Math empowerment: a multidisciplinary example to engage primary school students in learning mathematics

This paper describes an educational project conducted in a primary school in Italy (Scuola Primaria Alessandro Manzoni at Mulazzano, near to Milan). The school requested our collaboration to help improve upon the results achieved on the National Tests for Mathematics, in which students, aged 7, registered performances lower than the national average the past year. From January to June, 2016, we supported teachers, providing them with information, tools and methods to increase their pupils’ curiosity and passion for mathematics. Mixing our different experiences and competences (instructional design and gamification, information technologies and psychology) we have tried to provide a broader spectrum of parameters, tools and keys to understand how to achieve an inclusive approach that is ‘personalised’ to each student. This collaboration with teachers and students allowed us to draw interesting observations about learning styles, pointing out the negative impact that standardized processes and instruments can have on the self‐esteem and, consequently, on student performance. The goal of this programme was to find the right learning levers to intrigue and excite students in mathematical concepts and their applications. Our hypothesis is that, by considering the learning of mathematics as a continuous process, in which students develop freely through their own experiments, observations, involvement and curiosity, students can achieve improved results on the National Tests (INVALSI). This paper includes results of a survey conducted by children ‐’About Me and Mathematics‘

Computational methods to analyze biological networks from transcriptomics data

openThe regulation of biological processes within each single cell governs all the main cellular mechanisms aimed at the development, differentiation, and proper maintenance of the cell itself. It determines, at the tissue level and more generally at the organism level, the actual role assumed by the cell. It is of vital interest to the scientific and biological community to establish precisely how such regulatory processes are concretized in various cell types, whether they are considered healthy or diseased. Understanding these mechanisms necessarily involves identifying and sequencing the gene products that each cell synthesizes and possesses at a given moment. The technique at the core of this cellular study is called single-cell analysis, which is capable of generating multi-omics data that represent all the main regulatory mechanisms occurring within the isolated and analyzed cells. This technology can be considered as the basis for a more accurate study of the roles' heterogeneity exploited by cells within their respective tissues. In this regard, an effective representation of such processes is provided by gene regulatory networks, a tool of particular interest to the biological and scientific community. However, the inference of such networks remains an unresolved issue, with methods that are not simultaneously effective and efficient. This situation is further complicated by the need to study data from single-cell analyses and multi-omics data, which have a significantly larger dimension than the sequencing data obtained from previous generation technologies. This work aims to analyze two bioinformatics methods for the inference of gene regulatory networks, highlighting their biological potentials and computational limits. Of particular interest, in evaluating these methods for real applicability in experiments with single-cell and multi-omics data, is the scalability of the processes used by such software. This property is also evaluated based on the possibilities for parallelization that these software packages present already in their implementation. This analysis aims to evaluate potential computational improvements, also utilizing the capabilities of parallel computing on GPU architectures. The main tools used to implement these modifications are software libraries considered state-of-the-art in parallel computing, coupled with GPU structures capable of fully exploiting their potential. The improved versions of the two bioinformatics methods show significantly reduced execution times compared to those obtained from the original version, with comparable use of memory and resources

Italian Mediators in Action : the Impact of Style and Attitude

We analyzed a questionnaire sent to Italian mediators. We sought to investigate three areas: style of mediation, personal attitude toward the con\ufb02 ict, and e\ufb00 ectiveness in leading the parties to a negotiated agree- ment in mediation. We found no signi\ufb01 cant correlations between the style of mediation and the attitude of the respondents to the con\ufb02 ict. Respondents with postgraduate training in economics or accounting achieved higher rates of settlement. \ue003 e style of the mediator may be of some use as a paradigm of orientation, but has no su\ufb03 cient predictive value to be con\ufb01 rmed as a key to the functioning of the mediation

The Italian fashion supply chain : the role of e-collaboration in supporting fashion house-labor suppliers relationship

