1,721,123 research outputs found
IL TERREMOTO DEL 1980, RISCHIO SISMICO E PREVENZIONE. Ricerca e sperimentazione dell’Università degli Studi della Basilicata.
No full textIl 23 novembre del 1980 un terremoto del decimo grado della scala Mercalli (magnitudo
6,9) devastava una vasta area compresa tra la Basilicata e la Campania, provocando circa 3000 vittime. L’evento sismico, compromettendo buona parte del patrimonio edilizio e delle attività economiche presenti nell’area colpita, mostrava la grande fragilità del nostro territorio e l’enorme difficoltà del Sistema Italia dell’epoca a reagire prontamente a fronte di eventi calamitosi di così grande portata. Per la prima volta in Italia si avviava un processo di revisione dei meccanismi e delle procedure di approccio alle grandi calamità che portò, da una parte, alla nascita dell’attuale sistema di Protezione
Civile Nazionale, dall’altra determinò un impulso significativo verso gli studi per l’approfondimento della conoscenza sulla sismicità del territorio italiano e la messa a punto di tecniche sempre più efficaci di mitigazione del rischio sismico per strutture ed infrastrutture. Con l’approvazione della legge 219 del 1981, che regolamentò il processo di ricostruzione delle aree colpite dal sisma, si avviò, di fatto, anche il progetto di istituzione dell’Università degli Studi della Basilicata. Tale atto, espressione della volontà di rinascita della Basilicata a fronte di una tremenda catastrofe, rappresentò il punto di partenza di un processo che, alla luce dei risultati raggiunti, può essere definito sicuramente virtuoso, sebbene non del tutto completato. Il territorio ferito
dal terremoto si avviava, dunque, a diventare sede di un centro di studi e formazione scientifica specializzata in diverse discipline, tra cui quella dell’ingegneria sismica, contribuendo, così, alla ricerca e allo sviluppo di tecniche per la realizzazione di un patrimonio edilizio più sicuro ed una società più resiliente. Si individuava, contestualmente, un efficace strumento di sviluppo economico e di sbocco lavorativo per tanti giovani lucani. A distanza di 40 anni dal disastroso terremoto, questo lavoro prova a delineare un quadro aggiornato sullo stato di avanzamento della ricerca nel settore della riduzione del rischio sismico e della prevenzione, facendo particolare riferimento al contributo fornito dall’Ateneo Lucano
Functional markers for glutamine synthetase and correlation with grain protein content in durum wheat
No full textDurum wheat (Triticum turgidum L. var. durum) is one of the most important cereal crops grown world-wide and provides most of the proteins in human diet, especially in the less developed countries. Seed storage proteins are directly related to the nutritional and technological value of the derived products. Several studies have attested the key-role of the glutamine synthetase enzyme in plant nitrogen metabolism. Glutamine synthetase gene encodes for an enzyme responsible of the first step of ammonium assimilation and transformation into glutamine and glutamate, essential compounds in amino acid-biosynthetic pathway. High protein content is a very important quantitative trait controlled by several genes located on wheat chromosomes. Glutamine synthetase genes are located on the homeologous chromosomes 2A, 2B, and 2D where several authors reported major QTL for protein content. The goal of the present study was to assess the linkage between GS gene and the QTL for protein content. For this purpose, the nucleotide sequence of glutamine synthetase gene acc. DQ124214 was aligned to all the wheat ESTs available in public data bases by means of BLAST tool (http://www.wheat.pw.usda.gov/GG2/blast.shtml.). The bioinformatic analysis allowed to find 40 sequences with a similarity > 94% to the GS2 gene, of which three covered the whole gene sequence (DQ124213, DQ124212 and CJ705909). For each of these sequences we designed two or three primer pairs identifying a total of 7 functional markers that were screened among the parents of three segregant populations. Mapping analysis performed by Join Map software allowed to localize the amplified polymorphic fragments and to identify 4 loci: Gs-A2, Gs-B2, Gs-A4, Gs-B4, respectively mapped on chromosome 2A, 2B, 4A and 4B. The QTL analysis for protein content was carried out in a RIL population obtained from the crossing the two durum wheat cultivars Ciccio and Svevo. Two major QTLs were identified through Composite Interval Mapping (CIM) performed by the Q-Gene software: one QTL was identified by the functional marker Gs-B2 located on chromosome 2B, and the other one was identified by the functional marker Gs-A4 located on chromosome 4A. These data were confirmed by a linkage disequilibrium analysis carried on a collection of 75 different wheat genotypes. The present study represents the first step for the identification and sequencing of GS2 gene, which could be employed in breeding programs aimed to increase grain protein content commercial cultivars. Moreover, Gs-B2 and Gs-A4 represents functional markers that could be also efficiently used in marker assisted selection (MAS) programs and map-based cloning
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
Competing coherent and dissipative dynamics close to quantum criticality
Full text linkWe investigate the competition of coherent and dissipative dynamics in many-body systems at continuous quantum transitions. We consider dissipative mechanisms that can be effectively described by Lindblad equations for the density matrix of the system. The interplay between the critical coherent dynamics and dissipation is addressed within a dynamic finite-size scaling framework, which allows us to identify the regime where they develop a nontrivial competition. We analyze protocols that start from critical many-body ground states and put forward general dynamic scaling behaviors involving the Hamiltonian parameters and the coupling associated with the dissipation. This scaling scenario is supported by a numerical study of the dynamic behavior of a one-dimensional lattice fermion gas undergoing a quantum Ising transition in the presence of dissipative mechanisms such as local pumping, decaying, and dephasing
Candidate gene approach for the study of grain protein Content in durum wheat and isolation of glutamine synthetase gene sequences
No full textVariations 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
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
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