Interest In Italy Research Articles

Illegal products containing selective androgen receptor modulators purchased online from Italy: health risks for consumers.

Selective androgen receptor modulators (SARMs) are small synthetic drug molecules that are still not approved as medicine in Europe or the United States but are sold on illegal websites to improve sport performance, particularly bodybuilding. To address the quality issues of illegal SARM products and their increasing diffusion in Italy with their potential health risks for consumers. Web-based tools were used to investigate retail websites, trending searches, and information exchange via social media. Thirteen SARM products, purchased on retail websites accessible from Italy, were subject to visual inspection and chemical analysis by mass spectrometry and quantitative nuclear magnetic resonance. The primary outcome was demonstration of additional health risks due to the illicit presence of other active ingredients, contamination, and misdosage in SARM products sold on the internet. The secondary outcome was to show the increasing trend of interest in Italy for these products. Most websites reported misleading information; specifically, the statement "for research only" was reported notwithstanding indications on dosage and training phases. The trending search showed that interest toward SARMs increased in Italy in the last years. The use of these products is clearly encouraged by the emerging phenomenon of "broscience" as revealed in socials. Visual inspection evidenced nonconform labeling. Qualitative analysis confirmed the presence of the stated SARM in about 70% of samples. In 23% of samples, the expected SARM was not detected but a different one instead, and in 1 sample, no SARMs were detected. Other undeclared pharmaceutical substances (tamoxifen, clomifene, testosterone, epimethandienone, tadalafil) were measured in 30% of samples. The copresence of >1 active substance was observed in >60% of samples. Quantitative nuclear magnetic resonance data showed nonuniform content ranging from 30% to 90% of the label claim. The use of SARMs, in the presence of unexpected life-threatening reactions in persons using the products to increase sport performance, should be assessed. This investigation involved an integrated approach to study SARM products and related sociologic aspects. The main shortcomings are the limited number of samples and retail websites in the clear web investigated. SARMs sold online as food supplement-like products represent a health hazard due to the presence of unapproved and undeclared active substances. The presence of contaminants clearly indicates the absence of good manufacturing practices in the production, which increases the health risks.

An Increasingly (In)visible Religion? The Italian Case

Scholars have for some years hypothesized a “new visibility” of religion, so that a relevant role in the publicization of religion is played by the media. However, while the public visibility of religion in the media has recently become a topic of great interest at the international level, in Italy, the literature on this topic is quite scarce. It is of particular interest in Italy due to the central role played by the Catholic Church, which, despite the changed socio-political context and the transformations of the media system, does not seem to have lost its capacity to intervene publicly. Therefore, this study intends to fill this gap through a longitudinal analysis of the coverage of the Catholic Church in the main Italian print newspapers in the last 17 years (2005–2021). In total, 202,788 articles were collected and analysed using a content analysis. Results show that, in Italy, we cannot speak of a greater visibility of religion, in particular of the Catholic Church today in print press than in the past, nor of a uniformity with respect to the way in which is spoken about it in terms of issues and religious actors.

„Was willst du in Milano?“

Abstract The article examines the significance of musical images of Italy in the GDR. On the basis of travel documentaries, films and Italienschlager, especially from the 1950s and 1960s, it demonstrates that the traditional image of the South was aimed at a domestic audience – especially because, since the construction of the Wall in 1961, travel to capitalist foreign countries was impossible for ordinary citizens. East German criticism of capitalism, exploitation and, in part, neo-fascism in Italy was intended to cause the people of the GDR to lose interest in Italy. Finally, the debates about the ideal East German Schlager lyrics of around 1960 shed light on another aspect that is also relevant for the Italienschlager.

‘After the fashion of Italy’: Richard Brome and Italian culture

AbstractThe article discusses Richard Brome's engagement with Italy and its cultural legacy in his corpus. Apparently, the playwright's interest in Italy does not seem particularly profound since his works offer several examples of well‐known and worn‐out cultural stereotypes. Nevertheless, at a closer look, the dramatist may be indisputably listed among the early modern English playwrights who were drawn to Italian culture, art and language. Brome's use of Italian settings and his references to Italy and its literary, cultural and theatrical tradition work as a vehicle for a form of political and moral ideology which reflects the concerns of his country in the 1620s and 1630s. As happened for many playwrights from the period, Italy became a screen for the projection of moral, political and social anxieties as well as a mirror to look at England from another perspective. The analysis of Brome's oeuvre offers a fresh and unexpected angle on an area dominated by Shakespearean criticism while re‐igniting the interest in a playwright who has been an understudied figure in the critical debate, despite his contribution to the development of the Anglo‐Italian discourse in the Caroline age.

