Italian Scientists Research Articles

Artificial reefs of Europe: perspective and future

Artificial reefs have been placed in European waters for around 30 years. The majority now play a role in protecting valuable Mediterranean seagrass beds from trawl damage, and most aspire to a fisheries function. Until relatively recently, reef-building has been carried out locally, in some cases without national collaboration or international cooperation. This is changing; in 1991, Italian artificial reef scientists formed a national reef group to encourage liaison between research groups, and the Spanish created one in 1998. There is now also an association of Mediterranean artificial reef scientists. Research in Europe has reached a stage where scientific priorities for the future need to be developed in the light of previous research and experience. This is the aim, and the reason for the creation in 1995, of the European Artificial Reef Research Network (EARRN) funded by the European Commission AIR programme. Reefs have now been formally licensed and deployed in Finland, France, Greece, Israel, Italy, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, The Netherlands, Turkey, Ukraine, and the United Kingdom, and Denmark, Ireland, Russia, and Sweden have an interest, although no specific reef structures have, as yet, been placed. Norway has deployed experimental concrete units and has an interest in the rigs-to-reefs concept.

Why science is hunting for an audience: the reasons of Italian researchers

"We can only appeal to society, considering that governments and parties have fallen constantly short of expectations since the late eighties. The public must know that without research there is no innovation, and without innovation there is no state-of-theart. The lack of research is a handicap for the development of the country". The words of Silvio Garattini, director of Milan's Mario Negri Institute, reveal rage and passion. This is how he explained the reasons why more than one year ago 1,500 Italian scientists made an unprecedented, resolute and unmediated appeal to the general public to back research in Italy.

Lectio Doctoralis: the geometric progress of knowledge and the erratic course of a life: a memoir.

hormones with proteins have shed new light on the mechanisms of transport (influx and efflux) of the lipophylic hormones across the plasma membrane. Scientist and charismatic scholar, Jack Robbins attracted several Italian scientists to his branch. The earliest was Mario Andreoli, professor of medicine at the University La Sapienza. Professor Andreoli is present today with all the Italian fellows of Jack Robbins. These fellows have now reached, or are on their way to reaching, top academic positions. Indeed, these fellows are acknowledged scientists in the international scientific community, also because of the relationship that the unforgettable Gaetano Salvatore established with Jack Robbins. After the premature departure of Nino, Giancarlo Vecchio, who is a distinguished scientist and Fogarty Scholar, and a member of the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, has continued that relationship. Together with Mario Andreoli and Giancarlo Vecchio are Fabrizio Monaco, Luigi Bartalena and Alfredo Pontecorvi, Marco Centanni, Salvatore Benvenga, Daniela Foti, Antonella Farsetti, Gianni Salabe, and Settimio Grimaldi. With these Italian fellows and two Belgian fellows (Philippe De Nayer and Daniel Glinoer), many eminent scholars have also gathered here. These scholars are Aldo Pinchera, a worldwide recognized scientist who is deputy vice president of the Consiglio Universitario Nazionale; Riccardo Vigneri, a leading scientist in the field of endocrine and metabolic physiopathology, and thyroid oncology; Enio Martino, president of the collegium of the full professors of endocrinology; Eduardo Consiglio, director of Centro di Endocrinologia ed Oncologia Sperimentale of the National Research Council, which is an institution founded by Nino Salvatore and a hinge of the Italy-National Institutes of Health relationship. The presence of these scholars signifies that Italian endocrinology is pleased by the tribute that the University of Messina is paying to Jack Robbins.

Researchers target a continental transform fault in Tierra del Fuego

A comprehensive suite of field surveys was carried out by a team of Italian and Argentinean scientists in South America's Tierra del Fuego region to investigate the 600‐km‐long Magallanes‐Fagnano fault system (MFS), a transform‐type margin that developed on continental crust (Figure 1). Identifying and analyzing the morphological and structural elements related to the MFS and understanding mechanisms of slip along the fault are the principal objectives of an ongoing project called Tectonic Evolution of the South America‐Scotia Plate Boundary During the Cenozoic (TESAC).

