Nonostante il fervore che ha caratterizzato gli studi epistolografici negli ultimi anni, ancora poco studiato risulta il settore della trattatistica quattrocentesca. Tuttavia, la pubblicazione di... Show moreNonostante il fervore che ha caratterizzato gli studi epistolografici negli ultimi anni, ancora poco studiato risulta il settore della trattatistica quattrocentesca. Tuttavia, la pubblicazione di alcuni importanti strumenti di ricerca quali il Medieval and Renaissance Letter Treatises and Form Letters (Polak, 1993-2015) o l’ISTC, fa ben sperare per una prossima inversione di tendenza. Per quanto riguarda la produzione in volgare, i cataloghi hanno consentito di identificare quello che è probabilmente il primo manuale stampato, l’anonimo Trattato de li ditamini (ISTC it00427400); sul versante manoscritto essi hanno permesso di rintracciare uno dei primi trattati di ars epistolandi del Quattrocento (cod. 2333, Biblioteca Statale di Lucca), e di identificare nuove testimonianza riconducibili alla “preistoria” del celebre Formulario di epistole missive e responsive di Bartolomeo Miniatore. Tra i documenti registrati nel catalogo del Polak, si propone in queste pagine lo studio di una raccolta di soprascritte e intestazioni con rubriche in volgare composta in area bolognese nell’ultimo quarto del ’400. Si tratta di una tipologia trattatistica particolarmente negletta dalla critica, che in realtà può consentire di riflettere su un passaggio tutt’altro che secondario nella storia dell’epistolografia del Rinascimento: quello cioè dell’evoluzione tre-quattrocentesca della salutatio, una delle sezioni più soggette a riflessione teorica nelle artes medievali. Dal trattatello emerge, infatti, una tipologia epistolare alternativa a quella tradizionalmente in oggetto nei manuali due- trecenteschi, che, per diversi aspetti, risulta simile a quella ancora oggi in uso. Dei Soprascripti si tenta qui un’approfondita descrizione, e se ne pubblica in appendice un ampio estratto. Show less
This article provides a comprehensive analysis of the phonetics and phonology of the Hittite dental stops, which is especially based on a detailed treatment of the usage of the cuneiform signs TA... Show moreThis article provides a comprehensive analysis of the phonetics and phonology of the Hittite dental stops, which is especially based on a detailed treatment of the usage of the cuneiform signs TA and DA in all positions in the word, and in all chronological stages of Hittite. Show less
A common requirement, in field of life sciences, is the quantification of specific cells in a given fluorescent microscopy image. ImageJ is a popular tool for researchers to develop custom scripts... Show moreA common requirement, in field of life sciences, is the quantification of specific cells in a given fluorescent microscopy image. ImageJ is a popular tool for researchers to develop custom scripts for automated cell quantification. Validating the quality of cell quantification measurements is a common challenge for such researchers. The Fluorescent Nuclei Measurements Macro (FNMM) was developed to assist researchers performing cell quantification by presenting the results in an intuitive manner whilst simultaneously facilitating processed data collection and measurement assurance. Show less
Research on terrorism has long been criticized for its inability to overcome enduring methodological issues. These include an overreliance on secondary sources and the associated literature review... Show moreResearch on terrorism has long been criticized for its inability to overcome enduring methodological issues. These include an overreliance on secondary sources and the associated literature review methodology, a scarcity of statistical analyses, a tendency for authors to work alone rather than collaborate with colleagues, and the large number of one-time contributors to the field. However, the reviews that have brought these issues to light describe the field as it developed until 2007. This article investigates to what extent these issues have endured in the 2007–2016 period by constructing a database on all of the articles published in nine leading journals on terrorism (N = 3442). The results show that the use of primary data has increased considerably and is continuing to do so. Scholars have also begun to adapt a wider variety of data-gathering techniques, greatly diminishing the overreliance on literature reviews that was noted from the 1980s through to the early 2000s. These positive changes should not obscure enduring issues. Despite improvements, most scholars continue to work alone and most authors are one-time contributors. Overall, however, the field of terrorism studies appears to have made considerable steps towards addressing long-standing issues. Show less
Ransomware is malicious software (malware) that blocks access to someone’s com- puter system or files on the system and subsequently demands a ransom to be paid for unlocking the computer or files.... Show moreRansomware is malicious software (malware) that blocks access to someone’s com- puter system or files on the system and subsequently demands a ransom to be paid for unlocking the computer or files. Ransomware is considered one of the main threats in cybercrime today. Cryptoware is a specific type of ransomware, which encrypts files on computer systems. The ransom is often demanded in bitcoins. Based on desk research, a series of interviews, and the investigation of several police files, this paper investi- gates the modi operandi in which cybercriminals use ransomware and cryptoware to make profits and how they launder these profits. Two models, based on the payment of the ransom via vouchers and via bitcoins respectively, are identified and described. These methods allow criminals to launder profits in relative anonymity and prevent the seizure of the illegally obtained money. Show less
Needle electromyography (EMG) is a common technique used in clinical neurophysiology to record the electrical activity of muscles at different levels of activation. It can be used to diagnose... Show moreNeedle electromyography (EMG) is a common technique used in clinical neurophysiology to record the electrical activity of muscles at different levels of activation. It can be used to diagnose various neurological/muscular disorders, as the EMG signals of patients with both nerve diseases (neuropathies) andmuscle diseases (myopathies) differ from the signal in healthy controls. A major drawback of this examination is that it relies on visual inspection and as such, it is highly subjective and prone to errors. Based on EMG time series of 65 individuals (40 with ALS/IBM and 25 healthy), we aim to develop an automated machine-learning pipeline for the classification of EMG recordings of muscles in either disease or healthy (muscle-level). The automated pipeline consists of feature extraction, feature selection, modelling algorithm, and optimization, in which the most significant features are automatically selected from the feature space and the hyperparameters of the model are optimized by a Bayesian technique as part of the automatedapproach. Aside from the muscle-level approach, we also explore a patient-level approach, which uses the output of the muscle-level automated pipeline in a post-processing manner to classify patients in being either disease or healthy, based on their muscle recordings. The resulting two approaches yield an AUC scoreof 81.7% (muscle-level) and 81.5% (patient-level), indicating that such approaches can assist clinicians in diagnosing if a patient has a neuropathy/myopathy or is healthy. Show less
