Autoregressive (QVAR) model to estimate the spillover effects between reductions in hours worked and consumption, income inequality, Ecological Footprint, and Carbon Footprint, with a particular focus on extreme quantiles. This approach aims to understand the response of economic systems in scenarios of environmental stress.
The third chapter proposes an entropy indicator as a proxy for climate uncertainty, assessing the impact of demographic, economic, and productive factors on this uncertainty through a Stochastic Impact by Regression on Population, Affluence, and Technology (STIRPAT) model.
Overall, the thesis aims to provide an integrated assessment of the environmental and social impacts of such a radical paradigm shift, offering valuable insights for policymakers who wish to design strategies that can reduce environmental damage without compromising the socio-economic well-being of populations
Palladium nanoparticles, stabilized by lignin, as catalyst for cross-coupling reactions in water
No full textPalladium nanoparticles of a definite shape (spherical) and dimension (8–14 and 16–20 nm) were prepared employing two water soluble lignin samples as both reducing and stabilizing agent in definitely green experimental conditions, namely aqueous solution, aerobic conditions, moderate temperature,
short times. The above nanoparticles were employed as catalyst for a series of carbon–carbon coupling reactions carried out in water at mild conditions. Heck and Suzuki reactions were performed for several substrates, by changing the nature of halogen, the substituents at the aromatic ring, the bases employed and the temperature. Product yields were satisfactory and selectivities very good. Other two cross coupling reactions, namely Sonogashira and Stille, were also tested: iodine derivatives showed always the best reactivity, while chlorine derivatives did not react
One-pot synthesis of lignin-stabilised platinum and palladium nanoparticles, and their catalytic behaviour in oxidation and reduction reactions
No full textA one-pot green method to synthesise Pt and Pd nanoparticles is reported. Two natural aromatic
polymers, lignin and fulvic acid, were used as both reducing and stabilising agents at moderate
temperature (80 °C) in water and under aerobic conditions. Full characterisation was performed using
TEM, UV-vis, XRD, 195Pt and 1H NMR, FT-IR and GC-MS techniques. In the TEM images, we
observed spherical nanoparticles of diameters in the range of 16 nm to 20 nm, in the case of Pd, and
smaller ones of not so well defined shapes for Pt. GC-MS of the organic fractions formed during the
preparation of the nanoparticles showed defined amounts of vanillin, a well known degradation product of
these polymers. This finding indicates that the active participation of lignins and fulvic acids in the metal
reduction step. The catalytic activity of the nanoparticles was tested for the NaBH4 reduction of
4-nitrophenol and for the aerobic oxidation of alcohols, reactions that are always conducted under green
conditions. Both Pt and Pd nanoparticles show good catalytic activity in the reduction reaction, while in
the aerobic oxidation reaction only the Pt nanoparticles were effective
Supplemenatry_Figure - Bilateral Endometrioma Excision: Surgery-Related Damage to Ovarian Reserve
No full textSupplemenatry_Figure for Bilateral Endometrioma Excision: Surgery-Related Damage to Ovarian Reserve by Maria Elisabetta Coccia, Francesca Rizzello, Tommaso Capezzuoli, Paolo Evangelisti, Cinzia Cozzi, and Felice Petraglia in Reproductive Sciences</p
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Sustainable Photocatalytic Reduction of Maleic Acid: Enhancing Cu<sub>x</sub>O/ZnO Stability with Polydopamine
Full text linkThe development of effective photocatalysts for environmental applications is still a critical aspect of green chemistry. This study explores copper oxide (CuxO) catalysts supported on titanium dioxide (TiO2) and zinc oxide (ZnO) for the photocatalytic reduction of maleic acid to succinic acid under ultraviolet (UV) light in water. The main goal was to evaluate the performance of CuO/ZnO compared to CuO/TiO2 in photoreduction. In order to improve the efficiency of the first catalyst, an environmentally friendly synthesis, assisted by polydopamine (PDA), was tested, obtaining the Cu2O/ZnO-PDA catalyst. The results showed that CuO/TiO2 exhibited the highest activity for maleic acid reduction, obtaining a succinic acid yield and a selectivity of 32% after 24 h of reaction time, but comparable results could be reached even with Cu2O/ZnO-PDA increasing the reaction time. Furthermore, the addition of sodium ascorbate as a co-catalyst in the reaction mixture allowed us to overtake the previous results, leading to a succinic acid yield of 61% and a selectivity of 67%. These findings suggest that the PDA shell can be a solution for CuxO photodegradation, making Cu2O/ZnO-PDA an alternative to the toxic CuO/TiO2
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
- …