The origins of the 'Manifesto of racial scientists'

This article examines the origin, development and controversies concerning the 'Manifesto of racial scientists', the document published in July 1938 that laid the foundations for the forthcoming racial policies of the Fascist regime. The article seeks to explain Mussolini's rationale for adopting a racial ideology in the first place, and for including within this ideology such diverse (and contradictory) concepts as the 'Nordic Aryan' racial identity of Italians; the 'purity and uniqueness' of the 'Italian' race; anti-Semitism; anti-Africanism; and a 'biological' definition of race. These concepts, in general alien to traditional Italian thought, provoked a backlash among some prominent Italian scientists and Fascists of such magnitude as to throw the entire program of racial propaganda in disarray for the remainder of the regime's existence. The article also highlights the career of Dr Guido Landra, the actual author of the Manifesto, and considers the extent to which his ideas influenced the text. Questo articolo esamina l'origine, lo sviluppo e le controversie relative al Manifesto degli Scientisti Razziali. Il documento fu pubblicato nel luglio del 1938 e fornì la base ideologica per i successivi programmi razziali del regime fascista. L'articolo tenta di illustrare il motivo principale per cui Mussolini adottÒ un'ideologia razziale e incluse in tale ideologia concetti diversi e contraddittori come l'identitÀ razziale "Ariano-Nordica" degli Italiani; l'eccezionalitÀ e la pureza della razza italiana; l'antisemitismo; l'anti-Africanismo; e una definizione biologica del concetto di razza. Questi principi, che in generale sono contrari agli ideali comuni italiani, provocarono un contraccolpo, in grande scala fra molti scientisti italiani di fede fascisti e portarono il programma di propaganda razziale a uno stato di confusione per il resto dell'esistenza del regime. L'articolo esamina anche la carriera del dottor Guido Landra, il vero autore del Manifesto, e considera fino a che punto le idee di Landra influenzarono il contenuto del testo.

European views on terrestrial chronology from Descartes to the mid-eighteenth century

Abstract The Theories of the Earth formulated by the English scholars Thomas Burnet, William Whiston and John Woodward at the end of the seventeenth century circulated widely within the continent of Europe during the first decades of the eighteenth century. These theories established a sequence of physical conditions of the Earth according to the chronology outlined in the Book of Genesis, emphasizing two main stages: the Creation and the Deluge. Although the authority of the Biblical account of the age and early history of the Earth was normally accepted at the beginning of the eighteenth century, the continental reception of English Theories of the Earth varied. This was due to the complexity of the European context which since the 1660s had produced the theories of René Descartes, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and Athanasius Kircher, as well as Nicolaus Steno’s dynamic view on the development of the Earth’s surface. Steno emphasized the importance of the interpretation of rock strata in the field for reconstruction of the Earth’s history. He also carefully avoided contradicting the Biblical account and associated the Deluge with one of the geological stages identified in his history. Nevertheless, the Stenonian heritage stimulated some Italian scientists — such as Antonio Vallisneri, Luigi Ferdinando Marsili, and later Giovanni Targioni Tozzetti and Giovanni Arduino — to presuppose, within the results of their researches, an indefinitely great antiquity of the Earth. Theoretical models linked to Biblical chronology included those of Emanuel Swedenborg in Sweden and Johann Jakob Scheuchzer in Switzerland, while in France, Benoît De Maillet proposed a Theory of the Earth which was censured by the Church because of its possible implications regarding the eternity of matter. Among European scholars of the first decades of the eighteenth century, the Stenonian heritage (notably the necessity of fieldwork in a regional context) and the global Theories of the Earth were equally influential.

The Perineuronal Net: A Weapon for a Challenge

Theories and data do not always fit and sometimes are sources of conflicts among scientists. This is the case of a morphological structure, the perineuronal net, which was denied on the basis of an ideological conflict between two giants of neurosciences: Camillo Golgi and Santiago Ramón y Cajal. The perineuronal net is a reticular structure enveloping many neurons. Originally reported by Golgi in 1893 and 1898 and confirmed by several authors before the turn of the century, the perineuronal net was used by Golgi to support the reticular theory of the organization of the nervous system. Ramón y Cajal, the paladin of the neuronal theory who had also observed this anatomical structure, denied its existence suggesting that it was a fixation artifact. After Cajal's statements, only a few Italian scientists continued to work in this field, and after the 1930s the perineuronal net was forgotten. Only the recent advances in histochemical and immunocytochemical technology confirmed the existence of this structure opening new fields in functional neuroanatomy and neuropathology.

