Leveraging Collaboration and Peer Support to Initiate and Sustain a Faculty Development Program

In today’s impoverished higher education fiscal climate, especially considering the enormous financial implications to higher education of accommodating the changes required by the coronavirus pandemic, “nonessential” though highly important programs, such as centers for teaching and learning (CTLs), are very likely to be underfunded. In this study, we illustrate how underfunded programs can leverage peer collaboration and support to initiate productive, formal systems of assistance for faculty by describing a number of such programs developed by and/or coordinated by our CTL. Moreover, we propose that sustainable programs, especially at small liberal arts institutions, must include a strong component of peer networking and in-house expertise rather than relying on outside consulting services. In a climate of shrinking dollars, CTLs can still perform some key roles effectively while continuing to advocate for more adequate funding.

Straniamenti e spaesamenti di Luigi Gualdo

Estrangement and Out-of-Placeness in the Works of Luigi Gualdo Characters and places between ideal and reality, cosmopolitanism and uprooting This paper focuses on the different forms of estrangement and out-of-placeness which can be found in Luigi Gualdo’s works. Gualdo (1844-1898) was a prominent writer whose works are influenced by French realism and Parnasse, Italian scapigliatura and the European decadence and estheticism. Moreover, he lived between France and Italy and he was one of the main passeurs between French and Italian literature of his time. This particular condition of the writer is reflected in his works and in particular in the portraiture of his characters, which are often rootless artists and mundane women with a strong component of cosmopolitism. The aim of this paper is to analyse some of the characteristics and features of Gualdo’s characters according to the parameters of estrangement and out-of-placeness. In particular I will focus on the ambiguous nature of the relation between ideal world and reality, of artistic genius and its place in society and the normal world, as well as on more specific topics related to the subject, such as spleen, places described as theatrical decors, hotel rooms and feminine nomadic attitudes, cosmopolitism as both a challenge and an opportunity for the characters. I will conclude on a specific issue regarding the struggle between the estranged character, time, and aging.

Neighborhood Conditions for Super-λ′ Digraphs

Restricted arc-connectivity is a more refined network reliability index than arc-connectivity. An arc subset [Formula: see text] of a strong digraph [Formula: see text] is a restricted arc-cut of [Formula: see text] if [Formula: see text] has a non-trivial strong component [Formula: see text] such that [Formula: see text] contains an arc. The restricted arc-connectivity is the minimum cardinality over all restricted arc-cuts of [Formula: see text]. A strong digraph is super-[Formula: see text] if its restricted arc-connectivity is maximal and the number of its minimum restricted arc-cuts is minimal. In this paper, we present some neighborhood conditions for a digraph to be super-[Formula: see text].

Sex, mating and repeatability of Drosophila melanogaster longevity

Costs of reproduction are seemingly ubiquitous across the animal kingdom, and these reproductive costs are generally defined by increased reproduction leading to decreases in other fitness components, often longevity. However, some recent reports question whether reproductive costs exist in every species or population. To provide insight on this issue, we sought to determine the extent to which genetic variation might play a role in one type of reproductive cost—survival—using Drosophila melanogaster . We found, surprisingly, no costs of reproduction nor sex differences in longevity across all 15 genetic backgrounds in two cohorts. We did find significant variation within some genotypes, though these were much smaller than expected. We also observed that small laboratory changes lead to significant changes in longevity within genotypes, suggesting that longevity repeatability in flies may be difficult. We finally compared our results to previously published longevities and found that reproducibility is similar to what we saw in our own laboratory, further suggesting that stochasticity is a strong component of fruit fly lifespan. Overall, our results suggest that there are still large gaps in our knowledge about the effects of sex and mating, as well as genetic background and laboratory conditions on lifespan reproducibility.

The Acceleration of Outer-Belt Electrons by Localized Electric Fields

To explain the populations of the outer-belt energetic electrons, including relativistic electrons, that sporadically appear in the magnetosphere, a mechanism was proposed long ago for the acceleration of those electrons by short-term bursts of the electric field, which appear on the night side during substorm disturbances (Kropotkin, 1996). This mechanism can be substantially specified if the modern concepts of bursty bulk flows in the geomagnetic tail, the occurrence of dipolarization fronts, and the excitation of localized field-aligned-resonant poloidal Alfvén oscillations involving a strong component of the electric field in the dawn-dusk direction are taken into account.