‘My maine hope is, to begin the sport at Millaine’: Italy in Philip Massinger’s The Duke of Milan

Philip Massinger’s The Duke of Milan (1621) clearly sits in the tradition of the Elizabethan and Jacobean Italianate tragedy and is resonant of stories, ideas, theories, and characters from Italian history and its literary tradition. This essay discusses the play as one of the earliest examples of Massinger’s interest in Italy and its culture. It investigates the play’s Italian setting and examines the influence of the Italian cultural and political legacy to offer new insights into the development of Anglo-Italian relations and England’s home and religious politics in the early 1620s.

The effect of COVID-19 pandemic on Google search activity on foods: an analysis of the public interest in Italy

The effect of COVID-19 pandemic on Google search activity on foods: an analysis of the public interest in Italy

“Trying to feel the right feeling for the job”: The emotional labour of English language teachers in state secondary schools in Italy

The emotional challenges English as a foreign language (EFL) teachers face and the efforts they deploy to manage their emotions in their day-to-day practice have attracted little scholarly interest in Italy, and yet they are central to any language teacher's working experience. Through semi-structured interviews, this qualitative study explores the experiences of performing emotional labour of eight (six female and two male) EFL teachers in state secondary schools in Italy. The collected data was analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis, the findings of which reveal that teachers routinely hide or suppress negative emotions and invoke positive feelings in order to perform their job satisfactorily. The teachers’ emotional labour experiences differed greatly depending on the type of school and the pupils’ pedagogical needs, with teaching in vocational schools emerging as particularly demanding. The study also revealed that age and professional experience acted as moderators on the intensity of the teachers’ emotional responses. In addition, the participants deplored the low socioeconomic status and weak social fabric in terms of recognition of teachers’ merit and personal qualities. This contrasted with a clear passion for their jobs, thus resulting in a pleasure-pain axis, which seems to have provided these participants with a disciplinary mechanism for tolerating difficult working conditions. The teachers further concurred on the necessity to be granted psychological support and the opportunity to overtly discuss their unavoidable emotional labour experiences.

The Adriatic Thrust Fault of the 2021 Seismic Sequence Estimated from Accurate Earthquake Locations Using sP Depth Phases

ABSTRACT An earthquake sequence occurred in the Central Adriatic region during March–June 2021. This sequence started on 27 March with a mainshock of moment magnitude (Mw) 5.2 occurring at 13:47 coordinated universal time (UTC). No foreshock was observed before this mainshock. The sequence lasted approximately three months, until the end of June 2021. Approximately 200 seismic events were recorded by the regional seismic network during this time, including four M ≥ 4.0 earthquakes. The 27 March 2021 earthquake was one of the strongest instrumentally recorded events in the area bounded approximately by the Ancona–Zadar line to the north and the Gargano–Dubrovnik line to the south. The mainshock originated at a focal depth of 9.9 km. The seismicity spread from the mainshock up-dip and down-dip along a northeast-dipping plane. Here, we investigate the geometry of the fault activated by this seismic sequence by using sP depth phases. We aim to significantly reduce the large uncertainties associated with the hypocentral locations of offshore earthquakes beneath the Adriatic Sea—an area that plays a fundamental role in the geodynamics of the Mediterranean. These refined earthquake locations also allow us to make inferences with regards to the seismotectonic context responsible for the analyzed seismicity, thus identifying a structure (here referred to as the Mid-Adriatic fault) consisting of a northwest–southeast-striking thrust fault with a ∼35° northeast-dipping plane. The use of depth-phase arrival times to constrain off-network event locations is of particular interest in Italy due to both the peculiar shape of the peninsula and the extreme scarcity of seafloor stations, the cost and management of which are very expensive and complex. Here, we present the first attempt to apply this off-network locating technique to the Italian offshore seismicity research with the aim of improving hazard estimations in these hard-to-monitor regions.