LAUREA MAGISTRALEIl settore della Moda è un ambiente dinamico, caratterizzato da cambiamenti continui. In passato, molte ricerche sono state realizzate in merito ai temi di competitività e attrattività della filiera, principalmente con lo scopo di identificare i fattori di differenziazione più rilevanti. Questo progetto di ricerca ha l’obiettivo di studiare il potenziale impatto che l’e-collaboration ha all’interno della “Fashion Supply Chain”, dando un focus sulla relazione Casa di Moda–Fasonisti. Per cui, inizialmente, attraverso una serie di interviste a un campione di aziende della filiera, si è voluto approfondire: i ruoli e le attività dei principali attori, le interazioni B2B e B2C, con un’analisi dei flussi economici che attraversano la filiera. Ciò ha consentito di ottenere una panoramica completa della Filiera del Fashion a livello nazionale. A seguire, l’analisi è stata realizzata attraverso lo sviluppo di un modello innovativo, con lo scopo di identificare in maniera sintetica ed esaustiva i fattori che maggiormente impattano la scelta e il bisogno di adottare soluzioni digitali, a supporto della relazione. I principali risultati quantitativi sono stati ottenuti attraverso l’implementazione del modello su un campione di case di moda italiane. I risultati quantitativi sono stati ulteriormente rafforzati attraverso l’analisi di tre casi di studio: Loro Piana, Dolce & Gabbana e Moncler. Il modello finale può essere considerato una mappa che fornisce linee guida alle aziende per individuare la migliore soluzione tecnologica, specifica per la propria relazione con i fasonisti, comparando l’attuale posizionamento rispetto a quello dei competitor, e individuando aree di sviluppo.Fashion industry is a fast changing environment. Many studies have been performed among the topic of e-collaboration between fashion companies, aiming at identifying the major differentiating critical factors. This research project aims at understand the level of e-collaboration adoption in the Fashion supply Chain, and investigating the potential impact of the adoption of digital tools, from the Fashion House perspective. To better accomplish the goal, the research was conducted analyzing a sample of companies belonging to the Fashion Industry. This analysis of the main actors, activities, B2C and B2B processes, and the economic perspective allowed to provide a complete and interesting snap-shot of the Italian Fashion sector. Afterwards, the research follows with the development of an innovative holistic framework, which aims at identifying, synthetically and exhaustively, all the fashion companies attributes, characterizing the need of e-collaborative adoption. The definition of the major quantitative results has been fulfilled through the empirical implementation of the above mentioned framework on a sample of Italian Fashion Houses and in respect to their network of labor suppliers. Thus, matching the main analysed factors and the most suitable technological tools, the model can provide a good roadmap to identify best digital tool supporting the relationship, to benchmark companied with the main competitors and also to find interesting solution for driving the change. Specifically, the developed framework is an “incremental innovation” related to the architecture of the model which describes the attributes that drives the fashion companies’ choices in undertaking and modeling their digitalization path. On the other hand, the study of e-collaboration adoption, represents a “disruptive innovation” related to output of the framework architecture. Quantitative results have been further strengthened through the analysis of three practical case studies: Loro Piana, Dolce and Gabbana and Moncler. The most relevant source of data has been represented by the interviews, a questionnaire, past Observatory’s researches. It has been demonstrated that most advanced form of e-collaboration – strategic e-collaboration - in the fashion sector is realized when there is a high level of trust, communication , power and vision - and at the same time a high level of Supply Risk - concerning all the risk factors affecting the relationship between Fashion Houses and Labor suppliers-. Moreover, it has been demonstrated that, not in all the situations, E-collaboration adoption is the best decision: the choice must be taken, connecting the Strength of the relationship and the level of Supply Risk, regarding the relationship in the specific industry. In addition, in the attributes’ design process it should be considered not only the aspect of internal efficiency, but also the overall strategic objectives of the specific relationship. The model gives a great contribution in the literature focusing on the specific characteristic of the fashion sector that influence the adoption e-collaboration among actors. It is also the first time that e-collaboration is studied in this field, considering a group of up-to date main technologies and practices adopted in the industry

Editorial: Bone aging and osteoporosis: recent evidence focusing on plant-based natural products