The role of edible insects to mitigate challenges for sustainability

This review is focused on the utilization of insects as a new opportunity in food and feed products, including their commercialization both in traditional and new markets. It has been suggested that insects are considerably more sustainable when compared with other sources of animal protein, thus alleviating the pressure over the environment and the planet facing the necessity to feed the world population, constantly increasing. Many chefs have adhered to the trend of using insects in their culinary preparations, bringing insects to the plan of top gastronomy, highlighting their organoleptic qualities allied to a recognized high nutritional value. However, in some markets, insects or insect-based products are not readily accepted because of neophobia and disgust. Moreover, the insect markets, farming, and commercialization are experiencing a huge growth, in which the domain of animal feed is undoubtedly a very strong component. The future of insects as human food and animal feed seems promising in view of the recent trends and challenges.

Professoras de Educação do Campo e resistência: as brechas no habitus docente

This work analyzes teaching practices which refer to resistance in teaching habitus. We carried out a case study involving teachers graduated in the first classes of the Rural Education degree course. We assume that a student graduation engaged in the rural education struggles must train teachers whose teaching practices escapes the education structuring habitus in general, producing resistance also in the pedagogical field. The results point to the production of ways of resistance through tactics in which they improvise in the shortage of necessary materials and equipment; in which they share the little they have and make it a reason for reflection; in which they problematize the lived situations in daily life by teachers and students and make this a material and pedagogical activity; in which they redesign the circular distribution of students in the class and make the dynamics of relations break the linearity. In contrast, the rigid way in which education is organized as a whole - which is a strong component of the habitus - keeps framing/limiting initiatives, pointed to the constant need to problematize the curriculum, school times and social places occupied by the school and teachers.

ON THE PROSPECTS OF NEUROCYBERNETIC (STRONG) ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN BANKING

In the article “artificial intelligence” (AI) is considered as a multi-element system; in its composition, the author identifies objects of industrial property and, first of all, the neurocomputer interface, which in the future can become a “thinking”, “strong” component of this system. It is proved that the fact of using industrial property in a credit institution is not identical to the use of AI in it (an answering machine and a computer that is supplemented with data by an operator can hardly be called a “robot”, as well as a program that processes information faster than a person to open a Bank account, etc.). in this context, promising directions are described; so, if at the beginning of 2021, as the top managers of Sberbank claim, its Neurocomputers will be able to independently make decisions on issuing small loans without further approval by the Bank’s employees on the basis of a combined analysis of the client’s biometric data, credit history, income and expenses, then it will be possible to state the Genesis of the formation of a «strong» AI in banking.

Reducing Flood Risk in Changing Environments: Optimal Location and Sizing of Stormwater Tanks Considering Climate Change

In recent years, there has been an increase in the frequency of urban floods as a result of three determinant factors: the reduction in systems’ capacity due to aging, a changing environment that has resulted in alterations in the hydrological cycle, and the reduction of the permeability of watersheds due to urban growth. Due to this, a question that every urban area must answer is: Are we ready to face these new challenges? The renovation of all the pipes that compose the drainage system is not a feasible solution, and, therefore, the use of new solutions is an increasing trend, leading to a new operational paradigm where water is stored in the system and released at a controlled rate. Hence, technologies, such as stormwater tanks, are being implemented in different cities. This research sought to understand how Climate Change would affect future precipitation, and based on the results, applied two different approaches to determine the optimal location and sizing of storage units, through the application of the Simulated Annealing and Pseudo-Genetic Algorithms. In this process, a strong component of computational modeling was applied in order to allow the optimization algorithms to efficiently reach near-optimal solutions. These approaches were tested in two stormwater networks at Bogotá, Colombia, considering three different rainfall scenarios.

Mediação cultural: peixe que puxa carroça nas Ruínas Romanas de Troia

The enhancement project of the Roman fish-salting production centre of Troia began in 2006 with a strong component of cultural mediation answering the demand of the public. This mediation continued as a natural development of the investigation and valorization of the site, opened to the public in 2011, and became a proposal of cultural activities and a strong investment in heritage education. Several “carts” have been pulling this cultural mediation, such as the visit of the site, and specially the guided tour, but also school programs and thematic animations for children and adults through small and large events. The main goal is the knowledge and the recognition of the monument as cultural inheritance to be respected and preserved.