Italian survey on non-intubated thoracic surgery: results from INFINITY group

BackgroundNon-Intubated Thoracic Surgery (NITS) is becoming increasingly adopted all over the world. Although it is mainly used for pleural operations,, non-intubated parenchymal lung surgery has been less frequently reported. Recently, NITS utilization seems to be increased also in Italy, albeit there are no multi-center studies confirming this finding. The objective of this survey is to assess quantitatively and qualitatively the performance of NITS in Italy.MethodsIn 2018 a web-based national survey on Non-Intubated management including both thoracic surgeons and anesthesiologists was carried out. Reference centers have been asked to answer 32 questions. Replies were collected from June 26 to November 31, 2019.ResultsWe raised feedbacks from 95% (55/58) of Italian centers. Seventy-eight percent of the respondents perform NITS but only 38% of them used this strategy for parenchymal surgery. These procedures are more frequently carried out in patients with severe comorbidities and/or with poor lung function. Several issues as obesity, previous non-invasive ventilation and/or oxygen therapy are considered contraindications to NITS. The regional anesthesia technique most used to provide intra- and postoperative analgesia was the paravertebral block (37%). Conversion to general anesthesia is not anecdotal (31% of answerers). More than half of the centers believed that NITS may reduce postoperative intensive care unit admissions. Approximately a quarter of the centers are conducting trials on NITS and, three quarters of the respondent suppose that the number of these procedures will increase in the future.ConclusionsThere is a growing interest in Italy for NITS and this survey provides a clear view of the national management framework of these procedures.

A new list and prioritization of wild plants of socioeconomic interest in Italy: toward a conservation strategy

ABSTRACT Wild harvested plants (WHP) and crop wild relatives (CWR), part of the segment of natural diversity that is collectively known as ‘Plant Genetic Resources’, have great socioeconomic importance for humans because they are used either directly or in crop breeding. In order to lay down a solid base for constructing conservation strategies for Italy, an updated annotated list of CWR and WHP was produced for the country including information on known uses. Taxa included in the list were then prioritized using a pragmatic approach based on their value, native status, and need of protection or monitoring.

BURSAPHELENCHUS SPECIES (NEMATODA: APHELENCHIDA) ASSOCIATED WITH AN OLIVE TREE IN CENTRAL ITALY

Olive cultivation is of great economic, ecological, and cultural interest in Italy, as well as in the rest of the Mediterranean basin. Among the pests of olive trees, several groups of insects, mites, and nematodes have been reported. Phytoparasitic nematodes especially of the genera Meloidogyne, Pratylenchus, Helicotylenchus, Xiphinema, Tylenchulus, Rotylenchulus, and Heterodera have usually been extracted from roots and soil around trees. On the other hand, no information is available concerning nematodes directly associated with the wood. At the end of September 2018, in a high-density cultivated olive grove in Tuscany (central Italy), several olive trees with decline symptoms were observed. Three Bursaphelenchus species, B. fungivorus, B. minutus, and B. sexdentati were extracted from the wood of one dead tree. Even though these species had already been reported in Italy, these findings were the first ones recorded in olive wood. Moreover, another undescribed Bursaphelenchusspecies was found associated with the bark beetle Hylesinus fraxini collected from olive trunks and branches. Further research is needed to investigate the role of insects and Bursaphelenchus spp. in the decline processes of olive trees.

A study on accessibility in an Old Italian City: when the past is worth more than the present

Despite norms and regulations on accessibility, people with disabilities continue to face many problems in the built environment and it happens, in particular, in historic places and buildings. These, so numerous in Italian and European old cities, are not accessed only as tourist and/or cultural attractions but they are often accessed as public places, workspaces and study places in which accessibility should be ensured. This article is based on a qualitative research carried out in Trento, an old Italian city, in which people with disabilities and representatives of public and private organisations working in the area of urban or building construction and maintenance were interviewed. The findings show, in particular, that norms and regulations on conservation often prevail on those on accessibility, even when they could coexist and, at the same time, improve universal accessibility in historical built environments. Points of interest In Italy, Europe and elsewhere, standards should be applied to ensure equal rights to people with disabilities in all aspects of life, including access to the built environment. Local, national and international governments and institutions assign great importance to the conservation of historic city centres and buildings. This study found that there is only a partial - and often inconsistent - implementation of the laws on accessibility in historic built environments, as priority is given to the protection of such environments. Precedence given to the conservation of historic built environments causes many accessibility issues, thus limiting the possibility of people with disabilities to move around independently and carry out everyday life activities. The study suggests that art-historical values and accessibility can go hand in hand, in particular if people with disabilities are included in decision-making processes and can have their say through participatory planning.

Bryophyte diversity hotspot: the Marmore Waterfalls Regional Park (Umbria, central Italy)

A study of the bryophyte of Marmore Waterfall Natural Park a very peculiar territory for its geological, biogeographical and bioclimatic traits, was carried out. The reported data were collected in the valley area of ‘Parco Fluviale del Nera’ Regional Park, where the waters are flowing and the humidity of the rocks is oozing. Research led to the identification of 101 taxa of bryophytes (21 liverworts and 80 mosses), among which two liverwort and 10 moss species are new records for the Umbria region, while four are confirmed. The study offers new outcomes on neglected aspects of the flora of central Italy and represents a considerable improvement of the floristic, biogeographical and ecological understanding of its bryophytic component. Additionally, the area turn out to be significant from the conservation point of view both nationally and internationally considering that it harbours high diversity of bryophytes species among which many rare, threatened and interesting species occur. Eighteen species of conservation interest in Italy are recorded during the latest investigation (all in category NT – near threatened). Additionally two species that are considered data deficient in Italy are present in the researched area (Conocephalum salebrosum and Fissidens curvatus). Also, there is a small populations of a species vulnerable (Marchantia paleacea), endangered (Bryum calophyllum) and data deficient (Fissidens curvatus and Barbula bolleana) in European scale.