Due secoli di strumenti geomagnetici in Italia, 1740-1971 (Two Centuries of Geomagnetic Instruments in Italy, 1740-1971)

Reviewed by: Due secoli di strumenti geomagnetici in Italia, 1740–1971* Roberto Mantovani (bio) Due secoli di strumenti geomagnetici in Italia, 1740–1971. Edited by M. Basso Ricci et al. Bologna: Editrice Compositori, 1997. Pp. 234; illustrations, English summary. This book provides a first national census and a first homogeneous list of the remarkable instrumental geomagnetic patrimony present in Italy. The contributors are historians of physics at the University of Milan (coordinated by Pasquale Tucci) who for some time have engaged in the reconstruction of historical events and contributions of a scientific discipline rather neglected in Italy: geomagnetism. The work finds its starting point in the historical reconstruction of geomagnetic studies that occurred during the first half of [End Page 404] the nineteenth century in Milan at the Astronomic Observatory of Brera. In fact, this observatory was included by Carl Friedrich Gauss in an 1836 program of international cooperation—the Magnetische Verein—that intended to study, by means of an exact operative protocol prescribed by Gauss, the spatial and temporal variation of the horizontal component of the magnetic field of the earth on the whole terrestrial globe. The study of the scientific contribution furnished by the astronomers of Brera to Gauss’s project induced the historians of Milan to inquire into the activities of the other Italian scientific institutions in the field of geomagnetism. The methodological choice resulted not in a collection of personages, studies, or memories on geomagnetism in Italy (though such a collection is to be hoped for) but in a national census of geomagnetic instruments. This approach makes it clear that a careful consideration of scientific instrumentation, as these authors have rightly highlighted, can yield a profitable historiographical contribution for understanding routine procedure and the development of scientific theories, as can scientists’ documentary material. The book opens with a short summary written in English, then essentially consists of two parts: the first (less substantial) describes to readers, in two synthetic chapters, the historical context of the origin of geomagnetism and provides a panoramic picture of the most up-to-date knowledge of the discipline; the second (more substantial) contains the instrument catalog, a compilation of seventy-nine classification cards. The catalog has been compiled by Maria Basso Ricci, and it covers the period from 1740 to 1971. The census has allowed the classification of about two hundred instruments and has involved sixty-five scientific institutions scattered on the Italian territory. The instruments are classified in five sections (inclinometers, declinometers, declinometers-inclinometers, magnetometers, and integrated magnetic apparatus) according to the type of measurement (inclination, declination, magnetic intensity) and the terms of measurement that can be performed (absolute or daily variation). Each section is preceded by helpful historical data about the typologic evolution of the instrument. Each classification card describes the instrument and provides information on its principle of functioning and on its method of measurement, and each is accompanied by a color photograph. The catalog describes instruments of certain historical importance connected, for example, with the constitution of the first meteorological and geomagnetical international networks. A Brander’s declinometer from the Department of Astronomy of the University of Bologna was certainly used by the astronomers of Bologna between 1781 and 1792 within the limits of the most important meteorologic grid of the eighteenth century, as suggested and arranged by the Palatine Society of the Academy of Sciences of Mannheim. The Astronomic Observatory of Brera is in possession of one magnetometer built by Gauss in 1835. The instrument was employed during the [End Page 405] years 1836–45 by the astronomers of Milan within the limits of the Magnetische Verein. The catalog also describes the first unifilar variational declinometers that appeared in Italy after the one described by Coulomb (1777) as well as some nineteenth-century instruments utilized by important Italian scientists such as the Jesuit Father Angelo Secchi (who founded a magnetic observatory in Rome at the Roman College in 1859) and the Barnabite Francesco Denza, author in the years 1871–88 of the first magnetic survey carried out in Italy. The catalog also describes numerous models of magnetometer of the first half of the twentieth century. Roberto Mantovani Dr. Mantovani is curator of the Collection of Historical...

CORRISPONDENZA DI GIOVANNI BATTISTA AMICI CON CARLO MATTEUCCI E ANGELO SECCHI*

Abstracttitle SUMMARY /title We here publish 28 letters from the correspondence of Giovanni Battista Amici, belonging to the Estense Library in Modena, concerning his relationship with two of the greatest Italian scientists of the XIX century: Carlo Matteucci and Angelo Secchi.