Various active ingredients from plants, such as polyphenols, polysaccharides, and flavonoids, are considered potential sources of drugs for treating bone aging and osteoporosis (OP) and have been proven to have antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and anti-bone resorption effects; thus, these compounds alleviate bone aging and OP (1, 2). However, unfortunately, studies on many active ingredients from plants with therapeutic potential for OP are still in the laboratory stage rather than being applied in clinical practice. Therefore, we proposed to summarize the research on this Research Topic to promote further discovery and research on plant natural products, and to promote the clinical application of plant-derived natural products. A total of 13 studies were included in this review, and these studies mainly presented the research progress and development of single plant medicines, monomeric compositions, and Chinese patent medicines for the treatment of bone aging-related diseases. The types of articles on this topic were mainly reviews, which can help us better understand the widespread progress of plant-derived natural products in the treatment of bone aging. In addition, we propose that more attention should be given to clinical research and mechanistic explorations of natural plant products

The effects of a cognitive pathway to promote class creative thinking. An experimental study on Italian primary school students

The goal of this experimental research was to demonstrate that creative thinking could be trained in primary school children. After asserting the difficulty to determine a unique definition of creativity \u2013 the concept fits to several fields and areas of interests \u2013 the capacity to produce numerous ideas and to think divergently was chosen as the framework within creativity as a way of thinking that can be assessed and measured. Even though creativity is challenging to define and consequently to operationalize, tests exist with the purpose to evaluate creativity levels in individuals. Starting from the Test of Child Creativity (TCI) an Italian mental reactive aimed at measuring the potential of creative thinking in individual children, a Group Creativity Assessment (gTCI) was made up with the objective to test 224 children belonging to 10 primary school classes (5 second grades and 5 third grades), achieving creativity scores of groups. The aim was to investigate whether children\u2019s attitude to think divergently would improve after participating in a creativity training made up of 10 interactive one-hour long sessions. For that reason, all the sample of children were tested in T0 before the training; afterward 8 out of the 10 classes were weekly trained, before being all 10 classes tested again in T1, 10 weeks after T0. The hypothesis was that the trained classes would have improved in creative thinking, whereas the control groups would have not. It was therefore demonstrated the efficacy of the specific technique to train creative thinking that was conceived, developed and administered to the children

The impact of decision models on self-perceived quality of life: a study on brain cancer patients

Quality of life (QoL) is an increasingly important outcome measure in medicine. Health, in fact, is not only based on functional status but also on psychological and social well being. Since QoL is related to the patient’s perception of their position in life in relation to their goals, expectations, standards and concerns, the way in which the medical context is experienced may be critical. We then hypothesised that self-perceived QoL may be linked to unmet needs in information management and decision involvement. To analyse this hypothesis, we conducted a quantitative study on 84 consecutive patients with a diagnosis of primary high-grade glioma. The functional assessment of cancer therapy-Brain (FACT-Br) scales, the hospital anxiety and depression (HAD) scale and the need evaluation questionnaire (NEQ) questionnaire were used, in order to measure quality-of-life dimension, mood and unmet needs. Patients were classified as having no need (cluster 1), a moderate need (cluster 2) or a high need (cluster 3) to be more involved in the clinical process

Comparing minfulness and tDCS: A study on cognition and creative thinking

The current study investigates the differential effects of neurostimulation, mindfulness, and e-meditation over cognitive and creative performance. 47 healthy participants were randomly assigned to 4 experimental conditions: A) real stimulation, real meditation; B) sham stimulation, real meditation; C) real stimulation, fake meditation; D) real meditation alone. Before and after the treatment, a cognitive, creative, and personality assessment was conducted to investigate its efficacy. Results showed an improved performance on fluency in group C; on convergent thinking and cognitive task in group A; and on divergent thinking in group D. The differential effects of stimulation and mindfulness over different cognitive abilities could be further explored in future research

Chapter Is Three better than Two? A Study on EEG Activity and Imagination Abilities in 2D vs 3D Stimuli

Real and virtual are often considered terms in reciprocal opposition, but the boundaries between the two are blurred. The main goal of our study consists in answering the question whether the presence of a third dimension (3D) is a fundamental step of the virtual toward the real world, and if it causes some difference in the neural activity of the spectator [8]. Also, the possibility to consider real what is virtual will be discussed [6, 7]