Mechanical Hop-Picking Solutions in Italian Cultivated Areas

Hops for beer production are a crop of growing interest in Italy, requiring specialized harvesting equipment and infrastructure. Several studies have been conducted on hop cultivation and harvesting around the world, but information on Italian hop production is still very scarce. As it turns out, only a few Italian farms are self-sufficient, employing a mechanical harvesting system, while most of them resort to hand-picking. In this study, hand and mechanical hop-picking were investigated, highlighting the longest time necessary for the manual cut (65 ± 5 min for approximately 2 kg of fresh cones). Furthermore, different mechanical solutions for hop harvesting were evaluated; in particular, one hop-picking machine was tested at different settings (full speed and 75% of chain feed). At full speed, it was possible to collect an average of around 96 kg h−1 of fresh cones, while approximately 13% of cones were left unpicked. A speed reduction of approximately 25% made it possible to reduce the cone loss to 8%, with a cone collection of around 86 kg h−1. Lost and picked cones, however, were strongly related to the number of side-arms growing from the main bines. This experience made it possible to test an old solution for this emerging crop at moderate cost and with good sustainability for the Italian territory.

«Vagabondaggi» culturali per l’Italia di Mary Shelley

Mary Shelley’s interest in Italy is seen in her historical novel Valperga: or The Life and Adventures of Castruccio, Prince of Lucca (1823). The writer had been to Italy several times and had written impressive articles on the country and its culture; and for a while the translation of Manzoni’s I promessi sposi was amongst her work projects. The two volumes of Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842, and 1843 belong to 1844. These are written in epistolary form, as was often the case with travel books. The greater part is dedicated to Italy. There are examples of the beauty of the landscape, artistic works, fashions and customs. There are attempts to correct the largely negative judgements passed on Italians by travellers since the eighteenth century. Italy is experiencing years of deep political and cultural renewal. Mary Shelley writes favourably of the Resurgence/Risorgimento, although condemning the ‘Carbonari’ and ‘The Young Italy’ as secret societies. She dedicates much space to Italian literature: quoting Dante several times, and mentioning Petrarch, Ariosto, Berni, Tasso, Alfieri and Monti. Her judgement of the Renaissance is not however completely positive: its classicism, she believed, lead to a lack of originality. At the end of the eighteenth century there began a deep renewal that lead to Romanticism. Shelley writes that in Italy one reads less than in England or France, but that there are many contemporary writers: Foscolo, Berchet, Grossi, Pellico, D’Azeglio, and above all Manzoni and Giovan Battista Niccolini. The historians Botta, Colletta and Amari are also admired.

Damage assessment and partial failure mechanisms activation of historical masonry churches under seismic actions: Three case studies in Mantua

Abstract The structural safety and seismic performance assessment of historical masonry churches belonging to cultural heritage is currently a topic of increasing interest in Italy. Recent Italian seismic events have proved that severe damage or collapse can be caused to such typology of structures even by earthquakes of small-to-moderate magnitude. This paper describes the damage occurred in three important historical masonry churches of the outstanding cultural heritage in Mantua, Northern Italy, after the 2012 Emilia earthquake and presents the results of extensive numerical investigations carried out on detailed FE models with an elasto-plastic damage constitutive law for masonry. Historical and documentary research, on-site surveys and visual inspections were fundamental to identify the critical elements and obtain a thorough detailed knowledge of the churches for the development of accurate numerical models. The results of advanced FE analyses were used to investigate the causes of the crack patterns observed after the earthquake, indicating that the damage distribution detected in the churches can be simulated satisfactorily by the numerical approach adopted. Moreover, this study provides additional information on the seismic response of the three churches analyzed under higher PGA than those registered in Mantua during the 2012 Emilia earthquake. Comparisons among the seismic response of the churches are made in terms of predicted damage distribution, maximum normalized displacements and energy density dissipated by tensile damage.