Il contributo italiano nelle ricerche faunistiche in Anatolia

Biogeographia - vol. XX - 1999 (Pubblicata il 31 ottobre 1999) Biogeografia de|l'Analo|ia ll contribute italiano alle ricerche faunistiche in Anatolial AUGUSTO VIGNA TAGLIANTI *, MARZIO ZAPPAROLI ** *Dz'pz1m'me7zto di Biologia Arzimzzle e (lell’U0zr1a (Zoologizz), I/'Iziucrsz'rr‘z di Roma qLa Sapiezzzzffi Viz:/e :1/c'll’Ui1iuer5it:‘z, 32 - I—00185 Roma (ltzzlizz) **Dz;va;-tinzcrzro di Protezione dc//e Pimzte, Umq:/ez':irt'z dellzz Tmcirz, Via Szm Crzmillo dc Lellix — 1-01 100 Vz'tr;'rbo (Itrt/fa) Key words: Iiiunistic research. zoogcography, biospeleology, Anatolia. Italian zoologisrs. European naturalist travellers and cxplotets. SUMMARY This review is aimed to outline the history of the naturalistic, and especially zoological. researches in the Asian Turkey, focusing on thmconlribirtion of the Italian scientists to the knowledge of Anatolian fauna and to the zoogcngraphy of Near and Middle East. Since the beginning OFXIX century, the highest number of Italian zoologists exploring the Anatolian region is represented by en tomologists. The first ll:l!lqI(3.‘i. in Etct, are those oI’G. De Cristofbris and G. Jan (the founders 0Fthe Milan Museum oFNatur.1l History), with :1 travel in 1832 (and then the description in I337 ofsome oFthe most famous species of Cum/mt from Northern Anatolia). and C. Oseulati. :1 great traveller and explorer, also connected to the Milan Museum, who l'i‘dVCllcLi in north~e;ystern Anatolia in 1341 (along the road to Pcl‘Si:1:li1(,i India), collecting some Coleoptera also on Mount Ararat. In the second lmlIqoIqXlX century. among :1 rich number ofzoulogists travelling the Anatolia from Central Europe (as A. Kindernuuin. F. GoehcI,]. Lederen]. Iirueper, M. Korb. E. v. Oertzen. C, Eschericli, M. Halo.) and (mun France (as C. Delagrange), only the Italian A. Costa visited (1875) the Southern coast of Turkey. :‘\t the end UFXIX anti at the beginning of XX century. important research trips were done on Bolltar Dag (by E. v. Bodemeyer). Erciyes Dag (by A. 1’eIxtlIer and E. Zetlerhauer) and in \‘1/stern and Southern Anatolia (l:uy]. Sahlherg and son in 19011, E. v. Bodemeycr in 191 1. H. Gadeau dc Kerville in 1912). The scientific results ofzlmse explorations were published hy the top speL'i:1iists of the time, as L. Fairrnaire, IE. Reittcr, L. G-angllmuer, V. Api’i:ll)CCIC. ICW. Verhoeff. C.G. Atrems and the Italian D. Rosa who studied the ezirtlnvorms. In I913 E. Festa planned the first rcsearclr trip to Rhodes Island; ai-‘ter the World \\'/at I, while the Dodectnese Islands were under the Italian Government and some l[.'l.lial1 bases were on the Anatolian coasts (as Bodrum and Adzilia), some zoological and especially occanognxpliic researches were planned and carried out (R. Varriale in 1919, G. Magrini in 1921, L. Sanzo in 1922, E. Ninni in I933). Few years later. the liiuna ofthe Dotlecaiiese Islantls was studied by the Itriliaii expedition of A. Ghigi, R. Issel and A. Brian. and Tilt: results were published in 1928-1929 by many specialists. in the same years, also the lmrst areas near .‘\!1t'.1l}';l were explored by lmlizul speleologists (in 1928 the Circuit) Speleologico Romano visited the cave In Dag. [l‘lCl'l::ll‘l'Cl'l1£llllL’t.l qGretta Ulissc Aldrcwandiq); the Pisidian and Pamphylian caves were explored in the 305 by L. W/eitutiier, and the cave fauna was studied by R. jeannel and by G. Mfiller. After 21 Few years A. Della Torre e T315530 and A. Scliarmmyr (l\'Iu:.'eum “Pietro Rossiq of Duino) did two resmrch trips to islantls of the 1 Ricerche zoologiche delle Uriivcrsitii di Rmna nel Vicino Orieme: 185.

Lifting the lid on a mediaeval mystery.

munich Italian scientists have removed samples from the sarcophagus of Emperor Frederick the Second, the thirteenth century King of Sicily and Germany, in an attempt to establish his lineage, his cause of death, and why his body has remained so well preserved.

Italian scientists fear impact of cabinet reshuffle on reforms

munich Italian scientists are reacting nervously to the appointment of Ortensio Zecchino, a member of a right-wing political party as minister for research and universities in the new coalition government.

The early clinical history of salicylates in rheumatology and pain.

