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Vegetation in architecture can be considered a proper design strategy that is aimed at improving not only the performances of buildings, but also the outdoor climate. Different technological solutions have been proposed over the years to cover buildings with vegetation, i.e. green roofs, green walls and green balconies. A particular typology of green wall, which has recently been gaining high consensus among designers, is the vertical greenery modular system (VGMS). The positive impact of this type of technology on the performance of buildings is related to several factors, such as the facade orientation, the use of the building, climatic conditions, the type of plants, the substrates and wall assemblies, as well as mechanical and technological issues. A multidisciplinary approach is therefore needed, and different skills have to be joined together right from the early design phase in order to optimize and balance all the aspects that are involved. In this framework, a research project has been carried out in Turin (North West Italy), with the aim of developing a novel VGMS, constituted by a modular box covered with vegetation, made up of recycled/natural and highly performing materials from the energy/environmental point of view. After the design phase, the actual performance of the VGMS was assessed, through laboratory and long-term in field monitoring, and at the same time, the technological issues, biometric parameters, and the acoustic, thermal and mechanical aspects were investigated.

Does oxygen concentration during 3-day embryo culture affect obstetric and neonatal outcomes?

Current trends in educational assessment in different branches of higher education share the common goal of uniting learning with assessment. Most approaches and theoretical and practical developments in this field revolve around four main factors: feedback, democratization, alignment and relevance. This paper proposes the use of co-assessment as a means of ensuring dialogue-based, democratic and fairer evaluations. With co-assessment, the responsibility is shared by the teacher and the students, who negotiate and agree on the appraisal of student tasks and, in this paper, also on the awarded mark. The aim of this study is to analyse the relationship between a series of jointly agreed marks, following the co-assessment of four tasks, and the marks that the teachers and students would each have individually awarded. Two teachers and 100 students participated in the study, which follows a correlational design and analyses significant statistical differences. The results show a strong correlation between the jointly agreed marks and those assigned individually by the teacher, even though statistically significant differences were found between them. Conversely, no statistically significant differences were identified between the joint marks and the marks assigned individually by the students. These results call for reflection on the real possibility of adapting shared grading methods to students in university frameworks, where the repercussions of awarded marks go far beyond formative goals. Dentro de la variedad existente en las tendencias actuales sobre la evaluación de estudiantes, se encuentra el propósito común de relacionar evaluación y aprendizaje. La retroalimentación, la democratización, la coherencia y la relevancia son cuatro tópicos aglutinadores sobre los que giran la mayoría de los planteamientos y avances teóricos y prácticos en este ámbito. Como forma concreta de cristalizar una evaluación dialógica, democrática y justa, se propone la modalidad participativa de la evaluación colaborativa en la que docentes y estudiantes se reparten la responsabilidad, negociando y consensuando de forma conjunta el valor de las tareas y en nuestro caso, también la calificación final. El propósito de este estudio, que ha involucrado a un total de 100 alumnos y 2 docentes, es precisamente la comprobación del grado de relación existente entre las calificaciones compartidas de 4 tareas universitarias con las que habrían aportado en solitario el docente y el grupo de estudiantes. Se ha seguido un diseño de investigación correlacional y se ha comprobado la existencia de diferencias significativas. Los resultados muestran la estrecha correlación entre las calificaciones compartidas y las calificaciones del docente, aunque se han hallado diferencias estadísticamente significativas entre estas. Por otro lado, no se han encontrado diferencias entre las calificaciones compartidas y las calificaciones de los estudiantes. Las repercusiones de estos resultados, hacen reflexionar, entre otras cuestiones, sobre la posibilidad real de ajustar dichas calificaciones abiertas a la participación de los estudiantes en contextos universitarios donde las repercusiones sobrepasan de largo el ámbito únicamente formativo.

Conference paper on advanced integrated facades.ASHRAE - 2019 Buildings XIV International Conference.

This retrospective study reports the data of sofosbuvir-based anti-hepatitis C virus treatment in 24 candidates and 24 recipients of liver transplantation coinfected with human immunodeficiency virus. Sustained virologic response was cumulatively 85% (90% and 100% in those treated with optimal schedules pre- and posttransplant, respectively).

Activation of the PTEN-PI3K-mTORC1 pathway consolidates metabolic programs that sustain cancer cell growth and proliferation1,2. Here we show that mTORC1 regulates polyamine dynamics, a metabolic route that is essential for oncogenicity. Through the use of integrative metabolomics in a mouse model3 and human biopsies4 of prostate cancer, we identified alterations in tumours impacting on the production of decarboxylated S-adenosylmethionine (dcSAM) and polyamine synthesis. Mechanistically, this metabolic rewiring stems from mTORC1-dependent regulation of S-adenosylmethionine decarboxylase 1 (AMD1) stability. This novel molecular regulation was validated in murine and human cancer specimens. AMD1 was upregulated in prostate cancer specimens with activated mTORC1. Conversely, samples from a clinical trial with the mTORC1 inhibitor everolimus5 exhibited a predominant decrease in AMD1 immunoreactivity that was associated to a decrease in proliferation, in line with the requirement of dcSAM production for oncogenicity. These findings provide fundamental information about the complex regulatory landscape controlled by mTORC1 to integrate and translate growth signals into an oncogenic metabolic program