Italy in the Middle East and the Mediterranean

The Mediterranean and the Middle East have long constituted an important “circle” in Italy’s foreign policy, with Egypt and Libya playing a particularly important role. During 2016, two sources of tension emerged in Italy’s relations with these countries. The first reflects a wider European situation. Like the rest of the EU, Italy has followed strategic interests—on migration, energy, and security—that sometimes conflict with the promotion of human rights, democracy, and the rule of law, which the EU claims to promote in its external relations. The Regeni affair, involving a murdered Italian graduate student, exemplified this tension. The second source results from the role of corporate interests in Italy, especially those of oil and energy companies, in relation to the country’s “national interests.” Italian foreign policy toward both Libya and Egypt seems to have been driven by a combination of somewhat overlapping but also divergent national and corporate interests.

STRATEGIC ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT: A CRITICAL REVIEW OF PROCEDURAL SOUNDNESS AND RELIABILITY

The Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) is both a technical and administrative procedure with (mandatory) extensive application throughout Europe, holding a primary role in sustainable territorial development. Objectives of the SEA process are to: provide a high level of protection for the environment, and promote sustainability of development by contributing to the integration of appropriate environmental considerations in the adoption and implementation of specific plans and programs. In general, results of SEA application are quite positive, but some aspects may still be subject to a constructive critique, with considerable space for procedural improvement. Purpose of this work is to analyze a few case studies, which refer to the situation in Italy and, specifically, in the Lombardy Region, after a significantly extended period of SEA application, and evaluate their outcomes, suggesting possible ameliorations. Lombardy makes a good benchmark for examination, being a complex territory, characterized by the highest concentrations of population, industrial activities, and economic interests in Italy. Case studies’ evaluation reveals some critical issues that may have a negative influence on the correct application of the SEA process (and not just in Italy, as these considerations can be extended at the international level), and consequently on the resulting governance of the territory, and on the determination of foreseen effects related to development goals. Among critical issues, frequent oversight of important aspects concerning sustainability, incorrect definition of players and stakeholders, variations and differences of the applied techniques, debatable role of both the public administration and the public, varying costs of the procedure, to state a few, could be mentioned. Furthermore, a critical need is the definition of specific standards and parameters in the presence of activities that may present risks of relevant accidents.

Incentivizing ICT in healthcare: A comparative analysis of incentive schemes in Italian Regions

Background: The use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in healthcare has been presented as a potential solution to the current challenges that healthcare systems have to face. The introduction of ICTs may need initial investments and, moreover, may produce changes in the routine practice of the healthcare system. Financial incentives are expected to be an effective managerial tool to communicate a strategic vision and a mandate, to improve the adherence to the strategy and to promote a consistent individual behaviour. In this perspective, financial incentives are assumed to accelerate the ICTs adoption and use in healthcare. The aim of this study was to investigate whether and how Italian Regional healthcare systems use the Chief Executive Officers' (CEOs) reward scheme to stimuli the implementation of ICT in healthcare.Materials and methods: A content analysis was conducted on the Italian Regional acts on healthcare CEOs incentive schemes, that were approved in the period 2010–2012 and with a legal validity that ranged from 1 to 4 years (until 2014). The acts cover around 60% of the Italian Regions. ICT goals were identified, categorized, and compared using descriptive statistics.Results: This study identified two areas on which financial incentives related to ICTs were mainly focused: (i) ICT infrastructure and architecture; (ii) flows and processing of economic and financial data. The use of technology to better store and process medical data (i.e. EHR-like systems) were only marginally present. Use of e-Health and m-Health solutions for providing healthcare services, valorization of ‘health big data’ in a community care perspective, more advanced applications of technology for monitoring or preventing diseases were not incentivized for CEOs in Italy.Conclusion: The use of ICTs in healthcare appears to be of general interest in Italy: a great number of Italian Regions introduced specific goals into CEOs financial schemes. Efforts in this field seem to be not linked to the objectives of better care at sustainable cost, while it appears important to ensure a better and wider presence of enabling environments and to implement ICT-based control systems.

The ‘schemes’ of Piero de' Pazzi and the conflict with the Medici (1461–2)

This article opens up an important but overlooked chapter in the political and diplomatic history of Florence, as well as that of fifteenth-century Franco-Italian relations more broadly. In late 1461, the city of Florence elected ambassadors to go to France to congratulate King Louis XI on his accession to the throne. Intended as a purely ceremonial mission, the Florentine diplomat Piero de' Pazzi ignored his commission and pursued policies that explicitly promoted French interests in Italy. By doing so, Piero sought to improve the standing of his own family, both domestically and abroad, at the expense of the Medici regime in Florence and the anti-French Italian League that the Medici supported. This article offers for the first time a full investigation of a surprisingly early example of tensions between the Medici and the Pazzi, tensions that famously erupted in the Pazzi Conspiracy of 1478.