The first clinical reports on the treatment of fever and pain with salicylate-containing natural willow bark remedies were made by the English clergyman Edward Stone in 1763. The pharmacologically active principles were isolated from natural sources by Italian, German and French scientists between 1826 and 1829. Salicylic acid was first synthesised by the German Gerland in 1852 and a year later the Frenchman Gerhardt synthesised acetylsalicylic acid. The first reports on the clinical use of salicylic acid in rheumatic disorders were made independently by the two German physicians Stricher and Reiss in 1876. Acetylsalicylic acid was rediscovered by Hoffmann in 1897 and by the turn of the century it had gained worldwide recognition in the treatment of pain and rheumatological disorders. Reports on adverse events relating to gastrointestinal intolerance and bleeding appeared early, but were largely neglected until the 1950s. Today, salicylates are still widely used as analgesic, antipyretic and anti-inflammatory drugs. New indications, such as thrombosis prophylaxis, have emerged during the last decades, and yet others are being explored.

The Società Italiana di Neurologia: origins.

This paper describes the history of the Italian Society of Neurology (Società Italiana di Neurologia, SIN), originally an offshoot of the Società Freniatrica Italiana, whose origins go back to Aversa in 1861, when Biagio Gioacchino Miraglia founded the Società Frenopatica, the first neuropsychiatric organisation for Italian scientists. The "Società Freniatrica" was founded in Rome in 1873 and was to bring together neurologists and psychiatrists until 1907, when the SIN was founded with its own Articles of Association (subsequently modified in 1971) and the two specialisations of neurology and psychiatry were recognised as being distinct entities. The first SIN Congress was held in Naples in 1908, and an analysis of its themes and those of subsequent Congresses highlights the fact that, right from the start, the interests of neurologists covered the whole range of the neurosciences: neuroanatomy, histology, physiopathology and clinical neurology. Over the years, special Groups have been established to enable the more profound study of specialised aspects, and the Society of Hospital Neurologists founded.

New skull turns up in northeast Africa.

A new area for exploring human origins may be opening up. Three weeks ago, in the Danakil Desert of Eritrea, a team of Eritrean and Italian scientists unearthed a well-preserved hominid skull and other fossils dating to about 2 million years ago. Although the skull9s precise identity is still shrouded in sand and stone, researchers think it could be Homo erectus; in any event, it is the first hominid found in the region.

New Skull Turns Up in Northeast Africa

A new area for exploring human origins may be opening up. Three weeks ago, in the Danakil Desert of Eritrea, a team of Eritrean and Italian scientists unearthed a well-preserved hominid skull and other fossils dating to about 2 million years ago. Although the skull's precise identity is still shrouded in sand and stone, researchers think it could be Homo erectus ; in any event, it is the first hominid found in the region.

Italian space scientists face more upheaval

Italian space scientists face more upheaval

Autobiographies as instruments for the study of the history and nature of science: An essay on three contemporary Italian scientists

(1994). Autobiographies as instruments for the study of the history and nature of science: An essay on three contemporary Italian scientists. Creativity Research Journal: Vol. 7, Creativity and Discovery in Biomedical Sciences Guest Editor: Ken McNaughton Sponsor: Royal Society of Medicine, London, pp. 365-373.

Talbot and Botany

Abstract In an effort to make his invention of negative-positive paper photography known on the continent, William Henry Fox Talbot sent photogenic drawings to several Italian scientists in 1839 and 1840. The first to see specimens of Talbot's new art was the distinguished Bolognese botanist Antonio Bertoloni (figure 1). Between June 1839 and June 1840 Bertoloni received thirty-six photogenic drawings, distributed over five instalments, of which fifteen depicted leaves and plants; several others were intended to illustrate the potential utility of photography to botanists. The photographs, three letters from Talbot, a letter to Bertoloni from Talbot's uncle, William Thomas Homer Fox Strangways, and related printed and photographic materials are collected in a remarkable small volume, entitled Album di disegni fotogenici, preserved in the Department of Photographs at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.1

SUL FILO DELLE ACQUE

Abstract<title> SUMMARY </title>This article wishes to demonstrate the importance of several areas of scientific research, until now neglected, and their relevance to Italian physical sciences in the age between Galileo and Volta. The science of waters, which joined the cluster of the new Galilean sciences in the seventeenth century in particular deserves greater attention if we are to understand the scientific traditions developed South of the Alps. This science represented an extension of the Galilean science of motion in an engineering context, a development that concerned both mathematical and experimental theories. This development took place in the border area between the physical and the mathematical sciences, and also involved the medical and naturalistic traditions. This line of tought led the Italian physical scientists to discover both new fields of research and new forms of social support, and hence overcome the crisis that followed the end of the historic Medicis patronage.